had retained their colour, that forbade any expression of sympathy. The
least experienced of mankind would have seen at a glance that she was
the proudest of women, and would have guessed that she must be one of
the most reticent. She moved and spoke as though Sigmundskron were
still what it had been in former days, and she had brought up her only
child to be as much like herself, as it was possible that anything so
young and fair could resemble what was already a type of age and
gravity.

Poverty is too insignificant a word to describe the state in which the
mother and daughter lived, and had lived for many years. They had no
means of subsistence whatever beyond the pension accorded to the widow
of Lieutenant von Sigmundskron, 'fallen on the field of honour,' as the
official report had expressed it, in the murderous war with France. He
had been the last of his name and at the time of his death had no
relations living; two years earlier he had married a girl as penniless
and as noble as himself, and had lived to see a daughter born, destined
to inherit his nobility, his penury, and the bare walls of his
ancestral home.

Sigmundskron had been a very grand castle in its day, and the half-
ruined walls of the old stronghold still rose majestically from the
summit of the crag. Indeed the ruin was more apparent than real as yet,
and a few thousands judiciously expended upon the masonry would have
sufficed to restore the buildings to their original completeness. Many
a newly enriched merchant or banker would have paid a handsome price
for the place, though the land was gone and the government owned the
forest up to the very foot of the rock. But the Lady of Sigmundskron
would rather have starved to death in her vaulted chamber than have
taken half the gold in Swabia to sign away her dead husband's home.