"Ah, yes! Saint Agnes has given you a particular grace for that," said Jocunda. "And I have brought a ring for her treasury," said Agnes, taking out the gift of the Cavalier. "Holy Mother! here is something, to be sure!" said Jocunda, catching it eagerly. "Why, Agnes, this is a diamond,--and as pretty a one as ever I saw. How it shines!" she added, holding it up. "That's a prince's present. How did you get it?" "I want to tell our mother about it," said Agnes. "You do?" said Jocunda. "You'd better tell me. I know fifty times as much about such things as she." "Dear Jocunda, I will tell you, too; but I love Mother Theresa, and I ought to give it to her first." "As you please, then," said Jocunda. "Well, put your flowers here by the fountain, where the spray will keep them cool, and we will go to her." * * * * * GREEK LINES. Blessed are the shadows of porches and cloisters! Blessed the walls that shut us out from the dusty, dazzling world, and shed upon us the repose and consolation of our own serene humanity! We, harassed among the base utilities of life, made weary and sore by the ceaseless struggles of emulation and daily warfare, turn wistfully to the Peripatetic among the shady groves of Athens,--dream of quiet Saracenic courts, echoing with plashy fountains,--of hooded monks, pacing away their cloistered lives beneath storied vaults and little patches of sky,--knowing, while we dream, that out of these came of yore the happiness of the old _eurekas_ and the deep sweetness of ancient knowledge. And then, away from the city of our toil, the tumult of our ambitions, we gratefully find Vallombrosas of our own, where we walk not alone, but in the pleasant companionship of elevated thoughts, and of old sages and masters, long passed away, but still wise and gentle to those who approach them with faith and simplicity. Here, like those chimes which wander unheeded over the house-tops of the roaring town, till they drop down blessed dews of Heaven into still, grass-grown courts and deserted by-ways, the great universal human heart beats closer to our own, and our whole being palpitates with almost ethereal sympathies. Voices of old minstrels, wandering down to us on loving lips through the generations, murmur in our ears the dear burden of human, affection for men and things; and the same tale is poured abundantly into our hearts by all those great masters who, through their Art, have become to us oracles of Beauty and eloquent interpreters of the Love of God.