Sunday, the third of September, I now regard as the day, that finally decided on the fate of the object dearest to my heart that the universe contained.  Encouraged by what I considered as the progress of her recovery, I accompanied a friend in the morning in several calls, one of them as far as Kensington, and did not return till dinner-time.  On my return I found a degree of anxiety in every face, and was told that she had had a sort of shivering fit, and had expressed some anxiety at the length of my absence.  My sister and a friend of hers, had been engaged to dine below stairs, but a message was sent to put them off, and Mary ordered that the cloth should not be laid, as usual, in the room immediately under her on the first floor, but in the ground-floor parlour.  I felt a pang at having been so long and so unseasonably absent, and determined that I would not repeat the fault.

In the evening she had a second shivering fit, the symptoms of which were in the highest degree alarming.  Every muscle of the body trembled, the teeth chattered, and the bed shook under her.  This continued probably for five minutes.  She told me, after it was over, that it had been a struggle between life and death, and that she had been more than once, in the course of it, at the point of expiring.  I now apprehend these to have been the symptoms of a decided mortification, occasioned by the part of the placenta that remained in the womb.  At the time however I was far from considering it in that light.  When I went for Dr. Poignand, between two and three o’clock on the morning of Thursday, despair was in my heart.  The fact of the adhesion of the placenta was stated to me; and, ignorant as I was of obstetrical science, I felt as if the death of Mary was in a manner decided.  But hope had re-visited my bosom; and her chearings were so delightful, that I hugged her obstinately to my heart.  I was only mortified at what appeared to me a new delay in the recovery I so earnestly longed for.  I immediately sent for Dr. Fordyce, who had been with her in the morning, as well as on the three preceding days.  Dr. Poignand had also called this morning but declined paying any further visits, as we had thought proper to call in Dr. Fordyce.

The progress of the disease was now uninterrupted.  On Tuesday I found it necessary again to call in Dr. Fordyce in the afternoon, who brought with him Dr. Clarke of New Burlington-street, under the idea that some operation might be necessary.  I have already said, that I pertinaciously persisted in viewing the fair side of things; and therefore the interval between Sunday and Tuesday evening, did not pass without some mixture of cheerfulness.  On Monday, Dr. Fordyce forbad the child’s having the breast, and we therefore procured puppies to draw off the milk.  This occasioned some pleasantry of Mary with me and the other attendants.  Nothing could exceed the equanimity, the patience and affectionateness of the poor sufferer.  I intreated her to recover; I dwelt with trembling fondness on every favourable circumstance; and, as far it was possible in so dreadful a situation, she, by her smiles and kind speeches, rewarded my affection.