No one spoke; so she made bold to continue—but she addressed Lady Evelyn only.
"No doubt it is very picturesque, as you go up the Rhine, or across the See Kreis, or through the Lombard plains, to see every height crowned with its castle. Yes, one cannot help admiring. They are like beautiful flowers that have blossomed up from the valleys and the plains below. But who tilled the land, that these should grow there on every height? Are you not forced to think of the toiling wretches who labored and labored to carry stone by stone up the crest of the hill? They did not get much enjoyment out of the grandeur and picturesqueness of the castles."
"But they gave that labor for their own protection," Lady Evelyn said, with a smile. "The great lords and barons were their protectors."
"The great lords and barons said so, at least," said the girl, without any smile at all, "and I suppose the peasantry believed them; and were quite willing to leave their vineyards and go and shed their blood whenever the great lords and barons quarrelled among themselves."
"Well said! well said!" Brand exclaimed, quickly; though, indeed, this calm, gentle-eyed, self-possessed girl was in no need of any champion.
"I am afraid you are a great Radical, Miss Lind," said Lady Evelyn.
"Perhaps it is your English air, Lady Evelyn," said the girl, with a smile.
Lord Evelyn's mother, notwithstanding her impassive, unimaginative nature, soon began to betray a decided interest in this new guest, and even something more. She was attracted, to begin with, by the singular beauty of the young Hungarian lady, which was foreign-looking, unusual, picturesque. She was struck by her perfect self-possession, and by the ease and grace of her manner, which was rather that of a mature woman than of a girl of nineteen. But most of all she was interested in her odd talk and opinions, which she expressed with such absolute simplicity and frankness. Was it, Lady Evelyn asked herself, that the girl had been brought up so much in the society of men—that she had neither mother nor sisters—that she spoke of politics and such matters as if it
the most natural thing in the world for women, of whatever age, to consider them as of first importance?
But one chance remark that Natalie made, on the impulse of the moment, did for the briefest possible time break down that charming self-confidence of hers, and show her—to the wonderment of the English girls—the prey of an alarmed embarrassment. George Brand had been talking of patriotism, and of the scorn that must naturally be felt for the man who would say of his country, "Well, it will last my time. Let me enjoy myself when I can. What do I care about the future of other people?" And then he went on to talk of the larger patriotism that concerned itself not merely with one's fellow-countrymen but with one's fellow-mortals; and how the stimulus and enthusiasm of that wider patriotism should be proportionately stronger; and how it might seek to break down artificial barriers of political systems and religious creeds. Patriotism was a beautiful flame—a star; but here was a sun. Ordinary, to tell the truth, Brand was but an indifferent speaker—he had all an Englishman's self-consciousness; but now he spoke for Natalie alone, and minded the others but little. Presently Lady Evelyn said, with a smile,