de Charlus wanted. He did not however yield at once. “You would do wrong to apply in this case the ‘Whoso loveth well, chasteneth well’ of the proverb, for it is yourself whom I loved well, and I intend to chasten even after our parting those who have basely sought to do you an injury. Until now, their inquisitive insinuations, when they dared to ask me how a man like myself could mingle with a boy of your sort, sprung from the gutter, I have answered only in the words of the motto of my La Rochefoucauld cousins: ‘ ’Tis my pleasure.’ I have indeed pointed out to you more than once that this pleasure was capable of becoming my chiefest pleasure, without there resulting from your arbitrary elevation any degradation of myself.” And in an impulse of almost insane pride he exclaimed, raising his arms in the air: “ Tantus ab uno splendor!
5488