Rose was not naturally timid, and I suspect assumed more bravery than she really felt; and so making a great torch of the hickory bark, she said if I would go with her she would go, and, laughing, we set out together. The torch grew dimmer in the rain as we went across the brook, treading on the sandstones that stood above the water by the spearmint spring, and up the slope of the hill. Rose stopped once or twice and whirled the bundle of bark round and round to give the flame a new impetus, and when we came within a dozen yards of the rose-bush, held it high above her head that we might see a little in advance of us. We did see distinctly, not only the brier-bush, but something beside it that seemed like a woman, haggard, and clad in pale-colored

We did not wait to be assured of what we saw, but ran back fleetly enough, Rose dropping the torch or the rain beating it out, I forget which-I only know we plashed through the water in the dark.

Amos did not laugh, for he was not a little superstitious himself, and examining the priming of his gun came within the shelter of our hut, having first brightened the fire and whistled the fragment of a gay tune. "Now I guess you will believe," he said, and from the earnestness of his manner, and the drops of sweat along his fore

The night set in dismal enough, as the clouds and the damp soughing winds had foretold; and the slow falling of the rain on our leafy roof, the trickle of the brooks along their stony beds, and the noise of the winds in the thickets and the tree-tops all blent together, and seemed to us a melancholy moaning, for, to say truth, we were greatly more afraid with our protector, as Amos called himself, than we should have been alone. And sitting there in the rude shelter before the great blazing fire, the rain now and then dropping on our heads, Amos told us the following ghost story, to amuse us, as he said, but I suspect now it was rather to annoy us and retaliate upon Rose for her plain speech. Our hut, I said, was in part composed of the planks and boards which had once made a house. I could remember my-garments. self when it stood without inhabitant, but in pretty good repair, about the distance of a stone's throw from our camp; a spring, almost choked with spearmint and iron-weeds, was yet bubbling up a few steps from where the stones of the chimney lay, and we had picked bits of earthenware and searched for more precious treasures about the ruins many a time. We knew, too, that two brothers named Alerton had once lived in the log-house, and that one of them had died there. Some other facts with which we were conversant the story-teller adhered to, giving thus to his narration an air of probability, which oth-head, it was evident that he believed at any rate. erwise it would not have had. How the young men had chanced to live in the woods alone, Amos asserted was unknown to him. Whether he spoke truth I know not; but it never occurred to me to make inquiry on the subject elsewhere, and I have no means at hand of knowing now. I only know that an old house stood in my father's woods when I was a child, and that earlier than I could remember two brothers named Edward and Albert Alerton lived there together. But to the story. Amos began by asking us if we had never seen the ghost of Albert walking about the camp of gloomy nights, and he peered out curiously as he spoke, as though he expected to see him. You know, I suppose, he continued, that he is buried yonder on the hill-side where the sweet-brier grows? We knew of the sweetbrier, but said there was no grave-mound there. "No," said Amos, "but there is a hollow there; for when the grave was sunken it was never filled, and the wild rose was planted there by Betty Gardener," for that he saw her digging and setting it one moonlight night himself, as he drove the sheep home away from the wolves.

"Go now, if you dare," said Amos, "and see if there is not a sunken grave beside the brier."

We quite forgot to ask who Betty Gardener was, till, in the course of the story, it was unfolded.

"I don't see how he happened to be buried there," said Rose, now taking it for granted that Albert was buried as Amos had said, "and why he should come back to the earth, if he does come; was he wicked, or why can't he rest?"

Wicked!" repeated Amos, "he was the best be in the world, for he was only twenty when he died-such a sweet temper and such a fair face never went together before. His eyes were brown as a bird's, and his hair of the same hue, only touched with sunshine, and the smile of his lips was sweet as that of a woman," and in his earnestness the rough man paid a compliment to the sex, which, in his more habitual mood, he would have been far from doing. "All his ways were gentle like a child,” he went on to say, and that his hands were as white as a lily; and that while his brother Edward hunted in the woods with his gun and dogs, Albert would dig flowers or gather berries of fruits, or sit in the sunshine reading books of poetry.

"No, no, he was good as he could be," repeated Amos, "and once I told him the biggest lie I

1

could discover the ghost, "finding more game than we could well get home. The snow fell all day, so that when we crossed tracks we knew them to be fresh, and counted an addition to our treasures. Once crossing Mother Gardener's fields, as in derision we called the old woman, we saw her splitting back-logs half a mile from the house, and Edward, playfully leveling his piece, said he had a mind to make a target of her, and if he had poor Albert would have been the better off." Again Amos stopped to listen and poke the fire, but seeing nothing, and hearing nothing, he reseated himself and resumed.

"The sun set clear, the snow half a foot deep by this time; and the moon coming up full and round we kept up our sport for two or three hours, and so intent on it were we that Albert was scarcely thought of. The wind was still, and it was as clear and intensely cold as I ever saw it; and as I blew on my numb fingers I thought what Albert must have suffered, and felt a twinge. Coming in sight of the house we saw no light, and I had just remarked it, when Edward plied, "There he is now, just before us; he has been to Mother Gardener's for milk; don't you hear him striking on the pitcher?'

"He was not more than thirty yards in advance of us, and from the sound seemed to be striking the pitcher with his knuckles as he walked. 'Halloo!' said I, 'how many apples did you get? but no voice replied. 'O don't think to deceive us,' said Edward, 'we know you have been to Mother Gardener's, and let the fire go out at home; stop and tell us how is Betty! Such a dismal groan made answer as I never heard, and we both hurried forward to see what was the matter; but though we nearly run we gained not a whit, the boy keeping just so far in advance. 'Very well,' said Edward, halting, 'we are not so anxious to join you as you may think;' and here came such another groan as a dying man might make, and the youth staggered one way and another as if sick or faint.

window sill, and, looking in the direction of Mother Gardener's, howled out aloud three or four times, and striking a light we saw the China pitcher empty, and, as usual, hanging on the peg over the jamb.

"We made a great fire, and had been warming by it more than an hour, Edward appearing a good deal uneasy about his brother, but still not going forth, when all at once the door opened and Albert came in, pale and staggering just as we had seen him.

"We saw at once this was no affectation, and hastened to make a bed for him; and when he lay down he moaned just as we heard him an hour before. Edward asked him a little sharply why he had not answered our call, and why, when so ill, he had lain down in the snow.

"He asked, in a whisper, for water; and having swallowed a large draught, he told us he had not seen us, nor heard us call, nor lain down in the snow, and said he had come directly from Mrs. Gardener's, pointing out the direction and solre-emnly assuring us that he had not been where we supposed we had seen him. Having swallowed another draught of water, he said he was on his way home, and being almost frozen came across Mrs. Gardener's farm; that she saw him from the window as he looked at the house in the hope that he might see Betty, and coming out asked him very kindly to go in and warm by the fire; that he did so, and that she gave him something to drink, which he believed was killing him; and that Betty, coming in as he drank, pulled the cup away from his lips, crying out, 'Good God, mother!' and that she herself had walked with him most of the way home, supporting and cheering him; but that it was so cold he had persuaded her to go back against her will, telling her he felt quite well. He said all this gasping for breath and in a whisper; and while we sought to help him in some way, we knew not how, the door opened hurriedly and Betty came in, and, regardless of us, took his head on her bosom and rocked him to and fro, telling him she loved him, and he must not die; that she could not live without him, and she put her hand on her head as though it were indeed cracking. He smiled when he could not speak any longer, and putting one arm around her neck drew down her headperhaps he kissed her, I don't know-and a moment afterward Betty called us to come and help him. Poor Albert! there had come a helper greater than we.

"We thought he was practicing upon us, and spoke no more; and presently, being near the house, he turned aside and sat down where the brier-bush now grows. The moon shone full in his face as he turned, and seeing that it was indeed Albert, we told him he would have a cold bed, and would find it for his interest to come in, upon which he groaned again more piteously than before. Taking no further heed of him we passed into the house, where all was dark and lonesome enough.

"Rover rose from the corner on our entrance, and seeing not Albert threw his fore-paws on the

"When we had straightened him for the grave, and closed his eyes and mouth, we covered him with a sheet, and making torches, like those you

made to-night, we went out to the hill-side, think- | them, for that he was afraid to go alone I suspect, ing perhaps the poor boy had not known what and Rosalie and I were left to protect ourselves he said, and that after all it had been him that from fright as we best could. We began by talkwe saw. Our own tracks lay fresh, but there ing loud and making the blaze very bright; but were no others; and where we had seen him lie when the fire was mended and we sat down, we down, the snow was white and level without the found it difficult to keep up a steady conversaslightest imprint at all. Of course we knew it tion, and every now and then caught ourselves | was no mortal thing we had seen, but a shadow, listening for the steps of our father, we said; but as it were, sent to tell us of the death that was to own the truth, it was more in memory of what coming. we had seen, or supposed we had seen by the grave.

"All that night, and all the next day, and till the morning of the day after, Betty sat by the coffin still as a stone, speaking not for any thing that was said to her, her eyes tearless and her mouth rigid as though it would never smile again.

The rain was still falling slowly, and the night so dark that we could not see at all beyond the circle of the firelight; we had been left alone much longer than we had expected to be; and far from the house, the grave at hand, and the ghost story still ringing in our ears, it is no wonder we were afraid.

Two or three times I thought I heard footsteps along the damp leaves before I dare say so; for the sound was not in the direction we expected our father to come. At length I became so alarmed that I could not forbear asking Rose if she heard any thing, when she owned that she had heard the noise I spoke of for some time past, but that it must be a sheep or a cow astray from the flock. She said this to quiet me, but I did not believe it, nor she either. The step was too light and stealthy to be that of an animal; and yet what mortal would be walking alone in the rainy woods at night? and yet that some one was walking so we could no longer disbelieve. Our rude house, as I said, was open at one side, so that it could afford us no protection from an evil-disposed person, if such a one were hovering about us. We listened for the firm, fearless step we expected over the hill, but in that direction all was still, while between us and the grave we distinctly heard the slow, light treading. While we whispered together as to what we should do, we beheld standing in the edge of the light, but not plainly visible, something that looked very like the figure we had seen by the

"By Edward's direction a grave was digged a few steps from the door; he would not be so lonesome, he said, with Albert so near. He was buried there, and Edward might as well have been buried, too, for all the best part of him seemed to go with Albert; his gun grew rusty, and he neglected all the sports he used to enjoy so much, never jesting or smiling, or caring for his old companions any more. He would sit moody in the corner reading his brother's books day after day, and when the spring came round he would sometimes sit at the door and play the flute that used to be Albert's; but all the neighbors said the music was not like the old music. One night hearing the flute, I went across the fields and found him, thinking perhaps he would be glad of mortal company, having had only the dead so long. He spoke civilly enough, but seemed little glad to see me, playing on or musing the same as if I had not been there. All at once there was a noise, like some one digging, by Albert's grave, and looking in that direction, there, sure enough, was a woman setting a bush-her black hair blowing wildly about her shoulders; for it was a rough March night—clouds, and moonlight, and wind, all flying about together. Of course it was Betty Gardener; and when she had planted her rose, the old dog-black Rover-grave. We waited no longer, but stealing out of that was lying at Edward's feet got up and joined her, and the two went away silently together."

At this juncture of the story footsteps and merry voices were heard, and the next moment two or three young lads of the neighborhood. joined us at the camp-fire. All the tenderness and pathos of manner which had accompanied the story-telling, Amos dropped at once, and assumed the bullying, bragging behavior that characterized him. The lads were on their way home from a singing school, and when they went forward, which they did presently, Amos joined

the house gained the hill-top by a little circuit, and ran nimbly toward the lane leading to the house. When we dare look back to see if we were pursued, we heard the reassuring step of our father, and when we told him what we had seen, he said it was likeliest our fancy or the winds, or both together, or at most Amos himself lingering about to frighten us. Whatever it was we were not afraid to return with him and ascertain. It surprised us a little that he should walk right forward, never stopping to listen or look about at all, not even when we reached the hill