PAUL'S FIRST CRUISE IN THE FAWN.
At breakfast time the next morning, John Duncan was among the missing. His mother had charged him, when he first got up, to study his Sunday school lesson, which, in the extraordinary excitement of the preceding evening, had been neglected. Paul searched for him in their chamber, and in all the other apartments of the house; but he was not to be found.
Neither Paul nor his mother had any fears that he had run away or committed suicide; so that his absence produced more of indignation than alarm.
"He must have gone down to the boat," suggested Mrs. Duncan.
"If he has, I will throw him overboard."
"O, no, my son! you would not do that."
"He has no business on board the boat on Sunday."
"That is very true, Paul; but I suppose he cannot keep his thoughts away from her. I don't much wonder, either."
"I don't know as I am very much surprised myself," added Paul, whose second thought was more reasonable than the first.
When he considered how many times his thoughts had wandered to the beautiful Fawn, and how many times he had permitted himself to anticipate the pleasure of the first cruise in her, during the morning, he was more charitable towards his younger brother, who had only done what he had thought.