I.

DREAMS AND VISIONS.

Winter waned. Mrs. Waugh had attended the commodore to the South, for
the benefit of his health, and they had not yet returned.

Mrs. Morris and Alice were absent on a long visit to a relative in
Washington City, and were not expected back for a month. Paul remained
in Baltimore, attending the medical lectures.

The house at Dell-Delight was very sad and lonely. The family consisted
of only Thurston, Fanny and Miriam.

A change had also passed over poor Fanny's malady. She was no longer the
quaint, fantastical creature, half-lunatic, half-seeress, singing
snatches of wild songs through the house--now here, now there--now
everywhere, awaking smiles and merriment in spite of pity, and keeping
every one alive about her. Her bodily health had failed, her animal
spirits departed; she never sang nor smiled, but sat all day in her
eyrie chamber, lost in deep and concentrated study, her face having the
care-worn look of one striving to recall the past, to gather up and
reunite the broken links of thought, memory and understanding.

At last, one day, Miriam received a letter from Paul, announcing the
termination, of the winter's course of lectures, the conclusion of the
examination of medical candidates, the successful issue of his own
trial, in the acquisition of his diploma, and finally his speedy return
home.

Miriam's impulsive nature rebounded from all depressing thoughts, and
she looked forward with gladness to the arrival of Paul.

He came toward the last of the week.

Mr. Willcoxen, roused for a moment from his sad abstraction, gave the
youth a warm welcome.

Miriam received him with a bashful, blushing joy.

He had passed through Washington City on his way home, and had spent a
day with Mrs. Morris and her friends, and he had brought away strange
news of them.

Alice, he said, had an accepted suitor, and would probably be a bride
soon.

A few days after his return, Paul found Miriam in the old wainscoted
parlor seated by the fire. She appeared to be in deep and painful
thought. Her elbow rested on the circular work-table, her head was bowed
upon her hand, and her face was concealed by the drooping black
ringlets.

"What is the matter, dear, sister?" he asked, in that tender, familiar
tone, with which he sometimes spoke to her.

"Oh, Paul, I am thinking of our brother! Can nothing soothe or cheer
him, Paul? Can nothing help him? Can we do him no good at all? Oh, Paul!
I bro