Transcriber's Notes: Italics are indicated by _underscores_. ALONE. BY MARION HARLAND, OF RICHMOND, VIRGINIA. "Through long, long years, to seek, to strive, to yearn For human love,--and never quench that thirst; To pour the soul out winning no return-- O'er fragile idols, by delusions nursed,-- On things that fail us, reed by reed, to lean, To mourn the changed, the far-away, the dead, To send our troubled spirits through the unseen Intensely questioning for treasures fled." HEMANS. NINETEENTH THOUSAND. NEW YORK: J.C.DERBY, 119 NASSAU STREET. BOSTON: PHILLIPS, SAMPSON & CO. CINCINNATI: H. W. DERBY. 1856. ENTERED according to Act of Congress, in the year 1854, by A. MORRIS, In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States, for the Eastern District of Virginia. DEDICATION. _To my Brother and Sister._ It is meet that those whose sympathy has been dew and sunshine to the nursery plant, should watch over its transplantation into the public garden. And as this Dedication is the only portion of the book which is new to you, you do not require that it should remind you of the welcome stormy evenings, when I laid down my pen, to read to you the chapters written since our last "select party;" how the fictitious names of my real characters were household words to our trio: and your flattering interest--grateful because sincere--stimulated my flagging spirits in the performance of my task. You know, too, what many may not believe--with what misgivings it was entered upon, and prosecuted; what fears of the licensed critic's ban, and the unlicensed public's sneer;--above all, you comprehend the motive that held me to the work--an earnest desire to contribute my mite for the promotion of the happiness and usefulness of my kind. Coming as it does from my heart--penned under the shadow of our home-altar, I cannot but feel that the mission of my offering is to the hearts of others,--ask for it no higher place than the fireside circle. Readers and judges like yourselves, I may not, do not hope to find; but I trust there are those who will pardon the lack of artistic skill in the plot, or the deficiency of stirring incident, in consideration of the fact, that my story is what it purports to be, a simple tale of life--common joy and sorrow, whose merits, if it has any, consist in its truthfulness to Nature, and the fervent spirit which animated its narration. MARION HARLAND. Richmond, 1854. ALONE. CHAPTER I.