wn slowly, and without any
effort whatever, passing through shade and through moonlight--now lost
in the shadow of the tall trees, and now emerging into that part of the
stream which ran through meadows and cornfields, until the stream
widened, and then, at length, a ferry-house was to be seen in the
distance.

Then came the ferryman out of his hut, to look upon the beautiful
moonlight scene. It was cold, but pure, and brilliantly light. The
chaste moon was sailing through the heavens, and the stars diminished in
their lustre by the power of the luminous goddess of night.

There was a small cottage--true, it was somewhat larger than was
generally supposed by any casual observer who might look at it. The
place was rambling, and built chiefly of wood; but in it lived the
ferryman, his wife, and family; among these was a young girl about
seventeen years of age, but, at the same time, very beautiful.

They had been preparing their supper, and the ferryman himself walked
out to look at the river and the shadows of the tall trees that stood on
the hill opposite.

While thus employed, he heard a plashing in the water, and on turning
towards the quarter whence the sound proceeded for a few yards, he came
to the spot where he saw the stranger struggling in the stream.

"Good God!" he muttered to himself, as he saw the struggle continued;
"good God! he will sink and drown."

As he spoke, he jumped into his boat and pushed it off, for the purpose
of stopping the descent of the body down the stream, and in a moment or
two it came near to him. He muttered,--

"Come, come--he tries to swim; life is not gone yet--he will do now, if
I can catch hold of him. Swimming with one's face under the stream
doesn't say much for his skill, though it may account for the fact that
he don't cry out."

As the drowning man neared, the ferryman held on by the boat-hook, and
stooping down, he seized the drowning man by the hair of the head, and
then paused.

After a time, he lifted him up, and placed him across the edge of the
boat, and then, with some struggling of his own, he was rolled over into
the boat.

"You are safe now," muttered the ferryman.

The stranger spoke not, but sat or leaned against the boat's head,
sobbing and catching at his breath, and spitting off his stomach the
water it might be presumed he had swallowed.

The ferryman put back to the shore, when he paused, and secured his
boat, and then pulled the stranger out,