orded an excellent
opportunity of reaping a third recompense.

But, alas! the path of pleasure is not strewn only with roses! On the
third day, I found out, much to my dismay, that a serpent had been hid
under the flowers. Six weeks of care and of rigid diet re-established my
health.

When I met the handsome Greek again, I was foolish enough to reproach her
for the present she had bestowed upon me, but she baffled me by laughing,
and saying that she had only offered me what she possessed, and that it
was my own fault if I had not been sufficiently careful. The reader
cannot imagine how much this first misfortune grieved me, and what deep
shame I felt. I looked upon myself as a dishonoured man, and while I am
on that subject I may as well relate an incident which will give some
idea of my thoughtlessness.

Madame Vida, the major's sister-in-law, being alone with me one morning,
confided in me in a moment of unreserved confidence what she had to
suffer from the jealous disposition of her husband, and his cruelty in
having allowed her to sleep alone for the last four years, when she was
in the very flower of her age.

"I trust to God," she added, "that my husband will not find out that you
have spent an hour alone with me, for I should never hear the end of it."

Feeling deeply for her grief, and confidence begetting confidence, I was
stupid enough to tell her the sad state to which I had been reduced by
the cruel Greek woman, assuring her that I felt my misery all the more
deeply, because I should have been delighted to console her, and to give
her the opportunity of a revenge for her jealous husband's coldness. At
this speech, in which my simplicity and good faith could easily be
traced, she rose from her chair, and upbraided me with every insult which
an outraged honest woman might hurl at the head of a bold libertine who
has presumed too far. Astounded, but understanding perfectly well the
nature of my crime, I bowed myself out of her room; but as I was leaving
it she told me in the same angry tone that my visits would not be welcome
for the future, as I was a conceited puppy, unworthy of the society of
good and respectable women. I took care to answer that a respectable
woman would have been rather more reserved than she had been in her
confidences. On reflection I felt pretty sure that, if I had been in good
health, or had said nothing about my mishap, she would have been but too
happy to receive my consolations