He wanted to be alone, that he might read the last words of the woman whom all had loved, and who had passed away like a flower.

“My beloved, this is my last will.  Why should we not make wills for the treasures of our hearts, as for our worldly property?  Was not my love my property, my all?  I mean here to dispose of my love:  it was the only fortune of your Clemence, and it is all that she can leave you in dying.  Jules, you love me still, and I die happy.  The doctors may explain my death as they think best; I alone know the true cause.  I shall tell it to you, whatever pain it may cause you.  I cannot carry with me, in a heart all yours, a secret which you do not share, although I die the victim of an enforced silence.

“Jules, I was nurtured and brought up in the deepest solitude, far from the vices and the falsehoods of the world, by the loving woman whom you knew.  Society did justice to her conventional charm, for that is what pleases society; but I knew secretly her precious soul, I could cherish the mother who made my childhood a joy without bitterness, and I knew why I cherished her.  Was not that to love doubly?  Yes, I loved her, I feared her, I respected her; yet nothing oppressed my heart, neither fear nor respect.  I was all in all to her; she was all in all to me.  For nineteen happy years, without a care, my soul, solitary amid the world which muttered round me, reflected only her pure image; my heart beat for her and through her.  I was scrupulously pious; I found pleasure in being innocent before God.  My mother cultivated all noble and self-respecting sentiments in me.  Ah! it gives me happiness to tell you, Jules, that I now know I was indeed a young girl, and that I came to you virgin in heart.

“When I left that absolute solitude, when, for the first time, I braided my hair and crowned it with almond blossoms, when I added, with delight, a few satin knots to my white dress, thinking of the world I was to see, and which I was curious to see—­Jules, that innocent and modest coquetry was done for you!  Yes, as I entered the world, I saw you first of all.  Your face, I remarked it; it stood out from the rest; your person pleased me; your voice, your manners all inspired me with pleasant presentiments.  When you came up, when you spoke to me, the color on your forehead, the tremble in your voice,—­that moment gave me memories with which I throb as I now write to you, as I now, for the last time, think of them.  Our love was at first the keenest of sympathies, but it was soon discovered by each of us and then, as speedily, shared; just as, in after times, we have both equally felt and shared innumerable happinesses.  From that moment my mother was only second in my heart.  Next, I was yours, all yours.  There is my life, and all my life, dear husband.

“And here is what remains for me to tell you.  One evening, a few days before