My father,
too, is not unmoved by his amazing address and complaisance. I do
not think he often cares to use his arts--he is too indolent; but
with my father, my mother, and my sister he has set in motion all
his resources.
Robert, all Versailles is here. This Monsieur Doltaire speaks for
it. I know not if all courts in the world are the same, but if so,
I am at heart no courtier; though I love the sparkle, the sharp
play of wit and word, the very touch-and-go of weapons. I am in
love with life, and I wish to live to be old, very old, that I will
have known it all, from helplessness to helplessness again, missing
nothing, even though much be sad to feel and bear. Robert, I should
have gone on many years, seeing little, knowing little, I think, if
it had not been for you and for your troubles, which are mine, and
for this love of ours, builded in the midst of sorrows. Georgette
is now as old as when I first came to love you, and you were thrown
into the citadel, and yet in feeling and experience, I am ten years
older than she; and necessity has made me wiser. Ah, if necessity
would but make me happy too, by giving you your liberty, that on
these many miseries endured we might set up a sure home.
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