Mine;
And, sinking trembling on my breast,
She murmur'd out, "For ever thine!"
CHAPTER IX
PHOEBE R - -, AND OUR SECOND MOVING
"She died in early womanhood,
Sweet scion of a stem so rude;
A child of Nature, free from art,
With candid brow and open heart;
The flowers she loved now gently wave
Above her low and nameless grave."
It was during the month of March that Uncle Joe's eldest daughter,
Phoebe, a very handsome girl, and the best of the family, fell sick.
I went over to see her. The poor girl was very depressed, and stood
but a slight chance for her life, being under medical treatment of
three or four old women, who all recommended different treatment
and administered different nostrums. Seeing that the poor girl was
dangerously ill, I took her mother aside, and begged her to lose no
time in procuring proper medical advice. Mrs. Joe listened to me
very sullenly, and said there was no danger; that Phoebe had caught
a violent cold by going hot from the wash-tub to fetch a pail of
water from the spring; that the neighbours knew the nature of her
complaint, and would soon cure her.
The invalid turned upon me her fine dark eyes, in which the light of
fever painfully burned, and motioned me to come near her. I sat down
by her, and took her burning hand in mine.
"I am dying, Mrs. Moodie, but they won't believe me. I wish you
would talk to mother to send for the doctor."
"I will. Is there anything I can do for you? - anything I can make
for you, that you would like to take?"
She shook her head. "I can't eat. But I want to ask you one thing,
which I wish very much to know." She grasped my hand tightly between
her own. Her eyes looked darker, and her feverish cheek paled. "What
becomes of people when they die?"
"Good heavens!" I exclaimed involuntarily; "can you be ignorant of a
future state?"
"What is a future state?"
I endeavoured, as well as I was able, to explain to her the nature
of the soul, its endless duration, and responsibility to God for
the actions done in the flesh; its natural depravity and need of
a Saviour; urging her, in the gentlest manner, to lose no time in
obtaining forgiveness of her sins, through the atoning blood of
Christ.
The poor girl looked at me with surprise and horror. These things
were all new to her. She sat like one in a dream; yet the truth
seemed to flash upon her at once.
"How can I speak to God, who never knew Him? How can I ask Him to
forgive me?"
"You must pray to him."
"Pray!
