He had rallied two or three times and relapsed again, so that we were even afraid to trust the appearance of recovery when such appeared, but there was no sign of recovery now. It was just dawn, very early in the morning, and we had been watching all night. I had made Alice lie down, and baby was in a disturbed and painful slumber. As I sat watching him, restraining my very breath lest it should make him uneasy as he lay upon my lap, my eye wandered to the cold gray sky, over which the morning light was flushing faintly, and it came to my mind how I had watched the dawn upon this day twelvemonth, my wedding-day. The sweet serenity of that morning came back to my recollection, the agitation of my own mind, which, great as it was, was happy agitation still, and my trust, my hope unbounded; my perfect confidence in Harry, my fearlessness of any evil--yet, that was the beginning of sorrows; now the fear in my heart shook the very foundations of the earth; if such a calamity came, there was no light, no hope beyond it. I had come to love life for my baby's sake, and even now I know I made a great painful effort to say I would be resigned and content with God's will, whatever it--but I felt in my heart that life would be only a loathing and disgust to me; oh, heaven have pity upon me! What would I have in all the world if my baby were taken away! Every fleeting change that there was--every momentary alteration, I wanted to have the doctor, or to call Alice, to ask what they thought now. Then I remembered vaguely the name, the Great Physician--and that however far others might be, he was near at all times; oh, if I only could have got to his feet, as they did in Palestine in those blessed days when He was there, if I could but have thrown myself on the earth before him, and cried, "my child! my child!" I said, as in my prayer, from my very despair, I caught boldness. I cried with my heart, till it was bursting with that agony of asking,--praying for your child's life, do you know what it is? There was no difference, no difference! and the pallid light was growing on the sky, and the first sounds of life began to break upon the stillness; then I was stayed in my prayers as by an invisible hand. I cannot tell how or why these words came to my mind, but they came with a terrible force, making me silent, shutting my mouth in an instant: "If I regard sin in my heart, the Lord will not hear me." I was appalled by the sudden sentence; was there no hope, then? No hope? Did I not even dare to appeal to Him who never before cast any applicant away?