I vowed not to part with it while I had life: its presence was my only comfort, and no persuasion could induce me to give it up. It soon became a mass of putridity, and to every eye was a loathsome and disgusting object; to every eye but a mother’s. In vain did human feelings bid me recoil from this emblem of mortality with repugnance: I withstood, and vanquished that repugnance. I persisted in holding my infant to my bosom, in lamenting it, loving it, adoring it! Hour after hour have I passed upon my sorry couch, contemplating what had once been my child: I endeavoured to retrace its features through the livid corruption, with which they were overspread: during my confinement this sad occupation was my only delight; and at that time worlds should not have bribed me to give it up. Even when released from my prison, I brought away my child in my arms. The representations of my two kind friends⁠—(Here she took the hands of the marchioness and Virginia, and pressed them alternately to her lips)⁠—at length persuaded me to resign my unhappy infant to the grave. Yet I parted from it with reluctance: however, reason at length prevailed; I suffered it to be taken from me, and it now reposes in consecrated ground.