406 CONTINUES AT HIS WORK. CHAP. xxm. 



little easier. And there it stands. I am not at all 

 well, but Hope 



" ' Hope springs eternal in the human breast.' 



" I have sent you," he said to his brother-in-law, " a 

 Thurso paper full of holes holes out of which I have 

 cut words such as ' Thurso,' ' Caithness,' ' Dunnet,' etc., 

 for my plants." For he was still working away at 

 intervals on his herbarium. 



He got no better. Sometimes he was relieved, and 

 then he grew worse again. He thought it was an 

 internal fever burning him up, and causing an enormous 

 drinking of cold water. " I do not say I will go this 

 time," he says, " but my symptoms are much the same 

 as Jane's, my father's, and Ann's." In fact, it was 

 disease of the heart under which he laboured, and 

 perhaps of the liver. Hence his dropsical symptoms. 



He still continued his correspondence, though his 

 writing became weak and shaky like that of a sick 

 man. He also continued his daily work. On the 1st 

 of October he writes: 



" ' See the wretch, who long has tossed 

 On the thorny bed of pain, 

 Recruit his health and vigour lost, 

 And live and walk again. 



The blooming earth, the sun, the skies, 



To him are opening paradise/ " 



" A solemn truth ; and none but those who have been in 

 some measure afflicted, and tossed, and racked, and 

 wearied out of all patience, can know anything of the 



