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Bates, Arlo, 1850-1918

"The Puritans"

He would renounce; he would pluck up by
the roots this passion which had sprung and grown in his heart; at
whatever cost he would tear it up, and be faithful to his high calling.
As a child casts itself upon the bosom of its mother, he cast himself
upon the Divine, and with an ecstatic sense of pardon, of peace, of
perfect joy, he fell asleep at last.
Maurice awoke in broad daylight, with a confused sense that the world
was falling in fragments about his ears, and that his name was being
shouted by the angel of the last trump. He found that the physician who
could not be had on the previous night had now been brought to his
chamber by Mehitabel.
"Here's the saw-bones at last," was the characteristically
uncompromising introduction of the woman.
"Dr. Murray's come to tell you that all Mis' Morison did last night was
wrong, and that probably you'll have to have your arm cut off 'cause of
it."
Wynne sat up in bed dazed and uncomprehending, but the smile of the
doctor brought him to a sense of where he was. The latter was not in
the least surprised by Mehitabel's manner of speech.
"If you'd had anything to do with it, Mehitabel," was Dr.


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