Faire Christabelle, that ladye bright,
Was had forth of the towre:
But ever she droopeth in her minde,
As, nipt by an ungentle winde,
Doth some faire lillye flowre.
SYR CAULINE.

That evening, the last of their stay at Montepoole, Fleda was thought well enough to take her tea in company. So Mr. Carleton carried her down, though she could have walked, and placed her on the sofa in the parlour.

Whatever disposition the young officers might have felt to renew their pleasantry on the occasion, it was shamed into silence. There was a pure dignity about that little pale face which protected itself. They were quite struck, and Fleda had no reason to complain of want of attention from any of the party. Mr. Evelyn kissed her. Mr. Thorn brought a little table to the side of the sofa for her cup of tea to stand on, and handed her the toast most dutifully; and her cousin Rossitur went back and forth between her and the tea-urn. All of the ladies seemed to take immense satisfaction in looking at her, they did it so much; standing about the hearth-rug with their cups in their hands, sipping their tea. Fleda was quite touched with everybody's kindness, but somebody at the back of the sofa, whom she did not see, was the greatest comfort of all.

"You must let me carry you upstairs when you go, Fleda," said her cousin. "I shall grow quite jealous of your friend, Mr. Carleton."

"No," said Fleda, smiling a little, "I shall not let any one but him carry me up, if he will."

"We shall all grow jealous of Mr. Carleton," said Thorn. "He means to monopolize you, keeping you shut up there, upstairs."

"He didn't keep me shut up," said Fleda.

Mr. Carleton was welcome to monopolize her, if it depended on her vote.

"Not fair play, Carleton," continued the young officer, wisely shaking his head, "all start alike, or there's no fun in the race. You've fairly distanced us left us nowhere."

He might have talked Chinese, and been as intelligible to
Fleda, and as interesting to Guy, for all that appeared.

"How are we going to proceed to-morrow, Mr. Evelyn?" said Mrs. Carleton. "Has the missing stage-coach returned yet? or will it be forthcoming in the morning?"

"Promised, Mrs. Carleton. The landlord's faith stands pledged for it."

"Then it wont disappoint us, of course. What a dismal way of travelling!"

"This young country hasn't grown up to post-coaches yet," said
Mrs. Evelyn.

"How many will it hold?" inquired Mrs. Carleton.

"Hum! nine inside, I suppose."

"And we number ten, with the servants."

"Just take us," said Mr. Evelyn. "There's room on the box for one."

"It will not take me," said Mr. Carleton.

"How will you go? ride?" said his mother. "I should think you would, since you have found a horse you like so well."

"By George! I wish there was another that I liked," said Rossitur, "and I'd go on horseback too. Such weather! The landlord says it's the beginning of Indian summer."

"It's too early for that," said Thorn.

"Well, eight inside will do very well for one day," said Mrs. Carleton. "That will give little Fleda a little more space to lie at her ease."

"You may put Fleda out of your calculations, too, mother," said Mr. Carleton. "I will take care of her."

"How in the world," exclaimed his mother, "if you are on horseback?"

And Fleda twisted herself round so as to give a look of bright inquiry at his face. She got no answer beyond a smile, which, however, completely satisfied her. As to the rest, he told his mother that he had arranged it, and they should see in the morning. Mrs. Carleton was far from being at ease on the subject of his arrangements, but she let the matter drop.

Fleda was secretly very much pleased. She thought she would a great deal rather go with Mr. Carleton in the little wagon than in the stage-coach with the rest of the people. Privately she did not at all admire Mr. Thorn or her cousin Rossitur. They amused her though; and feeling very much better and stronger in body, and at least quiet in mind, she sat in tolerable comfort on her sofa, looking and listening to the people who were gaily talking around her.

In the gaps of talk she sometimes thought she heard a distressed sound in the hall. The buzz of tongues covered it up, then again she heard it, and she was sure at last that it was the voice of a dog. Never came an appeal in vain from any four-footed creature to Fleda's heart. All the rest being busy with their own affairs she quietly got up and opened the door and looked out, and finding that she was right, went softly into the hall. In one corner lay her cousin Rossitur's beautiful black pointer, which she well remembered, and had greatly admired several times. The poor creature was every now and then uttering short cries, in a manner as if he would not but they were forced from him.

"What is the matter with him?" asked Fleda, stepping fearfully towards the dog, and speaking to Mr. Carleton, who had come out to look after her. As she spoke, the dog rose, and came crouching and wagging his tail to meet them.

"Oh, Mr. Carleton!" Fleda almost screamed, "look at him! Oh, what is the matter with him! he's all over bloody! Poor creature!"

"You must ask your cousin, Fleda," said Mr. Carleton, with as much cold disgust in his countenance as it often expressed; and that is saying a good deal.

Fleda could speak in the cause of a dog, where she would have been silent in her own. She went back to the parlour, and begged her cousin, with a face of distress, to come out into the hall, she did not say for what. Both he and Thorn followed her. Rossitur's face darkened as Fleda repeated her enquiry, her heart so full by this time, as hardly to allow her to make any.

"Why, the dog didn't do his duty, and has been punished," he said, gloomily.

"Punished!" said Fleda.

"Shot," said Mr. Carleton, coolly.

"Shot!" exclaimed Fleda, bursting into heartwrung tears "shot! Oh, how could any one do it! Oh, how could you, how could you, cousin Charlton!"

It was a picture. The child was crying bitterly, her fingers stroking the poor dog's head with a touch in which lay, oh what tender healing, if the will had but had magnetic power! Carleton's eye glanced significantly from her to the young officers. Rossitur looked at Thorn.

"It was not Charlton it was I, Miss Fleda," said the latter. "Charlton lent him to me to-day, and he disobeyed me, and so I was angry with him, and punished him a little severely; but he'll soon get over it."

But all Fleda's answer was, "I am very sorry! I am very sorry! poor dog!" and to weep such tears as made the young gentlemen for once ashamed of themselves. It almost did the child a mischief. She did not get over it all the evening. And she never got over it, as far as Mr. Thorn was concerned.

Mrs. Carleton hoped, faintly, that Guy would come to reason by the next morning, and let Fleda go in the stage-coach with the rest of the people. But he was as unreasonable as ever, and stuck to his purpose. She had supposed, however, with Fleda, that the difference would be only an open vehicle and his company instead of a covered one and her own. Both of them were sadly discomfited when on coming to the hall door to take their carriages, it was found that Mr. Carleton's meaning was no less than to take Fleda before him on horseback. He was busy even then in arranging a cushion on the pommel of the saddle for her to sit upon. Mrs. Carleton burst into indignant remonstrances; Fleda silently trembled.

But Mr. Carleton had his own notions on the subject, and they were not moved by anything his mother could say. He quietly went on with his preparations; taking very slight notice of the raillery of the young officers, answering Mrs. Evelyn with polite words, and silencing his mother as he came up with one of those looks out of his dark eyes to which she always forgave the wilfulness for the sake of the beauty and the winning power. She was completely conquered, and stepped back with even a smile.

"But, Carleton!" cried Rossitur, impatiently; "you can't ride so! you'll find it deucedly inconvenient."

"Possibly," said Mr. Carleton.

"Fleda would be a great deal better off in the stage-coach."

"Have you studied medicine, Mr. Rossitur?" said the young man.
"Because I am persuaded of the contrary."

"I don't believe your horse will like it," said Thorn.

"My horse is always of my mind, Sir; or if he be not, I generally succeed in convincing him."

"But there is somebody else that deserves to be consulted," said Mrs. Thorn. "I wonder how little Fleda will like it."

"I will ask her when we get to our first stopping-place," said
Mr. Carleton, smiling. "Come, Fleda!"

Fleda would hardly have said a word if his purpose had been to put her under the horse's feet instead of on his back. But she came forward with great unwillingness, and a very tremulous little heart. He must have understood the want of alacrity in her face and manner, though he took no notice of it otherwise than by the gentle kindness with which he led her to the horse-block, and placed her upon it. Then mounting, and riding the horse up close to the block, he took Fleda in both hands, and bidding her spring, in a moment she was safely seated before him.

At first it seemed dreadful to Fleda to have that great horse's head so near her, and she was afraid that her feet touching him would excite his most serious disapprobation. However, a minute or so went by, and she could not see that his tranquillity seemed to be at all ruffled, or even that he was sensible of her being upon his shoulders. They waited to see the stage-coach off, and then gently set forward. Fleda feared very much again when she felt the horse moving under her, easy as his gait was, and looking after the stage-coach in the distance, now beyond call, she felt a little as if she was a great way from help and dry land cast away on a horse's back. But Mr. Carleton's arm was gently passed round her, and she knew it held her safely, and would not let her fall; and he bent down his face to her, and asked her so kindly and tenderly, and with such a look too, that seemed to laugh at her fears, whether she felt afraid? and with such a kind little pressure of his arm that promised to take care of her, that Fleda's courage mounted twenty degrees at once. And it rose higher every minute; the horse went very easily, and Mr. Carleton held her so that she could not be tired, and made her lean against him; and before they had gone a mile Fleda began to be delighted. Such a charming way of travelling! Such a free view of the country! and in this pleasant weather, too, neither hot nor cold, and when all nature's features were softened by the light veil of haze that hung over them, and kept off the sun's glare, Mr. Carleton was right. In the stage-coach Fleda would have sat quiet in a corner, and moped the time sadly away; now she was roused, excited, interested, even cheerful; forgetting herself, which was the very thing of all others to be desired for her. She lost her fears; she was willing to have the horse trot or canter as fast as his rider pleased; but the trotting was too rough for her, so they cantered or paced along most of the time, when the hills did not oblige them to walk quietly up and down, which happened pretty often. For several miles the country was not very familiar to Fleda. It was, however, extremely picturesque; and she sat silently and gravely looking at it, her head lying upon Mr. Carleton's breast, her little mind very full of thoughts and musings, curious, deep, sometimes sorrowful, but not unhappy.

"I am afraid I tire you, Mr. Carleton!" said she, in a sudden fit of recollection, starting up.

His look answered her, and his arm drew her back to her place again.

"Are you not tired, Elfie?"

"Oh no! You have got a new name for me, Mr. Carleton," said she, a moment after, looking up and smiling.

"Do you like it?"

"Yes."

"You are my good genius," said he, "so I must a peculiar title for you, different from what other people know you by."

"What is a genius, Sir?" said Fleda.

"Well, a sprite, then," said he, smiling.

"A sprite?" said Fleda.

"I have read a story of a lady, Elfie, who had a great many little unearthly creatures, a kind of sprites, to attend upon her. Some sat in the ringlets of her hair, and took charge of them; some hid in the folds of her dress and made them lie gracefully; another lodged in a dimple in her cheek, and another perched on her eyebrows, and so on."

"To take care of her eyebrows?" said Fleda, laughing.

"Yes; to smooth out all the ill-humoured wrinkles and frowns,
I suppose."

"But am I such a sprite?" said Fleda.

"Something like it."

"Why, what do I do?" said Fleda, rousing herself in a mixture of gratification and amusement that was pleasant to behold.

"What office would you choose, Elfie? what good would you like to do me?"

It was a curious wistful look with which Fleda answered this question, an innocent look, in which Mr. Carleton read perfectly that she felt something was wanting in him, and did not know exactly what. His smile almost made her think she had been mistaken.

"You are just the sprite you would wish to be, Elfie," he said.

Fleda's head took its former position, and she sat for some time musing over his question and answer, till a familiar waymark put all such thoughts to flight. They were passing Deepwater Lake, and would presently be at aunt Miriam's. Fleda looked now with a beating heart. Every foot of ground was known to her. She was seeing it, perhaps, for the last time. It was with even an intensity of eagerness that she watched every point and turn of the landscape, endeavouring to lose nothing in her farewell view, to give her farewell look at every favourite clump of trees and old rock, and at the very mill-wheels, which for years ,whether working or at rest, had had such interest for her. If tears came to bid their good-by too, they were hastily thrown off, or suffered to roll quietly down; they might bide their time; but eyes must look now or never. How pleasant, how pleasant, the quiet old country seemed to Fleda as they went along! in that most quiet light and colouring; the brightness of the autumn glory gone, and the sober warm hue which the hills still wore seen under that hazy veil. All the home-like peace of the place was spread out to make it hard going away. Would she ever see any other so pleasant again? Those dear old hills and fields, among which she had been so happy; they were not to be her home any more; would she ever have the same sweet happiness anywhere else? "The Lord will provide!" thought little Fleda with swimming eyes.

It was hard to go by aunt Miriam's. Fleda eagerly looked, as well as she could, but no one was to be seen about the house. It was just as well. A sad gush of tears must come, then, but she got rid of them as soon as possible, that she might not lose the rest of the way, promising them another time. The little settlement on "the hill" was passed, the factories, and mills, and mill-ponds, one after the other; they made Fleda feel very badly, for here she remembered going with her grandfather to see the work, and there she had stopped with him at the turner's shop to get a wooden bowl turned, and there she had been with Cynthy when she went to visit an acquaintance; and there never was a happier little girl than Fleda had been in those old times. All gone! It was no use trying to help it; Fleda put her two hands to her face and cried, at last, a silent but not the less bitter, leave- taking, of the shadows of the past.

She forced herself into quiet again, resolved to look to the last. As they were going down the hill, past the saw-mill, Mr. Carleton noticed that her head was stretched out to look back at it, with an expression of face he could not withstand. He wheeled about immediately, and went back and stood opposite to it. The mill was not working today. The saw was standing still, though there were plenty of huge trunks of trees lying about in all directions, waiting to be cut up. There was a desolate look of the place. No one was there; the little brook, most of its waters cut off, did not go roaring and laughing down the hill, but trickled softly and plaintively over the stones. It seemed exceeding sad to Fleda.

"Thank you, Mr. Carleton," she said, after a little earnest fond-looking at her old haunt; "you needn't stay any longer."

But as soon as they had crossed the little rude bridge at the foot of the hill, they could see the poplar trees which skirted the courtyard fence before her grandfather's house. Poor Fleda's eyes could hardly serve her. She managed to keep them open till the horse had made a few steps more and she had caught the well-known face of the old house looking at her through the poplars. Her fortitude failed, and bowing her little head, she wept so exceedingly, that Mr. Carleton was fain to draw bridle, and try to comfort her.

"My dear Elfie! do not weep so," he said, tenderly. "Is there anything you would like? Can I do anything for you?"

He had to wait a little. He repeated his first query.

"Oh, it's no matter," said Fleda, striving to conquer her tears, which found their way again; "if I only could have gone into the house once more! but it's no matter you needn't wait, Mr. Carleton "

The horse, however, remained motionless.

"Do you think you would feel better, Elfie, if you had seen it again?"

"Oh, yes! But never mind, Mr. Carleton, you may go on."

Mr. Carleton ordered his servant to open the gate, and rode up to the back of the house.

"I am afraid there is nobody here, Elfie," he said; "the house seems all shut up."

"I know how I can get in," said Fleda; "there's a window down stairs I don't believe it is fastened; if you wouldn't mind waiting, Mr. Carleton; I wont keep you long."

The child had dried her tears, and there was the eagerness of something like hope in her face. Mr. Carleton dismounted and took her off.

"I must find a way to get in too, Elfie; I cannot let you go alone."

"Oh, I can open the door when I get in," said Fleda.

"But you have not the key."

"There's no key, it's only bolted on the inside, that door. I can open it."

She found the window unfastened as she had expected: Mr. Carleton held it open while she crawled in, and then she undid the door for him. He more than half questioned the wisdom of his proceeding. The house had a dismal look; cold, empty, deserted; it was a dreary reminder of Fleda's loss, and he feared the effect of it would be anything but good. He followed and watched her, as with an eager business step she went through the hall and up the stairs, putting her head into every room and giving an earnest wistful look all round it. Here and there she went in and stood a moment, where associations were more thick and strong; sometimes taking a look out of a particular window, and even opening a cupboard door, to give that same kind and sorrowful glance of recognition at the old often-resorted-to hiding-place of her own or her grandfather's treasures and trumpery. Those old corners seemed to touch Fleda more than all the rest; and she turned away from one of them with a face of such extreme sorrow, that Mr. Carleton very much regretted he had brought her into the house. For her sake, for his own, it was a curious show of character. Though tears were sometimes streaming, she made no delay, and gave him no trouble; with the calm steadiness of a woman she went regularly through the house, leaving no place unvisited, but never obliging him to hasten her away. She said not a word during the whole time; her very crying was still; the light tread of her little feet was the only sound in the silent empty rooms; and the noise of their footsteps in the halls, and of the opening and shutting doors echoed mournfully through the house.

She had left her grandfather's room for the last. Mr. Carleton did not follow her in there, guessing that she would rather be alone. But she did not come back, and he was forced to go to fetch her.

The chill desolateness of that room had been too much for poor little Fleda. The empty bedstead, the cold stove, the table bare of books, only one or two lay upon the old Bible; the forlorn order of the place that bespoke the master far away; the very sunbeams that stole in at the little windows, and met now no answering look of gladness or gratitude; it had struck the child's heart too heavily, and she was standing crying by the window. A second time in that room Mr. Carleton sat down and drew his little charge to his breast; and spoke words of soothing and sympathy.

"I am very sorry I brought you here, dear Elfie," he said kindly. "It was too hard for you."

"Oh, no!" even through her tears, Fleda said, "she was very glad!"

"Hadn't we better try to overtake our friends?" he whispered, after another pause.

She immediately, almost immediately, put away her tears, and with a quiet obedience that touched him, went with him from the room, fastened the door, and got out again at the little window.

"Oh, Mr. Carleton!" she said, with great earnestness, when they had almost reached the horses, "wont you wait for me one minute more? I just want a piece of the burning bush."

Drawing her hand from him she rushed round to the front of the house. A little more slowly Mr. Carleton followed, and found her under the burning bush, tugging furiously at a branch, beyond her strength to break off.

"That's too much for you, Elfie," said he, gently taking her hand from the tree; "let my hand try."

She stood back and watched, tears running down her face, while he got a knife from his pocket and cut off the piece she had been trying for, nicely, and gave it to her. The first movement of Fleda's head was down, bent over the pretty spray of red berries; but by the time she stood at the horse's side she looked up at Mr. Carleton and thanked him with a face of more than thankfulness.

She was crying, however, constantly, till they had gone several miles on their way again, and Mr. Carleton doubted he had done wrong. It passed away, and she had been sitting quite peacefully for some time, when he told her they were near the place where they were to stop and join their friends. She looked up most gratefully in his face.

"I am very much obliged to you, Mr. Carleton, for what you did!"

"I was afraid I had made a mistake, Elfie."

"Oh, no, you didn't."

"Do you think you feel any easier after it, Elfie?"

"Oh, yes! indeed I do," said she, looking up again, "thank you, Mr. Carleton."

A gentle kind pressure of his arm answered her thanks.

"I ought to be a good sprite to you, Mr. Carleton," Fleda said, after musing a little while, "you are so very good to me!"

Perhaps Mr. Carleton felt too much pleasure at this speech to make any answer, for he made none.

"It is only selfishness, Elfie," said he, presently, looking down to the quiet sweet little face which seemed to him, and was, more pure than anything of earth's mould he had ever seen. "You know I must take care of you for my own sake."

Fleda laughed a little.

"But what will you do when we get to Paris?"

"I don't know. I should like to have you always, Elfie."

"You'll have to get aunt Lucy to give me to you," said Fleda.

"Mr. Carleton," said she, a few minutes after, "is that story in a book?"

"What story ?"

"About the lady and the little sprites that waited on her."

"Yes, it is in a book; you shall see it, Elfie. Here we are!"

And here it was proposed to stay till the next day, lest Fleda might not be able to bear so much travelling at first. But the country inn was not found inviting; the dinner was bad, and the rooms were worse; uninhabitable, the ladies said; and about the middle of the afternoon they began to cast about for the means of reaching Albany that night. None very comfortable could be had; however, it was thought better to push on at any rate than wear out the night in such a place. The weather was very mild; the moon at the full.

"How is Fleda to go this afternoon," said Mrs. Evelyn.

"She shall decide herself," said Mrs. Carleton. "How will you go, my sweet Fleda?"

Fleda was lying upon a sort of rude couch which had been spread for her, where she had been sleeping incessantly ever since she arrived, the hour of dinner alone excepted. Mrs. Carleton repeated her question.

"I am afraid Mr. Carleton must be tired," said Fleda, without opening her eyes.

"That means that you are, don't it?" said Rossitur.

"No," said Fleda, gently.

Mr. Carleton smiled, and went out to press forward the arrangements. In spite of good words and good money there was some delay. It was rather late before the cavalcade left the inn; and a journey of several hours was before them. Mr. Carleton rode rather slowly, too, for Fleda's sake, so the evening had fallen while they were yet a mile or two from the city.

His little charge had borne the fatigue well, thanks partly to his admirable care, and partly to her quiet pleasure in being with him. She had been so perfectly still for some distance, that he thought she had dropped asleep. Looking down closer, however, to make sure about it, he saw her thoughtful clear eyes most unsleepily fixed upon the sky.

"What are you gazing at, Elfie?"

The look of thought changed to a look of affection as the eyes were brought to bear upon him, and she answered with a smile,

"Nothing, I was looking at the stars."

"What are you dreaming about?"

"I wasn't dreaming," said Fleda, "I was thinking."

"Thinking of what?"

"Oh, of pleasant things."

"Mayn't I know them? I like to hear of pleasant things."

"I was thinking, " said Fleda, looking up again at the stars, which shone with no purer ray than those grave eyes sent back to them, "I was thinking of being ready to die."

The words, and the calm thoughtful manner in which they were said, thrilled upon Mr. Carleton with a disagreeable shock.

"How came you to think of such a thing?" said he, lightly.

"I don't know," said Fleda, still looking at the stars," I suppose I was thinking "

"What?" said Mr. Carleton, inexpressibly curious to get at the workings of the child's mind, which was not easy, for Fleda was never very forward to talk of herself; "what were you thinking? I want to know how you could get such a thing into your head."

"It wasn't very strange," said Fleda. "The stars made me think of heaven, and grandpa's being there, and then I thought how he was ready to go there, and that made him ready to die "

"I wouldn't think of such things, Elfie," said Mr. Carleton, after a few minutes.

"Why not, Sir?" said Fleda, quickly.

"I don't think they are good for you."

"But, Mr. Carleton," said Fleda, gently, "if I don't think about it, how shall I ever be ready to die?"

"It is not fit for you," said he, evading the question, "it is not necessary now, there's time enough. You are a little body, and should have none but gay thoughts."

"But, Mr. Carleton," said Fleda, with timid earnestness, "don't you think one could have gay thoughts better if one knew one was ready to die?"

"What makes a person ready to die, Elfie?" said her friend, disliking to ask the question, but yet more unable to answer hers, and curious to hear what she would say.

"Oh, to be a Christian," said Fleda.

"But I have seen Christians," said Mr. Carleton, "who were no more ready to die than other people."

"Then they were make-believe Christians," said Fleda, decidedly.

"What makes you think so?" said her friend, carefully guarding his countenance from anything like a smile.

"Because," said Fleda, "grandpa was ready, and my father was ready, and my mother, too; and I know it was because they were Christians."

"Perhaps your kind of Christians are different from my kind," said Mr. Carleton, carrying on the conversation half in spite of himself. "What do you mean by a Christian, Elfie?"

"Why, what the Bible means," said Fleda, looking at him with innocent earnestness.

Mr. Carleton was ashamed to tell her he did not know what that was, or he was unwilling to say what he felt would trouble the happy confidence she had in him. He was silent; but as they rode on, a bitter wish crossed his mind that he could have the simple purity of the little child in his arms; and he thought he would give his broad acres, supposing it possible that religion could be true, in exchange for that free happy spirit that looks up to all its possessions in heaven.

CHAPTER XI.

Starres are poore books, and oftentimes do misse;
This book of starres lights to eternall blisse.
GEORGE HERBERT.

The voyage across the Atlantic was not, in itself, at all notable. The first half of the passage was extremely unquiet, and most of the passengers uncomfortable to match. Then the weather cleared; and the rest of the way, though lengthened out a good deal by the tricks of the wind, was very fair and pleasant.

Fifteen days of tossing and sea-sickness had brought little Fleda to look like the ghost of herself. So soon as the weather changed, and sky and sea were looking gentle again, Mr. Carleton had a mattress and cushions laid in a sheltered corner of the deck for her, and carried her up. She had hardly any more strength than a baby.

"What are you looking at me so for, Mr. Carleton?" said she, a little while after he had carried her up, with a sweet serious smile that seemed to know the answer to her question.

He stooped down and clasped her little thin hand, as reverentially as if she really had not belonged to the earth.

"You are more like a sprite than I like to see you just now," said he, unconsciously fastening the child's heart to himself with the magnetism of those deep eyes. "I must get some of the sailors' salt beef and sea-biscuit for you they say that is the best thing to make people well."

"Oh, I feel better already," said Fleda; and settling her little face upon the cushion and closing her eyes, she added, "thank you, Mr. Carleton!"

The fresh air began to restore her immediately; she was no more sick; her appetite came back; and from that time, without the help of beef and sea-biscuit, she mended rapidly. Mr. Carleton proved himself as good a nurse on the sea as on land. She seemed to be never far from his thoughts. He was constantly finding out something that would do her good or please her; and Fleda could not discover that he took any trouble about it; she could not feel that she was a burden to him; the things seemed to come as a matter of course. Mrs. Carleton was not wanting in any show of kindness or care, and yet, when Fleda looked back upon the day, it somehow was Guy that had done everything for her; she thought little of thanking anybody but him.

There were other passengers that petted her a great deal, or would have done so, if Fleda's very timid, retiring nature had not stood in the way. She was never bashful, nor awkward; but yet it was only a very peculiar sympathetic style of address that could get within the wall of reserve which, in general, hid her from other people. Hid what it could: for through that reserve a singular modesty, sweetness, and gracefulness of spirit would show themselves. But there was much more behind. There were no eyes, however, on board, that did not look kindly on little Fleda, excepting only two pair. The Captain showed her a great deal of flattering attention, and said she was a pattern of a passenger; even the sailors noticed and spoke of her, and let slip no occasion of showing the respect and interest she had raised. But there were two pair of eyes, and one of them Fleda thought most remarkably ugly, that were an exception to the rest; these belonged to her cousin Rossitur and Lieutenant Thorn. Rossitur had never forgiven her remarks upon his character as a gentleman, and declared preference of Mr. Carleton in that capacity; and Thorn was mortified at the invincible childish reserve which she opposed to all his advances; and both, absurd as it seems, were jealous of the young Englishman's advantage over them. Both not the less, because their sole reason for making her a person of consequence was that he had thought fit to do so. Fleda would permit neither of them to do anything for her that she could help.

They took their revenge in raillery, which was not always good-natured. Mr. Carleton never answered it in any other way than by his look of cold disdain, not always by that; little Fleda could not be quite so unmoved. Many a time her nice sense of delicacy confessed itself hurt, by the deep and abiding colour her cheeks would wear after one of their ill- mannered flings at her. She bore them with a grave dignity peculiar to herself, but the same nice delicacy forbade her to mention the subject to any one; and the young gentlemen contrived to give the little child in the course of the voyage a good deal of pain. She shunned them at last as she would the plague. As to the rest, Fleda liked her life on board ship amazingly. In her quiet way she took al the good that offered and seemed not to recognise the ill.

Mr. Carleton had bought for her a copy of The Rape of the Lock, and Bryant's poems. With these, sitting or lying among her cushions, Fleda amused herself a great deal; and it was an especial pleasure when he would sit down by her and read and talk about them. Still a greater was to watch the sea, in its changes of colour and varieties of agitation, and to get from Mr. Carleton, bit by bit, all the pieces of knowledge concerning it that he had ever made his own. Even when Fleda feared it she was fascinated; and while the fear went off the fascination grew deeper. Daintily nestling among her cushions, she watched with charmed eyes the long rollers that came up in detachments of three to attack the good ship, that like a slandered character rode patiently over them; or the crested green billows, or sometimes the little rippling waves that showed old Ocean's placidest face; while with ears as charmed as if he had been delivering a fairy tale, she listened to all Mr. Carleton could tell her of the green water where the whales feed, or the blue water where Neptune sits in his own solitude, the furthest from land, and the pavement under his feet outdoes the very canopy overhead in its deep colouring; of the transparent seas where the curious mysterious marine plants and animals may be clearly seen many feet down, and in the North where hundreds of feet of depth do not hide the bottom; of the icebergs; and whirling great fields of ice, between which, if a ship get, she had as good be an almond in a pair of strong nut-crackers. How the water grows colder and murkier as it is nearer the shore; how the mountain waves are piled together; and how old Ocean, like a wise man,. however roughened and tumbled outwardly by the currents of life, is always calm at heart. Of the signs of the weather; the out- riders of the winds, and the use the seaman makes of the tidings they bring, and before Mr. Carleton knew where he was, he found himself deep in the science of navigation, and making a star-gazer of little Fleda. Sometimes kneeling beside him as he sat on her mattress, with her hand leaning on his shoulder, Fleda asked, listened, and looked; as engaged, as rapt, as interested, as another child would be in Robinson Crusoe, gravely drinking in knowledge with a fresh healthy taste for it that never had enough. Mr. Carleton was about as amused and as interested as she. There is a second taste of knowledge that some minds get in imparting it, almost as sweet as the first relish. At any rate, Fleda never felt that she had any reason to fear tiring him; and his mother, complaining of his want of sociableness, said she believed Guy did not like to talk to any-body but that little pet of his, and one or two of the old sailors. If left to her own resources, Fleda was never at a loss; she amused herself with her books, or watching the sailors, or watching the sea, or with some fanciful manufacture she had learned from one of the ladies on board, or with what the company about her were saying and doing.

One evening she had been some time alone, looking out upon the restless little waves that were tossing and tumbling in every direction. She had been afraid of them at first, and they were still rather fearful to her imagination. This evening, as heir musing eye watched them rise and fall, her childish fancy likened them to the up-springing chances of life, uncertain, unstable, alike too much for her skill and her strength to manage. She was not more helpless before the attacks of the one than of the other. But then that calm blue heaven that hung over the sea. It was like the heaven of power and love above her destinies; only this was far higher, and more pure and abiding. "He knoweth them that trust in him." "There shall not a hair of your head perish."

Not these words, perhaps, but something like the sense of them, was in little Fleda's head. Mr. Carleton coming up, saw her gazing out upon the water, with an eye that seemed to see nothing.

"Elfie! Are you looking into futurity!"

"No, yes not exactly!" said Fleda, smiling.

"No, yes, and not exactly!" said he, throwing himself down beside her. "What does all that mean?"

"I wasn't exactly looking into futurity," said Fleda.

"What then? Don't tell me you were 'thinking;' I know that already. What?"

Fleda was always rather shy of opening her cabinet of thoughts. She glanced at him, and hesitated, and then yielded to a fascination of eye and smile that rarely failed of its end. Looking off to the sea again as if she had left her thoughts there, she said,

"I was only thinking of that beautiful hymn of Mr. Newton's."

"What hymn?"

"That long one, 'The Lord will provide.' "

"Do you know it? Tell it to me, Elfie; let us see whether I shall think it beautiful."

Fleda knew the whole, and repeated it.

"Though troubles assail,
And dangers affright,
Though friends should all fail,
And foes all unite;
Yet one thing secures us
Whatever betide,
The Scripture assures us
'The Lord will provide.'

"The birds without barn
Or storehouse are fed;
From them let us learn
To trust for our bread.
His saints what is fitting
Shall ne'er be denied,
So long as 'tis written,
'The Lord will provide.'

"His call we obey,
Like Abraham of old,
Not knowing our way,
But faith makes us bold.
And though we are strangers,
We have a good guide,
And trust in all dangers
'The Lord will provide.'

"We may like the ships
In tempests be tossed
On perilous deeps,
But cannot be lost.
Though Satan enrages
The wind and the tide,
The promise engages
'The Lord will provide.'

"When Satan appears
To stop up our path,
And fills us with fears,
We triumph by faith.
He cannot take from us,
Though oft he has tried,
This heart-cheering promise,
'The Lord will provide.'

"He tells us we're weak,
Our hope is in vain,
The good that we seek
We ne'er shall obtain;
But when such suggestions
Our spirits have tried,
This answers all questions,
'The Lord will provide.'

"No strength of our own,
Or goodness we claim;
But since we have known
The Saviour's great name,
In this, our strong tower,
For safety we hide;
The Lord is our power!
'The Lord will provide.'

"When life sinks apace,
And death is in view,
This word of his grace
Shall comfort us through.
No fearing nor doubting,
With Christ on our side,
We hope to die shouting
'The Lord will provide!' "

Guy listened very attentively to the whole. He was very far from understanding the meaning of several of the verses, but the bounding expression of confidence and hope he did understand, and did feel.

"Happy to be so deluded!" he thought. "I almost wish I could share the delusion!"

He was gloomily silent when she had done, and little Fleda's eyes were so full that it was a little while before she could look towards him, and ask in her gentle way, "Do you like it, Mr. Carleton?"

She was gratified by his grave "Yes!"

"But Elfie," said he, smiling again, "you have not told me your thoughts yet. What had these verses to do with the sea you were looking at so hard?"

"Nothing; I was thinking," said Fleda, slowly, "that the sea seemed something like the world I don't mean it was like, but it made me think of it; and I thought how pleasant it is to know that God takes care of his people."

"Don't he take care of everybody?"

"Yes, in one sort of way," said Fleda; "but then it is only his children that he has promised to keep from everything that will hurt them."

"I don't see how that promise is kept, Elfie. I think those who call themselves so meet with as many troubles as the rest of the world, and perhaps more."

"Yes," said Fleda, quickly, "they have troubles, but then God wont let the troubles do them any harm."

A subtle evasion, thought Mr. Carleton. "Where did you learn that, Elfie?"

"The Bible says so," said Fleda.

"Well, how do you know it from that?" said Mr. Carleton, impelled, he hardly knew whether by his bad or his good angel, to carry on the conversation.

"Why," said Fleda, looking as if it were a very simple question, and Mr. Carleton were catechising her, "you know, Mr. Carleton, the Bible was written by men who were taught by God exactly what to say, so there could be nothing in it that is not true."

"How do you know those men were so taught?"

"The Bible says so."

A child's answer! but with a child's wisdom in it, not learnt of the schools. "He that is of God heareth God's words." To little Fleda, as to every simple and humble intelligence, the Bible proved itself; she had no need to go further.

Mr. Carleton did not smile, for nothing would have tempted him to hurt her feelings; but he said, though conscience did not let him do it without a twinge,

"But don't you know, Elfie, there are some people who do not believe the Bible?"

"Ah, but those are bad people," replied Fleda, quickly; "all good people believe it."

A child's reason again, but hitting the mark this time. Unconsciously, little Fleda had brought forward a strong argument for her cause. Mr. Carleton felt it, and rising up, that he might not be obliged to say anything more, he began to pace slowly up and down the deck, turning the matter over.

Was it so? that there were hardly any good men (he thought there might be a few), who did not believe in the Bible and uphold its authority? and that all the worst portion of society was comprehended in the other class? and if so, how had he overlooked it? He had reasoned most unphilosophically, from a few solitary instances that had come under his own eye; but applying the broad principle of induction, it could not be doubted that the Bible was on the side of all that is sound, healthful, and hopeful, in this disordered world. And whatever might be the character of a few exceptions, it was not supposable that a wide system of hypocrisy should tell universally for the best interests of mankind. Summoning history to produce her witnesses, as he went on with his walk up and down, he saw with increasing interest, what he had never seen before, that the Bible had come like the breath of spring upon the moral waste of mind; that the ice-bound intellect and cold heart of the world had waked into life under its kindly influence, and that all the rich growth of the one and the other had come forth at its bidding. And except in that sun-lightened tract, the world was and had been a waste indeed. Doubtless, in that waste, intellect had at different times put forth sundry barren shoots, such as a vigorous plant can make in the absence of the sun, but also like them immature, unsound, and groping vainly after the light in which alone they could expand and perfect themselves; ripening no seed for a future and richer growth. And flowers the wilderness had none. The affections were stunted and overgrown.

All this was so how had he overlooked it? His unbelief had come from a thoughtless, ignorant, one-sided view of life and human things. The disorder and ruin which he saw, where he did not also see the adjusting hand at work, had led him to refuse his credit to the Supreme Fabricator. He thought the waste would never be reclaimed, and did not know how much it already owed to the sun of revelation; but what was the waste where that light had not been! Mr. Carleton was staggered. He did not know what to think. He began to think he had been a fool.

Poor little Fleda was meditating less agreeably the while. With the sure tact of truth, she had discerned that there was more than jest in the questions that had been put to her. She almost feared that Mr. Carleton shared himself the doubts he had so lightly spoken of, and the thought gave her great distress. However, when he came to take her down to tea, with all his usual manner, Fleda's earnest look at him ended in the conviction that there was. nothing very wrong under that face.

For several days, Mr. Carleton pondered the matter of this evening's conversation, characteristically restless till he had made up his mind. He wished very much to draw Fleda to speak further upon the subject, but it was not easy; she never led to it. He sought in vain an opportunity to bring it in easily, and at last resolved to make one..

"Elfie," said he, one morning, when all the rest of the passengers were happily engaged at a distance with the letter- bags "I wish you would let me hear that favourite hymn of yours again; l like it very much."

Fleda was much gratified, and immediately with great satisfaction repeated the hymn. Its peculiar beauty struck him yet more the second time than the first.

"Do you understand those two last verses?" said he, when she had done.

Fleda said "Yes!" rather surprised.

"I do not," he said, gravely.

Fleda paused a minute or two, and then finding that it depended on her to enlighten him, said in her modest way,

"Why, it means that we have no goodness of our own, and only expect to be forgiven, and taken to heaven, for the Saviour's sake."

Mr. Carleton asked, "How for his sake?"

"Why, you know, Mr. Carleton, we don't deserve to go there, and if we are forgiven at all, it must be for what He has done."

"And what is that, Elfie?"

"He died for us," said Fleda, with a look of some anxiety into
Mr. Carleton's face.

"Died for us! And what end was that to serve, Elfie?" said he, partly willing to hear the full statement of the matter, and partly willing to see how far her intelligence could give it.

"Because we are sinners," said Fleda, "and God has said that sinners shall die."

"Then how can he keep his word, and forgive at all?"

"Because Christ has died for us," said Fleda, eagerly "instead of us."

"Do you understand the justice of letting one take the place of others?"

"He was willing, Mr. Carleton," said Fleda, with a singular wistful expression, that touched him.

"Still, Elfie," said he, after a minute's silence, "how could the ends of justice be answered by the death of one man in the place of millions?"

"No, Mr. Carleton, but He was God as well as man," Fleda said, with a sparkle in her eye which perhaps delayed her companion's rejoinder.

"What should induce him, Elfie," he said, gently, "to do such a thing for people who had displeased him?"

"Because he loved us, Mr. Carleton."

She answered with so evident a strong and clear appreciation of what she was saying, that it half made its way into Mr. Carleton's mind by the force of sheer sympathy. Her words came almost as something new.

Certainly Mr. Carleton had heard these things before; though perhaps never in a way that appealed so directly to his intelligence and his candour. He was again silent an instant, pondering, and so was Fleda.

"Do you know, Elfie," said Mr. Carleton, "there are some people who do not believe that the Saviour was anything more than a man?"

"Yes, I know it," said Fleda; "it is very strange!"

"Why is it strange?"

"Because the Bible says it so plainly."

"But those people hold, I believe, that the Bible does not say it."

"I don't see how they could have read the Bible," said Fleda.
"Why, he said so himself."

"Who said so?"

"Jesus Christ. Don't you believe it, Mr. Carleton?"

She saw he did not, and the shade that had come over her face was reflected in his before he said "No."

"But perhaps I shall believe it yet, Elfie," he said, kindly. "Can you show me the place in your Bible where Jesus says this of himself?"

Fleda looked in despair. She hastily turned over the leaves of her Bible to find the passages he had asked for, and Mr. Carleton was cut to the heart to see that she twice was obliged to turn her face from him, and brush her hand over her eyes, before she could find them. She turned to Matt. xxvi. 63-65, and, without speaking, gave him the book, pointing to the passage. He read it with great care, and several times over.

"You are right, Elfie," he said. "I do not see how those who honour the authority of the Bible, and the character of Jesus Christ, can deny the truth of His own declaration. If that is false, so must those be."

Fleda took the Bible, and hurriedly sought out another passage.

"Grandpa showed me these places," she said, "once when we were talking about Mr. Didenhover he didn't believe that. There are a great many other places, grandpa said; but one! is enough."

She gave him the latter part of the 20th chapter of John.

"You see, Mr. Carleton, he let Thomas fall down and worship him, and call him God; and if he had not been, you know God is more displeased with that than with anything."

"With what, Elfie?"

"With men's worshipping any other than himself. He says he 'will not give his glory to another.' "

"Where is that?"

"I am afraid I can't find it," said Fleda "it is somewhere in Isaiah, I know"

She tried in vain; and failing, then looked up in Mr.
Carleton's face to see what impression had been made.

"You see Thomas believed when he saw," said he, answering her;
"I will believe, too, when I see."

"Ah! if you wait for that" said Fleda.

Her voice suddenly checked: she bent her face down again to her little Bible, and there was a moment's struggle with herself.

"Are you looking for something more to show me?" said Mr.
Carleton, kindly, stooping his face down to hers.

"Not much," said Fleda, hurriedly; and then making a great effort, she raised her head, and gave him the book again.

"Look here, Mr. Carleton Jesus said, 'Blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed.' "

Mr. Carleton was profoundly struck, and the thought recurred to him afterwards, and was dwelt upon. "Blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed." It was strange at first, and then he wondered that it should ever have been so. His was a mind peculiarly open to conviction, peculiarly accessible to truth; and his attention being called to it, he saw faintly now what he had never seen before, the beauty of the principle of faith how natural, how reasonable, how necessary, how honourable to the Supreme Being, how happy even for man, that the grounds of his trust in God being established, his acceptance of many other things should rest on that trust alone.

Mr. Carleton now became more reserved and unsociable than ever. He wearied himself with thinking. If he could have got at the books, he would have spent his days and nights in studying the evidences of Christianity; but the ship was bare of any such books, and he never thought of turning to the most obvious of all, the Bible itself. His unbelief was shaken; it was within an ace of falling in pieces to the very foundation; or, rather, he began to suspect how foundationless it had been. It came at last to one point with him If there were a God, he would not have left the world without a revelation no more would he have suffered that revelation to defeat its own end by becoming corrupted or alloyed; if there was such a revelation, it could be no other than the Bible; and his acceptance of the whole scheme of Christianity now hung upon the turn of a hair. Yet he could not resolve himself. He balanced the counter doubts and arguments on one side and on the other, and strained his mind to the task; he could not weigh them nicely enough. He was in a maze; and seeking to clear and calm his judgment that he might see the way out, it was in vain that he tried to shake his dizzied head from the effect of the turns it had made. By dint of anxiety to find the right path, reason had lost herself in the wilderness.

Fleda was not, as Mr. Carleton had feared she would be, at all alienated from him by the discovery that had given her so much pain. It wrought in another way, rather to add a touch of tender and anxious interest to the affection she had for him. It gave her, however, much more pain than he thought. If he had seen the secret tears that fell on his account, he would have been grieved; and if he had known of the many petitions that little heart made for him, he could hardly have loved her more than he did.

One evening Mr. Carleton had been a long while pacing up and down the deck in front of little Fleda's nest, thinking and thinking, without coming to any end. It was a most fair evening, near sunset, the sky without a cloud, except two or three little dainty strips which set off its blue. The ocean was very quiet, only broken into cheerful mites of waves that seemed to have nothing to do but sparkle. The sun's rays were almost level now, and a long path of glory across the sea led off towards his sinking disk. Fleda sat watching and enjoying it all in her happy fashion, which always made the most of everything good, and was especially quick in catching any form of natural beauty.

Mr. Carleton's thoughts were elsewhere too busy to take note of things around him. Fleda looked now and then as he passed at his gloomy brow, wondering what he was thinking of, and wishing that he could have the same reason to be happy that she had. In one of his turns his eye met her gentle glance; and, vexed and bewildered as he was with study, there was something in that calm bright face that impelled him irresistibly to ask the little child to set the proud scholar right. Placing himself beside her, he said,

"Elfie, how do you know there is a God? what reason have you for thinking so, out of the Bible?"

It was a strange look little Fleda gave him. He felt it at the time, and he never forgot it. Such a look of reproach, sorrow, and pity, he afterwards thought, as an angel's face might have worn. The question did not seem to occupy her a moment. After this answering look she suddenly pointed to the sinking sun, and said

"Who made that, Mr. Carleton?"

Mr. Carleton's eyes, following the direction of hers, met the long, bright rays, whose still witness-bearing was almost too powerful to be borne. The sun was just dipping majestically into the sea, and its calm self-assertion seemed to him at that instant hardly stronger than its vindication of its Author.

A slight arrow may find the joint in the armour before which many weightier shafts have fallen powerless. Mr. Carleton was an unbeliever no more from that time.