In her happy oblivion, the veriest trifles
are as new and as interesting to her as if she was beginning her
existence again. Under the tender care of the friends who now
protect her, she lives contentedly the life of a child. When her
last hour comes, may she die with nothing on her memory but the
recollection of their kindness!
THE EIGHTH DAY.
THE wind that I saw in the sky yesterday has come. It sweeps down
our little valley in angry howling gusts, and drives the heavy
showers before it in great sheets of spray.
There are some people who find a strangely exciting effect
produced on their spirits by the noise, and rush, and tumult of
the elements on a stormy day. It has never been so with me, and
it is less so than ever now. I can hardly bear to think of my son
at sea in such a tempest as this. While I can still get no news
of his ship, morbid fancies beset me which I vainly try to shake
off. I see the trees through my window bending before the wind.
Are the masts of the good ship bending like them at this moment?
I hear the wash of the driving rain. Is _he_ hearing the thunder
of the raging waves? If he had only come back last night!--it is
vain to dwell on it, but the thought will haunt me--if he had
only come back last night!
I tried to speak cautiously about him again to Jessie, as Owen
had advised me; but I am so old and feeble now that this
ill-omened storm has upset me, and I could not feel sure enough
of my own self-control to venture on matching myself to-day
against a light-hearted, lively girl, with all her wits about
her.
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