"We undressed the little thing, put her to bed, and gave her
something to drink; at all this she spoke not a word, but only turned
her eyes upon us--eyes blue and bright as sea or sky--and continued
looking at us with a smile.

"Next morning we had no reason to fear that she had received any
other harm than her wetting, and I now asked her about her parents,
and how she could have come to us. But the account she gave was both
confused and incredible. She must surely have been born far from
here, not only because I have been unable for these fifteen years to
learn anything of her birth, but because she then said, and at times
continues to say, many things of so very singular a nature, that we
neither of us know, after all, whether she may not have dropped among
us from the moon; for her talk runs upon golden castles, crystal
domes, and Heaven knows what extravagances beside. What, however,
she related with most distinctness was this: that while she was once
taking a sail with her mother on the great lake, she fell out of the
boat into the water; and that when she first recovered her senses,
she was here under our trees, where the gay scenes of the shore
filled her with delight.

"We now had another care weighing upon our minds, and one that caused
us no small perplexity and uneasiness. We of course very soon
determined to keep and bring up the child we had found, in place of
our own darling that had been drowned; but who could tell us whether
she had been baptized or not? She herself could give us no light on
the subject. When we asked her the question, she commonly made
answer, that she well knew she was created for God's praise and
glory, and that she was willing to let us do with her all that might