D'Elsac could not be offended by such a refusal. "Victorine," he said, "pray tell me upon what motive do you act?" She smiled, though the tear still trembled on her eyelid, as she replied playfully, "By the same motive, uncle Dorsain, which you acknowledged just now. I too love peace. I love it dearly, but pardon me if I say that the peace after which I pursue is not of so transient a nature as yours. You seek but the peace of good nature and cheerful countenances. My peace is the peace of the heart; the peace that a young child feels upon its mother's knee. My Heavenly Father's arms I know are around me; they will, I feel assured, never be withdrawn; and whilst I do what He points out as right to be done, the peace and confidence of the loved child no earthly power can take from my mind. Dear uncle, Dorsain, I must not then accept your kind offer, for I must now give the comfort of sympathy to my sorrowing Caliste; and if I left her now, peace would be banished from my mind, for I should be acting against my conscience, and that ever brings punishment in its rear." "When I hear you speak, my dear niece," said Dorsain, "my conscience gives me many a pang for my unbrotherly conduct to that dear sister Pauline who performed the tender part of mother to you Victorine. Though a few miles, comparatively a few miles, separated us when I heard that my sister was a heretic, I at once determined to associate with her no more, and now that I have the will, the power is no longer mine to visit her." "Your estrangement was a great grief to my dear aunt," replied Victorine, "and had not my uncle's very bad health disabled him, he or my aunt would have forced upon you a visit; but he was too ill to leave home, and she had no one to take her place with him or with me, and before I was old enough to assist her he was no more, and circumstances were changed with us. She did, however, to the last, often talk of you, hoping you would meet, if not in this world, in the next." More was said upon this subject, and it was not till some time afterwards that the conversation was renewed, when D'Elsac said, "Then I must take Lisette, I suppose, with me to Grenoble, for when you flatter her she is good tempered, and I own I am afraid of Caliste." "Lisette will not, I think, leave Salency whilst she is Rosiere," replied her sister. "She could not make up her mind, I fear, to give up her crown, thorny as it appears to others." "I will ask her," replied D'Elsac, "but I acknowledge to you, Victorine, I rather hope a refusal. If you will not return with me, I prefer the hired labour of a stranger." Dorsain then sought Lisette to learn her mind. He found her deep in consultation about the only subject that now occupied her; and, as Victorine expected, she refused at once the invitation, scarcely deigning to clothe her answer in courteous terms.