ot to
renew my offer, but to shew my contempt for any proposal she might make
me herself.

The heedless fellow fulfilled his commission so well that the actress,
feeling insulted, told him that she dared me to call on her. Perfectly
determined to shew that I despised her, I went to her dressing-room the
same evening, after the second act of a play in which she had not to
appear again. She dismissed those who were with her, saying that she
wanted to speak with me, and, after she had bolted the door, she sat down
gracefully on my knees, asking me whether it was true that I despised her
so much.

In such a position a man has not the courage to insult a woman, and,
instead of answering, I set to work at once, without meeting even with
that show of resistance which sharpens the appetite. In spite of that,
dupe as I always was of a feeling truly absurd when an intelligent man
has to deal with such creatures, I gave her twenty sequins, and I confess
that it was paying dearly for very smarting regrets. We both laughed at
the stupidity of Paterno, who did not seem to know how such challenges
generally end.

I saw the unlucky son of Sicily the next morning, and I told him that,
having found the actress very dull, I would not see her again. Such was
truly my intention, but a very important reason, which nature took care
to explain to me three days afterwards, compelled me to keep my word
through a much more serious motive than a simple dislike for the woman.

However, although I was deeply grieved to find myself in such a
disgraceful position, I did not think I had any right to complain. On the
contrary, I considered that my misfortune to be a just and well-deserved
punishment for having abandoned myself to a Lais, after I had enjoyed the
felicity of possessing a woman like Henriette.

My disease was not a case within the province of empirics, and I
bethought myself of confiding in M. de is Haye who was then dining every
day with me, and made no mystery of his poverty. He placed me in the
hands of a skilful surgeon, who was at the same time a dentist. He
recognized certain symptoms which made it a necessity to sacrifice me to
the god Mercury, and that treatment, owing to the season of the year,
compelled me to keep my room for six weeks. It was during the winter of
1749.

While I was thus curing myself of an ugly disease, De la Haye inoculated
me with another as bad, perhaps even worse, which I should never have
thought my