UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA AT LOS ANGELES J/t/HZ Kl^) Ufa* $yv\ VY&^CU* m %*P. / there were each summer many marches and counter-marches with but few results, many skirmishes and small fights, and among the latter, perhaps, one victory. Who troubles himself about it now? The curious reader, however, who only looks to his own pleasure, cannot help saying that all this was good, since the "Letters of the Por- tuguese Nun " grew from it' As Sainte-Beuve indicates, the subject of the ' Letters ' forms one of the episodes of the war between Spain and Portugal which followed as a consequence of the Restoration of 1640 and the achieve- ment of the latter's independence under the House of Braganza. This war, which lasted for twenty -eight years, until the final peace in 1668, was in- termittent, and carried on only at long intervals owing to the state of the two contending parties. Spain had now entered on the period of her decline, and Portugal was in a hardly better 4 PORTUGUESE NUN condition after her sixty years' captivity intro- and the exhaustion of her forces which DUCTI0N had taken place during the reign of Philip IV. Owing, however, to the aid of France, she had been enabled to hold her own up to 1659 ; Dut tne news of the Peace of the Pyrenees seemed at first to take from her all hope of preserv- ing her hardly won autonomy. Yet in spite of this, Mazarin, while signing the clause which bound France to abandon the Portuguese cause, determined, with his usual duplicity, that this should not prevent him from secretly aiding an ally whom he had found so useful in the past as a thorn in the side of Spain. Hardly, indeed, had the treaty been made than he began to occupy himself in recruiting for the Portuguese service a number of French officers whom the peace had left without employment. Among these the chief was Schomberg, who went to Lisbon in 1660 as com- mander-in-chief and to reorganise the Portuguese army. It was not, however, 5 THE LETTERS OF A Intro- until 1663 that the hero of the Letters, duction Noel Boutori) afterwards Marquis of Chamilly and St. Leger, arrived in the country, which he was to leave four years later with the betrayal of a poor nun as his title to fame. For at the time when Schomberg was already there, we see Chamilly (as he is generally called) assisting at the marriage of his brother to Catherine le Comte de No- nant, referred to in the text (Letter II.). Three years afterwards, finding him- self without military employment in France, he came to Portugal, attracted probably, like so many others, by the reputation of the great captain, with whom he had doubtless established friendly relations during the campaign in Flanders (1656-8). Our hero, if hero he may be called, was the eleventh son of Nicholas Bouton, Lord of Chamilly, Charangeroux, and, later on, St. Leger, properties of modest size in Burgundy. His family was good, but its attachment to the Princes of 6 PORTUGUESE NUN Cond£ during the Fronde had compro- intro- mised its position and damaged its DUCTION fortunes. Noel, the future marquis, was born in 1636, and as soon as his age allowed he entered on a military- career. He served through the Flanders campaign under Turenne, and in 1658 was made captain, under the name of the Count of Chamilly, in Mazarin's regiment of cavalry. Reaching Portugal at the end of 1663, or the commence- ment of 1664, he was given the same rank in a regiment commanded by a French officer of note, Briquemault. Although his name is not mentioned in any of the contemporary notices of the war, we know that he was present at the Siege of Valencia de Alcantara (June 1664), at the battle of Castello Rodrigo (in the same month and year), at that of Montes Claros (June 1665), and at the principal sieges which occupied the next two years. In 1665, he was promoted to the rank of colonel, and two years later a diploma of Louis XIV., issued, 7 THE LETTERS OF A Intro- perhaps, at the instance of his brother, duction the Governor of Di j on) gave Chamilly a similar post in the French army, with the evident intention of enabling him to leave the Portuguese service when he liked, even though the war with Spain should not be ended. This, taken to- gether with the fact that in the docu- ment the space for the month is left blank, is extremely significant, and, as will be seen later on, certainly connects itself with the episode of the ' Letters,' even if it does not enter into their actual history. 1 The diploma of Louis XIV., it may be added, is dated 1667, and the sudden departure of Chamilly took place at the end of that year, so that it seems probable that the French captain, fearing future annoyance or even danger to himself from his liaison, had determined to secure a safe retreat. But let us look for a moment at the authoress of the famous 'Portuguese Letters.' 1 Cordeiro, op. cit., p. 131, 1st ed. 8 PORTUGUESE NUN Marianna Alcoforado was born of a intro- good family in the city of Beja and DUCTI0N province of Alemtejo in the year 1640. Her father appears to us in the first years of the Restoration as a man in an influential position, well related, and dis- charging important commissions both administrative and political. He pos- sessed a large agricultural property, which he administered with attention and even zeal, and was a Cavalier of the Order of Christ, besides being intimate with some of the principal men of the time. He had six children, of whom Marianna, according to Cordeiro, was the second. Life in Beja at that time seems to have been sufficiently insecure, owing to the fact that the province of which it was one of the chief cities formed the theatre of the war, and Beja itself was the chief garrison town. Tumults were con- stantly arising from quarrels between the various parts of the heterogeneous mass which then composed the Portuguese army, and hence increased care would 9 THE LETTERS OF A Intro- be necessary on the part of Francisco Alcoforado in order that the education of his daughters might be conducted in such a manner as their position de- manded. Hence, too, probably, the reason why Marianna and her sister Catherine entered the Convent of the Conception at an earlier age than was usual. Their father, occupied with administrative and military work on the frontier, would be unable to give them the oversight and attention which quieter times would have allowed. The Convent of the Conception at Beja was founded in 1467 by the parents of King Emanuel the Fortunate, and, favoured successively by royal and pri- vate devotion, it had become one of the most important and wealthy institutions of its kind in Portugal. It was situated at the extreme south of the city, near to the ancient walls, and looked on to the gates still called 'of Mertola,' because they are on the side of the city towards Mertola, distant fifty-four kilometres to PORTUGUESE NUN the south-west on the right bank of the intro- Guadiana. There is still to be seen the DUCTION remains of the balcony or verandah from which Marianna first caught sight of Chamilly, probably during some military evolutions (cf. Letter II.), and from it a good view may be obtained over the plains of Alemtejo as they stretch away to the south. Curiously enough, the tradition of Marianna and her fatal love has been perpetuated in the convent, in spite of the attempts, natural enough, on the part of monastic chroniclers and such like to hide all traces of it. In this as in most other convents there were two kinds of cells — the dormi- tories, divided into cubicles, and rooms forming independent abodes dispersed throughout the edifice. These latter the nuns of the seventeenth century called their ' houses,' — as suas casas, — and it was one of these which Marianna possessed. The former were in accordance with the Constitutions, while the latter, though strictly forbidden, nevertheless existed. THE LETTERS OF A Intro- These separate abodes were, it is true, duction f ten necessitated by the growth of the convent population, and generally apper- tained to nuns of a better position, while the dormitories served for those who were either poorer or of an inferior rank. Many of these casas, too, were built by private individuals who had some con- nection or other with the particular convent, and there are indications that the father of Marianna had caused some to be erected in that of the Conception. 1 From the year 1665 to 1667, then, Beja was, as we have said, the centre of the various military movements in which Chamilly took part under the leadership of Schomberg, and there is no doubt that he spent much of his time there. Marianna was twenty-five years old. She had been intrusted to the Cloister when a child, 2 as she herself tells us, and her 1 Cf. Cordeiro, op. cit. t pp. 147-8 and 300, 1st ed. 2 This was partly owing to the ideas of the time, and partly for reasons already mentioned, and also because her father wished to build up an estate, to be entailed on heirs-male. 12 PORTUGUESE NUN renunciation of the world must have intro- been little more than a form. She had DUCTI0N probably made her 'profession' too at the age of sixteen, that provided for by the Constitutions, if not at an earlier date. The dull routine of her life was sud- denly broken in upon by the sight of a man surrounded with all the prestige of military glory — one who was the first to awaken in her a consciousness of her own beauty — the first to tell her that he loved her, one, moreover, who was ready to throw all his greatness, his present and his future, at her feet ' I was young ; I was trustful. I had been shut up in this convent since my childhood. I had only seen people whom I did not care for. I had never heard the praises which you constantly gave me. Methought I owed you the charms and the beauty which you found in me, and which you were the first to make me perceive. I heard you well talked of; every one spoke in your favour. You did all that was necessary to awaken 13 THE LETTERS OF A Intro- love in me.' 1 Such is her simple con- duction f ess { OIlj anc j } comments Cordeiro, nothing more natural. Their first meeting was probably due to the relations which Chamilly, an officer of rank, had entered into with the t Alcoforados, one of the chief families in Beja. There are indications, indeed, that Chamilly and Marianna's eldest brother had met, doubtless in the field, for the latter also followed the profession of arms ; and this brother, named Bal- thazar Vaz Alcoforado, is probably the same as the ' brother ' referred to in the Letters as the lovers' go-between. It was for his benefit that Marianna's father had striven for years to build up an estate which was to be entailed on his offspring. But in the year 1669, just at the very time of the great sensation caused by the publication of the Letters in Paris, Balthazar abandoned his military career and all his brilliant prospects in the world to enter the priesthood. It is im- 1 Letter v. 14 PORTUGUESE NUN possible not to hazard a guess, although intro- we know nothing for certain on the DUCTI0N point, that his motive for so doing was connected in some way with the almost tragic ending of the liaison between his sister and the French captain. But to return : — The customs of the time, curiously enough, allowed a greater relative liberty to nuns as regards the visits which might be paid them than to married women, 1 or, as the Bishop of Gram Para puts it, ' the liberty of the grating was wide in those miserable times.' 2 We cannot of course be expected to give an account of the progress of this liaison, nor do we wish to indulge in romantic hypotheses. Chamilly was thirty at the time when he first saw Marianna. Brought up as 1 Asse, op. cit. , Preface, p. vi. For an account of the somewhat relaxed character of convent discipline at the time vide Cordeiro, pp. 156-164, 1st ed. 2 ' Muita era a liberdade das grades naquelle miseravel tempo.' 15 THE LETTERS OF A Intro- he had been to war as a trade, a man of duction sma n intelligence and few scruples, the intrigue would be a pleasant diversion, a means pour passer le temps which he would otherwise have found dull enough in a Portuguese provincial town after the Paris of 'Le Grand Monarque.' The seduction and desertion of a poor nun must have seemed all so perfectly natural to one brought up in contact with the loose morality of camp life and in the France of Louis XIV. In June 1667 the authorities of Beja received an answer from the new King, Don Pedro, to the complaint which they had made of ' the oppression which the French cavalry continued to exercise on this people.' * Already, on account of similar complaints, Schomberg had been ordered to move his cavalry from the town and district, but he had disobeyed these orders for strategic reasons. Now, we have already seen that it was between 1 Cordeiro, op. cit., pp. 326-7, 1st ed. 16 PORTUGUESE NUN 1665 and 1667 that Chamilly carried on intro- his intrigue with Marianna, and it is just DUCTI0N in 1667 that the scandal must have attained greater proportions, coinciding with and ending, not in the withdrawal of the French cavalry, but in the sudden retirement of Chamilly to France. But what, it may be asked, was the reason for the King's order, and what could those 'oppressions' have been in an important city where presumably there was a regular and well-appointed police administration? Has it not a relation, asks Cordeiro, with the incident in the ' Letters,' which would both afflict and irritate the influential family of the nun and the good burgesses of Beja ? The special situation of the French captain, on the other hand — his interest in not aggravating the scandal, and the peril for the religious herself in the adoption of violent means, would all naturally counsel the withdrawal of Chamilly. x The danger of remaining longer in 1 Cordeiro, op. cit., pp. 139-40, 1st. ed. 17 B THE LETTERS OF A Intro- Beja was not in the nature of those duction w hj c h the French colonel could confront with his recognised courage. If he were surprised in the convent, if he were denounced as its violator and as the seducer of a nun, the daughter of a well- known family, and one, too, which was on excellent terms with the new sove- reign, neither his own position nor the protection of Schomberg would avail him, since both the one and the other began to lose their importance with the approach of peace. 1 However this may be, certain it is that Chamilly's own excuses for depar- ture, referred to in the 'Letters,' were merely empty pretexts, and a reference to the history of the time will show this. If Louis XIV. needed his presence so much for the invasion of Franche Comte, why not, it may be asked, for the important campaign in Flanders in 1667? He seems to have left Portugal, too, a 1 Cordeiro, op. cit., p. 182, 1st ed. 18 PORTUGUESE NUN little clandestinely, for no notice is to be intro- met with, as in the case of other French DUCTI0N officers, of his asking and obtaining leave from the Portuguese Government, and he probably did not even embark in Lisbon. Already, in the beginning of February 1668, we find him with Louis xiv. in Dijon, so that he must have quitted Beja and the seat of war quite at the end of the preceding year. It is now that the ' Letters ' enter into the history of the lives of Marianna and Noel Bouton de Chamilly. As is well known, they were all written after the latter's retirement from Portugal, and probably between the December of 1667 and the June of 1668, and they express better than any remarks which we could make the stages of faith, doubt, and despair through which poor Marianna passed. As a piece of unconscious, though self-made, psychological analysis they are unsurpassed ; as a product of the Peninsular heart they are unrivalled. I f they are not, as Theophilo Braga calls 19 THE LETTERS OF A Intro- them, the only beautiful work produced duction j^ n j g coun trymen in the seventeenth century, they are, at any rate, by far the most beautiful. To compare them, as re- gards literary form, with those of Heloi'se would be manifestly unfair, the situation of the two women was so different. 1 Think of the Abbess of the Paraclete, mistressof all the learning of the time,and surrounded by things to console her, or at least to divert her attention, and then regard poor Marianna, persecuted by her family, and liable to the tender mercies of the Inquisition, with none of the com- forts, none of the consolations of the former. But if the ' Letters' of Heloi'se are superior to those of Marianna from the point of view of correctness of expression and style, they are inferior in all else. The nun's are far more natural, and 1 For a good comparison of the Letters of Mari- anna and Heloi'se see an article entitled • La Eloisa Portuguesa' in the June number of the review Espana Modema, 1889, written by Emilio Pardo Bazan. 20 PORTUGUESE NUN therefore more beautiful, and the very intro- confusion of feelings and ideas which we DUCTION should expect from one in her position rather adds to their charm. Finally, the moral character of Heloi'se as dis- played in her epistles cannot certainly be placed beside that of the Portuguese nun with any advantage. Henceforth, we only meet with the name of Marianna at intervals — once in 1668, again in 1676 and 1709, and lastly in an obituary notice in 1723. She, at any rate, is not an example of the well-known saying of Cervantes — 4 the Portuguese die of love.' It is true that some words at the end of the Fifth Letter seem to suggest suicide, but there is, on the other hand, throughout the whole of these ultima verba an ex- pression of energy and of her determina- tion to tread under foot, if she cannot extinguish, the flames of her passion. Marianna came of a vigorous race, and, in spite of the great infirmities of which her obituary speaks, she lived, as we THE LETTERS OF A Intro- shall see, to the age of fourscore years DUCTION an(] three She was made Portress, as mentioned in the Letters, at the beginning of 1668, no doubt to distract her mind by giving her some definite occupation and a sense of responsibility. It is, however, signifi- cant, as Cordeiro remarks, that we do not find the name of Marianna, a daughter of one of the principal and most influential families in Beja, filling any more elevated post, whereas her younger sister Peregrina Maria appears in the conventual register as both Ama- nuensis and Abbess. This sister, before professing in the same convent in 1676, made her will, ' being more than twelve years of age,' and there she spoke of the many obligations which she owed Marianna for having brought her up 'from the age of three years.' 1 Her enter- ing the Conception at such an early age is explained by the fact of the death of her mother, which took place at the end 1 Cordeiro, op. cit., p. 299, 1st ed. 22 PORTUGUESE NUN of 1663 or the beginning of 1664. intro- Again, in 1709, Marianna is mentioned DUCTI0N as beaten by only ten votes in an elec- tion for the office of Abbess by a certain nun of the name of Joanna de Bulhao, of whom nothing is known. The next time we hear of her is in 1723, the date of her death. The obitu- ary notice speaks for itself and for her life, since the episode which the • Letters ' contain,and needs no comment. ' On the 28th day of the month of July, in the year 1723, died, in this Royal Convent of Our Lady of the Conception, Mother D. Marianna Alcanforada, 1 at the age of eighty-seven years, 2 all of which she spent in the service of God. She was always very regular in the choir and at the confraternities, and withal fulfilled her (other) obligations. She was very 1 This syntactical extension of the sex to the patronymic was general in the seventeenth century. Vide Cordeiro, op. cit., p. 91, 1st ed. 1 This should be 83. Cf. the extract from the Bap. tismal Register in Cordeiro, p. 285, 1st ed, 23 THE LETTERS OF A Intro- exemplary, and none had fault to find duction w j t | 1 j^ f or g^g was ver y ^j nc j to a jj For thirty years she did rigid penance and suffered great infirmities with much conformity, desiring to have more to suffer. When she knew that her last hour was come, she asked for all the sacraments, which she received in a state of perfect consciousness, giving many thanks to God for having received them. Thus she ended her life with all the signs of predestination, speaking up to the last hour, in proof of which I, D. An ia Sophia Bap ta de Almeida, Amanu- ensis of the Convent, wrote this, which I signed on the same day, month and year as above. 1 D. An ,a Sophia Bap ta de Alm da , Amanuensis.' No such obscurity as that which hangs over the life of Marianna hides the 1 This document was found and transcribed by Cordeiro on pp. 328-9 of his oft-referred-to work, 1st ed. 24 PORTUGUESE NUN doings of Chamilly after his return to intro- France. Acts like the famous defence DUC1ION of Grave in 1674 against the Prince of Orange, and that of Oudenarde two years later, marked him out for future distinction. But if he knew how to defend towns he no less could attack and take them. He distinguished him- self greatly at the sieges of Gand, Cond£, Ypres and Heidelberg, and in 1703 received the recompense of his great services, being made a Marshal of France. M. Asse tells several anecdotes about him, which seem to show that he was a generous man as well as a brave soldier. 1 United in 1671 by a mariage de con- venance to a lady who, according to S. Simon, was far from being gifted with personal beauty, he was always a most exemplary husband. S. Simon, who knew him well, also tells us that Cham- illy was ' the best man in the world, the bravest, and the. most honourable.' He says, too, that no one after seeing him 1 Op. cit., Preface, p. xi. 25 THE LETTERS OF A Intro- or hearing him speak, could understand duction j low j^ kad i nS pi re d such an unmeasured love as that revealed in the famous ' Letters.' i How, then, are we to reconcile the Chamilly of the ' Letters ' with the man of whom his contemporaries and friends speak so highly ? The publication of the Epistles of Marianna was doubtless due to vanity, a fault which we may certainly credit Chamilly with possessing. It was, too, the custom in seventeenth-century France to hand round copies of letters, either received or written, for the ad- miration of friends, and thus, what now appears to us a brutal and cynical want of confidence, was then the most natural thing in the world. 2 It is not, however, so easy, even if it is possible, to excuse the conduct of the French captain in the betrayal and desertion of poor Marianna. Posterity, as M. Asse says, especially the 1 Memoires, vol. iii. pp. 372-3 ; Paris, 1873. 2 Observation of Senhor Cordeiro, op. cit., p. 6, 1st ed. 26 PORTUGUESE NUN feminine portion, has condemned him, intro- and there seems to be no reason why DUCTI0N we should seek to reverse the verdict. It was in 1669 that the first edition of what we know as the ' Portuguese Letters ' was published by Claude Barbin, the well - known Parisian bookseller. The translation seems to have been made towards the middle of the year preceding, and shortly after the return of Chamilly to France. The Letters were evidently shown by their possessor as one of those trophies, or at least souvenirs, which persons are accustomed to bring back with them from a foreign country. 1 The incognito, however, was complete, and neither the name of their recipient nor that of their translator was inscribed on this editio princeps. That of Marianna, indeed, the authoress, was not known until early in this present century, when in 18 10 Boissonade dis- covered her name written in a copy of 1 Observation of M. Asse. 27 THE LETTERS OF A Intro- the edition of 1669 by a contemporary duction hand The veracity f t hi s note has since been placed beyond doubt by the recent researches of Senhor Cordeiro,who has shown the persistence of a tradition in Beja connecting the French captain and the Portuguese nun. The success of the first edition was rapid and complete. A second by Barbin, and two in foreign countries, one in Amsterdam, the other in Cologne, all in the same year, attest this. The success, indeed, took such proportions, that from the mutual rivalry of authors and publishers there sprung up a new kind of literature, that of 'les Portu- gaises.' The Five Letters of the nun had followers like most successful romances, and the title of ' Portuguese Letters ' became a generic name apply- ing not only to the imitations which amplified subsequent editions, but also to every kind of correspondence where passion was shown toute nue. 1 1 Asse, op. cit., Preface, pp. xiii, xiv. 28 PORTUGUESE NUN 'Brancas/ says Mme. de Sevign6, intro- ' has written me a letter so excessively DUCTION tender as to make up for all his past neglect. He speaks to me from his heart in every line ; if I were to reply to him in the same tone, ce seroit une Portugaise! 1 In the same year, 1669, Barbin issued a • second part ' of the Portuguese Letters, which was counterfeited shortly afterwards at Cologne, as the real ones had been. This was written, we are told in the preface, by afemme dn monde, and its publication was suggested by the favour with which the letters of the nun had been received. The publisher counted, as he said, on the difference of style which distin- guished these fresh letters from the original ones, to assure a success as great as the first five had obtained. After the second part came the so- called ' Replies,' all in the same year, 1 Letter to Mme. de Grignan in vol. ii. , page 284, of the edition of Paris 1862. 29 THE LETTERS OF A Intro- and their publisher tells us in the pre- duction face that « he j s assured that the g ent i e . man who wrote them has returned to Portugal.' Shortly afterwards appeared the ■ New Replies,' but this time they were given for what they were, ' a jeu d" esprit for which the example of Aulus Salinus writing replies to the Heroides of Ovid, and, above all, the beauty of the first Portuguese Letters, should serve as an excuse.' l The motive, then, for the production of the second part of the ' Portuguese Letters' as for that of the 'New Replies' is satisfactorily explained, but how about the ' Replies ' themselves ? Can we not account for them by supposing that it was felt necessary on the part of the friends of Chamilly to attenuate the sympathy expressed on all sides for the unfortunate nun, and the censure which must naturally have followed such a base betrayal ? Hence, proceeds Senhor Cordeiro, the author of this suggestion, 1 Asse, op. cit.y Preface, p. xv. 30 PORTUGUESE NUN the publication of these Replies, whose intro- capital idea is to show us the seducer DUCTI0N of Marianna under a perfectly different aspect and character from that which readers of the Letters would naturally attribute to him. However this may be, it was not long before the name of their hero came to be printed in editions of the Letters, though, curiously enough, it was first divulged in an edition printed abroad — in Cologne — in 1669, a copy of which is to be found in the British Museum, marked 1085 b. 5 (2), containing the following : — ' The name of him to whom they (the Letters) were written is the Chevalier de Chamilly, and the name of him who made the translation is Cuilleraque.' 1 More strange still, the French editions of the Letters preserved a discreet 1 Director for a time of the Gazette de France, and a friend of Mme. de Sevigne" and Racine. Boileau described him as ' Esprit ne pour la cour et maitre en l'art de plaire Guilleragues qui sais et parler et se taire.' 31 THE LETTERS OF A Intro- silence as to the name of the recipient DUCTI w ith the exception of the 1671 edition of the Replies, until the year 1690, when a similar notice to that above referred to as being in the Cologne edition was made public ; so that even in Chamilly's lifetime his name was appended to editions of the Letters as their recipient, and as far as we know he never denied the authenticity of the ascription. The question as to whether the Let- ters were originally written in French, or whether they are a translation, hardly needs discussion here, for the principal critics, both French and Portuguese — Dorat, Malherbe, Filinto Elysio and Sousa Botelho — have unanimously de- cided from the text itself that they are a translation, and a bad one. The last- named says : — ' A Portuguese, or indeed any one knowing that language, cannot doubt but that the Five Letters of the Nun have been translated almost literally from a Portuguese original. The con- 32 PORTUGUESE NUN struction of many of the phrases is such intro- that, if re-translated word for word, they are found to be entirely in harmony with the genius and character of that language.' 1 But it is just this baldness for which we should all be truly thankful, because we are thus enabled to listen to what Marianna said, and hear how she said it. Had the translation been what the seven- teenth century would have called a good one, we should have known M. Guillera- que well enough, it is true, but only seen the nun ' darkly as through a glass.' As to the present version, the author can only add to what he has already said in the Preface, by confessing that he feels its inadequacy as much as any of his critics will doubtless do. At the same time, however, if its result be to excite competition, and call forth a better one, his labour will not, he thinks, have been in vain. ' Quoted by Cordeiro, op, cit., p. 31, ist ed. 33 c LETTERS She only faid, ■ My life is dreary, He cometh not,' fhe faid ; She faid, ' I am aweary, aweary, I would that I were dead ! ' Mariana. —Tennyson. FIRST LETTER Men amigo verdadeiro, quem me vos levou tao longe ? . . . Como v6s vos foftes, tudo fe tornou trifteza ; nem parece ainda, fenao que eftava efpreitando ja que vos foffeis. Bernardim Ribeiro, Saudades, cap. i. O but think, my love, how much thou wert wanting in fore- fight. Ah ! unfor- tunate, thou wert betrayed, and thou didft betray me with illufive hopes. A paffion on which thou didft reft fo many profpects of pleafure now only caufes thee a deadly defpair, which is like nothing elfe but the 37 »Ol.i/ftr' THE LETTERS OF A first cruelty of the abfence which occa- LETTER / fions it. What ! muft this abfence, to which my forrow, all ingenious though it be, cannot give a fad enough name, deprive me for ever of a fight of thofe eyes in which I was wont to fee fo much love, which made me feel fo full of joy, which took the place of all elfe to me, and which, in a word, were all that I defired ? Mine eyes, alas ! have loft the only light that gave them life, tears alone are left them, and ceafelefs weeping is the fole employment I have given them fince I learned that you were bent upon a feparation fo unbearable to me that it muft foon bring about my death. But yet it feems to me that I cling in fome fort to the forrows of 38 PORTUGUESE NUN which you are the fole caufe. I *™** R confecrated my life to you from the moment when I firft faw you, and I feel a certain pleafure in facri- ficing it to you. I fend you my fighs a thoufand times each day, they feek you everywhere, and as fole recompenfe of fo much dis- quietude they bring me back a warning too true, alas, of my un- happinefs : an unhappinefs which is cruel enough to prevent me from flattering myfelf with hope, and which is ever calling to me — Ceafe, ceafe to wear thyfelf out in vain, ill- fated Marianna, ceafe looking for a lover whom thou wilt never fee again, who has croffed the feas to fly from thee, who is now in France in the midft of pleafures, who is not 39 THE LETTERS OF A first thinking: for one moment on thy LETTER ° J forrows, who would not thank thee for thefe pangs for which he feels no gratitude. But no, I cannot make up my mind to think fo ill of you, and I am too much con- cerned that you mould right your- felf. I do not even wifh to think that you have forgotten me. Am I not unhappy enough already without torturing myfelf with falfe fufpicions ? And why mould I try fo hard to forget all the care you took to prove your love for me ? I was fo enchanted with it all that I mould be ungrateful indeed were I not ftill to love you with the fame tranfports that my paffion lent me when I enjoyed the pledges of your love. How 40 PORTUGUESE NUN can the memory of moments fo first fweet have become fo bitter ? And, contrary to their nature, muft they ferve only to tyrannife over my heart ? Alas, poor heart ! your laft letter brought it into a ftrange ftate ; it endured fuch ftrong pangs that it feemed to be trying to tear itfelf from me to go and feek for you. I was fo overcome by all thefe violent emotions that I was befide myfelf for more than three hours. 1 It was as though I refufed to come back to a life which I feel bound to lofe for you fince I can- not preferve it for you. In fpite of myfelf, however, I became my- felf again ; I flattered myfelf with 1 One of those ecflafies so common in conventual annals is here meant. 41 THE LETTERS OF A first the feeling that I was dying: of love, LETTER and befides, I was well pleafed at the thought of being no longer obliged to fee my heart torn by grief at your abfence. Ever fince thofe firft fymptoms I have fuffered much from ill-health, but can I ever be well again until I fee you ? And yet I am bearing it without a murmur fince it comes from you. What ! is this the reward you give me for loving you fo tenderly ? But it matters not ; I am refolved to adore you all my life and to care for no one elfe, and I tell you that you too will do well to love no other. Could you ever content yourfelf with a love colder than mine ? You will perhaps find more beauty elfewhere (yet you 42 PORTUGUESE NUN told me once that I was very first LETTER beautiful), but you will never find fo much love : and all the reft is nothing. Do not fill any more of your letters with trifles : and do not write and tell me again to remember you. I cannot forget you, and as little do I forget the hope you gave me that you would come and fpend fome time with me. Alas ! why are you not will- ing to pafs your whole life at my fide ? Could I leave this unhappy cloifler I fhould not await in Portugal the fulfilment of your promifes. I fhould go fearleffly over the whole world feeking you, following you, and loving you. I dare not flatter myfelf that this can be. I do not care to feed a hope 43 THE LETTERS OF A first that would certainly give me fome LETTER pleafure, while I wifh to feel nothing but forrow. Yet I confefs the chance of writing to you which my brother gave me fuddenly aroufed in me a certain feeling of joy, and checked for a time the defpair in which I live. I conjure you to tell me why you fet yourfelf to bewitch me as you did, when you well knew that you would have to for- fake me. Why were you fo bent on making me unhappy ? Why did you not leave me at peace in my cloifter ? Had I done you any wrong ? But I afk your pardon. I am not accufing you. I am not in a ftate to think on vengeance, and I only blame the harfhnefs of my fate. It feems to me that in 44 PORTUGUESE NUN feparating us it has done us all the first i i r r • LETTER harm that we could fear from it. It will not fucceed in feparating our hearts, — for love, more powerful than it, has united them for ever. If you take any intereft in my lot write to me often. I well deferve your taking fome pains to let me know the ftate of your heart and fortune. Above all, come and fee me. Good-bye. I cannot make up my mind to part from this letter. It will fall into your hands : would I might have the fame happinefs ! Ah, how foolifh I am ! I know fo well that this is impofhble. Good- bye. I can no more. Good-bye. Love me always and make me fuffer ftill more. 45 SECOND LETTER Das triftezas, nao fe pdde contar nada ordenada mente, porque defordenadamente acontefcem ellas. Bernardim Ribeiro, Saudades, cap. i. OUR lieutenant has juft told me that a ftorm has forced you to put into port in theAlgarve. 2 I am afraid you have fufifered much on the fea, and fo much has this fear abforbed me that I have thought no more on all my troubles. Do you think, perchance, 1 No. 4 in all editions and tranflations except that of Cordeiro. 2 A province in the extreme fouth of Portugal. 46 LETTERS OF A NUN that your lieutenant takes more second ' LETTER intereft in what happens to you than I do ? If not, why then is he better informed of it? And then, why have you not written to me ? I am unlucky indeed if you have found no time for writing fince you left, and ftill more fo if you could have written and would not. Your injuftice and ingratitude are too great; but I mould be in defpair if they were to caufe you any harm. — ^ I had rather you fhould remain unpunifhed than that they mould avenge me. I withftand all the proofs which ought to perfuade me that you do not love me at all, and I feel much more difpofed to yield myfelf blindly to my paffion than to the reafons you give me to 47 THE LETTERS OF A second complain of your neglect. What mortification you would have fpared me, if, in the days when I firft faw you, your conduct had been as cold as it has feemed to me for fome time now! But who would not have been deceived by fuch ardour as you then mowed, and who would not have thought it fincere? How hard it is to make up one's mind to doubt for any time the fincerity of thofe one loves! I fee clearly that the leaft excufe is good enough for you ; and, without your troub- ling to make it to me, my love for you ferves you fo faithfully that I cannot confent to find you guilty, except for the fake of enjoying the infinite pleafure of declaring you guiltlefs myfelf. You overcame 4 8 PORTUGUESE NUN me by your affiduities, you kindled second LETTER my paffions with your tranfports, your tendernefs fafcinated me, your vows perfuaded me, but it was the violence of my own love which led me away; and this, beginning at once fo fweet and fo happy, has left nothing behind it but tears, fighs, and a wretched death, without the poffibility of my miniftering any relief to myfelf. It is true that in loving you I enjoyed a pleafure unthought of before, but this very pleafure is now coiling me a forrow, which once I knew nothing of. All the emotions which you caufe me run to extremes. If I had fhown obftinacy in refilling your love, if I had given you any motive for anger or jealoufy in order to draw you on 49 d THE LETTERS OF A second the more, if you had detected any LETTER . .- . - artince in my conduct, if, in a word, I had wifhed to oppofe my reafon to the natural inclination I felt for you, and which you foon made me perceive (though doubtlefs my efforts would have been ufelefs), you might then have punifhed me feverely and ufed your power over me with fome fhow of juftice. But you feemed to me worthy of my love before you had told me that you loved me : you gave evidence of a great paffion for me r, I was overjoyed at it, and I gave myfelf up to love you to diftraction. You were not blinded as I was. Why then did you let me fall into the date in which I now am? What did you want with all my raptures, So PORTUGUESE NUN which muft have been very trouble- second LETTER fome to you ? You well knew that you would not ftay in Portugal for ever. Then why did you Tingle me out to make me fo unhappy? Doubtlefs you might, in this country, have found fome woman more beautiful than I am, one with whom you could have enjoyed as much pleafure,^fince in th^s you only fought the groffer kind,; — one who would have loved you faithfully as long as you were with her, whom time would have confoled for your abfence, and whom you might have left without either treachery or cruelty. You acl: more like a tyrant bent on perfecution than a lover whofe only thought fhould be how to pleafe. Alas! why do 51 THE LETTERS OF A second you treat fo harfhly a heart which LETTER * J is yours ? I can fee very well that you let yourfelf be turned againft me as eafily as I let myfelf be con- vinced in your favour. Without needing to call on all my love, and without imagining that I had done anything out of the way, I fhould have refilled much ftronger argu- ments than thofe can be which have moved you to leave me. They would have feemed to me very weak, and none could have been ftrong enough to tear me from your fide. But you were ready to make ufe of the firft pretexts that you found in order to get back to France. A veffel was failing. Why did you not let it fail ? Your family had written to you. Surely 52 PORTUGUESE NUN you know all the perfecutions which second J " . LETTER I have fuffered from mine ? Your honour obliged you to abandon me. Did I take any care of mine ? You were forced to go and ferve your king. If all they fay of him is true he has no need of your help, and would have excufed you. I mould have been only too happy if we could have paffed our whole lives together, but fince it was fated that a cruel abfence fhould feparate us, I think I ought to be glad indeed at the thought of not having been faithlefs, and I would not wifh to have committed fuch a bafe act for anything in the world. What ! you who have known the depths of my heart and affection, could you make up your mind to leave me for ever 53 THE LETTERS OF A second and expofe me to the dread of feeling LETTER . . that you only remember me in order to facrifice me to fome new paffion ? I well know that I love you as one diffracted. Withal I do not complain of all the violence of my heart's emotions ; I am accuftoming myfelf to its tortures, and I could not live without the pleafure which I find and enjoy in loving you in the midft of a thoufand forrows. But a difgufl and hatred for everything torments me conftantly ; I feel my family, my friends, and this convent unbearable. All I am forced to fee and everything I am obliged to do is hateful to me. I have grown fo jealous of my paffion that methinks all my actions and all my duties ought to have regard to you. Yes, 54 PORTUGUESE NUN I have fcruples in not employing second r . LETTER every moment of my life for you. Ah ! what mould I do without the extremities of hate and love which fill my heart ? Could I furvive that which inceffantly fills my thoughts, and lead a quiet cold life ? Such a void, and fuch a lack of feeling, could never fuit me. All have no- ticed how completely I am changed in my humour, my manners, and my perfon. My mother 1 fpoke to me about it, fharpiy at firft, but after- wards more kindly. I know not what I faid in reply. I think I confeffed all to her. Even the ftricteft religious pity my condition, and are moved by a certain confid- eration and regard for me. Every 1 The Mother Superior of the convent. 55 THE LETTERS OF A second one, in fact, is touched by my love : and you alone remain profoundly indifferent. You write me letters at once cold and full of repetitions ; the paper is not half filled, and you make it quite clear that you are dying to nnifh them. Dona Brites has been importuning me for feveral days to get me to leave my room, and thinking to divert me file took me for a walk upon the balcony, from which one fees the gates of Mertola. 1 I went with her, but at once cruel memories affailed me, and thefe made me weep for the reft of the day. She brought me back to my room, and there I 1 Gates in the city of Beja : fo called becaufe they are on the fide which looks toward Mertola, 54 kilo- metres diflant. Both Beja and Mertola are in the province of the Alemtejo. 56 PORTUGUESE NUN threw myfelf on the bed and thought second i /- i • ii-ii LETTER a thoufand times on the little hope I have of ever being well again. What is done to alleviate only em- bitters my grief, and I find in the very remedies themfelves parti- cular reafons for frefh forrows. It was from that fpot that I often faw you pafs by with that air which charmed me fo, and I was up on that balcony on the fatal day when I began to feel the firft effects of my unhappy paffion. Methought you were wifhing to pleafe me, although as yet you did not know me. I perfuaded myfelf that you fingled me out among all my companions. When you paffed I thought you were pleafed for me to fee you better and admire your (kill 57 THE LETTERS OF A second and grace whilft you caracoled your LETTER ° . norie. A fudden fright came over me when you made it go over fome difficult place. In a word, I inter- efted myfelf fecretly in every a<5t of yours. I felt quite fure you were not indifferent to me, and I took as meant for me all that you did. You know too well what came of all this ; and although I have nothing to hide, I ought not to write to you fo much about it, left I make you more guilty than you are already, if that be poffible, and left I have to reproach myfelf with fo many ufelefs efforts to oblige you to be faithful. This you will never be. Can I ever hope that my letters and reproaches will have an effect on your ingratitude that my love 58 PORTUGUESE NUN for you and your defertion of me second LETTER have not had ? I know my fad fate too well : your injuftice leaves me not the flighted reafon to doubt of it, and I am bound to fear the worftj fince you have caft me off. Have you a charm only for me, and do not other eyes find you pleafing ? I fhould not be annoyed, I think, were the feelings of others in fome fort to juftify mine, and I would wifh all the women in France to find you agreeable, but none to love you, none pleafe you. This idea is ridiculous and impoffible I well know. I have already, however, found by experience that you are incapable of a great affection, and that you could eafily forget me without any help, and without a 59 THE LETTERS OF A second frefh love obliging you to it. I LETTER n would, perhaps, wilh you to have fome reafonable pretext for your defertion of me. It is true that I mould then be more unhappy, but you would not be fo guilty. You mean to flay in France, I perceive, without great enjoyments, may be, but in the poffeffion of full liberty. The fatigue of a long voyage, fome punctilios of good manners, and the fear of not being able to correfpond to my ardent paffion, keep you there. Oh do not be afraid of me; I will be content with feeing you from time to time, and know- ing only that we are in the fame country ; but perhaps I flatter my- felf, and may be you will be more touched by the rigour and hardnefs 60 PORTUGUESE NUN of another woman than you have second LETTER been by all my favours. Can it be that cruelty will inflame you more ? But before engaging yourfelf in any great paffion, think well on the excefs of my forrows, on the uncer- tainty of my purpofes, on the con- tradictions in my emotions, on the extravagance of my letters, on my truftfulnefs, my defpair, my defires, and my jealoufy. Oh ! you are on the way to make yourfelf unhappy. I conjure you to profit by my ex- ample, that at leaft what I am fuf- fering for you may not be ufelefs to you. Five or fix months ago you told me a fecret which troubled me, and acknowledged, only too frankly, that you had once loved a lady in your own country. If it 61 THE LETTERS OF A second is fhe who prevents you from re- LETTER -11 r i 11 turning here, do not fcruple to tell me, that I may fret no more. I am borne up by fome remnants of hope ftill, but I mould be well pleafed, if it can have no good refult, to lofe it at a blow, and myfelf with it. Send me her likenefs and fome of her letters, and write me all fhe fays. Perchance I mall find reafons wherewith to confole myfelf, or it may be to afflict myfelf ftill more. I cannot remain any longer in my prefent ftate, and any change what- soever muft be to my advantage. I mould alfo like to have the por- trait of your brother and of your fifter-in-law. 1 All that concerns 1 Herard Bouton and Catherine Lecomte de Nonant. 62 PORTUGUESE NUN you is very dear to me, and I am second LFTTFR wholly given up to what touches you in any way : I have no inclina- tion of my own left. Sometimes, methinks, I could even fubmit to wait upon her whom you love. Your bad treatment and difdain have broken me down fo far that at times I do not dare to think of being jealous of you for fear of dis- pleafing you, and I go fo far as to think that I mould be doing the greateft wrong in the world were I to upbraid you. I am often con- vinced that I ought not to let you fee, fo madly as I do, feelings which you difown. An officer has now been waiting long for this letter. I had refolved to write it in fuch a way that you might re- 63 THE LETTERS OF A second ceive it without annoyance, but as LETTER .... , T it is, it is too extravagant, and I muft clofe it. Alas ! I cannot bring myfelf to this. I feem to be fpeak - ing to you whilft I write, and you feem to be more prefent to me. The next ■ letter fhall neither be fo long nor fo troublefome ; you may open and read it affured of this. It is true that I ought not to fpeak of a paffion which difpleafes you, and I will not fpeak of it again. In a few days it will be a year fince I gave myfelf up to you without re- ferve. Your love feemed to me very warm and fincere, and I mould never have thought that my favours would fo annoy you as to oblige 1 Both Cordeiro and the French texts read ' firft,' which does not make fenfe. 64 PORTUGUESE NUN you to voyage five hundred leagues second LETTF'R and expofe yourfelf to the rifk of fhipwreck to efcape from them. I have not deferved fuch treatment as this at any man's hands. You may remember my modefty, my fhame, and my confufion, but you do not remember what would make you love me in fpite of yourfelf. The officer who is to carry you this letter fends to me for the fourth time to fay that he wifhes to be gone. How prefs- ing he is ! doubtlefs he is leav- ing fome unhappy lady in this country. Good-bye. It cofts me more to finifh this letter than it coft you to quit me, perhaps for ever. Good- bye. I do not dare give you a 65 E THE LETTERS OF A second thoufand names of love, nor aban- LETTER don myfelf to all my feelings with- out reftraint. I love you a thoufand times more than my life, and a thoufand times more than I think for. How dear you are to me, and yet how cruel ! You do not write to me. I could not help faying this to you again. But I am be- ginning afrefh, and the officer will be gone. What matters it? Let him go. 'Tis not fo much for your fake that I write as for my own. I only feek fome folace. Befides, the very length of my letter will frighten you, and you will not read it. What have I done to be fo unhappy ? And why have you poifoned my life ? Why was I not born in fome other country? Good- 66 PORTUGUESE NUN bye, and forgive me. I dare not second LETTER now pray you to love me. See to what my fate has brought me. Good-bye ! 6 7 THIRD LETTER . . . Que efte pequeno penhor de meus longos fufpiros va ante os feus olhos. Muitas outras coufas defejo, mas efta me feria affaz.'— Bernardim Ribeiro, Saudades, cap. i. HAT will become of me, and what would you have me do ? How far I am now from all that I had looked forward to ! I hoped that you would write me from every place you paffed through, and that your letters would be very long ones, — that 68 LETTERS OF A NUN you would feed my love by the third , r r • • i LETTER hope of feeing you again, that full truft in your fidelity would give me some fort of reft, and that I fhould then remain in a ftate bearable enough, and without the extremes of forrow. I had even thought of fome poor plans of endeavouring, as far as poffible, my own cure, in cafe I could but once affure myfelf that you had entirely forgotten me. The dis- tance which you are at, certain impulfes of devotion, the fear of entirely deftroying the remainder of my health by fo many wakeful nights and fo many cares, the improbability of your return, the coldnefs of your love, and your laft good-byes, your unkind pretexts 69 THE LETTERS OF A third for departure, and a thoufand other LETTER l reafons which are only too good and too ufelefs, feemed to offer me a fafe refuge if I needed one. Having indeed only myfelf to reckon with, I was never able to imagine myfelf fo weak, nor forefee all that I now fuffer. Ah ! how pitiful it is for me, — I that am not able to fhare with you my forrows, and mull be all alone in my grief! This thought is killing me, and I almoft die of horror when I think that you were never really affected by all the blifs that we fhared. Yes, I underftand now the untruth of all your tranfports. You be- trayed me every time you told me that your fupreme delight was to be alone with me. It is to my 70 PORTUGUESE NUN importunities alone that I owe your third LETTER warmth and paffion. Deliberately and in cold blcod you formed a defign to kindle my love ; you only regarded my paffion as your triumph, and your heart was never deeply touched. Are you not very wretched ? and have you fo little delicacy that you made no other ufe of my love but this ? "How then can it be that with fuch love I have not been able to make you entirely happy ? It is folely for love of you that I regret the infinite pleafures you have loft. Why would you not enjoy them ? Ah ! if you only knew them you would doubtlefs find them much greater than that of having deceived me, and you would have experienced 71 THE LETTERS OF A third how much happier it is, and how LETTER rr much more poignant it is to love violently than to be loved. I know not what I am, or what I do, or what I wifh for. I am torn afunder by a thoufand contrary emotions. Can a more deplorable ftate be imagined ? I love you to diftrac- tion, and therefore I fpare you fufficiently not to dare to wifh that the fame emotions mould trouble you. \ I mould kill myfelf or die of grief without were I to be affured that you were never having any reft, that your life was as anxious and difturbed as mine, that you were weeping ceafeleffly, and that everything was hateful to you. I cannot bear my own fufferings, how then could I fupport the for- 72 PORTUGUESE NUN row a thoufand times more grievous third T FTTFR which yours would give me ? I cannot, on the other hand, make up my mind to wifh that you mould think no more of me; and to fpeak frankly, I am furioufly jealous of all that gives you pleafure, and comes near to your heart and fancy in France. I know not why I write to you. I perceive that you will only pity me, and I wifh for none of your pity. I hate myfelf when I look back on all that I have facrificed for you. I have loft my honour. I have expofed myfelf to the anger of my parents, to all the feverity of the laws of this country againft religious, and finally to your ingratitude, which has feemed to me the greateft of all my evils. 73 THE LETTERS OF A third Withal, I feel that my remorfe is LETTER J not real, and that I would willingly, with all my heart, have run the greateft rifks for the love of you, and that I experience a fad pleafure in having rifked my life and honour in your fervice. Ought not all that I hold moft dear to be at your difposal ? Ought I not to be fatisfied at having employed it as I have done ? Methinks I am fcarcely content with my forrows, or the excefs of my love, although I cannot, alas ! flatter myfelf fuffi- ciently to be content with you. I live, unfaithful that I am ; I do as much to preferve my life as to lofe it. Ah ! I am dying of fhame. Is my defpair then only in my letters ? If I loved you, as I have told you 74 PORTUGUESE NUN a thoufand times, mould I not have third been dead long ago ? I have de- ceived you, and you may rightly complain of me. Alas ! why do you not complain of me? I faw you leave, I can never hope to fee you come back, and in fpite of all I yet breathe ! I have deluded you. I afk your pardon, but do not grant it me. Treat me harfhly — fay my love for you is too weak ; be more hard to pleafe ; tell me that you would have me die of love for your fake. Help me thus, I conjure you, to overcome the weak- nefs of my fex, and to put an end to all my wavering in real defpair. Doubtlefs a tragic end would force you to think of me often, my memory would become dear to you, 75 THE LETTERS OF A third and perhaps you would be really LETTER 11,/- 11 touched by fo uncommon a death. Would not death be better than the ftate to which you have brought me ? Good-bye. How I wifh that I had never feen you. Ah ! I feel how falfe this phrafe is, and I know at the very moment in which I write it that I had far rather be unhappy in my love for you than never have feen you. Willingly, and without a murmur, I confent to my evil fate, fince it has not been your wifh to make it happier. Good-bye ; promife me a few ten- der regrets if I die of grief, or at leaft that you will let the violence of my love give you a difguft and repulfion for everything elfe. This confolation will fuffice me, and if 76 PORTUGUESE NUN I muft leave you for ever, I would third J LETTER wifh not to leave you to another woman. You furely would not be fo cruel as to make ufe of my defpair to render yourfelf more agreeable, and to let it be feen that you have infpired the greateft paffion in the world? Good-bye once again. My letters are too long, and I do not regard you fufficiently. I ask your pardon, and dare hope that you will fhow fome indulgence to a poor mad woman who was not fo, as you know, before fhe loved you. Good- bye. Methinks I too often fpeak to you of the infufferable ftate in which I am, yet I thank you from the bottom of my heart for the defpair which you caufe me, and 77 LETTERS OF A NUN third I hate the peace which I lived in LETTER r before I knew you. Good-bye ! My love grows ftronger each moment. Oh what a world of things I have to tell you of! - 78 FOURTH LETTER 1 Ai goftos fugitivos ! Ai gloria ja acabada e confumida ! Ai males tao efquivos ! Qual me deixais a vida ! Quao cheia de pezar ! quao deftruida ! Camoes, Ode iii. ETHINKS I do the greateft poffible wrong to the feel- ings of my heart in trying to make them known to you in writing. How happy fhould I be could you judge of my paffion by the violence of 1 No. 2 in all editions and tranflations except that of Cordeiro. 79 THE LETTERS OF A fourth yours ! But I muft not compare my feelings with yours, though I cannot help telling you, much lefs ftrongly than I feel it, it is true, that you ought not to maltreat me as you do by a forgetfulnefs which thrufts me into defpair, and which even for you is difhonourable. It is but fair that you mould allow me to complain of the evils which I clearly forefaw when I perceived that you were refolved to forfake me. I well know now that I deluded myfelf, thinking as I did that you would deal with me in better faith than is ufually the cafe, becaufe the excefs of my love put me, it feemed, above all kind of fufpicion, and merited more fidelity than is ordinarily met with. But your 80 PORTUGUESE NUN wifh to deceive me overruled the fourth LETTFR juftice you owe me for all that I have done for you. I mould Hill be unhappy even if you only loved me becaufe I love you, and I would wifh to owe it all to your inclination alone. But fo far is this from being the cafe that I have not received a Tingle letter from you for the laft fix months. I put down all my misfortunes to the blindnefs with which I gave myfelf up to love of you. Should I not have forefeen that the end of my pleafure would come before that of my love ? Could I expect you to flay all your life in Portugal and give up both country and career and think only of me ? Nothing can lighten my forrow, 8l F THE LETTERS OF A fourth and the remembrance of all that I enjoyed fills me with defpair. What ! are all my hopes to be utterly futile ? and fhall I never see you again in my room with all the ardour and paffion which you once fhowed?/But, alas! I am deceiving myfelf, and I know too well that all the feelings that filled my head and heart were only excited in you by a few pleafures, and that they both ended at the fame time. I ought then in thofe moments of fupreme happinefs to have called reafon to my aid to moderate the deadly excefs of my delight, and to foretell to me all that I am now fuffering. But I gave myfelf up to you entirely, and I was not in a ftate to think of anything which 82 PORTUGUESE NUN would have poifoned my pleafure fourth r LETTER and prevented me from fully enjoy- ing the pledges of your ardent love. I was too much delighted to feel that I was with you to think that you would one day be far from me. I remember, however, having told you fometimes that you would make me unhappy, but thefe fears were foon diffipated, and I took pleafure in facrificing them to you, and in giving myfelf up to the enchantment and the faithleffnefs of your protefts. I fee clearly the remedy for all the evils which I fuffer, and I fhould be foon rid of them if I loved you no more. But alas ! what a remedy ! I had rather fuffer ftill more than forget you. Does that, alas ! depend on me ? I 83 THE LETTERS OF A fourth cannot reproach myfelf with having for a fingle moment wifhed to ceafe to love you. You are more to be pitied than I am, and all my fuffer- ings are better than the cold pleafures which your French mis- treffes give you. I do not envy you your indifference, and you make me pity you. I defy you to forget me entirely. I flatter myfelf that I have put you in a Hate in which you can enjoy but imperfect pleafures without me, and I am happier than you becaufe I am more occupied. Some little time ago I was made portrefs of this convent. All who fpeak to me think that I am mad. I know not what I anfwer them. The religious muff be as mad as myfelf to have 84 PORTUGUESE NUN thought me capable of taking care fourth LETTER of anything. Oh how I envy the good fortune of Manoel and Fran- cifco ! 1 Why am I not always with you, as they are ? I would have followed you and waited upon you with more goodwill, it is certain. To fee you is all that I defire in this world. At leaft remember me ; for you to remember me will con- tent me, but I dare not make fure even of this. I ufed not to limit my hopes to your remembrance of me when I faw you daily, but you have taught me the neceffity of fubmitting to all that you wifh. Withal I do not repent of having adored you ; I am glad that you betrayed me, and your abfence, 1 Two of Chamilly's fervants. 85 THE LETTERS OF A fourth cruel though it is, and perhaps LETTER i i- ■ -n • - eternal, diminiines in no way the violence of my love. I wifh every- body to know it ; I make no mys- tery of it ; and I pride myfelf on having done for you all that I did againft every kind of decorum. My honour and religion confift but in loving you to diffraction all my life through, fince I have begun to love you. I am not telling you all this to oblige you to write to me. Oh do not force yourfelf; I only wifh from you what comes fpon- taneoufly, and I reject all the tefti- monies of your love which you can control. I fhall find pleafure in ex- cufing you, becaufe you will perhaps be glad not to have the trouble of writing to me, and I feel deeply 86 PORTUGUESE NUN difpofed to pardon you all your fourth faults. A French officer had the charity to talk to me of you for three hours this morning; he told me that peace was made with France. 1 If this is fo could you not come and fee me, and take me to France ? But I do not deferve it. Do as you pleafe, for my love no longer depends on the way in which you may treat me. I have not been well for a fingle moment fince you left, and my only pleafure has been that of repeating your name a thoufand times each day. Some religious who know the de- plorable ftate into which you have plunged me often fpeak to me of 1 The treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle, which was figned May 2nd, 1668, ratified this peace and put an end to the war called ' of Devolution.' 87 LETTERS OF A NUN fourth you. I leave my room, where you LETTER ' * 10 often uled to come to fee me, as little as poffible, and I conflantly look at your likenefs, which is to me a thoufand times dearer than life itfelf. It gives me fome pleafure, but alfo much forrow, when I confider that I fhall per- chance never fee you again. Why muft it be that I fhall poffibly never fee you again ? Have you then left me for ever? I am in defpair. Your poor Marianna can no more ; fhe is almoft fainting while fhe finifhes this letter. Good-bye, Good-bye. Have pity on me. 88 FIFTH LETTER Eflou pofto fem medo A tudo o que o fatal deftino ordene : P6de fer que canfado, Ou feja tarde, ou cedo, Com pena de penar-me, me defpene. CamSes, Canfao ix. AM writing to you for the laft time, and I hope to let you fee by the dif- ference in the terms and manner of this letter that you have at laft perfuaded me that you no longer love me, and that therefore I ought no longer to love you. I will fend you on the 89 THE LETTERS OF A fifth firft opportunity all that I (till have LETTER rr J of yours. Do not be afraid that I fhall write to you ; I will not even put your name on the packet. With all thefe details I have charged Dona Brites, 1 whom I have ac- cuftomed to confidences very differ- ent from this. Her care will be lefs fufpected than mine. She will take all the neceffary precautions, that I may be affured that you have received the portrait and bracelets which you gave me. I wifh you to know, however, that for fome days I have felt as if I could burn and tear up thefe tokens of your love, once fo dear to me. But I have revealed fuch weaknefs to 1 D. Brites de Noronha was a profeffed nun and a companion of Marianna in the convent of the Con- ception at Beja. 90 PORTUGUESE NUN your eyes that you would perhaps fifth never have believed me capable of going to a like extremity. I wifh, however, to enjoy all the pain I have experienced in fepar- ating from them, and caufe you fome vexation at leaft. I confefs, to your fhame and mine, that I found myfelf more attached to thefe trifles than I mould like to tell you, and I felt that I had again need of all my reafoning powers to enable me to get rid of each object in fpite of my flattering myfelf that I cared no more for you. But, provided with fuch good reafons as mine, one always achieves the end one feeks. I have placed them in the hands of Dona Brites. What tears this refolution coft me ! After 9» THE LETTERS OF A fifth a thoufand different emotions and LETTER doubts which you know not of, and of which I fhall certainly not give you an account, I have conjured her to fpeak no more to me of thefe baubles, and never to give them back to me even though I mould beg to fee them once again, and, in a word, to fend them you without letting me know. It is only fince I have been em- ploying all my efforts to heal myfelf that I have come to know the ex- cefs of my love, and I fear that I mould not have dared to take it in hand had I forefeen fo many diffi- culties and fuch violence. I am perfuaded that I mould have ex- perienced lefs difagreeable emotions in loving you, ungrateful though you Q2 PORTUGUESE NUN are, than in quitting you for ever, fifth I have found out that you were lefs dear to me than my paffion ; and I have had hard work to fight againft it even after your infulting behaviour made you hateful to me. The pride natural to my fex has not helped me to refolve aught againft you. Alas ! I fuffered your fcorn, and I could have fupported your hate and all the jealoufy which your attachment for another woman has given me. I mould have had at leaft some paffion to combat, but your indifference is infupportable to me. Your impertinent protefta- tions of friendfhip, and the ridi- culous civilities of your laft letter, convince me that you have received all thofe which I have written to 93 THE LETTERS OF A fifth you, that they have ftirred no LETTER emotions in your heart, and yet that you have read them. O ungrate- ful man ! I am ftill foolifh enough to be in defpair at not being able to flatter myfelf that they have not reached you or been given into your hands. I deteft your frank- nefs. Did I ever afk you to tell me the truth fincerely ? Why did you not leave me my love ? You had only not to write ; I did not feek to be enlightened. Am I not unhappy enough with all my in- ability to make the tafk of deceiving me difficult to you, and now at not being able to exculpate you. Know that I am convinced that you are unworthy of all my love, and that I underftand all your bafe qualities. 94 PORTUGUESE NUN If, however, all that I have done fifth for you deferves that you fhould pay fome flight regard to the favours I afk of you, write no more to me, I beg you, and help me to forget you entirely. If you were to fhow, even flightly, that you had felt fome grief at the reading of this letter, perchance I fhould believe you. Perchance, alfo, your acknowledg- ment and affent would vex and anger me, and all that would inflame my love afrefh. Do not then take any account of my life, or you would doubtlefs overthrow all my plans, however you entered into them. I care not to know the refult of this letter, and I beg of you not to diflurb the peace which I am pre- paring for myfelf. Methinks you 95 THE LETTERS OF A fifth may content yourfelf with the harm which you have already caufed me, whatever be the intention you formed to make me miferable. Do not tear me from my ftate of uncer- tainty ; I hope in time to combine with it something like peace of heart. I promife not to hate you ; indeed I diftruft any violent feel- ings too much to adventure that. I am perfuaded that I mould find, it may be in this country, another lover more faithful and handfomer ; but, alas ! who could make me feel love ? Would a paffion for another man fill my thoughts? Has mine had any power over you ? Have I not experienced that a tender heart never forgets him who firft made it know feelings it knew not that it 96 PORTUGUESE NUN was capable of? I have found that fifth all the feelings of fuch a heart are bound up with the idol it has created for itfelf — that its firft impreffions, its firft wounds, can neither be healed nor effaced — that all the paffions which offer their help and attempt to fill and content it pro- mife it but vainly an emotion which it never feels again — that all the pleafures which it feeks, without any defire of finding them, ferve only to convince it that nothing is fo dear as the remembrance of its forrows ? Why have you made me feel the imperfection and bitternefs of an attachment which cannot en- dure for ever, and all the evils that refult from a violent love, when it is not mutual ? Why is it that blind 97 g THE LETTERS OF A fifth inclination and cruel fate agree as a LETTER . . . rule in determining us in favour of thofe who could only love others ? Even if I could hope for fome diverfion in a new engagement, and could find a man of good faith, I pity myfelf fo much that I mould have great fcruples in putting the worft man in the world in the condi- tion to which you have brought me ; and although I may not be obliged to fpare you I could not make up my mind to avenge myfelf fo cruelly, even though it were to depend on me, by a change which I certainly do not forefee. At this very moment I am feeking excufes for you, and I underftand that a religious is not as a rule loveable. Methinks, how- ever, if reafon guided one's choice 9 8 PORTUGUESE NUN one ought to be more attached to fifth ° LETTER them than to other women. Nothing prevents their thinking conftantly of their paffion, and they are not turned afide by a thoufand things which divert and occupy the mind in the world. Surely it cannot be very pleafing to fee thofe whom one loves ever diftra&ed by a thoufand trifles, and one muft needs have but little delicacy to naffer them (without being in defpair at it) to talk of nothing but affemblies, drefs, and promenades. One is con- ftantly expofed to freih jealoufies, for they are tied down to attentions, politeneffes, and converfations with all. Who can be affured that they find no pleafure in all thefe occa- fions, and that they always endure 99 THE LETTERS OF A fifth their huf bands with extreme difguft and never of their freewill ? Ah, how they ought to diftruft a lover who does not render them an exa6t account of all, who believes eafily and without difquiet what they tell him, who in unruffled trufl fees them bound to all these fociety duties. But I do not feek to prove to you by good reafons that you ought to love me ; thefe are very ill means, and I have made ufe of much better, without fuccefs. Too well do I know my fate to try to rife above it. I mall be miferable all my life. Was I not fo even when I faw you daily ? I was dying for fear that you would not be faithful. I wifhed to fee you every moment, and I could not. PORTUGUESE NUN The danger you ran in entering the fifth 111 t i n i • i LETTER convent troubled me. I almoft died when you were with the army. I was in defpair at not being more beautiful and more worthy of you. I ufed to murmur againft my modeft rank, 1 and I often thought that the attachment you appeared to cherifh for me would be hurtful to you in fome way. Methought I did not love you enough. I feared the anger of my parents againft you, and I was, in a word, in as lament- able a (late then as now. If you had mown me any figns of affection fince you left Portugal I mould have made every effort to leave it, and I would have difguifed myfelf 1 Marianna refers to her condition as a Francifcan nun in a fmall provincial town, not to the rank of her family, which was as good as that of her lover. IOI THE LETTERS OF A fifth to go and find you. Ah, what would have became of me if you had troubled no more about me after I had arrived in France ? — what fcandal, what trouble, what depths of fhame for my family which is fo dear to me fince I have ceafed to love you! I quite underftand, you fee, that I might have been even more wretched than I am. At leaft for once in my life I am speaking reafonably to you. How delighted you will doubtlefs be at my moderation, and how pleafed with me ? But I wifh not to know it. I have already prayed you not to write to me again, and I repeat it now. Have you never reflected on the way in which you have treated me ? Have you never PORTUGUESE NUN confidered that you owe me more fifth J LETTER than any one el/e in the world ? I have loved you as a mad woman might. How I defpifed every- thing elfe ! Befides, you have not acted like an honourable man. You muft have had a natural averfion for me, fince you have not loved me to diftraction. I allowed myfelf to be enchanted by very mediocre qualities. What have you ever done to pleafe me ? What facrifice have you made for me ? Did you not always feek a thoufand other pleafures ? Did you ever give up gaming or the chafe? Were you not ever the firft to leave for the army, and did you not always come back the laft ? You expofed your- 103 THE LETTERS OF A fifth felf rafhly, although I had begged I FITTER °o you to fpare yourfelf for my fake. You never fought the means of fettling down in Portugal, where you were efteemed. A fingle letter from your brother made you leave without a moment's hefitation. Do I not know that during the voyage you were in the bell of humours ? It muft be confeffed that I ought to hate you with a deadly hatred. Ah, I have brought down all thefe misfortunes on myfelf. I accus- tomed you from the firft to a boundlefs love, and that with too much ingenuoufness, while one needs to employ artifice to make one's felf loved. One mould feek the means of fkilfully exciting it, for love of itfelf does not engender love. You 104 PORTUGUESE NUN wifhed me to love you, and fince fifth T FTTER you had formed this defign there is nothing that you would not have done to accomplifh it. You would even have made up your mind to love me had that been neceffary, but you knew that you could fucceed in your enterprife without paffion, and that you had no need of it. What treachery! did you think that you could deceive me with impunity? If any chance brings you again to this country, I declare that I will hand you over to the vengeance of my kinsfolk. I have lived too long, in an abandonment and idolatry which ftrikes me with horror, and feelings of re- morfe perfecute me with unbearable feverity. I feel a lively fhame for 105 THE LETTERS OF A fifth the crimes which you have made LETTER . . _ , me commit, and I have no more, alas ! the love which prevented me from comprehending their enormity. When will this heart of mine ceafe to be torn ? When fhall I be freed from thefe cruel trammels ? In fpite of all, methinks I do not wifh you harm, and could refolve to confent to your being happy. But how could you be so, if you had a true heart ? I mean to write you another letter, to fhow you that I fhall perchance be more at peace fome day. What pleafure 1 fhall find in being able to reproach you for your injuftice when I am no longer fo vividly touched by it, in letting you know that I defpife you, and that I can fpeak with 106 PORTUGUESE NUN indifference of your deceit, that I fifth i r 11 i r 1 LETTER have forgotten all my pleafures and all my forrows, and that I only remember you when I wifh to do fo! I recognife that you have a great advantage over me, and that you have infpired in me a love which has upfet my reafon ; but at the fame time you mould take little credit to yourfelf for it. I was young, I was truftful, I had been fhut up in this convent fince my childhood, 1 I had only l'een people whom I did not care for. I had never heard the praifes which you conftantly gave me. Methought 1 Marianna was about twenty-fix years of age when (he firfl met Chamilly. She had naturally made her profeflion at fixteen and had been con- fided to the care of the convent at twelve, or even much earlier, like her filter. 107 THE LETTERS OF A fifth I owed you the charms and the beauty which you found in me, and which you were the firft to make me perceive : I heard you well talked of ; every one fpoke in your favour : you did all that was neces- fary to awake love in me. But I have at laft returned to myfelf from this enchantment. You yourfelf helped me greatly, and I confefs that I had much need of it. When I return you your letters I fhall take care to keep the laft two which you wrote me ; and I fhall re-read them more often than I have the previous ones, in order that I may not relapfe into my former weaknefs. Ah ! how dear they coft me, and how happy I fhould have been if you had allowed 108 PORTUGUESE NUN me to love you always. I well fifth LETTER know that I am ftill a little too much taken up with my reproaches and your faithleffnefs, but remember that I have promifed myfelf a ftate of greater peace, and that I fhall reach it, or take fome defperate refolve againft myfelf, which you will learn, without great difpleafure. But I wifh no more of you, and I am foolifh to repeat the fame things fo often. I muft leave you, and think no more on you. I even think that I fhall not write to you again. Am I under any obligation to render you an exact account of all I do? 109 LETTRES PORTVGAISES TRADVITES EN FRANCOIS LETT RES PORTVGAISES TRADVITES EN FRANgOIS A PARI S, Chez Clavde Barbin, au Palais , fur le fecond Perron de la fainte Chapelle. M. DC. LXIX Avec Privilege du Roy AV LECTEVR A Y trouue' les moyens auec beaucoup defoin & de peine, de recouurer vne copie cor- vette de la traduction de cinq Le tires Portugaifes, qui ont efte ecrites a vn Gentilhomme de qualite, qui feruoit en Portugal. Pay veu tous ceux quife connoijfent en fentimens, ou les loner, ou les chercher auec tant d'emprejje- ment, que fay cril que ie leur ferois vn fmgulier plaijir de les imprinter. Ie ne fcay point le nom de celuy auquel on les a forties, ny de celuy qui en a fait la tra- duction, mais il niafemble que ie ne deuois pas leur deplaire en les rendant publiques. II eft difficile quelles n'eujjfent, enfin, parti auec des f antes d impreffion qui les eujfent dcfigurces. "5 PREMIERE LETTRE ONSIDERE, mon amour, jusqu'a quel excez tu as manque de preuoyance. Ah mal-heureux ! tu as eft6 trahy, & tu m'as trahie par des efperances trompeufes. Vne paflion fur laquelle tu auois fait tant de projets de plaifirs, ne te caufe prefentement qu'vn mortel defefpoir, qui ne peut eftre compare qu'ci la cruaute de l'abfence, qui le caufe. Quoy? cette abfence, a laquelle ma douleur, toute ingenieufe quelle eft, ne peut donner vn nom affez funefte, me priuera done pour toujours de regarder ces yeux, dans lefquels je voyois tat d'amour, & qui me faifoient connoitre des mouuemes, qui me combloient de joye, qui me tenoient lieu de toutes 117 LETTRES TRADVITES premiere chofes, & qui enfin me fuffifoient? ettre Helas ! les miens font priuez de la feule lumiere, qui les animoit, il ne leur refte que des larmes & je ne les ay employez a aucun vfage, qu'a pleurer fans ceffe, depuis que j'appris que vous eftiez enfin refolu a vn eloignement, qui m'est fi infupportable, qu'il me fera mourir en peu de temps. Cependant il me femble que j'ay quelque attachement pour des malheurs, dont vous eftes la feule caufe : Ie vous ay deftine ma vie auffi-toft que je vous ay veu ; & je fens quelque plaifir en vous la facrifiant I' enuoye mille fois le jour mes foupirs vers vous, ils vous cherchent en tous lieux, & ils ne me rapportent pour toute recompenfe de tant d'inquietudes, qu'vn aduertiffe- ment trop fincere, que me d5ne ma mauuaife fortune, qui a la cruaute de ne fouffrir pas, que je me flatte, & qui me dit a tous momens ; Ceffe, ceffe Mariane infortunee de te confumer vainement : & de chercher vn Amant que tu ne verras iamais ; qui a paffe les Mers pour te fuir, qui eft en France au milieu des plaifirs, qui ne penfe pas vn feul moment a tes douleurs, & qui te difpenfe 118 EN FRANCOIS de tous ces tranfports, defquels il ne te premiere fcait aucun gre ? mais non, je ne puis lettre me refoudre a juger fi injurieufement de vous, & je fuis trop intereffee a vous juftifier : Ie ne veux point m'imaginer que vous m'auez oubliee. Ne fuis-je pas affez malheureufe fans me tourmen- ter par de faux foupcons ? Et pourquoy ferois-je des efforts pour ne me plus fouuenir de tous les foins, que vous auez pris de me temoigner de l'amour ? I'ay efte fi charmee de tous ces foins, que je ferois bien ingrate, fi je ne vous aymois auec les mefmes emportemens, que ma Paffion me donnoit, quand je joiiiffois des temoignages de la voftre. Comment fe peut-il faire que les fouuenirs des momens fi agreables, foient deuenus fi cruels ? & faut-il que contre leur nature, ils ne feruent qu'a tyrannifer mon cceur ? Helas ! voftre derniere lettre le reduifit en vn eftrange etat : il eut des mouuemens fi fenfibles qu' il fit, ce femble, des efforts, pour fe feparer de moy, & pour vous aller trouuer : Ie fus fi accablee de toutes ces emotions violentes, que je demeuray plus de trois heures abandonnee de tous mes fens : je me 119 LETTRES TRADVITES premiere defendis de reuenir a vne vie que je dois lett re p er d re pour vous : puis que je ne puis la cdnferver pour vous, je reuis enfin, mal- gre moy la lumiere, je me flatois de fen- tir que je mourois d'amour ; & d'ailleurs j'eftois bien-aife de n'eftre plus expofee a voir mon cceur dechire' par la douleur de voftre abfence. Apres ces accidens, j'ay eu beaucoup de differetes indifpofitions : mais, puis-je jamais eftre fans maux, tant que je ne vous verray pas ? Ie les supporte cependant fans murmurer, puis qu'ils viennent de vous. Quoy? eft-ce la la recompefe, que vous me donnez, pour vous auoir (i tendrement ayme? Mais il n'importe, je fuis refolue a vous adorer toute ma vie, & a ne voir jamais personne ; & je vous affeure que vous ferez bien audi de n'aymer perfonne. Pourriez vous eftre content d'vne Paffion moins ardente que la miene? Vous trouuerez, peut-eftre, plus de beauts (vous m'auez pourtant dit autrefois, que j'eftois affez belle) mais vous ne trouuerez jamais tant d'amour, & tout le refte n'eft rien. Ne rempliffez plus vos lettres de chofes inutiles, & ne m'efcriuez plus de me fouuenir de vous ? Ie ne puis vous EN FRANCOIS oublier, & je n'oublie pas auffi, que vous premiere m'auez fait efperer, que vous viedriez LETTRE passer quelque temps auec moy. Helas ! pourquoy n'y voulez vous pas paffer toute voftre vie? S'il m'eftoit poffible de fortir de ce malheureux Cloiftre, je n'attendrois pas en Portugal l'effet de vos promeffes : j'irois, fans garder aucune mefure, vous chercher, vous fuiure, & vous aymer par tout le monde : je n'ofe me flater que cela puiffe eftre, je ne veux point nourrir vne efperance, qui me donneroit affeur£ment quelque plaifir, & je ne veux plus eftre fenfible qu'aux douleurs. I'auoue cependant que l'occa- fion, que mon frere m'a donn£e de vous efcrire, a furpris en moy quelques mouue- mens de joye, & qu'elle a fufpendu pour vn moment le defefpoir, oil je fuis. Ie vous coniure de me dire, pourquoy vous vous eftes attache a m'enchanter, comme vous auez fait, puifque vous fcauiez bien que vous deuiez m'abandonner ? Et pourquoy auez vous eft£ fi acharne' a me rendre malheureufe ? que ne me laiffiez vous en repos dans mon Cloiftre? vous auois-ie fait quelque iniure? Mais ie vous demande pardon : ie ne vous im- LETTRES TRADVITES premiere pute rien : ie ne fuis pas en eftat de lett re p en f er a ma vengeance, & i'accufe feule- ment la rigueur de mon Deftin. II me femble quen nous feparant, il nous a fait tout le mal, que nous pouuids craindre ; il ne fcauroit feparer nos cceurs ; l'amour qui eft plus puiffant que luy, les a vnis pour toute noflre vie. Si vous prenez quelque intereft a la mienne, efcriuez moy fouuent. Ie merite bien que vous preniez quelque foin de m'apprendre l'eftat de voftre cceur, & de voftre for- tune, fur tout venez, me voir. Adieu, ie ne puis quitter ce papier, il tombera entre vos mains, ie voudrois bien auoir le mefrne bon-heur : Helas ! infenfee que ie fuis, ie m'appercois bien que cela n'eft pas poffible. Adieu, ie n'en puis plus. Adieu, aymez moy toujours ; & faites moy fouffrir encore plus de maux. SECONDE LETTRE L me femble que je fais le plus grad tort du monde aux fentimes de mon coeur, de tafcher de vous les faire connoiftre en les ecriuant : que jc ierois heureufe, fi vous en pouuiez bie iuger par la violence des voftres ! mais ie ne dois pas m'en rapporter a vous, & ie ne puis m'empefcher de vous dire, bien moins vivement, que je ne le fens, que vous ne devriez pas me mal- traitter, comme vous faites, par vn oubly, qui me met au defefpoir, & qui eft mefme honteux pour vous ; il eft bien iuste au moins, que vous fouffriez que ie me plaigne des malheurs, que i'avois bien preveus, quand ie vous vis resolu de me quitter ie connois bien que ie me fuis abufee lorfque i'ay penfe, que vous auriez 123 LETTRES TRADVITES seconde vn procede de meilleure foy, qu'on n'a lettr.e accouftume d'auoir, parce que l'excez de mon amour me mettoit, ce femble, au deffus de toutes fortes de foupcons, & qu'il meritoit plus de fidelity qu'on n'en trouue d'ordinaire : mais la difpofitio, que vous auez a me trahir, l'emporte enfin fur la juftice, que vous deuez a tout ce que i'ay fait pour vous, ie ne laifferois pas d'eftre bien malheureufe, fi vous ne m'aymiez, que parce que ie vous ayme, & ie voudrois tout deuoir a voftre feule inclination mais ie fuis fi eloignee d'eftre en cet eftat, que ie n'ay pas receu vne feule lettre de vous depuis fix mois : j'attribue tout ce mal-heur a. l'aueugle- ment, auec lequel ie me fuis abandonnee a m'attacher a vous : ne deuois-je pas preuoir que mes plaifirs finiroient pliltoft que mon amour? pouuois-ie efperer, que vous demeureriez toute voftre vie en Portugal, & que vous renonceriez a voftre fortune & a voftre Pays, pour ne penfer qu' a moy? mes douleurs ne peuuent receuoir aucun foulagement, & le fouuenir de mes plaifirs me comble de defefpoir : Quoy ! tous mes defirs feront done inut- iles, & ie ne vous verray Jamais en ma 124 EN FRANCOIS chambre avec toute l'ardeur, & tout seconde l'emportement, que vous me faifiez voir ? LETTRE mais helas ! je m'abufe, & je ne connois que trop, que tous les mouuemens, qui occupoient ma tefte, & mon cceur, n'eftoient excitez en vous, que par quel- ques plaifirs, & qu'ils finiffoient aufli- tost qu'eux ; il falloit que dans ces momens trop heureux j'appellaffe ma raifon a mon fecours pour moderer I'excez funefte de mes delices, & pour m'annoncer tout ce que ie fouffre pre- fentement : mais ie me donnois toute a vous, & ie n'eftois pas en eftat de penser a ce qui eut pu empoifonner ma ioye, & m'empefcher de ioiiyr pleinement des temoignages ardens de voftre paffion ; ie m'apperceuois trop agreablement que i'eftois auec vous pour penfer que vous feriez vn iour eloigne de moy: ie me fouuiens pourtant de vous auoir dit quel- quefois que vous me rendriez malheur- euse: mais ces frayeurs eftoient bien-toft diffipees, & ie prenois plaifir, a vous les facrifier, & a m'abandonner a l'enchante- ment, & a la mauuaise foy de vos protefta- tions : ie voy bien le remede a tous mes maux, & i'en ferois bien-toft deliuree fi ie 125 LETTRES TRADVITES SECONDE LETTRE Deuxpetits laquais Portugais. ne vous aymois plus : mais, helas ! quel remede ; non i'ayme mieux fouffrir encore dauantage, que vous oublier. Helas ! cela depend il de moy ? Ie ne puis me reprocher d'auoir fouhait£ vn feul moment de ne vous plus aymer : vous eftes plus a plaindre ; que je ne fuis, & il vaut mieux fouffrir tout ce que je fouffre, que de iotiir des plaifirs lan- guifans, que vous donnent vos Mai- treffes de France : ie n'enuie point voftre indifference, & vous me faites pitie : Ie vous defie de m'oublier entierement : Ie me flatte de vous auoir mis en eftat de n'auoir fans moy, que des plaifirs impar- faits, & ie fuis plus heureufe que vous, puifque ie fuis plus occupee. L'on m'a fait depuis peu Portiere en ce Conuent : tous ceux qui me parlent, croyent que ie fois fole, ie ne fcay ce que ie leur repons : Et il faut que les Religieufes foyent auffi infenfees que moy, pour m'auoir cm capable de quelque foin. Ah ! i'enuie le bon-heur d'Emanuel, & de Francifque ; pourquoy ne fuis-je pas inceffamment auec vous, comme eux ? ie vous aurois fuiuy, & ie vous aurois affeurement feruy de meilleur 126 EN FRANCOIS coeur, ie ne fouhaite rien en ce mode, seconde que vous voir ; au moins fouuenez vous lettre de moy? ie me contente de vostre fouuenir: mais ie n'ofe m'en affeurer; ie ne bornois pas mes efperances a voftre fouuenir, quad ie vous voyois tous les iours : mais vous m'auez bien apris, qu'il faut que ie me foumette a tout ce que vous voudrez : cependat ie ne me repes point de vous auoir adore, ie fuis bien- aife, que vous m'ayez feduite : voftre abfence rigoureufe, & peut-eftre eternelle, ne diminue en rien l'emportement de mon amour : ie veux que tout le mond le fcache, ie n'en fais point vn myftere, & ie fuis rauie d'auoir fait tout ce que i'ay fait pour vous contre toute forte de bien-feance : ie ne mets plus mon hon- neur, & ma religion qu'a vous aymer eperduement toute ma vie, puifque i'ay commence a vous aymer : ie ne vous dis point toutes ces chofes, pour vous obliger a m'efcrire. Ah ! ne vous contraignez point ; ie ne veux de vous, que ce qui viendra de voftre mouuement, & ie refufe tous les temoignages de voftre amour dont vous pourriez vous empefcher : j'auray du plaifir a vous excufer, parce 127 LETTRES TRADVITES seconde que vous aurez, peut-eftre, du plaifir a lettre ne p as prendre la peine de m'ecrire : & ie fens vne profonde difpofition a vous pardonner toutes vos fautes. Vn Officier Francois a eu la charite* de me parler ce matin plus de trois heures de vous, il m'a dit que la paix de France, eftoit faite : fi cela eft, ne pourriez vous pas me venir voir, & m'emmener en Frace ? Mais ie ne le merite pas, faites tout ce qu'il vous plaira, mon amour ne depend plus de la maniere, dont vous me traiterez ; depuis que vous eftes party, je n'ay pas eu vn feul moment de fante, & je n'ay aucun plaifir qu'en nomment voftre no mille fois le iour ; quelques Religieufes, qui fcauent l'eftat deplorable, ou vous m'auez plongee, me parlent de vous fort fouuent : je sors le moins qu'il m'eft poffible de ma chambre, ou vous eftes venu tant de fois, & ie regarde fans ceffe votre portrait, qui m'eft mille fois plus cher que ma vie, il me donne quelque plaifir : mais il me donne auffi bien de la douleur, lors que ie penfe que ie ne vous reuerray, peut- eftre jamais ; pourquoy faut-il qu'il foit poffible que ie ne vous verray, peut-eftre, 128 EN FRANCOIS iamais? M'auez vous pour toujours seconde abandonnee? Ie fuis au defefpoir, voftre LETTRE pauure Mariane n'en peut plus, elle s'euanoiiit en finiffant cette Lettre. Adieu, adieu, ayez piti6 de moy. 129 TROISIESME LETTRE V'eft-ce que je deuiendray, & qu'eft-ce que vous voulez que ie faffe ? Ie me trouue bien eloignee de tout ce que j'auoispreueu: I'efperoisque vous m'ecririez de tous les endroits, ou vous pafferiez, & que vos lettres feroient fort longues ; que vous fouftiedrez ma Paffion par l'efperance de vous reuoir, qu'vne entiere confiance en voftre fidelite me donneroit quelque forte de repos, & que ie demeurerois cependant dans vn eftat affez fupportable fans d'extremes douleurs : j'auois mefrne penfe a quelques foibles projets de faire tous les efforts dont ie ferois capable, pour me guerir, fi ie pouuois connoiftre bien certainement que vous m'euffiez tout a fait oubliee ; voftre eloignement, quelques mouuemens de deuotio ; la crainte de ruiner entiere- 130 LETTRES TRADVITES ment le refte de ma fante par tant de troisiesme veilles, & par tant d'inquietudes ; le LETTRE peu d'apparence de voftre retour : la froideur de voftre Paffion, & de vos derniers adieux ; voftre depart, fond£ fur d'affez mefchas pretextes, & mille autres raifons, qui ne font que trop bonnes, & que trop inutiles, fembloient me promettre vn fecours affez affeure, s'il me deuenoit neceffaire : n'ayant enfin a combatre que contre moy mefme, ie ne pouuois jamais me defier de toutes mes foibleffes, ny apprehender tout ce que ie fouffre aujourd'huy. Helas ! que ie fuis a plaindre, de ne partager pas mes dou- leurs auec vous, & d'eftre toute feule malheureufe : cette penfee me tue, & je meurs de frayeur, que vous n'ayez iamais efte extr£mement fenfible a tous nos plaifirs : Oiiy, ie connois prefentement la mauuaife foy de tous vos mouuemens : vous m'auez trahie toutes les fois, que vous m'auez dit, que vous eftiez rauy d'eftre feul auec moy ; ie ne dois qu'a mes importunitez vos empreffemens, & vos tranfports ; vous auiez fait de fens froid vn deffein de m'enflamer, vous n'auez regard^ ma Paffion que comme 131 LETTRES TRADVITES troisiesme vne vifloire, & voftre coeur n'en a l e t t r e j ama i s e ft e profondement touche, n'eftes vous pas bien malheureux, & n'auez vous pas bien peu de delicateffe, de n'auoir fceu profiter qu'en cette maniere de mes emportemens? Et comment eft- il poflible qu'auec tant d'amour ie n'aye pu vous rendre tout a fait heu- reux ? ie regrette pour l'amour de vous feulement les plaifirs infinis, que vous auez perdus: faut-il que vous n'ayez pas voulu en ioiiir ? Ah ! fi vous les cSnoiffiez, vous trouueriez fans doute qu'ils font plus fenfibles, que celuy de m'auoir abufee, & vous auriez efprouu6, qu'on eft beaucoup plus heureux, & qu'on fent quelque chofe de bien plus touchant, quand on ayme violamment, que lors' qu'on eft ayme. Ie ne fcay, ny ce que ie fuis, ny ce que ie fais, ny ce que ie defire : ie fuis defchiree par mille mouuemens contraires : Peut-on s'ima- giner vn eftat fi deplorable? Ie vous ayme eperduement, & ie vous mefnage affez pour n'ofer, peut-eftre, fouhaiter que vous foyez agite des mefmes tranfports : ie me tuerois, ou ie mourrois de douleur fans me tuer, fi j'eftois affeuree que vous 132 EN FRANCOIS n'auez jamais aucun repos, que voftre troisiesme vie n'eft que trouble, & qu'agitation. que let t re vous pleurez fans ceffe, & que tout vous eft odieux ; je ne puis fuffire a mes maux, comment pourrois-je fupporter la douleur, que me donneroient les voftres, qui me feroient mille fois plus fenfibles ? Cependant ie ne puis auffi me refoudre a defirer que vous ne penfiez point a moy ; & a vous parler fincerement, ie fuis ialoufe auec fureur de tout ce qui vous donne de la joye, & qui touche voftre cceur, & voftre gouft en France. Ie ne fcay pourquoy ie vous ecris, ie voy bien que vous aurez feulement pitie" de moy, & ie ne veux point de voftre piti6 ; j'ay bien du depit c5tre moy-mefme, quand ie fais reflexion fur tout ce que ie vous ay facrifie : j'ay perdu ma reputa- tion, je me fuis exposee a la fureur de mes parens, a la feverite des loix de ce Pais contre les Religieufes, & a voftre ingratitude, qui me paroift le plus grand de tous les malheurs : cepen- dant je fens bien que mes remors ne font pas veritables, que ie voudrois du meilleur de mon cceur, auoir couru pour l'amour de vous de plus grans dangers, i33 LETTRES TRADVITES troisiesme & que i'ay vn plaifir funeste d'auoir l e t t r e hazarde ma vie & mo honneur, tout ce que i'ay de plus precieux, ne devoit-il pas eftre en voftre difpofition ? Et ne dois-je pas eftre bien aife de l'auoir employe, comme i'ay fait : il me femble mefme que ie ne fuis gueres contente ny de mes douleurs, ny de l'excez de mon amour, quoi que ie ne puiffe, helas ! me flater affez pour etre contente de vous ; je vis, infidelle que ie suis, & ie fais autant de chofes pour conferver ma vie, que pour la perdre, Ah ! j'en meurs de honte : mon defefpoir n'eft done que dans mes Lettres? Si je vous aimois autant que ie vous I'ay dit mille fois, ne ferois-je pas morte, il y a long-temps ? Ie vous ay tromp£, e'eft a vous a vous plaindre de moy : Helas ! pourquoy ne vous 'en plaignez vous pas ? Ie vous ay veu partir, ie ne puis efperer de vous voir iamais de retour, & ie refpire cepen- dant : ie vous ay trahy, ie vous en demande pardon : mais ne me l'accordez pas ? Traittez moy feueremet ? Ne trouuez point que mes fentimens foient affez violens? Soyez plus difficile a conteter ? Mandez moy que vo' voulez i34 EN FRANCOIS que ie meure d'amour pour vous ? Et troisiesme ie vous conjure de me donner ce fecours, LETTRE afin que ie furmonte la foibleffe de mon fexe, & que ie finiffe toutes mes irrefolu- tions par vn veritable defefpoir ; vne fin tragique vo' obligeroit fans doute a penfer fouuent a moy, ma memoire vous feroit chere, & vous feriez, peut-eftre, fenfiblement touch6 d'vne mort extra- ordinaire, ne vaut-elle pas mieux que l'eftat, ou vous m'auez reduite ? Adieu, ie voudrois bien ne vous auoir iamais veu. Ah ! ie fens viuement la fauffete de ce fentiment, & ie connois dans le moment que ie vous ecris, que i'aime bien mieux eftre malheureufe en vo' aimant, que de ne vous auoir iamais veu ; je confens done fans murmure a ma mauuaife deftinee, puifque vous n'auez pas voulu la rendre meilleure. Adieu, promettez moy de me regretter tendrement, fi ie meurs de douleur, & qu'au moins la violence de ma Paffion vous donne du d£gouft & de l'eloigne- ment pour toutes chofes ; cette confola- tion me fuffira, & s'il faut que ie vous abandonne pour tofljours, ie voudrois bien ne vous laiffer pas a vne autre. i35 LETTRES TRADVITES troisiesme Ne feriez vous pas bien cruel de vous l e t t r e f eru j r (-j e mon defefpoir, pour vous rendre plus aimable, & pour faire voir, que vous auez donne la plus grande Paffion du monde ? Adieu encore vne fois, ie vous ecris des lettres trop longues, je n'ay pas affez d'egard pour vous, ie vous en demande pardon, & j'ofe efperer que vous aurez quelque indulgence pour vne pauure infenfee, qui ne l'eftoit pas, comme vous fcauez, auant qu'elle vous aimat. Adieu, il me femble que ie vous parle trop fouuent de l'eftat infuportable oil ie fuis : cependant ie vous remercie dans le fonds de mon cceur du defefpoir, que vous me caufez, & ie detefte la tranquillite, ou j'ay vefcu, auant que je vous connuffe. Adieu, ma Paffion augmente a chaque moment. Ah ! que j'ay de chofes a vous dire. 136 QVATRIESME LETTRE Oftre Lieutenant vient de me dire, qu'vne tempefte vous a oblige de relafcher au Royaume d'Algarve : je crains que vous n'ayez beau- coup fouffert fur la mer, & cette apprehen- fion m'a tellement occupee ; que je n'ay plus penfe a tous mes maux, eftes vous bien perfuade que voftre Lieutenant prenne plus de part que moy a tout ce qui vous arriue? Pourquoy en eft-il mieux in- form6, & enfin pourquoi ne m'auez vous point ecrit? Ie fuis bien malheureufe, fi vous n'en aues trouue aucune occafion depuis voftre depart, & ie la fuis bien dauantage, fi vous en aues trouu6 fans m'ecrire; voftre injuftice & voftre ingrati- tude font extremes : mais ie ferois au defefpoir, fi elles vous attiroient quelque «37 LETTRES TRADVITES qvatriesme malheur, & j'aime beaucoup mieux l e t t r e q U ' e ll es demeurent fans punition, que fi j'en eftois vangee : je refifte a toutes les apparences, qui me deuroient perfuader, que vous ne m'aimes gueres, & ie fens bien plus de difpofition a m'abandonner aueuglement a ma Paffion,qu'aux raifons, que vo' me donnez de me plaindre de voftre peu de foin : que vous m'auries epargne d'inquietudes, fi voftre procede euft efte auffi languiffant les premiers jours, que je vous vis, qu'il m'a paru depuis quelque temps ! mais qui n'auroit efte abufee, comme moy, par tant d'em- preffement, & a qui n'euffent-ils paru fmceres ? Qu'on a de peine a fe refoudre a foupconner longtemps la bonne foy de ceux qu'on aime ! ie voy bien que la moindre excufe vous fuffit, & fans que vous preniez le foin de m'en faire, l'amour que i'ay pour vous, vous fert fi fidelemet, que ie ne puis confentir a vo' trouuer coupable, que pour joiiir du fenfible plaifir de vous justifier moy-meme. Vous m'auez confommee par vos affiduitez, vous m'auez enflamee par vos tranfports, vo' m'auez charmee par vos complai- fances, vous m'auez affeuree par vos 138 EN FRANCOIS fermens, mon inclinatio violente m'a quatriesme feduite, & les fuites de ces commencemes lettre fi agreables, & fi heureux ne font que des larmes, que des foupirs, & qu'vne mort funefte, fans que ie puiffe y porter aucun remede. II eft vray que i'ay eu des plaifirs bien furprenans en vous aimant : mais ils me couftent d'eftranges douleurs, & tous les mouuemes, que vous me caufez, font extremes. Si i'auois refifte auec opiniatrete a voftre amour, fi je vous auois donn£ quelque fujet de chagrin, & de jaloufie pour vous enflamer dauantage, fi vous auiez remarque quelque mefnagement artificieux dans ma conduite, fi i'auois enfin voulu oppofer ma raifon a l'inclination natur- elle que j'ay pour vous, dont vo' me fiftes bien-toft apperceuoir (quoy que mes efforts euffent eft£ fans doute inutiles) vous pourriez me punir feuere- ment, & vous feruir de voftre pouuoir : mais vous me paruftes aimable, auant que vous m'euffiez dit,que vous m'aimiez, vous me timoignaftes vne grande Paffion, j'en fus rauie, & ie m'abandonnay a vous aimer ^perduement, vous n'efties point aueugl^, comme moy, pour-quoy au£s i39 LETTRES TRADVITES qvatriesme vo' done fouffert que ie deuinffe en l'eftat lett re ou j e me trouue? qu'eft-ce que vous vouliez faire de tous mes emportemens, qui ne pouuoient vous eftre que tres- importuns ? Vous fgauiez bien que vous ne feriez pas toujours en Portugal, & pourquoy m'y au<§s vous voulu choifir pour me rendre fi malheureufe, vous euffies trouue fans doute en ce Pais quelque femme qui euft efte plus belle, auec laquelle vous euffies eu autant de plaifir, puifque vous n'en cherchies que de groffiers, qui vo' eut fidelement aime auffi long-temps qu'elle vous eut veu, que le temps euft pu confoler de voftre abfence, & que vous auries pu quitter fans perfidie, & fans cruaute : ce procede eft bie plus d'vn Tyran, attache a perfe- cuter, que d'vn Amant, qui ne doit penfer qu'a plaire ; Helas ! Pourquoy exerces vous tant de rigueur fur vn cceur, qui eft a vous ? Ie voy bien que vous eftes auffi facile a vous laiffer perfuader contre moy, que ie l'ay efte a me laiffer per- suader en voftre faueur ; j'aurois refiste, fans auoir befoin de tout mon amour, & fans m'apperceuoir que j'euffe rien fait d'extraordinaire, a de plus grandes 140 EN FRANCOIS raifons, que ne peuuet eftre celles, qui vo' qvatriesme ont oblige a me quitter : elles m'euffent LETTRE paru bien foibles, & il n'y en a point, qui euffent jamais pu m'arracher d'aupres de vous : mais vous aues voulu profiter des pretextes, que vous aues trouues de retourner en Frace ; vn vaiffeau partoit, que ne le laiffies vous partir ? voftre famille vous auoit efcrit, ne fcaues vous pas toutes les perfecutions, que j'ay fouffertes de la mienne? Voftre honeur vous engageoit a m'abandonner, ay-je pris quelque foin du mien ? Vous efties oblige d'aller feruir voftre Roy, fi tout ce qu'on dit de luy, eft vray, il n'a aucun befoin de voftre fecours, & il vous auroit excufe ; j'euffe efte trop heureufe, fi nous auions paffe noftre vie enfemble : mais puifqu'il falloit qu'vne abfence cruelle nous feparat, il me femble que je dois eftre bien aife de n'auoir pas efte infidele, & ie ne voudrois pas pour toutes les chofes du mode, auoir commis vne a6lion fi noire : Quoy ! vous auez connu le fonds de mon coeur, & de ma tendreffe, & vous auez pu vous refoudre a me laiffer pour iamais, & a m'expofer aux frayeurs, que ie dois auoir, que vous ne vous fouue- 141 LETTRES TRADVITES qvatriesme nez plus de moy, que pour me facrifier a l e t t r e vne nouuelle Paffion ? Ie voy bien que ie vous aime, comme vne folle : cepen- dant ie ne me plains point de toute la violence des mouuemens de mo cceur, ie m'accouftume a fes perfecutions, & ie ne pourrois viure fans vn plaifir, que ie defcouure, & dont ie jouis en vous aimat au milieu de mille douleurs : mais ie fuis fans ceffe perfecutee auec un ex- treme defagreemet par la haine, & par le degouftt que j'ay pour toutes chofes ; ma famille, mes amis & ce Conuent me font infuportables ; tout ce que ie fuis obligee de voir, et tout ce qu'il faut que ie faffe de toute neceffite, m'eft odieux : je fuis fi jaloufe de ma Paffion, qu'il me femble que toutes mes actions, & que tous mes deuoirs vous regardent : Oiiy, ie fais quelque fcrupule, fi ie n'employe tous les momens de ma vie pour vous ; que ferois-je, helas ! fans tant de haine, & fans tant d'amour, qui rempliffent mon cceur? Pourrois-je furviure a ce qui m'occupe inceffam- ment, pour mener vne vie tranquille & languiffante ? Ce vuide & cette infenfi- bilite ne peuuent me conuenir. Tout le 142 EN FRANCOIS monde ('eft apperceu du changement qvatriesme entier de mon humeur, de mes manieres, LETTRE & de ma persone, ma Mere m'en a parle auec aigreur, & enfuite auec quelque bonte\ ie ne fgay ce que ie luy ay repondu, il me femble que ie luy ay tout auoiie. Les Religieufes les plus feueres ont pitie de l'eftat ou je fuis, il leur donne mefme quelque confideration, & quelque menagemet pour moy ; tout le monde eft touche de mon amour. & vo' demeurez dans vne profonde indi- ference, fans m'efcrire, que des lettres froides ; pleines de redites ; la moitie du papier n'eft pas remply, & il paroift groffierement que vous mourez d'enuie de les auoir acheuees. Dona Brites me perfecuta ces jours paffez pour me faire fortir de ma chambre, & croyant me diuertir, elle me mena promener fur le Balcon, d'ou Ton voit Mertola, je la fuiuis, & je fus auffi-toft frapee d'vn fouuenir cruel, qui me fit pleurer tout le refte du jour : elle me ramena, & ie me jettay fur mon lift, ou ie fis mille re- flexions fur le peu d'apparence, que ie voy de guerir jamais : ce qu'on fait pour me foulager, aigrit ma douleur, & ie H3 LETTRES TRADVITES qvatriesme trouue dans les remedes mefmes des l e t t r e ra if ons particulieres de m'afliger : je vous ay veu fouuent paffer en ce lieu auec vn air, qui me charmoit, & j'eftois fur ce Balcon le jour fatal, que ie co- mencay a fentir les premiers effets de ma Paffion malheureufe : il me fembla que vous vouliez me plaire, quoy que vous ne me connuffiez pas : je me per- fuaday que vous m'auiez remarquee entre toutes celles, qui eftoient auec moy, ie m'imaginay que lors que vous vous arreftiez, vous eftiez bien aife, que ie vous viffe mieux, & i'admiraffe voftre adreffe,& voftre bonne grace, lors que vous pouffiez votre cheual, i'eftois furprife de quelque frayeur, lors que vous le faifiez paffer dans vn endroit difficile : enfin je m'intereffois fecrettement a toutes vos actions, je fentois bien que vous ne m'eftiez point indifferent, & ie prenois pour moy tout ce que vous faifiez : vous ne connoiffez que trop les fuites de ces commencemens, & quoy que ie n'aye rien a mefnager, ie ne dois pas vous les efcrire, de crainte de vous rendre plus coupable, s'il eft poffible que vous ne l'eftes, & d'auoir a me reprocher tant 144 EN FRANCOIS d'efiforts inutiles pour vous obliger a qvatriesme m'eftre fidele, vous ne le ferez point : LETTRE Puis-je efperer de mes lettres & de mes reproches ce que mon amour & mon abandonnement n'ont pu fur voftre ingra- titude? Ie fuis trop affeuree de mon mal- heur, voftre procede injuste ne me laiffe pas la moindre raifon d'en douter, & ie dois tout apprehender, puisque vous m'auez abandonee. N'aurez vous de charmes que pour moy, & ne paroiftrez vous pas agreable a d'autres yeux ? Ie croy que ie ne feray pas fachee que les fentimens des autres iuftifient les miens en quelque fa^on, & ie voudrois que toutes les femmes de France vous trouuaffent aimable, qu'aucune ne vous aimat, & qu'aucune ne vous plut : ce projet eft ridicule, & impoffible : neantmoins j'ay affez eprouue" que vous n'eftes gueres capable d'vn grand enteftement, & que vous pourrez bien m'oublier fans aucun fecours, & fans y eftre contraint par vne nouuelle Paffion : peut-eftre, voudrois- je que vous euffiez quelque pretexte raifonnable? II eft vray, que ie ferois plus malheureufe, mais vous ne feriez pas fi coupable : je voy bien que vovs 145 K LETTRES TRADVITES qvatriesme demeurerez en Frace fans de grands l e t t r e plaifirs, auec vne entiere liberte ; la fatigue d'vn long voyage, quelque petite bien-feance, & la crainte de ne repondre pas a mes tranfports, vous retiennent : Ah ! ne m'apprehendez point ? Ie me contenteray de vous voir de temps en temps, & de fcauoir feulement que no' fommes en mefme lieu : mais ie me flatte, peut-eftre, & vous ferez plus touche de la rigueur & de la feuerite d'vne autre, que vous ne l'auez efte de mes faueurs ; eft- il poffible que vous ferez enflamme par de mauuais traittemens? Mais auant que de vous engager dans vne grande Paffion, pen fez bien a l'excez de mes douleurs, a l'incertitude de mes projets, a la diuenit6 de mes mouuemens, a l'extrauagance de mes Lettres, a mes confiances, a mes defefpoirs, a mes fouhaits, a ma jaloufie ? Ah ! vous allez vous rendre malheureux ; je vous conjure de profiter de l'eftat oil ie fuis, & qu'au moins ce que ie fouffre pour vous, ne vous foit pas inutile ? Vous me fites, il y a cinq ou fix mois vne fafcheufe confidece, & vo' m'auouates de trop bonne foy, que vous auiez aim6 vne 146 EN FRANCOIS Dame en voftre Pa'fs : fi elle vous em- qvatriesmf. pefche de reuenir, madez-le moy fans lettre management? afin que ie ne languiffe plus ? quelque refte d'efperance me fouftiet encore, & ie feray bien aife (fi elle ne doit auoir aucune fuite) de la perdre tout a fait, & de me perdre moy- mefme ; enuoyez moy fon portrait auec quelqu'vne de fes Lettres ? Et efcriuez moy tout ce qu'elle vous dit ? Yy trou- uerois, peut-eftre, des raifons de me confoler, ou de m'affliger dauantage, ie ne puis demeurer plus long-temps das l'eftat ou ie fuis, & il n'y a point de chagement, qui ne me foit fauorable : Ie voudrois auffi auoir le portrait de voftre frere & de voftre Belle-fceur : tout ce qui vous eft quelque chofe, m'eft fort cher, & ie fuis entierement deuoiiee a ce qui vous touche : je ne me fuis laiffe aucune difpofition de moy-mefme ; II y a des momens, oil il me femble que j'aurois affez de soumiffion pour feruir celle, que vous aimez ; vos mauuais traittemes, & vos mepris m'ont tellement abatue, que ie n'ofe quelque fois penfer feulement, qu'il me femble que ie pourrois eftre jaloufe fans vous deplaire, & que i47 LETTRES TRADVITES qvatriesme ie croy auoir le plus grand tort du l e t t r e monc i e de vous faire des reproches : je fuis fouuent conuaincue, que ie ne dois point vous faire voir auec fureur, comme ie fais, des fentimens, que vo' defauoiiez. II y a long-temps qu'vn Officier attend voftre Lettre, i'auois refolu de l'efcrire d'vne maniere a vo' la faire receuoir fans degouft : mais elle eft trop extraua- gante, il faut la finir : Helas ! il n'eft pas en mon pouuoir de m'y refoudre, il me femble que je vous parle, quand ie vous efcris, & que vous m'eftes vn peu plus prefent ; La premiere ne fera pas fi longue, ny fi importune, vous pourrez l'ouurir & la lire fur l'affeurance, que ie vous donne, il eft vray que ie ne dois point vous parler d'vne paffion, qui vous deplaift, & ie ne vous en parleray plus. II y aura vn an dans peu de jours que ie m'abandonnay toute a vous fans menage - ment : voftre Paffion me paroiffoit fort ardente, & fort fmcere, & ie n'euffe jamais penf£ que mes faueurs vo' euffent affez rebute, pour vous obliger a faire cinq cens lieues, & a vous expofer a des naufrages, pour vo' en eloigner ; per- fonne ne m'eftoit redeuable d'vn pareil 148 EN FRANCOIS traittement : vous pouuez vous fouuenir qvatriesme de ma pudeur, de ma confufion &de LETTRE mon defordre, mais vous ne vous fouue- nez pas de ce qui vous engageroit a m'aimer malgr£ vous. L'Officier, qui doit vous porter cette Lettre, me mande pour la quatrieme fois, qu'il veut partir, qu'il eft preffant, il abandonne fans doute quelque malheureufe en ce PaTs. Adieu, j'ay plus de peine a finir ma Lettre, que vo' n'en auez eu a me quitter, peut-eftre, pour toujours. Adieu, ie n'ofe vous donner mille noms de tendreffe, ny m'abandonner fans cotrainte a tous mes mouuemens : ie vo' aime mille fois plus que ma vie, & mille fois plus que ie ne penfe ; que vous m'eftes cher ! & que vous m'eftes cruel ! vous ne m'efcriuez point, ie n'ay pu m'empefcher de vo' dire encore cela ; je vay recommencer, & l'Officier partira ; qu'importe, qu'il parte, j'ecris plus pour moy, que pour vous, ie ne cherche qu'a me foulager, auffi bien la longueur de ma lettre vous fera peur, vous ne la lirez point qu'eft-ce que j'ay fait pour eftre fi malheureufe ? Et pourquoy auez vous empoifonn6 ma vie ? Que ne fuis-je nee en vn 149 LETTRES TRADVITES qvatriesme autre Pais. Adieu, pardonnez moy ? l e x t r e j e n ' f e plus vous p r i er de m'aimer ; voyez ou mon deftin m'a reduite ? Adieu. 'So CINQVIESME LETTRE E vous ecris pour la derniere fois,& j'efpere vous faire con- noitre par la difference des termes, & de la maniere de cette Lettre,que vous m'auez enfin perfuadee que vous ne m'aymiez plus, & qu'ainfi je ne dois plus vous aymer : Ie vous r'enuoyeray done par la premiere voye tout ce qui me refte encore de vous : Ne craignez pas que je vous ecriue ; je ne mettray pas mefme voftre nom audeffus du pacquet ; j'ay charge de tout ce detail Dona Brites, que j'auois accouf- tumee a des confidences bien eloignees de celle-cy ; fes foins me feront moins fufpects que les miens, elle prendra toutes les precautions neceffaires, afin de pouuoir m'affeurer que vous auez receu le portrait & les bracelets que vous 151 LETTRES TRADVITES cinqviesme m'auez donnes : Ie veux cependant que lett re vous fgachiez que je me fens, depuis quelques jours, en eftat de bruler, & de dechirer ces gages de voftre Amour, qui m'eftoient fi chers, mais ie vous ay fait voir tant de foibleffe, que vous n'auries jamais cru que j'euffe peu deuenir ca- pable d'vne telle extremite, je veux done joiiir de toute la peine que j'ay eue a m'en feparer, & vous donner au moins quel- que depit : Ie vous aduoiie a ma honte & a la voftre, que ie me fuis trouuee plus attachee que ie ne veux vous le dire, a ces bagatelles, & que i'ay fenty que j'auois vn nouueau befoin de toutes mes reflexions, pour me defaire de chacune en particulier, lors mefme que ie me flattois de n'eftre plus attachee a vous : Mais on vient about de tout ce qu'on veut, auec tant de raifons : Ie les ay mifes entre les mains de Dona Brites ; que cette refolution ma coufte de larmes ! Apres mille mouuements & milles in- certitudes que vous ne connoiffez pas, & dont ie ne vous rendray pas compte affurement. Ie l'ay coniuree de ne m'en parler iamais, de ne me les redre iamais, quand mefme ie les demanderois pour 152 EN FRANCOIS les reuoir encore vne fois, & de vous les cinqviesme renuoyer, enfin, fans m'en aduertir. LETTRE Ie n'ay bien connu l'exces de mon Amour que depuis que i'ay voulu faire to' mes efforts pour m'en guerir, & ie crains que ie n'euffe ofe l'entreprendre, fi i'euffe pu preuoir tant de difficulties & tant de violences. Ie fuis perfuadee que j'euffe fenti des mouuemens moins defagreables en vo' aymant tout ingrat qve vous eftes, qu'en vous quittant pour toufiours. I'ay eprouu6 que vous m'eftiez moins cher que ma paffion, & j'ay eu d'eftranges peines a la combattre, apres que vos procedes iniurieux m'ont rendu voftre perfonne odieufe. L'orgueil ordinaire de mon fexe ne m'a point ayde a prendre des refolutions contre vous ; Helas ! j'ay fouffert vos mepris, j'euffe fupport6 votre haifne & toute la jaloufie que m'euft done l'at- tachement que vous euffiez peu auoir pour vn autre, j'aurois eu, au moins quelque paffion a combattre, mais voftre indifference m'eft infupportable ; vos impertinantes proteftations d'amitie, & les ciuilites ridicules de voftre derniere lettre, m'ot fait voir que vous auiez receu i53 LETTRES TRADVITES cinqviesme toutes celles que je vous ay ecrites, lett re q U ' e iies n'ont caufe dans voflre cceur aucun mouuement, & que cependant vous les auez lues : Ingrat, je fuis encore affez folle pour eftre au defefpoir de ne pouuoir me flatter quelles ne foient pas venues jufques a. vous, & qu'on ne vous les aye pas rendues ; Ie detefte voftre bonne foy, vous auois-je prie de me mader finceremet la verite, que ne me laiffiez vous ma paffion ; vous n'auiez qu'a ne me point ecrire ; ie ne cherchois pas a eftre eclaircie ; ne fuis-je pas bien malheureufe de n'auoir pu vous obliger a predre quelque foin de me tromper? & de n'eftre plus en eftat de vous excufer. Scachez que je m'apercois que vous eftes indigne de tous mes fentimens, & que je connois toutes vous mechantes qualitez : Ce- pendat (fi tout ce que j'ay fait pour vous peut meriter que vous ayez quel- que petits egards pour les graces que ie vous demande) je vous coniure de ne m'ecrire plus, & de m'ayder a vous oublier entierement, fi vous me temoi- gniez foiblement, mefme, que vous auez eu quelque peine en lisat cette lettre, je '54 EN FRANCOIS vo' croirois peut-eftre ; & peut-eftre cinqviesme aufli voftre adueu & votre confentement LETTRE me donneroient du depit & de la colere, & tout cela pourroit m'enflamer : Ne vous meflez done point de ma con- duite, vous renuerferiez, fans doute, tous mes proiets, de quelque maniere que vous vouluffiez y entrer ; je ne veux point fcauoir le fucces de cette lettre ; ne troubles pas l'eftat que ie me prepare, il me femble que vous pouuez eftre con- tent des maux que vous me caufes (quelque deffein que vous euffiez fait de me rendre mal'heureufe : Ne m'oftez point de mon incertitude ; i'efpere que j'en feray, auec le temps, quelque chofe de tranquille : Ie vous promets de ne vous point hayr, ie me defie trop des fentimens violents, pour ofer l'entre- prendre. Ie fuis perfuadee que ie trou- uerois peut-eftre, en ce pays vn Amant plus fidele & mieux fait ; mais helas ! qui pourra me donner de l'amour? la paffion d'vn autre m'occupera-t'elle ? La mienne a t'elle pu quelque chofe fur vous ? N'eprouue-je pas qu'vn cceur attendry n'oublie jamais ce qui l'a fait apperceuoir des trafports qu'il ne con- i55 LETTRES TRADVITES cinqviesme noiffoit pas, & dont il eftoit capable ; l e t t r e q Ue tous fes mouuemens font attaches a l'ldole qu'il s'eft faite ; que fes premieres idees & que fes premieres bleffures ne peuuent eftre ny gueries ny effacees ; que toutes les paffions qui s'offrent a fon fecours & qui font des efforts pour le remplir & pour le contenter, luy pro- mettent vainement vne fenfibilite qu'il ne retrouue plus, que tous les plaifirs qu'il cherche fans aucune enuie de les rencontrer, ne feruent qu'a luy faire bien connoitre que rien ne luy eft fi cher, que le fouuenir de fes douleurs. Pourquoy m'auez vo' fait connoitre l'imperfectio & le defagreement d'vn attachement qui ne doit pas durer eternellement, & les mal-heurs qui fuiuent vn amour violent, lors qu'il n'eft pas reciproque, & pour- quoy vne inclinatio aueugle & vne cruelle deftinee s'attachent-elles, d'ordinaire, a nous determiner pour ceux qui feroient fenfibles pour quelque autre. Quand mefrne je pourrois efperer quelque amufemet dans vn nouuel en- gagement, & que je trouuerois quelqu'vn de bonne foy, j'ay tant de pitie de moy- mefme, que je ferois beaucoup de 156 EN FRANCOIS fcrupule de mettre le dernier homme du cinqviesme monde en l'eftat ou vous m'auez reduite, L E T T R E & quoy que je ne fois pas obligee a vous menager ; je ne pourrois me refoudre a exercer fur vous, vne vengeance fi cruelle, quand mefme elle dependeroit de moy, par vn changement que je ne preuois pas. Ie cherche dans ce moment a vous excufer, & je coprend bien qu'vne Re- ligieufe n'eft guere aymable d'ordinaire : Cependant il femble que fi on eftoit capable de raifons, dans les choix qu'on fait, on deueroit pluftoft s'attacher a elles qu'aux autres femmes, rien ne les em- pefche de penfer inceffament a leur paffion, elles ne font point ddtournees par mille chofes qui diffipent & qui occupent dans le monde, il me femble qu'il n'eft pas fort agreable de voir celles qu'on ayme, toufiours diftraites par mille bagatelles, & il faut auoir bien peu de delicateffe, pour fouffrir (fans en eftre au defefpoir) qu'elles ne parlent que d'affem- blees, d'aiuftements, & de promenades ; on eft fans ceffe expofe a de nouuelles jaloufies ; elles font obligees a des egards, a des complaifances, a des con- uerfations : qui peut f'affeurer qu'elles 157 LETTRES TRADVITES cinqviesme n'ont aucun plaifir dans toutes ces occa- lettre f lonS) g qu'elles fouffrent toufiours leurs marys auec vn extreme degouft, & fans aucun consentement ; Ah qu'elles doiuent fe d£fier d'vn Amant qui ne leur fait pas rendre vn compte bien exa6l la deffus, qui croit ais£ment & fans inquietude ce qu'elles luy difent, & qui les voit auec beaucoup de confiance & de tranquility fuietes a tous ces deuoirs : Mais je ne pretens pas vous prouuer par de bonnes raifons, que vous deuiez m'aymer ; ce font de tres-m^chans moyens, & j'en ay employe de beaucoup meilleurs qui ne m'ont pas reiiffi ; je connois trop bien mon deftin pour tacher a le furmonter ; je feray mal-heureufe toute ma vie ; ne l'6ftois-je pas en vous voyat tous les iours, je mourois de frayeur que vous ne me fuffiez pas fidel, je voulois vous voir a tous moments, & cela n'eftoit pas poffible, j'eftois troublee par le peril que vous couriez en entrant dans ce Conuent ; ie ne viuois pas lors que vous eftiez a l'arm£e, i'eftois au defefpoir de n'eftre pas plus belle & plus digne de vous, ie mur- murois contre la mediocrite de ma condi- tion, ie croyois fouuet que l'attachement 158 EN FRANCOIS que vous paroiffiez auoir pour moy, vous cinqviesme pourroit faire quelque tort, il me fern- lettre bloit que je ne vous aymois pas affez, j'apprehendois pour vous la colere de mes parents, & j'eftois enfin dans vn eftat auffi pitoyable qu'eft celuy ou je fuis prefentement ; fi vous m'euffiez donn£ quelques t£moignages de voftre paffion depuis que vo' n'eftes plus en Portugal ; j'aurois fait tous mes efforts pour en fortir, je me fuffe deguifee pour vo' aller trouuer ; helas ! qu'eft-ce que je fuffe deuenue, fi vous ne vous fuffiez plus fouciee de moy, apres que j'euffe eft6 en France ; quel defordre ? quel egarement? quel coble de honte pour ma famille, qui m'eft fort chere depuis que je ne vous ayme plus. Vous voyez bien que je connois de fens froid qu'il eftoit poffible que je fuffe encore plus a plaindre que ie ne fuis ; & ie vous parle, au moins, raifonnablement vne fois en ma vie ; que ma moderati5 vous plaira, & que vous ferez content de moy ; je ne veux point le fcauoir, je vous ay defia pri£ de ne m'£crire plus, & je vous en coniure encore. N'auez vous jamais fait quelque re- i59 LETTRES TRADVITES cinqviesme flexion fur la maniere dont vous m'auez lettre traitee, ne penfez vous iamais que vous m'auez plus d'obligation qu'a perfonne du monde ; je vous ay ayme comme vne incenfee ; que de mepris j'ay eu pour toutes chofes ! voftre proced£ n'eft point d'vn honnefte homme, il faut que vous ayez eu pour moy de l'auerfion naturelle, puis que vous ne m'auez pas aymee eperduement ; je me fuis laiffee enchanter par des qualitez tres-medio- cres, qu'auez vous fait qui deuft me plaire? quel facrifice m'auez vous fait? n'auez vous pas cherche mille autres plaifirs ? auez vous renonce au jeu, & a la chaffe? n'eftes vous pas parti le premier pour aller a l'Armee? n'en eftes- vous pas reuenu apres tous les autres, vous vous y eftes expofe folement, quoy que je vous euffe pri£ de vous menager pour l'amour de moy, vous n'auez point cherche les moyens de vous eftablir en Portugal ? ou vous eftiez eftime ; vne lettre de voftre frere vous en a fait partir, fans hefiter vn moment, & n'ay-je pas fceu que durant le voyage vous auez efte de la plus belle humeur du monde. II faut aduoiier que ie fuis obligee a 160 EN FRANCOIS vous hai'r mortellement ; ah ! ie me fuis cinqviesme attiree tous mes mal-heurs : je vous ay LETTRE d'abord accouftume a vne grande paffion, auec trop de bonne foy, & il faut de l'artifice pour fe faire aymer, il faut chercher auec quelque adreffe les moyens d'enflamer, & l'amour tout feul ne donne point de l'amour, vous vouliez que ie vous aymaffe, & comme vous auiez forme ce deffein, il n'y a rien que vous n'euffiez fait pour y paruenir, vous vous fuffiez mefme refolu a m'aymer, s'il eut efte neceffaire ; mais vous auez connu que vous pouuiez reuffir dans voftre entreprife fans paffion, & que vous n'en auiez aucun befoin, quelle perfidie? croyes vous auoir pu impunement me tromper, fi quelque hazard vous r'amenoit en ce pays, ie vous declare que ie vous liureray a la vengeance de mes parents. I'ay vecu long-temps dans vn abandonnement & dans vne idolatrie qui me donne de l'horreur, & mon remords me perfecute auec vne rigueur infupportable, ie fens viuement la honte des crimes que vo' m'auez fait com- mettre, & ie n'ay plus, helas ! la paffion qui m'empefchoit d'en connoiftre l'enor- 161 L LETTRES TRADVITES cinqviesme mite ; quand eft-ce que mon coeur ne .lett re f era pi us dechir6? quand eft-ce que ie feray deliuree de c£t embarras, cruel ! cependant je croy que ie ne vous fouhaitte point de mal, & que je me refouderois a confentir que vous fuffiez heureux; mais comet pounds vous l'eftre fi vous au£s le cceur bie fait ; je veux vous ecrire vne autre Lettre, pour vous faire voir que ie feray peut-eftre plus tranquille dans quelque teps; que j'auray de plaifir de pouuoir vous reprocher vos proced^s iniustes apr£s que ie n'en feray plus fi viuement touched, & lors que ie vous feray connoiftre que ie vous m£prife, que ie parle auec beaucoup d'indifference de voftre trahifon ; que j'ay oublie" tous mes plaifirs, & toutes mes douleurs, & que ie ne me fouuiens de vous que lors que ie veux m'en fouuenir. Ie demeure d'accord que vous auez de grands aduantages fur moy, & que vous m'auez donne" vne paffion qui ma fait perdre la raifon, mais vous deuez en tirer peu de vanite ; j'eftois jeune, j'efhois credule, on m'auoit enferm£e dans ce convet depuis mon enfance, ie n'auois veu que des gens defagreables, 162 EN FRANCOIS je n'auois jamais entendu les loiianges cinqviesme que vous me donniez inceffamment, il lettre me fembloit que je vous deuois les charmes, & la beaute que vo' me trouuiez, & dont vous me faifiez apper- ceuoir, j'entendois dire du bien de vous, tout le monde me parloit en voftre faueur, vous faifiez tout ce qu'il falloit pour me dormer de l'amour ; mais ie fuis, enfin, reuenue de cet enchantement, vous m'auez done de grands fecours, & j'aduoiie que j'en auois vn extreme befoin : En vous renuoyant vos lettres, je garderay foigneufement les deux der- nieres que vous m'auez ecrites, & ie les reliray encore plus fouuent que ie n'ay leu les premieres, afin de ne retomber plus dans mes foibleffes, Ah ! quelles me coutet cher, & que i'aurois eft6 heureufe, fi vous euffiez voulu fouffrir que ie vous euffe toujours aime. Ie connois bien que ie fuis encore vn peu trop occupee de mes reproches & de voftre infidelite ; mais fouuenez-vous que ie me fuis promife vn eftat plus paifible, & que j'y paruiendray, ou que ie predray contre moy quelque refolution extreme, que vous apprendrez fans beaucoup de 163 LETTRES TRADVITES cinqviesme deplaifir ; mais ie ne veux plus rien de lett re V ous, ie fuis vne folle de redire les mefmes chofes fi fouuent, il faut vous quitter & ne penfer plus a vous, ie croy mefme que je ne vous ecriray plus, fuis- je obligee de vous rendre vn compte exa6l de to' mes diuers mouuements. FIN. 164 EXTRAIT DV Priuilege du Roy "D AR Grace & Priuilege du Roy, donne" a Paris le 28. jour d'Oaobre 1668. Signe" par le Roy en fon Confeil, Margeret. II eft permis a Clavde Barbin, Marchand Libraire, de faire imprimer vn Liure intitule, Lettres Portugaifes, pendant le temps & efpace de cinq annees; Et deffenfes font faites a tous autres de l'lmprimer, fur peine de quinze cent liures d'amande, de tous depens, dommages & interefts, comme il eft plus amplement porte par lefdites Lettres de Priuilege. Acheue d , imprimer pour la premiere fois le 4. Ianuier, 1669. Les Exemplaires ont efte fournis. Registre fur le Liure de la Communaute des Marchands Libraires 6° Imprimeurs de cette Ville, fuiuant 6° conformement a PArreft de la Cour de Parlement du 8. Avril, 1653, aux charges 6° conditions portees par le prefent Priuilege. Fait a Paris le 17 Nou- embre 1668. Sovbron, Syndic. i6 S BIBLIOGRAPHY BIBLIOGRAPHY P HE following forms the English Biblio- -*- graphy of the Letters : — ' Five | love-letters | from a | Nun | to a | Cava- lier | .' Done out of French into English. (By) Ro L'Estrange. London 1678. pp. 111-117, i2mo. Here is the Preface : — To the Reader. | You are to take this Translation very kind- | ly, for the Authour | of it has ventur'd his I Reputation to oblige | you : Ventur'd it | (I say) even in the very Attempt of Co | pying so Nice an I Original. It is, in French, one of the | most Artificial Pieces | perhaps of the Kind, | that is any- where Ex- I tant : Beside the Pe- | culiar Graces, and I Felicities of that Lan- | guage ; in the matter | of an Amour, which | cannot be adopted | into any other I Tongue without Ex- | tream Force, and Affectation. There was | (it seems) an Intrigue | of Love carry'd on | betwixt a French offi- | cer, and a Nun in | Portugal. The Cava- | Her forsakes his Mis- I tress, and Returns | for France. The La- | dy expostulates the | Business in five Let- | ters of complaint, | which she sends af- | ter him ; and those I five Letters are here | at your Service. You | 169 THE LETTERS OF A BIBLIO- will find in them the | Lively Image of an | Extra- GRAPHY vagant, and an | Unfortunate Passion ; | and that a woman may | be Flesh and Bloud, in a | Cloyster, as well as in a | Palace. ' Five love-letters from a Nun to a Cavalier,' etc., etc., 1693. i6mo. (2nd edition.) ' Five love-letters from a Nun to a Cavalier,' etc. etc., 1701. i6mo. (3rd edition. ) * ' New Miscellaneous | Poems | with five | Love- Letters | from | a Nun to a Cavalier | . Done into Verse | .' The Second Edition. London 1713. With frontispiece. i6mo. The Letters occupy pp. 3-43 ; the date of the 1st edition is unknown. ' Letters | from a | Portuguese Nun | to | an Offi- cer I in the | French Army.' | Translated by | W. R. Bowles, Esqre. London, 1808. i2mo., with frontis- piece, pp. xvi-125. This includes the so-called Second Part of the Letters. 'Letters from a Portuguese Nun,' etc., etc., 1817. (2nd edition.) 'Letters from a Portuguese Nun,' etc., etc., 1828. (3rd edition.) 1 The Love Letters of a | Portuguese Nun | being the letters written by Marianna | Alcaforado to Noel Bouton de Cha-milly, Count of St. Leger (later | Marquis of Chamilly) in | the year 1668.' | Trans- lated by I R. H. I New York 1890. i2mo. 148 p. 170 PORTUGUESE NUN 'Five love-letters written by a Cavalier (the BIBLIO- Chevalier Del) in answer to the five love-letters GRAPHV written to him by a Nun.' London 1694. i2mo. * ' Seven | Portuguese Letters ; | being a I second part I to the | Five Love-Letters | from a | Nun | to a I Cavalier | .' London 1681. pp. iii-78. 8vo. * ' Seven | Love-Letters | from a | Nun | to a | Cavalier,' | etc., etc., 1693. Small 4to. (2nd edition.) N. B. — The translations marked with an asterisk are not mentioned by Senhor Cordeiro in his Bibliography. 171 APPENDIX APPENDIX URING the passage of the present work through the press, Mr. York Powell was fortunate enough to acquire by purchase in Oxford a book not mentioned in any bibliographical dictionary, nor possessed by any of the chief English libraries, containing a translation into verse of the five Letters of the Portuguese Nun. On account of the rarity of the book, of which this is probably a unique copy, as well as of the curious rendering of the famous Letters, it seemed advisable to transcribe here all that concerned the love-lorn Marianna, which has therefore been done. It should perhaps be mentioned that every inquiry as to the author of this translation and the date of its first edition has proved fruitless. The following is a description of the book in question — 175 New Mifcellaneous POEMS With Five Love-Letters FROM A $>tm to a Cavalier- Done into Verfe. Nil dulcius eft ijloc amare aut amari, prceter hoc ipfum amare £ff amari. C6e §>econU (EDition. London, Printed for W. Mears, at the Lamb without Temple-bar. 1713. LETTERS OF A NUN One vol. in i6mo. appendix First comes the Preface, then a Table of Contents, and the title-page to the Letters, which runs, Five | Love -Letters | From a | Nun | to | A Cavalier | Done into Verse | London | Printed in the Year 17 13. | The Letters take up pp. 3-43, after which is another title-page to the Miscellaneous Poems, then the Poems themselves follow, occupying pp. 47-129. The frontispiece to the volume shows the Nun seated at a table in the act of writing ; upon the table is a lighted candle, rosary and ink-pot, while the portrait of her lover hangs over some book-shelves. The engraving is unsigned, and seems to be different from any of those hitherto recorded. 177 LOVE-LETTERS FROM A NUN TO A CAVALIER LETTER I H ! the unhappy Joys which Love contains, How short the Pleasures, and how long the Pains ! Curs'd be the treach'rous Hopes that drew me on, And made me fondly to my Ruin run. What I the Blessing of my Life design'd Is now become the Torment of my Mind : A Torment ! which is equally as great As is his Absence that doth it create. Heav'ns ! must this Absence then for ever last, This Absence ! which does all my comfort blast ? Must I no more enjoy the pleasing Light That charm'd my Heart with Rapture and Delight ? Must I no more those lovely Eyes behold 178 LETTERS OF A NUN Which have so oft their Master's Passion told ? APPENDIX Nor was I wanting in the same intent ; "^ Letter I A thousand times my Eyes in Flashes sent The Dictates of my Heart, and shew'd you what j they meant. J But now they must be other ways employ'd : When I reflect on what I have enjoy 'd Tears of their own accord in Streams will flow, To think I 'm scorned, and left by faithless you. And yet my Passion does so far exceed ~| A vulgar Flame, that I with Pleasure bleed, And doat upon the Torments which from you pro- j ceed. J From the first moment I beheld your Face, To you I dedicated all my Days : Your Eyes at first an easie Conquest gain'd, Which since they have but too too well maintain'd. Your Name each Hour I constantly repeat ; But what 's (alas !) the Comfort which I meet ? Nought but my wretched Fate's too true Advice, Which whispers to me in such Words as these : Ah ! Mariane, why do'st hope in vain To see thy lovely Fugitive again ? The dear, false, cruel Man 's for ever gone, And thou, unhappy thou ! art left alone : Gone is the Tyrant, slighting all thy Charms, And longs to languish in another's Arms. In vain you weep, in vain you sigh and mourn, For he will never, never more return. To fly from thee, he left his Downy Ease, And scorn'd the Dangers of the raging Seas. 179 T H; E LETTERS OF A APPENDIX In France, dissolv'd in Pleasures, now he lies, Letter I And for new Beauties every moment dies ; The Joys which once he with such Ardour sought \ Are now (alas !) all vanish'd and forgot ; r Nor art Thou ever present in his Thought. / But hold ! my Passion hurries me too far, And makes me think you falser than you are. You 've, sure, more Honour than to use me so For what I have endur'd and done for you, Forget me ! 'tis impossible you shou'd ; Nay, I believe yot cannot if you wou'd. My Case is bad enough without that Curse, I need not find fresh Plagues to make it worse. And when I think with how much care you strove To let me see at first, your dawning Love ; When I reflect upon the Bliss it brought, The Pleasure is too great to be forgot ; And I shou'd think I were ungrateful grown, Should I not love you, tho' by you undone. Yet oh ! the Mem'ry of my former Joys, So hard 's my Fate, my present Ease destroys. 'Tis strange that what gave such delight before, Shou'd serve to make me now lament the more. A Thousand Passions, not to be exprest, Your Letter rais'd in my distracted Breast ; My vanquish'd Senses from their Office fled, ^ A long time stupid on the ground I laid, f And since I 've often wish'd I had been dead. J But I unhappily reviv'd again To suffer greater Torment, greater Pain ; 180 PORTUGUESE NUN A Thousand Evils I each Day endure, APPENDIX Which nothing but the Sight of you can cure ; Letter I Yet I submit, without repining too, Because the ills I bear proceed from you. And 'tis because you know the Pow'r you have, You use me thus, and make me such a Slave. Oh ! give me leave to speak Is this the Recompense you think is due, To those that sacrifice their Lives for you ? Yet use me as you will, to my last Breath, Tho' loath'd by you, I '11 keep my plighted Faith. And did you understand what Pleasure lies In being constant, you wou'd Change despise. You '11 never meet with one will prove so kind, Tho' in another you more Beauty find. Yet I can tell the time, tho' now 'tis gone, ( Poor as it is) when mine has pleas'd alone. You need not bid me keep you in my Mind, I 'm too much of myself to that inclin'd. I can't forget you, nor those Hopes you give Of your return, in Portugal to live. Cou'd I from this unhappy Cloister break, You thro' the Perils of the World I 'd seek. I 'd follow where you went, without Regret, And constantly upon your Fortune wait, Think not I keep these Hopes to ease my Grief, Or bring to my despairing Soul Relief ; No, I 'm too well acquainted with my Fate, And know I 'm born to be unfortunate. iSi LETTERS OF A NUN APPENDIX Yet while I write, some glimmering Hopes appear ^ Letter I That yield a respite to my wild Despair, V And some small Ease afford amidst my Care. J Tell me, what made you press my Ruin so? Why with your Craft a harmless Maid undo ? Why strove t* ensnare my too-unguarded Heart, When you were sure ere long you shou'd depart ? What Injury had I e'er done to you, To make you with such Wiles, my Innocence pursue ? But pardon me, (thou Charmer of my Soul ! ) For I will charge you with no crime at all. Let me hear oft from you, where-e'er you are, For I methinks shou'd in your Fortune share, But above all, I beg you, by the Love Which once you swore shou'd ever constant prove ; By all those Vows, which you so often made When on my panting Bosom you have laid, Let me no longer this sad Absence mourn, But bless me, bless me with your kind Return. Adieu — and yet so tender am I grown, I know not how to end these Lines so soon ; Oh ! that I could but in their Room convey Myself, thou lovely faithless Man, to Thee ! Fool that I am, I quite distracted grow, "j And talk of things impossible to do ; r Adieu, — for I can say no more — Adieu. — J Love me for ever, and I '11 bear my Fate, (Hard as it is) without the least Regret. 182 LETTER II From a Nun to a Cavalier LAS ! it is impossible to tell Th' afflicting Pains that injur'd Lovers feel. And if my Flame, by what I write, you rate, Then have I made my self unfor- tunate. Blest should I be, cou'd your own Breast define The raging Passion that I feel in mine ; But I must ne'er enjoy that happy Fate : And if I 'm always doom'd to bear your Hate, 'Tis base to use me at this barb'rous rate. Oh ! it distracts my Soul when I reflect Upon my slighted Charms, and your Neglect : And 'twill t' your Honour as destructive be, As 'tis conducive to my Misery. It now is come to pass what then I fear'd, When you to leave me in such haste prepar'd. Fool as I was, to think your Flame was true, True as th' Excessive Love I bear to you ! T' encrease my Torments all your Acts incline ; To make me wretched is your whole Design. 183 THE LETTERS OF A APPENDIX Nor wou'd your Passion any Ease allow, etter II If only grounded on my Love for you : But I 'm so far ev'n from that poor Pretence, Six Months are past since you departed hence ; Six tedious Melancholy Months are gone, • And I 've not been so much as thought upon : Blind with the fondness of my own Desire, Else might have found my Joys wou'd soon expire. How cou'd I think that you 'd contented be To leave your Friends and Native Place for me ? Alas ! Remembrance of my former Joys Adds to the Number of my Miseries. Will all my flatt'ring Hopes then prove in vain ? Must I ne'er Live to see you here again ? Why may not I once more behold your Charms, Once more enfold you in my longing Arms ? Why may not I, as heretofore, receive Those sweet transporting Joys which none but you can give ? I find the Flame that set my Soul on Fire In you was nothing but a loose Desire. I should have reason'd ere it was too late, And so prevented my approaching Fate : My busie Thoughts were all on you bestow'd, I for my own repose not one allow'd : So pleas'd was I, whilst in your Lovely Arms, I thought myself secure from future Harms : But yet you may remember, oft I 've said, You 'd be the Ruin of a harmless Maid ; But those were Notions that abortive dy'd, And I upon your flatt'ring Oaths rely'd. 184 PORTUGUESE NUN Cou'd I cease loving you, I shou'd have Ease, APPENDIX But that 's a Cure far worse than the Disease ; L e t ter II And 'tis (alas) impossible, I find, To raze your Image from my tortur'd Mind ; And it 's a thing which I did ne'er design, For your Condition is far worse than mine;' You 'd better share what my poor soul endures, Than th' empty Joys you find in new Amours. So far am I from envying your Fate, I rather pity your unhappy State. I all your false dissembling Arts defie : I know I 'm rooted in your Memory, And am perhaps the happiest of the Two, In that I now am more employ'd than you. They 've made me Keeper of the Convent Door, Which is a Place I ne'er supply'd before ; It is an Office I ne'er thought t' have had ; All who discourse me think that I am mad. Our Convent too must be as mad as I, Or they might have perceiv'd my Incapacity. Oh ! how I wish to be as blest as they Who, as your Servants, your Commands obey. I shou'd be Proud, like one of them, to wait On you, tho' 'twere ev'n in the meanest State. My Love for you I don't at all repent ; That you 've seduced me, I am well content. Your Rig'rous Absence, tho' 'twill fatal prove, Yet lessens not the Vigour of my Love. My Passion I to all the World proclaim, And make no Secret of my raging Flame. 185 THE LETTERS OF A APPENDIX Some Things I 've done irregular, 'tis true, Letter II And glory'd in them, 'cause they were for you ; My Fame, my Honour, and Religion, are All made subservient to the Love I bear. Whilst I am writing, I have no intent That you shou'd Answer what I now have sent : Force not your self, I '11 not receive a Word You send, that comes not of its own accord. If not by writing you do Ease receive, So 't too to me shall Satisfaction give, To Pardon all your Faults I 'm much inclin'd, And shall be pleas'd to prove you 're not unkind. I 'm told that France has made a Peace ; if so \ A Visit here then sure you might bestow, And take me with you wheresoe'er you go, / That must alone at your disposal be, I fear (alas) it is too good for me. Since you first left this sad forsaken Place, I 've not enjoy 'd a Moment's Health or Ease : The Accent of your Name my Cares abate, Which I a thousand times a Day repeat. Within our Convent some there are who know From whence the Source of all my Sorrows flow, Who strive to Ease me and Discourse of you. I 'm constant to my Chamber, which is dear To me, because you 've been so often there : Your Picture as unvaiuable I prize, And have it always fixt before my Eyes : 1 86 PORTUGUESE NUN The Counterfeit does Satisfaction give ; APPENDIX But when I think that I must never live Letter II To see the Bright, the Fair Original, Great are the Horrors, great the Pains I feel, Oh ! how I 'm wrack'd and torn with endless Pain To think I ne'er must see you here again ! But why shou'd it be possible to be That I your lovely Form no more must see ? For ever ! are you then for ever gone ? For ever must I make my fruitless Moan ? No, Mariane, thou wilt soon have Peace ; Kind Death approaches, he will give thee Ease. Ah me ! how fast my fainting Spirits fail ! — Farewel, Oh, pity me ! — Thou lovely Man, Farewel. 187 LETTER III From a Nun to a Cavalier HAT will become of miserable me ? What will th' Event of my Mis- fortunes be, How can I hold, now all my hopes retire ? On them I liv'd, and must with them expire. Where are the cordial Lines to heal my Pain, T' assure me I shall see you here again ? Where are the Letters that should bring Relief, Compose my Soul, and mitigate my Grief? Fool'd with vain Projects, I of late design'd To strive to calm and heal my tortur'd Mind : The slender Hopes I have of seeing you, Joyn'd with the Coldness of your last Adieu : Th' Improbability of your Return, The many tedious restless Nights I 've born, Your frivolous Excuses to be gone, Encourag'd my Design and urg'd me on ; Nor did I doubt Success till, ah ! too soon, I found I still must love, still doat and be undone. 1 88 LETTERS OF A NUN Wretch that I am ! compel'd alone to bear APPENDIX The heavy Burthen, which you ought to share. Letter III You 're the Offender, and I undergo The Punishment, which ought to fall on you. 'Tis plain, I never yet enjoy 'd your Love, Since all my Torments can't your Pity move, Feign'd were the Transports, false the Vows you made, And only us'd that I might be betray'd. Your whole Design was to ensnare my Heart Then cruelly to act a Tyrant's Part. T' abuse a Love like mine, is highly base, And cannot but redound to your Disgrace. Who would have thought, when of my love possest, 'Twas not enough to make you ever blest ? And 'tis for your own sake I 'm troubled most, When I but think upon the Toys you 've lost : Nay, did you judge aright, The difference soon by you perceiv'd would be, Betwixt abusing and obliging me ; Betwixt the Pleasures, which you might have prov'd, Of loving much, and being much belov'd. Such is the Force of my excessive woe, I 'm quite insensible of what I do ; Ten Thousand different Thoughts distract my Mind, My rigid Fate can't be by words defin'd ; To Death I love, yet cannot wish that you Should share the Miseries I undergo. To loath, t' have all things odious in your sight, Receive no Ease by Day, no Rest by Night : 189 THE LETTERS OF A APPENDIX Your Soul o'erloaded with continual Cares, Letter III Yo ur Eyes still flowing with a flood of Tears ; Did you but suffer this my grief for you, 'Twou'd quickly finish what my own can't do. Why do I write ? Shou'd I your Pity move, What good wou'd Pity do without your Love ? I scorn it ; and my self with equal Scorn I loath, when I reflect on what I 've born : My Friends I 've lost, and Reputation too, Have ran the hazard of our Laws for you : But what 's much worse, now I all this have done, False as you are, ev'n you 're ingrateful grown. Yet, oh ! I cannot, cannot yet repent, But rather am with all my Ills content : I cannot grieve at what I've done for you, But more for your dear sake wou'd undergo ; To you wou'd sacrifice my Life and Fame ; They 're yours, which you (and only you) can claim. In short, I 'm vex'd with every thing I do ; Nor can I think I 'm kindly us'd by you. False as I am, why don't I die with Shame, And so convince you of my raging Flame ? If I had lov'd so well as oft I 've said, Your Cruelty ere this had struck me dead. No, all this while, 'tis you've deluded been, And have the greatest Reason to complain. How could I see you go, and yet survive, out of Hopes of your Return and Live? I 've wrong'd you ; but I hope you will forgive. 190 PORTUGUESE NUN Yet grant it not, treat me severely still, APPENDIX Tell me, that I 've abus'd, and us'd you ill. Letter III Be harder still to please, encrease my Care. And end my Sufferings with a sure Despair. A Fate that 's Tragical would doubtless be The Way t' endear me to your Memory. Perhaps too you 'd be touch'd with such a Death, When you reflect how I 've resign 'd my Breath. To me I 'm sure, 'twou'd welcome be indeed, And far to be preferr'd before the Life I lead. Farewel, I wish your Eyes I 'd never seen, But ah ! my Heart, now contradicts my Pen. I find I 'd rather live involv'd in Harms Than once to wish I ne'er had known your Charms. And since you think not fit to mend my State, I '11 cheerfully (tho' hard) embrace my Fate. Adieu, — but Promise me when I am dead, Some pitying Tears you '11 o'er my Ashes shed. At least, let my too-sad Example prove The means to hinder any other Love. Twill yield some Ease, since I must lose your Charms, That you '11 not revel in another's Arms. Neither can you be so inhumane sure To make my Fate assist a new Amour. I fear my Lines are troublesome to you ; But you '11 forgive my foolery — adieu, Ah me ! methinks too often I repeat The Story of my too unhappy Fate ; Yet let me pay the Thanks to you I owe For all the Miseries I undergo. 191 LETTERS OF A NUN APPENDIX I hate the State in which I liv'd before Letter III "pjjg more my Cares encrease, I 'm pleas'd the more ; My Flame does greater every moment grow — And I have still — Ten Thousand Thousand Things to say to you. 192 LETTER IV From a Nun to a Cavalier ? t E Gods ! the Torments that from Love arise When the dear Object's absent from our Eyes ! I 'm told you 've been by raging Tempests toss'd, And forc'd to seek some Hospitable Coast, The Sea, that is the faithless Lover's Foe, I doubt will hardly e'er agree with you. And oh ! my Fears for th' Dangers you may meet, Make me my own Tormenting Pains forget. But is your Friend then more concern'd to know Than I, the Perils that you undergo ? If not, how comes it that you cou'd afford To write to him, whilst I have not a Word? Why do I talk ? what cou'd I else expect? But base Ingratitude, and cold Neglect ? From one who slighting all which once he swore Now sc:ks new Beauties on a Foreign Shore. Yet Heav'n avert its Wrath, nor may'st thou be EVr punished for thy Treachery to me, 193 N THE LETTERS OF A APPENDIX For faithless as you are, I 'm still inclin'd Letter IV Not to revenge, but rather to be kind. Tis plain, I 'm now the least of all your Care, Else you 'd have some regard to My Despair. But I, tho' wrack'd and torn with endless Pain, To one relentless as the grave complain. Yet I, fond I ! regardless of my Fame, Still Cherish, and Indulge this fatal Flame ; In vain my Reason offers to perswade, I scorn its Counsel, and contemn its Aid, I And find a Pleasure in my being mad. ) Had you but with this Coldness been possest, When first you rais'd those Tumults in my Breast : How many plagues had it from me detain'd ! How calm ! how easie had I now remain'd ! But where's the Woman wou'd not have believ'd Your Arts, and not have been (like me) deceiv'd ? Who cou'd your num'rous Oaths and Vows mistrust ? Who cou'd have thought that you shou'd prove un- just? The frequent Protestations that you made Wou'd have a Heart more firm than mine betray'd. 'Tis hard to think the Man whom once we love, Shou'd false, shou'd cruel, and ingrateful prove. Nay, I 'm so easie, I 've already made Excuses for you, and wou'd fain perswade My too too cred'lous Heart, that I am not betray'd. It was your Converse that at first refin'd My Ignorance, and till then, unpolish'd Mind. 194 PORTUGUESE NUN 'Twas from your Passion that I caught this Flame APPENDIX That is destructive to my Ease and Fame. Letter IV In vain 'gainst you I strove my Heart to arm, For you in ev'ry Action had a Charm. Your pleasing Humour, and the Oaths you swore, Made me believe you ever wou'd adore. But now (alas !) those grateful Thoughts are fled, And all my Hopes are with my Pleasures dead : I sigh and weep, a thousand Plagues possess My Soul, and give me not a moment's Ease. Great were my past Delights, I must confess, Excessive were the Joys, and vast the Bliss, I But then, oh, cruel Fate ! my Miseries were not j less. J Had I with Artifice e'er drawn you on, And what I most desir'd have seem'd to shun ; Had I the cunning Arts of Women us'd, And with feign'd Scorn your gen'rous Love abus'd ; Had I my growing Flame with Care supprest When first I felt it rising in my Breast ; Nay, when I found I lov'd, had I conceal'd My Passion, nor to you my Soul reveal'd, That for your Hate had been some small Pretence, Which you might now have urg'd in your defence ; But So far was I from using such Deceit, My Heart was never conscious of a Cheat : And I no sooner of your Passion knew, But frankly I return'd the like to you. Yet you, tho' I was fondly blind, cou'd see, Not ign'rant what the Consequence wou'd be. 195 THE LETTERS OF A APPENDIX Why with such Wiles then did you draw me on, Letter IV To leave me wretched, hopeless, and undone? You knew you shou'd not long continue here, And so did make me love but to despair. Why was I singl'd out alone to be Th' unhappy Object of your Cruelty ? Sure in this Country you might those have met Who were for your cross Purposes more fit ; Such, who by frequent Use had got the Pow'r To give their Hearts but for the present Hour ; Who of your Falshood never wou'd complain, Nor give themselves for you a moment's Pain. Is 't like a Lover then to use me so, Me, who 'd give up all I have for you ? Is it not rather like a Tyrant done, To ruine and destroy what is your own ? Had you but lov'd so truly as you said, You never from me in such haste had fled. But you ! how easie did you go away ! Nay, e'en seem'd pleas'd you cou'd no longer stay The few Excuses that you made to go, How slight they were ! but any thing wou'd do, To fly from one already nauseous grown, That lov'd you but too well, and trusted you too soon. ' My Friends (you cry) and Honour call me hence, ' And I must now be gone, to serve my Prince,' Why was not that nice Honour thought on then, When you deluded me to give up mine ? 196 PORTUGUESE NUN This was all Fiction, which you did devise APPENDIX To seem less guilty, and to blind my Eyes. Letter IV But, ah ! should I have too much Bliss enjoy'd, Might I with you have liv'd, with you have dy'd. My only Comfort is, I 've been to you, Spite of this Absence, constant, just, and true ; And can you then, who all my Thoughts controul, And know the earnest Secrets of my Soul, Can you be so regardless of my Pray'r, T' abandon me for ever to Despair ? You see I 'm mad, but yet I '11 not complain, -\ For I 'm so us'd to suffer your Disdain, v That now I find a Pleasure in my Pain. J But what 's my greatest Curse, those things no more Can please me now, which I have lik'd before. My Friends, Relations, and my Convent too, \ Are odious all, and all detested grow, J- Nay, ev'ry thing that not relates to you. J The flitting Hours of each succeeding Day, If not on you bestow'd, I think they 're thrown away. So great 's my Love, and with such pow'r does rule, It takes up the whole Business of my Soul. Why then t' expel this Passion shou'd I strive ? ~j For 'tis impossible I shou'd survive r This restless state, and with Indiff' rence live. So much I now am chang'd from what I was, That all observe and wonder what 's the Cause : My Mother chides, and urges me to tell What 'tis creates my Grief, and what I ail, 197 THE LETTERS OF A APPENDIX I hardly know what Answers I have made, Letter IV But I believe that I have all betray'd. The most severe and hardest Hearts relent, And are with Pity touch'd at my Complaint. To cruel Thee alone I sigh in vain, For all the World beside compassionates my Pain. 'Tis seldom that you write, and when you do, Your Lukewarmness each Line does plainly shew. 'Tis all but Repetition and Constraint, Dull is each Word, and each Expression faint. My kind Companion took me t' other day To the Balcon' that looks tow'rds Mertola ; The Sight so struck my Heart that, while I stood, Strait from my Eyes a briny Deluge flow'd. I then return' d, and strove to ease my Care, For all my Thoughts brought nothing but Despair. What others do to help me in my Grief, Adds only to my Pains, and brings me no Relief. From that Balcon' I often took delight To see you pass, and languish'd for the Sight. 'Twas there that fatal Day I chanc'd to be When first my Heart resign'd its Liberty : 'Twas there I drew the Poison from your Eyes, 'Twas there this raging Passion had its rise. Methought on me alone you seem'd to gaze, And careless look'd on every other Face ; And when you stopt, I fondly thought tome 'Twas meant that I your lovely Shape might see. 198 PORTUGUESE NUN I call to mind what Trembling seiz'd my Breast, APPENDIX Caus'd by a Leap given by your prancing Beast. Letter IV I near concern'd in all your Actions was, Flatter'd my self I was of some the cause. What follow'd, to relate I '11 now forbear, Lest you appear more cruel than you are ; And 'twill perhaps your Vanity encrease To find my Labours have no more Success. Fool as I am! to think to move you more By Threats than all my Love cou'd do before ! Too well (alas!) I know my Fate to come, And you're too too unjust to make me doubt my Doom. Since I am not allow'd your Love to share, All ills in Nature I have cause to fear. I shou'd be pleas'd did all our Sex admire Your Charms, if you did not return the Fire ; But there 's no fear, I by Experience know None ever long will be ador'd by you. You '11 easily enough forget my Charms Without the taking others to your Arms. By Heav'ns, I love, I doat to that degree, That since I find you 're ever lost to me, I wish you 'ad some Excuse to hide your Crime, That to the World you might less guilty seem. 'Tis true, 'twould make my Case but so much worse, But then 'twould advantageous be to yours. While you are free, in France, perhaps the fear Of not returning Love for Love may keep you there. 199 THE LETTERS OF A APPENDIX But mind not that, if you I sometimes see, ) Letter IV j s jj a n con t e nted with my Fortune be, [ To know one country holds my Love and me. ) Why with vain Hopes do I my Reason blind ? To one less doting you may prove more kind. Pride in another may a Conquest gain Greater than mine, with all the endless Pain Of constant Love, which I 've endur'd for you : But, oh ! from me take Warning what you do ; Retract your Heart ere yet (it) is too late, And think upon my too too wretched Fate, Reflect upon my endless Miseries, Despairs, Distractions, and my Jealousies ; Think on the Trust that I 've repos'd in you, Th' Extravagance which all my Letters shew. I well remember you in Earnest said, For one in France you once a Passion had. If she 's the Reason why you don't return, Be free, and let me thus no longer mourn ; For if my Hopes and Wishes are but vain, Tell me the Truth And end at once my wretched Life and Pain. To me her Picture and her Letters send, They '11 make me worse, or else my Fate amend ; Such is the State of miserable me, That any change would advantageous be Your Brother's and your Sister's send me too, All will be dear to me that's so to you. 200 PORTUGUESE NUN Methinks I cou'd submit to wait upon The happy Woman that your Heart has won, So humble am I made by all your Scorn, And the ill Usage that from you I 've born ; Scarce dare I say, I may myself allow To Jealous be, without displeasing you, Fain wou'd I think that I mistaken am, And fain perswaded be, that you ar blame. APPENDIX Letter IV not to The Person that 's to bear these Lines to you, Wants to be gone, and does impatient grow. I thought in this not to have giv'n Offence, But yet I 'm fall'n into Extravagance. And now methinks 'tis time that I had done, But I 've no Pow'r to end these Lines so soon, Nor force the pleasing Vision from my Sight ; My lovely Charmer 's present while I write. Twelve solitary Months are almost past Since in your trembling Arms you held me last, And fondly, to my Ruin, me embrac'd. Fierce, and true as mine, I thought your Flame, And, oh ! believ'd 'twould always be the same. Ne'er cou'd I think, that when you had enjoy'd My Favours, with them you 'd so soon be cloy'd Or that the Dangers of the Sea you 'd run, Scorn Rocks and Pirates too, that you might shu A Maid that lov'd like me, and is by you undone Reflect, thou faithless Man ! and call to mind What I 've endur'd for you, yet not repin'd, And tell me, can this Treatment then be kind ? 201 ■1 LETTERS OF A NUN APPENDIX The Officer now presses me to 've done Letter IV My Letter, or (he says) he must be gone ; He 's as impatient, as if he, like you, Were running from another Mistress too, Farewel — from me you parted with more ease (Perhaps for ever too) than I can do with these. My Mind a thousand pleasing Notions frames, And I cou'd call you many tender Names ; More dear than is my Life to me, are you ; And dearer far than I imagine too ; Sure never any yet so cruel prov'd, To be so barb'rous when so well belov'd. 'Tis hard to end, — See I begin anew, And th' Officer won't stay ; oh ! let him go : I write to entertain my self, not you ; And 'tis so long, you '11 never read it thro', Gods ! how have I deserv'd such Plagues as these ? And why was you pick'd out to spoil my Peace ? Oh ! why was I not born where I might pass In Innocence and Happiness my Days ? 'Tis too too much to bear, no Tongue can tell What I endure — Farewel — false Man ! — Farewel, See ! see ! how miserable I 'm made by you, When I dare not so much as ask your Love — adieu. LETTER V From a Nun to a Cavalier HOPE, by th' different Ayre of this, you '11 find That as I 've chang'd my Stile, I 've chang'd my Mind. The Substance of these Lines will let you know That you 're to take them for my last Adieu : For since your Love is past redemption gone, I 've no Pretence to justifie my own. All that I have of yours shall be convey'd To you, without so much as mention made Of your loath'd Name ; the Pacquet shall not bear Those Letters which I now detest to hear. In Donna Brites I can well confide, And whom, you know, I 've other ways imploy'd ; Your Picture she '11 (and all that 's yours) remove, Those once-endearing Pledges of your Love : A thousand Times I 've had a strong Desire To tear and throw them in the flaming Fire ; But I 'm a Fool too easie in my Pain, And such a generous Rage can't entertain. 203 THE LETTERS OF A APPENDIX Wou'd but the Story of my Cares create Letter V The like to you, methinks 'twou'd mine abate. Your Trifles, I must own, went near my Heart, With them I found it difficult to part. To what was yours I bore such mortal Love, Tho' you yourself did quite indiff rent prove, They've cost me many a Sigh, and many a Tear, And more Distraction than you e'er shall hear. My Friend, I say, now keeps them in her Pow'r, And I am never to behold 'em more ; She them will secretly to you convey, Without my Knowledge hasten them away : Tho' for a sight I on my Knees shou'd lie, The more I pray, she must the more deny. Ne'er had I known the Fury of my Flame Had I not try'd my Passion to reclaim ; Nay, to attempt a Cure I 'd ne'er begun, Cou'd I 've foreseen the Hazards I must run : For sure I am, I cou'd with greater Ease Support your Scorn, as rig'rous as it is, Rather than to retain the dreadful Thought, That Absence must for ever be my Lot. I shou'd be happy if I cou'd be Proud, And with the Nature of our Sex endow'd : Cou'd I despise you, and your Actions scorn, And be reveng'd for all the Ills I 've born. Fool as I am, to let my hopes rely On one who strives t' encrease my Misery ! You talk of Truth and Sincerity ; They both are what you never shew'd to me. 204 PORTUGUESE NUN To tell you what I 've born 'tis now too late, APPENDIX (For th' most obliged, and yet the most ingrate) Letter V Let it suffice I all your Falsehood know ; And all I ask for what I 've done for you, Is, Write no more, but some Invention find To tear your Image from my Tortur'd Mind. I too must now forbear to write to you, i Lest a Relapse shou'd by that means ensue ; r And the Event of this I 've no Desire to know. / Methinks you shou'd enough contented be With th' Ills you have already brought on me : Sure now you need no more molest my Ease, Or shake the Structure of my future Peace. Do you but leave me in Uncertainty, I hope in time I shall at quiet be : Tis not impossible but I may find A Love as true as you have been unkind. But what will Love that any Man shall shew Afford to me, without I love him too ? Why shou'd his Am'rous Passion more incline To move my Heart, than yours was mov'd by mine ? And I perceive by what I now endure, That the first Wounds of Love admits no Cure ; All sorts of Remedies then prove in vain, W are ne'er recover'd to our selves again ; So fixt, and so immutable is Fate, We 're doomed to Love, though w' are repaid with Hate. I' m sure I cou'd not so hard-hearted be, To treat another as you 've treated me : 205 THE LETTERS OF A APPENDIX Provided you was to another chang'd, Letter V Of you I cou'd not that way take revenge. I 'd fain perswade my self a Nun shou'd ne'er Confine the Passions of a Cavalier ; But if a man wou'd by his Reason move, A Mistress in a Convent is most fit for Love ; Those in the World do all their Thoughts employ On Balls, on Visits, and their Finery, Encrease their Husbands' Jealousies and Cares, Whilst those who favour us have no such Fears. Alas ! we 've nothing here to change Desire, But by Reflection daily fan the Fire. I wou'd not have you think that I maintain These Arguments, in hopes I may regain Your Love ; too well I know my Destiny ; I always was, and still must wretched be. When you was here I did no Rest enjoy : 'i Present, for fear of infidelity ; V When distant, Absence did my ease destroy. J I always trembled while you was with me, Lest you shou'd be found, and come to Injury : While in the Field, both Lives in Danger were ; Fear of my parents did encrease my Care. So that 'tis plain, ev'n at the best, my Mind Was as disturb'd as I at present find : Since you left me, had you but once seem'd kind, I shou'd have follow'd, and not been confin'd. Alas ! what wou'd have then become of me, T' have brought a Scandal on my Family ; T' have lost my Parents and my Honour too, And, after all, to be despis'd by you ? 206 PORTUGUESE NUN What Thoughts soever you of me retain, APPENDIX I reconjure you ne'er to write again : Letter V Methinks you shou'd sometimes reflect upon The base ungen'rous Injuries you 've done. No woman sure did e'er so easy prove ; What did you ever do to gain my Love ? You was the first that to the Army went ; To stay the longest there, the best content. Did you more careful of your Person grow, Altho' upon my knees I begg'd you wou'd do so ? Did you e'er strive to fix in Portugal, A Place where you was well belov'd of all ? Your Brother's Letter hurry'd you away, On the receipt of it you 'd not a moment stay ; And I 'm inform 'd you ne'er was pleased more Than when on board a making from our Shore. You can't deny but you deserve my Hate, And I may thank my self for all my Fate ; I was too free, and gave my Heart too soon, And brought upon my self the Ills I 've undergone. Alas ! from Love alone Love ne'er will rise, It must be rais'd by Skill and Artifice. Your first Design was to ensnare my Love, And nothing wou'd have spar'd that might successful prove : Nay, I believe, if it had needful been, Rather than failed, you wou'd have lov'd again ; But you found easier ways to work upon, And thought it best to let the Love alone. Perfidious Man ! which way can you atone For th' base and treach'rous Affronts you 've done ? 207 THE LETTERS OF A APPENDIX The blinding Passion now is vanquished quite, Letter V That kept the foulness of them from my sight : Must my tormented Soul never have Ease ? When shall I be, thou cruel Man, at Peace? Within a while you yet perhaps may hear, Or have a Letter, from your injur'd Fair, To let you know that she is at repose, Freed of the Torments that from you arose. Oh ! what a Pleasure it will be to me, Without concern t' accuse you of your Treachery ! When I 've forgot the wracking Pains I 've born, And able am to talk of you with Scorn ! You 've had the better, it is plainly prov'd, Because I you have out of Reason lov'd ; But by the Conquest you small Honour won, For I was young, and easily undone. I, whilst a Child, was cloister'd, knew no hurt, Discours'd with none but of the vulgar Sort, And what belonged to Flatt'ry never knew. Till I unhappily was taught by you : You 'd a good Character of every one, Which you made use of to entice me on. My Indignation, and your Falsehood too, Makes me at present much disorder'd grow ; But, I assure you, I will shortly find Some Means or other for to ease my Mind. Perhaps may take a way to quit my Care Which, when 'tis acted, you '11 be pleas'd to hear. 208 PORTUGUESE NUN Fool as I am, to say thus o'er and o'er APPENDIX The same that I 've so often said before ! Letter V Of you a Thought I must not entertain, And fancy too I ne'er shall write again ? For what occasion 's there that I to you Shou'd be accountable for all I do ? THE END OF THE NUN S LETTERS. 209 Edinburgh : T. and A. Constable Printers to Her Majesty University of California SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY 305 De Neve Drive - Parking Lot 17 • Box 951388 LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA 90095-1388 Return this material to the library from which it was borrowed. UNIVERSITY of CALIFORNIA AT LOS ANGELES LIBRARY ftp 3 1158 00659 9418 mmr ** 000134 222