bleak and shelterless country affords,
stretching my chilled limbs to meet the
genial influence, and imbibing the warmth
at every pore, when my comfortable
meditations were interrupted by a long
and sonorous ringing at the door-bell
evidently effected by no timid hand.

A messenger had arrived to request my
attendance at the Lodge--such was the
name which distinguished a small and
somewhat antiquated building, occupying
a peculiarly secluded position among the
bleak and heathy hills which varied the
surface of that not altogether uninteresting
district, and which had, I believe, been
employed by the keen and hardy ancestors
of the O'Mara family as a convenient
temporary residence during the sporting
season.

Thither my attendance was required, in
order to administer to a deeply distressed
lady such comforts as an afflicted mind can
gather from the sublime hopes and consolations
of Christianity.

I had long suspected that the occupant
of this sequestered, I might say desolate,
dwelling-house was the poor girl whose