"Now, mother, you are not going to coop me in that hateful place?"

“Anna, I do not wish to injure you, or lessen your pleasures, but what will become of you, if you grow up ignorant as a servant girl? I wish you to become an intelligent lady, instead of a mere rattle-brained ignoramus !"

"Well, I don't care what you want, I won't go to that hateful school, to be moping my life away in dull study !”

Ah, father, though gone, here is your daughter, with that wayward temper which says "won't" to your widow. Mrs. W. knew it was wrong, but how could she, with the fresh tears of widowhood on her cheek, chide, much less punish, the child of her departed husband?

“Anna,” she replied, “I am sorry to hear you speak so wickedly. Here you are ten years old, and can only read. You are growing up to shame me! Now do go to school to please your mother!”

"Oh no, mother," was the little girl's reply in a coaxing tone, "I don't want to go now; there's time enough yet, and I will go by-andby."

"But, my daughter, it will be much better to go now, and finish your education as quick as you can, and then be ready for pleasure afterward."

“No, no, no, I can't go to school now, but I'll tell you what I will do. I will go with you to Mr. Jewel's store, and there you shall get me a beautiful ring like Jane Johnson's. And then we will go to Monsieur Jourdan's music room and look at his pianos."

"You extravagant creature," exclaimed her mother, half-laughingly, "and where else will you take me? At this rate you will spend all my money in a year!"

"Oh, never mind that; come, get your hat, mother, for I am in a great fidget to have these nice things!"

And sure enough, the mother yielded. She would be more strict by-and-by, but now she could not bear to, and so they bought the ring, and then went to the music room to select a piano. By the time they had reached home, five hundred dollars had been expended on the spoiled child.

It was a good trait in her waywardness in the matter of education, that Anna had the greatest passion for music. In the acquirement of this she had iron perseverance, and made her master weary with her zeal. And yet he was

275

proud to witness the astonishing progress of his pupil, accomplishing in a month what others required a year for. But on the matter of school, for the acquirement even of an ordinary education, she was inflexible, and her passion for music made all other educational pursuits disagreeable in the extreme. Her natural quickness enabled her to pick up many things by a sort of intuition which others must labor for, so that she did not appear deficient in education to an ordinary observer, while her sparkling wit and beauty, rendered more brilliant by her very waywardness, made her society greatly sought after. Her musical attainments, also, so great for one so young, atoned for everything else, so that from girlhood, Anna Wwas admired and petted wherever she went.

On the very morning when Mrs. W. was urging her daughter to attend school, the orphan stood by her; the sorrows of her past life had given to her countenance a cast of melancholy, so that her very smile was sad. She knew not why her mother suffered, but in early childhood she saw that tears mingled with the very bread she ate. And then to lose her mother, that was a sad blow, which even the care of Mrs. W. could not soften. There was kindness enough, for her friend was a conscientious Christian, and yet the entire connection of this unfortunate child with her family's troubles, a connection which could only be hid den by taking her into the bosom of her own family, insensibly may have lent a certain distance to the good woman's manner, which the young girl saw was not the feeling tenderness of a mother. And yet she suspected nothing, only Mrs. W. was not her own mother, and that was reason enough why she should not love her so well as she did her own Anna.

She was beautiful also, and knew nothing of her own history to make her cheek red with shame. Hers was not the sadness of shame. sprang from sorrow.

It

66

Well, Mary, you hear what Anna says about school; what do you think about it?" said Mrs. W., turning to the orphan girl.

"If you think it best for me, I should love to go very much," was the modest answer.

"Why, Mary, what makes you speak so stupidly about that school business?" exclaimed Anna. "I am sure we have nearly moped ourselves to death already, in that horrid school of Mrs. K's! Besides, you know enough now. Come, don't go, that's a dear girl!"

276

"If Aunt will let me, I would rather go to school, and shall feel thankful for the privilege."

"Anna, don't speak any more about this to Mary. She is a good girl and shall have her desire. I do wish you would go with her!" said the mother.

"Not I, indeed," was the short reply of the pouting beauty, whose sullenness did not vanish until she reached the jeweller's shop, and had obtained what pleased her vanity so well. Thus these little girls started side by side, with different aims and desires. The first very beautiful, and vain as beautiful. Her passion for music had been indulged, until there was scarce an instrument of which she was not master, and at the same time her voice was rich and cultivated in the highest degree. The second was beautiful and gifted, but she had already tasted the sorrows of life, and Divine Providence was gradually leading her to that only rest which is permanent and satisfying, rest in Christ.

Five years passed away, making great changes in this family. The splendid farm. which they occupied at Mr. W.'s death became an open space in the city. Population was increasing with unparalleled rapidity, and that spacious farm was in demand for buildings. At last parts of it were sold for a very large sum, and from easy circumstances, this family rose to great wealth. In the meantime the differences between Anna and Mary became more and more marked. Opulence added fuel to the bad qualities of the one, while early trials, mellowing down natural asperities of character, and a real desire to excel in all the pursuits of education, made the other appear the more lovely. Those five years contained the golden hours of the orphan's pilgrimage. Of this I wish to speak particularly, because it illustrates strikingly "the iniquities of the fathers visited on the children."

Long since had Mary outstript all rivalry, and was regarded the finest scholar in the school. Her beauty, her intelligence, and her singular modesty, made her an object of admiration and love. And yet it was so different from that accorded to Anna, that it never excited even momentary jealousy. Their spheres were as entirely different as those of the planet Venus and a comet. In general society they mingled together, and were the centres of admiration, and the presence of two such brilliant girls made the widow's house a favorite

resort for the fashionable and intelligent. Each had her admirers, and yet it was frequently observed that Mary's countenance was sad in society. It was not her delight. She had found "a friend that sticketh closer than a brother." She frequented these circles no more than she was constrained by the desires of Mrs. W. and her daughter, who really felt proud of

her.

In the meantime the growing city was receiving its addition of strangers from all parts of the world, and through that way will Providence unravel one of its own mysteries. A large company, one evening, was assembled in the parlors of Mrs. W. It was a brilliant scene, and one indicating that wealth and fashion had acquired an unusual control of the widow's mind and heart. But God restores his children, even though it be by buffetings. There was music and dancing, and merry laughter, and wine, and all the accompaniments of fashionable frivolity.

An intimate friend of Mrs. W. had introduced to her an acquaintance he had made at a fashionable watering-place. He was a gentleman of middle age, in whose gayest sallies a certain sadness was visible. He had not been long in the room, when his eye rested on Mary, and he started back as if affrighted. His friend saw his unusual emotion, and inquired for its cause. "It was only a sudden faintness; he was better now."

And yet again and repeatedly did he turn his eye towards Mary with a gaze which at last became painful to her, and noticed by all. He excused himself, and left the house. But why did Mary have such heart-sinkings and forebodings, as though some cloud were about to burst over her? She had done nothing wrong, and was strong in her own integrity, and yet that stranger's look oppressed her. But why?

The stranger was followed to his room by the gentleman who had introduced him to Mrs. W. He was pacing the room in great agitation, and exclaiming, "Has the dead come to life? or am I dreaming?"

66

My dear sir, what agitates you so greatly this evening?" asked the gentleman as he entered the room.

"I have seen the image of my lost sister to-night, just as she looked eighteen years ago. Oh, agony untold, to have treated her as we did. Her misstep brought disgrace on our family, and we drove her away. When we

sought her again we could not find her, and never have discovered a trace of her to this day! Tell me, I beseech you, who is that young lady who sang the duet with Mrs. W. to-night?"

His anxiety seemed to look for some reply which would clear up the mystery of his sister's fate.

66

Why, that was Mary W., a cousin of the one who played the piano. She is a niece of Anna's father, who provided for her in his will."

"Mary W., Mary W.! there is a mystery about her face, and would I could unravel it! Can she be my sister's child?"

Now these words sent a new train of ideas trooping over the gentleman's mind. He well remembered when Mary's mother was introduced into Mrs. W.'s family, and that there always was something unexplained about the matter, which no one dared to probe. Soon probability was elicited from possibility, and very soon he reached conviction. He had once seen the mother of Mary, and remarked how striking was the resemblance between the mother and daughter-so striking, indeed, that not even disease had effaced it. He stood a moment considering what he should say. It is a delicate position for one to occupy, when he speaks of things affecting the dead and the living.

"I infer from what you say, that your sister was ruined; can you give me a description of her seducer ?"

"Could you look into my heart, you would see his image traced there by the passion for vengeance. Iwould have torn his heart out could I have found him. He fled when his crime began to get out, and from that day I have never heard a word of him. He was a singularly handsome man, tall and well built, with a scar over the left eye."

66

Enough, enough!" exclaimed the astonished questioner; "the father of Anna W. was the man who ruined your sister. He must have changed his name, and till now has eluded detection. He has gone to a higher tribunal, as I always thought, a heart-broken man. He pined away without any perceptible disease on him, and Dr. X. has told me in confidence that he believed it was heart-sickness in some way connected with the two strangers so suddenly introduced into his family."

277

He then gave a minute account of all he knew concerning Mary, now dead, how she was treated, how kind Mrs. W. was to her, and how that Dr. X. believed that Mrs. W. was fully acquainted with the secret, and took that wise method to bury it. He then told of the provision Mr. W. made for the young Mary, and of the motherly care his widow had ever taken of her. As he thus spake, the brother, excited beyond control, burst into weeping, and fiercely striking his fist against his head, exclaimed,

"Oh my proud folly, in driving my poor sister away! Would I could recall it, and show her my repentance by soothing her last hours by my own assiduities. I will forgive the man who brought her shame on her, for giving her such an asylum to die in, and for taking care of her child! God forgive me for being more heartless and cruel to my sister than even her seducer was!"

He too, under provocation, had committed a great sin, and here he proved that years had not washed it away. Truly, a wrong is itself a centre of evil with a widening circle, drawing into itself many otherwise innocent.

But what are you intending to do now?" was the question propounded to the distressed brother.

"I must see my niece, and if I can, I will take her home with me!"

"Your feelings do honor to your heart, but you have not considered that to take Mary home with you, presupposes a reason, and that reason, known to her, will break the poor girl's heart, and a nobler one our city has not. She is all alive with high and honorable feelings, and to this day probably does not suspect a mother whose memory she reverences."

66

Yes, yes, I see the difficulties now, which this sudden incident has created. I do not know what to do. At any rate, I must see her for her mother's sake. Come what will, I must see her. To be introduced to her as her mother's brother, will do no injury."

"But you forget Mrs. W., who probably knows all the facts. If you must see Mary you must take Mrs. W. into your confidence. It is the only safe way."

The next morning found the brother closeted with Mrs. W., both greatly agitated by recurrence to the painful past. And what would come of it? Disgrace and death, perhaps.

278

Sir," said she, with an utterance even harder than when she first heard her husband speak of the same thing, "I had hoped to bury the past, and in some measure atone for it. But God is just, and sin is dreadful, for it pursues the innocent. That my husband has repented of that deed, I have no doubt, and that he did what he could to repair it. And yet, years after he is dead, destruction impends over the innocent!"

It was no wonder that both wept as these mournful thoughts swept like a tempest over them.

"Madam, I have done my sister a great wrong, and I would now make some atonement for it. And how can I do it without taking her daughter as my own, to love her and care for her, as I would for her mother, if she were yet alive?"

"But it is absolutely frightful in any way to hint or communicate this thing to the dear girl. Her character is faultless, and a purer heart is not on the earth; but now she dreams not of dishonor as associated in any way with her. self! You must bury this in your soul, and deprive yourself for her sake, of the pleasure of calling her your sister's daughter! We are all on the edge of a precipice, and reason almost fails when I see those so dear to me, my Anna and my Mary, dashed down! I can bear the reproach myself, but it is an intolerable anguish of heart to see them ruined!"

And who would not have sympathized with this distressed mother? There they canvassed the whole matter, and determined that he should leave the city without making himself known to Mary. To do otherwise might produce disastrous effects, and that course was adopted.

A secret crime is an unsafe secret, even when confined to our breast. Crime, as a secret, is safe nowhere, save in the grave. The author of this was now dead, but he had left one at least acquainted, who proved faithful to her trust. But nature had inscribed a record of the deed in the very face of the lovely Mary, which record the brother of her mother had met unexpectedly, and read with a shudder, as though the dead had risen before him. God, who sees and overrules all things, had left witnesses of a deed done many years before, and now it was to be laid bare in the most sorrow

ful way.

A secret safe with one alone, is well nigh

trumpeted to the world when it gains access to a second. Pandora's box could be more easily closed back on its escaping woes, than a suspected secret kept when once it gets in motion.

The singular emotion of Mary's uncle had been noticed at the evening party, and some fancied they could detect a resemblance between her and him. Forthwith there were eager questionings, and a revivification of all the surmises and reports which had been gossipped years before. Not a week was passed, before every mouth had a report about the matter, which compromised the honor of the sweet girl most interested.

"I tell you what I believe," said Miss Emptiness to her friend, Miss Folly, "and what I always did believe, that this pert Miss, who has carried such a high head in school and in society, is no better than she should be !”

"Now you don't say !" "how brazen she must be. acquaintance the very first I'll teach her manners."

replied Miss Folly; I mean to cut her chance, that I will.

"And then only think," said Miss E.,“ of that proud widow since she has got a little money; one would think she had always been a nice body. I guess if the truth were known that she was the mother of this niece before she had a right."

"Yes, I guess so, too," was the amiable reply; "and that stranger at the party, who is he? Mary's father, eh?"

And forthwith these sagacious and charitable young ladies started their surmises, which were not truth indeed, and yet were not much worse. They became unconsciously the agents of justice, because it is a part of the punishment of secreted sin, to give hundred-tongued rumor her ample reports for exaggeration.

The gentleman who had introduced the stranger, was subjected to a rack of questions. He kept silent, indeed, but his very silence was delicious food for gossip, and more could be made of that than of the truth, bad as it

was.

In the meantime the poor girl, so deeply interested, was alone kept in the dark. Her heart was weighed down with a sort of presentiment. She knew the stranger whose distressed gaze had haunted her, had been with her aunt. But what was the subject of their conversation ? When she saw her aunt, her eyes were red with weeping, and ever and

anon those eyes were riveted on her with a mournful earnestness. Her aunt indeed redoubled her kindnesses, but coming in just then, a less keen observer of human nature could have detected the movings of pity, caused by something peculiarly unfortunate in her condition. And what could it all mean? She was only twelve years of age when her mother died, and now for the first time she recurred with a shudder to the fact, that her mother never mentioned her father's name to her. Whither is it all tending? She felt the earth passing from beneath her. This was a foretaste of the father's iniquities visited on his child. She was a Christian, and yet who can tell the agony which rent her heart, as she knelt at the mercy seat, with all these thoughts concerning her sainted mother and concerning herself? Truly may it be said of all wickedness with emphasis, "And that man perished not alone in his sin."

This distressing suspense soon wrought its effects on her health, not strong at any time. The family now was avoided as though infected, and this confirmed the fears of Mary, that others knew something in her own history still concealed from her. Anna, self-willed and wayward as any spoiled beauty, was chagrined at the coolness manifested towards even her. Her mother utterly refused to be communicative on the causes, and this only served to quicken her curiosity. At length she obtained. through an intimate friend, with great difficulty, the reports in circulation.

Selfishness had become so inordinate, and her vanity had grown so large, that she could not feel even this dreadful suspicion of her mother so keenly as Mary did the mere suspicions in her own mind. Accordingly, with this advantage, Anna at length drew from her mother the sad history. In this she was wayward as in all other things, uttered a laugh and declared she would snap her fingers in the face of all the world. As for Mary, there was no use in her taking it so much to heart. She was a dear, good girl, and she would love her the more for her misfortune."

"But, my dear Anna, you must not break Mary's heart by revealing these things to her!" said the mother in a deprecating tone.

"Oh no, to be sure not; but then as for this heart-breaking, it is all fudge, mother. I'll trust her heart, that it is tougher than all that

279

comes to. I should like to see the thing which could break my heart."

Thus she rattled away, speaking the truth indeed concerning herself; but she knew not the deep sensibilities of the other heart of which she was speaking, or even she would have trembled to touch it so rudely.

The entire demeanor of Anna soon revealed to Mary that she had become possessor of the facts, which she knew were so interesting to herself. Not a smile had lightened her face since that evening, and yet who does not know that the human mind "hopes against hope?" Her forebodings were all gloomy, but hope had not deserted her yet. The blotting out of that hope, feeble as it is, will it crush her? In this state of suspense, one morning she was left alone with the thoughtless Anna, and with an effort of desperation and a trembling utterance, she besought her if she loved her to tell her all she knew.

"Oh, it is nothing killing," she replied, with a laugh. "I suppose I must be a little more affectionate to you now than I have been before, because mother says you are my sister!"

Mary's face was blanched with the pallor of death. She gasped for breath. She caught at a chair to hold herself, and with one suppressed shriek, fainted away. Anna was now thoroughly frightened, and shrieked for help. The mother in an instant comprehended it all, but it was no time for reproaches. The physician was sent for. Mary recovered from one fainting fit only to relapse into another. For days she hung between life and death, and it was long doubtful in which way the balance would turn. The tender assiduities of love at length received the smile of Providence, and for the present, Mary lived. But how long, after such a shock?

It is not to be wondered at that her pastor had watched her with feelings of the deepest interest. He knew her mother's history, divulged to him for the sake of his counsel and sympathy. His trust had been unbroken, and he loved Mary the more for what he knew. He had laid his own hand on her head in the holy ordinance of baptism, and had welcomed her into the bosom of the church. And she in turn looked up to him with such affection and reverence, as makes the intercourse of a pastor with the young Christian one of the most delightful on earth.