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The nurse came and shut her curtain saying in a whisper, 'Every body must stay quiet while the doctors are here. They do not like people to be peeping from their beds.'

In a short time her doctor drew aside her curtain, and spoke kindly to her. He then called to an elderly gentleman, and said, 'This is the girl I mentioned to you.'

The elder doctor immediately came, and Jessy's wound was uncovered. She looked earnestly at him, while he carefully examined it. He then said something to her doctor in a language she did not understand, and shook his head. 'We may continue the remedies you have begun for a few days,' added he; 'but delay, I fear, will only increase the evil.'

He then went away, and Jessy's own doctor staid to bandage up the wound. While doing so, he asked her if she had any book to amuse her. She drew her Bible from under the pillow. 'I have this, Sir.'

He looked much pleased. 'If you really love that book, Jessy, we know whose child you are, and whatever you may have to suffer, all will work together for your good.'

After the doctors were gone, Jessy thought over what she had understood in their conversation respecting her. She felt certain that they thought very unfavourably of her case; and her own doctor's last words seemed to imply, that she had still to look forward to severe suffering. Her mother's words the night before, returned to her thoughts, but she could not yet bear to think they might be true. The first time the nurse came near her bed, she asked her if she knew what the doctors thought of her case.

The nurse hesitated, and then said, 'They do not seem to think well of it for the present.'

'But do you think they mean to take off my leg?'

'I cannot tell, -- they did not say any thing to me. But if it should be so bad as to come to that, you know many a person has had that done, and been strong and healthy all the rest of their lives.'

'Oh! but such dreadful pain as it must be!' exclaimed Jessy.

'Oh! no,' replied the nurse; 'I have heard many people say that they had suffered more pain before than during the operation; and then you know, even if it should be very sore for a short time, -- ten minutes perhaps, or a quarter of an hour, it is the last pain, and then you get ease and sleep. I am sure, with that leg, you must always be suffering, and can get very little sleep.'

'That is very true,' replied Jessy.

'Well,' answered the nurse, 'would it not be better to suffer sharply for a short time, and then be well, than to be continually in pain, and have all your strength wasted away?'

Jessy agreed, and felt much comforted by what the nurse had said. For two or three days after this, Jessy continued in pretty much the same state. The perfect quiet which always reigned around her, composed her mind, and she could without interruption read her Bible; and think and pray over what she read. The nurse, who was pleased with the grateful manner in which she received all her attentions, had brought her a book, saying, 'I see you are very fond of reading. This is a book my mother was always at, when she was not reading her Bible. I do not know what it is about, for I never cared for reading; but I have kept it for her sake, and I am sure I may trust it with you, and may be you may like it.'

Jessy thanked the nurse gratefully. This book was 'The Scots Worthies,' and no other could have been better suited to wile away Jessy's thoughts from the pain she constantly endured. She read this account of the sufferings undergone by the faithful servants of her Lord, with an interest so deep as to make her forget all else, -- where she was, -- her own pain, -- what she herself might still have to suffer, -- every thing, while she followed in thought one or other of those 'Witnesses' for the truth, fearlessly proclaiming it to the scattered sheep of Christ's fold, who dared to gather to them in lonely glens, or beneath the rocky cliffs or unfrequented parts of the sea-shore, or amongst the hills: -- she followed them, to the eaves and woods, where they fled from their persecutors, or to prisons or cruel deaths; and her young and warm heart led her almost to wish she had been amongst those who had been called to suffer for her Lord's cause, as she found, that among 'The Scots Worthies,' there had been not only ministers who preached the truth, but many, and some of them younger than herself, who had witnessed to their faith in Christ by dying, rather than give up serving him. When it became dark, and she could no longer read, she still thought of them, and tried to discover whether she, too, might not honour her Lord in her sufferings. She remembered that the Bible spoke both of doing the will, and suffering the will of God. She prayed to be enabled to understand the meaning of the last expression; and she thought, that as doing the will of God meant obedience to his laws, which we were incapable of obeying without his continual assistance, so suffering his will must mean, to submit with love and gentleness, and without murmuring, to whatever he appointed, in the firm belief of what he himself has declared, that 'whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth,' -- and this she also knew she could not do without his assistance. She prayed earnestly, therefore, for grace to enable her to suffer the will of her Lord, whatever it might be.