t her ability to accomplish the distance in two days, at farthest.
Every mile passed inspired her with fresh courage, for was she not so
much nearer a heart that loved her? O, how she longed to be clasped to
that warm, beating bosom, and weep her sorrows forth to one she knew
would pity, sympathize, and strive to heal!

CHAPTER XIV.

"Do you come with the heart of your childhood back,
The free, the pure, the kind?
Thus murmured the trees in the homeward track,
As they played at the sport of the wind."

The autumn evening stole calmly, sweetly on. Again October's harvest
moon rode through the liquid ether, and poured her silvery beams over
the wild, old forest of Scraggiewood, as we saw it long ago when Annie
Evalyn's years were calm and golden-hued as Luna's gentle rays. She was
coming now to the low, cottage home. With weary, languid step, she
threaded the old, familiar path, and it seemed to have grown rougher,
and the forest looked wilder and darker than in the days gone by. Poor
Annie! the darkness and gloom were in thy weary, world-tossed heart.
That heart beat wildly as she drew nearer the wished-for spot. What if
she should see no light gleaming through the aperture in the rocky
walls? What if the door should be fallen away, and no aunty there to
welcome the wanderer's return? She quickened her pace, and a few moments
banished all fears. The cottage came in view, and a bright light
streamed through the rough-cut window. Now Annie clasped her hands, and
thanked God that her journey was well-nigh ended. She saw her aunt
bending over the embers on the hearth, as she paused a moment on the
threshold. Then, entering softly, she stole to the side of the old lady,
and, passing an arm round her neck, whispered in a low, trembling tone:
"Here's Annie, come home to love and you, dear aunty."

The old woman sprang so suddenly from her kneeling posture as nearly to
throw the slender form upon the floor, and gazed wildly in the speaker's
face.

"Why aunty, don't you know me?"

"Bless me, it is her voice! but how could she rise up here on my
hearth-stone to-night, like a witch or fairy?"

"No, aunty; I am no witch or fairy that has risen on your hearth. I
walked all the way through the dim old forest to reach you, and it looks
just as it used to, only darker and more frightful."

"Come here, darling, 'tis you! I know that voice. O how many t