and at intervals of weeks or months several others followed. They were
impressive letters, splendidly written, with a sort of grim humour about
them, expressing his passionate affection and venting his despair. This
was the first time that I had come in contact with passion, but it was a
passion that without having any unnatural or sensual element in it,
nevertheless, from a person of the same sex, excited a feeling of
displeasure, and even disgust, in me.

Sebastian wrote: "I felt that it was cheating you to take so much
without being able to give you anything in return; I thought it mean to
associate with you; consequently, I believe that I did perfectly right
to break with you. Still, it is true that I hardly needed to do it. Time
and circumstances would have effected the breach." And feeling that our
ways were now divided, he continued:

Hie locus est, partes ubi se via findit in ambas.
Dextera, quae Ditis magni sub moenia tendit
Hac iter Elysium nobis; at laeva malorum
Exercet poenas et ad impia Tartara mittit.

"I cannot kill myself at present, but as soon as I feel able I shall do
so."

Or he wrote: "Towards the end of the time when we were friends, I was
not quite myself when talking to you; I was unbalanced; for I was
convinced that you wasted your valuable time talking to me, and at the
same time was oppressed with grief at the thought that we must part.
Then I tried to make you angry by pretending to question your abilities,
by affecting indifference and scorn; but it was the dog baying at the
moon. I had to bring about the severance that I did. That I should be so