228 The Countess Itha

would willingly live so long as God willed ;
here she would gladly surrender her soul
when He was pleased to call it home.

The days of her exile were many. For
seventeen years she dwelt thus in her hermi-
tage in the forest, alone and forgotten.

Forgotten, didI say? Notwholly. The.
Count never forgot her. Stung by remorse
( for in his heart of hearts he could not but
believe her true and innocent), haunted by
the recollection of the happiness he had flung
from him, wifeless, childless, friendless, he
could find no rest or forgetfulness except in
the excitement and peril of the battle-field.
But the slaughter of men and the glory of
victory were as dust and ashes in his mouth.
He had lost the joy of life, the pride of race,
the exultation of power. For one look from
those sweet eyes, over which, doubtless, the
hands of some grateful peasant had laid the
earth, he would have joyfully exchanged

renown and lordship, and even life itself.

At length in the fulness of God’s good
time, it chanced that the Count was hunting
in a distant part of the forest, when he