It is useless to send me anything in the way either of linen or of food.
I received some preserves from Cayenne yesterday and I also asked for
some linen which I need. They have given me the _Revue des Deux Mondes_,
the _Revue de Paris_, and the _Revue Rose_. Continue to send them to me;
you may also send a few light novels.
* * * * *
_15 June, 1895, Saturday evening._
My dear Lucie:
I have already written to you, some days ago, on the receipt of your
letters of the beginning of March, and my intention had been to send
you, by this mail, only a few words of deep affection, for what can I
tell you that I have not already told you again and again in all my
letters? But in reading your dear letters, in re-reading them every day,
I have felt each time I read them, for a moment, a lightening of my load
of sorrow. It seemed to me that you were all near me and that I felt
your hearts beating in sympathy with mine.
Sure that you have this same feeling, I yield to the impulse of my
heart, which longs to do everything to bring some relief to your
horrible sorrow. It is contrary to reason; I know it, for reason tells
me to be calm and patient, that the light of truth will shine out, that
it is impossible that it should be otherwise in the age in which we
live; but yet when I write to you it is my heart that speaks, and then
in spite of myself everything within me revolts against the appalling
accusation so opposed to every feeling of our hearts, for to us honor is
everything. I feel within me such a fever of combat, such power of
energy to rend the impenetrable mantle that weighs me down, that still
envelops this whole affair, that I am always longing to instill them
into your souls, although I realize that the sentiments of you all are
the same as my own. It is a useless outbreak, and I know it; but you
know equally well that all my feelings are violent and deep. My heart
bleeds for all that it holds most dear; it bleeds for you and it bleeds
for our dear children, and that is to reiterate to you, my dear Lucie,
that it is the longing I have to see the name you bear, that our dear
children bear, once more as it has always been, pure, without a
stain--it is this longing that gives me the strength to overcome all.
I live absorbed in myself. I neither see nor hear what passes around me.
My brain alone still lives and all my thoughts are concentrated on you,
on our dear children, on waiting until my honor is given back to me.
Then still hold to your splendid courage, my dear Lucie. I hope that we
shall soon find the happiness which we used to enjoy and which we shall
enjoy even more after this appalling trial, the most awful that a man
can bear.