Page:The Writings of Prosper Merimee-Volume 4.djvu/21



Zagala, mas que las flores blanca, rubia y ojos verdes, Si piensas seguir amores piérdete bien, pues te pierdes!

JULIE DE CHAVERNY had been married for about six years, and for nearly five years and six months she had had her eyes open not only to the impossibility of loving her husband, but also to the difficulty of merely giving him a place in her esteem. This husband was not boorish. He was neither stupid nor foolish. Still there may have been, perhaps, a mingling of all those qualities in him. If she had recalled the past she might have remembered that once upon a time she had found him pleasant: but now he bored her. Everything about him seemed to her repulsive. His way of eating, of drinking coffee, of speaking, gave her nervous shudders. They seldom met or talked together except at table; but they dined together several times a week and that was sufficient to keep Julie's aversion alive.