ome over here, Tony. Tony, I'm going fast; I feel it, and my heart is
low. Could we withdraw the proceedings about Freney?"

"He 's the biggest blackguard--"

"Ah! no matter now; I 'm going to a place where we 'll all need mercy.
What was it that Canealy said he 'd give for the land?"

"Two pound ten an acre; and Freney never paid thirty shillings out of
it."

"It's mighty odd George didn't come over."

"Sure, I told you there was two feet of snow on the ground."

"Lord be about us, what a severe season! But why isn't Tom here?" I
started at the words, and was about to rush forward, when he added,--"I
don't want him, though."

"Of course you don't," said the attorney; "it's little comfort he ever
gave you. Are you in pain there?"

"Ay, great pain over my heart. Well, well! don't be hard to him when I
'm gone."

"Don't let him talk so much," said Basset, in a whisper, to the doctor.

"You must compose yourself, Mr. Burke," said the doctor. "Try and take a
sleep; the night isn't half through yet."

The sick man obeyed without a word; and soon after, the heavy
respiration betokened the same lethargic slumber once more.

The voices of the speakers gradually fell into a low, monotonous sound;
the long-drawn breathings from the sickbed mingled with them; the fire
only sent forth an occasional gleam, as some piece of falling turf
seemed to revive its wasting life, and shot up a myriad of bright
sparks; and the chirping of the cricket in the chimney-corner sounded to
my mournful heart like the tick of the death-watch.

As I listened, my tears fell fast, and a gulping fulness in my throat
made me feel like one in suffocation. But deep sorrow somehow tends to
sleep. The weariness of the long day and dreary night, exhaustion, the
dull hum of the subdued voices, and the faint light, all combined to
make me drowsy, and I fell into a heavy slumber.

I am writing now of the far-off past,--of the long years ago of my
youth,--since which my seared heart has had many a sore and scalding
lesson; yet I cannot think of that night, fixed and graven as it lies in
my memory, without a touch of boyish softness. I remember every waking
thought that crossed my mind: my very dream is still before me. It
was of my mother. I thought of her as she lay on a sofa in the old
drawing-room; the window open, and the blinds drawn, the gentle breeze
of a June morning flapping them lazily to and fro as I knelt beside
her to repeat my little h