d to it with its little mouth open and its little fingers feeling
for the place.

"Oh God! My God! Oh Mother of my God!"

And then in that happiness that is beyond all earthly bliss--the
happiness of a mother when she first clasps her baby to her breast--I
began to cry.

I had not cried for months--not since that night in Ellan which I did
not wish to remember any more--but now my tears gushed out and ran down
my face like rain.

I cried on Martin once more--I could not help it. And looking down at
the closed eyes of my child my soul gushed out in gratitude to God, who
had sent me this for all I had suffered.

"Hush, hush! You will do yourself a mischief and it will be bad for the
milk," said the nurse.

After that I tried to control myself. But I found a fierce and feverish
delight in suckling my child. It seemed as if every drop my baby drew
gave me a spiritual as well as a physical joy--cooling my blood and my
brain and wiping out all my troubles.

Oh mystery of mysteries! Oh miracle of miracles!

My baby was at my breast and my sufferings were at an end.

EIGHTY-EIGHTH CHAPTER

That was a long, long day of happiness.

It was both very long and very short, for it passed like a dream.

What wonderful happenings were crowded into it!

First the nurse, from the dizzy heights of her greater experience and
superior knowledge, indulged my infantile anxieties by allowing me to
look on while baby was being bathed, and rewarded me for "being good" by
many praises of my baby's beauty.

"I've nursed a-many in my time," she said, "but I don't mind saying as
I've never had a bonnier babby on my knee. Look at her legs now, so
white and plump and dimpled. Have you _ever_ seen anythink so putty?"

I confessed that I never had, and when nurse showed me how to fix the
binder, and put on the barrow-coat without disturbing baby while asleep,
I thought her a wonderful woman.

Emmerjane, who had with difficulty been kept out of the room last night
and was now rushing breathlessly up and down stairs, wished to hold baby
for a moment, and at length out of the magnificence of my generosity I
allowed her to do so, only warning her, as she loved her life, to hold
tight and not let baby fall.

"How'd you mean?" said the premature little mother. "_Me_ let her fall?
Not much!"

Every hour, according to the doctor's orders, I gave baby the breast. I
do not know which was my greatest joy--to feast my eyes on her while