II
Fresh Tortures—My Parents’ Talks—Theatres—Mysterious Letter—Troublesome Visits—Useless Prayers—My Protests.
Nature had given me a good figure; nevertheless, my father maintained that I stooped, that one of my shoulders was higher than the other, and that my feet grew large too quickly.
To remedy these imaginary defects he made me wear an iron collar, which was taken off only at meal-time, a steel corset that increased the torture and really made me deformed, and shoes so narrow and short that I could hardly walk.
When I begged him to take off this painful apparatus, a box on the ear was his usual answer.
He often took me to the opera, to teach me, he said, to hold myself properly; to move my arms easily; to behave with grace.
All this rigmarole was an enigma to me, until at last he explained it to me in these terms—
“Isn’t it about time, my dear Maria, that you repaid what I have spent on your education?”