indeed, dear Madam," replied Arthur, with an effort to control
his voice, "the loss of a very dear friend,"--here the tones visibly
faltered,--"by the burning of a vessel at sea, and the subsequent
upsetting of a boat, in which some of the passengers were endeavoring to
make their escape."

"That is indeed very, very sad news," said the old lady, affectionately
clasping Ella's hand, "and I, my friends, can sympathize with you, for
five years ago to-day, my son, my darling son, the pride of my heart,
the charm and ornament of our dwelling, set sail from his native shores,
for a distant land, and from that moment unto this, no tidings ever
reached me of his fate, for the vessel was heard of never after."

"Do you know," she said to Ella, a few moments after, as Arthur, with
some murmured apology left the room, for he felt that human sympathy,
however precious at other times, seemed but to madden him now, and he
longed to be alone--"Do you know," she repeated, as the young girl's
eyes, swollen with weeping, were upraised to her benevolent countenance,
"that I was standing at the window right opposite, when you drove up to
the door, and as your brother quickly alighted from the carriage, and
tenderly assisted you out, my heart beat quick; the blood forsook my
cheeks, and my whole frame was convulsed with emotion, for so strikingly
did he resemble my lost one in look and manner, that, for the moment, I
wildly dreamed that he had come back to bless me."

The old lady's tears flowed freely.

"I miss him so much, so very much," she said, "and especially on the
anniversary of that fatal day which tore him from my fond embrace, and I
can well appreciate the emotion which lent intensity to David's pathetic
exclamation, 'Oh my son, my son, would to heaven I had died for thee,
oh, my son, my son.'"

While Mrs. Cartwright was thus, by a relation of her own trials,
endeavoring to divert, in some measure, Ella's mind, and prevent her
from dwelling too exclusively on this painful event, Arthur, having
gained his chamber, was now pacing the floor with restless steps, his
whole soul a prey to the most intense emotions of grief, such as he had
never before experienced. At one moment he felt stupefied, at the
suddenness of the blow; the next, aroused again to the consciousness of
its terrible reality. At length a hope, that seemed to up-spring from
the depth of his despair, shed a faint light over the chaotic darkness
that reigned with