Such were her thoughts, when the knocker again struck the door.  She

approached the window.  It was the doctor.  Bessie had grown worse and
she, her mother, had not even inquired for the little one.

"The children, the children!"  she murmured; her sorrowful features
brightened, and her heart grew lighter as she said to herself:

"I promised Peter to treat them as if they were my own, and I will fulfil
the duties I have undertaken."  Full of joyous excitement, she entered
the sick-room, hastily closing the door behind her.  Doctor Bontius
looked at her with a reproving glance, and Barbara said:

"Gently, gently!  Bessie is just sleeping a little."  Maria approached
the bed, but the physician waved her back, saying:

"Have you had the purple-fever?"

"No."

"Then you ought not to enter this room again.  No other help is needed
where Frau Barbara nurses."

The burgomaster's wife made no reply, and returned to the entry.  Her
heart was so heavy, so unutterably heavy.  She felt like a stranger in
her husband's house.  Some impulse urged her to go out of doors, and as
she wrapped her mantle around her and went downstairs, the smell of
leather rising from the bales piled in layers on the lower story, which
she had scarcely noticed before, seemed unendurable.  She longed for her
mother, her friends in Delft, and her quiet, cheerful home.  For the
first time she ventured to call herself unhappy and, while walking
through the streets with downcast eyes against the wind, struggled vainly
to resist some mysterious, gloomy power, that compelled her to minutely
recall everything that had resulted differently from her expectations.




CHAPTER VIII.

After the musician had left the burgomaster's house, he went to young
Herr Matanesse Van Wibisma's aunt to get his cloak, which had not been
returned to him.  He did not usually give much heed to his dress, yet he
was glad that the rain kept people in the house, for the outgrown wrap on
his shoulders was by no means pleasing in appearance.  Wilhelm must
certainly have looked anything but well-clad, for as he stood in old
Fraulein Van Hoogstraten's spacious, stately hall, the steward Belotti
received him as patronizingly as if he were a beggar.

But the Neopolitan, in whose mouth the vigorous Dutch sounded like the
rattling in the throat of a chilled singer, speedily took a different
tone when Wilhelm, in excellent Italian, quietly explained the object of
his visit.  Nay, at the sweet accents of his native tongue, the servant's
repellent demeanor melted into friendly, eager welcome.  He was beginning
to speak of his home to Wilhelm, but the musician made him curt replies
and asked him to get his cloak.

Belotti now led him courteously into a small room at the side of the
great hall, took off his cloak, and then went upstairs.  As minute after
minute passed, until at last a whole quarter of an hour elapsed, and
neither servant nor cloak appeared, the young man lost his patience,
though it was not easily disturbed, and when the door at last opened
serious peril threatened the leaden panes on which he was drumming loudly
with his fingers.  Wilhelm doubtless heard it, yet he drummed with
redoubled vehemence, to show the Italian that the time was growing long
to him.  But he hastily withdrew his fingers from the glass, for a girl's
musical voice said behind him in excellent Dutch:

"Have you finished your war-song, sir?  Belotti is bringing your cloak."

Wilhelm had turned and was gazing in silent bewilderment into the face of
the young noblewoman, who stood directly in front of him.  These features
were not unfamiliar, and yet--years do not make even a goddess younger,
and mortals increase in height and don't grow smaller; but the, lady whom
he thought he saw before him, whom he had known well in the eternal city
and never forgotten, had been older and taller than the young girl, who
so strikingly resembled her and seemed to take little pleasure in the
young man's surprised yet inquiring glance.  With a haughty gesture she
beckoned to the steward, saying in Italian:

"Give the gentleman his cloak, Belotti, and tell him I came to beg him to
pardon your forgetfulness."

With these words Henrica Van Hoogstraten turned towards the door, but
Wilhelm took two hasty strides after her, exclaiming:

"Not yet, not yet, Fraulein!  I am the one to apologize.  But if you
have ever been amazed by a resemblance--"

"Anything but looking like other people!"  cried the girl with a
repellent gesture.

"Ah, Fraulein, yet--"

"Let that pass, let that pass," interrupted Henrica in so irritated a
tone that the musician looked at her in surprise.  "One sheep looks just
like another, and among a hundred peasants twenty have the same face.
All wares sold by the dozen are cheap."

As soon as Wilhelm heard reasons given, the quiet manner peculiar to him
returned, and he answered modestly:

"But nature also forms the most beautiful things in pairs.  Think of the
eyes in the Madonna's face."

"Are you a Catholic?"

"A Calvinist, Fraulein."

"And devoted to the Prince's cause?"

"Say rather, the cause of liberty."

"That accounts for the drumming of the war-song."

"It was first a gentle gavotte, but impatience quickened the time.  I am
a musician, Fraulein."

"But probably no drummer.  The poor panes!"

"They are an instrument like any other, and in playing we seek to express
what we feel."

"Then accept my thanks for not breaking them to pieces."

"That wouldn't have been beautiful, Fraulein, and art ceases when
ugliness begins."

"Do you think the song in your cloak--it dropped on the ground and Nico
picked it up--beautiful or ugly?"

"This one or the other?"

"I mean the Beggar-song."

"It is fierce, but no more ugly than the roaring of the storm."

"It is repulsive, barbarous, revolting."

"I call it strong, overmastering in its power."

"And this other melody?"

"Spare me an answer; I composed it myself.  Can you read notes,
Fraulein?"

"A little."

"And did my attempt displease you?"

"Not at all, but I find dolorous passages in this choral, as in all the
Calvinist hymns."

"It depends upon how they are sung."

"They are certainly intended for the voices of the shopkeepers' wives and
washerwomen in your churches."

"Every hymn, if it is only sincerely felt, will lend wings to the souls
of the simple folk who sing it; and whatever ascends to Heaven from the
inmost depths of the heart, can hardly displease the dear God, to whom it
is addressed.  And then--"

"Well?"

"If these notes are worth being preserved, it may happen that a matchless
choir--"

"Will sing them to you, you think?"

"No, Fraulein; they have fulfilled their destination if they are once
nobly rendered.  I would fain not be absent, but that wish is far less
earnest than the other."

"How modest!"

"I think the best enjoyment in creating is had in anticipation."

Henrica gazed at the artist with a look of sympathy, and said with a
softer tone in her musical voice:

"I am sorry for you, Meister.  Your music pleases me; why should I deny
it?  In many passages it appeals to the heart, but how it will be spoiled
in your churches!  Your heresy destroys every art.  The works of the
great artists are a horror to you, and the noble music that has unfolded
here in the Netherlands will soon fare no better."

"I think I may venture to believe the contrary."

"Wrongly,  Meister, wrongly, for if your cause triumphs, which may the
Virgin forbid, there will soon be nothing in Holland except piles of
goods, workshops, and bare churches, from which even singing and organ-
playing will soon be banished."

"By no means, Fraulein.  Little Athens first became the home of the arts,
after she had secured her liberty in the war against the Persians."

"Athens and Leyden!" she answered scornfully.  "True, there are owls on
the tower of Pancratius.  But where shall we find the Minerva?"

While Henrica rather laughed than spoke these words, her name was called
for the third time by a shrill female voice.  She now interrupted herself
in the middle of a sentence, saying:

"I must go.  I will keep these notes."

"You will honor me by accepting them; perhaps you will allow me to bring
you others."

"Henrica!"  the voice again called from the stairs, and the young lady
answered hastily:

"Give Belotti whatever you choose, but soon, for I shan't stay here much
longer."

Wilhelm gazed after her.  She walked no less quickly and firmly through
the wide hall and up the stairs, than she had spoken, and again he was
vividly reminded of his friend in Rome.

The old Italian had also followed Henrica with his eyes.  As she vanished
at the last bend of the broad steps, he shrugged his shoulders, turned to
the musician and said, with an expression of honest sympathy:

"The young lady isn't well.  Always in a tumult; always like a loaded
pistol, and these terrible headaches too!  She was different when she
came here."

"Is she ill?"

"My mistress won't see it," replied the servant.  "But what the cameriera
and I see, we see.  Now red--now pale, no rest at night, at table she
scarcely eats a chicken-wing and a leaf of salad."

"Does the doctor share your anxiety?"

"The doctor?  Doctor Fleuriel isn't here.  He moved to Ghent when the
Spaniards came, and since then my mistress will have nobody but the
barber who bleeds her.  The doctors here are devoted to the Prince of
Orange and are all heretics.  There, she is calling again.  I'll send the
cloak to your house, and if you ever feel inclined to speak my language,
just knock here.  That calling--that everlasting calling!  The young lady
suffers from it too."

When Wilhelm entered the street, it was only raining very slightly.  The
clouds were beginning to scatter, and from a patch of blue sky the sun
was shining brightly down on Nobelstrasse.  A rainbow shimmered in
variegated hues above the roofs, but to-day the musician had no eyes for
the beautiful spectacle.  The bright light in the wet street did not
charm him.  The hot rays of the day-star were not lasting, for "they drew
rain."  All that surrounded him seemed confused and restless.  Beside a
beautiful image which he treasured in the sanctuary of his memories, only
allowing his mind to dwell upon it in his happiest hours, sought to
intrude.  His real diamond was in danger of being exchanged for a stone,
whose value he did not know.  With the old, pure harmony blended another
similar one, but in a different key.  How could he still think of
Isabella, without remembering Henrica!  At least he had not heard the
young lady sing, so his recollection of Isabella's songs remained
unclouded.  He blamed himself because, obeying an emotion of vanity, he
had promised to send new songs to the proud young girl, the friend of
Spain.  He had treated Herr Matanesse Van Wibisma rudely on account of
his opinions, but sought to approach her, who laughed at what he prized
most highly, because she was a woman, and it was sweet to hear his work
praised by beautiful lips.  "Hercules throws the club aside and sits down
at the distaff, when Omphale beckons, and the beautiful Esther and the
daughter of Herodias--" murmured Wilhelm indignantly.  He felt sorely
troubled, and longed for his quiet attic chamber beside the dove-cote.

"Something unpleasant has happened to him in Delft," thought his father.

"Why doesn't he relish his fried flounders to-day?"  asked his mother,
when he had left them after dinner.  Each felt that something oppressed
the pride and favorite of the household, but did not attempt to discover
the cause; they knew the moods to which he was sometimes subject for half
a day.

After Wilhelm had fed his doves, he went to his room, where he paced
restlessly to and fro.  Then he seized his violin and wove all the
melodies be had heard from Isabella's lips into one.  His music had
rarely sounded so soft, and then so fierce and passionate, and his
mother, who heard it in the kitchen, turned the twirling-stick faster and
faster, then thrust it into the firmly-tied dough, and rubbing her hands
on her apron, murmured:

"How it wails and exults!  If it relieves his heart, in God's name let
him do it, but cat-gut is dear and it will cost at least two strings."

Towards evening Wilhelm was obliged to go to the drill of the military
corps to which he belonged.  His company was ordered to mount guard at
the Hoogewoort Gate.  As he marched through Nobelstrasse with it, he
heard the low, clear melody of a woman's voice issuing from an open
window of the Hoogstraten mansion.  He listened, and noticing with a
shudder how much Henrica's voice--for the singer must be the young lady
--resembled Isabella's, ordered the drummer to beat the drum.

The next morning a servant came from the Hoogstraten house and gave
Wilhelm a note, in which he was briefly requested to come to Nobelstrasse
at two o'clock in the afternoon, neither earlier nor later.

He did not wish to say "yes"--he could not say "no," and went to the
house at the appointed hour.  Henrica was awaiting him in the little room
adjoining the hall.  She looked graver than the day before, while heavier
shadows under her eyes and the deep flush on her cheeks reminded Wilhelm
of Belotti's fears for her health.  After returning his greeting, she
said without circumlocution, and very rapidly:

"I must speak to you.  Sit down.  To be brief, the way you greeted me
yesterday awakened strange thoughts.  I must strongly resemble some other
woman, and you met her in Italy.  Perhaps you are reminded of
some one very near to me, of whom I have lost all trace.  Answer me
honestly, for I do not ask from idle curiosity.  Where did you meet her?"

"In Lugano.  We drove to Milan with the same vetturino, and afterwards I
found her again in Rome and saw her daily for months."

Then you know her intimately.  Do you still think the resemblance
surprising, after having seen me for the second time?"

"Very surprising."

"Then I must have a double.  Is she a native of this country?"

"She called herself an Italian, but she understood Dutch, for she has
often turned the pages of my books and followed the conversation I had
with young artists from our home.  I think she is a German lady of noble
family."

"An adventuress then.  And her name?"

"Isabella--but I think no one would be justified in calling her an
adventuress."

"Was she married?"

"There was something matronly in her majestic appearance, yet she never
spoke of a husband.  The old Italian woman, her duenna, always called
her Donna Isabella, but she possessed little more knowledge of her past
than I."

"Is that good or evil?"

"Nothing at all, Fraulein."

"And what led her to Rome?"

"She practised the art of singing, of which she was mistress; but did not
cease studying, and made great progress in Rome.  I was permitted to
instruct her in counterpoint."

"And did she appear in public as a singer?"

"Yes and no.  A distinguished foreign prelate was her patron, and his
recommendation opened every door, even the Palestrina's.  So the church
music at aristocratic weddings was entrusted to her, and she did not
refuse to sing at noble houses, but never appeared for pay.  I know that,
for she would not allow any one else to play her accompaniments.  She
liked my music, and so through her I went into many aristocratic houses."

"Was she rich?"

"No, Fraulein.  She had beautiful dresses and brilliant jewels, but was
compelled to economize.  Remittances of money came to her at times from
Florence, but the gold pieces slipped quickly through her fingers, for
though she lived plainly and eat scarcely enough for a bird, while her
delicate strength required stronger food, she was lavish to imprudence if
she saw poor artists in want, and she knew most of them, for she did not
shrink from sitting with them over their wine in my company."

"With artists and musicians?"

"Mere artists of noble sentiments.  At times she surpassed them all in
her overflowing mirth."

"At times?"

"Yes, only at times, for she bad also sorrowful, pitiably sorrowful hours
and days, but as sunshine and shower alternate in an April day, despair
and extravagant gayety ruled her nature by turns."

"A strange character.  Do you know her end?"

"No, Fraulein.  One evening she received a letter from Milan, which must
have contained bad news, and the next day vanished without any farewell."

"And you did not try to follow her?"

Wilhelm blushed, and answered in an embarrassed tone:

"I had no right to do so, and just after her departure I fell sick--
dangerously sick."

"You loved her?"

"Fraulein, I must beg you--"

"You loved her!  And did she return your affection?"

"We have known each other only since yesterday, Fraulein von
Hoogstraten."

"Pardon me!  But if you value my desire, we shall not have seen each
other for the last time, though my double is undoubtedly a different
person from the one I supposed.  Farewell till we meet again.  You hear,
that calling never ends.  You have aroused an interest in your strange
friend, and some other time must tell me more about her.  Only this one
question: Can a modest maiden talk of her with you without disgrace?"

"Certainly, if you do not shrink from speaking of a noble lady who had no
other protector than herself."

"And you, don't forget yourself!"  cried Henrica, leaving the room.

The musician walked thoughtfully towards home.  Was Isabella a relative
of this young girl?  He had told Henrica almost all he knew of her
external circumstances, and this perhaps gave the former the same right
to call her an adventuress, that many in Rome had assumed.  The word
wounded him, and Henrica's inquiry whether he loved the stranger
disturbed him, and appeared intrusive and unseemly.  Yes, he had felt an
ardent love for her; ay, he had suffered deeply because he was no more
to her than a pleasant companion and reliable friend.  It had cost him
struggles enough to conceal his feelings, and he knew, that but for the
dread of repulse and scorn, he would have yielded and revealed them to
her.  Old wounds in his heart opened afresh, as he recalled the time she
suddenly left Rome without a word of farewell.  After barely recovering
from a severe illness, he had returned home pale and dispirited, and
months elapsed ere he could again find genuine pleasure in his art.
At first, the remembrance of her contained nothing save bitterness, but
now, by quiet, persistent effort, he had succeeded, not in attaining
forgetfulness, but in being able to separate painful emotions from the
pure and exquisite joy of remembering her.  To-day the old struggle
sought to begin afresh, but he was not disposed to yield, and did not
cease to summon Isabella's image, in all its beauty, before his soul.

Henrica returned to her aunt in a deeply-agitated mood.  Was the
adventuress of whom Wilhelm had spoken, the only creature whom she loved
with all the ardor of her passionate soul?  Was Isabella her lost sister?
Many incidents were opposed to it, yet it was possible.  She tortured
herself with questions, and the less peace her aunt gave her, the more
unendurable her headache became, the more plainly she felt that the
fever, against whose relaxing power she had struggled for days, would
conquer her.




CHAPTER IX.

On the evening of the third day after Wilhelm's interview with Henrica,
his way led him through Nobelstrasse past the Hoogstraten mansion.

Ere reaching it, he saw two gentlemen, preceded by a servant carrying a
lantern, cross the causeway towards it.

Wilhelm's attention was attracted.  The servant now seized the knocker,
and the light of his lantern fell on the men's faces.  Neither was
unfamiliar to him.

The small, delicate old man, with the peaked hat and short black velvet
cloak, was Abbe Picard, a gay Parisian, who had come to Leyden ten years
before and gave French lessons in the wealthy families of the city.  He
had been Wilhelm's teacher too, but the musician's father, the Receiver-
General, would have nothing to do with the witty abbe; for he was said
to have left his beloved France on account of some questionable
transactions, and Herr Cornelius scented in him a Spanish spy.  The
other gentleman, a grey-haired, unusually stout man, of middle height,
who required a great deal of cloth for his fur-bordered cloak, was Signor
Lamperi, the representative of the great Italian mercantile house of
Bonvisi in Antwerp, who was in the habit of annually coming to Leyden on
business for a few weeks with the storks and swallows, and was a welcome
guest in every tap-room as the inexhaustible narrator of funny stories.
Before these two men entered the house, they were joined by a third,
preceded by two servants carrying lanterns.  A wide cloak enveloped his
tall figure; he too stood on the threshold of old age and was no stranger
to Wilhelm, for the Catholic Monseigneur Gloria, who often came to Leyden
from Haarlem, was a patron of the noble art of music, and when the young
man set out on his journey to Italy had provided him, spite of his
heretical faith, with valuable letters of introduction.

Wilhelm, as the door closed behind the three gentlemen, continued his
way.  Belotti had told him the day before that the young lady seemed very
ill, but since her aunt was receiving guests, Henrica was doubtless
better.

The first story in the Hoogstraten mansion was brightly lighted, but in
the second a faint, steady glow streamed into Nobelstrasse from a single
window, while she for whom the lamp burned sat beside a table, her eyes
sparkling with a feverish glitter, as she pressed her forehead against
the marble top.  Henrica was entirely alone in the wide, lofty room her
aunt had assigned her.  Behind curtains of thick faded brocade was her
bedstead, a heavy structure of enormous width.  The other articles of
furniture were large and shabby, but had once been splendid.  Every
chair, every table looked as if it had been taken from some deserted
banqueting-hall.  Nothing really necessary was lacking in the apartment,
but it was anything but home-like and cosey, and no one would ever have
supposed a young girl occupied it, had it not been for a large gilt harp
that leaned against the long, hard couch beside the fireplace.

Henrica's head was burning but, though she had wrapped a shawl around her
lower limbs, her feet were freezing on the uncarpeted stone floor.

A short time after the three gentlemen had entered her aunt's house, a
woman's figure ascended the stairs leading from the first to the second
story.  Henrica's over-excited senses perceived the light tread of the
satin shoes and the rustle of the silk train, long before the approaching
form had reached the room, and with quickened breathing, she sat erect.

A thin hand, without any preliminary knock, now opened the door and old
Fraulein Van Hoogstraten walked up to her niece.

The elderly dame had once been beautiful, now and at this hour she
presented a strange, unpleasing appearance.

The thin, bent figure was attired in a long trailing robe of heavy pink
silk.  The little head almost disappeared in the ruff, a large structure
of immense height and width.  Long chains of pearls and glittering gems
hung on the sallow skin displayed by the open neck of her dress, and on
the false, reddish-yellow curls rested a roll of light-blue velvet decked
with ostrich plumes.  A strong odor of various fragrant essences preceded
her.  She herself probably found them somewhat overpowering, for her
large glittering fan was in constant motion and fluttered violently, when
in answer to her curt: "Quick, quick," Henrica returned a resolute "no,
'ma tante.'"

The old lady, however, was not at all disconcerted by the refusal, but
merely repeated her "Quick, quick," more positively, adding as an
important reason:

"Monseigneur has come and wants to hear you."

"He does me great honor," replied the young girl, "great honor, but how
often must I repeat: I will not come."

"Is it allowable to ask why not, my fair one?"  said the old lady.

"Because I am not fit for your society," cried Henrica vehemently,
"because my head aches and my eyes burn, because I can't sing to-day,
and because--because--because--I entreat you, leave me in peace."

Old Fraulein Van Hoogstraten let her fan sink by her side, and said
coolly:

"Were you singing two hours ago--yes or no?"

"Yes."

"Then your headache can't be so very bad, and Denise will dress you."

"If she comes, I'll send her away.  When I just took the harp, I did so
to sing the pain away.  It was relieved for a few minutes, but now my
temples are throbbing with twofold violence."

"Excuses."

"Believe what you choose.  Besides--even if I felt better at this moment
than a squirrel in the woods.  I wouldn't go down to see the gentlemen.
I shall stay here.  I have given my word, and I am a Hoogstraten as well
as you."

Henrica had risen, and her eyes flashed with a gloomy fire at her
oppressor.  The old lady waved her fan faster, and her projecting chin
trembled.  Then she said curtly:

"Your word of honor!  So you won't!  You won't!"

"Certainly not," cried the young girl with undutiful positiveness.

"Everybody must have his way," replied the old lady, turning towards the
door.  "What is too wilful is too wilful.  Your father won't thank you
for this."  With these words Fraulein Van Hoogstraten raised her long
train and approached the door.  There she paused, and again glanced
enquiringly at Henrica.  The latter doubtless noticed her aunt's
hesitation, but without heeding the implied threat intentionally turned
her back.

As soon as the door closed, the young girl sank back into her chair,
pressed her forehead against the marble slab and let it remain there a
long time.  Then she rose as suddenly and hastily as if obeying some
urgent summons, raised the lid of her trunk, tossed the stockings,
bodices and shoes, that came into her way, out on the floor, and did not
rise until she had found a few sheets of writing-paper which she had
laid, before leaving her father's castle, among the rest of her property.

As she rose from her kneeling posture, she was seized with giddiness,
but still kept her feet, carried to the table first the white sheets and
a portfolio, then the large inkstand that had already stood several days
in her room, and seated herself beside it.

Leaning far back in her chair, she began to write.  The book that served
as a desk lay on her knee, the paper on the book.  Creaking and pausing,
the goosequill made large, stiff letters on the white surface.  Henrica
was not skilled in writing, but to-day it must have been unspeakably
difficult for her; her high forehead became covered with perspiration,
her mouth was distorted by pain, and whenever she had finished a few
lines, she closed her eyes or drank greedily from the water-pitcher that
stood beside her.

The large room was perfectly still, but the peace that surrounded her was
often disturbed by strange noises and tones, that rose from the dining-
hall directly under her chamber.  The clinking of glasses, shrill
tittering, loud, deep laughter, single bars of a dissolute love-song,
cheers, and then the sharp rattle of a shattered wine glass reached her
in mingled sounds.  She did not wish to hear it, but could not escape and
clenched her white teeth indignantly.  Yet meantime the pen did not
wholly stop.

She wrote in broken, or long, disconnected sentences, almost incoherently
involved.  Sometimes there were gaps, sometimes the same word was twice
or thrice repeated.  The whole resembled a letter written by a lunatic,
yet every line, every stroke of the pen, expressed the same desire
uttered with passionate longing: "Take me away from here!  Take me away
from this woman and this house!"

The epistle was addressed to her father.  She implored him to rescue her
from this place, come or send for her.  "Her uncle, Matanesse Van
Wibisma," she said, "seemed to be a sluggish messenger; he had probably
enjoyed the evenings at her aunt's, which filled her, Henrica, with
loathing.  She would go out into the world after her sister, if her
father compelled her to stay here."  Then she began a description of her
aunt and her life.  The picture of the days and nights she had now spent
for weeks with the old lady, presented in vivid characters a mixture of
great and petty troubles, external and mental humiliations.

Only too often the same drinking and carousing had gone on below as
to-day-Henrica had always been compelled to join her aunt's guests,
elderly dissolute men of French or Italian origin and easy morals.  While
describing these conventicles, the blood crimsoned her flushed cheeks
still more deeply, and the long strokes of the pen grew heavier and
heavier.  What the abbe related and her aunt laughed at, what the Italian
screamed and Monseigneur smilingly condemned with a slight shake of the
head, was so shamelessly bold that she would have been defiled by
repeating the words.  Was she a respectable girl or not?  She would
rather hunger and thirst, than be present at such a banquet again.  If
the dining-room was empty, other unprecedented demands were made upon
Henrica, for then her aunt, who could not endure to be alone a moment,
was sick and miserable, and she was obliged to nurse her.  That she
gladly and readily served the suffering, she wrote, she had sufficiently
proved by her attendance on the village children when they had the
smallpox, but if her aunt could not sleep she was compelled to watch
beside her, hold her hand, and listen until morning as she moaned, whined
and prayed, sometimes cursing herself and sometimes the treacherous
world.  She, Henrica, had come to the house strong and well, but so much
disgust and anger, such constant struggling to control herself had robbed
her of her health.

The young girl had written until midnight.  The letters became more and
more irregular and indistinct, the lines more crooked, and with the last