“’Tis borne across the ocean’s main And blown along the desert’s tract In words which tell earth’s deepest pain. Come back! ye loved ones, O come back. ‘Come back, dear ones, Love calls you home, From her warm arms no more to roam, Come back--come back.’ “‘Dear ones come back to that sweet home Where loves strong ties are parted never, No more to weep, no more to roam, Come back and dwell in peace forever Come back dear ones, Love calls you home, From her fond breast no more to roam, Come back--come back.’” “As I said, although Miss Alliston did not enter our house again for a long time after that first evening, fate threw us together in the most unexpected ways. At last when I had not seen her for some weeks, I started to drive to a village a few miles distant on a business errand. As I drove along the lonely country road, I was in an exceedingly happy frame of mind. The solitude and a radiant fragrant autumn day were favourable to my deep enjoyment of the incense that burned upon the secret altar of my soul. I remember feeling a special glow of satisfaction that morning that I was content simply to have Love as a noble guest in the chambers of my heart. I asked no other gifts from her hands. “As I made a turn in the road, which was lined with woods on one side, I noticed to my surprise a woman dressed in black picking her way somewhat daintily along the muddy roadside at some distance ahead of me. By the way, don’t you like to see women dressed in black? It is my favourite dress. There is a rich grace and dignity about women dressed in black that seems wanting in any other colour. Their throats are so white, and their forms so sweetly and seriously graceful; it makes them doubly mysterious and captivating to me. “Of course when I saw this lady walking by the roadside, I decided at once to offer her a seat in my carriage. But I had not the slightest idea who she might be, nor indeed did I spend a moment’s thought upon it. Judge then of my electrifying surprise when I had stopped the carriage, and she had for the first time turned her face toward me, to see that it was Allegra Alliston! I felt as if I were in a dream as I helped her into the carriage, and she was apparently as much surprised as I was. But the explanation of her being there was very simple. She had obtained a new pupil in the sleepy village toward which we were going, and as she had no other means of getting there, she was heroically walking, although the distance was five miles.