“Then we looked into each other’s eyes for a long while.  Oh! what power a woman’s eye has!  How it agitates us, how it invades our very being, takes possession of us, and dominates us!  How profound it seems, how full of infinite promises!  People call that looking into each other’s souls!  Oh! monsieur, what humbug!  If we could see into each other’s souls, we should be more careful of what we did.  However, I was captivated and was crazy about her and tried to take her into my arms, but she said:  ‘Paws off!’.  Then I knelt down and opened my heart to her and poured out all the affection that was suffocating me.  She seemed surprised at my change of manner and gave me a sidelong glance, as if to say, ’Ah! so that is the way women make a fool of you, old fellow!  Very well, we will see.’

“In love, monsieur, we are always novices, and women artful dealers.

“No doubt I could have had her, and I saw my own stupidity later, but what I wanted was not a woman’s person, it was love, it was the ideal.  I was sentimental, when I ought to have been using my time to a better purpose.

“As soon as she had had enough of my declarations of affection, she got up, and we returned to Saint-Cloud, and I did not leave her until we got to Paris; but she had looked so sad as we were returning, that at last I asked her what was the matter.  ‘I am thinking,’ she replied, ’that this has been one of those days of which we have but few in life.’  My heart beat so that it felt as if it would break my ribs.

“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 any one to advise him?  One says to one’s self:  ‘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 janitor all her domestic details, confides all the secrets of her bedroom to the neighbor’s servant, discusses her husband with the tradespeople and has her head so stuffed with stupid stories, with idiotic superstitions, with extraordinary ideas and monstrous prejudices, that I—­for what I have said applies more particularly to myself—­shed tears of discouragement every time I talk 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.