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The little field

which have taken place in the western country since its first settlement, its former appearance is like a dream, or romance. He will find it difficult to realize the features of that wilderness which was the abode of his infant days. The little cabin of his father no longer exists. and truck patch, which gave him a scanty supply of coarse bread and vegetables, have been swallowed up in the extended meadow, orchard or grain field. The rude fort in which his people had resided so many painful summers has vanished, and, "like the baseless fabric of a vision, left not a wreck behind."

A prominent feature of the wilderness through which Adele and her little retinue made their way was solitude. Those who plunged into the bosom of this forest left behind them not only the busy hum of men, but domesticated animal life generally. The parting rays of the setting sun did not receive the requiem of the feathered songsters of the grove, nor was the blushing aurora ushered in by the shrill clarion of the chanticleer. The solitude of the night was broken only by the howl of the wolf, the melancholy moan of the ill-boding owl, or the terrible shriek of the panther. Even the faithful dog, the only steadfast companion of man among the brute creation, partook of the silence of the desert. The discipline of his master

forbade him to bark, or move, but in obedience to his command, and his native sagacity soon taught him the propriety of obedience to this severe government. The day was, if possible, more solitary than the night. The gobble of the wild turkey, the croaking of the raven, or the woodpecker, tapping on some hollow tree, did not do much to enliven the dreary scene. The various tribes of singing birds are not inhabitants of the wilderness. Not being carnivorous, they must be fed by the labors of man. At any rate, they have never existed far from human habitations, and have always followed up civilization. Dense, dark and dreary was the immense expanse of forest which Adele and her faithful servants were compelled to traverse.

At last, Port Royal, or Annapolis, was reached, and the mademoiselle remained there several days, forming the acquaintance of many of the English people and making many strange inquiries that puzzled wise heads.

Her long, tiresome mission was ended, and a fruitless one it proved. She was compelled to return home heavy-hearted.

"He is dead," she sighed. "Did he live, he would have kept his word with me. He would have come to Grand Pre.'

Nothing could shake her unbounded faith in the man whom she had rescued from slavery.

It was when the heats of noon died gradually away from the earth, that Adele and her small retinue set out on their return homeward. De Bray, the Coureur des Bois, declared that they would have a storm.

Their road lay among murmuring pines and hemlock, grown old and moss-covered, through dark aisles, of which the wood contained many. With her waiting-maid at her side, De Bray in front and the others bringing up the rear, the mademoiselle continued her journey.

The day waxed and waned, and still the little 'cavalcade was far from the home of the mistress. The sun was setting in the old Acadian forest. The few shafts of sunlight that had pierced their pillared gloom from out the billowy clouds were lost in fathomless depths, or splintered their ineffectual lances on the trunks of the tall pine trees. For a time, the sombre gray of fallen branches, which matted the echoless aisles, still seemed to hold a faint glow of the dying day; but this soon passed, as light and color fled upward. The dark, interlaced tree-tops, that had all day made an impenetrable shade, broke into fire here and there; their dead and barren top branches glittered, faded and went utterly out. A weird twilight, that seemed born of the wood itself, slowly filled up and possessed the aisles. The straight, tall trunks

of the pines and hemlocks rose to such prodigious heights, that they were lost in the gathering gloom overhead, while occasionally a fallen branch stretched its huge length into obscurity. A strange breath filled these mysterious vaults. Mingled with the sweet-scented cedar was the damp odor of decaying wood. The fallen monarchs were the dead of by-gone ages, and those dark vaults, their trunks, while the silence was a solitude of a forgotten past.

Only the trampling of horses' feet on the ground disturbed the silence, save when the rumbling of distant thunder along the western horizon fell on their ears. The Coureur des Bois cast uneasy glances about him, and when an opening appeared in the forest, which was very seldom, he turned his gaze toward the west, now shrouded in the gloom of approaching night and storm. De Bray was a brave man and, for himself, little heeded the storm which threatened to burst on them; but when he considered his delicate charge, unaccustomed to a tempest in the forest, he could not repress a shudder.

Lost in a painful revery, Adele jogged along on her horse through the forest path, all uncon scious of the dangers of a storm in the wilderness. She had never heard the crashing thunders reverberating in those gloomy old woods. She had

never seen a monarch splintered by the lightning's wrath, or heard the howling tempest tearing up monsters by their roots. The mind of the maid was on that face seen in chains and dungeons, and she asked herself again and again:

"Is he dead, or does he live?"

The storm which the Coureur des Bois had predicted was beginning to creep visibly over them. At first, a low and, distant thunder gave warning of the approaching conflict of the elements; and then rapidly rushed above them the dark ranks of clouds. The suddenness of the storm had something almost preternatural about it.

Adele was startled from her painful revery, as a few large drops broke heavily among the boughs that overhung the path, and then, swift and intolerably bright, the forked lightning darted across their very eyes and was swallowed up by the increasing darkness.

"Swifter, good De Bray!" cried. Adele to the Coureur des Bois. "The tempest is coming on rapidly."

The guide urged his hardy little horse to a swifter pace along the forest path. The clouds thickened; nearer and more near broke the thunder, while in the distance could be heard the dashing rain and roaring wind.

"Is the Mademoiselle afraid?" asked the guide.

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