"Courage, my dear sir, courage!"

He, overcome, with downcast eye, and cold perspiration on his pallid
brow, did not understand him; for he continued to stammer incessantly,--

"It is nothing, I hope. Did you not say it was nothing?"

There are misfortunes so terrible, so overwhelming in their suddenness,
that the stunned mind refuses to believe them, and denies their
genuineness in spite of their actual presence.

How could any one imagine or comprehend that the countess, who but a
moment ago was standing there full of life, in perfect health, and
the whole vigor of her years, apparently perfectly happy, smiling, and
beloved by all,--how could one conceive that she had all at once ceased
to exist?

They had laid her on her bed in her ball costume,--a blue satin dress
trimmed with lace. The flowers were still in her hair; and the blow
had come with such suddenness, that, even in death, she retained the
appearance of life; she was still warm, her skin transparent, and her
limbs supple. Even her eyes, still wide open, retained their expression,
and betrayed the last sensation that had filled her heart,--terror. It
looked as if she had had at that last moment a revelation of the future
which her too great cautiousness had prepared for her daughter.

"My mother is not dead; oh, no! she cannot be dead!" exclaimed
Henrietta. And she went from one doctor to the other, urging them,
beseeching them, to find some means--