How long do you think it will be before the angels come for me ?" "Many, many years, my precious one," said I, shuddering; for truly she looked so like them, that I began to fear they were close at hand.
But a few minutes afterwards she was playing with her brothers and talking to her pet doves, so sweet and humanlike, that the fear passed away.
We sent the children early to bed that night, and sat long by the fire, consulting how best to remove infection, and almost satisfied that in these two days it could not have taken any great hold on the house.
John was firm in his belief in Dr.Jenner and vaccination.

We went to bed greatly comforted, and the household sank into quiet slumbers, even though under its roof slept, in deeper sleep, the little dead child.
That small closet, which was next to the nursery I occupied, safely shut out by it from the rest of the house, seemed very still now.

I went to sleep thinking of it, and dreamed of it afterwards.
In the middle of the night a slight noise woke me, and I almost fancied I was dreaming still; for there I saw a little white figure gliding past my bed's foot; so softly and soundlessly--it might have been the ghost of a child--and it went into the dead child's room.
For a moment, that superstitious instinct which I believe we all have, paralyzed me.

Then I tried to listen.

There was most certainly a sound in the next room--a faint cry, quickly smothered--a very human cry.