“Eh! M. de Bussy, marry, and you will be as happy as we are,” said Jeanne; “it is so easy to be happy when you are loved.”

“Ah! madame, everyone is not so fortunate as you.”

“But you, the universal favorite.”

“To be loved by everyone is as though you were loved by no one, madame.”

“Well, let me marry you, and you will know the happiness you deny.”

“I do not deny the happiness, only that it does not exist for me.”

“Shall I marry you?”

“If you marry me according to your taste, no; if according to mine, yes.”

“Are you in love with a woman whom you cannot marry?”

“Comte,” said Bussy, “beg your wife not to plunge dagger in my heart.”