gain he was
puzzled. He could not at all remember where he had seen that face, and
yet certainly he _had_ seen it before. There was something forbidding
and malicious in it, and a sort of dread crept over him. And yet he
could not tell why he should fear. However, he resolved to be on his
guard, for strange things had often happened at the diggings, and there
were men prowling about the colony who would care nothing about shedding
blood, if they could secure thereby the gains of a successful digger.
He said nothing, however, to his companions; for it seemed an absurd
thing to trouble them with his vague impressions and misgivings,
especially as the man who had thus twice been near him had done nothing
more than approach him and pass on.

It was some ten days later, and violent winds with heavy rains had
driven the most ardent diggers early to their tents. Jacob was
revolving in his mind what he had heard at the last Sunday's preaching,
and thoughts of home, and duties left undone there, made him very sad.
Then he thought of his young master at Tanindie, and wondered how he was
progressing, and whether he would at length really take the one decided
step and become a pledged abstainer. Thus he mused on, till the
twilight melted rapidly into darkness. Then, having lifted up his heart
to God in prayer, he threw himself down on his bed. But he could not
sleep, though weary enough with the exhausting labours of many days.
Suddenly he half raised himself; he thought he heard a strange noise
like some one breathing not far from his head. Then the wind, which had
lulled for a second or two, resumed its violence, and flapped the canvas
of his tent backwards and forwards. Again he lay down, but shortly
afterwards thought he heard the breathing again--or was he only
deceiving himself? It was difficult to hear anything else distinctly
for the noise made by the flapping of the tent and the creaking of its
supports. Still, he did not feel easy. And now in the dusk it seemed
to him that the lower part of the folds of the tent near his bed's head
moved in a peculiar manner, such as the wind could not cause. Without
rising, he silently and cautiously rolled himself over from the bed till
he could lay his hand on a large rug;--this he quietly folded up, and,
creeping back, laid it in his own place on the bed itself. Then,
drawing himself round noiselessly, he lay at full-length on the ground,
at right angles to the bed, wit