[1] A pupil at the same convent.
[2] The portress of the convent.
[3] The words roué and rouerie, which are now happily falling into disuse in good society, were much in vogue at the time when these Letters were written.
[4] To understand this passage, it must be mentioned that the Comte de Gercourt had deserted the Marquise de Merteuil for the Intendante de ***, who had sacrificed for him the Vicomte de Valmont, and it was then that the Marquise and the Vicomte formed an attachment. As this adventure is long anterior to the events which are in question in these Letters, it seemed right to suppress all that correspondence.
[5] La Fontaine.
[6] One sees here the deplorable taste for puns, which was becoming the fashion, and which has since made so much progress.
[7] Not to abuse the Reader’s patience, many of the letters in this correspondence, from day to day, have been suppressed; only those have been given which have been found necessary for the elucidation of events. For the same reason all the replies of Sophie Carnay and many letters of the other actors in these adventures have been omitted.
[8] The error, into which Madame de Volanges falls, shows us that, like other criminals, Valmont did not betray his accomplices.
[9] An ingenious but very gallant romance by Monsieur de Crébillon fils. Translator’s Note.
[10] This is the same gentleman who is mentioned in the letters of Madame de Merteuil.