Page:The Mysterious Warning - Parsons (1796, volume 3).djvu/26

 of honour, he was very doubtful that his approbation to our union would not be obtained, if the Count's father refused his consent. He therefore wrote to my beloved parent on the subject; unhappily this letter never reached him, as he had been ordered on duty to a different part of the country.

Mean time, the Count continued his assiduities to me, and daily insinuated himself more into the favourable opinion of my friends. At this period, the good Madame Bouville caught a violent cold, by being out too late one evening in her garden, when the damps arose imperceptibly round her; the consequence was, a violent rheumatic and inflammatory fever, which in nine days terminated a life that had been uniformly good, pious and charitable.

The poor Abbe felt this stroke most severely; he had lost a parent and a friend,—his own health had been always delicate, and subject to frequent asthmatic spasms; he was of a remarkable studious and retired disposition, but ill calculated to struggle with the