There was weeping and wailing then in that room, where death-like stillness had reigned so long.

“Precious, precious child! dear lamb safely gathered into the Saviour’s fold,” said Mrs. Travilla in quivering tones, as she gently laid her hand upon the closed eyes, and straightened the limbs as tenderly as though it had been a living, breathing form.

“Oh, Elsie!  Elsie! dear, dear little Elsie!” cried Adelaide, flinging herself upon the bed, and pressing her lips to the cold cheek.  “I have only just learned to know your value, and now you are taken from me.  Oh!  Elsie, darling, precious one; oh! that I had sooner learned your worth! that I had done more to make your short life happy!”

Chloe was sobbing at the foot of the bed, “Oh! my child! my child!  Oh! now dis ole heart will break for sure!” while the kind-hearted physician stood wiping his eyes and sighing deeply.

“Her poor father!” exclaimed Mrs. Travilla at length.

“Yes, yes, I will go to him,” said Adelaide quickly.  “I promised to call him the moment she waked, and now—­oh, now, I must tell him she will never wake again.”

“No!” replied Mrs. Travilla, “rather tell him that she has waked in heaven, and is even now singing the song of the redeemed.”

Adelaide turned to Elsie’s writing-desk, and taking from it the packet which the child had directed to be given to her father as soon as she was gone, she carried it to him.

Her low knock was instantly followed by the opening of the door, for he had been awaiting her coming in torturing suspense.

She could not look at him, but hastily thrusting the packet into his hand, turned weeping away.

He well understood the meaning of her silence and her tears, and with a groan of anguish that Adelaide never could forget, he shut and locked himself in again; while she hurried to her room to indulge her grief in solitude, leaving Mrs. Travilla and Chloe to attend to the last sad offices of love to the dear remains of the little departed one.

The news had quickly spread through the house, and sobs and bitter weeping were heard in every part of it; for Elsie had been dearly loved by all.

Chloe was assisting Mrs. Travilla.

Suddenly the lady paused in her work, saying, in an agitated tone, “Quick! quick!  Aunt Chloe, throw open that shutter wide.  I thought I felt a little warmth about the heart, and—­yes! yes!  I was not mistaken; there is a slight quivering of the eyelid.  Go, Chloe! call the doctor! she may live yet!”

The doctor was only in the room below, and in a moment was at the bedside, doing all that could be done to fan into a flame that little spark of life.

And they were successful.  In a few moments those eyes, which they had thought closed forever to all the beauties of earth, opened again, and a faint, weak voice asked for water.

The doctor was obliged to banish Chloe from the room, lest the noisy manifestation of her joy should injure her nursling, yet trembling upon the very verge of the grave; and as he did so, he cautioned her to refrain from yet communicating the glad tidings to any one, lest some sound of their rejoicing might reach the sick-chamber, and disturb the little sufferer.