collar as I did so, and laying my breastpin and watch upon the table.  ’I wish Mr. and Mrs. Fitzgerald were not going to stay so long at Beaufort,’ said I.  ’It is lonesome here, and I don’t feel at home in this chamber.  I sha’n’t sleep if I go to bed; so I think I’ll read a little longer.  ’I looked round on the table and chairs, and added:  ’There, now!  I’ve left my book down stairs, and must go for it.’  I went down to the parlor and locked myself in.  A few minutes afterward I saw a dark figure steal across the piazza; and, unless the moonlight deceived me, it was Dandy Jim.  I wondered at it, because I thought he was on his way to New Orleans.  Of course, there was no sleep for me that night.  When the household were all astir, I went to the chamber again.  My watch and breastpin, which I had left on purpose, were still lying on the table.  It was evident that robbery had not been the object.  I did not mention the adventure to any one.  I pitied Jim, and if he had escaped, I had no mind to be the means of his recapture.  Whatever harm he had intended, he had not done it, and there was no probability that he would loiter about in that vicinity.  I had reason to be glad of my silence; for the next day an agent from the slave-trader arrived, saying that Jim had escaped, and that they thought he might be lurking near where his wife was.  When Mr. and Mrs. Fitzgerald returned, they questioned Nelly, but she averred that she had not seen Jim, or heard from him since he was sold.  Mr. Fitzgerald went away on horseback that afternoon.  The horse came back in the evening with an empty saddle, and he never returned.  The next morning Nelly was missing, and she was never found.  I thought it right to be silent about my adventure.  To have done otherwise might have produced mischievous results to Jim and Nelly, and could do their master no good.  I searched the woods in every direction, but I never came upon any trace of Mr. Fitzgerald, except the marks of footsteps near the sea, before the rising of the tide.  I had made arrangements to return to the North about that time; but Mrs. Fitzgerald’s second son was seized with fever, and I stayed with her till he was dead and buried.  Then we all came to Boston together.  About a year after, her little daughter, who had been my pupil, died.”

“Poor Mrs. Fitzgerald!” said Flora.  “I have heard her allude to her lost children, but I had no idea she had suffered so much.”

“She did suffer,” replied Mrs. Bright, “though not so deeply as some natures would have suffered in the same circumstances.  Her present situation is far from being enviable.  Her father is a hard, grasping man, and he was greatly vexed that her splendid marriage turned out to be such a failure.  It must be very mortifying to her to depend upon him mainly for the support of herself and son.  I pitied her, and I pitied Mr. Fitzgerald too.  He was selfish and dissipated, because he was brought up with plenty of money, and slaves to obey everything he chose to order.  That is enough to spoil any man.”