This letter was sent to London, and we waited. Eva kept her bed. William, seated near her, held her hand in his: his mother smiled sadly upon him, whilst I, at the other side of the bed, prepared potions to assuage her pains. Again she began to talk to her son, as if no longer despairing that, after her death, some of her words might recur to his memory. She gave the child all the advice, all the instructions she would have given to an intelligent being. Then she turned to me--"Who knows, doctor," she said, "one day, perhaps, he will find my words at the bottom of his heart!" Three more weeks elapsed. Death approached, and submissive as was the Christian soul of Eva, she yet felt the anguish of separation and the solemn awe of the future. The village priest came to see her, and when he left her I met him and took his hand. "You will pray for her," I said. "I have entreated _her_ to pray for _me_!" was his reply. It was Eva Meredith's last day. The sun had set: the window, near which she so long had sat, was open: she could see from her bed the landscape she had loved. She held her son in her arms and kissed his face and hair, weeping sadly. "Poor child! what will become of you? Oh!" she said, with tender earnestness, "listen to me, William:--I am dying! Your father is dead also; you are alone; you must pray to the Lord. I bequeath you to Him who watches over the sparrow upon the house-top; He will shield the orphan. Dear child, look at me! listen to me! Try to understand that I die, that one day you may remember me!" And the poor mother, unable to speak longer, still found strength to embrace her child. At that moment an unaccustomed noise reached my ears. The wheels of a carriage grated upon the gravel of the garden drive. I ran to the door. Lord James Kysington and Lady Mary entered the house. "I got your letter," said Lord James. "I was setting out for Italy, and it was not much off my road to come myself and settle the future destiny of William Meredith: so here I am. Mrs William?----" "Mrs William Kysington still lives, my lord," I replied.