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194
MARIA FELICIA

For many weeks his servants watched him as a lunatic. But no sooner had he recovered than a new thirst for vengeance seized him; he searched wildly for his rival’s son, intending to place him in a seminary and have him educated as a Catholic, to the disgrace of his father’s memory. The son, however, was not to be found; he had disappeared, and with him the chest containing all the documents which proved Hlohovsky’s right to his title. He searched for the boy all his life, for afterward, by the special favor of the Emperor, he married a wealthy lady, and had sons of his own. No trace of the son was ever found, although he was being brought up in Hlohov in the family of one of his own servants, who, in the confusion, had succeeded in taking and concealing the child and later claimed him as his own. The servant, a porter, was a devoted Brother; he imbued the child with love for the truth, his father’s faith and his country. Not until the porter was dying did he trust the secret of the boy’s birth to him, give him the documents, and console him with