was annihilated, and it seemed to have suddenly come down to her. She slowly retraced her steps, catching a glimpse, now and then, of the graceful curve of the fountain spray through the openings of the trees on either side, and stopped at a flower bed in front of the house laid out in the form of a circle, which had been preserved with scrupulous care in the exact style originally designed by her father. It comprised some of the rarest plants of the season, now in luxuriant bloom; and, glistening in their tear-drops of dew she thought they never looked half so beautiful before.
She stooped lovingly down to fondle them, as she had done in years gone by, when she pointed out triumphantly to her father some new law she had discovered relative to their organization and growth. While thus engaged. Earnest came up the walk, bringing her his hands full of pond lilies he had that morning gathered. She was dressed in a simple white morning wrapper with no ornament whatever, and the glossy ringlet which had received more than its usual care, looked glossier than ever, as, disengaging itself from the others, it gently swayed in the shining rays of the morning sun.
He had never seen her in one of those trance-like states necessary to display her spiritual beauty, when she was so much at peace with herself and all the world that nothing could disturb her serenity. She was not communicative at such times, the communings of her thoughts being of a character too intensely spiritual to be symbolized in human language. Ernest
