alkative about the war, my venerable pilot was
reserved about ---- House. I asked him if he knew it. 'These fifty years
and more,' was his answer. 'The House of Mystery; good people live there
now,--yes, good people, kind people,--a blessed change for all about and
around the House of Mystery. More he would not utter. At length I reached
the winning post, hobbled in, received a cordial welcome, and retired
early to bed.

"None but those who have lain for weeks in a crowded military hospital,
who have battled day by day with death, now flushed with fever, now
racked with agonizing spasmodic action in every nerve, can conceive the
effect of the quiet, the pure air, the bracing freshness of the country.
The stillness which reigned around,--the peaceful landscape beneath my
window,--the balmy fragrance of the flowers,--the hush of woods reposing
in all the stillness of a summer's twilight,--the faint tinkling of the
distant sheep-bell,--the musical murmur of the rill which gurgled gaily
and gladly from beneath the base of the sun-dial,--the deer dotted over
the park, and grazing lazily in groups beneath the branching oaks, made
up a picture which soothed and calmed me. I went to bed satisfied that _I
should sleep_. I did so without a single twinge till after midnight. Then
I was roused by a grating sound at a distance. It drew nearer, became
more and more distinct, and presently at a pelting pace, up drove a
carriage and four. I say four, because a man used to horses all his life,
can, by their tramp, judge, though blindfold, pretty accurately as to
their numbers. I heard the easy roll of the carriage, the grating of the
wheels on the gravel, the sharp pull-up at the main entrance, the
impatient pawing of the animals on the hard and well-rolled road. All
this I caught most distinctly. But though I listened keenly I heard no
bell ring, no door unclose, no servant hasten to these new arrivals. I
thought it odd. I struck my repeater. 'A quarter to one. Strange hour,
surely, for visitors to arrive! However, no business of mine. I have not,
happily, to rise and do the honors.' And, after a yawn or two, and a
hurried, though I trust grateful acknowledgment for the comparative ease
I was enjoying, I turned upon my side and dozed off. I had slept about
two hours when a similar noise again aroused me. Up came another carriage
at the same slapping pace. Pat, pat, pat, went the hoofs upon the hard
avenue. The wheels rattled; the gravel