The Freemason's Daughter: A Novel — page 133: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

124 THE FREEMASONS DAUGHTER. CHAPTER VIII. Life, from the cradle to the grave, Is but a tissue of disappointment; Blighted hopes and broken promises, Ending at last in death. At the expiration of the second week of poor Richard Lawrence’s holiday, it became evident to all but the invalid himself that his days were numbered— that the angel of death was hovering round him—that he was already overshadowed by his wing. It is fre- quently, nay, almost invariably, the character of con- sumption, that its victim is totally unaware of his danger, and full of confidence and hope, even when the film of approaching dissolution has already clouded “the eye, and the pulsations of the heart are num- bered. | Amy and her mother were not deceived; they saw their only stay daily and hourly sinking to an untimely grave; and the pang—the bitter pang—it caused them to dissemble, was a trial as severe as the anticipation of their approaching loss. Henry Beacham was a constant visitor to the house cCcomicbookxs.corm