f in the house with
her. He durst not kill her, and he durst not go to sleep, leaving her
alive. The Germans, perceiving his fear, looked at each other and
grunted. That grunt was the German for "mean cuss." They saw through
Lysander.

After all were gone, Salina went out and called Toby. The old negro had
fled for his life, and did not hear. She returned into the house, the
aspect of which was rendered all the more desolate and drear by the
marks of fire, the water that drenched the floor, the smoky atmosphere,
and the dim and bluish lamp-light. The unhappy woman sat down in the
lonely apartment, and thought of her brief dream of happiness, of this
last quarrel which could never be made up, and of the hopeless,
loveless, miserable future, until it seemed that the last drop of
womanly blood in her veins was turned to gall.

At the same hour, not many miles away, on a rude couch in a mountain
cave, by her father's side, Virginia was tranquilly sleeping, and
dreaming of angel visits. Across the entrance of the cavern, like an
ogre keeping guard, Cudjo was stretched on a bed of skins. The fire,
which rarely went out, illumined faintly the subterranean gloom. By its
light came one, and looked at the old man and his child sleeping there,
so peacefully, so innocently, side by side. The face of the father was
solemn, white, and calm; that of the maiden, smiling and sweet. The
heart of the young man yearned within him; his eyes, as they gazed,
filled with tears; and his lips murmured with pure emotion,--

"O Lord, I thank thee for their sakes! O Lord, preserve them and bless
them!"

And he moved softly away, his whole soul suffused with ineffable
tenderness towards that good old man and the dear, beautiful girl. He
had stolen thither to see that all was well. All was indeed well. And
now he retired once more to a recess in the rock, where he and Pomp had
made their bed of blankets and dry moss.

The footsteps on the solid floor of stone had not awakened her. And what
was more remarkable, the lover's beating heart and worshipping gaze had
not disturbed her slumber. But now the slightest movement on the part of
her blind parent banishes sleep in an instant.

"Daughter, are you here?"

"I am here, father!"

"Are you well, my child?"

"O, very well! I have had such a sweet sleep! Can I do anything for
you?"

"Yes. Let me feel that you are near me. That is all." She kissed him.
"Heaven is good to me!" he said.

She w