"Well, we will go now," returned Jenny; "and," added she, "there are a few plums on the old tree that we will take with us, though they are not half ripe yet; and perhaps we may get somebody to give us as much for them as will get bread enough to keep us from starving at least one day longer." A little basket was soon filled with the plums, and they set out, once more cheered by that hope which seldom totally forsakes the bosom of youth and innocence: but, on arriving at the owner's, Jenny was surprised to find all in a state of confusion. The servant that came to the door was evidently much agitated, and on Jenny's making her accustomed inquiry if any thing had yet been heard of the ship, she was told by the girl that a letter had, a very short time before, been received by her mistress, informing her that some wrecks of the vessel had been cast ashore, and some of the sailors' chests, among which was one bearing the name of William Anderson; and that there was every reason to believe that all the crew were lost. Here then was a fatal blow to all the fond hopes that Jenny had so anxiously cherished; and her affectionate brother, on whom she had relied for support and consolation in the hour of affliction, had himself found a premature and watery grave. The servant's sympathy was too powerfully excited for the distress of her mistress, whose husband had filled the double station of master and owner, to leave much to bestow upon poor Jenny; so that, after giving her all the information in her power, she turned from the door, leaving the two orphan sisters to themselves to mourn over their share of this heavy calamity. Jenny turned her steps homeward, with a heart bowed down with affliction, and was only made conscious of where she was and whither she was going, by the questions that Sally occasionally put to her. "Look at that black cloud, Jenny," said the child, "I never saw such a cloud before. Do you think we can get home before the rain comes on?" Jenny looked up and saw that the sky had indeed a most portentous aspect; but the gloom that surrounded her only seemed to be in unison with the state of her mind, and she almost felt rejoiced that nature did not wear the appearance of gladness, whilst she felt that all was darkness within. "Isn't that thunder?" asked Sally, as a deep and distant murmur rolled round the horizon. "And there is lightning, and there is another flash," continued the child; "Oh! I wish we were at home." Jenny saw the lightning and heard the thunder, but she heard and saw almost without being conscious that she did either; for her mind was absorbed in the idea of her beloved brother having been exposed to a storm, such as that which was approaching, accompanied with the additional horrors of a tempestuous ocean. A violent gust of wind now swept past them, and the thunder which, only a moment before, had rolled at a distance, burst over their heads with a noise which seemed to shake the very ground on which they stood; whilst the clouds brooded around in almost midnight darkness, or only parted to emit flashes of lightning, that, for the instant, illumined every object.
"Oh! Jenny, what must we do?" cried the little Sally, shrinking with fear, and putting her hands to her ears to shut out the noise of the thunder. Jenny put her arm round the neck of the child, and pressed her tenderly toward her, as, looking up at the forked shafts which flew across the skies, she inwardly breathed the prayer that he who rolls the thunderbolt and sends the lightning forth, if it was his pleasure that they should either of them fall beneath the stroke, would in his mercy let them sink together; and not leave one remaining, the helpless or wretched survivor of the other.
Jenny perhaps never looked more beautiful or interesting than she did at that moment, as she stood turning her back to a storm which she no longer felt the power to resist, her arm passed with an almost maternal tenderness round the neck of her orphan sister, who seemed to rest against her as if assured that she was under the care of a protecting angel; and her fine eyes raised to heaven with a mingled expression of steadfast faith and humble submission. "My mother! my dear William!" she faintly uttered, "perhaps these shafts of lightning are sent as the messengers of our re-union." As she said this, a voice seemed to be borne along on the wind, and she almost fancied that she heard her own name pronounced. "It is a wild thought," she continued internally, "but I could almost imagine that William's voice is in the wind, and that he is calling me to join him and our blessed mother in the regions above." Again the voice sounded in her ear, and again, and again—it grew louder and more distinct—what could it mean? Was she already in the region of spirits? or were those angelic beings really permitted, as has sometimes been imagined, to revisit this world and hover over those whom they had loved on earth? As she asked herself the question, she turned round, but what words can express her feelings when, on doing so, she beheld, hastening toward her with all the speed that the violence of the storm would permit, the beloved brother whom she had believed to be the inmate of a watery grave! Her mind had been strung to too high a degree of agony, and she was too much exhausted from the want of food, to bear this sudden revulsion of feeling without sinking under it. She uttered a scream, and made an attempt to rush forward, but her limbs became powerless, a film came over her eyes, and she would have sunk on the ground, had not William reached her in time to receive her in his arms. So deep was the swoon into which she had fallen, that there was time for her to be conveyed to a house that was at no very great distance, before her consciousness again returned to her. When it did, she started up, and looked eagerly around, as if to assure herself that the object she had seen had not been a mere vision of the imagination; but she was soon convinced of the happy reality, for her eye immediately rested on her beloved William as he stood trying to still the cries of the little Sally, who could not be convinced that the insensible state in which Jenny lay was not equally hopeless as that which she had first witnessed at the time of her mother's death.
A copious flood of tears now came to Jenny's relief, which she was permitted to indulge for a considerable time without interruption, and then her brother led her gradually on to speak of their mother, and describe the particulars of a death of which little Sally had already informed him; after which, he proceeded to satisfy her curiosity respecting himself. It appeared that a long continuation of high and contrary winds had kept the vessel buffeting about the ocean for many weeks, till at length a storm, too powerful to be resisted, had driven her on the coast, where she soon became a total wreck. Happily for William, however, he had been so fortunate as not only to save his own life, but that of his captain also, who had become so completely benumbed with cold and long exposure to the storm, as to be totally incapable of assisting himself, and must have been an unresisting prey to the angry waves, had not the generous youth determined to try to save him, even at the most imminent hazard of his own life. After many difficulties and dangers, he succeeded in gaining a footing on shore for both his captain and himself, but it was a considerable time before the former was able to proceed homeward; but when he was, they hastened on in the hope of preceding the news of their misfortunes. The letter, however, giving an account of the portions of the wreck which had been washed on shore, on a part of the coast at some distance from that on which they had landed, had arrived a short time before them; indeed, they had reached the captain's house only a very few minutes after Jenny and her little sister had left it, and William had lost no time in hastening after them. "We have weathered a heavy gale," said he, after he had given his sisters this account, "but it is all over now; and what is better, our captain declares he will never go to sea again, but will give me the command of the new vessel which he is going to have built. He says that I saved his life, and he is determined to prove a father to me in return."
"Oh! my mother," cried Jenny, clasping her hands and raising her eyes in thankfulness to Heaven, "why are you not here to enjoy this happy moment!"
"And why should you not, my dear girl," said the lady into whose house Jenny had been carried, and who had listened with great interest to the conversation between the brother and sister; "why should you not believe not only that she sympathizes in your happiness, but that her views of the great scheme of Providence are now so enlarged, as to render her capable of perceiving that, what we here call evils, are as mere motes in the balance, when put in competition with the great sum of happiness which awaits the virtuous hereafter? Upon the benevolent plan on which all creation is formed, the petty distinctions of rich and poor, high and low, on which we are apt to place so much importance, will soon be lost in the grand and comprehensive distinctions of virtue and vice; to which standard alone, all will be brought, and which may at once place the humblest peasant above the proudest monarch."
"Yes! yes! Jenny," said the young sailor, "we know that whatever storms may beset us, we still have a never-failing Friend, always at hand, who will steer us to a safe harbour at last. So come, my sweet lilly and my pretty rose-bud," added he, taking a hand of each of his sisters, "cheer up, my girls! for, though the winds still blow and the skies frown, by the blasts of poverty, at least, you shall never more be assailed, as long as your brother's arm has power to protect you."
THE MYSTERIOUS PICTURE.
TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH.