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Russian instructions peremptorily forbade the writer from ever contradicting in conversation the recipient of the letters. No pretext could excuse any deviation from the rôle of that most estatic admiration. The letters were always based on that hypothesis.

One evening at the opera, when in madame de Fervaques' box, Julien spoke of the ballet of Manon Lescaut in the most enthusiastic terms. His only reason for talking in that strain was the fact that he thought it insignificant.

The maréchale said that the ballet was very inferior to the abbé Prévost's novel.

"The idea," thought Julien, both surprised and amused, "of so highly virtuous a person praising a novel! Madame de Fervaques used to profess two or three times a week the most absolute contempt for those writers, who, by means of their insipid works, try to corrupt a youth which is, alas! only too inclined to the errors of the senses."

"Manon Lescaut," continued the maréchale, "is said to be one of the best of this immoral and dangerous type of book. The weaknesses and the deserved anguish of a criminal heart are, they say, portrayed with a truth which is not lacking in depth; a fact which does not prevent your Bonaparte from stating at St. Helena that it is simply a novel written for lackeys."

The word Bonaparte restored to Julien all the activity of his mind. "They have tried to ruin me with the maréchale;