Bid me good-by, say God bless me, and
go quickly, if you have any mercy for me."
"Listen just for a moment more! Oh, my darling, forgive my hasty
word; but, Constance, if your love was as devoted and single as mine
you would not thus resign one who loves you only of all the world; no
one shares my heart with you. I know you love me, but not as I would
be loved, or you would leave father and mother and cling to me. What
right has your father, or any other father, to blast his child's
happiness? Heed him not, love, but come with me. I will never let you
feel a single regret. I will love you more than all their love
combined. Nay, do not turn aside--you must hear me. Think what you are
doing! wrecking my happiness, casting me forth, without hope, to drag
out a miserable, useless existence. I may be cursed with long life.
Constance, darling, come with me! With your parents it will only be a
short grief--disappointed ambition--and, at the most, only the
thwarting of their proud hopes. They will soon get over it; but even
if they should not, in all human probability they have not the length
of days to suffer that we have. Bid me hope!"
"Ernest, Heaven only knows what a severe trial this is to me.
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