"And do you believe me to be your son?"
"Believe? believe! I know not what to believe. What should I believe! I believe thou art my own boy—mine, mine, mine!"
As she spoke she threw her arms with frantic wildness about his neck, and hugged him convulsively to her bosom.
"Lady, 'tis vain to shut your eyes to the truth. I am not your son—but your son lives!"
"He does, he does live, and I clasp him to my heart," she cried, energetically, folding him closer to her bosom.
"Nay—"
"Nay—nay, but I will hold thee! they shall not tear thee from me! No, no! they must take my heart too, for its strings are bound all about thee, and thou art tied too long and too strong to it by the thousand chords of a mother's love to be parted from it now. Ha, ha! They shall not part us! Shall they, boy?"
He looked up into her face and saw that her mind wandered; that reason was falling from its throne!
"Mother!" he said, in tones of gentle persuasion: "mother!" and he affectionately kissed her cheeks; "mother!" he repeated a third time, in the most touching tones of filial love—"I am, I will be, your own dear son!"
The softer feelings of her soul came back; all the mother rushed from the heart to the eyes; and dissolved, melted by his appeal, she burst into tears, and wept freely and long upon his shoulder.