r inspection while
the narrow valleys opening their gates, displayed all their tranquil
pastoral charm.

Our meals, delicately cooked and perfectly served, appeared as if by
conjury, on a table in the dining-room amidships, and as we ate we
watched the glory deepen on the clouds, while the waters, soundless as
oil, rolled past our open doors. It was all a passage to the Land of the
Lotos to me. How had I, whose youth had been so full of penury and toil,
earned a share in such leisure, such luxury? Was it right for me to
give myself up to the enjoyment of it? For Zulime's sake I rejoiced in
it, knowing that her days were long with waiting and suspense.

Without knowing much of the bitter anguish of the ordeal, I held
maternity to be (as the great poets had taught me to hold it) a noble
heroism. "If mankind is worth continuing on this earth," I had written,
"then the mother is entitled to the highest honor, the tenderest care.
Science should do its best to lessen her pain, to make her birth-bed
honorable."

In spite of my wife's brave smile I sensed in her a subconscious dread
of what was coming, and this anxiety I shared so fully that I ceased to
write and gave all my time to her. Together we walked the garden or
drove about the country in the low-hung, easy-riding old surrey, tracing
the wooded ways we loved the best, or climbing to where a wide view of
the valley offered. I understood her laughing stoicism much better now,
and it no longer deceived me. She made light of her own fears in order
that I might not worry. The fact that she was past her first youth was
my torment, for I had read that the danger increased with every year
beyond twenty-five and the thought that we might never ride these lanes
again came into my mind and would not be exorcised. At such moments as I
could snatch I worked on a series of lectures which I was scheduled to
deliver at the University of Chicago--lectures on Edwin Booth which
brought back my Boston days.

At last the dreaded day came!--I shall not dwell upon the long hours of
the mother's pain, or on the sleepless anxiety of my household, for I
have no desire to relive them. I would rather make statement of my
relief and gratitude when after many, many hours of suffering, Edward
Evans of LaCrosse, a scientific, deft and powerful surgeon, came to the
mother's rescue. He was a master--the man who knew!

[Illustration: At last the time came when I was permitted to take my
wife--lovel