“Ethopus has something extraordinary on his mind,” said Martha, to herself; but she did not communicate her observation to her timorous and sensitive sister.

The case was evidently this: Ethopus had discovered the plot of Magistus against us all, and he felt certain that the arrival of the magician boded no good. He was struggling between his disinterested affection for us and his intense fear of his wicked masters. He felt his own weakness, increased by his inability to speak; and he was laboring to devise some plan by which the sisters could be brought to share his knowledge, and to concert measures of escape from some impending catastrophe.

He seemed to divine that Martha was more thoughtful, courageous and trustworthy than her sister. It was late in the afternoon when he made her a signal, seen by herself alone, to follow him. She understood his meaning, and contrived to withdraw without exciting the suspicion of her companions. Ethopus conducted her to the chamber of Ulema. Scarcely giving her time to exchange kisses with her aunt, he pushed her into a little recess in the wall which was concealed by a hanging curtain. Between the folds of this, Martha could peep cautiously into the room. In a few moments Magistus entered.

He seemed hurried and flustered, and had a dark frown upon his brow.

“No message from Barabbas to-day. Something has gone wrong. Put this woman to sleep immediately.”

There was silence for several minutes, during which Ulema gazed steadfastly into the mirror. Martha could not help doing the same; and she gazed at the mirror until a strange, tingling, bewildered sensation began to creep over her frame, and she averted her eyes to escape its magical fascination.

The victim of this singular experiment now became rigid, and made a convulsive sound as if in a severe spasm. Martha was terribly frightened; but her aunt suddenly became relaxed with a profound sigh. Magistus took a long needle and passed it through the skin of her hand. She did not flinch. He then put something which seemed to be a lock of hair into her palm, and closed the fingers tightly upon it.

“Follow this person,” said he, “wherever he is, and tell me what you see.”

The woman began, after a long pause:

“I am in a great wilderness of bare hills full of rocks and sand. The sense of solitude is terrible. It is cloudy but windy—and the sun will soon shine in the west.”

“But the youth?—the youth?” cried Magistus, impatiently.

“That is good!” said Magistus eagerly; “that is good. He lies dead upon the ground. Go on.”

“He is not dead,” said the oracle slowly; “his heart still beats: he sleeps.”

“Not dead?” screeched the old man, “what say you, not dead? Is he not wounded? Is he not stabbed? Is he not bleeding?” he continued in the highest excitement.

“No!” said the woman calmly; “he is not dead, he sleeps.”

“Do you see no gashes upon his body?”

“No, I see only a bright new dagger.”

“Furies!” exclaimed Magistus; “he has escaped me. I have been deceived.”

Turning suddenly upon the woman, he seized her by the throat:

“Do you tell me the truth?”

“I tell you what I see. I fabricate nothing. I am now attracted around the hill. Ah! I see a young man with the face of an angel coming forth from a cave. He sings. Oh how sweetly he sings!”

“Angels and devils!” roared Magistus; “you have seen or reported falsely.”

Simon Magus was feeding his leopard.

“The Master has returned,” said my uncle, “I will consult him immediately. He may deliver me from this difficulty.”

He left the room. Ethopus made rapid passes from her knees upward, and Ulema awoke. She rubbed her hands and eyes, looked wonderingly around her and exclaimed:

“I have had a long, painful sleep, and I must have seen sad things. Did I give him satisfaction?”

Ethopus shook his head sadly.

“Alas!” said she, with a distressed and puzzled air, “when will this cruel imprisonment cease, and this strange life of visions which I never remember?”

Martha now came forward and threw herself weeping upon the neck of her aunt. For a long time these sorrowful women exchanged those kisses and tears which are consolations. They then unburdened their hearts to each other. By questioning Ethopus and interpreting his pantomimic answers as well as they could, they learned that some secret dangers surrounded them, and that Ethopus wished Martha to spend the night in the chamber of her aunt. Martha thought it best to rejoin Mary immediately, and explain to her that Ulema was quite indisposed, and get her to sleep with Mary Magdalen, and permit the older sister to comfort and nurse the invalid. All of which was easily accomplished.

Ulema had been confined for years in that little room by her husband as the subject and victim of his magical art. She was a clairvoyant of extraordinary power; and when put asleep by the shining mirror and the waving hands, she would follow any clue given her, and the greatest physical obstacles seemed only penetrable shadows in the path of her mysterious vision.

She was thus employed by her husband to advance the schemes of his unscrupulous spirit. She was made to read the thoughts of others, so that Magistus became possessed of any man’s or any woman’s secret life whenever he chose. He obtained information in this manner which enabled him to make lucrative transactions in business, to plot in the dark against whomsoever he pleased, to destroy the peace of families, and to acquire a reputation for superior and almost miraculous wisdom.

She had long ceased to be anything but a mere tool in her husband’s hands. She was locked up and taken care of as any other valuable instrument would have been. She was visited and inspected only when her services were required. Love, sympathy, interchange of sentiments, all this had ceased. She received nothing from him but contempt and threats. She lived within hearing of his midnight revels. She bore the ravages of these things in her pale and tearful face, with its sad and terrified expression.

Ethopus left them as stealthily as a cat, after placing them in the best position to see and hear what was going on in the den of sorcery. He pressed Martha’s hand to his heart before he departed. Perhaps he wished to show how deeply he felt for them; perhaps also to intimate how deeply he suffered. Perhaps he asked for help as well as sympathy. The poor, dumb African would not only save them, if possible, from their subtle enemies, but would enlist the knowledge and power of a superior race, to effect his own deliverance from the crushing thraldom they had imposed upon him.

Magic, which pervades to a greater or less extent all nations, and in some shape influences all individuals, had its origin in the corruption and perversion of the sacred truths of religion. It is the life of all false systems, the voice of their oracles, the inspiration of their prophets, the power of their mighty men. It was the medium by which evil spirits took possession of their victims. It is the falsity which antagonizes truth; the darkness opposite to light; the hell arrayed against heaven. To be under magical influence, is to be assaulted, betrayed, possessed, governed, by demons.

He was a man of unquestionable genius and boundless ambition. He was of majestic presence, bending weaker spirits easily to his will. He was brave to desperation, and eloquent as if he had been fed in his youth by the bees of Attica. He was the secret chief and leader of thousands of persons addicted to magic in different countries. His word was regarded as law; his power as irresistible; his wisdom as inscrutable.

The two women peeped cautiously into this chamber of mystery. The floor and the ceiling were both covered with black cloth, the latter having a great many stars flaming upon it in imitation of night. Through them a vast comet trailed its fiery form. The walls were painted with figures of the most disgusting objects which creep on the earth, or fly in the air, or swim in the sea. Some of these figures had the heads of men and women: others had the heads of monsters attached to naked bodies in the human shape.

On a raised platform of black marble, and in a great arm-chair covered with crimson silk, sat Simon Magus, wearing a white robe of dazzling lustre, a leopard skin loosely thrown over his shoulders, and a gilt crown surmounted by an eagle with outspread wings. He wore also a massive gold chain around his neck, from which was suspended a little sapphire image, which was supposed to guide the Egyptian priest to the truth, as the breast-plate of precious stones did the Jew.

A large black table was before him, brilliantly painted with the signs of the zodiac. In the centre of it stood an image or idol made of black stone or ebony, having the head of a man, the breast and fore-feet of a lion, and the hind quarters of a goat. The serpent was coiled on the platform at his right hand; the leopard crouched at his left. A splendid globe of crystal hung from the ceiling constituting a lamp, burning perfumed oil and shedding a rose-colored light over the scene.

In this mystic and formidable presence stood twelve or fifteen men with bowed heads, down-hanging hands, and attitudes of the deepest humility. The women recognized only the faces of Magistus and Caiaphas. The former stood nearest to the table. Simon was addressing them in terms of reproachful eloquence:

“You have made no progress in our sublime mysteries during the past year. You have acquired no new powers over the spiritual world. You have not even given me information of the least importance. Alas! you are devoid of genuine ambition, without which whoever deals with spirits becomes a slave and not a master.”

His voice became more sonorous and his eye more scornful as he warmed with his subject:

“My example has been almost in vain. My spirit of self-sacrifice in achieving my lofty ends, is a mystery to your sluggish and ignoble souls. I have endured hunger and thirst and wakefulness and nakedness and heat and cold and solitude and plagues and wounds for mastery in the great path I have chosen. I have traversed the world from the frozen seas to the chasms of torrid heat. I have contended with wild beasts and with their guardians, the great spirits, by land and water. I have conquered the serpent and the leopard. The vulture lights on my shoulder like a sparrow; the lion crouches at my feet like a dog. Arch-demons come at my bidding, and hundreds of lesser spirits swarm at the signal of my curse.”

He became violently excited; his eyeballs glared around in frenzy, and he continued in a fierce whisper:

He turned back the sleeves of his robe from his white arms, and held them out. Upon one arm in great red letters was the word Moloch, on the other the word Beelzebub.

“It was dreadful! dreadful!—but henceforth they are mine.”

The serpent writhed and protruded his tongue. The leopard showed his white teeth, but dropped his yellow head between his paws.

“I have told you,” he continued, scornfully, “what constitutes your ambition. Now I will tell you mine. To me belongs the glory of having organized magic and associated magicians. I found them a horde of wandering hunters; I shall make them an invisible phalanx of soldiers. I have more than two thousand magicians, in seven different countries, who obey me as one man. By concerted action we have obtained the secret history, the hidden life of all the governors, consuls, warriors, kings and great men throughout that vast region. I am maturing my plans to get them all under my sovereign control. Other conquerors operate from without, by sword and spear and catapult. I conquer from within, by hope and fear and lust and passion and terror. Unseen, unsuspected, unknown, with legions of invisible soldiers, I shall get possession of all their treasures, all their palaces, all their thrones!

While the magician’s imagination soared away in this flight of boundless ambition, his form dilated; a fierce red flush came over his face; his eye, fired with a baleful brilliancy; and the maniac stood forth the very impersonation of that Self-Love which is the moving and controlling genius of hell.

His hearers trembled at his words and manner.

He sunk back into his chair and leaned his brow upon his hand. No one disturbed his reverie. All were spellbound by the speaker’s enthusiasm. After several minutes he raised his head and continued in a subdued tone:

“But, alas! my friends! this glorious dream is far from accomplishment. If we had only to conquer the race of men, the difficulties would not be insuperable. But our fiercest fight is on the spiritual side. All are contending for the same prizes—power and glory. When we have beaten back the shining ones whom they call angels, our combat begins with each other; for each demands all for himself.

“I discovered by secret means only to be acquired in Egypt, that in a certain wild spot of the Lybian desert one of the oldest and greatest cities of the world was buried in the sand; a city so old that it has no historical record; a people inconceivably wicked, in comparison with whom the people of Sodom and Gomorrah were children sporting in the golden dawn of innocence. This city and these people had been overwhelmed by the same Power which buried the cities of the plain in the Salt Sea.

“I found this spot. By the aid of spiritual powers I burrowed my way into their buried palaces and temples. I exhumed their remains. I made food and drink of their ashes. The spirits who accompanied me fled away, and I was left alone. I blended my being with that of the lost people. I became a skeleton among skeletons, a shade among shades. I conquered. I drew voices out of the silence, forms out of the darkness, life out of death. I summoned with difficulty and danger the ruling spirits of the perished race. I mastered their master. I made him my slave. I compelled him to disgorge the secrets of the wilderness and the grave. I have enriched myself with treasures of knowledge and power, of which no man even dreams.”

Intense excitement pervaded his listeners—fear of the man and stupefaction at his words.

He now let down a large white curtain against the wall, to the top of which it had been rolled like a great map. He resumed his seat and drew forth a curious cup from a drawer in the table. It had words and figures engraven upon it. He gazed intently into the cup, and pronounced some words in an unknown tongue.

“See!” said the magician hoarsely, “See! He comes!”

And sure enough! Like the shadow of a man which the moon makes when it is going down, there crept a shadow up over the curtain; dim, wavering, misshapen, which slowly settled into distincter form, and stood with bended head and sweeping beard, with tottering knee and outstretched arms, like a very old man of gigantic size begging alms.

All shuddered at the presence of this terrific spirit, more than Saul at the rising of Samuel in the cave of the witch of Endor.

The shadow slowly turned its old and hideous face toward the audience and made an affirmative motion with its head. It then passed away from the curtain like the shadow of a cloud creeping over a field of grain. All breathed more freely.

“This formula will procure me a liquid of such potent magnetic virtue, that a single drop of it put into a glass of wine will bind the woman who drinks it, entirely and for ever, soul and body, to the man who administers it. She will surrender friends, home, name, fame, everything to his wishes.

“Miserable sensualists that you are,” he exclaimed, raising his voice and confronting his cowering audience, “the use for which you would chiefly value this inestimable secret has no attractions for me. My spirit looks upward, not downward. I scorn pleasure. I love glory and power. Through woman I shall conquer man. Woman herself shall be the agent of transferring all that husbands, lovers, brothers, sons, friends possess, to the great magician who shall be a god in her eyes.”

“Glorious ambition!” exclaimed Caiaphas.

“When I have achieved the conquest of the world,” said the earnest madman, “I will resign the women to you, as a conqueror throws the treasures of a sacked city to the soldiers who have won him a crown.”

“And the liquid?” inquired Magistus—“how is it to be obtained?”

“That brought me hither from my subterranean palace in Egypt, where I was initiated into the sacred mysteries by Isis herself.”

All ears paid him the strictest attention.

“I must obtain the body of a young girl and convey it to the buried city of the sands, where Ja-bol-he-moth, whom you saw just now, will assist me in the magical rites. We must take her alive. I have made every preparation. I have a vehicle specially constructed for concealment. That will convey us to Joppa whence I have just come. From there to Alexandria by a vessel which awaits me. Thence to the Lybian desert.”

“And the young woman?” asked Caiaphas.

“She must be pure as the snow nearest heaven: innocent as the babe tended by angels: beautiful as Aurora when she treads the golden pavement with her feet of pearl: loving as the heart of Spring when she gives her life to the earth: holy as the spirit of prayer which breathed from the lyre of King David.”

“And what would you do with this peerless maiden?” said some one in the group.

“Are you acquainted with the processes and powers of magic, and do you ask such a question? Do you know the virtues of the dust of a dove’s heart? of the ashes of a viper’s tongue? of the pulverized bones of a babe’s head? of the blood of a living man? Can you not imagine what subtile forces we may extract from the essences of a virgin body?”

“Has your oracle directed you where to find this wonderful woman?” asked Magistus.

These were the last words heard by either Ulema or Martha. These affrighted women had been the silent witnesses and auditors of the extraordinary scene I have described. With increasing amazement and terror they found themselves unable to stand, and they sank softly upon the floor. When the object of Simon’s visit to Bethany began to reveal itself, they trembled with intense fear. When the horrible idea took distinct shape in her mind, Martha had almost burst into a wild shriek of agony. The shriek was with great difficulty suppressed. The terror and agony were borne in upon the young soul, and she fell into a long and fearful swoon which seemed death itself.

After a long, long time, when all was still and dark, Ethopus approached as softly as he had departed. He aroused Ulema from her trance of grief, and the two bore the unreviving form of Martha back to the chamber. She was laid upon the bed; and as Ethopus passed out of the door, Ulema saw him by the dim light of the stars lifting his face and hands earnestly to heaven.

Simon Magus stood before them with his serpent and leopard. He had these creatures about him almost constantly. It was to keep them in good training, for his personal protection, to excite wonder, to inspire awe, and to enforce his authority. They were admirable adjuvants to his pretensions and power. Every one quailed before them.

He assured the women that his pets should not hurt them, if they followed him in silence, turning neither to the right nor to the left. There was no alternative but to obey. He conducted them to our father’s residence through the gardens and the gate in the garden wall. He had given every point a recent inspection. He passed into the inner courtyard, and led them down a flight of steps to a room in the cellar used by two of the domestics as a bed-chamber. Here he locked and bolted them in and retired.

Thus were the sisters secured without the possibility of communication or escape. The conspirators took every possible precaution. No one was permitted to leave the grounds, or to come in during the day. Magistus or Simon kept the black eunuch continually in sight. Whether his agitated and anxious manner betrayed him, or whether the magician really read his thoughts, his masters suspected that Ethopus meditated a revolt against the snares which had fascinated the leopard and the serpent. He was closely watched.

It spoke well for the native richness of the soil when good seed sprang up so luxuriantly as soon as planted. From the day he became acquainted with my sisters and myself, a new life had dawned upon him. Friendly voices, gentle words, kindly looks, sympathizing deeds, were food and drink to his amiable and child-like nature. His soul grew and expanded under them as flowers under dew and sunlight. Sincere attachment to us and hatred of our common enemies took possession of the whole man. He was ready for any labor, any danger, any sacrifice in our behalf.

Imagine the mental tortures of this humble and voiceless friend, when he saw the terrible fate which was impending over us, and found himself so helpless to avert it or to assist us!

Thus passed away the long, dreary, gloomy day—the day of my father’s funeral. It was spent by my sisters in prayer and tears and unavailing struggles to escape or to make themselves heard. Mary Magdalen identified herself thoroughly with the gentle and innocent child with whom she was imprisoned. She taxed her ingenuity to the utmost to give her consolation and hope; and when invention failed, she resorted to tears.

“Do you ever pray to God?” said little Mary.

“To which God?” asked Mary Magdalen.

“Which God? There is but one God!”

“Magistus has the statues of a dozen gods and goddesses in his house; and he says that all of them answer prayer when they are presented with splendid gifts.”

“Jehovah, the only God,” said the child with sweet solemnity, “heareth the prayer of the humble and contrite heart. He heareth the poor and needy, and lifteth up all who are cast down.”

“How beautiful!” exclaimed Mary Magdalen with a deep sigh; and she fell into a profound reverie with downcast eyes, while a solitary tear, the first pearl of genuine repentance, trickled down her cheek.

About nightfall Simon Magus unlocked the door and called Mary Magdalen out of the room. He closed the door behind her, so that Mary could not hear what he said. He put into her hands two cups of different patterns containing milk.

“This one,” said he, “you will give to the child; this you will drink yourself. Be careful and not forget. Your life depends upon it. If you fail to obey me, I will feed your body piecemeal to my leopard.”

Terror-stricken as well by his manner as his words, she took the cups mechanically from his hands and passed into the room. He carefully locked the door again.

“What is my wretched life worth in comparison with hers?” was the silent language of her heart, “What attraction has life for me, poor, guilty, forlorn, forsaken thing?” She drank from the cup intended for Mary.

“What is the matter,” said my sister, who had noticed her singular abstraction and agitation. “What are you drinking?”

“Only some milk. I was so frightened by that terrible man that I forgot what I was doing. Excuse me for drinking first. Here is a cup for you.”

The unsuspecting child drank it eagerly, having passed the whole day suffering from both hunger and thirst. Taken after fasting, poisons act quickly. It was not long before Mary Magdalen began to have strange swimmings in the head and benumbing sensations along the course of all her nerves. She felt sure that her death was approaching.

“Mary,” said the brave girl, “when you are delivered from these dangers and your brother comes home and I go away, will you remember me sometimes?”

“You will not go away.”

“Oh yes. I shall go away, far, far away.”

“You shall live with us always,” said Mary.

“I cannot! I cannot! When I am gone, and they tell you evil and cruel things of me, will you think of me kindly and love me still?”

“I will not believe them.”

“But if you should believe them, would you love me still? I cannot live without your love.”

“I will love you for ever,” said Mary, throwing her arms around her neck. “Why do you speak so sadly? You frighten me. What is the matter?”

“I am sleepy, so sleepy,” said Mary Magdalen, stretching herself on the couch.

Mary knelt at her side, chafing her hands, with some vague foreboding rising on her mind.

“Oh do not go to sleep so early. Do not leave me alone in the dark. Talk to me.”

“Mary,” said the stupefied woman slowly and with difficulty, “does Jehovah who accepts the offering of a contrite heart, ever receive into his heaven a very great sinner?”

“Certainly, certainly!” said the child.

“Then pray for me.”

No words, no shaking, no supplications, no frantic screams could arouse her again; and Mary beat her bosom and tore her hair in the extremity of grief at the side of her inanimate friend.

About an hour before midnight four men stood in the inner courtyard of my father’s house. Caiaphas and Simon Magus were engaged in earnest conversation. Magistus turned to the black mute whom he had compelled to accompany him everywhere, and said:

“I shall go half a day’s journey with Simon. We will start now in ten minutes. Haste to the stables where his chariot and servant are in waiting. Drive quietly around to the front gate of this house. Here is the key to Ulema’s chamber. After we have gone, not before, give those women some food.”

The women started on their dangerous journey, not knowing what was to be done. They hurried along the flowery walks in the greatest trepidation. On ascending our terraced garden, Ulema, weak, sick and overwhelmed with emotion, fainted and fell. Martha tried in vain to revive her. Time was flying. Faint screams now issued from the house. Mary was being abducted! She started up and without thinking,—for thought would have paralyzed her efforts,—rushed to the rescue alone.

The miscreants had descended into the cellar. Great was their astonishment to find Mary Magdalen in a profound stupor and the little Mary weeping at her side.

“This delays us,” said Simon, with great vexation. “That traitorous woman has taken the opiate herself. It will be necessary to bind and gag the little one. No sounds must issue from the chariot, no suspicions be excited.”

It was during this terrible process of binding and gagging that the screams were made which Martha heard in the garden. It was effected; and the three men were bearing the silent and muffled body through the courtyard, when Martha rushed toward them with a loud shriek of supplication.

“Pursue her!” said Simon to Caiaphas—“pursue her and keep her silent with your dagger until we have escaped.”

Caiaphas bounded after her. She turned and faced him on the house-top. He threatened to plunge the dagger into her heart if she made a sound. She backed before him to the parapet. It was at that moment when the moon, suddenly emerging from the cloud, revealed to me, as I was approaching my father’s house, the two figures; my sister raising her arms wildly to heaven, and the wicked priest threatening to strike.

Caiaphas, seeing that his party was vanquished, fled away through the garden to the house of Magistus. Martha hurried down and rejoined her friends below. Ethopus brought lights as quickly as possible, although I had already recognized in the new-comers the good old Persian whom Barabbas held prisoner, and my late deliverer who had styled himself the Son of the Desert.

Mary was released from her wrappages and threw herself alternately into the arms of brother and sister. Ethopus enjoyed this scene with gestures of frantic delight. The happy party was suddenly startled by the groans of the wounded man, who had dragged himself away and was leaning against the wall of the house, bleeding profusely.

We laid him on the floor of the reception-room, and the Son of the Desert, who was an adept in such matters, stanched the blood and bandaged his hurt, pronouncing it severe but not mortal. When Magistus opened his eyes and saw the old Persian bending over him, he stared at him with amazement, and stammered forth:

“Surely this is my renegade brother-in-law, who has renounced the name and religion of his fathers and calls himself Beltrezzor.”

He was right. Beltrezzor was our uncle, our father’s only brother, our next of kin, our legal guardian!

The Son of the Desert spent the night under our roof, and proceeded the next morning to Jerusalem with Beltrezzor. He refused to appear at the table with the women and declined all the rewards and presents which our gratitude induced us to offer.

It seems that Beltrezzor’s friend had sent one-half of the ransom by the robbers who passed me going down the ravine, promising the other half in two days after, on the delivery of Beltrezzor himself at Jerusalem. Barabbas had entrusted the Son of the Desert with that mission. The old man had been slow in his movements, and night with its black cloud had overtaken them before reaching the highway. Reflecting that the trumpets of the Roman soldiery had sounded the evening tattoo, Beltrezzor had luckily suggested that they should turn aside into Bethany, where he had a brother whom he had not seen for thirty years. They came close behind my own weary footsteps, and I have told the result.

The second day after these surprising events, Mary Magdalen disappeared suddenly to our great regret, leaving no clue by which she could be traced. She awoke from her artificial sleep about daylight, and the nurse supplied her with food, and told her the wonderful things which had happened. She went away, notwithstanding the remonstrances of the nurse.

Poor Magdalen!

My new and real uncle, Beltrezzor, had a bargain to make with Magistus and his young friend, the hypocrite Caiaphas. It was easily affected. We were in possession of facts which would have exposed them both to public infamy, and have cut short the ambitious career of the talented priest.

Silence on our part was purchased at the following price:

Beltrezzor was a pagan, and objections might be raised in the Jewish Sanhedrim to his taking possession of a Jewish estate and the charge of Jewish orphans. Magistus and Caiaphas were to obviate these objections, and to secure him the legal guardianship.

Ethopus was to be declared a freedman.

Beltrezzor, my sisters and myself were to be permitted to visit Ulema every Sabbath so long as she lived.

In addition to his liberty, Beltrezzor presented Ethopus with a precious stone of considerable value, upon which was engraved a mystic name. This gem had great reputation in the magical fraternity for releasing its possessor from the spell of the most powerful enchantment. Whether some change really came over his spirit, or whether his imagination did the work, Ethopus acted as if some great burden had been lifted from his soul. He entered at once into our service, and his gratitude seemed only equaled by his humility.

Thus several years passed happily away, overshadowed by no cloud. If a tear ever came into our eyes, it was consecrated to the memory of our dear father, and to the reflection that he had perished so sadly in the wilderness, without knowing the good fortune which was in store for his children.