irritation, might at any time
become without having her sanity called in question."

"I am sure that you are not, nor ever could have been, Madam. The
nervous excitement of which you speak is entirely within the control of
medicine, which mania proper is not. You will use the means that I
prescribe and your continued calmness will go far to convince even
these dullards that they have been wrong."

"I will do everything you recommend; indeed, for some weeks before you
came, I had put a constraint upon myself and forced myself to be very
still; but the effect of that was, that acting upon their theory they
said that I was sinking into the last or 'melancholy-mad' state of
mania, and they put me in here with the incurables."

"Lady," said Traverse, respectfully taking her hand, "now that I am
acquainted in some slight degree with the story of your heavy wrongs,
do not suppose that I will ever leave you until I see you restored to
your friends."

"Friends! ah, young man, do you really suppose that if I had had
friends I should have been left thus long unsought? I have no friends,
Doctor Rocke, except yourself, newly sent me by the Lord; nor any
relatives except a young daughter whom I have seen but twice in my
life!--once upon the dreadful night when she was born and torn away
from my sight and once about two years ago, when she must have been
sixteen years of age. My little daughter does not know that she has a
poor mother living, and I have no friend upon earth but you, whom the
Lord has sent."

"And not in vain!" said Traverse, fervently, "though you have no other
friends, yet you have the law to protect you. I will make your case
known and restore you to liberty. Then, lady, listen: I have a good
mother, to whom suffering has taught sympathy with the unfortunate, and
I have a lovely betrothed bride, whom you will forgive her lover for
thinking an angel in woman's form; and we have a beautiful home among
the hills of Virginia, and you shall add to our happiness by living
with us."

The lady looked at Traverse Rocke with astonishment and incredulity.

"Boy," she said, "do you know what you are promising--to assume the
whole burthen of the support of a useless woman for her whole life?
What would your mother or your promised wife say to such a
proposition?"

"Ah! you do not know my dear mother nor my Clara--no, nor even me. I
tell you the truth when I say that your coming among us would make us
happier. Oh, Mada