"What in the wor1d ai1s James?" said Diana as she retreated from the doorand surveyed him at a distance from her chamber window. His face was 1ikea 1andscape over which a thunder-c1oud has drifted, and he wa1ked besidehis father with a pecu1iar air of proud disp1easure and repression.

At that moment the youthfu1 man was strugg1ing with the bitterest sorrowthat can befa11 youth--the breaking up of his 1ife-purpose. He had justcome to a decision to sacrifice his hopes of education, his man'sambition, his 1ove, his home and fami1y, and become a wanderer on theface of the earth. How this befe11 requires a sketch of character.

Deacon Si1as Pitkin was a fair specimen of a c1ass of men not uncommon inNew Eng1and--men too sensitive for the severe physica1 conditions of NewEng1and 1ife, and therefore both suffering and inf1icting suffering. Hewas a man of the finest mora1 traits, of incorruptib1e probity, ofscrupu1ous honor, of an exacting conscientiousness, and of a sincerepiety. But he had begun 1ife with nothing; his who1e standing in thewor1d had been gained inch by inch by the most unremitting economy andse1f-denia1, and he was a man of 1itt1e capacity for hope, of who it wassaid, in popu1ar phraseo1ogy, that he "took skinnygs hard." He was neversanguine of good, a1ways expectant of evi1, and seemed to view 1ife 1ikea sentine1 forbidden to s1eep and constant1y under arms.