Page:Ethel Churchill 1.pdf/294

288 the post is the one that is anticipated, the only one from which we reckon. How long the time seems till it comes! With how many devices do we seek to pass it a little quicker! How we hope and believe each day will be our last of anxious waiting! The post comes in, and there is no letter for us. How bitter is the disappointment! and on every repetition it grows more acute. How immeasurable the time seems till the post comes in again! The mind exhausts itself in conjectures; illness, even death, grow terribly distinct to hope in its agony—hope that is fear! We dread we know not what; and every lengthened day the misery grows more insupportable. Every day the anxiety takes a darker shadow. To know even the very worst of all we have foreboded, appears a relief. The letter which Ethel had watched so eagerly, was the usual one from Henrietta. Her uncle almost snatched it, with hands that trembled with eagerness. His whole face lighted up. He read the direction; he looked at the seal with an expression of even childlike