through a deluge of
words?" The two friends often indulged the sweet dream of passing
their last years together, preparing; each other for the passage
equally dreaded and desired, advancing arm in arm and heart in heart
towards the unknown. The dream was not destined for fulfilment. But
Madame Swetchine had the great joy of seeing her favorite nephew one
of the Gargarin boys whom she loved so fondly in their childhood
married to Marie Stourdza, the niece and sole heiress of her friend.
The only words we have seen from Roxandra herself are worthy of the
eulogies paid her, and would seem to justify the highest estimate of
her character. She says, "May we all contribute, by our life and our
death, to the great thought of God, the re-establishment of order and
of truth among men!" And again, amid the alarming revolutions that
were shaking all Europe, she says, "We are witnessing the grand
judgment of human pride."

Among the wretched children of misfortune, loved and aided by the
saintly charity of Madame Swetchine, she was especially drawn to the
solacement of deaf mutes. She keenly felt the sadness and danger
consequent on this cruel infirmity. She took, as her own maid, a poor
deaf mute, named Parisse, whose temper was so bad that she was
scarcely tolerated by any one. She found a charm in taking her walks
with this still companion, to whom it was not necessary to speak, and
who was not humiliated in keeping silence. "With Parisse," she said,
"I can believe myself alone, and have a needed arm to support me, and
an aid which does not encroach on my liberty." Thus she loved to
appear the obliged party rather than the benefactress. The haughty
and quarrelsome Parisse often put on the grand airs of an outraged
queen. When the other servants were battling with her, Madame
Swetchine would go among them, and say, "I love you all, but know
that every one shall go before Parisse: she is the most unfortunate,
and much should be excused in her." After enduring almost every
thing, she succeeded, by her imperturbable good-nature and firmness,
in winning the poor girl to a more amiable behavior. Parisse
worshipped her mistress, and had the joy one day of being represented
behind her in the likeness engraved by a celebrated artist. They
became really attached friends. Is it not touchingly instructive thus
to trace the religious ascent of the soul of this noble woman in her
friendships, as they successively stoop from the Czarina Mari