But I am more resigned than I was, and I am doing my best to set my worldly affairs in order.

My one great anxiety is that Rachel should be kept in ignorance of the truth.

If she knew it, she would at once attribute my broken health to anxiety about the Diamond, and would reproach herself bitterly, poor child, for what is in no sense her fault.

Both the doctors agree that the mischief began two, if not three years since.

I am sure you will keep my secret, Drusilla--for I am sure I see sincere sorrow and sympathy for me in your face." Sorrow and sympathy! Oh, what Pagan emotions to expect from a Christian Englishwoman anchored firmly on her faith! Little did my poor aunt imagine what a gush of devout thankfulness thrilled through me as she approached the close of her melancholy story.
Here was a career of usefulness opened before me! Here was a beloved relative and perishing fellow-creature, on the eve of the great change, utterly unprepared; and led, providentially led, to reveal her situation to Me! How can I describe the joy with which I now remembered that the precious clerical friends on whom I could rely, were to be counted, not by ones or twos, but by tens and twenties.