Thanks for the good news that you give me of the children. Kiss them fondly for me until I can embrace them for myself.
My tenderest kisses for you.
From your devoted
Alfred.
Embrace your dear parents, all our family, for me.
I do not know by what route you sent the books and the reviews that you spoke of in your letters of the 25th of August, but they certainly have not yet arrived at Guiana.
27 December, 1895.
My dear Lucie:
I have not yet received your dear letters of October. Neither the French mail of November nor the English mail of December has brought them. What does it mean? What ought I to think of it? In what horrible nightmare have I lived for almost fifteen months?
As for suffering, alas! my poor darling, we both know what that is; and besides that, sufferings are of little importance, no matter what they are. What you must have is our honor, the honor of our children.
I wrote you a long letter on the 2d of December. To add anything to that letter, or, indeed, to any that preceded it, would be superfluous, would it not? Our thoughts are the same; our hearts have always beaten as one; our souls thrill together to-day, and they cry out for their honor with the burning ardor of honorable hearts struck in all that they hold most precious.
I wait with feverish impatience for news of you. I feel sure that it will soon arrive. I will even say that
