leg clasped, and a groan repeated by the person that held me. I lowered my

lamp, and saw a negro half clad, writhing under the agony of disease, while

he held me with a convulsive grasp. With mixed horror and impatience I

strove to disengage myself, and fell on the sufferer; he wound his naked

festering arms round me, his face was close to mine, and his breath,

death-laden, entered my vitals. For a moment I was overcome, my head was

bowed by aching nausea; till, reflection returning, I sprung up, threw the

wretch from me, and darting up the staircase, entered the chamber usually

inhabited by my family. A dim light shewed me Alfred on a couch; Clara

trembling, and paler than whitest snow, had raised him on her arm, holding

a cup of water to his lips. I saw full well that no spark of life existed

in that ruined form, his features were rigid, his eyes glazed, his head had

fallen back. I took him from her, I laid him softly down, kissed his cold

little mouth, and turned to speak in a vain whisper, when loudest sound of

thunderlike cannon could not have reached him in his immaterial abode.

And where was Idris? That she had gone out to seek me, and had not

returned, were fearful tidings, while the rain and driving wind clattered

against the window, and roared round the house. Added to this, the

sickening sensation of disease gained upon me; no time was to be lost, if

ever I would see her again. I mounted my horse and rode out to seek her,

fancying that I heard her voice in every gust, oppressed by fever and

aching pain.

I rode in the dark and rain through the labyrinthine streets of unpeopled

London. My child lay dead at home; the seeds of mortal disease had taken

442

The Last Man