Alas! for all that, I dare not go to my own window any longer for
fear of seeing you ogling the sky, and making declamations of love
to nature with your sentimental air.

"Tell me, now, in a few words, clever man that you are, how you
manage to combine so much sentimentality with such skillful
diplomacy? Tender friend of childhood, of virtue and of sunsets,
what an adroit courtier you make! From the first day you came
here, the master honored you with his confidence and his affection.
How he esteems you! how he cherishes you! what attentions! what
favors! Will he not order us tomorrow to kiss the dust under your
feet? If you want to know what disgusts me the most in you, it is
the unalterable placidity of your disposition and your face. You
know the faun who admires himself night and day in the basin upon
the terrace; he is always laughing and looks at himself laugh. I
detest this eternal laughter from the bottom of my soul, as I
detest you, as I detest the whole world with the exception of my
horse Soliman. But he, at least, is sincere in his gayety; he
shows himself what he really is, life amuses him, great good may it
do him! But you envelop your beatific happiness in an intolerable
gravity. Your tranquil airs fill me with consternation; your great
contented eyes seem to say: 'I am very well, so much the worse for
the sick!' One word more. You treat me as a child--I will prove
to you that I am not a child, showing you how well I have divined
you. The secret of your being is, that you were born without
passions! Confess honestly that you have never in your life felt a
sentiment of disgust, of anger, or of pity. Is there a single
passion, tell me, that you have experienced, or that you are
acquainted with, except through your books? Your soul is like your
cravat, which is always tied precisely the same way, and has such