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There were no lights but the great moon.
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"See, madam," she cried, "here is the Farm! And there is my little window in the roof! And there are the doves above the long barn."
She looked and saw that all these things were so, but great weariness filled her and she could think of nothing but the long way back, for she knew that they had come a great way from the city.
"This may all be well for you, child, but it is not the same to me," she said sadly.
"And why not, madam? The Dame is kind to all," the little maid replied, and urged the donkey on.
"What is your name?" she asked, looking for the first time at her guide in the full light of early day. The girl was quaintly dressed, she saw, with a black bodice laced across her young body, a shorter skirt than grown girls wear now, and a scarlet ribbon twisted among the long, dark braids that hung down her shoulders. She had travelled much in older countries than her own and to her eyes this girl had the air of a winsome little peasant that knew her simple station and was happy in it.
"Joan is my name, madam—and I have been told that the miller's Dyrk has called the new brown foal for me—the finest one at the Farm!" she said with a bubble of laughter.