I am dying fast, but not of the wound I took from thee; let not that thought darken thy soul, my husband! No, that wound is healed.

Thought is sharper than the sword.

I have pilled away for the loss of thee and thy love! Can the shadow live without the sun?
And wilt thou never place thy hands on my daughter's head, and bless her for her mother's sake?
Ah, yes--yes! The saints that watch over our human destinies will one day cast her in thy way: and the same hour that gives thee a daughter shall redeem and hallow the memory of a wife....

Leonarda has vowed to be a mother to our child; to tend her, work for her, rear her, though in poverty, to virtue.

I consign these letters to Leonarda's charge, with thy picture--never to be removed from my breast till the heart within has ceased to beat.