lies, the sinner; curse upon his hand of blood that took him I loved
from me! O, my heart's breakin' and my brain is boilin'! What will I do?
Where will I go? Am I mad? Father, my curse upon you for your deed of
blood! I never thought I'd live to curse you; but you don't hear me,
nor know what I suffer. Shame! disgrace--ay, and I'd bear it all for his
sake that you plunged, like a murderer, as you were, into eternity. How
does any of you know what it is to love as I did? or what it is to lose
the man you love by a death so cruel? And this hair that he praised so
much, who will praise it or admire it now, when he is gone? Let it go,
too, then. I'll not keep it on me--I'll tear it off--off!"

Her paroxysm had now risen to a degree of fury that fell little, if
anything, short of insanity--temporary insanity it certainly was.
She tore her beautiful hair from her head in handfuls, and would have
proceeded to still greater lengths, when she was seized by some of those
present, in order to restrain her violence. On finding that she was held
fast, she looked at them with blazing eyes, and struggled to set herself
free; but on finding her efforts vain, she panted deeply three or four
times, threw back her head, and fell into a fit that, from its violence,
resembled epilepsy. After a lapse of ten minutes or so, the spasmodic
action, having probably wasted her physical strength, ceased, and she
lay in a quiet trance; so quiet, indeed, that it might have passed for
death, were it not for the deep expression of pain and suffering which
lay upon her face, and betrayed the fury of the moral tempest which
swept through her heart and brain. All the mother's grief now was
hushed--all the faculties of her soul were now concentrated on her
daughter, and absorbed by the intense anxiety she felt for her recovery.
She sat behind the poor girl, and drew her body back so that her head
rested on her bosom, to which she pressed her, kissing her passive lips
with streaming eyes.

"O, darling Nannie!" she exclaimed, "strive and rouse yourself; it is
your loving mother that asks you. Waken up, poor misled and heart-broken
girl, waken up; I forgive you all your errors. O, avillish machree
(sweetness of my heart), don't you hear that it is your mother's voice
that's spakin' to you!"

She was still, however, insensible; and her little brothers were all in
tears about her.

"O mother!" said the oldest, sobbing, "is Nannie dead too? When she went
aw