picture he so much admired, endeared her more and more to him;
and it is not surprising that a girl who had seen so few gentlemen,
except her brothers and some of the Hudson's Bay clerks, should have
given him her heart in return. Loraine was not a man to trifle with a
girl's affections, and sooner than he might otherwise have done, he
expressed his wishes to Captain Mackintosh.

"I conclude Hector has told you that Sybil is not my daughter, though
she is as dear to me as if she were," answered Captain Mackintosh. "I
am, in truth, utterly ignorant of her parentage. Soon after my
marriage, while quartered in Upper Canada, my wife and I made an
excursion through Lake Ontario and the Sault Sainte Marie to the shores
of Lake Superior. We intended proceeding across the lake to the then
wild region of the west.

"While staying at a small cottage on the north side of the falls of
Sainte Marie, the very day before we were to sail, a heavy gale came on.
As we were unable to embark, not to disappoint my wife, I proposed to
make an excursion, partly on foot and partly on horseback, as far as we
could proceed along the north shore of the lake to Groscap, a conical
hill which we could see rising to a considerable elevation in the
distance. We found the path far more difficult than we had expected,
and at length, our object unaccomplished, we turned our steps homeward.
We had not got far when the rain began to come down in torrents, and we
were glad to take shelter in a log hut of the roughest description,
built on some rising ground a short way from the shore of the lake. It
was unoccupied, but as there was a hearth and chimney, we directed our
attendants to obtain some fuel and lighted a fire to dry our drenched
garments. In vain we waited for the weather to clear. Darkness coming
on, we found that we must spend the night in the hut, not a pleasant
prospect, but it was preferable to making our way through the forest
with the rain pouring down on our heads.

"The wind howled and whistled, the waves dashed furiously against the
shore, the trees bent and writhed beneath the blast, and my fear was
that some of those surrounding the hut might be uprooted and crush in
the roof. I went frequently to the door, in the hopes of discovering a
rent in the clouds which might enable me to hold out some prospect to my
wife of the cessation of the storm. While looking up at the sky I
fancied that I heard the plaintive cry of a child.