precious, precious babe!" And the mother clasped her child
passionately to her bosom.

In the course of ten or fifteen minutes, a vessel of hot water was
ready, and into this the still writhing form of the convulsed child
was placed. Then Wilkinson hurried off for their physician. Half an
hour afterwards he returned with him. The good effects of the
hot-bath were already perceptible. The face of the child had resumed
its placid sweetness of expression, and there was but slight
convulsive twitching in the limbs. The doctor remained with them,
applying, from time to time, appropriate remedies, until all the
painful signs which occasioned so much alarm had vanished, and then
left, promising to call early on the next morning.

It was past one o'clock. The physician had left, and the domestics
retired to their own apartment. Mr. and Mrs. Wilkinson were alone
with their still unconscious child, that lay in a deep, unnatural
slumber. They were standing, side by side, and bending over the bed
on which little Ella lay. Wilkinson had drawn his arm around his
wife, and she had laid her head upon his shoulder. Each heard the
beating of the other's heart, as thus they stood, silent, yet with
troubled thoughts and oppressed feelings.

A tear fell upon the hand of Wilkinson, and the warm touch, coming
as it did in that moment of intense excitement, caused a quick
thrill to pass through his nerves; and he started involuntarily.
Words of confession and promises for the future were on his tongue;
but, their utterance, just at that moment, seemed untimely, and he
merely answered the mute appeal of tears with a fervent, heart-warm
kiss, that, if the power of his will could have gone with it, would