“You look sad to-night, Alice,” was the remark of Mr. Colman as his young wife entered the sitting-room, and took a seat beside him with a countenance expressive of unusual dejection; “and where is Maggie this evening that you have been obliged to take upon yourself the duty of nursery-maid to our little ones?”

“Maggie has gone upon an errand of mercy—to watch over a sick and suffering fellow creature,” replied Mrs. Colman. “It is a long story,” she added, in answer to the look of inquiry which her husband cast upon her, “but I will endeavor to relate it if you will listen to it patiently. This morning, Harry, after you had left home, I resolved to set forth in search of a seamstress who was making some dresses for our little girl. She had failed to bring them home at the time appointed, and as I had never employed her before, and knew nothing of her character, I felt rather anxious concerning the safety of the materials I had given her to work upon, and determined to go to the dwelling which she had described as her residence and learn the cause of her disappointing me. The house was in a miserable street some distance from here, and I hurried along till I came to it. It was a wretched-looking dwelling, such as none but the very poorest class would have chosen. The door stood open, and several ragged little Irish children were playing upon the steps. I inquired of them if Mrs. Benson, the seamstress lived there? They did not seem to recognize the name—but they told me that a young woman who took in sewing hired the back rooms of the third-story. Following their direction, I ascended three flights of stairs and found myself at the door of the apartment, where I knocked, and a faint voice bidding me enter, I unclosed the door and stood upon the threshold. What a strange and unexpected sight now met my gaze! Upon the floor, almost at my feet as I entered, lay a young and very beautiful girl apparently bereft of all consciousness. She looked so thin and pale that at first I thought her dead, and starting back in horror I was about to leave the place, when a feeble voice, the same which told me to come in, besought me to stay. Looking round to discover whence it proceeded, I saw the emaciated form of a man reclining upon a couch in a distant part of the room. Hastily I approached him, for I felt it to be my duty to render what aid I could. As I drew nearer to his bedside, I read the tale of confirmed disease in that pallid face and in the wild sunken eyes whose gaze met my own. In a few words he informed me that the maiden who lay there senseless was his daughter. While busily engaged at her work about an hour previously, she had fallen from her seat and remained thus in a state of unconsciousness. He said that his limbs being palsied he was unable to help her, and so he had lain upon his couch agonized by the thought that his child was dead, or that she might die for want of proper assistance. And he now besought me to endeavor to discover if there were any signs of life, and if possible to restore her to her senses. The appeal was not in vain. I turned from him to his inanimate daughter, and raising that light and fragile form in my arms, placed her upon a couch in a small closet-like apartment adjoining the one I had first entered. For a long time every means of restoration were vainly tried—but at length my strenuous efforts were rewarded, and the young girl once more unclosed her eyes. But she evidently recognized nothing about her—those dark and strangely beautiful orbs glared wildly around, while a few broken, incoherent sentences burst from her lips, and as she sunk again upon the pillow the bright fever flushes rushed to her cheek, and I knew that her brain was suffering. Great was her parent’s joy that she once more breathed—but my heart was full of sadness, for I could not help feeling that her life was in jeopardy. It was my wish to have a physician summoned, but I knew not how this was to be done, for I dared not leave my charge, and there was no one near to help me. At this moment I heard footsteps in the hall, and quickly opening the door, beheld a boy ascending the stairs. The promise of a piece of silver easily procured his assent to go for the nearest doctor, and accordingly he set off, while re-entering the room I resumed my station by the sick girl’s bedside. In a few minutes the physician arrived and my suspicions of the nature of the young girl’s disorder were confirmed, for he pronounced it to be a fever of the brain, and said that his patient would require constant watching and careful nursing. The father listened anxiously and attentively to the doctor’s words. His countenance fell as he caught the last sentences, though he said not a word. It was not till after giving his prescription, the physician left, promising to call early on the morrow, that he spoke what was passing in his mind.

“‘Julie must die!’ he said, bowing his head upon his hands, while bitter, hopeless anguish was depicted upon his face, ‘for I have no means of obtaining for her the care she needs.’ It was all that passed his lips, but it spoke volumes to my heart, and my resolution was instantly taken. I told him that I would not desert his child, that I would continue with her part of the day, and when I was obliged to leave that I would send some one to take my place. Oh, Harry! if you could only have seen how grateful that poor invalid looked! Most amply repaid was I by that glance for whatever I had undertaken. I remained with the sick girl several hours longer, and in the intervals when she slumbered, I had time to observe the appearance of things around me. The furniture was mean and scanty. There were but two chairs in the room, and the carpet was worn almost threadbare. Every thing betokened extreme poverty—but neatness was plainly perceptible in the arrangements of the apartment, and I felt from the appearance of its occupants that they had seen more prosperous days. A book lay upon a table close at hand, I took it up, and discovered it to be a volume of Bryant’s poems. On looking over the pages, I found several of the most beautiful passages marked. Upon one of the fly-leaves was written, ‘To Julie—from her father.’ The book was evidently the young girl’s property. There was also a small portfolio of drawings upon the table, which evinced signs of both talent and cultivation. For an hour after the physician’s departure the parent of Julie—for by her name I may as well call her—showed little disposition to converse. He seemed exhausted by the emotions of the day—but I knew that though he said nothing, his gaze was often upon me when he imagined that I did not observe him. At last he roused himself to answer some inquiries which I thought it necessary to make. He told me that he was very poor, and that for more than a year, during which his infirmity had appeared and increased, his daughter had maintained him by the proceeds of her needle. He said also that two years previously he had resided at Baltimore as one of its wealthiest merchants—but having failed under circumstances that cast a cloud upon his character, though he was in reality innocent of intentional wrong, he had left the city of his birth and hastened with Julie, his only child, to New York, where he would be sure of never more meeting the scornful gaze of those who had been his friends ere misfortune overlook him. Here he hoped to procure employment—but fate seemed against him. Shortly after his arrival in this city, he was seized with a dangerous illness which left him in his present helpless condition, and his lovely and accomplished child found herself very unexpectedly thrown upon her own resources for her support and that of her invalid parent. Bravely for many months had she borne the burden, but continued anxiety concerning the means of obtaining life’s necessaries had at last done its work—and in the delirium of fever, the fair and noble girl now tossed restlessly upon her bed, a mere wreck of what she had once been.

“This brief sketch of their history, as you may imagine, dear Harry, interested me greatly. And when, at its conclusion, the speaker again expressed his fears for the future and his doubts as to the recovery of his child, for whom he had no power to provide necessary attendance, I again assured him that I would watch over her until she became quite well, and that after this I would endeavor to find some more healthy and suitable employment for her than that in which she had latterly been engaged.

“Toward the close of the afternoon, being desirous of going home for awhile, I dispatched the boy whom I have once before mentioned, for Maggie, that she might supply my place as attendant upon the sick Julie, until evening, when I proposed to bear her company and resume my post at the bedside. She came, and her sympathies were soon all enlisted by the tale which I hurriedly repeated to her. But she decidedly opposed my wish to return—reminded me of my late indisposition, and declaring that I was not strong enough to bear the fatigue of sitting up all night, insisted upon being allowed to exercise her skill as nurse without any other assistance. I thanked her for her consideration, while I felt that she was right. So I left her and proceeded home, where, as you may suppose, I was welcomed most joyfully by little Willie and his sister, who had mourned incessantly over mamma’s protracted absence.

“And now, Harry, that I have finished my somewhat lengthy narrative, tell me whether you approve of what I have done and promised to do?”

“Certainly, dearest Alice,” replied Mr. Colman, affectionately pressing the little hand that rested within his own, “while you continue to follow, as you have hitherto done, the dictates of your own pure, loving heart, I can never do aught but applaud you. The present objects of your benevolence, are I am sure from the account, well worthy of whatever you may do for them, and I would advise you to persevere in your efforts for their welfare. But you quite forgot to tell me, my dear, if you discovered in your protÉgÉ the seamstress for whom you were searching.”

“No, indeed,” she replied, while her countenance wore a look of vexation, “my seamstress was a very different sort of a being from this beautiful Julie. Nor do I think that I shall ever discover her, for just before I returned home I made inquiries as to whether a person answering her description lived in that house, and was assured that no one of that name had ever dwelt there. How foolish I was to trust those dresses to an entire stranger.”

“And pray what may be the name of the family whose history has interested you so deeply?” asked Mr. Colman.

“The father’s name is Malcolm—Walter Malcolm, as he informed me. With the daughter’s I believe that I have already acquainted you.”

“Walter Malcolm! Julie Malcolm! And you say they are from Baltimore?” As he spoke Mr. Colman’s cheek grew suddenly pale, and rising from his seat he paced the apartment with a hasty and agitated step.

“Why, what is the matter, Harry?” exclaimed his wife in a tone of the deepest solicitude, as she sprung to his side, “pray tell me what has moved you thus?” But it was some moments ere he seemed able to reply. At length with emotion he said—

“Alice, what if I were to tell you that this man—this Walter Malcolm is my brother—the brother who in my early youth drove me away from his luxurious home, an orphan and unprotected, to seek my fortune in the wide, wide world?” Alice Colman started and raised her eyes wonderingly to her husband’s face, and after a brief silence he resumed with a sternness unusual to him—

“In that hour, Alice—in that hour of utter desolation, when lonely and uncared for I left my brother’s roof forever, a fierce, burning desire for revenge took possession of my soul. In the first bitterness of despair I called upon Heaven to avenge my wrongs. I wished that Walter’s wealth might take to itself wings—that one day he might come to me for bread; and I resolved were this ever the case, to give him—a stone! My desire has been fulfilled, and my proud and unfeeling brother is now a beggar at my door!”

He paused—while his wife shuddered and looked appealingly up into his face.

“Harry!” she exclaimed in a low, earnest tone, “you surely do not mean that you will not forgive the sorrow your brother’s conduct once caused you—that you will now look exultingly upon his woes, and turn a deaf ear to the wants of his sweet and suffering child?”

The reproving expression of the dear face now anxiously upturned to his, at once recalled the husband to a sense of error, and drawing the form of the beloved one closer to his side, he said—

“Oh! how fervently should I thank Heaven who has given to me such a monitor in the hour of temptation! Pardon me, my Alice, if by giving way to impulse I have wounded your sensitive spirit, and that in the moment when passion held its sway, I slighted the divine lesson of forgiveness, through your influence first impressed upon my soul. Nay, dearest, look not thus surprised, for it was really by your means that the wish to quell the thirst for revenge upon my brother, entered my heart; and if you will listen a few seconds I can explain to you the words that at present may well seem mysterious. You will doubtless remember, Alice, that some months before our marriage, I experienced a severe fit of illness. One pleasant Sabbath evening shortly after I was declared convalescent, I was reclining upon a sofa in the sitting-room at your uncle’s residence. My spirits were just then very much depressed—I felt inwardly fretful and uneasy—and as is not uncommon at such a time, many little circumstances which before had been almost forgotten, rose up in my mind, and woke anew in my bosom sensations according to their nature, of pain, anxiety, or indignation. Among other things came forcibly to view the memory of the grievous wrong I had received at the hands of him who should have been a parent to me; and a feeling of the deepest hatred toward my brother stole to my heart, together with a hope that at some future time a chance might be mine of returning him measure for measure of the unkindness which he had so unsparingly dealt out to me.

“At that instant, Alice, you re-entered the room from which you had been a few minutes absent, and at the request of your uncle, opened the family Bible and began your usual Sabbath-evening duty of reading a series of chapters from the holy book. There was a passage in the first which you read that affected me strangely—for it came as a reproof from Heaven delivered to me through the medium of one of earth’s angels. It was the following—‘Avenge not yourselves, but rather give place unto wrath, for it is written, vengeance is mine; I will repay saith the Lord. Therefore, if thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirst, give him drink; for in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire on his head.’ The sentences awed me, coming upon my ear as they did at a period when my spirit needed the precious warning and rebuke contained in them, and I breathed a silent prayer to Heaven for strength to enable me to heed it. The hour of my trial has arrived, and to-day have I again felt the promptings of the tempter. You cannot imagine with what force these old feelings have been driven back upon my soul, but, Alice, your voice has once more stilled the tempest, and I know that I have passed the ordeal in safety.”

Harry Colman ceased, and this time as his gaze met that of his companion he saw that her eyes were full of tears—but they were tears of grateful joy. For a little while there was silence between them, but at length Mr. Colman continued:

“Let me recount to you, Alice, as briefly as possible, a few circumstances connected with my early history. I have never done so before, because the effort was a painful one, and there was no exact necessity for the repetition. As you are aware, I was so unfortunate as to lose my father when I was a mere infant, and my mother lived only till I had attained my twelfth year. I was the child of her second marriage, and she had one son by a previous union who was many years my senior. At the period of my mother’s death, my brother, Walter Malcolm, had been married nearly five years, and was now a widower and the father of one little girl, who had just reached her third summer. Upon her death-bed my parent left me beneath his care, desiring Walter to attend to my wants and to be kind and gentle to me when she was no more. As soon as the funeral was over, my brother took me with him to his own dwelling. I was now entirely dependent upon him for maintenance. Walter Malcolm was wealthy, for a large estate had descended to him from his father, who had also left my mother a life-annuity, which while she lived had supported us. At her death I was of course unprovided for, for my own father had possessed no worldly goods to bequeath me. My new home seemed very different to me from the hearth of my early, sunny childhood. I was lonely and desolate—for between Walter and myself brotherly love had never existed. Not that I would have denied him his meed—but I was too proud to award the gift that I was confident would never be valued, for my memory could not boast a single instance wherein he had evinced for me the slightest regard. Nay, I even felt that I was an object of dislike to him, though I knew not the cause. During my mother’s life I had been greatly indulged, and it was scarcely to be wondered at that I was frequently very wayward. Upon such occasions, a word of love had always been sufficient to control my passionate nature; but when the sweet affectionate tones that ever had power to calm me, were hushed in the tomb, my faults were met by my new guardian with harshness and contempt, and this never failed to rouse a spirit of continued opposition. There was but one voice in my brother’s household that ever spoke lovingly to me. It was that of his child—the little Julie. From the first hour of my residence beneath Walter’s roof, the little creature had conceived a passionate attachment to me, preferring my presence to that of her nurse or even her father. And, as you may imagine, Alice, I did not slight her proffered affection, and during the three years that we dwelt together the little one was the sole sunbeam upon my shadowed life-path. How gladly did I greet her graceful bounding step! How dear was the sound of her clear ringing laughter as I joined in her sports!—and more precious still were the moments when weary of play, she would steal to my side, and twining her tiny arms about my neck, murmur forth, in lisping accents, her sweet child-like terms of endearment.

“I had reached my fifteenth year when the incident occurred that separated me from my brother. An error was laid to my charge of which I was really guiltless—and as I proudly refused to acknowledge and repair the fault—Walter Malcolm turned me from his dwelling, declaring that thenceforth and forever he disowned me! Time was merely given me to collect a few little articles that I could really call my own—I was not allowed to bid farewell to the child whom I yearned to look upon once more before I went—and so, an outcast, I passed from that stately mansion. Alice, I dare not linger over a description of my sensations in that hour of anguish—for it might perhaps arouse them again within my soul. You know the rest of my history—the circumstance of my adoption by your uncle who was then visiting Baltimore, and first beheld me in a store where I had entered in quest of employment. To him I confided the facts relating to my former life; he pitied and sympathized with me, and bore me with him to his own home in this city, and from that day was in every respect to the lonely orphan all that a kind and generous parent could be to his only son.”

——