He laid his hand upon my head in a very kind manner, and tears rushed to my eyes. Seeing these, he immediately removed his hand, and gave my cheek a merry pinch.
'He will grow out of it?' questioned my mother, anxiously.
'Oh, yes,' was the reply, cheerfully uttered, 'he will grow out of it; but you must be careful with him. Don't let him mope; give him plenty of exercise and fresh air.'
'I should like a pony,' I said. My mother's troubled eyes sought the floor. If she could only have seen a magic pumpkin there!
'Then,' continued the doctor, until he is older and stronger I would fill his mind with cheerful fancies. Tell him as many stories as you please of fairies, and princesses, and flowers, and such-like; but none about ghosts. You would like to hear about beautiful fairies rising out of flower-bells, and sailing in the clouds, and floating on the water in lilies, would you not, my lad?'
I nodded gaily; his bright manner was better than all the medicine.
'Do they really do all these things, sir?'
'Surely; for such as you, my boy.' I clapped my hands. 'You see!' he said to my mother.
Many a time after this did my mother ransack her mental store, and bring forth bright-coloured fancies to make me glad. She told Jane Painter what the doctor said, and asked her to tell me the prettiest stories she knew. Jane Painter replied with one of her sweetest smiles. It was part of her duties to put me to bed every night, and one night, soon after I was well, she came into my room in the dark, as I was lying half awake and half asleep. She crept up the stairs and into the room so stealthily that I had no consciousness of her presence until a sepulchral voice stole upon my ears saying,
'Ho! Mister Friar, Don't be so bold, For fear you should make My 'eart's blood run cold!'