Page:A Picture-book without Pictures and Other Stories (1848).djvu/99

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WITHOUT PICTURES.
93

hand to ring at the door; there hung a hare’s foot in the packthread, which is now the bell-pull at the palace of the Cæsars. She stood stock-still for a moment; what was she thinking about? Perhaps of the beautiful Jesus-child clothed in gold and silver, in the chapel below, where the silver lamp was burning, and where her little-girl friends were singing in chorus as she knew; I cannot tell if it was of this she thought! but again she made a movement, and stumbled; the earthen jug fell from her head and was shivered in pieces upon the broken marble pavement. She burst into tears; the beautiful daughter of the palace of the Cæsars wept over the poor, broken, earthen jug; she stood with her bare feet and wept, and dared not to pull at the pack-thread string, the bell-pull at the palace of the Cæsars.