She had lain thus for above half an hour, when a slight rustling noise—a sound so slight as to be scarcely audible——caught her attention, and, without raising her head, she asked in a faint tone,——
“Is there any one there?”
“Yes, my Lady. It is Lisa,” replied her maid, coming stealthily forward, till she stood close behind her chair. “Put some of that thing——peat, turf, or whatever it is——on the fire, child. Has the post arrived?”
“No, my Lady; they say that the floods have detained the mails, and that they will be fully twelve hours late.”
“Of course they will,” sighed she; “and if there should be anything for me, they will be carried away.”
“I hope not, my Lady.”
“What's the use of your hoping about it, child? or, if you must hope, let it be for something worth while. Hope that we may get away from this miserable place,——that we may once more visit a land where there are sunshine and flowers, and live where it repays one for the bore of life.”
“I 'm sure I do hope it with all my heart, my Lady.”
“Of course you do, child. Even you must feel the barbarism of this wretched country. Have those things arrived from Dublin yet?”
“Yes, my Lady; but you never could wear them. The bonnet is a great unwieldy thing, nearly as big and quite as heavy as a Life-Guardsman's helmet; and the mantle is precisely like a hearth-rug with sleeves to it. They are specially commended to your Ladyship's notice, as being all of Irish manufacture.”