received.  But in love, a favour shared with others is an insult.  A man of feeling would rather be singled out for ill-treatment than be caressed with the crowd, and the worst that can befall him is to be treated like every one else.  So a woman who wants to keep several lovers at her feet must persuade every one of them that she prefers him, and she must contrive to do this in the sight of all the rest, each of whom is equally convinced that he is her favourite.

If you want to see a man in a quandary, place him between two women with each of whom he has a secret understanding, and see what a fool he looks.  But put a woman in similar circumstances between two men, and the results will be even more remarkable; you will be astonished at the skill with which she cheats them both, and makes them laugh at each other.  Now if that woman were to show the same confidence in both, if she were to be equally familiar with both, how could they be deceived for a moment?  If she treated them alike, would she not show that they both had the same claims upon her?  Oh, she is far too clever for that; so far from treating them just alike, she makes a marked difference between them, and she does it so skilfully that the man she flatters thinks it is affection, and the man she ill uses think it is spite.  So that each of them believes she is thinking of him, when she is thinking of no one but herself.

A general desire to please suggests similar measures; people would be disgusted with a woman’s whims if they were not skilfully managed, and when they are artistically distributed her servants are more than ever enslaved.

     “Usa ogn’arte la donna, onde sia colto
     Nella sua rete alcun novello amante;
     Ne con tutti, ne sempre un stesso volto
     Serba; ma cangia a tempo atto e sembiante.” 
          Tasso, Jerus.  Del., c. iv., v. 87.

What is the secret of this art?  Is it not the result of a delicate and continuous observation which shows her what is taking place in a man’s heart, so that she is able to encourage or to check every hidden impulse?  Can this art be acquired?  No; it is born with women; it is common to them all, and men never show it to the same degree.  It is one of the distinctive characters of the sex.  Self-possession, penetration, delicate observation, this is a woman’s science; the skill to make use of it is her chief accomplishment.

This is what is, and we have seen why it is so.  It is said that women are false.  They become false.  They are really endowed with skill not duplicity; in the genuine inclinations of their sex they are not false even when they tell a lie.  Why do you consult their words when it is not their mouths that speak?  Consult their eyes, their colour, their breathing, their timid manner, their slight resistance, that is the language nature gave them for your answer.  The lips always say “No,” and rightly so; but the tone is not always the same,