One day, in a state bordering on idiocy, I think, I examined and compared dates, in the sickening hope that my darling boy might have been born before the decree of divorce had been pronounced, and thus be the heir of his father's dukedom, notwithstanding all that followed.
But, ah! that faint hope also was destined to die! The dates, compared, stood thus:
The decree of divorce was pronounced February 13th, 18—.
The marriage between yourself and Lady Augusta McDugald was solemnized April 1st, 18—.
My boy was born April 15th, 18—.
Yes, you divorced the guiltless mother two months, and married another woman two weeks, before the birth of your innocent boy.
You cruelly and unjustly disowned, disinherited, and even delegalized, and degraded your son before he was born! So that your son was not born in wedlock, could not bear your name, or inherit your title! And this misfortune came upon him by no fault of his, or of his most unhappy mother's but by the jealousy, vengeance, and fatal rashness of his father! And now there was no help, either in law or equity, for the dishonored boy.
This, Duke of Hereward, is the ruin you have wrought in his life, in mine, and in yours.
Do you wonder that when I realized it all I fell into a state of despair deeper than any I had ever yet known?—a despair that was characterized by all who saw it as melancholy madness.
My dear boy, who was at first such a comfort to me, was now only a beloved sorrow! When I held him to my bosom, I thought of nothing but his bitter, irreparable wrongs.