Donatien-Alphonse-François, marquis de SADE. L.A., [donjon de Vincennes July 27, 1780], to his wife; 4pages small in-4 filled with small, tight handwriting. Long letter about his conditions of imprisonment, and his hatred of his mother-in-law. "Well, here you are in your great silence... It's right to rest on one's laurels sometimes. I've just been there too, as you see. But the difference between the two of us is that I have nothing to say, and that it is consequently useless for me to write; whereas you, if you wished or if you could, would have a lot to say". He thinks that she is not free... "My portion of hatred will not be divided; I would be too afraid that it would diminish by being shared, and I am too eager to reserve it entirely for her to whom it is so well due". His health suffers considerably from not being able to get fresh air. "I absolutely cannot eat or sleep. [...] to give myself horrible headaches for the whole day by depriving me of sleep, and to prevent me from taking the air, which is the only thing that can dissipate them, is to do me all the ills at once, and these are charming procedures that I don't think I'll forget". He asks for the bottle of eau de Cologne he has been asking for; it is "a gratuitous little tease to refuse me even this little help. [...] I'd rather smash my head against the wall than not force your execrable mother to say one day: 'He was right, I'm sorry. It was not with such a head that it was necessary to act in such a way"... He spent 17 nights without closing his eyes; and the surgeon who visited him was worthy of "the surgeon of the inquisition who checks the pulse during torture to know if it can be sustained any longer [...] all these nasty people have the greatest interest in imposing on families and [......] the horrible abuses that are committed daily in these houses under the shadow of this beautiful secret is one of the things that should most merit the attention of the people in place if there were really fairness in France and if the interested parties did not take the greatest care to silence the voice with gold and pretty women. All is well, all is well, all is the best in the world when one sleeps and fills one's purse. Gold and c. voila the gods of my country"... He would rather go and live in Japan than stay in France: "I would surely find more good faith there and would surely not see so many horrors"... He returns books by Abbé Prévost and d'Alembert: "What a man! What a pen. Here are people I would like to have as arbiters and judges, and not the imbecile sequelle who ventures to govern me. I would not be at pains to be cleared at tribunals like these because one has as little to fear when it is in the hands of the philosophy quest la balance, as one must fear when one sees it in those of bigotry and rapacity"... He would like to read "some very interesting and philosophical novels, but neither too dark nor too languid"... Finally, he asks for a marshmallow tablet, a bottle of eau de Cologne, figs and, when the time comes, "some good Carthusian peaches". But above all, "you will oblige me greatly to get me some fresh air, because [...] it is an infamy to deprive someone of the good of all animals. [...] In filth and dirt up to my collar, eaten by bugs, fleas, mice and spiders, served like a pig, because the affected promptitude with which one flees from my room as soon as one has brought my meals, never leaves me the memory or the time to ask for what I need, and our innkeeper's 3 kitchen staff always ready to fire as soon as my door is opened, isn't all this charming, isn't all this a delicious signal?... a truly pathetic and touching signal"... His hair falls profusely... And he concludes: "May the beloved friend who alone could still soften the end of my career not leave me the pain of outliving her, and may those unfortunate beings who owe us their existence have received it more happily than we did: these are the only wishes I still dare to address to the eternal, and the only ones whose fulfillment would still give birth to a few roses on the thorns of my life". Correspondance (Lély), CXIV.