Volume 5 — Translated from Le Correspondant The Story of A Sister. by Augustin Cochin.

Would you wish to see happiness realized on earth? It reigned in the palace of Simonetti at Rome, in the family of the ambassador of France, in the month of May, 1830. The ambassador was the Count de la Ferronaya. He had been for a long time ambassador in Russia, where his character, his natural gifts, his integrity, had triumphed over the reserve and hauteur of the Emperor Nicholas, who treated him as a friend. He was also the friend of the King of France, who, in 1828, appointed him minister of foreign affairs. Handsome, brilliant, brave, intelligent, he bore in his heart and in his appearance the qualities which constitute the true French gentleman. He had married the niece of the devoted, faithful Duchess of Tourzel, who accompanied the king and queen to Varennes as governess to their children. Three boys and four girls were the result of this happy marriage. This family, endowed with birth, rank, and so many gifts of this world, were united at Rome, under the most beautiful sky, in the most beautiful month of the year, in the sunny brightness of an unclouded existence. The revolution of July, 1830, having wrested the monarchy from the Bourbons, the Ferronays were not unhappy. God had not yet taken everything from them, he had only taken their riches. The father, by his fidelity, had grown in public respect; his sons and daughters had been prepared by a solid education for industry and self-sacrifice. For fifteen years the parents had enjoyed uninterrupted prosperity, but they had not forgotten their days of exile; and when poverty overtook them they met her as an old friend, meekly bowing to the hand from whom all changes come. They went to live in retirement at Castellamare, where their house was the image of their life, a small chamber and a magnificent view, a radiant horizon seen from a narrow dwelling. Soon after we find them at Chiaja, gay, happy, the brothers quitting home for an active life, the sisters loving each other devotedly, gathering flowers in Lady Acton's garden to wear them at the next ball, presented at court, deprived of their fortune, but still happy; tasting the pleasure that we find in traveling, and that we ought to find in the journey of life—the pleasure which consists in admiring ardently what we do process without the vanity of personal possession. However, this delightful life was not exempt from danger: a stranger has too much liberty; he is not subject to the supervision of relatives, friends, neighbors, or rivals, who exercise a control which, though often trying, is more often useful. Diplomatic families, above all, accustomed to be treated with consideration, to form transient acquaintances, passing from court to court, from St. Petersburg to London, from London to Rome, live in a cosmopolitan world, the most delightful, the most amusing, but by far the most dangerous. The family of M. de la Ferronays had not long escaped this danger, which was rendered still more seductive under the charming sky and in the luxurious climate of Italy. However, we do not pretend that this story introduces us to exceptional creatures; this is not a voyage to the country of the angels; we are still upon earth with common mortals. Albert, one of the younger brothers, was the first to perceive the dangers of this too self-indulgent life, and he had the courage to escape from it. He was a brave heart in a frail body; be was capable of making a mistake, but utterly incapable of excusing an unworthy action by an unworthy doctrine. Providence gave him the support of two friends, who drew him at eighteen from the enervating influences which he held in such horror, and the elevating power of whose example transformed the child into a man. Both survived him. M. Rio had been placed in the foreign office by M. de la Ferronays; he refused to change his opinions to please M. Polignac, or to abjure his oath to satisfy M. Guizot. M. de Polignac and M. Guizot, respecting his courage and firmness, had not forsaken him; and making use of his leisure to gratify his tastes as well as to show his gratitude, he begged his old chief to allow him to return to his son the favors that he had received from himself, and to permit him to take Albert to be his companion in that delightful journey among the churches and classical associations of Italy, to which we owe his great work on Christian Art. The other friend, the Count de Montalembert, was younger, his heart was filled with love of the church and of liberty; and devoting himself to their service, with an eloquence and activity which nothing could tire, he arrived in Italy to rejoin MM de Lamennais and Lacordaire. They set out all three for Rome in the month of January, 1832, and nothing appears more rare and more touching than the position of the gifted trio who arrived in the eternal city, the first in search of beauty, the second in pursuit of truth, and the third going unconsciously to encounter the pure love of his life. At St. Petersburg M. de la Ferronays had become acquainted with the family of the Count d'Alopeus, Russian minister at Berlin, whose daughter, Alexandrine, was much attached to Albert's sisters. After the death of her husband, in 1831, the Countess d'Alopeus came to Rome, and the young people met for the first time on the 1st of January, 1832.

We must read in Le Recit d'une Soeur, or rather in the story of Alexandrine, a journal which begins at this date, the origin, the progress, the incidents, and the development of the pure, innocent love of Alexandrine and Albert de Ferronays; those conversations which touch so deeply the heart; the friendship which changes into a warmer sentiment the name of brother which no longer satisfies; and at last the words "I love you" whispered on the steps of St. Peter's one beautiful evening in spring. A journey to Naples united the two families at Vomero, in the pretty villa of Trecase. We passed the greatest parts of our evenings on the terrace. Everything was enchanting; the two gulfs, the shores, Vesuvius, the sky gleaming with stars, the air breathing perfume above all to love—to love, yet to be able to speak of God. Delightful and innocent hours, who would wish to efface you from these pages, and who would wish not to have known your happiness!

But I hear stern voices cry out in alarm, lest this book should fall into the hands of young girls. "This book," they say, "is not written for them." Is it then necessary because we are Christians, to cast down our eyes and blush, when we hear those sacred words: Reason, love, liberty? What would life be without these words? Ah! you may allow your daughters' eyes, without fear, to wander over these brilliant pages, if they will only turn the leaves, and read to the end, to learn the uncertainty of human hope, the length of human suffering, the gentle consolations of faith, and the beauty of this holy union of tenderness and purity, under the protection of God.

In the month of November, it was thought better that Albert and Alexandrine should separate. They were engaged, but one was without fortune, the other was a Protestant. Their friends wished them to reflect, to try the strength of their attachment. It was absence without pain, full of hope. After three months Albert came back. The same family life recommenced, full of little home scenes; naïve, tender, sweet. This continued for three more months, short but happy, sunny days without clouds; and doubtless the beauty of nature, the enchantment of an innocent affection, the presence of God, formed a paradise around and above them.

"On Holy Thursday," wrote Alexandrine, "my mother allowed me to go with my friends, to Tenebrae at the chapel of the palace, to hear the charming music. In spite of my frivolity, the beautiful chapel, the singing, and above all, perhaps, the happiness of praying with Albert, inspired me to such a degree, that I prayed with gentleness and recollection. I was pleased to have the air of a Catholic. M. de La Ferronays took us there, and the return on foot was delightful. It was bright moonlight, and the air was heavy with the perfumes of spring. We went into several churches to pray before the holy tomb. Albert and I threw ourselves upon our knees, one besides the other, on the pavement of the church. I remember that I felt an indescribable calm; and I don't know what I asked from God, but I felt that we both implored his protection for us, and that, we felt it realized." The two families separated on the 30th of April. Alexandrine went with her mother to Germany, Madame de Ferronays took her two oldest daughters and Albert to France, and their father placed the two youngest in the convent de la Trinité du Mont at Rome. They left Naples together, but separated at Civita Vecchia. Albert not feeling well, his father kept him with him; leaving him at the inn, while he took his wife and children to the wharf for embarkation. He embraced them, following with his eyes the receding vessel, sending kisses from afar to the fast-fading shadows; and then when the last faint smoke of the steamer disappears in the circle of the horizon, he sighs, oppressed with a weight to which all are familiar, the heavy weight of loneliness which is inseparable from farewell words to those we love. He returned silently and sadly to the inn, where a frightful spectacle met his eyes. Albert is dying! They are bleeding him; one moment later he would be dead. It is necessary to read for oneself in his own words, the letters of a father to a mother. A father alone, a stranger in an inn, beside the deathbed of his child. "We were kept in an agony of suspense from three o'clock until seven. At seven the perspiration which, until then, had resisted all our efforts, this welcome perspiration showed itself, and became excessive. O my friend! with what faith, with what fervor of gratitude, I thanked heaven! How everything changes its nature and aspect when we nurse an invalid whom we love! The physicians say that this dreadful crisis will re-establish his health. He is saved! O my God! I Frank thee! for today I can feel only joy. O all you who are loved by heaven! give thanks for me, and ask God to smite me, but to spare my poor children." During this time Mademoiselle Alopeus had arrived in Rome, and was once more amid the scenes and associates where she first met Albert, when she learned that, instead of returning to France, he was dying at Civita Vecchia. In despair, she wrote to him, and wished to fly to him; she could not do so, and she quitted Rome without seeing him, feeling that he was only more dear to her because she had so nearly lost him. "At Viterbo," she writes, "where we slept, I heard them speak of the death of a young man, whose body was exposed in the neighboring church; this distressed me. I could not bear to hear anything that reminded me that Albert could die."

Eugenie To Alexandrine.

"I pray for you, for you and Pauline, for Pauline and you. I do not mention Albert. Albert is comprehended in you; it is the same prayer. God has loved him; God has spared him. God will bless him, and to bless him is to bless you. With what fervor have I repeated my favorite prayer that God would take my share of happiness and unite it to yours, that you may have a double portion. This desire realized would insure my bliss." In order that nothing might be wanting in this union of noble souls, Albert, just convalescent, writes to his friends, Montalembert and Rio, letters full of energy and confidence. Calm and serenity succeeded to this anxiety and disquiet. We find the two families united at Rome in September, 1833, where the young sister, Olga, makes her first communion. They then went to Naples, where Albert met them, looking so well that his health had never seemed so perfectly established. It was Alexandrine's health which, at this time, gave them cause for anxiety. Her mind was distressed, though she did her best to conceal her trouble. Her mother had not failed during their travels in Germany to represent to her Albert's bad health and his poverty. Happily he had recovered his health, but he was still poor. I do not know what prudent parents will say, but I agree with Monsieur de la Ferronays, who wrote thus to his wife: "They will be poor, but they will be truly happy. I have neither the courage nor the wish to oppose them; you will not be more cruel than I am." Alexandrine was still suffering. She was lying sadly on the sofa one evening at twilight, when her sister came to her, and told her that her wishes were realized; that she might look upon Albert as her future husband. These joyful tidings worked her cure—happiness is the best medicine. The marriage of Monsieur and Madame Albert de la Ferronays was preceded by that of the Countess d'Alopeus with the Prince Paul Lepoukhyn. Many dreary months of waiting elapsed, but I will not resume the letters at this period—one word is sufficient. Lovers are always permitted to repeat the same things. It was at this time that the sad revolt of M. de Lamennais took place, and Albert causelessly, but nobly anxious, writes thus to his friend: "Let us throw ourselves at the foot of the cross, which is the foundation of the church, not to undermine her, but to support and defend her; but, above all, I pray you do not commit yourself to M. de Lamennais. You know the happiness which is to be mine in the spring; but I will postpone it and fly to you if you wish me to do so." To these enthusiastic words his friend replied: "There is not a word in your letter which does not accord with all I have thought and desired. I used every effort to induce M. de Lamennais to do as I have done—to bow to the inscrutable dispensations of providence; and humbly, and with docility, to await the will of heaven." But we must leave the two friends to return to the preparations for the marriage, which was at last celebrated on the 17th of April, 1834. In the evening a carriage took Albert and Alexandrine to Castellamare. They were handsome, talented, good, and happy, and they loved.

Blissful dream! which as yet knew no awakening. If we could judge of life by outward appearances, we would believe that these bright anticipations would last for ever. All the family rejoined the newly married couple at Castellamare. "A staircase, embowered by vines and roses, led to the pretty house, the ground floor of which, occupied by Albert and Alexandrine, opened by large windows into the garden. Charles and Emma occupied the first floor; my parents, Fernand, my sisters and myself the second, and at each story these terraces communicated by outside staircases. We were always in communication by these terraces, and were only too glad of an excuse to be together, for never was a family more perfectly, more happily united." The sister who painted this little picture, which seems bathed in sunlight, added to the happiness of all during this pleasant summer, by her marriage; and her younger sister, Eugenie, melancholy and enthusiastic, overpowered with happiness, exclaimed, "Oh! if life is so delightful, what must be the joy of heaven; death is then better than all!" From Castellamare they went to Sorrento, thence to Rome, then to Pisa, where they spent the winter, and where they were joined by their faithful friend, like themselves young, intelligent, and amiable. "You can imagine," wrote Albert to his sister, "that he does not render our life less charming." "He left us in tears," writes Alexandrine. This friend was the Count de Montalembert. From Pisa M. and Madame de la Ferronays embarked for Naples in the month of March, and thence a month later for Malta, en route for the east. This journey was full of amusing and piquant little incidents. Friendship and affection followed them wherever they went. What delight to visit Castellamare, Sorrento, Pisa, Naples, Malta, Smyrna, Constantinople, Odessa, Vienna, Venice, at twenty years of age with hearts full of love! "The dim light of my lamp falling on her dear head—is not this worth all the world?" writes Albert. Alexandrine was filled with enthusiasm on returning to Italy. "O dear Italy!" she cries, "I return to thee for the ninetieth time, and always with renewed pleasure." But alas! this journey, made under these happy auspices, resembled the course of the inhabitant of the seas whom the harpoon of the fisherman has wounded, and who plunges and escapes in agitation and affright, carrying the iron in his side. The health of Albert and the religion of Alexandrine were the two poisons hidden under this smiling exterior. Ten days after his marriage, Albert in putting his handkerchief to his mouth, drew it away covered with blood. At Pisa he was better, at Constantinople quite well, at Rouen he was at death's-door. At Venice he was again better, and the husband and wife went together to Lido.

While the wife was disturbed for the health of her husband, he was trembling for more important interests. From the commencement of their love, Albert's most ardent desire had been to see Alexandrine kneel at the same altar, and practice the same faith, as himself. This hope seemed sure of realization when they married, for God was ever with them in their happiest hours; since their marriage a feeling of delicacy had kept them silent on the great subjects of conversion. Albert did not wish that Alexandrine should be constrained by her affection for him, and she feared for herself the same powerful influence. She was not willing to sacrifice her reason to the dictates of her heart, and dreading the displeasure of her mother, she dreaded still more the censures of conscience. She desired to submit to conviction, and to resist the pleadings of her love. We recognize here the transparent sincerity of a character of which Albert said truly, "I never saw in her the slightest affectation."

Thus Albert's health and Alexandrine's religion agitated them both with a constant, silent anxiety, which introduces something tragical and sorrowful into their history. Being prevented by his health from devoting himself to the service of his country and his church, Albert had concentrated all his desires on the establishment of truth in the heart dearest to him. Nothing could be more touching than Alexandrine's care for Albert's health. The charming Swede, the graceful daughter of the North, the belle of the Neapolitan fêtes, was transformed into the attentive nurse, hiding her fears, and accepting disagreeable duties. Shut up in a sick room, closing with her delicate fingers the curtains, while Albert was asleep, weeping while he slept, and, smiling when he woke. At this cruel moment hope is absent; sorrow extends still more and more her heavy icy hand over this hitherto so happy pair. Albert, at Venice, became so ill that they sent for his family. They come, they see him, he is dying, but he is consumed with an irresistible desire to revisit his country. They set out in a carriage at short journeys. They leave Venice the 10th of April, and arrive in Paris on the 11th of May. On the 26th Albert is established 13 Rue de Madame, in a hired room near the Luxembourg. He is a little better and much happier, for he is in France, surrounded by his friends. They are young, they are good, they are happy—why then, death, sickness, and the crushing sorrow of approaching separation? Why all this anguish at once—conversion refused to the prayers of Albert—recovery refused to the tears of Alexandrine? O God! where art thou? Thou art absent when they all wait for thee. Thou wert the witness of their innocent love, the author of their union. Thou wert with them when they were happy, and now they suffer, they cry, and thou dost not hear, and yet they have had days of perfect happiness and a youth without clouds. Thou didst create them. Thou hast forsaken them.

Thou permittest that they should be afflicted, and when they cry, thou wilt not answer. Why didst thou say by thy prophet, "Before they call I will answer. As they are yet speaking, I will hear." Thy promises but add to their sufferings the pain of disappointed hope. O God! where art thou? With their hearts wrung by the same sorrow, the disciples were walking on the road to Emmaus, when meeting a stranger they confided to him their trouble. "We hoped that it was he who would have redeemed Israel, and to-day is the third day since these things were done." They did not know that God was present, though hidden from them in the silence of the little chamber, where these poor Jews, who represent too well our patience so soon exhausted, and our unworthy dejection, were sadly assembled together. Suddenly their hearts awoke and they recognized in the breaking of bread this ever-present God who gives himself to us as the pledge of future immortality. The miracle of the little cottage of Emmaus is enacted every day, and was visible at the death-bed of Albert de La Ferronays. Already at Venice, during the night of the 6th of March, Albert appeared oppressed in his sleep, and Alexandrine, overwhelmed by the agony of the coming separation, watched by his bed. "At half-past five," she writes, "the color left his lips, he spoke with effort and desired me to send for his confessor. 'Has it come to this? Has it come to this?' I cried; then I added at the same moment, 'now I am a Catholic.' In pronouncing these words, firmness, if not happiness, filled my heart." On the 14th of March she wrote to her mother a truly sublime letter, which I will quote at length. "From love and respect to you, my mother, I have not inquired into the claims of the Catholic religion for fear that I should find it true, and I should be forced to embrace it. But now I am possessed with an irresistible desire to belong to the same faith as my Albert. At no price, however, not even to soften the death-bed of my husband, would I act disloyally toward God. Be assured, I shall not act without conviction. Dear mother, allow me to be instructed, and when you meet again your poor widowed daughter, ah! you will not repine at her being a Catholic. If the Catholic Church had no other advantage over ours than that she prays for the dead, I should prefer her." On his side Albert, with his dying hand, traced in his journal these words, which were his last: "O Lord! I implored thee by day and by night, Give her to me, grant me this joy if it only lasts for one day. Thou heardest me, O God! why should I complain. My happiness was complete, if it was short, and now thou hast granted the rest of my prayers, and my dear one is about to enter the bosom of the church, thus giving me the assurance that I shall see her again in that happy home where we shall both be lost in the beatific vision of thy boundless love." On the 27th of May, 1836, Madame de Ferronays knelt before an altar, arranged in her husband's room, on which the Abbé Martin de Mourien celebrated mass, and made her profession of the Catholic faith. On the night of the 5th or 7th of June, she received her first communion at the same mass where Albert received his last. I will describe this pathetic scene in the words of Alexandrine herself. "Albert was in bed, be had not been able to rise. I knelt beside him, I took his hand, it was thus that we commenced the mass of Abbé Gerbert. As the mass advanced, Albert made me let fall his hand, this dear hand that was to me so sacred that in the most solemn hour of life I felt that I did not offend God in retaining it. Albert drew it from me, exclaiming, 'Go, go, belong only to God.' The Abbé Gerbert addressed a few words to me before giving me communion, then be gave it to Albert, then again I took his beloved hand; we expected every moment would be his last." No book could contain, no imagination could depict a scene more tenderly, more profoundly pathetic. At this point we read no more, we weep; it is to thee, O God! that the soul turns, to thee that the soul ascends, to thee who truly and really wert present in his chamber of suffering, walking so to speak on the waves of death, and saying, "Fear not, I am with thee." O my Protestant brethren: it is to you that this page seems to be dedicated; it is you who have formed the character of this young girl; it is to you that she owes the habit of living in the presence of God, to you she owes the loyalty, the perfect sincerity of her intentions and the zeal with which she purifies her conscience; at each moment guarding it as a stainless mirror which must ever reflect the image of God. She followed you on the road to Emmaus, where Jesus explained to his disciples the sacred Scriptures; but like the disciples she has thrown down the book, it could not satisfy her; she has followed God to his holy table. By the bed of death, on the edge of the yawning abyss of irreparable separation, hymns and words disappear like useless sounds and barren discourses. Famished for hope and for consolation, the soul has need of stronger food. She must tear down the veil, and lay hold of God. O my Protestant brethren! read this history of a Christian, who was yours until the moment when stretching out her despairing hands toward nothingness, she came to us to be united in God with her dying husband. Read the sad but striking description of the days that follow the first communion. It is to you that I would dedicate the story of this sublime agony, accompanied so tenderly by the church to the last sigh of the passing soul.

On the 27th of June, after two years of married life, at twenty-two years of age, Albert returned to God!

Is not this sad enough? Why should we continue after such scenes? What new spectacle can move us? We have known the bride, the wife. We are going to follow the widow; to follow her from the extremity of human sorrow, to consolation, even to joy and love, reformed again in God. The only difference between the widow of India burned in the ashes of her husband and the Christian widow, is that the Christian is consumed more slowly. She waits for death, instead of seeking it; from the first day of bereavement an invisible fire, which nothing can extinguish, saps the spring of her life.

The first moments are the most cruel, but they are not the hardest to endure; when one can say yesterday, the day before yesterday, it is only absence, it is not the abyss of an irreparable adieu.

"Pauline—Pauline! I could have written to you on the 29th of June, had I not been occupied with other things. I repeat, I could have done it. God has given me the power to do and to endure much far beyond all I ever believed possible, for have I not seen the eyes of Albert close in death? have I not felt his hand grow cold for ever? Eugenie will tell you that God has granted me that which I asked of him. He died resting in my arms, my hand in his. Alone, and very quietly, I closed his dear eyes, deprived of sight, and perhaps of feeling. I whispered close into his ear the name so beloved, Albert! I had nothing more tender to say to him than this word which expressed everything I felt. I wished that the last sound which should fall upon his ear should be my voice, growing fainter and fainter until it was lost in the distance and darkness of that gloomy passage, which leads at last into the light. Alas! my voice, like myself, was obliged to remain on the confines, obliged for the first time to be separated from him. O Pauline! I was strong then, unnaturally strong. I was still stronger for three days, then I commenced to grow weaker and weaker, and each morning I seemed feebler than the night before."

This estimable widow of twenty years, always ardent and always perfectly natural, expresses a truth even in her first sensations. Little by little sorrow intensifies, courage fails, despair commences. The sympathy of friends, which had until then a little occupied, distracted, and deadened the pain, without healing it, becomes colder and more distant, and the soul is enveloped in the icy shades of silence and solitude.

Alexandrine to Pauline.

"To tell me at my age that all happiness is passed, that makes me shudder, and yet my only rest will be to feel entirely inconsolable, for I should loathe myself if I felt that I could again enjoy the amusements of life, or look upon the world otherwise than I do now. Albert was to me the light which colored everything. With him pearls, jewels, pretty rooms, beautiful scenery, appeared to me lovely. Now, nothing charms me. I have but one wish, to know where he is. To see if he is happy, if he loves me still; to share all things with him now as I promised to do on earth before God."

Yes, the faithful widow sees nothing, she is ever with the absent; it is not he who is dead, it is the world which has gone from her, which is shrouded in darkness. But in the long weary hours, when she listens to the plaintive murmurings of her own heart, the Christian widow hears another voice of heavenly music, and angels whisper in her ear those gentle words, "Blessed are those who weep, for they shall be comforted." "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God." It is not only in heaven that pure hearts see God, they see him everywhere on earth, in all objects, in all creatures—in all events they recognize him, they contemplate him. An unexpected brightness is introduced little by little into this desolate life. The world is colored anew; obscured by sorrow, it is transfigured by faith.

She who is afflicted is not consoled, she is accepted, supported; from this day a miracle commences. She whose affections have been riven, seeks to love again in making friends for him whom she has lost, in interesting for him the saints whom she invokes, the poor whom she assists. Some days after the death of Albert, Alexandrine sold a beautiful pearl collar, a relic of happy days, and she wrote:

The love of the poor became for this young Christian a sublime consolation—the love of Jesus Christ in the persons of the poor—the love of the poor in the thought of Albert. To love the unhappy when we are unhappy is an exquisite sign of perfection in our poor human nature, but a sign happily very common. Is it not much more difficult when we suffer to love the happy—not to be impatient of their pleasures, to lend ourselves to them, and though our own hearts are for ever shut against joy, to be able to rejoice with those who rejoice? Le Récit d'une Soeur shows us the Christian widow in the midst of her family, among her young sisters and brothers, smiling, amiable, communicating, no doubt, by her presence to the pleasures of the house the tinge of melancholy which ever belongs to the joys or earth.

The commencement of the second volume of Madame Craven's history is occupied with the tableau of the interior of her family, who were united at the Chateau of Boury during the years 1836, '37, and '38, which followed the death of M. Albert de la Ferronays. Obliged, by the diplomatic career of her husband, to change frequently her residence—to go from Naples to Lisbon, to London, to Carlsruhe, to Brussels—Madame Craven was almost always separated from her parents and her sisters. To this separation we owe the correspondence which serves today to interest and console us.

The description of the interior of the Chateau de Boury, depicted in these letters, resembles a conversation, where each speaks in his turn and with his own peculiar accent. But I will pass over this family picture to return to Madame Albert de la Ferronays, the principal character in my story.

In the month of October, 1837, they removed the body of Albert to Boury, in order to bury it in a sepulchre, where they had arranged two places without separation.

"Yesterday, alone with Julia, by the aid or a little ladder, Alexandrine descended into the excavation in order to touch and to kiss, for the last time, the coffin in which is enclosed all that she loves. In doing this she was on her knees in her own tomb. On the stone she had engraved: 'What God hath put together, let no man put asunder.'"

In 1838 she rejoined her mother in Germany, where she spent the second anniversary of the 29th of June. From Ischl she wrote to her sister a touching description of the death of a young priest, who died of consumption eleven months after his ordination. From Germany Madame de la Ferronays went to Lumigny, from thence to Boury; and when the family resolved to pass the winter of 1839 in Italy, she returned with a sad delight to this beautiful country, where she had been so happy. She wished to revisit all the scenes of her past happiness—to see again the rocks, the trees, the mountains, which had been witnesses of her felicity—not without tears, but without complaining; with the sweet serenity of perfect resignation. "It is here," she said, "that I have been so full of bliss that this world and life appeared too beautiful." After the description of the second journey to Italy, there follows the account of the successive deaths of M. de la Ferronays and the young daughters, Olga and Eugenie. At this time, always absolutely sincere, incapable in anything of being carried away by feeling, Alexandrine thought of entering a convent; she relinquished the idea, but resolved to live in poverty for the poor. From this day she dreams no more, she writes no more, she acts. Her love expresses itself in joyous accents, in words of heavenly sweetness, accompanied by austere virtues. It is the miracle and the triumph of true piety, What is this? demands a disdainful world. Who is this devotee, draped in black, who ventures out in the most inclement season, laden with bundles? Has she paralyzed her heart? Does she love no one? Is she a piece of mechanism, passing from the dreary garret to the dark cellar in the poor neighborhood which surrounds her? No; this widow is a great lady, bearing one of the oldest names of France. She is going to visit the dying, to supply them with clothes and food, to teach their ignorant children; and on her return she takes her pen, and from this heart, which you believe cold and frozen, flow forth these words: "O my dear sister! can I fill you with joy and courage in writing? Would that it were in my power; you do not know how I love you, but you will know in eternity, where we shall enjoy each other's love fully and completely."

This devotee paid a visit to another devotee, an old Russian lady, of whom she writes: "I have seen Madame Swetchine; this delightful, excellent woman told me that we ought not to speak ill of life, for it is full of beauty; and yet this woman, so tender and so pious, is overwhelmed with moral and physical suffering. She said to me, 'I love what is, because it is true; I am contented.' The longer I live the more I wish to have my heart filled with love, and only with love." Of all Alexandrine's former pleasures, the sole relaxations she permitted herself were music and reading. Part of her time she spent in Paris in the hospitals, which she entered with the joyous, animated air of a young girl who sets out for a fête, or a warrior who returns from battle. She ended by hiring a little room in the Rue de Sèvres in order to live more plainly. Her sisters, in looking into her wardrobe, found that it contained nothing. She had robbed herself to give to the poor. This noble woman had but one cause —the cause of God. She became the generous servant, almost the soldier of the church, interesting herself in the cause of freedom, contributing to foreign missions, seconding the educational projects of her friend, M. de Montalembert; and, from the quiet of her little chamber, giving forth her money and her prayers for the service of God. Madame Craven, in a letter, dated the 31st of July, thus writes: "The evening of my departure from Boury we went into the cemetery to pray. Alexandrine knelt beside Albert's tomb, on the spot which, twelve years before, had been prepared for herself. I was on my knees, by Olga. The night was warm and beautiful. As we strolled slowly home, I turned and admired the setting sun, which was embellishing, with its many colored rays, this sad spot. 'I love the setting sun,' I exclaimed. 'Since my sorrow,' replied Alexandrine, 'the setting sun makes me sad. It is the precursor of night. I do not like the night. I love the morning and the spring—they bring before me the reality of life that never ends. Night represents to me darkness and sin; evening the transitory nature of the world; but morning and spring give me promise of the resurrection and renewal of all things.' As we continued our walk, Alexandrine said: 'Rest assured that all that pleases us most upon earth is but a shadow; that the reality is alone in heaven. What is there upon earth so sweet as to love? And I ask you if it is not easy to conceive that the love of the divine love ought to be the perfection of this sweetness?—and is not this the love of Jesus Christ? I should never have been comforted if I had not learnt that this love exists for God, and is everlasting.' I replied, 'You are very happy so to love God.' She answered me—and her words, her expression, her attitude will remain ever engraved on my memory—'O Pauline! should I not love God? should I not be transported with joy when I think of him? How can you imagine there is any merit in this, even that of faith, when I think of the miracle that he has wrought in my soul? I loved, and desired the joy of earth—it was given to me. I lost it, and I was overwhelmed with despair. Yet, to-day my soul is so transformed that all the happiness I have ever known pales and grows dim in comparison with the felicity with which God has filled my soul.' Surprised to hear her speak thus, I said: 'If you had offered to you a long life to be spent with Albert, would you accept it?' She replied, without hesitation. 'I would not take it.' This was our last conversation, and as I saw her then I see her now, with a flower of jessamine in her hand, her face lighted up with heavenly beauty; and so she will ever appear to me until I meet her again where there will be no more parting.' Alexandrine died some months after, on the 9th of February, 1848.

If the angels could die, they would die as she did. Her last words to Albert's mother were: "Tell Pauline it is so sweet to die."

On the 14th of November of the same year, Madame de la Ferronays rejoined her husband, her son, and her three daughters. On the tombs of Albert, Alexandrine, Olga, and Eugenie, and of their father and mother, one single epitaph is necessary. It comprehends their life; it is the epitome of their faith; it is the conclusion, the explanation, the design of this book: "Love is stronger than death."