but he was too weak to move, and
so she placed a blanket under him and kneeling by his side, put his head
in her lap, and held it there until he ceased to breathe.

After his death there was nothing to relieve the tedium of Hannah's
life, and but for her trust in God her reason must have given way under
the strain, for it was not only her own sorrow, but her father's as
well, which she had to bear. With him there was no rest, day or night,
and every breath was a prayer for mercy and forgiveness.

At first he was continually haunted with a fear of detection, and
frequently in the night he would steal noiselessly to Hannah's room, and
awakening her with a whisper, tell her there were men about the house,
come to arrest him, and charge her with having broken her oath and
betrayed him into the hands of the law. Every possible precaution
against a surprise was taken. Iron bolts were put on the doors, the
windows were nailed down, and the house was never for an hour left
alone. The people said the man was deranged, and pitied the young girl
who, from daily association with him, was becoming almost as peculiar as
himself.

After a few years the aged pastor, who had so long officiated in the
stone church on the common, died, and the Rev. Charles Sanford, fresh
from the Theological Seminary, was called to take his place. Full of
energy and zeal in his work, the young rector soon made himself
acquainted with all his parishioners, and seemed to find a peculiar
attraction in the inmates of the farm-house, where he spent a great deal
of time, arguing with the father on the nature of the unpardonable sin,
and answering the many questions his host propounded to him upon the
subject of genuine repentance and its fruits, and how far confession to
man was necessary that one might be saved.

To these discourses Hannah was always an attentive listener, and there
came gradually a new light into her dark eyes, and a faint color to her
white cheeks, when she saw the rector coming up the walk, and met his
winning smile. But all this was ended at last; for, after a night in
June, when she walked with the young clergyman through the pasture land
under the row of chestnut trees which grew upon the hill-side, he came
less frequently to the farm-house, and when he did come his discourse
was mostly with her father, whom he was laboring to convince that it was
his duty to be confirmed. But Peter always answered him:

"No, you don't know what yo