Youth and health do not dwell long upon the words of sickness, though love cannot fail to produce a powerful effect for the time. Laud returned to Felixstowe, leaving our cottagers to lament his departure, and Margaret to the exercise of those duties to which her nature and inclination made her then, and ever after, so well adapted—the nursing of an invalid. Had she not had these duties to perform, she might have felt more keenly the loss of her lover. She was never of a desponding disposition. She knew that Laud must work hard; and she hoped that his love for her would make him prudent and careful, though it might be years before they both saved a sufficiency to furnish a cottage.
Her duties to poor Susan became every day more urgent, for every day seemed to bring her slowly to her end. Her attentions to this sick sister were of the gentlest and most affectionate kind. Softly, gently, noiselessly, she made every one go in and out of the apartment. Susan wished that all whom she knew and loved should pray with her, and her good mistress frequently came up from the farm to read to her. Oh, how eagerly does the mind of the sufferer devour the word of God!—the more humble, the more sweet that precious fruit to the palate of the sick! How does she desire more and more of the living waters of life, and lift her eyes to Heaven, and turn them in upon her heart, to see whence her help might come!
Poor Susan had been too long a sufferer not to have learned the duties of patience; she had too humble a spirit to think anything of herself; but when she thought of her father, mother, brothers, and sister, her whole soul seemed absorbed in their present and future welfare.
Oh! what instructive lessons may be learned at the sick-bed! How wise are the reflections then made upon life and immortality! Could men only be as wise at all hours, how happy might they be!
But Susan’s hours were numbered, and her end drew nigh. Scarcely three weeks after the departure of Laud, she was called away; but her end was so characteristic of piety and love, that, despite of the impatience of the hasty reader, it must be recorded. On Saturday, the 24th of June, not long before the family were about to retire to rest, Susan said to Margaret, “Lift me up, dear, lift me up—I feel myself going.” As might be expected, a word of this sort called them all around her. The poor, weak, wasted, emaciated girl, with an eye as brilliant as the purest crystal, and a countenance expressive of the calm spirit within, looked upon the mother bathing her thin hand with tears, and the affectionate father and brothers a little more composed, but not less afflicted. Edward, the youngest, knelt close by her side; whilst the affectionate Margaret, with her arm and part of her chest supporting the raised pillow, against which the sufferer leant, held with her left hand the other transparent one of her dying sister.
Who shall paint the silver locks of age, and that calm eye, watching the waning light of a dear daughter’s life? “Let us pray,” said the dying girl; “let us pray.” Around the bed knelt six of her relatives, and in deep humility heard Susan’s prayer for them all, whilst they could only answer, with a sob, “God bless you!”
But now came an effort, which seemed to agitate the sufferer beyond all former exertions: the clothes around her poor chest seemed to shake with excess of emotion, as, with a most earnest and impressive look, she half turned herself round, and uttered the name of her sister.
“Margaret,” she said, “Margaret, you will never marry William Laud—he will cause you all much sorrow; but do not forsake the right and honest path, and you will find peace at the last. Margaret, my dear sister, never suffer him to lead you astray! Promise me, promise me never to be his, except he marry you amidst your friends.”
“I never will, dear Susan—I never will.”
“Bless you! God bless you all!” And with one look up, as if she would pierce the skies, she raised both her hands to heaven, and said, “O blessed Saviour!” and with those words her spirit took its flight to eternity.