Anxious perhaps to escape the praises of her father, which, as he had a whimsical docility of temper, might be obtained at any moment,--rather than to avoid those of the guest, which struck her as being unusually agreeable, Miss Loring hastened to protest against all panegyrics, by referring to the more efficient aid rendered by the trader; and then, with an attempt at pleasantry, to lead the conversation still further from herself, she required to know 'to what mysterious cause of alarm on Mr. Hunter's part she owed the happy opportunity she had enjoyed of playing the heroine?' "You will be astonished, Miss Loring," he replied: "but you were positively the cause yourself." "I?" said she. "Ah! I understand," she continued, with a smile of infinite mirth--"you were thinking of the assault made by the two dragoons upon poor Elsie's habitation, which we were so near taking by storm; and you looked for nothing less than a repetition of the charge, while you were at a disadvantage on the narrow bridge!" "By no means," said Herman, sharing somewhat of her animation, and smiling--"I really took you for a spectre; and being of a superstitious turn"---- "A spectre!" cried Captain Loring; "does my Catherine look like a ghost?" And "A spectre!" re-echoed Miss Loring, though with a more serious emphasis. "I had heard," said the young man, "that there was a grave beyond the falls"---- "Adzooks!" exclaimed Captain Loring, "I never heard of it.--Who's buried there? One of the Hawks, hah? By the lord, I'll root him up--have no such villain's bones lying about the place"---- "Father," said Catherine, "it is a woman's grave."--Which answer instantly checked the veteran's rising indignation, and some little disgust with which Hunter heard him threaten the lowly sepulchre with violation. "In truth," resumed the painter, "my mind was affected by the solemn scenery that conducted me to the burial-place; and when I had reached the bridge, and, lifting up my eyes, beheld a figure rising, as it seemed out of the earth, and to all appearance commanding me, by menacing gestures (for such, Miss Loring, was your appearance,) to retire, you may judge how much my imagination was excited. I assure you, such was the hallucination of my mind, that I beheld, even in _your_ countenance, the pallid hues of death, with tears, too, dropping from your eyes, and such an expression of mingled sorrow and displeasure, as I thought could exist only on the visage of a disembodied spirit. In the sudden alarm produced by such an impression, I forgot entirely where I was, and so stepped off the narrow bridge into that malicious torrent, and thereby, as I may also add, fell under the obligation of owing you a life--an obligation, which, I assure you, is of so agreeable a nature, that"----