I felt a little awed in his presence, I could not exactly tell why; and yet I was more glad than I would have confessed that we were good friends again. He sipped his cup of tea slowly, as he talked, and was easily persuaded to take another.
"I see, Miss Ethel, you are looking at my book with curious eyes."
It was true; the book was a very thick and short volume, bound in black shagreen, with silver clasps, and lay on the window-stone, beside his cup. He took it up in slender fingers, smiling as he looked at me.
"You wish to know what it is; but you are too ceremonious to ask me. I should be curious myself, if I saw it for the first time. I have often picked out a book from a library, simply for its characteristic binding. Some books look interesting. Now what do you take this to be?"
"Haven't you books called breviaries? I think this is one," said I.
"That is your guess; it is not a bad one--but no, it is not a breviary. What do you say, Miss Grey?"
"Well, I say it is a book of the offices of the Church."
"Not a bad guess, either. But it is no such thing. I think I must tell you--it is what you would call a storybook."
"Really!" I exclaimed, and Miss Grey and I simultaneously conceived a longing to borrow it.
"The book is two hundred and seventy years old, and written in very old French. You would call them stories," he said, smiling on the back of the book; "but you must not laugh at them; for I believe them all implicitly. They are legends."
"Legends?" said I, eagerly--"I should so like to hear one. Do, pray, tell one of them."
"I'll read one, if you command me, into English. They are told here as shortly as it is possible to relate them. Here, for instance, is a legend of John of Parma. I think I can read it in about two minutes."
"I'm sorry it is so short; do, pray, begin," I said.
Accordingly, there being still light enough to read by, he translated the legend as follows:--
"John of Parma, general of the order of Friars Minors, travelling one winter's night, with some brothers of the order, the party went astray in a dense forest, where they wandered about for several hours, unable to find the right path. Wearied with their fruitless efforts, they at length knelt down, and having commended themselves to the protection of the mother of God, and of their patron, Saint Francis, began to recite the first nocturn of the Office of the Blessed Virgin. They had not been long so engaged, when they heard a bell in the distance, and rising at once, and following the direction whence the sound proceeded, soon came to an extensive abbey, at the gate of which they knocked for admittance. The doors were instantly thrown open, and within they beheld a number of monks evidently awaiting their arrival, who, the moment they appeared, led them to a fire, washed their feet, and then seated them at a table, where supper stood ready; and having attended them during their meal, they conducted them to their beds. Wearied with their toilsome journey, the other travellers slept soundly; but John, rising in the night to pray, as was his custom, heard the bell ring for matins, and quitting his cell, followed the monks of the abbey to the chapel, to join with them in reciting the divine office.