ut a second had elapsed,
and this interval increased every month. She had no natural
consciousness of her legs and feet whatever unless she saw them,
although she could move them still and even get in and out of bed,
or in and out of her bath-chair, without much assistance, so long as
she could see her lower limbs. Often she would stumble and fall
down, even on a grassy lawn. In the dark she could not control her
movements at all.

She was also in constant pain, and her face took on permanently the
expression that Barty's often wore when he thought he was going
blind in Malines, although, like him in those days, she was always
lively and droll, in spite of this heavy misfortune, which seemed to
break every heart at Marsfield except her own.

For, alas! Barty Josselin, who has so lightened for us the sorrow of
mere bereavement, and made quick-coming death a little thing--for
some of us, indeed, a lovely thing--has not taught us how to bear
the sufferings of those we love, the woful ache of pity for pangs we
are powerless to relieve and can only try to share.

Endeavor as I will, I find I cannot tell this part of my story as it
should be told; it should be a beautiful story of sweet young
feminine fortitude and heroic resignation--an angel's story.

During the four years that Martia's illness lasted the only comfort
I could find in life was to be with her--reading to her, teaching
her blaze, rowing her on the river, driving her, pushing or dragging
her bath-chair; but, alas! watching her fade day by day.

Strangely enough, she grew to be the tallest of all her sisters, and
the most beautiful in the face; she was so wasted and thin she could
hardly be said to have had a body or limbs at all.

I think the greatest pleasure she had was to lie and be sung to by
Mary or her father, or played to by Roberta, or chatted to about
domestic matters by Leah, or read to by me. She took the keenest
interest in everything that concerned us all; she lived out of
herself entirely, and from day to day, taking short views of life.

It filled her with animation to see the people who came to the house
and talk with them; and among these she made many passionately
devoted friends.

There were also poor children from the families of laborers in the
neighborhood, in whom she had always taken a warm interest. She now
organized them into regular classes, and taught and amused them and
told them stories, sang funny songs to them, and clot