The two girls had been standing on the eastern balcony of the Alms-house at ——, so absorbed that they noted not the flight of time, until Ellen’s exclamation, “Uncle is waiting for us,” aroused them.
“My children,” said Mr. Norton, as they descended, “I had begun to think you had quite forgotten me, and my rheumatism prevented me seeking you above stairs; but, now that you are here, Mr. Barker is going to accompany me through the insane department—you, Ellen, I know would like to go—but what says my little Lucy?”
“If you please, papa, I will wait here your return, and watch that noble steamer as she ploughs the wave, proud as it were of her happy burden, for from the music and the throng, I judge they have a pleasure-party on board. And as cousin Ellen seems determined to chase away all my fairy visions, do, dear papa, take her with you while I endeavor to recruit my spirits.”
Ellen, smiling, placed her arm within her uncle’s, and Mr. Barker led the way to a long low range, not far from the main-building.
Entering an apartment from which the light and pure atmosphere of heaven seemed banished, while the howls of the wretched maniacs (caged, like so many wild beasts, in their dreary cells, with naught upon which to rest their weary, lacerated limbs, but a heap of filthy straw,) struck upon the ear like the shrieks of the lost, causing the warm life-blood to recede from the heart and curdle in the veins. Mr. Norton, feeling the sudden grasp of Ellen, and noting her pallid countenance, said hurriedly —
“My dear, we had better not proceed; let us turn back.”
“Oh, no! dear uncle,” she exclaimed, making an effort at composure, “do not think of me, it was but a momentary weakness.”
As they proceeded from cell to cell, Ellen’s kind tone and pleasant smile, seemed to touch some hidden spring in the heart of these wretched beings, causing the jarring discordant strings to vibrate in momentary harmony. Each strove to withdraw her from the other, to listen to his tale of wo or imagined felicity. Some insisted that she was a being of superior order, sent to release them from their horrible confinement—until at last, overcome by her feelings, she leant for support against the frame of a half-open door that led to an inner apartment, lost in thought, and taking no cognizance of what passed around her.
From this abstraction she was aroused, by—“Madam, he has been dying these two days. I do not think he can last over to-night.”
“Who dying?” said Ellen, with a shudder, observing at the same time the coarse, hard-hearted looking female that addressed her.