her withered mouth with the warm, full lips of youth. "Verney," said the

Countess, "I need not recommend this dear girl to you, for your own sake

you will preserve her. Were the world as it was, I should have a thousand

sage precautions to impress, that one so sensitive, good, and beauteous,

might escape the dangers that used to lurk for the destruction of the fair

and excellent. This is all nothing now.

"I commit you, my kind nurse, to your uncle's care; to yours I entrust the

dearest relic of my better self. Be to Adrian, sweet one, what you have

been to me--enliven his sadness with your sprightly sallies; sooth his

anguish by your sober and inspired converse, when he is dying; nurse him as

you have done me."

Clara burst into tears; "Kind girl," said the Countess, "do not weep for

me. Many dear friends are left to you."

"And yet," cried Clara, "you talk of their dying also. This is indeed cruel

--how could I live, if they were gone? If it were possible for my beloved

protector to die before me, I could not nurse him; I could only die too."

The venerable lady survived this scene only twenty-four hours. She was the

last tie binding us to the ancient state of things. It was impossible to

look on her, and not call to mind in their wonted guise, events and

persons, as alien to our present situation as the disputes of Themistocles

and Aristides, or the wars of the two roses in our native land. The crown

of England had pressed her brow; the memory of my father and his

545

The Last Man