I never shall forget the countenance of my mother as she sat leaning from the carriage windows, for she was too feeble to stand during the burial, while I stood with Dr. Harlowe at the head of the grave. The sun was just sinking behind the blue undulation of the distant hills, and a mellow, golden lustre calmly settled on the level plain around us. It lighted up her pallid features with a kind of unearthly glow, similar to that which rested on the marble monuments gleaming through the weeping willows. Every thing looked as serene and lovely, as green and rejoicing, as if there were no such things as sickness and death in the world. My mother's eyes wandered slowly over the whole inclosure, shut in by the plain white railing, edged with black,--gleamed on every gray stone, white slab, and green hillock,--rested a moment on me, then turned towards heaven, with such an expression! "Not yet, my mother, oh, not yet!" I cried aloud in an agony that could not be repressed, clinging to Dr. Harlowe's arm as if every earthly stay and friend were sliding from my grasp. I knew the meaning of that mute, expressive glance. She was measuring her own grave by the side of Peggy's clay cold bed,--she was commending her desolate orphan to the Father of the fatherless, the God of the widow. She knew she would soon be there, and I knew it too. And after the first sharp pang,--after the arrow of conviction fastened in my heart,--I pressed it there with a kind of stern, vindictive joy, triumphing in my capacity of suffering. I wonder if any one ever felt as I did,--I wonder if any worm of the dust ever writhed so impotently under the foot of Almighty God! O kind and compassionate Father! Now I know thou art kind even in thy chastisements, merciful even in thy judgments, by the bitter chalice I have drained, by all the waves and billows that have gone over me, by anguish, humiliation, repentance, and prayer. Forgive, forgive! for I knew not what I was doing! From that night my mother never left her bed. The fever spared her, but she wilted like the grass beneath the scythe of the mower. Gone was the unnatural excitement which had sustained her the last nine days; severed the silver cord so long dimmed by secret tears. Thank heaven! I was not doomed to see her tortured by pain, or raving in delirious agony,--to see those exquisite features distorted by frenzy,--or to hear that low, sweet voice untuned, the key-note of reason lost. Thank heaven! even death laid its hand gently on one so gentle and so lovely. CHAPTER X. I said, death laid its hand gently on one so gentle and so lovely. Week after week she lingered, almost imperceptibly fading, passing away like a soft rolling cloud that melts into the sky. The pestilence had stayed its ravages. The terror, the thick gloom had passed by.