must submit, the knowledge of their cause would render her no happier.

Great changes had, however, taken place since their union; the stormy reign of Stephen was over, and the land seemed to sleep after his death, as if war itself was wearied, and had laid down to slumber when its great mover cast off his steel vestments for a shroud, and gave up the tumult of battle for the quiet of the tomb.

Henry the Second was expected daily in England, and so well had he arranged matters before Stephen's death, that no attempts were made to prevent his access to the throne. Rumour spoke loudly of his entry, for he had recently wedded Eleanor the divorced wife of Louis the Seventh of France, and daughter and heiress of William the Ninth, Earl of Poictou and Duke of Aquitaine, and through this marriage he had become the heir of her extensive possessions, which, united to his own, stretched far along the sea-coast from Picardy to the Pyrenees, and made him at once master of the greater part of France. Never had any English

king possessed so much continental territory; and well did the few know (who were in heart opposed to his accession to the throne of England,) that all their forces would be inadequate to oppose the power of such a monarch, who by his own right could command the whole forces of Normandy, the wide domains of Anjou and Maine, and place himself at the head of those vast provinces which extended from the Loire to the very feet of the mountainous barriers of France.

All England rung again with the rumour of his vast possessions. Even the disaffected and oppressed Saxons looked up to his coming with hope, for they believed that he would sway the sceptre with justice, and as he himself had descended on his mother's side from the Saxons, trusted that the animosities which had so long existed between the two races, would speedily terminate. The heart of the young bride also beat high with hope, for she had received tidings that her brave husband would come over in

Henry's train, nor had he ever before been so long absent. So stood matters at the time we may suppose our story commences, for the first chapter was but a necessary introduction.

It was on a gusty evening in December, when the snow lay deep on the ground, that the young bride sat by her bower window in the turret, awaiting the return of her husband, for on that day he had promised to be with her, should the winds prove favourable. She had set off her beautiful figure to the best advantage, which needed not the art of dress to enhance her loveliness. Sometimes the colour fled her cheeks as she listened to the loud roaring of the wind, or watched the huge gnarled and naked oaks, clash their iron arms together, or grate against the jagged angles of the old castle. Then she would uplift her blue and beautiful eyes to the heavens, and watch the pale round moon, struggling through the billowy clouds, like a solitary ship on a wide and tempestuous sea. Her ready fancy would also compare the orb of night and the stormy sky, to the ship in

which her lord rode, and the billows by which he was buffetted, and ever and anon as the moon was buried beneath some dark cloud, or shone a moment between the lines of light, that divided the black rays, her lips would move as if they breathed a prayer for his safety.

In the back-ground sat her attendant, a good looking merry-faced maiden, who had but just passed her twentieth year; but she also seemed to have caught a portion of that sadness which had settled upon the spirit of her beautiful mistress. Nor could she avoid turning her head occasionally in the direction where the lady sat, and giving a few ejaculations, or deep "hems" as if she had a mighty wish to say something, yet was at a loss how to begin.

At last she fairly gave up the embroidery with which she had so long busied herself, trimmed the little silver lamp which stood beside her, and which the wind seemed ready to extinguish at every gust, then rose and took her station behind the massy chair in which her mistress was seated.

VOL. I.

"He cometh not yet," she said in a low voice which half startled the hearer.

A deep sigh from the lady was her only answer; then there was a long pause, and neither spoke for some time, until the attendant again ventured to give utterance to her thoughts, and said,

"I scarce slept a wink last night until past the first cock-crow, for the wind so rattled about this old castle, and the trees made such a clattering, that I fancied I heard the tramp of horsemen, and twice rose to peep throngh the loop-holes on the turret stair."

"I slept not at all,” replied the lady, heaving another deep sigh, " until the cold grey morning fell on the frostwork of my casement, and the robin had begun his twittering song, I could not sleep until the wind went down, when I thought of him, who all night was tossing on the stormy sea."

"Marry, and they talk so much of the sea," replied the maiden, glad that she had untied her lady's tongue, "I have been on the Wye in