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Show tmhe hoOe-he-tters of a. Jxin lXsionate Epistles of a Portuguese Canoness UK Written In 1663 For the First Tirne pub 9B lished in this Country. Htt is strange that "Letters from a Portu-HRse Portu-HRse Nun," perhaps the most remarkable real Re-letters ever published human documents IjHtten with a passionate pen and rivaling IHfenterest those of Ilelolse to Abelard or those jBjulle de Lespinasse to M. de Guilbert have iBMrr before been published in this country in SBIHBr completeness. Innumerable editions have Jffieared abroad. The letters hayp been translat-JHflfinto translat-JHflfinto almost every modern language. Seven-$Hn Seven-$Hn editions, all told, have appeared in England. JBBt the edition that now appears, an exact fac-Biile fac-Biile of the edition of 1817, with frontispiece of $WRirianne interrupting her writing to gaze on a JBrtrait of De Chamilly, Is the first to be prl -IwHon this side of the Atlantic, says the Argonaut. JH It is strange how those stray leaves have drift-R drift-R down to us through a period of two centuries, Hbmlng, as one writer observes, "as fresh as if Rt written yesterday; almost confirming Haz-Rt's Haz-Rt's remark: 'Words are the only things that ffflfct forever.' " To which may be added the re-Hirk re-Hirk of one greater than Hazlitt, that a single Heat line of roetry, though It be written on the fjjOink of a tree in the fastnesses of the woods, IMougli it be inscribed on a rock in the heart of jfflffie desert, though it bo carved upon a bit of fljSjod and cast into the sea, will not be lost. 4fW Marianne, the writer of these letters, is sup-jOTSed sup-jOTSed to have composed thom about the year fjpfflr3- shG was at tnat tIme a nun or cano' ss' of ffgtlbon. and the letters were written to ono Noel "JEmiton de Chamilly, of a noble and distinguished jjlHraiily of Burgundy, who had gone to Portugal in JBflm army of Marshal de Schomberg, serving him Imf captain of horse. Violent as was the passion fHBnceived for him by Marianne, Chamilly was not, ) appears, an Adonis. On the contrary, ho re- Tmbled rather a Hercules in strength and cor- jgjSlence, if we may trust the portrait which St. lBmon nas left us oi him "Ho was" says lie' in 'Jhump niemoir3, "a stout fat man: to see and hear HHBm, we could nevr Imagine lipw he could have aRspired such an exalted passion as that which is IRie soul of the famous 'Portuguese Letters': fKnd ho was so dull and heavy that no one could Rippose he possessed any talents for war." iiV He had, however, considerable abilities as a BBeneral. According to the translator of the edi-Hfton edi-Hfton of 1817, after having passed through every Mften of military rank, he distinguished himself by Ig celebrated defense of Graave, in 1G75, which iHost the Prince of Orange sixteen thousand men fltnd placed De Chamilly in the rank of the most R'.ustrious warriors of France. He died at Paris Hi 1715, aged 79, leaving no issue by his wife, Kho is said to have been still more disagreeable K rerson than himself. The greater part of the jBtters were written bv the passion-wracked and Brief-stricken nun after Chamilly had returned to Branco. He, being vain, showed them to his R-iends, and it is to this folly that the world is Hdebted for their publication. Of the fate of the BKnfortunate Marianne, nothing is known. But Kne who reads the last of her letters is inclined Ho believe (despite Shakespeare's asseveration Khat, though men have died and. worms have eat-Kn eat-Kn them, none died for love) that Marianne's frail Hjody was so torn with anguish at the desertion Bof her lover that "ehe endured not long after for Bvery sorrow " K The lettei-3 themselves are best described by Bthe French poet, Dorat, who more than a hun-dred hun-dred years ago wrote of them as follows: H These letters will excite those delicious tears which relieve the heart, not that agony of grief wh ch oppresses it; they breathe the most tender, the most impassioned, the most generous love: they paint the passion In all Its nice gradations of shade, and all its Interesting details; you behold its storms, Its agitations, its momentary resolutions, resolu-tions, its fond relapses, the delicacy of its fears, and the heroism of its sacrifices. . . The "Portuguese "Por-tuguese Letters" display, with a most accurate delicacy and tiuth, the hoart of a woman deeply Impressed with love; her soul now intoxicated with bliss, now overwhelmed with sorrow; and describing describ-ing all her emotions with the naivete of genuine feeling, and the glowing warmth of passion. The fair, who have loved, will find in them what they " have thought and felt a thousand times, when they have been writing to their lovers; and lovers, at least those who have beon fortunate enough to inspire a delicate passion, will think, in reading them, that they are reperusing the letters of their mistresses. The tenor of the first few letters is that of a woman who, herself loving completely, doubts the strength of the love which her lover professes; loves him none the less because of his Incapacity to experience deep emotion. As time passes, and De Chamilly returns to France, the letters pass from gentle chiding to open upbraiding, then to imploration that he return, then finally to utter despair. A remarkable thing about the letters Is that they seldom betray any thought about, certainly cer-tainly no repentance for, her impiety In breaking her most sacred vows. There Is little mention of the disrepute into which she has been brought among her religious sisters; of the reproaches of her relatives; and the coldness toward her of th03e of her own family, resulting from her passion. pas-sion. These things are of seemingly no moment Co Marianne compared with the tragic fact that she is no longer beloved has never been beloved. Another thing: In letter after letter, she expresses ex-presses her pity for De Chamilly, because she is convinced that not only does he not love her, but that he is incapable of experiencing for any person per-son whatsoever a profound and enduring passion. DoserteJ as she is, despised, rejected, dishonored, dishon-ored, Marianne yet glories in that she is capffble of loving. Except in the last letter or two, she continues to rejoice, in the midst of despair, that she has met and lovod, even though she has lost. It is difficult to select from these letters pas-sagos pas-sagos which shall convey In any adequate manner th8 charm of the volume when read as a whole. Yet these passages that end the eleventh letter may reveal somewhat pf the writer's passion and femininity: The officer ha3 waited long for this letter: 1 had resolvud to write in a style that should not disp'ease you; but what an extravagant letter have I written I must conclude Alas! I can not resolve to do it. "While I write, I seem to converse con-verse with you, and you almost appear present to me. . . . The next shall not be so long nor so 'troublsomo; under this assurance you may open and road it It is true I ought not to speak to you of a passion which displeases you, and 1 will speak of it no more. It is now nearly a year since I gae myself up to you without reserve. Your passion appeared to me 0 ardent, so sincere, and I could never have thought that my fondness would have disgusted dis-gusted you ho much as to induce you to take a journey of five hundred leagues, and expose yourself your-self to all the dangers of the sea to escape from it. No one over experienced such treatment as 1 have done. You can remember my shame, my confusion, my disorder; but you do not remember that you bound yourself by oaths to love me forever for-ever The officer who Is to bring you this sends to me for the fourth time to tell me that he wishes to be gone. How very pressing he is! He, too, abandons, no doubt, some unhappy one of this country. Adieu! I suffer more in concluding this n , - , vm letter than you did in leaving me, though per- H haps forever. Adieu! I dare not call you by jH those thousand endearing names I would; I dare H not abandon myself to my feelings. I love you H more, a thousand times more, than I thought. How H dear you are to me! Oh, how cruel you are to H mo! You never write to me I can not refrain H from tolling you that once more I am beginning H again, and the officer will be gorie No matter H let him go! I write more for myself than you, I H only seek to console myself. The length of my M letter will alarm you you will not road It. What H have I done that I should be thus miserable, and M why have you embittered the remainder of my life? H Oh, that I had been born In another country! H Adieu! forgive me, I dare not now ask you to love H mo Behold to what my fate has reduced mo! H Adieu. M Hero are a few detached passages in which are M ombodiod, perhaps, some of the "wisdom of love": B I am not rational; I own It: but who can bo M so with excess of love like mine? I well know H that, at the moment I am Writing, I ought to bo M at ease. You aro but a stop from town, your duty H detains you, and the Illness of my brother would H have prevented my seeing you during the time H you have boon absent. Above all, there aro no H women whoro you aro, and that removes ono groat H disquiet from my hoart. But, alas! how many yet H remain, and how true it is that a fond woman, if M she lovo3 as I, do, finds in everything a torment M for herself. H Be not disgusted with my weakness; I have H never felt it but for you; and I would not exchange H It for the most solid wisdom, if to bo wise It woro H requisite to lovo you ono degree tho loss. H S ' I Ah! had I thought you so cold before I loved H you as I do! What. then? Though I had per- H celved all that I now perceive, and more, if possi- H bio, I could not have resisted the impulse of loving H you. It is a bias cf soul over which I had no H power, and which . . but when I think of the H moments of delight this pasilon has afforded me, H I can not repent of having conceived it. H Complain! abuse me! betray me! hate me! H since you can do it; but never despise mo. From H tho moment that your love no longer constitutes H your felicity I may livo without it, but I can not live without your osteem. H It was tho excess of your transports yesterday H which gave birth to my suspicions. You seemod H out of yourself; and through all that you ap- poared to bo I sought your real self. O heavens! HI what would havo become of mo had I found you H guilty of dissimulation? I prefer your lovo to my H fortune, to my glory, to my life; but I could more easily support the certainty of your hatred than H the deceitful semblance of your love. It is not to the exterior that I look, but to the feelings of H tho soul. Bo cold, be negligent, bo oven fickle, if H you can be so, but never dissimulate. Deception H Is the greatest crime that can bo committed against lovo; and I would much sooner pardon H you for infidelity than for using art to conceal it H from my knowledge. H |