of his craft. He had learned that the baroness had some early connexions in Caen; and once landed at Port, he concluded that she would experience little difficulty in reaching that place, whence the journey to her native town would be short and easy. Having concerted his plan of operations, the faithful Jacques lost no time in reducing it to practice.

The baroness, whom her grateful hostess tended with affectionate care, sparing none of the simple restoratives her frugal housekeeping afforded, fell into a torpid slumber, that continued for three hours. During this time the wind had veered; and although the gale was violent, it blew in a direction so favourable to their voyage, that Jacques determined to risk the passage, rather than hazard the arrival of emissaries from the castle, the fire in which, as he ascertained from the summit of the cliff above his cottage, was now entirely extinguished. Intimation was therefore given to the little party, that they should accompany him to the beach.

Adeline, though more composed, received the summons to depart with frantic eagerness. Attired in a holiday garb belonging to dame Therese, which, for the double purpose of warmth and disguise, she preferred to her own clothes, she left the cot, leaning on the arm of the fisherman, who supported her faltering steps on board a large and powerful boat, constructed for deep sea-fishing, in which he had provided a sheltered retreat for the females, on a feather-bed under the half-deck. Hoisting a close-reefed sail, he put his boat before the wind; and favoured by the moon, which through the

broken masses of clouds yielded sufficient light, he was enabled, by long experience of the coast, to avail himself fully of a gale so propitious to his object. After a somewhat dangerous but rapid passage, they arrived off the coast of Normandy, and anchored in safety within view of the insulated cluster of houses which constitute the village of Port.

They had reached their destination about day-break. They went ashore as soon as the dawning light permitted, for the disordered mind of the baroness was still haunted by the fear of pursuit; and although worn and enfeebled by the stormy and comfortless passage, she insisted upon proceeding immediately to Caen. Leaving his wife and son, with his little property, in the hospitable charge of Therese's kinsman at Port, Jacques Verprey procured a light rustic vehicle for himself and the lady, and rattled over the pavement of the ancient capital of Lower Normandy, ere the shades of night had descended on the spires of its numerous and venerable churches.

The friend with whom Adeline proposed to sojourn for a few hours, was an old schoolfellow, the youthful widow of an advocate of the Cour Royale. Madame Prevost resided in a street hard by the church of St. Pierre, which her early companion had frequently attended in her society during the only time she had ever visited Caen. The lively appearance of the illuminated streets momentarily dispelled the torpor of extreme lassitude. A feeling of security began to animate her as she surveyed the crowded habitations of cheerful industry. She recognised the ornamented front of the

church of St. Pierre, and desired Jacques to stop before it and await her return. Entering the sacred edifice, she advanced toward the railings that divided the choir from the body of the church, and poured forth her thanks to God and to St. Pierre for her deliverance from the thraldom of a monster. She then resumed her seat in the vehicle, and speedily alighted at the mansion of her friend. When the door was opened she rushed in, to the great surprise of the servant, who, doubting the propriety of admitting a stranger in a peasant's garb, was disposed to bar her ingress. In the parlour she found, as guests of Madame Prevost, Captain Duval and his wife. Bursting into a passionate flood of tears, she fainted in her sister's arms.

In the last letter which Adeline had forwarded to Rouen, her sister remarked a degree of reserve and perturbation, which boded no good. Captain Duval had also received a communication from a correspondent at St. Brieux, detailing the various sinister reports prevalent in that vicinity from the sudden decease of the first Baroness De Gavray. This information alarmed him so much, that, without revealing to his wife the extent of his apprehensions, he immediately determined to avail himself of an invitation to visit his brother-in-law in