which were sufficient to convince him that she was not so unsuspecting as he had imagined. From that time his manner changed, and before she recovered his neglect became so marked that a return of the fever was feared in consequence of the effect on her nerves.
The elder slave woman, who had been so aggrieved at being separated from her mistress, was now permitted to attend her, and nursed her as tenderly as a mother. When the patient was so far convalescent as to talk without injury, she besought Chrissy, her nurse, to relate her history.
"Not now, honey," she replied, "for it is a long, sad story, and 'pears like it might give you a misery somewhere. There now honey, lie down and rest you and I'll sing the New Jerusalem."
As the shrill notes of her sonorous voice rung out clear and loud upon the evening air, accompanied by that swaying motion of the body which attends their highest state of exaltation, Mrs. Carleton was reminded of an old legend familiar to the days of her childhood, of an elfish looking woman who was said to inhabit a certain retired locality in her native city, where her wild song often resounded through the midnight air, though no one was ever able to trace her home, where she came from or what became of her. Her sleep that night was disturbed by fearful forebodings of the future, until towards morning when a quiet slumber was varied with pleasant dreams of home, a home such as it should be, where in the society of her two children, her time was divided between her attentions to them
