French and Oriental Love in a Harem

Nevertheless, I must admit that the education of their intellects did

not keep pace with the cultivation of their ideas, but rendered them

still liable to commit a number of solecisms. I had an interest,

moreover, in keeping them in a certain degree of ignorance of the actual

laws of our own world. Imbued with their native ideas, their credulity

accepted without hesitation, everything which I chose to tell them about

"the customs of the harems of France," and they conformed to them

without making any pretence to further knowledge of them. None the less,

there began to grow up in their minds ideas of independence and

self-will, the natural consequences of the elevation effected in their

sentiments. The notion of a truer and more tender love was used by them

henceforth as a weapon against my absolute authority. Only too happy to

be treated as a lover rather than a master, I did not feel any loss in

this respect: love is kept alive by these numberless little stratagems

of a woman, who loves and desires--yet desires not--and so forth. And

then, you must remember, I had four wives.

They on their part, having no aims, no ambitions, but to please me, the

sole object of their common love, each tried to effect my conquest in

order to obtain the advantage over her rivals--an emulation of which I

experienced all the charms. Notwithstanding the fact that I distributed

my affections with a rare impartiality, I could not always prevent the

occurrence of jealous quarrels among them. Afterwards ensued regrets

tender reproaches, and clouds of sadness melting into tears. Peace was

restored amid foolish outbursts of mirth. But you cannot realise what a

task it has been for me to preserve the harmony of a well-regulated

household among creatures with their impulsive imaginations, which have

ripened under the heat of their native oriental sun. They have mixed up

their superstitions with those higher principles of which I have

endeavoured to inculcate a notion into their minds, and which they often

interpret in quite a different sense. All this has been the occasion for

the display of charming eccentricities. My little animals have grown

into women, and along with the development of a more intelligent love, I

have seen manifestations of a coquettish mutinous spirit, upon the

slightest evidence of partiality on my part, which they have thought to

detect in me.

I must tell you that Kondjé-Gul, who is really a very intelligent girl,

had begun to study with great ardour, and it naturally followed that she

benefited more from her lessons than the others, who treated them rather

as an amusement. In three months she learnt French tolerably well--she

it was who translated the novels to them. Hence arose a superiority on

her side, which must in any case have produced a good deal of envy among

the others. On the top of this came her famous excursion to the château,

concerning which the silly creature gave them marvellous accounts, in

order to pose as favourite. I should add that Kondjé-Gul, being of an

extremely jealous nature, often gave way to violent fits of passion.

Hadidjé, for some reason or other, more especially excited her

suspicions. Hadidjé has an excitable temperament. Between them,

consequently, a considerable coolness arose: this, however, created

nothing worse than a few clouds on my fine sky. For the passive

domesticities of the harem, I had substituted love; for its obedience,

the free expansions and impulses of the heart.