Abstract
The passage studied comes at a tipping point in the novel, where denial gives way to desire, the gesture of generosity to physical attraction: moved by the fate of a young Greek woman locked in the seraglio of Pasha Chériber, the narrator has cunning to repurchase it, and hide it temporarily with a Greek Orthodox, the "master of languages". The prolonged visit he makes to her, the dream in which she appears to him, a night of restless sleep, and the certainty of perceiving a reciprocity of feeling in her, make him decide to "rush the adventure" and make her his mistress..