“I have done all I could think of,” Agatha continued, speaking softly and cheerfully. “The doctor will be here soon; Mary and Eulalie are down-stairs. I have myself told Elizabeth that you are ill;--she is composed, and sends her love to her dear father. Was all this right?” Mr. Harper appeared to assent. “I will sit beside you till the doctor comes, and then I will write to my husband. You would like him to come home?” He seemed slow of comprehension, troubled, or excited. Agatha vainly tried to analyse the dumb expression of the features. With all her quickness she could not make out what he wanted. At last, a thought struck her. His eldest son, his favourite-- “Would you like me to send for Major Harper?” No words could tell the change which convulsed the old man. Abhorrence--anger--fear--all were written in his countenance. He rolled his head on the pillow, he struggled to gasp out something--what, his daughter-in-law could not guess. She was inexpressibly shocked. One thing only seemed clear, that for some cause or other the mere mention of Frederick's name worked up the father into frenzy. “Hush! do not try to speak. I will send for no one but Nathanael. Will that content you?” He made a motion of satisfaction, and became quiet. His features gradually composed themselves, and, he sank into torpor. Agatha still sat by the bed, holding his wrist, for she knew not moment by moment how soon the pulse might stop. The old man's own daughters were too terrified to approach him. They came on tiptoe to the door, looked in, shuddered, and went back. No one stayed in the room but the old coachman, who had been Mr. Harper's servant since they were both boys; and he sat in a corner crying like a child, though silently. Agatha might as well have sat there quite alone, the atmosphere around her was so still and solemn. She had never before been in her father-in-law's room---the state bedroom, in which for centuries the Harper family had been born and died. The great mahogany bed itself was almost like a bier, with its dark velvet hangings, and dusty plumes. Everything around was dusty, gloomy, and worn out; the Squire would have nothing changed from the time when the last Mrs. Harper died there. In a little curtained alcove the lace hung yellow and dusty over her toilet-table, just as she had left it when she laid herself down to the pains of motherhood and death. Her portraits--one girlish, another matronly, but still merry and fair--hung opposite the bed. Between them was a longitudinal family-group, in the very lowest style of art--a string of children, from the big boy to the tottering baby, in all varieties of impossible attitudes. Their names were written under (not unnecessarily)--Frederick, Emily, Harriet, Mary, Eulalie. The only names missed were Nathanael and “poor Elizabeth.”