is quartered in the suburb, and that there is a report of a rising in
Hertfordshire."

"When will peace come to England and to me!" sighed Sibyll.




CHAPTER IV.

THE WORLD'S JUSTICE, AND THE WISDOM OF OUR ANCESTORS.

The night had now commenced, and Sibyll was still listening--or,
perhaps, listening not--to the soothing babble of the venerable
servant. They were both seated in the little room that adjoined the
hall, and their only light came through the door opening on the
garden,--a gray, indistinct twilight, relieved by the few earliest
stars. The peacock, his head under his wing, roosted on the
balustrade, and the song of the nightingale, from amidst one of the
neighbouring copses, which studded the ground towards the chase of
Marybone, came soft and distant on the serene air. The balm and
freshness of spring were felt in the dews, in the skies, in the sweet
breath of young herb and leaf; through the calm of ever-watchful
nature, it seemed as if you might mark, distinct and visible, minute
after minute, the blessed growth of April into May.

Suddenly Madge uttered a cry of alarm, and pointed towards the
opposite wall. Sibyll, startled from her revery, looked up, and saw
something dusk and dwarf-like perched upon the crumbling eminence.
Presently this apparition leaped lightly into the garden, and the