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Rh horses gradually lost in the distance. She waited yet a little while, and then, her mother still appearing to sleep soundly, she thought she might leave her for a few minutes. With some difficulty she forced her way through the boughs. What devastation had a night effected! Flowers torn up by the roots—huge branches broken off as if they had been but leaves, and two or three trees utterly blown down—showed how the little garden had been laid open to its late unwelcome visitors. With a rapid, yet cautious step, she proceeded to the house. Not a human being was near, and she entered. What utter, what wanton destruction had been practised! The furniture lay in broken fragments—every portable article had been carried away—the walls defaced, and in one or two places burnt. There seemed to have been an intention of firing the house. What she felt most bitterly yet remained. There hung the blackened frames of her father and her mother's portraits, but the pictures had been consumed.

But Beatrice knew it was no time to indulge in lamentations. In the kitchen yet smouldered the remains of the fire, and this she soon kindled to a flame, and nourished it with wood which