Believe me, men are more inclined to love women they can pity than women they must admire and respect; feminine courage in adversity is to them a disagreeable picture in an ugly frame; that is to say, a poorly dressed woman in a poorly furnished room.  So you now see why, not wishing to disgust my future husband, I was careful that he should not see this ugly picture.

Ah! you speak to me of my dear ideal, and you say you love him?  Ah! to him alone could I fearlessly read these beautiful pages of my life.  But let us banish him from our minds; I would forget him!

Once I was very near betraying myself; my cousin and I called on a Russian lady residing in furnished apartments on Rivoli street.

M. de Monbert was there—­as I took a seat near the fire, the Countess R. handed me a screen—­I at once recognised a painting of my own.  It represented Paul and Virginia gardening with Domingo.

How horrible did all three look!  Time and dust had curiously altered the faces of my characters; by an inexplicable phenomenon Virginia and Domingo had changed complexions; Virginia was a negress, and Domingo was enfranchised, bleached, he had cast aside the tint of slavery and was a pure Caucasian.  The absurdity of the picture made me laugh, and M. de Monbert inquired the cause of my merriment.  I showed him the screen, and he said “How very horrible!” and I was about to add “I painted it,” when some one interrupted us, and so prevented the betrayal of my secret.

You will not have to scold me any more; I am going to take your advice and leave Pont de l’Arche to-day.  Oh I how I wish I were in Paris this minute!  I am dreadfully tired of this little place, it is so wearying to play poverty.

When I was really poor, the modest life I had to lead, the cruel privations I had to suffer, seemed to me to be noble and dignified.

Misery has its grandeur, and every sorrow has its poetry; but when the humility of life is voluntary and privations mere caprices, misery loses all its prestige, and the romantic sufferings we needlessly impose on ourselves, are intolerable, because there is no courage or merit in enduring them.

This sentiment I feel must be natural, for my old companion in misfortune, my good and faithful Blanchard, holds the same views that I do.  You know how devoted she was to me during my long weary days of trouble!

She faithfully served me three years with no reward other than the approval of her own conscience.  She, who was so proud of keeping my mother’s house, resembling a stewardess of the olden time; when misfortune came, converted herself for my sake into maid of all work!  Inspired by love for me, she patiently endured the hardships and dreariness of our sad situation; not a complaint, not a murmur, not a reproach.  To see her so quietly resigned, you would have supposed that she had been both chamber-maid and cook all her life, that is if you never tasted her dishes!  I shall always remember her first dinner.  O, the Spartan broth of that day!  She must have gotten the receipt from “The Good Lacedemonian Cook Book.”