rself to imagine what message the dying
woman could have had to communicate, and wondering if the future would
ever clear up the mystery. To the good Doctor it seemed only a strange
Providence, by which the religious convictions of Adele should be
deepened and made sure. And in no way were the results of those
convictions more beautifully apparent than in the efforts of Adele to
overcome her antipathies to the spinster. It is doubtful, indeed, if a
bolder challenge can be made to the Christian graces of any character
whatever than that which demands the conquest of social prejudices which
have grown into settled aversion. With all the stimulus of her new
Christian endeavor, Adele sought to think charitably of Miss Eliza. Yet
it was hard; always, that occasional cold kiss of the spinster had for
Adele an iron imprint, which drove her warm blood away, instead of
summoning it to response.

For her, Miss Eliza's staple praises of Reuben, and her adroit stories
of the admiration and attachment of Mrs. Brindlock for her nephew, were
distasteful to the last degree. Coarse natures never can learn upon
what fine threads the souls of the sensitive are strung.

Adele felt a tender gratitude toward Reuben, which it seemed to her the
boisterous affection of the spinster could never approach. She
apprehended his spiritual perplexities more keenly than the austere
aunt, and saw with what strange ferment his whole nature was vexed. Had
he been a brother by blood, she could not have felt for him more warmly.
And if she ever allowed herself to guess at a nearer tie, it was not to
Miss Eliza that she would have named the guess,--not even, thus far, to
herself. As yet there was a soft fulness in her heart that felt no
wound,--at least no wound in which her hope rankled. Whether Reuben were
present or away, her songs rose, with a sweeter, a serener, and a
loftier cheer than of old under the roof of the parsonage; and, as of
old, the Doctor laid down his book and listened, as if an angel sang.

XLII.

In the summer of 1840 the Doctor received a letter from Maverick which
overwhelmed him with consternation; and its revelations, we doubt not,
will, prove as great a surprise to our readers.

"My good friend Johns," he wrote, "I owe you a debt of gratitude which I
can never repay; you have shown such fatherly interest in my dear
child,--you have so guided and guarded her,--you have so abundantly
filled the place which, though it was my du