r faithful and
devoted nurse, our good and matchless Peggy. To her unsleeping
vigilance, her strong heart and untiring arm, I owe in a great measure
the restoration of my health, or rather the preservation of my life; my
health was never entirely renovated.

"When you were about five or six months old, St. James came to me with a
troubled countenance. He was summoned away, very unexpectedly. He would
probably be obliged to go as far as Texas before his return; he might be
absent a month. Business of a perplexing nature, which it was impossible
to explain then, called him from me, but he would shorten as much as
possible the days of absence which would be dreary and joyless to him. I
was overwhelmed with grief at the thought of his leaving me; my nerves
were still weak, and I wept in all the abandonment of sorrow. I feared
for him the dangers that beset the path of the traveller--sickness,
death; but I feared not for his honor or truth. I relied upon his
integrity, as I did upon the promises of the Holy Scriptures. I did hot
urge him to explain the motives of his departure, satisfied that they
were just and honorable.

"Oh! little did I think,--when he clasped me in a parting embrace when
he committed us both so tenderly and solemnly to the guardianship of our
Heavenly Father,--little did I think I should so soon seek to rend him
from my heart as a vile, accursed monster; that I should shrink from the
memory of his embraces as from the coils of the serpent, the fangs of
the wolf. God in his mercy veils the future, or who could bear the
burden of coming woe!

"A few days after his departure, as I was seated in the nursery,
watching your innocent witcheries as you lay cradled in the lap of
Peggy, I was told a lady wished to see me. It was too early an hour for
fashionable calls, and I went into the parlor expecting to meet one of
those ministering spirits, who go about on errands of mercy, seeking the
aid of the rich for the wants of the poor.

"A lady was standing with her back to the door, seemingly occupied in
gazing at a picture over the mantel-piece, an exquisite painting of St.
James. Her figure was slight and graceful, and she struck me at once as
having a foreign air. She turned round at my entrance, exhibiting a pale
and agitated countenance; a countenance which though not beautiful, was
painfully interesting. She had a soft olive complexion, and a full
melancholy black eye, surcharged with tears.

"I motion