here after him,
Ariel, and how could I? Yet I should like to see him once--once before
he dies; to see him, Ariel, in the fulness of his beauty; my eye to rest
upon him once more; and then I could die smiling."

She then sat down under the tree, and in a voice replete with exquisite
pathos and melody sang the plaintive air which Osborne had played on
the evening when the first rapturous declaration of their passion was
made. This incident with the bird also occurred much about the same hour
of the day, a remembrance which an association, uniformly painful to her
moral sense, now revived with peculiar power, for she started and became
pale. "My sweet bird," she exclaimed, "what is this; I shall be absent
from evening worship again--but I will not prevaricate now; why--why
is this spot to be fatal to me? Come, Ariel, come: perhaps I may not be
late."

She hastened home with a palpitating heart, and unhappily arrived only
in time to find the family rising from prayer.

As she stood and looked upon them, she smiled, but a sudden paleness
at the same instant overspread her face, which gave to her smile an
expression we are utterly incompetent to describe.

"I am late," she exclaimed, "and have neglected a solemn and a necessary
duty. To me, to me, papa, how necessary is that duty."

"It is equally so to us all, my child," replied her father; "but," he
added, in order to reconcile her to an omission which had occasioned her
to suffer so much pain before, "we did not forget to pray for you, Jane.
With respect to your absence, we know it was unintentional. Your mind
is troubled, my love, and do not, let me beg of you, dwell upon minor
points of that kind, so as to interrupt the singleness of heart with
which you ought to address God. You know, darling, you can pray in your
own room."

She mused for some minutes, and at length said, "I would be glad to
preserve that singleness of heart, but I fear I will not be able to do
so long."

"If you would stay more with us, darling," observed her mamma, "and talk
and chat more with Maria and Agnes, as you used to do, you would find
your spirits improved. You are not so cheerful as we would wish to see
you."

"Perhaps I ought to do that, mamma; indeed I know I ought, because you
wish it."

"We all wish it," said Agnes, "Jane dear, why keep aloof from us? Who in
the world loves you as we do; and why would you not, as you used to do,
allow us to cheer you, to support you, or to