"And now of poor Niall! When your letter came I went in search of him. No one had seen him for a good while, and it was supposed he had gone off on some of his wanderings. None of the people would venture near his cabin, so I took my stick in my hand, and went there with the letter. I found the poor fellow in a sad plight--alone, burning with fever, delirious, and going over all kinds of queer scenes in his raving: now crying for 'gold, gold, gold!' or giving heart-piercing cries for Winifred. Again, he would be back in the past, with Roderick, a boy, at his side.
"Well, there was no one to take care of the creature; and, as it fitted in with my day's work, I took care of him myself. His gratitude, when he came to consciousness, was touching; and yet I had only followed the plainest dictates of humanity. When I thought my patient was strong enough, I read the letter to him. Bless my soul! it was like a whirlwind. He nearly took the breath out of me, rushing from the cabin in a kind of madness, and leaving me sitting there staring at the door by which he had gone. I did not see him for more than a week, and I assure you I was anxious. I was afraid he had lost his mind through excess of joy.
"To make a long story short, when he did come back again I got hold of him entirely. Joy seems to have changed his nature as sunshine will purify a noisome spot. He is as gentle and tractable as a lamb; and better than all, his old faith and piety have come back to him. He goes to Mass and the sacraments. The light of heaven seemed to flow in on him with your letter. His sorrow for the past was like that of a child. I told him not to be disturbed about it, but just go on asking for mercy, mercy--only that and nothing more. 'For,' said I to him, 'my poor fellow, there's the eye of God looking down; and as it sees the noxious weed and the fairest flower, so it beholds our sins and our waywardness as well as our virtues. If these weeds of sin are plucked, the flowers of our virtues are just as fair in His sight.'
"But, O dear lady, how the old man sits and longs for the hour of reunion! He is out on the hills when their spurs are burnished gold, at the sunset hour; and he is there at the dawn waiting for the first beam to light up the Glen of the Dargle; he is out in the moonlight watching it making strange shapes out of the trees; and all the time with that one thought in his mind. He looks for gold no more, because he says his love of it was sinful; and the only treasures he seeks for now are the faces of his loved ones. Do not keep him long waiting, I entreat.