off the end of it. Then, notwithstanding my pain, I
became quite cool and collected, and calmly said, 'insulted and maimed
as I have now been, it is most fitting that I should absent myself for
the future from polite society. Office and title would ill become me
now. Your spite has now left me without spirit to face the world in
which I should be ridiculed, and has left me no alternative but to
withdraw my maimed person from the public gaze!' After I had alarmed
her by speaking in this exalted strain, I added, 'to-day we meet for
the last time,' and bending these fingers (pointing to them as she
spoke) I made the farewell remark:--

When on my fingers, I must say
I count the hours I spent with thee,
Is this, and this alone, I pray
The only pang you've caused to me?

You are now quits with me,' At the instant I said so, she burst into
tears and without premeditation, poured forth the following:--

'From me, who long bore grievous harms,
From that cold hand and wandering heart,
You now withdraw your sheltering arms,
And coolly tell me, we must part.'

"To speak the truth, I had no real intention of separating from her
altogether. For some time, however, I sent her no communication, and
was passing rather an unsettled life. Well! I was once returning from
the palace late one evening in November, after an experimental
practice of music for a special festival in the Temple of Kamo. Sleet
was falling heavily. The wind blew cold, and my road was dark and
muddy. There was no house near where I could make myself at home. To
return and spend a lonely night in the palace was not to be thought
of. At this moment a reflection flashed across my mind. 'How cold must
she feel whom I have treated so coldly,' thought I, and suddenly
became very anxious to know what she felt and what she was about. This
made me turn my steps towards her dwelling, and brushing away the snow
that had gathered on my shoulders I trudged on: at one moment shyly
biting my nails, at another thinking that on such a night at least all
her enmity towards me might be all melted away. I approached the
house. The curtains were not drawn, and I saw the dim light of a lamp
reflected on the windows. It was even perceivable that a soft quilt
was being warmed and thrown over the large couch. The scene was such
as to give you the notion that she was really anticipating that I
might come at least on such an evening. This gave me