“Well, you have a shrewd way of saying sweet things,” said Tarleton; “but I must own that you rarely or never direct it towards women individually. What makes you break through your ordinary custom?”
“Because I am angry with women collectively; and must pour my spleen through whatever channel presents itself.”
“Astonishing,” said Tarleton; “I despise women myself. I always did; but you were their most enthusiastic and chivalrous defender a month or two ago. What makes thee change, my Sir Amadis?”
“Disappointment! they weary, vex, disgust me; selfish, frivolous, mean, heartless: out on them! ‘tis a disgrace to have their love!”
“O Ciel! What a sensation the news of thy misogyny will cause; the young, gay, rich Count Devereux, whose wit, vivacity, splendour of appearance, in equipage and dress, in the course of one season have thrown all the most established beaux and pretty fellows into the shade; to whom dedications and odes and billet-doux are so much waste paper; who has carried off the most general envy and dislike that any man ever was blest with, since St. John turned politician; what! thou all of a sudden to become a railer against the divine sex that made thee what thou art! Fly, fly, unhappy apostate, or expect the fate of Orpheus, at least!”
“None of your raileries, Tarleton, or I shall speak to you of plebeians and the canaille!”
“Sacre! my teeth are on edge already! Oh, the base, base canaille, how I loathe them! Nay, Devereux, joking apart, I love you twice as well for your humour. I despise the sex heartily. Indeed, sub rosa be it spoken, there are few things that breathe that I do not despise. Human nature seems to me a most pitiful bundle of rags and scraps, which the gods threw out of Heaven, as the dust and rubbish there.”
“A pleasant view of thy species,” said I.
“By my soul it is. Contempt is to me a luxury. I would not lose the privilege of loathing for all the objects which fools ever admired. What does old Persius say on the subject?
“‘Hoc ridere meum, tam nil, nulla tibi vendo Iliade.’”*