That would be very commonplace at Venice, but here it is anything but that.--In her carriage, with the horses going at a gallop, amid the rattling of the wheels, the leaping and jolting, sometimes by the light of lanterns, sometimes in the densest darkness.--That doesn't lack a certain stimulating interest and I advise you to try it: but I forget that you are a venerable patriarch, and that you don't indulge in such refinements.--I have climbed in at her window when I had the key to the door in my pocket.--I have made her come to my apartments in broad daylight, in fact, I have compromised her so thoroughly that no one--myself excepted, be it understood--now doubts that she is my mistress. By reason of all these inventions which, if I were not so young, would resemble the expedients of a blasé old rake, Rosette adores me far and away above all others. She sees therein the ardor of a teasing passion that nothing can restrain, and that is always the same despite the changes of time and place. She sees therein the constantly renewed effect of her charms and the triumph of her beauty, and, in truth, I would that she were right, and it is neither my fault nor hers--I must be just--that she is not. The only wrong I have done her consists in being myself. If I told her that, the child would reply at once that that is my greatest merit in her eyes; which would be more courteous than sensible. Once--it was in the beginning of our liaison--I believed that I had gained my end, for a moment I believed that I loved her--I did love her.--O my friend, I have never lived except during that moment, and if it had lasted an hour I should have become a god. We had ridden out together in the saddle, I on my dear Ferragus, she on a snow-white mare that looks like a unicorn, her feet are so delicate and her body so slender. We rode along a broad avenue of elms of prodigious height; the sun poured down upon us, bright and warm, sifting through the serrated foliage; ultra-marine patches showed here and there amid the fleecy clouds, broad bands of pale blue lay along the horizon, changing to a most delicate apple-green when they encountered the golden rays of the setting sun. The appearance of the sky was unusual and fascinating; the breeze wafted to our nostrils an indefinable perfume of wild flowers delicious beyond words. From time to time a bird rose in front of us and flew singing along the avenue. The church-bell of an invisible village softly rang the Angelus, and the silvery notes, which came but faintly to our ears because of the distance, were inexpressibly sweet. Our horses were going at a foot pace, and they walked side by side in such perfect step that neither of them was an inch ahead of the other.--My heart dilated and my soul overflowed upon my body. I had never been so happy. I did not speak, nor did Rosette, and yet we never understood each other so perfectly. We were so close together that my leg touched her horse's side.