"No, no," she cried eagerly; "not all in vain! I am but a foolish girl, and should not speak of such high matters; but I mind my father often hath said that a great deed hath an immortality in itself and cannot die, even if for a time it seem to perish. He did not justify the death of the king, but doth bewail it yearly as the day comes round, in fasting and humiliation. He held that the cause of Liberty must triumph in the end by men's eyes being instructed to desire her for her beauty, for that she needs not the service of bloody hands. He is of so meek a spirit, he would rather endure to the uttermost than take the sword. Yet have I often heard him say that he did account all that the army had done for the liberty of England was so great, that the names of those who fought in it would, by-and-by, be numbered among the heroes of history." "You are a kind comforter, my gentle sister, and I trust your prophecies may prove true. Yet, as a man may not read his own epitaph, 'tis but a lesson of patience to say that by-and-by matters may mend, while now they go from bad to worse." Audrey could not, in the bottom of her heart, grieve as deeply as did the young soldier for the downfall of the Republican cause, but even in that lonely Hall she heard enough of public matters to understand that the new King Charles was not renewing the golden Elizabethan age she had been brought up to revere, and, moreover, she was a born hero-worshipper, and treasured the stories of Blake's victories, and of Cromwell's defence of the Waldenses all the more dearly now that the bones of those great Englishmen were torn from their graves and flung into a shameful pit under the gallows. She could give a good deal of sympathy, and still more of pity to the lost cause, but could she give consolation? She had seen her grandfather preserve his hope of the ultimate triumph of sober liberty through all the storms and tumult of the Civil wars; she knew how old men could sorrow and could endure. But this stranger's mind was still a sealed book to her. How did the young sorrow? What was the comfort that would appeal to him? How could she whisper hope to the man who sat with his head dropped in his hands, as if he feared to let any one see the burning tears of shame that were gathering in his eyes? "If indeed the Lord spake to the Jews," Harrison went on, "did He not speak to us? Or was that also but a vain imagination, and did men fable when they wrote of the wonders done for the Jews, as they fabled concerning the Greeks and Romans?"