Somewhat discouraged I was, as I wended my way homeward this February evening. The air was fresh and balmy, despite the fact that it was winter and the people in England were huddled over the fires, and were wrapped in their great-coats and furs. I had spent the day hunting, and two natives who trotted in front of me carried the spoils of the day, a lordly stag; a third Indian carried my musketoon. The last three months had been spent profitably in a way; the time had been passed in the open air, and my muscles were like steel. I could spend the whole day in the chase, and at night be fresh and untired. I had also devoted a good deal of my time to learning the language of the Indians, and had gotten such a fair idea of it that I could carry on an intelligible conversation. But I was low-spirited and downcast. Would I ever see England again--and Margaret? At the thought I groaned aloud, and the sound caused the Indians to look back at me. Shouting to them to go on, I quickened my footsteps and followed faster. They were rapidly getting out of speaking distance, and breaking into a long, swinging trot, they turned in among some trees, and were lost to my view. I resumed my train of thought. What did Margaret think had become of me--or did she care? England I would fain see again, but more than England, more than all else, I longed for a sight of her whom I worshiped, as the heathen worship the sun. She was my sun. As the captive longs for a sight of the sun, when shut up for weary months in some deep dungeon far below the prison walls, so I longed for one sight of the Lady Margaret Carroll, and with it I would have been content. What had become of Steele and the lovely Spanish maiden? Were they safe in Spain, or had the pirate but cozened me with his promise, and were they not now in some prison like my own? If Steele had reached England safely, had he delivered my message to my lady? What would she say to such a greeting as that? These and many other thoughts filled my mind, as I walked briskly on to overtake my carriers. Descending a steep hillock overgrown with brush and undergrowth, I saw far below me, some one hundred yards away, the mansion, from the windows of which the light streamed down and brightened up the dusk below--for it was beginning to grow dark. I had almost reached the foot of the hill, when I stopped. The dull murmur of conversation caught my ear, and I looked around me; there was no one in sight. Where could the sound come from? It was near me somewhere. I turned, and retraced my steps a few feet, the voice becoming plainer. Stepping cautiously, for I did not know what I was running into, I peered around. The noise seemed to come from the ground beneath me. A thick hedge of bushes was at my elbow, and from this the sound proceeded. Softly pushing them aside, I looked behind them. Below me I could see a light; that was where the people were, evidently, and talking in English.