The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 109, November, 1866

"And then," added she, after a short, deliberating pause, during which she, with my assistance, raised herself to sit on the side of the chair with her feet still resting on the turf, "while we are upon the subject,—one thing more. If I should be the first to go,—nobody knows whose turn may come the first,—then I should like to have you do—just what would make you happiest; but I don't like mourning. I shouldn't wish to have it worn for me. My feelings about it have all changed since we made it for mamma. It seemed as if we were only working at a great black wall, for our minds to have to break through, every time they yearned to go back into the past and sit with her. It was as if the things she chose for us, and loved to see us in, were part of her and of her life with us,—as if she would be able still to think of us in them, and know just how we looked. And it seemed so strange and unsympathizing in us, that, when we loved her so, we should go about all muffled up in darkness, because our God was clothing her in light!"

I answered,—rather slowly and tremulously this time, I fear,—that I had felt so too.

"Then, Katy," resumed she, pleadingly, as she leaned back in her usual attitude in the chair, and made a sign that I might draw her home, "we will not either of us wear it for the other,—without nor within either, will we?—any more than we can help. Don't you remember what dear mamma said once, when you had made two mistakes in your lessons at school, and lost a prize, and took it hard, and somebody was teasing you, with making very light of it, and telling you to think no more about it? You were very sorry and a little offended, and said, you always chose not to be hoodwinked, but to look at things on all sides and in the face. Mamma smiled, and said, 'It is good and brave to look all trials in the face; but among the sides, never forget the bright side, little Katy.' If I had my life to live over again, I would try to mind her more in that. She always said, there lay my greatest fault. I hope and think God has forgiven me, because he makes it so easy for me to be cheerful now."

"Fanny," said I, as we drew near the house, "things in this world are strangely jumbled. Here are you, with your character, to wit, that of a little saint, if you will have the goodness to overlook my saying so, and somebody else's conscience. I have no doubt that, while you are reproaching yourself first for this, then for that and the other, the said somebody else is sinning away merrily, somewhere among the antipodes or nearer, without so much as a single twinge."

Smiling, she shook her head at me; and that was all that passed. She was as cheerful as I tried to be. With regard to the other world, she seemed to have attained unto the perfect love that casteth out fear; and I believe her only regret in leaving this lower one for it was that she could not take me with her. In fact, throughout her illness, her freedom from anxiety about its symptoms—not absolute, but still in strong contrast with her previous tendencies—appeared to her physician, as he acknowledged to me afterwards, even when he considered the frequent flattering illusions of the disease, a most discouraging indication as to the case. But to her it was an infinite mercy; and to me, to have such glimpses to remember of her already in possession of so much of that peace which remaineth unto the people of God.

As the dog-days drew on, a change came, though at first a very gentle one to her, if not to me. She slept more, ate less, grew so thin that she could no more bear the motion of her little wagon, and begged that it might be returned, because it tired her so to think of it.

Then word came that our house was advertised to be sold, unconditionally, at an early day. To move her in that state,—how dreadful it would be! I did not mean to let her know anything about it until I must; but Miss Mehitable, always less remarkable for tact than for good-will, blurted it out before her.

Her brows contracted with a moment's look of pain. "O Katy," she whispered, "I am sorry! That must make you very anxious";—and then she went to sleep.

Evidently it did not make her very anxious, as I knew that it would have done as lately even as two or three months before. What was the remedy? Approaching death. Well, death was approaching me also, as steadily, if not so nearly; and, after her example, my thoughts took such a foretaste of that anodyne that, as I sat and gazed on her unconscious, placid face, all terrors left me, and I was strengthened to pray, and to determine to look to the morrow with only so much thought as should enable me to bring up all my resources of body and mind to meet it as I ought, and to leave the result, unquestioned, quite in God's hand.

The result was an entire relief to her last earthly care. The appointed day came. The matter took wind. None of our townspeople appeared, to bid against my guardian; but enough of them were on the spot "to see fair play," or, in other words, to advance for him whatever sum he might stand in need of; and the house was knocked down to him at a price even below its market value. He paid the mortgagee and George their due by the next mail, but left my title and Fanny's as it was, not to be settled till I came of age.

These details would only have worried and wearied her; but the auctioneer's loud voice had hardly died away, or the gathered footsteps scattered from the door, when the Doctor came to her chamber, flushed with triumph, to tell us that "Nobody now could turn us out; and everything was arranged for us to stay." Fanny looked brightly up to him, and answered: "Now I shall scarcely know what more to pray for, but God's reward for you." And most of all I thank Him for that news, because her last day on this earth was such a happy one.

The next morning, just at dawn, she waked me, saying, "O Katy, tell the Doctor I can't breathe!"

I sprang up, raised her on her pillows, and called him instantly.

She stretched out her hand to him, and gasped, "O Doctor, I can't breathe! Can't you do anything to help me?"

He felt her pulse quickly, looking at her, and said, very tenderly, "Have some ether, Fanny. I will run and bring it." Throwing wider open every window that he passed, he hurried down to the office and back with the ether.

Eagerly, though with difficulty, she inhaled it; and it relieved her. I sat and watched her, silent, with her hand in mine.

Presently the door behind me opened softly, as if somebody was looking in. "My dear," said the Doctor, turning his head, and speaking very earnestly, though in a low voice, "I wouldn't come here. You can do no good." But presently his wife came in, in her dressing-gown, very pale, and sat by me and held the hand that was not holding Fanny's.

And next I knew they thought she would not wake; and then the short breath stopped. And now it was my turn to stretch out my hands to him for help; but, looking at me, he burst into tears, as he had not when he looked at Fanny; and I knew there was no breath more for her, nor any ether for me. I did not want to go to sleep, because I should have to wake again; but his wife was sobbing aloud. I knew how dreadful such excitement was for her; and so I had to do just as they wished me to, and let them lead me out and lock the door, and lay down on a bed and shut my eyes.

PROTONEIRON

DECEMBER 9, 1864

"And in that sleep of death what dreams may come."

The unresting lines, where oceans end,
Are traced by shifting surf and sand;
As pallid, moonlit fingers blend
The dreamlight of the ghostly land.

No eye can tell where Love's last ray
Fades to the sky of colder light;
No ear, when sounds that vexed the day
Cease mingling with the holier night.

As bells, which long have failed to swing
In lonely towers of crumbling stone,
Through far eternal spaces ring,
With semblance of their ancient tone.

The lightning, quivering through the cloud,
Weaves warp and woof from sky to earth,
In mist that seems a mortal's shroud,
In light that hails an angel's birth.

Thought vainly strives, with life's dull load,
To mount through ether rare and thin;
Fond eyes pursue the spirit's road
To heaven, and dimly gaze therein.

In battle's travail-hour, a host
Writhes in the throes of deadly strife.
One flash! One groan! A startled ghost
Is born into the eternal life.

Dear wife and children! Now I fly
Forth from my soldier camp to you!
Blue ridge and river hurry by
My weary eyes, in quick review.

Long have I waited. How and when
My furlough came is mystery.
I dreamed of charging with my men,—
A dream of glorious history!

To you I fly on Love's strong wing;
My courser needs no armed heel:
And yet anew the bugles ring,
And wake me to the crash of steel.

In fiercer rush of hosts again
My dripping sabre seeks the front.
Spur your mad horses! Forward, men!
Meet with your hearts the battle's brunt.

Tricolor, flaunt! And trumpet-blare,
Scream louder than the bursting shell,
And thundering hoofs, that shake the air,
Trembling above that surging hell!

In carbine smoke and cannon flash,
Like avalanches twain, we meet;