When Ethel awoke, late in the morning, Villiers was gone. Her watch told her, indeed, that it was near ten o'clock, and that he must have departed long before. She felt inclined to reproach him for leaving her, though only for a few hours, without an interchange of adieu. In truth, she was vexed that he was not there: the world appeared to her so blank, without his voice to welcome her back to it from out of the regions of sleep. While this slight cloud of ill-humour (may it be called?) was passing over her mind, she perceived a little note, left by her husband, lying on her pillow. Kissing it a thousand times, she read its contents, as if they possessed talismanic power. They breathed the most passionate tenderness: they besought her, as she loved him, to take care of herself, and to keep up her spirits until his return, which would be as speedy as the dove flies back to its nest, where its sweet mate fondly expects him. With these assurances and blessings to cheer her, Ethel arose. The sun poured its wintry yet cheering beams into the parlour, and the sparkling, snow-clad earth glittered beneath. She wrapped herself in her cloak, and walked into the garden of the hotel. Long immured in London, living as if its fogs were the universal vesture of all things, her spirits rose to exultation and delight, as she looked on the blue sky spread cloudlessly around. As the pure breeze freshened her cheek, a kind of transport seized her; her spirit took wings; she felt as if she could float on the bosom of the air--as if there was a sympathy in nature, whose child and nursling she was, to welcome her back to her haunts, and to reward her bounteously for coming. The trees, all leafless and snow-bedecked, were friends and intimates: she kissed their rough barks, and then laughed at her own folly at being so rapt. The snow-drop, as it peeped from the ground, was a thing of wonder and mystery; and the shapes of frost, beautiful forms to be worshipped. All sorrow--all care passed away, and left her mind as clear and bright as the unclouded heavens that bent over her. CHAPTER VII Herein Shall my captivity be made my happiness; Since what I lose in freedom, I regain With interest. BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER.