the small game of the forest could be lured into her snares and parcelled among the apathetic hens. Many were the recipes and the consultations on the subject, till at last Ray wrote out for her, in black-letter, a notice to be pinned up in the sight of every delinquent : “Twelve eggs, or death! Whether it were the frozen rabbit-meat flung among them the day before, or whether it were the timely warning, there is no one to tell; but the next morning twelve eggs lay in the various hidingplaces, which Mrs. Vennard declared to be as good eggs as ever were laid, and custards and cookies renewed their reign. Here, suddenly, Ray remembered the purse in his haversack, containing all his uncounted pay. It was a weary while that he stayed alone in the cold, leaning over it as if he stared at the thirty pieces of silver, a faint sickness seized him, then hurriedly sweeping it up, with a red spot burning cruelly into either cheek, he brought it down, and emptied it in little Jane's lap, though he would rather have seen it ground to impalpable dust. But, after a moment's thought, the astonished recipient kept it for a use of her own. Finally, one night, Ray proposed to instruct Janet in some particular branch of his general ignorance; and after those firelight-recitations, little Jane forgot to move her seat away, and her hand was kept in his through all the hour of Vivia's slow enchantment

So the cold weather wore away, and spring stole into the scene like a surprise, finding Vivia as the winter found her, but Ray still undergoing volcanic changes, now passionless lulls and now rages and spasms of grief; gradually out of them all he gathered his strength about him.

It was once more a morning of early June, sunrise was blushing over the meadows, and the gossamers of hoar dew lay in spidery veils of woven light and melted under the rosy beams. From her window one heard Vivia singing, and the strain stole down like the breath of the heavy honeysuckles that trellised her pane:

"No more for me the eager day

66

Breaks its bright prison-bars;

The sunshine Thou hast stripped away,

But bared the eternal stars.

Though in the cloud the wild bird sings,

His song falls not for me,

Alone while rosy heaven rings,

But, Lord, alone with Thee!"

One well could know, in listening to the liquid melody of those clear tones, that love and sorrow had transfused her life at last to woof and warp of innermost joy that death itself could neither tarnish nor obscure. In a few moments she came down and joined Ray, where he stood upon the door-stone, with one arm resting over the shoulder of little Jane, and watched with him the antics of a youth who postured before them. It was some old acquaintance of Ray's, returned from the war; and as if he would demonstrate how wonderfully martial exercise supples joint and sinew, he was leaping in the air, turning his heel where his toe should be, hanging his foot on his arm and throwing it over his shoulder in a necklace, skipping and prancing on the grass like a veritable saltinbanco. Ray looked grimly on and inspected

the evolutions; then there was long process of question and answer and asseveration, and, when the youth departed, little Jane had announced with authority that Ray should throw away his crutch and stand on two feet of his own again.

"What a gay fellow he is!" said Ray, drawing a breath of relief. "They're all alike, dancing on graves. To be an old Téméraire, decked out in signal-flags after thunderous work well done, and settling down, is one thing. But we to-day, when one would think every woman in the land should wear the sackcloth and ashes of mourning, we break into a splendor of apparel that defies the butterflies and boughs of the dying year."

"Two striking examples before you," said little Jane, with a laugh, as she looked at her old print and at Vivia's gray gown.

"I was n't thinking of you. I saw the ladies in the village yesterday, they were pied and parded."

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Children," said Mrs. Vennard from within, "I've

taken up the coffee now. I sha'n't wait a minute longer. Vivia, I'll beat an egg into yours."

But the children had wandered down to the lake-shore, oblivious of her cry, and were standing on the rock watching their images glassed below and ever freshly shattered with rippling undulations. A wherry chained beside them Vivia rocked lightly with her foot.

“You and little Jane will set me down by and by? she asked. 66 "'T will be so much pleasanter than the coach."

And, Vivia dear, you Jane, with tearful eyes.

will go, then?" exclaimed little "You will certainly go?"

"Yes," said Vivia, looking out and far away, go to do that ”

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"I shall

Which no one can ever do for you," said Ray, with a shudder.

“Which some woman will praise Heaven for.”

"God bless you, Vivia!" cried little Jane.

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He has already blessed me," said Vivia, softly.

Janet nestled nearer to Ray's side, as they stood. There was a tremor of gladness through all the dew of her glance. Ray looked down at her for a moment, and his hard brow softened, in his eyes hung a light like the reflection of a star in a breaking wave.

"He has blessed me, too," said he. "Some day I shall be a man again. I have thrown away my crutch, Vivia, — for all my life I am going to have this little shoulder to lean upon."

And over his sombre face a smile crept and deepened, like the yellow ray that, after a long, dark day of driving rain, suddenly gilds the tree-tops and brims the sky; and though, when it went, the gloom shut drearily down again, still it bore the promise of fair day to-morrow.

T

HE smiting of the enemy's crescent front at Mission Ridge on the twenty-third of November, 1863, the capture of Lookout Mountain on the twenty-fourth, and the storming of Mission Ridge on the twenty-fifth were the three acts of one splendid drama.

THE SMITING OF THE SHIELD.

MONDAY-TWENTY-THIRD.

Ir was apparent that the enemy apprehended coming danger, for on Sunday morning two divisions moved northward along Mission Ridge and took position on his extreme right. All that beautiful Sunday the Rebel lines were restless; trains were moving, brigades passing and repassing, like the sliding pictures in a camera obscura; there was a fearful looking for" of coming judgment. All that beautiful Sunday there was anxious expectation in Chattanooga; field-glasses were everywhere sweeping the mountains; I walked through the