You say one must not find fault with a friend, when she is two hundred leagues off. But is it also necessary one must pardon her, if she fails in all the duties of friendship? If you know any maxim which enforces this doctrine, you will do well to quote it, for that alone can support your argument. You say I pout, and am in the sullens, but it is no such thing. I do not pout, but I am wounded and vexed to the very bottom of my soul! You have no nearer relation, not even Madame d’ Ostalis, since I am your first cousin, and she is only your niece in the thousandth degree. You had not a more tender friend, nor one who had known you longer; and yet in the only occasion of your life, when you could have given me the strongest proof of your confidence, you treat me as a stranger! Surely this is enough to make me angry! It was not entirely your own secret, it was another's! You go away for four years! My God, what a slave you are become! ‘Mons. d’ Almane prevented you from telling it,’ in other words ‘he forbid you.’ You are to be sure a most submissive wife, and he is an imperious tyrant. Now indeed I can hear Mons. de Limours’ secrets without even being tempted to disclose them to you. But whilst I was persuaded you loved me, I should have betrayed all the husbands in the world for you: you have convinced me I was wrong, and I will correct myself. You pretend to say I might have divined what you dared not to tell me, because you was ‘melancholy’ at supper; now as I never saw you remarkably gay, and as your avocations often made you serious, I confess I was not struck with this pretended sadness.