Hundreds of letters, the last of which was written in St. Petersburg on the day before her death, reveal an intensely ardent nature, and prove that the heart which truly loves never grows old. We translate a few extracts. "I will use all my moral forces to prove to you that our mutual affection has advanced me in the path of holiness which you opened to me the very first moments I heard you speak. God had pity upon me and sent you on my _via dolorosa_ to open to me a new horizon, a new heaven. He carried my heart to you with an intensity of which I did not think myself capable." "I have found in you two beings equally precious to me—the first is a friend I love like a dearly beloved daughter; the second the Maréchale of my Salvation, whose work, vocation and power I admire—that moral power which you only in the whole world exercise over me. If I had known you earlier, you would have made a saint of me." "Not any affection in the world, not even my children’s, can replace yours for me. What does it matter though everybody loves me if you do not?" "I know that it is because I have not yet renounced my ’self,’ my ’_moi_,’ that your absence makes me suffer, but I cannot help it—it is beyond my power. I know also that the day my ’self’ will be chased away—which is doubtful—I shall love no one, for to love one must be a self, one must have one’s _own_ heart." "I doubt if there are any others who bear you such a deep, complete, living, warm and luminous affection. Not that you do not deserve it, but all natures are not alike, and you know the fault of mine. I cannot love by halves." "’Love wisely,’ some one advises. That word ’wise’ hurts me. I do not want to be wise in my love for you. I prefer to love madly, and that is what I do, and you feel it, don’t you? Wisdom to the devil when it is a question of the heart." "I cannot believe that He must detach us from everything to attach us to Himself—that would make me very sad. On the contrary I feel that it is only human love, disinterested love, but deep and living, which can make us understand Divine love. It is only through human experience that we can appreciate His great, His mighty, His eternal love for us. All the life of Jesus is filled with that palpable love for His creatures, and that is why He is so near to us. Let me therefore love you without detachment, and the more I love you the more I will love Him." One of her letters is peculiarly interesting: "I will see the Emperor in these days, and I will seek strength to speak to him. You see, my darling, speaking is not enough, one must in such a case pour out one’s soul and feel that a superior force guides one and speaks for one."