A packet of letters in a female hand, with a French post-mark, was eagerly opened by the cousins, and contained a number of long and confidential letters from a Marguerite de Vericourt, which extended over a number of years, and stopped at the year when Jane and Elsie came to live with their uncle.  Jane’s knowledge of French was better than her cousin’s, and the sight of the words “Le PAUVRE Francois” arrested her attention in the first she opened.  “We have come to something at last,” said she, and she translated the passage, “’I am glad to hear that the poor Francis is doing so well at school—­surely you must learn to love him a little now.  My Arnauld grows very intelligent; and Clemence, with no teaching but my own, makes rapid progress.’  That is all; your name is not mentioned again in this letter.  We must go on to the next.”

Letter after letter was glanced over, and then translated, because though there was little mention of the poor Francis, but such a short allusion to something Mr. Hogarth had written about him as was found in the first letter, there was much that was very interesting in them all.  They were written with that curious mixture of friendship and love, so natural and easy to Frenchwomen, and so difficult to Englishwomen.  Madame de Vericourt appeared to be a widow with two children, a boy and girl.  Her letters showed her to be a capable and cultivated woman, passionately attached to her children, living much in society for part of the year in Paris, but spending the summer in a country chateau, where she became a child again with the little ones.  She wrote about her affairs, and her children’s, as if she were in the habit of transacting business, and thoroughly understood it, and as if she knew Mr. Hogarth’s whole history and circumstances, and took a very affectionate interest in them.  She reminded him frequently of conversations they had had together, of long walks and excursions they had taken in company; her children sent messages to her good friend, and she took notice of expressions in his letters which had pleased or disappointed her.

For herself, she had been unhappily married when extremely young; but before the correspondence had begun she had been for some years a widow, and she was fully aware of the position of Mr. Hogarth.  The most interesting letter of all was the last, which appeared to have been written in answer to his, telling of his resolution to adopt his sister’s children; and she seemed very much delighted at the idea.

“Since you say that you cannot bring yourself to love the poor Francis, whom, nevertheless, my heart yearns after, and of whom I love to hear even the meagre details you give to me, I rejoice, my friend, that you have made a home for your sister’s sweet little girls.  You must have something to love.  Ah! to me my Arnauld and my Clemence brought unspeakable comfort.  I do not think of them as Philippe de Vericourt’s children; they are the children whom