r whose sake
was all this alternation of agony? A poor humble creature, unknown to
many even by name--one who had had but few friends, nor wished for
more--contented to work all day, here--there--anywhere--that she might
be able to support her aged mother and her child--and who on Sabbath
took her seat in an obscure pew, set apart for paupers, in the kirk.

"Fall back, and give her fresh air," said the old minister of the
parish; and the ring of close faces widened round her lying as in death.
"Gie me the bonny bit bairn into my arms," cried first one mother and
then another, and it was tenderly handed round the circle of kisses,
many of the snooded maidens bathing its face in tears. "There's no a
single scratch about the puir innocent, for the Eagle, you see, maun hae
stuck its talons into the lang claes and the shawl. Blin', blin' maun
they be who see not the finger o' God in this thing!"

Hannah started up from her swoon--and, looking wildly round, cried, "Oh!
the Bird--the Bird!--the Eagle--the Eagle!--the Eagle has carried off my
bonny wee Walter--is there nane to pursue?" A neighbour put her baby
into her breast; and shutting her eyes, and smiting her forehead, the
sorely bewildered creature said in a low voice, "Am I wauken--oh! tell
me if I'm wauken--or if a' this be but the wark o' a fever."

Hannah Lamond was not yet twenty years old, and although she was a
mother--and you may guess what a mother--yet--frown not, fair and gentle
reader--frown not, pure and stainless as thou art--to her belonged not
the sacred name of wife--and that baby was the child of sin and of
shame--yes--"the child of misery, baptised in tears!" She had
loved--trusted--been betrayed--and deserted. In sorrow and
solitude--uncomforted and despised--she bore her burden. Dismal had been
the hour of travail--and she feared her mother's heart would have
broken, even when her own was cleft in twain. But how healing is
forgiveness--alike to the wounds of the forgiving and the forgiven! And
then Hannah knew that, although guilty before God, her guilt was not
such as her fellow-creatures deemed it--for there were dreadful secrets
which should never pass her lips against the father of her child. So she
bowed down her young head, and soiled it with the ashes of
repentance--walking with her eyes on the ground as she again entered the
kirk--yet not fearing to lift them up to heaven during the prayer. Her
sadness inspired a general pity--she was exclu