e abandoned all hope of recovery, but he sought
the mild climate of Cuba, trusting that the fatal day might be
deferred until he had secured independence to his family, but his
physician feared that the very eagerness of his wishes would
eventually defeat them. It was mournful, and deeply touching, to
witness that clinging to existence in one so young, not from love of
life itself, but from a desire to perform an act of justice. That
completed, his mission on earth was ended, and Death might claim him
without a murmur.

The hours dragged heavily on toward the desired day, and each one as
it passed appeared to hurry the poor invalid with rapid strides toward
the grave, that seemed eager to claim its prey. Barclay had not again
ventured to intrude on Edith, but he nightly hovered around the room
of the dying youth, and gloated on the wasted and death-like form
which held his earthly fortunes in his hands.

A skillful physician had accompanied Euston from his native land, and
his unremitting attention, aided by the tender nursing of his
affectionate sister, seemed as if they would eventually reap their
reward in the preservation of life beyond the hour of his majority.

In pain and weariness time slowly waned, but it still left him life
and an unclouded mind; and the bold, bad heart, that nightly watched
him, feared that the wealth he so ardently coveted, might yet elude
his grasp.

The evening of the twenty-fifth at last arrived. Euston reclined in
his chair as we first beheld him, wrapped in a brocade dressing-gown,
whose brilliant colors made his extreme pallor the more remarkable; a
table was drawn close beside him, and on it, at his own desire, was
placed his repeater, from which his eyes scarcely wandered. His breath
came slowly and gaspingly, and at brief intervals his physician
moistened his parched lips with a restorative cordial, and murmured
words of encouragement in his ear.

As before, Edith sat at his feet, with her guitar, ready to stifle her
deep emotion, and fulfill her promise to sing to him while his parting
soul was struggling for release from its earthly tenement. His mother
leaned over his chair, and bathed his cold brow with her burning
tears; in the back-ground sat a clergyman, gazing on the scene with
absorbing interest.

Each one in that hushed room felt the approach of the stern tyrant,
and all prayed fervently that his dart might be stayed yet a few
hours.

"My sister, sing to me. Soot