ld would have been most precious. His eyes were
decently closed, the curtains of the bed drawn round him, and the pillow
which supported his head was marked with the pressure of another head,
and with moisture which could have been only the tears of his wife. The
floor of the church was in confusion, like the dwelling of one too much
distracted with trouble to attend to what did not relate to it; but
there was corn which had served for food, and fuel heaped on the stone
which had been a hearth--there was the drawing of a lovely woman and of
a beautiful place: but these were cast into a corner, probably by the
irritable hand of despair. On a table stood empty cups, which had long,
perhaps, been dry--the glass of one had been shivered, and the fragments
lay on the floor; there were also a few books, neglected and covered
with dust. In the churchyard were the marks of three recent graves--one
of them had a stone at its head, on which was carved with care the name
of Alfred, and the soil was fenced and supported with sticks, so as to
preserve its shape over the body--probably it was that of the first
child whom the parents had committed to dust. Another was more hastily
prepared, and no superfluous labour had been bestowed on it. This must
be the last, when heart and health were both failing. Paulett and Ellen
kneeled and prayed beside them, and rejoiced that the mother, too, was
at rest after the long misery of this scene. They returned to their
cave, and, under the shadow of the rock near the old course of the
brook, laid both mother and child, covering their bodies with stones,
and thinking more of the probable reunion, in some unknown scene, of
the spirits of that family, than of the distance which separated their
graves on this earth.

And now, with good store of diamonds, and with increasing skill and
success in the resolution of them into water, both Paulett and Ellen
looked upon the lives of all as safe for the present, and their thoughts
were at liberty to wander to some other subject. They believed that they
and their children were alone in the world, for every sign of life from
other countries, as well as their own, had ceased. It was very long
since any human tidings had come, and though, after men had done with
each other, birds continued their migrations, these had now long been
over, and the years passed away without bringing or sending a single
wing. The course of the seasons, too, was strange and unnatural.