When this terrible state of affairs had lasted for a week, and everyone was worn out, the doctors--for they were now many, Lord Frogmore having summoned everyone who could be supposed to be of any help--requested an interview with him; and then announced their opinion that Lady Frogmore should be removed from home. Having thus to renounce the hopes he had still been cherishing against hope that her illness might still prove only temporary, the old lord struggled for some time against the dreadful necessity. He declared that he was ready to fill the house with attendants; to undergo any expense; to give up his house entirely to his wife and go away himself if they considered it necessary. But by and by calmer counsels prevailed. Mary’s family were more reasonable than her husband. They pointed out to him with much practical sense that he was risking his own health, destroying his own life, without any advantage to her, and that his life was more than ever valuable, for his child’s sake, and even for her sake, poor forlorn lady, who had no protector but he. It was hard for him in his weakened state to stand out against the doctors, against the dull persistency of the vicar, who besides could not be got rid of till poor Mary was removed, and against what was more than all, the dreadful sight of Mary convulsed with frenzy, or lying in her calm intervals like a dead thing, her mild face grown into a tragic mask of misery. On the whole it was better not to see that, to have the knowledge of it without having one’s heart rent every day by the dreadful, dreadful sight. Lord Frogmore at last consented to this miserable yet inevitable step, which he felt to be a public proclamation of the wretchedness which had so soon closed over the late and tranquil happiness of his old age. He went away for a few days with Rogers, as sad an old man as any under the stars, and gave himself up meekly into his faithful servant’s hands, to be brought back to life as far as was possible. “Yes,” he said, “Rogers, do what you can for me: for I have my little boy to look after, my poor little baby that ought to have been my grandchild, Rogers.” “Don’t say so, my lord. Oh, don’t say so. He’ll grow up to be a comfort to you.” The old lord shook his head with a melancholy smile. “He’s cost me dear, he’s cost me very dear, and he’s a delicate little mite with no stamina, an old man’s child. Poor little beggar that has cost his mother her reason! it would be the best thing for him, Rogers, to die comfortably and be buried with her when I go.” “Oh, my lord! please God you’ll live to see him come of age, and my lady as bright as ever, and all well.” Lord Frogmore gave a deep sigh, and then a little laugh, which was perhaps the saddest of the two. “Well,” he said, “let’s hope so, Rogers, since nobody can tell how it may be.”