The
years had brought many changes to her, and it was with mingled feelings
that she gazed on this unchanged spot. Each grey-lichened rock stood out
from the mossy floor with a face that was familiar; all the little
winding woodland paths, she knew where they led to, and could take the
children to many a nook where wild flowers and delicate green ferns
still loved to grow, at they did long ago when she used to gather them
in these woods.
"Seventeen years ago! is it possible?" she murmured, as she leaned back
in a corner of the carriage, and thought of the many leaves in the book
of her life which had been folded-down since she took farewell of these
green glades in her girlish days. And as she sits, quietly thinking,
while the little group round her are making the green aisles resound
with their merry laughter, we fancy, as we glance at her face, that it
is one we have seen before in this valley. The "stealthy day by day" has
certainly done its work; the outline of Grace's cheek is sharper than it
used to be, and the eager, speaking eyes have lost somewhat of their
fire, but there is a calm gladness in their gaze as she glances at the
joyous faces round her, that speaks of lessons learnt, and sorrows past,
during chequered days which have lain between the autumn evening, when
we saw her last, and this July afternoon, when she is coming with her
"two bands" to the home of her girlhood.
Miss Hume, Grace's aunt, had passed away from this world during that
autumn seventeen years ago, and Grace had never revisited Kirklands
since.
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