whom I love as a father and also as a friend. I
must now tell you the painful objections which he has made to me, and
which must be to you my answer.

Monsieur le vicomte, I am a poor girl, whose fortune depends entirely,
not only on my godfather's good-will, but also on the doubtful success
of the measures he may take to elude the schemes of his relatives
against me. Though I am the legitimate daughter of Joseph Mirouet,
band-master of the 45th regiment of infantry, my father himself was my
godfather's natural half-brother; and therefore these relatives may,
though without reason, being a suit against a young girl who would be
defenceless. You see, monsieur, that the smallness of my fortune is not
my greatest misfortune. I have many things to make me humble. It is for
your sake, and not for my own, that I lay before you these facts, which
to loving and devoted hearts are sometimes of little weight. But I beg
you to consider, monsieur, that if I did not submit them to you, I might
be suspected of leading your tenderness to overlook obstacles which the
world, and more especially your mother, regard as insuperable.

I shall be sixteen in four months. Perhaps you will admit that we are
both too young and too inexperienced to understand the miseries of a
life entered upon without other fortune than that I have received
from the kindness of the late Monsieur de Jordy. My godfather desires,
moreover, not to marry me until I am twenty. Who knows what fate may
have in store for you in four years, the finest years of your life? do
not sacrifice them to a poor girl.

Having thus explained to you, monsieur, the opinions of my dear
godfather, who, far from opposing my happiness, seeks to contribute to
it in every way, and earnestly desires that his protection, which must
soon fail me, may be replaced by a tenderness equal to his own; there
remains only to tell you how touched I am by your offer and by the
compliments which accompany it. The prudence which dictates my letter
is that of an old man to whom life is well-known; but the gratitude I
express is that of a young girl, in whose soul no other sentiment has
arisen.

Therefore, monsieur, I can sign myself, in all sincerity,

Your servant, Ursula Mirouet.

Savinien made no reply. Was he trying to soften his mother? Had this
letter put an end to his love? Many such questions, all insoluble,
tormented poor Ursula, and, by repercussion, the doctor too, who
suffered from ev