"'Then, how can you so positively assert that you feel more keenly
than I? Sorrow has but one form for women. The only misfortunes they
regard are disappointments of the heart.'

"She looked at me sweetly, and, like all women when stuck between the
issues of a dilemma, or held in the clutches of truth, she persisted,
nevertheless, in her wilfulness.

"'I am a nun,' she said, 'and you talk to me of the world where I
shall never again set foot.'

"'Not even in thought?' said I.

"'Is the world so much to be desired?' she replied. 'Oh! when my mind
wanders, it goes higher. The angel of perfection, the beautiful angel
Gabriel, often sings in my heart. If I were rich, I should work, all
the same, to keep me from soaring too often on the many-tinted wings
of the angel, and wandering in the world of fancy. There are
meditations which are the ruin of us women! I owe much peace of mind
to my flowers, though sometimes they fail to occupy me. On some days I
find my soul invaded by a purposeless expectancy; I cannot banish some
idea which takes possession of me, which seems to make my fingers
clumsy. I feel that some great event is impending, that my life is
about to change; I listen vaguely, I stare into the darkness, I have
no liking for my work, and after a thousand fatigues I find life once
more--everyday life. Is this a warning from heaven? I ask myself----'

"After three months of this struggle between two diplomates, concealed
under the semblance of youthful melancholy, and a woman whose disgust
of life made her invulnerable, I told the Count that it was impossible