where St. Aubyn stood ready to commence the ceremony. He whispered to Francesca, as she knelt, "The ring I have for you was once my mother's—I can give you no dearer pledge."
"Ah!" exclaimed she, in a choked and agitated voice, "it belongs, then, to the dead!"
The service proceeded; and the voice which had so little while since spoken the solemn farewell to a departed soul, now pronounced its blessing over the hopes and happiness of the living.
As Francesca knelt at the altar, there was a melancholy earnestness in her large black eyes, a spiritual expression on her pale features, that Lucy often recalled. She herself wept, for the recollection came often and bitter, that this was the last time they should ever meet; and the difficulties and dangers her companion was about to encounter rose with every possible exaggeration to her mind. Francesca seemed as if her feelings admitted not the weakness of tears; yet it was sad to leave almost the only friend she had ever known, and the grave of one so beloved as her brother. By that grave she had passed that very night, and, in the agitation and hurry, without one prayer or thought; yet, even while kneeling at Evelyn's side, it rose upon her mind as if she had slighted some dear friend.
