Still, as yet, nothing had occurred to alarm, for themselves, our friends in the neighborhood of Helmstedt’s Island. The sail of the enemy had been more than once seen in the distance, but not even a single foraging party had landed to lay them under tribute. Thus it was considered quite safe by the neighbors to vary the monotony of their lives by forming a picnic party for Helmstedt’s Island. The company consisted of the Houstons, the Wellworths, the Hartleys, and others. The time appointed for the festival was the first of August. The day proved cool for the season, and consequently pleasant for the occasion. The Wellworths came down to the bluff to join the Houstons, with whom, at sunrise, they set out for the island, where they were met by the Hartleys and other friends, and regaled by a sumptuous seaside breakfast, previously prepared to order by the island housekeeper, Aunt Hapzibah. After that repast, the company separated into groups, according to their “attractions.” Of the elder portion, some formed quiet whist parties in the drawing-room, and others sat down for a cozy gossip on the vine-shaded piazza. Of the younger party, some entered boats and went crabbing, while others formed quadrilles and danced to the sound of the tambourine, the fiddle, and the banjo, wielded with enthusiasm by the hands and arms of three ecstatic sable musicians. Margaret Helmstedt and her chosen friends, Grace Wellworth and Clare Hartley, separated themselves from the company, and with their arms affectionately intertwined around each other’s waists, wandered down to the beach with the purpose of making the whole circuit of her beloved island. Margaret has changed and matured in these fifteen months. She has become very beautiful, very much like what her mother had been, but with a profounder and more mournful style, “a beauty that makes sad the eye.” Time, experience and sorrow have prematurely done their work upon her. She, but sixteen years of age, looks much older. She is dressed quite plainly, in a gown of black gauze striped with black satin, a fine lace inside handkerchief and cuffs, white kid gloves and black morocco gaiters. Her jet-black hair is parted over her broad brow, and rippling in a myriad of shining wavelets that would, if permitted, fall in a cloud of ringlets around her sweet, pale face, and throw into deeper shade the shadowy, mournful eyes. The white chip hat, plainly trimmed with white ribbons, hangs idly from her arm. Within the last year Margaret’s position has not improved. It is true that the subject of the letters and the unknown correspondent or lover has been suffered to die out. Not even country gossips can, without new materials, keep a vague scandal alive year after year. And no such stimuli had been afforded them. Margaret, whether she had ceased to write, or had taken a more effectual manner of concealing her correspondence, seemed neither to receive nor send any more mysterious letters. But she had