house. I confess I doubted this very much, without however showing it.

The day of our departure arrived; and a day of sadness it was to me; my aunt and cousin came early in the morning and did what they could to console me, but it was all in vain.

My good parents were as much affected as myself, as they kissed me for the last time, and almost as soon as they left me I heard the noise of the carriage wheels as they drove away. I ran to the window all in tears; but the carriage had already turned the corner of the street and was out of sight.

I had scarcely half an hour to cry by myself, when it was my turn to go; after my aunt had charged Margaret to take good care of the house, saying, she intended to come once a week to see if she performed her duty faithfully.

I have only a confused idea of our sad journey. All that I remember is, that every care and attention was paid to me by my aunt and cousin, but it was not till afterwards that I understood the extent of their kindness.

After a sorrowful night I was awakened by a noise, in the poultry yard, which was new to me. A low wall only separated the yard on which I looked out from my room, from that where the cocks, the hens, the geese, the turkeys, and the ducks, (at once the delight and fortune of my aunt,) sported. Two pigeons came and sat on my window-sill. At first I felt somewhat frightened, for the curtain being down I did not see the cause of the noise which seemed so strange to

me.

I arose, and putting aside a corner of the curtain, saw what it was. The two pigeons appeared enormously large, but as they were only pigeons, I took courage and turned my eyes out upon the extended plain. Towards the horizon was the river glittering in the rising sun, and forming a silver sheet, intercepted here and there by trees. The approach of autumn was variegating the foliage with pale and crimson tints, but the fields of flax, yet in flower, spread out a carpet of such beautiful lilac, that a landscapepainter would hardly dare to copy them for fear no one would believe it true. This lilac carpet was intermingled with

a splendid green, and with fields newly reaped, the bare, sterile aspect of which contrasted in the most picturesque manner with the fresh pure fields of flax, and the verdure of the meadows filled with luzerne.

It was the first time I had ever seen the country at sunrise. I felt moved, but it was with a sweet emotion, and I opened my window. The sky was of a beautiful blue, with here and there light white clouds. At a distance were heard the soft murmurs which tell of the waking of animated life. The higher the sun arose above the horizon, the more sparkling were the plants and trees covered with dew. There were especially, at a little distance, two poplars, and their trembling foliage, scarcely stirred by a breath of air, shone as if each leaf had been covered with a coating of silver.

It is impossible for me to describe the change which took place in my feelings. My tears ran, and my heart was full. I dropped on my knees, and prayed as I never had before. My soul seemed to rise in gratitude to God. I admired him in his greatness and his goodness,

and the thought that my parents enjoyed at the same time the sight of similar fields, that they breathed with delight as I did the morning air, that they prayed for their daughter at the same time that their daughter prayed for them, and probably with much more fervour, spread through my soul an inexpressible tenderness and an unusual joy animated

me.

"Caroline, are you up already?"-my aunt said, as she was standing in the yard and happened to see the window

open.

Her voice and these words made me start. I showed myself immediately and came down to join my aunt, with a firm resolution to conduct myself in such a manner that she would never regret her hospitality to me.

CHAPTER II.

THE GOOD PEOPLE.

AT the age I had then attained we are not just observers; and it was sometime after that I came to the conclusion, that my great-aunt and cousin were to be numbered among the few originals we now and then meet with in the world.

To those who do not stop to think, their originality appeared as the result of the lonely state in which they had always lived; but I believe their character and not their situation was the cause of an originality which, in more social life, would have shown itself in another form, but would still have been noticed.

My aunt was early left a widow, without fortune, but found means, by her industry and labour, to procure a liberal and solid education for her son. My cousin had profited by his advantages, and in his turn gave himself up to his mother, whose devotion to him had been