Eva placed her child on a rug at her feet, then looking at it, she would say to me—“Doctor, when my son is grown up I wish him to become distinguished, and when once taught I will choose for him a noble career. I will follow him everywhere—on the sea if he is in the navy, in India if in the army: he must win glory and honors; and I will lean on his arm and proudly say—I am his mother! Will he not let me follow him, doctor? a poor woman who needs but silence and solitude that she may weep, can incommode no one, is it not so?” And then we would discuss the different pursuits to be chosen; we placed twenty years on that infant’s head, both of us forgetting that those twenty years would make us old. But, alas! we rarely dwell on ourselves, and never think of being otherwise than young and happy, when youth and happiness abide within us. In listening to those bright anticipations, I could not help regarding with fear the child on whom another’s existence so materially depended. An indefinable dread crept over me in spite of myself; but, thought I, she has shed tears enough, and God, whom she implores, owes her some happiness. Things were in this situation when I received a letter from my uncle, (the only surviving relation I had.) My uncle, a member of the faculty at Montpellier, sent for me that I might in that learned city perfect myself in the secrets of my profession. This letter, worded like a request, was in fact a command, and I was forced to go. The next morning, with a heart swelling at the thought of the isolation in which I should leave the widow and orphan, I repaired to the white house, to bid adieu to Eva Meredith. When I told her that I was about to quit her for a long time, I scarcely know if a shade of sadness passed over her features, her beautiful face since William’s death had worn a look of such deep melancholy, that it was impossible ever to trace on it more than the faintest smile; as for sadness, it was always there. “Are you going to leave us,” she said, “your services were so beneficial to my child!” The poor woman had no word of regret for her only friend who was leaving her, the mother alone grieved for the doctor so useful to her son; I did not complain. To be of use is the sweetest recompense for our devotion to others. “Farewell,” she said, giving me her hand. “Wherever you may be, may God bless you; and if at any time it is his will that you should be unhappy, may He provide you a heart as compassionate as your own.” I bent my forehead to her hand and retired deeply affected. The child lay sleeping on the lawn before the steps, I took him in my arms and embraced him over and over again; I gazed on him for a long time attentively, and sadly, and a tear dimmed my eye. “Oh! no, it cannot be, I am deceived,” I murmured, and hurried from the house. “Heavens! doctor,” simultaneously exclaimed all the listeners of the village doctor, “what then did you fear for this child?”