y by remaining in France; and that, after all, in
the colony where she had taken refuge, none but the idle failed to
grow rich. Having thus censured her niece, she concluded by eulogizing
herself. To avoid, she said, the almost inevitable evils of marriage,
she had determined to remain single. In fact, as she was of a very
ambitious disposition she had resolved to marry none but a man of
high rank; but although she was very rich, her fortune was not found
a sufficient bribe, even at court, to counterbalance the malignant
dispositions of her mind, and the disagreeable qualities of her person.

After mature deliberations, she added, in a postscript, that she had
strongly recommended her niece to Monsieur de la Bourdonnais. This she
had indeed done, but in a manner of late too common which renders a
patron perhaps even more to be feared than a declared enemy; for, in
order to justify herself for her harshness, she had cruelly slandered
her niece, while she affected to pity her misfortunes.

Madame de la Tour, whom no unprejudiced person could have seen without
feelings of sympathy and respect, was received with the utmost coolness
by Monsieur de la Bourdonnais, biased as he was against her. When she
painted to him her own situation and that of her child, he replied in
abrupt sentences,--"We shall see what can be done--there are so many to
relieve--all in good time--why did you displease your aunt?--you have
been much to blame."

Madame de la Tour returned to her cottage, her heart torn with grief,
and filled with all the bitterness of disappointment. When she
arrived, she threw her aunt's letter on the table, and exclaimed to her
friend,--"There is the fruit of eleven years of patient expectation!"
Madame de la Tour being the only person in the little circle who could
read, she again took up the letter, and read it aloud. Scarcely had
she finished, when Margaret exclaimed, "What have we to do with your
relations? Has God then forsaken us? He only is our father! Have we not
hitherto been happy? Why then this regret? You have no courage."
Seeing Madame de la Tour in tears, she threw herself upon her neck,
and pressing her in her arms,--"My dear friend!" cried she, "my dear
friend!"--but her emotion choked her utterance. At this sight Virginia
burst into tears, and pressed her mother's and Margaret's hand
alternately to her lips and heart; while Paul, his eyes inflamed with
anger, cried, clasped his hands together, and stam