Rienzi by Edward Bulwer-lytton — Read

For three days, the fatal three days, did Adrian remain bereft of / strength and sense. But he was not smitten by the scourge which / his devoted and generous nurse had anticipated. It was a fierce and / dangerous fever, brought on by the great fatigue, restlessness, and / terrible agitation he had undergone.

No professional mediciner could be found to attend him; but a good / friar, better perhaps skilled in the healing art than many who claimed / its monopoly, visited him daily. And in the long and frequent absences / to which his other and numerous duties compelled the monk, there was one / ever at hand to smooth the pillow, to wipe the brow, to listen to the / moan, to watch the sleep. And even in that dismal office, when, in / the frenzy of the sufferer, her name, coupled with terms of passionate / endearment, broke from his lips, a thrill of strange pleasure crossed / the heart of the betrothed, which she chid as if it were a crime. But / even the most unearthly love is selfish in the rapture of being loved! / Words cannot tell, heart cannot divine, the mingled emotions that broke / over her when, in some of these incoherent ravings, she dimly understood / that for her the city had been sought, the death dared, the danger / incurred. And as then bending passionately to kiss that burning brow, / her tears fell fast over the idol of her youth, the fountains from which / they gushed were those, fathomless and countless, which a life could not / weep away. Not an impulse of the human and the woman heart that was not / stirred; the adoring gratitude, the meek wonder thus to be loved, while / deeming it so simple a merit thus to love; -- as if all sacrifice in her / were a thing of course, -- to her, a virtue nature could not paragon, / worlds could not repay! And there he lay, the victim to his own fearless / faith, helpless -- dependent upon her -- a thing between life and death, / to thank, to serve -- to be proud of, yet protect, to compassionate, yet / revere -- the saver, to be saved! Never seemed one object to demand at / once from a single heart so many and so profound emotions; the romantic / enthusiasm of the girl -- the fond idolatry of the bride -- the watchful / providence of the mother over her child.