d under a stone. It was a ragged, rumpled, muddy fragment of a
letter, or an essay, which rain and wind and water had done their
best to annihilate, and finally, seeming to become weary of their
plaything, had tossed it contemptuously on the shore, and a pitying
stone had rolled down and covered and preserved a tiny corner. Dr.
Douglass eyed it curiously, trying to decipher the mud-stained lines,
and being in a dreamy mood wondered meanwhile what young, fair hand
had penned the words, and what of joy or sadness filled them.
Scarcely a word was readable, at least nothing that would gratify his
curiosity, until he turned the bit of leaf, and the first line, which
the stone had hidden, shone out distinctly: "Sometimes I can not help
asking myself why I was made--." Here the corner was torn off, and
whether that was the end of the original sentence or not, it was
the end to him. God sometimes uses very simple means with which to
confound the wisdom of this world. Such a sudden and extraordinary
revulsion of feeling as swept over Dr. Douglass he had never dreamed
of before. He did not stop to question the strangeness of his state of
mind, nor why that bit of soiled, torn paper should possess so fearful
a power over him. He did not even realize at the moment that it was
connected with this bewilderment, he only knew that the foundation
upon which he had been building for years seemed suddenly to have
been torn from under him by invisible hands, and left his feet sinking
slowly down on nothing; and his inmost soul took suddenly up that
solemn question with which he had never before troubled his logical
brain: "I can not help asking myself why I was made?" There was only
one other readable word on that paper, turn it whichever way he would,
and that word was "God;" and he started and shivered when his eye met
this, as if some awful voice had spoken it to his ear.

"What unaccountable witchcraft has taken possession of me?" he
muttered, at length. And turning suddenly he sat himself down on
an old decaying log by the river side, and gave himself up to real,
honest, solemn thought.

"Where is Dr. Douglass?" queried Julia, appearing at the dining-room
door just at tea time. "There is a boy at the door says they want him
at Judge Beldon's this very instant."

"He's _nowhere_" answered Sadie solemnly, pausing in the work of
arranging cups and saucers. "It's my private opinion that he has been
and gone and hung himself. He passed