The sailors had not been rough with the young captives, partly because they were valuable property, partly because their own hearts were not destitute of pity. One especially, called Dewi, had shown them no little kindness (the same who had crossed himself in half-sympathetic, half-superstitious fear of risking the divine displeasure by kidnapping baptized Christians), and missed no opportunity of ministering to their comfort. Moreover, there was in Ethne a heavenly gentleness, and in Baithene an unconquerable good-nature and readiness to help, that won on the rough sailors in spite of themselves. Once, moreover, Dewi had been greatly moved, when he had all but lost his balance in shifting a sail, and Baithene had sprung up from the bottom of the boat, fettered as he was, and had saved him by a timely grasp of his clothes. Here in the strange halls of this sea-cave, for the first time the boy and girl were set free to ramble whither they would. The sides of the cove were quite precipitous, and the outermost of these vaulted palace-chambers opened on another wider bay, which could only be reached by a rocky staircase always carefully guarded. So it happened that the morning after their arrival the brother and sister were left at liberty to wander along the little sandy cove together, to bathe their feet and hands in the waves. They were children enough to enjoy it, and were watching the morning sunbeams dancing on the foaming crests, when in the distance a familiar sound fell on their ears. “It is like our own Patrick’s bell!” said Ethne. They listened in silence. It was certainly a bell, and a bell meant Christianity and Christian worship. The clear tones came to them softly, like the pulsations of a heart that loved them. “It is calling them to the Eucharist of God!” Ethne said, with an awed voice. “There are Christians within reach.” “Alas! are not these robbers Christians?” exclaimed Baithene. “I suppose the loveliest things always have the falsest counterfeits,” said Ethne; “but these surely must be real Christians, gathered together to adore our Christ.” And she knelt down on the sands, and almost for the first time since their capture burst into a passion of tears. Baithene knelt down beside her, and tried to soothe and comfort her. But she was already comforted. The glow of sacred hopes and memories had melted away the icy weight on her heart, or she could not have wept. Instinctively they were drawn towards the sacred sound, creeping noiselessly through the rocky halls, till through an opening like a little arched window they caught a glimpse of the sandy bay on the other side, and above it, on a sandy ridge, of a little building of rough-hewn stones, scarcely larger than the cabins near it, but distinguished by a low bell-tower, within which their friend the Christian bell was slowly swinging. It was a little church, afterwards for centuries buried in the sands.