thousands of
francs a year, and I procured as a shelter, a modest and tranquil place
which enabled me to pass as wealthy for a bachelor.

"I had, since my youth, led a bachelor's life. You know what that is.
Free and without family, resolved not to take a legitimate wife, I passed
at one time three months with one, at another time six months with
another, then a year without a companion, taking as my prey the mass
of women who are either to be had for the asking or bought.

"This every day, or, if you like the phrase better, commonplace,
existence agreed with me, satisfied my natural tastes for changes and
silliness. I lived on the boulevard, in theaters and cafes, always out of
doors, always without a regular home, though I was comfortably housed. I
was one of those thousands of beings who let themselves float like corks,
through life, for whom the walls of Paris are the walls of the world,
and who have no care about anything, having no passion for anything. I
was what is called a good fellow, without accomplishments and without
defects. That is all. And I judge myself correctly.

"Then, from twenty to forty years, my existence flowed along slowly or
rapidly without any remarkable event. How quickly they pass, the
monstrous years of Paris, when none of those memories worth fixing the
date of find way into the soul, these long and yet hurried years, trivial
and gay, when you eat, drink and laugh without knowing why, your lips
stretched out towards all they can taste and all they can kiss, without
having a longing for anything. You are young, and you grow old without
doing any of the things that others do, without any attachment, any root,
any bond, almost without friends, without family, without wife, without
children.

"So, gently and quickly, I reached my fortieth year; and in order to
celebrate this anniversary, I invited myself to take a good dinner all
alone in one of the principal cafes.

"After dinner, I was in doubt as to what I would do. I felt disposed to
go to a theater; and then the idea came into my head to make a pilgrimage
to the Latin quarters, where I had in former days lived as a law-student.
So I made my way across Paris, and without premeditation went in to one
of those public-houses where you are served by girls.

"The one who attended at my table was quite young, pretty, and
merry-looking. I asked her to take a drink, and she at once consented.
She sat down opposite me, and gazed at me with