h less adored and loved.

At length one of the women lifted her face, haggard with care and grief,
and threw a glance, preternaturally sharpened, over the wild waste of
waters:--

"I see a sail yonder," she cried wildly. "Look," she cried to Agnes,
"can you not see it, too?"--but just at this moment one of the sailors,
not quite so much stupefied as the others, hearing the exclamation,
roused himself, and bent over the side of the boat, and instantly the
frail bark was submerged beneath the waves.

Oh, what shrieks of agony filled the air.

"Then rose from sea to sky the wild farewell,
Then shrieked the timid, and stood still the brave."

Agnes had carefully retained the life-preserver, which had been given to
her by her friend the minister, and with the instinct of
self-preservation, almost unconsciously clung to it, while her
companions, less fortunate, and worn out with previous grief, one by one
sank to rise no more "till the sea shall give up its dead."

"I think," she said, as she concluded her narrative, "I must have been
in the water more than half an hour, when I espied the sail, to which my
unfortunate companion had alluded, and seeing it, seemed to inspire me
with new life, for I had become so exhausted and enfeebled by the waves
that surrounded me, that I felt nature could not much longer survive the
icy chills which thrilled through my very frame; and when I found that
you had seen me, and were sailing towards me, evidently with the
intention of effecting my rescue, no language can describe the varied
emotions of my heart,--joy, gratitude and hope preponderating."

Exhausted by the effort of speaking, Agnes sank back on the rude couch,
that the sailors had with kind haste prepared for her.

"Land, yonder," sang one from the mast-head.

"I am heartily glad of it," said the Captain, "for all our sakes, for we
shall soon have a terrible storm, but especially for this poor lady's,
whose strength seems almost gone."

Prospered by a favoring breeze, a few hours sufficed to bear the vessel
to its destined harbor; and that night, sheltered, in comparative
comfort, beneath the hospitable roof of Mr. Williamson, Ellen's father,
Agnes sank into deep and quiet repose.

CHAPTER X.

April, capricious, yet beautiful child of Spring, once more smiled upon
the bleak shores and sterile plains which, when we last beheld them,
were encompassed by the chilling atmosphere, and loomed bleak and
deso