of delight in the soft elasticity of the wet grass
under his feet and in the shy, wondering eyes of
the wild spring flowers by the roadside. In a
thorn-acacia bush at the edge of a little strip of
wood a bird was building a nest, and flew up as he
passed with a startled cry and a quick fluttering of
brown wings.

He tried to keep his mind fixed upon the devout
meditations proper to the eve of Good Friday.
But thoughts of Montanelli and Gemma got so
much in the way of this devotional exercise that at
last he gave up the attempt and allowed his fancy
to drift away to the wonders and glories of the
coming insurrection, and to the part in it that he
had allotted to his two idols. The Padre was to
be the leader, the apostle, the prophet before
whose sacred wrath the powers of darkness were
to flee, and at whose feet the young defenders of
Liberty were to learn afresh the old doctrines,
the old truths in their new and unimagined
significance.

And Gemma? Oh, Gemma would fight at
the barricades. She was made of the clay from
which heroines are moulded; she would be the
perfect comrade, the maiden undefiled and unafraid,
of whom so many poets have dreamed. She
would stand beside him, shoulder to shoulder,
rejoicing under the winged death-storm; and they