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vain he made application for employment. Younger and more vigorous men filled all the places, and he was pushed aside. Discouraged and drooping in spirit, he went back to his home, and here awaited the fall of the evening, which was to bring the return of the only being left on earth to love him. At night-fall Ellen came in. Her face, so pale in the morning, was now slightly flushed; and her eyes were brighter than when she went out. The grandfather was not deceived by this; ⟨he⟩ knew it was the sign of disease. He took her hand—it was hot; and when he bent to kiss her gentle lips, he found them burning with fever.
"Ellen, my child, why did you go to work to-day? I knew it would make you sick," the old man said, in a voice of anguish.
Ellen tried to smile, and to appear not so very ill; but nature was too much oppressed.
"I brought home some work, and will not go out tomorrow," she remarked. "I think the walk fatigued me more than anything else. I will feel better in the morning, after a good night's sleep.
But the girl’s hope failed iu this. The morning found her so weak that she could not rise from bed: and when her grandfather came into her room to learn how she had passed the night, he found her weeping on the pillow. She had endeavoured to get up, but her head, which was aching terribly, grew dizzy, and she fell back under a despairing conciousness that her strength was gone.
The day passed but Ellen did hot grow better. The fever still kept her body ⟨prostrate⟩. Once or twice, when her grandfather was out of the room, she took the work she had brought home, and tried to do some of it while sitting up in her bed. But, ere a minute ⟨had⟩ passed, she became faint, while all grew dark around her. She was no better when night came. If her mind could have rested—if she had been free from anxious and distressing thoughts, nature
