Page:Traits and Trials.pdf/316

310 lattices of the Church into rubies; then on the low bench beside Lucy, I used to sit and read aloud to her grandmother. She was a very remarkable woman, her tall stately figure was unbent by age, and her high and strongly marked features were wonderful in expression for a face where the eyes were closed for ever. She was a north country woman, and her memory was stored with all those traditions which make so large a portion of our English poetry. Lucy was her only link with the present, but for her affection to that beautiful child, she lived entirely with the past. The old castle where she had chiefly lived, whose noble family had perished from the earth as if smitten by some strange and sudden doom, the legends connected with their house,—these were her sole topics of discourse. All these legends were of a gloomy tendency, and I used to gaze on her pale sightless face, and listen to the hollow tones of her voice till my heart sank within me for fear. But if by any chance Lucy left us for a moment, no matter how interesting the narrative, the old woman would suspend her