constant attention would save his life.

"Monsieur," Clélie explained to him upon the first occasion upon which he opened his eyes, "you are ill and alone, and we wish to befriend you." And he was too weak to require from her anything more definite.

Physically he was a person to admire. In health his muscular power must have been immense. He possessed the frame of a young giant, and yet there was in his face a look of innocence and inexperience amazing even when one recollected his youth.

"It is the look," said Clélie, regarding him attentively,—"the look one sees in the faces of Monsieur and his daughter down-stairs; the look of a person who has lived a simple life, and who knows absolutely nothing of the world."

It is possible that this may have prepared the reader for the dénoûment which followed; but singular as it may appear, it did not prepare either Clélie or myself—perhaps because we had seen the world, and having learned to view it in a practical light, were not prepared to encounter suddenly a romance almost unparalleled.

The next morning I was compelled to go out to give my lessons as usual, and left Clélie with our patient. On my return, my wife, hearing my footsteps, came out and met me upon the landing. She was moved by the strongest emotion and much excited; her cheeks were pale and her eyes shone.

"Do not go in yet," she said, "I have something to tell you. It is almost incredible; but—but it is—the lover!"

For a moment we remained silent—standing looking at each other. To me it seemed incredible indeed.

"He could not give her up," Clélie went on, "until he was sure she wished to discard him. The mother had employed all her ingenuity to force him to believe that such was the case, but he could not rest until he had seen his betrothed face to face. So he followed her,—poor, inexperienced, and miserable,—and when at last he saw her at a distance, the luxury with which she was surrounded caused his heart to fail him, and he gave way to despair."

I accompanied her into the room, and heard the rest from his own lips. He gathered together all his small savings, and made his journey in the cheapest possible way,—in the steerage of the vessel, and in third-class carriages,—so that he might have some trifle left to subsist upon.

"I've a little farm," he said, "and there's a house on it, but I wouldn't sell that. If she cared to go, it was all I had to take her to, an' I'd worked hard to buy it. I'd worked hard, early and late, always thinking that some day we'd begin life there together—Esmeraldy and me."

"Since neither sea, nor land, nor cruelty, could separate them," said Clélie to me during the day, "it is not I who will help to hold them apart."

So when Mademoiselle came for her lesson that afternoon, it was Clélie's task to break the news to her,—to tell her that neither sea nor land lay between herself and her lover, and that he was faithful still.

She received the information as she might have received a blow,—staggering backward, and whitening, and losing her breath; but almost immediately afterward she uttered a sad cry of disbelief and anguish.

"No, no," she said, "it—it isn't true! I won't believe it—I mustn't. There's half the world between us. Oh, don't try to make me believe it,—when it can't be true!"

"Come with me," replied Clélie.

Never—never in my life has it been my fate to see, before or since, a sight so touching as the meeting of these two young hearts. When the door of the cold, bare room opened, and Mademoiselle Esmeralda entered, the lover held out his weak arms with a sob,—a sob of rapture, and yet terrible to hear.

"I thought you'd gone back on me, Esmeraldy," he cried. "I thought you'd gone back on me."

Clélie and I turned away and left them as the girl fell upon her knees at his side.

The effect produced upon the father—who had followed Mademoiselle as usual, and whom we found patiently seated upon the bottom step of the flight of stairs, awaiting our arrival—was almost indescribable.

He sank back upon his seat with a gasp, clutching at his hat with both hands. He also disbelieved.

"Wash!" he exclaimed weakly. "Lord, no! Lord, no! Not Wash! Wash, he's in North Cal-lina. Lord, no!"

"He is up-stairs," returned Clélie, "and Mademoiselle is with him."

During the recovery of Monsieur Wash, though but little was said upon the subject, it is my opinion that the minds of each of our number pointed only toward one course in the future.

In Mademoiselle's demeanor there appeared a certain air of new courage and determination, though she was still pallid and anxious. It was as if she had passed a climax and had gained strength. Monsieur, the father, was alternately nervous and dejected, or in feverishly high spirits. Occasionally he sat for some time without speaking, merely gazing into the fire with a hand upon each knee; and it was one evening, after a more than usually prolonged silence of this description, that he finally took upon himself the burden which lay upon us unitedly.

"Esmeraldy," he remarked, tremulously, and with manifest trepidation,—"Esmeraldy, I've been thinkin'—it's time—we broke it to mother."

The girl lost color, but she lifted her head steadily.

"Yes, father," she answered, "it's time."

"Yes," he echoed, rubbing his knees slowly, "it's time; an', Esmeraldy, it's a thing to—to sorter set a man back."

"Yes, father," she answered again.

"Yes," as before, though his voice broke somewhat; "an' I dessay you know how it'll be, Esmeraldy,—that you'll have to choose betwixt mother and Wash."

She sat by her lover, and for answer she dropped her face upon his hand with a sob.

"An'—an' you've chose Wash, Esmeraldy?"

"Yes, father."

He hesitated a moment, and then took his hat from its place of concealment and rose.

"It's nat'ral," he said, "an' it's right. I wouldn't want it no other way. An' you mustn't mind, Esmeraldy, it's bein' kinder rough on me, as can't go back on mother, havin' swore to cherish her till death do us part. You've allus been a good gal to me, an' we've thought a heap on each other, an' I reckon it can allers be the same way, even though we're sep'rated, fur it's nat'ral you should have chose Wash, an'—an' I wouldn't have it no other way, Esmeraldy. Now I'll go an' have it out with mother."

We were all sufficiently unprepared for the announcement to be startled by it Mademoiselle Esmeralda, who was weeping bitterly, half sprang to her feet.

"To-night!" she said. "Oh, father!"

"Yes," he replied; "I've been thinking over it, an' I don't see no other way, an' it may as well be to-night as any other time."

After leaving us he was absent for about an hour. When he returned, there were traces in his appearance of the storm through which he had passed. His hands trembled with agitation; he even looked weakened as he sank into his chair. We regarded him with commiseration.

"It's over," he half whispered, "an' it was even rougher than I thought it would be. She was terrible outed, was mother. I reckon I never see her so outed before. She jest raged and tore. It was most more than I could stand, Esmeraldy," and he dropped his head upon his hands for support. "Seemed like it was the Markis as laid heaviest upon her," he proceeded. "She was terrible sot on the Markis, an' every time she think of him, she'd just rear—. she'd just rear. I never stood up agen mother afore, an' I hope I shan't never have it to do again in my time. I'm kinder wore out."

Little by little we learned much of what had passed, though he evidently withheld the most for the sake of Mademoiselle, and it was some time before he broke the news to her that her mother's doors were closed against her.

"I think you'll find it pleasanter a-stoppin' here," he said, "if Mis' Dimar'll board ye until—the time fur startin' home. Her sperrit was so up that she said she