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SKETCHES. 2TT
night and day did you work for me, and would not have
thanks for it. When I got so well, that I was able to work
again, I wanted her to allow herself some rest, of which she
was the more in need as her health was much impaired, and
she was evidently becoming weaker every day; but all in
vain. She continued carrying out milk until last week, when
she fell ill. She wishes to live merely for the sake of being
of use to me and my children. About herself she is per-
fectly indifferent, as for one already dead; I have not been
able to persuade her to allow herself to be carried into a
more comfortable room and to have a softer bed. ‘Iam
used to it, she says, ‘it is good enough for me. Oh!
if you knew, Sir, how, only a short time ago, I rejoiced in
the hope of working for her who has so long worked for
me; to see her old age made peaceful and happy through
our tender care and grateful love, you would also be able
to understand how bitterly I must feel it to see her fall a
sacrifice to her heroic devotion, just at a moment when she
might be able, through me and my children, to enjoy a re- °
ward, earned by the self-denial of half a life-time. If it is
in your power, try tosave her,—do it for her sake; she
may still see happy days here on earth,— do it for my
sake ; for I do not think that I could bear the idea that I
should have been the cause of the death of this angelic
woman ; doit for my children’s sake, who love her dearly,
and who would lose in her a daily example of the noblest
virtues. Oh! save her—and my gratitude — I rose,
asking her not to mention gratitude. ‘I consider myself
sufficiently rewarded, if I succeed in saving such a life, I
said, and returned to the sick-bed. I confess that I now
coutemplated her with very different eyes, and I comforted
the lady and her children with the assurance, that, unless
the thread of her life had not entirely run out, my excel-
lent medicine would add fresh elasticity to the springs and
set the pendulum going again as regularly as before.
“ Well, what do you think of her?” added the Doctor —
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