Oh, how dreadful the nights are in the sick chamber, with a night-light dimly burning and the sufferer moaning and tossing! Then my turn came to occupy the patient's position, and it was frightful.

Can you not see I am much altered--horrid, in fact ?" Hedwig shook her head; without flattery, well as her mistress assumed the air of languor, her figure had not been affected by any event since the slaying of the Viscount Gratian, and her countenance was unmarred by any change except a trifling pallor.
"Yes; after my uncle grew better, I was indisposed and should have died but for the cares of an old friend, Madame Lesperon the Female Bard.

But you would not know this favorite of the Muses.

You are not poetically inclined, Hedwig!" she added, laughingly.

Rising with animation, "but that makes no matter! I am glad to see you home again.