The Best Works of Balzac. Оноре де Бальзак

no more, and give them to you to reign over, as you do over my present life. What indeed was that time when I knew you not? It would be a void but that I was so wretched."

      FRAGMENT

      "Beloved angel, how delightful last evening was! How full of

       riches your dear heart is! And is your love endless, like mine?

       Each word brought me fresh joy, and each look made it deeper. The

       placid expression of your countenance gave our thoughts a

       limitless horizon. It was all as infinite as the sky, and as bland

       as its blue. The refinement of your adored features repeated

       itself by some inexplicable magic in your pretty movements and

       your least gestures. I knew that you were all graciousness, all

       love, but I did not know how variously graceful you could be.

       Everything combined to urge me to tender solicitation, to make me

       ask the first kiss that a woman always refuses, no doubt that it

       may be snatched from her. You, dear soul of my life, will never

       guess beforehand what you may grant to my love, and will yield

       perhaps without knowing it! You are utterly true, and obey your

       heart alone.

       "The sweet tones of your voice blended with the tender harmonies

       that filled the quiet air, the cloudless sky. Not a bird piped,

       not a breeze whispered—solitude, you, and I. The motionless

       leaves did not quiver in the beautiful sunset hues which are both

       light and shadow. You felt that heavenly poetry—you who

       experienced so many various emotions, and who so often raised your

       eyes to heaven to avoid answering me. You who are proud and saucy,

       humble and masterful, who give yourself to me so completely in

       spirit and in thought, and evade the most bashful caress. Dear

       witcheries of the heart! They ring in my ears; they sound and play

       there still. Sweet words but half spoken, like a child's speech,

       neither promise nor confession, but allowing love to cherish its

       fairest hopes without fear or torment! How pure a memory for life!

       What a free blossoming of all the flowers that spring from the

       soul, which a mere trifle can blight, but which, at that moment,

       everything warmed and expanded.

       "And it will always be so, will it not, my beloved? As I recall,

       this morning, the fresh and living delights revealed to me in that

       hour, I am conscious of a joy which makes me conceive of true love

       as an ocean of everlasting and ever-new experiences, into which we

       may plunge with increasing delight. Every day, every word, every

       kiss, every glance, must increase it by its tribute of past

       happiness. Hearts that are large enough never to forget must live

       every moment in their past joys as much as in those promised by

       the future. This was my dream of old, and now it is no longer a

       dream! Have I not met on this earth with an angel who had made me

       know all its happiness, as a reward, perhaps, for having endured

       all its torments? Angel of heaven, I salute thee with a kiss.

       "I shall send you this hymn of thanksgiving from my heart, I owe

       it to you; but it can hardly express my gratitude or the morning

       worship my heart offers up day by day to her who epitomized the

       whole gospel of the heart in this divine word: 'Believe.'"

       V

      "What! no further difficulties, dearest heart! We shall be free to

       belong to each other every day, every hour, every minute, and for

       ever! We may be as happy for all the days of our life as we now

       are by stealth, at rare intervals! Our pure, deep feelings will

       assume the expression of the thousand fond acts I have dreamed of.

       For me your little foot will be bared, you will be wholly mine!

       Such happiness kills me; it is too much for me. My head is too

       weak, it will burst with the vehemence of my ideas. I cry and I

       laugh—I am possessed! Every joy is an arrow of flame; it pierces

       and burns me. In fancy you rise before my eyes, ravished and

       dazzled by numberless and capricious images of delight.

       "In short, our whole future life is before me—its torrents, its

       still places, its joys; it seethes, it flows on, it lies sleeping;

       then again it awakes fresh and young. I see myself and you side by

       side, walking with equal pace, living in the same thought; each

       dwelling in each other's heart, understanding each other,

       responding to each other as an echo catches and repeats a sound

       across wide distances.

       "Can life be long when it is thus consumed hour by hour? Shall we

       not die in a first embrace? What if our souls have already met in

       that sweet evening kiss which almost overpowered us—a feeling

       kiss, but the crown of my hopes, the ineffectual expression of all

       the prayers I breathe while we are apart, hidden in my soul like

       remorse?

       "I, who would creep back and hide in the hedge only to hear your

       footsteps as you went homewards—I may henceforth admire you at my

       leisure, see you busy, moving, smiling, prattling! An endless joy!

       You cannot imagine all the gladness it is to me to see you going

       and coming; only a man can know that deep delight. Your least

       movement gives me greater pleasure than a mother even can feel as

       she sees her child asleep or at play. I love you with every kind

       of love in one. The grace of your least gesture is always new to

       me. I fancy I could spend whole nights breathing your breath; I

       would I could steal into every detail of your life, be the very

       substance of your thoughts—be your very self.

       "Well, we shall, at any rate, never part again! No human alloy

       shall ever disturb our love, infinite in its phases and as pure as

       all things are which are One—our love, vast as the sea, vast as

       the sky! You are mine! all mine! I may look into the depths of

       your eyes to read the sweet soul that alternately hides and shines

       there, to anticipate your wishes.

       "My best-beloved, listen to some things I have never yet dared to

       tell you, but which I may confess to you now. I felt a certain

       bashfulness of soul which hindered the full expression of my