--fortitude! The human heart is wonderfully sustained when it is not
the conscience that weighs it down-griefs, that we think at the moment
must kill us, wear themselves away. I speak the truth, for I too have
suffered!"

"Poor grandfather!" said Sophy, gently; and she said no more. But when
he would have continued to speak comfort, or exhort to patience, she
pressed his hand tightly, and laid her finger on her lip. He was hushed
in an instant.

Presently she began to move about the room, busying herself, as usual, in
those slight, scarce perceptible arrangements by which she loved to think
that she ministered to the old man's simple comforts. She placed the
armchair in his favourite nook by the window, and before it the footstool
for the poor lame foot; and drew the table near the chair, and looked
over the books that George had selected for his perusal from Darrell's
library; and chose the volume in which she saw his mark, to place nearest
to his hand, and tenderly cleared the mist from his reading-glass; and
removed one or two withered or ailing snowdrops from the little winter
nosegay she had gathered for him the day before--he watching her all the
time, silent as herself, not daring, indeed, to speak, lest his heart
should overflow.

These little tasks of love over, she came towards him a few paces, and
said: "Please, dear grandfather, tell me all about what has happened to
yourself, which should make us glad--that is, by-and-by; but nothing as
to the rest of that letter. I will just think over it by myself; but
never let us talk of it, grandy dear, never more--never more."