She looked from her window, but the aspect of all without seemed in accordance with her feelings. The sky of one leaden hue, looked as if no sun had ever enlivened it, and the sea beneath of a darker shade, heaved and tossed as if sullenly brooding over some storm in recollection. The wind whistled through the bare branches of the trees before the house, and drove a few withered leaves to and fro on the terrace, then found its way within doors, and moaned through the passages. Some groups of boys, as they went from house to house, to gather a few pence for their bonfire (it was the fifth of November), at another time, might have seemed to add some little liveliness to the scene; but to Judith, their voices as they reached her ear from below, had a melancholy tone, as they chanted their rhymes, and the tinkling of their little bells sounded doleful. She placed her harp in the window; for a minute or two the strings were silent, and she repeated her accustomed little invocation— “Ye winds that were cradled beyond the broad sea, Come stoop from your flight with your errand to me; And softly the strings of my harp as ye blow, Shall whisper your tidings of weal or of wo.” The wind appeared to answer her summons but fitfully at first, the strings jarring without music, as it swept over them. The blast increasing in strength, the tones became for a while loud, harsh, and discordant; then, as it blew more steadily, they gradually blended into harmony, and at length, sent to her ear a strain of such deep melancholy, as struck despair into her heart. Suddenly there was a crash, succeeded by the _tolling of a distant bell_. So profound was the illusion of the spell-bound hearer, that she did not perceive the snapping of a string, which, by the striking of its loose fragment over the others, produced the sounds so full of wo, to her saddened spirit. They ceased, and the harp was silent. Again its tones were heard, faintly, and as from afar; but gradually drawing nearer, as a gentle gale passed over the chords to the dejected girl. It fluttered round her, soft as the breath of a summer evening, kissed her fair brow and delicate cheek, and waved each golden curl which hung round her white throat, while a solemn strain arose, and softening by degrees to a melody of more than earthly beauty, as it seized upon her entranced senses, dispelled every cloud from her spirits, and poured into her soul peace and joy. Then as the breeze which bore it appeared to depart, and wing its way back over the ocean, the tones seemed to syllable the word, farewell, repeated each time with more sweetness, until the sounds were lost in distance. When Judith descended, her parents were rejoiced to see the dark shade dispelled from her brow.