Those were her words.

She was dead. Dear, gentle, patient, noble Nell was dead. Her little
bird--a poor slight thing the pressure of a finger would have
crushed--was stirring nimbly in its cage; and the strong heart of its
child mistress was mute and motionless for ever.

Where were the traces of her early cares, her sufferings, and fatigues?
All gone. Sorrow was dead indeed in her, but peace and perfect
happiness were born; imaged in her tranquil beauty and profound repose.

And still her former self lay there, unaltered in this change. Yes.
The old fireside had smiled upon that same sweet face; it had passed,
like a dream, through haunts of misery and care; at the door of the
poor schoolmaster on the summer evening, before the furnace fire upon
the cold wet night, at the still bedside of the dying boy, there had
been the same mild lovely look. So shall we know the angels in their
majesty, after death.

The old man held one languid arm in his, and had the small hand tight
folded to his breast, for warmth. It was the hand she had stretched
out to him with her last smile--the hand that had led him on, through
all their wanderings. Ever and anon he pressed it to his lips; then
hugged it to his breast again, murmuring that it was warmer now; and,
as he said it, he looked, in agony, to those who stood around, as if
imploring them to help her.

She was dead, and past all help, or need of it. The ancient rooms she
had seemed to fill with life, even while her own was waning fast--the
garden she had tended--the eyes she had gladdened--the noiseless haunts
of many a thoughtful hour--the paths she had trodden as it were but
yesterday--could know her never more.

'It is not,' said the schoolmaster, as he bent down to kiss her on the
cheek, and gave his tears free vent, 'it is not on earth that Heaven's
justice ends. Think what earth is, compared with the World to which
her young spirit has winged its early flight; and say, if one
deliberate wish expressed in solemn terms above this bed could call her
back to life, which of us would utter it!'

CHAPTER 72

When morning came, and they could speak more calmly on the subject of
their grief, they heard how her life had closed.

She had been dead two days. They were all about her at the time,
knowing that the end was drawing on. She died soon after daybreak.
They had read and talked to her in the earlier portion of the night,
but as the hours crept on, she