changes in herself that, forgetting how much
of the original Margaret was left, she had
reasoned that if her tastes and feelings had so
materially altered, even in her stay-at-home
life, his wild career, with which she was but
imperfectly acquainted, must have almost
substituted another Frederick from the tall
stripling in his middy's uniform, whom she
remembered looking up to with such admiring
awe. But in their absence they had
grown nearer to each other in age, as well as
in many other things. And so it was that the
weight, this sorrowful time, was lightened to
Margaret. Other light than that of
Frederick's presence she had none. For a few
hours the mother rallied on seeing her son.
She sate with his hand in hers; she would
not part with it even while she slept; and
Margaret had to feed him like a baby, rather
than that he should disturb her mother by
removing a finger. Mrs. Hale wakened
while they were thus engaged; she slowly
moved her head round on the pillow,
and smiled at her children, as she understood
what they were doing, and why it
was done.

"I am very selfish," said she; " but it will
not be for long." Frederick bent down and
kissed the feeble hand that imprisoned
his.

This state of tranquillity could not endure
for many days, nor perhaps for many hours;
so Dr. Donaldson assured Margaret. After
the kind doctor had gone away, she stole
down to Frederick, who, during the visit, had
been adjured to remain quietly concealed in
the back parlour, usually Dixon's bedroom,
but now given up to him.

Margaret told him what Dr. Donaldson
said.

"I don't believe it," he exclaimed. " She is
very ill; she may be dangerously ill, and in
immediate danger, too; but I can't imagine
that she could be as she is, if she were on the
point of death. Margaret! she should have
some other advice—some London doctor.
Have you never thought of that?"

"Yes," said Margaret, "more than once.
But I don't believe it would do any good.
And, you know, we have not the money to
bring any great London surgeon down, and
I am sure Dr. Donaldson is only second in
skill to the very best, if indeed he is to
them."

Frederick began to walk up and down the
room impatiently.

"I have credit in Cadiz," said he, "but
none here, owing to this wretched change of
name. Why did my father leave Helstone?
That was the blunder."

"It was no blunder," said Margaret
gloomily. ''And, above all possible chances,
avoid letting papa hear anything like what
you have just been saying. I can see that
he is tormenting himself already with the
idea that mamma would never have been ill
if we had staid at Helstone, and you don't
know papa's agonising power of
self-reproach!"

Frederick walked away as if he were on
the quarter-deck. At last he stopped
right opposite to Margaret, and looked at
her drooping, desponding attitude for an
instant.

"My little Margaret! " said he, caressing
her. " Let us hope as long as we can. Poor
little woman! what! is this face all wet with
tears? I will hope. I will, in spite of a
thousand doctors. Bear up, Margaret, and be
brave enough to hope!"

Margaret choked in trying to speak, and
when she did it was very low.

' I must try to be meek enough to trust.
Oh, Frederick! mamma was getting to love
me so! And I was getting to understand
her. And now comes death to snap us
asunder!"

"Come, come, come! Let us go up-stairs,
and do something, rather than waste time
that may be so precious. Thinking has,
many a time, made me sad, darling; but
doing never did in all my life. My theory is
a sort of parody on the maxim of ' Get
money, my son, honestly if you can; but get
money.' My precept is, ' Do something, my
sister, do good if you can; but, at any rate,
do something.'"

"Not excluding mischief," said Margaret,
smiling faintly through her tears.

"By no means. What I do exclude is the
remorse afterwards. Blot your misdeeds out
(if you are particularly conscientious), by a
good deed, as soon as you can; just as we did
a correct sum at school on the slate, where
an incorrect one was only half rubbed out. It
was better than wetting our sponge with
tears; both less loss of time where tears
had to be waited for, and a better effect at
last."

If Margaret thought Frederick's theory
rather a rough one at first, she saw how he
worked it out into continual production of
kindness in fact. After a bad night with his
mother (for he insisted on taking his turn as
a sitter-up) he was busy the next morning
before breakfast, contriving a leg-rest for
Dixon, who was beginning to feel the fatigues
of watching. At breakfast time he interested
Mr. Hale with vivid, graphic, rattling accounts
of the wild life he had led in Mexico, South
America, and elsewhere. Margaret would have
given up the effort in despair to rouse Mr.
Hale out of his dejection; it would even have
affected herself and rendered her incapable of
talking at all. But Fred, true to his theory,
did something perpetually; and talking was
the only thing to be done, besides eating, at
breakfast.

Before the night of that day, Dr. Donaldson's
opinion was proved to be all too well-
founded. Convulsions came on; and when
they ceased Mrs. Hale was unconscious. Her
husband might lie by her shaking the bed
with his sobs; her son's strong arms might