Amy Wakefield gradually recovered her spent energies. Her elastic constitution rebounded from the severe shocks it had received, but her sufferings left an indelible impress on her spirits. Time could not restore the loved ones sleeping in the dust, and smiles bade adieu to her once happy face. Like Egeria of yore, she forever mourned her heart’s lost treasures. Mordaunt dwelt upon that beautiful sorrowing face until it seduced him from his priestly vows; but it was a problem to the wary Frenchman how to approach Amy. Though a submissive slave, she was unapproachable; she answered no signs, nor noticed the broken English addressed to her. She shunned every one, and seemed to scorn sympathy with her foes. Months passed, and still she toiled on in Wiloma’s cabin, but her grief was not assuaged, nor the fountain of her tears dried up. As spring came, she would steal away by herself without the wigwam to admire the opening buds, which filled the air with their perfume, and with delight would listen to the carol of birds, as they hopped merrily from branch to branch, fit emblems of happiness. The cheerfulness and beauty of all around her, contrasted strangely with her own condition, but at times she would forget her sadness, and soothed by the wild music of the waterfall, lose herself in some day-dream of happiness. Old Wiloma scarcely watched her captive. Indeed, the thought of escape never entered the mind of Amy. Where should she fly, when all she loved were in heaven. True, she did not _know_ that two of her brothers were dead. The eldest, Winthrop, was at a distant settlement at school; and little Johnny, the pet, was sweetly sleeping in the chamber when they were attacked, so it seemed certain that he was slain. But the chance of life vanished when Richard fell. “Alas! the love of woman; it is known To be a lovely and a fearful thing; For all of hers upon that die is thrown, And if ’tis lost, life has no more to bring To her, but mockeries of the past alone.” Amy was one day sitting in the wigwam-door when she saw Mordaunt coming toward her, and rose to retire. “In the name of Jesus, tarry,” said he, in a manner so earnest and imperative, that she stopped involuntarily. “I have prayed for thee to the Holy Virgin and the Saints,” continued he, crossing himself. It was the first intelligible sentence in her own language that Amy had heard since she parted with her companions in misery. Some of the Indians spoke a broken English that she understood, but she had never heard Mordaunt utter a word before. “I need not thy prayers to thy saints,” said Amy, after recovering from her astonishment, and recollecting the teachings of her infancy. “Speak not lightly of prayers, child, thy soul hath need of them,” said Mordaunt. “I know it, but those now sleeping in death, taught me that there is but One that heareth prayer,” said she, her eyes filling with tears, “and He is our Father in Heaven.”