“Whited sepulchres,” answered Johnnie, indebted for his wit to his wool-gathering.

This put an end to the catechising.  Mrs. Glasford glanced round at Hugh, whose defection she had seen with indignation, and who, waiting for them by the roadside, had heard the last question and reply, with an expression that seemed to attribute any defect in the answer, entirely to the carelessness of the tutor, and the withdrawal of his energies from her boys to that “saucy quean, Meg Elginbrod.”

CHAPTER IX.

Nature.

When the Soul is kindled or enlightened by the Holy Ghost, then it beholds what God its Father does, as a Son beholds what his Father does at Home in his own House.—­Jacob BEHMEN’S Aurora—­Law’s Translation.

Margaret began to read Wordsworth, slowly at first, but soon with greater facility.  Ere long she perceived that she had found a friend; for not only did he sympathize with her in her love for nature, putting many vague feelings into thoughts, and many thoughts into words for her, but he introduced her to nature in many altogether new aspects, and taught her to regard it in ways which had hitherto been unknown to her.  Not only was the pine wood now dearer to her than before, but its mystery seemed more sacred, and, at the same time, more likely to be one day solved.  She felt far more assuredly the presence of a spirit in nature,

     “Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns,
      And the round ocean, and the living air;”

for he taught her to take wider views of nature, and to perceive and feel the expressions of more extended aspects of the world around her.  The purple hill-side was almost as dear to her as the fir-wood now; and the star that crowned its summit at eve, sparkled an especial message to her, before it went on its way up the blue.  She extended her rambles in all directions, and began to get with the neighbours the character of an idle girl.  Little they knew how early she rose, and how diligently she did her share of the work, urged by desire to read the word of God in his own handwriting; or rather, to pore upon that expression of the face of God, which, however little a man may think of it, yet sinks so deeply into his nature, and moulds it towards its own likeness.

Nature was doing for Margaret what she had done before for Wordsworth’s Lucy:  she was making of her “a lady of her own.”  She grew taller and more graceful.  The lasting quiet of her face began to look as if it were ever upon the point of blossoming into an expression of lovely feeling.  The principal change was in her mouth, which became delicate and tender in its curves, the lips seeming to kiss each other for very sweetness.  But I am anticipating these changes, for it took a far longer time to perfect them than has yet been occupied by my story.

But even her mother was not altogether proof against the appearance of listlessness and idleness which Margaret’s behaviour sometimes wore to her eyes; nor could she quite understand or excuse her long lonely walks; so that now and then she could not help addressing her after this fashion: