with some difficulty, succeeded in arousing me from the sweet, healthful
sleep of childhood. My mother drew nigh to me and whispered, "My dear
Clara, your papa is dying." With a frightened cry, I threw my arms
around her neck, and begged her to tell me what had happened. I was
unable to comprehend the meaning of her words. Since my earliest
recollection, my father had never experienced a day's illness, and so
the reader may be able to form some idea of the shock occasioned by her
words--uttered, as they were, at the hour of midnight. When my mother
had succeeded in soothing me, in some degree, to calmness, she informed
me, in a voice choked with sobs, which, for my sake, she tried to
suppress, that my father had, two hours since, been stricken with
apoplexy, in so severe a form that his life was despaired of. She
further informed me that his attending physician thought he would not
live to see the light of another morning. Well do I remember the nervous
terror with which I clung to my mother as we entered my father's
apartment, and the icy chill which diffused itself over my body, as I
gazed upon the fearfully changed features of my father. I had never
before seen death in any form. I believe the first view of death is more
or less terrible to every child; it certainly was terrible for me to
first view death imprinted upon the countenance of a fond father. I have
ever since thought that my father recognized me when my mother led me to
his bed-side; but power of utterance was gone. It was a fearful trial to
me, who had seen but ten years of life. After the first shock, a strange
calm took possession of me. Though many years have passed since that
period, I remember, as though it were but yesterday, how I sat during
those long hours, scarcely for an instant removing my eyes from my
father's face, but shed not a tear; for, after the first burst of grief,
tears refused to come to my relief. Just as the day began to dawn I
heard the physician say, in a whisper, to a kind neighbor who stood by,
I think he is going. At that moment my father opened his eyes, and,