"It is no matter what the sins were that brought me to the misery I shall tell you of; it is no matter whether they were committed for myself, or for the love of one whom I would have died to serve; it is no matter for me to tell you that they grew from little unchecked thoughts of pride and self-will, and little half-intended acts of deception, into the monster sins that overshadowed my life; it is enough that I had come to the recompense of them--that in remorse, in utter consternation, I mourned as one without hope. What did I know of hope? Six feet of foreign mound covered the remains of her I had served and sinned for. Shame and infamy covered her name; hope was dead in my heart; faith had never been lit there. Alone in a land of strangers, there was but one longing in my breast that exceeded the desire for death, and that was the craving to see home again. It makes me shudder even now to recall that journey--weary months of fatigue, and exposure and misery; the only thought that kept me up, a dreary one at best, to see home once more, and die before a word of reproach could stab me, or a familiar voice recall the wretched past. "It was a still, clear December night, when, footsore and weary, I saw, with a strange thrill, the lights of a little village, that my heart told me was the little village I had come thousands of miles to see, and that I had not seen nor heard from since my guilty flight, long years ago, on a December night, still and cold as this. I hurried on, my sinking strength nerved up for a last effort, till I should reach a woody knoll I knew overlooked the village, and there, I said, I will die. In my hand I held what I knew would free me; I had carried it in my bosom for months and months, only waiting for this moment. At last I reached the spot, and sinking down on the hard ground, covered my face a moment with my hands, then looked down upon the scene before me. There lay the village, its white houses gleaming in the moonlight--there the familiar road wound round the foot of the hill--there was the broad street, the old mill, the placid lake in the distance, and beyond it, clear against the sky, the dark outlines of Rutledge; massive, and gloomy, and lifeless, it stood far off from the cheery village, with its animation and content. Not a window of the little hamlet but showed a kindly light, while the great house beyond was dark and silent--not a gleam of light from all its sombre front. A horror and remorse that you cannot understand came over me, such as I had thought my dead heart was incapable of harboring; then despair settled on it again, and I prepared for death. But as I was looking--and I was not dreaming--between the desolate house and me, distinct against the dark woods, there shone out a silver cross. I was not dreaming--I was terribly awake; but there it glittered, still and bright. Not a sound broke the stillness of the frosty air, not another feature in the landscape changed; I strained my