towards the abbe's chair; I look at him with a kind of admiring
wonder, for who before ever asked pardon of the abbe? "All this is
very absurd, abbe; confess, is it not?" And then I laugh, and the
abbe laughs too. So that is my forgiveness on that side; but I had
next to approach the other, and that was a very different thing. I
forget exactly how it was that I framed my apology.--"Sir, here is
the madman...."--"He has made me suffer too long; I wish to hear no
more about him."--"He is sorry."--"Yes, I am very sorry."--"It
shall not happen again."--"Until the first rascal...."--I do not
know whether he was in one of those days of ill-humour when
mademoiselle herself dreads to go near him, or whether he
misunderstood what I said, or whether I said something wrong:
things were worse than before. Good heavens, does he not know me?
Does he not know that I am like children, and that there are some
circumstances in which I let anything and everything escape me? And
then, God help me, am I not to have a moment of relief? Why, it
would wear out a puppet made of steel, to keep pulling the string
from night to morning, and from morning to night! I must amuse
them, of course, that is the condition; but I must now and then
amuse myself. In the midst of these distractions there came into my
head a fatal idea, an idea that gave me confidence, that inspired
me with pride and insolence: it was that they could not do without
me, and that I was indispensable.

_I._--Yes, I daresay that you are very useful to them, but that
they are still more useful to you. You will not find as good a
house every day; but they, for one madman who falls short, will
find a hundred to take his place.

_He._--A hundred madmen like me, sir philosopher; they are not so
common, I can tell you! Flat fools--yes. People are harder to
please in folly than in talent or virtue. I am a rarity in my own
kind, a great rarity. Now that they have me no longer, what are
they doing? They find time as heavy as if they were dogs. I am an
inexhaustible bagful of impertinences. Every minute I had some
fantastic notion that made them laugh till they cried; I was a
whole Bedlam in myself.

_I._--Well, at any rate you had bed and board, coat and breeches,
shoes, and a pistole a month.

_He._--