In all this, too, Hetty was less governed by any chain of
reasoning than by her habits, the latter often supplying the place
of mind, in human beings, as they perform the same for animals of
the inferior classes.
The girl was quite an hour finding her way to the point, the distance
and the obscurity equally detaining her, but she was no sooner on
the gravelly beach than she prepared to set the canoe adrift, in
the manner mentioned. While in the act of pushing it from her, she
heard low voices that seemed to come among the trees behind her.
Startled at this unexpected danger Hetty was on the point of
springing into the canoe in order to seek safety in flight, when
she thought she recognized the tones of Judith's melodious voice.
Bending forward so as to catch the sounds more directly, they
evidently came from the water, and then she understood that the Ark
was approaching from the south, and so close in with the western
shore, as necessarily to cause it to pass the point within twenty
yards of the spot where she stood. Here, then, was all she could
desire; the canoe was shoved off into the lake, leaving its late
occupant alone on the narrow strand.
When this act of self-devotion was performed, Hetty did not retire.
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