in the conversation, when Mary saw her nodding, and after one or two
vibrations in her chair, she looked up with lustreless glassy eyes.
Mary took one of these semi-wakened moments, and in the tone of
caressing authority that had been already found effectual, said she
must sleep in bed; took no notice of the murmur of refusal, but
completed the undressing, and fairly deposited her in her bed.

Mary's scrupulous conscience was distressed at having thus led to the
omission of all evening orisons; but if her own simple-hearted loving
supplications at the orphan's bedside could compensate for their
absence, she did her utmost. Then, as both the room-door and that of
the sick-chamber had been left open, she stole into the passage,
where she could see her father, seated at the table, and telegraphed
to him a sign of her success. He durst not move, but he smiled and
nodded satisfaction; and Mary, after tidying the room, and
considering with herself, took off her more cumbrous garments,
wrapped herself in a cloak, and lay down beside Averil, not expecting
to sleep, but passing to thoughts of Harry, and of that 23rd Psalm,
which they had agreed to say at the same hour every night. By how
many hours was Harry beforehand with her? That was a calculation
that to Mary was always like the beads of the chaplain of Norham
Castle. Certain it is, that after she had seen Harry lighting a fire
to broil chickens' legs in a Chinese temple, under the willow-pattern
cannon-ball tree, and heard Henry Ward saying it was not like a
lieutenant in the navy, she found herself replying, 'Use before
gentility;' and in the enunciation of this--her first moral
sentiment--discovered that it was broad daylight.

What o'clock it was she could not guess. Averil was sound asleep,
breathing deeply and regularly, so that it was; a pleasure to listen