ward march. We had not gone more than a mile when a boy
came along, who told us we might just go back again, as there was no
other road to the lake; and added, with a knowing nod of his head,
"Master, I guess if you had known the bush as well as I, you would never
have been _fule_ enough to turn when you were going just right. Why, any
body knows that _them_ cedars and himlocks grow thickest near the water;
so you may just go back for your pains."

It was dark, save that the stars came forth with more than usual
brilliancy, when we suddenly emerged from the depth of the gloomy forest
to the shores of a beautiful little lake, that gleamed the more brightly
from the contrast of the dark masses of foliage that hung over it, and
the towering pine-woods that girt its banks.

Here, seated on a huge block of limestone, which was covered with a soft
cushion of moss, beneath the shade of the cedars that skirt the lake,
surrounded with trunks, boxes, and packages of various descriptions,
which the driver had hastily thrown from the waggon, sat your child, in
anxious expectation of some answering voice to my husband's long and
repeated halloo.

But when the echo of his voice had died away we heard only the gurgling
of the waters at the head of the rapids, and the distant and hoarse
murmur of a waterfall some half mile below them.

We could see no sign of any habitation, no gleam of light from the shore
to cheer us. In vain we strained our ears for the plash of the oar, or
welcome sound of the human voice, or bark of some household dog, that
might assure us we were not doomed to pass the night in the lone wood.

We began now to apprehend we had really lost the way. To attempt
returning through the deepening darkness of the forest in search of any
one to guide us was quite out of the question, the road being so ill
defined that we should soon have been lost in the mazes of the woods.
The last sound of the waggon wheels had died away in the distance; to
have overtaken it would have been impossible. Bidding me remain quietly
where I was, my husband forced his way through the tangled underwood
along the bank, in hope of discovering some sign of the house we sought,
which we had every reason to suppose must be near, though probably
hidden by the dense mass of trees from our sight.

As I sat in the wood in silence and in darkness, my thoughts gradually
wandered back across the Atlantic to my dear mother and to my old home;
and I th