aunt, I write to you the first moment, as, next to my father and
mother, no person in the world feels so much interest in all that
concerns me. I need not tell you that my father,

"Such in this moment as in all the past,"

is kindness itself--kindness far superior to what I deserve, but I
am grateful for it.

A few days later she writes to her cousin:--

I take it for granted, my dear friend, that you have by this time
seen a letter I wrote a few days ago to my aunt. To you, as to
her, every thought of my mind is open. I persist in refusing to
leave my country and friends to live at the court of Stockholm. And
he tells me (of course) that there is nothing he would not
sacrifice for me except his duty; he has been all his life in the
service of the King of Sweden, has places under him, and is
actually employed in collecting information for a large political
establishment. He thinks himself bound in honor to finish what he
has begun. He says he should not fear the ridicule or blame that
would be thrown upon him by his countrymen for quitting his country
at his age, but that he would despise himself if he abandoned his
duty for any passion. This is all very reasonable, but reasonable
for him only, not for me, and I have never felt anything for him
but esteem and gratitude.

Mrs. Edgeworth supplements these letters in the unpublished memoir of
her stepdaughter, which she wrote for her family and nearest friends.
She says:--

Even after her return to Edgeworthstown it was long before Maria
recovered the elasticity of her mind. She exerted all her powers of
self-command, and turned her attention to everything which her
father suggested for her to write. But _Leonora_, which she began
immediately after our return home, was written with the hope of
pleasing the Chevalier Edelcrantz; it was written in a style which
he liked, and the idea of what he would think of it was, I believe,
present to her in every page she wrote. She never heard that he had
even read it. From the time they parted at Paris there was no sort
of communication between them; and beyond the chance which brought
us sometimes into company with travellers who had been in Sweden,
or the casual mention of M. Edelcrantz in the newspapers or the
scientific journals, we never heard more of one