European Prison Discipline.
I. — Newgate.
We take pleasure in offering to American readers the following record of a visit to Newgate, as exhibiting the enlightened humanity shown in the treatment of public criminals in London. The guide whom we have selected as the interpreter of Newgate's mysteries is an imaginary personage. He expresses the impressions, thoughts, and comments of several persons, not the convictions of a single individual.
This way, sir, please. Yes, the passages do seem gloomy, coming in out of the sunny street, crowded with free men hurrying to and fro on business. Here we are in the kitchen; you see the good allowance of meat and potatoes the prisoners have for dinner four times a week; the other three days they have a good strong soup instead of meat; morning and night a mess of oatmeal, and with each meal half a pound of bread. Yes, they are well fed; better here, many of them, than they would be outside. Just look over your shoulder, sir. Through that low iron door behind you the condemned prisoners pass out into the square to be hanged. Why through the kitchen? Can't say, sir. It has always been so and that's all, I suppose. Do they take it quietly for the most part? Why—sometimes they give us a little trouble, but—yes, generally they bear it pretty well, poor fellows!
More narrow passages, with grated rooms like aviaries on each side. These are the apartments where the prisoners receive their friends, separated from them by two gratings several feet apart. It will remind you of the picture in Old Curiosity Shop, where Mrs. Nubbles and Barbara's mother go to see Kit in prison. A prisoner can receive a visit once in three months, write one letter, and receive one; but they are seldom here so long. Newgate is only a house of detention before trial, except for those condemned to death—a mere jail. Here we are in one of the great oblong halls with tiers of cells opening on to galleries. Up this iron staircase in the middle of the hall and across this little bridge, and we stand outside a cell door. In the American prisons you have seen, you say that the cells open on a corridor, with a grated door, and sometimes a grated window. Not so, here. The door is solid, with merely a small hole for purposes of surveillance, and a trap below it through which food, etc., may be passed. If the prisoner wants anything, he rings a bell, the action of which is curious. Fix your eye on the bell-spring outside. I pull the bell inside and a tin flap flies back, showing the number of the cell. Thus the officer knows what bell has rung, and the prisoner, having no power over the flap when it has once sprung back, cannot avoid discovery if he has rung merely in order to give trouble. The cell is sufficiently large, you see, and is lighted from the court-yard through that arched window near the ceiling. A nice little room enough, with the bedding stowed away on one of those shelves in the corner. On the shelf below is the prisoner's bowl with the spoon lying on it. Everything must be in its place. If the spoon were on the shelf, it would be out of place; it must lie on the reversed bowl. Resting against the wall is his plate, and on the lowest shelf are his books. Oh! yes, you may examine them—the same in all the cells, Bible, Prayer-Book, hymns, and psalms. [Footnote 222] The other volume comes from our library, and is changed every day, if necessary> At this little turn-up shelf the prisoner takes his meals, or reads by the small shade-lamp above it. In the corner is a nice copper basin with plenty of water. There are two apertures, one to admit warm air, the other for ventilation; every comfort provided for him, you see. Yes, we keep the prisoners entirely apart from each other, never two together, unless some one comes here for drunkenness, and has delirium tremens, and then we put two others with him for safety's sake. Now we'll go up to the next corridor; in the one below are the doctors' cells, where fresh prisoners are kept until they have passed through a sanitary examination.
[Footnote 222: Prisoners who do not belong to the Established Church can be visited by a priest or by a dissenting minister.]
Step into this cell, occupied, as you see, by a mere boy. There's his pile of oakum on the floor. Go on with your dinner, my man; no need to stop for us. As we go up higher, more light comes in from the courtyard; the upper cells are reserved for prisoners who are likely to be here some time. The next cell occupied too, you see, though we've not many prisoners here now, the trials being just over. Yes, sir, this man is trying to educate himself a little; has a dictionary on the shelf beside the library-book—a volume of travels this time. Now that we are in the corridor again, let me tell you that this same shock-headed young man is condemned to ten years of penal servitude and twenty lashes, for highway robbery with violence. The lashes are to be received before he leaves Newgate, but more on that subject presently.
Here we are in the old part of Newgate. In your reading, no doubt you've come across the name of Mrs. Elizabeth Fry. It was in this same long, dark room that she used to assemble the prisoners, and read and pray with them. No, I have no means of judging of the durability of her conversions. It is easy to talk of converting criminals; but perhaps her chief merit lay in setting the example in England of a friendly and trusting intercourse with these poor wretches. Yes, it is strange to see the whipping-block in this room, but indeed, sir, corporal punishment has become an absolute necessity. It is never used to force prison discipline, but is administered in execution of a sentence, imposed by a magistrate for wanton violence. It is a curious fact that these brutes, who go about garroting inoffensive travellers, breaking jaws and skulls with their brass knuckles or dusters, as they call them, are the veriest cowards on earth when physical pain comes to themselves. In this very room they will cry like children, and beg to be forgiven, I don't feel half the pity for them that I do for the poor creatures going to be hanged. [Footnote 223] This iron door survived the fire in the Gordon riots, you see. Come through here, if you please, sir. This is another of the large rooms in old Newgate, where prisoners were kept before the solitary system came into vogue. The change is a most fortunate one for all concerned, I'm confident.
[Footnote 223: We are not fully convinced of the wisdom of introducing the whipping-block once more into the honorable company of penal inflictions in England. One of the most satisfactory cases of reformation we have known among persons guilty of grave crimes, was that of a "garroter." It is our strong impression that corporal punishment would have degraded him beyond all human hope of redemption. At least, great care should be taken to keep the use of this instrument of torture within the bounds of absolute necessity. Imprisonment may soften the heart; perhaps many persons have died well on the scaffold, who would have died impenitent under other circumstances; but however great may have been the number of spirits crushed by flogging in prisons, we venture to doubt whether there is a single instance on record of its having produced or aided reformation.]
I've no question that many a crime was hatched here among the men herded together in these cells. You can see for yourself what kind of talk there would be among them. Perhaps some footman was sent here for stealing his master's purse. What a chance for an old hand to get a little useful information in a friendly way: "Your master was an easy, comfortable kind of a man, was he? Well, them well-to-do city-men mostly is easy-tempered. Not partickerlerly well-to-do, an't he? Old family he belongs to, eh? What lots o' plate some o' them poor noblemen do have! Wonder myself that they don't sell it and get the good out on it, 'stead of hiding it away at the banker's? Don't keep it at the bankers! Pity the poor cuss as cleans it, then! Go to Brighton or Bath, of course, when the season's over; I thought as much; it takes poor folks to travel," etc., etc. And then, the first step after getting out of Newgate would be to make love to the maid-servant when the family was out of town. Very devoted he'd be, until some evening he'd think it "such a pity there were no oranges in the house, or something else to cool your mouth with; there was such a nice, respectable place round the corner; wouldn't she just step round there and choose something for herself?" And then, while the the poor girl was gone, the accomplices, well instructed as to the whereabouts of the plate, would ransack the safe at their leisure. You may depend upon it, sir, it was a good thing for society when the present discipline was adopted.
The little court-yard we are crossing now is one of those where the prisoners take their exercise. Oh! yes, sir; they all have regular times for exercise, and in these yards within the building there is no possibility of their making their escape. I am going to show one of our cells for solitary confinement. Let me turn up the gas in this small room. You see this door which I open, and again an inner door, which I open too. Step in, sir. Now, turn so that your eye may catch the gaslight outside. Here is a bedstead; you can feel it, if you don't see it. In this cell, pitch-dark and cut off from the rest of the prison so completely that no shouts or screams would be heard, unruly prisoners are confined for any period between one hour and three days, with only bread and water for food. There is ventilation and warmth here, as in the other cells. The doctor comes each morning to see that mind and body are sound. Only by sentence of a magistrate can the confinement be prolonged beyond three days. Yes, sir, it is an awful place; and then, too, the men look upon it as sheer lost time. We have soldiers in here sometimes, and they say that they can make up for three days on bread and water in the guard-house, by spending their whole pay in eating and drinking when they come out; but here it's just loss of rations, and nothing else. You'll hardly ever catch an old thief in here. "Oh! don't stop my grub, whatever you do," he'll say, and so he takes care to behave well enough to keep out of "solitary." The prisoners who mind it least are little ragamuffins, accustomed to creep into any dark hole, to curl themselves up and go to sleep. They are never afraid of anything. Decent boys, in prison on suspicion of forgery or whatever, are dreadfully scared. But you'll be glad to get out into the daylight again, I am thinking, sir.
I'll show you our chapel now. In that screened gallery the women sit, where they can see everything without being seen. There is divine service here every morning, as well as on Sundays. No, sir; I've no authority to show you the female side of the prison, which is quite distinct from ours, and has female warders, and a committee of lady visitors. The system of female keepers works perfectly well; but it would have been impracticable before we adopted separate cells, because the talk among the prisoners was such as no decent woman should hear. A wicked woman is a thousand times worse than a bad man, and less intelligent, too. You see, sir, a woman falls because she is either pretty, or silly, or unprotected. Now, bad men and boys are often the most intelligent of their class, and are selected as tools for that very reason, by older rogues than themselves. It is one of the terrible features of the case, that the country loses valuable servants in these quick-witted outlaws.
Here we come out upon the sloping passage, leading to the criminal courts—Birdcage-walk, the old thieves call it. Over-head we get the light through the open iron-work, you see. Under the flags are buried all those who have been hanged, and the initial letter of the name is scratched on the wall above the grave. That iron door at the end leads to the court-rooms. Yes, indeed, sir, some of the prisoners one learns to like best are those awaiting execution here, educated men sometimes. Oh! yes; I know the names that all these letters stand for. Muller lies there. No, he was not much of a man, any way. Here's Courvoisier, who murdered Lord Russell; he was my lord's valet. Those five letters stand for five pirates. This one was a coachman, who murdered a female in the city, and burned the remains in his stable. Here's a man who killed his wife. Why, yes, sir; there are a good many in here for wife-murder; aggravating, I suppose, at times. That was an Italian, who killed another female in the city. This man hung his own child in the cellar. Oh! no, he was not insane; jealous of his wife, or something of the sort, I believe. There are a good many more here, but their cases were not so well known. Another court-yard to be crossed, sir, and here we are in one of the condemned cells. A good deal larger it is than the common cells, you see, with a bedstead, a good-sized table, and a long bench. From the time of his condemnation, the poor fellow is never left alone, night or day; two officers take turn and turn about in staying with him. Oh! certainly, sir, they talk with him; not about his case, of course, but of any book they have been reading, or of things outside the prison, and so on. The idea is not to let his mind dwell much on what is before him, and so spare him all the suffering we can.
You are right, sir; it would be absolutely impossible to dispense with capital punishment in this country. Murder is common enough now, but I am confident it would be much more frequent if the fear of death were withdrawn. Your professional thief never commits murder. All rogues have an especial line of business. A house-breaker is never guilty of highway robbery; a highway-man never picks pockets; and they none of them commit murder. Now, sir, there is a deal of talk about the horrors of a public execution, and the bad effect such a sight must have on the people. Well, sir, I am of a different opinion. The people who come to a hanging are the very scum of London. Some gentlemen there are, too, I know, by the looks of the windows opposite; but the crowd is chiefly made up of the mere scum and dregs of London. I think, sir, it is a lesson to them, and a lesson they need badly. Sometimes we say to the little ragamuffins who get in here, "Did you ever go to a hanging?" "Yes, sir." "And what did you think of it?" "Why, I wasn't in a very good place, sir; I couldn't see much." "Well, don't you know that if you go on as you're going now, you may come to commit murder one of these days, and be hanged yourself?" "Oh! no, sir! I mustn't commit murder." He has learned that much, if he's not learned anything else. [Footnote 224]
[Footnote 224: We present this argument simply as a statement of one side of an oft-mooted question, but we are far from being convinced of its validity.]
I believe that if capital punishment were abolished, a thief, instead of leaving his pal (as the vulgar term is for accomplice) in a mask, to watch the man and wife while he searches for plate, would kill them both. He would know that he could only be transported for life, and if he killed the officers placed in charge over him, the law could only repeat the same sentence. Yes, sir; you are right; capital punishment is sometimes too severe a penalty, in proportion to the crime it punishes. It falls, now and then, on a man who has not led a bad life in general, but who is possessed by one passion—jealousy, or revenge, or whatever. There should be a clearer distinction of circumstances in pronouncing sentence. A man who sets out to do a thing, with a distinct determination to take life if he can in no other way accomplish his purpose, commits murder. A man devoured by passion, and acting under its influence, should be judged less severely. And yet, sir, since the penalty of death is less designed as a punishment of criminals than as a defence of the public, even this distinction is very hard to make. We can only hope that our children will judge the matter more wisely than we do.
This room, sir, inclosed in glass, is the apartment where a prisoner meets his solicitor. The door is closed upon client and counsel, and the officer in attendance cannot hear their talk, or learn what points are to be used in the defence.
Here we are in the room where the prisoner is prepared for execution. I'll get the key, and unlock the closet where our irons are kept. This is the old style, sir, very cumbrous, as you see. Here are the identical irons Jack Sheppard wore. They would be so much too large for me, that I could slip my foot out at once; but in those days they wore pads around the ankle, so that the ring fitted close. When you read of Jack's breaking loose from his irons, it sounds very grand; but all he did was to unwind the pad from his ankle, and draw his foot out. These are the irons we use in travelling with convicts; here are common handcuffs, as you see; and here is the sort of harness worn by prisoners about to be executed. It pinions the arms firmly, and, at the last moment, fastens the legs together. Why, no, sir; I can't say that educated men bear it any better than ignorant ones. I've seen educated men most awfully frightened. I think it was death they feared, sir, not shame. When they are ready, they pass through this passage, and out through the iron door I showed you in the kitchen, on to the square. Step into this cabinet a moment, sir. On those shelves are casts taken after death from those who have been executed. There is Muller, there is Courvoisier, there is Marchand. The young fellow with negro features was only nineteen. He murdered his fellow-servant. Yes, the one next him looks like a negro too; you are probably right, sir. The one with the well-formed, dimpled chin little thought how his pleasure-loving youth would end. Surprisingly life-like they all are. Yes, these are the men who lie under the flags in the Birdcage-walk. This way, sir, for your hat and cane. Good day, sir. Astonishingly fine weather for the season.
II. Saint Lazare.
The ancient convent of Saint Lazare, in Paris, once the home of St. Vincent de Paul, is now a prison for women taken from the lowest depths of Parisian life. Their name is legion; their sufferings from sickness and neglect before arrest are unutterable. France has no law for such as they beyond the will of the prefect of police. What alleviation, you ask, has been found for this corrosive social evil? A more effective one than disbelievers in French virtue would anticipate. All females who come under the notice of the police for sanitary reasons or criminal matters, are sent to Saint Lazare, where, instead of jailers, there are fifty-five Sisters of Charity. [Footnote 225]
[Footnote 225: Or, more strictly speaking, fifty-five Sisters of Marie Joseph, the sisterhood devoted to prison discipline in France.]
How many of the miserable creatures are converted by intercourse with these noble and refined women, God only knows. The day of judgment will reveal the difference between real and apparent success. But a woman who has been first the plaything and then the scorn of society, must think more tenderly of God in Saint Lazare, than in any ordinary prison or workhouse.
Two objections which may be made to the system of treatment adopted at Saint Lazare, I will try to answer before enumerating the very details which would probably suggest them.
In the first place, it may be urged that the prisoners are made so comfortable that imprisonment becomes a reward rather than a punishment, a bribe rather than a threat. Secondly, it may be with truth asserted that the wicked poor receive better care in such an establishment, than society gives to the virtuous poor who have never seen the inside of a jail.
To the first objection I answer, that imprisonment is never easy for such women to bear, because the passions which bring them so low, love of excitement and vanity, find no food in a well-ordered prison; that the opposite system has been tested ever since the world was, and still the world overflows with impenitent sinners; that at least half the prisoners of Saint Lazare are wicked for want of precisely what they find there—judicious training; a decent dwelling-place, good example; and, last and best reason of all, that this system is the one most in accordance with the teaching and example of Christ.
And my answer to the second objection is this. Let us seek out the honest poor, provide them with decent lodging-houses at low prices, with practical education, useful and entertaining reading, innocent amusement, and, above all, with religious and moral instruction; but do not let us relax our efforts to reform sinners merely because we have shamefully neglected our duties toward saints. We may say truly that the respectable poor are hard to find, because their very virtues conceal them from the public eye. We have no such excuse where sinners are concerned; for they are festering in every jail, penitentiary, and almshouse in every city throughout the world. Justice, not charity, demands that society should provide decent asylums where its victims may hide their wretchedness.
But let us examine the discipline of Saint Lazare in detail, that the reader may judge for himself whether these objections have been satisfactorily disposed of.
The inmates are divided into three classes: 1st. Women who have been tried for crimes and condemned; 2d. Filles publiques, consigned to St. Lazare by the police for sanitary or other reasons; 3d. Young girls and children sent thither by their parents (correction paternelle) for safe keeping, or brought there by the police as vagrants.
The uniform is neat and inconspicuous, dark blue for one class of offenders, and maroon for the other; I think the children wear no uniform. The clothes-rooms are arranged very methodically, under-clothing and dresses being laid on shelves in orderly piles which would satisfy the most fastidious Yankee housekeeper. The common prison garments are comfortable and well made; but there is a higher grade of clothing for those who can afford to pay for it, who are there on "pistole," as the technical term is, taken from an old French coin. The same is to be said of food and lodging; comfortable accommodations being provided for all, while small luxuries can be purchased at a small expense. Tariffs are posted all over the prison, that the inmates may know the fixed prices of various articles, and not be subjected to dishonesty on the part of sub-officials. The present writer, who endured the terrible ordeal imposed on all conscientious visitors, of tasting everything the various kitchens produced, can answer for the excellent quality of soup, coffee, bread, etc., etc. Having been allowed to content himself with visual proof in passing through the well-ordered pharmacies, he can only vouch for their neatness and apparent convenience.
The work-rooms are generally furnished with tiers of benches graduated nearly to the ceiling, so that one sister can superintend a roomful of work-women. The gentleman who accompanied me in my first visit showed me with some pride the comfortable straw seats. "The empress came here one day," he said, and asked the prisoners if they were in need of anything. They told her the wooden benches were uncomfortable, and her majesty ordered these seats to be made, where they can sit and sew all day without great fatigue. Yes, our empress is a good and charitable soul."
Many institutions send work to be done at Saint Lazare, and each prisoner receives a certain proportion of the proceeds of her labor, that she may have the wherewithal to begin an honest life when her term is out. Each day's earnings she writes down in her own little account-book, a dingy record of hopes, as it must be to some of them. The court-yards, where there is an hour's recreation twice a day, are large and cheerful. In the centre are large tanks where the women are allowed to wash small articles of clothing; an inestimable privilege, as any one knows who has seen prisoners trying to extemporize a laundry in their cells with a tin wash-basin. These courts are the favored haunts of sparrows who twitter as cheerfully within the old prison walls as under the eaves of good men's dwellings. A magpie was hopping about in the cloister with the air of an habitué, looking amazingly as if he were there on sentence.
There are a number of infirmaries, all tended by Sisters of Charity, and well supplied from a kitchen devoted to hospital diet. The patients are of the lowest class, their maladies the saddest that flesh is heir to. That such a hospital should have any attraction to the visitor is impossible; but remembering the hosts of such forlorn creatures who throng our jails and almshouses in America, I longed to transport wards and warders to the other side of the Atlantic and inaugurate a change in prison discipline for women. [Footnote 226]
[Footnote 226: In the February number of The Catholic World appeared an article entitled Paris Impious, and Religious Paris, giving some interesting details concerning Saint Lazare.]
I had the good fortune to be accompanied by a gentleman associated for many years with prison reforms, and charged with high authority in the matter of prison discipline in Paris. He makes it his rule to visit the prisoners at all times and seasons, that he may detect any breach of discipline or lack of fidelity on the part of the superintendents. He is a man who under the wretched disguise of vice recognizes humanity, no matter how defiled; who looks rather to remove the causes of sin than to procure its punishment, and sees in every culprit a good man spoiled. Let no one suppose that I mean to advocate a feeble administration of justice. No; in a prison, over-indulgence means chaos; present weakness means future severity. At Saint Lazare steady, unswerving vigilance is observed, and silence enforced among the prisoners. Discipline being maintained evenly, not spasmodically, the prisoners can be allowed privileges very important to them. Visitors are admitted twice a week to converse with the women through two gratings, as at Newgate, a sister standing in the narrow passage between. Recreation in the yards is taken in common, instead of separately. It is surprising to find how a prisoner clings to the privilege of seeing his fellow-creatures, even when there is no chance of communication. The peculiar pangs inflicted by the solitary system, when endured for a long time, can only be appreciated by those who have had confidential intercourse with prisoners.
The prisoners' chapel is very cheerful, and has a pretty sanctuary with stained-glass windows, and an altar beautifully cared for. One of the points most worthy of approval in Saint Lazare, is the attractive form under which religion is everywhere presented. In each dormitory, infirmary, and work room, is an oratory; or, at least, some image or picture suited to impress the souls of the prisoners.
One part of the establishment is full of tender associations to every Christian soul—the sisters' private chapel, whose sanctuary was once the cell of Saint Vincent de Paul. The stone floor in the recessed window where he used to pray is worn hollow with the pressure of his knees. Saint Lazare was frequented in those days by many pilgrims, and in his cell the saint sought refuge from distraction and dissipation of spirit. It is from kneeling-cushions such as his, that the prayers go up to heaven which work true reforms, which achieve immortal victories whose laurels are fresh centuries after the conqueror's soul glories in the presence of God. I have never stood in any cathedral with a soul more filled with veneration than in this little chapel of Saint Lazare, where Saint Vincent de Paul prayed; and where his children pray still, devoted to the work most repugnant to human nature, that of tending beings who remind us what we should all be but for the grace of God.
One infirmary is a lying-in hospital. The mothers can keep their young children at Saint Lazare, or send them away as they choose. In this infirmary shone forth the kindly spirit of my guide. "This always touches me," he said; "for I am a père de famille" and he went from baby to baby with gentle looks and womanly sweetness, a man stalwart of frame as a grenadier. And it touched me, too, though I am not père de famille, to see the lines of little cribs, and the poor, forlorn mothers tending their tiny waifs and strays.
There is one serious defect in the construction of Saint Lazare, making it in that respect unsuitable for a prison. There is but one large dormitory for the adult prisoners who are in good health. The others sleep, two, three, or even four in a large cell, and with no arrangements for surveillance beyond a small aperture in the door, covered with glass. I remarked upon the imprudence of this arrangement, and was told that the danger was fully appreciated and deeply regretted. The French government is too generous in its treatment of public institutions to leave this evil long unremedied, I am confident.
Another defect in the regulations surprised me. There is no daily Mass in the public chapel of Saint Lazare, the prisoners hearing Mass on Sunday only. I had no opportunity of asking the reason of this omission, and will therefore refrain from making farther comment upon it. The third department in Saint Lazare is the most interesting, being the portion devoted to young girls and homeless children. The sentence is for six months only, but can be renewed if found expedient. My guide called to him child after child, and talked with them as he might talk with his own children at home. One little thing cried bitterly. Her mother had turned her into the streets to shift for herself, and the police, finding her wandering about the city, had brought her to Saint Lazare. He held her little hand in his and patted it softly as he said all the comforting things he could think of; there was not much to be said, one must confess. I asked where she would be sent when the six months were out. "To some industrial establishment under the charge of Sisters of Charity," was the answer; "The empress sees to all such things."
The young people are kept entirely separate from the prisoners, in the new part of Saint Lazare. They have several hours' schooling, and have their working hours, in which they earn money for themselves and for the establishment, as the women do. Each child has an exquisitely neat cell to herself for the night, opening with a grating on to a corridor, so that the watching sister can exercise a strict surveillance.
Whenever I see the right thing done in the right way for public offenders, I think of the man who first turned my attention to the subject of prison discipline—Governor Andrew, as he will be to us all in Massachusetts, no matter who holds the state reins. Surely the sun has not often shone on any spirit more steadfast or more tender than his; surely, the days of chivalry produced no knightly courage more unblenching than his; surely, whatever blessings come to Massachusetts in her future career, her children will never forget how valiantly that brave man fought for judicious legislation, for a humane execution of the laws, and for the equal rights of Catholics and Protestants—will never forget John Albion Andrew!
Translated From Le Correspondant.
A Heroine Of Conjugal Love.
Marquise De La Fayette.
When, at the end of the year 1864, the children of Madame de Montagu, having overcome the natural scruples of filial modesty, consented to open to the public the treasure of noble examples and Christian virtues enclosed in the remembrances of their mother, Le Correspondant was the first among the public organs to announce the lively interest felt in the recital. The success more than justified our predictions. There is no one who would not be edified by the perusal of the life of Madame de Montagu, and the book has already taken its place in our libraries.
Since that publication, the Duchess of Ayen, around whom are grouped five daughters widely differing from each other, and each with a strongly marked individuality, has become in some sort the type of the Christian mother in modern society.
Indeed, maternal love was in truth the terrestrial passion of her heart, and would entirely have occupied it, had not the care of this dear flock borne with it higher duties, and rendered greater her accountability. The marvellous gift had been given her to form souls; to develop the budding good within them, and, while respecting the originality peculiar to each, to arm them with incomparable strength.
We need not return to what, four years ago, we have already published of the Christian discipline, the simple and retired life to which the Duchess of Ayen had accustomed her daughters, realizing in them her type of true womanhood, making the heart superior to destiny, neither dazzled by fortune or success, nor cast down by the ills of life. When the life of Madame de Montagu was first published, only in episode we recognized those of the noble daughters of the Duchess d'Ayen, reserved by Providence for the rudest trials, or destined for a bloody immolation. We speak of the Viscountess de Noailles, who with her mother and grandmother, the old Marchioness of Noailles, perished on the scaffold, and Madame de La Fayette, the voluntary prisoner of Olmutz, in truth one of the most touching heroines of conjugal love. In the life of their sister they are but secondary figures; but as it is permitted even among the saints of paradise to have a preference, we must confess that, in this beautiful group of heroic figures, our predilection has always been for the two eldest. It will be readily understood, then, with what respect and emotion we have opened the book, in which we would not only find the abridged recital of the actions of Madame de La Fayette, but could see her act, hear her speak herself of her dearly loved mother, listen to the passionate accents of her voice, and, indeed, almost feel the very beatings of her heart.
This volume, printed by Téchener with great typographical care, contains the life of the Duchess of Ayen, written by Madame de La Fayette, in the fortress of Olmutz, on the margin of a Buffon, with a little India-ink and a tooth-pick, and subject to the hateful inspection of the Austrian jailers. We could not find a more touching relic. Nowadays we mount distinguished autographs in gold; should this ever pass into public sale, would it not justify unheard-of extravagances? And we have now this life of Madame de La Fayette compiled by a daughter worthy of her, Madame de Lasteyrie, herself the representative of the virtue and charity of a race of which, according to an expression applied to an eminent royal family, all the daughters were chaste and the sons valiant. And to these two recitals we add another document, that we had the good fortune to publish in April, 1847, in which the good Abbé Carrichon, an ecclesiastic full of zeal, but timid in character, and who only by the grace of the holy ministry could rise to intrepidity, relates, in the most perfect good faith, the anguish he endured, when to his lot it fell to give to the three condemned ones the peace and consolation of last pardon. Those who may be astonished to find in a whole generation of the same family so many and such extraordinary virtues, may rest assured of its truth. Imagination has added nothing to the edifying recital of these beautiful lives. The original documents that we give to-day in their sublime nakedness, bear an accent of austere heroism and holy enthusiasm that strengthens the heart and penetrates it with the love of good; they vouch for our first publication. In the rapid analysis we will try to make from these documents, we will present the most striking traits of the character and life of Madame de La Fayette. Adrienne de Noailles, second daughter of the Duchess of Ayen, was of ardent temperament, of deep sensibility, with a lively imagination and a mind well informed. She ever refused to adopt any idea imposed upon her, that could not be subject to a free discussion. She seized difficulties and penetrated to their depths. While still a child, she was troubled by doubts of her religion, even when, at the age of twelve, she was prepared for her first communion. She does not give us the nature of these doubts, but it is clearly seen they never interfered with the practice of piety; on the contrary, her thirst for truth increased her fervor. Her pious mother was not alarmed at this state of her soul; she divined the source, and waited with confidence for grace to dissipate the clouds. Only, she believed it best to defer the first communion of her daughter until, calm and reassured, she could enjoy her supreme happiness in all its plenitude. And she did not presume too much on the integrity of her daughter; never was more solid piety or firmer faith implanted in a heart of deeper conviction.
If we were to study anew the perfect model of a mother which the Duchess of Ayen presents in the portrait drawn of her by Madame de La Fayette, a portrait depicted, too, with a sincerity that does not fear to let us penetrate the shadows, and so prove its reality, we should dwell upon the profoundly Christian spirit that directed her in the choice of her sons-in-law. We there see her rising above all worldly considerations, seeking above all things in them the moral qualities which may assure the happiness of her daughters; for she did not look upon marriage, as is too often done, as a simple affair of interest, of fortune, or of vanity, but it was, in her eyes, the sacred tie in which love should bear the greater part. God, who united man and woman, and who said, "Man shall leave father and mother, and cleave to his wife, and they two shall be one flesh," has he not made love the duty of Christian marriage? Under the old régime and among the nobility, marriages were contracted early, and Mesdemoiselles de Noailles were scarcely twelve or thirteen years old when the first proposition for their hands were made for them to their mother. One of these candidates, the Marquis de La Fayette, was himself only fourteen years old. "His extreme youth, his isolated position, having lost all his near relations, an immense fortune suddenly acquired, which the Duchesse d'Ayen looked upon only as a temptation," all these considerations, which in a purely worldly view would have seduced many a mother, decided her at first to refuse him, notwithstanding the good opinion she entertained of his character. The Duke d'Ayen strongly insisted on an alliance which combined every advantage of rank and wealth, but the duchess for several months none the less persisted in her refusal; and it was only after a more attentive examination of the character of M. de Lafayette had reassured her of the future of her daughter, that, demanding a delay of two years, she finally gave her consent. The idea of the moment when she must resign her daughters into the keeping of another, filled her with apprehension; evidently, she desired for them a felicity that she had not enjoyed herself, that of entire conformity of tastes, thoughts, and character in the companions of their lives; and when the marriages were resolved upon, it is delightful to read in the recital of Madame de La Fayette the detail of touching cares with which this tender mother charged herself, to prepare these eldest daughters for their new stations—one to espouse the Viscount de Noailles, a cousin whom she had loved since her infancy, and the other to be united to M. de La Fayette.
"'My heart attracted me to M. de La Fayette,' says with much simplicity the manuscript of the prisoner of Olmutz, 'and with a sentiment so profound, that our union has always been one of firmness and tenderness through all the vicissitudes of this life—through all the good and evil that have been our lot for twenty-four years.
"With what pleasure I discovered that, for more than a year, my mother had looked upon and loved him as her son! She detailed to me all the good she had known of him—what she thought of him herself, and I soon saw he possessed for her the filial charm that made the happiness of my life. She occupied herself in aiding my poor head, especially about this time so empty and so weak, to keep from going astray during such an important event. She taught me to ask, and she asked for me, the blessings of heaven on the state I was about to embrace.
"'I was then only fourteen and a half years old, and, having new duties to perform, my mother believed it her duty to reapply herself to the care of forming my sister and myself for our future destinies. The confidence with which we always conversed with her, gave her abundant opportunity. It was not the kind of confidence to which, I believe, mothers oftener pretend than obtain from their children—that inspired by a companion of one's own age—but the perfect and intimate trust which needs the direction and approval of a parent, and causes a pang of fear in any step, visit, or conversation, of which she may not approve. A confidence, in fine, which always returns to its support—to its guide, in whose light it would repose as well as in its tenderness; a guide who, if even one could not always approve its decisions, and might encounter its reproaches, would still be considered necessary, and to whom the idea of dissimulation would be insupportable.
"'Such was my feeling toward my mother, who often permitted me to argue with her.'"
The ceremony of the marriage accomplished, the husband of sixteen years set out for his regiment, and the young bride testified by her grief at this separation all the affection she experienced for him. He returned: the religious education of Madame de La Fayette was completed, she made her first communion with an entire faith and in the most humble dispositions, and soon after, on the 15th of December, 1775, she became a mother for the first time.
The faculty of loving knew no bounds in this youthful heart. Identified in all the tastes, aspirations, sentiments, and interests of him who had given her the right to say, in all sincerity, "I love you religiously, worldly, passionately," she adopted the political faith of her husband, and, without any personal afterthought, without weakness or hesitation, from her most tender age, valiantly accepted all the sacrifices and all the perils of the public life of a man whose political preoccupations governed him exclusively. He held the best part of her heart; but, immovable in her religious faith, Madame de La Fayette never sacrificed a principle nor a practice of piety to her conjugal idolatry. It is remarkable, also, that this ardor of passion for her husband never weakened the vivacity of her tenderness for her mother, her children, and her oldest sister, who, from the cradle, had been her dearest friend.
Inasmuch as she was sufficient for every duty, so her soul was sufficient in all its affections. The war which broke out about this time between England and her American colonies, opened to the Marquis de La Fayette the brilliant arena that would give immortality to his name; but for his young companion began an existence full, at the same time, of anguish and delirious joy, of grief and devotion. The family of Noailles had strongly adopted philosophical ideas, and willingly followed the liberal views of the eighteenth century. The generous enthusiasm, however, which led M. de La Fayette to devote himself to the service of the American people vindicating their independence, was at first severely disapproved of and considered madness by the Duke d'Ayen and the Marshal de Noailles. The marquis was nineteen; he had been married three years, was already a father, and soon expected a second child. Madame de La Fayette and the Duchess d'Ayen alone understood the motives that determined the departure of M. de La Fayette; the former studied in every way to conceal the torture of her heart, preferring to be considered insensible, or too much of a child, to giving the appearance, by showing her grief, of wrong to the object of her worship.
Meanwhile, the great struggle, of which the new world was the theatre, and in which aristocratic England found herself at war with the principal democracy of modern society, held all Europe in suspense. The greatest interest was felt in France for the success of the Americans. While the French government, though understanding how matters stood, hesitated, nevertheless, to take an open part in the quarrel, public opinion declared itself still more favorably for the United States; the various incidents of the war were greedily sought after, each success of the insurgents excited enthusiasm, and soon all hearts beat in unison with that of Madame de La Fayette, for the success of the young hero who had so actively contributed to such glorious results.
We must transport ourselves to this time, recall its events, watch the fever of public opinion, to understand what must have been, after two years' absence, the first return of M. de La Fayette, and the intoxication of joy his wife experienced. He was not long in setting out again for the new world, and did not return from there finally until 1782, after the brilliant campaign of which his valor assured the success, and which terminated by the surrender of Lord Cornwallis. His return was unexpected, a surprise for the court as well as the city: the memoirs and memories of the Count de Segur furnished curious testimony to support what we have said. We read:
"All who lived in that day will still remember the enthusiasm occasioned by the return of M. de La Fayette, an enthusiasm of which the queen herself partook. They were celebrating, at the Hotel de Ville, a brilliant fête on the occasion of the birth of an heir to the throne. The news came of the arrival of the conqueror of Cornwallis. Madame de La Fayette, who assisted at the fête, received a special mark of favor; the queen placed her in her own carriage, and drove to the Hotel de Noailles, where the marquis, her husband, had just alighted." [Footnote 227]
[Footnote 227: Tome i. p. 180.]
The excess of sentiment of Madame de La Fayette for her husband at this time, was such that she suffered intensely in his presence. She endeavored to conceal her passion for him, and trembled lest she might seem importunate, and weary him. Some years after, she confessed to M. de La Fayette this passionate attraction for him which she had so resisted; "but," she added gently, "you need not be dissatisfied with what is left."
We, who have only known M. de La Fayette soured and old, and do not feel well disposed toward him, because, under the restoration, he shadowed his glory as liberator of two worlds by intrigues with secret societies; we find it difficult to imagine him so charming, "carrying away every heart." But it was even so; and, at the same time that popular favor rendered him so powerful among the multitude, the most beautiful, the proudest, the most brilliant ladies of the court, were madly in love with him.
But we are not writing a biography of M. de La Fayette, and it will be understood that, in an article on the saintly companion of his life, we would not wish any controversy on so illustrious a person, and for whom, with some reservation, we profess great and sincere respect. We will not speak, then, of the events of the revolution, in which he played so prominent a part, only inasmuch as our heroine was mingled with and took part in them.
The abolition of the slave-trade was one of the philanthropic preoccupations of M. de La Fayette. He bought a plantation at Cayenne, la belle Gabrielle, in order to give an example of a gradual enfranchisement of the slaves, and referred to the active charity of his wife the details of his enterprise. With this view, she kept up a correspondence with the priests of the seminary du Saint-Esprit, who had a house at Cayenne. If circumstances did not permit the realization of her hopes, at least she had the consolation of knowing that, thanks to the religious instruction given to the blacks on this plantation, they were guilty of less horrors than at any other point in the colonies.
We must recognize here, too, and to its eternal honor, that America has always been the portion of the globe where liberty of conscience, loudly proclaimed, has never ceased to be practised. It was not so in old Europe and in France before 1789, so the contrast presented by this free state of things, and the numerous vexations to which the different religions were exposed with us, could not but forcibly strike M. de La Fayette on his return. After a journey to Nimes, where he studied more closely the situation of the Protestants, he was able to present, with full knowledge of the case, a proposition to the Assembly of the Notables in 1787, demanding their restoration to the civil rights of which they had been despoiled.
I love to remember that an eminent Catholic clergyman, Mgr. Luzerne, Bishop of Langres, and later, Cardinal, warmly supported the proposition for this act of justice. Madame de La Fayette shared these sentiments, and received with lively interest the Protestant ministers whom the result of the affair attracted around her husband. A zealous child of the Catholic Church, she detested the persecutions that could only alienate her children, and which appeared to her so opposed to the spirit of Christianity.
After 1783, M. de La Fayette, whose family had increased considerably, and whose political importance had reached its height, left the hotel de Noailles, to establish himself in his own house, rue de Bourbon, now the rue de Lille. And there the ever-increasing wave of the revolutionary movement, that was never able to overcome the virtue and brightness of a king, the most estimable as a man of any who ever wore a crown, found our heroine. The high position of M. de La Fayette, deputy of the nobility, member of the Constitutional Assembly, and commander-in-chief of the Parisian National Guard, imposed obligations on him in which his wife never repudiated her part. She was seen to accept the successive demands of each of the districts of Paris, to the number of sixty; to preside at the blessing of flags and other patriotic demonstrations. The general kept open house, and did its honors in a manner to charm his numerous guests.
"'But, says her daughter, Madame de Lasteyrie, initiated into her most secret thoughts, 'what she suffered in the depths of her own heart, only those who heard her speak, can tell. She saw my father at the head of a revolution of which it was impossible to foretell the end. Every evil, every disorder, was judged by her with a complete lack of illusion in her own cause; yet she was so sustained by the principles of her husband, and so convinced of the good he could do, and the evil he might avert, that she bore with incredible strength the continual dangers to which she was exposed. Never, said she to us, did I see him go out during this time, without thinking that I heard his last adieu. No one was more terrified than she by the dangers of those she loved; but in these times, she rose above herself, and in her devotion to my father, hoped he could prevent the increasing crime.'"
We may infer from these words the perpetual anguish of Madame de La Fayette during the three first years of the revolution. In the Duchesse d'Ayen she found a support full of sweetness and tenderness; who, though sharing none of the opinions of her son-in-law, believed firmly in the rectitude of his intentions. Her angelic sister, the Viscountess de Noailles, felt exactly as she did, loved equally a husband, young, handsome, brave, and charming, associated in the most advanced ideas of M. de La Fayette, and, like him, a member of the Assembly. The eldest daughter, too, of Madame de La Fayette, began at this time to be of much comfort to her; she had her make her first communion in 1790. It was, in the midst of the great political events of that epoch, the first concern of her maternal heart.
The civil constitution of the clergy was to be one of the most sensible tribulations of Madame de La Fayette. She considered she should, more particularly on account of her personal situation, declare her attachment for the Catholic Church; consequently she was present at the refusal of the oath which the curé of Saint Sulpice made from the pulpit, of whom she was a parishioner; she was constantly meeting there with persons most known by their opposition to the new principles, and with those then called the aristocratie. She took part assiduously in the offices, at first in the churches and afterward in the oratories where the persecuted clergy took refuge.
She continually received the nuns who fled to her for protection; or priests not under oath, whom she encouraged in the exercise of their functions, and the preservation of their religious liberty. She well knew that such conduct was hurtful to the popularity of her husband, of great importance to her to preserve, but no consideration could stop her in what she considered a duty.
M. de La Fayette never interfered with the conduct of his wife; he held as nobly to his principles of liberty of conscience in this respect as in all others. Aloud he disapproved of the oath extorted from the Catholic priests, opposed it wherever he could, and was at least successful in preventing the articles relative to this civil constitution of the clergy from being constitutional; on the contrary, they were even rejected from the class of ordinary laws that any new legislature might revise. For General La Fayette deluded himself that the constitution of 1791 was destined to last. But whatever his sentiments, that which made him respect the religious convictions of his wife, and oppose all his power to the persecution of the clergy, does great honor to his character. As the priests under oath were habitually received by the commander of the National Guard at Paris, Madame de La Fayette never dissimulated before them her attachment to the ancient bishops; but she mingled in her expressions so much adroitness with her sincerity that she never wounded them. Only once she deviated from the rule of tolerance that she imposed on herself on her husband's account, and that was when the newly elected constitutional Bishop of Paris, came to dine officially with the general. She would not recognize by her presence the quality of his diocese, and dined out, although she knew by doing so it could not fail to be made a subject of remark.
Meanwhile, the ever-increasing revolutionary delirium multiplied disorders, paralyzed the efforts of the constitutional party, and rendered the part of M. de La Fayette more and more difficult. He was suspected on both sides, by the court and by the Jacobins, and was rapidly wearing out the remains of an expiring popularity in an already useless struggle.
The king, to escape the odious tyranny of which he was the victim, attempted to fly from Paris; we know the rest. Arrested at Varennes, brought back to the Tuileries, he and his family were placed in the closest confinement. The unhappy prince at last resigned himself to accept the constitution, the Constituent Assembly terminated its sittings, and was replaced by the Legislative Assembly, and General La Fayette, sincere in the illusion that the revolution was finished and the future secured, gave in his resignation as commander of the National Guard, and set out for Auvergne with his wife and children. Now in the destiny of Madame de La Fayette there came a short truce of happiness; the journey from Paris to Chavaniac was a series of ovations that popular enthusiasm spread, for the last time, before her idol. The Duchess d' Ayen and the Viscountess de Noailles came a little while to share this apparent and transitory calm; but the Duke d'Ayen had emigrated to Switzerland, and Madame de Montagu had taken refuge in England. The formation of three grand army corps had been decreed, in imminent danger of a foreign war; the command of the centre was confided to General La Fayette, who repaired to his camp in 1791.
The year 1792 saw the hideous journey of the 20th of June, soon after followed by the scenes more lamentable still, of the 10th of August.
At the news of the wicked attempt of the 20th of June, the General de La Fayette did not fear to address to the assembly, from Maubeuge, where were then his head-quarters, a letter in which he declaimed with indignation and vehemence against the Jacobins; and finally, quitting his camp, he hastened to Paris and appeared at the bar of the Assembly; there to brand energetically the violences committed at the Tuileries, and demand the punishment of the guilty. Was not this act of courage alone sufficient honor for a lifetime? But finally, seeing he had nothing to hope from the Assembly, he attempted to organize a resistance at Sedan in order to save Louis XVI. The triumphant Jacobins replied, on the 10th of August, by a decree of proscription to the refusal which M. de La Fayette made to recognize the fall of the king; a price was put upon his head, and, constrained in his turn to seek a refuge in a foreign land, the patriot of 1789 fell on the frontier into an Austrian post, was arrested with his aides-de-camp, conducted first to Namur, then to Wesel, and considered by the allied powers as an enemy of universal peace, whose liberty was incompatible with the surety of European governments.
The arbitrary detention of MM. de La Fayette, Latour Maubourg, and Bureaux de Pusy, remains one of the disgraces of the government of the Emperor Francis II., and he cannot be blamed enough for it; but in the condition of parties and in view of the renown of M. de La Fayette, had it not for him some great advantages? In our eyes, the five years of carcere duro inflicted upon the hero of American liberty, completed his glory. Such were the sentiments of Madame de Staël when she wrote to congratulate him on his release: "Your misfortune has preserved your glory, and if your health can be restored, you will come out perfect from the tomb where your name has acquired a new lustre." But dating from this epoch, what was not the ineffable anguish of Madame de La Fayette? Informed of the arrest of her husband, she had but one thought—to release him or share his captivity. But she had two other duties to fulfil; to get her son out of France, and, if possible, to confide him to the friendship of General Washington, and to protect the interests of the creditors of General La Fayette by giving them the sequestrated estates for security, and in both she experienced great difficulty. Arrested at Chavaniac, where she was resting with her son, aged thirteen, her two daughters, and the aged aunt who had brought up M. de La Fayette, she obtained from Roland, then minister of the interior, permission not to be taken to Paris, but to remain at Chavaniac on parole. Encouraged by this testimony of humanity, and hoping to be delivered from an engagement that weighed so heavily on her, she smothered her natural pride and again addressed herself to Roland:
"'I can only attribute to a sentiment of kindness,' she wrote him, 'the change you have brought about in my situation. You spare me the dangers of too perilous a journey, and consent to give me my retreat for my prison. But any prison, be it what it may, is insupportable to me, since I have learned this morning from the gazette of M. Brissot, that my husband has been transferred from town to town by the enemies of France, and is being conducted to Spandau. Whatever repugnance I may feel to owe a service to those who have shown themselves the enemies and accusers of him whom I revere and love as he only is worthy of being loved, yet it is in all the sincerity of my heart that I vow eternal gratitude to him who, while relieving the administration from responsibility and giving me my freedom, will afford me the opportunity to rejoin my husband, if France is sufficiently free to allow me to travel without risk.
"On my knees, if necessary, I ask you this favor. Judge of my present state of mind. Noailles La Fayette."
A faithful friend bore this letter to Roland. He appeared deeply moved, and replied immediately:
"I have placed your touching appeal, my dear madam, before the committee. I must observe, however, that it would not appear to me prudent for a person of your name to travel in France, on account of the unfortunate impressions just now attached to it. But circumstances may change. Be assured if they do, I shall be the first to seize upon them for your advantage."
For three months the poor woman was without any news of the general, though she redoubled every effort to obtain it; she wrote to the Princess of Orange, to the Duke of Brunswick, to Klopstock, but all in vain. Toward the middle of June, there came to her, through the interposition of the United States minister, two letters from M. de La Fayette; they were dated from the dungeon of Magdebourg, and the inquietude they gave her concerning the health of her husband made her more than ever anxious to join him. Governeur Morris, then American minister, proved her constant and faithful friend, and from him she accepted the loan of money of which she had need, to pay some debts and for the daily expenses of her family. At this time many of the wives of emigrants believed it necessary for their personal security, and preservation of their fortunes, to be divorced; Madame de La Fayette would never consent to save her life by such an act, and whenever she found it necessary to present a petition or make a demand, she took a pride in commencing all she wrote, "The wife of La Layette." In the midst of all these terrible agitations, the fervor of our heroine never decreased. She submitted with sweet resignation to the divine will, and associated in her exercises of piety the women of the village, who, like herself, were deprived of the holy sacrifice of the Mass, which was no longer celebrated. These innocent meetings were the subject of many denunciations; of aristocracy they could not accuse her, but now it was fanaticism. At the end of the year 1795, after the complete defeat of the Girondins, the persecutions against the priests and the ci-devant nobles were redoubled, and some of the effects of the general were exposed to sale. This courageous wife repaired to Brionde, where the auction took place. "Citizens," said she, to the district, "I feel myself obliged to protest before the sale about to take place, against the enormous injustice of applying the laws of emigration to him who now is the prisoner of the enemies of France. I demand of you certificate of my protestation."
The 12th of November, Madame de La Fayette was informed she would be arrested the next day; and truly she was carried off in the evening by a detachment of the National Guard, and incarcerated at Brionde. Her children remained at Chavaniac, but at the end of a few months the jailer was won over, and M. Frestel, preceptor of the young Georges, conducted them, one after the other, to their mother. ... It was in this prison of Brionde that the news reached her that Mesdames de Noailles and Madame d'Ayen, both arrested, had just been transferred to the Luxembourg; then in May, 1794, came the order to bring the Citoyenne La Fayette to Paris. She entered there the 19th Prairial, eve of the fête of the Supreme Being, three days before the one when, according to Madame de Lasteyrie, "they built up terror upon terror." Placed at la petite Force, at the end of fifteen days she was transported to Plessis, where she found her cousin, the Duchess of Duras. The massacres of the revolutionary tribunal at this time were no less than sixty a day; everything seemed to announce to the prisoner that she was being led to certain death.
One of the buildings of Plessis served as a depot to the Conciergerie, and each morning saw twenty prisoners depart for the guillotine. "The idea that one may soon be of the number," wrote Madame de La Fayette, "gives firmness for such a spectacle." She made a will at Plessis, of which several passages are given; nothing could be more noble and beautiful. It begins in this way:
"Lord, thou hast been my strength and my hope in the extreme evils that are poured down upon me; thou art my God."
Fifty days were thus passed by the prisoner, when on the 10th Thermidor, a great tumult being heard in the street, it was supposed the populace were rushing to massacre all in prison; it was the announcement of the death of Robespierre.
The representatives, Bourdon de l'Oise and Legendre came soon after to visit the prison and assign the fate of each. All were set at liberty except Madame de La Fayette, on whom they were not willing to pronounce sentence until they sent for the decision of the committee. The unhappy woman was but little concerned at the prolongation of her captivity; for she had just learned that her mother, her grandmother, and her sister had perished on the 4th Thermidor. Her grief was overwhelming, but she never revolted, her prayers preserved her. "Now," she wrote to her children, "I find the sentiments of those I mourn, those, too, that I desire, and those that I pray God to put in my heart, and sometimes I obtain all at once." Notwithstanding the active solicitations of Mr. Monroe, the new minister from the United States, Madame de La Fayette was not liberated; Le Piessis was used for other purposes, so she was transferred to the Maison Delmas, rue Notre Dame des Champs; she remained there four months, and met there with the strangest people, for it was now the partisans of the reign of terror who peopled the prisons; but there, as everywhere, she gained the respect of all. Her physical sufferings were great during the rigorous winter of 1794 and 1795. Everything froze in her room, and she was peculiarly sensitive to cold. God granted her in her distress a precious consolation in the visits of the Abbé Carrichon. He gave her all the details she hungered after of the death of the three dear persons that he had accompanied to the scaffold, and with him she made a complete examination of all the faults of her life. On the 23d of January, 1795, the deliverance, so long retarded, of Madame de La Fayette was finally signed, and she was set at liberty.
Her first care on leaving prison was to hasten to Mr. Monroe and thank him for all he had done for her, and begged him to finish the good work by obtaining passports for herself and family. She had but one aim, to rejoin her husband in Germany with her daughters, and place her son in safety in America. The letter she wrote General Washington, in which she portrays with simplicity, firmness, and dignity the obligations she was under to M. Frestel for his devotion to her and her family, and begs for him the regard he deserves, is truly remarkable. As to her son, she expresses herself thus: "My wish is, that my son may lead a very retired life in America, and continue the studies that three years of misfortune have interrupted; and that being far away from scenes which might abase or too strongly irritate him, he may work to become an efficient citizen of the United States, of which the principles and sentiments are entirely in accordance with those of French citizens."
When the time came to part with her only son, the separation seemed cruel to her mother's heart; but she was firmly convinced she acted in this matter as her husband would have dictated. She found her strength in this thought. As we read of so many sacrifices, sufferings, and sorrows so valiantly supported, we find ourselves so associated in the sentiments of this incomparable person, that we wait with feverish anxiety the moment when she should rejoin her husband. The memoirs of Madame de Montagu give us the details of the touching reunion of Madame de La Fayette at Altona with her two sisters and her Aunt de Tessé; they will be found in the account of Madame de Lasteyrie. The conversation with the Emperor of Austria is also there given. He granted her permission to shut herself up at Olmutz, and by opening heaven to her, he could scarcely have made her happier.
"'We arrived,' wrote Madame de Lasteyrie, 'at Olmutz, the 1st of October, 1795, at eleven o'clock in the morning, in one of the covered carriages found at all the posts, our own having been broken on the way. I never shall forget the moment when the postillion showed us from afar the steeples of the town. The vivid emotion of my mother is ever present with me. She was almost suffocated by her tears; and when she had sufficiently recovered herself to speak, she blessed God in the words of the canticle of Tobias: "Thou art great, O Lord, for ever, and thy kingdom is unto all ages, for thou scourgest and thou savest," etc., etc. My father was not informed of our arrival; he had never received a letter from my mother. Three years of captivity, the last passed in complete solitude, inquietude concerning all the objects of his affection, and sufferings of every kind, had deeply undermined his health; the change in his countenance was frightful. My mother was struck by it; but nothing could diminish the intoxication of her joy, but the bitterness of her irreparable losses. My father, after the first moment of happiness in this sudden reunion, dared not ask her a question. He knew there had been a reign of terror in France, but he was ignorant of the victims. The day passed without his venturing to examine into her fears, and without my mother having the strength to explain herself. Only at night, when my sister and I were shut into the next room assigned to us, could she inform my father that she had lost on the scaffold her grandmother, her mother, and her sister.'"
Madame de La Fayette shared her husband's captivity twenty-seven months. She paid with her health—we may say with her life—the privilege of being reunited to him she loved, and proving to him her tenderness; but it was such great happiness to her that, whatever the severity that accompanied it, it seems not even at such a price to have been too dearly bought.
At last the success of the French arms opened the dungeon of Olmutz. The French plenipotentiaries, in signing the treaty of Campo Formio, exacted that the prisoners should be immediately set at liberty. The gates of the fortress were therefore opened to them, and the 16th of September, 1797, they set out for Hamburg. It was just five years and a half since their arrest.
Happy to owe his liberty solely to the triumph of the French army, M. de La Fayette addressed to General Bonaparte the expression of his gratitude and that of his companions in arms, in these terms:
"Hamburg, Oct. 6, 1797.
"Citizen General: The prisoners of Olmutz, happy to owe their deliverance to your irresistible arms, have enjoyed in their captivity the thought that their liberty and life were attached to the triumphs of the republic and to your personal glory. To-day they enjoy the homage they would love to render to their liberator. It would, indeed, have been gratifying to us, Citizen General, to have offered in person the expression of these sentiments, and to have looked upon the theatre of so many victories, the army that won them, and the hero, who has placed our resurrection among the number of his miracles. But you know the journey to Hamburg has not been left to our choice. It is from the place where we have said good by to our jailers that we address our thanks to their conquerors. In the solitary retreat in the Danish territory of Holstein, where we will go to try and re-establish the health you have saved, we will join to our vows or patriotism for the republic the most lively interest in the illustrious general, to whom we are not only attached for the services he has rendered our country and in the cause of liberty, but for the particular obligations that we delight to owe him, and that the deepest gratitude has for ever engraven in our hearts. Salutation and respect.
"Lafayette,
Latour Maubourg,
Bureaux de Pusy."
Among all the marks of sympathy showered upon the escaped victims of Austrian tyranny, none touched M. de La Fayette more deeply than one from Madame de Staël—full of respect and emotion. Mathieu de Montmorency added to it a few lines in which these words strike us: "The constant occupation of your misfortunes and your courage has outlived in me, and ever will, my alienation from all political activity; but I believe I should renew all my ancient enthusiasm to welcome one so constant in the cause of liberty."
Although the health of Madame de La Fayette was destroyed, she preserved her wonderful activity and force of character. It was she, the only one of her family, whose name was not on the list of the banished, who was able the first to enter France, and there regulate her affairs and the return of all her relations. It was she again who, after the 18th Brumaire, understood that General La Fayette should return immediately without waiting for any authority that might possibly have been refused him. Sure of the marvellous tact with which she judged her surroundings, he followed her advice without any other information. The news of his arrival in Paris was not pleasing to the first consul; he wanted the general to return to Holland and solicit his entrance, like every one else. Madame de La Fayette called upon him, was graciously received, exposed the peculiar position of her husband, and the favorable effect that his return could not fail to produce on all honest and patriotic men, and proved herself noble, skilful, and prudent. "I am delighted, madame," said the first consul to her, "to have made your acquaintance; you have great good sense, but you understand nothing of business." However, it was agreed to that M. de La Fayette might remain openly in Paris without asking permission. Madame de Lasteyrie, in her recital, in which the most noble sentiments are expressed so simply and happily, has given us a page that portrays the whole soul of her heroic mother.
"Retirement would still have been preferable to my father under the consular magistracy of Bonaparte; under the despotism of Napoleon, it was, through honor, enforced upon him. In either case, it fulfilled the wishes of my mother. After so much suffering and exhaustion, a retired life—perfect quietude would not have been necessary for her—in which in peace she could consecrate the affections of her soul to those dearest to her, was the only earthly happiness she sought. She felt too deeply, too passionately, I may say, the emotions of family life to desire others. Neither the grandeur of her former state, nor the éclat even of her misfortunes, had excited in her that pride of imagination which cannot bear a simple existence. Her devotion rose above every trial, but the sentiments and easy duties of an obscure destiny sufficed for her heart. Love filled it entirely."
What can we add to this picture? Nothing, only to ask the perusal of the admirable letter of M. de La Fayette, which ends the volume. He there relates the long agony, the tender and charming delirium of the heavenly creature whose affections he possessed. To have seen him a practical Christian would have been the realization of her most cherished wish. "If I am going to another home, you must feel," she said to him once, "that I shall be occupied there with you. The sacrifice of my life would be very little, however much it may cost me to part with you, if it could assure your eternal happiness."
Another time, she said to him: "You are not a Christian?" As he did not reply, she said: "Ah! I know what you are, a fatalist." "You believe me proud," answered the general, "are you not a little so yourself?" "Oh! yes!" she cried, "with all my heart. I feel that I would give my life for that sect." Another time, in this half delirium which led astray her ideas, but never her heart, she said: "This life is short, troubled; let us be reunited in God, and set out together for eternity." Her God and her husband were her thoughts to the last moment. She died on Christmas night, the 25th of December, 1807, pressing the cherished hand and saying, "I am yours for ever."
Those who wish to finish this picture of conjugal love, must do as we have done, seek in the memoirs of an illustrious contemporary the scene that completes it. In the Memoires de M. Guizot, in the year 1834, we read:
"Some months before M. de Talleyrand had retired from public affairs, another celebrated man, very different in character, and celebrated in other ways, had disappeared from all worldly scenes. No life had been more exclusively, more passionately political than that of M. de La Fayette; no man had more constantly placed his political sentiments and ideas above all other preoccupations and all other interests, and yet in his death he was completely estranged from them. Having been ill for three weeks, he approached his last hour; his children and family alone surrounded his bed. He spoke no more, and they supposed he could not see. His son George noticed that, with an uncertain hand, he sought something on his breast; he came to the assistance of his father and laid in his hand the medallion that M. de La Fayette always wore suspended from his neck. He pressed it to his lips, and expired."
This medallion contained the likeness and hair of Madame de La Fayette, his wife whom he had lost twenty-seven years before. Thus, already separated from the entire world, alone with the thought and image of the devoted companion of his life, he died. When his obsequies were spoken of, it was a recognized fact in the family, that M. de La Fayette wished to be buried in the little cemetery adjoining the convent of Picpus, by the side of Madame de La Fayette, in the midst of the victims of the revolution, for the most part, royalists, and of the aristocracy, whose relations had founded this pious establishment. This wish of the veteran of 1789 was scrupulously respected and carried out. An immense crowd, troops, national guards, people of all kinds accompanied the funeral procession through the avenues and streets of Paris. Arrived at the gate of the convent, the crowd was stopped; the interior enclosure could not admit more than two or three hundred persons; the family, the near relations, the principal authorities entered alone, walked silently through the convent into the modest garden, then penetrated the cemetery. There no political manifestation took place; no discourse was pronounced; religion and the intimate memories of the soul alone were present; politics had no place near the death-bed or the tomb of the man whose life it had filled and governed.
Léon Arbaud.
Translated From The Revue Du Monde Catholique.
Flaminia.
By Alexandre De Bar.
"So you really believe that the soul lives for ever?" said the Baron Frederic.
"Certainly I do," answered the Count Shrann.
"That is very strange," replied the first speaker, emptying at a single draught a tankard of beer whose size a German could alone look at without trembling.
"And you believe that those whom we have loved in this world we shall again love in the next, and they will remember us even as we shall remember them?"
"Certainly I do!" again replied the count.
"This is yet more strange," observed the baron; and then both of them continued to smoke on in silence. They seemed, indeed, so completely absorbed in the contemplation of the bluish clouds of smoke which they continued to puff forth so regularly into the already misty and thickened atmosphere, that one might reasonably have thought that the discussion would end there; but such was not the case.
Let us profit by this interval to make known to our readers who were the Count Shrann and the Baron Frederic. They were two old fellow-soldiers, of whom the recollection yet remains in the minds of those who knew them, as being the most perfect type of that warm and devoted friendship which is less rare than one thinks or than one will admit. They were two brave Germans, who had courageously held their places during the wars in the commencement of this century. They had fought side by side with all the ardor of their youth and patriotism, and had on many occasions saved each other's lives by their bravery. This community of dangers and obligations had yet further strengthened the links of a friendship commenced in their childhood; so that when the peace of 1815 gave to Europe, wearied out by war, a time of rest, our two friends placed their experience and capabilities at the service of their country, as they had already offered the tribute of their blood and courage, each taking on himself the tie and responsibility of married life. Both married on the same day the two daughters of a neighbor whom the war had ruined; and if their brides were little endowed with worldly possessions, at least they were rich in virtues, and that is a wealth which equals the former, although it be much less sought after, and, we may even add, more difficult to find.
Unfortunately these marriages so alike in happiness were far less so in their duration; for at the end of two years Gertrude, the wife of the Baron Frederic, died, leaving in the heart and life of her husband a void which nothing could fill. Many were the efforts made to console the poor baron, many were the mothers who lavished on him their sweetest smiles; many were the maidens who directed on him their chaste regards, and who pictured to themselves a brilliant future in which his name and fortune held a prominent place; but all was useless, for the baron remained quite insensible to these efforts and designs. His friend, and even his sister-in-law, counselled him to seek in a new marriage that close and loving friendship which he was so well adapted to appreciate; but at length, seeing him so obstinately faithful to the memory of Gertrude, they feared to afflict him, and so ceased to press him on the subject, trusting all to time, which, nevertheless, rolled on without bringing any change to the baron's regrets and resolutions. His was one of those strongly organized minds where the impressions, lively as they are lasting, resist the stronger that they are unaccompanied by outward efforts. Hence was it that the baron supported, without giving way an instant, the blow which had struck him, and yet the wound in his heart remained as sensitive and as painful as on that day when with his own hands he placed his well-beloved Gertrude in her shroud. Old age came on, bringing with it its longing for rest, and then the two friends quitted their public life as they had entered it, side by side. The baron went to live with his brother, for thus he designated his friend; and only once every year left his castle to visit his own property and tenants, toward whom he showed a kindness without limit. Some of these tenants abused that kindness, and paid their rent year after year, with tears, excuses, and complaints, the worthy baron leaving them unmolested; and when his steward spoke to him of sending off the estate these families, he replied: "Better that this should happen to me, who have patience with them, than send them away to those who probably would have none." No sooner was he returned to the castle than he forgot all these things, and recommenced spoiling and fondling his nephews and nieces, of whom he had no small number; for the Count Shrann was a descendant of those ancient families who seemed to have presented the prolific virtue of the golden age; nor did the number of his nephews and nieces give any anxious thoughts to the baron, since often would he say to his friend:
"Why torment yourself so much about the future of your children? You will always have enough to settle them all in life; and besides, I myself, who have but cousins in I do not know what remote degree of affinity, I find it but just that these my nephews should inherit my property before them."
And then the count became silent, for he found the baron's answer quite natural, and such as he himself should have made, had their positions been reversed. Between these two men, so closely united by affection and so similar in heart and understanding, there was but one subject on which their point of view was diametrically opposed, and that was the one with which they were engaged at the opening of this chapter. Count Shrann, who had been brought up by a loving and pious mother, was a Catholic both in heart and soul; whilst the Baron Frederic had, on the contrary, lost both his parents at a very early age, and had been brought up by his uncle, who boasted of being the friend and the protector of the Encyclopedists; so that Frederic had been educated in that cold and barren school of materialism which Voltaire has the doubtful honor of having founded. Baron Frederic believed in nothing spiritual, a circumstance which caused great chagrin to his friend, whence it happened that on this, as on so many former occasions, the two friends, after the dinner-hour, had passed long hours in smoking and drinking huge tankards of beer, whilst making the same questions and the same answers on this, the one great subject of their difference in opinion and faith.
"So you believe that the soul lives for ever?" said the baron.
"Certainly I do," replied the count.
"It is very strange," answered the baron; and then both recommenced to smoke yet more vigorously than before. After a lapse of time during which two less serious men would have discussed three or four such subjects of conversation, the count recommenced: "What do you see so strange in my remark?"
"It is to see a mind such as yours give way to similar ideas and tales fit only, to say the best of it, to frighten children with."
"I, for my part, am yet more astonished to see a man so logical as yourself refuse to believe it; and how dare you treat as springing from weakness of mind that belief which you cannot deny fortifies the soul and places it above the blows of adversity?"
"The soul, the soul," replied the baron, "what is the soul? A name without a substance, and I do not know what of indefinable and vague. A something that we can neither see nor touch, and which eludes both the senses and the understanding. I, for my part, believe in nothing but that which I can see or touch."
"I would remind you, my dear friend, that there are a crowd of things in which you believe, without ever having seen them."
"It is because science explains those things, and I believe in her."
"Science! why, you are too clever not to admit of her inability to give you a full explanation of any one thing. Science proves that the fact exists, but she does not explain the first cause of its existence. She discovers the eternal laws which rule the universe, and it is by that means that she conducts the unprejudiced spirit from the discovery of things created to the knowledge of the Creator of all things; but the first causes of these same laws are utterly unknown to her."
"And what tells you that she will not yet discover them?"
"Never! For if the human understanding is immense, yet it is not infinite. We have seen many discoveries and marvels; our great-grandchildren will witness yet many more; but these will not be produced in any more developed sense than that which I just now indicated to you. The first causes will ever rest unknown to them as for us."
"But where are the proofs which prove the existence of the soul, and render it palpable to the eyes of the understanding?"
"The eyes of the heart, do they not equal those of the understanding?" quickly answered the count. "What! You feel within yourself a soul which thinks and which loves, which possesses in itself a longing for happiness, a thirst for truth, so utterly beyond the happiness and the truths of this world that it can only be a souvenir or a revelation, from on high, of something purer and more perfect; you love the good and you spurn the evil, even to self-sacrifice; nay, more, you prefer death to the evil; you hear in the depths of your heart that powerful voice which cries to all humanity that the soul cannot die; and yet you ask for a proof of the existence of this soul, and of its immortality! Death is visible to us on every side. He menaces us; he presses upon us; all that is above, beneath, on each side of us, is dead or dying. Man alone drives back before him that supreme law of final decay and oblivion; he whose life is comparatively much shorter than that of all other existences in this world, he alone hopes for an eternity which has no type here below, and which he could not even have conceived in himself, had it not been revealed to him. Surrounded by errors, he dreams the truth; wretched in this life, he dreams of a happiness without alloy; mortal, he dreams of immortality. Is not all this an infallible proof of his future destiny? God, who created man, would not he be both cruel and unjust had he given him all these profound aspirations toward a future state of happiness, only to plunge him finally in the abyss of eternal death? That secret voice speaks to you also, my friend; it resounds in the silence of your heart, and offers to you, as it does to others, its consoling hopes. Why do you not listen to it? When you saw before you, pale and discolored, destined to an inexorable decay, the body of her whom you so much loved; when the mouth that had so lately spoken to you, closed for ever; when those eyes, in which you had ever read their tenderness, became fixed, dull, and without expression; when that hand, which had but a moment before sought yours to press it for a last time, fell for ever powerless, equally insensible to the kisses with which you covered it, and to your tears, which rained on it—" Here the baron, without trying to hide his emotion, dried, with the back of his hand, the tears that this recollection of his beloved Gertrude caused him. The count continued: "That mouth, those eyes, that hand, they are the same; but where is the soul which animated them? Did you not then hear that interior voice which called with yet greater force, Thou shalt see her again? That body which the earth will hide to-morrow is but the form, and not the essence—the outward shape, but not the living spirit. A soul which you loved, and which rendered to thee an equal affection, animated that form, and rendered it palpable to your senses; that soul has fled, and the body falls back lifeless. The outward form rests here motionless and insensible, but the soul has remounted toward that celestial country where it shall await your coming, ready again to love you with an affection which shall have to suffer no second separation. And this is so true, my friend, that even whilst you deny this consciousness that the soul has of its future life and of its existence, you yourself obey that feeling; for you are faithful, not to the simple memory of Gertrude, but to Gertrude whom you feel to be still living, though far distant from you, and you desire to be able to say to her, when the moment of your meeting shall come: 'Thou seest that no other love has ever been mingled with thine in my heart; my own beloved one, thou didst wait for me, and I am come as full of thy recollection and of thy love as on that day when thou didst leave me.'"
Whilst the count was thus speaking, the baron had literally hidden himself in clouds of smoke, out of which came forth, by and by, a voice, trembling and changed by deep emotion, which answered:
"Ah! that I could believe as you do! In taking away from men these consoling thoughts, the materialists cried loudly that they were but working for the happiness of humanity yet wrapped in the shades of superstition; whilst, in truth, they were but plunging it into a gulf yet more profound and more implacable; for there is no real happiness possible where there exists a constant fear of losing that happiness. I know very well that the error was much more pleasant than the truth, and that in place of the hope, perhaps false, but certainly full of consolation, to re-find our friends one day, they have left us but the terrible certainty of having for ever lost them, and that they leave us with the heavy burden of misery which is crushing human nature, after having broken the very support that aided man to bear its weight. Now that the evil is done, how remedy it? And if I do not believe, what must I do that I may believe?"
"Acknowledge humbly our utter helplessness; humble the pride of an imperfect reason, which is irritated by the thought that there is something above it; listen to our conscience which speaks within us; and then, meekly kneeling down before the God who has created the universe, repeat to him, with simplicity and faith, these words of the blind man in the gospel, who cried, 'Lord, that I may receive my sight!' God is not deaf to persevering prayer. Pray, therefore, and you shall see likewise."
"Certainly," said the baron, "if I saw, I should at once believe; but who ever saw a soul?"
"My great-grandfather did," answered the count.
"You are joking."
"Not at all. Adolphus Shrann, my great-grandfather, saw not only one soul, but even two!"
"He was dreaming, then."
"No, for he knew what he was going to see, and that thought alone was sufficient to keep him awake."
"Ah! then in that case somebody made a jest of him, and by some optical delusion caused him to believe that he had seen a veritable supernatural vision."
"No, I assure you it was not so," replied the count. "I am determined to relate the history to you in full, this evening; and," added he, with a voice changed by the ardent friendship that he felt for the baron, "I should esteem myself really happy if its recital could cause you to kneel down side by side with me before the altar of that God whom you are so worthy to know. It is but there that we are separated, and did you know all that my true friendship suffers in the thought that, after living these long years together, and after having shared all the trials and the pains of this life until our old age, notwithstanding this, I should yet be alone when the hour comes to receive the recompense. Ah! my dear Frederic, that single thought would suffice to empoison the joys of paradise."
Here the two friends warmly shook hands, and after having again replenished their tankards and their pipes, the count commenced the story that you are going to hear.
"You know," said the count, "that the Shrann family has always been cited as one of the most fruitful in all Germany."
"And you! you certainly have not derogated from the example of your ancestors," said the baron.
"Neither had the Count Franz, the same who was raised from the rank of baron to that of count by Ferdinand III., in 1645, since he was the father of fifteen children, eight boys and seven girls; and of these lads Adolphus, the seventh son, was the only one who remained to perpetuate the name and race, for the others gave their lives to defend their country and the empire. But if this numerous offspring was an honor to the family, it was also a great cause of anxiety to the count; it being a fact that though a numerous family be a source of fortune to a poor farmer, such is not the case with a poor nobleman; and it was no slight task to place advantageously all these children, so that they might worthily bear and uphold their family name. Count Franz made, therefore, the most active endeavors to marry his daughters and to establish his sons; and he succeeded as well as he had hoped, since only one son remained at home, and that was Albert, the youngest child; nor did the future of this the last scion of his race much disturb the count, destined as he was, by him, from his very youth, to enter the church. But divine Providence often smiles at and overthrows our wisest calculations, and this is what occurred in Albert's case; for, notwithstanding the serious tendency given to his education, it was found that of the eight sons of the count this, the youngest, showed the greatest courage and taste for war. This martial spirit was the great despair of his tutor; for the lad left on the smallest pretext his studies and his books to play with an old rusty sword that he had found in one of the lumber-rooms of the castle, and with this he amused himself for hours, fencing against his desk or stool, and shouting all the war cries and songs that he had heard or read. When the vexed tutor complained of his pupil's conduct to the count, and of his little attention to his more serious studies, joined to his openly expressed contempt for them, the count answered, 'Bah! never mind; time will change all this, and you know that it is only natural that he should have imbibed a little of the family taste for war.' The seventh son, Adolphus, likewise distinguished himself by his recklessness of danger and by his great courage. This conformity of tastes, yet more than the similarity of their ages, had closely united these the two youngest brothers together; so that when the day came that the younger saw the elder leave home as a lieutenant in the army, to engage in that life of adventure and danger of which they had so often talked together, he was seized with a yet stronger repugnance to the future destined for him. The prospect of spending his days in the retirement of the cloister, instead of sharing with his brother the glorious achievements of a soldier's life, inspired him with not only a strong distaste for this future, but even with an aversion to all that then surrounded him. Albert fell into a great despair and lethargy; no longer did his tutor dread that rusty sword with which Albert had been wont to frighten him; not that his studies progressed any better for that; for although he read with pleasure the Iliad and the AEneid, he shrunk back with distaste from the study of theology, and when any observations were made to him on the subject, alleged that 'he should always know enough to cause him to die from ennui.' Not that the sentiment of religious feeling was dead within him, far from that; he was, on the contrary, animated with the liveliest and most sincere faith; nor was it that he felt an invincible repugnance to the obligations of the priesthood, for he was generous, sober, charitable, and patient, and therefore esteemed slightly the sacrifices that the ecclesiastical state requires. What he disliked and dreaded above all was a life of uniformity and of repose, such as seemed to him the life of a priest. This antipathy to the future for which he was destined grew from day to day, when, unable at last to fight any longer against his inclinations, he armed himself with all his resolution, and respectfully represented to his father his invincible dislike to becoming a priest, and asked of him the favor of being allowed to become a soldier. Great was the discomfiture of the count on hearing this demand. What was he to do? he who had made all his arrangements in order that Albert might become a bishop; and here was this son who in place of bearing the mitre and pastoral staff, desired nothing less than to wield the sword and don the coat of mail.
"'It is very perplexing,' at last answered the count, after having scratched his ear several times; 'this idea of yours completely upsets all my plans; but rather than see you become a bad priest it shall be as you desire. Although,' again added he with a heavy sigh, 'it is very perplexing.'
"Albert, after having again explained to his father all the reasons for his repugnance to the life of a priest, continued, 'You see, my dear father, that it is not a taste for the pleasures of the world that drives me from the priesthood; it is only my dislike to the monotony of such a life that hinders me from embracing it. My vocation leads me to follow a career of danger and of change, and not one of ease and uniformity. But I think that there is a means of conciliating the ideas that your tenderness had suggested for me and my own tastes.'
"'I desire nothing better than that,' answered the count with visible chagrin, 'but how to do so, that is the question. I wish you to become a bishop, and you desire to become a captain; now, we are no longer in the days when bishops wore a suit of mail inside their robes.'
"'That is true, dear father; but you could place me in a position to become one day a knight-commander,' (here the count lifted up his head with an air of satisfaction.) 'The order of St. John of Jerusalem,' continued Albert, 'is a glorious order, assimilating to the church by its vows and its constitutions, and to the army by its obligations and labors. The Turks are now menacing Christendom; what more glorious use can one make of one's sword than to defend one's brothers in Jesus Christ, and to oppose one's self against the barbarity of the Mussulman, who already regards Europe as a wild beast does his prey? What more glorious destiny than to consecrate one's courage and one's life to force back even to the very sands of Asia those hordes of infidels whose domination, similar to a pestilential atmosphere, has brought ruin and death upon the fertile countries where it extends?
"'If, then, as I hope, you will consent to my desires, I shall find in that career the occasion to place in a yet higher rank the glorious name that you have given me; and thus both my ancestors and yourself shall have reason to be proud of their descendant."
"My worthy ancestor, on hearing this proposition, felt a similar satisfaction to that which a man would feel who, after being shut up in a chest during some hours, could at last stretch his limbs out again in liberty. Therefore was it that he seized eagerly a proposition which drew him out of a great difficulty; for between ourselves, be it said, the worthy man was more accustomed to fighting than to solving difficult questions. It was easy for the count to prove the sixteen quarters of nobility which the rules of the order required for the admission of Germans; moreover, he had several friends in the order whose influence he made use of; nothing, therefore, opposed itself to the realization of Albert's desires; and, in consequence, a few weeks after the above related conversation, he left Germany, and became page to Nicholas Coroner, then Grand Master of the order, and Governor of Malta. In this position he did not fail to make himself very soon remarked by his dauntless courage and impetuous audacity. The requisite occasions did not fail him; each day the galleys of the order darted from their ports, as the eagle from his eyrie, and, powerful as the eagle, seized on some one of the innumerable Turkish pirates which were then ravaging the coasts of the Mediterranean, burning villages, and carrying off their wretched inhabitants to reduce them into a painful and degrading slavery. In this manner the order rendered the most important services to Europe, whilst the most adventurous spirit in it found means, in this incessant warfare, to satisfy his thirst for danger. Albert, ardent and indefatigable, scorning danger and braving Death, who seemed to shrink back before so much bravery and audacity, fought so often and so well, that scarcely was the time of his novitiate finished, than, by the general consent of his companions in arms, and the approbation of the grand master, he was created knight. In truth, it was impossible to show more valor and self-diffidence. This latter quality shows forth the more, that it was not an ordinary virtue in the order. Some years thus rolled on, during which the bravery of Albert had caused him to be known and remarked in all the commanderies of Europe; but the time was come when at length he should appear on a field more worthy of his talents.
"I will not here give you a recital of the events which brought the troops of Mohammed IV. under the walls of Vienna; since, in the first place, you recollect them as well as I do; and in the second place, it is too sad a thought for him who feels within him a soul truly German, to reflect that there was a day when German hearts beat with fear before the standards of Mohammed! At the time when the Hungarians, with a blindness that even their excess of patriotism does not excuse, called into the heart of Europe those born enemies of European civilization, Albert was in Germany. At the first news which reached him of the march of Mustapha on Vienna, he hurried to the commanderies that were nearest to him, and animating the zeal of the knights, united together without great difficulty a few of his companions, with whom he hastened on to that city. They reached Vienna on the very day that Leopold I. left it; and terrible was the consternation then reigning in that town, abandoned by those who ought to have been the first to face the danger and animate the courage of others by their example.
"The brave Count of Staremberg commanded the fortress which he did not dare hope to save, although he was determined to die in its defence. The aid that Albert brought was joyfully accepted by him; for he had but eight or ten thousand men to defend the city against the Turkish army, whose number was three hundred thousand; and besides this, the city was badly provisioned and insufficiently armed. Nevertheless, the defence was organized in the best manner possible; arms were distributed to all the citizens; and even the schoolboys were taught to carry arms, and perform the active service of the defence of the walls; whilst the entire population determined to suffer famine, and all the other horrors of a prolonged siege, rather than yield tamely to the enemy. These preparations made, they awaited the infidels; nor did they wait long; for in a few days after the departure of the emperor, the Turkish army encamped before Vienna, and opened its first trench. Then began in earnest that terrible siege. Albert performed prodigies of valor; now directing a sortie, then driving back an assault, ever in the foremost rank, he, as it were, multiplied himself, going on every side; he foresaw and provided against all emergencies; his courage excited even the most timid, whilst his unchangeable calm reassured their fears. In the midst of all this peril, which seemed endless, he alone seemed at his ease; so much so, that the Count of Staremberg used to say, 'Oh! that I had only one hundred knights like him; for then, in place of resting here blocked up, like a rat in his hole, I would drive back, and follow up these three hundred thousand Turks to the very walls of Constantinople!' During all this time, notwithstanding the pressing demands of the Pope, Innocent IX., and in spite of the necessity which bound the other Christian nations to prevent Vienna's falling into the hands of the infidels, the aid so much needed was but slowly organized. Already had the siege lasted two months, and nothing had yet happened to relieve the despair of the wretched inhabitants, already weakened by famine. There seemed to them no alternative between a cruel and lingering death and a yet more painful slavery. Almost were they reduced to the last extremities. It was quite impossible to obtain provisions, and the ammunition was nearly exhausted, whilst many of the cannon had become useless for service; and yet no voice was heard that spoke of surrender. Soldiers and citizens, alike excited by the example and firmness of the chiefs, supported with courage and resignation all the horrors of a desperate defence. At last the signals and banners of King John Sobieski were seen from the walls as he came to their rescue, leading the combined forces of Europe. It was time! The King of Poland, notwithstanding the immense inferiority of his troops in point of numbers, hesitated not a moment to take the most favorable position for giving battle to the enemy. Mustapha, on his side, divided his troops into two divisions, the one destined to make a last and desperate assault upon the city, and to enter it by main force through the breaches already made in its walls; whilst the second division was to stop the passage of Sobieski, and to hinder him from giving any aid to the besieged. But the impetuosity of the attack of the Christians was such that the battle became but a rout on the side of the Mussulmans, as they fled before their pursuers on every side, and were as soon and as completely dispersed as is a wisp of straw before a hurricane. Vienna free, Europe breathed again, being once more delivered from the immediate fear of the crescent, whilst awaiting the day when the Mussulman should be for ever driven back to the arid sands from whence he came. This heroic defence spread a new lustre upon the arms and reputation of the order. But none of its knights had acquired a similar renown to that of Albert. The name of this young warrior was in every mouth, his souvenir in every heart, and he shared with John Sobieski the enthusiastic ovation made by the Viennese to their deliverers. The loudest acclamations of admiration and gratitude greeted him during the day that he accompanied the King of Poland, who, still covered with the blood of his enemies, went in solemn state to the cathedral of St. Stephen, there to assist at the Te Deum which was sung in thanksgiving to God for this miraculous delivery of the city from the Turks. Mustapha, forced to make such a speedy retreat, had left in the possession of the Christians all his treasures, tents, and baggage. Among the spoil was found the standard of the Prophet. This, it was decided, should be offered to the pope as a gage and as a memorial of the victory, and it was Albert who was chosen to perform this honorable mission. His old father nearly died with joy on learning of the glorious renown of his son; and I leave you to guess if he did not praise himself in his heart for not having resisted the desires of Albert. The old count foresaw in the future his family giving a grand-master to the Order of St. John, and he trembled with happiness in thinking of the honor which would thus result to the Shrann race and name. In fact, one could hardly say where would have stopped the worldly honors of Albert, had not God reserved for him a yet more sweet and glorious recompense for his labors in his service."
At this point of his story, the count took a few minutes' repose, minutes that were fully employed, to judge by the manner in which he emptied the tankard that stood before him; and as the two friends did nothing without each other's aid or example, the baron hastened to imitate his friend; and when his tankard left his lips, there did not remain sufficient in it to satisfy the thirst of a wren. Then, grasping with a firm hand the immense jug of beer which awaited their good pleasure, he filled his own glass and passed the jug on to the count, who, with an equal dignity and silence, took his share. It is true that the baron paid but a slight attention to all these details of a family history that the count so complacently related to him; perhaps he was getting impatient for the appearance of the two souls that had been promised him; but he let no indication of his impatience escape him, and continued to smoke on with great tranquillity, puffing forth clouds of smoke which seemed timed to the cadenced sounds of an old clock that stood beside him, whose sculptured oak case would have delighted the taste of an antiquary. At length the count recommenced: "The Turks appeared to have abandoned their projects upon Germany, but the war yet continued with activity between themselves and the order and the Venetians on the shores of the Mediterranean. Notwithstanding the greatest sacrifices, and the most valiant efforts on the part of the Turks, Candia had fallen into the hands of the order; a new expedition was then resolved upon to lay siege to Coron, and Hector de La Tour de Maubourg, having been chosen as its commander, he made choice of Albert for his lieutenant.
"Upon one of the galleys that the pope had joined to the allied fleets of the Knights of St. John and of the Venetians, the young Giovanni Balbo, only heir to one of the most distinguished names in the republic of Venice, had been sent out by his father. This illustrious family had long been a friend to our house, and, in fact, we counted several alliances between the two families. When, therefore, Giovanni learnt that Albert was in the fleet, he made several attempts to become acquainted with him; and succeeded so well, that in a short time they became the greatest friends in the world.
"On this event, so slight in its appearance, nevertheless depended the destiny of Albert. You must have remarked, my friend, that it is the same with us all. The acts the most important in our lives, those which decide our future, and from which result our happiness or misery in this world, have always as their first commencement, some circumstance which is perfectly indifferent in itself, but the results of which have an influence on our entire destinies.
"One would say that divine Providence mocked our proud reason, in thus making use of events which at first sight seem so utterly unfitted to arrive at the end which it proposes to itself; and I might even add, that this impenetrable mystery would alone suffice to eyes less wilfully blinded than your own, to prove the existence of an unseen power that is unrestrained by human laws and prejudices. Does God owe to each one of us a miracle? Ought he to suspend for each individual man the eternal laws which govern the universe? Can we not believe in him unless we see the very rivers flow back to their sources? Does he not manifest himself to us at each instant of our lives, on each side of us and in us? Is not the admirable connection of events which exists in this world sufficient to make the certitude of his power and of his incessant action shine forth to the vision of the soul, as shines forth before the eyes of the body the brilliant multitude of planets that have each their appointed path in the wide space of heaven? The siege was terrible, and its success cost to the Order of Malta one and twenty of its bravest knights; Hector de la Tour de Maubourg was among the number of the dead, and Albert, who had flown to his side to protect him, had fallen covered with wounds, which caused his life to be despaired of. His youth, the strength of his constitution, and, above all, the tender care taken of him by his friend Giovanni, finally triumphed over the severity of his wounds, and as soon as he was sufficiently recovered to bear the fatigues of the voyage, Giovanni brought him to Venice to visit his family, who received him with the warmest hospitality. I have told you that Giovanni was the only heir of the Balbo family; this was but partly true, since there were two daughters, Flaminia, who had then attained her eighteenth year, and Antonia, who was but seventeen.
"Nothing could be more unlike than these two sisters, Flaminia and Antonia. Although both were in looks and in character equally charming, Heaven had gifted them with very dissimilar talents and tastes. Nevertheless, this did not impede the existence of an intimate friendship between these two natures so diametrically opposed; and, later in their lives, it proved no hinderance to a complete confidence. It is thanks to this confidence—that arose between them one day by reason of an imperious necessity of mutual aid and sympathy—that I can now describe the more intimate particularities of this history. Antonia, as you may judge from the portrait of her hanging in the room, was one of that sort of beauties that seem to overflow with vigor and life. Her complexion slightly brunette; her eyes of a deep black, ever glistening under her well-arched eye-brows, notwithstanding the depth of her eye-lashes; her mouth ever smiling, with its full and firmly designed lips; her perfectly chiselled nose, whose nostrils dilated at every instant; and, above all, the extreme vivacity of her face, where was portrayed, as in a mirror, every emotion that agitated her, even the most fugitive; all in her appearance indicated one of those vigorous natures that have need of real physical exertion. An over-rich development of physical forces impedes the flight of the imagination. Thus, Antonia was always remarked for the vivacity of her impressions, for the impetuosity of her sentiments, and for the sallies of her quick and brilliant spirit. But that world of reverie, peopled with vague and indefinable forms; that world illumined by a supernatural light, where we catch the glimpses of a happiness unknown here below; that world which is created by the soul and colored by the imagination, was to her quite unknown. Whilst her sister delighted in all this, and listened with her whole heart to those harmonious voices which spoke to her of a coming happiness penetrating and sweet as the joys of heaven, Antonia was bounding like a young fawn among the trees of their garden, or, mounted on a spirited horse, rapidly ascended the paths of the mountains that surrounded the town. The same impetuosity was to be remarked in her sympathies and antipathies; she could not moderate her expression of them, nor did she even seek to impose upon herself a useless constraint on this subject. On the other hand, Flaminia seemed already to bear in her entire appearance the impress of those sorrows that she was destined to suffer. Her look, so sweet and sad even in its smile, was half veiled with her eyelids, and gave to her face an indefinable expression of melancholy. That expression could be again found in her delicately shaped mouth, and even in her movements full of languor and grace. Whilst Antonia, lively and petulant, employed by every outward effort the too abundant forces of her life and youth, Flaminia seemed to place hers in reserve for the terrible moment of need. She concentrated in the depths of her soul all her impressions; nor could she give to herself a reason for so doing. She had the consciousness of her exquisite sensibility, and protected it, under the shield of indifference and affected calm, against all contact that could have wounded it. But under this apparent indolence an attentive eye could have easily recognized the marks of an ardent soul and of a strong nervous organization. A sudden flame would at moments lighten up those glances usually veiled in indifference, the soft and musical voice took an accent of enthusiasm, and her whole expression changed, being animated by the power of an emotion that she no longer restrained, and whose vibrations were the more violent, because her soul, far from pouring itself on all that surrounded her, as did Antonia's, was one of those that at a given hour in life is destined to concentrate all its force on a single thought and on an only affection. Outwardly cold and impassible, her excessive sensibility showed itself by scarcely perceptible signs; but later in life, happy to find at her side a heart filled with similar ideas, all this ice melted. Is there not in us, at the moment when life commences, that is to say, at the epoch when the soul awakes from the long slumber of infancy, a vague presentiment of our future destinies? For the same reason that we have so often seen the bravest soldiers tremble on the morning of a battle, feeling beforehand that death will call them during the day, is there not likewise in us a voice which warns us of the trials that we shall have later in our lives to endure? The birds have a presentiment of the coming storm, even when the atmosphere is yet full of splendor; the very insects that crawl upon the ground foresee in the autumn the rigors of the approaching winter, and envelop their eggs with a double covering of silk; and why should man be less favored than the birds or insects? Why should he be the only creature that is delivered up, as it were, with his hands and feet bound, to the rigors of the future? It is possible that Flaminia obeyed that sentiment of moral modesty that causes us to hide from all eyes our better qualities—those secret riches of our hearts, that we may lavish them without stint upon the hidden object that we have chosen. She knew herself to be incapable of half-loving any object, and she felt that her heart was a fragile instrument; that, if touched by a skilful hand, it would render harmonious sounds, but that it would infallibly break under a rude or awkward touch; and she wished to preserve it from such a fate. None of those surrounding her suspected the power of this instrument; on the contrary, her great outward calmness passed for the evident indication of a certain coldness of heart, whilst the expansive nature of her sister was considered as the sign of an extreme sensibility. Flaminia was much grieved at being thus misunderstood, and very often, in the silence of the night, bitter tears flowed from her eyes; very often the ivory crucifix which hung at the head of her couch, saw opening before it that soul so full of purity and love, that came to seek, at that inexhaustible source, a present consolation and a future strength. Sometimes she fancied that she heard in herself the distant mutterings of the heart's tempest; then she prayed with ardor, almost feverishly, as she listened to the murmur within her of those mysterious voices which warned her of a near peril, and told her to spread around her those riches of affection full of loving ardor, that then devoured her, and that one day would consume her. In these moments of instinctive alarm, she drew herself yet closer to God, hiding herself under the shadow of his protecting hand, ever lifted up over those who with faith invoke it; and then she felt herself reassured. At such moments as these was it that she felt herself to be so completely alone, notwithstanding the parental tenderness that surrounded her, and she suffered by this loneliness. In truth, Flaminia was right—she was alone; for though both the Prince and Princess Balbo cherished their daughter, yet time seemed to have passed on for her alone, and not for them. The child had merged into the young girl; the naïve graces of the infant had given place to the more opened charms of youth, yet they had remarked nothing of all this. They dreamt not even that parental affection ought to be modelled after the child of whom it is the object, and ought to transform itself and grow with that child. They did not understand that the protecting tenderness accorded to the infant who shelters himself under it as does a bird in its nest, becomes insufficient for the heart that time has developed, and that has need of leaning upon sentiments less protecting and more friendly. One of the most dangerous shoals in the difficult task of educating children, is doubtless that of noticing the first moments when the child whom we have held until then under our hand, and caused, as it were, to live of our own life, lays aside the trammels of infancy, and seeks to fly with his own wings. It is then that we ought to know how so to modify our affection that we may inspire that freedom and that confidence in ourselves that will protect this second period of life, as a salutary fear protects the first.
"Now for the development of these sentiments, so fragile and delicate, we must seize the instant when the child commences to become a man, when he first feels awakening in him thoughts and sensations that are his own, and not simply the echo or reflection of our own. It is at that moment, and then only, that we can ever arouse such confidence. If we allow this fleeting and critical period of his existence to escape us, never can we hope to recall it; and however powerful may be his sense of filial affection, the child will never again show us that confidence that we have repulsed; we shall have left his young heart, just awakening to the dawn of life, in an isolation that is always painful, and oftentimes dangerous, since it lends to the already strong voice of the passions the charms of solitude and mystery. Unhappily—and this is almost always through an ill-advised tenderness—we too often close our eyes to this transformation; habit blinds us, and the child escapes from our control. Such had been the case with Flaminia. Her mother was one of the most virtuous and excellent of women; the prince, as I have already told you, adored his children; but both of them, as well as Giovanni, who was fifteen years older than the eldest of his sisters, regarded these two lovely girls but as the two children who so lately had charmed them by their naïveté and grace. This situation, in which the two sisters shared, should have sooner given rise to a confidence equal to their friendship; but besides that their difference of tastes often separated them, no exterior event had yet happened to show them the power of their mutual affection and the community of ideas that ought to be its consequence. Thus Flaminia lived alone and gave herself up without reserve to the sweet charm of vague reverie; she listened with a deep joy to those mysterious aspirations that spoke to her of happiness, nor could she assign any form to these thoughts, that, all uncertain as they were, yet threw her into a delicious trouble. She sought solitude, and spent long hours sitting at the balcony of her window, her forehead leaning on her long white hands, while her eyes filled with tears that had no sorrow as their source, as she regarded the deep and large purple shadows which the setting sun cast on the blue waters of the Mediterranean. Although she was unconscious of the meaning of these frequent reveries, and would have been unable to explain the reason of that melancholy, so full of mingled pain and pleasure, into which she loved to plunge herself, yet she hid most carefully from every eye the state of her mind, dreading above all things lest any one should suspect the happiness she felt in yielding to its charm. At the moment when providence was about to bring together Albert and Flaminia, he also found himself in some such a state of mind as that which I have just portrayed. A glorious renown had at first seemed to him the only thing in this world worthy of envy; but that idol so ardently followed had been, little by little, despoiled of its brilliant prestige; the nearer he approached it, the more faint and dim became the aureole of splendor with which he had believed it surrounded; and when he at last saw himself in full possession of his desire, when the renown of his name had resounded to the most distant commanderies of his order, which regarded him as its firmest support and most assured hope; then he saw with affright that a glorious name is insufficient in itself, and that it must be regarded in a Christian life, or at least in connection with some one who is dear to us, and whose heart would rejoice and sympathize with our glory. When Albert at last understood the truth, he felt himself sad and unhappy; for be looked vainly around him—he was alone! An immense void then made itself felt in his soul—a void that even his glory was unable to hide from him, and which friendship was powerless to fill. Like Flaminia, he felt himself isolated on the earth; but while her solitude was sweetened by a hope as vague as her thoughts and desires, that of Albert was a bottomless abyss, full of discouragement and despair.
"The profound darkness of night then fell upon his soul, an obscurity similar to those sombre and cold nights in winter, when the eye sees not a single star piercing the sky covered with clouds; and when the sad heart hears but the moans of the wind that bends the tops of the bare trees as it passes over them, mingled with the boding cry of the birds of prey which slowly wheel around in the thick and misty atmosphere. A lassitude had fallen on him similar to that which a traveller feels at the sight of a straight and monotonous road which extends as far as the eye can reach in a dry and burning plain. Seeing nothing around him that seemed worthy either a desire or an effort, he allowed himself to be carried slowly on by time toward the common end; nor did he hasten that course by his vows; for even whilst he firmly believed in the joys of eternity, he felt not his soul drawn toward them. If he had run forward to meet death, it was through his natural intrepidity; for he felt in its presence but the same desolating indifference that he had shown at the moment of his recovery to life. Such were the secret sentiments of Albert and Flaminia when their mutual destiny placed them for the first time in presence of each other in the ancient salon of the Palace Balbo. We are both of us, my dear Frederic, so far distant from the time when our hearts first experienced these impressions of affection, that there now remains to us but a very slight recollection."
"You are deceived," interrupted the baron; "from the day when for the first time I saw my poor Gertrude, until that when I placed her in her tomb, I have forgotten nothing of all that has passed between us. There is not an hour of that much-regretted time which is not present in my memory; not an incident, however slight it may have been, that I cannot recall in even its slightest details!"
"You can the more easily understand, then," continued the count, "how it was that these two souls united themselves so closely the one to the other, that there soon existed between them but a single life, a single taste, and a single thought; and how it was that they both preserved, even until their very last moment, the most absolute certainty of their mutual affection, without ever having interchanged a single word on the subject. Scarcely had they been but a few days together, when already Albert had penetrated into all the thoughts of Flaminia. He read in her heart as in an open book; he divined all its secrets; that soul which to all others was closed, he saw opening, and breathed all its perfumes< foresaw all its destinies! Was it, then, in a few commonplace conversations that he had gained so complete an insight into that heart habitually closed? No; he had not judged Flaminia by any acquaintance that he had gained of her character by her words or actions; he had only looked upon her, and instantly, by intuition, he had understood her; and this was so true, that there were moments when it might have been said that he saw her think. On her side, Flaminia saw the soul of Albert by that same light which I should call supernatural, did I not consider it as one of the eternal laws instituted by the Creator. She knew him to be loyal and generous, and she saw his unchangeable goodness and patience; not because he had had any occasion of showing them before her, but because a lively and penetrating light thus showed him to her. All that Albert felt found in her an echo; the mirror does not more faithfully produce the image than did her soul his slightest sensations. By his side she felt happy, because she felt herself understood and loved. A new existence then opened for her; movement and activity succeeded to her vague reveries and habitual indolence; new horizons showed themselves each day to her soul. Nature became more beautiful, the flowers more sweet, the sun more brilliant; it seemed to her that her eyes had been shut until then, and that they now opened for the first time. At the same time that a new affection acquired over her soul a stronger influence than her affection for her family had yet exercised on her, even these became more lively and more complete. Nevertheless, it was no longer at that source whence she had so long drawn her sensations and ideas that she now went to seek them: all came to her from Albert, or had reference to him. She saw by his eyes and thought by his ideas; her tastes, her desires, were nothing else than the tastes and desires of Albert. Were he present, she seemed to live with delight; in his absence it seemed to her that her life lost its intensity, and all became sad and indifferent to her; he was the soul that gave life to all. In a word, he had become a part of herself, an indispensable condition for the perfection of her being and existence. I have no need to tell you that she did not render to herself so exact an account of the state of her soul as that which I have just sketched to you. She had, in truth, the consciousness of the change that was taking place in her, but the reasons of this change remained enveloped in a profound obscurity that her spirit could not penetrate; she obeyed her feelings of tenderness without being able to analyze them. And yet the more she felt that Albert alone filled her heart and thought, the more she instinctively enveloped herself exteriorly, with regard to him, in her mantle of ordinary indifference. But when hazard left her alone with Albert, then a sudden transformation took place in her. All that indifference melted away, as do the last snows of springtime under the heat of the sun. She delivered herself up unrestrainedly to the generous enthusiasm of her loving nature, her expression became more gentle, her voice more tender, and her heart beat faster in her bosom, which rose and fell agitated by an emotion so delicious and powerful that it resembled even grief; for in our weak nature, joy and suffering have a very near resemblance."
Concluded In Next Number.