BOOK III.


CHAPTER I.

Certes, the lizard is a shy and timorous creature. He runs into
chinks and crannies if you come too near to him, and sheds his very
tail for fear, if you catch it by the tip. He has not his being in
good society: no one cages him, no one pets. He is an idle vagrant.
But when he steals through the green herbage, and basks unmolested
in the sun, he crowds perhaps as much enjoyment into one summer hour
as a parrot, however pampered and erudite, spreads over a whole
drawing-room life spent in saying "How dye do" and "Pretty Poll."

ON that dull and sombre summer morning in which the grandfather and
grandchild departed from the friendly roof of Mr. Merle, very dull and
very sombre were the thoughts of little Sophy. She walked slowly behind
the gray cripple, who had need to lean so heavily on his staff, and her
eye had not even a smile for the golden buttercups that glittered on dewy
meads alongside the barren road.

Thus had they proceeded apart and silent till they had passed the second
milestone. There, Waife, rousing from his own reveries, which were
perhaps yet more dreary than those of the dejected child, halted
abruptly, passed his hand once or twice rapidly over his forehead, and,
turning round to Sophy, looked into her face with great kindness as she
came slowly to his side.

"You are sad, little one?" said he.