Alas, sometimes, for the marriages which have been preceded by too violent a love!--illusion gives place to sad reality. The boy and girl love without having learned to know each other; and cease to love when that knowledge comes! But the attachment of the Sieur and Madame Lebrun experienced no revolution of the kind. Fourteen years passed away in uninterrupted union. Though converted into a husband, the Sieur Lebrun did not cease to be Misis; the wedded De Surcourt continued to be "Fanny"--charming names--ingenious disguises--chosen by two lovers to perpetuate the memory of the times of courtship! More than three hundred letters, written by Madame Lebrun during that time, were in the hands of her husband--irrefragable proofs of their mutual affection; but she has found means to get away the greater part of them; enough, however, remain to make his justification complete. Never was a union more harmonious--a wife more petted and indulged. It seemed that felicity, resting on such foundations, could never be disturbed; but one single moment was sufficient to overturn the work of seventeen years! The Sieur and Madame Lebrun had been intimate for some years with a certain Sieur Grimod, who held an appointment from the king, and lived as if his office was of great value. The Sieur Lebrun is not astonished that his wife was pleased with the acquaintance, for he prized it very highly himself; but a time came when he thought it better for all parties that it should cease. The Sieur Lebrun believes in his wife's virtue as in his own existence. What! if he had _not_ that belief, would he be here to reclaim her by course of law? But it is not enough for a woman to have the reality of virtue--she must have the appearance also; and every man has a right to be in that respect a Caesar. Already some indiscretions of Madame Lebrun, which the openness and purity of her mind could alone render excusable--her portrait drawn without her husband's knowledge for the Sieur Grimod--a letter from that individual to the lady, written in a style such as no one would use towards a lady he respected--had begun to inspire the Sieur Lebrun with a certain coolness. The whisperings at last, unjust as they were, no doubt, of a malicious public--the advice of his friends--his own susceptibility, made it imperative on him to come to a rupture, in which Madame Lebrun should have been glad to join. And here is the letter he wrote to the Sieur Grimod:-- _This 15th January 1774._