even the sturdy doctor,
and that he had conceived the strongest affection for his patient.

The only one of the party on whom the fatigue and anxiety appeared
to have produced any lasting effect was dear little Fanny, and she
continued to look much more pale and thin than I liked to see her. Her
spirits, also, seemed less gay and buoyant than usual, and when Sir John
and Harry left us, and she had no longer any motive for exertion, a
kind of languor came over her, producing a listless distaste for all her
former employments; and she would sit for hours poring over one of the
Italian poets, without exchanging a word with any one. In order, if
possible, to rouse her from this state of apathy, I used every means in
my power to interest and amuse her; but, unfortunately, my time was
now so fully occupied that I had little leisure to bestow upon her. I
~228~~was to take my degree at the commencement of the new year; and,
as I had made up my mind to try for honours, I had not a moment to lose,
and read eight hours a day. The rest of my time was devoted to Sir John
and Harry (save an odd hour or two for a constitutional scamper with my
gun through the preserves to keep down the rabbits, or a gallop across
country to prevent the hunters from getting too fat), and our kind
friends were never so well pleased as when they could persuade us all
to come to them. My sister, however, seemed to prefer dreaming over her
book to the exertion of accompanying us to the Hall, and even when she
did so, appeared unequal to the labour of amusing Harry, and devoted
herself to the more easy task of pleasing Sir John, who, happy beyond
expression in the prospect of his son's recovery, was in the highest
good humour with everybody and everything. Becoming at length far from
satisfied about Fanny, I mentioned my uneasiness to my mother, who
comforted me by the assurance, that she considered it merely the natural
consequences of the fatigue and anxiety she had undergone, a sort of
reaction of the spirits, for which time and rest would prove the most
effectual cure.

And once again the leaves upon the trees grew brown, presenting, in
their varied richness, those exquisite shades of colouring that gladden
a painter's eye--and the swallows, those summer parasites, taking alarm
at the first sharp blast from the north, had departed to prosecute their
annual pursuit of sunshine under difficulties, leaving the honest
robin redbreast to renew his friendshi