four-and-twenty hours," he said to me, after I had been with her for two
days. I told her his verdict, but it moved her little; "I do not feel
that I am going to die just yet," she said resolutely, and she was right.
There was an attack of fearful prostration, a very wrestling with death,
and then the grim shadow drew backwards, and she struggled back to life.
Soon, as is usual in cases of such disease, dropsy intervened, with all
its weariness of discomfort, and for week after week her long martyrdom
dragged on. I nursed her night and day, with a very desperation of
tenderness, for now fate had touched the thing that was dearest to me in
life. A second horrible crisis came, and for the second time her tenacity
and my love beat back the death-stroke. She did not wish to die--the love
of life was strong in her; I would not let her die; between us we kept
the foe at bay.

At this period, after eighteen months of abstention, and for the last
time, I took the Sacrament. This statement will seem strange to my
readers, but the matter happened in this wise:

My dear mother had an intense longing to take it, but absolutely refused
to do so unless I partook of it with her.

"If it be necessary to salvation," she persisted doggedly, "I will not
take it if darling Annie is to be shut out. I would rather be lost with
her than saved without her." In vain I urged that I could not take it
without telling the officiating clergyman of my heresy, and that under
such circumstances the clergyman would be sure to refuse to administer to
me. She insisted that she could not die happy if she did not take it with
me. I went to a clergyman I knew well, and laid the case before him; as I
expected, he refused to allow me to communicate. I tried a second; the
result was the same. I was in despair; to me the service was foolish and