other women, love to steep themselves in love; but they have a
mind to possess and not to be possessed. They have made a sort
of compromise with human nature. The code of their parish gives
them a pretty wide latitude short of the last transgression. The
sweets enjoyed by this fair Duchess of yours are so many venial
sins to be washed away in the waters of penitence. But if you
had the impertinence to ask in earnest for the moral sin to which
naturally you are sure to attach the highest importance, you
would see the deep disdain with which the door of the boudoir and
the house would be incontinently shut upon you. The tender
Antoinette would dismiss everything from her memory; you would be
less than a cipher for her. She would wipe away your kisses, my
dear friend, as indifferently as she would perform her ablutions.
She would sponge love from her cheeks as she washes off rouge.
We know women of that sort--the thorough-bred Parisienne. Have
you ever noticed a grisette tripping along the street? Her face
is as good as a picture. A pretty cap, fresh cheeks, trim hair,
a guileful smile, and the rest of her almost neglected. Is not
this true to the life? Well, that is the Parisienne. She knows
that her face is all that will be seen, so she devotes all her
care, finery, and vanity to her head. The Duchess is the same;
the head is everything with her. She can only feel through her
intellect, her heart lies in her brain, she is a sort of
intellectual epicure, she has a head-voice. We call that kind of
poor creature a Lais of the intellect. You have been taken in
like a boy. If you doubt it, you can have proof of it tonight,
this morning, this instant. Go up to her, try the demand as an
experiment, insist peremptorily if it is refused. You might set
about it like the late Marechal de Richelieu, and get nothing for
your pains."