f bread while she was doing this, and upon his
return found all ready. The meal, palatable to all, was a well-made
soup; the mother and her two children ate of it with keen appetites.
When it was over, Henry went away again to school and Mrs. Gaston,
after administering to Ella another dose of medicine, sat down once
more to her work. One sleeve remained to be sewed in, when the
garment would only require to have the collar put on, and be pressed
off. This occupied her until late in the afternoon.

"Thirty cents for all that!" she sighed to herself, as she laid the
finished garment upon the bed. "Too bad! Too bad! How can a widow
and three children subsist on twenty cents a day?"

A deep moan from Ella caused her to look at her child more intently
than she had done for half an hour. She was alarmed to find that her
face had become like scarlet, and was considerably swollen. On
speaking to her, she seemed quite stupid, and answered incoherently,
frequently putting her hand to her throat, as if in pain there. This
confirmed the mother's worst fears for her child, especially as she
was in a raging fever. Soon after, Henry came in from school, and
she dispatched him for Doctor R--, who returned with the boy. He
seemed uneasy at the manner in which the symptoms were developing
themselves. A long and silent examination ended in his asking for a
basin. He bled her freely, as there appeared to be much visceral
congestion, and an active inflammation of the tonsils, larynx, and
air passages, with a most violent fever. After this she lay very
still, and seemed much relieved. But, half an hour after the doctor
had left, the fever rallied again, with burning intensity. Her face
swelled rapidly, and the soreness of her throat increased. About
nine o'clock the doctor came in again, and upon examining the
child's throat, found it black and deeply ulcerated.

"What do you think of her, doctor?" asked the poor mother, eagerly.

"I think her very ill, madam--and, I regret to say, dangerously so."

"Is it scarlet fever, doctor?"

"It is, madam. A very bad case of it. But do not give way to
feelings of despondency. I have seen worse cases recover."

More active medicines than any that had yet been administered were
given by the doctor, who again retired, with but little hope of
seeing his patient alive in the morning.

From the time Mrs. Gaston finished the garment upon which she had
been working, she had not even unrolled the othe