“I do my best to make your sea-side life bearable by not coming near you. Can I do more?
“I ought to be at Geneva, but a cousin of mine is going to be married next week and wants me to be one of his witnesses.
“Could I refuse? One ought to help relations out of difficulties!
“Perrin also wishes me to superintend the rehearsals of Alcestis, but he dawdles so, waiting for Society to come back to Paris (as if there were Society for Alcestis!), that I am going to leave him stranded and start for Geneva.
“Ah! dear lady, how glorious it is! how grand! The other day at rehearsal we all wept like stags at bay.
“‘What a man Gluck was!’ cried Perrin.
“‘No,’ said I, ‘we are the men. Don’t get confused.’
“Taylor said yesterday that Gluck had more heart than Homer; truly, he is more thoroughly human.
“And we are going to offer this food for the gods to pure idiots!
“Is Massart shooting, fishing, painting, building, dreaming?