As the night before that day of days died away and clarion cocks made the young dawn vocal, eager hands drew back the curtains of four-posters. Above the green-gray of spring-time streets and lanes, the sentinel tree-tops pointed to the translucent blue of a smiling sky. "Day's fair and all's well!" bawled the watch as they blew out their smoking lights. Voices cracked and rusted by sleep echoed the cry in the depths of soft, chintz-bound coverlets. "My best ferrandine coat," mumbled Miss Georgina to herself, in her delight over a pleasing picture of her entrance into the Snograss parlor. She let the bolster slip to the floor and precipitated her head against the carved laurel leaves of the top-board, all unconsciously. Bright were the visions of cherished falafals and gewgaws that came to the members of the Easter Guild as they parted company with Morpheus. Mrs. Rumbell, looking from a casement in the rectory, felt the sweetness of the season fall upon her. That patch of fresh sky, suggestive of new life and a swift-footed May, was more to her than a volley of sermons. The snow still lay on hill and heath. Father Winter, neglectful of one of his worlds, was sporting among the northern mountains. Oh, the peace of it! Why should she care if the wealthy Mrs. Snograss had come to York with her Trenton innovations? All her past grievances were forgotten. In her blissful state she felt she could even go the length of sewing whalebone in her second-best silk skirt to conform to the ridiculous fashion of stiffened skirts, introduced by that lady. Everything was changing! What could she, frail and old, gain by wrestling with the times? Across the way, torn landscape shades blinded the windows of Johnstone House. Roberta was dead and her home awaited a new tenant. Beyond lay the Bowling Green, the background of her long life--witness to all the parts the stage-master, Fate, had dealt out to her. Joys and sorrows marked its worn paths. The city of her golden time was fading away. No halloos of eager huntsmen, ushering in Aurora, greeted her ears as of yore. Only a stray thrush, mistaking the season, trilled liquid notes to his lost mates on a hemlock by her chamber. Soon the daylight's eyes were wide open, and the door-knockers, across the church-yard, began to glow like miniature suns. Festivals and holidays always brought the housekeepers of York to market, followed by their faithful blacks carrying little wicker baskets. They tripped first to Mrs. Sykes's booth, where one could find all the season's delicacies; then to the wintergreen-berry man, and on through the circle of venders. The mystical joy of Eastertide that flooded the heart of Mrs. Rumbell in the dawn swept through the concourse at the market. The perfume of the southern lilies, the merry cries of hucksters, and the shrill calls of gutter-waifs as they tugged at the skirts of Cock-a-nee-nae Bess were all permeated with it.