“At these words my heart revived, and, with the mobility of the savage, I passed suddenly from an excess of fear to an excess of confidence, from which, however, Atala soon aroused me. Shaking her head sadly, she made us a sign to approach her couch. “‘My father,’ she said, in a weak voice, addressing herself to the hermit, ‘I am upon the point of death. O Chactas! listen without despair to the fatal secret I had concealed from you in order not to make you too miserable, and out of obedience to my mother. Try not to interrupt me by any marks of grief, which would shorten the few moments I have to live. I have many things to tell of, and from the beatings of my heart, which slacken--I do not know what icy burden presses within my bosom--I feel that I cannot make too much haste!’ “After a short silence, Atala continued thus:-- “‘My sad destiny began almost before I had seen the light. My mother had conceived me in misfortune. I wearied her bosom, and she brought me into the world with such painful difficulty that my life was despaired of. To save me, my mother made a vow. She promised the Queen of Angels that I should consecrate myself to an unwedded life if I escaped from death. That fatal vow is now hurrying me to the tomb! “‘I was entering upon my sixteenth year when I lost my mother. Some hours before her death she called me to her bedside. “My daughter,” she said, in the presence of the missionary who was consoling her last moments, “you know the vow I made for you. Would you belie your mother? O my Atala, I am leaving you in a world that is not worthy of possessing a Christian--in the midst of idolators who persecute the God of your father and of your mother, the God who, after having given you life, has preserved it to you by a miracle. Ah, my dear child, by accepting the virgin’s veil, you only renounce the cares of the cabin and the fatal passions which have tormented your mother’s breast! Come, then, my well-beloved, come; swear upon this image of the Saviour’s Mother, held by the hands of this holy priest and of your dying parent, that you will not betray me in the face of heaven. Remember what I promised for you in order to save your life, and that, if you do not keep my promise, you will plunge your mother’s soul into eternal tortures.”