Welwyn spoke of her approaching end. The last
solemn words of the dying woman, the tenderest messages that she
could give, the dearest parting wishes that she could express,
the most earnest commands that she could leave behind her, the
gentlest reasons for consolation that she could suggest to the
survivors among those who loved her, were not poured into her
husband's ear, but into her child's. From the first period of her
illness, Ida had persisted in remaining in the sick-room, rarely
speaking, never showing outwardly any signs of terror or grief,
except when she was removed from it; and then bursting into
hysterical passions of weeping, which no expostulations, no
arguments, no commands--nothing, in short, but bringing her back
to the bedside--ever availed to calm. Her mother had been her
playfellow, her companion her dearest and most familiar friend;
and there seemed something in the remembrance of this which,
instead of overwhelming the child with despair, strengthened her
to watch faithfully and bravely by her dying parent to the very
last.
When the parting moment was over, and when Mr. Welwyn, unable to
bear the shock of being present in the house of death at the time
of his wife's funeral, left home and went to stay with one of his
relations in a distant part of England, Ida, whom it had been his
wish to take away with him, petitioned earnestly to be left
behind.
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