roper
remedies."

"Nature is an excellent healer herself. If wisely assisted, she soon
works the miracle of healing, unless,--" I hesitated.

"Unless what?" she asked sharply.

"God has willed otherwise."

"I cannot listen to such words, I am not going to die until I am old. Oh,
why must we grow old and die at last? it was a cruel way to create us."

"The other world seemed so beautiful to me when I was so sick, I scarcely
wanted to come back to this."

"Well, it seems just the reverse to me, I lie awake at night and shudder
when I think of death and the grave. It makes me shudder now in the
sunshine, and with you smiling down so kindly at me. Please to never
mention such things to me again."

I felt grieved; for then my task in coming here would be a vain one.
Day by day as I came to see her, the hectic flush in her cheek kept
deepening, and the eyes grew brighter and more sorrowful, while she grew
gradually weaker.

Very soon the pretty parlor was vacated, while her bed was the only
comfortable resting-place. She was anxious to have me come, and the nurse
said she counted the hours between my departure and return. Her eagerness
to have me read to her puzzled me at first, especially since she was
indifferent as to what I read, but after a while I found that she prized
my reading merely because it acted as a sedative. During the night sleep
usually forsook her; but when I left she was generally sleeping
peacefully. She permitted me to read the Bible as much as I chose. One
day she explained the reason for her indifference in the matter:--

"I do not wish to get interested in anything you read, for then I would
keep awake to listen; but the sleep you bring me is better than all my
medicine, I set nurse reading to me one day; but her voice was
uncultivated, and her emphasis intolerable I should soon be well if you
would read to me all the time."

"I never heard of any one getting raised from a sick-bed by so simple a
remedy."

"You do not try to encourage me," she said, fretfully.

I read on to her day after day until my voice grew husky, and the mere
act of speaking often wearied me.

We all saw the end was rapidly approaching, but no one had the courage to
tell her. She got so angry with me one day when I suggested bringing Mr.
Lathrop to visit her, that I slipped quietly away to escape the storm I
had raised. I used to go and return with a sense of defeat that paralyzed
all hopeful enthusiasm, and fear