My whole soul has been melted down into one burning, burning thought.

Feel this hand--ay, you may well start--but what is the fever of the frame to that within ?" Here the voice sunk so low as to be inaudible.

The woman seemed as if endeavouring to sooth him; at length she said--"But poor Tyrrell--you will not, surely, suffer him to die of actual starvation ?" The man paused for a few moments, and then replied--"Night and day, I pray to God, upon my bended knees, only one unvarying, unceasing prayer, and that is--'When the last agonies shall be upon that man--when, sick with weariness, pain, disease, hunger, he lies down to die--when the death-gurgle is in the throat, and the eye swims beneath the last dull film--when remembrance peoples the chamber with Hell, and his cowardice would falter forth its dastard recantation to Heaven--then--may I be there ?" There was a long pause, only broken by the woman's sobs, which she appeared endeavouring to stifle.

At last the man rose, and in a tone so soft that it seemed literally like music, addressed her in the most endearing terms.

She soon yielded to their persuasion, and replied to them with interest.