“I would thank you, Beauty, for this speech, but I am too senseless to say anything that would please you,” returned the beast in a melancholy voice; and altogether he seemed so gentle and so unhappy that Beauty, who had the tenderest heart in the world, felt her fear of him gradually vanish. She ate her supper with a good appetite, and conversed in her own sensible and charming way, till at last, when the beast rose to depart, he terrified her more than ever by saying abruptly, in his gruff voice, “Beauty, will you marry me?” Now Beauty, frightened as she was, would speak only the exact truth; besides her father had told her that the beast liked only to have the truth spoken to him. So she answered, in a very firm tone, “No, beast.” He did not get into a passion, or do anything but sigh deeply, and depart. When Beauty found herself alone, she began to feel pity for the poor beast. “Oh!” said she, “what a sad thing it is that he should be so very frightful, since he is so good-tempered!” Beauty lived three months in this palace very well pleased. The beast came to see her every night, and talked with her while she supped; and though what he said was not very clever, yet, as she saw in him every day some new goodness, instead of dreading the time of his coming, she soon began continually looking at her watch, to see if it were nine o’clock; for that was the hour when he never failed to visit her. One thing only vexed her, which was that every night before he went away, he always made it a rule to ask her if she would be his wife, and seemed very much grieved at her steadfastly replying “No.” At last, one night, she said to him, “You wound me greatly, beast, by forcing me to refuse you so often; I wish I could take such a liking to you as to agree to marry you; but I must tell you plainly that I do not think it will ever happen. I shall always be your friend; so try to let that content you. “I must,” sighed the beast, “for I know well enough how frightful I am; but I love you better than myself. Yet I think I am very lucky in your being pleased to stay with me; now promise, Beauty, that you will never leave me. Beauty would almost have agreed to this, so sorry was she for him, but she had that day seen in her magic glass, which she looked at constantly, that her father was dying of grief for her sake. “Alas!” she said, “I long so much to see my father, that if you do not give me leave to visit him, I shall break my heart.” “I would rather break mine, Beauty,” answered the beast; “I will send you to your father’s cottage: you shall stay there, and your poor beast shall die of sorrow.” “No,” said Beauty, crying, “I love you too well to be the cause of your death; I promise to return in a week. You have shown me that my sisters are married, and my brothers are gone for soldiers, so that my father is left all alone. Let me stay a week with him.”