“That severs George and me forever in this world, mother.  With a keen sword he has cut me off from him, like the gardener ruthlessly cuts the vine from the oak.”

As she spoke, Agnes drew from her bosom a gold locket, and, springing it open, she gazed for a moment upon a handsome manly face which it contained.  That was George’s likeness.

“Till eternity George, till eternity—­”

She did not finish the sentence in words; but the fond, artless, fervent kiss she imprinted upon the picture was such a one as is given to the dead lips of one we love, and are about to part with forever.

She snapped the lid shut again, replaced the closed trinket in her bosom, and said: 

“Mother, all is over.  I shall never open it again.  But in case I die before you, I wish you to have this buried with me.”

Mrs. Arnold tried to rally Agnes about this, her first disappointment of the heart, and had the satisfaction of presently seeing her quite merry.  Suddenly Agnes, as she glanced over the newspaper, exclaimed: 

“Mother, what a dreadful thing that yellow fever is!  Did you read this?  Whole families are being swept out of existence, and have no one to help or nurse them.  It’s frightful, and yet we boast of our Christianity.  It’s a sin and a shame!”

She continued to read the fearful despatches that had first attracted her attention, while her mother remained silent.

“Mother,” she resumed, when she had finished, “I am going down to Shreveport.”

“What do you mean, Agnes?” exclaimed Mrs. Arnold, glancing anxiously at her daughter.

“I am going down to Shreveport, to help to nurse those poor perishing people.”

“Agnes!”

“Yes, dear mother.  I believe it to be my duty to go and do what little I can toward alleviating the distress of those stricken sufferers.”

“Why, Agnes, dear, you would surely perish yourself.”

“O no, mother, you forget how I waited on papa and you when you both had the fever down in New Orleans.”

This was true.  Several years before, while the Arnolds had been making a pleasure tour in the Southern States, they had been seized with the disorder, and but for the unflagging, heroic devotion of Agnes, they would most likely have perished.

“No, darling, I could never forget that were I to live a hundred years.  It is because I do remember the horror of that time that I would not wish you to expose yourself to such another.  Besides, what would I do without you?”

“That is the only subject that gives me any pain, mother; but then God would take care of you as well as of me, would he not?”

“Yes.”