"Thank you, uncle Will. Tell James to bring a lamp into the parlor, if you please. I almost dread to open this!" she said to herself. "My fears are always on the alert, to forebode evil to those I love. I _will_ be courageous--_will_ have faith!" and she walked resolutely into the lighted room. But the superscription sent a tremor to her heart--a minute elapsed before she opened it. THE LETTER. "I have come home alone, dear friend, leaving our Annie asleep in a foreign land. Her day of suffering closed in ease and peace; her 'good night' was as calm, as though she were sinking into a slumber of hours, instead of ages. A lonely, stricken man, I retraced the route we had travelled in company, to find that I had never indeed missed and mourned her, until I saw her empty chamber at home. Here--'I cannot make her dead!' Oh! the desolation of that word, when applied to one, in whose veins ran the same blood as in ours, who lived and loved with us--partaker of our individuality! As love is immortal, we would believe the frail clay to which it clings, imperishable too. But in our grief, there is a mingling of praise that her rest is safe--that a merciful Father is also wise, and will not, in answer to our selfish lamentations, restore her to an existence replete with pain. * * * * * "The date of the above--a month back--may surprise you. I wrote a fortnight after I touched my native shore; contemplating such a letter as one friend might send to another;--to inform you of my bereavement, and solicit the sympathy none ever ask in vain from you. I was interrupted to read a communication which has changed--not the tenor of this alone, but the current of all my anticipations. It was from Miss Arnold; an annulment of the contract between us; a step, she says, foreseen from an early period of our engagement, when she discovered that the heart, she thought she had surrendered to me, was wholly another's. I omit much that would be uninteresting to you; and which, in honour, I ought not to transcribe. Briefly then--the facts stand thus. She never loved me; and when the owner of her heart sued for her hand, she pledged it, and asked for a release from her previous vow. I have no inclination to animadvert upon her course--singular and inconsistent as it has been throughout--but am obliged to refer to certain particulars, to make clear the explanation which follows. "I have told you, Ida, that my attentions, from the beginning of our intercourse, until my conviction of your betrothal, were correct exponents of my feelings. I cannot deny that when compelled to acknowledge the uselessness of my efforts, I judged you harshly--was tempted to believe you an unprincipled trifler with my hopes, and the truth of your accepted lover. As my indignation and disappointment cooled before mature reflection, my faith in your sterling integrity revived.