I was changed; the tight-drawn cord that sounded so harshly was loosened, the moment that Idris participated in my knowledge of our real situation.  The perturbed and passion-tossed waves of thought subsided, leaving only the heavy swell that kept right on without any outward manifestation of its disturbance, till it should break on the remote shore towards which I rapidly advanced:—­“It is true that I am sick,” I said, “and your society, my Idris is my only medicine; come, and sit beside me.”

She made me lie down on the couch, and, drawing a low ottoman near, sat close to my pillow, pressing my burning hands in her cold palms.  She yielded to my feverish restlessness, and let me talk, and talked to me, on subjects strange indeed to beings, who thus looked the last, and heard the last, of what they loved alone in the world.  We talked of times gone by; of the happy period of our early love; of Raymond, Perdita, and Evadne.  We talked of what might arise on this desert earth, if, two or three being saved, it were slowly re-peopled.—­We talked of what was beyond the tomb; and, man in his human shape being nearly extinct, we felt with certainty of faith, that other spirits, other minds, other perceptive beings, sightless to us, must people with thought and love this beauteous and imperishable universe.

We talked—­I know not how long—­but, in the morning I awoke from a painful heavy slumber; the pale cheek of Idris rested on my pillow; the large orbs of her eyes half raised the lids, and shewed the deep blue lights beneath; her lips were unclosed, and the slight murmurs they formed told that, even while asleep, she suffered.  “If she were dead,” I thought, “what difference? now that form is the temple of a residing deity; those eyes are the windows of her soul; all grace, love, and intelligence are throned on that lovely bosom—­were she dead, where would this mind, the dearer half of mine, be?  For quickly the fair proportion of this edifice would be more defaced, than are the sand-choked ruins of the desert temples of Palmyra.”

CHAPTER III.

Idris stirred and awoke; alas! she awoke to misery.  She saw the signs of disease on my countenance, and wondered how she could permit the long night to pass without her having sought, not cure, that was impossible, but alleviation to my sufferings.  She called Adrian; my couch was quickly surrounded by friends and assistants, and such medicines as were judged fitting were administered.  It was the peculiar and dreadful distinction of our visitation, that none who had been attacked by the pestilence had recovered.  The first symptom of the disease was the death-warrant, which in no single instance had been followed by pardon or reprieve.  No gleam of hope therefore cheered my friends.

While fever producing torpor, heavy pains, sitting like lead on my limbs, and making my breast heave, were upon me; I continued insensible to every thing but pain, and at last even to that.  I awoke on the fourth morning as from a dreamless sleep.  An irritating sense of thirst, and, when I strove to speak or move, an entire dereliction of power, was all I felt.