The Mysteries of Udolpho

M. Quesnel's visit proved an unhappy one to me; he came

to tell me part of the news he has now confirmed. You may have heard me

mention a M. Motteville, of Paris, but you did not know that the

chief of my personal property was invested in his hands. I had great

confidence in him, and I am yet willing to believe, that he is not

wholly unworthy of my esteem. A variety of circumstances have concurred

to ruin him, and--I am ruined with him.' St. Aubert paused to conceal his emotion.

'The letters I have just received from M. Quesnel,' resumed he,

struggling to speak with firmness, 'enclosed others from Motteville,

which confirmed all I dreaded.'

'Must we then quit La Vallee?' said Emily, after a long pause of

silence. 'That is yet uncertain,' replied St. Aubert, 'it will depend

upon the compromise Motteville is able to make with his creditors. My

income, you know, was never large, and now it will be reduced to

little indeed! It is for you, Emily, for you, my child, that I am most

afflicted.' His last words faltered; Emily smiled tenderly upon him

through her tears, and then, endeavouring to overcome her emotion, 'My

dear father,' said she, 'do not grieve for me, or for yourself; we may

yet be happy;--if La Vallee remains for us, we must be happy. We will

retain only one servant, and you shall scarcely perceive the change in

your income. Be comforted, my dear sir; we shall not feel the want of

those luxuries, which others value so highly, since we never had a taste

for them; and poverty cannot deprive us of many consolations. It cannot

rob us of the affection we have for each other, or degrade us in our own

opinion, or in that of any person, whose opinion we ought to value.'

St. Aubert concealed his face with his handkerchief, and was unable

to speak; but Emily continued to urge to her father the truths, which

himself had impressed upon her mind.

'Besides, my dear sir, poverty cannot deprive us of intellectual

delights. It cannot deprive you of the comfort of affording me examples

of fortitude and benevolence; nor me of the delight of consoling a

beloved parent. It cannot deaden our taste for the grand, and the

beautiful, or deny us the means of indulging it; for the scenes

of nature--those sublime spectacles, so infinitely superior to all

artificial luxuries! are open for the enjoyment of the poor, as well as

of the rich. Of what, then, have we to complain, so long as we are not

in want of necessaries? Pleasures, such as wealth cannot buy, will still

be ours. We retain, then, the sublime luxuries of nature, and lose only

the frivolous ones of art.'