lambs, a privileged fold into which every wolf is anxious to enter.

Let us put this million of women, already winnowed by our fan, through
another examination.

To arrive at the true idea of the degree of confidence which a man
ought to have in his wife, let us suppose for a moment that all wives
will deceive their husbands.

On this hypothesis, it will be proper to cut out about one-twentieth,
viz., young people who are newly married and who will be faithful to
their vows for a certain time.

Another twentieth will be in ill-health. This will be to make a very
modest allowance for human infirmities.

Certain passions, which we are told destroy the dominion of the man
over the heart of his wife, namely, aversion, grief, the bearing of
children, will account for another twentieth.

Adultery does not establish itself in the heart of a married woman
with the promptness of a pistol-shot. Even when sympathy with another
rouses feelings on first sight, a struggle always takes place, whose
duration discounts the total sum of conjugal infidelities. It would be
an insult to French modesty not to admit the duration of this struggle
in a country so naturally combative, without referring to at least a
twentieth in the total of married women; but then we will suppose that
there are certain sickly women who preserve their lovers while they
are using soothing draughts, and that there are certain wives whose
confinement makes sarcastic celibates smile. In this way we shall