iot wheels been stayed, when the
sun stood still on the plains of Gibeon, and the moon hung pale and
immovable over the vale of Ajalon. Sorrow and remorse are great
prophets, but Time is greater still, and they can no more arrest or
accelerate its progress than the breath of a new-born infant can move
the eternal mountains from their base.

Louis slept, thanks to his step-mother's anodyne, and the dreaded morrow
came, when the broad light of day must reveal all the inroads the
indulgence of guilty passions had caused. Another revelation must be
made. He knew his father would demand a full history of his conduct, and
it was a relief to his burdened conscience, that had so long groaned
under the weight of secret transgressions, to cast itself prostrate at
the feet of parental authority in the dust and ashes of humiliation. But
while he acknowledged and deplored his own vices, he could not
criminate Clinton. He implored his father to inflict upon him any
penalty, however severe, he knew, he felt it to be just, but not to
require of him to treat his friend with ingratitude and insult. His stay
would not be long. He must return very soon to Virginia. He had been
prevented from doing so by a fatal and contagious disease that had been
raging in the neighborhood of his home, and when that subsided, other
accidental causes had constantly interfered with his design. Must the
high-spirited Virginian go back to his native regions with the story so
oft repeated of New England coldness and inhospitality verified in his
own experience?

"Say no more," said his father. "I will reflect on all you have said,
and you shall know the result. Now, come with me to the counting-house,
and let me see if you can put your mathematics to any practical use.
Employment is the greatest safeguard against temptation."

There was one revelation which Louis did not make, and that was the
amount of his debts. He dared not do it, though again and again he had
opened his lips to tell it.

"To-morrow I will do it," thought he--but before the morrow came he
recollected the words of Miss Thusa, uttered the last time he had
visited her cabin--"If you should get into trouble and not want to vex
those that are kin, you can come to me, and if you don't despise my
counsel and assistance perhaps it may do you good." This had made but
little impression on him at the time, but it came back to him now
"_powerfully_" as Miss Thusa would say; and he thought it possib