The Awakening and Selected Short Stories - Page 61/161

Edna felt depressed rather than soothed after leaving them. The little

glimpse of domestic harmony which had been offered her, gave her no

regret, no longing. It was not a condition of life which fitted her, and

she could see in it but an appalling and hopeless ennui. She was moved

by a kind of commiseration for Madame Ratignolle,--a pity for that

colorless existence which never uplifted its possessor beyond the region

of blind contentment, in which no moment of anguish ever visited her

soul, in which she would never have the taste of life's delirium. Edna

vaguely wondered what she meant by "life's delirium." It had crossed her

thought like some unsought, extraneous impression.