Dear Madam,

Now please not to frown, still less to cry out, “Shocking!”

I assure you, you may turn over the leaves of this book from beginning to end without fear of encountering a single piece of indiscretion.

I know that fresh air and cold water are your delight. You dearly love to shiver at the contact of a dripping sponge; but your door is carefully closed, and I have seen nothing.

It is not your undraped photograph that I publish, it is the litany of your good qualities that I sing.

May I be allowed here to say freely what I think?

Well, dear Madam, I think that, if the human race, including Mr. Bull your husband, felt for you half the admiration which your charms and virtues inspire in me, you would be justly proclaimed the goddess of conjugal felicity.

Now you ought to give me a smile for that, I think. Open this little volume fearlessly, dear Madam, and if you should light upon any mention—I will not say of your faults, for most certainly you have none—but of some few little oddities perhaps, do not be offended; but remember that our real friends are those who tell us the truth—en ami, of course—but still who do tell it us.