I remember vividly a day passed in the chamber of the resigned creature, about two months after the first indication of her illness.  Her disease had increased rapidly, and the signs of its ravages were painfully manifest in her sunken eye, her hectic cheek, her hollow voice, her continual cough.  Her spirit became more tranquil as her body retreated from the world—­her hopes more firm, her belief in the love of her Saviour—­his will and power to save her, more clear, and free from all perplexity.  I had never beheld so beautiful a sight as the devoted maid presented to my view.  I had never supposed it possible to exist; and thus, as I sat at her side, though the thought of death was ever present, it was as of a terror in a milkwhite shroud—­a monster enveloped and concealed beneath a robe of beauty.  I listened to her with enchantment whilst she spoke of the littleness of this world, and the boundless happiness that awaited true believers in the next—­of the unutterable mercy of God, in removing us from a scene of trouble whilst our views were cloudless, and our hopes sure and abiding.  Yes, charmed by the unruffled air, the angelic look, I could forget even my mortality for a moment, and feel my living soul in deep communion with a superior and brighter spirit.  It was when she recalled me to earth by a reminiscence of our first days of love, that the bruised heart was made sensible of pain, and of its lonely widowed lot.  Then the tears would not be checked, but rushed passionately forth, and, as the clouds shut out and hid the one brief glimpse of heaven, flowed unrestrained.

Her mind was in a sweet composed state during the interview to which I allude.  She had pleasure in referring to the days of her childhood, and in speaking of the happiness which she had found amongst her native hills.

“How little, Caleb,” she said, “is the mind occupied with thoughts of death in childhood—­with any thoughts of actual lasting evil!  We cannot see these things in childhood—­we cannot penetrate so deeply or throw our gaze so far, we are so occupied with the joys that are round about us.  Is it not so?  Our parents are ever with us.  Day succeeds to day—­one so like the other—­and our home becomes our world.  A sorrow comes at length—­a parent dies—­the first and dearest object in that world; then all is known, and the stability of life becomes suspected.”

“The home of many,” I replied, “is undisturbed for years!”

“Yes, and how sweet a thing is love of home!  It is not acquired, I am sure.  It is a feeling that has its origin elsewhere.  It is born with us; brought from another world, to carry us on in this with joy.  It attaches to the humblest heart that ever throbbed.”

“Dear Ellen!” I exclaimed, “how little has sorrow to do with your affliction!”

“And why, dear Caleb?  Have you never found that the difficulties of the broad day melt away beneath the influences of the quiet lovely night?  Have you never been perplexed in the bustle and tumult of the day, and has not truth revealed itself when all was dark and still?  This is my night, and in sickness I have seen the eye of God upon me, and heard his words, as I have never seen and heard before?”