These alternations of tenderness and severity worked upon this feeble creature whose only life was through his amorous fibre, the same morbid effect which great changes from tropical heat to arctic cold produce upon the human body.

It was a moral pleurisy, which wore him out like a physical disease.

Flore alone could thus affect him; for to her, and to her alone, he was as good as he was foolish.
"Well, haven't you shaved yet ?" she said, appearing at his door.
Her sudden presence made the old man start violently; and from being pale and cast down he grew red for an instant, without, however, daring to complain of her treatment.
"Your breakfast is waiting," she added.

"You can come down as you are, in dressing-gown and slippers; for you'll breakfast alone, I can tell you." Without waiting for an answer, she disappeared.

To make him breakfast alone was the punishment he dreaded most; he loved to talk to her as he ate his meals.