"Don't go," she cried. "I do not dare to be alone. Oh, what a
terrible, terrible thing it is to die! To leave this bright,
beautiful world, and be nailed in a coffin and buried up in a cold,
dark grave.
"Nay," I said, "to leave this poor sick body there, and to fly to a
world ten thousand times brighter, more beautiful than this."
"I had just got to feeling nearly well," she said, "and I had
everything I wanted, and Charley was quite good to me, and I kept my
little girls looking like fairies, just from fairy-land. Everybody
said they wore the most picturesque costumes when they were dressed
according to my taste. And I have got to go and leave them, and
Charley will be marrying somebody else, and saying to her all the
nice things he has said to me.
"I really must go now," I said. "You are wearing yourself all out."
"I declare you are crying," she exclaimed. "You do pity me after
all."
"Indeed I do," I said, and came away, heartsick.
Ernest says there is nothing I can do for her now but to pray for
her, since she does not really believe herself in danger, and has a
vague feeling that if she can once convince him how much she wants to
live, he will use some vigorous measures to restore her Martha is to
watch with her to-night. Ernest will not let me.
JAN. 18, 1843.-Our wedding-day has passed unobserved. Amelia's
suffering condition absorbs us all.
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