At last, however, after a long and apparently refreshing sleep, he awoke suddenly to a full consciousness that it was indeed his daughter who was watching so patiently by his side.
The presence of his long absent child had a soothing effect upon Mr.
Linwood, and he now recovered rapidly from the sad and almost hopeless condition in which she had found him.

When able to converse, without danger of a relapse, he told Clotelle of his fruitless efforts to obtain a clew to her whereabouts after old Mrs.Miller had sold her to the slave-trader.

In answer to his daughter's inquiries about his family affairs up to the time that he left America, he said,-- "I blamed my wife for your being sold and sent away, for I thought she and her mother were acting in collusion; But I afterwards found that I had blamed her wrongfully.

Poor woman! she knew that I loved your mother, and feeling herself forsaken, she grew melancholy and died in a decline three years ago." Here both father and daughter wept at the thought of other days.

When they had recovered their composure, Mr.Linwood went on again: "Old Mrs.Miller," said he, "after the death of Gertrude, aware that she had contributed much toward her unhappiness, took to the free use of intoxicating drinks, and became the most brutal creature that ever lived.