"To be sure he is," said Dr. Wilson, in his cheeriest tones. He had got up from his chair, and was standing with his back to the fire looking at us. "Yes, he'll be quite well again by-and-by; and all the more prudent, we'll hope, for the trouble he's been putting us in during these last few days. He's had a lesson that ought to last for some time to come; but boys never learn their lessons, do what one will to make them."
There was a moment's pause after this discouraging general statement with reference to boys; and then the doctor added, as if thinking to himself, in quite a different tone:
"Poor boy! poor boy! it's been a very near thing. By the help of God, we've brought him through. May it be a life worth the saving—a life given back to God!"
"Amen!" ejaculated my father, earnestly; and then, at his suggestion, we knelt together, and, in a few heartfelt words, he offered thanks to the heavenly Father for his goodness to us, and turned kind Dr. Wilson's aspiration into a prayer, that the life given back to my cousin might be by him given back to God.
I knew, as I knelt there by my father's side, for the first time in my life, the feeling of a deep and speechless thankfulness, for which all words would be too poor.
It was very late—past ten o'clock—but I was not allowed to go up to bed at once. Supper was ready, my father said, and I should come into the dining-room, and have it with him and Dr. Wilson. Accordingly, in spite of all remonstrances of nurse, who put in her appearance, and thought fit to reflect upon the utter impropriety of such late hours, I went to supper; and felt, moreover, greatly refreshed and strengthened by it, sitting there close by my father's side, and rejoicing every moment of the time in the feeling as of a great deliverance.
So it came to pass that my second night did not begin until eleven o'clock.