The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from A Prince of Bohemia by Honore de Balzac: guess that he was joking; she shrank back, stumbled over a chair, and
fell with her head against the corner of the marble chimney-piece. She
thought she should have died. When she could speak, poor woman, as she
lay on the bed, all that she said was, 'I deserved it, Charles!'
"For a moment La Palferine was in despair; his anguish revived
Claudine. She rejoiced in the mishap; she took advantage of her
suffering to compel La Palferine to take the money and release him
from an awkward position. Then followed a variation on La Fontaine's
fable, in which a man blesses the thieves that brought him a sudden
impulse of tenderness from his wife. And while we are upon this
subject, another saying will paint the man for you.
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