light-heartedness, in its turn, exercised a wholesome influence over
him, and, like the gentle breeze, scattered the clouds which sometimes
brooded darkly over his spirit.

But the declaration of Sacred Writ is, "One event happeneth to all."
None, as they beheld that united and happy family, the centre of a
numerous circle of friends, admired and beloved in the community,
imagined the change which was so soon to "come o'er the spirit of their
dream."

A few weeks only had elapsed, after the festive scene we have portrayed
in a former chapter, when one morning Ella, on entering her mother's
chamber, which adjoined her own, was surprised to find, for the hour was
unusually late, that she had not yet risen. With noiseless step she
approached the couch, and with gentle hand drew back the curtain,
thinking to wake her by a kiss, when, terrible spectacle to her
affectionate heart, she beheld her idolized mother, not sleeping as she
had expected, but every lineament transfixed and motionless in death! An
apoplectic fit,--so the physician affirmed,--must have seized her during
the watches of the night, and thus, suddenly and fearfully, had she been
called to her final account. We draw a veil over that mournful scene,
for "too sacred is it for a stranger's eye."

On her children its effect was deep and lasting. Ella especially seemed
sinking beneath the blow, and her brother, fearing for her reason, if
not her life, with gentle violence almost compelled her to bid adieu to
her native city, and, accompanied by him, seek, in change of scene, some
alleviation for the grief that preyed so deeply on her spirit.