“He is safe, and we can well afford to laugh at them,” she answered, “all I hope is that he may never be taken prisoner again.”

“I do not believe he will relish the idea, much less the reality of such a thing again occurring,” observed Dr. Humphries.  “However,” he continued, “he will be here to-morrow, and the little cloud that his capture had sent over our happiness, will have been removed, and all will again be bright.”

As he concluded speaking, a servant entered with a letter containing a summons to attend a patient, and Dr. Humphries kissing his daughter once more, left the house.

CHAPTER FIFTEENTH.

ARRIVAL OF HARRY.

The next day Emily prepared herself to welcome the return of her lover, while Dr. Humphries proceeded to the railroad depot to meet him.  In the meantime, we will give our readers a brief account of Harry’s escape.

After leaving Chicago, Harry made his way through the country towards the Tennessee river.  His journey was a dangerous one, for the people of Illinois where then highly elated at the successes which had attended the Yankee arms, and the few sympathisers that the South had in their midst, were afraid to express their sympathies.  He, luckily, however, succeeded in finding out a worthy gentleman, who not only befriended him, but furnished the necessary means for his journey, and procured a passport for him to visit Nashville.  Prepared for a continuation of his travel, Harry, who had been staying at the residence of his noble hearted host for three days, bade him adieu, and started on his way to Nashville.  On arriving at Frankfort, Kentucky, he met with a man he had become acquainted with in Mississippi, but who, on account of his strong Union proclivities, was compelled to leave the South at the commencement of the war.  This creature immediately recognized Harry, and knowing that he had always been an ardent Secessionist, conjectured that he was either a spy, or an escaped prisoner.  Harry was accordingly arrested and carried before the military authorities, but his persistent denial of any knowledge of the man who had caused his arrest, and the passport he had received from the generous Illinoisan, induced the Yankee officer by whom he was examined, to release him, and permit his departure for Nashville.

Harry had many hair breadth escapes from detection and capture, but surmounting all the dangers which beset his path, he succeeded In reaching the Confederate lines in safety, and immediately started for Jackson.  But one thing marred the joy he experienced at his daringly won freedom, and that was his ignorance of Alfred’s fate.  Had not the love of freedom been too strong in his breast, he would have returned and endeavored to find his friend, but the success of his escape, and the idea that Alfred may have pursued a different road, deterred him from so doing.  He determined, however, to make enquiry on his return to Jackson, whether his friend had arrived there, he having promised Harry to call on Dr. Humphries after they should arrive in the Confederate lines.  He was not aware of the wound his friend had received, for though the Chicago papers made a notice of the attempted escape, and wounding of one of the prisoners, the notice was never seen by him, as he had no opportunity of getting a newspaper.