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Page 62
"Dear Mamma, I want to tell you all about it," said Amelia, kissing the
kind hand that stroked her brow.
But it appeared that the doctor had forbidden conversation; and though
Amelia knew it would do her no harm, she yielded to her mother's wish
and lay still and silent.
"Now, my love, it is time to take your medicine."
But Amelia pleaded--"Oh, Mamma, indeed I don't want any medicine. I am
quite well, and would like to get up."
"Ah, my dear child!" cried her mother, "what I have suffered in
inducing you to take your medicine, and yet see what good it has done
you."
"I hope you will never suffer any more from my wilfulness," said
Amelia; and she swallowed two tablespoonfuls of a mixture labelled "To
be well shaken before taken," without even a wry face.
Presently the doctor came.
"You're not so very angry at the sight of me to-day, my little lady,
eh?" he said.
"I have not seen you for a long time," said Amelia; "but I know you
have been here, attending a stock who looked like me. If your eyes had
been touched with fairy ointment, however, you would have been aware
that it was a fairy imp, and a very ugly one, covered with hair. I have
been living in terror lest it should go back underground in the shape
of a black cat. However, thanks to the four-leaved clover, and the old
woman of the heath, I am at home again."
On hearing this rhodomontade, Amelia's mother burst into tears, for she
thought the poor child was still raving with fever. But the doctor
smiled pleasantly, and said--"Ay, ay, to be sure," with a little nod,
as one should say, "We know all about it;" and laid two fingers in a
casual manner on Amelia's wrist.
"But she is wonderfully better, madam," he said afterwards to her
mamma; "the brain has been severely tried, but she is marvellously
improved: in fact, it is an effort of nature, a most favourable effort,
and we can but assist the rally; we will change the medicine." Which he
did, and very wisely assisted nature with a bottle of pure water
flavoured with tincture of roses.
"And it was so very kind of him to give me his directions in poetry,"
said Amelia's mamma; "for I told him my memory, which is never good,
seemed going completely, from anxiety, and if I had done anything wrong
just now, I should never have forgiven myself. And I always found
poetry easier to remember than prose,"--which puzzled everybody, the
doctor included, till it appeared that she had ingeniously discovered a
rhyme in his orders--
'To be kept cool and quiet,
With light nourishing diet.'
Under which treatment Amelia was soon pronounced to be well.
She made another attempt to relate her adventures, but she found that
not even Nurse would believe in them.
"Why you told me yourself I might meet with the fairies," said Amelia,
reproachfully.
"So I did, my dear," Nurse replied, "and they say that it's that put it
into your head. And I'm sure what you say about the dwarfs and all is
as good as a printed book, though you can't think that ever I would
have let any dirty clothes store up like that, let alone your frocks,
my dear. But for pity's sake, Miss Amelia, don't go on about it to your
mother, for she thinks you'll never get your senses right again, and
she has fretted enough about you, poor lady; and nursed you night and
day till she is nigh worn out. And anybody can see you've been ill,
Miss, you've grown so, and look paler and older like. Well, to be sure,
as you say, if you'd been washing and working for a month in a place
without a bit of sun, or a bed to lie on, and scraps to eat, it would
be enough to do it; and many's the poor child that has to, and gets
worn and old before her time. But, my dear, whatever you think, give in
to your mother; you'll never repent giving in to your mother, my dear,
the longest day you live."
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