and vanquished, and she abandons herself without thinking of the
irremediable stain, nor of her fall nor of the painful awakening on the
morrow.

"The man who has brought this about slowly, viciously, and who can tell
with what science of evil, and who, in such a case, has not steadiness
and self-restraint enough to quench that flame by some icy words, who
has not sense enough for two, who cannot recover his self-possession and
master the runaway brute within him, and who loses his head on the edge
of the precipice over which she is going to fall, is as contemptible as
any man who breaks open a lock, or as any rascal on the look-out for a
house left defenseless and without protection, or for some easy and
profitable stroke of business, or as that thief whose various exploits
you have just related to us.

"I, for my part, utterly, refuse to absolve him even when extenuating
circumstances plead in his favor, even when he is carrying on a
dangerous flirtation, in which a man tries in vain to keep his balance,
not to exceed the limits of the game, any more than at lawn tennis; even
when the parts are inverted and a man's adversary is some precocious,
curious, seductive girl, who shows you immediately that she has nothing
to learn and nothing to experience, except the last chapter of love, one
of those girls from whom may fate always preserve our sons, and whom a
psychological novel writer has christened _The Semi-Virgins_.

"It is, of course, difficult and painful for that coarse and
unfathomable vanity which is characteristic of every man, and which
might be called _malism_, not to stir such a charming fire, to act the
Joseph and the fool, to turn away his eyes, and, as it were, to put wax
into his ears, like the companions of Ulysses did when they were