again, it would only the more surely be
extinguished by his clumsy hands. What can it signify? Why try to save
a human being's life, who may, some day or other, wish that he had
never been born, and who may perhaps also see the hour, when he shall
have to bid good night to his dearest friend----

Again he listened, and held his breath not to lose a sound of what was
passing in the next room. He fancied he heard a child's plaintive
moaning, then the lady's gentle voice trying to soothe it, passionate
weeping, and then silence. He could stand it no longer in the solitude
of his room. He only wished to hear how the child was going on. He
began to think himself a barbarian, to be quietly hiding in a corner,
when even these rough peasants showed some sympathy. Hastily opening
the door, he groped his way through the dark empty tap-room, and across
the passage. The door was ajar, and a ray of light streamed through the
chink. He now distinctly heard the child moan and the mother quieting
it. "We ought to prepare some tea for the poor child in order to
bring on a perspiration," said the hostess, "We must try and find
some."--"The elder berries, in the drawer up-stairs, would not do badly
in case of need," answered her husband; then silence reigned again,
only interrupted by the sighs of the house-maid, who knelt in a corner,
repeating one pater-noster after another.

"Put another feather-bed on the child," advised the coachman; "it has
caught cold; see how its little hands twitch convulsively--it is
freezing."

The farm-servant, who stood near the stove, was just going to lay
another log on the still glowing embers, when he was arrested by a firm
hand which was laid on his shoulders. He turned round and perceived the
stranger standing before him. "I forbid you to put on another chip of
wood;" he said, in a voice which denoted that he was accustomed to be
strictly obeyed; "and you all," he continued, turning to the rest of
the idle spectators, "get out of the room; do you hear? the air here is
bad enough to stifle even a healthy man." They all looked at each
other--only the mother and nurse of the child had not perceived the
entrance of the stranger. The mother knelt beside the bed with one arm
clasped round the moaning child as if to defend it from assassins. The
nurse stood by her, and stared in helpless despair on her little
charge--on its wandering eyes, and fever parched lips, from which now
and then a low wail escaped.