I now recollected, concerning M. Breugne, what was amply sufficient to decide me in his favour. By way of making amends for my reserve, I went to his house myself. He promised to come in ten minutes: that space of time I employed in helping my younger son to dress, and come down stairs: the fatigue of these operations was to him excessive; arrived at the door of the first salon, he looked at the sofa, as if he wished it to come to meet him, made a few hasty and tottering steps, and threw himself upon it, quite exhausted. He desired that it might be turned with its back to the windows, as the light importuned him: this was done, and the large round table was pushed from the centre of the salon towards one side, that there might be space between it and the sofa. This trifling circumstance is not mentioned idly; it will be seen hereafter to have its meaning. Who can deny the existence of a superintending, a particular Providence, when he observes, that the mental faculties of my younger son were continued to him, as if on purpose that he might assist me in determining on the choice of the physician who rescued him from death, and that they were then temporarily suspended precisely at the time when it became necessary that he should be kept in ignorance of what, if known, would have retarded or prevented his restoration to health? Is it presumption in me to think, that even my negligence of the former day, when I waited so long for Guerard without taking any steps to replace him, may have been regulated, that the merciful dispensations of a good Providence might have their way? I advance this conjecture in all humility, and corrected by a sense of my own unworthiness. FOOTNOTES: [71] "M. Roche is your physician."--"_You_ are my physician also." [72] It is very well done of M. Busquet. [73] Here is the physician whom I recommend to you. [74] Since he is vomiting? CHAP. XVIII.