in. "The information may be exaggerated," was his
mental solving, "for it is plain that the writer, in penning it, was
actuated by no feelings of good-will, and there may yet exist a hope of
Anges's escape." With this idea, he opened another epistle, which he had
received, but not yet read. It was from an elderly gentleman, who had
always held Agnes in the deepest esteem, and with a trembling hand he
broke the seal. Alas for his futile hopes! Not at the close of the page,
as in the one received by Ella, but at the very commencement of the
letter, was the mournful intelligence communicated, and while the
narrator deeply deplored the event, he intimated, at the same time, that
not a doubt existed in his own mind, or in the minds of her friends, as
to the certainty of her untimely fate.

Arthur laid the letter aside, and again commenced his restless pacing.
Alas, he had once almost imagined himself a Christian, for had he not
been sedulous in the discharge of every duty, and, like the young man
referred to in Scripture, could have said, with reference to the moral
law as far as outward observances are concerned, "All these have I kept
from my youth up." But now, mitigating, soothing, extracting from grief,
however mighty, some portion of its bitterness, where was the
resignation of the Christian? Not, certainly, in that heart so full of
bitterness, that was ready to contend with heaven for having reclaimed
its own; its power, its goodness, its wisdom, were almost,
unconsciously, arraigned, and finite man presumed to pass judgment on
the acts of infinite benevolence, until, at length, shocked at his own
rebellious feelings,--and startled, nay, terrified, at this the deepest
insight he had ever obtained of the natural depravity of his heart, he
sank into a chair, and in utter recklessness abandoned himself to the
tide of grief which seemed waiting to overwhelm him.

Oh there are terrible moments in human experience, moments when even the
Christian is so haunted by the demon of unbelief, when the dire enemy of
God and man takes advantage of some unpropitious circumstance, some
painful affliction, to taunt the soul, already almost crushed, and to
inquire, with fiendish malignity, "Where is now thy God?" that if not
wholly overcome, he, at least, escapes alone with fearful wounds from
the trying conflict; how then can that one sustain the assault who is
totally unprepared, and who knows but little of the source from whence
alo