"Well," replied our governess laughing, as we all hurried to our work-baskets and drew round the table which had been moved nearer to the window, "as I can work and recite at the same time I may try to tell you the only story I ever heard about this Huguenot Goblet; but mind it isn't very romantic, and it isn't very cheerful. There is a love story in it, though, and as girls are always supposed to prefer something of that kind—though I have always found that girls are more interested in the stories provided for their brothers than in their own books—I will say on as well as I can."
CHAPTER II.
THE SILVER GOBLET.
HERE was a time when, on rare occasions, it flushed with the glow of rare old wine spiced with fragrant spices; or, better still, held the essence of odorous flowers distilled into subtle perfume. Need I say that this goblet is "old silver?" It was in France that it held a place of honour in the house. That house was one of note in Languedoc, not that its owner was noble by birth, but he was of the great Protestant families—the old Huguenots—whose undaunted spirit Louis the Fourteenth could not quell, even with the fortresses that he built to frown them into submission, or with the help of a fierce soldiery.
They were troublous times even long afterwards, when Anton Dormeur, owner of looms and manufacturer of velvet, went about with a serious face, and trusted few of his neighbours. Anton Dormeur was a man who kept his own counsel, and, when the persecutions had for a time been stayed, he saved money, hoping to rebuild the fortunes of his house for those two daughters, who were but children when his wife died and left a vacant place that never could be filled.