rangements for her
accommodation there, by sending to Berne for a distant relative, a widow
lady, who had but one child, also a little girl, about the age of the
stranger. She accordingly took up her residence with Dr. Lindhorst, and
assumed the charge of both the children, while the Doctor continued to
pursue his labors, apparently much lighter of heart than before."

"But the child?"

"I was about to add that I learned from my father the following account
of it. He told me (but I am sure this is not known to any out of our own
family) that as Dr. Lindhorst was returning home after his second long
absence, he entered a small village near Turin, just as a detachment of
'The Army of Italy' were leaving it. The rear presented the usual motley
collection of baggage-wagons, disabled soldiers, sutlers, camp-women,
and hangers-on of all sorts, who attend in the steps of a victorious
troop. As Paul Lindhorst stopped to view the spectacle, and while the
wild strains of music could be heard echoing and re-echoing as the
columns defiled around the brow of a mountain which shut them from his
sight, the rear of the detachment came up and passed. At a short
distance behind, a child, scarcely four years of age, without shoes or
stockings, and thinly clad, her hair streaming in the wind, ran by as
fast as her little feet could carry her, screaming, in a tone of agony
and terror, 'Wait for me, mamma!' 'Here I am, mamma!' 'Do dot leave me,
mamma!' '_Do_ wait for me!' Paul Lindhorst sprang forward, and taking
the child in his arms, he hastened to overtake the detachment, supposing
that by some accident the little creature had been overlooked. On coming
up, he inquired for the child's mother.

"'Bless me!' said one of the women, 'if there is not poor little
Annette!'

"'We can't take her; that's positive,' cried another.

"'How did she get here?' exclaimed a third.

"'Something must be done,' said a wounded soldier, in a compassionate
tone. 'Give her to me; I will carry her in my arms;' and taking the
little Annette, who recognized in him an old acquaintance, he easily
quieted her by saying her mamma would come very soon.

"The Doctor at length discovered that the poor child's mother had died
in the village they were just leaving. He learned also that she was the
wife of an officer who had been wounded some time before, and that she
had made a long journey, just in time to see him breathe his last, and
had remained with the camp u