who talks of help!
All the world has the plague!"

"Then to avoid it, we must quit the world," observed Adrian, with a
gentle smile.

Ryland groaned; cold drops stood on his brow. It was useless to oppose his
paroxysm of terror: but we soothed and encouraged him, so that after an
interval he was better able to explain to us the ground of his alarm. It
had come sufficiently home to him. One of his servants, while waiting on
him, had suddenly fallen down dead. The physician declared that he died of
the plague. We endeavoured to calm him--but our own hearts were not calm.
I saw the eye of Idris wander from me to her children, with an anxious
appeal to my judgment. Adrian was absorbed in meditation. For myself, I own
that Ryland's words rang in my ears; all the world was infected;--in what
uncontaminated seclusion could I save my beloved treasures, until the
shadow of death had passed from over the earth? We sunk into silence: a
silence that drank in the doleful accounts and prognostications of our
guest. We had receded from the crowd; and ascending the steps of the
terrace, sought the Castle. Our change of cheer struck those nearest to us;
and, by means of Ryland's servants, the report soon spread that he had fled
from the plague in London. The sprightly parties broke up--they assembled
in whispering groups. The spirit of gaiety was eclipsed; the music ceased;
the young people left their occupations and gathered together. The
lightness of heart which had dressed them in masquerade habits, had
decorated their tents, and assembled them in fantastic groups, appeared a
sin against, and a provocative to, the awful destiny that had laid its
palsying hand upon hope and life. The merriment of the hour was an unholy
mockery of the sorrows of man. The foreigners whom we had among us, who had
fled from the plague in their own country, now saw their last asylum
invaded; and, fear making them garrulous, they described to eager listeners
the miseries they had beheld in cities visited by the calamity, and gave
fearful accounts of the insidious and irremediable nature of the disease.

We had entered the Castle. Idris stood at a window that over-looked the
park; her maternal eyes sought her own children among the young crowd. An
Italian lad had got an audience about him, and with animated gestures was
describing some scene of horror. Alfred stood immoveable before him, his
whole attention absorbed. Little Evelyn had endeavoured to draw Cl