voking desire and satisfying it as quickly as
possible. One conjugates the verb after the
caprice of the moment : / want you^ you want me,
we want each other^ never passing on to the
impersonal, preferring to arrive at once at the
imperfect or the past definite. Divorce is there
to untie the bonds of those tortured by jealousy,
but the cynicism of the time has made these
delicacies rare. Marriage is no more considered,
save as, according to the terrible expression of
Cambac^res in the Code, " Nature in action ; *'
that civil act is held but temporary, incompatibility
of humour unbinding those whom physical agree-
ments had united.
** From husband to husband " say^, strangely
enough, the historians of the Directory, "the
woman wanders, pursuing her happiness, unbind-
ing and rebinding her girdle. She circulates as
a pretty piece of merchandise ; she is spouse so
long as she is not tired of it ; she is mother while
it amuses her. . . . The husband runs from the
arms of one to the arms of another, demanding a
concubine in a wife, and the satisfaction of his
appetite in continual marriages. Divorce occurs
for a mere nothing . . . marriage is its prelude ;
the husband has no jealousy of the past, the wife
has no shame. It seems that the marriages of
that time took their model in a stud where a
trial is allowed."



NYMPHS AND MERVEILLEUSES.
II.
