For long we knew not who her father was;
The girl today knows not her parentage.
Father and mother she beholds in us.
And such a state of things might have gone on
Since we do love her as our very own.
But some years later than her mother’s death
The papers that I hold were brought to us;
They make it plain who our child’s father is.
I cannot tell if he is known to thee.
(The Preceptor loses control over himself.)