Page:Elizabeth, or, The exiles of Siberia (1).pdf/14

                                14 Religion will lend you its torch and its support—trust wholly to it: you know to whom I have granted permission that your cabin shall be accessible. In confiding this paper to you, I render you the arbiter of my fate: for if it were disclosed, if it were suspected that I had facilitated your departure, I should be undone for ever. But, I have no fears; I know to whom I trust. I know all that may be expected from the intrepidity and virtue of a daughter, who has learned to devote her life to her father.” When the letter was read, Elizabeth implored her mother particularly to consent to her undertaking the journey, but Phedora could not be brought to accede to her request. “My mother,” said Elizabeth, “ God has given me the power of restoring you to happiness, and do not oppose yourself to the mission that heaven has confided to me. Dangers there arc none, and my excursions among the heaths have inured me to the fatigue of long walking, and to bear the cold. Is it inexperience you dread ? I shall not be alone; remember the words and the letter of the governor. How many great men, precipitated from the pinnacle of glory, have implored pardon for themselves? Happier than all, I implore it only for my father.” Her noble firmness, that divine pride which glowed in her looks, as she offered to humble herself for her parents, at last subdued Springer, and he felt willing that she should go—but, for the first time in her life, Phedora opposed the authority of her husband in the exclaiming, “ Shall I let my Elizabeth depart, to hear that she perished with cold and want in the deserts ? ” Elizabeth now promised not to go without her mother’s consent; “but,” said she, “perhaps God will obtain from you what you deny my father and myself, and oh, let us implore Him for his counsel, who is the light that guides, and tho strength that sustains.” The next day, Springer being alone with his daughter, he related to her the history of his family and misfortunes, which filled her mind with astonishment, and her eyes with tears. “My greatest crime, said he, “ was my devotedness to Poland, my dear, dear country, whose monarchs sprung from tho same stock as myself.—I defended her cause against tho three great powers, at the head of a mere handful of noble Poles, under the walls of Warsaw, but we were compelled to submit—our feeble hands could not shake off our chains. The possessions of my ancestor’s were in that part which fell under the domination of Russia, and for my exertions in defence of my country, I was torn from my paternal estate to suffer imprisonment and banishment. Phedora followed roe, and the permission to be confined with me was the only favour she could obtain, and what few happy moments I have enjoyed