CHAPTER THE SIXTH.
TOO MUCH ALONE.
Yet looking back upon that time, now it is past, and has "rounded itself into that perfect star I saw not when I dwelt therein," it would be untrue to represent myself as in any way unhappy.

At times I wished earnestly that I had been born among these people, and could live forever among them.
By degrees I discovered that Tardif led a somewhat solitary life himself, even in this solitary island, with its scanty population.

There was an ugly church standing in as central and prominent a situation as possible, but Tardif and his mother did not frequent it.

They belonged to a little knot of dissenters, who met for worship in a small room, when Tardif generally took the lead.

For this reason a sort of coldness existed between him and the larger portion of his fellow-islanders.