the drivers of two hearses and of a cart filled with coffins.  The church bells tolled unceasingly, and the desolation, the horror, were indescribable, as the sable wings of the Destroyer hung over the doomed city.  Out of her ten fellow-graduates, four slept in the cemetery.  The night before she had watched beside another, and at dawn saw the limbs stiffen and the eyes grow sightless.  Among her former schoolmates the contagion had been particularly fatal, and, fearless of danger, she had nursed two of them.  As she stood fanning herself, Clara entered hurriedly, and, sinking into a chair, exclaimed, in accents of terror: 

“It has come! as I knew it would!  Two of Mrs. Hoyt’s children have been taken, and, I believe, one of the waiters also!  Merciful God! what will become of me?” Her teeth chattered, and she trembled from head to foot.

“Don’t be alarmed, Clara!  Your excessive terror is your greatest danger.  If you would escape you must keep as quiet as possible.”

She poured out a glass of water and made her drink it; then asked: 

“Can Mrs. Hoyt get medical aid?”

“No; she has sent for every doctor in town, and not one has come.”

“Then I will go down and assist her.”  Beulah turned toward the door, but Clara caught her dress, and said hoarsely: 

“Are you mad, thus continually to put your life in jeopardy?  Are you shod with immortality, that you thrust yourself into the very path of destruction?”

“I am not afraid of the fever, and therefore think I shall not take it.  As long as I am able to be up I shall do all that I can to relieve the sick.  Remember, Clara, nurses are not to be had now for any sum.”  She glided down the steps, and found the terrified mother wringing her hands helplessly over the stricken ones.  The children were crying on the bed, and, with the energy which the danger demanded, Beulah speedily ordered the mustard baths, and administered the remedies she had seen prescribed on previous occasions.  The fever rose rapidly, and, undaunted by thoughts of personal danger, she took her place beside the bed.  It was past midnight when Dr. Asbury came; exhausted and haggard from unremitting toil and vigils, he looked several years older than when she had last seen him.  He started on perceiving her perilous post, and said anxiously: 

“Oh, you are rash! very rash!  What would Hartwell say?  What will he think when he comes?”

“Comes!  Surely you have not urged him to come back now!” said she, grasping his arm convulsively.

“Certainly.  I telegraphed to him to come home by express.  You need not look so troubled; he has had this Egyptian plague, will run no risk, and, even if he should, will return as soon as possible.”

“Are you sure that he has had the fever?”

“Yes, sure.  I nursed him myself, the summer after he came from Europe, and thought he would die.  That was the last sickly season we have had for years, but this caps the climax of all I ever saw or heard of in America.  Thank God, my wife and children are far away; and, free from apprehension on their account, I can do my duty.”