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You thought again that in sending a lawyer’s letter to your father to say that, rather than sever your eternal[31a] friendship with me, you would give up the allowance of ￡250 a year which, with I believe deductions for your Oxford debts, he was then making you, you were realising the very chivalry of friendship, touching the noblest note of self-denial[31b]. But your surrender of your little allowance did not mean that you were ready to give up even one of your most superfluous luxuries, or most unnecessary extravagances. On the contrary. Your appetite for luxurious living was never so keen. My expenses for eight days in Paris for myself, you, and your Italian servant were nearly ￡150: Paillard alone absorbing ￡85. At the rate at which you wished to live, your entire income for a whole year, if you had taken your meals alone, and been especially economical in your selection of the cheaper form of pleasures, would hardly have lasted you for three weeks. The fact that in what was merely a pretence of bravado you had surrendered your allowance, such as it was, gave you at last a plausible reason for your claim to live at my expense, or what you thought a plausible reason: and on many occasions you seriously availed yourself of it, and gave the very fullest expression to it: and the continued drain, principally of course on me, but also to a certain extent, I know, on your mother, was never so distressing, because in my case at any rate, never so completely unaccompanied by the smallest word of thanks, or sense of limit[31c].
你还以为，给你父亲送去一份律师信，说是与其斩断同我那地久天长的[31a]友谊，你宁愿放弃一年250英镑的津贴——我相信这是扣掉你在牛津的欠债后他当时给你的款子——这么做体现了为朋友甘愿受苦的肝胆义气[31b]。但是放弃那小小的年金，并不意味着你愿意放弃哪怕一种穷奢极欲的享乐，或是哪一样最不需要的挥霍。恰恰相反。你对奢侈生活的追求是前所未有的强烈。同你和你的意大利仆人在巴黎，我八天的开销是150英镑：光是在帕拉德就花了85英镑。照你所希望的这样生活开销下去，就是你一个人吃饭，同时在消遣玩乐方面也特别地节约从事，选比较便宜的，你整年的所有进项也供不了三个星期。你放弃年金不过是虚张声势，而如此一来造成的事实，却让你至少是名正言顺地来靠我的钱过活，或者你认为是名正言顺：在许多时候你是认认真真觉得自己名正言顺，并且表现得淋漓尽致。如此不断地掏钱，当然主要掏的是我的钱，但我知道也令你母亲破了些财，从来没有这样令人心烦过，因为在我这儿，无论怎么说，从来就没听过起码是小小的一声道谢，或是见过一点适可而止的表示[31c]。
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