A hand laid on my shoulder, a voice said, “Don't you take on so Master, — don't you now, — she's not worth it, — cheer up, — don't you take on so.” I looked up, it was Mary looking full at me, her eyes full of tears.

I started up astonished. “I beg your pardon”, said she looking uncomfortable, “I couldn't bear to see you so unhappy.” Her interest in me struck me to the heart, without premeditation I threw my arms round her, pressed her mouth to mine, it unresistingly met it, and we passionately kissed for two or three minutes; kissed till I recovered my senses, my tears still running down, and then said, “Mary you are kind, — you are a dear, good girl, — a good, affectionate, loving creature, -I am unhappy, miserable, but how do you know that?” “How could I be off of knowing? — how could you be anything else with her? — but don't take on so Master, — she beant worth it, — and you so good, and so kind, — I hate her when I look at her, and then look at you. Oh I I beg your pardon sir, — don't say anything”,-and as if astonished at herself, she disengaged herself, and stood looking at me. I closed with her again, folding her tightly to me, and we kissed till we could kiss no longer. My tears fell on her face, and hers ran down my cheeks, so close were they to-gether.

The parlours divided by folding doors mostly open, ran from back to front. A sofa was close by the dining-table. “Sit down”, said I. She did. I put my arm round her neck, pulled her face to mine, and kissed again that divinely pink and velvety cheek. Then her arm went round my waist, and lips to lips, each instant we kissed, and sat and talked of my miseries; yet as far as I recollect not the slightest desire to have her had then come into my head, all was delight at my trouble being shared, at a kind, soft, pretty woman commiserating me. After long talking and kissing, and looking at her, a sense of her great beauty suddenly struck me, just as if I had never noticed it before. I recollect telling her so.

Then a thrill of desire shot through me and staggered me. I trembled as the want overtook me, and drew her closer to me, kissed more fervently, and sighed. She sighed. My lust had kindled hers, and yet I had not spoken of it. My hand went on to her knees, I felt the thighs gently, felt their plumpness through the summer clothing, slowly my hand dropped lower kissing her all the while, and bending her forward with me, as I bent forward, with my dropping hand.

A long pause. I scarcely knew why, and then my hand went still lower, till it touched her ankles, still kissing her, and bending her with me (oh! how well I recollect it), then my right hand went quite slowly up her clothes to her knees, and there I stopped, frightened at my advances. Opening her eyes she gently re-pulsed me, and murmured, “Oh ! Master, — Master, — what are you doing,-pray don't.” Her eyes were filled with soft passion, her resistance physically would not have moved a butterfly, but morally she affected me. I became conscious of what I was driving on to unpremeditatingly.

I desisted, removed my hand, but passion now controlled me. I kissed again. “Let me feel, oh ! let me dear feel you”, bending her forward with me, I re-placed my hand. “Oh ! Master pray don't, — think what you are doing, — of who I am”, said she lovingly. “Oh ! I won't”, said she sharply,-but too late, my fingers were on her clitoris, I had begun that gentle twiddling which always ends in fucking. “Ohl — no, — oh I — pray.” Voluptuousness had overcome her, her mouth was glued to mine, her eyes fixed on mine; gently they closed, then opened, always looking into mine. Her breathing was short, she was past thought, she was mine. Gently pressing her back on the sofa, she raised her limbs, I lifted her clothes, and tearing open my trowsers threw myself on her. My fingers for an instant touched her cunt, a rapid probe, and then my prick ! My God! it was not standing, not a bit of swell or stiffness was in it, it was as a sucked gooseberry, a mere bit of dwindling, flexible, skinny gristle, a piece of loose, flabby flesh, and nothing more.

I had been occasionally, but rarely suddenly unequal to love's duty as already told, had gone home with gay women, my prick standing as I entered their houses, then suddenly it had shrunk, something about them having upset me. Occasionally it was a sudden fear of the ladies' fever, or something looked less inviting when their petticoats were off, than I had imagined when drapery hid their charms, or else the fear that my prick would be thought small. At other times I could not account for it at all. I told my doctor of it. He said that it was nervousness, but the knowledge that I had once been so affected, affected me often afterwards when I went indoors with girls. “Shall I be able to fuck?” I used to think, I who had already fucked two hundred women. But so it was, a fear of inability brought on inability. The power often returned to me a few minutes afterwards, yet some-times not for hours.

There was nothing to account for it now, I had more or less abstained for weeks, there lay one of the choicest female forms ever presented to man's eyes, a dark-brown crispy-haired cunt with a tiny bit of pink clitoris showing between a large pair of thighs like ivory, and a sweet face above turned on one side with eyes closed, and blushing a yielding up to me. And '' liked the woman, felt mad for her, yet as my prick rubbed against her pleasure-pit, it became useless. I got up, looked at her as she lay motionless with thighs extended, stood almost frantic, frigged my prick, probed her, and again threw myself on her as I stiffened; but no sooner had my prick touched her beautiful cunt, than as if bewitched, it shrunk from entering it, I could not even thumb it up.

I broke into a sweat. “My God what will she think of me?” I dreaded to get off, and look her in the face, feeling so ashamed, I kissed her taking her head in my hands, again got off, kissed all round her cunt, and smelt its inciting aroma, asked her to be still, said I should be all right directly. So time wore on, she never moving excepting to push her clothes down as I rose and exposed her, nor opening her eyes, nor uttering a word. “My God what is the matter with me, I don't know but I can't”, I said at last. Then she put quite down her clothes, and sitting up on the sofa gave me a kiss, said, “I must go, and see about laying the things for dinner”, and off she went.

I did not stop her, but was glad when she left the room, being so ashamed that I could not look at her. It was a relief not to have to speak, to excuse, to explain. I was reeking with sweat from exertion and nervous anxiety sat thinking and frigging, felt sensation of pleasure without stiffness, and only stiffened after half-an-hour's rubbing. With prick out and in hand, downstairs then I went, she was boiling potatoes. “Mary come up, come, I am all right, let me.” She would not. “I can't Master, I can't, — what will Missus think if she finds nothing ready? Nor could I induce her. I incited her by talk, she kept on ejaculating “oh !” to my baudy remarks, and blushing like a rose; but I could get no more. “If Missus comes home, and sees you through the area, what will she say? — Pray go up Master.” Yielding under the fear of being surprised, at length up I went to the parlour.

I knew she would be up to lay the cloth, waited in the parlour till she did, keeping my prick in hand, and trembling with anxiety. When she had laid it, “Now”, said I, “look here.” “No, — no,-no, — Missus may be home,-pray think of me.” But a stiff prick close to a randy woman is a great persuader. “Come dear, come”, and I pulled her. Again she was down on the sofa, again that divine belly was under me, again as I opened the lips of her cunt my prick dwindled to nothing. “Hush! there's Mistress' step, — there is the front-gate slamming. “Get up, — get up, oh! let me get up.” Upstairs I rushed to my own sitting-room as I heard a knock at the door, and had only time to but-ton up my disgraced doodle before I heard the woman tramping upstairs to our bed-room above. How I loathed her!