hope so patiently for you. Remember them,
and do not let them love and long in vain. And if there be any here
so forlorn that they have no friend to care for them, never forget the
Father whose arms are always open to receive, forgive, and comfort
His prodigal sons, even at the eleventh hour.' There the little sermon
ended; but the preacher of it felt that her few hearty words had not
been uttered in vain, for one boy's head was down, and several faces
wore the softened look which told that a tender memory was touched. Dan
was forced to set his lips to keep them steady, and drop his eyes to
hide the sudden dew that dimmed them when waiting, hoping friends were
spoken of. He was glad to be alone in his cell again, and sat thinking
deeply, instead of trying to forget himself in sleep. It seemed as if
those words were just what he needed to show him where he stood and how
fateful the next few days might be to him. Should he join the 'bad lot',
and perhaps add another crime to the one already committed, lengthen the
sentence already so terrible to bear, deliberately turn his back on all
that was good, and mar the future that might yet be redeemed? Or should
he, like the wiser man in the story, submit, bear the just punishment,
try to be better for it; and though the scar would remain, it might
serve as a reminder of a battle not wholly lost, since he had saved his
soul though innocence was gone? Then he would dare go home, perhaps,
confess, and find fresh strength in the pity and consolation of those
who never gave him up.

Good and evil fought for Dan that night as did the angel and the devil
for Sintram, and it was hard to tell whether lawless nature or loving
heart would conquer. Remorse and resentment, shame and sorrow, pride and
passion, made a battle-field of that narrow cell, and the poor fellow
felt as if he had fiercer enemies to fight now than any he had met in
all his wanderings. A little thing turned the scale, as it so often does
in these mysterious hearts of ours, and a touch of sympathy helped Dan
decide the course which would bless or ban his life.

In the dark hour before the dawn, as he lay wakeful on his bed, a ray
of light shone through the bars, the bolts turned softly, and a man came
in. It was the good chaplain, led by the same instinct that brings a
mother to her sick child's pillow; for long experience as nurse of souls
had taught him to see the signs of hope in the hard faces about him,
and to kn