I came again to conscious breath;
I heard the anguish worse than death.

No handmaid near, but one old nurse,
Whose face flash' d like a living curse;

And yet her wrinkled woman's heart
Fell faltering on the bitterest part.

She could not speak it—woe is me!
Made human by my misery.

But thou art changed! Rise from the spot;
Still at my feet? I say, kneel not!

Thou claspest me! What word?—what word?—
Mother?—is 't "Mother" that I heard?

Mother, and Queen?—O, hungry breast,
Feed on his beauty!—Rest, rest, rest!

Believe it, O true heart! now trace
Thy trembling when thou saw'st his face;

And weep, that thrones should dawn again,
To give our pleasure pomp—and pain.

Weep, weep, to see him standing there,
With his proud father's noble air.

Joy, joy! but weep that there should be
So proud a thing as majesty.

I fear it, now it is re-won;
We will arise and go, my son!

THE SPENDTHRIFT'S DAUGHTER.

IN SIX CHAPTERS.

CHAPTER THE SIXTH.

AND now that wretched man, broken with
disease and misery, sat there, with the lady,
who, patient and pitying, even to the worst of
her fellow-creatures, had been moved by the
sincerity of his distress. The extremity of his
misery had raised so much compassion in her
heart, as to overcome the resentment and
indignation which she had at first felt, on
recognising him.

He had entreated her to tell him everything
she knew of the fate of one whom he
had that morning followed to the grave. For
wretched as was his attire, defiled with dirt,
and worn with travel, he had left the house,
and had followed, a tearless, but heart-broken
mourner, the simple procession which attended
the once lovely and glorious creature
whom he had called daughter, to her resting-place.

He had stood by, at her funeral, whilst ill-taught
children stared aitd scoffed, until the
busy mercenaries had pushed and elbowed
him aside. He had seen his best and loveliest
one consigned, ashes to ashes, dust to dust;
he had waited quietly, until all had dispersed,
and every one was gone home. He had no
home—and he yet stood by, and watched the
sexton, completing his work, and cheerfully
whistling as he proceeded with it.

For it was now a gleaming bright day, and
the sun had burst forth, and beamed upon the
lofty tower of the church-steeple. It gilded the
church vane and weathercock; it sparkled
from the windows of the houses around
the graveyard; it glistened on the lowly
graves.

Cheerfulness was around him, for the bright
sun of heaven cheers and ennobles everything
upon which his beams fall. And there was a
soft wind, too, which stirred among the
leaves of a few poplars, that stood hard by,
whispering sweet secrets of nature, even in
that dismal spot.

He stood there, motionless and tearless,
until the sexton had finished his task, had
shouldered his spade, and, still whistling, had
walked away. Then he sat down upon the
little mound, and hid his face in his hands.
He sat there, for some time—for a long,
long time—and then slowly arose, and with
feeble and uncertain steps retraced the way
he had come, and found himself at the door
of the handsome house, whence he had
followed the funeral in the morning.

He made his way to the lady, who happened
to be still there, and who now (as I
have said), indignation having yielded to compassion,
was prepared to satisfy the yearning
anxiety he had expressed, to hear all she
could tell him of his once proud and beautiful
child.

"You know where you are, and what I am,
and what I and the other ladies whom you
have seen with me, employ ourselves upon
when we come here."

"No," he said, looking round. "It never
struck me to inquire, or even to reflect upon
what I saw."

"This house is a kind of hospital."

He started—and a faint flush passed over
his face.

"Yes," he said, "it was natural—as things
had gone on—a consequence inevitable. Then
she died at last in the hospital?"

"Not exactly that—as you would interpret
the word. This house is, indeed, a species of
hospital; it is intended as a refuge for the sick
and dying, who have nowhere else to go; but it
does not exactly resemble an ordinary hospital.
In the first place, the services performed, are
not altogether gratuitous; in the second,
every patient has a room to herself. We are
only women, except the medical attendants;
and we admit none but women—and those
women of a higher class, of gentle breeding,
and refined habits, who have fallen into
poverty, and yet who have not been hardened
in their sensations by habit, so as that the
edge of privation is blunted; or what, perhaps,
is still more difficult to bear, that
painful sense of publicity unfelt, which renders
shelter in an ordinary hospital a
source of suffering to them—which—God be
thanked!—it does not necessarily prove to those
for whom such places of refuge were intended.
This house would have been more justly