onvey you
again to Paris. Such generous devotion affected me to tears; I thanked
our worthy benefactor, and he went into Mad. Thomas's room. When he had
gone, Mad. Thomas took me aside, and said, that M. Dard's intention was
not only to adopt the wrecks of our family, but he wished also to offer
me his hand as soon as our grief had subsided. This confidence, I own,
displeased me not; for it was delightful for me to think that so
excellent a man, who had already given us such substantial assistance in
our distress, did not think himself degraded by uniting his fate with
that of a poor orphan. I recollected what my father had said to me
during one of our greatest misfortunes. "M. Dard," said that worthy man,
"is an estimable youth, whose attachment for us has never diminished in
spite of our wretchedness; and I am certain he prefers virtue in a wife
above all other riches."

Some days after, our benefactor came to tell us he had disembarked all
his effects, and that he had resumed his functions as director of the
French school at Senegal. We talked a long while together concerning my
father's affairs, and he then left us. However, as one of my brothers
was very ill, he returned in the evening to see how he was. He found us
in tears; for the innocent creature had expired in my arms. M. Dard and
M. Thomas instantly buried him, for his body had already become putrid.
We took great care to conceal his death from his brother, who, having a
mind superior to his age, would doubtless have been greatly affected.
Nevertheless, on the following day, poor Charles inquired where his
brother Gustavus was; M. Dard, who was sitting near his bed, told him he
was at school; but he discovered the cheat, and cried, weeping, that he
wished a hat to go to school, and see if Gustavus was really living. M.
Dard had the kindness to go and purchase him one to quiet him, which,
when he saw, he was satisfied, and waited till the morrow to go and see
if his brother was at school. This young victim to misery dragged out
his melancholy existence during two months; and about the end of October
we had the misfortune of losing him also.

This last blow plunged me into a gloomy melancholy. I was indifferent to
every thing. I had seen, in three months, nearly all my relations die. A
young orphan (Alphonso Fleury), our cousin, aged five years, to whom my
father was tutor, and whom he had always considered as his own child, my
sister Caroline, and myself, we