When she came near, the spectacle she offered was a sad one. She was young and graceful, and exquisitely beautiful, but weariness, sorrow, and terror were written in every line of her countenance, while her dress was soiled and torn, and dabbled in many parts with blood. Her story was soon told; for none of those attached to the cause of royalty, even in the times of the bitterest persecution, ever hesitated to rely entirely upon the loyalty and honour of the Breton peasantry; so that Clara de la Roche, the daughter of the unhappy marquis of that name, who fell in the route of Mans, related her tale to the ears of the good farmer La Brousse, with as much confidence, of sympathy, protection, and good faith, as if she had been relating it to the ears of a parent. After her father's death she had followed the fortunes of her only brother, through all the horrors of the Vendean war, till he also had fallen about a week before; and from that time she had wandered on, without companion or home, friend or protector, through a country in which famine was fast treading upon the steps of war; where her only food was obtained from charity; and where some of the many horrible deaths which had been invented by the diabolical cruelty of revolutionary tyranny, awaited her the moment she set her foot within the walls of a town. Good old La Brousse had once given shelter to her brother after some unsuccessful effort in the royal cause; and she had now sought him out, and besought him with tears, to let her live even as a servant in his house, till some of those dreams of triumphant loyalty, in which the Vendeans still indulged, should at length be realized. The old man led her in as tenderly, and as affectionately, as if she had been his own child, set before her all his cottage afforded, soothed her sorrow, and spoke the sweet hope of better days, and happier fortunes. "She could not act as his servant," he said, looking at her small beautiful hands; "for her appearance would at once betray her; but the daughter of a noble royalist, and especially a child of the house of La Roche, should never want bread or protection, while old La Brousse could give it, though the very act might cost his life. Mademoiselle, however, must consent to lie concealed," he added; and he showed her how the back of one of those _armoires_, which are so common in that country, had been contrived to act as a door to a little room beyond, which was lighted by a concealed window, and which, though extremely small, was neat and comfortable. Here, La Brousse told her, she must spend the greater part of her day, as her brother had done while he lay concealed in his house; but that, at night, when the doors and windows were all closed, she might come forth in security, and towards dusk might even venture to take a walk across the _landes_.