Transcriber’s note

Variable spelling and hyphenation have been retained. Minor punctuation inconsistencies have been silently repaired. A list of the changes made can be found [at the end of the book].

LES LIAISONS DANGEREUSES Vol. I

No. 200 of 360 Copies

C. Monnet del. Langlois Jun. Sculp^t.

LES LIAISONS DANGEREUSES
OR
LETTERS COLLECTED IN A PRIVATE SOCIETY
AND PUBLISHED FOR THE INSTRUCTION
OF OTHERS

BY
CHODERLOS DE LACLOS

TRANSLATED BY
ERNEST DOWSON

Vol. I

LONDON
PRIVATELY PRINTED
1898

NOTE TO THE PRESENT EDITION

(A.D. 1898)

Choderlos de Laclos was the Gallic Richardson of the XVIIIth Century; and he might more justly than Stendhal be called the father of French realism. With inimitable wit and the finest analysis of character he depicted the corrupt society of his day. His aim was excellent, but in his endeavour to point his moral he painted the vice which he wished to flagellate in colours so glowing that he appears more an advocate than an opponent of immorality. In his attempt to pourtray the wiles of the seducer for a warning to the unwary, the author of the “Liaisons Dangereuses” produced the most complete manual of the art of seduction; so that during the austere reign of Charles X. this masterpiece was suppressed as throwing too lurid a reflection on the manners and morals of the old régime. “Les Liaisons Dangereuses” is now for the first time literally and completely translated into English by Mr. Ernest Dowson, whose rendering of “La Terre,” in the Lutetian Society’s issue of Zola, gained such a warm meed of praise.

To render this edition of “Les Liaisons Dangereuses” worthy of its fame as one of the chefs-d’œuvre of Literature, it is illustrated with fine photogravure reproductions of the whole of the 15 charming designs by Monnet, Fragonard fils, and Gérard, which appeared in the much coveted French edition of 1796, and which are full of that inexpressible grace and beauty inseparable from the work of these Masters of French Art of the XVIIIth Century.

PUBLISHER’S NOTE TO THE FIRST EDITION (1784)

We think it our duty to warn the public that, in spite of the title of this work and of what the Editor says of it in his Preface, we do not guarantee the authenticity of this narrative, and have even strong reasons for believing that it is but a romance. It seems to us, moreover, that the author, who yet seems to have sought after verisimilitude, has himself destroyed that, and maladroitly, owing to the period which he has chosen in which to place these adventures. Certainly, several of the personages whom he brings on his stage have morals so sorry that it were impossible to believe that they lived in our century, in this century of philosophy, where the light shed on all sides has rendered, as everyone knows, all men so honourable, all women so modest and reserved.

Our opinion is, therefore, that if the adventures related in this work possess a foundation of truth, they could not have occurred save in other places and in other times, and we must censure our author, who, seduced apparently by his hope of being more diverting by treating rather of his own age and country, has dared to clothe in our customs and our costumes a state of morals so remote from us.

To preserve the too credulous Reader, at least so far as it lies with us, from all surprise in this matter, we will support our opinion with an argument which we proffer to him in all confidence, because it seems to us victorious and unanswerable; it is that, undoubtedly, like causes should not fail to produce like effects, and that, nevertheless, we do not hear to-day of young ladies with incomes of sixty thousand livres turning nuns, nor of young and pretty dame-presidents dying of grief.

AUTHOR’S PREFACE

This work, or rather this compilation, which the public will, perhaps, still find too voluminous, contains, however, but a very small portion of the letters which composed the correspondence whence it is extracted. Charged with the care of setting it in order by the persons into whose hands it had come, and whom I knew to have the intention of publishing it, I asked, for reward of my pains, no more than the permission to prune it of all that appeared to me useless; and I have, in fact, endeavoured to preserve only the letters which seemed to me necessary, whether for the right understanding of events or the development of the characters. If there be added to this light labour that of arranging in order the letters I have let remain, an order in which I have almost invariably followed that of the dates, and finally some brief and rare notes, which, for the most part, have no other object than that of indicating the source of certain quotations, or of explaining certain abridgments which I have permitted myself, the share which I have had in this work will have been told. My mission was of no wider range.

I had proposed alterations more considerable, and almost all in respect of diction or style, against which will be found many offences. I should have wished to be authorized to cut down certain too lengthy letters, of which several treat separately, and almost without transition, of matters quite extraneous to one another. This task, which has not been permitted me, would doubtless not have sufficed to give merit to the work, but it would, at least, have freed it from a portion of its defects.

It has been objected to me that it was the letters themselves which it was desirable to make public, not merely a work made after those letters; that it would be as great an offence against verisimilitude as against truth, if all the eight or ten persons who participated in this correspondence had written with an equal purity. And to my representations that, far from that, there was not one of them, on the contrary, who had not committed grave faults, which would not fail to excite criticism, I was answered that any reasonable reader would be certainly prepared to meet with faults in a compilation of letters written by private individuals, since in all those hitherto published by sundry esteemed authors, and even by certain academicians, none has proved quite free of this reproach. These reasons have not persuaded me, and I found them, as I find them still, easier to give than to accept; but I was not my own master, and I gave way. Only, I reserved to myself the right of protest, and of declaring that I was not of that opinion: it is this protest I make here.

What I must say at the outset is that, if my advice has been, as I admit, to publish these letters, I am nevertheless far from hoping for their success: and let not this sincerity on my part be taken for the feigned modesty of an author; for I declare with equal frankness that, if this compilation had not seemed to me worthy of being offered to the public, I would not have meddled with it. Let us try and reconcile these apparent contradictions.

The deserts of a work are composed of its utility or of its charm, and even of both these, when it is susceptible of them: but success, which is not always a proof of merit, often depends more on the choice of a subject than on its execution, on the sum of the objects which it presents rather than on the manner in which they are treated. Now this compilation containing, as its title announces, the letters of a whole society, it is dominated by a diversity of interest which weakens that of the reader. Nay more, almost all the sentiments therein expressed being feigned or dissimulated, they but excite an interest of curiosity which is ever inferior to that of sentiment, which less inclines the mind for indulgence, and which permits a perception of the errors contained in the details that is all the more keen in that these are continually opposed to the only desire which one would have satisfied.

These blemishes are, perhaps, redeemed, in part, by a quality which is implied in the very nature of the work: it is the variety of the styles, a merit which an author attains with difficulty, but which here occurs of itself, and at least prevents the tedium of uniformity. Many persons will also be able to count for something a considerable number of observations, either new or little known, which are scattered through these letters. That is all, I fear, that one can hope for in the matter of charm, judging them even with the utmost favour.

The utility of the work, which, perhaps, will be even more contested, yet seems to me easier to establish. It seems to me, at any rate, that it is to render a service to morals, to unveil the methods employed by those whose own are bad in corrupting those whose conduct is good; and I believe that these letters will effectually attain this end. There will also be found the proof and example of two important verities which one might believe unknown, for that they are so rarely practised: the one, that every woman who consents to admit a man of loose morals to her society ends by becoming his victim; the other, that a mother is, to say the least, imprudent who allows any other than herself to possess the confidence of her daughter. Young people of either sex might also learn from these pages that the friendship which persons of evil character appear to grant them so readily is never aught else but a dangerous snare, as fatal to their happiness as to their virtue. Abuse, however, always so near a neighbour to what is good, seems to me here too greatly to be feared; and far from commending this work for the perusal of youth, it seems to me most important to deter it from all such reading. The time when it may cease to be perilous and become useful seems to me to have been defined, for her sex, by a good mother, who has not only wit but good sense: “I should deem,” she said to me, after having read the manuscript of this correspondence, “that I was doing a service to my daughter, if I gave her this book on the day of her marriage.” If all mothers of families think thus, I shall congratulate myself on having published it.

But if, again, we put this favourable supposition on one side, I continue to think that this collection can please very few. Men and women who are depraved will have an interest in decrying a work calculated to injure them; and, as they are not lacking in skill, perhaps they will have sufficient to bring to their side the austere, who will be alarmed at the picture of bad morals which we have not feared to exhibit.

The would-be free-thinkers will not be interested in a God-fearing woman whom for that very reason they will regard as a ninny; while pious people will be angry at seeing virtue defeated and will complain that religion is not made to seem more powerful.

On the other hand, persons of delicate taste will be disgusted by the too simple and too faulty style of many of these letters; while the mass of readers, led away with the idea that everything they see in print is the fruit of labour, will think that they are beholding in certain others the elaborate method of an author concealing himself behind the person whom he causes to speak.

Lastly, it will perhaps be pretty generally said that everything is good in its own place; and that, although, as a rule, the too polished style of the authors detracts from the charm of the letters of society, the carelessness of the present ones becomes a real fault and makes them insufferable when sent to the printer’s.

I sincerely admit that all these reproaches may be well founded: I think also that I should be able to reply to them without exceeding the length permissible to a preface. But it must be plain that, to make it necessary to reply to all, the book itself should be unable to reply to any; and that, had I been of this opinion I would have suppressed at once the preface and the book.

LIST OF PLATES

Vol. I.

Vol. II.

CONTENTS OF VOLUME THE FIRST

LES LIAISONS DANGEREUSES

LETTER THE FIRST
CÉCILE VOLANGES TO SOPHIE CARNAY, AT THE URSULINES OF ....

You see, my dear friend, that I keep my word to you, and that bonnets and frills do not take up all my time; there will always be some left for you. However, I have seen more adornments in this one single day than in all the four years we passed together; and I think that the superb Tanville[1] will have more vexation at my first visit, when I shall certainly ask to see her, than she has ever fancied that she afforded us, when she used to come and see us in fiocchi. Mamma has consulted me in everything; she treats me much less as a school-girl than of old. I have a waiting-maid of my own; I have a room and a closet at my disposition; and I write this to you at a very pretty desk, of which I have the key, and where I can lock up all that I wish. Mamma has told me that I am to see her every day when she rises, that I need not have my hair dressed before dinner, because we shall always be alone, and that then she will tell me every day where I am to see her in the afternoon. The rest of the time is at my disposal, and I have my harp, my drawing, and books as at the convent, only there is no Mother Perpétue here to scold me, and it is nothing to anybody but myself, if I choose to do nothing at all. But as I have not my Sophie here to sing and laugh with, I would just as soon occupy myself.

It is not yet five o’clock; I have not to go and join Mamma until seven: there’s time enough, if I had anything to tell you! But as yet they have not spoken to me of anything, and were it not for the preparations I see being made, and the number of milliners who all come for me, I should believe that they had no thought of marrying me, and that that was the nonsense of the good Joséphine.[2] However, Mamma has told me so often that a young lady should stay in the convent until she marries that, since she has taken me out, I suppose Joséphine was right.

A carriage has just stopped at the door, and Mamma tells me to come to her at once. If it were to be the Gentleman! I am not dressed, my hand trembles and my heart is beating. I asked my waiting-maid if she knew who was with my mother. “Certainly,” she said, “it’s Monsieur C***.” And she laughed. Oh, I believe ’tis he! I will be sure to come back and relate to you what passes. There is his name, at any rate. I must not keep him waiting. For a moment, adieu....

How you will laugh at your poor Cécile! Oh, I have really been disgraceful! But you would have been caught just as I. When I went in to Mamma, I saw a gentleman in black standing by her. I bowed to him as well as I could, and stood still without being able to budge an inch. You can imagine how I scrutinized him.

“Madame,” he said to my mother, as he bowed to me, “what a charming young lady! I feel more than ever the value of your kindness.” At this very definite remark, I was seized with a fit of trembling, so much so that I could hardly stand: I found an arm-chair and sat down in it, very red and disconcerted. Hardly was I there, when I saw the man at my feet. Your poor Cécile quite lost her head; as Mamma said, I was absolutely terrified. I jumped up, uttering a piercing cry, just as I did that day when it thundered. Mamma burst out laughing, saying to me, “Well! what is the matter with you? Sit down, and give your foot to Monsieur.” Indeed, my dear friend, the gentleman was a shoe-maker. I can’t describe to you how ashamed I was; mercifully there was no one there but Mamma. I think that, when I am married, I shall give up employing that shoe-maker.

So much for our wisdom—admit it! Adieu. It is nearly six o’clock, and my waiting-maid tells me that I must dress. Adieu, my dear Sophie, I love you, just as well as if I were still at the convent.

P.S. I don’t know by whom to send my letter, so that I shall wait until Joséphine comes.

Paris, 3rd August, 17**.

LETTER THE SECOND
THE MARQUISE DE MERTEUIL TO THE VICOMTE DE VALMONT, AT THE CHÂTEAU DE ....

Come back, my dear Vicomte, come back; what are you doing, what can you be doing with an old aunt, whose whole property is settled on you? Set off at once; I have need of you. I have an excellent idea, and I should like to confide its execution to you. A very few words should suffice; and only too honoured at my choice, you ought to come, with enthusiasm, to receive my orders on your knees: but you abuse my kindness, even since you have ceased to take advantage of it, and between the alternatives of an eternal hatred and excessive indulgence, your happiness demands that my indulgence wins the day. I am willing then to inform you of my projects, but swear to me like a faithful cavalier that you embark on no other adventure till this one be brought to an end. It is worthy of a hero: you will serve both love and vengeance; it will be, in short, one rouerie[3] the more to include in your Memoirs: yes, in your Memoirs, for I wish them to be printed, and I will charge myself with the task of writing them. But let us leave that, and come back to what is occupying me.

Madame de Volanges is marrying her daughter: it is still a secret, but she imparted it to me yesterday. And whom do you think she has chosen for her son-in-law? The Comte de Gercourt. Who would have thought that I should ever become Gercourt’s cousin? I was furious.... Well! do you not divine me now? Oh, dull brains! Have you forgiven him then the adventure of the Intendante! And I, have I not still more cause to complain of him, monster that you are?[4] But I will calm myself, and the hope of vengeance soothes my soul.

You have been bored a hundred times, like myself, by the importance which Gercourt sets upon the wife who shall be his, and by his fatuous presumption, which leads him to believe he will escape the inevitable fate. You know his ridiculous precautions as to conventual education and his even more ridiculous prejudice in favour of the discretion of blondes. In fact, I would wager, that for all that the little Volanges has an income of sixty thousand livres, he would never have made this marriage if she had been dark or had not been bred at the convent. Let us prove to him then that he is but a fool: no doubt he will be made so one of these days; it isn’t that of which I am afraid; but ’twould be pleasant indeed if he were to make his début as one! How we should amuse ourselves on the day after, when we heard him boasting, for he will boast; and then, if you once form this little girl, it would be a rare mishap if Gercourt did not become, like another man, the joke of all Paris.

For the rest, the heroine of this new romance merits all your attentions: she is really pretty; it is only fifteen, ’tis a rose-bud, gauche in truth, incredibly so, and quite without affectation. But you men are not afraid of that; moreover, a certain languishing glance, which really promises great things. Add to this that I exhort you to it: you can only thank me and obey.

You will receive this letter to-morrow morning. I request that to-morrow, at seven o’clock in the evening, you may be with me. I shall receive nobody until eight, not even the reigning Chevalier: he has not head enough for such a mighty piece of work. You see that love does not blind me. At eight o’clock I will grant you your liberty, and you shall come back at ten to sup with the fair object; for mother and daughter will sup with me. Adieu, it is past noon: soon I shall have put you out of my thoughts.

Paris, 4th August, 17**.

LETTER THE THIRD
CÉCILE VOLANGES TO SOPHIE CARNAY

I know nothing as yet, my dear friend. Mamma had a great number of people to supper yesterday. In spite of the interest I took in regarding them, the men especially, I was far from being diverted. Men and women, everybody looked at me mightily, and then would whisper to one another, and I saw they were speaking of me. That made me blush; I could not prevent myself. I wish I could have, for I noticed that, when the other women were looked at, they did not blush: or perhaps ’tis the rouge they employ which prevents one seeing the red that is caused by embarrassment; for it must be very difficult not to blush when a man stares at you.

What made me most uneasy was that I did not know what they thought in my regard. I believe, however, that I heard two or three times the word pretty; but I heard very distinctly the word gauche; and I think that must be true, for the woman who said it is a kinswoman and friend of my mother; she seemed even to have suddenly taken a liking to me. She was the only person who spoke to me a little during the evening. We are to sup with her to-morrow.

I also heard, after supper, a man who, I am certain, was speaking of me, and who said to another, “We must let it ripen; this winter we shall see.” It is, perhaps, he who is to marry me, but then it will not be for four months! I should so much like to know how it stands.

Here is Joséphine, and she tells me she is in a hurry. Yet I must tell you one more of my gaucheries. Oh, I am afraid that lady was right!

After supper they started to play. I placed myself at Mamma’s side; I do not know how it happened, but I fell asleep almost at once. I was awakened by a great burst of laughter. I do not know if they were laughing at me, but I believe so. Mamma gave me permission to retire, and I was greatly pleased. Imagine, it was past eleven o’clock. Adieu, my dear Sophie; always love your Cécile. I assure you that the world is not so amusing as we imagined.

Paris, 4th August, 17**.

LETTER THE FOURTH
THE VICOMTE DE VALMONT TO THE MARQUISE DE MERTEUIL, AT PARIS

Your commands are charming; your fashion of conveying them is more gracious still; you would make us in love with despotism. It is not the first time, as you know, that I have regretted that I am no longer your slave: and monster though I be, according to you, I never recall without pleasure the time when you honoured me with sweeter titles. Indeed, I often desire to merit them again, and to end by setting, with you, an example of constancy to the world. But greater interests call us; to conquer is our destiny, we must follow it; perhaps at the end of the course we shall meet again; for, may I say it without vexing you, my fairest Marquise? you follow it at least as fast as I: and since the day when, separating for the good of the world, we began to preach the faith on our different sides, it seems to me that, in this mission of love, you have made more proselytes than I. I know your zeal, your ardent fervour; and if that god of ours judged us by our works, you would one day be the patroness of some great city, whilst your friend would be at most but a village saint. This language astounds you, does it not? But for the last week I hear and speak no other, and it is to perfect myself in it that I am forced to disobey you.

Listen to me and do not be vexed. Depositary of all the secrets of my heart, I will confide to you the most important project I have ever formed. What is it you suggest to me? To seduce a young girl, who has seen nothing, knows nothing, who would be, so to speak, delivered defenceless into my hands, whom a first compliment would not fail to intoxicate, and whom curiosity will perhaps more readily entice than love. Twenty others can succeed and these as well as I. That is not the case in the adventure which engrosses me; its success insures me as much glory as pleasure. Love, who prepares my crown, hesitates, himself, betwixt the myrtle and the laurel; or rather he will unite them to honour my triumph. You yourself, my fair friend, will be seized with a holy veneration and will say with enthusiasm, “Behold a man after my own heart!”

You know the Présidente de Tourvel, her piety, her conjugal love, her austere principles. She it is whom I am attacking; there is the foe meet for me; there the goal at which I dare to aim:

Et si de l’obtenir, je n’emporte le prix,

J’aurai du moins l’honneur de l’avoir entrepris.[5]

One may quote bad verses when a good poet has written them. You must know then that the President is in Burgundy, in consequence of some great law-suit: I hope to make him lose one of greater import! His disconsolate better-half has to pass here the whole term of this distressing widowhood. Mass every day; some visits to the poor of the district; morning and evening prayers, solitary walks, pious interviews with my old aunt, and sometimes a dismal game of whist, must be her sole distractions. I am preparing some for her which shall be more efficacious. My guardian angel has brought me here, for her happiness and my own. Madman that I was, I regretted twenty-four hours which I was sacrificing to my respect for the conventions. How I should be punished if I were made to return to Paris! Luckily, four are needed to play whist; and as there is no one here but the curé of the place, my eternal aunt has pressed me greatly to sacrifice a few days to her. You can guess that I have agreed. You cannot imagine how she has cajoled me since then, above all how edified she is at my regularity at prayers and mass. She has no suspicion what divinity I adore.

Here am I then for the last four days, in the throes of a doughty passion. You know how keen are my desires, how I brush aside obstacles to them: but what you do not know is how solitude adds ardour to desire. I have but one idea; I think of it all day and dream of it all night. It is very necessary that I should have this woman, if I would save myself from the ridicule of being in love with her: for whither may not thwarted desire lead one? O delicious pleasure! I implore thee for my happiness, and above all for my repose. How lucky it is for us that women defend themselves so badly! Else we should be to them no more than timid slaves. At present I have a feeling of gratitude for yielding women which brings me naturally to your feet. I prostrate myself to implore your pardon, and so conclude this too long epistle.

Adieu, my fairest friend, and bear me no malice.

At the Château de ..., 5th August, 17**.

LETTER THE FIFTH
THE MARQUISE DE MERTEUIL TO THE VICOMTE DE VALMONT

Do you know, Vicomte, that your letter is of an amazing insolence, and that I have every excuse to be angry with you? But it has proved clearly to me that you have lost your head, and that alone has saved you from my indignation. Like a generous and sympathetic friend, I forget my wrongs in order to concern myself with your peril; and tiresome though argument be, I give way before the need you have of it, at such a time.

You, to have the Présidente de Tourvel! The ridiculous caprice! I recognize there your froward imagination, which knows not how to desire aught but what it believes to be unattainable. What is the woman then? Regular features, if you like, but no expression; passably made, but lacking grace; and always dressed in a fashion to set you laughing, with her clusters of fichus on her bosom and her body running into her chin! I warn you as a friend, you need but to have two such women, and all your consideration will be lost. Remember the day when she collected at Saint-Roch, and when you thanked me so for having procured you such a spectacle. I think I see her still, giving her hand to that great gawk with the long hair, stumbling at every step, with her four yards of collecting-bag always over somebody’s head, and blushing at every reverence. Who would have said then that you would ever desire this woman? Come, Vicomte, blush too, and be yourself again! I promise to keep your secret.

And then, look at the disagreeables which await you! What rival have you to encounter? A husband! Are you not humiliated at the very word? What a disgrace if you fail! and how little glory even if you succeed! I say more; expect no pleasure from it. Is there ever any with your prudes? I mean those in good faith. Reserved in the very midst of pleasure, they give you but a half-enjoyment. That utter self-abandonment, that delirium of joy, where pleasure is purified by its excess, those good things of love are not known to them. I warn you: in the happiest supposition, your Présidente will think she has done everything for you, if she treats you as her husband; and in the most tender of conjugal tête-à-têtes you are always two. Here it is even worse; your prude is a dévote, with that devotion of worthy women which condemns them to eternal infancy. Perhaps you will overcome that obstacle; but do not flatter yourself that you will destroy it: victorious over the love of God, you will not be so over the fear of the Devil; and when, holding your mistress in your arms, you feel her heart palpitate, it will be from fear and not from love. Perhaps, if you had known this woman earlier, you would have been able to make something of her; but it is two-and-twenty, and has been married nearly two years. Believe me, Vicomte, when a woman is so incrusted with prejudice, it is best to abandon her to her fate; she will never be anything but a puppet.

Yet it is for this delightful creature that you refuse to obey me, bury yourself in the tomb of your aunt, and renounce the most enticing of adventures, and withal one so admirably suited to do you honour. By what fatality then must Gercourt always hold some advantage over you? Well, I am writing to you without temper: but, for the nonce, I am tempted to believe that you don’t merit your reputation; I am tempted, above all, to withdraw my confidence from you. I shall never get used to telling my secrets to the lover of Madame de Tourvel.

I must let you know, however, that the little Volanges has already turned one head. Young Danceny is wild about her. He sings duets with her; and really, she sings better than a school-girl should. They must rehearse a good many duets, and I think that she takes nicely to the unison; but this Danceny is a child, who will waste his time in making love and will never finish. The little person, on her side, is shy enough; and in any event it will be much less amusing than you could have made it: wherefore I am in a bad humour and shall certainly quarrel with the Chevalier at his next appearance. I advise him to be gentle; for, at this moment, it would cost me nothing to break with him. I am sure that, if I had the sense to leave him at present, he would be in despair; and nothing amuses me so much as a lover’s despair. He would call me perfidious, and that word “perfidious” has always pleased me; it is, after the word “cruel,” the sweetest to a woman’s ear, and less difficult to deserve.... Seriously, I shall have to set about this rupture. There’s what you are the cause of; so I put it on your conscience! Adieu. Recommend me to the prayers of your lady President.

Paris, 7th August, 17**.

LETTER THE SIXTH
THE VICOMTE DE VALMONT TO THE MARQUISE DE MERTEUIL

There is never a woman then but abuses the empire she has known how to seize! And yourself, you whom I have so often dubbed my indulgent friend, you have discarded the title and are not afraid to attack me in the object of my affections! With what traits you venture to depict Madame de Tourvel!... What man but would have paid with his life for such insolent boldness? What woman other than yourself would have escaped without receiving at least an ungracious retort? In mercy, put me not to such tests; I will not answer for my power to sustain them. In the name of friendship, wait until I have had this woman, if you wish to revile her. Do you not know that pleasure alone has the right to remove the bandage from Love’s eyes? But what am I saying? Has Madame de Tourvel any need of illusion? No; for to be adorable, she has only need to be herself. You reproach her with dressing badly; I quite agree: all adornment is hurtful to her, nothing that conceals her adorns. It is in the freedom of her négligé that she is really ravishing. Thanks to the distressing heat which we are experiencing, a déshabillé of simple stuff permits me to see her round and supple figure. Only a piece of muslin covers her breast; and my furtive but penetrating gaze has already seized its enchanting form. Her face, say you, has no expression. And, what should it express, in moments when nothing speaks to her heart? No, doubtless, she has not, like our coquettes, that false glance, which is sometimes seductive and always deceives. She knows not how to gloss over the emptiness of a phrase by a studied smile, and although she has the loveliest teeth in the world, she never laughs, except when she is amused. But you should see, in some frolicsome game, of what a frank and innocent gaiety she will present the image! Near some poor wretch whom she is eager to succour, what a pure joy and compassionate kindness her gaze denotes! You should see, above all, how, at the least word of praise or flattery, her heavenly face is tinged with the touching embarrassment of a modesty that is not feigned!... She is a prude and devout, and so you judge her to be cold and inanimate? I think very differently. What amazing sensibility she must have, that it can reach even her husband, and that she can always love a person who is always absent? What stronger proof would you desire? Yet I have been able to procure another.

I directed her walk in such a manner that a ditch had to be crossed; and, although she is very agile, she is even more timid. You can well believe how much a prude fears to cross the ditch![6] She was obliged to trust herself to me. I held this modest woman in my arms. Our preparations and the passage of my old aunt had caused the playful dévote to peal with laughter; but when I had once taken hold of her, by a happy awkwardness our arms were interlaced. I pressed her breast against my own; and in this short interval, I felt her heart beat faster. An amiable flush suffused her face; and her modest embarrassment taught me well enough that her heart had throbbed with love and not with fear. My aunt, however, was deceived, as you are, and said, “The child was frightened,” but the charming candour of the child did not permit her to lie, and she answered naively, “Oh no, but....” That alone was an illumination. From that moment the sweetness of hope has succeeded to my cruel uncertainty. I shall possess this woman; I shall steal her from the husband who profanes her: I will even dare ravish her from the God whom she adores. What delight, to be in turns the object and the victor of her remorse! Far be it from me to destroy the prejudices which sway her mind! They will add to my happiness and my triumph. Let her believe in virtue, and sacrifice it to me; let the idea of falling terrify her, without preventing her fall; and may she, shaken by a thousand terrors, forget them, vanquish them only in my arms. Then, I agree, let her say to me, “I adore thee;” she, alone among women, is worthy to pronounce these words. I shall be truly the God whom she has preferred.

Let us be candid: in our arrangements, as cold as they are facile, what we call happiness is hardly even a pleasure. Shall I tell you? I thought my heart was withered; and finding nothing left but my senses, I lamented my premature old age. Madame de Tourvel has restored to me the charming illusions of youth. With her I have no need of pleasure to be happy. The only thing which frightens me is the time which this adventure is going to take; for I dare leave nothing to chance. ’Tis in vain I recall my fortunate audacities; I cannot bring myself to put them in practice here. To become truly happy, I require her to give herself; and that is no slight affair.

I am sure that you admire my prudence. I have not yet pronounced the word “love;” but we have already come to those of confidence and interest. To deceive her as little as possible, and above all to counteract the effect of stories which might come to her ears, I have myself told her, as though in self-accusation, of some of my most notorious traits. You would laugh to see the candour with which she lectures me. She wishes, she says, to convert me. She has no suspicion as yet of what it will cost her to try. She is far from thinking, that in pleading, to use her own words, for the unfortunates I have ruined, she speaks in anticipation in her own cause. This idea struck me yesterday in the midst of one of her dissertations, and I could not resist the pleasure of interrupting her to tell her that she spoke like a prophet. Adieu, my fairest of friends. You see that I am not lost beyond all hope of return.

P.S. By the way, that poor Chevalier—has he killed himself from despair? Truly, you are a hundredfold naughtier person than myself, and you would humiliate me, if I had any vanity.

At the Château de ..., 9th August, 17**.

LETTER THE SEVENTH
CÉCILE VOLANGES TO SOPHIE CARNAY[7]

If I have told you nothing about my marriage, it is because I know no more about it than I did the first day. I am accustoming myself to think no more of it, and I am quite satisfied with my manner of life. I study much at my singing and my harp; it seems to me that I like them better since I have no longer a master, or perhaps it is because I have a better one. M. le Chevalier Danceny, the gentleman of whom I told you, and with whom I sang at Madame de Merteuil’s, is kind enough to come here every day, and to sing with me for whole hours. He is extremely amiable. He sings like an angel, and composes very pretty airs, to which he also does the words. It is a great pity that he is a Knight of Malta! It seems to me that, if he were to marry, his wife would be very happy.... He has a charming gentleness. He never has the air of paying you a compliment, and yet everything he says flatters you. He takes me up constantly, now about my music, now about something else; but he mingles his criticisms with so much gaiety and interest, that it is impossible not to be grateful for them. If he only looks at you, it seems as though he were saying something gracious. Added to all that, he is very obliging. For instance, yesterday he was invited to a great concert; he preferred to spend the whole evening at Mamma’s. That pleased me very much; for, when he is not here, nobody talks to me, and I bore myself: whereas, when he is here, we sing and talk together. He and Madame de Merteuil are the only two persons I find amiable. But adieu, my dearest friend; I have promised to learn for to-day a little air with a very difficult accompaniment, and I would not break my word. I am going to practise it until he comes.

Paris, 7th August, 17**.

LETTER THE EIGHTH
THE PRÉSIDENTE DE TOURVEL TO MADAME DE VOLANGES

No one, Madame, can be more sensible than I to the confidence you show in me, nor take a keener interest in the establishment of Mademoiselle de Volanges. It is, indeed, from my whole heart that I wish her a happiness of which I make no doubt she is worthy, and which your prudence will secure. I do not know M. le Comte de Gercourt; but being honoured by your choice, I cannot but form a favourable opinion of him. I confine myself, Madame, to wishing for this marriage a success as assured as my own, which is equally your handiwork, and for which each fresh day adds to my gratitude. May the happiness of your daughter be the reward of that which you have procured for me; and may the best of friends be also the happiest of mothers!

I am really grieved that I cannot offer you by word of mouth the homage of this sincere wish, nor make the acquaintance of Mademoiselle de Volanges so soon as I should wish. After having known your truly maternal kindness, I have a right to hope from her the tender friendship of a sister. I beg you, Madame, to be so good as to ask this from her in my behalf, while I wait until I have the opportunity of deserving it.

I expect to remain in the country all the time of M. de Tourvel’s absence. I have taken advantage of this leisure to enjoy and profit by the society of the venerable Madame de Rosemonde. This lady is always charming; her great age has deprived her of nothing; she retains all her memory and sprightliness. Her body alone is eighty-four years old; her mind is only twenty.

Our seclusion is enlivened by her nephew, the Vicomte de Valmont, who has cared to devote a few days to us. I knew him only by his reputation, which gave me small desire to make his acquaintance; but he seems to me to be better than that. Here, where he is not spoilt by the hubbub of the world, he talks rationally with extraordinary ease, and excuses himself for his errors with rare candour. He speaks to me with much confidence, and I preach to him with great severity. You, who know him, will admit that it would be a fine conversion to make: but I suspect, in spite of his promises, that a week of Paris will make him forget all my sermons. His sojourn here will be at least so much saved from his ordinary course of conduct; and I think, from his fashion of life, that what he can best do is to do nothing at all. He knows that I am engaged in writing to you and has charged me to present you with his respectful homage. Pray accept my own also, with the goodness that I know in you; and never doubt the sincere sentiments with which I have the honour to be, etc.

At the Château de ..., 9th August, 17**.

LETTER THE NINTH
MADAME DE VOLANGES TO THE PRÉSIDENTE DE TOURVEL

I have never doubted, my fair and youthful friend, either of the kindness which you have for me, or of the sincere interest which you take in all that concerns me. It is not to elucidate that point, which I hope is settled between us, that I reply to your reply; but I cannot refrain from having a talk with you on the subject of the Vicomte de Valmont.

I did not expect, I confess, ever to come across that name in your letters. Indeed, what can there be in common between you and him? You do not know this man; where should you have obtained any idea of the soul of a libertine? You speak to me of his rare candour: yes, indeed, the candour of Valmont must be most rare. Even more false and dangerous than he is amiable and seductive, never since his extreme youth has he taken a step or uttered a word without having some end in view which was either dishonourable or criminal. My dear, you know me; you know whether, of all the virtues which I try to acquire, charity be not the one which I cherish the most. So that, if Valmont were led away by the vehemence of his passions; if, like a thousand others, he were seduced by the errors of his age: while I should blame his conduct, I should pity him personally, and wait in silence for the time when a happy reformation should restore him the esteem of honest folk. But Valmont is not like that: his conduct is the consequence of his principles. He can calculate to a nicety how many atrocities a man may allow himself to commit, without compromising himself; and, in order to be cruel and mischievous with impunity, he has selected women to be his victims. I will not stop to count all those whom he has seduced: but how many has he not ruined utterly?

In the quiet and retired life which you lead, these scandalous stories do not reach your ears. I could tell you some which would make you shudder; but your eyes, which are as pure as your soul, would be defiled by such pictures: secure of being in no danger from Valmont, you have no need of such arms wherewith to defend yourself. The only thing which I may tell you is that out of all the women to whom he has paid attention, with or without success, there is not one who has not had cause to complain of him. The Marquise de Merteuil is the single exception to this general rule; she alone knew how to withstand and disarm his villainy. I must confess that this episode in her life is that which does her most honour in my eyes: it has also sufficed to justify her fully, in the eyes of all, for certain inconsistencies with which one had to reproach her at the commencement of her widowhood.[8]

However this may be, my fair friend, what age, experience, and above all, friendship, empower me to represent to you is that the absence of Valmont is beginning to be noticed, in the world; and that, if it becomes known that he has for some time made a third party to his aunt and you, your reputation will be in his hands: the greatest misfortune which can befall a woman. I advise you then to persuade his aunt not to keep him there longer; and, if he insists upon remaining, I think you should not hesitate to leave him in possession. But why should he stay? What is he doing in your part of the country? If you were to spy upon his proceedings, I am sure you would discover that he only came there to have a more convenient shelter for some black deed he is contemplating in the neighbourhood. But, as it is impossible to remedy the evil, let us be content by ourselves avoiding it.

Farewell, my lovely friend; at present the marriage of my daughter is a little delayed. The Comte de Gercourt, whom we expected from day to day, tells me that his regiment is ordered to Corsica; and as military operations are still afoot, it will be impossible for him to absent himself before the winter. This vexes me; but it causes me to hope that we shall have the pleasure of seeing you at the wedding; and I was sorry that it was to have taken place without you. Adieu; I am, unreservedly and without compliment, entirely yours.

P.S. Recall me to the recollection of Madame de Rosemonde, whom I always love as dearly as she deserves.

Paris, 11th August, 17**.

LETTER THE TENTH
THE MARQUISE DE MERTEUIL TO THE VICOMTE DE VALMONT

Vicomte, are you angry with me? Or are you, indeed, dead? Or, what would not be unlike that, are you living only for your Présidente? This woman, who has restored you the illusions of youth, will soon restore you also its ridiculous prejudices. Here you are already timid and a slave; you might as well be amorous. You renounce your fortunate audacities. Behold you then conducting yourself without principles, and trusting all to hazard, or rather to caprice. Do you no longer remember that love, like medicine, is nothing but the art of assisting nature? You see that I beat you with your own arms, but I will not plume myself on that: it is indeed beating a man when he is down. She must give herself, you tell me. Ah, no doubt, she must; she will give herself like the others, with this difference, that it will be with a bad grace.

But if the end is that she should give herself, the true way is to begin by taking her. This absurd distinction is indeed a true sign of love’s madness! I say love; for you are in love. To speak to you otherwise would be to cheat you, it would be to hide from you your ill. Tell me then, languid lover, the women whom you have had, did you think you had violated them? Why, however desirous one may be of giving one’s self, however eager one may be, one still needs a pretext; and is there any more convenient for us than that which gives us the air of yielding to force? For me, I confess, one of the things which flatter me the most is a well-timed and lively assault, where everything succeeds in order, although with rapidity; which never throws us into the painful embarrassment of having ourselves to repair a gaucherie from which, on the contrary, we should have profited; which is cunning to maintain the air of violence even in things which we grant, and to flatter adroitly our two favourite passions, the glory of resistance and the pleasure of defeat. I grant that this talent, rarer than one may think, has always given me pleasure, even when it has not seduced me, and that sometimes, solely for recompense, it has induced me to yield. So, in our ancient tourneys, beauty gave the prize of valour and skill.

But you, who are no longer you, are behaving as if you were afraid of success. Ah! since when do you travel by short stages and cross-roads? My friend, when one wishes to arrive, post-horses and the highway! But let us drop this subject, which is all the more distasteful to me in that it deprives me of the pleasure of seeing you. At least write to me more often than you do, and keep me informed of your progress. Do you know that it is now more than a fortnight since you have been occupied by this ridiculous adventure, and have neglected all the world?

À propos of negligence, you are like those people who send regularly to enquire after their sick friends, but who never trouble to get a reply. You finish your last letter by asking me if the Chevalier be dead. I do not answer, and you are no longer in the least concerned. Are you no longer aware that my lover is your born friend? But reassure yourself, he is not dead; or if he were, it would be for excess of joy. This poor Chevalier, how tender he is! how excellently is he made for love! how well he knows how to feel intensely! It makes my head reel. Seriously, the perfect happiness which he derives from being loved by me gives me a real attachment for him.

The very same day upon which I wrote to you that I was going to promote a rupture, how happy I made him! Yet I was mightily occupied, when they announced him, about the means of putting him in despair. Was it reason or caprice: he never seemed to me so fine. I nevertheless received him with temper. He hoped to pass two hours with me, before the time when my door would be open to everybody. I told him that I was going out: he asked me whither I was going; I refused to tell him. He insisted: “Where I shall not have your company,” I answered acidly. Luckily for himself, he stood as though petrified by this answer; for had he said a word, a scene would infallibly have ensued which would have led to the projected rupture. Astonished by his silence, I cast my eyes upon him, with no other intention, upon my oath, than to see what countenance he would shew. I discovered on that charming face that sorrow, at once so tender and so profound, to which, you yourself have admitted, it is so difficult to resist. Like causes produce like effects: I was vanquished a second time.

From that moment, I was only busy in finding a means of preventing him from having a grievance against me. “I am going out on business,” said I, with a somewhat gentler air; “nay, even on business which concerns you; but do not question me further. I shall sup at home; return, and you shall know all.” At this he recovered the power of speech; but I did not permit him to use it “I am in great haste,” I continued; “leave me, until this evening.” He kissed my hand and went away.

Immediately, to compensate him, perhaps to compensate myself, I decide to acquaint him with my petite maison, of which he had no suspicion. I called my faithful Victoire. I have my head-ache; I am gone to bed, for all my household; and left alone at last with my Trusty, whilst she disguises herself as a lackey, I don the costume of a waiting-maid. She next calls a hackney-coach to the gate of my garden, and behold us on our way! Arrived in this temple of love, I chose the most gallant of déshabillés. This one is delicious; it is my own invention: it lets nothing be seen and yet allows you to divine all. I promise you a pattern of it for your Présidente, when you have rendered her worthy to wear it.

After these preliminaries, whilst Victoire busies herself with other details, I read a chapter of Le Sopha,[9] a letter of Héloïse and two Tales of La Fontaine, in order to rehearse the different tones which I would assume. Meantime, my Chevalier arrives at my door with his accustomed zeal. My porter denies him, and informs him that I am ill: incident the first. At the same time he hands him a note from me, but not in my hand-writing, after my prudent rule. He opens it and sees written therein in Victoire’s hand: “At nine o’clock, punctually, on the Boulevard, in front of the cafés.” Thither he betakes himself, and there a little lackey whom he does not know, whom he believes, at least, that he does not know, for of course it was Victoire, comes and informs him that he must dismiss his carriage and follow her. All this romantic promenade helped all the more to heat his mind, and a hot head is by no means undesirable. At last, he arrives, and love and amazement produced in him a veritable enchantment. To give him time to recover, we strolled out for a while in the little wood; then I took him back again to the house. He sees, at first, two covers laid; then a bed prepared. We pass into the boudoir, which was richly adorned. There, half pensively, half in sentiment, I threw my arms round him, and fell on my knees.

“O my friend,” said I, “in my desire to reserve the surprise of this moment for you, I reproach myself with having grieved you with a pretence of ill-humour; with having been able, for an instant, to veil my heart to your gaze. Pardon me my wrongs: the strength of my love shall expiate them.”

You may judge of the effect of this sentimental oration. The happy Chevalier lifted me up, and my pardon was sealed on that very same ottoman where you and I once sealed so gallantly, and in like fashion, our eternal rupture.

As we had six hours to pass together, and I had resolved to make all this time equally delicious for him, I moderated his transports, and brought an amiable coquetry to replace tenderness. I do not think that I have ever been at so great pains to please, nor that I have ever been so pleased with myself. After supper, by turns childish and reasonable, sensible and gay, even libertine at times, it was my pleasure to look upon him as a sultan in the heart of his seraglio, of which I was by turn the different favourites. In fact, his repeated acts of homage, although always received by the same woman, were ever received by a different mistress.

C. Monnet del. N. le Mire sculp.

Finally, at the approach of day, we were obliged to separate; and whatever he might say, or even do, to prove to me the contrary, he had as much need of separation as he had little desire of it. At the moment when we left the house, and for a last adieu, I took the key of this abode of bliss, and giving it into his hands: “I had it but for you,” said I; “it is right that you should be its master. It is for him who sacrifices to have the disposition of the temple.” By such a piece of adroitness, I anticipated him from the reflexions which might have been suggested to him, by the possession, always suspicious, of a petite maison. I know him well enough to be sure that he will never make use of it except for me; and if the whim seized me to go there without him, I have a second key. He would at all costs fix a day for return; but I love him still too well, to care to exhaust him so soon. One must not permit one’s self excesses, except with persons whom one wishes soon to leave. He does not know that himself; but happily for him, I have knowledge for two.

I perceive that it is three o’clock in the morning, and that I have written a volume, with the intention but to write a word. Such is the charm of constant friendship: ’tis on account of that, that you are always he whom I love the best; but, in truth, the Chevalier pleases me more.

Paris, 12th August, 17**.

LETTER THE ELEVENTH
THE PRÉSIDENTE DE TOURVEL TO MADAME DE VOLANGES

Your severe letter would have alarmed me, Madame, if happily I had not found here more causes for security than you give me for being afraid. This redoubtable M. de Valmont, who must be the terror of every woman, seems to have laid down his murderous arms before coming to this château. Far from forming any projects there, he has not even advanced any pretensions: and the quality of an amiable man, which even his enemies accord him, almost disappears here, to be superseded by that of frank good-nature.

It is apparently the country air which has brought about this miracle. What I can assure you is that, being constantly with me, even seeming to take pleasure in my company, he has not let fall one word which resembles love, not one of those phrases which all men permit themselves, without having, like him, what is required to justify them. He never compels one to that reserve which every woman who respects herself is forced to maintain nowadays, in order to repress the men who encircle her. He knows how not to abuse the gaiety which he inspires. He is perhaps somewhat of a flatterer; but it is with so much delicacy, that he would accustom modesty itself to praise. In short, if I had a brother, I should desire him to be such as M. de Valmont reveals himself here. Perhaps, many women would ask a more marked gallantry from him; and I admit that I owe him infinite thanks for knowing how to judge me so well as not to confound me with them.

Doubtless, this portrait differs mightily from that which you send me: and in spite of that, neither need contradict the other, if one compares the dates. He confesses himself that he has committed many faults; and some others will have been fathered on him. But I have met few men who spoke of virtuous women with greater respect, I might almost say enthusiasm. You teach me that at least in this matter he is no deceiver. His conduct towards Madame de Merteuil is a proof of this. He talks much to us of her, and it is always with so much praise, and with the air of so true an attachment, that I believed, until I received your letter, that what he called the friendship between the two was actually love. I reproach myself for this hasty judgment, wherein I was all the more wrong, in that he himself has often been at the pains to justify her. I confess that I took for cunning what was honest sincerity on his part. I do not know, but it seems to me a man who is capable of so persistent a friendship for a woman so estimable cannot be a libertine beyond salvation. I am, for the rest, ignorant as to whether we owe the quiet manner of life which he leads here to any projects he cherishes in the vicinity, as you assume. There are, indeed, certain amiable women near us, but he rarely goes abroad, except in the morning, and then he tells us that it is to shoot. It is true that he rarely brings back any game; but he assures us that he is not a skilful sportsman. Moreover, what he may do without causes me little anxiety; and if I desired to know, it would only be in order to be convinced of your opinion or to bring you back to mine.

As to your suggestion to me to endeavour to cut short the stay which M. de Valmont proposes to make here, it seems to me very difficult to dare to ask his aunt not to have her nephew in her house, the more so in that she is very fond of him. I promise you, however, but only out of deference and not for any need, to seize any opportunity of making this request, either to her or to himself. As for myself, M. de Tourvel is aware of my project of remaining here until his return, and he would be astonished, and rightly so, at my frivolity, were I to change my mind.

These, Madame, are my very lengthy explanations: but I thought I owed it to truth to bear my testimony in M. de Valmont’s favour; it seems to me he stood in great need of it with you. I am none the less sensible of the friendship which dictated your counsels. To that also I am indebted for your obliging remarks to me on the occasion of the delay as to your daughter’s marriage. I thank you for them most sincerely: but however great the pleasure which I promise myself in passing those moments with you, I would sacrifice them with a good will to my desire to know Mlle. de Volanges more speedily happy, if, indeed, she could ever be more so than with a mother so deserving of all her affection and respect. I share with her those two sentiments which attach me to you, and I pray you kindly to receive my assurance of them.

I have the honour to be, etc.

At the Château de ..., 13th August, 17**.

LETTER THE TWELFTH
CÉCILE VOLANGES TO THE MARQUISE DE MERTEUIL

Mamma is indisposed, Madame; she cannot leave the house, and I must keep her company: I shall not, therefore, have the honour of accompanying you to the Opera. I assure you that I do not regret the performance nearly so much as not to be with you. I pray that you will be convinced of this. I love you so much! Would you kindly tell M. le Chevalier Danceny that I have not the selection of which he spoke to me, and that if he can bring it to me to-morrow, it will give me great pleasure? If he comes to-day, he will be told that we are not at home; but that is because Mamma cannot receive anybody. I hope that she will be better to-morrow.

I have the honour to be, etc.

Paris, 13th August, 17**.

LETTER THE THIRTEENTH
THE MARQUISE DE MERTEUIL TO CÉCILE VOLANGES

I am most grieved, my pretty one, both at being deprived of the pleasure of seeing you, and at the cause of this privation. I hope that the opportunity will recur. I will acquit myself of your commission with the Chevalier Danceny, who will certainly be distressed to hear of your Mamma’s sickness. If she can receive me to-morrow, I will come and keep her company. She and I will assault the Chevalier de Belleroche[10] at piquet, and while we win his money, we shall have the additional pleasure of hearing you sing with your amiable master, to whom I will suggest it. If this is convenient to your Mamma and to you, I can answer for myself and my two cavaliers. Adieu, my pretty one; my compliments to dear Madame de Volanges. I kiss you most tenderly.

Paris, 13th August, 17**.

LETTER THE FOURTEENTH
CÉCILE VOLANGES TO SOPHIE CARNAY

I did not write to you yesterday, my dear Sophie, but it was not pleasure which was the cause; of that I can assure you. Mamma was ill, and I did not leave her all day. In the evening, when I retired, I had no heart for anything at all, and I went to bed very quickly, to make sure that the day was done; never have I passed a longer. It is not that I do not love Mamma dearly; but I do not know what it was. I was to have gone to the Opera with Madame de Merteuil; the Chevalier Danceny was to have been there. You know well that they are the two persons whom I like best. When the hour arrived when I should have been there, my heart was sore in spite of me. I did not care for anything, and I cried, cried, without being able to stop myself. Happily Mamma had gone to bed, and could not see me. I am quite sure that the Chevalier Danceny will have been sorry too, but he will have been amused by the spectacle, and by everybody; that’s very different.

Luckily, Mamma is better to-day, and Madame de Merteuil is coming with somebody else and the Chevalier Danceny; but she always comes very late, Madame de Merteuil; and when one is so long all by one’s self, it is very tiresome. It is not yet eleven o’clock. It is true that I must play on my harp; and then my toilette will take me some time, for I want my hair to be done nicely to-day. I think Mother Perpétue is right and that one becomes a coquette as soon as one enters the world. I have never had such a desire to look pretty as during the last few days, and I find I am not as much so as I thought; and then, by the side of women who use rouge, one loses much. Madame de Merteuil, for instance; I can see that all the men think her prettier than me: that does not vex me much, because she is so fond of me; and then she assures me that the Chevalier Danceny thinks I am prettier than she. It is very nice of her to have told me that! She even seemed to be pleased at it. Well, that’s a thing I can’t understand! It’s because she likes me so much! And he!... Oh, that gives me so much pleasure! I think too that only to look at him is enough to make one prettier. I should look at him always, if I did not fear to meet his eyes: for every time that that happens to me, it puts me out of countenance, and seems as though it hurt me; but no matter!

Adieu, my dear friend: I am going to make my toilette. I love you as dearly as ever.

Paris, 14th August, 17**.

LETTER THE FIFTEENTH
THE VICOMTE DE VALMONT TO THE MARQUISE DE MERTEUIL

It is very nice of you not to abandon me to my sad fate. The life I lead here is really fatiguing, from the excess of its repose and its insipid monotony. Reading your letter and the details of your charming day, I was tempted a score of times to invent some business, to fly to your feet, and beg of you an infidelity, in my favour, to your Chevalier, who, after all, does not merit his happiness. Do you know that you have made me jealous of him? Why talk to me of an eternal rupture? I abjure that vow, uttered in a moment of frenzy: we should not have been worthy to make it, had we meant to keep it. Ah, that I might one day avenge myself, in your arms, for the involuntary vexation which the happiness of your Chevalier has caused me! I am indignant, I confess, when I think that this man, without reasoning, without giving himself the least trouble, but quite stupidly following the instinct of his heart, should find a felicity to which I cannot attain. Oh, I will trouble it!... Promise me that I shall trouble it. You yourself, are you not humiliated? You take the trouble to deceive him, and he is happier than you. You believe he is in your chains! It is, indeed, you, who are in his. He sleeps tranquilly, whilst you watch over his pleasures. What more would his slave do?

Listen, my lovely friend: so long as you divide yourself among many, I have not the least jealousy; I see then in your lovers only the successors of Alexander, incapable of preserving amongst them all that empire over which I reigned alone. But that you should give yourself entirely to one of them! That another man should exist as fortunate as myself! I will not suffer it; do not hope that I shall suffer it. Either take me back, or, at least, take someone else; and do not betray, by an exclusive caprice, the inviolate bond of friendship which we have sworn.

It is quite enough, no doubt, that I should have to complain of love. You see, I lend myself to your ideas, and confess my errors. In fact, if to be in love is to be unable to live without possessing the object of one’s desire, to sacrifice to it one’s time, one’s pleasures, one’s life, I am very really in love. I am no more advanced for that. I should not even have anything at all to tell you of in this matter, but for an incident which gives me much food for reflexion, and as to which I know not yet whether I must hope or fear.

You know my chasseur, a treasure of intrigue, and a real valet of comedy: you can imagine that his instructions bade him to fall in love with the waiting-maid, and make the household drunk. The knave is more fortunate than I: he has already succeeded. He has just discovered that Madame de Tourvel has charged one of her people to inform himself as to my behaviour, and even to follow me in my morning expeditions, as far as he could without being observed. What is this woman’s pretension? Thus then the most modest of them all yet dares do things which we should hardly venture to permit ourselves. I swear...! But before I think of avenging myself for this feminine ruse, let us occupy ourselves over methods of turning it to our advantage. Hitherto, these excursions which are suspected have had no object; needs must I give them one. This deserves all my attention, and I take leave of you to ponder upon it. Farewell, my lovely friend.

Still at the Château de ..., 15th August, 17**.

LETTER THE SIXTEENTH
CÉCILE VOLANGES TO SOPHIE CARNAY

Ah, my Sophie, I have a heap of news! I ought not, perhaps, to tell you: but I must talk to someone; it is stronger than I! This Chevalier Danceny ... I am so perturbed that I can hardly write: I do not know where to begin. Ever since I related to you the sweet evening[11] which I passed at Mamma’s, with him and Madame de Merteuil, I have said no more about him to you: it is because I did not want to speak of him to anybody; but I was thinking of him constantly. Since then he has grown so sad—oh, sad, sad!—that it gave me pain; and when I asked him why, he answered that it was not so; but I could well see that it was. Finally, yesterday he was even sadder than ordinarily. This did not prevent him from having the kindness to sing with me as usual; but every time that he looked at me it gripped my heart. When we had finished singing, he went to shut up my harp in its case; and returning the key to me, begged me to play again that evening when I was alone. I had no suspicion of anything at all; I did not even want to play: but he begged me so earnestly that I told him yes. He, certainly, had his motive. In effect, when I had retired to my room and my waiting-maid had gone, I went to get my harp. In the strings I found a letter, simply folded, with no seal, and it was from him. Ah, if you knew all he asks of me! Since I have read his letter, I feel so much delight that I can think of nothing else. I read it four times straight off, and then shut it up in my desk. I knew it by heart; and, when I was in bed, I repeated it so often that I had no thought to sleep. As soon as I shut my eyes, I saw him there; he told me himself all that I had just read. I did not get to sleep till quite late; and, as soon as I was awake (it was still quite early), I went to get his letter and read it again at my ease. I carried it to bed with me, and then I kissed it as if.... Perhaps I did wrong to kiss a letter like that, but I could not check myself.

At present, my dear friend, if I am very happy, I am also much embarrassed; for, assuredly, I ought not to reply to this letter. I know that I should not, and yet he asks me to; and, if I do not reply, I am sure he will be sad again. All the same, it is very unfortunate for him! What do you advise me to do? But you can no more tell than I. I have a great desire to speak of it to Madame de Merteuil, who is so fond of me. I should indeed like to console him; but I should not like to do anything wrong. We are always recommended to cherish a kind heart! and then they forbid us to follow its inspiration, directly there is question of a man! That is not just either. Is not a man our neighbour as much as a woman, if not more so? For, after all, has not one one’s father as well as one’s mother, one’s brother as well as one’s sister? The husband is still something extra. Nevertheless, if I were to do something which was not right, perhaps M. Danceny himself would no longer have a good opinion of me! Oh, rather than that, I would sooner see him sad; and then, besides, I shall always have time enough. Because he wrote yesterday, I am not obliged to write to-day: I shall be sure to see Madame de Merteuil this evening, and, if I have the courage, I will tell her all. If I only do what she tells me, I shall have nothing to reproach myself with. And then, perhaps, she will tell me that I may answer him a little, so that he need not be so sad! Oh, I am in great trouble!

Farewell, my dear friend; tell me, all the same, what you think.

Paris, 19th August, 17**.

LETTER THE SEVENTEENTH
THE CHEVALIER DANCENY TO CÉCILE VOLANGES

Before succumbing, Mademoiselle, to the pleasure, or, shall I say, the necessity of writing to you, I commence by imploring you to hear me. I feel that, to be bold enough to declare my sentiments, I have need of indulgence; did I but wish to justify them, it would be useless to me. What am I about to do, after all, save to show you your handiwork? And what have I to tell you, that my eyes, my embarrassment, my conduct and even my silence have not told you already? And why should you take offence at a sentiment to which you have given birth? Emanating from you, it is worthy to be offered to you; if it is ardent as my soul, it is pure as your own. Shall it be a crime to have known how to appreciate your charming face, your seductive talents, your enchanting graces, and that touching candour which adds inestimable value to qualities already so precious? No, without a doubt: but without being guilty, one may be unhappy; and that is the fate which awaits me if you refuse to accept my homage. It is the first that my heart has offered. But for you, I should have been, not happy, but tranquil. I have seen you, repose has fled far away from me, and my happiness is insecure. Yet you are surprised at my sadness; you ask me its cause: sometimes, I have even thought to see that it affected you. Ah, speak but a word and my felicity will be your handiwork! But, before you pronounce it, remember that one word can also fill the cup of my misery. Be then the arbiter of my destiny. Through you I am to be eternally happy or wretched. In what dearer hands can I commit an interest of such importance?

I shall end as I have begun, by imploring your indulgence. I have begged you to hear me; I will dare more, I will pray you to reply to me. A refusal would lead me to think that you were offended and my heart is a witness that my respect is equal to my love.

P.S. You can make use, to send a reply, of the same method which I employed to bring this letter into your hands; it seems to me as convenient as it is secure.

Paris, 18th August, 17**.

LETTER THE EIGHTEENTH
CÉCILE VOLANGES TO SOPHIE CARNAY

What, Sophie! You blame me in advance for what I am about to do! I had already enough anxiety, and here you are increasing it. Clearly, you say, I ought not to answer. You speak with great confidence; and besides, you do not know exactly how things are: you are not here to see. I am sure that, were you in my place, you would act like me. Assuredly, as a general rule, one ought not to reply; and you can see from my letter of yesterday that I did not want to either: but the thing is, I do not think anyone has ever found herself in quite my case.

And still to be obliged to take my decision all unaided! Madame de Merteuil, whom I counted on seeing yesterday evening, did not come. Everything conspires against me: it is through her that I know him! It is almost always with her that I have seen him, that I have spoken to him. It is not that I have any grudge against her; but she leaves me just in the embarrassing moment. Oh, I am greatly to be pitied!

Imagine! He came here yesterday just as he used to. I was so confused that I dared not look at him. He could not speak to me, because Mamma was there. I quite expected that he would be grieved, when he should find that I had not written to him. I did not know what face to wear. A moment later he asked me if I should like him to bring me my harp. My heart beat so quick, that it was as much as I could do to answer yes. When he came back, it was even worse. I only looked at him for a second. He—he did not look at me, but he had such a look that one would have thought him ill. It made me very unhappy. He began to tune my harp, and afterwards, coming close to me, he said, “Ah, Mademoiselle!”.... He only said these two words; but it was with such an accent that I was quite overwhelmed. I struck the first chords on my harp without knowing what I was doing. Mamma asked me if we were not going to sing. He excused himself, saying that he was not feeling well, and I, who had no excuse—I had to sing. I could have wished that I had never had a voice. I chose purposely an air which I did not know; for I was quite sure that I could not sing anything, and was afraid that something would be noticed. Luckily, there came a visit, and as soon as I heard the carriage wheels, I stopped, and begged him to take away my harp. I was very much afraid lest he should leave at the same time; but he came back.

Whilst Mamma and the lady who had arrived were talking together, I wanted to look at him again for one instant. I met his eyes, and it was impossible for me to turn away my own. A moment later, I saw the tears rise, and he was obliged to turn away in order not to be observed. For an instant I could no longer hold myself in; I felt that I too should weep. I went out, and at once wrote in pencil, on a scrap of paper: “Do not be so sad, I implore you; I promise to give you a reply.” Surely, you cannot see any harm in that, and then it was stronger than I. I put my paper in the strings of my harp, where his letter had been, and returned to the salon. I felt more calm.

It seemed to me very long until the lady went away. Luckily, she had more visits to pay; she went away shortly afterwards. As soon as she was gone, I said that I wanted to have my harp again, and begged him to go and fetch it. I saw from his expression that he suspected nothing. But, on his return, oh, how pleased he was! As he set down my harp in front of me, he placed himself in such a position that Mamma could not see, and he took my hand, which he squeezed ... but, in such a way! ... it was only for a moment: but I could not tell you the pleasure which it gave me. However, I withdrew it; so I have nothing for which to reproach myself.

And now, my dear friend, you must see that I cannot abstain from writing to him, since I have given my promise; and then I am not going to give him any more pain; for I suffer more than he does. If it were a question of doing anything wrong, I should certainly not do it. But what harm can there be in writing, especially when it is to save somebody from being unhappy? What embarrasses me is that I do not know how to write my letter: but he will surely feel that it is not my fault; and then I am certain that as long as it only comes from me, it will give him pleasure.

Adieu, my dear friend. If you think that I am wrong, tell me; but I do not think so. The nearer the moment of writing to him comes, the more does my heart beat: more than you can conceive. I must do it, however, since I have promised. Adieu.

Paris, 17th August, 17**.

LETTER THE NINETEENTH
CÉCILE VOLANGES TO THE CHEVALIER DANCENY

You were so sad yesterday, Monsieur, and that made me so sorry, that I went so far as to promise to reply to the letter which you wrote me. I none the less feel to-day that I ought not to do this: however, as I have promised, I do not wish to break my word, and that must prove how much friendship I feel for you. Now that you know that, I hope you will not ask me to write to you again. I hope also that you will tell nobody that I have written to you, because I should be certainly blamed, and that might cause me a great deal of pain. I hope, above all, that you yourself will not form a bad opinion of me, which would grieve me more than anything. I can give you every assurance that I would not have done as much to anyone except yourself. I should be very glad if you would do me a favour in your turn, and be less sad than you were: it takes away all the pleasure that I feel in seeing you. You see, Monsieur, I speak to you very sincerely. I ask nothing better than that I may always keep your friendship; but I beg of you do not write to me again.

I have the honour to be,

Cécile Volanges.

Paris, 20th August, 17**.

LETTER THE TWENTIETH
THE MARQUISE DE MERTEUIL TO THE VICOMTE DE VALMONT

Ah, wretch, so you flatter me, for fear that I shall make a mock of you! Come, I pardon you: you write me such a heap of nonsense that I must even forgive you the virtue in which you are kept by your Présidente. I do not think my Chevalier would show as much indulgence as I do; he would not be the man to approve the renewal of our contract, or to find anything amusing in your mad idea. I have laughed mightily over it, however, and was really vexed that I had to laugh over it by myself. If you had been there, I know not whither this merriment might not have led us; but I have had time for reflexion, and am armed with severity. I do not say that I refuse for ever; but I postpone, and I am right to do so. I should bring my vanity with me, and once wounded at the game, one knows not where one stops. I should be the woman to enslave you again, to make you forget your Présidente; and if I—unworthy I—were to disgust you with virtue, consider the scandal! To avoid these dangers, here are my conditions:

As soon as you have had your lovely bigot, as soon as you can furnish me with the proof, come to me and I am yours. But you cannot be ignorant that, in affairs of importance, only written proofs are admitted. By this arrangement, on one part, I shall become a recompense instead of being a consolation, and that notion likes me better: on the other hand, your success will have added piquancy by being itself a means to an infidelity. Come then, come as soon as possible, and bring me the gage of your triumph; like those valiant knights of ours, who came to lay at their ladies’ feet the brilliant fruits of their victory. Seriously, I am curious to know what a prude can write after such a moment, and what veil she casts over her language, after having discarded any from her person. It is for you to say whether I price myself too high; but I forewarn you that there is no abatement. Till then, my dear Vicomte, you will find it good that I remain faithful to my Chevalier and amuse myself by making him happy, in spite of the slight annoyance this may cause you.

However, if my morals were less severe, I think you would have, at this moment, a dangerous rival: the little Volanges girl. I am bewitched by this child: it is a real passion. Unless I be deceived, she will become one of our most fashionable women. I see her little heart developing, and it is a ravishing spectacle. She already loves her Danceny with ardour; but she knows nothing about it yet. He himself, although greatly in love, has still the timidity of his age, and dares not as yet tell her too much about it. The two of them are united in adoring me. The little one especially has a mighty desire to confide her secret to me. A few days ago, particularly, I saw her really oppressed, and should have done her a great service by assisting her a little: but I do not forget that she is a child, and I should not like to compromise myself. Danceny has spoken to me somewhat more clearly; but with him my course is resolved; I refuse to hear him. As to the little one, I am often tempted to make her my pupil; it is a service that I would fain render Gercourt. He leaves me the time, since he is to stay in Corsica until the month of October. I have a notion to make use of that time, and that we will give him a fully formed woman, instead of his innocent school-girl. In effect, what must be the insolent sense of security of this man, that he dare sleep in comfort, whilst a woman who has to complain of him has not yet been avenged? Believe me, if the child were here at this moment, I do not know what I would not say to her.

Adieu, Vicomte; good-night, and success to you: but do, for God’s sake, make progress. Bethink you that, if you do not have this woman, the others will blush for having taken you.

Paris, 20th August, 17**.

LETTER THE TWENTY-FIRST
THE VICOMTE DE VALMONT TO THE MARQUISE DE MERTEUIL

At last, my lovely friend, I have taken a step forward: a really great step, and one which, if it has not taken me to my goal, has at least let me know that I am on the right road, and dispelled the fear I was in, that I was lost. I have at last declared my love; and although the most obstinate silence had been maintained, I have obtained a reply that is, perhaps, the least equivocal and the most flattering: but let us not anticipate events, let us begin further back.

You will remember that a watch was set upon my movements. Well, I resolved that this scandalous means should turn to public edification; and this is what I did. I charged my confidant with the task of finding me some poor wretch in the neighbourhood who was in need of succour. This commission was not difficult to fulfil. Yesterday afternoon, he gave me the information that they were going to seize to-day, in the morning, the goods of a whole family who could not pay their taxes. I assured myself that there was no girl or woman amongst this household whose age or face might render my action suspicious; and, when I was well informed, I declared at supper my intention of going after game in the morning. Here I must render justice to my Présidente; doubtless she felt a certain remorse at the orders which she had given; and, not having the strength to vanquish her curiosity, she had at least enough to oppose my desire. It was going to be excessively hot; I ran the risk of making myself ill; I should kill nothing, and tire myself to no purpose; and during all this dialogue, her eyes, which spoke, perhaps, better than she wished, let me see quite sufficiently that she desired me to take these bad reasons for good. I was careful not to surrender, as you may believe, and I even resisted a little diatribe against sportsmen and sport and a little cloud of ill-humour which obscured, during all the evening, that celestial brow. I feared for a moment that her orders had been revoked, and that her delicacy might hinder me. I did not calculate on the strength of a woman’s curiosity; and so was deceived. My chasseur reassured me the same evening, and I went satisfied to bed.

At daybreak I rose and started off. Barely fifty yards from the château, I perceived the spy who was to follow me. I started after the game, and walked across country to the village whither I wished to make, with no other pleasure on the road than to give a run to the rogue who followed me, and who, not daring to quit the road, often had to cover, at full speed, a three times greater distance than mine. By dint of exercising him, I was excessively hot myself, and I sat down at the foot of a tree. He had the insolence to steal behind a bush, not twenty paces from me, and to sit down as well! I was tempted for a moment to fire my gun at him, which, although it only contained small shot, would have given him a sufficient lesson as to the dangers of curiosity: luckily for him, I remembered that he was useful and even necessary to my projects; this reflexion saved him.

However, I reach the village; I see the commotion; I step forward; I question somebody; the facts are related. I have the collector called to me; and, yielding to my generous compassion, I pay nobly fifty-six livres, for lack of which five persons were to be left to straw and their despair. After this simple action, you cannot imagine what a crowd of benedictions echoed round me from the witnesses of the scene! What tears of gratitude poured from the eyes of the aged head of the family, and embellished his patriarchal face, which, a moment before, had been rendered really hideous by the savage marks of despair! I was watching this spectacle, when another peasant, younger, who led a woman and two children by the hands, advanced to me with hasty steps and said to them, “Let us all fall at the feet of this image of God;” and at the same instant I was surrounded by the family, prostrate at my knees. I will confess my weakness: my eyes were moistened by tears, and I felt an involuntary but delicious emotion. I am astonished at the pleasure one experiences in doing good; and I should be tempted to believe that what we call virtuous people have not so much merit as they lead us to suppose. However that may be, I found it just to pay these poor people for the pleasure which they had given me. I had brought ten louis with me, and I gave them these. The acknowledgments began again, but they were not pathetic to the same degree: necessity had produced the great, the true effect; the rest was but a simple expression of gratitude and astonishment at superfluous gifts.

Fragonard fils del. Bertaux et Dupréel sculp^t.

However, in the midst of the loquacious benedictions of this family, I was by no means unlike the hero of a drama, in the scene of the dénouement. Above all, you will remark the faithful spy was also in this crowd. My purpose was fulfilled: I disengaged myself from them all, and regained the château. On further consideration, I congratulated myself on my inventive genius. This woman is, doubtless, well worth all the pains I take; they will one day be my titles with her; and having, in some sort, as it were, paid in advance, I shall have the right to dispose of her, according to my fantasy, without having any cause to reproach myself.

I forgot to tell you that, to turn everything to profit, I asked these good people to pray for the success of my projects. You shall see whether their prayers have not been already in part hearkened to.... But they come to tell me that supper is ready, and it would be too late to dispatch this letter, if I waited to end it after rising from table. “To be continued,” therefore, “in our next.” I am sorry, for the sequel is the finest part. Adieu, my lovely friend. You steal from me a moment of the pleasure of seeing her.

At the Château de ..., 20th August, 17**.

LETTER THE TWENTY-SECOND
THE PRÉSIDENTE DE TOURVEL TO MADAME DE VOLANGES

You will, doubtless, be well pleased, Madame, to hear of a trait in M. de Valmont which is in great contrast to all those under which you have represented him to me. It is so painful to have to think unfavourably of anybody, so grievous to find only vices in people who should possess all the qualities necessary to make virtue lovable! Moreover, you love so well to be indulgent that, were it only to oblige you, I must give you a reason for reconsidering your too harsh judgment. M. de Valmont seems to me entitled to hope for this favour, I might almost say this justice; and this is on what I base my opinion.

This morning he made one of those excursions which might lead one to believe in some project on his part, in the vicinity, just as the idea came to you of one; an idea which I accuse myself of having entertained with too much precipitation. Luckily for him, and above all luckily for us, since we are thus saved from being unjust, one of my men happened to be going in the same direction[12] and it is from this source that my reprehensible but fortunate curiosity was satisfied. He related to us that M. de Valmont, having found an unfortunate family in the village of —— whose goods were being sold because they were unable to pay their taxes, not only hastened to pay the debt of these poor people, but even added to this gift a considerable sum of money. My servant was a witness of this virtuous action; and he related to me in addition that the peasants, talking amongst themselves and with him, had said that a servant, whom they described, and who is believed by mine to be that of M. de Valmont, had sought information yesterday as to any of the inhabitants of the village who might be in need of help. If that be so, it was not merely a passing feeling of compassion, suggested by the opportunity: it was the deliberate project of doing good; it was a search for the chance of being benevolent; it was the fairest virtue of the most noble souls: but be it chance or design, it is none the less a laudable and generous action, the mere recital of which moved me to tears. I will add more, and still from a sense of justice, that when I spoke to him of this action, which he had never mentioned, he began by excusing himself, and had the air of attaching so little importance to it, that the merit of it was enhanced by his modesty.

After that, tell me, my esteemed friend, if M. de Valmont is indeed an irreclaimable libertine? If he can be no more than that and yet behave so, what is left for honest folk? What! are the wicked to share with the good the sacred joy of charity? Would God permit that a virtuous family should receive from the hands of a villain succour for which they render thanks to Divine Providence, and could it please Him to hear pure lips bestow their blessings upon a reprobate? No! I prefer to hold that errors, long as they may have lasted, do not endure for ever; and I cannot think that he who does good can be the enemy of virtue. M. de Valmont is perhaps only one more instance of the danger of associations. I remain of this opinion which pleases me. If, on one side, it may serve to justify him in your opinion, on the other, it renders more and more precious to me the tender friendship which unites me to you for life.

I have the honour to be, etc.

P.S. Madame de Rosemonde and I are going this moment to see for ourselves this worthy and unfortunate family, and to unite our tardy aid to that of M. de Valmont. We shall take him with us. We shall at least give these good people the pleasure of seeing their benefactor: that is, I believe, all he has left for us to do.

At the Château de ..., 20th August, 17**.

LETTER THE TWENTY-THIRD
THE VICOMTE DE VALMONT TO THE MARQUISE DE MERTEUIL

I left off at my return to the château: I resume my tale.

I had only time to make a hurried toilette, ere I repaired to the drawing-room, where my beauty was working at her tapestry, whilst the curé of the place was reading the gazette to my old aunt. I went and took my seat by the frame. Glances sweeter than were customary, and almost caressing, enabled me soon to divine that the servant had already given an account of his mission. Indeed, the dear, inquisitive lady could no longer keep the secret which she had acquired; and without fear of interrupting a venerable pastor, whose recital indeed resembled a sermon: “I too have a piece of news to recite,” said she; and suddenly related my adventure, with an exactitude which did honour to the intelligence of her historian. You may conceive what play I made with my modesty: but who can stop a woman, when she praises the man whom, without knowing it, she loves? I decided therefore to let her have her head. One would have thought she was making the panegyric of a saint. All this time I was observing, not without hope, all the promises of love in her animated gaze; her gesture, which had become more lively; and, above all, her voice, which, by its already perceptible alteration, betrayed the emotion of her soul. She had hardly finished speaking when: “Come, my nephew,” said Madame de Rosemonde to me, “come and let me embrace you.” I felt at once that the pretty preacher could not prevent herself from being embraced in her turn. However, she wished to fly; but she was soon in my arms, and, so far from having the strength to resist, she had scarcely sufficient to maintain herself. The more I observe this woman, the more desirable she appears to me. She hastened to return to her frame, and to everybody had the appearance of resuming her tapestry. But I saw well that her trembling hand prevented her from continuing her work.

After dinner, the ladies insisted on going to see the unfortunates whom I had so piously succoured; I accompanied them. I spare you the tedium of this second scene of gratitude and praise. My heart, impelled by a delicious recollection, hurries on the moment for return to the château. On the way, my fair Présidente, more pensive than is her wont, said never a word. Occupied as I was in seeking the means of profiting by the effect which the episode of the day had produced, I maintained the same silence. Madame de Rosemonde was the only one to speak, and obtained from us but scant and few replies. We must have bored her; that was my intention, and it succeeded. Thus, on stepping from the carriage, she passed into her apartment and left my fair one and myself tête-à-tête, in a dimly lighted room—a sweet obscurity which emboldens timid love.

I had not to be at the pains to lead the conversation into the channel which I wished. The fervour of the amiable preacheress served me better than any skill of my own.

“When one is capable of doing good,” said she, letting her sweet gaze rest on me, “how can one pass one’s life in doing ill?”

“I do not deserve, either that praise or that censure,” said I, “and I cannot imagine how you, who have so clear a wit, have not yet divined me. Though my confidence may damage me in your eyes, you are far too worthy of it that I should be able to refuse it. You will find the key to my conduct in my character, which is unhappily far too easy-going. Surrounded by persons of no morality, I have imitated their vices; I have perhaps made it a point of vanity to surpass them. In the same way, attracted here by the example of virtue, without ever hoping to come up to you, I have, at least, endeavoured to imitate you. Ah, perhaps the action for which you praise me to-day would lose all value in your eyes if you knew its true motive!” (You see, my fair friend, how near the truth I touched.) “It is not to myself,” I went on, “that these unfortunates owe their rescue. Where you think you see a praiseworthy action, I did but seek a means to please. I was nothing else, since I must say it, but the weak agent of the divinity whom I adore.” (Here she would have interrupted me, but I did not give her time.) “At this very moment even,” I added, “my secret only escapes from my weakness. I had vowed that I would be silent before you; I made it my happiness to render to your virtues as much as to your charms a pure homage of which you should always remain ignorant; but incapable of deception, when I have before my eyes the example of candour, I shall not have to reproach myself to you with guilty dissimulation. Do not believe that I insult you by entertaining any criminal hope. I shall be miserable, I know; but my sufferings will be dear to me: they will prove to me the immensity of my love; it is at your feet, it is on your bosom that I will cast down my woes. There shall I draw the strength to suffer anew; there shall I find compassionate bounty, and I shall deem myself consoled because you will have pitied me. Oh, you whom I adore! hearken to me, pity me, succour me!”

By this time I was at her feet, and I pressed her hands in mine; but she suddenly disengaged them and, folding them over her eyes, cried with an expression of despair, “Oh, wretched me!” then burst into tears. Luckily I was exalted to such a degree that I also wept; and, seizing her hands again, I bathed them with my tears. This precaution was most necessary; for she was so full of her grief that she would not have perceived my own, had I not taken this means of informing her. I moreover gained the privilege of considering at my leisure that charming face, yet more embellished by the potent charm of her tears. My head grew hot, and so little was I master of myself that I was tempted to profit by that moment.

What is this weakness of ours? of what avail is the force of circumstances if, forgetting my own projects, I risked losing, by a premature triumph, the charms of a long battle and the details of a painful defeat; if, seduced by the desires of youth, I thought of exposing the conqueror of Madame de Tourvel to the pain of plucking, for the fruit of victory, but the insipid consolation of having had one woman more? Ah, let her surrender, but let her first fight; let her, without having strength to conquer, have enough to resist; let her relish at her leisure the sentiment of her weakness and be constrained to confess her defeat! Let us leave it to the obscure poacher to kill at a bound the stag he has surprised; your true hunter will give it a run. Is not this project of mine sublime? Yet perhaps I should be now regretting that I had not followed it, had not chance come to the rescue of my prudence.

We heard a noise. Someone was coming to the drawing-room. Madame de Tourvel, in alarm, rose precipitately, seized one of the candles, and left the room. I could not but let her go. It was only one of the servants. As soon as I was assured of this, I followed her. I had hardly gone a few paces, before, whether that she had recognized me, or for some vague sentiment of terror, she quickened her steps, and flung herself into, rather than entered, her chamber, the door of which she closed behind her. I went after her; but the door was locked inside. I was careful not to knock; that would have been to give her the chance of a too easy resistance. I had the good and simple idea of peeping through the key-hole, and I saw this adorable woman on her knees, bathed with tears, and fervently praying. What God did she dare invoke? Is there one potent enough to resist love? In vain, henceforward, will she invoke extraneous aid! ’Tis I who will order her destiny.

Thinking I had done enough for one day, I too withdrew to my own room, and started to write to you. I hoped to see her again at supper; but she had given out that she was indisposed, and had gone to bed. Madame de Rosemonde wished to go up to her; but the cunning invalid alleged a headache which prevented her from seeing anybody. You may guess that after supper the interval was short, and that I too had my headache. Withdrawing to my room, I wrote a long letter to complain of this severity, and went to bed with the intention of delivering it to her this morning. I slept badly, as you can see by the date of this letter. I rose and re-read my epistle. I discovered that I had not been sufficiently restrained, had exhibited less love than ardour. It must be written again, but in a calmer mood.

I see the day break, and I hope the freshness which accompanies it will bring me sleep. I am going to return to my bed; and, whatever may be the power of this woman over me, I promise you never to be so occupied with her as to lack time to think much of you. Adieu, my lovely friend!

At the Château de ..., 21st August, 17**, at four o’clock in the morning.

LETTER THE TWENTY-FOURTH
THE VICOMTE DE VALMONT TO THE PRÉSIDENTE DE TOURVEL

Ah, Madame, deign in pity to calm the trouble of my soul, deign to tell me what I am to hope or fear. Cast between the extremes of happiness and misfortune, uncertainty is a cruel torment. Why did I speak to you? Why did I not know how to resist the imperious charm which betrayed my thoughts to you? Content to adore you in silence, I had at least the consolation of my love; and this pure sentiment, untroubled then by the image of your grief, sufficed for my felicity; but that source of happiness has become my despair, since I saw your tears flow, since I heard that cruel Ah, wretched me!

Madame, those words will echo long within my heart. By what fatality can the sweetest of the sentiments inspire nothing but terror? What then is this fear? Ah, it is not that of reciprocation: your heart, which I have misunderstood, is not made for love; mine, which you calumniate unceasingly is the only one which is disturbed: yours is even pitiless. If it were not so, you would not have refused a word of consolation to the wretch who told you of his sufferings; you would not have withdrawn yourself from his sight, when he has no other pleasure than that of seeing you; you would not have played a cruel game with his anxiety by letting him be told that you were ill, without permitting him to go and inform himself of your health; you would have felt that the same night which did but mean for you twelve hours of repose would be for him a century of pain.

For what cause, tell me, have I deserved this intolerable severity? I do not fear to take you for my judge: what have I done, then, but yield to an involuntary sentiment, inspired by beauty and justified by virtue, always restrained by respect, the innocent avowal of which was the effect of trust and not of hope? Will you betray that trust, which you yourself seemed to permit me, and to which I yielded myself without reserve? No, I cannot believe that: it would be to imply a fault in you, and my heart revolts at the bare idea of detecting one. I withdraw my reproaches; write them I can, but think them never! Ah, let me believe you perfect; it is the one pleasure which is left me! Prove to me that you are so by granting me your generous aid. What poor wretch have you ever helped who was in so much need as I? Do not abandon me to the frenzy in which you have plunged me: lend me your reason since you have ravished mine; after having corrected me, give me light to complete your work.

I would not deceive you; you will never succeed in subduing my love; but you shall teach me to moderate it: by guiding my conduct, by dictating my speech, you will save me, at least, from the dire misfortune of displeasing you. Dispel above all that dreadful fear; tell me that you forgive me, that you pity me; assure me of your indulgence. You will never have as much as I should desire in you; but I invoke that of which I have need: will you refuse it me?

Adieu, Madame; be kind enough to receive the homage of my sentiments; it hinders not that of my respect.

At the Château de ..., 20th August, 17**.

LETTER THE TWENTY-FIFTH
THE VICOMTE DE VALMONT TO THE MARQUISE DE MERTEUIL

This is yesterday’s bulletin. At eleven o’clock I visited Madame de Rosemonde, and, under her auspices, I was introduced into the presence of the pretended invalid, who was still in her bed. Her eyes looked very worn; I hope she slept as badly as I did. I seized a moment when Madame de Rosemonde had turned away to deliver my letter: it was refused; but I left it on the bed, and went decorously to the side of my old aunt’s arm-chair. She wished to be near her dear child. It was necessary to conceal the letter to avoid scandal. The invalid was artless enough to say that she thought she had a little fever. Madame de Rosemonde persuaded me to feel her pulse, vaunting mightily my knowledge of medicine. My beauty then had the double vexation of being forced to give me her hand, and of feeling that her little falsehood was to be discovered. I took her hand, which I pressed in one of mine, whilst, with the other, I ran over her fresh and rounded arm. The naughty creature made no response, which impelled me to say, as I withdrew, “There is not even the slightest symptom.” I suspected that her gaze would be severe, and, to punish her, I refused to meet it: a moment later she said that she wished to rise, and we left her alone. She appeared at dinner, which was a sombre one; she gave out that she would not take a walk, which was as much as to tell me that I should have no opportunity of conversing with her. I was well aware that, at this point, I must put in a sigh and a mournful look; no doubt she was waiting for that, for it was the one moment of the day when I succeeded in meeting her eyes. Virtuous as she is, she has her little ruses like another. I found a moment to ask of her “if she had had the kindness to inform me of my fate,” and I was somewhat astonished when she answered, “Yes, Monsieur, I have written to you.” I was mighty anxious to have this letter, but whether it were a ruse again, or for awkwardness, or shyness, she did not give it to me till the evening, when she was retiring to her apartment. I send it you, as well as the first draft of mine; read and judge; see with what signal falsity she says that she feels no love, when I am sure of the contrary; and then she will complain if I deceive her afterwards, when she does not fear to deceive me before! My lovely friend, the cleverest of men can do no more than keep on a level with the truest woman. I must needs, however, feign to believe all this nonsense, and weary myself with despair, because it pleases Madame to play at severity! It is hard not to be revenged on such baseness! Ah, patience!... But adieu. I have still much to write. By the way, return me the letter of the fair barbarian; it might happen later that she would expect one to attach a value to those wretched sheets, and one must be in order.

I say nothing to you of the little Volanges; we will talk of her at an early day.

At the Château de ..., 22nd August, 17**.

LETTER THE TWENTY-SIXTH
THE PRÉSIDENTE DE TOURVEL TO THE VICOMTE DE VALMONT

Assuredly, Monsieur, you would never have received any letter from me, did not my foolish conduct of yesterday evening compel me to-day to have an explanation with you. Yes, I wept, I confess it: perhaps, too, the words which you are so careful to quote to me did escape me; tears and words, you remarked everything; I must then explain to you everything.

Accustomed to inspire only honourable sentiments, to hear only conversation to which I can listen without a blush, and consequently to enjoy a feeling of security which I venture to say I deserve, I know not how either to dissimulate or to combat the impressions I receive. The astonishment and embarrassment into which your conduct threw me; a fear, I know not of what, inspired by a situation which should never have been thrust upon me; perhaps, even the revolting idea of seeing myself confounded with the women whom you despise, and treated as lightly as they are: all these causes in conjunction provoked my tears, and may have made me say, I think with reason, that I was wretched. This expression, which you think so strong, would certainly have been far too weak, if my tears and utterance had another motive; if, instead of disapproving sentiments which must need offend me, I could have feared lest I should share them.

No, Monsieur, I have not that fear; if I had, I would fly a hundred leagues away from you, I would go and weep in a desert at the misfortune of having known you. Perhaps even, in spite of the certainty in which I am of not loving you, of never loving you, perhaps I should have done better to follow the counsels of my friends, and forbid you to approach me.

I believed, and it is my sole error, I believed that you would respect a virtuous woman, who asked nothing better than to find you so and to do you justice; who already was defending you, whilst you were outraging her with your criminal avowals. You do not know me; no, Monsieur, you do not know me. Otherwise you would not have thought to make a right out of your error: because you had made proposals to me which I ought not to hear, you would not have thought yourself authorized to write me a letter which I ought not to read: and you ask me to guide your conduct, to dictate to you your speech! Very well, Monsieur, silence and forgetfulness, those are the counsels which it becomes me to give you, as it will you to follow them; then you will indeed have rights to my indulgence: it will only rest with you to obtain even my gratitude.... But no, I will not address a request to a man who has not respected me; I will give no mark of confidence to a man who has abused my security. You force me to fear, perhaps to hate you: I did not want to; I wished to see in you naught else than the nephew of my most respected friend; I opposed the voice of friendship to the public voice which accused you. You have destroyed it all; and I foresee, you will not want to repair it.

I am anxious, Monsieur, to make it clear to you that your sentiments offend me; that their avowal is an outrage to me; and, above all, that, so far from my coming one day to share them, you would force me to refuse ever again to see you, if you do not impose on yourself, as to this subject, the silence which it seems to me I have the right to expect and even to demand from you. I enclose in this letter that which you have written to me, and I beg that you will similarly return me this: I should be sincerely grieved if any trace remained of an incident which ought never to have occurred.

I have the honour to be, etc.

At the Château de ..., 21st August, 17**.

LETTER THE TWENTY-SEVENTH
CÉCILE VOLANGES TO THE MARQUISE DE MERTEUIL

Lord! how good you are, Madame! how well you understood that it would be easier to me to write to you than to speak! What I have to tell you, too, is very difficult; but is it not true that you are my friend? Oh yes, my very dear friend! I am going to try not to be afraid; and then, I have so much need of you, of your counsels! I am so very grieved, it seems to me that everybody guesses my thoughts; and, especially when he is there, I blush as soon as anyone looks at me. Yesterday, when you saw me crying, it was because I wished to speak to you, and then, I do not know what prevented me; and, when you asked me what was the matter, my tears flowed in spite of myself. I could not have said a single word. But for you, Mamma would have noticed it; and what would have become of me then? That is how I pass my life, especially since four days ago!

It was on that day, Madame, yes, I am going to tell you, it was on that day that M. le Chevalier Danceny wrote to me: oh, I assure you that when I found his letter, I did not know at all what it was: but, not to tell a falsehood, I cannot tell you that I did not take a great deal of pleasure in reading it; you see, I would sooner have sorrow all my life than that he should not have written it. But I knew well that I ought not to tell him that, and I can even assure you that I told him I was vexed at it: but he said that it was stronger than himself, and I quite believe it; for I had resolved not to answer him, and yet I could not help myself. Oh, I have only written to him once, and even that was partly to tell him not to write to me again: but, in spite of that, he goes on writing to me; and, as I do not answer him, I see quite well that he is sad, and that pains me more still: so much that I no longer know what to do, nor what will happen, and I am much to be pitied.

Tell me, I beg you, Madame, would it be very wrong to reply to him from time to time? Only until he has been able to resolve not to write to me any more himself, and to stay as we were before: for, as for me, if this continues, I do not know what will happen to me. See, in reading his last letter, I cried as though I should never have done; and I am very sure that if I do not answer him again, it will cause us a great deal of pain.

I am going to send you his letter as well, or rather a copy, and you will decide; you will quite see there is no harm in what he asks. However, if you think that it must not be, I promise you to restrain myself; but I believe that you will think like me, and that there is no harm there.

Whilst I am about it, Madame, permit me to ask you one more question. They have always told me that it was wrong to love anyone; but why is that? What makes me ask you is that M. le Chevalier Danceny maintains that it is not wrong at all, and that almost everybody loves; if that is so, I do not see why I should be the only one to refrain from it; or is it then that it is only wrong for young ladies? For I have heard Mamma herself say that Madame D*** was in love with Monsieur M***, and she did not speak of it as a thing which was so very wrong; and yet I am sure she would be angry with me, if she were only to suspect my liking for M. Danceny. She treats me always like a child, does Mamma; and she tells me nothing at all. I believed, when she took me from the convent, that it was to marry me; but at present it seems no: it is not that I care about it, I assure you; but you who are so friendly with her know, perhaps, how it stands; and, if you know, I hope you will tell me. This is a very long letter, Madame; but, since you have allowed me to write to you, I have profited by it to tell you all, and I count on your friendship.

I have the honour to be, etc.

Paris, 23rd August, 17**.

LETTER THE TWENTY-EIGHTH
THE CHEVALIER DANCENY TO CÉCILE VOLANGES.

What, Mademoiselle! you still refuse to answer me! Nothing can bend you, and each day bears away with it the hope which it had brought! What then is this friendship which you agree subsists between us, if it be not even powerful enough to render you sensible to my pain; if it leaves you cold and tranquil, whilst I experience the torments of a fire that I cannot extinguish; if, far from inspiring you with confidence, it does not even suffice to induce your pity? What! your friend suffers and you do nothing to help him! He does but ask you for a word, and you refuse him that! And you wish him to content himself with a sentiment so feeble, of which you even fear to reiterate the assurance!

You would not be ungrateful, you said yesterday: ah, believe me, Mademoiselle, to be ready to repay love with friendship is not to fear ingratitude, it is to dread only the having the appearance of it. However, I dare not discuss with you a sentiment which can only be a burden to you, if it does not interest you; I must at least confine it within myself until I learn how to conquer it. I feel how painful this task will be; I do not hide from myself that I shall have need of all my strength; I will attempt every means; there is one which will cost my heart most dearly, it is that of repeating to myself often that your own is insensible. I will even try to see you less often, and I am already busy in seeking a plausible excuse.

What! I should lose the sweet habit of seeing you every day! Ah, at least I shall never cease to regret it! An eternal sorrow will be the price of the most tender love; and you will have wished it, and it will be your work! Never, I feel it, shall I recover the happiness I lose to-day; you alone were made for my heart; with what delight I would take a vow to live only for you! But this vow you will not accept; your silence teaches me well enough that your heart says nothing to you in my behalf: it is at once the surest proof of your indifference and the most cruel fashion of announcing it to me. Adieu, Mademoiselle.

I dare not flatter myself with the hope of a reply: love would have written to me with impatience, friendship with pleasure, even pity with complacence; but pity, friendship and love are equally strangers to your heart.

Paris, 13th August, 17**.

LETTER THE TWENTY-NINTH
CÉCILE VOLANGES TO SOPHIE CARNAY

I told you, Sophie, that there were cases in which one might write; and I assure you that I reproach myself greatly with having followed your advice, which has brought so much grief to the Chevalier Danceny and to myself. The proof that I was right is that Madame de Merteuil, who is a woman who surely knows, thinks as I do. I confessed everything to her. She talked to me at first as you did: but when I had explained all to her, she agreed that it was very different; she only asks me to shew her all my letters and all those of the Chevalier Danceny, in order to make sure that I say nothing but what I should; thus, at present, I am tranquil. Heavens, how I love Madame de Merteuil! She is so good! and she is a woman very much respected. Thus, there is nothing more to be said.

How I am going to write to M. Danceny, and how pleased he will be! He will be even more so than he thinks, for hitherto I have only spoken of my friendship, and he always wanted me to tell him of my love. I think it was much the same thing; but anyhow, I did not dare, and he longed for that. I told this to Madame de Merteuil; she told me that I was right, and that one ought not to confess that one feels love, until one can no longer restrain one’s self: now I am sure that I could not restrain myself any longer; after all, it is the same thing, and it will give him greater pleasure.

Madame de Merteuil told me also that she would lend me books which spoke of all that, and which would teach me to behave myself properly, and to write better than I know now: for, you see, she tells me of all my faults, which is a proof how much she likes me; she has only recommended me to say nothing to Mamma of these books, because that would seem to suggest that she has neglected my education, and that might vex her. Oh, I shall say nothing about it to her!

It is very extraordinary, however, that a woman who is scarcely related to me should take more care of me than my mother! It is very lucky for me to have known her!

She has also asked Mamma to bring me the day after to-morrow to the Opera, in her box; she has told me that we shall be quite alone there, and we are to talk all the time, without fear of being overheard: I like that much better than the opera. We shall speak also of my marriage: for she has told me that it was quite true that I was to be married; but we have not been able to say more about it. By the way, is it not astonishing that Mamma has said nothing about it at all?

Adieu, my Sophie, I am going to write to the Chevalier Danceny. Oh! I am very happy.

Paris, 24th August, 17**.

LETTER THE THIRTIETH
CÉCILE VOLANGES TO THE CHEVALIER DANCENY

At last, Monsieur, I consent to write to you, to assure you of my friendship, of my love, since without that you would be unhappy. You say that I have not a good heart; I assure you, indeed, that you are mistaken, and I hope, at present, you no longer doubt it. If you have been grieved that I have not written to you, do you suppose that that did not grieve me as well? But the fact is that, for nothing in the world, would I like to do anything that was wrong; and I would not even have told you of my love, if I could have prevented myself: but your sadness gave me too much pain. I hope that, at present, you will be sad no longer, and that we shall both be very happy.

I trust to have the pleasure of seeing you this evening, and that you will come early; it will never be so early as I could wish. Mamma is to sup at home, and I believe she will ask you to stay: I hope you will not be engaged as you were the day before yesterday. Was the supper you went to so very agreeable? For you went to it very early. But come, let us not talk of that: now that you know I love you, I hope you will remain with me as much as you can, for I am only happy when I am with you, and I should like you to feel the same.

I am very sorry that you are still sad at this moment, but it is not my fault. I will ask if I may play on the harp as soon as you arrive, in order that you may get my letter at once. I can do no more.

Adieu, Monsieur. I love you well, with my whole heart: the more I tell you, the better pleased I am; I hope that you will be so too.

Paris, 24th August, 17**.

LETTER THE THIRTY-FIRST
THE CHEVALIER DANCENY TO CÉCILE VOLANGES

Yes, without a doubt, we shall be happy. My happiness is well assured, since I am loved by you; yours will never end, if it is to last as long as that which you have inspired in me. What! You love me, you no longer fear to assure me of your love! The more you tell me, the better pleased you are! After reading that charming I love you, written by your hand, I heard your sweet mouth repeat the confession. I saw fixed upon me those charming eyes, which their expression of tenderness embellished still more. I received your vow to live ever for me. Ah, receive mine, to consecrate my whole life to your happiness; receive it and be sure that I will never betray it!

What a happy day we passed yesterday! Ah, why has not Madame de Merteuil secrets to tell your Mamma every day? Why must it be that the idea of constraint, which follows us, comes to mingle with the delicious recollection which possesses me? Why can I not hold unceasingly that pretty hand, which has written to me I love you, cover it with kisses, and avenge myself so for the refusal you have given me of a greater favour!

Tell me, my Cécile, when your Mamma had returned; when we were forced by her presence to have only indifferent looks for one another; when you could no longer console me, with the assurance of your love, for the refusal you made to give me any proofs of it: did you have no sentiment of regret? Did you not say to yourself: a kiss would have made him happier, and it is I who have kept this joy from him? Promise me, my charming friend, that on the first opportunity you will be less severe. With the aid of this promise, I shall find the courage to support the vexations which circumstances have in store for us; and the cruel privations will be at least softened by my certainty that you share my regret.

Adieu, my charming Cécile: the hour is at hand when I must go to your house. It would be impossible to quit you, were it not to go and see you again. Adieu, you whom I love so dearly! you whom I shall love ever more and more!

Paris, 25th August, 17**.

LETTER THE THIRTY-SECOND
MADAME DE VOLANGES TO THE PRÉSIDENTE DE TOURVEL

You ask me then, Madame, to believe in the virtue of M. de Valmont? I confess that I cannot bring myself to it, and that I should find it as hard a task to believe in his honour, from the one fact that you relate to me, as to believe in the viciousness of a man of known probity, for the sake of one error. Humanity is not perfect in any fashion; no more in the case of evil than in that of good. The criminal has his virtues, just as the honest man has his weaknesses. This truth appears to me all the more necessary to believe, in that from it is derived the necessity of indulgence towards the wicked as well as to the good, and that it safeguards the latter from pride as it does the former from discouragement. You will doubtless think that I am practising but sorrily, at this moment, the indulgence which I preach; but I see in it only a dangerous weakness, when it leads us to treat the vicious and the man of integrity alike.

I will not permit myself to criticize the motives of M. de Valmont’s action; I would fain believe them as laudable as the act itself: but has he any the less spent his life in involving families in trouble, scandal and dishonour? Listen, if you will, to the voice of the wretched man he has succoured; but let not that prevent you from hearing the cries of the hundred victims whom he has sacrificed. Were he only, as you say, an instance of the danger of acquaintances, would that make him any less dangerous as an acquaintance himself? You assume him to be capable of a happy reformation? Let us go further: suppose this miracle accomplished; would not public opinion remain against him, and does not that suffice to regulate your conduct? God alone can absolve at the moment of repentance; he reads in men’s hearts: but men can only judge of thoughts by deeds; and none amongst them, after having lost the esteem of others, has a right to complain of the necessary distrust which renders this loss so difficult to repair. Remember above all, my dear young friend, that it sometimes suffices to lose this respect, merely to have the air of attaching too little value to it; and do not tax this severity with injustice: for, apart from our being obliged to believe that no one renounces this precious possession who has the right to pretend to it, he is, indeed, more liable to misdoing who is not restrained by this powerful brake. Such, nevertheless, would be the aspect under which an intimate acquaintance with M. de Valmont would display you, however innocent it might be.

Alarmed at the warmth with which you defend him, I hasten to anticipate the objections which I foresee you will make. You will quote Madame de Merteuil, to whom this acquaintance has been pardoned; you will ask me why I receive him at my house; you will tell me that, far from being repulsed by people of honour, he is admitted, sought after, even, in what is called good society. I believe I can answer everything.

To begin with, Madame de Merteuil, a most estimable person indeed, has perhaps no other fault save that of having too much confidence in her own strength; she is a skilful guide who delights in taking a carriage betwixt a mountain and a precipice, and who is only justified by success: it is right to praise her, it would be imprudent to imitate her; she herself admits it and reproaches herself for it. In proportion as she has seen more, have her principles become more severe; and I do not fear to assure you that she would think as I do.

As to what concerns myself, I will not justify myself more than others. No doubt I receive M. de Valmont, and he is received everywhere: it is one inconsistency the more to add to the thousand others which rule society. You know, as well as I do, how one passes one’s life in remarking them, bemoaning them, and submitting to them. M. de Valmont, with a great name, a great fortune, many amiable qualities, early recognized that, to obtain an empire over society, it was sufficient to employ, with equal skill, praise and ridicule. None possesses as he does this double talent: he seduces with the one, and makes himself feared with the other. People do not esteem him; but they flatter him. Such is his existence in the midst of a world which, more prudent than courageous, would rather humour than combat him.

But neither Madame de Merteuil herself, nor any other woman, would for a moment think of shutting herself up in the country, almost in solitude, with such a man. It was reserved for the most virtuous, the most modest of them all to set the example of such an inconsistency: forgive the word, it escapes from my friendship. My lovely friend, your very virtue betrays you by the security with which it fills you. Reflect then that you will have for judges, on the one side, frivolous folk, who will not believe in a virtue the pattern of which they do not find in themselves; and on the other, the ill-natured, who will feign not to believe in it, in order to punish you for its possession. Consider that you are doing, at this moment, what certain men would not venture to risk. In fact, amongst our young men, of whom M. de Valmont has only too much rendered himself the oracle, I remark the most prudent fear to seem too intimate with him; and you, are you not afraid? Ah, come back, come back, I conjure you!... If my reasons are not sufficient to convince you, yield to my friendship; it is that which makes me renew my entreaties, it is for that to justify them. You think it severe, and I trust that it may be needless; but I would rather you had to complain of its anxiety than of its neglect.

Paris, 24th August, 17**.

LETTER THE THIRTY-THIRD
THE MARQUISE DE MERTEUIL TO THE VICOMTE DE VALMONT

The moment that you are afraid of success, my dear Vicomte, the moment that your plan is to furnish arms against yourself and that you are less desirous to conquer than to fight, I have no more to say to you. Your conduct is a masterpiece of prudence. It would be one of folly in the contrary supposition; and, to tell the truth, I fear that you are under an illusion.

What I reproach you with is not that you did not take advantage of the moment. On the one side, I do not clearly see that it had arrived; on the other, I am quite aware, although they assert the contrary, that an occasion once missed returns, whereas one never recovers a too precipitate action. But the real blunder is that you should have let yourself start a correspondence. I defy you at present to foretell whither that may lead you. Do you hope, by any chance, to prove to this woman that she must surrender? It appears to me that therein can only lie a truth of sentiment and not of demonstration; and that to make her admit it is a matter of acting on her feelings, and not of arguing; but in what will it serve you to move her by letter, since you will not be at hand to profit by it? If your fine phrases produce the intoxication of love, do you flatter yourself that it will last so long that there will be no time left for reflexion to prevent the confession of it? Reflect only of the time it takes to write a letter, of that which passes before it can be delivered, and see whether a woman, especially one with the principles of your dévote, can wish so long that which it is her endeavour to wish never. This method may succeed with children, who, when they write, “I love you,” do not know that they say “I yield myself.” But the argumentative virtue of Madame de Tourvel seems to me to be fully aware of the value of terms. Thus, in spite of the advantage which you had over her in your conversation, she beats you in her letter. And then, do you know what happens? Merely for the sake of argument, one refuses to yield. By dint of searching for good reasons, one finds, one tells them; and afterwards one clings to them, not because they are good, so much as in order not to give one’s self the lie.

In addition, a point which I wonder you have not yet made: there is nothing so difficult in love as to write what you do not feel. I mean to write in a convincing manner: it is not that you do not employ the same words, but you do not arrange them in the same way; or rather, you arrange them, and that suffices. Read over your letter: there is an order presiding over it which betrays you at each turn. I would fain believe that your Présidente is too little formed to perceive it: but what matter? it has no less failed of its effect. It is the mistake of novels; the author whips himself to grow heated, and the reader remains cold. Héloïse is the only one which forms an exception, and, in spite of the talent of the author, this observation has ever made me believe that the substance of it was true. It is not the same in speaking. The habit of working the instrument gives sensibility to it; the facility of tears is added; the expression of desire in the eyes is confounded with that of tenderness; in short, the less coherent speech promotes more easily that air of trouble and confusion which is the true eloquence of love; and above all the presence of the beloved object forbids reflexion, and makes us desire to be won.

Believe me, Vicomte: you are asked to write no more; take advantage of that to retrieve your mistake, and wait for an opportunity to speak. Do you know, this woman has more strength than I believed? Her defence is good; and, but for the length of her letter, and the pretext which she gives you to return to the question in her phrase about gratitude, she would not have betrayed herself at all.

What appears to me, again, to ensure your success is the fact that she uses too much strength at one time; I foresee that she will exhaust it in the defence of the word, and that no more will be left her for that of the thing.

I return you your two letters, and, if you are prudent, they will be the two last, until after the happy moment. If it were not so late, I would speak to you of the little Volanges who is coming on quickly enough, and with whom I am greatly pleased. I believe that I shall have finished before you, and you ought to be very glad thereat. Adieu, for to-day.

Paris, 24th August, 17**.

LETTER THE THIRTY-FOURTH
THE VICOMTE DE VALMONT TO THE MARQUISE DE MERTEUIL

You speak with perfect truth, my fair friend: but why put yourself to so much fatigue to prove what nobody disputes? To move fast in love, ’tis better to speak than to write; that is, I believe, the whole of your letter. Why, those are the most simple elements in the art of seduction! I will only remark that you make but one exception to this principle, and that there are two. To children, who walk in this way from shyness and yield themselves from ignorance, must be added the femmes beaux-esprits, who let themselves be enticed therein by self-conceit and whom vanity leads into the snare. For instance, I am quite sure that the Comtesse de B***, who answered my first letter without any difficulty, had, at that time, no more love for me than I for her, and that she only saw an occasion for treating a subject which should be worthy of her pen.

However that may be, an advocate will tell you that principles are not applicable to the question. In fact, you suppose that I have a choice between writing and speaking, which is not the case. Since the affair of the 19th, my fair barbarian, who keeps on the defensive, has shown a skill in avoiding interviews which has disconcerted my own. So much so that, if this continues, I shall be forced to occupy myself seriously with the means of regaining this advantage; for assuredly I will not be routed by her in any way. My letters even are the subject of a little war; not content with leaving them unanswered, she refuses to receive them. For each one a fresh artifice is necessary, and it does not always succeed.

You will remember by what a simple means I gave her the first; the second presented no further difficulty. She had asked me to return her letter; I gave her my own instead, without her having the least suspicion. But whether from vexation at having been caught, or from caprice or, in short, virtue, for she will force me to believe in it, she obstinately refused the third. I hope, however, that the embarrassment into which the consequence of this refusal has happened to throw her will correct her for the future.

I was not much surprised that she would not receive this letter, which I offered her quite simply; that would already have been to grant a certain favour, and I am prepared for a longer defence. After this essay, which was but an attempt made in passing, I put my letter in an envelope; and seizing the moment of the toilette, when Madame de Rosemonde and the chamber-maid were present, I sent it her by my chasseur, with an order to tell her that it was the paper for which she had asked me. I had rightly guessed that she would dread the scandalous explanation which a refusal would necessitate: she took the letter; and my ambassador, who had received orders to observe her face, and who has good eyes, did but perceive a slight blush, and more embarrassment than anger.

I congratulated myself then, for sure, either that she would keep this letter, or that, if she wished to return it to me, it would be necessary for her to find herself alone with me, which would give me a good occasion to speak. About an hour afterwards, one of her people entered my room, and handed me, on behalf of his mistress, a packet of another shape than mine, on the envelope of which I recognized the writing so greatly longed for. I opened it in haste.... It was my letter itself, the seal unbroken, merely folded in two. I suspect that her fear that I might be less scrupulous than herself on the subject of scandal had made her employ this devil’s ruse.

You know me: I need be at no pains to depict to you my fury. It was necessary, however, to regain one’s sang-froid, and seek for fresh methods. This is the only one that I found:

They send from here every morning to fetch the letters from the post, which is about three quarters of a league away: they employ for this purpose a box with a lid almost like an alms-box, of which the post-master has one key and Madame de Rosemonde the other. Everyone puts his letters in it during the day, when it seems good to him: in the evening they are carried to the post, and in the morning those which have arrived are sent for. All the servants, strange or otherwise, perform this service. It was not the turn of my servant; but he undertook to go, under the pretext that he had business in that direction.

Meantime I wrote my letter. I disguised my handwriting in the address, and I counterfeited with some skill upon the envelope the stamp of Dijon. I chose this town, because I found it merrier, since I was asking for the same rights as the husband, to write also from the same place, and also because my fair had spoken all day of the desire she had to receive letters from Dijon. It seemed to me only right to procure her this pleasure.

These precautions once taken, it was easy enough to add this letter to the others. I moreover succeeded by this expedient in being a witness of the reception; for the custom is to assemble for breakfast, and to wait for the arrival of the letters before separating.

Madame de Rosemonde opened the box. “From Dijon,” she said, giving the letter to Madame de Tourvel.

“It is not my husband’s writing,” she answered in a troubled voice, hastily breaking the seal.

The first glances instructed her; and her face underwent such an alteration that Madame de Rosemonde perceived it, and asked, “What is the matter with you?”

I also drew near, saying, “Is this letter then so very dreadful?”

The shy dévote dared not raise her eyes; she said not a word; and, to hide her embarrassment, pretended to run over the epistle, which she was scarcely in a state to read. I enjoyed her confusion, and not being sorry to gird her a little, I added, “Your more tranquil air bids me hope that this letter has caused you more astonishment than pain.” Anger then inspired her better than prudence could have done.

“It contains,” she answered, “things which offend me, and that I am astounded anyone has dared to write to me.”

“Who has sent it?” interrupted Madame de Rosemonde.

“It is not signed,” answered the angry fair one; “but the letter and its author inspire me with equal contempt. You will oblige me by speaking no more of it.”

With that she tore up the audacious missive, put the pieces into her pocket, rose, and left the room.

In spite of this anger she has none the less had my letter; and I rely upon her curiosity to have taken care that she read it through.

The detailed relation of the day would take me too far. I add to this account the first draft of my two letters; you will thus be as fully informed as myself. If you want to be au courant with this correspondence, you must accustom yourself to deciphering my minutes; for nothing in the world could I support the tedium of copying them. Adieu, my lovely friend!

At the Château de ..., 25th August, 17**.

LETTER THE THIRTY-FIFTH
THE VICOMTE DE VALMONT TO THE PRÉSIDENTE DE TOURVEL