I was wakened by a low murmur from the baby, who stirred uneasily. Annie's hand was still locked in mine; as I sought to disengage it cautiously, I felt, with a sudden horror, that the fingers were lifeless. I sprang to my feet and bent over her; she did not breathe. Out of that sweet sleep her body had passed into another which would know no waking, and her soul had awakened free. Slowly I withdrew the little sleeping baby from her arms and carried it to the nurse. Then I went to Dr. Fearing's room; he had slept in the house for a week; I found him dressed, but asleep on a lounge. He had lain in this way, he told me, for four nights, expecting that each would be the last. When I touched him on the shoulder he opened his eyes, without surprise or alarm, and said,-- "Did she wake?" "No," I replied, and that was all. The day was just breaking: as the dark gray and red tints cleared and rolled away, and left a pale yellow sky, the morning star, which I could see from Annie's bedside, faded and melted in the pure ether. Even while I was looking at it it vanished, and I thought that, like it, Annie's bright soul, disappearing from my sight, had blended in Eternal Day. * * * * * This was four years ago. My Aunt Ann died, as Annie had said she would, in a very few months afterward. My uncle came, a broken and trembling man, to live with us, and Edward Neal gladly gave his little son into my hands, as Annie had desired. He went abroad immediately, finding it utterly impossible to bear the sight of the scenes of his lost happiness. He came back in two years, bringing a bright young wife with him, a sunny-haired English girl, who, he said, was so marvelously like Annie. She is like the Annie whom he knew! Every day their baby boy is brought to our house to see his brother; but I think two children of one name never before looked so unlike. My little Henry is the centre of his grandfather's life and of mine. He is a pensive child, and has never been strong; but his beauty and sweetness are such that we often tremble when we look in his face and remember Annie. George Ware is still in India. Every ship brings brave sweet letters, and gifts for the baby. I sent him the little paper which I found in the corner of Annie's jewel-case, bearing his name. I knew that it was for him when I saw her feeble hands laying the baby's hair and hers together in the locket. In November Annie's grave is snowy with white chrysanthemums. She loved them better than any other flowers, and I have made the little hillock almost into a thicket of them. In George Ware's last letter he wrote:-- "When the baby is ten years old I shall come home. He will not need me till then; till then, he is better in your hands alone; after that I can help you." The One-Legged Dancers.