In the letters of Mérimée harsh words fall like rain amidst the soft ones; “I will admit that you have become much more beautiful physically, but not morally.... You still have a sylph-like figure, and, although I am somewhat _blasé_ concerning black eyes, I have never seen any so large in Constantinople or in Smyrna. “Now comes the reverse of the medal. In many respects you have remained a child, and you have become a hypocrite into the bargain.... You imagine that you are proud, but I regret to tell you that what you think is pride is only the petty vanity which one would expect in a religious temperament. It is the fashion nowadays to preach. Shall you follow it? That would be the finishing stroke.” And a little farther on: “In all that you say and do, you substitute invariably a conventional for a genuine sentiment.... I respect convictions, even those that seem to me the most absurd. You have a great many ridiculous notions (pardon the word), of which I should hesitate to deprive you since you are so fond of them, and have no others to take their place.” After two months of affectionate words, of quarrels, and of meetings he concludes thus: “It seems to me you become more egotistical every day. When you speak of _us_, you mean only _yourself_. The more I think of this, the more deplorable it appears.... We are so unlike that it is hardly possible to understand each other.” It seems that he had met a character as restive and as independent as his own, “a lioness, though tame,” and he analyses it thus: “It is a pity we can not meet the day after having a quarrel, for I am sure we should be in a perfectly amiable frame of mind.... Without doubt, my most dangerous enemy to your heart or, if you prefer, my strongest rival, is your pride. Whatever wounds that, excites your indignation. This notion you carry out, perhaps unconsciously, in the most trifling matters. Is it not, for instance, your pride which is satisfied when I kiss your hand? This, you have said to me, makes you happy, and to this sensation you abandon yourself, because a demonstration of humility is gratifying to your pride.”