shed towards the bell-rope which hung beside the hearth.

She seized the golden tassel, the bell rang out like a ghostly chime,
when suddenly a fearful crash was heard, a thunderbolt came down the
chimney, zig-zagging through the room like a fiery serpent, fusing the
metal of the bell in its passage and flashing down the bell-rope to the
golden tassel with a blinding glare, finally vanishing with a dull
crackling sound.

The whole family rushed at once to the scene of this fearful crash.

With ghastly, frightened faces they came rushing in one by one, huddled
up in sheets and counterpanes or whatever else came first to hand, like
so many spectres in white mourning.

In the room lay two corpses, the mother and the child.

Bitter lamentations resounded through the house.

The father and the grandfather came hurrying along.

Howling and screaming like some wild beast never seen before, the father
flung himself upon his dead, turning frantically from the mother to the
child, and from the child to the mother, kissing and squeezing them
constantly. And then he pressed them to his bosom and literally howled
like one beyond the reach of the mercy of God.

But the grandfather groped his way along in silence, looking in his
white nightdress and his dishevelled silvery locks like some spectral
thing.

He could not speak. His palsied tongue could not utter a single cry for
the relief of his agony. He knelt down in front of the dead bodies and
raised his eyes aloft. Oh! how he strove to give expression to his
grief, to utter one word, if only one, which might pierce Heaven itself.
But he could not. He was dumb, his mouth moved as if it would speak, but
his tongue was tied.

Oh! how much this family must have sinned, to suffer so much.

CHAPTER V.

THE UNBELOVED SON.

The day dawned slowly and, as it seemed, with great difficulty. The
morning was cold and cloudy as is often the case after a tempestuous
night.

There was a great bustling about in the house of mourning. A bier and a
coffin had to be made, and the dead clothed in their funeral finery. The
old squire wished the funeral to be a splendid one.

The courtyard had been swept clean. Every household tool and implement
of labour had been removed out of the way. They were preparing to keep
one of those days of sad and solemn observance which must befall every
household at some time or other.

At such times the street door is kept wide open. Let the cou