“Papa, would you get me the Bible,” she continued.  “I wish if possible to console you and the rest; and mamma, you will think when I am gone of that which I am about to show you; think of it all of you, for indeed an early death is sometimes a great blessing to those who are taken away.  Alas! who can say when it is not?”

They assisted her to sit up in the bed, and after turning over the leaves of the Bible, she read in a voice of low impressive melody the first verse of the fifty-seventh chapter of Isaiah.

“The righteous perisheth, and no man taketh it to heart; and merciful men are taken away, none considering that the righteous is taken away from the evil to come.  He SHALL ENTER INTO PEACE.”

“Oh! many a death,” she continued, “is wept for and lamented by friends and relatives, who consider not that those for whom they weep may be taken away from the evil to come.  I feel that I am unable to speak much, but it is your Jane’s request, that the consolation to be found, not only in this passage, but in this book, may be applied to your hearts when I am gone.”

This effort, slight as it was, enfeebled her much, and she lay silent for some time; and such was their anxiety, neither to excite nor disturb her, that although their hearts were overflowing they restrained themselves, so far as to permit no startling symptoms of grief to be either seen or heard.  After a little time, however, she spoke again:—–­

“My poor bird,” said she, “I fear I have neglected it.  Dear Agnes would you let me see it—­I long to see it.”  Agnes in a few minutes returned and placed the bird in her bosom.  She caressed it for a short time, and then looking at it earnestly said—­

“Is it possible, that you too, my Ariel, are drooping?”

This indeed was true.  The bird had been for some time past as feeble and delicate as if its fate were bound up with that of its unhappy mistress—­whether it was that the sight of it revived some recollection that disturbed her, or whether this brief interval of reason was as much as exhausted nature could afford on one occasion, it is difficult to say; but the fact is, that after looking on it for some time, she put her hand to her bosom and asked, “Where, where is the letter?”

“What letter, my darling?” said her father.

“Is not Charles unhappy and dying?” she said.

“He is ill, my love,” said her father, “but not dying, we trust.”

“It is not here,” she said, searching her bosom, “it is not here—­but it matters nothing now—­it was a message of death, and the message has been delivered.  Sorrow—­sorrow—­sorrow—­how beautiful is that word—­there is but one other in the language that surpasses it, and that is mourn.  Oh! how beautiful is that too—­how delicately expressive.  Weep is violent; but mourn, the graduated tearless grief that wastes gently—­that disappoints death, for we die not but only cease to be.  I am the star of sorrow, pale and mournful in the lonely sky—­well, that is one consolation—­when I set I shall set in heaven.”