pon one's guard and to check oneself." They were "dreaded." The
exigencies of society are those of an absolute king, and admit of no
partition. "If morals lost by this, society was infinitely the gainer,"
says M. de Bezenval, a contemporary; "having got rid of the annoyances
and dullness caused by the husbands' presence, the freedom was extreme;
the coquetry both of men and women kept up social vivacity and daily
provided piquant adventures." Nobody is jealous, not even when in love.
"People are mutually pleased and become attached; if one grows weary
of the other, they part with as little concern as they came together.
Should the sentiment revive they take to each other with as much
vivacity as if it were the first time they had been engaged. They may
again separate, but they never quarrel. As they have become enamored
without love, they part without hate, deriving from the feeble desire
they have inspired the advantage of being always ready to oblige."[2231]
Appearances, moreover, are respected. An uninformed stranger would
detect nothing to excite suspicion. An extreme curiosity, says Horace
Walpole,[2232] or a great familiarity with things, is necessary to
detect the slightest intimacy between the two sexes. No familiarity is
allowed except under the guise of friendship, while the vocabulary
of love is as much prohibited as its rites apparently are. Even with
Crebillon fils, even with Laclos, at the most exciting moments, the
terms their characters employ are circumspect and irreproachable.
Whatever indecency there may be, it is never expressed in words, the
sense of propriety in language imposing itself not only on the outbursts
of passion, but again on the grossness of instincts. Thus do the
sentiments which are naturally the strongest lose their point and
sharpness; their rich and polished remains are converted into playthings
for the drawing room, and, thus cast to and fro by the whitest hands,
fall on the floor like a shuttlecock. We must, on this point, listen to
the heroes of the epoch; their free and easy tone is inimitable, and it
depicts both them and their actions. "I conducted myself," says the Duc
de Lauzun, "very prudently, and even deferentially with Mme. de Lauzun;
I knew Mme. de Cambis very openly, for whom I concerned myself very
little; I kept the little Eugenie whom I loved a great deal; I played
high, I paid my court to the king, and I hunted with him with great
punctuality."[2233] He had for othe