Saint's Progress [antikvár]

S AINT'S PROGRESS i ; ;; Such a day made glad the heart. All the flags of July were waving; the sun and the poppies flaming; white butterflies spiring up and twining, and the bees busy on the snapdragons. The lime-trees were coming into flower. Tall white lilies in the garden beds already rivalled the delphiniums; the York and Lancaster roses were full-blown rourid their golden hearts. There was a gentle .breeze, and a swish and stir and hum rose and feil above the head of Edward Pierson, coming back from his lonely ramble over Tintern Abbey. He had ar-rived at Kestrel, his brother Robert's home on the bank pf the Wye only that morning, having stayed at Bath on the way down; and now he had got his face burnt in that parti-coloured way peculiar to the faces of those who have. been too long in Lon-¦don. As he came along the narrow, rather over-grown avenue, the sound of a waltz thmmmed out on a piano feil on his ears and he smiled, for music was the greatest passion he had. His dark griz-zled hair was pushed back off his hot brow, which he fanned with his straw hat. Though not broad, ¦ that brow was the broadest part of a narrow oval