land. Their numbers had greatly increased since he first came among them, and the Indian haunts had retreated from before approaching civilization. They had prayed him to remain among them, to visit their sick and bury their dead, and they were kind to him in their own way. They had built his cabin, and furnished it with their own rude manufactures, and brought him presents of game from the forest, and fruit from their thriving farms. But, now the zeal of his first consecration was spent, he saw little fruit of all his labours; the wilderness had not yet blossomed as the rose. He longed for some one who could sympathize in his ardent desire to do good, and to encourage him to cast his “bread upon the waters.” He covered his face with his hands and prayed, communing with the only intelligence that could read his heart, and then he looked around him and still sighed.
Perhaps it was that he had seen the cheerful blaze from the fireside of some of his people, as he came homewards, and stopped to speak some playful word with the urchins before the door; but, as he sighed, he wondered if he could have been happier had he not denied to his starving heart all human, household love. “Perhaps I have wronged my nature,” he thought. “It may not be required of me to lead this lonely life.” And then—he never could tell what brought the recollection so vividly before him at that moment—there came a yearning thought of the little Miriam of years ago—his child-friend.
She must be a woman now, and beautiful and good. Perhaps she had already a home of her own, and her children about her. At any rate, she had forgotten him. If she had not, if she still remembered her childish promise to love him always—but no, he would not be so mad, so selfish, as to ask her to sacrifice her youth and beauty to his life of lonely privation. But he could not banish her from his mind, and he went in and unclasped the miniature he had not seen for many a day. It was a little faded now; but there were the earnest, serious look, and the soft curls, and the fond smile. How she had loved him! and he could almost feel her arms about his neck and her heart beating close to his. It was the isolation of spirit as well as outward life which had impressed
