to
take the babe away.

Dr. May's next expedient was to speak to her of her husband, who needed
her more than all, and to call him in. There seemed to be something
tranquillising in his wistful manner of repeating, "Don't cry, Flora;"
and she was at last reduced, by her extreme exhaustion, to stillness;
but there were still many fears for her.

Dr. May's prediction was accomplished--that she would suffer for having
over-exerted herself. Her constitution had been severely tried by the
grief and despondency that she had so long endured in silence, and the
fresh sorrow for her favourite sister coming at such a crisis. There
was a weariness of life, and an unwillingness to resume her ordinary
routine, that made her almost welcome her weakness and sinking; and now
that the black terror had cleared away from the future, she seemed to
long to follow Margaret at once, and to yearn after her lost child;
while appeals to the affection that surrounded her often seemed to
oppress her, as if there were nothing but weariness and toil in store.

The state of her mind made her father very anxious, though it was but
too well accounted for. Poor Flora had voluntarily assumed the trammels
that galled her; worldly motives had prompted her marriage, and though
she faithfully loved her husband, he was a heavy weight on her hands,
and she had made it more onerous by thrusting him into a position for
which he was not calculated, and inspiring him with a self-consequence
that would not recede from it. The shock of her child's death had taken
away the zest and energy which had rejoiced in her chosen way of life,
and opened her eyes to see what Master she had been serving; and the
perception of the hollowness of all that had been apparently good in
her, had filled her with remorse and despair. Her sufferings had been
the more bitter because she had not parted with her proud reserve. She
had refused council, and denied her confidence to those who could have
guided her repentance. Her natural good sense, and the sound principle
in which she had been brought up, had taught her to distrust her gloomy
feelings as possibly morbid; and she had prayed, keeping her hold of
faith in the Infinite Mercy, though she could not feel her own part in
it; and thus that faith was beginning at last to clear her path.

It was the harder to deal with her, because her hysterical agitation was
so easily excited, that her father hardly dared to let a word be spoken
t