Later in the day the prisoner heard Elizabeth singing, as not rarely he heard her,--for, knowing that the sound of her voice was pleasant to him, and that its cheerfulness cheered him, she had the habit of frequenting with her songs that part of the house in which his room was. The prisoner heard her singing later in the day, and thanked her for the grace, but did not catch the words whose sound swept past him. It was an ancient hymn she sang,--one that she often sang; and that she sang it this day of all days, I copy here the first verse:-- "Sing, my tongue, the glorious battle, With completed victory rife, And above the Cross's trophy Tell the triumph of the strife, How the world's Redeemer conquered _By surrendering of his life_." * * * * * The Drummer's Daughter has crossed the sea,--has landed on the shores of Fatherland. She has even parted from her fellow-voyagers at the station whence the coach shall take her on to Chalons, that venerable town and well-beloved, where the lives whence her own sprung were born and blended. She is in the land of wonders, of meadows, vineyards, gardens, lakes, and rivers, and of cattle feeding on a thousand hills,--among the graves of millions of men, among the works of heroes and of martyrs, in the land of mighty towns, of palaces, of masters, and of slaves, where a great king is building the great palace which shall witness, centuries hence, the dire humiliation of his race. Of all the crowds and companies that hurry to and fro from one end of the land to the other, Elizabeth seeks only two persons. It is not to her father's native town that she is drawn by the superior attraction. She passes Chalons in the moonlight. When the coach stops at the inn-door for a change of horses, she keeps her place, --she acts not with the quicker beating of her heart. She looks about her as they drive through the silent streets,--out on the moonlit landscape when they have passed the borders of the town; she sees the church-towers, and the old buildings, and the river whose windings she has heard described so often by the voices that once talked of love all along its borders. Chalons is dear to her; she looks back with tearful longing when the driver hurries on his horses as they pass into the open country. But she has no right to wait on her own pleasure,--to verify her parents' calculations when they talk together, by the fireside in Foray, of her journeying through Fatherland. No,--each sunrise appoints him one more day of imprisonment and exile! Every sunset leaves him to one more night of cruel dreams which morning shall deride! And while this can be said, what has Chalons, or any other spot on earth, that it should lure her into rest?