I felt a great pity for the poor old woman still wandering about in the cold night, while we were snug and warm at home; but mingled with that feeling there was another sentiment so confused and vague that I give it too much importance, even though I touch upon it never so lightly. It was this: I had a sort of restless curiosity to see those squalid streets through which the old peddler went so bravely, and to which I had never been taken. These streets, that I saw from the distance, were deserted in the day time, but there in the evening, from time immemorial, sailors made merry; sometimes the sound of their singing was so loud that we could hear it as we sat in our parlor. What could be going on there? What was the nature of that fun, the echo of whose din we heard so distinctly? How did they amuse themselves, these sailors, who had but newly come over the sea from distant countries where the sun was always hot? What life was careless and simple and free as theirs! My emotions lose their force when I endeavor to interpret them, and my words seem very inept. But I know that seeds of trouble, and seeds of hope (to develop how I could not guess) were at about this time planted in my little being. When, with my cakes in my hand, I re-entered the parlor where the family sat talking together quietly, I felt for a quick, almost inappreciable, moment suffocated and imprisoned. At half-past nine, because of me seldom later, tea was served, and with it we had thin slices of bread, spread with the most delicious butter, and cut with the care one gives to very few things in these days. Then at about eleven o'clock, after a reading from the Bible and a prayer, we retired. As I lay in my little white bed I was always more restless Sunday nights than at any other time. Immediately ahead of me there was the prospect of Mr. Ratin whom morning would surely bring, and he was always a most painful sight to me after a respite; also I was full of regret because Sunday was over, always over so quickly!--and I felt a great weariness when I thought of the many lessons it would be necessary for me to prepare before Sunday came again. Sometimes, as I lay there, I would hear the songs the sailors sung as they passed in the distant lands and noble ships; and a sort of dull and indefinite longing took possession of me and I felt as if I would like to be out of doors myself in search of pleasurable and exciting adventure. I hungered to be in the bracing wintry night air, or in one of those foreign lands where the sun beats down with tropical warmth; I yearned to be out and singing like them, as loud as possible, just for the joy of being alive. CHAPTER XXIV. “And I beheld, and heard an angel flying through the midst of heaven, saying with a loud voice, Woe, woe, woe, to the inhabiters of the earth!” Besides reading the Bible with the family every evening, I read a chapter from it each morning before rising.