[Gutenberg 13459] • The Waters of Edera

*"Who are you?" said the young man, looking at her in surprise.* *"I am Nerina," answered the child.*

*"Where do you come from? What is your country?"*

*She pointed vaguely to the southwest mountains, where the snow on the upper ranges was still lying with bands of cloud resting on it.*

*"From the Abruzzo?"*

*She was silent. . . .*

Ouida was the pen name of the English novelist Marie Louise de la Ramee. Ramee, who lived from 1839 until 1908, took her pen name from her own baby-talk nickname for *Louise.* She wrote more than 40 novels, children's books, and collections of short stories and essays -- books that had *flash* , but frequently, well, *weren't wholesome.* She wrote about folks full of lust acting out the things inside their hearts . . . she was a woman, in short, ahead of her time. But her best work -- novels like *Under Two Flags* and *Moths* \-- was so gripping that even the Victorian social critics had to own that she was a talent.

In 1874 she moved from London to Italy, and spent the remainder of her life in that country. She died there (alas, like many memorable writers) in poverty.