One hand was clenched.
The other was clutching her bodice, as if in the act of tearing it open.
A little foam flecked the blue lips.
Alta threw herself upon her mother's body, sobbing, "Oh, mamma, wake up! do! do!" "Is she dead ?" asked Miss Ludington, in horrified accents.
"I don't know; I fear so.

I warned her; I told her it would come.

But she would do it," cried the doctor incoherently, as he tried to feel her pulse with one hand while he tore at the fastenings of her dress with the other.

He set Paul at work chafing the hands of the unconscious woman, while Miss Ludington sprinkled her face and chest with ice-water from a small pitcher that stood in a corner of the cabinet, and the doctor himself endeavoured in vain to force some of the contents of a vial through her clenched teeth.

"It is of no use," he said, finally; "she is past help--she is dead!" At this Miss Ludington and Paul stood aside, and Alta, throwing herself upon her mother's form, burst into an agony of tears.