"The next morning we found she had done herself no harm; and I asked
her who were her parents, and what had brought her here; but she gave
me a strange, confused answer. I am sure she must have been born far
away, for these fifteen years have we kept her, without ever finding
out where she came from; and besides, she is apt to let drop such
marvellous things in her talk, that you might think she had lived in
the moon. She will speak of golden castles, of crystal roofs, and I
can't tell what beside. The only thing she has told us clearly, is,
that as she was sailing on the lake with her mother, she fell into the
water, and when she recovered her senses found herself lying under
these trees, in safety and comfort, upon our pretty shore.
"So now we had a serious, anxious charge thrown upon us. To keep
and bring up the foundling, instead of our poor drowned child--that
was soon resolved upon but who should tell us if she had yet been
baptised or no? She knew how not how to answer the question. That she
was one of God's creatures, made for His glory and service, that much
she knew; and anything that would glorify and please Him, she was
willing to have done. So my wife and I said to each other: 'If she has
never been baptised, there is no doubt it should be done; and if she
was, better do too much than too little, in a matter of such
consequence.' We therefore began to seek a good name for the child.
Dorothea seemed to us the best; for I had once heard that meant God's
gift; and she had indeed been sent us by Him as a special blessing, to
comfort us in our misery.
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