when her lungs
and side were throbbing with pain. "I know you will forgive me," said
she, "for most severely have I been punished."

Then, as she heard Jenny's voice in the room below, she added, "There
is one other thing which I would say to you Ere I die, you must
promise that Jenny shall marry William Bender. He is poor, I know, and
so are we, but he has a noble heart, and now for my sake, mother, take
back the bitter words you once spoke to Jenny, and say that she may
wed him. She will soon be your only daughter, and why should you
destroy her happiness? Promise me, mother, promise that she shall
marry him."

Mrs. Lincoln, though poor, was proud and haughty still, and the
struggle in her bosom was long and severe, but love for her dying
child conquered at last, and to the oft-repeated question, "Promise
me, mother, will you not?" she answered, "Yes, Rose, yes, for your
sake I give my consent though nothing else could ever have wrung it
from me."

"And, mother," continued Rose, "may he not be sent for now? I cannot
be here long, and once more I would see him, and tell him that I
gladly claim him as a brother."

A brother! How heavily those words smote upon the heart of the sick
girl. Henry was yet away, and though in Jenny's letter Rose herself
had once feebly traced the words, "Come, brother,--do come," he still
lingered, as if bound by a spell he could not break. And so days went
by and night succeeded night, until the bright May morning dawned, the
last Rose could ever see. Slowly up the eastern horizon came the warm
spring sun, and as its red beams danced for a time upon the wall of
Rose's chamber, she gazed wistfully upon it, murmuring, "It is the
last,--the last that will ever rise for me."

William Bender was there. He had come the night before, bringing word
that Henry would follow the next day. There was a gay party to which
he had promised to attend Miss Herndon, and he deemed that a
sufficient reason why he should neglect his dying sister, who every
few minutes asked eagerly if he had come. Strong was the agony at work
in the father's heart, and still he nerved himself to support his
daughter while he watched the shadows of death as one by one they
crept over her face. The mother, wholly overcome, declared she could
not remain in the room, and on the lounge below she kept two of the
neighbors constantly moving in quest of the restoratives which she
fancied she needed. Poor Jenny, weary and pale with