ately for me, I can not tell a woman whom I
despise that I love her, even when I know that it is only a convention
and that she will not be deceived by it. I have never bent my knee to the
ground when my heart did not go with it. So that class of women known as
facile is unknown to me, or if I allow myself to be taken with them, it
is without knowing it, and through innate simplicity.

I can understand that one's soul can be put aside, but not that it should
be handled. That there is some pride in this, I confess, but I do not
intend either to boast or abase myself. Above all things I hate those
women who laugh at love, and I permit them to reciprocate the sentiment;
there will never be any dispute between us.

Such women are beneath courtesans, for courtesans may lie as well as
they; but courtesans are capable of love, and these women are not. I
remember a woman who loved me, and who said to a man many times richer
than I, with whom she was living: "I am weary of you, I am going to my
lover." That woman is worth more than many others who are not despised by
society.

I passed the entire season with Desgenais, and learned that my mistress
had left France; that news left in my heart a feeling of languor which I
could not overcome.

At the sight of that world which surrounded and was so new to me, I
experienced at first a kind of bizarre curiosity, at once sad and
profound, which made me look timorously at things as does a restless
horse. Then an incident occurred which made a deep impression on me.

Desgenais had with him a very beautiful woman who loved him much. One
evening as I was walking with him I told him that I considered her
admirable, as much on account of her attachment for him as because of her
beauty. In short, I praised her highly and with warmth, giving him to
understand that he ought to be happy.

He made no reply. It was his manner, for he was the dryest of men. That
night when all had retired, and I had been in bed some fifteen minutes I
heard a knock at my door. I supposed it was some one of my friends who
could not sleep, and invited him to enter.

There appeared before my astonished eyes a woman, very pale, carrying a
bouquet in her hands, to which was attached a piece of paper bearing
these words "To Octave, from his friend Desgenais."

I had no sooner read these words than a flash of light came to me. I
understood the meaning of this action of Desgenais in making me this
African gift. It m