t the grieving beauty of her brows.
But held her heart's proud pain superbly still."

"My little sister, you must not stay here any longer. Would you prefer
to go home at once in my buggy, or remain in the parlor until
daylight?"

"Neither. Let me sit down on the stone terrace till the end comes. I
will disturb no one. It will be three hours before day breaks, and
when you know whether your idol will live or die, come and tell me.
Take your hand from my shoulder."

He had endeavored to detain her, but she shrank away from his grasp,
and glided down the smooth sward to the terrace which divided it from
the ripple-barred and ringed sands of the shelving beach.

As he returned to the house, the wind sprang up and moaned through the
dense foliage above him, and an owl, perched in some clustering bough
that overhung the portico, screamed and hooted dismally. The sound was
so startling that the greyhound leaped to his feet and set up an
answering howl, which almost froze Katie with fright, and caused even
Mrs. Gerome's heavy eyelids to unclose.

Salome sat down on the paved terrace, crossed her arms over the low
stone balustrade, and resting her chin upon them, looked out at the
burnished bosom of the ocean. Just beneath her, and near enough to
moisten the granite with the silvery spray,--

"Its waves are kneeling on the strand,
As kneels the human knee,
Their white locks bowing to the sand,
The priesthood of the sea."

If the old Rabbinical legend of Sandalphon be grounded in some solemn
vision granted to the saints of eld, who walked in Syria, then
peradventure on this night, the angel must have been puzzled indeed
concerning the petitions that floated up, and demanded admission to
the Eternal ear.

From the anxious heart of the sincere and humble Christian who knelt
at the bedside of the invalid, rose a fervent prayer that if
consistent with the Father's will, He would lay His healing hand upon
the sufferer, and restore her to health and strength; while the
wretched girl on the terrace prayed vehemently that God would crush
the feeble flicker of life in Mrs. Gerome's wasted frame, would take
from the world a woman whose existence was a burden to herself and
threatened to prove a curse to others.

The passionate cry of Salome's soul was,--

"Punish me in any way, and all other ways! Send sickness, destitution,
humiliation,--let every other affliction smite me; but save me from
the intolerable an