"Oh! I hoped it was my dear, dear boy!" Her breath now grew fainter, and she exclaimed, "Oh! where, where is he? must I die without seeing him once more, and giving him my blessing? Helen! Julia! be sure to speak very kindly to him, and tell him that I blessed him! But thy will, O Lord! be done!" Still, as long as consciousness remained, her eyes were anxiously turned towards the door, as if looking for that beloved object whom she was never more to see, we thought, in this world. At that moment, however, my watchful ear heard a quick step on the stairs, and an exclamation of agony, not mistaken by me. "_He_ is _here_! I am _sure_ he is here!" cried I, bending over her pillow; and in another moment Seymour was on his knees at the bedside. Never shall I forget his look of speechless woe, when he found her last agony approaching: but it seemed as if _affection_ struggled successfully with death for a few short moments. She could not speak, but her eyes were eloquent; and as she laid her hand upon the head of her child, those eyes were raised to heaven in earnest supplication: they then turned on him, while she reclined her head on my mother's bosom, and her right hand was clasped in mine. I cannot go on: the scene is still too present to my view. * * * * * Deep as was my affliction, it sunk into nothingness, compared with that of the bereaved and self-reproving son. It was really a _relief_ to me to see his sense of anguish suspended by his insensibility. When he recovered, there was something so full of woe, and yet of a woe so stern, in the look with which my mother ordered me away, that I had not the heart to resist it. It was near an hour before she came to me; and never before had I seen her so overpowered with affliction. She called upon Lady Helen by the tenderest names; talked of her patient gentleness--of the sweetness of that temper which she had so often tried--and reproached herself for having thus tried it. But she spoke not of Seymour; and deep as my regret was for the dead, it was equalled by my anxiety for the living. I therefore ventured to say, "But how is poor Seymour?" "Unfeeling girl!" cried my mother; "you can think only of him when his angel mother lies dead!" "_She_ would have _thanked_ me for my anxiety," I replied, rendered courageous by distress. "I shall go and inquire after him." "Hold, Helen! he is extremely wretched; so much so, that I could not bear to listen to his self-upbraidings, nor to witness his caresses of that hand which replied no longer to his grasp; and then his wild entreaties, that she would speak to him once more, and say that she forgave him!" "And could you have the cruelty to leave him alone in such a state?" cried I. "Do you think his mother would so have left _your_ child?" My mother started--"You are right!" said she: "I will return, and do my duty by him." "Oh! let me go with you!"