“I saw her on the following Sunday, and the next Sunday, and every Sunday.  I took her to Bougival, Saint-Germain, Maisons-Lafitte, Poissy; to every suburban resort of lovers.

“The little jade, in turn, pretended to love me, until, at last, I altogether lost my head, and three months later I married her.

“What can you expect, Monsieur, when a man is a clerk, living alone, without any relations, or anyone to advise him?  One says to oneself:  ’How sweet life would be with a wife!’

“And so one gets married, and she calls you names from morning till night, understands nothing, knows nothing, chatters continually, sings the song of Musette at the top of her voice (oh! that song of Musette, how tired one gets of it!); quarrels with the charcoal dealer, tells the porter of all her domestic details, confides all the secrets of her bedroom to the neighbor’s servant, discusses her husband with the trades-people, and has her head so stuffed with such stupid stories, with such idiotic superstitions, with such extraordinary ideas and such monstrous prejudices, that I—­for what I have said, applies more particularly to myself—­shed tears of discouragement every time I talked to her.”

He stopped, as he was rather out of breath, and very much moved, and I looked at him, for I felt pity for this poor, artless devil, and I was just going to give him some sort of answer, when the boat stopped.  We were at Saint-Cloud.

The little woman who had so taken my fancy, got up in order to land.  She passed close to me, and gave me a side glance and a furtive smile; one of those smiles that drive you mad; then she jumped on the landing-stage.  I sprang forward to follow her, but my neighbor laid hold of my arm, I shook myself loose, however, whereupon he seized the skirt of my coat, and pulled me back, exclaiming: 

“You shall not go!  You shall not go!” in such a loud voice, that everybody turned round and laughed, and I remained standing motionless and furious, but without venturing to face scandal and ridicule, and the steamboat started.

The little woman on the landing-stage looked at me as I went off with an air of disappointment, while my persecutor rubbed his hands, and whispered to me: 

“I have done you a great service, you must acknowledge.”

THE JENNET

Every time he held an inspection on the review ground, General Daumont de Croisailles was sure of a small success, and of receiving a whole packet of letters from women the next day.

Some were almost illegible, scribbled on paper with a love emblem at the top, by some sentimental milliner; the others ardent, as if saturated with curry, letters which excited him, and suggested the delights of kisses to him.

Among them, also, there were some which evidently came from a woman of the world, who was tired of her monotonous life, had lost her head, and let her pen run on, without exactly knowing what she was writing, with those mistakes in spelling here and there which seemed to be in unison with the disordered beating of her heart.