"Miserable stuff!" he replied; "will you accept what I offer? If I promise, you may be sure I can perform." The old woman looked at him with surprise, and at length consented to accept his offer and take his remedies. The young Doctor hastened to his chamber, shut fast the door, and looked round him, with his arms folded--"What is there here," said he, "that I can sell?" What he found to sell I do not know. Enough that he supplied the Countess with a sum sufficient to procure her the necessary medicines, and to relieve her from care as to the wants of life for some short time. The case proceeded favourably. At night, as he was returning from one of those solitary walks in which he was accustomed to exhale his sadness, and also to gather fresh resolution for the struggle he had undertaken with destiny, and was slowly mounting the long, dark, dilapidated staircase that led up to that fifth floor on which he resided, he stumbled over some obstacle, and, on looking closer, found it was the body of a woman lying outstretched upon the stairs. It was the Countess. In spite of solicitations and her own promise, she had gone out; but her strength had failed her. She had fallen, and now lay insensible. Our young Doctor, braving all malicious interpretations, carried her to his own room, which was the nearest place of refuge, and there, by the aid of some cordials he administered, restored her to her senses. She opened her eyes, looked around her, and understanding in whose room she was, she said, with a scrutinising air, "You are miserably lodged here." It was the only observation his amiable patient made, and she repeated it several times--"You must be miserably off." Even when she had returned to her own room, and he had left her for the night, she still said nothing but--"You are miserably lodged!" The next morning, when the Doctor visited his patient--and you may be sure his visit was an early one--to his surprise, she was on foot, with sleeves tucked up, sweeping, dusting, and _putting to rights_ her little abode. He was astonished. The shock which she had received the day before, instead of injuring her, had apparently aided in her restoration. She was quite gay. "You are resolved to kill yourself, then?" said the Doctor. "I was never better in my life," she answered. "Do not be too confident," was his reply. "You must keep your room two or three days; and this time," he added, with a smile, "I shall keep guard over you myself." The Countess consented with a most childlike docility. She would do what he pleased; only yesterday she was obliged to go out--it was absolutely necessary. There was so much gentleness in her altered manner, that the Doctor was disposed to regard this as an alarming symptom in her case.