"My poor Ursula!" replied Maurice, "we must submit to what is inevitable. Hitherto you have concealed from them the loss of their little fortune; tell it to them now, as it can not be helped. Try to regulate their expenditure of the little which remains; for, alas! we shall have nothing to give them." "Go away, and leave them here! Impossible! I tell you, I must work for them!" "Ursula, my Ursula!" said Maurice, pressing both her hands in his, "do not allow yourself, I conjure you, to be carried away by the first impulse of your generous heart. Reflect for a moment: we do not refuse to give, but we have it not. Even living alone, we shall have to endure many privations." "I can not leave them," said Ursula, looking mournfully at the two old people slumbering in their arm-chairs. "Do you not love me, Ursula?" The poor girl only replied by a torrent of tears. Maurice remained long with her, pouring forth protestations of love, and repeating explanations of their actual position. She listened without replying; and at length he took his leave. Left alone, Ursula leaned her head on her hand, and remained without moving for many hours. Alas! the tardy gloom of happiness which brightened her life for a moment was passing away: the blessed dream was fled never to return! Silence, oblivion, darkness, regained possession of that heart whence love had chased them. During the long midnight hours who can tell what passed in the poor girl's mind? God knew: she never spoke of it. When day dawned, she shuddered, closed the window, which had remained open during the night, and, trembling from the chill which seized both mind and body, she took paper and pen, and wrote--"Farewell, Maurice! I remain with my father and my mother: they have need of me. To abandon them in their old age would be to cause their death: they have only me in the world. My sister, on her death-bed, confided them to me, saying, 'We shall meet again, Ursula!' If I neglected my duties, I should never see her more. I have loved you well--I shall love you always. You have been very kind, but I know now that we are too poor to marry. Farewell! How hard to write that word! Farewell, dear friend--I knew that happiness was not for me, URSULA."