more than
all, how steadily it rolled away to meet the sea.

As it grew later in the night, and footsteps in the street became so
rare that he could hear them coming, count them as they passed, and lose
them in the hollow distance, he would lie and watch the many-coloured
ring about the candle, and wait patiently for day. His only trouble was,
the swift and rapid river. He felt forced, sometimes, to try to stop
it--to stem it with his childish hands--or choke its way with sand--and
when he saw it coming on, resistless, he cried out! But a word from
Florence, who was always at his side, restored him to himself; and
leaning his poor head upon her breast, he told Floy of his dream, and
smiled.

When day began to dawn again, he watched for the sun; and when
its cheerful light began to sparkle in the room, he pictured to
himself--pictured! he saw--the high church towers rising up into the
morning sky, the town reviving, waking, starting into life once more,
the river glistening as it rolled (but rolling fast as ever), and the
country bright with dew. Familiar sounds and cries came by degrees into
the street below; the servants in the house were roused and busy; faces
looked in at the door, and voices asked his attendants softly how he
was. Paul always answered for himself, 'I am better. I am a great deal
better, thank you! Tell Papa so!'

By little and little, he got tired of the bustle of the day, the noise
of carriages and carts, and people passing and repassing; and would fall
asleep, or be troubled with a restless and uneasy sense again--the
child could hardly tell whether this were in his sleeping or his waking
moments--of that rushing river. 'Why, will it never stop, Floy?' he
would sometimes ask her. 'It is bearing me away, I think!'

But Floy could always soothe and reassure him; and it was his daily
delight to make her lay her head down on his pillow, and take some rest.

'You are always watching me, Floy, let me watch you, now!' They would
prop him up with cushions in a corner of his bed, and there he would
recline the while she lay beside him: bending forward oftentimes to kiss
her, and whispering to those who were near that she was tired, and how
she had sat up so many nights beside him.

Thus, the flush of the day, in its heat and light, would gradually
decline; and again the golden water would be dancing on the wall.

He was visited by as many as three grave doctors--they used to assemble
downstairs, a