I was mad with passion and carrying her to the bed, I knelt before her and placed my mouth where my hand had been. I experienced then the supreme pleasure of one's lips in contact with virginity.

From this moment, Violette uttered inarticulate words, till a spasm of pleasure thrilled through her whole body.

I got up and gazed on her while she was recovering. She opened her eyes, tried to sit up, and murmured:

"Oh, how delicious it was! Can we begin again?"

Suddenly she got up and looking intently at me, she asked:

"Is it not very wicked?"

I sat near her on the bed.

"Has anybody ever spoken to you seriously?"

"Yes, sometimes father did, when I was a child, to scold me."

"I don't mean that. I mean to ask you whether you could understand anyone who should talk to you seriously?"

"Not perhaps if it were a stranger. But I believe I can understand anything you say to me."

"Well then, listen."

She clasped her arms round my neck, fixed her eyes on mine and with an attentive air, said: "Now speak, I listen."

"Woman, when created, certainly received the same rights as a man, that is, the right of obeying one's natural instincts.

"Well, society being ruled by men, who are stronger than women, certain laws have been forced on women. Chastity is imposed on girls, and fidelity on married women.

"Men, in framing these laws, have reserved for themselves the right of satisfying their passions, without thinking that in order to indulge them they must cause women to break the laws they laid down for them.

"These women give them happiness, but shame is their own lot."

"That is very unjust!" remarked Violette.

"Yes, my dear, truly so. Therefore have certain women risen up and said: "What does society offer me in exchange for the bondage in which she keeps me? Marriage with a man I shall not probably love, who will take me at eighteen years of age, who will enjoy me and make me unhappy all my life. I had rather remain outside of society,