Emmeline had awoke from her brief and troubled slumbers, more restless and feverish than when she had first sought her couch; and, suffering as she was from that nervous and anxious state peculiar to approaching fever, the poor girl no longer resisted Ellen’s evident determination, and clasping her hand between her own, now burning with fever, continually thanked her, in broken and feeble accents, for remaining with her, assuring her she did not feel so ill or as unhappy as she should have done had she been alone.  Anxious as she was, Ellen would not arouse her aunt, but at the first break of day she softly entered the housekeeper’s room, and succeeded in arousing without alarming her, informed her of Emmeline’s restless state, and implored her to send at once for Mr. Maitland.  Hastily rising, Ellis accompanied Ellen to her cousin’s room, and instantly decided on complying with her request.  The household were already on the alert, and a servant was speedily despatched; but, relieved as she was on this point, Ellen would not comply with the good housekeeper’s request to repose herself for a few hours; she had resolved not to relinquish her post by the bedside of the young sufferer to any save her aunt herself.  Ellis desisted, for a word from her favourite, almost her darling, as Ellen from many circumstances had become, was to her always sufficient.

Mrs. Hamilton and Mr. Maitland met at Emmeline’s door, to the astonishment and at first alarm of the former—­an alarm which subsided into comparative relief, as she listened to Ellen’s hurried tale, although anxiety to a very high degree remained, and with some reason, for Ellen’s fears were not unfounded.  Emmeline’s fever rapidly and painfully increased, and for a week her parents hung over her couch almost despairing of her recovery; their fond hearts almost breaking, as they heard her sweet voice, in the wild accent of delirious intervals, calling aloud on Arthur, and beseeching their consent and blessing to restore her to health; and scarcely less painful was it in her lucid hours to see her clasp her mother’s hands repeatedly, and murmur, in a voice almost inarticulate from weakness—­

“Do not be anxious or grieved for me, my own dear mamma, I shall soon get well, and be your happy Emmeline again.  I cannot be miserable, when I have you and papa and Ellen to love me so tenderly,” and then, she would cling to her mother’s neck, and kiss her till she would sink to sleep upon her bosom, as in infancy and childhood she had so often done; and dearer than ever did that gentle girl become, in these hours of suffering, to all who had loved her so fondly before; they had deemed it almost impossible that affection could in any way be increased, and yet it was so.  Strange must be that heart which can behold a being such as Emmeline cling to it, as if its protection and its love were now all that bound her to earth, and still remain unmoved and cold.  Affection is ever strengthened by dependence—­dependence at least like this; and there was something peculiarly touching in Emmeline’s present state of mental weakness.  Her parents felt, as they gazed on her, that they had occasioned the anguish which had prostrated her on a bed of sickness; and yet their child clung to them as if, in the intensity of her affection for them, and theirs for her, she would strive to forget her unhappy love, and be once more happy.