When Edward Levi, the iron merchant, came to out village, he cautiously went, first of all, to my nephew Joseph; he then sent for me, and handed me a letter from Ernst. It was written in a firm hand, and read as follows:
"To my parents I say farewell. I leave my so-called Fatherland forever.
"It grieves me to know that I must grieve you, but I cannot help it.
"If thousands had done what I did, it would have been praised as a noble deed. Must we sacrifice ourselves to this degenerate Fatherland?
"I cannot murder my compatriots, nor do I care to allow them to murder me.
"Take care of Martella for my sake. I will write to her myself.
"Your Lost Son."
"You must pluck such a child from your heart--you must forget him entirely."
These were Joseph's words after he had read the letter. Many others spoke just as he did. But he who has ever heard the word "father" from the lips of his child, knows that this is impossible. From that time I always said to myself, "No day without sorrow." Do you know what it means never to have a pure, bright, happy day?--"no day without sorrow?" And yet, I admit it, I was not without hope. I felt a quiet assurance that Ernst would be all right in the end. How it was to be brought about, I did not know; but I felt that the seeds of indestructible virtue and purity were yet lurking amidst this mass of ruin and rottenness. There might yet be a turn in the tide of affairs, that would draw the current of my son's life into the proper channel. My wife mentioned his name only once after that. But her love for the child was stronger and firmer than her resolution.
She took pains to be about and to keep up an interest in all that was going on: but, from the moment that she was shocked by the news of Ernst's desertion, it was evident that it cost her an effort to control her will.