On Sunday, August 22,
1869, I went to see old Mrs. Grant, whom I was grieved to see
sitting in her chair supported by pillows, and her poor feet raised
upon cushions, very much altered in her face, and, I fear, dying of
dropsy.
On August 26 I again saw her, and gave her a shawl and a pair of
socks, and found the poor old soul in bed, looking very weak and
very ill, but bowing her head and thanking me in her usual way. I
took her hand and held it.
On the 27th she died.
On the 28th I stopped at her cottage and went in with Louise and
Leopold. We found all so clean and tidy, but all so silent. Mrs.
Gordon, her daughter, was there, having arrived just in time to
spend the last evening and night with her; and then she lifted the
sheet, and there the poor old woman, whom we had known and seen from
the first here these twenty-one years, lay on a bier in her shroud,
but with her usual cap on, peaceful and little altered, her dark
skin taking away from, the usual terrible pallor of death. She had
on the socks I gave her the day before yesterday. She was in her
eighty-ninth year. |