And my daughters, the tender blossoms of my aged years--they grew around me, the fairest lilies of the land: but they, too, are passed away.

The one, scorning the mere charms of youth, and preferring a union with a soul that had long conversed with superior regions, loved the sage of Ercildown.

But my friend lost this rose of his bosom, and I the child of my heart, ere she had been a year his wife.

Then was my last and only daughter married to the Lord Mar; and in giving birth to my dear Isabella she, too, died.

Ah, my good young knight, were it not for that sweet child, the living image of her mother, who in the very spring of youth was cropped and fell, I should be alone: my hoary head would descend to the grave, unwept, unregretted!" The joy of the old man having recalled such melancholy remembrances, he wept upon the shoulder of Edwin, who had drawn so near, that the story, was begun to Murray, was ended to him.