“Certainly, my lady; I would travel to the other side of the earth if I thought that I should find an infallible cure at the end of the journey; but as the doctors have assured me over and over again that nothing can be done for the boy, I am resigned to the inevitable. As long as the Lord spares him to me I shall never complain.” “Your resignation is exemplary, nurse,” said Montella, as they returned to the little parlour; and then Patricia having refastened her jacket, they took their leave. They saw more of Mrs. Whiteside, however, before they went back to town. She had heard something of the anticipated Edict, and desired full information on the subject. Leaving Tom in the charge of a neighbour, she came up to the Abbey one morning, dressed in her best. The Montellas were in the library discussing a letter they had received from Dr. Engelmacher. The news was good, insomuch as building operations on the portion of land between Haifa and Akka, stretching to the Sea of Galilee, had now commenced. “Haifa will be our capital for the present,” the great leader wrote, after he had given vent to his jubilant feelings. “There is a fairly good harbour here, except when the wind is in the north-west. The town seems more capable of improvement and extension than any other on the coast of Palestine, and there is already a Jewish colony near by. By the time you and your charming wife come out, my dear Montella, your place of residence will be ready for your occupation. Picture to yourself a magnificent white-painted, flat-roofed house situated amidst olive-trees, with Mount Carmel to look down upon you, and hill after hill as far as eye can reach. Why, you will wonder how you could have remained in prosaic London for so many months at a time. And the thought that we are no longer on sufferance, but that this is our own country—our own little republic—will be best of all!” He was not lacking in enthusiasm, this big, burly, and usually matter-of-fact doctor. His letter brimmed over with expressions of cheery optimism, and he refused to be disheartened by those who opposed his schemes. What mattered the growlings of France and Russia so long as Turkey could be conciliated by _backsheesh_? Once the Palestinian negotiations were concluded and the treaty signed, he was certain his people need have no fear.