She had now reached the edge of the Black-moss, which lay half-way between her master's and her father's dwelling, when she heard a loud noise coming down Glen-Scrae, and in a few seconds she felt on her face some flakes of snow. She looked up the glen, and saw the snowstorm coming down fast as a flood. She felt no fears; but she ceased her song; and had there been a human eye to look upon her there, it might have seen a shadow on her face. She continued her course, and felt bolder and bolder every step that brought her nearer to her parents' house. But the snowstorm had now reached the Black-moss, and the broad line of light that had lain in the direction of her home was soon swallowed up, and the child was in utter darkness. She saw nothing but the flakes of snow, interminably intermingled, and furiously wafted in the air, close to her head; she heard nothing but one wild, fierce, fitful howl. The cold became intense, and her little feet and hands were fast being benumbed into insensibility.

"It is a fearful change," muttered the child to herself; but still she did not fear, for she had been born in a moorland cottage, and lived all her days among the hardships of the hills. "What will become of the poor sheep!" thought she; but still she scarcely thought of her own danger, for innocence, and youth, and joy are slow to think of aught evil befalling themselves, and, thinking benignly of all living things, forget their own fear in their pity for others' sorrow. At last, she could no longer discern a single mark on the snow, either of human steps, or of sheeptrack, or the foot-print of a wild-fowl. Suddenly, too, she felt out of breath and exhausted, and shedding tears for herself at last, sank down in the snow.

It was now that her heart began to quake with fear. She remembered stories of shepherds lost in the snow- -of a mother and a child frozen to death on that very moor-and in a moment she knew that she was to die. Bitterly did the poor child weep, for death was terrible to her, who, though poor, enjoyed the bright little world of youth and innocence. The skies of heaven were dearer than she knew to her-so were the flowers of earth. She had been happy at her work, happy in her sleep, happy in the kirk on Sabbath. A thousand thoughts had the solitary child,and in her own heart was a spring of happiness, pure and undisturbed as any fount that sparkles unseen all the year through, in some quiet nook among the pastoral hills. But now there was to be an end of all this-she was to be frozen to death-and lie there till the thaw might come; and then her father would find her body, and carry it away to be buried in the kirkyard.

F

The tears were frozen on her cheeks as soon as shed-and scarcely had her little hands strength to clasp themselves together, as the thought of an overruling and merciful Lord came across her heart. Then, indeed, the fears of this religious child were calmed, and she heard without terror the plover's wailing cry, and the deep boom of the bittern sounding in the moss. 66 I will repeat the Lord's Prayer;" and drawing her plaid more closely around her, she whispered, beneath its ineffectual cover,"Our Father which art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name, Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven." Had human aid been within fifty yards, it could have been of no avail-eye could not see her, ear could not hear her in that howling darkness. But that low prayer was heard in the centre of eternity, and that little sinless child was lying in the snow, beneath the all-seeing eye of God.

The maiden, having prayed to her Father in heaven, then thought of her father on earth. Alas! they were not far separated! The father was lying but a short distance from his child; he too had sunk down in the drifting snow, after having, in less than an hour, exhausted all the strength of fear, pity, hope, despair, and resignation that could rise in a father's heart blindly seeking to rescue his only child from death, thinking that one desperate exertion might enable them to perish in each other's arms. There they lay, within a stone's throw of each other, while a huge snow-drift was every moment piling itself up into a more insurmountable barrier between the dying parent and his dying child.

JAMES F. COOPER.

1789-1851.

The Ariel among the Shoals.

THE extraordinary activity of Griffith, which communicated itself with promptitude to the whole crew, was produced by a sudden alteration in the weather. In place of the well-defined streak along the horizon that has been already described, an immense body of misty light appeared to be moving in with rapidity from the ocean, while a distinct but distant roaring announced the sure approach of the tempest that had so long troubled the waters. Even Griffith, while thundering his orders through the trumpet,

and urging the men by his cries to expedition, would pause for instants to cast anxious glances in the direction of the coming storm, and the faces of the sailors who lay on the yards were turned instinctively toward the same quarter of the heavens, while they knotted the reef-points, or passed the gaskets that were to confine the unruly canvas to the prescribed limits.

The pilot alone, in that confused and busy throng, where voice arose above voice and cry echoed cry in quick succession, appeared as if he held no interest in the important stake. With his eyes steadily fixed on the approaching mist, and his arms folded together in composure, he stood calmly awaiting the result.

The ship had fallen off with her broadside to the sea, and was become unmanageable, and the sails were already brought into the folds necessary to her security, when the quick and heavy fluttering of canvas was thrown across the water with all the gloomy and chilling sensations that such sounds produce, where darkness and danger unite to appal the seaman.

"The schooner has it!" cried Griffith; " Barnstable has held on, like himself, to the last moment. God send that the squall leave him cloth enough to keep him from the shore!"

"His sails are easily handled," the commander observed, “and she must be over the principal danger. We are falling off before it, Mr. Gray; shall we try a cast of the lead?"

The pilot turned from his contemplative posture, and moved slowly across the deck before he returned any reply to this question, like a man who not only felt that everything depended on himself, but that he was equal to the emergency.

"'Tis unnecessary," he at length said: "'twould be certain destruction to be taken aback, and it is difficult to say, within several points, how the wind may strike us."

""Tis difficult no longer," cried Griffith, "for here it comes, and in right earnest!"

The rushing sounds of the wind were now indeed heard at hand, and the words were hardly past the lips of the young lieutenant before the vessel bowed down heavily to one side, and then, as she began to move through the water, rose again majestically to her upright position, as if saluting, like a courteous champion, the powerful antagonist with which she was about to contend. Not another minute elapsed before the ship was throwing the waters aside with a lively progress, and, obedient to her helm, was brought as near to the desired course as the direction of the wind would allow. The hurry and bustle on the yards gradually subsided, and the men slowly descended to the deck, all straining their eyes

to pierce the gloom in which they were enveloped, and some shaking their heads in melancholy doubt, afraid to express the apprehensions they really entertained. All on board anxiously waited for the fury of the gale; for there were none so ignorant or inexperienced in that gallant frigate as not to know that they as yet only felt the infant efforts of the winds. Each moment, however, it increased in power, though so gradual was the alteration that the relieved mariners began to believe that all their gloomy forebodings were not to be realized. During this short interval of uncertainty, no other sounds were heard than the whistling of the breeze, as it passed quickly through the mass of rigging that belonged to the vessel, and the dashing of the spray that began to fly from her bows like the foam of a cataract.

"It blows fresh," cried Griffith, who was the first to speak in that moment of doubt and anxiety; "but it is no more than a capful of wind after all. Give us elbow room and the right canvas, Mr. Pilot, and I'll handle the ship like a gentleman's yacht in this breeze."

"Will she stay, think ye, under this sail ?" said the low voice of the stranger.

"She will do all that man in reason can ask of wood and iron," returned the lieutenant; "but the vessel don't float the ocean that will tack under double-reefed topsails alone against a heavy sea. Help her with the courses, pilot, and you'll see her come round like a dancing-master."

"Let us feel the strength of the gale first, returned the man who was called Mr. Gray, moving from the side of Griffith to the weather gangway of the vessel, where he stood in silence, looking ahead of the ship with an air of singular coolness and abstraction.

All the lanterns had been extinguished on the deck of the frigate when her anchor was secured, and as the first mist of the gale had passed over, it was succeeded by a faint light that was a good deal aided by the glittering foam of the waters, which now broke in white curls around the vessel in every direction. The land could be faintly discerned, rising like a heavy bank of black fog above the margin of the waters, and was only distinguishable from the heavens by its deeper gloom and obscurity. The last rope was coiled and deposited in its proper place by the seamen, and for several minutes the stillness of death pervaded the crowded decks. It was evident to every one that their ship was dashing at a prodigious rate through the waves; and as she was approaching with such velocity the quarter of the bay where the shoals and dangers were known to be situated, nothing but the

habits of the most exact discipline could suppress the uneasiness of the officers and men within their own bosoms. At length the voice of Captain Munson was heard calling to the pilot.

"Shall I send a hand into the chains, Mr. Gray," he said, "and try our water?

"Tack your ship, sir, tack your ship: I would see how she works before we reach the point where she must behave well, or we perish."

Griffith gazed after him in wonder, while the pilot slowly paced the quarter deck, and then, rousing from his trance, gave forth the cheering order that called each man to his station to perform the desired evolution. The confident assurances which the young officer had given to the pilot respecting the qualities of his vessel, and his own ability to manage her, were fully realized by the result. The helm was no sooner put a-lee than the huge ship bore up gallantly against the wind, and dashing directly through the waves, threw the foam high into the air as she looked boldly into the very eye of the wind, and then, yielding gracefully to its power, she fell off on the other tack with her head pointed from those dangerous shoals that she had so recently approached with such terrifying velocity. The heavy yards swung round as if they had been vanes to indicate the currents of the air, and in a few moments the frigate again moved with stately progress through the water, leaving the rocks and shoals behind her on the other side of the bay, but advancing toward those that offered equal danger on the other.

During this time the sea was becoming more agitated, and the violence of the wind was gradually increasing. The latter no longer whistled amid the cordage of the vessel, but it seemed to howl surlily as it passed the complicated machinery that the frigate obtruded on its path. An endless succession of white surges rose above the heavy billows, and the very air was glittering with the light that was disengaged from the ocean. The ship yielded each moment more and more before the storm, and in less than half an hour from the time that she had lifted her anchor she was driven along with tremendous fury by the full power of a gale of wind. Still the hardy and experienced mariners who directed her movements held her to the course that was necessary to their preservation, and still Griffith gave forth, when directed by their unknown pilot, those orders that turned her in the narrow chaunel where safety was alone to be found.

So far the performance of his duty appeared easy to the stranger, and he gave the required directions in those still, calm