otion of the girl's true nature; nor understood that to keep
her contented it was not sufficient to treat her kindly, but that she
required some equivalent for the odious excitements of the past.

* * * * *

All feminine confessions--except those between relations which are
generally commonplace and uninteresting--assume a kind of beauty in my
eyes; a warmth and solemnity that excuses the casting aside of all
conventional barriers.

I remember one day--a day of oppressive heat and the heavy perfume of
roses--when, with a party of women friends, we began to talk about
tears. At first no one ventured to speak quite sincerely; but one thing
led to another until we were gradually caught in our own snares, and
finally we each gave out something that we had hitherto kept concealed
within us, as one locks up a deadly poison.

Not one of us, it appeared, ever cried because of some imperative inward
need. Tears are nature's gift to us. It is our own affair whether we
squander or economise their use.

Of all our confessions Sophie Harden's was the strangest. To her, tears
were a kind of erotic by-play, which added to the enjoyment of conjugal
life. Her husband, a good-natured creature, always believed he was to
blame, and she never enlightened him on the point.

Most of the others owned that they had recourse to tears to work
themselves up when they wanted to make a scene. But Astrid Bagge, a
gentle, quiet housewife and mother, declared she kept all her troubles
for the evenings when her husband dined at the volunteer's mess, because
he hated to see anyone crying. Then she sat alone and in darkness and
wept away the accumulated annoyances of the week.

When it came to my turn, I spoke the truth by chance when I said that,
however much I wanted to cry, I only permitted myself the luxury about
once in two years. I think my complexion is a conclusive proof that my
words were sincere.

There are deserts which never know the refreshment of dew or rain. My
life has been such a desert.

I, who like to receive confidences, have a morbid fear of giving them.
Perhaps it is because I was so much alone, so self-centred, in my
childhood.

The more I reflect upon life, the more clearly I see that I have not
laid out my talents to the best advantage. I have no sweet memories of
infidelity; I have lived irreproachably--and now I am very tired.

I sit here and write for myself alone. I know that no one