The mosses and marsh were lovely and the
clear pools full of living creatures. But these things were not
saint-blessed and eternal. No spring fed these silent wells, no holy man of
old had ever smiled upon them.
A stepping-stone by a wall lay before her now; this she crossed, heard the
stream murmuring peace, and hastened, and presently stood beside it. Here
were holy ground and water; here were peace and a place to pray in. Blue
forget-me-nots looked wondering up, seeing eyes as blue as their own, and
she smiled at them and drank of the ripples that ran at their roots. Gray
through the growing haze of green, a ruined wall showed close to the girl.
The blackthorns' blooms were faded around her, the hawthorn was not yet
powdered with white. She cast one look to right and left before entering
the chapel. A distant view of the moorland rose to the sky, and the ragged
edge of the hills was marked by a gaunt engine-stack noting past
enterprise, triumphs long gone by, ruined hopes but recently dead. Snug
fox-covers of rhododendron swept up toward the head of the coomb; and
below, distant half a mile or more, cottages already showed a glimmer of
gold on their thatches where the increasing splendor of day brightened
them, and morning mists were raising jeweled arms. Then Joan passed into
the ruin through that narrow opening which marks the door of it. The
granite walls now stand about the height of a man's shoulder and the
chamber itself is small.
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