I thought the poet intended to develop his idea, but unfortunately the
tirade here ends. 'Tis always very vague, cloudy poetry that describes
unknown torments; it seems to be a popular style, however, for all the
poetry of the present day is confined to misty complaints in cloudy
language. No moralist is specific in his sorrows. All lovers cry out in
chorus that they suffer horribly. Each suffering deserves an analysis
and a name. By way of example, my dear Edgar, I will describe one
torment that I am sure you have never known or even heard of, happy
mortal that you are!

The headquarters of this torment is at the office of the Poste-Restante,
on Jean-Jacques-Rousseau street. The lovers in _la Nouvelle Heloise_
never mentioned this place of torture, although they wrote so many
love-letters.

I have opened a correspondence with three of my servants--this
torture, however, is not the one to which I allude. These three men, at
this present moment, are sojourning in the three neighboring towns in
which Mlle. de Chateaudun has acquaintances, relations or friends. One
of these towns is Fontainebleau, where she first went when she left
Paris. I have charged them to be very circumspect in obtaining all the
information they can concerning her movements. Her mysterious retreat
must be in one of these three localities, so I watch them all. I told
them to direct all my letters to the Poste-Restante.

My porter, with the cunning sagacity of his profession, imagines he has
discovered some scandalous romance, because he brings me every day a
letter in the handwriting of my valet. You may imagine the complication
of my torment. I am afraid of my porter, therefore I go myself to the
post-office, that receptacle of all the secrets of Paris.

Usually the waiting-room is full of wretched men, each an epistolary
Tantalus, who, with eyes fixed on the wooden grating, implore the clerk
for a post-marked deception. 'Tis a sad spectacle, and I am sure that
there is a post-office in purgatory, where tortured souls go to inquire
if their deliverance has been signed in heaven.

The clerks in the post-office never seem to be aware of the impatient
murmurs around them. What administrative calmness beams on the fresh
faces of these distributors of consolation and of despair! In the agony
of waiting, minutes lose their mathematical value, and the hands of the
clock become motionless on the dial like impaled serpents. The
operations of the office