I turned on the old marquis a look so piercing that he wrung my hand and said:  “You seem to have a good heart, for nothing is certain in this life—­”

“Well, you may be sure that I have arranged a pleasant surprise for her in my will,” he replied, gayly.

“Come here, Joseph,” cried the marchioness, approaching a servant who carried an overcoat lined with silk.  “The marquis is probably feeling the cold.”

The old marquis put on his overcoat, buttoned it up, and taking my arm, led me to the sunny side of the terrace.

“In your work,” he continued, “you have doubtless spoken of the love of a young man.  Well, if you wish to act up to the scope which you give to your work—­in the word ec—­elec—­”

“Eclectic,” I said, smiling, seeing he could not remember this philosophic term.

“I know the word well!” he replied.  “If then you wish to keep your vow of eclecticism, you should be willing to express certain virile ideas on the subject of love which I will communicate to you, and I will not grudge you the benefit of them, if benefit there be; I wish to bequeath my property to you, but this will be all that you will get of it.”

“There is no money fortune which is worth as much as a fortune of ideas if they be valuable ideas!  I shall, therefore, listen to you with a grateful mind.”

“There is no such thing as love,” pursued the old man, fixing his gaze upon me.  “It is not even a sentiment, it is an unhappy necessity, which is midway between the needs of the body and those of the soul.  But siding for a moment with your youthful thoughts, let us try to reason upon this social malady.  I suppose that you can only conceive of love as either a need or a sentiment.”

I made a sign of assent.

“Considered as a need,” said the old man, “love makes itself felt last of all our needs, and is the first to cease.  We are inclined to love in our twentieth year, to speak in round numbers, and we cease to do so at fifty.  During these thirty years, how often would the need be felt, if it were not for the provocation of city manners, and the modern custom of living in the presence of not one woman, but of women in general?  What is our debt to the perpetuation of the race?  It probably consists in producing as many children as we have breasts—­so that if one dies the other may live.  If these two children were always faithfully produced, what would become of nations?  Thirty millions of people would constitute a population too great for France, for the soil is not sufficient to guarantee more than ten millions against misery and hunger.  Remember that China is reduced to the expedient of throwing its children into the water, according to the accounts of travelers.  Now this production of two children is really the whole of marriage.  The superfluous pleasures of marriage are not only profligate, but involve an immense loss to the man, as I will now demonstrate.  Compare then with this poverty of