and inflamed. "I would have that finger off, Wood, if I were you," said
one of the surgeons, a day or two afterwards, on seeing the state of the
wound. But the others laughed at the suggestion, and my father, at first
inclined to submit to the amputation, was persuaded to "leave Nature
alone".

About the middle of August, 1852, he got wet through, riding on the top
of an omnibus, and the wetting resulted in a severe cold, which "settled
on his chest". One of the most eminent doctors of the day, as able as he
was rough in manner, was called to see him. He examined him carefully,
sounded his lungs, and left the room followed by my mother. "Well?" she
asked, scarcely anxious as to the answer, save as it might worry her
husband to be kept idly at home. "You must keep up his spirits", was the
thoughtless answer. "He is in a galloping consumption; you will not have
him with you six weeks longer." The wife staggered back, and fell like a
stone on the floor. But love triumphed over agony, and half an hour later
she was again at her husband's side, never to leave it again for ten
minutes at a time, night or day, till he was lying with closed eyes
asleep in death.

I was lifted on to the bed to "say good-bye to dear Papa" on the day
before his death, and I remember being frightened at his eyes which
looked so large, and his voice which sounded so strange, as he made me
promise always to be "a very good girl to darling Mamma, as Papa was
going right away". I remember insisting that "Papa should kiss Cherry", a
doll given me on my birthday, three days before, by his direction, and
being removed, crying and struggling, from the room. He died on the
following day, October 5th, and I do not think that my elder brother and
I--who were staying at our maternal grandfather's--went to the house
again until the day of the funeral. With the death, my mother broke down,