a time should everything be open, clear, explicit.  Do not think I wish to reproach you.  What you are, Clarence, your false position and unfortunate education have made you.  I write it with pain—­your demand seems extremely selfish.  I fear it is not of me but of yourself you are thinking, when you ask me to sever, at once and for ever, my connection with a people who, you say, can only degrade me.  Yet how much happier am I, sharing their degradation, than you appear to be!  Is it regard for me that induces the desire that I should share the life of constant dread that I cannot but feel you endure—­or do you fear that my present connections will interfere with your own plans for the future?

“Even did I grant it was my happiness alone you had in view, my objections would be equally strong.  I could not forego the claims of early friendship, and estrange myself from those who have endeared themselves to me by long years of care—­nor pass coldly and unrecognizingly by playmates and acquaintances, because their complexions were a few shades darker than my own.  This I could never do—­to me it seems ungrateful:  yet I would not reproach you because you can—­for the circumstances by which you have been surrounded have conspired to produce that result—­and I presume you regard such conduct as necessary to sustain you in your present position.  From the tenor of your letter I should judge that you entertained some fear that I might compromise you with your future bride, and intimate that my choice may deprive you of yours.  Surely that need not be. She need not even know of my existence.  Do not entertain a fear that I, or my future husband, will ever interfere with your happiness by thrusting ourselves upon you, or endanger your social position by proclaiming our relationship.  Our paths lie so widely apart that they need never cross.  You walk on the side of the oppressor—­I, thank God, am with the oppressed.

“I am happy—­more happy, I am sure, than you could make me, even by surrounding me with the glittering lights that shine upon your path, and which, alas! may one day go suddenly out, and leave you wearily groping in the darkness.  I trust, dear brother, my words may not prove a prophecy; yet, should they be, trust me, Clarence, you may come back again, and a sister’s heart will receive you none the less warmly that you selfishly desired her to sacrifice the happiness of a lifetime to you.  I shall marry Charles Ellis.  I ask you to come and see us united—­I shall not reproach you if you do not; yet I shall feel strange without a single relative to kiss or bless me in that most eventful hour of a woman’s life.  God bless you, Clary!  I trust your union may be as happy as I anticipate my own will be—­and, if it is not, it will not be because it has lacked the earnest prayers of your neglected but still loving sister.”

“Esther, I thought I was too cold in that—­tell me, do you think so?”