d
on the window panes the frostwork looked like the invisible effort of
some fairy spirits, that a breath from mortals would dissolve.

The bright New Year is ever welcomed as a season of enjoyment for those
who have happy homes, where friends meet around well-laden boards, to
return thanks for past prosperity, and form plans for future happiness.
But to others, friendless, forsaken, and perhaps weary of a life of
ill-requited toil, the retrospection is often inexpressibly mournful.

Alone in her room, at her friend's humble cottage, sat Clemence
Graystone, watching for the noiseless incoming of another year. The
light gleamed redly out from the blazing wood fire, lighting up the
small apartment with its cheerful glow, but failed to call anything like
warmth or color to the marble face that drooped low with its weight of
painful thought.

The morrow was to be her wedding day. She raised her head and glanced
around the room, which was filled with all the paraphernalia of the
wedding toilet.

An undefined dread took possession of her. It seemed as though this
happiness, that appeared so near, was yet to elude her. A mirror stood
where she could behold her own image. A sadness stole over the girl's
spirit as she looked at the semblance of herself there reflected. As she
gazed, she seemed to be communing with some invisible presence, and she
found herself pitying the young face in the mirror, as if it were
another than her own.

While she looked sorrowfully, a second shadow became dimly outlined
behind it. Clemence started in momentary terror. The thought occurred to
her of the old-time superstition connected with this illusion. She
remembered that an old nurse had told her in childhood that it was an
omen of death to behold this spectral shadow. In spite of her freedom
from vulgar superstition, her lips grew colorless, and her heart beat
with alarm. She sank down again into her chair, cowering close to the
cheerful fire.

An hour passed thus. The clock struck twelve. The girl roused herself
again at this--remembered that this was to be the most eventful day of
her existence. "I must retire," she soliloquized; "it will never do to
have pale cheeks or troubled thoughts for my wedding day. Would that I
could make myself beautiful for his dear sake."

A smile of hope and joy wreathed the lips of the soft-eyed dreamer. She
paced the floor absently backward and forward, with far-off gaze; then
knelt at her bedside and b