It was a strange Maidie even to those who knew her best that developed in this illness—a very patient, submissive, and quiet Maidie, who liked best to lie still and think. One day as she was lying very still her mother asked her if there was anything she wished. “Oh, yes. If you would just leave the room door open a wee bit, and play the ‘Land o’ the Leal,’ and I will lie and think and enjoy myself.”
On Sunday, the 15th December, she was allowed to be up for a little while, and her sister thus describes the scene.
“It was Sabbath evening, and after tea my father, who idolized the child, and never afterwards in my hearing mentioned her name, took her in his arms; and while walking up and down the room, she said: ‘Father, I will repeat something to you: what would you like?’ He said ‘Just choose yourself, Maidie.’ She hesitated for a moment, between the paraphrase ‘Few are Thy Days and Full of Woe,’ and the lines of Burns, ‘Why I am loth to leave this Earthly Scene?’” but chose the latter.
That was the last earthly scene for poor little Maidie. Six days later, they laid her to rest in the churchyard of Abbotshall.
FOOTNOTES
[1] Echlasc = horse-rod, with a goad at the end of it.
[2] Cuchairi = “trappers.”
[3] Immdorus = door-porch.
[4] Feici = ridge-pole.