life and enter into matrimony with such
hopes, and the same assurance of happiness, as we two.

I have such faith in the girl I am going to marry, and have made her
such vows of love, that I should certainly kill myself without a
moment's hesitation if anything were to happen to separate us, to force
us to a correct but irremediable rupture, or if Elaine were seized by
some illness which carried her off quickly; and yet I hesitate, I am
afraid, for I know that many others have made shipwreck, lost their love
on the way, disenchanted their wives and have themselves been
disenchanted in those first essays of possession, during that first
night of tenderness and of intimacy.

What does Elaine expect in her vague innocence, which has been lessened
by the half confidences of married friends, by semi-avowals, by all the
kisses of this sort of apprenticeship which is a court of love; what
does she possess, what does she hope for? Will her refined, delicate,
vibrating nature bend to the painful submission of the initial embrace;
will she not rebel against that ardent attack that wounds and pains? Oh!
to have to say to oneself that it must come to that, to lower the most
ideal of affections, to think that one is risking one's whole future
happiness at such a hazardous game, that the merest trifle might make a
woman completely ridiculous or hopeful, and make an idolized woman laugh
or cry!

I do not know a more desirable, prettier or more attractive being in the
whole world than Elaine; I am worn out by feverish love, I thirst for
her lips and I wish every particle of her being to belong to me; I love
her ardently, but I would willingly give half that I possess to have got
through this ordeal, to be a week older, _and still happy_!...

PART IV

My mother-in-law took me aside yesterday, while they were dancing, and
with tears in her eyes, she said in a tremulous voice:

"You are going to possess the most precious object that we possess here,
and what we love best.... I beg you to always spare the slightest
unhappiness, and to be kind and gentle towards her.... I count on your
uprightness and affection to guide her and protect her in this dangerous
life in Paris."... And then, giving way to her feelings more and more,
she added: "I do not think that you suppose that I have tried to
instruct her in her new duties or to disturb her charming innocence,
which has been my work; when two persons worship each other like you two