Perhaps you will admit that we are both too young and too inexperienced to understand the miseries of a life entered upon without other fortune than that I have received from the kindness of the late Monsieur de Jordy.

My godfather desires, moreover, not to marry me until I am twenty.

Who knows what fate may have in store for you in four years, the finest years of your life?
do not sacrifice them to a poor girl.
Having thus explained to you, monsieur, the opinions of my dear godfather, who, far from opposing my happiness, seeks to contribute to it in every way, and earnestly desires that his protection, which must soon fail me, may be replaced by a tenderness equal to his own; there remains only to tell you how touched I am by your offer and by the compliments which accompany it.

The prudence which dictates my letter is that of an old man to whom life is well-known; but the gratitude I express is that of a young girl, in whose soul no other sentiment has arisen.
Therefore, monsieur, I can sign myself, in all sincerity, Your servant, Ursula Mirouet.
Savinien made no reply.

Was he trying to soften his mother?
Had this letter put an end to his love?
Many such questions, all insoluble, tormented poor Ursula, and, by repercussion, the doctor too, who suffered from every agitation of his darling child.