was
to fly where he would never be heard of more. And it was the thought of
him, from that day till now, has given me more misery than the thought
of the dead man!"

Carlen was crying bitterly; the letter was just ended, when Alf came
into the room asking bewilderedly what it was all about.

The name Wilhelm meant nothing to him. It was the summer before Wilhelm
came that he had begun this Oregon farm, which he, from the first, had
fondly dedicated to Carlen in his thoughts; and when he went back to
Pennsylvania after her, he found her the same as when he went away, only
comelier and sweeter. It would not be easy to give Alf an uncomfortable
thought about his Carlen. But he did not like to see her cry.

Neither, when he had heard the whole story, did he see why her tears
need have flowed so freely. It was sad, no doubt, and a bitter shame
too, for one man to suffer and go to his grave that way for the sin of
another. But it was long past and gone; no use in crying over it now.

"What a tender-hearted, foolish wife it is!" he said in gruff fondness,
laying his hand on Carlen's shoulder, "crying over a man dead and buried
these seven years, and none of our kith or kin, either. Poor fellow! It
was a shame!"

But Carlen said nothing.

Little Bel's Supplement.

"Indeed, then, my mother, I'll not take the school at Wissan Bridge
without they promise me a supplement. It's the worst school i' a' Prince
Edward Island."

"I doubt but ye're young to tackle wi' them boys, Bel," replied the
mother, gazing into her daughter's face with an intent expression in
which it would have been hard to say which predominated,--anxiety or
fond pride. "I'd sooner see ye take any other school between this an'
Charlottetown, an' no supplement."

"I'm not afraid, my mother, but I'll manage 'em well enough; but I'll
not undertake it for the same money as a decent school is taught.
They'll promise me five pounds' supplement at the end o' the year, or
I'll not set foot i' the place."

"Maybe they'll not be for givin' ye the school at all when they see
what's yer youth," replied the mother, in a half-antagonistic tone.
There was between this mother and daughter a continual undercurrent of
possible antagonism, overlain and usually smothered out of sight by
passionate attachment on both sides.

Little Bel tossed her head. "Age is not everything that goes to the
makkin o' a teacher," she retorted. "There's Grizzy McLeod; she's
tea