upon me, and the black
cauldron of the wizard's death boiling in my heated brain, I had
no faith in the tales they told. I believed that Lorna was in the
churchyard, while these rogues were lying to me. For with strength of
blood like mine, and power of heart behind it, a broken bone must burn
itself.

Mine went hard with fires of pain, being of such size and thickness; and
I was ashamed of him for breaking by reason of a pistol-ball, and the
mere hug of a man. And it fetched me down in conceit of strength; so
that I was careful afterwards.

All this was a lesson to me. All this made me very humble; illness being
a thing, as yet, altogether unknown to me. Not that I cried small, or
skulked, or feared the death which some foretold; shaking their heads
about mortification, and a green appearance. Only that I seemed quite
fit to go to heaven, and Lorna. For in my sick distracted mind (stirred
with many tossings), like the bead in the spread of frog-spawn carried
by the current, hung the black and central essence of my future life. A
life without Lorna; a tadpole life. All stupid head; and no body.

Many men may like such life; anchorites, fakirs, high-priests, and so
on; but to my mind, it is not the native thing God meant for us. My
dearest mother was a show, with crying and with fretting. The Doones,
as she thought, were born to destroy us. Scarce had she come to some
liveliness (though sprinkled with tears, every now and then) after her
great bereavement, and ten years' time to dwell on it--when lo, here was
her husband's son, the pet child of her own good John, murdered like his
father! Well, the ways of God were wonderful!

So they were, and so they are; and so they ever will be. Let us debate
them as we will, are ways are His, and much the same; only second-hand
from Him. And I expected something from Him, even in my worst of times,
knowing that I had done my best.

This is not edifying talk--as our Nonconformist parson says, when he can
get no more to drink--therefore let me only tell what became of Lorna.
One day, I was sitting in my bedroom, for I could not get downstairs,
and there was no one strong enough to carry me, even if I would have
allowed it.

Though it cost me sore trouble and weariness, I had put on all my Sunday
clothes, out of respect for the doctor, who was coming to bleed me again
(as he always did twice a week); and it struck me that he had seemed
hurt in his mind, because I wore my worst c