which vary with
their characters. Those who reply give curt and peremptory answers.

But women, at this time, are exceedingly aggravating. They consult
you, they ask your advice upon the best way of concealing the stem of
a rose, of giving a graceful fall to a bunch of briar, or a happy turn
to a scarf. As a neat English expression has it, "they fish for
compliments," and sometimes for better than compliments.

A boy just out of school would discern the motive concealed behind the
willows of these pretexts: but your wife is so well known to you, and
you have so often playfully joked upon her moral and physical
perfections, that you are harsh enough to give your opinion briefly
and conscientiously: you thus force Caroline to put that decisive
question, so cruel to women, even those who have been married twenty
years:

"So I don't suit you then?"

Drawn upon the true ground by this inquiry, you bestow upon her such
little compliments as you can spare and which are, as it were, the
small change, the sous, the liards of your purse.

"The best gown you ever wore!" "I never saw you so well dressed."
"Blue, pink, yellow, cherry [take your pick], becomes you charmingly."
"Your head-dress is quite original." "As you go in, every one will
admire you." "You will not only be the prettiest, but the best
dressed." "They'll all be mad not to have your taste." "Beauty is a
natural gift: taste is like intelligence, a thing that we may be proud
of."

"Do you think so? Are you in earnest, Adolphe?"

Your wife is coquetting with you. She chooses this moment to force
from you your pretended opinion of one and another of her friends, and
to insinuate the price of the articles of her dress you so much
admire. Nothing is too dear to please you. She sends the cook out of
the room.

"Let's go," you say.

She sends the chambermaid out after having dismissed the hair-dresser,
and begins to turn round and round before her glass, showing off to
you her most glorious beauties.

"Let's go," you say.

"You are in a hurry," she returns.

And she goes on exhibiting herself with all her little airs, setting
herself off like a fine peach magnificently exhibited in a fruiterer's
window. But since you have dined rather heartily, you kiss her upon
the forehead merely, not feeling able to countersign your opinions.
Caroline becomes serious.

The carriage waits. All the household looks at Caroline as she goes
out: she is the masterpiece to wh