y mother died I was too young for more than a child's
grief--an April shower of tears; and although my earliest maidenhood was
often lonely, I had made me my own happiness with bright imaginings, and
prayed God to bring them to pass. So I awaited my future always with a
smile and never doubted that it would be fair. All that had gone by.
Trouble had shown its face to me, and I knew it for something terrible
and strong, ready to leap at my throat and crush life out of me. What
wonder, then, that I walked fearfully from hour to hour?

Padre Felipe spoke again after a time. "The woods are thinning," he
said. "A few more steps and we shall come out on the shores of the San
Juan, near to a small village of the Yemassees, in which there are many
whose eyes have been opened to the truth. There we shall find shelter
from the storm, and means to pursue our journey when the clouds are
past. Let us hasten; the bearers with the litter are far ahead."

He gave me his arm once more, and ere many minutes were past, we came in
sight of the bold stream of the San Juan and the crowded huts of an
Indian village.

The settlement did not appear to be near so large as that at Santa
Catalina, nor did the buildings seem of as great size and
commodiousness. The most imposing edifice I took to be the mission
chapel, for before it was the great cross mounted aloft. It was circular
in shape, with mud walls, and a thatched roof rising to an apex. There
was a door in the side, of heavy planks battened strongly together; but
I could perceive no windows, only a few very small square apertures,
close under the eaves, for light and air.

The clouds were beginning to spill great drops upon our heads, so we
quickened our steps into a run. The litter and its bearers had paused
beside the door of the chapel, and from the neighbouring huts several
Indians emerged and advanced to meet us. A young woman with a little
copper-coloured babe strapped to her back, its tiny head just visible
over her shoulder, peered at us from the low doorway of her mud-walled
dwelling, but meeting my eyes, drew back hastily out of sight.

I was very weary, and Barbara, who had dismounted from the litter,
seemed unable to stand. The padre was holding converse with those of his
dark-skinned flock who had approached; so we two women crouched down
under the chapel eaves and gazed around us at the wind-tossed,
rain-blurred scene.

Before us was a thick grove of trees; to the left