reason. If anyone looked at me, I thought they knew my secret, and was ready to scream with horror. The gallop of a horse made me tremble and think I was overtaken, and my emotion would have betrayed me had the passengers been interested in watching my movements. Every unknown person I suspected as an enemy, and the remembrance of those hours of my life is still so vivid that they even now fill me with horror. However, I arrived at Clermont without accident, and remained there long enough to inform myself of the chances of being able to find a small house to let, in the neighborhood of the baths of Mount Dore. Here the first years of thy life were passed, and no remarkable event has ever troubled our happy solitude. What I have most dreaded was that I might have to return to the world, but God spares me this; he will take me soon. Thou canst now judge of my anguish at the thought of being separated from thee, and the desolation of my soul, that I know will soon leave thee alone in the world. O my child! in this hour, when my love redoubles its strength and struggles against death to enjoy some moments more of thy sweet society, I weep bitterly at the loneliness I have made for thee. I may, perhaps, exaggerate my wrongs; I may have acted badly; but when the moment comes when I will appear before my sovereign Judge, to render an account for all my actions, if I reproach myself with voluntarily throwing off the yoke which weighed me down, I will say also, with the same frankness, that I rejoice to have raised thee far from the world's corruptions and would rather leave thee alone in life than surrounded by wicked men. {73} I have tried to instil good principles into thy mind, and I know that thou fearest and lovest God and will cherish my memory, and the heart is the talisman that will preserve thee from evil. I have the firm conviction that thou wilt never forget the sublime teachings of religion, and that it will ever guide thee in the right way. Pardon me, my son, for having deprived thee of thy father's caresses and protection; and as I have need of thy indulgence, I will be indulgent to others, and efface all remembrance of what I have suffered, and will think only of the happiness thou hast given me. Then, if it pleases God that thou shouldst ever find thy father, tell him that I pardoned him long ago, but that I never forgave myself for my conduct to him. Tell him that to the last hour of my life I regretted I could not make him happy; and, if remorse should fill his heart, console him, my child, be to him an angel of mercy, be prodigal of thy cares and tenderness, for repentance is a second baptism; it is the regeneration of the soul. When thou wilt read the lines I now trace with trembling hand, it will be long after I have bid adieu to the transitory things of time. Thou wilt be a man and subject to passions.