She rose, and
having prepared herself, set out to visit her people. First of all she
would go to the bookbinder's, and see how his wife was attended to.
The doctor not being there, she was readily admitted. The poor husband,
unable to help, sat a picture of misery by the scanty fire. A neighbor,
not yet quite recovered from the disease herself, had taken on her the
duties of nurse. Having given her what instructions she thought it least
improbable she might carry out, and told her to send for anything she
wanted, she rose to take her leave.
"Won't you sing to her a bit, miss, before you go?" said the husband
beseechingly. "It'll do her more good than all the doctor's stuff."
"I don't think she's well enough," said Hester.
"Not to get all the good on it, I daresay, miss," rejoined the man; "but
she'll hear it like in a dream, an' she'll think it's the angels a
singin'; an' that'll do her good, for she do like all them creaturs!"
Hester yielded and sang, thinking all the time how the ways of the
open-eyed God look to us like things in a dream, because we are only in
the night of his great day, asleep before the brightness of his great
waking thoughts.
Pages:
459
460
461
462
463
464
465
466
467
468
469
470
471
472
473
474
475
476
477
478
479
480
481
482
483