CHAPTER IX A SEED OF GRATITUDE
In the evening they departed from Charing Cross, and without interruption their journey to France was accomplished. When a day had come and gone the Alpine solitudes were behind them, and they beheld once more the Arcadian valleys of Vaudois. Soon after that they moved in the sunlight over stretches of Lombardian plain. Now the azure above them resembled the sky color of pictures in old missals. How beautiful it was to Hera’s eyes! She felt the irresistible charm of the prospect, even as the barbarians did in ancient days. She wondered if it was any different then. Through all time those plains seemed to have been under the husbandman’s rule, ever fruitful, ever smiling in their bright verdure.
Tarsis lowered a window and the breath of springtime fanned
