My dear Nicholson,

        . . . We got her[*] through the acute crisis. . . . I resigned her a full month ago, and have since not dared to hope that she can do anything but linger. Nevertheless her life is less distressing and more worth having than it was. She moves from her bed into an arm-chair; sits at table for dinner. . . . She talks cheerfully, and can enjoy seeing her sisters. When I look at her I fancy she is pretty well; . . . yet I feel that she might be carried off very suddenly. Indeed, this was her mother's case, who had the very same combination of disease, and retained much muscular strength to the last. We had two physicians at Hastings, and here she is under Dr. Garth Wilkinson. I have no complaint against any of the physicians: they seem to me all to have done all they could; but nothing that anyone has done has been of any use. It was by nursing, not by medicine, that she was saved through critical days and nights. The physician said she could not live forty-eight hours, and so we believed: and at her request I sent him away. . . . I have written so many letters that I forget to whom I have written: and it was indeed a tumultuous existence at Hastings. I have now a good night nurse and cannot say that I want anything; but a great shadow overspreads me.

    [*Mrs. Newman.]