n the rainy skies,--
With the brow all patience, and the lips all pain,"

wove a strange spell over the visitor, whose gaze was riveted on the
only woman who had ever aroused even temporary interest in his heart.

She was always beautiful, but to-day there was a helpless, hopeless
abandonment in her listless demeanor, that appealed successfully to
the manly tenderness and chivalry of his nature; and into his strong,
true, noble soul, came a longing to cheer, and guide, and redeem this
strange, desolate woman, whose personal loveliness would have made her
regnant over the gay circles of fashionable life, yet whose existence
was more lonely than that of an eaglet in some mountain eyrie.

Rising, he leaned against the easel and looked down into the colorless
face that possessed such a wondrous charm for him.

"Mrs. Gerome, for natures diseased like yours, the only remedy, the
only cure, is earnest, vigorous labor; and the regimen you really
require is mournfully at variance with your present habits and modes
of thought."

"I do labor incessantly; more indefatigably than any plowman, or
mason, or carpenter. Your prescription has been thoroughly tested, and
found worthless, as an antidote to my malady,--hopelessness."

"Unfortunately the labor has all been mental; heart and soul have
stood aloof, while the brain almost wore itself out. This canvas is
destroying you; your creations are too rapid, too exhausting."

"Dr. Grey, you grievously misapprehend the whole matter, for my work
reminds me of what Canova once said of West's pictures, 'He groups; he
does not compose.'"

Dr. Grey put his hand on her wrist, and counted the rapid, feeble,
irregular pulse.

She made an effort to throw off his fingers, but they clung
tenaciously to the polished arm.

"How many hours do you sleep, during the twenty-four?"

"Sometimes three, occasionally one, frequently none."

"How much longer do you suppose your constitution will endure such
merciless taxation?"

"I know very little about these things, and care still less, but as
Horne Tooke said, when a foreigner inquired how much treason an
Englishman might venture to write without being hanged, 'I cannot
inform you just yet, but I am trying.'"

"Has life become such an intolerable burden that you are impatient to
shake it off?"

"Even so, Dr. Grey. When Elsie dies the last link will have snapped,
and I trust I shall not long survive her. If I prayed at all, it would
be f