I called on McCabe on one rent-day a month or two afterwards, forgetting she had none to pay till the ten pounds were worked off, and expecting to see her; but of course she did not appear. About nine months after (I think) I went there. In she came. “How d'ye do?” said I, “have the repairs been done?” “Thank ye, yes sir,” she replied looking awfully confused. I went to the back of the old man, and from there began feeling my cock, and making signs with my tongue. It was so delightful to see the woman I had enjoyed; but I did not follow the intrigue up, and she gave no signs of encouragement. And here I must add a few reflections. Although I always have had a great dislike to stroking married women, regarding it as an improper, — perhaps the only improper path in fornication, as unfair to married men, and a social sin to be carefully avoided, — yet fate seems to have determined that I shall err in that direction. My second woman was a married one, though I did not know it till late, my first I had again after she was married, and I have had several since. Was it the fault of the women, or myself? — did they intend me to fuck them, or not? Certainly I never deliberately set to work to tempt them, but the lech when it took me seems to have overcome all my moral objections. Has the devil determined to tempt me in this direction? If so, am I to blame for not being gifted with control of myself and my cod-piece? In my re-cent illness I have thought much on this, — with what practical result, who can tell?

[The foregoing paragraph printed in the original words exactly, was not written until many years after the affairs with the Scotch woman. This one is written as I send the narrative to press.

[It is useless for me to attempt to write the Scottish dialect, equally difficult is it to write the vulgar tongue of some of the women I have had, though I have written the characteristic remarks in our conversations.

[Now occur events which took place during the time when I had one woman all to myself, but to whom I found it utterly impossible to be faithful sexually.]

Chapter XIV

A gap in the narrative. • A mistress. • A lucky legacy. • Secret preparations. • A sudden flight. • At Paris. • A dog and a woman. • At a lake-city. • A South American lady. • Mrs. O*b***e. • Glimpses from a bed-room window. • Hairy arm-pits. • Stimulating effects. • Acquaintance made. — The children. • “Play with Mamma like Papa.” • A water excursion. • Lewed effects. • Contiguous bed-rooms. • Double doors. • Nights of nakededness. • Her form. • Her sex. • Carnal confessions. • Periodicity of lust.

I pass over many incidents of a couple of years or more, during which I was well off, had a mistress whom I had seduced, as it is stupidly called, and had children; but it brought me no happiness, and I fled from the connection. All this was never known to the world. My home life at length became so unbearable, that I at one time thought of realizing all I had, of throwing up all chance of advancement and a promising career which then was before me, and going for ever abroad I knew not where, nor cared. My mother had died, one sister was married, and was not much comfort to me; the other was far off, my brother nowhere. Just then a distant relative left me a largish sum of money, it was scarcely known to any one of my friends, quite unknown at' home, and to none until I had spent a good deal of it. I kept the fact to myself till I had put matters in such train that I could get a couple of thousand pounds on account, then quietly fitted myself out with clothes. One day I sent home new portmanteaus, and packed up my clothes the same day. “I am going abroad,” I said. “When?” “To-night.” “Where to?” “I don't know, — that is my business.” “When do you come back?” “Perhaps in a week, — perhaps a year,” — nor did I for a long time. I never wrote to England during that time, except to my solicitors and bankers who necessarily knew where I had been at times.

I went first to Paris, where I ran a course of baudy house amusements, saw a big dog fuck a woman who turned her rump towards it as if she were a bitch. The dog licked and smelt her cunt first, and then fucked. He was accustomed to the treat. Then I saw a little spaniel lick another French woman's cunt. She put a little powdered sugar on her clitoris first, and when the dog had licked that off, somehow she made it go on licking, until she spent, or shammed a spend, calling out, “Nini, — cher Nini, — go on Nini,” — in French of course.

I could make a long story out of both of these incidents if it were worth while, but it is not, and only notice that the Newfoundland, whose tongue hung out quite as long as his prick as he was pushing his penis up the French woman's quim, turned suddenly round when it had spent, seemed astonished to find he was not sticking arse to arse with her, and then licked the remains of the sperm off the tip of his prick. It was not a nice sight at all, nor did I ever want to see it again.

There were few large cities of Central Europe I did not see, and think that the best baudy houses in most large cities saw me. It was a journey in which my amatory doings were especially with the priestesses of Venus. Beautiful faces and beautiful limbs were sufficient for me, if coupled with ready submission to my wishes. Although I learnt no doubt a great deal, and had my voluptuous tastes cultivated in a high degree, yet they developed none of those outside tastes which ordinarily come with great knowledge and practice in the matters of cunt. I shall only tell the most remarkable fornicating incidents.

I was at the Hotel B*** in a Swiss town by a great lake, had arrived late, and was put into the third story, in a room overlooking a quadrangle. It was hot. I threw up my window when I got out of bed in the morning, and in night-gown looked into the quadrangle, and at the walls and windows of the various bed-rooms opening on to it on three sides. Looking down on my right, and one story below me, I caught sight over the window-curtain of a bed-room, of a female head of long dark hair, and a naked arm brushing it up from behind vigorously. The arm looked the size of a powerful man's, but it was that of a woman. She moved about heedlessly, and soon I saw that she was naked to below her breasts; but I only caught glimpses of that nakedness, for seconds, as she moved backwards and forwards near the window. Then she held up the hair for a minute, and seemed to be contemplating the effect of the arrangement of it, and showed what looked like a nest of hair beneath one armpit. Her flesh looked sallow or brown, and she seemed big and middle-aged. My window was near the angle of the quadrangle, so was hers, on the adjacent side of it. Perhaps from the window where I was, and that above mine only, could be seen all what I saw.

The armpit excited me, and I got lewed, though the glimpses were so few and short. Now I only saw the nape of the neck, and now her back, according to the postures which a woman takes in arranging her hair, and so far as the looking-glass and blinds and my position above let me. Once or so I saw big breasts of a tawny color. Then she looked at her teeth. Then she disappeared, then came forwards again, and I fancied she was naked to the waist. Then I lost sight of her, and again for an instant saw just the top of her naked bum, as if she were stripped, and in stooping down had bent her back towards the window. When she re-appeared she was more dressed. She looked up at the sky, approaching the window to do so, caught sight of me, and quickly drew the blind right down.

I went down to breakfast, met some friends, and sitting down to table with them in the large breakfast-room, saw close to me this very lady. I had seen so little of her face that I did not recognize her at first by that; but the darkness of the eye and hair, the fullness of bust, and the brown-tinted skin left me in no doubt. We were introduced to each other. “Mrs. O*b***e, a lady from New Orleans, a great friend of ours, — been travelling with us for some weeks, with her two little children,” — and so on.