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+Project Gutenberg's In the Days of My Youth, by Amelia Ann Blandford Edwards
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: In the Days of My Youth
+
+Author: Amelia Ann Blandford Edwards
+
+Release Date: May 26, 2004 [EBook #12442]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK IN THE DAYS OF MY YOUTH ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Curtis Weyant, Charlie Kirschner and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team.
+
+
+
+
+
+IN THE
+
+DAYS OF MY YOUTH.
+
+A NOVEL.
+
+
+BY
+AMELIA B. EDWARDS
+
+1874
+
+[Illustration]
+
+CAXTON PRESS OF
+SHERMAN & CO., PHILADELPHIA.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+MY BIRTHPLACE AND PARENTAGE.
+
+     Dolce sentier,
+     Colle, che mi piacesti,
+     Ov'ancor per usanza amor mi mena!
+
+     PETRARCH.
+
+Sweet, secluded, shady Saxonholme! I doubt if our whole England contains
+another hamlet so quaint, so picturesquely irregular, so thoroughly
+national in all its rustic characteristics. It lies in a warm hollow
+environed by hills. Woods, parks and young plantations clothe every
+height and slope for miles around, whilst here and there, peeping down
+through green vistas, or towering above undulating seas of summer
+foliage, stands many a fine old country mansion, turreted and gabled,
+and built of that warm red brick that seems to hold the light of the
+sunset long after it has faded from the rest of the landscape. A silver
+thread of streamlet, swift but shallow, runs noisily through the meadows
+beside the town and loses itself in the Chad, about a mile and a half
+farther eastward. Many a picturesque old wooden bridge, many a foaming
+weir and ruinous water-mill with weedy wheel, may be found scattered up
+and down the wooded banks of this little river Chad; while to the brook,
+which we call the Gipstream, attaches a vague tradition of trout.
+
+The hamlet itself is clean and old-fashioned, consisting of one long,
+straggling street, and a few tributary lanes and passages. The houses
+some few years back were mostly long and low-fronted, with projecting
+upper stories, and diamond-paned bay-windows bowered in with myrtle and
+clematis; but modern improvements have done much of late to sweep away
+these antique tenements, and a fine new suburb of Italian and Gothic
+villas has sprung up, between the town and the railway station. Besides
+this, we have a new church in the mediæval style, rich in gilding and
+colors and thirteenth-century brass-work; and a new cemetery, laid out
+like a pleasure-garden; and a new school-house, where the children are
+taught upon a system with a foreign name; and a Mechanics' Institute,
+where London professors come down at long intervals to expound popular
+science, and where agriculturists meet to discuss popular grievances.
+
+At the other extremity of the town, down by Girdlestone Grange, an old
+moated residence where the squire's family have resided these four
+centuries past, we are full fifty years behind our modern neighbors.
+Here stands our famous old "King's-head Inn," a well-known place of
+resort so early as the reign of Elizabeth. The great oak beside the
+porch is as old as the house itself; and on the windows of a little
+disused parlor overlooking the garden may still be seen the names of
+Sedley, Rochester and other wits of the Restoration. They scrawled those
+autographs after dinner, most likely, with their diamond rings, and went
+reeling afterwards, arm-in-arm, along the village street, singing and
+swearing, and eager for adventures--as gentlemen were wont to be in
+those famous old times when they drank the king's health more freely
+than was good for their own.
+
+Not far from the "King's Head," and almost hidden by the trees which
+divide it from the road, stands an ancient charitable institution called
+the College--quadrangular, mullion-windowed, many-gabled, and colonized
+by some twenty aged people of both sexes. At the back of the college,
+adjoining a space of waste ground and some ruined cloisters, lies the
+churchyard, in the midst of which, surrounded by solemn yews and
+mouldering tombs, stands the Priory Church. It is a rare old church,
+founded, according to the county history, in the reign of Edward the
+Confessor, and entered with a full description in Domesday Book. Its
+sculptured monuments and precious brasses, its Norman crypt, carved
+stalls and tattered banners drooping over faded scutcheons, tell all of
+generations long gone by, of noble families extinct, of gallant deeds
+forgotten, of knights and ladies remembered only by the names above
+their graves. Amongst these, some two or three modest tablets record the
+passing away of several generations of my own predecessors--obscure
+professional men for the most part, of whom some few became soldiers and
+died abroad.
+
+In close proximity to the church stands the vicarage, once the Priory; a
+quaint old rambling building, surrounded by magnificent old trees. Here
+for long centuries, a tribe of rooks have held undisputed possession,
+filling the boughs with their nests and the air with their voices, and,
+like genuine lords of the soil, descending at their own grave will and
+pleasure upon the adjacent lands.
+
+Picturesque and mediæval as all these old buildings and old associations
+help to make us, we of Saxonholme pretend to something more. We claim to
+be, not only picturesque but historic. Nay, more than this--we are
+classical. WE WERE FOUNDED BY THE ROMANS. A great Roman road, well known
+to antiquaries, passed transversely through the old churchyard. Roman
+coins and relics, and fragments of tesselated pavement, have been found
+in and about the town. Roman camps may be traced on most of the heights
+around. Above all, we are said to be indebted to the Romans for that
+inestimable breed of poultry in right of which we have for years carried
+off the leading prizes at every poultry-show in the county, and have
+even been enabled to make head against the exaggerated pretensions of
+modern Cochin-China interlopers.
+
+Such, briefly sketched, is my native Saxonholme. Born beneath the shade
+of its towering trees and overhanging eaves, brought up to reverence its
+antiquities, and educated in the love of its natural beauties, what
+wonder that I cling to it with every fibre of my heart, and even when
+affecting to smile at my own fond prejudice, continue to believe it the
+loveliest peacefulest nook in rural England?
+
+My father's name was John Arbuthnot. Sprung from the Arbuthnots of
+Montrose, we claim to derive from a common ancestor with the celebrated
+author of "Martinus Scriblerus." Indeed, the first of our name who
+settled at Saxonholme was one James Arbuthnot, son to a certain
+nonjuring parson Arbuthnot, who lived and died abroad, and was own
+brother to that famous wit, physician and courtier whose genius, my
+father was wont to say, conferred a higher distinction upon our branch
+of the family than did those Royal Letters-Patent whereby the elder
+stock was ennobled by His most Gracious Majesty King George the Fourth,
+on the occasion of his visit to Edinburgh in 1823. From this James
+Arbuthnot (who, being born and bred at St. Omer, and married, moreover,
+to a French wife, was himself half a Frenchman) we Saxonholme Arbuthnots
+were the direct descendants.
+
+Our French ancestress, according to the family tradition, was of no very
+exalted origin, being in fact the only daughter and heiress of one
+Monsieur Tartine, Perruquier in chief at the Court of Versailles. But
+what this lady wanted in birth, she made up in fortune, and the modest
+estate which her husband purchased with her dowry came down to us
+unimpaired through five generations. In the substantial and somewhat
+foreign-looking red-brick house which he built (also, doubtless, with
+Madame's Louis d'ors) we, his successors, had lived and died ever since.
+His portrait, together with the portraits of his wife, son, and
+grandson, hung on the dining-room walls; and of the quaint old
+spindle-legged chairs and tables that had adorned our best rooms from
+time immemorial, some were supposed to date as far back as the first
+founding and furnishing of the house.
+
+It is almost needless to say that the son of the non-juror and his
+immediate posterity were staunch Jacobites, one and all. I am not aware
+that they ever risked or suffered anything for the cause; but they were
+not therefore the less vehement. Many were the signs and tokens of that
+dead-and-gone political faith which these loyal Arbuthnots left behind
+them. In the bed-rooms there hung prints of King James the Second at the
+Battle of the Boyne; of the Royal Martyr with his plumed hat, lace
+collar, and melancholy fatal face; of the Old and Young Pretenders; of
+the Princess Louisa Teresia, and of the Cardinal York. In the library
+were to be found all kinds of books relating to the career of that
+unhappy family: "Ye Tragicall History of ye Stuarts, 1697;" "Memoirs of
+King James II., writ by his own hand;" "La Stuartide," an unfinished
+epic in the French language by one Jean de Schelandre; "The Fate of
+Majesty exemplified in the barbarous and disloyal treatment (by
+traitorous and undutiful subjects) of the Kings and Queens of the Royal
+House of Stuart," genealogies of the Stuarts in English, French and
+Latin; a fine copy of "Eikon Basilike," bound in old red morocco, with
+the royal arms stamped upon the cover; and many other volumes on the
+same subject, the names of which (although as a boy I was wont to pore
+over their contents with profound awe and sympathy) I have now for the
+most part forgotten.
+
+Most persons, I suppose, have observed how the example of a successful
+ancestor is apt to determine the pursuits of his descendants down to the
+third and fourth generations, inclining the lads of this house to the
+sea, and of that to the bar, according as the great man of the family
+achieved his honors on shipboard, or climbed his way to the woolsack.
+The Arbuthnots offered no exception to this very natural law of
+selection. They could not help remembering how the famous doctor had
+excelled in literature as in medicine; how he had been not only
+Physician in Ordinary to Queen Anne and Prince George of Denmark, but a
+satirist and pamphleteer, a wit and the friend of wits--of such wits as
+Pope and Swift, Harley and Bolingbroke. Hence they took, as it were
+instinctively, to physic and the _belles lettres_, and were never
+without a doctor or an author in the family.
+
+My father, however, like the great Martinus Scriblerus, was both doctor
+and author. And he was a John Arbuthnot. And to carry the resemblance
+still further, he was gifted with a vein of rough epigrammatic humor, in
+which it pleased his independence to indulge without much respect of
+persons, times, or places. His tongue, indeed, cost him some friends and
+gained him some enemies; but I am not sure that it diminished his
+popularity as a physician. People compared him to Abernethy, whereby he
+was secretly flattered. Some even went so far as to argue that only a
+very clever man could afford to be a bear; and I must say that he pushed
+this conclusion to its farthest limit, showing his temper alike to rich
+and poor upon no provocation whatever. He cared little, to be sure, for
+his connection. He loved the profession theoretically, and from a
+scientific point of view; but he disliked the drudgery of country
+practice, and stood in no need of its hardly-earned profits. Yet he was
+a man who so loved to indulge his humor, no matter at what cost, that I
+doubt whether he would have been more courteous had his bread depended
+on it. As it was, he practised and grumbled, snarled at his patients,
+quarrelled with the rich, bestowed his time and money liberally upon the
+poor, and amused his leisure by writing for a variety of scientific
+periodicals, both English and foreign.
+
+Our home stood at the corner of a lane towards the eastern extremity of
+the town, commanding a view of the Squire's Park, and a glimpse of the
+mill-pool and meadows in the valley beyond. This lane led up to
+Barnard's Green, a breezy space of high, uneven ground dedicated to
+fairs, cricket matches, and travelling circuses, whence the noisy music
+of brass bands, and the echoes of alternate laughter and applause, were
+wafted past our windows in the summer evenings. We had a large garden at
+the back, and a stable up the lane; and though the house was but one
+story in height, it covered a considerable space of ground, and
+contained more rooms than we ever had occasion to use. Thus it happened
+that since my mother's death, which took place when I was a very little
+boy, many doors on the upper floor were kept locked, to the undue
+development of my natural inquisitiveness by day, and my mortal terror
+when sent to bed at night. In one of these her portrait still hung above
+the mantelpiece, and her harp stood in its accustomed corner. In
+another, which was once her bedroom, everything was left as in her
+lifetime, her clothes yet hanging in the wardrobe, her dressing-case
+standing upon the toilet, her favorite book upon the table beside the
+bed. These things, told to me by the servants with much mystery, took a
+powerful hold upon my childish imagination. I trembled as I passed the
+closed doors at dusk, and listened fearfully outside when daylight gave
+me courage to linger near them. Something of my mother's presence, I
+fancied, must yet dwell within--something in her shape still wander from
+room to room in the dim moonlight, and echo back the sighing of the
+night winds. Alas! I could not remember her. Now and then, as if
+recalled by a dream, some broken and shadowy images of a pale face and a
+slender hand floated vaguely through my mind; but faded even as I strove
+to realize them. Sometimes, too, when I was falling off to sleep in my
+little bed, or making out pictures in the fire on a winter evening,
+strange fragments of old rhymes seemed to come back upon me, mingled
+with the tones of a soft voice and the haunting of a long-forgotten
+melody. But these, after all, were yearnings more of the heart than
+the memory:--
+
+     "I felt a mother-want about the world.
+          And still went seeking."
+
+To return to my description of my early home:--the two rooms on either
+side of the hall, facing the road, were appropriated by my father for
+his surgery and consulting-room; while the two corresponding rooms at
+the back were fitted up as our general reception-room, and my father's
+bed-room. In the former of these, and in the weedy old garden upon which
+it opened, were passed all the days of my boyhood.
+
+It was my father's good-will and pleasure to undertake the sole charge
+of my education. Fain would I have gone like other lads of my age to
+public school and college; but on this point, as on most others, he was
+inflexible. Himself an obscure physician in a remote country town, he
+brought me up with no other view than to be his own successor. The
+profession was not to my liking. Somewhat contemplative and nervous by
+nature, there were few pursuits for which I was less fitted. I knew
+this, but dared not oppose him. Loving study for its own sake, and
+trusting to the future for some lucky turn of destiny, I yielded to that
+which seemed inevitable, and strove to make the best of it.
+
+Thus it came to pass that I lived a quiet, hard-working home life, while
+other boys of my age were going through the joyous experience of school,
+and chose my companions from the dusty shelves of some three or four
+gigantic book-cases, instead of from the class and the playground. Not
+that I regret it. I believe, on the contrary, that a boy may have worse
+companions than books and busts, employments less healthy than the study
+of anatomy, and amusements more pernicious than Shakespeare and Horace.
+Thank Heaven! I escaped all such; and if, as I have been told, my
+boyhood was unboyish, and my youth prematurely cultivated, I am content
+to have been spared the dangers in exchange for the pleasures of a
+public school.
+
+I do not, however, pretend to say that I did not sometimes pine for the
+recreations common to my age. Well do I remember the manifold
+attractions of Barnard's Green. What longing glances I used to steal
+towards the boisterous cricketers, when going gravely forth upon a
+botanical walk with my father! With what eager curiosity have I not
+lingered many a time before the entrance to a forbidden booth, and
+scanned the scenic advertisement of a travelling show! Alas! how the
+charms of study paled before those intervals of brief but bitter
+temptation! What, then, was pathology compared to the pig-faced lady, or
+the Materia Medica to Smith's Mexican Circus, patronized by all the
+sovereigns of Europe? But my father was inexorable. He held that such
+places were, to use his own words, "opened by swindlers for the ruin of
+fools," and from one never-to-be-forgotten hour, when he caught me in
+the very act of taking out my penny-worth at a portable peep-show, he
+bound me over by a solemn promise (sealed by a whipping) never to repeat
+the offence under any provocation or pretext whatsoever. I was a tiny
+fellow in pinafores when this happened, but having once pledged my word,
+I kept it faithfully through all the studious years that lay between six
+and sixteen.
+
+At sixteen an immense crisis occurred in my life. I fell in love. I had
+been in love several times before--chiefly with the elder pupils at the
+Miss Andrews' establishment; and once (but that was when I was very
+young indeed) with the cook. This, however, was a much more romantic and
+desperate affair. The lady was a Columbine by profession, and as
+beautiful as an angel. She came down to our neighborhood with a
+strolling company, and performed every evening, in a temporary theatre
+on the green, for nearly three weeks. I used to steal out after dinner
+when my father was taking his nap, and run the whole way, that I might
+be in time to see the object of my adoration walking up and down the
+platform outside the booth before the performances commenced. This
+incomparable creature wore a blue petticoat spangled with tinfoil, and a
+wreath of faded poppies. Her age might have been about forty. I thought
+her the loveliest of created beings. I wrote sonnets to her--dozens of
+them--intending to leave them at the theatre door, but never finding the
+courage to do it. I made up bouquets for her, over and over again,
+chosen from the best flowers in our neglected garden; but invariably
+with the same result. I hated the harlequin who presumed to put his arm
+about her waist. I envied the clown, whom she condescended to address as
+Mr. Merriman. In short, I was so desperately in love that I even tried
+to lie awake at night and lose my appetite; but, I am ashamed to own,
+failed signally in both endeavors.
+
+At length I wrote to her. I can even now recall passages out of that
+passionate epistle. I well remember how it took me a whole morning to
+write it; how I crammed it with quotations from Horace; and how I fondly
+compared her to most of the mythological divinities. I then copied it
+out on pale pink paper, folded it in the form of a heart, and directed
+it to Miss Angelina Lascelles, and left it, about dusk, with the
+money-taker at the pit door. I signed myself, if I remember rightly,
+Pyramus. What would I not have given that evening to pay my sixpence
+like the rest of the audience, and feast my eyes upon her from some
+obscure corner! What would I not have given to add my quota to
+the applause!
+
+I could hardly sleep that night; I could hardly read or write, or eat my
+breakfast the next morning, for thinking of my letter and its probable
+effect. It never once occurred to me that my Angelina might possibly
+find it difficult to construe Horace. Towards evening, I escaped again,
+and flew to Barnard's Green. It wanted nearly an hour to the time of
+performance; but the tuning of a violin was audible from within, and the
+money-taker was already there with his pipe in his mouth and his hands
+in his pockets. I had no courage to address that functionary; but I
+lingered in his sight and sighed audibly, and wandered round and round
+the canvas walls that hedged my divinity. Presently he took his pipe out
+of, his mouth and his hands out of his pockets; surveyed me deliberately
+from head to foot, and said:--
+
+"Hollo there! aint you the party that brought a three-cornered letter
+here last evening!"
+
+I owned it, falteringly.
+
+He lifted a fold in the canvas, and gave me a gentle shove between the
+shoulders.
+
+"Then you're to go in," said he, shortly. "She's there, somewhere.
+You're sure to find her."
+
+The canvas dropped behind me, and I found myself inside. My heart beat
+so fast that I could scarcely breathe. The booth was almost dark; the
+curtain was down; and a gentleman with striped legs was lighting the
+footlamps. On the front pit bench next the orchestra, discussing a plate
+of bread and meat and the contents of a brown jug, sat a stout man in
+shirt-sleeves and a woman in a cotton gown. The woman rose as I made my
+appearance, and asked, civilly enough, whom I pleased to want.
+
+I stammered the name of Miss Angelina Lascelles.
+
+"Miss Lascelles!" she repeated. "I am Miss Lascelles," Then, looking at
+me more narrowly, "I suppose," she added, "you are the little boy that
+brought the letter?"
+
+The little boy that brought the letter! Gracious heavens! And this
+middle-aged woman in a cotton gown--was she the Angelina of my dreams!
+The booth went round with me, and the lights danced before my eyes.
+
+"If you have come for an answer," she continued, "you may just say to
+your Mr. Pyramid that I am a respectable married woman, and he ought to
+be ashamed of himself--and, as for his letter, I never read such a heap
+of nonsense in my life! There, you can go out by the way you came in,
+and if you take my advice, you won't come back again!"
+
+How I looked, what I said, how I made my exit, whether the doorkeeper
+spoke to me as I passed, I have no idea to this day. I only know that I
+flung myself on the dewy grass under a great tree in the first field I
+came to, and shed tears of such shame, disappointment, and wounded
+pride, as my eyes had never known before. She had called me a little
+boy, and my letter a heap of nonsense! She was elderly--she was
+ignorant--she was married! I had been a fool; but that knowledge came
+too late, and was not consolatory.
+
+By-and-by, while I was yet sobbing and disconsolate, I heard the
+drumming and fifing which heralded the appearance of the _Corps
+Dramatique_ on the outer platform. I resolved to see her for the last
+time. I pulled my hat over my eyes, went back to the Green, and mingled
+with the crowd outside the booth. It was growing dusk. I made my way to
+the foot of the ladder, and observed her narrowly. I saw that her ankles
+were thick, and her elbows red. The illusion was all over. The spangles
+had lost their lustre, and the poppies their glow. I no longer hated the
+harlequin, or envied the clown, or felt anything but mortification at my
+own folly.
+
+"Miss Angelina Lascelles, indeed!" I said to myself, as I sauntered
+moodily home. "Pshaw! I shouldn't wonder if her name was Snooks!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+THE LITTLE CHEVALIER.
+
+     A mere anatomy, a mountebank,
+     A threadbare juggler.
+
+     _Comedy of Errors_.
+
+     Nay, then, he is a conjuror.
+
+     _Henry VI_.
+
+My adventure with Miss Lascelles did me good service, and cured me for
+some time, at least, of my leaning towards the tender passion. I
+consequently devoted myself more closely than ever to my
+studies--indulged in a passing mania for genealogy and heraldry--began a
+collection of local geological specimens, all of which I threw away at
+the end of the first fortnight--and took to rearing rabbits in an old
+tumble-down summer-house at the end of the garden. I believe that from
+somewhere about this time I may also date the commencement of a great
+epic poem in blank verse, and Heaven knows how many cantos, which was to
+be called the Columbiad. It began, I remember, with a description of the
+Court of Ferdinand and Isabella, and the departure of Columbus, and was
+intended to celebrate the discovery, colonization, and subsequent
+history of America. I never got beyond ten or a dozen pages of the first
+canto, however, and that Transatlantic epic remains unfinished to
+this day.
+
+The great event which I have recorded in the preceding chapter took
+place in the early summer. It must, therefore, have been towards the
+close of autumn in the same year when my next important adventure
+befell. This time the temptation assumed a different shape.
+
+Coming briskly homewards one fine frosty morning after having left a
+note at the Vicarage, I saw a bill-sticker at work upon a line of dead
+wall which at that time reached from the Red Lion Inn to the corner of
+Pitcairn's Lane. His posters were printed in enormous type, and
+decorated with a florid bordering in which the signs of the zodiac
+conspicuously figured Being somewhat idly disposed, I followed the
+example of other passers-by, and lingered to watch the process and read
+the advertisement. It ran as follows:----
+
+MAGIC AND MYSTERY! MAGIC AND MYSTERY!
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+M. LE CHEVALIER ARMAND PROUDHINE, (of Paris) surnamed
+
+THE WIZARD OF THE CAUCASUS,
+
+Has the honor to announce to the Nobility and Gentry of Saxonholme and
+its vicinity, that he will, to-morrow evening (October--, 18--),
+hold his First
+
+SOIREE FANTASTIQUE
+
+IN
+
+THE LARGE ROOM OF THE RED LION HOTEL.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+ADMISSION 1s. RESERVED SEATS 2s. 6d.
+
+_To commence at Seven_.
+
+N.B.--_The performance will include a variety of new and surprising
+feats of Legerdemain never before exhibited_.
+
+_A soirée fantastique_! what would I not give to be present at a _soirée
+fantastique_! I had read of the Rosicrucians, of Count Cagliostro, and
+of Doctor Dee. I had peeped into more than one curious treatise on
+Demonology, and I fancied there could be nothing in the world half so
+marvellous as that last surviving branch of the Black Art entitled the
+Science of Legerdemain.
+
+What if, for this once, I were to ask leave to be present at the
+performance? Should I do so with even the remotest chance of success? It
+was easier to propound this momentous question than to answer it. My
+father, as I have already said, disapproved of public entertainments,
+and his prejudices were tolerably inveterate. But then, what could be
+more genteel than the programme, or more select than the prices? How
+different was an entertainment given in the large room of the Red Lion
+Hotel to a three-penny wax-work, or a strolling circus on Barnard's
+Green! I had made one of the audience in that very room over and over
+again when the Vicar read his celebrated "Discourses to Youth," or Dr.
+Dunks came down from Grinstead to deliver an explosive lecture on
+chemistry; and I had always seen the reserved seats filled by the best
+families in the neighborhood. Fully persuaded of the force of my own
+arguments, I made up my mind to prefer this tremendous request on the
+first favorable opportunity, and so hurried home, with my head full of
+quite other thoughts than usual.
+
+My father was sitting at the table with a mountain of books and papers
+before him. He looked up sharply as I entered, jerked his chair round so
+as to get the light at his back, put on his spectacles, and
+ejaculated:--
+
+"Well, sir!"
+
+This was a bad sign, and one with which I was only too familiar. Nature
+had intended my father for a barrister. He was an adept in all the arts
+of intimidation, and would have conducted a cross-examination to
+perfection. As it was, he indulged in a good deal of amateur practice,
+and from the moment when he turned his back to the light and donned the
+inexorable spectacles, there was not a soul in the house, from myself
+down to the errand-boy, who was not perfectly aware of something
+unpleasant to follow.
+
+"Well, sir!" he repeated, rapping impatiently upon the table with his
+knuckles.
+
+Having nothing to reply to this greeting, I looked out of the window and
+remained silent; whereby, unfortunately. I irritated him still more.
+
+"Confound you, sir!" he exclaimed, "have you nothing to say?"
+
+"Nothing," I replied, doggedly.
+
+"Stand there!" he said, pointing to a particular square in the pattern
+of the carpet. "Stand there!"
+
+I obeyed.
+
+"And now, perhaps, you will have the goodness to explain what you have
+been about this morning; and why it should have taken you just
+thirty-seven minutes by the clock to accomplish a journey which a
+tortoise--yes, sir, a tortoise,--might have done in less than ten?"
+
+I gravely compared my watch with the clock before replying.
+
+"Upon my word, sir," I said, "your tortoise would have the advantage of
+me."
+
+"The advantage of you! What do you mean by the advantage of you, you
+affected puppy?"
+
+"I had no idea," said I, provokingly, "that you were in unusual haste
+this morning."
+
+"Haste!" shouted my father. "I never said I was in haste. I never choose
+to be in haste. I hate haste!"
+
+"Then why..."
+
+"Because you have been wasting your time and mine, sir," interrupted he.
+"Because I will not permit you to go idling and vagabondizing about
+the village."
+
+My _sang froid_ was gone directly.
+
+"Idling and vagabondizing!" I repeated angrily. "I have done nothing of
+the kind. I defy you to prove it. When have you known me forget that I
+am a gentleman?"
+
+"Humph!" growled my father, mollified but sarcastic; "a pretty
+gentleman--a gentleman of sixteen!"
+
+"It is true,"' I continued, without heeding the interruption, "that I
+lingered for a moment to read a placard by the way; but if you will take
+the trouble, sir, to inquire at the Rectory, you will find that I waited
+a quarter of an hour before I could send up your letter."
+
+My father grinned and rubbed his hands. If there was one thing in the
+world that aggravated him more than another, it was to find his fire
+opposed to ice. Let him, however, succeed in igniting his adversary, and
+he was in a good humor directly.
+
+"Come, come, Basil," said he, taking off his spectacles, "I never said
+you were not a good lad. Go to your books, boy--go to your books; and
+this evening I will examine you in vegetable physiology."
+
+Silently, but not sullenly, I drew a chair to the table, and resumed my
+work. We were both satisfied, because each in his heart considered
+himself the victor. My father was amused at having irritated me, whereas
+I was content because he had, in some sort, withdrawn the expressions
+that annoyed me. Hence we both became good-tempered, and, according to
+our own tacit fashion, continued during the rest of that morning to be
+rather more than usually sociable.
+
+Hours passed thus--hours of quiet study, during which the quick
+travelling of a pen or the occasional turning of a page alone disturbed
+the silence. The warm sunlight which shone in so greenly through the
+vine leaves, stole, inch by inch, round the broken vases in the garden
+beyond, and touched their brown mosses with a golden bloom. The patient
+shadow on the antique sundial wound its way imperceptibly from left to
+right, and long slanting threads of light and shadow pierced in time
+between the branches of the poplars. Our mornings were long, for we rose
+early and dined late; and while my father paid professional visits, I
+devoted my hours to study. It rarely happened that he could thus spend a
+whole day among his books. Just as the clock struck four, however, there
+came a ring at the bell.
+
+My father settled himself obstinately in his chair.
+
+"If that's a gratis patient," said he, between his teeth, "I'll not
+stir. From eight to ten are their hours, confound them!"
+
+"If you please, sir," said Mary, peeping in, "if you please, sir, it's a
+gentleman."
+
+"A stranger?" asked my father.
+
+Mary nodded, put her hand to her mouth, and burst into an irrepressible
+giggle.
+
+"If you please, sir," she began--but could get no farther.
+
+My father was in a towering passion directly.
+
+"Is the girl mad?" he shouted. "What is the meaning of this buffoonery?"
+
+"Oh, sir--if you please, sir," ejaculated Mary, struggling with terror
+and laughter together, "it's the gentleman, sir. He--he says, if you
+please, sir, that his name is Almond Pudding!"
+
+"Your pardon, Mademoiselle," said a plaintive voice. "Armand
+Proudhine--le Chevalier Armand Proudhine, at your service."
+
+Mary disappeared with her apron to her mouth, and subsided into distant
+peals of laughter, leaving the Chevalier standing in the doorway.
+
+He was a very little man, with a pinched and melancholy countenance, and
+an eye as wistful as a dog's. His threadbare clothes, made in the
+fashion of a dozen years before, had been decently mended in many
+places. A paste pin in a faded cravat, and a jaunty cane with a
+pinchbeck top, betrayed that he was still somewhat of a beau. His scant
+gray hair was tied behind with a piece of black ribbon, and he carried
+his hat under his arm, after the fashion of Elliston and the Prince
+Regent, as one sees them in the colored prints of fifty years ago.
+
+He advanced a step, bowed, and laid his card upon the table.
+
+"I believe," he said in his plaintive voice, and imperfect English,
+"that I have the honor to introduce myself to Monsieur Arbuthnot."
+
+"If you want me, sir," said my father, gruffly, "I am Doctor Arbuthnot."
+
+"And I, Monsieur," said the little Frenchman, laying his hand upon his
+heart, and bowing again--"I am the Wizard of the Caucasus."
+
+"The what?" exclaimed my father.
+
+"The Wizard of the Caucasus," replied our visitor, impressively.
+
+There was an awkward pause, during which my father looked at me and
+touched his forehead significantly with his forefinger; while the
+Chevalier, embarrassed between his natural timidity and his desire to
+appear of importance, glanced from one face to the other, and waited for
+a reply. I hastened to disentangle the situation.
+
+"I think I can explain this gentleman's meaning," I said. "Monsieur le
+Chevalier will perform to-morrow evening in the large room of the Red
+Lion Hotel. He is a professor of legerdemain."
+
+"Of the marvellous art of legerdemain, Monsieur Arbuthnot," interrupted
+the Chevalier eagerly. "Prestidigitateur to the Court of Sachsenhausen,
+and successor to Al Hakim, the wise. It is I, Monsieur, that have invent
+the famous _tour du pistolet;_ it is I, that have originate the great
+and surprising deception of the bottle; it is I whom the world does
+surname the Wizard of the Caucasus. _Me voici!_"
+
+Carried away by the force of his own eloquence, the Chevalier fell into
+an attitude at the conclusion of his little speech; but remembering
+where he was, blushed, and bowed again.
+
+"Pshaw," said my father impatiently, "the man's a conjuror."
+
+The little Frenchman did not hear him. He was at that moment untying a
+packet which he carried in his hat, the contents whereof appeared to
+consist of a number of very small pink and yellow cards. Selecting a
+couple of each color, he deposited his hat carefully upon the floor and
+came a few steps nearer to the table.
+
+"Monsieur will give me the hope to see him, with Monsieur _son fils_, at
+my Soirée Fantastique, _n'est-ce pas?_" he asked, timidly.
+
+"Sir," said my father shortly, "I never encourage peripatetic
+mendicity."
+
+The little Frenchman looked puzzled.
+
+"_Comment_?" said he, and glanced to me for an explanation.
+
+"I am very sorry, Monsieur," I interposed hastily; "but my father
+objects to public entertainments."
+
+"_Ah, mon Dieu!_ but not to this," cried the Chevalier, raising his
+hands and eyes in deprecating astonishment. "Not to my Soirée
+Fantastique! The art of legerdemain, Monsieur, is not immoral. He is
+graceful--he is surprising--he is innocent; and, Monsieur, he is
+patronized by the Church; he is patronized by your amiable _Curé_,
+Monsieur le Docteur Brand."
+
+"Oh, father," I exclaimed, "Dr. Brand has taken tickets!"
+
+"And pray, sir, what's that to me?" growled my father, without looking
+up from the book which he had ungraciously resumed. "Let Dr. Brand make
+a fool of himself, if he pleases. I'm not bound to do the same."
+
+The Chevalier blushed crimson--not with humility this time, but with
+pride. He gathered the cards into his pocket, took up his hat, and
+saying stiffly--"_Monsieur, je vous demande pardon._"--moved towards
+the door.
+
+On the threshold he paused, and turning towards me with an air of faded
+dignity:--"Young gentleman," he said, "_you_ I thank for your
+politeness."
+
+He seemed as if he would have said more--hesitated--became suddenly
+livid--put his hand to his head, and leaned for support against
+the wall.
+
+My father was up and beside him in an instant. We carried rather than
+led him to the sofa, untied his cravat, and administered the necessary
+restoratives. He was all but insensible for some moments. Then the color
+came back to his lips, and he sighed heavily.
+
+"An attack of the nerves," he said, shaking his head feebly. "An attack
+of the nerves, Messieurs."
+
+My father looked doubtful.
+
+"Are you often taken in this way?" he asked, with unusual gentleness.
+
+"_Mais oui_, Monsieur," admitted the Frenchman, reluctantly. "He does
+often arrive to me. Not--not that he is dangerous. Ah, bah! _Pas
+du tout_!"
+
+"Humph!" ejaculated my father, more doubtfully than before. "Let me feel
+your pulse."
+
+The Chevalier bowed and submitted, watching the countenance of the
+operator all the time with an anxiety that was not lost upon me.
+
+"Do you sleep well?" asked my father, holding the fragile little wrist
+between his finger and thumb.
+
+"Passably, Monsieur."
+
+"Dream much?"
+
+"Ye--es, I dream."
+
+"Are you subject to giddiness?"
+
+The Chevalier shrugged his shoulders and looked uneasy.
+
+"_C'est vrai_" he acknowledged, more unwillingly than ever, "_J'ai des
+vertiges_."
+
+My father relinquished his hold and scribbled a rapid prescription.
+
+"There, sir," said he, "get that preparation made up, and when you next
+feel as you felt just now, drink a wine-glassful. I should recommend you
+to keep some always at hand, in case of emergency. You will find further
+directions on the other side."
+
+The little Frenchman attempted to get up with his usual vivacity; but
+was obliged to balance himself against the back of a chair.
+
+"Monsieur," said he, with another of his profound bows, "I thank you
+infinitely. You make me too much attention; but I am grateful. And,
+Monsieur, my little girl--my child that is far away across the sea--she
+thanks you also. _Elle m'aime, Monsieur--elle m'aime, cette pauvre
+petite_! What shall she do if I die?"
+
+Again he raised his hand to his brow. He was unconscious of anything
+theatrical in the gesture. He was in sad earnest, and his eyes were wet
+with tears, which he made no effort to conceal.
+
+My father shuffled restlessly in his chair.
+
+"No obligation--no obligation at all," he muttered, with a touch of
+impatience in his voice. "And now, what about those tickets? I suppose,
+Basil, you're dying to see all this tomfoolery?"
+
+"That I am, sir," said I, joyfully. "I should like it above all things!"
+
+The Chevalier glided forward, and laid a couple of little pink cards
+upon my father's desk.
+
+"If," said he, timidly, "if Monsieur will make me the honor to
+accept...."
+
+"Not for the world, sir--not for the world!" interposed my father. "The
+boy shan't go, unless I pay for the tickets."
+
+"But, Monsieur...."
+
+"Nothing of the kind, sir. I cannot hear of it. What are the prices of
+the seats?"
+
+Our little visitor looked down and was silent; but I replied for him.
+
+"The reserved seats," I whispered, "are half-a-crown each."
+
+"Then I will take eight reserved," said my father, opening a drawer in
+his desk and bringing out a bright, new sovereign.
+
+The little Frenchman started. He could hardly believe in such
+munificence.
+
+"When? How much?" stammered he, with a pleasant confusion of adverbs.
+
+"Eight," growled my father, scarcely able to repress a smile.
+
+"Eight? _mon Dieu_, Monsieur, how you are generous! I shall keep for you
+all the first row."
+
+"Oblige me by doing nothing of the kind," said my father, very
+decisively. "It would displease me extremely."
+
+The Chevalier counted out the eight little pink cards, and ranged them
+in a row beside my father's desk.
+
+"Count them, Monsieur, if you please," said he, his eyes wandering
+involuntarily towards the sovereign.
+
+My father did so with much gravity, and handed over the money.
+
+The Chevalier consigned it, with trembling fingers, to a small canvas
+bag, which looked very empty, and which came from the deepest recesses
+of his pocket.
+
+"Monsieur," said he, "my thanks are in my heart. I will not fatigue you
+with them. Good-morning."
+
+He bowed again, for perhaps the twentieth time; lingered a moment at the
+threshold; and then retired, closing the door softly after him.
+
+My father rubbbed his head all over, and gave a great yawn of
+satisfaction.
+
+"I am so much obliged to you, sir," I said, eagerly.
+
+"What for?"
+
+"For having bought those tickets. It was very kind of you."
+
+"Hold your tongue. I hate to be thanked," snarled he, and plunged back
+again into his books and papers.
+
+Once more the studious silence in the room--once more the rustling leaf
+and scratching pen, which only made the stillness seem more still,
+within and without.
+
+"I beg your pardons," murmured the voice of the little Chevalier.
+
+I turned, and saw him peeping through the half-open door. He looked more
+wistful than ever, and twisted the handle nervously between his fingers.
+
+My father frowned, and muttered something between his teeth. I fear it
+was not very complimentary to the Chevalier.
+
+"One word, Monsieur," pleaded the little man, edging himself round the
+door, "one small word!"
+
+"Say it, sir, and have done with it," said my father, savagely.
+
+The Chevalier hesitated.
+
+"I--I--Monsieur le Docteur--that is, I wish...."
+
+"Confound it, sir, what do you wish?"
+
+The Chevalier brushed away a tear.
+
+"_Dites-moi,"_ he said with suppressed agitation. "One word--yes or
+no--is he dangerous?"
+
+My father's countenance softened.
+
+"My good friend," he said, gently, "we are none of us safe for even a
+day, or an hour; but after all, that which we call danger is merely a
+relative position. I have known men in a state more precarious than
+yours who lived to a long old age, and I see no reason to doubt that
+with good living, good spirits, and precaution, you stand as fair a
+chance as another."
+
+The little Frenchman pressed his hands together in token of gratitude,
+whispered a broken word or two of thanks, and bowed himself out of
+the room.
+
+When he was fairly gone, my father flung a book at my head, and said,
+with more brevity than politeness:--
+
+"Boy, bolt the door."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+THE EVENTS OF AN EVENING.
+
+"Basil, my boy, if you are going to that place, you must take Collins
+with you."
+
+"Won't you go yourself, father?"
+
+"I! Is the boy mad!"
+
+"I hope not, sir; only as you took eight reserved seats, I thought...."
+
+"You've no business to think, sir! Seven of those tickets are in the
+fire."
+
+"For fear, then, you should fancy to burn the eighth, I'll wish you
+good-evening!"
+
+So away I darted, called to Collins to follow me, and set off at a brisk
+pace towards the Red Lion Hotel. Collins was our indoor servant; a
+sharp, merry fellow, some ten years older than myself, who desired no
+better employment than to escort me upon such an occasion as the
+present. The audience had begun to assemble when we arrived. Collins
+went into the shilling places, while I ensconced myself in the second
+row of reserved seats. I had an excellent view of the stage. There, in
+the middle of the platform, stood the conjuror's table--a quaint,
+cabalistic-looking piece of furniture with carved black legs and a deep
+bordering of green cloth all round the top. A gay pagoda-shaped canopy
+of many hues was erected overhead. A long white wand leaned up against
+the wall. To the right stood a bench laden with mysterious jars,
+glittering bowls, gilded cones, mystical globes, colored glass boxes,
+and other properties. To the left stood a large arm-chair covered with
+crimson cloth. All this was very exciting, and I waited breathlessly
+till the Wizard should appear.
+
+He came at last; but not, surely, our dapper little visitor of
+yesterday! A majestic beard of ashen gray fell in patriarchal locks
+almost to his knees. Upon his head he wore a high cap of some dark fur;
+upon his feet embroidered slippers; and round his waist a glittering
+belt patterned with hieroglyphics. A long woollen robe of chocolate and
+orange fell about him in heavy folds, and swept behind him, like a
+train. I could scarcely believe, at first, that it was the same person;
+but, when he spoke, despite the pomp and obscurity of his language. I
+recognised the plaintive voice of the little Chevalier.
+
+"_Messieurs et Mesdames_," he began, and took up the wand to emphasize
+his discourse; "to read in the stars the events of the future--to
+transform into gold the metals inferior--to discover the composition of
+that Elixir who, by himself, would perpetuate life, was in past ages the
+aim and aspiration of the natural philosopher. But they are gone, those
+days--they are displaced, those sciences. The Alchemist and the
+Rosicrucian are no more, and of all their race, the professor of
+Legerdemain alone survives. Ladies and gentlemen, my magic he is simple.
+I retain not familiars. I employ not crucible, nor furnace, nor retort.
+I but amuse you with my agility of hand, and for commencement I tell you
+that you shall be deceived as well as the Wizard of the Caucasus can
+deceive you."
+
+His voice trembled, and the slender wand shivered in his hand. Was this
+nervousness? Or was he, in accordance with the quaintness of his costume
+and the amplitude of his beard, enacting the feebleness of age?
+
+He advanced to the front of the platform. "Three things I require," he
+said. "A watch, a pocket-handkerchief and a hat. Is there here among my
+visitors any person so gracious as to lend me these trifles? I will not
+injure them, ladies and gentlemen. I will only pound the watch in my
+mortar--burn the _mouchoir_ in my lamp, and make a pudding in the
+_chapeau_. And, with all this, I engage to return them to their
+proprietors, better as new."
+
+There was a pause, and a laugh. Presently a gentleman volunteered his
+hat, and a lady her embroidered handkerchief; but no person seemed
+willing to submit his watch to the pounding process.
+
+"Shall nobody lend me the watch?" asked the Chevalier; but in a voice
+so hoarse that I scarcely recognised it.
+
+A sudden thought struck me, and I rose in my place.
+
+"I shall be happy to do so," I said aloud, and made my way round to the
+front of the platform.
+
+At the moment when he took it from me, I spoke to him.
+
+"Monsieur Proudhine," I whispered, "you are ill! What can I do for you?"
+
+"Nothing, _mon enfant_," he answered, in the same low tone. "I suffer;
+_mais il faut se résigner_."
+
+"Break off the performance--retire for half an hour."
+
+"Impossible. See, they already observe us!"
+
+And he drew back abruptly. There was a seat vacant in the front row. I
+took it, resolved at all events to watch him narrowly.
+
+Not to detail too minutely the events of a performance which since that
+time has become sufficiently familiar, I may say that he carried out his
+programme with dreadful exactness, and, after appearing to burn the
+handkerchief to ashes and mix up a quantity of eggs and flour in the
+hat, proceeded very coolly to smash the works of my watch beneath his
+ponderous pestle. Notwithstanding my faith, I began to feel seriously
+uncomfortable. It was a neat little silver watch of foreign
+workmanship--not very valuable, to be sure, but precious to me as the
+most precious of repeaters.
+
+"He is very tough, your watch, Monsieur," said the Wizard, pounding away
+vigorously. "He--he takes a long time ... _Ah! mon Dieu!_"
+
+He raised his hand to his head, uttered a faint cry, and snatched at the
+back of the chair for support.
+
+My first thought was that he had destroyed my watch by mistake--my
+second, that he was very ill indeed. Scarcely knowing what I did, and
+quite forgetting the audience, I jumped on the platform to his aid.
+
+He shook his head, waved me away with one trembling hand, made a last
+effort to articulate, and fell heavily to the ground.
+
+All was confusion in an instant. Everybody crowded to the stage; whilst
+I, with a presence of mind which afterwards surprised myself, made my
+way out by a side-door and ran to fetch my father. He was fortunately at
+home, and in less than ten minutes the Chevalier was under his care. We
+found him laid upon a sofa in one of the sitting-rooms of the inn, pale,
+rigid, insensible, and surrounded by an idle crowd of lookers-on. They
+had taken off his cap and beard, and the landlady was endeavoring to
+pour some brandy down his throat; but his teeth were fast set, and his
+lips were blue and cold.
+
+"Oh, Doctor Arbuthnot! Doctor Arbuthnot!" cried a dozen voices at once,
+"the Conjuror is dying!"
+
+"For which reason, I suppose, you are all trying to smother him!" said
+my father angrily. "Mistress Cobbe, I beg you will not trouble yourself
+to pour that brandy down the man's throat. He has no more power to
+swallow it than my stick. Basil, open the window, and help me to loosen
+these things about his throat. Good people, all, I must request you to
+leave the room. This man's life is in peril, and I can do nothing while
+you remain. Go home--go home. You will see no more conjuring to-night."
+
+My father was peremptory, and the crowd unwillingly dispersed. One by
+one they left the room and gathered discontentedly in the passage. When
+it came to the last two or three, he took them by the shoulders, closed
+the door upon them, and turned the key.
+
+Only the landlady, and elderly woman-servant, and myself remained.
+
+The first thing my father did was to examine the pupil of the patient's
+eye, and lay his hand upon his heart. It still fluttered feebly, but the
+action of the lungs was suspended, and his hands and feet were cold
+as death.
+
+My father shook his head.
+
+"This man must be bled," said he, "but I have little hope of saving
+him."
+
+He was bled, and, though still unconscious, became less rigid They then
+poured a little wine down his throat, and he fell into a passive but
+painless condition, more inanimate than sleep, but less positive than a
+state of trance.
+
+A fire was then lighted, a mattress brought down, and the patient laid
+upon it, wrapped in many blankets. My father announced his intention of
+sitting up with him all night. In vain I begged for leave to share his
+vigil. He would hear of no such thing, but turned me out as he had
+turned out the others, bade me a brief "Good-night," and desired me to
+run home as quickly as I could.
+
+At that stage of my history, to hear was to obey; so I took my way
+quietly through the bar of the hotel, and had just reached the door when
+a touch on my sleeve arrested me. It was Mr. Cobbe, the landlord--a
+portly, red-whiskered Boniface of the old English type.
+
+"Good-evening, Mr. Basil," said he. "Going home, sir?"
+
+"Yes, Mr. Cobbe," I replied. "I can be of no further use here."
+
+"Well, sir, you've been of more use this evening than anybody--let alone
+the Doctor--that I must say for you," observed Mr. Cobbe, approvingly.
+"I never see such presence o' mind in so young a gen'leman before.
+Never, sir. Have a glass of grog and a cigar, sir, before you turn out."
+
+Much as I felt flattered by the supposition that I smoked (which was
+more than I could have done to save my life), I declined Mr. Cobbe's
+obliging offer and wished him good-night. But the landlord of the Red
+Lion was in a gossiping humor, and would not let me go.
+
+"If you won't take spirits, Mr. Basil," said he, "you must have a glass
+of negus. I couldn't let you go out without something warm--particular
+after the excitement you've gone through. Why, bless you, sir, when they
+ran out and told me, I shook like a leaf--and I don't look like a very
+nervous subject, do I? And so sudden as it was, too, poor little
+gentleman!"
+
+"Very sudden, indeed," I replied, mechanically.
+
+"Does Doctor Arbuthnot think he'll get the better of it, Mr. Basil?"
+
+"I fear he has little hope."
+
+Mr. Cobbe sighed, and shook his head, and smoked in silence.
+
+"To be struck down just when he was playing such tricks as them
+conjuring dodges, do seem uncommon awful," said he, after a time. "What
+was he after at the minute?--making a pudding, wasn't he, in some
+gentleman's hat?"
+
+I uttered a sudden ejaculation, and set down my glass of negus untasted.
+Till that moment I had not once thought of my watch.
+
+"Oh, Mr. Cobbe!" I cried, "he was pounding my watch in the mortar!"
+
+"_Your_ watch, Mr. Basil?"
+
+"Yes, mine--and I have not seen it since. What can have become of it?
+What shall I do?"
+
+"Do!" echoed the landlord, seizing a candle; "why, go and look for it,
+to be sure, Mr. Basil. That's safe enough, you may be sure!"
+
+I followed him to the room where the performance had taken place. It
+showed darkly and drearily by the light of one feeble candle. The
+benches and chairs were all in disorder. The wand lay where it had
+fallen from the hand of the Wizard. The mortar still stood on the table,
+with the pestle beside it. It contained only some fragments of
+broken glass.
+
+Mr. Cobbe laughed triumphantly.
+
+"Come, sir," said he, "the watch is safe enough, anyhow. Mounseer only
+made believe to pound it up, and now all that concerns us is to
+find it."
+
+That was indeed all--not only all, but too much. We searched everything.
+We looked in all the jars and under all the moveables. We took the cover
+off the chair; we cleared the table; but without success. My watch had
+totally disappeared, and we at length decided that it must be concealed
+about the conjuror's person. Mr. Cobbe was my consoling angel.
+
+"Bless you, sir," said he, "don't never be cast down. My wife shall
+look for the watch to-morrow morning, and I'll promise you we'll find
+out every pocket he has about him."
+
+"And my father--you won't tell my father?" I said, dolefully.
+
+Mr. Cobbe replied by a mute but expressive piece of pantomime and took
+me back to the bar, where the good landlady ratified all that her
+husband had promised in her name.
+
+The stars shone brightly as I went home, and there was no moon. The town
+was intensely silent, and the road intensely solitary. I met no one on
+my way; let myself quietly in, and stole up to my bed-room in the dark.
+
+It was already late; but I was restless and weary--too restless to
+sleep, and too weary to read. I could not detach myself from the
+impressions of the day; and I longed for the morning, that I might learn
+the fate of my watch, and the condition of the Chevalier.
+
+At length, after some hours of wakefulness, I dropped into a profound
+and dreamless sleep.
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+THE CHEVALIER MAKES HIS LAST EXIT.
+
+     All the world's a stage,
+     And all the men and women merely players:
+     They have their exits and their entrances.
+         _As You Like It._
+
+I was waked by my father's voice calling to me from the garden, and so
+started up with that strange and sudden sense of trouble which most of
+us have experienced at some time or other in our lives.
+
+"Nine o'clock, Basil," cried my father. "Nine o'clock--come down
+directly, sir!"
+
+I sprang out of bed, and for some seconds could remember nothing of what
+had happened; but when I looked out of the window and saw my father in
+his dressing-gown and slippers walking up and down the sunny path with
+his hands behind his back and his eyes fixed on the ground, it all
+flashed suddenly upon me. To plunge into my bath, dress, run down, and
+join him in the garden, was the work of but a few minutes.
+
+"Good-morning, sir," I said, breathlessly.
+
+He stopped short in his walk, and looked at me from head to foot.
+
+"Humph!" said he, "you have dressed quickly...."
+
+"Yes, sir; I was startled to find myself so late."
+
+"So quickly," he continued, "that you have forgotten your watch."
+
+I felt my face burn. I had not a word to answer.
+
+"I suppose," said he, "you thought I should not find it out?"
+
+"I had hoped to recover it first," I replied, falteringly; "but...."
+
+"But you may make up your mind to the loss of it, sir; and serve you
+rightly, too," interposed my father. "I can tell you, for your
+satisfaction, that the man's clothes have been thoroughly examined, and
+that your watch has not been found. No doubt it lay somewhere on the
+table, and was stolen in the confusion."
+
+I hung my head. I could have wept for vexation.
+
+My father laughed sardonically.
+
+"Well, Master Basil," he said, "the loss is yours, and yours only. You
+won't get another watch from me, I promise you."
+
+I retorted angrily, whereat he only laughed the more; and then we went
+in to breakfast.
+
+Our morning meal was more unsociable than usual. I was too much annoyed
+to speak, and my father too preoccupied. I longed to inquire after the
+Chevalier, but not choosing to break the silence, hurried through my
+breakfast that I might run round to the Red Lion immediately after.
+Before we had left the table, a messenger came to say that "the conjuror
+was taken worse," and so my father and I hastened away together.
+
+He had passed from his trance-like sleep into a state of delirium, and
+when we entered the room was sitting up, pale and ghost-like, muttering
+to himself, and gesticulating as if in the presence of an audience.
+
+"_Pas du tout_," said he fantastically, "_pas du tout, Messieurs_--here
+is no deception. You shall see him pass from my hand to the _coffre_,
+and yet you shall not find how he does travel."
+
+My father smiled bitterly.
+
+"Conjurer to the last!" said he. "In the face of death, what a mockery
+is his trade!"
+
+Wandering as were his wits, he caught the last word and turned fiercely
+round; but there was no recognition in his eye.
+
+"Trade, Monsieur!" he echoed. "Trade!--you shall not call him trade! Do
+you know who I am, that you dare call him trade? _Dieu des Dieux!
+N'est-ce pas que je suis noble, moi?_ Trade!--when did one of my race
+embrace a trade? _Canaille!_ I do condescend for my reasons to take your
+money, but you shall not call him a trade!"
+
+Exhausted by this sudden burst of passion, he fell back upon his pillow,
+muttering and flushed. I bent over him, and caught a scattered phrase
+from time to time. He was dreaming of wealth, fancying himself rich and
+powerful, poor wretch! and all unconscious of his condition.
+
+"You shall see my Chateaux," he said, "my horses--my carriages.
+Listen--it is the ringing of the bells. Aha! _le jour viendra--le jour
+viendra_! Conjuror! who speaks of a conjuror? I never was a conjuror! I
+deny it: and he lies who says it! _Attendons_! Is the curtain up? Ah! my
+table--where is my table? I cannot play till I have my table.
+_Scélérats! je suis volé! je l'ai perdu! je l'ai perdu_! Ah, what shall
+I do? What shall I do? They have taken my table--they have taken...."
+
+He burst into tears, moaned twice or thrice, closed his eyes, and fell
+into a troubled sleep.
+
+The landlady sobbed. Hers was a kind heart, and the little Frenchman's
+simple courtesy had won her good-will from the first.
+
+"He had real quality manners," she said, disconsolately. "I do believe,
+gentlemen, that he had seen better days. Poor as he was, he never
+disputed the price of anything; and he never spoke to me without taking
+off his hat."
+
+"Upon my soul, Mistress Cobbe," said my father, "I incline to your
+opinion. I do think he is not what he seems."
+
+"And if I only knew where to find his friends, I shouldn't care half so
+much!" exclaimed the landlady. "It do seem so hard that he should die
+here, and not one of his own blood follow him to the grave! Surely he
+has some one who loves him!"
+
+"There was something said the other day about a child," mused my father.
+"Have no papers or letters been found about his person?"
+
+"None at all. Why, Doctor, you were here last night when we searched for
+Master Basil's watch, and you are witness that he had nothing of the
+kind in his possession. As to his luggage, that's only a carpet-bag and
+his conjuring things, and we looked through them as carefully as
+possible."
+
+The Chevalier moaned again, and tossed his arms feebly in his sleep.
+"The proofs," said he. "The proofs! I can do nothing without
+the proofs."
+
+My father listened. The landlady shook her head.
+
+"He has been going on like that ever since you left, sir," she said
+pitifully; "fancying he's been robbed, and calling out about the
+proofs--only ten times more violent. Then, again, he thinks he is going
+to act, and asks for his table. It's wonderful how he takes on about
+that trumpery table!"
+
+Scarcely had she spoken the words when the Chevalier opened his eyes,
+and, by a supreme effort, sat upright in his bed. The cold dew rose upon
+his brow; his lips quivered; he strove to speak, and only an
+inarticulate cry found utterance. My father flew to his support.
+
+"If you have anything to say," he urged earnestly, "try to say it now!"
+
+The dying man trembled convulsively, and a terrible look of despair came
+into his wan face.
+
+"Tell--tell" ... he gasped; but his voice failed him, and he could get
+no further.
+
+My father laid him gently down. There came an interval of terrible
+suspense--a moment of sharp agony--a deep, deep sigh--and then silence.
+
+My father laid his hand gently upon my shoulder.
+
+"It is all over," he said; "and his secret, if he had one, is in closer
+keeping than ours. Come away, boy; this is no place for you."
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+IN MEMORIAM.
+
+The poor little Chevalier! He died and became famous.
+
+Births, deaths and marriages are the great events of a country town; the
+prime novelties of a country newspaper; the salt of conversation, and
+the soul of gossip. An individual who furnishes the community with one
+or other of these topics, is a benefactor to his species. To be born is
+much; to marry is more; to die is to confer a favor on all the old
+ladies of the neighborhood. They love a christening and caudle--they
+rejoice in a wedding and cake--but they prefer a funeral and black kid
+gloves. It is a tragedy played off at the expense of the few for the
+gratification of the many--a costly luxury, of which it is pleasanter to
+be the spectator than the entertainer.
+
+Occurring, therefore, at a season when the supply of news was
+particularly scanty, the death of the little Chevalier was a boon to
+Saxonholme. The wildest reports were bandied about, and the most
+extraordinary fictions set on foot respecting his origin and station. He
+was a Russian spy. He was the unfortunate son of Louis XIV and Marie
+Antoinette. He was a pupil of Cagliostro, and the husband of Mlle.
+Lenormand. Customers flocked to the tap of the Red Lion as they had
+never flocked before, unless in election-time; and good Mrs. Cobbe had
+to repeat the story of the conjuror's illness and death till, like many
+other reciters, she had told it so often that she began to forget it. As
+for her husband, he had enough to do to serve the customers and take the
+money, to say nothing of showing the room, which proved a vast
+attraction, and remained for more than a week just as it was left on the
+evening of the performance, with the table, canopy and paraphernalia of
+wizardom still set out upon the platform.
+
+In the midst of these things arose a momentous question--what was the
+religion of the deceased, and where should he be buried? As in the old
+miracle plays we find good and bad angels contending for the souls of
+the dead, so on this occasion did the heads of all the Saxonholme
+churches, chapels and meeting-houses contend for the body of the little
+Chevalier. He was a Roman Catholic. He was a Dissenter. He was a member
+of the Established Church. He must be buried in the new Protestant
+Cemetery. He must lie in the churchyard of the Ebenezer Tabernacle. He
+must sleep in the far-away "God's Acre" of Father Daly's Chapel, and
+have a cross at his head, and masses said for the repose of his soul.
+The controversy ran high. The reverend gentlemen convoked a meeting,
+quarrelled outrageously, and separated in high dudgeon without having
+arrived at any conclusion.
+
+Whereupon arose another question, melancholy, ludicrous, perplexing,
+and, withal, as momentous as the first--Would the little Chevalier get
+buried at all? Or was he destined to remain, like Mahomet's coffin, for
+ever in a state of suspense?
+
+At the last, when Mr. and Mrs. Cobbe despairingly believed that they
+were never to be relieved of their troublesome guest, a vestry was
+called, and the churchwardens brought the matter to a conclusion. When
+he went round with his tickets, the conjuror called first at the
+Rectory, and solicited the patronage of Doctor Brand. Would he have paid
+that compliment to the cloth had he been other than a member of that
+religion "by law established?" Certainly not. The point was clear--could
+not be clearer; so orthodoxy and the new Protestant Cemetery
+carried the day.
+
+The funeral was a great event--not so far as mutes, feathers and
+carriages were concerned, for the Chevalier left but little worldly
+gear, and without hard cash even the most deserving must forego "the
+trappings and the suits of woe;" but it was a great event, inasmuch as
+it celebrated the victory of the Church, and the defeat of all
+schismatics. The rector himself, complacent and dignified, preached the
+funeral sermon to a crowded congregation, the following Sunday. We
+almost forgot, in fact, that the little Chevalier had any concern in the
+matter, and regarded it only as the triumph of orthodoxy.
+
+All was not ended, even here. For some weeks our conjuror continued to
+be the hero of every pulpit round about. He was cited as a shining
+light, denounced as a vessel of wrath, praised, pitied and calumniated
+according to the creed and temper of each declaimer. At length the
+controversy languished, died a natural death, and became "alms for
+oblivion."
+
+Laid to rest under a young willow, in a quiet corner, with a plain stone
+at his head, the little Frenchman was himself in course of time
+forgotten:--
+
+     "Alas! Poor Yorick!"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+POLONIUS TO LAERTES.
+
+Years went by. I studied; outgrew my jackets; became a young man. It was
+time, in short, that I walked the hospitals, and passed my examination.
+
+I had spoken to my father more than once upon the subject--spoken
+earnestly and urgently, as one who felt the necessity and justice of his
+appeal. But he put me off from time to time; persisted in looking upon
+me as a boy long after I had become acquainted with the penalties of the
+razor; and counselled me to be patient, till patience was well-nigh
+exhausted. The result of this treatment was that I became miserable and
+discontented; spent whole days wandering about the woods; and
+degenerated into a creature half idler and half misanthrope. I had never
+loved the profession of medicine. I should never have chosen it had I
+been free to follow my own inclinations: but having diligently fitted
+myself to enter it with credit, I felt that my father wronged me in this
+delay; and I felt it perhaps all the more bitterly because my labor had
+been none of love. Happily for me, however, he saw his error before it
+was too late, and repaired it generously.
+
+"Basil," said he, beckoning me one morning into the consulting-room, "I
+want to speak to you."
+
+I obeyed sullenly, and stood leaning up against the window, with my
+hands in my pockets.
+
+"You've been worrying me, Basil, more than enough these last few
+months," he said, rummaging among his papers, and speaking in a low,
+constrained voice. "I don't choose to be worried any longer. It is time
+you walked the hospitals, and--you may go."
+
+"To London, sir?"
+
+"No. I don't intend you to go to London."
+
+"To Edinburgh, then, I suppose," said I, in a tone of disappointment.
+
+"Nor to Edinburgh. You shall go to Paris."
+
+"To Paris!"
+
+"Yes--the French surgeons are the most skilful in the world, and Chéron
+will do everything for you. I know no eminent man in London from whom I
+should choose to ask a favor; and Chéron is one of my oldest
+friends--nay, the oldest friend I have in the world. If you have but two
+ounces of brains, he will make a clever man of you. Under him you will
+study French practice; walk the hospitals of Paris; acquire the language
+and, I hope, some of the polish of the French people. Are you
+satisfied?"
+
+"More than satisfied, sir," I replied, eagerly.
+
+"You shall not want for money, boy; and you may start as soon as you
+please. Is the thing settled?"
+
+"Quite, as far as I am concerned."
+
+My father rubbed his head all over with both hands, took off his
+spectacles, and walked up and down the room. By these signs he expressed
+any unusual degree of satisfaction. All at once he stopped, looked me
+full in the face, and said:--
+
+"Understand me, Basil. I require one thing in return."
+
+"If that thing be industry, sir, I think I may promise that you shall
+not have cause to complain,"
+
+My father shook his head.
+
+"Not industry," he said; "not industry alone. Keep good company, my boy.
+Keep good hours. Never forget that a gentleman must look like a
+gentleman, dress like a gentleman, frequent the society of gentlemen. To
+be a mere bookworm is to be a drone in the great hive. I hate a
+drone--as I hate a sloven."
+
+"I understand you, father," I faltered, blushing. "I know that of late
+I--I have not...."
+
+My father laid his hand suddenly over my mouth.
+
+"No confessions--no apologies," he said hastily. "We have both been to
+blame in more respects than one, and we shall both know how to be wiser
+in the future. Now go, and consider all that you may require for
+your journey."
+
+Agitated, delighted, full of hope, I ran up to my own room, locked the
+door, and indulged in a delightful reverie. What a prospect had suddenly
+opened before me! What novelty! what adventure! To have visited London
+would have been to fulfil all my desires; but to be sent to Paris was to
+receive a passport for Fairyland!
+
+That day, for the first time in many months, I dressed myself carefully,
+and went down to dinner with a light heart, a cheerful face, and an
+unexceptionable neckcloth.
+
+As I took my place at the table, my father looked up cheerily and gave
+me a pleased nod of recognition.
+
+Our meal passed off very silently. It was my father's maxim that no man
+could do more than one thing well at a time--especially at table; so we
+had contracted a habit which to strangers would have seemed even more
+unsociable than it really was, and gave to all our meals an air more
+penitential than convivial. But this day was, in reality, a festive
+occasion, and my father was disposed to be more than usually agreeable.
+When the cloth was removed, he flung the cellar-key at my head, and
+exclaimed, in a burst of unexampled good-humor:--
+
+"Basil, you dog, fetch up a bottle of the particular port!"
+
+Now it is one of my theories that a man's after-dinner talk takes much
+of its weight, color, and variety from the quality of his wines. A
+generous vintage brings out generous sentiments. Good fellowship,
+hospitality, liberal politics, and the milk of human kindness, may be
+uncorked simultaneously with a bottle of old Madeira; while a pint of
+thin Sauterne is productive only of envy, hatred, malice, and all
+uncharitableness. We grow sententious on Burgundy--logical on
+Bordeaux--sentimental on Cyprus--maudlin on Lagrima Christi--and witty
+on Champagne.
+
+Port was my father's favorite wine. It warmed his heart, cooled his
+temper, and made him not only conversational, but expansive. Leaning
+back complacently in his easy-chair, with the glass upheld between his
+eye and the window, he discoursed to me of my journey, of my prospects
+in life, and of all that I should do and avoid, professionally
+and morally.
+
+"Work," he said, "is the panacea for every sorrow--the plaster for every
+pain--your only universal remedy. Industry, air, and exercise are our
+best physicians. Trust to them, boy; but beware how you publish the
+prescription, lest you find your occupation gone. Remember, if you wish
+to be rich, you must never seem to be poor; and as soon as you stand in
+need of your friends, you will find yourself with none left. Be discreet
+of speech, and cultivate the art of silence. Above all things, be
+truthful. Hold your tongue as long as you please, but never open your
+lips to a lie. Show no man the contents of your purse--he would either
+despise you for having so little, or try to relieve you of the burden
+of carrying so much. Above all, never get into debt, and never fall in
+love. The first is disgrace, and the last is the devil! Respect
+yourself, if you wish others to respect you; and bear in mind that the
+world takes you at your own estimate. To dress well is a duty one owes
+to society. The man who neglects his own appearance not only degrades
+himself to the level of his inferiors, but puts an affront upon his
+friends and acquaintances."
+
+"I trust, sir," I said in some confusion, "that I shall never incur the
+last reproach again."
+
+"I hope not, Basil," replied my father, with a smile. "I hope not. Keep
+your conscience clean and your boots blacked, and I have no fear of you.
+You are no hero, my boy, but it depends upon yourself whether you become
+a man of honor or a scamp; a gentleman or a clown. You have, I see,
+registered a good resolution to-day. Keep it; and remember that
+Pandemonium will get paved without your help. There would be no
+industry, boy, if there was no idleness, and all true progress begins
+with--Reform."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+AT THE CHEVAL BLANC
+
+My journey, even at this distance of time, appears to me like an
+enchanted dream. I observed, yet scarcely remembered, the scenes through
+which I passed, so divided was I between the novelty of travelling and
+the eagerness of anticipation. Provided with my letters of introduction,
+the sum of one hundred guineas, English, and the enthusiasm of twenty
+years of age, I fancied myself endowed with an immortality of wealth and
+happiness.
+
+The Brighton coach passed through our town once a week; so I started for
+Paris without having ever visited London, and took the route by Newhaven
+and Dieppe. Having left home on Tuesday morning, I reached Rouen in the
+course of the next day but one. At Rouen I stayed to dine and sleep, and
+so made my way to the _Cheval Blanc_, a grand hotel on the quay, where I
+was received by an aristocratic elderly waiter who sauntered out from a
+side office, surveyed me patronizingly, entered my name upon a card for
+a seat at the _table d'hote_, and, having rung a feeble little bell,
+sank exhausted upon a seat in the hall.
+
+"To number seventeen, Marie," said this majestic personage, handing me
+over to a pretty little chambermaid who attended the summons. "And,
+Marie, on thy return, my child, bring me an absinthe."
+
+We left this gentleman in a condition of ostentatious languor, and Marie
+deposited me in a pretty room overlooking an exquisite little garden set
+round with beds of verbena and scarlet geranium, with a fountain
+sparkling in the midst. This garden was planted in what had once been
+the courtyard, of the building. The trees nodded and whispered, and the
+windows at the opposite side of the quadrangle glittered like burnished
+gold in the sunlight. I threw open the jalousies, plucked one of the
+white roses that clustered outside, and drank in with delight the sunny
+perfumed air that played among the leaves, and scattered the waters of
+the fountain. I could not long rest thus, however. I longed to be out
+and about; so, as it was now no more than half-past three o'clock, and
+two good hours of the glorious midsummer afternoon yet remained to me
+before the hotel dinner-hour, I took my hat, and went out along the
+quays and streets of this beautiful and ancient Norman city.
+
+Under the crumbling archways; through narrow alleys where the upper
+stories nearly met overhead, leaving only a bright strip of dazzling sky
+between; past quaint old mansions, and sculptured fountains, and stately
+churches hidden away in all kinds of strange forgotten nooks and
+corners, I wandered, wondering and unwearied. I saw the statue of Jeanne
+d'Arc; the château of Diane de Poitiers; the archway carved in oak where
+the founder of the city still, in rude effigy, presides; the museum
+rich in mediæval relics; the market-place crowded with fruit-sellers and
+flower-girls in their high Norman caps. Above all, I saw the rare old
+Gothic Cathedral, with its wondrous wealth of antique sculpture; its
+iron spire, destined, despite its traceried beauty, to everlasting
+incompleteness; its grass-grown buttresses, and crumbling pinnacles, and
+portals crowded with images of saints and kings. I went in. All was
+gray, shadowy, vast; dusk with the rich gloom of painted windows; and so
+silent that I scarcely dared disturb the echoes by my footsteps. There
+stood in a corner near the door a triangular iron stand stuck full of
+votive tapers that flickered and sputtered and guttered dismally,
+shedding showers of penitential grease-drops on the paved floor below;
+and there was a very old peasant woman on her knees before the altar. I
+sat down on a stone bench and fell into a long study of the stained
+oriel, the light o'erarching roof, and the long perspective of the
+pillared aisles. Presently the verger came out of the vestry-room,
+followed by two gentlemen. He was short and plump, with a loose black
+gown, slender black legs, and a pointed nose--like a larger species
+of raven.
+
+"_Bon jour, M'sieur_" croaked he, laying his head a little on one side,
+and surveying me with one glittering eye. "Will M'sieur be pleased to
+see the treasury?"
+
+"The treasury!" I repeated. "What is there to be seen in the treasury?"
+
+"Nothing, sir, worth one son of an Englishman's money," said the taller
+of the gentlemen. "Tinsel, paste, and dusty bones--all humbug and
+extortion."
+
+Something in the scornful accent and the deep voice aroused the
+suspicions of the verger, though the words were spoken in English.
+
+"Our treasury, M'sieur," croaked he, more ravenly than ever, "is
+rich--rich in episcopal jewels; in relics--inestimable relics. Tickets
+two francs each."
+
+Grateful, however, for the timely caution, I acknowledged my
+countryman's courtesy by a bow, declined the proffered investment, and
+went out again into the sunny streets.
+
+At five o'clock I found myself installed near the head of an immensely
+long dinner-table in the _salle à manger_ of the Cheval Blanc. The
+_salle à manger_ was a magnificent temple radiant with mirrors, and
+lustres, and panels painted in fresco. The dinner was an imposing rite,
+served with solemn ceremonies by ministering waiters. There were about
+thirty guests seated round, in august silence, most of them very smartly
+dressed, and nearly all English. A stout gentleman, with a little knob
+on the top of his bald head, a buff waistcoat, and a shirt amply
+frilled, sat opposite to me, flanked on either side by an elderly
+daughter in green silk. On my left I was supported by a thin young
+gentleman with fair hair, and blue glasses. To my right stood a vacant
+chair, the occupant of which had not yet arrived; and at the head of the
+table sat a spare pale man dressed all in black, who spoke to no one,
+kept his eyes fixed upon his plate, and was served by the waiters with
+especial servility. The soup came and went in profound silence. Faint
+whispers passed to and fro with the fish. It was not till the roast made
+its appearance that anything like conversation broke the sacred silence
+of the meal. At this point the owner of the vacant chair arrived, and
+took his place beside me. I recognised him immediately. It was the
+Englishman whom I had met in the Cathedral. We bowed, and presently he
+spoke to me. In the meantime, he had every forgone item of the dinner
+served to him as exactly as if he had not been late at table, and sipped
+his soup with perfect deliberation while others were busy with the
+sweets. Our conversation began, of course, with the weather and
+the place.
+
+"Your first visit to Rouen, I suppose?" said he. "Beautiful old city, is
+it not? _Garçon_, a pint of Bordeaux-Leoville."
+
+I modestly admitted that it was not only my first visit to Rouen, but my
+first to the Continent.
+
+"Ah, you may go farther than Rouen, and fare worse," said he. "Do you
+sketch? No? That's a pity, for it's deliciously picturesque--though,
+for my own part, I am not enthusiastic about gutters and gables, and I
+object to a population composed exclusively of old women. I'm glad, by
+the way, that I preserved you from wasting your time among the atrocious
+lumber of that so-called treasury."
+
+"The treasury!" exclaimed my slim neighbor with the blue glasses. "Beg
+your p--p--pardon, sir, but are you speaking of the Cathedral treasury?
+Is it worth v--v--visiting?"
+
+"Singularly so," replied he to my right. "One of the rarest collections
+of authentic curiosities in France. They have the snuff-box of Clovis,
+the great toe of Saint Helena, and the tongs with which St. Dunstan took
+the devil by the nose."
+
+"Up--p--pon my word, now, that's curious," ejaculated the thin tourist,
+who had an impediment in his speech. "I must p--p--put that down. Dear
+me! the snuff-box of King Clovis! I must see these relics to-morrow."
+
+"Be sure you ask for the great toe of St. Helena," said my right hand
+companion, proceeding imperturbably with his dinner. "The saint had but
+one leg at the period of her martyrdom, and that great toe is unique."
+
+"G--g--good gracious!" exclaimed the tourist, pulling out a gigantic
+note-book, and entering the fact upon the spot. "A saint with one
+leg--and a lady, too! Wouldn't m--m--miss that for the world!"
+
+I looked round, puzzled by the gravity of my new acquaintance.
+
+"Is this all true?" I whispered. "You told me the treasury was a
+humbug."
+
+"And so it is."
+
+"But the snuff-box of Clovis, and...."
+
+"Pure inventions! The man's a muff, and on muffs I have no mercy. Do you
+stay long in Rouen?"
+
+"No, I go on to Paris to-morrow. I wish I could remain longer."
+
+"I am not sure that you would gain more from a long visit than from a
+short one. Some places are like some women, charming, _en passant_, but
+intolerable upon close acquaintance. It is just so with Rouen. The place
+contains no fine galleries, and no places of public entertainment; and
+though exquisitely picturesque, is nothing more. One cannot always be
+looking at old houses, and admiring old churches. You will be delighted
+with Paris."
+
+"B--b--beautiful city," interposed the stammerer, eager to join our
+conversation, whenever he could catch a word of it. "I'm going to
+P--P--Paris myself."
+
+"Then, sir, I don't doubt you will do ample justice to its attractions,"
+observed my right-hand neighbor. "From the size of your note-book, and
+the industry with which you accumulate useful information, I should
+presume that you are a conscientious observer of all that is recondite
+and curious."
+
+"I as--p--pire to be so," replied the other, with a blush and a bow. "I
+m--m--mean to exhaust P--P--Paris. I'm going to write a b--b--book about
+it, when I get home."'
+
+My friend to the right flashed one glance of silent scorn upon the
+future author, drained the last glass of his Bordeaux-Leoville, pushed
+his chair impatiently back, and said:--"This place smells like a
+kitchen. Will you come out, and have a cigar?"
+
+So we rose, took our hats, and in a few moments were strolling under the
+lindens on the Quai de Corneille.
+
+I, of course, had never smoked in my life; and, humiliating though it
+was, found myself obliged to decline a "prime Havana," proffered in the
+daintiest of embroidered cigar-cases. My companion looked as if he
+pitied me. "You'll soon learn," said he. "A man can't live in Paris
+without tobacco. Do you stay there many weeks?"
+
+"Two years, at least," I replied, registering an inward resolution to
+conquer the difficulties of tobacco without delay. "I am going to study
+medicine under an eminent French surgeon."
+
+"Indeed! Well, you could not go to a better school, or embrace a nobler
+profession. I used to think a soldier's life the grandest under heaven;
+but curing is a finer thing than killing, after all! What a delicious
+evening, is it not? If one were only in Paris, now, or Vienna,...."
+
+"What, Oscar Dalrymple!" exclaimed a voice close beside us. "I should as
+soon have expected to meet the great Panjandrum himself!"
+
+"--With the little round button at top," added my companion, tossing
+away the end of his cigar, and shaking hands heartily with the
+new-comer. "By Jove, Frank, I'm glad to see you! What brings you here?"
+
+"Business--confound it! And not pleasant business either. _A procés_
+which my father has instituted against a great manufacturing firm here
+at Rouen, and of which I have to bear the brunt. And you?"
+
+"And I, my dear fellow? Pshaw! what should I be but an idler in search
+of amusement?"
+
+"Is it true that you have sold out of the Enniskillens?"
+
+"Unquestionably. Liberty is sweet; and who cares to carry a sword in
+time of peace? Not I, at all events."
+
+While this brief greeting was going forward, I hung somewhat in the
+rear, and amused myself by comparing the speakers. The new-comer was
+rather below than above the middle height, fair-haired and boyish, with
+a smile full of mirth and an eye full of mischief. He looked about two
+years my senior. The other was much older--two or three and thirty, at
+the least--dark, tall, powerful, finely built; his wavy hair clipped
+close about his sun-burnt neck; a thick moustache of unusual length; and
+a chest that looked as if it would have withstood the shock of a
+battering-ram. Without being at all handsome, there was a look of
+brightness, and boldness, and gallantry about him that arrested one's
+attention at first sight. I think I should have taken him for a soldier,
+had I not already gathered it from the last words of their conversation.
+
+"Who is your friend?" I heard the new-comer whisper.
+
+To which the other replied:--"Haven't the ghost of an idea."
+
+Presently he took out his pocket-book, and handing me a card, said:--
+
+"We are under the mutual disadvantage of all chance acquaintances. My
+name is Dalrymple--Oscar Dalrymple, late of the Enniskillen Dragoons. My
+friend here is unknown to fame as Mr. Frank Sullivan; a young gentleman
+who has the good fortune to be younger partner in a firm of merchant
+princes, and the bad taste to dislike his occupation."
+
+How I blushed as I took Captain Dalrymple's card, and stammered out my
+own name in return! I had never possessed a card in my life, nor needed
+one, till this moment. I rather think that Captain Dalrymple guessed
+these facts, for he shook hands with me at once, and put an end to my
+embarrassment by proposing that we should take a boat, and pull a mile
+or two up the river. The thing was no sooner said than done. There were
+plenty of boats below the iron bridge; so we chose one of the cleanest,
+and jumped into it without any kind of reference to the owner, whoever
+he might be.
+
+"_Batelier, Messieurs? Batelier_?" cried a dozen men at once, rushing
+down to the water's edge.
+
+But Dalrymple had already thrown off his coat, and seized the oars.
+
+"_Batelier_, indeed!" laughed he, as with two or three powerful strokes
+he carried us right into the middle, of the stream. "Trust an Oxford man
+for employing any arms but his own, when a pair of sculls are in
+question!"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+THE ISLAND IN THE RIVER.
+
+It was just eight o'clock when we started, with the twilight coming on.
+Our course lay up the river, with a strong current setting against us;
+so we made but little way, and enjoyed the tranquil beauty of the
+evening. The sky was pale and clear, somewhat greenish overhead and
+deepening along the line of the horizon into amber and rose. Behind us
+lay the town with every brown spire articulated against the sky and
+every vane glittering in the last glow that streamed up from the west.
+To our left rose a line of steep chalk cliffs, and before us lay the
+river, winding away through meadow lands fringed with willows and
+poplars, and interspersed with green islands wooded to the water's edge.
+Presently the last flush faded, and one large planet, splendid and
+solitary, like the first poet of a dark century, emerged from the
+deepening gray.
+
+My companions were in high spirits. They jested; they laughed; they
+hummed scraps of songs; they had a greeting for every boat that passed.
+By-and-by, we came to an island with a little landing-place where a
+score or two of boats were moored against the alders by the water's
+edge. A tall flag-staff gay with streamers peeped above the tree-tops,
+and a cheerful sound of piping and fiddling, mingled with the hum of
+many voices, came and went with the passing breeze. As Dalrymple rested
+on his oars to listen, a boat which we had outstripped some minutes
+before, shot past us to the landing-place, and its occupants, five in
+number, alighted.
+
+"Bet you ten to one that's a bridal party," said Mr. Sullivan.
+
+"Say you so? Then suppose we follow, and have a look at the bride!"
+exclaimed his friend. "The place is a public garden."
+
+The proposition was carried unanimously, and we landed, having first
+tied the boat to a willow. We found the island laid out very prettily;
+intersected by numbers of little paths, with rustic seats here and there
+among the trees, and variegated lamps gleaming out amid the grass, like
+parti-colored glow-worms. Following one of these paths, we came
+presently to an open space, brilliantly lighted and crowded by
+holiday-makers. Here were refreshment stalls, and Russian swings, and
+queer-looking merry-go-rounds, where each individual sat on a wooden
+horse and went gravely round and round with a stick in his hand, trying
+to knock off a ring from the top of a pole in the middle. Here, also,
+was a band in a gaily decorated orchestra; a circular area roped off
+for dancers; a mysterious tent with a fortune-teller inside; a
+lottery-stall resplendent with vases and knick-knacks, which nobody was
+ever known to win; in short, all kinds of attractions, stale enough, no
+doubt, to my companions, but sufficiently novel and amusing to me.
+
+We strolled about for some time among the stalls and promenaders and
+amused ourselves by criticising the company, which was composed almost
+entirely of peasants, soldiers, artisans in blue blouses and humble
+tradespeople. The younger women were mostly handsome, with high Norman
+caps, white kerchiefs and massive gold ear-rings. Many, in addition to
+the ear-rings, wore a gold cross suspended round the neck by a piece of
+black velvet; and some had a brooch to match. Here, sitting round a
+table under a tree, we came upon a family group, consisting of a little
+plump, bald-headed _bourgeois_ with his wife and two children--the wife
+stout and rosy; the children noisy and authoritative. They were
+discussing a dish of poached eggs and a bottle of red wine, to the music
+of a polka close by.
+
+"I should like to dance," said the little girl, drumming with her feet
+against the leg of the table, and eating an egg with her fingers. "I may
+dance presently with Phillippe, may I not, papa?"
+
+"I won't dance," said Phillippe sulkily. "I want some oysters."
+
+"Oysters, _mon enfant_! I have told you twice already that no one eats
+oysters in July," observed his mother.
+
+"I don't care for that," said Phillippe. "It's my _fête_ day, and Uncle
+Jacques said I was to have whatever I fancied; I want some oysters."
+
+"Your Uncle Jacques did not know what an unreasonable boy you are,"
+replied the father angrily. "If you say another word about oysters, you
+shall not ride in the _manège_ to-night."
+
+Phillippe thrust his fists into his eyes and began to roar--so we walked
+away.
+
+In an arbor, a little further on, we saw two young people whispering
+earnestly, and conscious of no eyes but each other's.
+
+"A pair of lovers," said Sullivan.
+
+"And a pair that seldom get the chance of meeting, if we may judge by
+their untasted omelette," replied Dalrymple. "But where's the
+bridal party?"
+
+"Oh, we shall find them presently. You seem interested."
+
+"I am. I mean to dance with the bride and make the bridegroom jealous."
+
+We laughed and passed on, peeping into every arbor, observing every
+group, and turning to stare at every pretty girl we met. My own aptitude
+in the acquisition of these arts of gallantry astonished myself. Now, we
+passed a couple of soldiers playing at dominoes; now a noisy party round
+a table in the open air covered with bottles; now an arbor where half a
+dozen young men and three or four girls were assembled round a bowl of
+blazing punch. The girls were protesting they dare not drink it, but
+were drinking it, nevertheless, with exceeding gusto.
+
+"Grisettes and _commis voyageurs!_" said Dalrymple, contemptuously. "Let
+us go and look at the dancers."
+
+We went on, and stood in the shelter of some trees near the orchestra.
+The players consisted of three violins, a clarionette and a big drum.
+The big drum was an enthusiastic performer. He belabored his instrument
+as heartily as if it had been his worst enemy, but with so much
+independence of character that he never kept the same time as his
+fellow-players for two minutes together. They were playing a polka for
+the benefit of some twelve or fifteen couples, who were dancing with all
+their might in the space before the orchestra. On they came, round and
+round and never weary, two at a time--a mechanic and a grisette, a
+rustic and a Normandy girl, a tall soldier and a short widow, a fat
+tradesman and his wife, a couple of milliners assistants who preferred
+dancing together to not dancing at all, and so forth.
+
+"How I wish somebody would ask me, _ma mère_!" said a coquettish
+brunette, close by, with a sidelong glance at ourselves."
+
+"You shall dance with your brother Paul, my dear, as soon as he comes,"
+replied her mother, a stout _bourgeoise_ with a green fan.
+
+"But it is such dull work to dance with one's brother!" pouted the
+brunette. "If it were one's cousin, even, it would be different."
+
+Mr. Frank Sullivan flung away his cigar, and began buttoning up his
+gloves.
+
+"I'll take that damsel out immediately," said he. "A girl who objects to
+dance with her brother deserves encouragement."
+
+So away he went with his hat inclining jauntily on one side, and, having
+obtained the mother's permission, whirled away with the pretty brunette
+into the very thickest of the throng.
+
+"There they are!" said Dalrymple, suddenly. "There's the wedding party.
+_Per Bacco_! but our little bride is charming!"
+
+"And the bridegroom is a handsome specimen of rusticity."
+
+"Yes--a genuine pastoral pair, like a Dresden china shepherd and
+shepherdess. See, the girl is looking up in his face--he shakes his
+head. She is urging him to dance, and he refuses! Never mind, _ma
+belle_--you shall have your valse, and Corydon may be as cross as
+he pleases!"
+
+"Don't flatter yourself that she will displease Corydon to dance with
+your lordship!" I said, laughingly.
+
+"Pshaw! she would displease fifty Corydons if I chose to make her do
+so," said Dalrymple, with a smile of conscious power.
+
+"True; but not on her wedding-day."
+
+"Wedding-day or not, I beg to observe that in less than half an hour you
+will see me whirling along with my arm round little Phillis's dainty
+waist. Now come and see how I do it."
+
+He made his way through the crowd, and I, half curious, half abashed,
+went with him. The party was five in number, consisting of the bride and
+bridegroom, a rosy, middle-aged peasant woman, evidently the mother of
+the bride, and an elderly couple who looked like humble townsfolk, and
+were probably related to one or other of the newly-married pair.
+Dalrymple opened the attack by stumbling against the mother, and then
+overwhelming her with elaborate apologies.
+
+"In these crowded places, Madame," said he, in his fluent French, "one
+is scarcely responsible for an impoliteness. I beg ten thousand pardons,
+however. I hope I have not hurt you?"
+
+"_Ma foi!_ no, M'sieur. It would take more than that to hurt me!"
+
+"Nor injured your dress, I trust, Madame?"
+
+"_Ah, par exemple_! do I wear muslins or gauzes that they should not
+bear touching? No, no, no, M'sieur--thanking you all the same."
+
+"You are very amiable, Madame, to say so."
+
+"You are very polite, M'sieur, to think so much of a trifle."
+
+"Nothing is a trifle, Madame, where a lady is concerned. At least, so we
+Englishmen consider."
+
+"Bah! M'sieur is not English?"
+
+"Indeed, Madame, I am."
+
+"_Mais, mon Dieu! c'est incroyable_. Suzette--brother Jacques--André, do
+you hear this? M'sieur, here, swears that he is English, and yet he
+speaks French like one of ourselves! Ah, what a fine thing learning is!"
+
+"I may say with truth, Madame, that I never appreciate the advantages of
+education so highly, as when they enable me to converse with ladies who
+are not my own countrywomen," said Dalrymple, carrying on the
+conversation with as much studied politeness as if his interlocutor had
+been a duchess. "But--excuse the observation--you are here, I imagine,
+upon a happy occasion?"
+
+The mother laughed, and rubbed her hands.
+
+"_Dâme_! one may see that," replied she, "with one's eyes shut! Yes,
+M'sieur,--yes--their wedding-day, the dear children--their wedding-day!
+They've been betrothed these two years."
+
+"The bride is very like you, Madame," said Dalrymple, gravely. "Your
+younger sister, I presume?"
+
+"_Ah, quel farceur_! He takes my daughter for my sister! Suzette, do
+you hear this? M'sieur is killing me with laughter!"
+
+And the good lady chuckled, and gasped, and wiped her eyes, and dealt
+Dalrymple a playful push between the shoulders, which would have upset
+the balance of any less heavy dragoon.
+
+"Your daughter, Madame!" said he. "Allow me to congratulate you. May I
+also be permitted to congratulate the bride?" And with this he took off
+his hat to Suzette and shook hands with André, who looked not
+overpleased, and proceeded to introduce me as his friend Monsieur Basil
+Arbuthnot, "a young English gentleman, _très distingué_"
+
+The old lady then said her name was Madame Roquet, and that she rented a
+small farm about a mile and a half from Rouen; that Suzette was her only
+child; and that she had lost her "blessed man" about eight years ago.
+She next introduced the elderly couple as her brother Jacques Robineau
+and his wife, and informed us that Jacques was a tailor, and had a shop
+opposite the church of St. Maclou, "_là bas_."
+
+To judge of Monsieur Robineau's skill by his outward appearance, I
+should have said that he was professionally unsuccessful, and supplied
+his own wardrobe from the misfits returned by his customers. He wore a
+waistcoat which was considerably too long for him, trousers which were
+considerably too short, and a green cloth coat with a high velvet collar
+which came up nearly to the tops of his ears. In respect of personal
+characteristics, Monsieur Robineau and his wife were the most admirable
+contrast imaginable. Monsieur Robineau was short; Madame Robineau was
+tall. Monsieur Robineau was as plump and rosy as a robin; Madame
+Robineau was pale and bony to behold. Monsieur Robineau looked the soul
+of good nature, ready to chirrup over his _grog-au-vin,_ to smoke a pipe
+with his neighbor, to cut a harmless joke or enjoy a harmless frolic, as
+cheerfully as any little tailor that ever lived; Madame Robineau, on the
+contrary, preserved a dreadful dignity, and looked as if she could laugh
+at nothing on this side of the grave. Not to consider the question too
+curiously, I should have said, at first sight, that Monsieur Robineau
+stood in no little awe of his wife, and that Madame Robineau was the
+very head and front of their domestic establishment.
+
+It was wonderful and delightful to see how Captain Dalrymple placed
+himself on the best of terms with all these good people--how he patted
+Robineau on the back and complimented Madame, banished the cloud from
+André's brow, and summoned a smile to the pretty cheek of Suzette. One
+would have thought he had known them for years already, so thoroughly
+was he at home with every member of the wedding party.
+
+Presently, he asked Suzette to dance. She blushed scarlet, and cast a
+pretty appealing look at her husband and her mother. I could almost
+guess what she whispered to the former by the motion of her lips.
+
+"Monsieur André will, I am sure, spare Madame for one gallop," said
+Dalrymple, with that kind of courtesy which accepts no denial. It was
+quite another tone, quite another manner. It was no longer the
+persuasive suavity of one who is desirous only to please, but the
+politeness of a gentleman to au inferior.
+
+The cloud came back upon André's brow, and he hesitated; but Madame
+Roquet interposed.
+
+"Spare her!" she exclaimed. "_Dâme_! I should think so! She has never
+left his arm all day. Here, my child, give me your shawl while you
+dance, and bake care not to get too warm, for the evening air is
+dangerous."
+
+And so Suzette took off her shawl, and André was silenced, and
+Dalrymple, in less than the half hour, was actually whirling away with
+his arm round little Phillis's dainty waist.
+
+I am afraid that I proved a very indifferent _locum tenens_ for my
+brilliant friend, and that the good people thought me exceedingly
+stupid. I tried to talk to them, but the language tripped me up at every
+turn, and the right words never would come when they were wanted.
+Besides, I felt uneasy without knowing exactly why. I could not keep
+from watching Dalrymple and Suzette. I could not help noticing how
+closely he held her; how he never ceased talking to her; and how the
+smiles and blushes chased each other over her pretty face. That I should
+have wit enough to observe these things proved that my education was
+progressing rapidly; but then, to be sure, I was studying under an
+accomplished teacher.
+
+They danced for a long time. So long, that André became uneasy, and my
+available French was quite exhausted. I was heartily glad when Dalrymple
+brought back the little bride at last, flushed and panting, and (himself
+as cool as a diplomatist) assisted her with her shawl and resigned her
+to the protection of her husband.
+
+"Why hast thou danced so long with that big Englishman?" murmured André,
+discontentedly. "When _I_ asked thee, thou wast too tired, and now...."
+
+"And now I am so happy to be near thee again," whispered Suzette.
+
+André softened directly.
+
+"But to dance for twenty minutes...." began he.
+
+"Ah, but he danced so well, and I am so fond of waltzing, André!"
+
+The cloud gathered again, and an impatient reply was coming, when
+Dalrymple opportunely invited the whole party to a bowl of punch in an
+adjoining arbor, and himself led the way with Madame Roquet. The arbor
+was vacant, a waiter was placing the chairs, and the punch was blazing
+in the bowl. It had evidently been ordered during one of the pauses in
+the dance, that it might be ready to the moment--a little attention
+which called forth exclamations of pleasure from both Madame Roquet and
+Monsieur Robineau, and touched with something like a gleam of
+satisfaction even the grim visage of Monsieur Robineau's wife.
+
+Dalrymple took the head of the table, and stirred the punch into leaping
+tongues of blue flame till it looked like a miniature Vesuvius.
+
+"What diabolical-looking stuff!" I exclaimed. "You might, to all
+appearance, be Lucifer's own cupbearer."
+
+"A proof that it ought to be devilish good," replied Dalrymple, ladling
+it out into the glasses. "Allow me, ladies and gentlemen, to propose the
+health, happiness, and prosperity of the bride and bridegroom. May they
+never die, and may they be remembered for ever after!"
+
+We all laughed as if this was the best joke we had heard in our lives,
+and Dalrymple filled the glasses up again.
+
+"What, in the name of all that's mischievous, can have become of
+Sullivan?" said he to me. "I have not caught so much as a glimpse of him
+for the last hour."
+
+"When I last saw him, he was dancing."
+
+"Yes, with a pretty little dark-eyed girl in a blue dress. By Jove! that
+fellow will be getting into trouble if left to himself!"
+
+"But the girl has her mother with her!"
+
+"All the stronger probability of a scrimmage," replied Dalrymple,
+sipping his punch with a covert glance of salutation at Suzette.
+
+"Shall I see if they are among the dancers?"
+
+"Do--but make haste; for the punch is disappearing fast."
+
+I left them, and went back to the platform where the indefatigable
+public was now engaged in the performance of quadrilles. Never, surely,
+were people so industrious in the pursuit of pleasure! They poussetted,
+bowed, curtsied, joined hands, and threaded the mysteries of every
+figure, as if their very lives depended on their agility.
+
+"Look at Jean Thomas," said a young girl to her still younger companion.
+"He dances like an angel!"
+
+The one thus called upon to admire, looked at Jean Thomas, and sighed.
+
+"He never asks me, by any chance," said she, sadly, "although his mother
+and mine are good neighbors. I suppose I don't dance well enough--or
+dress well enough," she added, glancing at her friend's gay shawl and
+coquettish cap.
+
+"He has danced with me twice this evening," said the first speaker
+triumphantly; "and he danced with me twice last Sunday at the Jardin
+d'Armide. Elise says...."
+
+Her voice dropped to a whisper, and I heard no more. It was a passing
+glimpse behind the curtain--a peep at one of the many dramas of real
+life that are being played for ever around us. Here were all the
+elements of romance--love, admiration, vanity, envy. Here was a hero in
+humble life--a lady-killer in his own little sphere. He dances with one,
+neglects another, and multiplies his conquests with all the
+heartlessness of a gentleman.
+
+I wandered round the platform once or twice, scrutinizing the dancers,
+but without success. There was no sign of Sullivan, or of his partner,
+or of his partner's mother, the _bourgeoise_ with the green fan. I then
+went to the grotto of the fortune-teller, but it was full of noisy
+rustics; and thence to the lottery hall, where there were plenty of
+players, but not those of whom I was in search.
+
+"Wheel of fortune, Messieurs et Mesdames," said the young lady behind
+the counter. "Only fifty centimes each. All prizes, and no blanks--try
+your fortune, _monsieur le capitaine!_ Put it once, _monsieur le
+capitaine_; once for yourself, and once for madame. Only fifty centimes
+each, and the certainty of winning!"
+
+_Monsieur le capitaine_ was a great, rawboned corporal, with a pretty
+little maid-servant on his arm. The flattery was not very delicate; but
+it succeeded. He threw down a franc. The wheel flew round, the papers
+were drawn, and the corporal won a needle-case, and the maid-servant a
+cigar-holder. In the midst of the laugh to which this distribution gave
+rise, I walked away in the direction of the refreshment stalls. Here
+were parties supping substantially, dancers drinking orgeat and
+lemonade, and little knots of tradesmen and mechanics sipping beer
+ridiculously out of wine-glasses to an accompaniment of cakes and
+sweet-biscuits. Still I could see no trace of Mr. Frank Sullivan.
+
+At length I gave up the search in despair, and on my way back
+encountered Master Philippe leaning against a tree, and looking
+exceedingly helpless and unwell.
+
+"You ate too many eggs, Philippe," said his mother. "I told you so at
+the time."
+
+"It--it wasn't the eggs," faltered the wretched Philippe. "It was the
+Russian swing."
+
+"And serve you rightly, too," said his father angrily. "I wish with all
+my heart that you had had your favorite oysters as well!"
+
+When I came back to the arbor, I found the little party immensely happy,
+and a fresh bowl of punch just placed upon the table. André was sitting
+next to Suzette, as proud as a king. Madame Roquet, volubly convivial,
+was talking to every one. Madame Robineau was silently disposing of all
+the biscuits and punch that came in her way. Monsieur Robineau, with his
+hat a little pushed back and his thumb in the arm-hole of his waistcoat,
+was telling a long story to which nobody listened; while Dalrymple,
+sitting on the other side of the bride, was gallantly doing the duties
+of entertainer.
+
+He looked up--I shook my head, slipped back into my place, and listened
+to the tangled threads of conversation going on around me.
+
+"And so," said Monsieur Robineau, proceeding with his story, and staring
+down into the bottom of his empty glass, "and so I said to myself,
+'Robineau, _mon ami_, take care. One honest man is better than two
+rogues; and if thou keepest thine eyes open, the devil himself stands
+small chance of cheating thee!' So I buttoned up my coat--this very coat
+I have on now, only that I have re-lined and re-cuffed it since then,
+and changed the buttons for brass ones; and brass buttons for one's
+holiday coat, you know, look so much more _comme il faut_--and said to
+the landlord...."
+
+"Another glass of punch, Monsieur Robineau," interrupted Dalrymple.
+
+"Thank you, M'sieur, you are very good; well, as I was saying...."
+
+"Ah, bah, brother Jacques!" exclaimed Madame Roquet, impatiently,
+"don't give us that old story of the miller and the gray colt, this
+evening! We've all heard it a hundred times already. Sing us a song
+instead, _mon ami_!"
+
+"I shall be happy to sing, sister Marie," replied Monsieur Robineau,
+with somewhat husky dignity, "when I have finished my story. You may
+have heard the story before. So may André--so may Suzette--so may my
+wife. I admit it. But these gentlemen--these gentlemen who have never
+heard it, and who have done me the honor...."
+
+"Not to listen to a word of it," said Madame Robineau, sharply. "There,
+you are answered, husband. Drink your punch, and hold your tongue."
+
+Monsieur Robineau waved his hand majestically, and assumed a
+Parliamentary air.
+
+"Madame Robineau," he said, getting more and more husky, "be so obliging
+as to wait till I ask for your advice. With regard to drinking my punch,
+I have drunk it--" and here he again stared down into the bottom of his
+glass, which was again empty--"and with regard to holding my tongue,
+that is my business, and--and...."
+
+"Monsieur Robineau," said Dalrymple, "allow me to offer you some more
+punch."
+
+"Not another drop, Jacques," said Madame, sternly. "You have had too
+much already."
+
+Poor Monsieur Robineau, who had put out his glass to be refilled, paused
+and looked helplessly at his wife.
+
+"_Mon cher ange_,...." he began; but she shook her head inflexibly, and
+Monsieur Robineau submitted with the air of a man who knows that from
+the sentence of the supreme court there is no appeal.
+
+"_Dâme_!" whispered Madame Roquet, with a confidential attack upon my
+ribs that gave me a pain in my side for half an hour after, "my brother
+has the heart of a rabbit. He gives way to her in everything--so much
+the worse for him. My blessed man, who was a saint of a husband, would
+have broken the bowl over my ears if I had dared to interfere between
+his glass and his mouth!"
+
+Whereupon Madame Roquet filled her own glass and mine, and Madame
+Robineau, less indulgent to her husband than herself, followed
+our example.
+
+Just at this moment, a confused hubbub of voices, and other sounds
+expressive of a _fracas_, broke out in the direction of the trees behind
+the orchestra. The dancers deserted their polka, the musicians stopped
+fiddling, the noisy supper-party in the next arbor abandoned their cold
+chicken and salad, and everybody ran to the scene of action. Dalrymple
+was on his feet in a moment; but Suzette held André back with both hands
+and implored him to stay.
+
+"Some _mauvais sujets_, no doubt, who refuse to pay the score,"
+suggested Madame Roquet.
+
+"Or Sullivan, who has got into one of his infernal scrapes," muttered
+Dalrymple, with a determined wrench at his moustache. "Come on, anyhow,
+and let us see what is the matter!"
+
+So we snatched up our hats and ran out, just as Monsieur Robineau seized
+the opportunity to drink another tumbler of punch when his wife was
+not looking.
+
+Following in the direction of the rest, we took one of the paths behind
+the orchestra, and came upon a noisy crowd gathered round a wooden
+summer-house.
+
+"It's a fight," said one.
+
+"It's a pickpocket," said another.
+
+"Bah! it's only a young fellow who has been making love to a girl,"
+exclaimed a third.
+
+We forced our way through, and there we saw Mr. Frank Sullivan with his
+hat off, his arms crossed, and his back against the wall, presenting a
+dauntless front to the gesticulations and threats of an exceedingly
+enraged young man with red hair, who was abusing him furiously. The
+amount of temper displayed by this young man was something unparalleled.
+He was angry in every one of his limbs. He stamped, he shook his fist,
+he shook his head. The very tips of his ears looked scarlet with rage.
+Every now and then he faced round to the spectators, and appealed to
+them--or to a stout woman with a green fan, who was almost as red and
+angry as himself, and who always rushed forward when addressed, and
+shook the green fan in Sullivan's face.
+
+"You are an aristocrat!" stormed the young man. "A pampered, insolent
+aristocrat! A dog of an Englishman! A _scélérat_! Don't suppose you are
+to trample upon us for nothing! We are Frenchmen, you beggarly
+islander--Frenchmen, do you hear?"
+
+A growl of sympathetic indignation ran through the crowd, and "_à bas
+les aristocrats_--_à bas les Anglais_!" broke out here and there.
+
+"In the devil's name, Sullivan," said Dalrymple, shouldering his way up
+to the object of these agreeable menaces, "what have you been after, to
+bring this storm about your ears?"
+
+"Pshaw! nothing at all," replied he with a mocking laugh, and a
+contemptuous gesture. "I danced with a pretty girl, and treated her to
+champagne afterwards. Her mother and brother hunted us out, and spoiled
+our flirtation. That's the whole story."
+
+Something in the laugh and gesture--something, too, perhaps in the
+language which they could not understand, appeared to give the last
+aggravation to both of Sullivan's assailants. I saw the young man raise
+his arm to strike--I saw Dalrymple fell him with a blow that would have
+stunned an ox--I saw the crowd close in, heard the storm break out on
+every side, and, above it all, the deep, strong tones of Dalrymple's
+voice, saying:--
+
+"To the boat, boys! Follow me."
+
+In another moment he had flung himself into the crowd, dealt one or two
+sounding blows to left and right, cleared a passage for himself and us,
+and sped away down one of the narrow walks leading to the river.
+Presently, having taken one or two turnings, none of which seemed to
+lead to the spot we sought, we came upon an open space full of piled-up
+benches, pyramids of empty bottles, boxes, baskets, and all kinds of
+lumber. Here we paused to listen and take breath.
+
+We had left the crowd behind us, but they were still within hearing.
+
+"By Jove!" said Dalrymple, "I don't know which way to go. I believe we
+are on the wrong side of the island."
+
+"And I believe they are after us," added Sullivan, peering into the
+baskets. "By all that's fortunate, here are the fireworks! Has anybody
+got a match? We'll take these with us, and go off in a blaze
+of triumph!"
+
+The suggestion was no sooner made than adopted. We filled our hats and
+pockets with crackers and Catherine-wheels, piled the rest into one
+great heap, threw a dozen or so of lighted fusees into the midst of
+them, and just as the voices of our pursuers were growing momentarily
+louder and nearer, darted away again down a fresh turning, and saw the
+river gleaming at the end of it.
+
+"Hurrah! here's a boat," shouted Sullivan, leaping into it, and we after
+him.
+
+It was not our boat, but we did not care for that. Ours was at the other
+side of the island, far enough away, down by the landing-place. Just as
+Dalrymple seized the oars, there burst forth a tremendous explosion. A
+column of rockets shot up into the air, and instantly the place was as
+light as day. Then a yell of discovery broke forth, and we were seen
+almost as soon as we were fairly out of reach. We had secured the only
+boat on that side of the island, and three or four of Dalrymple's
+powerful strokes had already carried us well into the middle of the
+stream. To let off our own store of fireworks--to pitch tokens of our
+regard to our friends on the island in the shape of blazing crackers,
+which fell sputtering and fizzing into the water half-way between the
+boat and the shore--to stand up in the stern and bow politely--finally,
+to row away singing "God save the Queen" with all our might, were feats
+upon which we prided ourselves very considerably at the time, and the
+recollection of which afforded us infinite amusement all the way home.
+
+That evening we all supped together at the Chaval Blane, and of what we
+did or said after supper I have but a confused remembrance. I believe
+that I tried to smoke a cigar; and it is my impression that I made a
+speech, in which I swore eternal friendship to both of my new friends;
+but the only circumstance about which I cannot be mistaken is that I
+awoke next morning with the worst specimen of headache that had yet come
+within the limits of my experience.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+DAMON AND PYTHIAS.
+
+I left Rouen the day after my great adventure on the river, and Captain
+Dalrymple went with me to the station.
+
+"You have my Paris address upon my card," he said, as we walked to and
+fro upon the platform. "It's just a bachelor's den, you know--and I
+shall be there in about a fortnight or three weeks. Come and look
+me up."
+
+To which I replied that I was glad to be allowed to do so, and that I
+should "look him up" as soon as he came home. And so, with words of
+cordial good-will and a hearty shake of the hand, we parted.
+
+Having started late in the evening, I arrived in Paris between four and
+five o'clock on a bright midsummer Sunday morning. I was not long
+delayed by the customs officers, for I carried but a scant supply of
+luggage. Having left this at an hotel, I wandered about till it should
+be time for breakfast. After breakfast I meant to dress and call upon
+Dr. Chéron.
+
+The morning air was clear and cool. The sun shone brilliantly, and was
+reflected back with dazzling vividness from long vistas of high white
+houses, innumerable windows, and gilded balconies. Theatres, shops,
+cafés, and hotels not yet opened, lined the great thoroughfares.
+Triumphal arches, columns, parks, palaces, and churches succeeded one
+another in apparently endless succession. I passed a lofty pillar
+crowned with a conqueror's statue--a palace tragic in history--a modern
+Parthenon surrounded by columns, peopled with sculptured friezes, and
+approached by a flight of steps extending the whole width of the
+building. I went in, for the doors had just been opened, and a
+white-haired Sacristan was preparing the seats for matin service. There
+were acolytes decorating the altar with fresh flowers, and early
+devotees on their knees before the shrine of the Madonna. The gilded
+ornaments, the tapers winking in the morning light, the statues, the
+paintings, the faint clinging odors of incense, the hushed atmosphere,
+the devotional silence, the marble angels kneeling round the altar, all
+united to increase my dream of delight. I gazed and gazed again;
+wandered round and round; and at last, worn out with excitement and
+fatigue, sank into a chair in a distant corner of the Church, and fell
+into a heavy sleep. How long it lasted I know not; but the voices of the
+choristers and the deep tones of the organ mingled with my dreams. When
+I awoke the last worshippers were departing, the music had died into
+silence, the wax-lights were being extinguished, and the service
+was ended.
+
+Again I went out into the streets; but all was changed. Where there had
+been the silence of early morning there was now the confusion of a great
+city. Where there had been closed shutters and deserted thoroughfares,
+there was the bustle of life, gayety, business, and pleasure. The shops
+blazed with jewels and merchandise; the stonemasons were at work on the
+new buildings; the lemonade venders, with their gay reservoirs upon
+their backs, were plying a noisy trade; the bill-stickers were papering
+boardings and lamp-posts with variegated advertisements; the charlatan,
+in his gaudy chariot, was selling pencils and penknives to the
+accompaniment of a hand-organ; soldiers were marching to the clangor of
+military music; the merchant was in his counting-house, the stock-broker
+at the Bourse, and the lounger, whose name is Legion, was sitting in the
+open air outside his favorite café, drinking chocolate, and yawning over
+the _Charivari_.
+
+I thought I must be dreaming. I scarcely believed the evidence of my
+eyes. Was this Sunday? Was it possible that in our own little church at
+home--in our own little church, where we could hear the birds twittering
+outside in every interval of the quiet service--the old familiar faces,
+row beyond row, were even now upturned in reverent attention to the
+words of the preacher? Prince Bedreddin, transported in his sleep to the
+gates of Damascus, could scarcely have opened his eyes upon a foreign
+city and a strange people with more incredulous amazement.
+
+I can now scarcely remember how that day of wonders went by. I only know
+that I rambled about as in a dream, and am vaguely conscious of having
+wandered through the gardens of the Tuilleries; of having found the
+Louvre open, and of losing myself among some of the upper galleries; of
+lying exhausted upon a bench in the Champs Elysées; of returning by
+quays lined with palaces and spanned by noble bridges; of pacing round
+and round the enchanted arcades of the Palais Royal; of wondering how
+and where I should find my hotel, and of deciding at last that I could
+go no farther without dining somehow. Wearied and half stupefied, I
+ventured, at length, into one of the large _restaurants_ upon the
+Boulevards. Here I found spacious rooms lighted by superb chandeliers
+which were again reflected in mirrors that extended from floor to
+ceiling. Rows of small tables ran round the rooms, and a double line
+down the centre, each laid with its snowy cloth and glittering silver.
+
+It was early when I arrived; so I passed up to the top of the room and
+appropriated a small table commanding a view of the great thoroughfare
+below. The waiters were slow to serve me; the place filled speedily; and
+by the time I had finished my soup, nearly all the tables were occupied.
+Here sat a party of officers, bronzed and mustachioed; yonder a group of
+laughing girls; a pair of provincials; a family party, children,
+governess and all; a stout capitalist, solitary and self content; a
+quatuor of rollicking _commis-voyageurs_; an English couple, perplexed
+and curious. Amused by the sight of so many faces, listening to the hum
+of voices, and watching the flying waiters bearing all kinds of
+mysterious dishes, I loitered over my lonely meal, and wished that this
+delightful whirl of novelty might last for ever. By and by a gentleman
+entered, walked up the whole length of the room in search of a seat,
+found my table occupied by only a single person, bowed politely, and
+drew his chair opposite mine.
+
+He was a portly man of about forty-five or fifty years of age, with a
+broad, calm brow; curling light hair, somewhat worn upon the temples;
+and large blue eyes, more keen than tender. His dress was scrupulously
+simple, and his hands were immaculately white. He carried an umbrella
+little thicker than a walking-stick, and wrote out his list of dishes
+with a massive gold pencil. The waiter bowed down before him as if he
+were an habitué of the place.
+
+It was not long before we fell into conversation. I do not remember
+which spoke first; but we talked of Paris--or rather, I talked and he
+listened; for, what with the excitement and fatigue of the day, and what
+with the half bottle of champagne which I had magnificently ordered, I
+found myself gifted with a sudden flood of words, and ran on, I fear,
+not very discreetly.
+
+A few civil rejoinders, a smile, a bow, an assent, a question implied
+rather than spoken, sufficed to draw from me the particulars of my
+journey. I told everything, from my birthplace and education to my
+future plans and prospects; and the stranger, with a frosty humor
+twinkling about his eyes, listened politely. He was himself particularly
+silent; but he had the art of provoking conversation while quietly
+enjoying his own dinner. When this was finished, however, he leaned back
+in his chair, sipped his claret, and talked a little more freely.
+
+"And so," said he, in very excellent English, "you have come to Paris to
+finish your studies. But have you no fear, young gentleman, that the
+attractions of so gay a city may divert your mind from graver subjects?
+Do you think that, when every pleasure may be had for the seeking, you
+will be content to devote yourself to the dry details of an
+uninteresting profession?"
+
+"It is not an uninteresting profession," I replied. "I might perhaps
+have preferred the church or the law; but having embarked in the study
+of medicine, I shall do my best to succeed in it."
+
+The stranger smiled.
+
+"I am glad," he said, "to see you so ambitious. I do not doubt that you
+will become a shining light in the brotherhood of Esculapius."
+
+"I hope so," I replied, boldly. "I have studied closer than most men of
+my age, already."
+
+He smiled again, coughed doubtfully, and insisted on filling my glass
+from his own bottle.
+
+"I only fear," he said, "that you will be too diffident of your own
+merits. Now, when you call upon this Doctor....what did you say was
+his name?"
+
+"Chéron," I replied, huskily.
+
+"True, Chéron. Well, when you meet him for the first time you will,
+perhaps, be timid, hesitating, and silent. But, believe me, a young man
+of your remarkable abilities should be self-possessed. You ought to
+inspire him from the beginning with a suitable respect for
+your talents."
+
+"That's precisely the line I mean to take," said I, boastfully.
+"I'll--I'll astonish him. I'm afraid of nobody--not I!"
+
+The stranger filled my glass again. His claret must have been very
+strong or my head very weak, for it seemed to me, as he did so, that all
+the chandeliers were in motion.
+
+"Upon my word," observed he, "you are a young man of infinite spirit."
+
+"And you," I replied, making an effort to bring the glass steadily to my
+lips, "you are a capital fellow--a clear-sighted, sensible, capital
+fellow. We'll be friends."
+
+He bowed, and said, somewhat coldly,
+
+"I have no doubt that we shall become better acquainted."
+
+"Better acquainted, indeed!--we'll be intimate!" I ejaculated,
+affectionately. "I'll introduce you to Dalrymple--you'll like him
+excessively. Just the fellow to delight you."
+
+"So I should say," observed the stranger, drily.
+
+"And as for you and myself, we'll--we'll be Damon and ... what's the
+other one's name?"
+
+"Pythias," replied my new acquaintance, leaning back in his chair, and
+surveying me with a peculiar and very deliberate stare. "Exactly
+so--Damon and Pythias! A charming arrangement."
+
+"Bravo! Famous! And now we'll have another bottle of wine."
+
+"Not on my account, I beg," said the gentleman firmly. "My head is not
+so cool as yours."
+
+Cool, indeed, and the room whirling round and round, like a teetotum!
+
+"Oh, if you won't, I won't," said I confusedly; "but I--I could--drink
+my share of another bottle, I assure you, and not--feel the
+slightest...."
+
+"I have no doubt on that point," said my neighbor, gravely; "but our
+French wines are deceptive, Mr. Arbuthnot, and you might possibly suffer
+some inconvenience to-morrow. You, as a medical man, should understand
+the evils of dyspepsia."
+
+"Dy--dy--dyspepsia be hanged," I muttered, dreamily. "Tell me,
+friend--by the by, I forget your name. Friend what?"
+
+"Friend Pythias," returned the stranger, drily. "You gave me the name
+yourself."
+
+"Ay, but your real name?"
+
+He shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"One name is as good as another," said he, lightly. "Let it be Pythias,
+for the present. But you were about to ask me some question?"
+
+"About old Chéron," I said, leaning both elbows on the table, and
+speaking very confidentially. "Now tell me, have you--have you any
+notion of what he is like? Do you--know--know anything about him?"
+
+"I have heard of him," he replied, intent for the moment on the pattern
+of his wine-glass.
+
+"Clever?"
+
+"That is a point upon which I could not venture an opinion. You must
+ask some more competent judge."
+
+"Come, now," said I, shaking my head, and trying to look knowing;
+"you--you know what I mean, well enough. Is he a grim old fellow?
+A--a--griffin, you know! Come, is he a gr--r--r--riffin?"
+
+My words had by this time acquired a distressing, self-propelling
+tendency, and linked themselves into compounds of twenty and thirty
+syllables.
+
+My _vis-à-vis_ smiled, bit his lip, then laughed a dry, short laugh.
+
+"Really," he said, "I am not in a position to reply to your question;
+but upon the whole, I should say that Dr. Chéron was not quite a
+griffin. The species, you see, is extinct."
+
+I roared with laughter; vowed I had never heard a better joke in my
+life; and repeated his last words over and over, like a degraded idiot
+as I was. All at once a sense of deadly faintness came upon me. I turned
+hot and cold by turns, and lifting my hand to my head, said, or tried
+to say:--
+
+"Room's--'bominably--close!"
+
+"We had better go," he replied promptly. "The air will do you good.
+Leave me to settle for our dinners, and you shall make it right with me
+by-and-by."
+
+He did so, and we left the room. Once out in the open air I found myself
+unable to stand. He called a _fiacre_; almost lifted me in; took his
+place beside me, and asked the name of my hotel.
+
+I had forgotten it; but I knew that it was opposite the railway station,
+and that was enough. When we arrived, I was on the verge of
+insensibility. I remember that I was led up-stairs by two waiters, and
+that the stranger saw me to my room. Then all was darkness and stupor.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+THE NEXT MORNING.
+
+"Oh, my Christian ducats!" _Merchant of Venice_.
+
+Gone!--gone!--both gone!--my new gold watch and my purse full of notes
+and Napoleons!
+
+I rang the bell furiously. It was answered by a demure-looking waiter,
+with a face like a parroquet.
+
+"Does Monsieur please to require anything?"
+
+"Require anything!" I exclaimed, in the best French I could muster. "I
+have been robbed!"
+
+"Robbed, Monsieur?"
+
+"Yes, of my watch and purse!"
+
+"_Tiens_! Of a watch and purse?" repeated the parroquet, lifting his
+eyebrows with an air of well-bred surprise. "_C'est drôle."_
+
+"Droll!" I cried, furiously. "Droll, you scoundrel! I'll let you know
+whether I think it droll! I'll complain to the authorities! I'll have
+the house searched! I'll--I'll...."
+
+I rang the bell again. Two or three more waiters came, and the master of
+the hotel. They all treated my communication in the same manner--coolly;
+incredulously; but with unruffled politeness.
+
+"Monsieur forgets," urged the master, "that he came back to the hotel
+last night in a state of absolute intoxication. Monsieur was accompanied
+by a stranger, who was gentlemanly, it it true; but since Monsieur
+acknowledges that that stranger was personally unknown to him, Monsieur
+may well perceive it would be more reasonable if his suspicions first
+pointed in that direction."
+
+Struck by the force of this observation, I flung myself into a chair and
+remained silent.
+
+"Has Monsieur no acquaintances in Paris to whom he may apply for
+advice?" inquired the landlord.
+
+"None," said I, moodily; "except that I have a letter of introduction
+to one Dr. Chéron."
+
+The landlord and his waiters exchanged glances.
+
+"I would respectfully recommend Monsieur to present his letter
+immediately," said the former. "Monsieur le Docteur Chéron is a man of
+the world--a man of high reputation and sagacity. Monsieur could not do
+better than advise with him."
+
+"Call a cab for me," said I, after a long pause. "I will go."
+
+The determination cost me something. Dismayed by the extent of my loss,
+racked with headache, languid, pale, and full of remorse for last
+night's folly, it needed but this humiliation to complete my misery.
+What! appear before my instructor for the first time with such a tale! I
+could have bitten my lips through with vexation.
+
+The cab was called. I saw, but would not see, the winks and nods
+exchanged behind my back by the grinning waiters. I flung myself into
+the vehicle, and soon was once more rattling through the noisy streets.
+But those brilliant streets had now lost all their charm for me. I
+admired nothing, saw nothing, heard nothing, on the way. I could think
+only of my father's anger and the contempt of Dr. Chéron.
+
+Presently the cab stopped before a large wooden gate with two enormous
+knockers. One half of this gate was opened by a servant in a sad-colored
+livery. I was shown across a broad courtyard, up a flight of lofty
+steps, and into a spacious _salon_ plainly furnished.
+
+"Monsieur le Docteur is at present engaged," said the servant, with an
+air of profound respect. "Will Monsieur have the goodness to be seated
+for a few moments."
+
+I sat down. I rose up. I examined the books upon the table, and the
+pictures on the walls. I wished myself "anywhere, anywhere out of the
+world," and more than once was on the point of stealing out of the
+house, jumping into my cab, and making off without seeing the doctor at
+all. One consideration alone prevented me. I had lost all my money, and
+had not even a franc left to pay the driver. Presently the door again
+opened, the grave footman reappeared, and I heard the dreaded
+announcement:--"Monsieur le Docteur will be happy to receive Monsieur in
+his consulting-room."
+
+I followed mechanically. We passed through a passage thickly carpeted,
+and paused before a green baize door. This door opened noiselessly, and
+I found myself in the great man's presence.
+
+"It gives me pleasure to welcome the son of my old friend John
+Arbuthnot," said a clear, and not unfamiliar voice.
+
+I started, looked up, grew red and white, hot and cold, and had not a
+syllable to utter in reply.
+
+In Doctor Chéron, I recognised--
+
+PYTHIAS!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+MYSTERIOUS PROCEEDINGS.
+
+The doctor pointed to a chair, looked at his watch, and said:--
+
+"I hope you have had a pleasant journey. Arrived this morning?"
+
+There was not the faintest gleam of recognition on his face. Not a
+smile; not a glance; nothing but the easy politeness of a stranger to
+a stranger.
+
+"N--not exactly," I faltered. "Yesterday morning, sir."
+
+"Ah, indeed! Spent the day in sight-seeing, I dare say. Admire Paris?"
+
+Too much astonished to speak, I took refuge in a bow.
+
+"Not found any lodgings yet, I presume?" asked the doctor, mending a pen
+very deliberately.
+
+"N--not yet, sir."
+
+"I concluded so The English do not seek apartments on Sunday. You
+observe the day very strictly, no doubt?"
+
+Blushing and confused, I stammered some incoherent words and sat
+twirling my hat, the very picture of remorse.
+
+"At what hotel have you put up?" he next inquired, without appearing to
+observe my agitation.
+
+"The--the Hôtel des Messageries."
+
+"Good, but expensive. You must find a lodging to-day."
+
+I bowed again.
+
+"And, as your father's representative, I must take care that you procure
+something suitable, and are not imposed upon. My valet shall go
+with you."
+
+He rang the bell, and the sad-colored footman appeared on the threshold.
+
+"Desire Brunet to be in readiness to walk out with this gentleman," he
+said, briefly, and the servant retired.
+
+"Brunet," he continued, addressing me again, "is faithful and sagacious.
+He will instruct you on certain points indispensable to a resident in
+Paris, and will see that you are not ill-accommodated or overcharged. A
+young man has few wants, and I should infer that a couple of rooms in
+some quiet street will be all that you require?"
+
+"I--I am very grateful."
+
+He waved down my thanks with an air of cold but polite authority; took
+out his note-book and pencil; (I could have sworn to that massive gold
+pencil!) and proceeded to question me.
+
+"Your age, I think," said he, "is twenty-one?"
+
+"Twenty, sir."
+
+"Ah--twenty. You desire to be entered upon the list of visiting students
+at the Hotel Dieu, to be free of the library and lecture-rooms, and to
+be admitted into my public classes?"
+
+"Yes, sir."
+
+"Also, to attend here in my house for private instruction."
+
+"Yes, sir."
+
+He filled in a few words upon a printed form, and handed it to me with
+his visiting card.
+
+"You will present these, and your passport, to the secretary at the
+hospital," said he, "and will receive in return the requisite tickets of
+admission. Your fees have already been paid in, and your name has been
+entered. You must see to this matter at once, for the _bureau_ closes
+at two o'clock. You will then require the rest of the day for
+lodging-seeking, moving, and so forth. To-morrow morning, at nine
+o'clock, I shall expect you here."
+
+"Indeed, sir," I murmured, "I am more obliged than...."
+
+"Not in the least," he interrupted, decisively; "your father's son has
+every claim upon me. I object to thanks. All that I require from you are
+habits of industry, punctuality, and respect. Your father speaks well of
+you, and I have no doubt I shall find you all that he represents. Can I
+do anything more for you this morning?"
+
+I hesitated; could not bring myself to utter one word of that which I
+had come to say; and murmured--
+
+"Nothing more, I thank you, sir."
+
+He looked at me piercingly, paused an instant, and then rang the bell.
+
+"I am about to order my carriage," he said; "and, as I am going in that
+direction, I will take you as far as the Hôtel Dieu."
+
+"But--but I have a cab at the door," I faltered, remembering, with a
+sinking heart, that I had not a sou to pay the driver.
+
+The servant appeared again.
+
+"Let the carriage be brought round immediately, and dismiss this
+gentleman's cab."
+
+The man retired, and I heaved a sigh of relief. The doctor bent low over
+the papers on his desk, and I fancied for the moment that a faint smile
+flitted over his face. Then he took up his hat, and pointed to the door.
+
+"Now, my young friend," he said authoritatively, "we must be gone. Time
+is gold. After you."
+
+I bowed and preceded him. His very courtesy was sterner than the
+displeasure of another, and I already felt towards him a greater degree
+of awe than I should have quite cared to confess. The carriage was
+waiting in the courtyard. I placed myself with my back to the horses;
+Dr. Chéron flung himself upon the opposite seat; a servant out of livery
+sprang up beside the coachman; the great gates were flung open; and we
+glided away on the easiest of springs and the softest of cushions.
+
+Dr. Chéron took a newspaper from his pocket, and began to read; so
+leaving me to my own uncomfortable reflections.
+
+And, indeed, when I came to consider my position I was almost in
+despair. Moneyless, what was to become of me? Watchless and moneyless,
+with a bill awaiting me at my hotel, and not a stiver in my pocket
+wherewith to pay it.... Miserable pupil of a stern master! luckless son
+of a savage father! to whom could I turn for help? Not certainly to Dr.
+Chéron, whom I had been ready to accuse, half an hour ago, of having
+stolen my watch and purse. Petty larceny and Dr. Chéron! how ludicrously
+incongruous! And yet, where was my property? Was the Hôtel des
+Messageries a den of thieves? And again, how was it that this same Dr.
+Chéron looked, and spoke, and acted, as if he had never seen me in his
+life till this morning? Was I mad, or dreaming, or both?
+
+The carriage stopped and the door opened.
+
+"Hôtel Dieu, M'sieur," said the servant, touching his hat.
+
+Dr. Chéron just raised his eyes from the paper.
+
+"This is your first destination," he said. "I would advise you, on
+leaving here, to return to your hotel. There may be letters awaiting
+you. Good-morning."
+
+With this he resumed his paper, the carriage rolled away, and I found
+myself at the Hôtel Dieu, with the servant out of livery standing
+respectfully behind me.
+
+Go back to my hotel! Why should I go back? Letters there could be none,
+unless at the Poste Restante. I thought this a very unnecessary piece of
+advice, rejected it in my own mind, and so went into the hospital
+_bureau_, and transacted my business. When I came out again, Brunet
+took the lead.
+
+He was an elderly man with a solemn countenance and a mysterious voice.
+His manner was oppressively respectful; his address diplomatic; his step
+stealthy as a courtier's. When we came to a crossing he bowed, stood
+aside, and followed me; then took the lead again; and so on, during a
+brisk walk of about half an hour. All at once, I found myself at the
+Hôtel des Messageries.
+
+"Monsieur's hotel," said the doctor's valet, touching his hat.
+
+"You are mistaken," said I, rather impatiently. "I did not ask to be
+brought here. My object this morning is to look for apartments."
+
+"Post in at mid-day, Monsieur," he observed, gravely. "Monsieur's
+letters may have arrived."
+
+"I expect none, thank you."
+
+"Monsieur will, nevertheless, permit me to inquire," said the
+persevering valet, and glided in before my eyes.
+
+The thing was absurd! Both master and servant insisted that I must have
+letters, whether I would, or no! To my amazement, however, Brunet came
+back with a small sealed box in his hands.
+
+"No letters have arrived for Monsieur," he said; "but this box was left
+with the porter about an hour ago."
+
+I weighed it, shook it, examined the seals, and, going into the public
+room, desired Brunet to follow me. There I opened it. It contained a
+folded paper, a quantity of wadding, my purse, my roll of bank-notes,
+and my watch! On the paper, I read the following words:--
+
+"Learn from the events of last night the value of temperance, the wisdom
+of silence, and the danger of chance acquaintanceships. Accept the
+lesson, and he by whom it is administered will forget the error."
+
+The paper dropped from my hands and fell upon the floor. The
+impenetrable Brunet picked it up, and returned it to me.
+
+"Brunet!" I ejaculated.
+
+"Monsieur?" said he, interrogatively, raising his hand to his forehead
+by force of habit, although his hat stood beside him on the floor.
+
+There was not a shadow of meaning in his face--not a quiver to denote
+that he knew anything of what had passed. To judge by the stolid
+indifference of his manner, one might have supposed that the delivery of
+caskets full of watches and valuables was an event of daily occurrence
+in the house of Dr. Chéron. His coolness silenced me. I drew a long
+breath; hastened to put my watch in my pocket, and lock up my money in
+my room; and then went to the master of the hotel, and informed him of
+the recovery of my property. He smiled and congratulated me; but he did
+not seem to be in the least surprised. I fancied, some how, that matters
+were not quite so mysterious to him as they had been to me.
+
+I also fancied that I heard a suspicious roar of laughter as I passed
+out into the street.
+
+It was not long before I found such apartments as I required, Piloted by
+Brunet through some broad thoroughfares and along part of the
+Boulevards, I came upon a cluster of narrow streets branching off
+through a massive stone gateway from the Rue du Faubourg Montmartre.
+This little nook was called the Cité Bergère. The houses were white and
+lofty. Some had courtyards, and all were decorated with pretty iron
+balconies and delicately-tinted Venetian shutters. Most of them bore the
+announcement--"_Apartements à louer_"--suspended above the door. Outside
+one of these houses sat two men with a little table between them. They
+were playing at dominoes, and wore the common blue blouse of the
+mechanic class. A woman stood by, paring celery, with an infant playing
+on the mat inside the door and a cat purring at her feet. It was a
+pleasant group. The men looked honest, the woman good-tempered, and the
+house exquisitely clean; so the diplomatic Brunet went forward to
+negotiate, while I walked up and down outside. There were rooms to be
+let on the second, third and fifth floors. The fifth was too high, and
+the second too expensive; but the third seemed likely to suit me. The
+_suite_ consisted of a bed-room, dressing-room, and tiny _salon_, and
+was furnished with the elegant uncomfortableness characteristic of our
+French neighbors. Here were floors shiny and carpetless; windows that
+objected to open, and drawers that refused to shut; mirrors all round
+the walls a set of hanging shelves; an ormolu time piece that struck all
+kinds of miscellaneous hours at unexpected times; an abundance of vases
+filled with faded artificial flowers; insecure chairs of white and gold;
+and a round table that had a way of turning over suddenly like a table
+in a pantomime, if you ventured to place anything on any part but the
+inlaid star in the centre. Above all, there was a balcony big enough for
+a couple of chairs, and some flower-pots, overlooking the street.
+
+I was delighted with everything. In imagination I beheld my balcony
+already blooming with roses, and my shelves laden with books. I admired
+the white and gold chairs with all my heart, and saw myself reflected in
+half a dozen mirrors at once with an innocent pride of ownership which
+can only be appreciated by those who have tasted the supreme luxury of
+going into chambers for the first time.
+
+"Shall I conclude for Monsieur at twenty francs a week?" murmured the
+sagacious Brunet.
+
+"Of course," said I, laying the first week's rent upon the table.
+
+And so the thing was done, and, brimful of satisfaction, I went off to
+the hotel for my luggage, and moved in immediately.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+BROADCLOTH AND CIVILIZATION.
+
+Allowing for my inexperience in the use of the language, I prospered
+better than I had expected, and found, to my satisfaction, that I was by
+no means behind my French fellow-students in medical knowledge. I passed
+through my preliminary examination with credit, and although Dr. Chéron
+was careful not to praise me too soon, I had reason to believe that he
+was satisfied with my progress. My life, indeed, was now wholly given up
+to my work. My country-breeding had made me timid, and the necessity for
+speaking a foreign tongue served only to increase my natural reserve; so
+that although I lived and studied day after day in the society of some
+two or three hundred young men, I yet lived as solitary a life as
+Robinson Crusoe in his island. No one sought to know me. No one took a
+liking for me. Gay, noisy, chattering fellows that they were, they
+passed me by for a "dull and muddy-pated rogue;" voted me
+uncompanionable when I was only shy; and, doubtless, quoted me to each
+other as a rare specimen of the silent Englishman. I lived, too, quite
+out of the students' colony. To me the _Quartier Latin_ (except as I
+went to and fro between the Hotel Dieu and the Ecole de Medicine) was a
+land unknown; and the student's life--that wonderful _Vie de Bohéme_
+which furnishes forth half the fiction of the Paris press--a condition
+of being, about which I had never even heard. What wonder, then, that I
+never arrived at Dr. Chéron's door five minutes behind time, never
+missed a lecture, never forgot an appointment? What wonder that, after
+dropping moodily into one or two of the theatres, I settled down quite
+quietly in my lodgings; gave up my days to study; sauntered about the
+lighted alleys of the Champs Elysées in the sweet spring evenings, and,
+going home betimes, spent an hour or two with my books, and kept almost
+as early hours as in my father's house at Saxonholme?
+
+After I had been living thus for rather longer than three weeks, I made
+up my mind one Sunday morning to call at Dalrymple's rooms, and inquire
+if he had yet arrived in Paris. It was about eleven o'clock when I
+reached the Chaussée d'Antin, and there learned that he was not only
+arrived, but at home. Being by this time in possession of the luxury of
+a card, I sent one up, and was immediately admitted. I found breakfast
+still upon the table; Dalrymple sitting with an open desk and cash-box
+before him; and, standing somewhat back, with his elbow resting on the
+chimney-piece, a gentleman smoking a cigar. They both looked up as I was
+announced, and Dalrymple, welcoming me with a hearty grasp, introduced
+this gentleman as Monsieur de Simoncourt.
+
+M. de Simoncourt bowed, knocked the ash from his cigar, and looked as
+if he wished me at the Antipodes. Dalrymple was really glad to see me.
+
+"I have been expecting you, Arbuthnot," said he, "for the last week. If
+you had not soon beaten up my quarters, I should have tried, somehow, to
+find out yours. What have you been about all this time? Where are you
+located? What mischief have you been perpetrating since our expedition
+to the _guingette_ on the river? Come, you have a thousand things
+to tell me!"
+
+M. de Simoncourt looked at his watch--a magnificent affair, decorated
+with a costly chain, and a profusion of pendant trifles--and threw the
+last-half of his cigar into the fireplace.
+
+"You must excuse me, _mon cher_" said he. "I have at least a dozen calls
+to make before dinner."
+
+Dalrymple rose, readily enough, and took a roll of bank-notes from the
+cash-box.
+
+"If you are going," he said, "I may as well hand over the price of that
+Tilbury. When will they send it home?"
+
+"To-morrow, undoubtedly."
+
+"And I am to pay fifteen hundred franks for it!"
+
+"Just half its value!" observed M. de Simoncourt, with a shrug of his
+shoulders.
+
+Dalrymple smiled, counted the notes, and handed them to his friend.
+
+"Fifteen hundred may be half its cost," said he; "but I doubt if I am
+paying much less than its full value. Just see that these are right."
+
+M. de Simoncourt ruffled the papers daintily over, and consigned them to
+his pocket-book. As he did so, I could not help observing the whiteness
+of his hands and the sparkle of a huge brilliant on his little finger.
+He was a pale, slender, olive-hued man, with very dark eyes, and
+glittering teeth, and a black moustache inclining superciliously upwards
+at each corner; somewhat too _nonchalant_, perhaps, in his manner, and
+somewhat too profuse in the article of jewellery; but a very elegant
+gentleman, nevertheless.
+
+"_Bon_!" said he. "I am glad you have bought it. I would have taken it
+myself, had the thing happened a week or two earlier. Poor Duchesne! To
+think that he should have come to this, after all!"
+
+"I am sorry for him," said Dalrymple; "but it is a case of wilful ruin.
+He made up his mind to go to the devil, and went accordingly. I am only
+surprised that the crash came no sooner."
+
+M. de Simoneourt twitched at the supercilious moustache.
+
+"And you think you would not care to take the black mare with the
+Tilbury?" said he, negligently.
+
+"No--I have a capital horse, already."
+
+"Hah I--well--'tis almost a pity. The mare is a dead bargain. Shouldn't
+wonder if I buy her, after all."
+
+"And yet you don't want her," said Dalrymple.
+
+"Quite true; but one must have a favorite sin, and horseflesh is mine. I
+shall ruin myself by it some day--_mort de ma vie!_ By the way, have you
+seen my chestnut in harness? No? Then you will be really pleased. Goes
+delightfully with the gray, and manages tandem to perfection. _Parbleu!_
+I was forgetting--do we meet to-night?"
+
+"Where?"
+
+"At Chardonnier's."
+
+Dalrymple shook his head, and turned the key in his cash box.
+
+"Not this evening," he replied. I have other engagements."
+
+"Bah! and I promised to go, believing you were sure to be of the party.
+St. Pol, I know, will be there, and De Brézy also."
+
+"Chardonnier's parties are charming things in their way," said
+Dalrymple, somewhat coldly, "and no man enjoys Burgundy and lansquenet
+more heartily than myself; but one might grow to care for nothing else,
+and I have no desire to fall into worse habits than those I have
+contracted already."
+
+M. de Simoneourt laughed a dry, short laugh, and twitched again at the
+supercilious moustache.
+
+"I had no idea you were a philosopher," said he.
+
+"Nor am I. I am a _mauvais sujet_--_mauvais_ enough, already, without
+seeking to become worse."
+
+"Well, adieu--I will see to this affair of the Tilbury, and desire them
+to let you have it by noon to-morrow."
+
+"A thousand thanks. I am ashamed that you have so much trouble in the
+matter. _Au revoir_."
+
+"_Au revoir_."
+
+Whereupon M. de Simoncourt honored me with a passing bow, and took his
+departure. Being near the window, I saw him spring into an elegant
+cabriolet, and drive off with the showiest of high horses and the
+tiniest of tigers.
+
+He was no sooner gone than Dalrymple took me by the shoulders, placed me
+in an easy chair, poured out a couple of glasses of hock, and said:--
+
+"Now, then, my young friend, your news or your life! Out with it, every
+word, as you hope to be forgiven!"
+
+I had but little to tell, and for that little, found myself, as I had
+anticipated, heartily laughed at. My adventure at the restaurant, my
+unlucky meeting with Dr. Chéron, and the history of my interview with
+him next morning, delighted Dalrymple beyond measure.
+
+Nothing would satisfy him, after this, but to call me Damon, to tease me
+continually about Doctor Pythias, and to remind me at every turn of the
+desirableness of Arcadian friendships.
+
+"And so, Damon," said he, "you go nowhere, see nothing, and know nobody.
+This sort of life will never do for you! I must take you out--introduce
+you--get you an _entrée_ into society, before I leave Paris."
+
+"I should be heartily glad to visit at one or two private houses," I
+replied. "To spend the winter in this place without knowing a soul,
+would be something frightful."
+
+Dalrymple looked at me half laughingly, half compassionately.
+
+"Before I do it, however," said he, "you must look a little less like a
+savage, and more like a tame Christian. You must have your hair cut, and
+learn to tie your cravat properly. Do you possess an evening suit?"
+
+Blushing to the tips of my ears, I not only confessed that I was
+destitute of that desirable outfit, but also that I had never yet in all
+my life had occasion to wear it.
+
+"I am glad of it; for now you are sure to be well fitted. Your tailor,
+depend on it, is your great civilizer, and a well-made suit of clothes
+is in itself a liberal education. I'll take you to Michaud--my own
+especial purveyor. He is a great artist. With so many yards of superfine
+black cloth, he will give you the tone of good society and the exterior
+of a gentleman. In short, he will do for you in eight or ten hours more
+than I could do in as many years."
+
+"Pray introduce me at once to this illustrious man," I exclaimed
+laughingly, "and let me do him homage!"
+
+"You will have to pay heavily for the honor," said Dalrymple. "Of that I
+give you notice."
+
+"No matter. I am willing to pay heavily for the tone of good society and
+the exterior of a gentleman."
+
+"Very good. Take a book, then, or a cigar, and amuse yourself for five
+minutes while I write a note. That done, you may command me for as long
+as you please."
+
+I took the first book that came, and finding it to be a history of the
+horse, amused myself, instead, by observing the aspect of Dalrymple's
+apartment.
+
+Rooms are eloquent biographies. They betray at once if the owner be
+careless or orderly, studious or idle, vulgar or refined. Flowers on the
+table, engravings on the walls, indicate refinement and taste; while a
+well-filled book-case says more in favor of its possessor than the most
+elaborate letter of recommendation. Dalrymple's room was a monograph of
+himself. Careless, luxurious, disorderly, crammed with all sorts of
+costly things, and characterized by a sort of reckless elegance, it
+expressed, as I interpreted it, the very history of the man. Rich
+hangings; luxurious carpets; walls covered with paintings; cabinets of
+bronze and rare porcelain; a statuette of Rachel beside a bust of Homer;
+a book-case full of French novels with a sprinkling of Shakespeare and
+Horace; a stand of foreign arms; a lamp from Pompeii; a silver casket
+full of cigars; tables piled up with newspapers, letters, pipes,
+riding-whips, faded bouquets, and all kinds of miscellaneous
+rubbish--such were my friend's surroundings; and such, had I speculated
+upon them beforehand, I should have expected to find them. Dalrymple, in
+the meanwhile, despatched his letter with characteristic rapidity. His
+pen rushed over the paper like a dragoon charge, nor was once laid aside
+till both letter and address were finished. Just as he was sealing it, a
+note was brought to him by his servant--a slender, narrow, perfumed
+note, written on creamy paper, and adorned on the envelope with an
+elaborate cypher in gold and colors. Had I lived in the world of society
+for the last hundred seasons, I could not have interpreted the
+appearance of that note more sagaciously.
+
+"It is from a lady," said I to myself. Then seeing Dalrymple tear up his
+own letter immediately after reading it, and begin another, I added,
+still in my own mind--"And it is from the lady to whom he was writing."
+
+Presently he paused, laid his pen aside, and said:--
+
+"Arbuthnot, would you like to go with me to-morrow evening to one or two
+_soirées_?"
+
+"Can your Civilizer provide me with my evening suit in time?"
+
+"He? The great Michaud? Why, he would equip you for this evening, if it
+were necessary!"
+
+"In that case, I shall be very glad."
+
+"_Bon!_ I will call for you at ten o'clock; so do not forget to leave me
+your address."
+
+Whereupon he resumed his letter. When it was written, he returned to the
+subject.
+
+"Then I will take you to-morrow night," said he, "to a reception at
+Madame Rachel's. Hers is the most beautiful house in Paris. I know fifty
+men who would give their ears to be admitted to her _salons_."
+
+Even in the wilds of Saxonholme I had heard and read of the great
+_tragedienne_ whose wealth vied with the Rothschilds, and whose
+diamonds might have graced a crown. I had looked forward to the
+probability of beholding her from afar off, if she was ever to be seen
+on the boards of the Theatre Français; but to be admitted to her
+presence--received in her house--introduced to her in person ... it
+seemed ever so much too good to be true!
+
+Dalrymple smiled good-naturedly, and put my thanks aside.
+
+"It is a great sight," said he, "and nothing more. She will bow to
+you--she may not even speak; and she would pass you the next morning
+without remembering that she had ever seen you in her life. Actresses
+are a race apart, my dear fellow, and care for no one who is neither
+rich nor famous."
+
+"I never imagined," said I, half annoyed, "that she would take any
+notice of me at all. Even a bow from such a woman is an event to be
+remembered."
+
+"Having received that bow, then," continued Dalrymple, "and having
+enjoyed the ineffable satisfaction of returning it, you can go on with
+me to the house of a lady close by, who receives every Monday evening.
+At her _soirées_ you will meet pleasant and refined people, and having
+been once introduced by me, you will, I have no doubt, find the house
+open to you for the future."
+
+"That would, indeed, be a privilege. Who is this lady?"
+
+"Her name," said Dalrymple, with an involuntary glance at the little
+note upon his desk, "is Madame de Courcelles. She is a very charming and
+accomplished lady."
+
+I decided in my own mind that Madame de Courcelles was the writer of
+that note.
+
+"Is she married?" was my next question.
+
+"She is a widow," replied Dalrymple. "Monsieur de Courcelles was many
+years older than his wife, and held office as a cabinet minister during
+the greater part of the reign of Louis Phillippe. He has been dead these
+four or five years."
+
+"Then she is rich?"
+
+"No--not rich; but sufficiently independent."
+
+"And handsome?"
+
+"Not handsome, either; but graceful, and very fascinating."
+
+Graceful, fascinating, independent, and a widow! Coupling these facts
+with the correspondence which I believed I had detected, I grouped them
+into a little romance, and laid out my friend's future career as
+confidently as if it had depended only on myself to marry him out of
+hand, and make all parties happy.
+
+Dalrymple sat musing for a moment, with his chin resting on his hands
+and his eyes fixed on the desk. Then shaking back his hair as if he
+would shake back his thoughts with it, he started suddenly to his feet
+and said, laughingly:--
+
+"Now, young Damon, to Michaud's--to Michaud's, with what speed we may!
+Farewell to 'Tempe and the vales of Arcady,' and hey for civilization,
+and a swallow-tailed coat!"
+
+I noticed, however, that before we left the room, he put the little note
+tenderly away in a drawer of his desk, and locked it with a tiny gold
+key that hung upon his watch-chain.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+I MAKE MY DEBUT IN SOCIETY.
+
+At ten o'clock on Monday evening, Dalrymple called for me, and by ten
+o'clock, thanks to the great Michaud and other men of genius, I
+presented a faultless exterior. My friend walked round me with a candle,
+and then sat down and examined me critically.
+
+"By Jove!" said he, "I don't believe I should have known you! You are a
+living testimony to the science of tailoring. I shall call on Michaud,
+to-morrow, and pay my tribute of admiration."
+
+"I am very uncomfortable," said I, ruefully.
+
+"Uncomfortable! nonsense--Michaud's customers don't know the meaning of
+the word."
+
+"But he has not made me a single pocket!"
+
+"And what of that? Do you suppose the great Michaud would spoil the fit
+of a masterpiece for your convenience?"
+
+"What am I to do with my pocket-handkerchief?"
+
+"Michaud's customers never need pocket-handkerchiefs."
+
+"And then my trousers..."
+
+"Unreasonable Juvenile, what of the trousers?"
+
+"They are so tight that I dare not sit down in them."
+
+"Barbarian! Michaud's customers never sit down in society."
+
+"And my boots are so small that I can hardly endure them."
+
+"Very becoming to the foot," said Dalyrmple, with exasperating
+indifference.
+
+"And my collar is so stiff that it almost cuts my throat."
+
+"Makes you hold your head up," said Dalrymple, "and leaves you no
+inducement to commit suicide."
+
+I could not help laughing, despite my discomfort.
+
+"Job himself never had such a comforter!" I exclaimed.
+
+"It would be a downright pleasure to quarrel with you."
+
+"Put on your hat instead, and let us delay no longer," replied my
+friend. "My cab is waiting."
+
+So we went down, and in another moment were driving through the lighted
+streets. I should hardly have chosen to confess how my heart beat when,
+on turning an angle of the Rue Trudon, our cab fell into the rear of
+three or four other carriages, passed into a courtyard crowded with
+arriving and departing vehicles, and drew up before an open door, whence
+a broad stream of light flowed out to meet us. A couple of footmen
+received us in a hall lighted by torches and decorated with stands of
+antique armor. From the centre of this hall sprang a Gothic staircase,
+so light, so richly sculptured, so full of niches and statues, slender
+columns, foliated capitals, and delicate ornamentation of every kind,
+that it looked a very blossoming of the stone. Following Dalrymple up
+this superb staircase and through a vestibule of carved oak, I next
+found myself in a room that might have been the scene of Plato's
+symposium. Here were walls painted in classic fresco; windows curtained
+with draperies of chocolate and amber; chairs and couches of ebony,
+carved in antique fashion; Etruscan amphorae; vases and paterae of
+terracotta; exquisite lamps, statuettes and candelabra in rare green
+bronze; and curious parti-colored busts of philosophers and heroes, in
+all kinds of variegated marbles. Powdered footmen serving modern coffee
+seemed here like anachronisms in livery. In such a room one should have
+been waited on by boys crowned with roses, and have partaken only of
+classic dishes--of Venafran olives or oysters from the Lucrine lake,
+washed down with Massic, or Chian, or honeyed Falernian.
+
+Some half-dozen gentlemen, chatting over their coffee, bowed to
+Dalrymple when we came in. They were talking of the war in Algiers, and
+especially of the gallantry of a certain Vicomte de Caylus, in whose
+deeds they seemed to take a more than ordinary interest.
+
+"Rode single-handed right through the enemy's camp," said a bronzed,
+elderly man, with a short, gray beard.
+
+"And escaped without a scratch," added another, with a tiny red ribbon
+at his button-hole.
+
+"He comes of a gallant stock," said a third. "I remember his father at
+Austerlitz--literally cut to pieces at the head of his squadron."
+
+"You are speaking of de Caylus," said Dalrymple. "What news of him from
+Algiers?"
+
+"This--that having volunteered to carry some important despatches to
+head-quarters, he preferred riding by night through Abd-el-Kader's camp,
+to taking a _détour_ by the mountains," replied the first speaker.
+
+"A wild piece of boyish daring," said Dalrymple, somewhat drily. "I
+presume he did not return by the same road?"
+
+"I should think not. It would have been certain death a second time!"
+
+"And this happened how long since?"
+
+"About a fortnight ago. But we shall soon know all particulars from
+himself."
+
+"From himself?"
+
+"Yes, he has obtained leave of absence--is, perhaps, by this time in
+Paris."
+
+Dalrymple set down his cup untasted, and turned away.
+
+"Come, Arbuthnot," he said, hastily, "I must introduce you to Madame
+Rachel."
+
+We passed through a small antechamber, and into a brilliant _salon_, the
+very reverse of antique. Here all was light and color. Here were
+hangings of flowered chintz; fantastic divans; lounge-chairs of every
+conceivable shape and hue; great Indian jars; richly framed drawings;
+stands of exotic plants; Chinese cages, filled with valuable birds from
+distant climes; folios of engravings; and, above all, a large cabinet in
+marqueterie, crowded with bronzes, Chinese carvings, pastille burners,
+fans, medals, Dresden groups, Sévres vases, Venetian glass, Asiatic
+idols, and all kinds of precious trifles in tortoise-shall, mother
+o'-pearl, malachite, onyx, lapis lazuli, jasper, ivory, and mosaic. In
+this room, sitting, standing, turning over engravings, or grouped here
+and there on sofas and divans, were some twenty-five or thirty
+gentlemen, all busily engaged in conversation. Saluting some of these by
+a passing bow, my friend led the way straight through this _salon_ and
+into a larger one immediately beyond it.
+
+"This," he said, "is one of the most beautiful rooms in Paris. Look
+round and tell me if you recognise, among all her votaries, the
+divinity herself."
+
+I looked round, bewildered.
+
+"Recognise!" I echoed. "I should not recognise my own father at this
+moment. I feel like Abou Hassan in the palace of the Caliph."
+
+"Or like Christopher Sly, when he wakes in the nobleman's bedchamber,"
+said Dalrymple; "though I should ask your pardon for the comparison. But
+see what it is to be an actress with forty-two thousand francs of salary
+per week. See these panels painted by Muller--this chandelier by
+Deniére, of which no copy exists--this bust of Napoleon by Canova--these
+hangings of purple and gold--this ceiling all carved and gilded, than
+which Versailles contains nothing more elaborate. _Allons donc_! have
+you nothing to say in admiration of so much splendor?"
+
+I shook my head.
+
+"What can I say? Is this the house of an actress, or the palace of a
+prince? But stay--that pale woman yonder, all in white, with a plain
+gold circlet on her head--who is she?"
+
+"Phédre herself," replied Dalrymple. "Follow me, and be introduced."
+
+She was sitting in a large fauteuil of purple velvet. One foot rested on
+a stool richly carved and gilt; one arm rested negligently on a table
+covered with curious foreign weapons. In her right hand she held a
+singular poignard, the blade of which was damascened with gold, while
+the handle, made of bronze and exquisitely modelled, represented a tiny
+human skeleton. With this ghastly toy she kept playing as she spoke,
+apparently unconscious of its grim significance. She was surrounded by
+some ten or a dozen distinguished-looking men, most of whom were
+profusely _décoré_. They made way courteously at our approach. Dalrymple
+then presented me. I made my bow, was graciously received, and dropped
+modestly into the rear.
+
+"I began to think that Captain Dalrymple had forsworn Paris," said
+Rachel, still toying with the skeleton dagger. "It is surely a year
+since I last had this pleasure?"
+
+"Nay, Madame, you flatter me," said Dalrymple. "I have been absent only
+five months."
+
+"Then, you see, I have measured your absence by my loss."
+
+Dalrymple bowed profoundly.
+
+Rachel turned to a young man behind her chair.
+
+"Monsieur le Prince," said she, "do you know what is rumored in the
+_foyer_ of the Francais? That you have offered me your hand!"
+
+"I offer you both my hands, in applause, Madame, every night of your
+performance," replied the gentleman so addressed.
+
+She smiled and made a feint at him with the dagger.
+
+"Excellent!" said she. "One is not enough for a tragedian But where is
+Alphonse Karr?"
+
+"I have been looking for him all the evening," said a tall man, with an
+iron-gray beard. "He told me he was coming; but authors are capricious
+beings--the slaves of the pen."
+
+"True; he lives by his pen--others die by it," said Rachel bitterly. "By
+the way, has any one seen Scribe's new Vaudeville?"
+
+"I have," replied a bald little gentleman with a red and green ribbon in
+his button-hole.
+
+"And your verdict?"
+
+"The plot is not ill-conceived; but Scribe is only godfather to the
+piece. It is almost entirely written by Duverger, his _collaborateur_."
+
+"The life of a _collaborateur_," said Rachel, "is one long act of
+self-abnegation. Another takes all the honor--he all the labor. Thus
+soldiers fall, and their generals reap the glory."
+
+"A _collaborateur_," said a cynical-looking man who had not yet spoken,
+"is a hackney vehicle which one hires on the road to fame, and dismisses
+at the end of the journey."
+
+"Sometimes without paying the fare," added a gentleman who had till now
+been examining, weapon by weapon, all the curious poignards and pistols
+on the table. "But what is this singular ornament?"
+
+And he held up what appeared to be a large bone, perforated in several
+places.
+
+The bald little man with the red and green ribbon uttered an exclamation
+of surprise.
+
+"It is a tibia!" said he, examining it through his double eye-glass.
+
+"And what of that?" laughed Rachel. "Is it so wonderful to find one leg
+in a collection of arms? However, not to puzzle you, I may as well
+acknowledge that it was brought to me from Rome by a learned Italian,
+and is a curious antique. The Romans made flutes of the leg-bones of
+their enemies, and this is one of them."
+
+"A melodious barbarism!" exclaimed one.
+
+"Puts a 'stop,' at all events, to the enemy's flight!" said another.
+
+"Almost as good as drinking out of his skull," added a third.
+
+"Or as eating him, _tout de bon_," said Rachel.
+
+"There must be a certain satisfaction in cannibalism," observed the
+cynic who had spoken before. "There are people upon whom one would sup
+willingly."
+
+"As, for instance, critics, who are our natural enemies," said Rachel.
+"_C'est à dire_, if critics were not too sour to be eaten."
+
+"Nay, with the sweet sauce of vengeance!"
+
+"You speak feelingly, Monsieur de Musset. I am almost sorry, for your
+sake, that cannibalism is out of fashion!"
+
+"It is one of the penalties of civilization," replied de Musset, with a
+shrug. "Besides, one would not wish to be an epicure."
+
+Dalrymple, who had been listening somewhat disdainfully to this skirmish
+of words, here touched me on the arm and turned away.
+
+"Don't you hate this sort of high-pressure talk?" he said, impatiently.
+
+"I was just thinking it so brilliant."
+
+"Pshaw!--conversational fireworks--every speaker bent on eclipsing every
+other speaker. It's an artificial atmosphere, my dear Damon--a sort of
+forcing-house for good things; and I hate forced witticisms, as I hate
+forced peas. But have you had enough of it? Or has this feast of reason
+taken away your appetite for simpler fare?"
+
+"If you mean, am I ready to go with you to Madame de Courcelles'--yes."
+
+"_A la bonne heure_!"
+
+"But you are not going away without taking leave of Madame Rachel?"
+
+"Unquestionably. Leave-taking is a custom more honored in the breach
+than the observance."
+
+"But isn't that very impolite?"
+
+"_Ingénu!_ Do you know that society ignores everything disagreeable? A
+leave-taker sets an unpleasant example, disturbs the harmony of things,
+and reminds others of their watches. Besides, he suggests unwelcome
+possibilities. Perhaps he finds the party dull; or, worse still, he may
+be going to one that is pleasanter."
+
+By this time we were again rattling along the Boulevard. The theatres
+were ablaze with lights. The road was full of carriages. The _trottoir_
+was almost as populous as at noon. The idlers outside the _cafés_ were
+still eating their ices and sipping their _eau-sucré_ as though, instead
+of being past eleven at night, it was scarcely eleven in the morning. In
+a few minutes, we had once more turned aside out of the great
+thoroughfare, and stopped at a private house in a quiet street. A
+carriage driving off, a cab drawing up behind our own, open windows with
+drawn blinds, upon which were profiled passing shadows of the guests
+within, and the ringing tones of a soprano voice, accompanied by a
+piano, gave sufficient indication of a party, and had served to attract
+a little crowd of soldiers and _gamins_ about the doorway.
+
+Having left our over-coats with a servant, we were ushered upstairs,
+and, as the song was not yet ended, slipped in unannounced and stationed
+ourselves just between two crowded drawing-rooms, where, sheltered by
+the folds of a muslin curtain, we could see all that was going on in
+both. I observed, at a glance, that I was now in a society altogether
+unlike that which I had just left.
+
+At Rachel's there were present only two ladies besides herself, and
+those were members of her own family. Here I found at least an equal
+proportion of both sexes. At Rachel's a princely magnificence reigned.
+Here the rooms were elegant, but simple; the paintings choice but few;
+the ornaments costly, but in no unnecessary profusion.
+
+"It is just the difference between taste and display," said Dalrymple.
+"Rachel is an actress, and Madame de Courcelles is a lady. Rachel
+exhibits her riches as an Indian chief exhibits the scalps of his
+victims--Madame de Courcelles adorns her house with no other view than
+to make it attractive to her friends."
+
+"As a Greek girl covers her head with sequins to show the amount of her
+fortune, and an English girl puts a rose in her hair for grace and
+beauty only," said I, fancying that I had made rather a clever
+observation. I was therefore considerably disappointed when Dalrymple
+merely said, "just so."
+
+The lady in the larger room here finished her song and returned to her
+seat, amid a shower of _bravas_.
+
+"She sings exquisitely," said I, following her with my eyes.
+
+"And so she ought," replied my friend. "She is the Countess Rossi, whom
+you may have heard of as Mademoiselle Sontag."
+
+"What! the celebrated Sontag?" I exclaimed.
+
+"The same. And the gentleman to whom she is now speaking is no less
+famous a person than the author of _Pelham_."
+
+I was as much delighted as a rustic at a menagerie, and Dalrymple,
+seeing this, continued to point out one celebrity after another till I
+began no longer to remember which was which. Thus Lamartine, Horace
+Vernet, Scribe, Baron Humboldt, Miss Bremer, Arago, Auber, and Sir Edwin
+Landseer, were successively indicated, and I thought myself one of the
+most fortunate fellows in Paris, only to be allowed to look upon them.
+
+"I suppose the spirit of lion-hunting is an original instinct," I said,
+presently. "Call it vulgar excitement, if you will; but I must confess
+that to see these people, and to be able to write about them to my
+father, is just the most delightful thing that has happened to me since
+I left home."
+
+"Call things by their right names, Damon," said Dalrymple,
+good-naturedly. "If you were a _parvenu_ giving a party, and wanted all
+these fine folks to be seen at your house, that would be lion-hunting;
+but being whom and what you are, it is hero-worship--a disease peculiar
+to the young; wholesome and inevitable, like the measles."
+
+"What have I done," said a charming voice close by, "that Captain
+Dalrymple will not even deign to look upon me?"
+
+The charming voice proceeded from the still more charming lips of an
+exceedingly pretty brunette in a dress of light green silk, fastened
+here and there with bouquets of rosebuds. Plump, rosy, black-haired,
+bright-eyed, bewilderingly coquettish, this lady might have been about
+thirty years of age, and seemed by no means unconscious of her powers of
+fascination.
+
+"I implore a thousand pardons, Madame...." began my friend.
+
+"_Comment_! A thousand pardons for a single offence!" exclaimed the
+lady. "What an unreasonable culprit!"
+
+To which she added, quite audibly, though behind the temporary shelter
+of her fan:--
+
+"Who is this _beau garçon_ whom you seem to have brought with you?"
+
+I turned aside, affecting not to hear the question; but could not help
+listening, nevertheless. Of Dalrymple's reply, however, I caught but
+my own name.
+
+"So much the better," observed the lady. "I delight in civilizing
+handsome boys. Introduce him."
+
+Dalrymple tapped me on the arm.
+
+"Madame de Marignan permits me to introduce you, _mon ami_," said he.
+"Mr. Basil Arbuthnot--Madame de Marignan."
+
+I bowed profoundly--all the more profoundly because I felt myself
+blushing to the eyes, and would not for the universe have been suspected
+of overhearing the preceding conversation; nor was my timidity
+alleviated when Dalrymple announced his intention of going in search of
+Madame de Courcelles, and of leaving me in the care of Madame
+de Marignan.
+
+"Now, Damon, make the most of your opportunities," whispered he, as he
+passed by. "_Vogue la galère_!"
+
+_Vogue la galère_, indeed! As if I had anything to do with the _galère_,
+except to sit down in it, the most helpless of galley-slaves, and
+blindly submit to the gyves and chains of Madame de Marignan, who,
+regarding me as the lawful captive of her bow and spear, carried me off
+at once to a vacant _causeuse_ in a distant corner.
+
+To send me in search of a footstool, to make me hold her fan, to
+overwhelm me with questions and bewilder me with a thousand coquetries,
+were the immediate proceedings of Madame de Marignan. A consummate
+tactician, she succeeded, before a quarter of an hour had gone by, in
+putting me at my ease, and in drawing from me everything that I had to
+tell--all my past; all my prospects for the future; the name and
+condition of my father; a description of Saxonholme, and the very date
+of my birth. Then she criticized all the ladies in the room, which only
+drew my attention more admiringly upon herself; and she quizzed all the
+young men, whereby I felt indirectly flattered, without exactly knowing
+why; and she praised Dalrymple in terms for which I could have embraced
+her on the spot had she been ten times less pretty, and ten times less
+fascinating.
+
+I was an easy victim, after all, and scarcely worth the powder and shot
+of an experienced _franc-tireur;_ but Madame de Marignan, according to
+her own confession, had a taste for civilizing "handsome boys," and as I
+may, perhaps, have come under that category a good many years ago, the
+little victory amused her! By the time, at all events, that Dalrymple
+returned to tell me it was past one o'clock in the morning, and I must
+be introduced to the mistress of the house before leaving, my head was
+as completely turned as that of old Time himself.
+
+"Past one!" I exclaimed. "Impossible! We cannot have been here half-an
+hour."
+
+At which neither Dalrymple nor Madame de Marignan could forbear smiling.
+
+"I hope our acquaintance is not to end here, monsieur," said Madame de
+Marignan. "I live in the Rue Castellane, and am at home to my friends
+every Wednesday evening."
+
+I bowed almost to my boots.
+
+"And to my intimates, every morning from twelve to two," she added very
+softly, with a dimpled smile that went straight to my heart, and set it
+beating like the paddle-wheels of a steamer.
+
+I stammered some incoherent thanks, bowed again, nearly upset a servant
+with a tray of ices, and, covered with confusion, followed Dalrymple
+into the farther room. Here I was introduced to Madame de Courcelles, a
+pale, aristocratic woman some few years younger than Madame de Marignan,
+and received a gracious invitation to all her Monday receptions. But I
+was much less interested in Madame de Courcelles than I should have been
+a couple of hours before. I scarcely looked at her, and five minutes
+after I was out of her presence, could not have told whether she was
+fair or dark, if my life had depended on it!
+
+"What say you to walking home?" said Dalrymple, as we went down stairs.
+"It is a superb night, and the fresh air would be delightful after these
+hot rooms."
+
+I assented gladly; so we dismissed the cab, and went out, arm-in-arm,
+along a labyrinth of quiet streets lighted by gas-lamps few and far
+between, and traversed only by a few homeward-bound pedestrians.
+Emerging presently at the back of the Madeleine, we paused for a moment
+to admire the noble building by moonlight; then struck across the Marché
+aux Fleurs and took our way along the Boulevard.
+
+"Are you tired, Damon?" said Dalrymple presently.
+
+"Not in the least," I replied, with my head full of Madame de Marignan.
+
+"Would you like to look in at an artists' club close by here, where I
+have the _entree?_--queer place enough, but amusing to a stranger."
+
+"Yes, very much."
+
+"Come along, then; but first button up your overcoat to the throat, and
+tie this colored scarf round your neck. See, I do the same. Now take off
+your gloves--that's it. And give your hat the least possible inclination
+to the left ear. You may turn up the bottoms of your trousers, if you
+like--anything to look a little slangy."
+
+"Is that necessary?"
+
+"Indispensable--at all events in the honorable society of _Les
+Chicards."_
+
+"_Les Chicards_!" I repeated. "What are they?"
+
+"It is the name of the club, and means--Heaven only knows what! for
+Greek or Latin root it has none, and record of it there exists not,
+unless in the dictionary of Argôt. And yet if you were an old Parisian
+and had matriculated for the last dozen years at the Bal de l'Opéra, you
+would know the illustrious Chicard by sight as familiarly as Punch, or
+Paul Pry, or Pierrot. He is a gravely comic personage with a bandage
+over one eye, a battered hat considerably inclining to the back of his
+head, a coat with a high collar and long tails, and a _tout ensemble_
+indescribably seedy--something between a street preacher and a
+travelling showman. But here we are. Take care how you come down, and
+mind your head."
+
+Having turned aside some few minutes before into the Rue St. Honoré, we
+had thence diverged down a narrow street with a gutter running along the
+middle and no foot-pavements on either side. The houses seemed to be
+nearly all shops, some few of which, for the retailing of
+_charbonnerie_, stale vegetables, uninviting cooked meats, and so forth,
+were still open; but that before which we halted was closely shuttered
+up, with only a private door open at the side, lighted by a single
+oil-lamp. Following my friend for a couple of yards along the dim
+passage within, I became aware of strange sounds, proceeding apparently
+from the bowels of the earth, and found myself at the head of a steep
+staircase, down which it was necessary to proceed with my body bent
+almost double, in consequence of the close proximity of the ceiling and
+the steps. At the foot of this staircase came another dim passage and
+another oil-lamp over a low door, at which Dalrymple paused a moment
+before entering. The sounds which I had heard above now resolved
+themselves into their component parts, consisting of roars of laughter,
+snatches of songs, clinkings of glasses, and thumpings of bottles upon
+tables, to the accompaniment of a deep bass hum of conversation, all of
+which prepared me to find a very merry company within.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+
+THE HONORABLE SOCIETY OF LES CHICARDS.
+
+     "When a set of men find themselves agree in any particular,
+     though never so trivial, they establish themselves into a
+     kind of fraternity, and meet once or twice a
+     week."--_Spectator_.
+
+It was a long, low room lighted by gas, with a table reaching from end
+to end. Round about this table, in various stages of conviviality and
+conversation, were seated some thirty or forty men, capped, bearded, and
+eccentric-looking, with all kinds of queer blouses and wonderful heads
+of hair. Dropping into a couple of vacant chairs at the lower end of
+this table, we called for a bottle of Chablis, lit our cigars, and fell
+in with the general business of the evening. At the top, dimly visible
+through a dense fog of tobacco smoke, sat a stout man in a green coat
+fastened by a belt round the waist. He was evidently the President, and,
+instead of a hammer, had a small bugle lying by his side, which he blew
+from time to time to enforce silence.
+
+Somewhat perplexed by the general aspect of the club, I turned to my
+companion for an explanation.
+
+"Is it possible," I asked, "that these amazing individuals are all
+artists and gentlemen?"
+
+"Artists, every one," replied Dalrymple; "but as to their claim to be
+gentlemen, I won't undertake to establish it. After all, the _Chicards_
+are not first-rate men."
+
+"What are they, then?"
+
+"Oh, the Helots of the profession--hewers of wood engravings, and
+drawers of water-colors, with a sprinkling of daguerreotypists, and
+academy students. But hush--somebody is going to sing!"
+
+And now, heralded by a convulsive flourish from the President's bugle, a
+young _Chicard_, whose dilapidated outer man sufficiently contradicted
+the burthen of his song, shouted with better will than skill, a
+_chanson_ of Beranger's, every verse of which ended with:--
+
+     "J'ai cinquante écus,
+     J'ai cinquante écus,
+     J'ai cinquante écus de rente!"
+
+Having brought this performance to a satisfactory conclusion, the singer
+sat down amid great clapping of hands and clattering of glasses, and the
+President, with another flourish on the bugle, called upon one Monsieur
+Tourterelle. Monsieur Tourterelle was a tall, gaunt, swarthy personage,
+who appeared to have cultivated his beard at the expense of his head,
+since the former reached nearly to his waist, while the latter was as
+bare as a billiard-ball. Preparing himself for the effort with a
+wine-glass full of raw cognac, this gentleman leaned back in his chair,
+stuck his thumbs into the armholes of his waistcoat, fixed his eyes on
+the ceiling, and plunged at once into a doleful ballad about one
+Mademoiselle Rosine, and a certain village _auprès de la mer_, which
+seemed to be in an indefinite number of verses, and amused no one but
+himself. In the midst of this ditty, just as the audience had begun to
+testify their impatience by much whispering and shuffling of feet, an
+elderly _Chicard_, with a very bald and shiny head, was discovered to
+have fallen asleep in the seat next but one to my own; whereupon my
+nearest neighbor, a merry-looking young fellow with a profusion of rough
+light hair surmounted by a cap of scarlet cloth, forthwith charred a
+cork in one of the candles, and decorated the bald head of the sleeper
+with a comic countenance and a pair of huge mustachios. An uproarious
+burst of laughter was the immediate result, and the singer, interrupted
+somewhere about his 18th verse, subsided into offended silence.
+
+"Monsieur Müller is requested to favor the honorable society with a
+song," cried the President, as soon as the tumult had somewhat subsided.
+
+My red-capped neighbor, answering to that name, begged to be excused, on
+the score of having pledged his _ut de poitrine_ a week since at the
+Mont de Piété, without yet having been able to redeem it. This apology
+was received with laughter, hisses, and general incredulity.
+
+"But," he added, "I am willing to relate an adventure that happened to
+myself in Rome two winters ago, if my honorable brother _Chicards_ will
+be pleased to hear it."
+
+An immense burst of approbation from all but Monsieur Tourterelle and
+the bald sleeper, followed this announcement; and so, after a
+preliminary _grog au vin_, and another explosive demonstration on the
+part of the chairman, Monsieur Müller thus began:--
+
+
+
+THE STUDENT'S STORY.
+
+"When I was in Rome, I lodged in the Via Margutta, which, for the
+benefit of those who have not been there, may be described as a street
+of studios and stables, crossed at one end by a little roofed gallery
+with a single window, like a shabby 'Bridge of Sighs,' A gutter runs
+down the middle, interrupted occasionally by heaps of stable-litter; and
+the perspective is damaged by rows of linen suspended across the street
+at uncertain intervals. The houses in this agreeable thoroughfare are
+dingy, dilapidated, and comfortless, and all which are not in use as
+stables, are occupied by artists. However, it was a very jolly place,
+and I never was happier anywhere in my life. I had but just touched my
+little patrimony, and I was acquainted with plenty of pleasant fellows
+who used to come down to my rooms at night from the French Academy where
+they had been studying all day. Ah, what evenings those were! What
+suppers we used to have in from the _Lepre_! What lots of Orvieto we
+drank! And what a mountain of empty wicker bottles had to be cleared
+away from the little square yard with the solitary lemon-tree at the
+back of the house!"
+
+"Come, Müller--no fond memories!" cried a student in a holland blouse.
+"Get on with the story."
+
+"Ay, get on with the story!" echoed several voices.
+
+To which Müller, who took advantage of the interruption to finish his
+_grog au vin_, deigned no reply.
+
+"Well," he continued, "like a good many other fellows who, having
+everything to learn and nothing to do, fancy themselves great geniuses
+only because they are in Rome, I put a grand brass plate on the door,
+testifying to all passers-by that mine was the STUDIO DI HERR FRANZ
+MULLER; and, having done this, I believed, of course, that my fortune
+was to be made out of hand. Nothing came of it, however. People in
+search of Dessoulavy's rooms knocked occasionally to ask their way, and
+a few English and Americans dropped in from time to time to stare about
+them, after the free-and-easy fashion of foreigners in Rome; but, for
+all this, I found no patrons. Thus several months went by, during which
+I studied from the life, worked hard at the antique, and relieved the
+monotony of study with occasional trips to Frascati, or supper parties
+at the Café Greco."
+
+"The story! the story!" interrupted a dozen impatient voices.
+
+"All in good time," said Müller, with provoking indifference. "We are
+now coming to it."
+
+And assuming an attitude expressive of mystery, he dropped his voice,
+looked round the table, and proceeded:--
+
+"It was on the last evening of the Carnival. It had been raining at
+intervals during the day, but held up for a good hour just at dusk, as
+if on purpose for the _moccoli_. Scarcely, however, had the guns of St.
+Angelo thundered an end to the frolic, when the rain came down again in
+torrents, and put out the last tapers that yet lingered along the Corso.
+Wet, weary, and splashed from head to foot with mud and tallow, I came
+home about seven o'clock, having to dine and dress before going to a
+masked-ball in the evening. To light my stove, change my wet clothes,
+and make the best of a half-cold _trattore_ dinner, were my first
+proceedings; after which, I laid out my costume ready to put on, wrapped
+myself in a huge cloak, swallowed a tumbler full of hot cognac and
+water, and lay down in front of the fire, determined to have a sound nap
+and a thorough warming, before venturing out again that night. I fell
+asleep, of course, and never woke till roused by a tremendous peal upon
+the studio-bell, about two hours and a half afterwards. More dead than
+alive, I started to my feet. The fire had gone out in the stove; the
+room was in utter darkness; and the bell still pealed loud enough to
+raise the neighborhood.
+
+"'Who's there?' I said, half-opening the door, through which the wind
+and rain came rushing. 'And what, in the name of ten thousand devils, do
+you want?"
+
+"'I want an artist,' said my visitor, in Italian. 'Are you one?'
+
+"'I flatter myself that I am,' replied I, still holding the door
+tolerably close.
+
+"'Can you paint heads?'
+
+"'Heads, figures, landscapes--anything,' said I, with my teeth
+chattering like castanets.
+
+"The stranger pushed the door open, walked in without further ceremony,
+closed it behind him, and said, in a low, distinct voice:--
+
+"'Could you take the portrait of a dead man?'
+
+"'Of a dead man?' I stammered. 'I--I ... Suppose I strike a light?'
+
+"The stranger laid his hand upon my arm.
+
+"'Not till you have given me an answer,' said he. 'Yes or no? Remember,
+you will be paid well for your work.'
+
+"'Well, then--yes,' I replied.
+
+"'And can you do it at once?'
+
+"'At once?'
+
+"'Ay, Signore, will you bring your colors, and come with me this
+instant--or must I seek some other painter?'
+
+"I thought of the masked-ball, and sighed; but the promise of good
+payment, and, above all, the peculiarity of the adventure determined me.
+
+"'Nay, if it is to be done,' said I, 'one time is as good as another.
+Let me strike a light, and I will at once pack up my colors and come
+with you.'
+
+"'_Bene_!' said the stranger. 'But be as quick as you can, Signore, for
+time presses.'
+
+"I was quick, you may be sure, and yet not so quick but that I found
+time to look at my strange visitor. He was a dark, elderly man, dressed
+in a suit of plain black, and might have been a clerk, or a tradesman,
+or a confidential servant. As soon as I was ready, he took the lead;
+conducted me to a carriage which was waiting at the corner of a
+neighboring street; took his place respectfully on the opposite seat;
+pulled down both the blinds, and gave the word to drive on. I never knew
+by what streets we went, or to what part of Rome he took me; but the way
+seemed long and intricate. At length, we stopped and alighted. The night
+was pitch-dark, and still stormy. I saw before me only the outline of a
+large building, indistinct and gloomy, and a small open door dimly
+lighted-from within. Hurried across the strip of narrow pavement, and
+shut in immediately, I had no time to identify localities--no choice,
+except to follow my conductor and blindly pursue the adventure to its
+close. Having entered by a back door, we went up and down a labyrinth of
+staircases and passages, for the mere purpose, as it seemed, of
+bewildering me as much as possible--then paused before an oaken door at
+the end of the corridor. Here my conductor signified by a gesture that I
+was to precede him.
+
+"It was a large, panelled chamber, richly furnished. A wood fire
+smouldered on the hearth--a curtained alcove to the left partly
+concealed a bed--a corresponding alcove to the right, fitted with altar
+and crucifix, served as an oratory. In the centre of the room stood a
+table covered with a cloth. It needed no second glance to tell me what
+object lay beneath that cloth, uplifting it in ghastly outline! My
+conductor pointed to the table, and asked if there was anything I
+needed. To this I replied that I must have more light and more fire, and
+so proceeded to disembarrass myself of my cloak, and prepare my palette.
+In the meantime, he threw on a log and some pine-cones, and went to
+fetch an additional lamp.
+
+"Left alone with the body and impelled by an irresistible impulse, I
+rolled back the cloth and saw before me the corpse of a young man in
+fancy dress--a magnificent fellow cast in the very mould of strength and
+grace, and measuring his six feet, if an inch. The features were
+singularly handsome; the brow open and resolute; the hair dark, and
+crisp with curls. Looking more closely, I saw that a lock had been
+lately cut from the right temple, and found one of the severed hairs
+upon the cheek, where it had fallen. The dress was that of a jester of
+the middle ages, half scarlet and half white, with a rich belt round the
+waist. In this belt, as if in horrible mockery of the dead, was stuck a
+tiny baton surmounted by a fool's cap, and hung with silver bells.
+Looking down thus upon the body--so young, so beautiful, so evidently
+unprepared for death--a conviction of foul play flashed upon me with all
+the suddenness and certainty of revelation. Here were no appearances of
+disease and no signs of strife. The expression was not that of a man who
+had fallen weapon in hand. Neither, however, was it that of one who had
+died in the agony of poison. The longer I looked, the more mysterious it
+seemed; yet the more I felt assured that there was guilt at the bottom
+of the mystery.
+
+"While I was yet under the first confused and shuddering impression of
+this doubt, my guide came back with a powerful solar lamp, and, seeing
+me stand beside the body, said sharply:--
+
+"'Well, Signore, you look as if you had never seen a dead man before in
+all your life!'
+
+"'I have seen plenty,' I replied, 'but never one so young, and so
+handsome.'
+
+"'He dropped down quite suddenly,' said he, volunteering the
+information, 'and died in a few minutes. 'Then finding that I remained
+silent, added:--
+
+"'But I am told that it is always so in cases of heart-disease.'
+
+"'I turned away without replying, and, having placed the lamp to my
+satisfaction, began rapidly sketching in my subject. My instructions
+were simple. I was to give the head only; to produce as rapid an effect
+with as little labor as possible; to alter nothing; to add nothing; and,
+above all, to be ready to leave the house before daybreak. So I set
+steadily to work, and my conductor, establishing himself in an
+easy-chair by the fire, watched my progress for some time, and then, as
+the night advanced, fell profoundly asleep. Thus, hour after hour went
+by, and, absorbed in my work, I painted on, unconscious of fatigue--
+might almost say with something of a morbid pleasure in the task before
+me. The silence within; the raving of the wind and rain without; the
+solemn mystery of death, and the still more solemn mystery of crime
+which, as I followed out train after train of wild conjectures, grew to
+still deeper conviction, had each and all their own gloomy fascination.
+Was it not possible, I asked myself, by mere force of will to penetrate
+the secret? Was it not possible to study that dead face till the springs
+of thought so lately stilled within the stricken brain should vibrate
+once more, if only for an instant, as wire vibrates to wire, and sound
+to sound! Could I not, by long studying of the passive mouth, compel
+some sympathetic revelation of the last word that it uttered, though
+that revelation took no outward form, and were communicable to the
+apprehension only? Pondering thus, I lost myself in a labyrinth of
+fantastic reveries, till the hand and the brain worked independently of
+each other--the one swiftly reproducing upon canvas the outer lineaments
+of the dead; the other laboring to retrace foregone facts of which no
+palpable evidence remained. Thus my work progressed; thus the night
+waned; thus the sleeper by the fireside stirred from time to time, or
+moaned at intervals in his dreams.
+
+"At length, when many hours had gone by, and I began to be conscious of
+the first languor of sleeplessness, I heard, or fancied I heard, a light
+sound in the corridor without. I held my breath, and listened. As I
+listened, it ceased--was renewed--drew nearer--paused outside the door.
+Involuntarily, I rose and looked round for some means of defence, in
+case of need. Was I brought here to perpetuate the record of a crime,
+and was I, when my task was done, to be silenced in a dungeon, or a
+grave? This thought flashed upon me almost before I was conscious of the
+horror it involved. At the same moment, I saw the handle of the door
+turned slowly and cautiously--then held back--and then, after a brief
+pause, the door itself gradually opening."
+
+Here the student paused as if overcome by the recollection of that
+moment, and passed his hand nervously across his brow. I took the
+liberty of pushing our bottle of Chablis towards him, for which he
+thanked me with a nod and a smile, and filled his glass to the brim.
+
+"Well?" cried two or three voices eagerly; my own being one of them.
+"The door opened--what then?"
+
+"And a lady entered," he continued. "A lady dressed in black from head
+to foot, with a small lamp in her hand. Seeing me, she laid her finger
+significantly on her lip, closed the door as cautiously as she had
+opened it, and, with the faltering, uncertain steps of one just risen
+from a sick-bed, came over to where I had been sitting, and leaned for
+support against my chair. She was very pale, very calm, very young and
+beautiful, with just that look of passive despair in her face that one
+sees in Guido's portrait of Beatrice Cenci. Standing thus, I observed
+that she kept her eyes turned from the corpse, and her attention
+concentrated on the portrait. So several minutes passed, and neither of
+us spoke nor stirred. Then, slowly, shudderingly, she turned, grasped me
+by the arm, pointed to the dead form stretched upon the table, and less
+with her breath than by the motion of her lips, shaped out the one
+word:--'_Murdered_!'
+
+"Stunned by this confirmation of my doubts, I could only clasp my hands
+in mute horror, and stare helplessly from the lady to the corpse, from
+the corpse to the sleeper. Wildly, feverishly, with all her calmness
+turned to eager haste, she then bent over the body, tore open the rich
+doublet, turned back the shirt, and, without uttering one syllable,
+pointed to a tiny puncture just above the region of the heart--a spot so
+small, so insignificant, such a mere speck upon the marble, that but for
+the pale violet discoloration which spread round it like a halo, I could
+scarcely have believed it to be the cause of death. The wound had
+evidently bled inwardly, and, being inflicted with some singularly
+slender weapon, had closed again so completely as to leave an aperture
+no larger than might have been caused by the prick of a needle. While I
+was yet examining it, the fire fell together, and my conductor stirred
+uneasily in his sleep. To cover the body hastily with the cloth and
+resume my seat, was, with me, the instinctive work of a moment; but he
+was quiet again the next instant, and breathing heavily. With trembling
+hands, my visitor next re-closed the shirt and doublet, replaced the
+outer covering, and bending down till her lips almost touched my ear,
+whispered:--
+
+"'You have seen it. If called upon to do so, will you swear it?'
+
+"I promised.
+
+"'You will not let yourself be intimidated by threats? nor bribed by
+gold? nor lured by promises?
+
+"'Never, so help me Heaven!'
+
+"She looked into my eyes, as if she would read my very soul; then,
+before I knew what she was about to do, seized my hand, and pressed it
+to her lip.
+
+"'I believe you,' she said. 'I believe, and I thank you. Not a word to
+him that you have seen me'--here she pointed to the sleeper by the fire.
+'He is faithful; but not to my interests alone. I dare tell you no
+more--at all events, not now. Heaven bless and reward you. In this
+portrait you give me the only treasure--the only consolation of my
+future life!'
+
+"So saying, she took a ring from her finger, pressed it, without another
+word, into my unwilling hand; and, with the same passive dreary look
+that her face had worn on first entering took up her lamp again, and
+glided from the room.
+
+"How the next hour, or half hour, went by, I know not--except that I sat
+before the canvas like one dreaming. Now and then I added a few touches;
+but mechanically, and, as it were, in a trance of wonder and dismay. I
+had, however, made such good progress before being interrupted, that
+when my companion woke and told me it would soon be day and I must make
+haste to be gone, the portrait was even more finished than I had myself
+hoped to make it in the time. So I packed up my colors and palette
+again, and, while I was doing so, observed that he not only drew the
+cloth once more over the features of the dead, but concealed the
+likeness behind the altar in the oratory, and even restored the chairs
+to their old positions against the wall. This done, he extinguished the
+solar lamp; put it out of sight; desired me once more to follow him; and
+led the way back along the same labyrinth of staircases and corridors by
+which he brought me. It was gray dawn as he hurried me into the coach.
+The blinds were already down--the door was instantly closed--again we
+seemed to be going through an infinite number of streets--again we
+stopped, and I found myself at the corner of the Via Margutta.
+
+"'Alight, Signore,' said the stranger, speaking for the first time since
+we started. 'Alight--you are but a few yards from your own door. Here
+are a hundred scudi; and all that you have now to do, is to forget your
+night's work, as if it had never been.'
+
+"With this he closed the carriage-door, the horses dashed on again, and,
+before I had time even to see if any arms were blazoned on the panels,
+the whole equipage had disappeared.
+
+"And here, strange to say, the adventure ended. I never was called upon
+for evidence. I never saw anything more of the stranger, or the lady. I
+never heard of any sudden death, or accident, or disappearance having
+taken place about that time; and I never even obtained any clue to the
+neighborhood of the house in which these things took place. Often and
+often afterwards, when I was strolling by night along the streets of
+Rome, I lingered before some old palazzo, and fancied that I recognised
+the gloomy outline that caught my eye in that hurried transit from the
+carriage to the house. Often and often I paused and started, thinking
+that I had found at last the very side-door by which I entered. But
+these were mere guesses after all. Perhaps that house stood in some
+remote quarter of the city where my footsteps never went again--perhaps
+in some neighboring street or piazza, where I passed it every day! At
+all events, the whole thing vanished like a dream, and, but for the ring
+and the hundred scudi, a dream I should by this time believe it to have
+been. The scudi, I am sorry to say, were spent within a month--the ring
+I have never parted from, and here it is."
+
+Hereupon the student took from his finger a superb ruby set between two
+brilliants of inferior size, and allowed it to pass from hand to hand,
+all round the table. Exclamations of surprise and admiration,
+accompanied by all sorts of conjectures and comments, broke from
+every lip.
+
+"The dead man was the lady's lover," said one. "That is why she wanted
+his portrait."
+
+"Of course, and her husband had murdered him," said another.
+
+"Who, then, was the man in black?" asked a third.
+
+"A servant, to be sure. She said, if you remember, that he was faithful;
+but not devoted to her interests alone. That meant that he would obey to
+the extent of procuring for her the portrait of her lover; but that he
+did not choose to betray his master, even though his master was a
+murderer."
+
+"But if so, where was the master?" said the first speaker. "Is it likely
+that he would have neglected to conceal the body during all
+these hours?"
+
+"Certainly. Nothing more likely, if he were a man of the world, and knew
+how to play his game out boldly to the end. Have we not been told that
+it was the last night of the Carnival, and what better could he do, to
+avert suspicion, than show himself at as many balls as he could visit in
+the course of the evening? But really, this ring is magnificent!"
+
+"Superb. The ruby alone must be worth a thousand francs."
+
+"To say nothing of the diamonds, and the setting," observed the next to
+whom it was handed.
+
+At length, after having gone nearly the round of the table, the ring
+came to a little dark, sagacious-looking man, just one seat beyond
+Dalrymple's, who peered at it suspiciously on every side, breathed upon
+it, rubbed it bright again upon his coat-sleeve, and, finally, held the
+stones up sideways between his eyes and the light.
+
+"Bah!" said he, sending it on with a contemptuous fillip of the
+forefinger and thumb. "Glass and paste, _mon ami_. Not worth five francs
+of anybody's money."
+
+Müller, who had been eyeing him all the time with an odd smile lurking
+about the corners of his mouth, emptied his last drop of Chablis, turned
+the glass over on the table, bottom upwards, and said very coolly:--
+
+"Well, I'm sorry for that; because I gave seven francs for it myself
+this morning, in the Palais Royal."
+
+"You!"
+
+"Seven francs!"
+
+"Bought in the Palais Royal!"
+
+"What does he mean?"
+
+"Mean?" echoed the student, in reply to this chorus of exclamations. "I
+mean that I bought it this morning, and gave seven francs for it. It is
+not every morning of my life, let me tell you, that I have seven francs
+to throw away on my personal appearance."
+
+"But then the ring that the lady took from her finger?"
+
+"And the murder?"
+
+"And the servant in black?"
+
+"And the hundred scudi?"
+
+"One great invention from beginning to end, Messieurs les Chicards, and
+being got up expressly for your amusement, I hope you liked it.
+_Garçon?_--another _grog au vin_, and sweeter than the last!"
+
+It would be difficult to say whether the Chicards were most disappointed
+or delighted at this _dénoûment_--disappointed at its want of fact, or
+delighted with the story-weaving power of Herr Franz Müller. They
+expressed themselves, at all events, with a tumultuous burst of
+applause, in the midst of which we rose and left the room. When we once
+more came out into the open air, the stars had disappeared and the air
+was heavy with the damps of approaching daybreak. Fortunately, we caught
+an empty _fiacre_ in the next street and, as we were nearer the Rue du
+Faubourg Montmartre than the Chaussée d' Antin, Dalrymple set me
+down first.
+
+"Adieu, Damon," he said, laughingly, as we shook hands through the
+window. "If we don't meet before, come and dine with me next Sunday at
+seven o'clock--and don't dream of dreadful murders, if you can help it!"
+
+I did not dream of dreadful murders. I dreamt, instead, of Madame de
+Marignan, and never woke the next morning till eleven o'clock, just two
+hours later than the time at which I should have presented myself at
+Dr. Chéron's.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+
+WHAT IT IS TO BE A CAVALIERE SERVENTE.
+
+     "Everye white will have its blacke,
+     And everye sweet its sowere."
+
+     _Old Ballad_.
+
+Neither the example of Oscar Dalrymple nor the broadcloth of the great
+Michaud, achieved half so much for my education as did the
+apprenticeship I was destined to serve to Madame de Marignan. Having
+once made up her mind to civilize me, she spared no pains for the
+accomplishment of that end, cost what it might to herself--or me. Before
+I had been for one week her subject, she taught me how to bow; how to
+pick up a pocket-handkerchief; how to present a bouquet; how to hold a
+fan; how to pay a compliment; how to turn over the leaves of a
+music-book--in short, how to obey and anticipate every imperious wish;
+and how to fetch and carry, like a dog. My vassalage began from the very
+day when I first ventured to call upon her. Her house was small, but
+very elegant, and she received me in a delicious little room overlooking
+the Champs Elysées--a very nest of flowers, books, and birds. Before I
+had breathed the air of that fatal boudoir for one quarter of an hour, I
+was as abjectly her slave as the poodle with the rose-colored collar
+which lay curled upon a velvet cushion at her feet.
+
+"I shall elect you my _cavaliere servente_," said she, after I had twice
+nervously risen to take my leave within the first half hour, and twice
+been desired to remain a little longer. "Will you accept the office?"
+
+I thought it the greatest privilege under heaven. Perhaps I said so.
+
+"The duties of the situation are onerous," added she, "and I ought not
+to accept your allegiance without setting them before you. In the first
+place, you will have to bring me every new novel of George Sand,
+Flaubert, or About, on the day of publication."
+
+"I will move heaven and earth to get them the day before, if that be
+all!" I exclaimed.
+
+Madame de Marignan nodded approvingly, and went on telling off my
+duties, one by one, upon her pretty fingers.
+
+"You will have to accompany me to the Opera at least twice a week, on
+which occasions you will bring me a bouquet--camellias being my
+favorite flowers."
+
+"Were they the flowers that bloom but once in a century," said I, with
+more enthusiasm than sense, "they should be yours!"
+
+Madame de Marignan smiled and nodded again.
+
+"When I drive in the Bois, you will sometimes take a seat in my
+carriage, and sometimes ride beside it, like an attentive cavalier."
+
+I was just about to avow that I had no horse, when I remembered that I
+could borrow Dalrymple's, or hire one, if necessary; so I checked
+myself, and bowed.
+
+"When I go to an exhibition," said Madame de Marignan, "it will be your
+business to look out the pictures in the catalogue--when I walk, you
+will carry my parasol--when I go into a shop, you will take care of my
+dog--when I embroider, you will wind off my silks, and look for my
+scissors--when I want amusement, you must make me laugh--and when I am
+sleepy, you must read to me. In short, my _cavaliere servente_ must be
+my shadow."
+
+"Then, like your shadow, Madame," said I, "his place is ever at your
+feet, and that is all I desire!"
+
+Madame de Marignan laughed outright, and showed the loveliest little
+double row of pearls in all the world.
+
+"Admirable!" said she. "Quite an elegant compliment, and worthy of an
+accomplished lady-killer! _Allons_! you are a promising scholar."
+
+"In all that I have dared to say, Madame, I am, at least, sincere," I
+added, abashed by the kind of praise.
+
+"Sincere? Of course you are sincere. Who ever doubted it? Nay, to blush
+like that is enough to spoil the finest compliment in the world.
+There--it is three o'clock, and at half-past I have an engagement, for
+which I must now make my _toilette_. Come to-morrow evening to my box at
+the _Italiens_, and so adieu. Stay--being my _cavaliere_, I permit you,
+at parting, to kiss my hand."
+
+Trembling, breathless, scarcely daring to touch it with mine, I lifted
+the soft little hand to my lips, stammered something which was, no
+doubt, sufficiently foolish, and hurried away, as if I were treading on
+air and breathing sunshine.
+
+All the rest of that day went by in a kind of agreeable delirium. I
+walked about, almost without knowledge where I went. I talked, without
+exactly knowing what I said. I have some recollection of marching to and
+fro among the side-alleys of the Bois de Boulogne, which at that time
+was really a woody park, and not a pleasure-garden--of lying under a
+tree, and listening to the birds overhead, and indulging myself in some
+idiotic romance about love, and solitude, and Madame de Marignan--of
+wandering into a _restaurant_ somewhere about seven o'clock, and sitting
+down to a dinner for which I had no appetite--of going back, sometime
+during the evening, to the Rue Castellane, and walking to and fro on the
+opposite side of the way, looking up for ever so long at the darkened
+windows where my divinity did not show herself--of coming back to my
+lodgings, weary, dusty, and not a bit more sober, somewhere about
+eleven o'clock at night, driven to-bed by sheer fatigue, and, even then,
+too much in love to go to sleep!
+
+The next day I went through my duties at Dr. Chéron's, and attended an
+afternoon lecture at the hospital; but mechanically, like one dreaming.
+In the evening I presented myself at the Opera, where Madame de Marignan
+received me very graciously, and deigned to accept a superb bouquet for
+which I had paid sixteen francs. I found her surrounded by elegant men,
+who looked upon me as nobody, and treated me accordingly. Driven to the
+back of the box where I could neither speak to her, nor see the stage,
+nor achieve even a glimpse of the house, I spent an evening which
+certainly fell short of my anticipations. I had, however, the
+gratification of seeing my bouquet thrown to Grisi at the end of the
+second act, and was permitted the privilege of going in search of Madame
+de Marignan's carriage, while somebody else handed her downstairs, and
+assisted her with her cloak. A whispered word of thanks, a tiny pressure
+of the hand, and the words "come early to-morrow," compensated me,
+nevertheless, for every disappointment, and sent me home as blindly
+happy as ever.
+
+The next day I called upon her, according to command, and was
+transported to the seventh heaven by receiving permission to accompany
+her to a morning concert, whereby I missed two lectures, and spent
+ten francs.
+
+On the Sunday, having hired a good horse for the occasion, I had the
+honor of riding beside her carriage till some better-mounted
+acquaintance came to usurp my place and her attention; after which I was
+forced to drop behind and bear the eclipse of my glory as
+philosophically as I could.
+
+Thus day after day went by, and, for the delusive sake of Madame de
+Marignan's bright eyes, I neglected my studies, spent my money, wasted
+my time, and incurred the displeasure of Dr. Chéron. Led on from folly
+to folly, I was perpetually buoyed up by coquetries which meant nothing,
+and as perpetually mortified, disappointed, and neglected. I hoped; I
+feared; I fretted; I lost my sleep and my appetite; I felt dissatisfied
+with all the world, sometimes blaming myself, and sometimes her--yet
+ready to excuse and forgive her at a moment's notice. A boy in
+experience even more than in years, I loved with a boy's headlong
+passion, and suffered with all a boy's acute susceptibility. I was
+intensely sensitive--abashed by a slight, humbled by a glance, and so
+easily wounded that there were often times when, seeing myself
+forgotten, I could with difficulty drive back the tears that kept rising
+to my eyes. On the other hand, I was as easily elated. A kind word, an
+encouraging smile, a lingering touch upon my sleeve, was enough at any
+time to make me forget all my foregone troubles. How often the mere gift
+of a flower sent me home rejoicing! How the tiniest show of preference
+set my heart beating! How proud I was if mine was the arm chosen to lead
+her to her carriage! How more than happy, if allowed for even one
+half-hour in the whole evening to occupy the seat beside her own! To
+dangle after her the whole day long--to traverse all Paris on her
+errands--to wait upon her pleasure like a slave, and this, too, without
+even expecting to be thanked for my devotion, seemed the most natural
+thing in the world. She was capricious; but caprice became her. She was
+exacting; but her exactions were so coquettish and attractive, that one
+would not have wished her more reasonable. She was, at least, ten or
+twelve years my senior; but boys proverbially fall in love with women
+older than themselves, and this one was in all respects so charming,
+that I do not, even now, wonder at my infatuation.
+
+After all, there are few things under heaven more beautiful, or more
+touching, than a boy's first love.
+
+Passionate is it as a man's--pure as a woman's--trusting
+as a child's--timid, through the very excess of its
+unselfishness--chivalrous, as though handed down direct from the days of
+old romance--poetical beyond the utterances of the poet. To the
+boy-lover, his mistress is only something less than a divinity. He
+believes in her truth as in his own; in her purity, as in the sun at
+noon. Her practised arts of voice and manner are, in his eyes, the
+unstudied graces that spring as naturally from her beauty as the scent
+from the flower. Single-hearted himself, it seems impossible that she
+whom he adores should trifle with the most sacred sentiment he has ever
+known. Conscious of his own devotion, he cannot conceive that his wealth
+is poured forth in vain, and that he is but the plaything of her idle
+hours. Yet it is so. The boy's first love is almost always misplaced;
+seldom rated at its true value; hardly ever productive of anything but
+disappointment. Aspirant of the highest mysteries of the soul, he passes
+through the ordeal of fire and tears, happy if he keep his faith
+unshaken and his heart pure, for the wiser worship hereafter. We all
+know this; and few know it better than myself. Yet, with all its
+suffering, which of us would choose to obliterate all record of his
+first romance? Which of us would be without the memory of its smiles and
+tears, its sunshine and its clouds? Not I for one.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+
+A CONTRETEMPS IN A CARRIAGE.
+
+My slavery lasted somewhat longer than three weeks, and less than a
+month; and was brought, oddly enough, to an abrupt conclusion. This was
+how it happened.
+
+I had, as usual, attended Madame de Marignan one evening to the Opera,
+and found myself, also as usual, neglected for a host of others. There
+was one man in particular whom I hated, and whom (perhaps because I
+hated him) she distinguished rather more than the rest. His name was
+Delaroche, and he called himself Monsieur le Comte Delaroche. Most
+likely he was a Count---I have no reason to doubt his title; but I chose
+to doubt it for mere spite, and because he was loud and conceited, and
+wore a little red and green ribbon in his button-hole. He had, besides,
+an offensive sense of my youth and his own superiority, which I have
+never forgiven to this day. On the particular occasion of which I am
+now speaking, this person had made his appearance in Madame de
+Marignan's box at the close of the first act, established himself in the
+seat behind hers, and there held the lists against all comers during the
+remainder of the evening. Everything he said, everything he did,
+aggravated me. When he looked through her lorgnette, I loathed him. When
+he admired her fan, I longed to thrust it down his throat. When he held
+her bouquet to his odious nose (the bouquet that I had given her!) I
+felt it would have been justifiable manslaughter to take him up bodily,
+and pitch him over into the pit.
+
+At length the performance came to a close, and M. Delaroche, having
+taken upon himself to arrange Madame de Marignan's cloak, carry Madame
+de Marignan's fan, and put Madame de Marignan's opera-glass into its
+morocco case, completed his officiousness by offering his arm and
+conducting her into the lobby, whilst I, outwardly indifferent but
+inwardly boiling, dropped behind, and consigned him silently to all the
+torments of the seven circles.
+
+It was an oppressive autumnal night without a star in the sky, and so
+still that one might have carried a lighted taper through the streets.
+Finding it thus warm, Madame de Marignan proposed walking down the line
+of carriages, instead of waiting till her own came up; and so she and M.
+Delaroche led the way and I followed. Having found the carriage, he
+assisted her in, placed her fan and bouquet on the opposite seat,
+lingered a moment at the open door, and had the unparalleled audacity to
+raise her hand to his lips at parting. As for me, I stood proudly back,
+and lifted my hat.
+
+"_Comment_!" she said, holding out her hand--the pretty, ungloved hand
+that had just been kissed--"is that your good night?"
+
+I bowed over the hand, I would not have touched it with my lips at that
+moment for all the wealth of Paris.
+
+"You are coming to me to-morrow morning at twelve?" she murmured
+tenderly.
+
+"If Madame desires it."
+
+"Of course I desire it. I am going to Auteuil, to look at a house for a
+friend--and to Pignot's for some flowers--and to Lubin's for some
+scent--and to a host of places. What should I do without you? Nay, why
+that grave face? Have I done anything to offend you?"
+
+"Madame, I--I confess that--"
+
+"That you are jealous of that absurd Delaroche, who is so much in love
+with himself that he has no place in his heart for any one else! _Fi
+donc!_ I am ashamed of you. There--adieu, twelve to-morrow!"
+
+And with this she laughed, waved her hand, gave the signal to drive on,
+and left me looking after the carriage, still irritated but already
+half consoled.
+
+I then sauntered moodily on, thinking of my tyrant, and her caprices,
+and her beauty. Her smile, for instance; surely it was the sweetest
+smile in the world--if only she were less lavish of it! Then, what a
+delicious little hand--if mine were the only lips permitted to kiss it!
+Why was she so charming?--or why, being so charming, need she prize the
+attentions of every _flaneur_ who had only enough wit to admire her? Was
+I not a fool to believe that she cared more for my devotion than for
+another's! Did I believe it? Yes ... no ... sometimes. But then that
+"sometimes" was only when under the immediate influence of her presence.
+She fascinated me; but she would fascinate a hundred others in precisely
+the same way. It was true that she accepted from me more devotion, more
+worship, more time, more outward and visible homage than from any other.
+Was I not her _Cavaliere servente?_ Did she not accept my bouquets? Did
+she not say the other day, when I gave her that volume of Tennyson, that
+she loved all that was English for my sake? Surely, I was worse than
+ungrateful, when, having so much, I was still dissatisfied! Why was I
+not the happiest fellow in Paris? Why .....
+
+My meditations were here interrupted by a sudden flash of very vivid
+lightning, followed by a low muttering of distant thunder. I paused, and
+looked round. The sky was darker than ever, and though the air was
+singularly stagnant, I could hear among the uppermost leaves of the tall
+trees that stealthy rustling that generally precedes a storm.
+Unfortunately for myself, I had not felt disposed to go home at once on
+leaving the theatre; but, being restless alike in mind and body, had
+struck down through the Place Vendôme and up the Rue de Rivoli,
+intending to come home by a circuitous route. At this precise moment I
+found myself in the middle of the Place de la Concorde, with Cleopatra's
+needle towering above my head, the lamps in the Champs Elysées twinkling
+in long chains of light through the blank darkness before me, and no
+vehicle anywhere in sight. To be caught in a heavy shower, was not,
+certainly, an agreeable prospect for one who had just emerged from the
+opera in the thinnest of boots and the lightest of folding hats, with
+neither umbrella nor paletôt of proof; so, having given a hasty glance
+in every direction from which a cab might be expected, I took valiantly
+to my heels, and made straight for the Madeleine.
+
+Long before I had accomplished half the distance, however, another flash
+announced the quick coming of the tempest, and the first premonitory
+drops began to plash down heavily upon the pavement. Still I ran on,
+thinking that I should find a cab in the Place de la Madeleine; but the
+Place de la Madeleine was empty. Even the café at the corner was closed.
+Even the omnibus office was shut up, and the red lamp above the door
+extinguished.
+
+What was I to do now? Panting and breathless, I leaned up against a
+doorway, and resigned myself to fate. Stay, what was that file of
+carriages, dimly seen through the rain which was now coming down in
+earnest? It was in a private street opening off at the back of the
+Madeleine--a street in which I could remember no public stand. Perhaps
+there was an evening party at one of the large houses lower down, and,
+if so, I might surely find a not wholly incorruptible cabman, who would
+consent for a liberal _pourboire_ to drive me home and keep his fare
+waiting, if need were, for one little half-hour! At all events it was
+worth trying for; so away I darted again, with the wind whistling about
+my ears, and the rain driving in my face.
+
+But my troubles were not to be so speedily ended. Among the ten or
+fifteen equipages which I found drawn up in file, there was not one
+hackney vehicle. They were private carriages, and all, therefore,
+inaccessible.
+
+Did I say inaccessible?
+
+A bold idea occurred to me. The rain was so heavy that it could scarcely
+be expected to last many minutes. The carriage at the very end of the
+line was not likely to be the first called; and, even if it were, one
+could spring out in a moment, if necessary. In short, the very daring of
+the deed was as attractive as the shelter! I made my way swiftly down
+the line. The last carriage was a neat little brougham, and the
+coachman, with his hat pulled down over his eyes, and his collar drawn
+up about his ears, was too much absorbed in taking care of himself and
+his horses to pay much attention to a foot-passenger. I passed boldly
+by--doubled back stealthily on my own steps--looked round
+cautiously--opened the door, and glided in.
+
+It was a delightfully comfortable little vehicle--cushioned, soft,
+yielding, and pervaded by a delicate perfume of eglantine. Wondering who
+the owner might be--if she was young--if she was pretty--if she was
+married, or single, or a widow--I settled myself in the darkest corner
+of the carriage, intending only to remain there till the rain had
+abated. Thus I fell, as fate would have it--first into a profound
+reverie, and then into a still profounder sleep. How long this sleep may
+have lasted I know not. I only remember becoming slowly conscious of a
+gentle movement, which, without awaking, partly roused me; of a check to
+that movement, which brought my thoughts suddenly to the surface; of a
+stream of light--of an open door--a crowded hall--a lady waiting to come
+out, and a little crowd of attentive beaux surrounding her!
+
+I comprehended my position in an instant, and the impossibility of
+extricating myself from it. To get out next the house was to brave
+detection; whilst at the other side I found myself blocked in by
+carriages. Escape was now hopeless! I turned hot and cold; I shrank
+back; I would have gone through the bottom of the carriage, if I could.
+At this moment, to my horror, the footman opened the door. I gave myself
+up for lost, and, in a sudden access of desperation, was on the point of
+rushing out _coûte que coûte_, when the lady ran forward; sprang lightly
+in; recoiled; and uttered a little breathless cry of surprise and
+apprehension!
+
+"_Mon Dieu_, Madame! what is it? Are you hurt?" cried two or three of
+the gentlemen, running out, bareheaded, to her assistance.
+
+But, to my amazement, she unfastened her cloak, and threw it over me in
+such a manner as to leave me completely hidden beneath the folds.
+
+"Oh, nothing, thank you!--I only caught my foot in my cloak. I am really
+quite ashamed to have alarmed you! A thousand thanks--good-night."
+
+And so, with something of a slight tremor in her voice, the lady drew up
+the window. The next instant the carriage moved on.
+
+And now, what was to be done? I blessed the accident which rendered me
+invisible; but, at the same time, asked myself how it was to end.
+
+Should I wait till she reached her own door, and then, still feigning
+sleep, allow myself to be discovered? Or should I take the bull by the
+horns, and reveal myself? If the latter, would she scream, or faint, or
+go into hysterics? Then, again, supposing she resumed her cloak ... a
+cold damp broke out upon my forehead at the mere thought! All at once,
+just as these questions flashed across my mind, the lady drew the mantle
+aside, and said:--
+
+"How imprudent of you to hide in my carriage?"
+
+I could not believe my ears.
+
+"Suppose any of those people had caught sight of you ... why, it would
+have been all over Paris to-morrow! Happily, I had the presence of mind
+to cover you with my cloak; otherwise ... but there, Monsieur, I have a
+great mind to be very angry with you!"
+
+It was now clear that I was mistaken for some one else. Fortunately the
+carriage-lamps were unlit, the windows still blurred with rain, and the
+night intensely dark; so, feeling like a wretch reprieved on the
+scaffold, I shrank farther and farther into the corner, glad to favor a
+mistake which promised some hope of escape.
+
+"_Eh bien_!" said the lady, half tenderly, half reproachfully; "have you
+nothing to say to me?"
+
+Say to her, indeed! What could I say to her? Would not my voice betray
+me directly?
+
+"Ah," she continued, without waiting for a reply; "you are ashamed of
+the cruel scene of this morning! Well, since you have not allowed the
+night to pass without seeking a reconciliation, I suppose I must
+forgive you!"
+
+I thought, at this point, that I could not do better than press her
+hand, which was exquisitely soft and small--softer and smaller than even
+Madame de Marignan's.
+
+"Naughty Hippolyte!" murmured my companion. "Confess, now, that you were
+unreasonable."
+
+I sighed heavily, and caressed the little hand with both of mine.
+
+"And are you very penitent?"
+
+I expressed my penitence by another prodigious sigh, and ventured, this
+time, to kiss the tips of the dainty fingers.
+
+"_Ciel_!" exclaimed the lady. "You have shaved off your beard! What can
+have induced you to do such a thing?"
+
+My beard, indeed! Alas! I would have given any money for even a
+moustache! However, the fatal moment was come when I must speak.
+
+"_Mon cher ange_," I began, trying a hoarse whisper, "I--I--the fact
+is--a bet--"
+
+"A bet indeed! The idea of sacrificing such a handsome beard for a mere
+bet! I never heard of anything so foolish. But how hoarse you are,
+Hippolyte!"
+
+"All within the last hour," whispered I. "I was caught in the storm,
+just now, and ..."
+
+"And have taken cold, for my sake! Alas! my poor, dear friend, why did
+you wait to speak to me? Why did you not go home at once, and change
+your clothes? Your sleeve, I declare, is still quite damp! Hippolyte, if
+you fall ill, I shall never forgive myself!"
+
+I kissed her hand again. It was much pleasanter than whispering, and
+expressed all that was necessary.
+
+"But you have not once asked after poor Bibi!" exclaimed my companion,
+after a momentary silence. "Poor, dear Bibi, who has been suffering from
+a martyrdom with her cough all the afternoon!"
+
+Now, who the deuce was Bibi? She might be a baby. Or--who could
+tell?--she might be a poodle? On this point, however, I was left
+uninformed; for my unknown friend, who, luckily, seemed fond of talking
+and had a great deal to say, launched off into another topic
+immediately.
+
+"After all," said she, "I should have been wrong not to go to the party!
+My uncle was evidently pleased with my compliance; and it is not wise to
+vex one's rich uncles, if one can help it--is it, Hippolyte!"
+
+I pressed her hand again.
+
+"Besides, Monsieur Delaroche was not there. He was not even invited; so
+you see how far they were from laying matchmaking plots, and how
+groundless were all your fears and reproaches!"
+
+Monsieur Delaroche! Could this be the Delaroche of my special aversion?
+I pressed her hand again, more closely, more tenderly, and listened for
+what might come next.
+
+"Well, it is all over now! And will you promise _never, never, never_ to
+be jealous again? Then, to be jealous of such a creature as that
+ridiculous Delaroche--a man who knows nothing--who can think and talk
+only of his own absurd self!--a man who has not even wit enough to see
+that every one laughs at him!"
+
+I was delighted. I longed to embrace her on the spot! Was there ever
+such a charming, sensible, lively creature?
+
+"Besides, the coxcomb is just now devoting himself, body and soul (such
+as they are!) to that insufferable little _intriguante_, Madame de
+Marignan. He is to be seen with her in every drawing-room and theatre
+throughout Paris. For my part, I am amazed that a woman of the world
+should suffer herself to be compromised to that extent--especially one
+so experienced in these _affaires du coeur_."
+
+Madame de Marignan! Compromised--experienced--_intriguante_! I felt as
+if I were choking.
+
+"To be sure, there is that poor English lad whom she drags about with
+her, to play propriety," continued she; "but do you suppose the world is
+blinded by so shallow an artifice?"
+
+"What English lad?" I asked, startled out of all sense of precaution,
+and desperately resolved to know the worst.
+
+"What English lad? Why, Hippolyte, you are more stupid than ever! I
+pointed him out to you the other night at the Comedie Française--a pale,
+handsome boy, of about nineteen or twenty, with brown curling hair, and
+very fine eyes, which were riveted on Madame de Marignan the whole
+evening. Poor fellow! I cannot help pitying him."
+
+"Then--then, you think she really does not love him?" I said. And this
+time my voice was hoarse enough, without any need of feigning.
+
+"Love him! Ridiculous! What does such a woman understand by love?
+Certainly neither the sentiment nor the poetry of it! Tush, Hippolyte! I
+do not wish to be censorious; but every one knows that ever since M. de
+Marignan has been away in Algiers, that woman has had, not one devoted
+admirer, but a dozen; and now that her husband is coming back...."
+
+"Coming back! ... her husband!" I echoed, half rising in my place, and
+falling back again, as if stunned. "Good heavens! is she not a widow?"
+
+It was now the lady's turn to be startled.
+
+"A widow!" she repeated. "Why, you know as well as I that--_Dieu_! To
+whom I am speaking?"
+
+"Madame," I said, as steadily as my agitation would let me, "I beg you
+not to be alarmed. I am not, it is true, the person whom you have
+supposed; but--Nay, I implore you...."
+
+She here uttered a quick cry, and darted forward for the check-string.
+Arresting her hand half way, respectfully but firmly, I went on:--
+
+"How I came here, I will explain presently. I am a gentleman; and upon
+the word of a gentleman, Madame, am innocent of any desire to offend or
+alarm you. Can you--will you--hear me for one moment?"
+
+"I appear, sir, to have no alternative," replied she, trembling like a
+caged bird.
+
+"I might have left you undeceived, Madame. I might have extricated
+myself from, this painful position undiscovered--but for some words
+which just escaped your lips; some words so nearly concerning the--the
+honor and happiness of--of.... in short, I lost my presence of mind. I
+now implore you to tell me if all that you have just been saying of
+Madame de Marignan is strictly true."
+
+"Who are you, sir, that you should dare to surprise confidences intended
+for another, and by what right do you question me?" said the lady,
+haughtily.
+
+"By no right, Madame," I replied, fairly breaking into sobs, and burying
+my face in my hands. "I can only appeal to your compassion. I am that
+Englishman whom--whom...."
+
+For a moment there was silence. My companion was the first to speak.
+
+"Poor boy!" she said; and her voice, now, was gentle and compassionate.
+"You have been rudely undeceived. Did Madame de Marignan pass herself
+off upon you for a widow?"
+
+"She never named her husband to me--I believed that she was free. I
+fancied he had been dead for years. She knew that was my impression."
+
+"And you would have married her--actually married her?"
+
+"I--I--hardly dared to hope...."
+
+"_Ciel_! it is almost beyond belief. And you never inquired into her
+past history?"
+
+"Never. Why should I?"
+
+"Monsieur de Marignan holds a government appointment in Algiers, and has
+been absent more than four years. He is, I understand, expected back
+shortly, on leave of absence."
+
+I conquered my agitation by a supreme effort.
+
+"Madame," I said, "I thank you. It now only remains for me to explain my
+intrusion. I can do so in half a dozen words. Caught in the storm and
+unable to find a conveyance, I sought shelter in this carriage, which
+being the last on the file, offered the only refuge of which I could
+avail myself unobserved. While waiting for the tempest to abate, I fell
+asleep; and but for the chance which led you to mistake me for another,
+I must have been discovered when you entered the carriage."
+
+"Then, finding yourself so mistaken, Monsieur, would it not have been
+more honorable to undeceive me than to usurp a conversation which...."
+
+"Madame, I dared not. I feared to alarm you--I hoped to find some means
+of escape, and...."
+
+"_Mon Dieu_! what means? How are you to escape as it is? How leave the
+carriage without being seen by my servants?"
+
+I had not thought of this, nor of the dilemma in which my presence must
+place her.
+
+"I can open the door softly," said I, "and jump out unperceived."
+
+"Impossible, at the pace we are going! You would break your neck."
+
+I shook my head, and laughed bitterly.
+
+"Have no fear of that, Madame," I said. "Those who least value their
+necks never happen to break them. See, I can spring out as we pass the
+next turning, and be out of sight in a moment."
+
+"Indeed, I will not permit it. Oh, dear! we have already reached the
+Faubourg St. Germain. Stay--I have an idea I Do you know what o'clock
+it is?"
+
+"I don't know how long I may have slept; but I think it must be quite
+three."
+
+"_Bien_! The Countess de Blois has a ball to-night, and her visitors are
+sure not to disperse before four or five. My sister is there. I will
+send in to ask if she has yet gone home, and when the carriage stops you
+can slip out. Here is the Rue de Bac, and the door of her hotel is yet
+surrounded with equipages."
+
+And with this, she let down a front window, desired the coachman to
+stop, leaned forward so as to hide me completely, and sent in her
+footman with the message. When the man had fairly entered the hall, she
+turned to me and said:--
+
+"Now, Monsieur, fly! It is your only chance."
+
+"I go, Madame; but before going, suffer me to assure you that I know
+neither your name, nor that of the person for whom you mistook me--that
+I have no idea of your place of residence--that I should not know you if
+I saw you again to-morrow--in short, that you are to me as entirely a
+stranger as if this adventure had never happened."
+
+"Monsieur, I thank you for the assurance; but I see the servant
+returning. Pray, begone!"
+
+I sprang out without another word, and, never once looking back, darted
+down a neighboring street and waited in the shadow of a doorway till I
+thought the carriage must be out of sight.
+
+The night was now fine, the moon was up, and the sky was full of stars.
+But I heeded nothing, save my own perplexed and painful thoughts.
+Absorbed in these, I followed the course of the Rue du Bac till I came
+to the Pont National. There my steps were arrested by the sight of the
+eddying river, the long gleaming front of the Louvre, the quaint,
+glistening gables of the Tuilleries, the far-reaching trees of the
+Champs Elysées all silvered in the soft, uncertain moonlight. It was a
+most calm and beautiful picture; and I stood for a long time leaning
+against the parapet of the bridge, and looking dreamily at the scene
+before me. Then I heard the quarters chime from belfry to belfry all
+over the quiet city, and found that it was half-past three o'clock.
+Presently a patrol of _gendarmes_ went by, and, finding that they paused
+and looked at me suspiciously, I turned away, and bent my steps
+homewards.
+
+By the time I reached the Cité Bergère it was past four, and the early
+market-carts were already rumbling along the Rue du Faubourg Montmartre.
+Going up wearily to my apartments, I found a note waiting for me in
+Dalrymple's handwriting. It ran thus:--
+
+"MY DEAR DAMON:--
+
+"Do you know that it is nearly a month since I last saw you? Do you know
+that I have called twice at your lodgings without finding you at home? I
+hear of you as having been constantly seen, of late, in the society of a
+very pretty woman of our acquaintance; but I confess that I do not
+desire to see you go to the devil entirely without the friendly
+assistance of
+
+"Yours faithfully,
+
+"OSCAR DALRYMPLE."
+
+I read the note twice. I could scarcely believe that I had so neglected
+my only friend. Had I been mad? Or a fool?--or both? Too anxious and
+unhappy to sleep, and too tired to sit up, I lit my lamp, threw myself
+upon the bed, and there lay repenting my wasted hours, my misplaced love
+and my egregious folly, till morning came with its sunshine and its
+traffic, and found me a "wiser," if not a "better man."
+
+"Half-past seven!" exclaimed I to myself, as I jumped up and plunged my
+head into a basin of cold water. "Dr. Chéron shall see me before nine
+this morning. I'll call on Dalrymple at luncheon time; at three, I must
+get back for the afternoon lecture; and in the evening--in the evening,
+by Jove! Madame de Marignan must be content with her adorable Delaroche,
+for the deuce a bit of her humble servant will she ever see again!"
+
+And away I went presently along the sunny streets, humming to myself
+those saucy and wholesome lines of good Sir Walter Raleigh's:--
+
+     "Shall I like a hermit dwell
+     On a rock, or in a cell,
+     Calling home the smallest part
+     That is missing of my heart,
+     To bestow it where I may
+     Meet a rival every day?
+     If she undervalues me,
+     What care I how fair she be?"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII.
+
+THE WIDOW OF A MINISTER OF FINANCE.
+
+"You are just in time, Arbuthnot, to do me a service," said Dalrymple,
+looking up from his desk as I went in, and reaching out his hand to me
+over a barricade of books and papers.
+
+"Then I am very glad I have come," I replied. "But what confusion is
+this? Are you going anywhere?"
+
+"Yes--to perdition. There, kick that rubbish out of your way and sit
+down."
+
+Never very orderly, Dalrymple's rooms were this time in as terrible a
+litter as can well be conceived. The table was piled high with bills,
+old letters, books, cigars, gloves, card-cases, and pamphlets. The
+carpet was strewn with portmanteaus, hat-cases, travelling-straps, old
+luggage labels, railway wrappers, and the like. The chairs and sofas
+were laden with wearing apparel. As for Dalrymple himself, he looked
+haggard and weary, as though the last four weeks had laid four years
+upon his shoulders.
+
+"You look ill," I said clearing a corner of the sofa for my own
+accommodation; "or _ennuyé_, which is much the same thing. What is the
+matter? And what can I do for you?"
+
+"The matter is that I am going abroad," said he, with his chin resting
+moodily in his two palms and his elbows on the table.
+
+"Going abroad! Where?"
+
+"I don't know--
+
+     'Anywhere, anywhere, out of the world.'
+
+It's of very little consequence whether I betake myself to the East or
+to the West; eat rice in the tropics, or drink train-oil at the Pole."
+
+"But have you no settled projects?"
+
+"None whatever."
+
+"And don't care what becomes of you?"
+
+"Not in the least."
+
+"Then, in Heaven's name, what has happened?"
+
+"The very thing that, three weeks ago, would have made me the happiest
+fellow in Christendom. What are you going to do to-morrow?"
+
+"Nothing, beyond my ordinary routine of medical study."
+
+"Humph! Could you get a whole holiday, for once?"
+
+I remembered how many I had taken of late, and felt ashamed of the
+readiness with which I replied:--
+
+"Oh yes! easily."
+
+"Well, then, I want you to spend the day with me. It will be, perhaps,
+my last in Paris for many a month, or even many a year. I ... Pshaw! I
+may as well say it, and have done with it. I am going to be married."
+
+"Married!" I exclaimed, in blank amazement; for it was the last thing I
+should have guessed.
+
+Dalrymple tugged away at his moustache with both hands, as was his habit
+when perplexed or troubled, and nodded gloomily. "To whom?"
+
+"To Madame de Courcelles."
+
+"And are you not very happy?"
+
+"Happy! I am the most miserable dog unhanged?"
+
+I was more at fault now than ever.
+
+"I ... judging from trifles which some would perhaps scarcely have
+observed," I said, hesitatingly, "I--I thought you were interested in
+Madame de Courcelles?"
+
+"Interested!" cried he, pushing back his chair and springing to his
+feet, as if the word had stung him. "By heaven! I love that woman as I
+never loved in my life."
+
+"Then why ..."
+
+"I'll tell you why--or, at least, I will tell you as much as I may--as I
+can; for the affair is hers, and not mine. She has a cousin--curse
+him!--to whom she was betrothed from childhood. His estates adjoined
+hers; family interests were concerned in their union; and the parents on
+both sides arranged matters. When, however, Monsieur de Courcelles fell
+in love with her--a man much older than herself, but possessed of great
+wealth and immense political influence--her father did not hesitate to
+send the cousin to the deuce and marry his daughter to the Minister of
+Finance. The cousin, it seems, was then a wild young fellow; not
+particularly in love with her himself; and not at all inconsolable for
+her loss. When, however, Monsieur de Courcelles was good enough to die
+(which he had the bad taste to do very hastily, and without making, by
+any means, the splendid provision for his widow which he had promised),
+our friend, the cousin, comes forward again. By this time he is enough
+man of the world to appreciate the value of land--more especially as he
+has sold, mortgaged, played the mischief with nearly every acre of his
+own. He pleads the old engagement, and, as he is pleased to call it, the
+old love. Madame de Courcelles is a young widow, very solitary, with no
+one to love, no object to live for, and no experience of the world. Her
+pity is easily awaked; and the result is that she not only accepts the
+cousin, but lends him large sums of money; suffers the title-deeds of
+her estates to go into the hands of his lawyer; and is formally
+betrothed to him before the eyes of all Paris!"
+
+"Who is this man? Where is he?" I asked, eagerly.
+
+"He is an officer of Chasseurs, now serving with his regiment in
+Algiers--a daring, dashing, reckless fellow; heartless and dissipated
+enough; but a splendid soldier. However, having committed her property
+to his hands, and suffered her name to be associated publicly with his,
+Madame de Courcelles, during his absence in Algiers, has done me the
+honor to prefer me. I have the first real love of her life, and the
+short and long of it is, that we are to be privately married to-morrow."
+
+"And why privately?"
+
+"Ah, there's the pity of it! There's the disappointment and the
+bitterness!"
+
+"Can't Madame de Courcelles write and tell this man that she loves
+somebody else better?"
+
+"Confound it! no. The fellow has her too much in his power, and, if he
+chose to be dishonest, could half ruin her. At all events she is afraid
+of him; and I ... I am as helpless as a child in the matter. If I were a
+rich man, I would snap my fingers at him; but how can I, with a paltry
+eight hundred a year, provide for that woman? Pshaw! If I could but
+settle it with a pair of hair-triggers and twenty paces of turf, I'd
+leave little work for the lawyers!"
+
+"Well, then, what is to be done?"
+
+"Only this," replied he, striding impatiently to and fro, like a caged
+lion; "I must just bear with my helplessness, and leave the remedy to
+those who can oppose skill to skill, and lawyer to lawyer."
+
+"At all events, you marry the lady."
+
+"Ay--I marry the lady; but I start to-morrow night for Berlin, _en
+route_ for anywhere that chance may lead me."
+
+"Without her?"
+
+"Without her. Do you suppose that I would stay in Paris--her
+husband--and live apart from her? Meet her, like an ordinary
+acquaintance? See others admiring her? Be content to lounge in and out
+of her _soirées_, or ride beside her carriage now and then, as you or
+fifty others might do? Perhaps, have even to endure the presence of De
+Caylus himself? _Merci_! Any number of miles, whether of land or sea,
+were better than a martyrdom like that!"
+
+"De Caylus!" I repeated. "Where have I heard that name?"
+
+"You may have heard of it in a hundred places," replied my friend. "As I
+said before, the man is a gallant soldier, and does gallant things. But
+to return to the present question--may I depend on you to-morrow? For we
+must have a witness, and our witness must be both discreet and silent."
+
+"On my silence and discretion you may rely absolutely."
+
+"And you can be here by nine?"
+
+"By daybreak, if you please."
+
+"I won't tax you to that extent. Nine will do quite well."
+
+"Adieu, then, till nine."
+
+"Adieu, and thank you."
+
+With this I left him, somewhat relieved to find that I had escaped all
+cross-examination on the score of Madame Marignan.
+
+"De Caylus!" I again repeated to myself, as I took my rapid way to the
+Hotel Dieu. "De Caylus! why, surely, it must have been that evening at
+Madame de Courcelles'...."
+
+And then I recollected that De Caylus was the name of that officer who
+was said to have ridden by night, and single-handed, through the heart
+of the enemy's camp, somewhere in Algiers.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII.
+
+A MARRIAGE NOT "A LA MODE."
+
+The marriage took place in a little out-of-the-way Protestant chapel
+beyond the barriers, at about a quarter before ten o'clock the next
+morning. Dalrymple and I were there first; and Madame de Courcelles,
+having, in order to avoid observation, come part of the distance in a
+cab and part on foot, arrived a few minutes later. She was very pale,
+and looked almost like a _religieuse_, with her black veil tied closely
+under her chin, and a dark violet dress, which might have passed for
+mourning. She gave her hand to Dalrymple without speaking; then knelt
+down at the communion-table, and so remained till we had all taken our
+places. As for Dalrymple, he had even less color than she, but held his
+head up haughtily, and betrayed no sign of the conflict within.
+
+It was a melancholy little chapel, dusty and neglected, full of black
+and white funereal tablets, and damp as a vault. We shivered as we stood
+about the altar; the clergyman's teeth chattered as he began the
+marriage service; and the echoes of our responses reverberated forlornly
+up among the gothic rafters overhead. Even the sunbeams struggled sadly
+and palely down the upper windows, and the chill wind whistled in when
+the door was opened, bringing with it a moan of coming rain.
+
+The ceremony over, the books signed in the vestry, and the clergyman,
+clerk, and pew-opener duly remunerated for their services, we prepared
+to be gone. For a couple of moments, Dalrymple and his bride stood apart
+in the shadow of the porch. I saw him take the hand on which he had just
+placed the ring, and look down upon it tenderly, wistfully--I saw him
+bend lower, and lower, whispering what no other ears might hear--saw
+their lips meet for one brief instant. Then the lady's veil was lowered;
+she turned hastily away; and Dalrymple was left standing in the
+doorway alone.
+
+"By Heaven!" said he, grasping my hand as though he would crush it.
+"This is hard to bear."
+
+I but returned the pressure of his hand; for I knew not with what words
+to comfort him. Thus we lingered for some minutes in silence, till the
+clergyman, having put off his surplice, passed us with a bow and went
+out; and the pew-opener, after pretending to polish the door-handle with
+her apron, and otherwise waiting about with an air of fidgety
+politeness, dropped a civil curtsey, and begged to remind us that the
+chapel must now be closed.
+
+Dalrymple started and shook himself like a water-dog, as if he would so
+shake off "the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune."
+
+"_Rex est qui metuit nihil_!" said he; "but I am a sovereign in bad
+circumstances, for all that. Heigho! Care will kill a cat. What shall we
+do with ourselves, old fellow, for the rest of the day?"
+
+"I hardly know. Would you like to go into the country?"
+
+"Nothing better. The air perhaps would exorcise some of these
+blue-devils."
+
+"What say you to St. Germains? It looks as if it must rain before night;
+yet there is the forest and...."
+
+"Excellent! We can do as we like, with nobody to stare at us; and I am
+in a horribly uncivilized frame of mind this morning."
+
+With this, we turned once more toward Paris, and, jumping into the first
+cab that came by, were driven to the station. It happened that a train
+was then about to start; so we were off immediately.
+
+There were no other passengers in the carriage, so Dalrymple infringed
+the company's mandate by lighting a cigar, and I, finding him
+disinclined for talk, did the same thing, and watched the passing
+country. Flat and uninteresting at first, it consisted of a mere sandy
+plain, treeless, hedgeless, and imperfectly cultivated with struggling
+strips of corn and vegetables. By and by came a line of stunted
+pollards, a hamlet, and a little dreary cemetery. Then the landscape
+improved. The straight line of the horizon broke into gentle
+undulations; the Seine, studded with islets, wound through the
+meadow-land at our feet; and a lofty viaduct carried us from height to
+height across the eddying river. Then we passed into the close green
+shade of a forest, which opened every here and there into long vistas,
+yielding glimpses of
+
+     "--verdurous glooms, and winding mossy ways."
+
+Through this wood the line continued to run till we reached our
+destination. Here our first few steps brought us out upon the Place,
+directly facing the old red and black chateau of St. Germain-en-Laye.
+Leaving this and the little dull town behind us, we loitered for some
+time about the broad walks of the park, and then passed on into the
+forest. Although it was neither Sunday nor a fête-day, there were
+pleasure parties gipseying under trees--Parisian cockneys riding
+raw-boned steeds--pony-chaises full of laughing grisettes dashing up and
+down the broad roads that pierce the wood in various directions--old
+women selling cakes and lemonade--workmen gambling with half-pence on
+the smooth turf by the wayside--_bonnes_, comely and important, with
+their little charges playing round them, and their busy fingers plying
+the knitting-needles as they walked--young ladies sketching trees, and
+prudent governesses reading novels close by; in short, all the life and
+variety of a favorite suburban resort on an ordinarily fine day about
+the beginning of autumn.
+
+Leaving the frequented routes to the right, we turned into one of the
+many hundred tracks that diverge in every direction from the beaten
+roads, and wandered deeper and deeper into the green shades and
+solitudes of the forest. Pausing, presently, to rest, Dalrymple threw
+himself at full length on the mossy ground, with his hands clasping the
+back of his head, and his hat over his eyes; whilst I found a luxurious
+arm-chair in the gnarled roots of a lichen-tufted elm. Thus we remained
+for a considerable time puffing away at our cigars in that sociable
+silence which may almost claim to be an unique privilege of masculine
+friendship. Women cannot sit together for long without talking; men can
+enjoy each other's companionship for hours with scarcely the interchange
+of an idea.
+
+Meanwhile, I watched the squirrels up in the beech-trees and the dancing
+of the green leaves against the sky; and thought dreamily of home, of my
+father, of the far past, and the possible future. I asked myself how,
+when my term of study came to an end, I should ever again endure the old
+home-life at Saxonholme? How settle down for life as my father's
+partner, conforming myself to his prejudices, obeying all the demands of
+his imperious temper, and accepting for evermore the monotonous routine
+of a provincial practice! It was an intolerable prospect, but no less
+inevitable than intolerable. Pondering thus, I sighed heavily, and the
+sigh roused Dalrymple's attention.
+
+"Why, Damon," said he, turning over on his elbow, and pushing up his
+hat to the level of his eyes, "what's the matter with you?"
+
+"Oh, nothing--at least, nothing new."
+
+"Well, new or old, what is it? A man must be either in debt, or in love,
+when he sighs in that way. You look as melancholy as Werter redivivus!"
+
+"I--I ought not to be melancholy, I suppose; for I was thinking of
+home."
+
+Dalrymple's face and voice softened immediately.
+
+"Poor boy!" he said, throwing away the end of his cigar, "yours is not a
+bright home, I fear. You told me, I think, that you had lost
+your mother?"
+
+"From infancy."
+
+"And you have no sisters?"
+
+"None. I am an only child."
+
+"Your father, however, is living?"
+
+"Yes, my father lives. He is a rough-tempered, eccentric man;
+misanthropic, but clever; kind enough, and generous enough, in his own
+strange way. Still--"
+
+"Still what?"
+
+--"I dread the life that lies before me! I dread the life without
+society, without ambition, without change--the dull house--the bounded
+sphere of action--the bondage.... But of what use is it to trouble you
+with these things?"
+
+"This use, that it does you good to tell, and me to listen. Sympathy,
+like mercy, blesseth him that gives and him that takes; and if I cannot
+actually help you, I am, at all events, thankful to be taken out of
+myself. Go on--tell me more of your prospects. Have you no acquaintance
+at Saxonholme whose society will make the place pleasant to you? No
+boyish friends? No pretty cousins? No first-loves, from amongst whom to
+choose a wife in time to come?"
+
+I shook my head sadly.
+
+"Did I not tell you that my father was a misanthrope? He visits no one,
+unless professionally. We have no friends and no relations."
+
+"Humph! that's awkward. However, it leaves you free to choose your own
+friends, when you go back. A medical man need never be without a
+visiting connection. His very profession puts a thousand opportunities
+in his way."
+
+"That is true; but--"
+
+"But what?"
+
+"I am not fond of the profession. I have never liked it. I would give
+much to relinquish it altogether."
+
+Dalrymple gave utterance to a prolonged and very dismal whistle.
+
+"This," said he gravely, "is the most serious part of the business. To
+live in a dull place is bad enough--to live with dull people is bad
+enough; but to have one's thoughts perpetually occupied with an
+uncongenial subject, and one's energies devoted to an uncongenial
+pursuit, is just misery, and nothing short of it! In fact 'tis a moral
+injustice, and one that no man should be required to endure."
+
+"Yet I must endure it."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Because it is too late to do otherwise."
+
+"It is never too late to repair an evil, or an error."
+
+"Unless the repairing of it involved a worse evil, or a more fatal
+error! No--I must not dream now of turning aside from the path that has
+been chosen for me. Too much time and too much money have been given to
+the thing for that;--I must let it take its course. There's no help
+for it!"
+
+"But, confound it, lad! you'd better follow the fife and drum, or go
+before the mast, than give up your life to a profession you hate!"
+
+"Hate is a strong word," I replied. "I do not actually hate it--at all
+events I must try to make the best of it, if only for my father's sake.
+His heart is set on making a physician of me, and I dare not
+disappoint him."
+
+Dalrymple looked at me fixedly, and then fell back into his old
+position.
+
+"Heigho!" he said, pulling his hat once more over his eyes, "I was a
+disobedient son. My father intended me for the Church; I was expelled
+from College for fighting a duel before I was twenty, and then, sooner
+than go home disgraced, enlisted as a private soldier in a cavalry corps
+bound for foreign service. Luckily, they found me out before the ship
+sailed, and made the best of a bad bargain by purchasing me a cornetcy
+in a dragoon regiment. I would not advise you to be disobedient, Damon.
+My experience in that line has been bitter enough,"
+
+"How so? You escaped a profession for which you were disinclined, and
+entered one for which you had every qualification."
+
+"Ay; but think of the cursed _esclandre_--first the duel, then the
+expulsion, then my disappearance for two months ... My mother was in bad
+health at the time, too; and I, her favorite son--I--in short, the
+anxiety was too much for her. She--she died before I had been six weeks
+in the regiment. There! we won't talk of it. It's the one subject
+that ..."
+
+His voice faltered, and he broke off abruptly.
+
+"I wish you were going with me to Berlin," said he, after a long silence
+which I had not attempted to interrupt.
+
+"I wish with all my heart that I were!"
+
+"And yet," he added, "I am glad on--on her account, that you remain in
+Paris. You will call upon her sometimes, Arbuthnot?"
+
+"If Madame De Cour.... I mean, if Mrs. Dalrymple will permit me."
+
+An involuntary smile flitted across his lips--the first I had seen there
+all the day.
+
+"She will be glad--grateful. She knows that I value you, and she has
+proof that I trust you. You are the only possessor of our secret."
+
+"It is as safe with me," I said, "as if I were dead, and in my grave."
+
+"I know it, old fellow. Well--you will see her sometimes. You will write
+to me, and tell me how she is looking. If--if she were to fall ill, you
+would not conceal it from me? and in case of any emergency--any
+annoyance arising from De Caylus ..."
+
+"Were she my own sister," I said, earnestly, "she would not find me
+readier to assist or defend her. Of this, Dalrymple, be assured."
+
+"Thank you," he said, and stretched up his hand to me. "I do believe you
+are true--though there are few men, and still fewer women, of whom I
+should like to say as much. By the way, Arbuthnot, beware of that little
+flirt, Madame de Marignan. She has charming eyes, but no more heart than
+a vampire. Besides, an entanglement with a married woman!... _cela ne se
+peut pas, mon cher_. You are too young to venture on such dangerous
+ground, and too inexperienced."
+
+I smiled--perhaps somewhat bitterly--for the wound was still fresh, and
+I could not help wincing when any hand came near it.
+
+"You are right," I replied. "Madame de Marignan is a dangerous woman;
+but dangerous for me no longer. However, I have paid rather dearly for
+my safety."
+
+And with this, I told him the whole story from beginning to end,
+confessing all my follies without reservation. Surprised, amused,
+sometimes unable to repress a smile, sometimes genuinely compassionate,
+he heard my narrative through, accompanying it from time to time with
+muttered comments and ejaculations, none of which were very flattering
+to Madame de Marignan. When I had done, he sprang to his feet, laid his
+hand heavily upon my shoulder, and said:--
+
+"Damon, there are a great many disagreeable things in life which wise
+people say are good for us, and for which they tell us we ought to be
+grateful in proportion to our discomfort. For my own part, however, I am
+no optimist. I am not fond of mortifying the flesh, and the eloquence of
+Socrates would fail to persuade me that a carbuncle was a cheerful
+companion, or the gout an ailment to be ardently desired. Yet, for all
+this, I cannot say that I look upon your adventure in the light of a
+misfortune. You have lost time, spent money, and endured a considerable
+amount of aggravation; but you have, on the other hand, acquired ease
+of manner, facility of conversation, and just that necessary polish
+which fits a man for society. Come! you have received a valuable lesson
+both in morals and manners; so farewell to Madame de Marignan, and let
+us write _Pour acquit_ against the score!"
+
+Willing enough to accept this cheerful view, I flourished an imaginary
+autograph upon the air with the end of my cane, and laughingly dismissed
+the subject.
+
+We then strolled back through the wood, treading the soft moss under our
+feet, startling the brown lizards from our path and the squirrels from
+the lower branches of the great trees, and, now and then, surprising a
+plump little green frog, which went skipping away into the long grass,
+like an animated emerald. Coming back to the gardens, we next lingered
+for some time upon the terrace, admiring the superb panorama of
+undulating woodland and cultivated champaign, which, seen through the
+golden haze of afternoon, stretched out in glory to the remotest
+horizon. To our right stood the prison-like chateau, flinging back the
+sunset from its innumerable casements, and seeming to drink in the warm
+glow at every pore of its old, red bricks. To our left, all lighted up
+against the sky, rose the lofty tree-tops of the forest which we had
+just quitted. Our shadows stretched behind us across the level terrace,
+like the shadows of giants. Involuntarily, we dropped our voices. It
+would have seemed almost like profanity to speak aloud while the first
+influence of that scene was upon us.
+
+Going on presently towards the verge of the terrace, we came upon an
+artist who, with his camp-stool under his arm, and his portfolio at his
+feet, was, like ourselves, taking a last look at the sunset before going
+away. As we approached, he turned and recognised us. It was Herr Franz
+Müller, the story-telling student of the _Chicards_ club.
+
+"Good-afternoon, gentlemen," said he, lifting his red cap, and letting
+it fall back again a little on one side. "We do not see many such
+sunsets in the course of the summer."
+
+"Indeed, no," replied Dalrymple; "and ere long the autumn tints will be
+creeping over the landscape, and the whole scene will assume a different
+character. Have you been sketching in the forest?"
+
+"No--I have been making a study of the chateau and terrace from this
+point, with the landscape beyond. It is for an historical subject which
+I have laid out for my winter's work."
+
+And with this, he good-naturedly opened his folio and took out the
+sketch, which was a tolerably large one, and represented the scene under
+much the same conditions of light as we now saw it.
+
+"I shall have a group of figures here," he said, pointing to a spot on
+the terrace, "and a more distant one there; with a sprinkling of dogs
+and, perhaps, a head or two at an open window of the chateau. I shall
+also add a flag flying on the turret, yonder."
+
+"A scene, I suppose, from the life of Louis the Thirteenth," I
+suggested.
+
+"No--I mean it for the exiled court of James the Second," replied he.
+"And I shall bring in the King, and Mary of Modena, and the Prince their
+son, who was afterwards the Pretender."
+
+"It is a good subject," said Dalrymple. "You will of course find
+excellent portraits of all these people at Versailles; and a lively
+description of their court, mode of life, and so forth, if my memory
+serves me correctly, in the tales of Anthony, Count Hamilton. But with
+all this, I dare say, you are better acquainted than I."
+
+"_Parbleu!_ not I," said the student, shouldering his camp-stool as if
+it were a musket, and slinging his portfolio by a strap across his back;
+"therefore, I am all the more obliged to you for the information. My
+reading is neither very extensive nor very useful; and as for my
+library, I could pack it all into a hat-case any day, and find room for
+a few other trifles at the same time. Here is the author I chiefly
+study. He is my constant companion, and, like myself, looks somewhat the
+worse for wear."
+
+Saying which, he produced from one of his pockets a little, greasy,
+dog-eared volume of Beranger, about the size of a small snuff-box, and
+began singing aloud, to a very cheerful air, a song of which a certain
+faithless Mademoiselle Lisette was the heroine, and of which the refrain
+was always:--
+
+     "_Lisette! ma Lisette,
+     Tu m'as trompé toujours;
+     Je veux, Lisette,
+     Boire à nos amours_."
+
+To this accompaniment we walked back through the gardens to the railway
+station, where, being a quarter of an hour too soon, our companion
+amused himself by "chaffing," questioning, contradicting, and otherwise
+ingeniously tormenting the check-takers and porters of the
+establishment. One pompous official, in particular, became so helplessly
+indignant that he retired into a little office overlooking the platform,
+and was heard to swear fluently, all by himself, for several minutes.
+The time having expired and the doors being opened, we passed out with
+the rest of the home-going Parisians, and were about to take our places,
+when Müller, climbing like a cat to the roof-seats on the top of the
+second-class carriages, beckoned us to follow.
+
+"Who would be shut up with ten fat people and a baby, when fresh air can
+be breathed, and tobacco smoked, for precisely the same fare?" asked he.
+"You don't mean to say that you came down to St. Germains in one of the
+dens below?"
+
+"Yes, we did," I replied; "but we had it to ourselves."
+
+"So much the worse. Man is a gregarious animal, and woman also--which
+proves Zimmerman to have been neither, and accounts for the brotherhood
+of _Les Chicards_. Would you like to see how that old gentleman looks
+when he is angry?"
+
+"Which? The one in the opposite corner?"
+
+"The same."
+
+"Well, that depends on circumstances. Why do you ask?"
+
+"Because I'll engage to satisfy your curiosity in less than ten
+minutes."
+
+"Oh, no, don't affront him," said I. "We shall only have a scene."
+
+"I won't affront him. I promise not to utter a syllable, either
+offensive or defensive."
+
+"Leave him alone, then, poor devil!"
+
+"Nonsense! If he chooses to be annoyed, that's his business, and not
+mine. Now, you'll see."
+
+And Müller, alert for mischief, stared fixedly at the old gentleman in
+the opposite corner for some minutes--then sighed--roused himself as if
+from a profound reverie--seized his portfolio--took out a pencil and
+sketch-book--mended the pencil with an elaborate show of fastidiousness
+and deliberation--stared again--drew a deep breath--turned somewhat
+aside, as if anxious to conceal his object, and began sketching rapidly.
+Now and then he paused; stole a furtive glance over his shoulder; bit
+his lip; rubbed out; corrected; glanced again; and then went on rapidly
+as before.
+
+In the meanwhile the old gentleman, who was somewhat red and irascible,
+began to get seriously uncomfortable. He frowned, fidgeted, coughed,
+buttoned and unbuttoned his coat, and jealously watched every proceeding
+of his tormentor. A general smile dawned upon the faces of the rest of
+the travellers. The priest over the way pinched his lips together, and
+looked down demurely. The two girls, next to the priest, tittered behind
+their handkerchiefs. The young man with the blue cravat sucked the top
+of his cane, and winked openly at his companions, both of whom were
+cracking nuts, and flinging the shells down the embankment. Presently
+Müller threw his head back, held the drawing off, still studiously
+keeping the back of it towards the rest of the passengers; looked at it
+with half-closed eyes; stole another exceedingly cautious glance at his
+victim; and then, affecting for the first time to find himself observed,
+made a vast show of pretending to sketch the country through which we
+were passing.
+
+The old gentleman could stand it no longer.
+
+"Monsieur," said he, angrily. "Monsieur, I will thank you not to take my
+portrait. I object to it. Monsieur."
+
+"Charming distance," said Müller, addressing himself to me "Wants
+interest, however, in the foreground. That's a picturesque tree yonder,
+is it not?"
+
+The old gentleman struck his umbrella sharply on the floor.
+
+"It's of no use, Monsieur," he exclaimed, getting more red and excited.
+"You are taking my portrait, and I object to it. I know you are taking
+my portrait."
+
+Müller looked up dreamily.
+
+"I beg your pardon, Monsieur," said he. "Did you speak?'
+
+"Yes, Monsieur. I did speak. I repeat that you shall not take my
+portrait."
+
+"Your portrait, Monsieur?"
+
+"Yes, my portrait!"
+
+"But, Monsieur," remonstrated the artist, with an air of mingled candor
+and surprise, "I never dreamed of taking your portrait!"
+
+"_Sacre non_!" shouted the old gentleman, with another rap of the
+umbrella. "I saw you do it! Everybody saw you do It!"
+
+"Nay, if Monsieur will but do me the honor to believe that I was simply
+sketching from nature, as the train...."
+
+"An impudent subterfuge, sir!" interrupted the old gentleman. "An
+impudent subterfuge, and nothing less!"
+
+Müller drew himself up with immense dignity.
+
+"Monsieur," he said, haughtily, "that is an expression which I must
+request you to retract. I have already assured you, on the word of a
+gentleman...."
+
+"A gentleman, indeed! A pretty gentleman! He takes my portrait, and...."
+
+"I have not taken your portrait, Monsieur."
+
+"Good heavens!" cried the old gentleman, looking round, "was ever such
+assurance! Did not every one present see him in the act? I appeal to
+every one--to you, Monsieur--to you, Mesdames,--to you, reverend
+father,--did you not all see this person taking my portrait?"
+
+"Nay, then, if it must come to this," said Müller, "let the sketch be
+evidence, and let these ladies and gentlemen decide whether it is really
+the portrait of Monsieur--and if they think it like?"
+
+Saying which, he held up the book, and displayed a head, sketched, it is
+true, with admirable spirit and cleverness, but--the head of an ass,
+with a thistle in its mouth!
+
+A simultaneous explosion of mirth followed. Even the priest laughed till
+the tears ran down his cheeks, and Dalrymple, heavy-hearted as he was,
+could not help joining in the general shout. As for the old gentleman,
+the victim of this elaborate practical joke, he glared at us all round,
+swore that it was a premeditated insult from beginning to end, and,
+swelling with suppressed rage, flung himself back into his corner, and
+looked resolutely in the opposite direction.
+
+By this time we were half-way to Paris, and the student, satisfied with
+his success, packed up his folio, brought out a great meerschaum with a
+snaky tube, and smoked like a factory-chimney.
+
+When we alighted, it was nearly five o'clock.
+
+"What shall we do next?" said Dalrymple, pulling drearily at his
+moustache. "I am so deuced dull to-day that I am ashamed to ask anybody
+to do me the charity to dine with me--especially a _bon garçon_ like
+Herr Müller."
+
+"Don't be ashamed," said the student, laughingly, "I would dine with
+Pluto himself, if the dishes were good and my appetite as sharp
+as to-day."
+
+"_Allons_, then! Where shall we go; to the _Trois Frères_, or the
+_Moulin Rouge_, or the _Maison Dorée_?"
+
+"The _Trois Frères_" said Müller, with the air of one who deliberates on
+the fate of nations, "has the disadvantage of being situated in the
+Palais Royal, where the band still continues to play at half-past five
+every afternoon. Now, music should come on with the sweets and the
+champagne. It is not appropriate with soup or fish, and it distracts
+one's attention if injudiciously administered with the made dishes,"
+
+"True. Then shall we try the _Moulin Rouge_?"
+
+Müller shook his head.
+
+"At the _Moulin Rouge_" said he, gravely, "one can breakfast well; but
+their dinners are stereotyped. For the last ten years they have not
+added a new dish to their _carte_; and the discovery of a new dish, says
+Brillat Savarin, is of more importance to the human race than the
+discovery of a new planet. No--I should not vote for the
+_Moulin Rouge_."
+
+"Well, then, Véfours, Véry's, the Café Anglais?"
+
+"Véfours is traditional; the Café Anglais is infested with English; and
+at Véry's, which is otherwise a meritorious establishment, one's
+digestion is disturbed by the sight of omnivorous provincials, who drink
+champagne with the _rôti_, and eat melon at dessert."
+
+Dalrymple laughed outright.
+
+"At this rate," said he, "we shall get no dinner at all! What is to
+become of us, if neither Véry's, nor the _Trois Frères_, nor the _Moulin
+Rouge_, nor the _Maison Dorée_...."
+
+"_Halte-là!"_ interrupted the student, theatrically; "for by my halidom,
+sirs, I said not a syllable in disparagement of the house yelept Dorée!
+Is it not there that we eat of the crab of Bordeaux, succulent and
+roseate? Is it not there that we drink of Veuve Cliquot the costly, and
+of that Johannisberger, to which all other hocks are vinegar and water?
+Never let it be said that Franz Müller, being of sound mind and body,
+did less than justice to the reputation of the _Maison Dorée_."
+
+"To the _Maison Dorée_, then," said Dalrymple, "with what speed and
+appetite we may! By Jove! Herr Franz, you are a _connoisseur_ in the
+matter of dining."
+
+"A man who for twenty-nine days out of every thirty pays his sixty-five
+centimes for two dishes at a student's Restaurant in the Quartier Latin,
+knows better than most people where to go for a good dinner when he has
+the chance," said Müller, philosophically. "The ragoûts of the
+Temple--the _arlequins_ of the _Cité_--the fried fish of the Odéon
+arcades--the unknown hashes of the _guingettes_, and the 'funeral baked
+meats' of the Palais Royal, are all familiar to my pocket and my palate.
+I do not scruple to confess that in cases of desperate emergency, I have
+even availed myself of the advantages of _Le hasard_."
+
+"_Le hasard_." said I. "What is that?"
+
+"_Le hasard de la fourchette_," replied the student, "is the resort of
+the vagabond, the _gamin_, and the _chiffonier_. It lies down by the
+river-side, near the Halles, and consists of nothing but a shed, a fire,
+and a caldron. In this caldron a seething sea of oleaginous liquid
+conceals an infinite variety of animal and vegetable substances. The
+arrangements of the establishment are beautifully simple. The votary
+pays his five centimes and is armed by the presiding genius of the place
+with a huge two-pronged iron fork. This fork he plunges in once;--he may
+get a calf's foot, or a potato, or a sheep's head, or a carrot, or a
+cabbage, or nothing, as fate and the fork direct. All men are gamblers
+in some way or another, and _Le hasard_ is a game of gastronomic chance.
+But from the ridiculous to the sublime, it is but a step--and while
+talking of _Le hasard_ behold, we have arrived at the _Maison Dorée_."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX.
+
+A DINNER AT THE MAISON DORÉE AND AN EVENING PARTY IN THE QUARTIER LATIN.
+
+The most genial of companions was our new acquaintance, Franz Müller,
+the art-student. Light-hearted, buoyant, unassuming, he gave his animal
+spirits full play, and was the life of our little dinner. He had more
+natural gayety than generally belongs to the German character, and his
+good-temper was inexhaustible. He enjoyed everything; he made the best
+of everything; he saw food for laughter in everything. He was always
+amused, and therefore was always amusing. Above all, there was a
+spontaneity in his mirth which acted upon others as a perpetual
+stimulant. He was in short, what the French call a _bon garçon_, and the
+English a capital fellow; easy without assurance, comic without
+vulgarity, and, as Sydney Smith wittily hath it--"a great number of
+other things without a great number of other things."
+
+Upon Dalrymple, who had been all day silent, abstracted, and unlike his
+usual self, this joyous influence acted like a tonic. As entertainer, he
+was bound to exert himself, and the exertion did him good. He threw off
+his melancholy; and with the help, possibly, of somewhat more than his
+usual quantity of wine, entered thoroughly into the passing joyousness
+of the hour. What a _recherché_, luxurious extravagant little dinner it
+was, that evening at the Maison Dorée! We had a charming little room
+overlooking the Boulevard, furnished with as much looking-glass,
+crimson-velvet, gilding, and arabesque painting as could be got together
+within the space of twelve-feet by eight. Our wine came to table in a
+silver cooler that Cellini might have wrought. Our meats were served
+upon porcelain that would have driven Palissy to despair. We had nothing
+that was in season, except game, and everything that was out; which,
+by-the-way, appears to be our modern criterion of excellence with
+respect to a dinner. Finally, we were waited upon by the most imposing
+of waiters--a waiter whose imperturbable gravity was not to be shaken by
+any amount of provocation, and whose neckcloth alone was sufficient to
+qualify him for the church.
+
+How merry we were! How Müller tormented that diplomatic waiter! What
+stories we told! what puns we made! What brilliant things we said, or
+fancied we said, over our Chambertin and Johannisberger! Müller knew
+nothing of the substratum of sadness underlying all that jollity. He
+little thought how heavy Dalrymple's strong heart had been that morning.
+He had no idea that my friend and I were to part on the morrow, for
+months or years, as the case might be--he to carry his unrest hither and
+thither through distant lands; I to remain alone in a strange city,
+pursuing a distasteful study, and toiling onward to a future without
+fascination or hope. But, as the glass seals tell us, "such is life." We
+are all mysteries to one another. The pleasant fellow whom I invite to
+dinner because he amuses me, carries a scar on his soul which it would
+frighten me to see; and he in turn, when he praises my claret, little
+dreams of the carking care that poisons it upon my palate, and robs it
+of all its aroma. Perhaps the laughter-loving painter himself had his
+own little tragedy locked up in some secret corner of the heart that
+seemed to beat so lightly under that braided blouse of Palais Royal cut
+and Quartier Latin fashion! Who could tell? And of what use would it be,
+if it were told? Smiles carry one through the world more agreeably than
+tears, and if the skeleton is only kept decently out of sight in its own
+unsuspected closet, so much the better for you and me, and society
+at large.
+
+Dinner over, and the serious waiter dismissed with the dessert and the
+empty bottles, we sat by the open window for a long time, sipping our
+coffee, smoking our cigars, and watching the busy life of the Boulevard
+below. There the shops were all alight and the passers-by more numerous
+than by day. Carriages were dashing along, full of opera-goers and
+ball-room beauties. On the pavement just under our window were seated
+the usual crowd of Boulevard idlers, sipping their _al fresco_ absinthe,
+and _grog-au-vin._ In the very next room, divided from us by only a
+slender partition, was a noisy party of young men and girls. We could
+hear their bursts of merriment, the chinking of their glasses as they
+pledged one another, the popping of the champagne corks, and almost the
+very jests that passed from lip to lip. Presently a band came and played
+at the corner of an adjoining street. All was mirth, all was life, all
+was amusement and dissipation both in-doors and out-of-doors, in the
+"care-charming" city of Paris on that pleasant September night; and we,
+of course, were gay and noisy, like our neighbors. Dalrymple and Müller
+could scarcely be called new acquaintances. They had met some few times
+at the _Chicards_, and also, some years before, in Rome. What stories
+they told of artists whom they had known! What fun they made of
+Academic dons and grave professors high in authority! What pictures they
+drew, of life in Rome--in Vienna--in Paris! Though we had no ladies of
+our party and were only three in number, I am not sure that the
+merry-makers in the next room laughed any louder or oftener than we!
+
+At length the clock on the mantelpiece warned us that it was already
+half-past nine, and that we had been three hours at dinner. It was
+clearly time to vary the evening's amusement in some way or other, and
+the only question was what next to do? Should we go to a billiard-room?
+Or to the Salle Valentinois? Or to some of the cheap theatres on the
+Boulevard du Temple? Or to the Tableaux Vivants? Or the Café des
+Aveugles? Or take a drive round by the Champs Elysées in an open fly?
+
+At length Müller remembered that some fellow-students were giving a
+party that evening, and offered to introduce us.
+
+"It is up five pairs of stairs, in the Quartier Latin," said he; "but
+thoroughly jolly--all students and grisettes. They'll be delighted
+to see us."
+
+This admirable proposition was no sooner made than acted upon; so we
+started immediately, and Dalrymple, who seemed to be well acquainted
+with the usages of student-life, proposed that we should take with us a
+store of sweetmeats for the ladies.
+
+"There subsists," observed he, "a mysterious elective affinity between
+the grisette and the chocolate bon-bon. He who can skilfully exhibit the
+latter, is almost certain to win the heart of the former. Where the
+chocolate fails, however, the _marron glacé_ is an infallible specific.
+I recommend that we lay in a liberal supply of both weapons."
+
+"Carried by acclamation," said Müller. "We can buy them on our way, in
+the Rue Vivienne. A capital shop; but one that I never patronize--they
+give no credit."
+
+Chatting thus, and laughing, we made our way across the Boulevard and
+through a net-work of by-streets into the Rue Vivienne, where we laid
+siege to a great bon-bon shop--a gigantic depot for dyspepsia at so
+much per kilogramme--and there filled our pockets with sweets of every
+imaginable flavor and color. This done, a cab conveyed us in something
+less than ten minutes across the Pont Neuf to the Quartier Latin.
+
+Müller's friends were three in number, and all students--one of art, one
+of law, and one of medicine. They lodged at the top of a dingy house
+near the Odéon, and being very great friends and very near neighbors
+were giving this entertainment conjointly. Their names were Gustave,
+Jules, and Adrien. Adrien was the artist, and lived in the garret, just
+over the heads of Gustave and Jules, which made it very convenient for a
+party, and placed a _suite_ of rooms at the disposal of their visitors.
+
+Long before we had achieved the five pairs of stairs, we heard the sound
+of voices and the scraping of a violin, and on the fifth landing were
+received by a pretty young lady in a coquettish little cap, whom Müller
+familiarly addressed as Annette, and who piloted us into a very small
+bed-room which was already full of hats and coats, bonnets, shawls, and
+umbrellas. Having added our own paletots and beavers to the general
+stock, and having each received a little bit of pasteboard in exchange
+for the same, we were shown into the ball-room by Mademoiselle Annette,
+who appeared to fill the position of hostess, usher, and general
+superintendent.
+
+It was a good-sized room, somewhat low in the ceiling, and brilliantly
+lighted with lots of tallow candles in bottles. The furniture had all
+been cleared out for the dancers, except a row of benches round the
+walls, and a chest of draws in a recess between the windows which served
+as a raised platform for the orchestra. The said orchestra consisted of
+a violin and accordion, both played by amateurs, with an occasional
+_obligato_ on the common comb. As for the guests, they were, as Müller
+had already told us, all students and grisettes--the former wearing
+every strange variety of beard and blouse; the latter in pretty
+light-colored muslins and bewitching little caps, with the exception of
+two who wore flowers in their hair, and belonged to the opera ballet.
+They were in the midst of a tremendous galop when we arrived; so we
+stood at the door and looked on, and Dalrymple flirted with Mademoiselle
+Annette. As soon as the galop was over, two of our hosts came forward to
+welcome us.
+
+"The Duke of Dalrymple and the Marquis of Arbuthnot--Messieurs Jules
+Charpentier and Gustave Dubois," said Müller, with the most _dégagé_ air
+in the world.
+
+Monsieur Jules, a tall young man with an enormous false nose of the
+regular carnival pattern, and Monsieur Gustave, who was short and stout,
+with a visible high-water mark round his throat and wrists, and curious
+leather mosaics in his boots, received us very cordially, and did not
+appear to be in the least surprised at the magnificence of the
+introduction. On the contrary, they shook hands with us; apologized for
+the absence of Adrien, who was preparing the supper upstairs; and
+offered to find us partners for the next valse. Dalrymple immediately
+proposed for the hand of Mademoiselle Annette. Müller, declining
+adventitious aid, wandered among the ladies, making himself universally
+agreeable and trusting for a partner to his own unassisted efforts. For
+myself, I was indebted to Monsieur Gustave for an introduction to a very
+charming young lady whose name was Josephine, and with whom I fell over
+head and ears in love without a moment's warning.
+
+She was somewhat under the middle height, slender, supple, rosy-lipped,
+and coquettish to distraction. Her pretty mouth dimpled round with
+smiles at every word it uttered. Her very eyes laughed. Her hair, which
+was more adorned than concealed by a tiny muslin cap that clung by some
+unseen agency to the back of her head, was of a soft, warm, wavy brown,
+with a woof of gold threading it here and there. Her voice was perhaps a
+little loud; her conversation rather childish; her accent such as would
+scarcely have passed current in the Faubourg St. Germain--but what of
+that? One would be worse than foolish to expect style and cultivation in
+a grisette; and had I not had enough to disgust me with both in Madame
+de Marignan? What more charming, after all, than youth, beauty, and
+lightheartedness? Were Noel and Chapsal of any importance to a mouth
+that could not speak without such a smile as Hebe might have envied?
+
+I was, at all events, in no mood to take exception to these little
+defects. I am not sure that I did not even regard them in the light of
+additional attractions. That which in another I should have called
+_bête_, I set down to the score of _naïveté_ in Mademoiselle
+Josephine. One is not diffident at twenty--by the way, I was now
+twenty-one--especially after dining at the Maison Dorée.
+
+Mademoiselle Josephine was frankness itself. Before I had enjoyed the
+pleasure of her acquaintance for ten minutes, she told me she was an
+artificial florist; that her _patronne_ lived in the Rue Ménilmontant;
+that she went to her work every morning at nine, and left it every
+evening at eight; that she lodged _sous les toits_ at No. 70, Rue
+Aubry-le-Boucher; that her relations lived at Juvisy; and that she went
+to see them now and then on Sundays, when the weather and her funds
+permitted.
+
+"Is the country pretty at Juvisy, Mademoiselle?" I asked, by way of
+keeping up the conversation.
+
+"Oh, M'sieur, it is a real paradise. There are trees and fields, and
+there is the Seine close by, and a château, and a park, and a church on
+a hill, ... _ma foi!_ there is nothing in Paris half so pretty; not even
+the Jardin des Plantes!"
+
+"And have you been there lately?"
+
+"Not for eight weeks, at the very least, M'sieur. But then it costs
+three francs and a half for the return ticket, and since I quarrelled
+with Emile...."
+
+"Emile!" said I, quickly. "Who is he?"
+
+"He is a picture-frame maker, M'sieur, and works for a great dealer in
+the Rue du Faubourg Montmartre. He was my sweetheart, and he took me out
+somewhere every Sunday, till we quarrelled."
+
+"And what did you quarrel about, Mademoiselle?"
+
+My pretty partner laughed and tossed her head.
+
+"Eh, _mon Dieu_! he was jealous."
+
+"Jealous of whom?"
+
+"Of a gentleman--an artist--who wanted to paint me in one of his
+pictures. Emile did not like me to go to his _atelier_ so often; and the
+gentleman gave me a shawl (such a pretty shawl!) and a canary in a
+lovely green and gold cage; and...."
+
+"And Emile objected ?"
+
+"Yes, M'sieur."
+
+"How very unreasonable!"
+
+"That's just what I said, M'sieur."
+
+"And have you never seen him since!"
+
+"Oh, yes--he keeps company now with my cousin Cecile, and she humors him
+in everything,"
+
+"And the artist--what of him, Mademoiselle?"
+
+"Oh, I sat to him every day, till his picture was finished. _Il était
+bien gentil_. He took me to the theatre several times, and once to a
+fête at Versailles; but that was after Emile and I had broken it off."
+
+"Did you find it tiresome, sitting as a model?"
+
+"_Mais, comme ci, et comme ça_! It was a beautiful dress, and became me
+wonderfully. To be sure, it was rather cold!"
+
+"May I ask what character you were supposed to represent, Mademoiselle?"
+
+"He said it was Phryne. I have no idea who she was; but I think she must
+have found it very uncomfortable if she always wore sandals, and went
+without stockings."
+
+I looked down at her little foot, and thought how pretty it must have
+looked in the Greek sandal. I pictured her to myself in the graceful
+Greek robe, with a chalice in her hand and her temples crowned with
+flowers. What a delicious Phryne! And what a happy fellow Praxiteles
+must have been!
+
+"It was a privilege, Mademoiselle, to be allowed to see you in so
+charming a costume," I said, pressing her hand tenderly. "I envy that
+artist from the bottom of my heart."
+
+Mademoiselle Josephine smiled, and returned the pressure.
+
+"One might borrow it," said she, "for the Bal de l'Opéra."
+
+"Ah, Mademoiselle, if I dared only aspire to the honor of conducting
+you!"
+
+"_Dame_! it is nearly four months to come!"
+
+"True, but in the meantime, Mademoiselle----"
+
+"In the meantime," said the fair Josephine, anticipating my hopes with
+all the unembarrassed straightforwardness imaginable, "I shall be
+delighted to improve M'sieur's acquaintance."
+
+"Mademoiselle, you make me happy!"
+
+"Besides, M'sieur is an Englishman, and I like the English so much!"
+
+"I am delighted to hear it, Mademoiselle. I hope I shall never give you
+cause to alter your opinion."
+
+"Last galop before supper!" shouted Monsieur Jules through, a brass
+speaking-trumpet, in order to make use of which he was obliged to hold
+up his nose with one hand. "Gentlemen, choose your partners. All couples
+to dance till they drop!"
+
+There were a dozen up immediately, amongst whom Dalrymple and
+Mademoiselle Annette, and Müller with one of the ballet ladies, were the
+first to start. As for Josephine, she proved to be a damsel of
+forty-galop power. She never wanted to rest, and she never cared to
+leave off. She did not even look warm when it was over. I wonder to this
+day how it was that I did not die on the spot.
+
+When the galop was ended, we all went upstairs to Monsieur Adrien's
+garret, where Monsieur Adrien, who had red hair and wore glasses,
+received us in person, and made us welcome. Here we found the supper
+elegantly laid out on two doors which had been taken off their hinges
+for the purpose; but which, being supported from beneath on divers boxes
+and chairs of unequal heights, presented a painfully sloping surface,
+thereby causing the jellies to look like leaning towers of Pisa, and the
+spongecake (which was already professedly tipsy) to assume an air so
+unbecomingly convivial that it might almost have been called drunk.
+
+Nobody thought of sitting down, and, if they did, there were no means of
+doing so; for Monsieur Adrien's garret was none of the largest, and, as
+in a small villa residence we sometimes see the whole house sacrificed
+to a winding staircase, so in this instance had the whole room been
+sacrificed to the splendor of the supper. For the inconvenience of
+standing, we were compensated, however, by the abundance and excellence
+of the fare. There were cold chickens, meat-pies, dishes of sliced ham,
+pyramids of little Bologna sausages, huge rolls of bread a yard in
+length, lobster salad, and cold punch in abundance.
+
+The flirtations at supper were tremendous. In a bachelor establishment
+one cannot expect to find every convenience, and on this occasion the
+prevailing deficiencies were among the plates and glasses; so those who
+had been partners in the dance now became partners in other matters,
+eating off the same plate and drinking out of the same tumbler; but this
+only made it so much the merrier. By and by somebody volunteered a song,
+and somebody else made a speech, and then we went down again to the
+ball-room, and dancing recommenced.
+
+The laughter now became louder, and the legs of the guests more vigorous
+than ever. The orchestra, too, received an addition to its strength in
+the person of a gentleman who, having drunk more cold punch than was
+quite consistent with the preservation of his equilibrium, was still
+sober enough to oblige us with a spirited accompaniment on the shovel
+and tongs, which, with the violin and accordion, and the comb _obligato_
+before mentioned, produced a startling effect, and reminded one of
+Turkish marches, Pantomime overtures, and the like barbaric music.
+
+In the midst of the first polka, however, we were interrupted by a
+succession of furious double knocks on the floor beneath our feet. We
+stopped by involuntary consent--dancers, musicians, and all.
+
+"It's our neighbor on the story below," said Monsieur Jules. "He objects
+to the dancing."
+
+"Then we'll dance a little heavier, to teach him better taste," said a
+student, who had so little hair on his head and so much on his chin,
+that he looked as if his face had been turned upside down. "What is the
+name of the ridiculous monster?"
+
+"Monsieur Bobinet."
+
+"Ladies and gentlemen, let us dance for the edification of Monsieur
+Bobinet! Orchestra, strike up, in honor of Monsieur Bobinet! One, two,
+three, and away!"
+
+Hereupon we uttered a general hurrah, and dashed off again, like a herd
+of young elephants. The knocking ceased, and we thought that Monsieur
+Bobinet had resigned himself to his fate, when, just as the polka ended
+and the dancers were promenading noisily round and round the room, the
+bombardment began afresh; and this time against the very door of the
+ball-room.
+
+"_Par exemple_!" cries Monsieur Jules. "The enemy dares to attack us in
+our own lines!"
+
+"Bolt the door, and let him knock till he's tired," suggested one.
+
+"Open it suddenly, and deluge him with water!" cried another.
+
+"Tar and feather him!" proposed a third.
+
+In the meantime, Monsieur Bobinet, happily ignorant of these agreeable
+schemes for his reception, continued to thunder away upon the outer
+panels, accompanying the raps with occasional loud coughs, and hems, and
+stampings of the feet.
+
+"Hush! do nothing violent," cried Müller, scenting a practical joke.
+"Let us invite him in, and make fun of him. It will be ever so much
+more amusing!"
+
+And with this he drove the rest somewhat back and threw open the door,
+upon the outer threshold of which, with a stick in one hand and a
+bedroom candle in the other, and a flowered dressing-gown tied round his
+ample waist by a cord and tassels, stood Monsieur Bobinet.
+
+Müller received him with a profound bow, and said:--
+
+"Monsieur Bobinet, I believe?"
+
+Monsieur Bobinet, who was very bald, very cross, and very stout, cast
+an irritable glance into the room, but, seeing so many people, drew back
+and said:--
+
+"Yes, that is my name, Monsieur. I lodge on the fourth floor...."
+
+"But pray walk in, Monsieur Bobinet," said Müller, opening the door
+still wider and bowing still more profoundly.
+
+"Monsieur," returned the fourth-floor lodger, "I--I only come to
+complain...."
+
+"Whatever the occasion of this honor, Monsieur," pursued the student,
+with increasing politeness, "we cannot suffer you to remain on the
+landing. Pray do us the favor to walk in."
+
+"Oh, walk in--pray walk in, Monsieur Bobinet," echoed Jules, Gustave,
+and Adrien, all together.
+
+The fourth-floor lodger hesitated; took a step forward; thought,
+perhaps, that, since we were all so polite, he would do his best to
+conciliate us; and, glancing down nervously at his dressing-gown and
+slippers, said:--
+
+"Really, gentlemen, I should have much pleasure, but I am not
+prepared...."
+
+"Don't mention it, Monsieur Bobinet," said Müller. "We are delighted to
+receive you. Allow me to disembarrass you of your candle."
+
+"And permit me," said Jules, "to relieve you of your stick."
+
+"Pray, Monsieur Bobinet, do you never dance the polka?" asked Gustave.
+
+"Bring Monsieur Bobinet a glass of cold punch," said Adrien.
+
+"And a plate of lobster salad," added the bearded student.
+
+Monsieur Bobinet, finding the door already closed behind him, looked
+round nervously; but encountering only polite and smiling faces,
+endeavored to seem at his ease, and to put a good face upon the matter.
+
+"Indeed, gentlemen, I must beg you to excuse me," said he. "I never
+drink at night, and I never eat suppers. I only came to request...."
+
+"Nay, Monsieur Bobinet, we cannot suffer you to leave us without taking
+a glass of cold punch," pursued Müller.
+
+"Upon my word," began the lodger, "I dare not...."
+
+"A glass of white wine, then?"
+
+"Or a cup of coffee?"
+
+"Or some home-made lemonade?"
+
+Monsieur Bobinet cast a look of helpless longing towards the door.
+
+"If you really insist, gentlemen," said he, "I will take a cup of
+coffee; but indeed...."
+
+"A cup of coffee for Monsieur Bobinet!" shouted Müller.
+
+"A large cup of coffee for Monsieur Bobinet!" repeated Jules.
+
+"A strong cup of coffee for Monsieur Bobinet!" cried Gustave, following
+up the lead of the other two.
+
+The fourth-floor lodger frowned and colored up, beginning to be
+suspicious of mischief. Seeing this, Müller hastened to apologize.
+
+"You must pardon us, Monsieur Bobinet," he said with the most winning
+amiability, "if we are all in unusually high spirits to-night. You are
+not aware, perhaps, that our friend Monsieur Jules Charpentier was
+married this morning, and that we are here in celebration of that happy
+event. Allow me to introduce you to the bride."
+
+And turning to one of the ballet ladies, he led her forward with
+exceeding gravity, and presented her to Monsieur Bobinet as Madame
+Charpentier.
+
+The fourth-floor lodger bowed, and went through the usual
+congratulations. In the meantime, some of the others had prepared a mock
+sofa by means of two chairs set somewhat wide apart, with a shawl thrown
+over the whole to conceal the space between. Upon one of these chairs
+sat a certain young lady named Louise, and upon the other Mam'selle
+Josephine. As soon as it was ready, Muller, who had been only waiting
+for it, affected to observe for the first time that Monsieur Bobinet was
+still standing.
+
+"_Mon Dieu_!" he exclaimed, "has no one offered our visitor a chair?
+Monsieur Bobinet, I beg a thousand pardons. Pray do us the favor to be
+seated. Your coffee will be here immediately, and these ladies on the
+sofa will be delighted to make room for you."
+
+"Oh yes, pray be seated, Monsieur Bobinet," cried the two girls. "We
+shall be charmed to make room for Monsieur Bobinet!"
+
+More than ever confused and uncomfortable, poor Monsieur Bobinet bowed;
+sat down upon the treacherous space between the two chairs; went through
+immediately; and presented the soles of his slippers to the company in
+the least picturesque manner imaginable. This involuntary performance
+was greeted with a shout of wild delight.
+
+"Bravo, Monsieur Bobinet!"
+
+"_Vive_ Monsieur Bobinet!"
+
+"Three cheers for Monsieur Bobinet!"
+
+Scarlet with rage, the fourth-floor lodger sprang to his feet and made a
+rush to the door; but he was hemmed in immediately. In vain he stormed;
+in vain he swore. We joined hands; we called for music; we danced round
+him; we sang; and at last, having fairly bumped and thumped and hustled
+him till we were tired, pushed him out on the landing, and left him
+to his fate.
+
+After this interlude, the mirth grew fast and furious. _Valse_ succeeded
+_valse_, and galop followed galop, till the orchestra declared they
+could play no longer, and the gentleman with the shovel and tongs
+collapsed in a corner of the room and went to sleep with his head in the
+coal-scuttle. Then the ballet-ladies were prevailed upon to favor us
+with a _pas de deux_; after which Müller sang a comic song with a
+chorus, in which everybody joined; and then the orchestra was bribed
+with hot brandy-and-water, and dancing commenced again. By this time the
+visitors began to drop away in twos and threes, and even the fair
+Josephine, to whom I had never ceased paying the most devoted attention,
+declared she could not stir another step. As for Dalrymple, he had
+disappeared during supper, without a word of leave-taking to any one.
+
+Matters being at this pass, I looked at my watch, and found that it was
+already half-past six o'clock; so, having bade good-night, or rather
+good-morning, to Messieurs Jules, Gustave, and Adrien, and having, with
+great difficulty, discovered my own coat and hat among the miscellaneous
+collection in the adjoining bed-room, I prepared to escort Mademoiselle
+Josephine to her home.
+
+"Going already?" said Müller, encountering us on the landing, with a
+roll in one hand and a Bologna sausage in the other.
+
+"Already! Why, my dear fellow, it is nearly seven o'clock!"
+
+"_Qu'importe_? Come up to the supper-room and have some breakfast!"
+
+"Not for the world!"
+
+"Well, _chacun à son goût_. I am as hungry as a hunter."
+
+"Can I not take you any part of your way?"
+
+"No, thank you. I am a Quartier Latinist, _pur sang_, and lodge only a
+street or two off. Stay, here is my address. Come and see me--you can't
+think how glad I shall be!"
+
+"Indeed, I will come---and here is my card in exchange. Good-night, Herr
+Müller."
+
+"Good-night, Marquis of Arbuthnot. Mademoiselle Josephine, _au
+plaisir_."
+
+So we shook hands and parted, and I saw my innamorata home to her
+residence at No. 70, Rue Aubry le Boucher, which opened upon the Marché
+des Innocents. She fell asleep upon my shoulder in the cab, and was only
+just sufficiently awake when I left her, to accept all the _marrons
+glacés_ that yet remained in the pockets of my paletot, and to remind me
+that I had promised to take her out next Sunday for a drive in the
+country, and a dinner at the Moulin Rouge.
+
+The fountain in the middle of the Marché was now sparkling in the
+sunshine like a shower of diamonds, and the business of the market was
+already at its height. The shops in the neighboring streets were opening
+fast. The "iron tongue" of St. Eustache was calling the devout to early
+prayer. Fagged as I was, I felt that a walk through the fresh air would
+do me good; so I dismissed the cab, and reached my lodgings just as the
+sleepy _concierge_ had turned out to sweep the hall, and open the
+establishment for the day. When I came down again two hours later,
+after a nap and a bath, I found a _commissionnaire_ waiting for me.
+
+"_Tiens_!" said Madame Bouïsse (Madame Bouïsse was the wife of the
+_concierge_). "_V'la_! here is M'sieur Arbuthnot."
+
+The man touched his cap, and handed me a letter.
+
+"I was told to deliver it into no hands but those of M'sieur himself,"
+said he.
+
+The address was in Dalrymple's writing. I tore the envelope open. It
+contained only a card, on the back of which, scrawled hastily in pencil,
+were the following words:
+
+"To have said good-bye would have made our parting none the lighter. By
+the time you decipher this hieroglyphic I shall be some miles on my way:
+Address Hôtel de Russie, Berlin. Adieu, Damon; God bless you. O.D."
+
+"How long is it since this letter was given to you?" said I, without
+taking my eyes from the card.
+
+The _commissionnaire_ made no reply. I repeated the question, looked up
+impatiently, and found that the man was already gone.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX.
+
+THE CHATEAU DE SAINTE AULAIRE.
+
+     "Mark yon old mansion frowning through the trees,
+     Whose hollow turret wooes the whistling breeze."
+
+My acquaintance with Mademoiselle Josephine progressed rapidly;
+although, to confess the truth, I soon found myself much less deeply in
+love than I had at first supposed. For this disenchantment, fate and
+myself were alone to blame. It was not her fault if I had invested her
+with a thousand imaginary perfections; nor mine if the spell was broken
+as soon as I discovered my mistake.
+
+Too impatient to wait till Sunday, I made my way on Saturday afternoon
+to Rue Aubry-le-Boucher. I persuaded myself that I was bound to call on
+her, in order to conclude our arrangements for the following day. At all
+events, I argued, she might forget the engagement, or believe that I had
+forgotten it. So I went, taking with me a magnificent bouquet, and an
+embroidered satin bag full of _marrons glacés_.
+
+My divinity lived, as she had told me, _sous les toits_--and _sous les
+toits_, up seven flights of very steep and dirty stairs, I found her. It
+was a large attic with a sloping roof, overlooking a bristling expanse
+of chimney-pots, and commanding the twin towers of Notre Dame. There
+were some colored prints of battles and shipwrecks wafered to the walls;
+a couple of flower-pots in the narrow space between the window-ledge and
+the coping outside; a dingy canary in a wire cage; a rival mechanical
+cuckoo in a Dutch clock in the corner; a little bed with striped
+hangings; a rush-bottomed _prie-dieu_ chair in front of a plain black
+crucifix, over which drooped a faded branch of consecrated palm; and
+some few articles of household furniture of the humblest description. In
+all this there was nothing vulgar. Under other circumstances I might,
+perhaps, have even elicited somewhat of grace and poetry from these
+simple materials. But conceive what it was to see them through an
+atmosphere of warm white steam that left an objectionable clamminess on
+the backs of the chairs and caused even the door-handle to burst into a
+tepid perspiration. Conceive what it was to behold my adored one
+standing in the middle of the room, up to her elbows in soap-suds,
+washing out the very dress in which she was to appear on the morrow....
+Good taste defend us! Could anything be more cruelly calculated to
+disturb the tender tenor of a lover's dreams? Fancy what Leander would
+have felt, if, after swimming across the Hellespont, he had surprised
+Hero at the washing-tub! Imagine Romeo's feelings, if he had scaled the
+orchard-walls only to find Juliet helping to hang out the family linen!
+
+The worst of it was that my lovely Josephine was not in the least
+embarrassed. She evidently regarded the washing-tub as a desirable
+piece of furniture, and was not even conscious that the act of "soaping
+in," was an unromantic occupation!
+
+Such was the severity of this first blow that I pleaded an engagement,
+presented my offerings (how dreadfully inappropriate they seemed!), and
+hurried away to a lecture on _materia medica_ at the _École Pratique_;
+that being a good, congenial, dismal entertainment for the evening!
+
+Sunday came with the sunrise, and at midday, true as the clock of St.
+Eustache, I knocked once more at the door of the _mansarde_ where my
+Josephine dwelt. This time, my visit being anticipated, I found her
+dressed to receive me. She looked more fresh and charming than ever; and
+the lilac muslin which I had seen in the washing-tub some eighteen or
+twenty hours before, became her to perfection. So did her pretty green
+shawl, pinned closely at the throat and worn as only a French-woman
+would have known how to wear it. So did the white camellia and the
+moss-rose buds which she had taken out of my bouquet, and fastened at
+her waist.
+
+What I was not prepared for, however, was her cap. I had forgotten that
+your Parisian grisette[1] would no more dream of wearing a bonnet than
+of crowning her head with feathers and adorning her countenance with
+war-paint. It had totally escaped me that I, a bashful Englishman of
+twenty-one, nervously sensitive to ridicule and gifted by nature with
+but little of the spirit of social defiance, must in broad daylight make
+my appearance in the streets of Paris, accompanied by a bonnetless
+grisette! What should I do, if I met Dr. Chéron? or Madame de
+Courcelles? or, worse than all, Madame de Marignan? My obvious resource
+was to take her in whatever direction we should be least likely to meet
+any of my acquaintances. Where, oh fate! might that obscurity be found
+which had suddenly become the dearest object of my desires?
+
+[1] The grisette of twenty years ago, _bien entendu_. I am writing, be
+it remembered, of "The days of my youth."
+
+"_Eh bien_, Monsieur Basil," said Josephine, when my first compliments
+had been paid. "I am quite ready. Where are we going?"
+
+"We shall dine, _mon cher ange_," said I, absently, "at--let me
+see--at...."
+
+"At the Moulin Rouge," interrupted she. "But that is six hours to come.
+In the meantime--"
+
+"In the meantime? Ay, in the meantime...what a delightful day for the
+time of year!"
+
+"Shall it be Versailles?" suggested Josephine.
+
+"Heaven forbid!"
+
+Josephine opened her large eyes.
+
+"_Mon Dieu!_" said she. "What is there so very dreadful in Versailles?"
+
+I made no reply. I was passing all the suburbs in review before my
+mind's eye,--Bellevue, Enghien, Fontenay-aux-Roses, St. Germains,
+Sceaux; even Fontainebleau and Compiègne.
+
+The grisette pouted, and glanced at the clock.
+
+"If Monsieur is as slow to start as he is to answer," said she, "we
+shall not get beyond the barriers to-day."
+
+At this moment, I remembered to have heard of Montlhéry as a place where
+there was a forest and a feudal ruin; also, which was more to the
+purpose, as lying at least six-and-twenty miles south of Paris.
+
+"My dear Mademoiselle Josephine," I said, "forgive me. I have planned an
+excursion which I am sure will please you infinitely better than a mere
+common-place trip to Versailles. Versailles, on Sunday, is vulgar. You
+have heard, of course, of Montlhéry--one of the most interesting places
+near Paris."
+
+"I have read a romance called _The Tower of Montlhéry"_ said Josephine.
+
+"And that tower--that historical and interesting tower--is still
+standing! How delightful to wander among the ruins--to recall the
+stirring events which caused it to be besieged in the reign of--of
+either Louis the Eleventh, or Louis the Fourteenth; I don't remember
+which, and it doesn't signify--to explore the picturesque village, and
+ramble through the adjoining woods of St. Geneviève--to visit..."
+
+"I wonder if we shall find any donkeys to ride," interrupted Josephine,
+upon whom my eloquence was taking the desired effect.
+
+"Donkeys!" I exclaimed, drawing, I am ashamed to say, upon my
+imagination. "Of course--hundreds of them!"
+
+"_Ah, ça_! Then the sooner we go the better. Stay, I must just lock my
+door, and leave word with my neighbor on the next floor that I am gone
+out for the day,"
+
+So she locked the door and left the message, and we started. I was
+fortunate enough to find a close cab at the corner of the _marché_--she
+would have preferred an open one, but I overruled that objection on the
+score of time--and before very long we were seated in the cushioned
+fauteuils of a first-class compartment on the Orleans Railway, and
+speeding away towards Montlhéry.
+
+It was with no trifling sense of relief that I found the place really
+picturesque, when we arrived. We had, it is true, to put up with a
+comfortless drive of three or four miles in a primitive, jolting, yellow
+omnibus, which crawled at stated hours of the day between the town and
+the station; but that was a minor evil, and we made the best of it.
+First of all, we strolled through the village--the clean, white, sunny
+village, where the people were sitting outside their doors playing at
+dominoes, and the cocks and hens were walking about like privileged
+inhabitants of the market-place. Then we had luncheon at the _auberge_
+of the "Lion d'Or." Then we looked in at the little church (still
+smelling of incense from the last service) with its curious old
+altar-piece and monumental brasses. Then we peeped through the iron gate
+of the melancholy _cimetière_, which was full of black crosses and
+wreaths of _immortelles_. Last of all, we went to see the ruin, which
+stood on the summit of a steep and solitary rock in the midst of a vast
+level plain. It proved to be a round keep of gigantic strength and
+height, approached by two courtyards and surrounded by the weed-grown
+and fragmentary traces of an extensive stronghold, nothing of which now
+remained save a few broken walls, three or four embrasured loopholes, an
+ancient well of incalculable depth, and the rusted teeth of a formidable
+portcullis. Here we paused awhile to rest and admire the view; while
+Josephine, pleased as a child on a holiday, flung pebbles into the well,
+ate sugar-plums, and amused herself with my pocket-telescope.
+
+"_Regardez_!" she cried, "there is the dome of the Panthéon. I am sure
+it is the Panthéon--and to the right, far away, I see a town!--little
+white houses, and a steeple. And there goes a steamer on the river--and
+there is the railway and the railway station, and the long road by which
+we came in the omnibus. Oh, how nice it is, Monsieur Basil, to look
+through a telescope!"
+
+"Do me the favor, _ma belle_, to accept it--for my sake," said I,
+thankful to find her so easily entertained. I was lying in a shady angle
+of old wall, puffing away at a cigar, with my hat over my eyes, and the
+soles of my boots levelled at the view. It is difficult to smoke and
+make love at the same time; and I preferred the tobacco.
+
+Josephine was enchanted, and thanked me in a thousand pretty, foolish
+phrases. She declared she saw ever so much farther and clearer with the
+glass, now that it was her own. She looked at me through it, and
+insisted that I should look at her. She picked out all sorts of
+marvellous objects, at all sorts of incredible distances. In short, she
+prattled and chattered till I forgot all about the washing-tub, and
+again began to think her quite charming. Presently we heard wandering
+sounds of music among the trees at the foot of the hill--sounds as of a
+violin and bagpipes; now coming with the wind from the west, now dying
+away to the north, now bursting out afresh more merrily than ever, and
+leading off towards the village.
+
+"_Tiens_! that must be a wedding!" said Josephine, drumming with her
+little feet against the side of the old well on which she was sitting.
+
+"A wedding! what connection subsists, pray, between the bonds of
+matrimony, and a tune on the bagpipes?"
+
+"I don't know what you mean by bagpipes--I only know that when people
+get married in the country, they go about with the musicians playing
+before them. What you hear yonder is a violin and a _cornemuse_."
+
+"A _cornemuse!_" I repeated. "What's that?"
+
+"Oh, country music. A thing you blow into with your mouth, and play upon
+with your fingers, and squeeze under your arm--like this."
+
+"Then it's the same thing, _ma chère_," said I. "A bagpipes and a
+_cornemuse_--a _cornemuse_ and bagpipes. Both of them national, popular,
+and frightful."
+
+"I'm so fond of music," said Josephine.
+
+Not wishing to object to her tastes, and believing that this observation
+related to the music then audible, I made no reply.
+
+"And I have never been to an opera," added she.
+
+I was still silent, though from another motive.
+
+"You will take me one night to the Italiens, or the Opéra Comique, will
+you not, Monsieur Basil?" pursued she, determined not to lose her
+opportunity.
+
+I had now no resource but to promise; which I did, very reluctantly.
+
+"You would enjoy the Opéra Comique far more than the Italiens," said I,
+remembering that Madame de Marignan had a box at the Italiens, and
+rapidly weighing the chances for and against the possibility of
+recognition. "At the first they sing in French--at the last,
+in Italian,"
+
+"Ah, bah! I should prefer the French," replied she, falling at once into
+the snare. "When shall it be--this week?"
+
+"Ye--es; one evening this week."
+
+"What evening?"
+
+"Well, let me see--we had better wait, and consult the advertisements."
+
+"_Dame_! never mind the advertisements. Let it be Tuesday."
+
+"Why Tuesday?"
+
+"Because it is soon; and because I can get away early on Tuesdays if I
+ask leave."
+
+I had, plainly, no chance of escape.
+
+"You would not prefer to see the great military piece at the Porte St.
+Martin?" I suggested. "There are three hundred real soldiers in it, and
+they fire real cannon."
+
+"Not I! I have been to the Porte St. Martin, over and over again. Emile
+knew one of the scene-painter's assistants, and used to get tickets two
+or three times a month."
+
+"Then it shall be the Opera Comique," said I, with a sigh.
+
+"And on Tuesday evening next."
+
+"On Tuesday evening next."
+
+At this moment the piping and fiddling broke out afresh, and Josephine,
+who had scarcely taken the little telescope from her eye all the time,
+exclaimed that she saw the wedding party going through the market-place
+of the town.
+
+"There they are--the musicians first; the bride and bridegroom next; and
+eight friends, all two and two! There will be a dance, depend on it! Let
+us go down to the town, and hear all about it! Perhaps they might invite
+us to join them--who knows?"
+
+"But you would not dance before dinner?"
+
+"_Eh, mon Dieu_! I would dance before breakfast, if I had the chance.
+Come along. If we do not make haste, we may miss them."
+
+I rose, feeling, and I daresay, looking, like a martyr; and we went down
+again into the town.
+
+There we inquired of the first person who seemed likely to know--he was
+a dapper hairdresser, standing at his shop-door with his hands in his
+apron pockets and a comb behind his ear--and were told that the
+wedding-party had just passed through the village, on their way to the
+Chateau of Saint Aulaire.
+
+"The Chateau of St. Aulaire!" said Josephine. "What are they going to do
+there? What is there to see?"
+
+"It is an ancient mansion, Mademoiselle, much visited by strangers,"
+replied the hairdresser with exceeding politeness. "Worthy of
+Mademoiselle's distinguished attention--and Monsieur's. Contains old
+furniture, old paintings, old china--stands in an extensive park--one of
+the lions of this neighborhood, Mademoiselle--also Monsieur."
+
+"To whom does it belong?" I asked, somewhat interested in this account.
+
+"That, Monsieur, is a question difficult to answer," replied the fluent
+hairdresser, running his fingers through his locks and dispersing a
+gentle odor of rose-oil. "It was formerly the property of the ancient
+family of Saint Aulaire. The last Marquis de Saint Aulaire, with his
+wife and family, were guillotined in 1793. Some say that the young heir
+was saved; and an individual asserting himself to be that heir did
+actually put forward a claim to the estate, some twenty, or
+five-and-twenty years ago, but lost his cause for want of sufficient
+proof. In the meantime, it had passed into the hands of a wealthy
+republican family, descended, it is said, from General Dumouriez. This
+family held it till within the last four years, when two or three fresh
+claimants came forward; so that it is now the object of a lawsuit which
+may last till every brick of it falls to ruin, and every tree about it
+withers away. At present, a man and his wife have charge of the place,
+and visitors are permitted to see it any day between twelve and four."
+
+"I should like to see the old place," said I.
+
+"And I should like to see how the bride is dressed," said Josephine,
+"and if the bridegroom is handsome."
+
+"Well, let us go--not forgetting to thank Monsieur _le Perruquier_ for
+his polite information."
+
+Monsieur _le Perruquier_ fell into what dancing-masters call the first
+position, and bowed elaborately.
+
+"Most welcome, Mademoiselle--and Monsieur," said he. "Straight up the
+road--past the orchard about a quarter of a mile--old iron gates--can't
+miss it. Good-afternoon, Mademoiselle--also Monsieur."
+
+Following his directions, we came presently to the gates, which were
+rusty and broken-hinged, with traces of old gilding still showing
+faintly here and there upon their battered scrolls and bosses. One of
+them was standing open, and had evidently been standing so for years;
+while the other had as evidently been long closed, so that the deep
+grass had grown rankly all about it, and the very bolt was crusted over
+with a yellow lichen. Between the two, an ordinary wooden hurdle had
+been put up, and this hurdle was opened for us by a little blue-bloused
+urchin in a pair of huge _sabots_, who, thinking we belonged to the
+bridal party, pointed up the dusky avenue, and said, with a grin:--
+
+"_Tout droit, M'sieur--ils sont passés par là!_"
+
+_Par là_, "under the shade of melancholy boughs," we went accordingly.
+Far away on either side stretched dim vistas of neglected park-land,
+deep with coarse grass and weeds and, where the trees stood thickest,
+all choked with a brambly undergrowth. After about a quarter of a mile
+of this dreary avenue, we came to a broad area of several acres laid out
+in the Italian style with fountains and terraces, at the upper end of
+which stood the house--a feudal, _moyen-âge_ French chateau, with
+irregular wings, steep slated roofings, innumerable windows, and
+fantastic steeple-topped turrets sheeted with lead and capped with
+grotesque gilded weathercocks. The principal front had been repaired in
+the style of the Renaissance and decorated with little foliated
+entablatures above the doors and windows; whilst a double flight of
+steps leading up to a grand entrance on the level of the first story,
+like the famous double staircase of Fontainebleau, had been patched on
+in the very centre, to the manifest disfigurement of the building. Most
+of the windows were shuttered up, and as we drew nearer, the general
+evidences of desolation became more apparent. The steps of the terraces
+were covered with patches of brown and golden moss. The stone urns were
+some of them fallen in the deep grass, and some broken. There were gaps
+in the rich balustrade here and there; and the two great fountains on
+either side of the lower terrace had long since ceased to fling up
+their feathery columns towards the sun. In the middle of one a broken
+Pan, noseless and armless, turned up a stony face of mute appeal, as if
+imploring us to free him from the parasitic jungle of aquatic plants
+which flourished rankly round him in the basin. In the other, a stalwart
+river-god with his finger on his lip, seemed listening for the music of
+those waters which now scarcely stirred amid the tangled weeds that
+clustered at his feet.
+
+Passing all these, passing also the flower-beds choked with brambles and
+long waving grasses, and the once quaintly-clipped myrtle and box-trees,
+all flinging out fantastic arms of later growth, we came to the upper
+terrace, which was paved in curious patterns of stars and arabesques,
+with stones alternately round and flat. Here a good-humored, cleanly
+peasant woman came clattering out in her _sabots_ from a side-door, key
+in hand, preceded us up the double flight of steps, unlocked the great
+door, and admitted us.
+
+The interior, like the front, had been modernized about a hundred and
+fifty years before, and resembled a little formal Versailles or
+miniature Fontainebleau. Dismantled halls paved with white marble;
+panelled ante-chambers an inch deep in dust; dismal _salons_ adorned
+with Renaissance arabesques and huge looking-glasses, cracked and
+mildewed, and mended with pasted seams of blue paper; boudoirs with
+faded Watteau panellings; corridors with painted ceilings where
+mythological divinities, marvellously foreshortened on a sky-blue
+ground, were seen surrounded by rose-colored Cupids and garlanded with
+ribbons and flowers; innumerable bed-rooms, some containing grim
+catafalques of beds with gilded cornices and funereal plumes, some
+empty, some full of stored-up furniture fast going to decay--all these
+in endless number we traversed, conducted by the good-tempered
+_concierge_, whose heavy _sabots_ awakened ghostly echoes from floor
+to floor.
+
+At length, through an ante-chamber lined with a double file of grim old
+family portraits--some so blackened with age and dust as to be totally
+indistinguishable, and others bulging hideously out of their frames--we
+came to the library, a really noble room, lofty, panelled with walnut
+wood, floored with polished oak, and looking over a wide expanse of
+level country. Long ranges of empty book-shelves fenced in with broken
+wire-work ran round the walls. The painted ceiling represented, as
+usual, the heavens and some pagan divinities. A dumb old time-piece,
+originally constructed to tell the months, the days of the year, and the
+hours, stood on a massive corner bracket near the door. Long antique
+mirrors in heavy black frames reached from floor to ceiling between each
+of the windows; and in the centre of the room, piled all together and
+festooned with a thick drapery of cobwebs, stood a dozen or so of old
+carved chairs, screens, and foot-stools, rich with velvet, brocade, and
+gilded leather, but now looking as if a touch would crumble them to
+dust. Over the great carved fireplace, however, hung a painting upon
+which my attention became riveted as soon as I entered the room--a
+painting yellow with age; covered with those minute cracks which are
+like wrinkles on the face of antique art, coated with dust, and yet so
+singularly attractive that, having once noticed it, I looked at
+nothing else.
+
+It was the half-length portrait of a young lady in the costume of the
+reign of Louis XVI. One hand rested on a stone urn; the other was raised
+to her bosom, holding a thin blue scarf that seemed to flutter in the
+wind. Her dress was of white satin, cut low and square, with a stomacher
+of lace and pearls. She also wore pearls in her hair, on her white arms,
+and on her whiter neck. Thus much for the mere adjuncts; as for the
+face--ah, how can I ever describe that pale, perfect, tender face, with
+its waving brown hair and soft brown eyes, and that steadfast perpetual
+smile that seemed to light the eyes from within, and to dwell in the
+corners of the lips without parting or moving them? It was like a face
+seen in a dream, or the imperfect image which seems to come between us
+and the page when we read of Imogen asleep.
+
+"Who was this lady?" I asked, eagerly.
+
+The _concierge_ nodded and rubbed her hands.
+
+"Aha! M'sieur," said she, "'tis the best painting in the chateau, as
+folks tell me. M'sieur is a connoisseur."
+
+"But do you know whose portrait it is?"
+
+"To be sure I do, M'sieur. It's the portrait of the last Marquise--the
+one who was guillotined, poor soul, with her husband, in--let me
+see--in 1793!"
+
+"What an exquisite creature! Look, Josephine, did you ever see anything
+so beautiful?"
+
+"Beautiful!" repeated the grisette, with a sidelong glance at one of the
+mirrors. "Beautiful, with such a coiffure and such a bodice! _Ciel!_ how
+tastes differ!"
+
+"But her face, Josephine!"
+
+"What of her face? I'm sure it's plain enough."
+
+"Plain! Good heavens! what..."
+
+But it was not worth while to argue upon it. I pulled out one of the old
+chairs, and so climbed near enough to dust the surface of the painting
+with my handkerchief.
+
+"I wish I could buy it!" I exclaimed.
+
+Josephine burst into a loud laugh.
+
+"_Grand Dieu_!" said she, half pettishly, "if you are so much in love
+with it as all that, I dare say it would not be difficult!"
+
+The _concierge_ shook her head.
+
+"Everything on this estate is locked up," said she. "Nothing can be
+sold, nothing given away, nothing even repaired, till the _procès_
+is ended."
+
+I sighed, and came down reluctantly from my perch. Josephine was visibly
+impatient. She had seen the wedding-party going down one of the walks at
+the back of the house; and the _concierge_ was waiting to let us out. I
+drew her aside, and slipped a liberal gratuity into her hand.
+
+"If I were to come down here some day with a friend of mine who is a
+painter," I whispered, "would you have any objection, Madame, to allow
+him to make a little sketch of that portrait?"
+
+The _concierge_ looked into her palm, and seeing the value of the coin,
+smiled, hesitated, put her finger to her lip, and said:--
+
+"_Ma foi_, M'sieur, I believe I have no business to allow it; but--to
+oblige a gentleman like you--if there was nobody about--"
+
+I nodded. We understood each other sufficiently, and no more was needed.
+
+Once out of the house, Medemoiselle Josephine pouted, and took upon
+herself to be sulky--a disposition which was by no means lessened when,
+after traversing the park in various directions in search of the bridal
+company, we found that they had gone out long ago by a gate at the other
+side of the estate, and were by this time piping, most probably, in the
+adjoining parish.
+
+It was now five o'clock; so we hastened back through the village, cast a
+last glance at the grim old tower on its steep solitude, consigned
+ourselves to the yellow omnibus, and in due time were once more flying
+along the iron road towards Paris. The rapid motion, the dignity of
+occupying a first-class seat, and, above all, the prospects of an
+excellent dinner, soon brought my fair companion round again, and by the
+time we reached the Moulin Rouge, she was all vivacity and good temper.
+The less I say about that dinner the better. I am humiliated when I
+recall all that I suffered, and all that she did. I blush even now when
+I remember how she blew upon her soup, put her knife in her mouth, and
+picked her teeth with her shawl-pin. What possessed her that she would
+persist in calling the waiter "Monsieur?" And why, in Heaven's name,
+need she have clapped her hands when I ordered the champagne? To say
+that I had no appetite--that I wished myself at the antipodes--that I
+longed to sink into my boots, to smother the waiter, or to do anything
+equally desperate and unreasonable, is to express but a tithe of the
+anguish I endured. I bore it, however, in silence, little dreaming what
+a much heavier trial was yet in store for me.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI.
+
+I FALL A SACRIFICE TO MRS. GRUNDY.
+
+"A word with you, if you please, Basil Arbuthnot," said Dr. Chéron,
+"when you have finished copying those prescriptions."
+
+Dr. Chéron was standing with his feet firmly planted in the tiger-skin
+rug and his back to the fireplace. I was busy writing at the study
+table, and glancing anxiously from time to time at the skeleton clock
+upon the chimney-piece; for it was getting on fast towards five, and at
+half-past six I was to take Josephine to the Opéra Comique. As perverse
+fortune would have it, the Doctor had this afternoon given me more
+desk-work than usual, and I began to doubt whether I should be able to
+dine, dress, and reach the theatre in time if he detained me
+much longer.
+
+"But you need be in no haste," he added, looking at his watch. "That is
+to say, upon my account."
+
+I bowed nervously--I was always nervous in his presence--and tried to
+write faster than ever; but, feeling his cold blue eye upon me, made a
+blot, smeared it with my sleeve, left one word out, wrote another twice
+over, and was continually tripped up by my pen, which sputtered
+hideously and covered the page with florid passages in little round
+spots, which only needed tails to become crotchets and quavers. At
+length, just as the clock struck the hour, I finished my task and laid
+aside my pen.
+
+Dr. Chéron coughed preparatorily.
+
+"It is some time," said he, "since you have given me any news of your
+father. Do you often hear from him?"
+
+"Not very often, sir," I replied. "About once in every three weeks. He
+dislikes letter-writing."
+
+Dr. Chéron took a packet of papers from his breast-pocket, and ruffling
+them over, said, somewhat indifferently:--
+
+"Very true--very true. His notes are brief and few; but always to the
+purpose. I heard from him this morning."
+
+"Indeed, sir?"
+
+"Yes--here is his letter. It encloses a remittance of seventy-five
+pounds; fifty of which are for you. The remaining twenty-five being
+reserved for the defrayal of your expenses at the Ecole de Médecine and
+the Ecole Pratique."
+
+I was delighted.
+
+"Both are made payable through my banker," continued Dr. Chéron, "and I
+am to take charge of your share till you require it; which cannot be
+just yet, as I understand from this letter that your father supplied you
+with the sum of one hundred and five pounds on leaving England."
+
+My delight went down to zero.
+
+"Does my father say that I am not to have it now, sir?" I asked,
+hesitatingly.
+
+"He says, as I have already told you, that it is to be yours when you
+require it."
+
+"And if I require it very shortly, sir--in fact, if I require it now?"
+
+"You ought not to require it now," replied the Doctor, with a cold,
+scrutinizing stare. "You ought not to have spent one hundred and five
+pounds in five months."
+
+I looked down in silence. I had more than spent it long since; and I had
+to thank Madame de Marignan for the facility with which it had flown. It
+was not to be denied that my course of lessons in practical politeness
+had been somewhat expensive.
+
+"How have you spent it?" asked Dr. Chéron, never removing his eyes from
+my face.
+
+I might have answered, in bouquets, opera stalls, and riding horses; in
+dress coats, tight boots, and white kid gloves; in new books, new music,
+bon-bons, cabs, perfumery, and the like inexcusable follies. But I held
+my tongue instead, and said nothing.
+
+Dr. Chéron looked again at his watch.
+
+"Have you kept any entries of your expenses since you came to Paris?"
+said he.
+
+"Not with--with any regularity, sir," I replied.
+
+He took out his pencil-case and pocket-book.
+
+"Let us try, then," said he, "to make an average calculation of what
+they might be in five months."
+
+I began to feel very uncomfortable.
+
+"I believe your father paid your travelling expenses?"
+
+I bowed affirmatively.
+
+"Leaving you the clear sum of one hundred and five pounds." I bowed
+again.
+
+"Allowing, then, for your rent--which is, I believe, twenty francs per
+week," said he, entering the figures as he went on, "there will be four
+hundred francs spent in five months. For your living, say thirty francs
+per week, which makes six hundred. For your clothing, seventy-five per
+month, which makes three hundred and seventy-five, and ought to be quite
+enough for a young man of moderate tastes. For your washing and
+firewood, perhaps forty per month, which makes two hundred--and for your
+incidental expenses, say fifteen per week, which makes three hundred. We
+thus arrive at a total of one thousand eight hundred and seventy-five
+francs, which, reduced to English money at the average standard of
+twenty-five francs to the sovereign, represents the exact sum of
+seventy-five pounds. Do I make myself understood?"
+
+I bowed for the third time.
+
+"Of the original one hundred and five pounds, we now have thirty not
+accounted for. May I ask how much of that surplus you have left?"
+
+"About--not more than--than a hundred and twenty francs," I replied,
+stripping the feathers off all the pens in succession, without
+knowing it.
+
+"Have you any debts?"
+
+"A--a few."
+
+"Tailors' bills?"
+
+"Yes, sir."
+
+"What others?"
+
+"A--a couple of months' rent, I believe, sir."
+
+"Is that all?"
+
+"N--not quite."
+
+Dr. Chéron frowned, and looked again at his watch.
+
+"Be good enough, Mr. Arbuthnot," he said, "to spare me this amount of
+useless interrogation by at once stating the nature and amount of
+the rest."
+
+"I--I cannot positively state the amount, sir," I said, absurdly trying
+to get the paper-weight into my waistcoat pocket, and then putting it
+down in great confusion. "I--I have an account at Monceau's in the Rue
+Duphot, and..."
+
+"I beg your pardon," interrupted Dr. Chéron: "but who is Monceau?"
+
+"Monceau's--Monceau's livery-stables, sir."
+
+Dr. Chéron slightly raised his eye-brows, and entered the name.
+
+"And at Lavoisier's, on the Boulevard Poissonnière--"
+
+"What is sold, pray, at Lavoisier's?"
+
+"Gloves, perfumes, hosiery, ready-made linen..."
+
+"Enough--you can proceed."
+
+"I have also a bill at--at Barbet's, in the Passage de l'Opéra."
+
+"And Barbet is--?"
+
+"A--a florist!" I replied, very reluctantly.
+
+"Humph!--a florist!" observed Dr. Chéron, again transfixing me with the
+cold, blue eye. "To what amount do you suppose you are indebted to
+Monsieur Barbet?"
+
+I looked down, and became utterly unintelligible.
+
+"Fifty francs?"
+
+"I--I fear, more than--than--"
+
+"A hundred? A hundred and fifty? Two hundred?"
+
+"About two hundred, I suppose, sir," I said desperately.
+
+"Two hundred francs--that is to say, eight pounds English--to your
+florist! Really, Mr. Arbuthnot, you must be singularly fond of flowers!"
+
+I looked down in silence.
+
+"Have you a conservatory attached to your rooms?"
+
+The skeleton clock struck the half hour.
+
+"Excuse me, sir," I said, driven now to the last extremity, "but--but I
+have an engagement which--in short, I will, if you please, make out a
+list of--of these items, ascertaining the correct amount of each; and
+when once paid, I will endeavor--I mean, it is my earnest desire, to--to
+limit my expenditure strictly to--in short, to study economy for the
+future. If, in the meantime, you will have the goodness to
+excuse me...."
+
+"One word, young man. Will the fifty pounds cover your debts?"
+
+"Quite, sir, I am confident."
+
+"And leave you something in hand for your current expenses?"
+
+"Indeed, I fear very little."
+
+"In that case what will you do?"
+
+This was a terrible question, and one for which I could find no answer.
+
+"Write to your father for another remittance--eh?"
+
+"I--upon my word, I dare not, sir," I faltered.
+
+"Then you would go in debt again?"
+
+"I really fear--even with the strictest economy--I--"
+
+"Be so obliging as to let me have your seat," said Dr. Chéron, thrusting
+the obnoxious note-book into his pocket and taking my place at the desk,
+from which he brought out a couple of cards, and a printed paper.
+
+"This ticket," said he, "admits the holder to the anatomical course for
+the term now beginning, and this to the lectures at the Ecole Pratique.
+Both are in my gift. The first is worth two hundred francs, and the
+second two hundred and fifty. I ought, perhaps, in strict justice, to
+bestow them upon some needy and deserving individual: however, to save
+you from debt, or a very unpleasant alternative, I will fill them in
+with your name, and, when you bring me all your bills receipted, I will
+transfer to your account the four hundred and fifty francs which I must,
+otherwise, have paid for your courses out of the remittance forwarded by
+your father for that purpose. Understand, however, that I must first
+have the receipts, and that I expect you, on the word of a gentleman,
+to commit no more follies, and to contract no more debts."
+
+"Oh, sir!" I exclaimed, "how can I ever--"
+
+"No thanks, I beg," interposed Dr. Chéron. "Prove your gratitude by your
+conduct; do not trouble yourself to talk about it."
+
+"Indeed, sir, you may depend--"
+
+"And no promises either, if you please. I attach no kind of value to
+them. Stay--here is my check for the fifty pounds forwarded by your
+father. With that sum extricate yourself from debt. You know the rest."
+
+Hereupon Dr. Chéron replaced the cards and the printed form,
+double-locked his desk, and, with a slight gesture of the hand, frigidly
+dismissed me.
+
+I left the house quite chopfallen. I was relieved, it is true, from the
+incubus of debt; but then how small a figure I had cut in the eyes of
+Dr. Chéron! Besides, I was small for the second time--reproved for the
+second time--lectured, helped, put down, and poohpoohed, for the second
+time! Could I have peeped at myself just then through the wrong end of a
+telescope, I vow I could not have looked smaller in my own eyes.
+
+I had no time to dine; so I despatched a cup of coffee and a roll on my
+way home, and went hungry to the theatre.
+
+Josephine was got up with immense splendor for this occasion; greatly to
+her own satisfaction and my disappointment. Having hired a small private
+box in the least conspicuous part of the theatre, I had committed the
+cowardly mistake of endeavoring to transform my grisette into a woman of
+fashion. I had bought her a pink and white opera cloak, a pretty little
+fan, a pair of white kid gloves, and a bouquet. With these she wore a
+decent white muslin dress furnished out of the limited resources of her
+own wardrobe, and a wreath of pink roses, the work of her own clever
+fingers. Thus equipped, she was far less pretty than in her coquettish
+little every-day cap, and looked, I regret to say, more like an
+_ouvrière_ than ever. Aggravating above all else, however, was her own
+undisguised delight in her appearance.
+
+"Are my flowers all right? Is my dress tumbled? Is the hood of my cloak
+in the middle of my back?" were the questions she addressed to me every
+moment. In the ante-room she took advantage of each mirror we passed. In
+the lobby I caught her trying to look at her own back. When we reached
+our box she pulled her chair to the very centre of it, and sat there as
+if she expected to be admired by the whole audience.
+
+"My dear Josephine," I remonstrated, "sit back here, facing the stage.
+You will see much better--besides, it is your proper seat, being the
+only lady in the box."
+
+"Ah, _mon Dieu!_ then I cannot see the house--and how pretty it is! Ever
+so much prettier than the Gaiété, or the Porte St. Martin!"
+
+"You can see the house by peeping behind the curtain."
+
+"As if I were ashamed to be seen! _Par exemple_!"
+
+"Nay, as you please. I only advise you according to custom and fashion."
+
+Josephine pouted, and unwillingly conceded a couple of inches.
+
+"I wish I had brought the little telescope you gave me last Sunday,"
+said she, presently. "There is a gentleman with one down there in
+the stalls."
+
+"A telescope at the opera--the gods forbid! Here, however, is my
+opera-glass, if you like to use it."
+
+Josephine turned it over curiously, and peeped first through one tube
+and then through the other.
+
+"Which ought I to look through?" asked she.
+
+"Both, of course."
+
+"Both! How can I?"
+
+"Why thus--as you look through a pair of spectacles."
+
+"_Ciel!_ I can't manage that! I can never look through anything without
+covering up one eye with my hand."
+
+"Then I think you had better be contented with your own charming eyes,
+_ma belle_" said I, nervously. "How do you like your bouquet?"
+
+Josephine sniffed at it as if she were taking snuff, and pronounced it
+perfect. Just then the opera began. I withdrew into the shade, and
+Josephine was silenced for a while in admiration of the scenery and the
+dresses. By and by, she began to yawn.
+
+"Ah, _mon Dieu!_" said she, "when will they have done singing? I have
+not heard a word all this time."
+
+"But everything is sung, _ma chére_, in an opera."
+
+"What do you mean? Is there no play?"
+
+"This is the play; only instead of speaking their words, they sing
+them."
+
+Josephine shrugged her shoulders.
+
+"Ah, bah!" said she. "How stupid! I had rather have seen the _Closerie
+des Gênets_ at the Graiété, if that is to be the case the whole evening.
+Oh, dear! there is such a pretty lady come into the opposite box, in
+such a beautiful blue _glacé_, trimmed with black velvet and lace!"
+
+"Hush! you must not talk while they are singing!"
+
+"_Tiens!_ it is no pleasure to come out and be dumb. But do just see the
+lady in the opposite box! She looks exactly as if she had walked out of
+a fashion-book."
+
+"My dear child, I don't care one pin to look at her," said I, preferring
+to keep as much out of sight as possible. "To admire your pretty face is
+enough for me."
+
+Josephine squeezed my hand affectionately.
+
+"That is just as Emile used to talk to me," said she.
+
+I felt by no means flattered.
+
+"_Regardez done!_" said she, pulling me by the sleeve, just as I was
+standing up, a little behind her chair, looking at the stage. "That lady
+in the blue _glacé_ never takes her eyes from our box! She points us out
+to the gentleman who is with her--do look!"
+
+I turned my glass in the direction to which she pointed, and recognised
+Madame de Marignan!
+
+I turned hot and cold, red and white, all in one moment, and shrank back
+like a snail that has been touched, or a sea-anemone at the first dig of
+the naturalist.
+
+"Does she know you?" asked Josephine.
+
+"I--I--probably--that is to say--I have met her in society."
+
+"And who is the gentleman?"
+
+That was just what I was wondering. It was not Delaroche. It was no one
+whom I had ever seen before. It was a short, fat, pale man, with a bald
+head, and a ribbon in his button-hole.
+
+"Is he her husband?" pursued Josephine.
+
+The suggestion flashed upon me like a revelation. Had I not heard that
+M. de Marignan was coming home from Algiers? Of course it was he. No
+doubt of it. A little vulgar, fat, bald man.... Pshaw, just the sort of
+a husband that she deserved!
+
+"How she looks at me!" said Josephine.
+
+I felt myself blush, so to speak, from head to foot.
+
+"Good Heavens! my dear girl," I exclaimed, "take your elbows off the
+front of the box!"
+
+Josephine complied, with a pettish little grimace.
+
+"And, for mercy's sake, don't hold your head as if you feared it would
+tumble off!"
+
+"It is the flowers," said she. "They tickle the back of my neck,
+whenever I move my head. I am much more comfortable in my cap."
+
+"Never mind. Make the best of it, and listen to this song."
+
+It was the great tenor ballad of the evening. The house was profoundly
+silent; the first wandering chords of a harp were heard behind the
+scenes; and Duprez began. In the very midst of one of his finest and
+tenderest _sostenuto_ passages, Josephine sneezed--and such a sneeze!
+you might have heard it out in the lobbies. An audible titter ran round
+the house. I saw Madame de Marignan cover her face with her
+handkerchief, and yield to an irrepressible fit of laughter. As for the
+tenor, he cast a withering glance up at the box, and made a marked pause
+before resuming his song. Merciful powers! what crime had I committed
+that I should be visited with such a punishment as this?
+
+"Wretched girl!" I exclaimed, savagely, "what have you done?"
+
+"Done, _mon ami!_" said Josephine, innocently. "Why, I fear I have taken
+cold."
+
+I groaned aloud.
+
+"Taken cold!" I muttered to myself. "Would to Heaven you had taken
+prussic acid!"
+
+"_Qu'est ce que c'est?"_ asked she.
+
+But it was not worth while to reply. I gave myself up to my fate. I
+determined to remonstrate no more. I flung myself on a seat at the back
+of the box, and made up my mind to bear all that might yet be in store
+for me. When she openly ate a stick of _sucre d'orge_ after this, I said
+nothing. When she applauded with both hands, I endured in silence. At
+length the performance came to a close and the curtain fell. Madame de
+Marignan had left before the last act, so I ran no danger of
+encountering her on the way out; but I was profoundly miserable,
+nevertheless. As for Josephine, she, poor child, had not enjoyed her
+evening at all, and was naturally out of temper. We quarrelled
+tremendously in the cab, and parted without having made it up. It was
+all my own fault. How could I be such a fool as to suppose that, with a
+few shreds and patches of finery, I could make a fine lady of
+a grisette?
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII.
+
+HIGH ART IN THE QUARTIER LATIN.
+
+"But, my dear fellow, what else could you have expected? You took
+Mam'selle Josephine to the _Opera Comique. Eh bien!_ you might as well
+have taken an oyster up Mount Vesuvius. Our fair friend was out of her
+element. _Voilà tout_."
+
+"Confound her and her element!" I exclaimed with a groan. "What the
+deuce _is_ her element--the Quartier Latin?"
+
+"The Quartier Latin is to some extent her habitat--but then Mam'selle
+Josephine belongs to a genus of which you, _cher_ Monsieur Arbuthnot,
+are deplorably ignorant--the genus grisette. The grisette from a certain
+point of view is the _chef-d'oeuvre_ of Parisian industry; the bouquet
+of Parisian civilization. She is indigenous to the _mansarde_ and the
+_pavé_--bears no transplantation--flourishes in _the première balconie_,
+the suburban _guingette_, and the Salle Valentinois; but degenerates at
+a higher elevation. To improve her is to spoil her. In her white cap and
+muslin gown, the Parisian grisette is simply delicious. In a smart
+bonnet, a Cashmere and a brougham, she is simply detestable. Fine
+clothes vulgarize her. Fine surroundings demoralize her. Lodged on the
+sixth story, rich in the possession of a cuckoo-clock, a canary, half a
+dozen pots of mignonette, and some bits of cheap furniture in imitation
+mahogany, she has every virtue and every fault that is charming in
+woman--childlike gaiety; coquetry; thoughtless generosity; the readiest
+laugh, the readiest tear, and the warmest heart in the world. Transplant
+her to the Chaussée d'Antin, instil the taste for diamonds, truffles,
+and Veuve Clicquot, and you poison her whole nature. She becomes false,
+cruel, greedy, prodigal of your money, parsimonious of her own--a
+vampire--a ghoul--the hideous thing we call in polite parlance a _Fille
+de Marbre."_
+
+Thus, with much gravity and emphasis, spoke Herr Franz Müller, lying on
+his back upon a very ricketty sofa, and smoking like a steam-engine. A
+cup of half-cold coffee, and a bottle of rum three parts emptied stood
+beside him on the floor. These were the remains of his breakfast; for it
+was yet early in the morning of the day following my great misadventure
+at the Opéra Comique, and I had sought him out at his lodgings in the
+Rue Clovis at an hour when the Quartier Latin was for the most part
+in bed.
+
+"Josephine, at all events, is not of the stuff that _Filles de Marbre_
+are made of," I said, smiling.
+
+"Perhaps not--_mais, que voulez-vous?_ We are what we are. A grisette
+makes a bad fine lady. A fine lady would make a still worse grisette.
+The Archbishopric of Paris is a most repectable and desirable
+preferment; but your humble servant, for instance, would hardly suit
+the place,"
+
+"And the moral of this learned and perspicuous discourse?"
+
+"_Tiens_! the moral, is--keep our fair friend in her place. Remember
+that a dinner at thirty sous in the Palais Royal, or a fête with
+fireworks at Mabille, will give her ten times more pleasure than the
+daintiest repast you could order at the Maison Dorée, or the choicest
+night of the season at either opera house. And how should it be
+otherwise? One must understand a thing to be able to enjoy it; and I'll
+be sworn Mam'selle Josephine was infinitely more bored last night than
+yourself."
+
+Our conversation, or rather his monologue, was here interrupted by the
+ringing of the outer bell.
+
+The artist sat up, took his pipe from his lips, and looked considerably
+disturbed.
+
+"_Mille tonnerres_!" said he in a low tone. "Who can it be?... so early
+in the day ... not yet ten o'clock ... it is very mysterious."
+
+"It is only mysterious," said I, "as long as you don't open the door.
+Shall I answer the bell?"
+
+"No--yes--wait a moment ... suppose it is that demon, my landlord, or
+that archfiend, my tailor--then you must say ... holy St. Nicholas! you
+must say I am in bed with small-pox, or that I've broken out suddenly
+into homicidal delirium, and you're my keeper."
+
+"Unfortunately I should not know either of your princes of darkness at
+first sight."
+
+"True--and it might be Dupont, who owes me thirty francs, and swore by
+the bones of his aunt (an excellent person, who keeps an estaminet in
+the Place St. Sulpice) that he would pay me this week. _Diable_! there
+goes the bell again."
+
+"It would perhaps be safest," I suggested, "to let M. or N. ring on till
+he is tired of the exercise."
+
+"But conceive the horrid possibility of letting thirty francs ring
+themselves out of patience! No, _mon ami_--I will dare the worst that
+may happen. Wait here for me--I will answer the door myself,"
+
+Now it should be explained that Müller's apartments consisted of three
+rooms. First, a small outer chamber which he dignified with the title of
+Salle d'Attente, but which, as it was mainly furnished with old boots,
+umbrellas and walking-sticks, and contained, by way of accommodation for
+visitors only a three-legged stool and a door-mat, would have been more
+fitly designated as the hall. Between this Salle d'Attente and the den
+in which he slept, ate, smoked, and received his friends, lay the
+studio--once a stately salon, now a wilderness of litter and
+dilapidation. On one side you beheld three windows closely boarded up,
+with strips of newspaper pasted over the cracks to exclude every gleam
+of day. Overhead yawned a huge, dusty skylight, to make way for which a
+fine old painted ceiling had been ruthlessly knocked away. On the walls
+were pinned and pasted all sorts of rough sketches and studies in color
+and crayon. In one corner lolled a despondent-looking lay-figure in a
+moth-eaten Spanish cloak; in another lay a heap of plaster-casts,
+gigantic hands and feet, broken-nosed masks of the Apollo, the Laocoon,
+the Hercules Farnese, and other foreigners of distinction. Upon the
+chimney-piece were displayed a pair of foils, a lute, a skull, an
+antique German drinking-mug, and several very modern empty bottles. In
+the middle of the room stood two large easels, a divan, a round table,
+and three or four chairs; while the floor was thickly strewn with empty
+color-tubes, bits of painting-rag, corks, cigar-ends, and all kinds of
+miscellaneous litter.
+
+All these things I had observed as I passed in; for this, be it
+remembered, was my first visit to Müller in his own territory.
+
+I heard him go through the studio and close the door behind him, and
+then I heard him open the door upon the public staircase. Presently he
+came back, shutting the door behind him as before.
+
+"My dear fellow," he exclaimed, breathlessly, "you have brought luck
+with you! What do you think? A sitter--positively, a sitter! Wants to be
+sketched in at once--_Vive la France_!"
+
+"Man or woman? Young or old? Plain or pretty?"
+
+"Elderly half-length, feminine gender--Madame Tapotte. They are both
+there, Monsieur and Madame Excellent couple--redolent of the
+country--husband bucolic, adipose, auriferous--wife arrayed in all her
+glory, like the Queen of Sheba. I left them in the Salle d'Attente--told
+them I had a sitter--time immensely occupied--half-lengths furiously in
+demand ... _Will_ you oblige me by performing the part for a few
+minutes, just to carry out the idea?"
+
+"What part?"
+
+"The part of sitter."
+
+"Oh, with pleasure," I replied, laughing. "Do with me what you please,"
+
+"You don't mind? Come! you are the best fellow in the world. Now, if
+you'll sit in that arm-chair facing the light--head a little thrown
+back, arms folded, chin up ... Capital! You don't know what an effect
+this will have upon the provincial mind!"
+
+"But you're not going to let them in! You have no portrait of me to be
+at work upon!"
+
+"My dear fellow, I've dozens of half-finished studies, any one of which
+will answer the purpose. _Voilà_! here is the very thing."
+
+And snatching up a canvas that had been standing till now with its face
+to the wall, he flourished it triumphantly before my eyes, and placed it
+on the easel.
+
+"Heavens and earth!" I exclaimed, "that's a copy of the Titian in the
+Louvre--the 'Young Man with the Glove!'"
+
+"What of that? Our Tapottes will never find out the difference. By the
+way, I told them you were a great English Milord, so please keep up the
+character."
+
+"I will try to do credit to the peerage."
+
+"And if you would not mind throwing in a word of English every now and
+then ... a little Goddam, for instance.. . Eh?"
+
+I laughed and shook my head.
+
+"I will pose for you as Milord with all the pleasure in life," I said;
+"only I cannot undertake to pose for the traditional Milord of the
+Bouffes Parisiens! However, I will speak some English, and, if you like,
+I'll know no French."
+
+"No, no--_diable_! you must know a little, or I can't exchange a word
+with you. But very little--the less the better. And now I'll let
+them in."
+
+They came; Madame first--tall, buxom, large-featured, fresh-colored,
+radiant in flowers, lace, and Palais Royal jewelry; then
+Monsieur--short, fat, bald, rosy and smiling, with a huge frill to his
+shirt-front and a nankeen waistcoat.
+
+Müller introduced them with much ceremony and many apologies.
+
+"Permit me, milord," he said, "to present Monsieur and Madame
+Tapotte--Monsieur and Madame Tapotte; Milord Smithfield."
+
+I rose and bowed with the gravity becoming my rank.
+
+"I have explained to milord," continued Müller, addressing himself
+partly to the new-comers, partly to me, and chiefly to the study on the
+easel, "that having no second room in which to invite Monsieur and
+Madame to repose themselves, I am compelled to ask them into the
+studio--where, however, his lordship is so very kind as to say that they
+are welcome." (Hereupon Madame Tapotte curtsied again, and Monsieur
+ducked his bald head, and I returned their salutations with the same
+dignity as before.) "If Monsieur and Madame will be pleased to take
+seats, however, his lordship's sitting will be ended in about ten
+minutes. _Mille pardons_, the face, milord, a little more to the right.
+Thank you--thank you very much. And if you will do me the favor to look
+at me ... for the expression of the eye--just so--thank you! A most
+important point, milord, is the expression of the eye. When I say the
+expression, I mean the fire, the sparkle, the liquidity ... _enfin_ the
+expression!"
+
+Here he affected to put in some touches with immense delicacy--then
+retreated a couple of yards, the better to contemplate his work--pursed
+up his mouth--ran his fingers through his hair--shaded his eyes with his
+hand--went back and put in another touch--again retreated--again put in
+a touch; and so on some three or four times successively.
+
+Meanwhile Monsieur and Madame Tapotte were fidgeting upon their chairs
+in respectful silence. Every now and then they exchanged glances of
+wonder and admiration. They were evidently dying to compare my august
+features with my portrait, but dared not take the liberty of rising. At
+length the lady's curiosity could hold out no longer.
+
+"_Ah, mon Dieu_!" she said; "but it must be very fatiguing to sit so
+long in the same position. And to paint.... _Oiel!_ what practice! what
+perseverance! what patience! _Avec permission_, M'sieur..."
+
+And with this she sidled up to Müller's elbow, leaving Monsieur Tapotte
+thunderstruck at her audacity.
+
+Then for a moment she stood silent; but during that moment the eager,
+apologetic smile vanished suddenly out of her face, and was succeeded by
+an expression of blank disappointment.
+
+"_Tiens_!" she said bluntly. "I don't see one bit of likeness."
+
+I turned hot from head to foot, but Müller's serene effrontery was equal
+to the occasion.
+
+"I dare say not, Madame," he replied, coolly. "I dare say not. This
+portrait is not intended to be like."
+
+Madame Tapotte's eyes and mouth opened simultaneously.
+
+"_Comment_!" she exclaimed.
+
+"I should be extremely sorry," continued Müller, loftily, "and his
+lordship would be extremely sorry, if there were too much resemblance."
+
+"But a--a likeness--it seems to me, should at all events be--like,"
+stammered Madame Tapotte, utterly bewildered.
+
+"And if M'sieur is to paint my wife," added Monsieur Tapotte, who had by
+this time joined the group at the easel, "I--I..._Dame_! it must be a
+good deal more like than this."
+
+Müller drew himself up with an air of great dignity.
+
+"Sir," he said, "if Madame does me the honor to sit to me for her
+portrait--for her _own_ portrait, observe--I flatter myself the
+resemblance will be overwhelming. But you must permit me to inform you
+that Milord Smithfield is not sitting for his own portrait."
+
+The Tapottes looked at each other in a state bordering on stupefaction.
+
+"His lordship," continued Müller, "is sitting for the portrait of one of
+his illustrious ancestors--a nobleman of the period of Queen Elizabeth."
+
+Tapotte _mari_ scratched his head, and smiled feebly.
+
+"_Parbleu_!" said he, "_mais c'est bien drôle, ça_!"
+
+The artist shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"It so happens," said he, "that his lordship's gallery at Smithfield
+Castle has unhappily been more than half destroyed by fire. Two
+centuries of family portraits reduced to ashes! Terrible misfortune!
+Only one way of repairing the loss--that is of partially repairing it. I
+do my best. I read the family records--I study the history of the
+period--his lordship sits to me daily--I endeavor to give a certain
+amount of family likeness; sometimes more, you observe, sometimes less
+... enormous responsibility, Monsieur Tapotte!"
+
+"Oh, enormous!"
+
+"The taste for family portraits," continued Müller, still touching up
+the Titian, "is a very natural one--and is on the increase. Many
+gentlemen of--of somewhat recent wealth, come to me for their
+ancestors."
+
+"No!"
+
+"_Foi d'honneur_. Few persons, however, are as conscientious as his
+lordship in the matter of family resemblance. They mostly buy up their
+forefathers ready-made--adopt them, christen them, and ask no
+questions."
+
+Monsieur and Madame Tapotte exchanged glances.
+
+"_Tiens, mon ami_, why should we not have an ancestor or two, as well
+as other folks," suggested the lady, in a very audible whisper.
+
+Monsieur shook his head, and muttered something about the expense.
+
+"There is no harm, at all events," urged madame, "in asking the price."
+
+"My charge for gallery portraits, madame, varies from sixty to a hundred
+francs," said Müller.
+
+"Heavens! how dear! Why, my own portrait is to be only fifty."
+
+"Sixty, Madame, if we put in the hands and the jewelry," said Müller,
+blandly.
+
+"_Eh bien_!--sixty. But for these other things.... bah! _ils sont
+fierement chers_."
+
+"_Pardon_, madame! The elegancies and superfluities of life are, by a
+just rule of political economy, expensive. It is right that they should
+be so; as it is right that the necessaries of life should be within the
+reach of the poorest. Bread, for instance, is strictly necessary, and
+should be cheap. A great-grandfather, on the contrary, is an elegant
+superfluity, and may be put up at a high figure."
+
+"There is some truth in that," murmured Monsieur Tapotte.
+
+"Besides, in the present instance, one also pays for antiquity."
+
+"_C'est juste--C'est juste_."
+
+"At the same time," continued Müller, "if Monsieur Tapotte were to honor
+me with a commission for, say, half a dozen family portraits, I would
+endeavor to put them in at forty francs apiece--including, at that very
+low price, a Revolutionary Deputy, a beauty of the Louis Quinze period,
+and a Marshal of France."
+
+"_Tiens_! that's a fair offer enough," said madame. "What say you, _mon
+ami_?"
+
+But Monsieur Tapotte, being a cautious man, would say nothing hastily.
+He coughed, looked doubtful, declined to commit himself to an opinion,
+and presently drew off into a corner for the purpose of holding a
+whispered consultation with his wife.
+
+Meanwhile Müller laid aside his brushes and palette, informed me with a
+profound bow that my lordship had honored him by sitting as long as was
+strictly necessary, and requested my opinion upon the progress of
+the work.
+
+I praised it rapturously. You would have thought, to hear me, that for
+drawing, breadth, finish, color, composition, chiaroscuro, and every
+other merit that a painting could possess, this particular
+_chef-d'oeuvre_ excelled all the masterpieces of Europe.
+
+Müller bowed, and bowed, and bowed, like a Chinaman at a visit of
+ceremony; He was more than proud; he was overwhelmed, _accablé_, et
+caetera, et caetera.
+
+The Tapottes left off whispering, and listened breathlessly.
+
+"He is evidently a great painter, _not' jeune homme_!" said Madame in
+one of her large whispers.
+
+To which Monsieur replied as audibly:--"_Ça se voit, ma femme--sacre nom
+d'une pipe_!"
+
+"Milford will do me the favor to sit again on Friday?" said Müller, as I
+took up my hat and gloves.
+
+I replied with infinite condescension that I would endeavor to do so. I
+then made the stiffest of stiff bows to the excellent Tapottes, and,
+ushered to the door by Müller, took my departure majestically in the
+character of Lord Smithfield.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII.
+
+THE QUARTIER LATIN.
+
+The dear old Quartier Latin of my time--the Quartier Latin of Balzac, of
+Béranger, of Henry Murger---the Quartier Latin where Franz Müller had
+his studio; where Messieurs Gustave; Jules, and Adrien gave their
+unparalleled _soirées dansantes_; where I first met my ex-flame
+Josephine--exists no longer. It has been improved off the face of the
+earth, and with it such a gay bizarre, improvident world of youth and
+folly as shall never again be met together on the banks of the Seine.
+
+Ah me! how well I remember that dingy, delightful Arcadia--the Rue de la
+Vieille Boucherie, narrow, noisy, crowded, with projecting upper stories
+and Gothic pent-house roofs--the Rue de la Parcheminerie, unchanged
+since the Middle Ages--the Rue St. Jacques, steep, interminable,
+dilapidated; with its dingy cabarets, its brasseries, its cheap
+restaurants, its grimy shop windows filled with colored prints, with
+cooked meats, with tobacco, old books, and old clothes; its ancient
+colleges and hospitals, time-worn and weather-beaten, frowning down upon
+the busy thoroughfare and breaking the squalid line of shops; its grim
+old hotels swarming with lodgers, floor above floor, from the cobblers
+in the cellars to the grisettes in the attics! Then again, the gloomy
+old Place St. Michel, its abundant fountain ever flowing, ever
+surrounded by water-carts and water-carriers, by women with pails, and
+bare-footed street urchins, and thirsty drovers drinking out of iron
+cups chained to the wall. And then, too, the Rue de la Harpe....
+
+I close my eyes, and the strange, precipitous, picturesque, decrepit old
+street, with its busy, surging crowd, its street-cries, its
+street-music, and its indescribable union of gloom and gayety, rises
+from its ashes. Here, grand old dilapidated mansions with shattered
+stone-carvings, delicate wrought-iron balconies all rust-eaten and
+broken, and windows in which every other pane is cracked or patched,
+alternate with more modern but still more ruinous houses, some leaning
+this way, some that, some with bulging upper stories, some with doorways
+sunk below the level of the pavement. Yonder, gloomy and grim, stands
+the College of Saint Louis. Dark alleys open off here and there from the
+main thoroughfare, and narrow side streets, steep as flights of steps.
+Low sheds and open stalls cling, limpet-like, to every available nook
+and corner. An endless procession of trucks, wagons, water-carts, and
+fiacres rumbles perpetually by. Here people live at their windows and in
+the doorways--the women talking from balcony to balcony, the men
+smoking, reading, playing at dominoes. Here too are more cafés and
+cabarets, open-air stalls for the sale of fried fish, and cheap
+restaurants for workmen and students, where, for a sum equivalent to
+sevenpence half-penny English, the Quartier Latin regales itself upon
+meats and drinks of dark and enigmatical origin. Close at hand is the
+Place and College of the Sorbonne--silent in the midst of noisy life,
+solitary in the heart of the most crowded quarter of Paris. A sombre
+mediæval gloom pervades that ancient quadrangle; scant tufts of sickly
+grass grow here and there in the interstices of the pavement; the dust
+of centuries crust those long rows of windows never opened. A little
+further on is the Rue des Grès, narrow, crowded, picturesque, one
+uninterrupted perspective of bookstalls and bookshops from end to end.
+Here the bookseller occasionally pursues a two-fold calling, and retails
+not only literature but a cellar of_ petit vin bleu_; and here,
+overnight, the thirsty student exchanges for a bottle of Macon the "Code
+Civile" that he must perforce buy back again at second-hand in
+the morning.
+
+A little farther on, and we come to the College Saint Louis, once the
+old College Narbonne; and yet a few yards more, and we are at the doors
+of the Theatre du Pantheon, once upon a time the Church of St. Bénoit,
+where the stage occupies the site of the altar, and an orchestra stall
+in what was once the nave, may be had for seventy-five centimes. Here,
+too, might be seen the shop of the immortal Lesage, renowned throughout
+the Quartier for the manufacture of a certain kind of transcendental
+ham-patty, peculiarly beloved by student and grisette; and here,
+clustering within a stone's throw of each other, were to be found those
+famous restaurants, Pompon, Viot, Flicoteaux, and the "Boeuf Enragé,"
+where, on gala days, many an Alphonse and Fifine, many a Théophile and
+Cerisette, were wont to hold high feast and festival--terms sevenpence
+half-penny each, bread at discretion, water gratis, wine and
+toothpicks extra.
+
+But it was in the side streets, courts, and _impasses_ that branched off
+to the left and right of the main arteries, that one came upon the very
+heart of the old Pays Latin; for the Rue St. Jacques, the Rue de la
+Harpe, the Rue des Grès, narrow, steep, dilapidated though they might
+be, were in truth the leading thoroughfares--the Boulevards, so to
+speak--of the Student Quartier. In most of the side alleys, however,
+some of which dated back as far, and farther, than the fifteenth
+century, there was no footway for passengers, and barely space for one
+wheeled vehicle at a time. A filthy gutter invariably flowed down the
+middle of the street. The pavement, as it peeped out here and there
+through a _moraine_ of superimposed mud and offal, was seen to consist
+of small oblong stones, like petrified kidney potatoes. The houses, some
+leaning this way, some that, with projecting upper stories and
+overhanging gable-roofs, nodded together overhead, leaving but a narrow
+strip of sky down which the sunlight strove in vain to struggle. Long
+poles upon which were suspended old clothes hung out to air, and ragged
+linen to dry, stood out like tattered banners from the attic windows.
+Here, too, every ground-floor was a shop, open, unglazed, cavernous,
+where the dealer lay _perdu_ in the gloom of midday, like a spider in
+the midst of his web, surrounded by piles of old bottles, old iron, old
+clothes, old furniture, or whatever else his stock in trade might
+consist of.
+
+Of such streets--less like streets, indeed, than narrow, overhanging
+gorges and ravines of damp and mouldering stone--of such streets, I say,
+intricate, winding, ill-lighted, unventilated, pervaded by an atmosphere
+compounded of the fumes of fried fish, tobacco, old leather, mildew and
+dirt, there were hundreds in the Quartier Latin of my time:--streets to
+the last degree unattractive as places of human habitation, but rich,
+nevertheless, in historic associations, in picturesque detail, and in
+archaeological interest. Such a street, for instance, was the Rue du
+Fouarre (scarcely a feature of which has been modernized to this day),
+where Dante, when a student of theology in Paris, attended the lectures
+of one Sigebert, a learned monk of Gemblours, who discoursed to his
+scholars in the open air, they sitting round him the while upon fresh
+straw strewn upon the pavement. Such a street was the Rue des Cordiers,
+close adjoining the Rue des Grès, where Rousseau lived and wrote; and
+the Rue du Dragon, where might then be seen the house of Bernard
+Palissy; and the Rue des Maçons, where Racine lived; and the Rue des
+Marais, where Adrienne Lecouvreur--poor, beautiful, generous, ill-fated
+Adrienne Lecouvreur!--died. Here, too, in a blind alley opening off the
+Rue St. Jacques, yet stands part of that Carmelite Convent in which, for
+thirty years, Madame de la Vallière expiated the solitary frailty of her
+life. And so at every turn! Not a gloomy by-street, not a dilapidated
+fountain, not a grim old college façade but had its history, or its
+legend. Here the voice of Abelard thundered new truths, and Rabelais
+jested, and Petrarch discoursed with the doctors. Here, in the Rue de
+l'Ancienne Comédie, walked the shades of Racine, of Molière, of
+Corneille, of Voltaire. Dear, venerable, immortal old Quartier Latin!
+Thy streets were narrow, but they were the arteries through which,
+century after century, circulated all the wisdom and poetry, all the
+art, and science, and learning of France! Their gloom, their squalor,
+their very dirt was sacred. Could I have had my will, not a stone of the
+old place should have been touched, not a pavement widened, not a
+landmark effaced.
+
+Then beside, yet not apart from, all that was mediæval and historic in
+the Pays Latin, ran the gay, effervescent, laughing current of the life
+of the _jeunessed' aujour d'hui._ Here beat the very heart of that rare,
+that immortal, that unparalleled _vie de Bohème_, the vagabond poetry of
+which possesses such an inexhaustible charm for even the soberest
+imagination. What brick and mortar idylls, what romances _au cinquième_,
+what joyous epithalamiums, what gay improvident _ménages_, what kisses,
+what laughter, what tears, what lightly-spoken and lightly-broken vows
+those old walls could have told of!
+
+Here, apparelled in all sorts of unimaginable tailoring, in jaunty
+colored cap or flapped sombrero, his pipe dangling from his button-hole,
+his hair and beard displaying every eccentricity under heaven, the Paris
+student, the _Pays Latiniste pur sang_, lived and had his being. Poring
+over the bookstalls in the Place du Panthéon or the Rue des
+Grès--hurrying along towards this or that college with a huge volume
+under each arm, about nine o'clock in the morning--haunting the cafés at
+midday and the restaurants at six--swinging his legs out of
+upper windows and smoking in his shirt-sleeves in the summer
+evenings--crowding the pit of the Odéon and every part of the Theatre du
+Panthéon--playing wind instruments at dead of night to the torment of
+his neighbors, or, in vocal mood, traversing the Quartier with a society
+of musical friends about the small hours of the morning--getting into
+scuffles with the gendarmes--flirting, dancing, playing billiards and
+the deuce; falling in love and in debt; dividing his time between
+Aristotle and Mademoiselle Mimi Pinson ... here, and here only, in all
+his phases, at every hour of the day and night, he swarmed, ubiquitous.
+
+And here, too (a necessary sequence), flourished the fair and frail
+grisette. Her race, alas! is now all but extinct--the race of Frétillon,
+of Francine, of Lisette, Musette, Rosette, and all the rest of that too
+fascinating terminology--the race immortalized again and again by
+Béranger, Gavarni, Balzac, De Musset; sketched by a hundred pencils and
+described by a hundred pens; celebrated in all manner of metres and set
+to all manner of melodies; now caricatured and now canonized; now
+painted wholly _en noir_ and now all _couleur de rose_; yet, however
+often described, however skilfully analyzed, remaining for ever
+indescribable, and for ever defying analysis!
+
+"De tous les produits Parisiens," says Monsieur Jules Janin (himself the
+quintessence of everything most Parisian), "le produit le plus Parisien,
+sans contredit, c'est la grisette." True; but our epigrammatist should
+have gone a step farther. He should have added that the grisette _pur
+sang_ is to be found nowhere except in Paris; and (still a step farther)
+nowhere in Paris save between the Pont Neuf and the Barrière d'Enfer.
+There she reigns; there (ah! let me use the delicious present tense--let
+me believe that I still live in Arcadia!)--there she lights up the old
+streets with her smile; makes the old walls ring with her laughter;
+flits over the crossings like a fairy; wears the most coquettish of
+little caps and the daintiest of little shoes; rises to her work with
+the dawn; keeps a pet canary; trains a nasturtium round her window;
+loves as heartily as she laughs, and almost as readily; owes not a sou,
+saves not a centime; sews on Adolphe's buttons, like a good neighbor; is
+never so happy as when Adolphe in return takes her to Tivoli or the
+Jardin Turc; adores _galette, sucre d'orge_, and Frederick Lemaître; and
+looks upon a masked ball and a debardeur dress as the summit of
+human felicity.
+
+_Vive la grisette_! Shall I not follow many an illustrious example and
+sing my modest paean in her praise? Frown not, august Britannia! Look
+not so severely askance upon my poor little heroine of the Quartier
+Latin! Thinkest thou because thou art so eminently virtuous that she who
+has many a serviceable virtue of her own, shall be debarred from her
+share in this world's cakes and ale?
+
+_Vive la grisette_! Let us think and speak no evil of her. "Elle ne
+tient au vice que par un rayon, et s'en éloigne par les mille autres
+points de la circonference sociale." The world sees only her follies,
+and sees them at first sight; her good qualities lie hidden in the
+shade. Is she not busy as a bee, joyous as a lark, helpful, pitiful,
+unselfish, industrious, contented? How often has she not slipped her
+last coin into the alms-box at the hospital gate, and gone supperless to
+bed? How often sat up all night, after a long day's toil in a crowded
+work-room, to nurse Victorine in the fever? How often pawned her Sunday
+gown and shawl, to redeem that coat without which Adolphe cannot appear
+before the examiners to-morrow morning? Granted, if you will, that she
+has an insatiable appetite for sweets, cigarettes, and theatrical
+admissions--shall she not be welcome to her tastes? And is it her fault
+if her capacity in the way of miscellaneous refreshments partakes of the
+nature of the miraculous--somewhat to the inconvenience of Adolphe, who
+has overspent his allowance? Supposing even that she may now and then
+indulge (among friends) in a very modified can-can at the
+Chaumière--what does that prove, except that her heels are as light as
+her heart, and that her early education has been somewhat neglected?
+
+But I am writing of a world that has vanished as completely as the lost
+Pleiad. The Quartier Latin of my time is no more. The Chaumière is no
+more. The grisette is fast dying out. Of the Rue de la Harpe not a
+recognisable feature is left. The old Place St. Michel, the fountain,
+the Theatre du Panthéon, are gone as if they had never been. Whole
+streets, I might say whole parishes, have been swept away--whole
+chapters of mediæval history erased for ever.
+
+Well, I love to close my eyes from time to time, and evoke the dear old
+haunts from their ruins; to descend once more the perilous steeps of the
+Rue St. Jacques, and to thread the labyrinthine by-streets that surround
+the École de Médecine. I see them all so plainly! I look in at the
+familiar print-shops--I meet many a long-forgotten face--I hear many a
+long-forgotten voice--I am twenty years of age and a student again!
+
+Ah me! what a pleasant time, and what a land of enchantment! Dingy,
+dilapidated, decrepit as it was, that graceless old Quartier Latin,
+believe me, was paved with roses and lighted with laughing gas.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV.
+
+THE FETE AT COURBEVOIE.
+
+"_Halte là_! I thought I should catch you about this time! They've been
+giving you unconscionable good measure to-day, though, haven't they? I
+thought Bollinet's lecture was always over by three; and here I've been
+moralizing on the flight of Time for more than twenty minutes."
+
+So saying, Müller, having stopped me as I was coming down the steps of
+the Hôtel Dieu, linked his arm in mine, drew me into a shady angle under
+the lee of Notre Dame, and, without leaving me time to reply, went on
+pouring out his light, eager chatter as readily as a mountain-spring
+bubbles out its waters.
+
+"I thought you'd like to know about the Tapottes, you see--and I was
+dying to tell you. I went to your rooms last night between eight and
+nine, and you were out; so I thought the only sure way was to come
+here--I know you never miss Bollinet's Lectures. Well, as I was saying,
+the Tapottes.... Oh, _mon cher_! I am your debtor for life in that
+matter of Milord Smithfield. It has been the making of me. What do you
+think? Tapotte is not only going to sit for a companion half-length to
+Madame's portrait, but he has given me a commission for half-a-dozen
+ancestors. Fancy--half-a-dozen illustrious dead-and-done Tapottes! What
+a scope for the imagination! What a bewildering vista of _billets de
+banque_! I feel--ah, _mon ami_! I feel that the wildest visions of my
+youth are about to be realized, and that I shall see my tailor's bill
+receipted before I die!"
+
+"I'm delighted," said I, "that Tapotte has turned up a trump card."
+
+"A trump card? Say a California--a Pactolus--a Golden Calf. Nay, hath
+not Tapotte two golden calves? Is he not of the precious metal all
+compact? Stands he not, in the amiable ripeness of his years, a living
+representative of the Golden Age? _'O bella età dell' oro_!'"
+
+And to my horror, he then and there executed a frantic _pas seul_.
+
+"Gracious powers!" I exclaimed. "Are you mad?"
+
+"Yes--raving mad. Have you any objection?"
+
+"But, my dear fellow--in the face of day--in the streets of Paris! We
+shall get taken up by the police!"
+
+"Then suppose we get out of the streets of Paris? I'm tired enough,
+Heaven knows, of cultivating the arid soil of the Pavé. See, it's a
+glorious afternoon. Let's go somewhere."
+
+"With all my heart. Where?"
+
+"_Ah, mon Dieu! ça m'est égal_. Enghien--Vincennes--St.
+Cloud--Versailles ... anywhere you like. Most probably there's a fête
+going on somewhere, if we only knew where,"
+
+"Can't we find out?"
+
+"Oh, yes--we can drop into a Café and look at the _Petites Affiches_;
+only that entails an absinthe; or we can go into the nearest Omnibus
+Bureau and see the notices on the walls, which will be cheaper."
+
+So we threaded our way along the narrow thoroughfares of the Ile de la
+Cité, and came presently to an Omnibus Bureau on the Quai de l'Horloge,
+overlooking the Pont Neuf and the river. Here the first thing we saw was
+a flaming placard setting forth the pleasures and attractions of the
+great annual fête at Courbevoie; a village on the banks of the Seine, a
+mile or two beyond Neuilly.
+
+"_Voilà, notre affaire_!" said Müller, gaily. "We can't do better than
+steer straight for Courbevoie."
+
+Saying which, he hailed a passing fiacre and bade the coachman drive to
+the Embarcadère of the Rive Droite.
+
+"We shall amuse ourselves famously at Courbevoie," he said, as we
+rattled over the stones. "We'll dine at the Toison d'Or--an excellent
+little restaurant overlooking the river; and if you're fond of angling,
+we can hire a punt and catch our own fish for dinner. Then there will be
+plenty of fiddling and dancing at the guingettes and gardens in the
+evening. By the way, though, I've no money! That is to say, none worth
+speaking of--_voilà!_... one franc, one piece of fifty centimes, another
+of twenty centimes, and some sous. I hope your pockets are better lined
+than mine."
+
+"Not much, I fear," I replied, pulling out my porte-monnaie, and
+emptying the contents into my hand. They amounted to nine francs and
+seventy-five centimes.
+
+"_Parbleu_! we've just eleven francs and a half between us," said
+Müller. "A modest sum-total; but we must make it as elastic as we can.
+Let me see, there'll be a franc for the fiacre, four francs for our
+return tickets, four for our dinner, and two and a half to spend as we
+like in the fair. Well, we can't commit any great extravagance with that
+amount of floating capital."
+
+"Better turn back and go to my rooms for some more money?" I exclaimed.
+"I've two Napoleons in my desk."
+
+"No, no--we should miss the three-fifty train, and not get another till
+between five and six."
+
+"But we shall have no fun if we have no money!"
+
+"I dissent entirely from that proposition, Monsieur Englishman. I have
+always had plenty of fun, and I have been short of cash since the hour
+of my birth. Come, it shall be my proud task to-day to prove to you the
+pleasures of impecuniosity!"
+
+So with our eleven francs and a half we went on to the station, and took
+our places for Courbevoie.
+
+We travelled, of course, by third class in the open wagons; and it so
+happened that in our compartment we had the company of three pretty
+little chattering grisettes, a fat countrywoman with a basket, and a
+quiet-looking elderly female with her niece. These last wore bonnets,
+and some kind of slight mourning. They belonged evidently to the small
+bourgeoise class, and sat very quietly in the corner of the carriage,
+speaking to no one. The three grisettes, however, kept up an incessant
+fire of small talk and squabble.
+
+"I was on this very line last Sunday," said one. "I went with Julie to
+Asnières, and we were so gay! I wonder if it will be very gay at
+Courbevoie."
+
+"_Je m'en doute_," replied another, whom they called Lolotte. "I came to
+one of the Courbevoie fêtes last spring, and it was not gay at all. But
+then, to be sure, I was with Edouard, and he is as dull as the first day
+in Lent. Where were you last Sunday, Adéle?"
+
+"I did not go beyond the barriers. I went to the Cirque with my cousin,
+and we dined in the Palais Royal. We enjoyed ourselves so much! You know
+my cousin?"
+
+"Ah! yes--the little fellow with the curly hair and the whiskers, who
+waits for you at the corner when we leave the workshop."
+
+"The same--Achille."
+
+"Your Achille is nice-looking," said Mademoiselle Lolotte, with a
+somewhat critical air. "It is a pity he squints."
+
+"He does not squint, mam'selle."
+
+"Oh, _ma chère_! I appeal to Caroline."
+
+"I am not sure that he actually squints," said Mam'selle Caroline,
+speaking for the first time; "but he certainly has one eye larger than
+the other, and of quite a different color."
+
+"_Tiens_, Caroline--it seems to me that you look very closely into the
+eyes of young men," exclaims Adèle, turning sharply upon this new
+assailant.
+
+"At all events you admit that Caroline is right," cries Lolotte,
+triumphantly.
+
+"I admit nothing of the kind. I say that you are both very ill-natured,
+and that you say what is not true. As for you, Lolotte, I don't believe
+you ever had the chance of seeing a young man's eyes turned upon you, or
+you would not be so pleased with the attentions of an old one."
+
+"An _old_ one!" shrieked Mam'selle Lolotte. "Ah, _mon Dieu_! Is a man
+old at forty-seven? Monsieur Durand is in the prime of life, and there
+isn't a girl in the Quartier who would not be proud of his attentions!"
+
+"He's sixty, if an hour," said the injured Adèle. "And as for you,
+Caroline, who have never had a beau in your life...."
+
+"_Ciel_! what a calumny!--I--never had a ... Holy Saint Geneviève! why,
+it was only last Thursday week...."
+
+Here the train stopped at the Asnières station, and two privates of the
+Garde Impériale got into the carriage. The horizon cleared as if by
+magic. The grisettes suddenly forgot their differences, and began to
+chat quite amicably. The soldiers twirled their mustachios, listened,
+smiled, and essayed to join in the conversation. In a few minutes all
+was mirth and flirtation.
+
+Meanwhile Müller was casting admiring glances on the young girl in the
+corner, whilst the fat countrywoman, pursing up her mouth, and watching
+the grisettes and soldiers, looked the image of offended virtue.
+
+"Dame! Madame," she said, addressing herself to the old lady in the
+bonnet, "girls usen't to be so forward in the days when you and I
+were young!"
+
+To which the old lady in the bonnet, blandly smiling, replied:--
+
+"Beautiful, for the time of year."
+
+"Eh? For the time of year? Dame! I don't see that the time of year has
+anything to do with it," exclaimed the fat countrywoman.
+
+Here the young girl in the corner, blushing and smiling very sweetly,
+interposed with--"Pardon, Madame--my aunt is somewhat deaf. Pray,
+excuse her."
+
+Whereupon the old lady, watching the motion of her niece's lips, added--
+
+"Ah, yes--yes! I am a poor, deaf old woman--I don't understand what you
+say. Talk to my little Marie, here--she can answer you."
+
+"I, for one, desire nothing better than permission to talk to
+Mademoiselle," said Müller, gallantly.
+
+_"Mais, Monsieur_..."
+
+"Mademoiselle, with Madame her aunt, are going to the fête at
+Courbevoie?"
+
+"Yes, Monsieur."
+
+"The river is very pretty thereabouts, and the walks through the meadows
+are delightful."
+
+"Indeed, Monsieur!"
+
+"Mademoiselle does not know the place?"
+
+"No, Monsieur."
+
+"Ah, if I might only be permitted to act as guide! I know every foot of
+the ground about Courbevoie."
+
+Mademoiselle Marie blushed again, looked down, and made no reply.
+
+"I am a painter," continued Müller; "and I have sketched all the
+windings of the Seine from Neuilly to St. Germains. My friend here is
+English--he is a student of medicine, and speaks excellent French."
+
+"What is the gentleman saying, _mon enfant_?" asked the old lady,
+somewhat anxiously.
+
+"Monsieur says that the river is very pretty about Courbevoie, _ma
+tante_," replied Mademoiselle Marie, raising her voice.
+
+"Ah! ah! and what else?"
+
+"Monsieur is a painter."
+
+"A painter? Ah, dear me! it's an unhealthy occupation. My poor brother
+Pierre might have been alive to this day if he had taken to any other
+line of business! You must take great care of your lungs, young man. You
+look delicate."
+
+Müller laughed, shook his head, and declared at the top of his voice
+that he had never had a day's illness in his life.
+
+Here the pretty niece again interposed.
+
+"Ah, Monsieur," she said, "my aunt does not understand....My--my uncle
+Pierre was a house-painter."
+
+"A very respectable occupation, Mademoiselle," replied Müller, politely.
+"For my own part, I would sooner paint the insides of some houses than
+the outsides of some people."
+
+At this moment the train began to slacken pace, and the steam was let
+off with a demoniac shriek.
+
+"_Tiens, mon enfant_," said the old lady, turning towards her niece with
+affectionate anxiety. "I hope you have not taken cold."
+
+The excellent soul believed that it was Mademoiselle Marie who sneezed.
+
+And now the train had stopped--the porters were running along the
+platform, shouting "Courbevoie! Courbevoie!"--the passengers were
+scrambling out _en masse_--and beyond the barrier one saw a confused
+crowd of _charrette_ and omnibus-drivers, touters, fruit-sellers, and
+idlers of every description. Müller handed out the old lady and the
+niece; the fat countrywoman scrambled up into a kind of tumbril driven
+by a boy in _sabots_; the grisettes and soldiers walked off together;
+and the tide of holiday-makers, some on foot, some in hired vehicles,
+set towards the village. In the meanwhile, what with the crowd on the
+platform and the crowd outside the barrier, and what with the hustling
+and pushing at the point where the tickets were taken, we lost sight of
+the old lady and her niece.
+
+"What the deuce has become of _ma tante_?" exclaimed Müller, looking
+round.
+
+But neither _ma tante_ nor Mademoiselle Marie were anywhere to be seen.
+I suggested that they must have gone on in the omnibus or taken a
+_charrette_, and so have passed us unperceived.
+
+"And, after all," I added, "we didn't want to enter upon an indissoluble
+union with them for the rest of the day. _Ma tante's_ deafness is not
+entertaining, and _la petite_ Marie has nothing to say."
+
+"_La petite_ Marie is uncommonly pretty, though," said Müller. "I mean
+to dance a quadrille with her by-and-by, I promise you."
+
+"_A la bonne heure_! We shall be sure to chance upon them again before
+long."
+
+We had come by this time to a group of pretty villa-residences with high
+garden walls and little shady side-lanes leading down to the river. Then
+came a church and more houses; then an open Place; and suddenly we found
+ourselves in the midst of the fair.
+
+It was just like any other of the hundred and one fêtes that take place
+every summer in the environs of Paris. There was a merry-go-round and a
+greasy pole; there was a juggler who swallowed knives and ribbons; there
+were fortune-tellers without number; there were dining-booths, and
+drinking-booths, and dancing-booths; there were acrobats, organ-boys
+with monkeys, and Savoyards with white mice; there were stalls for the
+sale of cakes, fruit, sweetmeats, toys, combs, cheap jewelry, glass,
+crockery, boots and shoes, holy-water vessels, rosaries, medals, and
+little colored prints of saints and martyrs; there were brass bands, and
+string bands, and ballad-singers everywhere; and there was an atmosphere
+compounded of dust, tobacco-smoke, onions, musk, and every objectionable
+perfume under heaven.
+
+"Dine at the Restaurant de l'Empire, Messieurs," shouted a shabby
+touter in a blouse, thrusting a greasy card into our faces. "Three
+dishes, a dessert, a half-bottle, and a band of music, for one
+franc-fifty. The cheapest dinner in the fair!"
+
+"The cheapest dinner in the fair is at the Belle Gabrielle!" cried
+another. "We'll give you for the same money soup, fish, two dishes, a
+dessert, a half-bottle, and take your photograph into the bargain!"
+
+"Bravo! _mon vieux_--you first poison them with your dinner, and then
+provide photographs for the widows and children," retorts touter number
+one. "That's justice, anyhow."
+
+Whereupon touter number two shrieks out a torrent of abuse, and we push
+on, leaving them to settle their differences after their own fashion.
+
+At the next booth we are accosted by a burly fellow daubed to the eyes
+with red and blue paint, and dressed as an Indian chief.
+
+"_Entrez, entrez, Messieurs et Mesdames_" he cries, flourishing a
+war-spear some nine feet in length. "Come and see the wonderful Peruvian
+maiden of Tanjore, with webbed fingers and toes, her mouth in the back
+of her head, and her eyes in the soles of her feet! Only four sous each,
+and an opportunity that will never occur again!"
+
+"Only fifty centimes!" shouts another public orator; "the most ingenious
+little machine ever invented! Goes into the waistcoat pocket--is wound
+up every twenty-four hours--tells the day of the month, the day of the
+year, the age of the moon, the state of the Bourse, the bank rate of
+discount, the quarter from which the wind is blowing, the price of
+new-laid eggs in Paris and the provinces, the rate of mortality in the
+Fee-jee islands, and the state of your sweetheart's affections!"
+
+A little further on, by dint of much elbowing, we made our way into a
+crowded booth where, for the modest consideration of two sous per head,
+might be seen a Boneless Youth and an Ashantee King. The performances
+were half over when we went in. The Boneless Youth had gone through his
+feats of agility, and was lying on a mat in a corner of the stage, the
+picture of limp incapability. The Ashantee monarch was just about to
+make his appearance. Meanwhile, a little man in fleshings and a cocked
+hat addressed the audience.
+
+"Messieurs and Mesdames--I have the honor to announce that Caraba
+Radokala, King of Ashantee, will next appear before you. This terrific
+native sovereign was taken captive by that famous Dutch navigator, the
+Mynheer Van Dunk, in his last voyage round the globe. Van Dunk, having
+brought his prisoner to Europe in an iron cage, sold him to the English
+government in 1840; who sold him again to Milord Barnum, the great
+American philanthropist, in 1842; who sold him again to Franconi of the
+Cirque Olympique; who finally sold him to me. At the time of his
+capture, Caraba Radokala was the most treacherous, barbarous, and
+sanguinary monster upon record. He had three hundred and sixty-five
+wives--a wife, you observe, for every day in the year. He lived
+exclusively upon human flesh, and consumed, when in good health, one
+baby per diem. His palace in Ashantee was built entirely of the skulls
+and leg-bones of his victims. He is now, however, much less ferocious;
+and, though he feeds on live pigeons, rabbits, dogs, mice, and the like,
+he has not tasted human flesh since his captivity. He is also heavily
+ironed. The distinguished company need therefore entertain no
+apprehensions. Pierre--draw the bolt, and let his majesty loose!"
+
+A savage roar was now heard, followed by a rattling of chains. Then the
+curtains were suddenly drawn back, and the Ashantee king--crowned with a
+feather head-dress, loaded with red and blue war-paint, and chained from
+ankle to ankle--bounded on the stage.
+
+Seeing the audience before him, he uttered a terrific howl. The front
+rows were visibly agitated. Several young women faintly screamed.
+
+The little man in the cocked hat rushed to the front, protesting that
+the ladies had no reason to be alarmed. Caraba Radokala, if not wantonly
+provoked, was now quite harmless--a little irritable, perhaps, from
+being waked too suddenly--would be as gentle as a lamb, if given
+something to eat:--"Pierre, quiet his majesty with a pigeon!"
+
+Pierre, a lank lad in motley, hereupon appeared with a live pigeon,
+which immediately escaped from his hands and perched on the top of the
+proscenium. Caraba Radokala yelled; the little man in the cocked hat
+raved; and Pierre, in default of more pigeons, contritely reappeared
+with a lump of raw beef, into which his majesty ravenously dug his royal
+teeth. The pigeon, meanwhile, dressed its feathers and looked
+complacently down, as if used to the incident.
+
+"Having fed, Caraba Radokala will now be quite gentle and good-humored,"
+said the showman. "If any lady desires to shake hands with him, she may
+do so with perfect safety. Will any lady embrace the opportunity?"
+
+A faint sound of tittering was heard in various parts of the booth; but
+no one came forward.
+
+"Will _no_ lady be persuaded? Well, then, is there any gentleman present
+who speaks Ashantee?"
+
+Müller gave me a dig with his elbow, and started to his feet.
+
+"Yes," he replied, loudly. "I do."
+
+Every head was instantly turned in our direction.
+
+The showman collapsed with astonishment. Even the captive, despite his
+ignorance of the French tongue, looked considerably startled.
+
+"_Comment_!" stammered the cocked hat. "Monsieur speaks Ashantee?"
+
+"Fluently."
+
+"Is it permitted to inquire how and when monsieur acquired this very
+unusual accomplishment?"
+
+"I have spoken Ashantee from my infancy," replied Müller, with admirable
+aplomb. "I was born at sea, brought up in an undiscovered island, twice
+kidnapped by hostile tribes before attaining the age of ten years, and
+have lived among savage nations all my life."
+
+A murmur of admiration ran through the audience, and Müller became, for
+the time, an object of livelier interest than Caraba Radokala himself.
+Seeing this, the indignant monarch executed a warlike _pas_, and rattled
+his chains fiercely.
+
+"In that case, monsieur, you had better come upon the stage, and speak
+to his majesty," said the showman reluctantly.
+
+"With all the pleasure in life."
+
+"But I warn you that his temper is uncertain."
+
+"Bah!" said Müller, working his way round through the crowd, "I'm not
+afraid of his temper."
+
+"As monsieur pleases--but, if monsieur offends him, _I_ will not be
+answerable for the consequences."
+
+"All right--give us a hand up, _mon vieux_!" And Muller, having
+clambered upon the stage, made a bow to the audience and a salaam to
+his majesty.
+
+"Chickahominy chowdar bang," said he, by way of opening the
+conversation.
+
+The ex-king of Ashantee scowled, folded his arms, and maintained a
+haughty silence.
+
+"Hic hac horum, high cockalorum," continued Müller, with exceeding
+suavity.
+
+The captive monarch stamped impatiently, ground his teeth, but still
+made no reply.
+
+"Monsieur had better not aggravate him," said the showman. "On the
+contrary--I am overwhelming him with civilities Now observe--I condole
+with him upon his melancholy position. I inquire after his wives and
+children; and I remark how uncommonly well he is looking."
+
+And with this, he made another salaam, smiled persuasively, and said--
+
+"Alpha, beta, gamma, delta--chin-chin--Potz tausend!--Erin-go-bragh!"
+
+"Borriobooloobah!" shrieked his majesty, apparently stung to
+desperation.
+
+"Rocofoco!" retorted Müller promptly.
+
+But as if this last was more than any Ashantee temper could bear, Caraba
+Rodokala clenched both his fists, set his teeth hard, and charged down
+upon Müller like a wild elephant. Being met, however, by a well-planted
+blow between the eyes, he went down like a ninepin--picked himself
+up,--rushed in again, and, being forcibly seized and held back by the
+cocked hat, Pierre of the pigeons, and a third man who came tumbling up
+precipitately from somewhere behind the stage, vented his fury, in a
+torrent of very highly civilized French oaths.
+
+"Eh, _sacredieu_!" he cried, shaking his fist in Müller's face, "I've
+not done with you yet, _diable de galérien_!"
+
+Whereupon there burst forth a general roar--a roar like the
+"inextinguishable laughter" of Olympus.
+
+"_Tiens_!" said Müller, "his majesty speaks French almost as well as I
+speak Ashantee!"
+
+"_Bourreau! Brigand! Assassin_!" shrieked his Ferocity, as his friends
+hustled him off the stage.
+
+The curtains then fell together again; and the audience, still laughing
+vociferously, dispersed with cries of "Vive Caraba Rodokala!" "Kind
+remembrances to the Queens of Ashantee!" "What's the latest news from
+home?" "Borriobooloo-bah--ah--ah!"
+
+Elbowing our way out with the crowd, we now plunged once more into the
+press of the fair. Here our old friends the dancing dogs of the Champs
+Elysées, and the familiar charlatan of the Place du Châtelet with his
+chariot and barrel-organ, transported us from Ashantee to Paris. Next we
+came to a temporary shooting-gallery, adorned over the entrance with a
+spirited cartoon of a Tyrolean sharpshooter; and then to an exhibition
+of cosmoramas; and presently to a weighing machine, in which a great,
+rosy-cheeked, laughing Normandy peasant girl, with her high cap, blue
+skirt, massive gold cross and heavy ear-rings, was in the act of
+being weighed.
+
+"_Tiens! Mam'selle est joliment solide_!" remarks a saucy bystander, as
+the owner of the machine piles on weight after weight.
+
+"Perhaps if I had no more brains than m'sieur, I should weigh as light!"
+retorts the damsel, with a toss of her high cap.
+
+"_Pardon_! it is not a question of brains--it is a question of hearts,"
+interposes an elderly exquisite in a white hat. "Mam'selle has captured
+so many that she is completely over weighted."
+
+"Twelve stone six ounces," pronounces the owner of the machine,
+adjusting the last weight.
+
+Whereupon there is a burst of ironical applause, and the big _paysanne_,
+half laughing, half angry, walks off, exclaiming, "_Eh bien! tant
+mieux_! I've no mind to be a scarecrow--_moi_!"
+
+By this time we have both had enough of the fair, and are glad to make
+our way out of the crowd and down to the riverside. Here we find lovers
+strolling in pairs along the towing-path; family groups pic-nicking in
+the shade; boats and punts for hire, and a swimming-match just coming
+off, of which all that is visible are two black heads bobbing up and
+down along the middle of the stream.
+
+"And now, _mon ami_, what do you vote for?" asks Müller. "Boating or
+fishing? or both? or neither?"
+
+"Both, if you like--but I never caught anything in my life,"
+
+"The pleasure of fishing, I take it," says Müller, "is not in the fish
+you catch, but in the fish you miss. The fish you catch is a poor little
+wretch, worth neither the trouble of landing, cooking, nor eating; but
+the fish you miss is always the finest fellow you ever saw in
+your life!"
+
+"_Allons donc_! I know, then, which of us two will have most of the
+pleasure to-day," I reply, laughing. "But how about the expense?"
+
+To which Müller, with a noble recklessness, answers:--
+
+"Oh, hang the expense! Here, boatman! a boat _à quatre rames_, and some
+fishing-tackle--by the hour."
+
+Now it was undoubtedly a fine sentiment this of Müller's, and had we but
+fetched my two Napoleons before starting, I should have applauded it to
+the echo; but when I considered that something very nearly approaching
+to a franc had already filtered out of our pockets in passing through
+the fair, and that the hour of dinner was looming somewhat indefinitely
+in the distance, I confess that my soul became disquieted within me.
+
+"Don't forget, for heaven's sake," I said, "that we must keep something
+for dinner!"
+
+"My dear fellow," he replied, "I have already a tremendous appetite for
+dinner--that _is_ something."
+
+After this, I resigned myself to whatever might happen.
+
+We then rowed up the river for about a mile beyond Courbevoie. moored
+our boat to a friendly willow, put our fishing-tackle together, and
+composed ourselves for the gentle excitement that waits upon the gudgeon
+and the minnow.
+
+"I haven't yet had a single nibble," said Müller, when we had been
+sitting to our work for something less than ten minutes.
+
+"Hush!" I said. "You mustn't speak, you know."
+
+"True--I had forgotten. I'll sing instead. Fishes, I have been told, are
+fond of music.
+
+     'Fanfan, je vous aimerais bien;
+       Contre vous je n'ai nul caprice;
+     Vous êtes gentil, j'en convien....'"
+
+"Come, now!" I exclaimed pettishly, "this is really too bad. I had a
+bite--a most decided bite--and if you had only kept quiet"....
+
+"Nonsense, my dear fellow! I tell you again--and I have it on the best
+authority--fishes like music. Did you never hear of Arion! Have you
+forgotten about the Syrens? Believe me, your gudgeon nibbled because I
+sang him to the surface--just as the snakes come out for the song of the
+snake-charmer. I'll try again!"
+
+And with this he began:--
+
+     "Jeannette est une brune
+       Qui demeure à Pantin,
+     Où toute sa fortune
+       Est un petit jardin!"
+
+"Well, if you go on like that, all I have to say is, that not a fish
+will come within half a mile of our bait," said I, with
+tranquil despair.
+
+"Alas! _mon cher_, I am grieved to observe in your otherwise estimable
+character, a melancholy want of faith," replied Müller "Without faith,
+what is friendship? What is angling? What is matrimony? Now, I tell you
+that with regard to the finny tribe, the more I charm them, the more
+enthusiastically they will flock to be caught. We shall have a
+miraculous draught in a few minutes, if you are but patient."
+
+And then he began again:--
+
+     "Mimi Pinson est une blonde,
+       Une blonde que l'on connaît.
+     Elle n'a qu'une robe au monde,
+       Landerirette!
+     Et qu'un bonnet."
+
+I laid aside my rod, folded my arms, and when he had done, applauded
+ironically.
+
+"Very good," I said. "I understand the situation. We are here, at
+some--indeed, I may say, considering the state of our exchequer, at a
+considerable mutual expense; not to catch fish, but to afford Herr
+Müller an opportunity of exercising his extensive memory, and his
+limited baritone voice. The entertainment is not without its
+_agréments_, but I find it dear at the price."
+
+"_Tiens_, Arbuthnot! let us fish seriously. I promise not to open my
+lips again till you have caught something."
+
+"Then, seriously, I believe you would have to be silent the whole night,
+and all I should catch would be the rheumatism. I am the worst angler in
+the world, and the most unlucky."
+
+"Really and truly?"
+
+"Really and truly. And you?"
+
+"As bad as yourself. If a tolerably large and energetic fish did me the
+honor to swallow my bait, the probability is that he would catch me. I
+certainly shouldn't know what to do with him."
+
+"Then the present question is--what shall we do with ourselves?"
+
+"I vote that we row up as far as yonder bend in the river, just to see
+what lies beyond; and then back to Courbevoie."
+
+"Heaven only grant that by that time we shall have enough money left for
+dinner!" I murmured with a sigh.
+
+We rowed up the river as far as the first bend, a distance of about
+half a mile; and then we rowed on as far as the next bend. Then we
+turned, and, resting on our oars, drifted slowly back with the current.
+The evening was indescribably brilliant and serene. The sky was
+cloudless, of a greenish blue, and full of light. The river was clear as
+glass. We could see the flaccid water-weeds swaying languidly with the
+current far below, and now and then a shoal of tiny fish shooting along
+half-way between the weeds and the surface. A rich fringe of purple
+iris, spear-leaved sagittarius, and tufted meadow-sweet (each blossom a
+bouquet on a slender thyrsus) bordered the towing-path and filled the
+air with perfume. Here the meadows lay open to the water's edge; a
+little farther on, they were shut off by a close rampart of poplars and
+willows whose leaves, already yellowed by autumn, were now fiery in the
+sunset. Joyous bands of gnats, like wild little intoxicated maenads,
+circled and hummed about our heads as we drifted slowly on; while, far
+away and mellowed by distance, we heard the brazen music of the fair.
+
+We were both silent. Müller pulled out a small sketch-book and made a
+rapid study of the scene--the reach in the river; the wooded banks; the
+green flats traversed by long lines of stunted pollards; the church-tops
+and roofs of Courbevoie beyond.
+
+Presently a soft voice, singing, broke upon the silence. Müller stopped
+involuntarily, pencil in hand. I held my breath, and listened. The tune
+was flowing and sweet; and as our boat drifted on, the words of the
+singer became audible.
+
+     "O miroir ondoyant!
+     Je rève en te voyant
+     Harmonie et lumière,
+       O ma rivière,
+     O ma belle rivière!
+
+     "On voit se réfléchir
+     Dans ses eaux les nuages;
+     Elle semble dormir
+     Entre les pâturages
+
+     Où paissent les grands boeufs
+     Et les grasses genisses.
+     Au pâtres amoureux
+     Que ses bords sont propices!"
+
+"A woman's voice," said Müller. "Dupont's words and music. She must be
+young and pretty ... where has she hidden herself?"
+
+The unseen singer, meanwhile, went on with another verse.
+
+     "Près des iris du bord,
+     Sous une berge haute,
+     La carpe aux reflets d'or
+     Où le barbeau ressaute,
+     Les goujons font le guet,
+     L'Ablette qui scintille
+     Fuit le dent du brochet;
+     Au fond rampe l'anguille!
+
+     "O miroir ondoyant!
+     Je rève en te voyant
+     Harmonic et lumière,
+       O ma rivière,
+     O ma belle rivière!"
+
+"Look!" said Müller. "Do you not see them yonder--two women under the
+trees? By Jupiter! it's _ma tante_ and _la petite_ Marie!"
+
+Saying which, he flung himself upon his oars and began pulling
+vigorously towards the shore.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV.
+
+THAT TERRIBLE MÜLLER.
+
+La petite Marie broke off at the sound of our oars, and blushed a
+becoming rose-color.
+
+"Will these ladies do us the honor of letting us row them back to
+Courbevoie?" said Müller, running our boat close in against the sedges,
+and pulling off his hat as respectfully as if they were duchesses.
+
+Mademoiselle Marie repeated the invitation to her aunt, who accepted it
+at once.
+
+"_Très volontiers, très volontiers, messieurs_" she said, smiling and
+nodding. "We have rambled out so far--so far! And I am not as young as I
+was forty years ago. _Ah, mon Dieu_! how my old bones ache! Give me thy
+hand, Marie, and thank the gentlemen for their politeness."
+
+So Mam'selle Marie helped her aunt to rise, and we steadied the boat
+close under the bank, at a point where the interlacing roots of a couple
+of sallows made a kind of natural step by means of which they could
+easily get down.
+
+"Oh, dear! dear! it will not turn over, will it, my dear young man?
+_Ciel_! I am slipping ... Ah, _Dieu, merci_!--Marie, _mon cher enfant_,
+pray be careful not to jump in, or you will upset us all!"
+
+And _ma tante_, somewhat tremulous from the ordeal of embarking, settled
+down in her place, while Müller lifted Mam'selle Marie into the boat, as
+if she had been a child. I then took the oars, leaving him to steer; and
+so we pursued our way towards Courbevoie.
+
+"Mam'selle has of course seen the fair?" said Müller, from behind the
+old lady's back.
+
+"No, monsieur,"
+
+"No! Is it possible?"
+
+"There was so much crowd, monsieur, and such a noise ... we were quite
+too much afraid to venture in."
+
+"Would you be afraid, mam'selle, to venture with me?"
+
+"I--I do not know, monsieur."
+
+"Ah, mam'selle, you might be very sure that I would take good care of
+you!"
+
+"_Mais ... monsieur_"...
+
+"These gentlemen, I see, have been angling," said the old lady,
+addressing me very graciously. "Have you caught many fish?"
+
+"None at all, madame!" I replied, loudly.
+
+"_Tiens_! so many as that?"
+
+"_Pardon_, madame," I shouted at the top of my voice. "We have caught
+nothing--nothing at all."
+
+_Ma tante_ smiled blandly.
+
+"Ah, yes," she said; "and you will have them cooked presently for
+dinner, _n'est-ce pas_? There is no fish so fresh, and so well-flavored,
+as the fish of our own catching."
+
+"Will madame and mam'selle do us the honor to taste our fish and share
+our modest dinner?" said Müller, leaning forward in his seat in the
+stern, and delivering his invitation close into the old lady's ear.
+
+To which _ma tante_, with a readiness of hearing for which no one would
+have given her credit, replied:--
+
+"But--but monsieur is very polite--if we should not be inconveniencing
+these gentlemen"....
+
+"We shall be charmed, madame--we shall be honored!"
+
+"_Eh bien!_ with pleasure, then--Marie, my child, thank the gentlemen
+for their amiable invitation."
+
+I was thunderstruck. I looked at Müller to see if he had suddenly gone
+out of his senses. Mam'selle Marie, however, was infinitely amused.
+
+"_Fi donc!_ monsieur," she said. "You have no fish. I heard the other
+gentleman say so."
+
+"The other gentleman, mam'selle," replied Müller, "is an Englishman, and
+troubled with the spleen. You must not mind anything he says."
+
+Troubled with the spleen! I believe myself to be as even-tempered and as
+ready to fall in with a joke as most men; but I should have liked at
+that moment to punch Franz Müller's head. Gracious heavens! into what a
+position he had now brought us! What was to be done? How were we to get
+out of it? It was now just seven; and we had already been upon the water
+for more than an hour. What should we have to pay for the boat? And when
+we had paid for the boat, how much money should we have left to pay for
+the dinner? Not for our own dinners--ah, no! For _ma tante's_ dinner
+(and _ma tante_ had a hungry eye) and for _la petite_ Marie's dinner;
+and _la petite_ Marie, plump, rosy, and well-liking, looked as if she
+might have a capital appetite upon occasion! Should we have as much as
+two and a half francs? I doubted it. And then, in the absence of a
+miracle, what could we do with two and a half francs, if we had them? A
+miserable sum!--convertible, perhaps, into as much bouilli, bread and
+cheese, and thin country wine as might have satisfied our own hunger in
+a prosaic and commonplace way; but for four persons, two of
+them women!...
+
+And this was not the worst of it. I thought I knew Müller well enough by
+this time to feel that he would entirely dismiss this minor
+consideration of ways and means; that he would order the dinner as
+recklessly as if we had twenty francs apiece in our pockets; and that he
+would not only order it, but eat it and preside at it with all the
+gayety and audacity in life.
+
+Then would come the horrible retribution of the bill!
+
+I felt myself turn red and hot at the mere thought of it.
+
+Then a dastardly idea insinuated itself into my mind. I had my
+return-ticket in my waistcoat-pocket:--what if I slipped away presently
+to the station and went back to Paris by the next train, leaving my
+clever friend to improvise his way out of his own scrape as best
+he could?
+
+In the meanwhile, as I was rowing with the stream, we soon got back to
+Courbevoie.
+
+"_Are_ you mad?" I said, as, having landed the ladies, Müller and I
+delivered up the boat to its owner.
+
+"Didn't I admit it, two or three hours ago?" he replied. "I wonder you
+don't get tired, _mon cher_, of asking the same question so often."
+
+"Four francs, fifty centimes, Messieurs," said the boatman, having made
+fast his boat to the landing-place.
+
+"Four francs, fifty centimes!" I echoed, in dismay.
+
+Even Müller looked aghast.
+
+"My good fellow," he said, "do you take us for coiners?"
+
+"Hire of boat, two francs the hour. These gentlemen have been out
+nearly one hour and a half--three francs. Hire of bait and
+fishing-tackle, one franc fifty. Total, four francs and a half," replied
+the boatman, putting out a great brown palm.
+
+Müller, who was acting as cashier and paymaster, pulled out his purse,
+deposited one solitary half-franc in the middle of that brown palm, and
+suggested that the boatman and he should toss up for the remaining four
+francs--or race for them--or play for them--or fight for them. The
+boatman, however, indignantly rejected each successive proposal, and,
+being paid at last, retired with a _decrescendo_ of oaths.
+
+"_Tiens_!" said Müller, reflectively. "We have but one franc left. One
+franc, two sous, and a centime. _Vive la France!_"
+
+"And you have actually asked that wretched old woman and her niece to
+dinner!"
+
+"And I have actually solicited that excellent and admirable woman,
+Madame Marotte, relict of the late lamented Jacques Marotte, umbrella
+maker, of number one hundred and two, Rue du Faubourg St. Denis, and her
+beautiful and accomplished niece, Mademoiselle Marie Charpentier, to
+honor us with their company this evening. _Dis-donc,_ what shall we give
+them for dinner?"
+
+"Precisely what you invited them to, I should guess--the fish we caught
+this afternoon."
+
+"Agreed. And what else?"
+
+"Say--a dish of invisible greens, and a phoenix _à la Marengo_."
+
+"You are funny, _mon cher_."
+
+"Then, for fear I should become too funny--good afternoon."
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"I mean that I have no mind to dine first, and be kicked out of doors
+afterwards. It is one of those aids to digestion that I can willingly
+dispense with."
+
+"But if I guarantee that the dinner shall be paid for--money down!"
+
+"Tra la la!"
+
+"You don't believe me? Well, come and see."
+
+With this, he went up to Madame Marotte, who, with her niece, had sat
+down on a bench under a walnut-tree close by, waiting our pleasure.
+
+"Would not these ladies prefer to rest here, while we seek for a
+suitable restaurant and order the dinner?" said Müller insinuatingly.
+
+The old lady looked somewhat blank. She was not too tired to go
+on--thought it a pity to bring us all the way back again--would do,
+however, as "_ces messieurs_" pleased; and so was left sitting under the
+walnut-tree, reluctant and disconsolate.
+
+"_Tiens! mon enfant_" I heard her say as we turned away, "suppose they
+don't come back again!"
+
+We had promised to be gone not longer, than twenty minutes, or at most
+half an hour. Müller led the way straight to the _Toison d' Or_.
+
+I took him by the arm as we neared the gate.
+
+"Steady, steady, _mon gaillard_" I said. "We don't order our dinner, you
+know, till we've found the money to pay for it."
+
+"True--but suppose I go in here to look for it?"
+
+"Into the restaurant garden?"
+
+"Precisely."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI.
+
+THE PETIT COURIER ILLUSTRÉ.
+
+THE _Toison d' Or_ was but a modest little establishment as regarded the
+house, but it was surrounded on three sides by a good-sized garden
+overlooking the river. Here, in the trellised arbors which lined the
+lawn on either side, those customers who preferred the open air could
+take their dinners, coffees, and absinthes _al fresco_.
+
+The scene when we arrived was at its gayest. There were dinners going on
+in every arbor; waiters running distractedly to and fro with trays and
+bottles; two women, one with a guitar, the other with a tamborine,
+singing under a tree in the middle of the garden; while in the air there
+reigned an exhilarating confusion of sounds and smells impossible
+to describe.
+
+We went in. Müller paused, looked round, captured a passing waiter, and
+asked for Monsieur le propriétaire. The waiter pointed over his shoulder
+towards the house, and breathlessly rushed on his way.
+
+Müller at once led the way into a salon on the ground-floor looking over
+the garden.
+
+Here we found ourselves in a large low room containing some thirty or
+forty tables, and fitted up after the universal restaurant pattern, with
+cheap-looking glasses, rows of hooks, and spittoons in due number. The
+air was heavy with the combined smells of many dinners, and noisy with
+the clatter of many tongues. Behind the fruits, cigars, and liqueur
+bottles that decorated the _comptoir_ sat a plump, black-eyed little
+woman in a gorgeous cap and a red silk dress. This lady welcomed us with
+a bewitching smile and a gracious inclination of the head.
+
+"_Ces messieurs_," she said, "will find a vacant table yonder, by the
+window."
+
+Müller bowed majestically.
+
+"Madame," he said, "I wish to see Monsieur le propriétaire."
+
+The dame de comptoir looked very uneasy.
+
+"If Monsieur has any complaint to make," she said, "he can make it to
+me."
+
+"Madame, I have none."
+
+"Or if it has reference to the ordering of a dinner...."
+
+Müller smiled loftily.
+
+"Dinner, Madame," he said, with a disdainful gesture, "is but one of the
+accidents common to humanity. A trifle! A trifle always
+humiliating--sometimes inconvenient--occasionally impossible. No,
+Madame, mine is a serious mission; a mission of the highest importance,
+both socially and commercially. May I beg that you will have the
+goodness to place my card in the hands of Monsieur le propriétaire, and
+say that I request the honor of five minutes' interview."
+
+The little woman's eyes had all this time been getting rounder and
+blacker. She was evidently confounded by my friend's grandiloquence.
+
+"_Ah! mon Dieu! M'sieur_," she said, nervously, "my husband is in the
+kitchen. It is a busy day with us, you understand--but I will send
+for him."
+
+And she forthwith despatched a waiter for "Monsieur Choucru."
+
+Müller seized me by the arm.
+
+"Heavens!" he exclaimed, in a very audible aside, "did you hear? She is
+his wife! She is Madame Choucru?"
+
+"Well, and what of that?"
+
+"What of that, indeed? _Mais, mon ami_, how can you ask the question?
+Have you no eyes? Look at her! Such a remarkably handsome woman--such a
+_tournure_--such eyes--such a figure for an illustration! Only conceive
+the effect of Madame Choucru--in medallion!"
+
+"Oh, magnificent!" I replied. "Magnificent--in medallion."
+
+But I could not, for the life of me, imagine what he was driving at.
+
+"And it would make the fortune of the _Toison d'Or_" he added, solemnly.
+
+To which I replied that it would undoubtedly do so.
+
+Monsieur Choucru now came upon the scene; a short, rosy, round-faced
+little man in a white flat cap and bibbed apron--like an elderly cherub
+that had taken to cookery. He hung back upon the threshold, wiping his
+forehead, and evidently unwilling to show himself in his shirt-sleeves.
+
+"Here, _mon bon_," cried Madame, who was by this time crimson with
+gratified vanity, and in a fever of curiosity; "this way--the gentleman
+is waiting to speak to you!"
+
+Monsieur, the cook and proprietor, shuffled his feet to and fro in the
+doorway, but came no nearer.
+
+"_Parbleu_!" he said, "if M'sieur's business is not urgent."
+
+"It is extremely urgent, Monsieur Choucru," replied Müller; "and,
+moreover, it is not so much my business as it is yours,"
+
+"Ah bah! if it is my business, then, it may stand over till to-morrow,"
+replied the little man, impatiently. "To-day I have eighty dinners on
+hand, and with M'sieur's permission"....
+
+But Müller strode to the door and caught him by the shoulder.
+
+"No, Monsieur Choucru," he said sternly, "I will not let you ruin
+yourself by putting off till to-morrow what can only be done to-day. I
+have come here, Monsieur Choucru, to offer you fame. Fame and fortune,
+Monsieur Choucru!--and I will not suffer you, for the sake of a few
+miserable dinners, to turn your back upon the most brilliant moment of
+your life!"
+
+"_Mais, M'sieur_--explain yourself" ... stammered the propriétaire.
+
+"You know who I am, Monsieur Choucru?"
+
+"No, M'sieur--not in the least."
+
+"I am Müller--Franz Müller--landscape painter, portrait painter,
+historical painter, caricaturist, artist _en chef_ to the _Petit Courier
+Illustré_"
+
+"_Hein! M'sieur est peintre_!"
+
+"Yes, Monsieur Choucru--and I offer you my protection."
+
+Monsieur Choucru scratched his ear, and smiled doubtfully.
+
+"Now listen, Monsieur Choucru--I am here to-day in the interests of the
+_Petit Courier Illustré_. I take the Courbevoie fête for my subject. I
+sketch the river, the village, the principal features of the-scene; and
+on Saturday my designs are in the hands of all Paris. Do you
+understand me?"
+
+"I understand that M'sieur is all this time talking to me of his own
+business, while mine, _là bas_, is standing still!" exclaimed the
+propriétaire, in an agony of impatience. "I have the honor to wish
+M'sieur good-day."
+
+But Müller seized him again, and would not let him escape.
+
+"Not so fast, Monsieur Choucru," he said; "not so fast! Will you answer
+me one question before you go?"
+
+"_Eh, mon Dieu_! Monsieur."
+
+"Will you tell me, Monsieur Choucru, what is to prevent me from giving
+a view of the best restaurant in Courbevoie?"
+
+Madame Choucru, from behind the _comptoir_, uttered a little scream.
+
+"A design in the _Petit Courier Illustré_, I need scarcely tell you,"
+pursued Müller, with indescribable pomposity, "is in itself sufficient
+to make the fortune not only of an establishment, but of a neighborhood.
+I am about to make Courbevoie the fashion. The sun of Asnières, of
+Montmorency, of Enghien has set--the sun of Courbevoie is about to rise.
+My sketches will produce an unheard-of effect. All Paris will throng to
+your fêtes next Sunday and Monday--all Paris, with its inexhaustible
+appetite for _bifteck aux pommes frites_--all Paris with its
+unquenchable thirst for absinthe and Bavarian beer! Now, Monsieur
+Choucru, do you begin to understand me?"
+
+"_Mais_, Monsieur, I--I think...."
+
+"You think you do, Monsieur Choucru? Very good. Then will you please to
+answer me one more question. What is to prevent me from conferring fame,
+fortune, and other benefits too numerous to mention on your excellent
+neighbor at the corner of the Place--Monsieur Coquille of the Restaurant
+_Croix de Malte_?"
+
+Monsieur Choucru scratched his ear again, stared helplessly at his wife,
+and said nothing. Madame looked grave.
+
+"Are we to treat this matter on the footing of a business transaction,
+Monsieur!" she asked, somewhat sharply. "Because, if so, let Monsieur at
+once name his price for me...."
+
+"'PRICE,' Madame!" interrupted Müller, with a start of horror. "Gracious
+powers! this to me--to Franz Müller of the _Petit Courier Illustré_!
+'No, Madame--you mistake me--you wound me--you touch the honor of the
+Fine Arts! Madame, I am incapable of selling my patronage."
+
+Madame clasped her hands; raised her voice; rolled her black eyes; did
+everything but burst into tears. She was shocked to have offended
+Monsieur! She was profoundly desolated! She implored a thousand pardons!
+And then, like a true French-woman of business, she brought back the
+conversation to the one important point:--since money was not in
+question, upon what consideration would Monsieur accord his preference
+to the _Toison d' Or_ instead of to the _Croix de Malte_?
+
+Müller bowed, laid his hand upon his heart, and said:--
+
+"I will do it, _pour les beaux yeux de Madame_."
+
+And then, in graceful recognition of the little man's rights as owner of
+the eyes in question, he bowed to Monsieur Choucru.
+
+Madame was inexpressibly charmed. Monsieur smiled, fidgeted, and cast
+longing glances towards the door.
+
+"I have eighty dinners on hand," he began again, "and if M'sieur will
+excuse me...."
+
+"One moment more, my dear Monsieur Choucru," said Müller, slipping his
+hand affectionately through the little man's arm. "For myself, as I have
+already told you, I can accept nothing--but I am bound in honor not to
+neglect the interests of the journal I represent. You will of course
+wish to express your sense of the compliment paid to your house by
+adding your name to the subscription list of the _Petit Courier
+Illustré_?"
+
+"Oh, by--by all means--with pleasure," faltered the propriétaire.
+
+"For how many copies, Monsieur Choucru? Shall we say--six?"
+
+Monsieur looked at Madame. Madame nodded. Müller took out his
+pocket-book, and waited, pencil in hand.
+
+"Eh--_parbleu_!--let it be for six, then," said Monsieur Choucru,
+somewhat reluctantly.
+
+Müller made the entry, shut up the pocket-book, and shook hands
+boisterously with his victim.
+
+"My dear Monsieur Choucru," he said, "I cannot tell you how gratifying
+this is to my feelings, or with what disinterested satisfaction I shall
+make your establishment known to the Parisian public. You shall be
+immortalized, my dear fellow--positively immortalized!"
+
+"_Bien obligé, M'sieur--bien obligé_. Will you not let my wife offer you
+a glass of liqueure?"
+
+"Liqueure, _mon cher_!" exclaimed Müller, with an outburst of frank
+cordiality--"hang liqueure!--WE'LL DINE WITH YOU!"
+
+"Monsieur shall be heartily welcome to the best dinner the _Toison d'Or_
+can send up; and his friend also," said Madame, with her sweetest smile.
+
+"Ah, Madame!"
+
+"And M'sieur Choucru shall make you one of his famous cheese soufflés.
+_Tiens, mon bon_, go down and prepare a cheese soufflé for two."
+
+Müller smote his forehead distractedly.
+
+"For two!" he cried. "Heavens! I had forgotten my aunt and my cousin!"
+
+Madame looked up inquiringly.
+
+"Monsieur has forgotten something?"
+
+"Two somethings, Madame--two somebodies! My aunt--my excellent and
+admirable maternal aunt,--and my cousin. We left them sitting under a
+tree by the river-side, more than half an hour ago. But the fault,
+Madame, is yours."
+
+"How, Monsieur?"
+
+"Yes; for in your charming society I forget the ties of family and the
+laws of politeness. But I hasten to fetch my forgotten relatives. With
+what pleasure they will share your amiable hospitality! _Au revoir_,
+Madame. In ten minutes we shall be with you again!"
+
+Madame Choucru looked grave. She had not bargained to entertain a party
+of four; yet she dared not disoblige the _Petit Courier Illustré_. She
+had no time, however, to demur to the arrangement; for Müller,
+ingeniously taking her acquiescence for granted, darted out of the room
+without waiting for an answer.
+
+"Miserable man!" I exclaimed, as soon as we were outside the doors,
+"what will you do now?"
+
+"Do! Why, fetch my admirable maternal aunt and my interesting cousin, to
+be sure."
+
+"But you have raised a dinner under false pretences!"
+
+"I, _mon cher_? Not a bit of it."
+
+"Have you, then, really anything to do with the _Petit Courier
+Illustré_?"
+
+"The Editor of the _Petit Courier Illustré_ is one of the best fellows
+in the world, and occasionally (when my pockets represent that vacuum
+which Nature very properly abhors) he advances me a couple of Napoleons.
+I wipe out the score from time to time by furnishing a design for the
+paper. Now to-day, you see, I'm in luck. I shall pay off two obligations
+at once--to say nothing of Monsieur Choucru's six-fold subscription to
+the P.C., on which the publishers will allow me a douceur of thirty
+francs. Now, confess that I'm a man of genius!"
+
+In less than a quarter of an hour we were all four established round one
+of Madame Choucru's comfortable little dining-tables, in a snug recess
+at the farthest end of the salon. Here, being well out of reach of our
+hostess's black eyes, Müller assumed all the airs of a liberal
+entertainer. He hung up _ma cousine's_ bonnet; fetched a footstool for
+_ma tante_; criticised the sauces; presided over the wine; cut jokes
+with the waiter; and pretended to have ordered every dish beforehand.
+The stewed kidneys with mushrooms were provided especially for Madame
+Marotte; the fricandeau was selected in honor of Mam'selle Marie (had he
+not an innate presentiment that she loved fricandeau?); and as for the
+soles _au gratin_, he swore, in defiance of probability and all the laws
+of nature, that they were the very fish we had just caught in the Seine.
+By-and-by came Monsieur Choucru's famous cheese _soufflé_; and then,
+with a dish of fruit, four cups of coffee, and four glasses of liqueure,
+the banquet came to an end.
+
+As we sat at desert, Müller pulled out his book and pencilled a rapid
+but flattering sketch of the dining-room interior, developing a
+perspective as long as the Rue de Rivoli, and a _mobilier_ at least
+equal in splendor to that of the _Trois Frères_.
+
+At sight of this _chef d'oeuvre_, Madame Choucru was moved almost to
+tears. Ah, Heaven! if Monsieur could only figure to himself her
+admiration for his _beau talent_! But alas! that was impossible--as
+impossible as that Monsieur Choucru should ever repay this unheard-of
+obligation!
+
+Müller laid his hand upon his heart, and bowed profoundly.
+
+"Ah! Madame," he said, "it is not to Monsieur Choucru that I look for
+repayment--it is to you."
+
+"To me, Monsieur? _Dieu merci! Monsieur se moque de moi_!"
+
+And the Dame de Comptoir, intrenched behind her fruits and liqueure
+bottles, shot a Parthian glance from under her black eye-lashes, and
+made believe to blush.
+
+"Yes, Madame, to you. I only ask permission to come again very soon, for
+the purpose of executing a little portrait of Madame--a little portrait
+which, alas! _must_ fail to render adequate justice to such a multitude
+of charms."
+
+And with this choice compliment, Müller bowed again, took his leave,
+bestowed a whole franc upon the astonished waiter, and departed from the
+_Toison d'Or_ in an atmosphere of glory.
+
+The fair, or rather that part of the fair where the dancers and diners
+most did congregate, was all ablaze with lights, and noisy with brass
+bands as we came out. _Ma tante_, who was somewhat tired, and had been
+dozing for the last half hour over her coffee and liqueure, was
+impatient to get back to Paris. The fair Marie, who was not tired at
+all, confessed that she should enjoy a waltz above everything. While
+Müller, who professed to be an animated time-table, swore that we were
+just too late for the ten minutes past ten train, and that there would
+be no other before eleven forty-five. So Madame Marotte was carried off,
+_bon gré, mal gré_, to a dancing-booth, where gentlemen were admitted on
+payment of forty centimes per head, and ladies went in free.
+
+Here, despite the noise, the dust, the braying of an abominable band,
+the overwhelming smell of lamp-oil, and the clatter, not only of heavy
+walking-boots, but even of several pairs of sabots upon an uneven floor
+of loosely-joined planks--_ma tante_, being disposed of in a safe
+corner, went soundly to sleep.
+
+It was a large booth, somewhat over-full; and the company consisted
+mainly of Parisian blue blouses, little foot-soldiers, grisettes (for
+there were grisettes in those days, and plenty of them), with a
+sprinkling of farm-boys and dairy-maids from the villages round about.
+We found this select society caracoling round the booth in a thundering
+galop, on first going in. After the galop, the conductor announced a
+_valse à deux temps_. The band struck up--one--two--three. Away went
+some thirty couples--away went Müller and the fair Marie--and away went
+the chronicler of this modest biography with a pretty little girl in
+green boots who waltzed remarkably well, and who deserted him in the
+middle of the dance for a hideous little French soldier about four feet
+and a half high.
+
+After this rebuff (having learned, notwithstanding my friend's
+representations to the contrary, that a train ran from Courbevoie to
+Paris every half-hour up till midnight) I slipped away, leaving Müller
+and _ma cousine_ in the midst of a furious flirtation, and Madame
+Marotte fast asleep in her corner.
+
+The clocks were just striking twelve as I passed under the archway
+leading to the Cité Bergère.
+
+"_Tiens_!" said the fat concierge, as she gave me my key and my candle.
+"Monsieur has perhaps been to the theatre this evening? No!--to the
+country--to the fête at Courbevoie! Ah, then, I'll be sworn that M'sieur
+has had plenty of fun!"
+
+But had I had plenty of fun? That was the question. That Müller had had
+plenty of flirting and plenty of fun was a fact beyond the reach of
+doubt. But a flirtation, after all, unless in a one-act comedy, is not
+entertaining to the mere looker-on; and oh! must not those bridesmaids
+who sometimes accompany a happy couple in their wedding-tour, have a
+dreary time of it?
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII.
+
+THE ÉCOLE DE NATATION.
+
+It seemed to me that I had but just closed my eyes, when I was waked by
+a hand upon my shoulder, and a voice calling me by my name. I started up
+to find the early sunshine pouring in at the window, and Franz Müller
+standing by my bedside.
+
+"_Tiens_!" said he. "How lovely are the slumbers of innocence! I was
+hesitating, _mon cher_, whether to wake or sketch you."
+
+I muttered something between a growl and a yawn, to the effect that I
+should have been better satisfied if he had left me alone.
+
+"You prefer everything that is basely self-indulgent, young man,"
+replied Müller, making a divan of my bed, and coolly lighting his pipe
+under my very nose. "Contrary to all the laws of _bon-camaraderie_, you
+stole away last night, leaving your unprotected friend in the hands of
+the enemy. And for what?--for the sake of a few hours' ignominious
+oblivion! Look at me--I have not been to bed all night, and I am as
+lively as a lobster in a lobster-pot."
+
+"How did you get home?" I asked, rubbing my eyes; "and when?"
+
+"I have not got home at all yet," replied my visitor. "I have come to
+breakfast with you first."
+
+Just at this moment, the _pendule_ in the adjoining room struck six.
+
+"To breakfast!" I repeated. "At this hour?--you who never breakfast
+before midday!"
+
+"True, _mon cher_; but then you see there are reasons. In the first
+place, we danced a little too long, and missed the last train, so I was
+obliged to bring the dear creatures back to Paris in a fiacre. In the
+second place, the driver was drunk, and the horse was groggy, and the
+fiacre was in the last stage of dilapidation. The powers below only know
+how many hours we were on the road; for we all fell asleep, driver
+included, and never woke till we found ourselves at the Barrière de
+l'Étoile at the dawn of day."
+
+"Then what have you done with Madame Marotte and Mademoiselle Marie?"
+
+"Deposited them at their own door in the Rue du Faubourg St. Denis, as
+was the bounden duty of a _preux chevalier_. But then, _mon cher_, I had
+no money; and having no money, I couldn't pay for the fiacre; so I drove
+on here--and here I am--and number One Thousand and Eleven is now at the
+door, waiting to be paid."
+
+"The deuce he is!"
+
+"So you see, sad as it was to disturb the slumbers of innocence, I
+couldn't possibly let you go on sleeping at the rate of two francs
+an hour."
+
+"And what is the rate at which you have waked me?"
+
+"Sixteen francs the fare, and something for the driver--say twenty in
+all."
+
+"Then, my dear fellow, just open my desk and take one of the two
+Napoleons you will see lying inside, and dismiss number One Thousand and
+Eleven without loss of time; and then...."
+
+"A thousand thanks! And then what?"
+
+"Will you accept a word of sound advice?"
+
+"Depends on whether it's pleasant to follow, _caro mio_"
+
+"Go home; get three or four hours' rest; and meet me in the Palais Royal
+about twelve for breakfast."
+
+"In order that you may turn round and go to sleep again in comfort? No,
+young man, I will do nothing of the kind. You shall get up, instead, and
+we'll go down to Molino's."
+
+"To Molino's?"
+
+"Yes--don't you know Molino's--the large swimming-school by the Pont
+Neuf. It's a glorious morning for a plunge in the Seine."
+
+A plunge in the Seine! Now, given a warm bed, a chilly autumn morning,
+and a decided inclination to quote the words of the sluggard, and
+"slumber again," could any proposition be more inopportune, savage, and
+alarming? I shuddered; I protested; I resisted; but in vain.
+
+"I shall be up again in less time than it will take you to tell your
+beads, _mon gaillard_" said Müller the ferocious, as, having captured my
+Napoleon, he prepared to go down and liquidate with number One Thousand
+and Eleven. "And it's of no use to bolt me out, because I shall hammer
+away till you let me in, and that will wake your fellow-lodgers. So let
+me find you up, and ready for the fray."
+
+And then, execrating Müller, and Molino, and Molino's bath, and Molino's
+customers, and all Molino's ancestors from the period of the deluge
+downwards, I reluctantly complied.
+
+The air was brisk, the sky cloudless, the sun coldly bright; and the
+city wore that strange, breathless, magical look so peculiar to Paris at
+early morning. The shops were closed; the pavements deserted; the busy
+thoroughfares silent as the avenues of Père la Chaise. Yet how different
+from the early stillness of London! London, before the world is up and
+stirring, looks dead, and sullen, and melancholy; but Paris lies all
+beautiful, and bright, and mysterious, with a look as of dawning smiles
+upon her face; and we know that she will wake presently, like the
+Sleeping Beauty, to sudden joyousness and activity.
+
+Our road lay for a little way along the Boulevards, then down the Rue
+Vivienne, and through the Palais Royal to the quays; but long ere we
+came within sight of the river this magical calm had begun to break up.
+The shop-boys in the Palais Royal were already taking down the
+shutters--the great book-stall at the end of the Galerie Vitrée showed
+signs of wakefulness; and in the Place du Louvre there was already a
+detachment of brisk little foot-soldiers at drill. By the time we had
+reached the open line of the quays, the first omnibuses were on the
+road; the water-carriers were driving their carts and blowing their
+shrill little bugles; the washer-women, hard at work in their gay,
+oriental-looking floating kiosques, were hammering away, mallet in hand,
+and chattering like millions of magpies; and the early matin-bell was
+ringing to prayers as we passed the doors of St. Germain L'Auxerrois.
+
+And now we were skirting the Quai de l'École, looking down upon the bath
+known in those days as Molino's--a hugh, floating quadrangular
+structure, surrounded by trellised arcades and rows of dressing-rooms,
+with a divan, a café restaurant, and a permanent corps of cooks and
+hair-dressers on the establishment. For your true Parisian has ever been
+wedded to his Seine, as the Venetian to his Adriatic; and the École de
+Natation was then, as now, a lounge, a reading-room, an adjunct of the
+clubs, and one of the great institutions of the capital.
+
+Some bathers, earlier than ourselves, were already sauntering about the
+galleries in every variety of undress, from the simple _caleçon_ to the
+gaudiest version of Turkish robe and Algerian _kepi_. Some were smoking;
+some reading the morning papers; some chatting in little knots; but as
+yet, with the exception of two or three school-boys (called, in the
+_argot_ of the bath, _moutards_), there were no swimmers in the water.
+
+With some of these loungers Müller exchanged a nod or a few words as we
+passed along the platform; but shook hands cordially with a bronzed,
+stalwart man, dressed like a Venetian gondolier in the frontispiece to a
+popular ballad, with white trousers, blue jacket, anchor buttons, red
+sash, gold ear-rings, and great silver buckles in his shoes. Müller
+introduced this romantic-looking person to me as "Monsieur Barbet."
+
+"My friend, Monsieur Barbet," said he, "is the prince of
+swimming-masters. He is more at home in the water than on land, and
+knows more about swimming than a fish. He will calculate you the
+specific gravity of the heaviest German metaphysician at a glance, and
+is capable of floating even the works of Monsieur Thiers, if put to
+the test."
+
+"Monsieur can swim?" said the master, addressing me, with a nautical
+scrape.
+
+"I think so," I replied.
+
+"Many gentlemen think so," said Monsieur Barbet, "till they find
+themselves in the water."
+
+"And many who wish to be thought accomplished swimmers never venture
+into it on that account," added Müller. "You would scarcely suppose," he
+continued, turning to me, "that there are men here--regular _habitués_
+of the bath--who never go into the water, and yet give themselves all
+the airs of practised bathers. That tall man, for instance, with the
+black beard and striped _peignoir_, yonder--there's a fellow who comes
+once or twice a week all through the season, goes through the ceremony
+of undressing, smokes, gossips, criticises, is looked up to as an
+authority, and has never yet been seen off the platform. Then there's
+that bald man in the white robe--his name's Giroflet--a retired
+stockbroker. Well, that fellow robes himself like an ancient Roman, puts
+himself in classical attitudes, affects taciturnity, models himself upon
+Brutus, and all that sort of thing; but is as careful not to get his
+feet wet as a cat. Others, again, come simply to feed. The restaurant is
+one of the choicest in Paris, with this advantage over Véfour or the
+Trois Frères, that it is the only place where you may eat and drink of
+the best in hot weather, with nothing on but the briefest of _caleçons_"
+
+Thus chattering, Müller took me the tour of the bath, which now began to
+fill rapidly. We then took possession of two little dressing-rooms no
+bigger than sentry-boxes, and were presently in the water.
+
+The scene now became very animated. Hundreds of eccentric figures
+crowded the galleries--some absurdly fat, some ludicrously thin; some
+old, some young; some bow-legged, some knock-kneed; some short, some
+tall; some brown, some yellow; some got up for effect in gorgeous
+wrappers; and all more or less hideous.
+
+"An amusing sight, isn't it?" said Müller, as, having swum several times
+round the bath, we sat down for a few moments on one of the flights of
+steps leading down to the water.
+
+"It is a sight to disgust one for ever with human-kind," I replied.
+
+"And to fill one with the profoundest respect for one's tailor. After
+all, it's broad-cloth makes the man."
+
+"But these are not men--they are caricatures."
+
+"Every man is a caricature of himself when you strip him," said Müller,
+epigrammatically. "Look at that scarecrow just opposite. He passes for
+an Adonis, _de par le monde_."
+
+I looked and recognised the Count de Rivarol, a tall young man, an
+_élégant_ of the first water, a curled darling of society, a professed
+lady-killer, whom I had met many a time in attendance on Madame de
+Marignan. He now looked like a monkey:--
+
+     .... "long, and lank and brown,
+     As in the ribb'd sea sand!"
+
+"Gracious heavens!" I exclaimed, "what would become of the world, if
+clothes went out of fashion?"
+
+"Humph!--one half of us, my dear fellow, would commit suicide."
+
+At the upper end of the bath was a semicircular platform somewhat
+loftier than the rest, called the Amphitheatre. This, I learned, was the
+place of honor. Here clustered the _élite_ of the swimmers; here they
+discussed the great principles of their art, and passed judgment on the
+performances of those less skilful than themselves. To the right of the
+Amphitheatre rose a slender spiral staircase, like an openwork pillar of
+iron, with a tiny circular platform on the top, half surrounded by a
+light iron rail. This conspicuous perch, like the pillar of St. Simeon
+Stylites, was every now and then surmounted by the gaunt figure of some
+ambitious plunger who, after attitudinizing awhile in the pose of
+Napoleon on the column Vendôme, would join his hands above his head and
+take a tremendous "header" into the gulf below. When this feat was
+successfully performed, the _élite_ in the Amphitheatre applauded
+graciously.
+
+And now, what with swimming, and lounging, and looking on, some two
+hours had slipped by, and we were both hungry and tired, Müller proposed
+that we should breakfast at the Café Procope.
+
+"But why not here?" I asked, as a delicious breeze from the buffet came
+wafting by "like a steam of rich distilled perfumes."
+
+"Because a breakfast _chez_ Molino costs at least twenty-five francs
+per head--BECAUSE I have credit at Procope--BECAUSE I have not a _sou_
+in my pocket--and BECAUSE, milord Smithfield, I aspire to the honor of
+entertaining your lordship on the present occasion!" replied Müller,
+punctuating each clause of his sentence with a bow.
+
+If Müller had not a _sou_, I, at all events, had now only one Napoleon;
+so the Café Procope carried the day.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII.
+
+THE RUE DE L'ANCIENNE COMÉDIE AND THE CAFÉ PROCOPE.
+
+The Rue des Fossés-Saint-Germain-des-Près and the Rue de
+l'Ancienne Comédie are one and the same. As the Rue des
+Fossés-Saint-Germain-des-Près, it dates back to somewhere about the
+reign of Philippe Auguste; and as the Rue de l'Ancienne Comèdie it takes
+its name and fame from the year 1689, when the old Théâtre Français was
+opened on the 18th of April by the company known as Moliêre's
+troupe--Moliêre being then dead, and Lully having succeeded him at the
+Théâtre du Palais Royal.
+
+In the same year, 1689, one François Procope, a Sicilian, conceived the
+happy idea of hiring a house just opposite the new theatre, and there
+opening a public refreshment-room, which at once became famous, not only
+for the excellence of its coffee (then newly introduced into France),
+but also for being the favorite resort of all the wits, dramatists, and
+beaux of that brilliant time. Here the latest epigrams were circulated,
+the newest scandals discussed, the bitterest literary cabals set on
+foot. Here Jean Jacques brooded over his chocolate; and Voltaire drank
+his mixed with coffee; and Dorat wrote his love-letters to Mademoiselle
+Saunier; and Marmontel wrote praises of Mademoiselle Clairon; and the
+Marquis de Biévre made puns innumerable; and Duclos and Mercier wrote
+satires, now almost forgotten; and Piron recited those verses which are
+at once his shame and his fame; and the Chevalier de St. Georges gave
+fencing lessons to his literary friends; and Lamothe, Fréron,
+D'Alembert, Diderot, Helvetius, and all that wonderful company of wits,
+philosophers, encyclopaedists, and poets, that lit up as with a dying
+glory the last decades of the old _régime_, met daily, nightly, to
+write, to recite, to squabble, to lampoon, and some times to fight.
+
+The year 1770 beheld, in the closing of the Théâtre
+Français, the extinction of a great power in the Rue des
+Fossés-Saint-Germain-des-Près--for it was not, in fact, till the theatre
+was no more a theatre that the street changed its name, and became the
+Rue de L'Ancienne Comédie. A new house (to be on first opening invested
+with the time-honored title of Théâtre Français, but afterwards to be
+known as the Odéon) was now in progress of erection in the close
+neighborhood of the Luxembourg. The actors, meanwhile, repaired to the
+little theatre of the Tuilleries. At length, in 1782,[2] the Rue de
+L'Ancienne Comédie was one evening awakened from its two years' lethargy
+by the echo of many footfalls, the glare of many flambeaux, and the
+rattle of many wheels; for all Paris, all the wits and critics of the
+Café Procope, all the fair shepherdesses and all the beaux seigneurs of
+the court of Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI., were hastening on foot, in
+chairs, and in chariots, to the opening of the new house and the
+performance of a new play! And what a play! Surely, not to consider it
+too curiously, a play which struck, however sportively, the key-note of
+the coming Revolution;--a play which, for the first time, displayed
+society literally in a state of _bouleversement_;--a play in which the
+greed of the courtier, the venality of the judge, the empty glitter of
+the crown, were openly held up to scorn;--a play in which all the wit,
+audacity, and success are on the side of the _canaille_;--a play in
+which a lady's-maid is the heroine, and a valet canes his master, and a
+great nobleman is tricked, outwitted, and covered with ridicule!
+
+[2] 1782 is the date given by M. Hippolyte Lucas. Sainte-Beuve places it
+two years later.
+
+This play, produced for the first time under the title of _La Folle
+Journée_, was written by one Caron de Beaumarchais--a man of wit, a man
+of letters, a man of the people, a man of nothing--and was destined to
+achieve immortality under its later title of _Le Mariage de Figaro_.
+
+A few years later, and the Rue de l'Ancienne Comédie echoed daily and
+nightly to the dull rumble of Revolutionary tumbrils, and the heavy
+tramp of Revolutionary mobs. Danton and Camille Desmoulins must have
+passed through it habitually on their way to the Revolutionary Tribunal.
+Charlotte Corday (and this is a matter of history) did pass through it
+that bright July evening, 1793, on her way to a certain gloomy house
+still to be seen in the adjoining Rue de l'École de Médecine, where she
+stabbed Marat in his bath.
+
+But throughout every vicissitude of time and politics, though fashion
+deserted the Rue de l'Ancienne Comédie, and actors migrated, and fresh
+generations of wits and philosophers succeeded each other, the Café
+Procope still held its ground and maintained its ancient reputation. The
+theatre (closed in less than a century) became the studio first of Gros
+and then of Gérard, and was finally occupied by a succession of
+restaurateurs but the Café Procope remained the Café Procope, and is the
+Café Procope to this day.
+
+The old street and all belonging to it--especially and peculiarly the
+Café Procope---was of the choicest Quartier Latin flavor in the time of
+which I write; in the pleasant, careless, impecunious days of my youth.
+A cheap and highly popular restaurateur named Pinson rented the old
+theatre. A _costumier_ hung out wigs, and masks, and débardeur garments
+next door to the restaurateur. Where the fatal tumbril used to labor
+past, the frequent omnibus now rattled gayly by; and the pavements
+trodden of old by Voltaire, and Beaumarchais, and Charlotte Corday, were
+thronged by a merry tide of students and grisettes. Meanwhile the Café
+Procope, though no longer the resort of great wits and famous
+philosophers, received within its hospitable doors, and nourished with
+its indifferent refreshments, many a now celebrated author, painter,
+barrister, and statesman. It was the general rendezvous for students of
+all kinds--poets of the École de Droit, philosophers of the École de
+Médecine, critics of the École des Beaux Arts. It must however be
+admitted that the poetry and criticism of these future great men was
+somewhat too liberally perfumed with tobacco, and that into their
+systems of philosophy there entered a considerable element of grisette.
+
+Such, at the time of my first introduction to it, was the famous Café
+Procope.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIX.
+
+THE PHILOSOPHY OF BREAKFAST.
+
+"Now this, _mon cher_," said Müller, taking off his hat with a flourish
+to the young lady at the _comptoir_, "is the immortal Café Procope."
+
+I looked round, and found myself in a dingy, ordinary sort of Café, in
+no wise differing from any other dingy, ordinary sort of Café in that
+part of Paris. The decorations were ugly enough to be modern. The
+ceiling was as black with gas-fumes and tobacco smoke as any other
+ceiling in any other estaminet in the Quartier Latin. The waiters looked
+as waiters always look before midday--sleepy, discontented, and
+unwashed. A few young men of the regular student type were scattered
+about here and there at various tables, reading, smoking, chatting,
+breakfasting, and reading the morning papers. In an alcove at the upper
+end of the second room (for there were two, one opening from the other)
+stood a blackened, broken-nosed, plaster bust of Voltaire, upon the
+summit of whose august wig some irreverent customer had perched a
+particularly rakish-looking hat. Just in front of this alcove and below
+the bust stood a marble-topped table, at one end of which two young men
+were playing dominoes to the accompaniment of the matutinal absinthe.
+
+"And this," said Müller, with another flourish, "is the still more
+immortal table of the still more supremely immortal Voltaire. Here he
+was wont to rest his sublime elbows and sip his _demi-tasse_. Here, upon
+this very table, he wrote that famous letter to Marie Antoinette that
+Fréron stole, and in revenge for which he wrote the comedy called
+_l'Ecossaise_; but of this admirable satire you English, who only know
+Voltaire in his Henriade and his history of Charles the Twelfth, have
+probably never heard till this moment! _Eh bien_! I'm not much wiser
+than you--so never mind. I'll be hanged if I've ever read a line of it.
+Anyhow, here is the table, and at this other end of it we'll have our
+breakfast."
+
+It was a large, old-fashioned, Louis Quatorze piece of furniture, the
+top of which, formed from a single slab of some kind of gray and yellow
+marble, was stained all over with the coffee, wine, and ink-splashes of
+many generations of customers. It looked as old--nay, older--than the
+house itself.
+
+The young men who were playing at dominoes looked up and nodded, as
+three or four others had done in the outer room when we passed through.
+
+"_Bonjour, l'ami_," said the one who seemed to be winning. "Hast thou
+chanced to see anything of Martial, coming along!"
+
+"I observed a nose defiling round the corner of the Rue de Bussy,"
+replied Müller, "and it looked as if Martial might be somewhere in the
+far distance, but I didn't wait to see. Are you expecting him?"
+
+"Confound him--yes! We've been waiting more than half an hour."
+
+"If you have invited him to breakfast," said Müller, "he is sure to
+come."
+
+"On the contrary, he has invited us to breakfast."
+
+"Ah, that alters the case," said Müller, philosophically. "Then he is
+sure _not_ to come." "Garçon!"
+
+A bullet-headed, short-jacketed, long-aproned waiter, who looked as if
+he had not been to bed since his early youth, answered the summons,
+
+"M'sieur!"
+
+"What have you that you can especially recommend this morning?"
+
+The waiter, with that nasal volubility peculiar to his race, rapidly ran
+over the whole vegetable and animal creation.
+
+Müller listened with polite incredulity.
+
+"Nothing else?" said he, when the other stopped, apparently from want of
+breath.
+
+"_Mais oui, M'sieur_!" and, thus stimulated, the waiter, having
+"exhausted worlds and then imagined new," launched forth into a second
+and still more impossible catalogue.
+
+Müller turned to me.
+
+"The resources of this establishment, you observe," he said, very
+gravely, "are inexhaustible. One might have a Roc's egg à la Sindbad for
+the asking."
+
+The waiter looked puzzled, shuffled his slippered feet, and murmured
+something about "_oeufs sur le plat_."
+
+"Unfortunately, however," continued Müller, "we are but men--not
+fortresses provisioning for a siege. Antoine, _mon enfant_, we know thee
+to be a fellow of incontestible veracity, and thy list is magnificent;
+but we will be content with a _vol-au-vent_ of fish, a _bifteck aux
+pommes frites_, an _omelette sucrée_, and a bottle of thy 1840 Bordeaux
+with the yellow seal. Now vanish!"
+
+The waiter, wearing an expression of intense relief, vanished
+accordingly.
+
+Meanwhile more students had come in, and more kept coming. Hats and caps
+cropped up rapidly wherever there were pegs to hang them on, and the
+talking became fast and furious.
+
+I soon found that everybody knew everybody at the Café Procope, and that
+the specialty of the establishment was dominoes--just as the specialty
+of the Café de la Régence is chess. There were games going on before
+long at almost every table, and groups of lookers-on gathered about
+those who enjoyed the reputation of being skilful players.
+
+Gradually breakfast after breakfast emerged from some mysterious nether
+world known only to the waiters, and the war of dominoes languished.
+
+"These are all students, of course," I said presently, "and yet, though
+I meet a couple of hundred fellows at our hospital lectures, I don't see
+a face I know."
+
+"You would find some by this time, I dare say, in the other room,"
+replied Müller. "I brought you in here that you might sit at Voltaire's
+table, and eat your steak under the shadow of Voltaire's bust; but this
+salon is chiefly frequented by law-students--the other by medical and
+art students. Your place, _mon chér_, as well as mine, is in the outer
+sanctuary."
+
+"That infernal Martial!" groaned one of the domino-players at the other
+end of the table. "So ends the seventh game, and here we are still.
+_Parbleu!_ Horace, hasn't that absinthe given you an inconvenient amount
+of appetite?"
+
+"Alas! my friend--don't mention it. And when the absinthe is paid for, I
+haven't a sou."
+
+"My own case precisely. What's to be done?"
+
+"Done!" echoed Horace, pathetically. "Shade of Apicius! inspire
+me...but, no--he's not listening."
+
+"Hold! I have it. We'll make our wills in one another's favor, and die."
+
+"I should prefer to die when the wind is due East, and the moon at the
+full," said Horace, contemplatively.
+
+"True--besides, there is still _la mère_ Gaudissart. Her cutlets are
+tough, but her heart is tender. She would not surely refuse to add one
+more breakfast to the score!"
+
+Horace shook his head with an air of great despondency.
+
+"There was but one Job," said he, "and he has been dead some time. The
+patience of _la mère_ Gaudissart has long since been entirely
+exhausted."
+
+"I am not so sure of that. One might appeal to her feelings, you
+know--have a presentiment of early death--wipe away a tear... Bah! it is
+worth the effort, anyhow."
+
+"It is a forlorn hope, my dear fellow, but, as you say, it is worth the
+effort. _Allons donc!_ to the storming of _la mère_ Gaudissart!"
+
+And with this they pushed aside the dominoes, took down their hats,
+nodded to Müller, and went out.
+
+"There go two of the brightest fellows and most improvident scamps in
+the whole Quartier," said my companion. "They are both studying for the
+bar; both under age; both younger sons of good families; and both
+destined, if I am not much mistaken, to rise to eminence by-and-by.
+Horace writes for _Figaro_ and the _Petit Journal pour Rire_--Théophile
+does _feuilleton_ work--romances, chit-chat, and political
+squibs--rubbish, of course; but clever rubbish, and wonderful when one
+considers what boys they both are, and what dissipated lives they lead.
+The amount of impecuniosity those fellows get through in the course of a
+term is something inconceivable. They have often only one decent suit
+between them--and sometimes not that. To-day, you see, they are at their
+wits' end for a breakfast. They have run their credit dry at Procope and
+everywhere else, and are gone now to a miserable little den in the Rue
+du Paon, kept by a fat good-natured old soul called _la mère_
+Gaudissart. She will perhaps take compassion on their youth and
+inexperience, and let them have six sous worth of horsebeef soup, stale
+bread, and the day before yesterday's vegetables. Nay, don't look so
+pitiful! We poor devils of the Student Quartier hug our Bohemian life,
+and exalt it above every other. When we have money, we cannot find
+windows enough out of which to fling it--when we have none, we start
+upon _la chasse au diner_, and enjoy the pleasures of the chase. We
+revel in the extremes of fasting and feasting, and scarcely know which
+we prefer."
+
+"I think your friends Horace and Théophile are tolerably clear as to
+which _they_ prefer," I remarked, with a smile.
+
+"Bah! they would die of _ennui_ if they had always enough to eat! Think
+how it sharpens a man's wits if--given the time, the place, and the
+appetite--he has every day to find the credit for his dinners! Show me a
+mathematical problem to compare with it as a popular educator of youth!"
+
+"But for young men of genius, like Horace and Théophile..."
+
+"Make yourself quite easy, _mon cher_. A little privation will do them
+no kind of harm. They belong to that class of whom it has been said that
+'they would borrow money from Harpagon, and find truffles on the raft of
+the Medusa.' But hold! we are at the end of our breakfast. What say you?
+Shall we take our _demi-tasse_ in the next room, among our
+fellow-students of physic and the fine arts?"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXX.
+
+A MAN WITH A HISTORY.
+
+The society of the outer salon differed essentially from the society of
+the inner salon at the Café Procope. It was noisier--it was
+shabbier--it was smokier. The conversation in the inner salon was of a
+general character on the whole, and, as one caught sentences of it here
+and there, seemed for the most part to relate to the literature and news
+of the day--to the last important paper in the Revue des Deux Mondes, to
+the new drama at the Odéon, or to the article on foreign politics in the
+_Journal des Débats_. But in the outer salon the talk was to the last
+degree shoppy, and overflowed with the argot of the studios. Some few
+medical students were clustered, it is true, in a corner near the door;
+but they were so outnumbered by the artists at the upper end of the
+room, that these latter seemed to hold complete possession, and behaved
+more like the members of a recognised club than the casual customers of
+a café. They talked from table to table. They called the waiters by
+their Christian names. They swaggered up and down the middle of the room
+with their hats on their heads, their hands in their pockets, and their
+pipes in their mouths, as coolly as if it were the broad walk of the
+Luxembourg gardens.
+
+And the appearance of these gentlemen was not less remarkable than their
+deportment. Their hair, their beards, their clothes, were of the wildest
+devising. They seemed one and all to have started from a central idea,
+that central idea being to look as unlike their fellow-men as possible;
+and thence to have diverged into a variety that was nothing short of
+infinite. Each man had evidently modelled himself upon his own ideal,
+and no two ideals were alike. Some were picturesque, some were
+grotesque; and some, it must be admitted, were rather dirty ideals, into
+the realization of which no such paltry considerations as those of soap,
+water, or brushes were permitted to enter.
+
+Here, for instance, were Roundhead crops and flowing locks of Cavalier
+redundancy--steeple-crowned hats, and Roman cloaks draped
+bandit-fashion--moustachios frizzed and brushed up the wrong way in the
+style of Louis XIV.--pointed beards and slouched hats, after the manner
+of Vandyke---patriarchal beards _à la Barbarossa_--open collars, smooth
+chins, and long undulating locks of the Raffaelle type--coats, blouses,
+paletots of inconceivable cut, and all kinds of unusual colors--in a
+word, every eccentricity of clothing, short of fancy costume, in which
+it was practicable for men of the nineteenth century to walk abroad and
+meet the light of day.
+
+We had no sooner entered this salon, taken possession of a vacant table,
+and called for coffee, than my companion was beset by a storm of
+greetings.
+
+"Holà! Müller, where hast thou been hiding these last few centuries,
+_mon gaillard?_"
+
+"_Tiens!_ Müller risen from the dead!"
+
+"What news from _là bas,_ old fellow?"
+
+To all which ingenious pleasantries my companion replied in
+kind--introducing me at the same time to two or three of the nearest
+speakers. One of these, a dark young man got up in the style of a
+Byzantine Christ, with straight hair parted down the middle, a
+bifurcated beard, and a bare throat, was called Eugène Droz.
+Another--big, burly, warm-complexioned, with bright open blue eyes,
+curling reddish beard and moustache, slouched hat, black velvet blouse,
+immaculate linen, and an abundance of rings, chains, and ornaments--was
+made up in excellent imitation of the well-known portrait of Rubens.
+This gentleman's name, as I presently learned, was Caesar de Lepany.
+
+When we came in, these two young men, Droz and De Lepany, were
+discussing, in enthusiastic but somewhat unintelligible language, the
+merits of a certain Monsieur Lemonnier, of whom, although till that
+moment ignorant of his name and fame, I at once perceived that he must
+be some celebrated _chef de cuisine_.
+
+"He will never surpass that last thing of his," said the Byzantine
+youth. "Heavens! How smooth it is! How buttery! How pulpy!"
+
+"Ay--and yet with all that lusciousness of quality, he never wants
+piquancy," added De Lepany.
+
+"I think his greens are apt to be a little raw," interposed Müller,
+taking part in the conversation.
+
+"Raw!" echoed the first speaker, indignantly. "_Eh, mon Dieu!_ What can
+you be thinking of! They are almost too hot!"
+
+"But they were not so always, Eugène," said he of the Rubens make-up,
+with an air of reluctant candor. "It must be admitted that Lemonnier's
+greens used formerly to be a trifle--just a trifle--raw. Evidently
+Monsieur Müller does not know how much he has taken to warming them up
+of late. Even now, perhaps, his olives are a little cold."
+
+"But then, how juicy his oranges are!" exclaimed young Byzantine.
+
+"True--and when you remember that he never washes--!"
+
+"Ah, _sacredie!_ yes--there is the marvel!"
+
+And Monsieur Eugène Droz held up his hands and eyes with all the
+reverent admiration of a true believer for a particularly dirty dervish.
+
+"Who, in Heaven's name, is this unclean individual who used to like his
+vegetables underdone, and never washes?" whispered I in Müller's ear.
+
+"What--Lemonnier! You don't mean to say you never heard of Lemonnier?"
+
+"Never, till now. Is he a cook?"
+
+Müller gave me a dig in the ribs that took my breath away.
+
+"_Goguenard!_" said he. "Lemonnier's an artist--the foremost man of the
+water-color school. But I wouldn't be too funny if I were you. Suppose
+you were to burst your jocular vein--there'd be a catastrophe!"
+
+Meanwhile the conversation of Messieurs Droz and Lepany had taken a
+fresh turn, and attracted a little circle of listeners, among whom I
+observed an eccentric-looking young man with a club-foot, an enormously
+long neck, and a head of short, stiff, dusty hair, like the bristles of
+a blacking-brush.
+
+"Queroulet!" said Lepany, with a contemptuous flourish of his pipe. "Who
+spoke of Queroulet? Bah!--a miserable plodder, destitute of ideality--a
+fellow who paints only what he sees, and sees only what is
+commonplace--a dull, narrow-souled, unimaginative handicraftsman, to
+whom a tree is just a tree; and a man, a man; and a straw, a straw, and
+nothing more!"
+
+"That's a very low-souled view to take of art, no doubt," croaked in a
+grating treble voice the youth with the club-foot; "but if trees and men
+and straws are not exactly trees and men and straws, and are not to be
+represented as trees and men and straws, may I inquire what else they
+are, and how they are to be pictorially treated?"
+
+"They must be ideally treated, Monsieur Valentin," replied Lepany,
+majestically.
+
+"No doubt; but what will they be like when they are ideally treated?
+Will they still, to the vulgar eye, be recognisable for trees and men
+and straws?"
+
+"I should scarcely have supposed that Monsieur Valentin would jest upon
+such a subject as a canon of the art he professes," said Lepany,
+becoming more and more dignified.
+
+"I am not jesting," croaked Monsieur Valentin; "but when I hear men of
+your school talk so much about the Ideal, I (as a realist) always want
+to know what they themselves understand by the phrase."
+
+"Are you asking me for my definition of the Ideal, Monsieur Valentin?"
+
+"Well, if it's not giving you too much trouble--yes."
+
+Lepany, who evidently relished every chance of showing off, fell into a
+picturesque attitude and prepared to hold forth. Valentin winked at one
+or two of his own clique, and lit a cigar.
+
+"You ask me," began Lepany, "to define the Ideal--in other words, to
+define the indefinite, which alas! whether from a metaphysical, a
+philosophical, or an aesthetic point of view, is a task transcending
+immeasurably my circumscribed powers of expression."
+
+"Gracious heavens!" whispered Müller in my ear. "He must have been
+reared from infancy on words of five syllables!"
+
+"What shall I say?" pursued Lepany. "Shall I say that the Ideal is, as
+it were, the Real distilled and sublimated in the alembic of the
+imagination? Shall I say that the Ideal is an image projected by the
+soul of genius upon the background of the universe? That it is that
+dazzling, that unimaginable, that incommunicable goal towards which the
+suns in their orbits, the stars in their courses, the spheres with all
+their harmonies, have been chaotically tending since time began! Ideal,
+say you? Call it ideal, soul, mind, matter, art, eternity,... what are
+they all but words? What are words but the weak strivings of the
+fettered soul that fain would soar to those empyrean heights where
+Truth, and Art, and Beauty are one and indivisible? Shall I say
+all this..."
+
+"My dear fellow, you have said it already--you needn't say it again,"
+interrupted Valentin.
+
+"Ay; but having said it--having expressed myself, perchance with some
+obscurity...."
+
+"With the obscurity of Erebus!" said, very deliberately, a fat student
+in a blouse.
+
+"Monsieur!" exclaimed De Lepany, measuring the length and breadth of
+the fat student with a glance of withering scorn.
+
+The Byzantine was no less indignant.
+
+"Don't heed them, _mon ami_!" he cried, enthusiastically. "Thy
+definition is sublime-eloquent!"
+
+"Nay," said Valentin, "we concede that Monsieur de Lepany is sublime; we
+recognise with admiration that he is eloquent; but we submit that he is
+wholly unintelligible."
+
+And having delivered this parting shot, the club-footed realist slipped
+his arm through the arm of the fat student, and went off to a distant
+table and a game at dominoes.
+
+Then followed an outburst of offended idealism. His own clique crowded
+round Lepany as the champion of their school. They shook hands with him.
+They embraced him. They fooled him to the top of his bent. Presently,
+being not only as good-natured as he was conceited, but (rare phenomenon
+in the Quartier Latin!) a rich fellow into the bargain, De Lepany called
+for champagne and treated his admirers all around.
+
+In the midst of the chatter and bustle which this incident occasioned, a
+pale, earnest-looking man of about five-and-thirty, coming past our
+table on his way out of the Café, touched Müller on the arm, bent down,
+and said quietly:--
+
+"Müller, will you do me a favor!"
+
+"A hundred, Monsieur," replied my companion; half rising, and with an
+air of unusual respect and alacrity.
+
+"Thanks, one will be enough. Do you see that man yonder, sitting alone
+in the corner, with his back to the light?"
+
+"I do."
+
+"Good--don't look at him again, for fear of attracting his attention. I
+have been trying for the last half hour to get a sketch of his head, but
+I think he suspected me. Anyhow he moved so often, and so hid his face
+with his hands and the newspaper, that I was completely baffled. Now it
+is a remarkable head--just the head I have been wanting for my Marshal
+Romero--and if, with your rapid pencil and your skill in seizing
+expression, you could manage this for me...."
+
+"I will do my best," said Müller.
+
+"A thousand thanks. I will go now; for when I am gone he will be off his
+guard. You will find me in the den up to three o'clock. Adieu."
+
+Saying which, the stranger passed on, and went out.
+
+"That's Flandrin!" said Müller.
+
+"Really?" I said. "Flandrin! And you know him?"
+
+But in truth I only answered thus to cover my own ignorance; for I knew
+little at that time of modern French art, and I had never even heard the
+name of Flandrin before.
+
+"Know him!" echoed Müller. "I should think so. Why, I worked in his
+studio for nearly two years."
+
+And then he explained to me that this great painter (great even then,
+though as yet appreciated only in certain choice Parisian circles, and
+not known out of France) was at work upon a grand historical subject
+connected with the Spanish persecutions in the Netherlands--the
+execution of Egmont and Horn, in short, in the great square before the
+Hôtel de Ville in Brussels.
+
+"But the main point now," said Müller, "is to get the sketch--and how?
+Confound the fellow! while he keeps his back to the light and his head
+down like that, the thing is impossible. Anyhow I can't do it without an
+accomplice. You must help me."
+
+"I! What can I do?"
+
+"Go and sit near him--speak to him--make him look up--keep him, if
+possible, for a few minutes in conversation--nothing easier."
+
+"Nothing easier, perhaps, if I were you; but, being only myself, few
+things more difficult!"
+
+"Nevertheless, my dear boy, you must try, and at once. Hey
+--presto!--away!"
+
+Placed where we were, the stranger was not likely to have observed us;
+for we had come into the room from behind the corner in which he was
+sitting, and had taken our places at a table which he could not have
+seen without shifting his own position. So, thus peremptorily
+commanded, I rose; slipped quietly back into the inner salon, made a
+pretext of looking at the clock over the door; and came out again, as if
+alone and looking for a vacant seat.
+
+The table at which he had placed himself was very small--only just big
+enough to stand in a corner and hold a plate and a coffee-cup; but it
+was supposed to be large enough for two, and there were evidently two
+chairs belonging to it. On one of these, being alone, the stranger had
+placed his overcoat and a small black bag. I at once saw and seized my
+opportunity.
+
+"Pardon, Monsieur," I said, very civilly, "will you permit me to hang
+these things up?"
+
+He looked up, frowned, and said abruptly:--
+
+"Why, Monsieur?"
+
+"That I may occupy this chair."
+
+He glanced round; saw that there was really no other vacant; swept off
+the bag and coat with his own hands; hung them on a peg overhead;
+dropped back into his former attitude, and went on reading.
+
+"I regret to have given you the trouble, Monsieur," I said, hoping to
+pave the way to a conversation.
+
+But a little quick, impatient movement of the hand was his only reply.
+He did not even raise his head. He did not even lift his eyes from
+the paper.
+
+I called for a demi-tasse and a cigar; then took out a note-book and
+pencil, assumed an air of profound abstraction, and affected to become
+absorbed in calculations.
+
+In the meanwhile, I could not resist furtively observing the appearance
+of this man whom a great artist had selected as his model for one of the
+darkest characters of mediæval history.
+
+He was rather below than above the middle height; spare and sinewy;
+square in the shoulders and deep in the chest; with close-clipped hair
+and beard; grizzled moustache; high cheek-bones; stern impassive
+features, sharply cut; and deep-set restless eyes, quick and glancing as
+the eyes of a monkey. His face, throat, and hands were sunburnt to a
+deep copper-color, as if cast in bronze. His age might have been from
+forty-five to fifty. He wore a thread-bare frock-coat buttoned to the
+chin; a stiff black stock revealing no glimpse of shirt-collar; a
+well-worn hat pulled low over his eyes; and trousers of dark blue cloth,
+worn very white and shiny at the knees, and strapped tightly down over a
+pair of much-mended boots.
+
+The more I looked at him, the less I was surprised that Flandrin should
+have been struck by his appearance. There was an air of stern poverty
+and iron resolution about the man that arrested one's attention at first
+sight. The words "_ancien militaire"_ were written in every furrow of
+his face; in every seam and on every button of his shabby clothing. That
+he had seen service, missed promotion, suffered unmerited neglect (or,
+it might be, merited disgrace), seemed also not unlikely.
+
+Watching him as he sat, half turned away, half hidden by the newspaper
+he was reading, one elbow resting on the table, one brown, sinewy hand
+supporting his chin and partly concealing his mouth, I told myself that
+here, at all events, was a man with a history--perhaps with a very dark
+history. What were the secrets of his past? What had he done? What had
+he endured? I would give much to know.
+
+My coffee and cigar being brought, I asked for the _Figaro_, and holding
+the paper somewhat between the stranger and myself, watched him with
+increasing interest.
+
+I now began to suspect that he was less interested in his own newspaper
+than he appeared to be, and that his profound abstraction, like my own,
+was assumed. An indefinable something in the turn of his head seemed to
+tell me that his attention was divided between whatever might be going
+forward in the room and what he was reading. I cannot describe what that
+something was; but it gave me the impression that he was always
+listening. When the outer door opened or shut, he stirred uneasily, and
+once or twice looked sharply round to see what new-comer entered the
+café. Was he anxiously expecting some one who did not come? Or was he
+dreading the appearance of some one whom he wished to avoid? Might he
+not be a political refugee? Might he not be a spy?
+
+"There is nothing of interest in the papers to-day, Monsieur," said,
+making another effort to force him into conversation.
+
+He affected not to hear me.
+
+I drew my chair a little nearer, and repeated the observation.
+
+He frowned impatiently, and without looking up, replied:--
+
+"_Eh, mon Dieu_, Monsieur!--when there is a dearth of news!"
+
+"There need not, even so, be a dearth of wit. _Figaro_ is as heavy
+to-day as a government leader in the _Moniteur_."
+
+He shrugged his shoulders and moved slightly round, apparently to get a
+better light upon what he was reading, but in reality to turn still more
+away from me. The gesture of avoidance was so marked, that with the best
+will in the world, it would have been impossible for me to address him
+again. I therefore relapsed into silence.
+
+Presently I saw a sudden change flash over him.
+
+Now, in turning away from myself, he had faced round towards a narrow
+looking-glass panel which reflected part of the opposite side of the
+room; and chancing, I suppose, to lift his eyes from the paper, he had
+seen something that arrested his attention. His head was still bent; but
+I could see that his eyes were riveted upon the mirror. There was
+alertness in the tightening of his hand before his mouth--in the
+suspension of his breathing.
+
+Then he rose abruptly, brushed past me as if I were not there, and
+crossed to where Müller, sketch-book in hand, was in the very act of
+taking his portrait.
+
+I jumped up, almost involuntarily, and followed him. Müller, with an
+unsuccessful effort to conceal his confusion, thrust the book into
+his pocket.
+
+"Monsieur," said the stranger, in a low, resolute voice, "I protest
+against what you have been doing. You have no right to take my likeness
+without my permission."
+
+"Pardon, Monsieur, I--I beg to assure you--" stammered Müller.
+
+"That you intended no offence? I am willing to suppose so. Give me up
+the sketch, and I am content."
+
+"Give up the sketch!" echoed Müller.
+
+"Precisely, Monsieur."
+
+"Nay--but if, as an artist, I have observed that which leads me to
+desire a--a memorandum--let us say of the pose and contour of a certain
+head," replied Müller, recovering his self-possession, "it is not likely
+that I shall be disposed to part from my memorandum."
+
+"How, Monsieur! you refuse?"
+
+"I am infinitely sorry, but--"
+
+"But you refuse?"
+
+"I certainly cannot comply with Monsieur's request."
+
+The stranger, for all his bronzing, grew pale with rage.
+
+"Do not compel me, Monsieur, to say what I must think of your conduct,
+if you persist in this determination," he said fiercely.
+
+Müller smiled, but made no reply.
+
+"You absolutely refuse to yield up the sketch?"
+
+"Absolutely."
+
+"Then, Monsieur, _c'est une infamie_--_et vous êtes un lâche_!"
+
+But the last word had scarcely hissed past his lips before Müller dashed
+his coffee dregs full in the stranger's face.
+
+In one second, the table was upset--blows were exchanged--Müller, pinned
+against the wall with his adversary's hands upon his throat, was
+striking out with the desperation of a man whose strength is
+overmatched--and the whole room was in a tumult.
+
+In vain I attempted to fling myself between them. In vain the waiters
+rushed to and fro, imploring "ces Messieurs" to interpose. In vain a
+stout man pushed his way through the bystanders, exclaiming angrily:--
+
+"Desist, Messieurs! Desist, in the name of the law! I am the proprietor
+of this establishment--I forbid this brawling--I will have you both
+arrested! Messieurs, do you hear?"
+
+Suddenly the flush of rage faded out of Müller's face. He gasped--became
+livid. Lepany, Droz, myself, and one or two others, flew at the stranger
+and dragged him forcibly back.
+
+"Assassin!" I cried, "would you murder him?"
+
+He flung us off, as a baited bull flings off a pack of curs. For myself,
+though I received only a backhanded blow on the chest, I staggered as if
+I had been struck with a sledgehammer.
+
+Müller, half-fainting, dropped into a chair.
+
+There was a tramp and clatter at the door--a swaying and parting of the
+crowd.
+
+"Here are the sergents de ville!" cried a trembling waiter.
+
+"He attacked me first," gasped Müller. "He has half strangled me."
+
+"_Qu'est ce que ça me fait_!" shouted the enraged proprietor. "You are a
+couple of _canaille_! You have made a scandal in my Café. Sergents,
+arrest both these gentlemen!"
+
+The police--there were two of them, with their big cocked hats on their
+heads and their long sabres by their sides--pushed through the circle of
+spectators. The first laid his hand on Müller's shoulder; the second was
+about to lay his hand on mine, but I drew back.
+
+"Which is the other?" said he, looking round.
+
+"_Sacredie_!" stammered the proprietor, "he was here--there--not a
+moment ago!"
+
+"_Diable_!" said the sergent de ville, stroking his moustache, and
+staring fiercely about him. "Did no one see him go?"
+
+There was a chorus of exclamations--a rush to the inner salon--to the
+door--to the street. But the stranger was nowhere in sight; and, which
+was still more incomprehensible, no one had seen him go!
+
+"_Mais, mon Dieu_!" exclaimed the proprietor, mopping his head and face
+violently with his pocket-handkerchief, "was the man a ghost, that he
+should vanish into the air?"
+
+"_Parbleu_! a ghost with muscles of iron," said Müller. "Talk of the
+strength of a madman--he has the strength of a whole lunatic asylum!"
+
+"He gave me a most confounded blow in the ribs, anyhow!" said Lepany.
+
+"And nearly broke my arm," added Eugène Droz.
+
+"And has given me a pain in my chest for a week," said I, in chorus.
+
+"If he wasn't a ghost," observed the fat student sententiously, "he must
+certainly be the devil."
+
+The sergents de ville grinned.
+
+"Do we, then, arrest this gentleman?" asked the taller and bigger of the
+two, his hand still upon my friend's shoulder.
+
+But Müller laughed and shook his head.
+
+"What!" said he, "arrest a man for resisting the devil? Nonsense, _mes
+amis_, you ought to canonize me. What says Monsieur le propriétaire?"
+
+Monsieur the proprietor smiled.
+
+"I am willing to let the matter drop," he replied, "on the understanding
+that Monsieur Müller was not really the first offender."
+
+"_Foi d'honneur_! He insulted me--I threw some coffee in his face--he
+flung himself upon me like a tiger, and almost choked me, as all here
+witnessed. And for what? Because I did him the honor to make a rough
+pencilling of his ugly face ... _Mille tonnerres_!--the fellow has
+stolen my sketch-book!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXI.
+
+FANCIES ABOUT FACES.
+
+The sketch-book was undoubtedly gone, and the stranger had undoubtedly
+taken it. How he took it, and how he vanished, remained a mystery.
+
+The aspect of affairs, meanwhile, was materially changed. Müller no
+longer stood in the position of a leniently-treated offender. He had
+become accuser, and plaintiff. A grave breach of the law had been
+committed, and he was the victim of a bold and skilful _tour de main_.
+
+The police shook their heads, twirled their moustaches, and looked wise.
+
+It was a case of premeditated assault--in short, of robbery with
+violence. It must be inquired into--reported, of course, at
+head-quarters, without loss of time. Would Monsieur be pleased to
+describe the stolen sketch-book? An oblong, green volume, secured by an
+elastic band; contains sketches in pencil and water-colors; value
+uncertain--Good. And the accused ... would Monsieur also be pleased to
+describe the person of the accused? His probable age, for instance; his
+height; the color of his hair, eyes, and beard? Good again. Lastly,
+Monsieur's own name and address, exactly and in full. _Très-bon._ It
+might, perhaps, be necessary for Monsieur to enter a formal deposition
+to-morrow morning at the Prefecture of Police, in which case due notice
+would be given.
+
+Whereupon he who seemed to be chief of the twain, having entered
+Müller's replies in a greasy pocket-book of stupendous dimensions, which
+he seemed to wear like a cuirass under the breast of his uniform,
+proceeded to interrogate the proprietor and waiters.
+
+Was the accused an habitual frequenter of the cafe?--No. Did they
+remember ever to have seen him there before?--No. Should they recognise
+him if they saw him again? To this question the answers were doubtful.
+One waiter thought he should recognise the man; another was not sure;
+and Monsieur the proprietor admitted that he had himself been too angry
+to observe anything or anybody very minutely.
+
+Finally, having made themselves of as much importance and asked as many
+questions as possible, the sergents de ville condescended to accept a
+couple of-petits verres a-piece, and then, with much lifting of cocked
+hats and clattering of sabres, departed.
+
+Most of the students had ere this dropped off by twos and threes, and
+were gone to their day's work, or pleasure--to return again in equal
+force about five in the afternoon. Of those that remained, some five or
+six came up when the police were gone, and began chatting about the
+robbery. When they learned that Flandrin had desired to have a sketch of
+the man's head; when Müller described his features, and I his obstinate
+reserve and semi-military air, their excitement knew no bounds. Each had
+immediately his own conjecture to offer. He was a political spy, and
+therefore fearful lest his portrait should be recognised. He was a
+conspirator of the Fieschi school. He was Mazzini in person.
+
+In the midst of the discussion, a sudden recollection flashed upon me.
+
+"A clue! a clue!" I shouted triumphantly. "He left his coat and black
+bag hanging up in the corner!"
+
+Followed by the others, I ran to the spot where I had been sitting
+before the affray began. But my exultation was shortlived. Coat and bag,
+like their owner, had disappeared.
+
+Müller thrust his hands into his pockets, shook his head, and whistled
+dismally.
+
+"I shall never see my sketch-book again, _parbleu!_" said he. "The man
+who could not only take it out of my breast-pocket, but also in the very
+teeth of the police, secure his property and escape unseen, is a master
+of his profession. Our friends in the cocked hats have no chance
+against him."
+
+"And Flandrin, who is expecting the sketch," said I; "what of him?"
+
+Müller shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"Next to being beaten," growled he, "there's nothing I hate like
+confessing it. However, it has to be done--so the sooner the better.
+Would you like to come with me? You'll see his studio."
+
+I was only too glad to accompany him; for to me, as to most of us, there
+was ever a nameless charm in the picturesque litter of an artist's
+studio. Müller's own studio, however, was as yet the only one I had
+seen. He laughed when I said this.
+
+"If your only notion of a studio is derived from that specimen," said
+he, "you will he agreeably surprised by the contrast. He calls his place
+a 'den,' but that's a metaphor. Mine is a howling wilderness."
+
+Arriving presently at a large house at the bottom of a courtyard in the
+Rue Vaugirard, he knocked at a small side-door bearing a tiny brass
+plate not much larger than a visiting-card, on which was
+engraved--"Monsieur Flandrin."
+
+The door opened by some invisible means from within, and we entered a
+passage dimly lighted by a painted glass door at the farther end. My
+companion led the way down this passage, through the door, and into a
+small garden containing some three or four old trees, a rustic seat, a
+sun-dial on an antique-looking fragment of a broken column, and a little
+weed-grown pond about the size of an ordinary drawing-room table,
+surrounded by artificial rock-work.
+
+At the farther extremity of this garden, filling the whole space from
+wall to wall, and occupying as much ground as must have been equal to
+half the original enclosure, stood a large, new, windowless building, in
+shape exactly like a barn, lighted from a huge skylight in the roof, and
+entered by a small door in one corner. I did not need to be told that
+this was the studio.
+
+But if the outside was like a barn, the inside was like a beautiful
+mediæval interior by Cattermole--an interior abounding in rich and
+costly detail; in heavy crimson draperies, precious old Italian
+cabinets, damascened armor, carved chairs with upright backs and twisted
+legs, old paintings in massive Florentine frames, and strange quaint
+pieces of Elizabethan furniture, like buffets, with open shelves full of
+rare and artistic things--bronzes, ivory carvings, unwieldy Majolica
+jars, and lovely goblets of antique Venetian glass laced with spiral
+ornaments of blue and crimson and that dark emerald green of which the
+secret is now lost for ever.
+
+Then, besides all these things, there were great folios leaning piled
+against the walls, one over the other; and Persian rugs of many colors
+lying here and there about the floor; and down in one corner I observed
+a heap of little models, useful, no doubt, as accessories in
+pictures--gondolas, frigates, foreign-looking carts, a tiny sedan chair,
+and the like.
+
+But the main interest of the scene concentrated itself in the unfinished
+picture, the hired model (a brawny fellow in a close-fitting suit of
+black, leaning on a huge two-handed sword), and the artist in his
+holland blouse, with the palette and brushes in his hand.
+
+It was a very large picture, and stood on a monster easel, somewhat
+towards the end of the studio. The light from above poured full upon the
+canvas, while beyond lay a background of shadow. Much of the subject was
+as yet only indicated, but enough was already there to tell the tragic
+story and display the power of the painter. There, high above the heads
+of the mounted guards and the assembled spectators, rose the scaffold,
+hung with black. Egmont, wearing a crimson tabard, a short black cloak
+embroidered with gold, and a hat ornamented with black and white plumes,
+stood in a haughty attitude, as if facing the square and the people. Two
+other figures, apparently of an ecclesiastic and a Spanish general,
+partly in outline, partly laid in with flat color, were placed to the
+right of the principal character. The headsman stood behind, leaning
+upon his sword. The slender spire of the Hôtel de Ville, surmounted by
+its gilded archangel glittering in the morning sun, rose high against a
+sky of cloudless blue; while all around was seen the well-known square
+with its sculptured gables and decorated façades--every roof, window,
+and balcony crowded with spectators.
+
+Unfinished though it was, I saw at once that I was brought face to face
+with what would some day be a famous work of art. The figures were
+grandly grouped; the heads were noble; the sky was full of air; the
+action of the whole scene informed with life and motion.
+
+I stood admiring and silent, while Müller told his tale, and Flandrin
+paused in his work to listen.
+
+"It is horribly unlucky," said he. "I had not been able to find a
+portrait of Romero and, _faute de mieux_, have been trying for days
+past to invent the right sort of head for him--of course, without
+success. You never saw such a heap of failures! But as for that man at
+the café, if Providence had especially created him for my purpose, he
+could not have answered it better."
+
+"I believe I am as sorry as you can possibly be," said Müller.
+
+"Then you are very sorry indeed," replied the painter; and he looked
+even more disappointment than he expressed.
+
+"I'm afraid I can't do it," said Müller, after a moment's silence; "but
+if you'll give me a pencil and a piece of paper, and credit me with the
+will in default of the deed, I will try to sketch the head from memory."
+
+"Ah? if you can only do that! Here is a drawing block--choose what
+pencils you prefer--or here are crayons, if you like them better."
+
+Müller took the pencils and block, perched himself on the corner of a
+table, and began. Flandrin, breathless with expectation, looked over his
+shoulder. Even the model (in the grim character of Egmont's executioner)
+laid aside his two-handed sword, and came round for a peep.
+
+"Bravo! that's just his nose and brow," said Flandrin, as Müller's rapid
+hand flew over the paper. "Yes--the likeness comes with every touch ...
+and the eyes, so keen and furtive. ... Nay, that eyelid should be a
+little more depressed at the corner.... Yes, yes--just so. Admirable!
+There!--don't attempt to work it up. The least thing might mar the
+likeness. My dear fellow, what a service you have rendered me!"
+
+"_Quatre-vingt mille diables_!" ejaculated the model, his eyes riveted
+upon the sketch.
+
+Müller laughed and looked.
+
+"_Tiens_! Guichet," said he, "is that meant for a compliment?"
+
+"Where did you see him?" asked the model, pointing down at the sketch.
+
+"Why? Do you know him?"
+
+"Where did you see him, I say?" repeated Guichet, impatiently.
+
+He was a rough fellow, and garnished every other sentence with an oath;
+but he did not mean to be uncivil.
+
+"At the Café Procope."
+
+"When?"
+
+"About an hour ago. But again, I repeat--do you know him?"
+
+"Do I know him? _Tonnerre de Dieu_!"
+
+"Then who and what is he?"
+
+The model stroked his beard; shook his head; declined to answer.
+
+"Bah!" said he, gloomily, "I may have seen him, or I may be mistaken.
+'Tis not my affair."
+
+"I suspect Guichet knows something against this interesting stranger,"
+laughed Flandrin. "Come, Guichet, out with it! We are among friends."
+
+But Guichet again looked at the drawing, and again shook his head.
+
+"I'm no judge of pictures, messieurs," said he. "I'm only a poor devil
+of a model. How can I pretend to know a man from such a _griffonage_
+as that?"
+
+And, taking up his big sword again, he retreated to his former post over
+against the picture. We all saw that he was resolved to say no more.
+
+Flandrin, delighted with Müller's sketch, put it, with many thanks and
+praises, carefully away in one of the great folios against the wall.
+
+"You have no idea, _mon cher_ Müller," he said, "of what value it is to
+me. I was in despair about the thing till I saw that fellow this morning
+in the Café; and he looked as if he had stepped out of the Middle Ages
+on purpose for me. It is quite a mediæval face--if you know what I mean
+by a mediæval face."
+
+"I think I do," said Müller. "You mean that there was a moyen-âge type,
+as there was a classical type, and as there is a modern type."
+
+"Just so; and therein lies the main difficulty that we historical
+painters have to encounter. When we cannot find portraits of our
+characters, we are driven to invent faces for them--and who can invent
+what he never sees? Invention must be based on some kind of experience;
+and to study old portraits is not enough for our purpose, except we
+frankly make use of them as portraits. We cannot generalize upon them,
+so as to resuscitate a vanished type."
+
+"But then has it really vanished?" said Müller. "And how can we know for
+certain that the mediæval type did actually differ from the type we see
+before us every day?"
+
+"By simple and direct proof--by studying the epochs of portrait
+painting. Take Holbein's heads, for instance. Were not the people of his
+time grimmer, harder-visaged, altogether more unbeautiful than the
+people of ours? Take Petitot's and Sir Peter Lely's. Can you doubt that
+the characteristics of their period were entirely different? Do you
+suppose that either race would look as we look, if resuscitated and
+clothed in the fashion of to-day?"
+
+"I am not at all sure that we should observe any difference," said
+Müller, doubtfully.
+
+"And I feel sure we should observe the greatest," replied Flandrin,
+striding up and down the studio, and speaking with great animation. "I
+believe, as regards the men and women of Holbein's time, that their
+faces were more lined than ours; their eyes, as a rule, smaller--their
+mouths wider--their eyebrows more scanty--their ears larger--their
+figures more ungainly. And in like manner, I believe the men and women
+of the seventeenth century to have been more fleshy than either
+Holbein's people or ourselves; to have had rounder cheeks, eyes more
+prominent and heavy-lidded, shorter noses, more prominent chins, and
+lips of a fuller and more voluptuous mould."
+
+"Still we can't be certain how much of all this may be owing to the mere
+mannerisms of successive schools of art," urged Müller, sticking
+manfully to his own opinion. "Where will you find a more decided
+mannerist than Holbein? And because he was the first portrait-painter of
+his day, was he not reproduced with all his faults of literalness and
+dryness by a legion of imitators? So with Sir Peter Lely, with Petitot,
+with Vandyck, with every great artist who painted kings and queens and
+court beauties. Then, again, a certain style of beauty becomes the rage,
+and-a skilful painter flatters each fair sitter in turn by bringing up
+her features, or her expression, or the color of her hair, as near as
+possible to the fashionable standard. And further, there is the dress of
+a period to be taken into account. Think of the family likeness that
+pervades the flowing wigs of the courts of Louis Quatorze and Charles
+the Second--see what powder did a hundred years ago to equalize
+mankind."
+
+Flandrin shook his head.
+
+"Ingenious, _mon garçon_" said he; "ingenious, but unsound The cut of a
+fair lady's bodice never yet altered the shape of her nose; neither was
+it the fashion of their furred surtouts that made Erasmus and Sir Thomas
+More as like as twins. What you call the 'mannerism' of Holbein is only
+his way of looking at his fellow-creatures. He and Sir Antonio More were
+the most faithful of portrait-painters. They didn't know how to flatter.
+They painted exactly what they saw--no more, and no less; so that every
+head they have left us is a chapter in the history of the Middle Ages.
+The race--depend on't--the race was unbeautiful; and not even the
+picturesque dress of the period (which, according to your theory, should
+have helped to make the wearers of it more attractive) could soften one
+jot of their plainness."
+
+"I can't bring myself to believe that we were all so ugly--French,
+English, and Germans alike--only a couple of centuries ago,"
+said Müller.
+
+"That is to say, you prefer to believe that Holbein, and Lucas Cranach,
+and Sir Antonio More, and all their school, were mannerists. Nonsense,
+my dear fellow--nonsense! _It is Nature who is the mannerist_. She loves
+to turn out a certain generation after a particular pattern; and when
+she is tired of that pattern, she invents another. Her fancies last, on
+the average about, a hundred years. Sometimes she changes the type quite
+abruptly; sometimes modifies it by gentle, yet always perceptible,
+degrees. And who shall say what her secret processes are? Education,
+travel, intermarriage with foreigners, the introduction of new kinds of
+food) the adoption of new habits, may each and all have something to do
+with these successive changes; but of one point at least we may be
+certain--and that is, that we painters are not responsible for her
+caprices. Our mission is to interpret Dame Nature more or less
+faithfully, according to our powers; but beyond interpretation we cannot
+go. And now (for you know I am as full of speculations as an
+experimental philosopher) I will tell you another conclusion I have come
+to with regard to this subject; and that is that national types were
+less distinctive in mediæval times than in ours. The French, English,
+Flemish, and Dutch of the Middle Ages, as we see them in their
+portraits, are curiously alike in all outward characteristics. The
+courtiers of Francis the First and their (James, and the lords and
+ladies of the court of Henry the Eighth, resemble each other as people
+of one nation. Their features are, as it were, cast in one mould. So
+also with the courts of Louis Quatorze and Charles the Second. As for
+the regular French face of to-day, with its broad cheek-bones and high
+temples running far up into the hair on either side, that type does not
+make its appearance till close upon the advent of the Reign of Terror.
+But enough! I shall weary you with theories, and wear out the patience
+of our friend Guichet, who is sufficiently tired already with waiting
+for a head that never comes to be cut off as it ought. Adieu--adieu.
+Come soon again, and see how I get on with Marshal Romero."
+
+Thus dismissed, we took our leave and left the painter to his work.
+
+"An extraordinary man!" said Müller, as we passed out again through the
+neglected garden and paused for a moment to look at some half-dozen fat
+gold and silver fish that were swimming lazily about the little pond. "A
+man made up of contradictions--abounding in energy, yet at the same time
+the dreamiest of speculators. An original thinker, too; but wanting that
+basis which alone makes original thinking of any permanent value."
+
+"But," said I, "he is evidently an educated man."
+
+"Yes--educated as most artists are educated; but Flandrin has as strong
+a bent for science as for art, and deserved something better. Five years
+at a German university would have made of him one of the most remarkable
+men of his time. What did you think of his theory of faces?"
+
+"I know nothing of the subject, and cannot form a judgment; but it
+sounded as if it might be true."
+
+"Yes--just that. It may be true, and it may not. If true, then for my
+own part I should like to pursue his theory a step further, and trace
+the operation of these secret processes by means of which
+I am, happily, such a much better-looking fellow than my
+great-great-great-great-grandfather of two hundred years ago. What, for
+instance, has the introduction of the potato done for the noses
+of mankind?"
+
+Chatting thus, we walked back as far as the corner of the Rue Racine,
+where we parted; I to attend a lecture at the École de Médecine, and
+Müller to go home to his studio in the Rue Clovis.
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+CHAPTER XXXII.
+
+RETURNED WITH THANKS.
+
+A week or two had thus gone by since the dreadful evening at the Opéra
+Comique, and all this time I had neither seen nor heard more of the fair
+Josephine. My acquaintance with Franz Müller and the life of the
+Quartier Latin had, on the contrary, progressed rapidly. Just as the
+affair of the Opera had dealt a final blow to my romance _à la grisette_
+on the one hand, so had the excursion to Courbevoie, the visit to the
+École de Natation, and the adventure of the Café Procope, fostered my
+intimacy with the artist on the other. We were both young, somewhat
+short of money, and brimful of fun. Each, too, had a certain substratum
+of earnestness underlying the mere surface-gayety of his character.
+Müller was enthusiastic for art; I for poetry; and both for liberty. I
+fear, when I look back upon them, that we talked a deal of nonsense
+about Brutus, and the Rights of Man, and the noble savage, and all that
+sort of thing, in those hot-headed days of our youth. It was a form of
+political measles that the young men of that time were quite as liable
+to as the young men of our own; and, living as we then were in the heart
+of the most revolutionary city in Europe, I do not well see how we could
+have escaped the infection. Müller (who took it worse than I did, and
+was very rabid indeed when I first knew him) belonged just then not only
+to the honorable brotherhood of Les Chicards, but also to a small
+debating club that met twice a week in a private room at the back of an
+obscure Estaminet in the Rue de la Harpe. The members of this club were
+mostly art-students, and some, like himself, Chicards--generous,
+turbulent, high-spirited boys, with more enthusiasm than brains, and a
+flow of words wholly out of proportion to the bulk of their ideas. As I
+came to know him more intimately, I used sometimes to go there with
+Müller, after our cheap dinner in the Quartier and our evening stroll
+along the Boulevards or the Champs Elysées; and I am bound to admit that
+I never, before or since, heard quite so much nonsense of the
+declamatory sort as on those memorable occasions. I did not think it
+nonsense then, however. I admired it with all my heart; applauded the
+nursery eloquence of these sucking Mirabeaus and Camille Desmoulins as
+frantically as their own vanity could desire; and was even secretly
+chagrined that my own French was not yet fluent enough to enable me to
+take part in their discussions.
+
+In the meanwhile, my debts were paid; and, having dropped out of society
+when I fell out of love with Madame de Marignan, I no longer overspent
+my allowance. I bought no more bouquets, paid for no more opera-stalls,
+and hired no more prancing steeds at seven francs the hour. I bade adieu
+to picture-galleries, flower-shows, morning concerts, dress boots, white
+kid gloves, elaborate shirt-fronts, and all the vanities of the
+fashionable world. In a word, I renounced the Faubourg St. Germain for
+the Quartier Latin, and applied myself to such work and such pleasures
+as pertained to the locality. If, after a long day at Dr. Chéron's, or
+the Hôtel Dieu, or the École de Médecine, I did waste a few hours now
+and then, I, at least, wasted them cheaply. Cheaply, but oh, so
+pleasantly! Ah me! those nights at the debating club, those evenings at
+the Chicards, those student's balls at the Chaumière, those third-class
+trips to Versailles and Fontainebleau, those one-franc pit seats at the
+Gaîeté and the Palais Royal, those little suppers at Pompon's and
+Flicoteau's--how delightful they were! How joyous! How free from care!
+And even when we made up a party and treated the ladies (for to treat
+the ladies is _de rigueur_ in the code of Quartier Latin etiquette), how
+little it still cost, and what a world of merriment we had for
+the money!
+
+It was well for me, too, and a source of much inward satisfaction, that
+my love-affair with Mademoiselle Josephine had faded and died a natural
+death. We never made up that quarrel of the Opéra Comique, and I had not
+desired that we should make it up. On the contrary, I was exceedingly
+glad of the opportunity of withdrawing my attentions; so I wrote her a
+polite little note, in which I expressed my regret that our tastes were
+so dissimilar and our paths in life so far apart; wished her every
+happiness; assured her that I should ever remember her with friendly
+regard; and signed my name with a tremendous flourish at the bottom of
+the second page. With the note, however, I sent her a raised pie and a
+red and green shawl, of which I begged her acceptance in token of amity;
+and as neither of those gifts was returned, I concluded that she ate the
+one and wore the other, and that there was peace between us.
+
+But the scales of fortune as they go up for one, go down for another.
+This man's luck is balanced by that man's ruin--Orestes falls sick, and
+Pylades returns from Kissingen cured of his lumbago--old Croesus dies,
+and little Miss Kilmansegg comes into the world with a golden spoon in
+her mouth, So it fell out with Franz Müller and myself. As I happily
+steered clear of Charybdis, he drifted into Scylla--in other words, just
+as I recovered from my second attack of the tender passion, he caught
+the epidemic and fancied himself in love with the fair Marie.
+
+I say "fancied," because his way of falling in love was so unlike my
+way, that I could scarcely believe it to be the same complaint. It
+affected neither his appetite, nor his spirits, nor his wardrobe. He
+made as many puns and smoked as many pipes as usual. He did not even buy
+a new hat. If, in fact, he had not told me himself, I should never have
+guessed that anything whatever was the matter with him.
+
+It came out one day when he was pressing me to go with him to a certain
+tea-party at Madame Marotte's, in the Rue St. Denis.
+
+"You see," said he, "it is _la petite_ Marie's fête; and the party's in
+her honor; and they'd be so proud if we both went to it; and--and, upon
+my soul, I'm awfully fond of that little girl"....
+
+"Of Marie Marotte?"
+
+He nodded.
+
+"You are not serious," I said.
+
+"I am as serious," he replied, "as a dancing dervish."
+
+And then, for I suppose I looked incredulous, he went on to justify
+himself.
+
+"She's very good," he said, "and very pretty. Quite a Madonna face, to
+my thinking."
+
+"You may see a dozen such Madonna faces among the nurses in the
+Luxembourg Gardens, every afternoon of your life," said I.
+
+"Oh, if you come to that, every woman is like every other woman, up to a
+certain point."
+
+"_Les femmes se suivent et se ressemblent toujours_," said I, parodying
+a well-known apothegm.
+
+"Precisely, but then they wear their rue, or cause you to wear yours,
+'with a difference.' This girl, however, escapes the monotony of her sex
+by one or two peculiarities:--she has not a bit of art about her, nor a
+shred of coquetry. She is as simple and as straightforward as an
+Arcadian. She doesn't even know when she is being made love to, or
+understand what you mean, when you pay her a compliment."
+
+"Then she's a phenomenon--and what man in his senses would fall in love
+with a phenomenon?"
+
+"Every man, _mon cher enfant_, who falls in love at all! The woman we
+worship is always a phenomenon, whether of beauty, or grace, or
+virtue--till we find her out; and then, probably, she becomes a
+phenomenon of deceit, or slovenliness, or bad temper! And now, to return
+to the point we started from--will you go with me to Madame Marotte's
+tea-party to-morrow evening at eight? Don't say 'No,' there's a
+good fellow."
+
+"I'll certainly not say No, if you particularly want me to say Yes," I
+replied, "but--"
+
+"Prythee, no buts! Let it be Yes, and the thing is settled. So--here we
+are. Won't you come in and smoke a pipe with me? I've a bottle of
+capital Rhenish in the cupboard."
+
+We had met near the Odéon, and, as our roads lay in the same direction,
+had gone on walking and talking till we came to Müller's own door in the
+Rue Clovis. I accepted the invitation, and followed him in. The
+_portière_, a sour-looking, bent old woman with a very dirty duster tied
+about her head, hobbled out from her little dark den at the foot of the
+stairs, and handed him the key of his apartment.
+
+"_Tiens_!" said she, "wait a moment--there's a parcel for you, M'sieur
+Müller."
+
+And so, hobbling back again, she brought out a small flat brown
+paper-packet sealed at both ends.
+
+"Ah, I see--from the Emperor!" said Müller. "Did he bring it himself,
+Madame Duphôt, or did he send it by the Archbishop of Paris?"
+
+A faint grin flitted over the little old woman's withered face.
+
+"Get along with you, M'sieur Müller," she said. "You're always playing
+the _farceur_! The parcel was brought by a man who looked like a
+stonemason."
+
+"And nobody has called?"
+
+"Nobody, except M'sieur Richard."
+
+"Monsieur Richard's visits are always gratifying and delightful--may
+the _diable_ fly away with him!" said Müller. "What did dear Monsieur
+Richard want to-day, Madame Duphôt?"
+
+"He wanted to see you, and the third-floor gentleman also--about the
+rent."
+
+"Dear Richard! What an admirable memory he has for dates! Did he leave
+any message, Madame Duphôt?"
+
+The old woman looked at me, and hesitated.
+
+"He says, M'sieur Müller--he says ..."
+
+"Nay, this gentleman is a friend--you may speak out. What does our
+beloved and respected _propriétaire_ say, Madame Duphôt?"
+
+"He says, if you don't both of you pay up the arrears by midday on
+Sunday next, he'll seize your goods, and turn you into the street."
+
+"Ah, I always said he was the nicest man I knew!" observed Müller,
+gravely. "Anything else, Madame Duphôt?"
+
+"Only this, Monsieur Müller--that if you didn't go quietly, he'd take
+your windows out of the frames and your doors off the hinges."
+
+"_Comment_! He bade you give me that message, the miserable old son of a
+spider! _Quatre-vingt mille plats de diables aux truffes_! Take my
+windows out of the frames, indeed! Let him try, Madame Duphôt--that's
+all--let him try!"
+
+And with this, Müller, in a towering rage, led the way upstairs,
+muttering volleys of the most extraordinary and eccentric oaths of his
+own invention, and leaving the little old _portière_ grinning
+maliciously in the hall.
+
+"But can't you pay him?" said I.
+
+"Whether I can, or can't, it seems I must," he replied, kicking open the
+door of his studio as viciously as if it were the corporeal frame of
+Monsieur Richard. "The only question is--how? At the present moment, I
+haven't five francs in the till."
+
+"Nor have I more than twenty. How much is it?"
+
+"A hundred and sixty--worse luck!"
+
+"Haven't the Tapottes paid for any of their ancestors yet?"
+
+"Confound it!--yes; they've paid for a Marshal of France and a Farmer
+General, which are all I've yet finished and sent home. But there was
+the washerwoman, and the _traiteur_, and the artist's colorman, and,
+_enfin_, the devil to pay--and the money's gone, somehow!"
+
+"I've only just cleared myself from a lot of debts," I said, ruefully,
+"and I daren't ask either my father or Dr. Chéron for an advance just at
+present. What is to be done?"
+
+"Oh, I don't know. I must raise the money somehow. I must sell
+something--there's my copy of Titian's 'Pietro Aretino.' It's worth
+eighty francs, if only for a sign. And there's a Madonna and Child after
+Andrea del Sarto, worth a fortune to any enterprising sage-femme with
+artistic proclivities. I'll try what Nebuchadnezzar will do for me."
+
+"And who, in the name of all that's Israelitish, is Nebuchadnezzar?"
+
+"Nebuchadnezzar, my dear Arbuthnot, is a worthy Shylock of my
+acquaintance--a gentleman well known to Bohemia--one who buys and sells
+whatever is purchasable and saleable on the face of the globe, from a
+ship of war to a comic paragraph in the _Charivari_. He deals in
+bric-à-brac, sermons, government sinecures, pugs, false hair, light
+literature, patent medicines, and the fine arts. He lives in the Place
+des Victoires. Would you like to be introduced to him?"
+
+"Immensely."
+
+"Well, then, be here by eight to-morrow morning, and I'll take you with
+me. After nine he goes out, or is only visible to buyers. Here's my
+bottle of Rhenish--genuine Assmanshauser. Are you hungry?"
+
+I admitted that I was not unconscious of a sensation akin to appetite.
+
+He gazed steadfastly into the cupboard, and shook his head.
+
+"A box of sardines," he said, gloomily, "nearly empty. Half a loaf,
+evidently disinterred from Pompeii. An inch of Lyons sausage, saved
+from the ark; the remains of a bottle of fish sauce, and a pot of
+currant jelly. What will you have?"
+
+I decided for the relics of Pompeii and the deluge, and we sat down to
+discuss those curious delicacies. Having no corkscrew, we knocked off
+the neck of the bottle, and being short of glasses, drank our wine out
+of teacups.
+
+"But you have never opened your parcel all this time," I said presently.
+"It may be full of _billets de banque_--who can tell?"
+
+"That's true," said Müller; and broke the seals.
+
+"By all the Gods of Olympus!" he shouted, holding up a small oblong
+volume bound in dark green cloth. "My sketch-book!"
+
+He opened it, and a slip of paper fell out. On this slip of paper were
+written, in a very neat, small hand, the words, "_Returned with
+thanks_;" but the page that contained the sketch made in the Café
+Procope was missing.
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+CHAPTER XXXIII.
+
+AN EVENING PARTY AMONG THE PETIT-BOURGEOISIE.
+
+Madame Marotte, as I have already mentioned more than once, lived in the
+Rue du Faubourg St. Denis; which, as all the world knows, is a
+prolongation of the Rue St. Denis--just as the Rue St. Denis was, in my
+time, a transpontine continuation of the old Rue de la Harpe. Beginning
+at the Place du Châtelet as the Rue St. Denis, opening at its farther
+end on the Boulevart St. Denis and passing under the triumphal arch of
+Louis le Grand (called the Porte St. Denis), it there becomes first the
+Rue du Faubourg St. Denis, and then the interminable Grande Route du St.
+Denis which drags its slow length along all the way to the famous Abbey
+outside Paris.
+
+The Rue du Faubourg St. Denis is a changed street now, and widens out,
+prim, white, and glittering, towards the new barrier and the new Rond
+Point. But in the dear old days of which I tell, it was the sloppiest,
+worst-paved, worst-lighted, noisiest, narrowest, and most crowded of all
+the great Paris thoroughfares north of the Seine. All the country
+traffic from Chantilly and Compiégne came lumbering this way into the
+city; diligences, omnibuses, wagons, fiacres, water-carts, and all kinds
+of vehicles thronged and blocked the street perpetually; and the sound
+of wheels ceased neither by night nor by day. The foot-pavements of the
+Rue du Faubourg St. Denis, too, were always muddy, be the weather what
+it might; and the gutters were always full of stagnant pools. An
+ever-changing, never-failing stream of rustics from the country,
+workpeople from the factories of the _banlieu,_ grisettes, commercial
+travellers, porters, commissionaires, and _gamins_ of all ages here
+flowed to and fro. Itinerant venders of cakes, lemonade, cocoa,
+chickweed, _allumettes_, pincushions, six-bladed penknives, and
+never-pointed pencils filled the air with their cries, and made both day
+and night hideous. You could not walk a dozen yards at any time without
+falling down a yawning cellar-trap, or being run over by a porter with a
+huge load upon his head, or getting splashed from head to foot by the
+sudden pulling-up of some cart in the gutter beside you.
+
+It was among the peculiarities of the Rue du Faubourg St. Denis that
+everybody was always in a hurry, and that nobody was ever seen to look
+in at the shop-windows. The shops, indeed, might as well have had no
+windows, since there were no loungers to profit by them. Every house,
+nevertheless, was a shop, and every shop had its window. These windows,
+however, were for the most part of that kind before which the passer-by
+rarely cares to linger; for the commerce of the Rue du Faubourg St.
+Denis was of that steady, unpretending, money-making sort that despises
+mere shop-front attractions. Grocers, stationers, corn-chandlers,
+printers, cutlers, leather-sellers, and such other inelegant trades,
+here most did congregate; and to the wearied wayfarer toiling along the
+dead level of this dreary pavé, it was quite a relief to come upon even
+an artistically-arranged _Magasin de Charcuterie_, with its rows of
+glazed tongues, mighty Lyons sausages, yellow _terrines_ of Strasbourg
+pies, fantastically shaped pickle-jars, and pyramids of silvery
+sardine boxes.
+
+It was at number One Hundred and Two in this agreeable thoroughfare that
+my friend's innamorata resided with her maternal aunt, the worthy relict
+of Monsieur Jacques Marotte, umbrella-maker, deceased. Thither,
+accordingly, we wended our miry way, Müller and I, after dining together
+at one of our accustomed haunts on the evening following the events
+related in my last chapter. The day had been dull and drizzly, and the
+evening had turned out duller and more drizzly still. We had not had
+rain for some time, and the weather had been (as it often is in Paris in
+October) oppressively hot; and now that the rain had come, it did not
+seem to cool the air at all, but rather to load it with vapors, and make
+the heat less endurable than before.
+
+Having toiled all the way up from the Rue de la Harpe on the farther
+bank of the Seine, and having forded the passage of the Arch of Louis le
+Grand, we were very wet and muddy indeed, very much out of breath, and
+very melancholy objects to behold.
+
+"It's dreadful to think of going into any house in this condition,
+Müller," said I, glancing down ruefully at the state of my boots, and
+having just received a copious spattering of mud all down the left side
+of my person. "What is to be done?"
+
+"We've only to go to a boot-cleaning and brushing-up shop," replied
+Müller. "There's sure to be one close by somewhere."
+
+"A boot-cleaning and brushing-up shop!" I echoed.
+
+"What--didn't you know there were lots of them, all over Paris? Have you
+never noticed places that look like shops, with ground glass windows
+instead of shop-fronts, on which are painted up the words, '_cirage des
+bottes?_'"
+
+"Never, that I can remember."
+
+"Then be grateful to me for a piece of very useful information! Suppose
+we turn down this by-street--it's mostly to the seclusion of by-streets
+and passages that our bashful sex retires to renovate its boots and its
+broadcloth."
+
+I followed him, and in the course of a few minutes we found the sort of
+place of which we were in search. It consisted of one large, long room,
+like a shop without goods, counters, or shelves. A single narrow bench
+ran all round the walls, raised on a sort of wooden platform about three
+feet in width and three feet from the ground. Seated upon this bench,
+somewhat uncomfortably, as it seemed, with their backs against the wall,
+sat some ten or a dozen men and boys, each with an attendant shoeblack
+kneeling before him, brushing away vigorously. Two or three other
+customers, standing up in the middle of the shop, like horses in the
+hands of the groom, were having their coats brushed instead of their
+boots. Of those present, some looked like young shopmen, some were of
+the _ouvrier_ class, and one or two looked like respectable small
+tradesmen and fathers of families. The younger men were evidently
+smartening up for an hour or two at some cheap ball or Café-Concert, now
+that the warehouse was closed, and the day's work was over.
+
+Our boots being presently brought up to the highest degree of polish,
+and our garments cleansed of every disfiguring speck, we paid a few sous
+apiece and turned out again into the streets. Happily, we had not far to
+go. A short cut brought us into the midst of the Rue de Faubourg St.
+Denis, and within a few yards of a gloomy-looking little shop with the
+words "_Veuve Marotte_" painted up over the window, and a huge red and
+white umbrella dangling over the door. A small boy in a shiny black
+apron was at that moment putting up the shutters; the windows of the
+front room over the shop were brightly lit from within; and a little old
+gentleman in goloshes and a large blue cloak with a curly collar, was
+just going in at the private door. We meekly followed him, and hung up
+our hats and overcoats, as he did, in the passage.
+
+"After you, Messieurs," said the little old gentleman, skipping politely
+back, and flourishing his hand in the direction of the stairs.
+"After you!"
+
+We protested vehemently against this arrangement, and fought quite a
+skirmish of civilities at the foot of the stairs.
+
+"I am at home here, Messieurs," said the little old gentleman, who, now
+that he was divested of hat, cloak, and goloshes, appeared in a flaxen
+_toupet_, an antiquated blue coat with brass buttons, a profusely
+frilled shirt, and low-cut shoes with silver buckles. "I am an old
+friend of the family--a friend of fifty years. I hold myself privileged
+to do the honors, Messieurs;--a friend of fifty years may claim to have
+his privileges."
+
+With this he smirked, bowed, and backed against the wall, so that we
+were obliged to precede him. When we reached the landing, however, he
+(being evidently an old gentleman of uncommon politeness and agility)
+sprang forward, held open the door for us, and insisted on ushering
+us in.
+
+It was a narrow, long-shaped room, the size of the shop, with two
+windows looking upon the street; a tiny square of carpet in the middle
+of the floor; boards highly waxed and polished; a tea-table squeezed up
+in one corner; a somewhat ancient-looking, spindle-legged cottage piano
+behind the door; a mirror and an ornamental clock over the mantelpiece;
+and a few French lithographs, colored in imitation of crayon drawings,
+hanging against the walls.
+
+Madame Marotte, very deaf and fussy, in a cap with white ribbons, came
+forward to receive us. Mademoiselle Marie, sitting between two other
+young women of her own age, hung her head, and took no notice of
+our arrival.
+
+The rest of the party consisted of a gentleman and two old ladies. The
+gentleman (a plump, black-whiskered elderly Cupid, with a vast expanse
+of shirt-front like an immense white ace of hearts, and a rose in his
+button-hole) was standing on the hearth-rug in a graceful attitude, with
+one hand resting on his hip, and the other under his coat-tails. Of the
+two old ladies, who seemed as if expressly created by nature to serve as
+foils to one another, one was very fat and rosy, in a red silk gown and
+a kind of black velvet hat trimmed with white marabout feathers and
+Roman pearls; while the other was tall, gaunt, and pale, with a long
+nose, a long upper lip, and supernaturally long yellow teeth. She wore a
+black gown, black cotton gloves, and a black velvet band across her
+forehead, fastened in the centre with a black and gold clasp containing
+a ghastly representation of a human eye, apparently purblind--which gave
+this lady the air of a serious Cyclops.
+
+Madame Marotte was profuse of thanks, welcomes, apologies, and curtseys.
+It was so good of these gentlemen to come so far--and in such unpleasant
+weather, too! But would not these Messieurs give themselves the trouble
+to be seated? And would they prefer tea or coffee--for both were on the
+table? And where was Marie? Marie, whose _fête_-day it was, and who
+should have come forward to welcome these gentlemen, and thank them for
+the honor of their company!
+
+Thus summoned, Mademoiselle Marie emerged from between the two young
+women, and curtsied demurely.
+
+In the meanwhile, the little old gentleman who had ushered as in was
+bustling about the room, shaking hands with every one, and complimenting
+the ladies.
+
+"Ah, Madame Desjardins," he said, addressing the stout lady in the hat,
+"enchanted to see you back from the sea-side!--you and your charming
+daughter. I do not know which looks the more young and blooming."
+
+Then, turning to the grim lady in black:--
+
+"And I am charmed to pay my homage to Madame de Montparnasse. I had the
+pleasure of being present at the brilliant _début_ of Madame's gifted
+daughter the other evening at the private performance of the pupils of
+the Conservatoire. Mademoiselle Honoria inherits the _grand air_,
+Madame, from yourself."
+
+Then, to the plump gentleman with the shirt-front:--
+
+"And Monsieur Philomène!--this is indeed a privilege and a pleasure. Bad
+weather, Monsieur Philomène, for the voice!"
+
+Then, to the two girls:--
+
+"Mesdemoiselles--Achille Dorinet prostrates himself at the feet of
+youth, beauty, and talent! Mademoiselle Honoria, I salute in you the
+future Empress of the tragic stage. Mademoiselle Rosalie, modesty
+forbids me to extol the acquired graces of even my most promising pupil;
+but I may be permitted to adore in you the graces of nature."
+
+While I was listening to these scraps of salutation, Müller was
+murmuring tender nothings in the ear of the fair Marie, and Madame
+Marotte was pouring out the coffee.
+
+Monsieur Achille Dorinet, having gone the round of the company, next
+addressed himself to me.
+
+"Permit me, Monsieur," he said, bringing his heels together and
+punctuating his sentences with little bows, "permit me, in the absence
+of a master of the ceremonies, to introduce myself--Achille Dorinet,
+Achille Dorinet, whose name may not, perhaps, be wholly unknown to you
+in connection with the past glories of the classical ballet. Achille
+Dorinet, formerly _premier sujet_ of the Opéra Français--now principal
+choreographic professor at the Conservatoire Impériale de Musique. I
+have had the honor, Monsieur, of dancing at Erfurth before their
+Imperial Majesties the Emperors Napoleon and Alexander, and a host of
+minor sovereigns. Those, Monsieur, were the high and palmy days of the
+art. We performed a ballet descriptive of the siege of Troy, and I
+undertook the part of a river god--the god Scamander, _en effet_. The
+great ladies of the court, Monsieur, were graciously pleased to admire
+my proportions as the god Scamander. I wore a girdle of sedges, a wreath
+of water-lilies, and a scarf of blue and silver. I have reason to
+believe that the costume became me."
+
+"Sir," I replied gravely, "I do not doubt it."
+
+"It is a noble art, Monsieur, _l'art de la dame_" said the former
+_premier sujet_, with a sigh; "but it is on the decline. Of the grand
+style of fifty years ago, only myself and tradition remain."
+
+"Monsieur was, doubtless, a contemporary of Vestris, the famous dancer,"
+I said.
+
+"The illustrious Vestris, Monsieur," said the little old gentleman,
+"was, next to Louis the Fourteenth, the greatest of Frenchmen. I am
+proud to own myself his disciple, as well as his contemporary."
+
+"Why next to Louis the Fourteenth, Monsieur Dorinet?" I asked, keeping
+my countenance with difficulty. "Why not next to Napoleon the First, who
+was a still greater conqueror?"
+
+"But no dancer, Monsieur!" replied the ex-god Scamander, with a kind of
+half pirouette; "whereas the Grand Monarque was the finest dancer of
+his epoch."
+
+Madame Marotte had by this time supplied all her guests with tea and
+coffee, while Monsieur Philomène went round with the cakes and bread and
+butter. Madame Desjardins spread her pocket-handkerchief on her lap--a
+pocket-handkerchief the size of a small table-cloth. Madame de
+Montparnasse, more mindful of her gentility, removed to a corner of the
+tea-table, and ate her bread and butter in her black cotton gloves.
+
+"We hope we have another bachelor by-and-by," said Madame Marotte,
+addressing herself to the young ladies, who looked down and giggled. "A
+charming man, mesdemoiselles, and quite the gentleman--our _locataire_,
+M'sieur Lenoir. You know him, M'sieur Dorinet--pray tell these
+demoiselles what a charming man M'sieur Lenoir is!"
+
+The little dancing-master bowed, coughed, smiled, and looked somewhat
+embarrassed.
+
+"Monsieur Lenoir is no doubt a man of much information," he said,
+hesitatingly; "a traveller--a reader--a gentleman--oh! yes, certainly a
+gentleman. But to say that he is a--a charming man ... well, perhaps the
+ladies are the best judges of such nice questions. What says
+Mam'selle Marie?"
+
+Thus applied to, the fair Marie became suddenly crimson, and had not a
+word to reply with. Monsieur Dorinet stared. The young ladies tittered.
+Madame Marotte, deaf as a post and serenely unconscious, smiled, nodded,
+and said "Ah, yes, yes--didn't I tell you so?"
+
+"Monsieur Dorinet has, I fear, asked an indiscreet question," said
+Müller, boiling over with jealousy.
+
+"I--I have not observed Monsieur Lenoir sufficiently to--to form an
+opinion," faltered Marie, ready to cry with vexation.
+
+Müller glared at her reproachfully, turned on his heel, and came over to
+where I was standing.
+
+"You saw how she blushed?" he said in a fierce whisper. "_Sacredie_!
+I'll bet my head she's an arrant flirt. Who, in the name of all the
+fiends, is this lodger she's been carrying on with? A lodger, too--oh!
+the artful puss!"
+
+At this awkward moment, Monsieur Dorinet, with considerable tact, asked
+Monsieur Philomène for a song; and Monsieur Philomène (who as I
+afterwards learned was a favorite tenor at fifth-rate concerts) was
+graciously pleased to comply.
+
+Not, however, without a little preliminary coquetry, after the manner of
+tenors. First he feared he was hoarse; then struck a note or two on the
+piano, and tried his falsetto; then asked for a glass of water; and
+finally begged that one of the young ladies would be so amiable as to
+accompany him.
+
+Mademoiselle Honoria, inheriting rigidity from the maternal Cyclops,
+drew herself up and declined stiffly; but the other, whom the
+dancing-master had called Rosalie, got up directly and said she would
+do her best.
+
+"Only," she added, blushing, "I play so badly!"
+
+Monsieur Philomène was provided with two copies of his song--one for the
+accompanyist and one for himself; then, standing well away from the
+piano with his face to the audience, he balanced his music in his hand,
+made his little professional bow, coughed, ran his fingers through his
+hair, and assumed an expression of tender melancholy.
+
+"One--two--three," began Mdlle. Rosalie, her little fat fingers
+staggering helplessly among the first cadenzas of the symphony.
+"One--two--three. One" ...
+
+Monsieur Philomène interrupted with a wave of the hand, as if conducting
+an orchestra.
+
+"Pardon, Mademoiselle," he said, "not quite so fast, if you please!
+Andantino--andantino--one--two--three ... Just so! A thousand thanks!"
+
+Again Mdlle. Rosalie attacked the symphony. Again Monsieur Philomène
+cleared his voice, and suffered a pensive languor to cloud his
+manly brow.
+
+     "_Revenez, revenez, beaux jours de mon enfance,_"
+
+he began, in a small, tremulous, fluty voice.
+
+"They'll have a long road to travel back, _parbleu_!" muttered Müller.
+
+     "_De votre aspect riant charmer ma souvenance_!"
+
+Here Mdlle. Rosalie struck a wrong chord, became involved in hopeless
+difficulties, and gasped audibly.
+
+Monsieur Philomène darted a withering glance at her, and went on:--
+
+     "_Mon coeur; mon pauvre coeur_" ...
+
+More wrong chords, and a smothered "_mille pardons_!" from Mdlle.
+Rosalie.
+
+     "_Mon coeur, mon pauvre coeur a la tristesse en proie,
+     En fouillant le passé"...._
+
+A dead stop on the part of Mdlle. Rosalie.
+
+     _"En fouillant le passé_"....
+
+repeated the tenor, with the utmost severity of emphasis.
+
+"_Mais, mon Dieu_, Rosalie! what are you doing?" cried Madame
+Desjardins, angrily. "Why don't you go on?"
+
+Mdlle. Rosalie burst into a flood of tears.
+
+"I--I can't!" she sobbed. "It's so--so very difficult--and"...
+
+Madame Desjardins flung up her hands in despair.
+
+"_Ciel_!" she cried, "and I have been paying three francs a lesson for
+you, Mademoiselle, twice a week for the last six years!"
+
+"_Mais, maman_"....
+
+"_Fi done_, Mademoiselle! I am ashamed of you. Make a curtsey to
+Monsieur Philomène this moment, and beg his pardon; for you have spoiled
+his beautiful song!"
+
+But Monsieur Philomène would hear of no such expiation. His soul, to
+use his own eloquent language, recoiled from it with horror! The
+accompaniment, _à vrai dire_, was not easy, and _la bien aimable_
+Mam'selle Rosalie had most kindly done her best with it. _Allons
+donc!_--on condition that no more should be said on the subject,
+Monsieur Philomène would volunteer to sing a little unaccompanied
+romance of his own composition--a mere _bagatelle_; but a tribute to
+"_les beaux yeux de ces chères dames_!"
+
+So Mam'selle Rosalie wiped away her tears, and Madame Desjardins
+smoothed her ruffled feathers, and Monsieur Philomène warbled a
+plaintive little ditty in which "_coeur_" rhymed to "_peur_" and
+"_amours_" to "_toujours_" and "_le sort_" to "_la mort_" in quite the
+usual way; so giving great satisfaction to all present, but most,
+perhaps, to himself.
+
+And now, hospitably anxious that each of her guests should have a chance
+of achieving distinction, Madame Marotte invited Mdlle. Honoria to favor
+the company with a dramatic recitation.
+
+Mdlle. Honoria hesitated; exchanged glances with the Cyclops; and, in
+order to enhance the value of her performance, began raising all kinds
+of difficulties. There was no stage, for instance; and there were no
+footlights; but M. Dorinet met these objections by proposing to range
+all the seats at one end of the room, and to divide the stage off by a
+row of lighted candles.
+
+"But it is so difficult to render a dramatic scene without an
+interlocutor!" said the young lady.
+
+"What is it you require, _ma chère demoiselle?_" asked Madame Marotte.
+
+"I have no interlocutor," said Mdlle. Honoria.
+
+"No what, my love?"
+
+"No interlocutor," repeated Mdlle. Honoria, at the top of her voice.
+
+"Dear! dear! what a pity! Can't we send the boy for it? Marie, my child,
+bid Jacques run to Madame de Montparnasse's _appartement_ in the
+Rue" ...
+
+But Madame Marotte's voice was lost in the confusion; for Monsieur
+Dorinet was already deep in the arrangement of the room, and we were all
+helping to move the furniture. As for Mademoiselle's last difficulty,
+the little dancing-master met that by offering to read whatever was
+necessary to carry on the scene.
+
+And now, the stage being cleared, the audience placed, and Monsieur
+Dorinet provided with a volume of Corneille, Mademoiselle Honoria
+proceeded to drape herself in an old red shawl belonging to
+Madame Marotte.
+
+The scene selected is the fifth of the fourth act of Horace, where
+Camille, meeting her only surviving brother, upbraids him with the death
+of Curiace.
+
+Mam'selle Honoria, as Camille, with clasped hands and tragic expression,
+stalks in a slow and stately manner towards the footlights.
+
+(Breathless suspense of the audience.)
+
+M. Dorinet, who should begin by vaunting his victory over the Curiatii,
+stops to put on his glasses, finds it difficult to read with all the
+candles on the ground, and mutters something about the smallness of
+the type.
+
+Mdlle. Honoria, not to keep the audience waiting, surveys the ex-god
+Seamander with a countenance expressive of horror; starts; and takes a
+turn across the stage.
+
+"_Ma soeur,_" begins M. Dorinet, holding the book very much on one side,
+so as to catch the light upon the page, "_ma soeur, voici le bras_"....
+
+"Ah, Heaven! my dear Mademoiselle, take care of the candles!" cries
+Madame Marotte in a shrill whisper.
+
+     ... "_le bras qui venge nos deux frères,
+     Le bras qui rompt le cours de nos destins contraires,
+     Qui nous rend"_...
+
+Here he lost his place; stammered; and recovered it with difficulty.
+
+     _"Qui nous rend maîtres d'Albe"_....
+
+Madame Marotte groans aloud in an agony of apprehension
+
+"_Ah, mon Dieu!_" she exclaims, gaspingly, "if they didn't flare so, it
+wouldn't be half so dangerous!"
+
+Here M. Dorinet dropped his book, and stooping to pick up the book,
+dropped his spectacles.
+
+"I think," said Mdlle. Honoria, indignantly, "we had better begin again.
+Monsieur Dorinet, pray read with the help of a candle _this_ time!"
+
+And, with an angry toss of her head, Mdlle. Honoria went up the stage,
+put on her tragedy face again, and prepared once more to stalk down to
+the footlights.
+
+Monsieur Dorinet, in the meanwhile, had snatched up a candle, readjusted
+his spectacles, and found his place.
+
+"_Ma soeur_" he began again, holding the book close to his eyes and the
+candle just under his nose, and nodding vehemently with every
+emphasis:--
+
+     "_Ma soeur, voici le bras qui venge nos deux frères,
+     Le bras qui rompt le cours de nos destins contraires,
+     Qui nous rend maîtres d'Albe_" ...
+
+A piercing scream from Madame Marotte, a general cry on the part of the
+audience, and a strong smell of burning, brought the dancing-master to a
+sudden stop. He looked round, bewildered.
+
+"Your wig! Your wig's on fire!" cried every one at once.
+
+Monsieur Dorinet clapped his hand to his head, which was now adorned
+with a rapidly-spreading glory; burned his fingers; and cut a
+frantic caper.
+
+"Save him! save him!" yelled Madame Marotte.
+
+But almost before the words were out of her mouth, Müller, clearing the
+candles at a bound, had rushed to the rescue, scalped Monsieur Dorinet
+by a _tour de main_, cast the blazing wig upon the floor, and trampled
+out the fire.
+
+Then followed a roar of "inextinguishable laughter," in which, however,
+neither the tragic Camille nor the luckless Horace joined.
+
+"Heavens and earth!" murmured the little dancing-master, ruefully
+surveying the ruins of his blonde peruke. And then he put his hand to
+his head, which was as bald as an egg.
+
+In the meanwhile Mdlle. Honoria, who had not yet succeeded in uttering a
+syllable of her part, took no pains to dissemble her annoyance; and was
+only pacified at last by a happy proposal on the part of Monsieur
+Philomène, who suggested that "this gifted demoiselle" should be
+entreated to favor the society with a soliloquy.
+
+Thus invited, she draped herself again, stalked down to the footlights
+for the third time, and in a high, shrill voice, with every variety of
+artificial emphasis and studied gesture, recited Voltaire's famous
+"Death of Coligny," from the _Henriade_.
+
+In the midst of this performance, just at that point when the assassins
+are described as falling upon their knees before their victim, the door
+of the room was softly opened, and another guest slipped in unseen
+behind us. Slipped in, indeed, so quietly that (the backs of the
+audience being turned that way) no one seemed to hear, and no one looked
+round but myself.
+
+Brief as was that glance, and all in the shade as he stood, I recognised
+him instantly.
+
+It was the mysterious stranger of the Café Procope.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIV.
+
+MY AUNT'S FLOWER GARDEN.
+
+Having despatched the venerable Coligny much to her own satisfaction and
+apparently to the satisfaction of her hearers, Mdlle. Honoria returned
+to private life; Messieurs Philomène and Dorinet removed the footlights;
+the audience once more dispersed itself about the room; and Madame
+Marotte welcomed the new-comer as Monsieur Lenoir.
+
+"_Monsieur est bien aimable_," she said, nodding and smiling, and, with
+tremulous hands, smoothing down the front of her black silk gown. "I had
+told these young ladies that we hoped for the honor of Monsieur's
+society. Will Monsieur permit me to introduce him?"
+
+"With pleasure, Madame Marotte."
+
+And M. Lenoir--white cravatted, white kid-gloved, hat in hand, perfectly
+well-dressed in full evening black, and wearing a small orange-colored
+rosette at his button-hole--bowed, glanced round the room, and, though
+his eyes undoubtedly took in both Müller and myself, looked as if he had
+never seen either of us in his life.
+
+I< saw Müller start, and the color fly into his face.
+
+"By Heaven!" he exclaimed, "it is--it must be ... look at him,
+Arbuthnot! If that isn't the man who stole my sketch-book, I'll eat
+my head!"
+
+"It _is_ the man," I replied. "I recognised him ten minutes ago, when he
+first came in."
+
+"You are certain?"
+
+"Quite certain."
+
+"And yet--there is something different!"
+
+There _was_ something different; but, at the same time, much that was
+identical. There was the same strange, inscrutable look, the same
+bronzed complexion, the same military bearing. M. Lenoir, it was true,
+was well, and even elegantly dressed; whereas, the stranger of the Café
+Procope bore all the outward stigmata of penury; but that was not all.
+There was yet "something different." The one looked like a man who had
+done, or suffered, a wrong in his time; who had an old quarrel with the
+world; and who only sought to hide himself, his poverty, and his bitter
+pride from the observation of his fellow men. The other stood before us
+dignified, _décoré_, self-possessed, a man not only of the world, but
+apparently no stranger to that small section of it called "the great
+world." In a word, the man of the Café, sunken, sullen, threadbare as he
+was, would have been almost less out of his proper place in Madame
+Marotte's society of small trades-people and minor professionals, than
+was M. Lenoir with his _grand air_ and his orange-colored ribbon.
+
+"It's the same man," said Müller; "the same, beyond a doubt. The more I
+look at him, the more confident I am."
+
+"And the more I look at him," said I, "the more doubtful I get."
+
+Madame Marotte, meanwhile, had introduced M. Lenoir to the two
+Conservatoire pupils and their mammas; Monsieur Dorinet had proposed
+some "_petits jeux_;" and Monsieur Philomène was helping him to
+re-arrange the chairs--this time in a circle.
+
+"Take your places, Messieurs et Mesdames--take your places!" cried
+Monsieur Dorinet, who had by this time resumed his wig, singed as it
+was, and shorn of its fair proportions. "What game shall we play at?"
+
+"_Pied de Boeuf_" "_Colin Maillard_" and other games were successively
+proposed and rejected.
+
+"We have a game in Alsace called 'My Aunt's Flower Garden'" said Müller.
+"Does any one know it?"
+
+"'My Aunt's Flower Garden?'" repeated Monsieur Dorinet. "I never heard
+of it."
+
+"It sounds pretty," said Mdlle. Rosalie.
+
+"Will M'sieur teach it to us, if it is not very difficult?" suggested
+Mdlle. Rosalie's mamma.
+
+"With pleasure, Madame. It is not a bad game--and it is extremely easy.
+We will sit in a circle, if you please--the chairs as they are placed
+will do quite well."
+
+We were just about to take our places when Madame Marotte seized the
+opportunity to introduce Müller and myself to M. Lenoir.
+
+"We have met before, Monsieur," said Müller, pointedly.
+
+"I am ashamed to confess, Monsieur, that I do not remember to have had
+that pleasure," replied M. Lenoir, somewhat stiffly.
+
+"And yet, Monsieur, it was but the other day," persisted Müller.
+
+"Monsieur, I can but reiterate my regret."
+
+"At the Café Procope."
+
+M. Lenoir stared coldly, slightly shrugged his shoulders, and said,
+with the air of one who repudiates a discreditable charge:--
+
+"Monsieur, I do not frequent the Café Procope."
+
+"If Monsieur Müller is to teach us the game, Monsieur Müller must begin
+it!" said Monsieur Dorinet.
+
+"At once," replied Müller, taking his place in the circle.
+
+As ill-luck would have it (the rest of us being already seated), there
+were but two chairs left; so that M. Lenoir and Müller had to sit
+side by side.
+
+"I begin with my left-hand neighbor," said Müller, addressing himself
+with a bow to Mdlle. Rosalie; "and the circle will please to repeat
+after me:--'I have the four corners of my Aunt's Flower Garden
+for sale--
+
+thee, and lov'd thee, and ne'er can forget._'"
+
+MDLLE. ROSALIE _to_ M. PHILOMÈNE.--I have the four corners of my Aunt's
+Flower Garden for sale--
+
+thee, and lov'd thee, and ne'er can forget._'
+
+M. PHILOMÈNE _to_ MADAME DE MONTPARNASSE.--I have the four corners of my
+Aunt's Flower Garden, etc., etc.
+
+MADAME DE MONTPARNASSE _to_ M. DORINET.--I have the four corners of my
+Aunt's Flower Garden, etc., etc.
+
+Monsieur Dorinet repeats the formula to Madame Desjardins; Madame
+Desjardins passes it on to me; I proclaim it at the top of my voice to
+Madame Marotte; Madame Marotte transfers it to Mdlle. Honoria; Mdlle.
+Honoria delivers it to the fair Marie; the fair Marie tells it to M.
+Lenoir, and the first round is completed.
+
+Müller resumes the lead :--
+
+     "_In the second grow heartsease and wild eglantine;
+     Fair exchange is no theft--for my heart, give me thine_."
+
+MDLLE. ROSALIE _to_ M. PHILOMÈNE:--
+
+     "_In the second grow heartsease and wild eglantine;
+     Fair exchange is no theft--for my heart, give me thine_."
+
+M. PHILOMÈNE _to_ MDLLE. DE MONTPARNASSE:--
+
+     "_In the second grow heartsease_," &c., &c.
+
+And so on again, till the second round is done. Then Müller began
+again:--
+
+     "_In the third of these corners pale primroses grow;
+     Now tell me thy secret, and whisper it low_."
+
+Mdlle. Rosalie was about to repeat these lines as before; but he stopped
+her.
+
+"No, Mademoiselle, not till you have told me the secret."
+
+"The secret, M'sieur? What secret?"
+
+"Nay, Mademoiselle, how can I tell that till you have told me? You must
+whisper something to me--something very secret, which you would not wish
+any one else to hear--before you repeat the lines. And when you repeat
+them, Monsieur Philomène must whisper his secret to you--and so on
+through the circle."
+
+Mdlle. Rosalie hesitated, smiled, whispered something in Müller's ear,
+and went on with:--
+
+     "_In the third of these corners pale primroses grow;
+     Now tell me thy secret, and whisper it low_."
+
+Monsieur Philomène then whispered his secret to Mdlle. Rosalie, and so
+on again till it ended with M. Lenoir and Müller.
+
+"I don't think it is a very amusing game," said Madame Marotte; who,
+being deaf, had been left out of the last round, and found it dull.
+
+"It will be more entertaining presently, Madame," shouted Müller, with a
+malicious twinkle about his eyes. "Pray observe the next lines,
+Messieurs et Mesdames, and follow my lead as before:--
+
+     '_Roses bloom in the fourth; and your secret, my dear,
+     Which you whisper'd so softly just now in my ear,
+     I repeat word for word, for the others to hear!_'
+
+Mademoiselle Rosalie (whose pardon I implore!) whispered to me that
+Monsieur Philomène dyed his moustache and whiskers."
+
+There was a general murmur of alarm tempered with tittering.
+Mademoiselle Rosalie was dumb with confusion. Monsieur Philomène's face
+became the color of a full-blown peony. Madame de Montparnasse and
+Mdlle. Honoria turned absolutely green.
+
+"_Comment!_" exclaimed one or two voices. "Is everything to be
+repeated?"
+
+"Everything, Messieurs et Mesdames," replied
+Müller--"everything--without reservation. I call upon Mdlle. Rosalie to
+reveal the secret of Monsieur Philomène."
+
+MDLLE. ROSALIE (_with great promptitude_):--Monsieur Philomène whispered
+to me that Honoria was the most disagreeable girl in Paris, Marie the
+dullest, and myself the prettiest.
+
+M. PHILOMÈNE (_in an agony of confusion_):--I beseech you, Mam'selle
+Honoria ... I entreat you, Mam'selle Marie, not for an instant to
+suppose....
+
+MDLLE. HONORIA (_drawing herself up and smiling acidly_):--Oh, pray do
+not give yourself the trouble to apologize, Monsieur Philomène. Your
+opinion, I assure you, is not of the least moment to either of us. Is
+it, Marie?
+
+But the fair Marie only smiled good-naturedly, and said:--
+
+"I know I am not clever. Monsieur Philomène is quite right; and I am not
+at all angry with him."
+
+"But--but, indeed, Mesdemoiselles, I--I--am incapable...." stammered the
+luckless tenor, wiping the perspiration from his brow. "I am
+incapable...."
+
+"Silence in the circle!" cried Müller, authoritatively. "Private
+civilities are forbidden by the rules of the game. I call Monsieur
+Philomène to order, and I demand from him the secret of Madame de
+Montparnasse."
+
+M. Philomène looked even more miserable than before.
+
+"I--I ... but it is an odious position! To betray the confidence of a
+lady ... Heavens! I cannot."
+
+"The secret!--the secret!" shouted the others, impatiently.
+
+Madame de Montparnasse pursed up her parchment lips, glared upon us
+defiantly, and said:--
+
+"Pray don't hesitate about repeating my words, M'sieur Philomène. I am
+not ashamed of them."
+
+M. PHILOMENE (_reluctantly_):--Madame de Montparnasse observed to me
+that what she particularly disliked was a mixed society like--like the
+present; and that she hoped our friend Madame Marotte would in future be
+less indiscriminate in the choice of her acquaintances.
+
+MULLER (_with elaborate courtesy_):--We are all infinitely obliged to
+Madame de Montparnasse for her opinion of us--(I speak for the society,
+as leader of the circle)--and beg to assure her that we entirely
+coincide in her views. It rests with Madame to carry on the game, and to
+betray the confidence of Monsieur Dorinet.
+
+MADAME DE MONTPARNASSE (_with obvious satisfaction_):--Monsieur Dorinet
+told me that Rosalie Desjardin's legs were ill-made, and that she would
+never make a dancer, though she practised from now till doomsday.
+
+M. DORINET (_springing to his feet as if he had been shot_):--Heavens
+and earth! Madame de Montparnasse, what have I done that you should so
+pervert my words? Mam'selle Rosalie--_ma chère elève_, believe me,
+I never....
+
+"Silence in the circle!" shouted Müller again.
+
+M. DORINET:--But, M'sieur, in simple self-defence....
+
+MULLER:--Self-defence, Monsieur Dorinet, is contrary to the rules of the
+game. Revenge only is permitted. Revenge yourself on Madame Desjardins,
+whose secret it is your turn to tell.
+
+M. DORINET:--Madame Desjardins drew my attention to the toilette of
+Madame de Montparnasse. She said: "_Mon Dieu!_ Monsieur Dorinet, are you
+not tired of seeing La Montparnasse in that everlasting old black gown?
+My Rosalie says she is in mourning for her ugliness."
+
+MADAME DESJARDINS (_laughing heartily_):--_Eh bien--oui!_ I don't deny
+it; and Rosalie's _mot_ was not bad. And now, M'sieur the Englishman
+(_turning to me_), it is your turn to be betrayed. Monsieur, whose name
+I cannot pronounce, said to me:--"Madame, the French, _selon moi_, are
+the best dressed and most _spirituel_ people of Europe. Their very
+silence is witty; and if mankind were, by universal consent, to go
+without clothes to-morrow, they would wear the primitive costume of Adam
+and Eve more elegantly than the rest of the world, and still lead
+the fashion,"
+
+(_A murmur of approval on the part of the company, who take the
+compliment entirely aux serieux_.)
+
+MYSELF (_agreeably conscious of having achieved popularity_):--Our
+hostess's deafness having unfortunately excluded her from this part of
+the game, I was honored with the confidence of Mdlle. Honoria, who
+informed me that she is to make her _début_ before long at the Theatre
+Français, and hoped that I would take tickets for the occasion.
+
+MDLLE. ROSALIE (_satirically_):--_Brava_, Honoria! What a woman of
+business you are!
+
+MDLLE. HONORIA (_affecting not to hear this observation_)--
+
+     "_Roses bloom in the fourth, and your secret, my dear,
+     Which you whispered so softly just now in my ear,
+     I repeat word for word for the others to hear_."
+
+Marie said to me.... _Tiens_! Marie, don't pull my dress in that way.
+You shouldn't have said it, you know, if it won't bear repeating! Marie
+said to me that she could have either Monsieur Müller or Monsieur
+Lenoir, by only holding up her finger--but she couldn't make up her mind
+which she liked best.
+
+MDLLE. MARIE (_half crying_):--Nay, Honoria--how can you be so--so
+unkind ... so spiteful? I--I did not say I could have either M'sieur
+Müller or... or...
+
+M. LENOIR (_with great spirit and good breeding_):--Whether Mademoiselle
+used those words or not is of very little importance. The fact remains
+the same; and is as old as the world. Beauty has but to will and
+to conquer.
+
+MULLER:--Order in the circle! The game waits for Mademoiselle Marie.
+
+MARIE (_hesitatingly_):--
+
+     "_Roses bloom in the fourth, and your secret_"
+
+M'sieur Lenoir said that--that he admired the color of my dress, and
+that blue became me more than lilac.
+
+MULLER: (_coldly_)--_Pardon_, Mademoiselle, but I happened to overhear
+what Monsieur Lenoir whispered just now, and those were not his words.
+Monsieur Lenoir said, "Look in"... but perhaps Mademoiselle would prefer
+me not to repeat more?
+
+MARIE--(_in great confusion_):--As--as you please, M'sieur.
+
+MULLER:--Then, Mademoiselle, I will be discreet, and I will not even
+impose a forfeit upon you, as I might do, by the laws of the game. It is
+for Monsieur Lenoir to continue.
+
+M. LENOIR:--I do not remember what Monsieur Müller whispered to me at
+the close of the last round.
+
+MULLER (_pointedly_):--_Pardon,_ Monsieur, I should have thought that
+scarcely possible.
+
+M. LENOIR:--It was perfectly unintelligible, and therefore left no
+impression on my memory.
+
+MULLER:--Permit me, then, to have the honor of assisting your memory. I
+said to you--"Monsieur, if I believed that any modest young woman of my
+acquaintance was in danger of being courted by a man of doubtful
+character, do you know what I would do? I would hunt that man down with
+as little remorse as a ferret hunts down a rat in a drain."
+
+M. LENOIR:--The sentiment does you honor, Monsieur; but I do not see the
+application,
+
+MULLER:--Vous ne le trouvez pas, Monsieur?
+
+M. LENOIR--(_with a cold stare, and a scarcely perceptible shrug of the
+shoulders_):--Non, Monsieur.
+
+Here Mdlle. Rosalie broke in with:--"What are we to do next, M'sieur
+Müller? Are we to begin another round, or shall we start a fresh game?"
+
+To which Müller replied that it must be "_selon le plaisir de ces
+dames_;" and put the question to the vote.
+
+But too many plain, unvarnished truths had cropped up in the course of
+the last round of my Aunt's Flower Garden; and the ladies were out of
+humor. Madame de Montparnasse, frigid, Cyclopian, black as Erebus, found
+that it was time to go home; and took her leave, bristling with
+gentility. The tragic Honoria stalked majestically after her. Madame
+Desjardins, mortally offended with M. Dorinet on the score of Rosalie's
+legs, also prepared to be gone; while M. Philomène, convicted of
+hair-dye and _brouillé_ for ever with "the most disagreeable girl in
+Paris," hastened to make his adieux as brief as possible.
+
+"A word in your ear, mon cher Dorinet," whispered he, catching the
+little dancing-master by the button-hole. "Isn't it the most unpleasant
+party you were ever at in your life?"
+
+The ex-god Scamander held up his hands and eyes.
+
+"_Eh, mon Dieu_!" he replied. "What an evening of disasters! I have lost
+my best pupil and my second-best wig!"
+
+In the meanwhile, we went up like the others, and said good-night to our
+hostess.
+
+She, good soul! in her deafness, knew nothing about the horrors of the
+evening, and was profuse of her civilities. "So amiable of these
+gentlemen to honor her little soirée--so kind of M'sieur Müller to have
+exerted himself to make things go off pleasantly--so sorry we would not
+stay half an hour longer," &c., &c.
+
+To all of which Müller (with a sly grimace expressive of contrition)
+replied only by a profound salutation and a rapid retreat. Passing M.
+Lenoir without so much as a glance, he paused a moment before Mdlle.
+Marie who was standing near the door, and said in a tone audible only to
+her and myself:--
+
+"I congratulate you, Mademoiselle, on your admirable talent for
+intrigue. I trust, when you look in the usual place and find the
+promised letter, it will prove agreeable reading. J'ai l'honneur,
+Mademoiselle, de vous saluer."
+
+I saw the girl flush crimson, then turn deadly white, and draw back as
+if his hand had struck her a sudden blow. The next moment we were
+half-way down the stairs.
+
+"What, in Heaven's name, does all this mean?" I said, when we were once
+more in the street.
+
+"It means," replied Müller fiercely, "that the man's a scoundrel, and
+the woman, like all other women, is false."
+
+"Then the whisper you overheard" ...
+
+"Was only this:--'_Look in the usual place, and you will find a
+letter_.' Not many words, _mon cher_, but confoundedly comprehensive!
+And I who believed that girl to be an angel of candor! I who was within
+an ace of falling seriously in love with her! _Sacredie_! what an idiot
+I have been!"
+
+"Forget her, my dear fellow," said I. "Wipe her out of your memory
+(which I think will not be difficult), and leave her to her fate."
+
+He shook his head.
+
+"No," he said, gloomily, "I won't do that. I'll get to the bottom of
+that man's mystery; and if, as I suspect, there's that about his past
+life which won't bear the light of day--I'll save her, if I can."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXV.
+
+WEARY AND FAR DISTANT.
+
+Twice already, in accordance with my promise to Dalrymple, I had called
+upon Madame de Courcelles, and finding her out each time, had left my
+card, and gone away disappointed. From Dalrymple himself, although I had
+written to him several times, I heard seldom, and always briefly. His
+first notes were dated from Berlin, and those succeeding them from
+Vienna. He seemed restless, bitter, dissatisfied with himself, and with
+the world. Naturally unfit for a lounging, idle life, his active nature,
+now that it had to bear up against the irritation of hope deferred,
+chafed and fretted for work.
+
+"My sword-arm," he wrote in one of his letters, "is weary of its
+holiday. There are times when I long for the smell of gunpowder, and the
+thunder of battle. I am sick to death of churches and picture-galleries,
+operas, dilettantism, white-kid-glovism, and all the hollow shows and
+seemings of society. Sometimes I regret having left the army--at others
+I rejoice; for, after all, in these piping times of peace, to be a
+soldier is to be a mere painted puppet--a thing of pipe-clay and gold
+bullion--an expensive scarecrow--an elegant Guy Fawkes--a sign, not of
+what is, but of what has been, and yet may be again. For my part, I care
+not to take the livery without the service. Pshaw! will things never
+mend! Are the good old times, and the good old international hatreds,
+gone by for ever? Shall we never again have a thorough, seasonable,
+wholesome, continental war? This place (Vienna) would be worth fighting
+for, if one had the chance. I sometimes amuse myself by planning a
+siege, when I ride round the fortifications, as is my custom of an
+afternoon."
+
+In another, after telling me that he had been reading some books of
+travel in Egypt and Central America, he said:--
+
+"Next to a military life I think that of a traveller--a genuine
+traveller, who turns his back upon railroads and guides--must be the
+most exciting and the most enviable under heaven. Since reading these
+books, I dream of the jungle and the desert, and fancy that a
+buffalo-hunt must be almost as fine sport as a charge of cavalry. Oh,
+what a weary exile this is! I feel as if the very air were stagnant
+around me, and I, like the accursed vessel that carried the ancient
+mariner,--
+
+     As idle as a painted ship,
+     Upon a painted ocean.'"
+
+Sometimes, though rarely, he mentioned Madame de Courcelles, and then
+very guardedly: always as "Madame de Courcelles," and never as his wife.
+
+"That morning," he wrote, "comes back to me with all the vagueness of a
+dream--you will know what morning I mean, and why it fills so shadowy a
+page in the book of my memory. And it might as well have been a dream,
+for aught of present peace or future hope that it has brought me. I
+often think that I was selfish when I exacted that pledge from her. I do
+not see of what good it can be to either her or me, or in what sense I
+can be said to have gained even the power to protect and serve her.
+Would that I were rich; or that she and I were poor together, and
+dwelling far away in some American wild, under the shade of primeval
+trees, the world forgetting; by the world forgot! I should enjoy the
+life of a Canadian settler--so free, so rational, so manly. How happy we
+might be--she with her children, her garden, her books; I with my dogs,
+my gun, my lands! What a curse it is, this spider's web of civilization,
+that hems and cramps us in on every side, and from which not all the
+armor of common-sense is sufficient to preserve us!"
+
+Sometimes he broke into a strain of forced gayety, more sad, to my
+thinking, than the bitterest lamentations could have been.
+
+"I wish to Heaven," he said, in one of his later letters--"I wish to
+Heaven I had no heart, and no brain! I wish I was, like some worthy
+people I know, a mere human zoophyte, consisting of nothing but a mouth
+and a stomach. Only conceive how it must simplify life when once one has
+succeeded in making a clean sweep of all those finer emotions which
+harass more complicated organisms! Enviable zoophytes, that live only to
+digest!--who would not be of the brotherhood?"
+
+In another he wrote:--
+
+"I seem to have lived years in the last five or six weeks, and to have
+grown suddenly old and cynical. Some French writer (I think it is
+Alphonse Karr) says, 'Nothing in life is really great and good, except
+what is not true. Man's greatest treasures are his illusions.' Alas! my
+illusions have been dropping from me in showers of late, like withered
+leaves in Autumn. The tree will be bare as a gallows ere long, if these
+rough winds keep on blowing. If only things would amuse me as of old! If
+there was still excitement in play, and forgetfulness in wine, and
+novelty in travel! But there is none--and all things alike are 'flat,
+stale, and unprofitable,' The truth is, Damon, I want but one thing--and
+wanting that, lack all."
+
+Here is one more extract, and it shall be the last:--
+
+"You ask me how I pass my days--in truth, wearily enough. I rise with
+the dawn, but that is not very early in September; and I ride for a
+couple of hours before breakfast. After breakfast I play billiards in
+some public room, consume endless pipes, read the papers, and so on.
+Later in the day I scowl through a picture-gallery, or a string of
+studios; or take a pull up the river; or start off upon a long, solitary
+objectless walk through miles and miles of forest. Then comes
+dinner--the inevitable, insufferable, interminable German table-d'hôte
+dinner--and then there is the evening to be got through somehow! Now and
+then I drop in at a theatre, but generally take refuge in some plebeian
+Lust Garten or Beer Hall, where amid clouds of tobacco-smoke, one may
+listen to the best part-singing and zitter-playing in Europe. And so my
+days drag by--who but myself knows how slowly? Truly, Damon, there comes
+to every one of us, sooner or later, a time when we say of life as
+Christopher Sly said of the comedy--''Tis an excellent piece of work.
+Would 'twere done!'"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVI.
+
+THE VICOMTE DE CAYLUS.
+
+It was after receiving the last of these letters that I hazarded a third
+visit to Madame de Courcelles. This time, I ventured to present myself
+at her door about midday, and was at once ushered upstairs into a
+drawing-room looking out on the Rue Castellane.
+
+Seeing her open work-table, with the empty chair and footstool beside
+it, I thought at the first glance that I was alone in the room, when a
+muttered "Sacr-r-r-re! Down, Bijou!" made me aware of a gentleman
+extended at full length upon a sofa near the fireplace, and of a
+vicious-looking Spitz crouched beneath it.
+
+The gentleman lifted his head from the sofa-cusion; stared at me; bowed
+carelessly; got upon his feet; and seizing the poker, lunged savagely at
+the fire, as if he had a spite against it, and would have put it out,
+if he could. This done, he yawned aloud, flung himself into the nearest
+easy-chair, and rang the bell.
+
+"More coals, Henri," he said, imperiously; "and--stop! a bottle of
+Seltzer-water."
+
+The servant hesitated.
+
+"I don't think, Monsieur le Vicomte," he said, "that Madame has any
+Seltzer-water in the house; but ..."
+
+"Confound you!--you never have anything in the house at the moment one
+wants it," interrupted the gentleman, irritably.
+
+"I can send for some, if Monsieur le Vicomte desires it."
+
+"Send for it, then; and remember, when I next ask for it, let there be
+some at hand."
+
+"Yes, Monsieur le Vicomte."
+
+"And--Henri!"
+
+"Yes, Monsieur le Vicomte."
+
+"Bid them be quick. I hate to be kept waiting!"
+
+The servant murmured his usual "Yes, Monsieur le Vicomte," and
+disappeared; but with a look of such subdued dislike and impatience in
+his face, as would scarcely have flattered Monsieur le Vicomte had he
+chanced to surprise it.
+
+In the meantime the dog had never ceased growling; whilst I, in default
+of something better to do, turned over the leaves of an album, and took
+advantage of a neighboring mirror to scrutinize the outward appearance
+of this authoritative occupant of Madame de Courcelles' drawing-room.
+
+He was a small, pallid, slender man of about thirty-five or seven years
+of age, with delicate, effeminate features, and hair thickly sprinkled
+with gray. His fingers, white and taper as a woman's, were covered with
+rings. His dress was careless, but that of a gentleman. Glancing at him
+even thus furtively, I could not help observing the worn lines about his
+temples, the mingled languor and irritability of his every gesture; the
+restless suspicion of his eye; the hard curves about his handsome mouth.
+
+"_Mille tonnerres_!" said he, between his teeth "come out, Bijou--come
+out, I say!"
+
+The dog came out unwillingly, and changed the growl to a little whine
+of apprehension. His master immediately dealt him a smart kick that sent
+him crouching to the farther corner of the room, where he hid himself
+under a chair.
+
+"I'll teach you to make that noise," muttered he, as he drew his chair
+closer to the fire, and bent over it, shiveringly. "A yelping brute,
+that would be all the better for hanging."
+
+Having sat thus for a few moments, he seemed to grow restless again,
+and, pushing back his chair, rose, looked out of the window, took a turn
+or two across the room, and paused at length to take a book from one of
+the side-tables. As he did this, our eyes met in the looking-glass;
+whereupon he turned hastily back to the window, and stood there
+whistling till it occurred to him to ring the bell again.
+
+"Monsieur rang?" said the footman, once more making his appearance at
+the door.
+
+"_Mort de ma vie_! yes. The Seltzer-water."
+
+"I have sent for it, Monsieur le Vicomte."
+
+"And it is not yet come?"
+
+"Not yet, Monsieur le Vicomte."
+
+He muttered something to himself, and dropped back into the chair before
+the fire.
+
+"Does Madame de Courcelles know that I am here?" he asked, as the
+servant, after lingering a moment, was about to leave the room.
+
+"I delivered Monsieur le Vicomte's message, and brought back Madame's
+reply," said the man, "half an hour ago."
+
+"True--I had forgotten it. You may go."
+
+The footman closed the door noiselessly, and had no sooner done so than
+he was recalled by another impatient peal.
+
+"Here, Henri--have you told Madame de Courcelles that this gentleman is
+also waiting to see her?"
+
+"Yes, Monsieur le Vicomte."
+
+"_Eh bien_?"
+
+"And Madame said she should be down in a few moments."
+
+"_Sacredie_! go back, then, and inquire if...."
+
+"Madame is here."
+
+As the footman moved back respectfully, Madame de Courcelles came into
+the room. She was looking perhaps somewhat paler, but, to my thinking,
+more charming than ever. Her dark hair was gathered closely round her
+head in massive braids, displaying to their utmost advantage all the
+delicate curves of her throat and chin; while her rich morning dress,
+made of some dark material, and fastened at the throat by a round brooch
+of dead gold, fell in loose and ample folds, like the drapery of a Roman
+matron. Coming at once to meet me, she extended a cordial hand,
+and said:--
+
+"I had begun to despair of ever seeing you again. Why have you always
+come when I was out?"
+
+"Madame," I said, bending low over the slender fingers, that seemed to
+linger kindly in my own, "I have been undeservedly unfortunate."
+
+"Remember for the future," she said, "that I am always at home till
+midday, and after five."
+
+Then, turning to her other visitor, she said:--
+
+"_Mon cousin_, allow me to present my friend. Monsieur
+Arbuthnot--Monsieur le Vicomte Adrien de Caylus."
+
+I had suspected as much already. Who but he would have dared to assume
+these airs of insolence? Who but her suitor and my friend's rival? I had
+disliked him at first sight, and now I detested him. Whether it was that
+my aversion showed itself in my face, or that Madame de Courcelles's
+cordial welcome of myself annoyed him, I know not; but his bow was even
+cooler than my own.
+
+"I have been waiting to see you, Helène," said he, looking at his watch,
+"for nearly three-quarters of an hour."
+
+"I sent you word, _mon cousin_, that I was finishing a letter for the
+foreign post," said Madame de Courcelles, coldly, "and that I could not
+come sooner."
+
+Monsieur de Caylus bit his lip and cast an impatient glance in my
+direction.
+
+"Can you spare me a few moments alone, Helène?" he said.
+
+"Alone, _mon cousin_?"
+
+"Yes, upon a matter of business."
+
+Madame de Courcelles sighed.
+
+"If Monsieur Arbuthnot will be so indulgent as to excuse me for five
+minutes," she replied. "This way, _mon cousin_."
+
+So saying, she lifted a dark green curtain, beneath which they passed to
+a farther room out of sight and hearing.
+
+They remained a long time away. So long, that I grew weary of waiting,
+and, having turned over all the illustrated books upon the table, and
+examined every painting on the walls, turned to the window, as the
+idler's last resource, and watched the passers-by.
+
+What endless entertainment in the life-tide of a Paris street, even
+though but a branch from one of the greater arteries! What color--what
+character--what animation--what variety! Every third or fourth man is a
+blue-bloused artisan; every tenth, a soldier in a showy uniform. Then
+comes the grisette in her white cap; and the lemonade-vender with his
+fantastic pagoda, slung like a peep-show across his shoulders; and the
+peasant woman from Normandy, with her high-crowned head-dress; and the
+abbé, all in black, with his shovel-hat pulled low over his eyes; and
+the mountebank selling pencils and lucifer-matches to the music of a
+hurdy-gurdy; and the gendarme, who is the terror of street urchins; and
+the gamin, who is the torment of the gendarme; and the water-carrier,
+with his cart and his cracked bugle; and the elegant ladies and
+gentlemen, who look in at shop windows and hire seats at two sous each
+in the Champs Elysées; and, of course, the English tourist reading
+"Galignani's Guide" as he goes along. Then, perhaps, a regiment marches
+past with colors flying and trumpets braying; or a fantastic-looking
+funeral goes by, with a hearse like a four-post bed hung with black
+velvet and silver; or the peripatetic showman with his company of white
+rats establishes himself on the pavement opposite, till admonished to
+move on by the sergent de ville. What an ever-shifting panorama! What a
+kaleidoscope of color and character! What a study for the humorist, the
+painter, the poet!
+
+Thinking thus, and watching the overflowing current as it hurried on
+below, I became aware of a smart cab drawn by a showy chestnut, which
+dashed round the corner of the street and came down the Rue Castellane
+at a pace that caused every head to turn as it went by. Almost before I
+had time to do more than observe that it was driven by a moustachioed
+and lavender-kidded gentleman, it drew up before the house, and a trim
+tiger jumped down, and thundered at the door. At that moment, the
+gentleman, taking advantage of the pause to light a cigar, looked up,
+and I recognised the black moustache and sinister countenance of
+Monsieur de Simoncourt.
+
+"A gentleman for Monsieur le Vicomte," said the servant, drawing back
+the green curtain and opening a vista into the room beyond.
+
+"Ask him to come upstairs," said the voice of De Caylus from within.
+
+"I have done so, Monsieur; but he prefers to wait in the cabriolet."
+
+"Pshaw!--confound it!--say that I'm coming."
+
+The servant withdrew.
+
+I then heard the words "perfectly safe investment--present
+convenience--unexpected demand," rapidly uttered by Monsieur de Caylus;
+and then they both came back; he looked flushed and angry--she calm
+as ever.
+
+"Then I shall call on you again to-morrow, Helène," said he, plucking
+nervously at his glove. "You will have had time to reflect. You will see
+matters differently."
+
+Madame Courcelles shook her head.
+
+"Reflection will not change my opinion," she said gently.
+
+"Well, shall I send Lejeune to you? He acts as solicitor to the company,
+and ..."
+
+"_Mon cousin_" interposed the lady, "I have already given you my
+decision--why pursue the question further? I do not wish to see
+Monsieur Lejeune, and I have no speculative tastes whatever."
+
+Monsieur de Caylus, with a suppressed exclamation that sounded like a
+curse, rent his glove right in two, and then, as if annoyed at the
+self-betrayal, crushed up the fragments in his hand, and
+laughed uneasily.
+
+"All women are alike," he said, with an impatient shrug. "They know
+nothing of the world, and place no faith in those who are competent to
+advise them. I had given you credit, my charming cousin, for
+broader views."
+
+Madame de Courcelles smiled without replying, and caressed the little
+dog, which had come out from under the sofa to fondle round her.
+
+"Poor Bijou!" said she. "Pretty Bijou! Do you take good care of him,
+_mon cousin_?"
+
+"Upon my soul, not I," returned De Caylus, carelessly. "Lecroix feeds
+him, I believe, and superintends his general education."
+
+"Who is Lecroix?"
+
+"My valet, courier, body-guard, letter-carrier, and general _factotum_.
+A useful vagabond, without whom I should scarcely know my right hand
+from my left!"
+
+"Poor Bijou! I fear, then, your chance of being remembered is small
+indeed!" said Madame de Courcelles, compassionately.
+
+But Monsieur le Vicomte only whistled to the dog; bowed haughtily to me;
+kissed, with an air of easy familiarity, before which she evidently
+recoiled, first the hand and then the cheek of his beautiful cousin, and
+so left the room. The next moment I saw him spring into the cabriolet,
+take his place beside Monsieur de Simoncourt, and drive away, with Bijou
+following at a pace that might almost have tried a greyhound.
+
+"My cousin, De Caylus, has lately returned from Algiers on leave of
+absence," said Madame de Courcelles, after a few moments of awkward
+silence, during which I had not known what to say. "You have heard of
+him, perhaps?"
+
+"Yes, Madame, I have heard of Monsieur de Caylus."
+
+"From Captain Dalrymple?
+
+"From Captain Dalrymple, Madame; and in society."
+
+"He is a brave officer," she said, hesitatingly, "and has greatly
+distinguished himself in this last campaign."
+
+"So I have heard, Madame."
+
+She looked at me, as if she would fain read how much or how little
+Dalrymple had told me.
+
+"You are Captain Dalrymple's friend, Mr. Arbuthnot," she said,
+presently, "and I know you have his confidence. You are probably aware
+that my present position with regard to Monsieur de Caylus is not only
+very painful, but also very difficult."
+
+"Madame, I know it."
+
+"But it is a position of which I have the command, and which no one
+understands so well as myself. To attempt to help me, would be to add to
+my embarrassments. For this reason it is well that Captain Dalrymple is
+not here. His presence just now in Paris could do no good--on the
+contrary, would be certain to do harm. Do you follow my meaning,
+Monsieur Arbuthnot?"
+
+"I understand what you say, Madame; but...."
+
+"But you do not quite understand why I say it? _Eh bien_, Monsieur, when
+you write to Captain Dalrymple.... for you write sometimes, do you not?"
+
+"Often, Madame."
+
+"Then, when you write, say nothing that may add to his anxieties. If you
+have reason at any time to suppose that I am importuned to do this or
+that; that I am annoyed; that I have my own battle to fight--still, for
+his sake as well as for mine, be silent. It _is_ my own battle, and I
+know how to fight it."
+
+"Alas! Madame...."
+
+She smiled sadly.
+
+"Nay," she said, "I have more courage than you would suppose; more
+courage and more will. I am fully capable of bearing my own burdens; and
+Captain Dalrymple has already enough of his own. Now tell me something
+of yourself. You are here, I think, to study medicine. Are you greatly
+devoted to your work? Have you many friends?"
+
+"I study, Madame--not always very regularly; and I have one friend."
+
+"An Englishman?"
+
+"No, Madame--a German."
+
+"A fellow-student, I presume."
+
+"No, Madame--an artist."
+
+"And you are very happy here?"
+
+"I have occupations and amusements; therefore, if to be neither idle nor
+dull is to be happy. I suppose I am happy."
+
+"Nay," she said quickly, "be sure of it. Do not doubt it. Who asks more
+from Fate courts his own destruction."
+
+"But it would be difficult, Madame, to go through life without desiring
+something better, something higher--without ambition, for
+instance--without love."
+
+"Ambition and love!" she repeated, smiling sadly. "There speaks the man.
+Ambition first--the aim and end of life; love next--the pleasant adjunct
+to success! Ah, beware of both."
+
+"But without either, life would be a desert."
+
+"Life _is_ a desert," she replied, bitterly. "Ambition is its mirage,
+ever beckoning, ever receding--love its Dead Sea fruit, fair without and
+dust within. You look surprised. You did not expect such gloomy theories
+from me--yet I am no cynic. I have lived; I have suffered; I am a
+woman--_voilà tout_. When you are a few years older, and have trodden
+some of the flinty ways of life, you will see the world as I see it."
+
+"It may be so, Madame; but if life is indeed a desert, it is, at all
+events, some satisfaction to know that the dwellers in tents become
+enamored of their lot, and, content with what the desert has to give,
+desire no other. It is only the neophyte who rides after the mirage and
+thirsts for the Dead Sea apple."
+
+She smiled again.
+
+"Ah!" she said, "the gifts of the desert are two-fold, and what one gets
+depends on what one seeks. For some the wilderness has gifts of
+resignation, meditation, peace; for others it has the horse, the tent,
+the pipe, the gun, the chase of the panther and antelope. But to go back
+to yourself. Life, you say, would be barren without ambition and love.
+What is your ambition?"
+
+"Nay, Madame, that is more than I can tell you--more than I know
+myself."
+
+"Your profession...."
+
+"If ever I dream dreams, Madame," I interrupted quickly, "my profession
+has no share in them. It is a profession I do not love, and which I hope
+some day to abandon."
+
+"Your dreams, then?"
+
+I shook my head.
+
+"Vague--unsubstantial--illusory--forgotten as soon as dreamt! How can I
+analyze them? How can I describe them? In childhood one says--'I should
+like to be a soldier, and conquer the world;' or 'I should like to be a
+sailor, and discover new Continents;' or 'I should like to be a poet,
+and wear a laurel wreath, like Petrarch and Dante;' but as one gets
+older and wiser (conscious, perhaps, of certain latent energies, and
+weary of certain present difficulties and restraints), one can only
+wait, as best one may, and watch for the rising of that tide whose flood
+leads on to fortune."
+
+With this I rose to take my leave. Madame de Courcelles smiled and put
+out her hand.
+
+"Come often," she said; "and come at the hours when I am at home. I
+shall always be glad to see you. Above all, remember my caution--not a
+word to Captain Dalrymple, either now or at any other time."
+
+"Madame, you may rely upon me. One thing I ask, however, as the reward
+of my discretion."
+
+"And that one thing?"
+
+"Permission, Madame, to serve you in any capacity, however humble--in
+any strait where a brother might interfere, or a faithful retainer lay
+down his life in your service."
+
+With a sweet earnestness that made my heart beat and my cheeks glow, she
+thanked and promised me.
+
+"I shall look upon you henceforth," she said, "as my knight _sans peur
+et sans reproche_."
+
+Heaven knows that not all the lessons of all the moralists that ever
+wrote or preached since the world began, could just then have done me
+half such good service as did those simple words. They came at the
+moment when I most needed them--when I had almost lost my taste for
+society, and was sliding day by day into habits of more confirmed
+idleness and Bohemianism. They roused me. They made a man of me. They
+recalled me to higher aims, "purer manners, nobler laws." They clothed
+me, so to speak, in the _toga virilis_ of a generous devotion. They made
+me long to prove myself "_sans peur_," to merit the "_sans reproche."_
+They marked an era in my life never to be forgotten or effaced.
+
+Let it not be thought for one moment that I loved her--or fancied I
+loved her. No, not so far as one heart-beat would carry me; but I was
+proud to possess her confidence and her friendship. Was she not
+Dalrymple's wife, and had not he asked me to watch over and protect her?
+Nay, had she not called me her knight and accepted my fealty?
+
+Nothing perhaps, is so invaluable to a young man on entering life as the
+friendship of a pure-minded and highly-cultivated woman who, removed too
+far above him to be regarded with passion, is yet beautiful enough to
+engage his admiration; whose good opinion becomes the measure of his own
+self-respect; and whose confidence is a sacred trust only to be parted
+from with loss of life or honor.
+
+Such an influence upon myself at this time was the friendship of Madame
+de Courcelles. I went out from her presence that morning morally
+stronger than before, and at each repetition of my visit I found her
+influence strengthen and increase. Sometimes I met Monsieur de Caylus,
+on which occasions my stay was ever of the briefest; but I most
+frequently found her alone, and then our talk was of books, of art, of
+culture, of all those high and stirring things that alike move the
+sympathies of the educated woman and rouse the enthusiasm of the young
+man. She became interested in me; at first for Dalrymple's sake, and
+by-and-by, however little I deserved it, for my own--and she showed
+that interest in many ways inexpressibly valuable to me then and
+thenceforth. She took pains to educate my taste; opened to me hitherto
+unknown avenues of study; led me to explore "fresh fields and pastures
+new," to which, but for her help, I might not have found my way for many
+a year to come. My reading, till now, had been almost wholly English or
+classical; she sent me to the old French literature--to the _Chansons de
+Geste_; to the metrical romances of the Trouvères; to the Chronicles of
+Froissart, Monstrelet, and Philip de Comines, and to the poets and
+dramatists that immediately succeeded them.
+
+These books opened a new world to me; and, having daily access to two
+fine public libraries, I plunged at once into a course of new and
+delightful reading, ranging over all that fertile tract of song and
+history that begins far away in the morning land of mediæval romance,
+and leads on, century after century, to the new era that began with the
+Revolution.
+
+With what avidity I devoured those picturesque old chronicles--those
+autobiographies--those poems, and satires, and plays that I now read for
+the first time! What evenings I spent with St. Simon, and De Thou, and
+Charlotte de Bavière! How I relished Voltaire! How I laughed over
+Molière! How I revelled in Montaigne! Most of all, however, I loved the
+quaint lore of the earlier literature:--
+
+     "Old legends of the monkish page,
+      Traditions of the saint and sage,
+      Tales that have the rime of age,
+       And Chronicles of Eld."
+
+Nor was this all. I had hitherto loved art as a child or a savage might
+love it, ignorantly, half-blindly, without any knowledge of its
+principles, its purposes, or its history. But Madame de Courcelles put
+into my hands certain books that opened my eyes to a thousand wonders
+unseen before. The works of Vasari, Nibby, Winkelman and Lessing, the
+aesthetic writings of Goethe and the Schlegels, awakened in me, one
+after the other, fresher and deeper revelations of beauty.
+
+I wandered through the galleries of the Louvre like one newly gifted
+with sight. I haunted the Venus of Milo and the Diane Chasseresse like
+another Pygmalion. The more I admired, the more I found to admire. The
+more I comprehended, the more I found there remained for me to
+comprehend. I recognised in art the Sphinx whose enigma is never solved.
+I learned, for the first time, that poetry may be committed to
+imperishable marble, and steeped in unfading colors. By degrees, as I
+followed in the footsteps of great thinkers, my insight became keener
+and my perceptions more refined. The symbolism of art evolved itself, as
+it were, from below the surface; and instead of beholding in paintings
+and statues mere studies of outward beauty, I came to know them as
+exponents of thought--as efforts after ideal truth--as aspirations
+which, because of their divineness, can never be wholly expressed; but
+whose suggestiveness is more eloquent than all the eloquence of words.
+
+Thus a great change came upon my life--imperceptibly at first, and by
+gradual degrees; but deeply and surely. To apply myself to the study of
+medicine became daily more difficult and more distasteful to me. The
+boisterous pleasures of the Quartier Latin lost their charm for me. Day
+by day I gave myself up more and more passionately to the cultivation of
+my taste for poetry and art. I filled my little sitting-room with casts
+after the antique. I bought some good engravings for my walls, and hung
+up a copy of the Madonna di San Sisto above the table at which I wrote
+and read. All day long, wherever I might be--at the hospital, in the
+lecture-room, in the laboratory--I kept looking longingly forward to the
+quiet evening by-and-by when, with shaded lamp and curtained window, I
+should again take up the studies of the night before.
+
+Thus new aims opened out before me, and my thoughts flowed into channels
+ever wider and deeper. Already the first effervescence of youth seemed
+to have died off the surface of my life, as the "beaded bubbles" die off
+the surface of champagne. I had tried society, and wearied of it. I had
+tried Bohemia, and found it almost as empty as the Chaussée d'Autin.
+And now that life which from boyhood I had ever looked upon as the
+happiest on earth, the life of the student, was mine. Could I have
+devoted it wholly and undividedly to those pursuits which were fast
+becoming to me as the life of my life, I would not have exchanged my lot
+for all the wealth of the Rothschilds. Somewhat indolent, perhaps, by
+nature, indifferent to achieve, ambitious only to acquire, I asked
+nothing better than a life given up to the worship of all that is
+beautiful in art, to the acquisition of knowledge, and to the
+development of taste. Would the time ever come when I might realize my
+dream? Ah! who could tell? In the meanwhile ... well, in the meanwhile,
+here was Paris--here were books, museums, galleries, schools, golden
+opportunities which, once past, might never come again. So I reasoned;
+so time went on; so I lived, plodding on by day in the École de
+Médecine, but, when evening came, resuming my studies at the leaf turned
+down the night before, and, like the visionary in "The Pilgrims of the
+Rhine," taking up my dream-life at the point where I had been
+last awakened.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+CHAPTER XXXVII.
+
+GUICHET THE MODEL.
+
+To the man who lives alone and walks about with his eyes open, the mere
+bricks and mortar of a great city are instinct with character. Buildings
+become to him like living creatures. The streets tell him tales. For
+him, the house-fronts are written over with hieroglyphics which, to the
+passing crowd, are either unseen or without meaning. Fallen grandeur,
+pretentious gentility, decent poverty, the infamy that wears a brazen
+front, and the crime that burrows in darkness--he knows them all at a
+glance. The patched window, the dingy blind, the shattered doorstep, the
+pot of mignonette on the garret ledge, are to him as significant as the
+lines and wrinkles on a human face. He grows to like some houses and to
+dislike others, almost without knowing why--just as one grows to like
+or dislike certain faces in the parks and clubs. I remember now, as well
+as if it were yesterday, how, during the first weeks of my life in
+Paris, I fell in love at first sight with a wee _maisonnette_ at the
+corner of a certain street overlooking the Luxembourg gardens--a tiny
+little house, with soft-looking blue silk window-curtains, and
+cream-colored jalousies, and boxes of red and white geraniums at all the
+windows. I never knew who lived in that sunny little nest; I never saw a
+face at any of those windows; yet I used to go out of my way in the
+summer evenings to look at it, as one might go to look at a beautiful
+woman behind a stall in the market-place, or at a Madonna in a
+shop-window.
+
+At the time about which I write, there was probably no city in Europe of
+which the street-scenery was so interesting as that of Paris. I have
+already described the Quartier Latin, joyous, fantastic, out-at-elbows;
+a world in itself and by itself; unlike anything else in Paris or
+elsewhere. But there were other districts in the great city--now swept
+away and forgotten--as characteristic in their way as the Quartier
+Latin. There was the He de Saint Louis, for instance--a _Campo Santo_ of
+decayed nobility--lonely, silent, fallen upon evil days, and haunted
+here and there by ghosts of departed Marquises and Abbés of the _vieille
+école_. There was the debateable land to the rear of the Invalides and
+the Champ de Mars. There was the Faubourg St. Germain, fast falling into
+the sere and yellow leaf, and going the way of the Ile de Saint Louis.
+There was the neighborhood of the Boulevart d'Aulnay, and the Rue de la
+Roquette, ghastly with the trades of death; a whole Quartier of
+monumental sculptors, makers of iron crosses, weavers of funereal
+chaplets, and wholesale coffin-factors. And beside and apart from all
+this, there were (as in all great cities) districts of evil report and
+obscure topography--lost islets of crime, round which flowed and circled
+the daily tide of Paris life; flowed and circled, yet never penetrated.
+A dark arch here and there--the mouth of a foul alley--a riverside vista
+of gloom and squalor, marked the entrance to these Alsatias. Such an
+Alsatia was the Rue Pierre Lescot, the Rue Sans Nom, and many more than
+I can now remember--streets into which no sane man would venture after
+nightfall without the escort of the police.
+
+Into the border land of such a neighborhood--a certain congeries of
+obscure and labyrinthine streets to the rear of the old Halles--I
+accompanied Franz Müller one wintry afternoon, about an hour before
+sunset, and perhaps some ten days after our evening in the Rue du
+Faubourg St. Denis. We were bound on an expedition of discovery, and the
+object of our journey was to find the habitat of Guichet the model.
+
+"I am determined to get to the bottom of this Lenoir business," said
+Müller, doggedly; "and if the police won't help me, I must help myself."
+
+"You have no case for the police," I replied.
+
+"So says the _chef de bureau_; but I am of the opposite opinion.
+However, I shall make my case out clearly enough before long. This
+Guichet can help me, if he will. He knows Lenoir, and he knows something
+against him; that is clear. You saw how cautious he was the other day.
+The difficulty will be to make him speak."
+
+"I doubt if you will succeed."
+
+"I don't, _mon cher_. But we shall see. Then, again, I have another line
+of evidence open to me. You remember that orange-colored rosette in the
+fellow's button-hole?"
+
+"Certainly I do."
+
+"Well, now, I happen, by the merest chance, to know what that rosette
+means. It is the ribbon of the third order of the Golden Palm of
+Mozambique--a Portuguese decoration. They give it to diplomatic
+officials, eminent civilians, distinguished foreigners, and the like. I
+know a fellow who has it, and who belongs to the Portuguese Legation
+here. _Eh bien!_ I went to him the other day, and asked him about our
+said friend--how he came by it, who he is, where he comes from, and so
+forth. My Portuguese repeats the name--elevates his eyebrows--in short,
+has never heard of such a person. Then he pulls down a big book from a
+shelf in the secretary's room--turns to a page headed 'Golden Palm of
+Mozambique'--runs his finger along the list of names--shakes his head,
+and informs me that no Lenoir is, or ever has been, received into the
+order. What do you say to that, now?"
+
+"It is just what I should have expected; but still it is not a ease for
+the police. It concerns the Portuguese minister; and the Portuguese
+minister is by no means likely to take any trouble about the matter. But
+why waste all this time and care? If I were you, I would let the thing
+drop. It is not worth the cost."
+
+Müller looked grave.
+
+"I would drop it this moment," he said, "if--if it were not for the
+girl."
+
+"Who is still less worth the cost,"
+
+"I know it," he replied, impatiently. "She has a pretty, sentimental
+Madonna face; a sweet voice; a gentle manner--_et voilà tout_. I'm not
+the least bit in love with her now. I might have been. I might have
+committed some great folly for her sake; but that danger is past, _Dieu
+merci!_ I couldn't love a girl I couldn't trust, and that girl is a
+flirt. A flirt of the worst sort, too--demure, serious, conventional.
+No, no; my fancy for the fair Marie has evaporated; but, for all that, I
+don't relish the thought of what her fate might be if linked for life to
+an unscrupulous scoundrel like Lenoir. I must do what I can, my dear
+fellow--I must do what I can."
+
+We had by this time rounded the Halles, and were threading our way
+through one gloomy by-street after another. The air was chill, the sky
+low and rainy; and already the yellow glow of an oil-lamp might be seen
+gleaming through the inner darkness of some of the smaller shops.
+Meanwhile, the dusk seemed to gather at our heels, and to thicken at
+every step.
+
+"You are sure you know your way?" I asked presently, seeing Müller look
+up at the name at the corner of the street.
+
+"Why, yes; I think I do," he answered, doubtfully.
+
+"Why not inquire of that man just ahead?" I suggested.
+
+He was a square-built, burly, shabby-looking fellow, and was striding
+along so fast that we had to quicken our pace in order to come up with
+him. All at once Müller fell back, laid his hand on my arm, and said:--
+
+"Stop! It is Guichet himself. Let him go on, and we'll follow."
+
+So we dropped into the rear and followed him. He turned presently to the
+right, and preceded us down a long and horribly ill-favored street, full
+of mean cabarets and lodging-houses of the poorest class, where, painted
+in red letters on broken lamps above the doors, or printed on cards
+wafered against the window-panes, one saw at almost every other house,
+the words, "_Ici on loge la nuit_." At the end of this thoroughfare our
+unconscious guide plunged into a still darker and fouler _impasse_, hung
+across from side to side with rows of dingy linen, and ornamented in the
+centre with a mound of decaying cabbage-leaves, potato-parings,
+oyster-shells, and the like. Here he made for a large tumble-down house
+that closed the alley at the farther end, and, still followed by
+ourselves, went in at an open doorway, and up a public staircase dimly
+lighted by a flickering oil-lamp at every landing. At his own door he
+paused, and just as he had turned the key, Müller accosted him.
+
+"Is that you, Guichet?" he said. "Why, you are the very man I want! If I
+had come ten minutes sooner, I should have missed you."
+
+"Is it M'sieur Müller?" said Guichet, bending his heavy brows and
+staring at us in the gloom of the landing.
+
+"Ay, and with me the friend you saw the other day. So, this is your den?
+May we come in?"
+
+He had been standing till now with his hand on the key and the closed
+door at his back, evidently not intending to admit us; but thus asked,
+he pushed the door open, and said, somewhat ungraciously:--
+
+"It is just that, M'sieur Müller--a den; not fit for gentlemen like you.
+But you can go in, if you please."
+
+We did not wait for a second invitation, but went in immediately. It was
+a long, low, dark room, with a pale gleam of fading daylight struggling
+in through a tiny window at the farther end. We could see nothing at
+first but this gleam; and it was not till Guichet had raked out the wood
+ashes on the hearth, and blown them into a red glow with his breath,
+that we could distinguish the form or position of anything in the room.
+Then, by the flicker of the fire, we saw a low truckle-bed close under
+the window; a kind of bruised and battered seaman's chest in the middle
+of the room; a heap of firewood in one corner; a pile of old
+packing-cases; old sail-cloth, old iron, and all kinds of rubbish in
+another; a few pots and pans over the fire-place; and a dilapidated
+stool or two standing about the room. Avoiding these latter, we set
+ourselves down upon the edge of the chest; while Guichet, having by this
+time lit a piece of candle-end in a tin sconce against the wall, stood
+before us with folded arms, and stared at us in silence.
+
+"I want to know, Guichet, if you can give me some sittings," said
+Müller, by way of opening the conversation.
+
+"Depends on when, M'sieur Müller," growled the model.
+
+"Well--next week, for the whole week."
+
+Guichet shook his head. He was engaged to Monsieur Flandrin _là bas_,
+for the next month, from twelve to three daily, and had only his
+mornings and evenings to dispose of; in proof of which he pulled out a
+greasy note-book and showed where the agreement was formally entered.
+Müller made a grimace of disappointment.
+
+"That man's head takes a deal of cutting off, _mon ami_," he said.
+"Aren't you tired of playing executioner so long?"
+
+"Not I, M'sieur! It's all the same to me--executioner or victim, saint
+or devil."
+
+Müller, laughing, offered him a cigar.
+
+"You've posed for some queer characters in your time, Guichet," said he.
+
+"Parbleu, M'sieur!"
+
+"But you've not been a model all your life?"
+
+"Perhaps not, M'sieur."
+
+"You've been a sailor once upon a time, haven't you?"
+
+The model looked up quickly.
+
+"How did you know that?" he said, frowning.
+
+"By a number of little things--by this, for instance," replied Müller,
+kicking his heels against the sea-chest; "by certain words you make use
+of now and then; by the way you walk; by the way you tie your cravat.
+_Que diable_! you look at me as if you took me for a sorcerer!"
+
+The model shook his head.
+
+"I don't understand it," he said, slowly.
+
+"Nay, I could tell you more than that if I liked," said Müller, with an
+air of mystery.
+
+"About myself?"
+
+"Ay, about yourself, and others."
+
+Guichet, having just lighted his cigar, forgot to put it to his lips.
+
+"What others?" he asked, with a look half of dull bewilderment and half
+of apprehension.
+
+Müller shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"Pshaw!" said he; "I know more than you think I know, Guichet. There's
+our friend, you know--he of whom I made the head t'other day ... you
+remember?"
+
+The model, still looking at him, made no answer.
+
+"Why didn't you say at once where you had met him, and all the rest of
+it, _mon vieux_? You might have been sure I should find out for myself,
+sooner or later."
+
+The model turned abruptly towards the fire-place, and, leaning his head
+against the mantel-shelf, stood with his back towards us, looking down
+into the fire.
+
+"You ask me why I did not tell you at once?" he said, very slowly.
+
+"Ay--why not?"
+
+"Why not? Because--because when a man has begun to lead an honest life,
+and has gone on leading an honest life, as I have, for years, he is glad
+to put the past behind him--to forget it, and all belonging to it. How
+was I to guess you knew anything about--about that place _là bas_?"
+
+"And why should I not know about it?" replied Müller, flashing a rapid
+glance at me.
+
+Guichet was silent.
+
+"What if I tell you that I am particularly interested in--that place _là
+bas_?"
+
+"Well, that may be. People used to come sometimes, I remember--artists
+and writers, and so on."
+
+"Naturally."
+
+"But I don't remember to have ever seen you, M'sieur Müller."
+
+"You did not observe me, _mon cher_--or it may have been before, or
+after your time."
+
+"Yes, that's true," replied Guichet, ponderingly. "How long ago was it,
+M'sieur Müller?"
+
+Müller glanced at me again. His game, hitherto so easy, was beginning to
+grow difficult.
+
+"Eh, _mon Dieu_!" he said, indifferently, "how can I tell? I have
+knocked about too much, now here, now there, in the course of my life,
+to remember in what particular year this or that event may have
+happened. I am not good at dates, and never was."
+
+"But you remember seeing me there?"
+
+"Have I not said so?"
+
+Guichet took a couple of turns about the room. He looked flushed and
+embarrassed.
+
+"There is one thing I should like to know," he said, abruptly. "Where
+was I? What was I doing when you saw me?"
+
+Müller was at fault now, for the first time.
+
+"Where were you?" he repeated. "Why, there--where we said just now. _Là
+bas_."
+
+"No, no--that's not what I mean. Was I .... was I in the uniform of the
+Garde Chiourme?"
+
+The color rushed into Müller's face as, flashing a glance of exultation
+at me, he replied:--
+
+"Assuredly, _mon ami_. In that, and no other."
+
+The model drew a deep breath.
+
+"And Bras de Fer?" he said. "Was he working in the quarries ?"
+
+"Bras de Fer! Was that the name he went by in those days?"
+
+"Ay--Bras de Fer--_alias_ Coupe-gorge--_alias_ Triphot--_alias_
+Lenoir--_alias_ a hundred other names. Bras de Fer was the one he went
+by at Toulon--and a real devil he was in the Bagnes! He escaped three
+times, and was twice caught and brought back again. The third time he
+killed one sentry, injured another for life, and got clear off. That was
+five years ago, and I left soon after. I suppose, if you saw him in
+Paris the other day, he has kept clear of Toulon ever since."
+
+"But was he in for life?" said Müller, eagerly.
+
+"_Travaux forcés à perpétuité_," replied Guichet, touching his own
+shoulder significantly with the thumb of his right hand.
+
+Müller sprang to his feet.
+
+"Enough," he said. "That is all I wanted to know. Guichet, _mon cher_, I
+am your debtor for life. We will talk about the sittings when you have
+more time to dispose of. Adieu."
+
+"But, M'sieur Müller, you won't get me into trouble!" exclaimed the
+model, eagerly. "You won't make any use of my words?"
+
+"Why, supposing I went direct to the Préfecture, what trouble could I
+possibly get you into, _mon ami?_" replied Müller.
+
+The model looked down in silence.
+
+"You are a brave man. You do not fear the vengeance of Bras de Fer, or
+his friends?"
+
+"No, M'sieur---it's not that."
+
+"What is it, then?"
+
+"M'sieur...."
+
+"Pshaw, man! Speak up."
+
+"It is not that you would get me personally into trouble, M'sieur
+Müller," said Guichet, slowly. "I am no coward, I hope--a coward would
+make a bad Garde Chiourme at Toulon, I fancy. And I'm not an escaped
+_forçat_. But--but, you see, I've worked my way into a connection here
+in Paris, and I've made myself a good name among the artists, and ...
+and I hold to that good name above everything in the world."
+
+"Naturally--rightly. But what has that to do with Lenoir?"
+
+"Ah, M'sieur Müller, if you knew more about me, you would not need
+telling how much it has to do with him! I was not always a Garde
+Chiourme at Toulon. I was promoted to it after a time, for good conduct,
+you know, and that sort of thing. But--but I began differently--I began
+by wearing the prison dress, and working in the quarries."
+
+"My good fellow," said Müller, gently, "I half suspected this--I am not
+surprised; and I respect you for having redeemed that past in the way
+you have redeemed it."
+
+"Thank you, M'sieur Müller; but you see, redeemed or unredeemed, I'd
+rather be lying at the bottom of the Seine than have it rise up
+against me now,"
+
+"We are men of honor," said Müller, "and your secret is safe with us."
+
+"Not if you go to the Préfecture and inform against Bras de Fer on my
+words," exclaimed the model, eagerly. "How can I appear against
+him--Guichet the model--Guichet the Garde Chiourme--Guichet the
+_forçat?_ M'sieur Müller, I could never hold my head up again. It would
+be the ruin of me."
+
+"You shall not appear against him, and it shall not be the ruin of you.
+Guichet," said Müller. "That I promise you. Only assure me that what you
+have said is strictly correct--that Bras de Fer and Lenoir are one and
+the same person--an escaped _forçat_, condemned for life to
+the galleys."
+
+"That's as true, M'sieur Müller, as that God is in heaven," said the
+model, emphatically.
+
+"Then I can prove it without your testimony--I can prove it by simply
+summoning any of the Toulon authorities to identify him."
+
+"Or by stripping his shirt off his back, and showing the brand on his
+left shoulder," said Guichet. "There you'll find it, T.F. as large as
+life--and if it don't show at first, just you hit him a sharp blow with
+the flat of your hand, M'sieur Müller, and it will start out as red and
+fresh as if it had been done only six months ago. _Parbleu!_ I remember
+the day he came in, and the look in his face when the hot iron hissed
+into his flesh! They roar like bulls, for the most part; but he never
+flinched or spoke. He just turned a shade paler under the tan, and
+that was all."
+
+"Do you remember what his crime was?" asked Müller
+
+Guichet shook his head.
+
+"Not distinctly," he said. "I only know that he was in for a good deal,
+and had a lot of things proved against him on his trial. But you can
+find all that out for yourself, easily enough. He was tried in Paris,
+about fourteen years ago, and it's all in print, if you only know where
+to look for it."
+
+"Then I'll find it, if I have to wade through half the Bibliothèque
+Nationale!" said Müller. "Adieu, Guichet--you have done me a great
+service, and you may be sure I will do nothing to betray you. Let us
+shake hands upon it."
+
+The color rushed into the model's swarthy cheeks.
+
+"_Comment_, M'sieur Müller!" he said, hesitatingly. "You offer to shake
+hands with me--after what I have told you?"
+
+"Ten times more willing than before, _mon ami_," said Müller. "Did I not
+tell you just now that I respected you for having redeemed that past,
+and shall I not give my hand where I give my respect?"
+
+The model grasped his outstretched hand with a vehemence that made
+Müller wince again.
+
+"Thank you," he said, in a low, deep voice. "Thank you. Death of my
+life! M'sieur Müller, I'd go to the galleys again for you, after
+this--if you asked me."
+
+"Agreed. Only when I do ask you, it shall be to pay a visit of ceremony
+to Monsieur Bras de Fer, when he is safely lodged again at Toulon with a
+chain round his leg, and a cannon-ball at the end of it."
+
+And with this Müller turned away laughingly, and I followed him down the
+dimly-lighted stairs.
+
+"By Jove!" he said, "what a grip the fellow gave me! I'd as soon shake
+hands with the Commendatore in Don Giovanni."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVIII.
+
+NUMBER TWO HUNDRED AND SEVEN.
+
+Müller, when he so confidently proposed to visit Bras de Fer in his
+future retirement at Toulon, believed that he had only to lodge his
+information with the proper authorities, and see the whole affair
+settled out of hand. He had not taken the bureaucratic system into
+consideration; and he had forgotten how little positive evidence he had
+to offer. It was no easier then than now to inspire the official mind
+with either insight or decision; and the police of Paris, inasmuch as
+they in no wise differed from the police of to-day, yesterday, or
+to-morrow, were slow to understand, slow to believe, and slower still
+to act.
+
+An escaped convict? Monsieur le Chef du Bureau, upon whom we took the
+liberty of waiting the next morning, could scarcely take in the bare
+possibility of such a fact. An escaped convict? Bah! no convict could
+possibly escape under the present admirable system. _Comment_! He
+effected his escape some years ago? How many years ago? In what yard, in
+what ward, under what number was he entered in the official books? For
+what offence was he convicted? Had Monsieur seen him at Toulon?--and was
+Monsieur prepared to swear that Lenoir and Bras de Fer were one and the
+same person? How! Monsieur proposed to identify a certain individual,
+and yet was incapable of replying to these questions! Would Monsieur be
+pleased to state upon what grounds he undertook to denounce the said
+individual, and what proof he was prepared to produce in confirmation
+of the same?
+
+To all which official catechizing, Müller, who (wanting Guichet's
+testimony) had nothing but his intense personal conviction to put
+forward, could only reply that he was ready to pledge himself to the
+accuracy of his information; and that if Monsieur the Chef du Bureau
+would be at the pains to call in any Toulon official of a few years'
+standing, he would undoubtedly find that the person now described as
+calling himself Lenoir, and the person commonly known in the Bagnes as
+Bras de Fer, were indeed "one and the same."
+
+Whereupon Monsieur le Chef--a pompous personage, with a bald head and a
+white moustache--shrugged his shoulders, smiled incredulously, had the
+honor to point out to Monsieur that the Government could by no means be
+at the expense of conveying an inspector from Toulon to Paris on so
+shadowy and unsupported a statement, and politely bowed us out.
+
+Thus rebuffed, Müller began to despair of present success; whilst I, in
+default of any brighter idea, proposed that he should take legal advice
+on the subject. So we went to a certain avocat, in a little street
+adjoining the École de Droit, and there purchased as much wisdom as
+might be bought for the sum of five francs sterling.
+
+The avocat, happily, was fertile in suggestions. This, he said, was not
+a case for a witness. Here was no question of appearing before a court.
+With the foregone offences of either Lenoir or Bras de Fer, we had
+nothing to do; and to convict them of such offences formed no part of
+our plan. We only sought to show that Lenoir and Bras de Fer were in
+truth "one and the same person," and we could only do so upon the
+authority of some third party who had seen both. Now Monsieur Müller had
+seen Lenoir, but not Bras de Fer; and Guichet had seen Bras de Fer, but
+not Lenoir. Here, then, was the real difficulty; and here, he hoped, its
+obvious solution. Let Guichet be taken to some place where, being
+himself unseen, he may obtain a glimpse of Lenoir. This done, he can, in
+a private interview of two minutes, state his conviction to Monsieur the
+Chef de Bureau--_voilà tout_! If, however, the said Guichet can be
+persuaded by no considerations either of interest or justice, then
+another very simple course remains open. Every newly-arrived convict in
+every penal establishment throughout France is photographed on his
+entrance into the Bagne, and these photographs are duly preserved for
+purposes of identification like the present. Supposing therefore Bras de
+Fer had not escaped from Toulon before the introduction of this system,
+his portrait would exist in the official books to this day, and might
+doubtless be obtained, if proper application were made through an
+official channel.
+
+Armed with this information, and knowing that any attempt to induce
+Guichet to move further in the matter would be useless, we then went
+back to the Bureau, and with much difficulty succeeded in persuading M.
+le Chef to send to Toulon for the photograph. This done, we could only
+wait and be patient.
+
+Briefly, then, we did wait and were patient--though the last condition
+was not easy; for even I, who was by no means disposed to sympathize
+with Müller in his solicitude for the fair Marie, could not but feel a
+strange contagion of excitement in this _chasse au forçat_. And so a
+week or ten days went by, till one memorable afternoon, when Müller came
+rushing round to my rooms in hot haste, about an hour before the time
+when we usually met to go to dinner, and greeted me with--
+
+"Good news, _mon vieux_! good news! The photograph has come--and I have
+been to the Bureau to see it--and I have identified my man--and he will
+be arrested to-night, as surely as that he carries T.F. on his
+shoulder!"
+
+"You are certain he is the same?" I said.
+
+"As certain as I am of my own face when I see it in the looking-glass."
+
+And then he went on to say that a party of soldiers were to be in
+readiness a couple of hours hence, in a shop commanding Madame Marôt's
+door; that he, Müller, was to be there to watch with them till Lenoir
+either came out from or went into the house; and that as soon as he
+pointed him out to the sergeant in command, he was to be arrested, put
+into a cab waiting for the purpose, and conveyed to La Roquette.
+
+Behold us, then, at the time prescribed, lounging in the doorway of a
+small shop adjoining the private entrance to Madame Marôt's house; our
+hands in our pockets; our cigars in our mouths; our whole attitude
+expressive of idleness and unconcern. The wintry evening has closed in
+rapidly. The street is bright with lamps, and busy with passers-by. The
+shop behind us is quite dark--so dark that not the keenest observer
+passing by could detect the dusky group of soldiers sitting on the
+counter within, or the gleaming of the musket-barrels which rest between
+their knees. The sergeant in command, a restless, black-eyed,
+intelligent little Gascon, about five feet four in height, with a
+revolver stuck in his belt, paces impatiently to and fro, and whistles
+softly between his teeth. The men, four in number, whisper together from
+time to time, or swing their feet in silence.
+
+Thus the minutes go by heavily; for it is weary work waiting in this
+way, uncertain how long the watch may last, and not daring to relax the
+vigilance of eye and ear for a single moment. It may be for an hour, or
+for many hours, or it may be for only a few minutes-who can tell? Of
+Lenoir's daily haunts and habits we know nothing. All we do know is that
+he is wont to be out all day, sometimes returning only to dress and go
+out again; sometimes not coming home till very late at night; sometimes
+absenting himself for a day and a night, or two days and two nights
+together. With this uncertain prospect before us, therefore, we wait and
+watch, and watch and wait, counting the hours as they strike, and
+scanning every face that gleams past in the lamplight.
+
+So the first hour goes by, and the second. Ten o'clock strikes. The
+traffic in the street begins perceptibly to diminish. Shops close here
+and there (Madame Marôt's shutters have been put up by the boy in the
+oilskin apron more than an hour ago), and the _chiffonnier_, sure herald
+of the quieter hours of the night, flits by with rake and lanthorn,
+observant of the gutters.
+
+The soldiers on' the counter yawn audibly from time to time; and the
+sergeant, who is naturally of an impatient disposition, exclaims, for
+the twentieth time, with an inexhaustible variety, however, in the
+choice of expletives:--
+
+"_Mais; nom de deux cent mille petards_! will this man of ours never
+come?"
+
+To which inquiry, though not directly addressed to myself, I reply, as I
+have already replied once or twice before, that he may come immediately,
+or that he may not come for hours; and that all we can do is to wait and
+be patient. In the midst of which explanation, Müller suddenly lays his
+hand on my arm, makes a sign to the sergeant, and peers eagerly down
+the street.
+
+There is a man coming up quickly on the opposite side of the way. For
+myself, I could recognise no one at such a distance, especially by
+night; but Müller's keener eye, made keener still by jealousy,
+identifies him at a glance.
+
+It is Lenoir.
+
+He wears a frock coat closely buttoned, and comes on with a light, rapid
+step, suspecting nothing. The sergeant gives the word--the soldiers
+spring to their feet--I draw back into the gloom of the shop-and only
+Müller remains, smoking his cigarette and lounging against the
+door-post.
+
+Then Lenoir crosses over, and Müller, affecting to observe him for the
+first time, looks up, and without lifting his hat, says loudly:--
+
+"_Comment_! have I the honor of saluting Monsieur Lenoir?"
+
+Whereupon Lenoir, thrown off his guard by the suddenness of the address,
+hesitates--seems about to reply--checks himself--quickens his pace, and
+passes without a word.
+
+The next instant he is surrounded. The butt ends of four muskets rattle
+on the pavement--the sergeant's hand is on his shoulder--the sergeant's
+voice rings in his ear.
+
+"Number two hundred and seven, you are my prisoner!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIX.
+
+THE END OF BRAS BE FER.
+
+LENOIR's first impulse was to struggle in silence; then, finding escape
+hopeless, he folded his arms and submitted.
+
+"So, it is Monsieur Müller who has done me this service," he said
+coldly; but with a flash in his eye like the sudden glint in the eye of
+a cobra di capello. "I will take care not to be unmindful of the
+obligation."
+
+Then, turning impatiently upon the sergeant:--
+
+"Have you no carriage at hand?" he said, sharply; "or do you want to
+collect a crowd in the street?"
+
+The cab, however, which had been waiting a few doors lower down, drove
+up while he was speaking. The sergeant hurried him in; the half-dozen
+loiterers who had already gathered about us pressed eagerly forward; two
+of the soldiers and the sergeant got inside; Müller and I scrambled up
+beside the driver; word was given "to the Préfecture of Police;" and we
+drove rapidly away down the Rue du Faubourg St. Denis, through the arch
+of Louis Quatorze, out upon the bright noisy Boulevard, and on through
+thoroughfares as brilliant and crowded as at midday, towards the quays
+and the river.
+
+Arrived at the Quai des Ortëvres, we alighted at the Préfecture, and
+were conducted through a series of ante-rooms and corridors into the
+presence of the same bald-headed Chef de Bureau whom we had seen on each
+previous occasion. He looked up as we came in, pressed the spring of a
+small bell that stood upon his desk, and growled something in the ear of
+a clerk who answered the summons.
+
+"Sergeant," he said, pompously, "bring the prisoner under the
+gas-burner."
+
+Lenoir, without waiting to be brought, took a couple of steps forward,
+and placed himself in the light.
+
+Monsieur le Chef then took out his double eye-glass, and proceeded to
+compare Lenoir's face, feature by feature, with a photograph which he
+took out of his pocket-book for the purpose.
+
+"Are you prepared, Monsieur," he said, addressing Müller for the first
+time--"are you, I say, prepared to identify the prisoner upon oath?"
+
+"Within certain limitations--yes," replied Müller.
+
+"Certain limitations!" exclaimed the Chef, testily. "What do you mean by
+'certain limitations?' Here is the man whom you accuse, and here is the
+photograph. Are you, I repeat, prepared to make your deposition before
+Monsieur le Préfet that they are one and the same person?"
+
+"I am neither more nor less prepared, Monsieur," said Müller, "than you
+are; or than Monsieur le Préfet, when he has the opportunity of judging.
+As I have already had the honor of informing you, I saw the prisoner for
+the first time about two months since. Having reason to believe that he
+was living in Paris under an assumed name, and wearing a decoration to
+which he had no right, I prosecuted certain inquiries about him. The
+result of those inquiries led me to conclude that he was an escaped
+convict from the Bagnes of Toulon. Never having seen him at Toulon, I
+was unable to prove this fact without assistance. You, Monsieur, have
+furnished that assistance, and the proof is now in your hand. It only
+remains for Monsieur le Préfet and yourself to decide upon its value."
+
+"Give me the photograph, Monsieur Marmot," said a pale little man in
+blue spectacles, who had come in unobserved from a door behind us, while
+Müller was speaking.
+
+The bald-headed Chef jumped up with great alacrity, bowed like a second
+Sir Pertinax, and handed over the photograph.
+
+"The peculiar difficulty of this case, Monsieur le Préfet" ... he began.
+
+The Préfet waved his hand.
+
+"Thanks, Monsieur Marmot," he said, "I know all the particulars of this
+case. You need not trouble to explain them. So this is the photograph
+forwarded from Toulon. Well--well! Sergeant, strip the prisoner's
+shoulders."
+
+A sudden quiver shot over Lenoir's face at this order, and his cheek
+blenched under the tan; but he neither spoke nor resisted. The next
+moment his coat and waistcoat were lying on the ground; his shirt, torn
+in the rough handling, was hanging round his loins, and he stood before
+us naked to the waist, lean, brown, muscular--a torso of an athlete done
+in bronze.
+
+We pressed round eagerly. Monsieur le Chef put up his double eye-glass;
+Monsier le Préfet took off his blue spectacles.
+
+"So--so," he said, pointing with the end of his glasses towards a
+whitish, indefinite kind of scar on Lenoir's left shoulder, "here is a
+mark like a burn. Is this the brand?"
+
+The sergeant nodded.
+
+"V'là, M'sieur le Préfet!" he said, and struck the spot smartly with
+his open palm. Instantly the smitten place turned livid, while from the
+midst of it, like the handwriting on the wall, the fatal letters T. F.
+sprang out in characters of fire.
+
+Lenoir flashed a savage glance upon us, and checked the imprecation that
+rose to his lips. Monsieur le Préfet, with a little nod of satisfaction,
+put on his glasses again, went over to the table, took out a printed
+form from a certain drawer, dipped a pen in the ink, and said:--
+
+"Sergeant, you will take this order, and convey Number Two Hundred and
+Seven to the Bicêtre, there to remain till Thursday next, when he will
+be drafted back to Toulon by the convict train, which leaves two hours
+after midnight. Monsieur Müller, the Government is indebted to you for
+the assistance you have rendered the executive in this matter. You are
+probably aware that the prisoner is a notorious criminal, guilty of one
+proved murder, and several cases of forgery, card-sharping, and the
+like. The Government is also indebted to Monsieur Marmot" (here he
+inclined his head to the bald-headed Chef), "who has acted with his
+usual zeal and intelligence."
+
+Monsieur Marmot, murmuring profuse thanks, bowed and bowed again, and
+followed Monsieur le Préfet obsequiously to the door. On the threshold,
+the great little man paused, turned, and said very quietly: "You
+understand, sergeant, this prisoner does _not_ escape again;" and so
+vanished; leaving Monsieur Marmot still bowing in the doorway.
+
+Then the sergeant hurried on Lenoir's coat and waistcoat, clapped a pair
+of handcuffs on his wrists, thrust his hat on his head, and prepared to
+be gone; Monsieur, the bald-headed, looking on, meanwhile, with the
+utmost complacency, as if taking to himself all the merit of discovery
+and capture.
+
+"Pardon, Messieurs," said the serjeant, when all was ready. "Pardon--but
+here is a fellow for whom I am responsible now, and who must be strictly
+looked after. I shall have to put a gendarme on the box from here to the
+Bicêtre, instead of you two gentlemen."
+
+"All right, _mon ami_" said Müller. "I suppose we should not have been
+admitted if we had gone with you?"
+
+"Nay, I could pass you in, Messieurs, if you cared to see the affair to
+the end, and followed in another _fiacre_."
+
+So we said we would see it to the end, and following the prisoner and
+his guard through all the rooms and corridors by which we had come,
+picked up a second cab on the Quai des Orfèvres, just outside the
+Préfecture of Police.
+
+It was now close upon midnight. The sky was flecked with driving clouds.
+The moon had just risen above the towers of Notre Dame. The quays were
+silent and deserted. The river hurried along, swirling and turbulent.
+The sergeant's cab led the way, and the driver, instead of turning back
+towards the Pont Neuf, followed the line of the quays along the southern
+bank of the Ile de la Cité; passing the Morgue--a mass of sinister
+shadow; passing the Hôtel Dieu; traversing the Parvis Notre Dame; and
+making for the long bridge, then called the Pont Louis Philippe, which
+connects the two river islands with the northern half of Paris.
+
+"It is a wild-looking night," said Müller, as we drove under the
+mountainous shadow of Notre Dame and came out again in sight of
+the river.
+
+"And it is a wild business to be out upon," I added. "I wonder if this
+is the end of it?"
+
+The words were scarcely past my lips when the door of the cab ahead flew
+suddenly open, and a swift something, more like a shadow than a man,
+darted across the moonlight, sprang upon the parapet of the bridge, and
+disappeared!
+
+In an instant we were all out--all rushing to and fro--all shouting--all
+wild with surprise and confusion.
+
+"One man to the Pont d'Arcole!" thundered the sergeant, running along
+the perapet, revolver in hand. "One to the Quai Bourbon--one to the Pont
+de la Cité! Watch up stream and down! The moment he shows his head above
+water, fire!"
+
+"But, in Heaven's name, how did he escape?" exclaimed Müller.
+
+"_Grand Dieu_! who can tell--unless he is the very devil?" cried the
+sergeant, distractedly. "The handcuffs were on the floor, the door was
+open, and he was gone in a breath! Hold! What's that?"
+
+The soldier on the Pont de la Cité gave a shout and fired. There was a
+splash--a plunge--a rush to the opposite parapet.
+
+"There he goes!"
+
+"Where?"
+
+"He has dived again!"
+
+"Look--look yonder--between the floating bath and the bank!"
+
+The sergeant stood motionless, his revolver ready cocked--the water
+swirled and eddied, eddied and parted--a dark dot rose for a second to
+the surface!
+
+Three shots fired at the same moment (one by the sergeant, two by the
+soldiers) rang sharply through the air, and were echoed with startling
+suddenness again and again from the buttressed walls of Notre Dame. Ere
+the last echo had died away, or the last faint smoke-wreath had faded,
+two boats were pulling to the spot, and all the quays were alive with a
+fast-gathering crowd. The sergeant beckoned to the gendarme who had come
+upon the box.
+
+"Bid the boatmen drag the river just here between the two bridges," he
+said, "and bring the body up to the Préfecture." Then, turning to Müller
+and myself, "I am sorry to trouble you again, Messieurs," he said, "but
+I must ask you to come back once more to the Quai des Orfèvres, to
+depose to the facts which have just happened."
+
+"But is the man shot, or has he escaped?" asked a breathless bystander.
+
+"Both," said the sergeant, with a grim smile, replacing his revolver in
+his belt. "He has escaped Toulon; but he has gone to the bottom of the
+Seine with something like six ounces of lead in his skull."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XL
+
+THE ENIGMA OF THE THIRD STORY.
+
+     Who ever loved, that loved not at first sight?--MARLOWE.
+
+In Paris, a lodging-house (or, as they prefer to style it, a _hôtel
+meublé_) is a little town in itself; a beehive swarming from basement to
+attic; a miniature model of the great world beyond, with all its loves
+and hatreds, jealousies, aspirations, and struggles. Like that world, it
+contains several grades of society, but with this difference, that those
+who therein occupy the loftiest position are held in the lowest
+estimation. Thus, the fifth-floor lodgers turn up their noses at the
+inhabitants of the attics; while the fifth-floor is in its turn scorned
+by the fourth, and the fourth is despised by the third, and the third by
+the second, down to the magnificent dwellers on _the premier étage_, who
+live in majestic disdain of everybody above or beneath them, from the
+grisettes in the garret, to the _concierge_ who has care of the cellars.
+
+The house in which I lived in the Cité Bergère was, in fact, a double
+house, and contained no fewer than thirty tenants, some of whom had
+wives, children, and servants. It consisted of six floors, and each
+floor contained from eight to ten rooms. These were let in single
+chambers, or in suites, as the case might be; and on the outer doors
+opening round the landings were painted the names, or affixed the
+visiting-cards, of the dwellers within. My own third-floor neighbors
+were four in number. To my left lived a certain Monsieur and Madame
+Lemercier, a retired couple from Alsace. Opposite their door, on the
+other side of the well staircase, dwelt one Monsieur Cliquot, an elderly
+_employé_ in some public office; next to him, Signor Milanesi, an
+Italian refugee who played in the orchestra at the _Variétés_ every
+night, was given to practising the violoncello by day, and wore as much
+hair about his face as a Skye-terrier. Lastly, in the apartment to my
+right, resided a lady, upon whose door was nailed a small visiting-card
+engraved with these words:--
+
+MLLE. HORTENSE DUFRESNOY.
+
+_Teacher of Languages_.
+
+I had resided in the house for months before I ever beheld this
+Mademoiselle Hortense Dufresnoy. When I did at last encounter her upon
+the stairs one dusk autumnal evening, she wore a thick black veil, and,
+darting past me like a bird on the wing, disappeared down the staircase
+in fewer moments than I take to write it. I scarcely observed her at the
+time. I had no more curiosity to learn whether the face under that veil
+was pretty or plain than I cared to know whether the veil itself was
+Shetland or Chantilly. At that time Paris was yet new to me: Madame de
+Marignan's evil influence was about me; and, occupied as my time and
+thoughts were with unprofitable matters, I took no heed of my
+fellow-lodgers. Save, indeed, when the groans of that much-tortured
+violoncello woke me in the morning to an unwelcome consciousness of the
+vicinity of Signor Milanesi, I should scarcely have remembered that I
+was not the only inhabitant of the third story.
+
+Now, however, that I spent all my evenings in my own quiet room, I
+became, by imperceptible degrees, interested in the unseen inhabitant of
+the adjoining apartment. Sometimes, when the house was so still that the
+very turning of the page sounded unnaturally loud, and the mere falling
+of a cinder startled me, I heard her in her chamber, singing softly to
+herself. Every night I saw the light from her window streaming out over
+the balcony and touching the evergreens with a midnight glow. Often and
+often, when it was so late that even I had given up study and gone to
+bed, I heard her reading aloud, or pacing to and fro to the measure of
+her own recitations. Listen as I would, I could only make out that these
+recitations were poetical fragments--I could only distinguish a certain
+chanted metre, the chiming of an occasional rhyme, the rising and
+falling of a voice more than commonly melodious.
+
+This vague interest gave place by-and-by to active curiosity. I resolved
+to question Madame Bouïsse, the _concierge_; and as she, good soul!
+loved gossip not wisely, but too well, I soon knew all the little she
+had to tell.
+
+Mademoiselle Hortense, it appeared, was the enigma of the third story.
+She had resided in the house for more than two years. She earned her
+living by her labor; went out teaching all the day; sat up at night,
+studying and writing; had no friends; received no visitors; was as
+industrious as a bee, and as proud as a princess. Books and flowers were
+her only friends, and her only luxuries. Poor as she was, she was
+continually filling her shelves with the former, and supplying her
+balcony with the latter. She lived frugally, drank no wine, was
+singularly silent and reserved, and "like a real lady," said the fat
+_concierge_, "paid her rent to the minute."
+
+This, and no more, had Madame Bouïsse to tell. I had sought her in her
+own little retreat at the foot of the public staircase. It was a very
+wet afternoon, and under pretext of drying my boots by the fire, I
+stayed to make conversation and elicit what information I could. Now
+Madame Bouïsse's sanctuary was a queer, dark, stuffy little cupboard
+devoted to many heterogeneous uses, and it "served her for parlor,
+kitchen, and all." In one corner stood that famous article of furniture
+which became "a bed by night, a chest of drawers by day." Adjoining the
+bed was the fireplace; near the fireplace stood a corner cupboard filled
+with crockery and surmounted by a grand ormolu clock, singularly at
+variance with the rest of the articles. A table, a warming-pan, and a
+couple of chairs completed the furniture of the room, which, with all
+its contents, could scarcely have measured more than eight feet square.
+On a shelf inside the door stood thirty flat candlesticks; and on a row
+of nails just beneath them, hung two and twenty bright brass
+chamber-door keys--whereby an apt arithmetician might have divined that
+exactly two-and-twenty lodgers were out in the rain, and only eight
+housed comfortably within doors.
+
+"And how old should you suppose this lady to be?" I asked, leaning idly
+against the table whereon Madame Bouïsse was preparing an unsavory dish
+of veal and garlic.
+
+The _concierge_ shrugged her ponderous shoulders.
+
+"Ah, bah, M'sieur, I am no judge of age," said she.
+
+"Well--is she pretty?"
+
+"I am no judge of beauty, either," grinned Madame Bouïsse.
+
+"But, my dear soul," I expostulated, "you have eyes!"
+
+"Yours are younger than mine, _mon enfant_," retorted the fat
+_concierge_; "and, as I see Mam'selle Hortense coming up to the door,
+I'd advise you to make use of them for yourself."
+
+And there, sure enough, was a tall and slender girl, dressed all in
+black, pausing to close up her umbrella at the threshold of the outer
+doorway. A porter followed her, carrying a heavy parcel. Having
+deposited this in the passage, he touched his cap and stated his charge.
+The young lady took out her purse, turned over the coins, shook her
+head, and finally came up to Madame's little sanctuary.
+
+"Will you be so obliging, Madame Bouïsse," she said, "as to lend me a
+piece of ten sous? I have no small change left in my purse."
+
+How shall I describe her? If I say that she was not particularly
+beautiful, I do her less than justice; for she was beautiful, with a
+pale, grave, serious beauty, unlike the ordinary beauty of woman. But
+even this, her beauty of feature, and color, and form, was eclipsed and
+overborne by that "true beauty of the soul" which outshines all other,
+as the sun puts out the stars.
+
+There was in her face--or, perhaps, rather in her expression--an
+indefinable something that came upon me almost like a memory. Had I seen
+that face in some forgotten dream of long ago? Brown-haired was she, and
+pale, with a brow "as chaste ice, as pure as snow," and eyes--
+
+     "In whose orb a shadow lies,
+     Like the dusk in evening skies!"
+
+Eyes lit from within, large, clear, lustrous, with a meaning in them so
+profound and serious that it was almost sorrowful,--like the eyes of
+Giotto's saints and Cimabue's Madonnas.
+
+But I cannot describe her--
+
+"For oh, her looks had something excellent That wants a name!"
+
+I can only look back upon her with "my mind's eye," trying to see her as
+I saw her then for the first time, and striving to recall my first
+impressions.
+
+Madame Bouïsse, meanwhile, searched in all the corners of her ample
+pockets, turned out her table-drawer, dived into the recesses of her
+husband's empty garments, and peeped into every ornament upon the
+chimney-piece; but in vain. There was no such thing as a ten-sous piece
+to be found.
+
+"Pray, M'sieur Basil," said she, "have you one?"
+
+"One what?" I ejaculated, startled out of my reverie.
+
+"Why, a ten-sous piece, to be sure. Don't you see that Mam'selle
+Hortense is waiting in her wet shoes, and that I have been hunting for
+the last five minutes, and can't find one anywhere?"
+
+Blushing like a school-boy, and stammering some unintelligible excuse, I
+pulled out a handful of francs and half-francs, and produced the
+coin required.
+
+"_Dame_!" said the _concierge_. "This comes of using one's eyes too
+well, my young Monsieur. Hem! I'm not so blind but that I can see as far
+as my neighbors."
+
+Mademoiselle Hortense had fortunately gone back to settle with the
+porter, so this observation passed unheard. The man being dismissed, she
+came back, carrying the parcel. It was evidently heavy, and she put it
+down on the nearest chair.
+
+"I fear, Madame Bouïsse," she said, "that I must ask you to help me with
+this. I am not strong enough to carry it upstairs."
+
+More alert this time, I took a step in advance, and offered my services.
+
+"Will Mademoiselle permit me to take it?" I said. "I am going
+upstairs."
+
+She hesitated.
+
+"Many thanks," she said, reluctantly, "but...."
+
+"But Madame Bouïsse is busy," I urged, "and the _pot au feu_ will spoil
+if she leaves it on the fire."
+
+The fat _concierge_ nodded, and patted me on the shoulder.
+
+"Let him carry the parcel, Mam'selle Hortense," she chuckled. "Let him
+carry it. M'sieur is your neighbor, and neighbors should be neighborly.
+Besides," she added, in an audible aside, "he is a _bon garçon_--an
+Englishman--and a book-student like yourself."
+
+The young lady bent her head, civilly, but proudly. Compelled, as it
+seemed, to accept my help, she evidently wished to show me that I must
+nevertheless put forward no claim to further intercourse--not even on
+the plea of neighborhood. I understood her, and taking up the parcel,
+followed her in silence to her door on the third story. Here she paused
+and thanked me.
+
+"Pray let me carry it in for you," I said.
+
+Again she hesitated; but only for an instant. Too well-bred not to see
+that a refusal would now be a discourtesy, she unlocked the door, and
+held it open.
+
+The first room was an ante-chamber; the second a _salon_ somewhat larger
+than my own, with a door to the right, leading into what I supposed
+would be her bedroom. At a glance, I took in all the details of her
+home. There was her writing-table laden with books and papers, her desk,
+and her pile of manuscripts. At one end of the room stood a piano doing
+duty as a side-board, and looking as if it were seldom opened. Some
+water-color drawings were pinned against the walls, and a well-filled
+bookcase stood in a recess beside the fireplace. Nothing escaped me
+--not even the shaded reading-lamp, nor the plain ebony time-piece, nor
+the bronze Apollo on the bracket above the piano, nor the sword over the
+mantelpiece, which seemed a strange ornament in the study of a gentle
+lady. Besides all this, there were books everywhere, heaped upon the
+tables, ranged on shelves, piled in corners, and scattered hither and
+thither in most admired disorder. It was, however, the only
+disorder there.
+
+I longed to linger, but dared not. Having laid the parcel down upon the
+nearest chair, there was nothing left for me to do but to take my leave.
+Mademoiselle Dufresnoy still kept her hand upon the door.
+
+"Accept my best thanks, sir," she said in English, with a pretty foreign
+accent, that seemed to give new music to the dear familiar tongue.
+
+"You have nothing to thank me for, Mademoiselle," I replied.
+
+She smiled, proudly still, but very sweetly, and closed the door upon
+me.
+
+I went back to my room; it had become suddenly dark and desolate. I
+tried to read; but all subjects seemed alike tedious and unprofitable. I
+could fix my attention to nothing; and so, becoming restless, I went out
+again, and wandered about the dusky streets till evening fairly set in,
+and the shops were lighted, and the tide of passers-by began to flow
+faster in the direction of boulevard and theatre.
+
+The soft light of her shaded lamp streamed from her window when I came
+back, nor faded thence till two hours after midnight. I watched it all
+the long evening, stealing out from time to time upon my balcony, which
+adjoined her own, and welcoming the cool night air upon my brow. For I
+was fevered and disquieted, I knew not why, and my heart was stirred
+within me, strangely and sweetly.
+
+Such was my first meeting with Hortense Dufresnoy. No incident of it has
+since faded from my memory. Brief as it was, it had already turned all
+the current of my life. I had fallen in love at first sight. Yes--in
+love; for love it was--real, passionate, earnest; a love destined to be
+the master-passion of all my future years.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLI.
+
+A CHRONICLE ABOUT FROISSART.
+
+     See, Lucius, here's the book I sought for so!
+     JULIUS CAESAR.
+
+     But all be that he was a philosophre,
+     Yet hadde he but litel gold in cofre,
+     But all that he might of his frends hente,
+     On bokes and on lerning he is spente.
+
+     CHAUCER.
+&/
+
+"LOVE-IN-IDLENESS" has passed into a proverb, and lovers,
+somehow, are not generally supposed to be industrious. I,
+however, worked none the less zealously for being in love. I
+applied only the more closely to my studies, both medical and
+literary, and made better progress in both than I had made
+before. I was not ambitious; but I had many incentives to
+work. I was anxious to satisfy my father. I earnestly desired
+to efface every unfavorable impression from the mind of Dr.
+Chéron, and to gain, if possible, his esteem. I was proud of
+the friendship of Madame de Courcelles, and wished to prove
+the value that I placed upon her good opinion. Above all, I
+had a true and passionate love of learning--not that love which
+leadeth on to fame; but rather that self-abandoning devotion
+which exchangeth willingly the world of action for the world of
+books, and, for an uninterrupted communion with the "souls
+of all that men held wise," bartereth away the society of the
+living.
+
+Little gregarious by nature, Paris had already ceased to
+delight me in the same way that it had delighted me at first. A
+"retired leisure," and the society of the woman whom I loved,
+grew to be the day-dream of my solitary life. And still, ever
+more and more plainly, it became evident to me that for the
+career of the student I was designed by nature. Bayle, Magliabecchi
+of Florence, Isaac Reed, Sir Thomas Brown, Montaigne--those
+were the men whose lot in life I envied--those the literary
+anchorites in whose steps I would fain have followed.
+
+But this was not to be; so I worked on, rose early, studied
+late, gained experience, took out my second inscription with
+credit, and had the satisfaction of knowing that I was fast
+acquiring the good opinion of Dr. Chéron. Thus Christmas
+passed by, and January with its bitter winds; and February set
+in, bright but frosty. And still, without encouragement or
+nope, I went on loving Hortense Dufresnoy.
+
+My opportunities of seeing her were few and brief. A passing bow in the
+hall, or a distant "good-evening" as we passed upon the stairs, for some
+time made up the sum of our intercourse. Gradually, however, a kind of
+formal acquaintance sprang up between us; an acquaintance fostered by
+trifles and dependent on the idlest, or what seemed the idlest,
+casualties. I say "seemed," for often that which to her appeared the
+work of chance was the result of elaborate contrivance on my part. She
+little knew, when I met her on the staircase, how I had been listening
+for the last hour to catch the echo of her step. She little dreamed when
+I encountered her at the corner of the street, how I had been concealed,
+till that moment, in the _café_ over the way, ready to dart out as soon
+as she appeared in sight. I would then affect either a polite unconcern,
+or an air of judicious surprise, or pretend not to lift my eyes at all
+till she was nearly past; and I think I must have been a very fair
+actor, for it all succeeded capitally, and I am not aware that she ever
+had the least suspicion of the truth. Let me, however, recall one
+incident over which I had no control, and which did more towards
+promoting our intercourse than all the rest.
+
+It is a cold, bright morning in February. There is a brisk
+exhilaration in the air. The windows and gilded balconies
+sparkle in the sun, and it is pleasant to hear the frosty ring of
+one's boots upon the pavement. It is a fête to-day. Nothing
+is doing in the lecture-rooms, and I have the whole day before
+me. Meaning, therefore, to enjoy it over the fire and a book,
+I wisely begin it by a walk.
+
+From the Cité Bergère, out along the right-hand side of the Boulevards,
+down past the front of the Madeleine, across the Place de la Concorde,
+and up the Champs Elysées as far as the Arc de Triomphe; this is the
+route I take in going. Arrived at the arch, I cross over, and come back
+by the same roads, but on the other side of the way. I have a motive in
+this. There is a certain second-hand book-shop on the opposite side of
+the Boulevard des Italiens, which draws me by a wholly irresistible
+attraction. Had I started on that side, I should have gone no further. I
+should have looked, lingered, purchased, and gone home to read. But I
+know my weakness. I have reserved the book-shop for my return journey,
+and now, rewarded and triumphant, compose myself for a quiet study of
+its treasures.
+
+And what a book-shop it is! Not only are its windows filled--not only
+are its walls a very perspective of learning--but square pillars of
+volumes are built up on either side of the door, and an immense
+supplementary library is erected in the open air, down all the length of
+a dead-wall adjoining the house.
+
+Here then I pause, turning over the leaves of one volume, reading the
+title of another, studying the personal appearance of a third, and
+weighing the merits of their authors against the contents of my purse.
+And when I say "personal appearance," I say it advisedly; for
+book-hunters, are skilled Lavaters in their way, and books, like men,
+attract or repel at first sight. Thus it happens that I love a portly
+book, in a sober coat of calf, but hate a thin, smart volume, in a gaudy
+binding. The one promises to be philosophic, learnedly witty, or solidly
+instructive; the other is tolerably certain to be pert and shallow, and
+reminds me of a coxcombical lacquey in bullion and red plush. On the
+same principle, I respect leaves soiled and dog's-eared, but mistrust
+gilt edges; love an old volume better than a new; prefer a spacious
+book-stall to all the unpurchased stores of Paternoster Row; and buy
+every book that I possess at second-hand. Nay, that it is second-hand is
+in itself a pass port to my favor. Somebody has read it before;
+therefore it is readable. Somebody has derived pleasure from it before;
+therefore I open it with a student's sympathy, and am disposed to be
+indulgent ere I have perused a single line. There are cases, however,
+in which I incline to luxury of binding. Just as I had rather have my
+historians in old calf and my chroniclers in black letter, so do I
+delight to see my modern poets, the Benjamins of my affections, clothed
+in coats of many colors. For them no moroccos are too rich, and no
+"toolings" too elaborate. I love to see them smiling on me from the
+shelves of my book-cases, as glowing and varied as the sunset through a
+painted oriel.
+
+Standing here, then, to-day, dipping first into this work and
+then into that, I light upon a very curious and interesting
+edition of _Froissart_--an edition full of quaint engravings, and
+printed in the obsolete spelling of two hundred years ago. The
+book is both a treasure and a bargain, being marked up at five
+and twenty francs. Only those who haunt book-stalls and
+luxuriate in old editions can appreciate the satisfaction with
+which I survey
+
+     "That weight of wood, with leathern coat overlaid,
+     Those ample clasps of solid metal made,
+     The close pressed leaves unclosed for many an age,
+     The dull red edging of the well-filled page,
+     And the broad back, with stubborn ridges roll'd,
+     Where yet the title stands in tarnished gold!"
+
+They only can sympathize in the eagerness with which I snatch up the
+precious volume, the haste with which I count out the five and twenty
+francs, the delight with which I see the dealer's hand close on the sum,
+and know that the book is legally and indisputably mine! Then how
+lovingly I embrace it under my arm, and taking advantage of my position
+as a purchaser, stroll leisurely round the inner warehouse, still
+courting that literary world which (in a library at least) always turns
+its back upon its worshipper!
+
+"Pray, Monsieur," says a gentle voice at the door, "where is that old
+_Froissart_ that I saw outside about a quarter of an hour ago?"
+
+"Just sold, Madame," replies the bookseller, promptly.
+
+"Oh, how unfortunate!--and I only went home for the money" exclaims the
+lady in a tone of real disappointment.
+
+Selfishly exultant, I hug the book more closely, turn to steal a glance
+at my defeated rival, and recognise--Mademoiselle Dufresnoy.
+
+She does not see me. I am standing in the inner gloom of the shop, and
+she is already turning away. I follow her at a little distance; keep her
+in sight all the way home; let her go into the house some few seconds in
+advance; and then, scaling three stairs at a time, overtake her at the
+door of her apartment.
+
+Flushed and breathless, I stand beside her with _Froissart_ in my hand.
+
+"Pardon, Mademoiselle," I say, hurriedly, "for having involuntarily
+forestalled you just now. I had just bought the book you wished to
+purchase,"
+
+She looks at me with evident surprise and some coldness; but says
+nothing.
+
+"And I am rejoiced to have this opportunity of transferring it to you."
+
+Mademoiselle Dufresnoy makes a slight but decided gesture of refusal.
+
+"I would not deprive you of it, Monsieur," she says promptly, "upon any
+consideration."
+
+"But, Mademoiselle, unless you allow me to relinquish it in your favor,
+I beg to assure you that I shall take the book back to the bookseller
+and exchange it for some other."
+
+"I cannot conceive why you should do that, Monsieur."
+
+"In order, Mademoiselle, that you may still have it in your power to
+become the purchaser."
+
+"And yet you wished to possess the book, or you would not have bought
+it."
+
+"I would not have bought it, Mademoiselle, if I had known that I should
+disappoint a--a lady by doing so,"
+
+I was on the point of saying, "if I had known that I should disappoint
+you by so doing," but hesitated, and checked myself in time.
+
+A half-mocking smile flitted across her lips.
+
+"Monsieur is too self-sacrificing," she said. "Had I first bought the
+book, I should have kept it--being a woman. Reverse the case as you
+will, and show me any just reason why you should not do the
+same--being a man?"
+
+"Nay, the merest by-law of courtesy..." I began, hesitatingly.
+
+"Do not think me ungracious, Monsieur," she interrupted, "if I hold that
+these so-called laws of courtesy are in truth but concessions, for the
+most part, from the strength of your sex to the weakness of ours."
+
+"_Eh bien_, Mademoiselle--what then?"
+
+"Then, Monsieur, may there not be some women---myself, for instance--who
+do not care to be treated like children?"
+
+"Pardon, Mademoiselle, but are you stating the case quite fairly? Is it
+not rather that we desire not to efface the last lingering tradition of
+the age of chivalry--not to reduce to prose the last faint echoes of
+that poetry which tempered the sword of the Crusader and inspired the
+song of the Trouvère?"
+
+"Were it not better that the new age created a new code and a new
+poetry?" said Mademoiselle Dufresnoy.
+
+"Perhaps; but I confess I love old forms and usages, and cling to creeds
+outworn. Above all, to that creed which in the age of powder and
+compliment, no less than in the age of chivalry, enjoined absolute
+devotion and courtesy towards women."
+
+"Against mere courtesy reasonably exercised and in due season, I have
+nothing to say," replied Mademoiselle Dufresnoy; "but the half-barbarous
+homage of the Middle Ages is as little to my taste as the scarcely less
+barbarous refinement of the Addison and Georgian periods. Both are alike
+unsound, because both have a basis of insincerity. Just as there is a
+mock refinement more vulgar than simple vulgarity, so are there
+courtesies which humiliate and compliments that offend."
+
+"Mademoiselle is pleased to talk in paradoxes," said I.
+
+Mademoiselle unlocked her door, and turning towards me with the same
+half-mocking smile and the same air of raillery, said:--
+
+"Monsieur, it is written in your English histories that when John le Bon
+was taken captive after the battle of Cressy, the Black Prince rode
+bareheaded before him through the streets of London, and served him at
+table as the humblest of his attendants. But for all that, was John any
+the less a prisoner, or the Black Prince any the less a conqueror?"
+
+"You mean, perhaps, that you reject all courtesy based on mere
+ceremonial. Let me then put the case of this _Froissart_ more
+plainly--as I would have done from the first, had I dared to speak the
+simple truth."
+
+"And that is...?"
+
+"That it will give me more pleasure to resign the book to you,
+Mademoiselle, than to possess it myself."
+
+Mademoiselle Dufresnoy colors up, looks both haughty and amused, and
+ends by laughing.
+
+"In truth, Monsieur," she says merrily, "if your politeness threatened
+at first to be too universal, it ends by becoming unnecessarily
+particular."
+
+"Say rather, Mademoiselle, that you will not have the book on any
+terms!" I exclaim impatiently.
+
+"Because you have not yet offered it to me upon any just or reasonable
+grounds."
+
+"Well, then, bluntly and frankly, as student to student, I beg you to
+spare me the trouble of carrying this book back to the Boulevard. Yours,
+Mademoiselle, was the first intention. You saw the book before I saw it.
+You would have bought it on the spot, but had to go home for the money.
+In common equity, it is yours. In common civility, as student to
+student, I offer it to you. Say, is it yes or no?"
+
+"Since you put it so simply and so generously, and since I believe you
+really wish me to accept your offer," replies Mademoiselle Dufresnoy,
+taking out her purse, "I suppose I must say--yes."
+
+And with this, she puts out her hand for the hook, and offers me in
+return the sum of five and twenty francs.
+
+Pained at having to accept the money, pained at being offered it, seeing
+no way of refusing it, and feel altogether more distress than is
+reasonable in a man brought up to the taking of fees; I affect not to
+see the coin, and, bowing, move away in the direction of my own door.
+
+"Pardon, Monsieur," she says, "but you forget that I am in your debt."
+
+"And--and do you really insist..."
+
+She looks at me, half surprised and half offended.
+
+"If you do not take the money, Monsieur, how can I take the book?"
+
+Bowing, I receive the unwelcome francs in my unwilling palm.
+
+Still she lingers.
+
+"I--I have not thanked you as I ought for your generosity," she says,
+hesitatingly.
+
+"Generosity!" I repeat, glancing with some bitterness at the five and
+twenty francs.
+
+"True kindness, Monsieur, is neither bought nor sold," says the lady,
+with the loveliest smile in the world, and closes her door.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLII
+
+THE OLD, OLD STORY.
+
+     What thing is Love, which nought can countervail?
+     Nought save itself--even such a thing is Love.
+
+     SIR W. RALEIGH.
+
+My acquaintance with Hortense Dufresnoy progressed slowly as, ever, and
+not even the Froissart incident went far towards promoting it. Absorbed
+in her studies, living for the intellect only, too self-contained to
+know the need for sympathy, she continued to be, at all events for me,
+the most inaccessible of God's creatures. And yet, despite her
+indifference, I loved her. Her pale, proud face haunted me; her voice
+haunted me. I thought of her sometimes till it seemed impossible she
+should not in some way be conscious of how my very soul was centred in
+her. But she knew nothing--guessed nothing--cared nothing; and the
+knowledge that I held no place in her life wrought in me at times till
+it became almost too bitter for endurance.
+
+And this was love--real, passionate, earnest; the first and last love of
+my heart. Did I believe that I ever loved till now? Ah! no; for now only
+I felt the god in his strength, and beheld him in his beauty. Was I not
+blind till I had looked into her eyes and drunk of their light? Was I
+not deaf till I had heard the music of her voice? Had I ever truly
+lived, or breathed, or known delight till now?
+
+I never stayed to ask myself how this would end, or whither it would
+lead me. The mere act of loving was too sweet for questioning. What
+cared I for the uncertainties of the future, having hope to live upon in
+the present? Was it not enough "to feed for aye my lamp and flames of
+love," and worship her till that worship became a religion and a rite?
+
+And now, longing to achieve something which should extort at least her
+admiration, if not her love, I wished I were a soldier, that I might win
+glory for her--or a poet, that I might write verses in her praise which
+should be deathless--or a painter, that I might spend years of my life
+in copying the dear perfection of her face. Ah! and I would so copy it
+that all the world should be in love with it. Not a wave of her brown
+hair that I would not patiently follow through all its windings. Not the
+tender tracery of a blue vein upon her temples that I would not lovingly
+render through its transparent veil of skin. Not a depth of her dark
+eyes that I would not study, "deep drinking of the infinite." Alas!
+those eyes, so grave, so luminous, so steadfast:--
+
+     "Eyes not down-dropt, not over-bright, but fed
+      With the clear-pointed flame of chastity,"
+
+--eyes wherein dwelt "thought folded over thought," what painter need
+ever hope to copy them?
+
+And still she never dreamed how dear she had grown to me. She never
+knew how the very air seemed purer to me because she breathed it. She
+never guessed how I watched the light from her window night after
+night--how I listened to every murmur in her chamber--how I watched and
+waited for the merest glimpse of her as she passed by--how her lightest
+glance hurried the pulses through my heart--how her coldest word was
+garnered up in the treasure-house of my memory! What cared she, though
+to her I had dedicated all the "book and volume of my brain;" hallowed
+its every page with blazonings of her name; and illuminated it, for love
+of her, with fair images, and holy thoughts, and forms of saints
+and angels
+
+     "Innumerable, of stains and splendid dyes
+     As are the tiger-moth's deep damask'd wings?"
+
+Ah me! her hand was never yet outstretched to undo its golden
+clasps--her eye had never yet deigned to rest upon its records. To her I
+was nothing, or less than nothing--a fellow-student, a fellow-lodger,
+a stranger.
+
+And yet I loved her "with a love that was more than love"--with a love
+dearer than life and stronger than death--a love that, day after day,
+struck its roots deeper and farther into my very soul, never thence to
+be torn up here or hereafter.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLIII.
+
+ON A WINTER'S EVENING.
+
+After a more than usually severe winter, the early spring came, crowned
+with rime instead of primroses. Paris was intensely cold. In March the
+Seine was still frozen, and snow lay thickly on the house-tops. Quiet at
+all times, the little nook in which I lived became monastically still,
+and at night, when the great gates were closed, and the footsteps of the
+passers-by fell noiselessly upon the trodden snow, you might have heard
+a whisper from one side of the street to the other. There was to me
+something indescribably delightful about this silent solitude in the
+heart of a great city.
+
+Sitting beside the fire one evening, enjoying the profound calm of the
+place, attending from time to time to my little coffee-pot on the hob,
+and slowly turning the pages of a favorite author, I luxuriate in a
+state of mind half idle, half studious. Leaving off presently to listen
+to some sound which I hear, or fancy I hear, in the adjoining room, I
+wonder for the twentieth time whether Hortense has yet returned from her
+long day's teaching; and so rise--open my window--and look out. Yes; the
+light from her reading-lamp streams out at last across the snow-laden
+balcony. Heigho! it is something even to know that she is there so near
+me--divided only by a thin partition!
+
+Trying to comfort myself with this thought, I close the window again and
+return to my book, more restless and absent than before. Sitting thus,
+with the unturned leaf lingering between my thumb and forefinger, I hear
+a rapid footfall on the stairs, and a musical whistle which, growing
+louder as it draws nearer, breaks off at my door, and is followed by a
+prolonged assault and battery of the outer panels.
+
+"Welcome, noisiest of visitors!" I exclaim, knowing it to be Müller
+before I even open the door. "You are quite a stranger. You have not
+been near me for a fortnight."
+
+"It will not be your fault, Signor Book-worm, if I don't become a
+stranger _au pied de la lettre_" replies he, cheerily. "Why, man, it is
+close upon three weeks since you have crossed the threshold of my door.
+The Quartier Latin is aggrieved by your neglect, and the fine arts
+t'other side of the water languish and are forlorn."
+
+So saying, he shakes the snow from his coat like a St. Bernard mastiff,
+perches his cap on the head of the plaster Niobe that adorns my
+chimney-piece, and lays aside the folio which he had been carrying under
+his arm. I, in the meanwhile, have wheeled an easy-chair to the fire,
+brought out a bottle of Chambertin, and piled on more wood in honor
+of my guest.
+
+"You can't think," said I, shaking hands with him for the second time,
+"how glad I am that you have come round to-night."
+
+"I quite believe it," replied he. "You must be bored to death, if these
+old busts are all the society you keep. _Sacre nom d'une pipe_! how can
+a fellow keep up his conviviality by the perpetual contemplation of
+Niobe and Jupiter Tonans? What do you mean by living such a life as
+this? Have you turned Trappist? Shall I head a subscription to present
+you with a skull and an hour-glass?"
+
+"I'll have the skull made into a drinking-cup, if you do. Take some
+wine."
+
+Müller filled his glass, tasted with the air of a connoisseur, and
+nodded approvingly.
+
+"Chambertin, by the god Bacchus!" said he. "Napoleon's favorite wine,
+and mine--evidence of the sympathy that exists between the truly great."
+
+And, draining the glass, he burst into a song in praise of French wines,
+beginning--
+
+     "Le Chambertin rend joyeux,
+     Le Nuits rend infatigable,
+     Le Volnay rend amoureux,
+     Le Champagne rend amiable.
+     Grisons-nous, mes chers amis,
+     L'ivresse
+     Vaut la richesse;
+     Pour moi, dès que le suis gris,
+     Je possède tout Paris!"
+
+"Oh hush!" said I, uneasily; "not so loud, pray!"
+
+"Why not?"
+
+"The--the neighbors, you know. We cannot do as we would in the Quartier
+Latin."
+
+"Nonsense, my dear fellow. You don't swear yourself to silence when you
+take apartments in a _hôtel meublé_! You might as well live in a
+penitentiary!--
+
+     'De bouchons faisons un tas,
+     Et s'il faut avoir la goutte,
+     Au moins que ce ne soit pas
+     Pour n'avoir bu qu'une goutte!'"
+
+"Nay, I implore you!" I interposed again. "The landlord ..."
+
+"Hang the landlord!
+
+     'Grisons-nous--'"
+
+"Well, but--but there is a lady in the next room ..."
+
+Müller laughed till the tears ran down his cheeks.
+
+"_Allons done_!" said he, "why not have told the truth at first? Oh, you
+sly rogue! You _gaillard_! This is your seclusion, is it? This is your
+love of learning--this the secret of your researches into science and
+art! What art, pray? Ovid's 'Art of Love,' I'll be sworn!"
+
+"Laugh on, pray," I said, feeling my face and my temper growing hot;
+"but that lady, who is a stranger to me"....
+
+"Oh--oh--oh!" cried Müller.
+
+"Who is a stranger to me," I repeated, "and who passes her evenings in
+study, must not be annoyed by noises in my room. Surely, my dear fellow,
+you know me well enough to understand whether I am in jest or
+in earnest."
+
+Müller laid his hand upon my sleeve.
+
+"Enough--enough," he said, smiling good-naturedly. "You are right, and I
+will be as dumb as Plato. What is the lady's name."
+
+"Dufresnoy," I answered, somewhat reluctantly. "Mademoiselle Dufresnoy."
+
+"Ay, but her Christian name!"
+
+"Her Christian name," I faltered, more reluctant still. "I--I--"
+
+"Don't say you don't know," said Müller, maliciously. "It isn't worth
+while. After all, what does it matter? Here's to her health, all the
+same--_à votre santé_, Mademoiselle Dufresnoy! What! not drink her
+health, though I have filled your glass on purpose?"
+
+There was no help for it, so I took the glass and drank the toast with
+the best grace I could.
+
+"And now, tell me," continued my companion, drawing nearer to the fire
+and settling himself with a confidential air that was peculiarly
+provoking, "what is she like? Young or old? Dark or fair? Plain
+or pretty?"
+
+"Old," said I, desperately. "Old and ugly. Fifty at the least. Squints
+horribly."
+
+Then, thinking that I had been a little too emphatic, I added:--
+
+"But a very ladylike person, and exceedingly well-informed,"
+
+Müller looked at me gravely, and filled his glass again.
+
+"I think I know the lady," said he.
+
+"Indeed?"
+
+"Yes--by your description. You forgot to add, however, that she is
+gray."
+
+"To be sure--as a badger."
+
+"To say nothing of a club foot, an impediment in her speech, a voice
+like a raven's, and a hump like a dromedary's! Ah! my dear friend, what
+an amazingly comic fellow you are!"
+
+And the student burst again into a peal of laughter so hearty and
+infectious that I could not have helped joining in it to save my life.
+
+"And now," said he, when we had laughed ourselves out of breath, "now to
+the object of my visit. Do you remember asking me, months ago, to make
+you a copy of an old portrait that you had taken a fancy to in some
+tumble-down château near Montlhéry!"
+
+"To be sure; and I have intended, over and over again, to remind you of
+it. Did you ever take the trouble to go over there and look at it?"
+
+"Look at it, indeed! I should rather think so--and here is the proof.
+What does your connoisseurship say to it?"
+
+Say to it! Good heavens! what could I say, what could I do, but flush up
+all suddenly with pleasure, and stare at it without power at first to
+utter a single word?
+
+For it was like _her_--so like that it might have been her very
+portrait. The features were cast in the same mould--the brow, perhaps,
+was a little less lofty--the smile a little less cold; but the eyes,
+the beautiful, lustrous, soul-lighted eyes were the same--the
+very same!
+
+If she were to wear an old-fashioned dress, and deck her fair neck and
+arms with pearls, and put powder on her hair, and stand just so, with
+her hand upon one of the old stone urns in the garden of that deserted
+château, she would seem to be standing for the portrait.
+
+Well might I feel, when I first saw her, that the beauty of her face was
+not wholly unfamiliar to me! Well might I fancy I had seen her in some
+dream of long ago!
+
+So this was the secret of it--and this picture was mine. Mine to hang
+before my desk when I was at work--mine to place at my bed's foot, where
+I might see it on first waking--mine to worship and adore, to weave
+fancies and build hopes upon, and "burn out the day in idle phantasies"
+of passionate devotion!
+
+"Well," said Müller impatiently, "what do you think of it?"
+
+I looked up, like one dreaming.
+
+"Think of it!" I repeated.
+
+"Yes--do you think it like?"
+
+"So like that it might be her por ... I mean that it might be the
+original."
+
+"Oh, that's satisfactory. I was afraid you were disappointed."
+
+"I was only silent from surprise and pleasure."
+
+"Well, however faithful the copy maybe, you know, in these things one
+always misses the tone of age."
+
+"I would not have it look a day older!" I exclaimed, never lifting my
+eyes from the canvas.
+
+Müller came and looked down at it over my shoulder.
+
+"It is an interesting head," said he. "I have a great mind to introduce
+it into my next year's competition picture."
+
+I started as if he had struck me. The thought was sacrilege!
+
+"For Heaven's sake do no such thing!" I ejaculated.
+
+"Why not?" said he, opening his eyes in astonishment.
+
+"I cannot tell you why--at least not yet; but to--to confer a very
+particular obligation upon me, will you waive this point?" Müller rubbed
+his head all over with both hands, and sat down in the utmost
+perplexity.
+
+"Upon my soul and conscience," said he, "you are the most
+incomprehensible fellow I ever knew in my life!"
+
+"I am. I grant it. What then? Let us see, I am to give you a hundred and
+fifty francs for this copy ..."
+
+"I won't take it," said Müller. "I mean you to accept it as a pledge of
+friendship and good-will."
+
+"Nay, I insist on paying for it. I shall be proud to pay for it; but a
+hundred and fifty are not enough. Let me give you three hundred, and
+promise me that you will not put the head into your picture!"
+
+Müller laughed, and shook his own head resolutely. "I will give you both
+the portrait and the promise," said he; "but I won't take your money, if
+I know it."
+
+"But ..."
+
+"But I won't--and so, if you don't like me well enough to accept such a
+trifle from me, I'll e'en carry the thing home again!"
+
+And, snatching up his cap and cloak, he made a feint of putting the
+portrait back into the folio.
+
+"Not for the world!" I exclaimed, taking possession of it without
+further remonstrance. "I would sooner part from all I possess. How can I
+ever thank you enough?"
+
+"By never thanking me at all! What little time the thing has cost me is
+overpaid, not only by the sight of your pleasure, but by my own
+satisfaction in copying it. To copy a good work is to have a lesson from
+the painter, though he were dead a hundred years before; and the man who
+painted that portrait, be he who he might, has taught me a trick or two
+that I never knew before. _Sapristi_! see if I don't dazzle you some day
+with an effect of white satin and pearls against a fair skin!"
+
+"An ingenious argument; but it leaves me unconvinced, all the same. How!
+you are not going to run away already? Here's another bottle of
+Chambertin waiting to be opened; and it is yet quite early."
+
+"Impossible! I have promised to meet a couple of men up at the Prado,
+and have, besides, invited them afterwards to supper."
+
+"What is the Prado?"
+
+"The Prado! Why, is it possible that I have never yet introduced you to
+the Prado? It's one of the joiliest places in all the Quartier
+Latin--it's close to the Palais de Justice. You can dance there, or
+practise pistol-shooting, or play billiards, or sup--or anything you
+please. Everybody smokes--ladies not excepted."
+
+"How very delightful!"
+
+"Oh, magnificent! Won't you come with me? I know a dozen pretty girls
+who will be delighted to be introduced to you."
+
+"Not to-night, thank you," said I, laughing.
+
+"Well, another time?"
+
+"Yes, to be sure--another time."
+
+"Well, good-night."
+
+"Good-night, and thank you again, a thousand times over."
+
+But he would not stay to hear me thank him, and was half way down the
+first flight before my sentence was finished. Just as I was going back
+into my room, and about to close the door, he called after me from
+the landing.
+
+"_Holà, amigo_! When my picture is done, I mean to give a bachelor's
+supper-party--chiefly students and _chicards_. Will you come?"
+
+"Gladly."
+
+"Adieu, then. I will let you know in time."
+
+And with this, he broke out into a fragment of Beranger, gave a cheerful
+good-night to Madame Bouïsse in the hall, and was gone.
+
+And now to enjoy my picture. Now to lock the door, and trim the lamp,
+and place it up against a pile of books, and sit down before it in
+silent rapture, like a devotee before the portrait of his patron saint.
+Now I can gaze, unreproved, into those eyes, and fancy they are hers.
+Now press my lips, unforbidden, upon that exquisite mouth, and believe
+it warm. Ah, will her eyes ever so give back the look of love in mine?
+Will her lips ever suffer mine to come so near? Would she, if she knew
+the treasure I possessed, be displeased that I so worshipped it?
+
+Hanging over it thus, and suffering my thoughts to stray on at their own
+will and pleasure, I am startled by the fall of some heavy object in the
+adjoining chamber. The fall is followed by a stifled cry, and then all
+is again silent.
+
+To unlock my door and rush to hers--to try vainly to open it--to cry
+"Hortense! Hortense! what has happened? For Heaven's sake, what has
+happened?" is the work of but an instant.
+
+The antechamber lay between, and I remembered that she could not hear
+me. I ran back, knocked against the wall, and repeated:--
+
+"What has happened? Tell me what has happened?"
+
+Again I listened, and in that interval of suspense heard her garments
+rustle along the ground, then a deep sigh, and then the words:--
+
+"Nothing serious. I have hurt my hand."
+
+"Can you open the door?"
+
+There was another long silence.
+
+"I cannot," she said at length, but more faintly.
+
+"In God's name, try!"
+
+No answer.
+
+"Shall I get over the balcony?"
+
+I waited another instant, heard nothing, and then, without, further
+hesitation, opened my own window and climbed the iron rail that
+separated her balcony from mine, leaving my footsteps trampled in
+the snow.
+
+I found her sitting on the floor, with her body bent forward and her
+head resting against the corner of a fallen bookcase. The scattered
+volumes lay all about. A half-filled portmanteau stood close by on a
+chair. A travelling-cloak and a passport-case lay on the table.
+
+Seeing, yet scarcely noting all this, I flung myself on my knees beside
+her, and found that one hand and arm lay imprisoned under the bookcase.
+She was not insensible, but pain had deprived her of the power of
+speech. I raised her head tenderly, and supported it against a chair;
+then lifted the heavy bookcase, and, one by one, removed the volumes
+that had fallen upon her.
+
+Alas! the white little hand all crushed and bleeding--the powerless
+arm--the brave mouth striving to be firm!
+
+I took the poor maimed arm, made a temporary sling for it with my
+cravat, and, taking her up in my arms as if she had been an infant,
+carried her to the sofa. Then I closed the window; ran back to my own
+room for hot water; tore up some old handkerchiefs for bandages; and so
+dressed and bound her wounds--blessing (for the first time in my life)
+the destiny that had made me a surgeon.
+
+"Are you in much pain?" I asked, when all was done.
+
+"Not now--but I feel very faint,"
+
+I remembered my coffee in the next room, and brought it to her. I lifted
+her head, and supported her with my arm while she drank it.
+
+"You are much better now," I said, when she had again lain down. "Tell
+me how it happened."
+
+She smiled languidly.
+
+"It was not my fault," she said, "but Froissart's. Do you remember that
+Froissart?"
+
+Remember it! I should think so.
+
+"Froissart!" I exclaimed. "Why, what had he to do with it?"
+
+"Only this. I usually kept him on the top of the bookcase that fell down
+this evening. Just now, while preparing for a journey upon which I must
+start to-morrow morning, I thought to remove the book to a safer place;
+and so, instead of standing on a chair, I tried to reach up, and,
+reaching up, disturbed the balance of the bookcase, and brought
+it down."
+
+"Could you not have got out of the way when you saw it falling?"
+
+"Yes--but I tried to prevent it, and so was knocked down and imprisoned
+as you found me."
+
+"Merciful Heaven! it might have killed you."
+
+"That was what flashed across my mind when I saw it coming," she
+replied, with a faint smile.
+
+"You spoke of a journey," I said presently, turning my face away lest
+she should read its story too plainly; "but now, of course, you must not
+move for a few days."
+
+"I must travel to-morrow," she said, with quiet decision.
+
+"Impossible!"
+
+"I have no alternative."
+
+"But think of the danger--the imprudence--the suffering."
+
+"Danger there cannot be," she replied, with a touch of impatience in her
+voice. "Imprudent it may possibly be; but of that I have no time to
+think. And as for the suffering, that concerns myself alone. There are
+mental pains harder to bear than the pains of the body, and the
+consciousness of a duty unfulfilled is one of the keenest of them. You
+urge in vain; I must go. And now, since it is time you bade me
+good-night, let me thank you for your ready help and say good-bye."
+
+"But may I do no more for you?"
+
+"Nothing--unless you will have the goodness to bid Madame Bouïsse to
+come up-stairs, and finish packing my portmanteau for me."
+
+"At what hour do you start?"
+
+"At eight."
+
+"May I not go with you to the station, and see that you get a
+comfortable seat?"
+
+"Many thanks," she replied, coldly; "but I do not go by rail, and my
+seat in the diligence is already taken."
+
+"You will want some one to see to your luggage--to carry your cloaks."
+
+"Madame Bouïsse has promised to go with me to the Messageries."
+
+Silenced, and perhaps a little hurt, I rose to take my leave.
+
+"I wish you a safe journey, mademoiselle," I said, "and a safe return,"
+
+"And think me, at the same time, an ungrateful patient."
+
+"I did not say that."
+
+"No--but you thought so. After all, it is possible that I seem so. I am
+undemonstrative--unused to the amenities of life--in short, I am only
+half-civilized. Pray, forgive me."
+
+"Mademoiselle," I said, "your apology pains me. I have nothing to
+forgive. I will send Madame Bouïsse to you immediately."
+
+And with this I had almost left the room, but paused upon the threshold.
+
+"Shall you be long away?" I asked, with assumed indifference.
+
+"Shall I be long away?" she repeated, dreamily. "How can I tell?" Then,
+correcting herself, "Oh, not long," she added. "Not long. Perhaps a
+fortnight--perhaps a week."
+
+"Once more, then, good-night."
+
+"Good-night," she answered, absently; and I withdrew.
+
+I then went down, sent Madame Bouïsse to wait upon her, and sat up
+anxiously listening more than half the night. Next morning, at seven, I
+heard Madame Bouïsse go in again. I dared not even go to her door to
+inquire how she had slept, lest I should seem too persistent; but when
+they left the room and went downstairs together, I flew to my window.
+
+I saw her cross the street in the gray morning. She walked feebly, and
+wore a large cloak, that hid the disabled arm and covered her to the
+feet. Madame Bouïsse trotted beside her with a bundle of cloaks and
+umbrellas; a porter followed with her little portmanteau on
+his shoulder.
+
+And so they passed under the archway across the trampled snow, and
+vanished out of sight.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLIV.
+
+A PRESCRIPTION.
+
+A week went by--a fortnight went by--and still Hortense prolonged her
+mysterious absence. Where could she be gone? Was she ill? Had any
+accident befallen her on the road? What if the wounded hand had failed
+to heal? What if inflammation had set in, and she were lying, even now,
+sick and helpless, among strangers? These terrors came back upon me at
+every moment, and drove me almost to despair. In vain I interrogated
+Madame Bouïsse. The good-natured _concierge_ knew no more than myself,
+and the little she had to tell only increased my uneasiness.
+
+Hortense, it appeared, had taken two such journeys before, and had, on
+both occasions, started apparently at a moment's notice, and with every
+indication of anxiety and haste. From the first she returned after an
+interval of more than three weeks; from the second after about four or
+five days. Each absence had been followed by a long season of
+despondency and lassitude, during which, said the _concierge_,
+Mademoiselle scarcely spoke, or ate, or slept, but, silent and pale as a
+ghost, sat up later than ever with her books and papers. As for this
+last journey, all she knew about it was that Mam'selle had had her
+passport regulated for foreign parts the afternoon of the day before
+she started.
+
+"But can you not remember in what direction the diligence was going?" I
+asked, again and again.
+
+"No, M'sieur--not in the least,"
+
+"Nor the name of the town to which her place was taken?"
+
+"I don't know that I ever heard it, M'sieur."
+
+"But at least you must have seen the address on the portmanteau?"
+
+"Not I, M'sieur--I never thought of looking at it."
+
+"Did she say nothing to account for the suddenness of her departure?"
+
+"Nothing at all."
+
+"Nor about her return either. Madame Bouïsse? Just think a
+moment--surely she said something about when you might expect her
+back again?"
+
+"Nothing, M'sieur, except, by the way--"
+
+"Except what?"
+
+"_Dame_! only this--as she was just going to step into the diligence,
+she turned back and shook hands with me--Mam'selle Hortense, proud as
+she is, is never above shaking hands with me, I can tell you, M'sieur."
+
+"No, no--I can well believe it. Pray, go on!"
+
+"Well, M'sieur," she shakes hands with me, and she says, "Thank you,
+good Madame Bouïsse, for all your kindness to me.... Hear that, M'sieur,
+'good Madame Bouïsse,'--the dear child!"
+
+"And then--?"
+
+"Bah! how impatient you are! Well, then, she says (after thanking me,
+you observe)--'I have paid you my rent, Madame Bouïsse, up to the end of
+the present month, and if, when the time has expired, I have neither
+written nor returned, consider me still as your tenant. If, however, I
+do not come back at all, I will let you know further respecting the care
+of my books and other property."
+
+If she did not come back at all! Oh, Heaven! I had never contemplated
+such a possibility. I left Madame Bouïsse without another word, and
+going up to my own rooms, flung myself upon my bed, as if I were
+stupefied.
+
+All that night, all the next day, those words haunted me. They seemed to
+have burned themselves into my brain in letters of fire. Dreaming, I
+woke up with them upon my lips; reading, they started out upon me from
+the page. "If I never come back at all!"
+
+At last, when the fifth day came round--the fifth day of the third week
+of her absence--I became so languid and desponding that I lost all power
+of application.
+
+Even Dr. Chéron noticed it, and calling me in the afternoon to his
+private room, said:--
+
+"Basil Arbuthnot, you look ill. Are you working too hard?"
+
+"I don't think so, sir."
+
+"Humph! Are you out much at night?"
+
+"Out, sir?"
+
+"Yes--don't echo my words--do you go into society: frequent balls,
+theatres, and so forth?"
+
+"I have not done so, sir, for several months past."
+
+"What is it, then? Do you read late?"
+
+"Really, sir, I hardly know--up to about one or two o'clock; on the
+average, I believe."
+
+"Let me feel your pulse."
+
+I put out my wrist, and he held it for some seconds, looking keenly at
+me all the time.
+
+"Got anything on your mind?" he asked, after he had dropped it again.
+"Want money, eh?"
+
+"No, sir, thank you."
+
+"Home-sick?"
+
+"Not in the least."
+
+"Hah! want amusement. Can't work perpetually--not reasonable to suppose
+it. There, _mon garçon_," (taking a folded paper from his pocket-book)
+"there's a prescription for you. Make the most of it."
+
+It was a stall-ticket for the opera. Too restless and unhappy to reject
+any chance of relief, however temporary, I accepted it, and went.
+
+I had not been to a theatre since that night with Josephine, nor to the
+Italian Opera since I used to go with Madame de Marignan. As I went in
+listlessly and took my place, the lights, the noise, the multitude of
+faces, confused and dazzled me. Presently the curtain rose, and the
+piece began. The opera was _I Capuletti_. I do not remember who the
+singers were, I am not sure that I ever knew. To me they were Romeo and
+Juliet, and I was a dweller in Verona. The story, the music, the
+scenery, took a vivid hold upon my imagination. From the moment the
+curtain rose, I saw only the stage, and, except that I in some sort
+established a dim comparison between Romeo's sorrows and my own
+disquietude of mind, I seemed to lose all recollection of time and
+place, and almost of my own identity.
+
+It seemed quite natural that that ill-fated pair of lovers should go
+through life, love, wed, and die singing. And why not? Are they not airy
+nothings, "born of romance, cradled in poetry, thinking other thoughts,
+and doing other deeds than ours?" As they live in poetry, so may they
+not with perfect fitness speak in song?
+
+I went home in a dream, with the melodies ringing in my ears and the
+story lying heavy at my heart. I passed upstairs in the dark, went over
+to the window, and saw, oh joy! the light--the dear, familiar, welcome,
+blessed light, streaming forth, as of old, from Hortense's
+chamber window!
+
+To thank Heaven that she was safe was my first impulse--to step out on
+the balcony, and watch the light as though it were a part of herself,
+was the second. I had not been there many moments when it was obscured
+by a passing shadow. The window opened and she came out.
+
+"Good-evening," she said, in her calm, clear voice. "I heard you out
+here, and thought you might like to know that, thanks to your treatment
+in the first instance, and such care as I have been able since to give
+it, my hand is once more in working order."
+
+"You are kind to come out and tell me so," I said. "I had no hope of
+seeing you to-night. How long is it since you arrived?"
+
+"About two hours," she replied, carelessly.
+
+"And you have been nearly three weeks away!"
+
+"Have I?" said she, leaning her cheek upon her hand, and looking up
+dreamily into the night. "I did not count the days."
+
+"That proves you passed them happily," I said; not without some secret
+bitterness.
+
+"Happily!" she echoed. "What is happiness?"
+
+"A word that we all translate differently," I replied.
+
+"And your own reading of it?" she said, interrogatively.
+
+I hesitated.
+
+"Do you inquire what is my need, individually?" I asked, "or do you want
+my general definition?"
+
+"The latter."
+
+"I think, then, that the first requirement of happiness is work; the
+second, success."
+
+She sighed.
+
+"I accept your definition," she said, "and hope that you may realize it
+to the full in your own experience. For myself, I have toiled and
+failed--sought, and found not. Judge, then, how I came to leave the days
+uncounted."
+
+The sadness of her attitude, the melancholy import of her words, the
+abstraction of her manner, filled me with a vague uneasiness.
+
+"Failure is often the forerunner of success," I replied, for want,
+perhaps, of something better to say.
+
+She shook her head drearily, and stood looking up at the sky, where,
+every now and then, the moon shone out fitfully between the
+flying clouds.
+
+"It is not the first time," she murmured, "nor will it be the last--and
+yet they say that God is merciful."
+
+She had forgotten my presence. These words were not spoken to me, but in
+answer to her own thoughts. I said nothing, but watched her upturned
+face. It was pale as the wan moon overhead; thinner than before she went
+away; and sadder--oh, how much sadder!
+
+She roused herself presently, and turning to me, said:--"I beg your
+pardon. I am very absent; but I am greatly fatigued. I have been
+travelling incessantly for two days and nights."
+
+"Then I will wish you good-night at once," I said.
+
+"Good-night," she replied; and went back into her room.
+
+The next morning Dr. Chéron smiled one of his cold smiles, and said:--
+
+"You look better to-day, my young friend. I knew how it was with you--no
+worse malady, after all, than _ennui_. I shall take care to repeat the
+medicine from time to time."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLV.
+
+UNDER THE STARS.
+
+Hoping, yet scarcely expecting to see her, I went out upon my balcony
+the next night at the same hour; but the light of her lamp was bright
+within, no shadow obscured it, and no window opened. So, after waiting
+for more than an hour, I gave her up, and returned to my work. I did
+this for six nights in succession. On the seventh she came.
+
+"You are fond of your balcony, fellow-student," said she. "I often hear
+you out here."
+
+"My room gets heated," I replied, "and my eyes weary, after several
+hours of hard reading; and this keen, clear air puts new life into
+one's brains."
+
+"Yes, it is delicious," said she, looking up into the night. "How dark
+the space of heaven is, and, how bright are the stars! What a night for
+the Alps! What a night to be upon some Alpine height, watching the moon
+through a good telescope, and waiting for the sunrise!"
+
+"Defer that wish for a few months," I replied smiling. "You would
+scarcely like Switzerland in her winter robes."
+
+"Nay, I prefer Switzerland in winter," she said. "I passed through part
+of the Jura about ten days ago, and saw nothing but snow. It was
+magnificent--like a paradise of pure marble awaiting the souls of all
+the sculptors of all the ages."
+
+"A fantastic idea," said I, "and spoken like an artist."
+
+"Like an artist!" she repeated, musingly. "Well, are not all students
+artists?"
+
+"Not those who study the exact sciences--not the student of law or
+divinity--nor he who, like myself, is a student of medicine. He is the
+slave of Fact, and Art is the Eden of his banishment. His imagination is
+for ever captive. His horizon is for ever bounded. He is fettered by
+routine, and paralyzed by tradition. His very ideas must put on the
+livery of his predecessors; for in a profession where originality of
+thought stands for the blackest shade of original sin, skill--mere
+skill--must be the end of his ambition."
+
+She looked at me, and the moonlight showed me that sad smile which her
+lips so often wore.
+
+"You do not love your profession," she said.
+
+"I do not, indeed."
+
+"And yet you labor zealously to acquire it--how is that?"
+
+"How is it with hundreds of others? My profession was chosen for me. I
+am not my own master."
+
+"But are you sure you would be happier in some other pursuit? Supposing,
+for instance, that you were free to begin again, what career do you
+think you would prefer?"
+
+"I scarcely know, and I should scarcely care, so long as there was
+freedom of thought and speculation in it."
+
+"Geology, perhaps--or astronomy," she suggested, laughingly.
+
+"Merci! The bowels of the earth are too profound, and the heavens too
+lofty for me. I should choose some pursuit that would set the Ariel of
+the imagination free. That is to say, I could be very happy if my life
+were devoted to Science, but my soul echoes to the name of Art."
+
+"'The artist creates--the man of science discovers," said Hortense.
+"Beware lest you fancy you would prefer the work of creation only
+because you lack patience to pursue the work of discovery. Pardon me, if
+I suggest that you may, perhaps, be fitted for neither. Your sphere, I
+fancy, is reflection--comparison--criticism. You are not made for
+action, or work. Your taste is higher than your ambition, and you love
+learning better than fame. Am I right?"
+
+"So right that I regret I can be read so easily."
+
+"And therefore, it may be that you would find yourself no happier with
+Art than with Science. You might even fall into deeper discouragement;
+for in Science every onward step is at least certain gain, but in Art
+every step is groping, and success is only another form of effort. Art,
+in so far as it is more divine, is more unattainable, more evanescent,
+more unsubstantial. It needs as much patience as Science, and the
+passionate devotion of an entire life is as nothing in comparison with
+the magnitude of the work. Self-sacrifice, self-distrust, infinite
+patience, infinite disappointment--such is the lot of the artist, such
+the law of aspiration."
+
+"A melancholy creed."
+
+"But a true one. The divine is doomed to suffering, and under the hays
+of the poet lurk ever the thorns of the self-immolator."
+
+"But, amid all this record of his pains, do you render no account of his
+pleasures?" I asked. "You forget that he has moments of enjoyment lofty
+as his aims, and deep as his devotion.
+
+"I do not forget it," she said. "I know it but too well. Alas! is not
+the catalogue of his pleasures the more melancholy record of the two?
+Hopes which sharpen disappointment; visions which cheat while they
+enrapture; dreams that embitter his waking hours--fellow-student, do you
+envy him these?"
+
+"I do; believing that he would not forego them for a life of
+common-place annoyances and placid pleasures."
+
+"Forego them! Never. Who that had once been the guest of the gods would
+forego the Divine for the Human? No--it is better to suffer than to
+stagnate. The artist and poet is overpaid in his brief snatches of joy.
+While they last, his soul sings 'at heaven's gate,' and his forehead
+strikes the stars."
+
+She spoke with a rare and passionate enthusiasm; sometimes pacing to and
+fro; sometimes pausing with upturned face--
+
+"A dauntless muse who eyes a dreadful fate!"
+
+There was a long, long silence--she looking at the stars, I upon her
+face.
+
+By-and-by she came over to where I stood, and leaned upon the railing
+that divided our separate territories.
+
+"Friend," said she, gravely, "be content. Art is the Sphinx, and to
+question her is destruction. Enjoy books, pictures, music,
+statues--rifle the world of beauty to satiety, if satiety be
+possible--but there pause Drink the wine; seek not to crush the grape.
+Be happy, be useful, labor honestly upon the task that is thine, and be
+assured that the work will itself achieve its reward. Is it nothing to
+relieve pain--to prolong the days of the sickly--to restore health to
+the suffering--to soothe the last pangs of the dying? Is it nothing to
+be followed by the prayers and blessing of those whom you have restored
+to love, to fame, to the world's service? To my thinking, the
+physician's trade hath something god-like in it. Be content. Harvey's
+discovery was as sublime as Newton's, and it were hard to say which did
+God's work best--Shakespeare or Jenner."
+
+"And you," I said, the passion that I could not conceal trembling in my
+voice; "and you--what are you, poet, or painter, or musician, that you
+know and reason of all these things?"
+
+She laughed with a sudden change of mood, and shook her head.
+
+"I am a woman," said she. "Simply a woman--no more. One of the inferior
+sex; and, as I told you long ago, only half civilized."
+
+"You are unlike every other woman!"
+
+"Possibly, because I am more useless. Strange as it may seem, do you
+know I love art better than sewing, or gossip, or dress; and hold my
+liberty to be a dower more precious than either beauty or riches? And
+yet--I am a woman!"
+
+"The wisest, virtuousest, discreetest, best!"
+
+"By no means. You are comparing me with Eve; but I am not in the least
+like Eve, I assure you. She was an excellent housewife, and, if we may
+believe Milton, knew how to prepare 'dulcet creams,' and all sorts of
+Paradisaical dainties for her husband's dinner. I, on the contrary,
+could not make a cream if Adam's life depended on it."
+
+"_Eh bien!_ of the theology of creams I know nothing. I only know that
+Eve was the first and fairest of her sex, and that you are as wise as
+you are beautiful."
+
+"Nay, that is what Titania said to the ass," laughed Hortense. "Your
+compliments become equivocal, fellow-student. But hush! what hour
+is that?"
+
+She stood with uplifted finger. The air was keen, and over the silence
+of the house-tops chimed the church-clocks--Two.
+
+"It is late, and cold," said she, drawing her cloak more closely round
+her.
+
+"Not later than you usually sit up," I replied. "Don't go yet. 'Tis now
+the very witching hour of night, when churchyards yawn--"
+
+"I beg your pardon," she interrupted. "The churchyards have done yawning
+by this time, and, like other respectable citizens, are sound asleep.
+Let us follow their example. Good-night."
+
+"Good-night," I replied, reluctantly; but almost before I had said it,
+she was gone.
+
+After this, as the winter wore away, and spring drew on, Hortense's
+balcony became once more a garden, and she used to attend to her flowers
+every evening. She always found me on my balcony when she came out, and
+soon our open-air meetings became such an established fact that, instead
+of parting with "good-night," we said "_au revoir_--till to-morrow." At
+these times we talked of many things; sometimes of subjects abstract and
+mystical--of futurity, of death, of the spiritual life--but oftenest of
+Art in its manifold developments. And sometimes our speculations
+wandered on into the late hours of the night.
+
+And yet, for all our talking and all our community of tastes, we became
+not one jot more intimate. I still loved in silence--she still lived in
+a world apart.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLVI.
+
+THERMOPYLÆ.
+
+     How dreary 'tis for women to sit still
+     On winter nights by solitary fires,
+     And hear the nations praising them far off.
+
+     AURORA LEIGH.
+
+Abolished by the National Convention of 1793, re-established in 1795,
+reformed by the first Napoleon in 1803, and remodelled in 1816 on the
+restoration of the Bourbons, the Académie Française, despite its changes
+of fortune, name, and government, is a liberal and splendid institution.
+It consists of forty members, whose office it is to compile the great
+dictionary, and to enrich, purify, and preserve the language. It assists
+authors in distress. It awards prizes for poetry, eloquence, and virtue;
+and it bestows those honors with a noble impartiality that observes no
+distinction of sex, rank, or party. To fill one of the forty fauteuils
+of the Académie Française is the darling ambition of every eminent
+Frenchman of letters. There the poet, the philosopher, the historian,
+the man of science, sit side by side, and meet on equal ground. When a
+seat falls vacant, when a prize is to be awarded, when an anniversary is
+to be celebrated, the interest and excitement become intense. To the
+political, the fashionable, or the commercial world, these events are
+perhaps of little moment. They affect neither the Bourse nor the Budget.
+They exercise no perceptible influence on the Longchamps toilettes. But
+to the striving author, to the rising orator, to all earnest workers in
+the broad fields of literature, they are serious and significant
+circumstances.
+
+Living out of society as I now did, I knew little and cared less for
+these academic crises. The success of one candidate was as unimportant
+to me as the failure of another; and I had more than once read the
+crowned poem of the prize essay without even glancing at the name or the
+fortunate author.
+
+Now it happened that, pacing to and fro under the budding acacias of the
+Palais Royal garden one sunny spring-like morning, some three or four
+weeks after the conversation last recorded, I was pursued by a
+persecuting newsvender with a hungry eye, mittened fingers, and a shrill
+voice, who persisted in reiterating close against my ear:--
+
+"News of the day, M'sieur!--news of the day. Frightful murder in the Rue
+du Faubourg St. Antoine--state of the Bourse--latest despatches from the
+seat of war--prize poem crowned by the Académie Française--news of the
+day, M'sieur! Only forty centimes! News of the day!"
+
+I refused, however, to be interested in any of those topics, turned a
+deaf ear to his allurements, and peremptorily dismissed him. I then
+continued my walk in solitary silence.
+
+At the further extremity of the square, near the _Galerie Vitrée_ and
+close beside the little newspaper kiosk, stood a large tree since cut
+down, which at that time served as an advertising medium, and was daily
+decorated with a written placard, descriptive of the contents of the
+_Moniteur_, the _Presse_, and other leading papers. This placard was
+generally surrounded by a crowd of readers, and to-day the crowd of
+readers was more than usually dense.
+
+I seldom cared in these days for what was going on in the busy outside
+world; but this morning, my attention having been drawn to the subject,
+I amused myself, as I paced to and fro, by watching the eager faces of
+the little throng of idlers. Presently I fell in with the rest, and
+found myself conning the placard on the tree.
+
+The name that met my astonished eyes on that placard was the name of
+Hortense Dufresnoy.
+
+The sentence ran thus:--
+
+"Grand Biennial Prize for Poetry--Subject: _The Pass of
+Thermopylæ_,--Successful Candidate, _Mademoiselle Hortense Dufresnoy_."
+
+Breathless, I read the passage twice; then, hearing at a little distance
+the shrill voice of the importunate newsvender, I plunged after him and
+stopped him, just as he came to the--
+
+"Frightful murder in the Rue du Faubourg Saint ..."
+
+"Here," said I, tapping him on the shoulder; "give me one of your
+papers."
+
+The man's eyes glittered.
+
+"Only forty centimes, M'sieur," said he. "'Tis the first I've sold
+to-day."
+
+He looked poor and wretched. I dropped into his hand a coin that would
+have purchased all his little sheaf of journals, and hurried away, not
+to take the change or hear his thanks. He was silent for some moments;
+then took up his cry at the point where he had broken off, and started
+away with:--
+
+--"Antoine!--state of the Bourse--latest despatches from the seat of
+war--news of the day--only forty centimes!"
+
+I took my paper to a quiet bench near the fountain, and read the whole
+account. There had been eighteen anonymous poems submitted to the
+Academy. Three out of the eighteen had come under discussion; one out of
+the three had been warmly advocated by Béranger, one by Lebrun, and the
+third by some other academician. The poem selected by Beranger was at
+length chosen; the sealed enclosure opened; and the name of the
+successful competitor found to be Hortense Dufresnoy. To Hortense
+Dufresnoy, therefore, the prize and crown were awarded.
+
+I read the article through, and then went home, hoping to be the first
+to congratulate her. Timidly, and with a fast-beating heart, I rang the
+bell at her outer door; for we all had our bells at Madame Bouïsse's,
+and lived in our rooms as if they were little private houses.
+
+She opened the door, and, seeing me, looked surprised; for I had never
+before ventured to pay her a visit in her apartment.
+
+"I have come to wish you joy," said I, not venturing to cross the
+threshold.
+
+"To wish me joy?"
+
+"You have not seen a morning paper?"
+
+"A morning paper!"
+
+And, echoing me thus, her color changed, and a strange vague look--it
+might be of hope, it might be of fear--came into her face.
+
+"There is something in the _Moniteur_" I went on, smiling, 'that
+concerns you nearly."
+
+"That concerns me?" she exclaimed. "_Me_? For Heaven's sake, speak
+plainly. I do not understand you. Has--has anything been discovered?"
+
+"Yes--it has been discovered at the Académie Française that Mademoiselle
+Hortense Dufresnoy has written the best poem on Thermopylæ."
+
+She drew a deep breath, pressed her hands tightly together, and
+murmured:--
+
+"Alas! is that all?"
+
+"All! Nay--is it not enough to step at once into fame--to have been
+advocated by Béranger--to have the poem crowned in the Theatre of the
+Académie Française?"
+
+She stood silent, with drooping head and listless hands, all
+disappointment and despondency. Presently she looked up.
+
+"Where did you learn this?" she asked.
+
+I handed her the journal.
+
+"Come in, fellow-student," said she, and held the door wide for me to
+enter.
+
+For the second time I found myself in her little _salon_, and found
+everything in the self-same order.
+
+"Well," I said, "are you not happy?"
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"Success is not happiness," she replied, smiling mournfully. "That
+Béranger should have advocated my poem is an honor beyond price;
+but--but I need more than this to make me happy."
+
+And her eyes wandered, with a strange, yearning look, to the sword over
+the chimney-piece.
+
+Seeing that look, my heart sank, and the tears sprang unbidden to my
+eyes. Whose was the sword? For whose sake was her life so lonely and
+secluded? For whom was she waiting? Surely here, if one could but read
+it aright, lay the secret of her strange and sudden journeys--here I
+touched unawares upon the mystery of her life!
+
+I did not speak. I shaded my face with my hand, and sat looking on the
+ground. Then, the silence remaining unbroken, I rose, and examined the
+drawings on the walls.
+
+They were water-colors for the most part, and treated in a masterly but
+quite peculiar style. The skies were sombre, the foregrounds singularly
+elaborate, the color stern and forcible. Angry sunsets barred by lines
+of purple cirrus stratus; sweeps of desolate heath bounded by jagged
+peaks; steep mountain passes crimson with faded ferns and half-obscured
+by rain-clouds; strange studies of weeds, and rivers, and lonely reaches
+of desolate sea-shore ... these were some of the subjects, and all were
+evidently by the same hand.
+
+"Ah," said Hortense, "you are criticizing my sketches!"
+
+"Your sketches!" I exclaimed. "Are these your work?"
+
+"Certainly," she replied, smiling. "Why not? What do you think of them?"
+
+"What do I think of them! Well, I think that if you had not been a poet
+you ought to have been a painter. How fortunate you are in being able to
+express yourself so variously! Are these compositions, or studies
+from Nature?"
+
+"All studies from Nature--mere records of fact. I do not presume to
+create--I am content humbly and from a distance to copy the changing
+moods of Nature."
+
+"Pray be your own catalogue, then, and tell me where these places are."
+
+"Willingly. This coast-line with the run of breaking surf was taken on
+the shores of Normandy, some few miles from Dieppe. This sunset is a
+recollection of a glorious evening near Frankfort, and those purple
+mountains in the distance are part of the Taunus range. Here is an old
+mediæval gateway at Solothurn, in Switzerland. This wild heath near the
+sea is in the neighborhood of Biscay. This quaint knot of ruinous houses
+in a weed-grown Court was sketched at Bruges. Do you see that milk-girl
+with her scarlet petticoat and Flemish _faille?_ She supplied us with
+milk, and her dairy was up that dark archway. She stood for me several
+times, when I wanted a foreground figure."
+
+"You have travelled a great deal," I said. "Were you long in Belgium?"
+
+"Yes; I lived there for some years. I was first pupil, then teacher, in
+a large school in Brussels. I was afterwards governess in a private
+family in Bruges. Of late, however, I have preferred to live in Paris,
+and give morning lessons. I have more liberty thus, and more leisure."
+
+"And these two little quaint bronze figures?"
+
+"Hans Sachs and Peter Vischer. I brought them from Nuremberg. Hans
+Sachs, you see, wears a furred robe, and presses a book to his breast.
+He does not look in the least like a cobbler. Peter Vischer, on the
+contrary, wears his leather apron and carries his mallet in his hand.
+Artist and iron-smith, he glories in his trade, and looks as sturdy a
+little burgher as one would wish to see."
+
+"And this statuette in green marble?"
+
+"A copy of the celebrated 'Pensiero' of Michel Angelo--in other words,
+the famous sitting statue of Lorenzo de Medici, in the Medicean chapel
+in Florence. I had it executed for me on the spot by Bazzanti."
+
+"A noble figure!"
+
+"Indeed it is--a noble figure, instinct with life, and strength, and
+meditation. My first thought on seeing the original was that I would not
+for worlds be condemned to pass a night alone with it. I should every
+moment expect the musing hand to drop away from the stern mouth, and the
+eyes to turn upon me!"
+
+"These," said I, pausing at the chimney-piece, "are _souvenirs_ of
+Switzerland. How delicately those chamois are carved out of the hard
+wood! They almost seem to snuff the mountain air! But here is a rapier
+with a hilt of ornamented steel--where did this come from?"
+
+I had purposely led up the conversation to this point. I had patiently
+questioned and examined for the sake of this one inquiry, and I waited
+her reply as if my life hung on it.
+
+Her whole countenance changed. She took it down, and her eyes filled
+with tears.
+
+"It was my father's," she said, tenderly.
+
+"Your father's!" I exclaimed, joyfully. "Heaven be thanked! Did you say
+your father's?"
+
+She looked up surprised, then smiled, and faintly blushed.
+
+"I did," she replied.
+
+"And was your father a soldier?" I asked; for the sword looked more like
+a sword of ceremony than a sword for service.
+
+But to this question she gave no direct reply.
+
+"It was his sword," she said, "and he had the best of all rights to wear
+it."
+
+With this she kissed the weapon reverently, and restored it to its
+place.
+
+I kissed her hand quite as reverently that day at parting, and she did
+not withdraw it.
+
+CHAPTER XLVII.
+
+ALL ABOUT ART.
+
+
+     Art's a service.
+
+     AURORA LEIGH.
+
+"God sent art, and the devil sent critics," said Müller, dismally
+paraphrasing a popular proverb. "My picture is rejected!"
+
+"Rejected!" I echoed, surprised to find him sitting on the floor, like a
+tailor, in front of an acre of canvas. "By whom?"
+
+"By the Hanging Committee."
+
+"Hang the Hanging Committee!"
+
+"A pious prayer, my friend. Would that it could be carried into
+execution!"
+
+"What cause do they assign?"
+
+"Cause! Do you suppose they trouble themselves to find one? Not a bit of
+it. They simply scrawl a great R in chalk on the back of it, and send
+you a printed notice to carry it home again. What is it to them, if a
+poor devil has been painting his very heart and hopes out, day after
+day, for a whole year, upon that piece of canvas? Nothing, and less than
+nothing--confound them!"
+
+I drew a chair before the picture, and set myself to a patient study of
+the details. He had chosen a difficult subject--the death of Louis XI.
+The scene represented a spacious chamber in the Castle of
+Plessisles-Tours. To the left, in a great oak chair beside the bed from
+which he had just risen, sat the dying king, with a rich, furred mantle
+loosely thrown around him. At his feet, his face buried in his hands,
+kneeled the Dauphin. Behind his chair, holding up the crucifix to enjoin
+silence, stood the king's confessor. A physician, a couple of
+councillors in scarlet robes, and a captain of archers, stood somewhat
+back, whispering together and watching the countenance of the dying man;
+while through the outer door was seen a crowd of courtiers and pages,
+waiting to congratulate King Charles VIII. It was an ambitious subject,
+and Müller had conceived it in a grand spirit. The heads were
+expressive; and the textures of the velvets, tapestries, oak carvings,
+and so forth, had been executed with more than ordinary finish and
+fidelity. For all this, however, there was more of promise than of
+achievement in the work. The lights were scattered; the attitudes were
+stiff; there was too evident an attempt at effect. One could see that it
+was the work of a young painter, who had yet much to learn, and
+something of the Academy to forget.
+
+"Well," said Müller, still sitting ruefully on the floor, "what do you
+think of it? Am I rightly served? Shall I send for a big pail of
+whitewash, and blot it all out?"
+
+"Not for the world!"
+
+"What shall I do, then?"
+
+"Do better."
+
+"But, if I have done my best already?"
+
+"Still do better; and when you have done that, do better again. So
+genius toils higher and ever higher, and like the climber of the
+glacier, plants his foot where only his hand clung the moment before."
+
+"Humph! but what of my picture?"
+
+"Well," I said, hesitatingly, "I am no critic--"
+
+"Thank Heaven!" muttered Müller, parenthetically.
+
+"But there is something noble in the disposition of the figures. I
+should say, however, that you had set to work upon too large a scale."
+
+"A question of focus," said the painter, hastily. "A mere question of
+focus."
+
+"How can that be, when you have finished some parts laboriously, and in
+others seem scarcely to have troubled yourself to cover the canvas?"
+
+"I don't know. I'm impatient, you see, and--and I think I got tired of
+it towards the last."
+
+"Would that have been the case if you had allowed yourself but half the
+space?"
+
+"I'll take to enamel," exclaimed Müller, with a grin of hyperbolical
+despair. "I'll immortalize myself in miniature. I'll paint henceforward
+with the aid of a microscope, and never again look at nature unless
+through the wrong end of a telescope!"
+
+"Pshaw!--be in earnest, man, and talk sensibly! Do you conceive that for
+every failure you are to change your style? Give yourself, heart and
+soul, to the school in which you have begun, and make up your mind
+to succeed."
+
+"Do you believe, then, that a man may succeed by force of will alone?"
+said Müller, musingly.
+
+"Yes, because force of will proceeds from force of character, and the
+two together, warp and woof, make the stuff out of which Nature clothes
+her heroes."
+
+"Oh, but I am not talking of heroes," said Müller.
+
+"By heroes, I do not mean only soldiers. Captain Pen is as good a hero
+as Captain Sword, any day; and Captain Brush, to my thinking, is as fine
+a fellow as either."
+
+"Ay; but do they come, as you would seem to imply, of the same stock?"
+said Müller. "Force of will and force of character are famous clays in
+which to mould a Wellington or a Columbus; but is not something more--at
+all events, something different--necessary to the modelling of a
+Raffaelle?"
+
+"I don't fancy so. Power is the first requisite of genius. Give power in
+equal quantity to your Columbus and your Raffaelle, and circumstance
+shall decide which will achieve the New World, and which the
+Transfiguration."
+
+"Circumstance!" cried the painter, impatiently. "Good heavens! do you
+make no account of the spontaneous tendencies of genius? Is Nature a
+mere vulgar cook, turning out men, like soups, from one common stock,
+with only a dash of flavoring here and there to give them variety?
+No--Nature is a subtle chemist, and her workshop, depend on it, is
+stored with delicate elixirs, volatile spirits, and precious fires of
+genius. Certain of these are kneaded with the clay of the poet, others
+with the clay of the painter, the astronomer, the mathematician, the
+legislator, the soldier. Raffaelle had in him some of 'the stuff that
+dreams are made of.' Never tell me that that same stuff, differently
+treated, would equally well have furnished forth an Archimedes or a
+Napoleon!"
+
+"Men are what their age calls upon them to be," I replied, after a
+moment's consideration. "Be that demand what it may, the supply is ever
+equal to it. Centre of the most pompous and fascinating of religions,
+Rome demanded Madonnas and Transfigurations, and straightway Raffaelle
+answered to the call. The Old World, overstocked with men, gold, and
+aristocracies, asked wider fields of enterprise, and Columbus added
+America to the map. What is this but circumstance? Had Italy needed
+colonies, would not her men of genius have turned sailors and
+discoverers? Had Madrid been the residence of the Popes, might not
+Columbus have painted altar-pieces or designed churches?"
+
+Müller, still sitting on the floor, shook his head despondingly.
+
+"I don't think it," he replied; "and I don't wish to think it. It is too
+material a view of genius to satisfy my imagination. I love to believe
+that gifts are special. I love to believe that the poet is born a poet,
+and the artist an artist."
+
+"Hold! I believe that the poet is born a poet, and the artist an artist;
+but I also believe the poetry of the one and the art of the other to be
+only diverse manifestations of a power that is universal in its
+application. The artist whose lot in life it is to be a builder is none
+the less an artist. The poet, though engineer or soldier, is none the
+less a poet. There is the poetry of language, and there is also the
+poetry of action. So also there is the art which expresses itself by
+means of marble or canvas, and the art which designs a capitol, tapers a
+spire, or plants a pleasure-ground. Nay, is not this very interfusion of
+gifts, this universality of uses, in itself the bond of beauty which
+girdles the world like a cestus? If poetry were only rhyme, and art only
+painting, to what an outer darkness of matter-of-fact should we be
+condemning nine-tenths of the creation!"
+
+Müller yawned, as if he would have swallowed me and my argument
+together.
+
+"You are getting transcendental," said he. "I dare say your theories are
+all very fine and all very true; but I confess that I don't understand
+them. I never could find out all this poetry of bricks and mortar,
+railroads and cotton-factories, that people talk about so fluently
+now-a-days. We Germans take the dreamy side of life, and are seldom at
+home in the practical, be it ever so highly colored and highly flavored.
+In our parlance, an artist is an artist, and neither a bagman nor an
+engine-driver."
+
+His professional pride was touched, and he said this with somewhat less
+than his usual _bonhomie_--almost with a shade of irritability.
+
+"Come," said I, smiling, "we will not discuss a topic which we can never
+see from the same point of view. Doing art is better than talking art;
+and your business now is to find a fresh subject and prepare another
+canvas. Meanwhile cheer up, and forget all about Louis XI. and the
+Hanging Committee. What say you to dining with me at the Trois Frères?
+It will do you good."
+
+"Good!" cried he, springing to his feet and shaking his fist at the
+picture. "More good, by Jupiter, than all the paint and megilp that ever
+was wasted! Not all the fine arts of Europe are worth a _poulet à la
+Marengo_ and a bottle of old _Romanée_!"
+
+So saying, he turned his picture to the wall, seized his cap, locked his
+door, scrawled outside with a piece of chalk,--"_Summoned to the
+Tuileries on state affairs_," and followed me, whistling, down the six
+flights of gloomy, ricketty, Quartier-Latin lodging-house stairs up
+which he lived and had his being.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLVIII.
+
+I MAKE MYSELF ACQUAINTED WITH THE IMPOLITE WORLD AND ITS PLACES OP
+UNFASHIONABLE RESORT.
+
+Müller and I dined merrily at the Café of the Trois Frères Provençaux,
+discussed our coffee and cigars outside the Rotonde in the Palais Royal,
+and then started off in search of adventures. Striking up in a
+north-easterly direction through a labyrinth of narrow streets, we
+emerged at the Rue des Fontaines, just in front of that famous
+second-hand market yclept the Temple. It was Saturday night, and the
+business of the place was at its height. We went in, and turning aside
+from the broad thoroughfares which intersect the market at right angles,
+plunged at once into a net-work of crowded side-alleys, noisy and
+populous as a cluster of beehives. Here were bargainings, hagglings,
+quarrellings, elbowings, slang, low wit, laughter, abuse, cheating, and
+chattering enough to turn the head of a neophyte like myself. Müller,
+however, was in his element. He took me up one row and down another,
+pointed out all that was curious, had a nod for every grisette, and an
+answer for every touter, and enjoyed the Babel like one to the
+manner born.
+
+"Buy, messieurs, buy! What will you buy?" was the question that
+assailed us on both sides, wherever we went.
+
+"What do you sell, _mon ami ?_" was Müller's invariable reply.
+
+"What do you want, m'sieur?"
+
+"Twenty thousand francs per annum, and the prettiest wife in Paris,"
+says my friend; a reply which is sure to evoke something _spirituel_,
+after the manner of the locality.
+
+"This is the most amusing place in Paris," observes he. "Like the
+Alsatia of old London, it has its own peculiar _argot,_ and its own
+peculiar privileges. The activity of its commerce is amazing. If you buy
+a pocket-handkerchief at the first stall you come to, and leave it
+unprotected in your coat-pocket for five minutes, you may purchase it
+again at the other end of the alley before you leave. As for the
+resources of the market, they are inexhaustible. You may buy anything
+you please here, from a Court suit to a cargo of old rags. In this alley
+(which is the aristocratic quarter), are sold old jewelry, old china,
+old furniture, silks that have rustled at the Tuileries; fans that may
+have fluttered at the opera; gloves once fitted to tiny hands, and yet
+bearing a light soil where the rings were worn beneath; laces that may
+have been the property of Countesses or Cardinals; masquerade suits,
+epaulets, uniforms, furs, perfumes, artificial flowers, and all sorts of
+elegant superfluities, most of which have descended to the merchants of
+the Temple through the hands of ladies-maids and valets. Yonder lies the
+district called the 'Forêt Noire'--a land of unpleasing atmosphere
+inhabited by cobblers and clothes-menders. Down to the left you see
+nothing but rag and bottle-shops, old iron stores, and lumber of every
+kind. Here you find chiefly household articles, bedding, upholstery,
+crockery, and so forth."
+
+"What will you buy, Messieurs?" continued to be the cry, as we moved
+along arm-in-arm, elbowing our way through the crowd, and exploring this
+singular scene in all directions.
+
+"What will you buy, messieurs?" shouts one salesman. "A carpet? A
+capital carpet, neither too large nor too small. Just the size
+you want!"
+
+"A hat, m'sieur, better than new," cries another; "just aired by the
+last owner."
+
+"A coat that will fit you better than if it had been made for you?"
+
+"A pair of boots? Dress-boots, dancing-boots, walking-boots,
+morning-boots, evening-boots, riding-boots, fishing-boots,
+hunting-boots. All sorts, m'sieur--all sorts!"
+
+"A cloak, m'sieur?"
+
+"A lace shawl to take home to Madame?"
+
+"An umbrella, m'sieur?"
+
+"A reading lamp?"
+
+"A warming-pan?"
+
+"A pair of gloves?"
+
+"A shower bath?"
+
+"A hand organ?"
+
+"What! m'sieurs, do you buy nothing this evening? Holà, Antoine!
+monsieur keeps his hands in his pockets, for fear his money should
+fall out!"
+
+"Bah! They've not a centime between them!"
+
+"Go down the next turning and have the hole in your coat mended!"
+
+"Make way there for monsieur the millionaire!"
+
+"They are ambassadors on their way to the Court of Persia."
+
+"_Ohe! Panè! panè! panè!_"
+
+Thus we run the gauntlet of all the tongues in the Temple, sometimes
+retorting, sometimes laughing and passing on, sometimes stopping to
+watch the issue of a dispute or the clinching of a bargain.
+
+"_Dame_, now! if it were only ten francs cheaper," says a voice that
+strikes my ear with a sudden sense of familiarity. Turning, I discover
+that the voice belongs to a young woman close at my elbow, and that the
+remark is addressed to a good-looking workman upon whose arm she
+is leaning.
+
+"What, Josephine!" I exclaim.
+
+"_Comment_! Monsieur Basil!"
+
+And I find myself kissed on both cheeks before I even guess what is
+going to happen to me.
+
+"Have I not also the honor of being remembered by Mademoiselle?" says
+Müller, taking off his hat with all the politeness possible; whereupon
+Josephine, in an ecstasy of recognition, embraces him likewise.
+
+"_Mais, quel bonheur_!" cries she. "And to meet in the Temple, above all
+places! Emile, you heard me speak of Monsieur Basil--the gentleman who
+gave me that lovely shawl that I wore last Sunday to the Château des
+Fleurs--_eh bien_! this is he--and here is Monsieur Müller, his friend.
+Gentlemen, this is Emile, my _fiancé_. We are to be married next Friday
+week, and we are buying our furniture."
+
+The good-looking workman pulled off his cap and made his bow, and we
+proffered the customary congratulations.
+
+"We have bought such sweet, pretty things," continued she, rattling on
+with all her old volubility, "and we have hired the dearest little
+_appartement_ on the fourth story, in a street near the Jardin des
+Plantes. See--this looking-glass is ours; we have just bought it. And
+those maple chairs, and that chest of drawers with the marble top. It
+isn't real marble, you know; but it's ever so much better than
+real:--not nearly so heavy, and so beautifully carved that it's quite a
+work of art. Then we have bought a carpet--the sweetest carpet! Is it
+not, Emile?"
+
+Emile smiled, and confessed that the carpet was "_fort bien_."
+
+"And the time-piece, Madame?" suggested the furniture-dealer, at whose
+door we were standing. "Madame should really not refuse herself the
+time-piece."
+
+Josephine shook her head.
+
+"It is too dear," said she.
+
+"Pardon, madame. I am giving it away,--absolutely giving it away at the
+price!"
+
+Josephine looked at it wistfully, and weighed her little purse. It was a
+very little purse, and very light.
+
+"It is so pretty!" said she.
+
+The clock was of ormolu upon a painted stand, that was surmounted by a
+stout little gilt Cupid in a triumphal chariot, drawn by a pair of
+hard-working doves.
+
+"What is the price of it?" I asked.
+
+"Thirty-five francs, m'sieur," replied the dealer, briskly.
+
+"Say twenty-five," urged Josephine.
+
+The dealer shook his head.
+
+"What if we did without the looking-glass?" whispered Josephine to her
+_fiancé_. "After all, you know, one can live without a looking-glass;
+but how shall I have your dinners ready, if I don't know what o'clock
+it is?"
+
+"I don't really see how we are to do without a clock," admitted Emile.
+
+"And that darling little Cupid!"
+
+Emile conceded that the Cupid was irresistible.
+
+"Then we decide to have the clock, and do without the looking-glass?"
+
+"Yes, we decide."
+
+In the meantime I had slipped the thirty-five francs into the dealer's
+hand.
+
+"You must do me the favor to accept the clock as a wedding-present,
+Mademoiselle Josephine," I said. "And I hope you will favor me with an
+invitation to the wedding."
+
+"And me also," said Müller; "and I shall hope to be allowed to offer a
+little sketch to adorn the walls of your new home."
+
+Their delight and gratitude were almost too great. We shook hands again
+all round. I am not sure, indeed, that Josephine did not then and there
+embrace us both for the second time.
+
+"And you will both come to our wedding!" cried she. "And we will spend
+the day at St. Cloud, and have a dance in the evening; and we will
+invite Monsieur Gustave, and Monsieur Jules, and Monsieur Adrien. Oh,
+dear! how delightful it will be!"
+
+"And you promise me the first quadrille?" said I.
+
+"And me the second?" added Müller.
+
+"Yes, yes--as many as you please."
+
+"Then you must let us know at what time to come, and all about it; so,
+till Friday week, adieu!"
+
+And thus, with more shaking of hands, and thanks, and good wishes, we
+parted company, leaving them still occupied with the gilt Cupid and the
+furniture-broker.
+
+After the dense atmosphere of the clothes-market, it is a relief to
+emerge upon the Boulevart du Temple--the noisy, feverish, crowded
+Boulevart du Temple, with its half dozen theatres, its glare of gas, its
+cake-sellers, bill-sellers, lemonade-sellers, cabs, cafés, gendarmes,
+tumblers, grisettes, and pleasure-seekers of both sexes.
+
+Here we pause awhile to applaud the performances of a company of
+dancing-dogs, whence we are presently drawn away by the sight of a
+gentleman in a _moyen-âge_ costume, who is swallowing penknives and
+bringing them out at his ears to the immense gratification of a large
+circle of bystanders.
+
+A little farther on lies the Jardin Turc; and here we drop in for half
+an hour, to restore ourselves with coffee-ices, and look on at the
+dancers. This done, we presently issue forth again, still in search of
+amusement.
+
+"Have you ever been to the Petit Lazary?" asks my friend, as we stand at
+the gate of the Jardin Turc, hesitating which way to turn.
+
+"Never; what is it?"
+
+"The most inexpensive of theatrical luxuries--an evening's entertainment
+of the mildest intellectual calibre, and at the lowest possible cost.
+Here we are at the doors. Come in, and complete your experience of
+Paris life!"
+
+The Petit Lazary occupies the lowest round of the theatrical ladder. We
+pay something like sixpence half-penny or sevenpence apiece, and are
+inducted into the dress-circle. Our appearance is greeted with a round
+of applause. The curtain has just fallen, and the audience have nothing
+better to do. Müller lays his hand upon his heart, and bows profoundly,
+first to the gallery and next to the pit; whereupon they laugh, and
+leave us in peace. Had we looked dignified or indignant we should
+probably have been hissed till the curtain rose.
+
+It is an audience in shirt-sleeves, consisting for the most part of
+workmen, maid-servants, soldiers, and street-urchins, with a plentiful
+sprinkling of pickpockets--the latter in a strictly private capacity,
+being present for entertainment only, without any ulterior
+professional views.
+
+It is a noisy _entr'acte_ enough. Three vaudevilles have already been
+played, and while the fourth is in preparation the public amuses itself
+according to its own riotous will and pleasure. Nuts and apple parings
+fly hither and thither; oranges describe perilous parabolas between the
+pit and the gallery; adventurous _gamins_ make daring excursions round
+the upper rails; dialogues maintained across the house, and quarrels
+supported by means of an incredible copiousness of invective, mingle in
+discordant chorus with all sorts of howlings, groanings, whistlings,
+crowings, and yelpings, above which, in shrillest treble, rise the
+voices of cake and apple-sellers, and the piercing cry of the hump-back
+who distributes "vaudevilles at five centimes apiece." In the meantime,
+almost distracted by the patronage that assails him in every direction,
+the lemonade-vendor strides hither and thither, supplying floods of
+nectar at two centimes the glass; while the audience, skilled in the
+combination of enjoyments, eats, drinks, and vociferates to its heart's
+content. Fabulous meats, and pies of mysterious origin, are brought out
+from baskets and hats. Pocket-handkerchiefs spread upon benches do duty
+as table-cloths. Clasp-knives, galette, and sucre d'orge pass from hand
+to hand--nay, from mouth to mouth--and, in the midst of the tumult, the
+curtain rises.
+
+All is, in one moment, profoundly silent. The viands disappear; the
+lemonade-seller vanishes; the boys outside the gallery-rails clamber
+back to their places. The drama, in the eyes of the Parisians, is almost
+a sacred rite, and not even the noisiest _gamin_ would raise his voice
+above a whisper when the curtain is up.
+
+The vaudeville that follows is, to say the least of it, a perplexing
+performance. It has no plot in particular. The scene is laid in a
+lodging-house, and the discomforts of one Monsieur Choufleur, an elderly
+gentleman in a flowered dressing-gown and a gigantic nightcap, furnish
+forth all the humor of the piece. What Monsieur Choufleur has done to
+deserve his discomforts, and why a certain student named Charles should
+devote all the powers of his mind to the devising and inflicting of
+those discomforts, is a mystery which we, the audience, are never
+permitted to penetrate. Enough that Charles, being a youth of
+mischievous tastes and extensive wardrobe, assumes a series of disguises
+for the express purpose of tormenting Monsieur Choufleur, and is
+unaccountably rewarded in the end with the hand of Monsieur Choufleur's
+daughter; a consummation which brings down the curtain amid loud
+applause, and affords entire satisfaction to everybody.
+
+It is by this time close upon midnight, and, leaving the theatre with
+the rest of the audience, we find a light rain falling. The noisy
+thoroughfare is hushed to comparative quiet. The carriages that roll by
+are homeward bound. The waiters yawn at the doors of the cafés and
+survey pedestrians with a threatening aspect. The theatres are closing
+fast, and a row of flickering gas-lamps in front of a faded transparency
+which proclaims that the juvenile _Tableaux Vivants_ are to be seen
+within, denotes the only place of public amusement yet open to the
+curious along the whole length of the Boulevart du Temple.
+
+"And now, _amigo_, where shall we go?" says Müller. "Are you for a
+billiard-room or a lobster supper? Or shall we beat up the quarters of
+some of the fellows in the Quartier Latin, and see what fun is afoot on
+the other side of the water?"
+
+"Whichever you please. You are my guest to-night, and I am at your
+disposal."
+
+"Or what say you to dropping in for an hour among the Chicards?"
+
+"A capital idea--especially if you again entertain the society with a
+true story of events that never happened."
+
+"_Allons donc_!--
+
+     'C'était de mon temps
+     Que brillait Madame Grégoire.
+     J'allais à vingt ans
+     Dans son cabaret rire et boire.'
+
+--confound this drizzle! It soaks one through and through, like a
+sponge. If you are no fonder of getting wet through than I am, I vote we
+both run for it!"
+
+With this he set off running at full speed, and I followed.
+
+The rain soon fell faster and thicker. We had no umbrellas; and being by
+this time in a region of back-streets, an empty fiacre was a prize not
+to be hoped for. Coming presently to a dark archway, we took shelter and
+waited till the shower should pass over. It lasted longer than we had
+expected, and threatened to settle into a night's steady rain. Müller
+kept his blood warm by practicing extravagant quadrille steps and
+singing scraps of Béranger's ballads; whilst I, watching impatiently for
+a cab, kept peering up and down the street, and listening to
+every sound.
+
+Presently a quick footfall echoed along the wet pavement, and the figure
+of a man, dimly seen by the blurred light of the street-lamps, came
+hurrying along the other side of the way. Something in the firm free
+step, in the upright carriage, in the height and build of the passer-by,
+arrested my attention. He drew nearer. He passed under the lamp just
+opposite, and, as he passed, flung away the end of his cigar, which
+fell, hissing, into the little rain-torrent running down the middle of
+the street. He carried no umbrella; but his hat was pulled low, and his
+collar drawn up, and I could see nothing of his face. But the gesture
+was enough.
+
+For a moment I stood still and looked after him; then, calling to Müller
+that I should be back presently, I darted off in pursuit.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLIX.
+
+THE KING OF DIAMONDS.
+
+The rain beat in my face and almost blinded me, the wind hustled me; the
+gendarme at the corner of the street looked at me suspiciously; and
+still I followed, and still the tall stranger strode on ahead. Up one
+street he led me and down another, across a market-place, through an
+arcade, past the Bourse, and into that labyrinth of small streets that
+lies behind the Italian Opera-house, and is bounded on the East by the
+Rue de Richelieu, and on the West by the Rue Louis le Grand. Here he
+slackened his pace, and I found myself gaming upon him for the first
+time. Presently he came to a dead stop, and as I continued to draw
+nearer, I saw him take out his watch and look at it by the light of a
+street-lamp. This done, he began sauntering slowly backwards and
+forwards, as if waiting for some second person.
+
+For a moment I also paused, hesitating. What should I do?--pass him
+under the lamp, and try to see his face? Go boldly up to him, and invent
+some pretence to address him, or wait in this angle of deep shade, and
+see what would happen next? I was deceived, of course--deceived by a
+merely accidental resemblance. Well, then, I should have had my run for
+my pains, and have taken cold, most likely, into the bargain. At all
+events, I would speak to him.
+
+Seeing me emerge from the darkness, and cross over towards the spot
+where he was standing, he drew aside with the air of a man upon his
+guard, and put his hand quickly into his breast.
+
+"I beg your pardon, Monsieur," I began.
+
+"What! my dear Damon!--is it you?" he interrupted, and held out both
+hands.
+
+I grasped them joyously.
+
+"Dalrymple, is it you?"
+
+"Myself, Damon--_faute de mieux_."
+
+"And I have been running after you for the last two miles! What brings
+you to Paris? Why did you not let me know you were here? How long have
+you been back? Has anything gone wrong? Are you well?"
+
+"One question at a time, my Arcadian, for mercy's sake!" said he. "Which
+am I to answer?"
+
+"The last."
+
+"Oh, I am well--well enough. But let us walk on a little farther while
+we talk."
+
+"Are you waiting for any one?" I asked, seeing him look round uneasily.
+
+"Yes--no--that is, I expect to see some one come past here presently.
+Step into this doorway, and I will tell you all about it."
+
+His manner was restless, and his hand, as it pressed mine, felt hot and
+feverish.
+
+"I am sure you are not well," I said, following him into the gloom of a
+deep, old-fashioned doorway.
+
+"Am I not? Well, I don't know--perhaps I am not. My blood burns in my
+veins to-night like fire. Nay, thou wilt learn nothing from my pulse,
+thou sucking Æsculapius! Mine is a sickness not to be cured by drugs. I
+must let blood for it."
+
+The short, hard laugh with which he said this troubled me still more.
+
+"Speak out," I said--"for Heaven's sake, speak out! You have something
+on your mind--what is it?"
+
+"I have something on my hands," he replied, gloomily. "Work. Work that
+must be done quickly, or there will be no peace for any of us. Look
+here, Damon--if you had a wife, and another man stood before the world
+as her betrothed husband--if you had a wife, and another man spoke of
+her as his--boasted of her--behaved in the house as if it were already
+his own--treated her servants as though he were their master--possessed
+himself of her papers--extorted money from her--brought his friends, on
+one pretext or another, about her house--tormented her, day after day,
+to marry him ... what would you do to such a man as this?"
+
+"Make my own marriage public at once, and set him at defiance," I
+replied.
+
+"Ay, but...."
+
+"But what?"
+
+"That alone will not content me. I must punish him with my own hand."
+
+"He would be punished enough in the loss of the lady and her fortune."
+
+"Not he! He has entangled her affairs sufficiently by this time to
+indemnify himself for her fortune, depend on it. And as for
+herself--pshaw! he does not know what love is!"
+
+"But his pride----"
+
+"But _my_ pride!" interrupted Dalrymple, passionately. "What of my
+pride?--my wounded honor?--my outraged love? No, no, I tell you, it is
+not such a paltry vengeance that will satisfy me! Would to Heaven I had
+trusted only my own arm from the first! Would to Heaven that, instead of
+having anything to say to the cursed brood of the law, I had taken the
+viper by the throat, and brought him to my own terms, after my
+own fashion!"
+
+"But you have not yet told me what you are doing here?"
+
+"I am waiting to see Monsieur de Simoncourt."
+
+"Monsieur de Simoncourt!"
+
+"Yes. That white house at the corner is one of his haunts,--a private
+gaming-house, never open till after midnight. I want to meet him
+accidentally, as he is going in."
+
+"What for?"
+
+"That he may take me with him. You can't get into one of these places
+without an introduction, you know. Those who keep them are too much
+afraid of the police."
+
+"But do you play?"
+
+"Come with me, and see. Hark! do you hear nothing?"
+
+"Yes, I hear a footstep. And here comes a man."
+
+"Let us walk to meet him, accidentally, and seem to be talking."
+
+I took Dalrymple's arm, and we strolled in the direction of the new
+comer. It was not De Simoncourt, however, but a tall man with a grizzled
+beard, who crossed over, apprehensively, at our approach, but recrossed
+and went into the white house at the corner as soon as he thought us
+out of sight.
+
+"One of the gang," said Dalrymple, with a shrug of his broad shoulders.
+"We had better go back to our doorway, and wait till the right
+man comes."
+
+We had not long to wait. The next arrival was he whom we sought. We
+strolled on, as before, and came upon him face to face.
+
+"De Simoncourt, by all that's propitious!" cried Dalrymple.
+
+"What--Major Dalrymple returned to Paris!"
+
+"Ay, just returned. Bored to death with Berlin and Vienna--no place like
+Paris, De Simoncourt, go where one will!"
+
+"None, indeed. There is but one Paris, and pleasure is the true profit
+of all who visit it."
+
+"My dear De Simoncourt, I am appalled to hear you perpetrate a pun! By
+the way, you have met Mr. Basil Arbuthnot at my rooms?"
+
+M. de Simoncourt lifted his hat, and was graciously pleased to remember
+the circumstance.
+
+"And now," pursued Dalrymple, "having met, what shall, we do next? Have
+you any engagement for the small hours, De Simoncourt?"
+
+"I am quite at your disposal. Where were your bound for?"
+
+"Anywhere--everywhere. I want excitement."
+
+"Would a hand at _écarté_, or a green table, have any attraction for
+you?" suggested De Simoncourt, falling into the trap as readily as one
+could have desired.
+
+"The very thing, if you know where they are to be found!"
+
+"Nay, I need not take you far to find both. There is in this very street
+a house where money may be lost and won as easily as at the Bourse.
+Follow me."
+
+He took us to the white house at the corner, and, pressing a spring
+concealed in the wood-work of the lintel, rung a bell of shrill and
+peculiar _timbre_. The door opened immediately, and, after we had
+passed in, closed behind us without any visible agency. Still following
+at the heels of M. de Simoncourt, we then went up a spacious staircase
+dimly lighted, and, leaving our hats in an ante-room, entered
+unannounced into an elegant _salon_, where some twenty or thirty
+_habitués_ of both sexes had already commenced the business of the
+evening. The ladies, of whom there were not more than half-a-dozen, were
+all more or less painted, _passées_, and showily dressed. Among the men
+were military stocks, ribbons, crosses, stars, and fine titles in
+abundance. We were evidently supposed to be in very brilliant
+society--brilliant, however, with a fictitious lustre that betrayed the
+tinsel beneath, and reminded one of a fashionable reception on the
+boards of the Haymarket or the Porte St. Martin. The mistress of the
+house, an abundant and somewhat elderly Juno in green velvet, with a
+profusion of jewelry on her arms and bosom, came forward to receive us.
+
+"Madame de Sainte Amaranthe, permit me to present my friends, Major
+Dalrymple and Mr. Arbuthnot," said De Simoncourt, imprinting a gallant
+kiss on the plump hand of the hostess.
+
+Madame de Ste. Amaranthe professed herself charmed to receive any
+friends of M. de Simoncourt; whereupon M. de Simoncourt's friends were
+enchanted to be admitted to the privilege of Madame de Ste. Amaranthe's
+acquaintance. Madame de Ste. Amaranthe then informed us that she was the
+widow of a general officer who fell at Austerlitz, and the daughter of a
+rich West India planter whom she called her _père adoré_, and to whose
+supposititious memory she wiped away an imaginary tear with an
+embroidered pocket-handkerchief. She then begged that we would make
+ourselves at home, and, gliding away, whispered something in De
+Simoncourt's ear, to which he replied by a nod of intelligence.
+
+"That harpy hopes to fleece us," said Dalrymple, slipping his arm
+through mine and drawing me towards the roulette table. "She has just
+told De Simoncourt to take us in hand. I always suspected the fellow
+was a Greek."
+
+"A Greek?"
+
+"Ay, in the figurative sense--a gentleman who lives by dexterity at
+cards."
+
+"And shall you play?"
+
+"By-and-by. Not yet, because--"
+
+He checked himself, and looked anxiously round the room.
+
+"Because what?"
+
+"Tell me, Arbuthnot," said he, paying no attention to my question; "do
+_you_ mind playing?"
+
+"I? My dear fellow, I hardly know one card from another."
+
+"But have you any objection?"
+
+"None whatever to the game; but a good deal to the penalty. I don't mind
+confessing to you that I ran into debt some months back, and that...."
+
+"Nonsense, boy!" interrupted Dalrymple, with a kindly smile. "Do you
+suppose I want you to gamble away your money? No, no--the fact is, that
+I am here for a purpose, and it will not do to let my purpose be
+suspected. These Greeks want a pigeon. Will you oblige me by being that
+pigeon, and by allowing me to pay for your plucking?"
+
+I still hesitated.
+
+"But you will be helping me," urged he. "If you don't sit down, I must."
+
+"You would not lose so much," I expostulated.
+
+"Perhaps not, if I were cool and kept my eyes open; but to-night I am
+_distrait_, and should be as defenceless as yourself."
+
+"In that case I will play for you with pleasure."
+
+He slipped a little pocket-book into my hand.
+
+"Never stake more than five francs at a time," said he, "and you cannot
+ruin me. The book contains a thousand. You shall have more, if
+necessary; but I think that sum will last as long as I shall want you to
+keep playing."
+
+"A thousand francs!" I exclaimed. "Why, that is forty pounds!"
+
+"If it were four hundred, and it answered my purpose," said Dalrymple,
+between his teeth, "I should hold it money well spent!"
+
+At this moment De Simoncourt came up, and apologized for having left us
+so long.
+
+"If you want mere amusement, Major Dalrymple," said he, "I suppose you
+will prefer _roulette_ to _écarté_!"
+
+"I will stake a few pieces presently on the green cloth," replied
+Dalrymple, carelessly; "but, first of all, I want to initiate my young
+friend here. As to double _écarté_, Monsieur de Simoncourt, I need
+hardly tell you, as a man of the world, that I never play it with
+strangers."
+
+De Simoncourt smiled, and shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"Quite right," said he. "I believe that here everything is really _de
+bonne foi_; but where there are cards there will always be danger. For
+my part, I always shuffle the pack after my adversary!"
+
+With this he strolled off again, and I took a vacant chair at the long
+table, next to a lady, who made way for me with the most gracious smile
+imaginable. Only the players sat; so Dalrymple stood behind me and
+looked on. It was a green board, somewhat larger than an ordinary
+billiard-table, with mysterious boundaries traced here and there in
+yellow and red, and a cabalistic table of figures towards each end. A
+couple of well-dressed men sat in the centre; one to deal out the cards,
+and the other to pay and receive the money. The one who had the
+management of the cash wore a superb diamond ring, and a red and green
+ribbon at his button-hole. Dalrymple informed me in a whisper that this
+noble seigneur was Madame de Ste. Amaranthe's brother.
+
+As for the players, they all looked serious and polite enough, as ladies
+and gentlemen should, at their amusement. Some had pieces of card, which
+they pricked occasionally with a pin, according to the progress of the
+game. Some had little piles of silver, or sealed _rouleaux_, lying
+beside them. As for myself, I took out Dalrymple's pocket-book, and laid
+it beside me, as if I were an experienced player and meant to break the
+bank. For a few minutes he stood by, and then, having given me some
+idea of the leading principles of the game, wandered away to observe the
+other players.
+
+Left to myself, I played on--timidly at first; soon with more
+confidence; and, of course, with the novice's invariable good-fortune.
+My amiable neighbor drew me presently into conversation. She had a
+theory of chances relating to averages of color, and based upon a
+bewildering calculation of all the black and red cards in the pack,
+which she was so kind as to explain to me. I could not understand a word
+of it, but politeness compelled me to listen. Politeness also compelled
+me to follow her advice when she was so obliging as to offer it, and I
+lost, as a matter of course. From this moment my good-luck deserted me.
+
+"Courage, Monsieur," said my amiable neighbour; "you have only to play
+long enough, and you are sure to win."
+
+In the meantime, I kept following Dalrymple with my eyes, for there was
+something in his manner that filled me with vague uneasiness. Sometimes
+he drew near the table and threw down a Napoleon, but without heeding
+the game, or caring whether he won or lost. He was always looking to the
+door, or wandering restlessly from table to table. Watching him thus, I
+thought how haggard he looked, and what deep channels were furrowed in
+his brow since that day when we lay together on the autumnal grass under
+the trees in the forest of St. Germain.
+
+Thus a long time went by, and I found by my watch that it was nearly
+four o'clock in the morning--also that I had lost six hundred francs out
+of the thousand. It seemed incredible. I could hardly believe that the
+time and the money had flown so fast. I rose in my seat and looked round
+for Dalrymple; but in vain. Could he be gone, leaving me here?
+Impossible! Apprehensive of I knew not what, I pushed back my chair, and
+left the table. The rooms were now much fuller--more stars and
+moustachios; more velvets and laces, and Paris diamonds. Fresh tables,
+too, had been opened for _lansquenet, baccarat_, and _écarté_. At one of
+these I saw M. de Simoncourt. When he laid down his cards for the deal,
+I seized the opportunity to inquire for my friend.
+
+He pointed to a small inner room divided by a rich hanging from the
+farther end of the _salon_.
+
+"You will find Major Dalrymple in Madame de Ste. Amaranthe's boudoir,
+playing with M. le Vicomte de Caylus," said he, courteously, and
+resumed his game.
+
+Playing with De Caylus! Sitting down amicably with De Caylus! I could
+not understand it.
+
+Crowded as the rooms now were, it took me some time to thread my way
+across, and longer still, when I had done so, to pass the threshold of
+the boudoir, and obtain sight of the players. The room was very small,
+and filled with lookers-on. At a table under a chandelier sat De Caylus
+and Dalrymple. I could not see Dalrymple's face, for his back was turned
+towards me; but the Vicomte I recognised at once--pale, slight, refined,
+with the old look of dissipation and irritability, and the same
+restlessness of eye and hand that I had observed on first seeing him.
+They were evidently playing high, and each had a pile of notes and gold
+lying at his left hand. De Caylus kept nervously crumbling a note in his
+fingers. Dalrymple sat motionless as a man of bronze, and, except to
+throw down a card when it came to his turn, never stirred a finger.
+There was, to my thinking, something ominous in his exceeding calmness.
+
+"At what game are they, playing?" I asked a gentleman near whom I was
+standing.
+
+"At _écarté_," replied he, without removing his eyes from the players.
+
+Knowing nothing of the game, I could only judge of its progress by the
+faces of those around me. A breathless silence prevailed, except when
+some particular subtlety in the play sent a murmur of admiration round
+the room. Even this was hushed almost as soon as uttered. Gradually the
+interest grew more intense, and the bystanders pressed closer. De Caylus
+sighed impatiently, and passed his hand across his brow. It was his turn
+to deal. Dalrymple shuffled the pack. De Caylus shuffled them after
+him, and dealt. The falling of a pin might have been heard in the pause
+that followed. They had but five cards each. Dalrymple played first--a
+queen of diamonds. De Caylus played the king, and both threw down their
+cards. A loud murmur broke out instantaneously in every direction, and
+De Caylus, looking excited and weary, leaned back in his chair, and
+called for wine. His expression was so unlike that of a victor that I
+thought at first he must have lost the game.
+
+"Which is the winner?" I asked, eagerly. "Which is the winner?"
+
+The gentleman who had replied to me before looked round with a smile of
+contemptuous wonder.
+
+"Why, Monsieur de Caylus, of course," said he. "Did you not see him play
+the king?"
+
+"I beg your pardon," I said, somewhat nettled; "but, as I said before, I
+do not understand the game."
+
+"_Eh bien_! the Englishman is counting out his money."
+
+What a changed scene it was! The circle of intent faces broken and
+shifting--the silence succeeded by a hundred conversations--De Caylus
+leaning back, sipping his wine and chatting over his shoulder--the cards
+pushed aside, and Dalrymple gravely sorting out little shining columns
+of Napoleons, and rolls of crisp bank paper! Having ranged all these
+before him in a row, he took out his check-book, filled in a page, tore
+it out and laid it with the rest. Then, replacing the book in his
+breast-pocket, he pushed back his chair, and, looking up for the first
+time since the close of the game, said aloud:--
+
+"Monsieur le Vicomte de Caylus, I have this evening had the honor of
+losing the sum of twelve thousand francs to you; will you do me the
+favor to count this money?"
+
+M. de Caylus bowed, emptied his glass, and languidly touching each
+little column with one dainty finger, told over his winnings as though
+they were scarcely worth even that amount of trouble.
+
+"Six rouleaux of four hundred each," said he, "making two thousand four
+hundred--six notes of five hundred each, making three thousand--and an
+order upon Rothschild for six thousand six hundred; in all, twelve
+thousand. Thanks, Monsieur ... Monsieur ... forgive me for not
+remembering your name."
+
+Dalrymple looked up with a dangerous light in his eyes, and took no
+notice of the apology.
+
+"It appears to me, Monsieur le Vicomte Caylus," said he, giving the
+other his full title and speaking with singular distinctness, "that you
+hold the king very often at _écarté_."
+
+De Caylus looked up with every vein on his forehead suddenly swollen and
+throbbing.
+
+"Monsieur!" he exclaimed, hoarsely.
+
+"Especially when you deal," added Dalrymple, smoothing his moustache
+with utter _sang-froid_, and keeping his eyes still riveted upon his
+adversary.
+
+With an inarticulate cry like the cry of a wild beast, De Caylus sprung
+at him, foaming with rage, and was instantly flung back against the
+wall, dragging with him not only the table-cloth, but all the wine,
+money, and cards upon it.
+
+"I will have blood for this!" he shrieked, struggling with those who
+rushed in between. "I will have blood! Blood! Blood!"
+
+Stained and streaming with red wine, he looked, in his ghastly rage, as
+if he was already bathed in the blood he thirsted for.
+
+Dalrymple drew himself to his full height, and stood looking on with
+folded arms and a cold smile.
+
+"I am quite ready," he said, "to give Monsieur le Vicomte full
+satisfaction."
+
+The room was by this time crowded to suffocation. I forced my way
+through, and laid my hand on Dalrymple's arm.
+
+"You have provoked this quarrel," I said, reproachfully.
+
+"That, my dear fellow, is precisely what I came here to do," he replied.
+"You will have to be my second in this affair."
+
+Here De Simoncourt came up, and hearing the last words, drew me aside.
+
+"I act for De Caylus," he whispered. "Pistols, of course?"
+
+I nodded, still all bewilderment at my novel position.
+
+"Your man received the first blow, so is entitled to the first shot."
+
+I nodded again.
+
+"I don't know a better place," he went on, "than Bellevue. There's a
+famous little bit of plantation, and it is just far enough from Paris to
+be secure. The Bois is hackneyed, and the police are too much about it.
+
+"Just so," I replied, vaguely.
+
+"And when shall we say? The sooner the better, it always seems to me, in
+these cases."
+
+"Oh, certainly--the sooner the better."
+
+He looked at his watch.
+
+"It is now ten minutes to five," he said. "Suppose we allow them five
+hours to put their papers in order, and meet at Bellevue, on the
+terrace, at ten?"
+
+"So soon!" I exclaimed.
+
+"Soon!" echoed De Simoncourt. "Why, under circumstances of such
+exceeding aggravation, most men would send for pistols and settle it
+across the table!"
+
+I shuddered. These niceties of honor were new to me, and I had been
+brought up to make little distinction between duelling and murder.
+
+"Be it so, then, Monsieur De Simoncourt," I said. "We will meet you at
+Bellevue, at ten."
+
+"On the terrace?"
+
+"On the terrace."
+
+We bowed and parted. Dalrymple was already gone, and De Caylus, still
+white and trembling with rage, was wiping the wine from his face and
+shirt. The crowd opened for me right and left as I went through the
+_salon_, and more than one voice whispered:--
+
+"He is the Englishman's second."
+
+I took my hat and cloak mechanically, and let myself out. It was broad
+daylight, and the blinding sun poured full upon my eyes as I passed into
+the street.
+
+"Come, Damon," said Dalrymple, crossing over to me from the opposite
+side of the way. "I have just caught a cab--there it is, waiting round
+the corner! We've no time to lose, I'll be bound."
+
+"We are to meet them at Bellevue at ten," I replied.
+
+"At ten? Hurrah! then I've still five certain hours of life before me!
+Long enough, Damon, to do a world of mischief, if one were so disposed!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER L.
+
+THE DUEL AT BELLEVUE.
+
+We drove straight to Dalrymple's rooms, and, going in with a pass-key,
+went up without disturbing the _concierge_. Arrived at home, my friend's
+first act was to open his buffetier and take out a loaf, a _paté de foie
+gras_, and a bottle of wine. I could not eat a morsel; but he supped (or
+breakfasted) with a capital appetite; insisted that I should lie down on
+his bed for two or three hours; and slipping into his dressing-gown,
+took out his desk and cash-box, and settled himself to a regular
+morning's work.
+
+"I hope to get a nap myself before starting," said he. "I have not many
+debts, and I made my will the day after I married--so I have but little
+to transact in the way of business. A few letters to write--a few to
+burn--a trifle or two to seal up and direct to one or two fellows who
+may like a _souvenír_,--that is the extent of my task! Meanwhile, my
+dear boy, get what rest you can. It will never do to be shaky and pale
+on the field, you know."
+
+I went, believing that I should be less in his way; and, lying down in
+my clothes, fell into a heavy sleep, from which, after what seemed a
+long time, I woke suddenly with the conviction that it was just ten
+o'clock. To start up, look at my watch, find that it was only a quarter
+to seven and fall profoundly asleep again, was the work of only a few
+minutes. At the end of another half-hour I woke with the same dread, and
+with the same result; and so on twice or thrice after, till at a
+quarter to nine I jumped up, plunged my head into a basin of cold water,
+and went back to the sitting-room.
+
+I found him lying forward upon the table, fast asleep, with his head
+resting on his hands. Some half-dozen letters lay folded and addressed
+beside him--one directed to his wife. A little pile of burnt paper
+fluttered on the hearth. His pistols were lying close by in their
+mahogany case, the blue and white steel relieved against the
+crimson-velvet lining. He slept so soundly, poor fellow, that I could
+with difficulty make up my mind to wake him. Once roused, however, he
+was alert and ready in a moment, changed his coat, took out a new pair
+of lavender gloves, hailed a cab from the window, and bade the driver
+name his own fare if he got us to the terrace at Bellevue by five
+minutes before ten.
+
+"I always like to be before my time in a matter of this kind, Damon,"
+said he. "It's shabby to be merely punctual when one has, perhaps, not
+more than a quarter of an hour to live. By-the-by, here are my keys.
+Take them, in case of accident. You will find a copy of my will in my
+desk---the original is with my lawyer. The letters you will forward,
+according to the addresses; and in my cash-box you will find a paper
+directed to yourself."
+
+I bent my head. I would not trust myself to speak. "As for the letter to
+Hélène--to my wife," he said, turning his face away, "will you--will you
+deliver that with your own hands?"
+
+"I will."
+
+"I--I have had but little time to write it," he faltered, "and I trust
+to you to supply the details. Tell her how I made the quarrel, and how
+it ended. No one suspects it to be other than a _fracas_ over a game at
+_écarté_. No one supposes that I had any other motive, or any deeper
+vengeance--not even De Caylus! I have not compromised her by word or
+deed. If I shoot him, I free her without a breath of scandal. If
+I fall--"
+
+His voice failed, and we were both silent for some moments
+
+We were now past the Barrier, and speeding on rapidly towards the open
+country. High white houses with jalousies closed against the sun, and
+pretty maisonnettes in formal gardens, succeeded the streets and shops
+of suburban Paris. Then came a long country road bordered by
+poplars--by-and-by, glimpses of the Seine, and scattered farms and
+villages far away--then Sèvres and the leafy heights of Bellevue
+overhanging the river.
+
+We crossed the bridge, and the driver, mindful of his fare, urged on his
+tired horse. Some country folks met us presently, and a wagoner with a
+load of fresh hay. They all smiled and gave us "good-day" as we
+passed--they going to their work in the fields, and we to our work of
+bloodshed!
+
+Shortly after this, the road began winding upwards, past the porcelain
+factories and through the village of Sèvres; after which, having but a
+short distance of very steep road to climb, we desired the cabman to
+wait, and went up on foot. Arrived at the top, where a peep of blue
+daylight came streaming down upon us through a green tunnel of acacias,
+we emerged all at once upon the terrace, and found ourselves first on
+the field. Behind us rose a hillside of woods--before us, glassy and
+glittering, as if traced upon the transparent air, lay the city of
+palaces. Domes and spires, arches and columns of triumph, softened by
+distance, looked as if built of the sunshine. Far away on one side
+stretched the Bois de Boulogne, undulating like a sea of tender green.
+Still farther away on the other, lay Père-la-Chaise--a dark hill specked
+with white; cypresses and tombs. At our feet, winding round a "lawny
+islet" and through a valley luxuriant in corn-fields and meadows, flowed
+the broad river, bluer than the sky.
+
+"A fine sight, Damon!" said Dalrymple, leaning on the parapet, and
+coolly lighting a cigar. "If my eyes are never to open on the day again,
+I am glad they should have rested for the last time on a scene of so
+much beauty! Where is the painter who could paint it? Not Claude
+himself, though he should come back to life on purpose, and mix his
+colors with liquid sunlight!"
+
+"You are a queer fellow," said I, "to talk of scenery and painters at
+such a moment!"
+
+"Not at all. Things are precious according to the tenure by which we
+hold them. For my part, I do not know when I appreciated earth and sky
+so heartily as this morning. _Tiens!_ here comes a carriage--our men,
+no doubt."
+
+"Are you a good shot?" I asked anxiously.
+
+"Pretty well. I can write my initials in bullet-holes on a sheet of
+notepaper at forty paces, or toss up half-a-crown as I ride at full
+gallop, and let the daylight through it as it comes down."
+
+"Thank Heaven!"
+
+"Not so fast, my boy. De Caylus is just as fine a shot, and one of the
+most skilful swordsmen in the French service."
+
+"Ay, but the first fire is yours!"
+
+"Is it? Well, I suppose it is. He struck the first blow, and so--here
+they come."
+
+"One more word, Dalrymple--did he really cheat you at _écarté?_"
+
+"Upon my soul, I don't know. He did hold the king very often, and there
+are some queer stories told of him in Vienna by the officers of the
+Emperor's Guard. At all events, this is not the first duel he has had to
+fight in defence of his good-fortune!"
+
+De Simoncourt now coming forward, we adjourned at once to the wood
+behind the village. A little open glade was soon found; the ground was
+soon measured; the pistols were soon loaded. De Caylus looked horribly
+pale, but it was the pallor of concentrated rage, with nothing of the
+craven hue in it. Dalrymple, on the contrary, had neither more nor less
+color than usual, and puffed away at his cigar with as much indifference
+as if he were waiting his turn at the pit of the Comédie Française. Both
+were clothed in black from head to foot, with their coats buttoned
+to the chin.
+
+"All is ready," said De Simoncourt. "Gentlemen, choose your weapons."
+
+De Caylus took his pistols one by one, weighed and poised them,
+examined the priming, and finally, after much hesitation, decided.
+
+Dalrymple took the first that came to hand.
+
+The combatants then took their places--De Caylus with his hat pulled low
+over his eyes; Dalrymple still smoking carelessly.
+
+They exchanged bows.
+
+"Major Dalrymple," said De Simoncourt, "it is for you to fire first."
+
+"God bless you, Damon!" said my friend, shaking me warmly by the hand.
+
+He then half turned aside, flung away the end of his cigar, lifted his
+right arm suddenly, and fired.
+
+I heard the dull thud of the ball--I saw De Caylus fling up his arms and
+fall forward on the grass. I saw Dalrymple running to his assistance.
+The next instant, however, the wounded man was on his knees, ghastly and
+bleeding, and crying for his pistol.
+
+"Give it me!" he gasped--"hold me up! I--I will have his life yet! So,
+steady--steady!"
+
+Shuddering, but not for his own danger, Dalrymple stepped calmly back to
+his place; while De Caylus, supported by his second, struggled to his
+feet and grasped his weapon. For a moment he once more stood upright.
+His eye burned; his lips contracted; he seemed to gather up all his
+strength for one last effort. Slowly, steadily, surely, he raised his
+pistol--then swaying heavily back, fired, and fell again.
+
+"Dead this time, sure enough," said De Simoncourt, bending over him.
+
+"Indeed, I fear so," replied Dalrymple, in a low, grave voice. "Can we
+do nothing to help you, Monsieur de Simoncourt?"
+
+"Nothing, thank you. I have a carriage down the road, and must get
+further assistance from the village. You had better lose no time in
+leaving Paris."
+
+"I suppose not. Good-morning."
+
+"Good-morning,"
+
+So we lifted our hats; gathered up the pistols; hurried out of the wood
+and across a field, so avoiding the village; found our cab waiting where
+we had left it; and in less than five minutes, were rattling down the
+dusty hill again and hurrying towards Paris.
+
+Once in the cab, Dalrymple began hastily pulling off his coat and
+waistcoat. I was startled to see his shirt-front stained with blood.
+
+"Heavens!" I exclaimed, "you are not wounded?"
+
+"Very slightly. De Caylus was too good a shot to miss me altogether.
+Pshaw! 'tis nothing--a mere graze--not even the bullet left in it!"
+
+"If it had been a little more to the left...." I faltered.
+
+"If he had fired one second sooner, or lived one second longer, he would
+have had me through the heart, as sure as there's a heaven above us!"
+said Dalrymple.
+
+Then, suddenly changing his tone, he added, laughingly--
+
+"Nonsense, Damon! cheer up, and help me to tear this handkerchief into
+bandages. Now's the time to show off your surgery, my little Æsculapius.
+By Jupiter, life's a capital thing, after all!"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LI
+
+THE PORTRAIT.
+
+Having seen Dalrymple to his lodgings and dressed his wound, which was,
+in truth, but a very slight one, I left him and went home, promising to
+return in a few hours, and help him with his packing; for we both agreed
+that he must leave Paris that evening, come what might.
+
+It was now close upon two o'clock, and I had been out since between
+three and four the previous afternoon--not quite twenty-four hours, in
+point of actual time; but a week, a month, a year, in point of
+sensation! Had I not seen a man die since that hour yesterday?
+
+Walking homewards through the garish streets in the hot afternoon, all
+the strange scenes in which I had just been an actor thronged
+fantastically upon my memory. The joyous dinner with Franz Müller; the
+busy Temple; the noisy theatre; the long chase through the wet streets
+at midnight; the crowded gaming-house; the sweet country drive at early
+morning; the quiet wood, and the dead man lying on his back, with the
+shadows of the leaves upon his face,--all this, in strange distinctness,
+came between me and the living tide of the Boulevards.
+
+And now, over-tired and over-excited as I was, I remembered for the
+first time that I had eaten nothing since half-past five that morning.
+And then I also remembered that I had left Müller waiting for me under
+the archway, without a word of explanation. I promised myself that I
+would write to him as soon as I got home, and in the meantime turned in
+at the first Café to which I came and called for breakfast. But when the
+breakfast was brought, I could not eat it. The coffee tasted bitter to
+me. The meat stuck in my throat. I wanted rest more than food--rest of
+body and mind, and the forgetfulness of sleep! So I paid my bill, and,
+leaving the untasted meal, went home like a man in a dream.
+
+Madame Bouïsse was not in her little lodge as I passed it--neither was
+my key on its accustomed hook. I concluded that she was cleaning my
+rooms, and so, going upstairs, found my door open. Hearing my own name,
+however, I paused involuntarily upon the threshold.
+
+"And so, as I was saying," pursued a husky voice, which I knew at once
+to be the property of Madame Bouïsse, "M'sieur Basil's friend painted it
+on purpose for him; and I am sure if he was as good a Catholic as the
+Holy Father himself, and that picture was a true portrait of our Blessed
+Lady, he could not worship it more devoutly. I believe he says his
+prayers to it, mam'selle! I often find it in the morning stuck up by the
+foot of his bed; and when he comes home of an evening to study his books
+and papers, it always stands on a chair just in front of his table, so
+that he can see it without turning his head, every time he lifts his
+eyes from the writing!"
+
+In the murmured reply that followed, almost inaudible though it was, my
+ear distinguished a tone that set my heart beating.
+
+"Well, I can't tell, of course," said Madame Bouïsse, in answer,
+evidently, to the remark just made; "but if mam'selle will only take the
+trouble to look in the glass, and then look at the picture, she will see
+how like it is. For my part, I believe it to be that, and nothing else.
+Do you suppose I don't know the symptoms? _Dame!_ I have eyes, as well
+as my neighbors; and you may take my word for it, mam'selle, that poor
+young gentleman is just as much in love as ever a man was in
+this world!"
+
+"No more of this, if you please, Madame Bouïsse," said Hortense, so
+distinctly that I could no longer be in doubt as to the speaker.
+
+I stayed to hear no more; but retreating softly down the first flight of
+stairs, came noisily up again, and went straight into my
+rooms, saying:--
+
+"Madame Bouïsse, are you here?"
+
+"Not only Madame Bouïsse, but an intruder who implores forgiveness,"
+said Hortense, with a frank smile, but a heightened color.
+
+I bowed profoundly. No need to tell her she was welcome--my face spoke
+for me.
+
+"It was Madame Bouïsse who lured me in," continued she, "to look at that
+painting."
+
+"_Mais, oui!_ I told mam'selle you had her portrait in your
+sitting-room," laughed the fat _concierge,_ leaning on her broom. "I'm
+sure it's quite like enough to be hers, bless her sweet face!"
+
+I felt myself turn scarlet. To hide my confusion I took the picture
+down, and carried it to the window.
+
+"You will see it better by this light," I said, pretending to dust it
+with my handkerchief. "It is worth a close examination."
+
+Hortense knelt down, and studied it for some moments in silence.
+
+"It must be a copy," she said, presently, more to herself than me--"it
+must be a copy."
+
+"It _is_ a copy," I replied. "The original is at the Château de Sainte
+Aulaire, near Montlhéry."
+
+"May I ask how you came by it?"
+
+"A friend of mine, who is an artist, copied it."
+
+"Then it was done especially for you?"
+
+"Just so."
+
+"And, no doubt, you value it?"
+
+"More than anything I possess!"
+
+Then, fearing I had said too much, I added:--
+
+"If I had not admired the original very much, I should not have wished
+for a copy."
+
+She shifted the position of the picture in such a manner that, standing
+where I did, I could no longer see her face.
+
+"Then you have seen the original," she said, in a low tone.
+
+"Undoubtedly--and you?"
+
+"Yes, I have seen it; but not lately."
+
+There was a brief pause.
+
+"Madame Bouïsse thinks it so like yourself, mademoiselle," I said,
+timidly, "that it might almost be your portrait."
+
+"I can believe it," she answered. "It is very like my mother."
+
+Her voice faltered; and, still kneeling, she dropped her face in her
+hands, and wept silently.
+
+Madame Bouïsse, in the meantime, had gone into my bedchamber, where she
+was sweeping and singing to herself with the door three parts closed,
+believing, no doubt, that she was affording me the opportunity to make a
+formal declaration.
+
+"Alas! mademoiselle," I said, hesitatingly, "I little thought..."
+
+She rose, dashed the tears aside, and, holding out her hand to me, said,
+kindly--
+
+"It is no fault of yours, fellow-student, if I remind you of the
+portrait, or if the portrait reminds me of one whom it resembles still
+more nearly. I am sorry to have troubled your kind heart with my griefs.
+It is not often that they rise to the surface."
+
+I raised her hand reverently to my lips.
+
+"But you are looking worn and ill yourself," she added. "Is anything the
+matter?"
+
+"Not now," I replied. "But I have been up all night, and--and I am very
+tired."
+
+"Was this in your professional capacity?"
+
+"Not exactly--and yet partly so. I have been more a looker-on than an
+active agent--and I have witnessed a frightful death-scene."
+
+She sighed, and shook her head.
+
+"You are not of the stuff that surgeons are made of, fellow-student,"
+she said, kindly. "Instead of prescribing for others, you need some one
+to prescribe for you. Why, your hand is quite feverish. You should go to
+bed, and keep quiet for the next twelve hours."
+
+"I will lie down for a couple of hours when Madame Bouïsse is gone; but
+I must be up and out again at six."
+
+"Nay, that is in three hours."
+
+"I cannot help it. It is my duty."
+
+"Then I have no more to say. Would you drink some lemonade, if I made it
+for you?"
+
+"I would drink poison, if you made it for me!"
+
+"A decidedly misplaced enthusiasm!" laughed she, and left the room.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LII.
+
+NEWS FROM ENGLAND.
+
+It was a glorious morning--first morning of the first week in the merry
+month of June--as I took my customary way to Dr. Chéron's house in the
+Faubourg St. Germain. I had seen Dalrymple off by the night train the
+evening previous, and, refreshed by a good night's rest, had started
+somewhat earlier than usual, for the purpose of taking a turn in the
+Luxembourg Gardens before beginning my day's work.
+
+There the blossoming parterres, the lavish perfume from geranium-bed and
+acacia-blossom, and the mad singing of the little birds up among the
+boughs, set me longing for a holiday. I thought of Saxonholme, and the
+sweet English woodlands round about. I thought how pleasant it would be
+to go home to dear Old England, if only for ten days, and surprise my
+father in his quiet study. What if I asked Dr. Chéron to spare me for a
+fortnight?
+
+Turning these things over in my mind, I left the gardens, and, arriving
+presently at the well-known Porte Cochère in the Rue de Mont Parnasse,
+rang the great bell, crossed the dull courtyard, and took my usual seat
+at my usual desk, not nearly so well disposed for work as usual.
+
+"If you please, Monsieur," said the solemn servant, making his
+appearance at the door, "Monsieur le Docteur requests your presence in
+his private room."
+
+I went. Dr. Chéron was standing on the hearth-rug, with his back to the
+fire, and his arms folded over his breast. An open letter, bordered
+broadly with black, lay upon his desk. Although distant some two yards
+from the table, his eyes were fixed upon this paper. When I came in he
+looked up, pointed to a seat, but himself remained standing and silent.
+
+"Basil Arbuthnot," he said, after a pause of some minutes, "I have this
+morning received a letter from England, by the early post."
+
+"From my father, sir?"
+
+"No. From a stranger,"
+
+He looked straight at me as he said this, and hesitated.
+
+"But it contains news," he added, "that--that much concerns you."
+
+There was a fixed gravity about the lines of his handsome mouth, and an
+unwonted embarrassment in his manner, that struck me with apprehension.
+
+"Good news, I--I hope, sir," I faltered.
+
+"Bad news, my young friend," said he, compassionately. "News that you
+must meet like a man, with fortitude--with resignation. Your
+father--your excellent father--my honored friend--"
+
+He pointed to the letter and turned away.
+
+I rose up, sat down, rose up again, reached out a trembling hand for the
+letter, and read the loss that my heart had already presaged.
+
+My father was dead.
+
+Well as ever in the morning, he had been struck with apoplexy in the
+afternoon, and died in a few hours, apparently without pain.
+
+The letter was written by our old family lawyer, and concluded with the
+request that Dr. Chéron would "break the melancholy news to Mr. Basil
+Arbuthnot, who would doubtless return to England for the funeral."
+
+My tears fell one by one upon the open letter. I had loved my father
+tenderly in my heart. His very roughnesses and eccentricities were dear
+to me. I could not believe that he was gone. I could not believe that I
+should never hear his voice again!
+
+Dr. Chéron came over, and laid his hand upon my shoulder.
+
+"Come," he said, "you have much to do, and must soon be on your way. The
+express leaves at midday. It is now ten, you have only two hours left."
+
+"My poor father!"
+
+"Brunet," continued the Doctor, "shall go back with you to your lodgings
+and help you to pack. As for money--"
+
+He took out his pocket-book and offered me a couple of notes; but I
+shook my head and put them from me.
+
+"I have enough money, thank you," I said. "Good-bye."
+
+"Good-bye," he replied, and, for the first time in all these months,
+shook me by the hand. "You will write to me?"
+
+I bowed my head in silence, and we parted. I found a cab at the door,
+and Brunet on the box. I was soon at home again. Home! I felt as if I
+had no home now, either in France or England--as if all my Paris life
+were a brief, bright dream, and this the dreary waking. Hortense was
+out. It was one of her busy mornings, and she would not be back till the
+afternoon. It was very bitter to leave without one last look--one last
+word. I seized pen and paper, and yielding for the first time to all the
+impulses of my love, wrote, without weighing my words, these few brief
+sentences:--
+
+"I have had a heavy loss, Hortense, and by the time you open this letter
+I shall be far away. My father--my dear, good father--is no more. My
+mother died when I was a little child. I have no brothers--no
+sisters--no close family ties. I am alone in the world now--quite alone.
+My last thought here is of you. If it seems strange to speak of love at
+such a moment, forgive me, for that love is now my only hope. Oh, that
+you were here, that I might kiss your hand at parting, and know that
+some of your thoughts went with me! I cannot believe that you are quite
+indifferent to me. It seems impossible that, loving you as I love, so
+deeply, so earnestly, I should love in vain. When I come back I shall
+seek you here, where I have loved you so long. I shall look into your
+eyes for my answer, and read in them all the joy, or all the despair, of
+the life that lies before me. I had intended to get that portrait copied
+again for you, because you saw in it some likeness to your mother; but
+there has been no time, and ere you receive this letter I shall be gone.
+I therefore send the picture to you by the _concierge_. It is my parting
+gift to you. I can offer no greater proof of my love. Farewell."
+
+Once written, I dared not read the letter over. I thrust it under her
+door, and in less than five minutes was on my way to the station.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LIII.
+
+THE FADING OF THE RAINBOW.
+
+     I loved a love once, fairest among women;
+     Closed are her doors on me, I must not see her--
+     All, all are gone, the old familiar faces.
+
+     LAMB.
+
+Beautifully and truly, in the fourth book of the most poetical of
+stories, has a New World romancist described the state of a sorrowing
+lover. "All around him," saith he, "seemed dreamy and vague; all within
+him, as in a sun's eclipse. As the moon, whether visible or invisible,
+has power over the tides of the ocean, so the face of that lady, whether
+present or absent, had power over the tides of his soul, both by day and
+night, both waking and sleeping. In every pale face and dark eye he saw
+a resemblance to her; and what the day denied him in reality, the night
+gave him in dreams."
+
+Such was, very faithfully, my own condition of mind during the interval
+which succeeded my departure from Paris--the only difference being that
+Longfellow's hero was rejected by the woman he loved, and sorrowing for
+that rejection; whilst I, neither rejected nor accepted, mourned another
+grief, and through the tears of that trouble, looked forward anxiously
+to my uncertain future.
+
+I reached Saxonholme the night before my father's funeral, and remained
+there for ten days. I found myself, to my surprise, almost a rich
+man--that is to say, sufficiently independent to follow the bent of my
+inclinations as regarded the future.
+
+My first impulse, on learning the extent of my means, was to relinquish
+a career that had been from the first distasteful to me--my second was
+to leave the decision to Hortense. To please her, to be worthy of her,
+to prove my devotion to her, was what I most desired upon earth. If she
+wished to see me useful and active in my generation, I would do my best
+to be so for her sake--if, on the contrary, she only cared to see me
+content, I would devote myself henceforth to that life of "retired
+leisure" that I had always coveted. Could man love more honestly
+and heartily?
+
+One year of foreign life had wrought a marked difference in me. I had
+not observed it so much in Paris; but here, amid old scenes and old
+reminiscences, I seemed to meet the image of my former self, and
+wondered at the change 'twixt now and then. I left home, timid, ignorant
+of the world and its ways, reserved, silent, almost misanthropic. I came
+back strengthened mentally and physically. Studious as ever, I could yet
+contemplate an active career without positive repugnance; I knew how to
+meet and treat my fellow-men; I was acquainted with society in its most
+refined and most homely phases. I had tasted of pleasure, of
+disappointment, of love--of all that makes life earnest.
+
+As the time drew near when I should return to Paris, grief, and hope,
+and that strange reluctance which would fain defer the thing it most
+desires, perplexed and troubled me by day and night. Once again on the
+road, the past seemed more than ever dream-like, and Paris and
+Saxonholme became confused together in my mind, like the mingling
+outlines of two dissolving views.
+
+I crossed the channel this time in a thick, misting rain; pushed on
+straight for Paris, and reached the Cité Bergère in the midst of a warm
+and glowing afternoon. The great streets were crowded with carriages and
+foot-passengers. The trees were in their fullest leaf. The sun poured
+down on pavement and awning with almost tropical intensity. I dismissed
+my cab at the top of the Rue du Faubourg Montmatre, and went up to the
+house on foot. A flower-girl sat in the shade of the archway, tying up
+her flowers for the evening-sale, and I bought a cluster of white roses
+for Hortense as I went by.
+
+Madame Bouïsse was sound asleep in her little sanctum; but my key hung
+in its old place, so I took it without disturbing her, and went up as if
+I had been away only a few hours. Arrived at the third story, I stopped
+outside Hortense's door and listened. All was very silent within. She
+was out, perhaps; or writing quietly in the farther chamber. I thought I
+would leave my travelling-bag in my own room, and then ring boldly for
+admittance. I turned the key, and found myself once again in my own
+familiar, pleasant student home. The books and busts were there in their
+accustomed places; everything was as I had left it. Everything, except
+the picture! The picture was gone; so Hortense had accepted it.
+
+Three letters awaited me on the table; one from Dr. Chéron, written in a
+bold hand--a mere note of condolence: one from Dalrymple, dated
+Chamounix: the third from Hortense. I knew it was from her. I knew that
+that small, clear, upright writing, so singularly distinct and regular,
+could be only hers. I had never seen it before; but my heart
+identified it.
+
+That letter contained my fate. I took it up, laid it down, paced
+backwards and forwards, and for several minutes dared not break the
+seal. At length I opened it. It ran thus:--
+
+"FRIEND AND FELLOW-STUDENT.
+
+"I had hoped that a man such as you and a woman such as I might become
+true friends, discuss books and projects, give and take the lesser
+services of life, and yet not end by loving. In this belief, despite
+occasional misgivings, I have suffered our intercourse to become
+intimacy--our acquaintance, friendship. I see now that I was mistaken,
+and now, when it is, alas! too late, I reproach myself for the
+consequences of that mistake.
+
+"I can be nothing to you, friend. I have duties in life more sacred than
+marriage. I have a task to fulfil which is sterner than love, and
+imperative as fate. I do not say that to answer you thus costs me no
+pain. Were there even hope, I would bid you hope; but my labor presses
+heavily upon me, and repeated failure has left me weary and heart-sick.
+
+"You tell me in your letter that, by the time I read it, you will be far
+away. It is now my turn to repeat the same words. When you come back to
+your rooms, mine will be empty. I shall be gone; all I ask is, that you
+will not attempt to seek me.
+
+"Farewell. I accept your gift. Perhaps I act selfishly in taking it, but
+a day may come when I shall justify that selfishness to you. In the
+meantime, once again farewell. You are my only friend, and these are the
+saddest words I have ever written--forget me!
+
+"HORTENSE."
+
+I scarcely know how I felt, or what I did, on first reading this letter.
+I believe that I stood for a long time stone still, incapable of
+realizing the extent of my misfortune. By-and-by it seemed to rush upon
+me suddenly. I threw open my window, scaled the balcony rails, and
+forced my way into her rooms.
+
+Her rooms! Ah, by that window she used to sit--at that table she read
+and wrote--in that bed she slept! All around and about were scattered
+evidences of her presence. Upon the chimney-piece lay an envelope
+addressed to her name--upon the floor, some fragments of torn paper and
+some ends of cordage! The very flowers were yet fresh upon her balcony!
+The sight of these things, while they confirmed my despair, thawed the
+ice at my heart. I kissed the envelope that she had touched, the flowers
+she had tended, the pillow on which her head had been wont to rest. I
+called wildly on her name. I threw myself on the floor in my great
+agony, and wept aloud.
+
+I cannot tell how long I may have lain there; but it seemed like a
+lifetime. Long enough, at all events, to drink the bitter draught to the
+last drop--long enough to learn that life had now no grief in store for
+which I should weep again.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LIV.
+
+TREATETH OF MANY THINGS; BUT CHIEFLY OF BOOKS AND POETS.
+
+     Dreams, books, are each a world; and books, we know,
+     Are a substantial world, both pure and good.
+
+     WORDSWORTH.
+
+There are times when this beautiful world seems to put on a mourning
+garb, as if sympathizing, like a gentle mother, with the grief that
+consumes us; when the trees shake their arms in mute sorrow, and scatter
+their faded leaves like ashes on our heads; when the slow rains weep
+down upon us, and the very clouds look cold above. Then, like Hamlet the
+Dane, we take no pleasure in the life that weighs so wearily upon us,
+and deem "this goodly frame, the earth, a sterile promonotory; this most
+excellent canopy, the air, this brave, overhanging firmament, this
+majestical roof fretted with golden fire, a foul and pestilent
+congregation of vapors."
+
+So it was with me, in the heavy time that followed my return to Paris. I
+had lost everything in losing her I loved. I had no aim in life. No
+occupation. No hope. No rest. The clouds had rolled between me and the
+sun, and wrapped me in their cold shadows, and all was dark about me. I
+felt that I could say with an old writer--"For the world, I count it,
+not an inn, but an hospital; and a place, not to live, but to die in."
+
+Week after week I lingered in Paris, hoping against hope, and always
+seeking her. I had a haunting conviction that she was not far off, and
+that, if I only had strength to persevere, I must find her. Possessed by
+this fixed idea, I paced the sultry streets day after day throughout the
+burning months of June and July; lingered at dusk and early morning
+about the gardens of the Luxembourg, and such other quiet places as she
+might frequent; and, heedless alike of fatigue, or heat, or tempest,
+traversed the dusty city over and over again from barrier to barrier, in
+every direction.
+
+Could I but see her once more--once only! Could I but listen to her
+sweet voice, even though it bade me an eternal farewell! Could I but lay
+my lips for the last, last time upon her hand, and see the tender pity
+in her eyes, and be comforted!
+
+Seeking, waiting, sorrowing thus, I grew daily weaker and paler,
+scarcely conscious of my own failing strength, and indifferent to all
+things save one. In vain Dr. Chéron urged me to resume my studies. In
+vain Müller, ever cheerful and active, came continually to my lodgings,
+seeking to divert my thoughts into healthier channels. In vain I
+received letter after letter from Oscar Dalrymple, imploring me to
+follow him to Switzerland, where his wife had already joined him. I shut
+my eyes to all alike. Study had grown hateful to me; Müller's
+cheerfulness jarred upon me; Dalrymple was too happy for my
+companionship. Liberty to pursue my weary search, peace to brood over my
+sorrow, were all that I now asked. I had not yet arrived at that stage
+when sympathy grows precious.
+
+So weeks went by, and August came, and a slow conviction of the utter
+hopelessness of my efforts dawned gradually upon me. She was really
+gone. If she had been in Paris all this time pursuing her daily
+avocations, I must surely have found her. Where should I seek her next?
+What should I do with life, with time, with the future?
+
+I resolved, at all events, to relinquish medicine at once, and for ever.
+So I wrote a brief farewell to Dr. Chéron and another to Müller, and
+without seeing either again, returned abruptly to England.
+
+I will not dwell on this part of my story; enough that I settled my
+affairs as quickly as might be, left an old servant in care of the
+solitary house that had been my birthplace, and turned my back once more
+on Saxonholme, perhaps for years--perhaps for ever; and in less than
+three weeks was again on my way to the Continent.
+
+The spirit of restlessness was now upon me. I had no home; I had no
+peace; and in place of the sun there was darkness. So I went with the
+thorns around my brow, and the shadow of the cross upon my breast. I
+went to suffer--to endure,--if possible, to forget. Oh, the grief of
+the soul which lives on in the night, and looks for no dawning! Oh, the
+weary weight that presses down the tired eyelids, and yet leaves them
+sleepless! Oh, the tide of alien faces, and the sickening remembrance of
+one, too dear, which may never be looked upon again! I carried with me
+the antidote to every pleasure. In the midst of crowds, I was alone. In
+the midst of novelty, the one thought came, and made all stale to me.
+Like Dr. Donne, I dwelt with the image of my dead self at my side.
+
+Thus for many, many months we journeyed together---I and my sorrow--and
+passed through fair and famous places, and saw the seasons change under
+new skies. To the quaint old Flemish cities and the Gothic Rhine--to the
+plains and passes of Spain--to the unfrequented valleys of the Tyrol and
+the glacier-lands of Switzerland I went, but still found not the
+forgetfulness I sought. As in Holbein's fresco the skeleton plays his
+part in every scene, so my trouble stalked beside me, drank of my cup,
+and sat grimly at my table. It was with me in Naples and among the
+orange groves of Sorrento. It met me amid the ruins of the Roman Forum.
+It travelled with me over the blue Mediterranean, and landed beside me
+on the shores of the Cyclades. Go where I would, it possessed and
+followed me, and brooded over my head, like the cloud that rested on
+the ark.
+
+Thinking over this period of my life, I seem to be turning the leaves of
+a rich album, or wandering through a gallery of glowing landscapes, and
+yet all the time to be dreaming. Faces grown familiar for a few days and
+never seen after--pictures photographed upon the memory in all their
+vividness--glimpses of cathedrals, of palaces, of ruins, of sunset and
+storm, sea and shore, flit before me for a moment, and are gone like
+phantasmagoria.
+
+And like phantasmagoria they impressed me at the time. Nothing seemed
+real to me. Startled, now and then, into admiration or wonder, my apathy
+fell from me like a garment, and my heart throbbed again as of old. But
+this was seldom--so seldom that I could almost count the times when it
+befell me.
+
+Thus it was that travelling did me no permanent good. It enlarged my
+experience; it undoubtedly cultivated my taste; but it brought me
+neither rest, nor sympathy, nor consolation. On the contrary, it widened
+the gulf between me and my fellow-men. I formed no friendships. I kept
+up no correspondence. A sojourner in hotels, I became more and more
+withdrawn from all tender and social impulses, and almost forgot the
+very name of home. So strong a hold did this morbid love of
+self-isolation take upon me, that I left Florence on one occasion, after
+a stay of only three days, because I had seen the names of a Saxonholme
+family among the list of arrivals in the Giornale Toscano.
+
+Three years went by thus--three springs--three vintages--three
+winters--till, weary of wandering, I began to ask myself "what next?" My
+old passion for books had, in the meantime, re-asserted itself, and I
+longed once more for quiet. I knew not that my pilgrimage was hopeless.
+I know that I loved her ever; that I could never forget her; that
+although the first pangs were past, I yet must bear
+
+     "All the aching of heart, the restless, unsatisfied longing,
+     All the dull, deep pain, and constant anguish of patience!"
+
+I reasoned with myself. I resolved to be stronger--at all events, to be
+calmer. Exhausted and world-worn, I turned in thought to my native
+village among the green hills, to my deserted home, and the great
+solitary study with its busts and bookshelves, and its vista of
+neglected garden. The rooms where my mother died; where my father wrote;
+where, as a boy, I dreamed and studied, would at least have memories
+for me.
+
+Perhaps, silently underlying all these motives, I may at this time
+already have begun to entertain one other project which was not so much
+a motive as a hope--not so much a hope as a half-seen possibility. I had
+written verses from time to time all my life long, and of late they had
+come to me more abundantly than ever. They flowed in upon me at times
+like an irresistible tide; at others they ebbed away for weeks, and
+seemed as if gone for ever. It was a power over which I had no control,
+and sought to have none. I never tried to make verses; but, when
+the inspiration was upon me, I made them, as it were, in spite of
+myself. My desk was full of them in time--sonnets, scraps of songs,
+fragments of blank verse, attempts in all sorts of queer and rugged
+metres--hexameters, pentameters, alcaics, and the like; with, here and
+there, a dialogue out of an imaginary tragedy, or a translation from
+some Italian or German poet. This taste grew by degrees, to be a rare
+and subtle pleasure to me. My rhymes became my companions, and when the
+interval of stagnation came, I was restless and lonely till it
+passed away.
+
+At length there came an hour (I was lying, I remember, on a ledge of
+turf on a mountain-side, overlooking one of the Italian valleys of the
+Alps), when I asked myself for the first time--
+
+"Am I also a poet?"
+
+I had never dreamed of it, never thought of it, never even hoped it,
+till that moment. I had scribbled on, idly, carelessly, out of what
+seemed a mere facile impulse, correcting nothing; seldom even reading
+what I had written, after it was committed to paper. I had sometimes
+been pleased with a melodious cadence or a happy image--sometimes amused
+with my own flow of thought and readiness of versification; but that I,
+simple Basil Arbuthnot, should be, after all, enriched with this
+splendid gift of song--was it mad presumption, or were these things
+proof? I knew not; but lying on the parched grass of the mountain-side,
+I tried the question over in my mind, this way and that, till "my heart
+beat in my brain," How should I come at the truth? How should I test
+whether this opening Paradise was indeed Eden, or only the mirage of my
+fancy--mere sunshine upon sand? We all write verses at some moment or
+other in our lives, even the most prosaic amongst us--some because they
+are happy; some because they are sad; some because the living fire of
+youth impels them, and they must be up and doing, let the work be
+what it may.
+
+     "Many fervent souls,
+     Strike rhyme on rhyme, who would strike steel on steel,
+     If steel had offer'd."
+
+Was this case mine? Was I fancying myself a poet, only because I was an
+idle man, and had lost the woman I loved? To answer these questions
+myself was impossible. They could only be answered by the public voice,
+and before I dared question that oracle I had much to do. I resolved to
+discipline myself to the harness of rhythm. I resolved to go back to the
+fathers of poetry--to graduate once again in Homer and Dante, Chaucer
+and Shakespeare. I promised myself that, before I tried my wings in the
+sun, I would be my own severest critic. Nay, more--that I would never
+try them so long as it seemed possible a fall might come of it. Once
+come to this determination, I felt happier and more hopeful than I had
+felt for the last three years. I looked across the blue mists of the
+valley below, and up to the aerial peaks which rose, faint, and far, and
+glittering--mountain beyond mountain, range above range, as if painted
+on the thin, transparent air--and it seemed to me that they stood by,
+steadfast and silent, the witnesses of my resolve.
+
+"I will be strong," I said. "I will be an idler and a dreamer no longer.
+Books have been my world. I have taken all, and given nothing. Now I too
+will work, and work to prove that I was not unworthy of her love."
+
+Going down, by-and-by, into the valley as the shadows were lengthening,
+I met a traveller with an open book in his hand. He was an
+Englishman--small, sallow, wiry, and wore a gray, loose coat, with two
+large pockets full of books. I had met him once before at Milan, and
+again in a steamer on Lago Maggiore. He was always reading. He read in
+the diligence--he read when he was walking--he read all through dinner
+at the _tables-d'-hôte_. He had a mania for reading; and, might, in
+fact, be said to be bound up in his own library.
+
+Meeting thus on the mountain, we fell into conversation. He told me that
+he was on his way to Geneva, that he detested continental life, and that
+he was only waiting the arrival of certain letters before starting
+for England.
+
+"But," said I, "you do not, perhaps, give continental life a trial. You
+are always absorbed in the pages of a book; and, as for the scenery, you
+appear not to observe it."
+
+"Deuce take the scenery!" he exclaimed, pettishly. "I never look at it.
+All scenery's alike. Trees, mountains, water--water, mountains, trees;
+the same thing over and over again, like the bits of colored glass in a
+kaleidoscope. I read about the scenery, and that is quite enough
+for me."
+
+"But no book can paint an Italian lake or an Alpine sunset; and when one
+is on the spot...."
+
+"I beg your pardon," interrupted the traveller in gray. "Everything
+is much pleasanter and more picturesque in books than in
+reality--travelling especially. There are no bad smells in books. There
+are no long bills in books. Above all, there are no mosquitoes.
+Travelling is the greatest mistake in the world, and I am going home as
+fast as I can."
+
+"And henceforth, I suppose, your travels will be confined to your
+library," I said, smiling.
+
+"Exactly so. I may say, with Hazlitt, that 'food, warmth, sleep, and a
+book,' are all I require. With those I may make the tour of the world,
+and incur neither expense nor fatigue."
+
+"Books, after all, are friends," I said, with a sigh.
+
+"Sir," replied the traveller, waving his hand somewhat theatrically,
+"books are our first real friends, and our last. I have no others. I
+wish for no others. I rely upon no others. They are the only associates
+upon whom a sensible man may depend. They are always wise, and they are
+always witty. They never intrude upon us when we desire to be alone.
+They never speak ill of us behind our backs. They are never capricious,
+and never surly; neither are they, like some clever folks,
+pertinaciously silent when we most wish them to shine. Did Shakespeare
+ever refuse his best thoughts to us, or Montaigne decline to be
+companionable? Did you ever find Molière dull? or Lamb prosy? or Scott
+unentertaining?"
+
+"You remind me," said I, laughing, "of the student in Chaucer, who
+desired for his only pleasure and society,
+
+     "'---at his bedde's head
+     A'twenty bokes clothed in black and red,
+     Of Aristotle and his philosophy!'"
+
+"Ay," replied my new acquaintance, "but he preferred them expressly to
+'robes riche, or fidel or sautrie,' whereas, I prefer them to men and
+women, and to Aristotle and his philosophy, into the bargain!"
+
+"Your own philosophy, at least, is admirable," said I. "For many a
+year--I might almost say for most years of my life--I have been a
+disciple in the same school."
+
+"Sir, you cannot belong to a better. Think of the convenience of always
+carrying half a dozen intimate friends in your pocket! Good-afternoon."
+
+We had now come to a point where two paths diverged, and the reading
+traveller, always economical of time, opened his book where he had last
+turned down the leaf, and disappeared round the corner.
+
+I never saw him again; but his theory amused me, and, as trifles will
+sometimes do even in the gravest matters, decided me. So the result of
+all my hopes and reflections was, that I went back to England and to the
+student life that had been the dream of my youth.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LV.
+
+MY BIRTHDAY.
+
+Three years of foreign travel, and five of retirement at home, brought
+my twenty-ninth birthday. I was still young, it is true; but how changed
+from that prime of early manhood when I used to play Romeo at midnight
+to Hortense upon her balcony! I looked at myself in the glass that
+morning, and contemplated the wearied, bronzed, and bearded face which
+
+"...seared by toil and something touched by time,"
+
+now gave me back glance for glance. I looked older than my age by many
+years. My eyes had grown grave with a steadfast melancholy, and streaks
+of premature silver gleamed here and there in the still abundant hair
+which had been the solitary vanity of my youth.
+
+"Is she also thus changed and faded?" I asked myself, as I turned away.
+And then I sighed to think that if we met she might not know me.
+
+For I loved her still; worshipped her; raised altars to her in the dusky
+chambers of my memory. My whole life was dedicated to her. My best
+thoughts were hers. My poems, my ambition, my hours of labor, all were
+hers only! I knew now that no time could change the love which had so
+changed me, or dim the sweet remembrance of that face which I carried
+for ever at my heart like an amulet. Other women might be fair, but my
+eyes never sought them; other voices might be sweet, but my ear never
+listened to them; other hands might be soft, but my lips never pressed
+them. She was the only woman in all my world--the only star in all my
+night--the one Eve of my ruined Paradise. In a word, I loved her--loved
+her, I think, more dearly than before I lost her.
+
+     "Love is not love
+     Which alters when it alteration finds,
+     Or bends with the remover to remove:
+     O no! it is an ever-fixed mark,
+     That looks on tempests and is never shaken."
+
+I had that morning received by post a parcel of London papers and
+magazines, which, for a foolish reason of my own, I almost dreaded to
+open; so, putting off the evil hour, I thrust the ominous parcel into my
+pocket and went out to read it in some green solitude, far away among
+the lonely hills and tracts of furzy common that extend for miles and
+miles around my native place. It was a delicious autumn morning, bright
+and fresh and joyous as spring. The purple heather was all abloom along
+the slopes of the hill-sides. The golden sandcliffs glittered in the
+sun. The great firwoods reached away over heights and through
+valleys--"grand and spiritual trees," pointing ever upward with warning
+finger, like the Apostles in the old Italian pictures. Now I passed a
+solitary farm-yard where busy laborers were piling the latest stacks;
+now met a group of happy children gathering wild nuts and blackberries.
+By-and-by, I came upon a great common, with a picturesque mill standing
+high against the sky. All around and about stretched a vast prospect of
+woodland and tufted heath, bounded far off by a range of chalk-hills
+speckled with farm-houses and villages, and melting towards the west
+into a distance faint and far, and mystic as the horizon of a Turner.
+
+Here I threw myself on the green turf and rested. Truly, Nature is a
+great "physician of souls." The peace of the place descended into my
+heart, and hushed for a while the voice of its repinings. The delicious
+air, the living silence of the woods, the dreamy influences of the
+autumnal sunshine, all alike served to lull me into a pleasant mood,
+neither gay nor sad, but very calm--calm enough for the purpose for
+which I had come. So I brought out my packet of papers, summoned all my
+philosophy to my aid, and met my own name upon the second page. For here
+was, as I had anticipated, a critique on my first volume of poems.
+
+Indifference to criticism, if based upon a simple consciousness of moral
+right, is a noble thing. But indifference to criticism, taken in its
+ordinary, and especially its literary sense, is generally a very small
+thing, and resolves itself, for the most part, into a halting and
+one-sided kind of stoicism, meaning indifference to blame and ridicule,
+and never indifference to praise. It is very convenient to the
+disappointed authorling; very effective, in the established writer; but
+it is mere vanity at the root, and equally contemptible in both. For my
+part, I confess that I came to my trial as tremblingly as any poor
+caitiff to the fiery ordeal, and finding myself miraculously clear of
+the burning ploughshares, was quite as full of wonder and thankfulness
+at my good fortune. For I found my purposes appreciated, and my best
+thoughts understood; not, it is true, without some censure, but it was
+censure tempered so largely with encouragement that I drew hope from
+it, and not despondency. And then I thought of Hortense, and, picturing
+to myself all the joy it would have been to lay these things at her
+feet, I turned my face to the grass, and wept like a child.
+
+Then, one by one, the ghosts of my dead hopes rose out of the grave of
+the past and vanished "into thin air" before me; and in their place came
+earnest aspirations, born of the man's strong will. I resolved to use
+wisely the gifts that were mine--to sing well the song that had risen to
+my lips--to "seize the spirit of my time," and turn to noble uses the
+God-given weapons of the poet. So should I be worthier of her
+remembrance, if she yet remembered me--worthier, at all events, to
+remember her.
+
+Thus the hours ebbed, and when I at length rose and turned my face
+homeward, the golden day was already bending westward. Lower and lower
+sank the sun as the miles shortened; stiller and sweeter grew the
+evening air; and ever my lengthening shadow travelled before me along
+the dusty road--wherein I was more fortunate than the man in the German
+story who sold his to the devil.
+
+It was quite dusk by the time I gained the outskirts of the town, and I
+reflected with much contentment upon the prospect of a cosy bachelor
+dinner, and, after dinner, lamplight and a book.
+
+"If you please, sir," said Collins, "a lady has been here."
+
+Collins--the same Collins who had been my father's servant when I was a
+boy at home--was now a grave married man, with hair fast whitening.
+
+"A lady?" I echoed. "One of my cousins, I suppose, from Effingham."
+
+"No, sir," said Collins. "A strange lady--a foreigner."
+
+A stranger! a foreigner! I felt myself change color.
+
+"She left her name?" I asked.
+
+"Her card, sir," said Collins, and handed it to me.
+
+I took it up with fingers that shook in spite of me and read:--
+
+MADLLE DE SAINTE AULAIRE.
+
+I dropped the card, with a sigh of profound disappointment.
+
+"At what time did this lady call, Collins?"
+
+"Not very long after you left the house, sir. She said she would call
+again. She is at the White Horse."
+
+"She shall not have the trouble of coming here," I said, drawing my
+chair to the table. "Send James up to the White Horse with my
+compliments, and say that I will wait upon the lady in about an
+hour's time."
+
+Collins darted away to despatch the message, and returning presently
+with the pale ale, uncorked it dexterously, and stood at the side-board,
+serenely indifferent.
+
+"And what kind of person was this--this Mademoiselle de Sainte Aulaire,
+Collins?" I asked, leisurely bisecting a partridge.
+
+"Can't say, sir, indeed. Lady kept her veil down."
+
+"Humph! Tall or short, Collins?"
+
+"Rather tall, sir."
+
+"Young?"
+
+"Haven't an idea, sir. Voice very pleasant, though."
+
+A pleasant voice has always a certain attraction for me. Hortense's
+voice was exquisite--rich and low, and somewhat deeper than the voices
+of most women.
+
+I took up the card again. Mademoiselle de Sainte Aulaire! Where had I
+heard that name?
+
+"She said nothing of the nature of her business, I suppose, Collins?"
+
+"Nothing at all, sir. Dear me, sir, I beg pardon for not mentioning it
+before; but there's been a messenger over from the White Horse, since
+the lady left, to know if you were yet home."
+
+"Then she is in haste?"
+
+"Very uncommon haste, I should say, sir," replied Collins, deliberately.
+
+I pushed back the untasted dish, and rose directly.
+
+"You should have told me this before," I said, hastily.
+
+"But--but surely, sir, you will dine--"
+
+"I will wait for nothing," I interrupted. "I'll go at once. Had I known
+the lady's business was urgent, I would not have delayed a moment."
+
+Collins cast a mournful glance at the table, and sighed respect fully.
+Before he had recovered from his amazement, I was half way to the inn.
+
+The White Horse was now the leading hostelry of Saxonholme. The old Red
+Lion was no more. Its former host and hostess were dead; a brewery
+occupied its site; and the White Horse was kept by a portly Boniface,
+who had been head-waiter under the extinct dynasty. But there had been
+many changes in Saxonholme since my boyish days, and this was one of the
+least among them.
+
+I was shown into the best sitting-room, preceded by a smart waiter in a
+white neckcloth. At a glance I took in all the bearings of the
+scene--the table with its untasted dessert; the shaded lamp; the closed
+curtains of red damask; the thoughtful figure in the easy chair.
+Although the weather was yet warm, a fire blazed in the grate; but the
+windows were open behind the crimson curtains, and the evening air stole
+gently in. It was like stepping into a picture by Gerard Dow, so closed,
+so glowing, so rich in color.
+
+"Mr. Arbuthnot," said the smart waiter, flinging the door very wide
+open, and lingering to see what might follow.
+
+The lady rose slowly, bowed, waved her hand towards a chair at some
+distance from her own, and resumed her seat. The waiter reluctantly
+left the room.
+
+"I had not intended, sir, to give you the trouble of coming here," said
+Mademoiselle de Sainte Aulaire, using her fan as a handscreen, and
+speaking in a low, and, as it seemed to me, a somewhat constrained
+voice. I could not see her face, but something in the accent made my
+heart leap.
+
+"Pray do not name it, madam," I said. "It is nothing."
+
+She bent her head, as if thanking me, and went on:--
+
+"I have come to this place," she said, "in order to prosecute certain
+inquiries which are of great importance to myself. May I ask if you are
+a native of Saxonholme?"
+
+"I am."
+
+"Were you here in the year 18--?"
+
+"I was."
+
+"Will you give me leave to test your memory respecting some events that
+took place about that time?"
+
+"By all means."
+
+Mademoiselle de Sainte Aulaire thanked me with a gesture, withdrew her
+chair still farther from the radius of the lamp and the tire,
+and said:--
+
+"I must entreat your patience if I first weary you with one or two
+particulars of my family history,"
+
+"Madam, I listen."
+
+During the brief pause that ensued, I tried vainly to distinguish
+something more of her features. I could only trace the outline of a
+slight and graceful figure, the contour of a very slender hand, and the
+ample folds of a dark silk dress.
+
+At length, in a low, sweet voice, she began:--
+
+"Not to impose upon you any dull genealogical details," she said, "I
+will begin by telling you that the Sainte Aulaires are an ancient French
+family of Bearnais extraction, and that my grandfather was the last
+Marquis who bore the title. Holding large possessions in the _comtat_ of
+Venaissin (a district which now forms part of the department of
+Vaucluse) and other demesnes at Montlhéry, in the province of the Ile de
+France---"
+
+"At Montlhéry!" I exclaimed, suddenly recovering the lost link in my
+memory.
+
+"The Sainte Aulaires," continued the lady, without pausing to notice my
+interruption, "were sufficiently wealthy to keep up their social
+position, and to contract alliances with many of the best families in
+the south of France. Towards the early part of the reign of Louis XIII.
+they began to be conspicuous at court, and continued to reside in and
+near Paris up to the period of the Revolution. Marshals of France,
+Envoys, and Ministers of State during a period of nearly a century and a
+half, the Sainte Aulaires had enjoyed too many honors not to be among
+the first of those who fell in the Reign of Terror. My grandfather, who,
+as I have already said, was the last Marquis bearing the title, was
+seized with his wife and daughter at his Château near Montlhéry in the
+spring-time of 1793, and carried to La Force. Thence, after a mock
+trial, they were all three conveyed to execution, and publicly
+guillotined on the sixth of June in the same year. Do you follow me?"
+
+"Perfectly."
+
+"One survivor, however, remained in the person of Charles Armand, Prévôt
+de Sainte Aulaire, only son of the Marquis, then a youth of seventeen
+years of age, and pursuing his studies in the seclusion of an old family
+seat in Vaucluse. He fled into Italy. In the meantime, his inheritance
+was confiscated; and the last representative of the race, reduced to
+exile and beggary, assumed another name. It were idle to attempt to map
+out his life through the years that followed. He wandered from land to
+land; lived none knew how; became a tutor, a miniature-painter, a
+volunteer at Naples under General Pepe, a teacher of languages in
+London, corrector of the press to a publishing house in
+Brussels--everything or anything, in short, by which he could honorably
+earn his bread. During these years of toil and poverty, he married. The
+lady was an orphan, of Scotch extraction, poor and proud as himself, and
+governess in a school near Brussels. She died in the third year of their
+union, and left him with one little daughter. This child became
+henceforth his only care and happiness. While she was yet a mere infant,
+he placed her in the school where her mother had been teacher. There she
+remained, first as pupil, by-and-by as governess, for more than sixteen
+years. The child was called by an old family name that had been her
+grandmother's and her great-grandmother's in the high and palmy days of
+the Sainte Aulaires--Hortense."
+
+"Hortense!" I cried, rising from my chair.
+
+"It is not an uncommon name," said the lady. "Does it surprise you?"
+
+"I--I beg your pardon, madam," I stammered, resuming my seat. "I once
+had a dear friend of that name. Pray, go on."
+
+"For ten years the refugee contrived to keep his little Hortense in the
+safe and pleasant shelter of her Flemish home. He led a wandering life,
+no one knew where; and earned his money, no one knew how. Travel-worn
+and careworn, he was prematurely aged, and at fifty might well have been
+mistaken for a man of sixty-five or seventy. Poor and broken as he was,
+however, Monsieur de Sainte Aulaire was every inch a gentleman of the
+old school; and his little girl was proud of him, when he came to the
+school to see her. This, however, was very seldom--never oftener than
+twice or three times in the year. When she saw him for the last time,
+Hortense was about thirteen years of age. He looked paler, and thinner,
+and poorer than ever; and when he bade her farewell, it was as if under
+the presentiment that they might meet no more. He then told her, for the
+first time, something of his story, and left with her at parting a small
+coffer containing his decorations, a few trinkets that had been his
+mother's, and his sword--the badge of his nobility."
+
+The lady's voice faltered. I neither spoke nor stirred, but sat like a
+man of stone.
+
+Then she went on again:--
+
+"The father never came again. The child, finding herself after a certain
+length of time thrown upon the charity of her former instructors, was
+glad to become under-teacher in their school. The rest of her history
+may be told in a few words. From under-teacher she became head-teacher,
+and at eighteen passed as governess into a private family. At twenty she
+removed to Paris, and set foot for the first time in the land of her
+fathers. All was now changed in France. The Bourbons reigned again, and
+her father, had he reappeared, might have reclaimed his lost estates.
+She sought him far and near. She employed agents to discover him. She
+could not believe that he was dead. To be once again clasped in his
+arms--to bring him back to his native country---to see him resume his
+name and station--this was the bright dream of her life. To accomplish
+these things she labored in many ways, teaching and writing; for
+Hortense also was proud--too proud to put forward an unsupported claim.
+For with her father were lost the title-deeds and papers that might have
+made the daughter wealthy, and she had no means of proving her identity.
+Still she labored heartily, lived poorly, and earned enough to push her
+inquiries far and wide--even to journey hither and thither, whenever she
+fancied, alas! that a clue had been found. Twice she travelled into
+Switzerland, and once into Italy, but always in vain. The exile had too
+well concealed, even from her, his _sobriquet_ and his calling, and
+Hortense at last grew weary of failure. One fact, however, she succeeded
+in discovering, and only one--namely, that her father had, many years
+before, made some attempt to establish his claims to the estates, but
+that he had failed for want either of sufficient proof, or of means to
+carry on the _procés_. Of even this circumstance only a meagre
+law-record remained, and she could succeed in learning no more. Since
+then, a claim has been advanced by a remote branch of the Sainte Aulaire
+family, and the cause is, even now, in course of litigation."
+
+She paused, as if fatigued by so long talking; but, seeing me about to
+speak, prevented me with a gesture of the hand, and resumed:--
+
+"Hortense de Ste. Aulaire continued to live in Paris for nearly five
+years, at the end of which time she left it to seek out the members of
+her mother's family. Finding them kindly disposed towards her, she took
+up her abode amongst them in the calm seclusion of a remote Scotch town.
+There, even there, she still hoped, still employed agents; still yearned
+to discover, if not her father, at least her father's grave. Several
+years passed thus. She continued to earn a modest subsistence by her
+pen, till at length the death of one of those Scotch relatives left her
+mistress of a small inheritance. Money was welcome, since it enabled
+her to pursue her task with renewed vigor. She searched farther and
+deeper. A trivial circumstance eagerly followed up brought a train of
+other circumstances to light. She discovered that her father had assumed
+a certain name; she found that the bearer of this name was a wandering
+man, a conjuror by trade; she pursued the vague traces of his progress
+from town to town, from county to county, sometimes losing, sometimes
+regaining the scattered links. Sir, he was my father--I am that
+Hortense. I have spent my life seeking him--I have lived for this one
+hope. I have traced his footsteps here to Saxonholme, and here the last
+clue fails. If you know anything--if you can remember anything---"
+
+Calm and collected as she had been at first, she was trembling now, and
+her voice died away in sobs. The firelight fell upon her face--upon the
+face of my lost love!
+
+I also was profoundly agitated.
+
+"Hortense," I said, "do you not know, that he who stood beside your
+father in his last hour, and he who so loved you years ago, are one and
+the same? Alas! why did you not tell me these things long since?"
+
+"Did _you_ stand beside my father's deathbed?" she asked brokenly.
+
+"I did."
+
+She clasped her hands over her eyes and shuddered, as if beneath the
+pressure of a great physical pain.
+
+"O God!" she murmured, "so many years of denial and suffering! so many
+years of darkness that might have been dispelled by a word!"
+
+We were both silent for a long time. Then I told her all that I
+remembered of her father; how he came to Saxonholme--how he fell
+ill--how he died, and was buried. It was a melancholy recital; painful
+for me to relate--painful for her to hear--and interrupted over and over
+again by questions and tears, and bursts of unavailing sorrow.
+
+"We will visit his grave to-morrow," I said, when all was told.
+
+She bent her head.
+
+"To-morrow, then," said she, "I end the pilgrimage of years."
+
+"And--and afterwards?" I faltered.
+
+"Afterwards? Alas! friend, when the hopes of years fall suddenly to dust
+and ashes, one feels as if there were no future to follow?"
+
+"It is true," I said gloomily. "I know it too well."
+
+"You know it?" she exclaimed, looking up.
+
+"I know it, Hortense. There was a moment in which all the hope, and the
+fulness, and the glory of my life went down at a blow. Have you not
+heard of ships that have gone to the bottom in fair weather, suddenly,
+with all sail set, and every hand on board?"
+
+She looked at me with a strange earnestness in her eyes, and sighed
+heavily.
+
+"What have you been doing all this time, fellow-student?" she asked,
+after a pause.
+
+The old name sounded very sweet upon her lips!
+
+"I? Alas!--nothing."
+
+"But you are a surgeon, are you not?"
+
+"No. I never even went up for examination. I gave up all idea of
+medicine as a profession when my father died."
+
+"What are you, then?"
+
+"An idler upon the great highway--a book-dreamer--a library fixture."
+
+Hortense looked at me thoughtfully, with her cheek resting on her hand.
+
+"Have you done nothing but read and dream?"
+
+"Not quite. I have travelled."
+
+"With what object?"
+
+"A purely personal one. I was alone and unhappy, and--"
+
+"And fancied that purposeless wandering was better for you than healthy
+labor. Well, you have travelled, and you have read books. What more?"
+
+"Nothing more, except--"
+
+"Except what?"
+
+I chanced to have one of the papers in my pocket, and so drew it out,
+and placed it before her.
+
+"I have been a rhymer as well as a dreamer," I said, shyly. "Perhaps the
+rhymes grew out of the dreams, as the dreams themselves grew out of
+something else which has been underlying my life this many a year. At
+all events I have hewn a few of them into shape, and trusted them to
+paper and type--and here is a critique which came to me this morning
+with some three or four others."
+
+She took the paper with a smile half of wonder, half of kindness, and,
+glancing quickly through it, said:--
+
+"This is well. This is very well. I must read the book. Will you lend it
+to me?"
+
+"I will give it to you," I replied; "if I can give you that which is
+already yours."
+
+"Already mine?"
+
+"Yes, as the poet in me, however worthless, is all and only yours! Do
+you suppose, Hortense, that I have ever ceased to love you? As my songs
+are born of my sorrow, so my sorrow was born of my love; and love, and
+sorrow, and song, such as they are, are of your making."
+
+"Hush!" she said, with something of her old gay indifference. "Your
+literary sins must not be charged upon me, fellow-student! I have enough
+of my own to answer for. Besides, I am not going to acquit you so
+easily. Granted that you have written a little book of poetry--what
+then? Have you done nothing else? Nothing active? Nothing manly?
+Nothing useful?"
+
+"If by usefulness and activity you mean manual labor, I certainly have
+neither felled a tree, nor ploughed a field, nor hammered a horse-shoe.
+I have lived by thought alone."
+
+"Then I fear you have lived a very idle life," said Hortense, smiling.
+"Are you married?"
+
+"Married!" I echoed, indignantly. "How can you ask the question?"
+
+"You are not a magistrate?"
+
+"Certainly not."
+
+"In short, then, you are perfectly useless. You play no part, domestic
+or public. You serve neither the state nor the community. You are a mere
+cypher--a make-weight in the social scale--an article of no value to any
+one except the owner."
+
+"Not even the latter, mademoiselle," I replied, bitterly. "It is long
+since I have ceased to value my own life."
+
+She smiled again, but her eyes this time were full of tears.
+
+"Nay," said she, softly, "am I not the owner?"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Great joys at first affect us like great griefs. We are stunned by them,
+and know not how deep they are till the night comes with its solemn
+stillness, and we are alone with our own hearts. Then comes the season
+of thankfulness, and wonder and joy. Then our souls rise up within us,
+and chant a hymn of praise; and the great vault of Heaven is as the roof
+of a mighty cathedral studded with mosaics of golden stars, and the
+night winds join in with the bass of their mighty organ-pipes; and the
+poplars rustle, like the leaves of the hymn-books in the hands of the
+congregation.
+
+So it was with me that evening when I went forth into the quiet fields
+where the summer moon was shining, and knew that Hortense was mine at
+last--mine now and for ever. Overjoyed and restless, I wandered about
+for hours. I could not go home. I felt I must breathe the open air of
+the hills, and tread the dewy grass, and sing my hymn of praise and
+thanksgiving after my own fashion. At length, as the dawning light came
+widening up the east, I turned my steps homewards, and before the sun
+had risen above the farthest pine-ridge, I was sleeping the sweetest
+sleep that had been mine for years.
+
+The conjuror's grave was green with grass and purple with wild thyme
+when Hortense knelt beside it, and there consummated the weary
+pilgrimage of half a life. The sapling willow had spread its arms above
+him in a pleasant canopy, leaning farther and reaching higher, year
+by year,
+
+"And lo! the twig to which they laid his head had now become a tree!"
+
+Hortense found nothing of her father but this grave. Papers and
+title-deeds there were none.
+
+I well remembered the anxious search made thirteen years ago, when not
+even a card was found to indicate the whereabouts of his friends or
+family. Not to lose the vestige of a chance, we pushed inquiry farther;
+but in vain. Our rector, now a very old man, remembered nothing of the
+wandering lecturer. Mine host and hostess of the Red Lion were both
+dead. The Red Lion itself had disappeared, and become a thing of
+tradition. All was lost and forgotten; and of all her hereditary wealth,
+station, and honors, Hortense de Sainte Aulaire retained nothing but her
+father's sword and her ancestral name.
+
+--Not even the latter for many weeks, O discerning reader! for before
+the golden harvest was gathered in, we two were wedded.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LVI.
+
+BRINGETH THIS TRUE STORY TO AN END.
+
+     Ye who have traced the pilgrim to the scene
+     Which is his last, if in your memories dwell
+     A thought that once was his, if on ye swell
+     A single recollection, not in vain
+     He wore his sandal shoon and scallop-shell.
+
+     BYRON.
+
+Having related the story of my life as it happened, incident by
+incident, and brought it down to that point at which stories are wont to
+end, I find that I have little to add respecting others. My narrative
+from first to last has been purely personal. The one love of my life was
+Hortense--the one friend of my life, Oscar Dalrymple. The catalogue of
+my acquaintances would scarcely number so many names as I have fingers
+on one hand. The two first are still mine; the latter, having been
+brought forward only in so far as they re-acted upon my feelings or
+modified my experiences, have become, for the most part, mere memories,
+and so vanish, ghost-like, from the page. Franz Müller is studying in
+Rome, having carried off a prize at the Ecole des Beaux Arts, which
+entitles him to three years at the Villa Medici, that Ultima Thule of
+the French art-student's ambition. I hear that he is as full of whim and
+jest as ever, and the very life of the Café Greco. May I some day hear
+his pleasant laugh again! Dr. Chéron, I believe, is still practising in
+Paris; and Monsieur de Simoncourt, I have no doubt, continues to
+exercise the profession of Chevalier d'Industrie, with such failures and
+successes as are incidental to that career.
+
+As for my early _amourettes_, they have disappeared from my path as
+utterly as though they had never crossed it. Of Madame de Marignan, I
+have neither heard, nor desired to hear, more. Even Josephine's pretty
+face is fast fading from my memory. It is ever thus with the transient
+passions of _our première jeunesse._ We believe in them for the moment,
+and waste laughter and tears, chaplets and sackcloth, upon them.
+Presently the delusion passes; the earnest heart within us is awakened;
+and we know that till now we have been mere actors in "a masquerade of
+dreams." The chaplets were woven of artificial flowers. The funeral was
+a mock funeral--the banquet a stage feast of painted fruits and empty
+goblets! Alas! we cannot undo that foolish past. We may only hope to
+blot it out with after records of high, and wise, and tender things.
+Thus it is that the young man's heart is like the precious palimpsest of
+old. He first of all defiles it with idle anacreontics in praise of love
+and wine; but, erasing these by-and-by with his own pious hand, he
+writes it over afresh with chronicles of a pure and holy passion, and
+dedicates it to the fair saint of all his orisons.
+
+Dalrymple and his wife are now settled in Italy, having purchased a
+villa in the neighborhood of Spezzia, where they live in great
+retirement. In their choice of such retirement they are influenced by
+more than one good reason. In the first place, the death of the Vicomte
+de Caylus was an event likely to be productive of many unpleasant
+consequences to one who had deprived the French government of so
+distinguished an officer. In the next, Dalrymple is a poor man, and his
+wife is no longer rich; so that Italy agrees with their means as well as
+with their tastes. Lastly, they love each other so well that they never
+weary of their solitude, nor care to barter away their blue Italian
+skies and solemn pine-woods for the glittering unrest of society.
+
+Fascinated by Dalrymple's description of his villa and the life he led
+in it, Hortense and I made up our minds some few weeks after our
+marriage, to visit that part of Italy--perhaps, in case we were much
+pleased with it, to settle there, for at least a few years. So I
+prepared once more to leave my father's house; this time to let it, for
+I knew that I should never live in it again.
+
+It took some weeks to clear the old place out. The thing was necessary;
+yet I felt as if it were a kind of sacrilege. To disturb the old dust
+upon the library-shelves and select such books as I cared to keep; to
+sort and destroy all kinds of hoarded papers; to ransack desks that had
+never been unlocked since the hands that last closed them were laid to
+rest for ever, constituted my share of the work. Hortense superintended
+the rest. As for the household goods, we resolved to keep nothing, save
+a few old family portraits and my father's plate, some of which had
+descended to us through two or three centuries.
+
+While yet in this unsettled state, with the house all in confusion and
+the time appointed for our journey drawing nearer and nearer day by day,
+a strange thing happened.
+
+At the end of the garden, encroaching partly upon a corner of it, and
+opening into the lane that bounded it on the other side of the hedge,
+stood the stable belonging to the house.
+
+It had been put to no use since my father's time, and was now so
+thoroughly out of repair that I resolved to have it pulled down and
+rebuilt before letting it to strangers. In the meantime, I went down
+there one morning with a workman before the work of demolition
+was begun.
+
+We had some difficulty to get in, for the lock and hinges were rusted,
+and the floor within was choked with fallen rubbish. At length we
+forced an entrance. I thought I had never seen a more dreary interior.
+My father's old chaise was yet standing there, with both wheels off. The
+mouldy harness was dropping to pieces on the walls. The beams were
+festooned with cobwebs. The very ladder leading to the loft above was so
+rotten that I scarcely dared trust to it for a footing.
+
+Having trusted to it, however, I found myself in a still more ruinous
+and dreary hole. The posts supporting the roof were insecure; the tiles
+were all displaced overhead; and the rafters showed black and bare
+against the sky in many places. In one corner lay a heap of mouldy
+straw, and at the farther end, seen dimly through the darkness, a pile
+of old lumber, and--by Heaven! the pagoda-canopy of many colors, and the
+little Chevalier's Conjuring Table!
+
+I could scarcely believe my eyes. My poor Hortense! Here, at last, were
+some relics of her father; but found in how strange a place, and by how
+strange a chance!
+
+I had them dragged out into the light, all mildewed and cob-webbed as
+they were; whereupon an army of spiders rushed out in every direction, a
+bat rose up, shrieking, and whirled in blind circles overhead. In a
+corner of the pagoda we found an empty bird's-nest. The table was small,
+and could be got out without much difficulty; so I helped the workman to
+carry it down the ladder, and sending it on before me to the house,
+sauntered back through the glancing shadows of the acacia-leaves, musing
+upon the way in which these long-forgotten things had been brought to
+light, and wondering how they came to be stored away in my own stable.
+
+"Do you know anything about it, Collins?" I said, coming up suddenly
+behind him in the hall.
+
+"About what, sir?" asked that respectable servant, looking round with
+some perplexity, as if in search of the nominative.
+
+I pointed to the table, now being carried into the dismantled
+dining-room.
+
+Collins smiled--he had a remarkably civil, apologetic way of smiling
+behind his hand, as if it were a yawn or a liberty.
+
+"Oh, sir," said he, "don't you remember? To be sure, you were quite a
+young gentleman at that time--but---"
+
+"But what?" I interrupted, impatiently.
+
+"Why, sir, that table once belonged to a poor little conjuring chap who
+called himself Almond Pudding, and died...."
+
+I checked him with a gesture.
+
+"I know all that," I said, hastily. "I remember it perfectly; but how
+came the things into my stable?"
+
+"Your respected father and my honored master, sir, had them conveyed
+there when the Red Lion was sold off," said Collins, with a sidelong
+glance at the dining-room door. "He was of opinion, sir, that they might
+some day identify the poor man to his relatives, in case of inquiry."
+
+I heard the sound of a suppressed sob, and, brushing past him without
+another word, went in and closed the door.
+
+"My own Hortense!" I said, taking her into my arms. "My wife!"
+
+Pale and tearful, she lifted her face from my shoulder, and pointed to
+the table.
+
+"I know what it is," she faltered. "You need not tell me. My heart tells
+me!"
+
+I led her to a chair, and explained how and where it had been found. I
+even told her of the little empty nest from which the young birds had
+long since flown away. In this tiny incident there was something
+pathetic that soothed her; so, presently, when she left off weeping, we
+examined the table together.
+
+It was a quaint, fragile, ricketty thing, with slender twisted legs of
+black wood, and a cloth-covered top that had once been green, but now
+retained no vestige of its original color. This cloth top was covered
+with slender slits of various shapes and sizes, round, square,
+sexagonal, and so forth, which, being pressed with the finger, fell
+inwards and disclosed little hiding-places sunk in the well of the
+table; but which, as soon as the pressure was removed, flew up again by
+means of concealed springs, and closed as neatly as before.
+
+"This is strange," said Hortense, peering into one of the recesses. "I
+have found something in the table! Look--it is a watch!"
+
+I snatched it from her, and carried it to the window. Blackened and
+discolored as it was, I recognised it instantly.
+
+It was my own watch--my own watch of which I was so boyishly vain years
+and years ago, and which I had lost so unaccountably on the night of the
+Chevalier's performance! There were my initials engraved on the back,
+amid a forest of flourishes, and there on the dial was that identical
+little Cupid with the cornucopia of flowers, which I once thought such a
+miracle of workmanship! Alas! what a mighty march old Time had stolen
+upon me, while that little watch was standing still!
+
+"Oh, Heaven!--oh, husband!"
+
+Startled from my reverie more by the tone than the words, I turned and
+saw Hortense with a packet of papers in her hand--old, yellow, dusty
+papers, tied together with a piece of black ribbon.
+
+"I found them there--there--there!" she faltered, pointing to a drawer
+in the table which I now saw for the first time. "I chanced to press
+that little knob, and the drawer flew out. Oh, my dear father!--see,
+Basil, here are his patents of nobility--here is the certificate of my
+birth--here are the title-deeds of the manor of Sainte Aulaire! This
+alone was wanted to complete our happiness!"
+
+"We will keep the table, Hortense, all our lives!" I explained, when the
+first agitation was past.
+
+"As sacredly," replied she, "as it kept this precious secret!"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+My task is done. Here on my desk lies the piled-up manuscript which has
+been my companion through so many pleasant hours. Those hours are over
+now. I may lay down my pen, and put aside the whispering vine-leaves
+from my casement, and lean out into the sweet Italian afternoon, as idly
+as though I wore to the climate and the manner born.
+
+The world to-day is only half awake. The little white town, crouched
+down by the "beached margent" of the bay, winks with its glittering
+windows and dozes in the sunshine. The very cicalas are silent. The
+fishermen's barques, with their wing-like sails all folded to rest, rock
+lazily at anchor, like sea-birds asleep. The cork-trees nod languidly to
+each other; and not even yonder far-away marble peaks are more
+motionless than that cloud which hangs like a white banner in the sky.
+Hush! I can almost believe that I hear the drowsy washing of the tide
+against the ruined tower on the beach.
+
+And this is the bay of Spezzia--the lovely, treacherous bay of Spezzia,
+where our English Shelley lost his gentle life! How blue those cruel
+waters are to-day! Bluer, by Heaven! than the sky, with scarce a ripple
+setting to the shore.
+
+We are very happy in our remote Italian home. It stands high upon a
+hill-side, and looks down over a slope of silvery olives to the sea.
+Vineyard and orange grove, white town, blue bay, and amber sands lie
+mapped out beneath our feet. Not a felucca "to Spezzia bound from Cape
+Circella" can sail past without our observation.
+
+     "Not a sun can die, nor yet be born, unseen
+     By dwellers at my villa."
+
+Nay, from this very window, one might almost pitch an orange into the
+empty vettura standing in the courtyard of the Croce di Malta!
+
+Then we have a garden--a wild, uncultured place, where figs and lemons,
+olives "blackening sullen ripe," and prickly aloes flourish in rank
+profusion, side by side; and a loggia, where we sit at twilight drinking
+our Chianti wine and listening to the nightingales; and a study looking
+out on the bay through a trellis of vine-leaves, where we read and write
+together, surrounded by our books. Here, also, just opposite my desk,
+hangs Müller's copy of that portrait of the Marquise de Sainte Aulaire,
+which I once gave to Hortense, and which is now my own again. How often
+I pause upon the unturned page, how often lay my pen aside, to look from
+the painting to the dear, living face beneath it! For there she sits,
+day after day, my wife! my poet! with the side-light falling on her
+hair, and the warm sea-breezes stirring the soft folds of her dress.
+Sometimes she lifts her eyes, those wondrous eyes, luminous from within
+"with the light of the rising soul"--and then we talk awhile of our
+work, or of our love, believing ever that
+
+     "Our work shall still be better for our love,
+     And still our love be sweeter for our work."
+
+Perhaps the original of that same painting in the study may yet be ours
+some day, with the old château in which it hangs, and all the broad
+lands belonging thereunto. Our claim has been put forward some time now,
+and our lawyers are confident of success. Shall we be happier, if that
+success is ours? Can rank add one grace, or wealth one pleasure, to a
+life which is already so perfect? I think not, and there are moments
+when I almost wish that we may never have it in our power to test
+the question.
+
+But stay! the hours fly past. The sun is low, and the tender Italian
+twilight will soon close in. Then, when the moon rises, we shall sail
+out upon the bay in our own tiny felucca; or perhaps go down through the
+town to that white villa gleaming out above the dark tops of yonder
+cypresses, and spend some pleasant hours with Dalrymple and his wife.
+They, too, are very happy; but their happiness is of an older date than
+ours, and tends to other ends. They have bought lands in the
+neighborhood, which they cultivate; and they have children whom they
+adore. To educate these little ones for the wide world lying beyond that
+blue bay and the far-off mountains, is the one joy, the one care of
+their lives. Truly has it been said that
+
+     "A happy family
+     Is but an earlier heaven."
+
+THE END.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of In the Days of My Youth
+by Amelia Ann Blandford Edwards
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+Project Gutenberg's In the Days of My Youth, by Amelia Ann Blandford Edwards
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+Title: In the Days of My Youth
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+Author: Amelia Ann Blandford Edwards
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+Release Date: May 26, 2004 [EBook #12442]
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+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK IN THE DAYS OF MY YOUTH ***
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+
+<h3>IN THE</h3>
+<h1>DAYS OF MY YOUTH.</h1>
+<h2>A NOVEL.</h2>
+<br>
+<h5>BY</h5>
+<h3>AMELIA B. EDWARDS</h3>
+<h5>1874</h5>
+<p class="ctr"><img src="images/001.png" width="15%" alt=""></p>
+<center>[<a href="#CHAPTER_I.">1</a>] [<a href=
+"#CHAPTER_II.">2</a>] [<a href="#CHAPTER_III.">3</a>] [<a href=
+"#CHAPTER_IV.">4</a>] [<a href="#CHAPTER_V.">5</a>] [<a href=
+"#CHAPTER_VI.">6</a>] [<a href="#CHAPTER_VII.">7</a>] [<a href=
+"#CHAPTER_VIII.">8</a>] [<a href="#CHAPTER_IX.">9</a>] [<a href=
+"#CHAPTER_X.">10</a>]<br>
+[<a href="#CHAPTER_XI.">11</a>] [<a href="#CHAPTER_XII.">12</a>]
+[<a href="#CHAPTER_XIII.">13</a>] [<a href="#CHAPTER_XIV.">14</a>]
+[<a href="#CHAPTER_XV.">15</a>] [<a href="#CHAPTER_XVI.">16</a>]
+[<a href="#CHAPTER_XVII.">17</a>] [<a href=
+"#CHAPTER_XVIII.">18</a>] [<a href="#CHAPTER_XIX.">19</a>]
+[<a href="#CHAPTER_XX.">20</a>]<br>
+[<a href="#CHAPTER_XXI.">21</a>] [<a href="#CHAPTER_XXII.">22</a>]
+[<a href="#CHAPTER_XXIII.">23</a>] [<a href=
+"#CHAPTER_XXIV.">24</a>] [<a href="#CHAPTER_XXV.">25</a>] [<a href=
+"#CHAPTER_XXVI.">26</a>] [<a href="#CHAPTER_XXVII.">27</a>]
+[<a href="#CHAPTER_XXVIII.">28</a>] [<a href=
+"#CHAPTER_XXIX.">29</a>] [<a href="#CHAPTER_XXX.">30</a>]<br>
+[<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXI.">31</a>] [<a href=
+"#CHAPTER_XXXII.">32</a>] [<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXIII.">33</a>]
+[<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXIV.">34</a>] [<a href=
+"#CHAPTER_XXXV.">35</a>] [<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXVI.">36</a>]
+[<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXVII.">37</a>] [<a href=
+"#CHAPTER_XXXVIII.">38</a>] [<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXIX.">39</a>]
+[<a href="#CHAPTER_XL.">40</a>]<br>
+[<a href="#CHAPTER_XLI.">41</a>] [<a href="#CHAPTER_XLII.">42</a>]
+[<a href="#CHAPTER_XLIII.">43</a>] [<a href=
+"#CHAPTER_XLIV.">44</a>] [<a href="#CHAPTER_XLV.">45</a>] [<a href=
+"#CHAPTER_XLVI.">46</a>] [<a href="#CHAPTER_XLVII.">47</a>]
+[<a href="#CHAPTER_XLVIII.">48</a>] [<a href=
+"#CHAPTER_XLIX.">49</a>] [<a href="#CHAPTER_L.">50</a>]<br>
+[<a href="#CHAPTER_LI.">51</a>] [<a href="#CHAPTER_LII.">52</a>]
+[<a href="#CHAPTER_LIII.">53</a>] [<a href="#CHAPTER_LIV.">54</a>]
+[<a href="#CHAPTER_LV.">55</a>] [<a href=
+"#CHAPTER_LVI.">56</a>]</center>
+<br>
+<p class="ctr"><img src="images/002.png" width="15%" alt=""></p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_I."></a>CHAPTER I.</h2>
+<h3>MY BIRTHPLACE AND PARENTAGE.</h3>
+<center>Dolce sentier,<br>
+Colle, che mi piacesti,<br>
+Ov'ancor per usanza amor mi mena!<br>
+<br>
+PETRARCH.</center>
+<br>
+<p>Sweet, secluded, shady Saxonholme! I doubt if our whole England
+contains another hamlet so quaint, so picturesquely irregular, so
+thoroughly national in all its rustic characteristics. It lies in a
+warm hollow environed by hills. Woods, parks and young plantations
+clothe every height and slope for miles around, whilst here and
+there, peeping down through green vistas, or towering above
+undulating seas of summer foliage, stands many a fine old country
+mansion, turreted and gabled, and built of that warm red brick that
+seems to hold the light of the sunset long after it has faded from
+the rest of the landscape. A silver thread of streamlet, swift but
+shallow, runs noisily through the meadows beside the town and loses
+itself in the Chad, about a mile and a half farther eastward. Many
+a picturesque old wooden bridge, many a foaming weir and ruinous
+water-mill with weedy wheel, may be found scattered up and down the
+wooded banks of this little river Chad; while to the brook, which
+we call the Gipstream, attaches a vague tradition of trout.</p>
+<p>The hamlet itself is clean and old-fashioned, consisting of one
+long, straggling street, and a few tributary lanes and passages.
+The houses some few years back were mostly long and low-fronted,
+with projecting upper stories, and diamond-paned bay-windows
+bowered in with myrtle and clematis; but modern improvements have
+done much of late to sweep away these antique tenements, and a fine
+new suburb of Italian and Gothic villas has sprung up, between the
+town and the railway station. Besides this, we have a new church in
+the medi&aelig;val style, rich in gilding and colors and
+thirteenth-century brass-work; and a new cemetery, laid out like a
+pleasure-garden; and a new school-house, where the children are
+taught upon a system with a foreign name; and a Mechanics'
+Institute, where London professors come down at long intervals to
+expound popular science, and where agriculturists meet to discuss
+popular grievances.</p>
+<p>At the other extremity of the town, down by Girdlestone Grange,
+an old moated residence where the squire's family have resided
+these four centuries past, we are full fifty years behind our
+modern neighbors. Here stands our famous old "King's-head Inn," a
+well-known place of resort so early as the reign of Elizabeth. The
+great oak beside the porch is as old as the house itself; and on
+the windows of a little disused parlor overlooking the garden may
+still be seen the names of Sedley, Rochester and other wits of the
+Restoration. They scrawled those autographs after dinner, most
+likely, with their diamond rings, and went reeling afterwards,
+arm-in-arm, along the village street, singing and swearing, and
+eager for adventures--as gentlemen were wont to be in those famous
+old times when they drank the king's health more freely than was
+good for their own.</p>
+<p>Not far from the "King's Head," and almost hidden by the trees
+which divide it from the road, stands an ancient charitable
+institution called the College--quadrangular, mullion-windowed,
+many-gabled, and colonized by some twenty aged people of both
+sexes. At the back of the college, adjoining a space of waste
+ground and some ruined cloisters, lies the churchyard, in the midst
+of which, surrounded by solemn yews and mouldering tombs, stands
+the Priory Church. It is a rare old church, founded, according to
+the county history, in the reign of Edward the Confessor, and
+entered with a full description in Domesday Book. Its sculptured
+monuments and precious brasses, its Norman crypt, carved stalls and
+tattered banners drooping over faded scutcheons, tell all of
+generations long gone by, of noble families extinct, of gallant
+deeds forgotten, of knights and ladies remembered only by the names
+above their graves. Amongst these, some two or three modest tablets
+record the passing away of several generations of my own
+predecessors--obscure professional men for the most part, of whom
+some few became soldiers and died abroad.</p>
+<p>In close proximity to the church stands the vicarage, once the
+Priory; a quaint old rambling building, surrounded by magnificent
+old trees. Here for long centuries, a tribe of rooks have held
+undisputed possession, filling the boughs with their nests and the
+air with their voices, and, like genuine lords of the soil,
+descending at their own grave will and pleasure upon the adjacent
+lands.</p>
+<p>Picturesque and medi&aelig;val as all these old buildings and
+old associations help to make us, we of Saxonholme pretend to
+something more. We claim to be, not only picturesque but historic.
+Nay, more than this--we are classical. WE WERE FOUNDED BY THE
+ROMANS. A great Roman road, well known to antiquaries, passed
+transversely through the old churchyard. Roman coins and relics,
+and fragments of tesselated pavement, have been found in and about
+the town. Roman camps may be traced on most of the heights around.
+Above all, we are said to be indebted to the Romans for that
+inestimable breed of poultry in right of which we have for years
+carried off the leading prizes at every poultry-show in the county,
+and have even been enabled to make head against the exaggerated
+pretensions of modern Cochin-China interlopers.</p>
+<p>Such, briefly sketched, is my native Saxonholme. Born beneath
+the shade of its towering trees and overhanging eaves, brought up
+to reverence its antiquities, and educated in the love of its
+natural beauties, what wonder that I cling to it with every fibre
+of my heart, and even when affecting to smile at my own fond
+prejudice, continue to believe it the loveliest peacefulest nook in
+rural England?</p>
+<p>My father's name was John Arbuthnot. Sprung from the Arbuthnots
+of Montrose, we claim to derive from a common ancestor with the
+celebrated author of "Martinus Scriblerus." Indeed, the first of
+our name who settled at Saxonholme was one James Arbuthnot, son to
+a certain nonjuring parson Arbuthnot, who lived and died abroad,
+and was own brother to that famous wit, physician and courtier
+whose genius, my father was wont to say, conferred a higher
+distinction upon our branch of the family than did those Royal
+Letters-Patent whereby the elder stock was ennobled by His most
+Gracious Majesty King George the Fourth, on the occasion of his
+visit to Edinburgh in 1823. From this James Arbuthnot (who, being
+born and bred at St. Omer, and married, moreover, to a French wife,
+was himself half a Frenchman) we Saxonholme Arbuthnots were the
+direct descendants.</p>
+<p>Our French ancestress, according to the family tradition, was of
+no very exalted origin, being in fact the only daughter and heiress
+of one Monsieur Tartine, Perruquier in chief at the Court of
+Versailles. But what this lady wanted in birth, she made up in
+fortune, and the modest estate which her husband purchased with her
+dowry came down to us unimpaired through five generations. In the
+substantial and somewhat foreign-looking red-brick house which he
+built (also, doubtless, with Madame's Louis d'ors) we, his
+successors, had lived and died ever since. His portrait, together
+with the portraits of his wife, son, and grandson, hung on the
+dining-room walls; and of the quaint old spindle-legged chairs and
+tables that had adorned our best rooms from time immemorial, some
+were supposed to date as far back as the first founding and
+furnishing of the house.</p>
+<p>It is almost needless to say that the son of the non-juror and
+his immediate posterity were staunch Jacobites, one and all. I am
+not aware that they ever risked or suffered anything for the cause;
+but they were not therefore the less vehement. Many were the signs
+and tokens of that dead-and-gone political faith which these loyal
+Arbuthnots left behind them. In the bed-rooms there hung prints of
+King James the Second at the Battle of the Boyne; of the Royal
+Martyr with his plumed hat, lace collar, and melancholy fatal face;
+of the Old and Young Pretenders; of the Princess Louisa Teresia,
+and of the Cardinal York. In the library were to be found all kinds
+of books relating to the career of that unhappy family: "Ye
+Tragicall History of ye Stuarts, 1697;" "Memoirs of King James II.,
+writ by his own hand;" "La Stuartide," an unfinished epic in the
+French language by one Jean de Schelandre; "The Fate of Majesty
+exemplified in the barbarous and disloyal treatment (by traitorous
+and undutiful subjects) of the Kings and Queens of the Royal House
+of Stuart," genealogies of the Stuarts in English, French and
+Latin; a fine copy of "Eikon Basilike," bound in old red morocco,
+with the royal arms stamped upon the cover; and many other volumes
+on the same subject, the names of which (although as a boy I was
+wont to pore over their contents with profound awe and sympathy) I
+have now for the most part forgotten.</p>
+<p>Most persons, I suppose, have observed how the example of a
+successful ancestor is apt to determine the pursuits of his
+descendants down to the third and fourth generations, inclining the
+lads of this house to the sea, and of that to the bar, according as
+the great man of the family achieved his honors on shipboard, or
+climbed his way to the woolsack. The Arbuthnots offered no
+exception to this very natural law of selection. They could not
+help remembering how the famous doctor had excelled in literature
+as in medicine; how he had been not only Physician in Ordinary to
+Queen Anne and Prince George of Denmark, but a satirist and
+pamphleteer, a wit and the friend of wits--of such wits as Pope and
+Swift, Harley and Bolingbroke. Hence they took, as it were
+instinctively, to physic and the <i>belles lettres</i>, and were
+never without a doctor or an author in the family.</p>
+<p>My father, however, like the great Martinus Scriblerus, was both
+doctor and author. And he was a John Arbuthnot. And to carry the
+resemblance still further, he was gifted with a vein of rough
+epigrammatic humor, in which it pleased his independence to indulge
+without much respect of persons, times, or places. His tongue,
+indeed, cost him some friends and gained him some enemies; but I am
+not sure that it diminished his popularity as a physician. People
+compared him to Abernethy, whereby he was secretly flattered. Some
+even went so far as to argue that only a very clever man could
+afford to be a bear; and I must say that he pushed this conclusion
+to its farthest limit, showing his temper alike to rich and poor
+upon no provocation whatever. He cared little, to be sure, for his
+connection. He loved the profession theoretically, and from a
+scientific point of view; but he disliked the drudgery of country
+practice, and stood in no need of its hardly-earned profits. Yet he
+was a man who so loved to indulge his humor, no matter at what
+cost, that I doubt whether he would have been more courteous had
+his bread depended on it. As it was, he practised and grumbled,
+snarled at his patients, quarrelled with the rich, bestowed his
+time and money liberally upon the poor, and amused his leisure by
+writing for a variety of scientific periodicals, both English and
+foreign.</p>
+<p>Our home stood at the corner of a lane towards the eastern
+extremity of the town, commanding a view of the Squire's Park, and
+a glimpse of the mill-pool and meadows in the valley beyond. This
+lane led up to Barnard's Green, a breezy space of high, uneven
+ground dedicated to fairs, cricket matches, and travelling
+circuses, whence the noisy music of brass bands, and the echoes of
+alternate laughter and applause, were wafted past our windows in
+the summer evenings. We had a large garden at the back, and a
+stable up the lane; and though the house was but one story in
+height, it covered a considerable space of ground, and contained
+more rooms than we ever had occasion to use. Thus it happened that
+since my mother's death, which took place when I was a very little
+boy, many doors on the upper floor were kept locked, to the undue
+development of my natural inquisitiveness by day, and my mortal
+terror when sent to bed at night. In one of these her portrait
+still hung above the mantelpiece, and her harp stood in its
+accustomed corner. In another, which was once her bedroom,
+everything was left as in her lifetime, her clothes yet hanging in
+the wardrobe, her dressing-case standing upon the toilet, her
+favorite book upon the table beside the bed. These things, told to
+me by the servants with much mystery, took a powerful hold upon my
+childish imagination. I trembled as I passed the closed doors at
+dusk, and listened fearfully outside when daylight gave me courage
+to linger near them. Something of my mother's presence, I fancied,
+must yet dwell within--something in her shape still wander from
+room to room in the dim moonlight, and echo back the sighing of the
+night winds. Alas! I could not remember her. Now and then, as if
+recalled by a dream, some broken and shadowy images of a pale face
+and a slender hand floated vaguely through my mind; but faded even
+as I strove to realize them. Sometimes, too, when I was falling off
+to sleep in my little bed, or making out pictures in the fire on a
+winter evening, strange fragments of old rhymes seemed to come back
+upon me, mingled with the tones of a soft voice and the haunting of
+a long-forgotten melody. But these, after all, were yearnings more
+of the heart than the memory:--</p>
+<blockquote>"I felt a mother-want about the world.<br>
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;And still went seeking."</blockquote>
+<p>To return to my description of my early home:--the two rooms on
+either side of the hall, facing the road, were appropriated by my
+father for his surgery and consulting-room; while the two
+corresponding rooms at the back were fitted up as our general
+reception-room, and my father's bed-room. In the former of these,
+and in the weedy old garden upon which it opened, were passed all
+the days of my boyhood.</p>
+<p>It was my father's good-will and pleasure to undertake the sole
+charge of my education. Fain would I have gone like other lads of
+my age to public school and college; but on this point, as on most
+others, he was inflexible. Himself an obscure physician in a remote
+country town, he brought me up with no other view than to be his
+own successor. The profession was not to my liking. Somewhat
+contemplative and nervous by nature, there were few pursuits for
+which I was less fitted. I knew this, but dared not oppose him.
+Loving study for its own sake, and trusting to the future for some
+lucky turn of destiny, I yielded to that which seemed inevitable,
+and strove to make the best of it.</p>
+<p>Thus it came to pass that I lived a quiet, hard-working home
+life, while other boys of my age were going through the joyous
+experience of school, and chose my companions from the dusty
+shelves of some three or four gigantic book-cases, instead of from
+the class and the playground. Not that I regret it. I believe, on
+the contrary, that a boy may have worse companions than books and
+busts, employments less healthy than the study of anatomy, and
+amusements more pernicious than Shakespeare and Horace. Thank
+Heaven! I escaped all such; and if, as I have been told, my boyhood
+was unboyish, and my youth prematurely cultivated, I am content to
+have been spared the dangers in exchange for the pleasures of a
+public school.</p>
+<p>I do not, however, pretend to say that I did not sometimes pine
+for the recreations common to my age. Well do I remember the
+manifold attractions of Barnard's Green. What longing glances I
+used to steal towards the boisterous cricketers, when going gravely
+forth upon a botanical walk with my father! With what eager
+curiosity have I not lingered many a time before the entrance to a
+forbidden booth, and scanned the scenic advertisement of a
+travelling show! Alas! how the charms of study paled before those
+intervals of brief but bitter temptation! What, then, was pathology
+compared to the pig-faced lady, or the Materia Medica to Smith's
+Mexican Circus, patronized by all the sovereigns of Europe? But my
+father was inexorable. He held that such places were, to use his
+own words, "opened by swindlers for the ruin of fools," and from
+one never-to-be-forgotten hour, when he caught me in the very act
+of taking out my penny-worth at a portable peep-show, he bound me
+over by a solemn promise (sealed by a whipping) never to repeat the
+offence under any provocation or pretext whatsoever. I was a tiny
+fellow in pinafores when this happened, but having once pledged my
+word, I kept it faithfully through all the studious years that lay
+between six and sixteen.</p>
+<p>At sixteen an immense crisis occurred in my life. I fell in
+love. I had been in love several times before--chiefly with the
+elder pupils at the Miss Andrews' establishment; and once (but that
+was when I was very young indeed) with the cook. This, however, was
+a much more romantic and desperate affair. The lady was a Columbine
+by profession, and as beautiful as an angel. She came down to our
+neighborhood with a strolling company, and performed every evening,
+in a temporary theatre on the green, for nearly three weeks. I used
+to steal out after dinner when my father was taking his nap, and
+run the whole way, that I might be in time to see the object of my
+adoration walking up and down the platform outside the booth before
+the performances commenced. This incomparable creature wore a blue
+petticoat spangled with tinfoil, and a wreath of faded poppies. Her
+age might have been about forty. I thought her the loveliest of
+created beings. I wrote sonnets to her--dozens of them--intending
+to leave them at the theatre door, but never finding the courage to
+do it. I made up bouquets for her, over and over again, chosen from
+the best flowers in our neglected garden; but invariably with the
+same result. I hated the harlequin who presumed to put his arm
+about her waist. I envied the clown, whom she condescended to
+address as Mr. Merriman. In short, I was so desperately in love
+that I even tried to lie awake at night and lose my appetite; but,
+I am ashamed to own, failed signally in both endeavors.</p>
+<p>At length I wrote to her. I can even now recall passages out of
+that passionate epistle. I well remember how it took me a whole
+morning to write it; how I crammed it with quotations from Horace;
+and how I fondly compared her to most of the mythological
+divinities. I then copied it out on pale pink paper, folded it in
+the form of a heart, and directed it to Miss Angelina Lascelles,
+and left it, about dusk, with the money-taker at the pit door. I
+signed myself, if I remember rightly, Pyramus. What would I not
+have given that evening to pay my sixpence like the rest of the
+audience, and feast my eyes upon her from some obscure corner! What
+would I not have given to add my quota to the applause!</p>
+<p>I could hardly sleep that night; I could hardly read or write,
+or eat my breakfast the next morning, for thinking of my letter and
+its probable effect. It never once occurred to me that my Angelina
+might possibly find it difficult to construe Horace. Towards
+evening, I escaped again, and flew to Barnard's Green. It wanted
+nearly an hour to the time of performance; but the tuning of a
+violin was audible from within, and the money-taker was already
+there with his pipe in his mouth and his hands in his pockets. I
+had no courage to address that functionary; but I lingered in his
+sight and sighed audibly, and wandered round and round the canvas
+walls that hedged my divinity. Presently he took his pipe out of,
+his mouth and his hands out of his pockets; surveyed me
+deliberately from head to foot, and said:--</p>
+<p>"Hollo there! aint you the party that brought a three-cornered
+letter here last evening!"</p>
+<p>I owned it, falteringly.</p>
+<p>He lifted a fold in the canvas, and gave me a gentle shove
+between the shoulders.</p>
+<p>"Then you're to go in," said he, shortly. "She's there,
+somewhere. You're sure to find her."</p>
+<p>The canvas dropped behind me, and I found myself inside. My
+heart beat so fast that I could scarcely breathe. The booth was
+almost dark; the curtain was down; and a gentleman with striped
+legs was lighting the footlamps. On the front pit bench next the
+orchestra, discussing a plate of bread and meat and the contents of
+a brown jug, sat a stout man in shirt-sleeves and a woman in a
+cotton gown. The woman rose as I made my appearance, and asked,
+civilly enough, whom I pleased to want.</p>
+<p>I stammered the name of Miss Angelina Lascelles.</p>
+<p>"Miss Lascelles!" she repeated. "I am Miss Lascelles," Then,
+looking at me more narrowly, "I suppose," she added, "you are the
+little boy that brought the letter?"</p>
+<p>The little boy that brought the letter! Gracious heavens! And
+this middle-aged woman in a cotton gown--was she the Angelina of my
+dreams! The booth went round with me, and the lights danced before
+my eyes.</p>
+<p>"If you have come for an answer," she continued, "you may just
+say to your Mr. Pyramid that I am a respectable married woman, and
+he ought to be ashamed of himself--and, as for his letter, I never
+read such a heap of nonsense in my life! There, you can go out by
+the way you came in, and if you take my advice, you won't come back
+again!"</p>
+<p>How I looked, what I said, how I made my exit, whether the
+doorkeeper spoke to me as I passed, I have no idea to this day. I
+only know that I flung myself on the dewy grass under a great tree
+in the first field I came to, and shed tears of such shame,
+disappointment, and wounded pride, as my eyes had never known
+before. She had called me a little boy, and my letter a heap of
+nonsense! She was elderly--she was ignorant--she was married! I had
+been a fool; but that knowledge came too late, and was not
+consolatory.</p>
+<p>By-and-by, while I was yet sobbing and disconsolate, I heard the
+drumming and fifing which heralded the appearance of the <i>Corps
+Dramatique</i> on the outer platform. I resolved to see her for the
+last time. I pulled my hat over my eyes, went back to the Green,
+and mingled with the crowd outside the booth. It was growing dusk.
+I made my way to the foot of the ladder, and observed her narrowly.
+I saw that her ankles were thick, and her elbows red. The illusion
+was all over. The spangles had lost their lustre, and the poppies
+their glow. I no longer hated the harlequin, or envied the clown,
+or felt anything but mortification at my own folly.</p>
+<p>"Miss Angelina Lascelles, indeed!" I said to myself, as I
+sauntered moodily home. "Pshaw! I shouldn't wonder if her name was
+Snooks!"</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_II."></a>CHAPTER II.</h2>
+<h3>THE LITTLE CHEVALIER.</h3>
+<center>A mere anatomy, a mountebank,<br>
+A threadbare juggler.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Comedy of Errors</i>.<br>
+<br>
+Nay, then, he is a conjuror.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Henry VI</i>.</center>
+<br>
+<p>My adventure with Miss Lascelles did me good service, and cured
+me for some time, at least, of my leaning towards the tender
+passion. I consequently devoted myself more closely than ever to my
+studies--indulged in a passing mania for genealogy and
+heraldry--began a collection of local geological specimens, all of
+which I threw away at the end of the first fortnight--and took to
+rearing rabbits in an old tumble-down summer-house at the end of
+the garden. I believe that from somewhere about this time I may
+also date the commencement of a great epic poem in blank verse, and
+Heaven knows how many cantos, which was to be called the Columbiad.
+It began, I remember, with a description of the Court of Ferdinand
+and Isabella, and the departure of Columbus, and was intended to
+celebrate the discovery, colonization, and subsequent history of
+America. I never got beyond ten or a dozen pages of the first
+canto, however, and that Transatlantic epic remains unfinished to
+this day.</p>
+<p>The great event which I have recorded in the preceding chapter
+took place in the early summer. It must, therefore, have been
+towards the close of autumn in the same year when my next important
+adventure befell. This time the temptation assumed a different
+shape.</p>
+<p>Coming briskly homewards one fine frosty morning after having
+left a note at the Vicarage, I saw a bill-sticker at work upon a
+line of dead wall which at that time reached from the Red Lion Inn
+to the corner of Pitcairn's Lane. His posters were printed in
+enormous type, and decorated with a florid bordering in which the
+signs of the zodiac conspicuously figured Being somewhat idly
+disposed, I followed the example of other passers-by, and lingered
+to watch the process and read the advertisement. It ran as
+follows:----</p>
+<p>MAGIC AND MYSTERY! MAGIC AND MYSTERY!</p>
+<hr style="width: 25%;">
+<p>M. LE CHEVALIER ARMAND PROUDHINE, (of Paris) surnamed</p>
+<p>THE WIZARD OF THE CAUCASUS,</p>
+<p>Has the honor to announce to the Nobility and Gentry of
+Saxonholme and its vicinity, that he will, to-morrow evening
+(October--, 18--), hold his First</p>
+<p>SOIREE FANTASTIQUE</p>
+<p>IN</p>
+<p>THE LARGE ROOM OF THE RED LION HOTEL.</p>
+<hr style="width: 25%;">
+<p>ADMISSION 1s. RESERVED SEATS 2s. 6d.</p>
+<p><i>To commence at Seven</i>.</p>
+<p>N.B.--<i>The performance will include a variety of new and
+surprising feats of Legerdemain never before exhibited</i>.</p>
+<p><i>A soir&eacute;e fantastique</i>! what would I not give to be
+present at a <i>soir&eacute;e fantastique</i>! I had read of the
+Rosicrucians, of Count Cagliostro, and of Doctor Dee. I had peeped
+into more than one curious treatise on Demonology, and I fancied
+there could be nothing in the world half so marvellous as that last
+surviving branch of the Black Art entitled the Science of
+Legerdemain.</p>
+<p>What if, for this once, I were to ask leave to be present at the
+performance? Should I do so with even the remotest chance of
+success? It was easier to propound this momentous question than to
+answer it. My father, as I have already said, disapproved of public
+entertainments, and his prejudices were tolerably inveterate. But
+then, what could be more genteel than the programme, or more select
+than the prices? How different was an entertainment given in the
+large room of the Red Lion Hotel to a three-penny wax-work, or a
+strolling circus on Barnard's Green! I had made one of the audience
+in that very room over and over again when the Vicar read his
+celebrated "Discourses to Youth," or Dr. Dunks came down from
+Grinstead to deliver an explosive lecture on chemistry; and I had
+always seen the reserved seats filled by the best families in the
+neighborhood. Fully persuaded of the force of my own arguments, I
+made up my mind to prefer this tremendous request on the first
+favorable opportunity, and so hurried home, with my head full of
+quite other thoughts than usual.</p>
+<p>My father was sitting at the table with a mountain of books and
+papers before him. He looked up sharply as I entered, jerked his
+chair round so as to get the light at his back, put on his
+spectacles, and ejaculated:--</p>
+<p>"Well, sir!"</p>
+<p>This was a bad sign, and one with which I was only too familiar.
+Nature had intended my father for a barrister. He was an adept in
+all the arts of intimidation, and would have conducted a
+cross-examination to perfection. As it was, he indulged in a good
+deal of amateur practice, and from the moment when he turned his
+back to the light and donned the inexorable spectacles, there was
+not a soul in the house, from myself down to the errand-boy, who
+was not perfectly aware of something unpleasant to follow.</p>
+<p>"Well, sir!" he repeated, rapping impatiently upon the table
+with his knuckles.</p>
+<p>Having nothing to reply to this greeting, I looked out of the
+window and remained silent; whereby, unfortunately. I irritated him
+still more.</p>
+<p>"Confound you, sir!" he exclaimed, "have you nothing to
+say?"</p>
+<p>"Nothing," I replied, doggedly.</p>
+<p>"Stand there!" he said, pointing to a particular square in the
+pattern of the carpet. "Stand there!"</p>
+<p>I obeyed.</p>
+<p>"And now, perhaps, you will have the goodness to explain what
+you have been about this morning; and why it should have taken you
+just thirty-seven minutes by the clock to accomplish a journey
+which a tortoise--yes, sir, a tortoise,--might have done in less
+than ten?"</p>
+<p>I gravely compared my watch with the clock before replying.</p>
+<p>"Upon my word, sir," I said, "your tortoise would have the
+advantage of me."</p>
+<p>"The advantage of you! What do you mean by the advantage of you,
+you affected puppy?"</p>
+<p>"I had no idea," said I, provokingly, "that you were in unusual
+haste this morning."</p>
+<p>"Haste!" shouted my father. "I never said I was in haste. I
+never choose to be in haste. I hate haste!"</p>
+<p>"Then why..."</p>
+<p>"Because you have been wasting your time and mine, sir,"
+interrupted he. "Because I will not permit you to go idling and
+vagabondizing about the village."</p>
+<p>My <i>sang froid</i> was gone directly.</p>
+<p>"Idling and vagabondizing!" I repeated angrily. "I have done
+nothing of the kind. I defy you to prove it. When have you known me
+forget that I am a gentleman?"</p>
+<p>"Humph!" growled my father, mollified but sarcastic; "a pretty
+gentleman--a gentleman of sixteen!"</p>
+<p>"It is true,"' I continued, without heeding the interruption,
+"that I lingered for a moment to read a placard by the way; but if
+you will take the trouble, sir, to inquire at the Rectory, you will
+find that I waited a quarter of an hour before I could send up your
+letter."</p>
+<p>My father grinned and rubbed his hands. If there was one thing
+in the world that aggravated him more than another, it was to find
+his fire opposed to ice. Let him, however, succeed in igniting his
+adversary, and he was in a good humor directly.</p>
+<p>"Come, come, Basil," said he, taking off his spectacles, "I
+never said you were not a good lad. Go to your books, boy--go to
+your books; and this evening I will examine you in vegetable
+physiology."</p>
+<p>Silently, but not sullenly, I drew a chair to the table, and
+resumed my work. We were both satisfied, because each in his heart
+considered himself the victor. My father was amused at having
+irritated me, whereas I was content because he had, in some sort,
+withdrawn the expressions that annoyed me. Hence we both became
+good-tempered, and, according to our own tacit fashion, continued
+during the rest of that morning to be rather more than usually
+sociable.</p>
+<p>Hours passed thus--hours of quiet study, during which the quick
+travelling of a pen or the occasional turning of a page alone
+disturbed the silence. The warm sunlight which shone in so greenly
+through the vine leaves, stole, inch by inch, round the broken
+vases in the garden beyond, and touched their brown mosses with a
+golden bloom. The patient shadow on the antique sundial wound its
+way imperceptibly from left to right, and long slanting threads of
+light and shadow pierced in time between the branches of the
+poplars. Our mornings were long, for we rose early and dined late;
+and while my father paid professional visits, I devoted my hours to
+study. It rarely happened that he could thus spend a whole day
+among his books. Just as the clock struck four, however, there came
+a ring at the bell.</p>
+<p>My father settled himself obstinately in his chair.</p>
+<p>"If that's a gratis patient," said he, between his teeth, "I'll
+not stir. From eight to ten are their hours, confound them!"</p>
+<p>"If you please, sir," said Mary, peeping in, "if you please,
+sir, it's a gentleman."</p>
+<p>"A stranger?" asked my father.</p>
+<p>Mary nodded, put her hand to her mouth, and burst into an
+irrepressible giggle.</p>
+<p>"If you please, sir," she began--but could get no farther.</p>
+<p>My father was in a towering passion directly.</p>
+<p>"Is the girl mad?" he shouted. "What is the meaning of this
+buffoonery?"</p>
+<p>"Oh, sir--if you please, sir," ejaculated Mary, struggling with
+terror and laughter together, "it's the gentleman, sir. He--he
+says, if you please, sir, that his name is Almond Pudding!"</p>
+<p>"Your pardon, Mademoiselle," said a plaintive voice. "Armand
+Proudhine--le Chevalier Armand Proudhine, at your service."</p>
+<p>Mary disappeared with her apron to her mouth, and subsided into
+distant peals of laughter, leaving the Chevalier standing in the
+doorway.</p>
+<p>He was a very little man, with a pinched and melancholy
+countenance, and an eye as wistful as a dog's. His threadbare
+clothes, made in the fashion of a dozen years before, had been
+decently mended in many places. A paste pin in a faded cravat, and
+a jaunty cane with a pinchbeck top, betrayed that he was still
+somewhat of a beau. His scant gray hair was tied behind with a
+piece of black ribbon, and he carried his hat under his arm, after
+the fashion of Elliston and the Prince Regent, as one sees them in
+the colored prints of fifty years ago.</p>
+<p>He advanced a step, bowed, and laid his card upon the table.</p>
+<p>"I believe," he said in his plaintive voice, and imperfect
+English, "that I have the honor to introduce myself to Monsieur
+Arbuthnot."</p>
+<p>"If you want me, sir," said my father, gruffly, "I am Doctor
+Arbuthnot."</p>
+<p>"And I, Monsieur," said the little Frenchman, laying his hand
+upon his heart, and bowing again--"I am the Wizard of the
+Caucasus."</p>
+<p>"The what?" exclaimed my father.</p>
+<p>"The Wizard of the Caucasus," replied our visitor,
+impressively.</p>
+<p>There was an awkward pause, during which my father looked at me
+and touched his forehead significantly with his forefinger; while
+the Chevalier, embarrassed between his natural timidity and his
+desire to appear of importance, glanced from one face to the other,
+and waited for a reply. I hastened to disentangle the
+situation.</p>
+<p>"I think I can explain this gentleman's meaning," I said.
+"Monsieur le Chevalier will perform to-morrow evening in the large
+room of the Red Lion Hotel. He is a professor of legerdemain."</p>
+<p>"Of the marvellous art of legerdemain, Monsieur Arbuthnot,"
+interrupted the Chevalier eagerly. "Prestidigitateur to the Court
+of Sachsenhausen, and successor to Al Hakim, the wise. It is I,
+Monsieur, that have invent the famous <i>tour du pistolet;</i> it
+is I, that have originate the great and surprising deception of the
+bottle; it is I whom the world does surname the Wizard of the
+Caucasus. <i>Me voici!</i>"</p>
+<p>Carried away by the force of his own eloquence, the Chevalier
+fell into an attitude at the conclusion of his little speech; but
+remembering where he was, blushed, and bowed again.</p>
+<p>"Pshaw," said my father impatiently, "the man's a conjuror."</p>
+<p>The little Frenchman did not hear him. He was at that moment
+untying a packet which he carried in his hat, the contents whereof
+appeared to consist of a number of very small pink and yellow
+cards. Selecting a couple of each color, he deposited his hat
+carefully upon the floor and came a few steps nearer to the
+table.</p>
+<p>"Monsieur will give me the hope to see him, with Monsieur <i>son
+fils</i>, at my Soir&eacute;e Fantastique, <i>n'est-ce pas?</i>" he
+asked, timidly.</p>
+<p>"Sir," said my father shortly, "I never encourage peripatetic
+mendicity."</p>
+<p>The little Frenchman looked puzzled.</p>
+<p>"<i>Comment</i>?" said he, and glanced to me for an
+explanation.</p>
+<p>"I am very sorry, Monsieur," I interposed hastily; "but my
+father objects to public entertainments."</p>
+<p>"<i>Ah, mon Dieu!</i> but not to this," cried the Chevalier,
+raising his hands and eyes in deprecating astonishment. "Not to my
+Soir&eacute;e Fantastique! The art of legerdemain, Monsieur, is not
+immoral. He is graceful--he is surprising--he is innocent; and,
+Monsieur, he is patronized by the Church; he is patronized by your
+amiable <i>Cur&eacute;</i>, Monsieur le Docteur Brand."</p>
+<p>"Oh, father," I exclaimed, "Dr. Brand has taken tickets!"</p>
+<p>"And pray, sir, what's that to me?" growled my father, without
+looking up from the book which he had ungraciously resumed. "Let
+Dr. Brand make a fool of himself, if he pleases. I'm not bound to
+do the same."</p>
+<p>The Chevalier blushed crimson--not with humility this time, but
+with pride. He gathered the cards into his pocket, took up his hat,
+and saying stiffly--"<i>Monsieur, je vous demande
+pardon.</i>"--moved towards the door.</p>
+<p>On the threshold he paused, and turning towards me with an air
+of faded dignity:--"Young gentleman," he said, "<i>you</i> I thank
+for your politeness."</p>
+<p>He seemed as if he would have said more--hesitated--became
+suddenly livid--put his hand to his head, and leaned for support
+against the wall.</p>
+<p>My father was up and beside him in an instant. We carried rather
+than led him to the sofa, untied his cravat, and administered the
+necessary restoratives. He was all but insensible for some moments.
+Then the color came back to his lips, and he sighed heavily.</p>
+<p>"An attack of the nerves," he said, shaking his head feebly. "An
+attack of the nerves, Messieurs."</p>
+<p>My father looked doubtful.</p>
+<p>"Are you often taken in this way?" he asked, with unusual
+gentleness.</p>
+<p>"<i>Mais oui</i>, Monsieur," admitted the Frenchman,
+reluctantly. "He does often arrive to me. Not--not that he is
+dangerous. Ah, bah! <i>Pas du tout</i>!"</p>
+<p>"Humph!" ejaculated my father, more doubtfully than before. "Let
+me feel your pulse."</p>
+<p>The Chevalier bowed and submitted, watching the countenance of
+the operator all the time with an anxiety that was not lost upon
+me.</p>
+<p>"Do you sleep well?" asked my father, holding the fragile little
+wrist between his finger and thumb.</p>
+<p>"Passably, Monsieur."</p>
+<p>"Dream much?"</p>
+<p>"Ye--es, I dream."</p>
+<p>"Are you subject to giddiness?"</p>
+<p>The Chevalier shrugged his shoulders and looked uneasy.</p>
+<p>"<i>C'est vrai</i>" he acknowledged, more unwillingly than ever,
+"<i>J'ai des vertiges</i>."</p>
+<p>My father relinquished his hold and scribbled a rapid
+prescription.</p>
+<p>"There, sir," said he, "get that preparation made up, and when
+you next feel as you felt just now, drink a wine-glassful. I should
+recommend you to keep some always at hand, in case of emergency.
+You will find further directions on the other side."</p>
+<p>The little Frenchman attempted to get up with his usual
+vivacity; but was obliged to balance himself against the back of a
+chair.</p>
+<p>"Monsieur," said he, with another of his profound bows, "I thank
+you infinitely. You make me too much attention; but I am grateful.
+And, Monsieur, my little girl--my child that is far away across the
+sea--she thanks you also. <i>Elle m'aime, Monsieur--elle m'aime,
+cette pauvre petite</i>! What shall she do if I die?"</p>
+<p>Again he raised his hand to his brow. He was unconscious of
+anything theatrical in the gesture. He was in sad earnest, and his
+eyes were wet with tears, which he made no effort to conceal.</p>
+<p>My father shuffled restlessly in his chair.</p>
+<p>"No obligation--no obligation at all," he muttered, with a touch
+of impatience in his voice. "And now, what about those tickets? I
+suppose, Basil, you're dying to see all this tomfoolery?"</p>
+<p>"That I am, sir," said I, joyfully. "I should like it above all
+things!"</p>
+<p>The Chevalier glided forward, and laid a couple of little pink
+cards upon my father's desk.</p>
+<p>"If," said he, timidly, "if Monsieur will make me the honor to
+accept...."</p>
+<p>"Not for the world, sir--not for the world!" interposed my
+father. "The boy shan't go, unless I pay for the tickets."</p>
+<p>"But, Monsieur...."</p>
+<p>"Nothing of the kind, sir. I cannot hear of it. What are the
+prices of the seats?"</p>
+<p>Our little visitor looked down and was silent; but I replied for
+him.</p>
+<p>"The reserved seats," I whispered, "are half-a-crown each."</p>
+<p>"Then I will take eight reserved," said my father, opening a
+drawer in his desk and bringing out a bright, new sovereign.</p>
+<p>The little Frenchman started. He could hardly believe in such
+munificence.</p>
+<p>"When? How much?" stammered he, with a pleasant confusion of
+adverbs.</p>
+<p>"Eight," growled my father, scarcely able to repress a
+smile.</p>
+<p>"Eight? <i>mon Dieu</i>, Monsieur, how you are generous! I shall
+keep for you all the first row."</p>
+<p>"Oblige me by doing nothing of the kind," said my father, very
+decisively. "It would displease me extremely."</p>
+<p>The Chevalier counted out the eight little pink cards, and
+ranged them in a row beside my father's desk.</p>
+<p>"Count them, Monsieur, if you please," said he, his eyes
+wandering involuntarily towards the sovereign.</p>
+<p>My father did so with much gravity, and handed over the
+money.</p>
+<p>The Chevalier consigned it, with trembling fingers, to a small
+canvas bag, which looked very empty, and which came from the
+deepest recesses of his pocket.</p>
+<p>"Monsieur," said he, "my thanks are in my heart. I will not
+fatigue you with them. Good-morning."</p>
+<p>He bowed again, for perhaps the twentieth time; lingered a
+moment at the threshold; and then retired, closing the door softly
+after him.</p>
+<p>My father rubbbed his head all over, and gave a great yawn of
+satisfaction.</p>
+<p>"I am so much obliged to you, sir," I said, eagerly.</p>
+<p>"What for?"</p>
+<p>"For having bought those tickets. It was very kind of you."</p>
+<p>"Hold your tongue. I hate to be thanked," snarled he, and
+plunged back again into his books and papers.</p>
+<p>Once more the studious silence in the room--once more the
+rustling leaf and scratching pen, which only made the stillness
+seem more still, within and without.</p>
+<p>"I beg your pardons," murmured the voice of the little
+Chevalier.</p>
+<p>I turned, and saw him peeping through the half-open door. He
+looked more wistful than ever, and twisted the handle nervously
+between his fingers.</p>
+<p>My father frowned, and muttered something between his teeth. I
+fear it was not very complimentary to the Chevalier.</p>
+<p>"One word, Monsieur," pleaded the little man, edging himself
+round the door, "one small word!"</p>
+<p>"Say it, sir, and have done with it," said my father,
+savagely.</p>
+<p>The Chevalier hesitated.</p>
+<p>"I--I--Monsieur le Docteur--that is, I wish...."</p>
+<p>"Confound it, sir, what do you wish?"</p>
+<p>The Chevalier brushed away a tear.</p>
+<p>"<i>Dites-moi,"</i> he said with suppressed agitation. "One
+word--yes or no--is he dangerous?"</p>
+<p>My father's countenance softened.</p>
+<p>"My good friend," he said, gently, "we are none of us safe for
+even a day, or an hour; but after all, that which we call danger is
+merely a relative position. I have known men in a state more
+precarious than yours who lived to a long old age, and I see no
+reason to doubt that with good living, good spirits, and
+precaution, you stand as fair a chance as another."</p>
+<p>The little Frenchman pressed his hands together in token of
+gratitude, whispered a broken word or two of thanks, and bowed
+himself out of the room.</p>
+<p>When he was fairly gone, my father flung a book at my head, and
+said, with more brevity than politeness:--</p>
+<p>"Boy, bolt the door."</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_III."></a>CHAPTER III.</h2>
+<h3>THE EVENTS OF AN EVENING.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>"Basil, my boy, if you are going to that place, you must take
+Collins with you."</p>
+<p>"Won't you go yourself, father?"</p>
+<p>"I! Is the boy mad!"</p>
+<p>"I hope not, sir; only as you took eight reserved seats, I
+thought...."</p>
+<p>"You've no business to think, sir! Seven of those tickets are in
+the fire."</p>
+<p>"For fear, then, you should fancy to burn the eighth, I'll wish
+you good-evening!"</p>
+<p>So away I darted, called to Collins to follow me, and set off at
+a brisk pace towards the Red Lion Hotel. Collins was our indoor
+servant; a sharp, merry fellow, some ten years older than myself,
+who desired no better employment than to escort me upon such an
+occasion as the present. The audience had begun to assemble when we
+arrived. Collins went into the shilling places, while I ensconced
+myself in the second row of reserved seats. I had an excellent view
+of the stage. There, in the middle of the platform, stood the
+conjuror's table--a quaint, cabalistic-looking piece of furniture
+with carved black legs and a deep bordering of green cloth all
+round the top. A gay pagoda-shaped canopy of many hues was erected
+overhead. A long white wand leaned up against the wall. To the
+right stood a bench laden with mysterious jars, glittering bowls,
+gilded cones, mystical globes, colored glass boxes, and other
+properties. To the left stood a large arm-chair covered with
+crimson cloth. All this was very exciting, and I waited
+breathlessly till the Wizard should appear.</p>
+<p>He came at last; but not, surely, our dapper little visitor of
+yesterday! A majestic beard of ashen gray fell in patriarchal locks
+almost to his knees. Upon his head he wore a high cap of some dark
+fur; upon his feet embroidered slippers; and round his waist a
+glittering belt patterned with hieroglyphics. A long woollen robe
+of chocolate and orange fell about him in heavy folds, and swept
+behind him, like a train. I could scarcely believe, at first, that
+it was the same person; but, when he spoke, despite the pomp and
+obscurity of his language. I recognised the plaintive voice of the
+little Chevalier.</p>
+<p>"<i>Messieurs et Mesdames</i>," he began, and took up the wand
+to emphasize his discourse; "to read in the stars the events of the
+future--to transform into gold the metals inferior--to discover the
+composition of that Elixir who, by himself, would perpetuate life,
+was in past ages the aim and aspiration of the natural philosopher.
+But they are gone, those days--they are displaced, those sciences.
+The Alchemist and the Rosicrucian are no more, and of all their
+race, the professor of Legerdemain alone survives. Ladies and
+gentlemen, my magic he is simple. I retain not familiars. I employ
+not crucible, nor furnace, nor retort. I but amuse you with my
+agility of hand, and for commencement I tell you that you shall be
+deceived as well as the Wizard of the Caucasus can deceive
+you."</p>
+<p>His voice trembled, and the slender wand shivered in his hand.
+Was this nervousness? Or was he, in accordance with the quaintness
+of his costume and the amplitude of his beard, enacting the
+feebleness of age?</p>
+<p>He advanced to the front of the platform. "Three things I
+require," he said. "A watch, a pocket-handkerchief and a hat. Is
+there here among my visitors any person so gracious as to lend me
+these trifles? I will not injure them, ladies and gentlemen. I will
+only pound the watch in my mortar--burn the <i>mouchoir</i> in my
+lamp, and make a pudding in the <i>chapeau</i>. And, with all this,
+I engage to return them to their proprietors, better as new."</p>
+<p>There was a pause, and a laugh. Presently a gentleman
+volunteered his hat, and a lady her embroidered handkerchief; but
+no person seemed willing to submit his watch to the pounding
+process.</p>
+<p>"Shall nobody lend me the watch?" asked the Chevalier; but in a
+voice so hoarse that I scarcely recognised it.</p>
+<p>A sudden thought struck me, and I rose in my place.</p>
+<p>"I shall be happy to do so," I said aloud, and made my way round
+to the front of the platform.</p>
+<p>At the moment when he took it from me, I spoke to him.</p>
+<p>"Monsieur Proudhine," I whispered, "you are ill! What can I do
+for you?"</p>
+<p>"Nothing, <i>mon enfant</i>," he answered, in the same low tone.
+"I suffer; <i>mais il faut se r&eacute;signer</i>."</p>
+<p>"Break off the performance--retire for half an hour."</p>
+<p>"Impossible. See, they already observe us!"</p>
+<p>And he drew back abruptly. There was a seat vacant in the front
+row. I took it, resolved at all events to watch him narrowly.</p>
+<p>Not to detail too minutely the events of a performance which
+since that time has become sufficiently familiar, I may say that he
+carried out his programme with dreadful exactness, and, after
+appearing to burn the handkerchief to ashes and mix up a quantity
+of eggs and flour in the hat, proceeded very coolly to smash the
+works of my watch beneath his ponderous pestle. Notwithstanding my
+faith, I began to feel seriously uncomfortable. It was a neat
+little silver watch of foreign workmanship--not very valuable, to
+be sure, but precious to me as the most precious of repeaters.</p>
+<p>"He is very tough, your watch, Monsieur," said the Wizard,
+pounding away vigorously. "He--he takes a long time ... <i>Ah! mon
+Dieu!</i>"</p>
+<p>He raised his hand to his head, uttered a faint cry, and
+snatched at the back of the chair for support.</p>
+<p>My first thought was that he had destroyed my watch by
+mistake--my second, that he was very ill indeed. Scarcely knowing
+what I did, and quite forgetting the audience, I jumped on the
+platform to his aid.</p>
+<p>He shook his head, waved me away with one trembling hand, made a
+last effort to articulate, and fell heavily to the ground.</p>
+<p>All was confusion in an instant. Everybody crowded to the stage;
+whilst I, with a presence of mind which afterwards surprised
+myself, made my way out by a side-door and ran to fetch my father.
+He was fortunately at home, and in less than ten minutes the
+Chevalier was under his care. We found him laid upon a sofa in one
+of the sitting-rooms of the inn, pale, rigid, insensible, and
+surrounded by an idle crowd of lookers-on. They had taken off his
+cap and beard, and the landlady was endeavoring to pour some brandy
+down his throat; but his teeth were fast set, and his lips were
+blue and cold.</p>
+<p>"Oh, Doctor Arbuthnot! Doctor Arbuthnot!" cried a dozen voices
+at once, "the Conjuror is dying!"</p>
+<p>"For which reason, I suppose, you are all trying to smother
+him!" said my father angrily. "Mistress Cobbe, I beg you will not
+trouble yourself to pour that brandy down the man's throat. He has
+no more power to swallow it than my stick. Basil, open the window,
+and help me to loosen these things about his throat. Good people,
+all, I must request you to leave the room. This man's life is in
+peril, and I can do nothing while you remain. Go home--go home. You
+will see no more conjuring to-night."</p>
+<p>My father was peremptory, and the crowd unwillingly dispersed.
+One by one they left the room and gathered discontentedly in the
+passage. When it came to the last two or three, he took them by the
+shoulders, closed the door upon them, and turned the key.</p>
+<p>Only the landlady, and elderly woman-servant, and myself
+remained.</p>
+<p>The first thing my father did was to examine the pupil of the
+patient's eye, and lay his hand upon his heart. It still fluttered
+feebly, but the action of the lungs was suspended, and his hands
+and feet were cold as death.</p>
+<p>My father shook his head.</p>
+<p>"This man must be bled," said he, "but I have little hope of
+saving him."</p>
+<p>He was bled, and, though still unconscious, became less rigid
+They then poured a little wine down his throat, and he fell into a
+passive but painless condition, more inanimate than sleep, but less
+positive than a state of trance.</p>
+<p>A fire was then lighted, a mattress brought down, and the
+patient laid upon it, wrapped in many blankets. My father announced
+his intention of sitting up with him all night. In vain I begged
+for leave to share his vigil. He would hear of no such thing, but
+turned me out as he had turned out the others, bade me a brief
+"Good-night," and desired me to run home as quickly as I could.</p>
+<p>At that stage of my history, to hear was to obey; so I took my
+way quietly through the bar of the hotel, and had just reached the
+door when a touch on my sleeve arrested me. It was Mr. Cobbe, the
+landlord--a portly, red-whiskered Boniface of the old English
+type.</p>
+<p>"Good-evening, Mr. Basil," said he. "Going home, sir?"</p>
+<p>"Yes, Mr. Cobbe," I replied. "I can be of no further use
+here."</p>
+<p>"Well, sir, you've been of more use this evening than
+anybody--let alone the Doctor--that I must say for you," observed
+Mr. Cobbe, approvingly. "I never see such presence o' mind in so
+young a gen'leman before. Never, sir. Have a glass of grog and a
+cigar, sir, before you turn out."</p>
+<p>Much as I felt flattered by the supposition that I smoked (which
+was more than I could have done to save my life), I declined Mr.
+Cobbe's obliging offer and wished him good-night. But the landlord
+of the Red Lion was in a gossiping humor, and would not let me
+go.</p>
+<p>"If you won't take spirits, Mr. Basil," said he, "you must have
+a glass of negus. I couldn't let you go out without something
+warm--particular after the excitement you've gone through. Why,
+bless you, sir, when they ran out and told me, I shook like a
+leaf--and I don't look like a very nervous subject, do I? And so
+sudden as it was, too, poor little gentleman!"</p>
+<p>"Very sudden, indeed," I replied, mechanically.</p>
+<p>"Does Doctor Arbuthnot think he'll get the better of it, Mr.
+Basil?"</p>
+<p>"I fear he has little hope."</p>
+<p>Mr. Cobbe sighed, and shook his head, and smoked in silence.</p>
+<p>"To be struck down just when he was playing such tricks as them
+conjuring dodges, do seem uncommon awful," said he, after a time.
+"What was he after at the minute?--making a pudding, wasn't he, in
+some gentleman's hat?"</p>
+<p>I uttered a sudden ejaculation, and set down my glass of negus
+untasted. Till that moment I had not once thought of my watch.</p>
+<p>"Oh, Mr. Cobbe!" I cried, "he was pounding my watch in the
+mortar!"</p>
+<p>"<i>Your</i> watch, Mr. Basil?"</p>
+<p>"Yes, mine--and I have not seen it since. What can have become
+of it? What shall I do?"</p>
+<p>"Do!" echoed the landlord, seizing a candle; "why, go and look
+for it, to be sure, Mr. Basil. That's safe enough, you may be
+sure!"</p>
+<p>I followed him to the room where the performance had taken
+place. It showed darkly and drearily by the light of one feeble
+candle. The benches and chairs were all in disorder. The wand lay
+where it had fallen from the hand of the Wizard. The mortar still
+stood on the table, with the pestle beside it. It contained only
+some fragments of broken glass.</p>
+<p>Mr. Cobbe laughed triumphantly.</p>
+<p>"Come, sir," said he, "the watch is safe enough, anyhow.
+Mounseer only made believe to pound it up, and now all that
+concerns us is to find it."</p>
+<p>That was indeed all--not only all, but too much. We searched
+everything. We looked in all the jars and under all the moveables.
+We took the cover off the chair; we cleared the table; but without
+success. My watch had totally disappeared, and we at length decided
+that it must be concealed about the conjuror's person. Mr. Cobbe
+was my consoling angel.</p>
+<p>"Bless you, sir," said he, "don't never be cast down. My wife
+shall look for the watch to-morrow morning, and I'll promise you
+we'll find out every pocket he has about him."</p>
+<p>"And my father--you won't tell my father?" I said,
+dolefully.</p>
+<p>Mr. Cobbe replied by a mute but expressive piece of pantomime
+and took me back to the bar, where the good landlady ratified all
+that her husband had promised in her name.</p>
+<p>The stars shone brightly as I went home, and there was no moon.
+The town was intensely silent, and the road intensely solitary. I
+met no one on my way; let myself quietly in, and stole up to my
+bed-room in the dark.</p>
+<p>It was already late; but I was restless and weary--too restless
+to sleep, and too weary to read. I could not detach myself from the
+impressions of the day; and I longed for the morning, that I might
+learn the fate of my watch, and the condition of the Chevalier.</p>
+<p>At length, after some hours of wakefulness, I dropped into a
+profound and dreamless sleep.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 25%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IV."></a>CHAPTER IV.</h2>
+<h3>THE CHEVALIER MAKES HIS LAST EXIT.</h3>
+<center>All the world's a stage,<br>
+And all the men and women merely players:<br>
+They have their exits and their entrances.<br>
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; <i>As You Like It.</i></center>
+<br>
+<p>I was waked by my father's voice calling to me from the garden,
+and so started up with that strange and sudden sense of trouble
+which most of us have experienced at some time or other in our
+lives.</p>
+<p>"Nine o'clock, Basil," cried my father. "Nine o'clock--come down
+directly, sir!"</p>
+<p>I sprang out of bed, and for some seconds could remember nothing
+of what had happened; but when I looked out of the window and saw
+my father in his dressing-gown and slippers walking up and down the
+sunny path with his hands behind his back and his eyes fixed on the
+ground, it all flashed suddenly upon me. To plunge into my bath,
+dress, run down, and join him in the garden, was the work of but a
+few minutes.</p>
+<p>"Good-morning, sir," I said, breathlessly.</p>
+<p>He stopped short in his walk, and looked at me from head to
+foot.</p>
+<p>"Humph!" said he, "you have dressed quickly...."</p>
+<p>"Yes, sir; I was startled to find myself so late."</p>
+<p>"So quickly," he continued, "that you have forgotten your
+watch."</p>
+<p>I felt my face burn. I had not a word to answer.</p>
+<p>"I suppose," said he, "you thought I should not find it
+out?"</p>
+<p>"I had hoped to recover it first," I replied, falteringly;
+"but...."</p>
+<p>"But you may make up your mind to the loss of it, sir; and serve
+you rightly, too," interposed my father. "I can tell you, for your
+satisfaction, that the man's clothes have been thoroughly examined,
+and that your watch has not been found. No doubt it lay somewhere
+on the table, and was stolen in the confusion."</p>
+<p>I hung my head. I could have wept for vexation.</p>
+<p>My father laughed sardonically.</p>
+<p>"Well, Master Basil," he said, "the loss is yours, and yours
+only. You won't get another watch from me, I promise you."</p>
+<p>I retorted angrily, whereat he only laughed the more; and then
+we went in to breakfast.</p>
+<p>Our morning meal was more unsociable than usual. I was too much
+annoyed to speak, and my father too preoccupied. I longed to
+inquire after the Chevalier, but not choosing to break the silence,
+hurried through my breakfast that I might run round to the Red Lion
+immediately after. Before we had left the table, a messenger came
+to say that "the conjuror was taken worse," and so my father and I
+hastened away together.</p>
+<p>He had passed from his trance-like sleep into a state of
+delirium, and when we entered the room was sitting up, pale and
+ghost-like, muttering to himself, and gesticulating as if in the
+presence of an audience.</p>
+<p>"<i>Pas du tout</i>," said he fantastically, "<i>pas du tout,
+Messieurs</i>--here is no deception. You shall see him pass from my
+hand to the <i>coffre</i>, and yet you shall not find how he does
+travel."</p>
+<p>My father smiled bitterly.</p>
+<p>"Conjurer to the last!" said he. "In the face of death, what a
+mockery is his trade!"</p>
+<p>Wandering as were his wits, he caught the last word and turned
+fiercely round; but there was no recognition in his eye.</p>
+<p>"Trade, Monsieur!" he echoed. "Trade!--you shall not call him
+trade! Do you know who I am, that you dare call him trade? <i>Dieu
+des Dieux! N'est-ce pas que je suis noble, moi?</i> Trade!--when
+did one of my race embrace a trade? <i>Canaille!</i> I do
+condescend for my reasons to take your money, but you shall not
+call him a trade!"</p>
+<p>Exhausted by this sudden burst of passion, he fell back upon his
+pillow, muttering and flushed. I bent over him, and caught a
+scattered phrase from time to time. He was dreaming of wealth,
+fancying himself rich and powerful, poor wretch! and all
+unconscious of his condition.</p>
+<p>"You shall see my Chateaux," he said, "my horses--my carriages.
+Listen--it is the ringing of the bells. Aha! <i>le jour viendra--le
+jour viendra</i>! Conjuror! who speaks of a conjuror? I never was a
+conjuror! I deny it: and he lies who says it! <i>Attendons</i>! Is
+the curtain up? Ah! my table--where is my table? I cannot play till
+I have my table. <i>Sc&eacute;l&eacute;rats! je suis vol&eacute;!
+je l'ai perdu! je l'ai perdu</i>! Ah, what shall I do? What shall I
+do? They have taken my table--they have taken...."</p>
+<p>He burst into tears, moaned twice or thrice, closed his eyes,
+and fell into a troubled sleep.</p>
+<p>The landlady sobbed. Hers was a kind heart, and the little
+Frenchman's simple courtesy had won her good-will from the
+first.</p>
+<p>"He had real quality manners," she said, disconsolately. "I do
+believe, gentlemen, that he had seen better days. Poor as he was,
+he never disputed the price of anything; and he never spoke to me
+without taking off his hat."</p>
+<p>"Upon my soul, Mistress Cobbe," said my father, "I incline to
+your opinion. I do think he is not what he seems."</p>
+<p>"And if I only knew where to find his friends, I shouldn't care
+half so much!" exclaimed the landlady. "It do seem so hard that he
+should die here, and not one of his own blood follow him to the
+grave! Surely he has some one who loves him!"</p>
+<p>"There was something said the other day about a child," mused my
+father. "Have no papers or letters been found about his
+person?"</p>
+<p>"None at all. Why, Doctor, you were here last night when we
+searched for Master Basil's watch, and you are witness that he had
+nothing of the kind in his possession. As to his luggage, that's
+only a carpet-bag and his conjuring things, and we looked through
+them as carefully as possible."</p>
+<p>The Chevalier moaned again, and tossed his arms feebly in his
+sleep. "The proofs," said he. "The proofs! I can do nothing without
+the proofs."</p>
+<p>My father listened. The landlady shook her head.</p>
+<p>"He has been going on like that ever since you left, sir," she
+said pitifully; "fancying he's been robbed, and calling out about
+the proofs--only ten times more violent. Then, again, he thinks he
+is going to act, and asks for his table. It's wonderful how he
+takes on about that trumpery table!"</p>
+<p>Scarcely had she spoken the words when the Chevalier opened his
+eyes, and, by a supreme effort, sat upright in his bed. The cold
+dew rose upon his brow; his lips quivered; he strove to speak, and
+only an inarticulate cry found utterance. My father flew to his
+support.</p>
+<p>"If you have anything to say," he urged earnestly, "try to say
+it now!"</p>
+<p>The dying man trembled convulsively, and a terrible look of
+despair came into his wan face.</p>
+<p>"Tell--tell" ... he gasped; but his voice failed him, and he
+could get no further.</p>
+<p>My father laid him gently down. There came an interval of
+terrible suspense--a moment of sharp agony--a deep, deep sigh--and
+then silence.</p>
+<p>My father laid his hand gently upon my shoulder.</p>
+<p>"It is all over," he said; "and his secret, if he had one, is in
+closer keeping than ours. Come away, boy; this is no place for
+you."</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_V."></a>CHAPTER V.</h2>
+<h3>IN MEMORIAM.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>The poor little Chevalier! He died and became famous.</p>
+<p>Births, deaths and marriages are the great events of a country
+town; the prime novelties of a country newspaper; the salt of
+conversation, and the soul of gossip. An individual who furnishes
+the community with one or other of these topics, is a benefactor to
+his species. To be born is much; to marry is more; to die is to
+confer a favor on all the old ladies of the neighborhood. They love
+a christening and caudle--they rejoice in a wedding and cake--but
+they prefer a funeral and black kid gloves. It is a tragedy played
+off at the expense of the few for the gratification of the many--a
+costly luxury, of which it is pleasanter to be the spectator than
+the entertainer.</p>
+<p>Occurring, therefore, at a season when the supply of news was
+particularly scanty, the death of the little Chevalier was a boon
+to Saxonholme. The wildest reports were bandied about, and the most
+extraordinary fictions set on foot respecting his origin and
+station. He was a Russian spy. He was the unfortunate son of Louis
+XIV and Marie Antoinette. He was a pupil of Cagliostro, and the
+husband of Mlle. Lenormand. Customers flocked to the tap of the Red
+Lion as they had never flocked before, unless in election-time; and
+good Mrs. Cobbe had to repeat the story of the conjuror's illness
+and death till, like many other reciters, she had told it so often
+that she began to forget it. As for her husband, he had enough to
+do to serve the customers and take the money, to say nothing of
+showing the room, which proved a vast attraction, and remained for
+more than a week just as it was left on the evening of the
+performance, with the table, canopy and paraphernalia of wizardom
+still set out upon the platform.</p>
+<p>In the midst of these things arose a momentous question--what
+was the religion of the deceased, and where should he be buried? As
+in the old miracle plays we find good and bad angels contending for
+the souls of the dead, so on this occasion did the heads of all the
+Saxonholme churches, chapels and meeting-houses contend for the
+body of the little Chevalier. He was a Roman Catholic. He was a
+Dissenter. He was a member of the Established Church. He must be
+buried in the new Protestant Cemetery. He must lie in the
+churchyard of the Ebenezer Tabernacle. He must sleep in the
+far-away "God's Acre" of Father Daly's Chapel, and have a cross at
+his head, and masses said for the repose of his soul. The
+controversy ran high. The reverend gentlemen convoked a meeting,
+quarrelled outrageously, and separated in high dudgeon without
+having arrived at any conclusion.</p>
+<p>Whereupon arose another question, melancholy, ludicrous,
+perplexing, and, withal, as momentous as the first--Would the
+little Chevalier get buried at all? Or was he destined to remain,
+like Mahomet's coffin, for ever in a state of suspense?</p>
+<p>At the last, when Mr. and Mrs. Cobbe despairingly believed that
+they were never to be relieved of their troublesome guest, a vestry
+was called, and the churchwardens brought the matter to a
+conclusion. When he went round with his tickets, the conjuror
+called first at the Rectory, and solicited the patronage of Doctor
+Brand. Would he have paid that compliment to the cloth had he been
+other than a member of that religion "by law established?"
+Certainly not. The point was clear--could not be clearer; so
+orthodoxy and the new Protestant Cemetery carried the day.</p>
+<p>The funeral was a great event--not so far as mutes, feathers and
+carriages were concerned, for the Chevalier left but little worldly
+gear, and without hard cash even the most deserving must forego
+"the trappings and the suits of woe;" but it was a great event,
+inasmuch as it celebrated the victory of the Church, and the defeat
+of all schismatics. The rector himself, complacent and dignified,
+preached the funeral sermon to a crowded congregation, the
+following Sunday. We almost forgot, in fact, that the little
+Chevalier had any concern in the matter, and regarded it only as
+the triumph of orthodoxy.</p>
+<p>All was not ended, even here. For some weeks our conjuror
+continued to be the hero of every pulpit round about. He was cited
+as a shining light, denounced as a vessel of wrath, praised, pitied
+and calumniated according to the creed and temper of each
+declaimer. At length the controversy languished, died a natural
+death, and became "alms for oblivion."</p>
+<p>Laid to rest under a young willow, in a quiet corner, with a
+plain stone at his head, the little Frenchman was himself in course
+of time forgotten:--</p>
+<blockquote>"Alas! Poor Yorick!"</blockquote>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VI."></a>CHAPTER VI.</h2>
+<h3>POLONIUS TO LAERTES.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>Years went by. I studied; outgrew my jackets; became a young
+man. It was time, in short, that I walked the hospitals, and passed
+my examination.</p>
+<p>I had spoken to my father more than once upon the
+subject--spoken earnestly and urgently, as one who felt the
+necessity and justice of his appeal. But he put me off from time to
+time; persisted in looking upon me as a boy long after I had become
+acquainted with the penalties of the razor; and counselled me to be
+patient, till patience was well-nigh exhausted. The result of this
+treatment was that I became miserable and discontented; spent whole
+days wandering about the woods; and degenerated into a creature
+half idler and half misanthrope. I had never loved the profession
+of medicine. I should never have chosen it had I been free to
+follow my own inclinations: but having diligently fitted myself to
+enter it with credit, I felt that my father wronged me in this
+delay; and I felt it perhaps all the more bitterly because my labor
+had been none of love. Happily for me, however, he saw his error
+before it was too late, and repaired it generously.</p>
+<p>"Basil," said he, beckoning me one morning into the
+consulting-room, "I want to speak to you."</p>
+<p>I obeyed sullenly, and stood leaning up against the window, with
+my hands in my pockets.</p>
+<p>"You've been worrying me, Basil, more than enough these last few
+months," he said, rummaging among his papers, and speaking in a
+low, constrained voice. "I don't choose to be worried any longer.
+It is time you walked the hospitals, and--you may go."</p>
+<p>"To London, sir?"</p>
+<p>"No. I don't intend you to go to London."</p>
+<p>"To Edinburgh, then, I suppose," said I, in a tone of
+disappointment.</p>
+<p>"Nor to Edinburgh. You shall go to Paris."</p>
+<p>"To Paris!"</p>
+<p>"Yes--the French surgeons are the most skilful in the world, and
+Ch&eacute;ron will do everything for you. I know no eminent man in
+London from whom I should choose to ask a favor; and Ch&eacute;ron
+is one of my oldest friends--nay, the oldest friend I have in the
+world. If you have but two ounces of brains, he will make a clever
+man of you. Under him you will study French practice; walk the
+hospitals of Paris; acquire the language and, I hope, some of the
+polish of the French people. Are you satisfied?"</p>
+<p>"More than satisfied, sir," I replied, eagerly.</p>
+<p>"You shall not want for money, boy; and you may start as soon as
+you please. Is the thing settled?"</p>
+<p>"Quite, as far as I am concerned."</p>
+<p>My father rubbed his head all over with both hands, took off his
+spectacles, and walked up and down the room. By these signs he
+expressed any unusual degree of satisfaction. All at once he
+stopped, looked me full in the face, and said:--</p>
+<p>"Understand me, Basil. I require one thing in return."</p>
+<p>"If that thing be industry, sir, I think I may promise that you
+shall not have cause to complain,"</p>
+<p>My father shook his head.</p>
+<p>"Not industry," he said; "not industry alone. Keep good company,
+my boy. Keep good hours. Never forget that a gentleman must look
+like a gentleman, dress like a gentleman, frequent the society of
+gentlemen. To be a mere bookworm is to be a drone in the great
+hive. I hate a drone--as I hate a sloven."</p>
+<p>"I understand you, father," I faltered, blushing. "I know that
+of late I--I have not...."</p>
+<p>My father laid his hand suddenly over my mouth.</p>
+<p>"No confessions--no apologies," he said hastily. "We have both
+been to blame in more respects than one, and we shall both know how
+to be wiser in the future. Now go, and consider all that you may
+require for your journey."</p>
+<p>Agitated, delighted, full of hope, I ran up to my own room,
+locked the door, and indulged in a delightful reverie. What a
+prospect had suddenly opened before me! What novelty! what
+adventure! To have visited London would have been to fulfil all my
+desires; but to be sent to Paris was to receive a passport for
+Fairyland!</p>
+<p>That day, for the first time in many months, I dressed myself
+carefully, and went down to dinner with a light heart, a cheerful
+face, and an unexceptionable neckcloth.</p>
+<p>As I took my place at the table, my father looked up cheerily
+and gave me a pleased nod of recognition.</p>
+<p>Our meal passed off very silently. It was my father's maxim that
+no man could do more than one thing well at a time--especially at
+table; so we had contracted a habit which to strangers would have
+seemed even more unsociable than it really was, and gave to all our
+meals an air more penitential than convivial. But this day was, in
+reality, a festive occasion, and my father was disposed to be more
+than usually agreeable. When the cloth was removed, he flung the
+cellar-key at my head, and exclaimed, in a burst of unexampled
+good-humor:--</p>
+<p>"Basil, you dog, fetch up a bottle of the particular port!"</p>
+<p>Now it is one of my theories that a man's after-dinner talk
+takes much of its weight, color, and variety from the quality of
+his wines. A generous vintage brings out generous sentiments. Good
+fellowship, hospitality, liberal politics, and the milk of human
+kindness, may be uncorked simultaneously with a bottle of old
+Madeira; while a pint of thin Sauterne is productive only of envy,
+hatred, malice, and all uncharitableness. We grow sententious on
+Burgundy--logical on Bordeaux--sentimental on Cyprus--maudlin on
+Lagrima Christi--and witty on Champagne.</p>
+<p>Port was my father's favorite wine. It warmed his heart, cooled
+his temper, and made him not only conversational, but expansive.
+Leaning back complacently in his easy-chair, with the glass upheld
+between his eye and the window, he discoursed to me of my journey,
+of my prospects in life, and of all that I should do and avoid,
+professionally and morally.</p>
+<p>"Work," he said, "is the panacea for every sorrow--the plaster
+for every pain--your only universal remedy. Industry, air, and
+exercise are our best physicians. Trust to them, boy; but beware
+how you publish the prescription, lest you find your occupation
+gone. Remember, if you wish to be rich, you must never seem to be
+poor; and as soon as you stand in need of your friends, you will
+find yourself with none left. Be discreet of speech, and cultivate
+the art of silence. Above all things, be truthful. Hold your tongue
+as long as you please, but never open your lips to a lie. Show no
+man the contents of your purse--he would either despise you for
+having so little, or try to relieve you of the burden of carrying
+so much. Above all, never get into debt, and never fall in love.
+The first is disgrace, and the last is the devil! Respect yourself,
+if you wish others to respect you; and bear in mind that the world
+takes you at your own estimate. To dress well is a duty one owes to
+society. The man who neglects his own appearance not only degrades
+himself to the level of his inferiors, but puts an affront upon his
+friends and acquaintances."</p>
+<p>"I trust, sir," I said in some confusion, "that I shall never
+incur the last reproach again."</p>
+<p>"I hope not, Basil," replied my father, with a smile. "I hope
+not. Keep your conscience clean and your boots blacked, and I have
+no fear of you. You are no hero, my boy, but it depends upon
+yourself whether you become a man of honor or a scamp; a gentleman
+or a clown. You have, I see, registered a good resolution to-day.
+Keep it; and remember that Pandemonium will get paved without your
+help. There would be no industry, boy, if there was no idleness,
+and all true progress begins with--Reform."</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VII."></a>CHAPTER VII.</h2>
+<h3>AT THE CHEVAL BLANC</h3>
+<br>
+<p>My journey, even at this distance of time, appears to me like an
+enchanted dream. I observed, yet scarcely remembered, the scenes
+through which I passed, so divided was I between the novelty of
+travelling and the eagerness of anticipation. Provided with my
+letters of introduction, the sum of one hundred guineas, English,
+and the enthusiasm of twenty years of age, I fancied myself endowed
+with an immortality of wealth and happiness.</p>
+<p>The Brighton coach passed through our town once a week; so I
+started for Paris without having ever visited London, and took the
+route by Newhaven and Dieppe. Having left home on Tuesday morning,
+I reached Rouen in the course of the next day but one. At Rouen I
+stayed to dine and sleep, and so made my way to the <i>Cheval
+Blanc</i>, a grand hotel on the quay, where I was received by an
+aristocratic elderly waiter who sauntered out from a side office,
+surveyed me patronizingly, entered my name upon a card for a seat
+at the <i>table d'hote</i>, and, having rung a feeble little bell,
+sank exhausted upon a seat in the hall.</p>
+<p>"To number seventeen, Marie," said this majestic personage,
+handing me over to a pretty little chambermaid who attended the
+summons. "And, Marie, on thy return, my child, bring me an
+absinthe."</p>
+<p>We left this gentleman in a condition of ostentatious languor,
+and Marie deposited me in a pretty room overlooking an exquisite
+little garden set round with beds of verbena and scarlet geranium,
+with a fountain sparkling in the midst. This garden was planted in
+what had once been the courtyard, of the building. The trees nodded
+and whispered, and the windows at the opposite side of the
+quadrangle glittered like burnished gold in the sunlight. I threw
+open the jalousies, plucked one of the white roses that clustered
+outside, and drank in with delight the sunny perfumed air that
+played among the leaves, and scattered the waters of the fountain.
+I could not long rest thus, however. I longed to be out and about;
+so, as it was now no more than half-past three o'clock, and two
+good hours of the glorious midsummer afternoon yet remained to me
+before the hotel dinner-hour, I took my hat, and went out along the
+quays and streets of this beautiful and ancient Norman city.</p>
+<p>Under the crumbling archways; through narrow alleys where the
+upper stories nearly met overhead, leaving only a bright strip of
+dazzling sky between; past quaint old mansions, and sculptured
+fountains, and stately churches hidden away in all kinds of strange
+forgotten nooks and corners, I wandered, wondering and unwearied. I
+saw the statue of Jeanne d'Arc; the ch&acirc;teau of Diane de
+Poitiers; the archway carved in oak where the founder of the city
+still, in rude effigy, presides; the museum rich in medi&aelig;val
+relics; the market-place crowded with fruit-sellers and
+flower-girls in their high Norman caps. Above all, I saw the rare
+old Gothic Cathedral, with its wondrous wealth of antique
+sculpture; its iron spire, destined, despite its traceried beauty,
+to everlasting incompleteness; its grass-grown buttresses, and
+crumbling pinnacles, and portals crowded with images of saints and
+kings. I went in. All was gray, shadowy, vast; dusk with the rich
+gloom of painted windows; and so silent that I scarcely dared
+disturb the echoes by my footsteps. There stood in a corner near
+the door a triangular iron stand stuck full of votive tapers that
+flickered and sputtered and guttered dismally, shedding showers of
+penitential grease-drops on the paved floor below; and there was a
+very old peasant woman on her knees before the altar. I sat down on
+a stone bench and fell into a long study of the stained oriel, the
+light o'erarching roof, and the long perspective of the pillared
+aisles. Presently the verger came out of the vestry-room, followed
+by two gentlemen. He was short and plump, with a loose black gown,
+slender black legs, and a pointed nose--like a larger species of
+raven.</p>
+<p>"<i>Bon jour, M'sieur</i>" croaked he, laying his head a little
+on one side, and surveying me with one glittering eye. "Will
+M'sieur be pleased to see the treasury?"</p>
+<p>"The treasury!" I repeated. "What is there to be seen in the
+treasury?"</p>
+<p>"Nothing, sir, worth one son of an Englishman's money," said the
+taller of the gentlemen. "Tinsel, paste, and dusty bones--all
+humbug and extortion."</p>
+<p>Something in the scornful accent and the deep voice aroused the
+suspicions of the verger, though the words were spoken in
+English.</p>
+<p>"Our treasury, M'sieur," croaked he, more ravenly than ever, "is
+rich--rich in episcopal jewels; in relics--inestimable relics.
+Tickets two francs each."</p>
+<p>Grateful, however, for the timely caution, I acknowledged my
+countryman's courtesy by a bow, declined the proffered investment,
+and went out again into the sunny streets.</p>
+<p>At five o'clock I found myself installed near the head of an
+immensely long dinner-table in the <i>salle &agrave; manger</i> of
+the Cheval Blanc. The <i>salle &agrave; manger</i> was a
+magnificent temple radiant with mirrors, and lustres, and panels
+painted in fresco. The dinner was an imposing rite, served with
+solemn ceremonies by ministering waiters. There were about thirty
+guests seated round, in august silence, most of them very smartly
+dressed, and nearly all English. A stout gentleman, with a little
+knob on the top of his bald head, a buff waistcoat, and a shirt
+amply frilled, sat opposite to me, flanked on either side by an
+elderly daughter in green silk. On my left I was supported by a
+thin young gentleman with fair hair, and blue glasses. To my right
+stood a vacant chair, the occupant of which had not yet arrived;
+and at the head of the table sat a spare pale man dressed all in
+black, who spoke to no one, kept his eyes fixed upon his plate, and
+was served by the waiters with especial servility. The soup came
+and went in profound silence. Faint whispers passed to and fro with
+the fish. It was not till the roast made its appearance that
+anything like conversation broke the sacred silence of the meal. At
+this point the owner of the vacant chair arrived, and took his
+place beside me. I recognised him immediately. It was the
+Englishman whom I had met in the Cathedral. We bowed, and presently
+he spoke to me. In the meantime, he had every forgone item of the
+dinner served to him as exactly as if he had not been late at
+table, and sipped his soup with perfect deliberation while others
+were busy with the sweets. Our conversation began, of course, with
+the weather and the place.</p>
+<p>"Your first visit to Rouen, I suppose?" said he. "Beautiful old
+city, is it not? <i>Gar&ccedil;on</i>, a pint of
+Bordeaux-Leoville."</p>
+<p>I modestly admitted that it was not only my first visit to
+Rouen, but my first to the Continent.</p>
+<p>"Ah, you may go farther than Rouen, and fare worse," said he.
+"Do you sketch? No? That's a pity, for it's deliciously
+picturesque--though, for my own part, I am not enthusiastic about
+gutters and gables, and I object to a population composed
+exclusively of old women. I'm glad, by the way, that I preserved
+you from wasting your time among the atrocious lumber of that
+so-called treasury."</p>
+<p>"The treasury!" exclaimed my slim neighbor with the blue
+glasses. "Beg your p--p--pardon, sir, but are you speaking of the
+Cathedral treasury? Is it worth v--v--visiting?"</p>
+<p>"Singularly so," replied he to my right. "One of the rarest
+collections of authentic curiosities in France. They have the
+snuff-box of Clovis, the great toe of Saint Helena, and the tongs
+with which St. Dunstan took the devil by the nose."</p>
+<p>"Up--p--pon my word, now, that's curious," ejaculated the thin
+tourist, who had an impediment in his speech. "I must p--p--put
+that down. Dear me! the snuff-box of King Clovis! I must see these
+relics to-morrow."</p>
+<p>"Be sure you ask for the great toe of St. Helena," said my right
+hand companion, proceeding imperturbably with his dinner. "The
+saint had but one leg at the period of her martyrdom, and that
+great toe is unique."</p>
+<p>"G--g--good gracious!" exclaimed the tourist, pulling out a
+gigantic note-book, and entering the fact upon the spot. "A saint
+with one leg--and a lady, too! Wouldn't m--m--miss that for the
+world!"</p>
+<p>I looked round, puzzled by the gravity of my new
+acquaintance.</p>
+<p>"Is this all true?" I whispered. "You told me the treasury was a
+humbug."</p>
+<p>"And so it is."</p>
+<p>"But the snuff-box of Clovis, and...."</p>
+<p>"Pure inventions! The man's a muff, and on muffs I have no
+mercy. Do you stay long in Rouen?"</p>
+<p>"No, I go on to Paris to-morrow. I wish I could remain
+longer."</p>
+<p>"I am not sure that you would gain more from a long visit than
+from a short one. Some places are like some women, charming, <i>en
+passant</i>, but intolerable upon close acquaintance. It is just so
+with Rouen. The place contains no fine galleries, and no places of
+public entertainment; and though exquisitely picturesque, is
+nothing more. One cannot always be looking at old houses, and
+admiring old churches. You will be delighted with Paris."</p>
+<p>"B--b--beautiful city," interposed the stammerer, eager to join
+our conversation, whenever he could catch a word of it. "I'm going
+to P--P--Paris myself."</p>
+<p>"Then, sir, I don't doubt you will do ample justice to its
+attractions," observed my right-hand neighbor. "From the size of
+your note-book, and the industry with which you accumulate useful
+information, I should presume that you are a conscientious observer
+of all that is recondite and curious."</p>
+<p>"I as--p--pire to be so," replied the other, with a blush and a
+bow. "I m--m--mean to exhaust P--P--Paris. I'm going to write a
+b--b--book about it, when I get home."'</p>
+<p>My friend to the right flashed one glance of silent scorn upon
+the future author, drained the last glass of his Bordeaux-Leoville,
+pushed his chair impatiently back, and said:--"This place smells
+like a kitchen. Will you come out, and have a cigar?"</p>
+<p>So we rose, took our hats, and in a few moments were strolling
+under the lindens on the Quai de Corneille.</p>
+<p>I, of course, had never smoked in my life; and, humiliating
+though it was, found myself obliged to decline a "prime Havana,"
+proffered in the daintiest of embroidered cigar-cases. My companion
+looked as if he pitied me. "You'll soon learn," said he. "A man
+can't live in Paris without tobacco. Do you stay there many
+weeks?"</p>
+<p>"Two years, at least," I replied, registering an inward
+resolution to conquer the difficulties of tobacco without delay. "I
+am going to study medicine under an eminent French surgeon."</p>
+<p>"Indeed! Well, you could not go to a better school, or embrace a
+nobler profession. I used to think a soldier's life the grandest
+under heaven; but curing is a finer thing than killing, after all!
+What a delicious evening, is it not? If one were only in Paris,
+now, or Vienna,...."</p>
+<p>"What, Oscar Dalrymple!" exclaimed a voice close beside us. "I
+should as soon have expected to meet the great Panjandrum
+himself!"</p>
+<p>"--With the little round button at top," added my companion,
+tossing away the end of his cigar, and shaking hands heartily with
+the new-comer. "By Jove, Frank, I'm glad to see you! What brings
+you here?"</p>
+<p>"Business--confound it! And not pleasant business either. <i>A
+proc&eacute;s</i> which my father has instituted against a great
+manufacturing firm here at Rouen, and of which I have to bear the
+brunt. And you?"</p>
+<p>"And I, my dear fellow? Pshaw! what should I be but an idler in
+search of amusement?"</p>
+<p>"Is it true that you have sold out of the Enniskillens?"</p>
+<p>"Unquestionably. Liberty is sweet; and who cares to carry a
+sword in time of peace? Not I, at all events."</p>
+<p>While this brief greeting was going forward, I hung somewhat in
+the rear, and amused myself by comparing the speakers. The
+new-comer was rather below than above the middle height,
+fair-haired and boyish, with a smile full of mirth and an eye full
+of mischief. He looked about two years my senior. The other was
+much older--two or three and thirty, at the least--dark, tall,
+powerful, finely built; his wavy hair clipped close about his
+sun-burnt neck; a thick moustache of unusual length; and a chest
+that looked as if it would have withstood the shock of a
+battering-ram. Without being at all handsome, there was a look of
+brightness, and boldness, and gallantry about him that arrested
+one's attention at first sight. I think I should have taken him for
+a soldier, had I not already gathered it from the last words of
+their conversation.</p>
+<p>"Who is your friend?" I heard the new-comer whisper.</p>
+<p>To which the other replied:--"Haven't the ghost of an idea."</p>
+<p>Presently he took out his pocket-book, and handing me a card,
+said:--</p>
+<p>"We are under the mutual disadvantage of all chance
+acquaintances. My name is Dalrymple--Oscar Dalrymple, late of the
+Enniskillen Dragoons. My friend here is unknown to fame as Mr.
+Frank Sullivan; a young gentleman who has the good fortune to be
+younger partner in a firm of merchant princes, and the bad taste to
+dislike his occupation."</p>
+<p>How I blushed as I took Captain Dalrymple's card, and stammered
+out my own name in return! I had never possessed a card in my life,
+nor needed one, till this moment. I rather think that Captain
+Dalrymple guessed these facts, for he shook hands with me at once,
+and put an end to my embarrassment by proposing that we should take
+a boat, and pull a mile or two up the river. The thing was no
+sooner said than done. There were plenty of boats below the iron
+bridge; so we chose one of the cleanest, and jumped into it without
+any kind of reference to the owner, whoever he might be.</p>
+<p>"<i>Batelier, Messieurs? Batelier</i>?" cried a dozen men at
+once, rushing down to the water's edge.</p>
+<p>But Dalrymple had already thrown off his coat, and seized the
+oars.</p>
+<p>"<i>Batelier</i>, indeed!" laughed he, as with two or three
+powerful strokes he carried us right into the middle, of the
+stream. "Trust an Oxford man for employing any arms but his own,
+when a pair of sculls are in question!"</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VIII."></a>CHAPTER VIII.</h2>
+<h3>THE ISLAND IN THE RIVER.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>It was just eight o'clock when we started, with the twilight
+coming on. Our course lay up the river, with a strong current
+setting against us; so we made but little way, and enjoyed the
+tranquil beauty of the evening. The sky was pale and clear,
+somewhat greenish overhead and deepening along the line of the
+horizon into amber and rose. Behind us lay the town with every
+brown spire articulated against the sky and every vane glittering
+in the last glow that streamed up from the west. To our left rose a
+line of steep chalk cliffs, and before us lay the river, winding
+away through meadow lands fringed with willows and poplars, and
+interspersed with green islands wooded to the water's edge.
+Presently the last flush faded, and one large planet, splendid and
+solitary, like the first poet of a dark century, emerged from the
+deepening gray.</p>
+<p>My companions were in high spirits. They jested; they laughed;
+they hummed scraps of songs; they had a greeting for every boat
+that passed. By-and-by, we came to an island with a little
+landing-place where a score or two of boats were moored against the
+alders by the water's edge. A tall flag-staff gay with streamers
+peeped above the tree-tops, and a cheerful sound of piping and
+fiddling, mingled with the hum of many voices, came and went with
+the passing breeze. As Dalrymple rested on his oars to listen, a
+boat which we had outstripped some minutes before, shot past us to
+the landing-place, and its occupants, five in number, alighted.</p>
+<p>"Bet you ten to one that's a bridal party," said Mr.
+Sullivan.</p>
+<p>"Say you so? Then suppose we follow, and have a look at the
+bride!" exclaimed his friend. "The place is a public garden."</p>
+<p>The proposition was carried unanimously, and we landed, having
+first tied the boat to a willow. We found the island laid out very
+prettily; intersected by numbers of little paths, with rustic seats
+here and there among the trees, and variegated lamps gleaming out
+amid the grass, like parti-colored glow-worms. Following one of
+these paths, we came presently to an open space, brilliantly
+lighted and crowded by holiday-makers. Here were refreshment
+stalls, and Russian swings, and queer-looking merry-go-rounds,
+where each individual sat on a wooden horse and went gravely round
+and round with a stick in his hand, trying to knock off a ring from
+the top of a pole in the middle. Here, also, was a band in a gaily
+decorated orchestra; a circular area roped off for dancers; a
+mysterious tent with a fortune-teller inside; a lottery-stall
+resplendent with vases and knick-knacks, which nobody was ever
+known to win; in short, all kinds of attractions, stale enough, no
+doubt, to my companions, but sufficiently novel and amusing to
+me.</p>
+<p>We strolled about for some time among the stalls and promenaders
+and amused ourselves by criticising the company, which was composed
+almost entirely of peasants, soldiers, artisans in blue blouses and
+humble tradespeople. The younger women were mostly handsome, with
+high Norman caps, white kerchiefs and massive gold ear-rings. Many,
+in addition to the ear-rings, wore a gold cross suspended round the
+neck by a piece of black velvet; and some had a brooch to match.
+Here, sitting round a table under a tree, we came upon a family
+group, consisting of a little plump, bald-headed <i>bourgeois</i>
+with his wife and two children--the wife stout and rosy; the
+children noisy and authoritative. They were discussing a dish of
+poached eggs and a bottle of red wine, to the music of a polka
+close by.</p>
+<p>"I should like to dance," said the little girl, drumming with
+her feet against the leg of the table, and eating an egg with her
+fingers. "I may dance presently with Phillippe, may I not,
+papa?"</p>
+<p>"I won't dance," said Phillippe sulkily. "I want some
+oysters."</p>
+<p>"Oysters, <i>mon enfant</i>! I have told you twice already that
+no one eats oysters in July," observed his mother.</p>
+<p>"I don't care for that," said Phillippe. "It's my
+<i>f&ecirc;te</i> day, and Uncle Jacques said I was to have
+whatever I fancied; I want some oysters."</p>
+<p>"Your Uncle Jacques did not know what an unreasonable boy you
+are," replied the father angrily. "If you say another word about
+oysters, you shall not ride in the <i>man&egrave;ge</i>
+to-night."</p>
+<p>Phillippe thrust his fists into his eyes and began to roar--so
+we walked away.</p>
+<p>In an arbor, a little further on, we saw two young people
+whispering earnestly, and conscious of no eyes but each
+other's.</p>
+<p>"A pair of lovers," said Sullivan.</p>
+<p>"And a pair that seldom get the chance of meeting, if we may
+judge by their untasted omelette," replied Dalrymple. "But where's
+the bridal party?"</p>
+<p>"Oh, we shall find them presently. You seem interested."</p>
+<p>"I am. I mean to dance with the bride and make the bridegroom
+jealous."</p>
+<p>We laughed and passed on, peeping into every arbor, observing
+every group, and turning to stare at every pretty girl we met. My
+own aptitude in the acquisition of these arts of gallantry
+astonished myself. Now, we passed a couple of soldiers playing at
+dominoes; now a noisy party round a table in the open air covered
+with bottles; now an arbor where half a dozen young men and three
+or four girls were assembled round a bowl of blazing punch. The
+girls were protesting they dare not drink it, but were drinking it,
+nevertheless, with exceeding gusto.</p>
+<p>"Grisettes and <i>commis voyageurs!</i>" said Dalrymple,
+contemptuously. "Let us go and look at the dancers."</p>
+<p>We went on, and stood in the shelter of some trees near the
+orchestra. The players consisted of three violins, a clarionette
+and a big drum. The big drum was an enthusiastic performer. He
+belabored his instrument as heartily as if it had been his worst
+enemy, but with so much independence of character that he never
+kept the same time as his fellow-players for two minutes together.
+They were playing a polka for the benefit of some twelve or fifteen
+couples, who were dancing with all their might in the space before
+the orchestra. On they came, round and round and never weary, two
+at a time--a mechanic and a grisette, a rustic and a Normandy girl,
+a tall soldier and a short widow, a fat tradesman and his wife, a
+couple of milliners assistants who preferred dancing together to
+not dancing at all, and so forth.</p>
+<p>"How I wish somebody would ask me, <i>ma m&egrave;re</i>!" said
+a coquettish brunette, close by, with a sidelong glance at
+ourselves."</p>
+<p>"You shall dance with your brother Paul, my dear, as soon as he
+comes," replied her mother, a stout <i>bourgeoise</i> with a green
+fan.</p>
+<p>"But it is such dull work to dance with one's brother!" pouted
+the brunette. "If it were one's cousin, even, it would be
+different."</p>
+<p>Mr. Frank Sullivan flung away his cigar, and began buttoning up
+his gloves.</p>
+<p>"I'll take that damsel out immediately," said he. "A girl who
+objects to dance with her brother deserves encouragement."</p>
+<p>So away he went with his hat inclining jauntily on one side,
+and, having obtained the mother's permission, whirled away with the
+pretty brunette into the very thickest of the throng.</p>
+<p>"There they are!" said Dalrymple, suddenly. "There's the wedding
+party. <i>Per Bacco</i>! but our little bride is charming!"</p>
+<p>"And the bridegroom is a handsome specimen of rusticity."</p>
+<p>"Yes--a genuine pastoral pair, like a Dresden china shepherd and
+shepherdess. See, the girl is looking up in his face--he shakes his
+head. She is urging him to dance, and he refuses! Never mind, <i>ma
+belle</i>--you shall have your valse, and Corydon may be as cross
+as he pleases!"</p>
+<p>"Don't flatter yourself that she will displease Corydon to dance
+with your lordship!" I said, laughingly.</p>
+<p>"Pshaw! she would displease fifty Corydons if I chose to make
+her do so," said Dalrymple, with a smile of conscious power.</p>
+<p>"True; but not on her wedding-day."</p>
+<p>"Wedding-day or not, I beg to observe that in less than half an
+hour you will see me whirling along with my arm round little
+Phillis's dainty waist. Now come and see how I do it."</p>
+<p>He made his way through the crowd, and I, half curious, half
+abashed, went with him. The party was five in number, consisting of
+the bride and bridegroom, a rosy, middle-aged peasant woman,
+evidently the mother of the bride, and an elderly couple who looked
+like humble townsfolk, and were probably related to one or other of
+the newly-married pair. Dalrymple opened the attack by stumbling
+against the mother, and then overwhelming her with elaborate
+apologies.</p>
+<p>"In these crowded places, Madame," said he, in his fluent
+French, "one is scarcely responsible for an impoliteness. I beg ten
+thousand pardons, however. I hope I have not hurt you?"</p>
+<p>"<i>Ma foi!</i> no, M'sieur. It would take more than that to
+hurt me!"</p>
+<p>"Nor injured your dress, I trust, Madame?"</p>
+<p>"<i>Ah, par exemple</i>! do I wear muslins or gauzes that they
+should not bear touching? No, no, no, M'sieur--thanking you all the
+same."</p>
+<p>"You are very amiable, Madame, to say so."</p>
+<p>"You are very polite, M'sieur, to think so much of a
+trifle."</p>
+<p>"Nothing is a trifle, Madame, where a lady is concerned. At
+least, so we Englishmen consider."</p>
+<p>"Bah! M'sieur is not English?"</p>
+<p>"Indeed, Madame, I am."</p>
+<p>"<i>Mais, mon Dieu! c'est incroyable</i>. Suzette--brother
+Jacques--Andr&eacute;, do you hear this? M'sieur, here, swears that
+he is English, and yet he speaks French like one of ourselves! Ah,
+what a fine thing learning is!"</p>
+<p>"I may say with truth, Madame, that I never appreciate the
+advantages of education so highly, as when they enable me to
+converse with ladies who are not my own countrywomen," said
+Dalrymple, carrying on the conversation with as much studied
+politeness as if his interlocutor had been a duchess. "But--excuse
+the observation--you are here, I imagine, upon a happy
+occasion?"</p>
+<p>The mother laughed, and rubbed her hands.</p>
+<p>"<i>D&acirc;me</i>! one may see that," replied she, "with one's
+eyes shut! Yes, M'sieur,--yes--their wedding-day, the dear
+children--their wedding-day! They've been betrothed these two
+years."</p>
+<p>"The bride is very like you, Madame," said Dalrymple, gravely.
+"Your younger sister, I presume?"</p>
+<p>"<i>Ah, quel farceur</i>! He takes my daughter for my sister!
+Suzette, do you hear this? M'sieur is killing me with
+laughter!"</p>
+<p>And the good lady chuckled, and gasped, and wiped her eyes, and
+dealt Dalrymple a playful push between the shoulders, which would
+have upset the balance of any less heavy dragoon.</p>
+<p>"Your daughter, Madame!" said he. "Allow me to congratulate you.
+May I also be permitted to congratulate the bride?" And with this
+he took off his hat to Suzette and shook hands with Andr&eacute;,
+who looked not overpleased, and proceeded to introduce me as his
+friend Monsieur Basil Arbuthnot, "a young English gentleman,
+<i>tr&egrave;s distingu&eacute;</i>"</p>
+<p>The old lady then said her name was Madame Roquet, and that she
+rented a small farm about a mile and a half from Rouen; that
+Suzette was her only child; and that she had lost her "blessed man"
+about eight years ago. She next introduced the elderly couple as
+her brother Jacques Robineau and his wife, and informed us that
+Jacques was a tailor, and had a shop opposite the church of St.
+Maclou, "<i>l&agrave; bas</i>."</p>
+<p>To judge of Monsieur Robineau's skill by his outward appearance,
+I should have said that he was professionally unsuccessful, and
+supplied his own wardrobe from the misfits returned by his
+customers. He wore a waistcoat which was considerably too long for
+him, trousers which were considerably too short, and a green cloth
+coat with a high velvet collar which came up nearly to the tops of
+his ears. In respect of personal characteristics, Monsieur Robineau
+and his wife were the most admirable contrast imaginable. Monsieur
+Robineau was short; Madame Robineau was tall. Monsieur Robineau was
+as plump and rosy as a robin; Madame Robineau was pale and bony to
+behold. Monsieur Robineau looked the soul of good nature, ready to
+chirrup over his <i>grog-au-vin,</i> to smoke a pipe with his
+neighbor, to cut a harmless joke or enjoy a harmless frolic, as
+cheerfully as any little tailor that ever lived; Madame Robineau,
+on the contrary, preserved a dreadful dignity, and looked as if she
+could laugh at nothing on this side of the grave. Not to consider
+the question too curiously, I should have said, at first sight,
+that Monsieur Robineau stood in no little awe of his wife, and that
+Madame Robineau was the very head and front of their domestic
+establishment.</p>
+<p>It was wonderful and delightful to see how Captain Dalrymple
+placed himself on the best of terms with all these good people--how
+he patted Robineau on the back and complimented Madame, banished
+the cloud from Andr&eacute;'s brow, and summoned a smile to the
+pretty cheek of Suzette. One would have thought he had known them
+for years already, so thoroughly was he at home with every member
+of the wedding party.</p>
+<p>Presently, he asked Suzette to dance. She blushed scarlet, and
+cast a pretty appealing look at her husband and her mother. I could
+almost guess what she whispered to the former by the motion of her
+lips.</p>
+<p>"Monsieur Andr&eacute; will, I am sure, spare Madame for one
+gallop," said Dalrymple, with that kind of courtesy which accepts
+no denial. It was quite another tone, quite another manner. It was
+no longer the persuasive suavity of one who is desirous only to
+please, but the politeness of a gentleman to au inferior.</p>
+<p>The cloud came back upon Andr&eacute;'s brow, and he hesitated;
+but Madame Roquet interposed.</p>
+<p>"Spare her!" she exclaimed. "<i>D&acirc;me</i>! I should think
+so! She has never left his arm all day. Here, my child, give me
+your shawl while you dance, and bake care not to get too warm, for
+the evening air is dangerous."</p>
+<p>And so Suzette took off her shawl, and Andr&eacute; was
+silenced, and Dalrymple, in less than the half hour, was actually
+whirling away with his arm round little Phillis's dainty waist.</p>
+<p>I am afraid that I proved a very indifferent <i>locum tenens</i>
+for my brilliant friend, and that the good people thought me
+exceedingly stupid. I tried to talk to them, but the language
+tripped me up at every turn, and the right words never would come
+when they were wanted. Besides, I felt uneasy without knowing
+exactly why. I could not keep from watching Dalrymple and Suzette.
+I could not help noticing how closely he held her; how he never
+ceased talking to her; and how the smiles and blushes chased each
+other over her pretty face. That I should have wit enough to
+observe these things proved that my education was progressing
+rapidly; but then, to be sure, I was studying under an accomplished
+teacher.</p>
+<p>They danced for a long time. So long, that Andr&eacute; became
+uneasy, and my available French was quite exhausted. I was heartily
+glad when Dalrymple brought back the little bride at last, flushed
+and panting, and (himself as cool as a diplomatist) assisted her
+with her shawl and resigned her to the protection of her
+husband.</p>
+<p>"Why hast thou danced so long with that big Englishman?"
+murmured Andr&eacute;, discontentedly. "When <i>I</i> asked thee,
+thou wast too tired, and now...."</p>
+<p>"And now I am so happy to be near thee again," whispered
+Suzette.</p>
+<p>Andr&eacute; softened directly.</p>
+<p>"But to dance for twenty minutes...." began he.</p>
+<p>"Ah, but he danced so well, and I am so fond of waltzing,
+Andr&eacute;!"</p>
+<p>The cloud gathered again, and an impatient reply was coming,
+when Dalrymple opportunely invited the whole party to a bowl of
+punch in an adjoining arbor, and himself led the way with Madame
+Roquet. The arbor was vacant, a waiter was placing the chairs, and
+the punch was blazing in the bowl. It had evidently been ordered
+during one of the pauses in the dance, that it might be ready to
+the moment--a little attention which called forth exclamations of
+pleasure from both Madame Roquet and Monsieur Robineau, and touched
+with something like a gleam of satisfaction even the grim visage of
+Monsieur Robineau's wife.</p>
+<p>Dalrymple took the head of the table, and stirred the punch into
+leaping tongues of blue flame till it looked like a miniature
+Vesuvius.</p>
+<p>"What diabolical-looking stuff!" I exclaimed. "You might, to all
+appearance, be Lucifer's own cupbearer."</p>
+<p>"A proof that it ought to be devilish good," replied Dalrymple,
+ladling it out into the glasses. "Allow me, ladies and gentlemen,
+to propose the health, happiness, and prosperity of the bride and
+bridegroom. May they never die, and may they be remembered for ever
+after!"</p>
+<p>We all laughed as if this was the best joke we had heard in our
+lives, and Dalrymple filled the glasses up again.</p>
+<p>"What, in the name of all that's mischievous, can have become of
+Sullivan?" said he to me. "I have not caught so much as a glimpse
+of him for the last hour."</p>
+<p>"When I last saw him, he was dancing."</p>
+<p>"Yes, with a pretty little dark-eyed girl in a blue dress. By
+Jove! that fellow will be getting into trouble if left to
+himself!"</p>
+<p>"But the girl has her mother with her!"</p>
+<p>"All the stronger probability of a scrimmage," replied
+Dalrymple, sipping his punch with a covert glance of salutation at
+Suzette.</p>
+<p>"Shall I see if they are among the dancers?"</p>
+<p>"Do--but make haste; for the punch is disappearing fast."</p>
+<p>I left them, and went back to the platform where the
+indefatigable public was now engaged in the performance of
+quadrilles. Never, surely, were people so industrious in the
+pursuit of pleasure! They poussetted, bowed, curtsied, joined
+hands, and threaded the mysteries of every figure, as if their very
+lives depended on their agility.</p>
+<p>"Look at Jean Thomas," said a young girl to her still younger
+companion. "He dances like an angel!"</p>
+<p>The one thus called upon to admire, looked at Jean Thomas, and
+sighed.</p>
+<p>"He never asks me, by any chance," said she, sadly, "although
+his mother and mine are good neighbors. I suppose I don't dance
+well enough--or dress well enough," she added, glancing at her
+friend's gay shawl and coquettish cap.</p>
+<p>"He has danced with me twice this evening," said the first
+speaker triumphantly; "and he danced with me twice last Sunday at
+the Jardin d'Armide. Elise says...."</p>
+<p>Her voice dropped to a whisper, and I heard no more. It was a
+passing glimpse behind the curtain--a peep at one of the many
+dramas of real life that are being played for ever around us. Here
+were all the elements of romance--love, admiration, vanity, envy.
+Here was a hero in humble life--a lady-killer in his own little
+sphere. He dances with one, neglects another, and multiplies his
+conquests with all the heartlessness of a gentleman.</p>
+<p>I wandered round the platform once or twice, scrutinizing the
+dancers, but without success. There was no sign of Sullivan, or of
+his partner, or of his partner's mother, the <i>bourgeoise</i> with
+the green fan. I then went to the grotto of the fortune-teller, but
+it was full of noisy rustics; and thence to the lottery hall, where
+there were plenty of players, but not those of whom I was in
+search.</p>
+<p>"Wheel of fortune, Messieurs et Mesdames," said the young lady
+behind the counter. "Only fifty centimes each. All prizes, and no
+blanks--try your fortune, <i>monsieur le capitaine!</i> Put it
+once, <i>monsieur le capitaine</i>; once for yourself, and once for
+madame. Only fifty centimes each, and the certainty of
+winning!"</p>
+<p><i>Monsieur le capitaine</i> was a great, rawboned corporal,
+with a pretty little maid-servant on his arm. The flattery was not
+very delicate; but it succeeded. He threw down a franc. The wheel
+flew round, the papers were drawn, and the corporal won a
+needle-case, and the maid-servant a cigar-holder. In the midst of
+the laugh to which this distribution gave rise, I walked away in
+the direction of the refreshment stalls. Here were parties supping
+substantially, dancers drinking orgeat and lemonade, and little
+knots of tradesmen and mechanics sipping beer ridiculously out of
+wine-glasses to an accompaniment of cakes and sweet-biscuits. Still
+I could see no trace of Mr. Frank Sullivan.</p>
+<p>At length I gave up the search in despair, and on my way back
+encountered Master Philippe leaning against a tree, and looking
+exceedingly helpless and unwell.</p>
+<p>"You ate too many eggs, Philippe," said his mother. "I told you
+so at the time."</p>
+<p>"It--it wasn't the eggs," faltered the wretched Philippe. "It
+was the Russian swing."</p>
+<p>"And serve you rightly, too," said his father angrily. "I wish
+with all my heart that you had had your favorite oysters as
+well!"</p>
+<p>When I came back to the arbor, I found the little party
+immensely happy, and a fresh bowl of punch just placed upon the
+table. Andr&eacute; was sitting next to Suzette, as proud as a
+king. Madame Roquet, volubly convivial, was talking to every one.
+Madame Robineau was silently disposing of all the biscuits and
+punch that came in her way. Monsieur Robineau, with his hat a
+little pushed back and his thumb in the arm-hole of his waistcoat,
+was telling a long story to which nobody listened; while Dalrymple,
+sitting on the other side of the bride, was gallantly doing the
+duties of entertainer.</p>
+<p>He looked up--I shook my head, slipped back into my place, and
+listened to the tangled threads of conversation going on around
+me.</p>
+<p>"And so," said Monsieur Robineau, proceeding with his story, and
+staring down into the bottom of his empty glass, "and so I said to
+myself, 'Robineau, <i>mon ami</i>, take care. One honest man is
+better than two rogues; and if thou keepest thine eyes open, the
+devil himself stands small chance of cheating thee!' So I buttoned
+up my coat--this very coat I have on now, only that I have re-lined
+and re-cuffed it since then, and changed the buttons for brass
+ones; and brass buttons for one's holiday coat, you know, look so
+much more <i>comme il faut</i>--and said to the landlord...."</p>
+<p>"Another glass of punch, Monsieur Robineau," interrupted
+Dalrymple.</p>
+<p>"Thank you, M'sieur, you are very good; well, as I was
+saying...."</p>
+<p>"Ah, bah, brother Jacques!" exclaimed Madame Roquet,
+impatiently, "don't give us that old story of the miller and the
+gray colt, this evening! We've all heard it a hundred times
+already. Sing us a song instead, <i>mon ami</i>!"</p>
+<p>"I shall be happy to sing, sister Marie," replied Monsieur
+Robineau, with somewhat husky dignity, "when I have finished my
+story. You may have heard the story before. So may Andr&eacute;--so
+may Suzette--so may my wife. I admit it. But these gentlemen--these
+gentlemen who have never heard it, and who have done me the
+honor...."</p>
+<p>"Not to listen to a word of it," said Madame Robineau, sharply.
+"There, you are answered, husband. Drink your punch, and hold your
+tongue."</p>
+<p>Monsieur Robineau waved his hand majestically, and assumed a
+Parliamentary air.</p>
+<p>"Madame Robineau," he said, getting more and more husky, "be so
+obliging as to wait till I ask for your advice. With regard to
+drinking my punch, I have drunk it--" and here he again stared down
+into the bottom of his glass, which was again empty--"and with
+regard to holding my tongue, that is my business, and--and...."</p>
+<p>"Monsieur Robineau," said Dalrymple, "allow me to offer you some
+more punch."</p>
+<p>"Not another drop, Jacques," said Madame, sternly. "You have had
+too much already."</p>
+<p>Poor Monsieur Robineau, who had put out his glass to be
+refilled, paused and looked helplessly at his wife.</p>
+<p>"<i>Mon cher ange</i>,...." he began; but she shook her head
+inflexibly, and Monsieur Robineau submitted with the air of a man
+who knows that from the sentence of the supreme court there is no
+appeal.</p>
+<p>"<i>D&acirc;me</i>!" whispered Madame Roquet, with a
+confidential attack upon my ribs that gave me a pain in my side for
+half an hour after, "my brother has the heart of a rabbit. He gives
+way to her in everything--so much the worse for him. My blessed
+man, who was a saint of a husband, would have broken the bowl over
+my ears if I had dared to interfere between his glass and his
+mouth!"</p>
+<p>Whereupon Madame Roquet filled her own glass and mine, and
+Madame Robineau, less indulgent to her husband than herself,
+followed our example.</p>
+<p>Just at this moment, a confused hubbub of voices, and other
+sounds expressive of a <i>fracas</i>, broke out in the direction of
+the trees behind the orchestra. The dancers deserted their polka,
+the musicians stopped fiddling, the noisy supper-party in the next
+arbor abandoned their cold chicken and salad, and everybody ran to
+the scene of action. Dalrymple was on his feet in a moment; but
+Suzette held Andr&eacute; back with both hands and implored him to
+stay.</p>
+<p>"Some <i>mauvais sujets</i>, no doubt, who refuse to pay the
+score," suggested Madame Roquet.</p>
+<p>"Or Sullivan, who has got into one of his infernal scrapes,"
+muttered Dalrymple, with a determined wrench at his moustache.
+"Come on, anyhow, and let us see what is the matter!"</p>
+<p>So we snatched up our hats and ran out, just as Monsieur
+Robineau seized the opportunity to drink another tumbler of punch
+when his wife was not looking.</p>
+<p>Following in the direction of the rest, we took one of the paths
+behind the orchestra, and came upon a noisy crowd gathered round a
+wooden summer-house.</p>
+<p>"It's a fight," said one.</p>
+<p>"It's a pickpocket," said another.</p>
+<p>"Bah! it's only a young fellow who has been making love to a
+girl," exclaimed a third.</p>
+<p>We forced our way through, and there we saw Mr. Frank Sullivan
+with his hat off, his arms crossed, and his back against the wall,
+presenting a dauntless front to the gesticulations and threats of
+an exceedingly enraged young man with red hair, who was abusing him
+furiously. The amount of temper displayed by this young man was
+something unparalleled. He was angry in every one of his limbs. He
+stamped, he shook his fist, he shook his head. The very tips of his
+ears looked scarlet with rage. Every now and then he faced round to
+the spectators, and appealed to them--or to a stout woman with a
+green fan, who was almost as red and angry as himself, and who
+always rushed forward when addressed, and shook the green fan in
+Sullivan's face.</p>
+<p>"You are an aristocrat!" stormed the young man. "A pampered,
+insolent aristocrat! A dog of an Englishman! A
+<i>sc&eacute;l&eacute;rat</i>! Don't suppose you are to trample
+upon us for nothing! We are Frenchmen, you beggarly
+islander--Frenchmen, do you hear?"</p>
+<p>A growl of sympathetic indignation ran through the crowd, and
+"<i>&agrave; bas les aristocrats</i>--<i>&agrave; bas les
+Anglais</i>!" broke out here and there.</p>
+<p>"In the devil's name, Sullivan," said Dalrymple, shouldering his
+way up to the object of these agreeable menaces, "what have you
+been after, to bring this storm about your ears?"</p>
+<p>"Pshaw! nothing at all," replied he with a mocking laugh, and a
+contemptuous gesture. "I danced with a pretty girl, and treated her
+to champagne afterwards. Her mother and brother hunted us out, and
+spoiled our flirtation. That's the whole story."</p>
+<p>Something in the laugh and gesture--something, too, perhaps in
+the language which they could not understand, appeared to give the
+last aggravation to both of Sullivan's assailants. I saw the young
+man raise his arm to strike--I saw Dalrymple fell him with a blow
+that would have stunned an ox--I saw the crowd close in, heard the
+storm break out on every side, and, above it all, the deep, strong
+tones of Dalrymple's voice, saying:--</p>
+<p>"To the boat, boys! Follow me."</p>
+<p>In another moment he had flung himself into the crowd, dealt one
+or two sounding blows to left and right, cleared a passage for
+himself and us, and sped away down one of the narrow walks leading
+to the river. Presently, having taken one or two turnings, none of
+which seemed to lead to the spot we sought, we came upon an open
+space full of piled-up benches, pyramids of empty bottles, boxes,
+baskets, and all kinds of lumber. Here we paused to listen and take
+breath.</p>
+<p>We had left the crowd behind us, but they were still within
+hearing.</p>
+<p>"By Jove!" said Dalrymple, "I don't know which way to go. I
+believe we are on the wrong side of the island."</p>
+<p>"And I believe they are after us," added Sullivan, peering into
+the baskets. "By all that's fortunate, here are the fireworks! Has
+anybody got a match? We'll take these with us, and go off in a
+blaze of triumph!"</p>
+<p>The suggestion was no sooner made than adopted. We filled our
+hats and pockets with crackers and Catherine-wheels, piled the rest
+into one great heap, threw a dozen or so of lighted fusees into the
+midst of them, and just as the voices of our pursuers were growing
+momentarily louder and nearer, darted away again down a fresh
+turning, and saw the river gleaming at the end of it.</p>
+<p>"Hurrah! here's a boat," shouted Sullivan, leaping into it, and
+we after him.</p>
+<p>It was not our boat, but we did not care for that. Ours was at
+the other side of the island, far enough away, down by the
+landing-place. Just as Dalrymple seized the oars, there burst forth
+a tremendous explosion. A column of rockets shot up into the air,
+and instantly the place was as light as day. Then a yell of
+discovery broke forth, and we were seen almost as soon as we were
+fairly out of reach. We had secured the only boat on that side of
+the island, and three or four of Dalrymple's powerful strokes had
+already carried us well into the middle of the stream. To let off
+our own store of fireworks--to pitch tokens of our regard to our
+friends on the island in the shape of blazing crackers, which fell
+sputtering and fizzing into the water half-way between the boat and
+the shore--to stand up in the stern and bow politely--finally, to
+row away singing "God save the Queen" with all our might, were
+feats upon which we prided ourselves very considerably at the time,
+and the recollection of which afforded us infinite amusement all
+the way home.</p>
+<p>That evening we all supped together at the Chaval Blane, and of
+what we did or said after supper I have but a confused remembrance.
+I believe that I tried to smoke a cigar; and it is my impression
+that I made a speech, in which I swore eternal friendship to both
+of my new friends; but the only circumstance about which I cannot
+be mistaken is that I awoke next morning with the worst specimen of
+headache that had yet come within the limits of my experience.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IX."></a>CHAPTER IX.</h2>
+<h3>DAMON AND PYTHIAS.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>I left Rouen the day after my great adventure on the river, and
+Captain Dalrymple went with me to the station.</p>
+<p>"You have my Paris address upon my card," he said, as we walked
+to and fro upon the platform. "It's just a bachelor's den, you
+know--and I shall be there in about a fortnight or three weeks.
+Come and look me up."</p>
+<p>To which I replied that I was glad to be allowed to do so, and
+that I should "look him up" as soon as he came home. And so, with
+words of cordial good-will and a hearty shake of the hand, we
+parted.</p>
+<p>Having started late in the evening, I arrived in Paris between
+four and five o'clock on a bright midsummer Sunday morning. I was
+not long delayed by the customs officers, for I carried but a scant
+supply of luggage. Having left this at an hotel, I wandered about
+till it should be time for breakfast. After breakfast I meant to
+dress and call upon Dr. Ch&eacute;ron.</p>
+<p>The morning air was clear and cool. The sun shone brilliantly,
+and was reflected back with dazzling vividness from long vistas of
+high white houses, innumerable windows, and gilded balconies.
+Theatres, shops, caf&eacute;s, and hotels not yet opened, lined the
+great thoroughfares. Triumphal arches, columns, parks, palaces, and
+churches succeeded one another in apparently endless succession. I
+passed a lofty pillar crowned with a conqueror's statue--a palace
+tragic in history--a modern Parthenon surrounded by columns,
+peopled with sculptured friezes, and approached by a flight of
+steps extending the whole width of the building. I went in, for the
+doors had just been opened, and a white-haired Sacristan was
+preparing the seats for matin service. There were acolytes
+decorating the altar with fresh flowers, and early devotees on
+their knees before the shrine of the Madonna. The gilded ornaments,
+the tapers winking in the morning light, the statues, the
+paintings, the faint clinging odors of incense, the hushed
+atmosphere, the devotional silence, the marble angels kneeling
+round the altar, all united to increase my dream of delight. I
+gazed and gazed again; wandered round and round; and at last, worn
+out with excitement and fatigue, sank into a chair in a distant
+corner of the Church, and fell into a heavy sleep. How long it
+lasted I know not; but the voices of the choristers and the deep
+tones of the organ mingled with my dreams. When I awoke the last
+worshippers were departing, the music had died into silence, the
+wax-lights were being extinguished, and the service was ended.</p>
+<p>Again I went out into the streets; but all was changed. Where
+there had been the silence of early morning there was now the
+confusion of a great city. Where there had been closed shutters and
+deserted thoroughfares, there was the bustle of life, gayety,
+business, and pleasure. The shops blazed with jewels and
+merchandise; the stonemasons were at work on the new buildings; the
+lemonade venders, with their gay reservoirs upon their backs, were
+plying a noisy trade; the bill-stickers were papering boardings and
+lamp-posts with variegated advertisements; the charlatan, in his
+gaudy chariot, was selling pencils and penknives to the
+accompaniment of a hand-organ; soldiers were marching to the
+clangor of military music; the merchant was in his counting-house,
+the stock-broker at the Bourse, and the lounger, whose name is
+Legion, was sitting in the open air outside his favorite
+caf&eacute;, drinking chocolate, and yawning over the
+<i>Charivari</i>.</p>
+<p>I thought I must be dreaming. I scarcely believed the evidence
+of my eyes. Was this Sunday? Was it possible that in our own little
+church at home--in our own little church, where we could hear the
+birds twittering outside in every interval of the quiet
+service--the old familiar faces, row beyond row, were even now
+upturned in reverent attention to the words of the preacher? Prince
+Bedreddin, transported in his sleep to the gates of Damascus, could
+scarcely have opened his eyes upon a foreign city and a strange
+people with more incredulous amazement.</p>
+<p>I can now scarcely remember how that day of wonders went by. I
+only know that I rambled about as in a dream, and am vaguely
+conscious of having wandered through the gardens of the Tuilleries;
+of having found the Louvre open, and of losing myself among some of
+the upper galleries; of lying exhausted upon a bench in the Champs
+Elys&eacute;es; of returning by quays lined with palaces and
+spanned by noble bridges; of pacing round and round the enchanted
+arcades of the Palais Royal; of wondering how and where I should
+find my hotel, and of deciding at last that I could go no farther
+without dining somehow. Wearied and half stupefied, I ventured, at
+length, into one of the large <i>restaurants</i> upon the
+Boulevards. Here I found spacious rooms lighted by superb
+chandeliers which were again reflected in mirrors that extended
+from floor to ceiling. Rows of small tables ran round the rooms,
+and a double line down the centre, each laid with its snowy cloth
+and glittering silver.</p>
+<p>It was early when I arrived; so I passed up to the top of the
+room and appropriated a small table commanding a view of the great
+thoroughfare below. The waiters were slow to serve me; the place
+filled speedily; and by the time I had finished my soup, nearly all
+the tables were occupied. Here sat a party of officers, bronzed and
+mustachioed; yonder a group of laughing girls; a pair of
+provincials; a family party, children, governess and all; a stout
+capitalist, solitary and self content; a quatuor of rollicking
+<i>commis-voyageurs</i>; an English couple, perplexed and curious.
+Amused by the sight of so many faces, listening to the hum of
+voices, and watching the flying waiters bearing all kinds of
+mysterious dishes, I loitered over my lonely meal, and wished that
+this delightful whirl of novelty might last for ever. By and by a
+gentleman entered, walked up the whole length of the room in search
+of a seat, found my table occupied by only a single person, bowed
+politely, and drew his chair opposite mine.</p>
+<p>He was a portly man of about forty-five or fifty years of age,
+with a broad, calm brow; curling light hair, somewhat worn upon the
+temples; and large blue eyes, more keen than tender. His dress was
+scrupulously simple, and his hands were immaculately white. He
+carried an umbrella little thicker than a walking-stick, and wrote
+out his list of dishes with a massive gold pencil. The waiter bowed
+down before him as if he were an habitu&eacute; of the place.</p>
+<p>It was not long before we fell into conversation. I do not
+remember which spoke first; but we talked of Paris--or rather, I
+talked and he listened; for, what with the excitement and fatigue
+of the day, and what with the half bottle of champagne which I had
+magnificently ordered, I found myself gifted with a sudden flood of
+words, and ran on, I fear, not very discreetly.</p>
+<p>A few civil rejoinders, a smile, a bow, an assent, a question
+implied rather than spoken, sufficed to draw from me the
+particulars of my journey. I told everything, from my birthplace
+and education to my future plans and prospects; and the stranger,
+with a frosty humor twinkling about his eyes, listened politely. He
+was himself particularly silent; but he had the art of provoking
+conversation while quietly enjoying his own dinner. When this was
+finished, however, he leaned back in his chair, sipped his claret,
+and talked a little more freely.</p>
+<p>"And so," said he, in very excellent English, "you have come to
+Paris to finish your studies. But have you no fear, young
+gentleman, that the attractions of so gay a city may divert your
+mind from graver subjects? Do you think that, when every pleasure
+may be had for the seeking, you will be content to devote yourself
+to the dry details of an uninteresting profession?"</p>
+<p>"It is not an uninteresting profession," I replied. "I might
+perhaps have preferred the church or the law; but having embarked
+in the study of medicine, I shall do my best to succeed in it."</p>
+<p>The stranger smiled.</p>
+<p>"I am glad," he said, "to see you so ambitious. I do not doubt
+that you will become a shining light in the brotherhood of
+Esculapius."</p>
+<p>"I hope so," I replied, boldly. "I have studied closer than most
+men of my age, already."</p>
+<p>He smiled again, coughed doubtfully, and insisted on filling my
+glass from his own bottle.</p>
+<p>"I only fear," he said, "that you will be too diffident of your
+own merits. Now, when you call upon this Doctor....what did you say
+was his name?"</p>
+<p>"Ch&eacute;ron," I replied, huskily.</p>
+<p>"True, Ch&eacute;ron. Well, when you meet him for the first time
+you will, perhaps, be timid, hesitating, and silent. But, believe
+me, a young man of your remarkable abilities should be
+self-possessed. You ought to inspire him from the beginning with a
+suitable respect for your talents."</p>
+<p>"That's precisely the line I mean to take," said I, boastfully.
+"I'll--I'll astonish him. I'm afraid of nobody--not I!"</p>
+<p>The stranger filled my glass again. His claret must have been
+very strong or my head very weak, for it seemed to me, as he did
+so, that all the chandeliers were in motion.</p>
+<p>"Upon my word," observed he, "you are a young man of infinite
+spirit."</p>
+<p>"And you," I replied, making an effort to bring the glass
+steadily to my lips, "you are a capital fellow--a clear-sighted,
+sensible, capital fellow. We'll be friends."</p>
+<p>He bowed, and said, somewhat coldly,</p>
+<p>"I have no doubt that we shall become better acquainted."</p>
+<p>"Better acquainted, indeed!--we'll be intimate!" I ejaculated,
+affectionately. "I'll introduce you to Dalrymple--you'll like him
+excessively. Just the fellow to delight you."</p>
+<p>"So I should say," observed the stranger, drily.</p>
+<p>"And as for you and myself, we'll--we'll be Damon and ... what's
+the other one's name?"</p>
+<p>"Pythias," replied my new acquaintance, leaning back in his
+chair, and surveying me with a peculiar and very deliberate stare.
+"Exactly so--Damon and Pythias! A charming arrangement."</p>
+<p>"Bravo! Famous! And now we'll have another bottle of wine."</p>
+<p>"Not on my account, I beg," said the gentleman firmly. "My head
+is not so cool as yours."</p>
+<p>Cool, indeed, and the room whirling round and round, like a
+teetotum!</p>
+<p>"Oh, if you won't, I won't," said I confusedly; "but I--I
+could--drink my share of another bottle, I assure you, and
+not--feel the slightest...."</p>
+<p>"I have no doubt on that point," said my neighbor, gravely; "but
+our French wines are deceptive, Mr. Arbuthnot, and you might
+possibly suffer some inconvenience to-morrow. You, as a medical
+man, should understand the evils of dyspepsia."</p>
+<p>"Dy--dy--dyspepsia be hanged," I muttered, dreamily. "Tell me,
+friend--by the by, I forget your name. Friend what?"</p>
+<p>"Friend Pythias," returned the stranger, drily. "You gave me the
+name yourself."</p>
+<p>"Ay, but your real name?"</p>
+<p>He shrugged his shoulders.</p>
+<p>"One name is as good as another," said he, lightly. "Let it be
+Pythias, for the present. But you were about to ask me some
+question?"</p>
+<p>"About old Ch&eacute;ron," I said, leaning both elbows on the
+table, and speaking very confidentially. "Now tell me, have
+you--have you any notion of what he is like? Do you--know--know
+anything about him?"</p>
+<p>"I have heard of him," he replied, intent for the moment on the
+pattern of his wine-glass.</p>
+<p>"Clever?"</p>
+<p>"That is a point upon which I could not venture an opinion. You
+must ask some more competent judge."</p>
+<p>"Come, now," said I, shaking my head, and trying to look
+knowing; "you--you know what I mean, well enough. Is he a grim old
+fellow? A--a--griffin, you know! Come, is he a
+gr--r--r--riffin?"</p>
+<p>My words had by this time acquired a distressing,
+self-propelling tendency, and linked themselves into compounds of
+twenty and thirty syllables.</p>
+<p>My <i>vis-&agrave;-vis</i> smiled, bit his lip, then laughed a
+dry, short laugh.</p>
+<p>"Really," he said, "I am not in a position to reply to your
+question; but upon the whole, I should say that Dr. Ch&eacute;ron
+was not quite a griffin. The species, you see, is extinct."</p>
+<p>I roared with laughter; vowed I had never heard a better joke in
+my life; and repeated his last words over and over, like a degraded
+idiot as I was. All at once a sense of deadly faintness came upon
+me. I turned hot and cold by turns, and lifting my hand to my head,
+said, or tried to say:--</p>
+<p>"Room's--'bominably--close!"</p>
+<p>"We had better go," he replied promptly. "The air will do you
+good. Leave me to settle for our dinners, and you shall make it
+right with me by-and-by."</p>
+<p>He did so, and we left the room. Once out in the open air I
+found myself unable to stand. He called a <i>fiacre</i>; almost
+lifted me in; took his place beside me, and asked the name of my
+hotel.</p>
+<p>I had forgotten it; but I knew that it was opposite the railway
+station, and that was enough. When we arrived, I was on the verge
+of insensibility. I remember that I was led up-stairs by two
+waiters, and that the stranger saw me to my room. Then all was
+darkness and stupor.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_X."></a>CHAPTER X.</h2>
+<h3>THE NEXT MORNING.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>"Oh, my Christian ducats!" <i>Merchant of Venice</i>.</p>
+<p>Gone!--gone!--both gone!--my new gold watch and my purse full of
+notes and Napoleons!</p>
+<p>I rang the bell furiously. It was answered by a demure-looking
+waiter, with a face like a parroquet.</p>
+<p>"Does Monsieur please to require anything?"</p>
+<p>"Require anything!" I exclaimed, in the best French I could
+muster. "I have been robbed!"</p>
+<p>"Robbed, Monsieur?"</p>
+<p>"Yes, of my watch and purse!"</p>
+<p>"<i>Tiens</i>! Of a watch and purse?" repeated the parroquet,
+lifting his eyebrows with an air of well-bred surprise. "<i>C'est
+dr&ocirc;le."</i></p>
+<p>"Droll!" I cried, furiously. "Droll, you scoundrel! I'll let you
+know whether I think it droll! I'll complain to the authorities!
+I'll have the house searched! I'll--I'll...."</p>
+<p>I rang the bell again. Two or three more waiters came, and the
+master of the hotel. They all treated my communication in the same
+manner--coolly; incredulously; but with unruffled politeness.</p>
+<p>"Monsieur forgets," urged the master, "that he came back to the
+hotel last night in a state of absolute intoxication. Monsieur was
+accompanied by a stranger, who was gentlemanly, it it true; but
+since Monsieur acknowledges that that stranger was personally
+unknown to him, Monsieur may well perceive it would be more
+reasonable if his suspicions first pointed in that direction."</p>
+<p>Struck by the force of this observation, I flung myself into a
+chair and remained silent.</p>
+<p>"Has Monsieur no acquaintances in Paris to whom he may apply for
+advice?" inquired the landlord.</p>
+<p>"None," said I, moodily; "except that I have a letter of
+introduction to one Dr. Ch&eacute;ron."</p>
+<p>The landlord and his waiters exchanged glances.</p>
+<p>"I would respectfully recommend Monsieur to present his letter
+immediately," said the former. "Monsieur le Docteur Ch&eacute;ron
+is a man of the world--a man of high reputation and sagacity.
+Monsieur could not do better than advise with him."</p>
+<p>"Call a cab for me," said I, after a long pause. "I will
+go."</p>
+<p>The determination cost me something. Dismayed by the extent of
+my loss, racked with headache, languid, pale, and full of remorse
+for last night's folly, it needed but this humiliation to complete
+my misery. What! appear before my instructor for the first time
+with such a tale! I could have bitten my lips through with
+vexation.</p>
+<p>The cab was called. I saw, but would not see, the winks and nods
+exchanged behind my back by the grinning waiters. I flung myself
+into the vehicle, and soon was once more rattling through the noisy
+streets. But those brilliant streets had now lost all their charm
+for me. I admired nothing, saw nothing, heard nothing, on the way.
+I could think only of my father's anger and the contempt of Dr.
+Ch&eacute;ron.</p>
+<p>Presently the cab stopped before a large wooden gate with two
+enormous knockers. One half of this gate was opened by a servant in
+a sad-colored livery. I was shown across a broad courtyard, up a
+flight of lofty steps, and into a spacious <i>salon</i> plainly
+furnished.</p>
+<p>"Monsieur le Docteur is at present engaged," said the servant,
+with an air of profound respect. "Will Monsieur have the goodness
+to be seated for a few moments."</p>
+<p>I sat down. I rose up. I examined the books upon the table, and
+the pictures on the walls. I wished myself "anywhere, anywhere out
+of the world," and more than once was on the point of stealing out
+of the house, jumping into my cab, and making off without seeing
+the doctor at all. One consideration alone prevented me. I had lost
+all my money, and had not even a franc left to pay the driver.
+Presently the door again opened, the grave footman reappeared, and
+I heard the dreaded announcement:--"Monsieur le Docteur will be
+happy to receive Monsieur in his consulting-room."</p>
+<p>I followed mechanically. We passed through a passage thickly
+carpeted, and paused before a green baize door. This door opened
+noiselessly, and I found myself in the great man's presence.</p>
+<p>"It gives me pleasure to welcome the son of my old friend John
+Arbuthnot," said a clear, and not unfamiliar voice.</p>
+<p>I started, looked up, grew red and white, hot and cold, and had
+not a syllable to utter in reply.</p>
+<p>In Doctor Ch&eacute;ron, I recognised--</p>
+<p>PYTHIAS!</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XI."></a>CHAPTER XI.</h2>
+<h3>MYSTERIOUS PROCEEDINGS.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>The doctor pointed to a chair, looked at his watch, and
+said:--</p>
+<p>"I hope you have had a pleasant journey. Arrived this
+morning?"</p>
+<p>There was not the faintest gleam of recognition on his face. Not
+a smile; not a glance; nothing but the easy politeness of a
+stranger to a stranger.</p>
+<p>"N--not exactly," I faltered. "Yesterday morning, sir."</p>
+<p>"Ah, indeed! Spent the day in sight-seeing, I dare say. Admire
+Paris?"</p>
+<p>Too much astonished to speak, I took refuge in a bow.</p>
+<p>"Not found any lodgings yet, I presume?" asked the doctor,
+mending a pen very deliberately.</p>
+<p>"N--not yet, sir."</p>
+<p>"I concluded so The English do not seek apartments on Sunday.
+You observe the day very strictly, no doubt?"</p>
+<p>Blushing and confused, I stammered some incoherent words and sat
+twirling my hat, the very picture of remorse.</p>
+<p>"At what hotel have you put up?" he next inquired, without
+appearing to observe my agitation.</p>
+<p>"The--the H&ocirc;tel des Messageries."</p>
+<p>"Good, but expensive. You must find a lodging to-day."</p>
+<p>I bowed again.</p>
+<p>"And, as your father's representative, I must take care that you
+procure something suitable, and are not imposed upon. My valet
+shall go with you."</p>
+<p>He rang the bell, and the sad-colored footman appeared on the
+threshold.</p>
+<p>"Desire Brunet to be in readiness to walk out with this
+gentleman," he said, briefly, and the servant retired.</p>
+<p>"Brunet," he continued, addressing me again, "is faithful and
+sagacious. He will instruct you on certain points indispensable to
+a resident in Paris, and will see that you are not ill-accommodated
+or overcharged. A young man has few wants, and I should infer that
+a couple of rooms in some quiet street will be all that you
+require?"</p>
+<p>"I--I am very grateful."</p>
+<p>He waved down my thanks with an air of cold but polite
+authority; took out his note-book and pencil; (I could have sworn
+to that massive gold pencil!) and proceeded to question me.</p>
+<p>"Your age, I think," said he, "is twenty-one?"</p>
+<p>"Twenty, sir."</p>
+<p>"Ah--twenty. You desire to be entered upon the list of visiting
+students at the Hotel Dieu, to be free of the library and
+lecture-rooms, and to be admitted into my public classes?"</p>
+<p>"Yes, sir."</p>
+<p>"Also, to attend here in my house for private instruction."</p>
+<p>"Yes, sir."</p>
+<p>He filled in a few words upon a printed form, and handed it to
+me with his visiting card.</p>
+<p>"You will present these, and your passport, to the secretary at
+the hospital," said he, "and will receive in return the requisite
+tickets of admission. Your fees have already been paid in, and your
+name has been entered. You must see to this matter at once, for the
+<i>bureau</i> closes at two o'clock. You will then require the rest
+of the day for lodging-seeking, moving, and so forth. To-morrow
+morning, at nine o'clock, I shall expect you here."</p>
+<p>"Indeed, sir," I murmured, "I am more obliged than...."</p>
+<p>"Not in the least," he interrupted, decisively; "your father's
+son has every claim upon me. I object to thanks. All that I require
+from you are habits of industry, punctuality, and respect. Your
+father speaks well of you, and I have no doubt I shall find you all
+that he represents. Can I do anything more for you this
+morning?"</p>
+<p>I hesitated; could not bring myself to utter one word of that
+which I had come to say; and murmured--</p>
+<p>"Nothing more, I thank you, sir."</p>
+<p>He looked at me piercingly, paused an instant, and then rang the
+bell.</p>
+<p>"I am about to order my carriage," he said; "and, as I am going
+in that direction, I will take you as far as the H&ocirc;tel
+Dieu."</p>
+<p>"But--but I have a cab at the door," I faltered, remembering,
+with a sinking heart, that I had not a sou to pay the driver.</p>
+<p>The servant appeared again.</p>
+<p>"Let the carriage be brought round immediately, and dismiss this
+gentleman's cab."</p>
+<p>The man retired, and I heaved a sigh of relief. The doctor bent
+low over the papers on his desk, and I fancied for the moment that
+a faint smile flitted over his face. Then he took up his hat, and
+pointed to the door.</p>
+<p>"Now, my young friend," he said authoritatively, "we must be
+gone. Time is gold. After you."</p>
+<p>I bowed and preceded him. His very courtesy was sterner than the
+displeasure of another, and I already felt towards him a greater
+degree of awe than I should have quite cared to confess. The
+carriage was waiting in the courtyard. I placed myself with my back
+to the horses; Dr. Ch&eacute;ron flung himself upon the opposite
+seat; a servant out of livery sprang up beside the coachman; the
+great gates were flung open; and we glided away on the easiest of
+springs and the softest of cushions.</p>
+<p>Dr. Ch&eacute;ron took a newspaper from his pocket, and began to
+read; so leaving me to my own uncomfortable reflections.</p>
+<p>And, indeed, when I came to consider my position I was almost in
+despair. Moneyless, what was to become of me? Watchless and
+moneyless, with a bill awaiting me at my hotel, and not a stiver in
+my pocket wherewith to pay it.... Miserable pupil of a stern
+master! luckless son of a savage father! to whom could I turn for
+help? Not certainly to Dr. Ch&eacute;ron, whom I had been ready to
+accuse, half an hour ago, of having stolen my watch and purse.
+Petty larceny and Dr. Ch&eacute;ron! how ludicrously incongruous!
+And yet, where was my property? Was the H&ocirc;tel des Messageries
+a den of thieves? And again, how was it that this same Dr.
+Ch&eacute;ron looked, and spoke, and acted, as if he had never seen
+me in his life till this morning? Was I mad, or dreaming, or
+both?</p>
+<p>The carriage stopped and the door opened.</p>
+<p>"H&ocirc;tel Dieu, M'sieur," said the servant, touching his
+hat.</p>
+<p>Dr. Ch&eacute;ron just raised his eyes from the paper.</p>
+<p>"This is your first destination," he said. "I would advise you,
+on leaving here, to return to your hotel. There may be letters
+awaiting you. Good-morning."</p>
+<p>With this he resumed his paper, the carriage rolled away, and I
+found myself at the H&ocirc;tel Dieu, with the servant out of
+livery standing respectfully behind me.</p>
+<p>Go back to my hotel! Why should I go back? Letters there could
+be none, unless at the Poste Restante. I thought this a very
+unnecessary piece of advice, rejected it in my own mind, and so
+went into the hospital <i>bureau</i>, and transacted my business.
+When I came out again, Brunet took the lead.</p>
+<p>He was an elderly man with a solemn countenance and a mysterious
+voice. His manner was oppressively respectful; his address
+diplomatic; his step stealthy as a courtier's. When we came to a
+crossing he bowed, stood aside, and followed me; then took the lead
+again; and so on, during a brisk walk of about half an hour. All at
+once, I found myself at the H&ocirc;tel des Messageries.</p>
+<p>"Monsieur's hotel," said the doctor's valet, touching his
+hat.</p>
+<p>"You are mistaken," said I, rather impatiently. "I did not ask
+to be brought here. My object this morning is to look for
+apartments."</p>
+<p>"Post in at mid-day, Monsieur," he observed, gravely.
+"Monsieur's letters may have arrived."</p>
+<p>"I expect none, thank you."</p>
+<p>"Monsieur will, nevertheless, permit me to inquire," said the
+persevering valet, and glided in before my eyes.</p>
+<p>The thing was absurd! Both master and servant insisted that I
+must have letters, whether I would, or no! To my amazement,
+however, Brunet came back with a small sealed box in his hands.</p>
+<p>"No letters have arrived for Monsieur," he said; "but this box
+was left with the porter about an hour ago."</p>
+<p>I weighed it, shook it, examined the seals, and, going into the
+public room, desired Brunet to follow me. There I opened it. It
+contained a folded paper, a quantity of wadding, my purse, my roll
+of bank-notes, and my watch! On the paper, I read the following
+words:--</p>
+<p>"Learn from the events of last night the value of temperance,
+the wisdom of silence, and the danger of chance acquaintanceships.
+Accept the lesson, and he by whom it is administered will forget
+the error."</p>
+<p>The paper dropped from my hands and fell upon the floor. The
+impenetrable Brunet picked it up, and returned it to me.</p>
+<p>"Brunet!" I ejaculated.</p>
+<p>"Monsieur?" said he, interrogatively, raising his hand to his
+forehead by force of habit, although his hat stood beside him on
+the floor.</p>
+<p>There was not a shadow of meaning in his face--not a quiver to
+denote that he knew anything of what had passed. To judge by the
+stolid indifference of his manner, one might have supposed that the
+delivery of caskets full of watches and valuables was an event of
+daily occurrence in the house of Dr. Ch&eacute;ron. His coolness
+silenced me. I drew a long breath; hastened to put my watch in my
+pocket, and lock up my money in my room; and then went to the
+master of the hotel, and informed him of the recovery of my
+property. He smiled and congratulated me; but he did not seem to be
+in the least surprised. I fancied, some how, that matters were not
+quite so mysterious to him as they had been to me.</p>
+<p>I also fancied that I heard a suspicious roar of laughter as I
+passed out into the street.</p>
+<p>It was not long before I found such apartments as I required,
+Piloted by Brunet through some broad thoroughfares and along part
+of the Boulevards, I came upon a cluster of narrow streets
+branching off through a massive stone gateway from the Rue du
+Faubourg Montmartre. This little nook was called the Cit&eacute;
+Berg&egrave;re. The houses were white and lofty. Some had
+courtyards, and all were decorated with pretty iron balconies and
+delicately-tinted Venetian shutters. Most of them bore the
+announcement--"<i>Apartements &agrave; louer</i>"--suspended above
+the door. Outside one of these houses sat two men with a little
+table between them. They were playing at dominoes, and wore the
+common blue blouse of the mechanic class. A woman stood by, paring
+celery, with an infant playing on the mat inside the door and a cat
+purring at her feet. It was a pleasant group. The men looked
+honest, the woman good-tempered, and the house exquisitely clean;
+so the diplomatic Brunet went forward to negotiate, while I walked
+up and down outside. There were rooms to be let on the second,
+third and fifth floors. The fifth was too high, and the second too
+expensive; but the third seemed likely to suit me. The <i>suite</i>
+consisted of a bed-room, dressing-room, and tiny <i>salon</i>, and
+was furnished with the elegant uncomfortableness characteristic of
+our French neighbors. Here were floors shiny and carpetless;
+windows that objected to open, and drawers that refused to shut;
+mirrors all round the walls a set of hanging shelves; an ormolu
+time piece that struck all kinds of miscellaneous hours at
+unexpected times; an abundance of vases filled with faded
+artificial flowers; insecure chairs of white and gold; and a round
+table that had a way of turning over suddenly like a table in a
+pantomime, if you ventured to place anything on any part but the
+inlaid star in the centre. Above all, there was a balcony big
+enough for a couple of chairs, and some flower-pots, overlooking
+the street.</p>
+<p>I was delighted with everything. In imagination I beheld my
+balcony already blooming with roses, and my shelves laden with
+books. I admired the white and gold chairs with all my heart, and
+saw myself reflected in half a dozen mirrors at once with an
+innocent pride of ownership which can only be appreciated by those
+who have tasted the supreme luxury of going into chambers for the
+first time.</p>
+<p>"Shall I conclude for Monsieur at twenty francs a week?"
+murmured the sagacious Brunet.</p>
+<p>"Of course," said I, laying the first week's rent upon the
+table.</p>
+<p>And so the thing was done, and, brimful of satisfaction, I went
+off to the hotel for my luggage, and moved in immediately.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XII."></a>CHAPTER XII.</h2>
+<h3>BROADCLOTH AND CIVILIZATION.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>Allowing for my inexperience in the use of the language, I
+prospered better than I had expected, and found, to my
+satisfaction, that I was by no means behind my French
+fellow-students in medical knowledge. I passed through my
+preliminary examination with credit, and although Dr. Ch&eacute;ron
+was careful not to praise me too soon, I had reason to believe that
+he was satisfied with my progress. My life, indeed, was now wholly
+given up to my work. My country-breeding had made me timid, and the
+necessity for speaking a foreign tongue served only to increase my
+natural reserve; so that although I lived and studied day after day
+in the society of some two or three hundred young men, I yet lived
+as solitary a life as Robinson Crusoe in his island. No one sought
+to know me. No one took a liking for me. Gay, noisy, chattering
+fellows that they were, they passed me by for a "dull and
+muddy-pated rogue;" voted me uncompanionable when I was only shy;
+and, doubtless, quoted me to each other as a rare specimen of the
+silent Englishman. I lived, too, quite out of the students' colony.
+To me the <i>Quartier Latin</i> (except as I went to and fro
+between the Hotel Dieu and the Ecole de Medicine) was a land
+unknown; and the student's life--that wonderful <i>Vie de
+Boh&eacute;me</i> which furnishes forth half the fiction of the
+Paris press--a condition of being, about which I had never even
+heard. What wonder, then, that I never arrived at Dr.
+Ch&eacute;ron's door five minutes behind time, never missed a
+lecture, never forgot an appointment? What wonder that, after
+dropping moodily into one or two of the theatres, I settled down
+quite quietly in my lodgings; gave up my days to study; sauntered
+about the lighted alleys of the Champs Elys&eacute;es in the sweet
+spring evenings, and, going home betimes, spent an hour or two with
+my books, and kept almost as early hours as in my father's house at
+Saxonholme?</p>
+<p>After I had been living thus for rather longer than three weeks,
+I made up my mind one Sunday morning to call at Dalrymple's rooms,
+and inquire if he had yet arrived in Paris. It was about eleven
+o'clock when I reached the Chauss&eacute;e d'Antin, and there
+learned that he was not only arrived, but at home. Being by this
+time in possession of the luxury of a card, I sent one up, and was
+immediately admitted. I found breakfast still upon the table;
+Dalrymple sitting with an open desk and cash-box before him; and,
+standing somewhat back, with his elbow resting on the
+chimney-piece, a gentleman smoking a cigar. They both looked up as
+I was announced, and Dalrymple, welcoming me with a hearty grasp,
+introduced this gentleman as Monsieur de Simoncourt.</p>
+<p>M. de Simoncourt bowed, knocked the ash from his cigar, and
+looked as if he wished me at the Antipodes. Dalrymple was really
+glad to see me.</p>
+<p>"I have been expecting you, Arbuthnot," said he, "for the last
+week. If you had not soon beaten up my quarters, I should have
+tried, somehow, to find out yours. What have you been about all
+this time? Where are you located? What mischief have you been
+perpetrating since our expedition to the <i>guingette</i> on the
+river? Come, you have a thousand things to tell me!"</p>
+<p>M. de Simoncourt looked at his watch--a magnificent affair,
+decorated with a costly chain, and a profusion of pendant
+trifles--and threw the last-half of his cigar into the
+fireplace.</p>
+<p>"You must excuse me, <i>mon cher</i>" said he. "I have at least
+a dozen calls to make before dinner."</p>
+<p>Dalrymple rose, readily enough, and took a roll of bank-notes
+from the cash-box.</p>
+<p>"If you are going," he said, "I may as well hand over the price
+of that Tilbury. When will they send it home?"</p>
+<p>"To-morrow, undoubtedly."</p>
+<p>"And I am to pay fifteen hundred franks for it!"</p>
+<p>"Just half its value!" observed M. de Simoncourt, with a shrug
+of his shoulders.</p>
+<p>Dalrymple smiled, counted the notes, and handed them to his
+friend.</p>
+<p>"Fifteen hundred may be half its cost," said he; "but I doubt if
+I am paying much less than its full value. Just see that these are
+right."</p>
+<p>M. de Simoncourt ruffled the papers daintily over, and consigned
+them to his pocket-book. As he did so, I could not help observing
+the whiteness of his hands and the sparkle of a huge brilliant on
+his little finger. He was a pale, slender, olive-hued man, with
+very dark eyes, and glittering teeth, and a black moustache
+inclining superciliously upwards at each corner; somewhat too
+<i>nonchalant</i>, perhaps, in his manner, and somewhat too profuse
+in the article of jewellery; but a very elegant gentleman,
+nevertheless.</p>
+<p>"<i>Bon</i>!" said he. "I am glad you have bought it. I would
+have taken it myself, had the thing happened a week or two earlier.
+Poor Duchesne! To think that he should have come to this, after
+all!"</p>
+<p>"I am sorry for him," said Dalrymple; "but it is a case of
+wilful ruin. He made up his mind to go to the devil, and went
+accordingly. I am only surprised that the crash came no
+sooner."</p>
+<p>M. de Simoneourt twitched at the supercilious moustache.</p>
+<p>"And you think you would not care to take the black mare with
+the Tilbury?" said he, negligently.</p>
+<p>"No--I have a capital horse, already."</p>
+<p>"Hah I--well--'tis almost a pity. The mare is a dead bargain.
+Shouldn't wonder if I buy her, after all."</p>
+<p>"And yet you don't want her," said Dalrymple.</p>
+<p>"Quite true; but one must have a favorite sin, and horseflesh is
+mine. I shall ruin myself by it some day--<i>mort de ma vie!</i> By
+the way, have you seen my chestnut in harness? No? Then you will be
+really pleased. Goes delightfully with the gray, and manages tandem
+to perfection. <i>Parbleu!</i> I was forgetting--do we meet
+to-night?"</p>
+<p>"Where?"</p>
+<p>"At Chardonnier's."</p>
+<p>Dalrymple shook his head, and turned the key in his cash
+box.</p>
+<p>"Not this evening," he replied. I have other engagements."</p>
+<p>"Bah! and I promised to go, believing you were sure to be of the
+party. St. Pol, I know, will be there, and De Br&eacute;zy
+also."</p>
+<p>"Chardonnier's parties are charming things in their way," said
+Dalrymple, somewhat coldly, "and no man enjoys Burgundy and
+lansquenet more heartily than myself; but one might grow to care
+for nothing else, and I have no desire to fall into worse habits
+than those I have contracted already."</p>
+<p>M. de Simoneourt laughed a dry, short laugh, and twitched again
+at the supercilious moustache.</p>
+<p>"I had no idea you were a philosopher," said he.</p>
+<p>"Nor am I. I am a <i>mauvais sujet</i>--<i>mauvais</i> enough,
+already, without seeking to become worse."</p>
+<p>"Well, adieu--I will see to this affair of the Tilbury, and
+desire them to let you have it by noon to-morrow."</p>
+<p>"A thousand thanks. I am ashamed that you have so much trouble
+in the matter. <i>Au revoir</i>."</p>
+<p>"<i>Au revoir</i>."</p>
+<p>Whereupon M. de Simoncourt honored me with a passing bow, and
+took his departure. Being near the window, I saw him spring into an
+elegant cabriolet, and drive off with the showiest of high horses
+and the tiniest of tigers.</p>
+<p>He was no sooner gone than Dalrymple took me by the shoulders,
+placed me in an easy chair, poured out a couple of glasses of hock,
+and said:--</p>
+<p>"Now, then, my young friend, your news or your life! Out with
+it, every word, as you hope to be forgiven!"</p>
+<p>I had but little to tell, and for that little, found myself, as
+I had anticipated, heartily laughed at. My adventure at the
+restaurant, my unlucky meeting with Dr. Ch&eacute;ron, and the
+history of my interview with him next morning, delighted Dalrymple
+beyond measure.</p>
+<p>Nothing would satisfy him, after this, but to call me Damon, to
+tease me continually about Doctor Pythias, and to remind me at
+every turn of the desirableness of Arcadian friendships.</p>
+<p>"And so, Damon," said he, "you go nowhere, see nothing, and know
+nobody. This sort of life will never do for you! I must take you
+out--introduce you--get you an <i>entr&eacute;e</i> into society,
+before I leave Paris."</p>
+<p>"I should be heartily glad to visit at one or two private
+houses," I replied. "To spend the winter in this place without
+knowing a soul, would be something frightful."</p>
+<p>Dalrymple looked at me half laughingly, half
+compassionately.</p>
+<p>"Before I do it, however," said he, "you must look a little less
+like a savage, and more like a tame Christian. You must have your
+hair cut, and learn to tie your cravat properly. Do you possess an
+evening suit?"</p>
+<p>Blushing to the tips of my ears, I not only confessed that I was
+destitute of that desirable outfit, but also that I had never yet
+in all my life had occasion to wear it.</p>
+<p>"I am glad of it; for now you are sure to be well fitted. Your
+tailor, depend on it, is your great civilizer, and a well-made suit
+of clothes is in itself a liberal education. I'll take you to
+Michaud--my own especial purveyor. He is a great artist. With so
+many yards of superfine black cloth, he will give you the tone of
+good society and the exterior of a gentleman. In short, he will do
+for you in eight or ten hours more than I could do in as many
+years."</p>
+<p>"Pray introduce me at once to this illustrious man," I exclaimed
+laughingly, "and let me do him homage!"</p>
+<p>"You will have to pay heavily for the honor," said Dalrymple.
+"Of that I give you notice."</p>
+<p>"No matter. I am willing to pay heavily for the tone of good
+society and the exterior of a gentleman."</p>
+<p>"Very good. Take a book, then, or a cigar, and amuse yourself
+for five minutes while I write a note. That done, you may command
+me for as long as you please."</p>
+<p>I took the first book that came, and finding it to be a history
+of the horse, amused myself, instead, by observing the aspect of
+Dalrymple's apartment.</p>
+<p>Rooms are eloquent biographies. They betray at once if the owner
+be careless or orderly, studious or idle, vulgar or refined.
+Flowers on the table, engravings on the walls, indicate refinement
+and taste; while a well-filled book-case says more in favor of its
+possessor than the most elaborate letter of recommendation.
+Dalrymple's room was a monograph of himself. Careless, luxurious,
+disorderly, crammed with all sorts of costly things, and
+characterized by a sort of reckless elegance, it expressed, as I
+interpreted it, the very history of the man. Rich hangings;
+luxurious carpets; walls covered with paintings; cabinets of bronze
+and rare porcelain; a statuette of Rachel beside a bust of Homer; a
+book-case full of French novels with a sprinkling of Shakespeare
+and Horace; a stand of foreign arms; a lamp from Pompeii; a silver
+casket full of cigars; tables piled up with newspapers, letters,
+pipes, riding-whips, faded bouquets, and all kinds of miscellaneous
+rubbish--such were my friend's surroundings; and such, had I
+speculated upon them beforehand, I should have expected to find
+them. Dalrymple, in the meanwhile, despatched his letter with
+characteristic rapidity. His pen rushed over the paper like a
+dragoon charge, nor was once laid aside till both letter and
+address were finished. Just as he was sealing it, a note was
+brought to him by his servant--a slender, narrow, perfumed note,
+written on creamy paper, and adorned on the envelope with an
+elaborate cypher in gold and colors. Had I lived in the world of
+society for the last hundred seasons, I could not have interpreted
+the appearance of that note more sagaciously.</p>
+<p>"It is from a lady," said I to myself. Then seeing Dalrymple
+tear up his own letter immediately after reading it, and begin
+another, I added, still in my own mind--"And it is from the lady to
+whom he was writing."</p>
+<p>Presently he paused, laid his pen aside, and said:--</p>
+<p>"Arbuthnot, would you like to go with me to-morrow evening to
+one or two <i>soir&eacute;es</i>?"</p>
+<p>"Can your Civilizer provide me with my evening suit in
+time?"</p>
+<p>"He? The great Michaud? Why, he would equip you for this
+evening, if it were necessary!"</p>
+<p>"In that case, I shall be very glad."</p>
+<p>"<i>Bon!</i> I will call for you at ten o'clock; so do not
+forget to leave me your address."</p>
+<p>Whereupon he resumed his letter. When it was written, he
+returned to the subject.</p>
+<p>"Then I will take you to-morrow night," said he, "to a reception
+at Madame Rachel's. Hers is the most beautiful house in Paris. I
+know fifty men who would give their ears to be admitted to her
+<i>salons</i>."</p>
+<p>Even in the wilds of Saxonholme I had heard and read of the
+great <i>tragedienne</i> whose wealth vied with the Rothschilds,
+and whose diamonds might have graced a crown. I had looked forward
+to the probability of beholding her from afar off, if she was ever
+to be seen on the boards of the Theatre Fran&ccedil;ais; but to be
+admitted to her presence--received in her house--introduced to her
+in person ... it seemed ever so much too good to be true!</p>
+<p>Dalrymple smiled good-naturedly, and put my thanks aside.</p>
+<p>"It is a great sight," said he, "and nothing more. She will bow
+to you--she may not even speak; and she would pass you the next
+morning without remembering that she had ever seen you in her life.
+Actresses are a race apart, my dear fellow, and care for no one who
+is neither rich nor famous."</p>
+<p>"I never imagined," said I, half annoyed, "that she would take
+any notice of me at all. Even a bow from such a woman is an event
+to be remembered."</p>
+<p>"Having received that bow, then," continued Dalrymple, "and
+having enjoyed the ineffable satisfaction of returning it, you can
+go on with me to the house of a lady close by, who receives every
+Monday evening. At her <i>soir&eacute;es</i> you will meet pleasant
+and refined people, and having been once introduced by me, you
+will, I have no doubt, find the house open to you for the
+future."</p>
+<p>"That would, indeed, be a privilege. Who is this lady?"</p>
+<p>"Her name," said Dalrymple, with an involuntary glance at the
+little note upon his desk, "is Madame de Courcelles. She is a very
+charming and accomplished lady."</p>
+<p>I decided in my own mind that Madame de Courcelles was the
+writer of that note.</p>
+<p>"Is she married?" was my next question.</p>
+<p>"She is a widow," replied Dalrymple. "Monsieur de Courcelles was
+many years older than his wife, and held office as a cabinet
+minister during the greater part of the reign of Louis Phillippe.
+He has been dead these four or five years."</p>
+<p>"Then she is rich?"</p>
+<p>"No--not rich; but sufficiently independent."</p>
+<p>"And handsome?"</p>
+<p>"Not handsome, either; but graceful, and very fascinating."</p>
+<p>Graceful, fascinating, independent, and a widow! Coupling these
+facts with the correspondence which I believed I had detected, I
+grouped them into a little romance, and laid out my friend's future
+career as confidently as if it had depended only on myself to marry
+him out of hand, and make all parties happy.</p>
+<p>Dalrymple sat musing for a moment, with his chin resting on his
+hands and his eyes fixed on the desk. Then shaking back his hair as
+if he would shake back his thoughts with it, he started suddenly to
+his feet and said, laughingly:--</p>
+<p>"Now, young Damon, to Michaud's--to Michaud's, with what speed
+we may! Farewell to 'Tempe and the vales of Arcady,' and hey for
+civilization, and a swallow-tailed coat!"</p>
+<p>I noticed, however, that before we left the room, he put the
+little note tenderly away in a drawer of his desk, and locked it
+with a tiny gold key that hung upon his watch-chain.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIII."></a>CHAPTER XIII.</h2>
+<h3>I MAKE MY DEBUT IN SOCIETY.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>At ten o'clock on Monday evening, Dalrymple called for me, and
+by ten o'clock, thanks to the great Michaud and other men of
+genius, I presented a faultless exterior. My friend walked round me
+with a candle, and then sat down and examined me critically.</p>
+<p>"By Jove!" said he, "I don't believe I should have known you!
+You are a living testimony to the science of tailoring. I shall
+call on Michaud, to-morrow, and pay my tribute of admiration."</p>
+<p>"I am very uncomfortable," said I, ruefully.</p>
+<p>"Uncomfortable! nonsense--Michaud's customers don't know the
+meaning of the word."</p>
+<p>"But he has not made me a single pocket!"</p>
+<p>"And what of that? Do you suppose the great Michaud would spoil
+the fit of a masterpiece for your convenience?"</p>
+<p>"What am I to do with my pocket-handkerchief?"</p>
+<p>"Michaud's customers never need pocket-handkerchiefs."</p>
+<p>"And then my trousers..."</p>
+<p>"Unreasonable Juvenile, what of the trousers?"</p>
+<p>"They are so tight that I dare not sit down in them."</p>
+<p>"Barbarian! Michaud's customers never sit down in society."</p>
+<p>"And my boots are so small that I can hardly endure them."</p>
+<p>"Very becoming to the foot," said Dalyrmple, with exasperating
+indifference.</p>
+<p>"And my collar is so stiff that it almost cuts my throat."</p>
+<p>"Makes you hold your head up," said Dalrymple, "and leaves you
+no inducement to commit suicide."</p>
+<p>I could not help laughing, despite my discomfort.</p>
+<p>"Job himself never had such a comforter!" I exclaimed.</p>
+<p>"It would be a downright pleasure to quarrel with you."</p>
+<p>"Put on your hat instead, and let us delay no longer," replied
+my friend. "My cab is waiting."</p>
+<p>So we went down, and in another moment were driving through the
+lighted streets. I should hardly have chosen to confess how my
+heart beat when, on turning an angle of the Rue Trudon, our cab
+fell into the rear of three or four other carriages, passed into a
+courtyard crowded with arriving and departing vehicles, and drew up
+before an open door, whence a broad stream of light flowed out to
+meet us. A couple of footmen received us in a hall lighted by
+torches and decorated with stands of antique armor. From the centre
+of this hall sprang a Gothic staircase, so light, so richly
+sculptured, so full of niches and statues, slender columns,
+foliated capitals, and delicate ornamentation of every kind, that
+it looked a very blossoming of the stone. Following Dalrymple up
+this superb staircase and through a vestibule of carved oak, I next
+found myself in a room that might have been the scene of Plato's
+symposium. Here were walls painted in classic fresco; windows
+curtained with draperies of chocolate and amber; chairs and couches
+of ebony, carved in antique fashion; Etruscan amphorae; vases and
+paterae of terracotta; exquisite lamps, statuettes and candelabra
+in rare green bronze; and curious parti-colored busts of
+philosophers and heroes, in all kinds of variegated marbles.
+Powdered footmen serving modern coffee seemed here like
+anachronisms in livery. In such a room one should have been waited
+on by boys crowned with roses, and have partaken only of classic
+dishes--of Venafran olives or oysters from the Lucrine lake, washed
+down with Massic, or Chian, or honeyed Falernian.</p>
+<p>Some half-dozen gentlemen, chatting over their coffee, bowed to
+Dalrymple when we came in. They were talking of the war in Algiers,
+and especially of the gallantry of a certain Vicomte de Caylus, in
+whose deeds they seemed to take a more than ordinary interest.</p>
+<p>"Rode single-handed right through the enemy's camp," said a
+bronzed, elderly man, with a short, gray beard.</p>
+<p>"And escaped without a scratch," added another, with a tiny red
+ribbon at his button-hole.</p>
+<p>"He comes of a gallant stock," said a third. "I remember his
+father at Austerlitz--literally cut to pieces at the head of his
+squadron."</p>
+<p>"You are speaking of de Caylus," said Dalrymple. "What news of
+him from Algiers?"</p>
+<p>"This--that having volunteered to carry some important
+despatches to head-quarters, he preferred riding by night through
+Abd-el-Kader's camp, to taking a <i>d&eacute;tour</i> by the
+mountains," replied the first speaker.</p>
+<p>"A wild piece of boyish daring," said Dalrymple, somewhat drily.
+"I presume he did not return by the same road?"</p>
+<p>"I should think not. It would have been certain death a second
+time!"</p>
+<p>"And this happened how long since?"</p>
+<p>"About a fortnight ago. But we shall soon know all particulars
+from himself."</p>
+<p>"From himself?"</p>
+<p>"Yes, he has obtained leave of absence--is, perhaps, by this
+time in Paris."</p>
+<p>Dalrymple set down his cup untasted, and turned away.</p>
+<p>"Come, Arbuthnot," he said, hastily, "I must introduce you to
+Madame Rachel."</p>
+<p>We passed through a small antechamber, and into a brilliant
+<i>salon</i>, the very reverse of antique. Here all was light and
+color. Here were hangings of flowered chintz; fantastic divans;
+lounge-chairs of every conceivable shape and hue; great Indian
+jars; richly framed drawings; stands of exotic plants; Chinese
+cages, filled with valuable birds from distant climes; folios of
+engravings; and, above all, a large cabinet in marqueterie, crowded
+with bronzes, Chinese carvings, pastille burners, fans, medals,
+Dresden groups, S&eacute;vres vases, Venetian glass, Asiatic idols,
+and all kinds of precious trifles in tortoise-shall, mother
+o'-pearl, malachite, onyx, lapis lazuli, jasper, ivory, and mosaic.
+In this room, sitting, standing, turning over engravings, or
+grouped here and there on sofas and divans, were some twenty-five
+or thirty gentlemen, all busily engaged in conversation. Saluting
+some of these by a passing bow, my friend led the way straight
+through this <i>salon</i> and into a larger one immediately beyond
+it.</p>
+<p>"This," he said, "is one of the most beautiful rooms in Paris.
+Look round and tell me if you recognise, among all her votaries,
+the divinity herself."</p>
+<p>I looked round, bewildered.</p>
+<p>"Recognise!" I echoed. "I should not recognise my own father at
+this moment. I feel like Abou Hassan in the palace of the
+Caliph."</p>
+<p>"Or like Christopher Sly, when he wakes in the nobleman's
+bedchamber," said Dalrymple; "though I should ask your pardon for
+the comparison. But see what it is to be an actress with forty-two
+thousand francs of salary per week. See these panels painted by
+Muller--this chandelier by Deni&eacute;re, of which no copy
+exists--this bust of Napoleon by Canova--these hangings of purple
+and gold--this ceiling all carved and gilded, than which Versailles
+contains nothing more elaborate. <i>Allons donc</i>! have you
+nothing to say in admiration of so much splendor?"</p>
+<p>I shook my head.</p>
+<p>"What can I say? Is this the house of an actress, or the palace
+of a prince? But stay--that pale woman yonder, all in white, with a
+plain gold circlet on her head--who is she?"</p>
+<p>"Ph&eacute;dre herself," replied Dalrymple. "Follow me, and be
+introduced."</p>
+<p>She was sitting in a large fauteuil of purple velvet. One foot
+rested on a stool richly carved and gilt; one arm rested
+negligently on a table covered with curious foreign weapons. In her
+right hand she held a singular poignard, the blade of which was
+damascened with gold, while the handle, made of bronze and
+exquisitely modelled, represented a tiny human skeleton. With this
+ghastly toy she kept playing as she spoke, apparently unconscious
+of its grim significance. She was surrounded by some ten or a dozen
+distinguished-looking men, most of whom were profusely
+<i>d&eacute;cor&eacute;</i>. They made way courteously at our
+approach. Dalrymple then presented me. I made my bow, was
+graciously received, and dropped modestly into the rear.</p>
+<p>"I began to think that Captain Dalrymple had forsworn Paris,"
+said Rachel, still toying with the skeleton dagger. "It is surely a
+year since I last had this pleasure?"</p>
+<p>"Nay, Madame, you flatter me," said Dalrymple. "I have been
+absent only five months."</p>
+<p>"Then, you see, I have measured your absence by my loss."</p>
+<p>Dalrymple bowed profoundly.</p>
+<p>Rachel turned to a young man behind her chair.</p>
+<p>"Monsieur le Prince," said she, "do you know what is rumored in
+the <i>foyer</i> of the Francais? That you have offered me your
+hand!"</p>
+<p>"I offer you both my hands, in applause, Madame, every night of
+your performance," replied the gentleman so addressed.</p>
+<p>She smiled and made a feint at him with the dagger.</p>
+<p>"Excellent!" said she. "One is not enough for a tragedian But
+where is Alphonse Karr?"</p>
+<p>"I have been looking for him all the evening," said a tall man,
+with an iron-gray beard. "He told me he was coming; but authors are
+capricious beings--the slaves of the pen."</p>
+<p>"True; he lives by his pen--others die by it," said Rachel
+bitterly. "By the way, has any one seen Scribe's new
+Vaudeville?"</p>
+<p>"I have," replied a bald little gentleman with a red and green
+ribbon in his button-hole.</p>
+<p>"And your verdict?"</p>
+<p>"The plot is not ill-conceived; but Scribe is only godfather to
+the piece. It is almost entirely written by Duverger, his
+<i>collaborateur</i>."</p>
+<p>"The life of a <i>collaborateur</i>," said Rachel, "is one long
+act of self-abnegation. Another takes all the honor--he all the
+labor. Thus soldiers fall, and their generals reap the glory."</p>
+<p>"A <i>collaborateur</i>," said a cynical-looking man who had not
+yet spoken, "is a hackney vehicle which one hires on the road to
+fame, and dismisses at the end of the journey."</p>
+<p>"Sometimes without paying the fare," added a gentleman who had
+till now been examining, weapon by weapon, all the curious
+poignards and pistols on the table. "But what is this singular
+ornament?"</p>
+<p>And he held up what appeared to be a large bone, perforated in
+several places.</p>
+<p>The bald little man with the red and green ribbon uttered an
+exclamation of surprise.</p>
+<p>"It is a tibia!" said he, examining it through his double
+eye-glass.</p>
+<p>"And what of that?" laughed Rachel. "Is it so wonderful to find
+one leg in a collection of arms? However, not to puzzle you, I may
+as well acknowledge that it was brought to me from Rome by a
+learned Italian, and is a curious antique. The Romans made flutes
+of the leg-bones of their enemies, and this is one of them."</p>
+<p>"A melodious barbarism!" exclaimed one.</p>
+<p>"Puts a 'stop,' at all events, to the enemy's flight!" said
+another.</p>
+<p>"Almost as good as drinking out of his skull," added a
+third.</p>
+<p>"Or as eating him, <i>tout de bon</i>," said Rachel.</p>
+<p>"There must be a certain satisfaction in cannibalism," observed
+the cynic who had spoken before. "There are people upon whom one
+would sup willingly."</p>
+<p>"As, for instance, critics, who are our natural enemies," said
+Rachel. "<i>C'est &agrave; dire</i>, if critics were not too sour
+to be eaten."</p>
+<p>"Nay, with the sweet sauce of vengeance!"</p>
+<p>"You speak feelingly, Monsieur de Musset. I am almost sorry, for
+your sake, that cannibalism is out of fashion!"</p>
+<p>"It is one of the penalties of civilization," replied de Musset,
+with a shrug. "Besides, one would not wish to be an epicure."</p>
+<p>Dalrymple, who had been listening somewhat disdainfully to this
+skirmish of words, here touched me on the arm and turned away.</p>
+<p>"Don't you hate this sort of high-pressure talk?" he said,
+impatiently.</p>
+<p>"I was just thinking it so brilliant."</p>
+<p>"Pshaw!--conversational fireworks--every speaker bent on
+eclipsing every other speaker. It's an artificial atmosphere, my
+dear Damon--a sort of forcing-house for good things; and I hate
+forced witticisms, as I hate forced peas. But have you had enough
+of it? Or has this feast of reason taken away your appetite for
+simpler fare?"</p>
+<p>"If you mean, am I ready to go with you to Madame de
+Courcelles'--yes."</p>
+<p>"<i>A la bonne heure</i>!"</p>
+<p>"But you are not going away without taking leave of Madame
+Rachel?"</p>
+<p>"Unquestionably. Leave-taking is a custom more honored in the
+breach than the observance."</p>
+<p>"But isn't that very impolite?"</p>
+<p>"<i>Ing&eacute;nu!</i> Do you know that society ignores
+everything disagreeable? A leave-taker sets an unpleasant example,
+disturbs the harmony of things, and reminds others of their
+watches. Besides, he suggests unwelcome possibilities. Perhaps he
+finds the party dull; or, worse still, he may be going to one that
+is pleasanter."</p>
+<p>By this time we were again rattling along the Boulevard. The
+theatres were ablaze with lights. The road was full of carriages.
+The <i>trottoir</i> was almost as populous as at noon. The idlers
+outside the <i>caf&eacute;s</i> were still eating their ices and
+sipping their <i>eau-sucr&eacute;</i> as though, instead of being
+past eleven at night, it was scarcely eleven in the morning. In a
+few minutes, we had once more turned aside out of the great
+thoroughfare, and stopped at a private house in a quiet street. A
+carriage driving off, a cab drawing up behind our own, open windows
+with drawn blinds, upon which were profiled passing shadows of the
+guests within, and the ringing tones of a soprano voice,
+accompanied by a piano, gave sufficient indication of a party, and
+had served to attract a little crowd of soldiers and <i>gamins</i>
+about the doorway.</p>
+<p>Having left our over-coats with a servant, we were ushered
+upstairs, and, as the song was not yet ended, slipped in
+unannounced and stationed ourselves just between two crowded
+drawing-rooms, where, sheltered by the folds of a muslin curtain,
+we could see all that was going on in both. I observed, at a
+glance, that I was now in a society altogether unlike that which I
+had just left.</p>
+<p>At Rachel's there were present only two ladies besides herself,
+and those were members of her own family. Here I found at least an
+equal proportion of both sexes. At Rachel's a princely magnificence
+reigned. Here the rooms were elegant, but simple; the paintings
+choice but few; the ornaments costly, but in no unnecessary
+profusion.</p>
+<p>"It is just the difference between taste and display," said
+Dalrymple. "Rachel is an actress, and Madame de Courcelles is a
+lady. Rachel exhibits her riches as an Indian chief exhibits the
+scalps of his victims--Madame de Courcelles adorns her house with
+no other view than to make it attractive to her friends."</p>
+<p>"As a Greek girl covers her head with sequins to show the amount
+of her fortune, and an English girl puts a rose in her hair for
+grace and beauty only," said I, fancying that I had made rather a
+clever observation. I was therefore considerably disappointed when
+Dalrymple merely said, "just so."</p>
+<p>The lady in the larger room here finished her song and returned
+to her seat, amid a shower of <i>bravas</i>.</p>
+<p>"She sings exquisitely," said I, following her with my eyes.</p>
+<p>"And so she ought," replied my friend. "She is the Countess
+Rossi, whom you may have heard of as Mademoiselle Sontag."</p>
+<p>"What! the celebrated Sontag?" I exclaimed.</p>
+<p>"The same. And the gentleman to whom she is now speaking is no
+less famous a person than the author of <i>Pelham</i>."</p>
+<p>I was as much delighted as a rustic at a menagerie, and
+Dalrymple, seeing this, continued to point out one celebrity after
+another till I began no longer to remember which was which. Thus
+Lamartine, Horace Vernet, Scribe, Baron Humboldt, Miss Bremer,
+Arago, Auber, and Sir Edwin Landseer, were successively indicated,
+and I thought myself one of the most fortunate fellows in Paris,
+only to be allowed to look upon them.</p>
+<p>"I suppose the spirit of lion-hunting is an original instinct,"
+I said, presently. "Call it vulgar excitement, if you will; but I
+must confess that to see these people, and to be able to write
+about them to my father, is just the most delightful thing that has
+happened to me since I left home."</p>
+<p>"Call things by their right names, Damon," said Dalrymple,
+good-naturedly. "If you were a <i>parvenu</i> giving a party, and
+wanted all these fine folks to be seen at your house, that would be
+lion-hunting; but being whom and what you are, it is
+hero-worship--a disease peculiar to the young; wholesome and
+inevitable, like the measles."</p>
+<p>"What have I done," said a charming voice close by, "that
+Captain Dalrymple will not even deign to look upon me?"</p>
+<p>The charming voice proceeded from the still more charming lips
+of an exceedingly pretty brunette in a dress of light green silk,
+fastened here and there with bouquets of rosebuds. Plump, rosy,
+black-haired, bright-eyed, bewilderingly coquettish, this lady
+might have been about thirty years of age, and seemed by no means
+unconscious of her powers of fascination.</p>
+<p>"I implore a thousand pardons, Madame...." began my friend.</p>
+<p>"<i>Comment</i>! A thousand pardons for a single offence!"
+exclaimed the lady. "What an unreasonable culprit!"</p>
+<p>To which she added, quite audibly, though behind the temporary
+shelter of her fan:--</p>
+<p>"Who is this <i>beau gar&ccedil;on</i> whom you seem to have
+brought with you?"</p>
+<p>I turned aside, affecting not to hear the question; but could
+not help listening, nevertheless. Of Dalrymple's reply, however, I
+caught but my own name.</p>
+<p>"So much the better," observed the lady. "I delight in
+civilizing handsome boys. Introduce him."</p>
+<p>Dalrymple tapped me on the arm.</p>
+<p>"Madame de Marignan permits me to introduce you, <i>mon
+ami</i>," said he. "Mr. Basil Arbuthnot--Madame de Marignan."</p>
+<p>I bowed profoundly--all the more profoundly because I felt
+myself blushing to the eyes, and would not for the universe have
+been suspected of overhearing the preceding conversation; nor was
+my timidity alleviated when Dalrymple announced his intention of
+going in search of Madame de Courcelles, and of leaving me in the
+care of Madame de Marignan.</p>
+<p>"Now, Damon, make the most of your opportunities," whispered he,
+as he passed by. "<i>Vogue la gal&egrave;re</i>!"</p>
+<p><i>Vogue la gal&egrave;re</i>, indeed! As if I had anything to
+do with the <i>gal&egrave;re</i>, except to sit down in it, the
+most helpless of galley-slaves, and blindly submit to the gyves and
+chains of Madame de Marignan, who, regarding me as the lawful
+captive of her bow and spear, carried me off at once to a vacant
+<i>causeuse</i> in a distant corner.</p>
+<p>To send me in search of a footstool, to make me hold her fan, to
+overwhelm me with questions and bewilder me with a thousand
+coquetries, were the immediate proceedings of Madame de Marignan. A
+consummate tactician, she succeeded, before a quarter of an hour
+had gone by, in putting me at my ease, and in drawing from me
+everything that I had to tell--all my past; all my prospects for
+the future; the name and condition of my father; a description of
+Saxonholme, and the very date of my birth. Then she criticized all
+the ladies in the room, which only drew my attention more
+admiringly upon herself; and she quizzed all the young men, whereby
+I felt indirectly flattered, without exactly knowing why; and she
+praised Dalrymple in terms for which I could have embraced her on
+the spot had she been ten times less pretty, and ten times less
+fascinating.</p>
+<p>I was an easy victim, after all, and scarcely worth the powder
+and shot of an experienced <i>franc-tireur;</i> but Madame de
+Marignan, according to her own confession, had a taste for
+civilizing "handsome boys," and as I may, perhaps, have come under
+that category a good many years ago, the little victory amused her!
+By the time, at all events, that Dalrymple returned to tell me it
+was past one o'clock in the morning, and I must be introduced to
+the mistress of the house before leaving, my head was as completely
+turned as that of old Time himself.</p>
+<p>"Past one!" I exclaimed. "Impossible! We cannot have been here
+half-an hour."</p>
+<p>At which neither Dalrymple nor Madame de Marignan could forbear
+smiling.</p>
+<p>"I hope our acquaintance is not to end here, monsieur," said
+Madame de Marignan. "I live in the Rue Castellane, and am at home
+to my friends every Wednesday evening."</p>
+<p>I bowed almost to my boots.</p>
+<p>"And to my intimates, every morning from twelve to two," she
+added very softly, with a dimpled smile that went straight to my
+heart, and set it beating like the paddle-wheels of a steamer.</p>
+<p>I stammered some incoherent thanks, bowed again, nearly upset a
+servant with a tray of ices, and, covered with confusion, followed
+Dalrymple into the farther room. Here I was introduced to Madame de
+Courcelles, a pale, aristocratic woman some few years younger than
+Madame de Marignan, and received a gracious invitation to all her
+Monday receptions. But I was much less interested in Madame de
+Courcelles than I should have been a couple of hours before. I
+scarcely looked at her, and five minutes after I was out of her
+presence, could not have told whether she was fair or dark, if my
+life had depended on it!</p>
+<p>"What say you to walking home?" said Dalrymple, as we went down
+stairs. "It is a superb night, and the fresh air would be
+delightful after these hot rooms."</p>
+<p>I assented gladly; so we dismissed the cab, and went out,
+arm-in-arm, along a labyrinth of quiet streets lighted by gas-lamps
+few and far between, and traversed only by a few homeward-bound
+pedestrians. Emerging presently at the back of the Madeleine, we
+paused for a moment to admire the noble building by moonlight; then
+struck across the March&eacute; aux Fleurs and took our way along
+the Boulevard.</p>
+<p>"Are you tired, Damon?" said Dalrymple presently.</p>
+<p>"Not in the least," I replied, with my head full of Madame de
+Marignan.</p>
+<p>"Would you like to look in at an artists' club close by here,
+where I have the <i>entree?</i>--queer place enough, but amusing to
+a stranger."</p>
+<p>"Yes, very much."</p>
+<p>"Come along, then; but first button up your overcoat to the
+throat, and tie this colored scarf round your neck. See, I do the
+same. Now take off your gloves--that's it. And give your hat the
+least possible inclination to the left ear. You may turn up the
+bottoms of your trousers, if you like--anything to look a little
+slangy."</p>
+<p>"Is that necessary?"</p>
+<p>"Indispensable--at all events in the honorable society of <i>Les
+Chicards."</i></p>
+<p>"<i>Les Chicards</i>!" I repeated. "What are they?"</p>
+<p>"It is the name of the club, and means--Heaven only knows what!
+for Greek or Latin root it has none, and record of it there exists
+not, unless in the dictionary of Arg&ocirc;t. And yet if you were
+an old Parisian and had matriculated for the last dozen years at
+the Bal de l'Op&eacute;ra, you would know the illustrious Chicard
+by sight as familiarly as Punch, or Paul Pry, or Pierrot. He is a
+gravely comic personage with a bandage over one eye, a battered hat
+considerably inclining to the back of his head, a coat with a high
+collar and long tails, and a <i>tout ensemble</i> indescribably
+seedy--something between a street preacher and a travelling
+showman. But here we are. Take care how you come down, and mind
+your head."</p>
+<p>Having turned aside some few minutes before into the Rue St.
+Honor&eacute;, we had thence diverged down a narrow street with a
+gutter running along the middle and no foot-pavements on either
+side. The houses seemed to be nearly all shops, some few of which,
+for the retailing of <i>charbonnerie</i>, stale vegetables,
+uninviting cooked meats, and so forth, were still open; but that
+before which we halted was closely shuttered up, with only a
+private door open at the side, lighted by a single oil-lamp.
+Following my friend for a couple of yards along the dim passage
+within, I became aware of strange sounds, proceeding apparently
+from the bowels of the earth, and found myself at the head of a
+steep staircase, down which it was necessary to proceed with my
+body bent almost double, in consequence of the close proximity of
+the ceiling and the steps. At the foot of this staircase came
+another dim passage and another oil-lamp over a low door, at which
+Dalrymple paused a moment before entering. The sounds which I had
+heard above now resolved themselves into their component parts,
+consisting of roars of laughter, snatches of songs, clinkings of
+glasses, and thumpings of bottles upon tables, to the accompaniment
+of a deep bass hum of conversation, all of which prepared me to
+find a very merry company within.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIV."></a>CHAPTER XIV.</h2>
+<h3>THE HONORABLE SOCIETY OF LES CHICARDS.</h3>
+<blockquote>"When a set of men find themselves agree in any
+particular, though never so trivial, they establish themselves into
+a kind of fraternity, and meet once or twice a
+week."--<i>Spectator</i>.</blockquote>
+<br>
+<p>It was a long, low room lighted by gas, with a table reaching
+from end to end. Round about this table, in various stages of
+conviviality and conversation, were seated some thirty or forty
+men, capped, bearded, and eccentric-looking, with all kinds of
+queer blouses and wonderful heads of hair. Dropping into a couple
+of vacant chairs at the lower end of this table, we called for a
+bottle of Chablis, lit our cigars, and fell in with the general
+business of the evening. At the top, dimly visible through a dense
+fog of tobacco smoke, sat a stout man in a green coat fastened by a
+belt round the waist. He was evidently the President, and, instead
+of a hammer, had a small bugle lying by his side, which he blew
+from time to time to enforce silence.</p>
+<p>Somewhat perplexed by the general aspect of the club, I turned
+to my companion for an explanation.</p>
+<p>"Is it possible," I asked, "that these amazing individuals are
+all artists and gentlemen?"</p>
+<p>"Artists, every one," replied Dalrymple; "but as to their claim
+to be gentlemen, I won't undertake to establish it. After all, the
+<i>Chicards</i> are not first-rate men."</p>
+<p>"What are they, then?"</p>
+<p>"Oh, the Helots of the profession--hewers of wood engravings,
+and drawers of water-colors, with a sprinkling of daguerreotypists,
+and academy students. But hush--somebody is going to sing!"</p>
+<p>And now, heralded by a convulsive flourish from the President's
+bugle, a young <i>Chicard</i>, whose dilapidated outer man
+sufficiently contradicted the burthen of his song, shouted with
+better will than skill, a <i>chanson</i> of Beranger's, every verse
+of which ended with:--</p>
+<blockquote>"J'ai cinquante &eacute;cus,<br>
+J'ai cinquante &eacute;cus,<br>
+J'ai cinquante &eacute;cus de rente!"</blockquote>
+<p>Having brought this performance to a satisfactory conclusion,
+the singer sat down amid great clapping of hands and clattering of
+glasses, and the President, with another flourish on the bugle,
+called upon one Monsieur Tourterelle. Monsieur Tourterelle was a
+tall, gaunt, swarthy personage, who appeared to have cultivated his
+beard at the expense of his head, since the former reached nearly
+to his waist, while the latter was as bare as a billiard-ball.
+Preparing himself for the effort with a wine-glass full of raw
+cognac, this gentleman leaned back in his chair, stuck his thumbs
+into the armholes of his waistcoat, fixed his eyes on the ceiling,
+and plunged at once into a doleful ballad about one Mademoiselle
+Rosine, and a certain village <i>aupr&egrave;s de la mer</i>, which
+seemed to be in an indefinite number of verses, and amused no one
+but himself. In the midst of this ditty, just as the audience had
+begun to testify their impatience by much whispering and shuffling
+of feet, an elderly <i>Chicard</i>, with a very bald and shiny
+head, was discovered to have fallen asleep in the seat next but one
+to my own; whereupon my nearest neighbor, a merry-looking young
+fellow with a profusion of rough light hair surmounted by a cap of
+scarlet cloth, forthwith charred a cork in one of the candles, and
+decorated the bald head of the sleeper with a comic countenance and
+a pair of huge mustachios. An uproarious burst of laughter was the
+immediate result, and the singer, interrupted somewhere about his
+18th verse, subsided into offended silence.</p>
+<p>"Monsieur M&uuml;ller is requested to favor the honorable
+society with a song," cried the President, as soon as the tumult
+had somewhat subsided.</p>
+<p>My red-capped neighbor, answering to that name, begged to be
+excused, on the score of having pledged his <i>ut de poitrine</i> a
+week since at the Mont de Pi&eacute;t&eacute;, without yet having
+been able to redeem it. This apology was received with laughter,
+hisses, and general incredulity.</p>
+<p>"But," he added, "I am willing to relate an adventure that
+happened to myself in Rome two winters ago, if my honorable brother
+<i>Chicards</i> will be pleased to hear it."</p>
+<p>An immense burst of approbation from all but Monsieur
+Tourterelle and the bald sleeper, followed this announcement; and
+so, after a preliminary <i>grog au vin</i>, and another explosive
+demonstration on the part of the chairman, Monsieur M&uuml;ller
+thus began:--</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h3>THE STUDENT'S STORY.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>"When I was in Rome, I lodged in the Via Margutta, which, for
+the benefit of those who have not been there, may be described as a
+street of studios and stables, crossed at one end by a little
+roofed gallery with a single window, like a shabby 'Bridge of
+Sighs,' A gutter runs down the middle, interrupted occasionally by
+heaps of stable-litter; and the perspective is damaged by rows of
+linen suspended across the street at uncertain intervals. The
+houses in this agreeable thoroughfare are dingy, dilapidated, and
+comfortless, and all which are not in use as stables, are occupied
+by artists. However, it was a very jolly place, and I never was
+happier anywhere in my life. I had but just touched my little
+patrimony, and I was acquainted with plenty of pleasant fellows who
+used to come down to my rooms at night from the French Academy
+where they had been studying all day. Ah, what evenings those were!
+What suppers we used to have in from the <i>Lepre</i>! What lots of
+Orvieto we drank! And what a mountain of empty wicker bottles had
+to be cleared away from the little square yard with the solitary
+lemon-tree at the back of the house!"</p>
+<p>"Come, M&uuml;ller--no fond memories!" cried a student in a
+holland blouse. "Get on with the story."</p>
+<p>"Ay, get on with the story!" echoed several voices.</p>
+<p>To which M&uuml;ller, who took advantage of the interruption to
+finish his <i>grog au vin</i>, deigned no reply.</p>
+<p>"Well," he continued, "like a good many other fellows who,
+having everything to learn and nothing to do, fancy themselves
+great geniuses only because they are in Rome, I put a grand brass
+plate on the door, testifying to all passers-by that mine was the
+STUDIO DI HERR FRANZ MULLER; and, having done this, I believed, of
+course, that my fortune was to be made out of hand. Nothing came of
+it, however. People in search of Dessoulavy's rooms knocked
+occasionally to ask their way, and a few English and Americans
+dropped in from time to time to stare about them, after the
+free-and-easy fashion of foreigners in Rome; but, for all this, I
+found no patrons. Thus several months went by, during which I
+studied from the life, worked hard at the antique, and relieved the
+monotony of study with occasional trips to Frascati, or supper
+parties at the Caf&eacute; Greco."</p>
+<p>"The story! the story!" interrupted a dozen impatient
+voices.</p>
+<p>"All in good time," said M&uuml;ller, with provoking
+indifference. "We are now coming to it."</p>
+<p>And assuming an attitude expressive of mystery, he dropped his
+voice, looked round the table, and proceeded:--</p>
+<p>"It was on the last evening of the Carnival. It had been raining
+at intervals during the day, but held up for a good hour just at
+dusk, as if on purpose for the <i>moccoli</i>. Scarcely, however,
+had the guns of St. Angelo thundered an end to the frolic, when the
+rain came down again in torrents, and put out the last tapers that
+yet lingered along the Corso. Wet, weary, and splashed from head to
+foot with mud and tallow, I came home about seven o'clock, having
+to dine and dress before going to a masked-ball in the evening. To
+light my stove, change my wet clothes, and make the best of a
+half-cold <i>trattore</i> dinner, were my first proceedings; after
+which, I laid out my costume ready to put on, wrapped myself in a
+huge cloak, swallowed a tumbler full of hot cognac and water, and
+lay down in front of the fire, determined to have a sound nap and a
+thorough warming, before venturing out again that night. I fell
+asleep, of course, and never woke till roused by a tremendous peal
+upon the studio-bell, about two hours and a half afterwards. More
+dead than alive, I started to my feet. The fire had gone out in the
+stove; the room was in utter darkness; and the bell still pealed
+loud enough to raise the neighborhood.</p>
+<p>"'Who's there?' I said, half-opening the door, through which the
+wind and rain came rushing. 'And what, in the name of ten thousand
+devils, do you want?"</p>
+<p>"'I want an artist,' said my visitor, in Italian. 'Are you
+one?'</p>
+<p>"'I flatter myself that I am,' replied I, still holding the door
+tolerably close.</p>
+<p>"'Can you paint heads?'</p>
+<p>"'Heads, figures, landscapes--anything,' said I, with my teeth
+chattering like castanets.</p>
+<p>"The stranger pushed the door open, walked in without further
+ceremony, closed it behind him, and said, in a low, distinct
+voice:--</p>
+<p>"'Could you take the portrait of a dead man?'</p>
+<p>"'Of a dead man?' I stammered. 'I--I ... Suppose I strike a
+light?'</p>
+<p>"The stranger laid his hand upon my arm.</p>
+<p>"'Not till you have given me an answer,' said he. 'Yes or no?
+Remember, you will be paid well for your work.'</p>
+<p>"'Well, then--yes,' I replied.</p>
+<p>"'And can you do it at once?'</p>
+<p>"'At once?'</p>
+<p>"'Ay, Signore, will you bring your colors, and come with me this
+instant--or must I seek some other painter?'</p>
+<p>"I thought of the masked-ball, and sighed; but the promise of
+good payment, and, above all, the peculiarity of the adventure
+determined me.</p>
+<p>"'Nay, if it is to be done,' said I, 'one time is as good as
+another. Let me strike a light, and I will at once pack up my
+colors and come with you.'</p>
+<p>"'<i>Bene</i>!' said the stranger. 'But be as quick as you can,
+Signore, for time presses.'</p>
+<p>"I was quick, you may be sure, and yet not so quick but that I
+found time to look at my strange visitor. He was a dark, elderly
+man, dressed in a suit of plain black, and might have been a clerk,
+or a tradesman, or a confidential servant. As soon as I was ready,
+he took the lead; conducted me to a carriage which was waiting at
+the corner of a neighboring street; took his place respectfully on
+the opposite seat; pulled down both the blinds, and gave the word
+to drive on. I never knew by what streets we went, or to what part
+of Rome he took me; but the way seemed long and intricate. At
+length, we stopped and alighted. The night was pitch-dark, and
+still stormy. I saw before me only the outline of a large building,
+indistinct and gloomy, and a small open door dimly lighted-from
+within. Hurried across the strip of narrow pavement, and shut in
+immediately, I had no time to identify localities--no choice,
+except to follow my conductor and blindly pursue the adventure to
+its close. Having entered by a back door, we went up and down a
+labyrinth of staircases and passages, for the mere purpose, as it
+seemed, of bewildering me as much as possible--then paused before
+an oaken door at the end of the corridor. Here my conductor
+signified by a gesture that I was to precede him.</p>
+<p>"It was a large, panelled chamber, richly furnished. A wood fire
+smouldered on the hearth--a curtained alcove to the left partly
+concealed a bed--a corresponding alcove to the right, fitted with
+altar and crucifix, served as an oratory. In the centre of the room
+stood a table covered with a cloth. It needed no second glance to
+tell me what object lay beneath that cloth, uplifting it in ghastly
+outline! My conductor pointed to the table, and asked if there was
+anything I needed. To this I replied that I must have more light
+and more fire, and so proceeded to disembarrass myself of my cloak,
+and prepare my palette. In the meantime, he threw on a log and some
+pine-cones, and went to fetch an additional lamp.</p>
+<p>"Left alone with the body and impelled by an irresistible
+impulse, I rolled back the cloth and saw before me the corpse of a
+young man in fancy dress--a magnificent fellow cast in the very
+mould of strength and grace, and measuring his six feet, if an
+inch. The features were singularly handsome; the brow open and
+resolute; the hair dark, and crisp with curls. Looking more
+closely, I saw that a lock had been lately cut from the right
+temple, and found one of the severed hairs upon the cheek, where it
+had fallen. The dress was that of a jester of the middle ages, half
+scarlet and half white, with a rich belt round the waist. In this
+belt, as if in horrible mockery of the dead, was stuck a tiny baton
+surmounted by a fool's cap, and hung with silver bells. Looking
+down thus upon the body--so young, so beautiful, so evidently
+unprepared for death--a conviction of foul play flashed upon me
+with all the suddenness and certainty of revelation. Here were no
+appearances of disease and no signs of strife. The expression was
+not that of a man who had fallen weapon in hand. Neither, however,
+was it that of one who had died in the agony of poison. The longer
+I looked, the more mysterious it seemed; yet the more I felt
+assured that there was guilt at the bottom of the mystery.</p>
+<p>"While I was yet under the first confused and shuddering
+impression of this doubt, my guide came back with a powerful solar
+lamp, and, seeing me stand beside the body, said sharply:--</p>
+<p>"'Well, Signore, you look as if you had never seen a dead man
+before in all your life!'</p>
+<p>"'I have seen plenty,' I replied, 'but never one so young, and
+so handsome.'</p>
+<p>"'He dropped down quite suddenly,' said he, volunteering the
+information, 'and died in a few minutes. 'Then finding that I
+remained silent, added:--</p>
+<p>"'But I am told that it is always so in cases of
+heart-disease.'</p>
+<p>"'I turned away without replying, and, having placed the lamp to
+my satisfaction, began rapidly sketching in my subject. My
+instructions were simple. I was to give the head only; to produce
+as rapid an effect with as little labor as possible; to alter
+nothing; to add nothing; and, above all, to be ready to leave the
+house before daybreak. So I set steadily to work, and my conductor,
+establishing himself in an easy-chair by the fire, watched my
+progress for some time, and then, as the night advanced, fell
+profoundly asleep. Thus, hour after hour went by, and, absorbed in
+my work, I painted on, unconscious of fatigue-- might almost say
+with something of a morbid pleasure in the task before me. The
+silence within; the raving of the wind and rain without; the solemn
+mystery of death, and the still more solemn mystery of crime which,
+as I followed out train after train of wild conjectures, grew to
+still deeper conviction, had each and all their own gloomy
+fascination. Was it not possible, I asked myself, by mere force of
+will to penetrate the secret? Was it not possible to study that
+dead face till the springs of thought so lately stilled within the
+stricken brain should vibrate once more, if only for an instant, as
+wire vibrates to wire, and sound to sound! Could I not, by long
+studying of the passive mouth, compel some sympathetic revelation
+of the last word that it uttered, though that revelation took no
+outward form, and were communicable to the apprehension only?
+Pondering thus, I lost myself in a labyrinth of fantastic reveries,
+till the hand and the brain worked independently of each other--the
+one swiftly reproducing upon canvas the outer lineaments of the
+dead; the other laboring to retrace foregone facts of which no
+palpable evidence remained. Thus my work progressed; thus the night
+waned; thus the sleeper by the fireside stirred from time to time,
+or moaned at intervals in his dreams.</p>
+<p>"At length, when many hours had gone by, and I began to be
+conscious of the first languor of sleeplessness, I heard, or
+fancied I heard, a light sound in the corridor without. I held my
+breath, and listened. As I listened, it ceased--was renewed--drew
+nearer--paused outside the door. Involuntarily, I rose and looked
+round for some means of defence, in case of need. Was I brought
+here to perpetuate the record of a crime, and was I, when my task
+was done, to be silenced in a dungeon, or a grave? This thought
+flashed upon me almost before I was conscious of the horror it
+involved. At the same moment, I saw the handle of the door turned
+slowly and cautiously--then held back--and then, after a brief
+pause, the door itself gradually opening."</p>
+<p>Here the student paused as if overcome by the recollection of
+that moment, and passed his hand nervously across his brow. I took
+the liberty of pushing our bottle of Chablis towards him, for which
+he thanked me with a nod and a smile, and filled his glass to the
+brim.</p>
+<p>"Well?" cried two or three voices eagerly; my own being one of
+them. "The door opened--what then?"</p>
+<p>"And a lady entered," he continued. "A lady dressed in black
+from head to foot, with a small lamp in her hand. Seeing me, she
+laid her finger significantly on her lip, closed the door as
+cautiously as she had opened it, and, with the faltering, uncertain
+steps of one just risen from a sick-bed, came over to where I had
+been sitting, and leaned for support against my chair. She was very
+pale, very calm, very young and beautiful, with just that look of
+passive despair in her face that one sees in Guido's portrait of
+Beatrice Cenci. Standing thus, I observed that she kept her eyes
+turned from the corpse, and her attention concentrated on the
+portrait. So several minutes passed, and neither of us spoke nor
+stirred. Then, slowly, shudderingly, she turned, grasped me by the
+arm, pointed to the dead form stretched upon the table, and less
+with her breath than by the motion of her lips, shaped out the one
+word:--'<i>Murdered</i>!'</p>
+<p>"Stunned by this confirmation of my doubts, I could only clasp
+my hands in mute horror, and stare helplessly from the lady to the
+corpse, from the corpse to the sleeper. Wildly, feverishly, with
+all her calmness turned to eager haste, she then bent over the
+body, tore open the rich doublet, turned back the shirt, and,
+without uttering one syllable, pointed to a tiny puncture just
+above the region of the heart--a spot so small, so insignificant,
+such a mere speck upon the marble, that but for the pale violet
+discoloration which spread round it like a halo, I could scarcely
+have believed it to be the cause of death. The wound had evidently
+bled inwardly, and, being inflicted with some singularly slender
+weapon, had closed again so completely as to leave an aperture no
+larger than might have been caused by the prick of a needle. While
+I was yet examining it, the fire fell together, and my conductor
+stirred uneasily in his sleep. To cover the body hastily with the
+cloth and resume my seat, was, with me, the instinctive work of a
+moment; but he was quiet again the next instant, and breathing
+heavily. With trembling hands, my visitor next re-closed the shirt
+and doublet, replaced the outer covering, and bending down till her
+lips almost touched my ear, whispered:--</p>
+<p>"'You have seen it. If called upon to do so, will you swear
+it?'</p>
+<p>"I promised.</p>
+<p>"'You will not let yourself be intimidated by threats? nor
+bribed by gold? nor lured by promises?</p>
+<p>"'Never, so help me Heaven!'</p>
+<p>"She looked into my eyes, as if she would read my very soul;
+then, before I knew what she was about to do, seized my hand, and
+pressed it to her lip.</p>
+<p>"'I believe you,' she said. 'I believe, and I thank you. Not a
+word to him that you have seen me'--here she pointed to the sleeper
+by the fire. 'He is faithful; but not to my interests alone. I dare
+tell you no more--at all events, not now. Heaven bless and reward
+you. In this portrait you give me the only treasure--the only
+consolation of my future life!'</p>
+<p>"So saying, she took a ring from her finger, pressed it, without
+another word, into my unwilling hand; and, with the same passive
+dreary look that her face had worn on first entering took up her
+lamp again, and glided from the room.</p>
+<p>"How the next hour, or half hour, went by, I know not--except
+that I sat before the canvas like one dreaming. Now and then I
+added a few touches; but mechanically, and, as it were, in a trance
+of wonder and dismay. I had, however, made such good progress
+before being interrupted, that when my companion woke and told me
+it would soon be day and I must make haste to be gone, the portrait
+was even more finished than I had myself hoped to make it in the
+time. So I packed up my colors and palette again, and, while I was
+doing so, observed that he not only drew the cloth once more over
+the features of the dead, but concealed the likeness behind the
+altar in the oratory, and even restored the chairs to their old
+positions against the wall. This done, he extinguished the solar
+lamp; put it out of sight; desired me once more to follow him; and
+led the way back along the same labyrinth of staircases and
+corridors by which he brought me. It was gray dawn as he hurried me
+into the coach. The blinds were already down--the door was
+instantly closed--again we seemed to be going through an infinite
+number of streets--again we stopped, and I found myself at the
+corner of the Via Margutta.</p>
+<p>"'Alight, Signore,' said the stranger, speaking for the first
+time since we started. 'Alight--you are but a few yards from your
+own door. Here are a hundred scudi; and all that you have now to
+do, is to forget your night's work, as if it had never been.'</p>
+<p>"With this he closed the carriage-door, the horses dashed on
+again, and, before I had time even to see if any arms were blazoned
+on the panels, the whole equipage had disappeared.</p>
+<p>"And here, strange to say, the adventure ended. I never was
+called upon for evidence. I never saw anything more of the
+stranger, or the lady. I never heard of any sudden death, or
+accident, or disappearance having taken place about that time; and
+I never even obtained any clue to the neighborhood of the house in
+which these things took place. Often and often afterwards, when I
+was strolling by night along the streets of Rome, I lingered before
+some old palazzo, and fancied that I recognised the gloomy outline
+that caught my eye in that hurried transit from the carriage to the
+house. Often and often I paused and started, thinking that I had
+found at last the very side-door by which I entered. But these were
+mere guesses after all. Perhaps that house stood in some remote
+quarter of the city where my footsteps never went again--perhaps in
+some neighboring street or piazza, where I passed it every day! At
+all events, the whole thing vanished like a dream, and, but for the
+ring and the hundred scudi, a dream I should by this time believe
+it to have been. The scudi, I am sorry to say, were spent within a
+month--the ring I have never parted from, and here it is."</p>
+<p>Hereupon the student took from his finger a superb ruby set
+between two brilliants of inferior size, and allowed it to pass
+from hand to hand, all round the table. Exclamations of surprise
+and admiration, accompanied by all sorts of conjectures and
+comments, broke from every lip.</p>
+<p>"The dead man was the lady's lover," said one. "That is why she
+wanted his portrait."</p>
+<p>"Of course, and her husband had murdered him," said another.</p>
+<p>"Who, then, was the man in black?" asked a third.</p>
+<p>"A servant, to be sure. She said, if you remember, that he was
+faithful; but not devoted to her interests alone. That meant that
+he would obey to the extent of procuring for her the portrait of
+her lover; but that he did not choose to betray his master, even
+though his master was a murderer."</p>
+<p>"But if so, where was the master?" said the first speaker. "Is
+it likely that he would have neglected to conceal the body during
+all these hours?"</p>
+<p>"Certainly. Nothing more likely, if he were a man of the world,
+and knew how to play his game out boldly to the end. Have we not
+been told that it was the last night of the Carnival, and what
+better could he do, to avert suspicion, than show himself at as
+many balls as he could visit in the course of the evening? But
+really, this ring is magnificent!"</p>
+<p>"Superb. The ruby alone must be worth a thousand francs."</p>
+<p>"To say nothing of the diamonds, and the setting," observed the
+next to whom it was handed.</p>
+<p>At length, after having gone nearly the round of the table, the
+ring came to a little dark, sagacious-looking man, just one seat
+beyond Dalrymple's, who peered at it suspiciously on every side,
+breathed upon it, rubbed it bright again upon his coat-sleeve, and,
+finally, held the stones up sideways between his eyes and the
+light.</p>
+<p>"Bah!" said he, sending it on with a contemptuous fillip of the
+forefinger and thumb. "Glass and paste, <i>mon ami</i>. Not worth
+five francs of anybody's money."</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller, who had been eyeing him all the time with an odd
+smile lurking about the corners of his mouth, emptied his last drop
+of Chablis, turned the glass over on the table, bottom upwards, and
+said very coolly:--</p>
+<p>"Well, I'm sorry for that; because I gave seven francs for it
+myself this morning, in the Palais Royal."</p>
+<p>"You!"</p>
+<p>"Seven francs!"</p>
+<p>"Bought in the Palais Royal!"</p>
+<p>"What does he mean?"</p>
+<p>"Mean?" echoed the student, in reply to this chorus of
+exclamations. "I mean that I bought it this morning, and gave seven
+francs for it. It is not every morning of my life, let me tell you,
+that I have seven francs to throw away on my personal
+appearance."</p>
+<p>"But then the ring that the lady took from her finger?"</p>
+<p>"And the murder?"</p>
+<p>"And the servant in black?"</p>
+<p>"And the hundred scudi?"</p>
+<p>"One great invention from beginning to end, Messieurs les
+Chicards, and being got up expressly for your amusement, I hope you
+liked it. <i>Gar&ccedil;on?</i>--another <i>grog au vin</i>, and
+sweeter than the last!"</p>
+<p>It would be difficult to say whether the Chicards were most
+disappointed or delighted at this
+<i>d&eacute;no&ucirc;ment</i>--disappointed at its want of fact, or
+delighted with the story-weaving power of Herr Franz M&uuml;ller.
+They expressed themselves, at all events, with a tumultuous burst
+of applause, in the midst of which we rose and left the room. When
+we once more came out into the open air, the stars had disappeared
+and the air was heavy with the damps of approaching daybreak.
+Fortunately, we caught an empty <i>fiacre</i> in the next street
+and, as we were nearer the Rue du Faubourg Montmartre than the
+Chauss&eacute;e d' Antin, Dalrymple set me down first.</p>
+<p>"Adieu, Damon," he said, laughingly, as we shook hands through
+the window. "If we don't meet before, come and dine with me next
+Sunday at seven o'clock--and don't dream of dreadful murders, if
+you can help it!"</p>
+<p>I did not dream of dreadful murders. I dreamt, instead, of
+Madame de Marignan, and never woke the next morning till eleven
+o'clock, just two hours later than the time at which I should have
+presented myself at Dr. Ch&eacute;ron's.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XV."></a>CHAPTER XV.</h2>
+<h3>WHAT IT IS TO BE A CAVALIERE SERVENTE.</h3>
+<center>"Everye white will have its blacke,<br>
+And everye sweet its sowere."<br>
+<br>
+<i>Old Ballad</i>.</center>
+<br>
+<p>Neither the example of Oscar Dalrymple nor the broadcloth of the
+great Michaud, achieved half so much for my education as did the
+apprenticeship I was destined to serve to Madame de Marignan.
+Having once made up her mind to civilize me, she spared no pains
+for the accomplishment of that end, cost what it might to
+herself--or me. Before I had been for one week her subject, she
+taught me how to bow; how to pick up a pocket-handkerchief; how to
+present a bouquet; how to hold a fan; how to pay a compliment; how
+to turn over the leaves of a music-book--in short, how to obey and
+anticipate every imperious wish; and how to fetch and carry, like a
+dog. My vassalage began from the very day when I first ventured to
+call upon her. Her house was small, but very elegant, and she
+received me in a delicious little room overlooking the Champs
+Elys&eacute;es--a very nest of flowers, books, and birds. Before I
+had breathed the air of that fatal boudoir for one quarter of an
+hour, I was as abjectly her slave as the poodle with the
+rose-colored collar which lay curled upon a velvet cushion at her
+feet.</p>
+<p>"I shall elect you my <i>cavaliere servente</i>," said she,
+after I had twice nervously risen to take my leave within the first
+half hour, and twice been desired to remain a little longer. "Will
+you accept the office?"</p>
+<p>I thought it the greatest privilege under heaven. Perhaps I said
+so.</p>
+<p>"The duties of the situation are onerous," added she, "and I
+ought not to accept your allegiance without setting them before
+you. In the first place, you will have to bring me every new novel
+of George Sand, Flaubert, or About, on the day of publication."</p>
+<p>"I will move heaven and earth to get them the day before, if
+that be all!" I exclaimed.</p>
+<p>Madame de Marignan nodded approvingly, and went on telling off
+my duties, one by one, upon her pretty fingers.</p>
+<p>"You will have to accompany me to the Opera at least twice a
+week, on which occasions you will bring me a bouquet--camellias
+being my favorite flowers."</p>
+<p>"Were they the flowers that bloom but once in a century," said
+I, with more enthusiasm than sense, "they should be yours!"</p>
+<p>Madame de Marignan smiled and nodded again.</p>
+<p>"When I drive in the Bois, you will sometimes take a seat in my
+carriage, and sometimes ride beside it, like an attentive
+cavalier."</p>
+<p>I was just about to avow that I had no horse, when I remembered
+that I could borrow Dalrymple's, or hire one, if necessary; so I
+checked myself, and bowed.</p>
+<p>"When I go to an exhibition," said Madame de Marignan, "it will
+be your business to look out the pictures in the catalogue--when I
+walk, you will carry my parasol--when I go into a shop, you will
+take care of my dog--when I embroider, you will wind off my silks,
+and look for my scissors--when I want amusement, you must make me
+laugh--and when I am sleepy, you must read to me. In short, my
+<i>cavaliere servente</i> must be my shadow."</p>
+<p>"Then, like your shadow, Madame," said I, "his place is ever at
+your feet, and that is all I desire!"</p>
+<p>Madame de Marignan laughed outright, and showed the loveliest
+little double row of pearls in all the world.</p>
+<p>"Admirable!" said she. "Quite an elegant compliment, and worthy
+of an accomplished lady-killer! <i>Allons</i>! you are a promising
+scholar."</p>
+<p>"In all that I have dared to say, Madame, I am, at least,
+sincere," I added, abashed by the kind of praise.</p>
+<p>"Sincere? Of course you are sincere. Who ever doubted it? Nay,
+to blush like that is enough to spoil the finest compliment in the
+world. There--it is three o'clock, and at half-past I have an
+engagement, for which I must now make my <i>toilette</i>. Come
+to-morrow evening to my box at the <i>Italiens</i>, and so adieu.
+Stay--being my <i>cavaliere</i>, I permit you, at parting, to kiss
+my hand."</p>
+<p>Trembling, breathless, scarcely daring to touch it with mine, I
+lifted the soft little hand to my lips, stammered something which
+was, no doubt, sufficiently foolish, and hurried away, as if I were
+treading on air and breathing sunshine.</p>
+<p>All the rest of that day went by in a kind of agreeable
+delirium. I walked about, almost without knowledge where I went. I
+talked, without exactly knowing what I said. I have some
+recollection of marching to and fro among the side-alleys of the
+Bois de Boulogne, which at that time was really a woody park, and
+not a pleasure-garden--of lying under a tree, and listening to the
+birds overhead, and indulging myself in some idiotic romance about
+love, and solitude, and Madame de Marignan--of wandering into a
+<i>restaurant</i> somewhere about seven o'clock, and sitting down
+to a dinner for which I had no appetite--of going back, sometime
+during the evening, to the Rue Castellane, and walking to and fro
+on the opposite side of the way, looking up for ever so long at the
+darkened windows where my divinity did not show herself--of coming
+back to my lodgings, weary, dusty, and not a bit more sober,
+somewhere about eleven o'clock at night, driven to-bed by sheer
+fatigue, and, even then, too much in love to go to sleep!</p>
+<p>The next day I went through my duties at Dr. Ch&eacute;ron's,
+and attended an afternoon lecture at the hospital; but
+mechanically, like one dreaming. In the evening I presented myself
+at the Opera, where Madame de Marignan received me very graciously,
+and deigned to accept a superb bouquet for which I had paid sixteen
+francs. I found her surrounded by elegant men, who looked upon me
+as nobody, and treated me accordingly. Driven to the back of the
+box where I could neither speak to her, nor see the stage, nor
+achieve even a glimpse of the house, I spent an evening which
+certainly fell short of my anticipations. I had, however, the
+gratification of seeing my bouquet thrown to Grisi at the end of
+the second act, and was permitted the privilege of going in search
+of Madame de Marignan's carriage, while somebody else handed her
+downstairs, and assisted her with her cloak. A whispered word of
+thanks, a tiny pressure of the hand, and the words "come early
+to-morrow," compensated me, nevertheless, for every disappointment,
+and sent me home as blindly happy as ever.</p>
+<p>The next day I called upon her, according to command, and was
+transported to the seventh heaven by receiving permission to
+accompany her to a morning concert, whereby I missed two lectures,
+and spent ten francs.</p>
+<p>On the Sunday, having hired a good horse for the occasion, I had
+the honor of riding beside her carriage till some better-mounted
+acquaintance came to usurp my place and her attention; after which
+I was forced to drop behind and bear the eclipse of my glory as
+philosophically as I could.</p>
+<p>Thus day after day went by, and, for the delusive sake of Madame
+de Marignan's bright eyes, I neglected my studies, spent my money,
+wasted my time, and incurred the displeasure of Dr. Ch&eacute;ron.
+Led on from folly to folly, I was perpetually buoyed up by
+coquetries which meant nothing, and as perpetually mortified,
+disappointed, and neglected. I hoped; I feared; I fretted; I lost
+my sleep and my appetite; I felt dissatisfied with all the world,
+sometimes blaming myself, and sometimes her--yet ready to excuse
+and forgive her at a moment's notice. A boy in experience even more
+than in years, I loved with a boy's headlong passion, and suffered
+with all a boy's acute susceptibility. I was intensely
+sensitive--abashed by a slight, humbled by a glance, and so easily
+wounded that there were often times when, seeing myself forgotten,
+I could with difficulty drive back the tears that kept rising to my
+eyes. On the other hand, I was as easily elated. A kind word, an
+encouraging smile, a lingering touch upon my sleeve, was enough at
+any time to make me forget all my foregone troubles. How often the
+mere gift of a flower sent me home rejoicing! How the tiniest show
+of preference set my heart beating! How proud I was if mine was the
+arm chosen to lead her to her carriage! How more than happy, if
+allowed for even one half-hour in the whole evening to occupy the
+seat beside her own! To dangle after her the whole day long--to
+traverse all Paris on her errands--to wait upon her pleasure like a
+slave, and this, too, without even expecting to be thanked for my
+devotion, seemed the most natural thing in the world. She was
+capricious; but caprice became her. She was exacting; but her
+exactions were so coquettish and attractive, that one would not
+have wished her more reasonable. She was, at least, ten or twelve
+years my senior; but boys proverbially fall in love with women
+older than themselves, and this one was in all respects so
+charming, that I do not, even now, wonder at my infatuation.</p>
+<p>After all, there are few things under heaven more beautiful, or
+more touching, than a boy's first love.</p>
+<p>Passionate is it as a man's--pure as a woman's--trusting as a
+child's--timid, through the very excess of its
+unselfishness--chivalrous, as though handed down direct from the
+days of old romance--poetical beyond the utterances of the poet. To
+the boy-lover, his mistress is only something less than a divinity.
+He believes in her truth as in his own; in her purity, as in the
+sun at noon. Her practised arts of voice and manner are, in his
+eyes, the unstudied graces that spring as naturally from her beauty
+as the scent from the flower. Single-hearted himself, it seems
+impossible that she whom he adores should trifle with the most
+sacred sentiment he has ever known. Conscious of his own devotion,
+he cannot conceive that his wealth is poured forth in vain, and
+that he is but the plaything of her idle hours. Yet it is so. The
+boy's first love is almost always misplaced; seldom rated at its
+true value; hardly ever productive of anything but disappointment.
+Aspirant of the highest mysteries of the soul, he passes through
+the ordeal of fire and tears, happy if he keep his faith unshaken
+and his heart pure, for the wiser worship hereafter. We all know
+this; and few know it better than myself. Yet, with all its
+suffering, which of us would choose to obliterate all record of his
+first romance? Which of us would be without the memory of its
+smiles and tears, its sunshine and its clouds? Not I for one.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XVI."></a>CHAPTER XVI.</h2>
+<h3>A CONTRETEMPS IN A CARRIAGE.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>My slavery lasted somewhat longer than three weeks, and less
+than a month; and was brought, oddly enough, to an abrupt
+conclusion. This was how it happened.</p>
+<p>I had, as usual, attended Madame de Marignan one evening to the
+Opera, and found myself, also as usual, neglected for a host of
+others. There was one man in particular whom I hated, and whom
+(perhaps because I hated him) she distinguished rather more than
+the rest. His name was Delaroche, and he called himself Monsieur le
+Comte Delaroche. Most likely he was a Count---I have no reason to
+doubt his title; but I chose to doubt it for mere spite, and
+because he was loud and conceited, and wore a little red and green
+ribbon in his button-hole. He had, besides, an offensive sense of
+my youth and his own superiority, which I have never forgiven to
+this day. On the particular occasion of which I am now speaking,
+this person had made his appearance in Madame de Marignan's box at
+the close of the first act, established himself in the seat behind
+hers, and there held the lists against all comers during the
+remainder of the evening. Everything he said, everything he did,
+aggravated me. When he looked through her lorgnette, I loathed him.
+When he admired her fan, I longed to thrust it down his throat.
+When he held her bouquet to his odious nose (the bouquet that I had
+given her!) I felt it would have been justifiable manslaughter to
+take him up bodily, and pitch him over into the pit.</p>
+<p>At length the performance came to a close, and M. Delaroche,
+having taken upon himself to arrange Madame de Marignan's cloak,
+carry Madame de Marignan's fan, and put Madame de Marignan's
+opera-glass into its morocco case, completed his officiousness by
+offering his arm and conducting her into the lobby, whilst I,
+outwardly indifferent but inwardly boiling, dropped behind, and
+consigned him silently to all the torments of the seven
+circles.</p>
+<p>It was an oppressive autumnal night without a star in the sky,
+and so still that one might have carried a lighted taper through
+the streets. Finding it thus warm, Madame de Marignan proposed
+walking down the line of carriages, instead of waiting till her own
+came up; and so she and M. Delaroche led the way and I followed.
+Having found the carriage, he assisted her in, placed her fan and
+bouquet on the opposite seat, lingered a moment at the open door,
+and had the unparalleled audacity to raise her hand to his lips at
+parting. As for me, I stood proudly back, and lifted my hat.</p>
+<p>"<i>Comment</i>!" she said, holding out her hand--the pretty,
+ungloved hand that had just been kissed--"is that your good
+night?"</p>
+<p>I bowed over the hand, I would not have touched it with my lips
+at that moment for all the wealth of Paris.</p>
+<p>"You are coming to me to-morrow morning at twelve?" she murmured
+tenderly.</p>
+<p>"If Madame desires it."</p>
+<p>"Of course I desire it. I am going to Auteuil, to look at a
+house for a friend--and to Pignot's for some flowers--and to
+Lubin's for some scent--and to a host of places. What should I do
+without you? Nay, why that grave face? Have I done anything to
+offend you?"</p>
+<p>"Madame, I--I confess that--"</p>
+<p>"That you are jealous of that absurd Delaroche, who is so much
+in love with himself that he has no place in his heart for any one
+else! <i>Fi donc!</i> I am ashamed of you. There--adieu, twelve
+to-morrow!"</p>
+<p>And with this she laughed, waved her hand, gave the signal to
+drive on, and left me looking after the carriage, still irritated
+but already half consoled.</p>
+<p>I then sauntered moodily on, thinking of my tyrant, and her
+caprices, and her beauty. Her smile, for instance; surely it was
+the sweetest smile in the world--if only she were less lavish of
+it! Then, what a delicious little hand--if mine were the only lips
+permitted to kiss it! Why was she so charming?--or why, being so
+charming, need she prize the attentions of every <i>flaneur</i> who
+had only enough wit to admire her? Was I not a fool to believe that
+she cared more for my devotion than for another's! Did I believe
+it? Yes ... no ... sometimes. But then that "sometimes" was only
+when under the immediate influence of her presence. She fascinated
+me; but she would fascinate a hundred others in precisely the same
+way. It was true that she accepted from me more devotion, more
+worship, more time, more outward and visible homage than from any
+other. Was I not her <i>Cavaliere servente?</i> Did she not accept
+my bouquets? Did she not say the other day, when I gave her that
+volume of Tennyson, that she loved all that was English for my
+sake? Surely, I was worse than ungrateful, when, having so much, I
+was still dissatisfied! Why was I not the happiest fellow in Paris?
+Why .....</p>
+<p>My meditations were here interrupted by a sudden flash of very
+vivid lightning, followed by a low muttering of distant thunder. I
+paused, and looked round. The sky was darker than ever, and though
+the air was singularly stagnant, I could hear among the uppermost
+leaves of the tall trees that stealthy rustling that generally
+precedes a storm. Unfortunately for myself, I had not felt disposed
+to go home at once on leaving the theatre; but, being restless
+alike in mind and body, had struck down through the Place
+Vend&ocirc;me and up the Rue de Rivoli, intending to come home by a
+circuitous route. At this precise moment I found myself in the
+middle of the Place de la Concorde, with Cleopatra's needle
+towering above my head, the lamps in the Champs Elys&eacute;es
+twinkling in long chains of light through the blank darkness before
+me, and no vehicle anywhere in sight. To be caught in a heavy
+shower, was not, certainly, an agreeable prospect for one who had
+just emerged from the opera in the thinnest of boots and the
+lightest of folding hats, with neither umbrella nor palet&ocirc;t
+of proof; so, having given a hasty glance in every direction from
+which a cab might be expected, I took valiantly to my heels, and
+made straight for the Madeleine.</p>
+<p>Long before I had accomplished half the distance, however,
+another flash announced the quick coming of the tempest, and the
+first premonitory drops began to plash down heavily upon the
+pavement. Still I ran on, thinking that I should find a cab in the
+Place de la Madeleine; but the Place de la Madeleine was empty.
+Even the caf&eacute; at the corner was closed. Even the omnibus
+office was shut up, and the red lamp above the door
+extinguished.</p>
+<p>What was I to do now? Panting and breathless, I leaned up
+against a doorway, and resigned myself to fate. Stay, what was that
+file of carriages, dimly seen through the rain which was now coming
+down in earnest? It was in a private street opening off at the back
+of the Madeleine--a street in which I could remember no public
+stand. Perhaps there was an evening party at one of the large
+houses lower down, and, if so, I might surely find a not wholly
+incorruptible cabman, who would consent for a liberal
+<i>pourboire</i> to drive me home and keep his fare waiting, if
+need were, for one little half-hour! At all events it was worth
+trying for; so away I darted again, with the wind whistling about
+my ears, and the rain driving in my face.</p>
+<p>But my troubles were not to be so speedily ended. Among the ten
+or fifteen equipages which I found drawn up in file, there was not
+one hackney vehicle. They were private carriages, and all,
+therefore, inaccessible.</p>
+<p>Did I say inaccessible?</p>
+<p>A bold idea occurred to me. The rain was so heavy that it could
+scarcely be expected to last many minutes. The carriage at the very
+end of the line was not likely to be the first called; and, even if
+it were, one could spring out in a moment, if necessary. In short,
+the very daring of the deed was as attractive as the shelter! I
+made my way swiftly down the line. The last carriage was a neat
+little brougham, and the coachman, with his hat pulled down over
+his eyes, and his collar drawn up about his ears, was too much
+absorbed in taking care of himself and his horses to pay much
+attention to a foot-passenger. I passed boldly by--doubled back
+stealthily on my own steps--looked round cautiously--opened the
+door, and glided in.</p>
+<p>It was a delightfully comfortable little vehicle--cushioned,
+soft, yielding, and pervaded by a delicate perfume of eglantine.
+Wondering who the owner might be--if she was young--if she was
+pretty--if she was married, or single, or a widow--I settled myself
+in the darkest corner of the carriage, intending only to remain
+there till the rain had abated. Thus I fell, as fate would have
+it--first into a profound reverie, and then into a still profounder
+sleep. How long this sleep may have lasted I know not. I only
+remember becoming slowly conscious of a gentle movement, which,
+without awaking, partly roused me; of a check to that movement,
+which brought my thoughts suddenly to the surface; of a stream of
+light--of an open door--a crowded hall--a lady waiting to come out,
+and a little crowd of attentive beaux surrounding her!</p>
+<p>I comprehended my position in an instant, and the impossibility
+of extricating myself from it. To get out next the house was to
+brave detection; whilst at the other side I found myself blocked in
+by carriages. Escape was now hopeless! I turned hot and cold; I
+shrank back; I would have gone through the bottom of the carriage,
+if I could. At this moment, to my horror, the footman opened the
+door. I gave myself up for lost, and, in a sudden access of
+desperation, was on the point of rushing out <i>co&ucirc;te que
+co&ucirc;te</i>, when the lady ran forward; sprang lightly in;
+recoiled; and uttered a little breathless cry of surprise and
+apprehension!</p>
+<p>"<i>Mon Dieu</i>, Madame! what is it? Are you hurt?" cried two
+or three of the gentlemen, running out, bareheaded, to her
+assistance.</p>
+<p>But, to my amazement, she unfastened her cloak, and threw it
+over me in such a manner as to leave me completely hidden beneath
+the folds.</p>
+<p>"Oh, nothing, thank you!--I only caught my foot in my cloak. I
+am really quite ashamed to have alarmed you! A thousand
+thanks--good-night."</p>
+<p>And so, with something of a slight tremor in her voice, the lady
+drew up the window. The next instant the carriage moved on.</p>
+<p>And now, what was to be done? I blessed the accident which
+rendered me invisible; but, at the same time, asked myself how it
+was to end.</p>
+<p>Should I wait till she reached her own door, and then, still
+feigning sleep, allow myself to be discovered? Or should I take the
+bull by the horns, and reveal myself? If the latter, would she
+scream, or faint, or go into hysterics? Then, again, supposing she
+resumed her cloak ... a cold damp broke out upon my forehead at the
+mere thought! All at once, just as these questions flashed across
+my mind, the lady drew the mantle aside, and said:--</p>
+<p>"How imprudent of you to hide in my carriage?"</p>
+<p>I could not believe my ears.</p>
+<p>"Suppose any of those people had caught sight of you ... why, it
+would have been all over Paris to-morrow! Happily, I had the
+presence of mind to cover you with my cloak; otherwise ... but
+there, Monsieur, I have a great mind to be very angry with
+you!"</p>
+<p>It was now clear that I was mistaken for some one else.
+Fortunately the carriage-lamps were unlit, the windows still
+blurred with rain, and the night intensely dark; so, feeling like a
+wretch reprieved on the scaffold, I shrank farther and farther into
+the corner, glad to favor a mistake which promised some hope of
+escape.</p>
+<p>"<i>Eh bien</i>!" said the lady, half tenderly, half
+reproachfully; "have you nothing to say to me?"</p>
+<p>Say to her, indeed! What could I say to her? Would not my voice
+betray me directly?</p>
+<p>"Ah," she continued, without waiting for a reply; "you are
+ashamed of the cruel scene of this morning! Well, since you have
+not allowed the night to pass without seeking a reconciliation, I
+suppose I must forgive you!"</p>
+<p>I thought, at this point, that I could not do better than press
+her hand, which was exquisitely soft and small--softer and smaller
+than even Madame de Marignan's.</p>
+<p>"Naughty Hippolyte!" murmured my companion. "Confess, now, that
+you were unreasonable."</p>
+<p>I sighed heavily, and caressed the little hand with both of
+mine.</p>
+<p>"And are you very penitent?"</p>
+<p>I expressed my penitence by another prodigious sigh, and
+ventured, this time, to kiss the tips of the dainty fingers.</p>
+<p>"<i>Ciel</i>!" exclaimed the lady. "You have shaved off your
+beard! What can have induced you to do such a thing?"</p>
+<p>My beard, indeed! Alas! I would have given any money for even a
+moustache! However, the fatal moment was come when I must
+speak.</p>
+<p>"<i>Mon cher ange</i>," I began, trying a hoarse whisper,
+"I--I--the fact is--a bet--"</p>
+<p>"A bet indeed! The idea of sacrificing such a handsome beard for
+a mere bet! I never heard of anything so foolish. But how hoarse
+you are, Hippolyte!"</p>
+<p>"All within the last hour," whispered I. "I was caught in the
+storm, just now, and ..."</p>
+<p>"And have taken cold, for my sake! Alas! my poor, dear friend,
+why did you wait to speak to me? Why did you not go home at once,
+and change your clothes? Your sleeve, I declare, is still quite
+damp! Hippolyte, if you fall ill, I shall never forgive
+myself!"</p>
+<p>I kissed her hand again. It was much pleasanter than whispering,
+and expressed all that was necessary.</p>
+<p>"But you have not once asked after poor Bibi!" exclaimed my
+companion, after a momentary silence. "Poor, dear Bibi, who has
+been suffering from a martyrdom with her cough all the
+afternoon!"</p>
+<p>Now, who the deuce was Bibi? She might be a baby. Or--who could
+tell?--she might be a poodle? On this point, however, I was left
+uninformed; for my unknown friend, who, luckily, seemed fond of
+talking and had a great deal to say, launched off into another
+topic immediately.</p>
+<p>"After all," said she, "I should have been wrong not to go to
+the party! My uncle was evidently pleased with my compliance; and
+it is not wise to vex one's rich uncles, if one can help it--is it,
+Hippolyte!"</p>
+<p>I pressed her hand again.</p>
+<p>"Besides, Monsieur Delaroche was not there. He was not even
+invited; so you see how far they were from laying matchmaking
+plots, and how groundless were all your fears and reproaches!"</p>
+<p>Monsieur Delaroche! Could this be the Delaroche of my special
+aversion? I pressed her hand again, more closely, more tenderly,
+and listened for what might come next.</p>
+<p>"Well, it is all over now! And will you promise <i>never, never,
+never</i> to be jealous again? Then, to be jealous of such a
+creature as that ridiculous Delaroche--a man who knows nothing--who
+can think and talk only of his own absurd self!--a man who has not
+even wit enough to see that every one laughs at him!"</p>
+<p>I was delighted. I longed to embrace her on the spot! Was there
+ever such a charming, sensible, lively creature?</p>
+<p>"Besides, the coxcomb is just now devoting himself, body and
+soul (such as they are!) to that insufferable little
+<i>intriguante</i>, Madame de Marignan. He is to be seen with her
+in every drawing-room and theatre throughout Paris. For my part, I
+am amazed that a woman of the world should suffer herself to be
+compromised to that extent--especially one so experienced in these
+<i>affaires du coeur</i>."</p>
+<p>Madame de Marignan!
+Compromised--experienced--<i>intriguante</i>! I felt as if I were
+choking.</p>
+<p>"To be sure, there is that poor English lad whom she drags about
+with her, to play propriety," continued she; "but do you suppose
+the world is blinded by so shallow an artifice?"</p>
+<p>"What English lad?" I asked, startled out of all sense of
+precaution, and desperately resolved to know the worst.</p>
+<p>"What English lad? Why, Hippolyte, you are more stupid than
+ever! I pointed him out to you the other night at the Comedie
+Fran&ccedil;aise--a pale, handsome boy, of about nineteen or
+twenty, with brown curling hair, and very fine eyes, which were
+riveted on Madame de Marignan the whole evening. Poor fellow! I
+cannot help pitying him."</p>
+<p>"Then--then, you think she really does not love him?" I said.
+And this time my voice was hoarse enough, without any need of
+feigning.</p>
+<p>"Love him! Ridiculous! What does such a woman understand by
+love? Certainly neither the sentiment nor the poetry of it! Tush,
+Hippolyte! I do not wish to be censorious; but every one knows that
+ever since M. de Marignan has been away in Algiers, that woman has
+had, not one devoted admirer, but a dozen; and now that her husband
+is coming back...."</p>
+<p>"Coming back! ... her husband!" I echoed, half rising in my
+place, and falling back again, as if stunned. "Good heavens! is she
+not a widow?"</p>
+<p>It was now the lady's turn to be startled.</p>
+<p>"A widow!" she repeated. "Why, you know as well as I
+that--<i>Dieu</i>! To whom I am speaking?"</p>
+<p>"Madame," I said, as steadily as my agitation would let me, "I
+beg you not to be alarmed. I am not, it is true, the person whom
+you have supposed; but--Nay, I implore you...."</p>
+<p>She here uttered a quick cry, and darted forward for the
+check-string. Arresting her hand half way, respectfully but firmly,
+I went on:--</p>
+<p>"How I came here, I will explain presently. I am a gentleman;
+and upon the word of a gentleman, Madame, am innocent of any desire
+to offend or alarm you. Can you--will you--hear me for one
+moment?"</p>
+<p>"I appear, sir, to have no alternative," replied she, trembling
+like a caged bird.</p>
+<p>"I might have left you undeceived, Madame. I might have
+extricated myself from, this painful position undiscovered--but for
+some words which just escaped your lips; some words so nearly
+concerning the--the honor and happiness of--of.... in short, I lost
+my presence of mind. I now implore you to tell me if all that you
+have just been saying of Madame de Marignan is strictly true."</p>
+<p>"Who are you, sir, that you should dare to surprise confidences
+intended for another, and by what right do you question me?" said
+the lady, haughtily.</p>
+<p>"By no right, Madame," I replied, fairly breaking into sobs, and
+burying my face in my hands. "I can only appeal to your compassion.
+I am that Englishman whom--whom...."</p>
+<p>For a moment there was silence. My companion was the first to
+speak.</p>
+<p>"Poor boy!" she said; and her voice, now, was gentle and
+compassionate. "You have been rudely undeceived. Did Madame de
+Marignan pass herself off upon you for a widow?"</p>
+<p>"She never named her husband to me--I believed that she was
+free. I fancied he had been dead for years. She knew that was my
+impression."</p>
+<p>"And you would have married her--actually married her?"</p>
+<p>"I--I--hardly dared to hope...."</p>
+<p>"<i>Ciel</i>! it is almost beyond belief. And you never inquired
+into her past history?"</p>
+<p>"Never. Why should I?"</p>
+<p>"Monsieur de Marignan holds a government appointment in Algiers,
+and has been absent more than four years. He is, I understand,
+expected back shortly, on leave of absence."</p>
+<p>I conquered my agitation by a supreme effort.</p>
+<p>"Madame," I said, "I thank you. It now only remains for me to
+explain my intrusion. I can do so in half a dozen words. Caught in
+the storm and unable to find a conveyance, I sought shelter in this
+carriage, which being the last on the file, offered the only refuge
+of which I could avail myself unobserved. While waiting for the
+tempest to abate, I fell asleep; and but for the chance which led
+you to mistake me for another, I must have been discovered when you
+entered the carriage."</p>
+<p>"Then, finding yourself so mistaken, Monsieur, would it not have
+been more honorable to undeceive me than to usurp a conversation
+which...."</p>
+<p>"Madame, I dared not. I feared to alarm you--I hoped to find
+some means of escape, and...."</p>
+<p>"<i>Mon Dieu</i>! what means? How are you to escape as it is?
+How leave the carriage without being seen by my servants?"</p>
+<p>I had not thought of this, nor of the dilemma in which my
+presence must place her.</p>
+<p>"I can open the door softly," said I, "and jump out
+unperceived."</p>
+<p>"Impossible, at the pace we are going! You would break your
+neck."</p>
+<p>I shook my head, and laughed bitterly.</p>
+<p>"Have no fear of that, Madame," I said. "Those who least value
+their necks never happen to break them. See, I can spring out as we
+pass the next turning, and be out of sight in a moment."</p>
+<p>"Indeed, I will not permit it. Oh, dear! we have already reached
+the Faubourg St. Germain. Stay--I have an idea I Do you know what
+o'clock it is?"</p>
+<p>"I don't know how long I may have slept; but I think it must be
+quite three."</p>
+<p>"<i>Bien</i>! The Countess de Blois has a ball to-night, and her
+visitors are sure not to disperse before four or five. My sister is
+there. I will send in to ask if she has yet gone home, and when the
+carriage stops you can slip out. Here is the Rue de Bac, and the
+door of her hotel is yet surrounded with equipages."</p>
+<p>And with this, she let down a front window, desired the coachman
+to stop, leaned forward so as to hide me completely, and sent in
+her footman with the message. When the man had fairly entered the
+hall, she turned to me and said:--</p>
+<p>"Now, Monsieur, fly! It is your only chance."</p>
+<p>"I go, Madame; but before going, suffer me to assure you that I
+know neither your name, nor that of the person for whom you mistook
+me--that I have no idea of your place of residence--that I should
+not know you if I saw you again to-morrow--in short, that you are
+to me as entirely a stranger as if this adventure had never
+happened."</p>
+<p>"Monsieur, I thank you for the assurance; but I see the servant
+returning. Pray, begone!"</p>
+<p>I sprang out without another word, and, never once looking back,
+darted down a neighboring street and waited in the shadow of a
+doorway till I thought the carriage must be out of sight.</p>
+<p>The night was now fine, the moon was up, and the sky was full of
+stars. But I heeded nothing, save my own perplexed and painful
+thoughts. Absorbed in these, I followed the course of the Rue du
+Bac till I came to the Pont National. There my steps were arrested
+by the sight of the eddying river, the long gleaming front of the
+Louvre, the quaint, glistening gables of the Tuilleries, the
+far-reaching trees of the Champs Elys&eacute;es all silvered in the
+soft, uncertain moonlight. It was a most calm and beautiful
+picture; and I stood for a long time leaning against the parapet of
+the bridge, and looking dreamily at the scene before me. Then I
+heard the quarters chime from belfry to belfry all over the quiet
+city, and found that it was half-past three o'clock. Presently a
+patrol of <i>gendarmes</i> went by, and, finding that they paused
+and looked at me suspiciously, I turned away, and bent my steps
+homewards.</p>
+<p>By the time I reached the Cit&eacute; Berg&egrave;re it was past
+four, and the early market-carts were already rumbling along the
+Rue du Faubourg Montmartre. Going up wearily to my apartments, I
+found a note waiting for me in Dalrymple's handwriting. It ran
+thus:--</p>
+<p>"MY DEAR DAMON:--</p>
+<p>"Do you know that it is nearly a month since I last saw you? Do
+you know that I have called twice at your lodgings without finding
+you at home? I hear of you as having been constantly seen, of late,
+in the society of a very pretty woman of our acquaintance; but I
+confess that I do not desire to see you go to the devil entirely
+without the friendly assistance of</p>
+<p>"Yours faithfully,</p>
+<p>"OSCAR DALRYMPLE."</p>
+<p>I read the note twice. I could scarcely believe that I had so
+neglected my only friend. Had I been mad? Or a fool?--or both? Too
+anxious and unhappy to sleep, and too tired to sit up, I lit my
+lamp, threw myself upon the bed, and there lay repenting my wasted
+hours, my misplaced love and my egregious folly, till morning came
+with its sunshine and its traffic, and found me a "wiser," if not a
+"better man."</p>
+<p>"Half-past seven!" exclaimed I to myself, as I jumped up and
+plunged my head into a basin of cold water. "Dr. Ch&eacute;ron
+shall see me before nine this morning. I'll call on Dalrymple at
+luncheon time; at three, I must get back for the afternoon lecture;
+and in the evening--in the evening, by Jove! Madame de Marignan
+must be content with her adorable Delaroche, for the deuce a bit of
+her humble servant will she ever see again!"</p>
+<p>And away I went presently along the sunny streets, humming to
+myself those saucy and wholesome lines of good Sir Walter
+Raleigh's:--</p>
+<blockquote>"Shall I like a hermit dwell<br>
+On a rock, or in a cell,<br>
+Calling home the smallest part<br>
+That is missing of my heart,<br>
+To bestow it where I may<br>
+Meet a rival every day?<br>
+If she undervalues me,<br>
+What care I how fair she be?"</blockquote>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XVII."></a>CHAPTER XVII.</h2>
+<h3>THE WIDOW OF A MINISTER OF FINANCE.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>"You are just in time, Arbuthnot, to do me a service," said
+Dalrymple, looking up from his desk as I went in, and reaching out
+his hand to me over a barricade of books and papers.</p>
+<p>"Then I am very glad I have come," I replied. "But what
+confusion is this? Are you going anywhere?"</p>
+<p>"Yes--to perdition. There, kick that rubbish out of your way and
+sit down."</p>
+<p>Never very orderly, Dalrymple's rooms were this time in as
+terrible a litter as can well be conceived. The table was piled
+high with bills, old letters, books, cigars, gloves, card-cases,
+and pamphlets. The carpet was strewn with portmanteaus, hat-cases,
+travelling-straps, old luggage labels, railway wrappers, and the
+like. The chairs and sofas were laden with wearing apparel. As for
+Dalrymple himself, he looked haggard and weary, as though the last
+four weeks had laid four years upon his shoulders.</p>
+<p>"You look ill," I said clearing a corner of the sofa for my own
+accommodation; "or <i>ennuy&eacute;</i>, which is much the same
+thing. What is the matter? And what can I do for you?"</p>
+<p>"The matter is that I am going abroad," said he, with his chin
+resting moodily in his two palms and his elbows on the table.</p>
+<p>"Going abroad! Where?"</p>
+<p>"I don't know--</p>
+<blockquote>'Anywhere, anywhere, out of the world.'</blockquote>
+<p>It's of very little consequence whether I betake myself to the
+East or to the West; eat rice in the tropics, or drink train-oil at
+the Pole."</p>
+<p>"But have you no settled projects?"</p>
+<p>"None whatever."</p>
+<p>"And don't care what becomes of you?"</p>
+<p>"Not in the least."</p>
+<p>"Then, in Heaven's name, what has happened?"</p>
+<p>"The very thing that, three weeks ago, would have made me the
+happiest fellow in Christendom. What are you going to do
+to-morrow?"</p>
+<p>"Nothing, beyond my ordinary routine of medical study."</p>
+<p>"Humph! Could you get a whole holiday, for once?"</p>
+<p>I remembered how many I had taken of late, and felt ashamed of
+the readiness with which I replied:--</p>
+<p>"Oh yes! easily."</p>
+<p>"Well, then, I want you to spend the day with me. It will be,
+perhaps, my last in Paris for many a month, or even many a year. I
+... Pshaw! I may as well say it, and have done with it. I am going
+to be married."</p>
+<p>"Married!" I exclaimed, in blank amazement; for it was the last
+thing I should have guessed.</p>
+<p>Dalrymple tugged away at his moustache with both hands, as was
+his habit when perplexed or troubled, and nodded gloomily. "To
+whom?"</p>
+<p>"To Madame de Courcelles."</p>
+<p>"And are you not very happy?"</p>
+<p>"Happy! I am the most miserable dog unhanged?"</p>
+<p>I was more at fault now than ever.</p>
+<p>"I ... judging from trifles which some would perhaps scarcely
+have observed," I said, hesitatingly, "I--I thought you were
+interested in Madame de Courcelles?"</p>
+<p>"Interested!" cried he, pushing back his chair and springing to
+his feet, as if the word had stung him. "By heaven! I love that
+woman as I never loved in my life."</p>
+<p>"Then why ..."</p>
+<p>"I'll tell you why--or, at least, I will tell you as much as I
+may--as I can; for the affair is hers, and not mine. She has a
+cousin--curse him!--to whom she was betrothed from childhood. His
+estates adjoined hers; family interests were concerned in their
+union; and the parents on both sides arranged matters. When,
+however, Monsieur de Courcelles fell in love with her--a man much
+older than herself, but possessed of great wealth and immense
+political influence--her father did not hesitate to send the cousin
+to the deuce and marry his daughter to the Minister of Finance. The
+cousin, it seems, was then a wild young fellow; not particularly in
+love with her himself; and not at all inconsolable for her loss.
+When, however, Monsieur de Courcelles was good enough to die (which
+he had the bad taste to do very hastily, and without making, by any
+means, the splendid provision for his widow which he had promised),
+our friend, the cousin, comes forward again. By this time he is
+enough man of the world to appreciate the value of land--more
+especially as he has sold, mortgaged, played the mischief with
+nearly every acre of his own. He pleads the old engagement, and, as
+he is pleased to call it, the old love. Madame de Courcelles is a
+young widow, very solitary, with no one to love, no object to live
+for, and no experience of the world. Her pity is easily awaked; and
+the result is that she not only accepts the cousin, but lends him
+large sums of money; suffers the title-deeds of her estates to go
+into the hands of his lawyer; and is formally betrothed to him
+before the eyes of all Paris!"</p>
+<p>"Who is this man? Where is he?" I asked, eagerly.</p>
+<p>"He is an officer of Chasseurs, now serving with his regiment in
+Algiers--a daring, dashing, reckless fellow; heartless and
+dissipated enough; but a splendid soldier. However, having
+committed her property to his hands, and suffered her name to be
+associated publicly with his, Madame de Courcelles, during his
+absence in Algiers, has done me the honor to prefer me. I have the
+first real love of her life, and the short and long of it is, that
+we are to be privately married to-morrow."</p>
+<p>"And why privately?"</p>
+<p>"Ah, there's the pity of it! There's the disappointment and the
+bitterness!"</p>
+<p>"Can't Madame de Courcelles write and tell this man that she
+loves somebody else better?"</p>
+<p>"Confound it! no. The fellow has her too much in his power, and,
+if he chose to be dishonest, could half ruin her. At all events she
+is afraid of him; and I ... I am as helpless as a child in the
+matter. If I were a rich man, I would snap my fingers at him; but
+how can I, with a paltry eight hundred a year, provide for that
+woman? Pshaw! If I could but settle it with a pair of hair-triggers
+and twenty paces of turf, I'd leave little work for the
+lawyers!"</p>
+<p>"Well, then, what is to be done?"</p>
+<p>"Only this," replied he, striding impatiently to and fro, like a
+caged lion; "I must just bear with my helplessness, and leave the
+remedy to those who can oppose skill to skill, and lawyer to
+lawyer."</p>
+<p>"At all events, you marry the lady."</p>
+<p>"Ay--I marry the lady; but I start to-morrow night for Berlin,
+<i>en route</i> for anywhere that chance may lead me."</p>
+<p>"Without her?"</p>
+<p>"Without her. Do you suppose that I would stay in Paris--her
+husband--and live apart from her? Meet her, like an ordinary
+acquaintance? See others admiring her? Be content to lounge in and
+out of her <i>soir&eacute;es</i>, or ride beside her carriage now
+and then, as you or fifty others might do? Perhaps, have even to
+endure the presence of De Caylus himself? <i>Merci</i>! Any number
+of miles, whether of land or sea, were better than a martyrdom like
+that!"</p>
+<p>"De Caylus!" I repeated. "Where have I heard that name?"</p>
+<p>"You may have heard of it in a hundred places," replied my
+friend. "As I said before, the man is a gallant soldier, and does
+gallant things. But to return to the present question--may I depend
+on you to-morrow? For we must have a witness, and our witness must
+be both discreet and silent."</p>
+<p>"On my silence and discretion you may rely absolutely."</p>
+<p>"And you can be here by nine?"</p>
+<p>"By daybreak, if you please."</p>
+<p>"I won't tax you to that extent. Nine will do quite well."</p>
+<p>"Adieu, then, till nine."</p>
+<p>"Adieu, and thank you."</p>
+<p>With this I left him, somewhat relieved to find that I had
+escaped all cross-examination on the score of Madame Marignan.</p>
+<p>"De Caylus!" I again repeated to myself, as I took my rapid way
+to the Hotel Dieu. "De Caylus! why, surely, it must have been that
+evening at Madame de Courcelles'...."</p>
+<p>And then I recollected that De Caylus was the name of that
+officer who was said to have ridden by night, and single-handed,
+through the heart of the enemy's camp, somewhere in Algiers.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XVIII."></a>CHAPTER XVIII.</h2>
+<h3>A MARRIAGE NOT "A LA MODE."</h3>
+<br>
+<p>The marriage took place in a little out-of-the-way Protestant
+chapel beyond the barriers, at about a quarter before ten o'clock
+the next morning. Dalrymple and I were there first; and Madame de
+Courcelles, having, in order to avoid observation, come part of the
+distance in a cab and part on foot, arrived a few minutes later.
+She was very pale, and looked almost like a <i>religieuse</i>, with
+her black veil tied closely under her chin, and a dark violet
+dress, which might have passed for mourning. She gave her hand to
+Dalrymple without speaking; then knelt down at the communion-table,
+and so remained till we had all taken our places. As for Dalrymple,
+he had even less color than she, but held his head up haughtily,
+and betrayed no sign of the conflict within.</p>
+<p>It was a melancholy little chapel, dusty and neglected, full of
+black and white funereal tablets, and damp as a vault. We shivered
+as we stood about the altar; the clergyman's teeth chattered as he
+began the marriage service; and the echoes of our responses
+reverberated forlornly up among the gothic rafters overhead. Even
+the sunbeams struggled sadly and palely down the upper windows, and
+the chill wind whistled in when the door was opened, bringing with
+it a moan of coming rain.</p>
+<p>The ceremony over, the books signed in the vestry, and the
+clergyman, clerk, and pew-opener duly remunerated for their
+services, we prepared to be gone. For a couple of moments,
+Dalrymple and his bride stood apart in the shadow of the porch. I
+saw him take the hand on which he had just placed the ring, and
+look down upon it tenderly, wistfully--I saw him bend lower, and
+lower, whispering what no other ears might hear--saw their lips
+meet for one brief instant. Then the lady's veil was lowered; she
+turned hastily away; and Dalrymple was left standing in the doorway
+alone.</p>
+<p>"By Heaven!" said he, grasping my hand as though he would crush
+it. "This is hard to bear."</p>
+<p>I but returned the pressure of his hand; for I knew not with
+what words to comfort him. Thus we lingered for some minutes in
+silence, till the clergyman, having put off his surplice, passed us
+with a bow and went out; and the pew-opener, after pretending to
+polish the door-handle with her apron, and otherwise waiting about
+with an air of fidgety politeness, dropped a civil curtsey, and
+begged to remind us that the chapel must now be closed.</p>
+<p>Dalrymple started and shook himself like a water-dog, as if he
+would so shake off "the slings and arrows of outrageous
+fortune."</p>
+<p>"<i>Rex est qui metuit nihil</i>!" said he; "but I am a
+sovereign in bad circumstances, for all that. Heigho! Care will
+kill a cat. What shall we do with ourselves, old fellow, for the
+rest of the day?"</p>
+<p>"I hardly know. Would you like to go into the country?"</p>
+<p>"Nothing better. The air perhaps would exorcise some of these
+blue-devils."</p>
+<p>"What say you to St. Germains? It looks as if it must rain
+before night; yet there is the forest and...."</p>
+<p>"Excellent! We can do as we like, with nobody to stare at us;
+and I am in a horribly uncivilized frame of mind this morning."</p>
+<p>With this, we turned once more toward Paris, and, jumping into
+the first cab that came by, were driven to the station. It happened
+that a train was then about to start; so we were off
+immediately.</p>
+<p>There were no other passengers in the carriage, so Dalrymple
+infringed the company's mandate by lighting a cigar, and I, finding
+him disinclined for talk, did the same thing, and watched the
+passing country. Flat and uninteresting at first, it consisted of a
+mere sandy plain, treeless, hedgeless, and imperfectly cultivated
+with struggling strips of corn and vegetables. By and by came a
+line of stunted pollards, a hamlet, and a little dreary cemetery.
+Then the landscape improved. The straight line of the horizon broke
+into gentle undulations; the Seine, studded with islets, wound
+through the meadow-land at our feet; and a lofty viaduct carried us
+from height to height across the eddying river. Then we passed into
+the close green shade of a forest, which opened every here and
+there into long vistas, yielding glimpses of</p>
+<blockquote>"--verdurous glooms, and winding mossy
+ways."</blockquote>
+<p>Through this wood the line continued to run till we reached our
+destination. Here our first few steps brought us out upon the
+Place, directly facing the old red and black chateau of St.
+Germain-en-Laye. Leaving this and the little dull town behind us,
+we loitered for some time about the broad walks of the park, and
+then passed on into the forest. Although it was neither Sunday nor
+a f&ecirc;te-day, there were pleasure parties gipseying under
+trees--Parisian cockneys riding raw-boned steeds--pony-chaises full
+of laughing grisettes dashing up and down the broad roads that
+pierce the wood in various directions--old women selling cakes and
+lemonade--workmen gambling with half-pence on the smooth turf by
+the wayside--<i>bonnes</i>, comely and important, with their little
+charges playing round them, and their busy fingers plying the
+knitting-needles as they walked--young ladies sketching trees, and
+prudent governesses reading novels close by; in short, all the life
+and variety of a favorite suburban resort on an ordinarily fine day
+about the beginning of autumn.</p>
+<p>Leaving the frequented routes to the right, we turned into one
+of the many hundred tracks that diverge in every direction from the
+beaten roads, and wandered deeper and deeper into the green shades
+and solitudes of the forest. Pausing, presently, to rest, Dalrymple
+threw himself at full length on the mossy ground, with his hands
+clasping the back of his head, and his hat over his eyes; whilst I
+found a luxurious arm-chair in the gnarled roots of a lichen-tufted
+elm. Thus we remained for a considerable time puffing away at our
+cigars in that sociable silence which may almost claim to be an
+unique privilege of masculine friendship. Women cannot sit together
+for long without talking; men can enjoy each other's companionship
+for hours with scarcely the interchange of an idea.</p>
+<p>Meanwhile, I watched the squirrels up in the beech-trees and the
+dancing of the green leaves against the sky; and thought dreamily
+of home, of my father, of the far past, and the possible future. I
+asked myself how, when my term of study came to an end, I should
+ever again endure the old home-life at Saxonholme? How settle down
+for life as my father's partner, conforming myself to his
+prejudices, obeying all the demands of his imperious temper, and
+accepting for evermore the monotonous routine of a provincial
+practice! It was an intolerable prospect, but no less inevitable
+than intolerable. Pondering thus, I sighed heavily, and the sigh
+roused Dalrymple's attention.</p>
+<p>"Why, Damon," said he, turning over on his elbow, and pushing up
+his hat to the level of his eyes, "what's the matter with you?"</p>
+<p>"Oh, nothing--at least, nothing new."</p>
+<p>"Well, new or old, what is it? A man must be either in debt, or
+in love, when he sighs in that way. You look as melancholy as
+Werter redivivus!"</p>
+<p>"I--I ought not to be melancholy, I suppose; for I was thinking
+of home."</p>
+<p>Dalrymple's face and voice softened immediately.</p>
+<p>"Poor boy!" he said, throwing away the end of his cigar, "yours
+is not a bright home, I fear. You told me, I think, that you had
+lost your mother?"</p>
+<p>"From infancy."</p>
+<p>"And you have no sisters?"</p>
+<p>"None. I am an only child."</p>
+<p>"Your father, however, is living?"</p>
+<p>"Yes, my father lives. He is a rough-tempered, eccentric man;
+misanthropic, but clever; kind enough, and generous enough, in his
+own strange way. Still--"</p>
+<p>"Still what?"</p>
+<p>--"I dread the life that lies before me! I dread the life
+without society, without ambition, without change--the dull
+house--the bounded sphere of action--the bondage.... But of what
+use is it to trouble you with these things?"</p>
+<p>"This use, that it does you good to tell, and me to listen.
+Sympathy, like mercy, blesseth him that gives and him that takes;
+and if I cannot actually help you, I am, at all events, thankful to
+be taken out of myself. Go on--tell me more of your prospects. Have
+you no acquaintance at Saxonholme whose society will make the place
+pleasant to you? No boyish friends? No pretty cousins? No
+first-loves, from amongst whom to choose a wife in time to
+come?"</p>
+<p>I shook my head sadly.</p>
+<p>"Did I not tell you that my father was a misanthrope? He visits
+no one, unless professionally. We have no friends and no
+relations."</p>
+<p>"Humph! that's awkward. However, it leaves you free to choose
+your own friends, when you go back. A medical man need never be
+without a visiting connection. His very profession puts a thousand
+opportunities in his way."</p>
+<p>"That is true; but--"</p>
+<p>"But what?"</p>
+<p>"I am not fond of the profession. I have never liked it. I would
+give much to relinquish it altogether."</p>
+<p>Dalrymple gave utterance to a prolonged and very dismal
+whistle.</p>
+<p>"This," said he gravely, "is the most serious part of the
+business. To live in a dull place is bad enough--to live with dull
+people is bad enough; but to have one's thoughts perpetually
+occupied with an uncongenial subject, and one's energies devoted to
+an uncongenial pursuit, is just misery, and nothing short of it! In
+fact 'tis a moral injustice, and one that no man should be required
+to endure."</p>
+<p>"Yet I must endure it."</p>
+<p>"Why?"</p>
+<p>"Because it is too late to do otherwise."</p>
+<p>"It is never too late to repair an evil, or an error."</p>
+<p>"Unless the repairing of it involved a worse evil, or a more
+fatal error! No--I must not dream now of turning aside from the
+path that has been chosen for me. Too much time and too much money
+have been given to the thing for that;--I must let it take its
+course. There's no help for it!"</p>
+<p>"But, confound it, lad! you'd better follow the fife and drum,
+or go before the mast, than give up your life to a profession you
+hate!"</p>
+<p>"Hate is a strong word," I replied. "I do not actually hate
+it--at all events I must try to make the best of it, if only for my
+father's sake. His heart is set on making a physician of me, and I
+dare not disappoint him."</p>
+<p>Dalrymple looked at me fixedly, and then fell back into his old
+position.</p>
+<p>"Heigho!" he said, pulling his hat once more over his eyes, "I
+was a disobedient son. My father intended me for the Church; I was
+expelled from College for fighting a duel before I was twenty, and
+then, sooner than go home disgraced, enlisted as a private soldier
+in a cavalry corps bound for foreign service. Luckily, they found
+me out before the ship sailed, and made the best of a bad bargain
+by purchasing me a cornetcy in a dragoon regiment. I would not
+advise you to be disobedient, Damon. My experience in that line has
+been bitter enough,"</p>
+<p>"How so? You escaped a profession for which you were
+disinclined, and entered one for which you had every
+qualification."</p>
+<p>"Ay; but think of the cursed <i>esclandre</i>--first the duel,
+then the expulsion, then my disappearance for two months ... My
+mother was in bad health at the time, too; and I, her favorite
+son--I--in short, the anxiety was too much for her. She--she died
+before I had been six weeks in the regiment. There! we won't talk
+of it. It's the one subject that ..."</p>
+<p>His voice faltered, and he broke off abruptly.</p>
+<p>"I wish you were going with me to Berlin," said he, after a long
+silence which I had not attempted to interrupt.</p>
+<p>"I wish with all my heart that I were!"</p>
+<p>"And yet," he added, "I am glad on--on her account, that you
+remain in Paris. You will call upon her sometimes, Arbuthnot?"</p>
+<p>"If Madame De Cour.... I mean, if Mrs. Dalrymple will permit
+me."</p>
+<p>An involuntary smile flitted across his lips--the first I had
+seen there all the day.</p>
+<p>"She will be glad--grateful. She knows that I value you, and she
+has proof that I trust you. You are the only possessor of our
+secret."</p>
+<p>"It is as safe with me," I said, "as if I were dead, and in my
+grave."</p>
+<p>"I know it, old fellow. Well--you will see her sometimes. You
+will write to me, and tell me how she is looking. If--if she were
+to fall ill, you would not conceal it from me? and in case of any
+emergency--any annoyance arising from De Caylus ..."</p>
+<p>"Were she my own sister," I said, earnestly, "she would not find
+me readier to assist or defend her. Of this, Dalrymple, be
+assured."</p>
+<p>"Thank you," he said, and stretched up his hand to me. "I do
+believe you are true--though there are few men, and still fewer
+women, of whom I should like to say as much. By the way, Arbuthnot,
+beware of that little flirt, Madame de Marignan. She has charming
+eyes, but no more heart than a vampire. Besides, an entanglement
+with a married woman!... <i>cela ne se peut pas, mon cher</i>. You
+are too young to venture on such dangerous ground, and too
+inexperienced."</p>
+<p>I smiled--perhaps somewhat bitterly--for the wound was still
+fresh, and I could not help wincing when any hand came near it.</p>
+<p>"You are right," I replied. "Madame de Marignan is a dangerous
+woman; but dangerous for me no longer. However, I have paid rather
+dearly for my safety."</p>
+<p>And with this, I told him the whole story from beginning to end,
+confessing all my follies without reservation. Surprised, amused,
+sometimes unable to repress a smile, sometimes genuinely
+compassionate, he heard my narrative through, accompanying it from
+time to time with muttered comments and ejaculations, none of which
+were very flattering to Madame de Marignan. When I had done, he
+sprang to his feet, laid his hand heavily upon my shoulder, and
+said:--</p>
+<p>"Damon, there are a great many disagreeable things in life which
+wise people say are good for us, and for which they tell us we
+ought to be grateful in proportion to our discomfort. For my own
+part, however, I am no optimist. I am not fond of mortifying the
+flesh, and the eloquence of Socrates would fail to persuade me that
+a carbuncle was a cheerful companion, or the gout an ailment to be
+ardently desired. Yet, for all this, I cannot say that I look upon
+your adventure in the light of a misfortune. You have lost time,
+spent money, and endured a considerable amount of aggravation; but
+you have, on the other hand, acquired ease of manner, facility of
+conversation, and just that necessary polish which fits a man for
+society. Come! you have received a valuable lesson both in morals
+and manners; so farewell to Madame de Marignan, and let us write
+<i>Pour acquit</i> against the score!"</p>
+<p>Willing enough to accept this cheerful view, I flourished an
+imaginary autograph upon the air with the end of my cane, and
+laughingly dismissed the subject.</p>
+<p>We then strolled back through the wood, treading the soft moss
+under our feet, startling the brown lizards from our path and the
+squirrels from the lower branches of the great trees, and, now and
+then, surprising a plump little green frog, which went skipping
+away into the long grass, like an animated emerald. Coming back to
+the gardens, we next lingered for some time upon the terrace,
+admiring the superb panorama of undulating woodland and cultivated
+champaign, which, seen through the golden haze of afternoon,
+stretched out in glory to the remotest horizon. To our right stood
+the prison-like chateau, flinging back the sunset from its
+innumerable casements, and seeming to drink in the warm glow at
+every pore of its old, red bricks. To our left, all lighted up
+against the sky, rose the lofty tree-tops of the forest which we
+had just quitted. Our shadows stretched behind us across the level
+terrace, like the shadows of giants. Involuntarily, we dropped our
+voices. It would have seemed almost like profanity to speak aloud
+while the first influence of that scene was upon us.</p>
+<p>Going on presently towards the verge of the terrace, we came
+upon an artist who, with his camp-stool under his arm, and his
+portfolio at his feet, was, like ourselves, taking a last look at
+the sunset before going away. As we approached, he turned and
+recognised us. It was Herr Franz M&uuml;ller, the story-telling
+student of the <i>Chicards</i> club.</p>
+<p>"Good-afternoon, gentlemen," said he, lifting his red cap, and
+letting it fall back again a little on one side. "We do not see
+many such sunsets in the course of the summer."</p>
+<p>"Indeed, no," replied Dalrymple; "and ere long the autumn tints
+will be creeping over the landscape, and the whole scene will
+assume a different character. Have you been sketching in the
+forest?"</p>
+<p>"No--I have been making a study of the chateau and terrace from
+this point, with the landscape beyond. It is for an historical
+subject which I have laid out for my winter's work."</p>
+<p>And with this, he good-naturedly opened his folio and took out
+the sketch, which was a tolerably large one, and represented the
+scene under much the same conditions of light as we now saw it.</p>
+<p>"I shall have a group of figures here," he said, pointing to a
+spot on the terrace, "and a more distant one there; with a
+sprinkling of dogs and, perhaps, a head or two at an open window of
+the chateau. I shall also add a flag flying on the turret,
+yonder."</p>
+<p>"A scene, I suppose, from the life of Louis the Thirteenth," I
+suggested.</p>
+<p>"No--I mean it for the exiled court of James the Second,"
+replied he. "And I shall bring in the King, and Mary of Modena, and
+the Prince their son, who was afterwards the Pretender."</p>
+<p>"It is a good subject," said Dalrymple. "You will of course find
+excellent portraits of all these people at Versailles; and a lively
+description of their court, mode of life, and so forth, if my
+memory serves me correctly, in the tales of Anthony, Count
+Hamilton. But with all this, I dare say, you are better acquainted
+than I."</p>
+<p>"<i>Parbleu!</i> not I," said the student, shouldering his
+camp-stool as if it were a musket, and slinging his portfolio by a
+strap across his back; "therefore, I am all the more obliged to you
+for the information. My reading is neither very extensive nor very
+useful; and as for my library, I could pack it all into a hat-case
+any day, and find room for a few other trifles at the same time.
+Here is the author I chiefly study. He is my constant companion,
+and, like myself, looks somewhat the worse for wear."</p>
+<p>Saying which, he produced from one of his pockets a little,
+greasy, dog-eared volume of Beranger, about the size of a small
+snuff-box, and began singing aloud, to a very cheerful air, a song
+of which a certain faithless Mademoiselle Lisette was the heroine,
+and of which the refrain was always:--</p>
+<blockquote>"<i>Lisette! ma Lisette,<br>
+Tu m'as tromp&eacute; toujours;<br>
+Je veux, Lisette,<br>
+Boire &agrave; nos amours</i>."</blockquote>
+<p>To this accompaniment we walked back through the gardens to the
+railway station, where, being a quarter of an hour too soon, our
+companion amused himself by "chaffing," questioning, contradicting,
+and otherwise ingeniously tormenting the check-takers and porters
+of the establishment. One pompous official, in particular, became
+so helplessly indignant that he retired into a little office
+overlooking the platform, and was heard to swear fluently, all by
+himself, for several minutes. The time having expired and the doors
+being opened, we passed out with the rest of the home-going
+Parisians, and were about to take our places, when M&uuml;ller,
+climbing like a cat to the roof-seats on the top of the
+second-class carriages, beckoned us to follow.</p>
+<p>"Who would be shut up with ten fat people and a baby, when fresh
+air can be breathed, and tobacco smoked, for precisely the same
+fare?" asked he. "You don't mean to say that you came down to St.
+Germains in one of the dens below?"</p>
+<p>"Yes, we did," I replied; "but we had it to ourselves."</p>
+<p>"So much the worse. Man is a gregarious animal, and woman
+also--which proves Zimmerman to have been neither, and accounts for
+the brotherhood of <i>Les Chicards</i>. Would you like to see how
+that old gentleman looks when he is angry?"</p>
+<p>"Which? The one in the opposite corner?"</p>
+<p>"The same."</p>
+<p>"Well, that depends on circumstances. Why do you ask?"</p>
+<p>"Because I'll engage to satisfy your curiosity in less than ten
+minutes."</p>
+<p>"Oh, no, don't affront him," said I. "We shall only have a
+scene."</p>
+<p>"I won't affront him. I promise not to utter a syllable, either
+offensive or defensive."</p>
+<p>"Leave him alone, then, poor devil!"</p>
+<p>"Nonsense! If he chooses to be annoyed, that's his business, and
+not mine. Now, you'll see."</p>
+<p>And M&uuml;ller, alert for mischief, stared fixedly at the old
+gentleman in the opposite corner for some minutes--then
+sighed--roused himself as if from a profound reverie--seized his
+portfolio--took &nbsp;out a pencil and sketch-book--mended the
+pencil<br>
+with an elaborate show of fastidiousness and deliberation--stared
+&nbsp;again--drew a deep breath--turned somewhat aside, as<br>
+if anxious to conceal his object, and began sketching rapidly. Now
+and then he paused; stole a furtive glance over his shoulder; bit
+his lip; rubbed out; corrected; glanced again; and then went on
+rapidly as before.</p>
+<p>In the meanwhile the old gentleman, who was somewhat red and
+irascible, began to get seriously uncomfortable. He frowned,
+fidgeted, coughed, buttoned and unbuttoned his coat, and jealously
+watched every proceeding of his tormentor. A general smile dawned
+upon the faces of the rest of the travellers. The priest over the
+way pinched his lips together, and looked down demurely. The two
+girls, next to the priest, tittered behind their handkerchiefs. The
+young man with the blue cravat sucked the top of his cane, and
+winked openly at his companions, both of whom were cracking nuts,
+and flinging the shells down the embankment. Presently M&uuml;ller
+threw his head back, held the drawing off, still studiously keeping
+the back of it towards the rest of the passengers; looked at it
+with half-closed eyes; stole another exceedingly cautious glance at
+his victim; and then, affecting for the first time to find himself
+observed, made a vast show of pretending to sketch the country
+through which we were passing.</p>
+<p>The old gentleman could stand it no longer.</p>
+<p>"Monsieur," said he, angrily. "Monsieur, I will thank you not to
+take my portrait. I object to it. Monsieur."</p>
+<p>"Charming distance," said M&uuml;ller, addressing himself to me
+"Wants interest, however, in the foreground. That's a picturesque
+tree yonder, is it not?"</p>
+<p>The old gentleman struck his umbrella sharply on the floor.</p>
+<p>"It's of no use, Monsieur," he exclaimed, getting more red and
+excited. "You are taking my portrait, and I object to it. I know
+you are taking my portrait."</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller looked up dreamily.</p>
+<p>"I beg your pardon, Monsieur," said he. "Did you speak?'</p>
+<p>"Yes, Monsieur. I did speak. I repeat that you shall not take my
+portrait."</p>
+<p>"Your portrait, Monsieur?"</p>
+<p>"Yes, my portrait!"</p>
+<p>"But, Monsieur," remonstrated the artist, with an air of mingled
+candor and surprise, "I never dreamed of taking your portrait!"</p>
+<p>"<i>Sacre non</i>!" shouted the old gentleman, with another rap
+of the umbrella. "I saw you do it! Everybody saw you do It!"</p>
+<p>"Nay, if Monsieur will but do me the honor to believe that I was
+simply sketching from nature, as the train...."</p>
+<p>"An impudent subterfuge, sir!" interrupted the old gentleman.
+"An impudent subterfuge, and nothing less!"</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller drew himself up with immense dignity.</p>
+<p>"Monsieur," he said, haughtily, "that is an expression which I
+must request you to retract. I have already assured you, on the
+word of a gentleman...."</p>
+<p>"A gentleman, indeed! A pretty gentleman! He takes my portrait,
+and...."</p>
+<p>"I have not taken your portrait, Monsieur."</p>
+<p>"Good heavens!" cried the old gentleman, looking round, "was
+ever such assurance! Did not every one present see him in the act?
+I appeal to every one--to you, Monsieur--to you, Mesdames,--to you,
+reverend father,--did you not all see this person taking my
+portrait?"</p>
+<p>"Nay, then, if it must come to this," said M&uuml;ller, "let the
+sketch be evidence, and let these ladies and gentlemen decide
+whether it is really the portrait of Monsieur--and if they think it
+like?"</p>
+<p>Saying which, he held up the book, and displayed a head,
+sketched, it is true, with admirable spirit and cleverness,
+but--the head of an ass, with a thistle in its mouth!</p>
+<p>A simultaneous explosion of mirth followed. Even the priest
+laughed till the tears ran down his cheeks, and Dalrymple,
+heavy-hearted as he was, could not help joining in the general
+shout. As for the old gentleman, the victim of this elaborate
+practical joke, he glared at us all round, swore that it was a
+premeditated insult from beginning to end, and, swelling with
+suppressed rage, flung himself back into his corner, and looked
+resolutely in the opposite direction.</p>
+<p>By this time we were half-way to Paris, and the student,
+satisfied with his success, packed up his folio, brought out a
+great meerschaum with a snaky tube, and smoked like a
+factory-chimney.</p>
+<p>When we alighted, it was nearly five o'clock.</p>
+<p>"What shall we do next?" said Dalrymple, pulling drearily at his
+moustache. "I am so deuced dull to-day that I am ashamed to ask
+anybody to do me the charity to dine with me--especially a <i>bon
+gar&ccedil;on</i> like Herr M&uuml;ller."</p>
+<p>"Don't be ashamed," said the student, laughingly, "I would dine
+with Pluto himself, if the dishes were good and my appetite as
+sharp as to-day."</p>
+<p>"<i>Allons</i>, then! Where shall we go; to the <i>Trois
+Fr&egrave;res</i>, or the <i>Moulin Rouge</i>, or the <i>Maison
+Dor&eacute;e</i>?"</p>
+<p>"The <i>Trois Fr&egrave;res</i>" said M&uuml;ller, with the air
+of one who deliberates on the fate of nations, "has the
+disadvantage of being situated in the Palais Royal, where the band
+still continues to play at half-past five every afternoon. Now,
+music should come on with the sweets and the champagne. It is not
+appropriate with soup or fish, and it distracts one's attention if
+injudiciously administered with the made dishes,"</p>
+<p>"True. Then shall we try the <i>Moulin Rouge</i>?"</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller shook his head.</p>
+<p>"At the <i>Moulin Rouge</i>" said he, gravely, "one can
+breakfast well; but their dinners are stereotyped. For the last ten
+years they have not added a new dish to their <i>carte</i>; and the
+discovery of a new dish, says Brillat Savarin, is of more
+importance to the human race than the discovery of a new planet.
+No--I should not vote for the <i>Moulin Rouge</i>."</p>
+<p>"Well, then, V&eacute;fours, V&eacute;ry's, the Caf&eacute;
+Anglais?"</p>
+<p>"V&eacute;fours is traditional; the Caf&eacute; Anglais is
+infested with English; and at V&eacute;ry's, which is otherwise a
+meritorious establishment, one's digestion is disturbed by the
+sight of omnivorous provincials, who drink champagne with the
+<i>r&ocirc;ti</i>, and eat melon at dessert."</p>
+<p>Dalrymple laughed outright.</p>
+<p>"At this rate," said he, "we shall get no dinner at all! What is
+to become of us, if neither V&eacute;ry's, nor the <i>Trois
+Fr&egrave;res</i>, nor the <i>Moulin Rouge</i>, nor the <i>Maison
+Dor&eacute;e</i>...."</p>
+<p>"<i>Halte-l&agrave;!"</i> interrupted the student, theatrically;
+"for by my halidom, sirs, I said not a syllable in disparagement of
+the house yelept Dor&eacute;e! Is it not there that we eat of the
+crab of Bordeaux, succulent and roseate? Is it not there that we
+drink of Veuve Cliquot the costly, and of that Johannisberger, to
+which all other hocks are vinegar and water? Never let it be said
+that Franz M&uuml;ller, being of sound mind and body, did less than
+justice to the reputation of the <i>Maison Dor&eacute;e</i>."</p>
+<p>"To the <i>Maison Dor&eacute;e</i>, then," said Dalrymple, "with
+what speed and appetite we may! By Jove! Herr Franz, you are a
+<i>connoisseur</i> in the matter of dining."</p>
+<p>"A man who for twenty-nine days out of every thirty pays his
+sixty-five centimes for two dishes at a student's Restaurant in the
+Quartier Latin, knows better than most people where to go for a
+good dinner when he has the chance," said M&uuml;ller,
+philosophically. "The rago&ucirc;ts of the Temple--the
+<i>arlequins</i> of the <i>Cit&eacute;</i>--the fried fish of the
+Od&eacute;on arcades--the unknown hashes of the <i>guingettes</i>,
+and the 'funeral baked meats' of the Palais Royal, are all familiar
+to my pocket and my palate. I do not scruple to confess that in
+cases of desperate emergency, I have even availed myself of the
+advantages of <i>Le hasard</i>."</p>
+<p>"<i>Le hasard</i>." said I. "What is that?"</p>
+<p>"<i>Le hasard de la fourchette</i>," replied the student, "is
+the resort of the vagabond, the <i>gamin</i>, and the
+<i>chiffonier</i>. It lies down by the river-side, near the Halles,
+and consists of nothing but a shed, a fire, and a caldron. In this
+caldron a seething sea of oleaginous liquid conceals an infinite
+variety of animal and vegetable substances. The arrangements of the
+establishment are beautifully simple. The votary pays his five
+centimes and is armed by the presiding genius of the place with a
+huge two-pronged iron fork. This fork he plunges in once;--he may
+get a calf's foot, or a potato, or a sheep's head, or a carrot, or
+a cabbage, or nothing, as fate and the fork direct. All men are
+gamblers in some way or another, and <i>Le hasard</i> is a game of
+gastronomic chance. But from the ridiculous to the sublime, it is
+but a step--and while talking of <i>Le hasard</i> behold, we have
+arrived at the <i>Maison Dor&eacute;e</i>."</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIX."></a>CHAPTER XIX.</h2>
+<h3>A DINNER AT THE MAISON DOR&Eacute;E AND AN EVENING PARTY IN THE
+QUARTIER LATIN.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>The most genial of companions was our new acquaintance, Franz
+M&uuml;ller, the art-student. Light-hearted, buoyant, unassuming,
+he gave his animal spirits full play, and was the life of our
+little dinner. He had more natural gayety than generally belongs to
+the German character, and his good-temper was inexhaustible. He
+enjoyed everything; he made the best of everything; he saw food for
+laughter in everything. He was always amused, and therefore was
+always amusing. Above all, there was a spontaneity in his mirth
+which acted upon others as a perpetual stimulant. He was in short,
+what the French call a <i>bon gar&ccedil;on</i>, and the English a
+capital fellow; easy without assurance, comic without vulgarity,
+and, as Sydney Smith wittily hath it--"a great number of other
+things without a great number of other things."</p>
+<p>Upon Dalrymple, who had been all day silent, abstracted, and
+unlike his usual self, this joyous influence acted like a tonic. As
+entertainer, he was bound to exert himself, and the exertion did
+him good. He threw off his melancholy; and with the help, possibly,
+of somewhat more than his usual quantity of wine, entered
+thoroughly into the passing joyousness of the hour. What a
+<i>recherch&eacute;</i>, luxurious extravagant little dinner it
+was, that evening at the Maison Dor&eacute;e! We had a charming
+little room overlooking the Boulevard, furnished with as much
+looking-glass, crimson-velvet, gilding, and arabesque painting as
+could be got together within the space of twelve-feet by eight. Our
+wine came to table in a silver cooler that Cellini might have
+wrought. Our meats were served upon porcelain that would have
+driven Palissy to despair. We had nothing that was in season,
+except game, and everything that was out; which, by-the-way,
+appears to be our modern criterion of excellence with respect to a
+dinner. Finally, we were waited upon by the most imposing of
+waiters--a waiter whose imperturbable gravity was not to be shaken
+by any amount of provocation, and whose neckcloth alone was
+sufficient to qualify him for the church.</p>
+<p>How merry we were! How M&uuml;ller tormented that diplomatic
+waiter! What stories we told! what puns we made! What brilliant
+things we said, or fancied we said, over our Chambertin and
+Johannisberger! M&uuml;ller knew nothing of the substratum of
+sadness underlying all that jollity. He little thought how heavy
+Dalrymple's strong heart had been that morning. He had no idea that
+my friend and I were to part on the morrow, for months or years, as
+the case might be--he to carry his unrest hither and thither
+through distant lands; I to remain alone in a strange city,
+pursuing a distasteful study, and toiling onward to a future
+without fascination or hope. But, as the glass seals tell us, "such
+is life." We are all mysteries to one another. The pleasant fellow
+whom I invite to dinner because he amuses me, carries a scar on his
+soul which it would frighten me to see; and he in turn, when he
+praises my claret, little dreams of the carking care that poisons
+it upon my palate, and robs it of all its aroma. Perhaps the
+laughter-loving painter himself had his own little tragedy locked
+up in some secret corner of the heart that seemed to beat so
+lightly under that braided blouse of Palais Royal cut and Quartier
+Latin fashion! Who could tell? And of what use would it be, if it
+were told? Smiles carry one through the world more agreeably than
+tears, and if the skeleton is only kept decently out of sight in
+its own unsuspected closet, so much the better for you and me, and
+society at large.</p>
+<p>Dinner over, and the serious waiter dismissed with the dessert
+and the empty bottles, we sat by the open window for a long time,
+sipping our coffee, smoking our cigars, and watching the busy life
+of the Boulevard below. There the shops were all alight and the
+passers-by more numerous than by day. Carriages were dashing along,
+full of opera-goers and ball-room beauties. On the pavement just
+under our window were seated the usual crowd of Boulevard idlers,
+sipping their <i>al fresco</i> absinthe, and <i>grog-au-vin.</i> In
+the very next room, divided from us by only a slender partition,
+was a noisy party of young men and girls. We could hear their
+bursts of merriment, the chinking of their glasses as they pledged
+one another, the popping of the champagne corks, and almost the
+very jests that passed from lip to lip. Presently a band came and
+played at the corner of an adjoining street. All was mirth, all was
+life, all was amusement and dissipation both in-doors and
+out-of-doors, in the "care-charming" city of Paris on that pleasant
+September night; and we, of course, were gay and noisy, like our
+neighbors. Dalrymple and M&uuml;ller could scarcely be called new
+acquaintances. They had met some few times at the <i>Chicards</i>,
+and also, some years before, in Rome. What stories they told of
+artists whom they had known! What fun they made of Academic dons
+and grave professors high in authority! What pictures they drew, of
+life in Rome--in Vienna--in Paris! Though we had no ladies of our
+party and were only three in number, I am not sure that the
+merry-makers in the next room laughed any louder or oftener than
+we!</p>
+<p>At length the clock on the mantelpiece warned us that it was
+already half-past nine, and that we had been three hours at dinner.
+It was clearly time to vary the evening's amusement in some way or
+other, and the only question was what next to do? Should we go to a
+billiard-room? Or to the Salle Valentinois? Or to some of the cheap
+theatres on the Boulevard du Temple? Or to the Tableaux Vivants? Or
+the Caf&eacute; des Aveugles? Or take a drive round by the Champs
+Elys&eacute;es in an open fly?</p>
+<p>At length M&uuml;ller remembered that some fellow-students were
+giving a party that evening, and offered to introduce us.</p>
+<p>"It is up five pairs of stairs, in the Quartier Latin," said he;
+"but thoroughly jolly--all students and grisettes. They'll be
+delighted to see us."</p>
+<p>This admirable proposition was no sooner made than acted upon;
+so we started immediately, and Dalrymple, who seemed to be well
+acquainted with the usages of student-life, proposed that we should
+take with us a store of sweetmeats for the ladies.</p>
+<p>"There subsists," observed he, "a mysterious elective affinity
+between the grisette and the chocolate bon-bon. He who can
+skilfully exhibit the latter, is almost certain to win the heart of
+the former. Where the chocolate fails, however, the <i>marron
+glac&eacute;</i> is an infallible specific. I recommend that we lay
+in a liberal supply of both weapons."</p>
+<p>"Carried by acclamation," said M&uuml;ller. "We can buy them on
+our way, in the Rue Vivienne. A capital shop; but one that I never
+patronize--they give no credit."</p>
+<p>Chatting thus, and laughing, we made our way across the
+Boulevard and through a net-work of by-streets into the Rue
+Vivienne, where we laid siege to a great bon-bon shop--a gigantic
+depot for dyspepsia at so much per kilogramme--and there filled our
+pockets with sweets of every imaginable flavor and color. This
+done, a cab conveyed us in something less than ten minutes across
+the Pont Neuf to the Quartier Latin.</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller's friends were three in number, and all
+students--one of art, one of law, and one of medicine. They lodged
+at the top of a dingy house near the Od&eacute;on, and being very
+great friends and very near neighbors were giving this
+entertainment conjointly. Their names were Gustave, Jules, and
+Adrien. Adrien was the artist, and lived in the garret, just over
+the heads of Gustave and Jules, which made it very convenient for a
+party, and placed a <i>suite</i> of rooms at the disposal of their
+visitors.</p>
+<p>Long before we had achieved the five pairs of stairs, we heard
+the sound of voices and the scraping of a violin, and on the fifth
+landing were received by a pretty young lady in a coquettish little
+cap, whom M&uuml;ller familiarly addressed as Annette, and who
+piloted us into a very small bed-room which was already full of
+hats and coats, bonnets, shawls, and umbrellas. Having added our
+own paletots and beavers to the general stock, and having each
+received a little bit of pasteboard in exchange for the same, we
+were shown into the ball-room by Mademoiselle Annette, who appeared
+to fill the position of hostess, usher, and general
+superintendent.</p>
+<p>It was a good-sized room, somewhat low in the ceiling, and
+brilliantly lighted with lots of tallow candles in bottles. The
+furniture had all been cleared out for the dancers, except a row of
+benches round the walls, and a chest of draws in a recess between
+the windows which served as a raised platform for the orchestra.
+The said orchestra consisted of a violin and accordion, both played
+by amateurs, with an occasional <i>obligato</i> on the common comb.
+As for the guests, they were, as M&uuml;ller had already told us,
+all students and grisettes--the former wearing every strange
+variety of beard and blouse; the latter in pretty light-colored
+muslins and bewitching little caps, with the exception of two who
+wore flowers in their hair, and belonged to the opera ballet. They
+were in the midst of a tremendous galop when we arrived; so we
+stood at the door and looked on, and Dalrymple flirted with
+Mademoiselle Annette. As soon as the galop was over, two of our
+hosts came forward to welcome us.</p>
+<p>"The Duke of Dalrymple and the Marquis of Arbuthnot--Messieurs
+Jules Charpentier and Gustave Dubois," said M&uuml;ller, with the
+most <i>d&eacute;gag&eacute;</i> air in the world.</p>
+<p>Monsieur Jules, a tall young man with an enormous false nose of
+the regular carnival pattern, and Monsieur Gustave, who was short
+and stout, with a visible high-water mark round his throat and
+wrists, and curious leather mosaics in his boots, received us very
+cordially, and did not appear to be in the least surprised at the
+magnificence of the introduction. On the contrary, they shook hands
+with us; apologized for the absence of Adrien, who was preparing
+the supper upstairs; and offered to find us partners for the next
+valse. Dalrymple immediately proposed for the hand of Mademoiselle
+Annette. M&uuml;ller, declining adventitious aid, wandered among
+the ladies, making himself universally agreeable and trusting for a
+partner to his own unassisted efforts. For myself, I was indebted
+to Monsieur Gustave for an introduction to a very charming young
+lady whose name was Josephine, and with whom I fell over head and
+ears in love without a moment's warning.</p>
+<p>She was somewhat under the middle height, slender, supple,
+rosy-lipped, and coquettish to distraction. Her pretty mouth
+dimpled round with smiles at every word it uttered. Her very eyes
+laughed. Her hair, which was more adorned than concealed by a tiny
+muslin cap that clung by some unseen agency to the back of her
+head, was of a soft, warm, wavy brown, with a woof of gold
+threading it here and there. Her voice was perhaps a little loud;
+her conversation rather childish; her accent such as would scarcely
+have passed current in the Faubourg St. Germain--but what of that?
+One would be worse than foolish to expect style and cultivation in
+a grisette; and had I not had enough to disgust me with both in
+Madame de Marignan? What more charming, after all, than youth,
+beauty, and lightheartedness? Were Noel and Chapsal of any
+importance to a mouth that could not speak without such a smile as
+Hebe might have envied?</p>
+<p>I was, at all events, in no mood to take exception to these
+little defects. I am not sure that I did not even regard them in
+the light of additional attractions. That which in another I should
+have called <i>b&ecirc;te</i>, I set down to the score of
+<i>na&iuml;vet&eacute;</i> in Mademoiselle Josephine. One is not
+diffident at twenty--by the way, I was now twenty-one--especially
+after dining at the Maison Dor&eacute;e.</p>
+<p>Mademoiselle Josephine was frankness itself. Before I had
+enjoyed the pleasure of her acquaintance for ten minutes, she told
+me she was an artificial florist; that her <i>patronne</i> lived in
+the Rue M&eacute;nilmontant; that she went to her work every
+morning at nine, and left it every evening at eight; that she
+lodged <i>sous les toits</i> at No. 70, Rue Aubry-le-Boucher; that
+her relations lived at Juvisy; and that she went to see them now
+and then on Sundays, when the weather and her funds permitted.</p>
+<p>"Is the country pretty at Juvisy, Mademoiselle?" I asked, by way
+of keeping up the conversation.</p>
+<p>"Oh, M'sieur, it is a real paradise. There are trees and fields,
+and there is the Seine close by, and a ch&acirc;teau, and a park,
+and a church on a hill, ... <i>ma foi!</i> there is nothing in
+Paris half so pretty; not even the Jardin des Plantes!"</p>
+<p>"And have you been there lately?"</p>
+<p>"Not for eight weeks, at the very least, M'sieur. But then it
+costs three francs and a half for the return ticket, and since I
+quarrelled with Emile...."</p>
+<p>"Emile!" said I, quickly. "Who is he?"</p>
+<p>"He is a picture-frame maker, M'sieur, and works for a great
+dealer in the Rue du Faubourg Montmartre. He was my sweetheart, and
+he took me out somewhere every Sunday, till we quarrelled."</p>
+<p>"And what did you quarrel about, Mademoiselle?"</p>
+<p>My pretty partner laughed and tossed her head.</p>
+<p>"Eh, <i>mon Dieu</i>! he was jealous."</p>
+<p>"Jealous of whom?"</p>
+<p>"Of a gentleman--an artist--who wanted to paint me in one of his
+pictures. Emile did not like me to go to his <i>atelier</i> so
+often; and the gentleman gave me a shawl (such a pretty shawl!) and
+a canary in a lovely green and gold cage; and...."</p>
+<p>"And Emile objected ?"</p>
+<p>"Yes, M'sieur."</p>
+<p>"How very unreasonable!"</p>
+<p>"That's just what I said, M'sieur."</p>
+<p>"And have you never seen him since!"</p>
+<p>"Oh, yes--he keeps company now with my cousin Cecile, and she
+humors him in everything,"</p>
+<p>"And the artist--what of him, Mademoiselle?"</p>
+<p>"Oh, I sat to him every day, till his picture was finished.
+<i>Il &eacute;tait bien gentil</i>. He took me to the theatre
+several times, and once to a f&ecirc;te at Versailles; but that was
+after Emile and I had broken it off."</p>
+<p>"Did you find it tiresome, sitting as a model?"</p>
+<p>"<i>Mais, comme ci, et comme &ccedil;a</i>! It was a beautiful
+dress, and became me wonderfully. To be sure, it was rather
+cold!"</p>
+<p>"May I ask what character you were supposed to represent,
+Mademoiselle?"</p>
+<p>"He said it was Phryne. I have no idea who she was; but I think
+she must have found it very uncomfortable if she always wore
+sandals, and went without stockings."</p>
+<p>I looked down at her little foot, and thought how pretty it must
+have looked in the Greek sandal. I pictured her to myself in the
+graceful Greek robe, with a chalice in her hand and her temples
+crowned with flowers. What a delicious Phryne! And what a happy
+fellow Praxiteles must have been!</p>
+<p>"It was a privilege, Mademoiselle, to be allowed to see you in
+so charming a costume," I said, pressing her hand tenderly. "I envy
+that artist from the bottom of my heart."</p>
+<p>Mademoiselle Josephine smiled, and returned the pressure.</p>
+<p>"One might borrow it," said she, "for the Bal de
+l'Op&eacute;ra."</p>
+<p>"Ah, Mademoiselle, if I dared only aspire to the honor of
+conducting you!"</p>
+<p>"<i>Dame</i>! it is nearly four months to come!"</p>
+<p>"True, but in the meantime, Mademoiselle----"</p>
+<p>"In the meantime," said the fair Josephine, anticipating my
+hopes with all the unembarrassed straightforwardness imaginable, "I
+shall be delighted to improve M'sieur's acquaintance."</p>
+<p>"Mademoiselle, you make me happy!"</p>
+<p>"Besides, M'sieur is an Englishman, and I like the English so
+much!"</p>
+<p>"I am delighted to hear it, Mademoiselle. I hope I shall never
+give you cause to alter your opinion."</p>
+<p>"Last galop before supper!" shouted Monsieur Jules through, a
+brass speaking-trumpet, in order to make use of which he was
+obliged to hold up his nose with one hand. "Gentlemen, choose your
+partners. All couples to dance till they drop!"</p>
+<p>There were a dozen up immediately, amongst whom Dalrymple and
+Mademoiselle Annette, and M&uuml;ller with one of the ballet
+ladies, were the first to start. As for Josephine, she proved to be
+a damsel of forty-galop power. She never wanted to rest, and she
+never cared to leave off. She did not even look warm when it was
+over. I wonder to this day how it was that I did not die on the
+spot.</p>
+<p>When the galop was ended, we all went upstairs to Monsieur
+Adrien's garret, where Monsieur Adrien, who had red hair and wore
+glasses, received us in person, and made us welcome. Here we found
+the supper elegantly laid out on two doors which had been taken off
+their hinges for the purpose; but which, being supported from
+beneath on divers boxes and chairs of unequal heights, presented a
+painfully sloping surface, thereby causing the jellies to look like
+leaning towers of Pisa, and the spongecake (which was already
+professedly tipsy) to assume an air so unbecomingly convivial that
+it might almost have been called drunk.</p>
+<p>Nobody thought of sitting down, and, if they did, there were no
+means of doing so; for Monsieur Adrien's garret was none of the
+largest, and, as in a small villa residence we sometimes see the
+whole house sacrificed to a winding staircase, so in this instance
+had the whole room been sacrificed to the splendor of the supper.
+For the inconvenience of standing, we were compensated, however, by
+the abundance and excellence of the fare. There were cold chickens,
+meat-pies, dishes of sliced ham, pyramids of little Bologna
+sausages, huge rolls of bread a yard in length, lobster salad, and
+cold punch in abundance.</p>
+<p>The flirtations at supper were tremendous. In a bachelor
+establishment one cannot expect to find every convenience, and on
+this occasion the prevailing deficiencies were among the plates and
+glasses; so those who had been partners in the dance now became
+partners in other matters, eating off the same plate and drinking
+out of the same tumbler; but this only made it so much the merrier.
+By and by somebody volunteered a song, and somebody else made a
+speech, and then we went down again to the ball-room, and dancing
+recommenced.</p>
+<p>The laughter now became louder, and the legs of the guests more
+vigorous than ever. The orchestra, too, received an addition to its
+strength in the person of a gentleman who, having drunk more cold
+punch than was quite consistent with the preservation of his
+equilibrium, was still sober enough to oblige us with a spirited
+accompaniment on the shovel and tongs, which, with the violin and
+accordion, and the comb <i>obligato</i> before mentioned, produced
+a startling effect, and reminded one of Turkish marches, Pantomime
+overtures, and the like barbaric music.</p>
+<p>In the midst of the first polka, however, we were interrupted by
+a succession of furious double knocks on the floor beneath our
+feet. We stopped by involuntary consent--dancers, musicians, and
+all.</p>
+<p>"It's our neighbor on the story below," said Monsieur Jules. "He
+objects to the dancing."</p>
+<p>"Then we'll dance a little heavier, to teach him better taste,"
+said a student, who had so little hair on his head and so much on
+his chin, that he looked as if his face had been turned upside
+down. "What is the name of the ridiculous monster?"</p>
+<p>"Monsieur Bobinet."</p>
+<p>"Ladies and gentlemen, let us dance for the edification of
+Monsieur Bobinet! Orchestra, strike up, in honor of Monsieur
+Bobinet! One, two, three, and away!"</p>
+<p>Hereupon we uttered a general hurrah, and dashed off again, like
+a herd of young elephants. The knocking ceased, and we thought that
+Monsieur Bobinet had resigned himself to his fate, when, just as
+the polka ended and the dancers were promenading noisily round and
+round the room, the bombardment began afresh; and this time against
+the very door of the ball-room.</p>
+<p>"<i>Par exemple</i>!" cries Monsieur Jules. "The enemy dares to
+attack us in our own lines!"</p>
+<p>"Bolt the door, and let him knock till he's tired," suggested
+one.</p>
+<p>"Open it suddenly, and deluge him with water!" cried
+another.</p>
+<p>"Tar and feather him!" proposed a third.</p>
+<p>In the meantime, Monsieur Bobinet, happily ignorant of these
+agreeable schemes for his reception, continued to thunder away upon
+the outer panels, accompanying the raps with occasional loud
+coughs, and hems, and stampings of the feet.</p>
+<p>"Hush! do nothing violent," cried M&uuml;ller, scenting a
+practical joke. "Let us invite him in, and make fun of him. It will
+be ever so much more amusing!"</p>
+<p>And with this he drove the rest somewhat back and threw open the
+door, upon the outer threshold of which, with a stick in one hand
+and a bedroom candle in the other, and a flowered dressing-gown
+tied round his ample waist by a cord and tassels, stood Monsieur
+Bobinet.</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller received him with a profound bow, and said:--</p>
+<p>"Monsieur Bobinet, I believe?"</p>
+<p>Monsieur Bobinet, who was very bald, very cross, and very stout,
+cast an irritable glance into the room, but, seeing so many people,
+drew back and said:--</p>
+<p>"Yes, that is my name, Monsieur. I lodge on the fourth
+floor...."</p>
+<p>"But pray walk in, Monsieur Bobinet," said M&uuml;ller, opening
+the door still wider and bowing still more profoundly.</p>
+<p>"Monsieur," returned the fourth-floor lodger, "I--I only come to
+complain...."</p>
+<p>"Whatever the occasion of this honor, Monsieur," pursued the
+student, with increasing politeness, "we cannot suffer you to
+remain on the landing. Pray do us the favor to walk in."</p>
+<p>"Oh, walk in--pray walk in, Monsieur Bobinet," echoed Jules,
+Gustave, and Adrien, all together.</p>
+<p>The fourth-floor lodger hesitated; took a step forward; thought,
+perhaps, that, since we were all so polite, he would do his best to
+conciliate us; and, glancing down nervously at his dressing-gown
+and slippers, said:--</p>
+<p>"Really, gentlemen, I should have much pleasure, but I am not
+prepared...."</p>
+<p>"Don't mention it, Monsieur Bobinet," said M&uuml;ller. "We are
+delighted to receive you. Allow me to disembarrass you of your
+candle."</p>
+<p>"And permit me," said Jules, "to relieve you of your stick."</p>
+<p>"Pray, Monsieur Bobinet, do you never dance the polka?" asked
+Gustave.</p>
+<p>"Bring Monsieur Bobinet a glass of cold punch," said Adrien.</p>
+<p>"And a plate of lobster salad," added the bearded student.</p>
+<p>Monsieur Bobinet, finding the door already closed behind him,
+looked round nervously; but encountering only polite and smiling
+faces, endeavored to seem at his ease, and to put a good face upon
+the matter.</p>
+<p>"Indeed, gentlemen, I must beg you to excuse me," said he. "I
+never drink at night, and I never eat suppers. I only came to
+request...."</p>
+<p>"Nay, Monsieur Bobinet, we cannot suffer you to leave us without
+taking a glass of cold punch," pursued M&uuml;ller.</p>
+<p>"Upon my word," began the lodger, "I dare not...."</p>
+<p>"A glass of white wine, then?"</p>
+<p>"Or a cup of coffee?"</p>
+<p>"Or some home-made lemonade?"</p>
+<p>Monsieur Bobinet cast a look of helpless longing towards the
+door.</p>
+<p>"If you really insist, gentlemen," said he, "I will take a cup
+of coffee; but indeed...."</p>
+<p>"A cup of coffee for Monsieur Bobinet!" shouted M&uuml;ller.</p>
+<p>"A large cup of coffee for Monsieur Bobinet!" repeated
+Jules.</p>
+<p>"A strong cup of coffee for Monsieur Bobinet!" cried Gustave,
+following up the lead of the other two.</p>
+<p>The fourth-floor lodger frowned and colored up, beginning to be
+suspicious of mischief. Seeing this, M&uuml;ller hastened to
+apologize.</p>
+<p>"You must pardon us, Monsieur Bobinet," he said with the most
+winning amiability, "if we are all in unusually high spirits
+to-night. You are not aware, perhaps, that our friend Monsieur
+Jules Charpentier was married this morning, and that we are here in
+celebration of that happy event. Allow me to introduce you to the
+bride."</p>
+<p>And turning to one of the ballet ladies, he led her forward with
+exceeding gravity, and presented her to Monsieur Bobinet as Madame
+Charpentier.</p>
+<p>The fourth-floor lodger bowed, and went through the usual
+congratulations. In the meantime, some of the others had prepared a
+mock sofa by means of two chairs set somewhat wide apart, with a
+shawl thrown over the whole to conceal the space between. Upon one
+of these chairs sat a certain young lady named Louise, and upon the
+other Mam'selle Josephine. As soon as it was ready, Muller, who had
+been only waiting for it, affected to observe for the first time
+that Monsieur Bobinet was still standing.</p>
+<p>"<i>Mon Dieu</i>!" he exclaimed, "has no one offered our visitor
+a chair? Monsieur Bobinet, I beg a thousand pardons. Pray do us the
+favor to be seated. Your coffee will be here immediately, and these
+ladies on the sofa will be delighted to make room for you."</p>
+<p>"Oh yes, pray be seated, Monsieur Bobinet," cried the two girls.
+"We shall be charmed to make room for Monsieur Bobinet!"</p>
+<p>More than ever confused and uncomfortable, poor Monsieur Bobinet
+bowed; sat down upon the treacherous space between the two chairs;
+went through immediately; and presented the soles of his slippers
+to the company in the least picturesque manner imaginable. This
+involuntary performance was greeted with a shout of wild
+delight.</p>
+<p>"Bravo, Monsieur Bobinet!"</p>
+<p>"<i>Vive</i> Monsieur Bobinet!"</p>
+<p>"Three cheers for Monsieur Bobinet!"</p>
+<p>Scarlet with rage, the fourth-floor lodger sprang to his feet
+and made a rush to the door; but he was hemmed in immediately. In
+vain he stormed; in vain he swore. We joined hands; we called for
+music; we danced round him; we sang; and at last, having fairly
+bumped and thumped and hustled him till we were tired, pushed him
+out on the landing, and left him to his fate.</p>
+<p>After this interlude, the mirth grew fast and furious.
+<i>Valse</i> succeeded <i>valse</i>, and galop followed galop, till
+the orchestra declared they could play no longer, and the gentleman
+with the shovel and tongs collapsed in a corner of the room and
+went to sleep with his head in the coal-scuttle. Then the
+ballet-ladies were prevailed upon to favor us with a <i>pas de
+deux</i>; after which M&uuml;ller sang a comic song with a chorus,
+in which everybody joined; and then the orchestra was bribed with
+hot brandy-and-water, and dancing commenced again. By this time the
+visitors began to drop away in twos and threes, and even the fair
+Josephine, to whom I had never ceased paying the most devoted
+attention, declared she could not stir another step. As for
+Dalrymple, he had disappeared during supper, without a word of
+leave-taking to any one.</p>
+<p>Matters being at this pass, I looked at my watch, and found that
+it was already half-past six o'clock; so, having bade good-night,
+or rather good-morning, to Messieurs Jules, Gustave, and Adrien,
+and having, with great difficulty, discovered my own coat and hat
+among the miscellaneous collection in the adjoining bed-room, I
+prepared to escort Mademoiselle Josephine to her home.</p>
+<p>"Going already?" said M&uuml;ller, encountering us on the
+landing, with a roll in one hand and a Bologna sausage in the
+other.</p>
+<p>"Already! Why, my dear fellow, it is nearly seven o'clock!"</p>
+<p>"<i>Qu'importe</i>? Come up to the supper-room and have some
+breakfast!"</p>
+<p>"Not for the world!"</p>
+<p>"Well, <i>chacun &agrave; son go&ucirc;t</i>. I am as hungry as
+a hunter."</p>
+<p>"Can I not take you any part of your way?"</p>
+<p>"No, thank you. I am a Quartier Latinist, <i>pur sang</i>, and
+lodge only a street or two off. Stay, here is my address. Come and
+see me--you can't think how glad I shall be!"</p>
+<p>"Indeed, I will come---and here is my card in exchange.
+Good-night, Herr M&uuml;ller."</p>
+<p>"Good-night, Marquis of Arbuthnot. Mademoiselle Josephine, <i>au
+plaisir</i>."</p>
+<p>So we shook hands and parted, and I saw my innamorata home to
+her residence at No. 70, Rue Aubry le Boucher, which opened upon
+the March&eacute; des Innocents. She fell asleep upon my shoulder
+in the cab, and was only just sufficiently awake when I left her,
+to accept all the <i>marrons glac&eacute;s</i> that yet remained in
+the pockets of my paletot, and to remind me that I had promised to
+take her out next Sunday for a drive in the country, and a dinner
+at the Moulin Rouge.</p>
+<p>The fountain in the middle of the March&eacute; was now
+sparkling in the sunshine like a shower of diamonds, and the
+business of the market was already at its height. The shops in the
+neighboring streets were opening fast. The "iron tongue" of St.
+Eustache was calling the devout to early prayer. Fagged as I was, I
+felt that a walk through the fresh air would do me good; so I
+dismissed the cab, and reached my lodgings just as the sleepy
+<i>concierge</i> had turned out to sweep the hall, and open the
+establishment for the day. When I came down again two hours later,
+after a nap and a bath, I found a <i>commissionnaire</i> waiting
+for me.</p>
+<p>"<i>Tiens</i>!" said Madame Bou&iuml;sse (Madame Bou&iuml;sse
+was the wife of the <i>concierge</i>). "<i>V'la</i>! here is
+M'sieur Arbuthnot."</p>
+<p>The man touched his cap, and handed me a letter.</p>
+<p>"I was told to deliver it into no hands but those of M'sieur
+himself," said he.</p>
+<p>The address was in Dalrymple's writing. I tore the envelope
+open. It contained only a card, on the back of which, scrawled
+hastily in pencil, were the following words:</p>
+<p>"To have said good-bye would have made our parting none the
+lighter. By the time you decipher this hieroglyphic I shall be some
+miles on my way: Address H&ocirc;tel de Russie, Berlin. Adieu,
+Damon; God bless you. O.D."</p>
+<p>"How long is it since this letter was given to you?" said I,
+without taking my eyes from the card.</p>
+<p>The <i>commissionnaire</i> made no reply. I repeated the
+question, looked up impatiently, and found that the man was already
+gone.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XX."></a>CHAPTER XX.</h2>
+<h3>THE CHATEAU DE SAINTE AULAIRE.</h3>
+<center>"Mark yon old mansion frowning through the trees,<br>
+Whose hollow turret wooes the whistling breeze."</center>
+<br>
+<p>My acquaintance with Mademoiselle Josephine progressed rapidly;
+although, to confess the truth, I soon found myself much less
+deeply in love than I had at first supposed. For this
+disenchantment, fate and myself were alone to blame. It was not her
+fault if I had invested her with a thousand imaginary perfections;
+nor mine if the spell was broken as soon as I discovered my
+mistake.</p>
+<p>Too impatient to wait till Sunday, I made my way on Saturday
+afternoon to Rue Aubry-le-Boucher. I persuaded myself that I was
+bound to call on her, in order to conclude our arrangements for the
+following day. At all events, I argued, she might forget the
+engagement, or believe that I had forgotten it. So I went, taking
+with me a magnificent bouquet, and an embroidered satin bag full of
+<i>marrons glac&eacute;s</i>.</p>
+<p>My divinity lived, as she had told me, <i>sous les
+toits</i>--and <i>sous les toits</i>, up seven flights of very
+steep and dirty stairs, I found her. It was a large attic with a
+sloping roof, overlooking a bristling expanse of chimney-pots, and
+commanding the twin towers of Notre Dame. There were some colored
+prints of battles and shipwrecks wafered to the walls; a couple of
+flower-pots in the narrow space between the window-ledge and the
+coping outside; a dingy canary in a wire cage; a rival mechanical
+cuckoo in a Dutch clock in the corner; a little bed with striped
+hangings; a rush-bottomed <i>prie-dieu</i> chair in front of a
+plain black crucifix, over which drooped a faded branch of
+consecrated palm; and some few articles of household furniture of
+the humblest description. In all this there was nothing vulgar.
+Under other circumstances I might, perhaps, have even elicited
+somewhat of grace and poetry from these simple materials. But
+conceive what it was to see them through an atmosphere of warm
+white steam that left an objectionable clamminess on the backs of
+the chairs and caused even the door-handle to burst into a tepid
+perspiration. Conceive what it was to behold my adored one standing
+in the middle of the room, up to her elbows in soap-suds, washing
+out the very dress in which she was to appear on the morrow....
+Good taste defend us! Could anything be more cruelly calculated to
+disturb the tender tenor of a lover's dreams? Fancy what Leander
+would have felt, if, after swimming across the Hellespont, he had
+surprised Hero at the washing-tub! Imagine Romeo's feelings, if he
+had scaled the orchard-walls only to find Juliet helping to hang
+out the family linen!</p>
+<p>The worst of it was that my lovely Josephine was not in the
+least embarrassed. She evidently regarded the washing-tub as a
+desirable piece of furniture, and was not even conscious that the
+act of "soaping in," was an unromantic occupation!</p>
+<p>Such was the severity of this first blow that I pleaded an
+engagement, presented my offerings (how dreadfully inappropriate
+they seemed!), and hurried away to a lecture on <i>materia
+medica</i> at the <i>&Eacute;cole Pratique</i>; that being a good,
+congenial, dismal entertainment for the evening!</p>
+<p>Sunday came with the sunrise, and at midday, true as the clock
+of St. Eustache, I knocked once more at the door of the
+<i>mansarde</i> where my Josephine dwelt. This time, my visit being
+anticipated, I found her dressed to receive me. She looked more
+fresh and charming than ever; and the lilac muslin which I had seen
+in the washing-tub some eighteen or twenty hours before, became her
+to perfection. So did her pretty green shawl, pinned closely at the
+throat and worn as only a French-woman would have known how to wear
+it. So did the white camellia and the moss-rose buds which she had
+taken out of my bouquet, and fastened at her waist.</p>
+<p>What I was not prepared for, however, was her cap. I had
+forgotten that your Parisian grisette<a name=
+"FNanchor1"></a><a href="#Footnote_1">[1]</a> would no more dream
+of wearing a bonnet than of crowning her head with feathers and
+adorning her countenance with war-paint. It had totally escaped me
+that I, a bashful Englishman of twenty-one, nervously sensitive to
+ridicule and gifted by nature with but little of the spirit of
+social defiance, must in broad daylight make my appearance in the
+streets of Paris, accompanied by a bonnetless grisette! What should
+I do, if I met Dr. Ch&eacute;ron? or Madame de Courcelles? or,
+worse than all, Madame de Marignan? My obvious resource was to take
+her in whatever direction we should be least likely to meet any of
+my acquaintances. Where, oh fate! might that obscurity be found
+which had suddenly become the dearest object of my desires?</p>
+<blockquote><a name="Footnote_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor1">[1]</a>
+The grisette of twenty years ago, <i>bien entendu</i>. I am
+writing, be it remembered, of "The days of my youth."</blockquote>
+<p>"<i>Eh bien</i>, Monsieur Basil," said Josephine, when my first
+compliments had been paid. "I am quite ready. Where are we
+going?"</p>
+<p>"We shall dine, <i>mon cher ange</i>," said I, absently,
+"at--let me see--at...."</p>
+<p>"At the Moulin Rouge," interrupted she. "But that is six hours
+to come. In the meantime--"</p>
+<p>"In the meantime? Ay, in the meantime...what a delightful day
+for the time of year!"</p>
+<p>"Shall it be Versailles?" suggested Josephine.</p>
+<p>"Heaven forbid!"</p>
+<p>Josephine opened her large eyes.</p>
+<p>"<i>Mon Dieu!</i>" said she. "What is there so very dreadful in
+Versailles?"</p>
+<p>I made no reply. I was passing all the suburbs in review before
+my mind's eye,--Bellevue, Enghien, Fontenay-aux-Roses, St.
+Germains, Sceaux; even Fontainebleau and Compi&egrave;gne.</p>
+<p>The grisette pouted, and glanced at the clock.</p>
+<p>"If Monsieur is as slow to start as he is to answer," said she,
+"we shall not get beyond the barriers to-day."</p>
+<p>At this moment, I remembered to have heard of Montlh&eacute;ry
+as a place where there was a forest and a feudal ruin; also, which
+was more to the purpose, as lying at least six-and-twenty miles
+south of Paris.</p>
+<p>"My dear Mademoiselle Josephine," I said, "forgive me. I have
+planned an excursion which I am sure will please you infinitely
+better than a mere common-place trip to Versailles. Versailles, on
+Sunday, is vulgar. You have heard, of course, of
+Montlh&eacute;ry--one of the most interesting places near
+Paris."</p>
+<p>"I have read a romance called <i>The Tower of
+Montlh&eacute;ry"</i> said Josephine.</p>
+<p>"And that tower--that historical and interesting tower--is still
+standing! How delightful to wander among the ruins--to recall the
+stirring events which caused it to be besieged in the reign of--of
+either Louis the Eleventh, or Louis the Fourteenth; I don't
+remember which, and it doesn't signify--to explore the picturesque
+village, and ramble through the adjoining woods of St.
+Genevi&egrave;ve--to visit..."</p>
+<p>"I wonder if we shall find any donkeys to ride," interrupted
+Josephine, upon whom my eloquence was taking the desired
+effect.</p>
+<p>"Donkeys!" I exclaimed, drawing, I am ashamed to say, upon my
+imagination. "Of course--hundreds of them!"</p>
+<p>"<i>Ah, &ccedil;a</i>! Then the sooner we go the better. Stay, I
+must just lock my door, and leave word with my neighbor on the next
+floor that I am gone out for the day,"</p>
+<p>So she locked the door and left the message, and we started. I
+was fortunate enough to find a close cab at the corner of the
+<i>march&eacute;</i>--she would have preferred an open one, but I
+overruled that objection on the score of time--and before very long
+we were seated in the cushioned fauteuils of a first-class
+compartment on the Orleans Railway, and speeding away towards
+Montlh&eacute;ry.</p>
+<p>It was with no trifling sense of relief that I found the place
+really picturesque, when we arrived. We had, it is true, to put up
+with a comfortless drive of three or four miles in a primitive,
+jolting, yellow omnibus, which crawled at stated hours of the day
+between the town and the station; but that was a minor evil, and we
+made the best of it. First of all, we strolled through the
+village--the clean, white, sunny village, where the people were
+sitting outside their doors playing at dominoes, and the cocks and
+hens were walking about like privileged inhabitants of the
+market-place. Then we had luncheon at the <i>auberge</i> of the
+"Lion d'Or." Then we looked in at the little church (still smelling
+of incense from the last service) with its curious old altar-piece
+and monumental brasses. Then we peeped through the iron gate of the
+melancholy <i>cimeti&egrave;re</i>, which was full of black crosses
+and wreaths of <i>immortelles</i>. Last of all, we went to see the
+ruin, which stood on the summit of a steep and solitary rock in the
+midst of a vast level plain. It proved to be a round keep of
+gigantic strength and height, approached by two courtyards and
+surrounded by the weed-grown and fragmentary traces of an extensive
+stronghold, nothing of which now remained save a few broken walls,
+three or four embrasured loopholes, an ancient well of incalculable
+depth, and the rusted teeth of a formidable portcullis. Here we
+paused awhile to rest and admire the view; while Josephine, pleased
+as a child on a holiday, flung pebbles into the well, ate
+sugar-plums, and amused herself with my pocket-telescope.</p>
+<p>"<i>Regardez</i>!" she cried, "there is the dome of the
+Panth&eacute;on. I am sure it is the Panth&eacute;on--and to the
+right, far away, I see a town!--little white houses, and a steeple.
+And there goes a steamer on the river--and there is the railway and
+the railway station, and the long road by which we came in the
+omnibus. Oh, how nice it is, Monsieur Basil, to look through a
+telescope!"</p>
+<p>"Do me the favor, <i>ma belle</i>, to accept it--for my sake,"
+said I, thankful to find her so easily entertained. I was lying in
+a shady angle of old wall, puffing away at a cigar, with my hat
+over my eyes, and the soles of my boots levelled at the view. It is
+difficult to smoke and make love at the same time; and I preferred
+the tobacco.</p>
+<p>Josephine was enchanted, and thanked me in a thousand pretty,
+foolish phrases. She declared she saw ever so much farther and
+clearer with the glass, now that it was her own. She looked at me
+through it, and insisted that I should look at her. She picked out
+all sorts of marvellous objects, at all sorts of incredible
+distances. In short, she prattled and chattered till I forgot all
+about the washing-tub, and again began to think her quite charming.
+Presently we heard wandering sounds of music among the trees at the
+foot of the hill--sounds as of a violin and bagpipes; now coming
+with the wind from the west, now dying away to the north, now
+bursting out afresh more merrily than ever, and leading off towards
+the village.</p>
+<p>"<i>Tiens</i>! that must be a wedding!" said Josephine, drumming
+with her little feet against the side of the old well on which she
+was sitting.</p>
+<p>"A wedding! what connection subsists, pray, between the bonds of
+matrimony, and a tune on the bagpipes?"</p>
+<p>"I don't know what you mean by bagpipes--I only know that when
+people get married in the country, they go about with the musicians
+playing before them. What you hear yonder is a violin and a
+<i>cornemuse</i>."</p>
+<p>"A <i>cornemuse!</i>" I repeated. "What's that?"</p>
+<p>"Oh, country music. A thing you blow into with your mouth, and
+play upon with your fingers, and squeeze under your arm--like
+this."</p>
+<p>"Then it's the same thing, <i>ma ch&egrave;re</i>," said I. "A
+bagpipes and a <i>cornemuse</i>--a <i>cornemuse</i> and bagpipes.
+Both of them national, popular, and frightful."</p>
+<p>"I'm so fond of music," said Josephine.</p>
+<p>Not wishing to object to her tastes, and believing that this
+observation related to the music then audible, I made no reply.</p>
+<p>"And I have never been to an opera," added she.</p>
+<p>I was still silent, though from another motive.</p>
+<p>"You will take me one night to the Italiens, or the Op&eacute;ra
+Comique, will you not, Monsieur Basil?" pursued she, determined not
+to lose her opportunity.</p>
+<p>I had now no resource but to promise; which I did, very
+reluctantly.</p>
+<p>"You would enjoy the Op&eacute;ra Comique far more than the
+Italiens," said I, remembering that Madame de Marignan had a box at
+the Italiens, and rapidly weighing the chances for and against the
+possibility of recognition. "At the first they sing in French--at
+the last, in Italian,"</p>
+<p>"Ah, bah! I should prefer the French," replied she, falling at
+once into the snare. "When shall it be--this week?"</p>
+<p>"Ye--es; one evening this week."</p>
+<p>"What evening?"</p>
+<p>"Well, let me see--we had better wait, and consult the
+advertisements."</p>
+<p>"<i>Dame</i>! never mind the advertisements. Let it be
+Tuesday."</p>
+<p>"Why Tuesday?"</p>
+<p>"Because it is soon; and because I can get away early on
+Tuesdays if I ask leave."</p>
+<p>I had, plainly, no chance of escape.</p>
+<p>"You would not prefer to see the great military piece at the
+Porte St. Martin?" I suggested. "There are three hundred real
+soldiers in it, and they fire real cannon."</p>
+<p>"Not I! I have been to the Porte St. Martin, over and over
+again. Emile knew one of the scene-painter's assistants, and used
+to get tickets two or three times a month."</p>
+<p>"Then it shall be the Opera Comique," said I, with a sigh.</p>
+<p>"And on Tuesday evening next."</p>
+<p>"On Tuesday evening next."</p>
+<p>At this moment the piping and fiddling broke out afresh, and
+Josephine, who had scarcely taken the little telescope from her eye
+all the time, exclaimed that she saw the wedding party going
+through the market-place of the town.</p>
+<p>"There they are--the musicians first; the bride and bridegroom
+next; and eight friends, all two and two! There will be a dance,
+depend on it! Let us go down to the town, and hear all about it!
+Perhaps they might invite us to join them--who knows?"</p>
+<p>"But you would not dance before dinner?"</p>
+<p>"<i>Eh, mon Dieu</i>! I would dance before breakfast, if I had
+the chance. Come along. If we do not make haste, we may miss
+them."</p>
+<p>I rose, feeling, and I daresay, looking, like a martyr; and we
+went down again into the town.</p>
+<p>There we inquired of the first person who seemed likely to
+know--he was a dapper hairdresser, standing at his shop-door with
+his hands in his apron pockets and a comb behind his ear--and were
+told that the wedding-party had just passed through the village, on
+their way to the Chateau of Saint Aulaire.</p>
+<p>"The Chateau of St. Aulaire!" said Josephine. "What are they
+going to do there? What is there to see?"</p>
+<p>"It is an ancient mansion, Mademoiselle, much visited by
+strangers," replied the hairdresser with exceeding politeness.
+"Worthy of Mademoiselle's distinguished attention--and Monsieur's.
+Contains old furniture, old paintings, old china--stands in an
+extensive park--one of the lions of this neighborhood,
+Mademoiselle--also Monsieur."</p>
+<p>"To whom does it belong?" I asked, somewhat interested in this
+account.</p>
+<p>"That, Monsieur, is a question difficult to answer," replied the
+fluent hairdresser, running his fingers through his locks and
+dispersing a gentle odor of rose-oil. "It was formerly the property
+of the ancient family of Saint Aulaire. The last Marquis de Saint
+Aulaire, with his wife and family, were guillotined in 1793. Some
+say that the young heir was saved; and an individual asserting
+himself to be that heir did actually put forward a claim to the
+estate, some twenty, or five-and-twenty years ago, but lost his
+cause for want of sufficient proof. In the meantime, it had passed
+into the hands of a wealthy republican family, descended, it is
+said, from General Dumouriez. This family held it till within the
+last four years, when two or three fresh claimants came forward; so
+that it is now the object of a lawsuit which may last till every
+brick of it falls to ruin, and every tree about it withers away. At
+present, a man and his wife have charge of the place, and visitors
+are permitted to see it any day between twelve and four."</p>
+<p>"I should like to see the old place," said I.</p>
+<p>"And I should like to see how the bride is dressed," said
+Josephine, "and if the bridegroom is handsome."</p>
+<p>"Well, let us go--not forgetting to thank Monsieur <i>le
+Perruquier</i> for his polite information."</p>
+<p>Monsieur <i>le Perruquier</i> fell into what dancing-masters
+call the first position, and bowed elaborately.</p>
+<p>"Most welcome, Mademoiselle--and Monsieur," said he. "Straight
+up the road--past the orchard about a quarter of a mile--old iron
+gates--can't miss it. Good-afternoon, Mademoiselle--also
+Monsieur."</p>
+<p>Following his directions, we came presently to the gates, which
+were rusty and broken-hinged, with traces of old gilding still
+showing faintly here and there upon their battered scrolls and
+bosses. One of them was standing open, and had evidently been
+standing so for years; while the other had as evidently been long
+closed, so that the deep grass had grown rankly all about it, and
+the very bolt was crusted over with a yellow lichen. Between the
+two, an ordinary wooden hurdle had been put up, and this hurdle was
+opened for us by a little blue-bloused urchin in a pair of huge
+<i>sabots</i>, who, thinking we belonged to the bridal party,
+pointed up the dusky avenue, and said, with a grin:--</p>
+<p>"<i>Tout droit, M'sieur--ils sont pass&eacute;s par
+l&agrave;!</i>"</p>
+<p><i>Par l&agrave;</i>, "under the shade of melancholy boughs," we
+went accordingly. Far away on either side stretched dim vistas of
+neglected park-land, deep with coarse grass and weeds and, where
+the trees stood thickest, all choked with a brambly undergrowth.
+After about a quarter of a mile of this dreary avenue, we came to a
+broad area of several acres laid out in the Italian style with
+fountains and terraces, at the upper end of which stood the
+house--a feudal, <i>moyen-&acirc;ge</i> French chateau, with
+irregular wings, steep slated roofings, innumerable windows, and
+fantastic steeple-topped turrets sheeted with lead and capped with
+grotesque gilded weathercocks. The principal front had been
+repaired in the style of the Renaissance and decorated with little
+foliated entablatures above the doors and windows; whilst a double
+flight of steps leading up to a grand entrance on the level of the
+first story, like the famous double staircase of Fontainebleau, had
+been patched on in the very centre, to the manifest disfigurement
+of the building. Most of the windows were shuttered up, and as we
+drew nearer, the general evidences of desolation became more
+apparent. The steps of the terraces were covered with patches of
+brown and golden moss. The stone urns were some of them fallen in
+the deep grass, and some broken. There were gaps in the rich
+balustrade here and there; and the two great fountains on either
+side of the lower terrace had long since ceased to fling up their
+feathery columns towards the sun. In the middle of one a broken
+Pan, noseless and armless, turned up a stony face of mute appeal,
+as if imploring us to free him from the parasitic jungle of aquatic
+plants which flourished rankly round him in the basin. In the
+other, a stalwart river-god with his finger on his lip, seemed
+listening for the music of those waters which now scarcely stirred
+amid the tangled weeds that clustered at his feet.</p>
+<p>Passing all these, passing also the flower-beds choked with
+brambles and long waving grasses, and the once quaintly-clipped
+myrtle and box-trees, all flinging out fantastic arms of later
+growth, we came to the upper terrace, which was paved in curious
+patterns of stars and arabesques, with stones alternately round and
+flat. Here a good-humored, cleanly peasant woman came clattering
+out in her <i>sabots</i> from a side-door, key in hand, preceded us
+up the double flight of steps, unlocked the great door, and
+admitted us.</p>
+<p>The interior, like the front, had been modernized about a
+hundred and fifty years before, and resembled a little formal
+Versailles or miniature Fontainebleau. Dismantled halls paved with
+white marble; panelled ante-chambers an inch deep in dust; dismal
+<i>salons</i> adorned with Renaissance arabesques and huge
+looking-glasses, cracked and mildewed, and mended with pasted seams
+of blue paper; boudoirs with faded Watteau panellings; corridors
+with painted ceilings where mythological divinities, marvellously
+foreshortened on a sky-blue ground, were seen surrounded by
+rose-colored Cupids and garlanded with ribbons and flowers;
+innumerable bed-rooms, some containing grim catafalques of beds
+with gilded cornices and funereal plumes, some empty, some full of
+stored-up furniture fast going to decay--all these in endless
+number we traversed, conducted by the good-tempered
+<i>concierge</i>, whose heavy <i>sabots</i> awakened ghostly echoes
+from floor to floor.</p>
+<p>At length, through an ante-chamber lined with a double file of
+grim old family portraits--some so blackened with age and dust as
+to be totally indistinguishable, and others bulging hideously out
+of their frames--we came to the library, a really noble room,
+lofty, panelled with walnut wood, floored with polished oak, and
+looking over a wide expanse of level country. Long ranges of empty
+book-shelves fenced in with broken wire-work ran round the walls.
+The painted ceiling represented, as usual, the heavens and some
+pagan divinities. A dumb old time-piece, originally constructed to
+tell the months, the days of the year, and the hours, stood on a
+massive corner bracket near the door. Long antique mirrors in heavy
+black frames reached from floor to ceiling between each of the
+windows; and in the centre of the room, piled all together and
+festooned with a thick drapery of cobwebs, stood a dozen or so of
+old carved chairs, screens, and foot-stools, rich with velvet,
+brocade, and gilded leather, but now looking as if a touch would
+crumble them to dust. Over the great carved fireplace, however,
+hung a painting upon which my attention became riveted as soon as I
+entered the room--a painting yellow with age; covered with those
+minute cracks which are like wrinkles on the face of antique art,
+coated with dust, and yet so singularly attractive that, having
+once noticed it, I looked at nothing else.</p>
+<p>It was the half-length portrait of a young lady in the costume
+of the reign of Louis XVI. One hand rested on a stone urn; the
+other was raised to her bosom, holding a thin blue scarf that
+seemed to flutter in the wind. Her dress was of white satin, cut
+low and square, with a stomacher of lace and pearls. She also wore
+pearls in her hair, on her white arms, and on her whiter neck. Thus
+much for the mere adjuncts; as for the face--ah, how can I ever
+describe that pale, perfect, tender face, with its waving brown
+hair and soft brown eyes, and that steadfast perpetual smile that
+seemed to light the eyes from within, and to dwell in the corners
+of the lips without parting or moving them? It was like a face seen
+in a dream, or the imperfect image which seems to come between us
+and the page when we read of Imogen asleep.</p>
+<p>"Who was this lady?" I asked, eagerly.</p>
+<p>The <i>concierge</i> nodded and rubbed her hands.</p>
+<p>"Aha! M'sieur," said she, "'tis the best painting in the
+chateau, as folks tell me. M'sieur is a connoisseur."</p>
+<p>"But do you know whose portrait it is?"</p>
+<p>"To be sure I do, M'sieur. It's the portrait of the last
+Marquise--the one who was guillotined, poor soul, with her husband,
+in--let me see--in 1793!"</p>
+<p>"What an exquisite creature! Look, Josephine, did you ever see
+anything so beautiful?"</p>
+<p>"Beautiful!" repeated the grisette, with a sidelong glance at
+one of the mirrors. "Beautiful, with such a coiffure and such a
+bodice! <i>Ciel!</i> how tastes differ!"</p>
+<p>"But her face, Josephine!"</p>
+<p>"What of her face? I'm sure it's plain enough."</p>
+<p>"Plain! Good heavens! what..."</p>
+<p>But it was not worth while to argue upon it. I pulled out one of
+the old chairs, and so climbed near enough to dust the surface of
+the painting with my handkerchief.</p>
+<p>"I wish I could buy it!" I exclaimed.</p>
+<p>Josephine burst into a loud laugh.</p>
+<p>"<i>Grand Dieu</i>!" said she, half pettishly, "if you are so
+much in love with it as all that, I dare say it would not be
+difficult!"</p>
+<p>The <i>concierge</i> shook her head.</p>
+<p>"Everything on this estate is locked up," said she. "Nothing can
+be sold, nothing given away, nothing even repaired, till the
+<i>proc&egrave;s</i> is ended."</p>
+<p>I sighed, and came down reluctantly from my perch. Josephine was
+visibly impatient. She had seen the wedding-party going down one of
+the walks at the back of the house; and the <i>concierge</i> was
+waiting to let us out. I drew her aside, and slipped a liberal
+gratuity into her hand.</p>
+<p>"If I were to come down here some day with a friend of mine who
+is a painter," I whispered, "would you have any objection, Madame,
+to allow him to make a little sketch of that portrait?"</p>
+<p>The <i>concierge</i> looked into her palm, and seeing the value
+of the coin, smiled, hesitated, put her finger to her lip, and
+said:--</p>
+<p>"<i>Ma foi</i>, M'sieur, I believe I have no business to allow
+it; but--to oblige a gentleman like you--if there was nobody
+about--"</p>
+<p>I nodded. We understood each other sufficiently, and no more was
+needed.</p>
+<p>Once out of the house, Medemoiselle Josephine pouted, and took
+upon herself to be sulky--a disposition which was by no means
+lessened when, after traversing the park in various directions in
+search of the bridal company, we found that they had gone out long
+ago by a gate at the other side of the estate, and were by this
+time piping, most probably, in the adjoining parish.</p>
+<p>It was now five o'clock; so we hastened back through the
+village, cast a last glance at the grim old tower on its steep
+solitude, consigned ourselves to the yellow omnibus, and in due
+time were once more flying along the iron road towards Paris. The
+rapid motion, the dignity of occupying a first-class seat, and,
+above all, the prospects of an excellent dinner, soon brought my
+fair companion round again, and by the time we reached the Moulin
+Rouge, she was all vivacity and good temper. The less I say about
+that dinner the better. I am humiliated when I recall all that I
+suffered, and all that she did. I blush even now when I remember
+how she blew upon her soup, put her knife in her mouth, and picked
+her teeth with her shawl-pin. What possessed her that she would
+persist in calling the waiter "Monsieur?" And why, in Heaven's
+name, need she have clapped her hands when I ordered the champagne?
+To say that I had no appetite--that I wished myself at the
+antipodes--that I longed to sink into my boots, to smother the
+waiter, or to do anything equally desperate and unreasonable, is to
+express but a tithe of the anguish I endured. I bore it, however,
+in silence, little dreaming what a much heavier trial was yet in
+store for me.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXI."></a>CHAPTER XXI.</h2>
+<h3>I FALL A SACRIFICE TO MRS. GRUNDY.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>"A word with you, if you please, Basil Arbuthnot," said Dr.
+Ch&eacute;ron, "when you have finished copying those
+prescriptions."</p>
+<p>Dr. Ch&eacute;ron was standing with his feet firmly planted in
+the tiger-skin rug and his back to the fireplace. I was busy
+writing at the study table, and glancing anxiously from time to
+time at the skeleton clock upon the chimney-piece; for it was
+getting on fast towards five, and at half-past six I was to take
+Josephine to the Op&eacute;ra Comique. As perverse fortune would
+have it, the Doctor had this afternoon given me more desk-work than
+usual, and I began to doubt whether I should be able to dine,
+dress, and reach the theatre in time if he detained me much
+longer.</p>
+<p>"But you need be in no haste," he added, looking at his watch.
+"That is to say, upon my account."</p>
+<p>I bowed nervously--I was always nervous in his presence--and
+tried to write faster than ever; but, feeling his cold blue eye
+upon me, made a blot, smeared it with my sleeve, left one word out,
+wrote another twice over, and was continually tripped up by my pen,
+which sputtered hideously and covered the page with florid passages
+in little round spots, which only needed tails to become crotchets
+and quavers. At length, just as the clock struck the hour, I
+finished my task and laid aside my pen.</p>
+<p>Dr. Ch&eacute;ron coughed preparatorily.</p>
+<p>"It is some time," said he, "since you have given me any news of
+your father. Do you often hear from him?"</p>
+<p>"Not very often, sir," I replied. "About once in every three
+weeks. He dislikes letter-writing."</p>
+<p>Dr. Ch&eacute;ron took a packet of papers from his
+breast-pocket, and ruffling them over, said, somewhat
+indifferently:--</p>
+<p>"Very true--very true. His notes are brief and few; but always
+to the purpose. I heard from him this morning."</p>
+<p>"Indeed, sir?"</p>
+<p>"Yes--here is his letter. It encloses a remittance of
+seventy-five pounds; fifty of which are for you. The remaining
+twenty-five being reserved for the defrayal of your expenses at the
+Ecole de M&eacute;decine and the Ecole Pratique."</p>
+<p>I was delighted.</p>
+<p>"Both are made payable through my banker," continued Dr.
+Ch&eacute;ron, "and I am to take charge of your share till you
+require it; which cannot be just yet, as I understand from this
+letter that your father supplied you with the sum of one hundred
+and five pounds on leaving England."</p>
+<p>My delight went down to zero.</p>
+<p>"Does my father say that I am not to have it now, sir?" I asked,
+hesitatingly.</p>
+<p>"He says, as I have already told you, that it is to be yours
+when you require it."</p>
+<p>"And if I require it very shortly, sir--in fact, if I require it
+now?"</p>
+<p>"You ought not to require it now," replied the Doctor, with a
+cold, scrutinizing stare. "You ought not to have spent one hundred
+and five pounds in five months."</p>
+<p>I looked down in silence. I had more than spent it long since;
+and I had to thank Madame de Marignan for the facility with which
+it had flown. It was not to be denied that my course of lessons in
+practical politeness had been somewhat expensive.</p>
+<p>"How have you spent it?" asked Dr. Ch&eacute;ron, never removing
+his eyes from my face.</p>
+<p>I might have answered, in bouquets, opera stalls, and riding
+horses; in dress coats, tight boots, and white kid gloves; in new
+books, new music, bon-bons, cabs, perfumery, and the like
+inexcusable follies. But I held my tongue instead, and said
+nothing.</p>
+<p>Dr. Ch&eacute;ron looked again at his watch.</p>
+<p>"Have you kept any entries of your expenses since you came to
+Paris?" said he.</p>
+<p>"Not with--with any regularity, sir," I replied.</p>
+<p>He took out his pencil-case and pocket-book.</p>
+<p>"Let us try, then," said he, "to make an average calculation of
+what they might be in five months."</p>
+<p>I began to feel very uncomfortable.</p>
+<p>"I believe your father paid your travelling expenses?"</p>
+<p>I bowed affirmatively.</p>
+<p>"Leaving you the clear sum of one hundred and five pounds." I
+bowed again.</p>
+<p>"Allowing, then, for your rent--which is, I believe, twenty
+francs per week," said he, entering the figures as he went on,
+"there will be four hundred francs spent in five months. For your
+living, say thirty francs per week, which makes six hundred. For
+your clothing, seventy-five per month, which makes three hundred
+and seventy-five, and ought to be quite enough for a young man of
+moderate tastes. For your washing and firewood, perhaps forty per
+month, which makes two hundred--and for your incidental expenses,
+say fifteen per week, which makes three hundred. We thus arrive at
+a total of one thousand eight hundred and seventy-five francs,
+which, reduced to English money at the average standard of
+twenty-five francs to the sovereign, represents the exact sum of
+seventy-five pounds. Do I make myself understood?"</p>
+<p>I bowed for the third time.</p>
+<p>"Of the original one hundred and five pounds, we now have thirty
+not accounted for. May I ask how much of that surplus you have
+left?"</p>
+<p>"About--not more than--than a hundred and twenty francs," I
+replied, stripping the feathers off all the pens in succession,
+without knowing it.</p>
+<p>"Have you any debts?"</p>
+<p>"A--a few."</p>
+<p>"Tailors' bills?"</p>
+<p>"Yes, sir."</p>
+<p>"What others?"</p>
+<p>"A--a couple of months' rent, I believe, sir."</p>
+<p>"Is that all?"</p>
+<p>"N--not quite."</p>
+<p>Dr. Ch&eacute;ron frowned, and looked again at his watch.</p>
+<p>"Be good enough, Mr. Arbuthnot," he said, "to spare me this
+amount of useless interrogation by at once stating the nature and
+amount of the rest."</p>
+<p>"I--I cannot positively state the amount, sir," I said, absurdly
+trying to get the paper-weight into my waistcoat pocket, and then
+putting it down in great confusion. "I--I have an account at
+Monceau's in the Rue Duphot, and..."</p>
+<p>"I beg your pardon," interrupted Dr. Ch&eacute;ron: "but who is
+Monceau?"</p>
+<p>"Monceau's--Monceau's livery-stables, sir."</p>
+<p>Dr. Ch&eacute;ron slightly raised his eye-brows, and entered the
+name.</p>
+<p>"And at Lavoisier's, on the Boulevard Poissonni&egrave;re--"</p>
+<p>"What is sold, pray, at Lavoisier's?"</p>
+<p>"Gloves, perfumes, hosiery, ready-made linen..."</p>
+<p>"Enough--you can proceed."</p>
+<p>"I have also a bill at--at Barbet's, in the Passage de
+l'Op&eacute;ra."</p>
+<p>"And Barbet is--?"</p>
+<p>"A--a florist!" I replied, very reluctantly.</p>
+<p>"Humph!--a florist!" observed Dr. Ch&eacute;ron, again
+transfixing me with the cold, blue eye. "To what amount do you
+suppose you are indebted to Monsieur Barbet?"</p>
+<p>I looked down, and became utterly unintelligible.</p>
+<p>"Fifty francs?"</p>
+<p>"I--I fear, more than--than--"</p>
+<p>"A hundred? A hundred and fifty? Two hundred?"</p>
+<p>"About two hundred, I suppose, sir," I said desperately.</p>
+<p>"Two hundred francs--that is to say, eight pounds English--to
+your florist! Really, Mr. Arbuthnot, you must be singularly fond of
+flowers!"</p>
+<p>I looked down in silence.</p>
+<p>"Have you a conservatory attached to your rooms?"</p>
+<p>The skeleton clock struck the half hour.</p>
+<p>"Excuse me, sir," I said, driven now to the last extremity,
+"but--but I have an engagement which--in short, I will, if you
+please, make out a list of--of these items, ascertaining the
+correct amount of each; and when once paid, I will endeavor--I
+mean, it is my earnest desire, to--to limit my expenditure strictly
+to--in short, to study economy for the future. If, in the meantime,
+you will have the goodness to excuse me...."</p>
+<p>"One word, young man. Will the fifty pounds cover your
+debts?"</p>
+<p>"Quite, sir, I am confident."</p>
+<p>"And leave you something in hand for your current expenses?"</p>
+<p>"Indeed, I fear very little."</p>
+<p>"In that case what will you do?"</p>
+<p>This was a terrible question, and one for which I could find no
+answer.</p>
+<p>"Write to your father for another remittance--eh?"</p>
+<p>"I--upon my word, I dare not, sir," I faltered.</p>
+<p>"Then you would go in debt again?"</p>
+<p>"I really fear--even with the strictest economy--I--"</p>
+<p>"Be so obliging as to let me have your seat," said Dr.
+Ch&eacute;ron, thrusting the obnoxious note-book into his pocket
+and taking my place at the desk, from which he brought out a couple
+of cards, and a printed paper.</p>
+<p>"This ticket," said he, "admits the holder to the anatomical
+course for the term now beginning, and this to the lectures at the
+Ecole Pratique. Both are in my gift. The first is worth two hundred
+francs, and the second two hundred and fifty. I ought, perhaps, in
+strict justice, to bestow them upon some needy and deserving
+individual: however, to save you from debt, or a very unpleasant
+alternative, I will fill them in with your name, and, when you
+bring me all your bills receipted, I will transfer to your account
+the four hundred and fifty francs which I must, otherwise, have
+paid for your courses out of the remittance forwarded by your
+father for that purpose. Understand, however, that I must first
+have the receipts, and that I expect you, on the word of a
+gentleman, to commit no more follies, and to contract no more
+debts."</p>
+<p>"Oh, sir!" I exclaimed, "how can I ever--"</p>
+<p>"No thanks, I beg," interposed Dr. Ch&eacute;ron. "Prove your
+gratitude by your conduct; do not trouble yourself to talk about
+it."</p>
+<p>"Indeed, sir, you may depend--"</p>
+<p>"And no promises either, if you please. I attach no kind of
+value to them. Stay--here is my check for the fifty pounds
+forwarded by your father. With that sum extricate yourself from
+debt. You know the rest."</p>
+<p>Hereupon Dr. Ch&eacute;ron replaced the cards and the printed
+form, double-locked his desk, and, with a slight gesture of the
+hand, frigidly dismissed me.</p>
+<p>I left the house quite chopfallen. I was relieved, it is true,
+from the incubus of debt; but then how small a figure I had cut in
+the eyes of Dr. Ch&eacute;ron! Besides, I was small for the second
+time--reproved for the second time--lectured, helped, put down, and
+poohpoohed, for the second time! Could I have peeped at myself just
+then through the wrong end of a telescope, I vow I could not have
+looked smaller in my own eyes.</p>
+<p>I had no time to dine; so I despatched a cup of coffee and a
+roll on my way home, and went hungry to the theatre.</p>
+<p>Josephine was got up with immense splendor for this occasion;
+greatly to her own satisfaction and my disappointment. Having hired
+a small private box in the least conspicuous part of the theatre, I
+had committed the cowardly mistake of endeavoring to transform my
+grisette into a woman of fashion. I had bought her a pink and white
+opera cloak, a pretty little fan, a pair of white kid gloves, and a
+bouquet. With these she wore a decent white muslin dress furnished
+out of the limited resources of her own wardrobe, and a wreath of
+pink roses, the work of her own clever fingers. Thus equipped, she
+was far less pretty than in her coquettish little every-day cap,
+and looked, I regret to say, more like an <i>ouvri&egrave;re</i>
+than ever. Aggravating above all else, however, was her own
+undisguised delight in her appearance.</p>
+<p>"Are my flowers all right? Is my dress tumbled? Is the hood of
+my cloak in the middle of my back?" were the questions she
+addressed to me every moment. In the ante-room she took advantage
+of each mirror we passed. In the lobby I caught her trying to look
+at her own back. When we reached our box she pulled her chair to
+the very centre of it, and sat there as if she expected to be
+admired by the whole audience.</p>
+<p>"My dear Josephine," I remonstrated, "sit back here, facing the
+stage. You will see much better--besides, it is your proper seat,
+being the only lady in the box."</p>
+<p>"Ah, <i>mon Dieu!</i> then I cannot see the house--and how
+pretty it is! Ever so much prettier than the Gai&eacute;t&eacute;,
+or the Porte St. Martin!"</p>
+<p>"You can see the house by peeping behind the curtain."</p>
+<p>"As if I were ashamed to be seen! <i>Par exemple</i>!"</p>
+<p>"Nay, as you please. I only advise you according to custom and
+fashion."</p>
+<p>Josephine pouted, and unwillingly conceded a couple of
+inches.</p>
+<p>"I wish I had brought the little telescope you gave me last
+Sunday," said she, presently. "There is a gentleman with one down
+there in the stalls."</p>
+<p>"A telescope at the opera--the gods forbid! Here, however, is my
+opera-glass, if you like to use it."</p>
+<p>Josephine turned it over curiously, and peeped first through one
+tube and then through the other.</p>
+<p>"Which ought I to look through?" asked she.</p>
+<p>"Both, of course."</p>
+<p>"Both! How can I?"</p>
+<p>"Why thus--as you look through a pair of spectacles."</p>
+<p>"<i>Ciel!</i> I can't manage that! I can never look through
+anything without covering up one eye with my hand."</p>
+<p>"Then I think you had better be contented with your own charming
+eyes, <i>ma belle</i>" said I, nervously. "How do you like your
+bouquet?"</p>
+<p>Josephine sniffed at it as if she were taking snuff, and
+pronounced it perfect. Just then the opera began. I withdrew into
+the shade, and Josephine was silenced for a while in admiration of
+the scenery and the dresses. By and by, she began to yawn.</p>
+<p>"Ah, <i>mon Dieu!</i>" said she, "when will they have done
+singing? I have not heard a word all this time."</p>
+<p>"But everything is sung, <i>ma ch&eacute;re</i>, in an
+opera."</p>
+<p>"What do you mean? Is there no play?"</p>
+<p>"This is the play; only instead of speaking their words, they
+sing them."</p>
+<p>Josephine shrugged her shoulders.</p>
+<p>"Ah, bah!" said she. "How stupid! I had rather have seen the
+<i>Closerie des G&ecirc;nets</i> at the Grai&eacute;t&eacute;, if
+that is to be the case the whole evening. Oh, dear! there is such a
+pretty lady come into the opposite box, in such a beautiful blue
+<i>glac&eacute;</i>, trimmed with black velvet and lace!"</p>
+<p>"Hush! you must not talk while they are singing!"</p>
+<p>"<i>Tiens!</i> it is no pleasure to come out and be dumb. But do
+just see the lady in the opposite box! She looks exactly as if she
+had walked out of a fashion-book."</p>
+<p>"My dear child, I don't care one pin to look at her," said I,
+preferring to keep as much out of sight as possible. "To admire
+your pretty face is enough for me."</p>
+<p>Josephine squeezed my hand affectionately.</p>
+<p>"That is just as Emile used to talk to me," said she.</p>
+<p>I felt by no means flattered.</p>
+<p>"<i>Regardez done!</i>" said she, pulling me by the sleeve, just
+as I was standing up, a little behind her chair, looking at the
+stage. "That lady in the blue <i>glac&eacute;</i> never takes her
+eyes from our box! She points us out to the gentleman who is with
+her--do look!"</p>
+<p>I turned my glass in the direction to which she pointed, and
+recognised Madame de Marignan!</p>
+<p>I turned hot and cold, red and white, all in one moment, and
+shrank back like a snail that has been touched, or a sea-anemone at
+the first dig of the naturalist.</p>
+<p>"Does she know you?" asked Josephine.</p>
+<p>"I--I--probably--that is to say--I have met her in society."</p>
+<p>"And who is the gentleman?"</p>
+<p>That was just what I was wondering. It was not Delaroche. It was
+no one whom I had ever seen before. It was a short, fat, pale man,
+with a bald head, and a ribbon in his button-hole.</p>
+<p>"Is he her husband?" pursued Josephine.</p>
+<p>The suggestion flashed upon me like a revelation. Had I not
+heard that M. de Marignan was coming home from Algiers? Of course
+it was he. No doubt of it. A little vulgar, fat, bald man....
+Pshaw, just the sort of a husband that she deserved!</p>
+<p>"How she looks at me!" said Josephine.</p>
+<p>I felt myself blush, so to speak, from head to foot.</p>
+<p>"Good Heavens! my dear girl," I exclaimed, "take your elbows off
+the front of the box!"</p>
+<p>Josephine complied, with a pettish little grimace.</p>
+<p>"And, for mercy's sake, don't hold your head as if you feared it
+would tumble off!"</p>
+<p>"It is the flowers," said she. "They tickle the back of my neck,
+whenever I move my head. I am much more comfortable in my cap."</p>
+<p>"Never mind. Make the best of it, and listen to this song."</p>
+<p>It was the great tenor ballad of the evening. The house was
+profoundly silent; the first wandering chords of a harp were heard
+behind the scenes; and Duprez began. In the very midst of one of
+his finest and tenderest <i>sostenuto</i> passages, Josephine
+sneezed--and such a sneeze! you might have heard it out in the
+lobbies. An audible titter ran round the house. I saw Madame de
+Marignan cover her face with her handkerchief, and yield to an
+irrepressible fit of laughter. As for the tenor, he cast a
+withering glance up at the box, and made a marked pause before
+resuming his song. Merciful powers! what crime had I committed that
+I should be visited with such a punishment as this?</p>
+<p>"Wretched girl!" I exclaimed, savagely, "what have you
+done?"</p>
+<p>"Done, <i>mon ami!</i>" said Josephine, innocently. "Why, I fear
+I have taken cold."</p>
+<p>I groaned aloud.</p>
+<p>"Taken cold!" I muttered to myself. "Would to Heaven you had
+taken prussic acid!"</p>
+<p>"<i>Qu'est ce que c'est?"</i> asked she.</p>
+<p>But it was not worth while to reply. I gave myself up to my
+fate. I determined to remonstrate no more. I flung myself on a seat
+at the back of the box, and made up my mind to bear all that might
+yet be in store for me. When she openly ate a stick of <i>sucre
+d'orge</i> after this, I said nothing. When she applauded with both
+hands, I endured in silence. At length the performance came to a
+close and the curtain fell. Madame de Marignan had left before the
+last act, so I ran no danger of encountering her on the way out;
+but I was profoundly miserable, nevertheless. As for Josephine,
+she, poor child, had not enjoyed her evening at all, and was
+naturally out of temper. We quarrelled tremendously in the cab, and
+parted without having made it up. It was all my own fault. How
+could I be such a fool as to suppose that, with a few shreds and
+patches of finery, I could make a fine lady of a grisette?</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXII."></a>CHAPTER XXII.</h2>
+<h3>HIGH ART IN THE QUARTIER LATIN.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>"But, my dear fellow, what else could you have expected? You
+took Mam'selle Josephine to the <i>Opera Comique. Eh bien!</i> you
+might as well have taken an oyster up Mount Vesuvius. Our fair
+friend was out of her element. <i>Voil&agrave; tout</i>."</p>
+<p>"Confound her and her element!" I exclaimed with a groan. "What
+the deuce <i>is</i> her element--the Quartier Latin?"</p>
+<p>"The Quartier Latin is to some extent her habitat--but then
+Mam'selle Josephine belongs to a genus of which you, <i>cher</i>
+Monsieur Arbuthnot, are deplorably ignorant--the genus grisette.
+The grisette from a certain point of view is the
+<i>chef-d'oeuvre</i> of Parisian industry; the bouquet of Parisian
+civilization. She is indigenous to the <i>mansarde</i> and the
+<i>pav&eacute;</i>--bears no transplantation--flourishes in <i>the
+premi&egrave;re balconie</i>, the suburban <i>guingette</i>, and
+the Salle Valentinois; but degenerates at a higher elevation. To
+improve her is to spoil her. In her white cap and muslin gown, the
+Parisian grisette is simply delicious. In a smart bonnet, a
+Cashmere and a brougham, she is simply detestable. Fine clothes
+vulgarize her. Fine surroundings demoralize her. Lodged on the
+sixth story, rich in the possession of a cuckoo-clock, a canary,
+half a dozen pots of mignonette, and some bits of cheap furniture
+in imitation mahogany, she has every virtue and every fault that is
+charming in woman--childlike gaiety; coquetry; thoughtless
+generosity; the readiest laugh, the readiest tear, and the warmest
+heart in the world. Transplant her to the Chauss&eacute;e d'Antin,
+instil the taste for diamonds, truffles, and Veuve Clicquot, and
+you poison her whole nature. She becomes false, cruel, greedy,
+prodigal of your money, parsimonious of her own--a vampire--a
+ghoul--the hideous thing we call in polite parlance a <i>Fille de
+Marbre."</i></p>
+<p>Thus, with much gravity and emphasis, spoke Herr Franz
+M&uuml;ller, lying on his back upon a very ricketty sofa, and
+smoking like a steam-engine. A cup of half-cold coffee, and a
+bottle of rum three parts emptied stood beside him on the floor.
+These were the remains of his breakfast; for it was yet early in
+the morning of the day following my great misadventure at the
+Op&eacute;ra Comique, and I had sought him out at his lodgings in
+the Rue Clovis at an hour when the Quartier Latin was for the most
+part in bed.</p>
+<p>"Josephine, at all events, is not of the stuff that <i>Filles de
+Marbre</i> are made of," I said, smiling.</p>
+<p>"Perhaps not--<i>mais, que voulez-vous?</i> We are what we are.
+A grisette makes a bad fine lady. A fine lady would make a still
+worse grisette. The Archbishopric of Paris is a most repectable and
+desirable preferment; but your humble servant, for instance, would
+hardly suit the place,"</p>
+<p>"And the moral of this learned and perspicuous discourse?"</p>
+<p>"<i>Tiens</i>! the moral, is--keep our fair friend in her place.
+Remember that a dinner at thirty sous in the Palais Royal, or a
+f&ecirc;te with fireworks at Mabille, will give her ten times more
+pleasure than the daintiest repast you could order at the Maison
+Dor&eacute;e, or the choicest night of the season at either opera
+house. And how should it be otherwise? One must understand a thing
+to be able to enjoy it; and I'll be sworn Mam'selle Josephine was
+infinitely more bored last night than yourself."</p>
+<p>Our conversation, or rather his monologue, was here interrupted
+by the ringing of the outer bell.</p>
+<p>The artist sat up, took his pipe from his lips, and looked
+considerably disturbed.</p>
+<p>"<i>Mille tonnerres</i>!" said he in a low tone. "Who can it
+be?... so early in the day ... not yet ten o'clock ... it is very
+mysterious."</p>
+<p>"It is only mysterious," said I, "as long as you don't open the
+door. Shall I answer the bell?"</p>
+<p>"No--yes--wait a moment ... suppose it is that demon, my
+landlord, or that archfiend, my tailor--then you must say ... holy
+St. Nicholas! you must say I am in bed with small-pox, or that I've
+broken out suddenly into homicidal delirium, and you're my
+keeper."</p>
+<p>"Unfortunately I should not know either of your princes of
+darkness at first sight."</p>
+<p>"True--and it might be Dupont, who owes me thirty francs, and
+swore by the bones of his aunt (an excellent person, who keeps an
+estaminet in the Place St. Sulpice) that he would pay me this week.
+<i>Diable</i>! there goes the bell again."</p>
+<p>"It would perhaps be safest," I suggested, "to let M. or N. ring
+on till he is tired of the exercise."</p>
+<p>"But conceive the horrid possibility of letting thirty francs
+ring themselves out of patience! No, <i>mon ami</i>--I will dare
+the worst that may happen. Wait here for me--I will answer the door
+myself,"</p>
+<p>Now it should be explained that M&uuml;ller's apartments
+consisted of three rooms. First, a small outer chamber which he
+dignified with the title of Salle d'Attente, but which, as it was
+mainly furnished with old boots, umbrellas and walking-sticks, and
+contained, by way of accommodation for visitors only a three-legged
+stool and a door-mat, would have been more fitly designated as the
+hall. Between this Salle d'Attente and the den in which he slept,
+ate, smoked, and received his friends, lay the studio--once a
+stately salon, now a wilderness of litter and dilapidation. On one
+side you beheld three windows closely boarded up, with strips of
+newspaper pasted over the cracks to exclude every gleam of day.
+Overhead yawned a huge, dusty skylight, to make way for which a
+fine old painted ceiling had been ruthlessly knocked away. On the
+walls were pinned and pasted all sorts of rough sketches and
+studies in color and crayon. In one corner lolled a
+despondent-looking lay-figure in a moth-eaten Spanish cloak; in
+another lay a heap of plaster-casts, gigantic hands and feet,
+broken-nosed masks of the Apollo, the Laocoon, the Hercules
+Farnese, and other foreigners of distinction. Upon the
+chimney-piece were displayed a pair of foils, a lute, a skull, an
+antique German drinking-mug, and several very modern empty bottles.
+In the middle of the room stood two large easels, a divan, a round
+table, and three or four chairs; while the floor was thickly strewn
+with empty color-tubes, bits of painting-rag, corks, cigar-ends,
+and all kinds of miscellaneous litter.</p>
+<p>All these things I had observed as I passed in; for this, be it
+remembered, was my first visit to M&uuml;ller in his own
+territory.</p>
+<p>I heard him go through the studio and close the door behind him,
+and then I heard him open the door upon the public staircase.
+Presently he came back, shutting the door behind him as before.</p>
+<p>"My dear fellow," he exclaimed, breathlessly, "you have brought
+luck with you! What do you think? A sitter--positively, a sitter!
+Wants to be sketched in at once--<i>Vive la France</i>!"</p>
+<p>"Man or woman? Young or old? Plain or pretty?"</p>
+<p>"Elderly half-length, feminine gender--Madame Tapotte. They are
+both there, Monsieur and Madame Excellent couple--redolent of the
+country--husband bucolic, adipose, auriferous--wife arrayed in all
+her glory, like the Queen of Sheba. I left them in the Salle
+d'Attente--told them I had a sitter--time immensely
+occupied--half-lengths furiously in demand ... <i>Will</i> you
+oblige me by performing the part for a few minutes, just to carry
+out the idea?"</p>
+<p>"What part?"</p>
+<p>"The part of sitter."</p>
+<p>"Oh, with pleasure," I replied, laughing. "Do with me what you
+please,"</p>
+<p>"You don't mind? Come! you are the best fellow in the world.
+Now, if you'll sit in that arm-chair facing the light--head a
+little thrown back, arms folded, chin up ... Capital! You don't
+know what an effect this will have upon the provincial mind!"</p>
+<p>"But you're not going to let them in! You have no portrait of me
+to be at work upon!"</p>
+<p>"My dear fellow, I've dozens of half-finished studies, any one
+of which will answer the purpose. <i>Voil&agrave;</i>! here is the
+very thing."</p>
+<p>And snatching up a canvas that had been standing till now with
+its face to the wall, he flourished it triumphantly before my eyes,
+and placed it on the easel.</p>
+<p>"Heavens and earth!" I exclaimed, "that's a copy of the Titian
+in the Louvre--the 'Young Man with the Glove!'"</p>
+<p>"What of that? Our Tapottes will never find out the difference.
+By the way, I told them you were a great English Milord, so please
+keep up the character."</p>
+<p>"I will try to do credit to the peerage."</p>
+<p>"And if you would not mind throwing in a word of English every
+now and then ... a little Goddam, for instance.. . Eh?"</p>
+<p>I laughed and shook my head.</p>
+<p>"I will pose for you as Milord with all the pleasure in life," I
+said; "only I cannot undertake to pose for the traditional Milord
+of the Bouffes Parisiens! However, I will speak some English, and,
+if you like, I'll know no French."</p>
+<p>"No, no--<i>diable</i>! you must know a little, or I can't
+exchange a word with you. But very little--the less the better. And
+now I'll let them in."</p>
+<p>They came; Madame first--tall, buxom, large-featured,
+fresh-colored, radiant in flowers, lace, and Palais Royal jewelry;
+then Monsieur--short, fat, bald, rosy and smiling, with a huge
+frill to his shirt-front and a nankeen waistcoat.</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller introduced them with much ceremony and many
+apologies.</p>
+<p>"Permit me, milord," he said, "to present Monsieur and Madame
+Tapotte--Monsieur and Madame Tapotte; Milord Smithfield."</p>
+<p>I rose and bowed with the gravity becoming my rank.</p>
+<p>"I have explained to milord," continued M&uuml;ller, addressing
+himself partly to the new-comers, partly to me, and chiefly to the
+study on the easel, "that having no second room in which to invite
+Monsieur and Madame to repose themselves, I am compelled to ask
+them into the studio--where, however, his lordship is so very kind
+as to say that they are welcome." (Hereupon Madame Tapotte curtsied
+again, and Monsieur ducked his bald head, and I returned their
+salutations with the same dignity as before.) "If Monsieur and
+Madame will be pleased to take seats, however, his lordship's
+sitting will be ended in about ten minutes. <i>Mille pardons</i>,
+the face, milord, a little more to the right. Thank you--thank you
+very much. And if you will do me the favor to look at me ... for
+the expression of the eye--just so--thank you! A most important
+point, milord, is the expression of the eye. When I say the
+expression, I mean the fire, the sparkle, the liquidity ...
+<i>enfin</i> the expression!"</p>
+<p>Here he affected to put in some touches with immense
+delicacy--then retreated a couple of yards, the better to
+contemplate his work--pursed up his mouth--ran his fingers through
+his hair--shaded his eyes with his hand--went back and put in
+another touch--again retreated--again put in a touch; and so on
+some three or four times successively.</p>
+<p>Meanwhile Monsieur and Madame Tapotte were fidgeting upon their
+chairs in respectful silence. Every now and then they exchanged
+glances of wonder and admiration. They were evidently dying to
+compare my august features with my portrait, but dared not take the
+liberty of rising. At length the lady's curiosity could hold out no
+longer.</p>
+<p>"<i>Ah, mon Dieu</i>!" she said; "but it must be very fatiguing
+to sit so long in the same position. And to paint.... <i>Oiel!</i>
+what practice! what perseverance! what patience! <i>Avec
+permission</i>, M'sieur..."</p>
+<p>And with this she sidled up to M&uuml;ller's elbow, leaving
+Monsieur Tapotte thunderstruck at her audacity.</p>
+<p>Then for a moment she stood silent; but during that moment the
+eager, apologetic smile vanished suddenly out of her face, and was
+succeeded by an expression of blank disappointment.</p>
+<p>"<i>Tiens</i>!" she said bluntly. "I don't see one bit of
+likeness."</p>
+<p>I turned hot from head to foot, but M&uuml;ller's serene
+effrontery was equal to the occasion.</p>
+<p>"I dare say not, Madame," he replied, coolly. "I dare say not.
+This portrait is not intended to be like."</p>
+<p>Madame Tapotte's eyes and mouth opened simultaneously.</p>
+<p>"<i>Comment</i>!" she exclaimed.</p>
+<p>"I should be extremely sorry," continued M&uuml;ller, loftily,
+"and his lordship would be extremely sorry, if there were too much
+resemblance."</p>
+<p>"But a--a likeness--it seems to me, should at all events
+be--like," stammered Madame Tapotte, utterly bewildered.</p>
+<p>"And if M'sieur is to paint my wife," added Monsieur Tapotte,
+who had by this time joined the group at the easel,
+"I--I...<i>Dame</i>! it must be a good deal more like than
+this."</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller drew himself up with an air of great dignity.</p>
+<p>"Sir," he said, "if Madame does me the honor to sit to me for
+her portrait--for her <i>own</i> portrait, observe--I flatter
+myself the resemblance will be overwhelming. But you must permit me
+to inform you that Milord Smithfield is not sitting for his own
+portrait."</p>
+<p>The Tapottes looked at each other in a state bordering on
+stupefaction.</p>
+<p>"His lordship," continued M&uuml;ller, "is sitting for the
+portrait of one of his illustrious ancestors--a nobleman of the
+period of Queen Elizabeth."</p>
+<p>Tapotte <i>mari</i> scratched his head, and smiled feebly.</p>
+<p>"<i>Parbleu</i>!" said he, "<i>mais c'est bien dr&ocirc;le,
+&ccedil;a</i>!"</p>
+<p>The artist shrugged his shoulders.</p>
+<p>"It so happens," said he, "that his lordship's gallery at
+Smithfield Castle has unhappily been more than half destroyed by
+fire. Two centuries of family portraits reduced to ashes! Terrible
+misfortune! Only one way of repairing the loss--that is of
+partially repairing it. I do my best. I read the family records--I
+study the history of the period--his lordship sits to me daily--I
+endeavor to give a certain amount of family likeness; sometimes
+more, you observe, sometimes less ... enormous responsibility,
+Monsieur Tapotte!"</p>
+<p>"Oh, enormous!"</p>
+<p>"The taste for family portraits," continued M&uuml;ller, still
+touching up the Titian, "is a very natural one--and is on the
+increase. Many gentlemen of--of somewhat recent wealth, come to me
+for their ancestors."</p>
+<p>"No!"</p>
+<p>"<i>Foi d'honneur</i>. Few persons, however, are as
+conscientious as his lordship in the matter of family resemblance.
+They mostly buy up their forefathers ready-made--adopt them,
+christen them, and ask no questions."</p>
+<p>Monsieur and Madame Tapotte exchanged glances.</p>
+<p>"<i>Tiens, mon ami</i>, why should we not have an ancestor or
+two, as well as other folks," suggested the lady, in a very audible
+whisper.</p>
+<p>Monsieur shook his head, and muttered something about the
+expense.</p>
+<br>
+<p>"There is no harm, at all events," urged madame, "in asking the
+price."</p>
+<p>"My charge for gallery portraits, madame, varies from sixty to a
+hundred francs," said M&uuml;ller.</p>
+<p>"Heavens! how dear! Why, my own portrait is to be only
+fifty."</p>
+<p>"Sixty, Madame, if we put in the hands and the jewelry," said
+M&uuml;ller, blandly.</p>
+<p>"<i>Eh bien</i>!--sixty. But for these other things.... bah!
+<i>ils sont fierement chers</i>."</p>
+<p>"<i>Pardon</i>, madame! The elegancies and superfluities of life
+are, by a just rule of political economy, expensive. It is right
+that they should be so; as it is right that the necessaries of life
+should be within the reach of the poorest. Bread, for instance, is
+strictly necessary, and should be cheap. A great-grandfather, on
+the contrary, is an elegant superfluity, and may be put up at a
+high figure."</p>
+<p>"There is some truth in that," murmured Monsieur Tapotte.</p>
+<p>"Besides, in the present instance, one also pays for
+antiquity."</p>
+<p>"<i>C'est juste--C'est juste</i>."</p>
+<p>"At the same time," continued M&uuml;ller, "if Monsieur Tapotte
+were to honor me with a commission for, say, half a dozen family
+portraits, I would endeavor to put them in at forty francs
+apiece--including, at that very low price, a Revolutionary Deputy,
+a beauty of the Louis Quinze period, and a Marshal of France."</p>
+<p>"<i>Tiens</i>! that's a fair offer enough," said madame. "What
+say you, <i>mon ami</i>?"</p>
+<p>But Monsieur Tapotte, being a cautious man, would say nothing
+hastily. He coughed, looked doubtful, declined to commit himself to
+an opinion, and presently drew off into a corner for the purpose of
+holding a whispered consultation with his wife.</p>
+<p>Meanwhile M&uuml;ller laid aside his brushes and palette,
+informed me with a profound bow that my lordship had honored him by
+sitting as long as was strictly necessary, and requested my opinion
+upon the progress of the work.</p>
+<p>I praised it rapturously. You would have thought, to hear me,
+that for drawing, breadth, finish, color, composition, chiaroscuro,
+and every other merit that a painting could possess, this
+particular <i>chef-d'oeuvre</i> excelled all the masterpieces of
+Europe.</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller bowed, and bowed, and bowed, like a Chinaman at a
+visit of ceremony; He was more than proud; he was overwhelmed,
+<i>accabl&eacute;</i>, et caetera, et caetera.</p>
+<p>The Tapottes left off whispering, and listened breathlessly.</p>
+<p>"He is evidently a great painter, <i>not' jeune homme</i>!" said
+Madame in one of her large whispers.</p>
+<p>To which Monsieur replied as audibly:--"<i>&Ccedil;a se voit, ma
+femme--sacre nom d'une pipe</i>!"</p>
+<p>"Milford will do me the favor to sit again on Friday?" said
+M&uuml;ller, as I took up my hat and gloves.</p>
+<p>I replied with infinite condescension that I would endeavor to
+do so. I then made the stiffest of stiff bows to the excellent
+Tapottes, and, ushered to the door by M&uuml;ller, took my
+departure majestically in the character of Lord Smithfield.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXIII."></a>CHAPTER XXIII.</h2>
+<h3>THE QUARTIER LATIN.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>The dear old Quartier Latin of my time--the Quartier Latin of
+Balzac, of B&eacute;ranger, of Henry Murger---the Quartier Latin
+where Franz M&uuml;ller had his studio; where Messieurs Gustave;
+Jules, and Adrien gave their unparalleled <i>soir&eacute;es
+dansantes</i>; where I first met my ex-flame Josephine--exists no
+longer. It has been improved off the face of the earth, and with it
+such a gay bizarre, improvident world of youth and folly as shall
+never again be met together on the banks of the Seine.</p>
+<p>Ah me! how well I remember that dingy, delightful Arcadia--the
+Rue de la Vieille Boucherie, narrow, noisy, crowded, with
+projecting upper stories and Gothic pent-house roofs--the Rue de la
+Parcheminerie, unchanged since the Middle Ages--the Rue St.
+Jacques, steep, interminable, dilapidated; with its dingy cabarets,
+its brasseries, its cheap restaurants, its grimy shop windows
+filled with colored prints, with cooked meats, with tobacco, old
+books, and old clothes; its ancient colleges and hospitals,
+time-worn and weather-beaten, frowning down upon the busy
+thoroughfare and breaking the squalid line of shops; its grim old
+hotels swarming with lodgers, floor above floor, from the cobblers
+in the cellars to the grisettes in the attics! Then again, the
+gloomy old Place St. Michel, its abundant fountain ever flowing,
+ever surrounded by water-carts and water-carriers, by women with
+pails, and bare-footed street urchins, and thirsty drovers drinking
+out of iron cups chained to the wall. And then, too, the Rue de la
+Harpe....</p>
+<p>I close my eyes, and the strange, precipitous, picturesque,
+decrepit old street, with its busy, surging crowd, its
+street-cries, its street-music, and its indescribable union of
+gloom and gayety, rises from its ashes. Here, grand old dilapidated
+mansions with shattered stone-carvings, delicate wrought-iron
+balconies all rust-eaten and broken, and windows in which every
+other pane is cracked or patched, alternate with more modern but
+still more ruinous houses, some leaning this way, some that, some
+with bulging upper stories, some with doorways sunk below the level
+of the pavement. Yonder, gloomy and grim, stands the College of
+Saint Louis. Dark alleys open off here and there from the main
+thoroughfare, and narrow side streets, steep as flights of steps.
+Low sheds and open stalls cling, limpet-like, to every available
+nook and corner. An endless procession of trucks, wagons,
+water-carts, and fiacres rumbles perpetually by. Here people live
+at their windows and in the doorways--the women talking from
+balcony to balcony, the men smoking, reading, playing at dominoes.
+Here too are more caf&eacute;s and cabarets, open-air stalls for
+the sale of fried fish, and cheap restaurants for workmen and
+students, where, for a sum equivalent to sevenpence half-penny
+English, the Quartier Latin regales itself upon meats and drinks of
+dark and enigmatical origin. Close at hand is the Place and College
+of the Sorbonne--silent in the midst of noisy life, solitary in the
+heart of the most crowded quarter of Paris. A sombre medi&aelig;val
+gloom pervades that ancient quadrangle; scant tufts of sickly grass
+grow here and there in the interstices of the pavement; the dust of
+centuries crust those long rows of windows never opened. A little
+further on is the Rue des Gr&egrave;s, narrow, crowded,
+picturesque, one uninterrupted perspective of bookstalls and
+bookshops from end to end. Here the bookseller occasionally pursues
+a two-fold calling, and retails not only literature but a cellar of
+<i>petit vin bleu</i>; and here, overnight, the thirsty student
+exchanges for a bottle of Macon the "Code Civile" that he must
+perforce buy back again at second-hand in the morning.</p>
+<p>A little farther on, and we come to the College Saint Louis,
+once the old College Narbonne; and yet a few yards more, and we are
+at the doors of the Theatre du Pantheon, once upon a time the
+Church of St. B&eacute;noit, where the stage occupies the site of
+the altar, and an orchestra stall in what was once the nave, may be
+had for seventy-five centimes. Here, too, might be seen the shop of
+the immortal Lesage, renowned throughout the Quartier for the
+manufacture of a certain kind of transcendental ham-patty,
+peculiarly beloved by student and grisette; and here, clustering
+within a stone's throw of each other, were to be found those famous
+restaurants, Pompon, Viot, Flicoteaux, and the "Boeuf
+Enrag&eacute;," where, on gala days, many an Alphonse and Fifine,
+many a Th&eacute;ophile and Cerisette, were wont to hold high feast
+and festival--terms sevenpence half-penny each, bread at
+discretion, water gratis, wine and toothpicks extra.</p>
+<p>But it was in the side streets, courts, and <i>impasses</i> that
+branched off to the left and right of the main arteries, that one
+came upon the very heart of the old Pays Latin; for the Rue St.
+Jacques, the Rue de la Harpe, the Rue des Gr&egrave;s, narrow,
+steep, dilapidated though they might be, were in truth the leading
+thoroughfares--the Boulevards, so to speak--of the Student
+Quartier. In most of the side alleys, however, some of which dated
+back as far, and farther, than the fifteenth century, there was no
+footway for passengers, and barely space for one wheeled vehicle at
+a time. A filthy gutter invariably flowed down the middle of the
+street. The pavement, as it peeped out here and there through a
+<i>moraine</i> of superimposed mud and offal, was seen to consist
+of small oblong stones, like petrified kidney potatoes. The houses,
+some leaning this way, some that, with projecting upper stories and
+overhanging gable-roofs, nodded together overhead, leaving but a
+narrow strip of sky down which the sunlight strove in vain to
+struggle. Long poles upon which were suspended old clothes hung out
+to air, and ragged linen to dry, stood out like tattered banners
+from the attic windows. Here, too, every ground-floor was a shop,
+open, unglazed, cavernous, where the dealer lay <i>perdu</i> in the
+gloom of midday, like a spider in the midst of his web, surrounded
+by piles of old bottles, old iron, old clothes, old furniture, or
+whatever else his stock in trade might consist of.</p>
+<p>Of such streets--less like streets, indeed, than narrow,
+overhanging gorges and ravines of damp and mouldering stone--of
+such streets, I say, intricate, winding, ill-lighted, unventilated,
+pervaded by an atmosphere compounded of the fumes of fried fish,
+tobacco, old leather, mildew and dirt, there were hundreds in the
+Quartier Latin of my time:--streets to the last degree unattractive
+as places of human habitation, but rich, nevertheless, in historic
+associations, in picturesque detail, and in archaeological
+interest. Such a street, for instance, was the Rue du Fouarre
+(scarcely a feature of which has been modernized to this day),
+where Dante, when a student of theology in Paris, attended the
+lectures of one Sigebert, a learned monk of Gemblours, who
+discoursed to his scholars in the open air, they sitting round him
+the while upon fresh straw strewn upon the pavement. Such a street
+was the Rue des Cordiers, close adjoining the Rue des Gr&egrave;s,
+where Rousseau lived and wrote; and the Rue du Dragon, where might
+then be seen the house of Bernard Palissy; and the Rue des
+Ma&ccedil;ons, where Racine lived; and the Rue des Marais, where
+Adrienne Lecouvreur--poor, beautiful, generous, ill-fated Adrienne
+Lecouvreur!--died. Here, too, in a blind alley opening off the Rue
+St. Jacques, yet stands part of that Carmelite Convent in which,
+for thirty years, Madame de la Valli&egrave;re expiated the
+solitary frailty of her life. And so at every turn! Not a gloomy
+by-street, not a dilapidated fountain, not a grim old college
+fa&ccedil;ade but had its history, or its legend. Here the voice of
+Abelard thundered new truths, and Rabelais jested, and Petrarch
+discoursed with the doctors. Here, in the Rue de l'Ancienne
+Com&eacute;die, walked the shades of Racine, of Moli&egrave;re, of
+Corneille, of Voltaire. Dear, venerable, immortal old Quartier
+Latin! Thy streets were narrow, but they were the arteries through
+which, century after century, circulated all the wisdom and poetry,
+all the art, and science, and learning of France! Their gloom,
+their squalor, their very dirt was sacred. Could I have had my
+will, not a stone of the old place should have been touched, not a
+pavement widened, not a landmark effaced.</p>
+<p>Then beside, yet not apart from, all that was medi&aelig;val and
+historic in the Pays Latin, ran the gay, effervescent, laughing
+current of the life of the <i>jeunessed' aujour d'hui.</i> Here
+beat the very heart of that rare, that immortal, that unparalleled
+<i>vie de Boh&egrave;me</i>, the vagabond poetry of which possesses
+such an inexhaustible charm for even the soberest imagination. What
+brick and mortar idylls, what romances <i>au cinqui&egrave;me</i>,
+what joyous epithalamiums, what gay improvident
+<i>m&eacute;nages</i>, what kisses, what laughter, what tears, what
+lightly-spoken and lightly-broken vows those old walls could have
+told of!</p>
+<p>Here, apparelled in all sorts of unimaginable tailoring, in
+jaunty colored cap or flapped sombrero, his pipe dangling from his
+button-hole, his hair and beard displaying every eccentricity under
+heaven, the Paris student, the <i>Pays Latiniste pur sang</i>,
+lived and had his being. Poring over the bookstalls in the Place du
+Panth&eacute;on or the Rue des Gr&egrave;s--hurrying along towards
+this or that college with a huge volume under each arm, about nine
+o'clock in the morning--haunting the caf&eacute;s at midday and the
+restaurants at six--swinging his legs out of upper windows and
+smoking in his shirt-sleeves in the summer evenings--crowding the
+pit of the Od&eacute;on and every part of the Theatre du
+Panth&eacute;on--playing wind instruments at dead of night to the
+torment of his neighbors, or, in vocal mood, traversing the
+Quartier with a society of musical friends about the small hours of
+the morning--getting into scuffles with the gendarmes--flirting,
+dancing, playing billiards and the deuce; falling in love and in
+debt; dividing his time between Aristotle and Mademoiselle Mimi
+Pinson ... here, and here only, in all his phases, at every hour of
+the day and night, he swarmed, ubiquitous.</p>
+<p>And here, too (a necessary sequence), flourished the fair and
+frail grisette. Her race, alas! is now all but extinct--the race of
+Fr&eacute;tillon, of Francine, of Lisette, Musette, Rosette, and
+all the rest of that too fascinating terminology--the race
+immortalized again and again by B&eacute;ranger, Gavarni, Balzac,
+De Musset; sketched by a hundred pencils and described by a hundred
+pens; celebrated in all manner of metres and set to all manner of
+melodies; now caricatured and now canonized; now painted wholly
+<i>en noir</i> and now all <i>couleur de rose</i>; yet, however
+often described, however skilfully analyzed, remaining for ever
+indescribable, and for ever defying analysis!</p>
+<p>"De tous les produits Parisiens," says Monsieur Jules Janin
+(himself the quintessence of everything most Parisian), "le produit
+le plus Parisien, sans contredit, c'est la grisette." True; but our
+epigrammatist should have gone a step farther. He should have added
+that the grisette <i>pur sang</i> is to be found nowhere except in
+Paris; and (still a step farther) nowhere in Paris save between the
+Pont Neuf and the Barri&egrave;re d'Enfer. There she reigns; there
+(ah! let me use the delicious present tense--let me believe that I
+still live in Arcadia!)--there she lights up the old streets with
+her smile; makes the old walls ring with her laughter; flits over
+the crossings like a fairy; wears the most coquettish of little
+caps and the daintiest of little shoes; rises to her work with the
+dawn; keeps a pet canary; trains a nasturtium round her window;
+loves as heartily as she laughs, and almost as readily; owes not a
+sou, saves not a centime; sews on Adolphe's buttons, like a good
+neighbor; is never so happy as when Adolphe in return takes her to
+Tivoli or the Jardin Turc; adores <i>galette, sucre d'orge</i>, and
+Frederick Lema&icirc;tre; and looks upon a masked ball and a
+debardeur dress as the summit of human felicity.</p>
+<p><i>Vive la grisette</i>! Shall I not follow many an illustrious
+example and sing my modest paean in her praise? Frown not, august
+Britannia! Look not so severely askance upon my poor little heroine
+of the Quartier Latin! Thinkest thou because thou art so eminently
+virtuous that she who has many a serviceable virtue of her own,
+shall be debarred from her share in this world's cakes and ale?</p>
+<p><i>Vive la grisette</i>! Let us think and speak no evil of her.
+"Elle ne tient au vice que par un rayon, et s'en &eacute;loigne par
+les mille autres points de la circonference sociale." The world
+sees only her follies, and sees them at first sight; her good
+qualities lie hidden in the shade. Is she not busy as a bee, joyous
+as a lark, helpful, pitiful, unselfish, industrious, contented? How
+often has she not slipped her last coin into the alms-box at the
+hospital gate, and gone supperless to bed? How often sat up all
+night, after a long day's toil in a crowded work-room, to nurse
+Victorine in the fever? How often pawned her Sunday gown and shawl,
+to redeem that coat without which Adolphe cannot appear before the
+examiners to-morrow morning? Granted, if you will, that she has an
+insatiable appetite for sweets, cigarettes, and theatrical
+admissions--shall she not be welcome to her tastes? And is it her
+fault if her capacity in the way of miscellaneous refreshments
+partakes of the nature of the miraculous--somewhat to the
+inconvenience of Adolphe, who has overspent his allowance?
+Supposing even that she may now and then indulge (among friends) in
+a very modified can-can at the Chaumi&egrave;re--what does that
+prove, except that her heels are as light as her heart, and that
+her early education has been somewhat neglected?</p>
+<p>But I am writing of a world that has vanished as completely as
+the lost Pleiad. The Quartier Latin of my time is no more. The
+Chaumi&egrave;re is no more. The grisette is fast dying out. Of the
+Rue de la Harpe not a recognisable feature is left. The old Place
+St. Michel, the fountain, the Theatre du Panth&eacute;on, are gone
+as if they had never been. Whole streets, I might say whole
+parishes, have been swept away--whole chapters of medi&aelig;val
+history erased for ever.</p>
+<p>Well, I love to close my eyes from time to time, and evoke the
+dear old haunts from their ruins; to descend once more the perilous
+steeps of the Rue St. Jacques, and to thread the labyrinthine
+by-streets that surround the &Eacute;cole de M&eacute;decine. I see
+them all so plainly! I look in at the familiar print-shops--I meet
+many a long-forgotten face--I hear many a long-forgotten voice--I
+am twenty years of age and a student again!</p>
+<p>Ah me! what a pleasant time, and what a land of enchantment!
+Dingy, dilapidated, decrepit as it was, that graceless old Quartier
+Latin, believe me, was paved with roses and lighted with laughing
+gas.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXIV."></a>CHAPTER XXIV.</h2>
+<h3>THE FETE AT COURBEVOIE.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>"<i>Halte l&agrave;</i>! I thought I should catch you about this
+time! They've been giving you unconscionable good measure to-day,
+though, haven't they? I thought Bollinet's lecture was always over
+by three; and here I've been moralizing on the flight of Time for
+more than twenty minutes."</p>
+<p>So saying, M&uuml;ller, having stopped me as I was coming down
+the steps of the H&ocirc;tel Dieu, linked his arm in mine, drew me
+into a shady angle under the lee of Notre Dame, and, without
+leaving me time to reply, went on pouring out his light, eager
+chatter as readily as a mountain-spring bubbles out its waters.</p>
+<p>"I thought you'd like to know about the Tapottes, you see--and I
+was dying to tell you. I went to your rooms last night between
+eight and nine, and you were out; so I thought the only sure way
+was to come here--I know you never miss Bollinet's Lectures. Well,
+as I was saying, the Tapottes.... Oh, <i>mon cher</i>! I am your
+debtor for life in that matter of Milord Smithfield. It has been
+the making of me. What do you think? Tapotte is not only going to
+sit for a companion half-length to Madame's portrait, but he has
+given me a commission for half-a-dozen ancestors.
+Fancy--half-a-dozen illustrious dead-and-done Tapottes! What a
+scope for the imagination! What a bewildering vista of <i>billets
+de banque</i>! I feel--ah, <i>mon ami</i>! I feel that the wildest
+visions of my youth are about to be realized, and that I shall see
+my tailor's bill receipted before I die!"</p>
+<p>"I'm delighted," said I, "that Tapotte has turned up a trump
+card."</p>
+<p>"A trump card? Say a California--a Pactolus--a Golden Calf. Nay,
+hath not Tapotte two golden calves? Is he not of the precious metal
+all compact? Stands he not, in the amiable ripeness of his years, a
+living representative of the Golden Age? <i>'O bella et&agrave;
+dell' oro</i>!'"</p>
+<p>And to my horror, he then and there executed a frantic <i>pas
+seul</i>.</p>
+<p>"Gracious powers!" I exclaimed. "Are you mad?"</p>
+<p>"Yes--raving mad. Have you any objection?"</p>
+<p>"But, my dear fellow--in the face of day--in the streets of
+Paris! We shall get taken up by the police!"</p>
+<p>"Then suppose we get out of the streets of Paris? I'm tired
+enough, Heaven knows, of cultivating the arid soil of the
+Pav&eacute;. See, it's a glorious afternoon. Let's go
+somewhere."</p>
+<p>"With all my heart. Where?"</p>
+<p>"<i>Ah, mon Dieu! &ccedil;a m'est &eacute;gal</i>.
+Enghien--Vincennes--St. Cloud--Versailles ... anywhere you like.
+Most probably there's a f&ecirc;te going on somewhere, if we only
+knew where,"</p>
+<p>"Can't we find out?"</p>
+<p>"Oh, yes--we can drop into a Caf&eacute; and look at the
+<i>Petites Affiches</i>; only that entails an absinthe; or we can
+go into the nearest Omnibus Bureau and see the notices on the
+walls, which will be cheaper."</p>
+<p>So we threaded our way along the narrow thoroughfares of the Ile
+de la Cit&eacute;, and came presently to an Omnibus Bureau on the
+Quai de l'Horloge, overlooking the Pont Neuf and the river. Here
+the first thing we saw was a flaming placard setting forth the
+pleasures and attractions of the great annual f&ecirc;te at
+Courbevoie; a village on the banks of the Seine, a mile or two
+beyond Neuilly.</p>
+<p>"<i>Voil&agrave;, notre affaire</i>!" said M&uuml;ller, gaily.
+"We can't do better than steer straight for Courbevoie."</p>
+<p>Saying which, he hailed a passing fiacre and bade the coachman
+drive to the Embarcad&egrave;re of the Rive Droite.</p>
+<p>"We shall amuse ourselves famously at Courbevoie," he said, as
+we rattled over the stones. "We'll dine at the Toison d'Or--an
+excellent little restaurant overlooking the river; and if you're
+fond of angling, we can hire a punt and catch our own fish for
+dinner. Then there will be plenty of fiddling and dancing at the
+guingettes and gardens in the evening. By the way, though, I've no
+money! That is to say, none worth speaking
+of--<i>voil&agrave;!</i>... one franc, one piece of fifty centimes,
+another of twenty centimes, and some sous. I hope your pockets are
+better lined than mine."</p>
+<p>"Not much, I fear," I replied, pulling out my porte-monnaie, and
+emptying the contents into my hand. They amounted to nine francs
+and seventy-five centimes.</p>
+<p>"<i>Parbleu</i>! we've just eleven francs and a half between
+us," said M&uuml;ller. "A modest sum-total; but we must make it as
+elastic as we can. Let me see, there'll be a franc for the fiacre,
+four francs for our return tickets, four for our dinner, and two
+and a half to spend as we like in the fair. Well, we can't commit
+any great extravagance with that amount of floating capital."</p>
+<p>"Better turn back and go to my rooms for some more money?" I
+exclaimed. "I've two Napoleons in my desk."</p>
+<p>"No, no--we should miss the three-fifty train, and not get
+another till between five and six."</p>
+<p>"But we shall have no fun if we have no money!"</p>
+<p>"I dissent entirely from that proposition, Monsieur Englishman.
+I have always had plenty of fun, and I have been short of cash
+since the hour of my birth. Come, it shall be my proud task to-day
+to prove to you the pleasures of impecuniosity!"</p>
+<p>So with our eleven francs and a half we went on to the station,
+and took our places for Courbevoie.</p>
+<p>We travelled, of course, by third class in the open wagons; and
+it so happened that in our compartment we had the company of three
+pretty little chattering grisettes, a fat countrywoman with a
+basket, and a quiet-looking elderly female with her niece. These
+last wore bonnets, and some kind of slight mourning. They belonged
+evidently to the small bourgeoise class, and sat very quietly in
+the corner of the carriage, speaking to no one. The three
+grisettes, however, kept up an incessant fire of small talk and
+squabble.</p>
+<p>"I was on this very line last Sunday," said one. "I went with
+Julie to Asni&egrave;res, and we were so gay! I wonder if it will
+be very gay at Courbevoie."</p>
+<p>"<i>Je m'en doute</i>," replied another, whom they called
+Lolotte. "I came to one of the Courbevoie f&ecirc;tes last spring,
+and it was not gay at all. But then, to be sure, I was with
+Edouard, and he is as dull as the first day in Lent. Where were you
+last Sunday, Ad&eacute;le?"</p>
+<p>"I did not go beyond the barriers. I went to the Cirque with my
+cousin, and we dined in the Palais Royal. We enjoyed ourselves so
+much! You know my cousin?"</p>
+<p>"Ah! yes--the little fellow with the curly hair and the
+whiskers, who waits for you at the corner when we leave the
+workshop."</p>
+<p>"The same--Achille."</p>
+<p>"Your Achille is nice-looking," said Mademoiselle Lolotte, with
+a somewhat critical air. "It is a pity he squints."</p>
+<p>"He does not squint, mam'selle."</p>
+<p>"Oh, <i>ma ch&egrave;re</i>! I appeal to Caroline."</p>
+<p>"I am not sure that he actually squints," said Mam'selle
+Caroline, speaking for the first time; "but he certainly has one
+eye larger than the other, and of quite a different color."</p>
+<p>"<i>Tiens</i>, Caroline--it seems to me that you look very
+closely into the eyes of young men," exclaims Ad&egrave;le, turning
+sharply upon this new assailant.</p>
+<p>"At all events you admit that Caroline is right," cries Lolotte,
+triumphantly.</p>
+<p>"I admit nothing of the kind. I say that you are both very
+ill-natured, and that you say what is not true. As for you,
+Lolotte, I don't believe you ever had the chance of seeing a young
+man's eyes turned upon you, or you would not be so pleased with the
+attentions of an old one."</p>
+<p>"An <i>old</i> one!" shrieked Mam'selle Lolotte. "Ah, <i>mon
+Dieu</i>! Is a man old at forty-seven? Monsieur Durand is in the
+prime of life, and there isn't a girl in the Quartier who would not
+be proud of his attentions!"</p>
+<p>"He's sixty, if an hour," said the injured Ad&egrave;le. "And as
+for you, Caroline, who have never had a beau in your life...."</p>
+<p>"<i>Ciel</i>! what a calumny!--I--never had a ... Holy Saint
+Genevi&egrave;ve! why, it was only last Thursday week...."</p>
+<p>Here the train stopped at the Asni&egrave;res station, and two
+privates of the Garde Imp&eacute;riale got into the carriage. The
+horizon cleared as if by magic. The grisettes suddenly forgot their
+differences, and began to chat quite amicably. The soldiers twirled
+their mustachios, listened, smiled, and essayed to join in the
+conversation. In a few minutes all was mirth and flirtation.</p>
+<p>Meanwhile M&uuml;ller was casting admiring glances on the young
+girl in the corner, whilst the fat countrywoman, pursing up her
+mouth, and watching the grisettes and soldiers, looked the image of
+offended virtue.</p>
+<p>"Dame! Madame," she said, addressing herself to the old lady in
+the bonnet, "girls usen't to be so forward in the days when you and
+I were young!"</p>
+<p>To which the old lady in the bonnet, blandly smiling,
+replied:--</p>
+<p>"Beautiful, for the time of year."</p>
+<p>"Eh? For the time of year? Dame! I don't see that the time of
+year has anything to do with it," exclaimed the fat
+countrywoman.</p>
+<p>Here the young girl in the corner, blushing and smiling very
+sweetly, interposed with--"Pardon, Madame--my aunt is somewhat
+deaf. Pray, excuse her."</p>
+<p>Whereupon the old lady, watching the motion of her niece's lips,
+added--</p>
+<p>"Ah, yes--yes! I am a poor, deaf old woman--I don't understand
+what you say. Talk to my little Marie, here--she can answer
+you."</p>
+<p>"I, for one, desire nothing better than permission to talk to
+Mademoiselle," said M&uuml;ller, gallantly.</p>
+<p><i>"Mais, Monsieur</i>..."</p>
+<p>"Mademoiselle, with Madame her aunt, are going to the f&ecirc;te
+at Courbevoie?"</p>
+<p>"Yes, Monsieur."</p>
+<p>"The river is very pretty thereabouts, and the walks through the
+meadows are delightful."</p>
+<p>"Indeed, Monsieur!"</p>
+<p>"Mademoiselle does not know the place?"</p>
+<p>"No, Monsieur."</p>
+<p>"Ah, if I might only be permitted to act as guide! I know every
+foot of the ground about Courbevoie."</p>
+<p>Mademoiselle Marie blushed again, looked down, and made no
+reply.</p>
+<p>"I am a painter," continued M&uuml;ller; "and I have sketched
+all the windings of the Seine from Neuilly to St. Germains. My
+friend here is English--he is a student of medicine, and speaks
+excellent French."</p>
+<p>"What is the gentleman saying, <i>mon enfant</i>?" asked the old
+lady, somewhat anxiously.</p>
+<p>"Monsieur says that the river is very pretty about Courbevoie,
+<i>ma tante</i>," replied Mademoiselle Marie, raising her
+voice.</p>
+<p>"Ah! ah! and what else?"</p>
+<p>"Monsieur is a painter."</p>
+<p>"A painter? Ah, dear me! it's an unhealthy occupation. My poor
+brother Pierre might have been alive to this day if he had taken to
+any other line of business! You must take great care of your lungs,
+young man. You look delicate."</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller laughed, shook his head, and declared at the top of
+his voice that he had never had a day's illness in his life.</p>
+<p>Here the pretty niece again interposed.</p>
+<p>"Ah, Monsieur," she said, "my aunt does not understand....My--my
+uncle Pierre was a house-painter."</p>
+<p>"A very respectable occupation, Mademoiselle," replied
+M&uuml;ller, politely. "For my own part, I would sooner paint the
+insides of some houses than the outsides of some people."</p>
+<p>At this moment the train began to slacken pace, and the steam
+was let off with a demoniac shriek.</p>
+<p>"<i>Tiens, mon enfant</i>," said the old lady, turning towards
+her niece with affectionate anxiety. "I hope you have not taken
+cold."</p>
+<p>The excellent soul believed that it was Mademoiselle Marie who
+sneezed.</p>
+<p>And now the train had stopped--the porters were running along
+the platform, shouting "Courbevoie! Courbevoie!"--the passengers
+were scrambling out <i>en masse</i>--and beyond the barrier one saw
+a confused crowd of <i>charrette</i> and omnibus-drivers, touters,
+fruit-sellers, and idlers of every description. M&uuml;ller handed
+out the old lady and the niece; the fat countrywoman scrambled up
+into a kind of tumbril driven by a boy in <i>sabots</i>; the
+grisettes and soldiers walked off together; and the tide of
+holiday-makers, some on foot, some in hired vehicles, set towards
+the village. In the meanwhile, what with the crowd on the platform
+and the crowd outside the barrier, and what with the hustling and
+pushing at the point where the tickets were taken, we lost sight of
+the old lady and her niece.</p>
+<p>"What the deuce has become of <i>ma tante</i>?" exclaimed
+M&uuml;ller, looking round.</p>
+<p>But neither <i>ma tante</i> nor Mademoiselle Marie were anywhere
+to be seen. I suggested that they must have gone on in the omnibus
+or taken a <i>charrette</i>, and so have passed us unperceived.</p>
+<p>"And, after all," I added, "we didn't want to enter upon an
+indissoluble union with them for the rest of the day. <i>Ma
+tante's</i> deafness is not entertaining, and <i>la petite</i>
+Marie has nothing to say."</p>
+<p>"<i>La petite</i> Marie is uncommonly pretty, though," said
+M&uuml;ller. "I mean to dance a quadrille with her by-and-by, I
+promise you."</p>
+<p>"<i>A la bonne heure</i>! We shall be sure to chance upon them
+again before long."</p>
+<p>We had come by this time to a group of pretty villa-residences
+with high garden walls and little shady side-lanes leading down to
+the river. Then came a church and more houses; then an open Place;
+and suddenly we found ourselves in the midst of the fair.</p>
+<p>It was just like any other of the hundred and one f&ecirc;tes
+that take place every summer in the environs of Paris. There was a
+merry-go-round and a greasy pole; there was a juggler who swallowed
+knives and ribbons; there were fortune-tellers without number;
+there were dining-booths, and drinking-booths, and dancing-booths;
+there were acrobats, organ-boys with monkeys, and Savoyards with
+white mice; there were stalls for the sale of cakes, fruit,
+sweetmeats, toys, combs, cheap jewelry, glass, crockery, boots and
+shoes, holy-water vessels, rosaries, medals, and little colored
+prints of saints and martyrs; there were brass bands, and string
+bands, and ballad-singers everywhere; and there was an atmosphere
+compounded of dust, tobacco-smoke, onions, musk, and every
+objectionable perfume under heaven.</p>
+<p>"Dine at the Restaurant de l'Empire, Messieurs," shouted a
+shabby touter in a blouse, thrusting a greasy card into our faces.
+"Three dishes, a dessert, a half-bottle, and a band of music, for
+one franc-fifty. The cheapest dinner in the fair!"</p>
+<p>"The cheapest dinner in the fair is at the Belle Gabrielle!"
+cried another. "We'll give you for the same money soup, fish, two
+dishes, a dessert, a half-bottle, and take your photograph into the
+bargain!"</p>
+<p>"Bravo! <i>mon vieux</i>--you first poison them with your
+dinner, and then provide photographs for the widows and children,"
+retorts touter number one. "That's justice, anyhow."</p>
+<p>Whereupon touter number two shrieks out a torrent of abuse, and
+we push on, leaving them to settle their differences after their
+own fashion.</p>
+<p>At the next booth we are accosted by a burly fellow daubed to
+the eyes with red and blue paint, and dressed as an Indian
+chief.</p>
+<p>"<i>Entrez, entrez, Messieurs et Mesdames</i>" he cries,
+flourishing a war-spear some nine feet in length. "Come and see the
+wonderful Peruvian maiden of Tanjore, with webbed fingers and toes,
+her mouth in the back of her head, and her eyes in the soles of her
+feet! Only four sous each, and an opportunity that will never occur
+again!"</p>
+<p>"Only fifty centimes!" shouts another public orator; "the most
+ingenious little machine ever invented! Goes into the waistcoat
+pocket--is wound up every twenty-four hours--tells the day of the
+month, the day of the year, the age of the moon, the state of the
+Bourse, the bank rate of discount, the quarter from which the wind
+is blowing, the price of new-laid eggs in Paris and the provinces,
+the rate of mortality in the Fee-jee islands, and the state of your
+sweetheart's affections!"</p>
+<p>A little further on, by dint of much elbowing, we made our way
+into a crowded booth where, for the modest consideration of two
+sous per head, might be seen a Boneless Youth and an Ashantee King.
+The performances were half over when we went in. The Boneless Youth
+had gone through his feats of agility, and was lying on a mat in a
+corner of the stage, the picture of limp incapability. The Ashantee
+monarch was just about to make his appearance. Meanwhile, a little
+man in fleshings and a cocked hat addressed the audience.</p>
+<p>"Messieurs and Mesdames--I have the honor to announce that
+Caraba Radokala, King of Ashantee, will next appear before you.
+This terrific native sovereign was taken captive by that famous
+Dutch navigator, the Mynheer Van Dunk, in his last voyage round the
+globe. Van Dunk, having brought his prisoner to Europe in an iron
+cage, sold him to the English government in 1840; who sold him
+again to Milord Barnum, the great American philanthropist, in 1842;
+who sold him again to Franconi of the Cirque Olympique; who finally
+sold him to me. At the time of his capture, Caraba Radokala was the
+most treacherous, barbarous, and sanguinary monster upon record. He
+had three hundred and sixty-five wives--a wife, you observe, for
+every day in the year. He lived exclusively upon human flesh, and
+consumed, when in good health, one baby per diem. His palace in
+Ashantee was built entirely of the skulls and leg-bones of his
+victims. He is now, however, much less ferocious; and, though he
+feeds on live pigeons, rabbits, dogs, mice, and the like, he has
+not tasted human flesh since his captivity. He is also heavily
+ironed. The distinguished company need therefore entertain no
+apprehensions. Pierre--draw the bolt, and let his majesty
+loose!"</p>
+<p>A savage roar was now heard, followed by a rattling of chains.
+Then the curtains were suddenly drawn back, and the Ashantee
+king--crowned with a feather head-dress, loaded with red and blue
+war-paint, and chained from ankle to ankle--bounded on the
+stage.</p>
+<p>Seeing the audience before him, he uttered a terrific howl. The
+front rows were visibly agitated. Several young women faintly
+screamed.</p>
+<p>The little man in the cocked hat rushed to the front, protesting
+that the ladies had no reason to be alarmed. Caraba Radokala, if
+not wantonly provoked, was now quite harmless--a little irritable,
+perhaps, from being waked too suddenly--would be as gentle as a
+lamb, if given something to eat:--"Pierre, quiet his majesty with a
+pigeon!"</p>
+<p>Pierre, a lank lad in motley, hereupon appeared with a live
+pigeon, which immediately escaped from his hands and perched on the
+top of the proscenium. Caraba Radokala yelled; the little man in
+the cocked hat raved; and Pierre, in default of more pigeons,
+contritely reappeared with a lump of raw beef, into which his
+majesty ravenously dug his royal teeth. The pigeon, meanwhile,
+dressed its feathers and looked complacently down, as if used to
+the incident.</p>
+<p>"Having fed, Caraba Radokala will now be quite gentle and
+good-humored," said the showman. "If any lady desires to shake
+hands with him, she may do so with perfect safety. Will any lady
+embrace the opportunity?"</p>
+<p>A faint sound of tittering was heard in various parts of the
+booth; but no one came forward.</p>
+<p>"Will <i>no</i> lady be persuaded? Well, then, is there any
+gentleman present who speaks Ashantee?"</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller gave me a dig with his elbow, and started to his
+feet.</p>
+<p>"Yes," he replied, loudly. "I do."</p>
+<p>Every head was instantly turned in our direction.</p>
+<p>The showman collapsed with astonishment. Even the captive,
+despite his ignorance of the French tongue, looked considerably
+startled.</p>
+<p>"<i>Comment</i>!" stammered the cocked hat. "Monsieur speaks
+Ashantee?"</p>
+<p>"Fluently."</p>
+<p>"Is it permitted to inquire how and when monsieur acquired this
+very unusual accomplishment?"</p>
+<p>"I have spoken Ashantee from my infancy," replied M&uuml;ller,
+with admirable aplomb. "I was born at sea, brought up in an
+undiscovered island, twice kidnapped by hostile tribes before
+attaining the age of ten years, and have lived among savage nations
+all my life."</p>
+<p>A murmur of admiration ran through the audience, and M&uuml;ller
+became, for the time, an object of livelier interest than Caraba
+Radokala himself. Seeing this, the indignant monarch executed a
+warlike <i>pas</i>, and rattled his chains fiercely.</p>
+<p>"In that case, monsieur, you had better come upon the stage, and
+speak to his majesty," said the showman reluctantly.</p>
+<p>"With all the pleasure in life."</p>
+<p>"But I warn you that his temper is uncertain."</p>
+<p>"Bah!" said M&uuml;ller, working his way round through the
+crowd, "I'm not afraid of his temper."</p>
+<p>"As monsieur pleases--but, if monsieur offends him, <i>I</i>
+will not be answerable for the consequences."</p>
+<p>"All right--give us a hand up, <i>mon vieux</i>!" And Muller,
+having clambered upon the stage, made a bow to the audience and a
+salaam to his majesty.</p>
+<p>"Chickahominy chowdar bang," said he, by way of opening the
+conversation.</p>
+<p>The ex-king of Ashantee scowled, folded his arms, and maintained
+a haughty silence.</p>
+<p>"Hic hac horum, high cockalorum," continued M&uuml;ller, with
+exceeding suavity.</p>
+<p>The captive monarch stamped impatiently, ground his teeth, but
+still made no reply.</p>
+<p>"Monsieur had better not aggravate him," said the showman. "On
+the contrary--I am overwhelming him with civilities Now observe--I
+condole with him upon his melancholy position. I inquire after his
+wives and children; and I remark how uncommonly well he is
+looking."</p>
+<p>And with this, he made another salaam, smiled persuasively, and
+said--</p>
+<p>"Alpha, beta, gamma, delta--chin-chin--Potz
+tausend!--Erin-go-bragh!"</p>
+<p>"Borriobooloobah!" shrieked his majesty, apparently stung to
+desperation.</p>
+<p>"Rocofoco!" retorted M&uuml;ller promptly.</p>
+<p>But as if this last was more than any Ashantee temper could
+bear, Caraba Rodokala clenched both his fists, set his teeth hard,
+and charged down upon M&uuml;ller like a wild elephant. Being met,
+however, by a well-planted blow between the eyes, he went down like
+a ninepin--picked himself up,--rushed in again, and, being forcibly
+seized and held back by the cocked hat, Pierre of the pigeons, and
+a third man who came tumbling up precipitately from somewhere
+behind the stage, vented his fury, in a torrent of very highly
+civilized French oaths.</p>
+<p>"Eh, <i>sacredieu</i>!" he cried, shaking his fist in
+M&uuml;ller's face, "I've not done with you yet, <i>diable de
+gal&eacute;rien</i>!"</p>
+<p>Whereupon there burst forth a general roar--a roar like the
+"inextinguishable laughter" of Olympus.</p>
+<p>"<i>Tiens</i>!" said M&uuml;ller, "his majesty speaks French
+almost as well as I speak Ashantee!"</p>
+<p>"<i>Bourreau! Brigand! Assassin</i>!" shrieked his Ferocity, as
+his friends hustled him off the stage.</p>
+<p>The curtains then fell together again; and the audience, still
+laughing vociferously, dispersed with cries of "Vive Caraba
+Rodokala!" "Kind remembrances to the Queens of Ashantee!" "What's
+the latest news from home?" "Borriobooloo-bah--ah--ah!"</p>
+<p>Elbowing our way out with the crowd, we now plunged once more
+into the press of the fair. Here our old friends the dancing dogs
+of the Champs Elys&eacute;es, and the familiar charlatan of the
+Place du Ch&acirc;telet with his chariot and barrel-organ,
+transported us from Ashantee to Paris. Next we came to a temporary
+shooting-gallery, adorned over the entrance with a spirited cartoon
+of a Tyrolean sharpshooter; and then to an exhibition of
+cosmoramas; and presently to a weighing machine, in which a great,
+rosy-cheeked, laughing Normandy peasant girl, with her high cap,
+blue skirt, massive gold cross and heavy ear-rings, was in the act
+of being weighed.</p>
+<p>"<i>Tiens! Mam'selle est joliment solide</i>!" remarks a saucy
+bystander, as the owner of the machine piles on weight after
+weight.</p>
+<p>"Perhaps if I had no more brains than m'sieur, I should weigh as
+light!" retorts the damsel, with a toss of her high cap.</p>
+<p>"<i>Pardon</i>! it is not a question of brains--it is a question
+of hearts," interposes an elderly exquisite in a white hat.
+"Mam'selle has captured so many that she is completely over
+weighted."</p>
+<p>"Twelve stone six ounces," pronounces the owner of the machine,
+adjusting the last weight.</p>
+<p>Whereupon there is a burst of ironical applause, and the big
+<i>paysanne</i>, half laughing, half angry, walks off, exclaiming,
+"<i>Eh bien! tant mieux</i>! I've no mind to be a
+scarecrow--<i>moi</i>!"</p>
+<p>By this time we have both had enough of the fair, and are glad
+to make our way out of the crowd and down to the riverside. Here we
+find lovers strolling in pairs along the towing-path; family groups
+pic-nicking in the shade; boats and punts for hire, and a
+swimming-match just coming off, of which all that is visible are
+two black heads bobbing up and down along the middle of the
+stream.</p>
+<p>"And now, <i>mon ami</i>, what do you vote for?" asks
+M&uuml;ller. "Boating or fishing? or both? or neither?"</p>
+<p>"Both, if you like--but I never caught anything in my life,"</p>
+<p>"The pleasure of fishing, I take it," says M&uuml;ller, "is not
+in the fish you catch, but in the fish you miss. The fish you catch
+is a poor little wretch, worth neither the trouble of landing,
+cooking, nor eating; but the fish you miss is always the finest
+fellow you ever saw in your life!"</p>
+<p>"<i>Allons donc</i>! I know, then, which of us two will have
+most of the pleasure to-day," I reply, laughing. "But how about the
+expense?"</p>
+<p>To which M&uuml;ller, with a noble recklessness, answers:--</p>
+<p>"Oh, hang the expense! Here, boatman! a boat <i>&agrave; quatre
+rames</i>, and some fishing-tackle--by the hour."</p>
+<p>Now it was undoubtedly a fine sentiment this of M&uuml;ller's,
+and had we but fetched my two Napoleons before starting, I should
+have applauded it to the echo; but when I considered that something
+very nearly approaching to a franc had already filtered out of our
+pockets in passing through the fair, and that the hour of dinner
+was looming somewhat indefinitely in the distance, I confess that
+my soul became disquieted within me.</p>
+<p>"Don't forget, for heaven's sake," I said, "that we must keep
+something for dinner!"</p>
+<p>"My dear fellow," he replied, "I have already a tremendous
+appetite for dinner--that <i>is</i> something."</p>
+<p>After this, I resigned myself to whatever might happen.</p>
+<p>We then rowed up the river for about a mile beyond Courbevoie.
+moored our boat to a friendly willow, put our fishing-tackle
+together, and composed ourselves for the gentle excitement that
+waits upon the gudgeon and the minnow.</p>
+<p>"I haven't yet had a single nibble," said M&uuml;ller, when we
+had been sitting to our work for something less than ten
+minutes.</p>
+<p>"Hush!" I said. "You mustn't speak, you know."</p>
+<p>"True--I had forgotten. I'll sing instead. Fishes, I have been
+told, are fond of music.</p>
+<blockquote>'Fanfan, je vous aimerais bien;<br>
+&nbsp;&nbsp;Contre vous je n'ai nul caprice;<br>
+Vous &ecirc;tes gentil, j'en convien....'"</blockquote>
+<p>"Come, now!" I exclaimed pettishly, "this is really too bad. I
+had a bite--a most decided bite--and if you had only kept
+quiet"....</p>
+<p>"Nonsense, my dear fellow! I tell you again--and I have it on
+the best authority--fishes like music. Did you never hear of Arion!
+Have you forgotten about the Syrens? Believe me, your gudgeon
+nibbled because I sang him to the surface--just as the snakes come
+out for the song of the snake-charmer. I'll try again!"</p>
+<p>And with this he began:--</p>
+<blockquote>"Jeannette est une brune<br>
+&nbsp;&nbsp;Qui demeure &agrave; Pantin,<br>
+O&ugrave; toute sa fortune<br>
+&nbsp;&nbsp;Est un petit jardin!"</blockquote>
+<p>"Well, if you go on like that, all I have to say is, that not a
+fish will come within half a mile of our bait," said I, with
+tranquil despair.</p>
+<p>"Alas! <i>mon cher</i>, I am grieved to observe in your
+otherwise estimable character, a melancholy want of faith," replied
+M&uuml;ller "Without faith, what is friendship? What is angling?
+What is matrimony? Now, I tell you that with regard to the finny
+tribe, the more I charm them, the more enthusiastically they will
+flock to be caught. We shall have a miraculous draught in a few
+minutes, if you are but patient."</p>
+<p>And then he began again:--</p>
+<blockquote>"Mimi Pinson est une blonde,<br>
+&nbsp;&nbsp;Une blonde que l'on conna&icirc;t.<br>
+Elle n'a qu'une robe au monde,<br>
+&nbsp;&nbsp;Landerirette!<br>
+Et qu'un bonnet."</blockquote>
+<p>I laid aside my rod, folded my arms, and when he had done,
+applauded ironically.</p>
+<p>"Very good," I said. "I understand the situation. We are here,
+at some--indeed, I may say, considering the state of our exchequer,
+at a considerable mutual expense; not to catch fish, but to afford
+Herr M&uuml;ller an opportunity of exercising his extensive memory,
+and his limited baritone voice. The entertainment is not without
+its <i>agr&eacute;ments</i>, but I find it dear at the price."</p>
+<p>"<i>Tiens</i>, Arbuthnot! let us fish seriously. I promise not
+to open my lips again till you have caught something."</p>
+<p>"Then, seriously, I believe you would have to be silent the
+whole night, and all I should catch would be the rheumatism. I am
+the worst angler in the world, and the most unlucky."</p>
+<p>"Really and truly?"</p>
+<p>"Really and truly. And you?"</p>
+<p>"As bad as yourself. If a tolerably large and energetic fish did
+me the honor to swallow my bait, the probability is that he would
+catch me. I certainly shouldn't know what to do with him."</p>
+<p>"Then the present question is--what shall we do with
+ourselves?"</p>
+<p>"I vote that we row up as far as yonder bend in the river, just
+to see what lies beyond; and then back to Courbevoie."</p>
+<p>"Heaven only grant that by that time we shall have enough money
+left for dinner!" I murmured with a sigh.</p>
+<p>We rowed up the river as far as the first bend, a distance of
+about half a mile; and then we rowed on as far as the next bend.
+Then we turned, and, resting on our oars, drifted slowly back with
+the current. The evening was indescribably brilliant and serene.
+The sky was cloudless, of a greenish blue, and full of light. The
+river was clear as glass. We could see the flaccid water-weeds
+swaying languidly with the current far below, and now and then a
+shoal of tiny fish shooting along half-way between the weeds and
+the surface. A rich fringe of purple iris, spear-leaved
+sagittarius, and tufted meadow-sweet (each blossom a bouquet on a
+slender thyrsus) bordered the towing-path and filled the air with
+perfume. Here the meadows lay open to the water's edge; a little
+farther on, they were shut off by a close rampart of poplars and
+willows whose leaves, already yellowed by autumn, were now fiery in
+the sunset. Joyous bands of gnats, like wild little intoxicated
+maenads, circled and hummed about our heads as we drifted slowly
+on; while, far away and mellowed by distance, we heard the brazen
+music of the fair.</p>
+<p>We were both silent. M&uuml;ller pulled out a small sketch-book
+and made a rapid study of the scene--the reach in the river; the
+wooded banks; the green flats traversed by long lines of stunted
+pollards; the church-tops and roofs of Courbevoie beyond.</p>
+<p>Presently a soft voice, singing, broke upon the silence.
+M&uuml;ller stopped involuntarily, pencil in hand. I held my
+breath, and listened. The tune was flowing and sweet; and as our
+boat drifted on, the words of the singer became audible.</p>
+<blockquote>"O miroir ondoyant!<br>
+Je r&egrave;ve en te voyant<br>
+Harmonie et lumi&egrave;re,<br>
+&nbsp;&nbsp;O ma rivi&egrave;re,<br>
+O ma belle rivi&egrave;re!<br>
+<br>
+"On voit se r&eacute;fl&eacute;chir<br>
+Dans ses eaux les nuages;<br>
+Elle semble dormir<br>
+Entre les p&acirc;turages<br>
+<br>
+O&ugrave; paissent les grands boeufs<br>
+Et les grasses genisses.<br>
+Au p&acirc;tres amoureux<br>
+Que ses bords sont propices!"</blockquote>
+<p>"A woman's voice," said M&uuml;ller. "Dupont's words and music.
+She must be young and pretty ... where has she hidden herself?"</p>
+<p>The unseen singer, meanwhile, went on with another verse.</p>
+<blockquote>"Pr&egrave;s des iris du bord,<br>
+Sous une berge haute,<br>
+La carpe aux reflets d'or<br>
+O&ugrave; le barbeau ressaute,<br>
+Les goujons font le guet,<br>
+L'Ablette qui scintille<br>
+Fuit le dent du brochet;<br>
+Au fond rampe l'anguille!<br>
+<br>
+"O miroir ondoyant!<br>
+Je r&egrave;ve en te voyant<br>
+Harmonic et lumi&egrave;re,<br>
+&nbsp;&nbsp;O ma rivi&egrave;re,<br>
+O ma belle rivi&egrave;re!"</blockquote>
+<p>"Look!" said M&uuml;ller. "Do you not see them yonder--two women
+under the trees? By Jupiter! it's <i>ma tante</i> and <i>la
+petite</i> Marie!"</p>
+<p>Saying which, he flung himself upon his oars and began pulling
+vigorously towards the shore.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXV."></a>CHAPTER XXV.</h2>
+<h3>THAT TERRIBLE M&Uuml;LLER.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>La petite Marie broke off at the sound of our oars, and blushed
+a becoming rose-color.</p>
+<p>"Will these ladies do us the honor of letting us row them back
+to Courbevoie?" said M&uuml;ller, running our boat close in against
+the sedges, and pulling off his hat as respectfully as if they were
+duchesses.</p>
+<p>Mademoiselle Marie repeated the invitation to her aunt, who
+accepted it at once.</p>
+<p>"<i>Tr&egrave;s volontiers, tr&egrave;s volontiers,
+messieurs</i>" she said, smiling and nodding. "We have rambled out
+so far--so far! And I am not as young as I was forty years ago.
+<i>Ah, mon Dieu</i>! how my old bones ache! Give me thy hand,
+Marie, and thank the gentlemen for their politeness."</p>
+<p>So Mam'selle Marie helped her aunt to rise, and we steadied the
+boat close under the bank, at a point where the interlacing roots
+of a couple of sallows made a kind of natural step by means of
+which they could easily get down.</p>
+<p>"Oh, dear! dear! it will not turn over, will it, my dear young
+man? <i>Ciel</i>! I am slipping ... Ah, <i>Dieu, merci</i>!--Marie,
+<i>mon cher enfant</i>, pray be careful not to jump in, or you will
+upset us all!"</p>
+<p>And <i>ma tante</i>, somewhat tremulous from the ordeal of
+embarking, settled down in her place, while M&uuml;ller lifted
+Mam'selle Marie into the boat, as if she had been a child. I then
+took the oars, leaving him to steer; and so we pursued our way
+towards Courbevoie.</p>
+<p>"Mam'selle has of course seen the fair?" said M&uuml;ller, from
+behind the old lady's back.</p>
+<p>"No, monsieur,"</p>
+<p>"No! Is it possible?"</p>
+<p>"There was so much crowd, monsieur, and such a noise ... we were
+quite too much afraid to venture in."</p>
+<p>"Would you be afraid, mam'selle, to venture with me?"</p>
+<p>"I--I do not know, monsieur."</p>
+<p>"Ah, mam'selle, you might be very sure that I would take good
+care of you!"</p>
+<p>"<i>Mais ... monsieur</i>"...</p>
+<p>"These gentlemen, I see, have been angling," said the old lady,
+addressing me very graciously. "Have you caught many fish?"</p>
+<p>"None at all, madame!" I replied, loudly.</p>
+<p>"<i>Tiens</i>! so many as that?"</p>
+<p>"<i>Pardon</i>, madame," I shouted at the top of my voice. "We
+have caught nothing--nothing at all."</p>
+<p><i>Ma tante</i> smiled blandly.</p>
+<p>"Ah, yes," she said; "and you will have them cooked presently
+for dinner, <i>n'est-ce pas</i>? There is no fish so fresh, and so
+well-flavored, as the fish of our own catching."</p>
+<p>"Will madame and mam'selle do us the honor to taste our fish and
+share our modest dinner?" said M&uuml;ller, leaning forward in his
+seat in the stern, and delivering his invitation close into the old
+lady's ear.</p>
+<p>To which <i>ma tante</i>, with a readiness of hearing for which
+no one would have given her credit, replied:--</p>
+<p>"But--but monsieur is very polite--if we should not be
+inconveniencing these gentlemen"....</p>
+<p>"We shall be charmed, madame--we shall be honored!"</p>
+<p>"<i>Eh bien!</i> with pleasure, then--Marie, my child, thank the
+gentlemen for their amiable invitation."</p>
+<p>I was thunderstruck. I looked at M&uuml;ller to see if he had
+suddenly gone out of his senses. Mam'selle Marie, however, was
+infinitely amused.</p>
+<p>"<i>Fi donc!</i> monsieur," she said. "You have no fish. I heard
+the other gentleman say so."</p>
+<p>"The other gentleman, mam'selle," replied M&uuml;ller, "is an
+Englishman, and troubled with the spleen. You must not mind
+anything he says."</p>
+<p>Troubled with the spleen! I believe myself to be as
+even-tempered and as ready to fall in with a joke as most men; but
+I should have liked at that moment to punch Franz M&uuml;ller's
+head. Gracious heavens! into what a position he had now brought us!
+What was to be done? How were we to get out of it? It was now just
+seven; and we had already been upon the water for more than an
+hour. What should we have to pay for the boat? And when we had paid
+for the boat, how much money should we have left to pay for the
+dinner? Not for our own dinners--ah, no! For <i>ma tante's</i>
+dinner (and <i>ma tante</i> had a hungry eye) and for <i>la
+petite</i> Marie's dinner; and <i>la petite</i> Marie, plump, rosy,
+and well-liking, looked as if she might have a capital appetite
+upon occasion! Should we have as much as two and a half francs? I
+doubted it. And then, in the absence of a miracle, what could we do
+with two and a half francs, if we had them? A miserable
+sum!--convertible, perhaps, into as much bouilli, bread and cheese,
+and thin country wine as might have satisfied our own hunger in a
+prosaic and commonplace way; but for four persons, two of them
+women!...</p>
+<p>And this was not the worst of it. I thought I knew M&uuml;ller
+well enough by this time to feel that he would entirely dismiss
+this minor consideration of ways and means; that he would order the
+dinner as recklessly as if we had twenty francs apiece in our
+pockets; and that he would not only order it, but eat it and
+preside at it with all the gayety and audacity in life.</p>
+<p>Then would come the horrible retribution of the bill!</p>
+<p>I felt myself turn red and hot at the mere thought of it.</p>
+<p>Then a dastardly idea insinuated itself into my mind. I had my
+return-ticket in my waistcoat-pocket:--what if I slipped away
+presently to the station and went back to Paris by the next train,
+leaving my clever friend to improvise his way out of his own scrape
+as best he could?</p>
+<p>In the meanwhile, as I was rowing with the stream, we soon got
+back to Courbevoie.</p>
+<p>"<i>Are</i> you mad?" I said, as, having landed the ladies,
+M&uuml;ller and I delivered up the boat to its owner.</p>
+<p>"Didn't I admit it, two or three hours ago?" he replied. "I
+wonder you don't get tired, <i>mon cher</i>, of asking the same
+question so often."</p>
+<p>"Four francs, fifty centimes, Messieurs," said the boatman,
+having made fast his boat to the landing-place.</p>
+<p>"Four francs, fifty centimes!" I echoed, in dismay.</p>
+<p>Even M&uuml;ller looked aghast.</p>
+<p>"My good fellow," he said, "do you take us for coiners?"</p>
+<p>"Hire of boat, two francs the hour. These gentlemen have been
+out nearly one hour and a half--three francs. Hire of bait and
+fishing-tackle, one franc fifty. Total, four francs and a half,"
+replied the boatman, putting out a great brown palm.</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller, who was acting as cashier and paymaster, pulled out
+his purse, deposited one solitary half-franc in the middle of that
+brown palm, and suggested that the boatman and he should toss up
+for the remaining four francs--or race for them--or play for
+them--or fight for them. The boatman, however, indignantly rejected
+each successive proposal, and, being paid at last, retired with a
+<i>decrescendo</i> of oaths.</p>
+<p>"<i>Tiens</i>!" said M&uuml;ller, reflectively. "We have but one
+franc left. One franc, two sous, and a centime. <i>Vive la
+France!</i>"</p>
+<p>"And you have actually asked that wretched old woman and her
+niece to dinner!"</p>
+<p>"And I have actually solicited that excellent and admirable
+woman, Madame Marotte, relict of the late lamented Jacques Marotte,
+umbrella maker, of number one hundred and two, Rue du Faubourg St.
+Denis, and her beautiful and accomplished niece, Mademoiselle Marie
+Charpentier, to honor us with their company this evening.
+<i>Dis-donc,</i> what shall we give them for dinner?"</p>
+<p>"Precisely what you invited them to, I should guess--the fish we
+caught this afternoon."</p>
+<p>"Agreed. And what else?"</p>
+<p>"Say--a dish of invisible greens, and a phoenix <i>&agrave; la
+Marengo</i>."</p>
+<p>"You are funny, <i>mon cher</i>."</p>
+<p>"Then, for fear I should become too funny--good afternoon."</p>
+<p>"What do you mean?"</p>
+<p>"I mean that I have no mind to dine first, and be kicked out of
+doors afterwards. It is one of those aids to digestion that I can
+willingly dispense with."</p>
+<p>"But if I guarantee that the dinner shall be paid for--money
+down!"</p>
+<p>"Tra la la!"</p>
+<p>"You don't believe me? Well, come and see."</p>
+<p>With this, he went up to Madame Marotte, who, with her niece,
+had sat down on a bench under a walnut-tree close by, waiting our
+pleasure.</p>
+<p>"Would not these ladies prefer to rest here, while we seek for a
+suitable restaurant and order the dinner?" said M&uuml;ller
+insinuatingly.</p>
+<p>The old lady looked somewhat blank. She was not too tired to go
+on--thought it a pity to bring us all the way back again--would do,
+however, as "<i>ces messieurs</i>" pleased; and so was left sitting
+under the walnut-tree, reluctant and disconsolate.</p>
+<p>"<i>Tiens! mon enfant</i>" I heard her say as we turned away,
+"suppose they don't come back again!"</p>
+<p>We had promised to be gone not longer, than twenty minutes, or
+at most half an hour. M&uuml;ller led the way straight to the
+<i>Toison d' Or</i>.</p>
+<p>I took him by the arm as we neared the gate.</p>
+<p>"Steady, steady, <i>mon gaillard</i>" I said. "We don't order
+our dinner, you know, till we've found the money to pay for
+it."</p>
+<p>"True--but suppose I go in here to look for it?"</p>
+<p>"Into the restaurant garden?"</p>
+<p>"Precisely."</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXVI."></a>CHAPTER XXVI.</h2>
+<h3>THE PETIT COURIER ILLUSTR&Eacute;.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>The <i>Toison d' Or</i> was but a modest little establishment as
+regarded the house, but it was surrounded on three sides by a
+good-sized garden overlooking the river. Here, in the trellised
+arbors which lined the lawn on either side, those customers who
+preferred the open air could take their dinners, coffees, and
+absinthes <i>al fresco</i>.</p>
+<p>The scene when we arrived was at its gayest. There were dinners
+going on in every arbor; waiters running distractedly to and fro
+with trays and bottles; two women, one with a guitar, the other
+with a tamborine, singing under a tree in the middle of the garden;
+while in the air there reigned an exhilarating confusion of sounds
+and smells impossible to describe.</p>
+<p>We went in. M&uuml;ller paused, looked round, captured a passing
+waiter, and asked for Monsieur le propri&eacute;taire. The waiter
+pointed over his shoulder towards the house, and breathlessly
+rushed on his way.</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller at once led the way into a salon on the ground-floor
+looking over the garden.</p>
+<p>Here we found ourselves in a large low room containing some
+thirty or forty tables, and fitted up after the universal
+restaurant pattern, with cheap-looking glasses, rows of hooks, and
+spittoons in due number. The air was heavy with the combined smells
+of many dinners, and noisy with the clatter of many tongues. Behind
+the fruits, cigars, and liqueur bottles that decorated the
+<i>comptoir</i> sat a plump, black-eyed little woman in a gorgeous
+cap and a red silk dress. This lady welcomed us with a bewitching
+smile and a gracious inclination of the head.</p>
+<p>"<i>Ces messieurs</i>," she said, "will find a vacant table
+yonder, by the window."</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller bowed majestically.</p>
+<p>"Madame," he said, "I wish to see Monsieur le
+propri&eacute;taire."</p>
+<p>The dame de comptoir looked very uneasy.</p>
+<p>"If Monsieur has any complaint to make," she said, "he can make
+it to me."</p>
+<p>"Madame, I have none."</p>
+<p>"Or if it has reference to the ordering of a dinner...."</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller smiled loftily.</p>
+<p>"Dinner, Madame," he said, with a disdainful gesture, "is but
+one of the accidents common to humanity. A trifle! A trifle always
+humiliating--sometimes inconvenient--occasionally impossible. No,
+Madame, mine is a serious mission; a mission of the highest
+importance, both socially and commercially. May I beg that you will
+have the goodness to place my card in the hands of Monsieur le
+propri&eacute;taire, and say that I request the honor of five
+minutes' interview."</p>
+<p>The little woman's eyes had all this time been getting rounder
+and blacker. She was evidently confounded by my friend's
+grandiloquence.</p>
+<p>"<i>Ah! mon Dieu! M'sieur</i>," she said, nervously, "my husband
+is in the kitchen. It is a busy day with us, you understand--but I
+will send for him."</p>
+<p>And she forthwith despatched a waiter for "Monsieur
+Choucru."</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller seized me by the arm.</p>
+<p>"Heavens!" he exclaimed, in a very audible aside, "did you hear?
+She is his wife! She is Madame Choucru?"</p>
+<p>"Well, and what of that?"</p>
+<p>"What of that, indeed? <i>Mais, mon ami</i>, how can you ask the
+question? Have you no eyes? Look at her! Such a remarkably handsome
+woman--such a <i>tournure</i>--such eyes--such a figure for an
+illustration! Only conceive the effect of Madame Choucru--in
+medallion!"</p>
+<p>"Oh, magnificent!" I replied. "Magnificent--in medallion."</p>
+<p>But I could not, for the life of me, imagine what he was driving
+at.</p>
+<p>"And it would make the fortune of the <i>Toison d'Or</i>" he
+added, solemnly.</p>
+<p>To which I replied that it would undoubtedly do so.</p>
+<p>Monsieur Choucru now came upon the scene; a short, rosy,
+round-faced little man in a white flat cap and bibbed apron--like
+an elderly cherub that had taken to cookery. He hung back upon the
+threshold, wiping his forehead, and evidently unwilling to show
+himself in his shirt-sleeves.</p>
+<p>"Here, <i>mon bon</i>," cried Madame, who was by this time
+crimson with gratified vanity, and in a fever of curiosity; "this
+way--the gentleman is waiting to speak to you!"</p>
+<p>Monsieur, the cook and proprietor, shuffled his feet to and fro
+in the doorway, but came no nearer.</p>
+<p>"<i>Parbleu</i>!" he said, "if M'sieur's business is not
+urgent."</p>
+<p>"It is extremely urgent, Monsieur Choucru," replied M&uuml;ller;
+"and, moreover, it is not so much my business as it is yours,"</p>
+<p>"Ah bah! if it is my business, then, it may stand over till
+to-morrow," replied the little man, impatiently. "To-day I have
+eighty dinners on hand, and with M'sieur's permission"....</p>
+<p>But M&uuml;ller strode to the door and caught him by the
+shoulder.</p>
+<p>"No, Monsieur Choucru," he said sternly, "I will not let you
+ruin yourself by putting off till to-morrow what can only be done
+to-day. I have come here, Monsieur Choucru, to offer you fame. Fame
+and fortune, Monsieur Choucru!--and I will not suffer you, for the
+sake of a few miserable dinners, to turn your back upon the most
+brilliant moment of your life!"</p>
+<p>"<i>Mais, M'sieur</i>--explain yourself" ... stammered the
+propri&eacute;taire.</p>
+<p>"You know who I am, Monsieur Choucru?"</p>
+<p>"No, M'sieur--not in the least."</p>
+<p>"I am M&uuml;ller--Franz M&uuml;ller--landscape painter,
+portrait painter, historical painter, caricaturist, artist <i>en
+chef</i> to the <i>Petit Courier Illustr&eacute;</i>"</p>
+<p>"<i>Hein! M'sieur est peintre</i>!"</p>
+<p>"Yes, Monsieur Choucru--and I offer you my protection."</p>
+<p>Monsieur Choucru scratched his ear, and smiled doubtfully.</p>
+<p>"Now listen, Monsieur Choucru--I am here to-day in the interests
+of the <i>Petit Courier Illustr&eacute;</i>. I take the Courbevoie
+f&ecirc;te for my subject. I sketch the river, the village, the
+principal features of the-scene; and on Saturday my designs are in
+the hands of all Paris. Do you understand me?"</p>
+<p>"I understand that M'sieur is all this time talking to me of his
+own business, while mine, <i>l&agrave; bas</i>, is standing still!"
+exclaimed the propri&eacute;taire, in an agony of impatience. "I
+have the honor to wish M'sieur good-day."</p>
+<p>But M&uuml;ller seized him again, and would not let him
+escape.</p>
+<p>"Not so fast, Monsieur Choucru," he said; "not so fast! Will you
+answer me one question before you go?"</p>
+<p>"<i>Eh, mon Dieu</i>! Monsieur."</p>
+<p>"Will you tell me, Monsieur Choucru, what is to prevent me from
+giving a view of the best restaurant in Courbevoie?"</p>
+<p>Madame Choucru, from behind the <i>comptoir</i>, uttered a
+little scream.</p>
+<p>"A design in the <i>Petit Courier Illustr&eacute;</i>, I need
+scarcely tell you," pursued M&uuml;ller, with indescribable
+pomposity, "is in itself sufficient to make the fortune not only of
+an establishment, but of a neighborhood. I am about to make
+Courbevoie the fashion. The sun of Asni&egrave;res, of Montmorency,
+of Enghien has set--the sun of Courbevoie is about to rise. My
+sketches will produce an unheard-of effect. All Paris will throng
+to your f&ecirc;tes next Sunday and Monday--all Paris, with its
+inexhaustible appetite for <i>bifteck aux pommes frites</i>--all
+Paris with its unquenchable thirst for absinthe and Bavarian beer!
+Now, Monsieur Choucru, do you begin to understand me?"</p>
+<p>"<i>Mais</i>, Monsieur, I--I think...."</p>
+<p>"You think you do, Monsieur Choucru? Very good. Then will you
+please to answer me one more question. What is to prevent me from
+conferring fame, fortune, and other benefits too numerous to
+mention on your excellent neighbor at the corner of the
+Place--Monsieur Coquille of the Restaurant <i>Croix de
+Malte</i>?"</p>
+<p>Monsieur Choucru scratched his ear again, stared helplessly at
+his wife, and said nothing. Madame looked grave.</p>
+<p>"Are we to treat this matter on the footing of a business
+transaction, Monsieur!" she asked, somewhat sharply. "Because, if
+so, let Monsieur at once name his price for me...."</p>
+<p>"'PRICE,' Madame!" interrupted M&uuml;ller, with a start of
+horror. "Gracious powers! this to me--to Franz M&uuml;ller of the
+<i>Petit Courier Illustr&eacute;</i>! 'No, Madame--you mistake
+me--you wound me--you touch the honor of the Fine Arts! Madame, I
+am incapable of selling my patronage."</p>
+<p>Madame clasped her hands; raised her voice; rolled her black
+eyes; did everything but burst into tears. She was shocked to have
+offended Monsieur! She was profoundly desolated! She implored a
+thousand pardons! And then, like a true French-woman of business,
+she brought back the conversation to the one important
+point:--since money was not in question, upon what consideration
+would Monsieur accord his preference to the <i>Toison d' Or</i>
+instead of to the <i>Croix de Malte</i>?</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller bowed, laid his hand upon his heart, and said:--</p>
+<p>"I will do it, <i>pour les beaux yeux de Madame</i>."</p>
+<p>And then, in graceful recognition of the little man's rights as
+owner of the eyes in question, he bowed to Monsieur Choucru.</p>
+<p>Madame was inexpressibly charmed. Monsieur smiled, fidgeted, and
+cast longing glances towards the door.</p>
+<p>"I have eighty dinners on hand," he began again, "and if M'sieur
+will excuse me...."</p>
+<p>"One moment more, my dear Monsieur Choucru," said M&uuml;ller,
+slipping his hand affectionately through the little man's arm. "For
+myself, as I have already told you, I can accept nothing--but I am
+bound in honor not to neglect the interests of the journal I
+represent. You will of course wish to express your sense of the
+compliment paid to your house by adding your name to the
+subscription list of the <i>Petit Courier Illustr&eacute;</i>?"</p>
+<p>"Oh, by--by all means--with pleasure," faltered the
+propri&eacute;taire.</p>
+<p>"For how many copies, Monsieur Choucru? Shall we say--six?"</p>
+<p>Monsieur looked at Madame. Madame nodded. M&uuml;ller took out
+his pocket-book, and waited, pencil in hand.</p>
+<p>"Eh--<i>parbleu</i>!--let it be for six, then," said Monsieur
+Choucru, somewhat reluctantly.</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller made the entry, shut up the pocket-book, and shook
+hands boisterously with his victim.</p>
+<p>"My dear Monsieur Choucru," he said, "I cannot tell you how
+gratifying this is to my feelings, or with what disinterested
+satisfaction I shall make your establishment known to the Parisian
+public. You shall be immortalized, my dear fellow--positively
+immortalized!"</p>
+<p>"<i>Bien oblig&eacute;, M'sieur--bien oblig&eacute;</i>. Will
+you not let my wife offer you a glass of liqueure?"</p>
+<p>"Liqueure, <i>mon cher</i>!" exclaimed M&uuml;ller, with an
+outburst of frank cordiality--"hang liqueure!--WE'LL DINE WITH
+YOU!"</p>
+<p>"Monsieur shall be heartily welcome to the best dinner the
+<i>Toison d'Or</i> can send up; and his friend also," said Madame,
+with her sweetest smile.</p>
+<p>"Ah, Madame!"</p>
+<p>"And M'sieur Choucru shall make you one of his famous cheese
+souffl&eacute;s. <i>Tiens, mon bon</i>, go down and prepare a
+cheese souffl&eacute; for two."</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller smote his forehead distractedly.</p>
+<p>"For two!" he cried. "Heavens! I had forgotten my aunt and my
+cousin!"</p>
+<p>Madame looked up inquiringly.</p>
+<p>"Monsieur has forgotten something?"</p>
+<p>"Two somethings, Madame--two somebodies! My aunt--my excellent
+and admirable maternal aunt,--and my cousin. We left them sitting
+under a tree by the river-side, more than half an hour ago. But the
+fault, Madame, is yours."</p>
+<p>"How, Monsieur?"</p>
+<p>"Yes; for in your charming society I forget the ties of family
+and the laws of politeness. But I hasten to fetch my forgotten
+relatives. With what pleasure they will share your amiable
+hospitality! <i>Au revoir</i>, Madame. In ten minutes we shall be
+with you again!"</p>
+<p>Madame Choucru looked grave. She had not bargained to entertain
+a party of four; yet she dared not disoblige the <i>Petit Courier
+Illustr&eacute;</i>. She had no time, however, to demur to the
+arrangement; for M&uuml;ller, ingeniously taking her acquiescence
+for granted, darted out of the room without waiting for an
+answer.</p>
+<p>"Miserable man!" I exclaimed, as soon as we were outside the
+doors, "what will you do now?"</p>
+<p>"Do! Why, fetch my admirable maternal aunt and my interesting
+cousin, to be sure."</p>
+<p>"But you have raised a dinner under false pretences!"</p>
+<p>"I, <i>mon cher</i>? Not a bit of it."</p>
+<p>"Have you, then, really anything to do with the <i>Petit Courier
+Illustr&eacute;</i>?"</p>
+<p>"The Editor of the <i>Petit Courier Illustr&eacute;</i> is one
+of the best fellows in the world, and occasionally (when my pockets
+represent that vacuum which Nature very properly abhors) he
+advances me a couple of Napoleons. I wipe out the score from time
+to time by furnishing a design for the paper. Now to-day, you see,
+I'm in luck. I shall pay off two obligations at once--to say
+nothing of Monsieur Choucru's six-fold subscription to the P.C., on
+which the publishers will allow me a douceur of thirty francs. Now,
+confess that I'm a man of genius!"</p>
+<p>In less than a quarter of an hour we were all four established
+round one of Madame Choucru's comfortable little dining-tables, in
+a snug recess at the farthest end of the salon. Here, being well
+out of reach of our hostess's black eyes, M&uuml;ller assumed all
+the airs of a liberal entertainer. He hung up <i>ma cousine's</i>
+bonnet; fetched a footstool for <i>ma tante</i>; criticised the
+sauces; presided over the wine; cut jokes with the waiter; and
+pretended to have ordered every dish beforehand. The stewed kidneys
+with mushrooms were provided especially for Madame Marotte; the
+fricandeau was selected in honor of Mam'selle Marie (had he not an
+innate presentiment that she loved fricandeau?); and as for the
+soles <i>au gratin</i>, he swore, in defiance of probability and
+all the laws of nature, that they were the very fish we had just
+caught in the Seine. By-and-by came Monsieur Choucru's famous
+cheese <i>souffl&eacute;</i>; and then, with a dish of fruit, four
+cups of coffee, and four glasses of liqueure, the banquet came to
+an end.</p>
+<p>As we sat at desert, M&uuml;ller pulled out his book and
+pencilled a rapid but flattering sketch of the dining-room
+interior, developing a perspective as long as the Rue de Rivoli,
+and a <i>mobilier</i> at least equal in splendor to that of the
+<i>Trois Fr&egrave;res</i>.</p>
+<p>At sight of this <i>chef d'oeuvre</i>, Madame Choucru was moved
+almost to tears. Ah, Heaven! if Monsieur could only figure to
+himself her admiration for his <i>beau talent</i>! But alas! that
+was impossible--as impossible as that Monsieur Choucru should ever
+repay this unheard-of obligation!</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller laid his hand upon his heart, and bowed
+profoundly.</p>
+<p>"Ah! Madame," he said, "it is not to Monsieur Choucru that I
+look for repayment--it is to you."</p>
+<p>"To me, Monsieur? <i>Dieu merci! Monsieur se moque de
+moi</i>!"</p>
+<p>And the Dame de Comptoir, intrenched behind her fruits and
+liqueure bottles, shot a Parthian glance from under her black
+eye-lashes, and made believe to blush.</p>
+<p>"Yes, Madame, to you. I only ask permission to come again very
+soon, for the purpose of executing a little portrait of Madame--a
+little portrait which, alas! <i>must</i> fail to render adequate
+justice to such a multitude of charms."</p>
+<p>And with this choice compliment, M&uuml;ller bowed again, took
+his leave, bestowed a whole franc upon the astonished waiter, and
+departed from the <i>Toison d'Or</i> in an atmosphere of glory.</p>
+<p>The fair, or rather that part of the fair where the dancers and
+diners most did congregate, was all ablaze with lights, and noisy
+with brass bands as we came out. <i>Ma tante</i>, who was somewhat
+tired, and had been dozing for the last half hour over her coffee
+and liqueure, was impatient to get back to Paris. The fair Marie,
+who was not tired at all, confessed that she should enjoy a waltz
+above everything. While M&uuml;ller, who professed to be an
+animated time-table, swore that we were just too late for the ten
+minutes past ten train, and that there would be no other before
+eleven forty-five. So Madame Marotte was carried off, <i>bon
+gr&eacute;, mal gr&eacute;</i>, to a dancing-booth, where gentlemen
+were admitted on payment of forty centimes per head, and ladies
+went in free.</p>
+<p>Here, despite the noise, the dust, the braying of an abominable
+band, the overwhelming smell of lamp-oil, and the clatter, not only
+of heavy walking-boots, but even of several pairs of sabots upon an
+uneven floor of loosely-joined planks--<i>ma tante</i>, being
+disposed of in a safe corner, went soundly to sleep.</p>
+<p>It was a large booth, somewhat over-full; and the company
+consisted mainly of Parisian blue blouses, little foot-soldiers,
+grisettes (for there were grisettes in those days, and plenty of
+them), with a sprinkling of farm-boys and dairy-maids from the
+villages round about. We found this select society caracoling round
+the booth in a thundering galop, on first going in. After the
+galop, the conductor announced a <i>valse &agrave; deux temps</i>.
+The band struck up--one--two--three. Away went some thirty
+couples--away went M&uuml;ller and the fair Marie--and away went
+the chronicler of this modest biography with a pretty little girl
+in green boots who waltzed remarkably well, and who deserted him in
+the middle of the dance for a hideous little French soldier about
+four feet and a half high.</p>
+<p>After this rebuff (having learned, notwithstanding my friend's
+representations to the contrary, that a train ran from Courbevoie
+to Paris every half-hour up till midnight) I slipped away, leaving
+M&uuml;ller and <i>ma cousine</i> in the midst of a furious
+flirtation, and Madame Marotte fast asleep in her corner.</p>
+<p>The clocks were just striking twelve as I passed under the
+archway leading to the Cit&eacute; Berg&egrave;re.</p>
+<p>"<i>Tiens</i>!" said the fat concierge, as she gave me my key
+and my candle. "Monsieur has perhaps been to the theatre this
+evening? No!--to the country--to the f&ecirc;te at Courbevoie! Ah,
+then, I'll be sworn that M'sieur has had plenty of fun!"</p>
+<p>But had I had plenty of fun? That was the question. That
+M&uuml;ller had had plenty of flirting and plenty of fun was a fact
+beyond the reach of doubt. But a flirtation, after all, unless in a
+one-act comedy, is not entertaining to the mere looker-on; and oh!
+must not those bridesmaids who sometimes accompany a happy couple
+in their wedding-tour, have a dreary time of it?</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXVII."></a>CHAPTER XXVII.</h2>
+<h3>THE &Eacute;COLE DE NATATION.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>It seemed to me that I had but just closed my eyes, when I was
+waked by a hand upon my shoulder, and a voice calling me by my
+name. I started up to find the early sunshine pouring in at the
+window, and Franz M&uuml;ller standing by my bedside.</p>
+<p>"<i>Tiens</i>!" said he. "How lovely are the slumbers of
+innocence! I was hesitating, <i>mon cher</i>, whether to wake or
+sketch you."</p>
+<p>I muttered something between a growl and a yawn, to the effect
+that I should have been better satisfied if he had left me
+alone.</p>
+<p>"You prefer everything that is basely self-indulgent, young
+man," replied M&uuml;ller, making a divan of my bed, and coolly
+lighting his pipe under my very nose. "Contrary to all the laws of
+<i>bon-camaraderie</i>, you stole away last night, leaving your
+unprotected friend in the hands of the enemy. And for what?--for
+the sake of a few hours' ignominious oblivion! Look at me--I have
+not been to bed all night, and I am as lively as a lobster in a
+lobster-pot."</p>
+<p>"How did you get home?" I asked, rubbing my eyes; "and
+when?"</p>
+<p>"I have not got home at all yet," replied my visitor. "I have
+come to breakfast with you first."</p>
+<p>Just at this moment, the <i>pendule</i> in the adjoining room
+struck six.</p>
+<p>"To breakfast!" I repeated. "At this hour?--you who never
+breakfast before midday!"</p>
+<p>"True, <i>mon cher</i>; but then you see there are reasons. In
+the first place, we danced a little too long, and missed the last
+train, so I was obliged to bring the dear creatures back to Paris
+in a fiacre. In the second place, the driver was drunk, and the
+horse was groggy, and the fiacre was in the last stage of
+dilapidation. The powers below only know how many hours we were on
+the road; for we all fell asleep, driver included, and never woke
+till we found ourselves at the Barri&egrave;re de l'&Eacute;toile
+at the dawn of day."</p>
+<p>"Then what have you done with Madame Marotte and Mademoiselle
+Marie?"</p>
+<p>"Deposited them at their own door in the Rue du Faubourg St.
+Denis, as was the bounden duty of a <i>preux chevalier</i>. But
+then, <i>mon cher</i>, I had no money; and having no money, I
+couldn't pay for the fiacre; so I drove on here--and here I am--and
+number One Thousand and Eleven is now at the door, waiting to be
+paid."</p>
+<p>"The deuce he is!"</p>
+<p>"So you see, sad as it was to disturb the slumbers of innocence,
+I couldn't possibly let you go on sleeping at the rate of two
+francs an hour."</p>
+<p>"And what is the rate at which you have waked me?"</p>
+<p>"Sixteen francs the fare, and something for the driver--say
+twenty in all."</p>
+<p>"Then, my dear fellow, just open my desk and take one of the two
+Napoleons you will see lying inside, and dismiss number One
+Thousand and Eleven without loss of time; and then...."</p>
+<p>"A thousand thanks! And then what?"</p>
+<p>"Will you accept a word of sound advice?"</p>
+<p>"Depends on whether it's pleasant to follow, <i>caro
+mio</i>"</p>
+<p>"Go home; get three or four hours' rest; and meet me in the
+Palais Royal about twelve for breakfast."</p>
+<p>"In order that you may turn round and go to sleep again in
+comfort? No, young man, I will do nothing of the kind. You shall
+get up, instead, and we'll go down to Molino's."</p>
+<p>"To Molino's?"</p>
+<p>"Yes--don't you know Molino's--the large swimming-school by the
+Pont Neuf. It's a glorious morning for a plunge in the Seine."</p>
+<p>A plunge in the Seine! Now, given a warm bed, a chilly autumn
+morning, and a decided inclination to quote the words of the
+sluggard, and "slumber again," could any proposition be more
+inopportune, savage, and alarming? I shuddered; I protested; I
+resisted; but in vain.</p>
+<p>"I shall be up again in less time than it will take you to tell
+your beads, <i>mon gaillard</i>" said M&uuml;ller the ferocious,
+as, having captured my Napoleon, he prepared to go down and
+liquidate with number One Thousand and Eleven. "And it's of no use
+to bolt me out, because I shall hammer away till you let me in, and
+that will wake your fellow-lodgers. So let me find you up, and
+ready for the fray."</p>
+<p>And then, execrating M&uuml;ller, and Molino, and Molino's bath,
+and Molino's customers, and all Molino's ancestors from the period
+of the deluge downwards, I reluctantly complied.</p>
+<p>The air was brisk, the sky cloudless, the sun coldly bright; and
+the city wore that strange, breathless, magical look so peculiar to
+Paris at early morning. The shops were closed; the pavements
+deserted; the busy thoroughfares silent as the avenues of
+P&egrave;re la Chaise. Yet how different from the early stillness
+of London! London, before the world is up and stirring, looks dead,
+and sullen, and melancholy; but Paris lies all beautiful, and
+bright, and mysterious, with a look as of dawning smiles upon her
+face; and we know that she will wake presently, like the Sleeping
+Beauty, to sudden joyousness and activity.</p>
+<p>Our road lay for a little way along the Boulevards, then down
+the Rue Vivienne, and through the Palais Royal to the quays; but
+long ere we came within sight of the river this magical calm had
+begun to break up. The shop-boys in the Palais Royal were already
+taking down the shutters--the great book-stall at the end of the
+Galerie Vitr&eacute;e showed signs of wakefulness; and in the Place
+du Louvre there was already a detachment of brisk little
+foot-soldiers at drill. By the time we had reached the open line of
+the quays, the first omnibuses were on the road; the water-carriers
+were driving their carts and blowing their shrill little bugles;
+the washer-women, hard at work in their gay, oriental-looking
+floating kiosques, were hammering away, mallet in hand, and
+chattering like millions of magpies; and the early matin-bell was
+ringing to prayers as we passed the doors of St. Germain
+L'Auxerrois.</p>
+<p>And now we were skirting the Quai de l'&Eacute;cole, looking
+down upon the bath known in those days as Molino's--a hugh,
+floating quadrangular structure, surrounded by trellised arcades
+and rows of dressing-rooms, with a divan, a caf&eacute; restaurant,
+and a permanent corps of cooks and hair-dressers on the
+establishment. For your true Parisian has ever been wedded to his
+Seine, as the Venetian to his Adriatic; and the &Eacute;cole de
+Natation was then, as now, a lounge, a reading-room, an adjunct of
+the clubs, and one of the great institutions of the capital.</p>
+<p>Some bathers, earlier than ourselves, were already sauntering
+about the galleries in every variety of undress, from the simple
+<i>cale&ccedil;on</i> to the gaudiest version of Turkish robe and
+Algerian <i>kepi</i>. Some were smoking; some reading the morning
+papers; some chatting in little knots; but as yet, with the
+exception of two or three school-boys (called, in the <i>argot</i>
+of the bath, <i>moutards</i>), there were no swimmers in the
+water.</p>
+<p>With some of these loungers M&uuml;ller exchanged a nod or a few
+words as we passed along the platform; but shook hands cordially
+with a bronzed, stalwart man, dressed like a Venetian gondolier in
+the frontispiece to a popular ballad, with white trousers, blue
+jacket, anchor buttons, red sash, gold ear-rings, and great silver
+buckles in his shoes. M&uuml;ller introduced this romantic-looking
+person to me as "Monsieur Barbet."</p>
+<p>"My friend, Monsieur Barbet," said he, "is the prince of
+swimming-masters. He is more at home in the water than on land, and
+knows more about swimming than a fish. He will calculate you the
+specific gravity of the heaviest German metaphysician at a glance,
+and is capable of floating even the works of Monsieur Thiers, if
+put to the test."</p>
+<p>"Monsieur can swim?" said the master, addressing me, with a
+nautical scrape.</p>
+<p>"I think so," I replied.</p>
+<p>"Many gentlemen think so," said Monsieur Barbet, "till they find
+themselves in the water."</p>
+<p>"And many who wish to be thought accomplished swimmers never
+venture into it on that account," added M&uuml;ller. "You would
+scarcely suppose," he continued, turning to me, "that there are men
+here--regular <i>habitu&eacute;s</i> of the bath--who never go into
+the water, and yet give themselves all the airs of practised
+bathers. That tall man, for instance, with the black beard and
+striped <i>peignoir</i>, yonder--there's a fellow who comes once or
+twice a week all through the season, goes through the ceremony of
+undressing, smokes, gossips, criticises, is looked up to as an
+authority, and has never yet been seen off the platform. Then
+there's that bald man in the white robe--his name's Giroflet--a
+retired stockbroker. Well, that fellow robes himself like an
+ancient Roman, puts himself in classical attitudes, affects
+taciturnity, models himself upon Brutus, and all that sort of
+thing; but is as careful not to get his feet wet as a cat. Others,
+again, come simply to feed. The restaurant is one of the choicest
+in Paris, with this advantage over V&eacute;four or the Trois
+Fr&egrave;res, that it is the only place where you may eat and
+drink of the best in hot weather, with nothing on but the briefest
+of <i>cale&ccedil;ons</i>"</p>
+<p>Thus chattering, M&uuml;ller took me the tour of the bath, which
+now began to fill rapidly. We then took possession of two little
+dressing-rooms no bigger than sentry-boxes, and were presently in
+the water.</p>
+<p>The scene now became very animated. Hundreds of eccentric
+figures crowded the galleries--some absurdly fat, some ludicrously
+thin; some old, some young; some bow-legged, some knock-kneed; some
+short, some tall; some brown, some yellow; some got up for effect
+in gorgeous wrappers; and all more or less hideous.</p>
+<p>"An amusing sight, isn't it?" said M&uuml;ller, as, having swum
+several times round the bath, we sat down for a few moments on one
+of the flights of steps leading down to the water.</p>
+<p>"It is a sight to disgust one for ever with human-kind," I
+replied.</p>
+<p>"And to fill one with the profoundest respect for one's tailor.
+After all, it's broad-cloth makes the man."</p>
+<p>"But these are not men--they are caricatures."</p>
+<p>"Every man is a caricature of himself when you strip him," said
+M&uuml;ller, epigrammatically. "Look at that scarecrow just
+opposite. He passes for an Adonis, <i>de par le monde</i>."</p>
+<p>I looked and recognised the Count de Rivarol, a tall young man,
+an <i>&eacute;l&eacute;gant</i> of the first water, a curled
+darling of society, a professed lady-killer, whom I had met many a
+time in attendance on Madame de Marignan. He now looked like a
+monkey:--</p>
+<blockquote>.... "long, and lank and brown,<br>
+As in the ribb'd sea sand!"</blockquote>
+<p>"Gracious heavens!" I exclaimed, "what would become of the
+world, if clothes went out of fashion?"</p>
+<p>"Humph!--one half of us, my dear fellow, would commit
+suicide."</p>
+<p>At the upper end of the bath was a semicircular platform
+somewhat loftier than the rest, called the Amphitheatre. This, I
+learned, was the place of honor. Here clustered the
+<i>&eacute;lite</i> of the swimmers; here they discussed the great
+principles of their art, and passed judgment on the performances of
+those less skilful than themselves. To the right of the
+Amphitheatre rose a slender spiral staircase, like an openwork
+pillar of iron, with a tiny circular platform on the top, half
+surrounded by a light iron rail. This conspicuous perch, like the
+pillar of St. Simeon Stylites, was every now and then surmounted by
+the gaunt figure of some ambitious plunger who, after
+attitudinizing awhile in the pose of Napoleon on the column
+Vend&ocirc;me, would join his hands above his head and take a
+tremendous "header" into the gulf below. When this feat was
+successfully performed, the <i>&eacute;lite</i> in the Amphitheatre
+applauded graciously.</p>
+<p>And now, what with swimming, and lounging, and looking on, some
+two hours had slipped by, and we were both hungry and tired,
+M&uuml;ller proposed that we should breakfast at the Caf&eacute;
+Procope.</p>
+<p>"But why not here?" I asked, as a delicious breeze from the
+buffet came wafting by "like a steam of rich distilled
+perfumes."</p>
+<p>"Because a breakfast <i>chez</i> Molino costs at least
+twenty-five francs per head--BECAUSE I have credit at
+Procope--BECAUSE I have not a <i>sou</i> in my pocket--and BECAUSE,
+milord Smithfield, I aspire to the honor of entertaining your
+lordship on the present occasion!" replied M&uuml;ller, punctuating
+each clause of his sentence with a bow.</p>
+<p>If M&uuml;ller had not a <i>sou</i>, I, at all events, had now
+only one Napoleon; so the Caf&eacute; Procope carried the day.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXVIII."></a>CHAPTER XXVIII.</h2>
+<h3>THE RUE DE L'ANCIENNE COM&Eacute;DIE AND THE CAF&Eacute;
+PROCOPE.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>The Rue des Foss&eacute;s-Saint-Germain-des-Pr&egrave;s and the
+Rue de l'Ancienne Com&eacute;die are one and the same. As the Rue
+des Foss&eacute;s-Saint-Germain-des-Pr&egrave;s, it dates back to
+somewhere about the reign of Philippe Auguste; and as the Rue de
+l'Ancienne Com&egrave;die it takes its name and fame from the year
+1689, when the old Th&eacute;&acirc;tre Fran&ccedil;ais was opened
+on the 18th of April by the company known as Moli&ecirc;re's
+troupe--Moli&ecirc;re being then dead, and Lully having succeeded
+him at the Th&eacute;&acirc;tre du Palais Royal.</p>
+<p>In the same year, 1689, one Fran&ccedil;ois Procope, a Sicilian,
+conceived the happy idea of hiring a house just opposite the new
+theatre, and there opening a public refreshment-room, which at once
+became famous, not only for the excellence of its coffee (then
+newly introduced into France), but also for being the favorite
+resort of all the wits, dramatists, and beaux of that brilliant
+time. Here the latest epigrams were circulated, the newest scandals
+discussed, the bitterest literary cabals set on foot. Here Jean
+Jacques brooded over his chocolate; and Voltaire drank his mixed
+with coffee; and Dorat wrote his love-letters to Mademoiselle
+Saunier; and Marmontel wrote praises of Mademoiselle Clairon; and
+the Marquis de Bi&eacute;vre made puns innumerable; and Duclos and
+Mercier wrote satires, now almost forgotten; and Piron recited
+those verses which are at once his shame and his fame; and the
+Chevalier de St. Georges gave fencing lessons to his literary
+friends; and Lamothe, Fr&eacute;ron, D'Alembert, Diderot,
+Helvetius, and all that wonderful company of wits, philosophers,
+encyclopaedists, and poets, that lit up as with a dying glory the
+last decades of the old <i>r&eacute;gime</i>, met daily, nightly,
+to write, to recite, to squabble, to lampoon, and some times to
+fight.</p>
+<p>The year 1770 beheld, in the closing of the Th&eacute;&acirc;tre
+Fran&ccedil;ais, the extinction of a great power in the Rue des
+Foss&eacute;s-Saint-Germain-des-Pr&egrave;s--for it was not, in
+fact, till the theatre was no more a theatre that the street
+changed its name, and became the Rue de L'Ancienne Com&eacute;die.
+A new house (to be on first opening invested with the time-honored
+title of Th&eacute;&acirc;tre Fran&ccedil;ais, but afterwards to be
+known as the Od&eacute;on) was now in progress of erection in the
+close neighborhood of the Luxembourg. The actors, meanwhile,
+repaired to the little theatre of the Tuilleries. At length, in
+1782,<a name="FNanchor2"></a><a href="#Footnote_2">[2]</a> the Rue
+de L'Ancienne Com&eacute;die was one evening awakened from its two
+years' lethargy by the echo of many footfalls, the glare of many
+flambeaux, and the rattle of many wheels; for all Paris, all the
+wits and critics of the Caf&eacute; Procope, all the fair
+shepherdesses and all the beaux seigneurs of the court of Marie
+Antoinette and Louis XVI., were hastening on foot, in chairs, and
+in chariots, to the opening of the new house and the performance of
+a new play! And what a play! Surely, not to consider it too
+curiously, a play which struck, however sportively, the key-note of
+the coming Revolution;--a play which, for the first time, displayed
+society literally in a state of <i>bouleversement</i>;--a play in
+which the greed of the courtier, the venality of the judge, the
+empty glitter of the crown, were openly held up to scorn;--a play
+in which all the wit, audacity, and success are on the side of the
+<i>canaille</i>;--a play in which a lady's-maid is the heroine, and
+a valet canes his master, and a great nobleman is tricked,
+outwitted, and covered with ridicule!</p>
+<blockquote><a name="Footnote_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor2">[2]</a>
+1782 is the date given by M. Hippolyte Lucas. Sainte-Beuve places
+it two years later.</blockquote>
+<p>This play, produced for the first time under the title of <i>La
+Folle Journ&eacute;e</i>, was written by one Caron de
+Beaumarchais--a man of wit, a man of letters, a man of the people,
+a man of nothing--and was destined to achieve immortality under its
+later title of <i>Le Mariage de Figaro</i>.</p>
+<p>A few years later, and the Rue de l'Ancienne Com&eacute;die
+echoed daily and nightly to the dull rumble of Revolutionary
+tumbrils, and the heavy tramp of Revolutionary mobs. Danton and
+Camille Desmoulins must have passed through it habitually on their
+way to the Revolutionary Tribunal. Charlotte Corday (and this is a
+matter of history) did pass through it that bright July evening,
+1793, on her way to a certain gloomy house still to be seen in the
+adjoining Rue de l'&Eacute;cole de M&eacute;decine, where she
+stabbed Marat in his bath.</p>
+<p>But throughout every vicissitude of time and politics, though
+fashion deserted the Rue de l'Ancienne Com&eacute;die, and actors
+migrated, and fresh generations of wits and philosophers succeeded
+each other, the Caf&eacute; Procope still held its ground and
+maintained its ancient reputation. The theatre (closed in less than
+a century) became the studio first of Gros and then of
+G&eacute;rard, and was finally occupied by a succession of
+restaurateurs but the Caf&eacute; Procope remained the Caf&eacute;
+Procope, and is the Caf&eacute; Procope to this day.</p>
+<p>The old street and all belonging to it--especially and
+peculiarly the Caf&eacute; Procope---was of the choicest Quartier
+Latin flavor in the time of which I write; in the pleasant,
+careless, impecunious days of my youth. A cheap and highly popular
+restaurateur named Pinson rented the old theatre. A
+<i>costumier</i> hung out wigs, and masks, and d&eacute;bardeur
+garments next door to the restaurateur. Where the fatal tumbril
+used to labor past, the frequent omnibus now rattled gayly by; and
+the pavements trodden of old by Voltaire, and Beaumarchais, and
+Charlotte Corday, were thronged by a merry tide of students and
+grisettes. Meanwhile the Caf&eacute; Procope, though no longer the
+resort of great wits and famous philosophers, received within its
+hospitable doors, and nourished with its indifferent refreshments,
+many a now celebrated author, painter, barrister, and statesman. It
+was the general rendezvous for students of all kinds--poets of the
+&Eacute;cole de Droit, philosophers of the &Eacute;cole de
+M&eacute;decine, critics of the &Eacute;cole des Beaux Arts. It
+must however be admitted that the poetry and criticism of these
+future great men was somewhat too liberally perfumed with tobacco,
+and that into their systems of philosophy there entered a
+considerable element of grisette.</p>
+<p>Such, at the time of my first introduction to it, was the famous
+Caf&eacute; Procope.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXIX."></a>CHAPTER XXIX.</h2>
+<h3>THE PHILOSOPHY OF BREAKFAST.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>"Now this, <i>mon cher</i>," said M&uuml;ller, taking off his
+hat with a flourish to the young lady at the <i>comptoir</i>, "is
+the immortal Caf&eacute; Procope."</p>
+<p>I looked round, and found myself in a dingy, ordinary sort of
+Caf&eacute;, in no wise differing from any other dingy, ordinary
+sort of Caf&eacute; in that part of Paris. The decorations were
+ugly enough to be modern. The ceiling was as black with gas-fumes
+and tobacco smoke as any other ceiling in any other estaminet in
+the Quartier Latin. The waiters looked as waiters always look
+before midday--sleepy, discontented, and unwashed. A few young men
+of the regular student type were scattered about here and there at
+various tables, reading, smoking, chatting, breakfasting, and
+reading the morning papers. In an alcove at the upper end of the
+second room (for there were two, one opening from the other) stood
+a blackened, broken-nosed, plaster bust of Voltaire, upon the
+summit of whose august wig some irreverent customer had perched a
+particularly rakish-looking hat. Just in front of this alcove and
+below the bust stood a marble-topped table, at one end of which two
+young men were playing dominoes to the accompaniment of the
+matutinal absinthe.</p>
+<p>"And this," said M&uuml;ller, with another flourish, "is the
+still more immortal table of the still more supremely immortal
+Voltaire. Here he was wont to rest his sublime elbows and sip his
+<i>demi-tasse</i>. Here, upon this very table, he wrote that famous
+letter to Marie Antoinette that Fr&eacute;ron stole, and in revenge
+for which he wrote the comedy called <i>l'Ecossaise</i>; but of
+this admirable satire you English, who only know Voltaire in his
+Henriade and his history of Charles the Twelfth, have probably
+never heard till this moment! <i>Eh bien</i>! I'm not much wiser
+than you--so never mind. I'll be hanged if I've ever read a line of
+it. Anyhow, here is the table, and at this other end of it we'll
+have our breakfast."</p>
+<p>It was a large, old-fashioned, Louis Quatorze piece of
+furniture, the top of which, formed from a single slab of some kind
+of gray and yellow marble, was stained all over with the coffee,
+wine, and ink-splashes of many generations of customers. It looked
+as old--nay, older--than the house itself.</p>
+<p>The young men who were playing at dominoes looked up and nodded,
+as three or four others had done in the outer room when we passed
+through.</p>
+<p>"<i>Bonjour, l'ami</i>," said the one who seemed to be winning.
+"Hast thou chanced to see anything of Martial, coming along!"</p>
+<p>"I observed a nose defiling round the corner of the Rue de
+Bussy," replied M&uuml;ller, "and it looked as if Martial might be
+somewhere in the far distance, but I didn't wait to see. Are you
+expecting him?"</p>
+<p>"Confound him--yes! We've been waiting more than half an
+hour."</p>
+<p>"If you have invited him to breakfast," said M&uuml;ller, "he is
+sure to come."</p>
+<p>"On the contrary, he has invited us to breakfast."</p>
+<p>"Ah, that alters the case," said M&uuml;ller, philosophically.
+"Then he is sure <i>not</i> to come." "Gar&ccedil;on!"</p>
+<p>A bullet-headed, short-jacketed, long-aproned waiter, who looked
+as if he had not been to bed since his early youth, answered the
+summons,</p>
+<p>"M'sieur!"</p>
+<p>"What have you that you can especially recommend this
+morning?"</p>
+<p>The waiter, with that nasal volubility peculiar to his race,
+rapidly ran over the whole vegetable and animal creation.</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller listened with polite incredulity.</p>
+<p>"Nothing else?" said he, when the other stopped, apparently from
+want of breath.</p>
+<p>"<i>Mais oui, M'sieur</i>!" and, thus stimulated, the waiter,
+having "exhausted worlds and then imagined new," launched forth
+into a second and still more impossible catalogue.</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller turned to me.</p>
+<p>"The resources of this establishment, you observe," he said,
+very gravely, "are inexhaustible. One might have a Roc's egg
+&agrave; la Sindbad for the asking."</p>
+<p>The waiter looked puzzled, shuffled his slippered feet, and
+murmured something about "<i>oeufs sur le plat</i>."</p>
+<p>"Unfortunately, however," continued M&uuml;ller, "we are but
+men--not fortresses provisioning for a siege. Antoine, <i>mon
+enfant</i>, we know thee to be a fellow of incontestible veracity,
+and thy list is magnificent; but we will be content with a
+<i>vol-au-vent</i> of fish, a <i>bifteck aux pommes frites</i>, an
+<i>omelette sucr&eacute;e</i>, and a bottle of thy 1840 Bordeaux
+with the yellow seal. Now vanish!"</p>
+<p>The waiter, wearing an expression of intense relief, vanished
+accordingly.</p>
+<p>Meanwhile more students had come in, and more kept coming. Hats
+and caps cropped up rapidly wherever there were pegs to hang them
+on, and the talking became fast and furious.</p>
+<p>I soon found that everybody knew everybody at the Caf&eacute;
+Procope, and that the specialty of the establishment was
+dominoes--just as the specialty of the Caf&eacute; de la
+R&eacute;gence is chess. There were games going on before long at
+almost every table, and groups of lookers-on gathered about those
+who enjoyed the reputation of being skilful players.</p>
+<p>Gradually breakfast after breakfast emerged from some mysterious
+nether world known only to the waiters, and the war of dominoes
+languished.</p>
+<p>"These are all students, of course," I said presently, "and yet,
+though I meet a couple of hundred fellows at our hospital lectures,
+I don't see a face I know."</p>
+<p>"You would find some by this time, I dare say, in the other
+room," replied M&uuml;ller. "I brought you in here that you might
+sit at Voltaire's table, and eat your steak under the shadow of
+Voltaire's bust; but this salon is chiefly frequented by
+law-students--the other by medical and art students. Your place,
+<i>mon ch&eacute;r</i>, as well as mine, is in the outer
+sanctuary."</p>
+<p>"That infernal Martial!" groaned one of the domino-players at
+the other end of the table. "So ends the seventh game, and here we
+are still. <i>Parbleu!</i> Horace, hasn't that absinthe given you
+an inconvenient amount of appetite?"</p>
+<p>"Alas! my friend--don't mention it. And when the absinthe is
+paid for, I haven't a sou."</p>
+<p>"My own case precisely. What's to be done?"</p>
+<p>"Done!" echoed Horace, pathetically. "Shade of Apicius! inspire
+me...but, no--he's not listening."</p>
+<p>"Hold! I have it. We'll make our wills in one another's favor,
+and die."</p>
+<p>"I should prefer to die when the wind is due East, and the moon
+at the full," said Horace, contemplatively.</p>
+<p>"True--besides, there is still <i>la m&egrave;re</i> Gaudissart.
+Her cutlets are tough, but her heart is tender. She would not
+surely refuse to add one more breakfast to the score!"</p>
+<p>Horace shook his head with an air of great despondency.</p>
+<p>"There was but one Job," said he, "and he has been dead some
+time. The patience of <i>la m&egrave;re</i> Gaudissart has long
+since been entirely exhausted."</p>
+<p>"I am not so sure of that. One might appeal to her feelings, you
+know--have a presentiment of early death--wipe away a tear... Bah!
+it is worth the effort, anyhow."</p>
+<p>"It is a forlorn hope, my dear fellow, but, as you say, it is
+worth the effort. <i>Allons donc!</i> to the storming of <i>la
+m&egrave;re</i> Gaudissart!"</p>
+<p>And with this they pushed aside the dominoes, took down their
+hats, nodded to M&uuml;ller, and went out.</p>
+<p>"There go two of the brightest fellows and most improvident
+scamps in the whole Quartier," said my companion. "They are both
+studying for the bar; both under age; both younger sons of good
+families; and both destined, if I am not much mistaken, to rise to
+eminence by-and-by. Horace writes for <i>Figaro</i> and the
+<i>Petit Journal pour Rire</i>--Th&eacute;ophile does
+<i>feuilleton</i> work--romances, chit-chat, and political
+squibs--rubbish, of course; but clever rubbish, and wonderful when
+one considers what boys they both are, and what dissipated lives
+they lead. The amount of impecuniosity those fellows get through in
+the course of a term is something inconceivable. They have often
+only one decent suit between them--and sometimes not that. To-day,
+you see, they are at their wits' end for a breakfast. They have run
+their credit dry at Procope and everywhere else, and are gone now
+to a miserable little den in the Rue du Paon, kept by a fat
+good-natured old soul called <i>la m&egrave;re</i> Gaudissart. She
+will perhaps take compassion on their youth and inexperience, and
+let them have six sous worth of horsebeef soup, stale bread, and
+the day before yesterday's vegetables. Nay, don't look so pitiful!
+We poor devils of the Student Quartier hug our Bohemian life, and
+exalt it above every other. When we have money, we cannot find
+windows enough out of which to fling it--when we have none, we
+start upon <i>la chasse au diner</i>, and enjoy the pleasures of
+the chase. We revel in the extremes of fasting and feasting, and
+scarcely know which we prefer."</p>
+<p>"I think your friends Horace and Th&eacute;ophile are tolerably
+clear as to which <i>they</i> prefer," I remarked, with a
+smile.</p>
+<p>"Bah! they would die of <i>ennui</i> if they had always enough
+to eat! Think how it sharpens a man's wits if--given the time, the
+place, and the appetite--he has every day to find the credit for
+his dinners! Show me a mathematical problem to compare with it as a
+popular educator of youth!"</p>
+<p>"But for young men of genius, like Horace and
+Th&eacute;ophile..."</p>
+<p>"Make yourself quite easy, <i>mon cher</i>. A little privation
+will do them no kind of harm. They belong to that class of whom it
+has been said that 'they would borrow money from Harpagon, and find
+truffles on the raft of the Medusa.' But hold! we are at the end of
+our breakfast. What say you? Shall we take our <i>demi-tasse</i> in
+the next room, among our fellow-students of physic and the fine
+arts?"</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXX."></a>CHAPTER XXX.</h2>
+<h3>A MAN WITH A HISTORY.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>The society of the outer salon differed essentially from the
+society of the inner salon at the Caf&eacute; Procope. It was
+noisier--it was shabbier--it was smokier. The conversation in the
+inner salon was of a general character on the whole, and, as one
+caught sentences of it here and there, seemed for the most part to
+relate to the literature and news of the day--to the last important
+paper in the Revue des Deux Mondes, to the new drama at the
+Od&eacute;on, or to the article on foreign politics in the
+<i>Journal des D&eacute;bats</i>. But in the outer salon the talk
+was to the last degree shoppy, and overflowed with the argot of the
+studios. Some few medical students were clustered, it is true, in a
+corner near the door; but they were so outnumbered by the artists
+at the upper end of the room, that these latter seemed to hold
+complete possession, and behaved more like the members of a
+recognised club than the casual customers of a caf&eacute;. They
+talked from table to table. They called the waiters by their
+Christian names. They swaggered up and down the middle of the room
+with their hats on their heads, their hands in their pockets, and
+their pipes in their mouths, as coolly as if it were the broad walk
+of the Luxembourg gardens.</p>
+<p>And the appearance of these gentlemen was not less remarkable
+than their deportment. Their hair, their beards, their clothes,
+were of the wildest devising. They seemed one and all to have
+started from a central idea, that central idea being to look as
+unlike their fellow-men as possible; and thence to have diverged
+into a variety that was nothing short of infinite. Each man had
+evidently modelled himself upon his own ideal, and no two ideals
+were alike. Some were picturesque, some were grotesque; and some,
+it must be admitted, were rather dirty ideals, into the realization
+of which no such paltry considerations as those of soap, water, or
+brushes were permitted to enter.</p>
+<p>Here, for instance, were Roundhead crops and flowing locks of
+Cavalier redundancy--steeple-crowned hats, and Roman cloaks draped
+bandit-fashion--moustachios frizzed and brushed up the wrong way in
+the style of Louis XIV.--pointed beards and slouched hats, after
+the manner of Vandyke---patriarchal beards <i>&agrave; la
+Barbarossa</i>--open collars, smooth chins, and long undulating
+locks of the Raffaelle type--coats, blouses, paletots of
+inconceivable cut, and all kinds of unusual colors--in a word,
+every eccentricity of clothing, short of fancy costume, in which it
+was practicable for men of the nineteenth century to walk abroad
+and meet the light of day.</p>
+<p>We had no sooner entered this salon, taken possession of a
+vacant table, and called for coffee, than my companion was beset by
+a storm of greetings.</p>
+<p>"Hol&agrave;! M&uuml;ller, where hast thou been hiding these
+last few centuries, <i>mon gaillard?</i>"</p>
+<p>"<i>Tiens!</i> M&uuml;ller risen from the dead!"</p>
+<p>"What news from <i>l&agrave; bas,</i> old fellow?"</p>
+<p>To all which ingenious pleasantries my companion replied in
+kind--introducing me at the same time to two or three of the
+nearest speakers. One of these, a dark young man got up in the
+style of a Byzantine Christ, with straight hair parted down the
+middle, a bifurcated beard, and a bare throat, was called
+Eug&egrave;ne Droz. Another--big, burly, warm-complexioned, with
+bright open blue eyes, curling reddish beard and moustache,
+slouched hat, black velvet blouse, immaculate linen, and an
+abundance of rings, chains, and ornaments--was made up in excellent
+imitation of the well-known portrait of Rubens. This gentleman's
+name, as I presently learned, was Caesar de Lepany.</p>
+<p>When we came in, these two young men, Droz and De Lepany, were
+discussing, in enthusiastic but somewhat unintelligible language,
+the merits of a certain Monsieur Lemonnier, of whom, although till
+that moment ignorant of his name and fame, I at once perceived that
+he must be some celebrated <i>chef de cuisine</i>.</p>
+<p>"He will never surpass that last thing of his," said the
+Byzantine youth. "Heavens! How smooth it is! How buttery! How
+pulpy!"</p>
+<p>"Ay--and yet with all that lusciousness of quality, he never
+wants piquancy," added De Lepany.</p>
+<p>"I think his greens are apt to be a little raw," interposed
+M&uuml;ller, taking part in the conversation.</p>
+<p>"Raw!" echoed the first speaker, indignantly. "<i>Eh, mon
+Dieu!</i> What can you be thinking of! They are almost too
+hot!"</p>
+<p>"But they were not so always, Eug&egrave;ne," said he of the
+Rubens make-up, with an air of reluctant candor. "It must be
+admitted that Lemonnier's greens used formerly to be a trifle--just
+a trifle--raw. Evidently Monsieur M&uuml;ller does not know how
+much he has taken to warming them up of late. Even now, perhaps,
+his olives are a little cold."</p>
+<p>"But then, how juicy his oranges are!" exclaimed young
+Byzantine.</p>
+<p>"True--and when you remember that he never washes--!"</p>
+<p>"Ah, <i>sacredie!</i> yes--there is the marvel!"</p>
+<p>And Monsieur Eug&egrave;ne Droz held up his hands and eyes with
+all the reverent admiration of a true believer for a particularly
+dirty dervish.</p>
+<p>"Who, in Heaven's name, is this unclean individual who used to
+like his vegetables underdone, and never washes?" whispered I in
+M&uuml;ller's ear.</p>
+<p>"What--Lemonnier! You don't mean to say you never heard of
+Lemonnier?"</p>
+<p>"Never, till now. Is he a cook?"</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller gave me a dig in the ribs that took my breath
+away.</p>
+<p>"<i>Goguenard!</i>" said he. "Lemonnier's an artist--the
+foremost man of the water-color school. But I wouldn't be too funny
+if I were you. Suppose you were to burst your jocular vein--there'd
+be a catastrophe!"</p>
+<p>Meanwhile the conversation of Messieurs Droz and Lepany had
+taken a fresh turn, and attracted a little circle of listeners,
+among whom I observed an eccentric-looking young man with a
+club-foot, an enormously long neck, and a head of short, stiff,
+dusty hair, like the bristles of a blacking-brush.</p>
+<p>"Queroulet!" said Lepany, with a contemptuous flourish of his
+pipe. "Who spoke of Queroulet? Bah!--a miserable plodder, destitute
+of ideality--a fellow who paints only what he sees, and sees only
+what is commonplace--a dull, narrow-souled, unimaginative
+handicraftsman, to whom a tree is just a tree; and a man, a man;
+and a straw, a straw, and nothing more!"</p>
+<p>"That's a very low-souled view to take of art, no doubt,"
+croaked in a grating treble voice the youth with the club-foot;
+"but if trees and men and straws are not exactly trees and men and
+straws, and are not to be represented as trees and men and straws,
+may I inquire what else they are, and how they are to be
+pictorially treated?"</p>
+<p>"They must be ideally treated, Monsieur Valentin," replied
+Lepany, majestically.</p>
+<p>"No doubt; but what will they be like when they are ideally
+treated? Will they still, to the vulgar eye, be recognisable for
+trees and men and straws?"</p>
+<p>"I should scarcely have supposed that Monsieur Valentin would
+jest upon such a subject as a canon of the art he professes," said
+Lepany, becoming more and more dignified.</p>
+<p>"I am not jesting," croaked Monsieur Valentin; "but when I hear
+men of your school talk so much about the Ideal, I (as a realist)
+always want to know what they themselves understand by the
+phrase."</p>
+<p>"Are you asking me for my definition of the Ideal, Monsieur
+Valentin?"</p>
+<p>"Well, if it's not giving you too much trouble--yes."</p>
+<p>Lepany, who evidently relished every chance of showing off, fell
+into a picturesque attitude and prepared to hold forth. Valentin
+winked at one or two of his own clique, and lit a cigar.</p>
+<p>"You ask me," began Lepany, "to define the Ideal--in other
+words, to define the indefinite, which alas! whether from a
+metaphysical, a philosophical, or an aesthetic point of view, is a
+task transcending immeasurably my circumscribed powers of
+expression."</p>
+<p>"Gracious heavens!" whispered M&uuml;ller in my ear. "He must
+have been reared from infancy on words of five syllables!"</p>
+<p>"What shall I say?" pursued Lepany. "Shall I say that the Ideal
+is, as it were, the Real distilled and sublimated in the alembic of
+the imagination? Shall I say that the Ideal is an image projected
+by the soul of genius upon the background of the universe? That it
+is that dazzling, that unimaginable, that incommunicable goal
+towards which the suns in their orbits, the stars in their courses,
+the spheres with all their harmonies, have been chaotically tending
+since time began! Ideal, say you? Call it ideal, soul, mind,
+matter, art, eternity,... what are they all but words? What are
+words but the weak strivings of the fettered soul that fain would
+soar to those empyrean heights where Truth, and Art, and Beauty are
+one and indivisible? Shall I say all this..."</p>
+<p>"My dear fellow, you have said it already--you needn't say it
+again," interrupted Valentin.</p>
+<p>"Ay; but having said it--having expressed myself, perchance with
+some obscurity...."</p>
+<p>"With the obscurity of Erebus!" said, very deliberately, a fat
+student in a blouse.</p>
+<p>"Monsieur!" exclaimed De Lepany, measuring the length and
+breadth of the fat student with a glance of withering scorn.</p>
+<p>The Byzantine was no less indignant.</p>
+<p>"Don't heed them, <i>mon ami</i>!" he cried, enthusiastically.
+"Thy definition is sublime-eloquent!"</p>
+<p>"Nay," said Valentin, "we concede that Monsieur de Lepany is
+sublime; we recognise with admiration that he is eloquent; but we
+submit that he is wholly unintelligible."</p>
+<p>And having delivered this parting shot, the club-footed realist
+slipped his arm through the arm of the fat student, and went off to
+a distant table and a game at dominoes.</p>
+<p>Then followed an outburst of offended idealism. His own clique
+crowded round Lepany as the champion of their school. They shook
+hands with him. They embraced him. They fooled him to the top of
+his bent. Presently, being not only as good-natured as he was
+conceited, but (rare phenomenon in the Quartier Latin!) a rich
+fellow into the bargain, De Lepany called for champagne and treated
+his admirers all around.</p>
+<p>In the midst of the chatter and bustle which this incident
+occasioned, a pale, earnest-looking man of about five-and-thirty,
+coming past our table on his way out of the Caf&eacute;, touched
+M&uuml;ller on the arm, bent down, and said quietly:--</p>
+<p>"M&uuml;ller, will you do me a favor!"</p>
+<p>"A hundred, Monsieur," replied my companion; half rising, and
+with an air of unusual respect and alacrity.</p>
+<p>"Thanks, one will be enough. Do you see that man yonder, sitting
+alone in the corner, with his back to the light?"</p>
+<p>"I do."</p>
+<p>"Good--don't look at him again, for fear of attracting his
+attention. I have been trying for the last half hour to get a
+sketch of his head, but I think he suspected me. Anyhow he moved so
+often, and so hid his face with his hands and the newspaper, that I
+was completely baffled. Now it is a remarkable head--just the head
+I have been wanting for my Marshal Romero--and if, with your rapid
+pencil and your skill in seizing expression, you could manage this
+for me...."</p>
+<p>"I will do my best," said M&uuml;ller.</p>
+<p>"A thousand thanks. I will go now; for when I am gone he will be
+off his guard. You will find me in the den up to three o'clock.
+Adieu."</p>
+<p>Saying which, the stranger passed on, and went out.</p>
+<p>"That's Flandrin!" said M&uuml;ller.</p>
+<p>"Really?" I said. "Flandrin! And you know him?"</p>
+<p>But in truth I only answered thus to cover my own ignorance; for
+I knew little at that time of modern French art, and I had never
+even heard the name of Flandrin before.</p>
+<p>"Know him!" echoed M&uuml;ller. "I should think so. Why, I
+worked in his studio for nearly two years."</p>
+<p>And then he explained to me that this great painter (great even
+then, though as yet appreciated only in certain choice Parisian
+circles, and not known out of France) was at work upon a grand
+historical subject connected with the Spanish persecutions in the
+Netherlands--the execution of Egmont and Horn, in short, in the
+great square before the H&ocirc;tel de Ville in Brussels.</p>
+<p>"But the main point now," said M&uuml;ller, "is to get the
+sketch--and how? Confound the fellow! while he keeps his back to
+the light and his head down like that, the thing is impossible.
+Anyhow I can't do it without an accomplice. You must help me."</p>
+<p>"I! What can I do?"</p>
+<p>"Go and sit near him--speak to him--make him look up--keep him,
+if possible, for a few minutes in conversation--nothing
+easier."</p>
+<p>"Nothing easier, perhaps, if I were you; but, being only myself,
+few things more difficult!"</p>
+<p>"Nevertheless, my dear boy, you must try, and at once. Hey
+--presto!--away!"</p>
+<p>Placed where we were, the stranger was not likely to have
+observed us; for we had come into the room from behind the corner
+in which he was sitting, and had taken our places at a table which
+he could not have seen without shifting his own position. So, thus
+peremptorily commanded, I rose; slipped quietly back into the inner
+salon, made a pretext of looking at the clock over the door; and
+came out again, as if alone and looking for a vacant seat.</p>
+<p>The table at which he had placed himself was very small--only
+just big enough to stand in a corner and hold a plate and a
+coffee-cup; but it was supposed to be large enough for two, and
+there were evidently two chairs belonging to it. On one of these,
+being alone, the stranger had placed his overcoat and a small black
+bag. I at once saw and seized my opportunity.</p>
+<p>"Pardon, Monsieur," I said, very civilly, "will you permit me to
+hang these things up?"</p>
+<p>He looked up, frowned, and said abruptly:--</p>
+<p>"Why, Monsieur?"</p>
+<p>"That I may occupy this chair."</p>
+<p>He glanced round; saw that there was really no other vacant;
+swept off the bag and coat with his own hands; hung them on a peg
+overhead; dropped back into his former attitude, and went on
+reading.</p>
+<p>"I regret to have given you the trouble, Monsieur," I said,
+hoping to pave the way to a conversation.</p>
+<p>But a little quick, impatient movement of the hand was his only
+reply. He did not even raise his head. He did not even lift his
+eyes from the paper.</p>
+<p>I called for a demi-tasse and a cigar; then took out a note-book
+and pencil, assumed an air of profound abstraction, and affected to
+become absorbed in calculations.</p>
+<p>In the meanwhile, I could not resist furtively observing the
+appearance of this man whom a great artist had selected as his
+model for one of the darkest characters of medi&aelig;val
+history.</p>
+<p>He was rather below than above the middle height; spare and
+sinewy; square in the shoulders and deep in the chest; with
+close-clipped hair and beard; grizzled moustache; high cheek-bones;
+stern impassive features, sharply cut; and deep-set restless eyes,
+quick and glancing as the eyes of a monkey. His face, throat, and
+hands were sunburnt to a deep copper-color, as if cast in bronze.
+His age might have been from forty-five to fifty. He wore a
+thread-bare frock-coat buttoned to the chin; a stiff black stock
+revealing no glimpse of shirt-collar; a well-worn hat pulled low
+over his eyes; and trousers of dark blue cloth, worn very white and
+shiny at the knees, and strapped tightly down over a pair of
+much-mended boots.</p>
+<p>The more I looked at him, the less I was surprised that Flandrin
+should have been struck by his appearance. There was an air of
+stern poverty and iron resolution about the man that arrested one's
+attention at first sight. The words "<i>ancien militaire"</i> were
+written in every furrow of his face; in every seam and on every
+button of his shabby clothing. That he had seen service, missed
+promotion, suffered unmerited neglect (or, it might be, merited
+disgrace), seemed also not unlikely.</p>
+<p>Watching him as he sat, half turned away, half hidden by the
+newspaper he was reading, one elbow resting on the table, one
+brown, sinewy hand supporting his chin and partly concealing his
+mouth, I told myself that here, at all events, was a man with a
+history--perhaps with a very dark history. What were the secrets of
+his past? What had he done? What had he endured? I would give much
+to know.</p>
+<p>My coffee and cigar being brought, I asked for the
+<i>Figaro</i>, and holding the paper somewhat between the stranger
+and myself, watched him with increasing interest.</p>
+<p>I now began to suspect that he was less interested in his own
+newspaper than he appeared to be, and that his profound
+abstraction, like my own, was assumed. An indefinable something in
+the turn of his head seemed to tell me that his attention was
+divided between whatever might be going forward in the room and
+what he was reading. I cannot describe what that something was; but
+it gave me the impression that he was always listening. When the
+outer door opened or shut, he stirred uneasily, and once or twice
+looked sharply round to see what new-comer entered the caf&eacute;.
+Was he anxiously expecting some one who did not come? Or was he
+dreading the appearance of some one whom he wished to avoid? Might
+he not be a political refugee? Might he not be a spy?</p>
+<p>"There is nothing of interest in the papers to-day, Monsieur,"
+said, making another effort to force him into conversation.</p>
+<p>He affected not to hear me.</p>
+<p>I drew my chair a little nearer, and repeated the
+observation.</p>
+<p>He frowned impatiently, and without looking up, replied:--</p>
+<p>"<i>Eh, mon Dieu</i>, Monsieur!--when there is a dearth of
+news!"</p>
+<p>"There need not, even so, be a dearth of wit. <i>Figaro</i> is
+as heavy to-day as a government leader in the <i>Moniteur</i>."</p>
+<p>He shrugged his shoulders and moved slightly round, apparently
+to get a better light upon what he was reading, but in reality to
+turn still more away from me. The gesture of avoidance was so
+marked, that with the best will in the world, it would have been
+impossible for me to address him again. I therefore relapsed into
+silence.</p>
+<p>Presently I saw a sudden change flash over him.</p>
+<p>Now, in turning away from myself, he had faced round towards a
+narrow looking-glass panel which reflected part of the opposite
+side of the room; and chancing, I suppose, to lift his eyes from
+the paper, he had seen something that arrested his attention. His
+head was still bent; but I could see that his eyes were riveted
+upon the mirror. There was alertness in the tightening of his hand
+before his mouth--in the suspension of his breathing.</p>
+<p>Then he rose abruptly, brushed past me as if I were not there,
+and crossed to where M&uuml;ller, sketch-book in hand, was in the
+very act of taking his portrait.</p>
+<p>I jumped up, almost involuntarily, and followed him.
+M&uuml;ller, with an unsuccessful effort to conceal his confusion,
+thrust the book into his pocket.</p>
+<p>"Monsieur," said the stranger, in a low, resolute voice, "I
+protest against what you have been doing. You have no right to take
+my likeness without my permission."</p>
+<p>"Pardon, Monsieur, I--I beg to assure you--" stammered
+M&uuml;ller.</p>
+<p>"That you intended no offence? I am willing to suppose so. Give
+me up the sketch, and I am content."</p>
+<p>"Give up the sketch!" echoed M&uuml;ller.</p>
+<p>"Precisely, Monsieur."</p>
+<p>"Nay--but if, as an artist, I have observed that which leads me
+to desire a--a memorandum--let us say of the pose and contour of a
+certain head," replied M&uuml;ller, recovering his self-possession,
+"it is not likely that I shall be disposed to part from my
+memorandum."</p>
+<p>"How, Monsieur! you refuse?"</p>
+<p>"I am infinitely sorry, but--"</p>
+<p>"But you refuse?"</p>
+<p>"I certainly cannot comply with Monsieur's request."</p>
+<p>The stranger, for all his bronzing, grew pale with rage.</p>
+<p>"Do not compel me, Monsieur, to say what I must think of your
+conduct, if you persist in this determination," he said
+fiercely.</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller smiled, but made no reply.</p>
+<p>"You absolutely refuse to yield up the sketch?"</p>
+<p>"Absolutely."</p>
+<p>"Then, Monsieur, <i>c'est une infamie</i>--<i>et vous &ecirc;tes
+un l&acirc;che</i>!"</p>
+<p>But the last word had scarcely hissed past his lips before
+M&uuml;ller dashed his coffee dregs full in the stranger's
+face.</p>
+<p>In one second, the table was upset--blows were
+exchanged--M&uuml;ller, pinned against the wall with his
+adversary's hands upon his throat, was striking out with the
+desperation of a man whose strength is overmatched--and the whole
+room was in a tumult.</p>
+<p>In vain I attempted to fling myself between them. In vain the
+waiters rushed to and fro, imploring "ces Messieurs" to interpose.
+In vain a stout man pushed his way through the bystanders,
+exclaiming angrily:--</p>
+<p>"Desist, Messieurs! Desist, in the name of the law! I am the
+proprietor of this establishment--I forbid this brawling--I will
+have you both arrested! Messieurs, do you hear?"</p>
+<p>Suddenly the flush of rage faded out of M&uuml;ller's face. He
+gasped--became livid. Lepany, Droz, myself, and one or two others,
+flew at the stranger and dragged him forcibly back.</p>
+<p>"Assassin!" I cried, "would you murder him?"</p>
+<p>He flung us off, as a baited bull flings off a pack of curs. For
+myself, though I received only a backhanded blow on the chest, I
+staggered as if I had been struck with a sledgehammer.</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller, half-fainting, dropped into a chair.</p>
+<p>There was a tramp and clatter at the door--a swaying and parting
+of the crowd.</p>
+<p>"Here are the sergents de ville!" cried a trembling waiter.</p>
+<p>"He attacked me first," gasped M&uuml;ller. "He has half
+strangled me."</p>
+<p>"<i>Qu'est ce que &ccedil;a me fait</i>!" shouted the enraged
+proprietor. "You are a couple of <i>canaille</i>! You have made a
+scandal in my Caf&eacute;. Sergents, arrest both these
+gentlemen!"</p>
+<p>The police--there were two of them, with their big cocked hats
+on their heads and their long sabres by their sides--pushed through
+the circle of spectators. The first laid his hand on M&uuml;ller's
+shoulder; the second was about to lay his hand on mine, but I drew
+back.</p>
+<p>"Which is the other?" said he, looking round.</p>
+<p>"<i>Sacredie</i>!" stammered the proprietor, "he was
+here--there--not a moment ago!"</p>
+<p>"<i>Diable</i>!" said the sergent de ville, stroking his
+moustache, and staring fiercely about him. "Did no one see him
+go?"</p>
+<p>There was a chorus of exclamations--a rush to the inner
+salon--to the door--to the street. But the stranger was nowhere in
+sight; and, which was still more incomprehensible, no one had seen
+him go!</p>
+<p>"<i>Mais, mon Dieu</i>!" exclaimed the proprietor, mopping his
+head and face violently with his pocket-handkerchief, "was the man
+a ghost, that he should vanish into the air?"</p>
+<p>"<i>Parbleu</i>! a ghost with muscles of iron," said
+M&uuml;ller. "Talk of the strength of a madman--he has the strength
+of a whole lunatic asylum!"</p>
+<p>"He gave me a most confounded blow in the ribs, anyhow!" said
+Lepany.</p>
+<p>"And nearly broke my arm," added Eug&egrave;ne Droz.</p>
+<p>"And has given me a pain in my chest for a week," said I, in
+chorus.</p>
+<p>"If he wasn't a ghost," observed the fat student sententiously,
+"he must certainly be the devil."</p>
+<p>The sergents de ville grinned.</p>
+<p>"Do we, then, arrest this gentleman?" asked the taller and
+bigger of the two, his hand still upon my friend's shoulder.</p>
+<p>But M&uuml;ller laughed and shook his head.</p>
+<p>"What!" said he, "arrest a man for resisting the devil?
+Nonsense, <i>mes amis</i>, you ought to canonize me. What says
+Monsieur le propri&eacute;taire?"</p>
+<p>Monsieur the proprietor smiled.</p>
+<p>"I am willing to let the matter drop," he replied, "on the
+understanding that Monsieur M&uuml;ller was not really the first
+offender."</p>
+<p>"<i>Foi d'honneur</i>! He insulted me--I threw some coffee in
+his face--he flung himself upon me like a tiger, and almost choked
+me, as all here witnessed. And for what? Because I did him the
+honor to make a rough pencilling of his ugly face &nbsp;...
+<i>Mille tonnerres</i>!--the fellow has stolen my sketch-book!"</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXI."></a>CHAPTER XXXI.</h2>
+<h3>FANCIES ABOUT FACES.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>The sketch-book was undoubtedly gone, and the stranger had
+undoubtedly taken it. How he took it, and how he vanished, remained
+a mystery.</p>
+<p>The aspect of affairs, meanwhile, was materially changed.
+M&uuml;ller no longer stood in the position of a leniently-treated
+offender. He had become accuser, and plaintiff. A grave breach of
+the law had been committed, and he was the victim of a bold and
+skilful <i>tour de main</i>.</p>
+<p>The police shook their heads, twirled their moustaches, and
+looked wise.</p>
+<p>It was a case of premeditated assault--in short, of robbery with
+violence. It must be inquired into--reported, of course, at
+head-quarters, without loss of time. Would Monsieur be pleased to
+describe the stolen sketch-book? An oblong, green volume, secured
+by an elastic band; contains sketches in pencil and water-colors;
+value uncertain--Good. And the accused ... would Monsieur also be
+pleased to describe the person of the accused? His probable age,
+for instance; his height; the color of his hair, eyes, and beard?
+Good again. Lastly, Monsieur's own name and address, exactly and in
+full. <i>Tr&egrave;s-bon.</i> It might, perhaps, be necessary for
+Monsieur to enter a formal deposition to-morrow morning at the
+Prefecture of Police, in which case due notice would be given.</p>
+<p>Whereupon he who seemed to be chief of the twain, having entered
+M&uuml;ller's replies in a greasy pocket-book of stupendous
+dimensions, which he seemed to wear like a cuirass under the breast
+of his uniform, proceeded to interrogate the proprietor and
+waiters.</p>
+<p>Was the accused an habitual frequenter of the cafe?--No. Did
+they remember ever to have seen him there before?--No. Should they
+recognise him if they saw him again? To this question the answers
+were doubtful. One waiter thought he should recognise the man;
+another was not sure; and Monsieur the proprietor admitted that he
+had himself been too angry to observe anything or anybody very
+minutely.</p>
+<p>Finally, having made themselves of as much importance and asked
+as many questions as possible, the sergents de ville condescended
+to accept a couple of-petits verres a-piece, and then, with much
+lifting of cocked hats and clattering of sabres, departed.</p>
+<p>Most of the students had ere this dropped off by twos and
+threes, and were gone to their day's work, or pleasure--to return
+again in equal force about five in the afternoon. Of those that
+remained, some five or six came up when the police were gone, and
+began chatting about the robbery. When they learned that Flandrin
+had desired to have a sketch of the man's head; when M&uuml;ller
+described his features, and I his obstinate reserve and
+semi-military air, their excitement knew no bounds. Each had
+immediately his own conjecture to offer. He was a political spy,
+and therefore fearful lest his portrait should be recognised. He
+was a conspirator of the Fieschi school. He was Mazzini in
+person.</p>
+<p>In the midst of the discussion, a sudden recollection flashed
+upon me.</p>
+<p>"A clue! a clue!" I shouted triumphantly. "He left his coat and
+black bag hanging up in the corner!"</p>
+<p>Followed by the others, I ran to the spot where I had been
+sitting before the affray began. But my exultation was shortlived.
+Coat and bag, like their owner, had disappeared.</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller thrust his hands into his pockets, shook his head,
+and whistled dismally.</p>
+<p>"I shall never see my sketch-book again, <i>parbleu!</i>" said
+he. "The man who could not only take it out of my breast-pocket,
+but also in the very teeth of the police, secure his property and
+escape unseen, is a master of his profession. Our friends in the
+cocked hats have no chance against him."</p>
+<p>"And Flandrin, who is expecting the sketch," said I; "what of
+him?"</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller shrugged his shoulders.</p>
+<p>"Next to being beaten," growled he, "there's nothing I hate like
+confessing it. However, it has to be done--so the sooner the
+better. Would you like to come with me? You'll see his studio."</p>
+<p>I was only too glad to accompany him; for to me, as to most of
+us, there was ever a nameless charm in the picturesque litter of an
+artist's studio. M&uuml;ller's own studio, however, was as yet the
+only one I had seen. He laughed when I said this.</p>
+<p>"If your only notion of a studio is derived from that specimen,"
+said he, "you will he agreeably surprised by the contrast. He calls
+his place a 'den,' but that's a metaphor. Mine is a howling
+wilderness."</p>
+<p>Arriving presently at a large house at the bottom of a courtyard
+in the Rue Vaugirard, he knocked at a small side-door bearing a
+tiny brass plate not much larger than a visiting-card, on which was
+engraved--"Monsieur Flandrin."</p>
+<p>The door opened by some invisible means from within, and we
+entered a passage dimly lighted by a painted glass door at the
+farther end. My companion led the way down this passage, through
+the door, and into a small garden containing some three or four old
+trees, a rustic seat, a sun-dial on an antique-looking fragment of
+a broken column, and a little weed-grown pond about the size of an
+ordinary drawing-room table, surrounded by artificial
+rock-work.</p>
+<p>At the farther extremity of this garden, filling the whole space
+from wall to wall, and occupying as much ground as must have been
+equal to half the original enclosure, stood a large, new,
+windowless building, in shape exactly like a barn, lighted from a
+huge skylight in the roof, and entered by a small door in one
+corner. I did not need to be told that this was the studio.</p>
+<p>But if the outside was like a barn, the inside was like a
+beautiful medi&aelig;val interior by Cattermole--an interior
+abounding in rich and costly detail; in heavy crimson draperies,
+precious old Italian cabinets, damascened armor, carved chairs with
+upright backs and twisted legs, old paintings in massive Florentine
+frames, and strange quaint pieces of Elizabethan furniture, like
+buffets, with open shelves full of rare and artistic
+things--bronzes, ivory carvings, unwieldy Majolica jars, and lovely
+goblets of antique Venetian glass laced with spiral ornaments of
+blue and crimson and that dark emerald green of which the secret is
+now lost for ever.</p>
+<p>Then, besides all these things, there were great folios leaning
+piled against the walls, one over the other; and Persian rugs of
+many colors lying here and there about the floor; and down in one
+corner I observed a heap of little models, useful, no doubt, as
+accessories in pictures--gondolas, frigates, foreign-looking carts,
+a tiny sedan chair, and the like.</p>
+<p>But the main interest of the scene concentrated itself in the
+unfinished picture, the hired model (a brawny fellow in a
+close-fitting suit of black, leaning on a huge two-handed sword),
+and the artist in his holland blouse, with the palette and brushes
+in his hand.</p>
+<p>It was a very large picture, and stood on a monster easel,
+somewhat towards the end of the studio. The light from above poured
+full upon the canvas, while beyond lay a background of shadow. Much
+of the subject was as yet only indicated, but enough was already
+there to tell the tragic story and display the power of the
+painter. There, high above the heads of the mounted guards and the
+assembled spectators, rose the scaffold, hung with black. Egmont,
+wearing a crimson tabard, a short black cloak embroidered with
+gold, and a hat ornamented with black and white plumes, stood in a
+haughty attitude, as if facing the square and the people. Two other
+figures, apparently of an ecclesiastic and a Spanish general,
+partly in outline, partly laid in with flat color, were placed to
+the right of the principal character. The headsman stood behind,
+leaning upon his sword. The slender spire of the H&ocirc;tel de
+Ville, surmounted by its gilded archangel glittering in the morning
+sun, rose high against a sky of cloudless blue; while all around
+was seen the well-known square with its sculptured gables and
+decorated fa&ccedil;ades--every roof, window, and balcony crowded
+with spectators.</p>
+<p>Unfinished though it was, I saw at once that I was brought face
+to face with what would some day be a famous work of art. The
+figures were grandly grouped; the heads were noble; the sky was
+full of air; the action of the whole scene informed with life and
+motion.</p>
+<p>I stood admiring and silent, while M&uuml;ller told his tale,
+and Flandrin paused in his work to listen.</p>
+<p>"It is horribly unlucky," said he. "I had not been able to find
+a portrait of Romero and, <i>faute de mieux</i>, have been trying
+for days past to invent the right sort of head for him--of course,
+without success. You never saw such a heap of failures! But as for
+that man at the caf&eacute;, if Providence had especially created
+him for my purpose, he could not have answered it better."</p>
+<p>"I believe I am as sorry as you can possibly be," said
+M&uuml;ller.</p>
+<p>"Then you are very sorry indeed," replied the painter; and he
+looked even more disappointment than he expressed.</p>
+<p>"I'm afraid I can't do it," said M&uuml;ller, after a moment's
+silence; "but if you'll give me a pencil and a piece of paper, and
+credit me with the will in default of the deed, I will try to
+sketch the head from memory."</p>
+<p>"Ah? if you can only do that! Here is a drawing block--choose
+what pencils you prefer--or here are crayons, if you like them
+better."</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller took the pencils and block, perched himself on the
+corner of a table, and began. Flandrin, breathless with
+expectation, looked over his shoulder. Even the model (in the grim
+character of Egmont's executioner) laid aside his two-handed sword,
+and came round for a peep.</p>
+<p>"Bravo! that's just his nose and brow," said Flandrin, as
+M&uuml;ller's rapid hand flew over the paper. "Yes--the likeness
+comes with every touch ... and the eyes, so keen and furtive.
+&nbsp;... Nay, that eyelid should be a little more depressed at
+the<br>
+corner.... Yes, yes--just so. Admirable! There!--don't attempt to
+work it up. The least thing might mar the likeness. My dear fellow,
+what a service you have rendered me!"</p>
+<p>"<i>Quatre-vingt mille diables</i>!" ejaculated the model, his
+eyes riveted upon the sketch.</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller laughed and looked.</p>
+<p>"<i>Tiens</i>! Guichet," said he, "is that meant for a
+compliment?"</p>
+<p>"Where did you see him?" asked the model, pointing down at the
+sketch.</p>
+<p>"Why? Do you know him?"</p>
+<p>"Where did you see him, I say?" repeated Guichet,
+impatiently.</p>
+<p>He was a rough fellow, and garnished every other sentence with
+an oath; but he did not mean to be uncivil.</p>
+<p>"At the Caf&eacute; Procope."</p>
+<p>"When?"</p>
+<p>"About an hour ago. But again, I repeat--do you know him?"</p>
+<p>"Do I know him? <i>Tonnerre de Dieu</i>!"</p>
+<p>"Then who and what is he?"</p>
+<p>The model stroked his beard; shook his head; declined to
+answer.</p>
+<p>"Bah!" said he, gloomily, "I may have seen him, or I may be
+mistaken. 'Tis not my affair."</p>
+<p>"I suspect Guichet knows something against this interesting
+stranger," laughed Flandrin. "Come, Guichet, out with it! We are
+among friends."</p>
+<p>But Guichet again looked at the drawing, and again shook his
+head.</p>
+<p>"I'm no judge of pictures, messieurs," said he. "I'm only a poor
+devil of a model. How can I pretend to know a man from such a
+<i>griffonage</i> as that?"</p>
+<p>And, taking up his big sword again, he retreated to his former
+post over against the picture. We all saw that he was resolved to
+say no more.</p>
+<p>Flandrin, delighted with M&uuml;ller's sketch, put it, with many
+thanks and praises, carefully away in one of the great folios
+against the wall.</p>
+<p>"You have no idea, <i>mon cher</i> M&uuml;ller," he said, "of
+what value it is to me. I was in despair about the thing till I saw
+that fellow this morning in the Caf&eacute;; and he looked as if he
+had stepped out of the Middle Ages on purpose for me. It is quite a
+medi&aelig;val face--if you know what I mean by a medi&aelig;val
+face."</p>
+<p>"I think I do," said M&uuml;ller. "You mean that there was a
+moyen-&acirc;ge type, as there was a classical type, and as there
+is a modern type."</p>
+<p>"Just so; and therein lies the main difficulty that we
+historical painters have to encounter. When we cannot find
+portraits of our characters, we are driven to invent faces for
+them--and who can invent what he never sees? Invention must be
+based on some kind of experience; and to study old portraits is not
+enough for our purpose, except we frankly make use of them as
+portraits. We cannot generalize upon them, so as to resuscitate a
+vanished type."</p>
+<p>"But then has it really vanished?" said M&uuml;ller. "And how
+can we know for certain that the medi&aelig;val type did actually
+differ from the type we see before us every day?"</p>
+<p>"By simple and direct proof--by studying the epochs of portrait
+painting. Take Holbein's heads, for instance. Were not the people
+of his time grimmer, harder-visaged, altogether more unbeautiful
+than the people of ours? Take Petitot's and Sir Peter Lely's. Can
+you doubt that the characteristics of their period were entirely
+different? Do you suppose that either race would look as we look,
+if resuscitated and clothed in the fashion of to-day?"</p>
+<p>"I am not at all sure that we should observe any difference,"
+said M&uuml;ller, doubtfully.</p>
+<p>"And I feel sure we should observe the greatest," replied
+Flandrin, striding up and down the studio, and speaking with great
+animation. "I believe, as regards the men and women of Holbein's
+time, that their faces were more lined than ours; their eyes, as a
+rule, smaller--their mouths wider--their eyebrows more
+scanty--their ears larger--their figures more ungainly. And in like
+manner, I believe the men and women of the seventeenth century to
+have been more fleshy than either Holbein's people or ourselves; to
+have had rounder cheeks, eyes more prominent and heavy-lidded,
+shorter noses, more prominent chins, and lips of a fuller and more
+voluptuous mould."</p>
+<p>"Still we can't be certain how much of all this may be owing to
+the mere mannerisms of successive schools of art," urged
+M&uuml;ller, sticking manfully to his own opinion. "Where will you
+find a more decided mannerist than Holbein? And because he was the
+first portrait-painter of his day, was he not reproduced with all
+his faults of literalness and dryness by a legion of imitators? So
+with Sir Peter Lely, with Petitot, with Vandyck, with every great
+artist who painted kings and queens and court beauties. Then,
+again, a certain style of beauty becomes the rage, and-a skilful
+painter flatters each fair sitter in turn by bringing up her
+features, or her expression, or the color of her hair, as near as
+possible to the fashionable standard. And further, there is the
+dress of a period to be taken into account. Think of the family
+likeness that pervades the flowing wigs of the courts of Louis
+Quatorze and Charles the Second--see what powder did a hundred
+years ago to equalize mankind."</p>
+<p>Flandrin shook his head.</p>
+<p>"Ingenious, <i>mon gar&ccedil;on</i>" said he; "ingenious, but
+unsound The cut of a fair lady's bodice never yet altered the shape
+of her nose; neither was it the fashion of their furred surtouts
+that made Erasmus and Sir Thomas More as like as twins. What you
+call the 'mannerism' of Holbein is only his way of looking at his
+fellow-creatures. He and Sir Antonio More were the most faithful of
+portrait-painters. They didn't know how to flatter. They painted
+exactly what they saw--no more, and no less; so that every head
+they have left us is a chapter in the history of the Middle Ages.
+The race--depend on't--the race was unbeautiful; and not even the
+picturesque dress of the period (which, according to your theory,
+should have helped to make the wearers of it more attractive) could
+soften one jot of their plainness."</p>
+<p>"I can't bring myself to believe that we were all so
+ugly--French, English, and Germans alike--only a couple of
+centuries ago," said M&uuml;ller.</p>
+<p>"That is to say, you prefer to believe that Holbein, and Lucas
+Cranach, and Sir Antonio More, and all their school, were
+mannerists. Nonsense, my dear fellow--nonsense! <i>It is Nature who
+is the mannerist</i>. She loves to turn out a certain generation
+after a particular pattern; and when she is tired of that pattern,
+she invents another. Her fancies last, on the average about, a
+hundred years. Sometimes she changes the type quite abruptly;
+sometimes modifies it by gentle, yet always perceptible, degrees.
+And who shall say what her secret processes are? Education, travel,
+intermarriage with foreigners, the introduction of new kinds of
+food) the adoption of new habits, may each and all have something
+to do with these successive changes; but of one point at least we
+may be certain--and that is, that we painters are not responsible
+for her caprices. Our mission is to interpret Dame Nature more or
+less faithfully, according to our powers; but beyond interpretation
+we cannot go. And now (for you know I am as full of speculations as
+an experimental philosopher) I will tell you another conclusion I
+have come to with regard to this subject; and that is that national
+types were less distinctive in medi&aelig;val times than in ours.
+The French, English, Flemish, and Dutch of the Middle Ages, as we
+see them in their portraits, are curiously alike in all outward
+characteristics. The courtiers of Francis the First and their
+(James, and the lords and ladies of the court of Henry the Eighth,
+resemble each other as people of one nation. Their features are, as
+it were, cast in one mould. So also with the courts of Louis
+Quatorze and Charles the Second. As for the regular French face of
+to-day, with its broad cheek-bones and high temples running far up
+into the hair on either side, that type does not make its
+appearance till close upon the advent of the Reign of Terror. But
+enough! I shall weary you with theories, and wear out the patience
+of our friend Guichet, who is sufficiently tired already with
+waiting for a head that never comes to be cut off as it ought.
+Adieu--adieu. Come soon again, and see how I get on with Marshal
+Romero."</p>
+<p>Thus dismissed, we took our leave and left the painter to his
+work.</p>
+<p>"An extraordinary man!" said M&uuml;ller, as we passed out again
+through the neglected garden and paused for a moment to look at
+some half-dozen fat gold and silver fish that were swimming lazily
+about the little pond. "A man made up of contradictions--abounding
+in energy, yet at the same time the dreamiest of speculators. An
+original thinker, too; but wanting that basis which alone makes
+original thinking of any permanent value."</p>
+<p>"But," said I, "he is evidently an educated man."</p>
+<p>"Yes--educated as most artists are educated; but Flandrin has as
+strong a bent for science as for art, and deserved something
+better. Five years at a German university would have made of him
+one of the most remarkable men of his time. What did you think of
+his theory of faces?"</p>
+<p>"I know nothing of the subject, and cannot form a judgment; but
+it sounded as if it might be true."</p>
+<p>"Yes--just that. It may be true, and it may not. If true, then
+for my own part I should like to pursue his theory a step further,
+and trace the operation of these secret processes by means of which
+I am, happily, such a much better-looking fellow than my
+great-great-great-great-grandfather of two hundred years ago. What,
+for instance, has the introduction of the potato done for the noses
+of mankind?"</p>
+<p>Chatting thus, we walked back as far as the corner of the Rue
+Racine, where we parted; I to attend a lecture at the &Eacute;cole
+de M&eacute;decine, and M&uuml;ller to go home to his studio in the
+Rue Clovis.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXII."></a>CHAPTER XXXII.</h2>
+<h3>RETURNED WITH THANKS.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>A week or two had thus gone by since the dreadful evening at the
+Op&eacute;ra Comique, and all this time I had neither seen nor
+heard more of the fair Josephine. My acquaintance with Franz
+M&uuml;ller and the life of the Quartier Latin had, on the
+contrary, progressed rapidly. Just as the affair of the Opera had
+dealt a final blow to my romance <i>&agrave; la grisette</i> on the
+one hand, so had the excursion to Courbevoie, the visit to the
+&Eacute;cole de Natation, and the adventure of the Caf&eacute;
+Procope, fostered my intimacy with the artist on the other. We were
+both young, somewhat short of money, and brimful of fun. Each, too,
+had a certain substratum of earnestness underlying the mere
+surface-gayety of his character. M&uuml;ller was enthusiastic for
+art; I for poetry; and both for liberty. I fear, when I look back
+upon them, that we talked a deal of nonsense about Brutus, and the
+Rights of Man, and the noble savage, and all that sort of thing, in
+those hot-headed days of our youth. It was a form of political
+measles that the young men of that time were quite as liable to as
+the young men of our own; and, living as we then were in the heart
+of the most revolutionary city in Europe, I do not well see how we
+could have escaped the infection. M&uuml;ller (who took it worse
+than I did, and was very rabid indeed when I first knew him)
+belonged just then not only to the honorable brotherhood of Les
+Chicards, but also to a small debating club that met twice a week
+in a private room at the back of an obscure Estaminet in the Rue de
+la Harpe. The members of this club were mostly art-students, and
+some, like himself, Chicards--generous, turbulent, high-spirited
+boys, with more enthusiasm than brains, and a flow of words wholly
+out of proportion to the bulk of their ideas. As I came to know him
+more intimately, I used sometimes to go there with M&uuml;ller,
+after our cheap dinner in the Quartier and our evening stroll along
+the Boulevards or the Champs Elys&eacute;es; and I am bound to
+admit that I never, before or since, heard quite so much nonsense
+of the declamatory sort as on those memorable occasions. I did not
+think it nonsense then, however. I admired it with all my heart;
+applauded the nursery eloquence of these sucking Mirabeaus and
+Camille Desmoulins as frantically as their own vanity could desire;
+and was even secretly chagrined that my own French was not yet
+fluent enough to enable me to take part in their discussions.</p>
+<p>In the meanwhile, my debts were paid; and, having dropped out of
+society when I fell out of love with Madame de Marignan, I no
+longer overspent my allowance. I bought no more bouquets, paid for
+no more opera-stalls, and hired no more prancing steeds at seven
+francs the hour. I bade adieu to picture-galleries, flower-shows,
+morning concerts, dress boots, white kid gloves, elaborate
+shirt-fronts, and all the vanities of the fashionable world. In a
+word, I renounced the Faubourg St. Germain for the Quartier Latin,
+and applied myself to such work and such pleasures as pertained to
+the locality. If, after a long day at Dr. Ch&eacute;ron's, or the
+H&ocirc;tel Dieu, or the &Eacute;cole de M&eacute;decine, I did
+waste a few hours now and then, I, at least, wasted them cheaply.
+Cheaply, but oh, so pleasantly! Ah me! those nights at the debating
+club, those evenings at the Chicards, those student's balls at the
+Chaumi&egrave;re, those third-class trips to Versailles and
+Fontainebleau, those one-franc pit seats at the Ga&icirc;et&eacute;
+and the Palais Royal, those little suppers at Pompon's and
+Flicoteau's--how delightful they were! How joyous! How free from
+care! And even when we made up a party and treated the ladies (for
+to treat the ladies is <i>de rigueur</i> in the code of Quartier
+Latin etiquette), how little it still cost, and what a world of
+merriment we had for the money!</p>
+<p>It was well for me, too, and a source of much inward
+satisfaction, that my love-affair with Mademoiselle Josephine had
+faded and died a natural death. We never made up that quarrel of
+the Op&eacute;ra Comique, and I had not desired that we should make
+it up. On the contrary, I was exceedingly glad of the opportunity
+of withdrawing my attentions; so I wrote her a polite little note,
+in which I expressed my regret that our tastes were so dissimilar
+and our paths in life so far apart; wished her every happiness;
+assured her that I should ever remember her with friendly regard;
+and signed my name with a tremendous flourish at the bottom of the
+second page. With the note, however, I sent her a raised pie and a
+red and green shawl, of which I begged her acceptance in token of
+amity; and as neither of those gifts was returned, I concluded that
+she ate the one and wore the other, and that there was peace
+between us.</p>
+<p>But the scales of fortune as they go up for one, go down for
+another. This man's luck is balanced by that man's ruin--Orestes
+falls sick, and Pylades returns from Kissingen cured of his
+lumbago--old Croesus dies, and little Miss Kilmansegg comes into
+the world with a golden spoon in her mouth, So it fell out with
+Franz M&uuml;ller and myself. As I happily steered clear of
+Charybdis, he drifted into Scylla--in other words, just as I
+recovered from my second attack of the tender passion, he caught
+the epidemic and fancied himself in love with the fair Marie.</p>
+<p>I say "fancied," because his way of falling in love was so
+unlike my way, that I could scarcely believe it to be the same
+complaint. It affected neither his appetite, nor his spirits, nor
+his wardrobe. He made as many puns and smoked as many pipes as
+usual. He did not even buy a new hat. If, in fact, he had not told
+me himself, I should never have guessed that anything whatever was
+the matter with him.</p>
+<p>It came out one day when he was pressing me to go with him to a
+certain tea-party at Madame Marotte's, in the Rue St. Denis.</p>
+<p>"You see," said he, "it is <i>la petite</i> Marie's f&ecirc;te;
+and the party's in her honor; and they'd be so proud if we both
+went to it; and--and, upon my soul, I'm awfully fond of that little
+girl"....</p>
+<p>"Of Marie Marotte?"</p>
+<p>He nodded.</p>
+<p>"You are not serious," I said.</p>
+<p>"I am as serious," he replied, "as a dancing dervish."</p>
+<p>And then, for I suppose I looked incredulous, he went on to
+justify himself.</p>
+<p>"She's very good," he said, "and very pretty. Quite a Madonna
+face, to my thinking."</p>
+<p>"You may see a dozen such Madonna faces among the nurses in the
+Luxembourg Gardens, every afternoon of your life," said I.</p>
+<p>"Oh, if you come to that, every woman is like every other woman,
+up to a certain point."</p>
+<p>"<i>Les femmes se suivent et se ressemblent toujours</i>," said
+I, parodying a well-known apothegm.</p>
+<p>"Precisely, but then they wear their rue, or cause you to wear
+yours, 'with a difference.' This girl, however, escapes the
+monotony of her sex by one or two peculiarities:--she has not a bit
+of art about her, nor a shred of coquetry. She is as simple and as
+straightforward as an Arcadian. She doesn't even know when she is
+being made love to, or understand what you mean, when you pay her a
+compliment."</p>
+<p>"Then she's a phenomenon--and what man in his senses would fall
+in love with a phenomenon?"</p>
+<p>"Every man, <i>mon cher enfant</i>, who falls in love at all!
+The woman we worship is always a phenomenon, whether of beauty, or
+grace, or virtue--till we find her out; and then, probably, she
+becomes a phenomenon of deceit, or slovenliness, or bad temper! And
+now, to return to the point we started from--will you go with me to
+Madame Marotte's tea-party to-morrow evening at eight? Don't say
+'No,' there's a good fellow."</p>
+<p>"I'll certainly not say No, if you particularly want me to say
+Yes," I replied, "but--"</p>
+<p>"Prythee, no buts! Let it be Yes, and the thing is settled.
+So--here we are. Won't you come in and smoke a pipe with me? I've a
+bottle of capital Rhenish in the cupboard."</p>
+<p>We had met near the Od&eacute;on, and, as our roads lay in the
+same direction, had gone on walking and talking till we came to
+M&uuml;ller's own door in the Rue Clovis. I accepted the
+invitation, and followed him in. The <i>porti&egrave;re</i>, a
+sour-looking, bent old woman with a very dirty duster tied about
+her head, hobbled out from her little dark den at the foot of the
+stairs, and handed him the key of his apartment.</p>
+<p>"<i>Tiens</i>!" said she, "wait a moment--there's a parcel for
+you, M'sieur M&uuml;ller."</p>
+<p>And so, hobbling back again, she brought out a small flat brown
+paper-packet sealed at both ends.</p>
+<p>"Ah, I see--from the Emperor!" said M&uuml;ller. "Did he bring
+it himself, Madame Duph&ocirc;t, or did he send it by the
+Archbishop of Paris?"</p>
+<p>A faint grin flitted over the little old woman's withered
+face.</p>
+<p>"Get along with you, M'sieur M&uuml;ller," she said. "You're
+always playing the <i>farceur</i>! The parcel was brought by a man
+who looked like a stonemason."</p>
+<p>"And nobody has called?"</p>
+<p>"Nobody, except M'sieur Richard."</p>
+<p>"Monsieur Richard's visits are always gratifying and
+delightful--may the <i>diable</i> fly away with him!" said
+M&uuml;ller. "What did dear Monsieur Richard want to-day, Madame
+Duph&ocirc;t?"</p>
+<p>"He wanted to see you, and the third-floor gentleman also--about
+the rent."</p>
+<p>"Dear Richard! What an admirable memory he has for dates! Did he
+leave any message, Madame Duph&ocirc;t?"</p>
+<p>The old woman looked at me, and hesitated.</p>
+<p>"He says, M'sieur M&uuml;ller--he says ..."</p>
+<p>"Nay, this gentleman is a friend--you may speak out. What does
+our beloved and respected <i>propri&eacute;taire</i> say, Madame
+Duph&ocirc;t?"</p>
+<p>"He says, if you don't both of you pay up the arrears by midday
+on Sunday next, he'll seize your goods, and turn you into the
+street."</p>
+<p>"Ah, I always said he was the nicest man I knew!" observed
+M&uuml;ller, gravely. "Anything else, Madame Duph&ocirc;t?"</p>
+<p>"Only this, Monsieur M&uuml;ller--that if you didn't go quietly,
+he'd take your windows out of the frames and your doors off the
+hinges."</p>
+<p>"<i>Comment</i>! He bade you give me that message, the miserable
+old son of a spider! <i>Quatre-vingt mille plats de diables aux
+truffes</i>! Take my windows out of the frames, indeed! Let him
+try, Madame Duph&ocirc;t--that's all--let him try!"</p>
+<p>And with this, M&uuml;ller, in a towering rage, led the way
+upstairs, muttering volleys of the most extraordinary and eccentric
+oaths of his own invention, and leaving the little old
+<i>porti&egrave;re</i> grinning maliciously in the hall.</p>
+<p>"But can't you pay him?" said I.</p>
+<p>"Whether I can, or can't, it seems I must," he replied, kicking
+open the door of his studio as viciously as if it were the
+corporeal frame of Monsieur Richard. "The only question is--how? At
+the present moment, I haven't five francs in the till."</p>
+<p>"Nor have I more than twenty. How much is it?"</p>
+<p>"A hundred and sixty--worse luck!"</p>
+<p>"Haven't the Tapottes paid for any of their ancestors yet?"</p>
+<p>"Confound it!--yes; they've paid for a Marshal of France and a
+Farmer General, which are all I've yet finished and sent home. But
+there was the washerwoman, and the <i>traiteur</i>, and the
+artist's colorman, and, <i>enfin</i>, the devil to pay--and the
+money's gone, somehow!"</p>
+<p>"I've only just cleared myself from a lot of debts," I said,
+ruefully, "and I daren't ask either my father or Dr. Ch&eacute;ron
+for an advance just at present. What is to be done?"</p>
+<p>"Oh, I don't know. I must raise the money somehow. I must sell
+something--there's my copy of Titian's 'Pietro Aretino.' It's worth
+eighty francs, if only for a sign. And there's a Madonna and Child
+after Andrea del Sarto, worth a fortune to any enterprising
+sage-femme with artistic proclivities. I'll try what Nebuchadnezzar
+will do for me."</p>
+<p>"And who, in the name of all that's Israelitish, is
+Nebuchadnezzar?"</p>
+<p>"Nebuchadnezzar, my dear Arbuthnot, is a worthy Shylock of my
+acquaintance--a gentleman well known to Bohemia--one who buys and
+sells whatever is purchasable and saleable on the face of the
+globe, from a ship of war to a comic paragraph in the
+<i>Charivari</i>. He deals in bric-&agrave;-brac, sermons,
+government sinecures, pugs, false hair, light literature, patent
+medicines, and the fine arts. He lives in the Place des Victoires.
+Would you like to be introduced to him?"</p>
+<p>"Immensely."</p>
+<p>"Well, then, be here by eight to-morrow morning, and I'll take
+you with me. After nine he goes out, or is only visible to buyers.
+Here's my bottle of Rhenish--genuine Assmanshauser. Are you
+hungry?"</p>
+<p>I admitted that I was not unconscious of a sensation akin to
+appetite.</p>
+<p>He gazed steadfastly into the cupboard, and shook his head.</p>
+<p>"A box of sardines," he said, gloomily, "nearly empty. Half a
+loaf, evidently disinterred from Pompeii. An inch of Lyons sausage,
+saved from the ark; the remains of a bottle of fish sauce, and a
+pot of currant jelly. What will you have?"</p>
+<p>I decided for the relics of Pompeii and the deluge, and we sat
+down to discuss those curious delicacies. Having no corkscrew, we
+knocked off the neck of the bottle, and being short of glasses,
+drank our wine out of teacups.</p>
+<p>"But you have never opened your parcel all this time," I said
+presently. "It may be full of <i>billets de banque</i>--who can
+tell?"</p>
+<p>"That's true," said M&uuml;ller; and broke the seals.</p>
+<p>"By all the Gods of Olympus!" he shouted, holding up a small
+oblong volume bound in dark green cloth. "My sketch-book!"</p>
+<p>He opened it, and a slip of paper fell out. On this slip of
+paper were written, in a very neat, small hand, the words,
+"<i>Returned with thanks</i>;" but the page that contained the
+sketch made in the Caf&eacute; Procope was missing.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXIII."></a>CHAPTER XXXIII.</h2>
+<h3>AN EVENING PARTY AMONG THE PETIT-BOURGEOISIE.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>Madame Marotte, as I have already mentioned more than once,
+lived in the Rue du Faubourg St. Denis; which, as all the world
+knows, is a prolongation of the Rue St. Denis--just as the Rue St.
+Denis was, in my time, a transpontine continuation of the old Rue
+de la Harpe. Beginning at the Place du Ch&acirc;telet as the Rue
+St. Denis, opening at its farther end on the Boulevart St. Denis
+and passing under the triumphal arch of Louis le Grand (called the
+Porte St. Denis), it there becomes first the Rue du Faubourg St.
+Denis, and then the interminable Grande Route du St. Denis which
+drags its slow length along all the way to the famous Abbey outside
+Paris.</p>
+<p>The Rue du Faubourg St. Denis is a changed street now, and
+widens out, prim, white, and glittering, towards the new barrier
+and the new Rond Point. But in the dear old days of which I tell,
+it was the sloppiest, worst-paved, worst-lighted, noisiest,
+narrowest, and most crowded of all the great Paris thoroughfares
+north of the Seine. All the country traffic from Chantilly and
+Compi&eacute;gne came lumbering this way into the city; diligences,
+omnibuses, wagons, fiacres, water-carts, and all kinds of vehicles
+thronged and blocked the street perpetually; and the sound of
+wheels ceased neither by night nor by day. The foot-pavements of
+the Rue du Faubourg St. Denis, too, were always muddy, be the
+weather what it might; and the gutters were always full of stagnant
+pools. An ever-changing, never-failing stream of rustics from the
+country, workpeople from the factories of the <i>banlieu,</i>
+grisettes, commercial travellers, porters, commissionaires, and
+<i>gamins</i> of all ages here flowed to and fro. Itinerant venders
+of cakes, lemonade, cocoa, chickweed, <i>allumettes</i>,
+pincushions, six-bladed penknives, and never-pointed pencils filled
+the air with their cries, and made both day and night hideous. You
+could not walk a dozen yards at any time without falling down a
+yawning cellar-trap, or being run over by a porter with a huge load
+upon his head, or getting splashed from head to foot by the sudden
+pulling-up of some cart in the gutter beside you.</p>
+<p>It was among the peculiarities of the Rue du Faubourg St. Denis
+that everybody was always in a hurry, and that nobody was ever seen
+to look in at the shop-windows. The shops, indeed, might as well
+have had no windows, since there were no loungers to profit by
+them. Every house, nevertheless, was a shop, and every shop had its
+window. These windows, however, were for the most part of that kind
+before which the passer-by rarely cares to linger; for the commerce
+of the Rue du Faubourg St. Denis was of that steady, unpretending,
+money-making sort that despises mere shop-front attractions.
+Grocers, stationers, corn-chandlers, printers, cutlers,
+leather-sellers, and such other inelegant trades, here most did
+congregate; and to the wearied wayfarer toiling along the dead
+level of this dreary pav&eacute;, it was quite a relief to come
+upon even an artistically-arranged <i>Magasin de Charcuterie</i>,
+with its rows of glazed tongues, mighty Lyons sausages, yellow
+<i>terrines</i> of Strasbourg pies, fantastically shaped
+pickle-jars, and pyramids of silvery sardine boxes.</p>
+<p>It was at number One Hundred and Two in this agreeable
+thoroughfare that my friend's innamorata resided with her maternal
+aunt, the worthy relict of Monsieur Jacques Marotte,
+umbrella-maker, deceased. Thither, accordingly, we wended our miry
+way, M&uuml;ller and I, after dining together at one of our
+accustomed haunts on the evening following the events related in my
+last chapter. The day had been dull and drizzly, and the evening
+had turned out duller and more drizzly still. We had not had rain
+for some time, and the weather had been (as it often is in Paris in
+October) oppressively hot; and now that the rain had come, it did
+not seem to cool the air at all, but rather to load it with vapors,
+and make the heat less endurable than before.</p>
+<p>Having toiled all the way up from the Rue de la Harpe on the
+farther bank of the Seine, and having forded the passage of the
+Arch of Louis le Grand, we were very wet and muddy indeed, very
+much out of breath, and very melancholy objects to behold.</p>
+<p>"It's dreadful to think of going into any house in this
+condition, M&uuml;ller," said I, glancing down ruefully at the
+state of my boots, and having just received a copious spattering of
+mud all down the left side of my person. "What is to be done?"</p>
+<p>"We've only to go to a boot-cleaning and brushing-up shop,"
+replied M&uuml;ller. "There's sure to be one close by
+somewhere."</p>
+<p>"A boot-cleaning and brushing-up shop!" I echoed.</p>
+<p>"What--didn't you know there were lots of them, all over Paris?
+Have you never noticed places that look like shops, with ground
+glass windows instead of shop-fronts, on which are painted up the
+words, '<i>cirage des bottes?</i>'"</p>
+<p>"Never, that I can remember."</p>
+<p>"Then be grateful to me for a piece of very useful information!
+Suppose we turn down this by-street--it's mostly to the seclusion
+of by-streets and passages that our bashful sex retires to renovate
+its boots and its broadcloth."</p>
+<p>I followed him, and in the course of a few minutes we found the
+sort of place of which we were in search. It consisted of one
+large, long room, like a shop without goods, counters, or shelves.
+A single narrow bench ran all round the walls, raised on a sort of
+wooden platform about three feet in width and three feet from the
+ground. Seated upon this bench, somewhat uncomfortably, as it
+seemed, with their backs against the wall, sat some ten or a dozen
+men and boys, each with an attendant shoeblack kneeling before him,
+brushing away vigorously. Two or three other customers, standing up
+in the middle of the shop, like horses in the hands of the groom,
+were having their coats brushed instead of their boots. Of those
+present, some looked like young shopmen, some were of the
+<i>ouvrier</i> class, and one or two looked like respectable small
+tradesmen and fathers of families. The younger men were evidently
+smartening up for an hour or two at some cheap ball or
+Caf&eacute;-Concert, now that the warehouse was closed, and the
+day's work was over.</p>
+<p>Our boots being presently brought up to the highest degree of
+polish, and our garments cleansed of every disfiguring speck, we
+paid a few sous apiece and turned out again into the streets.
+Happily, we had not far to go. A short cut brought us into the
+midst of the Rue de Faubourg St. Denis, and within a few yards of a
+gloomy-looking little shop with the words "<i>Veuve Marotte</i>"
+painted up over the window, and a huge red and white umbrella
+dangling over the door. A small boy in a shiny black apron was at
+that moment putting up the shutters; the windows of the front room
+over the shop were brightly lit from within; and a little old
+gentleman in goloshes and a large blue cloak with a curly collar,
+was just going in at the private door. We meekly followed him, and
+hung up our hats and overcoats, as he did, in the passage.</p>
+<p>"After you, Messieurs," said the little old gentleman, skipping
+politely back, and flourishing his hand in the direction of the
+stairs. "After you!"</p>
+<p>We protested vehemently against this arrangement, and fought
+quite a skirmish of civilities at the foot of the stairs.</p>
+<p>"I am at home here, Messieurs," said the little old gentleman,
+who, now that he was divested of hat, cloak, and goloshes, appeared
+in a flaxen <i>toupet</i>, an antiquated blue coat with brass
+buttons, a profusely frilled shirt, and low-cut shoes with silver
+buckles. "I am an old friend of the family--a friend of fifty
+years. I hold myself privileged to do the honors, Messieurs;--a
+friend of fifty years may claim to have his privileges."</p>
+<p>With this he smirked, bowed, and backed against the wall, so
+that we were obliged to precede him. When we reached the landing,
+however, he (being evidently an old gentleman of uncommon
+politeness and agility) sprang forward, held open the door for us,
+and insisted on ushering us in.</p>
+<p>It was a narrow, long-shaped room, the size of the shop, with
+two windows looking upon the street; a tiny square of carpet in the
+middle of the floor; boards highly waxed and polished; a tea-table
+squeezed up in one corner; a somewhat ancient-looking,
+spindle-legged cottage piano behind the door; a mirror and an
+ornamental clock over the mantelpiece; and a few French
+lithographs, colored in imitation of crayon drawings, hanging
+against the walls.</p>
+<p>Madame Marotte, very deaf and fussy, in a cap with white
+ribbons, came forward to receive us. Mademoiselle Marie, sitting
+between two other young women of her own age, hung her head, and
+took no notice of our arrival.</p>
+<p>The rest of the party consisted of a gentleman and two old
+ladies. The gentleman (a plump, black-whiskered elderly Cupid, with
+a vast expanse of shirt-front like an immense white ace of hearts,
+and a rose in his button-hole) was standing on the hearth-rug in a
+graceful attitude, with one hand resting on his hip, and the other
+under his coat-tails. Of the two old ladies, who seemed as if
+expressly created by nature to serve as foils to one another, one
+was very fat and rosy, in a red silk gown and a kind of black
+velvet hat trimmed with white marabout feathers and Roman pearls;
+while the other was tall, gaunt, and pale, with a long nose, a long
+upper lip, and supernaturally long yellow teeth. She wore a black
+gown, black cotton gloves, and a black velvet band across her
+forehead, fastened in the centre with a black and gold clasp
+containing a ghastly representation of a human eye, apparently
+purblind--which gave this lady the air of a serious Cyclops.</p>
+<p>Madame Marotte was profuse of thanks, welcomes, apologies, and
+curtseys. It was so good of these gentlemen to come so far--and in
+such unpleasant weather, too! But would not these Messieurs give
+themselves the trouble to be seated? And would they prefer tea or
+coffee--for both were on the table? And where was Marie? Marie,
+whose <i>f&ecirc;te</i>-day it was, and who should have come
+forward to welcome these gentlemen, and thank them for the honor of
+their company!</p>
+<p>Thus summoned, Mademoiselle Marie emerged from between the two
+young women, and curtsied demurely.</p>
+<p>In the meanwhile, the little old gentleman who had ushered as in
+was bustling about the room, shaking hands with every one, and
+complimenting the ladies.</p>
+<p>"Ah, Madame Desjardins," he said, addressing the stout lady in
+the hat, "enchanted to see you back from the sea-side!--you and
+your charming daughter. I do not know which looks the more young
+and blooming."</p>
+<p>Then, turning to the grim lady in black:--</p>
+<p>"And I am charmed to pay my homage to Madame de Montparnasse. I
+had the pleasure of being present at the brilliant
+<i>d&eacute;but</i> of Madame's gifted daughter the other evening
+at the private performance of the pupils of the Conservatoire.
+Mademoiselle Honoria inherits the <i>grand air</i>, Madame, from
+yourself."</p>
+<p>Then, to the plump gentleman with the shirt-front:--</p>
+<p>"And Monsieur Philom&egrave;ne!--this is indeed a privilege and
+a pleasure. Bad weather, Monsieur Philom&egrave;ne, for the
+voice!"</p>
+<p>Then, to the two girls:--</p>
+<p>"Mesdemoiselles--Achille Dorinet prostrates himself at the feet
+of youth, beauty, and talent! Mademoiselle Honoria, I salute in you
+the future Empress of the tragic stage. Mademoiselle Rosalie,
+modesty forbids me to extol the acquired graces of even my most
+promising pupil; but I may be permitted to adore in you the graces
+of nature."</p>
+<p>While I was listening to these scraps of salutation, M&uuml;ller
+was murmuring tender nothings in the ear of the fair Marie, and
+Madame Marotte was pouring out the coffee.</p>
+<p>Monsieur Achille Dorinet, having gone the round of the company,
+next addressed himself to me.</p>
+<p>"Permit me, Monsieur," he said, bringing his heels together and
+punctuating his sentences with little bows, "permit me, in the
+absence of a master of the ceremonies, to introduce myself--Achille
+Dorinet, Achille Dorinet, whose name may not, perhaps, be wholly
+unknown to you in connection with the past glories of the classical
+ballet. Achille Dorinet, formerly <i>premier sujet</i> of the
+Op&eacute;ra Fran&ccedil;ais--now principal choreographic professor
+at the Conservatoire Imp&eacute;riale de Musique. I have had the
+honor, Monsieur, of dancing at Erfurth before their Imperial
+Majesties the Emperors Napoleon and Alexander, and a host of minor
+sovereigns. Those, Monsieur, were the high and palmy days of the
+art. We performed a ballet descriptive of the siege of Troy, and I
+undertook the part of a river god--the god Scamander, <i>en
+effet</i>. The great ladies of the court, Monsieur, were graciously
+pleased to admire my proportions as the god Scamander. I wore a
+girdle of sedges, a wreath of water-lilies, and a scarf of blue and
+silver. I have reason to believe that the costume became me."</p>
+<p>"Sir," I replied gravely, "I do not doubt it."</p>
+<p>"It is a noble art, Monsieur, <i>l'art de la dame</i>" said the
+former <i>premier sujet</i>, with a sigh; "but it is on the
+decline. Of the grand style of fifty years ago, only myself and
+tradition remain."</p>
+<p>"Monsieur was, doubtless, a contemporary of Vestris, the famous
+dancer," I said.</p>
+<p>"The illustrious Vestris, Monsieur," said the little old
+gentleman, "was, next to Louis the Fourteenth, the greatest of
+Frenchmen. I am proud to own myself his disciple, as well as his
+contemporary."</p>
+<p>"Why next to Louis the Fourteenth, Monsieur Dorinet?" I asked,
+keeping my countenance with difficulty. "Why not next to Napoleon
+the First, who was a still greater conqueror?"</p>
+<p>"But no dancer, Monsieur!" replied the ex-god Scamander, with a
+kind of half pirouette; "whereas the Grand Monarque was the finest
+dancer of his epoch."</p>
+<p>Madame Marotte had by this time supplied all her guests with tea
+and coffee, while Monsieur Philom&egrave;ne went round with the
+cakes and bread and butter. Madame Desjardins spread her
+pocket-handkerchief on her lap--a pocket-handkerchief the size of a
+small table-cloth. Madame de Montparnasse, more mindful of her
+gentility, removed to a corner of the tea-table, and ate her bread
+and butter in her black cotton gloves.</p>
+<p>"We hope we have another bachelor by-and-by," said Madame
+Marotte, addressing herself to the young ladies, who looked down
+and giggled. "A charming man, mesdemoiselles, and quite the
+gentleman--our <i>locataire</i>, M'sieur Lenoir. You know him,
+M'sieur Dorinet--pray tell these demoiselles what a charming man
+M'sieur Lenoir is!"</p>
+<p>The little dancing-master bowed, coughed, smiled, and looked
+somewhat embarrassed.</p>
+<p>"Monsieur Lenoir is no doubt a man of much information," he
+said, hesitatingly; "a traveller--a reader--a gentleman--oh! yes,
+certainly a gentleman. But to say that he is a--a charming man ...
+well, perhaps the ladies are the best judges of such nice
+questions. What says Mam'selle Marie?"</p>
+<p>Thus applied to, the fair Marie became suddenly crimson, and had
+not a word to reply with. Monsieur Dorinet stared. The young ladies
+tittered. Madame Marotte, deaf as a post and serenely unconscious,
+smiled, nodded, and said "Ah, yes, yes--didn't I tell you so?"</p>
+<p>"Monsieur Dorinet has, I fear, asked an indiscreet question,"
+said M&uuml;ller, boiling over with jealousy.</p>
+<p>"I--I have not observed Monsieur Lenoir sufficiently to--to form
+an opinion," faltered Marie, ready to cry with vexation.</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller glared at her reproachfully, turned on his heel, and
+came over to where I was standing.</p>
+<p>"You saw how she blushed?" he said in a fierce whisper.
+"<i>Sacredie</i>! I'll bet my head she's an arrant flirt. Who, in
+the name of all the fiends, is this lodger she's been carrying on
+with? A lodger, too--oh! the artful puss!"</p>
+<p>At this awkward moment, Monsieur Dorinet, with considerable
+tact, asked Monsieur Philom&egrave;ne for a song; and Monsieur
+Philom&egrave;ne (who as I afterwards learned was a favorite tenor
+at fifth-rate concerts) was graciously pleased to comply.</p>
+<p>Not, however, without a little preliminary coquetry, after the
+manner of tenors. First he feared he was hoarse; then struck a note
+or two on the piano, and tried his falsetto; then asked for a glass
+of water; and finally begged that one of the young ladies would be
+so amiable as to accompany him.</p>
+<p>Mademoiselle Honoria, inheriting rigidity from the maternal
+Cyclops, drew herself up and declined stiffly; but the other, whom
+the dancing-master had called Rosalie, got up directly and said she
+would do her best.</p>
+<p>"Only," she added, blushing, "I play so badly!"</p>
+<p>Monsieur Philom&egrave;ne was provided with two copies of his
+song--one for the accompanyist and one for himself; then, standing
+well away from the piano with his face to the audience, he balanced
+his music in his hand, made his little professional bow, coughed,
+ran his fingers through his hair, and assumed an expression of
+tender melancholy.</p>
+<p>"One--two--three," began Mdlle. Rosalie, her little fat fingers
+staggering helplessly among the first cadenzas of the symphony.
+"One--two--three. One" ...</p>
+<p>Monsieur Philom&egrave;ne interrupted with a wave of the hand,
+as if conducting an orchestra.</p>
+<p>"Pardon, Mademoiselle," he said, "not quite so fast, if you
+please! Andantino--andantino--one--two--three ... Just so! A
+thousand thanks!"</p>
+<p>Again Mdlle. Rosalie attacked the symphony. Again Monsieur
+Philom&egrave;ne cleared his voice, and suffered a pensive languor
+to cloud his manly brow.</p>
+<blockquote>"<i>Revenez, revenez, beaux jours de mon
+enfance,</i>"</blockquote>
+<p>he began, in a small, tremulous, fluty voice.</p>
+<p>"They'll have a long road to travel back, <i>parbleu</i>!"
+muttered M&uuml;ller.</p>
+<blockquote>"<i>De votre aspect riant charmer ma
+souvenance</i>!"</blockquote>
+<p>Here Mdlle. Rosalie struck a wrong chord, became involved in
+hopeless difficulties, and gasped audibly.</p>
+<p>Monsieur Philom&egrave;ne darted a withering glance at her, and
+went on:--</p>
+<blockquote>"<i>Mon coeur; mon pauvre coeur</i>" ...</blockquote>
+<p>More wrong chords, and a smothered "<i>mille pardons</i>!" from
+Mdlle. Rosalie.</p>
+<blockquote>"<i>Mon coeur, mon pauvre coeur a la tristesse en
+proie,<br>
+En fouillant le pass&eacute;"....</i></blockquote>
+<p>A dead stop on the part of Mdlle. Rosalie.</p>
+<blockquote><i>"En fouillant le pass&eacute;</i>"....</blockquote>
+<p>repeated the tenor, with the utmost severity of emphasis.</p>
+<p>"<i>Mais, mon Dieu</i>, Rosalie! what are you doing?" cried
+Madame Desjardins, angrily. "Why don't you go on?"</p>
+<p>Mdlle. Rosalie burst into a flood of tears.</p>
+<p>"I--I can't!" she sobbed. "It's so--so very
+difficult--and"...</p>
+<p>Madame Desjardins flung up her hands in despair.</p>
+<p>"<i>Ciel</i>!" she cried, "and I have been paying three francs a
+lesson for you, Mademoiselle, twice a week for the last six
+years!"</p>
+<p>"<i>Mais, maman</i>"....</p>
+<p>"<i>Fi done</i>, Mademoiselle! I am ashamed of you. Make a
+curtsey to Monsieur Philom&egrave;ne this moment, and beg his
+pardon; for you have spoiled his beautiful song!"</p>
+<p>But Monsieur Philom&egrave;ne would hear of no such expiation.
+His soul, to use his own eloquent language, recoiled from it with
+horror! The accompaniment, <i>&agrave; vrai dire</i>, was not easy,
+and <i>la bien aimable</i> Mam'selle Rosalie had most kindly done
+her best with it. <i>Allons donc!</i>--on condition that no more
+should be said on the subject, Monsieur Philom&egrave;ne would
+volunteer to sing a little unaccompanied romance of his own
+composition--a mere <i>bagatelle</i>; but a tribute to "<i>les
+beaux yeux de ces ch&egrave;res dames</i>!"</p>
+<p>So Mam'selle Rosalie wiped away her tears, and Madame Desjardins
+smoothed her ruffled feathers, and Monsieur Philom&egrave;ne
+warbled a plaintive little ditty in which "<i>coeur</i>" rhymed to
+"<i>peur</i>" and "<i>amours</i>" to "<i>toujours</i>" and "<i>le
+sort</i>" to "<i>la mort</i>" in quite the usual way; so giving
+great satisfaction to all present, but most, perhaps, to
+himself.</p>
+<p>And now, hospitably anxious that each of her guests should have
+a chance of achieving distinction, Madame Marotte invited Mdlle.
+Honoria to favor the company with a dramatic recitation.</p>
+<p>Mdlle. Honoria hesitated; exchanged glances with the Cyclops;
+and, in order to enhance the value of her performance, began
+raising all kinds of difficulties. There was no stage, for
+instance; and there were no footlights; but M. Dorinet met these
+objections by proposing to range all the seats at one end of the
+room, and to divide the stage off by a row of lighted candles.</p>
+<p>"But it is so difficult to render a dramatic scene without an
+interlocutor!" said the young lady.</p>
+<p>"What is it you require, <i>ma ch&egrave;re demoiselle?</i>"
+asked Madame Marotte.</p>
+<p>"I have no interlocutor," said Mdlle. Honoria.</p>
+<p>"No what, my love?"</p>
+<p>"No interlocutor," repeated Mdlle. Honoria, at the top of her
+voice.</p>
+<p>"Dear! dear! what a pity! Can't we send the boy for it? Marie,
+my child, bid Jacques run to Madame de Montparnasse's
+<i>appartement</i> in the Rue" ...</p>
+<p>But Madame Marotte's voice was lost in the confusion; for
+Monsieur Dorinet was already deep in the arrangement of the room,
+and we were all helping to move the furniture. As for
+Mademoiselle's last difficulty, the little dancing-master met that
+by offering to read whatever was necessary to carry on the
+scene.</p>
+<p>And now, the stage being cleared, the audience placed, and
+Monsieur Dorinet provided with a volume of Corneille, Mademoiselle
+Honoria proceeded to drape herself in an old red shawl belonging to
+Madame Marotte.</p>
+<p>The scene selected is the fifth of the fourth act of Horace,
+where Camille, meeting her only surviving brother, upbraids him
+with the death of Curiace.</p>
+<p>Mam'selle Honoria, as Camille, with clasped hands and tragic
+expression, stalks in a slow and stately manner towards the
+footlights.</p>
+<p>(Breathless suspense of the audience.)</p>
+<p>M. Dorinet, who should begin by vaunting his victory over the
+Curiatii, stops to put on his glasses, finds it difficult to read
+with all the candles on the ground, and mutters something about the
+smallness of the type.</p>
+<p>Mdlle. Honoria, not to keep the audience waiting, surveys the
+ex-god Seamander with a countenance expressive of horror; starts;
+and takes a turn across the stage.</p>
+<p>"<i>Ma soeur,</i>" begins M. Dorinet, holding the book very much
+on one side, so as to catch the light upon the page, "<i>ma soeur,
+voici le bras</i>"....</p>
+<p>"Ah, Heaven! my dear Mademoiselle, take care of the candles!"
+cries Madame Marotte in a shrill whisper.</p>
+<blockquote>... "<i>le bras qui venge nos deux fr&egrave;res,<br>
+Le bras qui rompt le cours de nos destins contraires,<br>
+Qui nous rend"</i>...</blockquote>
+<p>Here he lost his place; stammered; and recovered it with
+difficulty.</p>
+<blockquote><i>"Qui nous rend ma&icirc;tres
+d'Albe"</i>....</blockquote>
+<p>Madame Marotte groans aloud in an agony of apprehension</p>
+<p>"<i>Ah, mon Dieu!</i>" she exclaims, gaspingly, "if they didn't
+flare so, it wouldn't be half so dangerous!"</p>
+<p>Here M. Dorinet dropped his book, and stooping to pick up the
+book, dropped his spectacles.</p>
+<p>"I think," said Mdlle. Honoria, indignantly, "we had better
+begin again. Monsieur Dorinet, pray read with the help of a candle
+<i>this</i> time!"</p>
+<p>And, with an angry toss of her head, Mdlle. Honoria went up the
+stage, put on her tragedy face again, and prepared once more to
+stalk down to the footlights.</p>
+<p>Monsieur Dorinet, in the meanwhile, had snatched up a candle,
+readjusted his spectacles, and found his place.</p>
+<p>"<i>Ma soeur</i>" he began again, holding the book close to his
+eyes and the candle just under his nose, and nodding vehemently
+with every emphasis:--</p>
+<blockquote>"<i>Ma soeur, voici le bras qui venge nos deux
+fr&egrave;res,<br>
+Le bras qui rompt le cours de nos destins contraires,<br>
+Qui nous rend ma&icirc;tres d'Albe</i>" ...</blockquote>
+<p>A piercing scream from Madame Marotte, a general cry on the part
+of the audience, and a strong smell of burning, brought the
+dancing-master to a sudden stop. He looked round, bewildered.</p>
+<p>"Your wig! Your wig's on fire!" cried every one at once.</p>
+<p>Monsieur Dorinet clapped his hand to his head, which was now
+adorned with a rapidly-spreading glory; burned his fingers; and cut
+a frantic caper.</p>
+<p>"Save him! save him!" yelled Madame Marotte.</p>
+<p>But almost before the words were out of her mouth, M&uuml;ller,
+clearing the candles at a bound, had rushed to the rescue, scalped
+Monsieur Dorinet by a <i>tour de main</i>, cast the blazing wig
+upon the floor, and trampled out the fire.</p>
+<p>Then followed a roar of "inextinguishable laughter," in which,
+however, neither the tragic Camille nor the luckless Horace
+joined.</p>
+<p>"Heavens and earth!" murmured the little dancing-master,
+ruefully surveying the ruins of his blonde peruke. And then he put
+his hand to his head, which was as bald as an egg.</p>
+<p>In the meanwhile Mdlle. Honoria, who had not yet succeeded in
+uttering a syllable of her part, took no pains to dissemble her
+annoyance; and was only pacified at last by a happy proposal on the
+part of Monsieur Philom&egrave;ne, who suggested that "this gifted
+demoiselle" should be entreated to favor the society with a
+soliloquy.</p>
+<p>Thus invited, she draped herself again, stalked down to the
+footlights for the third time, and in a high, shrill voice, with
+every variety of artificial emphasis and studied gesture, recited
+Voltaire's famous "Death of Coligny," from the <i>Henriade</i>.</p>
+<p>In the midst of this performance, just at that point when the
+assassins are described as falling upon their knees before their
+victim, the door of the room was softly opened, and another guest
+slipped in unseen behind us. Slipped in, indeed, so quietly that
+(the backs of the audience being turned that way) no one seemed to
+hear, and no one looked round but myself.</p>
+<p>Brief as was that glance, and all in the shade as he stood, I
+recognised him instantly.</p>
+<p>It was the mysterious stranger of the Caf&eacute; Procope.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXIV."></a>CHAPTER XXXIV.</h2>
+<h3>MY AUNT'S FLOWER GARDEN.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>Having despatched the venerable Coligny much to her own
+satisfaction and apparently to the satisfaction of her hearers,
+Mdlle. Honoria returned to private life; Messieurs Philom&egrave;ne
+and Dorinet removed the footlights; the audience once more
+dispersed itself about the room; and Madame Marotte welcomed the
+new-comer as Monsieur Lenoir.</p>
+<p>"<i>Monsieur est bien aimable</i>," she said, nodding and
+smiling, and, with tremulous hands, smoothing down the front of her
+black silk gown. "I had told these young ladies that we hoped for
+the honor of Monsieur's society. Will Monsieur permit me to
+introduce him?"</p>
+<p>"With pleasure, Madame Marotte."</p>
+<p>And M. Lenoir--white cravatted, white kid-gloved, hat in hand,
+perfectly well-dressed in full evening black, and wearing a small
+orange-colored rosette at his button-hole--bowed, glanced round the
+room, and, though his eyes undoubtedly took in both M&uuml;ller and
+myself, looked as if he had never seen either of us in his
+life.</p>
+<p>I&lt; saw M&uuml;ller start, and the color fly into his
+face.</p>
+<p>"By Heaven!" he exclaimed, "it is--it must be ... look at him,
+Arbuthnot! If that isn't the man who stole my sketch-book, I'll eat
+my head!"</p>
+<p>"It <i>is</i> the man," I replied. "I recognised him ten minutes
+ago, when he first came in."</p>
+<p>"You are certain?"</p>
+<p>"Quite certain."</p>
+<p>"And yet--there is something different!"</p>
+<p>There <i>was</i> something different; but, at the same time,
+much that was identical. There was the same strange, inscrutable
+look, the same bronzed complexion, the same military bearing. M.
+Lenoir, it was true, was well, and even elegantly dressed; whereas,
+the stranger of the Caf&eacute; Procope bore all the outward
+stigmata of penury; but that was not all. There was yet "something
+different." The one looked like a man who had done, or suffered, a
+wrong in his time; who had an old quarrel with the world; and who
+only sought to hide himself, his poverty, and his bitter pride from
+the observation of his fellow men. The other stood before us
+dignified, <i>d&eacute;cor&eacute;</i>, self-possessed, a man not
+only of the world, but apparently no stranger to that small section
+of it called "the great world." In a word, the man of the
+Caf&eacute;, sunken, sullen, threadbare as he was, would have been
+almost less out of his proper place in Madame Marotte's society of
+small trades-people and minor professionals, than was M. Lenoir
+with his <i>grand air</i> and his orange-colored ribbon.</p>
+<p>"It's the same man," said M&uuml;ller; "the same, beyond a
+doubt. The more I look at him, the more confident I am."</p>
+<p>"And the more I look at him," said I, "the more doubtful I
+get."</p>
+<p>Madame Marotte, meanwhile, had introduced M. Lenoir to the two
+Conservatoire pupils and their mammas; Monsieur Dorinet had
+proposed some "<i>petits jeux</i>;" and Monsieur Philom&egrave;ne
+was helping him to re-arrange the chairs--this time in a
+circle.</p>
+<p>"Take your places, Messieurs et Mesdames--take your places!"
+cried Monsieur Dorinet, who had by this time resumed his wig,
+singed as it was, and shorn of its fair proportions. "What game
+shall we play at?"</p>
+<p>"<i>Pied de Boeuf</i>" "<i>Colin Maillard</i>" and other games
+were successively proposed and rejected.</p>
+<p>"We have a game in Alsace called 'My Aunt's Flower Garden'" said
+M&uuml;ller. "Does any one know it?"</p>
+<p>"'My Aunt's Flower Garden?'" repeated Monsieur Dorinet. "I never
+heard of it."</p>
+<p>"It sounds pretty," said Mdlle. Rosalie.</p>
+<p>"Will M'sieur teach it to us, if it is not very difficult?"
+suggested Mdlle. Rosalie's mamma.</p>
+<p>"With pleasure, Madame. It is not a bad game--and it is
+extremely easy. We will sit in a circle, if you please--the chairs
+as they are placed will do quite well."</p>
+<p>We were just about to take our places when Madame Marotte seized
+the opportunity to introduce M&uuml;ller and myself to M.
+Lenoir.</p>
+<p>"We have met before, Monsieur," said M&uuml;ller, pointedly.</p>
+<p>"I am ashamed to confess, Monsieur, that I do not remember to
+have had that pleasure," replied M. Lenoir, somewhat stiffly.</p>
+<p>"And yet, Monsieur, it was but the other day," persisted
+M&uuml;ller.</p>
+<p>"Monsieur, I can but reiterate my regret."</p>
+<p>"At the Caf&eacute; Procope."</p>
+<p>M. Lenoir stared coldly, slightly shrugged his shoulders, and
+said, with the air of one who repudiates a discreditable
+charge:--</p>
+<p>"Monsieur, I do not frequent the Caf&eacute; Procope."</p>
+<p>"If Monsieur M&uuml;ller is to teach us the game, Monsieur
+M&uuml;ller must begin it!" said Monsieur Dorinet.</p>
+<p>"At once," replied M&uuml;ller, taking his place in the
+circle.</p>
+<p>As ill-luck would have it (the rest of us being already seated),
+there were but two chairs left; so that M. Lenoir and M&uuml;ller
+had to sit side by side.</p>
+<p>"I begin with my left-hand neighbor," said M&uuml;ller,
+addressing himself with a bow to Mdlle. Rosalie; "and the circle
+will please to repeat after me:--'I have the four corners of my
+Aunt's Flower Garden for sale--</p>
+<p>'<i>In the first of these corners grows sweet mignonette; I've
+seen thee, and lov'd thee, and ne'er can forget.</i>'"</p>
+<p>MDLLE. ROSALIE <i>to</i> M. PHILOM&Egrave;NE.--I have the four
+corners of my Aunt's Flower Garden for sale--</p>
+<p>'<i>In the first of these corners grows sweet mignonette; I've
+seen thee, and lov'd thee, and ne'er can forget.</i>'</p>
+<p>M. PHILOM&Egrave;NE <i>to</i> MADAME DE MONTPARNASSE.--I have
+the four corners of my Aunt's Flower Garden, etc., etc.</p>
+<p>MADAME DE MONTPARNASSE <i>to</i> M. DORINET.--I have the four
+corners of my Aunt's Flower Garden, etc., etc.</p>
+<p>Monsieur Dorinet repeats the formula to Madame Desjardins;
+Madame Desjardins passes it on to me; I proclaim it at the top of
+my voice to Madame Marotte; Madame Marotte transfers it to Mdlle.
+Honoria; Mdlle. Honoria delivers it to the fair Marie; the fair
+Marie tells it to M. Lenoir, and the first round is completed.</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller resumes the lead :--</p>
+<blockquote>"<i>In the second grow heartsease and wild
+eglantine;<br>
+Fair exchange is no theft--for my heart, give me
+thine</i>."</blockquote>
+<p>MDLLE. ROSALIE <i>to</i> M. PHILOM&Egrave;NE:--</p>
+<blockquote>"<i>In the second grow heartsease and wild
+eglantine;<br>
+Fair exchange is no theft--for my heart, give me
+thine</i>."</blockquote>
+<p>M. PHILOM&Egrave;NE <i>to</i> MDLLE. DE MONTPARNASSE:--</p>
+<blockquote>"<i>In the second grow heartsease</i>," &amp;c.,
+&amp;c.</blockquote>
+<p>And so on again, till the second round is done. Then M&uuml;ller
+began again:--</p>
+<blockquote>"<i>In the third of these corners pale primroses
+grow;<br>
+Now tell me thy secret, and whisper it low</i>."</blockquote>
+<p>Mdlle. Rosalie was about to repeat these lines as before; but he
+stopped her.</p>
+<p>"No, Mademoiselle, not till you have told me the secret."</p>
+<p>"The secret, M'sieur? What secret?"</p>
+<p>"Nay, Mademoiselle, how can I tell that till you have told me?
+You must whisper something to me--something very secret, which you
+would not wish any one else to hear--before you repeat the lines.
+And when you repeat them, Monsieur Philom&egrave;ne must whisper
+his secret to you--and so on through the circle."</p>
+<p>Mdlle. Rosalie hesitated, smiled, whispered something in
+M&uuml;ller's ear, and went on with:--</p>
+<blockquote>"<i>In the third of these corners pale primroses
+grow;<br>
+Now tell me thy secret, and whisper it low</i>."</blockquote>
+<p>Monsieur Philom&egrave;ne then whispered his secret to Mdlle.
+Rosalie, and so on again till it ended with M. Lenoir and
+M&uuml;ller.</p>
+<p>"I don't think it is a very amusing game," said Madame Marotte;
+who, being deaf, had been left out of the last round, and found it
+dull.</p>
+<p>"It will be more entertaining presently, Madame," shouted
+M&uuml;ller, with a malicious twinkle about his eyes. "Pray observe
+the next lines, Messieurs et Mesdames, and follow my lead as
+before:--</p>
+<blockquote>'<i>Roses bloom in the fourth; and your secret, my
+dear,<br>
+Which you whisper'd so softly just now in my ear,<br>
+I repeat word for word, for the others to hear!</i>'</blockquote>
+<p>Mademoiselle Rosalie (whose pardon I implore!) whispered to me
+that Monsieur Philom&egrave;ne dyed his moustache and
+whiskers."</p>
+<p>There was a general murmur of alarm tempered with tittering.
+Mademoiselle Rosalie was dumb with confusion. Monsieur
+Philom&egrave;ne's face became the color of a full-blown peony.
+Madame de Montparnasse and Mdlle. Honoria turned absolutely
+green.</p>
+<p>"<i>Comment!</i>" exclaimed one or two voices. "Is everything to
+be repeated?"</p>
+<p>"Everything, Messieurs et Mesdames," replied
+M&uuml;ller--"everything--without reservation. I call upon Mdlle.
+Rosalie to reveal the secret of Monsieur Philom&egrave;ne."</p>
+<p>MDLLE. ROSALIE (<i>with great promptitude</i>):--Monsieur
+Philom&egrave;ne whispered to me that Honoria was the most
+disagreeable girl in Paris, Marie the dullest, and myself the
+prettiest.</p>
+<p>M. PHILOM&Egrave;NE (<i>in an agony of confusion</i>):--I
+beseech you, Mam'selle Honoria ... I entreat you, Mam'selle Marie,
+not for an instant to suppose....</p>
+<p>MDLLE. HONORIA (<i>drawing herself up and smiling
+acidly</i>):--Oh, pray do not give yourself the trouble to
+apologize, Monsieur Philom&egrave;ne. Your opinion, I assure you,
+is not of the least moment to either of us. Is it, Marie?</p>
+<p>But the fair Marie only smiled good-naturedly, and said:--</p>
+<p>"I know I am not clever. Monsieur Philom&egrave;ne is quite
+right; and I am not at all angry with him."</p>
+<p>"But--but, indeed, Mesdemoiselles, I--I--am incapable...."
+stammered the luckless tenor, wiping the perspiration from his
+brow. "I am incapable...."</p>
+<p>"Silence in the circle!" cried M&uuml;ller, authoritatively.
+"Private civilities are forbidden by the rules of the game. I call
+Monsieur Philom&egrave;ne to order, and I demand from him the
+secret of Madame de Montparnasse."</p>
+<p>M. Philom&egrave;ne looked even more miserable than before.</p>
+<p>"I--I ... but it is an odious position! To betray the confidence
+of a lady ... Heavens! I cannot."</p>
+<p>"The secret!--the secret!" shouted the others, impatiently.</p>
+<p>Madame de Montparnasse pursed up her parchment lips, glared upon
+us defiantly, and said:--</p>
+<p>"Pray don't hesitate about repeating my words, M'sieur
+Philom&egrave;ne. I am not ashamed of them."</p>
+<p>M. PHILOMENE (<i>reluctantly</i>):--Madame de Montparnasse
+observed to me that what she particularly disliked was a mixed
+society like--like the present; and that she hoped our friend
+Madame Marotte would in future be less indiscriminate in the choice
+of her acquaintances.</p>
+<p>MULLER (<i>with elaborate courtesy</i>):--We are all infinitely
+obliged to Madame de Montparnasse for her opinion of us--(I speak
+for the society, as leader of the circle)--and beg to assure her
+that we entirely coincide in her views. It rests with Madame to
+carry on the game, and to betray the confidence of Monsieur
+Dorinet.</p>
+<p>MADAME DE MONTPARNASSE (<i>with obvious
+satisfaction</i>):--Monsieur Dorinet told me that Rosalie
+Desjardin's legs were ill-made, and that she would never make a
+dancer, though she practised from now till doomsday.</p>
+<p>M. DORINET (<i>springing to his feet as if he had been
+shot</i>):--Heavens and earth! Madame de Montparnasse, what have I
+done that you should so pervert my words? Mam'selle Rosalie--<i>ma
+ch&egrave;re el&egrave;ve</i>, believe me, I never....</p>
+<p>"Silence in the circle!" shouted M&uuml;ller again.</p>
+<p>M. DORINET:--But, M'sieur, in simple self-defence....</p>
+<p>MULLER:--Self-defence, Monsieur Dorinet, is contrary to the
+rules of the game. Revenge only is permitted. Revenge yourself on
+Madame Desjardins, whose secret it is your turn to tell.</p>
+<p>M. DORINET:--Madame Desjardins drew my attention to the toilette
+of Madame de Montparnasse. She said: "<i>Mon Dieu!</i> Monsieur
+Dorinet, are you not tired of seeing La Montparnasse in that
+everlasting old black gown? My Rosalie says she is in mourning for
+her ugliness."</p>
+<p>MADAME DESJARDINS (<i>laughing heartily</i>):--<i>Eh
+bien--oui!</i> I don't deny it; and Rosalie's <i>mot</i> was not
+bad. And now, M'sieur the Englishman (<i>turning to me</i>), it is
+your turn to be betrayed. Monsieur, whose name I cannot pronounce,
+said to me:--"Madame, the French, <i>selon moi</i>, are the best
+dressed and most <i>spirituel</i> people of Europe. Their very
+silence is witty; and if mankind were, by universal consent, to go
+without clothes to-morrow, they would wear the primitive costume of
+Adam and Eve more elegantly than the rest of the world, and still
+lead the fashion,"</p>
+<p>(<i>A murmur of approval on the part of the company, who take
+the compliment entirely aux serieux</i>.)</p>
+<p>MYSELF (<i>agreeably conscious of having achieved
+popularity</i>):--Our hostess's deafness having unfortunately
+excluded her from this part of the game, I was honored with the
+confidence of Mdlle. Honoria, who informed me that she is to make
+her <i>d&eacute;but</i> before long at the Theatre Fran&ccedil;ais,
+and hoped that I would take tickets for the occasion.</p>
+<p>MDLLE. ROSALIE (<i>satirically</i>):--<i>Brava</i>, Honoria!
+What a woman of business you are!</p>
+<p>MDLLE. HONORIA (<i>affecting not to hear this
+observation</i>)--</p>
+<blockquote>"<i>Roses bloom in the fourth, and your secret, my
+dear,<br>
+Which you whispered so softly just now in my ear,<br>
+I repeat word for word for the others to hear</i>."</blockquote>
+<p>Marie said to me.... <i>Tiens</i>! Marie, don't pull my dress in
+that way. You shouldn't have said it, you know, if it won't bear
+repeating! Marie said to me that she could have either Monsieur
+M&uuml;ller or Monsieur Lenoir, by only holding up her finger--but
+she couldn't make up her mind which she liked best.</p>
+<p>MDLLE. MARIE (<i>half crying</i>):--Nay, Honoria--how can you be
+so--so unkind ... so spiteful? I--I did not say I could have either
+M'sieur M&uuml;ller or... or...</p>
+<p>M. LENOIR (<i>with great spirit and good breeding</i>):--Whether
+Mademoiselle used those words or not is of very little importance.
+The fact remains the same; and is as old as the world. Beauty has
+but to will and to conquer.</p>
+<p>MULLER:--Order in the circle! The game waits for Mademoiselle
+Marie.</p>
+<p>MARIE (<i>hesitatingly</i>):--</p>
+<blockquote>"<i>Roses bloom in the fourth, and your
+secret</i>"</blockquote>
+<p>M'sieur Lenoir said that--that he admired the color of my dress,
+and that blue became me more than lilac.</p>
+<p>MULLER: (<i>coldly</i>)--<i>Pardon</i>, Mademoiselle, but I
+happened to overhear what Monsieur Lenoir whispered just now, and
+those were not his words. Monsieur Lenoir said, "Look in"... but
+perhaps Mademoiselle would prefer me not to repeat more?</p>
+<p>MARIE--(<i>in great confusion</i>):--As--as you please,
+M'sieur.</p>
+<p>MULLER:--Then, Mademoiselle, I will be discreet, and I will not
+even impose a forfeit upon you, as I might do, by the laws of the
+game. It is for Monsieur Lenoir to continue.</p>
+<p>M. LENOIR:--I do not remember what Monsieur M&uuml;ller
+whispered to me at the close of the last round.</p>
+<p>MULLER (<i>pointedly</i>):--<i>Pardon,</i> Monsieur, I should
+have thought that scarcely possible.</p>
+<p>M. LENOIR:--It was perfectly unintelligible, and therefore left
+no impression on my memory.</p>
+<p>MULLER:--Permit me, then, to have the honor of assisting your
+memory. I said to you--"Monsieur, if I believed that any modest
+young woman of my acquaintance was in danger of being courted by a
+man of doubtful character, do you know what I would do? I would
+hunt that man down with as little remorse as a ferret hunts down a
+rat in a drain."</p>
+<p>M. LENOIR:--The sentiment does you honor, Monsieur; but I do not
+see the application,</p>
+<p>MULLER:--Vous ne le trouvez pas, Monsieur?</p>
+<p>M. LENOIR--(<i>with a cold stare, and a scarcely perceptible
+shrug of the shoulders</i>):--Non, Monsieur.</p>
+<p>Here Mdlle. Rosalie broke in with:--"What are we to do next,
+M'sieur M&uuml;ller? Are we to begin another round, or shall we
+start a fresh game?"</p>
+<p>To which M&uuml;ller replied that it must be "<i>selon le
+plaisir de ces dames</i>;" and put the question to the vote.</p>
+<p>But too many plain, unvarnished truths had cropped up in the
+course of the last round of my Aunt's Flower Garden; and the ladies
+were out of humor. Madame de Montparnasse, frigid, Cyclopian, black
+as Erebus, found that it was time to go home; and took her leave,
+bristling with gentility. The tragic Honoria stalked majestically
+after her. Madame Desjardins, mortally offended with M. Dorinet on
+the score of Rosalie's legs, also prepared to be gone; while M.
+Philom&egrave;ne, convicted of hair-dye and <i>brouill&eacute;</i>
+for ever with "the most disagreeable girl in Paris," hastened to
+make his adieux as brief as possible.</p>
+<p>"A word in your ear, mon cher Dorinet," whispered he, catching
+the little dancing-master by the button-hole. "Isn't it the most
+unpleasant party you were ever at in your life?"</p>
+<p>The ex-god Scamander held up his hands and eyes.</p>
+<p>"<i>Eh, mon Dieu</i>!" he replied. "What an evening of
+disasters! I have lost my best pupil and my second-best wig!"</p>
+<p>In the meanwhile, we went up like the others, and said
+good-night to our hostess.</p>
+<p>She, good soul! in her deafness, knew nothing about the horrors
+of the evening, and was profuse of her civilities. "So amiable of
+these gentlemen to honor her little soir&eacute;e--so kind of
+M'sieur M&uuml;ller to have exerted himself to make things go off
+pleasantly--so sorry we would not stay half an hour longer,"
+&amp;c., &amp;c.</p>
+<p>To all of which M&uuml;ller (with a sly grimace expressive of
+contrition) replied only by a profound salutation and a rapid
+retreat. Passing M. Lenoir without so much as a glance, he paused a
+moment before Mdlle. Marie who was standing near the door, and said
+in a tone audible only to her and myself:--</p>
+<p>"I congratulate you, Mademoiselle, on your admirable talent for
+intrigue. I trust, when you look in the usual place and find the
+promised letter, it will prove agreeable reading. J'ai l'honneur,
+Mademoiselle, de vous saluer."</p>
+<p>I saw the girl flush crimson, then turn deadly white, and draw
+back as if his hand had struck her a sudden blow. The next moment
+we were half-way down the stairs.</p>
+<p>"What, in Heaven's name, does all this mean?" I said, when we
+were once more in the street.</p>
+<p>"It means," replied M&uuml;ller fiercely, "that the man's a
+scoundrel, and the woman, like all other women, is false."</p>
+<p>"Then the whisper you overheard" ...</p>
+<p>"Was only this:--'<i>Look in the usual place, and you will find
+a letter</i>.' Not many words, <i>mon cher</i>, but confoundedly
+comprehensive! And I who believed that girl to be an angel of
+candor! I who was within an ace of falling seriously in love with
+her! <i>Sacredie</i>! what an idiot I have been!"</p>
+<p>"Forget her, my dear fellow," said I. "Wipe her out of your
+memory (which I think will not be difficult), and leave her to her
+fate."</p>
+<p>He shook his head.</p>
+<p>"No," he said, gloomily, "I won't do that. I'll get to the
+bottom of that man's mystery; and if, as I suspect, there's that
+about his past life which won't bear the light of day--I'll save
+her, if I can."</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXV."></a>CHAPTER XXXV.</h2>
+<h3>WEARY AND FAR DISTANT.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>Twice already, in accordance with my promise to Dalrymple, I had
+called upon Madame de Courcelles, and finding her out each time,
+had left my card, and gone away disappointed. From Dalrymple
+himself, although I had written to him several times, I heard
+seldom, and always briefly. His first notes were dated from Berlin,
+and those succeeding them from Vienna. He seemed restless, bitter,
+dissatisfied with himself, and with the world. Naturally unfit for
+a lounging, idle life, his active nature, now that it had to bear
+up against the irritation of hope deferred, chafed and fretted for
+work.</p>
+<p>"My sword-arm," he wrote in one of his letters, "is weary of its
+holiday. There are times when I long for the smell of gunpowder,
+and the thunder of battle. I am sick to death of churches and
+picture-galleries, operas, dilettantism, white-kid-glovism, and all
+the hollow shows and seemings of society. Sometimes I regret having
+left the army--at others I rejoice; for, after all, in these piping
+times of peace, to be a soldier is to be a mere painted puppet--a
+thing of pipe-clay and gold bullion--an expensive scarecrow--an
+elegant Guy Fawkes--a sign, not of what is, but of what has been,
+and yet may be again. For my part, I care not to take the livery
+without the service. Pshaw! will things never mend! Are the good
+old times, and the good old international hatreds, gone by for
+ever? Shall we never again have a thorough, seasonable, wholesome,
+continental war? This place (Vienna) would be worth fighting for,
+if one had the chance. I sometimes amuse myself by planning a
+siege, when I ride round the fortifications, as is my custom of an
+afternoon."</p>
+<p>In another, after telling me that he had been reading some books
+of travel in Egypt and Central America, he said:--</p>
+<p>"Next to a military life I think that of a traveller--a genuine
+traveller, who turns his back upon railroads and guides--must be
+the most exciting and the most enviable under heaven. Since reading
+these books, I dream of the jungle and the desert, and fancy that a
+buffalo-hunt must be almost as fine sport as a charge of cavalry.
+Oh, what a weary exile this is! I feel as if the very air were
+stagnant around me, and I, like the accursed vessel that carried
+the ancient mariner,--</p>
+<blockquote>As idle as a painted ship,<br>
+Upon a painted ocean.'"</blockquote>
+<p>Sometimes, though rarely, he mentioned Madame de Courcelles, and
+then very guardedly: always as "Madame de Courcelles," and never as
+his wife.</p>
+<p>"That morning," he wrote, "comes back to me with all the
+vagueness of a dream--you will know what morning I mean, and why it
+fills so shadowy a page in the book of my memory. And it might as
+well have been a dream, for aught of present peace or future hope
+that it has brought me. I often think that I was selfish when I
+exacted that pledge from her. I do not see of what good it can be
+to either her or me, or in what sense I can be said to have gained
+even the power to protect and serve her. Would that I were rich; or
+that she and I were poor together, and dwelling far away in some
+American wild, under the shade of primeval trees, the world
+forgetting; by the world forgot! I should enjoy the life of a
+Canadian settler--so free, so rational, so manly. How happy we
+might be--she with her children, her garden, her books; I with my
+dogs, my gun, my lands! What a curse it is, this spider's web of
+civilization, that hems and cramps us in on every side, and from
+which not all the armor of common-sense is sufficient to preserve
+us!"</p>
+<p>Sometimes he broke into a strain of forced gayety, more sad, to
+my thinking, than the bitterest lamentations could have been.</p>
+<p>"I wish to Heaven," he said, in one of his later letters--"I
+wish to Heaven I had no heart, and no brain! I wish I was, like
+some worthy people I know, a mere human zoophyte, consisting of
+nothing but a mouth and a stomach. Only conceive how it must
+simplify life when once one has succeeded in making a clean sweep
+of all those finer emotions which harass more complicated
+organisms! Enviable zoophytes, that live only to digest!--who would
+not be of the brotherhood?"</p>
+<p>In another he wrote:--</p>
+<p>"I seem to have lived years in the last five or six weeks, and
+to have grown suddenly old and cynical. Some French writer (I think
+it is Alphonse Karr) says, 'Nothing in life is really great and
+good, except what is not true. Man's greatest treasures are his
+illusions.' Alas! my illusions have been dropping from me in
+showers of late, like withered leaves in Autumn. The tree will be
+bare as a gallows ere long, if these rough winds keep on blowing.
+If only things would amuse me as of old! If there was still
+excitement in play, and forgetfulness in wine, and novelty in
+travel! But there is none--and all things alike are 'flat, stale,
+and unprofitable,' The truth is, Damon, I want but one thing--and
+wanting that, lack all."</p>
+<p>Here is one more extract, and it shall be the last:--</p>
+<p>"You ask me how I pass my days--in truth, wearily enough. I rise
+with the dawn, but that is not very early in September; and I ride
+for a couple of hours before breakfast. After breakfast I play
+billiards in some public room, consume endless pipes, read the
+papers, and so on. Later in the day I scowl through a
+picture-gallery, or a string of studios; or take a pull up the
+river; or start off upon a long, solitary objectless walk through
+miles and miles of forest. Then comes dinner--the inevitable,
+insufferable, interminable German table-d'h&ocirc;te dinner--and
+then there is the evening to be got through somehow! Now and then I
+drop in at a theatre, but generally take refuge in some plebeian
+Lust Garten or Beer Hall, where amid clouds of tobacco-smoke, one
+may listen to the best part-singing and zitter-playing in Europe.
+And so my days drag by--who but myself knows how slowly? Truly,
+Damon, there comes to every one of us, sooner or later, a time when
+we say of life as Christopher Sly said of the comedy--''Tis an
+excellent piece of work. Would 'twere done!'"</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXVI."></a>CHAPTER XXXVI.</h2>
+<h3>THE VICOMTE DE CAYLUS.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>It was after receiving the last of these letters that I hazarded
+a third visit to Madame de Courcelles. This time, I ventured to
+present myself at her door about midday, and was at once ushered
+upstairs into a drawing-room looking out on the Rue Castellane.</p>
+<p>Seeing her open work-table, with the empty chair and footstool
+beside it, I thought at the first glance that I was alone in the
+room, when a muttered "Sacr-r-r-re! Down, Bijou!" made me aware of
+a gentleman extended at full length upon a sofa near the fireplace,
+and of a vicious-looking Spitz crouched beneath it.</p>
+<p>The gentleman lifted his head from the sofa-cusion; stared at
+me; bowed carelessly; got upon his feet; and seizing the poker,
+lunged savagely at the fire, as if he had a spite against it, and
+would have put it out, if he could. This done, he yawned aloud,
+flung himself into the nearest easy-chair, and rang the bell.</p>
+<p>"More coals, Henri," he said, imperiously; "and--stop! a bottle
+of Seltzer-water."</p>
+<p>The servant hesitated.</p>
+<p>"I don't think, Monsieur le Vicomte," he said, "that Madame has
+any Seltzer-water in the house; but ..."</p>
+<p>"Confound you!--you never have anything in the house at the
+moment one wants it," interrupted the gentleman, irritably.</p>
+<p>"I can send for some, if Monsieur le Vicomte desires it."</p>
+<p>"Send for it, then; and remember, when I next ask for it, let
+there be some at hand."</p>
+<p>"Yes, Monsieur le Vicomte."</p>
+<p>"And--Henri!"</p>
+<p>"Yes, Monsieur le Vicomte."</p>
+<p>"Bid them be quick. I hate to be kept waiting!"</p>
+<p>The servant murmured his usual "Yes, Monsieur le Vicomte," and
+disappeared; but with a look of such subdued dislike and impatience
+in his face, as would scarcely have flattered Monsieur le Vicomte
+had he chanced to surprise it.</p>
+<p>In the meantime the dog had never ceased growling; whilst I, in
+default of something better to do, turned over the leaves of an
+album, and took advantage of a neighboring mirror to scrutinize the
+outward appearance of this authoritative occupant of Madame de
+Courcelles' drawing-room.</p>
+<p>He was a small, pallid, slender man of about thirty-five or
+seven years of age, with delicate, effeminate features, and hair
+thickly sprinkled with gray. His fingers, white and taper as a
+woman's, were covered with rings. His dress was careless, but that
+of a gentleman. Glancing at him even thus furtively, I could not
+help observing the worn lines about his temples, the mingled
+languor and irritability of his every gesture; the restless
+suspicion of his eye; the hard curves about his handsome mouth.</p>
+<p>"<i>Mille tonnerres</i>!" said he, between his teeth "come out,
+Bijou--come out, I say!"</p>
+<p>The dog came out unwillingly, and changed the growl to a little
+whine of apprehension. His master immediately dealt him a smart
+kick that sent him crouching to the farther corner of the room,
+where he hid himself under a chair.</p>
+<p>"I'll teach you to make that noise," muttered he, as he drew his
+chair closer to the fire, and bent over it, shiveringly. "A yelping
+brute, that would be all the better for hanging."</p>
+<p>Having sat thus for a few moments, he seemed to grow restless
+again, and, pushing back his chair, rose, looked out of the window,
+took a turn or two across the room, and paused at length to take a
+book from one of the side-tables. As he did this, our eyes met in
+the looking-glass; whereupon he turned hastily back to the window,
+and stood there whistling till it occurred to him to ring the bell
+again.</p>
+<p>"Monsieur rang?" said the footman, once more making his
+appearance at the door.</p>
+<p>"<i>Mort de ma vie</i>! yes. The Seltzer-water."</p>
+<p>"I have sent for it, Monsieur le Vicomte."</p>
+<p>"And it is not yet come?"</p>
+<p>"Not yet, Monsieur le Vicomte."</p>
+<p>He muttered something to himself, and dropped back into the
+chair before the fire.</p>
+<p>"Does Madame de Courcelles know that I am here?" he asked, as
+the servant, after lingering a moment, was about to leave the
+room.</p>
+<p>"I delivered Monsieur le Vicomte's message, and brought back
+Madame's reply," said the man, "half an hour ago."</p>
+<p>"True--I had forgotten it. You may go."</p>
+<p>The footman closed the door noiselessly, and had no sooner done
+so than he was recalled by another impatient peal.</p>
+<p>"Here, Henri--have you told Madame de Courcelles that this
+gentleman is also waiting to see her?"</p>
+<p>"Yes, Monsieur le Vicomte."</p>
+<p>"<i>Eh bien</i>?"</p>
+<p>"And Madame said she should be down in a few moments."</p>
+<p>"<i>Sacredie</i>! go back, then, and inquire if...."</p>
+<p>"Madame is here."</p>
+<p>As the footman moved back respectfully, Madame de Courcelles
+came into the room. She was looking perhaps somewhat paler, but, to
+my thinking, more charming than ever. Her dark hair was gathered
+closely round her head in massive braids, displaying to their
+utmost advantage all the delicate curves of her throat and chin;
+while her rich morning dress, made of some dark material, and
+fastened at the throat by a round brooch of dead gold, fell in
+loose and ample folds, like the drapery of a Roman matron. Coming
+at once to meet me, she extended a cordial hand, and said:--</p>
+<p>"I had begun to despair of ever seeing you again. Why have you
+always come when I was out?"</p>
+<p>"Madame," I said, bending low over the slender fingers, that
+seemed to linger kindly in my own, "I have been undeservedly
+unfortunate."</p>
+<p>"Remember for the future," she said, "that I am always at home
+till midday, and after five."</p>
+<p>Then, turning to her other visitor, she said:--</p>
+<p>"<i>Mon cousin</i>, allow me to present my friend. Monsieur
+Arbuthnot--Monsieur le Vicomte Adrien de Caylus."</p>
+<p>I had suspected as much already. Who but he would have dared to
+assume these airs of insolence? Who but her suitor and my friend's
+rival? I had disliked him at first sight, and now I detested him.
+Whether it was that my aversion showed itself in my face, or that
+Madame de Courcelles's cordial welcome of myself annoyed him, I
+know not; but his bow was even cooler than my own.</p>
+<p>"I have been waiting to see you, Hel&egrave;ne," said he,
+looking at his watch, "for nearly three-quarters of an hour."</p>
+<p>"I sent you word, <i>mon cousin</i>, that I was finishing a
+letter for the foreign post," said Madame de Courcelles, coldly,
+"and that I could not come sooner."</p>
+<p>Monsieur de Caylus bit his lip and cast an impatient glance in
+my direction.</p>
+<p>"Can you spare me a few moments alone, Hel&egrave;ne?" he
+said.</p>
+<p>"Alone, <i>mon cousin</i>?"</p>
+<p>"Yes, upon a matter of business."</p>
+<p>Madame de Courcelles sighed.</p>
+<p>"If Monsieur Arbuthnot will be so indulgent as to excuse me for
+five minutes," she replied. "This way, <i>mon cousin</i>."</p>
+<p>So saying, she lifted a dark green curtain, beneath which they
+passed to a farther room out of sight and hearing.</p>
+<p>They remained a long time away. So long, that I grew weary of
+waiting, and, having turned over all the illustrated books upon the
+table, and examined every painting on the walls, turned to the
+window, as the idler's last resource, and watched the
+passers-by.</p>
+<p>What endless entertainment in the life-tide of a Paris street,
+even though but a branch from one of the greater arteries! What
+color--what character--what animation--what variety! Every third or
+fourth man is a blue-bloused artisan; every tenth, a soldier in a
+showy uniform. Then comes the grisette in her white cap; and the
+lemonade-vender with his fantastic pagoda, slung like a peep-show
+across his shoulders; and the peasant woman from Normandy, with her
+high-crowned head-dress; and the abb&eacute;, all in black, with
+his shovel-hat pulled low over his eyes; and the mountebank selling
+pencils and lucifer-matches to the music of a hurdy-gurdy; and the
+gendarme, who is the terror of street urchins; and the gamin, who
+is the torment of the gendarme; and the water-carrier, with his
+cart and his cracked bugle; and the elegant ladies and gentlemen,
+who look in at shop windows and hire seats at two sous each in the
+Champs Elys&eacute;es; and, of course, the English tourist reading
+"Galignani's Guide" as he goes along. Then, perhaps, a regiment
+marches past with colors flying and trumpets braying; or a
+fantastic-looking funeral goes by, with a hearse like a four-post
+bed hung with black velvet and silver; or the peripatetic showman
+with his company of white rats establishes himself on the pavement
+opposite, till admonished to move on by the sergent de ville. What
+an ever-shifting panorama! What a kaleidoscope of color and
+character! What a study for the humorist, the painter, the
+poet!</p>
+<p>Thinking thus, and watching the overflowing current as it
+hurried on below, I became aware of a smart cab drawn by a showy
+chestnut, which dashed round the corner of the street and came down
+the Rue Castellane at a pace that caused every head to turn as it
+went by. Almost before I had time to do more than observe that it
+was driven by a moustachioed and lavender-kidded gentleman, it drew
+up before the house, and a trim tiger jumped down, and thundered at
+the door. At that moment, the gentleman, taking advantage of the
+pause to light a cigar, looked up, and I recognised the black
+moustache and sinister countenance of Monsieur de Simoncourt.</p>
+<p>"A gentleman for Monsieur le Vicomte," said the servant, drawing
+back the green curtain and opening a vista into the room
+beyond.</p>
+<p>"Ask him to come upstairs," said the voice of De Caylus from
+within.</p>
+<p>"I have done so, Monsieur; but he prefers to wait in the
+cabriolet."</p>
+<p>"Pshaw!--confound it!--say that I'm coming."</p>
+<p>The servant withdrew.</p>
+<p>I then heard the words "perfectly safe investment--present
+convenience--unexpected demand," rapidly uttered by Monsieur de
+Caylus; and then they both came back; he looked flushed and
+angry--she calm as ever.</p>
+<p>"Then I shall call on you again to-morrow, Hel&egrave;ne," said
+he, plucking nervously at his glove. "You will have had time to
+reflect. You will see matters differently."</p>
+<p>Madame Courcelles shook her head.</p>
+<p>"Reflection will not change my opinion," she said gently.</p>
+<p>"Well, shall I send Lejeune to you? He acts as solicitor to the
+company, and ..."</p>
+<p>"<i>Mon cousin</i>" interposed the lady, "I have already given
+you my decision--why pursue the question further? I do not wish to
+see Monsieur Lejeune, and I have no speculative tastes
+whatever."</p>
+<p>Monsieur de Caylus, with a suppressed exclamation that sounded
+like a curse, rent his glove right in two, and then, as if annoyed
+at the self-betrayal, crushed up the fragments in his hand, and
+laughed uneasily.</p>
+<p>"All women are alike," he said, with an impatient shrug. "They
+know nothing of the world, and place no faith in those who are
+competent to advise them. I had given you credit, my charming
+cousin, for broader views."</p>
+<p>Madame de Courcelles smiled without replying, and caressed the
+little dog, which had come out from under the sofa to fondle round
+her.</p>
+<p>"Poor Bijou!" said she. "Pretty Bijou! Do you take good care of
+him, <i>mon cousin</i>?"</p>
+<p>"Upon my soul, not I," returned De Caylus, carelessly. "Lecroix
+feeds him, I believe, and superintends his general education."</p>
+<p>"Who is Lecroix?"</p>
+<p>"My valet, courier, body-guard, letter-carrier, and general
+<i>factotum</i>. A useful vagabond, without whom I should scarcely
+know my right hand from my left!"</p>
+<p>"Poor Bijou! I fear, then, your chance of being remembered is
+small indeed!" said Madame de Courcelles, compassionately.</p>
+<p>But Monsieur le Vicomte only whistled to the dog; bowed
+haughtily to me; kissed, with an air of easy familiarity, before
+which she evidently recoiled, first the hand and then the cheek of
+his beautiful cousin, and so left the room. The next moment I saw
+him spring into the cabriolet, take his place beside Monsieur de
+Simoncourt, and drive away, with Bijou following at a pace that
+might almost have tried a greyhound.</p>
+<p>"My cousin, De Caylus, has lately returned from Algiers on leave
+of absence," said Madame de Courcelles, after a few moments of
+awkward silence, during which I had not known what to say. "You
+have heard of him, perhaps?"</p>
+<p>"Yes, Madame, I have heard of Monsieur de Caylus."</p>
+<p>"From Captain Dalrymple?</p>
+<p>"From Captain Dalrymple, Madame; and in society."</p>
+<p>"He is a brave officer," she said, hesitatingly, "and has
+greatly distinguished himself in this last campaign."</p>
+<p>"So I have heard, Madame."</p>
+<p>She looked at me, as if she would fain read how much or how
+little Dalrymple had told me.</p>
+<p>"You are Captain Dalrymple's friend, Mr. Arbuthnot," she said,
+presently, "and I know you have his confidence. You are probably
+aware that my present position with regard to Monsieur de Caylus is
+not only very painful, but also very difficult."</p>
+<p>"Madame, I know it."</p>
+<p>"But it is a position of which I have the command, and which no
+one understands so well as myself. To attempt to help me, would be
+to add to my embarrassments. For this reason it is well that
+Captain Dalrymple is not here. His presence just now in Paris could
+do no good--on the contrary, would be certain to do harm. Do you
+follow my meaning, Monsieur Arbuthnot?"</p>
+<p>"I understand what you say, Madame; but...."</p>
+<p>"But you do not quite understand why I say it? <i>Eh bien</i>,
+Monsieur, when you write to Captain Dalrymple.... for you write
+sometimes, do you not?"</p>
+<p>"Often, Madame."</p>
+<p>"Then, when you write, say nothing that may add to his
+anxieties. If you have reason at any time to suppose that I am
+importuned to do this or that; that I am annoyed; that I have my
+own battle to fight--still, for his sake as well as for mine, be
+silent. It <i>is</i> my own battle, and I know how to fight
+it."</p>
+<p>"Alas! Madame...."</p>
+<p>She smiled sadly.</p>
+<p>"Nay," she said, "I have more courage than you would suppose;
+more courage and more will. I am fully capable of bearing my own
+burdens; and Captain Dalrymple has already enough of his own. Now
+tell me something of yourself. You are here, I think, to study
+medicine. Are you greatly devoted to your work? Have you many
+friends?"</p>
+<p>"I study, Madame--not always very regularly; and I have one
+friend."</p>
+<p>"An Englishman?"</p>
+<p>"No, Madame--a German."</p>
+<p>"A fellow-student, I presume."</p>
+<p>"No, Madame--an artist."</p>
+<p>"And you are very happy here?"</p>
+<p>"I have occupations and amusements; therefore, if to be neither
+idle nor dull is to be happy. I suppose I am happy."</p>
+<p>"Nay," she said quickly, "be sure of it. Do not doubt it. Who
+asks more from Fate courts his own destruction."</p>
+<p>"But it would be difficult, Madame, to go through life without
+desiring something better, something higher--without ambition, for
+instance--without love."</p>
+<p>"Ambition and love!" she repeated, smiling sadly. "There speaks
+the man. Ambition first--the aim and end of life; love next--the
+pleasant adjunct to success! Ah, beware of both."</p>
+<p>"But without either, life would be a desert."</p>
+<p>"Life <i>is</i> a desert," she replied, bitterly. "Ambition is
+its mirage, ever beckoning, ever receding--love its Dead Sea fruit,
+fair without and dust within. You look surprised. You did not
+expect such gloomy theories from me--yet I am no cynic. I have
+lived; I have suffered; I am a woman--<i>voil&agrave; tout</i>.
+When you are a few years older, and have trodden some of the flinty
+ways of life, you will see the world as I see it."</p>
+<p>"It may be so, Madame; but if life is indeed a desert, it is, at
+all events, some satisfaction to know that the dwellers in tents
+become enamored of their lot, and, content with what the desert has
+to give, desire no other. It is only the neophyte who rides after
+the mirage and thirsts for the Dead Sea apple."</p>
+<p>She smiled again.</p>
+<p>"Ah!" she said, "the gifts of the desert are two-fold, and what
+one gets depends on what one seeks. For some the wilderness has
+gifts of resignation, meditation, peace; for others it has the
+horse, the tent, the pipe, the gun, the chase of the panther and
+antelope. But to go back to yourself. Life, you say, would be
+barren without ambition and love. What is your ambition?"</p>
+<p>"Nay, Madame, that is more than I can tell you--more than I know
+myself."</p>
+<p>"Your profession...."</p>
+<p>"If ever I dream dreams, Madame," I interrupted quickly, "my
+profession has no share in them. It is a profession I do not love,
+and which I hope some day to abandon."</p>
+<p>"Your dreams, then?"</p>
+<p>I shook my head.</p>
+<p>"Vague--unsubstantial--illusory--forgotten as soon as dreamt!
+How can I analyze them? How can I describe them? In childhood one
+says--'I should like to be a soldier, and conquer the world;' or 'I
+should like to be a sailor, and discover new Continents;' or 'I
+should like to be a poet, and wear a laurel wreath, like Petrarch
+and Dante;' but as one gets older and wiser (conscious, perhaps, of
+certain latent energies, and weary of certain present difficulties
+and restraints), one can only wait, as best one may, and watch for
+the rising of that tide whose flood leads on to fortune."</p>
+<p>With this I rose to take my leave. Madame de Courcelles smiled
+and put out her hand.</p>
+<p>"Come often," she said; "and come at the hours when I am at
+home. I shall always be glad to see you. Above all, remember my
+caution--not a word to Captain Dalrymple, either now or at any
+other time."</p>
+<p>"Madame, you may rely upon me. One thing I ask, however, as the
+reward of my discretion."</p>
+<p>"And that one thing?"</p>
+<p>"Permission, Madame, to serve you in any capacity, however
+humble--in any strait where a brother might interfere, or a
+faithful retainer lay down his life in your service."</p>
+<p>With a sweet earnestness that made my heart beat and my cheeks
+glow, she thanked and promised me.</p>
+<p>"I shall look upon you henceforth," she said, "as my knight
+<i>sans peur et sans reproche</i>."</p>
+<p>Heaven knows that not all the lessons of all the moralists that
+ever wrote or preached since the world began, could just then have
+done me half such good service as did those simple words. They came
+at the moment when I most needed them--when I had almost lost my
+taste for society, and was sliding day by day into habits of more
+confirmed idleness and Bohemianism. They roused me. They made a man
+of me. They recalled me to higher aims, "purer manners, nobler
+laws." They clothed me, so to speak, in the <i>toga virilis</i> of
+a generous devotion. They made me long to prove myself "<i>sans
+peur</i>," to merit the "<i>sans reproche."</i> They marked an era
+in my life never to be forgotten or effaced.</p>
+<p>Let it not be thought for one moment that I loved her--or
+fancied I loved her. No, not so far as one heart-beat would carry
+me; but I was proud to possess her confidence and her friendship.
+Was she not Dalrymple's wife, and had not he asked me to watch over
+and protect her? Nay, had she not called me her knight and accepted
+my fealty?</p>
+<p>Nothing perhaps, is so invaluable to a young man on entering
+life as the friendship of a pure-minded and highly-cultivated woman
+who, removed too far above him to be regarded with passion, is yet
+beautiful enough to engage his admiration; whose good opinion
+becomes the measure of his own self-respect; and whose confidence
+is a sacred trust only to be parted from with loss of life or
+honor.</p>
+<p>Such an influence upon myself at this time was the friendship of
+Madame de Courcelles. I went out from her presence that morning
+morally stronger than before, and at each repetition of my visit I
+found her influence strengthen and increase. Sometimes I met
+Monsieur de Caylus, on which occasions my stay was ever of the
+briefest; but I most frequently found her alone, and then our talk
+was of books, of art, of culture, of all those high and stirring
+things that alike move the sympathies of the educated woman and
+rouse the enthusiasm of the young man. She became interested in me;
+at first for Dalrymple's sake, and by-and-by, however little I
+deserved it, for my own--and she showed that interest in many ways
+inexpressibly valuable to me then and thenceforth. She took pains
+to educate my taste; opened to me hitherto unknown avenues of
+study; led me to explore "fresh fields and pastures new," to which,
+but for her help, I might not have found my way for many a year to
+come. My reading, till now, had been almost wholly English or
+classical; she sent me to the old French literature--to the
+<i>Chansons de Geste</i>; to the metrical romances of the
+Trouv&egrave;res; to the Chronicles of Froissart, Monstrelet, and
+Philip de Comines, and to the poets and dramatists that immediately
+succeeded them.</p>
+<p>These books opened a new world to me; and, having daily access
+to two fine public libraries, I plunged at once into a course of
+new and delightful reading, ranging over all that fertile tract of
+song and history that begins far away in the morning land of
+medi&aelig;val romance, and leads on, century after century, to the
+new era that began with the Revolution.</p>
+<p>With what avidity I devoured those picturesque old
+chronicles--those autobiographies--those poems, and satires, and
+plays that I now read for the first time! What evenings I spent
+with St. Simon, and De Thou, and Charlotte de Bavi&egrave;re! How I
+relished Voltaire! How I laughed over Moli&egrave;re! How I
+revelled in Montaigne! Most of all, however, I loved the quaint
+lore of the earlier literature:--</p>
+<blockquote>"Old legends of the monkish page,<br>
+&nbsp;Traditions of the saint and sage,<br>
+&nbsp;Tales that have the rime of age,<br>
+&nbsp;&nbsp;And Chronicles of Eld."</blockquote>
+<p>Nor was this all. I had hitherto loved art as a child or a
+savage might love it, ignorantly, half-blindly, without any
+knowledge of its principles, its purposes, or its history. But
+Madame de Courcelles put into my hands certain books that opened my
+eyes to a thousand wonders unseen before. The works of Vasari,
+Nibby, Winkelman and Lessing, the aesthetic writings of Goethe and
+the Schlegels, awakened in me, one after the other, fresher and
+deeper revelations of beauty.</p>
+<p>I wandered through the galleries of the Louvre like one newly
+gifted with sight. I haunted the Venus of Milo and the Diane
+Chasseresse like another Pygmalion. The more I admired, the more I
+found to admire. The more I comprehended, the more I found there
+remained for me to comprehend. I recognised in art the Sphinx whose
+enigma is never solved. I learned, for the first time, that poetry
+may be committed to imperishable marble, and steeped in unfading
+colors. By degrees, as I followed in the footsteps of great
+thinkers, my insight became keener and my perceptions more refined.
+The symbolism of art evolved itself, as it were, from below the
+surface; and instead of beholding in paintings and statues mere
+studies of outward beauty, I came to know them as exponents of
+thought--as efforts after ideal truth--as aspirations which,
+because of their divineness, can never be wholly expressed; but
+whose suggestiveness is more eloquent than all the eloquence of
+words.</p>
+<p>Thus a great change came upon my life--imperceptibly at first,
+and by gradual degrees; but deeply and surely. To apply myself to
+the study of medicine became daily more difficult and more
+distasteful to me. The boisterous pleasures of the Quartier Latin
+lost their charm for me. Day by day I gave myself up more and more
+passionately to the cultivation of my taste for poetry and art. I
+filled my little sitting-room with casts after the antique. I
+bought some good engravings for my walls, and hung up a copy of the
+Madonna di San Sisto above the table at which I wrote and read. All
+day long, wherever I might be--at the hospital, in the
+lecture-room, in the laboratory--I kept looking longingly forward
+to the quiet evening by-and-by when, with shaded lamp and curtained
+window, I should again take up the studies of the night before.</p>
+<p>Thus new aims opened out before me, and my thoughts flowed into
+channels ever wider and deeper. Already the first effervescence of
+youth seemed to have died off the surface of my life, as the
+"beaded bubbles" die off the surface of champagne. I had tried
+society, and wearied of it. I had tried Bohemia, and found it
+almost as empty as the Chauss&eacute;e d'Autin. And now that life
+which from boyhood I had ever looked upon as the happiest on earth,
+the life of the student, was mine. Could I have devoted it wholly
+and undividedly to those pursuits which were fast becoming to me as
+the life of my life, I would not have exchanged my lot for all the
+wealth of the Rothschilds. Somewhat indolent, perhaps, by nature,
+indifferent to achieve, ambitious only to acquire, I asked nothing
+better than a life given up to the worship of all that is beautiful
+in art, to the acquisition of knowledge, and to the development of
+taste. Would the time ever come when I might realize my dream? Ah!
+who could tell? In the meanwhile ... well, in the meanwhile, here
+was Paris--here were books, museums, galleries, schools, golden
+opportunities which, once past, might never come again. So I
+reasoned; so time went on; so I lived, plodding on by day in the
+&Eacute;cole de M&eacute;decine, but, when evening came, resuming
+my studies at the leaf turned down the night before, and, like the
+visionary in "The Pilgrims of the Rhine," taking up my dream-life
+at the point where I had been last awakened.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXVII."></a>CHAPTER XXXVII.</h2>
+<h3>GUICHET THE MODEL.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>To the man who lives alone and walks about with his eyes open,
+the mere bricks and mortar of a great city are instinct with
+character. Buildings become to him like living creatures. The
+streets tell him tales. For him, the house-fronts are written over
+with hieroglyphics which, to the passing crowd, are either unseen
+or without meaning. Fallen grandeur, pretentious gentility, decent
+poverty, the infamy that wears a brazen front, and the crime that
+burrows in darkness--he knows them all at a glance. The patched
+window, the dingy blind, the shattered doorstep, the pot of
+mignonette on the garret ledge, are to him as significant as the
+lines and wrinkles on a human face. He grows to like some houses
+and to dislike others, almost without knowing why--just as one
+grows to like or dislike certain faces in the parks and clubs. I
+remember now, as well as if it were yesterday, how, during the
+first weeks of my life in Paris, I fell in love at first sight with
+a wee <i>maisonnette</i> at the corner of a certain street
+overlooking the Luxembourg gardens--a tiny little house, with
+soft-looking blue silk window-curtains, and cream-colored
+jalousies, and boxes of red and white geraniums at all the windows.
+I never knew who lived in that sunny little nest; I never saw a
+face at any of those windows; yet I used to go out of my way in the
+summer evenings to look at it, as one might go to look at a
+beautiful woman behind a stall in the market-place, or at a Madonna
+in a shop-window.</p>
+<p>At the time about which I write, there was probably no city in
+Europe of which the street-scenery was so interesting as that of
+Paris. I have already described the Quartier Latin, joyous,
+fantastic, out-at-elbows; a world in itself and by itself; unlike
+anything else in Paris or elsewhere. But there were other districts
+in the great city--now swept away and forgotten--as characteristic
+in their way as the Quartier Latin. There was the He de Saint
+Louis, for instance--a <i>Campo Santo</i> of decayed
+nobility--lonely, silent, fallen upon evil days, and haunted here
+and there by ghosts of departed Marquises and Abb&eacute;s of the
+<i>vieille &eacute;cole</i>. There was the debateable land to the
+rear of the Invalides and the Champ de Mars. There was the Faubourg
+St. Germain, fast falling into the sere and yellow leaf, and going
+the way of the Ile de Saint Louis. There was the neighborhood of
+the Boulevart d'Aulnay, and the Rue de la Roquette, ghastly with
+the trades of death; a whole Quartier of monumental sculptors,
+makers of iron crosses, weavers of funereal chaplets, and wholesale
+coffin-factors. And beside and apart from all this, there were (as
+in all great cities) districts of evil report and obscure
+topography--lost islets of crime, round which flowed and circled
+the daily tide of Paris life; flowed and circled, yet never
+penetrated. A dark arch here and there--the mouth of a foul
+alley--a riverside vista of gloom and squalor, marked the entrance
+to these Alsatias. Such an Alsatia was the Rue Pierre Lescot, the
+Rue Sans Nom, and many more than I can now remember--streets into
+which no sane man would venture after nightfall without the escort
+of the police.</p>
+<p>Into the border land of such a neighborhood--a certain congeries
+of obscure and labyrinthine streets to the rear of the old
+Halles--I accompanied Franz M&uuml;ller one wintry afternoon, about
+an hour before sunset, and perhaps some ten days after our evening
+in the Rue du Faubourg St. Denis. We were bound on an expedition of
+discovery, and the object of our journey was to find the habitat of
+Guichet the model.</p>
+<p>"I am determined to get to the bottom of this Lenoir business,"
+said M&uuml;ller, doggedly; "and if the police won't help me, I
+must help myself."</p>
+<p>"You have no case for the police," I replied.</p>
+<p>"So says the <i>chef de bureau</i>; but I am of the opposite
+opinion. However, I shall make my case out clearly enough before
+long. This Guichet can help me, if he will. He knows Lenoir, and he
+knows something against him; that is clear. You saw how cautious he
+was the other day. The difficulty will be to make him speak."</p>
+<p>"I doubt if you will succeed."</p>
+<p>"I don't, <i>mon cher</i>. But we shall see. Then, again, I have
+another line of evidence open to me. You remember that
+orange-colored rosette in the fellow's button-hole?"</p>
+<p>"Certainly I do."</p>
+<p>"Well, now, I happen, by the merest chance, to know what that
+rosette means. It is the ribbon of the third order of the Golden
+Palm of Mozambique--a Portuguese decoration. They give it to
+diplomatic officials, eminent civilians, distinguished foreigners,
+and the like. I know a fellow who has it, and who belongs to the
+Portuguese Legation here. <i>Eh bien!</i> I went to him the other
+day, and asked him about our said friend--how he came by it, who he
+is, where he comes from, and so forth. My Portuguese repeats the
+name--elevates his eyebrows--in short, has never heard of such a
+person. Then he pulls down a big book from a shelf in the
+secretary's room--turns to a page headed 'Golden Palm of
+Mozambique'--runs his finger along the list of names--shakes his
+head, and informs me that no Lenoir is, or ever has been, received
+into the order. What do you say to that, now?"</p>
+<p>"It is just what I should have expected; but still it is not a
+ease for the police. It concerns the Portuguese minister; and the
+Portuguese minister is by no means likely to take any trouble about
+the matter. But why waste all this time and care? If I were you, I
+would let the thing drop. It is not worth the cost."</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller looked grave.</p>
+<p>"I would drop it this moment," he said, "if--if it were not for
+the girl."</p>
+<p>"Who is still less worth the cost,"</p>
+<p>"I know it," he replied, impatiently. "She has a pretty,
+sentimental Madonna face; a sweet voice; a gentle manner--<i>et
+voil&agrave; tout</i>. I'm not the least bit in love with her now.
+I might have been. I might have committed some great folly for her
+sake; but that danger is past, <i>Dieu merci!</i> I couldn't love a
+girl I couldn't trust, and that girl is a flirt. A flirt of the
+worst sort, too--demure, serious, conventional. No, no; my fancy
+for the fair Marie has evaporated; but, for all that, I don't
+relish the thought of what her fate might be if linked for life to
+an unscrupulous scoundrel like Lenoir. I must do what I can, my
+dear fellow--I must do what I can."</p>
+<p>We had by this time rounded the Halles, and were threading our
+way through one gloomy by-street after another. The air was chill,
+the sky low and rainy; and already the yellow glow of an oil-lamp
+might be seen gleaming through the inner darkness of some of the
+smaller shops. Meanwhile, the dusk seemed to gather at our heels,
+and to thicken at every step.</p>
+<p>"You are sure you know your way?" I asked presently, seeing
+M&uuml;ller look up at the name at the corner of the street.</p>
+<p>"Why, yes; I think I do," he answered, doubtfully.</p>
+<p>"Why not inquire of that man just ahead?" I suggested.</p>
+<p>He was a square-built, burly, shabby-looking fellow, and was
+striding along so fast that we had to quicken our pace in order to
+come up with him. All at once M&uuml;ller fell back, laid his hand
+on my arm, and said:--</p>
+<p>"Stop! It is Guichet himself. Let him go on, and we'll
+follow."</p>
+<p>So we dropped into the rear and followed him. He turned
+presently to the right, and preceded us down a long and horribly
+ill-favored street, full of mean cabarets and lodging-houses of the
+poorest class, where, painted in red letters on broken lamps above
+the doors, or printed on cards wafered against the window-panes,
+one saw at almost every other house, the words, "<i>Ici on loge la
+nuit</i>." At the end of this thoroughfare our unconscious guide
+plunged into a still darker and fouler <i>impasse</i>, hung across
+from side to side with rows of dingy linen, and ornamented in the
+centre with a mound of decaying cabbage-leaves, potato-parings,
+oyster-shells, and the like. Here he made for a large tumble-down
+house that closed the alley at the farther end, and, still followed
+by ourselves, went in at an open doorway, and up a public staircase
+dimly lighted by a flickering oil-lamp at every landing. At his own
+door he paused, and just as he had turned the key, M&uuml;ller
+accosted him.</p>
+<p>"Is that you, Guichet?" he said. "Why, you are the very man I
+want! If I had come ten minutes sooner, I should have missed
+you."</p>
+<p>"Is it M'sieur M&uuml;ller?" said Guichet, bending his heavy
+brows and staring at us in the gloom of the landing.</p>
+<p>"Ay, and with me the friend you saw the other day. So, this is
+your den? May we come in?"</p>
+<p>He had been standing till now with his hand on the key and the
+closed door at his back, evidently not intending to admit us; but
+thus asked, he pushed the door open, and said, somewhat
+ungraciously:--</p>
+<p>"It is just that, M'sieur M&uuml;ller--a den; not fit for
+gentlemen like you. But you can go in, if you please."</p>
+<p>We did not wait for a second invitation, but went in
+immediately. It was a long, low, dark room, with a pale gleam of
+fading daylight struggling in through a tiny window at the farther
+end. We could see nothing at first but this gleam; and it was not
+till Guichet had raked out the wood ashes on the hearth, and blown
+them into a red glow with his breath, that we could distinguish the
+form or position of anything in the room. Then, by the flicker of
+the fire, we saw a low truckle-bed close under the window; a kind
+of bruised and battered seaman's chest in the middle of the room; a
+heap of firewood in one corner; a pile of old packing-cases; old
+sail-cloth, old iron, and all kinds of rubbish in another; a few
+pots and pans over the fire-place; and a dilapidated stool or two
+standing about the room. Avoiding these latter, we set ourselves
+down upon the edge of the chest; while Guichet, having by this time
+lit a piece of candle-end in a tin sconce against the wall, stood
+before us with folded arms, and stared at us in silence.</p>
+<p>"I want to know, Guichet, if you can give me some sittings,"
+said M&uuml;ller, by way of opening the conversation.</p>
+<p>"Depends on when, M'sieur M&uuml;ller," growled the model.</p>
+<p>"Well--next week, for the whole week."</p>
+<p>Guichet shook his head. He was engaged to Monsieur Flandrin
+<i>l&agrave; bas</i>, for the next month, from twelve to three
+daily, and had only his mornings and evenings to dispose of; in
+proof of which he pulled out a greasy note-book and showed where
+the agreement was formally entered. M&uuml;ller made a grimace of
+disappointment.</p>
+<p>"That man's head takes a deal of cutting off, <i>mon ami</i>,"
+he said. "Aren't you tired of playing executioner so long?"</p>
+<p>"Not I, M'sieur! It's all the same to me--executioner or victim,
+saint or devil."</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller, laughing, offered him a cigar.</p>
+<p>"You've posed for some queer characters in your time, Guichet,"
+said he.</p>
+<p>"Parbleu, M'sieur!"</p>
+<p>"But you've not been a model all your life?"</p>
+<p>"Perhaps not, M'sieur."</p>
+<p>"You've been a sailor once upon a time, haven't you?"</p>
+<p>The model looked up quickly.</p>
+<p>"How did you know that?" he said, frowning.</p>
+<p>"By a number of little things--by this, for instance," replied
+M&uuml;ller, kicking his heels against the sea-chest; "by certain
+words you make use of now and then; by the way you walk; by the way
+you tie your cravat. <i>Que diable</i>! you look at me as if you
+took me for a sorcerer!"</p>
+<p>The model shook his head.</p>
+<p>"I don't understand it," he said, slowly.</p>
+<p>"Nay, I could tell you more than that if I liked," said
+M&uuml;ller, with an air of mystery.</p>
+<p>"About myself?"</p>
+<p>"Ay, about yourself, and others."</p>
+<p>Guichet, having just lighted his cigar, forgot to put it to his
+lips.</p>
+<p>"What others?" he asked, with a look half of dull bewilderment
+and half of apprehension.</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller shrugged his shoulders.</p>
+<p>"Pshaw!" said he; "I know more than you think I know, Guichet.
+There's our friend, you know--he of whom I made the head t'other
+day ... you remember?"</p>
+<p>The model, still looking at him, made no answer.</p>
+<p>"Why didn't you say at once where you had met him, and all the
+rest of it, <i>mon vieux</i>? You might have been sure I should
+find out for myself, sooner or later."</p>
+<p>The model turned abruptly towards the fire-place, and, leaning
+his head against the mantel-shelf, stood with his back towards us,
+looking down into the fire.</p>
+<p>"You ask me why I did not tell you at once?" he said, very
+slowly.</p>
+<p>"Ay--why not?"</p>
+<p>"Why not? Because--because when a man has begun to lead an
+honest life, and has gone on leading an honest life, as I have, for
+years, he is glad to put the past behind him--to forget it, and all
+belonging to it. How was I to guess you knew anything about--about
+that place <i>l&agrave; bas</i>?"</p>
+<p>"And why should I not know about it?" replied M&uuml;ller,
+flashing a rapid glance at me.</p>
+<p>Guichet was silent.</p>
+<p>"What if I tell you that I am particularly interested in--that
+place <i>l&agrave; bas</i>?"</p>
+<p>"Well, that may be. People used to come sometimes, I
+remember--artists and writers, and so on."</p>
+<p>"Naturally."</p>
+<p>"But I don't remember to have ever seen you, M'sieur
+M&uuml;ller."</p>
+<p>"You did not observe me, <i>mon cher</i>--or it may have been
+before, or after your time."</p>
+<p>"Yes, that's true," replied Guichet, ponderingly. "How long ago
+was it, M'sieur M&uuml;ller?"</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller glanced at me again. His game, hitherto so easy, was
+beginning to grow difficult.</p>
+<p>"Eh, <i>mon Dieu</i>!" he said, indifferently, "how can I tell?
+I have knocked about too much, now here, now there, in the course
+of my life, to remember in what particular year this or that event
+may have happened. I am not good at dates, and never was."</p>
+<p>"But you remember seeing me there?"</p>
+<p>"Have I not said so?"</p>
+<p>Guichet took a couple of turns about the room. He looked flushed
+and embarrassed.</p>
+<p>"There is one thing I should like to know," he said, abruptly.
+"Where was I? What was I doing when you saw me?"</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller was at fault now, for the first time.</p>
+<p>"Where were you?" he repeated. "Why, there--where we said just
+now. <i>L&agrave; bas</i>."</p>
+<p>"No, no--that's not what I mean. Was I .... was I in the uniform
+of the Garde Chiourme?"</p>
+<p>The color rushed into M&uuml;ller's face as, flashing a glance
+of exultation at me, he replied:--</p>
+<p>"Assuredly, <i>mon ami</i>. In that, and no other."</p>
+<p>The model drew a deep breath.</p>
+<p>"And Bras de Fer?" he said. "Was he working in the quarries
+?"</p>
+<p>"Bras de Fer! Was that the name he went by in those days?"</p>
+<p>"Ay--Bras de Fer--<i>alias</i> Coupe-gorge--<i>alias</i>
+Triphot--<i>alias</i> Lenoir--<i>alias</i> a hundred other names.
+Bras de Fer was the one he went by at Toulon--and a real devil he
+was in the Bagnes! He escaped three times, and was twice caught and
+brought back again. The third time he killed one sentry, injured
+another for life, and got clear off. That was five years ago, and I
+left soon after. I suppose, if you saw him in Paris the other day,
+he has kept clear of Toulon ever since."</p>
+<p>"But was he in for life?" said M&uuml;ller, eagerly.</p>
+<p>"<i>Travaux forc&eacute;s &agrave;
+perp&eacute;tuit&eacute;</i>," replied Guichet, touching his own
+shoulder significantly with the thumb of his right hand.</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller sprang to his feet.</p>
+<p>"Enough," he said. "That is all I wanted to know. Guichet,
+<i>mon cher</i>, I am your debtor for life. We will talk about the
+sittings when you have more time to dispose of. Adieu."</p>
+<p>"But, M'sieur M&uuml;ller, you won't get me into trouble!"
+exclaimed the model, eagerly. "You won't make any use of my
+words?"</p>
+<p>"Why, supposing I went direct to the Pr&eacute;fecture, what
+trouble could I possibly get you into, <i>mon ami?</i>" replied
+M&uuml;ller.</p>
+<p>The model looked down in silence.</p>
+<p>"You are a brave man. You do not fear the vengeance of Bras de
+Fer, or his friends?"</p>
+<p>"No, M'sieur---it's not that."</p>
+<p>"What is it, then?"</p>
+<p>"M'sieur...."</p>
+<p>"Pshaw, man! Speak up."</p>
+<p>"It is not that you would get me personally into trouble,
+M'sieur M&uuml;ller," said Guichet, slowly. "I am no coward, I
+hope--a coward would make a bad Garde Chiourme at Toulon, I fancy.
+And I'm not an escaped <i>for&ccedil;at</i>. But--but, you see,
+I've worked my way into a connection here in Paris, and I've made
+myself a good name among the artists, and ... and I hold to that
+good name above everything in the world."</p>
+<p>"Naturally--rightly. But what has that to do with Lenoir?"</p>
+<p>"Ah, M'sieur M&uuml;ller, if you knew more about me, you would
+not need telling how much it has to do with him! I was not always a
+Garde Chiourme at Toulon. I was promoted to it after a time, for
+good conduct, you know, and that sort of thing. But--but I began
+differently--I began by wearing the prison dress, and working in
+the quarries."</p>
+<p>"My good fellow," said M&uuml;ller, gently, "I half suspected
+this--I am not surprised; and I respect you for having redeemed
+that past in the way you have redeemed it."</p>
+<p>"Thank you, M'sieur M&uuml;ller; but you see, redeemed or
+unredeemed, I'd rather be lying at the bottom of the Seine than
+have it rise up against me now,"</p>
+<p>"We are men of honor," said M&uuml;ller, "and your secret is
+safe with us."</p>
+<p>"Not if you go to the Pr&eacute;fecture and inform against Bras
+de Fer on my words," exclaimed the model, eagerly. "How can I
+appear against him--Guichet the model--Guichet the Garde
+Chiourme--Guichet the <i>for&ccedil;at?</i> M'sieur M&uuml;ller, I
+could never hold my head up again. It would be the ruin of me."</p>
+<p>"You shall not appear against him, and it shall not be the ruin
+of you. Guichet," said M&uuml;ller. "That I promise you. Only
+assure me that what you have said is strictly correct--that Bras de
+Fer and Lenoir are one and the same person--an escaped
+<i>for&ccedil;at</i>, condemned for life to the galleys."</p>
+<p>"That's as true, M'sieur M&uuml;ller, as that God is in heaven,"
+said the model, emphatically.</p>
+<p>"Then I can prove it without your testimony--I can prove it by
+simply summoning any of the Toulon authorities to identify
+him."</p>
+<p>"Or by stripping his shirt off his back, and showing the brand
+on his left shoulder," said Guichet. "There you'll find it, T.F. as
+large as life--and if it don't show at first, just you hit him a
+sharp blow with the flat of your hand, M'sieur M&uuml;ller, and it
+will start out as red and fresh as if it had been done only six
+months ago. <i>Parbleu!</i> I remember the day he came in, and the
+look in his face when the hot iron hissed into his flesh! They roar
+like bulls, for the most part; but he never flinched or spoke. He
+just turned a shade paler under the tan, and that was all."</p>
+<p>"Do you remember what his crime was?" asked M&uuml;ller</p>
+<p>Guichet shook his head.</p>
+<p>"Not distinctly," he said. "I only know that he was in for a
+good deal, and had a lot of things proved against him on his trial.
+But you can find all that out for yourself, easily enough. He was
+tried in Paris, about fourteen years ago, and it's all in print, if
+you only know where to look for it."</p>
+<p>"Then I'll find it, if I have to wade through half the
+Biblioth&egrave;que Nationale!" said M&uuml;ller. "Adieu,
+Guichet--you have done me a great service, and you may be sure I
+will do nothing to betray you. Let us shake hands upon it."</p>
+<p>The color rushed into the model's swarthy cheeks.</p>
+<p>"<i>Comment</i>, M'sieur M&uuml;ller!" he said, hesitatingly.
+"You offer to shake hands with me--after what I have told you?"</p>
+<p>"Ten times more willing than before, <i>mon ami</i>," said
+M&uuml;ller. "Did I not tell you just now that I respected you for
+having redeemed that past, and shall I not give my hand where I
+give my respect?"</p>
+<p>The model grasped his outstretched hand with a vehemence that
+made M&uuml;ller wince again.</p>
+<p>"Thank you," he said, in a low, deep voice. "Thank you. Death of
+my life! M'sieur M&uuml;ller, I'd go to the galleys again for you,
+after this--if you asked me."</p>
+<p>"Agreed. Only when I do ask you, it shall be to pay a visit of
+ceremony to Monsieur Bras de Fer, when he is safely lodged again at
+Toulon with a chain round his leg, and a cannon-ball at the end of
+it."</p>
+<p>And with this M&uuml;ller turned away laughingly, and I followed
+him down the dimly-lighted stairs.</p>
+<p>"By Jove!" he said, "what a grip the fellow gave me! I'd as soon
+shake hands with the Commendatore in Don Giovanni."</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXVIII."></a>CHAPTER XXXVIII.</h2>
+<h3>NUMBER TWO HUNDRED AND SEVEN.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>M&uuml;ller, when he so confidently proposed to visit Bras de
+Fer in his future retirement at Toulon, believed that he had only
+to lodge his information with the proper authorities, and see the
+whole affair settled out of hand. He had not taken the bureaucratic
+system into consideration; and he had forgotten how little positive
+evidence he had to offer. It was no easier then than now to inspire
+the official mind with either insight or decision; and the police
+of Paris, inasmuch as they in no wise differed from the police of
+to-day, yesterday, or to-morrow, were slow to understand, slow to
+believe, and slower still to act.</p>
+<p>An escaped convict? Monsieur le Chef du Bureau, upon whom we
+took the liberty of waiting the next morning, could scarcely take
+in the bare possibility of such a fact. An escaped convict? Bah! no
+convict could possibly escape under the present admirable system.
+<i>Comment</i>! He effected his escape some years ago? How many
+years ago? In what yard, in what ward, under what number was he
+entered in the official books? For what offence was he convicted?
+Had Monsieur seen him at Toulon?--and was Monsieur prepared to
+swear that Lenoir and Bras de Fer were one and the same person?
+How! Monsieur proposed to identify a certain individual, and yet
+was incapable of replying to these questions! Would Monsieur be
+pleased to state upon what grounds he undertook to denounce the
+said individual, and what proof he was prepared to produce in
+confirmation of the same?</p>
+<p>To all which official catechizing, M&uuml;ller, who (wanting
+Guichet's testimony) had nothing but his intense personal
+conviction to put forward, could only reply that he was ready to
+pledge himself to the accuracy of his information; and that if
+Monsieur the Chef du Bureau would be at the pains to call in any
+Toulon official of a few years' standing, he would undoubtedly find
+that the person now described as calling himself Lenoir, and the
+person commonly known in the Bagnes as Bras de Fer, were indeed
+"one and the same."</p>
+<p>Whereupon Monsieur le Chef--a pompous personage, with a bald
+head and a white moustache--shrugged his shoulders, smiled
+incredulously, had the honor to point out to Monsieur that the
+Government could by no means be at the expense of conveying an
+inspector from Toulon to Paris on so shadowy and unsupported a
+statement, and politely bowed us out.</p>
+<p>Thus rebuffed, M&uuml;ller began to despair of present success;
+whilst I, in default of any brighter idea, proposed that he should
+take legal advice on the subject. So we went to a certain avocat,
+in a little street adjoining the &Eacute;cole de Droit, and there
+purchased as much wisdom as might be bought for the sum of five
+francs sterling.</p>
+<p>The avocat, happily, was fertile in suggestions. This, he said,
+was not a case for a witness. Here was no question of appearing
+before a court. With the foregone offences of either Lenoir or Bras
+de Fer, we had nothing to do; and to convict them of such offences
+formed no part of our plan. We only sought to show that Lenoir and
+Bras de Fer were in truth "one and the same person," and we could
+only do so upon the authority of some third party who had seen
+both. Now Monsieur M&uuml;ller had seen Lenoir, but not Bras de
+Fer; and Guichet had seen Bras de Fer, but not Lenoir. Here, then,
+was the real difficulty; and here, he hoped, its obvious solution.
+Let Guichet be taken to some place where, being himself unseen, he
+may obtain a glimpse of Lenoir. This done, he can, in a private
+interview of two minutes, state his conviction to Monsieur the Chef
+de Bureau--<i>voil&agrave; tout</i>! If, however, the said Guichet
+can be persuaded by no considerations either of interest or
+justice, then another very simple course remains open. Every
+newly-arrived convict in every penal establishment throughout
+France is photographed on his entrance into the Bagne, and these
+photographs are duly preserved for purposes of identification like
+the present. Supposing therefore Bras de Fer had not escaped from
+Toulon before the introduction of this system, his portrait would
+exist in the official books to this day, and might doubtless be
+obtained, if proper application were made through an official
+channel.</p>
+<p>Armed with this information, and knowing that any attempt to
+induce Guichet to move further in the matter would be useless, we
+then went back to the Bureau, and with much difficulty succeeded in
+persuading M. le Chef to send to Toulon for the photograph. This
+done, we could only wait and be patient.</p>
+<p>Briefly, then, we did wait and were patient--though the last
+condition was not easy; for even I, who was by no means disposed to
+sympathize with M&uuml;ller in his solicitude for the fair Marie,
+could not but feel a strange contagion of excitement in this
+<i>chasse au for&ccedil;at</i>. And so a week or ten days went by,
+till one memorable afternoon, when M&uuml;ller came rushing round
+to my rooms in hot haste, about an hour before the time when we
+usually met to go to dinner, and greeted me with--</p>
+<p>"Good news, <i>mon vieux</i>! good news! The photograph has
+come--and I have been to the Bureau to see it--and I have
+identified my man--and he will be arrested to-night, as surely as
+that he carries T.F. on his shoulder!"</p>
+<p>"You are certain he is the same?" I said.</p>
+<p>"As certain as I am of my own face when I see it in the
+looking-glass."</p>
+<p>And then he went on to say that a party of soldiers were to be
+in readiness a couple of hours hence, in a shop commanding Madame
+Mar&ocirc;t's door; that he, M&uuml;ller, was to be there to watch
+with them till Lenoir either came out from or went into the house;
+and that as soon as he pointed him out to the sergeant in command,
+he was to be arrested, put into a cab waiting for the purpose, and
+conveyed to La Roquette.</p>
+<p>Behold us, then, at the time prescribed, lounging in the doorway
+of a small shop adjoining the private entrance to Madame
+Mar&ocirc;t's house; our hands in our pockets; our cigars in our
+mouths; our whole attitude expressive of idleness and unconcern.
+The wintry evening has closed in rapidly. The street is bright with
+lamps, and busy with passers-by. The shop behind us is quite
+dark--so dark that not the keenest observer passing by could detect
+the dusky group of soldiers sitting on the counter within, or the
+gleaming of the musket-barrels which rest between their knees. The
+sergeant in command, a restless, black-eyed, intelligent little
+Gascon, about five feet four in height, with a revolver stuck in
+his belt, paces impatiently to and fro, and whistles softly between
+his teeth. The men, four in number, whisper together from time to
+time, or swing their feet in silence.</p>
+<p>Thus the minutes go by heavily; for it is weary work waiting in
+this way, uncertain how long the watch may last, and not daring to
+relax the vigilance of eye and ear for a single moment. It may be
+for an hour, or for many hours, or it may be for only a few
+minutes-who can tell? Of Lenoir's daily haunts and habits we know
+nothing. All we do know is that he is wont to be out all day,
+sometimes returning only to dress and go out again; sometimes not
+coming home till very late at night; sometimes absenting himself
+for a day and a night, or two days and two nights together. With
+this uncertain prospect before us, therefore, we wait and watch,
+and watch and wait, counting the hours as they strike, and scanning
+every face that gleams past in the lamplight.</p>
+<p>So the first hour goes by, and the second. Ten o'clock strikes.
+The traffic in the street begins perceptibly to diminish. Shops
+close here and there (Madame Mar&ocirc;t's shutters have been put
+up by the boy in the oilskin apron more than an hour ago), and the
+<i>chiffonnier</i>, sure herald of the quieter hours of the night,
+flits by with rake and lanthorn, observant of the gutters.</p>
+<p>The soldiers on' the counter yawn audibly from time to time; and
+the sergeant, who is naturally of an impatient disposition,
+exclaims, for the twentieth time, with an inexhaustible variety,
+however, in the choice of expletives:--</p>
+<p>"<i>Mais; nom de deux cent mille petards</i>! will this man of
+ours never come?"</p>
+<p>To which inquiry, though not directly addressed to myself, I
+reply, as I have already replied once or twice before, that he may
+come immediately, or that he may not come for hours; and that all
+we can do is to wait and be patient. In the midst of which
+explanation, M&uuml;ller suddenly lays his hand on my arm, makes a
+sign to the sergeant, and peers eagerly down the street.</p>
+<p>There is a man coming up quickly on the opposite side of the
+way. For myself, I could recognise no one at such a distance,
+especially by night; but M&uuml;ller's keener eye, made keener
+still by jealousy, identifies him at a glance.</p>
+<p>It is Lenoir.</p>
+<p>He wears a frock coat closely buttoned, and comes on with a
+light, rapid step, suspecting nothing. The sergeant gives the
+word--the soldiers spring to their feet--I draw back into the gloom
+of the shop-and only M&uuml;ller remains, smoking his cigarette and
+lounging against the door-post.</p>
+<p>Then Lenoir crosses over, and M&uuml;ller, affecting to observe
+him for the first time, looks up, and without lifting his hat, says
+loudly:--</p>
+<p>"<i>Comment</i>! have I the honor of saluting Monsieur
+Lenoir?"</p>
+<p>Whereupon Lenoir, thrown off his guard by the suddenness of the
+address, hesitates--seems about to reply--checks himself--quickens
+his pace, and passes without a word.</p>
+<p>The next instant he is surrounded. The butt ends of four muskets
+rattle on the pavement--the sergeant's hand is on his shoulder--the
+sergeant's voice rings in his ear.</p>
+<p>"Number two hundred and seven, you are my prisoner!"</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXIX."></a>CHAPTER XXXIX.</h2>
+<h3>THE END OF BRAS BE FER.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>Lenoir's first impulse was to struggle in silence; then, finding
+escape hopeless, he folded his arms and submitted.</p>
+<p>"So, it is Monsieur M&uuml;ller who has done me this service,"
+he said coldly; but with a flash in his eye like the sudden glint
+in the eye of a cobra di capello. "I will take care not to be
+unmindful of the obligation."</p>
+<p>Then, turning impatiently upon the sergeant:--</p>
+<p>"Have you no carriage at hand?" he said, sharply; "or do you
+want to collect a crowd in the street?"</p>
+<p>The cab, however, which had been waiting a few doors lower down,
+drove up while he was speaking. The sergeant hurried him in; the
+half-dozen loiterers who had already gathered about us pressed
+eagerly forward; two of the soldiers and the sergeant got inside;
+M&uuml;ller and I scrambled up beside the driver; word was given
+"to the Pr&eacute;fecture of Police;" and we drove rapidly away
+down the Rue du Faubourg St. Denis, through the arch of Louis
+Quatorze, out upon the bright noisy Boulevard, and on through
+thoroughfares as brilliant and crowded as at midday, towards the
+quays and the river.</p>
+<p>Arrived at the Quai des Ort&euml;vres, we alighted at the
+Pr&eacute;fecture, and were conducted through a series of
+ante-rooms and corridors into the presence of the same bald-headed
+Chef de Bureau whom we had seen on each previous occasion. He
+looked up as we came in, pressed the spring of a small bell that
+stood upon his desk, and growled something in the ear of a clerk
+who answered the summons.</p>
+<p>"Sergeant," he said, pompously, "bring the prisoner under the
+gas-burner."</p>
+<p>Lenoir, without waiting to be brought, took a couple of steps
+forward, and placed himself in the light.</p>
+<p>Monsieur le Chef then took out his double eye-glass, and
+proceeded to compare Lenoir's face, feature by feature, with a
+photograph which he took out of his pocket-book for the
+purpose.</p>
+<p>"Are you prepared, Monsieur," he said, addressing M&uuml;ller
+for the first time--"are you, I say, prepared to identify the
+prisoner upon oath?"</p>
+<p>"Within certain limitations--yes," replied M&uuml;ller.</p>
+<p>"Certain limitations!" exclaimed the Chef, testily. "What do you
+mean by 'certain limitations?' Here is the man whom you accuse, and
+here is the photograph. Are you, I repeat, prepared to make your
+deposition before Monsieur le Pr&eacute;fet that they are one and
+the same person?"</p>
+<p>"I am neither more nor less prepared, Monsieur," said
+M&uuml;ller, "than you are; or than Monsieur le Pr&eacute;fet, when
+he has the opportunity of judging. As I have already had the honor
+of informing you, I saw the prisoner for the first time about two
+months since. Having reason to believe that he was living in Paris
+under an assumed name, and wearing a decoration to which he had no
+right, I prosecuted certain inquiries about him. The result of
+those inquiries led me to conclude that he was an escaped convict
+from the Bagnes of Toulon. Never having seen him at Toulon, I was
+unable to prove this fact without assistance. You, Monsieur, have
+furnished that assistance, and the proof is now in your hand. It
+only remains for Monsieur le Pr&eacute;fet and yourself to decide
+upon its value."</p>
+<p>"Give me the photograph, Monsieur Marmot," said a pale little
+man in blue spectacles, who had come in unobserved from a door
+behind us, while M&uuml;ller was speaking.</p>
+<p>The bald-headed Chef jumped up with great alacrity, bowed like a
+second Sir Pertinax, and handed over the photograph.</p>
+<p>"The peculiar difficulty of this case, Monsieur le
+Pr&eacute;fet" ... he began.</p>
+<p>The Pr&eacute;fet waved his hand.</p>
+<p>"Thanks, Monsieur Marmot," he said, "I know all the particulars
+of this case. You need not trouble to explain them. So this is the
+photograph forwarded from Toulon. Well--well! Sergeant, strip the
+prisoner's shoulders."</p>
+<p>A sudden quiver shot over Lenoir's face at this order, and his
+cheek blenched under the tan; but he neither spoke nor resisted.
+The next moment his coat and waistcoat were lying on the ground;
+his shirt, torn in the rough handling, was hanging round his loins,
+and he stood before us naked to the waist, lean, brown, muscular--a
+torso of an athlete done in bronze.</p>
+<p>We pressed round eagerly. Monsieur le Chef put up his double
+eye-glass; Monsier le Pr&eacute;fet took off his blue
+spectacles.</p>
+<p>"So--so," he said, pointing with the end of his glasses towards
+a whitish, indefinite kind of scar on Lenoir's left shoulder, "here
+is a mark like a burn. Is this the brand?"</p>
+<p>The sergeant nodded.</p>
+<p>"V'l&agrave;, M'sieur le Pr&eacute;fet!" he said, and struck the
+spot smartly with his open palm. Instantly the smitten place turned
+livid, while from the midst of it, like the handwriting on the
+wall, the fatal letters T. F. sprang out in characters of fire.</p>
+<p>Lenoir flashed a savage glance upon us, and checked the
+imprecation that rose to his lips. Monsieur le Pr&eacute;fet, with
+a little nod of satisfaction, put on his glasses again, went over
+to the table, took out a printed form from a certain drawer, dipped
+a pen in the ink, and said:--</p>
+<p>"Sergeant, you will take this order, and convey Number Two
+Hundred and Seven to the Bic&ecirc;tre, there to remain till
+Thursday next, when he will be drafted back to Toulon by the
+convict train, which leaves two hours after midnight. Monsieur
+M&uuml;ller, the Government is indebted to you for the assistance
+you have rendered the executive in this matter. You are probably
+aware that the prisoner is a notorious criminal, guilty of one
+proved murder, and several cases of forgery, card-sharping, and the
+like. The Government is also indebted to Monsieur Marmot" (here he
+inclined his head to the bald-headed Chef), "who has acted with his
+usual zeal and intelligence."</p>
+<p>Monsieur Marmot, murmuring profuse thanks, bowed and bowed
+again, and followed Monsieur le Pr&eacute;fet obsequiously to the
+door. On the threshold, the great little man paused, turned, and
+said very quietly: "You understand, sergeant, this prisoner does
+<i>not</i> escape again;" and so vanished; leaving Monsieur Marmot
+still bowing in the doorway.</p>
+<p>Then the sergeant hurried on Lenoir's coat and waistcoat,
+clapped a pair of handcuffs on his wrists, thrust his hat on his
+head, and prepared to be gone; Monsieur, the bald-headed, looking
+on, meanwhile, with the utmost complacency, as if taking to himself
+all the merit of discovery and capture.</p>
+<p>"Pardon, Messieurs," said the serjeant, when all was ready.
+"Pardon--but here is a fellow for whom I am responsible now, and
+who must be strictly looked after. I shall have to put a gendarme
+on the box from here to the Bic&ecirc;tre, instead of you two
+gentlemen."</p>
+<p>"All right, <i>mon ami</i>" said M&uuml;ller. "I suppose we
+should not have been admitted if we had gone with you?"</p>
+<p>"Nay, I could pass you in, Messieurs, if you cared to see the
+affair to the end, and followed in another <i>fiacre</i>."</p>
+<p>So we said we would see it to the end, and following the
+prisoner and his guard through all the rooms and corridors by which
+we had come, picked up a second cab on the Quai des
+Orf&egrave;vres, just outside the Pr&eacute;fecture of Police.</p>
+<p>It was now close upon midnight. The sky was flecked with driving
+clouds. The moon had just risen above the towers of Notre Dame. The
+quays were silent and deserted. The river hurried along, swirling
+and turbulent. The sergeant's cab led the way, and the driver,
+instead of turning back towards the Pont Neuf, followed the line of
+the quays along the southern bank of the Ile de la Cit&eacute;;
+passing the Morgue--a mass of sinister shadow; passing the
+H&ocirc;tel Dieu; traversing the Parvis Notre Dame; and making for
+the long bridge, then called the Pont Louis Philippe, which
+connects the two river islands with the northern half of Paris.</p>
+<p>"It is a wild-looking night," said M&uuml;ller, as we drove
+under the mountainous shadow of Notre Dame and came out again in
+sight of the river.</p>
+<p>"And it is a wild business to be out upon," I added. "I wonder
+if this is the end of it?"</p>
+<p>The words were scarcely past my lips when the door of the cab
+ahead flew suddenly open, and a swift something, more like a shadow
+than a man, darted across the moonlight, sprang upon the parapet of
+the bridge, and disappeared!</p>
+<p>In an instant we were all out--all rushing to and fro--all
+shouting--all wild with surprise and confusion.</p>
+<p>"One man to the Pont d'Arcole!" thundered the sergeant, running
+along the perapet, revolver in hand. "One to the Quai Bourbon--one
+to the Pont de la Cit&eacute;! Watch up stream and down! The moment
+he shows his head above water, fire!"</p>
+<p>"But, in Heaven's name, how did he escape?" exclaimed
+M&uuml;ller.</p>
+<p>"<i>Grand Dieu</i>! who can tell--unless he is the very devil?"
+cried the sergeant, distractedly. "The handcuffs were on the floor,
+the door was open, and he was gone in a breath! Hold! What's
+that?"</p>
+<p>The soldier on the Pont de la Cit&eacute; gave a shout and
+fired. There was a splash--a plunge--a rush to the opposite
+parapet.</p>
+<p>"There he goes!"</p>
+<p>"Where?"</p>
+<p>"He has dived again!"</p>
+<p>"Look--look yonder--between the floating bath and the bank!"</p>
+<p>The sergeant stood motionless, his revolver ready cocked--the
+water swirled and eddied, eddied and parted--a dark dot rose for a
+second to the surface!</p>
+<p>Three shots fired at the same moment (one by the sergeant, two
+by the soldiers) rang sharply through the air, and were echoed with
+startling suddenness again and again from the buttressed walls of
+Notre Dame. Ere the last echo had died away, or the last faint
+smoke-wreath had faded, two boats were pulling to the spot, and all
+the quays were alive with a fast-gathering crowd. The sergeant
+beckoned to the gendarme who had come upon the box.</p>
+<p>"Bid the boatmen drag the river just here between the two
+bridges," he said, "and bring the body up to the
+Pr&eacute;fecture." Then, turning to M&uuml;ller and myself, "I am
+sorry to trouble you again, Messieurs," he said, "but I must ask
+you to come back once more to the Quai des Orf&egrave;vres, to
+depose to the facts which have just happened."</p>
+<p>"But is the man shot, or has he escaped?" asked a breathless
+bystander.</p>
+<p>"Both," said the sergeant, with a grim smile, replacing his
+revolver in his belt. "He has escaped Toulon; but he has gone to
+the bottom of the Seine with something like six ounces of lead in
+his skull."</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XL."></a>CHAPTER XL.</h2>
+<h3>THE ENIGMA OF THE THIRD STORY.</h3>
+<center>Who ever loved, that loved not at first
+sight?--MARLOWE.</center>
+<br>
+<p>In Paris, a lodging-house (or, as they prefer to style it, a
+<i>h&ocirc;tel meubl&eacute;</i>) is a little town in itself; a
+beehive swarming from basement to attic; a miniature model of the
+great world beyond, with all its loves and hatreds, jealousies,
+aspirations, and struggles. Like that world, it contains several
+grades of society, but with this difference, that those who therein
+occupy the loftiest position are held in the lowest estimation.
+Thus, the fifth-floor lodgers turn up their noses at the
+inhabitants of the attics; while the fifth-floor is in its turn
+scorned by the fourth, and the fourth is despised by the third, and
+the third by the second, down to the magnificent dwellers on <i>the
+premier &eacute;tage</i>, who live in majestic disdain of everybody
+above or beneath them, from the grisettes in the garret, to the
+<i>concierge</i> who has care of the cellars.</p>
+<p>The house in which I lived in the Cit&eacute; Berg&egrave;re
+was, in fact, a double house, and contained no fewer than thirty
+tenants, some of whom had wives, children, and servants. It
+consisted of six floors, and each floor contained from eight to ten
+rooms. These were let in single chambers, or in suites, as the case
+might be; and on the outer doors opening round the landings were
+painted the names, or affixed the visiting-cards, of the dwellers
+within. My own third-floor neighbors were four in number. To my
+left lived a certain Monsieur and Madame Lemercier, a retired
+couple from Alsace. Opposite their door, on the other side of the
+well staircase, dwelt one Monsieur Cliquot, an elderly
+<i>employ&eacute;</i> in some public office; next to him, Signor
+Milanesi, an Italian refugee who played in the orchestra at the
+<i>Vari&eacute;t&eacute;s</i> every night, was given to practising
+the violoncello by day, and wore as much hair about his face as a
+Skye-terrier. Lastly, in the apartment to my right, resided a lady,
+upon whose door was nailed a small visiting-card engraved with
+these words:--</p>
+<blockquote>MLLE. HORTENSE DUFRESNOY.<br>
+<br>
+<i>Teacher of Languages</i>.</blockquote>
+<p>I had resided in the house for months before I ever beheld this
+Mademoiselle Hortense Dufresnoy. When I did at last encounter her
+upon the stairs one dusk autumnal evening, she wore a thick black
+veil, and, darting past me like a bird on the wing, disappeared
+down the staircase in fewer moments than I take to write it. I
+scarcely observed her at the time. I had no more curiosity to learn
+whether the face under that veil was pretty or plain than I cared
+to know whether the veil itself was Shetland or Chantilly. At that
+time Paris was yet new to me: Madame de Marignan's evil influence
+was about me; and, occupied as my time and thoughts were with
+unprofitable matters, I took no heed of my fellow-lodgers. Save,
+indeed, when the groans of that much-tortured violoncello woke me
+in the morning to an unwelcome consciousness of the vicinity of
+Signor Milanesi, I should scarcely have remembered that I was not
+the only inhabitant of the third story.</p>
+<p>Now, however, that I spent all my evenings in my own quiet room,
+I became, by imperceptible degrees, interested in the unseen
+inhabitant of the adjoining apartment. Sometimes, when the house
+was so still that the very turning of the page sounded unnaturally
+loud, and the mere falling of a cinder startled me, I heard her in
+her chamber, singing softly to herself. Every night I saw the light
+from her window streaming out over the balcony and touching the
+evergreens with a midnight glow. Often and often, when it was so
+late that even I had given up study and gone to bed, I heard her
+reading aloud, or pacing to and fro to the measure of her own
+recitations. Listen as I would, I could only make out that these
+recitations were poetical fragments--I could only distinguish a
+certain chanted metre, the chiming of an occasional rhyme, the
+rising and falling of a voice more than commonly melodious.</p>
+<p>This vague interest gave place by-and-by to active curiosity. I
+resolved to question Madame Bou&iuml;sse, the <i>concierge</i>; and
+as she, good soul! loved gossip not wisely, but too well, I soon
+knew all the little she had to tell.</p>
+<p>Mademoiselle Hortense, it appeared, was the enigma of the third
+story. She had resided in the house for more than two years. She
+earned her living by her labor; went out teaching all the day; sat
+up at night, studying and writing; had no friends; received no
+visitors; was as industrious as a bee, and as proud as a princess.
+Books and flowers were her only friends, and her only luxuries.
+Poor as she was, she was continually filling her shelves with the
+former, and supplying her balcony with the latter. She lived
+frugally, drank no wine, was singularly silent and reserved, and
+"like a real lady," said the fat <i>concierge</i>, "paid her rent
+to the minute."</p>
+<p>This, and no more, had Madame Bou&iuml;sse to tell. I had sought
+her in her own little retreat at the foot of the public staircase.
+It was a very wet afternoon, and under pretext of drying my boots
+by the fire, I stayed to make conversation and elicit what
+information I could. Now Madame Bou&iuml;sse's sanctuary was a
+queer, dark, stuffy little cupboard devoted to many heterogeneous
+uses, and it "served her for parlor, kitchen, and all." In one
+corner stood that famous article of furniture which became "a bed
+by night, a chest of drawers by day." Adjoining the bed was the
+fireplace; near the fireplace stood a corner cupboard filled with
+crockery and surmounted by a grand ormolu clock, singularly at
+variance with the rest of the articles. A table, a warming-pan, and
+a couple of chairs completed the furniture of the room, which, with
+all its contents, could scarcely have measured more than eight feet
+square. On a shelf inside the door stood thirty flat candlesticks;
+and on a row of nails just beneath them, hung two and twenty bright
+brass chamber-door keys--whereby an apt arithmetician might have
+divined that exactly two-and-twenty lodgers were out in the rain,
+and only eight housed comfortably within doors.</p>
+<p>"And how old should you suppose this lady to be?" I asked,
+leaning idly against the table whereon Madame Bou&iuml;sse was
+preparing an unsavory dish of veal and garlic.</p>
+<p>The <i>concierge</i> shrugged her ponderous shoulders.</p>
+<p>"Ah, bah, M'sieur, I am no judge of age," said she.</p>
+<p>"Well--is she pretty?"</p>
+<p>"I am no judge of beauty, either," grinned Madame
+Bou&iuml;sse.</p>
+<p>"But, my dear soul," I expostulated, "you have eyes!"</p>
+<p>"Yours are younger than mine, <i>mon enfant</i>," retorted the
+fat <i>concierge</i>; "and, as I see Mam'selle Hortense coming up
+to the door, I'd advise you to make use of them for yourself."</p>
+<p>And there, sure enough, was a tall and slender girl, dressed all
+in black, pausing to close up her umbrella at the threshold of the
+outer doorway. A porter followed her, carrying a heavy parcel.
+Having deposited this in the passage, he touched his cap and stated
+his charge. The young lady took out her purse, turned over the
+coins, shook her head, and finally came up to Madame's little
+sanctuary.</p>
+<p>"Will you be so obliging, Madame Bou&iuml;sse," she said, "as to
+lend me a piece of ten sous? I have no small change left in my
+purse."</p>
+<p>How shall I describe her? If I say that she was not particularly
+beautiful, I do her less than justice; for she was beautiful, with
+a pale, grave, serious beauty, unlike the ordinary beauty of woman.
+But even this, her beauty of feature, and color, and form, was
+eclipsed and overborne by that "true beauty of the soul" which
+outshines all other, as the sun puts out the stars.</p>
+<p>There was in her face--or, perhaps, rather in her expression--an
+indefinable something that came upon me almost like a memory. Had I
+seen that face in some forgotten dream of long ago? Brown-haired
+was she, and pale, with a brow "as chaste ice, as pure as snow,"
+and eyes--</p>
+<blockquote>"In whose orb a shadow lies,<br>
+Like the dusk in evening skies!"</blockquote>
+<p>Eyes lit from within, large, clear, lustrous, with a meaning in
+them so profound and serious that it was almost sorrowful,--like
+the eyes of Giotto's saints and Cimabue's Madonnas.</p>
+<p>But I cannot describe her--</p>
+<p>"For oh, her looks had something excellent That wants a
+name!"</p>
+<p>I can only look back upon her with "my mind's eye," trying to
+see her as I saw her then for the first time, and striving to
+recall my first impressions.</p>
+<p>Madame Bou&iuml;sse, meanwhile, searched in all the corners of
+her ample pockets, turned out her table-drawer, dived into the
+recesses of her husband's empty garments, and peeped into every
+ornament upon the chimney-piece; but in vain. There was no such
+thing as a ten-sous piece to be found.</p>
+<p>"Pray, M'sieur Basil," said she, "have you one?"</p>
+<p>"One what?" I ejaculated, startled out of my reverie.</p>
+<p>"Why, a ten-sous piece, to be sure. Don't you see that Mam'selle
+Hortense is waiting in her wet shoes, and that I have been hunting
+for the last five minutes, and can't find one anywhere?"</p>
+<p>Blushing like a school-boy, and stammering some unintelligible
+excuse, I pulled out a handful of francs and half-francs, and
+produced the coin required.</p>
+<p>"<i>Dame</i>!" said the <i>concierge</i>. "This comes of using
+one's eyes too well, my young Monsieur. Hem! I'm not so blind but
+that I can see as far as my neighbors."</p>
+<p>Mademoiselle Hortense had fortunately gone back to settle with
+the porter, so this observation passed unheard. The man being
+dismissed, she came back, carrying the parcel. It was evidently
+heavy, and she put it down on the nearest chair.</p>
+<p>"I fear, Madame Bou&iuml;sse," she said, "that I must ask you to
+help me with this. I am not strong enough to carry it
+upstairs."</p>
+<p>More alert this time, I took a step in advance, and offered my
+services.</p>
+<p>"Will Mademoiselle permit me to take it?" I said. "I am going
+upstairs."</p>
+<p>She hesitated.</p>
+<p>"Many thanks," she said, reluctantly, "but...."</p>
+<p>"But Madame Bou&iuml;sse is busy," I urged, "and the <i>pot au
+feu</i> will spoil if she leaves it on the fire."</p>
+<p>The fat <i>concierge</i> nodded, and patted me on the
+shoulder.</p>
+<p>"Let him carry the parcel, Mam'selle Hortense," she chuckled.
+"Let him carry it. M'sieur is your neighbor, and neighbors should
+be neighborly. Besides," she added, in an audible aside, "he is a
+<i>bon gar&ccedil;on</i>--an Englishman--and a book-student like
+yourself."</p>
+<p>The young lady bent her head, civilly, but proudly. Compelled,
+as it seemed, to accept my help, she evidently wished to show me
+that I must nevertheless put forward no claim to further
+intercourse--not even on the plea of neighborhood. I understood
+her, and taking up the parcel, followed her in silence to her door
+on the third story. Here she paused and thanked me.</p>
+<p>"Pray let me carry it in for you," I said.</p>
+<p>Again she hesitated; but only for an instant. Too well-bred not
+to see that a refusal would now be a discourtesy, she unlocked the
+door, and held it open.</p>
+<p>The first room was an ante-chamber; the second a <i>salon</i>
+somewhat larger than my own, with a door to the right, leading into
+what I supposed would be her bedroom. At a glance, I took in all
+the details of her home. There was her writing-table laden with
+books and papers, her desk, and her pile of manuscripts. At one end
+of the room stood a piano doing duty as a side-board, and looking
+as if it were seldom opened. Some water-color drawings were pinned
+against the walls, and a well-filled bookcase stood in a recess
+beside the fireplace. Nothing escaped me --not even the shaded
+reading-lamp, nor the plain ebony time-piece, nor the bronze Apollo
+on the bracket above the piano, nor the sword over the mantelpiece,
+which seemed a strange ornament in the study of a gentle lady.
+Besides all this, there were books everywhere, heaped upon the
+tables, ranged on shelves, piled in corners, and scattered hither
+and thither in most admired disorder. It was, however, the only
+disorder there.</p>
+<p>I longed to linger, but dared not. Having laid the parcel down
+upon the nearest chair, there was nothing left for me to do but to
+take my leave. Mademoiselle Dufresnoy still kept her hand upon the
+door.</p>
+<p>"Accept my best thanks, sir," she said in English, with a pretty
+foreign accent, that seemed to give new music to the dear familiar
+tongue.</p>
+<p>"You have nothing to thank me for, Mademoiselle," I replied.</p>
+<p>She smiled, proudly still, but very sweetly, and closed the door
+upon me.</p>
+<p>I went back to my room; it had become suddenly dark and
+desolate. I tried to read; but all subjects seemed alike tedious
+and unprofitable. I could fix my attention to nothing; and so,
+becoming restless, I went out again, and wandered about the dusky
+streets till evening fairly set in, and the shops were lighted, and
+the tide of passers-by began to flow faster in the direction of
+boulevard and theatre.</p>
+<p>The soft light of her shaded lamp streamed from her window when
+I came back, nor faded thence till two hours after midnight. I
+watched it all the long evening, stealing out from time to time
+upon my balcony, which adjoined her own, and welcoming the cool
+night air upon my brow. For I was fevered and disquieted, I knew
+not why, and my heart was stirred within me, strangely and
+sweetly.</p>
+<p>Such was my first meeting with Hortense Dufresnoy. No incident
+of it has since faded from my memory. Brief as it was, it had
+already turned all the current of my life. I had fallen in love at
+first sight. Yes--in love; for love it was--real, passionate,
+earnest; a love destined to be the master-passion of all my future
+years.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XLI."></a>CHAPTER XLI.</h2>
+<h3>A CHRONICLE ABOUT FROISSART.</h3>
+<center>See, Lucius, here's the book I sought for so!<br>
+<br>
+JULIUS CAESAR.<br>
+<br>
+But all be that he was a philosophre,<br>
+Yet hadde he but litel gold in cofre,<br>
+But all that he might of his frends hente,<br>
+On bokes and on lerning he is spente.<br>
+<br>
+CHAUCER.</center>
+<br>
+<p>"Love-In-Idleness" has passed into a proverb, and lovers,
+somehow, are not generally supposed to be industrious. I, however,
+worked none the less zealously for being in love. I applied only
+the more closely to my studies, both medical and literary, and made
+better progress in both than I had made before. I was not
+ambitious; but I had many incentives to work. I was anxious to
+satisfy my father. I earnestly desired to efface every unfavorable
+impression from the mind of Dr. Ch&eacute;ron, and to gain, if
+possible, his esteem. I was proud of the friendship of Madame de
+Courcelles, and wished to prove the value that I placed upon her
+good opinion. Above all, I had a true and passionate love of
+learning--not that love which leadeth on to fame; but rather that
+self-abandoning devotion which exchangeth willingly the world of
+action for the world of books, and, for an uninterrupted communion
+with the "souls of all that men held wise," bartereth away the
+society of the living.</p>
+<p>Little gregarious by nature, Paris had already ceased to delight
+me in the same way that it had delighted me at first. A "retired
+leisure," and the society of the woman whom I loved, grew to be the
+day-dream of my solitary life. And still, ever more and more
+plainly, it became evident to me that for the career of the student
+I was designed by nature. Bayle, Magliabecchi of Florence, Isaac
+Reed, Sir Thomas Brown, Montaigne--those were the men whose lot in
+life I envied--those the literary anchorites in whose steps I would
+fain have followed.</p>
+<p>But this was not to be; so I worked on, rose early, studied
+late, gained experience, took out my second inscription with
+credit, and had the satisfaction of knowing that I was fast
+acquiring the good opinion of Dr. Ch&eacute;ron. Thus Christmas
+passed by, and January with its bitter winds; and February set in,
+bright but frosty. And still, without encouragement or nope, I went
+on loving Hortense Dufresnoy.</p>
+<p>My opportunities of seeing her were few and brief. A passing bow
+in the hall, or a distant "good-evening" as we passed upon the
+stairs, for some time made up the sum of our intercourse.
+Gradually, however, a kind of formal acquaintance sprang up between
+us; an acquaintance fostered by trifles and dependent on the
+idlest, or what seemed the idlest, casualties. I say "seemed," for
+often that which to her appeared the work of chance was the result
+of elaborate contrivance on my part. She little knew, when I met
+her on the staircase, how I had been listening for the last hour to
+catch the echo of her step. She little dreamed when I encountered
+her at the corner of the street, how I had been concealed, till
+that moment, in the <i>caf&eacute;</i> over the way, ready to dart
+out as soon as she appeared in sight. I would then affect either a
+polite unconcern, or an air of judicious surprise, or pretend not
+to lift my eyes at all till she was nearly past; and I think I must
+have been a very fair actor, for it all succeeded capitally, and I
+am not aware that she ever had the least suspicion of the truth.
+Let me, however, recall one incident over which I had no control,
+and which did more towards promoting our intercourse than all the
+rest.</p>
+<p>It is a cold, bright morning in February. There is a brisk
+exhilaration in the air. The windows and gilded balconies sparkle
+in the sun, and it is pleasant to hear the frosty ring of one's
+boots upon the pavement. It is a f&ecirc;te to-day. Nothing is
+doing in the lecture-rooms, and I have the whole day before me.
+Meaning, therefore, to enjoy it over the fire and a book, I wisely
+begin it by a walk.</p>
+<p>From the Cit&eacute; Berg&egrave;re, out along the right-hand
+side of the Boulevards, down past the front of the Madeleine,
+across the Place de la Concorde, and up the Champs Elys&eacute;es
+as far as the Arc de Triomphe; this is the route I take in going.
+Arrived at the arch, I cross over, and come back by the same roads,
+but on the other side of the way. I have a motive in this. There is
+a certain second-hand book-shop on the opposite side of the
+Boulevard des Italiens, which draws me by a wholly irresistible
+attraction. Had I started on that side, I should have gone no
+further. I should have looked, lingered, purchased, and gone home
+to read. But I know my weakness. I have reserved the book-shop for
+my return journey, and now, rewarded and triumphant, compose myself
+for a quiet study of its treasures.</p>
+<p>And what a book-shop it is! Not only are its windows filled--not
+only are its walls a very perspective of learning--but square
+pillars of volumes are built up on either side of the door, and an
+immense supplementary library is erected in the open air, down all
+the length of a dead-wall adjoining the house.</p>
+<p>Here then I pause, turning over the leaves of one volume,
+reading the title of another, studying the personal appearance of a
+third, and weighing the merits of their authors against the
+contents of my purse. And when I say "personal appearance," I say
+it advisedly; for book-hunters, are skilled Lavaters in their way,
+and books, like men, attract or repel at first sight. Thus it
+happens that I love a portly book, in a sober coat of calf, but
+hate a thin, smart volume, in a gaudy binding. The one promises to
+be philosophic, learnedly witty, or solidly instructive; the other
+is tolerably certain to be pert and shallow, and reminds me of a
+coxcombical lacquey in bullion and red plush. On the same
+principle, I respect leaves soiled and dog's-eared, but mistrust
+gilt edges; love an old volume better than a new; prefer a spacious
+book-stall to all the unpurchased stores of Paternoster Row; and
+buy every book that I possess at second-hand. Nay, that it is
+second-hand is in itself a pass port to my favor. Somebody has read
+it before; therefore it is readable. Somebody has derived pleasure
+from it before; therefore I open it with a student's sympathy, and
+am disposed to be indulgent ere I have perused a single line. There
+are cases, however, in which I incline to luxury of binding. Just
+as I had rather have my historians in old calf and my chroniclers
+in black letter, so do I delight to see my modern poets, the
+Benjamins of my affections, clothed in coats of many colors. For
+them no moroccos are too rich, and no "toolings" too elaborate. I
+love to see them smiling on me from the shelves of my book-cases,
+as glowing and varied as the sunset through a painted oriel.</p>
+<p>Standing here, then, to-day, dipping first into this work and
+then into that, I light upon a very curious and interesting edition
+of <i>Froissart</i>--an edition full of quaint engravings, and
+printed in the obsolete spelling of two hundred years ago. The book
+is both a treasure and a bargain, being marked up at five and
+twenty francs. Only those who haunt book-stalls and luxuriate in
+old editions can appreciate the satisfaction with which I
+survey</p>
+<blockquote>"That weight of wood, with leathern coat overlaid,<br>
+Those ample clasps of solid metal made,<br>
+The close pressed leaves unclosed for many an age,<br>
+The dull red edging of the well-filled page,<br>
+And the broad back, with stubborn ridges roll'd,<br>
+Where yet the title stands in tarnished gold!"</blockquote>
+<p>They only can sympathize in the eagerness with which I snatch up
+the precious volume, the haste with which I count out the five and
+twenty francs, the delight with which I see the dealer's hand close
+on the sum, and know that the book is legally and indisputably
+mine! Then how lovingly I embrace it under my arm, and taking
+advantage of my position as a purchaser, stroll leisurely round the
+inner warehouse, still courting that literary world which (in a
+library at least) always turns its back upon its worshipper!</p>
+<p>"Pray, Monsieur," says a gentle voice at the door, "where is
+that old <i>Froissart</i> that I saw outside about a quarter of an
+hour ago?"</p>
+<p>"Just sold, Madame," replies the bookseller, promptly.</p>
+<p>"Oh, how unfortunate!--and I only went home for the money"
+exclaims the lady in a tone of real disappointment.</p>
+<p>Selfishly exultant, I hug the book more closely, turn to steal a
+glance at my defeated rival, and recognise--Mademoiselle
+Dufresnoy.</p>
+<p>She does not see me. I am standing in the inner gloom of the
+shop, and she is already turning away. I follow her at a little
+distance; keep her in sight all the way home; let her go into the
+house some few seconds in advance; and then, scaling three stairs
+at a time, overtake her at the door of her apartment.</p>
+<p>Flushed and breathless, I stand beside her with <i>Froissart</i>
+in my hand.</p>
+<p>"Pardon, Mademoiselle," I say, hurriedly, "for having
+involuntarily forestalled you just now. I had just bought the book
+you wished to purchase,"</p>
+<p>She looks at me with evident surprise and some coldness; but
+says nothing.</p>
+<p>"And I am rejoiced to have this opportunity of transferring it
+to you."</p>
+<p>Mademoiselle Dufresnoy makes a slight but decided gesture of
+refusal.</p>
+<p>"I would not deprive you of it, Monsieur," she says promptly,
+"upon any consideration."</p>
+<p>"But, Mademoiselle, unless you allow me to relinquish it in your
+favor, I beg to assure you that I shall take the book back to the
+bookseller and exchange it for some other."</p>
+<p>"I cannot conceive why you should do that, Monsieur."</p>
+<p>"In order, Mademoiselle, that you may still have it in your
+power to become the purchaser."</p>
+<p>"And yet you wished to possess the book, or you would not have
+bought it."</p>
+<p>"I would not have bought it, Mademoiselle, if I had known that I
+should disappoint a--a lady by doing so,"</p>
+<p>I was on the point of saying, "if I had known that I should
+disappoint you by so doing," but hesitated, and checked myself in
+time.</p>
+<p>A half-mocking smile flitted across her lips.</p>
+<p>"Monsieur is too self-sacrificing," she said. "Had I first
+bought the book, I should have kept it--being a woman. Reverse the
+case as you will, and show me any just reason why you should not do
+the same--being a man?"</p>
+<p>"Nay, the merest by-law of courtesy..." I began,
+hesitatingly.</p>
+<p>"Do not think me ungracious, Monsieur," she interrupted, "if I
+hold that these so-called laws of courtesy are in truth but
+concessions, for the most part, from the strength of your sex to
+the weakness of ours."</p>
+<p>"<i>Eh bien</i>, Mademoiselle--what then?"</p>
+<p>"Then, Monsieur, may there not be some women---myself, for
+instance--who do not care to be treated like children?"</p>
+<p>"Pardon, Mademoiselle, but are you stating the case quite
+fairly? Is it not rather that we desire not to efface the last
+lingering tradition of the age of chivalry--not to reduce to prose
+the last faint echoes of that poetry which tempered the sword of
+the Crusader and inspired the song of the Trouv&egrave;re?"</p>
+<p>"Were it not better that the new age created a new code and a
+new poetry?" said Mademoiselle Dufresnoy.</p>
+<p>"Perhaps; but I confess I love old forms and usages, and cling
+to creeds outworn. Above all, to that creed which in the age of
+powder and compliment, no less than in the age of chivalry,
+enjoined absolute devotion and courtesy towards women."</p>
+<p>"Against mere courtesy reasonably exercised and in due season, I
+have nothing to say," replied Mademoiselle Dufresnoy; "but the
+half-barbarous homage of the Middle Ages is as little to my taste
+as the scarcely less barbarous refinement of the Addison and
+Georgian periods. Both are alike unsound, because both have a basis
+of insincerity. Just as there is a mock refinement more vulgar than
+simple vulgarity, so are there courtesies which humiliate and
+compliments that offend."</p>
+<p>"Mademoiselle is pleased to talk in paradoxes," said I.</p>
+<p>Mademoiselle unlocked her door, and turning towards me with the
+same half-mocking smile and the same air of raillery, said:--</p>
+<p>"Monsieur, it is written in your English histories that when
+John le Bon was taken captive after the battle of Cressy, the Black
+Prince rode bareheaded before him through the streets of London,
+and served him at table as the humblest of his attendants. But for
+all that, was John any the less a prisoner, or the Black Prince any
+the less a conqueror?"</p>
+<p>"You mean, perhaps, that you reject all courtesy based on mere
+ceremonial. Let me then put the case of this <i>Froissart</i> more
+plainly--as I would have done from the first, had I dared to speak
+the simple truth."</p>
+<p>"And that is...?"</p>
+<p>"That it will give me more pleasure to resign the book to you,
+Mademoiselle, than to possess it myself."</p>
+<p>Mademoiselle Dufresnoy colors up, looks both haughty and amused,
+and ends by laughing.</p>
+<p>"In truth, Monsieur," she says merrily, "if your politeness
+threatened at first to be too universal, it ends by becoming
+unnecessarily particular."</p>
+<p>"Say rather, Mademoiselle, that you will not have the book on
+any terms!" I exclaim impatiently.</p>
+<p>"Because you have not yet offered it to me upon any just or
+reasonable grounds."</p>
+<p>"Well, then, bluntly and frankly, as student to student, I beg
+you to spare me the trouble of carrying this book back to the
+Boulevard. Yours, Mademoiselle, was the first intention. You saw
+the book before I saw it. You would have bought it on the spot, but
+had to go home for the money. In common equity, it is yours. In
+common civility, as student to student, I offer it to you. Say, is
+it yes or no?"</p>
+<p>"Since you put it so simply and so generously, and since I
+believe you really wish me to accept your offer," replies
+Mademoiselle Dufresnoy, taking out her purse, "I suppose I must
+say--yes."</p>
+<p>And with this, she puts out her hand for the hook, and offers me
+in return the sum of five and twenty francs.</p>
+<p>Pained at having to accept the money, pained at being offered
+it, seeing no way of refusing it, and feel altogether more distress
+than is reasonable in a man brought up to the taking of fees; I
+affect not to see the coin, and, bowing, move away in the direction
+of my own door.</p>
+<p>"Pardon, Monsieur," she says, "but you forget that I am in your
+debt."</p>
+<p>"And--and do you really insist..."</p>
+<p>She looks at me, half surprised and half offended.</p>
+<p>"If you do not take the money, Monsieur, how can I take the
+book?"</p>
+<p>Bowing, I receive the unwelcome francs in my unwilling palm.</p>
+<p>Still she lingers.</p>
+<p>"I--I have not thanked you as I ought for your generosity," she
+says, hesitatingly.</p>
+<p>"Generosity!" I repeat, glancing with some bitterness at the
+five and twenty francs.</p>
+<p>"True kindness, Monsieur, is neither bought nor sold," says the
+lady, with the loveliest smile in the world, and closes her
+door.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XLII."></a>CHAPTER XLII.</h2>
+<h3>THE OLD, OLD STORY.</h3>
+<center>What thing is Love, which nought can countervail?<br>
+Nought save itself--even such a thing is Love.<br>
+<br>
+SIR W. RALEIGH.</center>
+<br>
+<p>My acquaintance with Hortense Dufresnoy progressed slowly as,
+ever, and not even the Froissart incident went far towards
+promoting it. Absorbed in her studies, living for the intellect
+only, too self-contained to know the need for sympathy, she
+continued to be, at all events for me, the most inaccessible of
+God's creatures. And yet, despite her indifference, I loved her.
+Her pale, proud face haunted me; her voice haunted me. I thought of
+her sometimes till it seemed impossible she should not in some way
+be conscious of how my very soul was centred in her. But she knew
+nothing--guessed nothing--cared nothing; and the knowledge that I
+held no place in her life wrought in me at times till it became
+almost too bitter for endurance.</p>
+<p>And this was love--real, passionate, earnest; the first and last
+love of my heart. Did I believe that I ever loved till now? Ah! no;
+for now only I felt the god in his strength, and beheld him in his
+beauty. Was I not blind till I had looked into her eyes and drunk
+of their light? Was I not deaf till I had heard the music of her
+voice? Had I ever truly lived, or breathed, or known delight till
+now?</p>
+<p>I never stayed to ask myself how this would end, or whither it
+would lead me. The mere act of loving was too sweet for
+questioning. What cared I for the uncertainties of the future,
+having hope to live upon in the present? Was it not enough "to feed
+for aye my lamp and flames of love," and worship her till that
+worship became a religion and a rite?</p>
+<p>And now, longing to achieve something which should extort at
+least her admiration, if not her love, I wished I were a soldier,
+that I might win glory for her--or a poet, that I might write
+verses in her praise which should be deathless--or a painter, that
+I might spend years of my life in copying the dear perfection of
+her face. Ah! and I would so copy it that all the world should be
+in love with it. Not a wave of her brown hair that I would not
+patiently follow through all its windings. Not the tender tracery
+of a blue vein upon her temples that I would not lovingly render
+through its transparent veil of skin. Not a depth of her dark eyes
+that I would not study, "deep drinking of the infinite." Alas!
+those eyes, so grave, so luminous, so steadfast:--</p>
+<blockquote>"Eyes not down-dropt, not over-bright, but fed<br>
+&nbsp;With the clear-pointed flame of chastity,"</blockquote>
+<p>--eyes wherein dwelt "thought folded over thought," what painter
+need ever hope to copy them?</p>
+<p>And still she never dreamed how dear she had grown to me. She
+never knew how the very air seemed purer to me because she breathed
+it. She never guessed how I watched the light from her window night
+after night--how I listened to every murmur in her chamber--how I
+watched and waited for the merest glimpse of her as she passed
+by--how her lightest glance hurried the pulses through my
+heart--how her coldest word was garnered up in the treasure-house
+of my memory! What cared she, though to her I had dedicated all the
+"book and volume of my brain;" hallowed its every page with
+blazonings of her name; and illuminated it, for love of her, with
+fair images, and holy thoughts, and forms of saints and angels</p>
+<blockquote>"Innumerable, of stains and splendid dyes<br>
+As are the tiger-moth's deep damask'd wings?"</blockquote>
+<p>Ah me! her hand was never yet outstretched to undo its golden
+clasps--her eye had never yet deigned to rest upon its records. To
+her I was nothing, or less than nothing--a fellow-student, a
+fellow-lodger, a stranger.</p>
+<p>And yet I loved her "with a love that was more than love"--with
+a love dearer than life and stronger than death--a love that, day
+after day, struck its roots deeper and farther into my very soul,
+never thence to be torn up here or hereafter.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XLIII."></a>CHAPTER XLIII.</h2>
+<h3>ON A WINTER'S EVENING.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>After a more than usually severe winter, the early spring came,
+crowned with rime instead of primroses. Paris was intensely cold.
+In March the Seine was still frozen, and snow lay thickly on the
+house-tops. Quiet at all times, the little nook in which I lived
+became monastically still, and at night, when the great gates were
+closed, and the footsteps of the passers-by fell noiselessly upon
+the trodden snow, you might have heard a whisper from one side of
+the street to the other. There was to me something indescribably
+delightful about this silent solitude in the heart of a great
+city.</p>
+<p>Sitting beside the fire one evening, enjoying the profound calm
+of the place, attending from time to time to my little coffee-pot
+on the hob, and slowly turning the pages of a favorite author, I
+luxuriate in a state of mind half idle, half studious. Leaving off
+presently to listen to some sound which I hear, or fancy I hear, in
+the adjoining room, I wonder for the twentieth time whether
+Hortense has yet returned from her long day's teaching; and so
+rise--open my window--and look out. Yes; the light from her
+reading-lamp streams out at last across the snow-laden balcony.
+Heigho! it is something even to know that she is there so near
+me--divided only by a thin partition!</p>
+<p>Trying to comfort myself with this thought, I close the window
+again and return to my book, more restless and absent than before.
+Sitting thus, with the unturned leaf lingering between my thumb and
+forefinger, I hear a rapid footfall on the stairs, and a musical
+whistle which, growing louder as it draws nearer, breaks off at my
+door, and is followed by a prolonged assault and battery of the
+outer panels.</p>
+<p>"Welcome, noisiest of visitors!" I exclaim, knowing it to be
+M&uuml;ller before I even open the door. "You are quite a stranger.
+You have not been near me for a fortnight."</p>
+<p>"It will not be your fault, Signor Book-worm, if I don't become
+a stranger <i>au pied de la lettre</i>" replies he, cheerily. "Why,
+man, it is close upon three weeks since you have crossed the
+threshold of my door. The Quartier Latin is aggrieved by your
+neglect, and the fine arts t'other side of the water languish and
+are forlorn."</p>
+<p>So saying, he shakes the snow from his coat like a St. Bernard
+mastiff, perches his cap on the head of the plaster Niobe that
+adorns my chimney-piece, and lays aside the folio which he had been
+carrying under his arm. I, in the meanwhile, have wheeled an
+easy-chair to the fire, brought out a bottle of Chambertin, and
+piled on more wood in honor of my guest.</p>
+<p>"You can't think," said I, shaking hands with him for the second
+time, "how glad I am that you have come round to-night."</p>
+<p>"I quite believe it," replied he. "You must be bored to death,
+if these old busts are all the society you keep. <i>Sacre nom d'une
+pipe</i>! how can a fellow keep up his conviviality by the
+perpetual contemplation of Niobe and Jupiter Tonans? What do you
+mean by living such a life as this? Have you turned Trappist? Shall
+I head a subscription to present you with a skull and an
+hour-glass?"</p>
+<p>"I'll have the skull made into a drinking-cup, if you do. Take
+some wine."</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller filled his glass, tasted with the air of a
+connoisseur, and nodded approvingly.</p>
+<p>"Chambertin, by the god Bacchus!" said he. "Napoleon's favorite
+wine, and mine--evidence of the sympathy that exists between the
+truly great."</p>
+<p>And, draining the glass, he burst into a song in praise of
+French wines, beginning--</p>
+<blockquote>"Le Chambertin rend joyeux,<br>
+Le Nuits rend infatigable,<br>
+Le Volnay rend amoureux,<br>
+Le Champagne rend amiable.<br>
+Grisons-nous, mes chers amis,<br>
+L'ivresse<br>
+Vaut la richesse;<br>
+Pour moi, d&egrave;s que le suis gris,<br>
+Je poss&egrave;de tout Paris!"</blockquote>
+<p>"Oh hush!" said I, uneasily; "not so loud, pray!"</p>
+<p>"Why not?"</p>
+<p>"The--the neighbors, you know. We cannot do as we would in the
+Quartier Latin."</p>
+<p>"Nonsense, my dear fellow. You don't swear yourself to silence
+when you take apartments in a <i>h&ocirc;tel meubl&eacute;</i>! You
+might as well live in a penitentiary!--</p>
+<blockquote>'De bouchons faisons un tas,<br>
+Et s'il faut avoir la goutte,<br>
+Au moins que ce ne soit pas<br>
+Pour n'avoir bu qu'une goutte!'"</blockquote>
+<p>"Nay, I implore you!" I interposed again. "The landlord ..."</p>
+<p>"Hang the landlord!</p>
+<blockquote>'Grisons-nous--'"</blockquote>
+<p>"Well, but--but there is a lady in the next room ..."</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller laughed till the tears ran down his cheeks.</p>
+<p>"<i>Allons done</i>!" said he, "why not have told the truth at
+first? Oh, you sly rogue! You <i>gaillard</i>! This is your
+seclusion, is it? This is your love of learning--this the secret of
+your researches into science and art! What art, pray? Ovid's 'Art
+of Love,' I'll be sworn!"</p>
+<p>"Laugh on, pray," I said, feeling my face and my temper growing
+hot; "but that lady, who is a stranger to me"....</p>
+<p>"Oh--oh--oh!" cried M&uuml;ller.</p>
+<p>"Who is a stranger to me," I repeated, "and who passes her
+evenings in study, must not be annoyed by noises in my room.
+Surely, my dear fellow, you know me well enough to understand
+whether I am in jest or in earnest."</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller laid his hand upon my sleeve.</p>
+<p>"Enough--enough," he said, smiling good-naturedly. "You are
+right, and I will be as dumb as Plato. What is the lady's
+name."</p>
+<p>"Dufresnoy," I answered, somewhat reluctantly. "Mademoiselle
+Dufresnoy."</p>
+<p>"Ay, but her Christian name!"</p>
+<p>"Her Christian name," I faltered, more reluctant still.
+"I--I--"</p>
+<p>"Don't say you don't know," said M&uuml;ller, maliciously. "It
+isn't worth while. After all, what does it matter? Here's to her
+health, all the same--<i>&agrave; votre sant&eacute;</i>,
+Mademoiselle Dufresnoy! What! not drink her health, though I have
+filled your glass on purpose?"</p>
+<p>There was no help for it, so I took the glass and drank the
+toast with the best grace I could.</p>
+<p>"And now, tell me," continued my companion, drawing nearer to
+the fire and settling himself with a confidential air that was
+peculiarly provoking, "what is she like? Young or old? Dark or
+fair? Plain or pretty?"</p>
+<p>"Old," said I, desperately. "Old and ugly. Fifty at the least.
+Squints horribly."</p>
+<p>Then, thinking that I had been a little too emphatic, I
+added:--</p>
+<p>"But a very ladylike person, and exceedingly well-informed,"</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller looked at me gravely, and filled his glass
+again.</p>
+<p>"I think I know the lady," said he.</p>
+<p>"Indeed?"</p>
+<p>"Yes--by your description. You forgot to add, however, that she
+is gray."</p>
+<p>"To be sure--as a badger."</p>
+<p>"To say nothing of a club foot, an impediment in her speech, a
+voice like a raven's, and a hump like a dromedary's! Ah! my dear
+friend, what an amazingly comic fellow you are!"</p>
+<p>And the student burst again into a peal of laughter so hearty
+and infectious that I could not have helped joining in it to save
+my life.</p>
+<p>"And now," said he, when we had laughed ourselves out of breath,
+"now to the object of my visit. Do you remember asking me, months
+ago, to make you a copy of an old portrait that you had taken a
+fancy to in some tumble-down ch&acirc;teau near
+Montlh&eacute;ry!"</p>
+<p>"To be sure; and I have intended, over and over again, to remind
+you of it. Did you ever take the trouble to go over there and look
+at it?"</p>
+<p>"Look at it, indeed! I should rather think so--and here is the
+proof. What does your connoisseurship say to it?"</p>
+<p>Say to it! Good heavens! what could I say, what could I do, but
+flush up all suddenly with pleasure, and stare at it without power
+at first to utter a single word?</p>
+<p>For it was like <i>her</i>--so like that it might have been her
+very portrait. The features were cast in the same mould--the brow,
+perhaps, was a little less lofty--the smile a little less cold; but
+the eyes, the beautiful, lustrous, soul-lighted eyes were the
+same--the very same!</p>
+<p>If she were to wear an old-fashioned dress, and deck her fair
+neck and arms with pearls, and put powder on her hair, and stand
+just so, with her hand upon one of the old stone urns in the garden
+of that deserted ch&acirc;teau, she would seem to be standing for
+the portrait.</p>
+<p>Well might I feel, when I first saw her, that the beauty of her
+face was not wholly unfamiliar to me! Well might I fancy I had seen
+her in some dream of long ago!</p>
+<p>So this was the secret of it--and this picture was mine. Mine to
+hang before my desk when I was at work--mine to place at my bed's
+foot, where I might see it on first waking--mine to worship and
+adore, to weave fancies and build hopes upon, and "burn out the day
+in idle phantasies" of passionate devotion!</p>
+<p>"Well," said M&uuml;ller impatiently, "what do you think of
+it?"</p>
+<p>I looked up, like one dreaming.</p>
+<p>"Think of it!" I repeated.</p>
+<p>"Yes--do you think it like?"</p>
+<p>"So like that it might be her por ... I mean that it might be
+the original."</p>
+<p>"Oh, that's satisfactory. I was afraid you were
+disappointed."</p>
+<p>"I was only silent from surprise and pleasure."</p>
+<p>"Well, however faithful the copy maybe, you know, in these
+things one always misses the tone of age."</p>
+<p>"I would not have it look a day older!" I exclaimed, never
+lifting my eyes from the canvas.</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller came and looked down at it over my shoulder.</p>
+<p>"It is an interesting head," said he. "I have a great mind to
+introduce it into my next year's competition picture."</p>
+<p>I started as if he had struck me. The thought was sacrilege!</p>
+<p>"For Heaven's sake do no such thing!" I ejaculated.</p>
+<p>"Why not?" said he, opening his eyes in astonishment.</p>
+<p>"I cannot tell you why--at least not yet; but to--to confer a
+very particular obligation upon me, will you waive this point?"
+M&uuml;ller rubbed his head all over with both hands, and sat down
+in the utmost perplexity.</p>
+<p>"Upon my soul and conscience," said he, "you are the most
+incomprehensible fellow I ever knew in my life!"</p>
+<p>"I am. I grant it. What then? Let us see, I am to give you a
+hundred and fifty francs for this copy ..."</p>
+<p>"I won't take it," said M&uuml;ller. "I mean you to accept it as
+a pledge of friendship and good-will."</p>
+<p>"Nay, I insist on paying for it. I shall be proud to pay for it;
+but a hundred and fifty are not enough. Let me give you three
+hundred, and promise me that you will not put the head into your
+picture!"</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller laughed, and shook his own head resolutely. "I will
+give you both the portrait and the promise," said he; "but I won't
+take your money, if I know it."</p>
+<p>"But ..."</p>
+<p>"But I won't--and so, if you don't like me well enough to accept
+such a trifle from me, I'll e'en carry the thing home again!"</p>
+<p>And, snatching up his cap and cloak, he made a feint of putting
+the portrait back into the folio.</p>
+<p>"Not for the world!" I exclaimed, taking possession of it
+without further remonstrance. "I would sooner part from all I
+possess. How can I ever thank you enough?"</p>
+<p>"By never thanking me at all! What little time the thing has
+cost me is overpaid, not only by the sight of your pleasure, but by
+my own satisfaction in copying it. To copy a good work is to have a
+lesson from the painter, though he were dead a hundred years
+before; and the man who painted that portrait, be he who he might,
+has taught me a trick or two that I never knew before.
+<i>Sapristi</i>! see if I don't dazzle you some day with an effect
+of white satin and pearls against a fair skin!"</p>
+<p>"An ingenious argument; but it leaves me unconvinced, all the
+same. How! you are not going to run away already? Here's another
+bottle of Chambertin waiting to be opened; and it is yet quite
+early."</p>
+<p>"Impossible! I have promised to meet a couple of men up at the
+Prado, and have, besides, invited them afterwards to supper."</p>
+<p>"What is the Prado?"</p>
+<p>"The Prado! Why, is it possible that I have never yet introduced
+you to the Prado? It's one of the joiliest places in all the
+Quartier Latin--it's close to the Palais de Justice. You can dance
+there, or practise pistol-shooting, or play billiards, or sup--or
+anything you please. Everybody smokes--ladies not excepted."</p>
+<p>"How very delightful!"</p>
+<p>"Oh, magnificent! Won't you come with me? I know a dozen pretty
+girls who will be delighted to be introduced to you."</p>
+<p>"Not to-night, thank you," said I, laughing.</p>
+<p>"Well, another time?"</p>
+<p>"Yes, to be sure--another time."</p>
+<p>"Well, good-night."</p>
+<p>"Good-night, and thank you again, a thousand times over."</p>
+<p>But he would not stay to hear me thank him, and was half way
+down the first flight before my sentence was finished. Just as I
+was going back into my room, and about to close the door, he called
+after me from the landing.</p>
+<p>"<i>Hol&agrave;, amigo</i>! When my picture is done, I mean to
+give a bachelor's supper-party--chiefly students and
+<i>chicards</i>. Will you come?"</p>
+<p>"Gladly."</p>
+<p>"Adieu, then. I will let you know in time."</p>
+<p>And with this, he broke out into a fragment of Beranger, gave a
+cheerful good-night to Madame Bou&iuml;sse in the hall, and was
+gone.</p>
+<p>And now to enjoy my picture. Now to lock the door, and trim the
+lamp, and place it up against a pile of books, and sit down before
+it in silent rapture, like a devotee before the portrait of his
+patron saint. Now I can gaze, unreproved, into those eyes, and
+fancy they are hers. Now press my lips, unforbidden, upon that
+exquisite mouth, and believe it warm. Ah, will her eyes ever so
+give back the look of love in mine? Will her lips ever suffer mine
+to come so near? Would she, if she knew the treasure I possessed,
+be displeased that I so worshipped it?</p>
+<p>Hanging over it thus, and suffering my thoughts to stray on at
+their own will and pleasure, I am startled by the fall of some
+heavy object in the adjoining chamber. The fall is followed by a
+stifled cry, and then all is again silent.</p>
+<p>To unlock my door and rush to hers--to try vainly to open it--to
+cry "Hortense! Hortense! what has happened? For Heaven's sake, what
+has happened?" is the work of but an instant.</p>
+<p>The antechamber lay between, and I remembered that she could not
+hear me. I ran back, knocked against the wall, and repeated:--</p>
+<p>"What has happened? Tell me what has happened?"</p>
+<p>Again I listened, and in that interval of suspense heard her
+garments rustle along the ground, then a deep sigh, and then the
+words:--</p>
+<p>"Nothing serious. I have hurt my hand."</p>
+<p>"Can you open the door?"</p>
+<p>There was another long silence.</p>
+<p>"I cannot," she said at length, but more faintly.</p>
+<p>"In God's name, try!"</p>
+<p>No answer.</p>
+<p>"Shall I get over the balcony?"</p>
+<p>I waited another instant, heard nothing, and then, without,
+further hesitation, opened my own window and climbed the iron rail
+that separated her balcony from mine, leaving my footsteps trampled
+in the snow.</p>
+<p>I found her sitting on the floor, with her body bent forward and
+her head resting against the corner of a fallen bookcase. The
+scattered volumes lay all about. A half-filled portmanteau stood
+close by on a chair. A travelling-cloak and a passport-case lay on
+the table.</p>
+<p>Seeing, yet scarcely noting all this, I flung myself on my knees
+beside her, and found that one hand and arm lay imprisoned under
+the bookcase. She was not insensible, but pain had deprived her of
+the power of speech. I raised her head tenderly, and supported it
+against a chair; then lifted the heavy bookcase, and, one by one,
+removed the volumes that had fallen upon her.</p>
+<p>Alas! the white little hand all crushed and bleeding--the
+powerless arm--the brave mouth striving to be firm!</p>
+<p>I took the poor maimed arm, made a temporary sling for it with
+my cravat, and, taking her up in my arms as if she had been an
+infant, carried her to the sofa. Then I closed the window; ran back
+to my own room for hot water; tore up some old handkerchiefs for
+bandages; and so dressed and bound her wounds--blessing (for the
+first time in my life) the destiny that had made me a surgeon.</p>
+<p>"Are you in much pain?" I asked, when all was done.</p>
+<p>"Not now--but I feel very faint,"</p>
+<p>I remembered my coffee in the next room, and brought it to her.
+I lifted her head, and supported her with my arm while she drank
+it.</p>
+<p>"You are much better now," I said, when she had again lain down.
+"Tell me how it happened."</p>
+<p>She smiled languidly.</p>
+<p>"It was not my fault," she said, "but Froissart's. Do you
+remember that Froissart?"</p>
+<p>Remember it! I should think so.</p>
+<p>"Froissart!" I exclaimed. "Why, what had he to do with it?"</p>
+<p>"Only this. I usually kept him on the top of the bookcase that
+fell down this evening. Just now, while preparing for a journey
+upon which I must start to-morrow morning, I thought to remove the
+book to a safer place; and so, instead of standing on a chair, I
+tried to reach up, and, reaching up, disturbed the balance of the
+bookcase, and brought it down."</p>
+<p>"Could you not have got out of the way when you saw it
+falling?"</p>
+<p>"Yes--but I tried to prevent it, and so was knocked down and
+imprisoned as you found me."</p>
+<p>"Merciful Heaven! it might have killed you."</p>
+<p>"That was what flashed across my mind when I saw it coming," she
+replied, with a faint smile.</p>
+<p>"You spoke of a journey," I said presently, turning my face away
+lest she should read its story too plainly; "but now, of course,
+you must not move for a few days."</p>
+<p>"I must travel to-morrow," she said, with quiet decision.</p>
+<p>"Impossible!"</p>
+<p>"I have no alternative."</p>
+<p>"But think of the danger--the imprudence--the suffering."</p>
+<p>"Danger there cannot be," she replied, with a touch of
+impatience in her voice. "Imprudent it may possibly be; but of that
+I have no time to think. And as for the suffering, that concerns
+myself alone. There are mental pains harder to bear than the pains
+of the body, and the consciousness of a duty unfulfilled is one of
+the keenest of them. You urge in vain; I must go. And now, since it
+is time you bade me good-night, let me thank you for your ready
+help and say good-bye."</p>
+<p>"But may I do no more for you?"</p>
+<p>"Nothing--unless you will have the goodness to bid Madame
+Bou&iuml;sse to come up-stairs, and finish packing my portmanteau
+for me."</p>
+<p>"At what hour do you start?"</p>
+<p>"At eight."</p>
+<p>"May I not go with you to the station, and see that you get a
+comfortable seat?"</p>
+<p>"Many thanks," she replied, coldly; "but I do not go by rail,
+and my seat in the diligence is already taken."</p>
+<p>"You will want some one to see to your luggage--to carry your
+cloaks."</p>
+<p>"Madame Bou&iuml;sse has promised to go with me to the
+Messageries."</p>
+<p>Silenced, and perhaps a little hurt, I rose to take my
+leave.</p>
+<p>"I wish you a safe journey, mademoiselle," I said, "and a safe
+return,"</p>
+<p>"And think me, at the same time, an ungrateful patient."</p>
+<p>"I did not say that."</p>
+<p>"No--but you thought so. After all, it is possible that I seem
+so. I am undemonstrative--unused to the amenities of life--in
+short, I am only half-civilized. Pray, forgive me."</p>
+<p>"Mademoiselle," I said, "your apology pains me. I have nothing
+to forgive. I will send Madame Bou&iuml;sse to you
+immediately."</p>
+<p>And with this I had almost left the room, but paused upon the
+threshold.</p>
+<p>"Shall you be long away?" I asked, with assumed
+indifference.</p>
+<p>"Shall I be long away?" she repeated, dreamily. "How can I
+tell?" Then, correcting herself, "Oh, not long," she added. "Not
+long. Perhaps a fortnight--perhaps a week."</p>
+<p>"Once more, then, good-night."</p>
+<p>"Good-night," she answered, absently; and I withdrew.</p>
+<p>I then went down, sent Madame Bou&iuml;sse to wait upon her, and
+sat up anxiously listening more than half the night. Next morning,
+at seven, I heard Madame Bou&iuml;sse go in again. I dared not even
+go to her door to inquire how she had slept, lest I should seem too
+persistent; but when they left the room and went downstairs
+together, I flew to my window.</p>
+<p>I saw her cross the street in the gray morning. She walked
+feebly, and wore a large cloak, that hid the disabled arm and
+covered her to the feet. Madame Bou&iuml;sse trotted beside her
+with a bundle of cloaks and umbrellas; a porter followed with her
+little portmanteau on his shoulder.</p>
+<p>And so they passed under the archway across the trampled snow,
+and vanished out of sight.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XLIV."></a>CHAPTER XLIV.</h2>
+<h3>A PRESCRIPTION.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>A week went by--a fortnight went by--and still Hortense
+prolonged her mysterious absence. Where could she be gone? Was she
+ill? Had any accident befallen her on the road? What if the wounded
+hand had failed to heal? What if inflammation had set in, and she
+were lying, even now, sick and helpless, among strangers? These
+terrors came back upon me at every moment, and drove me almost to
+despair. In vain I interrogated Madame Bou&iuml;sse. The
+good-natured <i>concierge</i> knew no more than myself, and the
+little she had to tell only increased my uneasiness.</p>
+<p>Hortense, it appeared, had taken two such journeys before, and
+had, on both occasions, started apparently at a moment's notice,
+and with every indication of anxiety and haste. From the first she
+returned after an interval of more than three weeks; from the
+second after about four or five days. Each absence had been
+followed by a long season of despondency and lassitude, during
+which, said the <i>concierge</i>, Mademoiselle scarcely spoke, or
+ate, or slept, but, silent and pale as a ghost, sat up later than
+ever with her books and papers. As for this last journey, all she
+knew about it was that Mam'selle had had her passport regulated for
+foreign parts the afternoon of the day before she started.</p>
+<p>"But can you not remember in what direction the diligence was
+going?" I asked, again and again.</p>
+<p>"No, M'sieur--not in the least,"</p>
+<p>"Nor the name of the town to which her place was taken?"</p>
+<p>"I don't know that I ever heard it, M'sieur."</p>
+<p>"But at least you must have seen the address on the
+portmanteau?"</p>
+<p>"Not I, M'sieur--I never thought of looking at it."</p>
+<p>"Did she say nothing to account for the suddenness of her
+departure?"</p>
+<p>"Nothing at all."</p>
+<p>"Nor about her return either. Madame Bou&iuml;sse? Just think a
+moment--surely she said something about when you might expect her
+back again?"</p>
+<p>"Nothing, M'sieur, except, by the way--"</p>
+<p>"Except what?"</p>
+<p>"<i>Dame</i>! only this--as she was just going to step into the
+diligence, she turned back and shook hands with me--Mam'selle
+Hortense, proud as she is, is never above shaking hands with me, I
+can tell you, M'sieur."</p>
+<p>"No, no--I can well believe it. Pray, go on!"</p>
+<p>"Well, M'sieur," she shakes hands with me, and she says, "Thank
+you, good Madame Bou&iuml;sse, for all your kindness to me.... Hear
+that, M'sieur, 'good Madame Bou&iuml;sse,'--the dear child!"</p>
+<p>"And then--?"</p>
+<p>"Bah! how impatient you are! Well, then, she says (after
+thanking me, you observe)--'I have paid you my rent, Madame
+Bou&iuml;sse, up to the end of the present month, and if, when the
+time has expired, I have neither written nor returned, consider me
+still as your tenant. If, however, I do not come back at all, I
+will let you know further respecting the care of my books and other
+property."</p>
+<p>If she did not come back at all! Oh, Heaven! I had never
+contemplated such a possibility. I left Madame Bou&iuml;sse without
+another word, and going up to my own rooms, flung myself upon my
+bed, as if I were stupefied.</p>
+<p>All that night, all the next day, those words haunted me. They
+seemed to have burned themselves into my brain in letters of fire.
+Dreaming, I woke up with them upon my lips; reading, they started
+out upon me from the page. "If I never come back at all!"</p>
+<p>At last, when the fifth day came round--the fifth day of the
+third week of her absence--I became so languid and desponding that
+I lost all power of application.</p>
+<p>Even Dr. Ch&eacute;ron noticed it, and calling me in the
+afternoon to his private room, said:--</p>
+<p>"Basil Arbuthnot, you look ill. Are you working too hard?"</p>
+<p>"I don't think so, sir."</p>
+<p>"Humph! Are you out much at night?"</p>
+<p>"Out, sir?"</p>
+<p>"Yes--don't echo my words--do you go into society: frequent
+balls, theatres, and so forth?"</p>
+<p>"I have not done so, sir, for several months past."</p>
+<p>"What is it, then? Do you read late?"</p>
+<p>"Really, sir, I hardly know--up to about one or two o'clock; on
+the average, I believe."</p>
+<p>"Let me feel your pulse."</p>
+<p>I put out my wrist, and he held it for some seconds, looking
+keenly at me all the time.</p>
+<p>"Got anything on your mind?" he asked, after he had dropped it
+again. "Want money, eh?"</p>
+<p>"No, sir, thank you."</p>
+<p>"Home-sick?"</p>
+<p>"Not in the least."</p>
+<p>"Hah! want amusement. Can't work perpetually--not reasonable to
+suppose it. There, <i>mon gar&ccedil;on</i>," (taking a folded
+paper from his pocket-book) "there's a prescription for you. Make
+the most of it."</p>
+<p>It was a stall-ticket for the opera. Too restless and unhappy to
+reject any chance of relief, however temporary, I accepted it, and
+went.</p>
+<p>I had not been to a theatre since that night with Josephine, nor
+to the Italian Opera since I used to go with Madame de Marignan. As
+I went in listlessly and took my place, the lights, the noise, the
+multitude of faces, confused and dazzled me. Presently the curtain
+rose, and the piece began. The opera was <i>I Capuletti</i>. I do
+not remember who the singers were, I am not sure that I ever knew.
+To me they were Romeo and Juliet, and I was a dweller in Verona.
+The story, the music, the scenery, took a vivid hold upon my
+imagination. From the moment the curtain rose, I saw only the
+stage, and, except that I in some sort established a dim comparison
+between Romeo's sorrows and my own disquietude of mind, I seemed to
+lose all recollection of time and place, and almost of my own
+identity.</p>
+<p>It seemed quite natural that that ill-fated pair of lovers
+should go through life, love, wed, and die singing. And why not?
+Are they not airy nothings, "born of romance, cradled in poetry,
+thinking other thoughts, and doing other deeds than ours?" As they
+live in poetry, so may they not with perfect fitness speak in
+song?</p>
+<p>I went home in a dream, with the melodies ringing in my ears and
+the story lying heavy at my heart. I passed upstairs in the dark,
+went over to the window, and saw, oh joy! the light--the dear,
+familiar, welcome, blessed light, streaming forth, as of old, from
+Hortense's chamber window!</p>
+<p>To thank Heaven that she was safe was my first impulse--to step
+out on the balcony, and watch the light as though it were a part of
+herself, was the second. I had not been there many moments when it
+was obscured by a passing shadow. The window opened and she came
+out.</p>
+<p>"Good-evening," she said, in her calm, clear voice. "I heard you
+out here, and thought you might like to know that, thanks to your
+treatment in the first instance, and such care as I have been able
+since to give it, my hand is once more in working order."</p>
+<p>"You are kind to come out and tell me so," I said. "I had no
+hope of seeing you to-night. How long is it since you arrived?"</p>
+<p>"About two hours," she replied, carelessly.</p>
+<p>"And you have been nearly three weeks away!"</p>
+<p>"Have I?" said she, leaning her cheek upon her hand, and looking
+up dreamily into the night. "I did not count the days."</p>
+<p>"That proves you passed them happily," I said; not without some
+secret bitterness.</p>
+<p>"Happily!" she echoed. "What is happiness?"</p>
+<p>"A word that we all translate differently," I replied.</p>
+<p>"And your own reading of it?" she said, interrogatively.</p>
+<p>I hesitated.</p>
+<p>"Do you inquire what is my need, individually?" I asked, "or do
+you want my general definition?"</p>
+<p>"The latter."</p>
+<p>"I think, then, that the first requirement of happiness is work;
+the second, success."</p>
+<p>She sighed.</p>
+<p>"I accept your definition," she said, "and hope that you may
+realize it to the full in your own experience. For myself, I have
+toiled and failed--sought, and found not. Judge, then, how I came
+to leave the days uncounted."</p>
+<p>The sadness of her attitude, the melancholy import of her words,
+the abstraction of her manner, filled me with a vague
+uneasiness.</p>
+<p>"Failure is often the forerunner of success," I replied, for
+want, perhaps, of something better to say.</p>
+<p>She shook her head drearily, and stood looking up at the sky,
+where, every now and then, the moon shone out fitfully between the
+flying clouds.</p>
+<p>"It is not the first time," she murmured, "nor will it be the
+last--and yet they say that God is merciful."</p>
+<p>She had forgotten my presence. These words were not spoken to
+me, but in answer to her own thoughts. I said nothing, but watched
+her upturned face. It was pale as the wan moon overhead; thinner
+than before she went away; and sadder--oh, how much sadder!</p>
+<p>She roused herself presently, and turning to me, said:--"I beg
+your pardon. I am very absent; but I am greatly fatigued. I have
+been travelling incessantly for two days and nights."</p>
+<p>"Then I will wish you good-night at once," I said.</p>
+<p>"Good-night," she replied; and went back into her room.</p>
+<p>The next morning Dr. Ch&eacute;ron smiled one of his cold
+smiles, and said:--</p>
+<p>"You look better to-day, my young friend. I knew how it was with
+you--no worse malady, after all, than <i>ennui</i>. I shall take
+care to repeat the medicine from time to time."</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XLV."></a>CHAPTER XLV.</h2>
+<h3>UNDER THE STARS.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>Hoping, yet scarcely expecting to see her, I went out upon my
+balcony the next night at the same hour; but the light of her lamp
+was bright within, no shadow obscured it, and no window opened. So,
+after waiting for more than an hour, I gave her up, and returned to
+my work. I did this for six nights in succession. On the seventh
+she came.</p>
+<p>"You are fond of your balcony, fellow-student," said she. "I
+often hear you out here."</p>
+<p>"My room gets heated," I replied, "and my eyes weary, after
+several hours of hard reading; and this keen, clear air puts new
+life into one's brains."</p>
+<p>"Yes, it is delicious," said she, looking up into the night.
+"How dark the space of heaven is, and, how bright are the stars!
+What a night for the Alps! What a night to be upon some Alpine
+height, watching the moon through a good telescope, and waiting for
+the sunrise!"</p>
+<p>"Defer that wish for a few months," I replied smiling. "You
+would scarcely like Switzerland in her winter robes."</p>
+<p>"Nay, I prefer Switzerland in winter," she said. "I passed
+through part of the Jura about ten days ago, and saw nothing but
+snow. It was magnificent--like a paradise of pure marble awaiting
+the souls of all the sculptors of all the ages."</p>
+<p>"A fantastic idea," said I, "and spoken like an artist."</p>
+<p>"Like an artist!" she repeated, musingly. "Well, are not all
+students artists?"</p>
+<p>"Not those who study the exact sciences--not the student of law
+or divinity--nor he who, like myself, is a student of medicine. He
+is the slave of Fact, and Art is the Eden of his banishment. His
+imagination is for ever captive. His horizon is for ever bounded.
+He is fettered by routine, and paralyzed by tradition. His very
+ideas must put on the livery of his predecessors; for in a
+profession where originality of thought stands for the blackest
+shade of original sin, skill--mere skill--must be the end of his
+ambition."</p>
+<p>She looked at me, and the moonlight showed me that sad smile
+which her lips so often wore.</p>
+<p>"You do not love your profession," she said.</p>
+<p>"I do not, indeed."</p>
+<p>"And yet you labor zealously to acquire it--how is that?"</p>
+<p>"How is it with hundreds of others? My profession was chosen for
+me. I am not my own master."</p>
+<p>"But are you sure you would be happier in some other pursuit?
+Supposing, for instance, that you were free to begin again, what
+career do you think you would prefer?"</p>
+<p>"I scarcely know, and I should scarcely care, so long as there
+was freedom of thought and speculation in it."</p>
+<p>"Geology, perhaps--or astronomy," she suggested, laughingly.</p>
+<p>"Merci! The bowels of the earth are too profound, and the
+heavens too lofty for me. I should choose some pursuit that would
+set the Ariel of the imagination free. That is to say, I could be
+very happy if my life were devoted to Science, but my soul echoes
+to the name of Art."</p>
+<p>"'The artist creates--the man of science discovers," said
+Hortense. "Beware lest you fancy you would prefer the work of
+creation only because you lack patience to pursue the work of
+discovery. Pardon me, if I suggest that you may, perhaps, be fitted
+for neither. Your sphere, I fancy, is
+reflection--comparison--criticism. You are not made for action, or
+work. Your taste is higher than your ambition, and you love
+learning better than fame. Am I right?"</p>
+<p>"So right that I regret I can be read so easily."</p>
+<p>"And therefore, it may be that you would find yourself no
+happier with Art than with Science. You might even fall into deeper
+discouragement; for in Science every onward step is at least
+certain gain, but in Art every step is groping, and success is only
+another form of effort. Art, in so far as it is more divine, is
+more unattainable, more evanescent, more unsubstantial. It needs as
+much patience as Science, and the passionate devotion of an entire
+life is as nothing in comparison with the magnitude of the work.
+Self-sacrifice, self-distrust, infinite patience, infinite
+disappointment--such is the lot of the artist, such the law of
+aspiration."</p>
+<p>"A melancholy creed."</p>
+<p>"But a true one. The divine is doomed to suffering, and under
+the hays of the poet lurk ever the thorns of the
+self-immolator."</p>
+<p>"But, amid all this record of his pains, do you render no
+account of his pleasures?" I asked. "You forget that he has moments
+of enjoyment lofty as his aims, and deep as his devotion.</p>
+<p>"I do not forget it," she said. "I know it but too well. Alas!
+is not the catalogue of his pleasures the more melancholy record of
+the two? Hopes which sharpen disappointment; visions which cheat
+while they enrapture; dreams that embitter his waking
+hours--fellow-student, do you envy him these?"</p>
+<p>"I do; believing that he would not forego them for a life of
+common-place annoyances and placid pleasures."</p>
+<p>"Forego them! Never. Who that had once been the guest of the
+gods would forego the Divine for the Human? No--it is better to
+suffer than to stagnate. The artist and poet is overpaid in his
+brief snatches of joy. While they last, his soul sings 'at heaven's
+gate,' and his forehead strikes the stars."</p>
+<p>She spoke with a rare and passionate enthusiasm; sometimes
+pacing to and fro; sometimes pausing with upturned face--</p>
+<p>"A dauntless muse who eyes a dreadful fate!"</p>
+<p>There was a long, long silence--she looking at the stars, I upon
+her face.</p>
+<p>By-and-by she came over to where I stood, and leaned upon the
+railing that divided our separate territories.</p>
+<p>"Friend," said she, gravely, "be content. Art is the Sphinx, and
+to question her is destruction. Enjoy books, pictures, music,
+statues--rifle the world of beauty to satiety, if satiety be
+possible--but there pause Drink the wine; seek not to crush the
+grape. Be happy, be useful, labor honestly upon the task that is
+thine, and be assured that the work will itself achieve its reward.
+Is it nothing to relieve pain--to prolong the days of the
+sickly--to restore health to the suffering--to soothe the last
+pangs of the dying? Is it nothing to be followed by the prayers and
+blessing of those whom you have restored to love, to fame, to the
+world's service? To my thinking, the physician's trade hath
+something god-like in it. Be content. Harvey's discovery was as
+sublime as Newton's, and it were hard to say which did God's work
+best--Shakespeare or Jenner."</p>
+<p>"And you," I said, the passion that I could not conceal
+trembling in my voice; "and you--what are you, poet, or painter, or
+musician, that you know and reason of all these things?"</p>
+<p>She laughed with a sudden change of mood, and shook her
+head.</p>
+<p>"I am a woman," said she. "Simply a woman--no more. One of the
+inferior sex; and, as I told you long ago, only half
+civilized."</p>
+<p>"You are unlike every other woman!"</p>
+<p>"Possibly, because I am more useless. Strange as it may seem, do
+you know I love art better than sewing, or gossip, or dress; and
+hold my liberty to be a dower more precious than either beauty or
+riches? And yet--I am a woman!"</p>
+<p>"The wisest, virtuousest, discreetest, best!"</p>
+<blockquote>&nbsp;"By no means. You are comparing me with Eve; but
+I am<br>
+not in the least like Eve, I assure you. She was an excellent
+housewife, and, if we may believe Milton, knew how to prepare
+'dulcet creams,' and all sorts of Paradisaical dainties for her
+husband's dinner. I, on the contrary, could not make a cream if
+Adam's life depended on it."</blockquote>
+<p>"<i>Eh bien!</i> of the theology of creams I know nothing. I
+only know that Eve was the first and fairest of her sex, and that
+you are as wise as you are beautiful."</p>
+<p>"Nay, that is what Titania said to the ass," laughed Hortense.
+"Your compliments become equivocal, fellow-student. But hush! what
+hour is that?"</p>
+<p>She stood with uplifted finger. The air was keen, and over the
+silence of the house-tops chimed the church-clocks--Two.</p>
+<p>"It is late, and cold," said she, drawing her cloak more closely
+round her.</p>
+<p>"Not later than you usually sit up," I replied. "Don't go yet.
+'Tis now the very witching hour of night, when churchyards
+yawn--"</p>
+<p>"I beg your pardon," she interrupted. "The churchyards have done
+yawning by this time, and, like other respectable citizens, are
+sound asleep. Let us follow their example. Good-night."</p>
+<p>"Good-night," I replied, reluctantly; but almost before I had
+said it, she was gone.</p>
+<p>After this, as the winter wore away, and spring drew on,
+Hortense's balcony became once more a garden, and she used to
+attend to her flowers every evening. She always found me on my
+balcony when she came out, and soon our open-air meetings became
+such an established fact that, instead of parting with
+"good-night," we said "<i>au revoir</i>--till to-morrow." At these
+times we talked of many things; sometimes of subjects abstract and
+mystical--of futurity, of death, of the spiritual life--but
+oftenest of Art in its manifold developments. And sometimes our
+speculations wandered on into the late hours of the night.</p>
+<p>And yet, for all our talking and all our community of tastes, we
+became not one jot more intimate. I still loved in silence--she
+still lived in a world apart.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XLVI."></a>CHAPTER XLVI.</h2>
+<h3>THERMOPYL&AElig;.</h3>
+<center>How dreary 'tis for women to sit still<br>
+On winter nights by solitary fires,<br>
+And hear the nations praising them far off.<br>
+<br>
+AURORA LEIGH.</center>
+<br>
+<p>Abolished by the National Convention of 1793, re-established in
+1795, reformed by the first Napoleon in 1803, and remodelled in
+1816 on the restoration of the Bourbons, the Acad&eacute;mie
+Fran&ccedil;aise, despite its changes of fortune, name, and
+government, is a liberal and splendid institution. It consists of
+forty members, whose office it is to compile the great dictionary,
+and to enrich, purify, and preserve the language. It assists
+authors in distress. It awards prizes for poetry, eloquence, and
+virtue; and it bestows those honors with a noble impartiality that
+observes no distinction of sex, rank, or party. To fill one of the
+forty fauteuils of the Acad&eacute;mie Fran&ccedil;aise is the
+darling ambition of every eminent Frenchman of letters. There the
+poet, the philosopher, the historian, the man of science, sit side
+by side, and meet on equal ground. When a seat falls vacant, when a
+prize is to be awarded, when an anniversary is to be celebrated,
+the interest and excitement become intense. To the political, the
+fashionable, or the commercial world, these events are perhaps of
+little moment. They affect neither the Bourse nor the Budget. They
+exercise no perceptible influence on the Longchamps toilettes. But
+to the striving author, to the rising orator, to all earnest
+workers in the broad fields of literature, they are serious and
+significant circumstances.</p>
+<p>Living out of society as I now did, I knew little and cared less
+for these academic crises. The success of one candidate was as
+unimportant to me as the failure of another; and I had more than
+once read the crowned poem of the prize essay without even glancing
+at the name or the fortunate author.</p>
+<p>Now it happened that, pacing to and fro under the budding
+acacias of the Palais Royal garden one sunny spring-like morning,
+some three or four weeks after the conversation last recorded, I
+was pursued by a persecuting newsvender with a hungry eye, mittened
+fingers, and a shrill voice, who persisted in reiterating close
+against my ear:--</p>
+<p>"News of the day, M'sieur!--news of the day. Frightful murder in
+the Rue du Faubourg St. Antoine--state of the Bourse--latest
+despatches from the seat of war--prize poem crowned by the
+Acad&eacute;mie Fran&ccedil;aise--news of the day, M'sieur! Only
+forty centimes! News of the day!"</p>
+<p>I refused, however, to be interested in any of those topics,
+turned a deaf ear to his allurements, and peremptorily dismissed
+him. I then continued my walk in solitary silence.</p>
+<p>At the further extremity of the square, near the <i>Galerie
+Vitr&eacute;e</i> and close beside the little newspaper kiosk,
+stood a large tree since cut down, which at that time served as an
+advertising medium, and was daily decorated with a written placard,
+descriptive of the contents of the <i>Moniteur</i>, the
+<i>Presse</i>, and other leading papers. This placard was generally
+surrounded by a crowd of readers, and to-day the crowd of readers
+was more than usually dense.</p>
+<p>I seldom cared in these days for what was going on in the busy
+outside world; but this morning, my attention having been drawn to
+the subject, I amused myself, as I paced to and fro, by watching
+the eager faces of the little throng of idlers. Presently I fell in
+with the rest, and found myself conning the placard on the
+tree.</p>
+<p>The name that met my astonished eyes on that placard was the
+name of Hortense Dufresnoy.</p>
+<p>The sentence ran thus:--</p>
+<p>"Grand Biennial Prize for Poetry--Subject: <i>The Pass of
+Thermopyl&aelig;</i>,--Successful Candidate, <i>Mademoiselle
+Hortense Dufresnoy</i>."</p>
+<p>Breathless, I read the passage twice; then, hearing at a little
+distance the shrill voice of the importunate newsvender, I plunged
+after him and stopped him, just as he came to the--</p>
+<p>"Frightful murder in the Rue du Faubourg Saint ..."</p>
+<p>"Here," said I, tapping him on the shoulder; "give me one of
+your papers."</p>
+<p>The man's eyes glittered.</p>
+<p>"Only forty centimes, M'sieur," said he. "'Tis the first I've
+sold to-day."</p>
+<p>He looked poor and wretched. I dropped into his hand a coin that
+would have purchased all his little sheaf of journals, and hurried
+away, not to take the change or hear his thanks. He was silent for
+some moments; then took up his cry at the point where he had broken
+off, and started away with:--</p>
+<p>--"Antoine!--state of the Bourse--latest despatches from the
+seat of war--news of the day--only forty centimes!"</p>
+<p>I took my paper to a quiet bench near the fountain, and read the
+whole account. There had been eighteen anonymous poems submitted to
+the Academy. Three out of the eighteen had come under discussion;
+one out of the three had been warmly advocated by B&eacute;ranger,
+one by Lebrun, and the third by some other academician. The poem
+selected by Beranger was at length chosen; the sealed enclosure
+opened; and the name of the successful competitor found to be
+Hortense Dufresnoy. To Hortense Dufresnoy, therefore, the prize and
+crown were awarded.</p>
+<p>I read the article through, and then went home, hoping to be the
+first to congratulate her. Timidly, and with a fast-beating heart,
+I rang the bell at her outer door; for we all had our bells at
+Madame Bou&iuml;sse's, and lived in our rooms as if they were
+little private houses.</p>
+<p>She opened the door, and, seeing me, looked surprised; for I had
+never before ventured to pay her a visit in her apartment.</p>
+<p>"I have come to wish you joy," said I, not venturing to cross
+the threshold.</p>
+<p>"To wish me joy?"</p>
+<p>"You have not seen a morning paper?"</p>
+<p>"A morning paper!"</p>
+<p>And, echoing me thus, her color changed, and a strange vague
+look--it might be of hope, it might be of fear--came into her
+face.</p>
+<p>"There is something in the <i>Moniteur</i>" I went on, smiling,
+'that concerns you nearly."</p>
+<p>"That concerns me?" she exclaimed. "<i>Me</i>? For Heaven's
+sake, speak plainly. I do not understand you. Has--has anything
+been discovered?"</p>
+<p>"Yes--it has been discovered at the Acad&eacute;mie
+Fran&ccedil;aise that Mademoiselle Hortense Dufresnoy has written
+the best poem on Thermopyl&aelig;."</p>
+<p>She drew a deep breath, pressed her hands tightly together, and
+murmured:--</p>
+<p>"Alas! is that all?"</p>
+<p>"All! Nay--is it not enough to step at once into fame--to have
+been advocated by B&eacute;ranger--to have the poem crowned in the
+Theatre of the Acad&eacute;mie Fran&ccedil;aise?"</p>
+<p>She stood silent, with drooping head and listless hands, all
+disappointment and despondency. Presently she looked up.</p>
+<p>"Where did you learn this?" she asked.</p>
+<p>I handed her the journal.</p>
+<p>"Come in, fellow-student," said she, and held the door wide for
+me to enter.</p>
+<p>For the second time I found myself in her little <i>salon</i>,
+and found everything in the self-same order.</p>
+<p>"Well," I said, "are you not happy?"</p>
+<p>She shook her head.</p>
+<p>"Success is not happiness," she replied, smiling mournfully.
+"That B&eacute;ranger should have advocated my poem is an honor
+beyond price; but--but I need more than this to make me happy."</p>
+<p>And her eyes wandered, with a strange, yearning look, to the
+sword over the chimney-piece.</p>
+<p>Seeing that look, my heart sank, and the tears sprang unbidden
+to my eyes. Whose was the sword? For whose sake was her life so
+lonely and secluded? For whom was she waiting? Surely here, if one
+could but read it aright, lay the secret of her strange and sudden
+journeys--here I touched unawares upon the mystery of her life!</p>
+<p>I did not speak. I shaded my face with my hand, and sat looking
+on the ground. Then, the silence remaining unbroken, I rose, and
+examined the drawings on the walls.</p>
+<p>They were water-colors for the most part, and treated in a
+masterly but quite peculiar style. The skies were sombre, the
+foregrounds singularly elaborate, the color stern and forcible.
+Angry sunsets barred by lines of purple cirrus stratus; sweeps of
+desolate heath bounded by jagged peaks; steep mountain passes
+crimson with faded ferns and half-obscured by rain-clouds; strange
+studies of weeds, and rivers, and lonely reaches of desolate
+sea-shore ... these were some of the subjects, and all were
+evidently by the same hand.</p>
+<p>"Ah," said Hortense, "you are criticizing my sketches!"</p>
+<p>"Your sketches!" I exclaimed. "Are these your work?"</p>
+<p>"Certainly," she replied, smiling. "Why not? What do you think
+of them?"</p>
+<p>"What do I think of them! Well, I think that if you had not been
+a poet you ought to have been a painter. How fortunate you are in
+being able to express yourself so variously! Are these
+compositions, or studies from Nature?"</p>
+<p>"All studies from Nature--mere records of fact. I do not presume
+to create--I am content humbly and from a distance to copy the
+changing moods of Nature."</p>
+<p>"Pray be your own catalogue, then, and tell me where these
+places are."</p>
+<p>"Willingly. This coast-line with the run of breaking surf was
+taken on the shores of Normandy, some few miles from Dieppe. This
+sunset is a recollection of a glorious evening near Frankfort, and
+those purple mountains in the distance are part of the Taunus
+range. Here is an old medi&aelig;val gateway at Solothurn, in
+Switzerland. This wild heath near the sea is in the neighborhood of
+Biscay. This quaint knot of ruinous houses in a weed-grown Court
+was sketched at Bruges. Do you see that milk-girl with her scarlet
+petticoat and Flemish <i>faille?</i> She supplied us with milk, and
+her dairy was up that dark archway. She stood for me several times,
+when I wanted a foreground figure."</p>
+<p>"You have travelled a great deal," I said. "Were you long in
+Belgium?"</p>
+<p>"Yes; I lived there for some years. I was first pupil, then
+teacher, in a large school in Brussels. I was afterwards governess
+in a private family in Bruges. Of late, however, I have preferred
+to live in Paris, and give morning lessons. I have more liberty
+thus, and more leisure."</p>
+<p>"And these two little quaint bronze figures?"</p>
+<p>"Hans Sachs and Peter Vischer. I brought them from Nuremberg.
+Hans Sachs, you see, wears a furred robe, and presses a book to his
+breast. He does not look in the least like a cobbler. Peter
+Vischer, on the contrary, wears his leather apron and carries his
+mallet in his hand. Artist and iron-smith, he glories in his trade,
+and looks as sturdy a little burgher as one would wish to see."</p>
+<p>"And this statuette in green marble?"</p>
+<p>"A copy of the celebrated 'Pensiero' of Michel Angelo--in other
+words, the famous sitting statue of Lorenzo de Medici, in the
+Medicean chapel in Florence. I had it executed for me on the spot
+by Bazzanti."</p>
+<p>"A noble figure!"</p>
+<p>"Indeed it is--a noble figure, instinct with life, and strength,
+and meditation. My first thought on seeing the original was that I
+would not for worlds be condemned to pass a night alone with it. I
+should every moment expect the musing hand to drop away from the
+stern mouth, and the eyes to turn upon me!"</p>
+<p>"These," said I, pausing at the chimney-piece, "are
+<i>souvenirs</i> of Switzerland. How delicately those chamois are
+carved out of the hard wood! They almost seem to snuff the mountain
+air! But here is a rapier with a hilt of ornamented steel--where
+did this come from?"</p>
+<p>I had purposely led up the conversation to this point. I had
+patiently questioned and examined for the sake of this one inquiry,
+and I waited her reply as if my life hung on it.</p>
+<p>Her whole countenance changed. She took it down, and her eyes
+filled with tears.</p>
+<p>"It was my father's," she said, tenderly.</p>
+<p>"Your father's!" I exclaimed, joyfully. "Heaven be thanked! Did
+you say your father's?"</p>
+<p>She looked up surprised, then smiled, and faintly blushed.</p>
+<p>"I did," she replied.</p>
+<p>"And was your father a soldier?" I asked; for the sword looked
+more like a sword of ceremony than a sword for service.</p>
+<p>But to this question she gave no direct reply.</p>
+<p>"It was his sword," she said, "and he had the best of all rights
+to wear it."</p>
+<p>With this she kissed the weapon reverently, and restored it to
+its place.</p>
+<p>I kissed her hand quite as reverently that day at parting, and
+she did not withdraw it.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XLVII."></a>CHAPTER XLVII.</h2>
+<h3>ALL ABOUT ART.</h3>
+<center>Art's a service.<br>
+<br>
+AURORA LEIGH.</center>
+<br>
+<p>"God sent art, and the devil sent critics," said M&uuml;ller,
+dismally paraphrasing a popular proverb. "My picture is
+rejected!"</p>
+<p>"Rejected!" I echoed, surprised to find him sitting on the
+floor, like a tailor, in front of an acre of canvas. "By whom?"</p>
+<p>"By the Hanging Committee."</p>
+<p>"Hang the Hanging Committee!"</p>
+<p>"A pious prayer, my friend. Would that it could be carried into
+execution!"</p>
+<p>"What cause do they assign?"</p>
+<p>"Cause! Do you suppose they trouble themselves to find one? Not
+a bit of it. They simply scrawl a great R in chalk on the back of
+it, and send you a printed notice to carry it home again. What is
+it to them, if a poor devil has been painting his very heart and
+hopes out, day after day, for a whole year, upon that piece of
+canvas? Nothing, and less than nothing--confound them!"</p>
+<p>I drew a chair before the picture, and set myself to a patient
+study of the details. He had chosen a difficult subject--the death
+of Louis XI. The scene represented a spacious chamber in the Castle
+of Plessisles-Tours. To the left, in a great oak chair beside the
+bed from which he had just risen, sat the dying king, with a rich,
+furred mantle loosely thrown around him. At his feet, his face
+buried in his hands, kneeled the Dauphin. Behind his chair, holding
+up the crucifix to enjoin silence, stood the king's confessor. A
+physician, a couple of councillors in scarlet robes, and a captain
+of archers, stood somewhat back, whispering together and watching
+the countenance of the dying man; while through the outer door was
+seen a crowd of courtiers and pages, waiting to congratulate King
+Charles VIII. It was an ambitious subject, and M&uuml;ller had
+conceived it in a grand spirit. The heads were expressive; and the
+textures of the velvets, tapestries, oak carvings, and so forth,
+had been executed with more than ordinary finish and fidelity. For
+all this, however, there was more of promise than of achievement in
+the work. The lights were scattered; the attitudes were stiff;
+there was too evident an attempt at effect. One could see that it
+was the work of a young painter, who had yet much to learn, and
+something of the Academy to forget.</p>
+<p>"Well," said M&uuml;ller, still sitting ruefully on the floor,
+"what do you think of it? Am I rightly served? Shall I send for a
+big pail of whitewash, and blot it all out?"</p>
+<p>"Not for the world!"</p>
+<p>"What shall I do, then?"</p>
+<p>"Do better."</p>
+<p>"But, if I have done my best already?"</p>
+<p>"Still do better; and when you have done that, do better again.
+So genius toils higher and ever higher, and like the climber of the
+glacier, plants his foot where only his hand clung the moment
+before."</p>
+<p>"Humph! but what of my picture?"</p>
+<p>"Well," I said, hesitatingly, "I am no critic--"</p>
+<p>"Thank Heaven!" muttered M&uuml;ller, parenthetically.</p>
+<p>"But there is something noble in the disposition of the figures.
+I should say, however, that you had set to work upon too large a
+scale."</p>
+<p>"A question of focus," said the painter, hastily. "A mere
+question of focus."</p>
+<p>"How can that be, when you have finished some parts laboriously,
+and in others seem scarcely to have troubled yourself to cover the
+canvas?"</p>
+<p>"I don't know. I'm impatient, you see, and--and I think I got
+tired of it towards the last."</p>
+<p>"Would that have been the case if you had allowed yourself but
+half the space?"</p>
+<p>"I'll take to enamel," exclaimed M&uuml;ller, with a grin of
+hyperbolical despair. "I'll immortalize myself in miniature. I'll
+paint henceforward with the aid of a microscope, and never again
+look at nature unless through the wrong end of a telescope!"</p>
+<p>"Pshaw!--be in earnest, man, and talk sensibly! Do you conceive
+that for every failure you are to change your style? Give yourself,
+heart and soul, to the school in which you have begun, and make up
+your mind to succeed."</p>
+<p>"Do you believe, then, that a man may succeed by force of will
+alone?" said M&uuml;ller, musingly.</p>
+<p>"Yes, because force of will proceeds from force of character,
+and the two together, warp and woof, make the stuff out of which
+Nature clothes her heroes."</p>
+<p>"Oh, but I am not talking of heroes," said M&uuml;ller.</p>
+<p>"By heroes, I do not mean only soldiers. Captain Pen is as good
+a hero as Captain Sword, any day; and Captain Brush, to my
+thinking, is as fine a fellow as either."</p>
+<p>"Ay; but do they come, as you would seem to imply, of the same
+stock?" said M&uuml;ller. "Force of will and force of character are
+famous clays in which to mould a Wellington or a Columbus; but is
+not something more--at all events, something different--necessary
+to the modelling of a Raffaelle?"</p>
+<p>"I don't fancy so. Power is the first requisite of genius. Give
+power in equal quantity to your Columbus and your Raffaelle, and
+circumstance shall decide which will achieve the New World, and
+which the Transfiguration."</p>
+<p>"Circumstance!" cried the painter, impatiently. "Good heavens!
+do you make no account of the spontaneous tendencies of genius? Is
+Nature a mere vulgar cook, turning out men, like soups, from one
+common stock, with only a dash of flavoring here and there to give
+them variety? No--Nature is a subtle chemist, and her workshop,
+depend on it, is stored with delicate elixirs, volatile spirits,
+and precious fires of genius. Certain of these are kneaded with the
+clay of the poet, others with the clay of the painter, the
+astronomer, the mathematician, the legislator, the soldier.
+Raffaelle had in him some of 'the stuff that dreams are made of.'
+Never tell me that that same stuff, differently treated, would
+equally well have furnished forth an Archimedes or a Napoleon!"</p>
+<p>"Men are what their age calls upon them to be," I replied, after
+a moment's consideration. "Be that demand what it may, the supply
+is ever equal to it. Centre of the most pompous and fascinating of
+religions, Rome demanded Madonnas and Transfigurations, and
+straightway Raffaelle answered to the call. The Old World,
+overstocked with men, gold, and aristocracies, asked wider fields
+of enterprise, and Columbus added America to the map. What is this
+but circumstance? Had Italy needed colonies, would not her men of
+genius have turned sailors and discoverers? Had Madrid been the
+residence of the Popes, might not Columbus have painted
+altar-pieces or designed churches?"</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller, still sitting on the floor, shook his head
+despondingly.</p>
+<p>"I don't think it," he replied; "and I don't wish to think it.
+It is too material a view of genius to satisfy my imagination. I
+love to believe that gifts are special. I love to believe that the
+poet is born a poet, and the artist an artist."</p>
+<p>"Hold! I believe that the poet is born a poet, and the artist an
+artist; but I also believe the poetry of the one and the art of the
+other to be only diverse manifestations of a power that is
+universal in its application. The artist whose lot in life it is to
+be a builder is none the less an artist. The poet, though engineer
+or soldier, is none the less a poet. There is the poetry of
+language, and there is also the poetry of action. So also there is
+the art which expresses itself by means of marble or canvas, and
+the art which designs a capitol, tapers a spire, or plants a
+pleasure-ground. Nay, is not this very interfusion of gifts, this
+universality of uses, in itself the bond of beauty which girdles
+the world like a cestus? If poetry were only rhyme, and art only
+painting, to what an outer darkness of matter-of-fact should we be
+condemning nine-tenths of the creation!"</p>
+<p>M&uuml;ller yawned, as if he would have swallowed me and my
+argument together.</p>
+<p>"You are getting transcendental," said he. "I dare say your
+theories are all very fine and all very true; but I confess that I
+don't understand them. I never could find out all this poetry of
+bricks and mortar, railroads and cotton-factories, that people talk
+about so fluently now-a-days. We Germans take the dreamy side of
+life, and are seldom at home in the practical, be it ever so highly
+colored and highly flavored. In our parlance, an artist is an
+artist, and neither a bagman nor an engine-driver."</p>
+<p>His professional pride was touched, and he said this with
+somewhat less than his usual <i>bonhomie</i>--almost with a shade
+of irritability.</p>
+<p>"Come," said I, smiling, "we will not discuss a topic which we
+can never see from the same point of view. Doing art is better than
+talking art; and your business now is to find a fresh subject and
+prepare another canvas. Meanwhile cheer up, and forget all about
+Louis XI. and the Hanging Committee. What say you to dining with me
+at the Trois Fr&egrave;res? It will do you good."</p>
+<p>"Good!" cried he, springing to his feet and shaking his fist at
+the picture. "More good, by Jupiter, than all the paint and megilp
+that ever was wasted! Not all the fine arts of Europe are worth a
+<i>poulet &agrave; la Marengo</i> and a bottle of old
+<i>Roman&eacute;e</i>!"</p>
+<p>So saying, he turned his picture to the wall, seized his cap,
+locked his door, scrawled outside with a piece of
+chalk,--"<i>Summoned to the Tuileries on state affairs</i>," and
+followed me, whistling, down the six flights of gloomy, ricketty,
+Quartier-Latin lodging-house stairs up which he lived and had his
+being.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XLVIII."></a>CHAPTER XLVIII.</h2>
+<h3>I MAKE MYSELF ACQUAINTED WITH THE IMPOLITE WORLD<br>
+AND ITS PLACES OP UNFASHIONABLE RESORT.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>M&uuml;ller and I dined merrily at the Caf&eacute; of the Trois
+Fr&egrave;res Proven&ccedil;aux, discussed our coffee and cigars
+outside the Rotonde in the Palais Royal, and then started off in
+search of adventures. Striking up in a north-easterly direction
+through a labyrinth of narrow streets, we emerged at the Rue des
+Fontaines, just in front of that famous second-hand market yclept
+the Temple. It was Saturday night, and the business of the place
+was at its height. We went in, and turning aside from the broad
+thoroughfares which intersect the market at right angles, plunged
+at once into a net-work of crowded side-alleys, noisy and populous
+as a cluster of beehives. Here were bargainings, hagglings,
+quarrellings, elbowings, slang, low wit, laughter, abuse, cheating,
+and chattering enough to turn the head of a neophyte like myself.
+M&uuml;ller, however, was in his element. He took me up one row and
+down another, pointed out all that was curious, had a nod for every
+grisette, and an answer for every touter, and enjoyed the Babel
+like one to the manner born.</p>
+<p>"Buy, messieurs, buy! What will you buy?" was the question that
+assailed us on both sides, wherever we went.</p>
+<p>"What do you sell, <i>mon ami ?</i>" was M&uuml;ller's
+invariable reply.</p>
+<p>"What do you want, m'sieur?"</p>
+<p>"Twenty thousand francs per annum, and the prettiest wife in
+Paris," says my friend; a reply which is sure to evoke something
+<i>spirituel</i>, after the manner of the locality.</p>
+<p>"This is the most amusing place in Paris," observes he. "Like
+the Alsatia of old London, it has its own peculiar <i>argot,</i>
+and its own peculiar privileges. The activity of its commerce is
+amazing. If you buy a pocket-handkerchief at the first stall you
+come to, and leave it unprotected in your coat-pocket for five
+minutes, you may purchase it again at the other end of the alley
+before you leave. As for the resources of the market, they are
+inexhaustible. You may buy anything you please here, from a Court
+suit to a cargo of old rags. In this alley (which is the
+aristocratic quarter), are sold old jewelry, old china, old
+furniture, silks that have rustled at the Tuileries; fans that may
+have fluttered at the opera; gloves once fitted to tiny hands, and
+yet bearing a light soil where the rings were worn beneath; laces
+that may have been the property of Countesses or Cardinals;
+masquerade suits, epaulets, uniforms, furs, perfumes, artificial
+flowers, and all sorts of elegant superfluities, most of which have
+descended to the merchants of the Temple through the hands of
+ladies-maids and valets. Yonder lies the district called the
+'For&ecirc;t Noire'--a land of unpleasing atmosphere inhabited by
+cobblers and clothes-menders. Down to the left you see nothing but
+rag and bottle-shops, old iron stores, and lumber of every kind.
+Here you find chiefly household articles, bedding, upholstery,
+crockery, and so forth."</p>
+<p>"What will you buy, Messieurs?" continued to be the cry, as we
+moved along arm-in-arm, elbowing our way through the crowd, and
+exploring this singular scene in all directions.</p>
+<p>"What will you buy, messieurs?" shouts one salesman. "A carpet?
+A capital carpet, neither too large nor too small. Just the size
+you want!"</p>
+<p>"A hat, m'sieur, better than new," cries another; "just aired by
+the last owner."</p>
+<p>"A coat that will fit you better than if it had been made for
+you?"</p>
+<p>"A pair of boots? Dress-boots, dancing-boots, walking-boots,
+morning-boots, evening-boots, riding-boots, fishing-boots,
+hunting-boots. All sorts, m'sieur--all sorts!"</p>
+<p>"A cloak, m'sieur?"</p>
+<p>"A lace shawl to take home to Madame?"</p>
+<p>"An umbrella, m'sieur?"</p>
+<p>"A reading lamp?"</p>
+<p>"A warming-pan?"</p>
+<p>"A pair of gloves?"</p>
+<p>"A shower bath?"</p>
+<p>"A hand organ?"</p>
+<p>"What! m'sieurs, do you buy nothing this evening? Hol&agrave;,
+Antoine! monsieur keeps his hands in his pockets, for fear his
+money should fall out!"</p>
+<p>"Bah! They've not a centime between them!"</p>
+<p>"Go down the next turning and have the hole in your coat
+mended!"</p>
+<p>"Make way there for monsieur the millionaire!"</p>
+<p>"They are ambassadors on their way to the Court of Persia."</p>
+<p>"<i>Ohe! Pan&egrave;! pan&egrave;! pan&egrave;!</i>"</p>
+<p>Thus we run the gauntlet of all the tongues in the Temple,
+sometimes retorting, sometimes laughing and passing on, sometimes
+stopping to watch the issue of a dispute or the clinching of a
+bargain.</p>
+<p>"<i>Dame</i>, now! if it were only ten francs cheaper," says a
+voice that strikes my ear with a sudden sense of familiarity.
+Turning, I discover that the voice belongs to a young woman close
+at my elbow, and that the remark is addressed to a good-looking
+workman upon whose arm she is leaning.</p>
+<p>"What, Josephine!" I exclaim.</p>
+<p>"<i>Comment</i>! Monsieur Basil!"</p>
+<p>And I find myself kissed on both cheeks before I even guess what
+is going to happen to me.</p>
+<p>"Have I not also the honor of being remembered by Mademoiselle?"
+says M&uuml;ller, taking off his hat with all the politeness
+possible; whereupon Josephine, in an ecstasy of recognition,
+embraces him likewise.</p>
+<p>"<i>Mais, quel bonheur</i>!" cries she. "And to meet in the
+Temple, above all places! Emile, you heard me speak of Monsieur
+Basil--the gentleman who gave me that lovely shawl that I wore last
+Sunday to the Ch&acirc;teau des Fleurs--<i>eh bien</i>! this is
+he--and here is Monsieur M&uuml;ller, his friend. Gentlemen, this
+is Emile, my <i>fianc&eacute;</i>. We are to be married next Friday
+week, and we are buying our furniture."</p>
+<p>The good-looking workman pulled off his cap and made his bow,
+and we proffered the customary congratulations.</p>
+<p>"We have bought such sweet, pretty things," continued she,
+rattling on with all her old volubility, "and we have hired the
+dearest little <i>appartement</i> on the fourth story, in a street
+near the Jardin des Plantes. See--this looking-glass is ours; we
+have just bought it. And those maple chairs, and that chest of
+drawers with the marble top. It isn't real marble, you know; but
+it's ever so much better than real:--not nearly so heavy, and so
+beautifully carved that it's quite a work of art. Then we have
+bought a carpet--the sweetest carpet! Is it not, Emile?"</p>
+<p>Emile smiled, and confessed that the carpet was "<i>fort
+bien</i>."</p>
+<p>"And the time-piece, Madame?" suggested the furniture-dealer, at
+whose door we were standing. "Madame should really not refuse
+herself the time-piece."</p>
+<p>Josephine shook her head.</p>
+<p>"It is too dear," said she.</p>
+<p>"Pardon, madame. I am giving it away,--absolutely giving it away
+at the price!"</p>
+<p>Josephine looked at it wistfully, and weighed her little purse.
+It was a very little purse, and very light.</p>
+<p>"It is so pretty!" said she.</p>
+<p>The clock was of ormolu upon a painted stand, that was
+surmounted by a stout little gilt Cupid in a triumphal chariot,
+drawn by a pair of hard-working doves.</p>
+<p>"What is the price of it?" I asked.</p>
+<p>"Thirty-five francs, m'sieur," replied the dealer, briskly.</p>
+<p>"Say twenty-five," urged Josephine.</p>
+<p>The dealer shook his head.</p>
+<p>"What if we did without the looking-glass?" whispered Josephine
+to her <i>fianc&eacute;</i>. "After all, you know, one can live
+without a looking-glass; but how shall I have your dinners ready,
+if I don't know what o'clock it is?"</p>
+<p>"I don't really see how we are to do without a clock," admitted
+Emile.</p>
+<p>"And that darling little Cupid!"</p>
+<p>Emile conceded that the Cupid was irresistible.</p>
+<p>"Then we decide to have the clock, and do without the
+looking-glass?"</p>
+<p>"Yes, we decide."</p>
+<p>In the meantime I had slipped the thirty-five francs into the
+dealer's hand.</p>
+<p>"You must do me the favor to accept the clock as a
+wedding-present, Mademoiselle Josephine," I said. "And I hope you
+will favor me with an invitation to the wedding."</p>
+<p>"And me also," said M&uuml;ller; "and I shall hope to be allowed
+to offer a little sketch to adorn the walls of your new home."</p>
+<p>Their delight and gratitude were almost too great. We shook
+hands again all round. I am not sure, indeed, that Josephine did
+not then and there embrace us both for the second time.</p>
+<p>"And you will both come to our wedding!" cried she. "And we will
+spend the day at St. Cloud, and have a dance in the evening; and we
+will invite Monsieur Gustave, and Monsieur Jules, and Monsieur
+Adrien. Oh, dear! how delightful it will be!"</p>
+<p>"And you promise me the first quadrille?" said I.</p>
+<p>"And me the second?" added M&uuml;ller.</p>
+<p>"Yes, yes--as many as you please."</p>
+<p>"Then you must let us know at what time to come, and all about
+it; so, till Friday week, adieu!"</p>
+<p>And thus, with more shaking of hands, and thanks, and good
+wishes, we parted company, leaving them still occupied with the
+gilt Cupid and the furniture-broker.</p>
+<p>After the dense atmosphere of the clothes-market, it is a relief
+to emerge upon the Boulevart du Temple--the noisy, feverish,
+crowded Boulevart du Temple, with its half dozen theatres, its
+glare of gas, its cake-sellers, bill-sellers, lemonade-sellers,
+cabs, caf&eacute;s, gendarmes, tumblers, grisettes, and
+pleasure-seekers of both sexes.</p>
+<p>Here we pause awhile to applaud the performances of a company of
+dancing-dogs, whence we are presently drawn away by the sight of a
+gentleman in a <i>moyen-&acirc;ge</i> costume, who is swallowing
+penknives and bringing them out at his ears to the immense
+gratification of a large circle of bystanders.</p>
+<p>A little farther on lies the Jardin Turc; and here we drop in
+for half an hour, to restore ourselves with coffee-ices, and look
+on at the dancers. This done, we presently issue forth again, still
+in search of amusement.</p>
+<p>"Have you ever been to the Petit Lazary?" asks my friend, as we
+stand at the gate of the Jardin Turc, hesitating which way to
+turn.</p>
+<p>"Never; what is it?"</p>
+<p>"The most inexpensive of theatrical luxuries--an evening's
+entertainment of the mildest intellectual calibre, and at the
+lowest possible cost. Here we are at the doors. Come in, and
+complete your experience of Paris life!"</p>
+<p>The Petit Lazary occupies the lowest round of the theatrical
+ladder. We pay something like sixpence half-penny or sevenpence
+apiece, and are inducted into the dress-circle. Our appearance is
+greeted with a round of applause. The curtain has just fallen, and
+the audience have nothing better to do. M&uuml;ller lays his hand
+upon his heart, and bows profoundly, first to the gallery and next
+to the pit; whereupon they laugh, and leave us in peace. Had we
+looked dignified or indignant we should probably have been hissed
+till the curtain rose.</p>
+<p>It is an audience in shirt-sleeves, consisting for the most part
+of workmen, maid-servants, soldiers, and street-urchins, with a
+plentiful sprinkling of pickpockets--the latter in a strictly
+private capacity, being present for entertainment only, without any
+ulterior professional views.</p>
+<p>It is a noisy <i>entr'acte</i> enough. Three vaudevilles have
+already been played, and while the fourth is in preparation the
+public amuses itself according to its own riotous will and
+pleasure. Nuts and apple parings fly hither and thither; oranges
+describe perilous parabolas between the pit and the gallery;
+adventurous <i>gamins</i> make daring excursions round the upper
+rails; dialogues maintained across the house, and quarrels
+supported by means of an incredible copiousness of invective,
+mingle in discordant chorus with all sorts of howlings, groanings,
+whistlings, crowings, and yelpings, above which, in shrillest
+treble, rise the voices of cake and apple-sellers, and the piercing
+cry of the hump-back who distributes "vaudevilles at five centimes
+apiece." In the meantime, almost distracted by the patronage that
+assails him in every direction, the lemonade-vendor strides hither
+and thither, supplying floods of nectar at two centimes the glass;
+while the audience, skilled in the combination of enjoyments, eats,
+drinks, and vociferates to its heart's content. Fabulous meats, and
+pies of mysterious origin, are brought out from baskets and hats.
+Pocket-handkerchiefs spread upon benches do duty as table-cloths.
+Clasp-knives, galette, and sucre d'orge pass from hand to
+hand--nay, from mouth to mouth--and, in the midst of the tumult,
+the curtain rises.</p>
+<p>All is, in one moment, profoundly silent. The viands disappear;
+the lemonade-seller vanishes; the boys outside the gallery-rails
+clamber back to their places. The drama, in the eyes of the
+Parisians, is almost a sacred rite, and not even the noisiest
+<i>gamin</i> would raise his voice above a whisper when the curtain
+is up.</p>
+<p>The vaudeville that follows is, to say the least of it, a
+perplexing performance. It has no plot in particular. The scene is
+laid in a lodging-house, and the discomforts of one Monsieur
+Choufleur, an elderly gentleman in a flowered dressing-gown and a
+gigantic nightcap, furnish forth all the humor of the piece. What
+Monsieur Choufleur has done to deserve his discomforts, and why a
+certain student named Charles should devote all the powers of his
+mind to the devising and inflicting of those discomforts, is a
+mystery which we, the audience, are never permitted to penetrate.
+Enough that Charles, being a youth of mischievous tastes and
+extensive wardrobe, assumes a series of disguises for the express
+purpose of tormenting Monsieur Choufleur, and is unaccountably
+rewarded in the end with the hand of Monsieur Choufleur's daughter;
+a consummation which brings down the curtain amid loud applause,
+and affords entire satisfaction to everybody.</p>
+<p>It is by this time close upon midnight, and, leaving the theatre
+with the rest of the audience, we find a light rain falling. The
+noisy thoroughfare is hushed to comparative quiet. The carriages
+that roll by are homeward bound. The waiters yawn at the doors of
+the caf&eacute;s and survey pedestrians with a threatening aspect.
+The theatres are closing fast, and a row of flickering gas-lamps in
+front of a faded transparency which proclaims that the juvenile
+<i>Tableaux Vivants</i> are to be seen within, denotes the only
+place of public amusement yet open to the curious along the whole
+length of the Boulevart du Temple.</p>
+<p>"And now, <i>amigo</i>, where shall we go?" says M&uuml;ller.
+"Are you for a billiard-room or a lobster supper? Or shall we beat
+up the quarters of some of the fellows in the Quartier Latin, and
+see what fun is afoot on the other side of the water?"</p>
+<p>"Whichever you please. You are my guest to-night, and I am at
+your disposal."</p>
+<p>"Or what say you to dropping in for an hour among the
+Chicards?"</p>
+<p>"A capital idea--especially if you again entertain the society
+with a true story of events that never happened."</p>
+<p>"<i>Allons donc</i>!--</p>
+<blockquote>'C'&eacute;tait de mon temps<br>
+Que brillait Madame Gr&eacute;goire.<br>
+J'allais &agrave; vingt ans<br>
+Dans son cabaret rire et boire.'</blockquote>
+<p>--confound this drizzle! It soaks one through and through, like
+a sponge. If you are no fonder of getting wet through than I am, I
+vote we both run for it!"</p>
+<p>With this he set off running at full speed, and I followed.</p>
+<p>The rain soon fell faster and thicker. We had no umbrellas; and
+being by this time in a region of back-streets, an empty fiacre was
+a prize not to be hoped for. Coming presently to a dark archway, we
+took shelter and waited till the shower should pass over. It lasted
+longer than we had expected, and threatened to settle into a
+night's steady rain. M&uuml;ller kept his blood warm by practicing
+extravagant quadrille steps and singing scraps of B&eacute;ranger's
+ballads; whilst I, watching impatiently for a cab, kept peering up
+and down the street, and listening to every sound.</p>
+<p>Presently a quick footfall echoed along the wet pavement, and
+the figure of a man, dimly seen by the blurred light of the
+street-lamps, came hurrying along the other side of the way.
+Something in the firm free step, in the upright carriage, in the
+height and build of the passer-by, arrested my attention. He drew
+nearer. He passed under the lamp just opposite, and, as he passed,
+flung away the end of his cigar, which fell, hissing, into the
+little rain-torrent running down the middle of the street. He
+carried no umbrella; but his hat was pulled low, and his collar
+drawn up, and I could see nothing of his face. But the gesture was
+enough.</p>
+<p>For a moment I stood still and looked after him; then, calling
+to M&uuml;ller that I should be back presently, I darted off in
+pursuit.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XLIX."></a>CHAPTER XLIX.</h2>
+<h3>THE KING OF DIAMONDS.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>The rain beat in my face and almost blinded me, the wind hustled
+me; the gendarme at the corner of the street looked at me
+suspiciously; and still I followed, and still the tall stranger
+strode on ahead. Up one street he led me and down another, across a
+market-place, through an arcade, past the Bourse, and into that
+labyrinth of small streets that lies behind the Italian
+Opera-house, and is bounded on the East by the Rue de Richelieu,
+and on the West by the Rue Louis le Grand. Here he slackened his
+pace, and I found myself gaming upon him for the first time.
+Presently he came to a dead stop, and as I continued to draw
+nearer, I saw him take out his watch and look at it by the light of
+a street-lamp. This done, he began sauntering slowly backwards and
+forwards, as if waiting for some second person.</p>
+<p>For a moment I also paused, hesitating. What should I do?--pass
+him under the lamp, and try to see his face? Go boldly up to him,
+and invent some pretence to address him, or wait in this angle of
+deep shade, and see what would happen next? I was deceived, of
+course--deceived by a merely accidental resemblance. Well, then, I
+should have had my run for my pains, and have taken cold, most
+likely, into the bargain. At all events, I would speak to him.</p>
+<p>Seeing me emerge from the darkness, and cross over towards the
+spot where he was standing, he drew aside with the air of a man
+upon his guard, and put his hand quickly into his breast.</p>
+<p>"I beg your pardon, Monsieur," I began.</p>
+<p>"What! my dear Damon!--is it you?" he interrupted, and held out
+both hands.</p>
+<p>I grasped them joyously.</p>
+<p>"Dalrymple, is it you?"</p>
+<p>"Myself, Damon--<i>faute de mieux</i>."</p>
+<p>"And I have been running after you for the last two miles! What
+brings you to Paris? Why did you not let me know you were here? How
+long have you been back? Has anything gone wrong? Are you
+well?"</p>
+<p>"One question at a time, my Arcadian, for mercy's sake!" said
+he. "Which am I to answer?"</p>
+<p>"The last."</p>
+<p>"Oh, I am well--well enough. But let us walk on a little farther
+while we talk."</p>
+<p>"Are you waiting for any one?" I asked, seeing him look round
+uneasily.</p>
+<p>"Yes--no--that is, I expect to see some one come past here
+presently. Step into this doorway, and I will tell you all about
+it."</p>
+<p>His manner was restless, and his hand, as it pressed mine, felt
+hot and feverish.</p>
+<p>"I am sure you are not well," I said, following him into the
+gloom of a deep, old-fashioned doorway.</p>
+<p>"Am I not? Well, I don't know--perhaps I am not. My blood burns
+in my veins to-night like fire. Nay, thou wilt learn nothing from
+my pulse, thou sucking &AElig;sculapius! Mine is a sickness not to
+be cured by drugs. I must let blood for it."</p>
+<p>The short, hard laugh with which he said this troubled me still
+more.</p>
+<p>"Speak out," I said--"for Heaven's sake, speak out! You have
+something on your mind--what is it?"</p>
+<p>"I have something on my hands," he replied, gloomily. "Work.
+Work that must be done quickly, or there will be no peace for any
+of us. Look here, Damon--if you had a wife, and another man stood
+before the world as her betrothed husband--if you had a wife, and
+another man spoke of her as his--boasted of her--behaved in the
+house as if it were already his own--treated her servants as though
+he were their master--possessed himself of her papers--extorted
+money from her--brought his friends, on one pretext or another,
+about her house--tormented her, day after day, to marry him ...
+what would you do to such a man as this?"</p>
+<p>"Make my own marriage public at once, and set him at defiance,"
+I replied.</p>
+<p>"Ay, but...."</p>
+<p>"But what?"</p>
+<p>"That alone will not content me. I must punish him with my own
+hand."</p>
+<p>"He would be punished enough in the loss of the lady and her
+fortune."</p>
+<p>"Not he! He has entangled her affairs sufficiently by this time
+to indemnify himself for her fortune, depend on it. And as for
+herself--pshaw! he does not know what love is!"</p>
+<p>"But his pride----"</p>
+<p>"But <i>my</i> pride!" interrupted Dalrymple, passionately.
+"What of my pride?--my wounded honor?--my outraged love? No, no, I
+tell you, it is not such a paltry vengeance that will satisfy me!
+Would to Heaven I had trusted only my own arm from the first! Would
+to Heaven that, instead of having anything to say to the cursed
+brood of the law, I had taken the viper by the throat, and brought
+him to my own terms, after my own fashion!"</p>
+<p>"But you have not yet told me what you are doing here?"</p>
+<p>"I am waiting to see Monsieur de Simoncourt."</p>
+<p>"Monsieur de Simoncourt!"</p>
+<p>"Yes. That white house at the corner is one of his haunts,--a
+private gaming-house, never open till after midnight. I want to
+meet him accidentally, as he is going in."</p>
+<p>"What for?"</p>
+<p>"That he may take me with him. You can't get into one of these
+places without an introduction, you know. Those who keep them are
+too much afraid of the police."</p>
+<p>"But do you play?"</p>
+<p>"Come with me, and see. Hark! do you hear nothing?"</p>
+<p>"Yes, I hear a footstep. And here comes a man."</p>
+<p>"Let us walk to meet him, accidentally, and seem to be
+talking."</p>
+<p>I took Dalrymple's arm, and we strolled in the direction of the
+new comer. It was not De Simoncourt, however, but a tall man with a
+grizzled beard, who crossed over, apprehensively, at our approach,
+but recrossed and went into the white house at the corner as soon
+as he thought us out of sight.</p>
+<p>"One of the gang," said Dalrymple, with a shrug of his broad
+shoulders. "We had better go back to our doorway, and wait till the
+right man comes."</p>
+<p>We had not long to wait. The next arrival was he whom we sought.
+We strolled on, as before, and came upon him face to face.</p>
+<p>"De Simoncourt, by all that's propitious!" cried Dalrymple.</p>
+<p>"What--Major Dalrymple returned to Paris!"</p>
+<p>"Ay, just returned. Bored to death with Berlin and Vienna--no
+place like Paris, De Simoncourt, go where one will!"</p>
+<p>"None, indeed. There is but one Paris, and pleasure is the true
+profit of all who visit it."</p>
+<p>"My dear De Simoncourt, I am appalled to hear you perpetrate a
+pun! By the way, you have met Mr. Basil Arbuthnot at my rooms?"</p>
+<p>M. de Simoncourt lifted his hat, and was graciously pleased to
+remember the circumstance.</p>
+<p>"And now," pursued Dalrymple, "having met, what shall, we do
+next? Have you any engagement for the small hours, De
+Simoncourt?"</p>
+<p>"I am quite at your disposal. Where were your bound for?"</p>
+<p>"Anywhere--everywhere. I want excitement."</p>
+<p>"Would a hand at <i>&eacute;cart&eacute;</i>, or a green table,
+have any attraction for you?" suggested De Simoncourt, falling into
+the trap as readily as one could have desired.</p>
+<p>"The very thing, if you know where they are to be found!"</p>
+<p>"Nay, I need not take you far to find both. There is in this
+very street a house where money may be lost and won as easily as at
+the Bourse. Follow me."</p>
+<p>He took us to the white house at the corner, and, pressing a
+spring concealed in the wood-work of the lintel, rung a bell of
+shrill and peculiar <i>timbre</i>. The door opened immediately,
+and, after we had passed in, closed behind us without any visible
+agency. Still following at the heels of M. de Simoncourt, we then
+went up a spacious staircase dimly lighted, and, leaving our hats
+in an ante-room, entered unannounced into an elegant <i>salon</i>,
+where some twenty or thirty <i>habitu&eacute;s</i> of both sexes
+had already commenced the business of the evening. The ladies, of
+whom there were not more than half-a-dozen, were all more or less
+painted, <i>pass&eacute;es</i>, and showily dressed. Among the men
+were military stocks, ribbons, crosses, stars, and fine titles in
+abundance. We were evidently supposed to be in very brilliant
+society--brilliant, however, with a fictitious lustre that betrayed
+the tinsel beneath, and reminded one of a fashionable reception on
+the boards of the Haymarket or the Porte St. Martin. The mistress
+of the house, an abundant and somewhat elderly Juno in green
+velvet, with a profusion of jewelry on her arms and bosom, came
+forward to receive us.</p>
+<p>"Madame de Sainte Amaranthe, permit me to present my friends,
+Major Dalrymple and Mr. Arbuthnot," said De Simoncourt, imprinting
+a gallant kiss on the plump hand of the hostess.</p>
+<p>Madame de Ste. Amaranthe professed herself charmed to receive
+any friends of M. de Simoncourt; whereupon M. de Simoncourt's
+friends were enchanted to be admitted to the privilege of Madame de
+Ste. Amaranthe's acquaintance. Madame de Ste. Amaranthe then
+informed us that she was the widow of a general officer who fell at
+Austerlitz, and the daughter of a rich West India planter whom she
+called her <i>p&egrave;re ador&eacute;</i>, and to whose
+supposititious memory she wiped away an imaginary tear with an
+embroidered pocket-handkerchief. She then begged that we would make
+ourselves at home, and, gliding away, whispered something in De
+Simoncourt's ear, to which he replied by a nod of intelligence.</p>
+<p>"That harpy hopes to fleece us," said Dalrymple, slipping his
+arm through mine and drawing me towards the roulette table. "She
+has just told De Simoncourt to take us in hand. I always suspected
+the fellow was a Greek."</p>
+<p>"A Greek?"</p>
+<p>"Ay, in the figurative sense--a gentleman who lives by dexterity
+at cards."</p>
+<p>"And shall you play?"</p>
+<p>"By-and-by. Not yet, because--"</p>
+<p>He checked himself, and looked anxiously round the room.</p>
+<p>"Because what?"</p>
+<p>"Tell me, Arbuthnot," said he, paying no attention to my
+question; "do <i>you</i> mind playing?"</p>
+<p>"I? My dear fellow, I hardly know one card from another."</p>
+<p>"But have you any objection?"</p>
+<p>"None whatever to the game; but a good deal to the penalty. I
+don't mind confessing to you that I ran into debt some months back,
+and that...."</p>
+<p>"Nonsense, boy!" interrupted Dalrymple, with a kindly smile. "Do
+you suppose I want you to gamble away your money? No, no--the fact
+is, that I am here for a purpose, and it will not do to let my
+purpose be suspected. These Greeks want a pigeon. Will you oblige
+me by being that pigeon, and by allowing me to pay for your
+plucking?"</p>
+<p>I still hesitated.</p>
+<p>"But you will be helping me," urged he. "If you don't sit down,
+I must."</p>
+<p>"You would not lose so much," I expostulated.</p>
+<p>"Perhaps not, if I were cool and kept my eyes open; but to-night
+I am <i>distrait</i>, and should be as defenceless as
+yourself."</p>
+<p>"In that case I will play for you with pleasure."</p>
+<p>He slipped a little pocket-book into my hand.</p>
+<p>"Never stake more than five francs at a time," said he, "and you
+cannot ruin me. The book contains a thousand. You shall have more,
+if necessary; but I think that sum will last as long as I shall
+want you to keep playing."</p>
+<p>"A thousand francs!" I exclaimed. "Why, that is forty
+pounds!"</p>
+<p>"If it were four hundred, and it answered my purpose," said
+Dalrymple, between his teeth, "I should hold it money well
+spent!"</p>
+<p>At this moment De Simoncourt came up, and apologized for having
+left us so long.</p>
+<p>"If you want mere amusement, Major Dalrymple," said he, "I
+suppose you will prefer <i>roulette</i> to
+<i>&eacute;cart&eacute;</i>!"</p>
+<p>"I will stake a few pieces presently on the green cloth,"
+replied Dalrymple, carelessly; "but, first of all, I want to
+initiate my young friend here. As to double
+<i>&eacute;cart&eacute;</i>, Monsieur de Simoncourt, I need hardly
+tell you, as a man of the world, that I never play it with
+strangers."</p>
+<p>De Simoncourt smiled, and shrugged his shoulders.</p>
+<p>"Quite right," said he. "I believe that here everything is
+really <i>de bonne foi</i>; but where there are cards there will
+always be danger. For my part, I always shuffle the pack after my
+adversary!"</p>
+<p>With this he strolled off again, and I took a vacant chair at
+the long table, next to a lady, who made way for me with the most
+gracious smile imaginable. Only the players sat; so Dalrymple stood
+behind me and looked on. It was a green board, somewhat larger than
+an ordinary billiard-table, with mysterious boundaries traced here
+and there in yellow and red, and a cabalistic table of figures
+towards each end. A couple of well-dressed men sat in the centre;
+one to deal out the cards, and the other to pay and receive the
+money. The one who had the management of the cash wore a superb
+diamond ring, and a red and green ribbon at his button-hole.
+Dalrymple informed me in a whisper that this noble seigneur was
+Madame de Ste. Amaranthe's brother.</p>
+<p>As for the players, they all looked serious and polite enough,
+as ladies and gentlemen should, at their amusement. Some had pieces
+of card, which they pricked occasionally with a pin, according to
+the progress of the game. Some had little piles of silver, or
+sealed <i>rouleaux</i>, lying beside them. As for myself, I took
+out Dalrymple's pocket-book, and laid it beside me, as if I were an
+experienced player and meant to break the bank. For a few minutes
+he stood by, and then, having given me some idea of the leading
+principles of the game, wandered away to observe the other
+players.</p>
+<p>Left to myself, I played on--timidly at first; soon with more
+confidence; and, of course, with the novice's invariable
+good-fortune. My amiable neighbor drew me presently into
+conversation. She had a theory of chances relating to averages of
+color, and based upon a bewildering calculation of all the black
+and red cards in the pack, which she was so kind as to explain to
+me. I could not understand a word of it, but politeness compelled
+me to listen. Politeness also compelled me to follow her advice
+when she was so obliging as to offer it, and I lost, as a matter of
+course. From this moment my good-luck deserted me.</p>
+<p>"Courage, Monsieur," said my amiable neighbour; "you have only
+to play long enough, and you are sure to win."</p>
+<p>In the meantime, I kept following Dalrymple with my eyes, for
+there was something in his manner that filled me with vague
+uneasiness. Sometimes he drew near the table and threw down a
+Napoleon, but without heeding the game, or caring whether he won or
+lost. He was always looking to the door, or wandering restlessly
+from table to table. Watching him thus, I thought how haggard he
+looked, and what deep channels were furrowed in his brow since that
+day when we lay together on the autumnal grass under the trees in
+the forest of St. Germain.</p>
+<p>Thus a long time went by, and I found by my watch that it was
+nearly four o'clock in the morning--also that I had lost six
+hundred francs out of the thousand. It seemed incredible. I could
+hardly believe that the time and the money had flown so fast. I
+rose in my seat and looked round for Dalrymple; but in vain. Could
+he be gone, leaving me here? Impossible! Apprehensive of I knew not
+what, I pushed back my chair, and left the table. The rooms were
+now much fuller--more stars and moustachios; more velvets and
+laces, and Paris diamonds. Fresh tables, too, had been opened for
+<i>lansquenet, baccarat</i>, and <i>&eacute;cart&eacute;</i>. At
+one of these I saw M. de Simoncourt. When he laid down his cards
+for the deal, I seized the opportunity to inquire for my
+friend.</p>
+<p>He pointed to a small inner room divided by a rich hanging from
+the farther end of the <i>salon</i>.</p>
+<p>"You will find Major Dalrymple in Madame de Ste. Amaranthe's
+boudoir, playing with M. le Vicomte de Caylus," said he,
+courteously, and resumed his game.</p>
+<p>Playing with De Caylus! Sitting down amicably with De Caylus! I
+could not understand it.</p>
+<p>Crowded as the rooms now were, it took me some time to thread my
+way across, and longer still, when I had done so, to pass the
+threshold of the boudoir, and obtain sight of the players. The room
+was very small, and filled with lookers-on. At a table under a
+chandelier sat De Caylus and Dalrymple. I could not see Dalrymple's
+face, for his back was turned towards me; but the Vicomte I
+recognised at once--pale, slight, refined, with the old look of
+dissipation and irritability, and the same restlessness of eye and
+hand that I had observed on first seeing him. They were evidently
+playing high, and each had a pile of notes and gold lying at his
+left hand. De Caylus kept nervously crumbling a note in his
+fingers. Dalrymple sat motionless as a man of bronze, and, except
+to throw down a card when it came to his turn, never stirred a
+finger. There was, to my thinking, something ominous in his
+exceeding calmness.</p>
+<p>"At what game are they, playing?" I asked a gentleman near whom
+I was standing.</p>
+<p>"At <i>&eacute;cart&eacute;</i>," replied he, without removing
+his eyes from the players.</p>
+<p>Knowing nothing of the game, I could only judge of its progress
+by the faces of those around me. A breathless silence prevailed,
+except when some particular subtlety in the play sent a murmur of
+admiration round the room. Even this was hushed almost as soon as
+uttered. Gradually the interest grew more intense, and the
+bystanders pressed closer. De Caylus sighed impatiently, and passed
+his hand across his brow. It was his turn to deal. Dalrymple
+shuffled the pack. De Caylus shuffled them after him, and dealt.
+The falling of a pin might have been heard in the pause that
+followed. They had but five cards each. Dalrymple played first--a
+queen of diamonds. De Caylus played the king, and both threw down
+their cards. A loud murmur broke out instantaneously in every
+direction, and De Caylus, looking excited and weary, leaned back in
+his chair, and called for wine. His expression was so unlike that
+of a victor that I thought at first he must have lost the game.</p>
+<p>"Which is the winner?" I asked, eagerly. "Which is the
+winner?"</p>
+<p>The gentleman who had replied to me before looked round with a
+smile of contemptuous wonder.</p>
+<p>"Why, Monsieur de Caylus, of course," said he. "Did you not see
+him play the king?"</p>
+<p>"I beg your pardon," I said, somewhat nettled; "but, as I said
+before, I do not understand the game."</p>
+<p>"<i>Eh bien</i>! the Englishman is counting out his money."</p>
+<p>What a changed scene it was! The circle of intent faces broken
+and shifting--the silence succeeded by a hundred conversations--De
+Caylus leaning back, sipping his wine and chatting over his
+shoulder--the cards pushed aside, and Dalrymple gravely sorting out
+little shining columns of Napoleons, and rolls of crisp bank paper!
+Having ranged all these before him in a row, he took out his
+check-book, filled in a page, tore it out and laid it with the
+rest. Then, replacing the book in his breast-pocket, he pushed back
+his chair, and, looking up for the first time since the close of
+the game, said aloud:--</p>
+<p>"Monsieur le Vicomte de Caylus, I have this evening had the
+honor of losing the sum of twelve thousand francs to you; will you
+do me the favor to count this money?"</p>
+<p>M. de Caylus bowed, emptied his glass, and languidly touching
+each little column with one dainty finger, told over his winnings
+as though they were scarcely worth even that amount of trouble.</p>
+<p>"Six rouleaux of four hundred each," said he, "making two
+thousand four hundred--six notes of five hundred each, making three
+thousand--and an order upon Rothschild for six thousand six
+hundred; in all, twelve thousand. Thanks, Monsieur ... Monsieur ...
+forgive me for not remembering your name."</p>
+<p>Dalrymple looked up with a dangerous light in his eyes, and took
+no notice of the apology.</p>
+<p>"It appears to me, Monsieur le Vicomte Caylus," said he, giving
+the other his full title and speaking with singular distinctness,
+"that you hold the king very often at
+<i>&eacute;cart&eacute;</i>."</p>
+<p>De Caylus looked up with every vein on his forehead suddenly
+swollen and throbbing.</p>
+<p>"Monsieur!" he exclaimed, hoarsely.</p>
+<p>"Especially when you deal," added Dalrymple, smoothing his
+moustache with utter <i>sang-froid</i>, and keeping his eyes still
+riveted upon his adversary.</p>
+<p>With an inarticulate cry like the cry of a wild beast, De Caylus
+sprung at him, foaming with rage, and was instantly flung back
+against the wall, dragging with him not only the table-cloth, but
+all the wine, money, and cards upon it.</p>
+<p>"I will have blood for this!" he shrieked, struggling with those
+who rushed in between. "I will have blood! Blood! Blood!"</p>
+<p>Stained and streaming with red wine, he looked, in his ghastly
+rage, as if he was already bathed in the blood he thirsted for.</p>
+<p>Dalrymple drew himself to his full height, and stood looking on
+with folded arms and a cold smile.</p>
+<p>"I am quite ready," he said, "to give Monsieur le Vicomte full
+satisfaction."</p>
+<p>The room was by this time crowded to suffocation. I forced my
+way through, and laid my hand on Dalrymple's arm.</p>
+<p>"You have provoked this quarrel," I said, reproachfully.</p>
+<p>"That, my dear fellow, is precisely what I came here to do," he
+replied. "You will have to be my second in this affair."</p>
+<p>Here De Simoncourt came up, and hearing the last words, drew me
+aside.</p>
+<p>"I act for De Caylus," he whispered. "Pistols, of course?"</p>
+<p>I nodded, still all bewilderment at my novel position.</p>
+<p>"Your man received the first blow, so is entitled to the first
+shot."</p>
+<p>I nodded again.</p>
+<p>"I don't know a better place," he went on, "than Bellevue.
+There's a famous little bit of plantation, and it is just far
+enough from Paris to be secure. The Bois is hackneyed, and the
+police are too much about it.</p>
+<p>"Just so," I replied, vaguely.</p>
+<p>"And when shall we say? The sooner the better, it always seems
+to me, in these cases."</p>
+<p>"Oh, certainly--the sooner the better."</p>
+<p>He looked at his watch.</p>
+<p>"It is now ten minutes to five," he said. "Suppose we allow them
+five hours to put their papers in order, and meet at Bellevue, on
+the terrace, at ten?"</p>
+<p>"So soon!" I exclaimed.</p>
+<p>"Soon!" echoed De Simoncourt. "Why, under circumstances of such
+exceeding aggravation, most men would send for pistols and settle
+it across the table!"</p>
+<p>I shuddered. These niceties of honor were new to me, and I had
+been brought up to make little distinction between duelling and
+murder.</p>
+<p>"Be it so, then, Monsieur De Simoncourt," I said. "We will meet
+you at Bellevue, at ten."</p>
+<p>"On the terrace?"</p>
+<p>"On the terrace."</p>
+<p>We bowed and parted. Dalrymple was already gone, and De Caylus,
+still white and trembling with rage, was wiping the wine from his
+face and shirt. The crowd opened for me right and left as I went
+through the <i>salon</i>, and more than one voice whispered:--</p>
+<p>"He is the Englishman's second."</p>
+<p>I took my hat and cloak mechanically, and let myself out. It was
+broad daylight, and the blinding sun poured full upon my eyes as I
+passed into the street.</p>
+<p>"Come, Damon," said Dalrymple, crossing over to me from the
+opposite side of the way. "I have just caught a cab--there it is,
+waiting round the corner! We've no time to lose, I'll be
+bound."</p>
+<p>"We are to meet them at Bellevue at ten," I replied.</p>
+<p>"At ten? Hurrah! then I've still five certain hours of life
+before me! Long enough, Damon, to do a world of mischief, if one
+were so disposed!"</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_L."></a>CHAPTER L.</h2>
+<h3>THE DUEL AT BELLEVUE.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>We drove straight to Dalrymple's rooms, and, going in with a
+pass-key, went up without disturbing the <i>concierge</i>. Arrived
+at home, my friend's first act was to open his buffetier and take
+out a loaf, a <i>pat&eacute; de foie gras</i>, and a bottle of
+wine. I could not eat a morsel; but he supped (or breakfasted) with
+a capital appetite; insisted that I should lie down on his bed for
+two or three hours; and slipping into his dressing-gown, took out
+his desk and cash-box, and settled himself to a regular morning's
+work.</p>
+<p>"I hope to get a nap myself before starting," said he. "I have
+not many debts, and I made my will the day after I married--so I
+have but little to transact in the way of business. A few letters
+to write--a few to burn--a trifle or two to seal up and direct to
+one or two fellows who may like a <i>souven&iacute;r</i>,--that is
+the extent of my task! Meanwhile, my dear boy, get what rest you
+can. It will never do to be shaky and pale on the field, you
+know."</p>
+<p>I went, believing that I should be less in his way; and, lying
+down in my clothes, fell into a heavy sleep, from which, after what
+seemed a long time, I woke suddenly with the conviction that it was
+just ten o'clock. To start up, look at my watch, find that it was
+only a quarter to seven and fall profoundly asleep again, was the
+work of only a few minutes. At the end of another half-hour I woke
+with the same dread, and with the same result; and so on twice or
+thrice after, till at a quarter to nine I jumped up, plunged my
+head into a basin of cold water, and went back to the
+sitting-room.</p>
+<p>I found him lying forward upon the table, fast asleep, with his
+head resting on his hands. Some half-dozen letters lay folded and
+addressed beside him--one directed to his wife. A little pile of
+burnt paper fluttered on the hearth. His pistols were lying close
+by in their mahogany case, the blue and white steel relieved
+against the crimson-velvet lining. He slept so soundly, poor
+fellow, that I could with difficulty make up my mind to wake him.
+Once roused, however, he was alert and ready in a moment, changed
+his coat, took out a new pair of lavender gloves, hailed a cab from
+the window, and bade the driver name his own fare if he got us to
+the terrace at Bellevue by five minutes before ten.</p>
+<p>"I always like to be before my time in a matter of this kind,
+Damon," said he. "It's shabby to be merely punctual when one has,
+perhaps, not more than a quarter of an hour to live. By-the-by,
+here are my keys. Take them, in case of accident. You will find a
+copy of my will in my desk---the original is with my lawyer. The
+letters you will forward, according to the addresses; and in my
+cash-box you will find a paper directed to yourself."</p>
+<p>I bent my head. I would not trust myself to speak. "As for the
+letter to H&eacute;l&egrave;ne--to my wife," he said, turning his
+face away, "will you--will you deliver that with your own
+hands?"</p>
+<p>"I will."</p>
+<p>"I--I have had but little time to write it," he faltered, "and I
+trust to you to supply the details. Tell her how I made the
+quarrel, and how it ended. No one suspects it to be other than a
+<i>fracas</i> over a game at <i>&eacute;cart&eacute;</i>. No one
+supposes that I had any other motive, or any deeper vengeance--not
+even De Caylus! I have not compromised her by word or deed. If I
+shoot him, I free her without a breath of scandal. If I fall--"</p>
+<p>His voice failed, and we were both silent for some moments</p>
+<p>We were now past the Barrier, and speeding on rapidly towards
+the open country. High white houses with jalousies closed against
+the sun, and pretty maisonnettes in formal gardens, succeeded the
+streets and shops of suburban Paris. Then came a long country road
+bordered by poplars--by-and-by, glimpses of the Seine, and
+scattered farms and villages far away--then S&egrave;vres and the
+leafy heights of Bellevue overhanging the river.</p>
+<p>We crossed the bridge, and the driver, mindful of his fare,
+urged on his tired horse. Some country folks met us presently, and
+a wagoner with a load of fresh hay. They all smiled and gave us
+"good-day" as we passed--they going to their work in the fields,
+and we to our work of bloodshed!</p>
+<p>Shortly after this, the road began winding upwards, past the
+porcelain factories and through the village of S&egrave;vres; after
+which, having but a short distance of very steep road to climb, we
+desired the cabman to wait, and went up on foot. Arrived at the
+top, where a peep of blue daylight came streaming down upon us
+through a green tunnel of acacias, we emerged all at once upon the
+terrace, and found ourselves first on the field. Behind us rose a
+hillside of woods--before us, glassy and glittering, as if traced
+upon the transparent air, lay the city of palaces. Domes and
+spires, arches and columns of triumph, softened by distance, looked
+as if built of the sunshine. Far away on one side stretched the
+Bois de Boulogne, undulating like a sea of tender green. Still
+farther away on the other, lay P&egrave;re-la-Chaise--a dark hill
+specked with white; cypresses and tombs. At our feet, winding round
+a "lawny islet" and through a valley luxuriant in corn-fields and
+meadows, flowed the broad river, bluer than the sky.</p>
+<p>"A fine sight, Damon!" said Dalrymple, leaning on the parapet,
+and coolly lighting a cigar. "If my eyes are never to open on the
+day again, I am glad they should have rested for the last time on a
+scene of so much beauty! Where is the painter who could paint it?
+Not Claude himself, though he should come back to life on purpose,
+and mix his colors with liquid sunlight!"</p>
+<p>"You are a queer fellow," said I, "to talk of scenery and
+painters at such a moment!"</p>
+<p>"Not at all. Things are precious according to the tenure by
+which we hold them. For my part, I do not know when I appreciated
+earth and sky so heartily as this morning. <i>Tiens!</i> here comes
+a carriage--our men, no doubt."</p>
+<p>"Are you a good shot?" I asked anxiously.</p>
+<p>"Pretty well. I can write my initials in bullet-holes on a sheet
+of notepaper at forty paces, or toss up half-a-crown as I ride at
+full gallop, and let the daylight through it as it comes down."</p>
+<p>"Thank Heaven!"</p>
+<p>"Not so fast, my boy. De Caylus is just as fine a shot, and one
+of the most skilful swordsmen in the French service."</p>
+<p>"Ay, but the first fire is yours!"</p>
+<p>"Is it? Well, I suppose it is. He struck the first blow, and
+so--here they come."</p>
+<p>"One more word, Dalrymple--did he really cheat you at
+<i>&eacute;cart&eacute;?</i>"</p>
+<p>"Upon my soul, I don't know. He did hold the king very often,
+and there are some queer stories told of him in Vienna by the
+officers of the Emperor's Guard. At all events, this is not the
+first duel he has had to fight in defence of his good-fortune!"</p>
+<p>De Simoncourt now coming forward, we adjourned at once to the
+wood behind the village. A little open glade was soon found; the
+ground was soon measured; the pistols were soon loaded. De Caylus
+looked horribly pale, but it was the pallor of concentrated rage,
+with nothing of the craven hue in it. Dalrymple, on the contrary,
+had neither more nor less color than usual, and puffed away at his
+cigar with as much indifference as if he were waiting his turn at
+the pit of the Com&eacute;die Fran&ccedil;aise. Both were clothed
+in black from head to foot, with their coats buttoned to the
+chin.</p>
+<p>"All is ready," said De Simoncourt. "Gentlemen, choose your
+weapons."</p>
+<p>De Caylus took his pistols one by one, weighed and poised them,
+examined the priming, and finally, after much hesitation,
+decided.</p>
+<p>Dalrymple took the first that came to hand.</p>
+<p>The combatants then took their places--De Caylus with his hat
+pulled low over his eyes; Dalrymple still smoking carelessly.</p>
+<p>They exchanged bows.</p>
+<p>"Major Dalrymple," said De Simoncourt, "it is for you to fire
+first."</p>
+<p>"God bless you, Damon!" said my friend, shaking me warmly by the
+hand.</p>
+<p>He then half turned aside, flung away the end of his cigar,
+lifted his right arm suddenly, and fired.</p>
+<p>I heard the dull thud of the ball--I saw De Caylus fling up his
+arms and fall forward on the grass. I saw Dalrymple running to his
+assistance. The next instant, however, the wounded man was on his
+knees, ghastly and bleeding, and crying for his pistol.</p>
+<p>"Give it me!" he gasped--"hold me up! I--I will have his life
+yet! So, steady--steady!"</p>
+<p>Shuddering, but not for his own danger, Dalrymple stepped calmly
+back to his place; while De Caylus, supported by his second,
+struggled to his feet and grasped his weapon. For a moment he once
+more stood upright. His eye burned; his lips contracted; he seemed
+to gather up all his strength for one last effort. Slowly,
+steadily, surely, he raised his pistol--then swaying heavily back,
+fired, and fell again.</p>
+<p>"Dead this time, sure enough," said De Simoncourt, bending over
+him.</p>
+<p>"Indeed, I fear so," replied Dalrymple, in a low, grave voice.
+"Can we do nothing to help you, Monsieur de Simoncourt?"</p>
+<p>"Nothing, thank you. I have a carriage down the road, and must
+get further assistance from the village. You had better lose no
+time in leaving Paris."</p>
+<p>"I suppose not. Good-morning."</p>
+<p>"Good-morning,"</p>
+<p>So we lifted our hats; gathered up the pistols; hurried out of
+the wood and across a field, so avoiding the village; found our cab
+waiting where we had left it; and in less than five minutes, were
+rattling down the dusty hill again and hurrying towards Paris.</p>
+<p>Once in the cab, Dalrymple began hastily pulling off his coat
+and waistcoat. I was startled to see his shirt-front stained with
+blood.</p>
+<p>"Heavens!" I exclaimed, "you are not wounded?"</p>
+<p>"Very slightly. De Caylus was too good a shot to miss me
+altogether. Pshaw! 'tis nothing--a mere graze--not even the bullet
+left in it!"</p>
+<p>"If it had been a little more to the left...." I faltered.</p>
+<p>"If he had fired one second sooner, or lived one second longer,
+he would have had me through the heart, as sure as there's a heaven
+above us!" said Dalrymple.</p>
+<p>Then, suddenly changing his tone, he added, laughingly--</p>
+<p>"Nonsense, Damon! cheer up, and help me to tear this
+handkerchief into bandages. Now's the time to show off your
+surgery, my little &AElig;sculapius. By Jupiter, life's a capital
+thing, after all!"</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_LI."></a>CHAPTER LI.</h2>
+<h3>THE PORTRAIT.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>Having seen Dalrymple to his lodgings and dressed his wound,
+which was, in truth, but a very slight one, I left him and went
+home, promising to return in a few hours, and help him with his
+packing; for we both agreed that he must leave Paris that evening,
+come what might.</p>
+<p>It was now close upon two o'clock, and I had been out since
+between three and four the previous afternoon--not quite
+twenty-four hours, in point of actual time; but a week, a month, a
+year, in point of sensation! Had I not seen a man die since that
+hour yesterday?</p>
+<p>Walking homewards through the garish streets in the hot
+afternoon, all the strange scenes in which I had just been an actor
+thronged fantastically upon my memory. The joyous dinner with Franz
+M&uuml;ller; the busy Temple; the noisy theatre; the long chase
+through the wet streets at midnight; the crowded gaming-house; the
+sweet country drive at early morning; the quiet wood, and the dead
+man lying on his back, with the shadows of the leaves upon his
+face,--all this, in strange distinctness, came between me and the
+living tide of the Boulevards.</p>
+<p>And now, over-tired and over-excited as I was, I remembered for
+the first time that I had eaten nothing since half-past five that
+morning. And then I also remembered that I had left M&uuml;ller
+waiting for me under the archway, without a word of explanation. I
+promised myself that I would write to him as soon as I got home,
+and in the meantime turned in at the first Caf&eacute; to which I
+came and called for breakfast. But when the breakfast was brought,
+I could not eat it. The coffee tasted bitter to me. The meat stuck
+in my throat. I wanted rest more than food--rest of body and mind,
+and the forgetfulness of sleep! So I paid my bill, and, leaving the
+untasted meal, went home like a man in a dream.</p>
+<p>Madame Bou&iuml;sse was not in her little lodge as I passed
+it--neither was my key on its accustomed hook. I concluded that she
+was cleaning my rooms, and so, going upstairs, found my door open.
+Hearing my own name, however, I paused involuntarily upon the
+threshold.</p>
+<p>"And so, as I was saying," pursued a husky voice, which I knew
+at once to be the property of Madame Bou&iuml;sse, "M'sieur Basil's
+friend painted it on purpose for him; and I am sure if he was as
+good a Catholic as the Holy Father himself, and that picture was a
+true portrait of our Blessed Lady, he could not worship it more
+devoutly. I believe he says his prayers to it, mam'selle! I often
+find it in the morning stuck up by the foot of his bed; and when he
+comes home of an evening to study his books and papers, it always
+stands on a chair just in front of his table, so that he can see it
+without turning his head, every time he lifts his eyes from the
+writing!"</p>
+<p>In the murmured reply that followed, almost inaudible though it
+was, my ear distinguished a tone that set my heart beating.</p>
+<p>"Well, I can't tell, of course," said Madame Bou&iuml;sse, in
+answer, evidently, to the remark just made; "but if mam'selle will
+only take the trouble to look in the glass, and then look at the
+picture, she will see how like it is. For my part, I believe it to
+be that, and nothing else. Do you suppose I don't know the
+symptoms? <i>Dame!</i> I have eyes, as well as my neighbors; and
+you may take my word for it, mam'selle, that poor young gentleman
+is just as much in love as ever a man was in this world!"</p>
+<p>"No more of this, if you please, Madame Bou&iuml;sse," said
+Hortense, so distinctly that I could no longer be in doubt as to
+the speaker.</p>
+<p>I stayed to hear no more; but retreating softly down the first
+flight of stairs, came noisily up again, and went straight into my
+rooms, saying:--</p>
+<p>"Madame Bou&iuml;sse, are you here?"</p>
+<p>"Not only Madame Bou&iuml;sse, but an intruder who implores
+forgiveness," said Hortense, with a frank smile, but a heightened
+color.</p>
+<p>I bowed profoundly. No need to tell her she was welcome--my face
+spoke for me.</p>
+<p>"It was Madame Bou&iuml;sse who lured me in," continued she, "to
+look at that painting."</p>
+<p>"<i>Mais, oui!</i> I told mam'selle you had her portrait in your
+sitting-room," laughed the fat <i>concierge,</i> leaning on her
+broom. "I'm sure it's quite like enough to be hers, bless her sweet
+face!"</p>
+<p>I felt myself turn scarlet. To hide my confusion I took the
+picture down, and carried it to the window.</p>
+<p>"You will see it better by this light," I said, pretending to
+dust it with my handkerchief. "It is worth a close
+examination."</p>
+<p>Hortense knelt down, and studied it for some moments in
+silence.</p>
+<p>"It must be a copy," she said, presently, more to herself than
+me--"it must be a copy."</p>
+<p>"It <i>is</i> a copy," I replied. "The original is at the
+Ch&acirc;teau de Sainte Aulaire, near Montlh&eacute;ry."</p>
+<p>"May I ask how you came by it?"</p>
+<p>"A friend of mine, who is an artist, copied it."</p>
+<p>"Then it was done especially for you?"</p>
+<p>"Just so."</p>
+<p>"And, no doubt, you value it?"</p>
+<p>"More than anything I possess!"</p>
+<p>Then, fearing I had said too much, I added:--</p>
+<p>"If I had not admired the original very much, I should not have
+wished for a copy."</p>
+<p>She shifted the position of the picture in such a manner that,
+standing where I did, I could no longer see her face.</p>
+<p>"Then you have seen the original," she said, in a low tone.</p>
+<p>"Undoubtedly--and you?"</p>
+<p>"Yes, I have seen it; but not lately."</p>
+<p>There was a brief pause.</p>
+<p>"Madame Bou&iuml;sse thinks it so like yourself, mademoiselle,"
+I said, timidly, "that it might almost be your portrait."</p>
+<p>"I can believe it," she answered. "It is very like my
+mother."</p>
+<p>Her voice faltered; and, still kneeling, she dropped her face in
+her hands, and wept silently.</p>
+<p>Madame Bou&iuml;sse, in the meantime, had gone into my
+bedchamber, where she was sweeping and singing to herself with the
+door three parts closed, believing, no doubt, that she was
+affording me the opportunity to make a formal declaration.</p>
+<p>"Alas! mademoiselle," I said, hesitatingly, "I little
+thought..."</p>
+<p>She rose, dashed the tears aside, and, holding out her hand to
+me, said, kindly--</p>
+<p>"It is no fault of yours, fellow-student, if I remind you of the
+portrait, or if the portrait reminds me of one whom it resembles
+still more nearly. I am sorry to have troubled your kind heart with
+my griefs. It is not often that they rise to the surface."</p>
+<p>I raised her hand reverently to my lips.</p>
+<p>"But you are looking worn and ill yourself," she added. "Is
+anything the matter?"</p>
+<p>"Not now," I replied. "But I have been up all night, and--and I
+am very tired."</p>
+<p>"Was this in your professional capacity?"</p>
+<p>"Not exactly--and yet partly so. I have been more a looker-on
+than an active agent--and I have witnessed a frightful
+death-scene."</p>
+<p>She sighed, and shook her head.</p>
+<p>"You are not of the stuff that surgeons are made of,
+fellow-student," she said, kindly. "Instead of prescribing for
+others, you need some one to prescribe for you. Why, your hand is
+quite feverish. You should go to bed, and keep quiet for the next
+twelve hours."</p>
+<p>"I will lie down for a couple of hours when Madame Bou&iuml;sse
+is gone; but I must be up and out again at six."</p>
+<p>"Nay, that is in three hours."</p>
+<p>"I cannot help it. It is my duty."</p>
+<p>"Then I have no more to say. Would you drink some lemonade, if I
+made it for you?"</p>
+<p>"I would drink poison, if you made it for me!"</p>
+<p>"A decidedly misplaced enthusiasm!" laughed she, and left the
+room.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_LII."></a>CHAPTER LII.</h2>
+<h3>NEWS FROM ENGLAND.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>It was a glorious morning--first morning of the first week in
+the merry month of June--as I took my customary way to Dr.
+Ch&eacute;ron's house in the Faubourg St. Germain. I had seen
+Dalrymple off by the night train the evening previous, and,
+refreshed by a good night's rest, had started somewhat earlier than
+usual, for the purpose of taking a turn in the Luxembourg Gardens
+before beginning my day's work.</p>
+<p>There the blossoming parterres, the lavish perfume from
+geranium-bed and acacia-blossom, and the mad singing of the little
+birds up among the boughs, set me longing for a holiday. I thought
+of Saxonholme, and the sweet English woodlands round about. I
+thought how pleasant it would be to go home to dear Old England, if
+only for ten days, and surprise my father in his quiet study. What
+if I asked Dr. Ch&eacute;ron to spare me for a fortnight?</p>
+<p>Turning these things over in my mind, I left the gardens, and,
+arriving presently at the well-known Porte Coch&egrave;re in the
+Rue de Mont Parnasse, rang the great bell, crossed the dull
+courtyard, and took my usual seat at my usual desk, not nearly so
+well disposed for work as usual.</p>
+<p>"If you please, Monsieur," said the solemn servant, making his
+appearance at the door, "Monsieur le Docteur requests your presence
+in his private room."</p>
+<p>I went. Dr. Ch&eacute;ron was standing on the hearth-rug, with
+his back to the fire, and his arms folded over his breast. An open
+letter, bordered broadly with black, lay upon his desk. Although
+distant some two yards from the table, his eyes were fixed upon
+this paper. When I came in he looked up, pointed to a seat, but
+himself remained standing and silent.</p>
+<p>"Basil Arbuthnot," he said, after a pause of some minutes, "I
+have this morning received a letter from England, by the early
+post."</p>
+<p>"From my father, sir?"</p>
+<p>"No. From a stranger,"</p>
+<p>He looked straight at me as he said this, and hesitated.</p>
+<p>"But it contains news," he added, "that--that much concerns
+you."</p>
+<p>There was a fixed gravity about the lines of his handsome mouth,
+and an unwonted embarrassment in his manner, that struck me with
+apprehension.</p>
+<p>"Good news, I--I hope, sir," I faltered.</p>
+<p>"Bad news, my young friend," said he, compassionately. "News
+that you must meet like a man, with fortitude--with resignation.
+Your father--your excellent father--my honored friend--"</p>
+<p>He pointed to the letter and turned away.</p>
+<p>I rose up, sat down, rose up again, reached out a trembling hand
+for the letter, and read the loss that my heart had already
+presaged.</p>
+<p>My father was dead.</p>
+<p>Well as ever in the morning, he had been struck with apoplexy in
+the afternoon, and died in a few hours, apparently without
+pain.</p>
+<p>The letter was written by our old family lawyer, and concluded
+with the request that Dr. Ch&eacute;ron would "break the melancholy
+news to Mr. Basil Arbuthnot, who would doubtless return to England
+for the funeral."</p>
+<p>My tears fell one by one upon the open letter. I had loved my
+father tenderly in my heart. His very roughnesses and
+eccentricities were dear to me. I could not believe that he was
+gone. I could not believe that I should never hear his voice
+again!</p>
+<p>Dr. Ch&eacute;ron came over, and laid his hand upon my
+shoulder.</p>
+<p>"Come," he said, "you have much to do, and must soon be on your
+way. The express leaves at midday. It is now ten, you have only two
+hours left."</p>
+<p>"My poor father!"</p>
+<p>"Brunet," continued the Doctor, "shall go back with you to your
+lodgings and help you to pack. As for money--"</p>
+<p>He took out his pocket-book and offered me a couple of notes;
+but I shook my head and put them from me.</p>
+<p>"I have enough money, thank you," I said. "Good-bye."</p>
+<p>"Good-bye," he replied, and, for the first time in all these
+months, shook me by the hand. "You will write to me?"</p>
+<p>I bowed my head in silence, and we parted. I found a cab at the
+door, and Brunet on the box. I was soon at home again. Home! I felt
+as if I had no home now, either in France or England--as if all my
+Paris life were a brief, bright dream, and this the dreary waking.
+Hortense was out. It was one of her busy mornings, and she would
+not be back till the afternoon. It was very bitter to leave without
+one last look--one last word. I seized pen and paper, and yielding
+for the first time to all the impulses of my love, wrote, without
+weighing my words, these few brief sentences:--</p>
+<p>"I have had a heavy loss, Hortense, and by the time you open
+this letter I shall be far away. My father--my dear, good
+father--is no more. My mother died when I was a little child. I
+have no brothers--no sisters--no close family ties. I am alone in
+the world now--quite alone. My last thought here is of you. If it
+seems strange to speak of love at such a moment, forgive me, for
+that love is now my only hope. Oh, that you were here, that I might
+kiss your hand at parting, and know that some of your thoughts went
+with me! I cannot believe that you are quite indifferent to me. It
+seems impossible that, loving you as I love, so deeply, so
+earnestly, I should love in vain. When I come back I shall seek you
+here, where I have loved you so long. I shall look into your eyes
+for my answer, and read in them all the joy, or all the despair, of
+the life that lies before me. I had intended to get that portrait
+copied again for you, because you saw in it some likeness to your
+mother; but there has been no time, and ere you receive this letter
+I shall be gone. I therefore send the picture to you by the
+<i>concierge</i>. It is my parting gift to you. I can offer no
+greater proof of my love. Farewell."</p>
+<p>Once written, I dared not read the letter over. I thrust it
+under her door, and in less than five minutes was on my way to the
+station.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_LIII."></a>CHAPTER LIII.</h2>
+<h3>THE FADING OF THE RAINBOW.</h3>
+<center>I loved a love once, fairest among women;<br>
+Closed are her doors on me, I must not see her--<br>
+All, all are gone, the old familiar faces.<br>
+<br>
+LAMB.</center>
+<br>
+<p>Beautifully and truly, in the fourth book of the most poetical
+of stories, has a New World romancist described the state of a
+sorrowing lover. "All around him," saith he, "seemed dreamy and
+vague; all within him, as in a sun's eclipse. As the moon, whether
+visible or invisible, has power over the tides of the ocean, so the
+face of that lady, whether present or absent, had power over the
+tides of his soul, both by day and night, both waking and sleeping.
+In every pale face and dark eye he saw a resemblance to her; and
+what the day denied him in reality, the night gave him in
+dreams."</p>
+<p>Such was, very faithfully, my own condition of mind during the
+interval which succeeded my departure from Paris--the only
+difference being that Longfellow's hero was rejected by the woman
+he loved, and sorrowing for that rejection; whilst I, neither
+rejected nor accepted, mourned another grief, and through the tears
+of that trouble, looked forward anxiously to my uncertain
+future.</p>
+<p>I reached Saxonholme the night before my father's funeral, and
+remained there for ten days. I found myself, to my surprise, almost
+a rich man--that is to say, sufficiently independent to follow the
+bent of my inclinations as regarded the future.</p>
+<p>My first impulse, on learning the extent of my means, was to
+relinquish a career that had been from the first distasteful to
+me--my second was to leave the decision to Hortense. To please her,
+to be worthy of her, to prove my devotion to her, was what I most
+desired upon earth. If she wished to see me useful and active in my
+generation, I would do my best to be so for her sake--if, on the
+contrary, she only cared to see me content, I would devote myself
+henceforth to that life of "retired leisure" that I had always
+coveted. Could man love more honestly and heartily?</p>
+<p>One year of foreign life had wrought a marked difference in me.
+I had not observed it so much in Paris; but here, amid old scenes
+and old reminiscences, I seemed to meet the image of my former
+self, and wondered at the change 'twixt now and then. I left home,
+timid, ignorant of the world and its ways, reserved, silent, almost
+misanthropic. I came back strengthened mentally and physically.
+Studious as ever, I could yet contemplate an active career without
+positive repugnance; I knew how to meet and treat my fellow-men; I
+was acquainted with society in its most refined and most homely
+phases. I had tasted of pleasure, of disappointment, of love--of
+all that makes life earnest.</p>
+<p>As the time drew near when I should return to Paris, grief, and
+hope, and that strange reluctance which would fain defer the thing
+it most desires, perplexed and troubled me by day and night. Once
+again on the road, the past seemed more than ever dream-like, and
+Paris and Saxonholme became confused together in my mind, like the
+mingling outlines of two dissolving views.</p>
+<p>I crossed the channel this time in a thick, misting rain; pushed
+on straight for Paris, and reached the Cit&eacute; Berg&egrave;re
+in the midst of a warm and glowing afternoon. The great streets
+were crowded with carriages and foot-passengers. The trees were in
+their fullest leaf. The sun poured down on pavement and awning with
+almost tropical intensity. I dismissed my cab at the top of the Rue
+du Faubourg Montmatre, and went up to the house on foot. A
+flower-girl sat in the shade of the archway, tying up her flowers
+for the evening-sale, and I bought a cluster of white roses for
+Hortense as I went by.</p>
+<p>Madame Bou&iuml;sse was sound asleep in her little sanctum; but
+my key hung in its old place, so I took it without disturbing her,
+and went up as if I had been away only a few hours. Arrived at the
+third story, I stopped outside Hortense's door and listened. All
+was very silent within. She was out, perhaps; or writing quietly in
+the farther chamber. I thought I would leave my travelling-bag in
+my own room, and then ring boldly for admittance. I turned the key,
+and found myself once again in my own familiar, pleasant student
+home. The books and busts were there in their accustomed places;
+everything was as I had left it. Everything, except the picture!
+The picture was gone; so Hortense had accepted it.</p>
+<p>Three letters awaited me on the table; one from Dr.
+Ch&eacute;ron, written in a bold hand--a mere note of condolence:
+one from Dalrymple, dated Chamounix: the third from Hortense. I
+knew it was from her. I knew that that small, clear, upright
+writing, so singularly distinct and regular, could be only hers. I
+had never seen it before; but my heart identified it.</p>
+<p>That letter contained my fate. I took it up, laid it down, paced
+backwards and forwards, and for several minutes dared not break the
+seal. At length I opened it. It ran thus:--</p>
+<p>"FRIEND AND FELLOW-STUDENT.</p>
+<p>"I had hoped that a man such as you and a woman such as I might
+become true friends, discuss books and projects, give and take the
+lesser services of life, and yet not end by loving. In this belief,
+despite occasional misgivings, I have suffered our intercourse to
+become intimacy--our acquaintance, friendship. I see now that I was
+mistaken, and now, when it is, alas! too late, I reproach myself
+for the consequences of that mistake.</p>
+<p>"I can be nothing to you, friend. I have duties in life more
+sacred than marriage. I have a task to fulfil which is sterner than
+love, and imperative as fate. I do not say that to answer you thus
+costs me no pain. Were there even hope, I would bid you hope; but
+my labor presses heavily upon me, and repeated failure has left me
+weary and heart-sick.</p>
+<p>"You tell me in your letter that, by the time I read it, you
+will be far away. It is now my turn to repeat the same words. When
+you come back to your rooms, mine will be empty. I shall be gone;
+all I ask is, that you will not attempt to seek me.</p>
+<p>"Farewell. I accept your gift. Perhaps I act selfishly in taking
+it, but a day may come when I shall justify that selfishness to
+you. In the meantime, once again farewell. You are my only friend,
+and these are the saddest words I have ever written--forget me!</p>
+<p>"HORTENSE."</p>
+<p>I scarcely know how I felt, or what I did, on first reading this
+letter. I believe that I stood for a long time stone still,
+incapable of realizing the extent of my misfortune. By-and-by it
+seemed to rush upon me suddenly. I threw open my window, scaled the
+balcony rails, and forced my way into her rooms.</p>
+<p>Her rooms! Ah, by that window she used to sit--at that table she
+read and wrote--in that bed she slept! All around and about were
+scattered evidences of her presence. Upon the chimney-piece lay an
+envelope addressed to her name--upon the floor, some fragments of
+torn paper and some ends of cordage! The very flowers were yet
+fresh upon her balcony! The sight of these things, while they
+confirmed my despair, thawed the ice at my heart. I kissed the
+envelope that she had touched, the flowers she had tended, the
+pillow on which her head had been wont to rest. I called wildly on
+her name. I threw myself on the floor in my great agony, and wept
+aloud.</p>
+<p>I cannot tell how long I may have lain there; but it seemed like
+a lifetime. Long enough, at all events, to drink the bitter draught
+to the last drop--long enough to learn that life had now no grief
+in store for which I should weep again.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_LIV."></a>CHAPTER LIV.</h2>
+<h3>TREATETH OF MANY THINGS; BUT CHIEFLY OF BOOKS AND POETS.</h3>
+<center>Dreams, books, are each a world; and books, we know,<br>
+Are a substantial world, both pure and good.<br>
+<br>
+WORDSWORTH.</center>
+<br>
+<p>There are times when this beautiful world seems to put on a
+mourning garb, as if sympathizing, like a gentle mother, with the
+grief that consumes us; when the trees shake their arms in mute
+sorrow, and scatter their faded leaves like ashes on our heads;
+when the slow rains weep down upon us, and the very clouds look
+cold above. Then, like Hamlet the Dane, we take no pleasure in the
+life that weighs so wearily upon us, and deem "this goodly frame,
+the earth, a sterile promonotory; this most excellent canopy, the
+air, this brave, overhanging firmament, this majestical roof
+fretted with golden fire, a foul and pestilent congregation of
+vapors."</p>
+<p>So it was with me, in the heavy time that followed my return to
+Paris. I had lost everything in losing her I loved. I had no aim in
+life. No occupation. No hope. No rest. The clouds had rolled
+between me and the sun, and wrapped me in their cold shadows, and
+all was dark about me. I felt that I could say with an old
+writer--"For the world, I count it, not an inn, but an hospital;
+and a place, not to live, but to die in."</p>
+<p>Week after week I lingered in Paris, hoping against hope, and
+always seeking her. I had a haunting conviction that she was not
+far off, and that, if I only had strength to persevere, I must find
+her. Possessed by this fixed idea, I paced the sultry streets day
+after day throughout the burning months of June and July; lingered
+at dusk and early morning about the gardens of the Luxembourg, and
+such other quiet places as she might frequent; and, heedless alike
+of fatigue, or heat, or tempest, traversed the dusty city over and
+over again from barrier to barrier, in every direction.</p>
+<p>Could I but see her once more--once only! Could I but listen to
+her sweet voice, even though it bade me an eternal farewell! Could
+I but lay my lips for the last, last time upon her hand, and see
+the tender pity in her eyes, and be comforted!</p>
+<p>Seeking, waiting, sorrowing thus, I grew daily weaker and paler,
+scarcely conscious of my own failing strength, and indifferent to
+all things save one. In vain Dr. Ch&eacute;ron urged me to resume
+my studies. In vain M&uuml;ller, ever cheerful and active, came
+continually to my lodgings, seeking to divert my thoughts into
+healthier channels. In vain I received letter after letter from
+Oscar Dalrymple, imploring me to follow him to Switzerland, where
+his wife had already joined him. I shut my eyes to all alike. Study
+had grown hateful to me; M&uuml;ller's cheerfulness jarred upon me;
+Dalrymple was too happy for my companionship. Liberty to pursue my
+weary search, peace to brood over my sorrow, were all that I now
+asked. I had not yet arrived at that stage when sympathy grows
+precious.</p>
+<p>So weeks went by, and August came, and a slow conviction of the
+utter hopelessness of my efforts dawned gradually upon me. She was
+really gone. If she had been in Paris all this time pursuing her
+daily avocations, I must surely have found her. Where should I seek
+her next? What should I do with life, with time, with the
+future?</p>
+<p>I resolved, at all events, to relinquish medicine at once, and
+for ever. So I wrote a brief farewell to Dr. Ch&eacute;ron and
+another to M&uuml;ller, and without seeing either again, returned
+abruptly to England.</p>
+<p>I will not dwell on this part of my story; enough that I settled
+my affairs as quickly as might be, left an old servant in care of
+the solitary house that had been my birthplace, and turned my back
+once more on Saxonholme, perhaps for years--perhaps for ever; and
+in less than three weeks was again on my way to the Continent.</p>
+<p>The spirit of restlessness was now upon me. I had no home; I had
+no peace; and in place of the sun there was darkness. So I went
+with the thorns around my brow, and the shadow of the cross upon my
+breast. I went to suffer--to endure,--if possible, to forget. Oh,
+the grief of the soul which lives on in the night, and looks for no
+dawning! Oh, the weary weight that presses down the tired eyelids,
+and yet leaves them sleepless! Oh, the tide of alien faces, and the
+sickening remembrance of one, too dear, which may never be looked
+upon again! I carried with me the antidote to every pleasure. In
+the midst of crowds, I was alone. In the midst of novelty, the one
+thought came, and made all stale to me. Like Dr. Donne, I dwelt
+with the image of my dead self at my side.</p>
+<p>Thus for many, many months we journeyed together---I and my
+sorrow--and passed through fair and famous places, and saw the
+seasons change under new skies. To the quaint old Flemish cities
+and the Gothic Rhine--to the plains and passes of Spain--to the
+unfrequented valleys of the Tyrol and the glacier-lands of
+Switzerland I went, but still found not the forgetfulness I sought.
+As in Holbein's fresco the skeleton plays his part in every scene,
+so my trouble stalked beside me, drank of my cup, and sat grimly at
+my table. It was with me in Naples and among the orange groves of
+Sorrento. It met me amid the ruins of the Roman Forum. It travelled
+with me over the blue Mediterranean, and landed beside me on the
+shores of the Cyclades. Go where I would, it possessed and followed
+me, and brooded over my head, like the cloud that rested on the
+ark.</p>
+<p>Thinking over this period of my life, I seem to be turning the
+leaves of a rich album, or wandering through a gallery of glowing
+landscapes, and yet all the time to be dreaming. Faces grown
+familiar for a few days and never seen after--pictures photographed
+upon the memory in all their vividness--glimpses of cathedrals, of
+palaces, of ruins, of sunset and storm, sea and shore, flit before
+me for a moment, and are gone like phantasmagoria.</p>
+<p>And like phantasmagoria they impressed me at the time. Nothing
+seemed real to me. Startled, now and then, into admiration or
+wonder, my apathy fell from me like a garment, and my heart
+throbbed again as of old. But this was seldom--so seldom that I
+could almost count the times when it befell me.</p>
+<p>Thus it was that travelling did me no permanent good. It
+enlarged my experience; it undoubtedly cultivated my taste; but it
+brought me neither rest, nor sympathy, nor consolation. On the
+contrary, it widened the gulf between me and my fellow-men. I
+formed no friendships. I kept up no correspondence. A sojourner in
+hotels, I became more and more withdrawn from all tender and social
+impulses, and almost forgot the very name of home. So strong a hold
+did this morbid love of self-isolation take upon me, that I left
+Florence on one occasion, after a stay of only three days, because
+I had seen the names of a Saxonholme family among the list of
+arrivals in the Giornale Toscano.</p>
+<p>Three years went by thus--three springs--three vintages--three
+winters--till, weary of wandering, I began to ask myself "what
+next?" My old passion for books had, in the meantime, re-asserted
+itself, and I longed once more for quiet. I knew not that my
+pilgrimage was hopeless. I know that I loved her ever; that I could
+never forget her; that although the first pangs were past, I yet
+must bear</p>
+<blockquote>"All the aching of heart, the restless, unsatisfied
+longing,<br>
+All the dull, deep pain, and constant anguish of
+patience!"</blockquote>
+<p>I reasoned with myself. I resolved to be stronger--at all
+events, to be calmer. Exhausted and world-worn, I turned in thought
+to my native village among the green hills, to my deserted home,
+and the great solitary study with its busts and bookshelves, and
+its vista of neglected garden. The rooms where my mother died;
+where my father wrote; where, as a boy, I dreamed and studied,
+would at least have memories for me.</p>
+<p>Perhaps, silently underlying all these motives, I may at this
+time already have begun to entertain one other project which was
+not so much a motive as a hope--not so much a hope as a half-seen
+possibility. I had written verses from time to time all my life
+long, and of late they had come to me more abundantly than ever.
+They flowed in upon me at times like an irresistible tide; at
+others they ebbed away for weeks, and seemed as if gone for ever.
+It was a power over which I had no control, and sought to have
+none. I never tried to make verses; but, when the inspiration was
+upon me, I made them, as it were, in spite of myself. My desk was
+full of them in time--sonnets, scraps of songs, fragments of blank
+verse, attempts in all sorts of queer and rugged
+metres--hexameters, pentameters, alcaics, and the like; with, here
+and there, a dialogue out of an imaginary tragedy, or a translation
+from some Italian or German poet. This taste grew by degrees, to be
+a rare and subtle pleasure to me. My rhymes became my companions,
+and when the interval of stagnation came, I was restless and lonely
+till it passed away.</p>
+<p>At length there came an hour (I was lying, I remember, on a
+ledge of turf on a mountain-side, overlooking one of the Italian
+valleys of the Alps), when I asked myself for the first time--</p>
+<p>"Am I also a poet?"</p>
+<p>I had never dreamed of it, never thought of it, never even hoped
+it, till that moment. I had scribbled on, idly, carelessly, out of
+what seemed a mere facile impulse, correcting nothing; seldom even
+reading what I had written, after it was committed to paper. I had
+sometimes been pleased with a melodious cadence or a happy
+image--sometimes amused with my own flow of thought and readiness
+of versification; but that I, simple Basil Arbuthnot, should be,
+after all, enriched with this splendid gift of song--was it mad
+presumption, or were these things proof? I knew not; but lying on
+the parched grass of the mountain-side, I tried the question over
+in my mind, this way and that, till "my heart beat in my brain,"
+How should I come at the truth? How should I test whether this
+opening Paradise was indeed Eden, or only the mirage of my
+fancy--mere sunshine upon sand? We all write verses at some moment
+or other in our lives, even the most prosaic amongst us--some
+because they are happy; some because they are sad; some because the
+living fire of youth impels them, and they must be up and doing,
+let the work be what it may.</p>
+<blockquote>"Many fervent souls,<br>
+Strike rhyme on rhyme, who would strike steel on steel,<br>
+If steel had offer'd."</blockquote>
+<p>Was this case mine? Was I fancying myself a poet, only because I
+was an idle man, and had lost the woman I loved? To answer these
+questions myself was impossible. They could only be answered by the
+public voice, and before I dared question that oracle I had much to
+do. I resolved to discipline myself to the harness of rhythm. I
+resolved to go back to the fathers of poetry--to graduate once
+again in Homer and Dante, Chaucer and Shakespeare. I promised
+myself that, before I tried my wings in the sun, I would be my own
+severest critic. Nay, more--that I would never try them so long as
+it seemed possible a fall might come of it. Once come to this
+determination, I felt happier and more hopeful than I had felt for
+the last three years. I looked across the blue mists of the valley
+below, and up to the aerial peaks which rose, faint, and far, and
+glittering--mountain beyond mountain, range above range, as if
+painted on the thin, transparent air--and it seemed to me that they
+stood by, steadfast and silent, the witnesses of my resolve.</p>
+<p>"I will be strong," I said. "I will be an idler and a dreamer no
+longer. Books have been my world. I have taken all, and given
+nothing. Now I too will work, and work to prove that I was not
+unworthy of her love."</p>
+<p>Going down, by-and-by, into the valley as the shadows were
+lengthening, I met a traveller with an open book in his hand. He
+was an Englishman--small, sallow, wiry, and wore a gray, loose
+coat, with two large pockets full of books. I had met him once
+before at Milan, and again in a steamer on Lago Maggiore. He was
+always reading. He read in the diligence--he read when he was
+walking--he read all through dinner at the
+<i>tables-d'-h&ocirc;te</i>. He had a mania for reading; and,
+might, in fact, be said to be bound up in his own library.</p>
+<p>Meeting thus on the mountain, we fell into conversation. He told
+me that he was on his way to Geneva, that he detested continental
+life, and that he was only waiting the arrival of certain letters
+before starting for England.</p>
+<p>"But," said I, "you do not, perhaps, give continental life a
+trial. You are always absorbed in the pages of a book; and, as for
+the scenery, you appear not to observe it."</p>
+<p>"Deuce take the scenery!" he exclaimed, pettishly. "I never look
+at it. All scenery's alike. Trees, mountains, water--water,
+mountains, trees; the same thing over and over again, like the bits
+of colored glass in a kaleidoscope. I read about the scenery, and
+that is quite enough for me."</p>
+<p>"But no book can paint an Italian lake or an Alpine sunset; and
+when one is on the spot...."</p>
+<p>"I beg your pardon," interrupted the traveller in gray.
+"Everything is much pleasanter and more picturesque in books than
+in reality--travelling especially. There are no bad smells in
+books. There are no long bills in books. Above all, there are no
+mosquitoes. Travelling is the greatest mistake in the world, and I
+am going home as fast as I can."</p>
+<p>"And henceforth, I suppose, your travels will be confined to
+your library," I said, smiling.</p>
+<p>"Exactly so. I may say, with Hazlitt, that 'food, warmth, sleep,
+and a book,' are all I require. With those I may make the tour of
+the world, and incur neither expense nor fatigue."</p>
+<p>"Books, after all, are friends," I said, with a sigh.</p>
+<p>"Sir," replied the traveller, waving his hand somewhat
+theatrically, "books are our first real friends, and our last. I
+have no others. I wish for no others. I rely upon no others. They
+are the only associates upon whom a sensible man may depend. They
+are always wise, and they are always witty. They never intrude upon
+us when we desire to be alone. They never speak ill of us behind
+our backs. They are never capricious, and never surly; neither are
+they, like some clever folks, pertinaciously silent when we most
+wish them to shine. Did Shakespeare ever refuse his best thoughts
+to us, or Montaigne decline to be companionable? Did you ever find
+Moli&egrave;re dull? or Lamb prosy? or Scott unentertaining?"</p>
+<p>"You remind me," said I, laughing, "of the student in Chaucer,
+who desired for his only pleasure and society,</p>
+<blockquote>"'---at his bedde's head<br>
+A'twenty bokes clothed in black and red,<br>
+Of Aristotle and his philosophy!'"</blockquote>
+<p>"Ay," replied my new acquaintance, "but he preferred them
+expressly to 'robes riche, or fidel or sautrie,' whereas, I prefer
+them to men and women, and to Aristotle and his philosophy, into
+the bargain!"</p>
+<p>"Your own philosophy, at least, is admirable," said I. "For many
+a year--I might almost say for most years of my life--I have been a
+disciple in the same school."</p>
+<p>"Sir, you cannot belong to a better. Think of the convenience of
+always carrying half a dozen intimate friends in your pocket!
+Good-afternoon."</p>
+<p>We had now come to a point where two paths diverged, and the
+reading traveller, always economical of time, opened his book where
+he had last turned down the leaf, and disappeared round the
+corner.</p>
+<p>I never saw him again; but his theory amused me, and, as trifles
+will sometimes do even in the gravest matters, decided me. So the
+result of all my hopes and reflections was, that I went back to
+England and to the student life that had been the dream of my
+youth.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_LV."></a>CHAPTER LV.</h2>
+<h3>MY BIRTHDAY.</h3>
+<br>
+<p>Three years of foreign travel, and five of retirement at home,
+brought my twenty-ninth birthday. I was still young, it is true;
+but how changed from that prime of early manhood when I used to
+play Romeo at midnight to Hortense upon her balcony! I looked at
+myself in the glass that morning, and contemplated the wearied,
+bronzed, and bearded face which</p>
+<p>"...seared by toil and something touched by time,"</p>
+<p>now gave me back glance for glance. I looked older than my age
+by many years. My eyes had grown grave with a steadfast melancholy,
+and streaks of premature silver gleamed here and there in the still
+abundant hair which had been the solitary vanity of my youth.</p>
+<p>"Is she also thus changed and faded?" I asked myself, as I
+turned away. And then I sighed to think that if we met she might
+not know me.</p>
+<p>For I loved her still; worshipped her; raised altars to her in
+the dusky chambers of my memory. My whole life was dedicated to
+her. My best thoughts were hers. My poems, my ambition, my hours of
+labor, all were hers only! I knew now that no time could change the
+love which had so changed me, or dim the sweet remembrance of that
+face which I carried for ever at my heart like an amulet. Other
+women might be fair, but my eyes never sought them; other voices
+might be sweet, but my ear never listened to them; other hands
+might be soft, but my lips never pressed them. She was the only
+woman in all my world--the only star in all my night--the one Eve
+of my ruined Paradise. In a word, I loved her--loved her, I think,
+more dearly than before I lost her.</p>
+<blockquote>"Love is not love<br>
+Which alters when it alteration finds,<br>
+Or bends with the remover to remove:<br>
+O no! it is an ever-fixed mark,<br>
+That looks on tempests and is never shaken."</blockquote>
+<p>I had that morning received by post a parcel of London papers
+and magazines, which, for a foolish reason of my own, I almost
+dreaded to open; so, putting off the evil hour, I thrust the
+ominous parcel into my pocket and went out to read it in some green
+solitude, far away among the lonely hills and tracts of furzy
+common that extend for miles and miles around my native place. It
+was a delicious autumn morning, bright and fresh and joyous as
+spring. The purple heather was all abloom along the slopes of the
+hill-sides. The golden sandcliffs glittered in the sun. The great
+firwoods reached away over heights and through valleys--"grand and
+spiritual trees," pointing ever upward with warning finger, like
+the Apostles in the old Italian pictures. Now I passed a solitary
+farm-yard where busy laborers were piling the latest stacks; now
+met a group of happy children gathering wild nuts and blackberries.
+By-and-by, I came upon a great common, with a picturesque mill
+standing high against the sky. All around and about stretched a
+vast prospect of woodland and tufted heath, bounded far off by a
+range of chalk-hills speckled with farm-houses and villages, and
+melting towards the west into a distance faint and far, and mystic
+as the horizon of a Turner.</p>
+<p>Here I threw myself on the green turf and rested. Truly, Nature
+is a great "physician of souls." The peace of the place descended
+into my heart, and hushed for a while the voice of its repinings.
+The delicious air, the living silence of the woods, the dreamy
+influences of the autumnal sunshine, all alike served to lull me
+into a pleasant mood, neither gay nor sad, but very calm--calm
+enough for the purpose for which I had come. So I brought out my
+packet of papers, summoned all my philosophy to my aid, and met my
+own name upon the second page. For here was, as I had anticipated,
+a critique on my first volume of poems.</p>
+<p>Indifference to criticism, if based upon a simple consciousness
+of moral right, is a noble thing. But indifference to criticism,
+taken in its ordinary, and especially its literary sense, is
+generally a very small thing, and resolves itself, for the most
+part, into a halting and one-sided kind of stoicism, meaning
+indifference to blame and ridicule, and never indifference to
+praise. It is very convenient to the disappointed authorling; very
+effective, in the established writer; but it is mere vanity at the
+root, and equally contemptible in both. For my part, I confess that
+I came to my trial as tremblingly as any poor caitiff to the fiery
+ordeal, and finding myself miraculously clear of the burning
+ploughshares, was quite as full of wonder and thankfulness at my
+good fortune. For I found my purposes appreciated, and my best
+thoughts understood; not, it is true, without some censure, but it
+was censure tempered so largely with encouragement that I drew hope
+from it, and not despondency. And then I thought of Hortense, and,
+picturing to myself all the joy it would have been to lay these
+things at her feet, I turned my face to the grass, and wept like a
+child.</p>
+<p>Then, one by one, the ghosts of my dead hopes rose out of the
+grave of the past and vanished "into thin air" before me; and in
+their place came earnest aspirations, born of the man's strong
+will. I resolved to use wisely the gifts that were mine--to sing
+well the song that had risen to my lips--to "seize the spirit of my
+time," and turn to noble uses the God-given weapons of the poet. So
+should I be worthier of her remembrance, if she yet remembered
+me--worthier, at all events, to remember her.</p>
+<p>Thus the hours ebbed, and when I at length rose and turned my
+face homeward, the golden day was already bending westward. Lower
+and lower sank the sun as the miles shortened; stiller and sweeter
+grew the evening air; and ever my lengthening shadow travelled
+before me along the dusty road--wherein I was more fortunate than
+the man in the German story who sold his to the devil.</p>
+<p>It was quite dusk by the time I gained the outskirts of the
+town, and I reflected with much contentment upon the prospect of a
+cosy bachelor dinner, and, after dinner, lamplight and a book.</p>
+<p>"If you please, sir," said Collins, "a lady has been here."</p>
+<p>Collins--the same Collins who had been my father's servant when
+I was a boy at home--was now a grave married man, with hair fast
+whitening.</p>
+<p>"A lady?" I echoed. "One of my cousins, I suppose, from
+Effingham."</p>
+<p>"No, sir," said Collins. "A strange lady--a foreigner."</p>
+<p>A stranger! a foreigner! I felt myself change color.</p>
+<p>"She left her name?" I asked.</p>
+<p>"Her card, sir," said Collins, and handed it to me.</p>
+<p>I took it up with fingers that shook in spite of me and
+read:--</p>
+<p>MADLLE DE SAINTE AULAIRE.</p>
+<p>I dropped the card, with a sigh of profound disappointment.</p>
+<p>"At what time did this lady call, Collins?"</p>
+<p>"Not very long after you left the house, sir. She said she would
+call again. She is at the White Horse."</p>
+<p>"She shall not have the trouble of coming here," I said, drawing
+my chair to the table. "Send James up to the White Horse with my
+compliments, and say that I will wait upon the lady in about an
+hour's time."</p>
+<p>Collins darted away to despatch the message, and returning
+presently with the pale ale, uncorked it dexterously, and stood at
+the side-board, serenely indifferent.</p>
+<p>"And what kind of person was this--this Mademoiselle de Sainte
+Aulaire, Collins?" I asked, leisurely bisecting a partridge.</p>
+<p>"Can't say, sir, indeed. Lady kept her veil down."</p>
+<p>"Humph! Tall or short, Collins?"</p>
+<p>"Rather tall, sir."</p>
+<p>"Young?"</p>
+<p>"Haven't an idea, sir. Voice very pleasant, though."</p>
+<p>A pleasant voice has always a certain attraction for me.
+Hortense's voice was exquisite--rich and low, and somewhat deeper
+than the voices of most women.</p>
+<p>I took up the card again. Mademoiselle de Sainte Aulaire! Where
+had I heard that name?</p>
+<p>"She said nothing of the nature of her business, I suppose,
+Collins?"</p>
+<p>"Nothing at all, sir. Dear me, sir, I beg pardon for not
+mentioning it before; but there's been a messenger over from the
+White Horse, since the lady left, to know if you were yet
+home."</p>
+<p>"Then she is in haste?"</p>
+<p>"Very uncommon haste, I should say, sir," replied Collins,
+deliberately.</p>
+<p>I pushed back the untasted dish, and rose directly.</p>
+<p>"You should have told me this before," I said, hastily.</p>
+<p>"But--but surely, sir, you will dine--"</p>
+<p>"I will wait for nothing," I interrupted. "I'll go at once. Had
+I known the lady's business was urgent, I would not have delayed a
+moment."</p>
+<p>Collins cast a mournful glance at the table, and sighed respect
+fully. Before he had recovered from his amazement, I was half way
+to the inn.</p>
+<p>The White Horse was now the leading hostelry of Saxonholme. The
+old Red Lion was no more. Its former host and hostess were dead; a
+brewery occupied its site; and the White Horse was kept by a portly
+Boniface, who had been head-waiter under the extinct dynasty. But
+there had been many changes in Saxonholme since my boyish days, and
+this was one of the least among them.</p>
+<p>I was shown into the best sitting-room, preceded by a smart
+waiter in a white neckcloth. At a glance I took in all the bearings
+of the scene--the table with its untasted dessert; the shaded lamp;
+the closed curtains of red damask; the thoughtful figure in the
+easy chair. Although the weather was yet warm, a fire blazed in the
+grate; but the windows were open behind the crimson curtains, and
+the evening air stole gently in. It was like stepping into a
+picture by Gerard Dow, so closed, so glowing, so rich in color.</p>
+<p>"Mr. Arbuthnot," said the smart waiter, flinging the door very
+wide open, and lingering to see what might follow.</p>
+<p>The lady rose slowly, bowed, waved her hand towards a chair at
+some distance from her own, and resumed her seat. The waiter
+reluctantly left the room.</p>
+<p>"I had not intended, sir, to give you the trouble of coming
+here," said Mademoiselle de Sainte Aulaire, using her fan as a
+handscreen, and speaking in a low, and, as it seemed to me, a
+somewhat constrained voice. I could not see her face, but something
+in the accent made my heart leap.</p>
+<p>"Pray do not name it, madam," I said. "It is nothing."</p>
+<p>She bent her head, as if thanking me, and went on:--</p>
+<p>"I have come to this place," she said, "in order to prosecute
+certain inquiries which are of great importance to myself. May I
+ask if you are a native of Saxonholme?"</p>
+<p>"I am."</p>
+<p>"Were you here in the year 18--?"</p>
+<p>"I was."</p>
+<p>"Will you give me leave to test your memory respecting some
+events that took place about that time?"</p>
+<p>"By all means."</p>
+<p>Mademoiselle de Sainte Aulaire thanked me with a gesture,
+withdrew her chair still farther from the radius of the lamp and
+the tire, and said:--</p>
+<p>"I must entreat your patience if I first weary you with one or
+two particulars of my family history,"</p>
+<p>"Madam, I listen."</p>
+<p>During the brief pause that ensued, I tried vainly to
+distinguish something more of her features. I could only trace the
+outline of a slight and graceful figure, the contour of a very
+slender hand, and the ample folds of a dark silk dress.</p>
+<p>At length, in a low, sweet voice, she began:--</p>
+<p>"Not to impose upon you any dull genealogical details," she
+said, "I will begin by telling you that the Sainte Aulaires are an
+ancient French family of Bearnais extraction, and that my
+grandfather was the last Marquis who bore the title. Holding large
+possessions in the <i>comtat</i> of Venaissin (a district which now
+forms part of the department of Vaucluse) and other demesnes at
+Montlh&eacute;ry, in the province of the Ile de France---"</p>
+<p>"At Montlh&eacute;ry!" I exclaimed, suddenly recovering the lost
+link in my memory.</p>
+<p>"The Sainte Aulaires," continued the lady, without pausing to
+notice my interruption, "were sufficiently wealthy to keep up their
+social position, and to contract alliances with many of the best
+families in the south of France. Towards the early part of the
+reign of Louis XIII. they began to be conspicuous at court, and
+continued to reside in and near Paris up to the period of the
+Revolution. Marshals of France, Envoys, and Ministers of State
+during a period of nearly a century and a half, the Sainte Aulaires
+had enjoyed too many honors not to be among the first of those who
+fell in the Reign of Terror. My grandfather, who, as I have already
+said, was the last Marquis bearing the title, was seized with his
+wife and daughter at his Ch&acirc;teau near Montlh&eacute;ry in the
+spring-time of 1793, and carried to La Force. Thence, after a mock
+trial, they were all three conveyed to execution, and publicly
+guillotined on the sixth of June in the same year. Do you follow
+me?"</p>
+<p>"Perfectly."</p>
+<p>"One survivor, however, remained in the person of Charles
+Armand, Pr&eacute;v&ocirc;t de Sainte Aulaire, only son of the
+Marquis, then a youth of seventeen years of age, and pursuing his
+studies in the seclusion of an old family seat in Vaucluse. He fled
+into Italy. In the meantime, his inheritance was confiscated; and
+the last representative of the race, reduced to exile and beggary,
+assumed another name. It were idle to attempt to map out his life
+through the years that followed. He wandered from land to land;
+lived none knew how; became a tutor, a miniature-painter, a
+volunteer at Naples under General Pepe, a teacher of languages in
+London, corrector of the press to a publishing house in
+Brussels--everything or anything, in short, by which he could
+honorably earn his bread. During these years of toil and poverty,
+he married. The lady was an orphan, of Scotch extraction, poor and
+proud as himself, and governess in a school near Brussels. She died
+in the third year of their union, and left him with one little
+daughter. This child became henceforth his only care and happiness.
+While she was yet a mere infant, he placed her in the school where
+her mother had been teacher. There she remained, first as pupil,
+by-and-by as governess, for more than sixteen years. The child was
+called by an old family name that had been her grandmother's and
+her great-grandmother's in the high and palmy days of the Sainte
+Aulaires--Hortense."</p>
+<p>"Hortense!" I cried, rising from my chair.</p>
+<p>"It is not an uncommon name," said the lady. "Does it surprise
+you?"</p>
+<p>"I--I beg your pardon, madam," I stammered, resuming my seat. "I
+once had a dear friend of that name. Pray, go on."</p>
+<p>"For ten years the refugee contrived to keep his little Hortense
+in the safe and pleasant shelter of her Flemish home. He led a
+wandering life, no one knew where; and earned his money, no one
+knew how. Travel-worn and careworn, he was prematurely aged, and at
+fifty might well have been mistaken for a man of sixty-five or
+seventy. Poor and broken as he was, however, Monsieur de Sainte
+Aulaire was every inch a gentleman of the old school; and his
+little girl was proud of him, when he came to the school to see
+her. This, however, was very seldom--never oftener than twice or
+three times in the year. When she saw him for the last time,
+Hortense was about thirteen years of age. He looked paler, and
+thinner, and poorer than ever; and when he bade her farewell, it
+was as if under the presentiment that they might meet no more. He
+then told her, for the first time, something of his story, and left
+with her at parting a small coffer containing his decorations, a
+few trinkets that had been his mother's, and his sword--the badge
+of his nobility."</p>
+<p>The lady's voice faltered. I neither spoke nor stirred, but sat
+like a man of stone.</p>
+<p>Then she went on again:--</p>
+<p>"The father never came again. The child, finding herself after a
+certain length of time thrown upon the charity of her former
+instructors, was glad to become under-teacher in their school. The
+rest of her history may be told in a few words. From under-teacher
+she became head-teacher, and at eighteen passed as governess into a
+private family. At twenty she removed to Paris, and set foot for
+the first time in the land of her fathers. All was now changed in
+France. The Bourbons reigned again, and her father, had he
+reappeared, might have reclaimed his lost estates. She sought him
+far and near. She employed agents to discover him. She could not
+believe that he was dead. To be once again clasped in his arms--to
+bring him back to his native country---to see him resume his name
+and station--this was the bright dream of her life. To accomplish
+these things she labored in many ways, teaching and writing; for
+Hortense also was proud--too proud to put forward an unsupported
+claim. For with her father were lost the title-deeds and papers
+that might have made the daughter wealthy, and she had no means of
+proving her identity. Still she labored heartily, lived poorly, and
+earned enough to push her inquiries far and wide--even to journey
+hither and thither, whenever she fancied, alas! that a clue had
+been found. Twice she travelled into Switzerland, and once into
+Italy, but always in vain. The exile had too well concealed, even
+from her, his <i>sobriquet</i> and his calling, and Hortense at
+last grew weary of failure. One fact, however, she succeeded in
+discovering, and only one--namely, that her father had, many years
+before, made some attempt to establish his claims to the estates,
+but that he had failed for want either of sufficient proof, or of
+means to carry on the <i>proc&eacute;s</i>. Of even this
+circumstance only a meagre law-record remained, and she could
+succeed in learning no more. Since then, a claim has been advanced
+by a remote branch of the Sainte Aulaire family, and the cause is,
+even now, in course of litigation."</p>
+<p>She paused, as if fatigued by so long talking; but, seeing me
+about to speak, prevented me with a gesture of the hand, and
+resumed:--</p>
+<p>"Hortense de Ste. Aulaire continued to live in Paris for nearly
+five years, at the end of which time she left it to seek out the
+members of her mother's family. Finding them kindly disposed
+towards her, she took up her abode amongst them in the calm
+seclusion of a remote Scotch town. There, even there, she still
+hoped, still employed agents; still yearned to discover, if not her
+father, at least her father's grave. Several years passed thus. She
+continued to earn a modest subsistence by her pen, till at length
+the death of one of those Scotch relatives left her mistress of a
+small inheritance. Money was welcome, since it enabled her to
+pursue her task with renewed vigor. She searched farther and
+deeper. A trivial circumstance eagerly followed up brought a train
+of other circumstances to light. She discovered that her father had
+assumed a certain name; she found that the bearer of this name was
+a wandering man, a conjuror by trade; she pursued the vague traces
+of his progress from town to town, from county to county, sometimes
+losing, sometimes regaining the scattered links. Sir, he was my
+father--I am that Hortense. I have spent my life seeking him--I
+have lived for this one hope. I have traced his footsteps here to
+Saxonholme, and here the last clue fails. If you know anything--if
+you can remember anything---"</p>
+<p>Calm and collected as she had been at first, she was trembling
+now, and her voice died away in sobs. The firelight fell upon her
+face--upon the face of my lost love!</p>
+<p>I also was profoundly agitated.</p>
+<p>"Hortense," I said, "do you not know, that he who stood beside
+your father in his last hour, and he who so loved you years ago,
+are one and the same? Alas! why did you not tell me these things
+long since?"</p>
+<p>"Did <i>you</i> stand beside my father's deathbed?" she asked
+brokenly.</p>
+<p>"I did."</p>
+<p>She clasped her hands over her eyes and shuddered, as if beneath
+the pressure of a great physical pain.</p>
+<p>"O God!" she murmured, "so many years of denial and suffering!
+so many years of darkness that might have been dispelled by a
+word!"</p>
+<p>We were both silent for a long time. Then I told her all that I
+remembered of her father; how he came to Saxonholme--how he fell
+ill--how he died, and was buried. It was a melancholy recital;
+painful for me to relate--painful for her to hear--and interrupted
+over and over again by questions and tears, and bursts of
+unavailing sorrow.</p>
+<p>"We will visit his grave to-morrow," I said, when all was
+told.</p>
+<p>She bent her head.</p>
+<p>"To-morrow, then," said she, "I end the pilgrimage of
+years."</p>
+<p>"And--and afterwards?" I faltered.</p>
+<p>"Afterwards? Alas! friend, when the hopes of years fall suddenly
+to dust and ashes, one feels as if there were no future to
+follow?"</p>
+<p>"It is true," I said gloomily. "I know it too well."</p>
+<p>"You know it?" she exclaimed, looking up.</p>
+<p>"I know it, Hortense. There was a moment in which all the hope,
+and the fulness, and the glory of my life went down at a blow. Have
+you not heard of ships that have gone to the bottom in fair
+weather, suddenly, with all sail set, and every hand on board?"</p>
+<p>She looked at me with a strange earnestness in her eyes, and
+sighed heavily.</p>
+<p>"What have you been doing all this time, fellow-student?" she
+asked, after a pause.</p>
+<p>The old name sounded very sweet upon her lips!</p>
+<p>"I? Alas!--nothing."</p>
+<p>"But you are a surgeon, are you not?"</p>
+<p>"No. I never even went up for examination. I gave up all idea of
+medicine as a profession when my father died."</p>
+<p>"What are you, then?"</p>
+<p>"An idler upon the great highway--a book-dreamer--a library
+fixture."</p>
+<p>Hortense looked at me thoughtfully, with her cheek resting on
+her hand.</p>
+<p>"Have you done nothing but read and dream?"</p>
+<p>"Not quite. I have travelled."</p>
+<p>"With what object?"</p>
+<p>"A purely personal one. I was alone and unhappy, and--"</p>
+<p>"And fancied that purposeless wandering was better for you than
+healthy labor. Well, you have travelled, and you have read books.
+What more?"</p>
+<p>"Nothing more, except--"</p>
+<p>"Except what?"</p>
+<p>I chanced to have one of the papers in my pocket, and so drew it
+out, and placed it before her.</p>
+<p>"I have been a rhymer as well as a dreamer," I said, shyly.
+"Perhaps the rhymes grew out of the dreams, as the dreams
+themselves grew out of something else which has been underlying my
+life this many a year. At all events I have hewn a few of them into
+shape, and trusted them to paper and type--and here is a critique
+which came to me this morning with some three or four others."</p>
+<p>She took the paper with a smile half of wonder, half of
+kindness, and, glancing quickly through it, said:--</p>
+<p>"This is well. This is very well. I must read the book. Will you
+lend it to me?"</p>
+<p>"I will give it to you," I replied; "if I can give you that
+which is already yours."</p>
+<p>"Already mine?"</p>
+<p>"Yes, as the poet in me, however worthless, is all and only
+yours! Do you suppose, Hortense, that I have ever ceased to love
+you? As my songs are born of my sorrow, so my sorrow was born of my
+love; and love, and sorrow, and song, such as they are, are of your
+making."</p>
+<p>"Hush!" she said, with something of her old gay indifference.
+"Your literary sins must not be charged upon me, fellow-student! I
+have enough of my own to answer for. Besides, I am not going to
+acquit you so easily. Granted that you have written a little book
+of poetry--what then? Have you done nothing else? Nothing active?
+Nothing manly? Nothing useful?"</p>
+<p>"If by usefulness and activity you mean manual labor, I
+certainly have neither felled a tree, nor ploughed a field, nor
+hammered a horse-shoe. I have lived by thought alone."</p>
+<p>"Then I fear you have lived a very idle life," said Hortense,
+smiling. "Are you married?"</p>
+<p>"Married!" I echoed, indignantly. "How can you ask the
+question?"</p>
+<p>"You are not a magistrate?"</p>
+<p>"Certainly not."</p>
+<p>"In short, then, you are perfectly useless. You play no part,
+domestic or public. You serve neither the state nor the community.
+You are a mere cypher--a make-weight in the social scale--an
+article of no value to any one except the owner."</p>
+<p>"Not even the latter, mademoiselle," I replied, bitterly. "It is
+long since I have ceased to value my own life."</p>
+<p>She smiled again, but her eyes this time were full of tears.</p>
+<p>"Nay," said she, softly, "am I not the owner?"</p>
+<hr style="width: 25%;">
+<p>Great joys at first affect us like great griefs. We are stunned
+by them, and know not how deep they are till the night comes with
+its solemn stillness, and we are alone with our own hearts. Then
+comes the season of thankfulness, and wonder and joy. Then our
+souls rise up within us, and chant a hymn of praise; and the great
+vault of Heaven is as the roof of a mighty cathedral studded with
+mosaics of golden stars, and the night winds join in with the bass
+of their mighty organ-pipes; and the poplars rustle, like the
+leaves of the hymn-books in the hands of the congregation.</p>
+<p>So it was with me that evening when I went forth into the quiet
+fields where the summer moon was shining, and knew that Hortense
+was mine at last--mine now and for ever. Overjoyed and restless, I
+wandered about for hours. I could not go home. I felt I must
+breathe the open air of the hills, and tread the dewy grass, and
+sing my hymn of praise and thanksgiving after my own fashion. At
+length, as the dawning light came widening up the east, I turned my
+steps homewards, and before the sun had risen above the farthest
+pine-ridge, I was sleeping the sweetest sleep that had been mine
+for years.</p>
+<p>The conjuror's grave was green with grass and purple with wild
+thyme when Hortense knelt beside it, and there consummated the
+weary pilgrimage of half a life. The sapling willow had spread its
+arms above him in a pleasant canopy, leaning farther and reaching
+higher, year by year,</p>
+<p>"And lo! the twig to which they laid his head had now become a
+tree!"</p>
+<p>Hortense found nothing of her father but this grave. Papers and
+title-deeds there were none.</p>
+<p>I well remembered the anxious search made thirteen years ago,
+when not even a card was found to indicate the whereabouts of his
+friends or family. Not to lose the vestige of a chance, we pushed
+inquiry farther; but in vain. Our rector, now a very old man,
+remembered nothing of the wandering lecturer. Mine host and hostess
+of the Red Lion were both dead. The Red Lion itself had
+disappeared, and become a thing of tradition. All was lost and
+forgotten; and of all her hereditary wealth, station, and honors,
+Hortense de Sainte Aulaire retained nothing but her father's sword
+and her ancestral name.</p>
+<p>--Not even the latter for many weeks, O discerning reader! for
+before the golden harvest was gathered in, we two were wedded.</p>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+<h2><a name="CHAPTER_LVI."></a>CHAPTER LVI.</h2>
+<h3>BRINGETH THIS TRUE STORY TO AN END.</h3>
+<center>Ye who have traced the pilgrim to the scene<br>
+Which is his last, if in your memories dwell<br>
+A thought that once was his, if on ye swell<br>
+A single recollection, not in vain<br>
+He wore his sandal shoon and scallop-shell.<br>
+<br>
+BYRON.</center>
+<br>
+<p>Having related the story of my life as it happened, incident by
+incident, and brought it down to that point at which stories are
+wont to end, I find that I have little to add respecting others. My
+narrative from first to last has been purely personal. The one love
+of my life was Hortense--the one friend of my life, Oscar
+Dalrymple. The catalogue of my acquaintances would scarcely number
+so many names as I have fingers on one hand. The two first are
+still mine; the latter, having been brought forward only in so far
+as they re-acted upon my feelings or modified my experiences, have
+become, for the most part, mere memories, and so vanish,
+ghost-like, from the page. Franz M&uuml;ller is studying in Rome,
+having carried off a prize at the Ecole des Beaux Arts, which
+entitles him to three years at the Villa Medici, that Ultima Thule
+of the French art-student's ambition. I hear that he is as full of
+whim and jest as ever, and the very life of the Caf&eacute; Greco.
+May I some day hear his pleasant laugh again! Dr. Ch&eacute;ron, I
+believe, is still practising in Paris; and Monsieur de Simoncourt,
+I have no doubt, continues to exercise the profession of Chevalier
+d'Industrie, with such failures and successes as are incidental to
+that career.</p>
+<p>As for my early <i>amourettes</i>, they have disappeared from my
+path as utterly as though they had never crossed it. Of Madame de
+Marignan, I have neither heard, nor desired to hear, more. Even
+Josephine's pretty face is fast fading from my memory. It is ever
+thus with the transient passions of <i>our premi&egrave;re
+jeunesse.</i> We believe in them for the moment, and waste laughter
+and tears, chaplets and sackcloth, upon them. Presently the
+delusion passes; the earnest heart within us is awakened; and we
+know that till now we have been mere actors in "a masquerade of
+dreams." The chaplets were woven of artificial flowers. The funeral
+was a mock funeral--the banquet a stage feast of painted fruits and
+empty goblets! Alas! we cannot undo that foolish past. We may only
+hope to blot it out with after records of high, and wise, and
+tender things. Thus it is that the young man's heart is like the
+precious palimpsest of old. He first of all defiles it with idle
+anacreontics in praise of love and wine; but, erasing these
+by-and-by with his own pious hand, he writes it over afresh with
+chronicles of a pure and holy passion, and dedicates it to the fair
+saint of all his orisons.</p>
+<p>Dalrymple and his wife are now settled in Italy, having
+purchased a villa in the neighborhood of Spezzia, where they live
+in great retirement. In their choice of such retirement they are
+influenced by more than one good reason. In the first place, the
+death of the Vicomte de Caylus was an event likely to be productive
+of many unpleasant consequences to one who had deprived the French
+government of so distinguished an officer. In the next, Dalrymple
+is a poor man, and his wife is no longer rich; so that Italy agrees
+with their means as well as with their tastes. Lastly, they love
+each other so well that they never weary of their solitude, nor
+care to barter away their blue Italian skies and solemn pine-woods
+for the glittering unrest of society.</p>
+<p>Fascinated by Dalrymple's description of his villa and the life
+he led in it, Hortense and I made up our minds some few weeks after
+our marriage, to visit that part of Italy--perhaps, in case we were
+much pleased with it, to settle there, for at least a few years. So
+I prepared once more to leave my father's house; this time to let
+it, for I knew that I should never live in it again.</p>
+<p>It took some weeks to clear the old place out. The thing was
+necessary; yet I felt as if it were a kind of sacrilege. To disturb
+the old dust upon the library-shelves and select such books as I
+cared to keep; to sort and destroy all kinds of hoarded papers; to
+ransack desks that had never been unlocked since the hands that
+last closed them were laid to rest for ever, constituted my share
+of the work. Hortense superintended the rest. As for the household
+goods, we resolved to keep nothing, save a few old family portraits
+and my father's plate, some of which had descended to us through
+two or three centuries.</p>
+<p>While yet in this unsettled state, with the house all in
+confusion and the time appointed for our journey drawing nearer and
+nearer day by day, a strange thing happened.</p>
+<p>At the end of the garden, encroaching partly upon a corner of
+it, and opening into the lane that bounded it on the other side of
+the hedge, stood the stable belonging to the house.</p>
+<p>It had been put to no use since my father's time, and was now so
+thoroughly out of repair that I resolved to have it pulled down and
+rebuilt before letting it to strangers. In the meantime, I went
+down there one morning with a workman before the work of demolition
+was begun.</p>
+<p>We had some difficulty to get in, for the lock and hinges were
+rusted, and the floor within was choked with fallen rubbish. At
+length we forced an entrance. I thought I had never seen a more
+dreary interior. My father's old chaise was yet standing there,
+with both wheels off. The mouldy harness was dropping to pieces on
+the walls. The beams were festooned with cobwebs. The very ladder
+leading to the loft above was so rotten that I scarcely dared trust
+to it for a footing.</p>
+<p>Having trusted to it, however, I found myself in a still more
+ruinous and dreary hole. The posts supporting the roof were
+insecure; the tiles were all displaced overhead; and the rafters
+showed black and bare against the sky in many places. In one corner
+lay a heap of mouldy straw, and at the farther end, seen dimly
+through the darkness, a pile of old lumber, and--by Heaven! the
+pagoda-canopy of many colors, and the little Chevalier's Conjuring
+Table!</p>
+<p>I could scarcely believe my eyes. My poor Hortense! Here, at
+last, were some relics of her father; but found in how strange a
+place, and by how strange a chance!</p>
+<p>I had them dragged out into the light, all mildewed and
+cob-webbed as they were; whereupon an army of spiders rushed out in
+every direction, a bat rose up, shrieking, and whirled in blind
+circles overhead. In a corner of the pagoda we found an empty
+bird's-nest. The table was small, and could be got out without much
+difficulty; so I helped the workman to carry it down the ladder,
+and sending it on before me to the house, sauntered back through
+the glancing shadows of the acacia-leaves, musing upon the way in
+which these long-forgotten things had been brought to light, and
+wondering how they came to be stored away in my own stable.</p>
+<p>"Do you know anything about it, Collins?" I said, coming up
+suddenly behind him in the hall.</p>
+<p>"About what, sir?" asked that respectable servant, looking round
+with some perplexity, as if in search of the nominative.</p>
+<p>I pointed to the table, now being carried into the dismantled
+dining-room.</p>
+<p>Collins smiled--he had a remarkably civil, apologetic way of
+smiling behind his hand, as if it were a yawn or a liberty.</p>
+<p>"Oh, sir," said he, "don't you remember? To be sure, you were
+quite a young gentleman at that time--but---"</p>
+<p>"But what?" I interrupted, impatiently.</p>
+<p>"Why, sir, that table once belonged to a poor little conjuring
+chap who called himself Almond Pudding, and died...."</p>
+<p>I checked him with a gesture.</p>
+<p>"I know all that," I said, hastily. "I remember it perfectly;
+but how came the things into my stable?"</p>
+<p>"Your respected father and my honored master, sir, had them
+conveyed there when the Red Lion was sold off," said Collins, with
+a sidelong glance at the dining-room door. "He was of opinion, sir,
+that they might some day identify the poor man to his relatives, in
+case of inquiry."</p>
+<p>I heard the sound of a suppressed sob, and, brushing past him
+without another word, went in and closed the door.</p>
+<p>"My own Hortense!" I said, taking her into my arms. "My
+wife!"</p>
+<p>Pale and tearful, she lifted her face from my shoulder, and
+pointed to the table.</p>
+<p>"I know what it is," she faltered. "You need not tell me. My
+heart tells me!"</p>
+<p>I led her to a chair, and explained how and where it had been
+found. I even told her of the little empty nest from which the
+young birds had long since flown away. In this tiny incident there
+was something pathetic that soothed her; so, presently, when she
+left off weeping, we examined the table together.</p>
+<p>It was a quaint, fragile, ricketty thing, with slender twisted
+legs of black wood, and a cloth-covered top that had once been
+green, but now retained no vestige of its original color. This
+cloth top was covered with slender slits of various shapes and
+sizes, round, square, sexagonal, and so forth, which, being pressed
+with the finger, fell inwards and disclosed little hiding-places
+sunk in the well of the table; but which, as soon as the pressure
+was removed, flew up again by means of concealed springs, and
+closed as neatly as before.</p>
+<p>"This is strange," said Hortense, peering into one of the
+recesses. "I have found something in the table! Look--it is a
+watch!"</p>
+<p>I snatched it from her, and carried it to the window. Blackened
+and discolored as it was, I recognised it instantly.</p>
+<p>It was my own watch--my own watch of which I was so boyishly
+vain years and years ago, and which I had lost so unaccountably on
+the night of the Chevalier's performance! There were my initials
+engraved on the back, amid a forest of flourishes, and there on the
+dial was that identical little Cupid with the cornucopia of
+flowers, which I once thought such a miracle of workmanship! Alas!
+what a mighty march old Time had stolen upon me, while that little
+watch was standing still!</p>
+<p>"Oh, Heaven!--oh, husband!"</p>
+<p>Startled from my reverie more by the tone than the words, I
+turned and saw Hortense with a packet of papers in her hand--old,
+yellow, dusty papers, tied together with a piece of black
+ribbon.</p>
+<p>"I found them there--there--there!" she faltered, pointing to a
+drawer in the table which I now saw for the first time. "I chanced
+to press that little knob, and the drawer flew out. Oh, my dear
+father!--see, Basil, here are his patents of nobility--here is the
+certificate of my birth--here are the title-deeds of the manor of
+Sainte Aulaire! This alone was wanted to complete our
+happiness!"</p>
+<p>"We will keep the table, Hortense, all our lives!" I explained,
+when the first agitation was past.</p>
+<p>"As sacredly," replied she, "as it kept this precious
+secret!"</p>
+<hr style="width: 25%;">
+<p>My task is done. Here on my desk lies the piled-up manuscript
+which has been my companion through so many pleasant hours. Those
+hours are over now. I may lay down my pen, and put aside the
+whispering vine-leaves from my casement, and lean out into the
+sweet Italian afternoon, as idly as though I wore to the climate
+and the manner born.</p>
+<p>The world to-day is only half awake. The little white town,
+crouched down by the "beached margent" of the bay, winks with its
+glittering windows and dozes in the sunshine. The very cicalas are
+silent. The fishermen's barques, with their wing-like sails all
+folded to rest, rock lazily at anchor, like sea-birds asleep. The
+cork-trees nod languidly to each other; and not even yonder
+far-away marble peaks are more motionless than that cloud which
+hangs like a white banner in the sky. Hush! I can almost believe
+that I hear the drowsy washing of the tide against the ruined tower
+on the beach.</p>
+<p>And this is the bay of Spezzia--the lovely, treacherous bay of
+Spezzia, where our English Shelley lost his gentle life! How blue
+those cruel waters are to-day! Bluer, by Heaven! than the sky, with
+scarce a ripple setting to the shore.</p>
+<p>We are very happy in our remote Italian home. It stands high
+upon a hill-side, and looks down over a slope of silvery olives to
+the sea. Vineyard and orange grove, white town, blue bay, and amber
+sands lie mapped out beneath our feet. Not a felucca "to Spezzia
+bound from Cape Circella" can sail past without our
+observation.</p>
+<blockquote>"Not a sun can die, nor yet be born, unseen<br>
+By dwellers at my villa."</blockquote>
+<p>Nay, from this very window, one might almost pitch an orange
+into the empty vettura standing in the courtyard of the Croce di
+Malta!</p>
+<p>Then we have a garden--a wild, uncultured place, where figs and
+lemons, olives "blackening sullen ripe," and prickly aloes flourish
+in rank profusion, side by side; and a loggia, where we sit at
+twilight drinking our Chianti wine and listening to the
+nightingales; and a study looking out on the bay through a trellis
+of vine-leaves, where we read and write together, surrounded by our
+books. Here, also, just opposite my desk, hangs M&uuml;ller's copy
+of that portrait of the Marquise de Sainte Aulaire, which I once
+gave to Hortense, and which is now my own again. How often I pause
+upon the unturned page, how often lay my pen aside, to look from
+the painting to the dear, living face beneath it! For there she
+sits, day after day, my wife! my poet! with the side-light falling
+on her hair, and the warm sea-breezes stirring the soft folds of
+her dress. Sometimes she lifts her eyes, those wondrous eyes,
+luminous from within "with the light of the rising soul"--and then
+we talk awhile of our work, or of our love, believing ever that</p>
+<blockquote>"Our work shall still be better for our love,<br>
+And still our love be sweeter for our work."</blockquote>
+<p>Perhaps the original of that same painting in the study may yet
+be ours some day, with the old ch&acirc;teau in which it hangs, and
+all the broad lands belonging thereunto. Our claim has been put
+forward some time now, and our lawyers are confident of success.
+Shall we be happier, if that success is ours? Can rank add one
+grace, or wealth one pleasure, to a life which is already so
+perfect? I think not, and there are moments when I almost wish that
+we may never have it in our power to test the question.</p>
+<p>But stay! the hours fly past. The sun is low, and the tender
+Italian twilight will soon close in. Then, when the moon rises, we
+shall sail out upon the bay in our own tiny felucca; or perhaps go
+down through the town to that white villa gleaming out above the
+dark tops of yonder cypresses, and spend some pleasant hours with
+Dalrymple and his wife. They, too, are very happy; but their
+happiness is of an older date than ours, and tends to other ends.
+They have bought lands in the neighborhood, which they cultivate;
+and they have children whom they adore. To educate these little
+ones for the wide world lying beyond that blue bay and the far-off
+mountains, is the one joy, the one care of their lives. Truly has
+it been said that</p>
+<blockquote>"A happy family<br>
+Is but an earlier heaven."</blockquote>
+<h3>THE END.</h3>
+<br>
+<br>
+<hr style="width: 35%;">
+<br>
+<br>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
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+by Amelia Ann Blandford Edwards
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+Project Gutenberg's In the Days of My Youth, by Amelia Ann Blandford Edwards
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: In the Days of My Youth
+
+Author: Amelia Ann Blandford Edwards
+
+Release Date: May 26, 2004 [EBook #12442]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK IN THE DAYS OF MY YOUTH ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Curtis Weyant, Charlie Kirschner and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team.
+
+
+
+
+
+IN THE
+
+DAYS OF MY YOUTH.
+
+A NOVEL.
+
+
+BY
+AMELIA B. EDWARDS
+
+1874
+
+[Illustration]
+
+CAXTON PRESS OF
+SHERMAN & CO., PHILADELPHIA.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+MY BIRTHPLACE AND PARENTAGE.
+
+     Dolce sentier,
+     Colle, che mi piacesti,
+     Ov'ancor per usanza amor mi mena!
+
+     PETRARCH.
+
+Sweet, secluded, shady Saxonholme! I doubt if our whole England contains
+another hamlet so quaint, so picturesquely irregular, so thoroughly
+national in all its rustic characteristics. It lies in a warm hollow
+environed by hills. Woods, parks and young plantations clothe every
+height and slope for miles around, whilst here and there, peeping down
+through green vistas, or towering above undulating seas of summer
+foliage, stands many a fine old country mansion, turreted and gabled,
+and built of that warm red brick that seems to hold the light of the
+sunset long after it has faded from the rest of the landscape. A silver
+thread of streamlet, swift but shallow, runs noisily through the meadows
+beside the town and loses itself in the Chad, about a mile and a half
+farther eastward. Many a picturesque old wooden bridge, many a foaming
+weir and ruinous water-mill with weedy wheel, may be found scattered up
+and down the wooded banks of this little river Chad; while to the brook,
+which we call the Gipstream, attaches a vague tradition of trout.
+
+The hamlet itself is clean and old-fashioned, consisting of one long,
+straggling street, and a few tributary lanes and passages. The houses
+some few years back were mostly long and low-fronted, with projecting
+upper stories, and diamond-paned bay-windows bowered in with myrtle and
+clematis; but modern improvements have done much of late to sweep away
+these antique tenements, and a fine new suburb of Italian and Gothic
+villas has sprung up, between the town and the railway station. Besides
+this, we have a new church in the mediaeval style, rich in gilding and
+colors and thirteenth-century brass-work; and a new cemetery, laid out
+like a pleasure-garden; and a new school-house, where the children are
+taught upon a system with a foreign name; and a Mechanics' Institute,
+where London professors come down at long intervals to expound popular
+science, and where agriculturists meet to discuss popular grievances.
+
+At the other extremity of the town, down by Girdlestone Grange, an old
+moated residence where the squire's family have resided these four
+centuries past, we are full fifty years behind our modern neighbors.
+Here stands our famous old "King's-head Inn," a well-known place of
+resort so early as the reign of Elizabeth. The great oak beside the
+porch is as old as the house itself; and on the windows of a little
+disused parlor overlooking the garden may still be seen the names of
+Sedley, Rochester and other wits of the Restoration. They scrawled those
+autographs after dinner, most likely, with their diamond rings, and went
+reeling afterwards, arm-in-arm, along the village street, singing and
+swearing, and eager for adventures--as gentlemen were wont to be in
+those famous old times when they drank the king's health more freely
+than was good for their own.
+
+Not far from the "King's Head," and almost hidden by the trees which
+divide it from the road, stands an ancient charitable institution called
+the College--quadrangular, mullion-windowed, many-gabled, and colonized
+by some twenty aged people of both sexes. At the back of the college,
+adjoining a space of waste ground and some ruined cloisters, lies the
+churchyard, in the midst of which, surrounded by solemn yews and
+mouldering tombs, stands the Priory Church. It is a rare old church,
+founded, according to the county history, in the reign of Edward the
+Confessor, and entered with a full description in Domesday Book. Its
+sculptured monuments and precious brasses, its Norman crypt, carved
+stalls and tattered banners drooping over faded scutcheons, tell all of
+generations long gone by, of noble families extinct, of gallant deeds
+forgotten, of knights and ladies remembered only by the names above
+their graves. Amongst these, some two or three modest tablets record the
+passing away of several generations of my own predecessors--obscure
+professional men for the most part, of whom some few became soldiers and
+died abroad.
+
+In close proximity to the church stands the vicarage, once the Priory; a
+quaint old rambling building, surrounded by magnificent old trees. Here
+for long centuries, a tribe of rooks have held undisputed possession,
+filling the boughs with their nests and the air with their voices, and,
+like genuine lords of the soil, descending at their own grave will and
+pleasure upon the adjacent lands.
+
+Picturesque and mediaeval as all these old buildings and old associations
+help to make us, we of Saxonholme pretend to something more. We claim to
+be, not only picturesque but historic. Nay, more than this--we are
+classical. WE WERE FOUNDED BY THE ROMANS. A great Roman road, well known
+to antiquaries, passed transversely through the old churchyard. Roman
+coins and relics, and fragments of tesselated pavement, have been found
+in and about the town. Roman camps may be traced on most of the heights
+around. Above all, we are said to be indebted to the Romans for that
+inestimable breed of poultry in right of which we have for years carried
+off the leading prizes at every poultry-show in the county, and have
+even been enabled to make head against the exaggerated pretensions of
+modern Cochin-China interlopers.
+
+Such, briefly sketched, is my native Saxonholme. Born beneath the shade
+of its towering trees and overhanging eaves, brought up to reverence its
+antiquities, and educated in the love of its natural beauties, what
+wonder that I cling to it with every fibre of my heart, and even when
+affecting to smile at my own fond prejudice, continue to believe it the
+loveliest peacefulest nook in rural England?
+
+My father's name was John Arbuthnot. Sprung from the Arbuthnots of
+Montrose, we claim to derive from a common ancestor with the celebrated
+author of "Martinus Scriblerus." Indeed, the first of our name who
+settled at Saxonholme was one James Arbuthnot, son to a certain
+nonjuring parson Arbuthnot, who lived and died abroad, and was own
+brother to that famous wit, physician and courtier whose genius, my
+father was wont to say, conferred a higher distinction upon our branch
+of the family than did those Royal Letters-Patent whereby the elder
+stock was ennobled by His most Gracious Majesty King George the Fourth,
+on the occasion of his visit to Edinburgh in 1823. From this James
+Arbuthnot (who, being born and bred at St. Omer, and married, moreover,
+to a French wife, was himself half a Frenchman) we Saxonholme Arbuthnots
+were the direct descendants.
+
+Our French ancestress, according to the family tradition, was of no very
+exalted origin, being in fact the only daughter and heiress of one
+Monsieur Tartine, Perruquier in chief at the Court of Versailles. But
+what this lady wanted in birth, she made up in fortune, and the modest
+estate which her husband purchased with her dowry came down to us
+unimpaired through five generations. In the substantial and somewhat
+foreign-looking red-brick house which he built (also, doubtless, with
+Madame's Louis d'ors) we, his successors, had lived and died ever since.
+His portrait, together with the portraits of his wife, son, and
+grandson, hung on the dining-room walls; and of the quaint old
+spindle-legged chairs and tables that had adorned our best rooms from
+time immemorial, some were supposed to date as far back as the first
+founding and furnishing of the house.
+
+It is almost needless to say that the son of the non-juror and his
+immediate posterity were staunch Jacobites, one and all. I am not aware
+that they ever risked or suffered anything for the cause; but they were
+not therefore the less vehement. Many were the signs and tokens of that
+dead-and-gone political faith which these loyal Arbuthnots left behind
+them. In the bed-rooms there hung prints of King James the Second at the
+Battle of the Boyne; of the Royal Martyr with his plumed hat, lace
+collar, and melancholy fatal face; of the Old and Young Pretenders; of
+the Princess Louisa Teresia, and of the Cardinal York. In the library
+were to be found all kinds of books relating to the career of that
+unhappy family: "Ye Tragicall History of ye Stuarts, 1697;" "Memoirs of
+King James II., writ by his own hand;" "La Stuartide," an unfinished
+epic in the French language by one Jean de Schelandre; "The Fate of
+Majesty exemplified in the barbarous and disloyal treatment (by
+traitorous and undutiful subjects) of the Kings and Queens of the Royal
+House of Stuart," genealogies of the Stuarts in English, French and
+Latin; a fine copy of "Eikon Basilike," bound in old red morocco, with
+the royal arms stamped upon the cover; and many other volumes on the
+same subject, the names of which (although as a boy I was wont to pore
+over their contents with profound awe and sympathy) I have now for the
+most part forgotten.
+
+Most persons, I suppose, have observed how the example of a successful
+ancestor is apt to determine the pursuits of his descendants down to the
+third and fourth generations, inclining the lads of this house to the
+sea, and of that to the bar, according as the great man of the family
+achieved his honors on shipboard, or climbed his way to the woolsack.
+The Arbuthnots offered no exception to this very natural law of
+selection. They could not help remembering how the famous doctor had
+excelled in literature as in medicine; how he had been not only
+Physician in Ordinary to Queen Anne and Prince George of Denmark, but a
+satirist and pamphleteer, a wit and the friend of wits--of such wits as
+Pope and Swift, Harley and Bolingbroke. Hence they took, as it were
+instinctively, to physic and the _belles lettres_, and were never
+without a doctor or an author in the family.
+
+My father, however, like the great Martinus Scriblerus, was both doctor
+and author. And he was a John Arbuthnot. And to carry the resemblance
+still further, he was gifted with a vein of rough epigrammatic humor, in
+which it pleased his independence to indulge without much respect of
+persons, times, or places. His tongue, indeed, cost him some friends and
+gained him some enemies; but I am not sure that it diminished his
+popularity as a physician. People compared him to Abernethy, whereby he
+was secretly flattered. Some even went so far as to argue that only a
+very clever man could afford to be a bear; and I must say that he pushed
+this conclusion to its farthest limit, showing his temper alike to rich
+and poor upon no provocation whatever. He cared little, to be sure, for
+his connection. He loved the profession theoretically, and from a
+scientific point of view; but he disliked the drudgery of country
+practice, and stood in no need of its hardly-earned profits. Yet he was
+a man who so loved to indulge his humor, no matter at what cost, that I
+doubt whether he would have been more courteous had his bread depended
+on it. As it was, he practised and grumbled, snarled at his patients,
+quarrelled with the rich, bestowed his time and money liberally upon the
+poor, and amused his leisure by writing for a variety of scientific
+periodicals, both English and foreign.
+
+Our home stood at the corner of a lane towards the eastern extremity of
+the town, commanding a view of the Squire's Park, and a glimpse of the
+mill-pool and meadows in the valley beyond. This lane led up to
+Barnard's Green, a breezy space of high, uneven ground dedicated to
+fairs, cricket matches, and travelling circuses, whence the noisy music
+of brass bands, and the echoes of alternate laughter and applause, were
+wafted past our windows in the summer evenings. We had a large garden at
+the back, and a stable up the lane; and though the house was but one
+story in height, it covered a considerable space of ground, and
+contained more rooms than we ever had occasion to use. Thus it happened
+that since my mother's death, which took place when I was a very little
+boy, many doors on the upper floor were kept locked, to the undue
+development of my natural inquisitiveness by day, and my mortal terror
+when sent to bed at night. In one of these her portrait still hung above
+the mantelpiece, and her harp stood in its accustomed corner. In
+another, which was once her bedroom, everything was left as in her
+lifetime, her clothes yet hanging in the wardrobe, her dressing-case
+standing upon the toilet, her favorite book upon the table beside the
+bed. These things, told to me by the servants with much mystery, took a
+powerful hold upon my childish imagination. I trembled as I passed the
+closed doors at dusk, and listened fearfully outside when daylight gave
+me courage to linger near them. Something of my mother's presence, I
+fancied, must yet dwell within--something in her shape still wander from
+room to room in the dim moonlight, and echo back the sighing of the
+night winds. Alas! I could not remember her. Now and then, as if
+recalled by a dream, some broken and shadowy images of a pale face and a
+slender hand floated vaguely through my mind; but faded even as I strove
+to realize them. Sometimes, too, when I was falling off to sleep in my
+little bed, or making out pictures in the fire on a winter evening,
+strange fragments of old rhymes seemed to come back upon me, mingled
+with the tones of a soft voice and the haunting of a long-forgotten
+melody. But these, after all, were yearnings more of the heart than
+the memory:--
+
+     "I felt a mother-want about the world.
+          And still went seeking."
+
+To return to my description of my early home:--the two rooms on either
+side of the hall, facing the road, were appropriated by my father for
+his surgery and consulting-room; while the two corresponding rooms at
+the back were fitted up as our general reception-room, and my father's
+bed-room. In the former of these, and in the weedy old garden upon which
+it opened, were passed all the days of my boyhood.
+
+It was my father's good-will and pleasure to undertake the sole charge
+of my education. Fain would I have gone like other lads of my age to
+public school and college; but on this point, as on most others, he was
+inflexible. Himself an obscure physician in a remote country town, he
+brought me up with no other view than to be his own successor. The
+profession was not to my liking. Somewhat contemplative and nervous by
+nature, there were few pursuits for which I was less fitted. I knew
+this, but dared not oppose him. Loving study for its own sake, and
+trusting to the future for some lucky turn of destiny, I yielded to that
+which seemed inevitable, and strove to make the best of it.
+
+Thus it came to pass that I lived a quiet, hard-working home life, while
+other boys of my age were going through the joyous experience of school,
+and chose my companions from the dusty shelves of some three or four
+gigantic book-cases, instead of from the class and the playground. Not
+that I regret it. I believe, on the contrary, that a boy may have worse
+companions than books and busts, employments less healthy than the study
+of anatomy, and amusements more pernicious than Shakespeare and Horace.
+Thank Heaven! I escaped all such; and if, as I have been told, my
+boyhood was unboyish, and my youth prematurely cultivated, I am content
+to have been spared the dangers in exchange for the pleasures of a
+public school.
+
+I do not, however, pretend to say that I did not sometimes pine for the
+recreations common to my age. Well do I remember the manifold
+attractions of Barnard's Green. What longing glances I used to steal
+towards the boisterous cricketers, when going gravely forth upon a
+botanical walk with my father! With what eager curiosity have I not
+lingered many a time before the entrance to a forbidden booth, and
+scanned the scenic advertisement of a travelling show! Alas! how the
+charms of study paled before those intervals of brief but bitter
+temptation! What, then, was pathology compared to the pig-faced lady, or
+the Materia Medica to Smith's Mexican Circus, patronized by all the
+sovereigns of Europe? But my father was inexorable. He held that such
+places were, to use his own words, "opened by swindlers for the ruin of
+fools," and from one never-to-be-forgotten hour, when he caught me in
+the very act of taking out my penny-worth at a portable peep-show, he
+bound me over by a solemn promise (sealed by a whipping) never to repeat
+the offence under any provocation or pretext whatsoever. I was a tiny
+fellow in pinafores when this happened, but having once pledged my word,
+I kept it faithfully through all the studious years that lay between six
+and sixteen.
+
+At sixteen an immense crisis occurred in my life. I fell in love. I had
+been in love several times before--chiefly with the elder pupils at the
+Miss Andrews' establishment; and once (but that was when I was very
+young indeed) with the cook. This, however, was a much more romantic and
+desperate affair. The lady was a Columbine by profession, and as
+beautiful as an angel. She came down to our neighborhood with a
+strolling company, and performed every evening, in a temporary theatre
+on the green, for nearly three weeks. I used to steal out after dinner
+when my father was taking his nap, and run the whole way, that I might
+be in time to see the object of my adoration walking up and down the
+platform outside the booth before the performances commenced. This
+incomparable creature wore a blue petticoat spangled with tinfoil, and a
+wreath of faded poppies. Her age might have been about forty. I thought
+her the loveliest of created beings. I wrote sonnets to her--dozens of
+them--intending to leave them at the theatre door, but never finding the
+courage to do it. I made up bouquets for her, over and over again,
+chosen from the best flowers in our neglected garden; but invariably
+with the same result. I hated the harlequin who presumed to put his arm
+about her waist. I envied the clown, whom she condescended to address as
+Mr. Merriman. In short, I was so desperately in love that I even tried
+to lie awake at night and lose my appetite; but, I am ashamed to own,
+failed signally in both endeavors.
+
+At length I wrote to her. I can even now recall passages out of that
+passionate epistle. I well remember how it took me a whole morning to
+write it; how I crammed it with quotations from Horace; and how I fondly
+compared her to most of the mythological divinities. I then copied it
+out on pale pink paper, folded it in the form of a heart, and directed
+it to Miss Angelina Lascelles, and left it, about dusk, with the
+money-taker at the pit door. I signed myself, if I remember rightly,
+Pyramus. What would I not have given that evening to pay my sixpence
+like the rest of the audience, and feast my eyes upon her from some
+obscure corner! What would I not have given to add my quota to
+the applause!
+
+I could hardly sleep that night; I could hardly read or write, or eat my
+breakfast the next morning, for thinking of my letter and its probable
+effect. It never once occurred to me that my Angelina might possibly
+find it difficult to construe Horace. Towards evening, I escaped again,
+and flew to Barnard's Green. It wanted nearly an hour to the time of
+performance; but the tuning of a violin was audible from within, and the
+money-taker was already there with his pipe in his mouth and his hands
+in his pockets. I had no courage to address that functionary; but I
+lingered in his sight and sighed audibly, and wandered round and round
+the canvas walls that hedged my divinity. Presently he took his pipe out
+of, his mouth and his hands out of his pockets; surveyed me deliberately
+from head to foot, and said:--
+
+"Hollo there! aint you the party that brought a three-cornered letter
+here last evening!"
+
+I owned it, falteringly.
+
+He lifted a fold in the canvas, and gave me a gentle shove between the
+shoulders.
+
+"Then you're to go in," said he, shortly. "She's there, somewhere.
+You're sure to find her."
+
+The canvas dropped behind me, and I found myself inside. My heart beat
+so fast that I could scarcely breathe. The booth was almost dark; the
+curtain was down; and a gentleman with striped legs was lighting the
+footlamps. On the front pit bench next the orchestra, discussing a plate
+of bread and meat and the contents of a brown jug, sat a stout man in
+shirt-sleeves and a woman in a cotton gown. The woman rose as I made my
+appearance, and asked, civilly enough, whom I pleased to want.
+
+I stammered the name of Miss Angelina Lascelles.
+
+"Miss Lascelles!" she repeated. "I am Miss Lascelles," Then, looking at
+me more narrowly, "I suppose," she added, "you are the little boy that
+brought the letter?"
+
+The little boy that brought the letter! Gracious heavens! And this
+middle-aged woman in a cotton gown--was she the Angelina of my dreams!
+The booth went round with me, and the lights danced before my eyes.
+
+"If you have come for an answer," she continued, "you may just say to
+your Mr. Pyramid that I am a respectable married woman, and he ought to
+be ashamed of himself--and, as for his letter, I never read such a heap
+of nonsense in my life! There, you can go out by the way you came in,
+and if you take my advice, you won't come back again!"
+
+How I looked, what I said, how I made my exit, whether the doorkeeper
+spoke to me as I passed, I have no idea to this day. I only know that I
+flung myself on the dewy grass under a great tree in the first field I
+came to, and shed tears of such shame, disappointment, and wounded
+pride, as my eyes had never known before. She had called me a little
+boy, and my letter a heap of nonsense! She was elderly--she was
+ignorant--she was married! I had been a fool; but that knowledge came
+too late, and was not consolatory.
+
+By-and-by, while I was yet sobbing and disconsolate, I heard the
+drumming and fifing which heralded the appearance of the _Corps
+Dramatique_ on the outer platform. I resolved to see her for the last
+time. I pulled my hat over my eyes, went back to the Green, and mingled
+with the crowd outside the booth. It was growing dusk. I made my way to
+the foot of the ladder, and observed her narrowly. I saw that her ankles
+were thick, and her elbows red. The illusion was all over. The spangles
+had lost their lustre, and the poppies their glow. I no longer hated the
+harlequin, or envied the clown, or felt anything but mortification at my
+own folly.
+
+"Miss Angelina Lascelles, indeed!" I said to myself, as I sauntered
+moodily home. "Pshaw! I shouldn't wonder if her name was Snooks!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+THE LITTLE CHEVALIER.
+
+     A mere anatomy, a mountebank,
+     A threadbare juggler.
+
+     _Comedy of Errors_.
+
+     Nay, then, he is a conjuror.
+
+     _Henry VI_.
+
+My adventure with Miss Lascelles did me good service, and cured me for
+some time, at least, of my leaning towards the tender passion. I
+consequently devoted myself more closely than ever to my
+studies--indulged in a passing mania for genealogy and heraldry--began a
+collection of local geological specimens, all of which I threw away at
+the end of the first fortnight--and took to rearing rabbits in an old
+tumble-down summer-house at the end of the garden. I believe that from
+somewhere about this time I may also date the commencement of a great
+epic poem in blank verse, and Heaven knows how many cantos, which was to
+be called the Columbiad. It began, I remember, with a description of the
+Court of Ferdinand and Isabella, and the departure of Columbus, and was
+intended to celebrate the discovery, colonization, and subsequent
+history of America. I never got beyond ten or a dozen pages of the first
+canto, however, and that Transatlantic epic remains unfinished to
+this day.
+
+The great event which I have recorded in the preceding chapter took
+place in the early summer. It must, therefore, have been towards the
+close of autumn in the same year when my next important adventure
+befell. This time the temptation assumed a different shape.
+
+Coming briskly homewards one fine frosty morning after having left a
+note at the Vicarage, I saw a bill-sticker at work upon a line of dead
+wall which at that time reached from the Red Lion Inn to the corner of
+Pitcairn's Lane. His posters were printed in enormous type, and
+decorated with a florid bordering in which the signs of the zodiac
+conspicuously figured Being somewhat idly disposed, I followed the
+example of other passers-by, and lingered to watch the process and read
+the advertisement. It ran as follows:----
+
+MAGIC AND MYSTERY! MAGIC AND MYSTERY!
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+M. LE CHEVALIER ARMAND PROUDHINE, (of Paris) surnamed
+
+THE WIZARD OF THE CAUCASUS,
+
+Has the honor to announce to the Nobility and Gentry of Saxonholme and
+its vicinity, that he will, to-morrow evening (October--, 18--),
+hold his First
+
+SOIREE FANTASTIQUE
+
+IN
+
+THE LARGE ROOM OF THE RED LION HOTEL.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+ADMISSION 1s. RESERVED SEATS 2s. 6d.
+
+_To commence at Seven_.
+
+N.B.--_The performance will include a variety of new and surprising
+feats of Legerdemain never before exhibited_.
+
+_A soiree fantastique_! what would I not give to be present at a _soiree
+fantastique_! I had read of the Rosicrucians, of Count Cagliostro, and
+of Doctor Dee. I had peeped into more than one curious treatise on
+Demonology, and I fancied there could be nothing in the world half so
+marvellous as that last surviving branch of the Black Art entitled the
+Science of Legerdemain.
+
+What if, for this once, I were to ask leave to be present at the
+performance? Should I do so with even the remotest chance of success? It
+was easier to propound this momentous question than to answer it. My
+father, as I have already said, disapproved of public entertainments,
+and his prejudices were tolerably inveterate. But then, what could be
+more genteel than the programme, or more select than the prices? How
+different was an entertainment given in the large room of the Red Lion
+Hotel to a three-penny wax-work, or a strolling circus on Barnard's
+Green! I had made one of the audience in that very room over and over
+again when the Vicar read his celebrated "Discourses to Youth," or Dr.
+Dunks came down from Grinstead to deliver an explosive lecture on
+chemistry; and I had always seen the reserved seats filled by the best
+families in the neighborhood. Fully persuaded of the force of my own
+arguments, I made up my mind to prefer this tremendous request on the
+first favorable opportunity, and so hurried home, with my head full of
+quite other thoughts than usual.
+
+My father was sitting at the table with a mountain of books and papers
+before him. He looked up sharply as I entered, jerked his chair round so
+as to get the light at his back, put on his spectacles, and
+ejaculated:--
+
+"Well, sir!"
+
+This was a bad sign, and one with which I was only too familiar. Nature
+had intended my father for a barrister. He was an adept in all the arts
+of intimidation, and would have conducted a cross-examination to
+perfection. As it was, he indulged in a good deal of amateur practice,
+and from the moment when he turned his back to the light and donned the
+inexorable spectacles, there was not a soul in the house, from myself
+down to the errand-boy, who was not perfectly aware of something
+unpleasant to follow.
+
+"Well, sir!" he repeated, rapping impatiently upon the table with his
+knuckles.
+
+Having nothing to reply to this greeting, I looked out of the window and
+remained silent; whereby, unfortunately. I irritated him still more.
+
+"Confound you, sir!" he exclaimed, "have you nothing to say?"
+
+"Nothing," I replied, doggedly.
+
+"Stand there!" he said, pointing to a particular square in the pattern
+of the carpet. "Stand there!"
+
+I obeyed.
+
+"And now, perhaps, you will have the goodness to explain what you have
+been about this morning; and why it should have taken you just
+thirty-seven minutes by the clock to accomplish a journey which a
+tortoise--yes, sir, a tortoise,--might have done in less than ten?"
+
+I gravely compared my watch with the clock before replying.
+
+"Upon my word, sir," I said, "your tortoise would have the advantage of
+me."
+
+"The advantage of you! What do you mean by the advantage of you, you
+affected puppy?"
+
+"I had no idea," said I, provokingly, "that you were in unusual haste
+this morning."
+
+"Haste!" shouted my father. "I never said I was in haste. I never choose
+to be in haste. I hate haste!"
+
+"Then why..."
+
+"Because you have been wasting your time and mine, sir," interrupted he.
+"Because I will not permit you to go idling and vagabondizing about
+the village."
+
+My _sang froid_ was gone directly.
+
+"Idling and vagabondizing!" I repeated angrily. "I have done nothing of
+the kind. I defy you to prove it. When have you known me forget that I
+am a gentleman?"
+
+"Humph!" growled my father, mollified but sarcastic; "a pretty
+gentleman--a gentleman of sixteen!"
+
+"It is true,"' I continued, without heeding the interruption, "that I
+lingered for a moment to read a placard by the way; but if you will take
+the trouble, sir, to inquire at the Rectory, you will find that I waited
+a quarter of an hour before I could send up your letter."
+
+My father grinned and rubbed his hands. If there was one thing in the
+world that aggravated him more than another, it was to find his fire
+opposed to ice. Let him, however, succeed in igniting his adversary, and
+he was in a good humor directly.
+
+"Come, come, Basil," said he, taking off his spectacles, "I never said
+you were not a good lad. Go to your books, boy--go to your books; and
+this evening I will examine you in vegetable physiology."
+
+Silently, but not sullenly, I drew a chair to the table, and resumed my
+work. We were both satisfied, because each in his heart considered
+himself the victor. My father was amused at having irritated me, whereas
+I was content because he had, in some sort, withdrawn the expressions
+that annoyed me. Hence we both became good-tempered, and, according to
+our own tacit fashion, continued during the rest of that morning to be
+rather more than usually sociable.
+
+Hours passed thus--hours of quiet study, during which the quick
+travelling of a pen or the occasional turning of a page alone disturbed
+the silence. The warm sunlight which shone in so greenly through the
+vine leaves, stole, inch by inch, round the broken vases in the garden
+beyond, and touched their brown mosses with a golden bloom. The patient
+shadow on the antique sundial wound its way imperceptibly from left to
+right, and long slanting threads of light and shadow pierced in time
+between the branches of the poplars. Our mornings were long, for we rose
+early and dined late; and while my father paid professional visits, I
+devoted my hours to study. It rarely happened that he could thus spend a
+whole day among his books. Just as the clock struck four, however, there
+came a ring at the bell.
+
+My father settled himself obstinately in his chair.
+
+"If that's a gratis patient," said he, between his teeth, "I'll not
+stir. From eight to ten are their hours, confound them!"
+
+"If you please, sir," said Mary, peeping in, "if you please, sir, it's a
+gentleman."
+
+"A stranger?" asked my father.
+
+Mary nodded, put her hand to her mouth, and burst into an irrepressible
+giggle.
+
+"If you please, sir," she began--but could get no farther.
+
+My father was in a towering passion directly.
+
+"Is the girl mad?" he shouted. "What is the meaning of this buffoonery?"
+
+"Oh, sir--if you please, sir," ejaculated Mary, struggling with terror
+and laughter together, "it's the gentleman, sir. He--he says, if you
+please, sir, that his name is Almond Pudding!"
+
+"Your pardon, Mademoiselle," said a plaintive voice. "Armand
+Proudhine--le Chevalier Armand Proudhine, at your service."
+
+Mary disappeared with her apron to her mouth, and subsided into distant
+peals of laughter, leaving the Chevalier standing in the doorway.
+
+He was a very little man, with a pinched and melancholy countenance, and
+an eye as wistful as a dog's. His threadbare clothes, made in the
+fashion of a dozen years before, had been decently mended in many
+places. A paste pin in a faded cravat, and a jaunty cane with a
+pinchbeck top, betrayed that he was still somewhat of a beau. His scant
+gray hair was tied behind with a piece of black ribbon, and he carried
+his hat under his arm, after the fashion of Elliston and the Prince
+Regent, as one sees them in the colored prints of fifty years ago.
+
+He advanced a step, bowed, and laid his card upon the table.
+
+"I believe," he said in his plaintive voice, and imperfect English,
+"that I have the honor to introduce myself to Monsieur Arbuthnot."
+
+"If you want me, sir," said my father, gruffly, "I am Doctor Arbuthnot."
+
+"And I, Monsieur," said the little Frenchman, laying his hand upon his
+heart, and bowing again--"I am the Wizard of the Caucasus."
+
+"The what?" exclaimed my father.
+
+"The Wizard of the Caucasus," replied our visitor, impressively.
+
+There was an awkward pause, during which my father looked at me and
+touched his forehead significantly with his forefinger; while the
+Chevalier, embarrassed between his natural timidity and his desire to
+appear of importance, glanced from one face to the other, and waited for
+a reply. I hastened to disentangle the situation.
+
+"I think I can explain this gentleman's meaning," I said. "Monsieur le
+Chevalier will perform to-morrow evening in the large room of the Red
+Lion Hotel. He is a professor of legerdemain."
+
+"Of the marvellous art of legerdemain, Monsieur Arbuthnot," interrupted
+the Chevalier eagerly. "Prestidigitateur to the Court of Sachsenhausen,
+and successor to Al Hakim, the wise. It is I, Monsieur, that have invent
+the famous _tour du pistolet;_ it is I, that have originate the great
+and surprising deception of the bottle; it is I whom the world does
+surname the Wizard of the Caucasus. _Me voici!_"
+
+Carried away by the force of his own eloquence, the Chevalier fell into
+an attitude at the conclusion of his little speech; but remembering
+where he was, blushed, and bowed again.
+
+"Pshaw," said my father impatiently, "the man's a conjuror."
+
+The little Frenchman did not hear him. He was at that moment untying a
+packet which he carried in his hat, the contents whereof appeared to
+consist of a number of very small pink and yellow cards. Selecting a
+couple of each color, he deposited his hat carefully upon the floor and
+came a few steps nearer to the table.
+
+"Monsieur will give me the hope to see him, with Monsieur _son fils_, at
+my Soiree Fantastique, _n'est-ce pas?_" he asked, timidly.
+
+"Sir," said my father shortly, "I never encourage peripatetic
+mendicity."
+
+The little Frenchman looked puzzled.
+
+"_Comment_?" said he, and glanced to me for an explanation.
+
+"I am very sorry, Monsieur," I interposed hastily; "but my father
+objects to public entertainments."
+
+"_Ah, mon Dieu!_ but not to this," cried the Chevalier, raising his
+hands and eyes in deprecating astonishment. "Not to my Soiree
+Fantastique! The art of legerdemain, Monsieur, is not immoral. He is
+graceful--he is surprising--he is innocent; and, Monsieur, he is
+patronized by the Church; he is patronized by your amiable _Cure_,
+Monsieur le Docteur Brand."
+
+"Oh, father," I exclaimed, "Dr. Brand has taken tickets!"
+
+"And pray, sir, what's that to me?" growled my father, without looking
+up from the book which he had ungraciously resumed. "Let Dr. Brand make
+a fool of himself, if he pleases. I'm not bound to do the same."
+
+The Chevalier blushed crimson--not with humility this time, but with
+pride. He gathered the cards into his pocket, took up his hat, and
+saying stiffly--"_Monsieur, je vous demande pardon._"--moved towards
+the door.
+
+On the threshold he paused, and turning towards me with an air of faded
+dignity:--"Young gentleman," he said, "_you_ I thank for your
+politeness."
+
+He seemed as if he would have said more--hesitated--became suddenly
+livid--put his hand to his head, and leaned for support against
+the wall.
+
+My father was up and beside him in an instant. We carried rather than
+led him to the sofa, untied his cravat, and administered the necessary
+restoratives. He was all but insensible for some moments. Then the color
+came back to his lips, and he sighed heavily.
+
+"An attack of the nerves," he said, shaking his head feebly. "An attack
+of the nerves, Messieurs."
+
+My father looked doubtful.
+
+"Are you often taken in this way?" he asked, with unusual gentleness.
+
+"_Mais oui_, Monsieur," admitted the Frenchman, reluctantly. "He does
+often arrive to me. Not--not that he is dangerous. Ah, bah! _Pas
+du tout_!"
+
+"Humph!" ejaculated my father, more doubtfully than before. "Let me feel
+your pulse."
+
+The Chevalier bowed and submitted, watching the countenance of the
+operator all the time with an anxiety that was not lost upon me.
+
+"Do you sleep well?" asked my father, holding the fragile little wrist
+between his finger and thumb.
+
+"Passably, Monsieur."
+
+"Dream much?"
+
+"Ye--es, I dream."
+
+"Are you subject to giddiness?"
+
+The Chevalier shrugged his shoulders and looked uneasy.
+
+"_C'est vrai_" he acknowledged, more unwillingly than ever, "_J'ai des
+vertiges_."
+
+My father relinquished his hold and scribbled a rapid prescription.
+
+"There, sir," said he, "get that preparation made up, and when you next
+feel as you felt just now, drink a wine-glassful. I should recommend you
+to keep some always at hand, in case of emergency. You will find further
+directions on the other side."
+
+The little Frenchman attempted to get up with his usual vivacity; but
+was obliged to balance himself against the back of a chair.
+
+"Monsieur," said he, with another of his profound bows, "I thank you
+infinitely. You make me too much attention; but I am grateful. And,
+Monsieur, my little girl--my child that is far away across the sea--she
+thanks you also. _Elle m'aime, Monsieur--elle m'aime, cette pauvre
+petite_! What shall she do if I die?"
+
+Again he raised his hand to his brow. He was unconscious of anything
+theatrical in the gesture. He was in sad earnest, and his eyes were wet
+with tears, which he made no effort to conceal.
+
+My father shuffled restlessly in his chair.
+
+"No obligation--no obligation at all," he muttered, with a touch of
+impatience in his voice. "And now, what about those tickets? I suppose,
+Basil, you're dying to see all this tomfoolery?"
+
+"That I am, sir," said I, joyfully. "I should like it above all things!"
+
+The Chevalier glided forward, and laid a couple of little pink cards
+upon my father's desk.
+
+"If," said he, timidly, "if Monsieur will make me the honor to
+accept...."
+
+"Not for the world, sir--not for the world!" interposed my father. "The
+boy shan't go, unless I pay for the tickets."
+
+"But, Monsieur...."
+
+"Nothing of the kind, sir. I cannot hear of it. What are the prices of
+the seats?"
+
+Our little visitor looked down and was silent; but I replied for him.
+
+"The reserved seats," I whispered, "are half-a-crown each."
+
+"Then I will take eight reserved," said my father, opening a drawer in
+his desk and bringing out a bright, new sovereign.
+
+The little Frenchman started. He could hardly believe in such
+munificence.
+
+"When? How much?" stammered he, with a pleasant confusion of adverbs.
+
+"Eight," growled my father, scarcely able to repress a smile.
+
+"Eight? _mon Dieu_, Monsieur, how you are generous! I shall keep for you
+all the first row."
+
+"Oblige me by doing nothing of the kind," said my father, very
+decisively. "It would displease me extremely."
+
+The Chevalier counted out the eight little pink cards, and ranged them
+in a row beside my father's desk.
+
+"Count them, Monsieur, if you please," said he, his eyes wandering
+involuntarily towards the sovereign.
+
+My father did so with much gravity, and handed over the money.
+
+The Chevalier consigned it, with trembling fingers, to a small canvas
+bag, which looked very empty, and which came from the deepest recesses
+of his pocket.
+
+"Monsieur," said he, "my thanks are in my heart. I will not fatigue you
+with them. Good-morning."
+
+He bowed again, for perhaps the twentieth time; lingered a moment at the
+threshold; and then retired, closing the door softly after him.
+
+My father rubbbed his head all over, and gave a great yawn of
+satisfaction.
+
+"I am so much obliged to you, sir," I said, eagerly.
+
+"What for?"
+
+"For having bought those tickets. It was very kind of you."
+
+"Hold your tongue. I hate to be thanked," snarled he, and plunged back
+again into his books and papers.
+
+Once more the studious silence in the room--once more the rustling leaf
+and scratching pen, which only made the stillness seem more still,
+within and without.
+
+"I beg your pardons," murmured the voice of the little Chevalier.
+
+I turned, and saw him peeping through the half-open door. He looked more
+wistful than ever, and twisted the handle nervously between his fingers.
+
+My father frowned, and muttered something between his teeth. I fear it
+was not very complimentary to the Chevalier.
+
+"One word, Monsieur," pleaded the little man, edging himself round the
+door, "one small word!"
+
+"Say it, sir, and have done with it," said my father, savagely.
+
+The Chevalier hesitated.
+
+"I--I--Monsieur le Docteur--that is, I wish...."
+
+"Confound it, sir, what do you wish?"
+
+The Chevalier brushed away a tear.
+
+"_Dites-moi,"_ he said with suppressed agitation. "One word--yes or
+no--is he dangerous?"
+
+My father's countenance softened.
+
+"My good friend," he said, gently, "we are none of us safe for even a
+day, or an hour; but after all, that which we call danger is merely a
+relative position. I have known men in a state more precarious than
+yours who lived to a long old age, and I see no reason to doubt that
+with good living, good spirits, and precaution, you stand as fair a
+chance as another."
+
+The little Frenchman pressed his hands together in token of gratitude,
+whispered a broken word or two of thanks, and bowed himself out of
+the room.
+
+When he was fairly gone, my father flung a book at my head, and said,
+with more brevity than politeness:--
+
+"Boy, bolt the door."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+THE EVENTS OF AN EVENING.
+
+"Basil, my boy, if you are going to that place, you must take Collins
+with you."
+
+"Won't you go yourself, father?"
+
+"I! Is the boy mad!"
+
+"I hope not, sir; only as you took eight reserved seats, I thought...."
+
+"You've no business to think, sir! Seven of those tickets are in the
+fire."
+
+"For fear, then, you should fancy to burn the eighth, I'll wish you
+good-evening!"
+
+So away I darted, called to Collins to follow me, and set off at a brisk
+pace towards the Red Lion Hotel. Collins was our indoor servant; a
+sharp, merry fellow, some ten years older than myself, who desired no
+better employment than to escort me upon such an occasion as the
+present. The audience had begun to assemble when we arrived. Collins
+went into the shilling places, while I ensconced myself in the second
+row of reserved seats. I had an excellent view of the stage. There, in
+the middle of the platform, stood the conjuror's table--a quaint,
+cabalistic-looking piece of furniture with carved black legs and a deep
+bordering of green cloth all round the top. A gay pagoda-shaped canopy
+of many hues was erected overhead. A long white wand leaned up against
+the wall. To the right stood a bench laden with mysterious jars,
+glittering bowls, gilded cones, mystical globes, colored glass boxes,
+and other properties. To the left stood a large arm-chair covered with
+crimson cloth. All this was very exciting, and I waited breathlessly
+till the Wizard should appear.
+
+He came at last; but not, surely, our dapper little visitor of
+yesterday! A majestic beard of ashen gray fell in patriarchal locks
+almost to his knees. Upon his head he wore a high cap of some dark fur;
+upon his feet embroidered slippers; and round his waist a glittering
+belt patterned with hieroglyphics. A long woollen robe of chocolate and
+orange fell about him in heavy folds, and swept behind him, like a
+train. I could scarcely believe, at first, that it was the same person;
+but, when he spoke, despite the pomp and obscurity of his language. I
+recognised the plaintive voice of the little Chevalier.
+
+"_Messieurs et Mesdames_," he began, and took up the wand to emphasize
+his discourse; "to read in the stars the events of the future--to
+transform into gold the metals inferior--to discover the composition of
+that Elixir who, by himself, would perpetuate life, was in past ages the
+aim and aspiration of the natural philosopher. But they are gone, those
+days--they are displaced, those sciences. The Alchemist and the
+Rosicrucian are no more, and of all their race, the professor of
+Legerdemain alone survives. Ladies and gentlemen, my magic he is simple.
+I retain not familiars. I employ not crucible, nor furnace, nor retort.
+I but amuse you with my agility of hand, and for commencement I tell you
+that you shall be deceived as well as the Wizard of the Caucasus can
+deceive you."
+
+His voice trembled, and the slender wand shivered in his hand. Was this
+nervousness? Or was he, in accordance with the quaintness of his costume
+and the amplitude of his beard, enacting the feebleness of age?
+
+He advanced to the front of the platform. "Three things I require," he
+said. "A watch, a pocket-handkerchief and a hat. Is there here among my
+visitors any person so gracious as to lend me these trifles? I will not
+injure them, ladies and gentlemen. I will only pound the watch in my
+mortar--burn the _mouchoir_ in my lamp, and make a pudding in the
+_chapeau_. And, with all this, I engage to return them to their
+proprietors, better as new."
+
+There was a pause, and a laugh. Presently a gentleman volunteered his
+hat, and a lady her embroidered handkerchief; but no person seemed
+willing to submit his watch to the pounding process.
+
+"Shall nobody lend me the watch?" asked the Chevalier; but in a voice
+so hoarse that I scarcely recognised it.
+
+A sudden thought struck me, and I rose in my place.
+
+"I shall be happy to do so," I said aloud, and made my way round to the
+front of the platform.
+
+At the moment when he took it from me, I spoke to him.
+
+"Monsieur Proudhine," I whispered, "you are ill! What can I do for you?"
+
+"Nothing, _mon enfant_," he answered, in the same low tone. "I suffer;
+_mais il faut se resigner_."
+
+"Break off the performance--retire for half an hour."
+
+"Impossible. See, they already observe us!"
+
+And he drew back abruptly. There was a seat vacant in the front row. I
+took it, resolved at all events to watch him narrowly.
+
+Not to detail too minutely the events of a performance which since that
+time has become sufficiently familiar, I may say that he carried out his
+programme with dreadful exactness, and, after appearing to burn the
+handkerchief to ashes and mix up a quantity of eggs and flour in the
+hat, proceeded very coolly to smash the works of my watch beneath his
+ponderous pestle. Notwithstanding my faith, I began to feel seriously
+uncomfortable. It was a neat little silver watch of foreign
+workmanship--not very valuable, to be sure, but precious to me as the
+most precious of repeaters.
+
+"He is very tough, your watch, Monsieur," said the Wizard, pounding away
+vigorously. "He--he takes a long time ... _Ah! mon Dieu!_"
+
+He raised his hand to his head, uttered a faint cry, and snatched at the
+back of the chair for support.
+
+My first thought was that he had destroyed my watch by mistake--my
+second, that he was very ill indeed. Scarcely knowing what I did, and
+quite forgetting the audience, I jumped on the platform to his aid.
+
+He shook his head, waved me away with one trembling hand, made a last
+effort to articulate, and fell heavily to the ground.
+
+All was confusion in an instant. Everybody crowded to the stage; whilst
+I, with a presence of mind which afterwards surprised myself, made my
+way out by a side-door and ran to fetch my father. He was fortunately at
+home, and in less than ten minutes the Chevalier was under his care. We
+found him laid upon a sofa in one of the sitting-rooms of the inn, pale,
+rigid, insensible, and surrounded by an idle crowd of lookers-on. They
+had taken off his cap and beard, and the landlady was endeavoring to
+pour some brandy down his throat; but his teeth were fast set, and his
+lips were blue and cold.
+
+"Oh, Doctor Arbuthnot! Doctor Arbuthnot!" cried a dozen voices at once,
+"the Conjuror is dying!"
+
+"For which reason, I suppose, you are all trying to smother him!" said
+my father angrily. "Mistress Cobbe, I beg you will not trouble yourself
+to pour that brandy down the man's throat. He has no more power to
+swallow it than my stick. Basil, open the window, and help me to loosen
+these things about his throat. Good people, all, I must request you to
+leave the room. This man's life is in peril, and I can do nothing while
+you remain. Go home--go home. You will see no more conjuring to-night."
+
+My father was peremptory, and the crowd unwillingly dispersed. One by
+one they left the room and gathered discontentedly in the passage. When
+it came to the last two or three, he took them by the shoulders, closed
+the door upon them, and turned the key.
+
+Only the landlady, and elderly woman-servant, and myself remained.
+
+The first thing my father did was to examine the pupil of the patient's
+eye, and lay his hand upon his heart. It still fluttered feebly, but the
+action of the lungs was suspended, and his hands and feet were cold
+as death.
+
+My father shook his head.
+
+"This man must be bled," said he, "but I have little hope of saving
+him."
+
+He was bled, and, though still unconscious, became less rigid They then
+poured a little wine down his throat, and he fell into a passive but
+painless condition, more inanimate than sleep, but less positive than a
+state of trance.
+
+A fire was then lighted, a mattress brought down, and the patient laid
+upon it, wrapped in many blankets. My father announced his intention of
+sitting up with him all night. In vain I begged for leave to share his
+vigil. He would hear of no such thing, but turned me out as he had
+turned out the others, bade me a brief "Good-night," and desired me to
+run home as quickly as I could.
+
+At that stage of my history, to hear was to obey; so I took my way
+quietly through the bar of the hotel, and had just reached the door when
+a touch on my sleeve arrested me. It was Mr. Cobbe, the landlord--a
+portly, red-whiskered Boniface of the old English type.
+
+"Good-evening, Mr. Basil," said he. "Going home, sir?"
+
+"Yes, Mr. Cobbe," I replied. "I can be of no further use here."
+
+"Well, sir, you've been of more use this evening than anybody--let alone
+the Doctor--that I must say for you," observed Mr. Cobbe, approvingly.
+"I never see such presence o' mind in so young a gen'leman before.
+Never, sir. Have a glass of grog and a cigar, sir, before you turn out."
+
+Much as I felt flattered by the supposition that I smoked (which was
+more than I could have done to save my life), I declined Mr. Cobbe's
+obliging offer and wished him good-night. But the landlord of the Red
+Lion was in a gossiping humor, and would not let me go.
+
+"If you won't take spirits, Mr. Basil," said he, "you must have a glass
+of negus. I couldn't let you go out without something warm--particular
+after the excitement you've gone through. Why, bless you, sir, when they
+ran out and told me, I shook like a leaf--and I don't look like a very
+nervous subject, do I? And so sudden as it was, too, poor little
+gentleman!"
+
+"Very sudden, indeed," I replied, mechanically.
+
+"Does Doctor Arbuthnot think he'll get the better of it, Mr. Basil?"
+
+"I fear he has little hope."
+
+Mr. Cobbe sighed, and shook his head, and smoked in silence.
+
+"To be struck down just when he was playing such tricks as them
+conjuring dodges, do seem uncommon awful," said he, after a time. "What
+was he after at the minute?--making a pudding, wasn't he, in some
+gentleman's hat?"
+
+I uttered a sudden ejaculation, and set down my glass of negus untasted.
+Till that moment I had not once thought of my watch.
+
+"Oh, Mr. Cobbe!" I cried, "he was pounding my watch in the mortar!"
+
+"_Your_ watch, Mr. Basil?"
+
+"Yes, mine--and I have not seen it since. What can have become of it?
+What shall I do?"
+
+"Do!" echoed the landlord, seizing a candle; "why, go and look for it,
+to be sure, Mr. Basil. That's safe enough, you may be sure!"
+
+I followed him to the room where the performance had taken place. It
+showed darkly and drearily by the light of one feeble candle. The
+benches and chairs were all in disorder. The wand lay where it had
+fallen from the hand of the Wizard. The mortar still stood on the table,
+with the pestle beside it. It contained only some fragments of
+broken glass.
+
+Mr. Cobbe laughed triumphantly.
+
+"Come, sir," said he, "the watch is safe enough, anyhow. Mounseer only
+made believe to pound it up, and now all that concerns us is to
+find it."
+
+That was indeed all--not only all, but too much. We searched everything.
+We looked in all the jars and under all the moveables. We took the cover
+off the chair; we cleared the table; but without success. My watch had
+totally disappeared, and we at length decided that it must be concealed
+about the conjuror's person. Mr. Cobbe was my consoling angel.
+
+"Bless you, sir," said he, "don't never be cast down. My wife shall
+look for the watch to-morrow morning, and I'll promise you we'll find
+out every pocket he has about him."
+
+"And my father--you won't tell my father?" I said, dolefully.
+
+Mr. Cobbe replied by a mute but expressive piece of pantomime and took
+me back to the bar, where the good landlady ratified all that her
+husband had promised in her name.
+
+The stars shone brightly as I went home, and there was no moon. The town
+was intensely silent, and the road intensely solitary. I met no one on
+my way; let myself quietly in, and stole up to my bed-room in the dark.
+
+It was already late; but I was restless and weary--too restless to
+sleep, and too weary to read. I could not detach myself from the
+impressions of the day; and I longed for the morning, that I might learn
+the fate of my watch, and the condition of the Chevalier.
+
+At length, after some hours of wakefulness, I dropped into a profound
+and dreamless sleep.
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+THE CHEVALIER MAKES HIS LAST EXIT.
+
+     All the world's a stage,
+     And all the men and women merely players:
+     They have their exits and their entrances.
+         _As You Like It._
+
+I was waked by my father's voice calling to me from the garden, and so
+started up with that strange and sudden sense of trouble which most of
+us have experienced at some time or other in our lives.
+
+"Nine o'clock, Basil," cried my father. "Nine o'clock--come down
+directly, sir!"
+
+I sprang out of bed, and for some seconds could remember nothing of what
+had happened; but when I looked out of the window and saw my father in
+his dressing-gown and slippers walking up and down the sunny path with
+his hands behind his back and his eyes fixed on the ground, it all
+flashed suddenly upon me. To plunge into my bath, dress, run down, and
+join him in the garden, was the work of but a few minutes.
+
+"Good-morning, sir," I said, breathlessly.
+
+He stopped short in his walk, and looked at me from head to foot.
+
+"Humph!" said he, "you have dressed quickly...."
+
+"Yes, sir; I was startled to find myself so late."
+
+"So quickly," he continued, "that you have forgotten your watch."
+
+I felt my face burn. I had not a word to answer.
+
+"I suppose," said he, "you thought I should not find it out?"
+
+"I had hoped to recover it first," I replied, falteringly; "but...."
+
+"But you may make up your mind to the loss of it, sir; and serve you
+rightly, too," interposed my father. "I can tell you, for your
+satisfaction, that the man's clothes have been thoroughly examined, and
+that your watch has not been found. No doubt it lay somewhere on the
+table, and was stolen in the confusion."
+
+I hung my head. I could have wept for vexation.
+
+My father laughed sardonically.
+
+"Well, Master Basil," he said, "the loss is yours, and yours only. You
+won't get another watch from me, I promise you."
+
+I retorted angrily, whereat he only laughed the more; and then we went
+in to breakfast.
+
+Our morning meal was more unsociable than usual. I was too much annoyed
+to speak, and my father too preoccupied. I longed to inquire after the
+Chevalier, but not choosing to break the silence, hurried through my
+breakfast that I might run round to the Red Lion immediately after.
+Before we had left the table, a messenger came to say that "the conjuror
+was taken worse," and so my father and I hastened away together.
+
+He had passed from his trance-like sleep into a state of delirium, and
+when we entered the room was sitting up, pale and ghost-like, muttering
+to himself, and gesticulating as if in the presence of an audience.
+
+"_Pas du tout_," said he fantastically, "_pas du tout, Messieurs_--here
+is no deception. You shall see him pass from my hand to the _coffre_,
+and yet you shall not find how he does travel."
+
+My father smiled bitterly.
+
+"Conjurer to the last!" said he. "In the face of death, what a mockery
+is his trade!"
+
+Wandering as were his wits, he caught the last word and turned fiercely
+round; but there was no recognition in his eye.
+
+"Trade, Monsieur!" he echoed. "Trade!--you shall not call him trade! Do
+you know who I am, that you dare call him trade? _Dieu des Dieux!
+N'est-ce pas que je suis noble, moi?_ Trade!--when did one of my race
+embrace a trade? _Canaille!_ I do condescend for my reasons to take your
+money, but you shall not call him a trade!"
+
+Exhausted by this sudden burst of passion, he fell back upon his pillow,
+muttering and flushed. I bent over him, and caught a scattered phrase
+from time to time. He was dreaming of wealth, fancying himself rich and
+powerful, poor wretch! and all unconscious of his condition.
+
+"You shall see my Chateaux," he said, "my horses--my carriages.
+Listen--it is the ringing of the bells. Aha! _le jour viendra--le jour
+viendra_! Conjuror! who speaks of a conjuror? I never was a conjuror! I
+deny it: and he lies who says it! _Attendons_! Is the curtain up? Ah! my
+table--where is my table? I cannot play till I have my table.
+_Scelerats! je suis vole! je l'ai perdu! je l'ai perdu_! Ah, what shall
+I do? What shall I do? They have taken my table--they have taken...."
+
+He burst into tears, moaned twice or thrice, closed his eyes, and fell
+into a troubled sleep.
+
+The landlady sobbed. Hers was a kind heart, and the little Frenchman's
+simple courtesy had won her good-will from the first.
+
+"He had real quality manners," she said, disconsolately. "I do believe,
+gentlemen, that he had seen better days. Poor as he was, he never
+disputed the price of anything; and he never spoke to me without taking
+off his hat."
+
+"Upon my soul, Mistress Cobbe," said my father, "I incline to your
+opinion. I do think he is not what he seems."
+
+"And if I only knew where to find his friends, I shouldn't care half so
+much!" exclaimed the landlady. "It do seem so hard that he should die
+here, and not one of his own blood follow him to the grave! Surely he
+has some one who loves him!"
+
+"There was something said the other day about a child," mused my father.
+"Have no papers or letters been found about his person?"
+
+"None at all. Why, Doctor, you were here last night when we searched for
+Master Basil's watch, and you are witness that he had nothing of the
+kind in his possession. As to his luggage, that's only a carpet-bag and
+his conjuring things, and we looked through them as carefully as
+possible."
+
+The Chevalier moaned again, and tossed his arms feebly in his sleep.
+"The proofs," said he. "The proofs! I can do nothing without
+the proofs."
+
+My father listened. The landlady shook her head.
+
+"He has been going on like that ever since you left, sir," she said
+pitifully; "fancying he's been robbed, and calling out about the
+proofs--only ten times more violent. Then, again, he thinks he is going
+to act, and asks for his table. It's wonderful how he takes on about
+that trumpery table!"
+
+Scarcely had she spoken the words when the Chevalier opened his eyes,
+and, by a supreme effort, sat upright in his bed. The cold dew rose upon
+his brow; his lips quivered; he strove to speak, and only an
+inarticulate cry found utterance. My father flew to his support.
+
+"If you have anything to say," he urged earnestly, "try to say it now!"
+
+The dying man trembled convulsively, and a terrible look of despair came
+into his wan face.
+
+"Tell--tell" ... he gasped; but his voice failed him, and he could get
+no further.
+
+My father laid him gently down. There came an interval of terrible
+suspense--a moment of sharp agony--a deep, deep sigh--and then silence.
+
+My father laid his hand gently upon my shoulder.
+
+"It is all over," he said; "and his secret, if he had one, is in closer
+keeping than ours. Come away, boy; this is no place for you."
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+IN MEMORIAM.
+
+The poor little Chevalier! He died and became famous.
+
+Births, deaths and marriages are the great events of a country town; the
+prime novelties of a country newspaper; the salt of conversation, and
+the soul of gossip. An individual who furnishes the community with one
+or other of these topics, is a benefactor to his species. To be born is
+much; to marry is more; to die is to confer a favor on all the old
+ladies of the neighborhood. They love a christening and caudle--they
+rejoice in a wedding and cake--but they prefer a funeral and black kid
+gloves. It is a tragedy played off at the expense of the few for the
+gratification of the many--a costly luxury, of which it is pleasanter to
+be the spectator than the entertainer.
+
+Occurring, therefore, at a season when the supply of news was
+particularly scanty, the death of the little Chevalier was a boon to
+Saxonholme. The wildest reports were bandied about, and the most
+extraordinary fictions set on foot respecting his origin and station. He
+was a Russian spy. He was the unfortunate son of Louis XIV and Marie
+Antoinette. He was a pupil of Cagliostro, and the husband of Mlle.
+Lenormand. Customers flocked to the tap of the Red Lion as they had
+never flocked before, unless in election-time; and good Mrs. Cobbe had
+to repeat the story of the conjuror's illness and death till, like many
+other reciters, she had told it so often that she began to forget it. As
+for her husband, he had enough to do to serve the customers and take the
+money, to say nothing of showing the room, which proved a vast
+attraction, and remained for more than a week just as it was left on the
+evening of the performance, with the table, canopy and paraphernalia of
+wizardom still set out upon the platform.
+
+In the midst of these things arose a momentous question--what was the
+religion of the deceased, and where should he be buried? As in the old
+miracle plays we find good and bad angels contending for the souls of
+the dead, so on this occasion did the heads of all the Saxonholme
+churches, chapels and meeting-houses contend for the body of the little
+Chevalier. He was a Roman Catholic. He was a Dissenter. He was a member
+of the Established Church. He must be buried in the new Protestant
+Cemetery. He must lie in the churchyard of the Ebenezer Tabernacle. He
+must sleep in the far-away "God's Acre" of Father Daly's Chapel, and
+have a cross at his head, and masses said for the repose of his soul.
+The controversy ran high. The reverend gentlemen convoked a meeting,
+quarrelled outrageously, and separated in high dudgeon without having
+arrived at any conclusion.
+
+Whereupon arose another question, melancholy, ludicrous, perplexing,
+and, withal, as momentous as the first--Would the little Chevalier get
+buried at all? Or was he destined to remain, like Mahomet's coffin, for
+ever in a state of suspense?
+
+At the last, when Mr. and Mrs. Cobbe despairingly believed that they
+were never to be relieved of their troublesome guest, a vestry was
+called, and the churchwardens brought the matter to a conclusion. When
+he went round with his tickets, the conjuror called first at the
+Rectory, and solicited the patronage of Doctor Brand. Would he have paid
+that compliment to the cloth had he been other than a member of that
+religion "by law established?" Certainly not. The point was clear--could
+not be clearer; so orthodoxy and the new Protestant Cemetery
+carried the day.
+
+The funeral was a great event--not so far as mutes, feathers and
+carriages were concerned, for the Chevalier left but little worldly
+gear, and without hard cash even the most deserving must forego "the
+trappings and the suits of woe;" but it was a great event, inasmuch as
+it celebrated the victory of the Church, and the defeat of all
+schismatics. The rector himself, complacent and dignified, preached the
+funeral sermon to a crowded congregation, the following Sunday. We
+almost forgot, in fact, that the little Chevalier had any concern in the
+matter, and regarded it only as the triumph of orthodoxy.
+
+All was not ended, even here. For some weeks our conjuror continued to
+be the hero of every pulpit round about. He was cited as a shining
+light, denounced as a vessel of wrath, praised, pitied and calumniated
+according to the creed and temper of each declaimer. At length the
+controversy languished, died a natural death, and became "alms for
+oblivion."
+
+Laid to rest under a young willow, in a quiet corner, with a plain stone
+at his head, the little Frenchman was himself in course of time
+forgotten:--
+
+     "Alas! Poor Yorick!"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+POLONIUS TO LAERTES.
+
+Years went by. I studied; outgrew my jackets; became a young man. It was
+time, in short, that I walked the hospitals, and passed my examination.
+
+I had spoken to my father more than once upon the subject--spoken
+earnestly and urgently, as one who felt the necessity and justice of his
+appeal. But he put me off from time to time; persisted in looking upon
+me as a boy long after I had become acquainted with the penalties of the
+razor; and counselled me to be patient, till patience was well-nigh
+exhausted. The result of this treatment was that I became miserable and
+discontented; spent whole days wandering about the woods; and
+degenerated into a creature half idler and half misanthrope. I had never
+loved the profession of medicine. I should never have chosen it had I
+been free to follow my own inclinations: but having diligently fitted
+myself to enter it with credit, I felt that my father wronged me in this
+delay; and I felt it perhaps all the more bitterly because my labor had
+been none of love. Happily for me, however, he saw his error before it
+was too late, and repaired it generously.
+
+"Basil," said he, beckoning me one morning into the consulting-room, "I
+want to speak to you."
+
+I obeyed sullenly, and stood leaning up against the window, with my
+hands in my pockets.
+
+"You've been worrying me, Basil, more than enough these last few
+months," he said, rummaging among his papers, and speaking in a low,
+constrained voice. "I don't choose to be worried any longer. It is time
+you walked the hospitals, and--you may go."
+
+"To London, sir?"
+
+"No. I don't intend you to go to London."
+
+"To Edinburgh, then, I suppose," said I, in a tone of disappointment.
+
+"Nor to Edinburgh. You shall go to Paris."
+
+"To Paris!"
+
+"Yes--the French surgeons are the most skilful in the world, and Cheron
+will do everything for you. I know no eminent man in London from whom I
+should choose to ask a favor; and Cheron is one of my oldest
+friends--nay, the oldest friend I have in the world. If you have but two
+ounces of brains, he will make a clever man of you. Under him you will
+study French practice; walk the hospitals of Paris; acquire the language
+and, I hope, some of the polish of the French people. Are you
+satisfied?"
+
+"More than satisfied, sir," I replied, eagerly.
+
+"You shall not want for money, boy; and you may start as soon as you
+please. Is the thing settled?"
+
+"Quite, as far as I am concerned."
+
+My father rubbed his head all over with both hands, took off his
+spectacles, and walked up and down the room. By these signs he expressed
+any unusual degree of satisfaction. All at once he stopped, looked me
+full in the face, and said:--
+
+"Understand me, Basil. I require one thing in return."
+
+"If that thing be industry, sir, I think I may promise that you shall
+not have cause to complain,"
+
+My father shook his head.
+
+"Not industry," he said; "not industry alone. Keep good company, my boy.
+Keep good hours. Never forget that a gentleman must look like a
+gentleman, dress like a gentleman, frequent the society of gentlemen. To
+be a mere bookworm is to be a drone in the great hive. I hate a
+drone--as I hate a sloven."
+
+"I understand you, father," I faltered, blushing. "I know that of late
+I--I have not...."
+
+My father laid his hand suddenly over my mouth.
+
+"No confessions--no apologies," he said hastily. "We have both been to
+blame in more respects than one, and we shall both know how to be wiser
+in the future. Now go, and consider all that you may require for
+your journey."
+
+Agitated, delighted, full of hope, I ran up to my own room, locked the
+door, and indulged in a delightful reverie. What a prospect had suddenly
+opened before me! What novelty! what adventure! To have visited London
+would have been to fulfil all my desires; but to be sent to Paris was to
+receive a passport for Fairyland!
+
+That day, for the first time in many months, I dressed myself carefully,
+and went down to dinner with a light heart, a cheerful face, and an
+unexceptionable neckcloth.
+
+As I took my place at the table, my father looked up cheerily and gave
+me a pleased nod of recognition.
+
+Our meal passed off very silently. It was my father's maxim that no man
+could do more than one thing well at a time--especially at table; so we
+had contracted a habit which to strangers would have seemed even more
+unsociable than it really was, and gave to all our meals an air more
+penitential than convivial. But this day was, in reality, a festive
+occasion, and my father was disposed to be more than usually agreeable.
+When the cloth was removed, he flung the cellar-key at my head, and
+exclaimed, in a burst of unexampled good-humor:--
+
+"Basil, you dog, fetch up a bottle of the particular port!"
+
+Now it is one of my theories that a man's after-dinner talk takes much
+of its weight, color, and variety from the quality of his wines. A
+generous vintage brings out generous sentiments. Good fellowship,
+hospitality, liberal politics, and the milk of human kindness, may be
+uncorked simultaneously with a bottle of old Madeira; while a pint of
+thin Sauterne is productive only of envy, hatred, malice, and all
+uncharitableness. We grow sententious on Burgundy--logical on
+Bordeaux--sentimental on Cyprus--maudlin on Lagrima Christi--and witty
+on Champagne.
+
+Port was my father's favorite wine. It warmed his heart, cooled his
+temper, and made him not only conversational, but expansive. Leaning
+back complacently in his easy-chair, with the glass upheld between his
+eye and the window, he discoursed to me of my journey, of my prospects
+in life, and of all that I should do and avoid, professionally
+and morally.
+
+"Work," he said, "is the panacea for every sorrow--the plaster for every
+pain--your only universal remedy. Industry, air, and exercise are our
+best physicians. Trust to them, boy; but beware how you publish the
+prescription, lest you find your occupation gone. Remember, if you wish
+to be rich, you must never seem to be poor; and as soon as you stand in
+need of your friends, you will find yourself with none left. Be discreet
+of speech, and cultivate the art of silence. Above all things, be
+truthful. Hold your tongue as long as you please, but never open your
+lips to a lie. Show no man the contents of your purse--he would either
+despise you for having so little, or try to relieve you of the burden
+of carrying so much. Above all, never get into debt, and never fall in
+love. The first is disgrace, and the last is the devil! Respect
+yourself, if you wish others to respect you; and bear in mind that the
+world takes you at your own estimate. To dress well is a duty one owes
+to society. The man who neglects his own appearance not only degrades
+himself to the level of his inferiors, but puts an affront upon his
+friends and acquaintances."
+
+"I trust, sir," I said in some confusion, "that I shall never incur the
+last reproach again."
+
+"I hope not, Basil," replied my father, with a smile. "I hope not. Keep
+your conscience clean and your boots blacked, and I have no fear of you.
+You are no hero, my boy, but it depends upon yourself whether you become
+a man of honor or a scamp; a gentleman or a clown. You have, I see,
+registered a good resolution to-day. Keep it; and remember that
+Pandemonium will get paved without your help. There would be no
+industry, boy, if there was no idleness, and all true progress begins
+with--Reform."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+AT THE CHEVAL BLANC
+
+My journey, even at this distance of time, appears to me like an
+enchanted dream. I observed, yet scarcely remembered, the scenes through
+which I passed, so divided was I between the novelty of travelling and
+the eagerness of anticipation. Provided with my letters of introduction,
+the sum of one hundred guineas, English, and the enthusiasm of twenty
+years of age, I fancied myself endowed with an immortality of wealth and
+happiness.
+
+The Brighton coach passed through our town once a week; so I started for
+Paris without having ever visited London, and took the route by Newhaven
+and Dieppe. Having left home on Tuesday morning, I reached Rouen in the
+course of the next day but one. At Rouen I stayed to dine and sleep, and
+so made my way to the _Cheval Blanc_, a grand hotel on the quay, where I
+was received by an aristocratic elderly waiter who sauntered out from a
+side office, surveyed me patronizingly, entered my name upon a card for
+a seat at the _table d'hote_, and, having rung a feeble little bell,
+sank exhausted upon a seat in the hall.
+
+"To number seventeen, Marie," said this majestic personage, handing me
+over to a pretty little chambermaid who attended the summons. "And,
+Marie, on thy return, my child, bring me an absinthe."
+
+We left this gentleman in a condition of ostentatious languor, and Marie
+deposited me in a pretty room overlooking an exquisite little garden set
+round with beds of verbena and scarlet geranium, with a fountain
+sparkling in the midst. This garden was planted in what had once been
+the courtyard, of the building. The trees nodded and whispered, and the
+windows at the opposite side of the quadrangle glittered like burnished
+gold in the sunlight. I threw open the jalousies, plucked one of the
+white roses that clustered outside, and drank in with delight the sunny
+perfumed air that played among the leaves, and scattered the waters of
+the fountain. I could not long rest thus, however. I longed to be out
+and about; so, as it was now no more than half-past three o'clock, and
+two good hours of the glorious midsummer afternoon yet remained to me
+before the hotel dinner-hour, I took my hat, and went out along the
+quays and streets of this beautiful and ancient Norman city.
+
+Under the crumbling archways; through narrow alleys where the upper
+stories nearly met overhead, leaving only a bright strip of dazzling sky
+between; past quaint old mansions, and sculptured fountains, and stately
+churches hidden away in all kinds of strange forgotten nooks and
+corners, I wandered, wondering and unwearied. I saw the statue of Jeanne
+d'Arc; the chateau of Diane de Poitiers; the archway carved in oak where
+the founder of the city still, in rude effigy, presides; the museum
+rich in mediaeval relics; the market-place crowded with fruit-sellers and
+flower-girls in their high Norman caps. Above all, I saw the rare old
+Gothic Cathedral, with its wondrous wealth of antique sculpture; its
+iron spire, destined, despite its traceried beauty, to everlasting
+incompleteness; its grass-grown buttresses, and crumbling pinnacles, and
+portals crowded with images of saints and kings. I went in. All was
+gray, shadowy, vast; dusk with the rich gloom of painted windows; and so
+silent that I scarcely dared disturb the echoes by my footsteps. There
+stood in a corner near the door a triangular iron stand stuck full of
+votive tapers that flickered and sputtered and guttered dismally,
+shedding showers of penitential grease-drops on the paved floor below;
+and there was a very old peasant woman on her knees before the altar. I
+sat down on a stone bench and fell into a long study of the stained
+oriel, the light o'erarching roof, and the long perspective of the
+pillared aisles. Presently the verger came out of the vestry-room,
+followed by two gentlemen. He was short and plump, with a loose black
+gown, slender black legs, and a pointed nose--like a larger species
+of raven.
+
+"_Bon jour, M'sieur_" croaked he, laying his head a little on one side,
+and surveying me with one glittering eye. "Will M'sieur be pleased to
+see the treasury?"
+
+"The treasury!" I repeated. "What is there to be seen in the treasury?"
+
+"Nothing, sir, worth one son of an Englishman's money," said the taller
+of the gentlemen. "Tinsel, paste, and dusty bones--all humbug and
+extortion."
+
+Something in the scornful accent and the deep voice aroused the
+suspicions of the verger, though the words were spoken in English.
+
+"Our treasury, M'sieur," croaked he, more ravenly than ever, "is
+rich--rich in episcopal jewels; in relics--inestimable relics. Tickets
+two francs each."
+
+Grateful, however, for the timely caution, I acknowledged my
+countryman's courtesy by a bow, declined the proffered investment, and
+went out again into the sunny streets.
+
+At five o'clock I found myself installed near the head of an immensely
+long dinner-table in the _salle a manger_ of the Cheval Blanc. The
+_salle a manger_ was a magnificent temple radiant with mirrors, and
+lustres, and panels painted in fresco. The dinner was an imposing rite,
+served with solemn ceremonies by ministering waiters. There were about
+thirty guests seated round, in august silence, most of them very smartly
+dressed, and nearly all English. A stout gentleman, with a little knob
+on the top of his bald head, a buff waistcoat, and a shirt amply
+frilled, sat opposite to me, flanked on either side by an elderly
+daughter in green silk. On my left I was supported by a thin young
+gentleman with fair hair, and blue glasses. To my right stood a vacant
+chair, the occupant of which had not yet arrived; and at the head of the
+table sat a spare pale man dressed all in black, who spoke to no one,
+kept his eyes fixed upon his plate, and was served by the waiters with
+especial servility. The soup came and went in profound silence. Faint
+whispers passed to and fro with the fish. It was not till the roast made
+its appearance that anything like conversation broke the sacred silence
+of the meal. At this point the owner of the vacant chair arrived, and
+took his place beside me. I recognised him immediately. It was the
+Englishman whom I had met in the Cathedral. We bowed, and presently he
+spoke to me. In the meantime, he had every forgone item of the dinner
+served to him as exactly as if he had not been late at table, and sipped
+his soup with perfect deliberation while others were busy with the
+sweets. Our conversation began, of course, with the weather and
+the place.
+
+"Your first visit to Rouen, I suppose?" said he. "Beautiful old city, is
+it not? _Garcon_, a pint of Bordeaux-Leoville."
+
+I modestly admitted that it was not only my first visit to Rouen, but my
+first to the Continent.
+
+"Ah, you may go farther than Rouen, and fare worse," said he. "Do you
+sketch? No? That's a pity, for it's deliciously picturesque--though,
+for my own part, I am not enthusiastic about gutters and gables, and I
+object to a population composed exclusively of old women. I'm glad, by
+the way, that I preserved you from wasting your time among the atrocious
+lumber of that so-called treasury."
+
+"The treasury!" exclaimed my slim neighbor with the blue glasses. "Beg
+your p--p--pardon, sir, but are you speaking of the Cathedral treasury?
+Is it worth v--v--visiting?"
+
+"Singularly so," replied he to my right. "One of the rarest collections
+of authentic curiosities in France. They have the snuff-box of Clovis,
+the great toe of Saint Helena, and the tongs with which St. Dunstan took
+the devil by the nose."
+
+"Up--p--pon my word, now, that's curious," ejaculated the thin tourist,
+who had an impediment in his speech. "I must p--p--put that down. Dear
+me! the snuff-box of King Clovis! I must see these relics to-morrow."
+
+"Be sure you ask for the great toe of St. Helena," said my right hand
+companion, proceeding imperturbably with his dinner. "The saint had but
+one leg at the period of her martyrdom, and that great toe is unique."
+
+"G--g--good gracious!" exclaimed the tourist, pulling out a gigantic
+note-book, and entering the fact upon the spot. "A saint with one
+leg--and a lady, too! Wouldn't m--m--miss that for the world!"
+
+I looked round, puzzled by the gravity of my new acquaintance.
+
+"Is this all true?" I whispered. "You told me the treasury was a
+humbug."
+
+"And so it is."
+
+"But the snuff-box of Clovis, and...."
+
+"Pure inventions! The man's a muff, and on muffs I have no mercy. Do you
+stay long in Rouen?"
+
+"No, I go on to Paris to-morrow. I wish I could remain longer."
+
+"I am not sure that you would gain more from a long visit than from a
+short one. Some places are like some women, charming, _en passant_, but
+intolerable upon close acquaintance. It is just so with Rouen. The place
+contains no fine galleries, and no places of public entertainment; and
+though exquisitely picturesque, is nothing more. One cannot always be
+looking at old houses, and admiring old churches. You will be delighted
+with Paris."
+
+"B--b--beautiful city," interposed the stammerer, eager to join our
+conversation, whenever he could catch a word of it. "I'm going to
+P--P--Paris myself."
+
+"Then, sir, I don't doubt you will do ample justice to its attractions,"
+observed my right-hand neighbor. "From the size of your note-book, and
+the industry with which you accumulate useful information, I should
+presume that you are a conscientious observer of all that is recondite
+and curious."
+
+"I as--p--pire to be so," replied the other, with a blush and a bow. "I
+m--m--mean to exhaust P--P--Paris. I'm going to write a b--b--book about
+it, when I get home."'
+
+My friend to the right flashed one glance of silent scorn upon the
+future author, drained the last glass of his Bordeaux-Leoville, pushed
+his chair impatiently back, and said:--"This place smells like a
+kitchen. Will you come out, and have a cigar?"
+
+So we rose, took our hats, and in a few moments were strolling under the
+lindens on the Quai de Corneille.
+
+I, of course, had never smoked in my life; and, humiliating though it
+was, found myself obliged to decline a "prime Havana," proffered in the
+daintiest of embroidered cigar-cases. My companion looked as if he
+pitied me. "You'll soon learn," said he. "A man can't live in Paris
+without tobacco. Do you stay there many weeks?"
+
+"Two years, at least," I replied, registering an inward resolution to
+conquer the difficulties of tobacco without delay. "I am going to study
+medicine under an eminent French surgeon."
+
+"Indeed! Well, you could not go to a better school, or embrace a nobler
+profession. I used to think a soldier's life the grandest under heaven;
+but curing is a finer thing than killing, after all! What a delicious
+evening, is it not? If one were only in Paris, now, or Vienna,...."
+
+"What, Oscar Dalrymple!" exclaimed a voice close beside us. "I should as
+soon have expected to meet the great Panjandrum himself!"
+
+"--With the little round button at top," added my companion, tossing
+away the end of his cigar, and shaking hands heartily with the
+new-comer. "By Jove, Frank, I'm glad to see you! What brings you here?"
+
+"Business--confound it! And not pleasant business either. _A proces_
+which my father has instituted against a great manufacturing firm here
+at Rouen, and of which I have to bear the brunt. And you?"
+
+"And I, my dear fellow? Pshaw! what should I be but an idler in search
+of amusement?"
+
+"Is it true that you have sold out of the Enniskillens?"
+
+"Unquestionably. Liberty is sweet; and who cares to carry a sword in
+time of peace? Not I, at all events."
+
+While this brief greeting was going forward, I hung somewhat in the
+rear, and amused myself by comparing the speakers. The new-comer was
+rather below than above the middle height, fair-haired and boyish, with
+a smile full of mirth and an eye full of mischief. He looked about two
+years my senior. The other was much older--two or three and thirty, at
+the least--dark, tall, powerful, finely built; his wavy hair clipped
+close about his sun-burnt neck; a thick moustache of unusual length; and
+a chest that looked as if it would have withstood the shock of a
+battering-ram. Without being at all handsome, there was a look of
+brightness, and boldness, and gallantry about him that arrested one's
+attention at first sight. I think I should have taken him for a soldier,
+had I not already gathered it from the last words of their conversation.
+
+"Who is your friend?" I heard the new-comer whisper.
+
+To which the other replied:--"Haven't the ghost of an idea."
+
+Presently he took out his pocket-book, and handing me a card, said:--
+
+"We are under the mutual disadvantage of all chance acquaintances. My
+name is Dalrymple--Oscar Dalrymple, late of the Enniskillen Dragoons. My
+friend here is unknown to fame as Mr. Frank Sullivan; a young gentleman
+who has the good fortune to be younger partner in a firm of merchant
+princes, and the bad taste to dislike his occupation."
+
+How I blushed as I took Captain Dalrymple's card, and stammered out my
+own name in return! I had never possessed a card in my life, nor needed
+one, till this moment. I rather think that Captain Dalrymple guessed
+these facts, for he shook hands with me at once, and put an end to my
+embarrassment by proposing that we should take a boat, and pull a mile
+or two up the river. The thing was no sooner said than done. There were
+plenty of boats below the iron bridge; so we chose one of the cleanest,
+and jumped into it without any kind of reference to the owner, whoever
+he might be.
+
+"_Batelier, Messieurs? Batelier_?" cried a dozen men at once, rushing
+down to the water's edge.
+
+But Dalrymple had already thrown off his coat, and seized the oars.
+
+"_Batelier_, indeed!" laughed he, as with two or three powerful strokes
+he carried us right into the middle, of the stream. "Trust an Oxford man
+for employing any arms but his own, when a pair of sculls are in
+question!"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+THE ISLAND IN THE RIVER.
+
+It was just eight o'clock when we started, with the twilight coming on.
+Our course lay up the river, with a strong current setting against us;
+so we made but little way, and enjoyed the tranquil beauty of the
+evening. The sky was pale and clear, somewhat greenish overhead and
+deepening along the line of the horizon into amber and rose. Behind us
+lay the town with every brown spire articulated against the sky and
+every vane glittering in the last glow that streamed up from the west.
+To our left rose a line of steep chalk cliffs, and before us lay the
+river, winding away through meadow lands fringed with willows and
+poplars, and interspersed with green islands wooded to the water's edge.
+Presently the last flush faded, and one large planet, splendid and
+solitary, like the first poet of a dark century, emerged from the
+deepening gray.
+
+My companions were in high spirits. They jested; they laughed; they
+hummed scraps of songs; they had a greeting for every boat that passed.
+By-and-by, we came to an island with a little landing-place where a
+score or two of boats were moored against the alders by the water's
+edge. A tall flag-staff gay with streamers peeped above the tree-tops,
+and a cheerful sound of piping and fiddling, mingled with the hum of
+many voices, came and went with the passing breeze. As Dalrymple rested
+on his oars to listen, a boat which we had outstripped some minutes
+before, shot past us to the landing-place, and its occupants, five in
+number, alighted.
+
+"Bet you ten to one that's a bridal party," said Mr. Sullivan.
+
+"Say you so? Then suppose we follow, and have a look at the bride!"
+exclaimed his friend. "The place is a public garden."
+
+The proposition was carried unanimously, and we landed, having first
+tied the boat to a willow. We found the island laid out very prettily;
+intersected by numbers of little paths, with rustic seats here and there
+among the trees, and variegated lamps gleaming out amid the grass, like
+parti-colored glow-worms. Following one of these paths, we came
+presently to an open space, brilliantly lighted and crowded by
+holiday-makers. Here were refreshment stalls, and Russian swings, and
+queer-looking merry-go-rounds, where each individual sat on a wooden
+horse and went gravely round and round with a stick in his hand, trying
+to knock off a ring from the top of a pole in the middle. Here, also,
+was a band in a gaily decorated orchestra; a circular area roped off
+for dancers; a mysterious tent with a fortune-teller inside; a
+lottery-stall resplendent with vases and knick-knacks, which nobody was
+ever known to win; in short, all kinds of attractions, stale enough, no
+doubt, to my companions, but sufficiently novel and amusing to me.
+
+We strolled about for some time among the stalls and promenaders and
+amused ourselves by criticising the company, which was composed almost
+entirely of peasants, soldiers, artisans in blue blouses and humble
+tradespeople. The younger women were mostly handsome, with high Norman
+caps, white kerchiefs and massive gold ear-rings. Many, in addition to
+the ear-rings, wore a gold cross suspended round the neck by a piece of
+black velvet; and some had a brooch to match. Here, sitting round a
+table under a tree, we came upon a family group, consisting of a little
+plump, bald-headed _bourgeois_ with his wife and two children--the wife
+stout and rosy; the children noisy and authoritative. They were
+discussing a dish of poached eggs and a bottle of red wine, to the music
+of a polka close by.
+
+"I should like to dance," said the little girl, drumming with her feet
+against the leg of the table, and eating an egg with her fingers. "I may
+dance presently with Phillippe, may I not, papa?"
+
+"I won't dance," said Phillippe sulkily. "I want some oysters."
+
+"Oysters, _mon enfant_! I have told you twice already that no one eats
+oysters in July," observed his mother.
+
+"I don't care for that," said Phillippe. "It's my _fete_ day, and Uncle
+Jacques said I was to have whatever I fancied; I want some oysters."
+
+"Your Uncle Jacques did not know what an unreasonable boy you are,"
+replied the father angrily. "If you say another word about oysters, you
+shall not ride in the _manege_ to-night."
+
+Phillippe thrust his fists into his eyes and began to roar--so we walked
+away.
+
+In an arbor, a little further on, we saw two young people whispering
+earnestly, and conscious of no eyes but each other's.
+
+"A pair of lovers," said Sullivan.
+
+"And a pair that seldom get the chance of meeting, if we may judge by
+their untasted omelette," replied Dalrymple. "But where's the
+bridal party?"
+
+"Oh, we shall find them presently. You seem interested."
+
+"I am. I mean to dance with the bride and make the bridegroom jealous."
+
+We laughed and passed on, peeping into every arbor, observing every
+group, and turning to stare at every pretty girl we met. My own aptitude
+in the acquisition of these arts of gallantry astonished myself. Now, we
+passed a couple of soldiers playing at dominoes; now a noisy party round
+a table in the open air covered with bottles; now an arbor where half a
+dozen young men and three or four girls were assembled round a bowl of
+blazing punch. The girls were protesting they dare not drink it, but
+were drinking it, nevertheless, with exceeding gusto.
+
+"Grisettes and _commis voyageurs!_" said Dalrymple, contemptuously. "Let
+us go and look at the dancers."
+
+We went on, and stood in the shelter of some trees near the orchestra.
+The players consisted of three violins, a clarionette and a big drum.
+The big drum was an enthusiastic performer. He belabored his instrument
+as heartily as if it had been his worst enemy, but with so much
+independence of character that he never kept the same time as his
+fellow-players for two minutes together. They were playing a polka for
+the benefit of some twelve or fifteen couples, who were dancing with all
+their might in the space before the orchestra. On they came, round and
+round and never weary, two at a time--a mechanic and a grisette, a
+rustic and a Normandy girl, a tall soldier and a short widow, a fat
+tradesman and his wife, a couple of milliners assistants who preferred
+dancing together to not dancing at all, and so forth.
+
+"How I wish somebody would ask me, _ma mere_!" said a coquettish
+brunette, close by, with a sidelong glance at ourselves."
+
+"You shall dance with your brother Paul, my dear, as soon as he comes,"
+replied her mother, a stout _bourgeoise_ with a green fan.
+
+"But it is such dull work to dance with one's brother!" pouted the
+brunette. "If it were one's cousin, even, it would be different."
+
+Mr. Frank Sullivan flung away his cigar, and began buttoning up his
+gloves.
+
+"I'll take that damsel out immediately," said he. "A girl who objects to
+dance with her brother deserves encouragement."
+
+So away he went with his hat inclining jauntily on one side, and, having
+obtained the mother's permission, whirled away with the pretty brunette
+into the very thickest of the throng.
+
+"There they are!" said Dalrymple, suddenly. "There's the wedding party.
+_Per Bacco_! but our little bride is charming!"
+
+"And the bridegroom is a handsome specimen of rusticity."
+
+"Yes--a genuine pastoral pair, like a Dresden china shepherd and
+shepherdess. See, the girl is looking up in his face--he shakes his
+head. She is urging him to dance, and he refuses! Never mind, _ma
+belle_--you shall have your valse, and Corydon may be as cross as
+he pleases!"
+
+"Don't flatter yourself that she will displease Corydon to dance with
+your lordship!" I said, laughingly.
+
+"Pshaw! she would displease fifty Corydons if I chose to make her do
+so," said Dalrymple, with a smile of conscious power.
+
+"True; but not on her wedding-day."
+
+"Wedding-day or not, I beg to observe that in less than half an hour you
+will see me whirling along with my arm round little Phillis's dainty
+waist. Now come and see how I do it."
+
+He made his way through the crowd, and I, half curious, half abashed,
+went with him. The party was five in number, consisting of the bride and
+bridegroom, a rosy, middle-aged peasant woman, evidently the mother of
+the bride, and an elderly couple who looked like humble townsfolk, and
+were probably related to one or other of the newly-married pair.
+Dalrymple opened the attack by stumbling against the mother, and then
+overwhelming her with elaborate apologies.
+
+"In these crowded places, Madame," said he, in his fluent French, "one
+is scarcely responsible for an impoliteness. I beg ten thousand pardons,
+however. I hope I have not hurt you?"
+
+"_Ma foi!_ no, M'sieur. It would take more than that to hurt me!"
+
+"Nor injured your dress, I trust, Madame?"
+
+"_Ah, par exemple_! do I wear muslins or gauzes that they should not
+bear touching? No, no, no, M'sieur--thanking you all the same."
+
+"You are very amiable, Madame, to say so."
+
+"You are very polite, M'sieur, to think so much of a trifle."
+
+"Nothing is a trifle, Madame, where a lady is concerned. At least, so we
+Englishmen consider."
+
+"Bah! M'sieur is not English?"
+
+"Indeed, Madame, I am."
+
+"_Mais, mon Dieu! c'est incroyable_. Suzette--brother Jacques--Andre, do
+you hear this? M'sieur, here, swears that he is English, and yet he
+speaks French like one of ourselves! Ah, what a fine thing learning is!"
+
+"I may say with truth, Madame, that I never appreciate the advantages of
+education so highly, as when they enable me to converse with ladies who
+are not my own countrywomen," said Dalrymple, carrying on the
+conversation with as much studied politeness as if his interlocutor had
+been a duchess. "But--excuse the observation--you are here, I imagine,
+upon a happy occasion?"
+
+The mother laughed, and rubbed her hands.
+
+"_Dame_! one may see that," replied she, "with one's eyes shut! Yes,
+M'sieur,--yes--their wedding-day, the dear children--their wedding-day!
+They've been betrothed these two years."
+
+"The bride is very like you, Madame," said Dalrymple, gravely. "Your
+younger sister, I presume?"
+
+"_Ah, quel farceur_! He takes my daughter for my sister! Suzette, do
+you hear this? M'sieur is killing me with laughter!"
+
+And the good lady chuckled, and gasped, and wiped her eyes, and dealt
+Dalrymple a playful push between the shoulders, which would have upset
+the balance of any less heavy dragoon.
+
+"Your daughter, Madame!" said he. "Allow me to congratulate you. May I
+also be permitted to congratulate the bride?" And with this he took off
+his hat to Suzette and shook hands with Andre, who looked not
+overpleased, and proceeded to introduce me as his friend Monsieur Basil
+Arbuthnot, "a young English gentleman, _tres distingue_"
+
+The old lady then said her name was Madame Roquet, and that she rented a
+small farm about a mile and a half from Rouen; that Suzette was her only
+child; and that she had lost her "blessed man" about eight years ago.
+She next introduced the elderly couple as her brother Jacques Robineau
+and his wife, and informed us that Jacques was a tailor, and had a shop
+opposite the church of St. Maclou, "_la bas_."
+
+To judge of Monsieur Robineau's skill by his outward appearance, I
+should have said that he was professionally unsuccessful, and supplied
+his own wardrobe from the misfits returned by his customers. He wore a
+waistcoat which was considerably too long for him, trousers which were
+considerably too short, and a green cloth coat with a high velvet collar
+which came up nearly to the tops of his ears. In respect of personal
+characteristics, Monsieur Robineau and his wife were the most admirable
+contrast imaginable. Monsieur Robineau was short; Madame Robineau was
+tall. Monsieur Robineau was as plump and rosy as a robin; Madame
+Robineau was pale and bony to behold. Monsieur Robineau looked the soul
+of good nature, ready to chirrup over his _grog-au-vin,_ to smoke a pipe
+with his neighbor, to cut a harmless joke or enjoy a harmless frolic, as
+cheerfully as any little tailor that ever lived; Madame Robineau, on the
+contrary, preserved a dreadful dignity, and looked as if she could laugh
+at nothing on this side of the grave. Not to consider the question too
+curiously, I should have said, at first sight, that Monsieur Robineau
+stood in no little awe of his wife, and that Madame Robineau was the
+very head and front of their domestic establishment.
+
+It was wonderful and delightful to see how Captain Dalrymple placed
+himself on the best of terms with all these good people--how he patted
+Robineau on the back and complimented Madame, banished the cloud from
+Andre's brow, and summoned a smile to the pretty cheek of Suzette. One
+would have thought he had known them for years already, so thoroughly
+was he at home with every member of the wedding party.
+
+Presently, he asked Suzette to dance. She blushed scarlet, and cast a
+pretty appealing look at her husband and her mother. I could almost
+guess what she whispered to the former by the motion of her lips.
+
+"Monsieur Andre will, I am sure, spare Madame for one gallop," said
+Dalrymple, with that kind of courtesy which accepts no denial. It was
+quite another tone, quite another manner. It was no longer the
+persuasive suavity of one who is desirous only to please, but the
+politeness of a gentleman to au inferior.
+
+The cloud came back upon Andre's brow, and he hesitated; but Madame
+Roquet interposed.
+
+"Spare her!" she exclaimed. "_Dame_! I should think so! She has never
+left his arm all day. Here, my child, give me your shawl while you
+dance, and bake care not to get too warm, for the evening air is
+dangerous."
+
+And so Suzette took off her shawl, and Andre was silenced, and
+Dalrymple, in less than the half hour, was actually whirling away with
+his arm round little Phillis's dainty waist.
+
+I am afraid that I proved a very indifferent _locum tenens_ for my
+brilliant friend, and that the good people thought me exceedingly
+stupid. I tried to talk to them, but the language tripped me up at every
+turn, and the right words never would come when they were wanted.
+Besides, I felt uneasy without knowing exactly why. I could not keep
+from watching Dalrymple and Suzette. I could not help noticing how
+closely he held her; how he never ceased talking to her; and how the
+smiles and blushes chased each other over her pretty face. That I should
+have wit enough to observe these things proved that my education was
+progressing rapidly; but then, to be sure, I was studying under an
+accomplished teacher.
+
+They danced for a long time. So long, that Andre became uneasy, and my
+available French was quite exhausted. I was heartily glad when Dalrymple
+brought back the little bride at last, flushed and panting, and (himself
+as cool as a diplomatist) assisted her with her shawl and resigned her
+to the protection of her husband.
+
+"Why hast thou danced so long with that big Englishman?" murmured Andre,
+discontentedly. "When _I_ asked thee, thou wast too tired, and now...."
+
+"And now I am so happy to be near thee again," whispered Suzette.
+
+Andre softened directly.
+
+"But to dance for twenty minutes...." began he.
+
+"Ah, but he danced so well, and I am so fond of waltzing, Andre!"
+
+The cloud gathered again, and an impatient reply was coming, when
+Dalrymple opportunely invited the whole party to a bowl of punch in an
+adjoining arbor, and himself led the way with Madame Roquet. The arbor
+was vacant, a waiter was placing the chairs, and the punch was blazing
+in the bowl. It had evidently been ordered during one of the pauses in
+the dance, that it might be ready to the moment--a little attention
+which called forth exclamations of pleasure from both Madame Roquet and
+Monsieur Robineau, and touched with something like a gleam of
+satisfaction even the grim visage of Monsieur Robineau's wife.
+
+Dalrymple took the head of the table, and stirred the punch into leaping
+tongues of blue flame till it looked like a miniature Vesuvius.
+
+"What diabolical-looking stuff!" I exclaimed. "You might, to all
+appearance, be Lucifer's own cupbearer."
+
+"A proof that it ought to be devilish good," replied Dalrymple, ladling
+it out into the glasses. "Allow me, ladies and gentlemen, to propose the
+health, happiness, and prosperity of the bride and bridegroom. May they
+never die, and may they be remembered for ever after!"
+
+We all laughed as if this was the best joke we had heard in our lives,
+and Dalrymple filled the glasses up again.
+
+"What, in the name of all that's mischievous, can have become of
+Sullivan?" said he to me. "I have not caught so much as a glimpse of him
+for the last hour."
+
+"When I last saw him, he was dancing."
+
+"Yes, with a pretty little dark-eyed girl in a blue dress. By Jove! that
+fellow will be getting into trouble if left to himself!"
+
+"But the girl has her mother with her!"
+
+"All the stronger probability of a scrimmage," replied Dalrymple,
+sipping his punch with a covert glance of salutation at Suzette.
+
+"Shall I see if they are among the dancers?"
+
+"Do--but make haste; for the punch is disappearing fast."
+
+I left them, and went back to the platform where the indefatigable
+public was now engaged in the performance of quadrilles. Never, surely,
+were people so industrious in the pursuit of pleasure! They poussetted,
+bowed, curtsied, joined hands, and threaded the mysteries of every
+figure, as if their very lives depended on their agility.
+
+"Look at Jean Thomas," said a young girl to her still younger companion.
+"He dances like an angel!"
+
+The one thus called upon to admire, looked at Jean Thomas, and sighed.
+
+"He never asks me, by any chance," said she, sadly, "although his mother
+and mine are good neighbors. I suppose I don't dance well enough--or
+dress well enough," she added, glancing at her friend's gay shawl and
+coquettish cap.
+
+"He has danced with me twice this evening," said the first speaker
+triumphantly; "and he danced with me twice last Sunday at the Jardin
+d'Armide. Elise says...."
+
+Her voice dropped to a whisper, and I heard no more. It was a passing
+glimpse behind the curtain--a peep at one of the many dramas of real
+life that are being played for ever around us. Here were all the
+elements of romance--love, admiration, vanity, envy. Here was a hero in
+humble life--a lady-killer in his own little sphere. He dances with one,
+neglects another, and multiplies his conquests with all the
+heartlessness of a gentleman.
+
+I wandered round the platform once or twice, scrutinizing the dancers,
+but without success. There was no sign of Sullivan, or of his partner,
+or of his partner's mother, the _bourgeoise_ with the green fan. I then
+went to the grotto of the fortune-teller, but it was full of noisy
+rustics; and thence to the lottery hall, where there were plenty of
+players, but not those of whom I was in search.
+
+"Wheel of fortune, Messieurs et Mesdames," said the young lady behind
+the counter. "Only fifty centimes each. All prizes, and no blanks--try
+your fortune, _monsieur le capitaine!_ Put it once, _monsieur le
+capitaine_; once for yourself, and once for madame. Only fifty centimes
+each, and the certainty of winning!"
+
+_Monsieur le capitaine_ was a great, rawboned corporal, with a pretty
+little maid-servant on his arm. The flattery was not very delicate; but
+it succeeded. He threw down a franc. The wheel flew round, the papers
+were drawn, and the corporal won a needle-case, and the maid-servant a
+cigar-holder. In the midst of the laugh to which this distribution gave
+rise, I walked away in the direction of the refreshment stalls. Here
+were parties supping substantially, dancers drinking orgeat and
+lemonade, and little knots of tradesmen and mechanics sipping beer
+ridiculously out of wine-glasses to an accompaniment of cakes and
+sweet-biscuits. Still I could see no trace of Mr. Frank Sullivan.
+
+At length I gave up the search in despair, and on my way back
+encountered Master Philippe leaning against a tree, and looking
+exceedingly helpless and unwell.
+
+"You ate too many eggs, Philippe," said his mother. "I told you so at
+the time."
+
+"It--it wasn't the eggs," faltered the wretched Philippe. "It was the
+Russian swing."
+
+"And serve you rightly, too," said his father angrily. "I wish with all
+my heart that you had had your favorite oysters as well!"
+
+When I came back to the arbor, I found the little party immensely happy,
+and a fresh bowl of punch just placed upon the table. Andre was sitting
+next to Suzette, as proud as a king. Madame Roquet, volubly convivial,
+was talking to every one. Madame Robineau was silently disposing of all
+the biscuits and punch that came in her way. Monsieur Robineau, with his
+hat a little pushed back and his thumb in the arm-hole of his waistcoat,
+was telling a long story to which nobody listened; while Dalrymple,
+sitting on the other side of the bride, was gallantly doing the duties
+of entertainer.
+
+He looked up--I shook my head, slipped back into my place, and listened
+to the tangled threads of conversation going on around me.
+
+"And so," said Monsieur Robineau, proceeding with his story, and staring
+down into the bottom of his empty glass, "and so I said to myself,
+'Robineau, _mon ami_, take care. One honest man is better than two
+rogues; and if thou keepest thine eyes open, the devil himself stands
+small chance of cheating thee!' So I buttoned up my coat--this very coat
+I have on now, only that I have re-lined and re-cuffed it since then,
+and changed the buttons for brass ones; and brass buttons for one's
+holiday coat, you know, look so much more _comme il faut_--and said to
+the landlord...."
+
+"Another glass of punch, Monsieur Robineau," interrupted Dalrymple.
+
+"Thank you, M'sieur, you are very good; well, as I was saying...."
+
+"Ah, bah, brother Jacques!" exclaimed Madame Roquet, impatiently,
+"don't give us that old story of the miller and the gray colt, this
+evening! We've all heard it a hundred times already. Sing us a song
+instead, _mon ami_!"
+
+"I shall be happy to sing, sister Marie," replied Monsieur Robineau,
+with somewhat husky dignity, "when I have finished my story. You may
+have heard the story before. So may Andre--so may Suzette--so may my
+wife. I admit it. But these gentlemen--these gentlemen who have never
+heard it, and who have done me the honor...."
+
+"Not to listen to a word of it," said Madame Robineau, sharply. "There,
+you are answered, husband. Drink your punch, and hold your tongue."
+
+Monsieur Robineau waved his hand majestically, and assumed a
+Parliamentary air.
+
+"Madame Robineau," he said, getting more and more husky, "be so obliging
+as to wait till I ask for your advice. With regard to drinking my punch,
+I have drunk it--" and here he again stared down into the bottom of his
+glass, which was again empty--"and with regard to holding my tongue,
+that is my business, and--and...."
+
+"Monsieur Robineau," said Dalrymple, "allow me to offer you some more
+punch."
+
+"Not another drop, Jacques," said Madame, sternly. "You have had too
+much already."
+
+Poor Monsieur Robineau, who had put out his glass to be refilled, paused
+and looked helplessly at his wife.
+
+"_Mon cher ange_,...." he began; but she shook her head inflexibly, and
+Monsieur Robineau submitted with the air of a man who knows that from
+the sentence of the supreme court there is no appeal.
+
+"_Dame_!" whispered Madame Roquet, with a confidential attack upon my
+ribs that gave me a pain in my side for half an hour after, "my brother
+has the heart of a rabbit. He gives way to her in everything--so much
+the worse for him. My blessed man, who was a saint of a husband, would
+have broken the bowl over my ears if I had dared to interfere between
+his glass and his mouth!"
+
+Whereupon Madame Roquet filled her own glass and mine, and Madame
+Robineau, less indulgent to her husband than herself, followed
+our example.
+
+Just at this moment, a confused hubbub of voices, and other sounds
+expressive of a _fracas_, broke out in the direction of the trees behind
+the orchestra. The dancers deserted their polka, the musicians stopped
+fiddling, the noisy supper-party in the next arbor abandoned their cold
+chicken and salad, and everybody ran to the scene of action. Dalrymple
+was on his feet in a moment; but Suzette held Andre back with both hands
+and implored him to stay.
+
+"Some _mauvais sujets_, no doubt, who refuse to pay the score,"
+suggested Madame Roquet.
+
+"Or Sullivan, who has got into one of his infernal scrapes," muttered
+Dalrymple, with a determined wrench at his moustache. "Come on, anyhow,
+and let us see what is the matter!"
+
+So we snatched up our hats and ran out, just as Monsieur Robineau seized
+the opportunity to drink another tumbler of punch when his wife was
+not looking.
+
+Following in the direction of the rest, we took one of the paths behind
+the orchestra, and came upon a noisy crowd gathered round a wooden
+summer-house.
+
+"It's a fight," said one.
+
+"It's a pickpocket," said another.
+
+"Bah! it's only a young fellow who has been making love to a girl,"
+exclaimed a third.
+
+We forced our way through, and there we saw Mr. Frank Sullivan with his
+hat off, his arms crossed, and his back against the wall, presenting a
+dauntless front to the gesticulations and threats of an exceedingly
+enraged young man with red hair, who was abusing him furiously. The
+amount of temper displayed by this young man was something unparalleled.
+He was angry in every one of his limbs. He stamped, he shook his fist,
+he shook his head. The very tips of his ears looked scarlet with rage.
+Every now and then he faced round to the spectators, and appealed to
+them--or to a stout woman with a green fan, who was almost as red and
+angry as himself, and who always rushed forward when addressed, and
+shook the green fan in Sullivan's face.
+
+"You are an aristocrat!" stormed the young man. "A pampered, insolent
+aristocrat! A dog of an Englishman! A _scelerat_! Don't suppose you are
+to trample upon us for nothing! We are Frenchmen, you beggarly
+islander--Frenchmen, do you hear?"
+
+A growl of sympathetic indignation ran through the crowd, and "_a bas
+les aristocrats_--_a bas les Anglais_!" broke out here and there.
+
+"In the devil's name, Sullivan," said Dalrymple, shouldering his way up
+to the object of these agreeable menaces, "what have you been after, to
+bring this storm about your ears?"
+
+"Pshaw! nothing at all," replied he with a mocking laugh, and a
+contemptuous gesture. "I danced with a pretty girl, and treated her to
+champagne afterwards. Her mother and brother hunted us out, and spoiled
+our flirtation. That's the whole story."
+
+Something in the laugh and gesture--something, too, perhaps in the
+language which they could not understand, appeared to give the last
+aggravation to both of Sullivan's assailants. I saw the young man raise
+his arm to strike--I saw Dalrymple fell him with a blow that would have
+stunned an ox--I saw the crowd close in, heard the storm break out on
+every side, and, above it all, the deep, strong tones of Dalrymple's
+voice, saying:--
+
+"To the boat, boys! Follow me."
+
+In another moment he had flung himself into the crowd, dealt one or two
+sounding blows to left and right, cleared a passage for himself and us,
+and sped away down one of the narrow walks leading to the river.
+Presently, having taken one or two turnings, none of which seemed to
+lead to the spot we sought, we came upon an open space full of piled-up
+benches, pyramids of empty bottles, boxes, baskets, and all kinds of
+lumber. Here we paused to listen and take breath.
+
+We had left the crowd behind us, but they were still within hearing.
+
+"By Jove!" said Dalrymple, "I don't know which way to go. I believe we
+are on the wrong side of the island."
+
+"And I believe they are after us," added Sullivan, peering into the
+baskets. "By all that's fortunate, here are the fireworks! Has anybody
+got a match? We'll take these with us, and go off in a blaze
+of triumph!"
+
+The suggestion was no sooner made than adopted. We filled our hats and
+pockets with crackers and Catherine-wheels, piled the rest into one
+great heap, threw a dozen or so of lighted fusees into the midst of
+them, and just as the voices of our pursuers were growing momentarily
+louder and nearer, darted away again down a fresh turning, and saw the
+river gleaming at the end of it.
+
+"Hurrah! here's a boat," shouted Sullivan, leaping into it, and we after
+him.
+
+It was not our boat, but we did not care for that. Ours was at the other
+side of the island, far enough away, down by the landing-place. Just as
+Dalrymple seized the oars, there burst forth a tremendous explosion. A
+column of rockets shot up into the air, and instantly the place was as
+light as day. Then a yell of discovery broke forth, and we were seen
+almost as soon as we were fairly out of reach. We had secured the only
+boat on that side of the island, and three or four of Dalrymple's
+powerful strokes had already carried us well into the middle of the
+stream. To let off our own store of fireworks--to pitch tokens of our
+regard to our friends on the island in the shape of blazing crackers,
+which fell sputtering and fizzing into the water half-way between the
+boat and the shore--to stand up in the stern and bow politely--finally,
+to row away singing "God save the Queen" with all our might, were feats
+upon which we prided ourselves very considerably at the time, and the
+recollection of which afforded us infinite amusement all the way home.
+
+That evening we all supped together at the Chaval Blane, and of what we
+did or said after supper I have but a confused remembrance. I believe
+that I tried to smoke a cigar; and it is my impression that I made a
+speech, in which I swore eternal friendship to both of my new friends;
+but the only circumstance about which I cannot be mistaken is that I
+awoke next morning with the worst specimen of headache that had yet come
+within the limits of my experience.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+DAMON AND PYTHIAS.
+
+I left Rouen the day after my great adventure on the river, and Captain
+Dalrymple went with me to the station.
+
+"You have my Paris address upon my card," he said, as we walked to and
+fro upon the platform. "It's just a bachelor's den, you know--and I
+shall be there in about a fortnight or three weeks. Come and look
+me up."
+
+To which I replied that I was glad to be allowed to do so, and that I
+should "look him up" as soon as he came home. And so, with words of
+cordial good-will and a hearty shake of the hand, we parted.
+
+Having started late in the evening, I arrived in Paris between four and
+five o'clock on a bright midsummer Sunday morning. I was not long
+delayed by the customs officers, for I carried but a scant supply of
+luggage. Having left this at an hotel, I wandered about till it should
+be time for breakfast. After breakfast I meant to dress and call upon
+Dr. Cheron.
+
+The morning air was clear and cool. The sun shone brilliantly, and was
+reflected back with dazzling vividness from long vistas of high white
+houses, innumerable windows, and gilded balconies. Theatres, shops,
+cafes, and hotels not yet opened, lined the great thoroughfares.
+Triumphal arches, columns, parks, palaces, and churches succeeded one
+another in apparently endless succession. I passed a lofty pillar
+crowned with a conqueror's statue--a palace tragic in history--a modern
+Parthenon surrounded by columns, peopled with sculptured friezes, and
+approached by a flight of steps extending the whole width of the
+building. I went in, for the doors had just been opened, and a
+white-haired Sacristan was preparing the seats for matin service. There
+were acolytes decorating the altar with fresh flowers, and early
+devotees on their knees before the shrine of the Madonna. The gilded
+ornaments, the tapers winking in the morning light, the statues, the
+paintings, the faint clinging odors of incense, the hushed atmosphere,
+the devotional silence, the marble angels kneeling round the altar, all
+united to increase my dream of delight. I gazed and gazed again;
+wandered round and round; and at last, worn out with excitement and
+fatigue, sank into a chair in a distant corner of the Church, and fell
+into a heavy sleep. How long it lasted I know not; but the voices of the
+choristers and the deep tones of the organ mingled with my dreams. When
+I awoke the last worshippers were departing, the music had died into
+silence, the wax-lights were being extinguished, and the service
+was ended.
+
+Again I went out into the streets; but all was changed. Where there had
+been the silence of early morning there was now the confusion of a great
+city. Where there had been closed shutters and deserted thoroughfares,
+there was the bustle of life, gayety, business, and pleasure. The shops
+blazed with jewels and merchandise; the stonemasons were at work on the
+new buildings; the lemonade venders, with their gay reservoirs upon
+their backs, were plying a noisy trade; the bill-stickers were papering
+boardings and lamp-posts with variegated advertisements; the charlatan,
+in his gaudy chariot, was selling pencils and penknives to the
+accompaniment of a hand-organ; soldiers were marching to the clangor of
+military music; the merchant was in his counting-house, the stock-broker
+at the Bourse, and the lounger, whose name is Legion, was sitting in the
+open air outside his favorite cafe, drinking chocolate, and yawning over
+the _Charivari_.
+
+I thought I must be dreaming. I scarcely believed the evidence of my
+eyes. Was this Sunday? Was it possible that in our own little church at
+home--in our own little church, where we could hear the birds twittering
+outside in every interval of the quiet service--the old familiar faces,
+row beyond row, were even now upturned in reverent attention to the
+words of the preacher? Prince Bedreddin, transported in his sleep to the
+gates of Damascus, could scarcely have opened his eyes upon a foreign
+city and a strange people with more incredulous amazement.
+
+I can now scarcely remember how that day of wonders went by. I only know
+that I rambled about as in a dream, and am vaguely conscious of having
+wandered through the gardens of the Tuilleries; of having found the
+Louvre open, and of losing myself among some of the upper galleries; of
+lying exhausted upon a bench in the Champs Elysees; of returning by
+quays lined with palaces and spanned by noble bridges; of pacing round
+and round the enchanted arcades of the Palais Royal; of wondering how
+and where I should find my hotel, and of deciding at last that I could
+go no farther without dining somehow. Wearied and half stupefied, I
+ventured, at length, into one of the large _restaurants_ upon the
+Boulevards. Here I found spacious rooms lighted by superb chandeliers
+which were again reflected in mirrors that extended from floor to
+ceiling. Rows of small tables ran round the rooms, and a double line
+down the centre, each laid with its snowy cloth and glittering silver.
+
+It was early when I arrived; so I passed up to the top of the room and
+appropriated a small table commanding a view of the great thoroughfare
+below. The waiters were slow to serve me; the place filled speedily; and
+by the time I had finished my soup, nearly all the tables were occupied.
+Here sat a party of officers, bronzed and mustachioed; yonder a group of
+laughing girls; a pair of provincials; a family party, children,
+governess and all; a stout capitalist, solitary and self content; a
+quatuor of rollicking _commis-voyageurs_; an English couple, perplexed
+and curious. Amused by the sight of so many faces, listening to the hum
+of voices, and watching the flying waiters bearing all kinds of
+mysterious dishes, I loitered over my lonely meal, and wished that this
+delightful whirl of novelty might last for ever. By and by a gentleman
+entered, walked up the whole length of the room in search of a seat,
+found my table occupied by only a single person, bowed politely, and
+drew his chair opposite mine.
+
+He was a portly man of about forty-five or fifty years of age, with a
+broad, calm brow; curling light hair, somewhat worn upon the temples;
+and large blue eyes, more keen than tender. His dress was scrupulously
+simple, and his hands were immaculately white. He carried an umbrella
+little thicker than a walking-stick, and wrote out his list of dishes
+with a massive gold pencil. The waiter bowed down before him as if he
+were an habitue of the place.
+
+It was not long before we fell into conversation. I do not remember
+which spoke first; but we talked of Paris--or rather, I talked and he
+listened; for, what with the excitement and fatigue of the day, and what
+with the half bottle of champagne which I had magnificently ordered, I
+found myself gifted with a sudden flood of words, and ran on, I fear,
+not very discreetly.
+
+A few civil rejoinders, a smile, a bow, an assent, a question implied
+rather than spoken, sufficed to draw from me the particulars of my
+journey. I told everything, from my birthplace and education to my
+future plans and prospects; and the stranger, with a frosty humor
+twinkling about his eyes, listened politely. He was himself particularly
+silent; but he had the art of provoking conversation while quietly
+enjoying his own dinner. When this was finished, however, he leaned back
+in his chair, sipped his claret, and talked a little more freely.
+
+"And so," said he, in very excellent English, "you have come to Paris to
+finish your studies. But have you no fear, young gentleman, that the
+attractions of so gay a city may divert your mind from graver subjects?
+Do you think that, when every pleasure may be had for the seeking, you
+will be content to devote yourself to the dry details of an
+uninteresting profession?"
+
+"It is not an uninteresting profession," I replied. "I might perhaps
+have preferred the church or the law; but having embarked in the study
+of medicine, I shall do my best to succeed in it."
+
+The stranger smiled.
+
+"I am glad," he said, "to see you so ambitious. I do not doubt that you
+will become a shining light in the brotherhood of Esculapius."
+
+"I hope so," I replied, boldly. "I have studied closer than most men of
+my age, already."
+
+He smiled again, coughed doubtfully, and insisted on filling my glass
+from his own bottle.
+
+"I only fear," he said, "that you will be too diffident of your own
+merits. Now, when you call upon this Doctor....what did you say was
+his name?"
+
+"Cheron," I replied, huskily.
+
+"True, Cheron. Well, when you meet him for the first time you will,
+perhaps, be timid, hesitating, and silent. But, believe me, a young man
+of your remarkable abilities should be self-possessed. You ought to
+inspire him from the beginning with a suitable respect for
+your talents."
+
+"That's precisely the line I mean to take," said I, boastfully.
+"I'll--I'll astonish him. I'm afraid of nobody--not I!"
+
+The stranger filled my glass again. His claret must have been very
+strong or my head very weak, for it seemed to me, as he did so, that all
+the chandeliers were in motion.
+
+"Upon my word," observed he, "you are a young man of infinite spirit."
+
+"And you," I replied, making an effort to bring the glass steadily to my
+lips, "you are a capital fellow--a clear-sighted, sensible, capital
+fellow. We'll be friends."
+
+He bowed, and said, somewhat coldly,
+
+"I have no doubt that we shall become better acquainted."
+
+"Better acquainted, indeed!--we'll be intimate!" I ejaculated,
+affectionately. "I'll introduce you to Dalrymple--you'll like him
+excessively. Just the fellow to delight you."
+
+"So I should say," observed the stranger, drily.
+
+"And as for you and myself, we'll--we'll be Damon and ... what's the
+other one's name?"
+
+"Pythias," replied my new acquaintance, leaning back in his chair, and
+surveying me with a peculiar and very deliberate stare. "Exactly
+so--Damon and Pythias! A charming arrangement."
+
+"Bravo! Famous! And now we'll have another bottle of wine."
+
+"Not on my account, I beg," said the gentleman firmly. "My head is not
+so cool as yours."
+
+Cool, indeed, and the room whirling round and round, like a teetotum!
+
+"Oh, if you won't, I won't," said I confusedly; "but I--I could--drink
+my share of another bottle, I assure you, and not--feel the
+slightest...."
+
+"I have no doubt on that point," said my neighbor, gravely; "but our
+French wines are deceptive, Mr. Arbuthnot, and you might possibly suffer
+some inconvenience to-morrow. You, as a medical man, should understand
+the evils of dyspepsia."
+
+"Dy--dy--dyspepsia be hanged," I muttered, dreamily. "Tell me,
+friend--by the by, I forget your name. Friend what?"
+
+"Friend Pythias," returned the stranger, drily. "You gave me the name
+yourself."
+
+"Ay, but your real name?"
+
+He shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"One name is as good as another," said he, lightly. "Let it be Pythias,
+for the present. But you were about to ask me some question?"
+
+"About old Cheron," I said, leaning both elbows on the table, and
+speaking very confidentially. "Now tell me, have you--have you any
+notion of what he is like? Do you--know--know anything about him?"
+
+"I have heard of him," he replied, intent for the moment on the pattern
+of his wine-glass.
+
+"Clever?"
+
+"That is a point upon which I could not venture an opinion. You must
+ask some more competent judge."
+
+"Come, now," said I, shaking my head, and trying to look knowing;
+"you--you know what I mean, well enough. Is he a grim old fellow?
+A--a--griffin, you know! Come, is he a gr--r--r--riffin?"
+
+My words had by this time acquired a distressing, self-propelling
+tendency, and linked themselves into compounds of twenty and thirty
+syllables.
+
+My _vis-a-vis_ smiled, bit his lip, then laughed a dry, short laugh.
+
+"Really," he said, "I am not in a position to reply to your question;
+but upon the whole, I should say that Dr. Cheron was not quite a
+griffin. The species, you see, is extinct."
+
+I roared with laughter; vowed I had never heard a better joke in my
+life; and repeated his last words over and over, like a degraded idiot
+as I was. All at once a sense of deadly faintness came upon me. I turned
+hot and cold by turns, and lifting my hand to my head, said, or tried
+to say:--
+
+"Room's--'bominably--close!"
+
+"We had better go," he replied promptly. "The air will do you good.
+Leave me to settle for our dinners, and you shall make it right with me
+by-and-by."
+
+He did so, and we left the room. Once out in the open air I found myself
+unable to stand. He called a _fiacre_; almost lifted me in; took his
+place beside me, and asked the name of my hotel.
+
+I had forgotten it; but I knew that it was opposite the railway station,
+and that was enough. When we arrived, I was on the verge of
+insensibility. I remember that I was led up-stairs by two waiters, and
+that the stranger saw me to my room. Then all was darkness and stupor.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+THE NEXT MORNING.
+
+"Oh, my Christian ducats!" _Merchant of Venice_.
+
+Gone!--gone!--both gone!--my new gold watch and my purse full of notes
+and Napoleons!
+
+I rang the bell furiously. It was answered by a demure-looking waiter,
+with a face like a parroquet.
+
+"Does Monsieur please to require anything?"
+
+"Require anything!" I exclaimed, in the best French I could muster. "I
+have been robbed!"
+
+"Robbed, Monsieur?"
+
+"Yes, of my watch and purse!"
+
+"_Tiens_! Of a watch and purse?" repeated the parroquet, lifting his
+eyebrows with an air of well-bred surprise. "_C'est drole."_
+
+"Droll!" I cried, furiously. "Droll, you scoundrel! I'll let you know
+whether I think it droll! I'll complain to the authorities! I'll have
+the house searched! I'll--I'll...."
+
+I rang the bell again. Two or three more waiters came, and the master of
+the hotel. They all treated my communication in the same manner--coolly;
+incredulously; but with unruffled politeness.
+
+"Monsieur forgets," urged the master, "that he came back to the hotel
+last night in a state of absolute intoxication. Monsieur was accompanied
+by a stranger, who was gentlemanly, it it true; but since Monsieur
+acknowledges that that stranger was personally unknown to him, Monsieur
+may well perceive it would be more reasonable if his suspicions first
+pointed in that direction."
+
+Struck by the force of this observation, I flung myself into a chair and
+remained silent.
+
+"Has Monsieur no acquaintances in Paris to whom he may apply for
+advice?" inquired the landlord.
+
+"None," said I, moodily; "except that I have a letter of introduction
+to one Dr. Cheron."
+
+The landlord and his waiters exchanged glances.
+
+"I would respectfully recommend Monsieur to present his letter
+immediately," said the former. "Monsieur le Docteur Cheron is a man of
+the world--a man of high reputation and sagacity. Monsieur could not do
+better than advise with him."
+
+"Call a cab for me," said I, after a long pause. "I will go."
+
+The determination cost me something. Dismayed by the extent of my loss,
+racked with headache, languid, pale, and full of remorse for last
+night's folly, it needed but this humiliation to complete my misery.
+What! appear before my instructor for the first time with such a tale! I
+could have bitten my lips through with vexation.
+
+The cab was called. I saw, but would not see, the winks and nods
+exchanged behind my back by the grinning waiters. I flung myself into
+the vehicle, and soon was once more rattling through the noisy streets.
+But those brilliant streets had now lost all their charm for me. I
+admired nothing, saw nothing, heard nothing, on the way. I could think
+only of my father's anger and the contempt of Dr. Cheron.
+
+Presently the cab stopped before a large wooden gate with two enormous
+knockers. One half of this gate was opened by a servant in a sad-colored
+livery. I was shown across a broad courtyard, up a flight of lofty
+steps, and into a spacious _salon_ plainly furnished.
+
+"Monsieur le Docteur is at present engaged," said the servant, with an
+air of profound respect. "Will Monsieur have the goodness to be seated
+for a few moments."
+
+I sat down. I rose up. I examined the books upon the table, and the
+pictures on the walls. I wished myself "anywhere, anywhere out of the
+world," and more than once was on the point of stealing out of the
+house, jumping into my cab, and making off without seeing the doctor at
+all. One consideration alone prevented me. I had lost all my money, and
+had not even a franc left to pay the driver. Presently the door again
+opened, the grave footman reappeared, and I heard the dreaded
+announcement:--"Monsieur le Docteur will be happy to receive Monsieur in
+his consulting-room."
+
+I followed mechanically. We passed through a passage thickly carpeted,
+and paused before a green baize door. This door opened noiselessly, and
+I found myself in the great man's presence.
+
+"It gives me pleasure to welcome the son of my old friend John
+Arbuthnot," said a clear, and not unfamiliar voice.
+
+I started, looked up, grew red and white, hot and cold, and had not a
+syllable to utter in reply.
+
+In Doctor Cheron, I recognised--
+
+PYTHIAS!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+MYSTERIOUS PROCEEDINGS.
+
+The doctor pointed to a chair, looked at his watch, and said:--
+
+"I hope you have had a pleasant journey. Arrived this morning?"
+
+There was not the faintest gleam of recognition on his face. Not a
+smile; not a glance; nothing but the easy politeness of a stranger to
+a stranger.
+
+"N--not exactly," I faltered. "Yesterday morning, sir."
+
+"Ah, indeed! Spent the day in sight-seeing, I dare say. Admire Paris?"
+
+Too much astonished to speak, I took refuge in a bow.
+
+"Not found any lodgings yet, I presume?" asked the doctor, mending a pen
+very deliberately.
+
+"N--not yet, sir."
+
+"I concluded so The English do not seek apartments on Sunday. You
+observe the day very strictly, no doubt?"
+
+Blushing and confused, I stammered some incoherent words and sat
+twirling my hat, the very picture of remorse.
+
+"At what hotel have you put up?" he next inquired, without appearing to
+observe my agitation.
+
+"The--the Hotel des Messageries."
+
+"Good, but expensive. You must find a lodging to-day."
+
+I bowed again.
+
+"And, as your father's representative, I must take care that you procure
+something suitable, and are not imposed upon. My valet shall go
+with you."
+
+He rang the bell, and the sad-colored footman appeared on the threshold.
+
+"Desire Brunet to be in readiness to walk out with this gentleman," he
+said, briefly, and the servant retired.
+
+"Brunet," he continued, addressing me again, "is faithful and sagacious.
+He will instruct you on certain points indispensable to a resident in
+Paris, and will see that you are not ill-accommodated or overcharged. A
+young man has few wants, and I should infer that a couple of rooms in
+some quiet street will be all that you require?"
+
+"I--I am very grateful."
+
+He waved down my thanks with an air of cold but polite authority; took
+out his note-book and pencil; (I could have sworn to that massive gold
+pencil!) and proceeded to question me.
+
+"Your age, I think," said he, "is twenty-one?"
+
+"Twenty, sir."
+
+"Ah--twenty. You desire to be entered upon the list of visiting students
+at the Hotel Dieu, to be free of the library and lecture-rooms, and to
+be admitted into my public classes?"
+
+"Yes, sir."
+
+"Also, to attend here in my house for private instruction."
+
+"Yes, sir."
+
+He filled in a few words upon a printed form, and handed it to me with
+his visiting card.
+
+"You will present these, and your passport, to the secretary at the
+hospital," said he, "and will receive in return the requisite tickets of
+admission. Your fees have already been paid in, and your name has been
+entered. You must see to this matter at once, for the _bureau_ closes
+at two o'clock. You will then require the rest of the day for
+lodging-seeking, moving, and so forth. To-morrow morning, at nine
+o'clock, I shall expect you here."
+
+"Indeed, sir," I murmured, "I am more obliged than...."
+
+"Not in the least," he interrupted, decisively; "your father's son has
+every claim upon me. I object to thanks. All that I require from you are
+habits of industry, punctuality, and respect. Your father speaks well of
+you, and I have no doubt I shall find you all that he represents. Can I
+do anything more for you this morning?"
+
+I hesitated; could not bring myself to utter one word of that which I
+had come to say; and murmured--
+
+"Nothing more, I thank you, sir."
+
+He looked at me piercingly, paused an instant, and then rang the bell.
+
+"I am about to order my carriage," he said; "and, as I am going in that
+direction, I will take you as far as the Hotel Dieu."
+
+"But--but I have a cab at the door," I faltered, remembering, with a
+sinking heart, that I had not a sou to pay the driver.
+
+The servant appeared again.
+
+"Let the carriage be brought round immediately, and dismiss this
+gentleman's cab."
+
+The man retired, and I heaved a sigh of relief. The doctor bent low over
+the papers on his desk, and I fancied for the moment that a faint smile
+flitted over his face. Then he took up his hat, and pointed to the door.
+
+"Now, my young friend," he said authoritatively, "we must be gone. Time
+is gold. After you."
+
+I bowed and preceded him. His very courtesy was sterner than the
+displeasure of another, and I already felt towards him a greater degree
+of awe than I should have quite cared to confess. The carriage was
+waiting in the courtyard. I placed myself with my back to the horses;
+Dr. Cheron flung himself upon the opposite seat; a servant out of livery
+sprang up beside the coachman; the great gates were flung open; and we
+glided away on the easiest of springs and the softest of cushions.
+
+Dr. Cheron took a newspaper from his pocket, and began to read; so
+leaving me to my own uncomfortable reflections.
+
+And, indeed, when I came to consider my position I was almost in
+despair. Moneyless, what was to become of me? Watchless and moneyless,
+with a bill awaiting me at my hotel, and not a stiver in my pocket
+wherewith to pay it.... Miserable pupil of a stern master! luckless son
+of a savage father! to whom could I turn for help? Not certainly to Dr.
+Cheron, whom I had been ready to accuse, half an hour ago, of having
+stolen my watch and purse. Petty larceny and Dr. Cheron! how ludicrously
+incongruous! And yet, where was my property? Was the Hotel des
+Messageries a den of thieves? And again, how was it that this same Dr.
+Cheron looked, and spoke, and acted, as if he had never seen me in his
+life till this morning? Was I mad, or dreaming, or both?
+
+The carriage stopped and the door opened.
+
+"Hotel Dieu, M'sieur," said the servant, touching his hat.
+
+Dr. Cheron just raised his eyes from the paper.
+
+"This is your first destination," he said. "I would advise you, on
+leaving here, to return to your hotel. There may be letters awaiting
+you. Good-morning."
+
+With this he resumed his paper, the carriage rolled away, and I found
+myself at the Hotel Dieu, with the servant out of livery standing
+respectfully behind me.
+
+Go back to my hotel! Why should I go back? Letters there could be none,
+unless at the Poste Restante. I thought this a very unnecessary piece of
+advice, rejected it in my own mind, and so went into the hospital
+_bureau_, and transacted my business. When I came out again, Brunet
+took the lead.
+
+He was an elderly man with a solemn countenance and a mysterious voice.
+His manner was oppressively respectful; his address diplomatic; his step
+stealthy as a courtier's. When we came to a crossing he bowed, stood
+aside, and followed me; then took the lead again; and so on, during a
+brisk walk of about half an hour. All at once, I found myself at the
+Hotel des Messageries.
+
+"Monsieur's hotel," said the doctor's valet, touching his hat.
+
+"You are mistaken," said I, rather impatiently. "I did not ask to be
+brought here. My object this morning is to look for apartments."
+
+"Post in at mid-day, Monsieur," he observed, gravely. "Monsieur's
+letters may have arrived."
+
+"I expect none, thank you."
+
+"Monsieur will, nevertheless, permit me to inquire," said the
+persevering valet, and glided in before my eyes.
+
+The thing was absurd! Both master and servant insisted that I must have
+letters, whether I would, or no! To my amazement, however, Brunet came
+back with a small sealed box in his hands.
+
+"No letters have arrived for Monsieur," he said; "but this box was left
+with the porter about an hour ago."
+
+I weighed it, shook it, examined the seals, and, going into the public
+room, desired Brunet to follow me. There I opened it. It contained a
+folded paper, a quantity of wadding, my purse, my roll of bank-notes,
+and my watch! On the paper, I read the following words:--
+
+"Learn from the events of last night the value of temperance, the wisdom
+of silence, and the danger of chance acquaintanceships. Accept the
+lesson, and he by whom it is administered will forget the error."
+
+The paper dropped from my hands and fell upon the floor. The
+impenetrable Brunet picked it up, and returned it to me.
+
+"Brunet!" I ejaculated.
+
+"Monsieur?" said he, interrogatively, raising his hand to his forehead
+by force of habit, although his hat stood beside him on the floor.
+
+There was not a shadow of meaning in his face--not a quiver to denote
+that he knew anything of what had passed. To judge by the stolid
+indifference of his manner, one might have supposed that the delivery of
+caskets full of watches and valuables was an event of daily occurrence
+in the house of Dr. Cheron. His coolness silenced me. I drew a long
+breath; hastened to put my watch in my pocket, and lock up my money in
+my room; and then went to the master of the hotel, and informed him of
+the recovery of my property. He smiled and congratulated me; but he did
+not seem to be in the least surprised. I fancied, some how, that matters
+were not quite so mysterious to him as they had been to me.
+
+I also fancied that I heard a suspicious roar of laughter as I passed
+out into the street.
+
+It was not long before I found such apartments as I required, Piloted by
+Brunet through some broad thoroughfares and along part of the
+Boulevards, I came upon a cluster of narrow streets branching off
+through a massive stone gateway from the Rue du Faubourg Montmartre.
+This little nook was called the Cite Bergere. The houses were white and
+lofty. Some had courtyards, and all were decorated with pretty iron
+balconies and delicately-tinted Venetian shutters. Most of them bore the
+announcement--"_Apartements a louer_"--suspended above the door. Outside
+one of these houses sat two men with a little table between them. They
+were playing at dominoes, and wore the common blue blouse of the
+mechanic class. A woman stood by, paring celery, with an infant playing
+on the mat inside the door and a cat purring at her feet. It was a
+pleasant group. The men looked honest, the woman good-tempered, and the
+house exquisitely clean; so the diplomatic Brunet went forward to
+negotiate, while I walked up and down outside. There were rooms to be
+let on the second, third and fifth floors. The fifth was too high, and
+the second too expensive; but the third seemed likely to suit me. The
+_suite_ consisted of a bed-room, dressing-room, and tiny _salon_, and
+was furnished with the elegant uncomfortableness characteristic of our
+French neighbors. Here were floors shiny and carpetless; windows that
+objected to open, and drawers that refused to shut; mirrors all round
+the walls a set of hanging shelves; an ormolu time piece that struck all
+kinds of miscellaneous hours at unexpected times; an abundance of vases
+filled with faded artificial flowers; insecure chairs of white and gold;
+and a round table that had a way of turning over suddenly like a table
+in a pantomime, if you ventured to place anything on any part but the
+inlaid star in the centre. Above all, there was a balcony big enough for
+a couple of chairs, and some flower-pots, overlooking the street.
+
+I was delighted with everything. In imagination I beheld my balcony
+already blooming with roses, and my shelves laden with books. I admired
+the white and gold chairs with all my heart, and saw myself reflected in
+half a dozen mirrors at once with an innocent pride of ownership which
+can only be appreciated by those who have tasted the supreme luxury of
+going into chambers for the first time.
+
+"Shall I conclude for Monsieur at twenty francs a week?" murmured the
+sagacious Brunet.
+
+"Of course," said I, laying the first week's rent upon the table.
+
+And so the thing was done, and, brimful of satisfaction, I went off to
+the hotel for my luggage, and moved in immediately.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+BROADCLOTH AND CIVILIZATION.
+
+Allowing for my inexperience in the use of the language, I prospered
+better than I had expected, and found, to my satisfaction, that I was by
+no means behind my French fellow-students in medical knowledge. I passed
+through my preliminary examination with credit, and although Dr. Cheron
+was careful not to praise me too soon, I had reason to believe that he
+was satisfied with my progress. My life, indeed, was now wholly given up
+to my work. My country-breeding had made me timid, and the necessity for
+speaking a foreign tongue served only to increase my natural reserve; so
+that although I lived and studied day after day in the society of some
+two or three hundred young men, I yet lived as solitary a life as
+Robinson Crusoe in his island. No one sought to know me. No one took a
+liking for me. Gay, noisy, chattering fellows that they were, they
+passed me by for a "dull and muddy-pated rogue;" voted me
+uncompanionable when I was only shy; and, doubtless, quoted me to each
+other as a rare specimen of the silent Englishman. I lived, too, quite
+out of the students' colony. To me the _Quartier Latin_ (except as I
+went to and fro between the Hotel Dieu and the Ecole de Medicine) was a
+land unknown; and the student's life--that wonderful _Vie de Boheme_
+which furnishes forth half the fiction of the Paris press--a condition
+of being, about which I had never even heard. What wonder, then, that I
+never arrived at Dr. Cheron's door five minutes behind time, never
+missed a lecture, never forgot an appointment? What wonder that, after
+dropping moodily into one or two of the theatres, I settled down quite
+quietly in my lodgings; gave up my days to study; sauntered about the
+lighted alleys of the Champs Elysees in the sweet spring evenings, and,
+going home betimes, spent an hour or two with my books, and kept almost
+as early hours as in my father's house at Saxonholme?
+
+After I had been living thus for rather longer than three weeks, I made
+up my mind one Sunday morning to call at Dalrymple's rooms, and inquire
+if he had yet arrived in Paris. It was about eleven o'clock when I
+reached the Chaussee d'Antin, and there learned that he was not only
+arrived, but at home. Being by this time in possession of the luxury of
+a card, I sent one up, and was immediately admitted. I found breakfast
+still upon the table; Dalrymple sitting with an open desk and cash-box
+before him; and, standing somewhat back, with his elbow resting on the
+chimney-piece, a gentleman smoking a cigar. They both looked up as I was
+announced, and Dalrymple, welcoming me with a hearty grasp, introduced
+this gentleman as Monsieur de Simoncourt.
+
+M. de Simoncourt bowed, knocked the ash from his cigar, and looked as
+if he wished me at the Antipodes. Dalrymple was really glad to see me.
+
+"I have been expecting you, Arbuthnot," said he, "for the last week. If
+you had not soon beaten up my quarters, I should have tried, somehow, to
+find out yours. What have you been about all this time? Where are you
+located? What mischief have you been perpetrating since our expedition
+to the _guingette_ on the river? Come, you have a thousand things
+to tell me!"
+
+M. de Simoncourt looked at his watch--a magnificent affair, decorated
+with a costly chain, and a profusion of pendant trifles--and threw the
+last-half of his cigar into the fireplace.
+
+"You must excuse me, _mon cher_" said he. "I have at least a dozen calls
+to make before dinner."
+
+Dalrymple rose, readily enough, and took a roll of bank-notes from the
+cash-box.
+
+"If you are going," he said, "I may as well hand over the price of that
+Tilbury. When will they send it home?"
+
+"To-morrow, undoubtedly."
+
+"And I am to pay fifteen hundred franks for it!"
+
+"Just half its value!" observed M. de Simoncourt, with a shrug of his
+shoulders.
+
+Dalrymple smiled, counted the notes, and handed them to his friend.
+
+"Fifteen hundred may be half its cost," said he; "but I doubt if I am
+paying much less than its full value. Just see that these are right."
+
+M. de Simoncourt ruffled the papers daintily over, and consigned them to
+his pocket-book. As he did so, I could not help observing the whiteness
+of his hands and the sparkle of a huge brilliant on his little finger.
+He was a pale, slender, olive-hued man, with very dark eyes, and
+glittering teeth, and a black moustache inclining superciliously upwards
+at each corner; somewhat too _nonchalant_, perhaps, in his manner, and
+somewhat too profuse in the article of jewellery; but a very elegant
+gentleman, nevertheless.
+
+"_Bon_!" said he. "I am glad you have bought it. I would have taken it
+myself, had the thing happened a week or two earlier. Poor Duchesne! To
+think that he should have come to this, after all!"
+
+"I am sorry for him," said Dalrymple; "but it is a case of wilful ruin.
+He made up his mind to go to the devil, and went accordingly. I am only
+surprised that the crash came no sooner."
+
+M. de Simoneourt twitched at the supercilious moustache.
+
+"And you think you would not care to take the black mare with the
+Tilbury?" said he, negligently.
+
+"No--I have a capital horse, already."
+
+"Hah I--well--'tis almost a pity. The mare is a dead bargain. Shouldn't
+wonder if I buy her, after all."
+
+"And yet you don't want her," said Dalrymple.
+
+"Quite true; but one must have a favorite sin, and horseflesh is mine. I
+shall ruin myself by it some day--_mort de ma vie!_ By the way, have you
+seen my chestnut in harness? No? Then you will be really pleased. Goes
+delightfully with the gray, and manages tandem to perfection. _Parbleu!_
+I was forgetting--do we meet to-night?"
+
+"Where?"
+
+"At Chardonnier's."
+
+Dalrymple shook his head, and turned the key in his cash box.
+
+"Not this evening," he replied. I have other engagements."
+
+"Bah! and I promised to go, believing you were sure to be of the party.
+St. Pol, I know, will be there, and De Brezy also."
+
+"Chardonnier's parties are charming things in their way," said
+Dalrymple, somewhat coldly, "and no man enjoys Burgundy and lansquenet
+more heartily than myself; but one might grow to care for nothing else,
+and I have no desire to fall into worse habits than those I have
+contracted already."
+
+M. de Simoneourt laughed a dry, short laugh, and twitched again at the
+supercilious moustache.
+
+"I had no idea you were a philosopher," said he.
+
+"Nor am I. I am a _mauvais sujet_--_mauvais_ enough, already, without
+seeking to become worse."
+
+"Well, adieu--I will see to this affair of the Tilbury, and desire them
+to let you have it by noon to-morrow."
+
+"A thousand thanks. I am ashamed that you have so much trouble in the
+matter. _Au revoir_."
+
+"_Au revoir_."
+
+Whereupon M. de Simoncourt honored me with a passing bow, and took his
+departure. Being near the window, I saw him spring into an elegant
+cabriolet, and drive off with the showiest of high horses and the
+tiniest of tigers.
+
+He was no sooner gone than Dalrymple took me by the shoulders, placed me
+in an easy chair, poured out a couple of glasses of hock, and said:--
+
+"Now, then, my young friend, your news or your life! Out with it, every
+word, as you hope to be forgiven!"
+
+I had but little to tell, and for that little, found myself, as I had
+anticipated, heartily laughed at. My adventure at the restaurant, my
+unlucky meeting with Dr. Cheron, and the history of my interview with
+him next morning, delighted Dalrymple beyond measure.
+
+Nothing would satisfy him, after this, but to call me Damon, to tease me
+continually about Doctor Pythias, and to remind me at every turn of the
+desirableness of Arcadian friendships.
+
+"And so, Damon," said he, "you go nowhere, see nothing, and know nobody.
+This sort of life will never do for you! I must take you out--introduce
+you--get you an _entree_ into society, before I leave Paris."
+
+"I should be heartily glad to visit at one or two private houses," I
+replied. "To spend the winter in this place without knowing a soul,
+would be something frightful."
+
+Dalrymple looked at me half laughingly, half compassionately.
+
+"Before I do it, however," said he, "you must look a little less like a
+savage, and more like a tame Christian. You must have your hair cut, and
+learn to tie your cravat properly. Do you possess an evening suit?"
+
+Blushing to the tips of my ears, I not only confessed that I was
+destitute of that desirable outfit, but also that I had never yet in all
+my life had occasion to wear it.
+
+"I am glad of it; for now you are sure to be well fitted. Your tailor,
+depend on it, is your great civilizer, and a well-made suit of clothes
+is in itself a liberal education. I'll take you to Michaud--my own
+especial purveyor. He is a great artist. With so many yards of superfine
+black cloth, he will give you the tone of good society and the exterior
+of a gentleman. In short, he will do for you in eight or ten hours more
+than I could do in as many years."
+
+"Pray introduce me at once to this illustrious man," I exclaimed
+laughingly, "and let me do him homage!"
+
+"You will have to pay heavily for the honor," said Dalrymple. "Of that I
+give you notice."
+
+"No matter. I am willing to pay heavily for the tone of good society and
+the exterior of a gentleman."
+
+"Very good. Take a book, then, or a cigar, and amuse yourself for five
+minutes while I write a note. That done, you may command me for as long
+as you please."
+
+I took the first book that came, and finding it to be a history of the
+horse, amused myself, instead, by observing the aspect of Dalrymple's
+apartment.
+
+Rooms are eloquent biographies. They betray at once if the owner be
+careless or orderly, studious or idle, vulgar or refined. Flowers on the
+table, engravings on the walls, indicate refinement and taste; while a
+well-filled book-case says more in favor of its possessor than the most
+elaborate letter of recommendation. Dalrymple's room was a monograph of
+himself. Careless, luxurious, disorderly, crammed with all sorts of
+costly things, and characterized by a sort of reckless elegance, it
+expressed, as I interpreted it, the very history of the man. Rich
+hangings; luxurious carpets; walls covered with paintings; cabinets of
+bronze and rare porcelain; a statuette of Rachel beside a bust of Homer;
+a book-case full of French novels with a sprinkling of Shakespeare and
+Horace; a stand of foreign arms; a lamp from Pompeii; a silver casket
+full of cigars; tables piled up with newspapers, letters, pipes,
+riding-whips, faded bouquets, and all kinds of miscellaneous
+rubbish--such were my friend's surroundings; and such, had I speculated
+upon them beforehand, I should have expected to find them. Dalrymple, in
+the meanwhile, despatched his letter with characteristic rapidity. His
+pen rushed over the paper like a dragoon charge, nor was once laid aside
+till both letter and address were finished. Just as he was sealing it, a
+note was brought to him by his servant--a slender, narrow, perfumed
+note, written on creamy paper, and adorned on the envelope with an
+elaborate cypher in gold and colors. Had I lived in the world of society
+for the last hundred seasons, I could not have interpreted the
+appearance of that note more sagaciously.
+
+"It is from a lady," said I to myself. Then seeing Dalrymple tear up his
+own letter immediately after reading it, and begin another, I added,
+still in my own mind--"And it is from the lady to whom he was writing."
+
+Presently he paused, laid his pen aside, and said:--
+
+"Arbuthnot, would you like to go with me to-morrow evening to one or two
+_soirees_?"
+
+"Can your Civilizer provide me with my evening suit in time?"
+
+"He? The great Michaud? Why, he would equip you for this evening, if it
+were necessary!"
+
+"In that case, I shall be very glad."
+
+"_Bon!_ I will call for you at ten o'clock; so do not forget to leave me
+your address."
+
+Whereupon he resumed his letter. When it was written, he returned to the
+subject.
+
+"Then I will take you to-morrow night," said he, "to a reception at
+Madame Rachel's. Hers is the most beautiful house in Paris. I know fifty
+men who would give their ears to be admitted to her _salons_."
+
+Even in the wilds of Saxonholme I had heard and read of the great
+_tragedienne_ whose wealth vied with the Rothschilds, and whose
+diamonds might have graced a crown. I had looked forward to the
+probability of beholding her from afar off, if she was ever to be seen
+on the boards of the Theatre Francais; but to be admitted to her
+presence--received in her house--introduced to her in person ... it
+seemed ever so much too good to be true!
+
+Dalrymple smiled good-naturedly, and put my thanks aside.
+
+"It is a great sight," said he, "and nothing more. She will bow to
+you--she may not even speak; and she would pass you the next morning
+without remembering that she had ever seen you in her life. Actresses
+are a race apart, my dear fellow, and care for no one who is neither
+rich nor famous."
+
+"I never imagined," said I, half annoyed, "that she would take any
+notice of me at all. Even a bow from such a woman is an event to be
+remembered."
+
+"Having received that bow, then," continued Dalrymple, "and having
+enjoyed the ineffable satisfaction of returning it, you can go on with
+me to the house of a lady close by, who receives every Monday evening.
+At her _soirees_ you will meet pleasant and refined people, and having
+been once introduced by me, you will, I have no doubt, find the house
+open to you for the future."
+
+"That would, indeed, be a privilege. Who is this lady?"
+
+"Her name," said Dalrymple, with an involuntary glance at the little
+note upon his desk, "is Madame de Courcelles. She is a very charming and
+accomplished lady."
+
+I decided in my own mind that Madame de Courcelles was the writer of
+that note.
+
+"Is she married?" was my next question.
+
+"She is a widow," replied Dalrymple. "Monsieur de Courcelles was many
+years older than his wife, and held office as a cabinet minister during
+the greater part of the reign of Louis Phillippe. He has been dead these
+four or five years."
+
+"Then she is rich?"
+
+"No--not rich; but sufficiently independent."
+
+"And handsome?"
+
+"Not handsome, either; but graceful, and very fascinating."
+
+Graceful, fascinating, independent, and a widow! Coupling these facts
+with the correspondence which I believed I had detected, I grouped them
+into a little romance, and laid out my friend's future career as
+confidently as if it had depended only on myself to marry him out of
+hand, and make all parties happy.
+
+Dalrymple sat musing for a moment, with his chin resting on his hands
+and his eyes fixed on the desk. Then shaking back his hair as if he
+would shake back his thoughts with it, he started suddenly to his feet
+and said, laughingly:--
+
+"Now, young Damon, to Michaud's--to Michaud's, with what speed we may!
+Farewell to 'Tempe and the vales of Arcady,' and hey for civilization,
+and a swallow-tailed coat!"
+
+I noticed, however, that before we left the room, he put the little note
+tenderly away in a drawer of his desk, and locked it with a tiny gold
+key that hung upon his watch-chain.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+I MAKE MY DEBUT IN SOCIETY.
+
+At ten o'clock on Monday evening, Dalrymple called for me, and by ten
+o'clock, thanks to the great Michaud and other men of genius, I
+presented a faultless exterior. My friend walked round me with a candle,
+and then sat down and examined me critically.
+
+"By Jove!" said he, "I don't believe I should have known you! You are a
+living testimony to the science of tailoring. I shall call on Michaud,
+to-morrow, and pay my tribute of admiration."
+
+"I am very uncomfortable," said I, ruefully.
+
+"Uncomfortable! nonsense--Michaud's customers don't know the meaning of
+the word."
+
+"But he has not made me a single pocket!"
+
+"And what of that? Do you suppose the great Michaud would spoil the fit
+of a masterpiece for your convenience?"
+
+"What am I to do with my pocket-handkerchief?"
+
+"Michaud's customers never need pocket-handkerchiefs."
+
+"And then my trousers..."
+
+"Unreasonable Juvenile, what of the trousers?"
+
+"They are so tight that I dare not sit down in them."
+
+"Barbarian! Michaud's customers never sit down in society."
+
+"And my boots are so small that I can hardly endure them."
+
+"Very becoming to the foot," said Dalyrmple, with exasperating
+indifference.
+
+"And my collar is so stiff that it almost cuts my throat."
+
+"Makes you hold your head up," said Dalrymple, "and leaves you no
+inducement to commit suicide."
+
+I could not help laughing, despite my discomfort.
+
+"Job himself never had such a comforter!" I exclaimed.
+
+"It would be a downright pleasure to quarrel with you."
+
+"Put on your hat instead, and let us delay no longer," replied my
+friend. "My cab is waiting."
+
+So we went down, and in another moment were driving through the lighted
+streets. I should hardly have chosen to confess how my heart beat when,
+on turning an angle of the Rue Trudon, our cab fell into the rear of
+three or four other carriages, passed into a courtyard crowded with
+arriving and departing vehicles, and drew up before an open door, whence
+a broad stream of light flowed out to meet us. A couple of footmen
+received us in a hall lighted by torches and decorated with stands of
+antique armor. From the centre of this hall sprang a Gothic staircase,
+so light, so richly sculptured, so full of niches and statues, slender
+columns, foliated capitals, and delicate ornamentation of every kind,
+that it looked a very blossoming of the stone. Following Dalrymple up
+this superb staircase and through a vestibule of carved oak, I next
+found myself in a room that might have been the scene of Plato's
+symposium. Here were walls painted in classic fresco; windows curtained
+with draperies of chocolate and amber; chairs and couches of ebony,
+carved in antique fashion; Etruscan amphorae; vases and paterae of
+terracotta; exquisite lamps, statuettes and candelabra in rare green
+bronze; and curious parti-colored busts of philosophers and heroes, in
+all kinds of variegated marbles. Powdered footmen serving modern coffee
+seemed here like anachronisms in livery. In such a room one should have
+been waited on by boys crowned with roses, and have partaken only of
+classic dishes--of Venafran olives or oysters from the Lucrine lake,
+washed down with Massic, or Chian, or honeyed Falernian.
+
+Some half-dozen gentlemen, chatting over their coffee, bowed to
+Dalrymple when we came in. They were talking of the war in Algiers, and
+especially of the gallantry of a certain Vicomte de Caylus, in whose
+deeds they seemed to take a more than ordinary interest.
+
+"Rode single-handed right through the enemy's camp," said a bronzed,
+elderly man, with a short, gray beard.
+
+"And escaped without a scratch," added another, with a tiny red ribbon
+at his button-hole.
+
+"He comes of a gallant stock," said a third. "I remember his father at
+Austerlitz--literally cut to pieces at the head of his squadron."
+
+"You are speaking of de Caylus," said Dalrymple. "What news of him from
+Algiers?"
+
+"This--that having volunteered to carry some important despatches to
+head-quarters, he preferred riding by night through Abd-el-Kader's camp,
+to taking a _detour_ by the mountains," replied the first speaker.
+
+"A wild piece of boyish daring," said Dalrymple, somewhat drily. "I
+presume he did not return by the same road?"
+
+"I should think not. It would have been certain death a second time!"
+
+"And this happened how long since?"
+
+"About a fortnight ago. But we shall soon know all particulars from
+himself."
+
+"From himself?"
+
+"Yes, he has obtained leave of absence--is, perhaps, by this time in
+Paris."
+
+Dalrymple set down his cup untasted, and turned away.
+
+"Come, Arbuthnot," he said, hastily, "I must introduce you to Madame
+Rachel."
+
+We passed through a small antechamber, and into a brilliant _salon_, the
+very reverse of antique. Here all was light and color. Here were
+hangings of flowered chintz; fantastic divans; lounge-chairs of every
+conceivable shape and hue; great Indian jars; richly framed drawings;
+stands of exotic plants; Chinese cages, filled with valuable birds from
+distant climes; folios of engravings; and, above all, a large cabinet in
+marqueterie, crowded with bronzes, Chinese carvings, pastille burners,
+fans, medals, Dresden groups, Sevres vases, Venetian glass, Asiatic
+idols, and all kinds of precious trifles in tortoise-shall, mother
+o'-pearl, malachite, onyx, lapis lazuli, jasper, ivory, and mosaic. In
+this room, sitting, standing, turning over engravings, or grouped here
+and there on sofas and divans, were some twenty-five or thirty
+gentlemen, all busily engaged in conversation. Saluting some of these by
+a passing bow, my friend led the way straight through this _salon_ and
+into a larger one immediately beyond it.
+
+"This," he said, "is one of the most beautiful rooms in Paris. Look
+round and tell me if you recognise, among all her votaries, the
+divinity herself."
+
+I looked round, bewildered.
+
+"Recognise!" I echoed. "I should not recognise my own father at this
+moment. I feel like Abou Hassan in the palace of the Caliph."
+
+"Or like Christopher Sly, when he wakes in the nobleman's bedchamber,"
+said Dalrymple; "though I should ask your pardon for the comparison. But
+see what it is to be an actress with forty-two thousand francs of salary
+per week. See these panels painted by Muller--this chandelier by
+Deniere, of which no copy exists--this bust of Napoleon by Canova--these
+hangings of purple and gold--this ceiling all carved and gilded, than
+which Versailles contains nothing more elaborate. _Allons donc_! have
+you nothing to say in admiration of so much splendor?"
+
+I shook my head.
+
+"What can I say? Is this the house of an actress, or the palace of a
+prince? But stay--that pale woman yonder, all in white, with a plain
+gold circlet on her head--who is she?"
+
+"Phedre herself," replied Dalrymple. "Follow me, and be introduced."
+
+She was sitting in a large fauteuil of purple velvet. One foot rested on
+a stool richly carved and gilt; one arm rested negligently on a table
+covered with curious foreign weapons. In her right hand she held a
+singular poignard, the blade of which was damascened with gold, while
+the handle, made of bronze and exquisitely modelled, represented a tiny
+human skeleton. With this ghastly toy she kept playing as she spoke,
+apparently unconscious of its grim significance. She was surrounded by
+some ten or a dozen distinguished-looking men, most of whom were
+profusely _decore_. They made way courteously at our approach. Dalrymple
+then presented me. I made my bow, was graciously received, and dropped
+modestly into the rear.
+
+"I began to think that Captain Dalrymple had forsworn Paris," said
+Rachel, still toying with the skeleton dagger. "It is surely a year
+since I last had this pleasure?"
+
+"Nay, Madame, you flatter me," said Dalrymple. "I have been absent only
+five months."
+
+"Then, you see, I have measured your absence by my loss."
+
+Dalrymple bowed profoundly.
+
+Rachel turned to a young man behind her chair.
+
+"Monsieur le Prince," said she, "do you know what is rumored in the
+_foyer_ of the Francais? That you have offered me your hand!"
+
+"I offer you both my hands, in applause, Madame, every night of your
+performance," replied the gentleman so addressed.
+
+She smiled and made a feint at him with the dagger.
+
+"Excellent!" said she. "One is not enough for a tragedian But where is
+Alphonse Karr?"
+
+"I have been looking for him all the evening," said a tall man, with an
+iron-gray beard. "He told me he was coming; but authors are capricious
+beings--the slaves of the pen."
+
+"True; he lives by his pen--others die by it," said Rachel bitterly. "By
+the way, has any one seen Scribe's new Vaudeville?"
+
+"I have," replied a bald little gentleman with a red and green ribbon in
+his button-hole.
+
+"And your verdict?"
+
+"The plot is not ill-conceived; but Scribe is only godfather to the
+piece. It is almost entirely written by Duverger, his _collaborateur_."
+
+"The life of a _collaborateur_," said Rachel, "is one long act of
+self-abnegation. Another takes all the honor--he all the labor. Thus
+soldiers fall, and their generals reap the glory."
+
+"A _collaborateur_," said a cynical-looking man who had not yet spoken,
+"is a hackney vehicle which one hires on the road to fame, and dismisses
+at the end of the journey."
+
+"Sometimes without paying the fare," added a gentleman who had till now
+been examining, weapon by weapon, all the curious poignards and pistols
+on the table. "But what is this singular ornament?"
+
+And he held up what appeared to be a large bone, perforated in several
+places.
+
+The bald little man with the red and green ribbon uttered an exclamation
+of surprise.
+
+"It is a tibia!" said he, examining it through his double eye-glass.
+
+"And what of that?" laughed Rachel. "Is it so wonderful to find one leg
+in a collection of arms? However, not to puzzle you, I may as well
+acknowledge that it was brought to me from Rome by a learned Italian,
+and is a curious antique. The Romans made flutes of the leg-bones of
+their enemies, and this is one of them."
+
+"A melodious barbarism!" exclaimed one.
+
+"Puts a 'stop,' at all events, to the enemy's flight!" said another.
+
+"Almost as good as drinking out of his skull," added a third.
+
+"Or as eating him, _tout de bon_," said Rachel.
+
+"There must be a certain satisfaction in cannibalism," observed the
+cynic who had spoken before. "There are people upon whom one would sup
+willingly."
+
+"As, for instance, critics, who are our natural enemies," said Rachel.
+"_C'est a dire_, if critics were not too sour to be eaten."
+
+"Nay, with the sweet sauce of vengeance!"
+
+"You speak feelingly, Monsieur de Musset. I am almost sorry, for your
+sake, that cannibalism is out of fashion!"
+
+"It is one of the penalties of civilization," replied de Musset, with a
+shrug. "Besides, one would not wish to be an epicure."
+
+Dalrymple, who had been listening somewhat disdainfully to this skirmish
+of words, here touched me on the arm and turned away.
+
+"Don't you hate this sort of high-pressure talk?" he said, impatiently.
+
+"I was just thinking it so brilliant."
+
+"Pshaw!--conversational fireworks--every speaker bent on eclipsing every
+other speaker. It's an artificial atmosphere, my dear Damon--a sort of
+forcing-house for good things; and I hate forced witticisms, as I hate
+forced peas. But have you had enough of it? Or has this feast of reason
+taken away your appetite for simpler fare?"
+
+"If you mean, am I ready to go with you to Madame de Courcelles'--yes."
+
+"_A la bonne heure_!"
+
+"But you are not going away without taking leave of Madame Rachel?"
+
+"Unquestionably. Leave-taking is a custom more honored in the breach
+than the observance."
+
+"But isn't that very impolite?"
+
+"_Ingenu!_ Do you know that society ignores everything disagreeable? A
+leave-taker sets an unpleasant example, disturbs the harmony of things,
+and reminds others of their watches. Besides, he suggests unwelcome
+possibilities. Perhaps he finds the party dull; or, worse still, he may
+be going to one that is pleasanter."
+
+By this time we were again rattling along the Boulevard. The theatres
+were ablaze with lights. The road was full of carriages. The _trottoir_
+was almost as populous as at noon. The idlers outside the _cafes_ were
+still eating their ices and sipping their _eau-sucre_ as though, instead
+of being past eleven at night, it was scarcely eleven in the morning. In
+a few minutes, we had once more turned aside out of the great
+thoroughfare, and stopped at a private house in a quiet street. A
+carriage driving off, a cab drawing up behind our own, open windows with
+drawn blinds, upon which were profiled passing shadows of the guests
+within, and the ringing tones of a soprano voice, accompanied by a
+piano, gave sufficient indication of a party, and had served to attract
+a little crowd of soldiers and _gamins_ about the doorway.
+
+Having left our over-coats with a servant, we were ushered upstairs,
+and, as the song was not yet ended, slipped in unannounced and stationed
+ourselves just between two crowded drawing-rooms, where, sheltered by
+the folds of a muslin curtain, we could see all that was going on in
+both. I observed, at a glance, that I was now in a society altogether
+unlike that which I had just left.
+
+At Rachel's there were present only two ladies besides herself, and
+those were members of her own family. Here I found at least an equal
+proportion of both sexes. At Rachel's a princely magnificence reigned.
+Here the rooms were elegant, but simple; the paintings choice but few;
+the ornaments costly, but in no unnecessary profusion.
+
+"It is just the difference between taste and display," said Dalrymple.
+"Rachel is an actress, and Madame de Courcelles is a lady. Rachel
+exhibits her riches as an Indian chief exhibits the scalps of his
+victims--Madame de Courcelles adorns her house with no other view than
+to make it attractive to her friends."
+
+"As a Greek girl covers her head with sequins to show the amount of her
+fortune, and an English girl puts a rose in her hair for grace and
+beauty only," said I, fancying that I had made rather a clever
+observation. I was therefore considerably disappointed when Dalrymple
+merely said, "just so."
+
+The lady in the larger room here finished her song and returned to her
+seat, amid a shower of _bravas_.
+
+"She sings exquisitely," said I, following her with my eyes.
+
+"And so she ought," replied my friend. "She is the Countess Rossi, whom
+you may have heard of as Mademoiselle Sontag."
+
+"What! the celebrated Sontag?" I exclaimed.
+
+"The same. And the gentleman to whom she is now speaking is no less
+famous a person than the author of _Pelham_."
+
+I was as much delighted as a rustic at a menagerie, and Dalrymple,
+seeing this, continued to point out one celebrity after another till I
+began no longer to remember which was which. Thus Lamartine, Horace
+Vernet, Scribe, Baron Humboldt, Miss Bremer, Arago, Auber, and Sir Edwin
+Landseer, were successively indicated, and I thought myself one of the
+most fortunate fellows in Paris, only to be allowed to look upon them.
+
+"I suppose the spirit of lion-hunting is an original instinct," I said,
+presently. "Call it vulgar excitement, if you will; but I must confess
+that to see these people, and to be able to write about them to my
+father, is just the most delightful thing that has happened to me since
+I left home."
+
+"Call things by their right names, Damon," said Dalrymple,
+good-naturedly. "If you were a _parvenu_ giving a party, and wanted all
+these fine folks to be seen at your house, that would be lion-hunting;
+but being whom and what you are, it is hero-worship--a disease peculiar
+to the young; wholesome and inevitable, like the measles."
+
+"What have I done," said a charming voice close by, "that Captain
+Dalrymple will not even deign to look upon me?"
+
+The charming voice proceeded from the still more charming lips of an
+exceedingly pretty brunette in a dress of light green silk, fastened
+here and there with bouquets of rosebuds. Plump, rosy, black-haired,
+bright-eyed, bewilderingly coquettish, this lady might have been about
+thirty years of age, and seemed by no means unconscious of her powers of
+fascination.
+
+"I implore a thousand pardons, Madame...." began my friend.
+
+"_Comment_! A thousand pardons for a single offence!" exclaimed the
+lady. "What an unreasonable culprit!"
+
+To which she added, quite audibly, though behind the temporary shelter
+of her fan:--
+
+"Who is this _beau garcon_ whom you seem to have brought with you?"
+
+I turned aside, affecting not to hear the question; but could not help
+listening, nevertheless. Of Dalrymple's reply, however, I caught but
+my own name.
+
+"So much the better," observed the lady. "I delight in civilizing
+handsome boys. Introduce him."
+
+Dalrymple tapped me on the arm.
+
+"Madame de Marignan permits me to introduce you, _mon ami_," said he.
+"Mr. Basil Arbuthnot--Madame de Marignan."
+
+I bowed profoundly--all the more profoundly because I felt myself
+blushing to the eyes, and would not for the universe have been suspected
+of overhearing the preceding conversation; nor was my timidity
+alleviated when Dalrymple announced his intention of going in search of
+Madame de Courcelles, and of leaving me in the care of Madame
+de Marignan.
+
+"Now, Damon, make the most of your opportunities," whispered he, as he
+passed by. "_Vogue la galere_!"
+
+_Vogue la galere_, indeed! As if I had anything to do with the _galere_,
+except to sit down in it, the most helpless of galley-slaves, and
+blindly submit to the gyves and chains of Madame de Marignan, who,
+regarding me as the lawful captive of her bow and spear, carried me off
+at once to a vacant _causeuse_ in a distant corner.
+
+To send me in search of a footstool, to make me hold her fan, to
+overwhelm me with questions and bewilder me with a thousand coquetries,
+were the immediate proceedings of Madame de Marignan. A consummate
+tactician, she succeeded, before a quarter of an hour had gone by, in
+putting me at my ease, and in drawing from me everything that I had to
+tell--all my past; all my prospects for the future; the name and
+condition of my father; a description of Saxonholme, and the very date
+of my birth. Then she criticized all the ladies in the room, which only
+drew my attention more admiringly upon herself; and she quizzed all the
+young men, whereby I felt indirectly flattered, without exactly knowing
+why; and she praised Dalrymple in terms for which I could have embraced
+her on the spot had she been ten times less pretty, and ten times less
+fascinating.
+
+I was an easy victim, after all, and scarcely worth the powder and shot
+of an experienced _franc-tireur;_ but Madame de Marignan, according to
+her own confession, had a taste for civilizing "handsome boys," and as I
+may, perhaps, have come under that category a good many years ago, the
+little victory amused her! By the time, at all events, that Dalrymple
+returned to tell me it was past one o'clock in the morning, and I must
+be introduced to the mistress of the house before leaving, my head was
+as completely turned as that of old Time himself.
+
+"Past one!" I exclaimed. "Impossible! We cannot have been here half-an
+hour."
+
+At which neither Dalrymple nor Madame de Marignan could forbear smiling.
+
+"I hope our acquaintance is not to end here, monsieur," said Madame de
+Marignan. "I live in the Rue Castellane, and am at home to my friends
+every Wednesday evening."
+
+I bowed almost to my boots.
+
+"And to my intimates, every morning from twelve to two," she added very
+softly, with a dimpled smile that went straight to my heart, and set it
+beating like the paddle-wheels of a steamer.
+
+I stammered some incoherent thanks, bowed again, nearly upset a servant
+with a tray of ices, and, covered with confusion, followed Dalrymple
+into the farther room. Here I was introduced to Madame de Courcelles, a
+pale, aristocratic woman some few years younger than Madame de Marignan,
+and received a gracious invitation to all her Monday receptions. But I
+was much less interested in Madame de Courcelles than I should have been
+a couple of hours before. I scarcely looked at her, and five minutes
+after I was out of her presence, could not have told whether she was
+fair or dark, if my life had depended on it!
+
+"What say you to walking home?" said Dalrymple, as we went down stairs.
+"It is a superb night, and the fresh air would be delightful after these
+hot rooms."
+
+I assented gladly; so we dismissed the cab, and went out, arm-in-arm,
+along a labyrinth of quiet streets lighted by gas-lamps few and far
+between, and traversed only by a few homeward-bound pedestrians.
+Emerging presently at the back of the Madeleine, we paused for a moment
+to admire the noble building by moonlight; then struck across the Marche
+aux Fleurs and took our way along the Boulevard.
+
+"Are you tired, Damon?" said Dalrymple presently.
+
+"Not in the least," I replied, with my head full of Madame de Marignan.
+
+"Would you like to look in at an artists' club close by here, where I
+have the _entree?_--queer place enough, but amusing to a stranger."
+
+"Yes, very much."
+
+"Come along, then; but first button up your overcoat to the throat, and
+tie this colored scarf round your neck. See, I do the same. Now take off
+your gloves--that's it. And give your hat the least possible inclination
+to the left ear. You may turn up the bottoms of your trousers, if you
+like--anything to look a little slangy."
+
+"Is that necessary?"
+
+"Indispensable--at all events in the honorable society of _Les
+Chicards."_
+
+"_Les Chicards_!" I repeated. "What are they?"
+
+"It is the name of the club, and means--Heaven only knows what! for
+Greek or Latin root it has none, and record of it there exists not,
+unless in the dictionary of Argot. And yet if you were an old Parisian
+and had matriculated for the last dozen years at the Bal de l'Opera, you
+would know the illustrious Chicard by sight as familiarly as Punch, or
+Paul Pry, or Pierrot. He is a gravely comic personage with a bandage
+over one eye, a battered hat considerably inclining to the back of his
+head, a coat with a high collar and long tails, and a _tout ensemble_
+indescribably seedy--something between a street preacher and a
+travelling showman. But here we are. Take care how you come down, and
+mind your head."
+
+Having turned aside some few minutes before into the Rue St. Honore, we
+had thence diverged down a narrow street with a gutter running along the
+middle and no foot-pavements on either side. The houses seemed to be
+nearly all shops, some few of which, for the retailing of
+_charbonnerie_, stale vegetables, uninviting cooked meats, and so forth,
+were still open; but that before which we halted was closely shuttered
+up, with only a private door open at the side, lighted by a single
+oil-lamp. Following my friend for a couple of yards along the dim
+passage within, I became aware of strange sounds, proceeding apparently
+from the bowels of the earth, and found myself at the head of a steep
+staircase, down which it was necessary to proceed with my body bent
+almost double, in consequence of the close proximity of the ceiling and
+the steps. At the foot of this staircase came another dim passage and
+another oil-lamp over a low door, at which Dalrymple paused a moment
+before entering. The sounds which I had heard above now resolved
+themselves into their component parts, consisting of roars of laughter,
+snatches of songs, clinkings of glasses, and thumpings of bottles upon
+tables, to the accompaniment of a deep bass hum of conversation, all of
+which prepared me to find a very merry company within.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+
+THE HONORABLE SOCIETY OF LES CHICARDS.
+
+     "When a set of men find themselves agree in any particular,
+     though never so trivial, they establish themselves into a
+     kind of fraternity, and meet once or twice a
+     week."--_Spectator_.
+
+It was a long, low room lighted by gas, with a table reaching from end
+to end. Round about this table, in various stages of conviviality and
+conversation, were seated some thirty or forty men, capped, bearded, and
+eccentric-looking, with all kinds of queer blouses and wonderful heads
+of hair. Dropping into a couple of vacant chairs at the lower end of
+this table, we called for a bottle of Chablis, lit our cigars, and fell
+in with the general business of the evening. At the top, dimly visible
+through a dense fog of tobacco smoke, sat a stout man in a green coat
+fastened by a belt round the waist. He was evidently the President, and,
+instead of a hammer, had a small bugle lying by his side, which he blew
+from time to time to enforce silence.
+
+Somewhat perplexed by the general aspect of the club, I turned to my
+companion for an explanation.
+
+"Is it possible," I asked, "that these amazing individuals are all
+artists and gentlemen?"
+
+"Artists, every one," replied Dalrymple; "but as to their claim to be
+gentlemen, I won't undertake to establish it. After all, the _Chicards_
+are not first-rate men."
+
+"What are they, then?"
+
+"Oh, the Helots of the profession--hewers of wood engravings, and
+drawers of water-colors, with a sprinkling of daguerreotypists, and
+academy students. But hush--somebody is going to sing!"
+
+And now, heralded by a convulsive flourish from the President's bugle, a
+young _Chicard_, whose dilapidated outer man sufficiently contradicted
+the burthen of his song, shouted with better will than skill, a
+_chanson_ of Beranger's, every verse of which ended with:--
+
+     "J'ai cinquante ecus,
+     J'ai cinquante ecus,
+     J'ai cinquante ecus de rente!"
+
+Having brought this performance to a satisfactory conclusion, the singer
+sat down amid great clapping of hands and clattering of glasses, and the
+President, with another flourish on the bugle, called upon one Monsieur
+Tourterelle. Monsieur Tourterelle was a tall, gaunt, swarthy personage,
+who appeared to have cultivated his beard at the expense of his head,
+since the former reached nearly to his waist, while the latter was as
+bare as a billiard-ball. Preparing himself for the effort with a
+wine-glass full of raw cognac, this gentleman leaned back in his chair,
+stuck his thumbs into the armholes of his waistcoat, fixed his eyes on
+the ceiling, and plunged at once into a doleful ballad about one
+Mademoiselle Rosine, and a certain village _aupres de la mer_, which
+seemed to be in an indefinite number of verses, and amused no one but
+himself. In the midst of this ditty, just as the audience had begun to
+testify their impatience by much whispering and shuffling of feet, an
+elderly _Chicard_, with a very bald and shiny head, was discovered to
+have fallen asleep in the seat next but one to my own; whereupon my
+nearest neighbor, a merry-looking young fellow with a profusion of rough
+light hair surmounted by a cap of scarlet cloth, forthwith charred a
+cork in one of the candles, and decorated the bald head of the sleeper
+with a comic countenance and a pair of huge mustachios. An uproarious
+burst of laughter was the immediate result, and the singer, interrupted
+somewhere about his 18th verse, subsided into offended silence.
+
+"Monsieur Mueller is requested to favor the honorable society with a
+song," cried the President, as soon as the tumult had somewhat subsided.
+
+My red-capped neighbor, answering to that name, begged to be excused, on
+the score of having pledged his _ut de poitrine_ a week since at the
+Mont de Piete, without yet having been able to redeem it. This apology
+was received with laughter, hisses, and general incredulity.
+
+"But," he added, "I am willing to relate an adventure that happened to
+myself in Rome two winters ago, if my honorable brother _Chicards_ will
+be pleased to hear it."
+
+An immense burst of approbation from all but Monsieur Tourterelle and
+the bald sleeper, followed this announcement; and so, after a
+preliminary _grog au vin_, and another explosive demonstration on the
+part of the chairman, Monsieur Mueller thus began:--
+
+
+
+THE STUDENT'S STORY.
+
+"When I was in Rome, I lodged in the Via Margutta, which, for the
+benefit of those who have not been there, may be described as a street
+of studios and stables, crossed at one end by a little roofed gallery
+with a single window, like a shabby 'Bridge of Sighs,' A gutter runs
+down the middle, interrupted occasionally by heaps of stable-litter; and
+the perspective is damaged by rows of linen suspended across the street
+at uncertain intervals. The houses in this agreeable thoroughfare are
+dingy, dilapidated, and comfortless, and all which are not in use as
+stables, are occupied by artists. However, it was a very jolly place,
+and I never was happier anywhere in my life. I had but just touched my
+little patrimony, and I was acquainted with plenty of pleasant fellows
+who used to come down to my rooms at night from the French Academy where
+they had been studying all day. Ah, what evenings those were! What
+suppers we used to have in from the _Lepre_! What lots of Orvieto we
+drank! And what a mountain of empty wicker bottles had to be cleared
+away from the little square yard with the solitary lemon-tree at the
+back of the house!"
+
+"Come, Mueller--no fond memories!" cried a student in a holland blouse.
+"Get on with the story."
+
+"Ay, get on with the story!" echoed several voices.
+
+To which Mueller, who took advantage of the interruption to finish his
+_grog au vin_, deigned no reply.
+
+"Well," he continued, "like a good many other fellows who, having
+everything to learn and nothing to do, fancy themselves great geniuses
+only because they are in Rome, I put a grand brass plate on the door,
+testifying to all passers-by that mine was the STUDIO DI HERR FRANZ
+MULLER; and, having done this, I believed, of course, that my fortune
+was to be made out of hand. Nothing came of it, however. People in
+search of Dessoulavy's rooms knocked occasionally to ask their way, and
+a few English and Americans dropped in from time to time to stare about
+them, after the free-and-easy fashion of foreigners in Rome; but, for
+all this, I found no patrons. Thus several months went by, during which
+I studied from the life, worked hard at the antique, and relieved the
+monotony of study with occasional trips to Frascati, or supper parties
+at the Cafe Greco."
+
+"The story! the story!" interrupted a dozen impatient voices.
+
+"All in good time," said Mueller, with provoking indifference. "We are
+now coming to it."
+
+And assuming an attitude expressive of mystery, he dropped his voice,
+looked round the table, and proceeded:--
+
+"It was on the last evening of the Carnival. It had been raining at
+intervals during the day, but held up for a good hour just at dusk, as
+if on purpose for the _moccoli_. Scarcely, however, had the guns of St.
+Angelo thundered an end to the frolic, when the rain came down again in
+torrents, and put out the last tapers that yet lingered along the Corso.
+Wet, weary, and splashed from head to foot with mud and tallow, I came
+home about seven o'clock, having to dine and dress before going to a
+masked-ball in the evening. To light my stove, change my wet clothes,
+and make the best of a half-cold _trattore_ dinner, were my first
+proceedings; after which, I laid out my costume ready to put on, wrapped
+myself in a huge cloak, swallowed a tumbler full of hot cognac and
+water, and lay down in front of the fire, determined to have a sound nap
+and a thorough warming, before venturing out again that night. I fell
+asleep, of course, and never woke till roused by a tremendous peal upon
+the studio-bell, about two hours and a half afterwards. More dead than
+alive, I started to my feet. The fire had gone out in the stove; the
+room was in utter darkness; and the bell still pealed loud enough to
+raise the neighborhood.
+
+"'Who's there?' I said, half-opening the door, through which the wind
+and rain came rushing. 'And what, in the name of ten thousand devils, do
+you want?"
+
+"'I want an artist,' said my visitor, in Italian. 'Are you one?'
+
+"'I flatter myself that I am,' replied I, still holding the door
+tolerably close.
+
+"'Can you paint heads?'
+
+"'Heads, figures, landscapes--anything,' said I, with my teeth
+chattering like castanets.
+
+"The stranger pushed the door open, walked in without further ceremony,
+closed it behind him, and said, in a low, distinct voice:--
+
+"'Could you take the portrait of a dead man?'
+
+"'Of a dead man?' I stammered. 'I--I ... Suppose I strike a light?'
+
+"The stranger laid his hand upon my arm.
+
+"'Not till you have given me an answer,' said he. 'Yes or no? Remember,
+you will be paid well for your work.'
+
+"'Well, then--yes,' I replied.
+
+"'And can you do it at once?'
+
+"'At once?'
+
+"'Ay, Signore, will you bring your colors, and come with me this
+instant--or must I seek some other painter?'
+
+"I thought of the masked-ball, and sighed; but the promise of good
+payment, and, above all, the peculiarity of the adventure determined me.
+
+"'Nay, if it is to be done,' said I, 'one time is as good as another.
+Let me strike a light, and I will at once pack up my colors and come
+with you.'
+
+"'_Bene_!' said the stranger. 'But be as quick as you can, Signore, for
+time presses.'
+
+"I was quick, you may be sure, and yet not so quick but that I found
+time to look at my strange visitor. He was a dark, elderly man, dressed
+in a suit of plain black, and might have been a clerk, or a tradesman,
+or a confidential servant. As soon as I was ready, he took the lead;
+conducted me to a carriage which was waiting at the corner of a
+neighboring street; took his place respectfully on the opposite seat;
+pulled down both the blinds, and gave the word to drive on. I never knew
+by what streets we went, or to what part of Rome he took me; but the way
+seemed long and intricate. At length, we stopped and alighted. The night
+was pitch-dark, and still stormy. I saw before me only the outline of a
+large building, indistinct and gloomy, and a small open door dimly
+lighted-from within. Hurried across the strip of narrow pavement, and
+shut in immediately, I had no time to identify localities--no choice,
+except to follow my conductor and blindly pursue the adventure to its
+close. Having entered by a back door, we went up and down a labyrinth of
+staircases and passages, for the mere purpose, as it seemed, of
+bewildering me as much as possible--then paused before an oaken door at
+the end of the corridor. Here my conductor signified by a gesture that I
+was to precede him.
+
+"It was a large, panelled chamber, richly furnished. A wood fire
+smouldered on the hearth--a curtained alcove to the left partly
+concealed a bed--a corresponding alcove to the right, fitted with altar
+and crucifix, served as an oratory. In the centre of the room stood a
+table covered with a cloth. It needed no second glance to tell me what
+object lay beneath that cloth, uplifting it in ghastly outline! My
+conductor pointed to the table, and asked if there was anything I
+needed. To this I replied that I must have more light and more fire, and
+so proceeded to disembarrass myself of my cloak, and prepare my palette.
+In the meantime, he threw on a log and some pine-cones, and went to
+fetch an additional lamp.
+
+"Left alone with the body and impelled by an irresistible impulse, I
+rolled back the cloth and saw before me the corpse of a young man in
+fancy dress--a magnificent fellow cast in the very mould of strength and
+grace, and measuring his six feet, if an inch. The features were
+singularly handsome; the brow open and resolute; the hair dark, and
+crisp with curls. Looking more closely, I saw that a lock had been
+lately cut from the right temple, and found one of the severed hairs
+upon the cheek, where it had fallen. The dress was that of a jester of
+the middle ages, half scarlet and half white, with a rich belt round the
+waist. In this belt, as if in horrible mockery of the dead, was stuck a
+tiny baton surmounted by a fool's cap, and hung with silver bells.
+Looking down thus upon the body--so young, so beautiful, so evidently
+unprepared for death--a conviction of foul play flashed upon me with all
+the suddenness and certainty of revelation. Here were no appearances of
+disease and no signs of strife. The expression was not that of a man who
+had fallen weapon in hand. Neither, however, was it that of one who had
+died in the agony of poison. The longer I looked, the more mysterious it
+seemed; yet the more I felt assured that there was guilt at the bottom
+of the mystery.
+
+"While I was yet under the first confused and shuddering impression of
+this doubt, my guide came back with a powerful solar lamp, and, seeing
+me stand beside the body, said sharply:--
+
+"'Well, Signore, you look as if you had never seen a dead man before in
+all your life!'
+
+"'I have seen plenty,' I replied, 'but never one so young, and so
+handsome.'
+
+"'He dropped down quite suddenly,' said he, volunteering the
+information, 'and died in a few minutes. 'Then finding that I remained
+silent, added:--
+
+"'But I am told that it is always so in cases of heart-disease.'
+
+"'I turned away without replying, and, having placed the lamp to my
+satisfaction, began rapidly sketching in my subject. My instructions
+were simple. I was to give the head only; to produce as rapid an effect
+with as little labor as possible; to alter nothing; to add nothing; and,
+above all, to be ready to leave the house before daybreak. So I set
+steadily to work, and my conductor, establishing himself in an
+easy-chair by the fire, watched my progress for some time, and then, as
+the night advanced, fell profoundly asleep. Thus, hour after hour went
+by, and, absorbed in my work, I painted on, unconscious of fatigue--
+might almost say with something of a morbid pleasure in the task before
+me. The silence within; the raving of the wind and rain without; the
+solemn mystery of death, and the still more solemn mystery of crime
+which, as I followed out train after train of wild conjectures, grew to
+still deeper conviction, had each and all their own gloomy fascination.
+Was it not possible, I asked myself, by mere force of will to penetrate
+the secret? Was it not possible to study that dead face till the springs
+of thought so lately stilled within the stricken brain should vibrate
+once more, if only for an instant, as wire vibrates to wire, and sound
+to sound! Could I not, by long studying of the passive mouth, compel
+some sympathetic revelation of the last word that it uttered, though
+that revelation took no outward form, and were communicable to the
+apprehension only? Pondering thus, I lost myself in a labyrinth of
+fantastic reveries, till the hand and the brain worked independently of
+each other--the one swiftly reproducing upon canvas the outer lineaments
+of the dead; the other laboring to retrace foregone facts of which no
+palpable evidence remained. Thus my work progressed; thus the night
+waned; thus the sleeper by the fireside stirred from time to time, or
+moaned at intervals in his dreams.
+
+"At length, when many hours had gone by, and I began to be conscious of
+the first languor of sleeplessness, I heard, or fancied I heard, a light
+sound in the corridor without. I held my breath, and listened. As I
+listened, it ceased--was renewed--drew nearer--paused outside the door.
+Involuntarily, I rose and looked round for some means of defence, in
+case of need. Was I brought here to perpetuate the record of a crime,
+and was I, when my task was done, to be silenced in a dungeon, or a
+grave? This thought flashed upon me almost before I was conscious of the
+horror it involved. At the same moment, I saw the handle of the door
+turned slowly and cautiously--then held back--and then, after a brief
+pause, the door itself gradually opening."
+
+Here the student paused as if overcome by the recollection of that
+moment, and passed his hand nervously across his brow. I took the
+liberty of pushing our bottle of Chablis towards him, for which he
+thanked me with a nod and a smile, and filled his glass to the brim.
+
+"Well?" cried two or three voices eagerly; my own being one of them.
+"The door opened--what then?"
+
+"And a lady entered," he continued. "A lady dressed in black from head
+to foot, with a small lamp in her hand. Seeing me, she laid her finger
+significantly on her lip, closed the door as cautiously as she had
+opened it, and, with the faltering, uncertain steps of one just risen
+from a sick-bed, came over to where I had been sitting, and leaned for
+support against my chair. She was very pale, very calm, very young and
+beautiful, with just that look of passive despair in her face that one
+sees in Guido's portrait of Beatrice Cenci. Standing thus, I observed
+that she kept her eyes turned from the corpse, and her attention
+concentrated on the portrait. So several minutes passed, and neither of
+us spoke nor stirred. Then, slowly, shudderingly, she turned, grasped me
+by the arm, pointed to the dead form stretched upon the table, and less
+with her breath than by the motion of her lips, shaped out the one
+word:--'_Murdered_!'
+
+"Stunned by this confirmation of my doubts, I could only clasp my hands
+in mute horror, and stare helplessly from the lady to the corpse, from
+the corpse to the sleeper. Wildly, feverishly, with all her calmness
+turned to eager haste, she then bent over the body, tore open the rich
+doublet, turned back the shirt, and, without uttering one syllable,
+pointed to a tiny puncture just above the region of the heart--a spot so
+small, so insignificant, such a mere speck upon the marble, that but for
+the pale violet discoloration which spread round it like a halo, I could
+scarcely have believed it to be the cause of death. The wound had
+evidently bled inwardly, and, being inflicted with some singularly
+slender weapon, had closed again so completely as to leave an aperture
+no larger than might have been caused by the prick of a needle. While I
+was yet examining it, the fire fell together, and my conductor stirred
+uneasily in his sleep. To cover the body hastily with the cloth and
+resume my seat, was, with me, the instinctive work of a moment; but he
+was quiet again the next instant, and breathing heavily. With trembling
+hands, my visitor next re-closed the shirt and doublet, replaced the
+outer covering, and bending down till her lips almost touched my ear,
+whispered:--
+
+"'You have seen it. If called upon to do so, will you swear it?'
+
+"I promised.
+
+"'You will not let yourself be intimidated by threats? nor bribed by
+gold? nor lured by promises?
+
+"'Never, so help me Heaven!'
+
+"She looked into my eyes, as if she would read my very soul; then,
+before I knew what she was about to do, seized my hand, and pressed it
+to her lip.
+
+"'I believe you,' she said. 'I believe, and I thank you. Not a word to
+him that you have seen me'--here she pointed to the sleeper by the fire.
+'He is faithful; but not to my interests alone. I dare tell you no
+more--at all events, not now. Heaven bless and reward you. In this
+portrait you give me the only treasure--the only consolation of my
+future life!'
+
+"So saying, she took a ring from her finger, pressed it, without another
+word, into my unwilling hand; and, with the same passive dreary look
+that her face had worn on first entering took up her lamp again, and
+glided from the room.
+
+"How the next hour, or half hour, went by, I know not--except that I sat
+before the canvas like one dreaming. Now and then I added a few touches;
+but mechanically, and, as it were, in a trance of wonder and dismay. I
+had, however, made such good progress before being interrupted, that
+when my companion woke and told me it would soon be day and I must make
+haste to be gone, the portrait was even more finished than I had myself
+hoped to make it in the time. So I packed up my colors and palette
+again, and, while I was doing so, observed that he not only drew the
+cloth once more over the features of the dead, but concealed the
+likeness behind the altar in the oratory, and even restored the chairs
+to their old positions against the wall. This done, he extinguished the
+solar lamp; put it out of sight; desired me once more to follow him; and
+led the way back along the same labyrinth of staircases and corridors by
+which he brought me. It was gray dawn as he hurried me into the coach.
+The blinds were already down--the door was instantly closed--again we
+seemed to be going through an infinite number of streets--again we
+stopped, and I found myself at the corner of the Via Margutta.
+
+"'Alight, Signore,' said the stranger, speaking for the first time since
+we started. 'Alight--you are but a few yards from your own door. Here
+are a hundred scudi; and all that you have now to do, is to forget your
+night's work, as if it had never been.'
+
+"With this he closed the carriage-door, the horses dashed on again, and,
+before I had time even to see if any arms were blazoned on the panels,
+the whole equipage had disappeared.
+
+"And here, strange to say, the adventure ended. I never was called upon
+for evidence. I never saw anything more of the stranger, or the lady. I
+never heard of any sudden death, or accident, or disappearance having
+taken place about that time; and I never even obtained any clue to the
+neighborhood of the house in which these things took place. Often and
+often afterwards, when I was strolling by night along the streets of
+Rome, I lingered before some old palazzo, and fancied that I recognised
+the gloomy outline that caught my eye in that hurried transit from the
+carriage to the house. Often and often I paused and started, thinking
+that I had found at last the very side-door by which I entered. But
+these were mere guesses after all. Perhaps that house stood in some
+remote quarter of the city where my footsteps never went again--perhaps
+in some neighboring street or piazza, where I passed it every day! At
+all events, the whole thing vanished like a dream, and, but for the ring
+and the hundred scudi, a dream I should by this time believe it to have
+been. The scudi, I am sorry to say, were spent within a month--the ring
+I have never parted from, and here it is."
+
+Hereupon the student took from his finger a superb ruby set between two
+brilliants of inferior size, and allowed it to pass from hand to hand,
+all round the table. Exclamations of surprise and admiration,
+accompanied by all sorts of conjectures and comments, broke from
+every lip.
+
+"The dead man was the lady's lover," said one. "That is why she wanted
+his portrait."
+
+"Of course, and her husband had murdered him," said another.
+
+"Who, then, was the man in black?" asked a third.
+
+"A servant, to be sure. She said, if you remember, that he was faithful;
+but not devoted to her interests alone. That meant that he would obey to
+the extent of procuring for her the portrait of her lover; but that he
+did not choose to betray his master, even though his master was a
+murderer."
+
+"But if so, where was the master?" said the first speaker. "Is it likely
+that he would have neglected to conceal the body during all
+these hours?"
+
+"Certainly. Nothing more likely, if he were a man of the world, and knew
+how to play his game out boldly to the end. Have we not been told that
+it was the last night of the Carnival, and what better could he do, to
+avert suspicion, than show himself at as many balls as he could visit in
+the course of the evening? But really, this ring is magnificent!"
+
+"Superb. The ruby alone must be worth a thousand francs."
+
+"To say nothing of the diamonds, and the setting," observed the next to
+whom it was handed.
+
+At length, after having gone nearly the round of the table, the ring
+came to a little dark, sagacious-looking man, just one seat beyond
+Dalrymple's, who peered at it suspiciously on every side, breathed upon
+it, rubbed it bright again upon his coat-sleeve, and, finally, held the
+stones up sideways between his eyes and the light.
+
+"Bah!" said he, sending it on with a contemptuous fillip of the
+forefinger and thumb. "Glass and paste, _mon ami_. Not worth five francs
+of anybody's money."
+
+Mueller, who had been eyeing him all the time with an odd smile lurking
+about the corners of his mouth, emptied his last drop of Chablis, turned
+the glass over on the table, bottom upwards, and said very coolly:--
+
+"Well, I'm sorry for that; because I gave seven francs for it myself
+this morning, in the Palais Royal."
+
+"You!"
+
+"Seven francs!"
+
+"Bought in the Palais Royal!"
+
+"What does he mean?"
+
+"Mean?" echoed the student, in reply to this chorus of exclamations. "I
+mean that I bought it this morning, and gave seven francs for it. It is
+not every morning of my life, let me tell you, that I have seven francs
+to throw away on my personal appearance."
+
+"But then the ring that the lady took from her finger?"
+
+"And the murder?"
+
+"And the servant in black?"
+
+"And the hundred scudi?"
+
+"One great invention from beginning to end, Messieurs les Chicards, and
+being got up expressly for your amusement, I hope you liked it.
+_Garcon?_--another _grog au vin_, and sweeter than the last!"
+
+It would be difficult to say whether the Chicards were most disappointed
+or delighted at this _denoument_--disappointed at its want of fact, or
+delighted with the story-weaving power of Herr Franz Mueller. They
+expressed themselves, at all events, with a tumultuous burst of
+applause, in the midst of which we rose and left the room. When we once
+more came out into the open air, the stars had disappeared and the air
+was heavy with the damps of approaching daybreak. Fortunately, we caught
+an empty _fiacre_ in the next street and, as we were nearer the Rue du
+Faubourg Montmartre than the Chaussee d' Antin, Dalrymple set me
+down first.
+
+"Adieu, Damon," he said, laughingly, as we shook hands through the
+window. "If we don't meet before, come and dine with me next Sunday at
+seven o'clock--and don't dream of dreadful murders, if you can help it!"
+
+I did not dream of dreadful murders. I dreamt, instead, of Madame de
+Marignan, and never woke the next morning till eleven o'clock, just two
+hours later than the time at which I should have presented myself at
+Dr. Cheron's.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+
+WHAT IT IS TO BE A CAVALIERE SERVENTE.
+
+     "Everye white will have its blacke,
+     And everye sweet its sowere."
+
+     _Old Ballad_.
+
+Neither the example of Oscar Dalrymple nor the broadcloth of the great
+Michaud, achieved half so much for my education as did the
+apprenticeship I was destined to serve to Madame de Marignan. Having
+once made up her mind to civilize me, she spared no pains for the
+accomplishment of that end, cost what it might to herself--or me. Before
+I had been for one week her subject, she taught me how to bow; how to
+pick up a pocket-handkerchief; how to present a bouquet; how to hold a
+fan; how to pay a compliment; how to turn over the leaves of a
+music-book--in short, how to obey and anticipate every imperious wish;
+and how to fetch and carry, like a dog. My vassalage began from the very
+day when I first ventured to call upon her. Her house was small, but
+very elegant, and she received me in a delicious little room overlooking
+the Champs Elysees--a very nest of flowers, books, and birds. Before I
+had breathed the air of that fatal boudoir for one quarter of an hour, I
+was as abjectly her slave as the poodle with the rose-colored collar
+which lay curled upon a velvet cushion at her feet.
+
+"I shall elect you my _cavaliere servente_," said she, after I had twice
+nervously risen to take my leave within the first half hour, and twice
+been desired to remain a little longer. "Will you accept the office?"
+
+I thought it the greatest privilege under heaven. Perhaps I said so.
+
+"The duties of the situation are onerous," added she, "and I ought not
+to accept your allegiance without setting them before you. In the first
+place, you will have to bring me every new novel of George Sand,
+Flaubert, or About, on the day of publication."
+
+"I will move heaven and earth to get them the day before, if that be
+all!" I exclaimed.
+
+Madame de Marignan nodded approvingly, and went on telling off my
+duties, one by one, upon her pretty fingers.
+
+"You will have to accompany me to the Opera at least twice a week, on
+which occasions you will bring me a bouquet--camellias being my
+favorite flowers."
+
+"Were they the flowers that bloom but once in a century," said I, with
+more enthusiasm than sense, "they should be yours!"
+
+Madame de Marignan smiled and nodded again.
+
+"When I drive in the Bois, you will sometimes take a seat in my
+carriage, and sometimes ride beside it, like an attentive cavalier."
+
+I was just about to avow that I had no horse, when I remembered that I
+could borrow Dalrymple's, or hire one, if necessary; so I checked
+myself, and bowed.
+
+"When I go to an exhibition," said Madame de Marignan, "it will be your
+business to look out the pictures in the catalogue--when I walk, you
+will carry my parasol--when I go into a shop, you will take care of my
+dog--when I embroider, you will wind off my silks, and look for my
+scissors--when I want amusement, you must make me laugh--and when I am
+sleepy, you must read to me. In short, my _cavaliere servente_ must be
+my shadow."
+
+"Then, like your shadow, Madame," said I, "his place is ever at your
+feet, and that is all I desire!"
+
+Madame de Marignan laughed outright, and showed the loveliest little
+double row of pearls in all the world.
+
+"Admirable!" said she. "Quite an elegant compliment, and worthy of an
+accomplished lady-killer! _Allons_! you are a promising scholar."
+
+"In all that I have dared to say, Madame, I am, at least, sincere," I
+added, abashed by the kind of praise.
+
+"Sincere? Of course you are sincere. Who ever doubted it? Nay, to blush
+like that is enough to spoil the finest compliment in the world.
+There--it is three o'clock, and at half-past I have an engagement, for
+which I must now make my _toilette_. Come to-morrow evening to my box at
+the _Italiens_, and so adieu. Stay--being my _cavaliere_, I permit you,
+at parting, to kiss my hand."
+
+Trembling, breathless, scarcely daring to touch it with mine, I lifted
+the soft little hand to my lips, stammered something which was, no
+doubt, sufficiently foolish, and hurried away, as if I were treading on
+air and breathing sunshine.
+
+All the rest of that day went by in a kind of agreeable delirium. I
+walked about, almost without knowledge where I went. I talked, without
+exactly knowing what I said. I have some recollection of marching to and
+fro among the side-alleys of the Bois de Boulogne, which at that time
+was really a woody park, and not a pleasure-garden--of lying under a
+tree, and listening to the birds overhead, and indulging myself in some
+idiotic romance about love, and solitude, and Madame de Marignan--of
+wandering into a _restaurant_ somewhere about seven o'clock, and sitting
+down to a dinner for which I had no appetite--of going back, sometime
+during the evening, to the Rue Castellane, and walking to and fro on the
+opposite side of the way, looking up for ever so long at the darkened
+windows where my divinity did not show herself--of coming back to my
+lodgings, weary, dusty, and not a bit more sober, somewhere about
+eleven o'clock at night, driven to-bed by sheer fatigue, and, even then,
+too much in love to go to sleep!
+
+The next day I went through my duties at Dr. Cheron's, and attended an
+afternoon lecture at the hospital; but mechanically, like one dreaming.
+In the evening I presented myself at the Opera, where Madame de Marignan
+received me very graciously, and deigned to accept a superb bouquet for
+which I had paid sixteen francs. I found her surrounded by elegant men,
+who looked upon me as nobody, and treated me accordingly. Driven to the
+back of the box where I could neither speak to her, nor see the stage,
+nor achieve even a glimpse of the house, I spent an evening which
+certainly fell short of my anticipations. I had, however, the
+gratification of seeing my bouquet thrown to Grisi at the end of the
+second act, and was permitted the privilege of going in search of Madame
+de Marignan's carriage, while somebody else handed her downstairs, and
+assisted her with her cloak. A whispered word of thanks, a tiny pressure
+of the hand, and the words "come early to-morrow," compensated me,
+nevertheless, for every disappointment, and sent me home as blindly
+happy as ever.
+
+The next day I called upon her, according to command, and was
+transported to the seventh heaven by receiving permission to accompany
+her to a morning concert, whereby I missed two lectures, and spent
+ten francs.
+
+On the Sunday, having hired a good horse for the occasion, I had the
+honor of riding beside her carriage till some better-mounted
+acquaintance came to usurp my place and her attention; after which I was
+forced to drop behind and bear the eclipse of my glory as
+philosophically as I could.
+
+Thus day after day went by, and, for the delusive sake of Madame de
+Marignan's bright eyes, I neglected my studies, spent my money, wasted
+my time, and incurred the displeasure of Dr. Cheron. Led on from folly
+to folly, I was perpetually buoyed up by coquetries which meant nothing,
+and as perpetually mortified, disappointed, and neglected. I hoped; I
+feared; I fretted; I lost my sleep and my appetite; I felt dissatisfied
+with all the world, sometimes blaming myself, and sometimes her--yet
+ready to excuse and forgive her at a moment's notice. A boy in
+experience even more than in years, I loved with a boy's headlong
+passion, and suffered with all a boy's acute susceptibility. I was
+intensely sensitive--abashed by a slight, humbled by a glance, and so
+easily wounded that there were often times when, seeing myself
+forgotten, I could with difficulty drive back the tears that kept rising
+to my eyes. On the other hand, I was as easily elated. A kind word, an
+encouraging smile, a lingering touch upon my sleeve, was enough at any
+time to make me forget all my foregone troubles. How often the mere gift
+of a flower sent me home rejoicing! How the tiniest show of preference
+set my heart beating! How proud I was if mine was the arm chosen to lead
+her to her carriage! How more than happy, if allowed for even one
+half-hour in the whole evening to occupy the seat beside her own! To
+dangle after her the whole day long--to traverse all Paris on her
+errands--to wait upon her pleasure like a slave, and this, too, without
+even expecting to be thanked for my devotion, seemed the most natural
+thing in the world. She was capricious; but caprice became her. She was
+exacting; but her exactions were so coquettish and attractive, that one
+would not have wished her more reasonable. She was, at least, ten or
+twelve years my senior; but boys proverbially fall in love with women
+older than themselves, and this one was in all respects so charming,
+that I do not, even now, wonder at my infatuation.
+
+After all, there are few things under heaven more beautiful, or more
+touching, than a boy's first love.
+
+Passionate is it as a man's--pure as a woman's--trusting
+as a child's--timid, through the very excess of its
+unselfishness--chivalrous, as though handed down direct from the days of
+old romance--poetical beyond the utterances of the poet. To the
+boy-lover, his mistress is only something less than a divinity. He
+believes in her truth as in his own; in her purity, as in the sun at
+noon. Her practised arts of voice and manner are, in his eyes, the
+unstudied graces that spring as naturally from her beauty as the scent
+from the flower. Single-hearted himself, it seems impossible that she
+whom he adores should trifle with the most sacred sentiment he has ever
+known. Conscious of his own devotion, he cannot conceive that his wealth
+is poured forth in vain, and that he is but the plaything of her idle
+hours. Yet it is so. The boy's first love is almost always misplaced;
+seldom rated at its true value; hardly ever productive of anything but
+disappointment. Aspirant of the highest mysteries of the soul, he passes
+through the ordeal of fire and tears, happy if he keep his faith
+unshaken and his heart pure, for the wiser worship hereafter. We all
+know this; and few know it better than myself. Yet, with all its
+suffering, which of us would choose to obliterate all record of his
+first romance? Which of us would be without the memory of its smiles and
+tears, its sunshine and its clouds? Not I for one.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+
+A CONTRETEMPS IN A CARRIAGE.
+
+My slavery lasted somewhat longer than three weeks, and less than a
+month; and was brought, oddly enough, to an abrupt conclusion. This was
+how it happened.
+
+I had, as usual, attended Madame de Marignan one evening to the Opera,
+and found myself, also as usual, neglected for a host of others. There
+was one man in particular whom I hated, and whom (perhaps because I
+hated him) she distinguished rather more than the rest. His name was
+Delaroche, and he called himself Monsieur le Comte Delaroche. Most
+likely he was a Count---I have no reason to doubt his title; but I chose
+to doubt it for mere spite, and because he was loud and conceited, and
+wore a little red and green ribbon in his button-hole. He had, besides,
+an offensive sense of my youth and his own superiority, which I have
+never forgiven to this day. On the particular occasion of which I am
+now speaking, this person had made his appearance in Madame de
+Marignan's box at the close of the first act, established himself in the
+seat behind hers, and there held the lists against all comers during the
+remainder of the evening. Everything he said, everything he did,
+aggravated me. When he looked through her lorgnette, I loathed him. When
+he admired her fan, I longed to thrust it down his throat. When he held
+her bouquet to his odious nose (the bouquet that I had given her!) I
+felt it would have been justifiable manslaughter to take him up bodily,
+and pitch him over into the pit.
+
+At length the performance came to a close, and M. Delaroche, having
+taken upon himself to arrange Madame de Marignan's cloak, carry Madame
+de Marignan's fan, and put Madame de Marignan's opera-glass into its
+morocco case, completed his officiousness by offering his arm and
+conducting her into the lobby, whilst I, outwardly indifferent but
+inwardly boiling, dropped behind, and consigned him silently to all the
+torments of the seven circles.
+
+It was an oppressive autumnal night without a star in the sky, and so
+still that one might have carried a lighted taper through the streets.
+Finding it thus warm, Madame de Marignan proposed walking down the line
+of carriages, instead of waiting till her own came up; and so she and M.
+Delaroche led the way and I followed. Having found the carriage, he
+assisted her in, placed her fan and bouquet on the opposite seat,
+lingered a moment at the open door, and had the unparalleled audacity to
+raise her hand to his lips at parting. As for me, I stood proudly back,
+and lifted my hat.
+
+"_Comment_!" she said, holding out her hand--the pretty, ungloved hand
+that had just been kissed--"is that your good night?"
+
+I bowed over the hand, I would not have touched it with my lips at that
+moment for all the wealth of Paris.
+
+"You are coming to me to-morrow morning at twelve?" she murmured
+tenderly.
+
+"If Madame desires it."
+
+"Of course I desire it. I am going to Auteuil, to look at a house for a
+friend--and to Pignot's for some flowers--and to Lubin's for some
+scent--and to a host of places. What should I do without you? Nay, why
+that grave face? Have I done anything to offend you?"
+
+"Madame, I--I confess that--"
+
+"That you are jealous of that absurd Delaroche, who is so much in love
+with himself that he has no place in his heart for any one else! _Fi
+donc!_ I am ashamed of you. There--adieu, twelve to-morrow!"
+
+And with this she laughed, waved her hand, gave the signal to drive on,
+and left me looking after the carriage, still irritated but already
+half consoled.
+
+I then sauntered moodily on, thinking of my tyrant, and her caprices,
+and her beauty. Her smile, for instance; surely it was the sweetest
+smile in the world--if only she were less lavish of it! Then, what a
+delicious little hand--if mine were the only lips permitted to kiss it!
+Why was she so charming?--or why, being so charming, need she prize the
+attentions of every _flaneur_ who had only enough wit to admire her? Was
+I not a fool to believe that she cared more for my devotion than for
+another's! Did I believe it? Yes ... no ... sometimes. But then that
+"sometimes" was only when under the immediate influence of her presence.
+She fascinated me; but she would fascinate a hundred others in precisely
+the same way. It was true that she accepted from me more devotion, more
+worship, more time, more outward and visible homage than from any other.
+Was I not her _Cavaliere servente?_ Did she not accept my bouquets? Did
+she not say the other day, when I gave her that volume of Tennyson, that
+she loved all that was English for my sake? Surely, I was worse than
+ungrateful, when, having so much, I was still dissatisfied! Why was I
+not the happiest fellow in Paris? Why .....
+
+My meditations were here interrupted by a sudden flash of very vivid
+lightning, followed by a low muttering of distant thunder. I paused, and
+looked round. The sky was darker than ever, and though the air was
+singularly stagnant, I could hear among the uppermost leaves of the tall
+trees that stealthy rustling that generally precedes a storm.
+Unfortunately for myself, I had not felt disposed to go home at once on
+leaving the theatre; but, being restless alike in mind and body, had
+struck down through the Place Vendome and up the Rue de Rivoli,
+intending to come home by a circuitous route. At this precise moment I
+found myself in the middle of the Place de la Concorde, with Cleopatra's
+needle towering above my head, the lamps in the Champs Elysees twinkling
+in long chains of light through the blank darkness before me, and no
+vehicle anywhere in sight. To be caught in a heavy shower, was not,
+certainly, an agreeable prospect for one who had just emerged from the
+opera in the thinnest of boots and the lightest of folding hats, with
+neither umbrella nor paletot of proof; so, having given a hasty glance
+in every direction from which a cab might be expected, I took valiantly
+to my heels, and made straight for the Madeleine.
+
+Long before I had accomplished half the distance, however, another flash
+announced the quick coming of the tempest, and the first premonitory
+drops began to plash down heavily upon the pavement. Still I ran on,
+thinking that I should find a cab in the Place de la Madeleine; but the
+Place de la Madeleine was empty. Even the cafe at the corner was closed.
+Even the omnibus office was shut up, and the red lamp above the door
+extinguished.
+
+What was I to do now? Panting and breathless, I leaned up against a
+doorway, and resigned myself to fate. Stay, what was that file of
+carriages, dimly seen through the rain which was now coming down in
+earnest? It was in a private street opening off at the back of the
+Madeleine--a street in which I could remember no public stand. Perhaps
+there was an evening party at one of the large houses lower down, and,
+if so, I might surely find a not wholly incorruptible cabman, who would
+consent for a liberal _pourboire_ to drive me home and keep his fare
+waiting, if need were, for one little half-hour! At all events it was
+worth trying for; so away I darted again, with the wind whistling about
+my ears, and the rain driving in my face.
+
+But my troubles were not to be so speedily ended. Among the ten or
+fifteen equipages which I found drawn up in file, there was not one
+hackney vehicle. They were private carriages, and all, therefore,
+inaccessible.
+
+Did I say inaccessible?
+
+A bold idea occurred to me. The rain was so heavy that it could scarcely
+be expected to last many minutes. The carriage at the very end of the
+line was not likely to be the first called; and, even if it were, one
+could spring out in a moment, if necessary. In short, the very daring of
+the deed was as attractive as the shelter! I made my way swiftly down
+the line. The last carriage was a neat little brougham, and the
+coachman, with his hat pulled down over his eyes, and his collar drawn
+up about his ears, was too much absorbed in taking care of himself and
+his horses to pay much attention to a foot-passenger. I passed boldly
+by--doubled back stealthily on my own steps--looked round
+cautiously--opened the door, and glided in.
+
+It was a delightfully comfortable little vehicle--cushioned, soft,
+yielding, and pervaded by a delicate perfume of eglantine. Wondering who
+the owner might be--if she was young--if she was pretty--if she was
+married, or single, or a widow--I settled myself in the darkest corner
+of the carriage, intending only to remain there till the rain had
+abated. Thus I fell, as fate would have it--first into a profound
+reverie, and then into a still profounder sleep. How long this sleep may
+have lasted I know not. I only remember becoming slowly conscious of a
+gentle movement, which, without awaking, partly roused me; of a check to
+that movement, which brought my thoughts suddenly to the surface; of a
+stream of light--of an open door--a crowded hall--a lady waiting to come
+out, and a little crowd of attentive beaux surrounding her!
+
+I comprehended my position in an instant, and the impossibility of
+extricating myself from it. To get out next the house was to brave
+detection; whilst at the other side I found myself blocked in by
+carriages. Escape was now hopeless! I turned hot and cold; I shrank
+back; I would have gone through the bottom of the carriage, if I could.
+At this moment, to my horror, the footman opened the door. I gave myself
+up for lost, and, in a sudden access of desperation, was on the point of
+rushing out _coute que coute_, when the lady ran forward; sprang lightly
+in; recoiled; and uttered a little breathless cry of surprise and
+apprehension!
+
+"_Mon Dieu_, Madame! what is it? Are you hurt?" cried two or three of
+the gentlemen, running out, bareheaded, to her assistance.
+
+But, to my amazement, she unfastened her cloak, and threw it over me in
+such a manner as to leave me completely hidden beneath the folds.
+
+"Oh, nothing, thank you!--I only caught my foot in my cloak. I am really
+quite ashamed to have alarmed you! A thousand thanks--good-night."
+
+And so, with something of a slight tremor in her voice, the lady drew up
+the window. The next instant the carriage moved on.
+
+And now, what was to be done? I blessed the accident which rendered me
+invisible; but, at the same time, asked myself how it was to end.
+
+Should I wait till she reached her own door, and then, still feigning
+sleep, allow myself to be discovered? Or should I take the bull by the
+horns, and reveal myself? If the latter, would she scream, or faint, or
+go into hysterics? Then, again, supposing she resumed her cloak ... a
+cold damp broke out upon my forehead at the mere thought! All at once,
+just as these questions flashed across my mind, the lady drew the mantle
+aside, and said:--
+
+"How imprudent of you to hide in my carriage?"
+
+I could not believe my ears.
+
+"Suppose any of those people had caught sight of you ... why, it would
+have been all over Paris to-morrow! Happily, I had the presence of mind
+to cover you with my cloak; otherwise ... but there, Monsieur, I have a
+great mind to be very angry with you!"
+
+It was now clear that I was mistaken for some one else. Fortunately the
+carriage-lamps were unlit, the windows still blurred with rain, and the
+night intensely dark; so, feeling like a wretch reprieved on the
+scaffold, I shrank farther and farther into the corner, glad to favor a
+mistake which promised some hope of escape.
+
+"_Eh bien_!" said the lady, half tenderly, half reproachfully; "have you
+nothing to say to me?"
+
+Say to her, indeed! What could I say to her? Would not my voice betray
+me directly?
+
+"Ah," she continued, without waiting for a reply; "you are ashamed of
+the cruel scene of this morning! Well, since you have not allowed the
+night to pass without seeking a reconciliation, I suppose I must
+forgive you!"
+
+I thought, at this point, that I could not do better than press her
+hand, which was exquisitely soft and small--softer and smaller than even
+Madame de Marignan's.
+
+"Naughty Hippolyte!" murmured my companion. "Confess, now, that you were
+unreasonable."
+
+I sighed heavily, and caressed the little hand with both of mine.
+
+"And are you very penitent?"
+
+I expressed my penitence by another prodigious sigh, and ventured, this
+time, to kiss the tips of the dainty fingers.
+
+"_Ciel_!" exclaimed the lady. "You have shaved off your beard! What can
+have induced you to do such a thing?"
+
+My beard, indeed! Alas! I would have given any money for even a
+moustache! However, the fatal moment was come when I must speak.
+
+"_Mon cher ange_," I began, trying a hoarse whisper, "I--I--the fact
+is--a bet--"
+
+"A bet indeed! The idea of sacrificing such a handsome beard for a mere
+bet! I never heard of anything so foolish. But how hoarse you are,
+Hippolyte!"
+
+"All within the last hour," whispered I. "I was caught in the storm,
+just now, and ..."
+
+"And have taken cold, for my sake! Alas! my poor, dear friend, why did
+you wait to speak to me? Why did you not go home at once, and change
+your clothes? Your sleeve, I declare, is still quite damp! Hippolyte, if
+you fall ill, I shall never forgive myself!"
+
+I kissed her hand again. It was much pleasanter than whispering, and
+expressed all that was necessary.
+
+"But you have not once asked after poor Bibi!" exclaimed my companion,
+after a momentary silence. "Poor, dear Bibi, who has been suffering from
+a martyrdom with her cough all the afternoon!"
+
+Now, who the deuce was Bibi? She might be a baby. Or--who could
+tell?--she might be a poodle? On this point, however, I was left
+uninformed; for my unknown friend, who, luckily, seemed fond of talking
+and had a great deal to say, launched off into another topic
+immediately.
+
+"After all," said she, "I should have been wrong not to go to the party!
+My uncle was evidently pleased with my compliance; and it is not wise to
+vex one's rich uncles, if one can help it--is it, Hippolyte!"
+
+I pressed her hand again.
+
+"Besides, Monsieur Delaroche was not there. He was not even invited; so
+you see how far they were from laying matchmaking plots, and how
+groundless were all your fears and reproaches!"
+
+Monsieur Delaroche! Could this be the Delaroche of my special aversion?
+I pressed her hand again, more closely, more tenderly, and listened for
+what might come next.
+
+"Well, it is all over now! And will you promise _never, never, never_ to
+be jealous again? Then, to be jealous of such a creature as that
+ridiculous Delaroche--a man who knows nothing--who can think and talk
+only of his own absurd self!--a man who has not even wit enough to see
+that every one laughs at him!"
+
+I was delighted. I longed to embrace her on the spot! Was there ever
+such a charming, sensible, lively creature?
+
+"Besides, the coxcomb is just now devoting himself, body and soul (such
+as they are!) to that insufferable little _intriguante_, Madame de
+Marignan. He is to be seen with her in every drawing-room and theatre
+throughout Paris. For my part, I am amazed that a woman of the world
+should suffer herself to be compromised to that extent--especially one
+so experienced in these _affaires du coeur_."
+
+Madame de Marignan! Compromised--experienced--_intriguante_! I felt as
+if I were choking.
+
+"To be sure, there is that poor English lad whom she drags about with
+her, to play propriety," continued she; "but do you suppose the world is
+blinded by so shallow an artifice?"
+
+"What English lad?" I asked, startled out of all sense of precaution,
+and desperately resolved to know the worst.
+
+"What English lad? Why, Hippolyte, you are more stupid than ever! I
+pointed him out to you the other night at the Comedie Francaise--a pale,
+handsome boy, of about nineteen or twenty, with brown curling hair, and
+very fine eyes, which were riveted on Madame de Marignan the whole
+evening. Poor fellow! I cannot help pitying him."
+
+"Then--then, you think she really does not love him?" I said. And this
+time my voice was hoarse enough, without any need of feigning.
+
+"Love him! Ridiculous! What does such a woman understand by love?
+Certainly neither the sentiment nor the poetry of it! Tush, Hippolyte! I
+do not wish to be censorious; but every one knows that ever since M. de
+Marignan has been away in Algiers, that woman has had, not one devoted
+admirer, but a dozen; and now that her husband is coming back...."
+
+"Coming back! ... her husband!" I echoed, half rising in my place, and
+falling back again, as if stunned. "Good heavens! is she not a widow?"
+
+It was now the lady's turn to be startled.
+
+"A widow!" she repeated. "Why, you know as well as I that--_Dieu_! To
+whom I am speaking?"
+
+"Madame," I said, as steadily as my agitation would let me, "I beg you
+not to be alarmed. I am not, it is true, the person whom you have
+supposed; but--Nay, I implore you...."
+
+She here uttered a quick cry, and darted forward for the check-string.
+Arresting her hand half way, respectfully but firmly, I went on:--
+
+"How I came here, I will explain presently. I am a gentleman; and upon
+the word of a gentleman, Madame, am innocent of any desire to offend or
+alarm you. Can you--will you--hear me for one moment?"
+
+"I appear, sir, to have no alternative," replied she, trembling like a
+caged bird.
+
+"I might have left you undeceived, Madame. I might have extricated
+myself from, this painful position undiscovered--but for some words
+which just escaped your lips; some words so nearly concerning the--the
+honor and happiness of--of.... in short, I lost my presence of mind. I
+now implore you to tell me if all that you have just been saying of
+Madame de Marignan is strictly true."
+
+"Who are you, sir, that you should dare to surprise confidences intended
+for another, and by what right do you question me?" said the lady,
+haughtily.
+
+"By no right, Madame," I replied, fairly breaking into sobs, and burying
+my face in my hands. "I can only appeal to your compassion. I am that
+Englishman whom--whom...."
+
+For a moment there was silence. My companion was the first to speak.
+
+"Poor boy!" she said; and her voice, now, was gentle and compassionate.
+"You have been rudely undeceived. Did Madame de Marignan pass herself
+off upon you for a widow?"
+
+"She never named her husband to me--I believed that she was free. I
+fancied he had been dead for years. She knew that was my impression."
+
+"And you would have married her--actually married her?"
+
+"I--I--hardly dared to hope...."
+
+"_Ciel_! it is almost beyond belief. And you never inquired into her
+past history?"
+
+"Never. Why should I?"
+
+"Monsieur de Marignan holds a government appointment in Algiers, and has
+been absent more than four years. He is, I understand, expected back
+shortly, on leave of absence."
+
+I conquered my agitation by a supreme effort.
+
+"Madame," I said, "I thank you. It now only remains for me to explain my
+intrusion. I can do so in half a dozen words. Caught in the storm and
+unable to find a conveyance, I sought shelter in this carriage, which
+being the last on the file, offered the only refuge of which I could
+avail myself unobserved. While waiting for the tempest to abate, I fell
+asleep; and but for the chance which led you to mistake me for another,
+I must have been discovered when you entered the carriage."
+
+"Then, finding yourself so mistaken, Monsieur, would it not have been
+more honorable to undeceive me than to usurp a conversation which...."
+
+"Madame, I dared not. I feared to alarm you--I hoped to find some means
+of escape, and...."
+
+"_Mon Dieu_! what means? How are you to escape as it is? How leave the
+carriage without being seen by my servants?"
+
+I had not thought of this, nor of the dilemma in which my presence must
+place her.
+
+"I can open the door softly," said I, "and jump out unperceived."
+
+"Impossible, at the pace we are going! You would break your neck."
+
+I shook my head, and laughed bitterly.
+
+"Have no fear of that, Madame," I said. "Those who least value their
+necks never happen to break them. See, I can spring out as we pass the
+next turning, and be out of sight in a moment."
+
+"Indeed, I will not permit it. Oh, dear! we have already reached the
+Faubourg St. Germain. Stay--I have an idea I Do you know what o'clock
+it is?"
+
+"I don't know how long I may have slept; but I think it must be quite
+three."
+
+"_Bien_! The Countess de Blois has a ball to-night, and her visitors are
+sure not to disperse before four or five. My sister is there. I will
+send in to ask if she has yet gone home, and when the carriage stops you
+can slip out. Here is the Rue de Bac, and the door of her hotel is yet
+surrounded with equipages."
+
+And with this, she let down a front window, desired the coachman to
+stop, leaned forward so as to hide me completely, and sent in her
+footman with the message. When the man had fairly entered the hall, she
+turned to me and said:--
+
+"Now, Monsieur, fly! It is your only chance."
+
+"I go, Madame; but before going, suffer me to assure you that I know
+neither your name, nor that of the person for whom you mistook me--that
+I have no idea of your place of residence--that I should not know you if
+I saw you again to-morrow--in short, that you are to me as entirely a
+stranger as if this adventure had never happened."
+
+"Monsieur, I thank you for the assurance; but I see the servant
+returning. Pray, begone!"
+
+I sprang out without another word, and, never once looking back, darted
+down a neighboring street and waited in the shadow of a doorway till I
+thought the carriage must be out of sight.
+
+The night was now fine, the moon was up, and the sky was full of stars.
+But I heeded nothing, save my own perplexed and painful thoughts.
+Absorbed in these, I followed the course of the Rue du Bac till I came
+to the Pont National. There my steps were arrested by the sight of the
+eddying river, the long gleaming front of the Louvre, the quaint,
+glistening gables of the Tuilleries, the far-reaching trees of the
+Champs Elysees all silvered in the soft, uncertain moonlight. It was a
+most calm and beautiful picture; and I stood for a long time leaning
+against the parapet of the bridge, and looking dreamily at the scene
+before me. Then I heard the quarters chime from belfry to belfry all
+over the quiet city, and found that it was half-past three o'clock.
+Presently a patrol of _gendarmes_ went by, and, finding that they paused
+and looked at me suspiciously, I turned away, and bent my steps
+homewards.
+
+By the time I reached the Cite Bergere it was past four, and the early
+market-carts were already rumbling along the Rue du Faubourg Montmartre.
+Going up wearily to my apartments, I found a note waiting for me in
+Dalrymple's handwriting. It ran thus:--
+
+"MY DEAR DAMON:--
+
+"Do you know that it is nearly a month since I last saw you? Do you know
+that I have called twice at your lodgings without finding you at home? I
+hear of you as having been constantly seen, of late, in the society of a
+very pretty woman of our acquaintance; but I confess that I do not
+desire to see you go to the devil entirely without the friendly
+assistance of
+
+"Yours faithfully,
+
+"OSCAR DALRYMPLE."
+
+I read the note twice. I could scarcely believe that I had so neglected
+my only friend. Had I been mad? Or a fool?--or both? Too anxious and
+unhappy to sleep, and too tired to sit up, I lit my lamp, threw myself
+upon the bed, and there lay repenting my wasted hours, my misplaced love
+and my egregious folly, till morning came with its sunshine and its
+traffic, and found me a "wiser," if not a "better man."
+
+"Half-past seven!" exclaimed I to myself, as I jumped up and plunged my
+head into a basin of cold water. "Dr. Cheron shall see me before nine
+this morning. I'll call on Dalrymple at luncheon time; at three, I must
+get back for the afternoon lecture; and in the evening--in the evening,
+by Jove! Madame de Marignan must be content with her adorable Delaroche,
+for the deuce a bit of her humble servant will she ever see again!"
+
+And away I went presently along the sunny streets, humming to myself
+those saucy and wholesome lines of good Sir Walter Raleigh's:--
+
+     "Shall I like a hermit dwell
+     On a rock, or in a cell,
+     Calling home the smallest part
+     That is missing of my heart,
+     To bestow it where I may
+     Meet a rival every day?
+     If she undervalues me,
+     What care I how fair she be?"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII.
+
+THE WIDOW OF A MINISTER OF FINANCE.
+
+"You are just in time, Arbuthnot, to do me a service," said Dalrymple,
+looking up from his desk as I went in, and reaching out his hand to me
+over a barricade of books and papers.
+
+"Then I am very glad I have come," I replied. "But what confusion is
+this? Are you going anywhere?"
+
+"Yes--to perdition. There, kick that rubbish out of your way and sit
+down."
+
+Never very orderly, Dalrymple's rooms were this time in as terrible a
+litter as can well be conceived. The table was piled high with bills,
+old letters, books, cigars, gloves, card-cases, and pamphlets. The
+carpet was strewn with portmanteaus, hat-cases, travelling-straps, old
+luggage labels, railway wrappers, and the like. The chairs and sofas
+were laden with wearing apparel. As for Dalrymple himself, he looked
+haggard and weary, as though the last four weeks had laid four years
+upon his shoulders.
+
+"You look ill," I said clearing a corner of the sofa for my own
+accommodation; "or _ennuye_, which is much the same thing. What is the
+matter? And what can I do for you?"
+
+"The matter is that I am going abroad," said he, with his chin resting
+moodily in his two palms and his elbows on the table.
+
+"Going abroad! Where?"
+
+"I don't know--
+
+     'Anywhere, anywhere, out of the world.'
+
+It's of very little consequence whether I betake myself to the East or
+to the West; eat rice in the tropics, or drink train-oil at the Pole."
+
+"But have you no settled projects?"
+
+"None whatever."
+
+"And don't care what becomes of you?"
+
+"Not in the least."
+
+"Then, in Heaven's name, what has happened?"
+
+"The very thing that, three weeks ago, would have made me the happiest
+fellow in Christendom. What are you going to do to-morrow?"
+
+"Nothing, beyond my ordinary routine of medical study."
+
+"Humph! Could you get a whole holiday, for once?"
+
+I remembered how many I had taken of late, and felt ashamed of the
+readiness with which I replied:--
+
+"Oh yes! easily."
+
+"Well, then, I want you to spend the day with me. It will be, perhaps,
+my last in Paris for many a month, or even many a year. I ... Pshaw! I
+may as well say it, and have done with it. I am going to be married."
+
+"Married!" I exclaimed, in blank amazement; for it was the last thing I
+should have guessed.
+
+Dalrymple tugged away at his moustache with both hands, as was his habit
+when perplexed or troubled, and nodded gloomily. "To whom?"
+
+"To Madame de Courcelles."
+
+"And are you not very happy?"
+
+"Happy! I am the most miserable dog unhanged?"
+
+I was more at fault now than ever.
+
+"I ... judging from trifles which some would perhaps scarcely have
+observed," I said, hesitatingly, "I--I thought you were interested in
+Madame de Courcelles?"
+
+"Interested!" cried he, pushing back his chair and springing to his
+feet, as if the word had stung him. "By heaven! I love that woman as I
+never loved in my life."
+
+"Then why ..."
+
+"I'll tell you why--or, at least, I will tell you as much as I may--as I
+can; for the affair is hers, and not mine. She has a cousin--curse
+him!--to whom she was betrothed from childhood. His estates adjoined
+hers; family interests were concerned in their union; and the parents on
+both sides arranged matters. When, however, Monsieur de Courcelles fell
+in love with her--a man much older than herself, but possessed of great
+wealth and immense political influence--her father did not hesitate to
+send the cousin to the deuce and marry his daughter to the Minister of
+Finance. The cousin, it seems, was then a wild young fellow; not
+particularly in love with her himself; and not at all inconsolable for
+her loss. When, however, Monsieur de Courcelles was good enough to die
+(which he had the bad taste to do very hastily, and without making, by
+any means, the splendid provision for his widow which he had promised),
+our friend, the cousin, comes forward again. By this time he is enough
+man of the world to appreciate the value of land--more especially as he
+has sold, mortgaged, played the mischief with nearly every acre of his
+own. He pleads the old engagement, and, as he is pleased to call it, the
+old love. Madame de Courcelles is a young widow, very solitary, with no
+one to love, no object to live for, and no experience of the world. Her
+pity is easily awaked; and the result is that she not only accepts the
+cousin, but lends him large sums of money; suffers the title-deeds of
+her estates to go into the hands of his lawyer; and is formally
+betrothed to him before the eyes of all Paris!"
+
+"Who is this man? Where is he?" I asked, eagerly.
+
+"He is an officer of Chasseurs, now serving with his regiment in
+Algiers--a daring, dashing, reckless fellow; heartless and dissipated
+enough; but a splendid soldier. However, having committed her property
+to his hands, and suffered her name to be associated publicly with his,
+Madame de Courcelles, during his absence in Algiers, has done me the
+honor to prefer me. I have the first real love of her life, and the
+short and long of it is, that we are to be privately married to-morrow."
+
+"And why privately?"
+
+"Ah, there's the pity of it! There's the disappointment and the
+bitterness!"
+
+"Can't Madame de Courcelles write and tell this man that she loves
+somebody else better?"
+
+"Confound it! no. The fellow has her too much in his power, and, if he
+chose to be dishonest, could half ruin her. At all events she is afraid
+of him; and I ... I am as helpless as a child in the matter. If I were a
+rich man, I would snap my fingers at him; but how can I, with a paltry
+eight hundred a year, provide for that woman? Pshaw! If I could but
+settle it with a pair of hair-triggers and twenty paces of turf, I'd
+leave little work for the lawyers!"
+
+"Well, then, what is to be done?"
+
+"Only this," replied he, striding impatiently to and fro, like a caged
+lion; "I must just bear with my helplessness, and leave the remedy to
+those who can oppose skill to skill, and lawyer to lawyer."
+
+"At all events, you marry the lady."
+
+"Ay--I marry the lady; but I start to-morrow night for Berlin, _en
+route_ for anywhere that chance may lead me."
+
+"Without her?"
+
+"Without her. Do you suppose that I would stay in Paris--her
+husband--and live apart from her? Meet her, like an ordinary
+acquaintance? See others admiring her? Be content to lounge in and out
+of her _soirees_, or ride beside her carriage now and then, as you or
+fifty others might do? Perhaps, have even to endure the presence of De
+Caylus himself? _Merci_! Any number of miles, whether of land or sea,
+were better than a martyrdom like that!"
+
+"De Caylus!" I repeated. "Where have I heard that name?"
+
+"You may have heard of it in a hundred places," replied my friend. "As I
+said before, the man is a gallant soldier, and does gallant things. But
+to return to the present question--may I depend on you to-morrow? For we
+must have a witness, and our witness must be both discreet and silent."
+
+"On my silence and discretion you may rely absolutely."
+
+"And you can be here by nine?"
+
+"By daybreak, if you please."
+
+"I won't tax you to that extent. Nine will do quite well."
+
+"Adieu, then, till nine."
+
+"Adieu, and thank you."
+
+With this I left him, somewhat relieved to find that I had escaped all
+cross-examination on the score of Madame Marignan.
+
+"De Caylus!" I again repeated to myself, as I took my rapid way to the
+Hotel Dieu. "De Caylus! why, surely, it must have been that evening at
+Madame de Courcelles'...."
+
+And then I recollected that De Caylus was the name of that officer who
+was said to have ridden by night, and single-handed, through the heart
+of the enemy's camp, somewhere in Algiers.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII.
+
+A MARRIAGE NOT "A LA MODE."
+
+The marriage took place in a little out-of-the-way Protestant chapel
+beyond the barriers, at about a quarter before ten o'clock the next
+morning. Dalrymple and I were there first; and Madame de Courcelles,
+having, in order to avoid observation, come part of the distance in a
+cab and part on foot, arrived a few minutes later. She was very pale,
+and looked almost like a _religieuse_, with her black veil tied closely
+under her chin, and a dark violet dress, which might have passed for
+mourning. She gave her hand to Dalrymple without speaking; then knelt
+down at the communion-table, and so remained till we had all taken our
+places. As for Dalrymple, he had even less color than she, but held his
+head up haughtily, and betrayed no sign of the conflict within.
+
+It was a melancholy little chapel, dusty and neglected, full of black
+and white funereal tablets, and damp as a vault. We shivered as we stood
+about the altar; the clergyman's teeth chattered as he began the
+marriage service; and the echoes of our responses reverberated forlornly
+up among the gothic rafters overhead. Even the sunbeams struggled sadly
+and palely down the upper windows, and the chill wind whistled in when
+the door was opened, bringing with it a moan of coming rain.
+
+The ceremony over, the books signed in the vestry, and the clergyman,
+clerk, and pew-opener duly remunerated for their services, we prepared
+to be gone. For a couple of moments, Dalrymple and his bride stood apart
+in the shadow of the porch. I saw him take the hand on which he had just
+placed the ring, and look down upon it tenderly, wistfully--I saw him
+bend lower, and lower, whispering what no other ears might hear--saw
+their lips meet for one brief instant. Then the lady's veil was lowered;
+she turned hastily away; and Dalrymple was left standing in the
+doorway alone.
+
+"By Heaven!" said he, grasping my hand as though he would crush it.
+"This is hard to bear."
+
+I but returned the pressure of his hand; for I knew not with what words
+to comfort him. Thus we lingered for some minutes in silence, till the
+clergyman, having put off his surplice, passed us with a bow and went
+out; and the pew-opener, after pretending to polish the door-handle with
+her apron, and otherwise waiting about with an air of fidgety
+politeness, dropped a civil curtsey, and begged to remind us that the
+chapel must now be closed.
+
+Dalrymple started and shook himself like a water-dog, as if he would so
+shake off "the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune."
+
+"_Rex est qui metuit nihil_!" said he; "but I am a sovereign in bad
+circumstances, for all that. Heigho! Care will kill a cat. What shall we
+do with ourselves, old fellow, for the rest of the day?"
+
+"I hardly know. Would you like to go into the country?"
+
+"Nothing better. The air perhaps would exorcise some of these
+blue-devils."
+
+"What say you to St. Germains? It looks as if it must rain before night;
+yet there is the forest and...."
+
+"Excellent! We can do as we like, with nobody to stare at us; and I am
+in a horribly uncivilized frame of mind this morning."
+
+With this, we turned once more toward Paris, and, jumping into the first
+cab that came by, were driven to the station. It happened that a train
+was then about to start; so we were off immediately.
+
+There were no other passengers in the carriage, so Dalrymple infringed
+the company's mandate by lighting a cigar, and I, finding him
+disinclined for talk, did the same thing, and watched the passing
+country. Flat and uninteresting at first, it consisted of a mere sandy
+plain, treeless, hedgeless, and imperfectly cultivated with struggling
+strips of corn and vegetables. By and by came a line of stunted
+pollards, a hamlet, and a little dreary cemetery. Then the landscape
+improved. The straight line of the horizon broke into gentle
+undulations; the Seine, studded with islets, wound through the
+meadow-land at our feet; and a lofty viaduct carried us from height to
+height across the eddying river. Then we passed into the close green
+shade of a forest, which opened every here and there into long vistas,
+yielding glimpses of
+
+     "--verdurous glooms, and winding mossy ways."
+
+Through this wood the line continued to run till we reached our
+destination. Here our first few steps brought us out upon the Place,
+directly facing the old red and black chateau of St. Germain-en-Laye.
+Leaving this and the little dull town behind us, we loitered for some
+time about the broad walks of the park, and then passed on into the
+forest. Although it was neither Sunday nor a fete-day, there were
+pleasure parties gipseying under trees--Parisian cockneys riding
+raw-boned steeds--pony-chaises full of laughing grisettes dashing up and
+down the broad roads that pierce the wood in various directions--old
+women selling cakes and lemonade--workmen gambling with half-pence on
+the smooth turf by the wayside--_bonnes_, comely and important, with
+their little charges playing round them, and their busy fingers plying
+the knitting-needles as they walked--young ladies sketching trees, and
+prudent governesses reading novels close by; in short, all the life and
+variety of a favorite suburban resort on an ordinarily fine day about
+the beginning of autumn.
+
+Leaving the frequented routes to the right, we turned into one of the
+many hundred tracks that diverge in every direction from the beaten
+roads, and wandered deeper and deeper into the green shades and
+solitudes of the forest. Pausing, presently, to rest, Dalrymple threw
+himself at full length on the mossy ground, with his hands clasping the
+back of his head, and his hat over his eyes; whilst I found a luxurious
+arm-chair in the gnarled roots of a lichen-tufted elm. Thus we remained
+for a considerable time puffing away at our cigars in that sociable
+silence which may almost claim to be an unique privilege of masculine
+friendship. Women cannot sit together for long without talking; men can
+enjoy each other's companionship for hours with scarcely the interchange
+of an idea.
+
+Meanwhile, I watched the squirrels up in the beech-trees and the dancing
+of the green leaves against the sky; and thought dreamily of home, of my
+father, of the far past, and the possible future. I asked myself how,
+when my term of study came to an end, I should ever again endure the old
+home-life at Saxonholme? How settle down for life as my father's
+partner, conforming myself to his prejudices, obeying all the demands of
+his imperious temper, and accepting for evermore the monotonous routine
+of a provincial practice! It was an intolerable prospect, but no less
+inevitable than intolerable. Pondering thus, I sighed heavily, and the
+sigh roused Dalrymple's attention.
+
+"Why, Damon," said he, turning over on his elbow, and pushing up his
+hat to the level of his eyes, "what's the matter with you?"
+
+"Oh, nothing--at least, nothing new."
+
+"Well, new or old, what is it? A man must be either in debt, or in love,
+when he sighs in that way. You look as melancholy as Werter redivivus!"
+
+"I--I ought not to be melancholy, I suppose; for I was thinking of
+home."
+
+Dalrymple's face and voice softened immediately.
+
+"Poor boy!" he said, throwing away the end of his cigar, "yours is not a
+bright home, I fear. You told me, I think, that you had lost
+your mother?"
+
+"From infancy."
+
+"And you have no sisters?"
+
+"None. I am an only child."
+
+"Your father, however, is living?"
+
+"Yes, my father lives. He is a rough-tempered, eccentric man;
+misanthropic, but clever; kind enough, and generous enough, in his own
+strange way. Still--"
+
+"Still what?"
+
+--"I dread the life that lies before me! I dread the life without
+society, without ambition, without change--the dull house--the bounded
+sphere of action--the bondage.... But of what use is it to trouble you
+with these things?"
+
+"This use, that it does you good to tell, and me to listen. Sympathy,
+like mercy, blesseth him that gives and him that takes; and if I cannot
+actually help you, I am, at all events, thankful to be taken out of
+myself. Go on--tell me more of your prospects. Have you no acquaintance
+at Saxonholme whose society will make the place pleasant to you? No
+boyish friends? No pretty cousins? No first-loves, from amongst whom to
+choose a wife in time to come?"
+
+I shook my head sadly.
+
+"Did I not tell you that my father was a misanthrope? He visits no one,
+unless professionally. We have no friends and no relations."
+
+"Humph! that's awkward. However, it leaves you free to choose your own
+friends, when you go back. A medical man need never be without a
+visiting connection. His very profession puts a thousand opportunities
+in his way."
+
+"That is true; but--"
+
+"But what?"
+
+"I am not fond of the profession. I have never liked it. I would give
+much to relinquish it altogether."
+
+Dalrymple gave utterance to a prolonged and very dismal whistle.
+
+"This," said he gravely, "is the most serious part of the business. To
+live in a dull place is bad enough--to live with dull people is bad
+enough; but to have one's thoughts perpetually occupied with an
+uncongenial subject, and one's energies devoted to an uncongenial
+pursuit, is just misery, and nothing short of it! In fact 'tis a moral
+injustice, and one that no man should be required to endure."
+
+"Yet I must endure it."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Because it is too late to do otherwise."
+
+"It is never too late to repair an evil, or an error."
+
+"Unless the repairing of it involved a worse evil, or a more fatal
+error! No--I must not dream now of turning aside from the path that has
+been chosen for me. Too much time and too much money have been given to
+the thing for that;--I must let it take its course. There's no help
+for it!"
+
+"But, confound it, lad! you'd better follow the fife and drum, or go
+before the mast, than give up your life to a profession you hate!"
+
+"Hate is a strong word," I replied. "I do not actually hate it--at all
+events I must try to make the best of it, if only for my father's sake.
+His heart is set on making a physician of me, and I dare not
+disappoint him."
+
+Dalrymple looked at me fixedly, and then fell back into his old
+position.
+
+"Heigho!" he said, pulling his hat once more over his eyes, "I was a
+disobedient son. My father intended me for the Church; I was expelled
+from College for fighting a duel before I was twenty, and then, sooner
+than go home disgraced, enlisted as a private soldier in a cavalry corps
+bound for foreign service. Luckily, they found me out before the ship
+sailed, and made the best of a bad bargain by purchasing me a cornetcy
+in a dragoon regiment. I would not advise you to be disobedient, Damon.
+My experience in that line has been bitter enough,"
+
+"How so? You escaped a profession for which you were disinclined, and
+entered one for which you had every qualification."
+
+"Ay; but think of the cursed _esclandre_--first the duel, then the
+expulsion, then my disappearance for two months ... My mother was in bad
+health at the time, too; and I, her favorite son--I--in short, the
+anxiety was too much for her. She--she died before I had been six weeks
+in the regiment. There! we won't talk of it. It's the one subject
+that ..."
+
+His voice faltered, and he broke off abruptly.
+
+"I wish you were going with me to Berlin," said he, after a long silence
+which I had not attempted to interrupt.
+
+"I wish with all my heart that I were!"
+
+"And yet," he added, "I am glad on--on her account, that you remain in
+Paris. You will call upon her sometimes, Arbuthnot?"
+
+"If Madame De Cour.... I mean, if Mrs. Dalrymple will permit me."
+
+An involuntary smile flitted across his lips--the first I had seen there
+all the day.
+
+"She will be glad--grateful. She knows that I value you, and she has
+proof that I trust you. You are the only possessor of our secret."
+
+"It is as safe with me," I said, "as if I were dead, and in my grave."
+
+"I know it, old fellow. Well--you will see her sometimes. You will write
+to me, and tell me how she is looking. If--if she were to fall ill, you
+would not conceal it from me? and in case of any emergency--any
+annoyance arising from De Caylus ..."
+
+"Were she my own sister," I said, earnestly, "she would not find me
+readier to assist or defend her. Of this, Dalrymple, be assured."
+
+"Thank you," he said, and stretched up his hand to me. "I do believe you
+are true--though there are few men, and still fewer women, of whom I
+should like to say as much. By the way, Arbuthnot, beware of that little
+flirt, Madame de Marignan. She has charming eyes, but no more heart than
+a vampire. Besides, an entanglement with a married woman!... _cela ne se
+peut pas, mon cher_. You are too young to venture on such dangerous
+ground, and too inexperienced."
+
+I smiled--perhaps somewhat bitterly--for the wound was still fresh, and
+I could not help wincing when any hand came near it.
+
+"You are right," I replied. "Madame de Marignan is a dangerous woman;
+but dangerous for me no longer. However, I have paid rather dearly for
+my safety."
+
+And with this, I told him the whole story from beginning to end,
+confessing all my follies without reservation. Surprised, amused,
+sometimes unable to repress a smile, sometimes genuinely compassionate,
+he heard my narrative through, accompanying it from time to time with
+muttered comments and ejaculations, none of which were very flattering
+to Madame de Marignan. When I had done, he sprang to his feet, laid his
+hand heavily upon my shoulder, and said:--
+
+"Damon, there are a great many disagreeable things in life which wise
+people say are good for us, and for which they tell us we ought to be
+grateful in proportion to our discomfort. For my own part, however, I am
+no optimist. I am not fond of mortifying the flesh, and the eloquence of
+Socrates would fail to persuade me that a carbuncle was a cheerful
+companion, or the gout an ailment to be ardently desired. Yet, for all
+this, I cannot say that I look upon your adventure in the light of a
+misfortune. You have lost time, spent money, and endured a considerable
+amount of aggravation; but you have, on the other hand, acquired ease
+of manner, facility of conversation, and just that necessary polish
+which fits a man for society. Come! you have received a valuable lesson
+both in morals and manners; so farewell to Madame de Marignan, and let
+us write _Pour acquit_ against the score!"
+
+Willing enough to accept this cheerful view, I flourished an imaginary
+autograph upon the air with the end of my cane, and laughingly dismissed
+the subject.
+
+We then strolled back through the wood, treading the soft moss under our
+feet, startling the brown lizards from our path and the squirrels from
+the lower branches of the great trees, and, now and then, surprising a
+plump little green frog, which went skipping away into the long grass,
+like an animated emerald. Coming back to the gardens, we next lingered
+for some time upon the terrace, admiring the superb panorama of
+undulating woodland and cultivated champaign, which, seen through the
+golden haze of afternoon, stretched out in glory to the remotest
+horizon. To our right stood the prison-like chateau, flinging back the
+sunset from its innumerable casements, and seeming to drink in the warm
+glow at every pore of its old, red bricks. To our left, all lighted up
+against the sky, rose the lofty tree-tops of the forest which we had
+just quitted. Our shadows stretched behind us across the level terrace,
+like the shadows of giants. Involuntarily, we dropped our voices. It
+would have seemed almost like profanity to speak aloud while the first
+influence of that scene was upon us.
+
+Going on presently towards the verge of the terrace, we came upon an
+artist who, with his camp-stool under his arm, and his portfolio at his
+feet, was, like ourselves, taking a last look at the sunset before going
+away. As we approached, he turned and recognised us. It was Herr Franz
+Mueller, the story-telling student of the _Chicards_ club.
+
+"Good-afternoon, gentlemen," said he, lifting his red cap, and letting
+it fall back again a little on one side. "We do not see many such
+sunsets in the course of the summer."
+
+"Indeed, no," replied Dalrymple; "and ere long the autumn tints will be
+creeping over the landscape, and the whole scene will assume a different
+character. Have you been sketching in the forest?"
+
+"No--I have been making a study of the chateau and terrace from this
+point, with the landscape beyond. It is for an historical subject which
+I have laid out for my winter's work."
+
+And with this, he good-naturedly opened his folio and took out the
+sketch, which was a tolerably large one, and represented the scene under
+much the same conditions of light as we now saw it.
+
+"I shall have a group of figures here," he said, pointing to a spot on
+the terrace, "and a more distant one there; with a sprinkling of dogs
+and, perhaps, a head or two at an open window of the chateau. I shall
+also add a flag flying on the turret, yonder."
+
+"A scene, I suppose, from the life of Louis the Thirteenth," I
+suggested.
+
+"No--I mean it for the exiled court of James the Second," replied he.
+"And I shall bring in the King, and Mary of Modena, and the Prince their
+son, who was afterwards the Pretender."
+
+"It is a good subject," said Dalrymple. "You will of course find
+excellent portraits of all these people at Versailles; and a lively
+description of their court, mode of life, and so forth, if my memory
+serves me correctly, in the tales of Anthony, Count Hamilton. But with
+all this, I dare say, you are better acquainted than I."
+
+"_Parbleu!_ not I," said the student, shouldering his camp-stool as if
+it were a musket, and slinging his portfolio by a strap across his back;
+"therefore, I am all the more obliged to you for the information. My
+reading is neither very extensive nor very useful; and as for my
+library, I could pack it all into a hat-case any day, and find room for
+a few other trifles at the same time. Here is the author I chiefly
+study. He is my constant companion, and, like myself, looks somewhat the
+worse for wear."
+
+Saying which, he produced from one of his pockets a little, greasy,
+dog-eared volume of Beranger, about the size of a small snuff-box, and
+began singing aloud, to a very cheerful air, a song of which a certain
+faithless Mademoiselle Lisette was the heroine, and of which the refrain
+was always:--
+
+     "_Lisette! ma Lisette,
+     Tu m'as trompe toujours;
+     Je veux, Lisette,
+     Boire a nos amours_."
+
+To this accompaniment we walked back through the gardens to the railway
+station, where, being a quarter of an hour too soon, our companion
+amused himself by "chaffing," questioning, contradicting, and otherwise
+ingeniously tormenting the check-takers and porters of the
+establishment. One pompous official, in particular, became so helplessly
+indignant that he retired into a little office overlooking the platform,
+and was heard to swear fluently, all by himself, for several minutes.
+The time having expired and the doors being opened, we passed out with
+the rest of the home-going Parisians, and were about to take our places,
+when Mueller, climbing like a cat to the roof-seats on the top of the
+second-class carriages, beckoned us to follow.
+
+"Who would be shut up with ten fat people and a baby, when fresh air can
+be breathed, and tobacco smoked, for precisely the same fare?" asked he.
+"You don't mean to say that you came down to St. Germains in one of the
+dens below?"
+
+"Yes, we did," I replied; "but we had it to ourselves."
+
+"So much the worse. Man is a gregarious animal, and woman also--which
+proves Zimmerman to have been neither, and accounts for the brotherhood
+of _Les Chicards_. Would you like to see how that old gentleman looks
+when he is angry?"
+
+"Which? The one in the opposite corner?"
+
+"The same."
+
+"Well, that depends on circumstances. Why do you ask?"
+
+"Because I'll engage to satisfy your curiosity in less than ten
+minutes."
+
+"Oh, no, don't affront him," said I. "We shall only have a scene."
+
+"I won't affront him. I promise not to utter a syllable, either
+offensive or defensive."
+
+"Leave him alone, then, poor devil!"
+
+"Nonsense! If he chooses to be annoyed, that's his business, and not
+mine. Now, you'll see."
+
+And Mueller, alert for mischief, stared fixedly at the old gentleman in
+the opposite corner for some minutes--then sighed--roused himself as if
+from a profound reverie--seized his portfolio--took out a pencil and
+sketch-book--mended the pencil with an elaborate show of fastidiousness
+and deliberation--stared again--drew a deep breath--turned somewhat
+aside, as if anxious to conceal his object, and began sketching rapidly.
+Now and then he paused; stole a furtive glance over his shoulder; bit
+his lip; rubbed out; corrected; glanced again; and then went on rapidly
+as before.
+
+In the meanwhile the old gentleman, who was somewhat red and irascible,
+began to get seriously uncomfortable. He frowned, fidgeted, coughed,
+buttoned and unbuttoned his coat, and jealously watched every proceeding
+of his tormentor. A general smile dawned upon the faces of the rest of
+the travellers. The priest over the way pinched his lips together, and
+looked down demurely. The two girls, next to the priest, tittered behind
+their handkerchiefs. The young man with the blue cravat sucked the top
+of his cane, and winked openly at his companions, both of whom were
+cracking nuts, and flinging the shells down the embankment. Presently
+Mueller threw his head back, held the drawing off, still studiously
+keeping the back of it towards the rest of the passengers; looked at it
+with half-closed eyes; stole another exceedingly cautious glance at his
+victim; and then, affecting for the first time to find himself observed,
+made a vast show of pretending to sketch the country through which we
+were passing.
+
+The old gentleman could stand it no longer.
+
+"Monsieur," said he, angrily. "Monsieur, I will thank you not to take my
+portrait. I object to it. Monsieur."
+
+"Charming distance," said Mueller, addressing himself to me "Wants
+interest, however, in the foreground. That's a picturesque tree yonder,
+is it not?"
+
+The old gentleman struck his umbrella sharply on the floor.
+
+"It's of no use, Monsieur," he exclaimed, getting more red and excited.
+"You are taking my portrait, and I object to it. I know you are taking
+my portrait."
+
+Mueller looked up dreamily.
+
+"I beg your pardon, Monsieur," said he. "Did you speak?'
+
+"Yes, Monsieur. I did speak. I repeat that you shall not take my
+portrait."
+
+"Your portrait, Monsieur?"
+
+"Yes, my portrait!"
+
+"But, Monsieur," remonstrated the artist, with an air of mingled candor
+and surprise, "I never dreamed of taking your portrait!"
+
+"_Sacre non_!" shouted the old gentleman, with another rap of the
+umbrella. "I saw you do it! Everybody saw you do It!"
+
+"Nay, if Monsieur will but do me the honor to believe that I was simply
+sketching from nature, as the train...."
+
+"An impudent subterfuge, sir!" interrupted the old gentleman. "An
+impudent subterfuge, and nothing less!"
+
+Mueller drew himself up with immense dignity.
+
+"Monsieur," he said, haughtily, "that is an expression which I must
+request you to retract. I have already assured you, on the word of a
+gentleman...."
+
+"A gentleman, indeed! A pretty gentleman! He takes my portrait, and...."
+
+"I have not taken your portrait, Monsieur."
+
+"Good heavens!" cried the old gentleman, looking round, "was ever such
+assurance! Did not every one present see him in the act? I appeal to
+every one--to you, Monsieur--to you, Mesdames,--to you, reverend
+father,--did you not all see this person taking my portrait?"
+
+"Nay, then, if it must come to this," said Mueller, "let the sketch be
+evidence, and let these ladies and gentlemen decide whether it is really
+the portrait of Monsieur--and if they think it like?"
+
+Saying which, he held up the book, and displayed a head, sketched, it is
+true, with admirable spirit and cleverness, but--the head of an ass,
+with a thistle in its mouth!
+
+A simultaneous explosion of mirth followed. Even the priest laughed till
+the tears ran down his cheeks, and Dalrymple, heavy-hearted as he was,
+could not help joining in the general shout. As for the old gentleman,
+the victim of this elaborate practical joke, he glared at us all round,
+swore that it was a premeditated insult from beginning to end, and,
+swelling with suppressed rage, flung himself back into his corner, and
+looked resolutely in the opposite direction.
+
+By this time we were half-way to Paris, and the student, satisfied with
+his success, packed up his folio, brought out a great meerschaum with a
+snaky tube, and smoked like a factory-chimney.
+
+When we alighted, it was nearly five o'clock.
+
+"What shall we do next?" said Dalrymple, pulling drearily at his
+moustache. "I am so deuced dull to-day that I am ashamed to ask anybody
+to do me the charity to dine with me--especially a _bon garcon_ like
+Herr Mueller."
+
+"Don't be ashamed," said the student, laughingly, "I would dine with
+Pluto himself, if the dishes were good and my appetite as sharp
+as to-day."
+
+"_Allons_, then! Where shall we go; to the _Trois Freres_, or the
+_Moulin Rouge_, or the _Maison Doree_?"
+
+"The _Trois Freres_" said Mueller, with the air of one who deliberates on
+the fate of nations, "has the disadvantage of being situated in the
+Palais Royal, where the band still continues to play at half-past five
+every afternoon. Now, music should come on with the sweets and the
+champagne. It is not appropriate with soup or fish, and it distracts
+one's attention if injudiciously administered with the made dishes,"
+
+"True. Then shall we try the _Moulin Rouge_?"
+
+Mueller shook his head.
+
+"At the _Moulin Rouge_" said he, gravely, "one can breakfast well; but
+their dinners are stereotyped. For the last ten years they have not
+added a new dish to their _carte_; and the discovery of a new dish, says
+Brillat Savarin, is of more importance to the human race than the
+discovery of a new planet. No--I should not vote for the
+_Moulin Rouge_."
+
+"Well, then, Vefours, Very's, the Cafe Anglais?"
+
+"Vefours is traditional; the Cafe Anglais is infested with English; and
+at Very's, which is otherwise a meritorious establishment, one's
+digestion is disturbed by the sight of omnivorous provincials, who drink
+champagne with the _roti_, and eat melon at dessert."
+
+Dalrymple laughed outright.
+
+"At this rate," said he, "we shall get no dinner at all! What is to
+become of us, if neither Very's, nor the _Trois Freres_, nor the _Moulin
+Rouge_, nor the _Maison Doree_...."
+
+"_Halte-la!"_ interrupted the student, theatrically; "for by my halidom,
+sirs, I said not a syllable in disparagement of the house yelept Doree!
+Is it not there that we eat of the crab of Bordeaux, succulent and
+roseate? Is it not there that we drink of Veuve Cliquot the costly, and
+of that Johannisberger, to which all other hocks are vinegar and water?
+Never let it be said that Franz Mueller, being of sound mind and body,
+did less than justice to the reputation of the _Maison Doree_."
+
+"To the _Maison Doree_, then," said Dalrymple, "with what speed and
+appetite we may! By Jove! Herr Franz, you are a _connoisseur_ in the
+matter of dining."
+
+"A man who for twenty-nine days out of every thirty pays his sixty-five
+centimes for two dishes at a student's Restaurant in the Quartier Latin,
+knows better than most people where to go for a good dinner when he has
+the chance," said Mueller, philosophically. "The ragouts of the
+Temple--the _arlequins_ of the _Cite_--the fried fish of the Odeon
+arcades--the unknown hashes of the _guingettes_, and the 'funeral baked
+meats' of the Palais Royal, are all familiar to my pocket and my palate.
+I do not scruple to confess that in cases of desperate emergency, I have
+even availed myself of the advantages of _Le hasard_."
+
+"_Le hasard_." said I. "What is that?"
+
+"_Le hasard de la fourchette_," replied the student, "is the resort of
+the vagabond, the _gamin_, and the _chiffonier_. It lies down by the
+river-side, near the Halles, and consists of nothing but a shed, a fire,
+and a caldron. In this caldron a seething sea of oleaginous liquid
+conceals an infinite variety of animal and vegetable substances. The
+arrangements of the establishment are beautifully simple. The votary
+pays his five centimes and is armed by the presiding genius of the place
+with a huge two-pronged iron fork. This fork he plunges in once;--he may
+get a calf's foot, or a potato, or a sheep's head, or a carrot, or a
+cabbage, or nothing, as fate and the fork direct. All men are gamblers
+in some way or another, and _Le hasard_ is a game of gastronomic chance.
+But from the ridiculous to the sublime, it is but a step--and while
+talking of _Le hasard_ behold, we have arrived at the _Maison Doree_."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX.
+
+A DINNER AT THE MAISON DOREE AND AN EVENING PARTY IN THE QUARTIER LATIN.
+
+The most genial of companions was our new acquaintance, Franz Mueller,
+the art-student. Light-hearted, buoyant, unassuming, he gave his animal
+spirits full play, and was the life of our little dinner. He had more
+natural gayety than generally belongs to the German character, and his
+good-temper was inexhaustible. He enjoyed everything; he made the best
+of everything; he saw food for laughter in everything. He was always
+amused, and therefore was always amusing. Above all, there was a
+spontaneity in his mirth which acted upon others as a perpetual
+stimulant. He was in short, what the French call a _bon garcon_, and the
+English a capital fellow; easy without assurance, comic without
+vulgarity, and, as Sydney Smith wittily hath it--"a great number of
+other things without a great number of other things."
+
+Upon Dalrymple, who had been all day silent, abstracted, and unlike his
+usual self, this joyous influence acted like a tonic. As entertainer, he
+was bound to exert himself, and the exertion did him good. He threw off
+his melancholy; and with the help, possibly, of somewhat more than his
+usual quantity of wine, entered thoroughly into the passing joyousness
+of the hour. What a _recherche_, luxurious extravagant little dinner it
+was, that evening at the Maison Doree! We had a charming little room
+overlooking the Boulevard, furnished with as much looking-glass,
+crimson-velvet, gilding, and arabesque painting as could be got together
+within the space of twelve-feet by eight. Our wine came to table in a
+silver cooler that Cellini might have wrought. Our meats were served
+upon porcelain that would have driven Palissy to despair. We had nothing
+that was in season, except game, and everything that was out; which,
+by-the-way, appears to be our modern criterion of excellence with
+respect to a dinner. Finally, we were waited upon by the most imposing
+of waiters--a waiter whose imperturbable gravity was not to be shaken by
+any amount of provocation, and whose neckcloth alone was sufficient to
+qualify him for the church.
+
+How merry we were! How Mueller tormented that diplomatic waiter! What
+stories we told! what puns we made! What brilliant things we said, or
+fancied we said, over our Chambertin and Johannisberger! Mueller knew
+nothing of the substratum of sadness underlying all that jollity. He
+little thought how heavy Dalrymple's strong heart had been that morning.
+He had no idea that my friend and I were to part on the morrow, for
+months or years, as the case might be--he to carry his unrest hither and
+thither through distant lands; I to remain alone in a strange city,
+pursuing a distasteful study, and toiling onward to a future without
+fascination or hope. But, as the glass seals tell us, "such is life." We
+are all mysteries to one another. The pleasant fellow whom I invite to
+dinner because he amuses me, carries a scar on his soul which it would
+frighten me to see; and he in turn, when he praises my claret, little
+dreams of the carking care that poisons it upon my palate, and robs it
+of all its aroma. Perhaps the laughter-loving painter himself had his
+own little tragedy locked up in some secret corner of the heart that
+seemed to beat so lightly under that braided blouse of Palais Royal cut
+and Quartier Latin fashion! Who could tell? And of what use would it be,
+if it were told? Smiles carry one through the world more agreeably than
+tears, and if the skeleton is only kept decently out of sight in its own
+unsuspected closet, so much the better for you and me, and society
+at large.
+
+Dinner over, and the serious waiter dismissed with the dessert and the
+empty bottles, we sat by the open window for a long time, sipping our
+coffee, smoking our cigars, and watching the busy life of the Boulevard
+below. There the shops were all alight and the passers-by more numerous
+than by day. Carriages were dashing along, full of opera-goers and
+ball-room beauties. On the pavement just under our window were seated
+the usual crowd of Boulevard idlers, sipping their _al fresco_ absinthe,
+and _grog-au-vin._ In the very next room, divided from us by only a
+slender partition, was a noisy party of young men and girls. We could
+hear their bursts of merriment, the chinking of their glasses as they
+pledged one another, the popping of the champagne corks, and almost the
+very jests that passed from lip to lip. Presently a band came and played
+at the corner of an adjoining street. All was mirth, all was life, all
+was amusement and dissipation both in-doors and out-of-doors, in the
+"care-charming" city of Paris on that pleasant September night; and we,
+of course, were gay and noisy, like our neighbors. Dalrymple and Mueller
+could scarcely be called new acquaintances. They had met some few times
+at the _Chicards_, and also, some years before, in Rome. What stories
+they told of artists whom they had known! What fun they made of
+Academic dons and grave professors high in authority! What pictures they
+drew, of life in Rome--in Vienna--in Paris! Though we had no ladies of
+our party and were only three in number, I am not sure that the
+merry-makers in the next room laughed any louder or oftener than we!
+
+At length the clock on the mantelpiece warned us that it was already
+half-past nine, and that we had been three hours at dinner. It was
+clearly time to vary the evening's amusement in some way or other, and
+the only question was what next to do? Should we go to a billiard-room?
+Or to the Salle Valentinois? Or to some of the cheap theatres on the
+Boulevard du Temple? Or to the Tableaux Vivants? Or the Cafe des
+Aveugles? Or take a drive round by the Champs Elysees in an open fly?
+
+At length Mueller remembered that some fellow-students were giving a
+party that evening, and offered to introduce us.
+
+"It is up five pairs of stairs, in the Quartier Latin," said he; "but
+thoroughly jolly--all students and grisettes. They'll be delighted
+to see us."
+
+This admirable proposition was no sooner made than acted upon; so we
+started immediately, and Dalrymple, who seemed to be well acquainted
+with the usages of student-life, proposed that we should take with us a
+store of sweetmeats for the ladies.
+
+"There subsists," observed he, "a mysterious elective affinity between
+the grisette and the chocolate bon-bon. He who can skilfully exhibit the
+latter, is almost certain to win the heart of the former. Where the
+chocolate fails, however, the _marron glace_ is an infallible specific.
+I recommend that we lay in a liberal supply of both weapons."
+
+"Carried by acclamation," said Mueller. "We can buy them on our way, in
+the Rue Vivienne. A capital shop; but one that I never patronize--they
+give no credit."
+
+Chatting thus, and laughing, we made our way across the Boulevard and
+through a net-work of by-streets into the Rue Vivienne, where we laid
+siege to a great bon-bon shop--a gigantic depot for dyspepsia at so
+much per kilogramme--and there filled our pockets with sweets of every
+imaginable flavor and color. This done, a cab conveyed us in something
+less than ten minutes across the Pont Neuf to the Quartier Latin.
+
+Mueller's friends were three in number, and all students--one of art, one
+of law, and one of medicine. They lodged at the top of a dingy house
+near the Odeon, and being very great friends and very near neighbors
+were giving this entertainment conjointly. Their names were Gustave,
+Jules, and Adrien. Adrien was the artist, and lived in the garret, just
+over the heads of Gustave and Jules, which made it very convenient for a
+party, and placed a _suite_ of rooms at the disposal of their visitors.
+
+Long before we had achieved the five pairs of stairs, we heard the sound
+of voices and the scraping of a violin, and on the fifth landing were
+received by a pretty young lady in a coquettish little cap, whom Mueller
+familiarly addressed as Annette, and who piloted us into a very small
+bed-room which was already full of hats and coats, bonnets, shawls, and
+umbrellas. Having added our own paletots and beavers to the general
+stock, and having each received a little bit of pasteboard in exchange
+for the same, we were shown into the ball-room by Mademoiselle Annette,
+who appeared to fill the position of hostess, usher, and general
+superintendent.
+
+It was a good-sized room, somewhat low in the ceiling, and brilliantly
+lighted with lots of tallow candles in bottles. The furniture had all
+been cleared out for the dancers, except a row of benches round the
+walls, and a chest of draws in a recess between the windows which served
+as a raised platform for the orchestra. The said orchestra consisted of
+a violin and accordion, both played by amateurs, with an occasional
+_obligato_ on the common comb. As for the guests, they were, as Mueller
+had already told us, all students and grisettes--the former wearing
+every strange variety of beard and blouse; the latter in pretty
+light-colored muslins and bewitching little caps, with the exception of
+two who wore flowers in their hair, and belonged to the opera ballet.
+They were in the midst of a tremendous galop when we arrived; so we
+stood at the door and looked on, and Dalrymple flirted with Mademoiselle
+Annette. As soon as the galop was over, two of our hosts came forward to
+welcome us.
+
+"The Duke of Dalrymple and the Marquis of Arbuthnot--Messieurs Jules
+Charpentier and Gustave Dubois," said Mueller, with the most _degage_ air
+in the world.
+
+Monsieur Jules, a tall young man with an enormous false nose of the
+regular carnival pattern, and Monsieur Gustave, who was short and stout,
+with a visible high-water mark round his throat and wrists, and curious
+leather mosaics in his boots, received us very cordially, and did not
+appear to be in the least surprised at the magnificence of the
+introduction. On the contrary, they shook hands with us; apologized for
+the absence of Adrien, who was preparing the supper upstairs; and
+offered to find us partners for the next valse. Dalrymple immediately
+proposed for the hand of Mademoiselle Annette. Mueller, declining
+adventitious aid, wandered among the ladies, making himself universally
+agreeable and trusting for a partner to his own unassisted efforts. For
+myself, I was indebted to Monsieur Gustave for an introduction to a very
+charming young lady whose name was Josephine, and with whom I fell over
+head and ears in love without a moment's warning.
+
+She was somewhat under the middle height, slender, supple, rosy-lipped,
+and coquettish to distraction. Her pretty mouth dimpled round with
+smiles at every word it uttered. Her very eyes laughed. Her hair, which
+was more adorned than concealed by a tiny muslin cap that clung by some
+unseen agency to the back of her head, was of a soft, warm, wavy brown,
+with a woof of gold threading it here and there. Her voice was perhaps a
+little loud; her conversation rather childish; her accent such as would
+scarcely have passed current in the Faubourg St. Germain--but what of
+that? One would be worse than foolish to expect style and cultivation in
+a grisette; and had I not had enough to disgust me with both in Madame
+de Marignan? What more charming, after all, than youth, beauty, and
+lightheartedness? Were Noel and Chapsal of any importance to a mouth
+that could not speak without such a smile as Hebe might have envied?
+
+I was, at all events, in no mood to take exception to these little
+defects. I am not sure that I did not even regard them in the light of
+additional attractions. That which in another I should have called
+_bete_, I set down to the score of _naivete_ in Mademoiselle
+Josephine. One is not diffident at twenty--by the way, I was now
+twenty-one--especially after dining at the Maison Doree.
+
+Mademoiselle Josephine was frankness itself. Before I had enjoyed the
+pleasure of her acquaintance for ten minutes, she told me she was an
+artificial florist; that her _patronne_ lived in the Rue Menilmontant;
+that she went to her work every morning at nine, and left it every
+evening at eight; that she lodged _sous les toits_ at No. 70, Rue
+Aubry-le-Boucher; that her relations lived at Juvisy; and that she went
+to see them now and then on Sundays, when the weather and her funds
+permitted.
+
+"Is the country pretty at Juvisy, Mademoiselle?" I asked, by way of
+keeping up the conversation.
+
+"Oh, M'sieur, it is a real paradise. There are trees and fields, and
+there is the Seine close by, and a chateau, and a park, and a church on
+a hill, ... _ma foi!_ there is nothing in Paris half so pretty; not even
+the Jardin des Plantes!"
+
+"And have you been there lately?"
+
+"Not for eight weeks, at the very least, M'sieur. But then it costs
+three francs and a half for the return ticket, and since I quarrelled
+with Emile...."
+
+"Emile!" said I, quickly. "Who is he?"
+
+"He is a picture-frame maker, M'sieur, and works for a great dealer in
+the Rue du Faubourg Montmartre. He was my sweetheart, and he took me out
+somewhere every Sunday, till we quarrelled."
+
+"And what did you quarrel about, Mademoiselle?"
+
+My pretty partner laughed and tossed her head.
+
+"Eh, _mon Dieu_! he was jealous."
+
+"Jealous of whom?"
+
+"Of a gentleman--an artist--who wanted to paint me in one of his
+pictures. Emile did not like me to go to his _atelier_ so often; and the
+gentleman gave me a shawl (such a pretty shawl!) and a canary in a
+lovely green and gold cage; and...."
+
+"And Emile objected ?"
+
+"Yes, M'sieur."
+
+"How very unreasonable!"
+
+"That's just what I said, M'sieur."
+
+"And have you never seen him since!"
+
+"Oh, yes--he keeps company now with my cousin Cecile, and she humors him
+in everything,"
+
+"And the artist--what of him, Mademoiselle?"
+
+"Oh, I sat to him every day, till his picture was finished. _Il etait
+bien gentil_. He took me to the theatre several times, and once to a
+fete at Versailles; but that was after Emile and I had broken it off."
+
+"Did you find it tiresome, sitting as a model?"
+
+"_Mais, comme ci, et comme ca_! It was a beautiful dress, and became me
+wonderfully. To be sure, it was rather cold!"
+
+"May I ask what character you were supposed to represent, Mademoiselle?"
+
+"He said it was Phryne. I have no idea who she was; but I think she must
+have found it very uncomfortable if she always wore sandals, and went
+without stockings."
+
+I looked down at her little foot, and thought how pretty it must have
+looked in the Greek sandal. I pictured her to myself in the graceful
+Greek robe, with a chalice in her hand and her temples crowned with
+flowers. What a delicious Phryne! And what a happy fellow Praxiteles
+must have been!
+
+"It was a privilege, Mademoiselle, to be allowed to see you in so
+charming a costume," I said, pressing her hand tenderly. "I envy that
+artist from the bottom of my heart."
+
+Mademoiselle Josephine smiled, and returned the pressure.
+
+"One might borrow it," said she, "for the Bal de l'Opera."
+
+"Ah, Mademoiselle, if I dared only aspire to the honor of conducting
+you!"
+
+"_Dame_! it is nearly four months to come!"
+
+"True, but in the meantime, Mademoiselle----"
+
+"In the meantime," said the fair Josephine, anticipating my hopes with
+all the unembarrassed straightforwardness imaginable, "I shall be
+delighted to improve M'sieur's acquaintance."
+
+"Mademoiselle, you make me happy!"
+
+"Besides, M'sieur is an Englishman, and I like the English so much!"
+
+"I am delighted to hear it, Mademoiselle. I hope I shall never give you
+cause to alter your opinion."
+
+"Last galop before supper!" shouted Monsieur Jules through, a brass
+speaking-trumpet, in order to make use of which he was obliged to hold
+up his nose with one hand. "Gentlemen, choose your partners. All couples
+to dance till they drop!"
+
+There were a dozen up immediately, amongst whom Dalrymple and
+Mademoiselle Annette, and Mueller with one of the ballet ladies, were the
+first to start. As for Josephine, she proved to be a damsel of
+forty-galop power. She never wanted to rest, and she never cared to
+leave off. She did not even look warm when it was over. I wonder to this
+day how it was that I did not die on the spot.
+
+When the galop was ended, we all went upstairs to Monsieur Adrien's
+garret, where Monsieur Adrien, who had red hair and wore glasses,
+received us in person, and made us welcome. Here we found the supper
+elegantly laid out on two doors which had been taken off their hinges
+for the purpose; but which, being supported from beneath on divers boxes
+and chairs of unequal heights, presented a painfully sloping surface,
+thereby causing the jellies to look like leaning towers of Pisa, and the
+spongecake (which was already professedly tipsy) to assume an air so
+unbecomingly convivial that it might almost have been called drunk.
+
+Nobody thought of sitting down, and, if they did, there were no means of
+doing so; for Monsieur Adrien's garret was none of the largest, and, as
+in a small villa residence we sometimes see the whole house sacrificed
+to a winding staircase, so in this instance had the whole room been
+sacrificed to the splendor of the supper. For the inconvenience of
+standing, we were compensated, however, by the abundance and excellence
+of the fare. There were cold chickens, meat-pies, dishes of sliced ham,
+pyramids of little Bologna sausages, huge rolls of bread a yard in
+length, lobster salad, and cold punch in abundance.
+
+The flirtations at supper were tremendous. In a bachelor establishment
+one cannot expect to find every convenience, and on this occasion the
+prevailing deficiencies were among the plates and glasses; so those who
+had been partners in the dance now became partners in other matters,
+eating off the same plate and drinking out of the same tumbler; but this
+only made it so much the merrier. By and by somebody volunteered a song,
+and somebody else made a speech, and then we went down again to the
+ball-room, and dancing recommenced.
+
+The laughter now became louder, and the legs of the guests more vigorous
+than ever. The orchestra, too, received an addition to its strength in
+the person of a gentleman who, having drunk more cold punch than was
+quite consistent with the preservation of his equilibrium, was still
+sober enough to oblige us with a spirited accompaniment on the shovel
+and tongs, which, with the violin and accordion, and the comb _obligato_
+before mentioned, produced a startling effect, and reminded one of
+Turkish marches, Pantomime overtures, and the like barbaric music.
+
+In the midst of the first polka, however, we were interrupted by a
+succession of furious double knocks on the floor beneath our feet. We
+stopped by involuntary consent--dancers, musicians, and all.
+
+"It's our neighbor on the story below," said Monsieur Jules. "He objects
+to the dancing."
+
+"Then we'll dance a little heavier, to teach him better taste," said a
+student, who had so little hair on his head and so much on his chin,
+that he looked as if his face had been turned upside down. "What is the
+name of the ridiculous monster?"
+
+"Monsieur Bobinet."
+
+"Ladies and gentlemen, let us dance for the edification of Monsieur
+Bobinet! Orchestra, strike up, in honor of Monsieur Bobinet! One, two,
+three, and away!"
+
+Hereupon we uttered a general hurrah, and dashed off again, like a herd
+of young elephants. The knocking ceased, and we thought that Monsieur
+Bobinet had resigned himself to his fate, when, just as the polka ended
+and the dancers were promenading noisily round and round the room, the
+bombardment began afresh; and this time against the very door of the
+ball-room.
+
+"_Par exemple_!" cries Monsieur Jules. "The enemy dares to attack us in
+our own lines!"
+
+"Bolt the door, and let him knock till he's tired," suggested one.
+
+"Open it suddenly, and deluge him with water!" cried another.
+
+"Tar and feather him!" proposed a third.
+
+In the meantime, Monsieur Bobinet, happily ignorant of these agreeable
+schemes for his reception, continued to thunder away upon the outer
+panels, accompanying the raps with occasional loud coughs, and hems, and
+stampings of the feet.
+
+"Hush! do nothing violent," cried Mueller, scenting a practical joke.
+"Let us invite him in, and make fun of him. It will be ever so much
+more amusing!"
+
+And with this he drove the rest somewhat back and threw open the door,
+upon the outer threshold of which, with a stick in one hand and a
+bedroom candle in the other, and a flowered dressing-gown tied round his
+ample waist by a cord and tassels, stood Monsieur Bobinet.
+
+Mueller received him with a profound bow, and said:--
+
+"Monsieur Bobinet, I believe?"
+
+Monsieur Bobinet, who was very bald, very cross, and very stout, cast
+an irritable glance into the room, but, seeing so many people, drew back
+and said:--
+
+"Yes, that is my name, Monsieur. I lodge on the fourth floor...."
+
+"But pray walk in, Monsieur Bobinet," said Mueller, opening the door
+still wider and bowing still more profoundly.
+
+"Monsieur," returned the fourth-floor lodger, "I--I only come to
+complain...."
+
+"Whatever the occasion of this honor, Monsieur," pursued the student,
+with increasing politeness, "we cannot suffer you to remain on the
+landing. Pray do us the favor to walk in."
+
+"Oh, walk in--pray walk in, Monsieur Bobinet," echoed Jules, Gustave,
+and Adrien, all together.
+
+The fourth-floor lodger hesitated; took a step forward; thought,
+perhaps, that, since we were all so polite, he would do his best to
+conciliate us; and, glancing down nervously at his dressing-gown and
+slippers, said:--
+
+"Really, gentlemen, I should have much pleasure, but I am not
+prepared...."
+
+"Don't mention it, Monsieur Bobinet," said Mueller. "We are delighted to
+receive you. Allow me to disembarrass you of your candle."
+
+"And permit me," said Jules, "to relieve you of your stick."
+
+"Pray, Monsieur Bobinet, do you never dance the polka?" asked Gustave.
+
+"Bring Monsieur Bobinet a glass of cold punch," said Adrien.
+
+"And a plate of lobster salad," added the bearded student.
+
+Monsieur Bobinet, finding the door already closed behind him, looked
+round nervously; but encountering only polite and smiling faces,
+endeavored to seem at his ease, and to put a good face upon the matter.
+
+"Indeed, gentlemen, I must beg you to excuse me," said he. "I never
+drink at night, and I never eat suppers. I only came to request...."
+
+"Nay, Monsieur Bobinet, we cannot suffer you to leave us without taking
+a glass of cold punch," pursued Mueller.
+
+"Upon my word," began the lodger, "I dare not...."
+
+"A glass of white wine, then?"
+
+"Or a cup of coffee?"
+
+"Or some home-made lemonade?"
+
+Monsieur Bobinet cast a look of helpless longing towards the door.
+
+"If you really insist, gentlemen," said he, "I will take a cup of
+coffee; but indeed...."
+
+"A cup of coffee for Monsieur Bobinet!" shouted Mueller.
+
+"A large cup of coffee for Monsieur Bobinet!" repeated Jules.
+
+"A strong cup of coffee for Monsieur Bobinet!" cried Gustave, following
+up the lead of the other two.
+
+The fourth-floor lodger frowned and colored up, beginning to be
+suspicious of mischief. Seeing this, Mueller hastened to apologize.
+
+"You must pardon us, Monsieur Bobinet," he said with the most winning
+amiability, "if we are all in unusually high spirits to-night. You are
+not aware, perhaps, that our friend Monsieur Jules Charpentier was
+married this morning, and that we are here in celebration of that happy
+event. Allow me to introduce you to the bride."
+
+And turning to one of the ballet ladies, he led her forward with
+exceeding gravity, and presented her to Monsieur Bobinet as Madame
+Charpentier.
+
+The fourth-floor lodger bowed, and went through the usual
+congratulations. In the meantime, some of the others had prepared a mock
+sofa by means of two chairs set somewhat wide apart, with a shawl thrown
+over the whole to conceal the space between. Upon one of these chairs
+sat a certain young lady named Louise, and upon the other Mam'selle
+Josephine. As soon as it was ready, Muller, who had been only waiting
+for it, affected to observe for the first time that Monsieur Bobinet was
+still standing.
+
+"_Mon Dieu_!" he exclaimed, "has no one offered our visitor a chair?
+Monsieur Bobinet, I beg a thousand pardons. Pray do us the favor to be
+seated. Your coffee will be here immediately, and these ladies on the
+sofa will be delighted to make room for you."
+
+"Oh yes, pray be seated, Monsieur Bobinet," cried the two girls. "We
+shall be charmed to make room for Monsieur Bobinet!"
+
+More than ever confused and uncomfortable, poor Monsieur Bobinet bowed;
+sat down upon the treacherous space between the two chairs; went through
+immediately; and presented the soles of his slippers to the company in
+the least picturesque manner imaginable. This involuntary performance
+was greeted with a shout of wild delight.
+
+"Bravo, Monsieur Bobinet!"
+
+"_Vive_ Monsieur Bobinet!"
+
+"Three cheers for Monsieur Bobinet!"
+
+Scarlet with rage, the fourth-floor lodger sprang to his feet and made a
+rush to the door; but he was hemmed in immediately. In vain he stormed;
+in vain he swore. We joined hands; we called for music; we danced round
+him; we sang; and at last, having fairly bumped and thumped and hustled
+him till we were tired, pushed him out on the landing, and left him
+to his fate.
+
+After this interlude, the mirth grew fast and furious. _Valse_ succeeded
+_valse_, and galop followed galop, till the orchestra declared they
+could play no longer, and the gentleman with the shovel and tongs
+collapsed in a corner of the room and went to sleep with his head in the
+coal-scuttle. Then the ballet-ladies were prevailed upon to favor us
+with a _pas de deux_; after which Mueller sang a comic song with a
+chorus, in which everybody joined; and then the orchestra was bribed
+with hot brandy-and-water, and dancing commenced again. By this time the
+visitors began to drop away in twos and threes, and even the fair
+Josephine, to whom I had never ceased paying the most devoted attention,
+declared she could not stir another step. As for Dalrymple, he had
+disappeared during supper, without a word of leave-taking to any one.
+
+Matters being at this pass, I looked at my watch, and found that it was
+already half-past six o'clock; so, having bade good-night, or rather
+good-morning, to Messieurs Jules, Gustave, and Adrien, and having, with
+great difficulty, discovered my own coat and hat among the miscellaneous
+collection in the adjoining bed-room, I prepared to escort Mademoiselle
+Josephine to her home.
+
+"Going already?" said Mueller, encountering us on the landing, with a
+roll in one hand and a Bologna sausage in the other.
+
+"Already! Why, my dear fellow, it is nearly seven o'clock!"
+
+"_Qu'importe_? Come up to the supper-room and have some breakfast!"
+
+"Not for the world!"
+
+"Well, _chacun a son gout_. I am as hungry as a hunter."
+
+"Can I not take you any part of your way?"
+
+"No, thank you. I am a Quartier Latinist, _pur sang_, and lodge only a
+street or two off. Stay, here is my address. Come and see me--you can't
+think how glad I shall be!"
+
+"Indeed, I will come---and here is my card in exchange. Good-night, Herr
+Mueller."
+
+"Good-night, Marquis of Arbuthnot. Mademoiselle Josephine, _au
+plaisir_."
+
+So we shook hands and parted, and I saw my innamorata home to her
+residence at No. 70, Rue Aubry le Boucher, which opened upon the Marche
+des Innocents. She fell asleep upon my shoulder in the cab, and was only
+just sufficiently awake when I left her, to accept all the _marrons
+glaces_ that yet remained in the pockets of my paletot, and to remind me
+that I had promised to take her out next Sunday for a drive in the
+country, and a dinner at the Moulin Rouge.
+
+The fountain in the middle of the Marche was now sparkling in the
+sunshine like a shower of diamonds, and the business of the market was
+already at its height. The shops in the neighboring streets were opening
+fast. The "iron tongue" of St. Eustache was calling the devout to early
+prayer. Fagged as I was, I felt that a walk through the fresh air would
+do me good; so I dismissed the cab, and reached my lodgings just as the
+sleepy _concierge_ had turned out to sweep the hall, and open the
+establishment for the day. When I came down again two hours later,
+after a nap and a bath, I found a _commissionnaire_ waiting for me.
+
+"_Tiens_!" said Madame Bouisse (Madame Bouisse was the wife of the
+_concierge_). "_V'la_! here is M'sieur Arbuthnot."
+
+The man touched his cap, and handed me a letter.
+
+"I was told to deliver it into no hands but those of M'sieur himself,"
+said he.
+
+The address was in Dalrymple's writing. I tore the envelope open. It
+contained only a card, on the back of which, scrawled hastily in pencil,
+were the following words:
+
+"To have said good-bye would have made our parting none the lighter. By
+the time you decipher this hieroglyphic I shall be some miles on my way:
+Address Hotel de Russie, Berlin. Adieu, Damon; God bless you. O.D."
+
+"How long is it since this letter was given to you?" said I, without
+taking my eyes from the card.
+
+The _commissionnaire_ made no reply. I repeated the question, looked up
+impatiently, and found that the man was already gone.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX.
+
+THE CHATEAU DE SAINTE AULAIRE.
+
+     "Mark yon old mansion frowning through the trees,
+     Whose hollow turret wooes the whistling breeze."
+
+My acquaintance with Mademoiselle Josephine progressed rapidly;
+although, to confess the truth, I soon found myself much less deeply in
+love than I had at first supposed. For this disenchantment, fate and
+myself were alone to blame. It was not her fault if I had invested her
+with a thousand imaginary perfections; nor mine if the spell was broken
+as soon as I discovered my mistake.
+
+Too impatient to wait till Sunday, I made my way on Saturday afternoon
+to Rue Aubry-le-Boucher. I persuaded myself that I was bound to call on
+her, in order to conclude our arrangements for the following day. At all
+events, I argued, she might forget the engagement, or believe that I had
+forgotten it. So I went, taking with me a magnificent bouquet, and an
+embroidered satin bag full of _marrons glaces_.
+
+My divinity lived, as she had told me, _sous les toits_--and _sous les
+toits_, up seven flights of very steep and dirty stairs, I found her. It
+was a large attic with a sloping roof, overlooking a bristling expanse
+of chimney-pots, and commanding the twin towers of Notre Dame. There
+were some colored prints of battles and shipwrecks wafered to the walls;
+a couple of flower-pots in the narrow space between the window-ledge and
+the coping outside; a dingy canary in a wire cage; a rival mechanical
+cuckoo in a Dutch clock in the corner; a little bed with striped
+hangings; a rush-bottomed _prie-dieu_ chair in front of a plain black
+crucifix, over which drooped a faded branch of consecrated palm; and
+some few articles of household furniture of the humblest description. In
+all this there was nothing vulgar. Under other circumstances I might,
+perhaps, have even elicited somewhat of grace and poetry from these
+simple materials. But conceive what it was to see them through an
+atmosphere of warm white steam that left an objectionable clamminess on
+the backs of the chairs and caused even the door-handle to burst into a
+tepid perspiration. Conceive what it was to behold my adored one
+standing in the middle of the room, up to her elbows in soap-suds,
+washing out the very dress in which she was to appear on the morrow....
+Good taste defend us! Could anything be more cruelly calculated to
+disturb the tender tenor of a lover's dreams? Fancy what Leander would
+have felt, if, after swimming across the Hellespont, he had surprised
+Hero at the washing-tub! Imagine Romeo's feelings, if he had scaled the
+orchard-walls only to find Juliet helping to hang out the family linen!
+
+The worst of it was that my lovely Josephine was not in the least
+embarrassed. She evidently regarded the washing-tub as a desirable
+piece of furniture, and was not even conscious that the act of "soaping
+in," was an unromantic occupation!
+
+Such was the severity of this first blow that I pleaded an engagement,
+presented my offerings (how dreadfully inappropriate they seemed!), and
+hurried away to a lecture on _materia medica_ at the _Ecole Pratique_;
+that being a good, congenial, dismal entertainment for the evening!
+
+Sunday came with the sunrise, and at midday, true as the clock of St.
+Eustache, I knocked once more at the door of the _mansarde_ where my
+Josephine dwelt. This time, my visit being anticipated, I found her
+dressed to receive me. She looked more fresh and charming than ever; and
+the lilac muslin which I had seen in the washing-tub some eighteen or
+twenty hours before, became her to perfection. So did her pretty green
+shawl, pinned closely at the throat and worn as only a French-woman
+would have known how to wear it. So did the white camellia and the
+moss-rose buds which she had taken out of my bouquet, and fastened at
+her waist.
+
+What I was not prepared for, however, was her cap. I had forgotten that
+your Parisian grisette[1] would no more dream of wearing a bonnet than
+of crowning her head with feathers and adorning her countenance with
+war-paint. It had totally escaped me that I, a bashful Englishman of
+twenty-one, nervously sensitive to ridicule and gifted by nature with
+but little of the spirit of social defiance, must in broad daylight make
+my appearance in the streets of Paris, accompanied by a bonnetless
+grisette! What should I do, if I met Dr. Cheron? or Madame de
+Courcelles? or, worse than all, Madame de Marignan? My obvious resource
+was to take her in whatever direction we should be least likely to meet
+any of my acquaintances. Where, oh fate! might that obscurity be found
+which had suddenly become the dearest object of my desires?
+
+[1] The grisette of twenty years ago, _bien entendu_. I am writing, be
+it remembered, of "The days of my youth."
+
+"_Eh bien_, Monsieur Basil," said Josephine, when my first compliments
+had been paid. "I am quite ready. Where are we going?"
+
+"We shall dine, _mon cher ange_," said I, absently, "at--let me
+see--at...."
+
+"At the Moulin Rouge," interrupted she. "But that is six hours to come.
+In the meantime--"
+
+"In the meantime? Ay, in the meantime...what a delightful day for the
+time of year!"
+
+"Shall it be Versailles?" suggested Josephine.
+
+"Heaven forbid!"
+
+Josephine opened her large eyes.
+
+"_Mon Dieu!_" said she. "What is there so very dreadful in Versailles?"
+
+I made no reply. I was passing all the suburbs in review before my
+mind's eye,--Bellevue, Enghien, Fontenay-aux-Roses, St. Germains,
+Sceaux; even Fontainebleau and Compiegne.
+
+The grisette pouted, and glanced at the clock.
+
+"If Monsieur is as slow to start as he is to answer," said she, "we
+shall not get beyond the barriers to-day."
+
+At this moment, I remembered to have heard of Montlhery as a place where
+there was a forest and a feudal ruin; also, which was more to the
+purpose, as lying at least six-and-twenty miles south of Paris.
+
+"My dear Mademoiselle Josephine," I said, "forgive me. I have planned an
+excursion which I am sure will please you infinitely better than a mere
+common-place trip to Versailles. Versailles, on Sunday, is vulgar. You
+have heard, of course, of Montlhery--one of the most interesting places
+near Paris."
+
+"I have read a romance called _The Tower of Montlhery"_ said Josephine.
+
+"And that tower--that historical and interesting tower--is still
+standing! How delightful to wander among the ruins--to recall the
+stirring events which caused it to be besieged in the reign of--of
+either Louis the Eleventh, or Louis the Fourteenth; I don't remember
+which, and it doesn't signify--to explore the picturesque village, and
+ramble through the adjoining woods of St. Genevieve--to visit..."
+
+"I wonder if we shall find any donkeys to ride," interrupted Josephine,
+upon whom my eloquence was taking the desired effect.
+
+"Donkeys!" I exclaimed, drawing, I am ashamed to say, upon my
+imagination. "Of course--hundreds of them!"
+
+"_Ah, ca_! Then the sooner we go the better. Stay, I must just lock my
+door, and leave word with my neighbor on the next floor that I am gone
+out for the day,"
+
+So she locked the door and left the message, and we started. I was
+fortunate enough to find a close cab at the corner of the _marche_--she
+would have preferred an open one, but I overruled that objection on the
+score of time--and before very long we were seated in the cushioned
+fauteuils of a first-class compartment on the Orleans Railway, and
+speeding away towards Montlhery.
+
+It was with no trifling sense of relief that I found the place really
+picturesque, when we arrived. We had, it is true, to put up with a
+comfortless drive of three or four miles in a primitive, jolting, yellow
+omnibus, which crawled at stated hours of the day between the town and
+the station; but that was a minor evil, and we made the best of it.
+First of all, we strolled through the village--the clean, white, sunny
+village, where the people were sitting outside their doors playing at
+dominoes, and the cocks and hens were walking about like privileged
+inhabitants of the market-place. Then we had luncheon at the _auberge_
+of the "Lion d'Or." Then we looked in at the little church (still
+smelling of incense from the last service) with its curious old
+altar-piece and monumental brasses. Then we peeped through the iron gate
+of the melancholy _cimetiere_, which was full of black crosses and
+wreaths of _immortelles_. Last of all, we went to see the ruin, which
+stood on the summit of a steep and solitary rock in the midst of a vast
+level plain. It proved to be a round keep of gigantic strength and
+height, approached by two courtyards and surrounded by the weed-grown
+and fragmentary traces of an extensive stronghold, nothing of which now
+remained save a few broken walls, three or four embrasured loopholes, an
+ancient well of incalculable depth, and the rusted teeth of a formidable
+portcullis. Here we paused awhile to rest and admire the view; while
+Josephine, pleased as a child on a holiday, flung pebbles into the well,
+ate sugar-plums, and amused herself with my pocket-telescope.
+
+"_Regardez_!" she cried, "there is the dome of the Pantheon. I am sure
+it is the Pantheon--and to the right, far away, I see a town!--little
+white houses, and a steeple. And there goes a steamer on the river--and
+there is the railway and the railway station, and the long road by which
+we came in the omnibus. Oh, how nice it is, Monsieur Basil, to look
+through a telescope!"
+
+"Do me the favor, _ma belle_, to accept it--for my sake," said I,
+thankful to find her so easily entertained. I was lying in a shady angle
+of old wall, puffing away at a cigar, with my hat over my eyes, and the
+soles of my boots levelled at the view. It is difficult to smoke and
+make love at the same time; and I preferred the tobacco.
+
+Josephine was enchanted, and thanked me in a thousand pretty, foolish
+phrases. She declared she saw ever so much farther and clearer with the
+glass, now that it was her own. She looked at me through it, and
+insisted that I should look at her. She picked out all sorts of
+marvellous objects, at all sorts of incredible distances. In short, she
+prattled and chattered till I forgot all about the washing-tub, and
+again began to think her quite charming. Presently we heard wandering
+sounds of music among the trees at the foot of the hill--sounds as of a
+violin and bagpipes; now coming with the wind from the west, now dying
+away to the north, now bursting out afresh more merrily than ever, and
+leading off towards the village.
+
+"_Tiens_! that must be a wedding!" said Josephine, drumming with her
+little feet against the side of the old well on which she was sitting.
+
+"A wedding! what connection subsists, pray, between the bonds of
+matrimony, and a tune on the bagpipes?"
+
+"I don't know what you mean by bagpipes--I only know that when people
+get married in the country, they go about with the musicians playing
+before them. What you hear yonder is a violin and a _cornemuse_."
+
+"A _cornemuse!_" I repeated. "What's that?"
+
+"Oh, country music. A thing you blow into with your mouth, and play upon
+with your fingers, and squeeze under your arm--like this."
+
+"Then it's the same thing, _ma chere_," said I. "A bagpipes and a
+_cornemuse_--a _cornemuse_ and bagpipes. Both of them national, popular,
+and frightful."
+
+"I'm so fond of music," said Josephine.
+
+Not wishing to object to her tastes, and believing that this observation
+related to the music then audible, I made no reply.
+
+"And I have never been to an opera," added she.
+
+I was still silent, though from another motive.
+
+"You will take me one night to the Italiens, or the Opera Comique, will
+you not, Monsieur Basil?" pursued she, determined not to lose her
+opportunity.
+
+I had now no resource but to promise; which I did, very reluctantly.
+
+"You would enjoy the Opera Comique far more than the Italiens," said I,
+remembering that Madame de Marignan had a box at the Italiens, and
+rapidly weighing the chances for and against the possibility of
+recognition. "At the first they sing in French--at the last,
+in Italian,"
+
+"Ah, bah! I should prefer the French," replied she, falling at once into
+the snare. "When shall it be--this week?"
+
+"Ye--es; one evening this week."
+
+"What evening?"
+
+"Well, let me see--we had better wait, and consult the advertisements."
+
+"_Dame_! never mind the advertisements. Let it be Tuesday."
+
+"Why Tuesday?"
+
+"Because it is soon; and because I can get away early on Tuesdays if I
+ask leave."
+
+I had, plainly, no chance of escape.
+
+"You would not prefer to see the great military piece at the Porte St.
+Martin?" I suggested. "There are three hundred real soldiers in it, and
+they fire real cannon."
+
+"Not I! I have been to the Porte St. Martin, over and over again. Emile
+knew one of the scene-painter's assistants, and used to get tickets two
+or three times a month."
+
+"Then it shall be the Opera Comique," said I, with a sigh.
+
+"And on Tuesday evening next."
+
+"On Tuesday evening next."
+
+At this moment the piping and fiddling broke out afresh, and Josephine,
+who had scarcely taken the little telescope from her eye all the time,
+exclaimed that she saw the wedding party going through the market-place
+of the town.
+
+"There they are--the musicians first; the bride and bridegroom next; and
+eight friends, all two and two! There will be a dance, depend on it! Let
+us go down to the town, and hear all about it! Perhaps they might invite
+us to join them--who knows?"
+
+"But you would not dance before dinner?"
+
+"_Eh, mon Dieu_! I would dance before breakfast, if I had the chance.
+Come along. If we do not make haste, we may miss them."
+
+I rose, feeling, and I daresay, looking, like a martyr; and we went down
+again into the town.
+
+There we inquired of the first person who seemed likely to know--he was
+a dapper hairdresser, standing at his shop-door with his hands in his
+apron pockets and a comb behind his ear--and were told that the
+wedding-party had just passed through the village, on their way to the
+Chateau of Saint Aulaire.
+
+"The Chateau of St. Aulaire!" said Josephine. "What are they going to do
+there? What is there to see?"
+
+"It is an ancient mansion, Mademoiselle, much visited by strangers,"
+replied the hairdresser with exceeding politeness. "Worthy of
+Mademoiselle's distinguished attention--and Monsieur's. Contains old
+furniture, old paintings, old china--stands in an extensive park--one of
+the lions of this neighborhood, Mademoiselle--also Monsieur."
+
+"To whom does it belong?" I asked, somewhat interested in this account.
+
+"That, Monsieur, is a question difficult to answer," replied the fluent
+hairdresser, running his fingers through his locks and dispersing a
+gentle odor of rose-oil. "It was formerly the property of the ancient
+family of Saint Aulaire. The last Marquis de Saint Aulaire, with his
+wife and family, were guillotined in 1793. Some say that the young heir
+was saved; and an individual asserting himself to be that heir did
+actually put forward a claim to the estate, some twenty, or
+five-and-twenty years ago, but lost his cause for want of sufficient
+proof. In the meantime, it had passed into the hands of a wealthy
+republican family, descended, it is said, from General Dumouriez. This
+family held it till within the last four years, when two or three fresh
+claimants came forward; so that it is now the object of a lawsuit which
+may last till every brick of it falls to ruin, and every tree about it
+withers away. At present, a man and his wife have charge of the place,
+and visitors are permitted to see it any day between twelve and four."
+
+"I should like to see the old place," said I.
+
+"And I should like to see how the bride is dressed," said Josephine,
+"and if the bridegroom is handsome."
+
+"Well, let us go--not forgetting to thank Monsieur _le Perruquier_ for
+his polite information."
+
+Monsieur _le Perruquier_ fell into what dancing-masters call the first
+position, and bowed elaborately.
+
+"Most welcome, Mademoiselle--and Monsieur," said he. "Straight up the
+road--past the orchard about a quarter of a mile--old iron gates--can't
+miss it. Good-afternoon, Mademoiselle--also Monsieur."
+
+Following his directions, we came presently to the gates, which were
+rusty and broken-hinged, with traces of old gilding still showing
+faintly here and there upon their battered scrolls and bosses. One of
+them was standing open, and had evidently been standing so for years;
+while the other had as evidently been long closed, so that the deep
+grass had grown rankly all about it, and the very bolt was crusted over
+with a yellow lichen. Between the two, an ordinary wooden hurdle had
+been put up, and this hurdle was opened for us by a little blue-bloused
+urchin in a pair of huge _sabots_, who, thinking we belonged to the
+bridal party, pointed up the dusky avenue, and said, with a grin:--
+
+"_Tout droit, M'sieur--ils sont passes par la!_"
+
+_Par la_, "under the shade of melancholy boughs," we went accordingly.
+Far away on either side stretched dim vistas of neglected park-land,
+deep with coarse grass and weeds and, where the trees stood thickest,
+all choked with a brambly undergrowth. After about a quarter of a mile
+of this dreary avenue, we came to a broad area of several acres laid out
+in the Italian style with fountains and terraces, at the upper end of
+which stood the house--a feudal, _moyen-age_ French chateau, with
+irregular wings, steep slated roofings, innumerable windows, and
+fantastic steeple-topped turrets sheeted with lead and capped with
+grotesque gilded weathercocks. The principal front had been repaired in
+the style of the Renaissance and decorated with little foliated
+entablatures above the doors and windows; whilst a double flight of
+steps leading up to a grand entrance on the level of the first story,
+like the famous double staircase of Fontainebleau, had been patched on
+in the very centre, to the manifest disfigurement of the building. Most
+of the windows were shuttered up, and as we drew nearer, the general
+evidences of desolation became more apparent. The steps of the terraces
+were covered with patches of brown and golden moss. The stone urns were
+some of them fallen in the deep grass, and some broken. There were gaps
+in the rich balustrade here and there; and the two great fountains on
+either side of the lower terrace had long since ceased to fling up
+their feathery columns towards the sun. In the middle of one a broken
+Pan, noseless and armless, turned up a stony face of mute appeal, as if
+imploring us to free him from the parasitic jungle of aquatic plants
+which flourished rankly round him in the basin. In the other, a stalwart
+river-god with his finger on his lip, seemed listening for the music of
+those waters which now scarcely stirred amid the tangled weeds that
+clustered at his feet.
+
+Passing all these, passing also the flower-beds choked with brambles and
+long waving grasses, and the once quaintly-clipped myrtle and box-trees,
+all flinging out fantastic arms of later growth, we came to the upper
+terrace, which was paved in curious patterns of stars and arabesques,
+with stones alternately round and flat. Here a good-humored, cleanly
+peasant woman came clattering out in her _sabots_ from a side-door, key
+in hand, preceded us up the double flight of steps, unlocked the great
+door, and admitted us.
+
+The interior, like the front, had been modernized about a hundred and
+fifty years before, and resembled a little formal Versailles or
+miniature Fontainebleau. Dismantled halls paved with white marble;
+panelled ante-chambers an inch deep in dust; dismal _salons_ adorned
+with Renaissance arabesques and huge looking-glasses, cracked and
+mildewed, and mended with pasted seams of blue paper; boudoirs with
+faded Watteau panellings; corridors with painted ceilings where
+mythological divinities, marvellously foreshortened on a sky-blue
+ground, were seen surrounded by rose-colored Cupids and garlanded with
+ribbons and flowers; innumerable bed-rooms, some containing grim
+catafalques of beds with gilded cornices and funereal plumes, some
+empty, some full of stored-up furniture fast going to decay--all these
+in endless number we traversed, conducted by the good-tempered
+_concierge_, whose heavy _sabots_ awakened ghostly echoes from floor
+to floor.
+
+At length, through an ante-chamber lined with a double file of grim old
+family portraits--some so blackened with age and dust as to be totally
+indistinguishable, and others bulging hideously out of their frames--we
+came to the library, a really noble room, lofty, panelled with walnut
+wood, floored with polished oak, and looking over a wide expanse of
+level country. Long ranges of empty book-shelves fenced in with broken
+wire-work ran round the walls. The painted ceiling represented, as
+usual, the heavens and some pagan divinities. A dumb old time-piece,
+originally constructed to tell the months, the days of the year, and the
+hours, stood on a massive corner bracket near the door. Long antique
+mirrors in heavy black frames reached from floor to ceiling between each
+of the windows; and in the centre of the room, piled all together and
+festooned with a thick drapery of cobwebs, stood a dozen or so of old
+carved chairs, screens, and foot-stools, rich with velvet, brocade, and
+gilded leather, but now looking as if a touch would crumble them to
+dust. Over the great carved fireplace, however, hung a painting upon
+which my attention became riveted as soon as I entered the room--a
+painting yellow with age; covered with those minute cracks which are
+like wrinkles on the face of antique art, coated with dust, and yet so
+singularly attractive that, having once noticed it, I looked at
+nothing else.
+
+It was the half-length portrait of a young lady in the costume of the
+reign of Louis XVI. One hand rested on a stone urn; the other was raised
+to her bosom, holding a thin blue scarf that seemed to flutter in the
+wind. Her dress was of white satin, cut low and square, with a stomacher
+of lace and pearls. She also wore pearls in her hair, on her white arms,
+and on her whiter neck. Thus much for the mere adjuncts; as for the
+face--ah, how can I ever describe that pale, perfect, tender face, with
+its waving brown hair and soft brown eyes, and that steadfast perpetual
+smile that seemed to light the eyes from within, and to dwell in the
+corners of the lips without parting or moving them? It was like a face
+seen in a dream, or the imperfect image which seems to come between us
+and the page when we read of Imogen asleep.
+
+"Who was this lady?" I asked, eagerly.
+
+The _concierge_ nodded and rubbed her hands.
+
+"Aha! M'sieur," said she, "'tis the best painting in the chateau, as
+folks tell me. M'sieur is a connoisseur."
+
+"But do you know whose portrait it is?"
+
+"To be sure I do, M'sieur. It's the portrait of the last Marquise--the
+one who was guillotined, poor soul, with her husband, in--let me
+see--in 1793!"
+
+"What an exquisite creature! Look, Josephine, did you ever see anything
+so beautiful?"
+
+"Beautiful!" repeated the grisette, with a sidelong glance at one of the
+mirrors. "Beautiful, with such a coiffure and such a bodice! _Ciel!_ how
+tastes differ!"
+
+"But her face, Josephine!"
+
+"What of her face? I'm sure it's plain enough."
+
+"Plain! Good heavens! what..."
+
+But it was not worth while to argue upon it. I pulled out one of the old
+chairs, and so climbed near enough to dust the surface of the painting
+with my handkerchief.
+
+"I wish I could buy it!" I exclaimed.
+
+Josephine burst into a loud laugh.
+
+"_Grand Dieu_!" said she, half pettishly, "if you are so much in love
+with it as all that, I dare say it would not be difficult!"
+
+The _concierge_ shook her head.
+
+"Everything on this estate is locked up," said she. "Nothing can be
+sold, nothing given away, nothing even repaired, till the _proces_
+is ended."
+
+I sighed, and came down reluctantly from my perch. Josephine was visibly
+impatient. She had seen the wedding-party going down one of the walks at
+the back of the house; and the _concierge_ was waiting to let us out. I
+drew her aside, and slipped a liberal gratuity into her hand.
+
+"If I were to come down here some day with a friend of mine who is a
+painter," I whispered, "would you have any objection, Madame, to allow
+him to make a little sketch of that portrait?"
+
+The _concierge_ looked into her palm, and seeing the value of the coin,
+smiled, hesitated, put her finger to her lip, and said:--
+
+"_Ma foi_, M'sieur, I believe I have no business to allow it; but--to
+oblige a gentleman like you--if there was nobody about--"
+
+I nodded. We understood each other sufficiently, and no more was needed.
+
+Once out of the house, Medemoiselle Josephine pouted, and took upon
+herself to be sulky--a disposition which was by no means lessened when,
+after traversing the park in various directions in search of the bridal
+company, we found that they had gone out long ago by a gate at the other
+side of the estate, and were by this time piping, most probably, in the
+adjoining parish.
+
+It was now five o'clock; so we hastened back through the village, cast a
+last glance at the grim old tower on its steep solitude, consigned
+ourselves to the yellow omnibus, and in due time were once more flying
+along the iron road towards Paris. The rapid motion, the dignity of
+occupying a first-class seat, and, above all, the prospects of an
+excellent dinner, soon brought my fair companion round again, and by the
+time we reached the Moulin Rouge, she was all vivacity and good temper.
+The less I say about that dinner the better. I am humiliated when I
+recall all that I suffered, and all that she did. I blush even now when
+I remember how she blew upon her soup, put her knife in her mouth, and
+picked her teeth with her shawl-pin. What possessed her that she would
+persist in calling the waiter "Monsieur?" And why, in Heaven's name,
+need she have clapped her hands when I ordered the champagne? To say
+that I had no appetite--that I wished myself at the antipodes--that I
+longed to sink into my boots, to smother the waiter, or to do anything
+equally desperate and unreasonable, is to express but a tithe of the
+anguish I endured. I bore it, however, in silence, little dreaming what
+a much heavier trial was yet in store for me.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI.
+
+I FALL A SACRIFICE TO MRS. GRUNDY.
+
+"A word with you, if you please, Basil Arbuthnot," said Dr. Cheron,
+"when you have finished copying those prescriptions."
+
+Dr. Cheron was standing with his feet firmly planted in the tiger-skin
+rug and his back to the fireplace. I was busy writing at the study
+table, and glancing anxiously from time to time at the skeleton clock
+upon the chimney-piece; for it was getting on fast towards five, and at
+half-past six I was to take Josephine to the Opera Comique. As perverse
+fortune would have it, the Doctor had this afternoon given me more
+desk-work than usual, and I began to doubt whether I should be able to
+dine, dress, and reach the theatre in time if he detained me
+much longer.
+
+"But you need be in no haste," he added, looking at his watch. "That is
+to say, upon my account."
+
+I bowed nervously--I was always nervous in his presence--and tried to
+write faster than ever; but, feeling his cold blue eye upon me, made a
+blot, smeared it with my sleeve, left one word out, wrote another twice
+over, and was continually tripped up by my pen, which sputtered
+hideously and covered the page with florid passages in little round
+spots, which only needed tails to become crotchets and quavers. At
+length, just as the clock struck the hour, I finished my task and laid
+aside my pen.
+
+Dr. Cheron coughed preparatorily.
+
+"It is some time," said he, "since you have given me any news of your
+father. Do you often hear from him?"
+
+"Not very often, sir," I replied. "About once in every three weeks. He
+dislikes letter-writing."
+
+Dr. Cheron took a packet of papers from his breast-pocket, and ruffling
+them over, said, somewhat indifferently:--
+
+"Very true--very true. His notes are brief and few; but always to the
+purpose. I heard from him this morning."
+
+"Indeed, sir?"
+
+"Yes--here is his letter. It encloses a remittance of seventy-five
+pounds; fifty of which are for you. The remaining twenty-five being
+reserved for the defrayal of your expenses at the Ecole de Medecine and
+the Ecole Pratique."
+
+I was delighted.
+
+"Both are made payable through my banker," continued Dr. Cheron, "and I
+am to take charge of your share till you require it; which cannot be
+just yet, as I understand from this letter that your father supplied you
+with the sum of one hundred and five pounds on leaving England."
+
+My delight went down to zero.
+
+"Does my father say that I am not to have it now, sir?" I asked,
+hesitatingly.
+
+"He says, as I have already told you, that it is to be yours when you
+require it."
+
+"And if I require it very shortly, sir--in fact, if I require it now?"
+
+"You ought not to require it now," replied the Doctor, with a cold,
+scrutinizing stare. "You ought not to have spent one hundred and five
+pounds in five months."
+
+I looked down in silence. I had more than spent it long since; and I had
+to thank Madame de Marignan for the facility with which it had flown. It
+was not to be denied that my course of lessons in practical politeness
+had been somewhat expensive.
+
+"How have you spent it?" asked Dr. Cheron, never removing his eyes from
+my face.
+
+I might have answered, in bouquets, opera stalls, and riding horses; in
+dress coats, tight boots, and white kid gloves; in new books, new music,
+bon-bons, cabs, perfumery, and the like inexcusable follies. But I held
+my tongue instead, and said nothing.
+
+Dr. Cheron looked again at his watch.
+
+"Have you kept any entries of your expenses since you came to Paris?"
+said he.
+
+"Not with--with any regularity, sir," I replied.
+
+He took out his pencil-case and pocket-book.
+
+"Let us try, then," said he, "to make an average calculation of what
+they might be in five months."
+
+I began to feel very uncomfortable.
+
+"I believe your father paid your travelling expenses?"
+
+I bowed affirmatively.
+
+"Leaving you the clear sum of one hundred and five pounds." I bowed
+again.
+
+"Allowing, then, for your rent--which is, I believe, twenty francs per
+week," said he, entering the figures as he went on, "there will be four
+hundred francs spent in five months. For your living, say thirty francs
+per week, which makes six hundred. For your clothing, seventy-five per
+month, which makes three hundred and seventy-five, and ought to be quite
+enough for a young man of moderate tastes. For your washing and
+firewood, perhaps forty per month, which makes two hundred--and for your
+incidental expenses, say fifteen per week, which makes three hundred. We
+thus arrive at a total of one thousand eight hundred and seventy-five
+francs, which, reduced to English money at the average standard of
+twenty-five francs to the sovereign, represents the exact sum of
+seventy-five pounds. Do I make myself understood?"
+
+I bowed for the third time.
+
+"Of the original one hundred and five pounds, we now have thirty not
+accounted for. May I ask how much of that surplus you have left?"
+
+"About--not more than--than a hundred and twenty francs," I replied,
+stripping the feathers off all the pens in succession, without
+knowing it.
+
+"Have you any debts?"
+
+"A--a few."
+
+"Tailors' bills?"
+
+"Yes, sir."
+
+"What others?"
+
+"A--a couple of months' rent, I believe, sir."
+
+"Is that all?"
+
+"N--not quite."
+
+Dr. Cheron frowned, and looked again at his watch.
+
+"Be good enough, Mr. Arbuthnot," he said, "to spare me this amount of
+useless interrogation by at once stating the nature and amount of
+the rest."
+
+"I--I cannot positively state the amount, sir," I said, absurdly trying
+to get the paper-weight into my waistcoat pocket, and then putting it
+down in great confusion. "I--I have an account at Monceau's in the Rue
+Duphot, and..."
+
+"I beg your pardon," interrupted Dr. Cheron: "but who is Monceau?"
+
+"Monceau's--Monceau's livery-stables, sir."
+
+Dr. Cheron slightly raised his eye-brows, and entered the name.
+
+"And at Lavoisier's, on the Boulevard Poissonniere--"
+
+"What is sold, pray, at Lavoisier's?"
+
+"Gloves, perfumes, hosiery, ready-made linen..."
+
+"Enough--you can proceed."
+
+"I have also a bill at--at Barbet's, in the Passage de l'Opera."
+
+"And Barbet is--?"
+
+"A--a florist!" I replied, very reluctantly.
+
+"Humph!--a florist!" observed Dr. Cheron, again transfixing me with the
+cold, blue eye. "To what amount do you suppose you are indebted to
+Monsieur Barbet?"
+
+I looked down, and became utterly unintelligible.
+
+"Fifty francs?"
+
+"I--I fear, more than--than--"
+
+"A hundred? A hundred and fifty? Two hundred?"
+
+"About two hundred, I suppose, sir," I said desperately.
+
+"Two hundred francs--that is to say, eight pounds English--to your
+florist! Really, Mr. Arbuthnot, you must be singularly fond of flowers!"
+
+I looked down in silence.
+
+"Have you a conservatory attached to your rooms?"
+
+The skeleton clock struck the half hour.
+
+"Excuse me, sir," I said, driven now to the last extremity, "but--but I
+have an engagement which--in short, I will, if you please, make out a
+list of--of these items, ascertaining the correct amount of each; and
+when once paid, I will endeavor--I mean, it is my earnest desire, to--to
+limit my expenditure strictly to--in short, to study economy for the
+future. If, in the meantime, you will have the goodness to
+excuse me...."
+
+"One word, young man. Will the fifty pounds cover your debts?"
+
+"Quite, sir, I am confident."
+
+"And leave you something in hand for your current expenses?"
+
+"Indeed, I fear very little."
+
+"In that case what will you do?"
+
+This was a terrible question, and one for which I could find no answer.
+
+"Write to your father for another remittance--eh?"
+
+"I--upon my word, I dare not, sir," I faltered.
+
+"Then you would go in debt again?"
+
+"I really fear--even with the strictest economy--I--"
+
+"Be so obliging as to let me have your seat," said Dr. Cheron, thrusting
+the obnoxious note-book into his pocket and taking my place at the desk,
+from which he brought out a couple of cards, and a printed paper.
+
+"This ticket," said he, "admits the holder to the anatomical course for
+the term now beginning, and this to the lectures at the Ecole Pratique.
+Both are in my gift. The first is worth two hundred francs, and the
+second two hundred and fifty. I ought, perhaps, in strict justice, to
+bestow them upon some needy and deserving individual: however, to save
+you from debt, or a very unpleasant alternative, I will fill them in
+with your name, and, when you bring me all your bills receipted, I will
+transfer to your account the four hundred and fifty francs which I must,
+otherwise, have paid for your courses out of the remittance forwarded by
+your father for that purpose. Understand, however, that I must first
+have the receipts, and that I expect you, on the word of a gentleman,
+to commit no more follies, and to contract no more debts."
+
+"Oh, sir!" I exclaimed, "how can I ever--"
+
+"No thanks, I beg," interposed Dr. Cheron. "Prove your gratitude by your
+conduct; do not trouble yourself to talk about it."
+
+"Indeed, sir, you may depend--"
+
+"And no promises either, if you please. I attach no kind of value to
+them. Stay--here is my check for the fifty pounds forwarded by your
+father. With that sum extricate yourself from debt. You know the rest."
+
+Hereupon Dr. Cheron replaced the cards and the printed form,
+double-locked his desk, and, with a slight gesture of the hand, frigidly
+dismissed me.
+
+I left the house quite chopfallen. I was relieved, it is true, from the
+incubus of debt; but then how small a figure I had cut in the eyes of
+Dr. Cheron! Besides, I was small for the second time--reproved for the
+second time--lectured, helped, put down, and poohpoohed, for the second
+time! Could I have peeped at myself just then through the wrong end of a
+telescope, I vow I could not have looked smaller in my own eyes.
+
+I had no time to dine; so I despatched a cup of coffee and a roll on my
+way home, and went hungry to the theatre.
+
+Josephine was got up with immense splendor for this occasion; greatly to
+her own satisfaction and my disappointment. Having hired a small private
+box in the least conspicuous part of the theatre, I had committed the
+cowardly mistake of endeavoring to transform my grisette into a woman of
+fashion. I had bought her a pink and white opera cloak, a pretty little
+fan, a pair of white kid gloves, and a bouquet. With these she wore a
+decent white muslin dress furnished out of the limited resources of her
+own wardrobe, and a wreath of pink roses, the work of her own clever
+fingers. Thus equipped, she was far less pretty than in her coquettish
+little every-day cap, and looked, I regret to say, more like an
+_ouvriere_ than ever. Aggravating above all else, however, was her own
+undisguised delight in her appearance.
+
+"Are my flowers all right? Is my dress tumbled? Is the hood of my cloak
+in the middle of my back?" were the questions she addressed to me every
+moment. In the ante-room she took advantage of each mirror we passed. In
+the lobby I caught her trying to look at her own back. When we reached
+our box she pulled her chair to the very centre of it, and sat there as
+if she expected to be admired by the whole audience.
+
+"My dear Josephine," I remonstrated, "sit back here, facing the stage.
+You will see much better--besides, it is your proper seat, being the
+only lady in the box."
+
+"Ah, _mon Dieu!_ then I cannot see the house--and how pretty it is! Ever
+so much prettier than the Gaiete, or the Porte St. Martin!"
+
+"You can see the house by peeping behind the curtain."
+
+"As if I were ashamed to be seen! _Par exemple_!"
+
+"Nay, as you please. I only advise you according to custom and fashion."
+
+Josephine pouted, and unwillingly conceded a couple of inches.
+
+"I wish I had brought the little telescope you gave me last Sunday,"
+said she, presently. "There is a gentleman with one down there in
+the stalls."
+
+"A telescope at the opera--the gods forbid! Here, however, is my
+opera-glass, if you like to use it."
+
+Josephine turned it over curiously, and peeped first through one tube
+and then through the other.
+
+"Which ought I to look through?" asked she.
+
+"Both, of course."
+
+"Both! How can I?"
+
+"Why thus--as you look through a pair of spectacles."
+
+"_Ciel!_ I can't manage that! I can never look through anything without
+covering up one eye with my hand."
+
+"Then I think you had better be contented with your own charming eyes,
+_ma belle_" said I, nervously. "How do you like your bouquet?"
+
+Josephine sniffed at it as if she were taking snuff, and pronounced it
+perfect. Just then the opera began. I withdrew into the shade, and
+Josephine was silenced for a while in admiration of the scenery and the
+dresses. By and by, she began to yawn.
+
+"Ah, _mon Dieu!_" said she, "when will they have done singing? I have
+not heard a word all this time."
+
+"But everything is sung, _ma chere_, in an opera."
+
+"What do you mean? Is there no play?"
+
+"This is the play; only instead of speaking their words, they sing
+them."
+
+Josephine shrugged her shoulders.
+
+"Ah, bah!" said she. "How stupid! I had rather have seen the _Closerie
+des Genets_ at the Graiete, if that is to be the case the whole evening.
+Oh, dear! there is such a pretty lady come into the opposite box, in
+such a beautiful blue _glace_, trimmed with black velvet and lace!"
+
+"Hush! you must not talk while they are singing!"
+
+"_Tiens!_ it is no pleasure to come out and be dumb. But do just see the
+lady in the opposite box! She looks exactly as if she had walked out of
+a fashion-book."
+
+"My dear child, I don't care one pin to look at her," said I, preferring
+to keep as much out of sight as possible. "To admire your pretty face is
+enough for me."
+
+Josephine squeezed my hand affectionately.
+
+"That is just as Emile used to talk to me," said she.
+
+I felt by no means flattered.
+
+"_Regardez done!_" said she, pulling me by the sleeve, just as I was
+standing up, a little behind her chair, looking at the stage. "That lady
+in the blue _glace_ never takes her eyes from our box! She points us out
+to the gentleman who is with her--do look!"
+
+I turned my glass in the direction to which she pointed, and recognised
+Madame de Marignan!
+
+I turned hot and cold, red and white, all in one moment, and shrank back
+like a snail that has been touched, or a sea-anemone at the first dig of
+the naturalist.
+
+"Does she know you?" asked Josephine.
+
+"I--I--probably--that is to say--I have met her in society."
+
+"And who is the gentleman?"
+
+That was just what I was wondering. It was not Delaroche. It was no one
+whom I had ever seen before. It was a short, fat, pale man, with a bald
+head, and a ribbon in his button-hole.
+
+"Is he her husband?" pursued Josephine.
+
+The suggestion flashed upon me like a revelation. Had I not heard that
+M. de Marignan was coming home from Algiers? Of course it was he. No
+doubt of it. A little vulgar, fat, bald man.... Pshaw, just the sort of
+a husband that she deserved!
+
+"How she looks at me!" said Josephine.
+
+I felt myself blush, so to speak, from head to foot.
+
+"Good Heavens! my dear girl," I exclaimed, "take your elbows off the
+front of the box!"
+
+Josephine complied, with a pettish little grimace.
+
+"And, for mercy's sake, don't hold your head as if you feared it would
+tumble off!"
+
+"It is the flowers," said she. "They tickle the back of my neck,
+whenever I move my head. I am much more comfortable in my cap."
+
+"Never mind. Make the best of it, and listen to this song."
+
+It was the great tenor ballad of the evening. The house was profoundly
+silent; the first wandering chords of a harp were heard behind the
+scenes; and Duprez began. In the very midst of one of his finest and
+tenderest _sostenuto_ passages, Josephine sneezed--and such a sneeze!
+you might have heard it out in the lobbies. An audible titter ran round
+the house. I saw Madame de Marignan cover her face with her
+handkerchief, and yield to an irrepressible fit of laughter. As for the
+tenor, he cast a withering glance up at the box, and made a marked pause
+before resuming his song. Merciful powers! what crime had I committed
+that I should be visited with such a punishment as this?
+
+"Wretched girl!" I exclaimed, savagely, "what have you done?"
+
+"Done, _mon ami!_" said Josephine, innocently. "Why, I fear I have taken
+cold."
+
+I groaned aloud.
+
+"Taken cold!" I muttered to myself. "Would to Heaven you had taken
+prussic acid!"
+
+"_Qu'est ce que c'est?"_ asked she.
+
+But it was not worth while to reply. I gave myself up to my fate. I
+determined to remonstrate no more. I flung myself on a seat at the back
+of the box, and made up my mind to bear all that might yet be in store
+for me. When she openly ate a stick of _sucre d'orge_ after this, I said
+nothing. When she applauded with both hands, I endured in silence. At
+length the performance came to a close and the curtain fell. Madame de
+Marignan had left before the last act, so I ran no danger of
+encountering her on the way out; but I was profoundly miserable,
+nevertheless. As for Josephine, she, poor child, had not enjoyed her
+evening at all, and was naturally out of temper. We quarrelled
+tremendously in the cab, and parted without having made it up. It was
+all my own fault. How could I be such a fool as to suppose that, with a
+few shreds and patches of finery, I could make a fine lady of
+a grisette?
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII.
+
+HIGH ART IN THE QUARTIER LATIN.
+
+"But, my dear fellow, what else could you have expected? You took
+Mam'selle Josephine to the _Opera Comique. Eh bien!_ you might as well
+have taken an oyster up Mount Vesuvius. Our fair friend was out of her
+element. _Voila tout_."
+
+"Confound her and her element!" I exclaimed with a groan. "What the
+deuce _is_ her element--the Quartier Latin?"
+
+"The Quartier Latin is to some extent her habitat--but then Mam'selle
+Josephine belongs to a genus of which you, _cher_ Monsieur Arbuthnot,
+are deplorably ignorant--the genus grisette. The grisette from a certain
+point of view is the _chef-d'oeuvre_ of Parisian industry; the bouquet
+of Parisian civilization. She is indigenous to the _mansarde_ and the
+_pave_--bears no transplantation--flourishes in _the premiere balconie_,
+the suburban _guingette_, and the Salle Valentinois; but degenerates at
+a higher elevation. To improve her is to spoil her. In her white cap and
+muslin gown, the Parisian grisette is simply delicious. In a smart
+bonnet, a Cashmere and a brougham, she is simply detestable. Fine
+clothes vulgarize her. Fine surroundings demoralize her. Lodged on the
+sixth story, rich in the possession of a cuckoo-clock, a canary, half a
+dozen pots of mignonette, and some bits of cheap furniture in imitation
+mahogany, she has every virtue and every fault that is charming in
+woman--childlike gaiety; coquetry; thoughtless generosity; the readiest
+laugh, the readiest tear, and the warmest heart in the world. Transplant
+her to the Chaussee d'Antin, instil the taste for diamonds, truffles,
+and Veuve Clicquot, and you poison her whole nature. She becomes false,
+cruel, greedy, prodigal of your money, parsimonious of her own--a
+vampire--a ghoul--the hideous thing we call in polite parlance a _Fille
+de Marbre."_
+
+Thus, with much gravity and emphasis, spoke Herr Franz Mueller, lying on
+his back upon a very ricketty sofa, and smoking like a steam-engine. A
+cup of half-cold coffee, and a bottle of rum three parts emptied stood
+beside him on the floor. These were the remains of his breakfast; for it
+was yet early in the morning of the day following my great misadventure
+at the Opera Comique, and I had sought him out at his lodgings in the
+Rue Clovis at an hour when the Quartier Latin was for the most part
+in bed.
+
+"Josephine, at all events, is not of the stuff that _Filles de Marbre_
+are made of," I said, smiling.
+
+"Perhaps not--_mais, que voulez-vous?_ We are what we are. A grisette
+makes a bad fine lady. A fine lady would make a still worse grisette.
+The Archbishopric of Paris is a most repectable and desirable
+preferment; but your humble servant, for instance, would hardly suit
+the place,"
+
+"And the moral of this learned and perspicuous discourse?"
+
+"_Tiens_! the moral, is--keep our fair friend in her place. Remember
+that a dinner at thirty sous in the Palais Royal, or a fete with
+fireworks at Mabille, will give her ten times more pleasure than the
+daintiest repast you could order at the Maison Doree, or the choicest
+night of the season at either opera house. And how should it be
+otherwise? One must understand a thing to be able to enjoy it; and I'll
+be sworn Mam'selle Josephine was infinitely more bored last night than
+yourself."
+
+Our conversation, or rather his monologue, was here interrupted by the
+ringing of the outer bell.
+
+The artist sat up, took his pipe from his lips, and looked considerably
+disturbed.
+
+"_Mille tonnerres_!" said he in a low tone. "Who can it be?... so early
+in the day ... not yet ten o'clock ... it is very mysterious."
+
+"It is only mysterious," said I, "as long as you don't open the door.
+Shall I answer the bell?"
+
+"No--yes--wait a moment ... suppose it is that demon, my landlord, or
+that archfiend, my tailor--then you must say ... holy St. Nicholas! you
+must say I am in bed with small-pox, or that I've broken out suddenly
+into homicidal delirium, and you're my keeper."
+
+"Unfortunately I should not know either of your princes of darkness at
+first sight."
+
+"True--and it might be Dupont, who owes me thirty francs, and swore by
+the bones of his aunt (an excellent person, who keeps an estaminet in
+the Place St. Sulpice) that he would pay me this week. _Diable_! there
+goes the bell again."
+
+"It would perhaps be safest," I suggested, "to let M. or N. ring on till
+he is tired of the exercise."
+
+"But conceive the horrid possibility of letting thirty francs ring
+themselves out of patience! No, _mon ami_--I will dare the worst that
+may happen. Wait here for me--I will answer the door myself,"
+
+Now it should be explained that Mueller's apartments consisted of three
+rooms. First, a small outer chamber which he dignified with the title of
+Salle d'Attente, but which, as it was mainly furnished with old boots,
+umbrellas and walking-sticks, and contained, by way of accommodation for
+visitors only a three-legged stool and a door-mat, would have been more
+fitly designated as the hall. Between this Salle d'Attente and the den
+in which he slept, ate, smoked, and received his friends, lay the
+studio--once a stately salon, now a wilderness of litter and
+dilapidation. On one side you beheld three windows closely boarded up,
+with strips of newspaper pasted over the cracks to exclude every gleam
+of day. Overhead yawned a huge, dusty skylight, to make way for which a
+fine old painted ceiling had been ruthlessly knocked away. On the walls
+were pinned and pasted all sorts of rough sketches and studies in color
+and crayon. In one corner lolled a despondent-looking lay-figure in a
+moth-eaten Spanish cloak; in another lay a heap of plaster-casts,
+gigantic hands and feet, broken-nosed masks of the Apollo, the Laocoon,
+the Hercules Farnese, and other foreigners of distinction. Upon the
+chimney-piece were displayed a pair of foils, a lute, a skull, an
+antique German drinking-mug, and several very modern empty bottles. In
+the middle of the room stood two large easels, a divan, a round table,
+and three or four chairs; while the floor was thickly strewn with empty
+color-tubes, bits of painting-rag, corks, cigar-ends, and all kinds of
+miscellaneous litter.
+
+All these things I had observed as I passed in; for this, be it
+remembered, was my first visit to Mueller in his own territory.
+
+I heard him go through the studio and close the door behind him, and
+then I heard him open the door upon the public staircase. Presently he
+came back, shutting the door behind him as before.
+
+"My dear fellow," he exclaimed, breathlessly, "you have brought luck
+with you! What do you think? A sitter--positively, a sitter! Wants to be
+sketched in at once--_Vive la France_!"
+
+"Man or woman? Young or old? Plain or pretty?"
+
+"Elderly half-length, feminine gender--Madame Tapotte. They are both
+there, Monsieur and Madame Excellent couple--redolent of the
+country--husband bucolic, adipose, auriferous--wife arrayed in all her
+glory, like the Queen of Sheba. I left them in the Salle d'Attente--told
+them I had a sitter--time immensely occupied--half-lengths furiously in
+demand ... _Will_ you oblige me by performing the part for a few
+minutes, just to carry out the idea?"
+
+"What part?"
+
+"The part of sitter."
+
+"Oh, with pleasure," I replied, laughing. "Do with me what you please,"
+
+"You don't mind? Come! you are the best fellow in the world. Now, if
+you'll sit in that arm-chair facing the light--head a little thrown
+back, arms folded, chin up ... Capital! You don't know what an effect
+this will have upon the provincial mind!"
+
+"But you're not going to let them in! You have no portrait of me to be
+at work upon!"
+
+"My dear fellow, I've dozens of half-finished studies, any one of which
+will answer the purpose. _Voila_! here is the very thing."
+
+And snatching up a canvas that had been standing till now with its face
+to the wall, he flourished it triumphantly before my eyes, and placed it
+on the easel.
+
+"Heavens and earth!" I exclaimed, "that's a copy of the Titian in the
+Louvre--the 'Young Man with the Glove!'"
+
+"What of that? Our Tapottes will never find out the difference. By the
+way, I told them you were a great English Milord, so please keep up the
+character."
+
+"I will try to do credit to the peerage."
+
+"And if you would not mind throwing in a word of English every now and
+then ... a little Goddam, for instance.. . Eh?"
+
+I laughed and shook my head.
+
+"I will pose for you as Milord with all the pleasure in life," I said;
+"only I cannot undertake to pose for the traditional Milord of the
+Bouffes Parisiens! However, I will speak some English, and, if you like,
+I'll know no French."
+
+"No, no--_diable_! you must know a little, or I can't exchange a word
+with you. But very little--the less the better. And now I'll let
+them in."
+
+They came; Madame first--tall, buxom, large-featured, fresh-colored,
+radiant in flowers, lace, and Palais Royal jewelry; then
+Monsieur--short, fat, bald, rosy and smiling, with a huge frill to his
+shirt-front and a nankeen waistcoat.
+
+Mueller introduced them with much ceremony and many apologies.
+
+"Permit me, milord," he said, "to present Monsieur and Madame
+Tapotte--Monsieur and Madame Tapotte; Milord Smithfield."
+
+I rose and bowed with the gravity becoming my rank.
+
+"I have explained to milord," continued Mueller, addressing himself
+partly to the new-comers, partly to me, and chiefly to the study on the
+easel, "that having no second room in which to invite Monsieur and
+Madame to repose themselves, I am compelled to ask them into the
+studio--where, however, his lordship is so very kind as to say that they
+are welcome." (Hereupon Madame Tapotte curtsied again, and Monsieur
+ducked his bald head, and I returned their salutations with the same
+dignity as before.) "If Monsieur and Madame will be pleased to take
+seats, however, his lordship's sitting will be ended in about ten
+minutes. _Mille pardons_, the face, milord, a little more to the right.
+Thank you--thank you very much. And if you will do me the favor to look
+at me ... for the expression of the eye--just so--thank you! A most
+important point, milord, is the expression of the eye. When I say the
+expression, I mean the fire, the sparkle, the liquidity ... _enfin_ the
+expression!"
+
+Here he affected to put in some touches with immense delicacy--then
+retreated a couple of yards, the better to contemplate his work--pursed
+up his mouth--ran his fingers through his hair--shaded his eyes with his
+hand--went back and put in another touch--again retreated--again put in
+a touch; and so on some three or four times successively.
+
+Meanwhile Monsieur and Madame Tapotte were fidgeting upon their chairs
+in respectful silence. Every now and then they exchanged glances of
+wonder and admiration. They were evidently dying to compare my august
+features with my portrait, but dared not take the liberty of rising. At
+length the lady's curiosity could hold out no longer.
+
+"_Ah, mon Dieu_!" she said; "but it must be very fatiguing to sit so
+long in the same position. And to paint.... _Oiel!_ what practice! what
+perseverance! what patience! _Avec permission_, M'sieur..."
+
+And with this she sidled up to Mueller's elbow, leaving Monsieur Tapotte
+thunderstruck at her audacity.
+
+Then for a moment she stood silent; but during that moment the eager,
+apologetic smile vanished suddenly out of her face, and was succeeded by
+an expression of blank disappointment.
+
+"_Tiens_!" she said bluntly. "I don't see one bit of likeness."
+
+I turned hot from head to foot, but Mueller's serene effrontery was equal
+to the occasion.
+
+"I dare say not, Madame," he replied, coolly. "I dare say not. This
+portrait is not intended to be like."
+
+Madame Tapotte's eyes and mouth opened simultaneously.
+
+"_Comment_!" she exclaimed.
+
+"I should be extremely sorry," continued Mueller, loftily, "and his
+lordship would be extremely sorry, if there were too much resemblance."
+
+"But a--a likeness--it seems to me, should at all events be--like,"
+stammered Madame Tapotte, utterly bewildered.
+
+"And if M'sieur is to paint my wife," added Monsieur Tapotte, who had by
+this time joined the group at the easel, "I--I..._Dame_! it must be a
+good deal more like than this."
+
+Mueller drew himself up with an air of great dignity.
+
+"Sir," he said, "if Madame does me the honor to sit to me for her
+portrait--for her _own_ portrait, observe--I flatter myself the
+resemblance will be overwhelming. But you must permit me to inform you
+that Milord Smithfield is not sitting for his own portrait."
+
+The Tapottes looked at each other in a state bordering on stupefaction.
+
+"His lordship," continued Mueller, "is sitting for the portrait of one of
+his illustrious ancestors--a nobleman of the period of Queen Elizabeth."
+
+Tapotte _mari_ scratched his head, and smiled feebly.
+
+"_Parbleu_!" said he, "_mais c'est bien drole, ca_!"
+
+The artist shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"It so happens," said he, "that his lordship's gallery at Smithfield
+Castle has unhappily been more than half destroyed by fire. Two
+centuries of family portraits reduced to ashes! Terrible misfortune!
+Only one way of repairing the loss--that is of partially repairing it. I
+do my best. I read the family records--I study the history of the
+period--his lordship sits to me daily--I endeavor to give a certain
+amount of family likeness; sometimes more, you observe, sometimes less
+... enormous responsibility, Monsieur Tapotte!"
+
+"Oh, enormous!"
+
+"The taste for family portraits," continued Mueller, still touching up
+the Titian, "is a very natural one--and is on the increase. Many
+gentlemen of--of somewhat recent wealth, come to me for their
+ancestors."
+
+"No!"
+
+"_Foi d'honneur_. Few persons, however, are as conscientious as his
+lordship in the matter of family resemblance. They mostly buy up their
+forefathers ready-made--adopt them, christen them, and ask no
+questions."
+
+Monsieur and Madame Tapotte exchanged glances.
+
+"_Tiens, mon ami_, why should we not have an ancestor or two, as well
+as other folks," suggested the lady, in a very audible whisper.
+
+Monsieur shook his head, and muttered something about the expense.
+
+"There is no harm, at all events," urged madame, "in asking the price."
+
+"My charge for gallery portraits, madame, varies from sixty to a hundred
+francs," said Mueller.
+
+"Heavens! how dear! Why, my own portrait is to be only fifty."
+
+"Sixty, Madame, if we put in the hands and the jewelry," said Mueller,
+blandly.
+
+"_Eh bien_!--sixty. But for these other things.... bah! _ils sont
+fierement chers_."
+
+"_Pardon_, madame! The elegancies and superfluities of life are, by a
+just rule of political economy, expensive. It is right that they should
+be so; as it is right that the necessaries of life should be within the
+reach of the poorest. Bread, for instance, is strictly necessary, and
+should be cheap. A great-grandfather, on the contrary, is an elegant
+superfluity, and may be put up at a high figure."
+
+"There is some truth in that," murmured Monsieur Tapotte.
+
+"Besides, in the present instance, one also pays for antiquity."
+
+"_C'est juste--C'est juste_."
+
+"At the same time," continued Mueller, "if Monsieur Tapotte were to honor
+me with a commission for, say, half a dozen family portraits, I would
+endeavor to put them in at forty francs apiece--including, at that very
+low price, a Revolutionary Deputy, a beauty of the Louis Quinze period,
+and a Marshal of France."
+
+"_Tiens_! that's a fair offer enough," said madame. "What say you, _mon
+ami_?"
+
+But Monsieur Tapotte, being a cautious man, would say nothing hastily.
+He coughed, looked doubtful, declined to commit himself to an opinion,
+and presently drew off into a corner for the purpose of holding a
+whispered consultation with his wife.
+
+Meanwhile Mueller laid aside his brushes and palette, informed me with a
+profound bow that my lordship had honored him by sitting as long as was
+strictly necessary, and requested my opinion upon the progress of
+the work.
+
+I praised it rapturously. You would have thought, to hear me, that for
+drawing, breadth, finish, color, composition, chiaroscuro, and every
+other merit that a painting could possess, this particular
+_chef-d'oeuvre_ excelled all the masterpieces of Europe.
+
+Mueller bowed, and bowed, and bowed, like a Chinaman at a visit of
+ceremony; He was more than proud; he was overwhelmed, _accable_, et
+caetera, et caetera.
+
+The Tapottes left off whispering, and listened breathlessly.
+
+"He is evidently a great painter, _not' jeune homme_!" said Madame in
+one of her large whispers.
+
+To which Monsieur replied as audibly:--"_Ca se voit, ma femme--sacre nom
+d'une pipe_!"
+
+"Milford will do me the favor to sit again on Friday?" said Mueller, as I
+took up my hat and gloves.
+
+I replied with infinite condescension that I would endeavor to do so. I
+then made the stiffest of stiff bows to the excellent Tapottes, and,
+ushered to the door by Mueller, took my departure majestically in the
+character of Lord Smithfield.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII.
+
+THE QUARTIER LATIN.
+
+The dear old Quartier Latin of my time--the Quartier Latin of Balzac, of
+Beranger, of Henry Murger---the Quartier Latin where Franz Mueller had
+his studio; where Messieurs Gustave; Jules, and Adrien gave their
+unparalleled _soirees dansantes_; where I first met my ex-flame
+Josephine--exists no longer. It has been improved off the face of the
+earth, and with it such a gay bizarre, improvident world of youth and
+folly as shall never again be met together on the banks of the Seine.
+
+Ah me! how well I remember that dingy, delightful Arcadia--the Rue de la
+Vieille Boucherie, narrow, noisy, crowded, with projecting upper stories
+and Gothic pent-house roofs--the Rue de la Parcheminerie, unchanged
+since the Middle Ages--the Rue St. Jacques, steep, interminable,
+dilapidated; with its dingy cabarets, its brasseries, its cheap
+restaurants, its grimy shop windows filled with colored prints, with
+cooked meats, with tobacco, old books, and old clothes; its ancient
+colleges and hospitals, time-worn and weather-beaten, frowning down upon
+the busy thoroughfare and breaking the squalid line of shops; its grim
+old hotels swarming with lodgers, floor above floor, from the cobblers
+in the cellars to the grisettes in the attics! Then again, the gloomy
+old Place St. Michel, its abundant fountain ever flowing, ever
+surrounded by water-carts and water-carriers, by women with pails, and
+bare-footed street urchins, and thirsty drovers drinking out of iron
+cups chained to the wall. And then, too, the Rue de la Harpe....
+
+I close my eyes, and the strange, precipitous, picturesque, decrepit old
+street, with its busy, surging crowd, its street-cries, its
+street-music, and its indescribable union of gloom and gayety, rises
+from its ashes. Here, grand old dilapidated mansions with shattered
+stone-carvings, delicate wrought-iron balconies all rust-eaten and
+broken, and windows in which every other pane is cracked or patched,
+alternate with more modern but still more ruinous houses, some leaning
+this way, some that, some with bulging upper stories, some with doorways
+sunk below the level of the pavement. Yonder, gloomy and grim, stands
+the College of Saint Louis. Dark alleys open off here and there from the
+main thoroughfare, and narrow side streets, steep as flights of steps.
+Low sheds and open stalls cling, limpet-like, to every available nook
+and corner. An endless procession of trucks, wagons, water-carts, and
+fiacres rumbles perpetually by. Here people live at their windows and in
+the doorways--the women talking from balcony to balcony, the men
+smoking, reading, playing at dominoes. Here too are more cafes and
+cabarets, open-air stalls for the sale of fried fish, and cheap
+restaurants for workmen and students, where, for a sum equivalent to
+sevenpence half-penny English, the Quartier Latin regales itself upon
+meats and drinks of dark and enigmatical origin. Close at hand is the
+Place and College of the Sorbonne--silent in the midst of noisy life,
+solitary in the heart of the most crowded quarter of Paris. A sombre
+mediaeval gloom pervades that ancient quadrangle; scant tufts of sickly
+grass grow here and there in the interstices of the pavement; the dust
+of centuries crust those long rows of windows never opened. A little
+further on is the Rue des Gres, narrow, crowded, picturesque, one
+uninterrupted perspective of bookstalls and bookshops from end to end.
+Here the bookseller occasionally pursues a two-fold calling, and retails
+not only literature but a cellar of_ petit vin bleu_; and here,
+overnight, the thirsty student exchanges for a bottle of Macon the "Code
+Civile" that he must perforce buy back again at second-hand in
+the morning.
+
+A little farther on, and we come to the College Saint Louis, once the
+old College Narbonne; and yet a few yards more, and we are at the doors
+of the Theatre du Pantheon, once upon a time the Church of St. Benoit,
+where the stage occupies the site of the altar, and an orchestra stall
+in what was once the nave, may be had for seventy-five centimes. Here,
+too, might be seen the shop of the immortal Lesage, renowned throughout
+the Quartier for the manufacture of a certain kind of transcendental
+ham-patty, peculiarly beloved by student and grisette; and here,
+clustering within a stone's throw of each other, were to be found those
+famous restaurants, Pompon, Viot, Flicoteaux, and the "Boeuf Enrage,"
+where, on gala days, many an Alphonse and Fifine, many a Theophile and
+Cerisette, were wont to hold high feast and festival--terms sevenpence
+half-penny each, bread at discretion, water gratis, wine and
+toothpicks extra.
+
+But it was in the side streets, courts, and _impasses_ that branched off
+to the left and right of the main arteries, that one came upon the very
+heart of the old Pays Latin; for the Rue St. Jacques, the Rue de la
+Harpe, the Rue des Gres, narrow, steep, dilapidated though they might
+be, were in truth the leading thoroughfares--the Boulevards, so to
+speak--of the Student Quartier. In most of the side alleys, however,
+some of which dated back as far, and farther, than the fifteenth
+century, there was no footway for passengers, and barely space for one
+wheeled vehicle at a time. A filthy gutter invariably flowed down the
+middle of the street. The pavement, as it peeped out here and there
+through a _moraine_ of superimposed mud and offal, was seen to consist
+of small oblong stones, like petrified kidney potatoes. The houses, some
+leaning this way, some that, with projecting upper stories and
+overhanging gable-roofs, nodded together overhead, leaving but a narrow
+strip of sky down which the sunlight strove in vain to struggle. Long
+poles upon which were suspended old clothes hung out to air, and ragged
+linen to dry, stood out like tattered banners from the attic windows.
+Here, too, every ground-floor was a shop, open, unglazed, cavernous,
+where the dealer lay _perdu_ in the gloom of midday, like a spider in
+the midst of his web, surrounded by piles of old bottles, old iron, old
+clothes, old furniture, or whatever else his stock in trade might
+consist of.
+
+Of such streets--less like streets, indeed, than narrow, overhanging
+gorges and ravines of damp and mouldering stone--of such streets, I say,
+intricate, winding, ill-lighted, unventilated, pervaded by an atmosphere
+compounded of the fumes of fried fish, tobacco, old leather, mildew and
+dirt, there were hundreds in the Quartier Latin of my time:--streets to
+the last degree unattractive as places of human habitation, but rich,
+nevertheless, in historic associations, in picturesque detail, and in
+archaeological interest. Such a street, for instance, was the Rue du
+Fouarre (scarcely a feature of which has been modernized to this day),
+where Dante, when a student of theology in Paris, attended the lectures
+of one Sigebert, a learned monk of Gemblours, who discoursed to his
+scholars in the open air, they sitting round him the while upon fresh
+straw strewn upon the pavement. Such a street was the Rue des Cordiers,
+close adjoining the Rue des Gres, where Rousseau lived and wrote; and
+the Rue du Dragon, where might then be seen the house of Bernard
+Palissy; and the Rue des Macons, where Racine lived; and the Rue des
+Marais, where Adrienne Lecouvreur--poor, beautiful, generous, ill-fated
+Adrienne Lecouvreur!--died. Here, too, in a blind alley opening off the
+Rue St. Jacques, yet stands part of that Carmelite Convent in which, for
+thirty years, Madame de la Valliere expiated the solitary frailty of her
+life. And so at every turn! Not a gloomy by-street, not a dilapidated
+fountain, not a grim old college facade but had its history, or its
+legend. Here the voice of Abelard thundered new truths, and Rabelais
+jested, and Petrarch discoursed with the doctors. Here, in the Rue de
+l'Ancienne Comedie, walked the shades of Racine, of Moliere, of
+Corneille, of Voltaire. Dear, venerable, immortal old Quartier Latin!
+Thy streets were narrow, but they were the arteries through which,
+century after century, circulated all the wisdom and poetry, all the
+art, and science, and learning of France! Their gloom, their squalor,
+their very dirt was sacred. Could I have had my will, not a stone of the
+old place should have been touched, not a pavement widened, not a
+landmark effaced.
+
+Then beside, yet not apart from, all that was mediaeval and historic in
+the Pays Latin, ran the gay, effervescent, laughing current of the life
+of the _jeunessed' aujour d'hui._ Here beat the very heart of that rare,
+that immortal, that unparalleled _vie de Boheme_, the vagabond poetry of
+which possesses such an inexhaustible charm for even the soberest
+imagination. What brick and mortar idylls, what romances _au cinquieme_,
+what joyous epithalamiums, what gay improvident _menages_, what kisses,
+what laughter, what tears, what lightly-spoken and lightly-broken vows
+those old walls could have told of!
+
+Here, apparelled in all sorts of unimaginable tailoring, in jaunty
+colored cap or flapped sombrero, his pipe dangling from his button-hole,
+his hair and beard displaying every eccentricity under heaven, the Paris
+student, the _Pays Latiniste pur sang_, lived and had his being. Poring
+over the bookstalls in the Place du Pantheon or the Rue des
+Gres--hurrying along towards this or that college with a huge volume
+under each arm, about nine o'clock in the morning--haunting the cafes at
+midday and the restaurants at six--swinging his legs out of
+upper windows and smoking in his shirt-sleeves in the summer
+evenings--crowding the pit of the Odeon and every part of the Theatre du
+Pantheon--playing wind instruments at dead of night to the torment of
+his neighbors, or, in vocal mood, traversing the Quartier with a society
+of musical friends about the small hours of the morning--getting into
+scuffles with the gendarmes--flirting, dancing, playing billiards and
+the deuce; falling in love and in debt; dividing his time between
+Aristotle and Mademoiselle Mimi Pinson ... here, and here only, in all
+his phases, at every hour of the day and night, he swarmed, ubiquitous.
+
+And here, too (a necessary sequence), flourished the fair and frail
+grisette. Her race, alas! is now all but extinct--the race of Fretillon,
+of Francine, of Lisette, Musette, Rosette, and all the rest of that too
+fascinating terminology--the race immortalized again and again by
+Beranger, Gavarni, Balzac, De Musset; sketched by a hundred pencils and
+described by a hundred pens; celebrated in all manner of metres and set
+to all manner of melodies; now caricatured and now canonized; now
+painted wholly _en noir_ and now all _couleur de rose_; yet, however
+often described, however skilfully analyzed, remaining for ever
+indescribable, and for ever defying analysis!
+
+"De tous les produits Parisiens," says Monsieur Jules Janin (himself the
+quintessence of everything most Parisian), "le produit le plus Parisien,
+sans contredit, c'est la grisette." True; but our epigrammatist should
+have gone a step farther. He should have added that the grisette _pur
+sang_ is to be found nowhere except in Paris; and (still a step farther)
+nowhere in Paris save between the Pont Neuf and the Barriere d'Enfer.
+There she reigns; there (ah! let me use the delicious present tense--let
+me believe that I still live in Arcadia!)--there she lights up the old
+streets with her smile; makes the old walls ring with her laughter;
+flits over the crossings like a fairy; wears the most coquettish of
+little caps and the daintiest of little shoes; rises to her work with
+the dawn; keeps a pet canary; trains a nasturtium round her window;
+loves as heartily as she laughs, and almost as readily; owes not a sou,
+saves not a centime; sews on Adolphe's buttons, like a good neighbor; is
+never so happy as when Adolphe in return takes her to Tivoli or the
+Jardin Turc; adores _galette, sucre d'orge_, and Frederick Lemaitre; and
+looks upon a masked ball and a debardeur dress as the summit of
+human felicity.
+
+_Vive la grisette_! Shall I not follow many an illustrious example and
+sing my modest paean in her praise? Frown not, august Britannia! Look
+not so severely askance upon my poor little heroine of the Quartier
+Latin! Thinkest thou because thou art so eminently virtuous that she who
+has many a serviceable virtue of her own, shall be debarred from her
+share in this world's cakes and ale?
+
+_Vive la grisette_! Let us think and speak no evil of her. "Elle ne
+tient au vice que par un rayon, et s'en eloigne par les mille autres
+points de la circonference sociale." The world sees only her follies,
+and sees them at first sight; her good qualities lie hidden in the
+shade. Is she not busy as a bee, joyous as a lark, helpful, pitiful,
+unselfish, industrious, contented? How often has she not slipped her
+last coin into the alms-box at the hospital gate, and gone supperless to
+bed? How often sat up all night, after a long day's toil in a crowded
+work-room, to nurse Victorine in the fever? How often pawned her Sunday
+gown and shawl, to redeem that coat without which Adolphe cannot appear
+before the examiners to-morrow morning? Granted, if you will, that she
+has an insatiable appetite for sweets, cigarettes, and theatrical
+admissions--shall she not be welcome to her tastes? And is it her fault
+if her capacity in the way of miscellaneous refreshments partakes of the
+nature of the miraculous--somewhat to the inconvenience of Adolphe, who
+has overspent his allowance? Supposing even that she may now and then
+indulge (among friends) in a very modified can-can at the
+Chaumiere--what does that prove, except that her heels are as light as
+her heart, and that her early education has been somewhat neglected?
+
+But I am writing of a world that has vanished as completely as the lost
+Pleiad. The Quartier Latin of my time is no more. The Chaumiere is no
+more. The grisette is fast dying out. Of the Rue de la Harpe not a
+recognisable feature is left. The old Place St. Michel, the fountain,
+the Theatre du Pantheon, are gone as if they had never been. Whole
+streets, I might say whole parishes, have been swept away--whole
+chapters of mediaeval history erased for ever.
+
+Well, I love to close my eyes from time to time, and evoke the dear old
+haunts from their ruins; to descend once more the perilous steeps of the
+Rue St. Jacques, and to thread the labyrinthine by-streets that surround
+the Ecole de Medecine. I see them all so plainly! I look in at the
+familiar print-shops--I meet many a long-forgotten face--I hear many a
+long-forgotten voice--I am twenty years of age and a student again!
+
+Ah me! what a pleasant time, and what a land of enchantment! Dingy,
+dilapidated, decrepit as it was, that graceless old Quartier Latin,
+believe me, was paved with roses and lighted with laughing gas.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV.
+
+THE FETE AT COURBEVOIE.
+
+"_Halte la_! I thought I should catch you about this time! They've been
+giving you unconscionable good measure to-day, though, haven't they? I
+thought Bollinet's lecture was always over by three; and here I've been
+moralizing on the flight of Time for more than twenty minutes."
+
+So saying, Mueller, having stopped me as I was coming down the steps of
+the Hotel Dieu, linked his arm in mine, drew me into a shady angle under
+the lee of Notre Dame, and, without leaving me time to reply, went on
+pouring out his light, eager chatter as readily as a mountain-spring
+bubbles out its waters.
+
+"I thought you'd like to know about the Tapottes, you see--and I was
+dying to tell you. I went to your rooms last night between eight and
+nine, and you were out; so I thought the only sure way was to come
+here--I know you never miss Bollinet's Lectures. Well, as I was saying,
+the Tapottes.... Oh, _mon cher_! I am your debtor for life in that
+matter of Milord Smithfield. It has been the making of me. What do you
+think? Tapotte is not only going to sit for a companion half-length to
+Madame's portrait, but he has given me a commission for half-a-dozen
+ancestors. Fancy--half-a-dozen illustrious dead-and-done Tapottes! What
+a scope for the imagination! What a bewildering vista of _billets de
+banque_! I feel--ah, _mon ami_! I feel that the wildest visions of my
+youth are about to be realized, and that I shall see my tailor's bill
+receipted before I die!"
+
+"I'm delighted," said I, "that Tapotte has turned up a trump card."
+
+"A trump card? Say a California--a Pactolus--a Golden Calf. Nay, hath
+not Tapotte two golden calves? Is he not of the precious metal all
+compact? Stands he not, in the amiable ripeness of his years, a living
+representative of the Golden Age? _'O bella eta dell' oro_!'"
+
+And to my horror, he then and there executed a frantic _pas seul_.
+
+"Gracious powers!" I exclaimed. "Are you mad?"
+
+"Yes--raving mad. Have you any objection?"
+
+"But, my dear fellow--in the face of day--in the streets of Paris! We
+shall get taken up by the police!"
+
+"Then suppose we get out of the streets of Paris? I'm tired enough,
+Heaven knows, of cultivating the arid soil of the Pave. See, it's a
+glorious afternoon. Let's go somewhere."
+
+"With all my heart. Where?"
+
+"_Ah, mon Dieu! ca m'est egal_. Enghien--Vincennes--St.
+Cloud--Versailles ... anywhere you like. Most probably there's a fete
+going on somewhere, if we only knew where,"
+
+"Can't we find out?"
+
+"Oh, yes--we can drop into a Cafe and look at the _Petites Affiches_;
+only that entails an absinthe; or we can go into the nearest Omnibus
+Bureau and see the notices on the walls, which will be cheaper."
+
+So we threaded our way along the narrow thoroughfares of the Ile de la
+Cite, and came presently to an Omnibus Bureau on the Quai de l'Horloge,
+overlooking the Pont Neuf and the river. Here the first thing we saw was
+a flaming placard setting forth the pleasures and attractions of the
+great annual fete at Courbevoie; a village on the banks of the Seine, a
+mile or two beyond Neuilly.
+
+"_Voila, notre affaire_!" said Mueller, gaily. "We can't do better than
+steer straight for Courbevoie."
+
+Saying which, he hailed a passing fiacre and bade the coachman drive to
+the Embarcadere of the Rive Droite.
+
+"We shall amuse ourselves famously at Courbevoie," he said, as we
+rattled over the stones. "We'll dine at the Toison d'Or--an excellent
+little restaurant overlooking the river; and if you're fond of angling,
+we can hire a punt and catch our own fish for dinner. Then there will be
+plenty of fiddling and dancing at the guingettes and gardens in the
+evening. By the way, though, I've no money! That is to say, none worth
+speaking of--_voila!_... one franc, one piece of fifty centimes, another
+of twenty centimes, and some sous. I hope your pockets are better lined
+than mine."
+
+"Not much, I fear," I replied, pulling out my porte-monnaie, and
+emptying the contents into my hand. They amounted to nine francs and
+seventy-five centimes.
+
+"_Parbleu_! we've just eleven francs and a half between us," said
+Mueller. "A modest sum-total; but we must make it as elastic as we can.
+Let me see, there'll be a franc for the fiacre, four francs for our
+return tickets, four for our dinner, and two and a half to spend as we
+like in the fair. Well, we can't commit any great extravagance with that
+amount of floating capital."
+
+"Better turn back and go to my rooms for some more money?" I exclaimed.
+"I've two Napoleons in my desk."
+
+"No, no--we should miss the three-fifty train, and not get another till
+between five and six."
+
+"But we shall have no fun if we have no money!"
+
+"I dissent entirely from that proposition, Monsieur Englishman. I have
+always had plenty of fun, and I have been short of cash since the hour
+of my birth. Come, it shall be my proud task to-day to prove to you the
+pleasures of impecuniosity!"
+
+So with our eleven francs and a half we went on to the station, and took
+our places for Courbevoie.
+
+We travelled, of course, by third class in the open wagons; and it so
+happened that in our compartment we had the company of three pretty
+little chattering grisettes, a fat countrywoman with a basket, and a
+quiet-looking elderly female with her niece. These last wore bonnets,
+and some kind of slight mourning. They belonged evidently to the small
+bourgeoise class, and sat very quietly in the corner of the carriage,
+speaking to no one. The three grisettes, however, kept up an incessant
+fire of small talk and squabble.
+
+"I was on this very line last Sunday," said one. "I went with Julie to
+Asnieres, and we were so gay! I wonder if it will be very gay at
+Courbevoie."
+
+"_Je m'en doute_," replied another, whom they called Lolotte. "I came to
+one of the Courbevoie fetes last spring, and it was not gay at all. But
+then, to be sure, I was with Edouard, and he is as dull as the first day
+in Lent. Where were you last Sunday, Adele?"
+
+"I did not go beyond the barriers. I went to the Cirque with my cousin,
+and we dined in the Palais Royal. We enjoyed ourselves so much! You know
+my cousin?"
+
+"Ah! yes--the little fellow with the curly hair and the whiskers, who
+waits for you at the corner when we leave the workshop."
+
+"The same--Achille."
+
+"Your Achille is nice-looking," said Mademoiselle Lolotte, with a
+somewhat critical air. "It is a pity he squints."
+
+"He does not squint, mam'selle."
+
+"Oh, _ma chere_! I appeal to Caroline."
+
+"I am not sure that he actually squints," said Mam'selle Caroline,
+speaking for the first time; "but he certainly has one eye larger than
+the other, and of quite a different color."
+
+"_Tiens_, Caroline--it seems to me that you look very closely into the
+eyes of young men," exclaims Adele, turning sharply upon this new
+assailant.
+
+"At all events you admit that Caroline is right," cries Lolotte,
+triumphantly.
+
+"I admit nothing of the kind. I say that you are both very ill-natured,
+and that you say what is not true. As for you, Lolotte, I don't believe
+you ever had the chance of seeing a young man's eyes turned upon you, or
+you would not be so pleased with the attentions of an old one."
+
+"An _old_ one!" shrieked Mam'selle Lolotte. "Ah, _mon Dieu_! Is a man
+old at forty-seven? Monsieur Durand is in the prime of life, and there
+isn't a girl in the Quartier who would not be proud of his attentions!"
+
+"He's sixty, if an hour," said the injured Adele. "And as for you,
+Caroline, who have never had a beau in your life...."
+
+"_Ciel_! what a calumny!--I--never had a ... Holy Saint Genevieve! why,
+it was only last Thursday week...."
+
+Here the train stopped at the Asnieres station, and two privates of the
+Garde Imperiale got into the carriage. The horizon cleared as if by
+magic. The grisettes suddenly forgot their differences, and began to
+chat quite amicably. The soldiers twirled their mustachios, listened,
+smiled, and essayed to join in the conversation. In a few minutes all
+was mirth and flirtation.
+
+Meanwhile Mueller was casting admiring glances on the young girl in the
+corner, whilst the fat countrywoman, pursing up her mouth, and watching
+the grisettes and soldiers, looked the image of offended virtue.
+
+"Dame! Madame," she said, addressing herself to the old lady in the
+bonnet, "girls usen't to be so forward in the days when you and I
+were young!"
+
+To which the old lady in the bonnet, blandly smiling, replied:--
+
+"Beautiful, for the time of year."
+
+"Eh? For the time of year? Dame! I don't see that the time of year has
+anything to do with it," exclaimed the fat countrywoman.
+
+Here the young girl in the corner, blushing and smiling very sweetly,
+interposed with--"Pardon, Madame--my aunt is somewhat deaf. Pray,
+excuse her."
+
+Whereupon the old lady, watching the motion of her niece's lips, added--
+
+"Ah, yes--yes! I am a poor, deaf old woman--I don't understand what you
+say. Talk to my little Marie, here--she can answer you."
+
+"I, for one, desire nothing better than permission to talk to
+Mademoiselle," said Mueller, gallantly.
+
+_"Mais, Monsieur_..."
+
+"Mademoiselle, with Madame her aunt, are going to the fete at
+Courbevoie?"
+
+"Yes, Monsieur."
+
+"The river is very pretty thereabouts, and the walks through the meadows
+are delightful."
+
+"Indeed, Monsieur!"
+
+"Mademoiselle does not know the place?"
+
+"No, Monsieur."
+
+"Ah, if I might only be permitted to act as guide! I know every foot of
+the ground about Courbevoie."
+
+Mademoiselle Marie blushed again, looked down, and made no reply.
+
+"I am a painter," continued Mueller; "and I have sketched all the
+windings of the Seine from Neuilly to St. Germains. My friend here is
+English--he is a student of medicine, and speaks excellent French."
+
+"What is the gentleman saying, _mon enfant_?" asked the old lady,
+somewhat anxiously.
+
+"Monsieur says that the river is very pretty about Courbevoie, _ma
+tante_," replied Mademoiselle Marie, raising her voice.
+
+"Ah! ah! and what else?"
+
+"Monsieur is a painter."
+
+"A painter? Ah, dear me! it's an unhealthy occupation. My poor brother
+Pierre might have been alive to this day if he had taken to any other
+line of business! You must take great care of your lungs, young man. You
+look delicate."
+
+Mueller laughed, shook his head, and declared at the top of his voice
+that he had never had a day's illness in his life.
+
+Here the pretty niece again interposed.
+
+"Ah, Monsieur," she said, "my aunt does not understand....My--my uncle
+Pierre was a house-painter."
+
+"A very respectable occupation, Mademoiselle," replied Mueller, politely.
+"For my own part, I would sooner paint the insides of some houses than
+the outsides of some people."
+
+At this moment the train began to slacken pace, and the steam was let
+off with a demoniac shriek.
+
+"_Tiens, mon enfant_," said the old lady, turning towards her niece with
+affectionate anxiety. "I hope you have not taken cold."
+
+The excellent soul believed that it was Mademoiselle Marie who sneezed.
+
+And now the train had stopped--the porters were running along the
+platform, shouting "Courbevoie! Courbevoie!"--the passengers were
+scrambling out _en masse_--and beyond the barrier one saw a confused
+crowd of _charrette_ and omnibus-drivers, touters, fruit-sellers, and
+idlers of every description. Mueller handed out the old lady and the
+niece; the fat countrywoman scrambled up into a kind of tumbril driven
+by a boy in _sabots_; the grisettes and soldiers walked off together;
+and the tide of holiday-makers, some on foot, some in hired vehicles,
+set towards the village. In the meanwhile, what with the crowd on the
+platform and the crowd outside the barrier, and what with the hustling
+and pushing at the point where the tickets were taken, we lost sight of
+the old lady and her niece.
+
+"What the deuce has become of _ma tante_?" exclaimed Mueller, looking
+round.
+
+But neither _ma tante_ nor Mademoiselle Marie were anywhere to be seen.
+I suggested that they must have gone on in the omnibus or taken a
+_charrette_, and so have passed us unperceived.
+
+"And, after all," I added, "we didn't want to enter upon an indissoluble
+union with them for the rest of the day. _Ma tante's_ deafness is not
+entertaining, and _la petite_ Marie has nothing to say."
+
+"_La petite_ Marie is uncommonly pretty, though," said Mueller. "I mean
+to dance a quadrille with her by-and-by, I promise you."
+
+"_A la bonne heure_! We shall be sure to chance upon them again before
+long."
+
+We had come by this time to a group of pretty villa-residences with high
+garden walls and little shady side-lanes leading down to the river. Then
+came a church and more houses; then an open Place; and suddenly we found
+ourselves in the midst of the fair.
+
+It was just like any other of the hundred and one fetes that take place
+every summer in the environs of Paris. There was a merry-go-round and a
+greasy pole; there was a juggler who swallowed knives and ribbons; there
+were fortune-tellers without number; there were dining-booths, and
+drinking-booths, and dancing-booths; there were acrobats, organ-boys
+with monkeys, and Savoyards with white mice; there were stalls for the
+sale of cakes, fruit, sweetmeats, toys, combs, cheap jewelry, glass,
+crockery, boots and shoes, holy-water vessels, rosaries, medals, and
+little colored prints of saints and martyrs; there were brass bands, and
+string bands, and ballad-singers everywhere; and there was an atmosphere
+compounded of dust, tobacco-smoke, onions, musk, and every objectionable
+perfume under heaven.
+
+"Dine at the Restaurant de l'Empire, Messieurs," shouted a shabby
+touter in a blouse, thrusting a greasy card into our faces. "Three
+dishes, a dessert, a half-bottle, and a band of music, for one
+franc-fifty. The cheapest dinner in the fair!"
+
+"The cheapest dinner in the fair is at the Belle Gabrielle!" cried
+another. "We'll give you for the same money soup, fish, two dishes, a
+dessert, a half-bottle, and take your photograph into the bargain!"
+
+"Bravo! _mon vieux_--you first poison them with your dinner, and then
+provide photographs for the widows and children," retorts touter number
+one. "That's justice, anyhow."
+
+Whereupon touter number two shrieks out a torrent of abuse, and we push
+on, leaving them to settle their differences after their own fashion.
+
+At the next booth we are accosted by a burly fellow daubed to the eyes
+with red and blue paint, and dressed as an Indian chief.
+
+"_Entrez, entrez, Messieurs et Mesdames_" he cries, flourishing a
+war-spear some nine feet in length. "Come and see the wonderful Peruvian
+maiden of Tanjore, with webbed fingers and toes, her mouth in the back
+of her head, and her eyes in the soles of her feet! Only four sous each,
+and an opportunity that will never occur again!"
+
+"Only fifty centimes!" shouts another public orator; "the most ingenious
+little machine ever invented! Goes into the waistcoat pocket--is wound
+up every twenty-four hours--tells the day of the month, the day of the
+year, the age of the moon, the state of the Bourse, the bank rate of
+discount, the quarter from which the wind is blowing, the price of
+new-laid eggs in Paris and the provinces, the rate of mortality in the
+Fee-jee islands, and the state of your sweetheart's affections!"
+
+A little further on, by dint of much elbowing, we made our way into a
+crowded booth where, for the modest consideration of two sous per head,
+might be seen a Boneless Youth and an Ashantee King. The performances
+were half over when we went in. The Boneless Youth had gone through his
+feats of agility, and was lying on a mat in a corner of the stage, the
+picture of limp incapability. The Ashantee monarch was just about to
+make his appearance. Meanwhile, a little man in fleshings and a cocked
+hat addressed the audience.
+
+"Messieurs and Mesdames--I have the honor to announce that Caraba
+Radokala, King of Ashantee, will next appear before you. This terrific
+native sovereign was taken captive by that famous Dutch navigator, the
+Mynheer Van Dunk, in his last voyage round the globe. Van Dunk, having
+brought his prisoner to Europe in an iron cage, sold him to the English
+government in 1840; who sold him again to Milord Barnum, the great
+American philanthropist, in 1842; who sold him again to Franconi of the
+Cirque Olympique; who finally sold him to me. At the time of his
+capture, Caraba Radokala was the most treacherous, barbarous, and
+sanguinary monster upon record. He had three hundred and sixty-five
+wives--a wife, you observe, for every day in the year. He lived
+exclusively upon human flesh, and consumed, when in good health, one
+baby per diem. His palace in Ashantee was built entirely of the skulls
+and leg-bones of his victims. He is now, however, much less ferocious;
+and, though he feeds on live pigeons, rabbits, dogs, mice, and the like,
+he has not tasted human flesh since his captivity. He is also heavily
+ironed. The distinguished company need therefore entertain no
+apprehensions. Pierre--draw the bolt, and let his majesty loose!"
+
+A savage roar was now heard, followed by a rattling of chains. Then the
+curtains were suddenly drawn back, and the Ashantee king--crowned with a
+feather head-dress, loaded with red and blue war-paint, and chained from
+ankle to ankle--bounded on the stage.
+
+Seeing the audience before him, he uttered a terrific howl. The front
+rows were visibly agitated. Several young women faintly screamed.
+
+The little man in the cocked hat rushed to the front, protesting that
+the ladies had no reason to be alarmed. Caraba Radokala, if not wantonly
+provoked, was now quite harmless--a little irritable, perhaps, from
+being waked too suddenly--would be as gentle as a lamb, if given
+something to eat:--"Pierre, quiet his majesty with a pigeon!"
+
+Pierre, a lank lad in motley, hereupon appeared with a live pigeon,
+which immediately escaped from his hands and perched on the top of the
+proscenium. Caraba Radokala yelled; the little man in the cocked hat
+raved; and Pierre, in default of more pigeons, contritely reappeared
+with a lump of raw beef, into which his majesty ravenously dug his royal
+teeth. The pigeon, meanwhile, dressed its feathers and looked
+complacently down, as if used to the incident.
+
+"Having fed, Caraba Radokala will now be quite gentle and good-humored,"
+said the showman. "If any lady desires to shake hands with him, she may
+do so with perfect safety. Will any lady embrace the opportunity?"
+
+A faint sound of tittering was heard in various parts of the booth; but
+no one came forward.
+
+"Will _no_ lady be persuaded? Well, then, is there any gentleman present
+who speaks Ashantee?"
+
+Mueller gave me a dig with his elbow, and started to his feet.
+
+"Yes," he replied, loudly. "I do."
+
+Every head was instantly turned in our direction.
+
+The showman collapsed with astonishment. Even the captive, despite his
+ignorance of the French tongue, looked considerably startled.
+
+"_Comment_!" stammered the cocked hat. "Monsieur speaks Ashantee?"
+
+"Fluently."
+
+"Is it permitted to inquire how and when monsieur acquired this very
+unusual accomplishment?"
+
+"I have spoken Ashantee from my infancy," replied Mueller, with admirable
+aplomb. "I was born at sea, brought up in an undiscovered island, twice
+kidnapped by hostile tribes before attaining the age of ten years, and
+have lived among savage nations all my life."
+
+A murmur of admiration ran through the audience, and Mueller became, for
+the time, an object of livelier interest than Caraba Radokala himself.
+Seeing this, the indignant monarch executed a warlike _pas_, and rattled
+his chains fiercely.
+
+"In that case, monsieur, you had better come upon the stage, and speak
+to his majesty," said the showman reluctantly.
+
+"With all the pleasure in life."
+
+"But I warn you that his temper is uncertain."
+
+"Bah!" said Mueller, working his way round through the crowd, "I'm not
+afraid of his temper."
+
+"As monsieur pleases--but, if monsieur offends him, _I_ will not be
+answerable for the consequences."
+
+"All right--give us a hand up, _mon vieux_!" And Muller, having
+clambered upon the stage, made a bow to the audience and a salaam to
+his majesty.
+
+"Chickahominy chowdar bang," said he, by way of opening the
+conversation.
+
+The ex-king of Ashantee scowled, folded his arms, and maintained a
+haughty silence.
+
+"Hic hac horum, high cockalorum," continued Mueller, with exceeding
+suavity.
+
+The captive monarch stamped impatiently, ground his teeth, but still
+made no reply.
+
+"Monsieur had better not aggravate him," said the showman. "On the
+contrary--I am overwhelming him with civilities Now observe--I condole
+with him upon his melancholy position. I inquire after his wives and
+children; and I remark how uncommonly well he is looking."
+
+And with this, he made another salaam, smiled persuasively, and said--
+
+"Alpha, beta, gamma, delta--chin-chin--Potz tausend!--Erin-go-bragh!"
+
+"Borriobooloobah!" shrieked his majesty, apparently stung to
+desperation.
+
+"Rocofoco!" retorted Mueller promptly.
+
+But as if this last was more than any Ashantee temper could bear, Caraba
+Rodokala clenched both his fists, set his teeth hard, and charged down
+upon Mueller like a wild elephant. Being met, however, by a well-planted
+blow between the eyes, he went down like a ninepin--picked himself
+up,--rushed in again, and, being forcibly seized and held back by the
+cocked hat, Pierre of the pigeons, and a third man who came tumbling up
+precipitately from somewhere behind the stage, vented his fury, in a
+torrent of very highly civilized French oaths.
+
+"Eh, _sacredieu_!" he cried, shaking his fist in Mueller's face, "I've
+not done with you yet, _diable de galerien_!"
+
+Whereupon there burst forth a general roar--a roar like the
+"inextinguishable laughter" of Olympus.
+
+"_Tiens_!" said Mueller, "his majesty speaks French almost as well as I
+speak Ashantee!"
+
+"_Bourreau! Brigand! Assassin_!" shrieked his Ferocity, as his friends
+hustled him off the stage.
+
+The curtains then fell together again; and the audience, still laughing
+vociferously, dispersed with cries of "Vive Caraba Rodokala!" "Kind
+remembrances to the Queens of Ashantee!" "What's the latest news from
+home?" "Borriobooloo-bah--ah--ah!"
+
+Elbowing our way out with the crowd, we now plunged once more into the
+press of the fair. Here our old friends the dancing dogs of the Champs
+Elysees, and the familiar charlatan of the Place du Chatelet with his
+chariot and barrel-organ, transported us from Ashantee to Paris. Next we
+came to a temporary shooting-gallery, adorned over the entrance with a
+spirited cartoon of a Tyrolean sharpshooter; and then to an exhibition
+of cosmoramas; and presently to a weighing machine, in which a great,
+rosy-cheeked, laughing Normandy peasant girl, with her high cap, blue
+skirt, massive gold cross and heavy ear-rings, was in the act of
+being weighed.
+
+"_Tiens! Mam'selle est joliment solide_!" remarks a saucy bystander, as
+the owner of the machine piles on weight after weight.
+
+"Perhaps if I had no more brains than m'sieur, I should weigh as light!"
+retorts the damsel, with a toss of her high cap.
+
+"_Pardon_! it is not a question of brains--it is a question of hearts,"
+interposes an elderly exquisite in a white hat. "Mam'selle has captured
+so many that she is completely over weighted."
+
+"Twelve stone six ounces," pronounces the owner of the machine,
+adjusting the last weight.
+
+Whereupon there is a burst of ironical applause, and the big _paysanne_,
+half laughing, half angry, walks off, exclaiming, "_Eh bien! tant
+mieux_! I've no mind to be a scarecrow--_moi_!"
+
+By this time we have both had enough of the fair, and are glad to make
+our way out of the crowd and down to the riverside. Here we find lovers
+strolling in pairs along the towing-path; family groups pic-nicking in
+the shade; boats and punts for hire, and a swimming-match just coming
+off, of which all that is visible are two black heads bobbing up and
+down along the middle of the stream.
+
+"And now, _mon ami_, what do you vote for?" asks Mueller. "Boating or
+fishing? or both? or neither?"
+
+"Both, if you like--but I never caught anything in my life,"
+
+"The pleasure of fishing, I take it," says Mueller, "is not in the fish
+you catch, but in the fish you miss. The fish you catch is a poor little
+wretch, worth neither the trouble of landing, cooking, nor eating; but
+the fish you miss is always the finest fellow you ever saw in
+your life!"
+
+"_Allons donc_! I know, then, which of us two will have most of the
+pleasure to-day," I reply, laughing. "But how about the expense?"
+
+To which Mueller, with a noble recklessness, answers:--
+
+"Oh, hang the expense! Here, boatman! a boat _a quatre rames_, and some
+fishing-tackle--by the hour."
+
+Now it was undoubtedly a fine sentiment this of Mueller's, and had we but
+fetched my two Napoleons before starting, I should have applauded it to
+the echo; but when I considered that something very nearly approaching
+to a franc had already filtered out of our pockets in passing through
+the fair, and that the hour of dinner was looming somewhat indefinitely
+in the distance, I confess that my soul became disquieted within me.
+
+"Don't forget, for heaven's sake," I said, "that we must keep something
+for dinner!"
+
+"My dear fellow," he replied, "I have already a tremendous appetite for
+dinner--that _is_ something."
+
+After this, I resigned myself to whatever might happen.
+
+We then rowed up the river for about a mile beyond Courbevoie. moored
+our boat to a friendly willow, put our fishing-tackle together, and
+composed ourselves for the gentle excitement that waits upon the gudgeon
+and the minnow.
+
+"I haven't yet had a single nibble," said Mueller, when we had been
+sitting to our work for something less than ten minutes.
+
+"Hush!" I said. "You mustn't speak, you know."
+
+"True--I had forgotten. I'll sing instead. Fishes, I have been told, are
+fond of music.
+
+     'Fanfan, je vous aimerais bien;
+       Contre vous je n'ai nul caprice;
+     Vous etes gentil, j'en convien....'"
+
+"Come, now!" I exclaimed pettishly, "this is really too bad. I had a
+bite--a most decided bite--and if you had only kept quiet"....
+
+"Nonsense, my dear fellow! I tell you again--and I have it on the best
+authority--fishes like music. Did you never hear of Arion! Have you
+forgotten about the Syrens? Believe me, your gudgeon nibbled because I
+sang him to the surface--just as the snakes come out for the song of the
+snake-charmer. I'll try again!"
+
+And with this he began:--
+
+     "Jeannette est une brune
+       Qui demeure a Pantin,
+     Ou toute sa fortune
+       Est un petit jardin!"
+
+"Well, if you go on like that, all I have to say is, that not a fish
+will come within half a mile of our bait," said I, with
+tranquil despair.
+
+"Alas! _mon cher_, I am grieved to observe in your otherwise estimable
+character, a melancholy want of faith," replied Mueller "Without faith,
+what is friendship? What is angling? What is matrimony? Now, I tell you
+that with regard to the finny tribe, the more I charm them, the more
+enthusiastically they will flock to be caught. We shall have a
+miraculous draught in a few minutes, if you are but patient."
+
+And then he began again:--
+
+     "Mimi Pinson est une blonde,
+       Une blonde que l'on connait.
+     Elle n'a qu'une robe au monde,
+       Landerirette!
+     Et qu'un bonnet."
+
+I laid aside my rod, folded my arms, and when he had done, applauded
+ironically.
+
+"Very good," I said. "I understand the situation. We are here, at
+some--indeed, I may say, considering the state of our exchequer, at a
+considerable mutual expense; not to catch fish, but to afford Herr
+Mueller an opportunity of exercising his extensive memory, and his
+limited baritone voice. The entertainment is not without its
+_agrements_, but I find it dear at the price."
+
+"_Tiens_, Arbuthnot! let us fish seriously. I promise not to open my
+lips again till you have caught something."
+
+"Then, seriously, I believe you would have to be silent the whole night,
+and all I should catch would be the rheumatism. I am the worst angler in
+the world, and the most unlucky."
+
+"Really and truly?"
+
+"Really and truly. And you?"
+
+"As bad as yourself. If a tolerably large and energetic fish did me the
+honor to swallow my bait, the probability is that he would catch me. I
+certainly shouldn't know what to do with him."
+
+"Then the present question is--what shall we do with ourselves?"
+
+"I vote that we row up as far as yonder bend in the river, just to see
+what lies beyond; and then back to Courbevoie."
+
+"Heaven only grant that by that time we shall have enough money left for
+dinner!" I murmured with a sigh.
+
+We rowed up the river as far as the first bend, a distance of about
+half a mile; and then we rowed on as far as the next bend. Then we
+turned, and, resting on our oars, drifted slowly back with the current.
+The evening was indescribably brilliant and serene. The sky was
+cloudless, of a greenish blue, and full of light. The river was clear as
+glass. We could see the flaccid water-weeds swaying languidly with the
+current far below, and now and then a shoal of tiny fish shooting along
+half-way between the weeds and the surface. A rich fringe of purple
+iris, spear-leaved sagittarius, and tufted meadow-sweet (each blossom a
+bouquet on a slender thyrsus) bordered the towing-path and filled the
+air with perfume. Here the meadows lay open to the water's edge; a
+little farther on, they were shut off by a close rampart of poplars and
+willows whose leaves, already yellowed by autumn, were now fiery in the
+sunset. Joyous bands of gnats, like wild little intoxicated maenads,
+circled and hummed about our heads as we drifted slowly on; while, far
+away and mellowed by distance, we heard the brazen music of the fair.
+
+We were both silent. Mueller pulled out a small sketch-book and made a
+rapid study of the scene--the reach in the river; the wooded banks; the
+green flats traversed by long lines of stunted pollards; the church-tops
+and roofs of Courbevoie beyond.
+
+Presently a soft voice, singing, broke upon the silence. Mueller stopped
+involuntarily, pencil in hand. I held my breath, and listened. The tune
+was flowing and sweet; and as our boat drifted on, the words of the
+singer became audible.
+
+     "O miroir ondoyant!
+     Je reve en te voyant
+     Harmonie et lumiere,
+       O ma riviere,
+     O ma belle riviere!
+
+     "On voit se reflechir
+     Dans ses eaux les nuages;
+     Elle semble dormir
+     Entre les paturages
+
+     Ou paissent les grands boeufs
+     Et les grasses genisses.
+     Au patres amoureux
+     Que ses bords sont propices!"
+
+"A woman's voice," said Mueller. "Dupont's words and music. She must be
+young and pretty ... where has she hidden herself?"
+
+The unseen singer, meanwhile, went on with another verse.
+
+     "Pres des iris du bord,
+     Sous une berge haute,
+     La carpe aux reflets d'or
+     Ou le barbeau ressaute,
+     Les goujons font le guet,
+     L'Ablette qui scintille
+     Fuit le dent du brochet;
+     Au fond rampe l'anguille!
+
+     "O miroir ondoyant!
+     Je reve en te voyant
+     Harmonic et lumiere,
+       O ma riviere,
+     O ma belle riviere!"
+
+"Look!" said Mueller. "Do you not see them yonder--two women under the
+trees? By Jupiter! it's _ma tante_ and _la petite_ Marie!"
+
+Saying which, he flung himself upon his oars and began pulling
+vigorously towards the shore.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV.
+
+THAT TERRIBLE MUeLLER.
+
+La petite Marie broke off at the sound of our oars, and blushed a
+becoming rose-color.
+
+"Will these ladies do us the honor of letting us row them back to
+Courbevoie?" said Mueller, running our boat close in against the sedges,
+and pulling off his hat as respectfully as if they were duchesses.
+
+Mademoiselle Marie repeated the invitation to her aunt, who accepted it
+at once.
+
+"_Tres volontiers, tres volontiers, messieurs_" she said, smiling and
+nodding. "We have rambled out so far--so far! And I am not as young as I
+was forty years ago. _Ah, mon Dieu_! how my old bones ache! Give me thy
+hand, Marie, and thank the gentlemen for their politeness."
+
+So Mam'selle Marie helped her aunt to rise, and we steadied the boat
+close under the bank, at a point where the interlacing roots of a couple
+of sallows made a kind of natural step by means of which they could
+easily get down.
+
+"Oh, dear! dear! it will not turn over, will it, my dear young man?
+_Ciel_! I am slipping ... Ah, _Dieu, merci_!--Marie, _mon cher enfant_,
+pray be careful not to jump in, or you will upset us all!"
+
+And _ma tante_, somewhat tremulous from the ordeal of embarking, settled
+down in her place, while Mueller lifted Mam'selle Marie into the boat, as
+if she had been a child. I then took the oars, leaving him to steer; and
+so we pursued our way towards Courbevoie.
+
+"Mam'selle has of course seen the fair?" said Mueller, from behind the
+old lady's back.
+
+"No, monsieur,"
+
+"No! Is it possible?"
+
+"There was so much crowd, monsieur, and such a noise ... we were quite
+too much afraid to venture in."
+
+"Would you be afraid, mam'selle, to venture with me?"
+
+"I--I do not know, monsieur."
+
+"Ah, mam'selle, you might be very sure that I would take good care of
+you!"
+
+"_Mais ... monsieur_"...
+
+"These gentlemen, I see, have been angling," said the old lady,
+addressing me very graciously. "Have you caught many fish?"
+
+"None at all, madame!" I replied, loudly.
+
+"_Tiens_! so many as that?"
+
+"_Pardon_, madame," I shouted at the top of my voice. "We have caught
+nothing--nothing at all."
+
+_Ma tante_ smiled blandly.
+
+"Ah, yes," she said; "and you will have them cooked presently for
+dinner, _n'est-ce pas_? There is no fish so fresh, and so well-flavored,
+as the fish of our own catching."
+
+"Will madame and mam'selle do us the honor to taste our fish and share
+our modest dinner?" said Mueller, leaning forward in his seat in the
+stern, and delivering his invitation close into the old lady's ear.
+
+To which _ma tante_, with a readiness of hearing for which no one would
+have given her credit, replied:--
+
+"But--but monsieur is very polite--if we should not be inconveniencing
+these gentlemen"....
+
+"We shall be charmed, madame--we shall be honored!"
+
+"_Eh bien!_ with pleasure, then--Marie, my child, thank the gentlemen
+for their amiable invitation."
+
+I was thunderstruck. I looked at Mueller to see if he had suddenly gone
+out of his senses. Mam'selle Marie, however, was infinitely amused.
+
+"_Fi donc!_ monsieur," she said. "You have no fish. I heard the other
+gentleman say so."
+
+"The other gentleman, mam'selle," replied Mueller, "is an Englishman, and
+troubled with the spleen. You must not mind anything he says."
+
+Troubled with the spleen! I believe myself to be as even-tempered and as
+ready to fall in with a joke as most men; but I should have liked at
+that moment to punch Franz Mueller's head. Gracious heavens! into what a
+position he had now brought us! What was to be done? How were we to get
+out of it? It was now just seven; and we had already been upon the water
+for more than an hour. What should we have to pay for the boat? And when
+we had paid for the boat, how much money should we have left to pay for
+the dinner? Not for our own dinners--ah, no! For _ma tante's_ dinner
+(and _ma tante_ had a hungry eye) and for _la petite_ Marie's dinner;
+and _la petite_ Marie, plump, rosy, and well-liking, looked as if she
+might have a capital appetite upon occasion! Should we have as much as
+two and a half francs? I doubted it. And then, in the absence of a
+miracle, what could we do with two and a half francs, if we had them? A
+miserable sum!--convertible, perhaps, into as much bouilli, bread and
+cheese, and thin country wine as might have satisfied our own hunger in
+a prosaic and commonplace way; but for four persons, two of
+them women!...
+
+And this was not the worst of it. I thought I knew Mueller well enough by
+this time to feel that he would entirely dismiss this minor
+consideration of ways and means; that he would order the dinner as
+recklessly as if we had twenty francs apiece in our pockets; and that he
+would not only order it, but eat it and preside at it with all the
+gayety and audacity in life.
+
+Then would come the horrible retribution of the bill!
+
+I felt myself turn red and hot at the mere thought of it.
+
+Then a dastardly idea insinuated itself into my mind. I had my
+return-ticket in my waistcoat-pocket:--what if I slipped away presently
+to the station and went back to Paris by the next train, leaving my
+clever friend to improvise his way out of his own scrape as best
+he could?
+
+In the meanwhile, as I was rowing with the stream, we soon got back to
+Courbevoie.
+
+"_Are_ you mad?" I said, as, having landed the ladies, Mueller and I
+delivered up the boat to its owner.
+
+"Didn't I admit it, two or three hours ago?" he replied. "I wonder you
+don't get tired, _mon cher_, of asking the same question so often."
+
+"Four francs, fifty centimes, Messieurs," said the boatman, having made
+fast his boat to the landing-place.
+
+"Four francs, fifty centimes!" I echoed, in dismay.
+
+Even Mueller looked aghast.
+
+"My good fellow," he said, "do you take us for coiners?"
+
+"Hire of boat, two francs the hour. These gentlemen have been out
+nearly one hour and a half--three francs. Hire of bait and
+fishing-tackle, one franc fifty. Total, four francs and a half," replied
+the boatman, putting out a great brown palm.
+
+Mueller, who was acting as cashier and paymaster, pulled out his purse,
+deposited one solitary half-franc in the middle of that brown palm, and
+suggested that the boatman and he should toss up for the remaining four
+francs--or race for them--or play for them--or fight for them. The
+boatman, however, indignantly rejected each successive proposal, and,
+being paid at last, retired with a _decrescendo_ of oaths.
+
+"_Tiens_!" said Mueller, reflectively. "We have but one franc left. One
+franc, two sous, and a centime. _Vive la France!_"
+
+"And you have actually asked that wretched old woman and her niece to
+dinner!"
+
+"And I have actually solicited that excellent and admirable woman,
+Madame Marotte, relict of the late lamented Jacques Marotte, umbrella
+maker, of number one hundred and two, Rue du Faubourg St. Denis, and her
+beautiful and accomplished niece, Mademoiselle Marie Charpentier, to
+honor us with their company this evening. _Dis-donc,_ what shall we give
+them for dinner?"
+
+"Precisely what you invited them to, I should guess--the fish we caught
+this afternoon."
+
+"Agreed. And what else?"
+
+"Say--a dish of invisible greens, and a phoenix _a la Marengo_."
+
+"You are funny, _mon cher_."
+
+"Then, for fear I should become too funny--good afternoon."
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"I mean that I have no mind to dine first, and be kicked out of doors
+afterwards. It is one of those aids to digestion that I can willingly
+dispense with."
+
+"But if I guarantee that the dinner shall be paid for--money down!"
+
+"Tra la la!"
+
+"You don't believe me? Well, come and see."
+
+With this, he went up to Madame Marotte, who, with her niece, had sat
+down on a bench under a walnut-tree close by, waiting our pleasure.
+
+"Would not these ladies prefer to rest here, while we seek for a
+suitable restaurant and order the dinner?" said Mueller insinuatingly.
+
+The old lady looked somewhat blank. She was not too tired to go
+on--thought it a pity to bring us all the way back again--would do,
+however, as "_ces messieurs_" pleased; and so was left sitting under the
+walnut-tree, reluctant and disconsolate.
+
+"_Tiens! mon enfant_" I heard her say as we turned away, "suppose they
+don't come back again!"
+
+We had promised to be gone not longer, than twenty minutes, or at most
+half an hour. Mueller led the way straight to the _Toison d' Or_.
+
+I took him by the arm as we neared the gate.
+
+"Steady, steady, _mon gaillard_" I said. "We don't order our dinner, you
+know, till we've found the money to pay for it."
+
+"True--but suppose I go in here to look for it?"
+
+"Into the restaurant garden?"
+
+"Precisely."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI.
+
+THE PETIT COURIER ILLUSTRE.
+
+THE _Toison d' Or_ was but a modest little establishment as regarded the
+house, but it was surrounded on three sides by a good-sized garden
+overlooking the river. Here, in the trellised arbors which lined the
+lawn on either side, those customers who preferred the open air could
+take their dinners, coffees, and absinthes _al fresco_.
+
+The scene when we arrived was at its gayest. There were dinners going on
+in every arbor; waiters running distractedly to and fro with trays and
+bottles; two women, one with a guitar, the other with a tamborine,
+singing under a tree in the middle of the garden; while in the air there
+reigned an exhilarating confusion of sounds and smells impossible
+to describe.
+
+We went in. Mueller paused, looked round, captured a passing waiter, and
+asked for Monsieur le proprietaire. The waiter pointed over his shoulder
+towards the house, and breathlessly rushed on his way.
+
+Mueller at once led the way into a salon on the ground-floor looking over
+the garden.
+
+Here we found ourselves in a large low room containing some thirty or
+forty tables, and fitted up after the universal restaurant pattern, with
+cheap-looking glasses, rows of hooks, and spittoons in due number. The
+air was heavy with the combined smells of many dinners, and noisy with
+the clatter of many tongues. Behind the fruits, cigars, and liqueur
+bottles that decorated the _comptoir_ sat a plump, black-eyed little
+woman in a gorgeous cap and a red silk dress. This lady welcomed us with
+a bewitching smile and a gracious inclination of the head.
+
+"_Ces messieurs_," she said, "will find a vacant table yonder, by the
+window."
+
+Mueller bowed majestically.
+
+"Madame," he said, "I wish to see Monsieur le proprietaire."
+
+The dame de comptoir looked very uneasy.
+
+"If Monsieur has any complaint to make," she said, "he can make it to
+me."
+
+"Madame, I have none."
+
+"Or if it has reference to the ordering of a dinner...."
+
+Mueller smiled loftily.
+
+"Dinner, Madame," he said, with a disdainful gesture, "is but one of the
+accidents common to humanity. A trifle! A trifle always
+humiliating--sometimes inconvenient--occasionally impossible. No,
+Madame, mine is a serious mission; a mission of the highest importance,
+both socially and commercially. May I beg that you will have the
+goodness to place my card in the hands of Monsieur le proprietaire, and
+say that I request the honor of five minutes' interview."
+
+The little woman's eyes had all this time been getting rounder and
+blacker. She was evidently confounded by my friend's grandiloquence.
+
+"_Ah! mon Dieu! M'sieur_," she said, nervously, "my husband is in the
+kitchen. It is a busy day with us, you understand--but I will send
+for him."
+
+And she forthwith despatched a waiter for "Monsieur Choucru."
+
+Mueller seized me by the arm.
+
+"Heavens!" he exclaimed, in a very audible aside, "did you hear? She is
+his wife! She is Madame Choucru?"
+
+"Well, and what of that?"
+
+"What of that, indeed? _Mais, mon ami_, how can you ask the question?
+Have you no eyes? Look at her! Such a remarkably handsome woman--such a
+_tournure_--such eyes--such a figure for an illustration! Only conceive
+the effect of Madame Choucru--in medallion!"
+
+"Oh, magnificent!" I replied. "Magnificent--in medallion."
+
+But I could not, for the life of me, imagine what he was driving at.
+
+"And it would make the fortune of the _Toison d'Or_" he added, solemnly.
+
+To which I replied that it would undoubtedly do so.
+
+Monsieur Choucru now came upon the scene; a short, rosy, round-faced
+little man in a white flat cap and bibbed apron--like an elderly cherub
+that had taken to cookery. He hung back upon the threshold, wiping his
+forehead, and evidently unwilling to show himself in his shirt-sleeves.
+
+"Here, _mon bon_," cried Madame, who was by this time crimson with
+gratified vanity, and in a fever of curiosity; "this way--the gentleman
+is waiting to speak to you!"
+
+Monsieur, the cook and proprietor, shuffled his feet to and fro in the
+doorway, but came no nearer.
+
+"_Parbleu_!" he said, "if M'sieur's business is not urgent."
+
+"It is extremely urgent, Monsieur Choucru," replied Mueller; "and,
+moreover, it is not so much my business as it is yours,"
+
+"Ah bah! if it is my business, then, it may stand over till to-morrow,"
+replied the little man, impatiently. "To-day I have eighty dinners on
+hand, and with M'sieur's permission"....
+
+But Mueller strode to the door and caught him by the shoulder.
+
+"No, Monsieur Choucru," he said sternly, "I will not let you ruin
+yourself by putting off till to-morrow what can only be done to-day. I
+have come here, Monsieur Choucru, to offer you fame. Fame and fortune,
+Monsieur Choucru!--and I will not suffer you, for the sake of a few
+miserable dinners, to turn your back upon the most brilliant moment of
+your life!"
+
+"_Mais, M'sieur_--explain yourself" ... stammered the proprietaire.
+
+"You know who I am, Monsieur Choucru?"
+
+"No, M'sieur--not in the least."
+
+"I am Mueller--Franz Mueller--landscape painter, portrait painter,
+historical painter, caricaturist, artist _en chef_ to the _Petit Courier
+Illustre_"
+
+"_Hein! M'sieur est peintre_!"
+
+"Yes, Monsieur Choucru--and I offer you my protection."
+
+Monsieur Choucru scratched his ear, and smiled doubtfully.
+
+"Now listen, Monsieur Choucru--I am here to-day in the interests of the
+_Petit Courier Illustre_. I take the Courbevoie fete for my subject. I
+sketch the river, the village, the principal features of the-scene; and
+on Saturday my designs are in the hands of all Paris. Do you
+understand me?"
+
+"I understand that M'sieur is all this time talking to me of his own
+business, while mine, _la bas_, is standing still!" exclaimed the
+proprietaire, in an agony of impatience. "I have the honor to wish
+M'sieur good-day."
+
+But Mueller seized him again, and would not let him escape.
+
+"Not so fast, Monsieur Choucru," he said; "not so fast! Will you answer
+me one question before you go?"
+
+"_Eh, mon Dieu_! Monsieur."
+
+"Will you tell me, Monsieur Choucru, what is to prevent me from giving
+a view of the best restaurant in Courbevoie?"
+
+Madame Choucru, from behind the _comptoir_, uttered a little scream.
+
+"A design in the _Petit Courier Illustre_, I need scarcely tell you,"
+pursued Mueller, with indescribable pomposity, "is in itself sufficient
+to make the fortune not only of an establishment, but of a neighborhood.
+I am about to make Courbevoie the fashion. The sun of Asnieres, of
+Montmorency, of Enghien has set--the sun of Courbevoie is about to rise.
+My sketches will produce an unheard-of effect. All Paris will throng to
+your fetes next Sunday and Monday--all Paris, with its inexhaustible
+appetite for _bifteck aux pommes frites_--all Paris with its
+unquenchable thirst for absinthe and Bavarian beer! Now, Monsieur
+Choucru, do you begin to understand me?"
+
+"_Mais_, Monsieur, I--I think...."
+
+"You think you do, Monsieur Choucru? Very good. Then will you please to
+answer me one more question. What is to prevent me from conferring fame,
+fortune, and other benefits too numerous to mention on your excellent
+neighbor at the corner of the Place--Monsieur Coquille of the Restaurant
+_Croix de Malte_?"
+
+Monsieur Choucru scratched his ear again, stared helplessly at his wife,
+and said nothing. Madame looked grave.
+
+"Are we to treat this matter on the footing of a business transaction,
+Monsieur!" she asked, somewhat sharply. "Because, if so, let Monsieur at
+once name his price for me...."
+
+"'PRICE,' Madame!" interrupted Mueller, with a start of horror. "Gracious
+powers! this to me--to Franz Mueller of the _Petit Courier Illustre_!
+'No, Madame--you mistake me--you wound me--you touch the honor of the
+Fine Arts! Madame, I am incapable of selling my patronage."
+
+Madame clasped her hands; raised her voice; rolled her black eyes; did
+everything but burst into tears. She was shocked to have offended
+Monsieur! She was profoundly desolated! She implored a thousand pardons!
+And then, like a true French-woman of business, she brought back the
+conversation to the one important point:--since money was not in
+question, upon what consideration would Monsieur accord his preference
+to the _Toison d' Or_ instead of to the _Croix de Malte_?
+
+Mueller bowed, laid his hand upon his heart, and said:--
+
+"I will do it, _pour les beaux yeux de Madame_."
+
+And then, in graceful recognition of the little man's rights as owner of
+the eyes in question, he bowed to Monsieur Choucru.
+
+Madame was inexpressibly charmed. Monsieur smiled, fidgeted, and cast
+longing glances towards the door.
+
+"I have eighty dinners on hand," he began again, "and if M'sieur will
+excuse me...."
+
+"One moment more, my dear Monsieur Choucru," said Mueller, slipping his
+hand affectionately through the little man's arm. "For myself, as I have
+already told you, I can accept nothing--but I am bound in honor not to
+neglect the interests of the journal I represent. You will of course
+wish to express your sense of the compliment paid to your house by
+adding your name to the subscription list of the _Petit Courier
+Illustre_?"
+
+"Oh, by--by all means--with pleasure," faltered the proprietaire.
+
+"For how many copies, Monsieur Choucru? Shall we say--six?"
+
+Monsieur looked at Madame. Madame nodded. Mueller took out his
+pocket-book, and waited, pencil in hand.
+
+"Eh--_parbleu_!--let it be for six, then," said Monsieur Choucru,
+somewhat reluctantly.
+
+Mueller made the entry, shut up the pocket-book, and shook hands
+boisterously with his victim.
+
+"My dear Monsieur Choucru," he said, "I cannot tell you how gratifying
+this is to my feelings, or with what disinterested satisfaction I shall
+make your establishment known to the Parisian public. You shall be
+immortalized, my dear fellow--positively immortalized!"
+
+"_Bien oblige, M'sieur--bien oblige_. Will you not let my wife offer you
+a glass of liqueure?"
+
+"Liqueure, _mon cher_!" exclaimed Mueller, with an outburst of frank
+cordiality--"hang liqueure!--WE'LL DINE WITH YOU!"
+
+"Monsieur shall be heartily welcome to the best dinner the _Toison d'Or_
+can send up; and his friend also," said Madame, with her sweetest smile.
+
+"Ah, Madame!"
+
+"And M'sieur Choucru shall make you one of his famous cheese souffles.
+_Tiens, mon bon_, go down and prepare a cheese souffle for two."
+
+Mueller smote his forehead distractedly.
+
+"For two!" he cried. "Heavens! I had forgotten my aunt and my cousin!"
+
+Madame looked up inquiringly.
+
+"Monsieur has forgotten something?"
+
+"Two somethings, Madame--two somebodies! My aunt--my excellent and
+admirable maternal aunt,--and my cousin. We left them sitting under a
+tree by the river-side, more than half an hour ago. But the fault,
+Madame, is yours."
+
+"How, Monsieur?"
+
+"Yes; for in your charming society I forget the ties of family and the
+laws of politeness. But I hasten to fetch my forgotten relatives. With
+what pleasure they will share your amiable hospitality! _Au revoir_,
+Madame. In ten minutes we shall be with you again!"
+
+Madame Choucru looked grave. She had not bargained to entertain a party
+of four; yet she dared not disoblige the _Petit Courier Illustre_. She
+had no time, however, to demur to the arrangement; for Mueller,
+ingeniously taking her acquiescence for granted, darted out of the room
+without waiting for an answer.
+
+"Miserable man!" I exclaimed, as soon as we were outside the doors,
+"what will you do now?"
+
+"Do! Why, fetch my admirable maternal aunt and my interesting cousin, to
+be sure."
+
+"But you have raised a dinner under false pretences!"
+
+"I, _mon cher_? Not a bit of it."
+
+"Have you, then, really anything to do with the _Petit Courier
+Illustre_?"
+
+"The Editor of the _Petit Courier Illustre_ is one of the best fellows
+in the world, and occasionally (when my pockets represent that vacuum
+which Nature very properly abhors) he advances me a couple of Napoleons.
+I wipe out the score from time to time by furnishing a design for the
+paper. Now to-day, you see, I'm in luck. I shall pay off two obligations
+at once--to say nothing of Monsieur Choucru's six-fold subscription to
+the P.C., on which the publishers will allow me a douceur of thirty
+francs. Now, confess that I'm a man of genius!"
+
+In less than a quarter of an hour we were all four established round one
+of Madame Choucru's comfortable little dining-tables, in a snug recess
+at the farthest end of the salon. Here, being well out of reach of our
+hostess's black eyes, Mueller assumed all the airs of a liberal
+entertainer. He hung up _ma cousine's_ bonnet; fetched a footstool for
+_ma tante_; criticised the sauces; presided over the wine; cut jokes
+with the waiter; and pretended to have ordered every dish beforehand.
+The stewed kidneys with mushrooms were provided especially for Madame
+Marotte; the fricandeau was selected in honor of Mam'selle Marie (had he
+not an innate presentiment that she loved fricandeau?); and as for the
+soles _au gratin_, he swore, in defiance of probability and all the laws
+of nature, that they were the very fish we had just caught in the Seine.
+By-and-by came Monsieur Choucru's famous cheese _souffle_; and then,
+with a dish of fruit, four cups of coffee, and four glasses of liqueure,
+the banquet came to an end.
+
+As we sat at desert, Mueller pulled out his book and pencilled a rapid
+but flattering sketch of the dining-room interior, developing a
+perspective as long as the Rue de Rivoli, and a _mobilier_ at least
+equal in splendor to that of the _Trois Freres_.
+
+At sight of this _chef d'oeuvre_, Madame Choucru was moved almost to
+tears. Ah, Heaven! if Monsieur could only figure to himself her
+admiration for his _beau talent_! But alas! that was impossible--as
+impossible as that Monsieur Choucru should ever repay this unheard-of
+obligation!
+
+Mueller laid his hand upon his heart, and bowed profoundly.
+
+"Ah! Madame," he said, "it is not to Monsieur Choucru that I look for
+repayment--it is to you."
+
+"To me, Monsieur? _Dieu merci! Monsieur se moque de moi_!"
+
+And the Dame de Comptoir, intrenched behind her fruits and liqueure
+bottles, shot a Parthian glance from under her black eye-lashes, and
+made believe to blush.
+
+"Yes, Madame, to you. I only ask permission to come again very soon, for
+the purpose of executing a little portrait of Madame--a little portrait
+which, alas! _must_ fail to render adequate justice to such a multitude
+of charms."
+
+And with this choice compliment, Mueller bowed again, took his leave,
+bestowed a whole franc upon the astonished waiter, and departed from the
+_Toison d'Or_ in an atmosphere of glory.
+
+The fair, or rather that part of the fair where the dancers and diners
+most did congregate, was all ablaze with lights, and noisy with brass
+bands as we came out. _Ma tante_, who was somewhat tired, and had been
+dozing for the last half hour over her coffee and liqueure, was
+impatient to get back to Paris. The fair Marie, who was not tired at
+all, confessed that she should enjoy a waltz above everything. While
+Mueller, who professed to be an animated time-table, swore that we were
+just too late for the ten minutes past ten train, and that there would
+be no other before eleven forty-five. So Madame Marotte was carried off,
+_bon gre, mal gre_, to a dancing-booth, where gentlemen were admitted on
+payment of forty centimes per head, and ladies went in free.
+
+Here, despite the noise, the dust, the braying of an abominable band,
+the overwhelming smell of lamp-oil, and the clatter, not only of heavy
+walking-boots, but even of several pairs of sabots upon an uneven floor
+of loosely-joined planks--_ma tante_, being disposed of in a safe
+corner, went soundly to sleep.
+
+It was a large booth, somewhat over-full; and the company consisted
+mainly of Parisian blue blouses, little foot-soldiers, grisettes (for
+there were grisettes in those days, and plenty of them), with a
+sprinkling of farm-boys and dairy-maids from the villages round about.
+We found this select society caracoling round the booth in a thundering
+galop, on first going in. After the galop, the conductor announced a
+_valse a deux temps_. The band struck up--one--two--three. Away went
+some thirty couples--away went Mueller and the fair Marie--and away went
+the chronicler of this modest biography with a pretty little girl in
+green boots who waltzed remarkably well, and who deserted him in the
+middle of the dance for a hideous little French soldier about four feet
+and a half high.
+
+After this rebuff (having learned, notwithstanding my friend's
+representations to the contrary, that a train ran from Courbevoie to
+Paris every half-hour up till midnight) I slipped away, leaving Mueller
+and _ma cousine_ in the midst of a furious flirtation, and Madame
+Marotte fast asleep in her corner.
+
+The clocks were just striking twelve as I passed under the archway
+leading to the Cite Bergere.
+
+"_Tiens_!" said the fat concierge, as she gave me my key and my candle.
+"Monsieur has perhaps been to the theatre this evening? No!--to the
+country--to the fete at Courbevoie! Ah, then, I'll be sworn that M'sieur
+has had plenty of fun!"
+
+But had I had plenty of fun? That was the question. That Mueller had had
+plenty of flirting and plenty of fun was a fact beyond the reach of
+doubt. But a flirtation, after all, unless in a one-act comedy, is not
+entertaining to the mere looker-on; and oh! must not those bridesmaids
+who sometimes accompany a happy couple in their wedding-tour, have a
+dreary time of it?
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII.
+
+THE ECOLE DE NATATION.
+
+It seemed to me that I had but just closed my eyes, when I was waked by
+a hand upon my shoulder, and a voice calling me by my name. I started up
+to find the early sunshine pouring in at the window, and Franz Mueller
+standing by my bedside.
+
+"_Tiens_!" said he. "How lovely are the slumbers of innocence! I was
+hesitating, _mon cher_, whether to wake or sketch you."
+
+I muttered something between a growl and a yawn, to the effect that I
+should have been better satisfied if he had left me alone.
+
+"You prefer everything that is basely self-indulgent, young man,"
+replied Mueller, making a divan of my bed, and coolly lighting his pipe
+under my very nose. "Contrary to all the laws of _bon-camaraderie_, you
+stole away last night, leaving your unprotected friend in the hands of
+the enemy. And for what?--for the sake of a few hours' ignominious
+oblivion! Look at me--I have not been to bed all night, and I am as
+lively as a lobster in a lobster-pot."
+
+"How did you get home?" I asked, rubbing my eyes; "and when?"
+
+"I have not got home at all yet," replied my visitor. "I have come to
+breakfast with you first."
+
+Just at this moment, the _pendule_ in the adjoining room struck six.
+
+"To breakfast!" I repeated. "At this hour?--you who never breakfast
+before midday!"
+
+"True, _mon cher_; but then you see there are reasons. In the first
+place, we danced a little too long, and missed the last train, so I was
+obliged to bring the dear creatures back to Paris in a fiacre. In the
+second place, the driver was drunk, and the horse was groggy, and the
+fiacre was in the last stage of dilapidation. The powers below only know
+how many hours we were on the road; for we all fell asleep, driver
+included, and never woke till we found ourselves at the Barriere de
+l'Etoile at the dawn of day."
+
+"Then what have you done with Madame Marotte and Mademoiselle Marie?"
+
+"Deposited them at their own door in the Rue du Faubourg St. Denis, as
+was the bounden duty of a _preux chevalier_. But then, _mon cher_, I had
+no money; and having no money, I couldn't pay for the fiacre; so I drove
+on here--and here I am--and number One Thousand and Eleven is now at the
+door, waiting to be paid."
+
+"The deuce he is!"
+
+"So you see, sad as it was to disturb the slumbers of innocence, I
+couldn't possibly let you go on sleeping at the rate of two francs
+an hour."
+
+"And what is the rate at which you have waked me?"
+
+"Sixteen francs the fare, and something for the driver--say twenty in
+all."
+
+"Then, my dear fellow, just open my desk and take one of the two
+Napoleons you will see lying inside, and dismiss number One Thousand and
+Eleven without loss of time; and then...."
+
+"A thousand thanks! And then what?"
+
+"Will you accept a word of sound advice?"
+
+"Depends on whether it's pleasant to follow, _caro mio_"
+
+"Go home; get three or four hours' rest; and meet me in the Palais Royal
+about twelve for breakfast."
+
+"In order that you may turn round and go to sleep again in comfort? No,
+young man, I will do nothing of the kind. You shall get up, instead, and
+we'll go down to Molino's."
+
+"To Molino's?"
+
+"Yes--don't you know Molino's--the large swimming-school by the Pont
+Neuf. It's a glorious morning for a plunge in the Seine."
+
+A plunge in the Seine! Now, given a warm bed, a chilly autumn morning,
+and a decided inclination to quote the words of the sluggard, and
+"slumber again," could any proposition be more inopportune, savage, and
+alarming? I shuddered; I protested; I resisted; but in vain.
+
+"I shall be up again in less time than it will take you to tell your
+beads, _mon gaillard_" said Mueller the ferocious, as, having captured my
+Napoleon, he prepared to go down and liquidate with number One Thousand
+and Eleven. "And it's of no use to bolt me out, because I shall hammer
+away till you let me in, and that will wake your fellow-lodgers. So let
+me find you up, and ready for the fray."
+
+And then, execrating Mueller, and Molino, and Molino's bath, and Molino's
+customers, and all Molino's ancestors from the period of the deluge
+downwards, I reluctantly complied.
+
+The air was brisk, the sky cloudless, the sun coldly bright; and the
+city wore that strange, breathless, magical look so peculiar to Paris at
+early morning. The shops were closed; the pavements deserted; the busy
+thoroughfares silent as the avenues of Pere la Chaise. Yet how different
+from the early stillness of London! London, before the world is up and
+stirring, looks dead, and sullen, and melancholy; but Paris lies all
+beautiful, and bright, and mysterious, with a look as of dawning smiles
+upon her face; and we know that she will wake presently, like the
+Sleeping Beauty, to sudden joyousness and activity.
+
+Our road lay for a little way along the Boulevards, then down the Rue
+Vivienne, and through the Palais Royal to the quays; but long ere we
+came within sight of the river this magical calm had begun to break up.
+The shop-boys in the Palais Royal were already taking down the
+shutters--the great book-stall at the end of the Galerie Vitree showed
+signs of wakefulness; and in the Place du Louvre there was already a
+detachment of brisk little foot-soldiers at drill. By the time we had
+reached the open line of the quays, the first omnibuses were on the
+road; the water-carriers were driving their carts and blowing their
+shrill little bugles; the washer-women, hard at work in their gay,
+oriental-looking floating kiosques, were hammering away, mallet in hand,
+and chattering like millions of magpies; and the early matin-bell was
+ringing to prayers as we passed the doors of St. Germain L'Auxerrois.
+
+And now we were skirting the Quai de l'Ecole, looking down upon the bath
+known in those days as Molino's--a hugh, floating quadrangular
+structure, surrounded by trellised arcades and rows of dressing-rooms,
+with a divan, a cafe restaurant, and a permanent corps of cooks and
+hair-dressers on the establishment. For your true Parisian has ever been
+wedded to his Seine, as the Venetian to his Adriatic; and the Ecole de
+Natation was then, as now, a lounge, a reading-room, an adjunct of the
+clubs, and one of the great institutions of the capital.
+
+Some bathers, earlier than ourselves, were already sauntering about the
+galleries in every variety of undress, from the simple _calecon_ to the
+gaudiest version of Turkish robe and Algerian _kepi_. Some were smoking;
+some reading the morning papers; some chatting in little knots; but as
+yet, with the exception of two or three school-boys (called, in the
+_argot_ of the bath, _moutards_), there were no swimmers in the water.
+
+With some of these loungers Mueller exchanged a nod or a few words as we
+passed along the platform; but shook hands cordially with a bronzed,
+stalwart man, dressed like a Venetian gondolier in the frontispiece to a
+popular ballad, with white trousers, blue jacket, anchor buttons, red
+sash, gold ear-rings, and great silver buckles in his shoes. Mueller
+introduced this romantic-looking person to me as "Monsieur Barbet."
+
+"My friend, Monsieur Barbet," said he, "is the prince of
+swimming-masters. He is more at home in the water than on land, and
+knows more about swimming than a fish. He will calculate you the
+specific gravity of the heaviest German metaphysician at a glance, and
+is capable of floating even the works of Monsieur Thiers, if put to
+the test."
+
+"Monsieur can swim?" said the master, addressing me, with a nautical
+scrape.
+
+"I think so," I replied.
+
+"Many gentlemen think so," said Monsieur Barbet, "till they find
+themselves in the water."
+
+"And many who wish to be thought accomplished swimmers never venture
+into it on that account," added Mueller. "You would scarcely suppose," he
+continued, turning to me, "that there are men here--regular _habitues_
+of the bath--who never go into the water, and yet give themselves all
+the airs of practised bathers. That tall man, for instance, with the
+black beard and striped _peignoir_, yonder--there's a fellow who comes
+once or twice a week all through the season, goes through the ceremony
+of undressing, smokes, gossips, criticises, is looked up to as an
+authority, and has never yet been seen off the platform. Then there's
+that bald man in the white robe--his name's Giroflet--a retired
+stockbroker. Well, that fellow robes himself like an ancient Roman, puts
+himself in classical attitudes, affects taciturnity, models himself upon
+Brutus, and all that sort of thing; but is as careful not to get his
+feet wet as a cat. Others, again, come simply to feed. The restaurant is
+one of the choicest in Paris, with this advantage over Vefour or the
+Trois Freres, that it is the only place where you may eat and drink of
+the best in hot weather, with nothing on but the briefest of _calecons_"
+
+Thus chattering, Mueller took me the tour of the bath, which now began to
+fill rapidly. We then took possession of two little dressing-rooms no
+bigger than sentry-boxes, and were presently in the water.
+
+The scene now became very animated. Hundreds of eccentric figures
+crowded the galleries--some absurdly fat, some ludicrously thin; some
+old, some young; some bow-legged, some knock-kneed; some short, some
+tall; some brown, some yellow; some got up for effect in gorgeous
+wrappers; and all more or less hideous.
+
+"An amusing sight, isn't it?" said Mueller, as, having swum several times
+round the bath, we sat down for a few moments on one of the flights of
+steps leading down to the water.
+
+"It is a sight to disgust one for ever with human-kind," I replied.
+
+"And to fill one with the profoundest respect for one's tailor. After
+all, it's broad-cloth makes the man."
+
+"But these are not men--they are caricatures."
+
+"Every man is a caricature of himself when you strip him," said Mueller,
+epigrammatically. "Look at that scarecrow just opposite. He passes for
+an Adonis, _de par le monde_."
+
+I looked and recognised the Count de Rivarol, a tall young man, an
+_elegant_ of the first water, a curled darling of society, a professed
+lady-killer, whom I had met many a time in attendance on Madame de
+Marignan. He now looked like a monkey:--
+
+     .... "long, and lank and brown,
+     As in the ribb'd sea sand!"
+
+"Gracious heavens!" I exclaimed, "what would become of the world, if
+clothes went out of fashion?"
+
+"Humph!--one half of us, my dear fellow, would commit suicide."
+
+At the upper end of the bath was a semicircular platform somewhat
+loftier than the rest, called the Amphitheatre. This, I learned, was the
+place of honor. Here clustered the _elite_ of the swimmers; here they
+discussed the great principles of their art, and passed judgment on the
+performances of those less skilful than themselves. To the right of the
+Amphitheatre rose a slender spiral staircase, like an openwork pillar of
+iron, with a tiny circular platform on the top, half surrounded by a
+light iron rail. This conspicuous perch, like the pillar of St. Simeon
+Stylites, was every now and then surmounted by the gaunt figure of some
+ambitious plunger who, after attitudinizing awhile in the pose of
+Napoleon on the column Vendome, would join his hands above his head and
+take a tremendous "header" into the gulf below. When this feat was
+successfully performed, the _elite_ in the Amphitheatre applauded
+graciously.
+
+And now, what with swimming, and lounging, and looking on, some two
+hours had slipped by, and we were both hungry and tired, Mueller proposed
+that we should breakfast at the Cafe Procope.
+
+"But why not here?" I asked, as a delicious breeze from the buffet came
+wafting by "like a steam of rich distilled perfumes."
+
+"Because a breakfast _chez_ Molino costs at least twenty-five francs
+per head--BECAUSE I have credit at Procope--BECAUSE I have not a _sou_
+in my pocket--and BECAUSE, milord Smithfield, I aspire to the honor of
+entertaining your lordship on the present occasion!" replied Mueller,
+punctuating each clause of his sentence with a bow.
+
+If Mueller had not a _sou_, I, at all events, had now only one Napoleon;
+so the Cafe Procope carried the day.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII.
+
+THE RUE DE L'ANCIENNE COMEDIE AND THE CAFE PROCOPE.
+
+The Rue des Fosses-Saint-Germain-des-Pres and the Rue de
+l'Ancienne Comedie are one and the same. As the Rue des
+Fosses-Saint-Germain-des-Pres, it dates back to somewhere about the
+reign of Philippe Auguste; and as the Rue de l'Ancienne Comedie it takes
+its name and fame from the year 1689, when the old Theatre Francais was
+opened on the 18th of April by the company known as Moliere's
+troupe--Moliere being then dead, and Lully having succeeded him at the
+Theatre du Palais Royal.
+
+In the same year, 1689, one Francois Procope, a Sicilian, conceived the
+happy idea of hiring a house just opposite the new theatre, and there
+opening a public refreshment-room, which at once became famous, not only
+for the excellence of its coffee (then newly introduced into France),
+but also for being the favorite resort of all the wits, dramatists, and
+beaux of that brilliant time. Here the latest epigrams were circulated,
+the newest scandals discussed, the bitterest literary cabals set on
+foot. Here Jean Jacques brooded over his chocolate; and Voltaire drank
+his mixed with coffee; and Dorat wrote his love-letters to Mademoiselle
+Saunier; and Marmontel wrote praises of Mademoiselle Clairon; and the
+Marquis de Bievre made puns innumerable; and Duclos and Mercier wrote
+satires, now almost forgotten; and Piron recited those verses which are
+at once his shame and his fame; and the Chevalier de St. Georges gave
+fencing lessons to his literary friends; and Lamothe, Freron,
+D'Alembert, Diderot, Helvetius, and all that wonderful company of wits,
+philosophers, encyclopaedists, and poets, that lit up as with a dying
+glory the last decades of the old _regime_, met daily, nightly, to
+write, to recite, to squabble, to lampoon, and some times to fight.
+
+The year 1770 beheld, in the closing of the Theatre
+Francais, the extinction of a great power in the Rue des
+Fosses-Saint-Germain-des-Pres--for it was not, in fact, till the theatre
+was no more a theatre that the street changed its name, and became the
+Rue de L'Ancienne Comedie. A new house (to be on first opening invested
+with the time-honored title of Theatre Francais, but afterwards to be
+known as the Odeon) was now in progress of erection in the close
+neighborhood of the Luxembourg. The actors, meanwhile, repaired to the
+little theatre of the Tuilleries. At length, in 1782,[2] the Rue de
+L'Ancienne Comedie was one evening awakened from its two years' lethargy
+by the echo of many footfalls, the glare of many flambeaux, and the
+rattle of many wheels; for all Paris, all the wits and critics of the
+Cafe Procope, all the fair shepherdesses and all the beaux seigneurs of
+the court of Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI., were hastening on foot, in
+chairs, and in chariots, to the opening of the new house and the
+performance of a new play! And what a play! Surely, not to consider it
+too curiously, a play which struck, however sportively, the key-note of
+the coming Revolution;--a play which, for the first time, displayed
+society literally in a state of _bouleversement_;--a play in which the
+greed of the courtier, the venality of the judge, the empty glitter of
+the crown, were openly held up to scorn;--a play in which all the wit,
+audacity, and success are on the side of the _canaille_;--a play in
+which a lady's-maid is the heroine, and a valet canes his master, and a
+great nobleman is tricked, outwitted, and covered with ridicule!
+
+[2] 1782 is the date given by M. Hippolyte Lucas. Sainte-Beuve places it
+two years later.
+
+This play, produced for the first time under the title of _La Folle
+Journee_, was written by one Caron de Beaumarchais--a man of wit, a man
+of letters, a man of the people, a man of nothing--and was destined to
+achieve immortality under its later title of _Le Mariage de Figaro_.
+
+A few years later, and the Rue de l'Ancienne Comedie echoed daily and
+nightly to the dull rumble of Revolutionary tumbrils, and the heavy
+tramp of Revolutionary mobs. Danton and Camille Desmoulins must have
+passed through it habitually on their way to the Revolutionary Tribunal.
+Charlotte Corday (and this is a matter of history) did pass through it
+that bright July evening, 1793, on her way to a certain gloomy house
+still to be seen in the adjoining Rue de l'Ecole de Medecine, where she
+stabbed Marat in his bath.
+
+But throughout every vicissitude of time and politics, though fashion
+deserted the Rue de l'Ancienne Comedie, and actors migrated, and fresh
+generations of wits and philosophers succeeded each other, the Cafe
+Procope still held its ground and maintained its ancient reputation. The
+theatre (closed in less than a century) became the studio first of Gros
+and then of Gerard, and was finally occupied by a succession of
+restaurateurs but the Cafe Procope remained the Cafe Procope, and is the
+Cafe Procope to this day.
+
+The old street and all belonging to it--especially and peculiarly the
+Cafe Procope---was of the choicest Quartier Latin flavor in the time of
+which I write; in the pleasant, careless, impecunious days of my youth.
+A cheap and highly popular restaurateur named Pinson rented the old
+theatre. A _costumier_ hung out wigs, and masks, and debardeur garments
+next door to the restaurateur. Where the fatal tumbril used to labor
+past, the frequent omnibus now rattled gayly by; and the pavements
+trodden of old by Voltaire, and Beaumarchais, and Charlotte Corday, were
+thronged by a merry tide of students and grisettes. Meanwhile the Cafe
+Procope, though no longer the resort of great wits and famous
+philosophers, received within its hospitable doors, and nourished with
+its indifferent refreshments, many a now celebrated author, painter,
+barrister, and statesman. It was the general rendezvous for students of
+all kinds--poets of the Ecole de Droit, philosophers of the Ecole de
+Medecine, critics of the Ecole des Beaux Arts. It must however be
+admitted that the poetry and criticism of these future great men was
+somewhat too liberally perfumed with tobacco, and that into their
+systems of philosophy there entered a considerable element of grisette.
+
+Such, at the time of my first introduction to it, was the famous Cafe
+Procope.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIX.
+
+THE PHILOSOPHY OF BREAKFAST.
+
+"Now this, _mon cher_," said Mueller, taking off his hat with a flourish
+to the young lady at the _comptoir_, "is the immortal Cafe Procope."
+
+I looked round, and found myself in a dingy, ordinary sort of Cafe, in
+no wise differing from any other dingy, ordinary sort of Cafe in that
+part of Paris. The decorations were ugly enough to be modern. The
+ceiling was as black with gas-fumes and tobacco smoke as any other
+ceiling in any other estaminet in the Quartier Latin. The waiters looked
+as waiters always look before midday--sleepy, discontented, and
+unwashed. A few young men of the regular student type were scattered
+about here and there at various tables, reading, smoking, chatting,
+breakfasting, and reading the morning papers. In an alcove at the upper
+end of the second room (for there were two, one opening from the other)
+stood a blackened, broken-nosed, plaster bust of Voltaire, upon the
+summit of whose august wig some irreverent customer had perched a
+particularly rakish-looking hat. Just in front of this alcove and below
+the bust stood a marble-topped table, at one end of which two young men
+were playing dominoes to the accompaniment of the matutinal absinthe.
+
+"And this," said Mueller, with another flourish, "is the still more
+immortal table of the still more supremely immortal Voltaire. Here he
+was wont to rest his sublime elbows and sip his _demi-tasse_. Here, upon
+this very table, he wrote that famous letter to Marie Antoinette that
+Freron stole, and in revenge for which he wrote the comedy called
+_l'Ecossaise_; but of this admirable satire you English, who only know
+Voltaire in his Henriade and his history of Charles the Twelfth, have
+probably never heard till this moment! _Eh bien_! I'm not much wiser
+than you--so never mind. I'll be hanged if I've ever read a line of it.
+Anyhow, here is the table, and at this other end of it we'll have our
+breakfast."
+
+It was a large, old-fashioned, Louis Quatorze piece of furniture, the
+top of which, formed from a single slab of some kind of gray and yellow
+marble, was stained all over with the coffee, wine, and ink-splashes of
+many generations of customers. It looked as old--nay, older--than the
+house itself.
+
+The young men who were playing at dominoes looked up and nodded, as
+three or four others had done in the outer room when we passed through.
+
+"_Bonjour, l'ami_," said the one who seemed to be winning. "Hast thou
+chanced to see anything of Martial, coming along!"
+
+"I observed a nose defiling round the corner of the Rue de Bussy,"
+replied Mueller, "and it looked as if Martial might be somewhere in the
+far distance, but I didn't wait to see. Are you expecting him?"
+
+"Confound him--yes! We've been waiting more than half an hour."
+
+"If you have invited him to breakfast," said Mueller, "he is sure to
+come."
+
+"On the contrary, he has invited us to breakfast."
+
+"Ah, that alters the case," said Mueller, philosophically. "Then he is
+sure _not_ to come." "Garcon!"
+
+A bullet-headed, short-jacketed, long-aproned waiter, who looked as if
+he had not been to bed since his early youth, answered the summons,
+
+"M'sieur!"
+
+"What have you that you can especially recommend this morning?"
+
+The waiter, with that nasal volubility peculiar to his race, rapidly ran
+over the whole vegetable and animal creation.
+
+Mueller listened with polite incredulity.
+
+"Nothing else?" said he, when the other stopped, apparently from want of
+breath.
+
+"_Mais oui, M'sieur_!" and, thus stimulated, the waiter, having
+"exhausted worlds and then imagined new," launched forth into a second
+and still more impossible catalogue.
+
+Mueller turned to me.
+
+"The resources of this establishment, you observe," he said, very
+gravely, "are inexhaustible. One might have a Roc's egg a la Sindbad for
+the asking."
+
+The waiter looked puzzled, shuffled his slippered feet, and murmured
+something about "_oeufs sur le plat_."
+
+"Unfortunately, however," continued Mueller, "we are but men--not
+fortresses provisioning for a siege. Antoine, _mon enfant_, we know thee
+to be a fellow of incontestible veracity, and thy list is magnificent;
+but we will be content with a _vol-au-vent_ of fish, a _bifteck aux
+pommes frites_, an _omelette sucree_, and a bottle of thy 1840 Bordeaux
+with the yellow seal. Now vanish!"
+
+The waiter, wearing an expression of intense relief, vanished
+accordingly.
+
+Meanwhile more students had come in, and more kept coming. Hats and caps
+cropped up rapidly wherever there were pegs to hang them on, and the
+talking became fast and furious.
+
+I soon found that everybody knew everybody at the Cafe Procope, and that
+the specialty of the establishment was dominoes--just as the specialty
+of the Cafe de la Regence is chess. There were games going on before
+long at almost every table, and groups of lookers-on gathered about
+those who enjoyed the reputation of being skilful players.
+
+Gradually breakfast after breakfast emerged from some mysterious nether
+world known only to the waiters, and the war of dominoes languished.
+
+"These are all students, of course," I said presently, "and yet, though
+I meet a couple of hundred fellows at our hospital lectures, I don't see
+a face I know."
+
+"You would find some by this time, I dare say, in the other room,"
+replied Mueller. "I brought you in here that you might sit at Voltaire's
+table, and eat your steak under the shadow of Voltaire's bust; but this
+salon is chiefly frequented by law-students--the other by medical and
+art students. Your place, _mon cher_, as well as mine, is in the outer
+sanctuary."
+
+"That infernal Martial!" groaned one of the domino-players at the other
+end of the table. "So ends the seventh game, and here we are still.
+_Parbleu!_ Horace, hasn't that absinthe given you an inconvenient amount
+of appetite?"
+
+"Alas! my friend--don't mention it. And when the absinthe is paid for, I
+haven't a sou."
+
+"My own case precisely. What's to be done?"
+
+"Done!" echoed Horace, pathetically. "Shade of Apicius! inspire
+me...but, no--he's not listening."
+
+"Hold! I have it. We'll make our wills in one another's favor, and die."
+
+"I should prefer to die when the wind is due East, and the moon at the
+full," said Horace, contemplatively.
+
+"True--besides, there is still _la mere_ Gaudissart. Her cutlets are
+tough, but her heart is tender. She would not surely refuse to add one
+more breakfast to the score!"
+
+Horace shook his head with an air of great despondency.
+
+"There was but one Job," said he, "and he has been dead some time. The
+patience of _la mere_ Gaudissart has long since been entirely
+exhausted."
+
+"I am not so sure of that. One might appeal to her feelings, you
+know--have a presentiment of early death--wipe away a tear... Bah! it is
+worth the effort, anyhow."
+
+"It is a forlorn hope, my dear fellow, but, as you say, it is worth the
+effort. _Allons donc!_ to the storming of _la mere_ Gaudissart!"
+
+And with this they pushed aside the dominoes, took down their hats,
+nodded to Mueller, and went out.
+
+"There go two of the brightest fellows and most improvident scamps in
+the whole Quartier," said my companion. "They are both studying for the
+bar; both under age; both younger sons of good families; and both
+destined, if I am not much mistaken, to rise to eminence by-and-by.
+Horace writes for _Figaro_ and the _Petit Journal pour Rire_--Theophile
+does _feuilleton_ work--romances, chit-chat, and political
+squibs--rubbish, of course; but clever rubbish, and wonderful when one
+considers what boys they both are, and what dissipated lives they lead.
+The amount of impecuniosity those fellows get through in the course of a
+term is something inconceivable. They have often only one decent suit
+between them--and sometimes not that. To-day, you see, they are at their
+wits' end for a breakfast. They have run their credit dry at Procope and
+everywhere else, and are gone now to a miserable little den in the Rue
+du Paon, kept by a fat good-natured old soul called _la mere_
+Gaudissart. She will perhaps take compassion on their youth and
+inexperience, and let them have six sous worth of horsebeef soup, stale
+bread, and the day before yesterday's vegetables. Nay, don't look so
+pitiful! We poor devils of the Student Quartier hug our Bohemian life,
+and exalt it above every other. When we have money, we cannot find
+windows enough out of which to fling it--when we have none, we start
+upon _la chasse au diner_, and enjoy the pleasures of the chase. We
+revel in the extremes of fasting and feasting, and scarcely know which
+we prefer."
+
+"I think your friends Horace and Theophile are tolerably clear as to
+which _they_ prefer," I remarked, with a smile.
+
+"Bah! they would die of _ennui_ if they had always enough to eat! Think
+how it sharpens a man's wits if--given the time, the place, and the
+appetite--he has every day to find the credit for his dinners! Show me a
+mathematical problem to compare with it as a popular educator of youth!"
+
+"But for young men of genius, like Horace and Theophile..."
+
+"Make yourself quite easy, _mon cher_. A little privation will do them
+no kind of harm. They belong to that class of whom it has been said that
+'they would borrow money from Harpagon, and find truffles on the raft of
+the Medusa.' But hold! we are at the end of our breakfast. What say you?
+Shall we take our _demi-tasse_ in the next room, among our
+fellow-students of physic and the fine arts?"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXX.
+
+A MAN WITH A HISTORY.
+
+The society of the outer salon differed essentially from the society of
+the inner salon at the Cafe Procope. It was noisier--it was
+shabbier--it was smokier. The conversation in the inner salon was of a
+general character on the whole, and, as one caught sentences of it here
+and there, seemed for the most part to relate to the literature and news
+of the day--to the last important paper in the Revue des Deux Mondes, to
+the new drama at the Odeon, or to the article on foreign politics in the
+_Journal des Debats_. But in the outer salon the talk was to the last
+degree shoppy, and overflowed with the argot of the studios. Some few
+medical students were clustered, it is true, in a corner near the door;
+but they were so outnumbered by the artists at the upper end of the
+room, that these latter seemed to hold complete possession, and behaved
+more like the members of a recognised club than the casual customers of
+a cafe. They talked from table to table. They called the waiters by
+their Christian names. They swaggered up and down the middle of the room
+with their hats on their heads, their hands in their pockets, and their
+pipes in their mouths, as coolly as if it were the broad walk of the
+Luxembourg gardens.
+
+And the appearance of these gentlemen was not less remarkable than their
+deportment. Their hair, their beards, their clothes, were of the wildest
+devising. They seemed one and all to have started from a central idea,
+that central idea being to look as unlike their fellow-men as possible;
+and thence to have diverged into a variety that was nothing short of
+infinite. Each man had evidently modelled himself upon his own ideal,
+and no two ideals were alike. Some were picturesque, some were
+grotesque; and some, it must be admitted, were rather dirty ideals, into
+the realization of which no such paltry considerations as those of soap,
+water, or brushes were permitted to enter.
+
+Here, for instance, were Roundhead crops and flowing locks of Cavalier
+redundancy--steeple-crowned hats, and Roman cloaks draped
+bandit-fashion--moustachios frizzed and brushed up the wrong way in the
+style of Louis XIV.--pointed beards and slouched hats, after the manner
+of Vandyke---patriarchal beards _a la Barbarossa_--open collars, smooth
+chins, and long undulating locks of the Raffaelle type--coats, blouses,
+paletots of inconceivable cut, and all kinds of unusual colors--in a
+word, every eccentricity of clothing, short of fancy costume, in which
+it was practicable for men of the nineteenth century to walk abroad and
+meet the light of day.
+
+We had no sooner entered this salon, taken possession of a vacant table,
+and called for coffee, than my companion was beset by a storm of
+greetings.
+
+"Hola! Mueller, where hast thou been hiding these last few centuries,
+_mon gaillard?_"
+
+"_Tiens!_ Mueller risen from the dead!"
+
+"What news from _la bas,_ old fellow?"
+
+To all which ingenious pleasantries my companion replied in
+kind--introducing me at the same time to two or three of the nearest
+speakers. One of these, a dark young man got up in the style of a
+Byzantine Christ, with straight hair parted down the middle, a
+bifurcated beard, and a bare throat, was called Eugene Droz.
+Another--big, burly, warm-complexioned, with bright open blue eyes,
+curling reddish beard and moustache, slouched hat, black velvet blouse,
+immaculate linen, and an abundance of rings, chains, and ornaments--was
+made up in excellent imitation of the well-known portrait of Rubens.
+This gentleman's name, as I presently learned, was Caesar de Lepany.
+
+When we came in, these two young men, Droz and De Lepany, were
+discussing, in enthusiastic but somewhat unintelligible language, the
+merits of a certain Monsieur Lemonnier, of whom, although till that
+moment ignorant of his name and fame, I at once perceived that he must
+be some celebrated _chef de cuisine_.
+
+"He will never surpass that last thing of his," said the Byzantine
+youth. "Heavens! How smooth it is! How buttery! How pulpy!"
+
+"Ay--and yet with all that lusciousness of quality, he never wants
+piquancy," added De Lepany.
+
+"I think his greens are apt to be a little raw," interposed Mueller,
+taking part in the conversation.
+
+"Raw!" echoed the first speaker, indignantly. "_Eh, mon Dieu!_ What can
+you be thinking of! They are almost too hot!"
+
+"But they were not so always, Eugene," said he of the Rubens make-up,
+with an air of reluctant candor. "It must be admitted that Lemonnier's
+greens used formerly to be a trifle--just a trifle--raw. Evidently
+Monsieur Mueller does not know how much he has taken to warming them up
+of late. Even now, perhaps, his olives are a little cold."
+
+"But then, how juicy his oranges are!" exclaimed young Byzantine.
+
+"True--and when you remember that he never washes--!"
+
+"Ah, _sacredie!_ yes--there is the marvel!"
+
+And Monsieur Eugene Droz held up his hands and eyes with all the
+reverent admiration of a true believer for a particularly dirty dervish.
+
+"Who, in Heaven's name, is this unclean individual who used to like his
+vegetables underdone, and never washes?" whispered I in Mueller's ear.
+
+"What--Lemonnier! You don't mean to say you never heard of Lemonnier?"
+
+"Never, till now. Is he a cook?"
+
+Mueller gave me a dig in the ribs that took my breath away.
+
+"_Goguenard!_" said he. "Lemonnier's an artist--the foremost man of the
+water-color school. But I wouldn't be too funny if I were you. Suppose
+you were to burst your jocular vein--there'd be a catastrophe!"
+
+Meanwhile the conversation of Messieurs Droz and Lepany had taken a
+fresh turn, and attracted a little circle of listeners, among whom I
+observed an eccentric-looking young man with a club-foot, an enormously
+long neck, and a head of short, stiff, dusty hair, like the bristles of
+a blacking-brush.
+
+"Queroulet!" said Lepany, with a contemptuous flourish of his pipe. "Who
+spoke of Queroulet? Bah!--a miserable plodder, destitute of ideality--a
+fellow who paints only what he sees, and sees only what is
+commonplace--a dull, narrow-souled, unimaginative handicraftsman, to
+whom a tree is just a tree; and a man, a man; and a straw, a straw, and
+nothing more!"
+
+"That's a very low-souled view to take of art, no doubt," croaked in a
+grating treble voice the youth with the club-foot; "but if trees and men
+and straws are not exactly trees and men and straws, and are not to be
+represented as trees and men and straws, may I inquire what else they
+are, and how they are to be pictorially treated?"
+
+"They must be ideally treated, Monsieur Valentin," replied Lepany,
+majestically.
+
+"No doubt; but what will they be like when they are ideally treated?
+Will they still, to the vulgar eye, be recognisable for trees and men
+and straws?"
+
+"I should scarcely have supposed that Monsieur Valentin would jest upon
+such a subject as a canon of the art he professes," said Lepany,
+becoming more and more dignified.
+
+"I am not jesting," croaked Monsieur Valentin; "but when I hear men of
+your school talk so much about the Ideal, I (as a realist) always want
+to know what they themselves understand by the phrase."
+
+"Are you asking me for my definition of the Ideal, Monsieur Valentin?"
+
+"Well, if it's not giving you too much trouble--yes."
+
+Lepany, who evidently relished every chance of showing off, fell into a
+picturesque attitude and prepared to hold forth. Valentin winked at one
+or two of his own clique, and lit a cigar.
+
+"You ask me," began Lepany, "to define the Ideal--in other words, to
+define the indefinite, which alas! whether from a metaphysical, a
+philosophical, or an aesthetic point of view, is a task transcending
+immeasurably my circumscribed powers of expression."
+
+"Gracious heavens!" whispered Mueller in my ear. "He must have been
+reared from infancy on words of five syllables!"
+
+"What shall I say?" pursued Lepany. "Shall I say that the Ideal is, as
+it were, the Real distilled and sublimated in the alembic of the
+imagination? Shall I say that the Ideal is an image projected by the
+soul of genius upon the background of the universe? That it is that
+dazzling, that unimaginable, that incommunicable goal towards which the
+suns in their orbits, the stars in their courses, the spheres with all
+their harmonies, have been chaotically tending since time began! Ideal,
+say you? Call it ideal, soul, mind, matter, art, eternity,... what are
+they all but words? What are words but the weak strivings of the
+fettered soul that fain would soar to those empyrean heights where
+Truth, and Art, and Beauty are one and indivisible? Shall I say
+all this..."
+
+"My dear fellow, you have said it already--you needn't say it again,"
+interrupted Valentin.
+
+"Ay; but having said it--having expressed myself, perchance with some
+obscurity...."
+
+"With the obscurity of Erebus!" said, very deliberately, a fat student
+in a blouse.
+
+"Monsieur!" exclaimed De Lepany, measuring the length and breadth of
+the fat student with a glance of withering scorn.
+
+The Byzantine was no less indignant.
+
+"Don't heed them, _mon ami_!" he cried, enthusiastically. "Thy
+definition is sublime-eloquent!"
+
+"Nay," said Valentin, "we concede that Monsieur de Lepany is sublime; we
+recognise with admiration that he is eloquent; but we submit that he is
+wholly unintelligible."
+
+And having delivered this parting shot, the club-footed realist slipped
+his arm through the arm of the fat student, and went off to a distant
+table and a game at dominoes.
+
+Then followed an outburst of offended idealism. His own clique crowded
+round Lepany as the champion of their school. They shook hands with him.
+They embraced him. They fooled him to the top of his bent. Presently,
+being not only as good-natured as he was conceited, but (rare phenomenon
+in the Quartier Latin!) a rich fellow into the bargain, De Lepany called
+for champagne and treated his admirers all around.
+
+In the midst of the chatter and bustle which this incident occasioned, a
+pale, earnest-looking man of about five-and-thirty, coming past our
+table on his way out of the Cafe, touched Mueller on the arm, bent down,
+and said quietly:--
+
+"Mueller, will you do me a favor!"
+
+"A hundred, Monsieur," replied my companion; half rising, and with an
+air of unusual respect and alacrity.
+
+"Thanks, one will be enough. Do you see that man yonder, sitting alone
+in the corner, with his back to the light?"
+
+"I do."
+
+"Good--don't look at him again, for fear of attracting his attention. I
+have been trying for the last half hour to get a sketch of his head, but
+I think he suspected me. Anyhow he moved so often, and so hid his face
+with his hands and the newspaper, that I was completely baffled. Now it
+is a remarkable head--just the head I have been wanting for my Marshal
+Romero--and if, with your rapid pencil and your skill in seizing
+expression, you could manage this for me...."
+
+"I will do my best," said Mueller.
+
+"A thousand thanks. I will go now; for when I am gone he will be off his
+guard. You will find me in the den up to three o'clock. Adieu."
+
+Saying which, the stranger passed on, and went out.
+
+"That's Flandrin!" said Mueller.
+
+"Really?" I said. "Flandrin! And you know him?"
+
+But in truth I only answered thus to cover my own ignorance; for I knew
+little at that time of modern French art, and I had never even heard the
+name of Flandrin before.
+
+"Know him!" echoed Mueller. "I should think so. Why, I worked in his
+studio for nearly two years."
+
+And then he explained to me that this great painter (great even then,
+though as yet appreciated only in certain choice Parisian circles, and
+not known out of France) was at work upon a grand historical subject
+connected with the Spanish persecutions in the Netherlands--the
+execution of Egmont and Horn, in short, in the great square before the
+Hotel de Ville in Brussels.
+
+"But the main point now," said Mueller, "is to get the sketch--and how?
+Confound the fellow! while he keeps his back to the light and his head
+down like that, the thing is impossible. Anyhow I can't do it without an
+accomplice. You must help me."
+
+"I! What can I do?"
+
+"Go and sit near him--speak to him--make him look up--keep him, if
+possible, for a few minutes in conversation--nothing easier."
+
+"Nothing easier, perhaps, if I were you; but, being only myself, few
+things more difficult!"
+
+"Nevertheless, my dear boy, you must try, and at once. Hey
+--presto!--away!"
+
+Placed where we were, the stranger was not likely to have observed us;
+for we had come into the room from behind the corner in which he was
+sitting, and had taken our places at a table which he could not have
+seen without shifting his own position. So, thus peremptorily
+commanded, I rose; slipped quietly back into the inner salon, made a
+pretext of looking at the clock over the door; and came out again, as if
+alone and looking for a vacant seat.
+
+The table at which he had placed himself was very small--only just big
+enough to stand in a corner and hold a plate and a coffee-cup; but it
+was supposed to be large enough for two, and there were evidently two
+chairs belonging to it. On one of these, being alone, the stranger had
+placed his overcoat and a small black bag. I at once saw and seized my
+opportunity.
+
+"Pardon, Monsieur," I said, very civilly, "will you permit me to hang
+these things up?"
+
+He looked up, frowned, and said abruptly:--
+
+"Why, Monsieur?"
+
+"That I may occupy this chair."
+
+He glanced round; saw that there was really no other vacant; swept off
+the bag and coat with his own hands; hung them on a peg overhead;
+dropped back into his former attitude, and went on reading.
+
+"I regret to have given you the trouble, Monsieur," I said, hoping to
+pave the way to a conversation.
+
+But a little quick, impatient movement of the hand was his only reply.
+He did not even raise his head. He did not even lift his eyes from
+the paper.
+
+I called for a demi-tasse and a cigar; then took out a note-book and
+pencil, assumed an air of profound abstraction, and affected to become
+absorbed in calculations.
+
+In the meanwhile, I could not resist furtively observing the appearance
+of this man whom a great artist had selected as his model for one of the
+darkest characters of mediaeval history.
+
+He was rather below than above the middle height; spare and sinewy;
+square in the shoulders and deep in the chest; with close-clipped hair
+and beard; grizzled moustache; high cheek-bones; stern impassive
+features, sharply cut; and deep-set restless eyes, quick and glancing as
+the eyes of a monkey. His face, throat, and hands were sunburnt to a
+deep copper-color, as if cast in bronze. His age might have been from
+forty-five to fifty. He wore a thread-bare frock-coat buttoned to the
+chin; a stiff black stock revealing no glimpse of shirt-collar; a
+well-worn hat pulled low over his eyes; and trousers of dark blue cloth,
+worn very white and shiny at the knees, and strapped tightly down over a
+pair of much-mended boots.
+
+The more I looked at him, the less I was surprised that Flandrin should
+have been struck by his appearance. There was an air of stern poverty
+and iron resolution about the man that arrested one's attention at first
+sight. The words "_ancien militaire"_ were written in every furrow of
+his face; in every seam and on every button of his shabby clothing. That
+he had seen service, missed promotion, suffered unmerited neglect (or,
+it might be, merited disgrace), seemed also not unlikely.
+
+Watching him as he sat, half turned away, half hidden by the newspaper
+he was reading, one elbow resting on the table, one brown, sinewy hand
+supporting his chin and partly concealing his mouth, I told myself that
+here, at all events, was a man with a history--perhaps with a very dark
+history. What were the secrets of his past? What had he done? What had
+he endured? I would give much to know.
+
+My coffee and cigar being brought, I asked for the _Figaro_, and holding
+the paper somewhat between the stranger and myself, watched him with
+increasing interest.
+
+I now began to suspect that he was less interested in his own newspaper
+than he appeared to be, and that his profound abstraction, like my own,
+was assumed. An indefinable something in the turn of his head seemed to
+tell me that his attention was divided between whatever might be going
+forward in the room and what he was reading. I cannot describe what that
+something was; but it gave me the impression that he was always
+listening. When the outer door opened or shut, he stirred uneasily, and
+once or twice looked sharply round to see what new-comer entered the
+cafe. Was he anxiously expecting some one who did not come? Or was he
+dreading the appearance of some one whom he wished to avoid? Might he
+not be a political refugee? Might he not be a spy?
+
+"There is nothing of interest in the papers to-day, Monsieur," said,
+making another effort to force him into conversation.
+
+He affected not to hear me.
+
+I drew my chair a little nearer, and repeated the observation.
+
+He frowned impatiently, and without looking up, replied:--
+
+"_Eh, mon Dieu_, Monsieur!--when there is a dearth of news!"
+
+"There need not, even so, be a dearth of wit. _Figaro_ is as heavy
+to-day as a government leader in the _Moniteur_."
+
+He shrugged his shoulders and moved slightly round, apparently to get a
+better light upon what he was reading, but in reality to turn still more
+away from me. The gesture of avoidance was so marked, that with the best
+will in the world, it would have been impossible for me to address him
+again. I therefore relapsed into silence.
+
+Presently I saw a sudden change flash over him.
+
+Now, in turning away from myself, he had faced round towards a narrow
+looking-glass panel which reflected part of the opposite side of the
+room; and chancing, I suppose, to lift his eyes from the paper, he had
+seen something that arrested his attention. His head was still bent; but
+I could see that his eyes were riveted upon the mirror. There was
+alertness in the tightening of his hand before his mouth--in the
+suspension of his breathing.
+
+Then he rose abruptly, brushed past me as if I were not there, and
+crossed to where Mueller, sketch-book in hand, was in the very act of
+taking his portrait.
+
+I jumped up, almost involuntarily, and followed him. Mueller, with an
+unsuccessful effort to conceal his confusion, thrust the book into
+his pocket.
+
+"Monsieur," said the stranger, in a low, resolute voice, "I protest
+against what you have been doing. You have no right to take my likeness
+without my permission."
+
+"Pardon, Monsieur, I--I beg to assure you--" stammered Mueller.
+
+"That you intended no offence? I am willing to suppose so. Give me up
+the sketch, and I am content."
+
+"Give up the sketch!" echoed Mueller.
+
+"Precisely, Monsieur."
+
+"Nay--but if, as an artist, I have observed that which leads me to
+desire a--a memorandum--let us say of the pose and contour of a certain
+head," replied Mueller, recovering his self-possession, "it is not likely
+that I shall be disposed to part from my memorandum."
+
+"How, Monsieur! you refuse?"
+
+"I am infinitely sorry, but--"
+
+"But you refuse?"
+
+"I certainly cannot comply with Monsieur's request."
+
+The stranger, for all his bronzing, grew pale with rage.
+
+"Do not compel me, Monsieur, to say what I must think of your conduct,
+if you persist in this determination," he said fiercely.
+
+Mueller smiled, but made no reply.
+
+"You absolutely refuse to yield up the sketch?"
+
+"Absolutely."
+
+"Then, Monsieur, _c'est une infamie_--_et vous etes un lache_!"
+
+But the last word had scarcely hissed past his lips before Mueller dashed
+his coffee dregs full in the stranger's face.
+
+In one second, the table was upset--blows were exchanged--Mueller, pinned
+against the wall with his adversary's hands upon his throat, was
+striking out with the desperation of a man whose strength is
+overmatched--and the whole room was in a tumult.
+
+In vain I attempted to fling myself between them. In vain the waiters
+rushed to and fro, imploring "ces Messieurs" to interpose. In vain a
+stout man pushed his way through the bystanders, exclaiming angrily:--
+
+"Desist, Messieurs! Desist, in the name of the law! I am the proprietor
+of this establishment--I forbid this brawling--I will have you both
+arrested! Messieurs, do you hear?"
+
+Suddenly the flush of rage faded out of Mueller's face. He gasped--became
+livid. Lepany, Droz, myself, and one or two others, flew at the stranger
+and dragged him forcibly back.
+
+"Assassin!" I cried, "would you murder him?"
+
+He flung us off, as a baited bull flings off a pack of curs. For myself,
+though I received only a backhanded blow on the chest, I staggered as if
+I had been struck with a sledgehammer.
+
+Mueller, half-fainting, dropped into a chair.
+
+There was a tramp and clatter at the door--a swaying and parting of the
+crowd.
+
+"Here are the sergents de ville!" cried a trembling waiter.
+
+"He attacked me first," gasped Mueller. "He has half strangled me."
+
+"_Qu'est ce que ca me fait_!" shouted the enraged proprietor. "You are a
+couple of _canaille_! You have made a scandal in my Cafe. Sergents,
+arrest both these gentlemen!"
+
+The police--there were two of them, with their big cocked hats on their
+heads and their long sabres by their sides--pushed through the circle of
+spectators. The first laid his hand on Mueller's shoulder; the second was
+about to lay his hand on mine, but I drew back.
+
+"Which is the other?" said he, looking round.
+
+"_Sacredie_!" stammered the proprietor, "he was here--there--not a
+moment ago!"
+
+"_Diable_!" said the sergent de ville, stroking his moustache, and
+staring fiercely about him. "Did no one see him go?"
+
+There was a chorus of exclamations--a rush to the inner salon--to the
+door--to the street. But the stranger was nowhere in sight; and, which
+was still more incomprehensible, no one had seen him go!
+
+"_Mais, mon Dieu_!" exclaimed the proprietor, mopping his head and face
+violently with his pocket-handkerchief, "was the man a ghost, that he
+should vanish into the air?"
+
+"_Parbleu_! a ghost with muscles of iron," said Mueller. "Talk of the
+strength of a madman--he has the strength of a whole lunatic asylum!"
+
+"He gave me a most confounded blow in the ribs, anyhow!" said Lepany.
+
+"And nearly broke my arm," added Eugene Droz.
+
+"And has given me a pain in my chest for a week," said I, in chorus.
+
+"If he wasn't a ghost," observed the fat student sententiously, "he must
+certainly be the devil."
+
+The sergents de ville grinned.
+
+"Do we, then, arrest this gentleman?" asked the taller and bigger of the
+two, his hand still upon my friend's shoulder.
+
+But Mueller laughed and shook his head.
+
+"What!" said he, "arrest a man for resisting the devil? Nonsense, _mes
+amis_, you ought to canonize me. What says Monsieur le proprietaire?"
+
+Monsieur the proprietor smiled.
+
+"I am willing to let the matter drop," he replied, "on the understanding
+that Monsieur Mueller was not really the first offender."
+
+"_Foi d'honneur_! He insulted me--I threw some coffee in his face--he
+flung himself upon me like a tiger, and almost choked me, as all here
+witnessed. And for what? Because I did him the honor to make a rough
+pencilling of his ugly face ... _Mille tonnerres_!--the fellow has
+stolen my sketch-book!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXI.
+
+FANCIES ABOUT FACES.
+
+The sketch-book was undoubtedly gone, and the stranger had undoubtedly
+taken it. How he took it, and how he vanished, remained a mystery.
+
+The aspect of affairs, meanwhile, was materially changed. Mueller no
+longer stood in the position of a leniently-treated offender. He had
+become accuser, and plaintiff. A grave breach of the law had been
+committed, and he was the victim of a bold and skilful _tour de main_.
+
+The police shook their heads, twirled their moustaches, and looked wise.
+
+It was a case of premeditated assault--in short, of robbery with
+violence. It must be inquired into--reported, of course, at
+head-quarters, without loss of time. Would Monsieur be pleased to
+describe the stolen sketch-book? An oblong, green volume, secured by an
+elastic band; contains sketches in pencil and water-colors; value
+uncertain--Good. And the accused ... would Monsieur also be pleased to
+describe the person of the accused? His probable age, for instance; his
+height; the color of his hair, eyes, and beard? Good again. Lastly,
+Monsieur's own name and address, exactly and in full. _Tres-bon._ It
+might, perhaps, be necessary for Monsieur to enter a formal deposition
+to-morrow morning at the Prefecture of Police, in which case due notice
+would be given.
+
+Whereupon he who seemed to be chief of the twain, having entered
+Mueller's replies in a greasy pocket-book of stupendous dimensions, which
+he seemed to wear like a cuirass under the breast of his uniform,
+proceeded to interrogate the proprietor and waiters.
+
+Was the accused an habitual frequenter of the cafe?--No. Did they
+remember ever to have seen him there before?--No. Should they recognise
+him if they saw him again? To this question the answers were doubtful.
+One waiter thought he should recognise the man; another was not sure;
+and Monsieur the proprietor admitted that he had himself been too angry
+to observe anything or anybody very minutely.
+
+Finally, having made themselves of as much importance and asked as many
+questions as possible, the sergents de ville condescended to accept a
+couple of-petits verres a-piece, and then, with much lifting of cocked
+hats and clattering of sabres, departed.
+
+Most of the students had ere this dropped off by twos and threes, and
+were gone to their day's work, or pleasure--to return again in equal
+force about five in the afternoon. Of those that remained, some five or
+six came up when the police were gone, and began chatting about the
+robbery. When they learned that Flandrin had desired to have a sketch of
+the man's head; when Mueller described his features, and I his obstinate
+reserve and semi-military air, their excitement knew no bounds. Each had
+immediately his own conjecture to offer. He was a political spy, and
+therefore fearful lest his portrait should be recognised. He was a
+conspirator of the Fieschi school. He was Mazzini in person.
+
+In the midst of the discussion, a sudden recollection flashed upon me.
+
+"A clue! a clue!" I shouted triumphantly. "He left his coat and black
+bag hanging up in the corner!"
+
+Followed by the others, I ran to the spot where I had been sitting
+before the affray began. But my exultation was shortlived. Coat and bag,
+like their owner, had disappeared.
+
+Mueller thrust his hands into his pockets, shook his head, and whistled
+dismally.
+
+"I shall never see my sketch-book again, _parbleu!_" said he. "The man
+who could not only take it out of my breast-pocket, but also in the very
+teeth of the police, secure his property and escape unseen, is a master
+of his profession. Our friends in the cocked hats have no chance
+against him."
+
+"And Flandrin, who is expecting the sketch," said I; "what of him?"
+
+Mueller shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"Next to being beaten," growled he, "there's nothing I hate like
+confessing it. However, it has to be done--so the sooner the better.
+Would you like to come with me? You'll see his studio."
+
+I was only too glad to accompany him; for to me, as to most of us, there
+was ever a nameless charm in the picturesque litter of an artist's
+studio. Mueller's own studio, however, was as yet the only one I had
+seen. He laughed when I said this.
+
+"If your only notion of a studio is derived from that specimen," said
+he, "you will he agreeably surprised by the contrast. He calls his place
+a 'den,' but that's a metaphor. Mine is a howling wilderness."
+
+Arriving presently at a large house at the bottom of a courtyard in the
+Rue Vaugirard, he knocked at a small side-door bearing a tiny brass
+plate not much larger than a visiting-card, on which was
+engraved--"Monsieur Flandrin."
+
+The door opened by some invisible means from within, and we entered a
+passage dimly lighted by a painted glass door at the farther end. My
+companion led the way down this passage, through the door, and into a
+small garden containing some three or four old trees, a rustic seat, a
+sun-dial on an antique-looking fragment of a broken column, and a little
+weed-grown pond about the size of an ordinary drawing-room table,
+surrounded by artificial rock-work.
+
+At the farther extremity of this garden, filling the whole space from
+wall to wall, and occupying as much ground as must have been equal to
+half the original enclosure, stood a large, new, windowless building, in
+shape exactly like a barn, lighted from a huge skylight in the roof, and
+entered by a small door in one corner. I did not need to be told that
+this was the studio.
+
+But if the outside was like a barn, the inside was like a beautiful
+mediaeval interior by Cattermole--an interior abounding in rich and
+costly detail; in heavy crimson draperies, precious old Italian
+cabinets, damascened armor, carved chairs with upright backs and twisted
+legs, old paintings in massive Florentine frames, and strange quaint
+pieces of Elizabethan furniture, like buffets, with open shelves full of
+rare and artistic things--bronzes, ivory carvings, unwieldy Majolica
+jars, and lovely goblets of antique Venetian glass laced with spiral
+ornaments of blue and crimson and that dark emerald green of which the
+secret is now lost for ever.
+
+Then, besides all these things, there were great folios leaning piled
+against the walls, one over the other; and Persian rugs of many colors
+lying here and there about the floor; and down in one corner I observed
+a heap of little models, useful, no doubt, as accessories in
+pictures--gondolas, frigates, foreign-looking carts, a tiny sedan chair,
+and the like.
+
+But the main interest of the scene concentrated itself in the unfinished
+picture, the hired model (a brawny fellow in a close-fitting suit of
+black, leaning on a huge two-handed sword), and the artist in his
+holland blouse, with the palette and brushes in his hand.
+
+It was a very large picture, and stood on a monster easel, somewhat
+towards the end of the studio. The light from above poured full upon the
+canvas, while beyond lay a background of shadow. Much of the subject was
+as yet only indicated, but enough was already there to tell the tragic
+story and display the power of the painter. There, high above the heads
+of the mounted guards and the assembled spectators, rose the scaffold,
+hung with black. Egmont, wearing a crimson tabard, a short black cloak
+embroidered with gold, and a hat ornamented with black and white plumes,
+stood in a haughty attitude, as if facing the square and the people. Two
+other figures, apparently of an ecclesiastic and a Spanish general,
+partly in outline, partly laid in with flat color, were placed to the
+right of the principal character. The headsman stood behind, leaning
+upon his sword. The slender spire of the Hotel de Ville, surmounted by
+its gilded archangel glittering in the morning sun, rose high against a
+sky of cloudless blue; while all around was seen the well-known square
+with its sculptured gables and decorated facades--every roof, window,
+and balcony crowded with spectators.
+
+Unfinished though it was, I saw at once that I was brought face to face
+with what would some day be a famous work of art. The figures were
+grandly grouped; the heads were noble; the sky was full of air; the
+action of the whole scene informed with life and motion.
+
+I stood admiring and silent, while Mueller told his tale, and Flandrin
+paused in his work to listen.
+
+"It is horribly unlucky," said he. "I had not been able to find a
+portrait of Romero and, _faute de mieux_, have been trying for days
+past to invent the right sort of head for him--of course, without
+success. You never saw such a heap of failures! But as for that man at
+the cafe, if Providence had especially created him for my purpose, he
+could not have answered it better."
+
+"I believe I am as sorry as you can possibly be," said Mueller.
+
+"Then you are very sorry indeed," replied the painter; and he looked
+even more disappointment than he expressed.
+
+"I'm afraid I can't do it," said Mueller, after a moment's silence; "but
+if you'll give me a pencil and a piece of paper, and credit me with the
+will in default of the deed, I will try to sketch the head from memory."
+
+"Ah? if you can only do that! Here is a drawing block--choose what
+pencils you prefer--or here are crayons, if you like them better."
+
+Mueller took the pencils and block, perched himself on the corner of a
+table, and began. Flandrin, breathless with expectation, looked over his
+shoulder. Even the model (in the grim character of Egmont's executioner)
+laid aside his two-handed sword, and came round for a peep.
+
+"Bravo! that's just his nose and brow," said Flandrin, as Mueller's rapid
+hand flew over the paper. "Yes--the likeness comes with every touch ...
+and the eyes, so keen and furtive. ... Nay, that eyelid should be a
+little more depressed at the corner.... Yes, yes--just so. Admirable!
+There!--don't attempt to work it up. The least thing might mar the
+likeness. My dear fellow, what a service you have rendered me!"
+
+"_Quatre-vingt mille diables_!" ejaculated the model, his eyes riveted
+upon the sketch.
+
+Mueller laughed and looked.
+
+"_Tiens_! Guichet," said he, "is that meant for a compliment?"
+
+"Where did you see him?" asked the model, pointing down at the sketch.
+
+"Why? Do you know him?"
+
+"Where did you see him, I say?" repeated Guichet, impatiently.
+
+He was a rough fellow, and garnished every other sentence with an oath;
+but he did not mean to be uncivil.
+
+"At the Cafe Procope."
+
+"When?"
+
+"About an hour ago. But again, I repeat--do you know him?"
+
+"Do I know him? _Tonnerre de Dieu_!"
+
+"Then who and what is he?"
+
+The model stroked his beard; shook his head; declined to answer.
+
+"Bah!" said he, gloomily, "I may have seen him, or I may be mistaken.
+'Tis not my affair."
+
+"I suspect Guichet knows something against this interesting stranger,"
+laughed Flandrin. "Come, Guichet, out with it! We are among friends."
+
+But Guichet again looked at the drawing, and again shook his head.
+
+"I'm no judge of pictures, messieurs," said he. "I'm only a poor devil
+of a model. How can I pretend to know a man from such a _griffonage_
+as that?"
+
+And, taking up his big sword again, he retreated to his former post over
+against the picture. We all saw that he was resolved to say no more.
+
+Flandrin, delighted with Mueller's sketch, put it, with many thanks and
+praises, carefully away in one of the great folios against the wall.
+
+"You have no idea, _mon cher_ Mueller," he said, "of what value it is to
+me. I was in despair about the thing till I saw that fellow this morning
+in the Cafe; and he looked as if he had stepped out of the Middle Ages
+on purpose for me. It is quite a mediaeval face--if you know what I mean
+by a mediaeval face."
+
+"I think I do," said Mueller. "You mean that there was a moyen-age type,
+as there was a classical type, and as there is a modern type."
+
+"Just so; and therein lies the main difficulty that we historical
+painters have to encounter. When we cannot find portraits of our
+characters, we are driven to invent faces for them--and who can invent
+what he never sees? Invention must be based on some kind of experience;
+and to study old portraits is not enough for our purpose, except we
+frankly make use of them as portraits. We cannot generalize upon them,
+so as to resuscitate a vanished type."
+
+"But then has it really vanished?" said Mueller. "And how can we know for
+certain that the mediaeval type did actually differ from the type we see
+before us every day?"
+
+"By simple and direct proof--by studying the epochs of portrait
+painting. Take Holbein's heads, for instance. Were not the people of his
+time grimmer, harder-visaged, altogether more unbeautiful than the
+people of ours? Take Petitot's and Sir Peter Lely's. Can you doubt that
+the characteristics of their period were entirely different? Do you
+suppose that either race would look as we look, if resuscitated and
+clothed in the fashion of to-day?"
+
+"I am not at all sure that we should observe any difference," said
+Mueller, doubtfully.
+
+"And I feel sure we should observe the greatest," replied Flandrin,
+striding up and down the studio, and speaking with great animation. "I
+believe, as regards the men and women of Holbein's time, that their
+faces were more lined than ours; their eyes, as a rule, smaller--their
+mouths wider--their eyebrows more scanty--their ears larger--their
+figures more ungainly. And in like manner, I believe the men and women
+of the seventeenth century to have been more fleshy than either
+Holbein's people or ourselves; to have had rounder cheeks, eyes more
+prominent and heavy-lidded, shorter noses, more prominent chins, and
+lips of a fuller and more voluptuous mould."
+
+"Still we can't be certain how much of all this may be owing to the mere
+mannerisms of successive schools of art," urged Mueller, sticking
+manfully to his own opinion. "Where will you find a more decided
+mannerist than Holbein? And because he was the first portrait-painter of
+his day, was he not reproduced with all his faults of literalness and
+dryness by a legion of imitators? So with Sir Peter Lely, with Petitot,
+with Vandyck, with every great artist who painted kings and queens and
+court beauties. Then, again, a certain style of beauty becomes the rage,
+and-a skilful painter flatters each fair sitter in turn by bringing up
+her features, or her expression, or the color of her hair, as near as
+possible to the fashionable standard. And further, there is the dress of
+a period to be taken into account. Think of the family likeness that
+pervades the flowing wigs of the courts of Louis Quatorze and Charles
+the Second--see what powder did a hundred years ago to equalize
+mankind."
+
+Flandrin shook his head.
+
+"Ingenious, _mon garcon_" said he; "ingenious, but unsound The cut of a
+fair lady's bodice never yet altered the shape of her nose; neither was
+it the fashion of their furred surtouts that made Erasmus and Sir Thomas
+More as like as twins. What you call the 'mannerism' of Holbein is only
+his way of looking at his fellow-creatures. He and Sir Antonio More were
+the most faithful of portrait-painters. They didn't know how to flatter.
+They painted exactly what they saw--no more, and no less; so that every
+head they have left us is a chapter in the history of the Middle Ages.
+The race--depend on't--the race was unbeautiful; and not even the
+picturesque dress of the period (which, according to your theory, should
+have helped to make the wearers of it more attractive) could soften one
+jot of their plainness."
+
+"I can't bring myself to believe that we were all so ugly--French,
+English, and Germans alike--only a couple of centuries ago,"
+said Mueller.
+
+"That is to say, you prefer to believe that Holbein, and Lucas Cranach,
+and Sir Antonio More, and all their school, were mannerists. Nonsense,
+my dear fellow--nonsense! _It is Nature who is the mannerist_. She loves
+to turn out a certain generation after a particular pattern; and when
+she is tired of that pattern, she invents another. Her fancies last, on
+the average about, a hundred years. Sometimes she changes the type quite
+abruptly; sometimes modifies it by gentle, yet always perceptible,
+degrees. And who shall say what her secret processes are? Education,
+travel, intermarriage with foreigners, the introduction of new kinds of
+food) the adoption of new habits, may each and all have something to do
+with these successive changes; but of one point at least we may be
+certain--and that is, that we painters are not responsible for her
+caprices. Our mission is to interpret Dame Nature more or less
+faithfully, according to our powers; but beyond interpretation we cannot
+go. And now (for you know I am as full of speculations as an
+experimental philosopher) I will tell you another conclusion I have come
+to with regard to this subject; and that is that national types were
+less distinctive in mediaeval times than in ours. The French, English,
+Flemish, and Dutch of the Middle Ages, as we see them in their
+portraits, are curiously alike in all outward characteristics. The
+courtiers of Francis the First and their (James, and the lords and
+ladies of the court of Henry the Eighth, resemble each other as people
+of one nation. Their features are, as it were, cast in one mould. So
+also with the courts of Louis Quatorze and Charles the Second. As for
+the regular French face of to-day, with its broad cheek-bones and high
+temples running far up into the hair on either side, that type does not
+make its appearance till close upon the advent of the Reign of Terror.
+But enough! I shall weary you with theories, and wear out the patience
+of our friend Guichet, who is sufficiently tired already with waiting
+for a head that never comes to be cut off as it ought. Adieu--adieu.
+Come soon again, and see how I get on with Marshal Romero."
+
+Thus dismissed, we took our leave and left the painter to his work.
+
+"An extraordinary man!" said Mueller, as we passed out again through the
+neglected garden and paused for a moment to look at some half-dozen fat
+gold and silver fish that were swimming lazily about the little pond. "A
+man made up of contradictions--abounding in energy, yet at the same time
+the dreamiest of speculators. An original thinker, too; but wanting that
+basis which alone makes original thinking of any permanent value."
+
+"But," said I, "he is evidently an educated man."
+
+"Yes--educated as most artists are educated; but Flandrin has as strong
+a bent for science as for art, and deserved something better. Five years
+at a German university would have made of him one of the most remarkable
+men of his time. What did you think of his theory of faces?"
+
+"I know nothing of the subject, and cannot form a judgment; but it
+sounded as if it might be true."
+
+"Yes--just that. It may be true, and it may not. If true, then for my
+own part I should like to pursue his theory a step further, and trace
+the operation of these secret processes by means of which
+I am, happily, such a much better-looking fellow than my
+great-great-great-great-grandfather of two hundred years ago. What, for
+instance, has the introduction of the potato done for the noses
+of mankind?"
+
+Chatting thus, we walked back as far as the corner of the Rue Racine,
+where we parted; I to attend a lecture at the Ecole de Medecine, and
+Mueller to go home to his studio in the Rue Clovis.
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+CHAPTER XXXII.
+
+RETURNED WITH THANKS.
+
+A week or two had thus gone by since the dreadful evening at the Opera
+Comique, and all this time I had neither seen nor heard more of the fair
+Josephine. My acquaintance with Franz Mueller and the life of the
+Quartier Latin had, on the contrary, progressed rapidly. Just as the
+affair of the Opera had dealt a final blow to my romance _a la grisette_
+on the one hand, so had the excursion to Courbevoie, the visit to the
+Ecole de Natation, and the adventure of the Cafe Procope, fostered my
+intimacy with the artist on the other. We were both young, somewhat
+short of money, and brimful of fun. Each, too, had a certain substratum
+of earnestness underlying the mere surface-gayety of his character.
+Mueller was enthusiastic for art; I for poetry; and both for liberty. I
+fear, when I look back upon them, that we talked a deal of nonsense
+about Brutus, and the Rights of Man, and the noble savage, and all that
+sort of thing, in those hot-headed days of our youth. It was a form of
+political measles that the young men of that time were quite as liable
+to as the young men of our own; and, living as we then were in the heart
+of the most revolutionary city in Europe, I do not well see how we could
+have escaped the infection. Mueller (who took it worse than I did, and
+was very rabid indeed when I first knew him) belonged just then not only
+to the honorable brotherhood of Les Chicards, but also to a small
+debating club that met twice a week in a private room at the back of an
+obscure Estaminet in the Rue de la Harpe. The members of this club were
+mostly art-students, and some, like himself, Chicards--generous,
+turbulent, high-spirited boys, with more enthusiasm than brains, and a
+flow of words wholly out of proportion to the bulk of their ideas. As I
+came to know him more intimately, I used sometimes to go there with
+Mueller, after our cheap dinner in the Quartier and our evening stroll
+along the Boulevards or the Champs Elysees; and I am bound to admit that
+I never, before or since, heard quite so much nonsense of the
+declamatory sort as on those memorable occasions. I did not think it
+nonsense then, however. I admired it with all my heart; applauded the
+nursery eloquence of these sucking Mirabeaus and Camille Desmoulins as
+frantically as their own vanity could desire; and was even secretly
+chagrined that my own French was not yet fluent enough to enable me to
+take part in their discussions.
+
+In the meanwhile, my debts were paid; and, having dropped out of society
+when I fell out of love with Madame de Marignan, I no longer overspent
+my allowance. I bought no more bouquets, paid for no more opera-stalls,
+and hired no more prancing steeds at seven francs the hour. I bade adieu
+to picture-galleries, flower-shows, morning concerts, dress boots, white
+kid gloves, elaborate shirt-fronts, and all the vanities of the
+fashionable world. In a word, I renounced the Faubourg St. Germain for
+the Quartier Latin, and applied myself to such work and such pleasures
+as pertained to the locality. If, after a long day at Dr. Cheron's, or
+the Hotel Dieu, or the Ecole de Medecine, I did waste a few hours now
+and then, I, at least, wasted them cheaply. Cheaply, but oh, so
+pleasantly! Ah me! those nights at the debating club, those evenings at
+the Chicards, those student's balls at the Chaumiere, those third-class
+trips to Versailles and Fontainebleau, those one-franc pit seats at the
+Gaiete and the Palais Royal, those little suppers at Pompon's and
+Flicoteau's--how delightful they were! How joyous! How free from care!
+And even when we made up a party and treated the ladies (for to treat
+the ladies is _de rigueur_ in the code of Quartier Latin etiquette), how
+little it still cost, and what a world of merriment we had for
+the money!
+
+It was well for me, too, and a source of much inward satisfaction, that
+my love-affair with Mademoiselle Josephine had faded and died a natural
+death. We never made up that quarrel of the Opera Comique, and I had not
+desired that we should make it up. On the contrary, I was exceedingly
+glad of the opportunity of withdrawing my attentions; so I wrote her a
+polite little note, in which I expressed my regret that our tastes were
+so dissimilar and our paths in life so far apart; wished her every
+happiness; assured her that I should ever remember her with friendly
+regard; and signed my name with a tremendous flourish at the bottom of
+the second page. With the note, however, I sent her a raised pie and a
+red and green shawl, of which I begged her acceptance in token of amity;
+and as neither of those gifts was returned, I concluded that she ate the
+one and wore the other, and that there was peace between us.
+
+But the scales of fortune as they go up for one, go down for another.
+This man's luck is balanced by that man's ruin--Orestes falls sick, and
+Pylades returns from Kissingen cured of his lumbago--old Croesus dies,
+and little Miss Kilmansegg comes into the world with a golden spoon in
+her mouth, So it fell out with Franz Mueller and myself. As I happily
+steered clear of Charybdis, he drifted into Scylla--in other words, just
+as I recovered from my second attack of the tender passion, he caught
+the epidemic and fancied himself in love with the fair Marie.
+
+I say "fancied," because his way of falling in love was so unlike my
+way, that I could scarcely believe it to be the same complaint. It
+affected neither his appetite, nor his spirits, nor his wardrobe. He
+made as many puns and smoked as many pipes as usual. He did not even buy
+a new hat. If, in fact, he had not told me himself, I should never have
+guessed that anything whatever was the matter with him.
+
+It came out one day when he was pressing me to go with him to a certain
+tea-party at Madame Marotte's, in the Rue St. Denis.
+
+"You see," said he, "it is _la petite_ Marie's fete; and the party's in
+her honor; and they'd be so proud if we both went to it; and--and, upon
+my soul, I'm awfully fond of that little girl"....
+
+"Of Marie Marotte?"
+
+He nodded.
+
+"You are not serious," I said.
+
+"I am as serious," he replied, "as a dancing dervish."
+
+And then, for I suppose I looked incredulous, he went on to justify
+himself.
+
+"She's very good," he said, "and very pretty. Quite a Madonna face, to
+my thinking."
+
+"You may see a dozen such Madonna faces among the nurses in the
+Luxembourg Gardens, every afternoon of your life," said I.
+
+"Oh, if you come to that, every woman is like every other woman, up to a
+certain point."
+
+"_Les femmes se suivent et se ressemblent toujours_," said I, parodying
+a well-known apothegm.
+
+"Precisely, but then they wear their rue, or cause you to wear yours,
+'with a difference.' This girl, however, escapes the monotony of her sex
+by one or two peculiarities:--she has not a bit of art about her, nor a
+shred of coquetry. She is as simple and as straightforward as an
+Arcadian. She doesn't even know when she is being made love to, or
+understand what you mean, when you pay her a compliment."
+
+"Then she's a phenomenon--and what man in his senses would fall in love
+with a phenomenon?"
+
+"Every man, _mon cher enfant_, who falls in love at all! The woman we
+worship is always a phenomenon, whether of beauty, or grace, or
+virtue--till we find her out; and then, probably, she becomes a
+phenomenon of deceit, or slovenliness, or bad temper! And now, to return
+to the point we started from--will you go with me to Madame Marotte's
+tea-party to-morrow evening at eight? Don't say 'No,' there's a
+good fellow."
+
+"I'll certainly not say No, if you particularly want me to say Yes," I
+replied, "but--"
+
+"Prythee, no buts! Let it be Yes, and the thing is settled. So--here we
+are. Won't you come in and smoke a pipe with me? I've a bottle of
+capital Rhenish in the cupboard."
+
+We had met near the Odeon, and, as our roads lay in the same direction,
+had gone on walking and talking till we came to Mueller's own door in the
+Rue Clovis. I accepted the invitation, and followed him in. The
+_portiere_, a sour-looking, bent old woman with a very dirty duster tied
+about her head, hobbled out from her little dark den at the foot of the
+stairs, and handed him the key of his apartment.
+
+"_Tiens_!" said she, "wait a moment--there's a parcel for you, M'sieur
+Mueller."
+
+And so, hobbling back again, she brought out a small flat brown
+paper-packet sealed at both ends.
+
+"Ah, I see--from the Emperor!" said Mueller. "Did he bring it himself,
+Madame Duphot, or did he send it by the Archbishop of Paris?"
+
+A faint grin flitted over the little old woman's withered face.
+
+"Get along with you, M'sieur Mueller," she said. "You're always playing
+the _farceur_! The parcel was brought by a man who looked like a
+stonemason."
+
+"And nobody has called?"
+
+"Nobody, except M'sieur Richard."
+
+"Monsieur Richard's visits are always gratifying and delightful--may
+the _diable_ fly away with him!" said Mueller. "What did dear Monsieur
+Richard want to-day, Madame Duphot?"
+
+"He wanted to see you, and the third-floor gentleman also--about the
+rent."
+
+"Dear Richard! What an admirable memory he has for dates! Did he leave
+any message, Madame Duphot?"
+
+The old woman looked at me, and hesitated.
+
+"He says, M'sieur Mueller--he says ..."
+
+"Nay, this gentleman is a friend--you may speak out. What does our
+beloved and respected _proprietaire_ say, Madame Duphot?"
+
+"He says, if you don't both of you pay up the arrears by midday on
+Sunday next, he'll seize your goods, and turn you into the street."
+
+"Ah, I always said he was the nicest man I knew!" observed Mueller,
+gravely. "Anything else, Madame Duphot?"
+
+"Only this, Monsieur Mueller--that if you didn't go quietly, he'd take
+your windows out of the frames and your doors off the hinges."
+
+"_Comment_! He bade you give me that message, the miserable old son of a
+spider! _Quatre-vingt mille plats de diables aux truffes_! Take my
+windows out of the frames, indeed! Let him try, Madame Duphot--that's
+all--let him try!"
+
+And with this, Mueller, in a towering rage, led the way upstairs,
+muttering volleys of the most extraordinary and eccentric oaths of his
+own invention, and leaving the little old _portiere_ grinning
+maliciously in the hall.
+
+"But can't you pay him?" said I.
+
+"Whether I can, or can't, it seems I must," he replied, kicking open the
+door of his studio as viciously as if it were the corporeal frame of
+Monsieur Richard. "The only question is--how? At the present moment, I
+haven't five francs in the till."
+
+"Nor have I more than twenty. How much is it?"
+
+"A hundred and sixty--worse luck!"
+
+"Haven't the Tapottes paid for any of their ancestors yet?"
+
+"Confound it!--yes; they've paid for a Marshal of France and a Farmer
+General, which are all I've yet finished and sent home. But there was
+the washerwoman, and the _traiteur_, and the artist's colorman, and,
+_enfin_, the devil to pay--and the money's gone, somehow!"
+
+"I've only just cleared myself from a lot of debts," I said, ruefully,
+"and I daren't ask either my father or Dr. Cheron for an advance just at
+present. What is to be done?"
+
+"Oh, I don't know. I must raise the money somehow. I must sell
+something--there's my copy of Titian's 'Pietro Aretino.' It's worth
+eighty francs, if only for a sign. And there's a Madonna and Child after
+Andrea del Sarto, worth a fortune to any enterprising sage-femme with
+artistic proclivities. I'll try what Nebuchadnezzar will do for me."
+
+"And who, in the name of all that's Israelitish, is Nebuchadnezzar?"
+
+"Nebuchadnezzar, my dear Arbuthnot, is a worthy Shylock of my
+acquaintance--a gentleman well known to Bohemia--one who buys and sells
+whatever is purchasable and saleable on the face of the globe, from a
+ship of war to a comic paragraph in the _Charivari_. He deals in
+bric-a-brac, sermons, government sinecures, pugs, false hair, light
+literature, patent medicines, and the fine arts. He lives in the Place
+des Victoires. Would you like to be introduced to him?"
+
+"Immensely."
+
+"Well, then, be here by eight to-morrow morning, and I'll take you with
+me. After nine he goes out, or is only visible to buyers. Here's my
+bottle of Rhenish--genuine Assmanshauser. Are you hungry?"
+
+I admitted that I was not unconscious of a sensation akin to appetite.
+
+He gazed steadfastly into the cupboard, and shook his head.
+
+"A box of sardines," he said, gloomily, "nearly empty. Half a loaf,
+evidently disinterred from Pompeii. An inch of Lyons sausage, saved
+from the ark; the remains of a bottle of fish sauce, and a pot of
+currant jelly. What will you have?"
+
+I decided for the relics of Pompeii and the deluge, and we sat down to
+discuss those curious delicacies. Having no corkscrew, we knocked off
+the neck of the bottle, and being short of glasses, drank our wine out
+of teacups.
+
+"But you have never opened your parcel all this time," I said presently.
+"It may be full of _billets de banque_--who can tell?"
+
+"That's true," said Mueller; and broke the seals.
+
+"By all the Gods of Olympus!" he shouted, holding up a small oblong
+volume bound in dark green cloth. "My sketch-book!"
+
+He opened it, and a slip of paper fell out. On this slip of paper were
+written, in a very neat, small hand, the words, "_Returned with
+thanks_;" but the page that contained the sketch made in the Cafe
+Procope was missing.
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+CHAPTER XXXIII.
+
+AN EVENING PARTY AMONG THE PETIT-BOURGEOISIE.
+
+Madame Marotte, as I have already mentioned more than once, lived in the
+Rue du Faubourg St. Denis; which, as all the world knows, is a
+prolongation of the Rue St. Denis--just as the Rue St. Denis was, in my
+time, a transpontine continuation of the old Rue de la Harpe. Beginning
+at the Place du Chatelet as the Rue St. Denis, opening at its farther
+end on the Boulevart St. Denis and passing under the triumphal arch of
+Louis le Grand (called the Porte St. Denis), it there becomes first the
+Rue du Faubourg St. Denis, and then the interminable Grande Route du St.
+Denis which drags its slow length along all the way to the famous Abbey
+outside Paris.
+
+The Rue du Faubourg St. Denis is a changed street now, and widens out,
+prim, white, and glittering, towards the new barrier and the new Rond
+Point. But in the dear old days of which I tell, it was the sloppiest,
+worst-paved, worst-lighted, noisiest, narrowest, and most crowded of all
+the great Paris thoroughfares north of the Seine. All the country
+traffic from Chantilly and Compiegne came lumbering this way into the
+city; diligences, omnibuses, wagons, fiacres, water-carts, and all kinds
+of vehicles thronged and blocked the street perpetually; and the sound
+of wheels ceased neither by night nor by day. The foot-pavements of the
+Rue du Faubourg St. Denis, too, were always muddy, be the weather what
+it might; and the gutters were always full of stagnant pools. An
+ever-changing, never-failing stream of rustics from the country,
+workpeople from the factories of the _banlieu,_ grisettes, commercial
+travellers, porters, commissionaires, and _gamins_ of all ages here
+flowed to and fro. Itinerant venders of cakes, lemonade, cocoa,
+chickweed, _allumettes_, pincushions, six-bladed penknives, and
+never-pointed pencils filled the air with their cries, and made both day
+and night hideous. You could not walk a dozen yards at any time without
+falling down a yawning cellar-trap, or being run over by a porter with a
+huge load upon his head, or getting splashed from head to foot by the
+sudden pulling-up of some cart in the gutter beside you.
+
+It was among the peculiarities of the Rue du Faubourg St. Denis that
+everybody was always in a hurry, and that nobody was ever seen to look
+in at the shop-windows. The shops, indeed, might as well have had no
+windows, since there were no loungers to profit by them. Every house,
+nevertheless, was a shop, and every shop had its window. These windows,
+however, were for the most part of that kind before which the passer-by
+rarely cares to linger; for the commerce of the Rue du Faubourg St.
+Denis was of that steady, unpretending, money-making sort that despises
+mere shop-front attractions. Grocers, stationers, corn-chandlers,
+printers, cutlers, leather-sellers, and such other inelegant trades,
+here most did congregate; and to the wearied wayfarer toiling along the
+dead level of this dreary pave, it was quite a relief to come upon even
+an artistically-arranged _Magasin de Charcuterie_, with its rows of
+glazed tongues, mighty Lyons sausages, yellow _terrines_ of Strasbourg
+pies, fantastically shaped pickle-jars, and pyramids of silvery
+sardine boxes.
+
+It was at number One Hundred and Two in this agreeable thoroughfare that
+my friend's innamorata resided with her maternal aunt, the worthy relict
+of Monsieur Jacques Marotte, umbrella-maker, deceased. Thither,
+accordingly, we wended our miry way, Mueller and I, after dining together
+at one of our accustomed haunts on the evening following the events
+related in my last chapter. The day had been dull and drizzly, and the
+evening had turned out duller and more drizzly still. We had not had
+rain for some time, and the weather had been (as it often is in Paris in
+October) oppressively hot; and now that the rain had come, it did not
+seem to cool the air at all, but rather to load it with vapors, and make
+the heat less endurable than before.
+
+Having toiled all the way up from the Rue de la Harpe on the farther
+bank of the Seine, and having forded the passage of the Arch of Louis le
+Grand, we were very wet and muddy indeed, very much out of breath, and
+very melancholy objects to behold.
+
+"It's dreadful to think of going into any house in this condition,
+Mueller," said I, glancing down ruefully at the state of my boots, and
+having just received a copious spattering of mud all down the left side
+of my person. "What is to be done?"
+
+"We've only to go to a boot-cleaning and brushing-up shop," replied
+Mueller. "There's sure to be one close by somewhere."
+
+"A boot-cleaning and brushing-up shop!" I echoed.
+
+"What--didn't you know there were lots of them, all over Paris? Have you
+never noticed places that look like shops, with ground glass windows
+instead of shop-fronts, on which are painted up the words, '_cirage des
+bottes?_'"
+
+"Never, that I can remember."
+
+"Then be grateful to me for a piece of very useful information! Suppose
+we turn down this by-street--it's mostly to the seclusion of by-streets
+and passages that our bashful sex retires to renovate its boots and its
+broadcloth."
+
+I followed him, and in the course of a few minutes we found the sort of
+place of which we were in search. It consisted of one large, long room,
+like a shop without goods, counters, or shelves. A single narrow bench
+ran all round the walls, raised on a sort of wooden platform about three
+feet in width and three feet from the ground. Seated upon this bench,
+somewhat uncomfortably, as it seemed, with their backs against the wall,
+sat some ten or a dozen men and boys, each with an attendant shoeblack
+kneeling before him, brushing away vigorously. Two or three other
+customers, standing up in the middle of the shop, like horses in the
+hands of the groom, were having their coats brushed instead of their
+boots. Of those present, some looked like young shopmen, some were of
+the _ouvrier_ class, and one or two looked like respectable small
+tradesmen and fathers of families. The younger men were evidently
+smartening up for an hour or two at some cheap ball or Cafe-Concert, now
+that the warehouse was closed, and the day's work was over.
+
+Our boots being presently brought up to the highest degree of polish,
+and our garments cleansed of every disfiguring speck, we paid a few sous
+apiece and turned out again into the streets. Happily, we had not far to
+go. A short cut brought us into the midst of the Rue de Faubourg St.
+Denis, and within a few yards of a gloomy-looking little shop with the
+words "_Veuve Marotte_" painted up over the window, and a huge red and
+white umbrella dangling over the door. A small boy in a shiny black
+apron was at that moment putting up the shutters; the windows of the
+front room over the shop were brightly lit from within; and a little old
+gentleman in goloshes and a large blue cloak with a curly collar, was
+just going in at the private door. We meekly followed him, and hung up
+our hats and overcoats, as he did, in the passage.
+
+"After you, Messieurs," said the little old gentleman, skipping politely
+back, and flourishing his hand in the direction of the stairs.
+"After you!"
+
+We protested vehemently against this arrangement, and fought quite a
+skirmish of civilities at the foot of the stairs.
+
+"I am at home here, Messieurs," said the little old gentleman, who, now
+that he was divested of hat, cloak, and goloshes, appeared in a flaxen
+_toupet_, an antiquated blue coat with brass buttons, a profusely
+frilled shirt, and low-cut shoes with silver buckles. "I am an old
+friend of the family--a friend of fifty years. I hold myself privileged
+to do the honors, Messieurs;--a friend of fifty years may claim to have
+his privileges."
+
+With this he smirked, bowed, and backed against the wall, so that we
+were obliged to precede him. When we reached the landing, however, he
+(being evidently an old gentleman of uncommon politeness and agility)
+sprang forward, held open the door for us, and insisted on ushering
+us in.
+
+It was a narrow, long-shaped room, the size of the shop, with two
+windows looking upon the street; a tiny square of carpet in the middle
+of the floor; boards highly waxed and polished; a tea-table squeezed up
+in one corner; a somewhat ancient-looking, spindle-legged cottage piano
+behind the door; a mirror and an ornamental clock over the mantelpiece;
+and a few French lithographs, colored in imitation of crayon drawings,
+hanging against the walls.
+
+Madame Marotte, very deaf and fussy, in a cap with white ribbons, came
+forward to receive us. Mademoiselle Marie, sitting between two other
+young women of her own age, hung her head, and took no notice of
+our arrival.
+
+The rest of the party consisted of a gentleman and two old ladies. The
+gentleman (a plump, black-whiskered elderly Cupid, with a vast expanse
+of shirt-front like an immense white ace of hearts, and a rose in his
+button-hole) was standing on the hearth-rug in a graceful attitude, with
+one hand resting on his hip, and the other under his coat-tails. Of the
+two old ladies, who seemed as if expressly created by nature to serve as
+foils to one another, one was very fat and rosy, in a red silk gown and
+a kind of black velvet hat trimmed with white marabout feathers and
+Roman pearls; while the other was tall, gaunt, and pale, with a long
+nose, a long upper lip, and supernaturally long yellow teeth. She wore a
+black gown, black cotton gloves, and a black velvet band across her
+forehead, fastened in the centre with a black and gold clasp containing
+a ghastly representation of a human eye, apparently purblind--which gave
+this lady the air of a serious Cyclops.
+
+Madame Marotte was profuse of thanks, welcomes, apologies, and curtseys.
+It was so good of these gentlemen to come so far--and in such unpleasant
+weather, too! But would not these Messieurs give themselves the trouble
+to be seated? And would they prefer tea or coffee--for both were on the
+table? And where was Marie? Marie, whose _fete_-day it was, and who
+should have come forward to welcome these gentlemen, and thank them for
+the honor of their company!
+
+Thus summoned, Mademoiselle Marie emerged from between the two young
+women, and curtsied demurely.
+
+In the meanwhile, the little old gentleman who had ushered as in was
+bustling about the room, shaking hands with every one, and complimenting
+the ladies.
+
+"Ah, Madame Desjardins," he said, addressing the stout lady in the hat,
+"enchanted to see you back from the sea-side!--you and your charming
+daughter. I do not know which looks the more young and blooming."
+
+Then, turning to the grim lady in black:--
+
+"And I am charmed to pay my homage to Madame de Montparnasse. I had the
+pleasure of being present at the brilliant _debut_ of Madame's gifted
+daughter the other evening at the private performance of the pupils of
+the Conservatoire. Mademoiselle Honoria inherits the _grand air_,
+Madame, from yourself."
+
+Then, to the plump gentleman with the shirt-front:--
+
+"And Monsieur Philomene!--this is indeed a privilege and a pleasure. Bad
+weather, Monsieur Philomene, for the voice!"
+
+Then, to the two girls:--
+
+"Mesdemoiselles--Achille Dorinet prostrates himself at the feet of
+youth, beauty, and talent! Mademoiselle Honoria, I salute in you the
+future Empress of the tragic stage. Mademoiselle Rosalie, modesty
+forbids me to extol the acquired graces of even my most promising pupil;
+but I may be permitted to adore in you the graces of nature."
+
+While I was listening to these scraps of salutation, Mueller was
+murmuring tender nothings in the ear of the fair Marie, and Madame
+Marotte was pouring out the coffee.
+
+Monsieur Achille Dorinet, having gone the round of the company, next
+addressed himself to me.
+
+"Permit me, Monsieur," he said, bringing his heels together and
+punctuating his sentences with little bows, "permit me, in the absence
+of a master of the ceremonies, to introduce myself--Achille Dorinet,
+Achille Dorinet, whose name may not, perhaps, be wholly unknown to you
+in connection with the past glories of the classical ballet. Achille
+Dorinet, formerly _premier sujet_ of the Opera Francais--now principal
+choreographic professor at the Conservatoire Imperiale de Musique. I
+have had the honor, Monsieur, of dancing at Erfurth before their
+Imperial Majesties the Emperors Napoleon and Alexander, and a host of
+minor sovereigns. Those, Monsieur, were the high and palmy days of the
+art. We performed a ballet descriptive of the siege of Troy, and I
+undertook the part of a river god--the god Scamander, _en effet_. The
+great ladies of the court, Monsieur, were graciously pleased to admire
+my proportions as the god Scamander. I wore a girdle of sedges, a wreath
+of water-lilies, and a scarf of blue and silver. I have reason to
+believe that the costume became me."
+
+"Sir," I replied gravely, "I do not doubt it."
+
+"It is a noble art, Monsieur, _l'art de la dame_" said the former
+_premier sujet_, with a sigh; "but it is on the decline. Of the grand
+style of fifty years ago, only myself and tradition remain."
+
+"Monsieur was, doubtless, a contemporary of Vestris, the famous dancer,"
+I said.
+
+"The illustrious Vestris, Monsieur," said the little old gentleman,
+"was, next to Louis the Fourteenth, the greatest of Frenchmen. I am
+proud to own myself his disciple, as well as his contemporary."
+
+"Why next to Louis the Fourteenth, Monsieur Dorinet?" I asked, keeping
+my countenance with difficulty. "Why not next to Napoleon the First, who
+was a still greater conqueror?"
+
+"But no dancer, Monsieur!" replied the ex-god Scamander, with a kind of
+half pirouette; "whereas the Grand Monarque was the finest dancer of
+his epoch."
+
+Madame Marotte had by this time supplied all her guests with tea and
+coffee, while Monsieur Philomene went round with the cakes and bread and
+butter. Madame Desjardins spread her pocket-handkerchief on her lap--a
+pocket-handkerchief the size of a small table-cloth. Madame de
+Montparnasse, more mindful of her gentility, removed to a corner of the
+tea-table, and ate her bread and butter in her black cotton gloves.
+
+"We hope we have another bachelor by-and-by," said Madame Marotte,
+addressing herself to the young ladies, who looked down and giggled. "A
+charming man, mesdemoiselles, and quite the gentleman--our _locataire_,
+M'sieur Lenoir. You know him, M'sieur Dorinet--pray tell these
+demoiselles what a charming man M'sieur Lenoir is!"
+
+The little dancing-master bowed, coughed, smiled, and looked somewhat
+embarrassed.
+
+"Monsieur Lenoir is no doubt a man of much information," he said,
+hesitatingly; "a traveller--a reader--a gentleman--oh! yes, certainly a
+gentleman. But to say that he is a--a charming man ... well, perhaps the
+ladies are the best judges of such nice questions. What says
+Mam'selle Marie?"
+
+Thus applied to, the fair Marie became suddenly crimson, and had not a
+word to reply with. Monsieur Dorinet stared. The young ladies tittered.
+Madame Marotte, deaf as a post and serenely unconscious, smiled, nodded,
+and said "Ah, yes, yes--didn't I tell you so?"
+
+"Monsieur Dorinet has, I fear, asked an indiscreet question," said
+Mueller, boiling over with jealousy.
+
+"I--I have not observed Monsieur Lenoir sufficiently to--to form an
+opinion," faltered Marie, ready to cry with vexation.
+
+Mueller glared at her reproachfully, turned on his heel, and came over to
+where I was standing.
+
+"You saw how she blushed?" he said in a fierce whisper. "_Sacredie_!
+I'll bet my head she's an arrant flirt. Who, in the name of all the
+fiends, is this lodger she's been carrying on with? A lodger, too--oh!
+the artful puss!"
+
+At this awkward moment, Monsieur Dorinet, with considerable tact, asked
+Monsieur Philomene for a song; and Monsieur Philomene (who as I
+afterwards learned was a favorite tenor at fifth-rate concerts) was
+graciously pleased to comply.
+
+Not, however, without a little preliminary coquetry, after the manner of
+tenors. First he feared he was hoarse; then struck a note or two on the
+piano, and tried his falsetto; then asked for a glass of water; and
+finally begged that one of the young ladies would be so amiable as to
+accompany him.
+
+Mademoiselle Honoria, inheriting rigidity from the maternal Cyclops,
+drew herself up and declined stiffly; but the other, whom the
+dancing-master had called Rosalie, got up directly and said she would
+do her best.
+
+"Only," she added, blushing, "I play so badly!"
+
+Monsieur Philomene was provided with two copies of his song--one for the
+accompanyist and one for himself; then, standing well away from the
+piano with his face to the audience, he balanced his music in his hand,
+made his little professional bow, coughed, ran his fingers through his
+hair, and assumed an expression of tender melancholy.
+
+"One--two--three," began Mdlle. Rosalie, her little fat fingers
+staggering helplessly among the first cadenzas of the symphony.
+"One--two--three. One" ...
+
+Monsieur Philomene interrupted with a wave of the hand, as if conducting
+an orchestra.
+
+"Pardon, Mademoiselle," he said, "not quite so fast, if you please!
+Andantino--andantino--one--two--three ... Just so! A thousand thanks!"
+
+Again Mdlle. Rosalie attacked the symphony. Again Monsieur Philomene
+cleared his voice, and suffered a pensive languor to cloud his
+manly brow.
+
+     "_Revenez, revenez, beaux jours de mon enfance,_"
+
+he began, in a small, tremulous, fluty voice.
+
+"They'll have a long road to travel back, _parbleu_!" muttered Mueller.
+
+     "_De votre aspect riant charmer ma souvenance_!"
+
+Here Mdlle. Rosalie struck a wrong chord, became involved in hopeless
+difficulties, and gasped audibly.
+
+Monsieur Philomene darted a withering glance at her, and went on:--
+
+     "_Mon coeur; mon pauvre coeur_" ...
+
+More wrong chords, and a smothered "_mille pardons_!" from Mdlle.
+Rosalie.
+
+     "_Mon coeur, mon pauvre coeur a la tristesse en proie,
+     En fouillant le passe"...._
+
+A dead stop on the part of Mdlle. Rosalie.
+
+     _"En fouillant le passe_"....
+
+repeated the tenor, with the utmost severity of emphasis.
+
+"_Mais, mon Dieu_, Rosalie! what are you doing?" cried Madame
+Desjardins, angrily. "Why don't you go on?"
+
+Mdlle. Rosalie burst into a flood of tears.
+
+"I--I can't!" she sobbed. "It's so--so very difficult--and"...
+
+Madame Desjardins flung up her hands in despair.
+
+"_Ciel_!" she cried, "and I have been paying three francs a lesson for
+you, Mademoiselle, twice a week for the last six years!"
+
+"_Mais, maman_"....
+
+"_Fi done_, Mademoiselle! I am ashamed of you. Make a curtsey to
+Monsieur Philomene this moment, and beg his pardon; for you have spoiled
+his beautiful song!"
+
+But Monsieur Philomene would hear of no such expiation. His soul, to
+use his own eloquent language, recoiled from it with horror! The
+accompaniment, _a vrai dire_, was not easy, and _la bien aimable_
+Mam'selle Rosalie had most kindly done her best with it. _Allons
+donc!_--on condition that no more should be said on the subject,
+Monsieur Philomene would volunteer to sing a little unaccompanied
+romance of his own composition--a mere _bagatelle_; but a tribute to
+"_les beaux yeux de ces cheres dames_!"
+
+So Mam'selle Rosalie wiped away her tears, and Madame Desjardins
+smoothed her ruffled feathers, and Monsieur Philomene warbled a
+plaintive little ditty in which "_coeur_" rhymed to "_peur_" and
+"_amours_" to "_toujours_" and "_le sort_" to "_la mort_" in quite the
+usual way; so giving great satisfaction to all present, but most,
+perhaps, to himself.
+
+And now, hospitably anxious that each of her guests should have a chance
+of achieving distinction, Madame Marotte invited Mdlle. Honoria to favor
+the company with a dramatic recitation.
+
+Mdlle. Honoria hesitated; exchanged glances with the Cyclops; and, in
+order to enhance the value of her performance, began raising all kinds
+of difficulties. There was no stage, for instance; and there were no
+footlights; but M. Dorinet met these objections by proposing to range
+all the seats at one end of the room, and to divide the stage off by a
+row of lighted candles.
+
+"But it is so difficult to render a dramatic scene without an
+interlocutor!" said the young lady.
+
+"What is it you require, _ma chere demoiselle?_" asked Madame Marotte.
+
+"I have no interlocutor," said Mdlle. Honoria.
+
+"No what, my love?"
+
+"No interlocutor," repeated Mdlle. Honoria, at the top of her voice.
+
+"Dear! dear! what a pity! Can't we send the boy for it? Marie, my child,
+bid Jacques run to Madame de Montparnasse's _appartement_ in the
+Rue" ...
+
+But Madame Marotte's voice was lost in the confusion; for Monsieur
+Dorinet was already deep in the arrangement of the room, and we were all
+helping to move the furniture. As for Mademoiselle's last difficulty,
+the little dancing-master met that by offering to read whatever was
+necessary to carry on the scene.
+
+And now, the stage being cleared, the audience placed, and Monsieur
+Dorinet provided with a volume of Corneille, Mademoiselle Honoria
+proceeded to drape herself in an old red shawl belonging to
+Madame Marotte.
+
+The scene selected is the fifth of the fourth act of Horace, where
+Camille, meeting her only surviving brother, upbraids him with the death
+of Curiace.
+
+Mam'selle Honoria, as Camille, with clasped hands and tragic expression,
+stalks in a slow and stately manner towards the footlights.
+
+(Breathless suspense of the audience.)
+
+M. Dorinet, who should begin by vaunting his victory over the Curiatii,
+stops to put on his glasses, finds it difficult to read with all the
+candles on the ground, and mutters something about the smallness of
+the type.
+
+Mdlle. Honoria, not to keep the audience waiting, surveys the ex-god
+Seamander with a countenance expressive of horror; starts; and takes a
+turn across the stage.
+
+"_Ma soeur,_" begins M. Dorinet, holding the book very much on one side,
+so as to catch the light upon the page, "_ma soeur, voici le bras_"....
+
+"Ah, Heaven! my dear Mademoiselle, take care of the candles!" cries
+Madame Marotte in a shrill whisper.
+
+     ... "_le bras qui venge nos deux freres,
+     Le bras qui rompt le cours de nos destins contraires,
+     Qui nous rend"_...
+
+Here he lost his place; stammered; and recovered it with difficulty.
+
+     _"Qui nous rend maitres d'Albe"_....
+
+Madame Marotte groans aloud in an agony of apprehension
+
+"_Ah, mon Dieu!_" she exclaims, gaspingly, "if they didn't flare so, it
+wouldn't be half so dangerous!"
+
+Here M. Dorinet dropped his book, and stooping to pick up the book,
+dropped his spectacles.
+
+"I think," said Mdlle. Honoria, indignantly, "we had better begin again.
+Monsieur Dorinet, pray read with the help of a candle _this_ time!"
+
+And, with an angry toss of her head, Mdlle. Honoria went up the stage,
+put on her tragedy face again, and prepared once more to stalk down to
+the footlights.
+
+Monsieur Dorinet, in the meanwhile, had snatched up a candle, readjusted
+his spectacles, and found his place.
+
+"_Ma soeur_" he began again, holding the book close to his eyes and the
+candle just under his nose, and nodding vehemently with every
+emphasis:--
+
+     "_Ma soeur, voici le bras qui venge nos deux freres,
+     Le bras qui rompt le cours de nos destins contraires,
+     Qui nous rend maitres d'Albe_" ...
+
+A piercing scream from Madame Marotte, a general cry on the part of the
+audience, and a strong smell of burning, brought the dancing-master to a
+sudden stop. He looked round, bewildered.
+
+"Your wig! Your wig's on fire!" cried every one at once.
+
+Monsieur Dorinet clapped his hand to his head, which was now adorned
+with a rapidly-spreading glory; burned his fingers; and cut a
+frantic caper.
+
+"Save him! save him!" yelled Madame Marotte.
+
+But almost before the words were out of her mouth, Mueller, clearing the
+candles at a bound, had rushed to the rescue, scalped Monsieur Dorinet
+by a _tour de main_, cast the blazing wig upon the floor, and trampled
+out the fire.
+
+Then followed a roar of "inextinguishable laughter," in which, however,
+neither the tragic Camille nor the luckless Horace joined.
+
+"Heavens and earth!" murmured the little dancing-master, ruefully
+surveying the ruins of his blonde peruke. And then he put his hand to
+his head, which was as bald as an egg.
+
+In the meanwhile Mdlle. Honoria, who had not yet succeeded in uttering a
+syllable of her part, took no pains to dissemble her annoyance; and was
+only pacified at last by a happy proposal on the part of Monsieur
+Philomene, who suggested that "this gifted demoiselle" should be
+entreated to favor the society with a soliloquy.
+
+Thus invited, she draped herself again, stalked down to the footlights
+for the third time, and in a high, shrill voice, with every variety of
+artificial emphasis and studied gesture, recited Voltaire's famous
+"Death of Coligny," from the _Henriade_.
+
+In the midst of this performance, just at that point when the assassins
+are described as falling upon their knees before their victim, the door
+of the room was softly opened, and another guest slipped in unseen
+behind us. Slipped in, indeed, so quietly that (the backs of the
+audience being turned that way) no one seemed to hear, and no one looked
+round but myself.
+
+Brief as was that glance, and all in the shade as he stood, I recognised
+him instantly.
+
+It was the mysterious stranger of the Cafe Procope.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIV.
+
+MY AUNT'S FLOWER GARDEN.
+
+Having despatched the venerable Coligny much to her own satisfaction and
+apparently to the satisfaction of her hearers, Mdlle. Honoria returned
+to private life; Messieurs Philomene and Dorinet removed the footlights;
+the audience once more dispersed itself about the room; and Madame
+Marotte welcomed the new-comer as Monsieur Lenoir.
+
+"_Monsieur est bien aimable_," she said, nodding and smiling, and, with
+tremulous hands, smoothing down the front of her black silk gown. "I had
+told these young ladies that we hoped for the honor of Monsieur's
+society. Will Monsieur permit me to introduce him?"
+
+"With pleasure, Madame Marotte."
+
+And M. Lenoir--white cravatted, white kid-gloved, hat in hand, perfectly
+well-dressed in full evening black, and wearing a small orange-colored
+rosette at his button-hole--bowed, glanced round the room, and, though
+his eyes undoubtedly took in both Mueller and myself, looked as if he had
+never seen either of us in his life.
+
+I< saw Mueller start, and the color fly into his face.
+
+"By Heaven!" he exclaimed, "it is--it must be ... look at him,
+Arbuthnot! If that isn't the man who stole my sketch-book, I'll eat
+my head!"
+
+"It _is_ the man," I replied. "I recognised him ten minutes ago, when he
+first came in."
+
+"You are certain?"
+
+"Quite certain."
+
+"And yet--there is something different!"
+
+There _was_ something different; but, at the same time, much that was
+identical. There was the same strange, inscrutable look, the same
+bronzed complexion, the same military bearing. M. Lenoir, it was true,
+was well, and even elegantly dressed; whereas, the stranger of the Cafe
+Procope bore all the outward stigmata of penury; but that was not all.
+There was yet "something different." The one looked like a man who had
+done, or suffered, a wrong in his time; who had an old quarrel with the
+world; and who only sought to hide himself, his poverty, and his bitter
+pride from the observation of his fellow men. The other stood before us
+dignified, _decore_, self-possessed, a man not only of the world, but
+apparently no stranger to that small section of it called "the great
+world." In a word, the man of the Cafe, sunken, sullen, threadbare as he
+was, would have been almost less out of his proper place in Madame
+Marotte's society of small trades-people and minor professionals, than
+was M. Lenoir with his _grand air_ and his orange-colored ribbon.
+
+"It's the same man," said Mueller; "the same, beyond a doubt. The more I
+look at him, the more confident I am."
+
+"And the more I look at him," said I, "the more doubtful I get."
+
+Madame Marotte, meanwhile, had introduced M. Lenoir to the two
+Conservatoire pupils and their mammas; Monsieur Dorinet had proposed
+some "_petits jeux_;" and Monsieur Philomene was helping him to
+re-arrange the chairs--this time in a circle.
+
+"Take your places, Messieurs et Mesdames--take your places!" cried
+Monsieur Dorinet, who had by this time resumed his wig, singed as it
+was, and shorn of its fair proportions. "What game shall we play at?"
+
+"_Pied de Boeuf_" "_Colin Maillard_" and other games were successively
+proposed and rejected.
+
+"We have a game in Alsace called 'My Aunt's Flower Garden'" said Mueller.
+"Does any one know it?"
+
+"'My Aunt's Flower Garden?'" repeated Monsieur Dorinet. "I never heard
+of it."
+
+"It sounds pretty," said Mdlle. Rosalie.
+
+"Will M'sieur teach it to us, if it is not very difficult?" suggested
+Mdlle. Rosalie's mamma.
+
+"With pleasure, Madame. It is not a bad game--and it is extremely easy.
+We will sit in a circle, if you please--the chairs as they are placed
+will do quite well."
+
+We were just about to take our places when Madame Marotte seized the
+opportunity to introduce Mueller and myself to M. Lenoir.
+
+"We have met before, Monsieur," said Mueller, pointedly.
+
+"I am ashamed to confess, Monsieur, that I do not remember to have had
+that pleasure," replied M. Lenoir, somewhat stiffly.
+
+"And yet, Monsieur, it was but the other day," persisted Mueller.
+
+"Monsieur, I can but reiterate my regret."
+
+"At the Cafe Procope."
+
+M. Lenoir stared coldly, slightly shrugged his shoulders, and said,
+with the air of one who repudiates a discreditable charge:--
+
+"Monsieur, I do not frequent the Cafe Procope."
+
+"If Monsieur Mueller is to teach us the game, Monsieur Mueller must begin
+it!" said Monsieur Dorinet.
+
+"At once," replied Mueller, taking his place in the circle.
+
+As ill-luck would have it (the rest of us being already seated), there
+were but two chairs left; so that M. Lenoir and Mueller had to sit
+side by side.
+
+"I begin with my left-hand neighbor," said Mueller, addressing himself
+with a bow to Mdlle. Rosalie; "and the circle will please to repeat
+after me:--'I have the four corners of my Aunt's Flower Garden
+for sale--
+
+thee, and lov'd thee, and ne'er can forget._'"
+
+MDLLE. ROSALIE _to_ M. PHILOMENE.--I have the four corners of my Aunt's
+Flower Garden for sale--
+
+thee, and lov'd thee, and ne'er can forget._'
+
+M. PHILOMENE _to_ MADAME DE MONTPARNASSE.--I have the four corners of my
+Aunt's Flower Garden, etc., etc.
+
+MADAME DE MONTPARNASSE _to_ M. DORINET.--I have the four corners of my
+Aunt's Flower Garden, etc., etc.
+
+Monsieur Dorinet repeats the formula to Madame Desjardins; Madame
+Desjardins passes it on to me; I proclaim it at the top of my voice to
+Madame Marotte; Madame Marotte transfers it to Mdlle. Honoria; Mdlle.
+Honoria delivers it to the fair Marie; the fair Marie tells it to M.
+Lenoir, and the first round is completed.
+
+Mueller resumes the lead :--
+
+     "_In the second grow heartsease and wild eglantine;
+     Fair exchange is no theft--for my heart, give me thine_."
+
+MDLLE. ROSALIE _to_ M. PHILOMENE:--
+
+     "_In the second grow heartsease and wild eglantine;
+     Fair exchange is no theft--for my heart, give me thine_."
+
+M. PHILOMENE _to_ MDLLE. DE MONTPARNASSE:--
+
+     "_In the second grow heartsease_," &c., &c.
+
+And so on again, till the second round is done. Then Mueller began
+again:--
+
+     "_In the third of these corners pale primroses grow;
+     Now tell me thy secret, and whisper it low_."
+
+Mdlle. Rosalie was about to repeat these lines as before; but he stopped
+her.
+
+"No, Mademoiselle, not till you have told me the secret."
+
+"The secret, M'sieur? What secret?"
+
+"Nay, Mademoiselle, how can I tell that till you have told me? You must
+whisper something to me--something very secret, which you would not wish
+any one else to hear--before you repeat the lines. And when you repeat
+them, Monsieur Philomene must whisper his secret to you--and so on
+through the circle."
+
+Mdlle. Rosalie hesitated, smiled, whispered something in Mueller's ear,
+and went on with:--
+
+     "_In the third of these corners pale primroses grow;
+     Now tell me thy secret, and whisper it low_."
+
+Monsieur Philomene then whispered his secret to Mdlle. Rosalie, and so
+on again till it ended with M. Lenoir and Mueller.
+
+"I don't think it is a very amusing game," said Madame Marotte; who,
+being deaf, had been left out of the last round, and found it dull.
+
+"It will be more entertaining presently, Madame," shouted Mueller, with a
+malicious twinkle about his eyes. "Pray observe the next lines,
+Messieurs et Mesdames, and follow my lead as before:--
+
+     '_Roses bloom in the fourth; and your secret, my dear,
+     Which you whisper'd so softly just now in my ear,
+     I repeat word for word, for the others to hear!_'
+
+Mademoiselle Rosalie (whose pardon I implore!) whispered to me that
+Monsieur Philomene dyed his moustache and whiskers."
+
+There was a general murmur of alarm tempered with tittering.
+Mademoiselle Rosalie was dumb with confusion. Monsieur Philomene's face
+became the color of a full-blown peony. Madame de Montparnasse and
+Mdlle. Honoria turned absolutely green.
+
+"_Comment!_" exclaimed one or two voices. "Is everything to be
+repeated?"
+
+"Everything, Messieurs et Mesdames," replied
+Mueller--"everything--without reservation. I call upon Mdlle. Rosalie to
+reveal the secret of Monsieur Philomene."
+
+MDLLE. ROSALIE (_with great promptitude_):--Monsieur Philomene whispered
+to me that Honoria was the most disagreeable girl in Paris, Marie the
+dullest, and myself the prettiest.
+
+M. PHILOMENE (_in an agony of confusion_):--I beseech you, Mam'selle
+Honoria ... I entreat you, Mam'selle Marie, not for an instant to
+suppose....
+
+MDLLE. HONORIA (_drawing herself up and smiling acidly_):--Oh, pray do
+not give yourself the trouble to apologize, Monsieur Philomene. Your
+opinion, I assure you, is not of the least moment to either of us. Is
+it, Marie?
+
+But the fair Marie only smiled good-naturedly, and said:--
+
+"I know I am not clever. Monsieur Philomene is quite right; and I am not
+at all angry with him."
+
+"But--but, indeed, Mesdemoiselles, I--I--am incapable...." stammered the
+luckless tenor, wiping the perspiration from his brow. "I am
+incapable...."
+
+"Silence in the circle!" cried Mueller, authoritatively. "Private
+civilities are forbidden by the rules of the game. I call Monsieur
+Philomene to order, and I demand from him the secret of Madame de
+Montparnasse."
+
+M. Philomene looked even more miserable than before.
+
+"I--I ... but it is an odious position! To betray the confidence of a
+lady ... Heavens! I cannot."
+
+"The secret!--the secret!" shouted the others, impatiently.
+
+Madame de Montparnasse pursed up her parchment lips, glared upon us
+defiantly, and said:--
+
+"Pray don't hesitate about repeating my words, M'sieur Philomene. I am
+not ashamed of them."
+
+M. PHILOMENE (_reluctantly_):--Madame de Montparnasse observed to me
+that what she particularly disliked was a mixed society like--like the
+present; and that she hoped our friend Madame Marotte would in future be
+less indiscriminate in the choice of her acquaintances.
+
+MULLER (_with elaborate courtesy_):--We are all infinitely obliged to
+Madame de Montparnasse for her opinion of us--(I speak for the society,
+as leader of the circle)--and beg to assure her that we entirely
+coincide in her views. It rests with Madame to carry on the game, and to
+betray the confidence of Monsieur Dorinet.
+
+MADAME DE MONTPARNASSE (_with obvious satisfaction_):--Monsieur Dorinet
+told me that Rosalie Desjardin's legs were ill-made, and that she would
+never make a dancer, though she practised from now till doomsday.
+
+M. DORINET (_springing to his feet as if he had been shot_):--Heavens
+and earth! Madame de Montparnasse, what have I done that you should so
+pervert my words? Mam'selle Rosalie--_ma chere eleve_, believe me,
+I never....
+
+"Silence in the circle!" shouted Mueller again.
+
+M. DORINET:--But, M'sieur, in simple self-defence....
+
+MULLER:--Self-defence, Monsieur Dorinet, is contrary to the rules of the
+game. Revenge only is permitted. Revenge yourself on Madame Desjardins,
+whose secret it is your turn to tell.
+
+M. DORINET:--Madame Desjardins drew my attention to the toilette of
+Madame de Montparnasse. She said: "_Mon Dieu!_ Monsieur Dorinet, are you
+not tired of seeing La Montparnasse in that everlasting old black gown?
+My Rosalie says she is in mourning for her ugliness."
+
+MADAME DESJARDINS (_laughing heartily_):--_Eh bien--oui!_ I don't deny
+it; and Rosalie's _mot_ was not bad. And now, M'sieur the Englishman
+(_turning to me_), it is your turn to be betrayed. Monsieur, whose name
+I cannot pronounce, said to me:--"Madame, the French, _selon moi_, are
+the best dressed and most _spirituel_ people of Europe. Their very
+silence is witty; and if mankind were, by universal consent, to go
+without clothes to-morrow, they would wear the primitive costume of Adam
+and Eve more elegantly than the rest of the world, and still lead
+the fashion,"
+
+(_A murmur of approval on the part of the company, who take the
+compliment entirely aux serieux_.)
+
+MYSELF (_agreeably conscious of having achieved popularity_):--Our
+hostess's deafness having unfortunately excluded her from this part of
+the game, I was honored with the confidence of Mdlle. Honoria, who
+informed me that she is to make her _debut_ before long at the Theatre
+Francais, and hoped that I would take tickets for the occasion.
+
+MDLLE. ROSALIE (_satirically_):--_Brava_, Honoria! What a woman of
+business you are!
+
+MDLLE. HONORIA (_affecting not to hear this observation_)--
+
+     "_Roses bloom in the fourth, and your secret, my dear,
+     Which you whispered so softly just now in my ear,
+     I repeat word for word for the others to hear_."
+
+Marie said to me.... _Tiens_! Marie, don't pull my dress in that way.
+You shouldn't have said it, you know, if it won't bear repeating! Marie
+said to me that she could have either Monsieur Mueller or Monsieur
+Lenoir, by only holding up her finger--but she couldn't make up her mind
+which she liked best.
+
+MDLLE. MARIE (_half crying_):--Nay, Honoria--how can you be so--so
+unkind ... so spiteful? I--I did not say I could have either M'sieur
+Mueller or... or...
+
+M. LENOIR (_with great spirit and good breeding_):--Whether Mademoiselle
+used those words or not is of very little importance. The fact remains
+the same; and is as old as the world. Beauty has but to will and
+to conquer.
+
+MULLER:--Order in the circle! The game waits for Mademoiselle Marie.
+
+MARIE (_hesitatingly_):--
+
+     "_Roses bloom in the fourth, and your secret_"
+
+M'sieur Lenoir said that--that he admired the color of my dress, and
+that blue became me more than lilac.
+
+MULLER: (_coldly_)--_Pardon_, Mademoiselle, but I happened to overhear
+what Monsieur Lenoir whispered just now, and those were not his words.
+Monsieur Lenoir said, "Look in"... but perhaps Mademoiselle would prefer
+me not to repeat more?
+
+MARIE--(_in great confusion_):--As--as you please, M'sieur.
+
+MULLER:--Then, Mademoiselle, I will be discreet, and I will not even
+impose a forfeit upon you, as I might do, by the laws of the game. It is
+for Monsieur Lenoir to continue.
+
+M. LENOIR:--I do not remember what Monsieur Mueller whispered to me at
+the close of the last round.
+
+MULLER (_pointedly_):--_Pardon,_ Monsieur, I should have thought that
+scarcely possible.
+
+M. LENOIR:--It was perfectly unintelligible, and therefore left no
+impression on my memory.
+
+MULLER:--Permit me, then, to have the honor of assisting your memory. I
+said to you--"Monsieur, if I believed that any modest young woman of my
+acquaintance was in danger of being courted by a man of doubtful
+character, do you know what I would do? I would hunt that man down with
+as little remorse as a ferret hunts down a rat in a drain."
+
+M. LENOIR:--The sentiment does you honor, Monsieur; but I do not see the
+application,
+
+MULLER:--Vous ne le trouvez pas, Monsieur?
+
+M. LENOIR--(_with a cold stare, and a scarcely perceptible shrug of the
+shoulders_):--Non, Monsieur.
+
+Here Mdlle. Rosalie broke in with:--"What are we to do next, M'sieur
+Mueller? Are we to begin another round, or shall we start a fresh game?"
+
+To which Mueller replied that it must be "_selon le plaisir de ces
+dames_;" and put the question to the vote.
+
+But too many plain, unvarnished truths had cropped up in the course of
+the last round of my Aunt's Flower Garden; and the ladies were out of
+humor. Madame de Montparnasse, frigid, Cyclopian, black as Erebus, found
+that it was time to go home; and took her leave, bristling with
+gentility. The tragic Honoria stalked majestically after her. Madame
+Desjardins, mortally offended with M. Dorinet on the score of Rosalie's
+legs, also prepared to be gone; while M. Philomene, convicted of
+hair-dye and _brouille_ for ever with "the most disagreeable girl in
+Paris," hastened to make his adieux as brief as possible.
+
+"A word in your ear, mon cher Dorinet," whispered he, catching the
+little dancing-master by the button-hole. "Isn't it the most unpleasant
+party you were ever at in your life?"
+
+The ex-god Scamander held up his hands and eyes.
+
+"_Eh, mon Dieu_!" he replied. "What an evening of disasters! I have lost
+my best pupil and my second-best wig!"
+
+In the meanwhile, we went up like the others, and said good-night to our
+hostess.
+
+She, good soul! in her deafness, knew nothing about the horrors of the
+evening, and was profuse of her civilities. "So amiable of these
+gentlemen to honor her little soiree--so kind of M'sieur Mueller to have
+exerted himself to make things go off pleasantly--so sorry we would not
+stay half an hour longer," &c., &c.
+
+To all of which Mueller (with a sly grimace expressive of contrition)
+replied only by a profound salutation and a rapid retreat. Passing M.
+Lenoir without so much as a glance, he paused a moment before Mdlle.
+Marie who was standing near the door, and said in a tone audible only to
+her and myself:--
+
+"I congratulate you, Mademoiselle, on your admirable talent for
+intrigue. I trust, when you look in the usual place and find the
+promised letter, it will prove agreeable reading. J'ai l'honneur,
+Mademoiselle, de vous saluer."
+
+I saw the girl flush crimson, then turn deadly white, and draw back as
+if his hand had struck her a sudden blow. The next moment we were
+half-way down the stairs.
+
+"What, in Heaven's name, does all this mean?" I said, when we were once
+more in the street.
+
+"It means," replied Mueller fiercely, "that the man's a scoundrel, and
+the woman, like all other women, is false."
+
+"Then the whisper you overheard" ...
+
+"Was only this:--'_Look in the usual place, and you will find a
+letter_.' Not many words, _mon cher_, but confoundedly comprehensive!
+And I who believed that girl to be an angel of candor! I who was within
+an ace of falling seriously in love with her! _Sacredie_! what an idiot
+I have been!"
+
+"Forget her, my dear fellow," said I. "Wipe her out of your memory
+(which I think will not be difficult), and leave her to her fate."
+
+He shook his head.
+
+"No," he said, gloomily, "I won't do that. I'll get to the bottom of
+that man's mystery; and if, as I suspect, there's that about his past
+life which won't bear the light of day--I'll save her, if I can."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXV.
+
+WEARY AND FAR DISTANT.
+
+Twice already, in accordance with my promise to Dalrymple, I had called
+upon Madame de Courcelles, and finding her out each time, had left my
+card, and gone away disappointed. From Dalrymple himself, although I had
+written to him several times, I heard seldom, and always briefly. His
+first notes were dated from Berlin, and those succeeding them from
+Vienna. He seemed restless, bitter, dissatisfied with himself, and with
+the world. Naturally unfit for a lounging, idle life, his active nature,
+now that it had to bear up against the irritation of hope deferred,
+chafed and fretted for work.
+
+"My sword-arm," he wrote in one of his letters, "is weary of its
+holiday. There are times when I long for the smell of gunpowder, and the
+thunder of battle. I am sick to death of churches and picture-galleries,
+operas, dilettantism, white-kid-glovism, and all the hollow shows and
+seemings of society. Sometimes I regret having left the army--at others
+I rejoice; for, after all, in these piping times of peace, to be a
+soldier is to be a mere painted puppet--a thing of pipe-clay and gold
+bullion--an expensive scarecrow--an elegant Guy Fawkes--a sign, not of
+what is, but of what has been, and yet may be again. For my part, I care
+not to take the livery without the service. Pshaw! will things never
+mend! Are the good old times, and the good old international hatreds,
+gone by for ever? Shall we never again have a thorough, seasonable,
+wholesome, continental war? This place (Vienna) would be worth fighting
+for, if one had the chance. I sometimes amuse myself by planning a
+siege, when I ride round the fortifications, as is my custom of an
+afternoon."
+
+In another, after telling me that he had been reading some books of
+travel in Egypt and Central America, he said:--
+
+"Next to a military life I think that of a traveller--a genuine
+traveller, who turns his back upon railroads and guides--must be the
+most exciting and the most enviable under heaven. Since reading these
+books, I dream of the jungle and the desert, and fancy that a
+buffalo-hunt must be almost as fine sport as a charge of cavalry. Oh,
+what a weary exile this is! I feel as if the very air were stagnant
+around me, and I, like the accursed vessel that carried the ancient
+mariner,--
+
+     As idle as a painted ship,
+     Upon a painted ocean.'"
+
+Sometimes, though rarely, he mentioned Madame de Courcelles, and then
+very guardedly: always as "Madame de Courcelles," and never as his wife.
+
+"That morning," he wrote, "comes back to me with all the vagueness of a
+dream--you will know what morning I mean, and why it fills so shadowy a
+page in the book of my memory. And it might as well have been a dream,
+for aught of present peace or future hope that it has brought me. I
+often think that I was selfish when I exacted that pledge from her. I do
+not see of what good it can be to either her or me, or in what sense I
+can be said to have gained even the power to protect and serve her.
+Would that I were rich; or that she and I were poor together, and
+dwelling far away in some American wild, under the shade of primeval
+trees, the world forgetting; by the world forgot! I should enjoy the
+life of a Canadian settler--so free, so rational, so manly. How happy we
+might be--she with her children, her garden, her books; I with my dogs,
+my gun, my lands! What a curse it is, this spider's web of civilization,
+that hems and cramps us in on every side, and from which not all the
+armor of common-sense is sufficient to preserve us!"
+
+Sometimes he broke into a strain of forced gayety, more sad, to my
+thinking, than the bitterest lamentations could have been.
+
+"I wish to Heaven," he said, in one of his later letters--"I wish to
+Heaven I had no heart, and no brain! I wish I was, like some worthy
+people I know, a mere human zoophyte, consisting of nothing but a mouth
+and a stomach. Only conceive how it must simplify life when once one has
+succeeded in making a clean sweep of all those finer emotions which
+harass more complicated organisms! Enviable zoophytes, that live only to
+digest!--who would not be of the brotherhood?"
+
+In another he wrote:--
+
+"I seem to have lived years in the last five or six weeks, and to have
+grown suddenly old and cynical. Some French writer (I think it is
+Alphonse Karr) says, 'Nothing in life is really great and good, except
+what is not true. Man's greatest treasures are his illusions.' Alas! my
+illusions have been dropping from me in showers of late, like withered
+leaves in Autumn. The tree will be bare as a gallows ere long, if these
+rough winds keep on blowing. If only things would amuse me as of old! If
+there was still excitement in play, and forgetfulness in wine, and
+novelty in travel! But there is none--and all things alike are 'flat,
+stale, and unprofitable,' The truth is, Damon, I want but one thing--and
+wanting that, lack all."
+
+Here is one more extract, and it shall be the last:--
+
+"You ask me how I pass my days--in truth, wearily enough. I rise with
+the dawn, but that is not very early in September; and I ride for a
+couple of hours before breakfast. After breakfast I play billiards in
+some public room, consume endless pipes, read the papers, and so on.
+Later in the day I scowl through a picture-gallery, or a string of
+studios; or take a pull up the river; or start off upon a long, solitary
+objectless walk through miles and miles of forest. Then comes
+dinner--the inevitable, insufferable, interminable German table-d'hote
+dinner--and then there is the evening to be got through somehow! Now and
+then I drop in at a theatre, but generally take refuge in some plebeian
+Lust Garten or Beer Hall, where amid clouds of tobacco-smoke, one may
+listen to the best part-singing and zitter-playing in Europe. And so my
+days drag by--who but myself knows how slowly? Truly, Damon, there comes
+to every one of us, sooner or later, a time when we say of life as
+Christopher Sly said of the comedy--''Tis an excellent piece of work.
+Would 'twere done!'"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVI.
+
+THE VICOMTE DE CAYLUS.
+
+It was after receiving the last of these letters that I hazarded a third
+visit to Madame de Courcelles. This time, I ventured to present myself
+at her door about midday, and was at once ushered upstairs into a
+drawing-room looking out on the Rue Castellane.
+
+Seeing her open work-table, with the empty chair and footstool beside
+it, I thought at the first glance that I was alone in the room, when a
+muttered "Sacr-r-r-re! Down, Bijou!" made me aware of a gentleman
+extended at full length upon a sofa near the fireplace, and of a
+vicious-looking Spitz crouched beneath it.
+
+The gentleman lifted his head from the sofa-cusion; stared at me; bowed
+carelessly; got upon his feet; and seizing the poker, lunged savagely at
+the fire, as if he had a spite against it, and would have put it out,
+if he could. This done, he yawned aloud, flung himself into the nearest
+easy-chair, and rang the bell.
+
+"More coals, Henri," he said, imperiously; "and--stop! a bottle of
+Seltzer-water."
+
+The servant hesitated.
+
+"I don't think, Monsieur le Vicomte," he said, "that Madame has any
+Seltzer-water in the house; but ..."
+
+"Confound you!--you never have anything in the house at the moment one
+wants it," interrupted the gentleman, irritably.
+
+"I can send for some, if Monsieur le Vicomte desires it."
+
+"Send for it, then; and remember, when I next ask for it, let there be
+some at hand."
+
+"Yes, Monsieur le Vicomte."
+
+"And--Henri!"
+
+"Yes, Monsieur le Vicomte."
+
+"Bid them be quick. I hate to be kept waiting!"
+
+The servant murmured his usual "Yes, Monsieur le Vicomte," and
+disappeared; but with a look of such subdued dislike and impatience in
+his face, as would scarcely have flattered Monsieur le Vicomte had he
+chanced to surprise it.
+
+In the meantime the dog had never ceased growling; whilst I, in default
+of something better to do, turned over the leaves of an album, and took
+advantage of a neighboring mirror to scrutinize the outward appearance
+of this authoritative occupant of Madame de Courcelles' drawing-room.
+
+He was a small, pallid, slender man of about thirty-five or seven years
+of age, with delicate, effeminate features, and hair thickly sprinkled
+with gray. His fingers, white and taper as a woman's, were covered with
+rings. His dress was careless, but that of a gentleman. Glancing at him
+even thus furtively, I could not help observing the worn lines about his
+temples, the mingled languor and irritability of his every gesture; the
+restless suspicion of his eye; the hard curves about his handsome mouth.
+
+"_Mille tonnerres_!" said he, between his teeth "come out, Bijou--come
+out, I say!"
+
+The dog came out unwillingly, and changed the growl to a little whine
+of apprehension. His master immediately dealt him a smart kick that sent
+him crouching to the farther corner of the room, where he hid himself
+under a chair.
+
+"I'll teach you to make that noise," muttered he, as he drew his chair
+closer to the fire, and bent over it, shiveringly. "A yelping brute,
+that would be all the better for hanging."
+
+Having sat thus for a few moments, he seemed to grow restless again,
+and, pushing back his chair, rose, looked out of the window, took a turn
+or two across the room, and paused at length to take a book from one of
+the side-tables. As he did this, our eyes met in the looking-glass;
+whereupon he turned hastily back to the window, and stood there
+whistling till it occurred to him to ring the bell again.
+
+"Monsieur rang?" said the footman, once more making his appearance at
+the door.
+
+"_Mort de ma vie_! yes. The Seltzer-water."
+
+"I have sent for it, Monsieur le Vicomte."
+
+"And it is not yet come?"
+
+"Not yet, Monsieur le Vicomte."
+
+He muttered something to himself, and dropped back into the chair before
+the fire.
+
+"Does Madame de Courcelles know that I am here?" he asked, as the
+servant, after lingering a moment, was about to leave the room.
+
+"I delivered Monsieur le Vicomte's message, and brought back Madame's
+reply," said the man, "half an hour ago."
+
+"True--I had forgotten it. You may go."
+
+The footman closed the door noiselessly, and had no sooner done so than
+he was recalled by another impatient peal.
+
+"Here, Henri--have you told Madame de Courcelles that this gentleman is
+also waiting to see her?"
+
+"Yes, Monsieur le Vicomte."
+
+"_Eh bien_?"
+
+"And Madame said she should be down in a few moments."
+
+"_Sacredie_! go back, then, and inquire if...."
+
+"Madame is here."
+
+As the footman moved back respectfully, Madame de Courcelles came into
+the room. She was looking perhaps somewhat paler, but, to my thinking,
+more charming than ever. Her dark hair was gathered closely round her
+head in massive braids, displaying to their utmost advantage all the
+delicate curves of her throat and chin; while her rich morning dress,
+made of some dark material, and fastened at the throat by a round brooch
+of dead gold, fell in loose and ample folds, like the drapery of a Roman
+matron. Coming at once to meet me, she extended a cordial hand,
+and said:--
+
+"I had begun to despair of ever seeing you again. Why have you always
+come when I was out?"
+
+"Madame," I said, bending low over the slender fingers, that seemed to
+linger kindly in my own, "I have been undeservedly unfortunate."
+
+"Remember for the future," she said, "that I am always at home till
+midday, and after five."
+
+Then, turning to her other visitor, she said:--
+
+"_Mon cousin_, allow me to present my friend. Monsieur
+Arbuthnot--Monsieur le Vicomte Adrien de Caylus."
+
+I had suspected as much already. Who but he would have dared to assume
+these airs of insolence? Who but her suitor and my friend's rival? I had
+disliked him at first sight, and now I detested him. Whether it was that
+my aversion showed itself in my face, or that Madame de Courcelles's
+cordial welcome of myself annoyed him, I know not; but his bow was even
+cooler than my own.
+
+"I have been waiting to see you, Helene," said he, looking at his watch,
+"for nearly three-quarters of an hour."
+
+"I sent you word, _mon cousin_, that I was finishing a letter for the
+foreign post," said Madame de Courcelles, coldly, "and that I could not
+come sooner."
+
+Monsieur de Caylus bit his lip and cast an impatient glance in my
+direction.
+
+"Can you spare me a few moments alone, Helene?" he said.
+
+"Alone, _mon cousin_?"
+
+"Yes, upon a matter of business."
+
+Madame de Courcelles sighed.
+
+"If Monsieur Arbuthnot will be so indulgent as to excuse me for five
+minutes," she replied. "This way, _mon cousin_."
+
+So saying, she lifted a dark green curtain, beneath which they passed to
+a farther room out of sight and hearing.
+
+They remained a long time away. So long, that I grew weary of waiting,
+and, having turned over all the illustrated books upon the table, and
+examined every painting on the walls, turned to the window, as the
+idler's last resource, and watched the passers-by.
+
+What endless entertainment in the life-tide of a Paris street, even
+though but a branch from one of the greater arteries! What color--what
+character--what animation--what variety! Every third or fourth man is a
+blue-bloused artisan; every tenth, a soldier in a showy uniform. Then
+comes the grisette in her white cap; and the lemonade-vender with his
+fantastic pagoda, slung like a peep-show across his shoulders; and the
+peasant woman from Normandy, with her high-crowned head-dress; and the
+abbe, all in black, with his shovel-hat pulled low over his eyes; and
+the mountebank selling pencils and lucifer-matches to the music of a
+hurdy-gurdy; and the gendarme, who is the terror of street urchins; and
+the gamin, who is the torment of the gendarme; and the water-carrier,
+with his cart and his cracked bugle; and the elegant ladies and
+gentlemen, who look in at shop windows and hire seats at two sous each
+in the Champs Elysees; and, of course, the English tourist reading
+"Galignani's Guide" as he goes along. Then, perhaps, a regiment marches
+past with colors flying and trumpets braying; or a fantastic-looking
+funeral goes by, with a hearse like a four-post bed hung with black
+velvet and silver; or the peripatetic showman with his company of white
+rats establishes himself on the pavement opposite, till admonished to
+move on by the sergent de ville. What an ever-shifting panorama! What a
+kaleidoscope of color and character! What a study for the humorist, the
+painter, the poet!
+
+Thinking thus, and watching the overflowing current as it hurried on
+below, I became aware of a smart cab drawn by a showy chestnut, which
+dashed round the corner of the street and came down the Rue Castellane
+at a pace that caused every head to turn as it went by. Almost before I
+had time to do more than observe that it was driven by a moustachioed
+and lavender-kidded gentleman, it drew up before the house, and a trim
+tiger jumped down, and thundered at the door. At that moment, the
+gentleman, taking advantage of the pause to light a cigar, looked up,
+and I recognised the black moustache and sinister countenance of
+Monsieur de Simoncourt.
+
+"A gentleman for Monsieur le Vicomte," said the servant, drawing back
+the green curtain and opening a vista into the room beyond.
+
+"Ask him to come upstairs," said the voice of De Caylus from within.
+
+"I have done so, Monsieur; but he prefers to wait in the cabriolet."
+
+"Pshaw!--confound it!--say that I'm coming."
+
+The servant withdrew.
+
+I then heard the words "perfectly safe investment--present
+convenience--unexpected demand," rapidly uttered by Monsieur de Caylus;
+and then they both came back; he looked flushed and angry--she calm
+as ever.
+
+"Then I shall call on you again to-morrow, Helene," said he, plucking
+nervously at his glove. "You will have had time to reflect. You will see
+matters differently."
+
+Madame Courcelles shook her head.
+
+"Reflection will not change my opinion," she said gently.
+
+"Well, shall I send Lejeune to you? He acts as solicitor to the company,
+and ..."
+
+"_Mon cousin_" interposed the lady, "I have already given you my
+decision--why pursue the question further? I do not wish to see
+Monsieur Lejeune, and I have no speculative tastes whatever."
+
+Monsieur de Caylus, with a suppressed exclamation that sounded like a
+curse, rent his glove right in two, and then, as if annoyed at the
+self-betrayal, crushed up the fragments in his hand, and
+laughed uneasily.
+
+"All women are alike," he said, with an impatient shrug. "They know
+nothing of the world, and place no faith in those who are competent to
+advise them. I had given you credit, my charming cousin, for
+broader views."
+
+Madame de Courcelles smiled without replying, and caressed the little
+dog, which had come out from under the sofa to fondle round her.
+
+"Poor Bijou!" said she. "Pretty Bijou! Do you take good care of him,
+_mon cousin_?"
+
+"Upon my soul, not I," returned De Caylus, carelessly. "Lecroix feeds
+him, I believe, and superintends his general education."
+
+"Who is Lecroix?"
+
+"My valet, courier, body-guard, letter-carrier, and general _factotum_.
+A useful vagabond, without whom I should scarcely know my right hand
+from my left!"
+
+"Poor Bijou! I fear, then, your chance of being remembered is small
+indeed!" said Madame de Courcelles, compassionately.
+
+But Monsieur le Vicomte only whistled to the dog; bowed haughtily to me;
+kissed, with an air of easy familiarity, before which she evidently
+recoiled, first the hand and then the cheek of his beautiful cousin, and
+so left the room. The next moment I saw him spring into the cabriolet,
+take his place beside Monsieur de Simoncourt, and drive away, with Bijou
+following at a pace that might almost have tried a greyhound.
+
+"My cousin, De Caylus, has lately returned from Algiers on leave of
+absence," said Madame de Courcelles, after a few moments of awkward
+silence, during which I had not known what to say. "You have heard of
+him, perhaps?"
+
+"Yes, Madame, I have heard of Monsieur de Caylus."
+
+"From Captain Dalrymple?
+
+"From Captain Dalrymple, Madame; and in society."
+
+"He is a brave officer," she said, hesitatingly, "and has greatly
+distinguished himself in this last campaign."
+
+"So I have heard, Madame."
+
+She looked at me, as if she would fain read how much or how little
+Dalrymple had told me.
+
+"You are Captain Dalrymple's friend, Mr. Arbuthnot," she said,
+presently, "and I know you have his confidence. You are probably aware
+that my present position with regard to Monsieur de Caylus is not only
+very painful, but also very difficult."
+
+"Madame, I know it."
+
+"But it is a position of which I have the command, and which no one
+understands so well as myself. To attempt to help me, would be to add to
+my embarrassments. For this reason it is well that Captain Dalrymple is
+not here. His presence just now in Paris could do no good--on the
+contrary, would be certain to do harm. Do you follow my meaning,
+Monsieur Arbuthnot?"
+
+"I understand what you say, Madame; but...."
+
+"But you do not quite understand why I say it? _Eh bien_, Monsieur, when
+you write to Captain Dalrymple.... for you write sometimes, do you not?"
+
+"Often, Madame."
+
+"Then, when you write, say nothing that may add to his anxieties. If you
+have reason at any time to suppose that I am importuned to do this or
+that; that I am annoyed; that I have my own battle to fight--still, for
+his sake as well as for mine, be silent. It _is_ my own battle, and I
+know how to fight it."
+
+"Alas! Madame...."
+
+She smiled sadly.
+
+"Nay," she said, "I have more courage than you would suppose; more
+courage and more will. I am fully capable of bearing my own burdens; and
+Captain Dalrymple has already enough of his own. Now tell me something
+of yourself. You are here, I think, to study medicine. Are you greatly
+devoted to your work? Have you many friends?"
+
+"I study, Madame--not always very regularly; and I have one friend."
+
+"An Englishman?"
+
+"No, Madame--a German."
+
+"A fellow-student, I presume."
+
+"No, Madame--an artist."
+
+"And you are very happy here?"
+
+"I have occupations and amusements; therefore, if to be neither idle nor
+dull is to be happy. I suppose I am happy."
+
+"Nay," she said quickly, "be sure of it. Do not doubt it. Who asks more
+from Fate courts his own destruction."
+
+"But it would be difficult, Madame, to go through life without desiring
+something better, something higher--without ambition, for
+instance--without love."
+
+"Ambition and love!" she repeated, smiling sadly. "There speaks the man.
+Ambition first--the aim and end of life; love next--the pleasant adjunct
+to success! Ah, beware of both."
+
+"But without either, life would be a desert."
+
+"Life _is_ a desert," she replied, bitterly. "Ambition is its mirage,
+ever beckoning, ever receding--love its Dead Sea fruit, fair without and
+dust within. You look surprised. You did not expect such gloomy theories
+from me--yet I am no cynic. I have lived; I have suffered; I am a
+woman--_voila tout_. When you are a few years older, and have trodden
+some of the flinty ways of life, you will see the world as I see it."
+
+"It may be so, Madame; but if life is indeed a desert, it is, at all
+events, some satisfaction to know that the dwellers in tents become
+enamored of their lot, and, content with what the desert has to give,
+desire no other. It is only the neophyte who rides after the mirage and
+thirsts for the Dead Sea apple."
+
+She smiled again.
+
+"Ah!" she said, "the gifts of the desert are two-fold, and what one gets
+depends on what one seeks. For some the wilderness has gifts of
+resignation, meditation, peace; for others it has the horse, the tent,
+the pipe, the gun, the chase of the panther and antelope. But to go back
+to yourself. Life, you say, would be barren without ambition and love.
+What is your ambition?"
+
+"Nay, Madame, that is more than I can tell you--more than I know
+myself."
+
+"Your profession...."
+
+"If ever I dream dreams, Madame," I interrupted quickly, "my profession
+has no share in them. It is a profession I do not love, and which I hope
+some day to abandon."
+
+"Your dreams, then?"
+
+I shook my head.
+
+"Vague--unsubstantial--illusory--forgotten as soon as dreamt! How can I
+analyze them? How can I describe them? In childhood one says--'I should
+like to be a soldier, and conquer the world;' or 'I should like to be a
+sailor, and discover new Continents;' or 'I should like to be a poet,
+and wear a laurel wreath, like Petrarch and Dante;' but as one gets
+older and wiser (conscious, perhaps, of certain latent energies, and
+weary of certain present difficulties and restraints), one can only
+wait, as best one may, and watch for the rising of that tide whose flood
+leads on to fortune."
+
+With this I rose to take my leave. Madame de Courcelles smiled and put
+out her hand.
+
+"Come often," she said; "and come at the hours when I am at home. I
+shall always be glad to see you. Above all, remember my caution--not a
+word to Captain Dalrymple, either now or at any other time."
+
+"Madame, you may rely upon me. One thing I ask, however, as the reward
+of my discretion."
+
+"And that one thing?"
+
+"Permission, Madame, to serve you in any capacity, however humble--in
+any strait where a brother might interfere, or a faithful retainer lay
+down his life in your service."
+
+With a sweet earnestness that made my heart beat and my cheeks glow, she
+thanked and promised me.
+
+"I shall look upon you henceforth," she said, "as my knight _sans peur
+et sans reproche_."
+
+Heaven knows that not all the lessons of all the moralists that ever
+wrote or preached since the world began, could just then have done me
+half such good service as did those simple words. They came at the
+moment when I most needed them--when I had almost lost my taste for
+society, and was sliding day by day into habits of more confirmed
+idleness and Bohemianism. They roused me. They made a man of me. They
+recalled me to higher aims, "purer manners, nobler laws." They clothed
+me, so to speak, in the _toga virilis_ of a generous devotion. They made
+me long to prove myself "_sans peur_," to merit the "_sans reproche."_
+They marked an era in my life never to be forgotten or effaced.
+
+Let it not be thought for one moment that I loved her--or fancied I
+loved her. No, not so far as one heart-beat would carry me; but I was
+proud to possess her confidence and her friendship. Was she not
+Dalrymple's wife, and had not he asked me to watch over and protect her?
+Nay, had she not called me her knight and accepted my fealty?
+
+Nothing perhaps, is so invaluable to a young man on entering life as the
+friendship of a pure-minded and highly-cultivated woman who, removed too
+far above him to be regarded with passion, is yet beautiful enough to
+engage his admiration; whose good opinion becomes the measure of his own
+self-respect; and whose confidence is a sacred trust only to be parted
+from with loss of life or honor.
+
+Such an influence upon myself at this time was the friendship of Madame
+de Courcelles. I went out from her presence that morning morally
+stronger than before, and at each repetition of my visit I found her
+influence strengthen and increase. Sometimes I met Monsieur de Caylus,
+on which occasions my stay was ever of the briefest; but I most
+frequently found her alone, and then our talk was of books, of art, of
+culture, of all those high and stirring things that alike move the
+sympathies of the educated woman and rouse the enthusiasm of the young
+man. She became interested in me; at first for Dalrymple's sake, and
+by-and-by, however little I deserved it, for my own--and she showed
+that interest in many ways inexpressibly valuable to me then and
+thenceforth. She took pains to educate my taste; opened to me hitherto
+unknown avenues of study; led me to explore "fresh fields and pastures
+new," to which, but for her help, I might not have found my way for many
+a year to come. My reading, till now, had been almost wholly English or
+classical; she sent me to the old French literature--to the _Chansons de
+Geste_; to the metrical romances of the Trouveres; to the Chronicles of
+Froissart, Monstrelet, and Philip de Comines, and to the poets and
+dramatists that immediately succeeded them.
+
+These books opened a new world to me; and, having daily access to two
+fine public libraries, I plunged at once into a course of new and
+delightful reading, ranging over all that fertile tract of song and
+history that begins far away in the morning land of mediaeval romance,
+and leads on, century after century, to the new era that began with the
+Revolution.
+
+With what avidity I devoured those picturesque old chronicles--those
+autobiographies--those poems, and satires, and plays that I now read for
+the first time! What evenings I spent with St. Simon, and De Thou, and
+Charlotte de Baviere! How I relished Voltaire! How I laughed over
+Moliere! How I revelled in Montaigne! Most of all, however, I loved the
+quaint lore of the earlier literature:--
+
+     "Old legends of the monkish page,
+      Traditions of the saint and sage,
+      Tales that have the rime of age,
+       And Chronicles of Eld."
+
+Nor was this all. I had hitherto loved art as a child or a savage might
+love it, ignorantly, half-blindly, without any knowledge of its
+principles, its purposes, or its history. But Madame de Courcelles put
+into my hands certain books that opened my eyes to a thousand wonders
+unseen before. The works of Vasari, Nibby, Winkelman and Lessing, the
+aesthetic writings of Goethe and the Schlegels, awakened in me, one
+after the other, fresher and deeper revelations of beauty.
+
+I wandered through the galleries of the Louvre like one newly gifted
+with sight. I haunted the Venus of Milo and the Diane Chasseresse like
+another Pygmalion. The more I admired, the more I found to admire. The
+more I comprehended, the more I found there remained for me to
+comprehend. I recognised in art the Sphinx whose enigma is never solved.
+I learned, for the first time, that poetry may be committed to
+imperishable marble, and steeped in unfading colors. By degrees, as I
+followed in the footsteps of great thinkers, my insight became keener
+and my perceptions more refined. The symbolism of art evolved itself, as
+it were, from below the surface; and instead of beholding in paintings
+and statues mere studies of outward beauty, I came to know them as
+exponents of thought--as efforts after ideal truth--as aspirations
+which, because of their divineness, can never be wholly expressed; but
+whose suggestiveness is more eloquent than all the eloquence of words.
+
+Thus a great change came upon my life--imperceptibly at first, and by
+gradual degrees; but deeply and surely. To apply myself to the study of
+medicine became daily more difficult and more distasteful to me. The
+boisterous pleasures of the Quartier Latin lost their charm for me. Day
+by day I gave myself up more and more passionately to the cultivation of
+my taste for poetry and art. I filled my little sitting-room with casts
+after the antique. I bought some good engravings for my walls, and hung
+up a copy of the Madonna di San Sisto above the table at which I wrote
+and read. All day long, wherever I might be--at the hospital, in the
+lecture-room, in the laboratory--I kept looking longingly forward to the
+quiet evening by-and-by when, with shaded lamp and curtained window, I
+should again take up the studies of the night before.
+
+Thus new aims opened out before me, and my thoughts flowed into channels
+ever wider and deeper. Already the first effervescence of youth seemed
+to have died off the surface of my life, as the "beaded bubbles" die off
+the surface of champagne. I had tried society, and wearied of it. I had
+tried Bohemia, and found it almost as empty as the Chaussee d'Autin.
+And now that life which from boyhood I had ever looked upon as the
+happiest on earth, the life of the student, was mine. Could I have
+devoted it wholly and undividedly to those pursuits which were fast
+becoming to me as the life of my life, I would not have exchanged my lot
+for all the wealth of the Rothschilds. Somewhat indolent, perhaps, by
+nature, indifferent to achieve, ambitious only to acquire, I asked
+nothing better than a life given up to the worship of all that is
+beautiful in art, to the acquisition of knowledge, and to the
+development of taste. Would the time ever come when I might realize my
+dream? Ah! who could tell? In the meanwhile ... well, in the meanwhile,
+here was Paris--here were books, museums, galleries, schools, golden
+opportunities which, once past, might never come again. So I reasoned;
+so time went on; so I lived, plodding on by day in the Ecole de
+Medecine, but, when evening came, resuming my studies at the leaf turned
+down the night before, and, like the visionary in "The Pilgrims of the
+Rhine," taking up my dream-life at the point where I had been
+last awakened.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+CHAPTER XXXVII.
+
+GUICHET THE MODEL.
+
+To the man who lives alone and walks about with his eyes open, the mere
+bricks and mortar of a great city are instinct with character. Buildings
+become to him like living creatures. The streets tell him tales. For
+him, the house-fronts are written over with hieroglyphics which, to the
+passing crowd, are either unseen or without meaning. Fallen grandeur,
+pretentious gentility, decent poverty, the infamy that wears a brazen
+front, and the crime that burrows in darkness--he knows them all at a
+glance. The patched window, the dingy blind, the shattered doorstep, the
+pot of mignonette on the garret ledge, are to him as significant as the
+lines and wrinkles on a human face. He grows to like some houses and to
+dislike others, almost without knowing why--just as one grows to like
+or dislike certain faces in the parks and clubs. I remember now, as well
+as if it were yesterday, how, during the first weeks of my life in
+Paris, I fell in love at first sight with a wee _maisonnette_ at the
+corner of a certain street overlooking the Luxembourg gardens--a tiny
+little house, with soft-looking blue silk window-curtains, and
+cream-colored jalousies, and boxes of red and white geraniums at all the
+windows. I never knew who lived in that sunny little nest; I never saw a
+face at any of those windows; yet I used to go out of my way in the
+summer evenings to look at it, as one might go to look at a beautiful
+woman behind a stall in the market-place, or at a Madonna in a
+shop-window.
+
+At the time about which I write, there was probably no city in Europe of
+which the street-scenery was so interesting as that of Paris. I have
+already described the Quartier Latin, joyous, fantastic, out-at-elbows;
+a world in itself and by itself; unlike anything else in Paris or
+elsewhere. But there were other districts in the great city--now swept
+away and forgotten--as characteristic in their way as the Quartier
+Latin. There was the He de Saint Louis, for instance--a _Campo Santo_ of
+decayed nobility--lonely, silent, fallen upon evil days, and haunted
+here and there by ghosts of departed Marquises and Abbes of the _vieille
+ecole_. There was the debateable land to the rear of the Invalides and
+the Champ de Mars. There was the Faubourg St. Germain, fast falling into
+the sere and yellow leaf, and going the way of the Ile de Saint Louis.
+There was the neighborhood of the Boulevart d'Aulnay, and the Rue de la
+Roquette, ghastly with the trades of death; a whole Quartier of
+monumental sculptors, makers of iron crosses, weavers of funereal
+chaplets, and wholesale coffin-factors. And beside and apart from all
+this, there were (as in all great cities) districts of evil report and
+obscure topography--lost islets of crime, round which flowed and circled
+the daily tide of Paris life; flowed and circled, yet never penetrated.
+A dark arch here and there--the mouth of a foul alley--a riverside vista
+of gloom and squalor, marked the entrance to these Alsatias. Such an
+Alsatia was the Rue Pierre Lescot, the Rue Sans Nom, and many more than
+I can now remember--streets into which no sane man would venture after
+nightfall without the escort of the police.
+
+Into the border land of such a neighborhood--a certain congeries of
+obscure and labyrinthine streets to the rear of the old Halles--I
+accompanied Franz Mueller one wintry afternoon, about an hour before
+sunset, and perhaps some ten days after our evening in the Rue du
+Faubourg St. Denis. We were bound on an expedition of discovery, and the
+object of our journey was to find the habitat of Guichet the model.
+
+"I am determined to get to the bottom of this Lenoir business," said
+Mueller, doggedly; "and if the police won't help me, I must help myself."
+
+"You have no case for the police," I replied.
+
+"So says the _chef de bureau_; but I am of the opposite opinion.
+However, I shall make my case out clearly enough before long. This
+Guichet can help me, if he will. He knows Lenoir, and he knows something
+against him; that is clear. You saw how cautious he was the other day.
+The difficulty will be to make him speak."
+
+"I doubt if you will succeed."
+
+"I don't, _mon cher_. But we shall see. Then, again, I have another line
+of evidence open to me. You remember that orange-colored rosette in the
+fellow's button-hole?"
+
+"Certainly I do."
+
+"Well, now, I happen, by the merest chance, to know what that rosette
+means. It is the ribbon of the third order of the Golden Palm of
+Mozambique--a Portuguese decoration. They give it to diplomatic
+officials, eminent civilians, distinguished foreigners, and the like. I
+know a fellow who has it, and who belongs to the Portuguese Legation
+here. _Eh bien!_ I went to him the other day, and asked him about our
+said friend--how he came by it, who he is, where he comes from, and so
+forth. My Portuguese repeats the name--elevates his eyebrows--in short,
+has never heard of such a person. Then he pulls down a big book from a
+shelf in the secretary's room--turns to a page headed 'Golden Palm of
+Mozambique'--runs his finger along the list of names--shakes his head,
+and informs me that no Lenoir is, or ever has been, received into the
+order. What do you say to that, now?"
+
+"It is just what I should have expected; but still it is not a ease for
+the police. It concerns the Portuguese minister; and the Portuguese
+minister is by no means likely to take any trouble about the matter. But
+why waste all this time and care? If I were you, I would let the thing
+drop. It is not worth the cost."
+
+Mueller looked grave.
+
+"I would drop it this moment," he said, "if--if it were not for the
+girl."
+
+"Who is still less worth the cost,"
+
+"I know it," he replied, impatiently. "She has a pretty, sentimental
+Madonna face; a sweet voice; a gentle manner--_et voila tout_. I'm not
+the least bit in love with her now. I might have been. I might have
+committed some great folly for her sake; but that danger is past, _Dieu
+merci!_ I couldn't love a girl I couldn't trust, and that girl is a
+flirt. A flirt of the worst sort, too--demure, serious, conventional.
+No, no; my fancy for the fair Marie has evaporated; but, for all that, I
+don't relish the thought of what her fate might be if linked for life to
+an unscrupulous scoundrel like Lenoir. I must do what I can, my dear
+fellow--I must do what I can."
+
+We had by this time rounded the Halles, and were threading our way
+through one gloomy by-street after another. The air was chill, the sky
+low and rainy; and already the yellow glow of an oil-lamp might be seen
+gleaming through the inner darkness of some of the smaller shops.
+Meanwhile, the dusk seemed to gather at our heels, and to thicken at
+every step.
+
+"You are sure you know your way?" I asked presently, seeing Mueller look
+up at the name at the corner of the street.
+
+"Why, yes; I think I do," he answered, doubtfully.
+
+"Why not inquire of that man just ahead?" I suggested.
+
+He was a square-built, burly, shabby-looking fellow, and was striding
+along so fast that we had to quicken our pace in order to come up with
+him. All at once Mueller fell back, laid his hand on my arm, and said:--
+
+"Stop! It is Guichet himself. Let him go on, and we'll follow."
+
+So we dropped into the rear and followed him. He turned presently to the
+right, and preceded us down a long and horribly ill-favored street, full
+of mean cabarets and lodging-houses of the poorest class, where, painted
+in red letters on broken lamps above the doors, or printed on cards
+wafered against the window-panes, one saw at almost every other house,
+the words, "_Ici on loge la nuit_." At the end of this thoroughfare our
+unconscious guide plunged into a still darker and fouler _impasse_, hung
+across from side to side with rows of dingy linen, and ornamented in the
+centre with a mound of decaying cabbage-leaves, potato-parings,
+oyster-shells, and the like. Here he made for a large tumble-down house
+that closed the alley at the farther end, and, still followed by
+ourselves, went in at an open doorway, and up a public staircase dimly
+lighted by a flickering oil-lamp at every landing. At his own door he
+paused, and just as he had turned the key, Mueller accosted him.
+
+"Is that you, Guichet?" he said. "Why, you are the very man I want! If I
+had come ten minutes sooner, I should have missed you."
+
+"Is it M'sieur Mueller?" said Guichet, bending his heavy brows and
+staring at us in the gloom of the landing.
+
+"Ay, and with me the friend you saw the other day. So, this is your den?
+May we come in?"
+
+He had been standing till now with his hand on the key and the closed
+door at his back, evidently not intending to admit us; but thus asked,
+he pushed the door open, and said, somewhat ungraciously:--
+
+"It is just that, M'sieur Mueller--a den; not fit for gentlemen like you.
+But you can go in, if you please."
+
+We did not wait for a second invitation, but went in immediately. It was
+a long, low, dark room, with a pale gleam of fading daylight struggling
+in through a tiny window at the farther end. We could see nothing at
+first but this gleam; and it was not till Guichet had raked out the wood
+ashes on the hearth, and blown them into a red glow with his breath,
+that we could distinguish the form or position of anything in the room.
+Then, by the flicker of the fire, we saw a low truckle-bed close under
+the window; a kind of bruised and battered seaman's chest in the middle
+of the room; a heap of firewood in one corner; a pile of old
+packing-cases; old sail-cloth, old iron, and all kinds of rubbish in
+another; a few pots and pans over the fire-place; and a dilapidated
+stool or two standing about the room. Avoiding these latter, we set
+ourselves down upon the edge of the chest; while Guichet, having by this
+time lit a piece of candle-end in a tin sconce against the wall, stood
+before us with folded arms, and stared at us in silence.
+
+"I want to know, Guichet, if you can give me some sittings," said
+Mueller, by way of opening the conversation.
+
+"Depends on when, M'sieur Mueller," growled the model.
+
+"Well--next week, for the whole week."
+
+Guichet shook his head. He was engaged to Monsieur Flandrin _la bas_,
+for the next month, from twelve to three daily, and had only his
+mornings and evenings to dispose of; in proof of which he pulled out a
+greasy note-book and showed where the agreement was formally entered.
+Mueller made a grimace of disappointment.
+
+"That man's head takes a deal of cutting off, _mon ami_," he said.
+"Aren't you tired of playing executioner so long?"
+
+"Not I, M'sieur! It's all the same to me--executioner or victim, saint
+or devil."
+
+Mueller, laughing, offered him a cigar.
+
+"You've posed for some queer characters in your time, Guichet," said he.
+
+"Parbleu, M'sieur!"
+
+"But you've not been a model all your life?"
+
+"Perhaps not, M'sieur."
+
+"You've been a sailor once upon a time, haven't you?"
+
+The model looked up quickly.
+
+"How did you know that?" he said, frowning.
+
+"By a number of little things--by this, for instance," replied Mueller,
+kicking his heels against the sea-chest; "by certain words you make use
+of now and then; by the way you walk; by the way you tie your cravat.
+_Que diable_! you look at me as if you took me for a sorcerer!"
+
+The model shook his head.
+
+"I don't understand it," he said, slowly.
+
+"Nay, I could tell you more than that if I liked," said Mueller, with an
+air of mystery.
+
+"About myself?"
+
+"Ay, about yourself, and others."
+
+Guichet, having just lighted his cigar, forgot to put it to his lips.
+
+"What others?" he asked, with a look half of dull bewilderment and half
+of apprehension.
+
+Mueller shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"Pshaw!" said he; "I know more than you think I know, Guichet. There's
+our friend, you know--he of whom I made the head t'other day ... you
+remember?"
+
+The model, still looking at him, made no answer.
+
+"Why didn't you say at once where you had met him, and all the rest of
+it, _mon vieux_? You might have been sure I should find out for myself,
+sooner or later."
+
+The model turned abruptly towards the fire-place, and, leaning his head
+against the mantel-shelf, stood with his back towards us, looking down
+into the fire.
+
+"You ask me why I did not tell you at once?" he said, very slowly.
+
+"Ay--why not?"
+
+"Why not? Because--because when a man has begun to lead an honest life,
+and has gone on leading an honest life, as I have, for years, he is glad
+to put the past behind him--to forget it, and all belonging to it. How
+was I to guess you knew anything about--about that place _la bas_?"
+
+"And why should I not know about it?" replied Mueller, flashing a rapid
+glance at me.
+
+Guichet was silent.
+
+"What if I tell you that I am particularly interested in--that place _la
+bas_?"
+
+"Well, that may be. People used to come sometimes, I remember--artists
+and writers, and so on."
+
+"Naturally."
+
+"But I don't remember to have ever seen you, M'sieur Mueller."
+
+"You did not observe me, _mon cher_--or it may have been before, or
+after your time."
+
+"Yes, that's true," replied Guichet, ponderingly. "How long ago was it,
+M'sieur Mueller?"
+
+Mueller glanced at me again. His game, hitherto so easy, was beginning to
+grow difficult.
+
+"Eh, _mon Dieu_!" he said, indifferently, "how can I tell? I have
+knocked about too much, now here, now there, in the course of my life,
+to remember in what particular year this or that event may have
+happened. I am not good at dates, and never was."
+
+"But you remember seeing me there?"
+
+"Have I not said so?"
+
+Guichet took a couple of turns about the room. He looked flushed and
+embarrassed.
+
+"There is one thing I should like to know," he said, abruptly. "Where
+was I? What was I doing when you saw me?"
+
+Mueller was at fault now, for the first time.
+
+"Where were you?" he repeated. "Why, there--where we said just now. _La
+bas_."
+
+"No, no--that's not what I mean. Was I .... was I in the uniform of the
+Garde Chiourme?"
+
+The color rushed into Mueller's face as, flashing a glance of exultation
+at me, he replied:--
+
+"Assuredly, _mon ami_. In that, and no other."
+
+The model drew a deep breath.
+
+"And Bras de Fer?" he said. "Was he working in the quarries ?"
+
+"Bras de Fer! Was that the name he went by in those days?"
+
+"Ay--Bras de Fer--_alias_ Coupe-gorge--_alias_ Triphot--_alias_
+Lenoir--_alias_ a hundred other names. Bras de Fer was the one he went
+by at Toulon--and a real devil he was in the Bagnes! He escaped three
+times, and was twice caught and brought back again. The third time he
+killed one sentry, injured another for life, and got clear off. That was
+five years ago, and I left soon after. I suppose, if you saw him in
+Paris the other day, he has kept clear of Toulon ever since."
+
+"But was he in for life?" said Mueller, eagerly.
+
+"_Travaux forces a perpetuite_," replied Guichet, touching his own
+shoulder significantly with the thumb of his right hand.
+
+Mueller sprang to his feet.
+
+"Enough," he said. "That is all I wanted to know. Guichet, _mon cher_, I
+am your debtor for life. We will talk about the sittings when you have
+more time to dispose of. Adieu."
+
+"But, M'sieur Mueller, you won't get me into trouble!" exclaimed the
+model, eagerly. "You won't make any use of my words?"
+
+"Why, supposing I went direct to the Prefecture, what trouble could I
+possibly get you into, _mon ami?_" replied Mueller.
+
+The model looked down in silence.
+
+"You are a brave man. You do not fear the vengeance of Bras de Fer, or
+his friends?"
+
+"No, M'sieur---it's not that."
+
+"What is it, then?"
+
+"M'sieur...."
+
+"Pshaw, man! Speak up."
+
+"It is not that you would get me personally into trouble, M'sieur
+Mueller," said Guichet, slowly. "I am no coward, I hope--a coward would
+make a bad Garde Chiourme at Toulon, I fancy. And I'm not an escaped
+_forcat_. But--but, you see, I've worked my way into a connection here
+in Paris, and I've made myself a good name among the artists, and ...
+and I hold to that good name above everything in the world."
+
+"Naturally--rightly. But what has that to do with Lenoir?"
+
+"Ah, M'sieur Mueller, if you knew more about me, you would not need
+telling how much it has to do with him! I was not always a Garde
+Chiourme at Toulon. I was promoted to it after a time, for good conduct,
+you know, and that sort of thing. But--but I began differently--I began
+by wearing the prison dress, and working in the quarries."
+
+"My good fellow," said Mueller, gently, "I half suspected this--I am not
+surprised; and I respect you for having redeemed that past in the way
+you have redeemed it."
+
+"Thank you, M'sieur Mueller; but you see, redeemed or unredeemed, I'd
+rather be lying at the bottom of the Seine than have it rise up
+against me now,"
+
+"We are men of honor," said Mueller, "and your secret is safe with us."
+
+"Not if you go to the Prefecture and inform against Bras de Fer on my
+words," exclaimed the model, eagerly. "How can I appear against
+him--Guichet the model--Guichet the Garde Chiourme--Guichet the
+_forcat?_ M'sieur Mueller, I could never hold my head up again. It would
+be the ruin of me."
+
+"You shall not appear against him, and it shall not be the ruin of you.
+Guichet," said Mueller. "That I promise you. Only assure me that what you
+have said is strictly correct--that Bras de Fer and Lenoir are one and
+the same person--an escaped _forcat_, condemned for life to
+the galleys."
+
+"That's as true, M'sieur Mueller, as that God is in heaven," said the
+model, emphatically.
+
+"Then I can prove it without your testimony--I can prove it by simply
+summoning any of the Toulon authorities to identify him."
+
+"Or by stripping his shirt off his back, and showing the brand on his
+left shoulder," said Guichet. "There you'll find it, T.F. as large as
+life--and if it don't show at first, just you hit him a sharp blow with
+the flat of your hand, M'sieur Mueller, and it will start out as red and
+fresh as if it had been done only six months ago. _Parbleu!_ I remember
+the day he came in, and the look in his face when the hot iron hissed
+into his flesh! They roar like bulls, for the most part; but he never
+flinched or spoke. He just turned a shade paler under the tan, and
+that was all."
+
+"Do you remember what his crime was?" asked Mueller
+
+Guichet shook his head.
+
+"Not distinctly," he said. "I only know that he was in for a good deal,
+and had a lot of things proved against him on his trial. But you can
+find all that out for yourself, easily enough. He was tried in Paris,
+about fourteen years ago, and it's all in print, if you only know where
+to look for it."
+
+"Then I'll find it, if I have to wade through half the Bibliotheque
+Nationale!" said Mueller. "Adieu, Guichet--you have done me a great
+service, and you may be sure I will do nothing to betray you. Let us
+shake hands upon it."
+
+The color rushed into the model's swarthy cheeks.
+
+"_Comment_, M'sieur Mueller!" he said, hesitatingly. "You offer to shake
+hands with me--after what I have told you?"
+
+"Ten times more willing than before, _mon ami_," said Mueller. "Did I not
+tell you just now that I respected you for having redeemed that past,
+and shall I not give my hand where I give my respect?"
+
+The model grasped his outstretched hand with a vehemence that made
+Mueller wince again.
+
+"Thank you," he said, in a low, deep voice. "Thank you. Death of my
+life! M'sieur Mueller, I'd go to the galleys again for you, after
+this--if you asked me."
+
+"Agreed. Only when I do ask you, it shall be to pay a visit of ceremony
+to Monsieur Bras de Fer, when he is safely lodged again at Toulon with a
+chain round his leg, and a cannon-ball at the end of it."
+
+And with this Mueller turned away laughingly, and I followed him down the
+dimly-lighted stairs.
+
+"By Jove!" he said, "what a grip the fellow gave me! I'd as soon shake
+hands with the Commendatore in Don Giovanni."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVIII.
+
+NUMBER TWO HUNDRED AND SEVEN.
+
+Mueller, when he so confidently proposed to visit Bras de Fer in his
+future retirement at Toulon, believed that he had only to lodge his
+information with the proper authorities, and see the whole affair
+settled out of hand. He had not taken the bureaucratic system into
+consideration; and he had forgotten how little positive evidence he had
+to offer. It was no easier then than now to inspire the official mind
+with either insight or decision; and the police of Paris, inasmuch as
+they in no wise differed from the police of to-day, yesterday, or
+to-morrow, were slow to understand, slow to believe, and slower still
+to act.
+
+An escaped convict? Monsieur le Chef du Bureau, upon whom we took the
+liberty of waiting the next morning, could scarcely take in the bare
+possibility of such a fact. An escaped convict? Bah! no convict could
+possibly escape under the present admirable system. _Comment_! He
+effected his escape some years ago? How many years ago? In what yard, in
+what ward, under what number was he entered in the official books? For
+what offence was he convicted? Had Monsieur seen him at Toulon?--and was
+Monsieur prepared to swear that Lenoir and Bras de Fer were one and the
+same person? How! Monsieur proposed to identify a certain individual,
+and yet was incapable of replying to these questions! Would Monsieur be
+pleased to state upon what grounds he undertook to denounce the said
+individual, and what proof he was prepared to produce in confirmation
+of the same?
+
+To all which official catechizing, Mueller, who (wanting Guichet's
+testimony) had nothing but his intense personal conviction to put
+forward, could only reply that he was ready to pledge himself to the
+accuracy of his information; and that if Monsieur the Chef du Bureau
+would be at the pains to call in any Toulon official of a few years'
+standing, he would undoubtedly find that the person now described as
+calling himself Lenoir, and the person commonly known in the Bagnes as
+Bras de Fer, were indeed "one and the same."
+
+Whereupon Monsieur le Chef--a pompous personage, with a bald head and a
+white moustache--shrugged his shoulders, smiled incredulously, had the
+honor to point out to Monsieur that the Government could by no means be
+at the expense of conveying an inspector from Toulon to Paris on so
+shadowy and unsupported a statement, and politely bowed us out.
+
+Thus rebuffed, Mueller began to despair of present success; whilst I, in
+default of any brighter idea, proposed that he should take legal advice
+on the subject. So we went to a certain avocat, in a little street
+adjoining the Ecole de Droit, and there purchased as much wisdom as
+might be bought for the sum of five francs sterling.
+
+The avocat, happily, was fertile in suggestions. This, he said, was not
+a case for a witness. Here was no question of appearing before a court.
+With the foregone offences of either Lenoir or Bras de Fer, we had
+nothing to do; and to convict them of such offences formed no part of
+our plan. We only sought to show that Lenoir and Bras de Fer were in
+truth "one and the same person," and we could only do so upon the
+authority of some third party who had seen both. Now Monsieur Mueller had
+seen Lenoir, but not Bras de Fer; and Guichet had seen Bras de Fer, but
+not Lenoir. Here, then, was the real difficulty; and here, he hoped, its
+obvious solution. Let Guichet be taken to some place where, being
+himself unseen, he may obtain a glimpse of Lenoir. This done, he can, in
+a private interview of two minutes, state his conviction to Monsieur the
+Chef de Bureau--_voila tout_! If, however, the said Guichet can be
+persuaded by no considerations either of interest or justice, then
+another very simple course remains open. Every newly-arrived convict in
+every penal establishment throughout France is photographed on his
+entrance into the Bagne, and these photographs are duly preserved for
+purposes of identification like the present. Supposing therefore Bras de
+Fer had not escaped from Toulon before the introduction of this system,
+his portrait would exist in the official books to this day, and might
+doubtless be obtained, if proper application were made through an
+official channel.
+
+Armed with this information, and knowing that any attempt to induce
+Guichet to move further in the matter would be useless, we then went
+back to the Bureau, and with much difficulty succeeded in persuading M.
+le Chef to send to Toulon for the photograph. This done, we could only
+wait and be patient.
+
+Briefly, then, we did wait and were patient--though the last condition
+was not easy; for even I, who was by no means disposed to sympathize
+with Mueller in his solicitude for the fair Marie, could not but feel a
+strange contagion of excitement in this _chasse au forcat_. And so a
+week or ten days went by, till one memorable afternoon, when Mueller came
+rushing round to my rooms in hot haste, about an hour before the time
+when we usually met to go to dinner, and greeted me with--
+
+"Good news, _mon vieux_! good news! The photograph has come--and I have
+been to the Bureau to see it--and I have identified my man--and he will
+be arrested to-night, as surely as that he carries T.F. on his
+shoulder!"
+
+"You are certain he is the same?" I said.
+
+"As certain as I am of my own face when I see it in the looking-glass."
+
+And then he went on to say that a party of soldiers were to be in
+readiness a couple of hours hence, in a shop commanding Madame Marot's
+door; that he, Mueller, was to be there to watch with them till Lenoir
+either came out from or went into the house; and that as soon as he
+pointed him out to the sergeant in command, he was to be arrested, put
+into a cab waiting for the purpose, and conveyed to La Roquette.
+
+Behold us, then, at the time prescribed, lounging in the doorway of a
+small shop adjoining the private entrance to Madame Marot's house; our
+hands in our pockets; our cigars in our mouths; our whole attitude
+expressive of idleness and unconcern. The wintry evening has closed in
+rapidly. The street is bright with lamps, and busy with passers-by. The
+shop behind us is quite dark--so dark that not the keenest observer
+passing by could detect the dusky group of soldiers sitting on the
+counter within, or the gleaming of the musket-barrels which rest between
+their knees. The sergeant in command, a restless, black-eyed,
+intelligent little Gascon, about five feet four in height, with a
+revolver stuck in his belt, paces impatiently to and fro, and whistles
+softly between his teeth. The men, four in number, whisper together from
+time to time, or swing their feet in silence.
+
+Thus the minutes go by heavily; for it is weary work waiting in this
+way, uncertain how long the watch may last, and not daring to relax the
+vigilance of eye and ear for a single moment. It may be for an hour, or
+for many hours, or it may be for only a few minutes-who can tell? Of
+Lenoir's daily haunts and habits we know nothing. All we do know is that
+he is wont to be out all day, sometimes returning only to dress and go
+out again; sometimes not coming home till very late at night; sometimes
+absenting himself for a day and a night, or two days and two nights
+together. With this uncertain prospect before us, therefore, we wait and
+watch, and watch and wait, counting the hours as they strike, and
+scanning every face that gleams past in the lamplight.
+
+So the first hour goes by, and the second. Ten o'clock strikes. The
+traffic in the street begins perceptibly to diminish. Shops close here
+and there (Madame Marot's shutters have been put up by the boy in the
+oilskin apron more than an hour ago), and the _chiffonnier_, sure herald
+of the quieter hours of the night, flits by with rake and lanthorn,
+observant of the gutters.
+
+The soldiers on' the counter yawn audibly from time to time; and the
+sergeant, who is naturally of an impatient disposition, exclaims, for
+the twentieth time, with an inexhaustible variety, however, in the
+choice of expletives:--
+
+"_Mais; nom de deux cent mille petards_! will this man of ours never
+come?"
+
+To which inquiry, though not directly addressed to myself, I reply, as I
+have already replied once or twice before, that he may come immediately,
+or that he may not come for hours; and that all we can do is to wait and
+be patient. In the midst of which explanation, Mueller suddenly lays his
+hand on my arm, makes a sign to the sergeant, and peers eagerly down
+the street.
+
+There is a man coming up quickly on the opposite side of the way. For
+myself, I could recognise no one at such a distance, especially by
+night; but Mueller's keener eye, made keener still by jealousy,
+identifies him at a glance.
+
+It is Lenoir.
+
+He wears a frock coat closely buttoned, and comes on with a light, rapid
+step, suspecting nothing. The sergeant gives the word--the soldiers
+spring to their feet--I draw back into the gloom of the shop-and only
+Mueller remains, smoking his cigarette and lounging against the
+door-post.
+
+Then Lenoir crosses over, and Mueller, affecting to observe him for the
+first time, looks up, and without lifting his hat, says loudly:--
+
+"_Comment_! have I the honor of saluting Monsieur Lenoir?"
+
+Whereupon Lenoir, thrown off his guard by the suddenness of the address,
+hesitates--seems about to reply--checks himself--quickens his pace, and
+passes without a word.
+
+The next instant he is surrounded. The butt ends of four muskets rattle
+on the pavement--the sergeant's hand is on his shoulder--the sergeant's
+voice rings in his ear.
+
+"Number two hundred and seven, you are my prisoner!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIX.
+
+THE END OF BRAS BE FER.
+
+LENOIR's first impulse was to struggle in silence; then, finding escape
+hopeless, he folded his arms and submitted.
+
+"So, it is Monsieur Mueller who has done me this service," he said
+coldly; but with a flash in his eye like the sudden glint in the eye of
+a cobra di capello. "I will take care not to be unmindful of the
+obligation."
+
+Then, turning impatiently upon the sergeant:--
+
+"Have you no carriage at hand?" he said, sharply; "or do you want to
+collect a crowd in the street?"
+
+The cab, however, which had been waiting a few doors lower down, drove
+up while he was speaking. The sergeant hurried him in; the half-dozen
+loiterers who had already gathered about us pressed eagerly forward; two
+of the soldiers and the sergeant got inside; Mueller and I scrambled up
+beside the driver; word was given "to the Prefecture of Police;" and we
+drove rapidly away down the Rue du Faubourg St. Denis, through the arch
+of Louis Quatorze, out upon the bright noisy Boulevard, and on through
+thoroughfares as brilliant and crowded as at midday, towards the quays
+and the river.
+
+Arrived at the Quai des Ortevres, we alighted at the Prefecture, and
+were conducted through a series of ante-rooms and corridors into the
+presence of the same bald-headed Chef de Bureau whom we had seen on each
+previous occasion. He looked up as we came in, pressed the spring of a
+small bell that stood upon his desk, and growled something in the ear of
+a clerk who answered the summons.
+
+"Sergeant," he said, pompously, "bring the prisoner under the
+gas-burner."
+
+Lenoir, without waiting to be brought, took a couple of steps forward,
+and placed himself in the light.
+
+Monsieur le Chef then took out his double eye-glass, and proceeded to
+compare Lenoir's face, feature by feature, with a photograph which he
+took out of his pocket-book for the purpose.
+
+"Are you prepared, Monsieur," he said, addressing Mueller for the first
+time--"are you, I say, prepared to identify the prisoner upon oath?"
+
+"Within certain limitations--yes," replied Mueller.
+
+"Certain limitations!" exclaimed the Chef, testily. "What do you mean by
+'certain limitations?' Here is the man whom you accuse, and here is the
+photograph. Are you, I repeat, prepared to make your deposition before
+Monsieur le Prefet that they are one and the same person?"
+
+"I am neither more nor less prepared, Monsieur," said Mueller, "than you
+are; or than Monsieur le Prefet, when he has the opportunity of judging.
+As I have already had the honor of informing you, I saw the prisoner for
+the first time about two months since. Having reason to believe that he
+was living in Paris under an assumed name, and wearing a decoration to
+which he had no right, I prosecuted certain inquiries about him. The
+result of those inquiries led me to conclude that he was an escaped
+convict from the Bagnes of Toulon. Never having seen him at Toulon, I
+was unable to prove this fact without assistance. You, Monsieur, have
+furnished that assistance, and the proof is now in your hand. It only
+remains for Monsieur le Prefet and yourself to decide upon its value."
+
+"Give me the photograph, Monsieur Marmot," said a pale little man in
+blue spectacles, who had come in unobserved from a door behind us, while
+Mueller was speaking.
+
+The bald-headed Chef jumped up with great alacrity, bowed like a second
+Sir Pertinax, and handed over the photograph.
+
+"The peculiar difficulty of this case, Monsieur le Prefet" ... he began.
+
+The Prefet waved his hand.
+
+"Thanks, Monsieur Marmot," he said, "I know all the particulars of this
+case. You need not trouble to explain them. So this is the photograph
+forwarded from Toulon. Well--well! Sergeant, strip the prisoner's
+shoulders."
+
+A sudden quiver shot over Lenoir's face at this order, and his cheek
+blenched under the tan; but he neither spoke nor resisted. The next
+moment his coat and waistcoat were lying on the ground; his shirt, torn
+in the rough handling, was hanging round his loins, and he stood before
+us naked to the waist, lean, brown, muscular--a torso of an athlete done
+in bronze.
+
+We pressed round eagerly. Monsieur le Chef put up his double eye-glass;
+Monsier le Prefet took off his blue spectacles.
+
+"So--so," he said, pointing with the end of his glasses towards a
+whitish, indefinite kind of scar on Lenoir's left shoulder, "here is a
+mark like a burn. Is this the brand?"
+
+The sergeant nodded.
+
+"V'la, M'sieur le Prefet!" he said, and struck the spot smartly with
+his open palm. Instantly the smitten place turned livid, while from the
+midst of it, like the handwriting on the wall, the fatal letters T. F.
+sprang out in characters of fire.
+
+Lenoir flashed a savage glance upon us, and checked the imprecation that
+rose to his lips. Monsieur le Prefet, with a little nod of satisfaction,
+put on his glasses again, went over to the table, took out a printed
+form from a certain drawer, dipped a pen in the ink, and said:--
+
+"Sergeant, you will take this order, and convey Number Two Hundred and
+Seven to the Bicetre, there to remain till Thursday next, when he will
+be drafted back to Toulon by the convict train, which leaves two hours
+after midnight. Monsieur Mueller, the Government is indebted to you for
+the assistance you have rendered the executive in this matter. You are
+probably aware that the prisoner is a notorious criminal, guilty of one
+proved murder, and several cases of forgery, card-sharping, and the
+like. The Government is also indebted to Monsieur Marmot" (here he
+inclined his head to the bald-headed Chef), "who has acted with his
+usual zeal and intelligence."
+
+Monsieur Marmot, murmuring profuse thanks, bowed and bowed again, and
+followed Monsieur le Prefet obsequiously to the door. On the threshold,
+the great little man paused, turned, and said very quietly: "You
+understand, sergeant, this prisoner does _not_ escape again;" and so
+vanished; leaving Monsieur Marmot still bowing in the doorway.
+
+Then the sergeant hurried on Lenoir's coat and waistcoat, clapped a pair
+of handcuffs on his wrists, thrust his hat on his head, and prepared to
+be gone; Monsieur, the bald-headed, looking on, meanwhile, with the
+utmost complacency, as if taking to himself all the merit of discovery
+and capture.
+
+"Pardon, Messieurs," said the serjeant, when all was ready. "Pardon--but
+here is a fellow for whom I am responsible now, and who must be strictly
+looked after. I shall have to put a gendarme on the box from here to the
+Bicetre, instead of you two gentlemen."
+
+"All right, _mon ami_" said Mueller. "I suppose we should not have been
+admitted if we had gone with you?"
+
+"Nay, I could pass you in, Messieurs, if you cared to see the affair to
+the end, and followed in another _fiacre_."
+
+So we said we would see it to the end, and following the prisoner and
+his guard through all the rooms and corridors by which we had come,
+picked up a second cab on the Quai des Orfevres, just outside the
+Prefecture of Police.
+
+It was now close upon midnight. The sky was flecked with driving clouds.
+The moon had just risen above the towers of Notre Dame. The quays were
+silent and deserted. The river hurried along, swirling and turbulent.
+The sergeant's cab led the way, and the driver, instead of turning back
+towards the Pont Neuf, followed the line of the quays along the southern
+bank of the Ile de la Cite; passing the Morgue--a mass of sinister
+shadow; passing the Hotel Dieu; traversing the Parvis Notre Dame; and
+making for the long bridge, then called the Pont Louis Philippe, which
+connects the two river islands with the northern half of Paris.
+
+"It is a wild-looking night," said Mueller, as we drove under the
+mountainous shadow of Notre Dame and came out again in sight of
+the river.
+
+"And it is a wild business to be out upon," I added. "I wonder if this
+is the end of it?"
+
+The words were scarcely past my lips when the door of the cab ahead flew
+suddenly open, and a swift something, more like a shadow than a man,
+darted across the moonlight, sprang upon the parapet of the bridge, and
+disappeared!
+
+In an instant we were all out--all rushing to and fro--all shouting--all
+wild with surprise and confusion.
+
+"One man to the Pont d'Arcole!" thundered the sergeant, running along
+the perapet, revolver in hand. "One to the Quai Bourbon--one to the Pont
+de la Cite! Watch up stream and down! The moment he shows his head above
+water, fire!"
+
+"But, in Heaven's name, how did he escape?" exclaimed Mueller.
+
+"_Grand Dieu_! who can tell--unless he is the very devil?" cried the
+sergeant, distractedly. "The handcuffs were on the floor, the door was
+open, and he was gone in a breath! Hold! What's that?"
+
+The soldier on the Pont de la Cite gave a shout and fired. There was a
+splash--a plunge--a rush to the opposite parapet.
+
+"There he goes!"
+
+"Where?"
+
+"He has dived again!"
+
+"Look--look yonder--between the floating bath and the bank!"
+
+The sergeant stood motionless, his revolver ready cocked--the water
+swirled and eddied, eddied and parted--a dark dot rose for a second to
+the surface!
+
+Three shots fired at the same moment (one by the sergeant, two by the
+soldiers) rang sharply through the air, and were echoed with startling
+suddenness again and again from the buttressed walls of Notre Dame. Ere
+the last echo had died away, or the last faint smoke-wreath had faded,
+two boats were pulling to the spot, and all the quays were alive with a
+fast-gathering crowd. The sergeant beckoned to the gendarme who had come
+upon the box.
+
+"Bid the boatmen drag the river just here between the two bridges," he
+said, "and bring the body up to the Prefecture." Then, turning to Mueller
+and myself, "I am sorry to trouble you again, Messieurs," he said, "but
+I must ask you to come back once more to the Quai des Orfevres, to
+depose to the facts which have just happened."
+
+"But is the man shot, or has he escaped?" asked a breathless bystander.
+
+"Both," said the sergeant, with a grim smile, replacing his revolver in
+his belt. "He has escaped Toulon; but he has gone to the bottom of the
+Seine with something like six ounces of lead in his skull."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XL
+
+THE ENIGMA OF THE THIRD STORY.
+
+     Who ever loved, that loved not at first sight?--MARLOWE.
+
+In Paris, a lodging-house (or, as they prefer to style it, a _hotel
+meuble_) is a little town in itself; a beehive swarming from basement to
+attic; a miniature model of the great world beyond, with all its loves
+and hatreds, jealousies, aspirations, and struggles. Like that world, it
+contains several grades of society, but with this difference, that those
+who therein occupy the loftiest position are held in the lowest
+estimation. Thus, the fifth-floor lodgers turn up their noses at the
+inhabitants of the attics; while the fifth-floor is in its turn scorned
+by the fourth, and the fourth is despised by the third, and the third by
+the second, down to the magnificent dwellers on _the premier etage_, who
+live in majestic disdain of everybody above or beneath them, from the
+grisettes in the garret, to the _concierge_ who has care of the cellars.
+
+The house in which I lived in the Cite Bergere was, in fact, a double
+house, and contained no fewer than thirty tenants, some of whom had
+wives, children, and servants. It consisted of six floors, and each
+floor contained from eight to ten rooms. These were let in single
+chambers, or in suites, as the case might be; and on the outer doors
+opening round the landings were painted the names, or affixed the
+visiting-cards, of the dwellers within. My own third-floor neighbors
+were four in number. To my left lived a certain Monsieur and Madame
+Lemercier, a retired couple from Alsace. Opposite their door, on the
+other side of the well staircase, dwelt one Monsieur Cliquot, an elderly
+_employe_ in some public office; next to him, Signor Milanesi, an
+Italian refugee who played in the orchestra at the _Varietes_ every
+night, was given to practising the violoncello by day, and wore as much
+hair about his face as a Skye-terrier. Lastly, in the apartment to my
+right, resided a lady, upon whose door was nailed a small visiting-card
+engraved with these words:--
+
+MLLE. HORTENSE DUFRESNOY.
+
+_Teacher of Languages_.
+
+I had resided in the house for months before I ever beheld this
+Mademoiselle Hortense Dufresnoy. When I did at last encounter her upon
+the stairs one dusk autumnal evening, she wore a thick black veil, and,
+darting past me like a bird on the wing, disappeared down the staircase
+in fewer moments than I take to write it. I scarcely observed her at the
+time. I had no more curiosity to learn whether the face under that veil
+was pretty or plain than I cared to know whether the veil itself was
+Shetland or Chantilly. At that time Paris was yet new to me: Madame de
+Marignan's evil influence was about me; and, occupied as my time and
+thoughts were with unprofitable matters, I took no heed of my
+fellow-lodgers. Save, indeed, when the groans of that much-tortured
+violoncello woke me in the morning to an unwelcome consciousness of the
+vicinity of Signor Milanesi, I should scarcely have remembered that I
+was not the only inhabitant of the third story.
+
+Now, however, that I spent all my evenings in my own quiet room, I
+became, by imperceptible degrees, interested in the unseen inhabitant of
+the adjoining apartment. Sometimes, when the house was so still that the
+very turning of the page sounded unnaturally loud, and the mere falling
+of a cinder startled me, I heard her in her chamber, singing softly to
+herself. Every night I saw the light from her window streaming out over
+the balcony and touching the evergreens with a midnight glow. Often and
+often, when it was so late that even I had given up study and gone to
+bed, I heard her reading aloud, or pacing to and fro to the measure of
+her own recitations. Listen as I would, I could only make out that these
+recitations were poetical fragments--I could only distinguish a certain
+chanted metre, the chiming of an occasional rhyme, the rising and
+falling of a voice more than commonly melodious.
+
+This vague interest gave place by-and-by to active curiosity. I resolved
+to question Madame Bouisse, the _concierge_; and as she, good soul!
+loved gossip not wisely, but too well, I soon knew all the little she
+had to tell.
+
+Mademoiselle Hortense, it appeared, was the enigma of the third story.
+She had resided in the house for more than two years. She earned her
+living by her labor; went out teaching all the day; sat up at night,
+studying and writing; had no friends; received no visitors; was as
+industrious as a bee, and as proud as a princess. Books and flowers were
+her only friends, and her only luxuries. Poor as she was, she was
+continually filling her shelves with the former, and supplying her
+balcony with the latter. She lived frugally, drank no wine, was
+singularly silent and reserved, and "like a real lady," said the fat
+_concierge_, "paid her rent to the minute."
+
+This, and no more, had Madame Bouisse to tell. I had sought her in her
+own little retreat at the foot of the public staircase. It was a very
+wet afternoon, and under pretext of drying my boots by the fire, I
+stayed to make conversation and elicit what information I could. Now
+Madame Bouisse's sanctuary was a queer, dark, stuffy little cupboard
+devoted to many heterogeneous uses, and it "served her for parlor,
+kitchen, and all." In one corner stood that famous article of furniture
+which became "a bed by night, a chest of drawers by day." Adjoining the
+bed was the fireplace; near the fireplace stood a corner cupboard filled
+with crockery and surmounted by a grand ormolu clock, singularly at
+variance with the rest of the articles. A table, a warming-pan, and a
+couple of chairs completed the furniture of the room, which, with all
+its contents, could scarcely have measured more than eight feet square.
+On a shelf inside the door stood thirty flat candlesticks; and on a row
+of nails just beneath them, hung two and twenty bright brass
+chamber-door keys--whereby an apt arithmetician might have divined that
+exactly two-and-twenty lodgers were out in the rain, and only eight
+housed comfortably within doors.
+
+"And how old should you suppose this lady to be?" I asked, leaning idly
+against the table whereon Madame Bouisse was preparing an unsavory dish
+of veal and garlic.
+
+The _concierge_ shrugged her ponderous shoulders.
+
+"Ah, bah, M'sieur, I am no judge of age," said she.
+
+"Well--is she pretty?"
+
+"I am no judge of beauty, either," grinned Madame Bouisse.
+
+"But, my dear soul," I expostulated, "you have eyes!"
+
+"Yours are younger than mine, _mon enfant_," retorted the fat
+_concierge_; "and, as I see Mam'selle Hortense coming up to the door,
+I'd advise you to make use of them for yourself."
+
+And there, sure enough, was a tall and slender girl, dressed all in
+black, pausing to close up her umbrella at the threshold of the outer
+doorway. A porter followed her, carrying a heavy parcel. Having
+deposited this in the passage, he touched his cap and stated his charge.
+The young lady took out her purse, turned over the coins, shook her
+head, and finally came up to Madame's little sanctuary.
+
+"Will you be so obliging, Madame Bouisse," she said, "as to lend me a
+piece of ten sous? I have no small change left in my purse."
+
+How shall I describe her? If I say that she was not particularly
+beautiful, I do her less than justice; for she was beautiful, with a
+pale, grave, serious beauty, unlike the ordinary beauty of woman. But
+even this, her beauty of feature, and color, and form, was eclipsed and
+overborne by that "true beauty of the soul" which outshines all other,
+as the sun puts out the stars.
+
+There was in her face--or, perhaps, rather in her expression--an
+indefinable something that came upon me almost like a memory. Had I seen
+that face in some forgotten dream of long ago? Brown-haired was she, and
+pale, with a brow "as chaste ice, as pure as snow," and eyes--
+
+     "In whose orb a shadow lies,
+     Like the dusk in evening skies!"
+
+Eyes lit from within, large, clear, lustrous, with a meaning in them so
+profound and serious that it was almost sorrowful,--like the eyes of
+Giotto's saints and Cimabue's Madonnas.
+
+But I cannot describe her--
+
+"For oh, her looks had something excellent That wants a name!"
+
+I can only look back upon her with "my mind's eye," trying to see her as
+I saw her then for the first time, and striving to recall my first
+impressions.
+
+Madame Bouisse, meanwhile, searched in all the corners of her ample
+pockets, turned out her table-drawer, dived into the recesses of her
+husband's empty garments, and peeped into every ornament upon the
+chimney-piece; but in vain. There was no such thing as a ten-sous piece
+to be found.
+
+"Pray, M'sieur Basil," said she, "have you one?"
+
+"One what?" I ejaculated, startled out of my reverie.
+
+"Why, a ten-sous piece, to be sure. Don't you see that Mam'selle
+Hortense is waiting in her wet shoes, and that I have been hunting for
+the last five minutes, and can't find one anywhere?"
+
+Blushing like a school-boy, and stammering some unintelligible excuse, I
+pulled out a handful of francs and half-francs, and produced the
+coin required.
+
+"_Dame_!" said the _concierge_. "This comes of using one's eyes too
+well, my young Monsieur. Hem! I'm not so blind but that I can see as far
+as my neighbors."
+
+Mademoiselle Hortense had fortunately gone back to settle with the
+porter, so this observation passed unheard. The man being dismissed, she
+came back, carrying the parcel. It was evidently heavy, and she put it
+down on the nearest chair.
+
+"I fear, Madame Bouisse," she said, "that I must ask you to help me with
+this. I am not strong enough to carry it upstairs."
+
+More alert this time, I took a step in advance, and offered my services.
+
+"Will Mademoiselle permit me to take it?" I said. "I am going
+upstairs."
+
+She hesitated.
+
+"Many thanks," she said, reluctantly, "but...."
+
+"But Madame Bouisse is busy," I urged, "and the _pot au feu_ will spoil
+if she leaves it on the fire."
+
+The fat _concierge_ nodded, and patted me on the shoulder.
+
+"Let him carry the parcel, Mam'selle Hortense," she chuckled. "Let him
+carry it. M'sieur is your neighbor, and neighbors should be neighborly.
+Besides," she added, in an audible aside, "he is a _bon garcon_--an
+Englishman--and a book-student like yourself."
+
+The young lady bent her head, civilly, but proudly. Compelled, as it
+seemed, to accept my help, she evidently wished to show me that I must
+nevertheless put forward no claim to further intercourse--not even on
+the plea of neighborhood. I understood her, and taking up the parcel,
+followed her in silence to her door on the third story. Here she paused
+and thanked me.
+
+"Pray let me carry it in for you," I said.
+
+Again she hesitated; but only for an instant. Too well-bred not to see
+that a refusal would now be a discourtesy, she unlocked the door, and
+held it open.
+
+The first room was an ante-chamber; the second a _salon_ somewhat larger
+than my own, with a door to the right, leading into what I supposed
+would be her bedroom. At a glance, I took in all the details of her
+home. There was her writing-table laden with books and papers, her desk,
+and her pile of manuscripts. At one end of the room stood a piano doing
+duty as a side-board, and looking as if it were seldom opened. Some
+water-color drawings were pinned against the walls, and a well-filled
+bookcase stood in a recess beside the fireplace. Nothing escaped me
+--not even the shaded reading-lamp, nor the plain ebony time-piece, nor
+the bronze Apollo on the bracket above the piano, nor the sword over the
+mantelpiece, which seemed a strange ornament in the study of a gentle
+lady. Besides all this, there were books everywhere, heaped upon the
+tables, ranged on shelves, piled in corners, and scattered hither and
+thither in most admired disorder. It was, however, the only
+disorder there.
+
+I longed to linger, but dared not. Having laid the parcel down upon the
+nearest chair, there was nothing left for me to do but to take my leave.
+Mademoiselle Dufresnoy still kept her hand upon the door.
+
+"Accept my best thanks, sir," she said in English, with a pretty foreign
+accent, that seemed to give new music to the dear familiar tongue.
+
+"You have nothing to thank me for, Mademoiselle," I replied.
+
+She smiled, proudly still, but very sweetly, and closed the door upon
+me.
+
+I went back to my room; it had become suddenly dark and desolate. I
+tried to read; but all subjects seemed alike tedious and unprofitable. I
+could fix my attention to nothing; and so, becoming restless, I went out
+again, and wandered about the dusky streets till evening fairly set in,
+and the shops were lighted, and the tide of passers-by began to flow
+faster in the direction of boulevard and theatre.
+
+The soft light of her shaded lamp streamed from her window when I came
+back, nor faded thence till two hours after midnight. I watched it all
+the long evening, stealing out from time to time upon my balcony, which
+adjoined her own, and welcoming the cool night air upon my brow. For I
+was fevered and disquieted, I knew not why, and my heart was stirred
+within me, strangely and sweetly.
+
+Such was my first meeting with Hortense Dufresnoy. No incident of it has
+since faded from my memory. Brief as it was, it had already turned all
+the current of my life. I had fallen in love at first sight. Yes--in
+love; for love it was--real, passionate, earnest; a love destined to be
+the master-passion of all my future years.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLI.
+
+A CHRONICLE ABOUT FROISSART.
+
+     See, Lucius, here's the book I sought for so!
+     JULIUS CAESAR.
+
+     But all be that he was a philosophre,
+     Yet hadde he but litel gold in cofre,
+     But all that he might of his frends hente,
+     On bokes and on lerning he is spente.
+
+     CHAUCER.
+&/
+
+"LOVE-IN-IDLENESS" has passed into a proverb, and lovers,
+somehow, are not generally supposed to be industrious. I,
+however, worked none the less zealously for being in love. I
+applied only the more closely to my studies, both medical and
+literary, and made better progress in both than I had made
+before. I was not ambitious; but I had many incentives to
+work. I was anxious to satisfy my father. I earnestly desired
+to efface every unfavorable impression from the mind of Dr.
+Cheron, and to gain, if possible, his esteem. I was proud of
+the friendship of Madame de Courcelles, and wished to prove
+the value that I placed upon her good opinion. Above all, I
+had a true and passionate love of learning--not that love which
+leadeth on to fame; but rather that self-abandoning devotion
+which exchangeth willingly the world of action for the world of
+books, and, for an uninterrupted communion with the "souls
+of all that men held wise," bartereth away the society of the
+living.
+
+Little gregarious by nature, Paris had already ceased to
+delight me in the same way that it had delighted me at first. A
+"retired leisure," and the society of the woman whom I loved,
+grew to be the day-dream of my solitary life. And still, ever
+more and more plainly, it became evident to me that for the
+career of the student I was designed by nature. Bayle, Magliabecchi
+of Florence, Isaac Reed, Sir Thomas Brown, Montaigne--those
+were the men whose lot in life I envied--those the literary
+anchorites in whose steps I would fain have followed.
+
+But this was not to be; so I worked on, rose early, studied
+late, gained experience, took out my second inscription with
+credit, and had the satisfaction of knowing that I was fast
+acquiring the good opinion of Dr. Cheron. Thus Christmas
+passed by, and January with its bitter winds; and February set
+in, bright but frosty. And still, without encouragement or
+nope, I went on loving Hortense Dufresnoy.
+
+My opportunities of seeing her were few and brief. A passing bow in the
+hall, or a distant "good-evening" as we passed upon the stairs, for some
+time made up the sum of our intercourse. Gradually, however, a kind of
+formal acquaintance sprang up between us; an acquaintance fostered by
+trifles and dependent on the idlest, or what seemed the idlest,
+casualties. I say "seemed," for often that which to her appeared the
+work of chance was the result of elaborate contrivance on my part. She
+little knew, when I met her on the staircase, how I had been listening
+for the last hour to catch the echo of her step. She little dreamed when
+I encountered her at the corner of the street, how I had been concealed,
+till that moment, in the _cafe_ over the way, ready to dart out as soon
+as she appeared in sight. I would then affect either a polite unconcern,
+or an air of judicious surprise, or pretend not to lift my eyes at all
+till she was nearly past; and I think I must have been a very fair
+actor, for it all succeeded capitally, and I am not aware that she ever
+had the least suspicion of the truth. Let me, however, recall one
+incident over which I had no control, and which did more towards
+promoting our intercourse than all the rest.
+
+It is a cold, bright morning in February. There is a brisk
+exhilaration in the air. The windows and gilded balconies
+sparkle in the sun, and it is pleasant to hear the frosty ring of
+one's boots upon the pavement. It is a fete to-day. Nothing
+is doing in the lecture-rooms, and I have the whole day before
+me. Meaning, therefore, to enjoy it over the fire and a book,
+I wisely begin it by a walk.
+
+From the Cite Bergere, out along the right-hand side of the Boulevards,
+down past the front of the Madeleine, across the Place de la Concorde,
+and up the Champs Elysees as far as the Arc de Triomphe; this is the
+route I take in going. Arrived at the arch, I cross over, and come back
+by the same roads, but on the other side of the way. I have a motive in
+this. There is a certain second-hand book-shop on the opposite side of
+the Boulevard des Italiens, which draws me by a wholly irresistible
+attraction. Had I started on that side, I should have gone no further. I
+should have looked, lingered, purchased, and gone home to read. But I
+know my weakness. I have reserved the book-shop for my return journey,
+and now, rewarded and triumphant, compose myself for a quiet study of
+its treasures.
+
+And what a book-shop it is! Not only are its windows filled--not only
+are its walls a very perspective of learning--but square pillars of
+volumes are built up on either side of the door, and an immense
+supplementary library is erected in the open air, down all the length of
+a dead-wall adjoining the house.
+
+Here then I pause, turning over the leaves of one volume, reading the
+title of another, studying the personal appearance of a third, and
+weighing the merits of their authors against the contents of my purse.
+And when I say "personal appearance," I say it advisedly; for
+book-hunters, are skilled Lavaters in their way, and books, like men,
+attract or repel at first sight. Thus it happens that I love a portly
+book, in a sober coat of calf, but hate a thin, smart volume, in a gaudy
+binding. The one promises to be philosophic, learnedly witty, or solidly
+instructive; the other is tolerably certain to be pert and shallow, and
+reminds me of a coxcombical lacquey in bullion and red plush. On the
+same principle, I respect leaves soiled and dog's-eared, but mistrust
+gilt edges; love an old volume better than a new; prefer a spacious
+book-stall to all the unpurchased stores of Paternoster Row; and buy
+every book that I possess at second-hand. Nay, that it is second-hand is
+in itself a pass port to my favor. Somebody has read it before;
+therefore it is readable. Somebody has derived pleasure from it before;
+therefore I open it with a student's sympathy, and am disposed to be
+indulgent ere I have perused a single line. There are cases, however,
+in which I incline to luxury of binding. Just as I had rather have my
+historians in old calf and my chroniclers in black letter, so do I
+delight to see my modern poets, the Benjamins of my affections, clothed
+in coats of many colors. For them no moroccos are too rich, and no
+"toolings" too elaborate. I love to see them smiling on me from the
+shelves of my book-cases, as glowing and varied as the sunset through a
+painted oriel.
+
+Standing here, then, to-day, dipping first into this work and
+then into that, I light upon a very curious and interesting
+edition of _Froissart_--an edition full of quaint engravings, and
+printed in the obsolete spelling of two hundred years ago. The
+book is both a treasure and a bargain, being marked up at five
+and twenty francs. Only those who haunt book-stalls and
+luxuriate in old editions can appreciate the satisfaction with
+which I survey
+
+     "That weight of wood, with leathern coat overlaid,
+     Those ample clasps of solid metal made,
+     The close pressed leaves unclosed for many an age,
+     The dull red edging of the well-filled page,
+     And the broad back, with stubborn ridges roll'd,
+     Where yet the title stands in tarnished gold!"
+
+They only can sympathize in the eagerness with which I snatch up the
+precious volume, the haste with which I count out the five and twenty
+francs, the delight with which I see the dealer's hand close on the sum,
+and know that the book is legally and indisputably mine! Then how
+lovingly I embrace it under my arm, and taking advantage of my position
+as a purchaser, stroll leisurely round the inner warehouse, still
+courting that literary world which (in a library at least) always turns
+its back upon its worshipper!
+
+"Pray, Monsieur," says a gentle voice at the door, "where is that old
+_Froissart_ that I saw outside about a quarter of an hour ago?"
+
+"Just sold, Madame," replies the bookseller, promptly.
+
+"Oh, how unfortunate!--and I only went home for the money" exclaims the
+lady in a tone of real disappointment.
+
+Selfishly exultant, I hug the book more closely, turn to steal a glance
+at my defeated rival, and recognise--Mademoiselle Dufresnoy.
+
+She does not see me. I am standing in the inner gloom of the shop, and
+she is already turning away. I follow her at a little distance; keep her
+in sight all the way home; let her go into the house some few seconds in
+advance; and then, scaling three stairs at a time, overtake her at the
+door of her apartment.
+
+Flushed and breathless, I stand beside her with _Froissart_ in my hand.
+
+"Pardon, Mademoiselle," I say, hurriedly, "for having involuntarily
+forestalled you just now. I had just bought the book you wished to
+purchase,"
+
+She looks at me with evident surprise and some coldness; but says
+nothing.
+
+"And I am rejoiced to have this opportunity of transferring it to you."
+
+Mademoiselle Dufresnoy makes a slight but decided gesture of refusal.
+
+"I would not deprive you of it, Monsieur," she says promptly, "upon any
+consideration."
+
+"But, Mademoiselle, unless you allow me to relinquish it in your favor,
+I beg to assure you that I shall take the book back to the bookseller
+and exchange it for some other."
+
+"I cannot conceive why you should do that, Monsieur."
+
+"In order, Mademoiselle, that you may still have it in your power to
+become the purchaser."
+
+"And yet you wished to possess the book, or you would not have bought
+it."
+
+"I would not have bought it, Mademoiselle, if I had known that I should
+disappoint a--a lady by doing so,"
+
+I was on the point of saying, "if I had known that I should disappoint
+you by so doing," but hesitated, and checked myself in time.
+
+A half-mocking smile flitted across her lips.
+
+"Monsieur is too self-sacrificing," she said. "Had I first bought the
+book, I should have kept it--being a woman. Reverse the case as you
+will, and show me any just reason why you should not do the
+same--being a man?"
+
+"Nay, the merest by-law of courtesy..." I began, hesitatingly.
+
+"Do not think me ungracious, Monsieur," she interrupted, "if I hold that
+these so-called laws of courtesy are in truth but concessions, for the
+most part, from the strength of your sex to the weakness of ours."
+
+"_Eh bien_, Mademoiselle--what then?"
+
+"Then, Monsieur, may there not be some women---myself, for instance--who
+do not care to be treated like children?"
+
+"Pardon, Mademoiselle, but are you stating the case quite fairly? Is it
+not rather that we desire not to efface the last lingering tradition of
+the age of chivalry--not to reduce to prose the last faint echoes of
+that poetry which tempered the sword of the Crusader and inspired the
+song of the Trouvere?"
+
+"Were it not better that the new age created a new code and a new
+poetry?" said Mademoiselle Dufresnoy.
+
+"Perhaps; but I confess I love old forms and usages, and cling to creeds
+outworn. Above all, to that creed which in the age of powder and
+compliment, no less than in the age of chivalry, enjoined absolute
+devotion and courtesy towards women."
+
+"Against mere courtesy reasonably exercised and in due season, I have
+nothing to say," replied Mademoiselle Dufresnoy; "but the half-barbarous
+homage of the Middle Ages is as little to my taste as the scarcely less
+barbarous refinement of the Addison and Georgian periods. Both are alike
+unsound, because both have a basis of insincerity. Just as there is a
+mock refinement more vulgar than simple vulgarity, so are there
+courtesies which humiliate and compliments that offend."
+
+"Mademoiselle is pleased to talk in paradoxes," said I.
+
+Mademoiselle unlocked her door, and turning towards me with the same
+half-mocking smile and the same air of raillery, said:--
+
+"Monsieur, it is written in your English histories that when John le Bon
+was taken captive after the battle of Cressy, the Black Prince rode
+bareheaded before him through the streets of London, and served him at
+table as the humblest of his attendants. But for all that, was John any
+the less a prisoner, or the Black Prince any the less a conqueror?"
+
+"You mean, perhaps, that you reject all courtesy based on mere
+ceremonial. Let me then put the case of this _Froissart_ more
+plainly--as I would have done from the first, had I dared to speak the
+simple truth."
+
+"And that is...?"
+
+"That it will give me more pleasure to resign the book to you,
+Mademoiselle, than to possess it myself."
+
+Mademoiselle Dufresnoy colors up, looks both haughty and amused, and
+ends by laughing.
+
+"In truth, Monsieur," she says merrily, "if your politeness threatened
+at first to be too universal, it ends by becoming unnecessarily
+particular."
+
+"Say rather, Mademoiselle, that you will not have the book on any
+terms!" I exclaim impatiently.
+
+"Because you have not yet offered it to me upon any just or reasonable
+grounds."
+
+"Well, then, bluntly and frankly, as student to student, I beg you to
+spare me the trouble of carrying this book back to the Boulevard. Yours,
+Mademoiselle, was the first intention. You saw the book before I saw it.
+You would have bought it on the spot, but had to go home for the money.
+In common equity, it is yours. In common civility, as student to
+student, I offer it to you. Say, is it yes or no?"
+
+"Since you put it so simply and so generously, and since I believe you
+really wish me to accept your offer," replies Mademoiselle Dufresnoy,
+taking out her purse, "I suppose I must say--yes."
+
+And with this, she puts out her hand for the hook, and offers me in
+return the sum of five and twenty francs.
+
+Pained at having to accept the money, pained at being offered it, seeing
+no way of refusing it, and feel altogether more distress than is
+reasonable in a man brought up to the taking of fees; I affect not to
+see the coin, and, bowing, move away in the direction of my own door.
+
+"Pardon, Monsieur," she says, "but you forget that I am in your debt."
+
+"And--and do you really insist..."
+
+She looks at me, half surprised and half offended.
+
+"If you do not take the money, Monsieur, how can I take the book?"
+
+Bowing, I receive the unwelcome francs in my unwilling palm.
+
+Still she lingers.
+
+"I--I have not thanked you as I ought for your generosity," she says,
+hesitatingly.
+
+"Generosity!" I repeat, glancing with some bitterness at the five and
+twenty francs.
+
+"True kindness, Monsieur, is neither bought nor sold," says the lady,
+with the loveliest smile in the world, and closes her door.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLII
+
+THE OLD, OLD STORY.
+
+     What thing is Love, which nought can countervail?
+     Nought save itself--even such a thing is Love.
+
+     SIR W. RALEIGH.
+
+My acquaintance with Hortense Dufresnoy progressed slowly as, ever, and
+not even the Froissart incident went far towards promoting it. Absorbed
+in her studies, living for the intellect only, too self-contained to
+know the need for sympathy, she continued to be, at all events for me,
+the most inaccessible of God's creatures. And yet, despite her
+indifference, I loved her. Her pale, proud face haunted me; her voice
+haunted me. I thought of her sometimes till it seemed impossible she
+should not in some way be conscious of how my very soul was centred in
+her. But she knew nothing--guessed nothing--cared nothing; and the
+knowledge that I held no place in her life wrought in me at times till
+it became almost too bitter for endurance.
+
+And this was love--real, passionate, earnest; the first and last love of
+my heart. Did I believe that I ever loved till now? Ah! no; for now only
+I felt the god in his strength, and beheld him in his beauty. Was I not
+blind till I had looked into her eyes and drunk of their light? Was I
+not deaf till I had heard the music of her voice? Had I ever truly
+lived, or breathed, or known delight till now?
+
+I never stayed to ask myself how this would end, or whither it would
+lead me. The mere act of loving was too sweet for questioning. What
+cared I for the uncertainties of the future, having hope to live upon in
+the present? Was it not enough "to feed for aye my lamp and flames of
+love," and worship her till that worship became a religion and a rite?
+
+And now, longing to achieve something which should extort at least her
+admiration, if not her love, I wished I were a soldier, that I might win
+glory for her--or a poet, that I might write verses in her praise which
+should be deathless--or a painter, that I might spend years of my life
+in copying the dear perfection of her face. Ah! and I would so copy it
+that all the world should be in love with it. Not a wave of her brown
+hair that I would not patiently follow through all its windings. Not the
+tender tracery of a blue vein upon her temples that I would not lovingly
+render through its transparent veil of skin. Not a depth of her dark
+eyes that I would not study, "deep drinking of the infinite." Alas!
+those eyes, so grave, so luminous, so steadfast:--
+
+     "Eyes not down-dropt, not over-bright, but fed
+      With the clear-pointed flame of chastity,"
+
+--eyes wherein dwelt "thought folded over thought," what painter need
+ever hope to copy them?
+
+And still she never dreamed how dear she had grown to me. She never
+knew how the very air seemed purer to me because she breathed it. She
+never guessed how I watched the light from her window night after
+night--how I listened to every murmur in her chamber--how I watched and
+waited for the merest glimpse of her as she passed by--how her lightest
+glance hurried the pulses through my heart--how her coldest word was
+garnered up in the treasure-house of my memory! What cared she, though
+to her I had dedicated all the "book and volume of my brain;" hallowed
+its every page with blazonings of her name; and illuminated it, for love
+of her, with fair images, and holy thoughts, and forms of saints
+and angels
+
+     "Innumerable, of stains and splendid dyes
+     As are the tiger-moth's deep damask'd wings?"
+
+Ah me! her hand was never yet outstretched to undo its golden
+clasps--her eye had never yet deigned to rest upon its records. To her I
+was nothing, or less than nothing--a fellow-student, a fellow-lodger,
+a stranger.
+
+And yet I loved her "with a love that was more than love"--with a love
+dearer than life and stronger than death--a love that, day after day,
+struck its roots deeper and farther into my very soul, never thence to
+be torn up here or hereafter.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLIII.
+
+ON A WINTER'S EVENING.
+
+After a more than usually severe winter, the early spring came, crowned
+with rime instead of primroses. Paris was intensely cold. In March the
+Seine was still frozen, and snow lay thickly on the house-tops. Quiet at
+all times, the little nook in which I lived became monastically still,
+and at night, when the great gates were closed, and the footsteps of the
+passers-by fell noiselessly upon the trodden snow, you might have heard
+a whisper from one side of the street to the other. There was to me
+something indescribably delightful about this silent solitude in the
+heart of a great city.
+
+Sitting beside the fire one evening, enjoying the profound calm of the
+place, attending from time to time to my little coffee-pot on the hob,
+and slowly turning the pages of a favorite author, I luxuriate in a
+state of mind half idle, half studious. Leaving off presently to listen
+to some sound which I hear, or fancy I hear, in the adjoining room, I
+wonder for the twentieth time whether Hortense has yet returned from her
+long day's teaching; and so rise--open my window--and look out. Yes; the
+light from her reading-lamp streams out at last across the snow-laden
+balcony. Heigho! it is something even to know that she is there so near
+me--divided only by a thin partition!
+
+Trying to comfort myself with this thought, I close the window again and
+return to my book, more restless and absent than before. Sitting thus,
+with the unturned leaf lingering between my thumb and forefinger, I hear
+a rapid footfall on the stairs, and a musical whistle which, growing
+louder as it draws nearer, breaks off at my door, and is followed by a
+prolonged assault and battery of the outer panels.
+
+"Welcome, noisiest of visitors!" I exclaim, knowing it to be Mueller
+before I even open the door. "You are quite a stranger. You have not
+been near me for a fortnight."
+
+"It will not be your fault, Signor Book-worm, if I don't become a
+stranger _au pied de la lettre_" replies he, cheerily. "Why, man, it is
+close upon three weeks since you have crossed the threshold of my door.
+The Quartier Latin is aggrieved by your neglect, and the fine arts
+t'other side of the water languish and are forlorn."
+
+So saying, he shakes the snow from his coat like a St. Bernard mastiff,
+perches his cap on the head of the plaster Niobe that adorns my
+chimney-piece, and lays aside the folio which he had been carrying under
+his arm. I, in the meanwhile, have wheeled an easy-chair to the fire,
+brought out a bottle of Chambertin, and piled on more wood in honor
+of my guest.
+
+"You can't think," said I, shaking hands with him for the second time,
+"how glad I am that you have come round to-night."
+
+"I quite believe it," replied he. "You must be bored to death, if these
+old busts are all the society you keep. _Sacre nom d'une pipe_! how can
+a fellow keep up his conviviality by the perpetual contemplation of
+Niobe and Jupiter Tonans? What do you mean by living such a life as
+this? Have you turned Trappist? Shall I head a subscription to present
+you with a skull and an hour-glass?"
+
+"I'll have the skull made into a drinking-cup, if you do. Take some
+wine."
+
+Mueller filled his glass, tasted with the air of a connoisseur, and
+nodded approvingly.
+
+"Chambertin, by the god Bacchus!" said he. "Napoleon's favorite wine,
+and mine--evidence of the sympathy that exists between the truly great."
+
+And, draining the glass, he burst into a song in praise of French wines,
+beginning--
+
+     "Le Chambertin rend joyeux,
+     Le Nuits rend infatigable,
+     Le Volnay rend amoureux,
+     Le Champagne rend amiable.
+     Grisons-nous, mes chers amis,
+     L'ivresse
+     Vaut la richesse;
+     Pour moi, des que le suis gris,
+     Je possede tout Paris!"
+
+"Oh hush!" said I, uneasily; "not so loud, pray!"
+
+"Why not?"
+
+"The--the neighbors, you know. We cannot do as we would in the Quartier
+Latin."
+
+"Nonsense, my dear fellow. You don't swear yourself to silence when you
+take apartments in a _hotel meuble_! You might as well live in a
+penitentiary!--
+
+     'De bouchons faisons un tas,
+     Et s'il faut avoir la goutte,
+     Au moins que ce ne soit pas
+     Pour n'avoir bu qu'une goutte!'"
+
+"Nay, I implore you!" I interposed again. "The landlord ..."
+
+"Hang the landlord!
+
+     'Grisons-nous--'"
+
+"Well, but--but there is a lady in the next room ..."
+
+Mueller laughed till the tears ran down his cheeks.
+
+"_Allons done_!" said he, "why not have told the truth at first? Oh, you
+sly rogue! You _gaillard_! This is your seclusion, is it? This is your
+love of learning--this the secret of your researches into science and
+art! What art, pray? Ovid's 'Art of Love,' I'll be sworn!"
+
+"Laugh on, pray," I said, feeling my face and my temper growing hot;
+"but that lady, who is a stranger to me"....
+
+"Oh--oh--oh!" cried Mueller.
+
+"Who is a stranger to me," I repeated, "and who passes her evenings in
+study, must not be annoyed by noises in my room. Surely, my dear fellow,
+you know me well enough to understand whether I am in jest or
+in earnest."
+
+Mueller laid his hand upon my sleeve.
+
+"Enough--enough," he said, smiling good-naturedly. "You are right, and I
+will be as dumb as Plato. What is the lady's name."
+
+"Dufresnoy," I answered, somewhat reluctantly. "Mademoiselle Dufresnoy."
+
+"Ay, but her Christian name!"
+
+"Her Christian name," I faltered, more reluctant still. "I--I--"
+
+"Don't say you don't know," said Mueller, maliciously. "It isn't worth
+while. After all, what does it matter? Here's to her health, all the
+same--_a votre sante_, Mademoiselle Dufresnoy! What! not drink her
+health, though I have filled your glass on purpose?"
+
+There was no help for it, so I took the glass and drank the toast with
+the best grace I could.
+
+"And now, tell me," continued my companion, drawing nearer to the fire
+and settling himself with a confidential air that was peculiarly
+provoking, "what is she like? Young or old? Dark or fair? Plain
+or pretty?"
+
+"Old," said I, desperately. "Old and ugly. Fifty at the least. Squints
+horribly."
+
+Then, thinking that I had been a little too emphatic, I added:--
+
+"But a very ladylike person, and exceedingly well-informed,"
+
+Mueller looked at me gravely, and filled his glass again.
+
+"I think I know the lady," said he.
+
+"Indeed?"
+
+"Yes--by your description. You forgot to add, however, that she is
+gray."
+
+"To be sure--as a badger."
+
+"To say nothing of a club foot, an impediment in her speech, a voice
+like a raven's, and a hump like a dromedary's! Ah! my dear friend, what
+an amazingly comic fellow you are!"
+
+And the student burst again into a peal of laughter so hearty and
+infectious that I could not have helped joining in it to save my life.
+
+"And now," said he, when we had laughed ourselves out of breath, "now to
+the object of my visit. Do you remember asking me, months ago, to make
+you a copy of an old portrait that you had taken a fancy to in some
+tumble-down chateau near Montlhery!"
+
+"To be sure; and I have intended, over and over again, to remind you of
+it. Did you ever take the trouble to go over there and look at it?"
+
+"Look at it, indeed! I should rather think so--and here is the proof.
+What does your connoisseurship say to it?"
+
+Say to it! Good heavens! what could I say, what could I do, but flush up
+all suddenly with pleasure, and stare at it without power at first to
+utter a single word?
+
+For it was like _her_--so like that it might have been her very
+portrait. The features were cast in the same mould--the brow, perhaps,
+was a little less lofty--the smile a little less cold; but the eyes,
+the beautiful, lustrous, soul-lighted eyes were the same--the
+very same!
+
+If she were to wear an old-fashioned dress, and deck her fair neck and
+arms with pearls, and put powder on her hair, and stand just so, with
+her hand upon one of the old stone urns in the garden of that deserted
+chateau, she would seem to be standing for the portrait.
+
+Well might I feel, when I first saw her, that the beauty of her face was
+not wholly unfamiliar to me! Well might I fancy I had seen her in some
+dream of long ago!
+
+So this was the secret of it--and this picture was mine. Mine to hang
+before my desk when I was at work--mine to place at my bed's foot, where
+I might see it on first waking--mine to worship and adore, to weave
+fancies and build hopes upon, and "burn out the day in idle phantasies"
+of passionate devotion!
+
+"Well," said Mueller impatiently, "what do you think of it?"
+
+I looked up, like one dreaming.
+
+"Think of it!" I repeated.
+
+"Yes--do you think it like?"
+
+"So like that it might be her por ... I mean that it might be the
+original."
+
+"Oh, that's satisfactory. I was afraid you were disappointed."
+
+"I was only silent from surprise and pleasure."
+
+"Well, however faithful the copy maybe, you know, in these things one
+always misses the tone of age."
+
+"I would not have it look a day older!" I exclaimed, never lifting my
+eyes from the canvas.
+
+Mueller came and looked down at it over my shoulder.
+
+"It is an interesting head," said he. "I have a great mind to introduce
+it into my next year's competition picture."
+
+I started as if he had struck me. The thought was sacrilege!
+
+"For Heaven's sake do no such thing!" I ejaculated.
+
+"Why not?" said he, opening his eyes in astonishment.
+
+"I cannot tell you why--at least not yet; but to--to confer a very
+particular obligation upon me, will you waive this point?" Mueller rubbed
+his head all over with both hands, and sat down in the utmost
+perplexity.
+
+"Upon my soul and conscience," said he, "you are the most
+incomprehensible fellow I ever knew in my life!"
+
+"I am. I grant it. What then? Let us see, I am to give you a hundred and
+fifty francs for this copy ..."
+
+"I won't take it," said Mueller. "I mean you to accept it as a pledge of
+friendship and good-will."
+
+"Nay, I insist on paying for it. I shall be proud to pay for it; but a
+hundred and fifty are not enough. Let me give you three hundred, and
+promise me that you will not put the head into your picture!"
+
+Mueller laughed, and shook his own head resolutely. "I will give you both
+the portrait and the promise," said he; "but I won't take your money, if
+I know it."
+
+"But ..."
+
+"But I won't--and so, if you don't like me well enough to accept such a
+trifle from me, I'll e'en carry the thing home again!"
+
+And, snatching up his cap and cloak, he made a feint of putting the
+portrait back into the folio.
+
+"Not for the world!" I exclaimed, taking possession of it without
+further remonstrance. "I would sooner part from all I possess. How can I
+ever thank you enough?"
+
+"By never thanking me at all! What little time the thing has cost me is
+overpaid, not only by the sight of your pleasure, but by my own
+satisfaction in copying it. To copy a good work is to have a lesson from
+the painter, though he were dead a hundred years before; and the man who
+painted that portrait, be he who he might, has taught me a trick or two
+that I never knew before. _Sapristi_! see if I don't dazzle you some day
+with an effect of white satin and pearls against a fair skin!"
+
+"An ingenious argument; but it leaves me unconvinced, all the same. How!
+you are not going to run away already? Here's another bottle of
+Chambertin waiting to be opened; and it is yet quite early."
+
+"Impossible! I have promised to meet a couple of men up at the Prado,
+and have, besides, invited them afterwards to supper."
+
+"What is the Prado?"
+
+"The Prado! Why, is it possible that I have never yet introduced you to
+the Prado? It's one of the joiliest places in all the Quartier
+Latin--it's close to the Palais de Justice. You can dance there, or
+practise pistol-shooting, or play billiards, or sup--or anything you
+please. Everybody smokes--ladies not excepted."
+
+"How very delightful!"
+
+"Oh, magnificent! Won't you come with me? I know a dozen pretty girls
+who will be delighted to be introduced to you."
+
+"Not to-night, thank you," said I, laughing.
+
+"Well, another time?"
+
+"Yes, to be sure--another time."
+
+"Well, good-night."
+
+"Good-night, and thank you again, a thousand times over."
+
+But he would not stay to hear me thank him, and was half way down the
+first flight before my sentence was finished. Just as I was going back
+into my room, and about to close the door, he called after me from
+the landing.
+
+"_Hola, amigo_! When my picture is done, I mean to give a bachelor's
+supper-party--chiefly students and _chicards_. Will you come?"
+
+"Gladly."
+
+"Adieu, then. I will let you know in time."
+
+And with this, he broke out into a fragment of Beranger, gave a cheerful
+good-night to Madame Bouisse in the hall, and was gone.
+
+And now to enjoy my picture. Now to lock the door, and trim the lamp,
+and place it up against a pile of books, and sit down before it in
+silent rapture, like a devotee before the portrait of his patron saint.
+Now I can gaze, unreproved, into those eyes, and fancy they are hers.
+Now press my lips, unforbidden, upon that exquisite mouth, and believe
+it warm. Ah, will her eyes ever so give back the look of love in mine?
+Will her lips ever suffer mine to come so near? Would she, if she knew
+the treasure I possessed, be displeased that I so worshipped it?
+
+Hanging over it thus, and suffering my thoughts to stray on at their own
+will and pleasure, I am startled by the fall of some heavy object in the
+adjoining chamber. The fall is followed by a stifled cry, and then all
+is again silent.
+
+To unlock my door and rush to hers--to try vainly to open it--to cry
+"Hortense! Hortense! what has happened? For Heaven's sake, what has
+happened?" is the work of but an instant.
+
+The antechamber lay between, and I remembered that she could not hear
+me. I ran back, knocked against the wall, and repeated:--
+
+"What has happened? Tell me what has happened?"
+
+Again I listened, and in that interval of suspense heard her garments
+rustle along the ground, then a deep sigh, and then the words:--
+
+"Nothing serious. I have hurt my hand."
+
+"Can you open the door?"
+
+There was another long silence.
+
+"I cannot," she said at length, but more faintly.
+
+"In God's name, try!"
+
+No answer.
+
+"Shall I get over the balcony?"
+
+I waited another instant, heard nothing, and then, without, further
+hesitation, opened my own window and climbed the iron rail that
+separated her balcony from mine, leaving my footsteps trampled in
+the snow.
+
+I found her sitting on the floor, with her body bent forward and her
+head resting against the corner of a fallen bookcase. The scattered
+volumes lay all about. A half-filled portmanteau stood close by on a
+chair. A travelling-cloak and a passport-case lay on the table.
+
+Seeing, yet scarcely noting all this, I flung myself on my knees beside
+her, and found that one hand and arm lay imprisoned under the bookcase.
+She was not insensible, but pain had deprived her of the power of
+speech. I raised her head tenderly, and supported it against a chair;
+then lifted the heavy bookcase, and, one by one, removed the volumes
+that had fallen upon her.
+
+Alas! the white little hand all crushed and bleeding--the powerless
+arm--the brave mouth striving to be firm!
+
+I took the poor maimed arm, made a temporary sling for it with my
+cravat, and, taking her up in my arms as if she had been an infant,
+carried her to the sofa. Then I closed the window; ran back to my own
+room for hot water; tore up some old handkerchiefs for bandages; and so
+dressed and bound her wounds--blessing (for the first time in my life)
+the destiny that had made me a surgeon.
+
+"Are you in much pain?" I asked, when all was done.
+
+"Not now--but I feel very faint,"
+
+I remembered my coffee in the next room, and brought it to her. I lifted
+her head, and supported her with my arm while she drank it.
+
+"You are much better now," I said, when she had again lain down. "Tell
+me how it happened."
+
+She smiled languidly.
+
+"It was not my fault," she said, "but Froissart's. Do you remember that
+Froissart?"
+
+Remember it! I should think so.
+
+"Froissart!" I exclaimed. "Why, what had he to do with it?"
+
+"Only this. I usually kept him on the top of the bookcase that fell down
+this evening. Just now, while preparing for a journey upon which I must
+start to-morrow morning, I thought to remove the book to a safer place;
+and so, instead of standing on a chair, I tried to reach up, and,
+reaching up, disturbed the balance of the bookcase, and brought
+it down."
+
+"Could you not have got out of the way when you saw it falling?"
+
+"Yes--but I tried to prevent it, and so was knocked down and imprisoned
+as you found me."
+
+"Merciful Heaven! it might have killed you."
+
+"That was what flashed across my mind when I saw it coming," she
+replied, with a faint smile.
+
+"You spoke of a journey," I said presently, turning my face away lest
+she should read its story too plainly; "but now, of course, you must not
+move for a few days."
+
+"I must travel to-morrow," she said, with quiet decision.
+
+"Impossible!"
+
+"I have no alternative."
+
+"But think of the danger--the imprudence--the suffering."
+
+"Danger there cannot be," she replied, with a touch of impatience in her
+voice. "Imprudent it may possibly be; but of that I have no time to
+think. And as for the suffering, that concerns myself alone. There are
+mental pains harder to bear than the pains of the body, and the
+consciousness of a duty unfulfilled is one of the keenest of them. You
+urge in vain; I must go. And now, since it is time you bade me
+good-night, let me thank you for your ready help and say good-bye."
+
+"But may I do no more for you?"
+
+"Nothing--unless you will have the goodness to bid Madame Bouisse to
+come up-stairs, and finish packing my portmanteau for me."
+
+"At what hour do you start?"
+
+"At eight."
+
+"May I not go with you to the station, and see that you get a
+comfortable seat?"
+
+"Many thanks," she replied, coldly; "but I do not go by rail, and my
+seat in the diligence is already taken."
+
+"You will want some one to see to your luggage--to carry your cloaks."
+
+"Madame Bouisse has promised to go with me to the Messageries."
+
+Silenced, and perhaps a little hurt, I rose to take my leave.
+
+"I wish you a safe journey, mademoiselle," I said, "and a safe return,"
+
+"And think me, at the same time, an ungrateful patient."
+
+"I did not say that."
+
+"No--but you thought so. After all, it is possible that I seem so. I am
+undemonstrative--unused to the amenities of life--in short, I am only
+half-civilized. Pray, forgive me."
+
+"Mademoiselle," I said, "your apology pains me. I have nothing to
+forgive. I will send Madame Bouisse to you immediately."
+
+And with this I had almost left the room, but paused upon the threshold.
+
+"Shall you be long away?" I asked, with assumed indifference.
+
+"Shall I be long away?" she repeated, dreamily. "How can I tell?" Then,
+correcting herself, "Oh, not long," she added. "Not long. Perhaps a
+fortnight--perhaps a week."
+
+"Once more, then, good-night."
+
+"Good-night," she answered, absently; and I withdrew.
+
+I then went down, sent Madame Bouisse to wait upon her, and sat up
+anxiously listening more than half the night. Next morning, at seven, I
+heard Madame Bouisse go in again. I dared not even go to her door to
+inquire how she had slept, lest I should seem too persistent; but when
+they left the room and went downstairs together, I flew to my window.
+
+I saw her cross the street in the gray morning. She walked feebly, and
+wore a large cloak, that hid the disabled arm and covered her to the
+feet. Madame Bouisse trotted beside her with a bundle of cloaks and
+umbrellas; a porter followed with her little portmanteau on
+his shoulder.
+
+And so they passed under the archway across the trampled snow, and
+vanished out of sight.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLIV.
+
+A PRESCRIPTION.
+
+A week went by--a fortnight went by--and still Hortense prolonged her
+mysterious absence. Where could she be gone? Was she ill? Had any
+accident befallen her on the road? What if the wounded hand had failed
+to heal? What if inflammation had set in, and she were lying, even now,
+sick and helpless, among strangers? These terrors came back upon me at
+every moment, and drove me almost to despair. In vain I interrogated
+Madame Bouisse. The good-natured _concierge_ knew no more than myself,
+and the little she had to tell only increased my uneasiness.
+
+Hortense, it appeared, had taken two such journeys before, and had, on
+both occasions, started apparently at a moment's notice, and with every
+indication of anxiety and haste. From the first she returned after an
+interval of more than three weeks; from the second after about four or
+five days. Each absence had been followed by a long season of
+despondency and lassitude, during which, said the _concierge_,
+Mademoiselle scarcely spoke, or ate, or slept, but, silent and pale as a
+ghost, sat up later than ever with her books and papers. As for this
+last journey, all she knew about it was that Mam'selle had had her
+passport regulated for foreign parts the afternoon of the day before
+she started.
+
+"But can you not remember in what direction the diligence was going?" I
+asked, again and again.
+
+"No, M'sieur--not in the least,"
+
+"Nor the name of the town to which her place was taken?"
+
+"I don't know that I ever heard it, M'sieur."
+
+"But at least you must have seen the address on the portmanteau?"
+
+"Not I, M'sieur--I never thought of looking at it."
+
+"Did she say nothing to account for the suddenness of her departure?"
+
+"Nothing at all."
+
+"Nor about her return either. Madame Bouisse? Just think a
+moment--surely she said something about when you might expect her
+back again?"
+
+"Nothing, M'sieur, except, by the way--"
+
+"Except what?"
+
+"_Dame_! only this--as she was just going to step into the diligence,
+she turned back and shook hands with me--Mam'selle Hortense, proud as
+she is, is never above shaking hands with me, I can tell you, M'sieur."
+
+"No, no--I can well believe it. Pray, go on!"
+
+"Well, M'sieur," she shakes hands with me, and she says, "Thank you,
+good Madame Bouisse, for all your kindness to me.... Hear that, M'sieur,
+'good Madame Bouisse,'--the dear child!"
+
+"And then--?"
+
+"Bah! how impatient you are! Well, then, she says (after thanking me,
+you observe)--'I have paid you my rent, Madame Bouisse, up to the end of
+the present month, and if, when the time has expired, I have neither
+written nor returned, consider me still as your tenant. If, however, I
+do not come back at all, I will let you know further respecting the care
+of my books and other property."
+
+If she did not come back at all! Oh, Heaven! I had never contemplated
+such a possibility. I left Madame Bouisse without another word, and
+going up to my own rooms, flung myself upon my bed, as if I were
+stupefied.
+
+All that night, all the next day, those words haunted me. They seemed to
+have burned themselves into my brain in letters of fire. Dreaming, I
+woke up with them upon my lips; reading, they started out upon me from
+the page. "If I never come back at all!"
+
+At last, when the fifth day came round--the fifth day of the third week
+of her absence--I became so languid and desponding that I lost all power
+of application.
+
+Even Dr. Cheron noticed it, and calling me in the afternoon to his
+private room, said:--
+
+"Basil Arbuthnot, you look ill. Are you working too hard?"
+
+"I don't think so, sir."
+
+"Humph! Are you out much at night?"
+
+"Out, sir?"
+
+"Yes--don't echo my words--do you go into society: frequent balls,
+theatres, and so forth?"
+
+"I have not done so, sir, for several months past."
+
+"What is it, then? Do you read late?"
+
+"Really, sir, I hardly know--up to about one or two o'clock; on the
+average, I believe."
+
+"Let me feel your pulse."
+
+I put out my wrist, and he held it for some seconds, looking keenly at
+me all the time.
+
+"Got anything on your mind?" he asked, after he had dropped it again.
+"Want money, eh?"
+
+"No, sir, thank you."
+
+"Home-sick?"
+
+"Not in the least."
+
+"Hah! want amusement. Can't work perpetually--not reasonable to suppose
+it. There, _mon garcon_," (taking a folded paper from his pocket-book)
+"there's a prescription for you. Make the most of it."
+
+It was a stall-ticket for the opera. Too restless and unhappy to reject
+any chance of relief, however temporary, I accepted it, and went.
+
+I had not been to a theatre since that night with Josephine, nor to the
+Italian Opera since I used to go with Madame de Marignan. As I went in
+listlessly and took my place, the lights, the noise, the multitude of
+faces, confused and dazzled me. Presently the curtain rose, and the
+piece began. The opera was _I Capuletti_. I do not remember who the
+singers were, I am not sure that I ever knew. To me they were Romeo and
+Juliet, and I was a dweller in Verona. The story, the music, the
+scenery, took a vivid hold upon my imagination. From the moment the
+curtain rose, I saw only the stage, and, except that I in some sort
+established a dim comparison between Romeo's sorrows and my own
+disquietude of mind, I seemed to lose all recollection of time and
+place, and almost of my own identity.
+
+It seemed quite natural that that ill-fated pair of lovers should go
+through life, love, wed, and die singing. And why not? Are they not airy
+nothings, "born of romance, cradled in poetry, thinking other thoughts,
+and doing other deeds than ours?" As they live in poetry, so may they
+not with perfect fitness speak in song?
+
+I went home in a dream, with the melodies ringing in my ears and the
+story lying heavy at my heart. I passed upstairs in the dark, went over
+to the window, and saw, oh joy! the light--the dear, familiar, welcome,
+blessed light, streaming forth, as of old, from Hortense's
+chamber window!
+
+To thank Heaven that she was safe was my first impulse--to step out on
+the balcony, and watch the light as though it were a part of herself,
+was the second. I had not been there many moments when it was obscured
+by a passing shadow. The window opened and she came out.
+
+"Good-evening," she said, in her calm, clear voice. "I heard you out
+here, and thought you might like to know that, thanks to your treatment
+in the first instance, and such care as I have been able since to give
+it, my hand is once more in working order."
+
+"You are kind to come out and tell me so," I said. "I had no hope of
+seeing you to-night. How long is it since you arrived?"
+
+"About two hours," she replied, carelessly.
+
+"And you have been nearly three weeks away!"
+
+"Have I?" said she, leaning her cheek upon her hand, and looking up
+dreamily into the night. "I did not count the days."
+
+"That proves you passed them happily," I said; not without some secret
+bitterness.
+
+"Happily!" she echoed. "What is happiness?"
+
+"A word that we all translate differently," I replied.
+
+"And your own reading of it?" she said, interrogatively.
+
+I hesitated.
+
+"Do you inquire what is my need, individually?" I asked, "or do you want
+my general definition?"
+
+"The latter."
+
+"I think, then, that the first requirement of happiness is work; the
+second, success."
+
+She sighed.
+
+"I accept your definition," she said, "and hope that you may realize it
+to the full in your own experience. For myself, I have toiled and
+failed--sought, and found not. Judge, then, how I came to leave the days
+uncounted."
+
+The sadness of her attitude, the melancholy import of her words, the
+abstraction of her manner, filled me with a vague uneasiness.
+
+"Failure is often the forerunner of success," I replied, for want,
+perhaps, of something better to say.
+
+She shook her head drearily, and stood looking up at the sky, where,
+every now and then, the moon shone out fitfully between the
+flying clouds.
+
+"It is not the first time," she murmured, "nor will it be the last--and
+yet they say that God is merciful."
+
+She had forgotten my presence. These words were not spoken to me, but in
+answer to her own thoughts. I said nothing, but watched her upturned
+face. It was pale as the wan moon overhead; thinner than before she went
+away; and sadder--oh, how much sadder!
+
+She roused herself presently, and turning to me, said:--"I beg your
+pardon. I am very absent; but I am greatly fatigued. I have been
+travelling incessantly for two days and nights."
+
+"Then I will wish you good-night at once," I said.
+
+"Good-night," she replied; and went back into her room.
+
+The next morning Dr. Cheron smiled one of his cold smiles, and said:--
+
+"You look better to-day, my young friend. I knew how it was with you--no
+worse malady, after all, than _ennui_. I shall take care to repeat the
+medicine from time to time."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLV.
+
+UNDER THE STARS.
+
+Hoping, yet scarcely expecting to see her, I went out upon my balcony
+the next night at the same hour; but the light of her lamp was bright
+within, no shadow obscured it, and no window opened. So, after waiting
+for more than an hour, I gave her up, and returned to my work. I did
+this for six nights in succession. On the seventh she came.
+
+"You are fond of your balcony, fellow-student," said she. "I often hear
+you out here."
+
+"My room gets heated," I replied, "and my eyes weary, after several
+hours of hard reading; and this keen, clear air puts new life into
+one's brains."
+
+"Yes, it is delicious," said she, looking up into the night. "How dark
+the space of heaven is, and, how bright are the stars! What a night for
+the Alps! What a night to be upon some Alpine height, watching the moon
+through a good telescope, and waiting for the sunrise!"
+
+"Defer that wish for a few months," I replied smiling. "You would
+scarcely like Switzerland in her winter robes."
+
+"Nay, I prefer Switzerland in winter," she said. "I passed through part
+of the Jura about ten days ago, and saw nothing but snow. It was
+magnificent--like a paradise of pure marble awaiting the souls of all
+the sculptors of all the ages."
+
+"A fantastic idea," said I, "and spoken like an artist."
+
+"Like an artist!" she repeated, musingly. "Well, are not all students
+artists?"
+
+"Not those who study the exact sciences--not the student of law or
+divinity--nor he who, like myself, is a student of medicine. He is the
+slave of Fact, and Art is the Eden of his banishment. His imagination is
+for ever captive. His horizon is for ever bounded. He is fettered by
+routine, and paralyzed by tradition. His very ideas must put on the
+livery of his predecessors; for in a profession where originality of
+thought stands for the blackest shade of original sin, skill--mere
+skill--must be the end of his ambition."
+
+She looked at me, and the moonlight showed me that sad smile which her
+lips so often wore.
+
+"You do not love your profession," she said.
+
+"I do not, indeed."
+
+"And yet you labor zealously to acquire it--how is that?"
+
+"How is it with hundreds of others? My profession was chosen for me. I
+am not my own master."
+
+"But are you sure you would be happier in some other pursuit? Supposing,
+for instance, that you were free to begin again, what career do you
+think you would prefer?"
+
+"I scarcely know, and I should scarcely care, so long as there was
+freedom of thought and speculation in it."
+
+"Geology, perhaps--or astronomy," she suggested, laughingly.
+
+"Merci! The bowels of the earth are too profound, and the heavens too
+lofty for me. I should choose some pursuit that would set the Ariel of
+the imagination free. That is to say, I could be very happy if my life
+were devoted to Science, but my soul echoes to the name of Art."
+
+"'The artist creates--the man of science discovers," said Hortense.
+"Beware lest you fancy you would prefer the work of creation only
+because you lack patience to pursue the work of discovery. Pardon me, if
+I suggest that you may, perhaps, be fitted for neither. Your sphere, I
+fancy, is reflection--comparison--criticism. You are not made for
+action, or work. Your taste is higher than your ambition, and you love
+learning better than fame. Am I right?"
+
+"So right that I regret I can be read so easily."
+
+"And therefore, it may be that you would find yourself no happier with
+Art than with Science. You might even fall into deeper discouragement;
+for in Science every onward step is at least certain gain, but in Art
+every step is groping, and success is only another form of effort. Art,
+in so far as it is more divine, is more unattainable, more evanescent,
+more unsubstantial. It needs as much patience as Science, and the
+passionate devotion of an entire life is as nothing in comparison with
+the magnitude of the work. Self-sacrifice, self-distrust, infinite
+patience, infinite disappointment--such is the lot of the artist, such
+the law of aspiration."
+
+"A melancholy creed."
+
+"But a true one. The divine is doomed to suffering, and under the hays
+of the poet lurk ever the thorns of the self-immolator."
+
+"But, amid all this record of his pains, do you render no account of his
+pleasures?" I asked. "You forget that he has moments of enjoyment lofty
+as his aims, and deep as his devotion.
+
+"I do not forget it," she said. "I know it but too well. Alas! is not
+the catalogue of his pleasures the more melancholy record of the two?
+Hopes which sharpen disappointment; visions which cheat while they
+enrapture; dreams that embitter his waking hours--fellow-student, do you
+envy him these?"
+
+"I do; believing that he would not forego them for a life of
+common-place annoyances and placid pleasures."
+
+"Forego them! Never. Who that had once been the guest of the gods would
+forego the Divine for the Human? No--it is better to suffer than to
+stagnate. The artist and poet is overpaid in his brief snatches of joy.
+While they last, his soul sings 'at heaven's gate,' and his forehead
+strikes the stars."
+
+She spoke with a rare and passionate enthusiasm; sometimes pacing to and
+fro; sometimes pausing with upturned face--
+
+"A dauntless muse who eyes a dreadful fate!"
+
+There was a long, long silence--she looking at the stars, I upon her
+face.
+
+By-and-by she came over to where I stood, and leaned upon the railing
+that divided our separate territories.
+
+"Friend," said she, gravely, "be content. Art is the Sphinx, and to
+question her is destruction. Enjoy books, pictures, music,
+statues--rifle the world of beauty to satiety, if satiety be
+possible--but there pause Drink the wine; seek not to crush the grape.
+Be happy, be useful, labor honestly upon the task that is thine, and be
+assured that the work will itself achieve its reward. Is it nothing to
+relieve pain--to prolong the days of the sickly--to restore health to
+the suffering--to soothe the last pangs of the dying? Is it nothing to
+be followed by the prayers and blessing of those whom you have restored
+to love, to fame, to the world's service? To my thinking, the
+physician's trade hath something god-like in it. Be content. Harvey's
+discovery was as sublime as Newton's, and it were hard to say which did
+God's work best--Shakespeare or Jenner."
+
+"And you," I said, the passion that I could not conceal trembling in my
+voice; "and you--what are you, poet, or painter, or musician, that you
+know and reason of all these things?"
+
+She laughed with a sudden change of mood, and shook her head.
+
+"I am a woman," said she. "Simply a woman--no more. One of the inferior
+sex; and, as I told you long ago, only half civilized."
+
+"You are unlike every other woman!"
+
+"Possibly, because I am more useless. Strange as it may seem, do you
+know I love art better than sewing, or gossip, or dress; and hold my
+liberty to be a dower more precious than either beauty or riches? And
+yet--I am a woman!"
+
+"The wisest, virtuousest, discreetest, best!"
+
+"By no means. You are comparing me with Eve; but I am not in the least
+like Eve, I assure you. She was an excellent housewife, and, if we may
+believe Milton, knew how to prepare 'dulcet creams,' and all sorts of
+Paradisaical dainties for her husband's dinner. I, on the contrary,
+could not make a cream if Adam's life depended on it."
+
+"_Eh bien!_ of the theology of creams I know nothing. I only know that
+Eve was the first and fairest of her sex, and that you are as wise as
+you are beautiful."
+
+"Nay, that is what Titania said to the ass," laughed Hortense. "Your
+compliments become equivocal, fellow-student. But hush! what hour
+is that?"
+
+She stood with uplifted finger. The air was keen, and over the silence
+of the house-tops chimed the church-clocks--Two.
+
+"It is late, and cold," said she, drawing her cloak more closely round
+her.
+
+"Not later than you usually sit up," I replied. "Don't go yet. 'Tis now
+the very witching hour of night, when churchyards yawn--"
+
+"I beg your pardon," she interrupted. "The churchyards have done yawning
+by this time, and, like other respectable citizens, are sound asleep.
+Let us follow their example. Good-night."
+
+"Good-night," I replied, reluctantly; but almost before I had said it,
+she was gone.
+
+After this, as the winter wore away, and spring drew on, Hortense's
+balcony became once more a garden, and she used to attend to her flowers
+every evening. She always found me on my balcony when she came out, and
+soon our open-air meetings became such an established fact that, instead
+of parting with "good-night," we said "_au revoir_--till to-morrow." At
+these times we talked of many things; sometimes of subjects abstract and
+mystical--of futurity, of death, of the spiritual life--but oftenest of
+Art in its manifold developments. And sometimes our speculations
+wandered on into the late hours of the night.
+
+And yet, for all our talking and all our community of tastes, we became
+not one jot more intimate. I still loved in silence--she still lived in
+a world apart.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLVI.
+
+THERMOPYLAE.
+
+     How dreary 'tis for women to sit still
+     On winter nights by solitary fires,
+     And hear the nations praising them far off.
+
+     AURORA LEIGH.
+
+Abolished by the National Convention of 1793, re-established in 1795,
+reformed by the first Napoleon in 1803, and remodelled in 1816 on the
+restoration of the Bourbons, the Academie Francaise, despite its changes
+of fortune, name, and government, is a liberal and splendid institution.
+It consists of forty members, whose office it is to compile the great
+dictionary, and to enrich, purify, and preserve the language. It assists
+authors in distress. It awards prizes for poetry, eloquence, and virtue;
+and it bestows those honors with a noble impartiality that observes no
+distinction of sex, rank, or party. To fill one of the forty fauteuils
+of the Academie Francaise is the darling ambition of every eminent
+Frenchman of letters. There the poet, the philosopher, the historian,
+the man of science, sit side by side, and meet on equal ground. When a
+seat falls vacant, when a prize is to be awarded, when an anniversary is
+to be celebrated, the interest and excitement become intense. To the
+political, the fashionable, or the commercial world, these events are
+perhaps of little moment. They affect neither the Bourse nor the Budget.
+They exercise no perceptible influence on the Longchamps toilettes. But
+to the striving author, to the rising orator, to all earnest workers in
+the broad fields of literature, they are serious and significant
+circumstances.
+
+Living out of society as I now did, I knew little and cared less for
+these academic crises. The success of one candidate was as unimportant
+to me as the failure of another; and I had more than once read the
+crowned poem of the prize essay without even glancing at the name or the
+fortunate author.
+
+Now it happened that, pacing to and fro under the budding acacias of the
+Palais Royal garden one sunny spring-like morning, some three or four
+weeks after the conversation last recorded, I was pursued by a
+persecuting newsvender with a hungry eye, mittened fingers, and a shrill
+voice, who persisted in reiterating close against my ear:--
+
+"News of the day, M'sieur!--news of the day. Frightful murder in the Rue
+du Faubourg St. Antoine--state of the Bourse--latest despatches from the
+seat of war--prize poem crowned by the Academie Francaise--news of the
+day, M'sieur! Only forty centimes! News of the day!"
+
+I refused, however, to be interested in any of those topics, turned a
+deaf ear to his allurements, and peremptorily dismissed him. I then
+continued my walk in solitary silence.
+
+At the further extremity of the square, near the _Galerie Vitree_ and
+close beside the little newspaper kiosk, stood a large tree since cut
+down, which at that time served as an advertising medium, and was daily
+decorated with a written placard, descriptive of the contents of the
+_Moniteur_, the _Presse_, and other leading papers. This placard was
+generally surrounded by a crowd of readers, and to-day the crowd of
+readers was more than usually dense.
+
+I seldom cared in these days for what was going on in the busy outside
+world; but this morning, my attention having been drawn to the subject,
+I amused myself, as I paced to and fro, by watching the eager faces of
+the little throng of idlers. Presently I fell in with the rest, and
+found myself conning the placard on the tree.
+
+The name that met my astonished eyes on that placard was the name of
+Hortense Dufresnoy.
+
+The sentence ran thus:--
+
+"Grand Biennial Prize for Poetry--Subject: _The Pass of
+Thermopylae_,--Successful Candidate, _Mademoiselle Hortense Dufresnoy_."
+
+Breathless, I read the passage twice; then, hearing at a little distance
+the shrill voice of the importunate newsvender, I plunged after him and
+stopped him, just as he came to the--
+
+"Frightful murder in the Rue du Faubourg Saint ..."
+
+"Here," said I, tapping him on the shoulder; "give me one of your
+papers."
+
+The man's eyes glittered.
+
+"Only forty centimes, M'sieur," said he. "'Tis the first I've sold
+to-day."
+
+He looked poor and wretched. I dropped into his hand a coin that would
+have purchased all his little sheaf of journals, and hurried away, not
+to take the change or hear his thanks. He was silent for some moments;
+then took up his cry at the point where he had broken off, and started
+away with:--
+
+--"Antoine!--state of the Bourse--latest despatches from the seat of
+war--news of the day--only forty centimes!"
+
+I took my paper to a quiet bench near the fountain, and read the whole
+account. There had been eighteen anonymous poems submitted to the
+Academy. Three out of the eighteen had come under discussion; one out of
+the three had been warmly advocated by Beranger, one by Lebrun, and the
+third by some other academician. The poem selected by Beranger was at
+length chosen; the sealed enclosure opened; and the name of the
+successful competitor found to be Hortense Dufresnoy. To Hortense
+Dufresnoy, therefore, the prize and crown were awarded.
+
+I read the article through, and then went home, hoping to be the first
+to congratulate her. Timidly, and with a fast-beating heart, I rang the
+bell at her outer door; for we all had our bells at Madame Bouisse's,
+and lived in our rooms as if they were little private houses.
+
+She opened the door, and, seeing me, looked surprised; for I had never
+before ventured to pay her a visit in her apartment.
+
+"I have come to wish you joy," said I, not venturing to cross the
+threshold.
+
+"To wish me joy?"
+
+"You have not seen a morning paper?"
+
+"A morning paper!"
+
+And, echoing me thus, her color changed, and a strange vague look--it
+might be of hope, it might be of fear--came into her face.
+
+"There is something in the _Moniteur_" I went on, smiling, 'that
+concerns you nearly."
+
+"That concerns me?" she exclaimed. "_Me_? For Heaven's sake, speak
+plainly. I do not understand you. Has--has anything been discovered?"
+
+"Yes--it has been discovered at the Academie Francaise that Mademoiselle
+Hortense Dufresnoy has written the best poem on Thermopylae."
+
+She drew a deep breath, pressed her hands tightly together, and
+murmured:--
+
+"Alas! is that all?"
+
+"All! Nay--is it not enough to step at once into fame--to have been
+advocated by Beranger--to have the poem crowned in the Theatre of the
+Academie Francaise?"
+
+She stood silent, with drooping head and listless hands, all
+disappointment and despondency. Presently she looked up.
+
+"Where did you learn this?" she asked.
+
+I handed her the journal.
+
+"Come in, fellow-student," said she, and held the door wide for me to
+enter.
+
+For the second time I found myself in her little _salon_, and found
+everything in the self-same order.
+
+"Well," I said, "are you not happy?"
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"Success is not happiness," she replied, smiling mournfully. "That
+Beranger should have advocated my poem is an honor beyond price;
+but--but I need more than this to make me happy."
+
+And her eyes wandered, with a strange, yearning look, to the sword over
+the chimney-piece.
+
+Seeing that look, my heart sank, and the tears sprang unbidden to my
+eyes. Whose was the sword? For whose sake was her life so lonely and
+secluded? For whom was she waiting? Surely here, if one could but read
+it aright, lay the secret of her strange and sudden journeys--here I
+touched unawares upon the mystery of her life!
+
+I did not speak. I shaded my face with my hand, and sat looking on the
+ground. Then, the silence remaining unbroken, I rose, and examined the
+drawings on the walls.
+
+They were water-colors for the most part, and treated in a masterly but
+quite peculiar style. The skies were sombre, the foregrounds singularly
+elaborate, the color stern and forcible. Angry sunsets barred by lines
+of purple cirrus stratus; sweeps of desolate heath bounded by jagged
+peaks; steep mountain passes crimson with faded ferns and half-obscured
+by rain-clouds; strange studies of weeds, and rivers, and lonely reaches
+of desolate sea-shore ... these were some of the subjects, and all were
+evidently by the same hand.
+
+"Ah," said Hortense, "you are criticizing my sketches!"
+
+"Your sketches!" I exclaimed. "Are these your work?"
+
+"Certainly," she replied, smiling. "Why not? What do you think of them?"
+
+"What do I think of them! Well, I think that if you had not been a poet
+you ought to have been a painter. How fortunate you are in being able to
+express yourself so variously! Are these compositions, or studies
+from Nature?"
+
+"All studies from Nature--mere records of fact. I do not presume to
+create--I am content humbly and from a distance to copy the changing
+moods of Nature."
+
+"Pray be your own catalogue, then, and tell me where these places are."
+
+"Willingly. This coast-line with the run of breaking surf was taken on
+the shores of Normandy, some few miles from Dieppe. This sunset is a
+recollection of a glorious evening near Frankfort, and those purple
+mountains in the distance are part of the Taunus range. Here is an old
+mediaeval gateway at Solothurn, in Switzerland. This wild heath near the
+sea is in the neighborhood of Biscay. This quaint knot of ruinous houses
+in a weed-grown Court was sketched at Bruges. Do you see that milk-girl
+with her scarlet petticoat and Flemish _faille?_ She supplied us with
+milk, and her dairy was up that dark archway. She stood for me several
+times, when I wanted a foreground figure."
+
+"You have travelled a great deal," I said. "Were you long in Belgium?"
+
+"Yes; I lived there for some years. I was first pupil, then teacher, in
+a large school in Brussels. I was afterwards governess in a private
+family in Bruges. Of late, however, I have preferred to live in Paris,
+and give morning lessons. I have more liberty thus, and more leisure."
+
+"And these two little quaint bronze figures?"
+
+"Hans Sachs and Peter Vischer. I brought them from Nuremberg. Hans
+Sachs, you see, wears a furred robe, and presses a book to his breast.
+He does not look in the least like a cobbler. Peter Vischer, on the
+contrary, wears his leather apron and carries his mallet in his hand.
+Artist and iron-smith, he glories in his trade, and looks as sturdy a
+little burgher as one would wish to see."
+
+"And this statuette in green marble?"
+
+"A copy of the celebrated 'Pensiero' of Michel Angelo--in other words,
+the famous sitting statue of Lorenzo de Medici, in the Medicean chapel
+in Florence. I had it executed for me on the spot by Bazzanti."
+
+"A noble figure!"
+
+"Indeed it is--a noble figure, instinct with life, and strength, and
+meditation. My first thought on seeing the original was that I would not
+for worlds be condemned to pass a night alone with it. I should every
+moment expect the musing hand to drop away from the stern mouth, and the
+eyes to turn upon me!"
+
+"These," said I, pausing at the chimney-piece, "are _souvenirs_ of
+Switzerland. How delicately those chamois are carved out of the hard
+wood! They almost seem to snuff the mountain air! But here is a rapier
+with a hilt of ornamented steel--where did this come from?"
+
+I had purposely led up the conversation to this point. I had patiently
+questioned and examined for the sake of this one inquiry, and I waited
+her reply as if my life hung on it.
+
+Her whole countenance changed. She took it down, and her eyes filled
+with tears.
+
+"It was my father's," she said, tenderly.
+
+"Your father's!" I exclaimed, joyfully. "Heaven be thanked! Did you say
+your father's?"
+
+She looked up surprised, then smiled, and faintly blushed.
+
+"I did," she replied.
+
+"And was your father a soldier?" I asked; for the sword looked more like
+a sword of ceremony than a sword for service.
+
+But to this question she gave no direct reply.
+
+"It was his sword," she said, "and he had the best of all rights to wear
+it."
+
+With this she kissed the weapon reverently, and restored it to its
+place.
+
+I kissed her hand quite as reverently that day at parting, and she did
+not withdraw it.
+
+CHAPTER XLVII.
+
+ALL ABOUT ART.
+
+
+     Art's a service.
+
+     AURORA LEIGH.
+
+"God sent art, and the devil sent critics," said Mueller, dismally
+paraphrasing a popular proverb. "My picture is rejected!"
+
+"Rejected!" I echoed, surprised to find him sitting on the floor, like a
+tailor, in front of an acre of canvas. "By whom?"
+
+"By the Hanging Committee."
+
+"Hang the Hanging Committee!"
+
+"A pious prayer, my friend. Would that it could be carried into
+execution!"
+
+"What cause do they assign?"
+
+"Cause! Do you suppose they trouble themselves to find one? Not a bit of
+it. They simply scrawl a great R in chalk on the back of it, and send
+you a printed notice to carry it home again. What is it to them, if a
+poor devil has been painting his very heart and hopes out, day after
+day, for a whole year, upon that piece of canvas? Nothing, and less than
+nothing--confound them!"
+
+I drew a chair before the picture, and set myself to a patient study of
+the details. He had chosen a difficult subject--the death of Louis XI.
+The scene represented a spacious chamber in the Castle of
+Plessisles-Tours. To the left, in a great oak chair beside the bed from
+which he had just risen, sat the dying king, with a rich, furred mantle
+loosely thrown around him. At his feet, his face buried in his hands,
+kneeled the Dauphin. Behind his chair, holding up the crucifix to enjoin
+silence, stood the king's confessor. A physician, a couple of
+councillors in scarlet robes, and a captain of archers, stood somewhat
+back, whispering together and watching the countenance of the dying man;
+while through the outer door was seen a crowd of courtiers and pages,
+waiting to congratulate King Charles VIII. It was an ambitious subject,
+and Mueller had conceived it in a grand spirit. The heads were
+expressive; and the textures of the velvets, tapestries, oak carvings,
+and so forth, had been executed with more than ordinary finish and
+fidelity. For all this, however, there was more of promise than of
+achievement in the work. The lights were scattered; the attitudes were
+stiff; there was too evident an attempt at effect. One could see that it
+was the work of a young painter, who had yet much to learn, and
+something of the Academy to forget.
+
+"Well," said Mueller, still sitting ruefully on the floor, "what do you
+think of it? Am I rightly served? Shall I send for a big pail of
+whitewash, and blot it all out?"
+
+"Not for the world!"
+
+"What shall I do, then?"
+
+"Do better."
+
+"But, if I have done my best already?"
+
+"Still do better; and when you have done that, do better again. So
+genius toils higher and ever higher, and like the climber of the
+glacier, plants his foot where only his hand clung the moment before."
+
+"Humph! but what of my picture?"
+
+"Well," I said, hesitatingly, "I am no critic--"
+
+"Thank Heaven!" muttered Mueller, parenthetically.
+
+"But there is something noble in the disposition of the figures. I
+should say, however, that you had set to work upon too large a scale."
+
+"A question of focus," said the painter, hastily. "A mere question of
+focus."
+
+"How can that be, when you have finished some parts laboriously, and in
+others seem scarcely to have troubled yourself to cover the canvas?"
+
+"I don't know. I'm impatient, you see, and--and I think I got tired of
+it towards the last."
+
+"Would that have been the case if you had allowed yourself but half the
+space?"
+
+"I'll take to enamel," exclaimed Mueller, with a grin of hyperbolical
+despair. "I'll immortalize myself in miniature. I'll paint henceforward
+with the aid of a microscope, and never again look at nature unless
+through the wrong end of a telescope!"
+
+"Pshaw!--be in earnest, man, and talk sensibly! Do you conceive that for
+every failure you are to change your style? Give yourself, heart and
+soul, to the school in which you have begun, and make up your mind
+to succeed."
+
+"Do you believe, then, that a man may succeed by force of will alone?"
+said Mueller, musingly.
+
+"Yes, because force of will proceeds from force of character, and the
+two together, warp and woof, make the stuff out of which Nature clothes
+her heroes."
+
+"Oh, but I am not talking of heroes," said Mueller.
+
+"By heroes, I do not mean only soldiers. Captain Pen is as good a hero
+as Captain Sword, any day; and Captain Brush, to my thinking, is as fine
+a fellow as either."
+
+"Ay; but do they come, as you would seem to imply, of the same stock?"
+said Mueller. "Force of will and force of character are famous clays in
+which to mould a Wellington or a Columbus; but is not something more--at
+all events, something different--necessary to the modelling of a
+Raffaelle?"
+
+"I don't fancy so. Power is the first requisite of genius. Give power in
+equal quantity to your Columbus and your Raffaelle, and circumstance
+shall decide which will achieve the New World, and which the
+Transfiguration."
+
+"Circumstance!" cried the painter, impatiently. "Good heavens! do you
+make no account of the spontaneous tendencies of genius? Is Nature a
+mere vulgar cook, turning out men, like soups, from one common stock,
+with only a dash of flavoring here and there to give them variety?
+No--Nature is a subtle chemist, and her workshop, depend on it, is
+stored with delicate elixirs, volatile spirits, and precious fires of
+genius. Certain of these are kneaded with the clay of the poet, others
+with the clay of the painter, the astronomer, the mathematician, the
+legislator, the soldier. Raffaelle had in him some of 'the stuff that
+dreams are made of.' Never tell me that that same stuff, differently
+treated, would equally well have furnished forth an Archimedes or a
+Napoleon!"
+
+"Men are what their age calls upon them to be," I replied, after a
+moment's consideration. "Be that demand what it may, the supply is ever
+equal to it. Centre of the most pompous and fascinating of religions,
+Rome demanded Madonnas and Transfigurations, and straightway Raffaelle
+answered to the call. The Old World, overstocked with men, gold, and
+aristocracies, asked wider fields of enterprise, and Columbus added
+America to the map. What is this but circumstance? Had Italy needed
+colonies, would not her men of genius have turned sailors and
+discoverers? Had Madrid been the residence of the Popes, might not
+Columbus have painted altar-pieces or designed churches?"
+
+Mueller, still sitting on the floor, shook his head despondingly.
+
+"I don't think it," he replied; "and I don't wish to think it. It is too
+material a view of genius to satisfy my imagination. I love to believe
+that gifts are special. I love to believe that the poet is born a poet,
+and the artist an artist."
+
+"Hold! I believe that the poet is born a poet, and the artist an artist;
+but I also believe the poetry of the one and the art of the other to be
+only diverse manifestations of a power that is universal in its
+application. The artist whose lot in life it is to be a builder is none
+the less an artist. The poet, though engineer or soldier, is none the
+less a poet. There is the poetry of language, and there is also the
+poetry of action. So also there is the art which expresses itself by
+means of marble or canvas, and the art which designs a capitol, tapers a
+spire, or plants a pleasure-ground. Nay, is not this very interfusion of
+gifts, this universality of uses, in itself the bond of beauty which
+girdles the world like a cestus? If poetry were only rhyme, and art only
+painting, to what an outer darkness of matter-of-fact should we be
+condemning nine-tenths of the creation!"
+
+Mueller yawned, as if he would have swallowed me and my argument
+together.
+
+"You are getting transcendental," said he. "I dare say your theories are
+all very fine and all very true; but I confess that I don't understand
+them. I never could find out all this poetry of bricks and mortar,
+railroads and cotton-factories, that people talk about so fluently
+now-a-days. We Germans take the dreamy side of life, and are seldom at
+home in the practical, be it ever so highly colored and highly flavored.
+In our parlance, an artist is an artist, and neither a bagman nor an
+engine-driver."
+
+His professional pride was touched, and he said this with somewhat less
+than his usual _bonhomie_--almost with a shade of irritability.
+
+"Come," said I, smiling, "we will not discuss a topic which we can never
+see from the same point of view. Doing art is better than talking art;
+and your business now is to find a fresh subject and prepare another
+canvas. Meanwhile cheer up, and forget all about Louis XI. and the
+Hanging Committee. What say you to dining with me at the Trois Freres?
+It will do you good."
+
+"Good!" cried he, springing to his feet and shaking his fist at the
+picture. "More good, by Jupiter, than all the paint and megilp that ever
+was wasted! Not all the fine arts of Europe are worth a _poulet a la
+Marengo_ and a bottle of old _Romanee_!"
+
+So saying, he turned his picture to the wall, seized his cap, locked his
+door, scrawled outside with a piece of chalk,--"_Summoned to the
+Tuileries on state affairs_," and followed me, whistling, down the six
+flights of gloomy, ricketty, Quartier-Latin lodging-house stairs up
+which he lived and had his being.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLVIII.
+
+I MAKE MYSELF ACQUAINTED WITH THE IMPOLITE WORLD AND ITS PLACES OP
+UNFASHIONABLE RESORT.
+
+Mueller and I dined merrily at the Cafe of the Trois Freres Provencaux,
+discussed our coffee and cigars outside the Rotonde in the Palais Royal,
+and then started off in search of adventures. Striking up in a
+north-easterly direction through a labyrinth of narrow streets, we
+emerged at the Rue des Fontaines, just in front of that famous
+second-hand market yclept the Temple. It was Saturday night, and the
+business of the place was at its height. We went in, and turning aside
+from the broad thoroughfares which intersect the market at right angles,
+plunged at once into a net-work of crowded side-alleys, noisy and
+populous as a cluster of beehives. Here were bargainings, hagglings,
+quarrellings, elbowings, slang, low wit, laughter, abuse, cheating, and
+chattering enough to turn the head of a neophyte like myself. Mueller,
+however, was in his element. He took me up one row and down another,
+pointed out all that was curious, had a nod for every grisette, and an
+answer for every touter, and enjoyed the Babel like one to the
+manner born.
+
+"Buy, messieurs, buy! What will you buy?" was the question that
+assailed us on both sides, wherever we went.
+
+"What do you sell, _mon ami ?_" was Mueller's invariable reply.
+
+"What do you want, m'sieur?"
+
+"Twenty thousand francs per annum, and the prettiest wife in Paris,"
+says my friend; a reply which is sure to evoke something _spirituel_,
+after the manner of the locality.
+
+"This is the most amusing place in Paris," observes he. "Like the
+Alsatia of old London, it has its own peculiar _argot,_ and its own
+peculiar privileges. The activity of its commerce is amazing. If you buy
+a pocket-handkerchief at the first stall you come to, and leave it
+unprotected in your coat-pocket for five minutes, you may purchase it
+again at the other end of the alley before you leave. As for the
+resources of the market, they are inexhaustible. You may buy anything
+you please here, from a Court suit to a cargo of old rags. In this alley
+(which is the aristocratic quarter), are sold old jewelry, old china,
+old furniture, silks that have rustled at the Tuileries; fans that may
+have fluttered at the opera; gloves once fitted to tiny hands, and yet
+bearing a light soil where the rings were worn beneath; laces that may
+have been the property of Countesses or Cardinals; masquerade suits,
+epaulets, uniforms, furs, perfumes, artificial flowers, and all sorts of
+elegant superfluities, most of which have descended to the merchants of
+the Temple through the hands of ladies-maids and valets. Yonder lies the
+district called the 'Foret Noire'--a land of unpleasing atmosphere
+inhabited by cobblers and clothes-menders. Down to the left you see
+nothing but rag and bottle-shops, old iron stores, and lumber of every
+kind. Here you find chiefly household articles, bedding, upholstery,
+crockery, and so forth."
+
+"What will you buy, Messieurs?" continued to be the cry, as we moved
+along arm-in-arm, elbowing our way through the crowd, and exploring this
+singular scene in all directions.
+
+"What will you buy, messieurs?" shouts one salesman. "A carpet? A
+capital carpet, neither too large nor too small. Just the size
+you want!"
+
+"A hat, m'sieur, better than new," cries another; "just aired by the
+last owner."
+
+"A coat that will fit you better than if it had been made for you?"
+
+"A pair of boots? Dress-boots, dancing-boots, walking-boots,
+morning-boots, evening-boots, riding-boots, fishing-boots,
+hunting-boots. All sorts, m'sieur--all sorts!"
+
+"A cloak, m'sieur?"
+
+"A lace shawl to take home to Madame?"
+
+"An umbrella, m'sieur?"
+
+"A reading lamp?"
+
+"A warming-pan?"
+
+"A pair of gloves?"
+
+"A shower bath?"
+
+"A hand organ?"
+
+"What! m'sieurs, do you buy nothing this evening? Hola, Antoine!
+monsieur keeps his hands in his pockets, for fear his money should
+fall out!"
+
+"Bah! They've not a centime between them!"
+
+"Go down the next turning and have the hole in your coat mended!"
+
+"Make way there for monsieur the millionaire!"
+
+"They are ambassadors on their way to the Court of Persia."
+
+"_Ohe! Pane! pane! pane!_"
+
+Thus we run the gauntlet of all the tongues in the Temple, sometimes
+retorting, sometimes laughing and passing on, sometimes stopping to
+watch the issue of a dispute or the clinching of a bargain.
+
+"_Dame_, now! if it were only ten francs cheaper," says a voice that
+strikes my ear with a sudden sense of familiarity. Turning, I discover
+that the voice belongs to a young woman close at my elbow, and that the
+remark is addressed to a good-looking workman upon whose arm she
+is leaning.
+
+"What, Josephine!" I exclaim.
+
+"_Comment_! Monsieur Basil!"
+
+And I find myself kissed on both cheeks before I even guess what is
+going to happen to me.
+
+"Have I not also the honor of being remembered by Mademoiselle?" says
+Mueller, taking off his hat with all the politeness possible; whereupon
+Josephine, in an ecstasy of recognition, embraces him likewise.
+
+"_Mais, quel bonheur_!" cries she. "And to meet in the Temple, above all
+places! Emile, you heard me speak of Monsieur Basil--the gentleman who
+gave me that lovely shawl that I wore last Sunday to the Chateau des
+Fleurs--_eh bien_! this is he--and here is Monsieur Mueller, his friend.
+Gentlemen, this is Emile, my _fiance_. We are to be married next Friday
+week, and we are buying our furniture."
+
+The good-looking workman pulled off his cap and made his bow, and we
+proffered the customary congratulations.
+
+"We have bought such sweet, pretty things," continued she, rattling on
+with all her old volubility, "and we have hired the dearest little
+_appartement_ on the fourth story, in a street near the Jardin des
+Plantes. See--this looking-glass is ours; we have just bought it. And
+those maple chairs, and that chest of drawers with the marble top. It
+isn't real marble, you know; but it's ever so much better than
+real:--not nearly so heavy, and so beautifully carved that it's quite a
+work of art. Then we have bought a carpet--the sweetest carpet! Is it
+not, Emile?"
+
+Emile smiled, and confessed that the carpet was "_fort bien_."
+
+"And the time-piece, Madame?" suggested the furniture-dealer, at whose
+door we were standing. "Madame should really not refuse herself the
+time-piece."
+
+Josephine shook her head.
+
+"It is too dear," said she.
+
+"Pardon, madame. I am giving it away,--absolutely giving it away at the
+price!"
+
+Josephine looked at it wistfully, and weighed her little purse. It was a
+very little purse, and very light.
+
+"It is so pretty!" said she.
+
+The clock was of ormolu upon a painted stand, that was surmounted by a
+stout little gilt Cupid in a triumphal chariot, drawn by a pair of
+hard-working doves.
+
+"What is the price of it?" I asked.
+
+"Thirty-five francs, m'sieur," replied the dealer, briskly.
+
+"Say twenty-five," urged Josephine.
+
+The dealer shook his head.
+
+"What if we did without the looking-glass?" whispered Josephine to her
+_fiance_. "After all, you know, one can live without a looking-glass;
+but how shall I have your dinners ready, if I don't know what o'clock
+it is?"
+
+"I don't really see how we are to do without a clock," admitted Emile.
+
+"And that darling little Cupid!"
+
+Emile conceded that the Cupid was irresistible.
+
+"Then we decide to have the clock, and do without the looking-glass?"
+
+"Yes, we decide."
+
+In the meantime I had slipped the thirty-five francs into the dealer's
+hand.
+
+"You must do me the favor to accept the clock as a wedding-present,
+Mademoiselle Josephine," I said. "And I hope you will favor me with an
+invitation to the wedding."
+
+"And me also," said Mueller; "and I shall hope to be allowed to offer a
+little sketch to adorn the walls of your new home."
+
+Their delight and gratitude were almost too great. We shook hands again
+all round. I am not sure, indeed, that Josephine did not then and there
+embrace us both for the second time.
+
+"And you will both come to our wedding!" cried she. "And we will spend
+the day at St. Cloud, and have a dance in the evening; and we will
+invite Monsieur Gustave, and Monsieur Jules, and Monsieur Adrien. Oh,
+dear! how delightful it will be!"
+
+"And you promise me the first quadrille?" said I.
+
+"And me the second?" added Mueller.
+
+"Yes, yes--as many as you please."
+
+"Then you must let us know at what time to come, and all about it; so,
+till Friday week, adieu!"
+
+And thus, with more shaking of hands, and thanks, and good wishes, we
+parted company, leaving them still occupied with the gilt Cupid and the
+furniture-broker.
+
+After the dense atmosphere of the clothes-market, it is a relief to
+emerge upon the Boulevart du Temple--the noisy, feverish, crowded
+Boulevart du Temple, with its half dozen theatres, its glare of gas, its
+cake-sellers, bill-sellers, lemonade-sellers, cabs, cafes, gendarmes,
+tumblers, grisettes, and pleasure-seekers of both sexes.
+
+Here we pause awhile to applaud the performances of a company of
+dancing-dogs, whence we are presently drawn away by the sight of a
+gentleman in a _moyen-age_ costume, who is swallowing penknives and
+bringing them out at his ears to the immense gratification of a large
+circle of bystanders.
+
+A little farther on lies the Jardin Turc; and here we drop in for half
+an hour, to restore ourselves with coffee-ices, and look on at the
+dancers. This done, we presently issue forth again, still in search of
+amusement.
+
+"Have you ever been to the Petit Lazary?" asks my friend, as we stand at
+the gate of the Jardin Turc, hesitating which way to turn.
+
+"Never; what is it?"
+
+"The most inexpensive of theatrical luxuries--an evening's entertainment
+of the mildest intellectual calibre, and at the lowest possible cost.
+Here we are at the doors. Come in, and complete your experience of
+Paris life!"
+
+The Petit Lazary occupies the lowest round of the theatrical ladder. We
+pay something like sixpence half-penny or sevenpence apiece, and are
+inducted into the dress-circle. Our appearance is greeted with a round
+of applause. The curtain has just fallen, and the audience have nothing
+better to do. Mueller lays his hand upon his heart, and bows profoundly,
+first to the gallery and next to the pit; whereupon they laugh, and
+leave us in peace. Had we looked dignified or indignant we should
+probably have been hissed till the curtain rose.
+
+It is an audience in shirt-sleeves, consisting for the most part of
+workmen, maid-servants, soldiers, and street-urchins, with a plentiful
+sprinkling of pickpockets--the latter in a strictly private capacity,
+being present for entertainment only, without any ulterior
+professional views.
+
+It is a noisy _entr'acte_ enough. Three vaudevilles have already been
+played, and while the fourth is in preparation the public amuses itself
+according to its own riotous will and pleasure. Nuts and apple parings
+fly hither and thither; oranges describe perilous parabolas between the
+pit and the gallery; adventurous _gamins_ make daring excursions round
+the upper rails; dialogues maintained across the house, and quarrels
+supported by means of an incredible copiousness of invective, mingle in
+discordant chorus with all sorts of howlings, groanings, whistlings,
+crowings, and yelpings, above which, in shrillest treble, rise the
+voices of cake and apple-sellers, and the piercing cry of the hump-back
+who distributes "vaudevilles at five centimes apiece." In the meantime,
+almost distracted by the patronage that assails him in every direction,
+the lemonade-vendor strides hither and thither, supplying floods of
+nectar at two centimes the glass; while the audience, skilled in the
+combination of enjoyments, eats, drinks, and vociferates to its heart's
+content. Fabulous meats, and pies of mysterious origin, are brought out
+from baskets and hats. Pocket-handkerchiefs spread upon benches do duty
+as table-cloths. Clasp-knives, galette, and sucre d'orge pass from hand
+to hand--nay, from mouth to mouth--and, in the midst of the tumult, the
+curtain rises.
+
+All is, in one moment, profoundly silent. The viands disappear; the
+lemonade-seller vanishes; the boys outside the gallery-rails clamber
+back to their places. The drama, in the eyes of the Parisians, is almost
+a sacred rite, and not even the noisiest _gamin_ would raise his voice
+above a whisper when the curtain is up.
+
+The vaudeville that follows is, to say the least of it, a perplexing
+performance. It has no plot in particular. The scene is laid in a
+lodging-house, and the discomforts of one Monsieur Choufleur, an elderly
+gentleman in a flowered dressing-gown and a gigantic nightcap, furnish
+forth all the humor of the piece. What Monsieur Choufleur has done to
+deserve his discomforts, and why a certain student named Charles should
+devote all the powers of his mind to the devising and inflicting of
+those discomforts, is a mystery which we, the audience, are never
+permitted to penetrate. Enough that Charles, being a youth of
+mischievous tastes and extensive wardrobe, assumes a series of disguises
+for the express purpose of tormenting Monsieur Choufleur, and is
+unaccountably rewarded in the end with the hand of Monsieur Choufleur's
+daughter; a consummation which brings down the curtain amid loud
+applause, and affords entire satisfaction to everybody.
+
+It is by this time close upon midnight, and, leaving the theatre with
+the rest of the audience, we find a light rain falling. The noisy
+thoroughfare is hushed to comparative quiet. The carriages that roll by
+are homeward bound. The waiters yawn at the doors of the cafes and
+survey pedestrians with a threatening aspect. The theatres are closing
+fast, and a row of flickering gas-lamps in front of a faded transparency
+which proclaims that the juvenile _Tableaux Vivants_ are to be seen
+within, denotes the only place of public amusement yet open to the
+curious along the whole length of the Boulevart du Temple.
+
+"And now, _amigo_, where shall we go?" says Mueller. "Are you for a
+billiard-room or a lobster supper? Or shall we beat up the quarters of
+some of the fellows in the Quartier Latin, and see what fun is afoot on
+the other side of the water?"
+
+"Whichever you please. You are my guest to-night, and I am at your
+disposal."
+
+"Or what say you to dropping in for an hour among the Chicards?"
+
+"A capital idea--especially if you again entertain the society with a
+true story of events that never happened."
+
+"_Allons donc_!--
+
+     'C'etait de mon temps
+     Que brillait Madame Gregoire.
+     J'allais a vingt ans
+     Dans son cabaret rire et boire.'
+
+--confound this drizzle! It soaks one through and through, like a
+sponge. If you are no fonder of getting wet through than I am, I vote we
+both run for it!"
+
+With this he set off running at full speed, and I followed.
+
+The rain soon fell faster and thicker. We had no umbrellas; and being by
+this time in a region of back-streets, an empty fiacre was a prize not
+to be hoped for. Coming presently to a dark archway, we took shelter and
+waited till the shower should pass over. It lasted longer than we had
+expected, and threatened to settle into a night's steady rain. Mueller
+kept his blood warm by practicing extravagant quadrille steps and
+singing scraps of Beranger's ballads; whilst I, watching impatiently for
+a cab, kept peering up and down the street, and listening to
+every sound.
+
+Presently a quick footfall echoed along the wet pavement, and the figure
+of a man, dimly seen by the blurred light of the street-lamps, came
+hurrying along the other side of the way. Something in the firm free
+step, in the upright carriage, in the height and build of the passer-by,
+arrested my attention. He drew nearer. He passed under the lamp just
+opposite, and, as he passed, flung away the end of his cigar, which
+fell, hissing, into the little rain-torrent running down the middle of
+the street. He carried no umbrella; but his hat was pulled low, and his
+collar drawn up, and I could see nothing of his face. But the gesture
+was enough.
+
+For a moment I stood still and looked after him; then, calling to Mueller
+that I should be back presently, I darted off in pursuit.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLIX.
+
+THE KING OF DIAMONDS.
+
+The rain beat in my face and almost blinded me, the wind hustled me; the
+gendarme at the corner of the street looked at me suspiciously; and
+still I followed, and still the tall stranger strode on ahead. Up one
+street he led me and down another, across a market-place, through an
+arcade, past the Bourse, and into that labyrinth of small streets that
+lies behind the Italian Opera-house, and is bounded on the East by the
+Rue de Richelieu, and on the West by the Rue Louis le Grand. Here he
+slackened his pace, and I found myself gaming upon him for the first
+time. Presently he came to a dead stop, and as I continued to draw
+nearer, I saw him take out his watch and look at it by the light of a
+street-lamp. This done, he began sauntering slowly backwards and
+forwards, as if waiting for some second person.
+
+For a moment I also paused, hesitating. What should I do?--pass him
+under the lamp, and try to see his face? Go boldly up to him, and invent
+some pretence to address him, or wait in this angle of deep shade, and
+see what would happen next? I was deceived, of course--deceived by a
+merely accidental resemblance. Well, then, I should have had my run for
+my pains, and have taken cold, most likely, into the bargain. At all
+events, I would speak to him.
+
+Seeing me emerge from the darkness, and cross over towards the spot
+where he was standing, he drew aside with the air of a man upon his
+guard, and put his hand quickly into his breast.
+
+"I beg your pardon, Monsieur," I began.
+
+"What! my dear Damon!--is it you?" he interrupted, and held out both
+hands.
+
+I grasped them joyously.
+
+"Dalrymple, is it you?"
+
+"Myself, Damon--_faute de mieux_."
+
+"And I have been running after you for the last two miles! What brings
+you to Paris? Why did you not let me know you were here? How long have
+you been back? Has anything gone wrong? Are you well?"
+
+"One question at a time, my Arcadian, for mercy's sake!" said he. "Which
+am I to answer?"
+
+"The last."
+
+"Oh, I am well--well enough. But let us walk on a little farther while
+we talk."
+
+"Are you waiting for any one?" I asked, seeing him look round uneasily.
+
+"Yes--no--that is, I expect to see some one come past here presently.
+Step into this doorway, and I will tell you all about it."
+
+His manner was restless, and his hand, as it pressed mine, felt hot and
+feverish.
+
+"I am sure you are not well," I said, following him into the gloom of a
+deep, old-fashioned doorway.
+
+"Am I not? Well, I don't know--perhaps I am not. My blood burns in my
+veins to-night like fire. Nay, thou wilt learn nothing from my pulse,
+thou sucking AEsculapius! Mine is a sickness not to be cured by drugs. I
+must let blood for it."
+
+The short, hard laugh with which he said this troubled me still more.
+
+"Speak out," I said--"for Heaven's sake, speak out! You have something
+on your mind--what is it?"
+
+"I have something on my hands," he replied, gloomily. "Work. Work that
+must be done quickly, or there will be no peace for any of us. Look
+here, Damon--if you had a wife, and another man stood before the world
+as her betrothed husband--if you had a wife, and another man spoke of
+her as his--boasted of her--behaved in the house as if it were already
+his own--treated her servants as though he were their master--possessed
+himself of her papers--extorted money from her--brought his friends, on
+one pretext or another, about her house--tormented her, day after day,
+to marry him ... what would you do to such a man as this?"
+
+"Make my own marriage public at once, and set him at defiance," I
+replied.
+
+"Ay, but...."
+
+"But what?"
+
+"That alone will not content me. I must punish him with my own hand."
+
+"He would be punished enough in the loss of the lady and her fortune."
+
+"Not he! He has entangled her affairs sufficiently by this time to
+indemnify himself for her fortune, depend on it. And as for
+herself--pshaw! he does not know what love is!"
+
+"But his pride----"
+
+"But _my_ pride!" interrupted Dalrymple, passionately. "What of my
+pride?--my wounded honor?--my outraged love? No, no, I tell you, it is
+not such a paltry vengeance that will satisfy me! Would to Heaven I had
+trusted only my own arm from the first! Would to Heaven that, instead of
+having anything to say to the cursed brood of the law, I had taken the
+viper by the throat, and brought him to my own terms, after my
+own fashion!"
+
+"But you have not yet told me what you are doing here?"
+
+"I am waiting to see Monsieur de Simoncourt."
+
+"Monsieur de Simoncourt!"
+
+"Yes. That white house at the corner is one of his haunts,--a private
+gaming-house, never open till after midnight. I want to meet him
+accidentally, as he is going in."
+
+"What for?"
+
+"That he may take me with him. You can't get into one of these places
+without an introduction, you know. Those who keep them are too much
+afraid of the police."
+
+"But do you play?"
+
+"Come with me, and see. Hark! do you hear nothing?"
+
+"Yes, I hear a footstep. And here comes a man."
+
+"Let us walk to meet him, accidentally, and seem to be talking."
+
+I took Dalrymple's arm, and we strolled in the direction of the new
+comer. It was not De Simoncourt, however, but a tall man with a grizzled
+beard, who crossed over, apprehensively, at our approach, but recrossed
+and went into the white house at the corner as soon as he thought us
+out of sight.
+
+"One of the gang," said Dalrymple, with a shrug of his broad shoulders.
+"We had better go back to our doorway, and wait till the right
+man comes."
+
+We had not long to wait. The next arrival was he whom we sought. We
+strolled on, as before, and came upon him face to face.
+
+"De Simoncourt, by all that's propitious!" cried Dalrymple.
+
+"What--Major Dalrymple returned to Paris!"
+
+"Ay, just returned. Bored to death with Berlin and Vienna--no place like
+Paris, De Simoncourt, go where one will!"
+
+"None, indeed. There is but one Paris, and pleasure is the true profit
+of all who visit it."
+
+"My dear De Simoncourt, I am appalled to hear you perpetrate a pun! By
+the way, you have met Mr. Basil Arbuthnot at my rooms?"
+
+M. de Simoncourt lifted his hat, and was graciously pleased to remember
+the circumstance.
+
+"And now," pursued Dalrymple, "having met, what shall, we do next? Have
+you any engagement for the small hours, De Simoncourt?"
+
+"I am quite at your disposal. Where were your bound for?"
+
+"Anywhere--everywhere. I want excitement."
+
+"Would a hand at _ecarte_, or a green table, have any attraction for
+you?" suggested De Simoncourt, falling into the trap as readily as one
+could have desired.
+
+"The very thing, if you know where they are to be found!"
+
+"Nay, I need not take you far to find both. There is in this very street
+a house where money may be lost and won as easily as at the Bourse.
+Follow me."
+
+He took us to the white house at the corner, and, pressing a spring
+concealed in the wood-work of the lintel, rung a bell of shrill and
+peculiar _timbre_. The door opened immediately, and, after we had
+passed in, closed behind us without any visible agency. Still following
+at the heels of M. de Simoncourt, we then went up a spacious staircase
+dimly lighted, and, leaving our hats in an ante-room, entered
+unannounced into an elegant _salon_, where some twenty or thirty
+_habitues_ of both sexes had already commenced the business of the
+evening. The ladies, of whom there were not more than half-a-dozen, were
+all more or less painted, _passees_, and showily dressed. Among the men
+were military stocks, ribbons, crosses, stars, and fine titles in
+abundance. We were evidently supposed to be in very brilliant
+society--brilliant, however, with a fictitious lustre that betrayed the
+tinsel beneath, and reminded one of a fashionable reception on the
+boards of the Haymarket or the Porte St. Martin. The mistress of the
+house, an abundant and somewhat elderly Juno in green velvet, with a
+profusion of jewelry on her arms and bosom, came forward to receive us.
+
+"Madame de Sainte Amaranthe, permit me to present my friends, Major
+Dalrymple and Mr. Arbuthnot," said De Simoncourt, imprinting a gallant
+kiss on the plump hand of the hostess.
+
+Madame de Ste. Amaranthe professed herself charmed to receive any
+friends of M. de Simoncourt; whereupon M. de Simoncourt's friends were
+enchanted to be admitted to the privilege of Madame de Ste. Amaranthe's
+acquaintance. Madame de Ste. Amaranthe then informed us that she was the
+widow of a general officer who fell at Austerlitz, and the daughter of a
+rich West India planter whom she called her _pere adore_, and to whose
+supposititious memory she wiped away an imaginary tear with an
+embroidered pocket-handkerchief. She then begged that we would make
+ourselves at home, and, gliding away, whispered something in De
+Simoncourt's ear, to which he replied by a nod of intelligence.
+
+"That harpy hopes to fleece us," said Dalrymple, slipping his arm
+through mine and drawing me towards the roulette table. "She has just
+told De Simoncourt to take us in hand. I always suspected the fellow
+was a Greek."
+
+"A Greek?"
+
+"Ay, in the figurative sense--a gentleman who lives by dexterity at
+cards."
+
+"And shall you play?"
+
+"By-and-by. Not yet, because--"
+
+He checked himself, and looked anxiously round the room.
+
+"Because what?"
+
+"Tell me, Arbuthnot," said he, paying no attention to my question; "do
+_you_ mind playing?"
+
+"I? My dear fellow, I hardly know one card from another."
+
+"But have you any objection?"
+
+"None whatever to the game; but a good deal to the penalty. I don't mind
+confessing to you that I ran into debt some months back, and that...."
+
+"Nonsense, boy!" interrupted Dalrymple, with a kindly smile. "Do you
+suppose I want you to gamble away your money? No, no--the fact is, that
+I am here for a purpose, and it will not do to let my purpose be
+suspected. These Greeks want a pigeon. Will you oblige me by being that
+pigeon, and by allowing me to pay for your plucking?"
+
+I still hesitated.
+
+"But you will be helping me," urged he. "If you don't sit down, I must."
+
+"You would not lose so much," I expostulated.
+
+"Perhaps not, if I were cool and kept my eyes open; but to-night I am
+_distrait_, and should be as defenceless as yourself."
+
+"In that case I will play for you with pleasure."
+
+He slipped a little pocket-book into my hand.
+
+"Never stake more than five francs at a time," said he, "and you cannot
+ruin me. The book contains a thousand. You shall have more, if
+necessary; but I think that sum will last as long as I shall want you to
+keep playing."
+
+"A thousand francs!" I exclaimed. "Why, that is forty pounds!"
+
+"If it were four hundred, and it answered my purpose," said Dalrymple,
+between his teeth, "I should hold it money well spent!"
+
+At this moment De Simoncourt came up, and apologized for having left us
+so long.
+
+"If you want mere amusement, Major Dalrymple," said he, "I suppose you
+will prefer _roulette_ to _ecarte_!"
+
+"I will stake a few pieces presently on the green cloth," replied
+Dalrymple, carelessly; "but, first of all, I want to initiate my young
+friend here. As to double _ecarte_, Monsieur de Simoncourt, I need
+hardly tell you, as a man of the world, that I never play it with
+strangers."
+
+De Simoncourt smiled, and shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"Quite right," said he. "I believe that here everything is really _de
+bonne foi_; but where there are cards there will always be danger. For
+my part, I always shuffle the pack after my adversary!"
+
+With this he strolled off again, and I took a vacant chair at the long
+table, next to a lady, who made way for me with the most gracious smile
+imaginable. Only the players sat; so Dalrymple stood behind me and
+looked on. It was a green board, somewhat larger than an ordinary
+billiard-table, with mysterious boundaries traced here and there in
+yellow and red, and a cabalistic table of figures towards each end. A
+couple of well-dressed men sat in the centre; one to deal out the cards,
+and the other to pay and receive the money. The one who had the
+management of the cash wore a superb diamond ring, and a red and green
+ribbon at his button-hole. Dalrymple informed me in a whisper that this
+noble seigneur was Madame de Ste. Amaranthe's brother.
+
+As for the players, they all looked serious and polite enough, as ladies
+and gentlemen should, at their amusement. Some had pieces of card, which
+they pricked occasionally with a pin, according to the progress of the
+game. Some had little piles of silver, or sealed _rouleaux_, lying
+beside them. As for myself, I took out Dalrymple's pocket-book, and laid
+it beside me, as if I were an experienced player and meant to break the
+bank. For a few minutes he stood by, and then, having given me some
+idea of the leading principles of the game, wandered away to observe the
+other players.
+
+Left to myself, I played on--timidly at first; soon with more
+confidence; and, of course, with the novice's invariable good-fortune.
+My amiable neighbor drew me presently into conversation. She had a
+theory of chances relating to averages of color, and based upon a
+bewildering calculation of all the black and red cards in the pack,
+which she was so kind as to explain to me. I could not understand a word
+of it, but politeness compelled me to listen. Politeness also compelled
+me to follow her advice when she was so obliging as to offer it, and I
+lost, as a matter of course. From this moment my good-luck deserted me.
+
+"Courage, Monsieur," said my amiable neighbour; "you have only to play
+long enough, and you are sure to win."
+
+In the meantime, I kept following Dalrymple with my eyes, for there was
+something in his manner that filled me with vague uneasiness. Sometimes
+he drew near the table and threw down a Napoleon, but without heeding
+the game, or caring whether he won or lost. He was always looking to the
+door, or wandering restlessly from table to table. Watching him thus, I
+thought how haggard he looked, and what deep channels were furrowed in
+his brow since that day when we lay together on the autumnal grass under
+the trees in the forest of St. Germain.
+
+Thus a long time went by, and I found by my watch that it was nearly
+four o'clock in the morning--also that I had lost six hundred francs out
+of the thousand. It seemed incredible. I could hardly believe that the
+time and the money had flown so fast. I rose in my seat and looked round
+for Dalrymple; but in vain. Could he be gone, leaving me here?
+Impossible! Apprehensive of I knew not what, I pushed back my chair, and
+left the table. The rooms were now much fuller--more stars and
+moustachios; more velvets and laces, and Paris diamonds. Fresh tables,
+too, had been opened for _lansquenet, baccarat_, and _ecarte_. At one of
+these I saw M. de Simoncourt. When he laid down his cards for the deal,
+I seized the opportunity to inquire for my friend.
+
+He pointed to a small inner room divided by a rich hanging from the
+farther end of the _salon_.
+
+"You will find Major Dalrymple in Madame de Ste. Amaranthe's boudoir,
+playing with M. le Vicomte de Caylus," said he, courteously, and
+resumed his game.
+
+Playing with De Caylus! Sitting down amicably with De Caylus! I could
+not understand it.
+
+Crowded as the rooms now were, it took me some time to thread my way
+across, and longer still, when I had done so, to pass the threshold of
+the boudoir, and obtain sight of the players. The room was very small,
+and filled with lookers-on. At a table under a chandelier sat De Caylus
+and Dalrymple. I could not see Dalrymple's face, for his back was turned
+towards me; but the Vicomte I recognised at once--pale, slight, refined,
+with the old look of dissipation and irritability, and the same
+restlessness of eye and hand that I had observed on first seeing him.
+They were evidently playing high, and each had a pile of notes and gold
+lying at his left hand. De Caylus kept nervously crumbling a note in his
+fingers. Dalrymple sat motionless as a man of bronze, and, except to
+throw down a card when it came to his turn, never stirred a finger.
+There was, to my thinking, something ominous in his exceeding calmness.
+
+"At what game are they, playing?" I asked a gentleman near whom I was
+standing.
+
+"At _ecarte_," replied he, without removing his eyes from the players.
+
+Knowing nothing of the game, I could only judge of its progress by the
+faces of those around me. A breathless silence prevailed, except when
+some particular subtlety in the play sent a murmur of admiration round
+the room. Even this was hushed almost as soon as uttered. Gradually the
+interest grew more intense, and the bystanders pressed closer. De Caylus
+sighed impatiently, and passed his hand across his brow. It was his turn
+to deal. Dalrymple shuffled the pack. De Caylus shuffled them after
+him, and dealt. The falling of a pin might have been heard in the pause
+that followed. They had but five cards each. Dalrymple played first--a
+queen of diamonds. De Caylus played the king, and both threw down their
+cards. A loud murmur broke out instantaneously in every direction, and
+De Caylus, looking excited and weary, leaned back in his chair, and
+called for wine. His expression was so unlike that of a victor that I
+thought at first he must have lost the game.
+
+"Which is the winner?" I asked, eagerly. "Which is the winner?"
+
+The gentleman who had replied to me before looked round with a smile of
+contemptuous wonder.
+
+"Why, Monsieur de Caylus, of course," said he. "Did you not see him play
+the king?"
+
+"I beg your pardon," I said, somewhat nettled; "but, as I said before, I
+do not understand the game."
+
+"_Eh bien_! the Englishman is counting out his money."
+
+What a changed scene it was! The circle of intent faces broken and
+shifting--the silence succeeded by a hundred conversations--De Caylus
+leaning back, sipping his wine and chatting over his shoulder--the cards
+pushed aside, and Dalrymple gravely sorting out little shining columns
+of Napoleons, and rolls of crisp bank paper! Having ranged all these
+before him in a row, he took out his check-book, filled in a page, tore
+it out and laid it with the rest. Then, replacing the book in his
+breast-pocket, he pushed back his chair, and, looking up for the first
+time since the close of the game, said aloud:--
+
+"Monsieur le Vicomte de Caylus, I have this evening had the honor of
+losing the sum of twelve thousand francs to you; will you do me the
+favor to count this money?"
+
+M. de Caylus bowed, emptied his glass, and languidly touching each
+little column with one dainty finger, told over his winnings as though
+they were scarcely worth even that amount of trouble.
+
+"Six rouleaux of four hundred each," said he, "making two thousand four
+hundred--six notes of five hundred each, making three thousand--and an
+order upon Rothschild for six thousand six hundred; in all, twelve
+thousand. Thanks, Monsieur ... Monsieur ... forgive me for not
+remembering your name."
+
+Dalrymple looked up with a dangerous light in his eyes, and took no
+notice of the apology.
+
+"It appears to me, Monsieur le Vicomte Caylus," said he, giving the
+other his full title and speaking with singular distinctness, "that you
+hold the king very often at _ecarte_."
+
+De Caylus looked up with every vein on his forehead suddenly swollen and
+throbbing.
+
+"Monsieur!" he exclaimed, hoarsely.
+
+"Especially when you deal," added Dalrymple, smoothing his moustache
+with utter _sang-froid_, and keeping his eyes still riveted upon his
+adversary.
+
+With an inarticulate cry like the cry of a wild beast, De Caylus sprung
+at him, foaming with rage, and was instantly flung back against the
+wall, dragging with him not only the table-cloth, but all the wine,
+money, and cards upon it.
+
+"I will have blood for this!" he shrieked, struggling with those who
+rushed in between. "I will have blood! Blood! Blood!"
+
+Stained and streaming with red wine, he looked, in his ghastly rage, as
+if he was already bathed in the blood he thirsted for.
+
+Dalrymple drew himself to his full height, and stood looking on with
+folded arms and a cold smile.
+
+"I am quite ready," he said, "to give Monsieur le Vicomte full
+satisfaction."
+
+The room was by this time crowded to suffocation. I forced my way
+through, and laid my hand on Dalrymple's arm.
+
+"You have provoked this quarrel," I said, reproachfully.
+
+"That, my dear fellow, is precisely what I came here to do," he replied.
+"You will have to be my second in this affair."
+
+Here De Simoncourt came up, and hearing the last words, drew me aside.
+
+"I act for De Caylus," he whispered. "Pistols, of course?"
+
+I nodded, still all bewilderment at my novel position.
+
+"Your man received the first blow, so is entitled to the first shot."
+
+I nodded again.
+
+"I don't know a better place," he went on, "than Bellevue. There's a
+famous little bit of plantation, and it is just far enough from Paris to
+be secure. The Bois is hackneyed, and the police are too much about it.
+
+"Just so," I replied, vaguely.
+
+"And when shall we say? The sooner the better, it always seems to me, in
+these cases."
+
+"Oh, certainly--the sooner the better."
+
+He looked at his watch.
+
+"It is now ten minutes to five," he said. "Suppose we allow them five
+hours to put their papers in order, and meet at Bellevue, on the
+terrace, at ten?"
+
+"So soon!" I exclaimed.
+
+"Soon!" echoed De Simoncourt. "Why, under circumstances of such
+exceeding aggravation, most men would send for pistols and settle it
+across the table!"
+
+I shuddered. These niceties of honor were new to me, and I had been
+brought up to make little distinction between duelling and murder.
+
+"Be it so, then, Monsieur De Simoncourt," I said. "We will meet you at
+Bellevue, at ten."
+
+"On the terrace?"
+
+"On the terrace."
+
+We bowed and parted. Dalrymple was already gone, and De Caylus, still
+white and trembling with rage, was wiping the wine from his face and
+shirt. The crowd opened for me right and left as I went through the
+_salon_, and more than one voice whispered:--
+
+"He is the Englishman's second."
+
+I took my hat and cloak mechanically, and let myself out. It was broad
+daylight, and the blinding sun poured full upon my eyes as I passed into
+the street.
+
+"Come, Damon," said Dalrymple, crossing over to me from the opposite
+side of the way. "I have just caught a cab--there it is, waiting round
+the corner! We've no time to lose, I'll be bound."
+
+"We are to meet them at Bellevue at ten," I replied.
+
+"At ten? Hurrah! then I've still five certain hours of life before me!
+Long enough, Damon, to do a world of mischief, if one were so disposed!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER L.
+
+THE DUEL AT BELLEVUE.
+
+We drove straight to Dalrymple's rooms, and, going in with a pass-key,
+went up without disturbing the _concierge_. Arrived at home, my friend's
+first act was to open his buffetier and take out a loaf, a _pate de foie
+gras_, and a bottle of wine. I could not eat a morsel; but he supped (or
+breakfasted) with a capital appetite; insisted that I should lie down on
+his bed for two or three hours; and slipping into his dressing-gown,
+took out his desk and cash-box, and settled himself to a regular
+morning's work.
+
+"I hope to get a nap myself before starting," said he. "I have not many
+debts, and I made my will the day after I married--so I have but little
+to transact in the way of business. A few letters to write--a few to
+burn--a trifle or two to seal up and direct to one or two fellows who
+may like a _souvenir_,--that is the extent of my task! Meanwhile, my
+dear boy, get what rest you can. It will never do to be shaky and pale
+on the field, you know."
+
+I went, believing that I should be less in his way; and, lying down in
+my clothes, fell into a heavy sleep, from which, after what seemed a
+long time, I woke suddenly with the conviction that it was just ten
+o'clock. To start up, look at my watch, find that it was only a quarter
+to seven and fall profoundly asleep again, was the work of only a few
+minutes. At the end of another half-hour I woke with the same dread, and
+with the same result; and so on twice or thrice after, till at a
+quarter to nine I jumped up, plunged my head into a basin of cold water,
+and went back to the sitting-room.
+
+I found him lying forward upon the table, fast asleep, with his head
+resting on his hands. Some half-dozen letters lay folded and addressed
+beside him--one directed to his wife. A little pile of burnt paper
+fluttered on the hearth. His pistols were lying close by in their
+mahogany case, the blue and white steel relieved against the
+crimson-velvet lining. He slept so soundly, poor fellow, that I could
+with difficulty make up my mind to wake him. Once roused, however, he
+was alert and ready in a moment, changed his coat, took out a new pair
+of lavender gloves, hailed a cab from the window, and bade the driver
+name his own fare if he got us to the terrace at Bellevue by five
+minutes before ten.
+
+"I always like to be before my time in a matter of this kind, Damon,"
+said he. "It's shabby to be merely punctual when one has, perhaps, not
+more than a quarter of an hour to live. By-the-by, here are my keys.
+Take them, in case of accident. You will find a copy of my will in my
+desk---the original is with my lawyer. The letters you will forward,
+according to the addresses; and in my cash-box you will find a paper
+directed to yourself."
+
+I bent my head. I would not trust myself to speak. "As for the letter to
+Helene--to my wife," he said, turning his face away, "will you--will you
+deliver that with your own hands?"
+
+"I will."
+
+"I--I have had but little time to write it," he faltered, "and I trust
+to you to supply the details. Tell her how I made the quarrel, and how
+it ended. No one suspects it to be other than a _fracas_ over a game at
+_ecarte_. No one supposes that I had any other motive, or any deeper
+vengeance--not even De Caylus! I have not compromised her by word or
+deed. If I shoot him, I free her without a breath of scandal. If
+I fall--"
+
+His voice failed, and we were both silent for some moments
+
+We were now past the Barrier, and speeding on rapidly towards the open
+country. High white houses with jalousies closed against the sun, and
+pretty maisonnettes in formal gardens, succeeded the streets and shops
+of suburban Paris. Then came a long country road bordered by
+poplars--by-and-by, glimpses of the Seine, and scattered farms and
+villages far away--then Sevres and the leafy heights of Bellevue
+overhanging the river.
+
+We crossed the bridge, and the driver, mindful of his fare, urged on his
+tired horse. Some country folks met us presently, and a wagoner with a
+load of fresh hay. They all smiled and gave us "good-day" as we
+passed--they going to their work in the fields, and we to our work of
+bloodshed!
+
+Shortly after this, the road began winding upwards, past the porcelain
+factories and through the village of Sevres; after which, having but a
+short distance of very steep road to climb, we desired the cabman to
+wait, and went up on foot. Arrived at the top, where a peep of blue
+daylight came streaming down upon us through a green tunnel of acacias,
+we emerged all at once upon the terrace, and found ourselves first on
+the field. Behind us rose a hillside of woods--before us, glassy and
+glittering, as if traced upon the transparent air, lay the city of
+palaces. Domes and spires, arches and columns of triumph, softened by
+distance, looked as if built of the sunshine. Far away on one side
+stretched the Bois de Boulogne, undulating like a sea of tender green.
+Still farther away on the other, lay Pere-la-Chaise--a dark hill specked
+with white; cypresses and tombs. At our feet, winding round a "lawny
+islet" and through a valley luxuriant in corn-fields and meadows, flowed
+the broad river, bluer than the sky.
+
+"A fine sight, Damon!" said Dalrymple, leaning on the parapet, and
+coolly lighting a cigar. "If my eyes are never to open on the day again,
+I am glad they should have rested for the last time on a scene of so
+much beauty! Where is the painter who could paint it? Not Claude
+himself, though he should come back to life on purpose, and mix his
+colors with liquid sunlight!"
+
+"You are a queer fellow," said I, "to talk of scenery and painters at
+such a moment!"
+
+"Not at all. Things are precious according to the tenure by which we
+hold them. For my part, I do not know when I appreciated earth and sky
+so heartily as this morning. _Tiens!_ here comes a carriage--our men,
+no doubt."
+
+"Are you a good shot?" I asked anxiously.
+
+"Pretty well. I can write my initials in bullet-holes on a sheet of
+notepaper at forty paces, or toss up half-a-crown as I ride at full
+gallop, and let the daylight through it as it comes down."
+
+"Thank Heaven!"
+
+"Not so fast, my boy. De Caylus is just as fine a shot, and one of the
+most skilful swordsmen in the French service."
+
+"Ay, but the first fire is yours!"
+
+"Is it? Well, I suppose it is. He struck the first blow, and so--here
+they come."
+
+"One more word, Dalrymple--did he really cheat you at _ecarte?_"
+
+"Upon my soul, I don't know. He did hold the king very often, and there
+are some queer stories told of him in Vienna by the officers of the
+Emperor's Guard. At all events, this is not the first duel he has had to
+fight in defence of his good-fortune!"
+
+De Simoncourt now coming forward, we adjourned at once to the wood
+behind the village. A little open glade was soon found; the ground was
+soon measured; the pistols were soon loaded. De Caylus looked horribly
+pale, but it was the pallor of concentrated rage, with nothing of the
+craven hue in it. Dalrymple, on the contrary, had neither more nor less
+color than usual, and puffed away at his cigar with as much indifference
+as if he were waiting his turn at the pit of the Comedie Francaise. Both
+were clothed in black from head to foot, with their coats buttoned
+to the chin.
+
+"All is ready," said De Simoncourt. "Gentlemen, choose your weapons."
+
+De Caylus took his pistols one by one, weighed and poised them,
+examined the priming, and finally, after much hesitation, decided.
+
+Dalrymple took the first that came to hand.
+
+The combatants then took their places--De Caylus with his hat pulled low
+over his eyes; Dalrymple still smoking carelessly.
+
+They exchanged bows.
+
+"Major Dalrymple," said De Simoncourt, "it is for you to fire first."
+
+"God bless you, Damon!" said my friend, shaking me warmly by the hand.
+
+He then half turned aside, flung away the end of his cigar, lifted his
+right arm suddenly, and fired.
+
+I heard the dull thud of the ball--I saw De Caylus fling up his arms and
+fall forward on the grass. I saw Dalrymple running to his assistance.
+The next instant, however, the wounded man was on his knees, ghastly and
+bleeding, and crying for his pistol.
+
+"Give it me!" he gasped--"hold me up! I--I will have his life yet! So,
+steady--steady!"
+
+Shuddering, but not for his own danger, Dalrymple stepped calmly back to
+his place; while De Caylus, supported by his second, struggled to his
+feet and grasped his weapon. For a moment he once more stood upright.
+His eye burned; his lips contracted; he seemed to gather up all his
+strength for one last effort. Slowly, steadily, surely, he raised his
+pistol--then swaying heavily back, fired, and fell again.
+
+"Dead this time, sure enough," said De Simoncourt, bending over him.
+
+"Indeed, I fear so," replied Dalrymple, in a low, grave voice. "Can we
+do nothing to help you, Monsieur de Simoncourt?"
+
+"Nothing, thank you. I have a carriage down the road, and must get
+further assistance from the village. You had better lose no time in
+leaving Paris."
+
+"I suppose not. Good-morning."
+
+"Good-morning,"
+
+So we lifted our hats; gathered up the pistols; hurried out of the wood
+and across a field, so avoiding the village; found our cab waiting where
+we had left it; and in less than five minutes, were rattling down the
+dusty hill again and hurrying towards Paris.
+
+Once in the cab, Dalrymple began hastily pulling off his coat and
+waistcoat. I was startled to see his shirt-front stained with blood.
+
+"Heavens!" I exclaimed, "you are not wounded?"
+
+"Very slightly. De Caylus was too good a shot to miss me altogether.
+Pshaw! 'tis nothing--a mere graze--not even the bullet left in it!"
+
+"If it had been a little more to the left...." I faltered.
+
+"If he had fired one second sooner, or lived one second longer, he would
+have had me through the heart, as sure as there's a heaven above us!"
+said Dalrymple.
+
+Then, suddenly changing his tone, he added, laughingly--
+
+"Nonsense, Damon! cheer up, and help me to tear this handkerchief into
+bandages. Now's the time to show off your surgery, my little AEsculapius.
+By Jupiter, life's a capital thing, after all!"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LI
+
+THE PORTRAIT.
+
+Having seen Dalrymple to his lodgings and dressed his wound, which was,
+in truth, but a very slight one, I left him and went home, promising to
+return in a few hours, and help him with his packing; for we both agreed
+that he must leave Paris that evening, come what might.
+
+It was now close upon two o'clock, and I had been out since between
+three and four the previous afternoon--not quite twenty-four hours, in
+point of actual time; but a week, a month, a year, in point of
+sensation! Had I not seen a man die since that hour yesterday?
+
+Walking homewards through the garish streets in the hot afternoon, all
+the strange scenes in which I had just been an actor thronged
+fantastically upon my memory. The joyous dinner with Franz Mueller; the
+busy Temple; the noisy theatre; the long chase through the wet streets
+at midnight; the crowded gaming-house; the sweet country drive at early
+morning; the quiet wood, and the dead man lying on his back, with the
+shadows of the leaves upon his face,--all this, in strange distinctness,
+came between me and the living tide of the Boulevards.
+
+And now, over-tired and over-excited as I was, I remembered for the
+first time that I had eaten nothing since half-past five that morning.
+And then I also remembered that I had left Mueller waiting for me under
+the archway, without a word of explanation. I promised myself that I
+would write to him as soon as I got home, and in the meantime turned in
+at the first Cafe to which I came and called for breakfast. But when the
+breakfast was brought, I could not eat it. The coffee tasted bitter to
+me. The meat stuck in my throat. I wanted rest more than food--rest of
+body and mind, and the forgetfulness of sleep! So I paid my bill, and,
+leaving the untasted meal, went home like a man in a dream.
+
+Madame Bouisse was not in her little lodge as I passed it--neither was
+my key on its accustomed hook. I concluded that she was cleaning my
+rooms, and so, going upstairs, found my door open. Hearing my own name,
+however, I paused involuntarily upon the threshold.
+
+"And so, as I was saying," pursued a husky voice, which I knew at once
+to be the property of Madame Bouisse, "M'sieur Basil's friend painted it
+on purpose for him; and I am sure if he was as good a Catholic as the
+Holy Father himself, and that picture was a true portrait of our Blessed
+Lady, he could not worship it more devoutly. I believe he says his
+prayers to it, mam'selle! I often find it in the morning stuck up by the
+foot of his bed; and when he comes home of an evening to study his books
+and papers, it always stands on a chair just in front of his table, so
+that he can see it without turning his head, every time he lifts his
+eyes from the writing!"
+
+In the murmured reply that followed, almost inaudible though it was, my
+ear distinguished a tone that set my heart beating.
+
+"Well, I can't tell, of course," said Madame Bouisse, in answer,
+evidently, to the remark just made; "but if mam'selle will only take the
+trouble to look in the glass, and then look at the picture, she will see
+how like it is. For my part, I believe it to be that, and nothing else.
+Do you suppose I don't know the symptoms? _Dame!_ I have eyes, as well
+as my neighbors; and you may take my word for it, mam'selle, that poor
+young gentleman is just as much in love as ever a man was in
+this world!"
+
+"No more of this, if you please, Madame Bouisse," said Hortense, so
+distinctly that I could no longer be in doubt as to the speaker.
+
+I stayed to hear no more; but retreating softly down the first flight of
+stairs, came noisily up again, and went straight into my
+rooms, saying:--
+
+"Madame Bouisse, are you here?"
+
+"Not only Madame Bouisse, but an intruder who implores forgiveness,"
+said Hortense, with a frank smile, but a heightened color.
+
+I bowed profoundly. No need to tell her she was welcome--my face spoke
+for me.
+
+"It was Madame Bouisse who lured me in," continued she, "to look at that
+painting."
+
+"_Mais, oui!_ I told mam'selle you had her portrait in your
+sitting-room," laughed the fat _concierge,_ leaning on her broom. "I'm
+sure it's quite like enough to be hers, bless her sweet face!"
+
+I felt myself turn scarlet. To hide my confusion I took the picture
+down, and carried it to the window.
+
+"You will see it better by this light," I said, pretending to dust it
+with my handkerchief. "It is worth a close examination."
+
+Hortense knelt down, and studied it for some moments in silence.
+
+"It must be a copy," she said, presently, more to herself than me--"it
+must be a copy."
+
+"It _is_ a copy," I replied. "The original is at the Chateau de Sainte
+Aulaire, near Montlhery."
+
+"May I ask how you came by it?"
+
+"A friend of mine, who is an artist, copied it."
+
+"Then it was done especially for you?"
+
+"Just so."
+
+"And, no doubt, you value it?"
+
+"More than anything I possess!"
+
+Then, fearing I had said too much, I added:--
+
+"If I had not admired the original very much, I should not have wished
+for a copy."
+
+She shifted the position of the picture in such a manner that, standing
+where I did, I could no longer see her face.
+
+"Then you have seen the original," she said, in a low tone.
+
+"Undoubtedly--and you?"
+
+"Yes, I have seen it; but not lately."
+
+There was a brief pause.
+
+"Madame Bouisse thinks it so like yourself, mademoiselle," I said,
+timidly, "that it might almost be your portrait."
+
+"I can believe it," she answered. "It is very like my mother."
+
+Her voice faltered; and, still kneeling, she dropped her face in her
+hands, and wept silently.
+
+Madame Bouisse, in the meantime, had gone into my bedchamber, where she
+was sweeping and singing to herself with the door three parts closed,
+believing, no doubt, that she was affording me the opportunity to make a
+formal declaration.
+
+"Alas! mademoiselle," I said, hesitatingly, "I little thought..."
+
+She rose, dashed the tears aside, and, holding out her hand to me, said,
+kindly--
+
+"It is no fault of yours, fellow-student, if I remind you of the
+portrait, or if the portrait reminds me of one whom it resembles still
+more nearly. I am sorry to have troubled your kind heart with my griefs.
+It is not often that they rise to the surface."
+
+I raised her hand reverently to my lips.
+
+"But you are looking worn and ill yourself," she added. "Is anything the
+matter?"
+
+"Not now," I replied. "But I have been up all night, and--and I am very
+tired."
+
+"Was this in your professional capacity?"
+
+"Not exactly--and yet partly so. I have been more a looker-on than an
+active agent--and I have witnessed a frightful death-scene."
+
+She sighed, and shook her head.
+
+"You are not of the stuff that surgeons are made of, fellow-student,"
+she said, kindly. "Instead of prescribing for others, you need some one
+to prescribe for you. Why, your hand is quite feverish. You should go to
+bed, and keep quiet for the next twelve hours."
+
+"I will lie down for a couple of hours when Madame Bouisse is gone; but
+I must be up and out again at six."
+
+"Nay, that is in three hours."
+
+"I cannot help it. It is my duty."
+
+"Then I have no more to say. Would you drink some lemonade, if I made it
+for you?"
+
+"I would drink poison, if you made it for me!"
+
+"A decidedly misplaced enthusiasm!" laughed she, and left the room.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LII.
+
+NEWS FROM ENGLAND.
+
+It was a glorious morning--first morning of the first week in the merry
+month of June--as I took my customary way to Dr. Cheron's house in the
+Faubourg St. Germain. I had seen Dalrymple off by the night train the
+evening previous, and, refreshed by a good night's rest, had started
+somewhat earlier than usual, for the purpose of taking a turn in the
+Luxembourg Gardens before beginning my day's work.
+
+There the blossoming parterres, the lavish perfume from geranium-bed and
+acacia-blossom, and the mad singing of the little birds up among the
+boughs, set me longing for a holiday. I thought of Saxonholme, and the
+sweet English woodlands round about. I thought how pleasant it would be
+to go home to dear Old England, if only for ten days, and surprise my
+father in his quiet study. What if I asked Dr. Cheron to spare me for a
+fortnight?
+
+Turning these things over in my mind, I left the gardens, and, arriving
+presently at the well-known Porte Cochere in the Rue de Mont Parnasse,
+rang the great bell, crossed the dull courtyard, and took my usual seat
+at my usual desk, not nearly so well disposed for work as usual.
+
+"If you please, Monsieur," said the solemn servant, making his
+appearance at the door, "Monsieur le Docteur requests your presence in
+his private room."
+
+I went. Dr. Cheron was standing on the hearth-rug, with his back to the
+fire, and his arms folded over his breast. An open letter, bordered
+broadly with black, lay upon his desk. Although distant some two yards
+from the table, his eyes were fixed upon this paper. When I came in he
+looked up, pointed to a seat, but himself remained standing and silent.
+
+"Basil Arbuthnot," he said, after a pause of some minutes, "I have this
+morning received a letter from England, by the early post."
+
+"From my father, sir?"
+
+"No. From a stranger,"
+
+He looked straight at me as he said this, and hesitated.
+
+"But it contains news," he added, "that--that much concerns you."
+
+There was a fixed gravity about the lines of his handsome mouth, and an
+unwonted embarrassment in his manner, that struck me with apprehension.
+
+"Good news, I--I hope, sir," I faltered.
+
+"Bad news, my young friend," said he, compassionately. "News that you
+must meet like a man, with fortitude--with resignation. Your
+father--your excellent father--my honored friend--"
+
+He pointed to the letter and turned away.
+
+I rose up, sat down, rose up again, reached out a trembling hand for the
+letter, and read the loss that my heart had already presaged.
+
+My father was dead.
+
+Well as ever in the morning, he had been struck with apoplexy in the
+afternoon, and died in a few hours, apparently without pain.
+
+The letter was written by our old family lawyer, and concluded with the
+request that Dr. Cheron would "break the melancholy news to Mr. Basil
+Arbuthnot, who would doubtless return to England for the funeral."
+
+My tears fell one by one upon the open letter. I had loved my father
+tenderly in my heart. His very roughnesses and eccentricities were dear
+to me. I could not believe that he was gone. I could not believe that I
+should never hear his voice again!
+
+Dr. Cheron came over, and laid his hand upon my shoulder.
+
+"Come," he said, "you have much to do, and must soon be on your way. The
+express leaves at midday. It is now ten, you have only two hours left."
+
+"My poor father!"
+
+"Brunet," continued the Doctor, "shall go back with you to your lodgings
+and help you to pack. As for money--"
+
+He took out his pocket-book and offered me a couple of notes; but I
+shook my head and put them from me.
+
+"I have enough money, thank you," I said. "Good-bye."
+
+"Good-bye," he replied, and, for the first time in all these months,
+shook me by the hand. "You will write to me?"
+
+I bowed my head in silence, and we parted. I found a cab at the door,
+and Brunet on the box. I was soon at home again. Home! I felt as if I
+had no home now, either in France or England--as if all my Paris life
+were a brief, bright dream, and this the dreary waking. Hortense was
+out. It was one of her busy mornings, and she would not be back till the
+afternoon. It was very bitter to leave without one last look--one last
+word. I seized pen and paper, and yielding for the first time to all the
+impulses of my love, wrote, without weighing my words, these few brief
+sentences:--
+
+"I have had a heavy loss, Hortense, and by the time you open this letter
+I shall be far away. My father--my dear, good father--is no more. My
+mother died when I was a little child. I have no brothers--no
+sisters--no close family ties. I am alone in the world now--quite alone.
+My last thought here is of you. If it seems strange to speak of love at
+such a moment, forgive me, for that love is now my only hope. Oh, that
+you were here, that I might kiss your hand at parting, and know that
+some of your thoughts went with me! I cannot believe that you are quite
+indifferent to me. It seems impossible that, loving you as I love, so
+deeply, so earnestly, I should love in vain. When I come back I shall
+seek you here, where I have loved you so long. I shall look into your
+eyes for my answer, and read in them all the joy, or all the despair, of
+the life that lies before me. I had intended to get that portrait copied
+again for you, because you saw in it some likeness to your mother; but
+there has been no time, and ere you receive this letter I shall be gone.
+I therefore send the picture to you by the _concierge_. It is my parting
+gift to you. I can offer no greater proof of my love. Farewell."
+
+Once written, I dared not read the letter over. I thrust it under her
+door, and in less than five minutes was on my way to the station.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LIII.
+
+THE FADING OF THE RAINBOW.
+
+     I loved a love once, fairest among women;
+     Closed are her doors on me, I must not see her--
+     All, all are gone, the old familiar faces.
+
+     LAMB.
+
+Beautifully and truly, in the fourth book of the most poetical of
+stories, has a New World romancist described the state of a sorrowing
+lover. "All around him," saith he, "seemed dreamy and vague; all within
+him, as in a sun's eclipse. As the moon, whether visible or invisible,
+has power over the tides of the ocean, so the face of that lady, whether
+present or absent, had power over the tides of his soul, both by day and
+night, both waking and sleeping. In every pale face and dark eye he saw
+a resemblance to her; and what the day denied him in reality, the night
+gave him in dreams."
+
+Such was, very faithfully, my own condition of mind during the interval
+which succeeded my departure from Paris--the only difference being that
+Longfellow's hero was rejected by the woman he loved, and sorrowing for
+that rejection; whilst I, neither rejected nor accepted, mourned another
+grief, and through the tears of that trouble, looked forward anxiously
+to my uncertain future.
+
+I reached Saxonholme the night before my father's funeral, and remained
+there for ten days. I found myself, to my surprise, almost a rich
+man--that is to say, sufficiently independent to follow the bent of my
+inclinations as regarded the future.
+
+My first impulse, on learning the extent of my means, was to relinquish
+a career that had been from the first distasteful to me--my second was
+to leave the decision to Hortense. To please her, to be worthy of her,
+to prove my devotion to her, was what I most desired upon earth. If she
+wished to see me useful and active in my generation, I would do my best
+to be so for her sake--if, on the contrary, she only cared to see me
+content, I would devote myself henceforth to that life of "retired
+leisure" that I had always coveted. Could man love more honestly
+and heartily?
+
+One year of foreign life had wrought a marked difference in me. I had
+not observed it so much in Paris; but here, amid old scenes and old
+reminiscences, I seemed to meet the image of my former self, and
+wondered at the change 'twixt now and then. I left home, timid, ignorant
+of the world and its ways, reserved, silent, almost misanthropic. I came
+back strengthened mentally and physically. Studious as ever, I could yet
+contemplate an active career without positive repugnance; I knew how to
+meet and treat my fellow-men; I was acquainted with society in its most
+refined and most homely phases. I had tasted of pleasure, of
+disappointment, of love--of all that makes life earnest.
+
+As the time drew near when I should return to Paris, grief, and hope,
+and that strange reluctance which would fain defer the thing it most
+desires, perplexed and troubled me by day and night. Once again on the
+road, the past seemed more than ever dream-like, and Paris and
+Saxonholme became confused together in my mind, like the mingling
+outlines of two dissolving views.
+
+I crossed the channel this time in a thick, misting rain; pushed on
+straight for Paris, and reached the Cite Bergere in the midst of a warm
+and glowing afternoon. The great streets were crowded with carriages and
+foot-passengers. The trees were in their fullest leaf. The sun poured
+down on pavement and awning with almost tropical intensity. I dismissed
+my cab at the top of the Rue du Faubourg Montmatre, and went up to the
+house on foot. A flower-girl sat in the shade of the archway, tying up
+her flowers for the evening-sale, and I bought a cluster of white roses
+for Hortense as I went by.
+
+Madame Bouisse was sound asleep in her little sanctum; but my key hung
+in its old place, so I took it without disturbing her, and went up as if
+I had been away only a few hours. Arrived at the third story, I stopped
+outside Hortense's door and listened. All was very silent within. She
+was out, perhaps; or writing quietly in the farther chamber. I thought I
+would leave my travelling-bag in my own room, and then ring boldly for
+admittance. I turned the key, and found myself once again in my own
+familiar, pleasant student home. The books and busts were there in their
+accustomed places; everything was as I had left it. Everything, except
+the picture! The picture was gone; so Hortense had accepted it.
+
+Three letters awaited me on the table; one from Dr. Cheron, written in a
+bold hand--a mere note of condolence: one from Dalrymple, dated
+Chamounix: the third from Hortense. I knew it was from her. I knew that
+that small, clear, upright writing, so singularly distinct and regular,
+could be only hers. I had never seen it before; but my heart
+identified it.
+
+That letter contained my fate. I took it up, laid it down, paced
+backwards and forwards, and for several minutes dared not break the
+seal. At length I opened it. It ran thus:--
+
+"FRIEND AND FELLOW-STUDENT.
+
+"I had hoped that a man such as you and a woman such as I might become
+true friends, discuss books and projects, give and take the lesser
+services of life, and yet not end by loving. In this belief, despite
+occasional misgivings, I have suffered our intercourse to become
+intimacy--our acquaintance, friendship. I see now that I was mistaken,
+and now, when it is, alas! too late, I reproach myself for the
+consequences of that mistake.
+
+"I can be nothing to you, friend. I have duties in life more sacred than
+marriage. I have a task to fulfil which is sterner than love, and
+imperative as fate. I do not say that to answer you thus costs me no
+pain. Were there even hope, I would bid you hope; but my labor presses
+heavily upon me, and repeated failure has left me weary and heart-sick.
+
+"You tell me in your letter that, by the time I read it, you will be far
+away. It is now my turn to repeat the same words. When you come back to
+your rooms, mine will be empty. I shall be gone; all I ask is, that you
+will not attempt to seek me.
+
+"Farewell. I accept your gift. Perhaps I act selfishly in taking it, but
+a day may come when I shall justify that selfishness to you. In the
+meantime, once again farewell. You are my only friend, and these are the
+saddest words I have ever written--forget me!
+
+"HORTENSE."
+
+I scarcely know how I felt, or what I did, on first reading this letter.
+I believe that I stood for a long time stone still, incapable of
+realizing the extent of my misfortune. By-and-by it seemed to rush upon
+me suddenly. I threw open my window, scaled the balcony rails, and
+forced my way into her rooms.
+
+Her rooms! Ah, by that window she used to sit--at that table she read
+and wrote--in that bed she slept! All around and about were scattered
+evidences of her presence. Upon the chimney-piece lay an envelope
+addressed to her name--upon the floor, some fragments of torn paper and
+some ends of cordage! The very flowers were yet fresh upon her balcony!
+The sight of these things, while they confirmed my despair, thawed the
+ice at my heart. I kissed the envelope that she had touched, the flowers
+she had tended, the pillow on which her head had been wont to rest. I
+called wildly on her name. I threw myself on the floor in my great
+agony, and wept aloud.
+
+I cannot tell how long I may have lain there; but it seemed like a
+lifetime. Long enough, at all events, to drink the bitter draught to the
+last drop--long enough to learn that life had now no grief in store for
+which I should weep again.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LIV.
+
+TREATETH OF MANY THINGS; BUT CHIEFLY OF BOOKS AND POETS.
+
+     Dreams, books, are each a world; and books, we know,
+     Are a substantial world, both pure and good.
+
+     WORDSWORTH.
+
+There are times when this beautiful world seems to put on a mourning
+garb, as if sympathizing, like a gentle mother, with the grief that
+consumes us; when the trees shake their arms in mute sorrow, and scatter
+their faded leaves like ashes on our heads; when the slow rains weep
+down upon us, and the very clouds look cold above. Then, like Hamlet the
+Dane, we take no pleasure in the life that weighs so wearily upon us,
+and deem "this goodly frame, the earth, a sterile promonotory; this most
+excellent canopy, the air, this brave, overhanging firmament, this
+majestical roof fretted with golden fire, a foul and pestilent
+congregation of vapors."
+
+So it was with me, in the heavy time that followed my return to Paris. I
+had lost everything in losing her I loved. I had no aim in life. No
+occupation. No hope. No rest. The clouds had rolled between me and the
+sun, and wrapped me in their cold shadows, and all was dark about me. I
+felt that I could say with an old writer--"For the world, I count it,
+not an inn, but an hospital; and a place, not to live, but to die in."
+
+Week after week I lingered in Paris, hoping against hope, and always
+seeking her. I had a haunting conviction that she was not far off, and
+that, if I only had strength to persevere, I must find her. Possessed by
+this fixed idea, I paced the sultry streets day after day throughout the
+burning months of June and July; lingered at dusk and early morning
+about the gardens of the Luxembourg, and such other quiet places as she
+might frequent; and, heedless alike of fatigue, or heat, or tempest,
+traversed the dusty city over and over again from barrier to barrier, in
+every direction.
+
+Could I but see her once more--once only! Could I but listen to her
+sweet voice, even though it bade me an eternal farewell! Could I but lay
+my lips for the last, last time upon her hand, and see the tender pity
+in her eyes, and be comforted!
+
+Seeking, waiting, sorrowing thus, I grew daily weaker and paler,
+scarcely conscious of my own failing strength, and indifferent to all
+things save one. In vain Dr. Cheron urged me to resume my studies. In
+vain Mueller, ever cheerful and active, came continually to my lodgings,
+seeking to divert my thoughts into healthier channels. In vain I
+received letter after letter from Oscar Dalrymple, imploring me to
+follow him to Switzerland, where his wife had already joined him. I shut
+my eyes to all alike. Study had grown hateful to me; Mueller's
+cheerfulness jarred upon me; Dalrymple was too happy for my
+companionship. Liberty to pursue my weary search, peace to brood over my
+sorrow, were all that I now asked. I had not yet arrived at that stage
+when sympathy grows precious.
+
+So weeks went by, and August came, and a slow conviction of the utter
+hopelessness of my efforts dawned gradually upon me. She was really
+gone. If she had been in Paris all this time pursuing her daily
+avocations, I must surely have found her. Where should I seek her next?
+What should I do with life, with time, with the future?
+
+I resolved, at all events, to relinquish medicine at once, and for ever.
+So I wrote a brief farewell to Dr. Cheron and another to Mueller, and
+without seeing either again, returned abruptly to England.
+
+I will not dwell on this part of my story; enough that I settled my
+affairs as quickly as might be, left an old servant in care of the
+solitary house that had been my birthplace, and turned my back once more
+on Saxonholme, perhaps for years--perhaps for ever; and in less than
+three weeks was again on my way to the Continent.
+
+The spirit of restlessness was now upon me. I had no home; I had no
+peace; and in place of the sun there was darkness. So I went with the
+thorns around my brow, and the shadow of the cross upon my breast. I
+went to suffer--to endure,--if possible, to forget. Oh, the grief of
+the soul which lives on in the night, and looks for no dawning! Oh, the
+weary weight that presses down the tired eyelids, and yet leaves them
+sleepless! Oh, the tide of alien faces, and the sickening remembrance of
+one, too dear, which may never be looked upon again! I carried with me
+the antidote to every pleasure. In the midst of crowds, I was alone. In
+the midst of novelty, the one thought came, and made all stale to me.
+Like Dr. Donne, I dwelt with the image of my dead self at my side.
+
+Thus for many, many months we journeyed together---I and my sorrow--and
+passed through fair and famous places, and saw the seasons change under
+new skies. To the quaint old Flemish cities and the Gothic Rhine--to the
+plains and passes of Spain--to the unfrequented valleys of the Tyrol and
+the glacier-lands of Switzerland I went, but still found not the
+forgetfulness I sought. As in Holbein's fresco the skeleton plays his
+part in every scene, so my trouble stalked beside me, drank of my cup,
+and sat grimly at my table. It was with me in Naples and among the
+orange groves of Sorrento. It met me amid the ruins of the Roman Forum.
+It travelled with me over the blue Mediterranean, and landed beside me
+on the shores of the Cyclades. Go where I would, it possessed and
+followed me, and brooded over my head, like the cloud that rested on
+the ark.
+
+Thinking over this period of my life, I seem to be turning the leaves of
+a rich album, or wandering through a gallery of glowing landscapes, and
+yet all the time to be dreaming. Faces grown familiar for a few days and
+never seen after--pictures photographed upon the memory in all their
+vividness--glimpses of cathedrals, of palaces, of ruins, of sunset and
+storm, sea and shore, flit before me for a moment, and are gone like
+phantasmagoria.
+
+And like phantasmagoria they impressed me at the time. Nothing seemed
+real to me. Startled, now and then, into admiration or wonder, my apathy
+fell from me like a garment, and my heart throbbed again as of old. But
+this was seldom--so seldom that I could almost count the times when it
+befell me.
+
+Thus it was that travelling did me no permanent good. It enlarged my
+experience; it undoubtedly cultivated my taste; but it brought me
+neither rest, nor sympathy, nor consolation. On the contrary, it widened
+the gulf between me and my fellow-men. I formed no friendships. I kept
+up no correspondence. A sojourner in hotels, I became more and more
+withdrawn from all tender and social impulses, and almost forgot the
+very name of home. So strong a hold did this morbid love of
+self-isolation take upon me, that I left Florence on one occasion, after
+a stay of only three days, because I had seen the names of a Saxonholme
+family among the list of arrivals in the Giornale Toscano.
+
+Three years went by thus--three springs--three vintages--three
+winters--till, weary of wandering, I began to ask myself "what next?" My
+old passion for books had, in the meantime, re-asserted itself, and I
+longed once more for quiet. I knew not that my pilgrimage was hopeless.
+I know that I loved her ever; that I could never forget her; that
+although the first pangs were past, I yet must bear
+
+     "All the aching of heart, the restless, unsatisfied longing,
+     All the dull, deep pain, and constant anguish of patience!"
+
+I reasoned with myself. I resolved to be stronger--at all events, to be
+calmer. Exhausted and world-worn, I turned in thought to my native
+village among the green hills, to my deserted home, and the great
+solitary study with its busts and bookshelves, and its vista of
+neglected garden. The rooms where my mother died; where my father wrote;
+where, as a boy, I dreamed and studied, would at least have memories
+for me.
+
+Perhaps, silently underlying all these motives, I may at this time
+already have begun to entertain one other project which was not so much
+a motive as a hope--not so much a hope as a half-seen possibility. I had
+written verses from time to time all my life long, and of late they had
+come to me more abundantly than ever. They flowed in upon me at times
+like an irresistible tide; at others they ebbed away for weeks, and
+seemed as if gone for ever. It was a power over which I had no control,
+and sought to have none. I never tried to make verses; but, when
+the inspiration was upon me, I made them, as it were, in spite of
+myself. My desk was full of them in time--sonnets, scraps of songs,
+fragments of blank verse, attempts in all sorts of queer and rugged
+metres--hexameters, pentameters, alcaics, and the like; with, here and
+there, a dialogue out of an imaginary tragedy, or a translation from
+some Italian or German poet. This taste grew by degrees, to be a rare
+and subtle pleasure to me. My rhymes became my companions, and when the
+interval of stagnation came, I was restless and lonely till it
+passed away.
+
+At length there came an hour (I was lying, I remember, on a ledge of
+turf on a mountain-side, overlooking one of the Italian valleys of the
+Alps), when I asked myself for the first time--
+
+"Am I also a poet?"
+
+I had never dreamed of it, never thought of it, never even hoped it,
+till that moment. I had scribbled on, idly, carelessly, out of what
+seemed a mere facile impulse, correcting nothing; seldom even reading
+what I had written, after it was committed to paper. I had sometimes
+been pleased with a melodious cadence or a happy image--sometimes amused
+with my own flow of thought and readiness of versification; but that I,
+simple Basil Arbuthnot, should be, after all, enriched with this
+splendid gift of song--was it mad presumption, or were these things
+proof? I knew not; but lying on the parched grass of the mountain-side,
+I tried the question over in my mind, this way and that, till "my heart
+beat in my brain," How should I come at the truth? How should I test
+whether this opening Paradise was indeed Eden, or only the mirage of my
+fancy--mere sunshine upon sand? We all write verses at some moment or
+other in our lives, even the most prosaic amongst us--some because they
+are happy; some because they are sad; some because the living fire of
+youth impels them, and they must be up and doing, let the work be
+what it may.
+
+     "Many fervent souls,
+     Strike rhyme on rhyme, who would strike steel on steel,
+     If steel had offer'd."
+
+Was this case mine? Was I fancying myself a poet, only because I was an
+idle man, and had lost the woman I loved? To answer these questions
+myself was impossible. They could only be answered by the public voice,
+and before I dared question that oracle I had much to do. I resolved to
+discipline myself to the harness of rhythm. I resolved to go back to the
+fathers of poetry--to graduate once again in Homer and Dante, Chaucer
+and Shakespeare. I promised myself that, before I tried my wings in the
+sun, I would be my own severest critic. Nay, more--that I would never
+try them so long as it seemed possible a fall might come of it. Once
+come to this determination, I felt happier and more hopeful than I had
+felt for the last three years. I looked across the blue mists of the
+valley below, and up to the aerial peaks which rose, faint, and far, and
+glittering--mountain beyond mountain, range above range, as if painted
+on the thin, transparent air--and it seemed to me that they stood by,
+steadfast and silent, the witnesses of my resolve.
+
+"I will be strong," I said. "I will be an idler and a dreamer no longer.
+Books have been my world. I have taken all, and given nothing. Now I too
+will work, and work to prove that I was not unworthy of her love."
+
+Going down, by-and-by, into the valley as the shadows were lengthening,
+I met a traveller with an open book in his hand. He was an
+Englishman--small, sallow, wiry, and wore a gray, loose coat, with two
+large pockets full of books. I had met him once before at Milan, and
+again in a steamer on Lago Maggiore. He was always reading. He read in
+the diligence--he read when he was walking--he read all through dinner
+at the _tables-d'-hote_. He had a mania for reading; and, might, in
+fact, be said to be bound up in his own library.
+
+Meeting thus on the mountain, we fell into conversation. He told me that
+he was on his way to Geneva, that he detested continental life, and that
+he was only waiting the arrival of certain letters before starting
+for England.
+
+"But," said I, "you do not, perhaps, give continental life a trial. You
+are always absorbed in the pages of a book; and, as for the scenery, you
+appear not to observe it."
+
+"Deuce take the scenery!" he exclaimed, pettishly. "I never look at it.
+All scenery's alike. Trees, mountains, water--water, mountains, trees;
+the same thing over and over again, like the bits of colored glass in a
+kaleidoscope. I read about the scenery, and that is quite enough
+for me."
+
+"But no book can paint an Italian lake or an Alpine sunset; and when one
+is on the spot...."
+
+"I beg your pardon," interrupted the traveller in gray. "Everything
+is much pleasanter and more picturesque in books than in
+reality--travelling especially. There are no bad smells in books. There
+are no long bills in books. Above all, there are no mosquitoes.
+Travelling is the greatest mistake in the world, and I am going home as
+fast as I can."
+
+"And henceforth, I suppose, your travels will be confined to your
+library," I said, smiling.
+
+"Exactly so. I may say, with Hazlitt, that 'food, warmth, sleep, and a
+book,' are all I require. With those I may make the tour of the world,
+and incur neither expense nor fatigue."
+
+"Books, after all, are friends," I said, with a sigh.
+
+"Sir," replied the traveller, waving his hand somewhat theatrically,
+"books are our first real friends, and our last. I have no others. I
+wish for no others. I rely upon no others. They are the only associates
+upon whom a sensible man may depend. They are always wise, and they are
+always witty. They never intrude upon us when we desire to be alone.
+They never speak ill of us behind our backs. They are never capricious,
+and never surly; neither are they, like some clever folks,
+pertinaciously silent when we most wish them to shine. Did Shakespeare
+ever refuse his best thoughts to us, or Montaigne decline to be
+companionable? Did you ever find Moliere dull? or Lamb prosy? or Scott
+unentertaining?"
+
+"You remind me," said I, laughing, "of the student in Chaucer, who
+desired for his only pleasure and society,
+
+     "'---at his bedde's head
+     A'twenty bokes clothed in black and red,
+     Of Aristotle and his philosophy!'"
+
+"Ay," replied my new acquaintance, "but he preferred them expressly to
+'robes riche, or fidel or sautrie,' whereas, I prefer them to men and
+women, and to Aristotle and his philosophy, into the bargain!"
+
+"Your own philosophy, at least, is admirable," said I. "For many a
+year--I might almost say for most years of my life--I have been a
+disciple in the same school."
+
+"Sir, you cannot belong to a better. Think of the convenience of always
+carrying half a dozen intimate friends in your pocket! Good-afternoon."
+
+We had now come to a point where two paths diverged, and the reading
+traveller, always economical of time, opened his book where he had last
+turned down the leaf, and disappeared round the corner.
+
+I never saw him again; but his theory amused me, and, as trifles will
+sometimes do even in the gravest matters, decided me. So the result of
+all my hopes and reflections was, that I went back to England and to the
+student life that had been the dream of my youth.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LV.
+
+MY BIRTHDAY.
+
+Three years of foreign travel, and five of retirement at home, brought
+my twenty-ninth birthday. I was still young, it is true; but how changed
+from that prime of early manhood when I used to play Romeo at midnight
+to Hortense upon her balcony! I looked at myself in the glass that
+morning, and contemplated the wearied, bronzed, and bearded face which
+
+"...seared by toil and something touched by time,"
+
+now gave me back glance for glance. I looked older than my age by many
+years. My eyes had grown grave with a steadfast melancholy, and streaks
+of premature silver gleamed here and there in the still abundant hair
+which had been the solitary vanity of my youth.
+
+"Is she also thus changed and faded?" I asked myself, as I turned away.
+And then I sighed to think that if we met she might not know me.
+
+For I loved her still; worshipped her; raised altars to her in the dusky
+chambers of my memory. My whole life was dedicated to her. My best
+thoughts were hers. My poems, my ambition, my hours of labor, all were
+hers only! I knew now that no time could change the love which had so
+changed me, or dim the sweet remembrance of that face which I carried
+for ever at my heart like an amulet. Other women might be fair, but my
+eyes never sought them; other voices might be sweet, but my ear never
+listened to them; other hands might be soft, but my lips never pressed
+them. She was the only woman in all my world--the only star in all my
+night--the one Eve of my ruined Paradise. In a word, I loved her--loved
+her, I think, more dearly than before I lost her.
+
+     "Love is not love
+     Which alters when it alteration finds,
+     Or bends with the remover to remove:
+     O no! it is an ever-fixed mark,
+     That looks on tempests and is never shaken."
+
+I had that morning received by post a parcel of London papers and
+magazines, which, for a foolish reason of my own, I almost dreaded to
+open; so, putting off the evil hour, I thrust the ominous parcel into my
+pocket and went out to read it in some green solitude, far away among
+the lonely hills and tracts of furzy common that extend for miles and
+miles around my native place. It was a delicious autumn morning, bright
+and fresh and joyous as spring. The purple heather was all abloom along
+the slopes of the hill-sides. The golden sandcliffs glittered in the
+sun. The great firwoods reached away over heights and through
+valleys--"grand and spiritual trees," pointing ever upward with warning
+finger, like the Apostles in the old Italian pictures. Now I passed a
+solitary farm-yard where busy laborers were piling the latest stacks;
+now met a group of happy children gathering wild nuts and blackberries.
+By-and-by, I came upon a great common, with a picturesque mill standing
+high against the sky. All around and about stretched a vast prospect of
+woodland and tufted heath, bounded far off by a range of chalk-hills
+speckled with farm-houses and villages, and melting towards the west
+into a distance faint and far, and mystic as the horizon of a Turner.
+
+Here I threw myself on the green turf and rested. Truly, Nature is a
+great "physician of souls." The peace of the place descended into my
+heart, and hushed for a while the voice of its repinings. The delicious
+air, the living silence of the woods, the dreamy influences of the
+autumnal sunshine, all alike served to lull me into a pleasant mood,
+neither gay nor sad, but very calm--calm enough for the purpose for
+which I had come. So I brought out my packet of papers, summoned all my
+philosophy to my aid, and met my own name upon the second page. For here
+was, as I had anticipated, a critique on my first volume of poems.
+
+Indifference to criticism, if based upon a simple consciousness of moral
+right, is a noble thing. But indifference to criticism, taken in its
+ordinary, and especially its literary sense, is generally a very small
+thing, and resolves itself, for the most part, into a halting and
+one-sided kind of stoicism, meaning indifference to blame and ridicule,
+and never indifference to praise. It is very convenient to the
+disappointed authorling; very effective, in the established writer; but
+it is mere vanity at the root, and equally contemptible in both. For my
+part, I confess that I came to my trial as tremblingly as any poor
+caitiff to the fiery ordeal, and finding myself miraculously clear of
+the burning ploughshares, was quite as full of wonder and thankfulness
+at my good fortune. For I found my purposes appreciated, and my best
+thoughts understood; not, it is true, without some censure, but it was
+censure tempered so largely with encouragement that I drew hope from
+it, and not despondency. And then I thought of Hortense, and, picturing
+to myself all the joy it would have been to lay these things at her
+feet, I turned my face to the grass, and wept like a child.
+
+Then, one by one, the ghosts of my dead hopes rose out of the grave of
+the past and vanished "into thin air" before me; and in their place came
+earnest aspirations, born of the man's strong will. I resolved to use
+wisely the gifts that were mine--to sing well the song that had risen to
+my lips--to "seize the spirit of my time," and turn to noble uses the
+God-given weapons of the poet. So should I be worthier of her
+remembrance, if she yet remembered me--worthier, at all events, to
+remember her.
+
+Thus the hours ebbed, and when I at length rose and turned my face
+homeward, the golden day was already bending westward. Lower and lower
+sank the sun as the miles shortened; stiller and sweeter grew the
+evening air; and ever my lengthening shadow travelled before me along
+the dusty road--wherein I was more fortunate than the man in the German
+story who sold his to the devil.
+
+It was quite dusk by the time I gained the outskirts of the town, and I
+reflected with much contentment upon the prospect of a cosy bachelor
+dinner, and, after dinner, lamplight and a book.
+
+"If you please, sir," said Collins, "a lady has been here."
+
+Collins--the same Collins who had been my father's servant when I was a
+boy at home--was now a grave married man, with hair fast whitening.
+
+"A lady?" I echoed. "One of my cousins, I suppose, from Effingham."
+
+"No, sir," said Collins. "A strange lady--a foreigner."
+
+A stranger! a foreigner! I felt myself change color.
+
+"She left her name?" I asked.
+
+"Her card, sir," said Collins, and handed it to me.
+
+I took it up with fingers that shook in spite of me and read:--
+
+MADLLE DE SAINTE AULAIRE.
+
+I dropped the card, with a sigh of profound disappointment.
+
+"At what time did this lady call, Collins?"
+
+"Not very long after you left the house, sir. She said she would call
+again. She is at the White Horse."
+
+"She shall not have the trouble of coming here," I said, drawing my
+chair to the table. "Send James up to the White Horse with my
+compliments, and say that I will wait upon the lady in about an
+hour's time."
+
+Collins darted away to despatch the message, and returning presently
+with the pale ale, uncorked it dexterously, and stood at the side-board,
+serenely indifferent.
+
+"And what kind of person was this--this Mademoiselle de Sainte Aulaire,
+Collins?" I asked, leisurely bisecting a partridge.
+
+"Can't say, sir, indeed. Lady kept her veil down."
+
+"Humph! Tall or short, Collins?"
+
+"Rather tall, sir."
+
+"Young?"
+
+"Haven't an idea, sir. Voice very pleasant, though."
+
+A pleasant voice has always a certain attraction for me. Hortense's
+voice was exquisite--rich and low, and somewhat deeper than the voices
+of most women.
+
+I took up the card again. Mademoiselle de Sainte Aulaire! Where had I
+heard that name?
+
+"She said nothing of the nature of her business, I suppose, Collins?"
+
+"Nothing at all, sir. Dear me, sir, I beg pardon for not mentioning it
+before; but there's been a messenger over from the White Horse, since
+the lady left, to know if you were yet home."
+
+"Then she is in haste?"
+
+"Very uncommon haste, I should say, sir," replied Collins, deliberately.
+
+I pushed back the untasted dish, and rose directly.
+
+"You should have told me this before," I said, hastily.
+
+"But--but surely, sir, you will dine--"
+
+"I will wait for nothing," I interrupted. "I'll go at once. Had I known
+the lady's business was urgent, I would not have delayed a moment."
+
+Collins cast a mournful glance at the table, and sighed respect fully.
+Before he had recovered from his amazement, I was half way to the inn.
+
+The White Horse was now the leading hostelry of Saxonholme. The old Red
+Lion was no more. Its former host and hostess were dead; a brewery
+occupied its site; and the White Horse was kept by a portly Boniface,
+who had been head-waiter under the extinct dynasty. But there had been
+many changes in Saxonholme since my boyish days, and this was one of the
+least among them.
+
+I was shown into the best sitting-room, preceded by a smart waiter in a
+white neckcloth. At a glance I took in all the bearings of the
+scene--the table with its untasted dessert; the shaded lamp; the closed
+curtains of red damask; the thoughtful figure in the easy chair.
+Although the weather was yet warm, a fire blazed in the grate; but the
+windows were open behind the crimson curtains, and the evening air stole
+gently in. It was like stepping into a picture by Gerard Dow, so closed,
+so glowing, so rich in color.
+
+"Mr. Arbuthnot," said the smart waiter, flinging the door very wide
+open, and lingering to see what might follow.
+
+The lady rose slowly, bowed, waved her hand towards a chair at some
+distance from her own, and resumed her seat. The waiter reluctantly
+left the room.
+
+"I had not intended, sir, to give you the trouble of coming here," said
+Mademoiselle de Sainte Aulaire, using her fan as a handscreen, and
+speaking in a low, and, as it seemed to me, a somewhat constrained
+voice. I could not see her face, but something in the accent made my
+heart leap.
+
+"Pray do not name it, madam," I said. "It is nothing."
+
+She bent her head, as if thanking me, and went on:--
+
+"I have come to this place," she said, "in order to prosecute certain
+inquiries which are of great importance to myself. May I ask if you are
+a native of Saxonholme?"
+
+"I am."
+
+"Were you here in the year 18--?"
+
+"I was."
+
+"Will you give me leave to test your memory respecting some events that
+took place about that time?"
+
+"By all means."
+
+Mademoiselle de Sainte Aulaire thanked me with a gesture, withdrew her
+chair still farther from the radius of the lamp and the tire,
+and said:--
+
+"I must entreat your patience if I first weary you with one or two
+particulars of my family history,"
+
+"Madam, I listen."
+
+During the brief pause that ensued, I tried vainly to distinguish
+something more of her features. I could only trace the outline of a
+slight and graceful figure, the contour of a very slender hand, and the
+ample folds of a dark silk dress.
+
+At length, in a low, sweet voice, she began:--
+
+"Not to impose upon you any dull genealogical details," she said, "I
+will begin by telling you that the Sainte Aulaires are an ancient French
+family of Bearnais extraction, and that my grandfather was the last
+Marquis who bore the title. Holding large possessions in the _comtat_ of
+Venaissin (a district which now forms part of the department of
+Vaucluse) and other demesnes at Montlhery, in the province of the Ile de
+France---"
+
+"At Montlhery!" I exclaimed, suddenly recovering the lost link in my
+memory.
+
+"The Sainte Aulaires," continued the lady, without pausing to notice my
+interruption, "were sufficiently wealthy to keep up their social
+position, and to contract alliances with many of the best families in
+the south of France. Towards the early part of the reign of Louis XIII.
+they began to be conspicuous at court, and continued to reside in and
+near Paris up to the period of the Revolution. Marshals of France,
+Envoys, and Ministers of State during a period of nearly a century and a
+half, the Sainte Aulaires had enjoyed too many honors not to be among
+the first of those who fell in the Reign of Terror. My grandfather, who,
+as I have already said, was the last Marquis bearing the title, was
+seized with his wife and daughter at his Chateau near Montlhery in the
+spring-time of 1793, and carried to La Force. Thence, after a mock
+trial, they were all three conveyed to execution, and publicly
+guillotined on the sixth of June in the same year. Do you follow me?"
+
+"Perfectly."
+
+"One survivor, however, remained in the person of Charles Armand, Prevot
+de Sainte Aulaire, only son of the Marquis, then a youth of seventeen
+years of age, and pursuing his studies in the seclusion of an old family
+seat in Vaucluse. He fled into Italy. In the meantime, his inheritance
+was confiscated; and the last representative of the race, reduced to
+exile and beggary, assumed another name. It were idle to attempt to map
+out his life through the years that followed. He wandered from land to
+land; lived none knew how; became a tutor, a miniature-painter, a
+volunteer at Naples under General Pepe, a teacher of languages in
+London, corrector of the press to a publishing house in
+Brussels--everything or anything, in short, by which he could honorably
+earn his bread. During these years of toil and poverty, he married. The
+lady was an orphan, of Scotch extraction, poor and proud as himself, and
+governess in a school near Brussels. She died in the third year of their
+union, and left him with one little daughter. This child became
+henceforth his only care and happiness. While she was yet a mere infant,
+he placed her in the school where her mother had been teacher. There she
+remained, first as pupil, by-and-by as governess, for more than sixteen
+years. The child was called by an old family name that had been her
+grandmother's and her great-grandmother's in the high and palmy days of
+the Sainte Aulaires--Hortense."
+
+"Hortense!" I cried, rising from my chair.
+
+"It is not an uncommon name," said the lady. "Does it surprise you?"
+
+"I--I beg your pardon, madam," I stammered, resuming my seat. "I once
+had a dear friend of that name. Pray, go on."
+
+"For ten years the refugee contrived to keep his little Hortense in the
+safe and pleasant shelter of her Flemish home. He led a wandering life,
+no one knew where; and earned his money, no one knew how. Travel-worn
+and careworn, he was prematurely aged, and at fifty might well have been
+mistaken for a man of sixty-five or seventy. Poor and broken as he was,
+however, Monsieur de Sainte Aulaire was every inch a gentleman of the
+old school; and his little girl was proud of him, when he came to the
+school to see her. This, however, was very seldom--never oftener than
+twice or three times in the year. When she saw him for the last time,
+Hortense was about thirteen years of age. He looked paler, and thinner,
+and poorer than ever; and when he bade her farewell, it was as if under
+the presentiment that they might meet no more. He then told her, for the
+first time, something of his story, and left with her at parting a small
+coffer containing his decorations, a few trinkets that had been his
+mother's, and his sword--the badge of his nobility."
+
+The lady's voice faltered. I neither spoke nor stirred, but sat like a
+man of stone.
+
+Then she went on again:--
+
+"The father never came again. The child, finding herself after a certain
+length of time thrown upon the charity of her former instructors, was
+glad to become under-teacher in their school. The rest of her history
+may be told in a few words. From under-teacher she became head-teacher,
+and at eighteen passed as governess into a private family. At twenty she
+removed to Paris, and set foot for the first time in the land of her
+fathers. All was now changed in France. The Bourbons reigned again, and
+her father, had he reappeared, might have reclaimed his lost estates.
+She sought him far and near. She employed agents to discover him. She
+could not believe that he was dead. To be once again clasped in his
+arms--to bring him back to his native country---to see him resume his
+name and station--this was the bright dream of her life. To accomplish
+these things she labored in many ways, teaching and writing; for
+Hortense also was proud--too proud to put forward an unsupported claim.
+For with her father were lost the title-deeds and papers that might have
+made the daughter wealthy, and she had no means of proving her identity.
+Still she labored heartily, lived poorly, and earned enough to push her
+inquiries far and wide--even to journey hither and thither, whenever she
+fancied, alas! that a clue had been found. Twice she travelled into
+Switzerland, and once into Italy, but always in vain. The exile had too
+well concealed, even from her, his _sobriquet_ and his calling, and
+Hortense at last grew weary of failure. One fact, however, she succeeded
+in discovering, and only one--namely, that her father had, many years
+before, made some attempt to establish his claims to the estates, but
+that he had failed for want either of sufficient proof, or of means to
+carry on the _proces_. Of even this circumstance only a meagre
+law-record remained, and she could succeed in learning no more. Since
+then, a claim has been advanced by a remote branch of the Sainte Aulaire
+family, and the cause is, even now, in course of litigation."
+
+She paused, as if fatigued by so long talking; but, seeing me about to
+speak, prevented me with a gesture of the hand, and resumed:--
+
+"Hortense de Ste. Aulaire continued to live in Paris for nearly five
+years, at the end of which time she left it to seek out the members of
+her mother's family. Finding them kindly disposed towards her, she took
+up her abode amongst them in the calm seclusion of a remote Scotch town.
+There, even there, she still hoped, still employed agents; still yearned
+to discover, if not her father, at least her father's grave. Several
+years passed thus. She continued to earn a modest subsistence by her
+pen, till at length the death of one of those Scotch relatives left her
+mistress of a small inheritance. Money was welcome, since it enabled
+her to pursue her task with renewed vigor. She searched farther and
+deeper. A trivial circumstance eagerly followed up brought a train of
+other circumstances to light. She discovered that her father had assumed
+a certain name; she found that the bearer of this name was a wandering
+man, a conjuror by trade; she pursued the vague traces of his progress
+from town to town, from county to county, sometimes losing, sometimes
+regaining the scattered links. Sir, he was my father--I am that
+Hortense. I have spent my life seeking him--I have lived for this one
+hope. I have traced his footsteps here to Saxonholme, and here the last
+clue fails. If you know anything--if you can remember anything---"
+
+Calm and collected as she had been at first, she was trembling now, and
+her voice died away in sobs. The firelight fell upon her face--upon the
+face of my lost love!
+
+I also was profoundly agitated.
+
+"Hortense," I said, "do you not know, that he who stood beside your
+father in his last hour, and he who so loved you years ago, are one and
+the same? Alas! why did you not tell me these things long since?"
+
+"Did _you_ stand beside my father's deathbed?" she asked brokenly.
+
+"I did."
+
+She clasped her hands over her eyes and shuddered, as if beneath the
+pressure of a great physical pain.
+
+"O God!" she murmured, "so many years of denial and suffering! so many
+years of darkness that might have been dispelled by a word!"
+
+We were both silent for a long time. Then I told her all that I
+remembered of her father; how he came to Saxonholme--how he fell
+ill--how he died, and was buried. It was a melancholy recital; painful
+for me to relate--painful for her to hear--and interrupted over and over
+again by questions and tears, and bursts of unavailing sorrow.
+
+"We will visit his grave to-morrow," I said, when all was told.
+
+She bent her head.
+
+"To-morrow, then," said she, "I end the pilgrimage of years."
+
+"And--and afterwards?" I faltered.
+
+"Afterwards? Alas! friend, when the hopes of years fall suddenly to dust
+and ashes, one feels as if there were no future to follow?"
+
+"It is true," I said gloomily. "I know it too well."
+
+"You know it?" she exclaimed, looking up.
+
+"I know it, Hortense. There was a moment in which all the hope, and the
+fulness, and the glory of my life went down at a blow. Have you not
+heard of ships that have gone to the bottom in fair weather, suddenly,
+with all sail set, and every hand on board?"
+
+She looked at me with a strange earnestness in her eyes, and sighed
+heavily.
+
+"What have you been doing all this time, fellow-student?" she asked,
+after a pause.
+
+The old name sounded very sweet upon her lips!
+
+"I? Alas!--nothing."
+
+"But you are a surgeon, are you not?"
+
+"No. I never even went up for examination. I gave up all idea of
+medicine as a profession when my father died."
+
+"What are you, then?"
+
+"An idler upon the great highway--a book-dreamer--a library fixture."
+
+Hortense looked at me thoughtfully, with her cheek resting on her hand.
+
+"Have you done nothing but read and dream?"
+
+"Not quite. I have travelled."
+
+"With what object?"
+
+"A purely personal one. I was alone and unhappy, and--"
+
+"And fancied that purposeless wandering was better for you than healthy
+labor. Well, you have travelled, and you have read books. What more?"
+
+"Nothing more, except--"
+
+"Except what?"
+
+I chanced to have one of the papers in my pocket, and so drew it out,
+and placed it before her.
+
+"I have been a rhymer as well as a dreamer," I said, shyly. "Perhaps the
+rhymes grew out of the dreams, as the dreams themselves grew out of
+something else which has been underlying my life this many a year. At
+all events I have hewn a few of them into shape, and trusted them to
+paper and type--and here is a critique which came to me this morning
+with some three or four others."
+
+She took the paper with a smile half of wonder, half of kindness, and,
+glancing quickly through it, said:--
+
+"This is well. This is very well. I must read the book. Will you lend it
+to me?"
+
+"I will give it to you," I replied; "if I can give you that which is
+already yours."
+
+"Already mine?"
+
+"Yes, as the poet in me, however worthless, is all and only yours! Do
+you suppose, Hortense, that I have ever ceased to love you? As my songs
+are born of my sorrow, so my sorrow was born of my love; and love, and
+sorrow, and song, such as they are, are of your making."
+
+"Hush!" she said, with something of her old gay indifference. "Your
+literary sins must not be charged upon me, fellow-student! I have enough
+of my own to answer for. Besides, I am not going to acquit you so
+easily. Granted that you have written a little book of poetry--what
+then? Have you done nothing else? Nothing active? Nothing manly?
+Nothing useful?"
+
+"If by usefulness and activity you mean manual labor, I certainly have
+neither felled a tree, nor ploughed a field, nor hammered a horse-shoe.
+I have lived by thought alone."
+
+"Then I fear you have lived a very idle life," said Hortense, smiling.
+"Are you married?"
+
+"Married!" I echoed, indignantly. "How can you ask the question?"
+
+"You are not a magistrate?"
+
+"Certainly not."
+
+"In short, then, you are perfectly useless. You play no part, domestic
+or public. You serve neither the state nor the community. You are a mere
+cypher--a make-weight in the social scale--an article of no value to any
+one except the owner."
+
+"Not even the latter, mademoiselle," I replied, bitterly. "It is long
+since I have ceased to value my own life."
+
+She smiled again, but her eyes this time were full of tears.
+
+"Nay," said she, softly, "am I not the owner?"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Great joys at first affect us like great griefs. We are stunned by them,
+and know not how deep they are till the night comes with its solemn
+stillness, and we are alone with our own hearts. Then comes the season
+of thankfulness, and wonder and joy. Then our souls rise up within us,
+and chant a hymn of praise; and the great vault of Heaven is as the roof
+of a mighty cathedral studded with mosaics of golden stars, and the
+night winds join in with the bass of their mighty organ-pipes; and the
+poplars rustle, like the leaves of the hymn-books in the hands of the
+congregation.
+
+So it was with me that evening when I went forth into the quiet fields
+where the summer moon was shining, and knew that Hortense was mine at
+last--mine now and for ever. Overjoyed and restless, I wandered about
+for hours. I could not go home. I felt I must breathe the open air of
+the hills, and tread the dewy grass, and sing my hymn of praise and
+thanksgiving after my own fashion. At length, as the dawning light came
+widening up the east, I turned my steps homewards, and before the sun
+had risen above the farthest pine-ridge, I was sleeping the sweetest
+sleep that had been mine for years.
+
+The conjuror's grave was green with grass and purple with wild thyme
+when Hortense knelt beside it, and there consummated the weary
+pilgrimage of half a life. The sapling willow had spread its arms above
+him in a pleasant canopy, leaning farther and reaching higher, year
+by year,
+
+"And lo! the twig to which they laid his head had now become a tree!"
+
+Hortense found nothing of her father but this grave. Papers and
+title-deeds there were none.
+
+I well remembered the anxious search made thirteen years ago, when not
+even a card was found to indicate the whereabouts of his friends or
+family. Not to lose the vestige of a chance, we pushed inquiry farther;
+but in vain. Our rector, now a very old man, remembered nothing of the
+wandering lecturer. Mine host and hostess of the Red Lion were both
+dead. The Red Lion itself had disappeared, and become a thing of
+tradition. All was lost and forgotten; and of all her hereditary wealth,
+station, and honors, Hortense de Sainte Aulaire retained nothing but her
+father's sword and her ancestral name.
+
+--Not even the latter for many weeks, O discerning reader! for before
+the golden harvest was gathered in, we two were wedded.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LVI.
+
+BRINGETH THIS TRUE STORY TO AN END.
+
+     Ye who have traced the pilgrim to the scene
+     Which is his last, if in your memories dwell
+     A thought that once was his, if on ye swell
+     A single recollection, not in vain
+     He wore his sandal shoon and scallop-shell.
+
+     BYRON.
+
+Having related the story of my life as it happened, incident by
+incident, and brought it down to that point at which stories are wont to
+end, I find that I have little to add respecting others. My narrative
+from first to last has been purely personal. The one love of my life was
+Hortense--the one friend of my life, Oscar Dalrymple. The catalogue of
+my acquaintances would scarcely number so many names as I have fingers
+on one hand. The two first are still mine; the latter, having been
+brought forward only in so far as they re-acted upon my feelings or
+modified my experiences, have become, for the most part, mere memories,
+and so vanish, ghost-like, from the page. Franz Mueller is studying in
+Rome, having carried off a prize at the Ecole des Beaux Arts, which
+entitles him to three years at the Villa Medici, that Ultima Thule of
+the French art-student's ambition. I hear that he is as full of whim and
+jest as ever, and the very life of the Cafe Greco. May I some day hear
+his pleasant laugh again! Dr. Cheron, I believe, is still practising in
+Paris; and Monsieur de Simoncourt, I have no doubt, continues to
+exercise the profession of Chevalier d'Industrie, with such failures and
+successes as are incidental to that career.
+
+As for my early _amourettes_, they have disappeared from my path as
+utterly as though they had never crossed it. Of Madame de Marignan, I
+have neither heard, nor desired to hear, more. Even Josephine's pretty
+face is fast fading from my memory. It is ever thus with the transient
+passions of _our premiere jeunesse._ We believe in them for the moment,
+and waste laughter and tears, chaplets and sackcloth, upon them.
+Presently the delusion passes; the earnest heart within us is awakened;
+and we know that till now we have been mere actors in "a masquerade of
+dreams." The chaplets were woven of artificial flowers. The funeral was
+a mock funeral--the banquet a stage feast of painted fruits and empty
+goblets! Alas! we cannot undo that foolish past. We may only hope to
+blot it out with after records of high, and wise, and tender things.
+Thus it is that the young man's heart is like the precious palimpsest of
+old. He first of all defiles it with idle anacreontics in praise of love
+and wine; but, erasing these by-and-by with his own pious hand, he
+writes it over afresh with chronicles of a pure and holy passion, and
+dedicates it to the fair saint of all his orisons.
+
+Dalrymple and his wife are now settled in Italy, having purchased a
+villa in the neighborhood of Spezzia, where they live in great
+retirement. In their choice of such retirement they are influenced by
+more than one good reason. In the first place, the death of the Vicomte
+de Caylus was an event likely to be productive of many unpleasant
+consequences to one who had deprived the French government of so
+distinguished an officer. In the next, Dalrymple is a poor man, and his
+wife is no longer rich; so that Italy agrees with their means as well as
+with their tastes. Lastly, they love each other so well that they never
+weary of their solitude, nor care to barter away their blue Italian
+skies and solemn pine-woods for the glittering unrest of society.
+
+Fascinated by Dalrymple's description of his villa and the life he led
+in it, Hortense and I made up our minds some few weeks after our
+marriage, to visit that part of Italy--perhaps, in case we were much
+pleased with it, to settle there, for at least a few years. So I
+prepared once more to leave my father's house; this time to let it, for
+I knew that I should never live in it again.
+
+It took some weeks to clear the old place out. The thing was necessary;
+yet I felt as if it were a kind of sacrilege. To disturb the old dust
+upon the library-shelves and select such books as I cared to keep; to
+sort and destroy all kinds of hoarded papers; to ransack desks that had
+never been unlocked since the hands that last closed them were laid to
+rest for ever, constituted my share of the work. Hortense superintended
+the rest. As for the household goods, we resolved to keep nothing, save
+a few old family portraits and my father's plate, some of which had
+descended to us through two or three centuries.
+
+While yet in this unsettled state, with the house all in confusion and
+the time appointed for our journey drawing nearer and nearer day by day,
+a strange thing happened.
+
+At the end of the garden, encroaching partly upon a corner of it, and
+opening into the lane that bounded it on the other side of the hedge,
+stood the stable belonging to the house.
+
+It had been put to no use since my father's time, and was now so
+thoroughly out of repair that I resolved to have it pulled down and
+rebuilt before letting it to strangers. In the meantime, I went down
+there one morning with a workman before the work of demolition
+was begun.
+
+We had some difficulty to get in, for the lock and hinges were rusted,
+and the floor within was choked with fallen rubbish. At length we
+forced an entrance. I thought I had never seen a more dreary interior.
+My father's old chaise was yet standing there, with both wheels off. The
+mouldy harness was dropping to pieces on the walls. The beams were
+festooned with cobwebs. The very ladder leading to the loft above was so
+rotten that I scarcely dared trust to it for a footing.
+
+Having trusted to it, however, I found myself in a still more ruinous
+and dreary hole. The posts supporting the roof were insecure; the tiles
+were all displaced overhead; and the rafters showed black and bare
+against the sky in many places. In one corner lay a heap of mouldy
+straw, and at the farther end, seen dimly through the darkness, a pile
+of old lumber, and--by Heaven! the pagoda-canopy of many colors, and the
+little Chevalier's Conjuring Table!
+
+I could scarcely believe my eyes. My poor Hortense! Here, at last, were
+some relics of her father; but found in how strange a place, and by how
+strange a chance!
+
+I had them dragged out into the light, all mildewed and cob-webbed as
+they were; whereupon an army of spiders rushed out in every direction, a
+bat rose up, shrieking, and whirled in blind circles overhead. In a
+corner of the pagoda we found an empty bird's-nest. The table was small,
+and could be got out without much difficulty; so I helped the workman to
+carry it down the ladder, and sending it on before me to the house,
+sauntered back through the glancing shadows of the acacia-leaves, musing
+upon the way in which these long-forgotten things had been brought to
+light, and wondering how they came to be stored away in my own stable.
+
+"Do you know anything about it, Collins?" I said, coming up suddenly
+behind him in the hall.
+
+"About what, sir?" asked that respectable servant, looking round with
+some perplexity, as if in search of the nominative.
+
+I pointed to the table, now being carried into the dismantled
+dining-room.
+
+Collins smiled--he had a remarkably civil, apologetic way of smiling
+behind his hand, as if it were a yawn or a liberty.
+
+"Oh, sir," said he, "don't you remember? To be sure, you were quite a
+young gentleman at that time--but---"
+
+"But what?" I interrupted, impatiently.
+
+"Why, sir, that table once belonged to a poor little conjuring chap who
+called himself Almond Pudding, and died...."
+
+I checked him with a gesture.
+
+"I know all that," I said, hastily. "I remember it perfectly; but how
+came the things into my stable?"
+
+"Your respected father and my honored master, sir, had them conveyed
+there when the Red Lion was sold off," said Collins, with a sidelong
+glance at the dining-room door. "He was of opinion, sir, that they might
+some day identify the poor man to his relatives, in case of inquiry."
+
+I heard the sound of a suppressed sob, and, brushing past him without
+another word, went in and closed the door.
+
+"My own Hortense!" I said, taking her into my arms. "My wife!"
+
+Pale and tearful, she lifted her face from my shoulder, and pointed to
+the table.
+
+"I know what it is," she faltered. "You need not tell me. My heart tells
+me!"
+
+I led her to a chair, and explained how and where it had been found. I
+even told her of the little empty nest from which the young birds had
+long since flown away. In this tiny incident there was something
+pathetic that soothed her; so, presently, when she left off weeping, we
+examined the table together.
+
+It was a quaint, fragile, ricketty thing, with slender twisted legs of
+black wood, and a cloth-covered top that had once been green, but now
+retained no vestige of its original color. This cloth top was covered
+with slender slits of various shapes and sizes, round, square,
+sexagonal, and so forth, which, being pressed with the finger, fell
+inwards and disclosed little hiding-places sunk in the well of the
+table; but which, as soon as the pressure was removed, flew up again by
+means of concealed springs, and closed as neatly as before.
+
+"This is strange," said Hortense, peering into one of the recesses. "I
+have found something in the table! Look--it is a watch!"
+
+I snatched it from her, and carried it to the window. Blackened and
+discolored as it was, I recognised it instantly.
+
+It was my own watch--my own watch of which I was so boyishly vain years
+and years ago, and which I had lost so unaccountably on the night of the
+Chevalier's performance! There were my initials engraved on the back,
+amid a forest of flourishes, and there on the dial was that identical
+little Cupid with the cornucopia of flowers, which I once thought such a
+miracle of workmanship! Alas! what a mighty march old Time had stolen
+upon me, while that little watch was standing still!
+
+"Oh, Heaven!--oh, husband!"
+
+Startled from my reverie more by the tone than the words, I turned and
+saw Hortense with a packet of papers in her hand--old, yellow, dusty
+papers, tied together with a piece of black ribbon.
+
+"I found them there--there--there!" she faltered, pointing to a drawer
+in the table which I now saw for the first time. "I chanced to press
+that little knob, and the drawer flew out. Oh, my dear father!--see,
+Basil, here are his patents of nobility--here is the certificate of my
+birth--here are the title-deeds of the manor of Sainte Aulaire! This
+alone was wanted to complete our happiness!"
+
+"We will keep the table, Hortense, all our lives!" I explained, when the
+first agitation was past.
+
+"As sacredly," replied she, "as it kept this precious secret!"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+My task is done. Here on my desk lies the piled-up manuscript which has
+been my companion through so many pleasant hours. Those hours are over
+now. I may lay down my pen, and put aside the whispering vine-leaves
+from my casement, and lean out into the sweet Italian afternoon, as idly
+as though I wore to the climate and the manner born.
+
+The world to-day is only half awake. The little white town, crouched
+down by the "beached margent" of the bay, winks with its glittering
+windows and dozes in the sunshine. The very cicalas are silent. The
+fishermen's barques, with their wing-like sails all folded to rest, rock
+lazily at anchor, like sea-birds asleep. The cork-trees nod languidly to
+each other; and not even yonder far-away marble peaks are more
+motionless than that cloud which hangs like a white banner in the sky.
+Hush! I can almost believe that I hear the drowsy washing of the tide
+against the ruined tower on the beach.
+
+And this is the bay of Spezzia--the lovely, treacherous bay of Spezzia,
+where our English Shelley lost his gentle life! How blue those cruel
+waters are to-day! Bluer, by Heaven! than the sky, with scarce a ripple
+setting to the shore.
+
+We are very happy in our remote Italian home. It stands high upon a
+hill-side, and looks down over a slope of silvery olives to the sea.
+Vineyard and orange grove, white town, blue bay, and amber sands lie
+mapped out beneath our feet. Not a felucca "to Spezzia bound from Cape
+Circella" can sail past without our observation.
+
+     "Not a sun can die, nor yet be born, unseen
+     By dwellers at my villa."
+
+Nay, from this very window, one might almost pitch an orange into the
+empty vettura standing in the courtyard of the Croce di Malta!
+
+Then we have a garden--a wild, uncultured place, where figs and lemons,
+olives "blackening sullen ripe," and prickly aloes flourish in rank
+profusion, side by side; and a loggia, where we sit at twilight drinking
+our Chianti wine and listening to the nightingales; and a study looking
+out on the bay through a trellis of vine-leaves, where we read and write
+together, surrounded by our books. Here, also, just opposite my desk,
+hangs Mueller's copy of that portrait of the Marquise de Sainte Aulaire,
+which I once gave to Hortense, and which is now my own again. How often
+I pause upon the unturned page, how often lay my pen aside, to look from
+the painting to the dear, living face beneath it! For there she sits,
+day after day, my wife! my poet! with the side-light falling on her
+hair, and the warm sea-breezes stirring the soft folds of her dress.
+Sometimes she lifts her eyes, those wondrous eyes, luminous from within
+"with the light of the rising soul"--and then we talk awhile of our
+work, or of our love, believing ever that
+
+     "Our work shall still be better for our love,
+     And still our love be sweeter for our work."
+
+Perhaps the original of that same painting in the study may yet be ours
+some day, with the old chateau in which it hangs, and all the broad
+lands belonging thereunto. Our claim has been put forward some time now,
+and our lawyers are confident of success. Shall we be happier, if that
+success is ours? Can rank add one grace, or wealth one pleasure, to a
+life which is already so perfect? I think not, and there are moments
+when I almost wish that we may never have it in our power to test
+the question.
+
+But stay! the hours fly past. The sun is low, and the tender Italian
+twilight will soon close in. Then, when the moon rises, we shall sail
+out upon the bay in our own tiny felucca; or perhaps go down through the
+town to that white villa gleaming out above the dark tops of yonder
+cypresses, and spend some pleasant hours with Dalrymple and his wife.
+They, too, are very happy; but their happiness is of an older date than
+ours, and tends to other ends. They have bought lands in the
+neighborhood, which they cultivate; and they have children whom they
+adore. To educate these little ones for the wide world lying beyond that
+blue bay and the far-off mountains, is the one joy, the one care of
+their lives. Truly has it been said that
+
+     "A happy family
+     Is but an earlier heaven."
+
+THE END.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of In the Days of My Youth
+by Amelia Ann Blandford Edwards
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK IN THE DAYS OF MY YOUTH ***
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