I have the saddest news to tell you. Our friend Fundanus has lost his
youngest daughter. I never saw a girl more cheerful, more lovable, more
worthy of long life--nay, of immortality. She had not yet completed her
fourteenth year, and she had already the prudence of an old woman, the
gravity of a matron, and still, with all maidenly modesty, the sweetness
of a girl. How she would cling to her father's neck! how affectionately
and discreetly she would greet us, her father's friends! how she loved
her nurses, her attendants, her teachers,--everyone according to his
service. How earnestly, how intelligently, she used to read! How modest
was she and restrained in her sports! And with what self-restraint, what
patience--nay, what courage--she bore her last illness! She obeyed the
physicians, encouraged her father and sister, and, when all strength of
body had left her, kept herself alive by the vigor of her mind. This
vigor lasted to the very end, and was not broken by the length of her
illness or by the fear of death; so leaving, alas! to us yet more and
weightier reasons for our grief and our regret. Oh the sadness, the
bitterness of that death! Oh the cruelty of the time when we lost her,
worse even than the loss itself! She had been betrothed to a noble
youth; the marriage day had been fixed, and we had been invited. How
great a joy changed into how great a sorrow! I cannot express in words
how it went to my heart when I heard Fundanus himself (this is one of
the grievous experiences of sorrow) giving orders that what he had meant
to lay out on dresses, and pearls, and jewels, should be spent on
incense, unguents, and spices.
--Tr. Alfred J. Church