ome
experience.

When one has a beautiful young woman for one's next-door neighbour, it
is easy to pass by degrees from daily compliments and salutations to a
certain sort of intimacy. One begins to ask: "How are you?" or "Did you
sleep well last night?" One exchanges complaints upon the subject of the
weather, the scirocco, the rain. At length, after some days passed in
such inquiries on topics common to all stupid people, one is anxious to
show that one is not as stupid as the rest of the world.

I asked her one morning why she invariably exercised her charming voice
in mournful songs and plaintive music. She replied that her temperament
inclined to melancholy; that she sang to distract her thoughts, and that
she only found relief in sadness. "But you are young," I said. "I see
that you are well provided; I recognise that you have wit and
understanding; you ought to overcome your temperament by wise
reflections; and yet, I cannot deny it, there is always something in
your eyes and in your face which betrays a chagrin unsuited to your
years. I cannot comprehend it." She answered with much grace, and with a
captivating half-smile, that "since she was not a man, she could not
know what impression the affairs of this world make upon the minds of
men, and since I was not a woman, I could not know what impression they
make upon the minds of women." This reply, which had a flavour of
philosophy, sent a little arrow to my heart. The modest demeanour, the
seriousness, and the cultivation of this Venetian lady pictured her to
me immeasurably different from the Dalmatian women I had known. I began
to flatter myself that here perhaps I had discovered the virtuous
mistress for whom my romantic, metaphysical, delicate heart was sighing.
A crowd of reflections came to break the dream, and I contented myself
with complimenting her upon her answer. Afterwards, I rather avoided
occasions for seeing and talking with her.

Certainly she must have had plenty of work to finish; for I observed her
every day seated at the same window sewing with melancholy seriousness.
While shunning, so far as this was possible, the danger of conversing
with her, my poor heart felt it would be less than civil not to speak a
word from time to time. Accordingly we now and then engaged in short
dialogues. They turned upon philosophical and moral topics--absurdities
in life, human nature, fashion. I tried to take a lively tone, and
entered upon some innocent