Ah! my good little sisters who are so very much shocked and cry “Shame!” follow our reasoning a little further.  It is all very well that you should be treated like saints, but do not let it be forgotten that you are women, and, listen to me, do not forget it yourselves.

A husband, majestic and slightly bald, is a good thing; a young husband who loves you and eats off the same plate is better.  If he rumples your dress a little, and imprints a kiss, in passing, on the back of your neck, let him.  When, on coming home from a ball, he tears out the pins, tangles the strings, and laughs like a madman, trying to see whether you are ticklish, let him.  Do not cry “Murder!” if his moustache pricks you, but think that it is all because at heart he loves you well.  He worships your virtues; is it surprising hence that he should cherish their outward coverings?  No doubt you have a noble soul; but your body is not therefore to be despised; and when one loves fervently, one loves everything at the same time.  Do not be alarmed if in the evening, when the fire is burning brightly and you are chatting gayly beside it, he should take off one of your shoes and stockings, put your foot on his lap, and in a moment of forgetfulness carry irreverence so far as to kiss it; if he likes to pass your large tortoise-shell comb through your hair, if he selects your perfumes, arranges your plaits, and suddenly exclaims, striking his forehead:  “Sit down there, darling; I have an idea how to arrange a new coiffure.”

If he turns up his sleeves and by chance tangles your curls, where really is the harm?  Thank Heaven if in the marriage which you have hit upon you find a laughing, joyous side; if in your husband you find the loved reader of the pretty romance you have in your pocket; if, while wearing cashmere shawls and costly jewels in your ears, you find the joys of a real intimacy—­that is delicious!  In short, reckon yourself happy if in your husband you find a lover.

But before accepting my theories, ladies, although in your heart and conscience you find them perfect, you will have several little prejudices to overcome; above all, you will have to struggle against your education, which is deplorable, as I have already said, but that is no great matter.  Remember that under the pretext of education you have been stuffed, my dear sisters.  You have been varnished too soon, like those pictures painted for sales, which crack all over six months after purchase.  Your disposition has not been properly directed; you are not cultivated; you have been stifled, pruned; you have been shaped like those yew-trees at Versailles which represent goblets and birds.  Still, you are women at the bottom, though you no longer look it.