On reaching the house, a formal man-servant, with indifferent face,
transferred me to the guidance of a hired nurse, who led me up the stairs,
and, before I was well aware of it, into the room in which Dr. Lloyd had
died. Widely different, indeed, the aspect of the walls, the character of
the furniture! The dingy paperhangings were replaced by airy muslins,
showing a rose-coloured ground through their fanciful openwork; luxurious
fauteuils, gilded wardrobes, full-length mirrors, a toilet-table tricked
out with lace and ribbons; and glittering with an array of silver gewgaws
and jewelled trinkets,--all transformed the sick chamber of the simple
man of science to a boudoir of death for the vain coquette. But the room
itself, in its high lattice and heavy ceiling, was the same--as the coffin
itself has the same confines, whether it be rich in velvets and bright
with blazoning, or rude as a pauper's shell.

And the bed, with its silken coverlet, and its pillows edged with the
thread-work of Louvain, stood in the same sharp angle as that over which
had flickered the frowning smoke-reek above the dying, resentful foe. As
I approached, a man, who was seated beside the sufferer, turned round his
face, and gave me a silent kindly nod of recognition. He was Mr. C----,
one of the clergy of the town, the one with whom I had the most frequently
come into contact wherever the physician resigns to the priest the
language that bids man hope. Mr. C-----, as a preacher, was renowned for
his touching eloquence; as a pastor, revered for his benignant piety; as
friend and neighbour, beloved for a sweetness of nature which seemed to
regulate all the movements of a mind eminently masculine by the beat of a
heart tender as the gentlest woman's.

This good man; then whispering something to the sufferer which I did not
overhear, stole towards me, took me by the hand, and said, also in a