ed tone and hurried utterance;--and when, having been lifted up
to kiss his grandmamma, he and his sister were taken out of the chamber,
their little breasts would heave a sigh which showed how sensibly they
were relieved from their recent constraint!

How wofully changed was everything in the once cheerful old Hall! Mr.
Aubrey sitting in the library, intently engaged upon books and
papers--Mrs. Aubrey and Kate now and then, arm in arm, walking slowly up
and down the galleries, or one of the rooms, or the hall, not with their
former sprightly gayety, but pensive, and often in tears, and then
returning to the chamber of their suffering parent. All this was sad
work, indeed, and seemed, as it were, to herald coming desolation!

But little variation occurred, for several weeks, in the condition of
Mrs. Aubrey, except that she grew visibly feebler. One morning, however,
about six weeks after her seizure, from certain symptoms, the medical
men intimated their opinion that some important change was on the eve of
taking place, for which they prepared the family. She had been very
restless during the night. After frequent intervals of uneasy sleep, she
would awake with evident surprise and bewilderment. Sometimes a peculiar
smile would flit over her emaciated features; at others, they would be
overcast with gloom, and she would seem struggling to suppress tears.
Her voice, too, when she spoke, was feeble and tremulous; and she would
sigh, and shake her head mournfully. Old Jacob Jones, not being
introduced at the accustomed hour, she asked for him. When he made his
appearance, she gazed at him for a moment or two, with a perplexed eye,
exclaiming, "Jacob! Jacob! is it you?" in a very low tone; and then she
closed her eyes, apparently falling asleep. Thus passed the day; her
daughter and daughter-in-law sitting on either side of the bed, where
they had so long kept their anxious and affectionate vigils--Mr. Aubrey
sitting at the foot of the bed--and Dr. Goddart and Mr. Whately in
frequent attendance. Towards the evening, Dr. Tatham also, as had been
his daily custom through her illness, appeared, and in a low tone read
over the service for the visitation of the sick. Shortly afterwards Mr.
Aubrey was obliged to quit the chamber, in order to attend to some very
pressing matters of business; and he had been engaged for nearly an
hour, intending almost every moment to return to his mother's chamber,
when Dr. Tatham entered, as Mr.