“However, at first all things went well.  My Lord was as gay as gay could be:  and never would come inside the carriage, when a decent horse could be got to ride.  He would gallop in front, at a reckless pace, without a weapon of any kind, delighted with the pure blue air, and throwing his heart around him.  Benita had never seen any man so admirable, and so childish.  As innocent as an infant; and not only contented, but noisily happy with anything.  Only other people must share his joy; and the shadow of sorrow scattered it, though it were but the shade of poverty.

“Here Benita wept a little; and I liked her none the less, and believed her ten times more; in virtue of a tear or two.

“And so they travelled through Northern Italy, and throughout the south of France, making their way anyhow; sometimes in coaches, sometimes in carts, sometimes upon mule-back, sometimes even a-foot and weary; but always as happy as could be.  The children laughed, and grew, and throve (especially the young lady, the elder of the two), and Benita began to think that omens must not be relied upon.  But suddenly her faith in omens was confirmed for ever.

“My Lord, who was quite a young man still, and laughed at English arrogance, rode on in front of his wife and friends, to catch the first of a famous view, on the French side of the Pyrenee hills.  He kissed his hand to his wife, and said that he would save her the trouble of coming.  For those two were so one in one, that they could make each other know whatever he or she had felt.  And so my Lord went round the corner, with a fine young horse leaping up at the steps.

“They waited for him, long and long; but he never came again; and within a week, his mangled body lay in a little chapel-yard; and if the priests only said a quarter of the prayers they took the money for, God knows they can have no throats left; only a relaxation.

“My lady dwelled for six months more—­it is a melancholy tale (what true tale is not so?)—­scarcely able to believe that all her fright was not a dream.  She would not wear a piece or shape of any mourning-clothes; she would not have a person cry, or any sorrow among us.  She simply disbelieved the thing, and trusted God to right it.  The Protestants, who have no faith, cannot understand this feeling.  Enough that so it was; and so my Lady went to heaven.

“For when the snow came down in autumn on the roots of the Pyrenees, and the chapel-yard was white with it, many people told the lady that it was time for her to go.  And the strongest plea of all was this, that now she bore another hope of repeating her husband’s virtues.  So at the end of October, when wolves came down to the farm-lands, the little English family went home towards their England.

“They landed somewhere on the Devonshire coast, ten or eleven years agone, and stayed some days at Exeter; and set out thence in a hired coach, without any proper attendance, for Watchett, in the north of Somerset.  For the lady owned a quiet mansion in the neighbourhood of that town, and her one desire was to find refuge there, and to meet her lord, who was sure to come (she said) when he heard of his new infant.  Therefore with only two serving-men and two maids (including Benita), the party set forth from Exeter, and lay the first night at Bampton.