Dinner is always served by the four sultanas (by, that is to say, the four new wives), and supper by the remaining four sultanas; a quatrain always serves coffee; but the quatrains formerly allocated to each niche in the auditorium are now reduced in number to one boy and one girl.
The reader will recall our mention of the pillars in the auditorium; at the beginning of each seance, Aline is attached to one of them, Adelaide to the other, their buttocks facing out toward the alcoves, and near each pillar is a little table covered with assorted punitive instruments; and so it is the two women are at all times ready to receive the lash. Constance has permission to sit with the storytellers. Each duenna keeps close to her couple, and Julie, completely unclothed, wanders from couch to couch, taking orders and executing them upon the spot. As always, one fucker per couch.
Such is the situation when Desgranges begins her narrations. The friends have also ruled, in a special decree, that, during this month, Aline, Adelaide, Augustine, and Zelmire shall be surrendered to Messieurs' brutal passions, and that Messieurs are at liberty, upon the described day, either to immolate them privately or to invite whichever of their friends they please to witness the sacrifice; and that with what regards Constance, she shall be employed for the celebration of the final week, a full explanation of which shall be given in due time and place. Should the Duc and Curval, who by this arrangement are to be made widowers, be disposed to take another wife to care for their needs until the end of the holiday, they shall be able to do so by making a selection from amongst the four remaining sultanas. But the pillars will remain ungarnished when the two women who garnish them now shall have been bidden a last farewell.
Desgranges starts, and after having reminded her auditors that henceforth the tales shall be those of an exclusively murderous character, she says that she will be careful, as their Lordships have enjoined her to be, to enter into the most minute details, and above all to indicate with what ordinary caprices these libertine assassins preface their more serious exercises; thus, their Lordships will be able to perceive and judge their relationships and associations, and to see how an example of simple libertinage, rectified and elaborated by an unmannerly and unprincipled individual, may lead straight to murder, and to what kind of murder. Then she begins.
THE 1ST OF FEBRUARY. 1. He used to enjoy amusing himself with a beggarwoman who had not had a bit to eat in three days, and his second passion is to leave a woman to die of hunger in a dungeon; he keeps a close watch upon her and frigs himself while examining her, but does not discharge until the day she perishes.
2. He maintains her in her prison cell, toying with her for a long season, gradually diminishing her daily portion of food; beforehand, he has her shit, and eats her turd upon a platter.
3. He formerly liked to suck the mouth and swallow its saliva; in recent days he has developed the passion of immuring a woman in a dungeon with food to last no more than a fortnight; on the thirtieth day, he enters her prison and frigs himself upon the corpse.
4. First, he would have her kiss, then he would slowly destroy her by preventing her from drinking although feeding her all she wanted to eat.
5. He would flog, then later kill the woman by depriving her of sleep.
That same evening, Michette, after having eaten a big supper, is hung head downward until she has vomited everything upon Curval, who stands frigging himself beneath her and eating the manna that descends from on high.
THE 2ND. 6. His first passion was to have her shit into his mouth, and he would eat it as it emerged; nowadays he feeds her a diet of worthless bread and cheap wine. A month on this fare and she starves to death.
7. He was once a great cunt-fucker; now he gives the woman a venereal distemper by injection, but of such virulence she croaks in very short order.
8. As a youth, he was fond of receiving vomit in his mouth, now, by means of a certain decoction, he gives her a deathly fever which results in her speedy demise.
9. He was once wont to gather shit from assholes, presently injects an enema containing toxic ingredients dissolved in boiling water or aqua fortis.
10. Once a famous fustigator, today he binds a woman to a pivot upon which she uninterruptedly revolves until dead.
That evening, an enema of boiling water is given to Rosette the moment after the Duc has finished embuggering her.
THE 3RD. 11. He used to like to slap the whore's face; as a mature man, he twists her head around until it faces backward. When so adjusted, one may simultaneously look at her face and at her buttocks.
12. Addicted to bestiality as a youngster, he now likes to have a girl depucelated by a stallion while he looks on. She ordinarily dies.
13. Once an ass-fucker, he now buries the girl up to her waist and maintains her thus till the lower half of her body rots.
14. Previously, he was wont to frig her clitoris, and he still does so, but more vigorously, employing one of his servants to keep at the work until the girl expires.
15. Gradually perfecting his passion over the years, a fustigator now flogs every part of a woman's body until she perishes.
That evening, the Duc would have Augustine, endowed with an unusually sensitive clitoris, frigged thereupon by Duclos and Champville, who relieve each other at the post and continue the task until the little lady falls unconscious.
THE 4TH. 16. His earlier passion was to squeeze the whore's neck, in later years he would tie the girl by the neck. Before her sits a sumptuous meal, but to reach it she must strangle; otherwise she dies of hunger.
17. The same man who slew Duclos' sister and whose taste is to subject the flesh to a prolonged mauling, abuses the breasts and buttocks with such furious violence that his treatment of the whore proves fatal to her.
18. The man Martaine mentioned on the 20th of January, he who formerly adored bleeding women, now kills them by dint of repeated bloodlettings.
19. He whose passion in times past was to make a naked woman run until she dropped from exhaustion, in this age of unbridled libertinage shuts her up in a steaming bathhouse where she dies of asphyxiation.
20. He whom Duclos cited earlier, the gentleman who liked to be wrapped in swaddling clothes and fed whoreshit in a spoon rather than pap, swathes a girl so tightly in baby's blankets that he kills her.
Shortly before the company moved into the auditorium that afternoon, Curval was found embuggering one of the scullery maids. He pays the fine; the girl is ordered to reappear at the evening's orgies, where the Duc and the Bishop embugger her in their turn, and she receives two hundred lashes from the hand of each of them. She's a strapping country girl, twenty-five, in satisfactory health, and has a fine ass.
THE 5TH. 21. His first passion is for bestiality, his second is to sew the girl into an untanned donkey's skin, her head protruding; he feeds and cares for her until the animal's skin shrinks and crushes her to death.
22. He of whom Martaine spoke on the 15th of January and who liked to hang a girl for his amusement, currently amuses himself by hanging her by her feet until the blood rushing to her head kills her.
23. Duclos' libertine of the 27th of November who liked to besot his whore, today inserts a funnel into her mouth and floods her with liquids till she dies therefrom.
24. Once he was wont to mistreat nipples, but has progressed since then and now buckles a sort of small iron pot over each breast and lowers her over a stove; the iron heats, and she is allowed to perish thus in frightful pain.
25. His whole delight used to consist in watching a woman swim, but he now casts her into a pond and fishes her out half-drowned, then hangs her by the feet to encourage the water to drain out of her. Once she has returned to her senses, into the pond she goes again, and so on and so forth, till she gives up the ghost.
Upon that day and at the same hour, another kitchen servant is found being embuggered, this time by the Duc; he pays the fine, the servant is summoned to the orgies, where everyone cavorts with her, Durcet making good use of her mouth, the others of her bum, and even of her cunt, for she is a virgin, and she is condemned to receive two hundred lashes from each of her employers. She is a girl of eighteen, tall and well made, her hair is auburn in color, and she owns a very fair ass.
That same evening, Curval utters the opinion that it is a matter of extreme urgency that Constance be bled again on account of her pregnancy; the Duc embuggers her, and Curval bleeds her while Augustine frigs his prick against Zelmire's buttocks and while someone else fucks Zelmire. Upon discharging, he executes the puncture; his aim is true.
THE 6TH. 26. As a young man he used to kick a woman in the ass, tumbling her into a brazier, whence she would emerge before suffering excessively. He has lately refined this stunt, now obliges a girl to stand upright between two blazing fires: one cooks her in front, the other behind; and there she remains until the fat on her body melts.
Desgranges announces that she is going to describe murders which, bringing on a prompt death, cause very little suffering.
27. In former times he would impede respiration by constricting the neck with his hands or by blocking the nose and mouth, but these days he deposits the whore between four mattresses and she suffocates.
28. He of whom Martaine said a few words and who used to allow his victim a choice from among three manners of dying (see the 14th of January) has of late begun to blow out the whore's brains, denying her any say in the matter; he embuggers, and upon discharging, pulls the trigger.
29. The man Champville referred to on the 22nd of December as the libertine who made the girl dance with the cat, presently flings the whore from the top of a tower. She lands on sharp gravel. He discharges upon hearing her land.
30. That gentleman who liked to throttle his partner while embuggering her, and whom Martaine described on the 6th of January, has advanced to the stage at which, as he embuggers her, he slips a black silk cord about her neck and strangles her while discharging; this delight, says Desgranges, is one of the most exquisite a libertine can procure himself.
Upon that day, Messieurs celebrate the festival of the fourteenth week, and, in the guise of a woman, Curval becomes Bum-Cleaver's wife, and, as a man, takes Adonis to be his helpmeet; 'tis not till then that child is depucelated, and the event occurs very publicly, while Bum-Cleaver is fucking the President.
Messieurs besot themselves at supper. And they flog Zelmire and Augustine about the loins, the buttocks, the thighs, the belly, the cunt, and the groin, then Curval has Zelmire fucked by Adonis, his new wife, and embuggers both of them one after the other.
THE 7TH. 31. He once liked to fuck a drowsy woman; he does much better now: he kills her with a strong dose of opium and encunts her during her death-sleep.
32. The same roue she referred to very recently, and who subjects the whore to a series of duckings, has still another passion: tying a stone to her neck, he drowns the woman.
33. Whereas once he was content to slap her face, now he carries matters further: he pours molten lead into her ear while she is asleep.
34. He was fond of whipping her face; Champville spoke of him on the 30th of December (verify that); but now he dispatches the girl with a quick hammer blow upon the temple.
35. This libertine would previously allow a candle to burn out in a woman's anus; today, he attaches her to a lightning rod during a thunderstorm and awaits a fortuitous stroke.
36. A sometime fustigator. He has her bend over with her behind facing the muzzle of a small piece of artillery. The ball enters her ass.
That day 'tis the Bishop they discover with his prick lodged in the third kitchen servant's asshole. He pays the fine, the Duc and Curval embugger and cunt-fuck her, for she is also a virgin, then she is given a total of eight hundred stripes, two hundred by each friend. She is Swiss, nineteen, very fair of skin, very plump, and has a splendid ass. The cooks complain and say that the service will not be able to continue any longer if Messieurs go on fussing about with the help, and the society agrees to a truce extending until March.
Rosette loses a finger that evening, and the wound is cauterized with fire. She is sandwiched between Curval and the Duc during the operation: one fucks her ass, the other her cunt. Adonis' ass is made generally available that same evening; and so it is that the Duc cunt-fucks one servant and Rosette at the orgies and ass-fucks the same servant, ass-fucks Rosette too, and Adonis. He is tired.
THE 8TH. 37. His whole delight once lay in beating a woman's entire body with a bull's pizzle; 'twas to him Martaine alluded as the man who strained all four of his victim's limbs on the rack and broke but one of them. He likes now thoroughly to break the woman on the wheel, but he chokes her to death when he has finished exercising her.
38. Martaine's gentleman who would feign a decapitation and have the woman snatched from beneath the blade at the last moment, now severs her head in all good faith. He discharges as the blow falls. He frigs himself.
39. Martaine's libertine of the 30th of January who was wont to perform an extensive scarification, now consigns his victims to perish in dungeons.
40. He used to be a whipper of pregnant women's bellies, has latterly perfected that by causing an enormous weight to fall on the pregnant woman's belly, thereby crushing her and her fruit at one stroke.
41. Formerly, he was known to be fond of the sight of a girl's bare neck, which he would squeeze and molest somewhat; that mild passion has been replaced by the insertion of a pin in a certain spot upon the woman's neck. The pin kills her at once.