A Strange Story, Complete

ation; even the grief permitted to others he must put aside. He must enter that room-a calm intelligence. He is disabled for his mission if he suffer aught to obscure the keen

hand in mine, and I felt the throb of its pulse, I was aware of no quicker beat of my own heart. I looked with a steady eye on the face more beautiful from the flush that deepened the delicate hues of the yo

d, turned round, looked at me full and long, with unmistakable surprise, yet not as if the surprise displeased her,-less the surprise which recoils from the sight of a stranger than that

be? Am I awake? M

ent by Mrs. Poyntz, for I was uneasy

Strangely

modest shrinking turned towards Mrs. Ashleigh, drawing her mo

tutions peculiarly sensitive, I retired noiselessly from the room, and went, not into that which had been occupied by the ill-fated Naturalist, but do

y self-possessed, only she cannot account for her own seizure,-cannot accou

self from an injury. Nature has nearly succeeded. What I have prescribed will a little aid and accelerate that which Nature has yet to do, and in a day or two I do not doubt that your daughter will be perfectly restored. Only let me recommend care to avoid exposure to the open air during the close of the day. Let her avoid also the room in which she was first seized, for it is a strange phenomenon in nervous temperaments that a nervous attack may, without visible cause, be repeated in the same place where it wa

ev

old and cough, to attack

she may have a tendency to consumption. D

ore. You say you have feared a tendency to consumption. Is that disease in he

er eyes, "died young, but of brain fever, which t

ite to that in which the seeds of consumption lurk. It is rather that far nobler constitution, which the ke

nsumptive, and Mrs. Poyntz has rather frightened me at times by hints to the same effect. But when you speak of nervous susce

mpressionable? The things which do not disturb her temper ma

es. To most things that affect the spirits she is not more sensitive than other

wh

ut in a more marked degree,-at least, I observe it more in her; for he was very silent and reserved. And perhaps also her peculiarities have been fostered by the seclusion in which she has been brought up. It was with a view to make her a litt

igh is fond

ay that she had seen-positively seen-beautiful lands far away from earth; flowers and trees not like ours. As she grew older this visionary talk displeased me, and I scolded her, and said that if others heard her, they would think that she was not only silly but very untr

so? By that time I expect she will be asleep. I will wait here till you return. Oh, I can amuse myself with the newspapers and books on your table. Stay! o

as yet so hastily disposed that the settled look of home was not about them, I still knew that I was gazing on things which her mind must associate with the history of her young life. That luteharp m

ting revery, which Mrs. Ash

mly. I had no excuse to

uite at ease," said I. "You will allow

s, grat

out her hand as I m

, "True, you have given health and life. Adieu! there, you are paid for it!" With a poor person there would have been no dilemma, but Mrs. Ashleigh was affluent: to depart from custom here was almost impertinence.

. Fenwic

ut me. Whenever my aid is really wanted, then-but Heaven grant t

the chamber of death. But the streets were not ghastly now, and the moon was no longer Hecate, that dreary goddess of awe and spectres, but the sweet, simple Lady of the Stars, on whose gentle face lovers have ga