from his unhappy daughter, and rubbed his
hands gleefully as the glad tidings came that the rebellion had been
quelled. The old lady shared his happiness with all her heart, but
mingled with her joy some of the harmless vanity of her nature. She
attributed the happy result in a good degree to the counsel and wisdom
of her husband, and recurred with great delight to her own bountiful
hospitality to the fugitive loyalists. Nay, in the excess of her
self-gratulation, she even hinted an opinion, that if Colonel Temple had
remained in England, the cause of loyalty would have been much advanced,
and that General Monk would not have borne away the palm of having
achieved the glorious restoration.

But these loyal sentiments of gratulation met with no response in the
heart of Virginia Temple. The exciting scenes through which she had
lately passed had left their traces on her young heart. No more the
laughing, thoughtless, happy girl whom we have known, shedding light and
gaiety on all around her, she had gained, in the increased strength and
development of her character, much to compensate for the loss. The
furnace which evaporates the lighter particles of the ore, leaves the
precious metal in their stead. Thus is it with the trying furnace of
affliction in the formation of the human character, and such was its
effect upon Virginia. She no longer thought or felt as a girl. She felt
that she was a woman, called upon to act a woman's part; and relying on
her strengthened nature, but more upon the hand whose protection she had
early learned to seek, she was prepared to act that part. The fate of
Hansford was unknown to her. She had neither seen nor heard from him
since that awful night, when she parted from him at the gate of
Jamestown. Convinced of his high sense of honour, and his heroic daring,
she knew that he was the last to desert a falling cause, and she
trembled for his life, should he fall into the hands of the enraged and
relentless Berkeley. But even if her fears in this respect were
groundless, the future was still dark to her. The bright dream which she
had cherished, that he to whom, in the trusting truth of her young
heart, she had plighted her troth, would share with her the joys and
hopes of life, was now, alas! dissipated forever. A proscribed rebel, an
outcast from home, her father's loyal prejudices were such that she
could never hope to unite her destiny with Hansford. And yet, dreary as
the future had becom