I never left her side for more than half an hour at a time. She grew worse rapidly, but I would not believe it. My mother, however, was fully aware of her situation. She told me frequently, with a smile, which I could not bear to see upon her face, it was so unlike joy, but it was to comfort me,--she told me that she knew she was about to die, and she endeavoured to impress upon me those simple maxims of conduct for my future life which she had herself derived from her parents. She must not die--must not; and I heard with impatience, and heedlessly, the advice she endeavoured to bestow upon me. She died. The old nurse told me she was dead. It could not be,--she was asleep. My mother had told me not an hour before, that she felt much better, and wanted a little sleep; and at that moment her hand was clasped in mine. The lady of the house took me gently by the arm, and, leading me into an adjoining room, began to talk to me in a strain, I suppose, usually adopted upon such occasions,--for I knew not what she said to me. In about two hours I was permitted to see my mother again. There was a change--a frightful change! The nurse, I remember, said something about her looking like one asleep. I burst into a loud laugh. Asleep! that blank, passive, impenetrable face like sleep--petrified sleep! I enjoined them to leave me, and they let me have my own way; for, boy as I was, they were frightened at me. I took my mother's hand, and wrung it violently. I implored her to speak to me once more, to repeat that she still loved me, to tell me that she forgave all my faults, all my omissions, all my sins towards her. And then I knew she _was_ dead, and fell down upon my knees to pray; but I could not. Something told me that I ought not--something whispered that I ought rather to----; but I was struck senseless upon the floor. The mistress of my mother, who was a good and worthy woman, offered to pay her funeral expenses; but I would not permit it. Not a farthing would I receive from her; out of my own savings I buried her. If I could have wept--but I never could weep--when this calamity befell me, I think that impious thought would never have entered my brain. That thought was, that the Almighty was unjust to deprive me of the only being in the world who loved me, who understood me, who knew that I had a heart, and that, when it was hurt and outraged, my head was not safe--not to be trusted. That thought remained with me for years. CHAPTER II.