The Maid of Maiden Lane

"It is the curse of Adam," answered Doctor Moran bitterly--"to bring up daughters, to love them, to toil and save and deny ourselves for them, and then to see some strange man, of whom we have no certain knowledge, carry them off captive to his destiny and his desires. 'Tis a thankless portion to be a father--a bitter pleasure."

"Well, then, to be a mother is worse."

"Who can tell that? Women take for compensations things that do not deceive a father. And, also, they have one grand promise to help them bear loss and disappointment--the assurance of the Holy Scripture that they shall have salvation through child-bearing. And I, who have seen so much of family love and life, can tell you that this promise is all many a mother has for her travail and sorrowful love."

"It is enough. Pray God that we miss not of that reward some share," and with a motion of adieu he turned into his house. Very thoughtfully the Doctor went on to William Street where he had a patient,--a young girl of about Arenta's age--very ill. A woman opened the door--a woman weeping bitterly.

"She is gone, Doctor."

"At what hour?"

"The clock was striking three--she went smiling."

Then he bowed his head and turned away.

There was nothing more that he could do; but he remembered that Arenta had stepped on board the La Belle France as the clock struck three, and that she also had gone smiling to her unknown destiny.

"Two emigrants," he thought, "pilgrims of Love and Death, and both went smiling!" An unwonted tenderness came into his heart; he thought of the bright, lovely bride clinging so trustfully to her husband's arm, and he voiced this gentle feeling to his wife in very sincere wishes for the safety and happiness of the little emigrant for Love. He had a singular reluctance to name her--he knew not why--with the other little maid who also had left smiling at three o'clock, an emigrant for whom Death had opened eternal vistas of delight.

"I do not know," said Mrs. Moran, "how Van Ariens could suffer his daughter to go to a country full of turmoil and bloodshed."

"He was very unhappy to do so, Ava. But when things have gone a certain length they have fatality. The Marquis had promised to become eventually a citizen of this Republic, and Van Ariens had no idea in sanctioning the marriage that his daughter would leave New York. It was even supposed the Marquis would remain here in the Count de Moustier's place, and the sudden turn of events which sent de Tounnerre to France was a severe blow to Van Ariens. But what could he do?"