Ursula; at that time I was very far from suspecting its cause. On the contrary, I waited for my gaoler’s appearance at first with impatience, and afterwards with despair. One day passed away; another followed it; the third arrived. Still no Camilla! Still no food! I knew the lapse of time by the wasting of my lamp, to supply which fortunately a week’s supply of oil had been left me. I supposed, either that the nuns had forgotten me, or that the domina had ordered them to let me perish. The latter idea seemed the most probable; yet so natural is the love of life, that I trembled to find it true. Though embittered by every species of misery, my existence was still dear to me, and I dreaded to lose it. Every succeeding minute proved to me that I must abandon all hopes of relief. I was become an absolute skeleton: my eyes already failed me, and my limbs were beginning to stiffen. I could only express my anguish, and the pangs of that hunger which gnawed my heartstrings, by frequent groans, whose melancholy sound the vaulted roof of the dungeon reechoed. I resigned myself to my fate: I already expected the moment of dissolution, when my guardian angel, when my beloved brother arrived in time to save me.