"
"'I recommend to your goodness Mary and Domingo, who took so much care of
my infancy. Caress Fidele for me who found me in the wood.'
"Paul was astonished that Virginia had not said one word of him, she who
had not forgotten even the house dog. But Paul was not aware that, however
long may be a woman's letter, she always puts the sentiments most dear to
her at the end.
"In a postscript, Virginia recommended particularly to Paul's care two
kinds of seed, those of the violet and scabious. She gave him some
instructions upon the nature of those plants, and the spots most proper for
their cultivation. 'The first,' said she, 'produces a little flower of a
deep violet, which loves to hide itself beneath the bushes, but is soon
discovered by its delightful odours.' She desired those seeds might be sown
along the borders of the fountain, at the foot of her cocoa tree. 'The
scabious,' she added, 'produces a beautiful flower of a pale blue, and a
black ground, spotted with white. You might fancy it was in mourning; and
for this reason, it is called the widow's flower. It delights in bleak
spots beaten by the winds.' She begged this might be sown upon the rock
where she had spoken to him for the last time, and that, for her sake, he
would henceforth give it the name of the Farewell Rock.
"She had put those seeds into a little purse, the tissue of which was
extremely simple; but which appeared above all price to Paul, when he
perceived a P and a V intwined together, and knew that the beautiful hair
which formed the cipher was the hair of Virginia.
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