“And the accustomed train Of things grew round her brain again”; then it was with the shrinking dread with which a burned child would approach fire that Alice drew near her home. She would have preferred to remain away for ever, amid the kaleidoscopic changes of her new, wandering, unreal life, rather than have awakened from the strange, painful, but very vague dream; rather than have consciousness forced upon her by the dear, old familiar scenes and associations of her home—her once peaceful, hopeful, happy home, as by “Some monstrous torture-engine’s whole Strength.” The day of their arrival at home a large company had been invited to meet them at dinner. The days that followed were filled up with dinner parties. At length, late in the fall, they were quietly settled, and the monotonous routine of daily country life commenced. One thing Alice dreaded and avoided—appearing at church again under her new position and name. But Sinclair had accepted a “call” to a church in the West, which opened to him a new field of labor and usefulness. His departure followed; and this was a great relief to Alice, who, with the “sigh of a great deliverance, tried to leave the past with all its gloom and terror,” and turn to the future with some hope. Two events of great domestic importance occurred in the second year of their marriage; one was the death of Colonel Chester, who died, as all their neighbors said, of nothing more than his diabolical temper; as their physician said, of congestion of the brain, brought on by excitement. And what do you think was the cause of this fatal excitement? That the child of Alice happened to be a girl instead of a boy, which he had set his heart upon. CHAPTER VI. COUNTRY NEIGHBORS. Blest those abodes where want and pain repair And every stranger finds a ready chair; Blest be those feasts, with joyous plenty crowned, Where all the blooming family around, Laugh at the jests or pranks that never fail, Or sigh with pity at some mournful tale, Or press the weary traveler to his food, And feel the luxury of doing good. _—Goldsmith._ Alice was almost in solitary confinement in the cold, stern prison of her home, for General Garnet discouraged association with old friends, who at least suggested the past, if they did not openly refer to it. But there was one family, and that family the very warmest and most steadfast among the few friends of Sinclair, from whom General Garnet had not the will to separate his young wife—the Wylies of Yocomoco, or Point Pleasant, as their seat was more frequently called by their delighted visitors. Who, indeed, had the will or the power to do aught to annoy the delightful host of Point Pleasant?