He stood upon the narrow verge of an awful precipice. Night, black, rayless night, enshrouded the yawning gulf below, save that, ever and anon, hideous and fleshless forms--skeletons wrought in lurid and undying flame--strode to and fro within the thick panoply of gloom; while, at intervals, howls of despair came up from its midst, like howls from the lips of the damned in hell. With a thrill of horror, he turned hurriedly from the scene, and cast his despairing eyes heavenward. In the centre of a massive cloud, burning with the brilliancy of a summer sunset, appeared a vast city, with domes and palaces of pearl and ruby, and whose gates were gates of burnished gold. As he gazed, they were flung open on silent hinges, and a host, clothed in spotless white, entered their portals, welcomed with swelling anthems and seraphic songs. Then the toppling precipice began to reel and stagger beneath his feet--a fierce bright flame burst from amidst the night below, more brilliant than the sun's intensest ray. It drank up the darkness, and filled the gulf with liquid fire. It flashed through his eye-balls like a glance of lightning. He felt his foothold totter on the eve of its awful rush of destruction, and turned to flee, but started aside with a wild cry. The same voice was in his ear, and it shrieked in exulting tones--"THE MURDERER'S DOOM!" But where was the mother during these fearful and agonizing moments! Had _she_ forgotten the son that once nestled on her bosom? Had _she_ forsaken the child she bore, now that the dark hour of adversity had come? Ah! no. It is not a mother's nature to forget or to forsake! Though crime and infamy enshroud his name; though base heartlessness and vile ingratitude shut-to the portals of his soul; though he fling off the hoarded wealth of her affections as the oak the clinging ivy when the storm comes, yet the mother will love--must love--it is the thirst of her immortal nature. No, no! Widow White had not forgotten, neither had she forsaken her son. Villain as he was, and stained with the blood of her foster-child, her heart warmed toward him--the mother was the mother still! Though absent, her mind was racked with agony--stern agony. For hours had she paced up and down her dim-lit chamber, her hands folded across her breast, and her eyes fixed upon the floor--thought and feeling were busy. To the casual observer her features exhibited scarcely an evidence of internal emotion; but the arched lip, bloodless with pressure, and the swollen veins upon her high forehead betokened how severe was the struggle going on within. There are some persons who can stand by the bedside of a dying relative, and, with an almost unruffled countenance, behold him stiffened in the cold arms of death--who can look upon the corpse for the last time, follow it to the grave, and see it laid beneath the heavy sod with so little apparent concern, that the beholder considers him heartless; but draw aside the curtain which separates the inner