Ellen made no answer, and Mrs. Hamilton's newly-raised hopes vanished; she waited full two or three minutes, then gently disengaged her hand and dress from Ellen's still convulsive grasp; the door closed, with a sullen, seemingly unwilling sound, and Ellen was alone. She remained in the same posture, the same spot, till a vague, cold terror so took possession of her, that the room seemed filled with ghostly shapes, and all the articles of furniture suddenly transformed to things of life! and springing up, with the wild, fleet step of fear, she paused not till she found herself in her own room, where flinging herself on her bed, she buried her face on her pillow, to shut out every object--oh, how she longed to shut out thought! It was such a different scene, such a fullness of innocent joy, on which Mrs. Hamilton entered, that though she thought herself nerved to control all visible emotion, the contrast almost overpowered her; knowing, too, that the fatal effects of one person's sin must banish that innocent enjoyment, and would fall on them all as some fearful, joy-destroying blow. The room, one of the least spacious, was cheerfully lighted, the urn hissing upon the table, at which Caroline, us usual, was presiding, only waiting for her mother's appearance, to satisfy Percy, who was loudly declaring he was famished in two senses--for want of his mother's company, and of some restorative for his craving appetite. He was lounging on the sofa, playing with Emmeline's flowing ringlets, as she sat on a low stool by his side, chatting with him, in as discursive a strain as his fancy willed. Herbert and Miss Harcourt were still in earnest discussion on their poem, from which Herbert was occasionally reading aloud such beautiful passages, and with such richness of intonation, and variety of expression, that Caroline, and even Percy and Emmeline, would pause involuntarily to listen. "At length!" exclaimed Percy, springing up, as did Herbert at the same moment, to get their mother a chair, and place her comfortably as usual in the midst of them. "Mother, I really did begin to think you intended to punish my impatience by not joining us at all to-night." "I did not know you were impatient, my dear boy, or perhaps I might have done so!" was her quiet, and even smiling reply. "I fear, indeed, waiting for me so long after a water-excursion, must have caused you to be impatient in another sense." "What! that we must be all famished? I assure you, we are, and the loss of your society sharpened the pangs of hunger I owe Morris a grudge, and will certainly serve him out one day, for detaining you so long when I wanted you."