"Our friend has not been able to start yet and I have received news of what is happening in Prague which is not of a nature calculated to diminish my longing to go there, but which also makes the need of your advice more urgent. If, therefore, you are able to proceed to Venice without delay, you will find me there, or else letters left at the post-office telling you where you can join me. I shall travel part of the journey with some people for whom I entertain feelings of great friendship and gratitude: M.[56] and Madame de Bauffremont[57]. We often speak of you; their devotion to myself and to our Henry makes them long to see you arrive. M. de Mesnard[58] shares that longing." Madame de Berry refers in her letter to a little manifesto[59] which was issued after she left Blaye and which was of no great value, because it said neither yes nor no. The letter, on the other hand, is curious as an historical document, since it reveals the feelings of the Princess towards her kinsmen-gaolers and points to the sufferings endured by her. Marie-Caroline's reflections are just; she expresses them with spirit and pride. Again, one likes to see that courageous and devoted mother, whether fettered or free, constantly occupied with the interests of her son. There, at least in that heart, are youth and life to be found. It cost me an effort once more to undertake a long journey; but I was too much touched by the confidence of that poor Princess to refuse to obey her wishes and to abandon her on the high-road. M. Jauge came to the assistance of my poverty, as he had done the first time. I took the field again with a dozen volumes scattered around me. Now, while I was peregrinating _da capo_ in the Prince de Bénévent's calash, he was eating in London in the manger of his fifth master, in expectation of the accident which will send him, perhaps, to sleep at Westminster, among saints, kings and wise men: a burial to which his religion, fidelity and virtues have justly entitled him. [1] This book was written on the road from Carlsbad to Paris, from the 1st to the 5th of June 1833, and in Paris, in the Rue d'Enfer, from the 6th of June to the 25th of August 1833.--T. [2] The author addresses an imaginary Cynthia. Cynthia was one of the surnames of Diana, from Mount Cynthus, where she was born.--B. [3] SCHILLER: _Wallenstein's Tod_, Act V. Sc. iii. [4] Max Piccolomini, son to Octavio Piccolomini, the famous Austrian general.--T. [5] Thekla, Wallenstein's daughter.--T. [6] _Wallenstein: Tod_, Act V. Sc. iii.--T. [7] _Wallenstein's Tod_. Act V. Sc. v.--T. [8] "It is the knight of the Landes: O unhappy knight! Heard bells ring on every hand, When crossing the waste at night."--T. [9] VOLTAIRE: _Ode sur la mort de S. A. S. Mme. la princesse de Bareith_, 141-144: