THE RANDALL FAMILY I45
the concert (probably faint from close air), she left ; and two hours afterward, on opening the house door, I met a man who asked me if I had a sister of such age and aspect as he described. Not identifying her by the description, I directed him elsewhere, supposing some one of our name owed him a debt ; but, as about to close the door, I said, "And what of her, supposing you seek my sister?" "Nothing more," said he, "than to tell you that she just dropped dead in the street, and now lies in a coffin at the undertaker's, awaiting identification."
Just then Mrs. Gumming passed us to go out, who, hear- ing the last words, went with me, but in great excitement, to the place. Much to my alarm, the lid was upon the coffin, and upon its removal we saw Anna, pale with death, yet warm with life. She was at once brought home, and the whole night was spent by my surviving sisters in evi- dently useless efforts to restore her. Upon inquiring in Winter street, it was found that she had reached the front of the stone steps of the church [long since torn down], when she was seen to fall upon her face, having thrown out her hands to ward off the blow. Convulsions instantly came on, and she was borne to the opposite side of the street, and carried into a store where, with one or two in- effectual efforts to speak, in a few minutes she subsided into perfect repose. Dr. Storer had been at once called, who, after working half an hour, pronounced her dead, but did not recognize her ; and it so happened, my dear friend, that she died on the very spot where we were bom, but where she was now a stranger to all, so that the evening papers announced the death of an " unknown lady."
We at first supposed the cause of death to be a valvular disease of the heart. But, upon an examination by Drs. Ellis and Storer, no disease was found either there or else-
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