"'The doctor has not been to-day, and I understand that he can do nothing more.' "She asked me the doctor's name and my mother's, and when I answered, she said: 'What! has she grown so much worse during the night? he told me last evening that he still hoped to save her.' "These words, which she involuntarily let fall did not lead me to think that it was the Princess of Palmarosa who was speaking to me. I did not then know what many people do not know to-day, that that charitable woman paid several doctors to attend the poor of the city, the suburbs, and the country; that, without ever appearing in person, unwilling to receive the reward of her good works in the esteem and gratitude of others, she gave the most assiduous and careful attention to all the details of our hardships and our necessities. "I was too much engrossed by my grief to pay the same attention to her words that I afterwards paid to them. I left her; but when I entered my poor invalid's room, I saw that the veiled lady had followed me. She approached my mother's bed without speaking, took her hand and held it a long time, leaned over her, looked into her eyes, listened to her breathing, and finally said in my ear: 'Young man, your mother is not so ill as you think. She still has some strength and vitality. The doctor did wrong to give up hope. I will send him to you and I am sure that he will save her.' "'Who is this woman?' my mother asked in a feeble voice; 'I do not recognize you, my dear, but I recognize everybody else here.' "'I am a neighbor of yours,' replied the princess, 'and I came to tell you that the doctor is coming soon.' "She went out, and my father at once exclaimed: 'That woman is the Princess Agatha! I recognized her perfectly.' "We could not believe my father; we supposed that he was mistaken, but we did not have time to discuss the question much. Mother said that she felt better, and the doctor soon arrived, ordered other remedies, and left us, saying that she was saved. "And so she was; and since then she has always insisted that the veiled lady she saw at her death-bed was her patron saint, who had appeared to her just as she was praying to her, and that the breath of that blessed spirit had restored her life as by a miracle. We cannot disabuse my dear mother's mind of that pious and poetic idea, and my brothers and sisters, who were children then, share it with her. The doctor always pretended that he didn't know what we meant when we talked about a woman in a black _mazzaro_, who had just entered the house and gone out again, saying that he was coming, and that my mother was saved.