Winter came upon them. It was wild and drear. Their abode, far in the north of the island, was cold beyond their experience, the dark prison-walls were whitened by snow, the bars of their windows were laden; Falkner looked out, the snow drifted against his face, one peep at the dusky sky was all that was allowed him; he thought of the wide steppes of Russia, the swift sledges, and how he longed for freedom! Elizabeth, as she walked home through the frost and sleet, gave a sigh for the soft seasons of Greece, and felt that a double winter gathered round her steps. Day by day, time passed on. Each evening returning to her solitary fireside, she thought, "Another is gone, the time draws near;" she shuddered, despite her conviction that the trial would be the signal for the liberation of Falkner; she saw the barriers time had placed between him and fate fall off one by one with terror; January and February passed, March had come--the first of March, the very month when all was to be decided, arrived. Poor tempest-tossed voyagers! would the wished-for port be gained--should they ever exchange the uncertain element of danger for the firm land of security? It was on the first of March that, returning home in the evening, she found a letter on her table from Neville. Poor Elizabeth! she loved with tenderness and passion--and yet how few of the fairy thoughts and visions of love had been hers--love with her was mingled with so dire a tragedy, such real oppressive griefs, that its charms seemed crimes against her benefactor; yet now, as she looked on the letter, and thought, "_from him_," the rapture of love stole over her, her eyes were dimmed by the agitation of delight, and the knowledge that she was loved suspended every pain, filling her with soft triumph, and thrilling, though vague expectation. She broke the seal--there was an inner envelope directed to Miss Raby--and she smiled at the mere thought of the pleasure Gerard must have felt in tracing that name--the seal, as he regarded it, of their future union; but when she unfolded the sheet, and glanced down the page, her attention was riveted by other emotions. Thus Neville wrote:-- "My own sweet Elizabeth, I write in haste, but doubt is so painful, and tidings fly so quickly, that I hope you will hear first by means of these lines the new blow fate has prepared for us. My father lies dangerously ill. This, I fear, will again delay the trial--occasion prolonged imprisonment--and keep you still a martyr to those duties you so courageously fulfil. We must have patience. We are impotent to turn aside irrevocable decrees, yet when we think how much hangs on the present moment of time, the heart--my weak heart at least--is wrung by anguish.