imagine that I was not to be touched by a young soul. My
distress is the keener for my interest in you. I am naturally
tender-hearted and kindly, but circumstances force me to act
unkindly. Another woman would have flung your letter, unread, into
the fire; I read it, and I am answering it. My answer will make it
clear to you that while I am not untouched by the expression of
this feeling which I have inspired, albeit unconsciously, I am
still far from sharing it, and the step which I am about to take
will show you still more plainly that I mean what I say. I wish
besides, to use, for your welfare, that authority, as it were,
which you give me over your life; and I desire to exercise it this
once to draw aside the veil from your eyes.

"I am nearly thirty years old, monsieur; you are barely
two-and-twenty. You yourself cannot know what your thoughts will
be at my age. The vows that you make so lightly to-day may seem a
very heavy burden to you then. I am quite willing to believe that
at this moment you would give me your whole life without a regret,
you would even be ready to die for a little brief happiness; but
at the age of thirty experience will take from you the very power
of making daily sacrifices for my sake, and I myself should feel
deeply humiliated if I accepted them. A day would come when
everything, even Nature, would bid you leave me, and I have
already told you that death is preferable to desertion. Misfortune
has taught me to calculate; as you see, I am arguing perfectly
dispassionately. You force me to tell you that I have no love for
you; I ought not to love, I cannot, and I will not. It is too late
to yield, as women yield, to a blind unreasoning impulse of the
heart, too late to be the mistress whom you seek. My consolations
spring from God, not from earth. Ah, and besides, with the
melancholy insight of disappointed love, I read hearts too clearly
to accept your proffered friendship. It is only instinct. I
forgive the boyish ruse, for which you are not responsible as yet.
In the name of this passing fancy of yours, for the sake of your
career and my own peace of mind, I bid you stay in your own
country; you must not spoil a fair and honorable life for an
illusion which, by its very nature, cannot last. At a later day,
when you have accomplished your real destiny, in the fully
developed manhood that awaits you, you will appreci