It may be that Beverly "touched her light," but he held the flask to his mouth for a long time, and did not return it to the major until its contents were considerably diminished. "A cursed scrape," he muttered. "If anything happens, what'll become of my daughter?" It seems he had a motherless child,--"and then there's the Van Huyden estate. If he wings me, all my hope of that is gone,--of course it is." At length the broad river was crossed, and the oarsmen ran the boat into a sheltered cove, some three miles above Hoboken. The first glimpse of the coming morn stole over the broad river, the distant city, and the magnificent bay. "Wait for us,--you know what I told you?" said Robert to the oarsmen, who were stout fellows, in rough overcoats, and tarpaulin hats. "Ay, ay sir," they responded in a breath. "Major, you lead the way," said Robert, "up the heights we'll find a quiet place." The Major took Beverly by the arm, and began to climb the steep ascent, over wildly scattered rocks, and among leafless trees. They were followed by Robert and Eugene arm in arm. After much difficult wayfaring, they reached the summit of the heights, just in time to catch the first ray of the rising sun, as it shot upward, among the leaden clouds of the eastern horizon. All at once the steeples of the city caught the glow, and the distant day blushed scarlet and gold on every wave. Among the heights,--may be some three miles above Hoboken,--there is a quiet nook, imbosomed, in the summer time, in foliage, and opening to the south-east, in a view of the Empire City, and Manhattan Bay. A place as level as a floor, bounded on all sides save one, by oak, and chestnut and cedar, with great rocks piled like monuments of a long passed age, among the massive trunks. It is green in summer time, with a carpet-like sward, and then the tree branches are woven together by fragrant vines; there are flowers about the rocks and around the roots of the old trees,--a balmy, drowsy atmosphere of June pervades the place. And looking to the east, or south-east, you see the broad river dotted with snowy sails, the great city, with its steeples glittering in the light, and with the calm, clear, vast Heaven arching overhead. The Bay gleams in the distance, white with sails, or shadowed here and there by the steamer's cloud of smoke, and far away Staten Island closes the horizon like a wall. Standing by one of these huge rocks, encircled by the trees, and steeped in the quiet of the place, you gaze upon the distant city, like one contemplating a far off battle-field, in which millions are engaged, and the fate of empires is the stake. A sadder battle-field, sun never shone upon, than the Empire City, in which millions are battling every moment of the hour, and battling all life long for fame, for wealth, for bread, for life. Sometimes the quiet nook rings with the laugh of happy children, who come here to stretch themselves upon the grass, and gather flowers among the rocks,