How to be happy!--not to read Baudelaire and Verlaine, not to enter the _Nouvelle Athènes_, unless perhaps to play dominoes like the _bourgeois_ over there, not to do anything that would awake a too intense consciousness of life,--to live in a sleepy country side, to have a garden to work in, to have a wife and children, to chatter quietly every evening over the details of existence. We must have the azaleas out to-morrow and thoroughly cleansed, they are devoured by insects; the tame rook has flown away; mother lost her prayer-book coming from church, she thinks it was stolen. A good, honest, well-to-do peasant, who knows nothing of politics, must be very nearly happy;--and to think there are people who would educate, who would draw these people out of the calm satisfaction of their instincts, and give them passions! The philanthropist is the Nero of modern times. X EXTRACT FROM A LETTER "Why did you not send a letter? We have all been writing to you for the last six months, but no answer--none. Had you written one word I would have saved all. The poor _concierge_ was in despair; she said the _propriétaire_ would wait if you had only said when you were coming back, or if you only had let us know what you wished to be done. Three quarters rent was due, and no news could be obtained of you, so an auction had to be called. It nearly broke my heart to see those horrid men tramping over the delicate carpets, their coarse faces set against the sweet colour of that beautiful English cretonne.... And all the while the pastel by Manet, the great hat set like an aureole about the face--'the eyes deep set in crimson shadow,' 'the fan widespread across the bosom' (you see I am quoting your own words), looking down, the mistress of that little paradise of tapestry. She seemed to resent the intrusion. I looked once or twice half expecting those eyes 'deep set in crimson shadow' to fill with tears. But nothing altered her great dignity; she seemed to see all, but as a Buddha she remained impenetrable.... "I was there the night before the sale. I looked through the books, taking notes of those I intended to buy--those which we used to read together when the snow lay high about the legs of the poor faun in _terre cuite_, that laughed amid the frosty _boulingrins_. I found a large packet of letters which I instantly destroyed. You should not be so careless; I wonder how it is that men are always careless about their letters.