lines to their repose upon the yellow sand; their surface occasionally rippled by the eddying breeze as it swept along; his own little skiff safe at her moorings, undulating with the swell; the sea-gulls, who but a few hours ago were screaming with dismay as they buffeted against the fury of the gale, now skimming on the waves, or balanced on the wing near to their inaccessible retreats; the carolling of the smaller birds on every side of him, produced a lightness of heart and quickened pulse, to which Edward Forster had latterly been a stranger.

He soon arrived at the cottage, where the sound of his footsteps brought out the fisherman and his wife, the latter bearing in her arms the little object of his solicitude.

“See, Mr Forster,” said Jane, holding out the infant, “it’s quite well and hearty, and does nothing but smile.  What a lovely babe it is!”

Forster looked at the child, who smiled, as if in gratitude; but his attention was called away by the Newfoundland dog, who fawned upon him, and after having received his caresses, squatted down upon the sand, which he beat with his tail as he looked wistfully in Forster’s face.

Forster took the child from the arms of its new mother.  “Thou hast had a narrow escape, poor thing,” said he, and his countenance assumed a melancholy cast as the ideas floated in his mind.  “Who knows how many more perils may await thee?  Who can say whether thou art to be restored to the arms of thy relatives, or to be left an orphan to a sailor’s care?  Whether it had not been better that the waves should have swallowed thee in thy purity, than thou shouldest be exposed to a heartless world of sorrow and of crime?  But He who willed thee to be saved knows best for us who are in darkness;” and Forster kissed its brow, and returned it to the arms of Jane.

Having made a few arrangements with Robertson and his wife, in whose care he resolved at present to leave the child, Forster bent his steps towards the promontory, that he might ascertain if any part of the vessel remained.  Stretching over the summit of the cliff, he perceived that several of the lower futtocks and timbers still hung together, and showed themselves above water.  Anxious to obtain some clue to her identity, he prepared to descend by a winding and hazardous path which he had before surmounted.  In a quarter of an hour he had gained a position close to the wreck; but, with the exception of the shattered remnant which was firmly wedged between the rocks, there was nothing to be seen; not a fragment of her masts and spars, or sails, not a relic of what once was life remained.  The tide, which ran furiously round the promontory, had swept them all away, or the undertow of the deep water had buried every detached particle, to be delivered up again, “far, far at sea.”  All that Forster could ascertain was that the vessel was foreign built, and of large tonnage; but who were its unfortunate tenants, or