"Oh, thank you, sir, thank you! How very kind you are!" I exclaimed, with the tears coming into my eyes. "Only please to be punctual at six o'clock." He made this promise; and made it good. "Unless the case becomes complicated," said the Doctor, three days afterwards, "with cardiac symptoms, or pulmonary, or possibly renal derangement, or any other resultant cachexy of the organisms; we may anticipate, my dear madam, a condition of gradual convalescence." "Why, Doctor, he is ever so much better already!" my mother exclaimed impatiently; "he has ordered our Tommy to go himself, as far as the shop of the famous Mr. Chumps, and to try to be back by twelve o'clock, with three pounds cut thick of tender rumpsteak, and two dozen of oysters from Tester's. And he is coming downstairs, to dine at one o'clock. But he is so weak, that I shall have to help him. Deary me, what a thing to think of! And a week ago, he carried me up, when I slipped, and hurt my ancle. And I am not so light as I was, you know, sir. All that I leave now to my son Tommy. He will never be good weight." "Very few medical men," replied the Doctor, with a pleasant smile at both of us, "would like to have the question of diet so completely taken out of their own hands. But as soon as therapeusis has reinstated our patients, though it be but a little, they are apt to think themselves quit of us. And then there comes the relapse, my dear madam; then there comes the sad relapse; and the blame of it is cast on us." "He has taken a great many bottles, sir, such as I never could have believed;" my mother answered sorrowfully, "and it will be a little too hard upon him, not to let him have his change. How much will you please to allow him, sir?" "Not an ounce, if I could help it--liquid nourishment for three days more. Our poor stomach is still most delicate, and unfitted for solid food. Restrict him, at any rate, to three ounces, and the like number of oysters." This was easier said than done. My father got through a good pound of steak, and at least a dozen oysters; and after that, he felt so well, that he had a pint of ale, and some of his healthy red returned to him. My mother was so pleased with this, that she came to his chair, and kissed him; and he said, "My dear, I thought at one time, I never should kiss you no more, nor Tommy neither. But the Lord has shown Himself most merciful. And I don't see, as a pipe would hurt me." The next day, he was so much better, that at nine o'clock I went back to school, and worked with a light heart; trying to make up for the work I had fallen back with. And Mr. Cope was most kind to me, and said that I did very well.