How often were Catharine's hands filled with wild-flowers, to carry home,
as she fondly said, to sick Louise, or her mother. Poor Catharine, how
often did your bouquets fade; how often did the sad exile water them with
her tears,--for hers was the hope that keeps alive despair.
When they roused them in the morning to recommence their fruitless
wanderings, they would say to each other: "Perhaps we shall see our father,
he may find us here to-day;" but evening came, and still he came not, and
they were no nearer to their father's home than they had been the day
previous.
"If we could but find our way back to the 'Cold Creek,' we might, by
following its course, return to Cold Springs," said Hector.
"I doubt much the fact of the 'Cold Creek' having any connexion with our
Spring," said Louis; "I think it has its rise in the 'Beaver-meadow,' and
following its course would only entangle us among those wolfish balsam and
cedar swamps, or lead us yet further astray into the thick recesses of the
pine forest. For my part, I believe we are already fifty miles from Cold
Springs.
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