Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1875-04-08
.rcontinuetl fto,n frs. page. |


There were none to hear her voice, or
see her smiles, but the ear and eye OF
Providence. As on she glided, and took
her looks from heaven, she saw her own
little fireside,-her parents waiting for her
arrival the Bible opened for Worship
her own little room kept SO neatly for her,
with its mirror hanging by the window,
in which to braid her hair by the morning
light, her bed prepared for her by her
mothers hand,-the primroses in the gar
den peeping through the snow,-old Tray.
who ever welcomed her home with his
dim white eyes, the ponev and the COW
friends all. and inmates of that happy
household. So stepped she along, while
the snow diamonds glittered around her
feet, and the frost wove wreath of lucid
pearls round her forehead.
Black-moss, which lay halfway between
her masters and her fathers dwelling,
when she heard loud noise coming down
Glen-Scrae, and in few seconds she felt
on her face some flakes of snow. She
looked up the glen, and saw the snow
storm coming down, fast as flood. She
felt no fears; but she ceased her song;
and had there been human eye to look
upon her there, it might have seen shad-
ow on her face. She continued her course,
and felt holder and holder every step that
brought her nearer TO her parents house.
But the snow storm 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 fakes OF snow, interninably inter-
mingled, and furiously waited in the air,
close to her head; she heard nothing but
one wild, fierce, fitful howl. The cold be-
came intense, and her little feet and hands
were fast being benumbed into insensibil-
ity.
ut is a fearful change" muttered the
child to herself; but still she did not fear,
for she had been born in moorland cot
tage, and lived all her days among the
hardships OF the hills. What will become
of the poor sheep p thought she; but still
she scarcely thought of her own danger,
for innocence and youth and joy are slow
to think of aught evil Detailing themselves
and, thinking benignly of all living things
forgot their own fear in their pity for 9TH
ers' sorrow. At last she could no longer
discern single mark on the snow, either
Of human steps or sheep-track, or the foot
print OF wild fowl. Suddenly, too, ex-
hausted, and, shedding tears for herself
Ut last, sank down in the snow.
1t was now that her heart began to
quake with fear. She remembered stories
Of sheperds lost in the snow,-of mother
and child frozen to death on that very
moor,-and in 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 in her sleep.-happy in
the kirk on Sabbath, A thousand thoughts
had the solitary ehild,-and in her own
heart was spring of happiness, pure and
undisturbed as any fount that sparkles I'M
seen 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, lie there
till the thaw might come; and then her
father would find her body, and carry it
away to be buried in the kirk-yard.
The tears were frozen on her cheeks as
soon as shed and scarcely had her little
hands strength to clasp themselves togeth
er, as the thought OF an oyeruling mercI-
full Lord came across her heart. Then, in
deed, the fears of the religious child were
Gained, and she heard without terror the
plovers wailing cry, and the deep boom
of the bittern sounding in the moss. II
will repeat the Lords Prayer" And.
drawing her plaid more closely around her
she whispered, beneath its Intellectual COW
er, "Our Father which art in heaven, hal
lowed be thy name,-thy kingdom come,
thy will be done oniearth as it is in heav-
en- Had human aid been within fifty
yards, it could have been of no ail,-eye
could not see her,-ear could not hear her
in that bowling darkness. But that low
aud 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 tar separated .
The father was lying but a short distance
from his child he too had sunk down in
the drifting snow after having exhausted
all the strength of fear, pity hope, des-
pair. and resignation. that could rise in
fathers heart blindly seeking to rescue his
only child from death, thinking that one
desperate exertion might enable them to
perish with each other while huge snow
drift was every moment piling itself up in
to more insurmountable barrier between
the dying parent and his dying child.
= There was all the while blazing fire
in the cottage, a white spread table. and
beds prepared for the family to lie down
In peace. Yet was she who sat therein
more to be pitisd than the old man and
the child stretched upon the snow. II will
not 20 to seek them; that would be tempt
ing Providence, and wilfully putting out
the lamp of life. No ! will abide here
and pray for their souls - Then, as she
knelt down, she looked at the useless fire
burning away SO cheerfully, when all she
loved might be dying of cold; and unable
to bear the thought, she shrieked out
prayer, as if she might pierce the sky to
the very throne OF God, and send with it
her own miserable soul to plead before
him for the deliverance of her child and
husband. She then fell down in blessed
forgetfutncss of all trouble, in the midst
Of the solitary cheerfulness OF that bright
burning hearth; and the Bible, which she