He knit his brows in an effort to remember when, before this day, he had last thought of a child whom he had held in his arms and comforted, one splendid dawn, upon a hilltop, in a mountainous region.

He came to the conclusion that he must have forgotten her quite six years ago.

Well, she would seem to have thriven under his neglect,--and he saw again the girl who had run for the golden guinea.

It was true that when he had put her there where that light was shining, it was with some shadowy idea of giving her gentle breeding, of making a lady of her.

But man's purposes are fleeting, and often gone with the morrow.