But he saw that I was deeply melancholy, and sometimes appeared to suppose that his conversation wearied me, and ceased it for an hour or two. Thus, however, some little conversation took place between the Catholics and Protestants; but it was very different with the Jews, who formed the third division of our party. They were spoken to, indeed, by both the Catholics and Protestants from time to time, and were treated with great kindness and with substantial courtesy, having every protection and assistance given to them whenever they needed it; but the servants, like their masters, looked upon them evidently as an inferior race, and kept up as little communication with them as possible. To ensure that they were well treated and had nothing to complain of--for the Prince d'Auvergne had given me authority to regulate such matters on the march--I generally made Solomon and Miriam come and sit with me for an hour after our day's journey was over, somewhat to the scandal, I believe, of good Master Arnon the intendant, who thought it strange that a French nobleman should permit a Jew to sit in his presence. By this means an intimacy--if that can be so called which consisted almost altogether in tokens of respect and reverence on the one side, and protection on the other--took place between me and the Jew and his daughter; they clung to me as the only being that treated them with real kindness, and Miriam used to strive to amuse me with a thousand little engaging youthful ways: she would dance to me to the sound of her own singing, which was very sweet, though in a tongue that I did not understand; and she would play to me at other times, either upon a small instrument which she called a cithern, or upon a lute, with a skill and perfection that I had never heard before. She used to watch my looks, too, as if to see whether she amused me; but she was too young for idle thoughts to enter into the head of any one with regard to her; and I do not think I was of a character, even if she had been two or three years older, to fancy that she was in love with me, because she had a grateful regard for me. The Jew himself, I believe, would have trusted her anywhere with me, as by this time he would have trusted me with any jewel of his store; and one evening, when he himself had arrived at the inn, weary and somewhat unwell, he sent his daughter to amuse me, and to tell me that he himself had retired to rest. Well might he do so; and yet the conversation that we had together was as tender and as full of thrilling interest as it is possible to conceive. I had been musing sadly over my fate and that of Louise, and my eyes were buried in my hands when her entrance roused me, so that it was evident enough to her that she had just recalled me from a painful dream. "You are sad, seigneur," she said, drawing a seat close up beside me, and laying her small, clear, olive hand upon mine. "You are sad, and you do not tell Miriam what you are sad about."