When ready to depart for the enchanted world,
I saw arrive wretched mortals who came to detain me upon earth, I
could neither conceal nor moderate my vexation; and no longer master
of myself, I gave them so uncivil a reception, that it might justly be
termed brutal. This tended to confirm my reputation as a
misanthrope, from the very cause which, could the world have read my
heart, should have acquired me one of a nature directly opposite.
In the midst of my exaltation I was pulled down like a paper kite,
and restored to my proper place by means of a smart attack of my
disorder. I recurred to the only means that had before given me
relief, and thus made a truce with my angelic amours; for besides that
it seldom happens that a man is amorous when he suffers, my
imagination, which is animated in the country and beneath the shade of
trees, languishes and becomes extinguished in a chamber, and under the
joists of a ceiling. I frequently regretted that there existed no
dryads; it would certainly have been amongst these that I should
have fixed my attachment.
Other domestic broils came at the same time to increase my
chagrin. Madam le Vasseur, while making me the finest compliments in
the world, alienated from me her daughter as much as she possibly
could. I received letters from my late neighborhood, informing me that
the good old lady had secretly contracted several debts in the name of
Theresa, to whom these became known, but of which she had never
mentioned to me a word.
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