found,
That summer birds flit heedlessly,
And mocking nature smiles around.--LUNT.

Five years have passed. It is the summer of 1825. In that
comparatively brief period, what vast changes have taken place! How
many have come upon and departed from the stage of life! How many
plans, intentions and resolutions have been formed and either failed
or succeeded! How many governments have toppled to the earth, and
followed by "those that in their turn shall follow them." What a
harvest it has been for Death!

The missionary's cabin stands on the Clearing where it was first
erected, and there is little change in its outward appearance, save
that perhaps it has been more completely isolated from the wood. The
humble but rather massive structure is almost impervious to the touch
of time. It is silent and deserted within. Around the door plays a
little boy, the image of his mother, while some distance away, under
the shadow of the huge tree, sits the missionary himself. One leg is
thrown over the other, an open book turned with its face downward upon
his lap, while his hands are folded upon it, and he is looking off
toward the wood in deep abstraction of thought. Time has not been so
gentle with Harvey Richter. There are lines upon his face, and a sad,
wearied expression that does not properly belong there. It would have
required full fifteen years, in the ordinary course of events, to have
bowed him in this manner.

The young man--for he is still such--and his little boy are the only
ones who now dwell within the cabin. No tidings or rumors have reached
him of the fate of his wife, who was so cruelly taken from him four
years before. The faithful Teddy is still searching for her. The last
two winters he has spent at home, but each summer he has occupied in
wandering hither and thither through the great wilderness, in his
vain searching for the lost trail. Cast down and dejected, he has
never yet entirely abandoned hope of finding traces of her. He had
followed out the suggestion of the trapper, and visited the Indians
that dwelt further north, where he was informed that nothing whatever
was known of the missing woman. Since that time his search had been
mostly of an aimless character, which, as we have already stated,
could be productive of no definite results.

The missionary had become, in a degree, resigned to his fate; and yet,
properly speaking, he could not be said to be resigned, for he was not
yet convinced