the other, contemptuously; "some tale of wicked indulgence, wrapped in the simulated language of the day, when a violation of the obligations of justice is called imprudence, and guilt softened down into misfortune. Some pretty device to steal away the pity of a tender, inexperienced girl."

"Would to Heaven it were! No, sir; you wrong me, on my soul you do. But let us end this painful interview. Colonel Dangerfield," continued he, with deep solemnity, "do you believe in oaths; in appeals to the Being who is all truth, all justice? If so, hear me assure you, as I hope for happiness hereafter, if not here; as I am a being possessing an immortal soul, which I here pledge to everlasting perdition if I say not the truth; hear me swear to you, that it is misfortune, and not guilt, which urges me to keep from you for a time the reasons for my conduct towards you and yours. They may be weak, unfounded, childish perhaps; they may be a part of my mal-but such as they are, I cannot overcome them just now. Yet before the throne of the great Governor of the universe, I here pledge myself that ere another year has passed away, you shall know all, and that in the mean time the confidence you have bestowed upon me shall not be abused. Dare you trust me thus far?"

"It is asking almost too much, sir; but when I call to mind that but for you I should have had no daughter, I cannot but confess that you are entitled to some little confidence." He reflected a few moments, and resumed,-"I will trust you; though even you yourself little

at what a risk of one day being pointed he most rash and imprudent of fathers. to your terms; in less than a year, you

less than a year. Oh! sir," and he took nd of Colonel Dangerfield, and pressed h! sir, you cannot know my gratitude s confidence; and-and Heaven grant ay never live to repent it!"

y separated, the colonel musing on this sh, which sounded somewhat equivocal, ainsford bending his way to the domicil ster Zeno Paddock, where sat Mrs. Judith ague, a very agony of curiosity. She sort of instinctive feeling that something appened, that something would happen, omething was going on which she did xactly comprehend, and she forthwith herself, as it were, in nautical phrase, m and yardarm, alongside of Rainsford, ained to sink him outright, if he did not der his secret. But alas! all her manouFor boarding failed. Rainsford was so immersed in his own anxious and painlings, that he answered her like Hotspur, ectingly, he knew not what," and uninnally perplexed her beyond all womanly

ance.

thought I saw you coming out of the el's just now; didn't I, Mr. Rainsford?" looked in her face with a blank vacuity, eplied to his own thoughts,

ne year more-yes-hum-and all will own."

s. Judith could make nothing of this.

"O yes, as you say, one year more, and then -we shall all be a year older." Mrs. Judith did not know exactly what to say, and, as usual in such like cases, talked nonsense.

"Perhaps not-perhaps after all it may not come to pass."

"Not come to pass that we shall be a year older next year!" screamed Mrs. Paddock, and the scream brought him to his recollection for

a moment.

"We may be dead, you know," said he, smiling.

"Ah, that's true; that's clever; hah, hah! I declare you make me laugh, Mr. Rainsford." "And yet," said Rainsford, relapsing, "it may be-hum—um—um.”

"What did you say,

sir ?"

“All—yes—all my poor brothers went that way-and within a few months of the same age-um-u-u-m.”

"Ah! yes sir, this is a scan-I mean a miserable world; we may die, or be robbed, or ose all we have in the world, and our wits into the bargain, before-"

"What do you say about losing my wits, woman?" cried Rainsford, starting up furiously, and glaring at her as if he had seen a ghost.

Mrs. Judith fled out of the room like a timid fawn, and, throwing her handkerchief over it to protect the head of Holofernes from the sun, "made tracks," as Bushfield would say, in a straight line over to the temporary residence of Colonel Dangerfield, where the first person she encountered was Virginia.

"O, Miss Phiginny! Miss Phiginny! such an accident has happened to Mr. Rainsford.” "What accident? tell me, Mrs. Paddock; quick, quick!"

"O, what a miserable world is this! O, Miss Phiginny!"

"For heaven's sake tell me,” cried the young lady, “what, what has happened to Mr. Rainsford?" and she trembled and grew as pale as ashes.

"0-0-0, I declare I'm so frightened, and so out of breath,-O, who'd have thought it, poor young man !”

"What? what?" cried Virginia, in agony. "Why, he's run distracted, as sure

Here Mrs. Judith was arrested in her speech; Virginia uttered one scream, and fell as if dead on the greensward of the little enclosure in the rear of the house, where she had been sitting under the shade of a spreading tree.

Mrs.

Dangerfield heard the scream, and ran out to see the cause. She found Virginia lying senseless, and Mrs. Judith wringing her hands, and crying out against this miserable world, almost, nay, quite unconscious of what she was saying. After some time and care, the young maiden recovered sufficiently to utter a few rambling incoherent words.

"So soon-it was not to have come yet. Poor, poor Rainsford, and poor Virginia." Then seeing Mrs. Paddock, she raised herself up, and asked,

"Are you sure, quite sure?"

"Why I can't altogether say that he has lost all his wits but he talked as if he did not know

what he was saying, and looked at me as if he didn't know me from Adam; and then he called me woman, as if he meant d-1. But as I live, here he comes; who'd have thought it?"

At this moment Rainsford looked over the little paling, and invited Virginia to walk with him to the river-side. Mrs. Dangerfield would have opposed it, but Virginia insisted she was quite recovered, and displayed so much impatience of contradiction, that the kind mother acquiesced.

"My dear Virginia," thought she, "you are not what you used to be."

They walked a long while over the smooth meadows that skirted the river, and under the spreading elms and lofty sycamore-trees that here and there overshadowed the carpets of flowers, now putting forth their many-tinted products of the spring. Rainsford inquired the cause of her temporary indisposition, to which he had heard her mother allude; but she evaded the subject, fearful of giving him pain, and by so doing inflicted perhaps a greater. At length, urged beyond her will to resist, she disclosed the whole of Mrs. Judith's communication. He shrunk with bitter and mortified feelings.

"Yes, every one sees it coming; every one will know it soon, and fly from me as they did from my poor father and brothers; as this foolish woman did from me. Art thou not afraid of me, Virginia ?"

"Afraid of you!" and she gave him a look so innocent and confiding, that he once more revived to a perception of happiness. They