These reflections, awake or in a slumber, (for he never
slept,) possessed his mind, and, even whilst his wounds were healing,
produced such an irritation in his blood as hourly threatened a
fever.
Things were in this situation, when the surgeon put a letter from the
countess into his hand. He opened it, and read with breathless
anxiety these lines:
"TO THADDEUS, COUNT SOBIESKI.
"Console yourself, my most precious son, console yourself for my
sake. I have seen Colonel Lonza, and I have heard all the horrors
which took place on the tenth of this month. I have heard them, and I
am yet alive. I am resigned. He tells me you are wounded. Oh! do not
let me be bereft of my son also! Remember that you were my dear
sainted father's darling; remember that, as his representative, you
are to be my consolation; in pity to me, if not to our suffering
country, preserve yourself to be at least the last comfort Heaven's
mercy hath spared to me. I find that all is lost to Poland as well as
to myself! that when my glorious father fell, and his friend with
him, even its name, as a country, became extinct. The allied invaders
are in full march towards Masovia, and I am too weak to come to you.
Let me see you soon, very soon, my beloved son. I beseech you to come
to me. You will find me feebler in body than in mind; for there is a
holy Comforter that descends on the bruised heart, which none other
than the unhappy have conceived or felt.
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