ow. The waters of the
bay sobbed in their ebb and flow upon the sands, and the wind that
sighed through the pines echoed the wail of the grief-stricken women:

"Desolate! Desolate! Desolate!"

CHAPTER XVI

"OF WHAT WAS HE GUILTY?"

"Close his eyes; his work is done!
What to him is friend or foeman,
Rise of moon, or set of sun,
Hand of man, or kiss of woman?

"Fold him in his country's stars,
Roll the drum and fire the volley!
What to him are all our wars,
What but death bemocking folly?"

--_George H. Boker._

There is no time when man so realizes his helplessness as in the
presence of great affliction. So now Peggy and Sally, wishing to give
comfort but at a loss how to do so, withdrew a short distance from the
stricken ones, then they too sat down. The girls were in sore need of
consolation themselves, for they were faint and weary after the trying
ordeal through which they had passed. It was therefore no wonder that
through utter exhaustion they fell into slumber; for youth and
weariness will assert themselves against the tyranny of nerve-racking
stress. A slumber that was of short duration.

A drop of rain splashed suddenly upon Peggy's hand causing her to
start up in alarm. She looked about her quickly. The sky was covered
by dark, lowering clouds which hung above them like a pall. The wind
had veered to the east and a fiercer note had crept into its moaning.
Instead of the soft lapping of the tide there was an angry menace in
the waves breaking turbulently upon the shore. A storm was coming, and
they were without shelter. The girl ran to Nurse Johnson and touched
her gently.

"'Tis going to rain," she cried, her clear young voice ringing out
with startling suddenness. "Does thee not think that we should try to
get somewhere, Friend Nurse?"

Nurse Johnson glanced at her dully, then at sight of the overcast sky
she rose hurriedly.

"You are right, Peggy," she said. "'Tis time for action now. We must
give way to grief no longer. Help me to rouse these women."

A patter of rain which fell as she finished speaking, brought a
realizing sense of the situation to the women, and bravely they rose
to meet it. For one short hour they had indulged their sorrow. In the
greatness of the calamity that had overwhelmed them there had seemed
to come an end of everything. That Freedom might live they had been
bereft of all, but life with its responsibilities still