“What a wonderful patient you are, child! What a beautiful spirit!” He looked at her intently. “Well, I'm older and wiser in experience than you. I'm glad you added that clause `unless you say I should.' I'm going to say it. After all my talks to you on our return to the truths and simplicity of Nature you are perhaps surprised. You needn't be. I'm going to put you into a gentle sleep. Nature will then do her physical work automatically. I do this because our daughters are the inheritors of the sins of their mothers for centuries. The over-refinement of nerves, the hothouse methods of living, and the maiming of their bodies with the inventions of fashion have made the pains of this supreme hour beyond endurance. This should not be. It will not be so when our race has come into its own. But it will take many generations and perhaps many centuries before we reach the ideal. No physician who has a soul could permit a woman of your physique, your culture and refinement to walk barefoot and blindfolded into such a hell of physical torture. I will not permit it.” He walked quietly into his laboratory, prepared the sleeping powders and gave them to her. Six hours later she opened her eyes with eager wonder. Aunt Abbie was busy over a bundle of fluffy clothes. The Doctor was standing with his arms folded behind his back, his fine, clean-shaven face in profile looking thoughtfully over the sun-lit valley. There was just one moment of agonized fear. If they had failed! If her child were hideous--or deformed! Her lips moved in silent prayer. “Doctor?” she whispered. In a moment he was bending over her, a look of exaltation in his brown eyes. “Tell me quick!” “A wonderful boy, little mother! The most beautiful babe I have ever seen. He didn't even cry--just opened his big, wide eyes and grunted contentedly.” “Give him to me.” Aunt Abbie laid the warm bundle in her arms and she pressed it gently until the sweet, red flesh touched her own. She lay still for a moment, a smile on her lips. “Lift him and let me look!” “What a funny little pug nose,” she laughed. “Yes--exactly like his mother's!” the Doctor replied. She gazed with breathless reverence. “He is beautiful, isn't he?” she sighed. “And you have observed the chin and mouth?” “Exactly like yours. It's wonderful!” CHAPTER XXVIII. WHAT IS LOVE? Eighteen months swiftly passed with the little mother and her boy still in Dr. Mulford's sanitarium. She had allowed herself to be persuaded that he had the right to be her guide and helper in the first year's training of the child. The boy had steadily grown in strength and beauty of body and mind. The Doctor persuaded her to spend one more winter basking in his sun-parlor and finishing the final chapters of his book. Her mind was singularly clever and helpful in the interpretation of the experiences and emotions of motherhood.