gave Don Louis Quijada so distinguished an appearance.

True, his greeting was more eager and cordial than the genuine "sosiego"
--which means "repose"--would have permitted. Even the manner in which
Wolf expressed his pleasure in the new melody of Barbara's voice, and
whispered an entreaty to send the children and Frau Lamperi--who came to
greet him--away for a short time, was anything but patient.

What had he in view?

Yet it must be something good.

When the light shone through her flower-decked window upon his face,
she thought she perceived this by the smile hovering around his lips.
She was not mistaken, nor did she wait long for the joyous tidings she
expected; his desire to tell her what, with the exception of the regent--
to whom his travelling companion, the Grand Prior Don Luis de Avila, was
perhaps just telling it as King Philip's envoy--no human being in the
Netherlands could yet know, was perhaps not much less than hers to hear
it.

Scarcely an hour before he had dismounted in Brussels with the nobleman,
and his first visit was to her, whom his news must render happy, even
happier than it did him and the woman in the house near the palace, whose
heart cherished the Emperor's son scarcely less warmly than his own
mother's.

On the long journey hither he had constantly anticipated the pleasure of
telling every incident in succession, just as it had happened; but
Barbara interrupted his first sentence with an inquiry how her John was