They had not proceeded far beyond the miserable shed where Sarah, in the rapid prostration of typhus, had been forced to take shelter, when, in passing a wretched cabin by the roadside, which, from its open door and ruinous windows, had all the appearance of being uninhabited, they heard the moans of some unhappy individual within, accompanied, as it were, with something like the low feeble wail of an infant.

“Ah,” said the worthy priest, “this, I fear, is another of those awful cases of desertion and death that are too common in this terrible and scourging visitation.  We must not pass here without seeing what is the matther, and rendering such assistance as we can.”

“Wid the help o’ God, my foot won’t cross the threshel,” replied Nelly—­“I know it’s the sickness—­God keep it from us!—­an’ I won’t put myself in the way o’ it.”

“Don’t profain the name of the Almighty, you wretched woman,” replied the priest, alighting from his horse; “it is always His will and wish, that in such trials as these you should do whatever you can for your suffering fellow-creatures.”

“But if I should catch it,” the other replied, “what ‘ud become o’ me? mightn’t I be as bad as they are in there; an’ maybe in the same place, too; an’ God knows I’m not fit to die.”

“Stay where you are,” said the priest, “until I enter the house, and if your assistance should be necessary, I shall command you to come in.”

“Well, if you ordher me,” replied the superstitious creature, “that changes the case.  I’ll be then undher obadience to my clargy.”

“If you had better observed the precepts of your religion, and the injunctions of your clergy, wretched woman, you would not be the vile creature you are to-day,” he replied, as he hooked his horse’s bridle upon a staple in the door-post, and entered the cabin.

“Oh, merciful father, support me!” he exclaimed, “what a sight is here!  Come in at once,” he added, addressing himself to Nelly; “and if you have a woman’s heart within you, aid me in trying what can be done.”

Awed by his words, but with timidity and reluctance, she approached the scene of appalling misery which there lay before them.  But how shall we describe it?  The cabin in which they stood had been evidently for some time deserted, a proof that its former humble inmates had been all swept off by typhus; for in these peculiar and not uncommon cases, no other family would occupy the house thus left desolate, so that the cause of its desertion was easily understood.  The floor was strewed in some places with little stopples of rotten thatch, evidently blown in by the wind of the previous night; the cheerless fire-place was covered with clots of soot, and the floor was all spattered over with the black shining moisture called soot-drops, which want of heat and habitation caused to fall from the roof.  The cold, strong blast, too, from time to time, rushed in with wild moans of desolation, that