produce artistic effects. I say my memory paints it again for me; but it
is only a memory, a shadow that my mind sees; and how can I describe to
you a shadow? When words are but phantoms themselves, how can I use them
to set forth a phantom?

Whenever the grandeur of the cliffs had wearied me, as one grows weary
sometimes of too long and too close a study of what is great, there was
a little, enclosed, quiet graveyard that lay in the very lap of the
island, where I could go for rest. It was a small patch of ground, a
God's acre, shut in on every side by high hedge-rows, which hid every
view from sight except that of the heavens brooding over it. Nothing was
to be seen but the long mossy mounds above the dead, and the great,
warm, sunny dome rising above them. Even the church was not there, for
it was built in another spot, and had a few graves of its own scattered
about it.

I was sitting there one evening in the early spring, after the sun had
dipped below the line of the high hedge-row, though it was still shining
in level rays through it. No sound had disturbed the deep silence for a
long time, except the twittering of birds among the branches; for up
here even the sea could not be heard when it was calm. I suppose my face
was sad, as most human faces are apt to be when the spirit is busy in
its citadel, and has left the outworks of the eyes and mouth to
themselves. So I was sitting quiet, with my hands clasped about my
knees, and my face bent down, when a grave, low voice at my side
startled me back to consciousness. Tardif was standing beside me, and
looking down upon me with a world of watchful anxiety in his deep eyes.

"You are sad, mam'zelle," he said; "too sad for one so young as you
are."