She had returned from her morning shopping, and she wore a straw hat trimmed with yellow roses and a shawl of lilac barege (it was the period of the shawl) sprinkled with tiny bouquets of violets.

Her dark curls (the poor beloved curls to-day, alas! so thin and white) were at this time without a gray hair.

There was about her the fragrance of the May day, and her face as it looked that morning with its broad brimmed hat is still distinctly present with me.

Besides the bouquet of pink hyacinths, she had brought me a tiny watering-pot, an exact imitation in miniature of the crockery ones so much used by the country people.
As she leaned over my bed to embrace me I felt as if every wish was gratified.

I no longer had a desire to weep, nor to rise from my bed, nor to go out.