"I questioned whether she should be told the danger she was in, but I decided not; for has not my darling been for years standing on the threshold of the heavenly kingdom? Death could to her only be the passing quite over that threshold, and to us the last glimpse of her most sweet presence here.
"2 P.M.—Charlotte Leycester and Emma Simpkinson have been with me in the room all morning by turns. I cannot but think her slightly better. The shutter has just been opened that she may see the sun, which poured into the room. My darling was sitting up then and smiled to see it.
"5½ P.M.—Waiting for the consultation of doctors. How I dread it, yet I cannot but think they will find my darling better. I have a feeling that there must still be hope. At two I went in a carriage to the Villa Negroni,[367] as the most solitary place I knew, and there spent an hour on that terraced walk beneath the house in which I was born, where my two mothers walked up and down together before my birth, and where I have often been, oh! so happy in the sunshine of her presence who is life to me.
"Coming back, I went into the Church of the Angeli. A white Carthusian was kneeling there alone. I knelt too and prayed—not that God would give my darling back to me unless it were His will, but oh! so earnestly that there might be no pain in her departure.
"Mrs. Woodward and Miss Finucane want to come and sit up—always good and kind. Grilli has been this evening with Dr. Bertoldi, and says everything depends on how she passes the next night: if she sleeps and the breathing becomes easier, we may hope, but even then it will be most difficult to regain the ground lost. In this I buoy myself up that they know nothing of her wonderful power of rallying.
"When Charlotte went away for the night, she said, 'I shall think of you, dear, and pray for you very much to-night.'—'Yes, into the Lord's hands I commend my spirit,' said my darling solemnly.
"9 A.M. Feb. 28, Friday.—Last night, when I wished her good-night, she said in her sweetest manner, 'Don't be too anxious; it is all in His hands.' Lea went to bed and Emma Simpkinson sat upon the sofa. I went in and out all through the night. Since 4 A.M. she has been less well!
"6 P.M.—I went rapidly to-day in a little carriage to St. Peter's, and kneeling at the grating of the chapel of the Sacrament by Sixtus IV.'s tomb, I implored God to take two years out of my life and to add them to my Mother's. I could not part with her now. If there is power in prayer, I must have been heard. I was back within the hour.
"When Charlotte came, she repeated to the Mother the texts about the saints in white robes, and then said 'Perhaps, dear, you will be with them soon—perhaps it is as in our favourite hymn, "Just passing over the brink."'—'Yes,' said my darling, 'it cannot last long; this is quite wearing me out.' I heard this through the door, for I could not bear to be in the room. Then Charlotte said, 'The Lord be with you,' or similar words, and my darling answered 'Yes, and may He be with those who are left as well as with those who are taken.' At this moment I came in and kissed my darling. Charlotte, not knowing I had heard, then repeated what she had said. 'She is praying that God may be with you and with me,' she said. I could not bear it, and went back to the next room. Charlotte came in and kissed me. 'I cannot say what I feel for you,' she said. I begged her not to say so now, 'as long as there was anything to be done I must not give way.'"
"3 P.M. Saturday.—The night was one of terrible suffering. Mrs. Woodward sat up, but I could not leave the room. In the morning my darling said, 'I never thought it would have been like this; I thought it would have been unconscious. The valley of the Shadow of Death is a dark valley, but there is light at the end.... No more pain.... The Rock of Ages, that is my rock.' Then I read the three prayers in the Visitation Service. 'It will be over soon,' she said; 'I am going to rest.'