MARION HOWARD.
Having sealed this, and written the address, she added this direction: "If I should die, please deliver this at once;" then, enclosing the whole in a blank envelope, she touched her hand-bell and requested Annie to place it in her desk.
"I must rest my head now," she said; "but first, I want you to promise me that, in case anything should happen to me, you will forward any letters you may find in my desk. Don't look so frightened, dear. I shall try to get well, for I have a great deal to do, and life is so pleasant; but there are duties which I dared not defer."
At this moment James knocked at the door, and passed in a letter just delivered by the postman.
"It is Annie Asbury's handwriting," explained Marion, in a glad voice. "It will soothe me to sleep, perhaps. Annie is a dear child."
The letter read thus:-
DEAR MARION,—
Imagine me sitting by the east window, where I can
look out on the great elm-tree, and hear the robin-redbreasts as they