threw her into this abnormal sleep. In it the impulse to utterance,
still unsatisfied, so wrought within her unable, yet compliant form,
that she could not rest, but rose and walked. And now, a fresh surge
from the sea of her unknown being, unrepressed by the _hitherto_ of the
objects of sense, had burst the gates and bars, swept the obstructions
from its channel, and poured from her in melodious song.

The first green lobes, at least, of these thoughts, appeared above the
soil of my mind, while I sat and gazed on the sleeping girl. And now I
had once more the delight of watching a spirit-dawn, a soul-rise, in
that lovely form. The light flushing of its pallid sky was, as before,
the first sign. I dreaded the flash of lovely flame, and the outburst of
regnant anger, ere I should have time to say that I was not to blame.
But when, at length, the full dawn, the slow sunrise came, it was with
all the gentleness of a cloudy summer morn. Never did a more celestial
rosy red hang about the skirts of the level sun, than deepened and
glowed upon her face, when, opening her eyes, she saw me beside her. She
covered her face with her hands; and instead of the words of indignant
reproach which I dreaded to hear, she murmured behind the snowy screen:
"I am glad you have broken your promise."

My heart gave a bound and was still. I grew faint with delight. "No," I
said; "I have not broken my promise, Lady Alice; I have struggled nearly
to madness to keep it--and I have kept it."

"I have come then of myself. Worse and worse! But it is their fault."

Tears now found their way through the repressing fingers. I could not
endure to see her weep. I knelt beside her, and, while she still covered
her face with her hands, I said--I do not know what I said. They were