" In
another state of existence, he was offensively certain that she would
be living with _him._ "You are frightfully pale, you will soon die; I
shall break a blood-vessel, and follow you; we shall sit side by side
on clouds, and sing together everlastingly to accompaniment of
celestial harps. Oh, what a treat!" Like a child, he screamed when he
was in pain; and, like a child, he laughed when the pain had gone away.
When she was angry enough with him to say, "If I had known what sort of
man you were, I would never have undertaken to nurse you," he only
answered, "my dear, let us thank God together that you did not know."
There was no temper in him to be roused; and, worse still, on buoyant
days, when his spirits were lively, there was no persuading him that he
might not live long enough to marry his nurse, if he only put the
question to her often enough. What was to be done with such a man as
this? Fanny believed that she despised her feeble patient. At the same
time, the food that nourished him was prepared by her own hands--while
the other inhabitants of the cottage were left (in the absence of the
cook) to the tough mercies of a neighbouring restaurant. First and
foremost among the many good deeds by which the conduct of women claims
the gratitude of the other sex, is surely the manner in which they let
an unfortunate man master them, without an unworthy suspicion of that
circumstance to trouble the charitable serenity of their minds.
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