hammock was then soon rigged. A long line was attached to one end of this hammock, in order to be used for the ship, while a similar one was fastened to the other end. Two of the most agile of the party were now selected to go off to the vessel. This they effected by traversing the cable, which they did with an agility that only sailors possess. It would have made any other description of person giddy to have crossed that awful abyss on a support so slender and vibratory. We will not detain the reader by a tiresome recital of the rest of that eventful history. For, after the impromptu apparatus had been once securely rigged, the deliverance of Kate and her aunt was merely an affair of time. Kate insisted on being left till the last. There was some difficulty in getting her still terrified aunt to the bow of the ship, and more in placing her safely in the hammock; but as her assistants had the precaution to lash her tightly in, so that she should not, in a moment of frenzied panic, leap from her frail couch, she reached the land without further hindrance. Kate followed. With unmoved nerve she stepped into the frail car, disposed herself so as to preserve its equilibrium, and holding firmly to it, was borne ashore with a rapidity that seemed almost like flying. The two watermen now lost no time in abandoning the vessel. It was wise that they made such haste, for, in less than half an hour, and before the party had been able to prepare their boat for making sail again, the stout old craft, succumbing at last to the angry surges, parted in the middle, and rapidly broke into fragments. 7 CHAPTER IX. SWEETWATER. "Sweet Auburn! loveliest village of the plain, Where smiling Spring its earliest visit paid, And parting Summer's lingering blooms delay'd, Dear, lovely bowers of innocence and ease, Seats of my youth, where every sport could please.-Goldsmith. NEAR One of the affluents of the river, off whose mouth occurred the transactions recorded in the preceding chapters, stands the village, or rather hamlet, of Sweetwater. It is one of those quiet, solitary spots, nestled by lake and wood, which makes visitors from cities so passionately in love with the country. Situated about half way between the Delaware and the Atlantic, and surrounded for miles on miles by an almost unbroken forest, it is effectually shut out from the roar and tumult of the great world. The very atmosphere breathes of peace and happiness. seem to shine there more gently than anywhere else. A dreamy languor pervades the place, as if amid the drowsy hum of bees and the low gurgle of cool waters, life would pass like one long, delicious, summer afternoon. The stars The few dwellings which Sweetwater boasts-and more would destroy the magical quiet of the place-are ranged around one end of the pond, which forms the chief beauty of the location. An open space, something like a village green, lies between them and the water, only here, instead of being covered with sward, it is of the whitest and purest sand; and no one, who has not visited it, can imagine the fine effect of this snowy bit of landscape, relieved on one side by the translucent lake, and on the other by the dark pine woods. At the northern end of the hamlet stands an old mill, whose waste-gate is raised for most of the year, so that, look over the little bridge when you will, the water will be seen gliding darkly underneath, as it shoots roaring and flashing to meet the stream below. Full many a time, when we were a boy, have we leaned over the wooden rail which formed the parapet, and watched by the hour the white foam go whirling off down the creek, leaving a thousand glistening eddies under the gravelly banks. Beautiful Sweetwater! shall we ever again in this world experience the sweet calm which used to descend, dove-like, upon our spirit, as we sat musing by thee, listening to the pine-woods sigh in the evening breeze, while the moon walked up the heavens, or the stars twinkled in thy mirrored depths? After passing the hamlet and bridge, the road winds in front of a picturesque white mansion, situated in the rear of a garden built out into the pond. From the back of the edifice a flight of steps leads down into the water, where, when we knew the place, a light pinnace always lay, like a Venitian gondola. Embowered in green trees, and surrounded on three sides by the lake, that white mansion seems, with but little stretch of the imagination, like a swan nestling among green rushes. A few hundred rods further on, the road gains the head of the lake. Looking back from this point, the scene is one of rare loveliness. Before you stretches the pond, still, glassy, quiet, dream-like. Half way down its eastern side the mansion rises amid its shrubbery, as if on a fairy island about to float off into the lake. On the other side the tall pines cast their sombre shadows into the water. In the distance whole fields of white water-lilies cover the surface of the pond. Still further off, and at the very extremity of the vista in that direction, two or three blasted trees raise their tall, bleached skeletons, like grim sentinels guarding the pathless swamp in their rear, where, if tradition errs not, more than one wayfarer has lost his path and perished. Close by the head of the pond, in the centre of a grove of oaks thinned out from the original forest, is a white church edifice. Here, every Sunday, assemble the few inhabitants of Sweetwater, as well as those of a neighboring village, where, in the days of which we write, a foundry existed, at which cannon balls were cast for the patriot army. Beside the church is a grave-yard, surrounded by a rude fence, and shaded by oak trees. The birds build their nests undisturbed here, and the grass and wild flowers bloom and fade in peace. A few paces in the rear of the church runs a deep but narrow stream. This creek, flowing from a cedar-swamp near at hand, pours its rich, chocolate-colored waters between tortuous wooded banks; now slumbering in the deep shadows of some gigantic tree, whose half-bared roots stretch forth, talon-like, as if to grasp the ebbing tide; and now whirling around an abrupt corner, its polished surface glistening like burnished gold as it shoots into the sunshine. Here the long branch of some bush sways to and fro in the tide, and there the old trees arch greenly overhead. A delicious coolness hangs ever about that stream. On the hottest of summer days one may sit on the old gnarled root, at the end of the path leading down to the water, and listening to the purling of the quiet current, almost fancy himself far off among the gardens and fountains of Damascus. In the summer parlor of the mansion at Sweetwater, about a fortnight after the events narrated in the preceding chapters, sat Kate and her aunt. The windows were up, admitting the cool breeze from the water, and presenting an uninterrupted view of the pond in the direction of the little church, whose white walls, gleaming out from behind the trees, afforded a pleasant repose for the eye in the distance. Mrs. Warren sat, so far as dress could make her, in all the dignity and state of a dowager. Not a ruffle could be seen in her stomacher. Every hair in her powdered toupee was in its exact place, as firm and stiff as the clipped box trees in the garden. Her robe was spread majestically around her; and her hands lay crossed in her lap, on top of an open book, as if she had just ceased reading. Truth compels us to add that the good lady was drowsy, a condition not a little assisted by the hum of insects without, and by the almost inaudible plash of the water, as the faint breeze gently dashed it against the garden wall. Yet, even in this crisis, Mrs. Warren was not unmindful of what might be expected from her. Bravely did she struggle against the weakness of the flesh, waking up continually and looking fiercely around, as if to show that she was not sleepy in the least. But soon the lulling sounds would prove too much for her; her eyes would close languidly; her mouth would gradually open; and perhaps a sacrilegious snore would be heard, to Kate's infinite amusement. Then, all at once, her head would pitch forward, when, waking up with a start, she would renew her defiant glance, but only to subside again into a doze immediately. All this while Kate sat sewing, by a little table, on which stood a bouquet of fresh flowers, the choicest the season could afford. She wore a pretty morning dress of white cambric, which, fitting close to the bust, as was the mode, yet opening in front, revealed a stomacher of illusion, and then swept off in full and ample folds below the waist, parting on each side. before the elaborately worked petticoat. In the changes of fashion, an approximation has been made to the same style in our own day. Kate also wore a short sleeve, reaching to the elbow, with a fall of deep lace around it. One little foot peeped out from beneath her skirt, just revealing the silk stocking and the daintily-made high-heeled shoe. Her rich masses of hair fell curling over her shoulders in a style |