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Before marriage she thought herself in love; but the happiness that
should have followed this love not having come, she must, she thought,
have been mistaken. And Emma tried to find out what one meant exactly in
life by the words felicity, passion, rapture, that had seemed to her so
beautiful in books.

Chapter Six
She had read "Paul and Virginia," and she had dreamed of the little
bamboo-house, the nigger Domingo, the dog Fiddle, but above all of the
sweet friendship of some dear little brother, who seeks red fruit for
you on trees taller than steeples, or who runs barefoot over the sand,
bringing you a bird's nest.
When she was thirteen, her father himself took her to town to place
her in the convent. They stopped at an inn in the St. Gervais quarter,
where, at their supper, they used painted plates that set forth the
story of Mademoiselle de la Valliere. The explanatory legends, chipped
here and there by the scratching of knives, all glorified religion, the
tendernesses of the heart, and the pomps of court.


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