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Through the days of rain and falling leaves, when all the forest was

sodden with h the dark days of winter, hushed with snow,

she stayed with the nuns, serving them meekly in whatever tasks they

set her She was once ain,

still-rooh) tire-

woet no

nearer the choir than that It was not by her tongue that she won so

much favour--indeed she hardly spoke at all; as for pleasantness she

never showed e," she

said to herself, "in a strange house, and no one knohat treasure I

hide inBut if she was

subdued, she was undeniably useful, and there are worse things in a

servant than to go staidly about her ith collected looks and

sober feet, to have no adventurous traffic with the es or farms, never to see nor hear what it would be

inconvenient to know--in a word, toone as tio--her featness and

patience, added to her beauty (for it was not long before the gentler

life or the richer possession ard of everybody in the house

The Abbess, as I have told you already, took her into high favour

before Christmas was over--actually by Epiphany she could suffer no

other to dress her or be about her person