But the pain grew worse and worse, and he was so weakened by it, that on his eleventh birthday we dared to hope, that before the day was over, he would be keeping it in Paradise. We had brought him flowers, and some of them we strewed over his bed, and wreathed around his pillow, and it might have been in his last slumber that he was lying there, so silent and still, and the sheets no whiter than his wan white face. But that mercy was not yet granted him; there was still much more suffering in store. A month later came my eighteenth birthday, and directly I came to see him in the morning, he pulled out from under his pillow a tiny marble slab, on which notwithstanding the awkward position in which he lay, he had contrived to paint in water-colours the words: “God is love.” When he gave it me, we could only throw our arms round one another and cry together. The night before he had made the remark, that whatever presents he now gave must be of a lasting nature. For an account of the last few dreadful weeks, during which his illness made rapid strides, I turn to letters written by me at the time, and copy a few pages. “_December, 1861._--Our preparations of Christmas are being made with more than usual care, so that the festival may be kept with all due solemnity,--for the last time, as we well know, that we shall all celebrate it together on earth.... Papa is very weak, and the fits of coughing are almost intermittent. With him, as with Otto, it is only a question of time.... Christmas Eve was very solemn and peaceful and beautiful: the few days preceding it had been exceptionally good and free from pain, so that Otto could be wheeled into the room where the Christmas-trees stood ready, and it was touching to see his little face, beaming with happiness, when the trees were lighted up, and the Christmas hymn sung as usual, by the whole household, led by me from my accustomed place at the organ.... But since then he has had two very disturbed nights, and the dreadful attacks of pain have begun again.... ‘Keep calm!’ he called to mamma, after one of these,--‘it is only the body that suffers, nothing of this can hurt the soul!’