Madame F--No doubt. For instance, how would you have me go to high mass, which is celebrated at my parish church at eleven o’clock exactly? That is just our breakfast time. Can I let my husband breakfast alone? He would never hinder me from going to high mass, he has said so a thousand times, only he has always added, “When you want to go to mass during breakfast time, I only ask one thing--it is to give me notice the day before, so that I may invite some friends to keep me company.” Madame H--But only fancy, pet, our two husbands could not be more alike if they were brothers. Leon has always said, “My dear little chicken--” Madame F--Ha! ha! ha! Madame H--Yes, that is his name for me; you know how lively he is. He has always said to me, then, “My dear little chicken, I am not a man to do violence to your opinions, but in return give way to me as regards some of your pious practices.” I only give you the mere gist of it; it was said with a thousand delicacies, which I suppress. And I have agreed by degrees,... so that, while only paying very little attention to the outward observances of religion, I have remained, as I told you, a bar of iron as regards dogmas. Oh! as to that, I would not give way an inch, a hair-breadth, and Leon is the first to tell me that I am right. After all, dogma is everything; practice, well, what would you? If I could bring Leon round, it would be quite another thing. How glad I am to have spoken to you about all this. Madame F--Have we not been chattering? But it is half-past five, and I must go and take my cinchona bark. Thirty minutes before meals, it is a sacred duty. Will you come, pet? Madame H--Stop a moment, I have lost my thimble again and must find it. BOOK 3. CHAPTER XX. THE HOT-WATER BOTTLE When midnight strikes, when the embers die away into ashes, when the lamp burns more feebly and your eyes close in spite of yourself, the best thing to do, dear Madame, is to go to bed. Get up from your armchair, take off your bracelets, light your rosecolored taper, and proceed slowly, to the soft accompaniment of your trailing skirt, rustling across the carpet, to your dressing-room, that perfumed sanctuary in which your beauty, knowing itself to be alone, raises its veils, indulges in self-examination, revels in itself and reckons up its treasures as a miser does his wealth. Before the muslin-framed mirror, which reveals all that it sees so well, you pause carelessly and with a smile give one long satisfied look, then with two fingers you withdraw the pin that kept up your hair, and its long, fair tresses unroll and fall in waves, veiling your bare shoulders. With a coquettish hand, the little finger of which is turned up, you caress, as you gather them together, the golden flood of your abundant locks, while with the other you pass through them the tortoiseshell comb that buries itself in the depths of this fair forest and bends with the effort.