f poison and such, and
indeed, it is no wonder, for the food they put inside of them."

"O, no, " said Mrs. Murray, "it is the same with all people, but
especially so with sick people."

Kirsty looked as doubtful as was consistent with her respect for the
minister's wife, and Mrs. Murray went on.

"So you will just get the sheets ready to change, and, Kirsty, a clean
night-shirt."

"Night-shirt! and indeed, he has not such a thing to his name." Kirsty's
tone betrayed her thankfulness that her brother was free from the
effeminacy of a night-shirt; but noting the dismay and confusion on Mrs.
Murray's face, she suggested, hesitatingly, "He might have one of my
own, but I am thinking it will be small for him across the back."

"I am afraid so, Kirsty," said the minister's wife, struggling hard
with a smile. "We will just use one of his own white shirts." But this
scandalized Kirsty as an unnecessary and wasteful luxury.

"Indeed, there is plenty of them in the chist, but he will be keeping
them for the communion season, and the funerals, and such. He will not
be wearing them in his bed, for no one will be seeing him there at all."

"But he will feel so much better," said Mrs. Murray, and her smile was
so sweet and winning that Kirsty's opposition collapsed, and without
more words both sheets and shirt were produced.

As Kirsty laid them out she observed with a sigh: "Aye, aye, she was
the clever woman--the wife, I mean. She was good with the needle, and
indeed, at anything she tried to do."

"I did not know her," said Mrs. Murray, softly, "but every one tells me
she was a good housekeeper and a good woman."

"She was that," said Kirsty, emphatically, "and she was the light of his
eyes, and it was a bad day for Hugh when she went away."

"Now, Kirsty," said Mrs. Murray, after a pause, "before we put on these
clean things, we will just give him a sponge bath."

Kirsty gasped.

"Mercy sakes! He will not be needing that in the winter, and he will be
getting a cold from it. In the summer-time he will be going to the river
himself. And how will you be giving him a bath whatever?"

Mrs. Murray carefully explained the process, again fortifying her
position by referring to the practices of the Montreal hospital, till,
as a result of her persuasions and instructions, in an hour after
Macdonald had awakened from his sleep he was lying in his Sabbath white
shirt and between fresh sheets, and feeling cleaner and more com