Maintenon--But deign to inform me, Helen, if you were really as beautiful as fame reports? for to say truth, I cannot in your shade see the beauty which for nine long years had set the world in arms.
Helen--Honestly, no: I was rather low, and something sunburnt; but I had the good fortune to please; that was all. I was greatly obliged to Homer.
Maintenon--And did you live tolerably with Menelaus after all your adventures?
Helen--As well as possible. Menelaus was a good-natured domestic man, and was glad to sit down and end his days in quiet. I persuaded him that Venus and the Fates were the cause of all my irregularities, which he complaisantly believed. Besides, I was not sorry to return home: for to tell you a secret, Paris had been unfaithful to me long before his death, and was fond of a little Trojan brunette whose office it was to hold up my train; but it was thought dishonorable to give me up. I began to think love a very foolish thing: I became a great housekeeper, worked the battles of Troy in tapestry, and spun with my maids by the side of Menelaus, who was so satisfied with my conduct, and behaved, good man, with so much fondness, that I verily think this was the happiest period of my life.
Maintenon--Nothing more likely; but the most obscure wife in Greece could rival you there.--Adieu! you have convinced me how little fame and greatness conduce to happiness.
LIFE
Life! I know not what thou art,
But know that thou and I must part;
And when or how or where we met,