with an air so composed and melancholy that he might have been taken for
one of the marble knights that sometimes are found on tombs.

"You are surprised to see me, dear Agnes," he said, with a calm, slow
utterance, like a man who has assumed a position he means fully to
justify; "but I have watched day and night, ever since I saw you, to
find one moment to speak with you alone."

"My Lord," said Agnes, "I humbly wait your pleasure. Anything that a
poor maiden may rightly do I will endeavor, in all loving duty."

"Whom do you take me for, Agnes, that you speak thus?" said the
cavalier, smiling sadly.

"Are you not the brother of our gracious King?" said Agnes.

"No, dear maiden; and if the kind promise you lately made me is founded
on this mistake, it may be retracted."

"No, my Lord," said Agnes,--"though I now know not who you are, yet if
in any strait or need you seek such poor prayers as mine, God forbid I
should refuse them!"

"I am, indeed, in strait and need, Agnes; the sun does not shine on a
more desolate man than I am,--one more utterly alone in the world; there
is no one left to love me. Agnes, can you not love me a little?--let it
be ever so little, it shall content me."

It was the first time that words of this purport had ever been addressed
to Agnes; but they were said so simply, so sadly, so tenderly, that they