"God sent you to the shore that day, Samuel Parris. I felt it then, I feel it now. Had the waves swallowed me I should have died with a sweet hope in my heart, and the struggle would have been hard. But now that all is lost--nay, nay, I shudder yet!" CHAPTER LII. THE LAST WISH. "I awoke in sight of the spot where we had first met, in hearing of the waves that had borne us, twenty-two years before, a happy pair, across the ocean. All the dear, old memories came back to me then--the night when we rode through the forest to your dwelling, and were sacredly wedded under its roof--the secrecy, the doubt, the happiness, and the love unutterable which bound me, the daughter of a proud earldom, to the fate of a being rendered greater still by the energies and strength which make the nobility of manhood. "Full of these thoughts, rich in the holy love that runs like a golden thread from time into eternity, I waited in that old farm-house, to which exhaustion confined me, for the hour when I could tell my husband all that I had suffered--all that I had hoped, since the pride of my father forced us asunder. But while I was resting in the sweet hush of a new hope, with the sound of the far-off waters reaching me like a perpetual promise, content with the dear certainty that he was close at hand, a cruel blow was preparing for me. I was resting in peace, with a new life before me, and sweet hopes singing at my heart, when a lady came to my presence, a fair woman, whose smiles made my heart ache under their sweet welcome. She came with offers of hospitality and cordial good-will--came in the plenitude of her rich happiness to invite the storm-tossed stranger to share the luxuries of her home--to share the society and protection of her husband, Sir William Phipps, Governor of Massachusetts! "I fainted at the lady's feet, but kept my secret safe. She left me smitten to the soul with a great blow, for which I was utterly unprepared. Old man, you would pity me could you guess at the anguish, the terrible, terrible desolation that followed this interview with my husband's second wife!" "Oh, me!" said Samuel Parris, dropping the hands that had covered his face--"oh, me! I do pity you. And it was I that married you both--he, so noble, so grand of character--you, so bright and good. God have mercy upon us!"