imple statement of a fact.

Instantly I saw Kenmure's arm move, and grasp her with that strong and
gentle touch of his which I had so often noticed in the studio,--a
touch that seemed quiet as the approach of fate, and equally
resistless. I knew him well enough to understand that iron adoption.

He drew her toward him, her soft hair was on his breast, she looked
fearlessly into his eyes, and I could hear the little prayer
proceeding, yet in so low a whisper that I could not catch one word.
She was infinitely solemn at such times, the darling; and there was
always something in her low, clear tone, through all her prayings and
philosophizings, which was strangely like her mother's voice. Sometimes
she paused, as if to ask a question, and at every answer I could see
her father's arm tighten.

The moments passed, the voices grew lower yet, the candle flickered and
went out, the doll slid to the ground. Marian had drifted away upon a
vaster ocean than that whose music lulled her from without,--upon that
sea whose waves are dreams. The night was wearing on, the lights
gleamed from the anchored vessels, the water rippled serenely against
the low sea-wall, the breeze blew gently in. Marian's baby breathing
grew deeper and more tranquil; and as all the sorrows of the weary
earth might be imagined to exhale themselves in spring through the
breath of violets, so I prayed that it might be with Kenmure's burdened
heart, through hers. By degrees the strong man's deeper respirations
mingled with those of the child, and their two separate beings seemed
merged and solved into identity, as they slumbered, breast to breast,
beneath the golden and quiet stars. I passed by without awaking them,
and I knew that the artist had attained his dream.

IN A WHERRY.

We have a phrase in Oldport, "What New-Yorkers call poverty: to be
reduced to a pony phaeton." In consequence of a November gale, I am
reduced To a similar state of destitution, from a sail-boat to a
wherry; and, like others of the deserving poor, I have found many
compensations in my humbler condition. Which is the more enjoyable,
rowing or sailing? If you sail before the wind, there is the glorious
vigor of the breeze that fills your sails; you get all of it you have
room for, and a ship of the line could do no more; indeed, your very
nearness to the water increases the excitement, since the water swirls
and boils up, as it unites in your wake, and seems to clutch at the low