uch,
though never felt but once before. I looked up involuntarily, and met
the eyes of Ernest Linwood, who was standing close to the seat I
occupied. I did not know he was there. He had wedged the crowd silently,
gradually, till he reached the spot he had quitted soon after our
entrance, to greet his former class mates. I knew by his countenance
that he had heard all, and a sick, deadly feeling came over me. He, to
hear my mother's name made a byword and reproach, myself alluded to as
the indigent daughter of an outcast,--he, who seemed already lifted as
high above me on the eagle wings of fortune, as the eyry of the
king-bird is above the nest of the swallow,--it was more than I could
bear.

I said I knew by his countenance that he had heard all. I never saw such
an expression as his face wore,--such burning indignation, such
withering scorn. I trembled to think of the central fires from which
such flames darted. As he caught my glance, an instantaneous change came
over it. Compassion softened every lineament. Still his eye of power
held me down. It said, "be quiet, be calm,--I am near, be not afraid."

"I wish I could get you a glass of water," said he, in a low voice, for
I suppose I looked deadly pale; "but it would be impossible I fear in
this crowd,--the aisles are impenetrable."

"Thank you," I answered, "there is no need,--but if I could only leave."

I looked despairingly at the masses of living beings on every side,
crowding the pews, filling the aisles, standing on the window-sills, on
the tops of the pews, leaning from the gallery,--and felt that I was a
prisoner. The sultry air of August, confined in the chapel walls, and
deprived of its vital principle by so many heaving lungs, weighed
oppressively on mine. I could feel behind me the breathing of the lips
of slander, and it literally seemed to scorch me. Ernest took my fan
from my hand and fanned me without intermission, or I think I must have
fainted.

As I sat with downcast eyes, whose drooping lashes were heavy with
unshed tears, I saw a glass of water held before me by an unsteady hand.
I looked up and saw Richard Clyde, his student's robe of flowing black
silk gathered up by his left arm, who had literally forced his way
through a triple row of men. We were very near the platform, there being
but one row of pews between.

I drank the water eagerly, gratefully. Even before those blistering
words were uttered, I had felt as if a glass of cold wat