of the Mission. He talks to the people of their
Heavenly Father and they give heed to his teaching."

Then said Evangeline: "Let us go to the Mission, for there good tidings
await us."

So they turned their steeds thither, and just as the sun was setting
they reached a green meadow by the riverside. There the preacher knelt
in prayer and with him a multitude of people. The travelers joined
reverently in the prayers, and when the service was over, the priest
came to welcome the strangers and offered them shelter and a share of
his frugal meal of wheaten cakes and spring water. Afterwards they told
the priest their story, and he said: "Only six days ago Gabriel sat by
my side and told me this same sad tale, then he continued his journey.
He has gone far to the north, but in autumn when the hunting is over he
will return to the Mission."

Then Evangeline pleaded: "Let me remain with thee, for my soul is sad
and afflicted." This seemed to the others a wise thing to do, so thus it
was arranged. Early on the morrow Basil returned homewards and
Evangeline stayed on at the Mission.

Slowly and wearily the days passed by, and Evangeline lived and worked
at the Mission till autumn drew on. But still Gabriel did not come, and
the maiden lived on there till the following summer. Then a rumor
reached her ears that Gabriel had encamped in a far distant forest, and
Evangeline took leave of her friends at the Mission and set forth again
to seek her lover, but when she reached the hunter's lodge she found it
deserted and fallen to ruin.

[Illustration]

And now her weary pilgrimage began anew. Her wanderings led her through
towns and villages, now she tarried a while in mission tents, now she
tended the sick and wounded in the camp of a battlefield. As the years
went on, her beauty faded and streaks of gray appeared in her dark hair.
She was fair and young when she began her long journey, faded and old
when it ended in disappointment.

At length poor Evangeline grew weary of wandering through strange places
and resolved to end her days in the city founded by the great preacher,
Penn. Here other of the Acadian exiles had settled, and Evangeline felt
that there was something homelike in the pleasant streets of the little
city and the friendly speech of the Quakers.

There for many years she dwelt as a Sister of Mercy, bringing hope and
comfort to the poor and suffering ones. Then it came to pass that a
terrible pestilence fell o