"Have no fear, Dame Lucas," said the piper; "you see it has pleased a merciful Providence to spare the lives of myself, my child, and this young man, and if you should be attacked, the same benificent Being may preserve you in like manner."
"The Lord's will be done!" rejoined Dame Lucas. "I know I shall be well attended to by Doctor Hodges. I nursed him when he was an infant, and he has been like a son to me. Bless his kind heart!" she exclaimed, her eyes filling with tears of gratitude, "there is not his like in London."
"Always excepting my master," observed Leonard, with a smile at her enthusiasm.
"I except no one," rejoined Dame Lucas. "A worthier man never lived, than Doctor Hodges. If I die of the plague," she continued, "he has promised not to let me be thrown into that horrible pit—ough!—but to bury me in my garden, beneath the old apple-tree."
"And he will keep his word, dame, I am sure," replied Leonard. "I would recommend you, however, as the best antidote against the plague, to keep yourself constantly employed, and to indulge as few gloomy notions as possible."
"I am seldom melancholy, and still more seldom idle," replied the good dame. "But despondency will steal on me sometimes, especially when the dead-cart passes and I think what it contains."
While the conversation was going forward, Nizza and the piper withdrew into an inner room, where they remained closeted together for some time. On their re-appearance, Nizza said she was ready to depart, and taking an affectionate farewell of her father, and committing Bell to his charge, she quitted the cottage with the apprentice.
Evening was now advancing, and the sun was setting with the gorgeousness already described as peculiar to this fatal period. Filled with the pleasing melancholy inspired by the hour, they walked on in silence. They had not proceeded far, when they observed a man crossing the field with a bundle in his arms. Suddenly, he staggered and fell. Seeing he did not stir, and guessing what was the matter, Leonard ran towards him to offer him assistance. He found him lying in the grass with his left hand fixed against his heart. He groaned heavily, and his features were convulsed with pain. Near him lay the body of a beautiful little girl, with long fair hair, and finely-formed features, though now disfigured by purple blotches, proclaiming the disorder of which she had perished. She was apparently about ten years old, and was partially covered by a linen cloth. The man, whose features bore a marked resemblance to those of the child, was evidently from his attire above the middle rank. His frame was athletic, and as he was scarcely past the prime of life, the irresistible power of the disease, which could in one instant prostrate strength like his, was terribly attested.
"Alas!" he cried, addressing the apprentice, "I was about to convey the remains of my poor child to the plague-pit. But I have been unable to accomplish my purpose. I hoped she would have escaped the polluting touch of those loathly attendants on the dead-cart."
"She shall escape it," replied Leonard; "if you wish it, I will carry her to the pit myself."