entreat you, come; if you linger thus, the man may take courage and
attack us yet. There! that's right! Is the pain very great?"

"I do not mind the pain," murmered Madeline; "but if he should think we
intrude? His habits are so reserved--so secluded; indeed I fear--"

"Intrude!" interrupted Ellinor. "Do you think so ill of him?--Do you
suppose that, hermit as he is, he has lost common humanity? But lean more
on me, dearest; you do not know how strong I am!"

Thus alternately chiding, caressing, and encouraging her sister, Ellinor
led on the sufferer, till they had crossed the plain, though with
slowness and labour, and stood before the porch of the Recluse's house.
They had looked back from time to time, but the cause of so much alarm
appeared no more. This they deemed a sufficient evidence of the justice
of their apprehensions.

Madeline would even now fain have detained her sister's hand from the
bell that hung without the porch half imbedded in ivy; but Ellinor, out
of patience--as she well might be--with her sister's unseasonable
prudence, refused any longer delay. So singularly still and solitary was
the plain around the house, that the sound of the bell breaking the
silence, had in it something startling, and appeared in its sudden and
shrill voice, a profanation to the deep tranquillity of the spot. They
did not wait long--a step was heard within--the door was slowly unbarred,
and the Student himself stood before them.

He was a man who might, perhaps, have numbered some five and thirty
years; but at a hasty glance, he would have seemed considerably younger.
He was above the ordinary stature; though a gentle, and not ungraceful