“As white as clay or death,” was responded. “She will fall: let her sit.”

And indeed my head swam: I dropped, but a chair received me. I still possessed my senses, though just now I could not speak.

“Perhaps a little water would restore her. Hannah, fetch some. But she is worn to nothing. How very thin, and how very bloodless!”

“A mere spectre!”

“Is she ill, or only famished?”

“Famished, I think. Hannah, is that milk? Give it me, and a piece of bread.”