His frame was athletic, and as he was scarcely past the prime of life, the irresistible power of the disease, which could in one instant prostrate strength like his, was terribly attested.
"Alas!" he cried, addressing the apprentice, "I was about to convey the remains of my poor child to the plague-pit.

But I have been unable to accomplish my purpose.

I hoped she would have escaped the polluting touch of those loathly attendants on the dead-cart." "She _shall_ escape it," replied Leonard; "if you wish it, I will carry her to the pit myself." "The blessing of a dying man rest on your head," cried the sufferer; "your charitable action will not pass unrequited." With this, despite the agony he endured, he dragged himself to his child, kissed her cold lips, smoothed her fair tresses, and covered the body carefully with the cloth.

He then delivered it to Leonard, who received it tenderly, and calling to Nizza Macascree, who had witnessed the scene at a little distance, and was deeply affected by it, to await his return, ran towards the plague-pit.

Arrived there, he placed his little burden at the brink of the excavation, and, kneeling beside it, uttered a short prayer inspired by the occasion.