He carried forth with his own hands a number of things that were necessary for the journey.  His fleetest horses were attached to the vehicle; and, although they strained their bits and pawed the ground as if impatient for the road, the postillion lashed them fiercely as they dashed through the gateway.

In a moment, and almost as if by magic, the coach was on the road to Antwerp and hidden from the staring crowd by a cloud of dust.

CHAPTER XI.

Suppose that we too take a trip in fancy to Nancy, in France, in search of poor De Vlierbeck and his daughter.  Let us wind through an immense number of narrow streets in the quarter known as the Old Town and at last halt at the door of an humble cobbler.  This is the place.  Pass through the shop, mount the staircase; another story yet; open that door, and here we are.

Every thing indicates poverty; but order and neatness preside over the room.  The curtains of the little bed are white as snow, the stove is polished with black-lead till it shines, and the floor is sanded in Flemish style.  Mignonette and violets bloom in a box on the window-sill, and a bird chirps in its cage above them.  A young woman sits in front of the window; but she is so intent on the linen she is sewing that no other sound is heard in the silent room but that made by the motion of her hands as they guide the needle.  She is dressed in the plainest garments; yet they are cut and put on so gracefully that one may declare at a glance she is a lady.

Poor Lenora!  And this was what fate had in store for thee!  To hide thy noble birth under the humble roof of a mechanic; to seek a refuge from insult and contempt far from thy childhood’s home; to work without relaxation; to fight against privation and want, and to sink at last into shame and poverty, heart-broken by despair!  Misery, doubtless, has cast a yellow tinge upon thy cheeks and stolen its radiance from thy glance.  But no! thank God, it is not so!  Thy heroic blood has strengthened thee against fate, and thy beauty is even more ravishing than of old!  If a cloistered life has chastened thy roses, their tender bloom has only become more touching.  Thy brow has grown loftier and purer; thine eyes still glisten beneath their sweeping lashes; and that well-remembered smile still hovers around thy coral lips!

Suddenly Lenora stopped working.  Her hands rested on the work in her lap, her head bent forward, her eyes were riveted dreamily on the ground, and her soul, wandering perhaps to other lands, seemed to abandon itself on the current of a happy reverie.  After a while she placed the linen she had been sewing on a chair and got up slowly.  Leaning languidly on the window-frame, she gathered a few violets, played with them a while, and then looked abroad at the sky over the roof-tops, as if longing to breathe once more the fresh air and enjoy the spring.  Soon her eyes fixed themselves compassionately on the bird that hopped about its cage and ever and anon struck its bill against the wires as if striving to get out.