"It is a gloomy morning, dearest Nell," said she, shivering; "the winter seems about to begin at last."
"Stay, I will shut the window; the sun is struggling with the clouds at present, but I am sure it will clear up by and by. You don't—you don't leave us—the word must out—till evening."
"Don't cry!" said Madeline, half weeping herself; and sitting down, she drew Ellinor to her, and the two sisters who had never been parted since birth, exchanged tears that were natural, though scarcely the unmixed tears of grief.
"And what pleasant evenings we shall have!" said Madeline, holding her sister's hands, "in the Christmas time. You will be staying with us, you know; and that pretty old room in the north of the house, Eugene has already ordered to be fitted up for you. Well, and then my dear father, and dear Walter who will be returned long ere then, will walk over to see us, and praise my
