"You are trembling, Beata. Do not let his idle prating annoy you. The world is full of these baser souls, but they cannot come near us; they vanish before us like the dust clouds that whirl up beneath our feet."
"Ah! but you see, my lord, this is what happens to me wherever I go, first they torment me with friendly advances, and then when I fly from them they curse me and call me a witch."
"Poor little witch!" and an expression played upon his lips, a faintly sweet and merry smile.
"Oh! you are smiling, you are smiling," cried the child joyfully. "I can see you smile for the first time!" and again she would have said, "How handsome you are!" But for the first time in her life she coloured consciously, and the words died on her lips.
Donatus laid his hand on the child's head. "Let me feel how tall you are?" said he, "are you quite grown up?"
"I should think so," said the child, leaning her head on his breast. "See I reach up to there." Donatus felt the height with his hand.
"Only so far! Oh! then you will certainly grow taller yet. How many summers old are you then?"
"That I do not know."
"What, child, do you not even know how old you are?"
"Wait, not by summers, but I can count by trees."