The felucca reached Sisal in safety, but Talbot and Mary deeply and unceasingly mourned the loss of their true and invaluable friend. And Frank bitterly grieved that his freedom should have been purchased at such a sacrifice. He was, indeed, worthy of all regret—but a cloud had overshadowed his sun of life. He would have brooded over his sister’s shame until existence had become a burthen, and his impulsive nature might by unlawful means have sought relief in the cold embrace of death. He perished in a work of charity, and it is to be hoped that He who, “When all our souls were forfeit, Could the advantage best have took, Found out the remedy,” in His abounding mercy, forgave one act of passion for the redeeming merits of the cause wherein the unhappy Gonzalez met his death. There was only one vessel at Sisal, bound at an early day to the United States, and her destination was New Orleans. Frank, his sister and Talbot, accordingly took passage in her, and reached the south-west pass of the Mississippi just as a gale was coming on. The country above had been overflowed by recent heavy rains, and what between the current from within, and the swell without, they were greeted with a magnificent spectacle. The waves of the gulf, driven before the gale, which had soon become terrific, encountered the onward sweep of the waters of the mighty river. The sight forcibly reminded them of Rebecca’s exclamation in Ivanhoe, “God of Jacob! it is like the meeting of two oceans moved by adverse tides!” Nearly the whole period of their stay was embraced in one uninterrupted storm, but the magnificence of the scenery compensated for the inclemency of the weather. Vegetation was still in full luxuriance, and the moss, pendent from the trees, and saturated with incessant rain, like dripping garments swayed to and fro in the wind, while low, rugged clouds trailed along but a short distance overhead, and a gray semi-transparent mist floated above the surface of the ground. The “Mississippi,” unusually turbid, and swollen to the utmost capacity of its banks, with its mighty whirls and eddies, rushed impetuously on, bearing on its surface many a vestige of the devastation it had caused. Nor were the works of art, clumsy and unsymmetrical though they were, wanting to the scene, spreading no sail to the breeze, but drifting idly with the current, the arks and the broad-horns were whirled by with a rapidity that seemed to defy management. Wafted over the water frequently came the wild and not unmelodious sound of the bugle, while in the stillness of the night were heard the manly and sonorous voices of the boatmen singing,