                         THE TWENTY-THIRD DAY

       "But how is it possible to shout and roar the way you do when
you discharge?" the Duc demanded of Curval upon bidding him good
morning on the 23rd. "Why the devil must you scream that way? I've
never seen such violent discharges."
       "Why, by God," Curval replied, "is it for you, whom one can
hear a league away, to address such a reproach to a modest man like
myself? Those little murmurs you hear, my good friend, are caused by
my extremely sensitive nervous system; the objects which excite our
passions create such a lively commotion in the electrically charged
fluid that flows in our nerves, the shock received by the animal
spirits composing this fluid is of such a degree of violence, that the
entire mechanism is rattled by these effects, and one is just as
powerless to suppress one's cries when overwhelmed by the terrible
blows imparted by pleasure, as one would be when assailed by the
powerful emotions of pain."
       "Well, you define the thing very well, Prsident, but what was
the delicate object that could have produced such a vibration in your
animal spirits?"
       "I was very energetically sucking Adonis' prick, his mouth, and
his asshole, for I was cast down with despair at not being able to do
more to my couch companion; all the while I made the best of my hard
situation, Antinos, seconded by your dear daughter Julie, labored,
each in his own way, to evacuate the liquor whose eventual outpouring
occasioned the musical sounds which, you say, struck your ears."
       "And it all worked so well that now, today," said the Duc,
"you're as weak as a baby."
       "No, your Grace, not at all," Curval declared; "deign but to
observe my career, my motions today, and but do me the honor of
judging my style and vehemence in sport, and you shall see me conduct
myself quite as ever, and assuredly as well as you yourself."
       They were at this point in the conversation when Durcet arrived
to say breakfast was being served. They passed into the qirls'
quarters, where those eight charming little houris were distributing
cups of coffee and hot water; the Duc therewith demanded to know of
Durcet, the month's steward and presiding officer, why was it the
coffee was being served with water?
       "You'll have it with milk whenever you wish," said the
financier. "Would you prefer it thus now?"
       The Duc said that yes, he would.
       "Augustine, my dear," Durcet said, "a little milk in Monsieur
le Duc's cup, if you please."
       Thereupon the little girl, prepared for any eventuality, placed
Blangis' cup beneath her ass, and through her anus squeezed three or
four spoonfuls of milk, very clear and perfectly fresh. This cunning
feat produced much pleasant laughter, everyone requested milk in his
coffee. All the asses were charged in the same way Augustine's was:
'twas an agreeable little surprise the month's director of games had
thought to give his colleagues. Fanny poured some into the Bishop's
cup, Zelmire into Curval's, and Michette into the financier's; the
friends took a second round of coffee, and the four other girls
performed over these new cups the same ceremony their comrades had
over the first cups; and so on and on; the whole thing entertained
their Lordships immoderately. It heated the Bishop's brain; he
affirmed he wanted something beside milk, and the lovely Sophie
stepped forth to satisfy him. Although all eight definitely wished to
shit, they had been strongly urged to exercise self-restraint while
dispensing the milk, and this first time to yield absolutely nothing
else.
       Next, they paid the little boys a good-morning visit; Curval
induced Zlamir to shit from him, the Duc applauded what Giton brought
to light. Two subaltern fuckers, Constance, and Rosette provided the
spectacle in the chapel latrine. Rosette was one of those upon whom
the old formula for promoting indigestion had beed tried out; at
coffee, she had had the world's worst time keeping her milk free of
foreign ingredients, and now, seated upon the throne, she released the
most superb turd you could hope to lay eyes upon. Duclos was
congratulated, they said her system was a resounding success, and from
then on they used it every day; never once did it fail them. The
conversation at the dinner was enlivened by the breakfast's
pleasantry, and a number of other things of the same kind were
invented and proposed; we shall perhaps have occasion to mention them
in the sequel.
       After-dinner coffee was served by four subjects of the same
age: to wit, Zelmire, Augustine, Zphyr, and Adonis. The Duc
thigh-fucked Augustine while tickling her anus with his thumb, Curval
did the same thing with Zelmire, but may or may not have used his
thumb, his hand was not in clear view; the Bishop toiled between
Zphyr's tightly squeezed legs, and the financier fucked Adonis'
mouth. Augustine announced that she was ready to shit, how would they
like her to do a little shit? The poor dear could not wait another
moment, she too had been exposed to the indigestion-producing
experiments. Curval beckoned her to him, opened his mouth, and the
delightful little girl dropped a monstrous turd into it; the Prsident
gobbled it up in a trice, not without unleashing a veritable stream of
fuck into Fanchon's hands.
       "There you are," he said to the Duc, "you see that night-time
merriment has no damaging effect upon the following day's pleasures;
you're lagging behind, Monsieur le Duc."
       "I'll not be behind for long," said the latter, to whom
Zelmire, inspired by an urge no less imperious, was rendering the same
service Augustine had a moment before rendered Curval. And, yes, as he
pronounces those words, the Duc topples over, utters piercing shrieks,
swallows shit, and discharges like a madman.
       "Enough of this," said the stern, austere voice of the Bishop,
moderation's exponent; "at least two of us must preserve our strength
for the stories."
       Durcet, who, unlike the Duc and Curval, had no surfeit of fuck
to fling carelessly about, assented wholeheartedly, and after the
shortest possible nap, they installed themselves in the auditorium,
where, in the following terms, the spellbinding Duclos resumed her
brilliant and lascivious history:

       Why is it, Messieurs, the radiant creature inquired, that in
this world there are men whose hearts have been so numbed, whose
sentiments of honor and delicacy have been so deadened, that one sees
them pleased and amused by what degrades and soils them? One is even
led to suppose their joy can be mined nowhere save from the depths of
opprobrium, that, for such men, delights cannot exist elsewhere save
in what brings them into consort with dishonor and infamy. To what I
am going now to recount to you, my Lords, to the various instances I
shall lay before you in order to prove my assertion, do not reply,
saying that 'tis physical sensation which is the foundation of these
subsequent pleasures; I know, to be sure, physical sensation is
involved herein, but be perfectly certain that it does not exist in
some sort save thanks to the powerful support given it by moral
sensation, and be sure as well that, were you to provide these
individuals with the same physical sensation and to omit to join to it
all that the moral may yield, you'd fail entirely to stir them.
       There very often came to me a man of whose name and quality I
was ignorant, but who, however, I knew most certainly to be a man of
circumstance. The kind of woman with whom I married him made no
difference at all: beautiful or ugly, old or young, it was all the
same to him; his partner had only to play her role competently, and
that role was as follows: ordinarily, he would come to the house in
the morning, he would enter, as though by accident, into a room where
a girl lay upon a bed, her skirts raised to above her waist and in the
attitude of a woman frigging herself. Immediately his entrance was
noticed, the woman, as if surprised, would spring from the bed.
       "What are you doing here, villain?" she would ask very crossly;
"who gave you permission to disturb me?"
       He would beg forgiveness, his apologies would go unheeded, and
all the while showering him with a renewed deluge of the harshest and
most biting invectives, she would fall to giving him furious kicks
upon the posterior, and she would become all the more certain of her
aim as the patient, far from dodging or shielding his behind, would
unfailingly turn himself and present the target within easy range,
although looking for all the world as if he wished only to escape this
punishment and flee the room. The kicking is redoubled, he cries to be
spared, blows and curses are the only replies he receives, and as soon
as he feels he is sufficiently excited, he promptly draws his prick
from his breeches, which he has hitherto kept tightly buttoned, and
lightly giving his device three or four flicks of the wrist, he
discharges while rushing away under an unremitting storm of kicks and
abuses.
       A second personage, either tougher or more accustomed to this
sort of exercise, would not enter the lists save with a street porter
or some other stout rascal willing to sweat for his hire. The
libertine enters furtively while his opponent is busily counting his
money; the churl cries thief; whereupon the hard language and blows
begin. Whereas with the former debauchee, the blows were scattered
somewhat over his body, this one, keeping his breeches down about his
ankles, wishes to receive everything squarely in the center of his
unclothed bum, and that bum has to be buffeted by a good heavy boot,
amply studded with hobnails and well coated with mud. At the moment he
felt himself about to discharge, our gentleman ceased to parry the
blows; planted firmly in the middle of the room, his breeches still
lowered, and agitating his prick with all his strength, he braved his
enemy's assaults, and, at this crucial juncture, dared him do his
worst, insulting him in his own turn, and swearing he was about to die
of pleasure. The more vile, the more lowly the man I found for this
stalwart libertine, the more scurvy his antagonist, the heavier and
the more filthy his boot, the more overpowering would be my client's
ecstasy; I had to employ the same tact and discrimination in selecting
his assailant that I would have had to devote to embellishing and
beautifying another man's woman.
       A third wished to find himself in what in a whorehouse is
called the harem, at the same instant two other men, paid so to do and
on hand for no other purpose, began a dispute. Both would turn upon
our libertine, he would ask to be spared, would throw himself upon his
knees, would not be listened to, and one of the two champions would
directly snatch up a cane and fall to belaboring him all the while he
crept to the entrance of another room where he would take refuge.
There he would be received by a girl, she would console him, caress
him as one might a child who has come to be comforted, she would raise
her skirts, display her ass, and the libertine, all smiles, would
spray his fuck upon it.
       A fourth required the same preliminaries, but as soon as the
strokes of the cane began to rain down upon his back, he would frig
himself within sight of all. Then this last operation would be
suspended for a moment; there would, however, be no interruption in
the dual attack of blows and oaths; then he'd get hot again, frig some
more, and when they saw his fuck was about to fly, they'd open a
window, pick him up by the waist, and fling him out; he would land
upon a specially prepared dung heap after a fall of no more than six
feet. And that was the critical moment; he had been morally aroused by
the foregoing preliminaries, and his physical self only became so
thanks to his fall; 'twas never but upon that dung heap he loosed his
fuck. When one went to look from the window, he was gone; there was an
obscure little door below (he had a key to it), and he'd disappear
through it at once.
       A man paid for the purpose and dressed like a rowdy would
abruptly enter the chamber in which the man who furnishes us with the
fifth example would be lying with a girl, kissing her ass while
awaiting developments. Accosting the expectant libertine, the bully,
having forced the door, would insolently ask what right he had thus to
meddle with his mistress and then, laying his hands upon his sword, he
would tell the usurper to defend himself. All confused, the latter
would fall to his knees, ask pardon, grovel on the floor, kiss his
rival's feet too, and swear he was ready to relinquish the lady at
once, for he had no desire to fight over a woman. The bully, whom his
adversary's pliability rendered all the more insolent, now called his
enemy a coward, a contemptible fellow, a whoreson ass-fucker, and a
dog, and threatened to carve up his face with the edge of his sword.
And the more ugly became the one's behavior, the more humble and
fawning became the other's. Finally, after a few minutes of debate,
the assailant offered to make a settlement with his enemy:
       "I see damned well that you've got no guts at all," said he,
"and so I'll let you go, but upon condition you kiss my ass."
       "Oh, Monsieur, I'll do whatever you like," said the other,
enchanted by this solution, "I'd even kiss it if 'twere all beshitted,
if you wish, provided you do me no harm."
       Sheathing his sword, the bully directly pulled down his
breeches, the libertine, only too delighted, leapt enthusiastically to
work, and while the young man let fly half a dozen farts at his nose,
the old rake, having attained the summit of ecstasy, loosed his fuck
and swooned with pleasure.

       "Every one of those excesses makes sense to me," Durcet said in
a faltering tone, for the little libertine was stiff after hearing
tell of these turpitudes. "Nothing more logical than to adore
degradation and to reap delight from scorn. He who ardently loves the
things which dishonor, finds pleasure in being dishonored and must
necessarily stiffen when told that he is. Turpitude is, to certain
spirits, a very sound cause of joy. One loves to hear oneself called
what one wishes only to merit being, and it is truly impossible to
guess how far a man may go in this direction, provided he be ashamed
of nothing. 'Tis once again the story of certain sick persons whom
nothing delights like the disintegration of their body."
       " 'Tis all a question of cynicism," was Curval's deliberated
opinion, pronounced while toying with Fanchon's buttocks. "Who is
unaware that even punishment produces enthusiasms, and have we not
seen certain individual's pricks stiffen into clubs at the same
instant they find themselves publicly disgraced? Everyone knows the
story of the brave Marquis de S*** who, when informed of the
magistrates' decision to burn him in effigy, pulled his prick from his
breeches and exclaimed: 'God be fucked, it has taken them years to do
it, but it's achieved at last; covered with opprobrium and infamy, am
I? Oh, leave me, for I've got absolutely to discharge'; and he did so
in less time than it takes to tell."
       "Those are undisputed facts," the Duc commented, nodding
gravely. "But can you explain to me their cause?"
       "It resides in our heart," Curval replied. "Once a man has
degraded himself, debased himself through excesses, he has imparted
something of a vicious cast to his soul, and nothing can rectify that
situation. In any other case, shame would act as a deterrent and
incline him away from the vices to which his mind advises him to
surrender, but here that possibility has been eliminated altogether:
'tis the first token of shame he has obliterated, the initial call he
has definitively silenced, and from the state in which one is when one
has ceased to blush, to that other state wherein one adores everything
that causes others to blush, there is no more, nor less, than a single
step. All that before affected one disagreeably, now encountering an
otherwise prepared soul, in metamorphosed into pleasure, and from this
moment onward, whatever recalls the new state one has adopted can
henceforth only be voluptuous."
       "But what a distance one must first have ventured along the
road of vice to arrive at that point!" said the Bishop.
       "Yes, yes, 'tis so," Curval acknowledged; "but little by little
one makes one's way along, and the path one treads is strewn with
flowers; one excess leads to another, the imagination, never sated,
soon brings us to our destination, and as the traveler's heart has
only hardened as he has pursued his career, immediately he reaches his
goal, that heart which of old contained some virtues, no longer
recognizes a single one. Accustomed to livelier things, it promptly
shrugs off those early impressions, those soft and unsweet, those
tasteless ones which till then had made it drunk, and as it strongly
senses that infamy and dishonor are going surely to be the
consequences of its new impulsions, in order to have nothing to fear
of them, it begins by making itself familiar with them. It no sooner
caresses than it is seized with a fondness for them, because they are
of the same nature as its new conquests; and now that heart is fixed
unalterably, forever."
       "And that," the Bishop observed, "is what makes mending one's
way so difficult."
       "Say rather that it is impossible, my friend. And how are the
punishments inflicted upon him you wish to reform ever to succeed,
since, with the exception of one or two privations, the state of
degradation which characterizes the situation in which you place him
when you punish him, pleases him, amuses him, delights him, and
inwardly he relishes the self that has gone so far as to merit being
treated in this way?"
       "Oh, what is this glory, jest, and riddle of the world!" sighed
the Duc.
       "Yes, my friend, an enigma above all else," said the grave
Curval. "And that perhaps is what led a very witty individual to say
that better every time to fuck a man than to seek to comprehend him."
       And the arrival of supper interrupting our interlocutors, they
seated themselves at table without having achieved a thing during the
soiree. Natheless, at dessert, Curval, his prick as hard as a demon's,
declared he'd be damned if it wasn't a pucelage he wanted to pop, even
if he had twenty fines to pay, and instantly laying rude hands upon
Zelmire, who had been reserved for him, he was about to drag her off
to the boudoir when his three colleagues, casting themselves in his
path, besought him to reconsider and submit to the law he had himself
prescribed; and, said they, since they too had equally powerful urges
to breach the contract, but held themselves somehow in check all the
same, he should imitate them, at least out of a feeling of
comradeship. And as they had straightway sent word to have Julie
fetched in, for Curval was fond of her, she, upon arriving, took him
directly in hand, and, together with Champville and Bum-Cleaver, they
all four went into the salon; the other three friends soon joined them
there, for the orgies were scheduled to begin. Upon entering, they
found Curval close at grips with his aides, who, adopting the most
lubricious postures and providing the most libertine exhortations,
finally caused him to yield up his fuck.
       In the course of the orgies, Durcet had the duennas give him
two or three hundred kicks in the ass; not to be outdone, his peers
had the fuckers serve them identically, and before retiring for the
night, no one was exempted from shedding more or less fuck, depending
upon the faculties wherewith by Nature he had been endowed. Fearing
some fresh return of the defloratory whim Curval had just announced,
the duennas were, through precaution, assigned to sleep in the boys'
and girls' chambers. But this measure was unnecessary, and Julie, who
looked after the Prsident all night long, the following morning
turned him over to the society as limp as an empty glove.
