Year: 1874




A new sound startled her. The boat
scraped against rock. With sudden
JOY in her heart she sprang TO the side
and reached out her arm-there was moth
ing there. She searched all round in the
Understanding but water. She knew
now how rapidly the wind and tide COM
bined were carrying her away; and as
the wild fancy struck her that was the
last point of the island that the boat had
grazed, aud that she was drifting cut to
sea. she rose and called aloud iu her ago.
ny 10 her friends. aud most of all to her
young husband. Alas! there was not
even an echo to these wild cries.


She might, however, drift on to the
SkeirTore rocks: and as The sea, with the
wind off the land, was here comparatively
smooth, she would be able to SCRABBLE over
the sea-weed to some higher place ofsafc-
ty. But she could not make them out in
the darkness of the night. She sat wait.
irg IL silence now, with a great dread
stealing over heart, listening for the sound
Of the waves on the rocks. AT leRgth
she heard it. 1t made her trembe, but
it was welcome. She kept watching the
water by the side of the boat that sho
might be able to make out the first mass
Of stone or sea-weed. and she knew now
that the point of the long and narrow is.
land was near at haud. Still she kept
her head down. The water was tapping
all around the boat; it confused her as
she listened to the breaking of the waves
close by. Then she rose again. Was not
the sound more distant She had gone
by the Skeirmore rocks, and was drifting
out to the open sea.


"AalaSa! Aalrsa -


She started to her feet again. Was not
that the voice Of her lover, far away and
faint :?


''Allster" she cried, "Alister! Are
you coming for me?"


She listened again. There was another
sound Of "Ailasa AilaSa !" but it
seemed more faint; and how could she
send back an answer against the wind :?
Nevertheless despair made her try again.
She called aloud from time to time, and
listened !; then when she could hear 10 re.
ply she gave herself up for lost, and sat
down in the boat, aad could only cry Bit
terly that she should see Darroch and
KiIleena and her young husband no more,


So she sat through the weary hours,
sleepless with her utter wrctchedness, and
yet sinking into numbed state with the
cole and the wet. She had sacrificed her
shawl it was now lying soaked in the
bottom OF the boat. one corner of it plug.
gcd iu with the thole.pin. She heard no
more the sound of the waves along the
coast; the waves were growing bigger /;
she knew that she was out at sea.


Day broke, cold and gray and misty.
The islands that she could dimly see in
the distance lay like huge black shadows
in the white fog; but the more she gazed
at them the more she was convinced that
these were not the Skelrmoro rocks, with
Darroch aud Klllecna behind. Whittier
had she come? A sort of stupcr was be-
ginning to crawl over her; the pain in
her heart alone prevented her sinking IN
to the bottom of the boat, and letting the
rain and the wind and the cold sea have
their will Of her.


She could not havo closed her eyes !;
vet i. was with start that she saw, far
down in the southwest, small vessel ap.
parently coming rorihward. Faint as the
chances we're that they would descry so
small an object as this boat in the midst
of the fog and rain, the sight gave her
new courage. She began TO think of the
ships she had watched go by this remote
and lonely coast. Might not one Of them
them pick her up, and carry her to some
port from which she could make her way
back to her own home And it this help
was long deyed, she knew they would
find only corpse in The drifting boat.


How slowly the small aud shadowy ship
came along! She gazed at it with such
intensity that occasionally her head be-
came giddy. and it seemed to disappear
altogether; then with quick anxiety she
would rub hor eyes and look again. 1t
was schooner. She stood up in the boat
and she had more difficulty now in bal
anciDg herself--aud waved her handkcr-
chief, looking anxiously all the while.
Surely they must see her now. She watch.
cd the sails aud the course Of tho vessel
her accustomed eye eager to perceive
the slightest charge in either. And there,
sure enough, the schooner seemed to be
drawing nearer TO her. She waved the
again. She began TO treln-
Bile violently. Then she sank into the