She always
_plumped_ into her chair. Her muscles were too soft to lower her
gently down into it. Invariably on reaching a certain point they
ceased to act, and let her down with a crash. She had just reached
this point, and her baby's hopes and prospects were on the eve of
being cruelly crushed for ever, when Mr. Grant noticed the impending
calamity. He had no time to warn her, for she had already passed the
point at which her powers of muscular endurance terminated; so
grasping the chair, he suddenly withdrew it with such force that the
baby rolled off upon the floor like a hedgehog, straightened out
flat, and gave vent to an outrageous roar, while its horror-struck
mother came to the ground with a sound resembling the fall of an
enormous sack of wool. Although the old lady could not see exactly
that there was anything very blameworthy in her husband's conduct on
this occasion, yet her nerves had received so severe a shock that she
refused to be comforted for two entire days.
But to return from this digression. After Charley had two or three
times recommended Kate (who was a little inclined to be quizzical) to
proceed, she continued,--
"Well, then you were carried up here by father and Tom Whyte, and put
to bed, and after a good deal of rubbing and rough treatment you were
got round. Then Peter Mactavish nearly poisoned you, but fortunately
he was such a goose that he did not think of reading the label of the
phial, and so gave you a dose of tincture of rhubarb instead of
laudanum as he had intended; and then father flew into a passion, and
Tom Whyte was sent to fetch the doctor, and couldn't find him; but
fortunately he found me, which was much better, I think, and brought
me up here.
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