For weeks an investigation and search, led by himself, was followed up; but it proved without success. Those who have known the blank that follows the death of an idolized child—the uneasy void, the sense of desolation that will come when something beloved is missed at every turn—they can faintly guess how those unhappy parents pined as their faint and shadowy hope deferred from day to day till their hearts grew sick. With the mother, a removal from the scene of her late bereavement was tried, in order to discover whether change of place would rouse or cheer her. But alas! she was henceforth the same—a broken-hearted woman. The sympathy felt for her in the village was profound. As she appeared among them those who met her drew back to make way for her, and give her a softened greeting. Some shook her kindly by the hand, some stood uncovered as she glided by, and many cried, “God help you!” as she passed along.
Months passed on, and still no tidings of Frank Winthrop cheered the ears of the villagers. Years, too, in their course, gradually rolled on, and many changes were witnessed in the settlement—the old died and were buried—new children were added to the colonists—the young began to approach the season of maturity—yet still the vanished one was seen not, and tidings of him were heard in that place no more.
——
CHAPTER IV.
I struck in a pathway half-worn o’er the sod
By the feet that went up to the worship of God.
* * * * *
Such language as his I may never recall,
But his theme was salvation, salvation to all—
And the souls of his hearers in ecstacy hung