if this is to be the end, farewell to you all!” And his expression was rapturous, as he bade us each good-night, and prayed for blessings on us.... But even then it was not over....” The agony lasted two days longer. He seemed to sleep, but woke from time to time with a cry of anguish. He could no longer speak, though he still saw and heard everything, and gave signs that he understood. Then, at the very last, after a few broken accents, came the rattle in his throat, and the one word “Help!” loud and clear. And then a deathly silence. And mamma bent over him and murmured--“Thanks be to God! His name be praised for evermore!” The struggle was over. Peace and heavenly calm spread themselves over the tired features, and a sweet smile played about his lips--the deep line across the high forehead alone showing how dearly this peace had been purchased. Our dear Otto looked like an angel sleeping there; we could scarce tear ourselves away from him. My mother kept saying--“How quietly he rests!” and if anyone sobbed on coming into the room--“Hush! hush!” she said, “do not disturb my child!” With our own hands we placed him in his last little bed, and covered him over. The old clergyman from Biebrich, by whom the benediction had been spoken at my parents’ marriage, now pronounced the last blessing over their beloved child. Otto’s best epitaph is contained in a letter from my father to an intimate friend, which concluded thus: “ ...On a little rising-ground not far from Monrepos, he sleeps his last sleep in the shade of the old linden trees. But he lives on forever in our memory, and this living remembrance, this communion with the dead, is our last best heritage, by which in the midst of the heavy loss, we are yet made rich sempiternally.” End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of From memory's shrine, by Carmen Sylva