ly have retreated, after his return to the world; but that was
not so easy. Miss Ringtop held him with an inexorable clutch. They were
not married, however, until just before his departure for California,
whither she afterwards followed him. She died in less than a year, and
left him free."

"And what became of the other Arcadians?" asked Mr. Johnson.

"The Shelldrakes are still living in Norridgeport. They have become
Spiritualists, I understand, and cultivate Mediums. Hollins, when I
last heard of him, was a Deputy Surveyor in the New York Custom-House.
Perkins Brown is our butcher, here in Waterbury, and he often asks
me,--'Do you take chloride of soda on your beefsteaks? 'He is as fat as
a prize ox, and the father of five children."

"Enos!" exclaimed Mrs. Billings, looking at the clock, "it's nearly
midnight! Mr. Johnson must be very tired, after such a long story. The
Chapter of the A.C. is hereby closed!"

* * * * *

SNOW.

All through the long hours of yesterday the low clouds hung close above
our heads, to pour with more unswerving aim their constant storm of
sleet and snow,--sometimes working in soft silence, sometimes with
impatient gusty breaths, but always busily at work. Darkness brought no
rest to these laborious warriors of the air, but only fiercer strife:
the wild winds rose; noisy recruits, they howled beneath the eaves,
or swept around the walls, like hungry wolves, now here, now there,
howling; at opposite doors. Thus, through the anxious and wakeful night,
the storm went on. The household lay vexed by broken dreams, with
changing fancies of lost children on solitary moors, of sleighs
hopelessly overturned in drifted and pathless gorges, or of icy cordage
upon disabled vessels in Arctic seas; until a softer warmth, as of
sheltering snow-wreaths, lulled all into deeper rest till morning.

And what a morning! The sun, a young conqueror, sends in his glorious
rays, like heralds, to rouse us for the inspection of his trophies. The
baffled foe, retiring, has left far and near the high-heaped spoils
behind. The glittering plains own the new victor. Over all these level
and wide-swept meadows, over all these drifted, spotless slopes, he is
proclaimed undisputed monarch. On the wooded hill-sides the startled
shadows are in motion; they flee like young fawns, bounding upward and
downward over rock and dell, as through the long gleaming arches the
king comes marching