of retaliation:—­but she was more severe on the indecorum of mademoiselle de Renville, who being known for the mistress of the duke of Chartres, and that she was supported by him, was fond of appearing in all public places.  She could not help testifying a good deal of surprize, that any woman who pretended to virtue would admit her into their assemblies:  not but she said the case of that lady was greatly to be pitied, who being high-born and bred had been reduced to the lowest exigencies of life, and from which to be relieved she had only consented to assist the looser pleasures of the amorous duke; but, added she, I would not methinks have her seem to glory in her shame, and in a manner of life which her misfortunes alone can render excusable; nor can I approve of the indulgence her mistaken triumph meets with, because it may not only destroy all notions of regret in herself for what her necessities oblige her to, but also make others, who have not the same pretence, find a kind of sanction for their own errors:—­vice, said she, ought at lead to blush, and hide itself as much as possible from view, left by being tolerated in public it should become a fashion.

Horatio was so much taken up with admiring the justness of her sentiments, that awed by them, as it were, he could not yet, tho’ mask’d, make any discovery of his own:  she was about entering into a discourse with him concerning the first motives which had rendered some persons she pointed out to him unhappy in the marriage-state, which perhaps might have given him an opportunity for explaining himself, when a lady richly dress’d came up to them, and giving Horatio a sudden pluck by the arm; villain! cried she.  Madam, returned he, strongly amazed.  Is the trifling conversation of Sanserre, resumed she, or this little creature to be preferred to a woman of that quality you have dared to abuse?—­but this night has convinced her of your perfidy:—­she sends you this, continued she, giving him a slap over the face as hard as she could, and be assured it is the last present you will ever receive from her.

She had no sooner uttered these words than she flew quick as lightning out of the room, leaving Horatio in such a consternation both at what she said and did, as deprived him even of the thought of following her, or using any means to solve this riddle.—­He was in a deep musing when mademoiselle Charlotta, possessed that moment with a passion she till then was ignorant of, said to him; I find, Horatio, you have wonderfully improved the little time you have been in France, to gain you a multiplicity of mistresses; but I am sorry my inadvertency in talking to a man so doubly pre-engaged, should cause me to be reckoned among the number.  In speaking this she turned away with a confusion which was visible in her air, and the scarlet colour with which her neck was dyed.  By heaven! cried he, in the utmost agitation, I know so little the meaning of what I have just now heard,