'Years thus passed on, when one day, after she had been more than usually perverse and fretful, WILLIAM, who had been reading to her, on receiving some slight rebuff, started suddenly from his seat by her side, called her '_a little hunch-back_,' and left the room. In a moment, however, his passion subsided, and returning, he found his sister in tears. He attempted to put his arm around her neck, but she repulsed him, and slipping away, retired to her own chamber. Her mother soon after learned what had happened, and going to EMMA, found her upon the bed in a paroxysm of grief. She endeavored to soothe her feelings, but in vain; she refused to be comforted. 'I want to _die_, mother,' she replied to all her endearments; 'I have long felt that I was a burden to you all.' She cried herself to sleep that night, and on the morrow was too ill to rise. The doctor was called in, and warned the mother against an approaching fever. For three days she remained in an uncertain state; but on the fourth, the fever came in earnest, and thenceforth she was confined to her pillow. 'In the mean time, the grief of WILLIAM had been more poignant even than that of his sister. Thrice he had been to her bedside to ask her forgiveness, and kiss once more her pallid cheek; but she turned her face resolutely away, and refused to recognize him. After these repulses he would slowly leave the room, and going to his own chamber, sit brooding for hours over the melancholy consequences of his rashness. Owing to the previous enfeebled health of EMMA, the fever made rapid progress, and it soon became apparent that she must die. WILLIAM, in consequence of the violent aversion of his sister, had latterly been denied admittance to the chamber, though he lingered all day about the door, eagerly catching the least word in regard to her state, and apparently unmindful of all other existence.