Ah! my good Valentine, how I thank you for having nursed him as a sister; how noble and charming you were to him; I would like to reward you by having you here to witness our happiness.  And you must thank the esteemed M. de Braimes for me, and my beautiful Irene, who taught him to love my name, and brought him a bouquet every morning; and your handsome Henri, the golden-haired angel, who brought him his little doves in your work-basket to take care of, while he studied his lessons.  Embrace for me these dear children he caressed, who cheered his hours of suffering, whom I so love for his sake and yours.

Will you not let me show my appreciation of my little goddaughter by rendering her independent of future accidents, enabling her without imprudence to marry for love?

I am so happy in loving that I can imagine it to be the only source of joy to others; yet this happiness is so great that I find myself asking if my heart is equal to its blessings; if my poor reason, wearied by so many trials, will have sufficient strength to support these violent emotions; if happiness has not, like misery, a madness.  I endeavor when alone to calm my excited mind; I sit down and try to quietly think over my past life with that inflexibility of judgment, that analyzing pedantry, of which you have so often accused me.

You remember, Valentine, more than once you have told me you saw in me two persons, a romantic young girl and a disenchanted old philosopher....  Ah! well, to-day the romantic young girl has reached the most thrilling chapter of her life; she feels her weak head whirl at the prospect of such intoxicating bliss, and she appeals to the old philosopher for assistance.  She tells him how this bliss frightens her; she begs him to reassure her about this beautiful future opening before her, by proving to her that it is natural and logical; that it is the result of her past life, and finally that however great it may be, however extraordinary it may seem, it is possible, it is lasting, because it is bought at the price of humiliation, of sorrow, of trials!

Yes, I confess it, these happy events appear to be so strange, so impossible, that I try to explain them, to calmly analyze them and believe in their reality.

I recall one by one all my impressions of the last four years, and exert my mind to discover in the strangeness, in the fatality, in the excessive injustice of my past misfortunes, a natural explanation for extraordinary and incredible events of the present.  The reverses themselves were romantic and improbable, therefore the reparations and consolations should in their turn be equally romantic.  Is it an ordinary thing for a young girl reared like myself in Parisian luxury, belonging to an illustrious family, to be reduced to the sternest poverty, and through family pride and dignity to conceal her name?  Is not such dignity, assailed by fate, destined sooner or later to vindicate itself?