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212520_The_Adve ... _Way_Through_The_World.pdf - OUDL Home

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506 THE ADVENTURES OF PHILIP<br />

what the purse contained, Philip used one of his great jurons (as he<br />

always does when he is most tender-hearted), and he said that<br />

woman was an angel, and that we would keep those five sovereigns,<br />

and never change them. Ah ! I am thankful my husband has such<br />

friends ! I will loye all who love him—you most of all. For were<br />

not you the means of bringing this noble heart to me? I fancy I<br />

have known bigger people, since I have known you, and some of<br />

your friends. <strong>The</strong>ir talk is simpler, their thoughts are greater than<br />

—those with whom I used to live. P. says, Heaven has given Mrs.<br />

Brandon such a great heart, that she must have a good intellect. If<br />

loving my Philip be wisdom, I know some one who will be very<br />

wise!<br />

" If I was not in a very great hurry to see mamma, Philip said<br />

we might stop a day at Amiens. And we went to the Cathedral,<br />

and to whom do you think it is dedicated ? To my saint : to SAINT<br />

FIRMIN ! And oh! I prayed to Heaven to give me strength to<br />

devote my life to my saint's service, to love him always, as a pure<br />

true wife : in sickness to guard him, in sorrow to soothe him. I<br />

will try and learn and study, not to make my intellect equal to<br />

his—very few women can hope for that—but that I may better<br />

comprehend him, and give him a companion more worthy of him.<br />

I wonder whether there are many men in the world as clever as our<br />

husbands ? Though Philip is so modest. He says he is not clever<br />

at all. Yet I know he is, and grander somehow than other men.<br />

I said nothing, but I used to listen at Queen Square ; and some<br />

who came who thought best of themselves, seemed to me pert, and<br />

worldly, and small; and some were like princes somehow. My<br />

Philip is one of the princes. Ah, dear friend ! may I not give<br />

thanks where thanks are due, that I am chosen to be the wife of<br />

a true gentleman ? Kind, and brave, and loyal Philip ! Honest<br />

and generous,—above deceit or selfish scheme. Oh ! I hope it is<br />

not wrong to be so happy !<br />

" We wrote to mamma and dear Madame Smolensk to say we<br />

were coming. Mamma finds Madame de Valentinois's boardinghouse<br />

even dearer than dear Madame Smolensk's. I don't mean a<br />

pun! She says she has found out that Madame de Valentinois's real<br />

name is Cornichon; that she was a person of the worst character,<br />

and that cheating at écarté was practised at her house. She took<br />

up her own two francs and another two-franc piece from the cardtable,<br />

saying that Colonel Boulotte was cheating, and by rights the<br />

money was hers. She is going to leave Madame de Valentinois at<br />

the end of her month, or as soon as her children, who have the<br />

measles, can move. She desired that on no account I would come<br />

to see her at Madame V.'s; and she brought Philip £12, 10s. in

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