I had not that resource since I was alone: nature, the kind mother, seemed, on the contrary, more vast and more empty than ever. If I had been able to forget my mistress I would have been saved. How many there are who can be cured with even less than that. Such men are incapable of loving a faithless woman and their conduct, under the circumstances, is admirable in its firmness. But is it thus that one loves at nineteen when, knowing nothing of the world, desiring everything, the young man feels within him the germ of all the passions? On the right, on the left, below, on the horizon, everywhere some voice which calls him. All is desire, all is reverie. There is no reality which holds him when the heart is young; there is no oak so gnarled that it may not give birth to a dryad; and if one had a hundred arms one need not fear to open them; one has but to clasp his mistress and all is well. As for me I did not understand what else there was to do besides love, and when any one spoke to me of another occupation I did not reply. My passion for my mistress had something fierce about it, as all my life had been severely monachal. I wish to cite a single example. She gave me her portrait in miniature in a medallion; I wore it over my heart, a practise much affected by men; but one day while idly rummaging about a shop filled with curiosities I found an iron "discipline whip," such as was used by the mediaeval flagellants; at the end of this whip was a metal plate bristling with sharp iron points; I had the medallion riveted to this plate and then returned it to its place over my heart. The sharp points pierced my bosom with every movement and caused such a strange voluptuous anguish that I sometimes pressed it down with my hand in order to intensify the sensation. I knew very well that I was committing folly; love is responsible for many others. When that woman deceived me I removed the cruel medallion. I can not tell with what sadness I detached that iron girdle and what a sigh escaped me when it was gone. "Ah! poor wounds!" I said, "you will soon heal, but what balm is there for that other deeper wound?" I had reason to hate that woman, she was, so to speak, mingled with the blood of my veins; I cursed her but I dreamed of her. What could I do with a dream? By what effort of the will could I drown memory of flesh and blood? Macbeth having killed Duncan saw that the ocean would not wash his hands clean again; it would not have washed away my wounds. I said to Desgenais: "When I sleep, her head is on my pillow." My life had been wrapped up in that woman; to doubt her was to doubt all; to deny her, to curse all; to lose her, to renounce all. I no longer went out; the world seemed to be peopled with monsters, with horned deer and crocodiles. To all that was said to distract my mind I replied: "Yes, that is all very well, but you may rest assured I shall do nothing of the kind." I sat in my window and said: