t
her: to ride in a coach, to look at a scarlet waistcoat, and hear
loud music. Yesterday at the fete she enjoyed the two latter; but,
to honor J. J. Rousseau, I intend to give her a sash, the first she
has ever had round her...."

In a second, she writes:--

"I have been playing and laughing with the little girl so long,
that I cannot take up my pen to address you without emotion.
Pressing her to my bosom, she looked so like you (_entre nous_,
your best looks, for I do not admire your commercial face), every
nerve seemed to vibrate to her touch, and I began to think that
there was something in the assertion of man and wife being one, for
you seemed to pervade my whole frame, quickening the beat of my
heart, and lending me the sympathetic tears you excited."

And in still another, she exclaims:--

"My little darling is indeed a sweet child; and I am sorry that you
are not here to see her little mind unfold itself. You talk of
'dalliance,' but certainly no lover was ever more attached to his
mistress than she is to me. Her eyes follow me everywhere, and by
affection I have the most despotic power over her. She is all
vivacity or softness. Yes; I love her more than I thought I should.
When I have been hurt at your stay, I have embraced her as my only
comfort; when pleased with her, for looking and laughing like you;
nay, I cannot, I find, long be angry with you, whilst I am kissing
her for resembling you. But there would be no end to these details.
Fold us both to your heart."

As the devout go on pilgrimage to places once sanctified by the presence
of a departed saint, so she visited alone the haunts of the early days
of their love, living over again the incidents which had made them
sacred. "My imagination," she told him, "... chooses to ramble back to
the barrier with you, or to see you coming to meet me and my basket of
grapes. With what pleasure do I recollect your looks and words, when I
have been sitting on the window, regarding the waving corn." She begged
him to bring back his "barrier face," as she thus fondly recalled their
interviews at the barrier. She told him of a night passed at Saint
Germains in the very room which had once been theirs, and, glowing with
these recollections, she warned him, that if he should return changed in
aught, she would fly from him to cherish remembrances which mu