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232 'But not in the least, monsieur,' she replied, with an accent which was as unknown to him as her toilette.

They were exchanging a few casual remarks, when Randal, who had turned away, joined them with amused eyes.

'There is an inscription,' he said; 'do you see it, there on the pillar? Some devout and beautiful biblical phrase about that cross. This grove on the top of a hill would have quite a pagan feeling if it weren't for that cross, and then the inscription! Together they save it.'

The girl looked at him gravely, as if uncertain whether he was in earnest or not, and made a face.

'The inscription,' she said, in her quaint French, 'tells us that this pillar is so many hundred metres above the level of the sea.'

Randal began laughing, and the other two followed suit.

The blue sky and waters—the sunny breeze—the pine-clad summit—the rude pile of stone like the remains of an antique altar—the pillar—the iron cross, and the inscription of the exact height above the sea,—his sense of humour suddenly supplied the comment.

O dix-neuvième siècle, dix-neuvième siècle! he quoted; 'Beyle's cry for ever returns to me at all