Page:In Maremma, by Ouida (vol 2).djvu/231

 tween. Maremma is wide, and the tombs of the Lucumo were fenced about with many prickly outworks of all the ruscus tribe, and the holy-thorn, and the box-holly, which horses could not face and that hunters had to hack with their knives. Usually the days were perfectly still, with no sound in them save such as the birds made, or the foals as they whinnied and capered, or the wild hogs as they grunted for joy over a new fall of acorns.

She saw moreover, at last, the colour of health returning to Este's face, and strength to his listless limbs; the potent medicine of the Orbetellano leech began to restore the tone and the nerve to a constitution naturally good, though never vigorous. His physical beauty grew with each week that his lost health and force came in some degree back to him. His eyes ceased to have beneath them the dark sunken circles of weakness and pain; his skin had the delicate brown of his youth in lieu of the pallor that had been like the hue of worn ivory; his limbs lost their emaciation, and regained their symmetry of proportion and ease of movement. When he stood at nightfall for a few wary moments