Diary of Marie Bashkirtseff
CZENUKFR

Monday, 11 August 1879

I spent two hours at the Gavinis', just the three of us. These people represent perfectly the banal, reasonable and down-to-earth society. I go there to seek the opinions of everyone and the current rules of conduct. One also speaks of marriages such as are made every day. I have finally consented to confess that I shall have 100,000 francs in income upon marrying, more than double afterwards. That my family has 400,000 francs in income, that my aunt is very rich and will give me everything. I added however that my father eats up a great deal and I initialed all these lies by declaring that under no pretext would I marry a man having less than double what I have. In this way I gain the consideration that money procures and I spare myself the speculations of fortune hunters... up to a certain point. Mother Gavini reads my horoscope and tells me that she sees me at the age of thirty [years] at the head of a salon and occupying myself only with politics and succeeding Mmes de Lieven, Troubetskoy, etc. But for that one must marry.
"Certainly, Madame, but I want him to be very rich."
She speaks to me of M. de Rivoli, I pretend to disdain [him] but in reality I do not have enough money for that. All of this is quite disgusting.
Until now I did not want people to say that I am rich but since M. de l'Ariege nearly appeared on the horizon I want it, on the contrary. This little vain man would be more quickly attracted by the pride one would display than by anything else in the world.
But my life is finished. There was only Cassagnac for me...
I believe I speak the truth and whatever one may think, it is true. Is it a matter of the heart or is it that we would truly be well matched?... I do not even seek to know. I shall leave tomorrow, I need a diversion, I need a change.
The Acard girl, moustachioed beauty; at forty she will have a beard. Mother Couvelet, the little brother-in-law. O ignominy. Yes, he must have loved that creature to have committed such stupidities!
They laugh when I speak of Cassagnac's honor, I mean that honor which is, so to speak... superior and subtle, which would oppose this marriage. They do not believe in his chivalry. No matter.
He could have married some grocer's daughter worth millions. He loved her at least for an instant. Blanc says she was his mistress... Be that as it may, it changes nothing about the matter.
I do not wish to marry in France.
I shall go to marry in Russia in the winter of 1880-1881. That is to say the winter after next. I shall be twenty-two years old.