back afterwards; the link died in about two weeks," said the dealer in
wild animals, with a smile that curled his mustache into his ears, and a
glance at Colonel Ellison. "He may have been bruised, I suppose. He may
have been homesick. Perhaps he was never a very strong link. The link is
a curious animal, miss," he said to Kitty, in conclusion.

They had been slowly climbing the mountain road, from which, on either
hand, the pasturelands fell away in long, irregular knolls and hollows.
The tops were quite barren, but in the little vales, despite the stones,
a short grass grew very thick and tenderly green, and groups of kine
tinkled their soft bells in a sweet, desultory assonance as they cropped
the herbage. Below, the bay filled the oval of the hills with its sunny
expanse, and the white steamer, where she lay beside the busy wharf, and
the black lumber-ships, gave their variety to the pretty scene, which
was completed by the picturesque villages on the shore. It was a very
simple sight, but somehow very touching, as if the soft spectacle were
but a respite from desolation and solitude; as indeed it was.

Mr. Arbuton must have been talking of travel elsewhere, for now he said
to Mrs. Ellison, "This looks like a bit of Norway; the bay yonder might
very well be a fjord of the Northern sea."

Mrs. Ellison murmured her sense of obligation to the bay, the fjord, and
Mr. Arbuton, for their complaisance, and Kitty remembered that he had
somewhat snubbed her the night before for attributing any suggestive
grace to the native scenery. "Then you've really found something in an
American landscape. I suppose we ought to congratulate it," she said, in
smiling enjoyment of her triumph.

The colonel looked at her with eyes of humorous question; Mrs. Ellison