use, who, that day, shed many bitter tears
on witnessing the mute but feverish agony of her sufferings. As evening
approached she became evidently more distracted and depressed; her
head, she said, felt hot, and her temples occasionally throbbed with
considerable violence. The alternations of color on her cheek were
more frequent than before, and their pallid and carmine hues were more
alarmingly contrasted. Her weeping mother took the stricken one to her
bosom, and, after kissing her burning and passive lips, pressed her
temples with a hope that this might give her relief.

"Why don't you cry, _anien maehree_? (daughter of my heart). Thry and
shed tears; it 'ill take away this burning pain that's in your poor head;
oh, thry and let down the tears, and you'll see how it 'ill relieve I
you."

"Mother, I can't," she replied; "I can shed no tears; I wish they were
home, for I the worst couldn't be worse than this."

"No, asthore, it couldn't--it can't; husth! I--do you hear it? There
they are; that's the car; ay, indeed, it's at the gate."

They both listened for a moment, and the voices of her father and
brother were distinctly heard giving some necessary orders! to the
servant.

"Mother, mother," exclaimed Una, pressing her hands upon her heart, "my
heart is bursting, and my temples--my temples--"

"Chierna yeelish," said the mother, feeling its strong and rapid
palpitations, "you can't stand this. Oh, darling of my heart, for the
sake of your own life, and of the living God, be firm!"

At this moment their knock at the hall-door occasioned her to leap with
a sudden start, almost out of her mother's arms. But, all at once, the
tumult of that heart ceased, and the vermillion of her cheek changed to
the hue of death. With a composure probably more the result of weakness
than fortitude, she clasped her hands, and giving a fixed gaze towards
the parlor-door, that spoke the resignation of despair, she awaited the
tidings of her lover's doom. They both entered, and, after a cautious
glance about the room, immediately perceived the situation in which,
reclining on her mother's bosom, she lay, ghastly as a corpse, before
them.

"Una, dear," said John, approaching her, "I am afraid you are ill."

She riveted her eyes upon him, as if she would read his soul, but she
could not utter a syllable.

The young man's countenance became overshadowed by a deep and mournful
sense of the task he found himself compelled to perform