"That's a sensible boy," said the snow-bringer condescendingly; "you've something of the old northern spirit about you here on the moorlands still, I fancy. Ah! if you could see the north--the real north--I don't fancy you would care much about the sleepy golden lands you were dreaming of just now." "I'd like to _see_ them," replied the child; "I don't say I'd like to live in them always. But the scents and the colours--they must be very beautiful. I seem to know all about them when Golden-wings kisses me." "Humph," said the Spirit of the North. Both she and Gray-wings had a peculiar way of saying "humph" when Gratian praised either of the gentler sisters--"as for scents I don't say--scent is a stupid sort of thing. I don't understand anything about it. But _colours_--you're mistaken, I assure you, if you think the south can beat me in that. You've got your head full of the idea of snow--interminable ice-fields and all the rest of it. Why, my good boy, did you never hear of Arctic sunsets--not to speak of the Northern Lights? I could show you sunsets and sunrises such as you have never dreamt of--like rainbows painted on gold. Ah, it is a pity you cannot come with me!" "And why can't I?" asked Gratian. "I'm not afraid of the cold." The North-wind gave a whistle of good-natured contempt. "My dear, you'd have no time to be afraid or not afraid--you'd be dead before you'd even looked about you. Ah--it's a terrible inconvenience, those bodies of yours--if you were like us, now! But I mustn't waste my time talking, only as I was passing I thought I'd say a word or two. When my sisters are all together there's never any getting in a syllable edgeways. Good-bye, my child. We'll meet again oftener during the next few months." "Good-bye, Godmother White-wings," said Gratian, and a gust of wind rushing past him with a whistle seemed to answer, "Good-bye." "I'm very glad to have had a little talk with her," he said to himself; "she's much nicer than I thought she was, and she makes one feel so strong and brisk. Dear me--what wonderful places there must be up in the north where she lives!" The master called him aside after morning lessons. "Did your mother send any message to me, Gratian?" he asked. "Yes, sir," and he repeated what Mrs. Conyfer had said. The schoolmaster looked pleased. "I'm glad she and your father have no objection," he said. "I think it may be a good thing for you in several ways. But I must explain it to you. You know the Big House as they call it, here? A lady and her son have come to stay there for a time--relations of the squire's----" "Yes, sir, I know," interrupted Gratian; "she plays the organ on Sunday afternoons, and her little boy is ill."