THE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S 
 PART I.
 
 . 
 
 HE WALKED ROUND HIS GARDEN, HE LOOhffD AT THE 
 WEATHER.
 
 H. DE 'BALZAC 
 
 THEDEPUTYFORARCIS 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES 
 
 AND INDICES 
 
 TRANSLATED BY 
 
 CLARA BELL and JNO. RUDD, B. A. 
 
 WITH PREPACKS BY 
 
 PHILADELPHIA 
 
 t 
 
 JOHN D. MORRIS AND COMPANY 
 PUBLISHERS
 
 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 VOLUME I. 
 
 HE WALKED ROUND HIS GARDEN, HE LOOKED AT THE WEATHER 
 
 (p. 59) Frontispiece 
 
 PACK 
 THIS TIME HE WAS WOUNDED . . . . . . . 126 
 
 BKAUVISAGE STANDING ON THE BRIDGE, HAPPENED TO RE- 
 MARK THE DAMSEL 237 
 
 LUCAS OPENED THE DOOR TO SHOW IN "MONSIEUR PHILIPPE" 328 
 
 " GOOD-EVENING; LADIES " 374 
 
 Drawn by J. Ayton Symington. 
 
 VOLUME II. 
 
 " EH, WELL, YES, I LOVE YOU," SAID HE IO5 
 
 Drawn by D. Murray-Smith. 
 
 IT WERE USELESS TO PAINT A BALL OF THIS KIND . . . 143 
 
 Drawn by W. Boucher. 
 
 "BUT DOES MADEMOISELLE REALLY SUIT ME?" REPLIED LA 
 
 PEYRADE 268 
 
 Drawn ty J. Ayton Symington. 
 
 "BUT LOOK AT THE DOCTOR," SHE CRIED 425 
 
 Drawn ty F. C. Tilney.
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 " LE DEPUTE D'ARCIS," like the still less generally known 
 " Les Petits Bourgeois," stands on a rather different footing 
 from the rest of Balzac's work. Both were posthumous, and 
 both, having been left unfinished, were completed by the 
 author's friend, Charles Rabou. Rabou is not much known 
 nowadays as a man of letters ; he must not be confused with 
 the writer Hippolyte Babou, the friend of Baudelaire, the 
 reputed inventor of the title " Fleurs du Mai," and the 
 author of some very acute articles in the great collection of 
 Crepet's " Poetes Francais." But he figures pretty frequently 
 in association of one kind or another with Balzac, and would 
 appear to have been thoroughly imbued with the scheme and 
 spirit of the Comedie. At the same time, it does not appear 
 that even the indefatigable and most competent M. de Loven- 
 joul is perfectly certain where Balzac's labors end and those 
 of Rabou begin. 
 
 It would seem, however (and certainly internal evidence 
 has nothing to say on the other side), that the severance, or 
 rather the junction, must have taken place somewhere about 
 the point where, after the introduction of Maxime de Trailles, 
 the interest suddenly shifts altogether from the folk of Arcis 
 and the conduct of their election to the hitherto unknown 
 Comte de Sallenauve. It would, no doubt, be possible, and 
 even easy, to discover in Balzac's undoubted work for in- 
 stance, in "Le Cure de Village" and "Illusions Perdues " 
 instances of shiftings of interest nearly as abrupt and of 
 changes in the main centre of the story nearly as decided. 
 Nor is it possible, considering the weakness of constructive 
 finish which always marked Balzac, to rule out offhand the 
 substitution, after an unusually lively and business-like begin-
 
 X PREFACE. 
 
 ning, of the nearly always frigid scheme of letters, topped up 
 with a conclusion in which, with very doubtful art, as many 
 personages of the Comedie, and even direct references to as 
 many of its books as possible, are dragged in. But it is as 
 nearly as possible certain that he would never have left things 
 in such a condition, and I do not even think that he would 
 ever have arranged them in quite the same state, even as an 
 experiment. 
 
 The book belongs to the Champenois or Arcis-sur-Aube 
 series, which is so brilliantly followed by " Une Tenebreuse 
 Affaire." It is curious and worth notice, as showing the con- 
 scientious fashion in which Balzac always set about his mature 
 work, that though his provincial stories are taken from parts 
 of France widely distant from one another, the selection is 
 by no means haphazard, and arranges itself with ease into 
 groups corresponding to certain haunts or sojourns of the 
 author. There is the Loire group, furnished by his youthful 
 remembrances of Tours and Saumur, and by later ones down 
 to the Breton coast. There is the group of which Alencon 
 and the Breton-Norman frontiers are the field, and the scenery 
 of which was furnished by early visits of which we know little, 
 but the fact of the existence of which is of the first impor- 
 tance, as having given birth to the " Chouans," and so to the 
 whole Comedie in a way. There is the Angoumois-Limousin 
 group, for which he informed himself during his frequent 
 visits to the Carraud family. And lastly, there is one of 
 rather wider extent, and not connected with so definite a 
 centre, but including the Morvan, Upper Burgundy, and 
 part of Champagne, which seems to have been commended 
 to him by his stay at Sache and other places. This was his 
 latest set of studies, and to this "Le Deput6 d'Arcis" of 
 course belongs. To round off the subject, it is noteworthy 
 that no part of the coast except a little in the north, with the 
 remarkable exceptions of the scenes of "La Recherche de 
 1'Absolu " and one or two others; nothing in the greater part
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 of Brittany and Normandy ; nothing in Guienne, Gascony, 
 Languedoc, Provence, or Dauphin^, seems to have attracted 
 him. Yet some of these scenes and with some of them he 
 had meddled in the Days of Ignorance are the most tempt- 
 ing of any in France to the romancer, and his abstention from 
 them is one of the clearest proofs of his resolve to speak only 
 of that he did know. 
 
 The certainly genuine part of the present book is, as cer- 
 tainly, not below anything save his very best work. It be- 
 longs, indeed, to the more minute and " meticulous" part of 
 that work, not to the bolder and more ambitious side. There 
 is no Goriot, no Eugenie Grandet, not even any Corentin or 
 Vautrin, hardly so much as a Rastignac about it. But the 
 good little people of Arcis-sur-Aube are represented " in their 
 natural," as Balzac's great compatriot would have said, with 
 extraordinary felicity and force. The electoral meeting in 
 Madame Marions' house is certainly one of the best things in 
 the whole Com6die for completeness within its own limits, 
 and none of the personages, official or other, can be said to 
 suffer from that touch of exaggeration which, to some tastes, 
 interferes with the more celebrated and perhaps more generally 
 attractive delineations of Parisian journalism in "Illusions 
 Perdues " and similar books. In fact, in what he wrote of 
 " Le D6put6 d'Arcis," Balzac seems to have had personal 
 knowledge to go upon, without any personal grievances to 
 revenge or any personal crazes to enforce. The latter, it is 
 true, often prompted his sublimest work ; but the former 
 frequently helped to produce his least successful. In " Le 
 Depute d'Arcis" he is at the happy mean. It is not neces- 
 sary to give an elaborate bibliography of it ; for, as has been 
 said, only the " Election " part is certainly Balzac's. This 
 appeared in a newspaper, "L'Union Monarchique," for April 
 and May 1847. 
 
 G. S.
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 PART I. 
 
 THE ELECTION. 
 
 BEFORE entering on a study of a country election, I need 
 hardly say that the town of Arcis-sur-Aube was not the scene 
 of the events to be related. The district of Arcis votes at 
 Bar-sur-Aube, which is fifteen leagues away from Arcis; so 
 there is no member for Arcis in the Chamber of Deputies. 
 The amenities demanded by the history of contemporary 
 manners require this precaution. It is perhaps an ingenious 
 notion to describe one town as the setting for a drama played 
 out in another ; indeed, the plan has been already adopted in 
 the course of this Human Comedy, in spite of the drawback 
 that it often makes the frame as elaborate as the picture. 
 
 Toward the end of April, 1839, at about ten in the morning, 
 a strange appearance was presented by Madame Marion's 
 drawing-room the lady was the widow of a revenue collector 
 in the department of the Aube. Nothing remained in it of 
 all the furniture but the window-curtains, the chimney hang- 
 ings and ornaments, the chandelier, and the tea-table. The 
 Aubusson carpet, taken up a fortnight sooner than was neces- 
 sary, encumbered the balcony steps, and the parquet had been 
 energetically rubbed without looking any the brighter. 
 
 This was a sort of domestic forecast of the coming elections, 
 for which preparations were being made over the whole face of 
 the country. Things are sometimes as humorous as men. This 
 is an argument in favor of the occult sciences. 
 
 An old manservant, attached to Colonel Giguet, Madame 
 
 (1)
 
 S THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 Marion's brother, had just finished sweeping away the dust 
 that had lodged between the boards in the course of the 
 winter. The housemaid and cook, with a nimble zeal that 
 showed as much enthusiasm as devotion, were bringing down 
 all the chairs in the house and piling them in the garden. It 
 must be explained that the trees already displayed large 
 leaves, between which the sky smiled cloudless. Spring 
 breezes and May sunshine allowed of the glass doors and 
 windows being thrown open from the drawing-room, a room 
 longer than it was wide. 
 
 The old lady, giving her orders to the two women, desired 
 them to place the chairs in four rows with a space of about 
 three feet between. In a few minutes there were ten chairs 
 across the rows, a medley of various patterns ; a line of chairs 
 was placed along the wall in front of the windows. At the 
 end of the room opposite the forty chairs Madame Marion 
 placed three armchairs behind the tea-table, which she covered 
 with a green cloth, and on it placed a bell. 
 
 Old Colonel Giguet appeared on the scene of the fray just 
 as it had occurred to his sister that she might fill up the recess 
 on each side of the chimney-place by bringing in two benches 
 from the anteroom, in spite of the baldness of the velvet, which 
 had seen four-and-twenty years' service. 
 
 " We can seat seventy persons," said she, with exultation. 
 
 " God send us seventy friends ! " replied the colonel. 
 
 "If, after receiving all the society of Arcis-sur-Aube every 
 evening for twenty-four years, even one of our usual visitors 
 should fail us well ! " said the old lady in a threatening 
 tone. 
 
 "Come," said the colonel with a shrug, as he interrupted 
 his sister, " I can name ten who cannot who ought not to 
 come. To begin with," said he, counting on his fingers: 
 " Antonin Goulard, the sub-prefect, for one ; the public pros- 
 ecutor, Frederic Marest,* for another ; Monsieur Olivier Vinet, 
 * See "A Start in Life."
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR 
 
 his deputy, three; Monsieur Martener, the examining judge, 
 four; the justice of the peace " 
 
 "But I am not so silly," the old lady interrupted in her 
 turn, " as to expect that men who hold appointments should 
 attend a meeting of which the purpose is to return one more 
 deputy to the Opposition. At the same time, Antonin Gou- 
 lard, Simon's playfellow and schoolmate, would be very glad 
 to see him in the Chamber, for " 
 
 " Now, my good sister, leave us men to manage our own 
 business. Where is Simon ?" 
 
 " He is dressing. He was very wise not to come to break- 
 fast, for he is very nervous ; and though our young lawyer is 
 in the habit of speaking in court, he dreads this meeting as 
 much as if he had to face his enemies." 
 
 " My word ! Yes. I have often stood the fire of a battery 
 and my soul never quaked my body I say nothing about ; 
 but if I had to stand up here," said the old soldier, placing 
 himself behind the table, "opposite the forty good people 
 who will sit there, open-mouthed, their eyes fixed on mine, 
 and expecting a set speech in sounding periods my shirt 
 would be soaking before I could find a word." 
 
 "And yet, my dear father, you must make that effort on 
 my behalf," said Simon Giguet, coming in from the little 
 drawing-room ; " for if there is a man in the department 
 whose word is powerful, it is certainly you. In 1815 " 
 
 " In 1815," said the particularly well-preserved little man, 
 " I had not to speak ; I merely drew up a little proclamation 
 which raised two thousand men in twenty-four hours. And 
 there is a great difference between putting one's name at the 
 bottom of a broadsheet and addressing a meeting. Napoleon 
 himself would have lost at that game. On the i8th Brumaire* 
 he talked sheer nonsense to the Five Hundred." 
 
 "But, my dear father, my whole life is at stake, my pros- 
 pects, my happiness Just look at one person only, and 
 
 * The date of the overthrow of the Directory by Bonaparte.
 
 4 fff DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 fancy you are speaking to him alone you will get through it 
 all right." 
 
 "Mercy on us! I am only an old woman," said Madame 
 Marion ; " but in such a case, and if I knew what it was all 
 about why, I could be eloquent ! " 
 
 "Too eloquent, perhaps," said the colonel. "And to 
 shoot beyond the mark is not to hit it. But what is in the 
 wind?" he added, addressing his son. "For the last two 
 days you have connected this nomination with some no- 
 tion If my son is not elected, so much the worse for 
 
 Arcis, that's all." 
 
 These words, worthy of a father, were quite in harmony 
 with the whole life of the speaker. 
 
 Colonel Giguet, one of the most respected officers in the 
 Grande Armee, was one of those admirable characters which 
 to a foundation of perfect rectitude add great delicacy of 
 feeling. He never thrust himself forward ; honors came to 
 seek him out ; hence for eleven years he had remained a 
 captain in the Artillery of the Guards, rising to command a 
 battalion in 1813, and promoted major in 1814. His almost 
 fanatical attachment to Napoleon prohibited his serving the 
 Bourbons after the Emperor's first abdication. And in 1815 
 his devotion was so conspicuous that he would have been 
 banished but for the Comte de Gondreville, who had his name 
 erased from the list, and succeeded in getting him a retiring 
 pension and the rank of colonel. 
 
 Madame Marion, ne Giguet, had had another brother who 
 was colonel of the Gendarmes at Troyes, and with whom she 
 had formerly lived. There she had married Monsieur Marion, 
 receiver-general of the revenues of the department. 
 
 A brother of the late lamented Marion was presiding judge 
 of one of the Imperial courts. While still a pleader at Arcis 
 this lawyer had, during the "Terror," lent his name to the 
 famous Malin (deputy for the Aube), a representative of the 
 people, to enable him to purchase the estate of Gondreville.
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 5 
 
 Marion, the receiver-general, had inherited the property of 
 his brother the judge ; Madame Marion came in for that of 
 her brother, Colonel Gignet of the Gendarmes. In 1814 
 Monsieur Marion suffered some reverses ; he died at about 
 the same time as the Empire, and his widow was able to make 
 up fifteen thousand francs a year from the wreck of these fag- 
 ends of fortunes. Giguet of the Gendarmes had left all his 
 little wealth to his sister on hearing of his brother's marriage, 
 in 1806, to one of the daughters of a rich Hamburg banker. 
 The admiration of all Europe for Napoleon's magnificent 
 troopers is well known. 
 
 In 1814 Madame Marion, in very narrow circumstances, 
 came to live at Arcis, her native town, where she bought a 
 house in the Grande Place, one of the handsomest residences 
 in the town, on a site suggesting that it had formerly been 
 dependent on the castle. Being used to entertain a great 
 deal at Troyes, where the revenue-collector was a person of 
 importance, her drawing-room was open to the prominent 
 members of the Liberal circle at Arcis. A woman who is 
 used to the position of queen of a country salon does not 
 readily forego it. Of all habits, those of vanity are the most 
 enduring. 
 
 Colonel Giguet, a Liberal, after being a Bonapartist for, 
 by a singular metamorphosis, Napoleon's soldiers almost all 
 fell in love with the constitutional system naturally became, 
 under the Restoration, the president of the Town Council of 
 Arcis, which included Grevin, the notary, and Beauvisage, 
 his son-in-law ; Varlet's son, the leading physician in the town 
 and Grevin's brother-in-law, with sundry other Liberals of 
 importance. 
 
 " If our dear boy is not elected," said Madame Marion, 
 after looking into the anteroom and the garden to make sure 
 that nobody was listening, " he will not win Mademoiselle 
 Beauvisage ; for what he looks for in the event of his success 
 is marrying Cecile,"
 
 I THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 "Cecile?" said the old man, opening his eyes wide to 
 gaze at his sister in amazement. 
 
 "No one but you in all the department, brother, is likely 
 to forget the fortune and the expectations of Mademoiselle 
 Beauvisage." 
 
 " She is the wealthiest heiress in the department of the 
 Aube," said Simon Giguet. 
 
 " But it seems to me that my son is not to be sneezed at ! " 
 said the old colonel. " He is your heir ; he has his mother's 
 money ; and I hope to leave him something better than my 
 bare name." 
 
 "All that put together will not give him more than thirty 
 thousand francs a year, and men have already come forward 
 with as much as that to say nothing of position " 
 
 "And? " asked the colonel. 
 
 "And have been refused." 
 
 "What on earth do the Beauvisages want, then?" said 
 Giguet, looking from his sister to his son. 
 
 It may seem strange that Colonel Giguet, Madame Marion's 
 brother in whose house the society of Arcis had been meeting 
 every evening for the last four-and-twenty years, whose salon 
 rang with the echo of every rumor, every slander, every piece 
 of gossip of the countryside where perhaps they were even 
 manufactured should be ignorant of such facts and events. 
 But his ignorance is accounted for when it is pointed out that 
 this noble survivor of the Imperial phalanx went to bed and 
 rose with the chickens, as old men do who want to live all 
 the days of their life. Hence he was never present at confi- 
 dential " talks." 
 
 For the past nine years, since his political party had come 
 to the top, the colonel lived almost out of the world. He 
 always rose with the sun, and devoted himself to horticulture ; 
 he was devoted to flowers ; but of all flowers, he only cherished 
 his roses. He had the stained hands of a true gardener. He 
 himself tended his beds his squares he called them. His.
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 7 
 
 squares ! The word reminded him of the gaudy array of 
 men drawn up on the field of battle. He was always holding 
 council with his man, and, especially for the last two years, 
 seldom mingled with the company, rarely seeing any visitors. 
 He took one meal only with the family his dinner ; for he 
 was up too early to breakfast with his sister and his son. It 
 is to the colonel's skill that the world owes the Giguet rose, 
 famous among amateurs. 
 
 This old man, a sort of domestic fetish, was brought out, 
 of course, on great occasions ; some families have a demi- 
 god of this kind, and make a display of him as they would of 
 a title. 
 
 " I have a suspicion that since the Revolution of July Ma- 
 dame Beauvisage has a hankering after living in Paris," said 
 Madame Marion. " Being compelled to remain here till her 
 father dies, she has transferred her ambition and placed her 
 hopes in her future son-in-law; the fair matron dreams of the 
 splendors of a political position." 
 
 "And could you love C6cile?" asked the colonel of his 
 son. y 
 
 "Yes, father." 
 
 " Does she take to you ? " 
 
 " I think so. But the important point is that her mother 
 and her grandfather should fancy me. Although old Grevin 
 is pleased to oppose my election, success would bring Madame 
 Beauvisage to accept me, for she will hope to govern me to 
 her mind, and be minister under my name." 
 
 "A good joke!" cried Madame Marion. "And what 
 does she take us for?" 
 
 " Whom has she refused then ? " asked the colonel of his 
 sister. 
 
 " Well, within the last three months they say that Antonin 
 Goulard and Monsieur Frederic Marest, the public prose- 
 cutor, got very equivocal replies, meaning anything excepting 
 YES."
 
 8 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 "Good heavens!" exclaimed the old man, throwing up 
 his arms, " what times we live in ! Why, Ccile is a hosier's 
 daughter, a farmer's grandchild. Does Madame Beauvisage 
 look for a Comtc de Cinq-Cygne for a son-in-law ? " 
 
 " Nay, brother, do not make fun of the Beauvisages. Cicile 
 is rich enough to choose a husband wherever she pleases even 
 of the rank of the Cygnes. But I hear the bell announcing 
 the arrival of some elector ; I must go, and am only sorry that 
 I cannot listen to what is said." 
 
 The district of Arcis-sur-Aube was at this time in a strange 
 position, believing itself free to elect a deputy. From 1816 
 till 1836 it had always returned one of the most ponderous 
 orators of the Left, one of those seventeen whom the Liberal 
 party loved to designate as "great citizens" no less a man, 
 in short, than Francois Keller, of the firm of Keller Brothers, 
 son-in-law to the Comte de Gondreville. 
 
 Gondreville, one of the finest estates in France, is not 
 more than a quarter of a league from Arcis. The banker, 
 lately created count and peer of France, proposed, no doubt, 
 to hand on to his son, now thirty years of age, his position as 
 deputy, so as to fit him in due time to sit among the peers. 
 
 Chailes Keller, already a major holding a staff appointment, 
 and now a viscount, as one of the prince royal's favorites, 
 was attached to the party of the Citizen King. A splendid 
 future seemed to lie before a young man of immense wealth, 
 high courage, and noteworthy devotion to the new dynasty 
 grandson to the Comte de Gondreville, and nephew of the 
 Marechale de Carigliano. But this election, indispensable to 
 his future plans, presented very great difficulties. 
 
 Ever since the advancement to power of the citizen class, 
 Arcis had felt a vague yearning for independence. The last 
 few elections, at which Fransois Keller had been returned, 
 had been disturbed by certain Republicans whose red caps and 
 wagging beards had not proved alarming to the good folk of 
 Arcis. By working up the feeling of the country, the Radical
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS, 9 
 
 candidate had secured thirty or forty votes. Some of the 
 residents, humiliated by seeing their town a rotten borough 
 of the Opposition, then joined these democrats, but not to 
 support democracy. 
 
 When Simon Giguet sounded Grevin the notary, the count's 
 faithful ally, on the subject of the candidature, the old man 
 replied that, without knowing anything of the Comte de 
 Gondreville's intentions, Charles Keller was the man for him, 
 and that he should do his utmost to secure his return. 
 
 As soon as Gre'vin's announcement was made known in 
 Arcis there was a strong feeling against him. Although this 
 Aristides of Champagne had, during thirty years of practice, 
 commanded the fullest confidence of the citizens ; although 
 he had been mayor of the town from 1804 till 1814, and 
 again during the Hundred Days ; although the Opposition 
 had recognized him as their leader till the days of triumph in 
 1830, when he had refused the honor of the mayoralty in 
 consideration of his advanced age ; finally, although the 
 town, in proof of its attachment, had then elected his son-in- 
 law, Monsieur Beauvisage, they now all turned against him, 
 and some of the younger spirit accused him of being in his 
 dotage. 
 
 Monsieur le Maire, questioned only the day before on the 
 market-place, had declared that he would sooner vote for the 
 first name on the list of eligible citizens of Arcis than for 
 Charles Keller, for whom he had, however, the highest es- 
 teem. 
 
 "Arcis shall no longer be a rotten borough ! " cried he. 
 "Or I go to live in Paris." 
 
 Flatter the passions of the day, and you become a hero at 
 once, even at Arcis-sur-Aube. 
 
 " Monsieur le Maire has given crowning proof of his firm- 
 ness of temper," they said. 
 
 Nothing gathers faster than a legalized rebellion. In the 
 course of the evening Madame Marion and her friends had
 
 10 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 organized for the morrow a meeting of " Independent Elec- 
 tors " in favor of Simon Giguet, the colonel's son. And now 
 that morrow was to-day, and she had turned the whole house 
 topsy-turvy for the reception of the friends on whose inde- 
 pendence they relied. 
 
 Simon Giguet, the home-made candidate of a little town 
 that was jealously eager to return one of its sons, had, as has 
 been seen, at once taken advantage of this little stir to make 
 himself the representative of the wants and interests of South- 
 western Champagne. At the same time, the position and 
 fortune of the Giguet family were wholly due to the Comte 
 de Gondreville. But when an election is in the case, can 
 feelings be considered ? 
 
 This drama is written for the enlightenment of lands so un- 
 happy as to be ignorant of the benefits of national representa- 
 tion, and unaware, therefore, of the intestinal struggles and 
 tb~ Brutus-like sacrifices a little town has to suffer in giving 
 bktli to a deputy a natural and majestic spectacle which can 
 only be compared to childbirth there are the same efforts, 
 t} e same defilement, the same travail, the same triumph. 
 
 During his wife's lifetime, from 1806 to 1813, the colonel 
 had had three children, of whom Simon, the eldest, survived 
 the other two. The mother died in 1814, one of the children 
 in 1818, the other in 1825. Until he remained the sole sur- 
 vivor, Simon had, of course, been brought up with a view to 
 making his own living by some lucrative profession. Then, 
 when he was an only son, Simon's prospects underwent a 
 reverse. Madame Marion's hopes for her nephew had been 
 largely founded on his inheriting considerable wealth from his 
 grandfather, the Hamburg banker ; but the German, dying in 
 1826, left his grandson, Giguet, no more than two thousand 
 francs a year. The financier, endowed with great powers of 
 procreation, had counteracted the monotony of commercial 
 life by indulging in the joys of fatherhood ; hence he favored 
 the families of the eleven other children who clung to him, as.
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 11 
 
 it were, and made him believe what, indeed, seemed not 
 unlikely that Simon would be a rich man. 
 
 The colonel was bent on putting his son into an independent 
 profession ; and this was why : the Giguets could not hope for 
 any favor from Government under the Restoration. Even if 
 Simon had not had an ardent Bonapartist for his father, he 
 belonged to a family all of whom had justly incurred the dis- 
 approbation of the Cinq-Cygne family, in consequence of the 
 part taken by Giguet, the colonel of Gendarmes, and all the 
 Marions Madame Marion included as witnesses for the 
 prosecution in the famous trial of the Simeuses. These 
 brothers were unjustly sentenced, in 1805, as guilty of carry- 
 ing off and detaining the Comte de Gondreville (at that time 
 a senator, after having been the people's representative), who 
 had despoiled their family of its fortune. 
 
 Grevin had been not only one of the most important wit- 
 nesses, but also an ardent promoter of the proceedings. At 
 this time this trial still divided the district of Arcis into two 
 factions one believing in the innocence of the condemned 
 pr.rties and upholding the family of Cinq-Cygne, the other 
 supporting the Comte de Gondreville and his adherents. 
 Though, after the Restoration, the Comtesse de Cinq-Cygne 
 made use of the influence she acquired by the return of the 
 Bourbons to settle everything to her mind in the department, 
 the Comte de Gondreville found means to counterbalance the 
 supremacy of the Cinq-Cygnes by the secret authority he held 
 over the Liberals by means of Grvin and Colonel Giguet. 
 He also had the support of his son-in-law, Keller, who was 
 unfailingly elected deputy in spite of the Cinq-Cygnes, and 
 considerable influence in the State Council so long as King 
 Louis XVIII. lived. 
 
 It was by the Comte de Gondreville's advice that Colonel 
 Giguet had made a lawyer of his son. Simon had all the 
 better chance of shining in the Arcis district, because he was 
 the only pleader there ; as a rule, in these small towns, the
 
 12 THE DEPUTY FOR AKCIS. 
 
 attorneys plead in their own cases. Simon had had some 
 little success at the assizes of the department ; but he was not 
 the less the butt of many pleasantries from Frederic Marest, 
 the public prosecutor ; from Olivier Vinet, his deputy ; and 
 Michu, the presiding judge the three wits of the court. 
 Simon Giguet, it must be owned, like all men who are laughed 
 at, laid himself open to the cruel power of ridicule. He 
 listened to his own voice, he was ready to talk on any pre- 
 tense, he spun out endless reels of cut-and-dried phrases, 
 which were accepted as eloquence among the superior citizens 
 of Arcis. The poor fellow was one of the class of bores who 
 have an explanation for everything, even for the simplest 
 matters. He would explain the rain ; the causes of the Revo- 
 lution of July; he would also explain things that were inex- 
 plicable he would explain Louis-Philippe, Monsieur CKlilon 
 Barrot, Monsieur Thiers ; he explained the Eastern Question ; 
 the state of the province of Champagne; he explained 1789, 
 the custom-house tariff, the views of humanitarians, mag- 
 netism, and the distribution of the civil list. 
 
 This young man, who was lean and bilious-looking, and 
 tall enough to account for his sonorous emptiness for a tall 
 man is rarely remarkable for distinguished gifts caricatured 
 the puritanism of the Extreme Left, whose members are all so 
 precise, after the fashion of a prude who has some intrigue to 
 conceal. 
 
 The first sound of the door-bell, announcing the advent of 
 the more important electors, made the ambitious youth's heart 
 beat with vague alarms. Simon did not deceive himself as to 
 the cleverness or the vast resources at the command of old 
 Gr6vin, nor as to the effect of the heroic measures that would 
 be taken by the Ministry to support the interests of the 'brave 
 young officer at that time in Africa on the staff of the prince 
 who was the son of one of the great citizen-lords of France, 
 and the nephew of a mar6chale. 
 
 ' I really think I have the colic," said he to his father. " I
 
 TffE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S. 13 
 
 have a sickly burning just over the pit of my stomach, which 
 I do not at all like " * 
 
 "The oldest soldiers," replied the colonel, "felt just the 
 same when the guns opened fire at the beginning of a bat- 
 tle." 
 
 " What will it be, then, in the Chamber ! " exclaimed the 
 lawyer. 
 
 "The Comte de Gondreville has told us," the old soldier 
 went on, " that more than one speaker is liable to the little 
 discomforts which we old leather-breeches were used to feel 
 at the beginning of a fight. And all for a few empty words ! 
 But, dear me, you want to be a deputy," added the old man, 
 with a shrug. " Be a deputy ! " 
 
 "The triumph, father, will be Cicile ! C6cile is enor- 
 mously rich, and in these days money is power." 
 
 " Well, well, times have changed ! In the Emperor's time 
 it was bravery that was needed." 
 
 "Every age may be summed up in a word ! " said Simon, 
 repeating a remark of the old Comte de Gondreville's, which 
 was thoroughly characteristic of the man. " Under the Em- 
 pire to ruin a man you said : ' He is a coward ! ' Nowadays 
 we say : * He is a swindler.' " 
 
 " Unhappy France, what have you come to ! " cried the 
 colonel. " I will go back to my roses." 
 
 "No, no, stay here, father. You are the keystone of the 
 arch ! " 
 
 The first to appear was the mayor, Monsieur Phil6as Beau- 
 visage, and with him came his father-in-law's successor, the 
 busiest notary in the town, Achille Pigoult, the grandson of 
 an old man who had been justice of the peace at Arcis all 
 through the Revolution, the Empire, and the early days of 
 the Restoration. Achille Pigoult, a man of about two-and- 
 thirty, had been old Grvin's clerk for eighteen years, with- 
 out a hope of getting an office as notary. His father, the old
 
 14 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 justice's son, had failed badly in business, and died of an 
 apoplexy so called. Then the Comte de Gondreville, on 
 whom old Pigoult had some claims outstanding from 1793, 
 had lent the necessary security, and so enabled the grandson 
 to purchase Grevin's office ; the old justice of the peace had, 
 in fact, conducted the preliminary inquiry in the Simeuse 
 case. So Achille had established himself in a house in the 
 Church Square belonging to the count, and let at so low a 
 rent that it was easy to perceive how anxious the wily poli- 
 tician was to keep a hold over the chief notary of the town. 
 
 This young Pigoult, a lean little man, with eyes that seemed 
 to pierce the green spectacles which did not mitigate their 
 cunning expression, and fully informed of everybody's con- 
 cerns in the district, had acquired a certain readiness of speech 
 from the habit of- talking on business, and was supposed to 
 be a great wag, simply because he spoke out with rather more 
 wit than the natives had at their command. He was still a 
 bachelor, looking forward to making some good match by the 
 intervention of his two patrons GreVin and the Comte de 
 Gondreville. And Lawyer Giguet could not repress a start of 
 surprise when he saw Achille as a satellite to Monsieur Philas 
 Beauvisage. 
 
 The man's entire self-satisfaction passed, however, for benev- 
 olence and friendliness, all the more readily because he had a 
 style of speech of his own, marked by the most extravagant 
 use of polite phraseology. He always " had the honor " to in- 
 quire after the health of a friend, he invariably added the 
 adjectives dear, good, excellent ; and he was prodigal of compli- 
 mentary phrases on every occasion of the minor grievances or 
 pleasures of life. Thus, under a deluge of commonplace, he 
 concealed his utter incapacity, his lack of education, and a 
 vacillating nature which can only find adequate description in 
 the old-fashioned word weathercock. But then this weather- 
 cock had for its pinion handsome Madame Beauvisage, Sever- 
 ine Grevin, the notable lady of the district.
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC/S. IS 
 
 When Sdverine had heard of what she was pleased to call 
 her husband's freak a propos to the election, she had said to 
 him that very morning : 
 
 "You did not do badly by asserting your independence; 
 but you must not go to the meeting at the Giguets' without 
 taking Achille Pigoult ; I have sent to tell him to call for 
 you." 
 
 Now sending Achille Pigoult to keep an eye on Beauvisage 
 was tantamount to sending a spy from the Gondreville faction 
 to attend the Giguets' meeting. So it is easy to imagine what 
 a grimace twisted Simon's puritanical features when he found 
 himself extending a civil welcome to a regular visitor in his 
 aunt's drawing-room, and an influential elector, in whom he 
 scented an enemy. 
 
 " Ah ! " thought he to himself, " I was a fool when I re- 
 fused the security money he asked me to lend him ! Old 
 Gondreville was sharper than I. Good-day, Achille," he said 
 aloud, with an air of ease. " You will give me a tough job 
 or two." 
 
 " Your meeting is not a conspiracy against the independence 
 of our votes, I suppose," replied the notary with a smile. 
 " We are playing aboveboard ? " 
 
 " Aboveboard ! " repeated Beauvisage. 
 
 And the mayor laughed that meaningless laugh with which 
 some men end every sentence, and which might be called the 
 burden of their song. Then Monsieur le Maire assumed what 
 we may call his third position, fullface, and very upright, 
 with his hands behind his back. He was in a whole suit of 
 black, with a highly decorated white vest, open so as to show 
 a glimpse of two diamond studs worth several thousand francs. 
 
 " We will fight it out, and be none the worse friends," 
 Phileas went on. "That'is the essential feature of constitu- 
 tional institutions. Hah, ha, ha ! That is my notion of the 
 alliance between the monarchy and liberty. He, he, he ! " 
 
 Thereupon the mayor took Simon by the hand, saying
 
 16 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 "And how are you, my dear friend? Your dear aunt and 
 the worthy colonel are, no doubt, as well to-day as they were 
 yesterday at least we may presume that they are. Eh, eh ! 
 A little put out, perhaps, by the ceremony we are preparing 
 for, perhaps. So, so! Young man" (yong maan, he said), 
 "we are starting in our political career? Ah, ha, ha! This 
 is our first step! We must never draw back it is a strong 
 measure ! Ay, and I would rather you than I should rush 
 into the tempests of the Chamber. He, he ! pleasing as it 
 may be to find the sovereign power of France embodied in 
 one's own person he, he ! one four-hundred-and-fifty-third 
 part of it he, he ! " 
 
 There was a pleasant fullness in Philias Beauvisage's voice 
 that corresponded admirably with the gourd-like rotundity of 
 his face and its hue as of a pale buff pumpkin, his round 
 back, and broad protuberant person. His voice, as deep and 
 mellow as a 'cello, had the velvety quality of a baritone, and 
 the laugh with which he ended every sentence had a silvery 
 ring. 
 
 " I admire the devotion of men who can throw themselves 
 into the storms of political life," he went on. "He, he, he ! 
 You need a nerve that I cannot boast of. Who would have 
 said in 1812 in 1813 even that this was what we were 
 coming to? For my part, I am prepared for anything, now 
 that asphalt and india-rubber, railways and steam, are meta- 
 morphosing the ground under our feet, our greatcoats, and 
 the length of distances. Ha, ha ! " 
 
 It is, no doubt, superfluous to add that Philias was regarded 
 at Arcis as an agreeable and charming man. 
 
 "I will endeavor," said Simon Giguet, "to be a worthy 
 representative " 
 
 "Of the sheep of Champagne-," said Achille Pigoult 
 quickly, interrupting his friend. 
 
 The aspirant took the irony without replying, for he had to 
 go forward and receive two more electors. One was the
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 17 
 
 owner of the Mulct, the best inn of the town, situated in the 
 market square, at the corner of the Rue de Brienne. This 
 worthy innkeeper, whose name was Poupart, had married the 
 sister of a man in the Comtesse de Cinq-Cygne's service, the 
 notorious Gothard, who had figured at the great trial. Now 
 Gothard had been acquitted. Poupart, though he was of all the 
 townsfolk one of the most devoted to the Cinq-Cygnes, had, 
 two days since, been so diligently and so cleverly wheedled by 
 Colonel Giguet's servant, that lie fancied he would be doing 
 their enemy an ill turn by bringing all his influence to bear 
 on the election of Simon Giguet ; and he had just been talk- 
 ing to this effect to a chemist named Fromaget, who, as he 
 was not employed by the Gondreville family, was very ready 
 to plot against the Kellers. These two men, important among 
 the lower middle-class, could control a certain number of 
 doubtful votes, for they were the advisers of several electors 
 to whom the political opinions of the candidates were a matter 
 of indifference. 
 
 Simon, therefore, took Poupart in hand, leaving Fromaget 
 to his father, who had just come in, and was greeting those 
 who had arrived. 
 
 The deputy inspector of public works of the district, the 
 secretary to the mairie, four bailiffs, three attorneys, the clerk 
 of assize, and the justice's clerk, the revenue collector, and the 
 registrar, two doctors old Varlet's rivals, Grevin's brother- 
 in-law a miller named Laurent Coussard, leader of the Re- 
 publican party at Arcis the mayor's two deputies, the book- 
 seller and printer of the place, and a dozen or so of townsfolk 
 came in by degrees, and then walked about the garden in 
 groups while waiting till the company should be numerous 
 enough to hold the meeting. 
 
 Finally, by twelve o'clock, about fifty men in their Sunday 
 
 attire, most of them having come out of curiosity to see the 
 
 fine rooms of which so much had been said in the district, 
 
 were seated in the chairs arranged for them by Madame 
 
 2
 
 18 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 Marion. The windows were left open, and the silence was 
 presently so complete that the rustle of a silk dress could be 
 heard ; for Madame Marion could not resist the temptation 
 to go out into the garden and sit where she could hear what 
 was going on. The cook, the housemaid, and the manservant 
 remained in the dining-room, fully sharing their masters' feel- 
 ings. 
 
 "Gentlemen," said Simon Giguet, "some of you wish to 
 do my father the honor of placing him in the chair as president 
 of this meeting, but Colonel Giguet desires me to express his 
 acknowledgments and decline it, while deeply grateful to you 
 for the proposal, which he takes as a recompense for his ser- 
 vices to his country. We are under my father's roof, and he 
 feels that he must beg to be excused ; he proposes a merchant 
 of the highest respectability a gentleman on whom your 
 suffrages conferred the mayoralty of this town Monsieur 
 Phildas Beauvisage." 
 
 "Hear, hear!" 
 
 "We are, I believe, agreed that in this meeting purely 
 friendly, and perfectly free, without prejudice in any way to 
 the great preliminary meeting, when it will be your business 
 to question your candidates and weigh their merits we are 
 agreed, I say, to follow the forms the constitutional forms 
 of the elective Chamber ! " 
 
 " Yes, yes ! " unanimously. 
 
 "Therefore," said Simon, "I have the honor, speaking in 
 the name of all present, to request Monsieur the Mayor to 
 take the president's chair." 
 
 Phileas rose and crossed the room, feeling himself turn as 
 red as a cherry. When he found himself behind the tea-table, 
 he saw not a hundred eyes, but a hundred thousand lights. 
 The sunshine seemed to put the room in a blaze, and, to use 
 his own words, his throat was full of salt. 
 
 " Return thanks ! " murmured Simon in his ear. 
 
 "Gentlemen "
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 19 
 
 The silence was so alarming that Phileas felt his heart in his 
 mouth. 
 
 " What am I to say, Simon ? " he whispered. 
 
 " Well ? " said Achille Pigoult.* 
 
 "Gentlemen," said Simon, prompted by the little notary's 
 spiteful interjection, " the honor you have done the mayor 
 may have startled without surprising him." 
 
 " It is so," said Beauvisage. " lam too much overpowered 
 by this compliment from my fellow-citizens not to be exces- 
 sively flattered." 
 
 "Hear, hear! " cried the notary only. 
 
 "The devil may take me," said Beauvisage to himself, " if 
 I am ever caught again to make speeches ! " 
 
 " Will Monsieur Fromaget and Monsieur Matcelin accept 
 the functions of tellers?" asked Simon. 
 
 " It would be more in order," said Achille Pigoult, rising, 
 " if the meeting were to elect the two members who support 
 the chair in imitation of the Chamber." 
 
 1* It would be far better," observed Monsieur Mollot, an 
 enormous man, clerk of the assizes, " otherwise the whole 
 business will be a farce, and we shall not be really free. 
 There would be no just cause why the whole of the proceed- 
 ings should not be regulated as Monsieur Simon might dic- 
 tate." 
 
 Simon muttered a few words to Beauvisage, who rose, and 
 was presently delivered of the word, "Gentlemen ! " which 
 might be described as of thrilling interest. 
 
 "Allow me, Mr. President," said Achille Pigoult; "it is 
 your part to preside, not to discuss." 
 
 "Gentlemen," said Beauvisage again, prompted by Simon, 
 " if we are to to conform to to parliamentary usage I 
 would beg the Honorable Monsieur Pigoult to to come and 
 speak from the table this table." 
 
 Pigoult started forward and stood by the tea-table, his fin- 
 * Grandson of Pigoult, in "A Historical Mystery."
 
 20 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 gers lightly resting on the edge, and showed his sublim* 
 courage by speaking most fluently almost like the great 
 Monsieur Thiers. 
 
 "Gentlemen, it was not I who proposed that we should 
 imitate the Chamber ; till now it has always appeared to me 
 that the Chambers are truly inimitable. At the same time, it 
 was self-evident that a meeting of sixty-odd notables of Cham- 
 pagne must select a president, for no sheep can move without 
 a shepherd. If we had voted by ballot, I am quite sure our 
 esteemed mayor would have been unanimously elected. His 
 antagonism to the candidate put forward by his relations 
 shows that he possesses civic courage in no ordinary degree, 
 since he can shake off the strongest ties those of family con- 
 nection. 
 
 " To set public interest above family feeling is so great an 
 effort, that, to achieve it, we are always obliged to remind 
 ourselves that Brutus, from his tribune, has looked down on 
 us for two thousand five hundred odd years. It seemed quite 
 natural to Maitre Giguet who was so clever as to divine our 
 wishes with regard to the choice of a chairman to guide us 
 in our selection of the tellers ; but, in response to my remark, 
 you thought that once was enough, and you were right. Our 
 common friend, Simon Giguet, who is, in fact, to appear as a. 
 candidate, would appear too much as the master of the situa- 
 tion, and would then lose that high place in our opinion 
 which his venerable father has secured by his diffidence. 
 
 " Now, what is our worthy chairman doing by accepting 
 the presidency on the lines suggested to him by the candi- 
 date ? Why, he is robbing us of our liberty. And, I ask 
 you, is it seemly that the chairman of our choice should call 
 upon us to vote, by rising and sitting, for the two tellers ? 
 Gentlemen, that would be a choice already made. Should we 
 be free to choose ? Can a man sit still when his neighbor 
 stands? If I were proposed, every one would rise, I believe, 
 out of politeness ; and so, as all would rise for each one in
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. ffl 
 
 turn, there would be simply no choice when every one had 
 voted for every one else." 
 
 "Very true ! " said the sixty listeners. 
 
 "Well, then, let each of us write two names on a voting- 
 paper, and then those who take their seats on each side of the 
 chairman may regard themselves as ornaments to the meeting. 
 They will be qualified, conjointly with the chairman, to decide 
 on the majority when we vote by rising and sitting on any 
 resolution to be passed. 
 
 " We have met, I believe, to promise the candidate such 
 support as we can command at the preliminary meeting, at 
 which every elector in the district will be present. This I 
 pronounce to be a solemn occasion. Are we not voting for 
 the four-hundredth part of the governing power, as Monsieur 
 le Maire told us just now with the appropriate and character- 
 istic wit that we so highly appreciate ? " 
 
 During this address Colonel Giguet had been cutting a 
 sheet of paper into strips, and Simon sent for an inkstand and 
 pens. There was a pause. 
 
 This introductory discussion had greatly disturbed Simon 
 and aroused the attention of the sixty worthies in convocation. 
 In a few minutes they were all busy writing the names, and 
 the cunning Pigoult gave it out that the votes were in favor of 
 Monsieur Mollot, clerk of assize, and Monsieur Godivet, the 
 registrar. These two nominations naturally displeased Fro- 
 maget the druggist and Marcelin the attorney. 
 
 "You have been of service," said Achille Pigoult, "by 
 enabling us to assert our independence ; you may be prouder 
 of being rejected than you could have been of being chosen." 
 
 Everybody laughed. Simon Giguet restored silence by 
 asking leave of the chairman to speak. Beauvisage was 
 already damp with perspiration, but he summoned all his 
 courage to say 
 
 "Monsieur Simon Giguet will address the meeting." 
 
 "Gentlemen," said the candidate, "allow me first to thank
 
 22 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 Monsieur Achilla Pigoult, who, although our meeting is a 
 strictly friendly one " 
 
 "Is preparatory to the great preliminary meeting," Mar- 
 celin put in. 
 
 "I was about to say so," Simon went on. "In the first 
 place, I beg to thank Monsieur Achille Pigoult for having 
 proceeded on strictly parliamentary lines. To-day, for the 
 first time, the district of Arcis will make free use " 
 
 "Free use ! " said Pigoult, interrupting the orator. 
 
 " Free use ! " cried the assembly. 
 
 " Free use," repeated Simon, " of the right of voting in the 
 great contest of the general election of a deputy to be re- 
 turned to Parliament ; and as, in a few days, we shall have a 
 meeting, to which every elector is invited, to form an opinion 
 of the candidates, we may think ourselves fortunate to acquire 
 here, on a small scale, some practice in the customs of such 
 meetings. We shall be all the forwarder as to a decision on 
 the political prospects of the town of Arcis ; for what we have 
 to do to-day is to consider the town instead of a family, the 
 country instead of a man." 
 
 He went on to sketch the history of the elections for the 
 past twenty years. While approving of the repeated election 
 of Francois Keller, he said that now the time had come for 
 shaking off the yoke of the Gondrevilles. Arcis could not be 
 a fief of the Liberals any more than it could be a fief of the 
 Cinq-Cygnes. Advanced opinions were making their way in 
 France, and Charles Keller did not represent them. Charles 
 Keller, now a viscount, was a courtier ; he could never be truly 
 independent, since, in proposing him as a candidate for elec- 
 tion, it was done more with a view to fitting him to succeed 
 his father as a peer than as a deputy to the Lower Chamber 
 and so forth, and so forth. Finally, Simon begged to offer 
 himself as a candidate for their suffrages, pledging himself to 
 sit under the wing of the illustrious Odilon Barrot, and never 
 to desert the glorious standard of Progress. Progress ! a
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARClS. 23 
 
 word behind which, at that time, more insincere ambitions 
 took shelter than definite ideas; for, after 1830, it could only 
 stand for the pretensions of certain hungry democrats. 
 
 Still, the word had much effect in Arcis, and lent importance 
 to any man who wrote it on his flag. A man who announced 
 himself as a partisan of Progress was a philosopher in all ques- 
 tions, and politically a Puritan. He was in favor of railways, 
 macintoshes, penitentiaries, negro emancipation, savings- 
 banks, seamless shoes, gas-lighting, asphalt pavements, uni- 
 versal suffrage, and the reduction of the civil list. It was 
 also a pronouncement of opposition to the treaties of 1815, to 
 the Elder Branch (the Bourbons), to the Giant of the North, 
 "perfidious Albion," and to every undertaking, good or bad, 
 inaugurated by the Government. As may be seen, the word 
 Progress can stand equally well for black or white. It was a 
 furbishing up of the word Liberalism, a new rallying-cry for 
 new ambitions. 
 
 "If I rightly understand what we are here for," said Jean 
 Violette, a stocking-weaver, who had, two years since, bought 
 the Beauvisage business, " we are to bind ourselves to secure, 
 by every means in our power, the return of Monsieur Simon 
 Giguet at the election as deputy for Arcis in the place of 
 the Count Francois Keller. And if we are all agreed to com- 
 bine to that end, we have only to say YES or No to that ques- 
 tion." 
 
 " That is going much too fast. Political matters are not 
 managed in that way, or they would cease to be politics ! " 
 cried Pigoult, as his grandfather, a man of eighty-jjix, came 
 into the room. " The last speaker pronounces a decision on 
 what is, in my humble opinion, the very subject under discus- 
 sion. I beg to speak." 
 
 " Monsieur Achille Pigoult will address the meeting," said 
 Beauvisage, who could now get through this sentence with due 
 municipal and constitutional dignity. 
 
 "Gentlemen," said the little notary, "if there be in all
 
 J4 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 Arcis a house where no opposition ought to be made to the 
 influence of the Comte de Gondreville and the Keller family, 
 is it not this ? The worthy colonel Colonel Giguet is the 
 only member of this household who has not experienced the 
 benefits of senatorial influence, since he never asked anything 
 of the Comte de Gondreville, who, however, had his name 
 erased from the list of exiles in 1815, and secured him the 
 pension he enjoys, without any steps on the part of the colonel, 
 who is the pride of our town " 
 
 A murmur, flattering to the old man, ran through the 
 crowd. 
 
 " But," the orator went on, " the Marion family are loaded 
 with the count's favors. But for his patronage the late Col- 
 onel Giguet never would have had the command of the Gen- 
 darmes of this department. The late Monsieur Marion would 
 not have been presiding judge of the Imperial Court here but 
 for the count to whom I, for my part, am eternally indebted. 
 You will therefore understand how natural it is that I should 
 take his part in this room. And, in fact, there are few per- 
 sons in this district who have not received some kindness from 
 that family." 
 
 There was a stir among the audience. 
 
 "A candidate comes forward," Achille went on with some 
 vehemence, " and I have a right to inquire into his past before 
 I intrust him with power to act for me. Now, I will not 
 accept ingratitude in my delegate, for ingratitude is like mis- 
 fortune it leads from bad to worse. We have been a stepping- 
 stone for the Kellers, you will say ; well, what I have just lis- 
 tened to makes me fear that we may become a stepping-stone 
 for the Giguets. We live in an age of facts, do we not? 
 Well, then, let us inquire what will be the results for the 
 electors of Arcis if we return Simon Giguet ? 
 
 "Independence is your cry? Well, Simon, whom I am 
 scouting as a candidate, is my friend as he is the friend of 
 all who hear me and personally I should be delighted to see
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 25 
 
 him as an orator of the Left, between Garnier-Pages and Laf- 
 fitte ; but what will be the result for the district represented? 
 It will have lost the countenance of the Comte de Gondreville 
 and the Kellers, and in the course of five years we shall all 
 feel the want of one or the other. If we want to get leave for 
 a poor fellow who is drawn for the conscription, we apply to 
 the Mardchale de Carigliano. We rely on the Kellers' interest 
 in many matters of business which their good word settles at 
 once. We have always found the old Comte de Gondreville 
 kind and helpful ; if you belong to Arcis, you are shown in 
 without being kept waiting. Those three families know every 
 family in the place. But where is the Maison Giguet's bank, 
 and what influence has it on the ministry? What credit does 
 it command in the Paris markets? If we want to have a good 
 stone bridge in the place of our wretched timber one, will the 
 Giguets extract the necessary funds from the department and 
 the State? 
 
 " If we return Charles Keller, we shall perpetuate a bond of 
 alliance and friendship which till now has been entirely to 
 our advantage. By electing my good, my excellent friend 
 and schoolfellow Simon Giguet, we shall be constantly the 
 worse till he is in office ! And I know his modesty too well 
 to think that he will contradict me when I express a doubt as 
 to his rapid advancement to the ministry ! {Laughter.} 
 
 "I came to this meeting to oppose a resolution which, I 
 think, would be fatal to our district. ' Charles Keller is a 
 courtier,' I am told. So much the better. We shall not 
 have to pay for his political apprenticeship ; he knows all the 
 business of the place and the requirements of parliamentary 
 etiquette ; he is more nearly a statesman than my friend 
 Simon, who does not pretend, indeed, th'at he has trained 
 himself to be a Pitt or a Talleyrand in our little town of 
 Arcis-sur- Aube ' ' 
 
 " Danton was a native of Arcis !" cried Colonel Giguet, 
 furious at this harangue, which was only too truthful.
 
 26 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 A. 
 "Hear, hear / " The word was shouted, and sixty listeners 
 
 clapped the speaker. 
 
 "My father is very ready," said Simon in an undertone to 
 Beauvisage. 
 
 " I cannot understand why, in discussing an election matter, 
 there should be so much exaggeration of any ties between us 
 and the Comte de Gondreville," the old colonel went on, 
 starting to his feet, while the blood mounted to his face. 
 "My son inherits his fortune from his mother; he never 
 asked the Comte de Gondreville for anything. If the count 
 had never existed, my son would have been just what he is 
 the son of an artillery colonel who owes his promotion to his 
 services a lawyer who has always held the same opinions. I 
 would say to the Comte de Gondreville himself: ' We have 
 elected your son-in-law for twenty years. Now we wish to 
 prove that when we did so it was of our own free-will, and we 
 are returning an Arcis man to show that the old spirit of 1793 
 to which you owed your fortune still lives on the native 
 
 soil of Danton, Malin, Gr6vin, Pigoult, Marion And 
 
 so ' " 
 
 The old man sat down. 
 
 There was a great commotion. Achille opened his mouth 
 to speak. Beauvisage, who would not have felt himself pre- 
 siding if he had not rung his bell, added to the racket by 
 ringing for silence. It was by this time two o'clock. 
 
 "I must be permitted to point out to the honored colonel, 
 whose feelings we can all understand, that he spoke without 
 authority from the chair, which is contrary to parliamentary 
 usage," said Achille Pigoult. 
 
 "I see no necessity for calling the colonel to order," said 
 Beauvisage. "As a father " 
 
 Silence was restored. 
 
 "We did not come here," said Fromaget, " to say Amen 
 to everything put forward by the Giguets, father and son, 
 and "
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 27 
 
 "No, no ! " cried the audience. 
 
 "This looks badly ! " said Madame Marion to the cook. 
 
 "Gentlemen," said Achille, "I will confine myself to ask- 
 ing my friend Simon Giguet to set forth categorically what he 
 proposes to do to further our interests." 
 
 "Yes, yes!" 
 
 "And when, may I ask," said Simon Giguet, "did good 
 citizens like the men of Arcis first begin to make the sacred 
 mission of a deputy a matter of bargaining and business?" 
 
 It is impossible to overestimate the effect of fine sentiment 
 on a crowd. Noble maxims are always applauded, and the 
 humiliation of the country voted for all the same ; just as a 
 jail-bird, who yearns for the punishment of Robert Macaire 
 when he sees the play, will nevertheless murder the first Mon- 
 sieur Germeuil who comes in his way. 
 
 "Hear, hear ! " cried some thorough-going partisans. 
 
 " If you send me to the Chamber, it will be to represent 
 your principles the principles of 1789 to be a cipher, if 
 you will, of the Opposition ; but to vote with it, to enlighten 
 the Government, to make war against abuses, and insist on 
 progress in all particulars " 
 
 " But what do you call progress? Our notion of progress 
 would be to bring all this part of the country under cultiva- 
 tion," said Fromaget. 
 
 "Progress? I will explain to you what I mean by prog, 
 ress," cried Giguet, provoked by the interruption. 
 
 " It is the Rhine-frontier for France," said Colonel Giguet, 
 "and the treaties of 1815 torn across." 
 
 " It is keeping up the price of wheat and keeping down the 
 price of bread !" said Pigoult mockingly, and uttering in 
 jest one of the nonsensical cries which France believes in. 
 
 " It is the happiness of the multitude achieved by the 
 triumph of humanitarian doctrines." 
 
 "What did I tell you?" the wily notary muttered to his 
 neighbors.
 
 28 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 " Hush, silence we want to hear ! " said some. 
 
 " Gentlemen," said Mollot, with a fat smile, " the debate 
 is noisy ; give your attention to the speaker ; allow him to 
 explain " 
 
 " Ba-a-a, ba-a-aa," bleated a friend of Achille's, who was 
 gifted with a power of ventriloquism that was invaluable at 
 elections. 
 
 A roar of laughter burst from the audience, who were essen- 
 tially men of their province. Simon Giguet folded his arms 
 and waited till the storm of merriment should be over. 
 
 " If that was intended as a reproof," he said, "a hint that 
 I was marching with the flock of those noble defenders of the 
 rights of man, who cry out, who write book after book of 
 the immortal priest who pleads for murdered Poland of the 
 bold pamphleteers of those who keep an eye on the civil 
 list of the philosophers who cry out for honesty in the action 
 of our institutions if so, I thank my unknown friend. To 
 me progress means the realization of all that was promised us 
 at the Revolution of July ; electoral reform and " 
 
 " Then you are a democrat," interrupted Achille Pigoult. 
 
 " No," replied the candidate. " Am I a democrat because 
 I aim at a regular and legal development of our institutions? 
 To me progress is fraternity among all the members of the 
 great French family, and we cannot deny that much suffer- 
 ing " 
 
 At three o'clock Simon Giguet was still explaining the 
 meaning of progress, and some of the audience were emitting 
 steady snores expressive of deep slumbers. 
 
 Achille Pigoult had artfully persuaded them to listen in re- 
 ligious silence to the speaker, who was sinking, drowning, in 
 his endless phrases and parentheses. 
 
 At that hour several groups of citizens, electors, and non- 
 electors were standing about in front of the Chateau d'Arcis. 
 The gate opens on to the place at a right angle to that of
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 29 
 
 Madame Marion's house. Several streets turn out of this 
 square, and in the middle of it stands a covered market. 
 Opposite the castle, on the farther side of the square, which 
 is neither paved nor macadamized, so that the rain runs off in 
 little gullies, there is a fine avenue known as the Avenue des 
 Soupirs (of Sighs). Is this to the honor or the discredit of the 
 women of the town ? The ambiguity is, no doubt, a local 
 witticism. 
 
 While the discussion was at its height, to which Achille 
 Pigoult had given a dramatic turn, with a coolness and dex- 
 terity worthy of a member of the real Parliament, four men 
 were pacing one of the lime-walks of the Avenue dcs Soupirs. 
 When they came to the square they stopped with one accord 
 to watch the townsfolk, who were buzzing round the castle 
 like bees going into a hive at dusk. These four were the 
 whole Ministerial party of Arcis : the sub-prefect, the public 
 prosecutor, his deputy, and Monsieur Martener, the examin- 
 ing judge. 
 
 " Well, I cannot understand what the Government is 
 about," the sub- prefect declared, pointing to the growing 
 crowd. "The position is serious, and I am left without any 
 instructions." 
 
 " In that you are like many other people," said Olivier 
 Vinet, smiling. 
 
 "What complaint have you against the Government?" 
 asked the public prosecutor. 
 
 "The ministry is in a difficulty," said young Martener. 
 " It is well known that this borough belongs, so to speak, to 
 the Kellers, and it has no wish to annoy them. Some con- 
 sideration must be shown to the only man who can at all 
 compare with Monsieur de Talleyrand. It is to the Comte 
 de Gondreville that the police should go for instructions, not 
 to the prefect." 
 
 "And meanwhile," said Frederic Marest, " the Opposition 
 is making a stir, and you see that Colonel Giguet's influence
 
 SO THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 is strong. The mayor, Monsieur Beauvisagc, is in the chair 
 at this preliminary meeting." 
 
 "After all," said Olivier Vinet slily to the sub-prefect, 
 "Simon Giguet is a friend of yours, a schoolfellow. Even 
 if he were a supporter of Monsieur Thiers, you would lose 
 nothing by his being elected." 
 
 "The present ministry might turn me out before its fall. 
 We may know when we are likely to be kicked out, but we 
 can never tell when we may get in again," said Antonin 
 Goulard. 
 
 " There goes Collinet the grocer. He is the sixty-seventh 
 qualified elector who has gone into Colonel Giguet's house," 
 said Monsieur Martener, fulfilling his functions as examining 
 judge by counting the electors. 
 
 "If Charles Keller is the Ministerial candidate, I ought 
 to have been informed," said Goulard. "Time ought not 
 to have been given for Simon Giguet to get hold of the 
 voters. ' ' 
 
 The four gentlemen walked on slowly to where the avenues 
 end at the market-place. 
 
 "There comes Monsieur Groslier ! " said the judge, seeing 
 a man on horseback. 
 
 The horseman was the superintendent of the police. He 
 saw the governing body of Arcis assembled on the highway, 
 and rode up to the four functionaries. 
 
 "Well, Monsieur Groslier?" questioned the sub-prefect, 
 meeting him at a few paces from the other three. 
 
 "Monsieur," said the police-officer in a low voice, "Mon- 
 sieur le Prefet sent me to tell you some very sad news the 
 Vicomte Charles Keller is dead. The news reached Paris by 
 telegraph the day before yesterday ; and the two Messieurs 
 Keller, the Comte de Gondreville, the Mardchale de Carig- 
 liano, in fact, all the family, came yesterday to Gondreville. 
 Abd-el-Kader has reopened the fighting in Africa, and there 
 has been some every hot work. The poor young man was
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S. 31 
 
 one of the first victims to the war. You will receive con- 
 fidental instructions, I was told to say, with regard to the 
 election." 
 
 " Through whom ? " asked Goulard. 
 
 "If I knew, it would cease to be confidential," replied 
 the other. "Monsieur le Prefet himself did not know. ' It 
 would be,' he said, 'a private communication to you from the 
 minister.' " 
 
 And he went on his way, while the proud and happy 
 official laid a finger to his lips to impress on him to be 
 secret. 
 
 " What news from the prefecture ? " asked the public prose- 
 cutor when Goulard returned to join the other three func- 
 tionaries. 
 
 "Nothing more satisfactory," replied Antonin, hurrying 
 on as if to be rid of his companions. 
 
 As they made their way toward the middle of the square, 
 saying little, for the three officials were somewhat nettled by 
 the hasty pace assumed by the sub-prefect, Monsieur Mactener 
 saw old Madame Beauvisage, Phileas' mother, surrounded by 
 almost all the people who had gathered there, and apparently 
 telling them some long story. An attorney named Sinot, 
 whose clients were the royalists of the town and district, and 
 who had not gone to the Giguet meeting, stepped out of the 
 crowd, and, hurrying up to Madame Marion's house, rang the 
 bell violently. 
 
 "What is the matter?" asked Frederic Marest, dropping 
 his eyeglass, and informing the other two of this proceeding. 
 
 "The matter, gentlemen," replied Antonin Goulard, see- 
 ing no occasion for keeping a secret which would at once be 
 told by others, " is that Charles Keller has been killed in 
 Africa, an event which gives Simon Giguet every chance ! 
 You know Arcis ; there could be no Ministerial candidate 
 other than Charles Keller. Parochial patriotism would rise 
 in arms against any other "
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 "And will such a simpleton be elected?" asked Olivier 
 Vinet,* laughing. 
 
 The judge's deputy, a young fellow of three-and-twenty, 
 the eldest son of a very famous public prosecutor, whose pro- 
 motion dated from the Revolution of July, had, of course, 
 been helped by his father's interest to get into the upper ranks 
 of his profession. That father, still a public prosecutor, and 
 returned as deputy by the town of Provins, is one of the but- 
 tresses of the Centre. 
 
 The free-and-easy air, and the sort of judicial conceit as- 
 sumed by this little personage on the strength of his certainty 
 of "getting on," annoyed Frederic Marest, and all the more 
 because a very biting wit effectually supported his young 
 subaltern's undisciplined freedom. The public prosecutor 
 himself, a man of forty, who had waited six years under the 
 Restoration to rise to the post of first deputy judge, and whom 
 the Revolution of July had left stranded at Arcis, though he 
 had eighteen thousand francs a year of his own, was always 
 torn between his anxiety to win the good graces of the elder 
 Vinet, who had every chance of becoming keeper of the 
 seals an office commonly conferred on a lawyer who sits in 
 Parliament and the necessity for preserving his own dignity. 
 Olivier Vinet, a thin stripling, with fair hair and a colorless 
 face, accentuated by a pair of mischievous greenish eyes, was 
 one of those mocking spirits, fond of pleasure, who can at any 
 moment assume the precise, pedantic, and rather abrupt man- 
 ner which a magistrate puts on when in court. 
 
 The burly public prosecutor, very stout and solemn, had, 
 for a short time past, adopted a method by which, as he 
 hoped, to get the upper hand of this distracting youth ; he 
 treated him as a father treats a spoilt child. 
 
 " Olivier," said he to his deputy, patting him on the 
 shoulder, "a man as clear-sighted as you are must see that 
 Maitre Giguet is likely enough to be elected. You might 
 
 * Fraisicr's rival in " Cousin Pons."
 
 THE LEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 33 
 
 have blurted out that speech before the townsfolk instead of 
 among friends." 
 
 "But there is one thing against Giguet," remarked Mon- 
 sieur Martener. 
 
 This worthy young fellow, dull, but with very capable 
 brains, the son of a doctor at Provins, owed his position to 
 Vinet's father, who, during the long years when he had been 
 a pleader at Provins, had patronized the townsfolk there as 
 the Comte de Gondreville did those of Arcis. 
 
 "What?" asked Antonin. 
 
 "Parochial feeling is tremendously strong against a man 
 who is forced on the electors," replied the judge ; " but when, 
 in a place like Arcis, the alternative is the elevation of one of 
 their equals, jealousy and envy get the upper hand even of 
 local feeling." 
 
 "That seems simple enough," said the public prosecutor, 
 "but it is perfectly true. If you could secure only fifty Min- 
 isterial votes, you would not unlikely find the first favorite 
 here," and he glanced at Antonin Goulard. 
 
 " It will be enough to set up a candidate of the same calibre 
 to oppose Simon Giguet," said Olivier Vinet. 
 
 The sub-prefect's face betrayed such satisfaction as could 
 not escape the eye of either of his companions, with whom, 
 indeed, he was on excellent terms. Bachelors all, and all 
 well to do, they had without premeditation formed a defen- 
 sive alliance to defy the dullness of a country town. The 
 other three were already aware of Goulard's jealousy of Giguet, 
 which a few words here will suffice to account for. 
 
 Antonin Goulard, whose father had been a huntsman in the 
 service of the Simeuse family, enriched by investments in 
 nationalized land, was, like Simon Giguet, a native of Arcis. 
 Old Goulard left the Abbey of Valpreux a corruption of 
 Val-des-Preux to live in the town after his wife's death, and 
 sent his son Antonin to school at the Lycee Imperial, where 
 Colonel Giguet had placed his boy. 
 3
 
 54 THE DEPUTY FOR AKCIS. 
 
 In spite of his sufficiently evident personal advantages, and 
 the cross of the Legion of Honor,* which the count had ob- 
 tained for Goulard to compensate him for lack of promotion, 
 and which he displayed at his button-hole, the offer of his heart 
 and prospects had been civilly declined when, six months 
 before the day when this narrative opens, Antonin had se- 
 cretly called on Madame Beauvisage as her daughter's suitor. 
 
 As they walked just now, they both had guessed, and had 
 told each other, the secret of Simon Giguet's candidature, 
 for they had got wind, the night before, of Madame Marion's 
 ambitions. Animated alike by the spirit of the dog in the 
 manger, they were tacitly but heartily agreed in a determi- 
 nation to hinder the young lawyer from winning the wealthy 
 heiress who had been refused to them. 
 
 " Heaven grant that I may be able to control the election ! " 
 said the sub-prefect, "and the Comte de Gondreville may get 
 me appointed prefect, for I have no more wish to remain here 
 than you have, though I am a native born." 
 
 " You have a very good opportunity of being elected 
 deputy, sir," said Olivier Vinet to Marest. " Come and see 
 my father, who will, no doubt, arrive at Provins within a few 
 hours, and we will get him to have you nominated as the 
 Ministerial candidate." 
 
 " Stay where you are," said Goulard. " The ministry has 
 ideas of its own as to its candidate " 
 
 " Pooh ! Why, there are two ministries one that hopes 
 to control the election, and one that means to profit by it," 
 said Vinet. 
 
 " Do not complicate Antonin's difficulties," replied Fred- 
 6ric Marest, with a knowing wink to his deputy. 
 
 The four officials, now far away from the Avenue des 
 Soupirs, crossed the market-place to the Mulct Inn on seeing 
 Poupart come out of Madame Marion's house. At that mo- 
 
 * The Legion of Honor has five ranks : knights, officers, commanders, 
 grand officers, grand-crosses.
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S. 35 
 
 ment, in fact, the sixty-seven conspirators were pouring out 
 of the carriage gate. 
 
 "And you have been into that house?" asked Antonin 
 Goulard, pointing to the wall of the Marions' garden, backing 
 on the Brienne road opposite the stables of the Mulct. 
 
 "And I go there no more, Monsieur le Sous-Prefet," re- 
 turned the innkeeper. " Monsieur Keller's son is dead ; I 
 have nothing more to do with it. God has made it His busi- 
 ness to clear the way " 
 
 "Well, Pigoult?" said Olivier Vinet, seeing the whole of 
 the Opposition coming out from the meeting. 
 
 "Well," echoed the notary, on whose brow the moisture 
 still testified to the energy of his efforts, " Sinot has just 
 brought us news which resulted in unanimity. With the ex- 
 ception of five dissidents Poupart, my grandfather, Mollot, 
 Sinot, and myself they have all sworn, as at a game of tennis, 
 to use every means in their power to secure the return of 
 Simon Giguet of whom I have made a mortal enemy. We 
 all got very heated ! At any rate, I got the Giguets to ful- 
 minate against the Gondrevilles, so the old count will side 
 with me. Not later than to-morrow he shall know what the 
 self-styled patriots of Arcis said about him, and his corruption, 
 and his infamous conduct, so as to shake off his protection, 
 or, as they say, his yoke." 
 
 "And they are unanimous?" said Vinet, with a smile. 
 
 "To-day," replied Monsieur Martener. 
 
 "Oh ! " cried Pigoult, " the general feeling is in favor ot 
 electing a man of the place. Whom can you find to set up 
 in opposition to Simon Giguet, who has spent two mortal 
 hours in preaching on the word Progress ! " 
 
 " We can find old Grevin ! " cried the sub-prefect. 
 
 " He has no ambition," said Pigoult. " But first and fore- 
 most we must consult the count. Just look," he went on, 
 "how attentively Simon is taking care of that old noodle 
 Beauvisage ! "
 
 86 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 And he pointed to the lawyer, who had the mayor by the 
 arm, and was talking in his ear. 
 
 Beauvisage bowed right and left to all the inhabitants, who 
 gazed at him with the deference of country towns-people for 
 the richest man in the place. 
 
 " He treats him as a father and mother ! " remarked Vinet. 
 
 "Oh! he will do no good by buttering him up," replied 
 Pigoult, who caught the hint conveyed in Vinet's retort. 
 " Cecile's fate does not rest with either father or mother." 
 
 "With whom, then?" 
 
 " My old master. If Simon were the member for Arcis, 
 he would be no forwarder in that matter." 
 
 Though the sub-prefect and Marest pressed Pigoult hard, 
 they could get no explanation of this remark, which, as they 
 shrewdly surmised, was big with meaning, and revealed some 
 acquaintance with the intentions of the Beauvisage family. 
 
 All Arcis was in a pother, not only in consequence of the 
 distressing news that had stricken the Gondrevilles, but also 
 because of the great resolution voted at the Giguets' where, 
 at this moment, Madame Marion and the servants were hard 
 at work restoring order, that everything might be in readiness 
 for the company who would undoubtedly drop in as usual -in 
 the evening in full force, attracted by curiosity. 
 
 Champagne looks, and is, but a poor country. Its aspect 
 is for the most part dreary, a dull plain. As you pass through 
 the villages, or even the towns, you see none but shabby 
 buildings of timber or concrete ; the handsomest are of brick. 
 Stone is scarcely used even for public buildings. At Arcis 
 the castle, the Palais de Justice, and the church are the only 
 edifices constructed of stone. Nevertheless, the province 
 or, at any rate, the departments of the Aube, the Marne, and 
 the Haute-Marne, rich in the vineyards which are famous 
 throughout the world also support many flourishing indus- 
 tries. To say nothing of the manufacturing centre at Reims,
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 37 
 
 almost all the hosiery of every kind produced in France, a 
 very considerable trade, is woven in and near Troyes. For 
 ten leagues round the country is inhabited by stocking- 
 weavers, whose frames may be seen through the open doors as 
 you pass through the hamlets. These workers deal through 
 factors with the master speculator, who calls himself a manu- 
 facturer. The manufacturer sells to Paris houses, or, more 
 often, to retail hosiers, who stick up a sign proclaiming them- 
 selves manufacturing hosiers. 
 
 None of these middlemen ever made a stocking, or a night- 
 cap, or a sock. A large proportion of such gear comes from 
 Champagne not all, for there are weavers in Paris who com- 
 pete with the country workers. 
 
 These middlemen, coming between the producer and the 
 consumer, are a curse not peculiar to this trade. It exists in 
 most branches of commerce, and adds to the price of the 
 goods all the profit taken by the intermediary. To do away 
 with these expensive go-betweens, who hinder the direct sale 
 of manufactured goods, would be a benevolent achievement, 
 and the magnitude of the results would raise it to the level of a 
 great political reform. Industry at large would be benefited, 
 for it would bring about such a reduction of prices to the 
 home-consumer as is needed to maintain the struggle against 
 foreign competition, a battle as murderous as that of hostile 
 armies. 
 
 But the overthrow of such an abuse as this would not secure 
 to our modern philanthropists such glory or such profit as are 
 to be obtained by fighting for the Dead Sea apples of negro 
 emancipation, or the penitentiary system ; hence this illicit 
 commerce of the middlemen, the producer's banker, will weigh 
 for a long time yet on the workers and consumers alike. In 
 France so clever as a nation it is always supposed that sim- 
 plification means destruction. We are still frightened by the 
 Revolution of 1789. 
 
 The industrial energy that always thrives in a land where
 
 38 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 Nature is a grudging step-dame, sufficiently shows what progress 
 agriculture would make there if only wealth would join its 
 partnership with the land, which is not more barren in Cham- 
 pagne than in Scotland, where the outlay of capital has worked 
 miracles. And when agriculture shall have conquered the 
 unfertile tracts of that province, when industry shall have 
 scattered a little capital on the chalk-fields of Champagne, 
 prosperity will multiply threefold. The land is, in fact, 
 devoid of luxury and the dwelling-houses are bare ; but Eng- 
 lish comfort will find its way thither, money will acquire that 
 rapid circulation which is half of what makes wealth, and 
 which is now beginning in many of the torpid districts of 
 France. 
 
 Writers, officials, the church from its pulpits, the press in 
 its columns all to whtfm chance has given any kind of in- 
 fluence over the masses ought to proclaim it again and again : 
 " Hoarding is a social crime." The miserliness of the pro- 
 vinces stagnates the vitality of the industrial mass and im- 
 pairs the health of the nation. The little town of Arcis, for 
 instance, on the way to nowhere, and apparently sunk in 
 complete quiescence, is comparatively rich in the possession 
 of capital slowly amassed in the hosiery trade. 
 
 Monsieur Phileas Beauvisage was the Alexander or, if you 
 will, the Attila of his native town. This is how that respect- 
 able and hard-working man had conquered the dominion of 
 cotton. He was the only surviving child of the Beauvisages, 
 long settled on the fine farm of Bellache, part of the Gondre- 
 ville estate; and in 1811 his parents made a considerable 
 sacrifice to save him from the conscription by purchasing a 
 substitute. Then his mother, as a widow, had again, in 1813, 
 rescued her only son from being enlisted in the Guards by the 
 good offices of the Comte de Gondreville. 
 
 In 1813 Phileas, then twenty-one, had for three years past 
 been engaged in the pacific business of a hosier. The lease 
 of the farm of Bellache having run out, the farmer's widow
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR AKCIS. 39 
 
 decided that she would not renew it. In fact,, she foresaw 
 ample occupation for her old age in watching the investment 
 of her money. 
 
 That her later days might not be disturbed by anxiety, she 
 had a complete valuation made by Monsieur Grevin, the 
 notary, of all her husband's estate, though her son had made 
 no claims on her ; and his share was found to amount to 
 about a hundred and fifty thousand francs. The good woman 
 had not to sell her land, most of it purchased from Michu, 
 the luckless steward of the Simeuse family. She paid her son 
 in cash, advising him to buy up his master's business. This 
 old Monsieur Pigoult was the son of the old justice of the 
 peace, and his affairs were already in such disorder that his 
 death, as has been hinted, was supposed to have been due to 
 his own act. 
 
 Phileas Beauvisage, a prudent youth, with a proper respect 
 for his mother, had soon concluded the bargain ; and as he 
 inherited from his parents the bump of acquisitiveness, as 
 phrenologists term it, his youthful zeal was thrown into the 
 business, which seemed to him immense, and which he pro- 
 posed to extend by speculation. 
 
 The Christian name Phileas, which may, perhaps, seem 
 extraordinary, was one of the many whimsical results of the 
 Revolution. The Beauvisages, as connected with the Simeuses, 
 and consequently good Catholics, had their infant baptized. 
 The cure of Cinq-Cygne, the Abb6 Goujet, being consulted 
 by the farmers, advised them to take Phileas as his patron 
 saint, his Greek name being likely to find favor in the eyes 
 of the municipality, for the boy was born at a time when chil- 
 dren were registered by the strange names in the Republican 
 kalendar. 
 
 In 1814, hosiery as a rule, a fairly regular trade was 
 liable to all the ups and downs of the cotton market. The 
 price of cotton depended on the Emperor's successes or 
 defeats; his adversaries, the English generals in Spain, would
 
 40 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 say: "The town is ours; send up the bales." Pigoult, 
 Phil6as' retiring master, supplied his weavers in the country 
 with yarn. At the time when he sold his business to young 
 Beauvisage, he had in stock a large supply of cotton yarns, 
 purchased when they were at the dearest, while cotton was 
 now being brought in through Lisbon in vast quantities at six 
 sous the kilogramme, in virtue of the Emperor's famous 
 decree. The reaction in France, caused by the importation 
 of this cheap cotton, brought about Pigoult's death, and laid 
 the foundation of Beauvisage's fortune ; for he, instead of 
 losing his head like his old master, bought up twice as much 
 cotton as his predecessor had in stock, and so struck a medium 
 average price. This simple transaction enabled Phileas to 
 triple his output of manufactured goods, while apparently a 
 benefactor to the workers ; and he could sell his produce in 
 Paris and the provinces at a profit when others were merely 
 recovering the cost price. By the beginning of 1814 his 
 manufactured stock was Exhausted. 
 
 The prospect of war on French soil, which would be espe- 
 cially disastrous to Champagne, made him cautious. He 
 manufactured no more goods, and by realizing his capital in 
 solid gold, stood prepared for the event. At that time the 
 custom-houses were a dead letter. Napoleon had been obliged 
 to enlist his thirty thousand customs officials to defend the 
 country. Cotton, smuggled in through a thousand gaps in 
 the hedge, was flung into every market. It is impossible to 
 give an idea of the liveliness- and cunning of cotton at that 
 date, or of the avidity with which the English clutched at a 
 country where cotton stockings were worth six francs a pair, 
 and cambric shirts were an article of luxury. 
 
 Manufacturers on a smaller scale and the master workmen, 
 counting on Napoleon's genius and luck, had invested in 
 cotton coming through Spain. This they were working up, 
 in the hope of presently dictating terms to the Paris retail 
 stores. All this Phileas noted. Then, when the province
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 41 
 
 was devastated by war, he stood between the army and Paris. 
 As each battle was lost he went to the weavers who had hidden 
 their goods in casks silos of hosiery and, cash in hand, this 
 Cossack of the trade, going from village to village, bought up, 
 below coat price, these barrels of stockings, which might fall 
 any day into the hands of foes whose feet wanted covering as 
 badly as their throats wanted liquor. 
 
 At this period of disaster, Phileas displayed a degree of 
 energy that was almost a match for the Emperor's. This 
 captain of the hosiery trade fought the commercial campaign 
 of 18:4 with a courage that remains unrecognized. One 
 league behind, wherever the general was one league in advance, 
 he bought up cotton nightcaps and stockings as his trophies, 
 while the Emperor in his reverses plucked immortal palms. 
 The genius was equal in both, though exercised in widely 
 different spheres, since one was eager to cover as many heads 
 as the other hoped to fell. Compelled to create means of 
 transport to save his casks full of stockings, which he stored 
 in a Paris suburb, Phileas often requisitioned horses and 
 wagons, as though the safety of the Empire depended on him. 
 And was not the majesty of Trade as good as that of Napo- 
 leon? Had not the English merchants, after subsidizing 
 Europe, got the upper hand of the giant who threatened their 
 ships? 
 
 While the Emperor was abdicating at Fontainebleau, Phileas 
 was the triumphant master of the "article." As a result of 
 his clever manoeuvres, the price of cotton was kept down, and 
 he had doubled his fortune when many manufacturers thought 
 themselves lucky to get rid of their goods at a loss of fifty per 
 cent. He returned to Arcis with three hundred thousand 
 francs, half of which, invested in the Funds, brought him 
 fifteen thousand francs a year. One hundred thousand he 
 used to double the capital needed for his business; and he 
 spent the remainder in building, decorating, and furnishing a 
 fine house in the Place du Pont, at Arcis.
 
 42 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 On his return in triumph, the hosier naturally confided his 
 story to Monsieur Grevin. The notary had a daughter to 
 marry, just twenty years of age. Gr^vin's father-in-law, who 
 for forty years had practiced as a doctor at Arcis, was at that 
 time still alive. Grevin was a widower; he knew that old 
 Madame Beauvisage was rich ; he believed in the energy and 
 capacity of a young man who had thus boldly utilized the 
 campaign of 1814. Severine Grevin's fortune from her mother 
 was sixty thousand francs. What was old Dr. Varlet to leave 
 her ? As much again, at most ! Grevin was already fifty ; 
 he was very much afraid of dying ; he saw no chance, after 
 the Restoration, of marrying his daughter as he would wish 
 for her he was ambitious. 
 
 Under these circumstances, he contrived to have it sug- 
 gested to Phileas that he should propose for Severine. Made- 
 moiselle Grevin, well brought up and handsome, was regarded 
 as one of the good matches of the town. Also, the connec- 
 tion with the most intimate friend of the Comte dc Gondre- 
 ville, who retained his dignity as a peer of France, was, of 
 course, an honor for the son of one of the Gondreville 
 farmers. The widow would, indeed, have made a sacrifice to 
 achieve it. But when she heard that her son's suit was suc- 
 cessful, she held her hand, and gave him nothing, an act of 
 prudence in which the notary followed suit. And thus the 
 marriage was brought about between the son of the farmer 
 who had been so faithful to the Simeuses, and the daughter of 
 one of their most determined enemies. This, perhaps, was 
 the only instance in which Louis XVIII. 's motto found 
 application " Union et oubli" (union and oblivion). 
 
 When the Bourbons returned for the second time, old Dr. 
 Variet died, at the age of seventy-six, leaving in his cellar 
 two hundred thousand francs in gold, beside other property 
 valued at an equal sum. Thus, in 1816, PhilSas and his wife 
 found themselves possessed of thirty thousand francs a year, 
 apart from the profits of the business ; for Grevin wished to
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 43 
 
 invest his daughter's money in land, and Beauvisage made no 
 objection. The interest on Severine Grevin's share of her 
 grandfather's money amounted to scarcely fifteen thousand 
 francs a year, in spite of the good opportunities for invest- 
 ment which Grevin kept a lookout for. 
 
 The two first years of married life were enough to show 
 Grevin and his daughter how incapable Phileas really was. 
 The hawk's eye of commercial greed had seemed to be the 
 effect of superior capacity, and the old notary had mistaken 
 youthfulness for power, and luck for a talent for business. 
 But though Phileas could read and write, and do sums to 
 admiration, he had never read a book. Miserably ignorant, 
 conversation with him was out of the question ; he could re- 
 spond by a deluge of commonplace, expressed pleasantly 
 enough. But, as the son of a farmer, he was not wanting in 
 commercial acumen. 
 
 Other men must be plain with him, clear and explicit ; but 
 he never was the same to his adversary. 
 
 Tender and kind-hearted, Phileas wept at the least touch of 
 pathos. This made him reverent to his wife, whose superi- 
 ority filled him with unbounded admiration. Severine, a 
 woman of brains, knew everything according to Phileas. 
 And she was all the more accurate in her judgments because 
 she consulted her father on every point. Also, she had a very 
 firm temper, and this made her absolute mistress in her own 
 house. As soon as this point was gained, the old notary felt 
 less regret at seeing his daughter happy through a mastery 
 which is always gratifying to a wife of determined character. 
 Still, there was the woman ! 
 
 This, it was said, was what befell the woman. 
 
 At the time of the reaction of 1815, a certain Vicomte de 
 Chargeboeuf, of the poorer branch, was appointed sub-prefect 
 at Arcis by the influence of the Marquise de Cinq-Cygne, to 
 whom he was related. This young gentleman remained there 
 as sub-prefect for five years. Handsome Madame Beauvisage,
 
 44 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 it was said, had something to do with the long stay much 
 too long for his advantage made by the vicomte in this 
 small post. At the same time, it must at once be said that 
 these hints were never justified by the scandals which betray 
 such love affairs, so difficult to conceal from the Argus eyes of 
 a small country town. " If Severine loved the Vicomte de 
 Chargeboeuf, if he loved her, it was a blameless and honora- 
 ble attachment," said all the friends of the Grevins and the 
 Marions. And these two sets imposed their opinion on the 
 immediate neighborhood. But the Grevins and the Marions 
 had no influence over the Royalists, and the Royalists de- 
 clared that the sub-prefect was a happy man. 
 
 As soon as the Marquise de Cinq-Cygne heard what was 
 rumored as to her young relation, she sent for him to Cinq- 
 Cygne ; and so great was her horror of all who were ever so 
 remotely connected with the actors in the judicial tragedy 
 that had been so fatal to her family, that she desired the vis- 
 count to live elsewhere. She got him appointed to Sanccrre 
 as sub-prefect, promising to secure his promotion. Some 
 acute observers asserted that the viscount had pretended to be 
 in love, so as to be made prefect, knowing how deeply the 
 marquise hated the name of GreVin. Others, on the other 
 hand, remarked on the coincidence of the Vicomte de Charge- 
 boeuf 's visits to Paris with those made by Madame Beauvisage 
 under the most trivial pretexts. An impartial historian would 
 find it very difficult to form an opinion as to facts thus en- 
 wrapped in the mystery of private life. 
 
 A single circumstance seemed to turn the scale in favor of 
 scandal. Cecile-Renee Beauvisage was born in 1820, when 
 Monsieur de Chargeboeuf was leaving Arcis, and one of the 
 sous-prefet's names was Ren6. The name was given her by 
 the Comte de Gondreville, her godfather. If the mother had 
 raised any objection to her child's having that name, she 
 might possibly have confirmed these suspicions; and as the 
 world must always be in the right, this was supposed to be a
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 45 
 
 little bit of mischief on the part of the old peer. Madame 
 Keller, the count's daughter, was the godmother, and her 
 name was Cecile. 
 
 As to Cecile-Renee Beauvisage's face, the likeness is strik- 
 ing ! not to her father or her mother ; as time goes on, she 
 has become the living image of the viscount, even to his 
 aristocratic manner. This likeness, moral and physical, has 
 however escaped the ken of the good folk of Arcis, for the 
 vicomte never returned there. 
 
 At any rate, Severine made Phileas happy in his own way. 
 He was fond of good living and the comforts of life; she 
 gave him the choicest wines, a table fit for a bishop, catered 
 for by the best cook in the department ; but she made no dis- 
 play of luxury, keeping house in the style required by the 
 plain citizens of Arcis. It was a saying at Arcis that you 
 should dine with Madame Beauvisage, and spend the evening 
 with Madame Marion. 
 
 The importance to which the House of Cinq-Cygne was at 
 once raised by the Restoration had naturally tightened the 
 bonds that held together all the families in the district who 
 had been in any way concerned in the trial as to the tem- 
 porary disappearance of Gondreville. The Marions, the 
 Gr6vins, and the Giguets held together all the more closely 
 because, to secure the triumph of their so-called constitutional 
 party at the coming elections, harmonious cooperation would 
 be necessary. 
 
 Severine, of aforethought, kept Beauvisage busy with his 
 hosiery trade, from which any other man might have retired, 
 sending him to Paris or about the country on business. In- 
 deed, till 1830, Phileas, who thus found work for his bump 
 of acquisitiveness, earned every year as much as he spent, be- 
 side the interest on his capital, while taking things easy and 
 doing his work "in slippers," as they say. Hence, the in- 
 terest and fortune of Monsieur and Madame Beauvisage, in- 
 vested for fifteen years past by the constant care of old Gr6vin,
 
 46 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S. 
 
 would amount, in 1830, to five hundred thousand francs. 
 This, in fact, was at that time Cecile's marriage-portion ; and 
 the old notary invested it in three and a half per cents, 
 bought at fifty, and so yielding thirty thousand francs a year. 
 So no one was mistaken when estimating the fortune of the 
 Beauvisages at a guess at eighty thousand francs a year. 
 
 In 1830 they sold the business to Jean Violette, one of 
 their agents, the grandson of one of the most important 
 witnesses for the prosecution in the Simeuse trial, and had 
 invested the purchase-money, estimated at three hundred 
 thousand francs. And Monsieur and Madame Beauvisage 
 had still in prospect the money that would come to them 
 from old Grevin and from the old farmer's widow, each sup- 
 posed to be worth fifteen to twenty thousand francs a year. 
 
 These great provincial fortunes are the product of time 
 multiplied by economy. Thirty years of old age are in them- 
 selves a capital. Even if they gave Cecile a portion of fifty 
 thousand francs a year, Monsieur and Madame Beauvisage 
 would still inherit two fortunes, beside keeping thirty thou- 
 sand francs a year and their house at Arcis. 
 
 As soon as the old Marquise de Cinq-Cygne should die, 
 Cecile would be an acceptable match for the young marquis ; 
 but that lady's health strong, and almost handsome still at 
 the age of sixty negatived any such hope, if, indeed, it had 
 ever entered into the mind of Grevin and his daughter, as 
 some persons asserted who were surprised at the rejection of 
 suitors so eligible as the sub-prefect and the public prosecutor. 
 
 The house built by Beauvisage, one of the handsomest in 
 Arcis, stands in the Place du Pont, in a line with the Rue 
 Vide-Bourse, and at the corner of the Rue du Pont, which 
 slopes up to the Church Square. Though, like many pro- 
 vincial town-houses, it has neither forecourt nor garden, it 
 has a rather good effect in spite of some bad taste in the 
 decorations. The house door a double door opens from the 
 street. The windows on the first floor overlook the Poste
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARClS. 47 
 
 Inn, on the street side, and on the side toward the square 
 have a view of the picturesque reaches of the Aube, which is 
 navigable below this bridge. On the other side of the bridge 
 is a corresponding place or square. Here stood Monsieur 
 Grevin's house, and here begins the road to Sezanne. 
 
 The Beauvisage house, carefully painted white, might pass 
 for being built of stone. The height of the windows and the 
 enriched outside mouldings contribute to give the building 
 a certain style, enhanced, no doubt, by the poverty-stricken 
 appearance of most of the houses in the town, constructed as 
 they are of timber, and coated with stucco made to imitate 
 stone. Still, even these dwellings have a stamp of originality, 
 since each architect, or each owner, has exerted his ingenuity 
 to solve the problems of this mode of construction. 
 
 On each of the open spaces at either end of the bridge, an 
 example may be seen of this peculiar architecture. In the 
 middle of the row of houses in the square, to the left of the 
 Beauvisage house, may be seen the frail store the walls 
 painted plum-color, and the woodwork green occupied by 
 Jean Violette, grandson of the famous farmer of Grouage, one 
 of the chief witnesses in the case of the senator's disappear- 
 ance ;* to him, in 1830, Beauvisage had made over his con- 
 nection and his stock-in-trade, and, it was said, had lent him 
 capital. 
 
 The bridge of Arcis is of timber. At about a hundred 
 yards above this bridge the current is checked by another 
 bridge supporting the tall wooden buildings of a mill with 
 several wheels. The space between the road bridge and this 
 private dam forms a pool, on each side of which stand some 
 good houses. Through a gap, and over the roofs, the hill is 
 seen where stands the Chateau d'Arcis, with its gardens, its 
 paddock, its surrounding walls and trees, commanding the 
 upper river of the Aube and the poor meadows of the left 
 bank. 
 
 * These allusions are explained in "A Historical Mystery."
 
 48 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 The character of the buildings is so various that the tourist 
 might find a specimen representative of every country. On 
 the North side of the pool, where ducks sport and gobble in 
 the water, there is, for instance, an almost Southern-looking 
 house with an incurved roof covered with pantiles, such as 
 are used in Italy ; on one side of it is a small garden plot on 
 the quay in which vines grow over a trellis, and two or three 
 trees. It recalls some corner of Rome, where, on the banks 
 of the Tiber, houses of this type may be seen. Opposite, on 
 the other shore, is a large dwelling with a pent-house roof 
 and balconies like those, of a Swiss chalet; to complete the 
 illusion, between it and the weir lies a wide meadow, planted 
 with poplars on each side of a narrow graveled path. And, 
 crowning the town, the buildings of the castle, looking all 
 the more imposing as it stands up amid such frail structures, 
 seem to represent the one-time grandeur of the old French 
 aristocracy. 
 
 Though the two squares at the ends of the bridge are inter- 
 sected by the Sezanne road, an abominable road too, and very 
 ill kept, and though they are the liveliest spots in the town 
 for the offices of the justice of the peace and of the mayor of 
 Arcis are both in the Rue Vide-Bourse a Parisian would 
 think the place strangely rustic and deserted. The landscape 
 is altogether artless ; standing on the square by the bridge, 
 opposite the Poste Inn, a farmyard pump is to be seen ; to be 
 sure, for nearly half a century a similar one commanded our 
 admiration in the grand courtyard of the Louvre. 
 
 Nothing can more aptly illustrate provincial life than the 
 utter silence that reigns in this little town, even in its busiest 
 quarter. It may easily be supposed how agitating is the pres- 
 ence of a stranger, even if he stays but half a day, and what 
 eager faces lean from every window to watch him ; and, then, 
 picture the chronic espionage exercised by the residents over 
 each other. Life becomes so nearly monastic that, excepting 
 on Sundays and f&te-days, a visitor will not meet a creature
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR AKCIS. 49 
 
 on the boulevards or in the Avenue des Soupirs nowhere, in 
 short, not even in the streets. 
 
 It will now be obvious why the front of Monsieur Beau- 
 visage's house was in a line with the street and the square : 
 the square served as a forecourt. As he sat at the window, 
 the retired hosier could get a raking view of the Church 
 Square, of those at the two ends of the bridge, and of the 
 Sezanne road. He could see the coaches and travelers arrive 
 at the Hotel de la Poste. And on days when the court was 
 sitting, he could see the stir in front of the justice-house and 
 the mairie. And, indeed, Beauvisage would not have ex- 
 changed his house for the castle in spite of its lordly appear- 
 ance, its stone masonry, and its commanding position. 
 
 On entering the house, you found yourself in a hall, and 
 facing a staircase beyond. On the right was a large drawing- 
 room, with two windows to the square, on the left a handsome 
 dining-room looking on to the street. The bedrooms were 
 on the second floor. 
 
 In spite of their wealth, the Beauvisage household consisted 
 of a cook and a housemaid, a peasant-woman who washed, 
 ironed, and cleaned, not often being required to wait on ma- 
 dame and mademoiselle, who waited on each other to fill up 
 their time. Since the hosiery business had been sold, the 
 horse and trap, formerly used by Phileas, and kept at the inn, 
 had also been disposed of. 
 
 Just as Phileas went in, his wife, who had been informed of 
 the resolution passed at the meeting, had put on her shoes 
 and her shawl to call on her father ; for she rightly guessed 
 that in the course of the evening Madame Marion would 
 throw out some hints preliminary to proposing Simon for 
 Cecile. 
 
 After telling her about Charles Keller's death, Phileas asked 
 her opinion with a simplicity that proved a habit of respecting 
 Severine's views on all subjects. 
 4
 
 50 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 "What do you say to that, wife?" said he, and then sat 
 down to await her reply. 
 
 In 1839 Madame Beauvisage, though forty-four years of age, 
 still looked so young that she might have been the "double " 
 of Mademoiselle Mars. If the reader can remember the 
 most charming Celimene ever seen on the stage of the Fran- 
 cais, he may form an exact idea of Severine Beauvisage. 
 There were in both the same roundness of form, the same 
 beautiful features, the same finished outline ; but the hosier's 
 wife was too short, and thus missed the dignified grace, the 
 coquettish, the la Sevigne style, which dwell in the memory of 
 those who have lived through the Empire and the Restoration. 
 And then provincial habits, and the careless way of dressing 
 which Severine had allowed herself to drift into for ten years 
 past, gave a common look to that handsome profile and fine fea- 
 tures, and she had grown stout, which disfigured what for the 
 first twelve years of her married life had been really a magnifi- 
 cent person. Severine's imperfections were redeemed by a 
 queenly glance, full of pride and command, and by a turn of 
 the head that asserted her dignity. Her hair, still black, long, 
 and thick, crowning her head with a broad plait, gave her 
 a youthful look. Her shoulders and bosom were as white 
 as snow, but all too full and puffy, spoiling the lines of 
 the throat and making it too short. Her arms, too stout and 
 dimpled, ended in hands which, though pretty and small, were 
 too plump. She was so overfull of life and health that the 
 flesh, in spite of all her care, made a little roll above her shoe. 
 A pair of earrings, without pendants, each worth a thousand 
 crowns, adorned her ears. 
 
 She had on a lace cap with pink ribbons, a morning-gown 
 of delaine, striped in pink and gray, and trimmed with green, 
 opening over a petticoat with a narrow frill of Valenciennes 
 lace edging, and a green Indian shawl, of which the point 
 hung to the ground. Her feet did not seem comfortable in 
 their bronze kid shoes.
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 51 
 
 " You cannot be so hungry," said she, looking at her hus- 
 band, " but that you can wait half an hour. My father will 
 have finished dinner, but I cannot eat mine in comfort till I 
 know what he thinks, and whether we ought to go out to 
 Gondreville " 
 
 " Yes, yes, go, my dear ; I can wait," said the hosier. 
 
 " Bless me ! shall I never cure you of addressing me as 
 tu ? "* she exclaimed, with a meaning shrug. 
 
 "I have never done so in company by any chance since 
 1817," replied Phileas. 
 
 "But you constantly do so before your daughter and the 
 servants " 
 
 "As you please, Severine," said Beauvisage dejectedly. 
 
 "Above all things, do not say a word to Cecile about the 
 resolution of the electors," added Madame Beauvisage, who 
 was looking at herself in the glass while arranging her shawl. 
 
 " Shall I go with you to see your father? " asked Phileas. 
 
 " No ; stay with Cecile. Beside, Jean Violette is to call 
 to-day to pay the rest of the money he owes you. He will 
 bring you his twenty thousand francs. This is the third time 
 he has asked for three months' grace ; grant him no more 
 time, and if he cannot pay up, take his note of hand to Courtet 
 the bailiff; we must do things regularly, and apply to the 
 court. Achille Pigoult will tell you how to get the money. 
 That Violette is the worthy descendant of his grandfather ! I 
 believe him quite capable of making money out of a bank- 
 ruptcy. He has no sense of honor or justice." 
 
 " He is a very clever fellow," said Beauvisage. 
 
 "You handed over to him a connection and stock-in-trade 
 that were well worth fifty thousand francs for thirty thousand, 
 and in eight years he has only paid you ten thousand " 
 
 "I never had the law of any man," replied Beauvisage, 
 
 *Tu (thou) instead of vous (you) is used in domestic and familiar in- 
 tercourse. TRANSLATOR.
 
 52 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC IS. 
 
 "and would rather lose my money than torment the poor 
 fellow " 
 
 "A poor fellow who is making a fool of you." 
 
 Beauvisage was silent. Finding nothing to say in reply to 
 this brutal remark, he stared at the drawing-room floor. 
 
 The gradual extinction of Beauvisage's intellect was perhaps 
 due to too much sleep. He was in bed every night by eight 
 o'clock, and remained there till eight next morning, and for 
 twenty years had slept for twelve hours on end without ever 
 waking ; or, if such a serious event should supervene, it was to 
 him the most extraordinary fact he would talk about it all 
 day. He then spent about an hour dressing, for his wife had 
 drilled him into never appearing in her presence at breakfast 
 till he was shaved, washed, and properly dressed. 
 
 When he was in business he went off after breakfast to attend 
 to it, and did not come in till dinner-time. Since 1832 he 
 would call on his father-in-law instead, and take a walk or 
 pay visits in the town. He always was seen in boots, blue 
 cloth trousers, a white vest, and a blue coat, the dress insisted 
 on by his wife. His linen was exquisitely fine and white, 
 S6verine requiring him to have a clean shirt every day. This 
 care of his person, so unusual in the country, contributed to 
 the respect in which he was held, as in Paris we remark a man 
 of fashion. 
 
 Thus the outer man of this worthy and solemn nightcap- 
 seller denoted a person of worship; and his wife was too 
 shrewd ever to have said a word that could let the public of 
 Arcis into the secret of her disappointment and of her hus- 
 band's ineptitude ; while he, by dint of smiles, obsequious 
 speeches, and airs of wealth, passed muster as a man of great 
 importance. It was reported that SeVerine was so jealous that 
 she would not allow him to go out in the evening, while 
 Phileas was expressing roses and lilies for his complexion 
 under the weight of blissful slumbers. 
 
 Beauvisage, whose life was quite to his mind, cared for by
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 53 
 
 X 
 
 his wife, well served by the two maids, and petted by his 
 daughter, declared himself and was the happiest man in 
 Arcis. Severine's feeling for her commonplace husband was 
 not without the hue of protective pity that a mother feels for 
 her children. She disguised the stern remarks she felt called 
 upon to make to him under a jesting tone. There was not a 
 more peaceful household ; and Phileas' dislike to company, 
 which sent him to sleep, as he could not play any games of 
 cards, had left Severine free to dispose of her evenings. 
 
 Cecile's entrance put an end to her father's embarrassment. 
 He looked up. 
 
 " How fine you are ! " he exclaimed. 
 
 Madame Beauvisage turned round sharply with a piercing 
 look at her daughter, who blushed under it. 
 
 "Why, Cecile! who told you to dress up in that style?" 
 asked the mother. 
 
 "Are we not going to Madame Marion's this evening? I 
 dressed to see how my gown fits." 
 
 "Cecile, Cecile!" said SeVerine, "why try to deceive 
 your mother ? It is not right ; I am not pleased with you. 
 You are trying to hide something " 
 
 " Why, what has she done ? " asked Beauvisage, enchanted 
 to see his daughter so fresh and smart. 
 
 "What has she done? I will tell her," said the mother, 
 threatening her only child with an ominous finger. 
 
 Cecile threw her arms round her mother's neck, hugged 
 and petted her, which, in an only child, is a sure way of win- 
 ning the day. 
 
 Cecile Beauvisage, a young lady of nineteen, had dressed 
 herself in a pale gray silk frock, trimmed with brandenburgs 
 of a darker shade to look in front like a coat. The body, 
 with its buttons and jockey tails, formed a point in front, and 
 laced up the back, like stays. This sort of corset fitted exactly 
 to the line of the back, hips and bust. The skirt, with three 
 rows of narrow fringe, hung in pretty folds, and the cut and
 
 64 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 style proclaimed the hand of a Paris dressmaker. A light 
 handkerchief trimmed with lace was worn over the body. 
 The heiress had knotted a pink kerchief round her throat, 
 and wore a straw hat with a moss rose in it. She had fine, 
 black netted mittens and bronze kid boots ; in short, but for 
 a certain "Sunday-best " effect, this turn-out, as of a figure 
 in a fashion-plate, could not fail to charm her father and 
 mother. And Cecile was a pretty girl, of medium height, 
 and well proportioned. Her chestnut hair was dressed in 
 the fashion of the day, in two thick plaits, forming loops on 
 each side of her face, and fastened up at the back of her head. 
 Her face, bright with health, had the aristocratic stamp which 
 she had not inherited from her father or her mother. Thus 
 her clear brown eyes had not a trace of the soft, calm, almost 
 melancholy look so common in young girls. Sprightly, quick, 
 and healthy, Cecile destroyed the romantic cast of her features 
 by a sort of practical homeliness and the freedom of manner 
 often seen in spoilt children. At the same time, a husband 
 who should be capable of recommencing her education and 
 effacing the traces of a provincial life might extract a charm- 
 ing woman from this rough-hewn marble. 
 
 In point of fact, Severine's pride of her daughter had coun- 
 teracted the effects of her love for her. Madame Beauvisage 
 had had firmness enough to bring her daughter up well ; she 
 had assumed a certain severity which exacted obedience and 
 eradicated the little evil that was indigenous in the child's 
 soul. The mother and daughter had never been separated ; 
 and Cecile was blessed with what is rarer among girls than is 
 commonly supposed perfect and unblemished purity of mind, 
 innocence of heart, and genuine guilelessness. 
 
 "Your dress is highly suggestive," said Madame Beau- 
 visage. " Did Simon Giguet say anything to you yesterday 
 which you did not confide to me?" 
 
 "Well, well!" said Phileas, "a man who is to be the 
 representative of his fellow-citizens "
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 55 
 
 " My dear mamma," said Cecile in her mother's ear, " he 
 bores me to death but there is not another man in Arcis ! " 
 
 "Your opinion of him is quite correct. But wait till we 
 know what your grandfather thinks," said Madame Beau- 
 visage, embracing her daughter, whose reply betrayed great 
 good sense, though it showed that her innocence had been 
 tarnished by a thought of marriage. 
 
 Monsieur Grain's house, situated on the opposite bank of 
 the river, at the corner of the little square beyond the bridge, 
 was one of the oldest in the town. It was built of wood, the 
 interstices between the timbers being filled up with pebbles, 
 and it was covered with a smooth coating of cement painted 
 stone-color. In spite of this coquettish artifice, it looked, all 
 the same, like a house built of cards. 
 
 The garden, lying along the river bank, had a terrace wall 
 with vases for flower-pots. 
 
 This modest dwelling, with its stout wooden shutters painted 
 stone-color like the walls, was furnished with a simplicity to 
 correspond with the exterior. On entering you found your- 
 self in a small pebbled courtyard, divided from the garden by a 
 green trellis. On the first floor the old notary's office had 
 been turned into a drawing-room, with windows looking out 
 on the river and the square, furnished with very old and very 
 faded green Utrecht velvet. The lawyer's study was now his 
 dining-room. Everything bore the stamp of the owner, the 
 philosophical old man who led one of those lives that flow 
 like the waters of a country stream, the envy of political 
 harlequins when at last their eyes are opened to the vanity of 
 social distinctions, and when they are tired of a mad struggle 
 with the tide of human affairs. 
 
 While Severine is making her way across the bridge to see 
 if her father has finished his dinner, it may be well to give a 
 few minutes' study to the person, the life, and the opinions of 
 the old man whose friendship with the Comte Malin de 
 Gondreville secured him the respect of the whole neighbor-
 
 66 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 hood. This is a plain unvarnished tale of the notary who for 
 a long time had been, to all intents and purposes, the only 
 notary in Arcis. 
 
 In 1787 two youths set out from Arcis with letters of recom- 
 mendation to a member of the Council named Danton. This 
 famous revolutionary was a native of Arcis. His house is still 
 shown, and his family still lives there. This may perhaps 
 account for the influence of the Revolution being so strongly 
 felt in that part of the province. 
 
 Danton articled his young fellow-countrymen to a lawyer of 
 the Chatelet, who became famous for an action against the 
 Comte Morton de Chabrillant concerning his box at the 
 theatre on the occasion of the first performance of the 
 " Mariage de Figaro," when the " Parlement " took the 
 lawyer's side as considering itself insulted in the person of 
 its legal representative. 
 
 One of the young men was named Malin, and the other 
 Grevin ; each was an only son. Malin's father was at time 
 the owner of the house in which Grevin was now living. 
 They were mutually and faithfully attached. Malin, a shrewd 
 fellow, with good brains and high ambitions, had the gift of 
 eloquence. Grevin, honest and hard-working, made it his 
 business to admire Malin. 
 
 They returned to the country when the Revolution began ; 
 Malin as a pleader at Troyes, Grevin to be a notary at Arcis. 
 Grevin, always Malin's humble servant, got him returned as 
 deputy to the Convention ; Malin had Grevin appointed 
 prosecuting magistrate at Arcis. Until the pth Thermidor, 
 Malin remained unknown ; he always voted with the strong 
 to crush the weak ; but Tallien showed him the necessity for 
 crushing Robespierre. Then in that terrific parliamentary 
 battle, Malin distinguished himself; he showed courage at the 
 right moment. 
 
 From that day he began to play a part as a politician ; he 
 was one of the heroes of the rank and file ; he deserted from
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 67 
 
 the party of the " Thermidoriens " to join that of the 
 ".Clichiens," and was one of the Council of Elders. After 
 allying himself with Talleyrand and Fouchd to conspire 
 against Bonaparte, he with them became one of Bona- 
 parte's most ardent partisans after the victory of Marengo. 
 Appointed tribune, he was one of the first to be elected to 
 the Council of State, worked at the revision of the Code, 
 and was soon promoted to senatorial dignity with the title 
 of Comte de Gondreville. 
 
 This was the political side of their career. Now for the 
 financial side. 
 
 Grevin was the most active and most crafty instrument of 
 the Comte de Gondreville's fortune in the district of Arcis. 
 The estate of Gondreville had belonged to the Simeuse 
 family, a good old house of provincial nobility, decimated by 
 the guillotine, of which the two surviving heirs, both young 
 soldiers, were serving in Conde's army. The estate, sold as 
 nationalized land, was purchased by Grevin for Malin, under 
 Marion's name. Grdvin, in fact, acquired for his friend the 
 larger part of the church lands sold by the Republic in the 
 department of the Aube. Malin sent the sums necessary for 
 these purchases, not forgetting a bonus to the agent. When, 
 presently, the Directory was supreme by which time Malin 
 was a power in the Republic the sales were taken up in his 
 name. 
 
 Then Grevin was a notary, and Malin in the Council of 
 State ; Grevin became mayor of Arcis, Malin was senator and 
 Comte de Gondreville. Malin married the daughter of a 
 millionaire army-contractor ; Grevin married the only daugh- 
 ter of Monsieur Varlet, the leading doctor in Arcis. The 
 Comte de Gondreville had three hundred thousand francs a 
 year, a fine house in Paris, and the splendid castle of Gondre- 
 ville. One of his daughters married a Paris banker, one of 
 the Kellers ; the other became the wife of Marshal the Due 
 de Carigliano.
 
 58 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 Grivin, a rich man too, with fifteen thousand francs a year, 
 owned the house where he was now peacefully ending his 
 days in itrict economy, having managed his friend's business 
 For him, and bought this house from him for six thousand 
 francs. The Comte de Gondreville was eighty years of age, 
 and Grevin seventy-six. The peer, taking his walk in his 
 park, the old notary in what had been that peer's father's 
 garden, each in his warm morning wrapper, hoarded crown 
 upon crown. Not a cloud had chequered this friendship of 
 sixty years. The notary had always been subservient to the 
 member of the convention, the councilor of State, the sen- 
 ator, the peer of France. 
 
 After the Revolution of July, Malin, being in Arcis, had 
 said to Gcivin 
 
 "Would you care to have the cross?" (of the Legion of 
 Honor). 
 
 " And what would I do with it ? " replied Grevin. 
 
 Neither had ever failed the other. They had always ad- 
 vised and informed each other without envy on one side or 
 arrogance or offensive airs on the other. Malin had always 
 been obliged to do his best for Grevin, for all Grevin's pride 
 was in the Comte de Gondreville. Grdvin was as much the 
 Comte de Gondreville as Malin himself. At the same time, 
 since the Revolution of July, when Grevin, already an old 
 man, had given ap the management of the comte's affairs, 
 and when the count, failing from age and from the part he 
 , had played in so many political storms, was settling down to 
 a quiet life, the old men sure of each other's regard, but no 
 longer needing each other's help had met but rarely. On 
 his way to his country place or on his return journey to Paris, 
 the count would call on Grevin, who paid the count a visit or 
 two while he was at Gondreville. 
 
 Their children were scarcely acquainted. Neither Madame 
 Keller nor the Duchesse de Carigliano had ever formed any 
 intimacy with Mademoiselle Grevin either before or since her
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 59 
 
 marriage to Beauvisage the hosier. This scorn, whether 
 apparent or real, greatly puzzled Severine. Grevin, as mayor 
 of Arcis under the Empire, a man kind and helpful to all, 
 had, in the exercise of his power, conciliated and overcome 
 many difficulties. His good humor, bluntness, and honesty 
 had won the regard and affection of his district ; and beside, 
 everybody respected him as a man who could command the 
 favor, the power, and the influence of the Comte de Gondre- 
 ville. 
 
 By this time, however, when the notary's active participa- 
 tion in public business was a thing of the past, when for eight 
 years he had been almost forgotten in the town of Arcis, and 
 his death might be expected any day, Grevin, like his old friend 
 Malin, vegetated rather than lived. He never went beyond 
 his garden; he grew his flowers, pruned his trees, inspected 
 his vegetables and his grafts like all old men, he seemed to 
 practice being a corpse. His life was as regular as clockwork. 
 
 In all weathers he wore the same clothes: heavy shoes, 
 oiled to keep out the wet, loose worsted stockings, thick gray 
 flannel trousers strapped round the waist, without braces ; a 
 wide vest of thin sky-blue cloth with horn buttons, and a 
 coat of gray flannel to match the trousers. On his head he 
 wore a little round beaver-skin cap, which he never took off 
 in the house. In the summer a black velvet cap took the 
 place of the fur cap, and he wore an iron-gray cloth coat 
 instead of the thick flannel one. 
 
 He was of medium height, and stout, as a healthy old man 
 should be, which made him move a little heavily ; his pace 
 was slow, as is natural to men of sedentary habits. Up by 
 daybreak, he made the most careful and elaborate toilet ; he 
 shaved himself, he walked round his garden, he looked at the 
 weather and consulted the barometer, opening the drawing- 
 room shutters himself. He hoed, he raked, he hunted out 
 the caterpillars he would always find occupation till breakfast- 
 time. After breakfast he devoted two hours to digestion,
 
 oO THE DEPUTY FOR AKCIS. 
 
 thinking of heaven knows what. Almost every day, between 
 two and five, his grand-daughter came to see him, sometimes 
 brought by the maid, and sometimes, more often, in fact, by 
 her mother. 
 
 There were days when this mechanical routine was upset. 
 He had to receive the farmers' rents, and payments in kind, 
 to be at once resold ; but this little business was but once a 
 month on a market-day. What became of the money? No 
 one knew, not even Severine or Cecile ; on that point Grevin 
 was as mute as the confessional. Still, all the old man's 
 feelings had in the end centred in his daughter and his grand- 
 child ; he really loved them more than his money. 
 
 This septuagenarian, so neat in his person, with his round 
 face, his bald forehead, his blue eyes and thin white hair, had 
 a tinge of despotism in his temper, as men have when they 
 have met with no resistance from men and things. His only 
 great fault, and that deeply hidden, for nothing had ever 
 called it into play, was a persistent and terrible vindictiveness, 
 a rancor which Malin had never roused. Gr6vin had always 
 been at Malin's service, but he had always found him grateful; 
 the count had never humiliated or offended his friend, whose 
 nature he knew thoroughly. 
 
 S6verine was affectionately attached to her father; she and 
 her daughter never left the making of his linen to any one 
 else. They knitted his winter stockings, and watched his 
 health with minute care. Before leaving the goodman's 
 house every day Sdverine or Cecile inquired as to what his 
 dinner was to be next day, and sent him early vegetables from 
 market. 
 
 Madame Beauvisage had always wished that her father 
 should introduce her at the Chateau de Gondreville to make 
 acquaintance with the count's daughters ; but the prudent old 
 man had frequently explained to her how difficult it would be 
 to keep up any connection with the Duchesse de Carigliano, 
 who lived in Paris, and seldom came to Gondreville, or with
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 61 
 
 a woman of fashion, like Madame Keller, when she herself 
 had a hosier's store at Arcis. 
 
 " Your life is settled," said Grdvin to his daughter. " Place 
 all your hopes of enjoyment in Cecile, who, when you give 
 up business, will certainly be rich enough to give you the free 
 and handsome style of living that you deserve. Choose a 
 son-in-law who has ambitions and brains, and then you can 
 some day go to Paris and leave that simpleton Beauvisage 
 here. If I should live long enough to have a grandson-in- 
 law, I will steer you over the sea of politics as I steered Malin, 
 and you shall rise as high as the Kellers." 
 
 These words, spoken before the Revolution of 1830, and 
 one year after the old notary had established himself in his 
 little house, account for his calm existence. Grevin wished to 
 live ; he wished to start his daughter, his grand-daughter, and 
 his great-grandchildren on the high road to greatness. Grevin 
 was ambitious for the third generation. 
 
 When he made that speech the old man was thinking of 
 seeing Cecile married to Charles Keller, and at this moment 
 he was mourning over his disappointed hopes ; he did not 
 know what determination to come to. 
 
 Severine found her father sitting on a wooden bench at the 
 end of his terrace, under the blossoming lilacs, and taking his 
 coffee, for it was half-past five. She saw at once by the sor- 
 rowful gravity of her father's expression that he had heard the 
 news. In fact, the old count had sent a manservant to beg 
 his friend to go to him. Hitherto, Grevin had been unwilling 
 to encourage his daughter's hopes ; but now, in the conflict of 
 mingled considerations that struggled in his sorrowful mind, 
 his secret slipped out. 
 
 " My dear child," said he, " I had dreamed of such splen- 
 did and noble prospects for your future life, and death has 
 upset them all. Cecile might have been the Vicomtesse 
 Keller; for Charles, by my management, would have been 
 elected deputy for Arcis, and he would certainly some day
 
 62 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 have succeeded his father as peer. Neither Gondreville nor 
 Madame Keller, his daughter, would have sneezed at Cecile's 
 sixty thousand francs a year, especially with the added pros- 
 pect of a hundred thousand more which will come to you 
 some day. You could have lived in Paris with your daughter, 
 and have played your part as mother-in-law in the higher 
 spheres of power." 
 
 Madame Beauvisage nodded approval. 
 
 " But we are struck down by the blow that has killed this 
 charming young man, who had already made a friend of the 
 prince. And this Simon Giguet, who is pushing forward on 
 the political stage, is a fool, a fool of the worst kind, for he 
 believes himself an eagle. You are too intimate with the 
 Giguets and the Marion family to refuse the alliance without 
 a great show of reason, but you must refuse " 
 
 " We are, as usual, quite agreed, my dear father." 
 
 "All this necessitates my going to see my old friend Malin ; 
 in the first place, to comfort him; and in the second place, 
 to consult him. You and Cecile would be miserable with an 
 old family of the Faubourg Saint-Germain ; they would make 
 you feel your humble birth -in a thousand little ways. What 
 we must look out for is one of Napoleon's dukes who is in 
 want of money ; then we can get a fine title for Cecile, and 
 we will tie up her fortune. 
 
 "You can say that I have arranged for the disposal of 
 Cecile's hand, and that will put an end to all such impertinent 
 proposals as Antonin Goulard's. Little Vinet is sure to come 
 forward ; and of all the suitors who will nibble at her fortune, 
 he is the more preferable. He is clever, pushing, and connected 
 through his mother with the Chargebceufs. But he is too 
 determined not to be master, and he is young enough to make 
 her love him ; between the two you would be done for. I 
 know what you are, my child ! " 
 
 "I shall feel very much embarrassed this evening at the 
 Marions," said Severine.
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS, 68 
 
 " Well, my dear, send Madame Marion to me, I will talk 
 to her!" 
 
 " I knew that you were planning for our future, dear 
 father, but I had no idea that it would be anything so bril- 
 liant," said Madame Beauvisage, taking her father's haods 
 and kissing them. 
 
 "I have planned so deeply," replied GrSvin, "that in 
 
 1831 I bought a house you know very well the H6teH3eau- 
 seant " 
 
 Madame Beauvisage started with surprise at hearing this 
 well-kept secret, but she did not interrupt her father. 
 
 "It will be my wedding-gift," he added. "I let it in 
 
 1832 to some English, for seven years, at twenty-four thou- 
 sand francs a year a good stroke of business, for it only cost 
 me three hundred and twenty-five thousand, and I have got 
 back nearly two hundred thousand. The lease is out on the 
 i5th of July next." 
 
 Severine kissed her father on the forehead and on both 
 cheeks. This last discovery promised such splendor in the 
 future that she was dazzled. 
 
 "If my father takes my advice," said she to herself, as she 
 recrossed the bridge, " he will leave the property only in 
 reversion to his grandchildren, and I shall have the life- 
 interest ; I do not wish that my daughter and her husband 
 should turn me out of their house ; they shall live in mine.'* 
 
 At dessert, when the two maids were dining in the kitchen, 
 and Madame Beauvisage was sure of not being overheard, she 
 thought it well to give Cecile a little lecture. 
 
 " My dear child," said she, " behave this evening as a well- 
 brought-up girl should ; and henceforth try to have a quiet, 
 reserved manner ; do not chatter too freely, nor walk about 
 alone with Monsieur Giguet, or Monsieur Olivier Vinet, or 
 the sub-prefect, or Monsieur Martener or anybody, in short, 
 not even Achille Pigoult. You will never marry any young 
 man of Arcis or of the department. Your fate will be to shinfi
 
 64 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC2S. 
 
 in Paris. You shall have some pretty dresses for every-day 
 wear, to accustom you to being elegant ; and I will try to 
 bribe some waiting-woman of the Duchesse de Maufrigneuse's 
 to find out where the Princesse de Cadignan and the Marquise 
 de Cinq-Cygne buy their things. Oh, we will not look in the 
 least provincial 1 You must practice the piano three hours a 
 day, and I will have MoYse over from Troyes daily until I 
 can find out about a master who will come from Paris. You 
 must cultivate all your talents, for you have not more than a 
 year before you at most before getting married. So, now, I 
 have warned you, and I shall see how you conduct yourself 
 this evening. You must keep Simon at arm's length without 
 making him ridiculous." 
 
 " Be quite easy, ma'am, I will begin at once to adore the 
 Unknown." 
 
 This speech, which made Madame Beauvisage smile, needs 
 a word of explanation. 
 
 "Ah, I have not seen him yet," said Phildas, " but every- 
 body is talking of him. When I want to know whom he is, 
 I will send the sergeant or Monsieur Groslier to inspect his 
 passport." 
 
 There is not a country town in France where sooner or later 
 the Comedy of the Stranger is not played. The Stranger is 
 not infrequently an adventurer who takes the natives in, and 
 goes off, carrying with him a woman's reputation or a family 
 cash-box. 
 
 Now, the possible accession of Simon Giguet to representative 
 power was not the only great event of the day. The attention 
 of the citizens of Arcis had been much engaged by the pro- 
 ceedings of an individual who haSd arrived three days pre- 
 viously, and who was, as it happened, the first Stranger to the 
 rising generation. Hence, the " Unknown " was the chief 
 subject of conversation in every family circle. He was the 
 log that had dropped from the clouds into a community of 
 frogs.
 
 THE Dl.PUTY FOR ARCIS. 65 
 
 All the residents of Arcis-sur-Aube know each other, and 
 they know every drummer who comes on business from the 
 Paris houses ; thus, as in every small town in a similar posi- 
 tion, the arrival of a stranger in Arcis sets all tongues wag- 
 ging, and excites every imagination, if he should stay more 
 than two days without announcing his name and business. 
 
 Now, while Arcis was still stagnantly peaceful, three days 
 before that on which by the fiat of the creator of so many 
 fictions this story begins, everybody had witnessed the ar- 
 rival, by the road from La Belle-Etoile, of a Stranger, in a neat 
 tilbury, driving a well-bred horse, and followed by a tiger no 
 bigger than your thumb, mounted on a saddle-horse. The 
 coach in connection with the mails for Troyes had brought from 
 La Belle-Etoile three trunks from Paris, with no name on them, 
 but belonging to the new-comer, who took rooms at the Mulct. 
 Everybody in Arcis that evening supposed that this individual 
 wanted to purchase land at Arcis, and he was spoken of in 
 many family councils as the future owner of the castle. 
 
 The tilbury, the traveler, the tiger, and the steeds all 
 seemed to have dropped from some very superior social 
 sphere. The stranger, who was tired no doubt, remained in- 
 visible ; perhaps he spent part of his time in settling in the 
 rooms he selected, announcing his intention of remaining 
 some little time. He insisted on seeing; where his horses were 
 housed in the stable, and was exceedingly particular; they 
 were to be kept apart from those belonging to the inn, and 
 from any that might arrive. So much eccentric care led the 
 host of the Mulct to the conclusion that the visitor must be an 
 Englishman. 
 
 On the very first evening some attempts were made on the 
 Mulct by curious inquirers ; but no information was to be got- 
 ten out of the little groom, who refused to give any account of 
 his master, not by misleading answers or silence, but by such 
 banter as seeme4 to indicate deep depravity far beyond his 
 years. 
 5
 
 8 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 After a careful toilet, the visitor ate his dinner at about six 
 o'clock, and then rode out, his groom in attendance, on the 
 BHenne road, and returned very late. The innkeeper, his 
 wife, and the chambermaids vainly examined the stranger's 
 luggage and possessions; they discovered nothing that could 
 throw any light on the mysterious visitor's rank, name, pro- 
 fession, or purpose. 
 
 The effect was incalculable ; endless surmises were put for- 
 ward, such as might have justified the intervention of the 
 public prosecutor. 
 
 When he returned, the stranger admitted the mistress of 
 the house, who laid before him the volume in which, by the 
 regulations of the police, he was required to write his name 
 and dignity,, the object of his visit, and the place whence he 
 eame. 
 
 "I shall write nothing whatever, madame," said he to the 
 innkeeper's wife. " If anybody troubles you on the subject, 
 you can say that I refused, and send the sub-prefect to me if 
 you like, for I have no passport. People will ask you a great 
 many questions about me, madame," he added. "And you 
 can answer what you please ; I do not intend that you should 
 know anything about me, even if you should obtain informa- 
 tion in spite of me. If you annoy me, I shall go to the Hotel 
 de la Poste, on the square by the bridge ; and, observe, that I 
 propose to remain a fortnight at least. I should be very sorry 
 to go, for I know you to be a sister of Gothard, one of the 
 heroes of the Simeuse case." 
 
 " Certainly sir ! " replied the sister of Gothard the Cinq- 
 Cygnes' steward. 
 
 After this, the stranger had no difficulty in detaining the 
 good woman for nearly two hours, and extracting from her all 
 she could tell him concerning Arcis everybody's fortune, 
 everybody's business, and who all the officials were. 
 
 Next morning he again rode out attended by the tiger, and 
 did not come in till midnight.
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 67 
 
 The reader can now understand Cecile's little jest, which 
 Madame Beauvisage thought had nothing in it. 
 
 Beauvisage and Cecile, equally surprised by the order of 
 the day set forth by Severine, were no less delighted. While 
 his wife was changing her dress to go to Madame Marion's, 
 the father listened to the girl's hypothesesguesses such as a 
 young lady naturally indulges in under such circumstances. 
 Then, tired by the day's work, as soon as his wife and daugh- 
 ter were gone, he went to bed. 
 
 As all may suppose who know France, or the province of 
 Champagne which is not quite the same thing or yet more, 
 the ways of country towns, there was a perfect mob in Madame 
 Marion's room that evening. Simon Giguet's success "was re- 
 garded as a victory over the Comte dc Gondreville, and the 
 independence of Arcis in electioneering matters as established 
 for ever. The news of poor Charles Keller's death was 
 felt to be a special dispensation from heaven, and silenced 
 rivalry. 
 
 Antonin Goulard, Frederic Marest, Olivier Vinet, Monsieur 
 Martener, in short, all the authorities who had ever fre- 
 quented the house, whose opinions could hardly be adverse to 
 the Government as established by popular suffrage in July, 
 1830, were there as usual, but all brought thither by curiosity 
 as to the attitude assumed by the Beauvisages, mother and 
 daughter. 
 
 The drawing-room, restored to order, bore no traces of 
 the meeting which had presumably decided Maitre Simon's 
 fate. 
 
 By eight o'clock, four card-players, at each of the four 
 tables, were busily occupied. The small drawing-room and 
 the dining-room were full of company. 
 
 "It is the dawn of advancement," said Olivier, remarking 
 to her on a sight so delightful to a woman who is fond of en- 
 tertaining. 
 
 "It is impossible to foresee what Simon may rise to," re-
 
 C8 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 plied Madame Marion. "We live in an age when a man 
 who has perseverance and the art of getting on may aspire to 
 the best." 
 
 This speech was made less to Vinet than for the benefit of 
 Madame Beauvisage, who had just come in with her daughter 
 and congratulated her friend. 
 
 Cecile went to gossip with Mademoiselle Mollot, one of her 
 bosom friends, and seemed more affectionate to her than ever. 
 Mademoiselle Mollot was the beauty of Arcis, as Cecile was 
 the heiress. M. Mollot, clerk of assize at Arcis, lived in the 
 Grande Place, in a house situated very much as that of the 
 Beauvisages was at the bridge end. Madame Mollot, who 
 never sat anywhere but at the drawing-room window on the 
 first floor, suffered in consequence from acute and chronic 
 curiosity, a permanent and inveterate malady. Madame 
 Mollot devoted herself to watching her neighbors, as a ner- 
 vous woman talks of her ailments, with airs, and graces, and 
 thorough enjoyment. If a countryman came on the square 
 from the road to Brienne, she watched and wondered what 
 his business could be at Arcis, and her mind knew no rest till 
 she could account for that peasant's proceedings. She spent 
 her whole life in criticising events, men and things, and the 
 household affairs of Arcis. 
 
 She was a tall, meagre woman, the daughter of a judge at 
 Troyes, and she had brought Monsieur Mollot, formerly Gre- 
 vin's managing clerk, fortune enough to enable him to pay for 
 his place as clerk of assize. The clerk of assize ranks with a 
 judge, just as in the Supreme Court the chief clerk ranks with a 
 councilor. Monsieur Mollot owed his nomination to the 
 Comte de Gondreville, who had settled the matter by a word 
 in season at the chancellor's office in favor of Grdvin's clerk. 
 The whole ambition of these three persons Mollot, his wife, 
 and his daughter was to see Ernestine Mollot, who was an 
 only child, married to Antonin Goulard. Thus the rejection 
 by the Beauvisages of every advance on the part of the sub-
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 69 
 
 prefect had tightened the bonds of friendship between the two 
 families. 
 
 "There is a much-provoked man!" said Ernestine to 
 Cecile, pointing to Simon Giguet. " He is pining to come 
 and talk to us ; but everybody who comes in feels bound to 
 congratulate and detain him. Fifty times at least I have 
 heard him say : ' The good-will of my fellow-citizens is toward 
 my father, I believe, rather than myself; be that as it may, 
 rely upon it, I shall devote myself not merely to our common 
 interests, but more especially to yours.' I can hear the 
 words from the movement of his lips, and every time he 
 looks round at you with the eyes of a martyr." 
 
 "Ernestine," said Cecile, "stay by me all the evening, 
 for I do not want to hear his hints hidden under speeches 
 full of Alas ! and punctuated with sighs." 
 
 " Then you do not want to be the wife of a keeper of the 
 seals!" 
 
 "Have they got no higher than that?" said Cicile, 
 laughing. 
 
 " I assure you," said Ernestine, " that just now, before 
 you came in, Monsieur Godivet the registrar declared in his 
 enthusiasm that Simon would be keeper of the seals before 
 three years were out." 
 
 "And do they rely on the patronage of the Comte de Gon- 
 dreville?" asked Goulard, seating himself by the two girls, 
 with a shrewd suspicion that they were laughing at his friend 
 Giguet. 
 
 "Ah, Monsieur Antonin," said pretty Ernestine, "you 
 promised my mother to find out who the handsome stranger 
 is ! What is your latest information ? " 
 
 "The events of to-day, mademoiselle, have been of far 
 greater importance," said Antonin, seating himself by Cecile 
 like a diplomatist enchanted to escape from general observa- 
 tion by taking refuge with a party of girls. " My whole 
 career as sub-prefect or full prefect hangs in the balance."
 
 70 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 " Why ! Will you not allow your friend Simon to be re- 
 turned as unanimously elected? " 
 
 " Simon is my friend, but the Government is my master, 
 and I mean to do all I can to hinder Simon's return. And 
 Madame Mollot ought to lend me her assistance as the wife 
 of a man whose duties attach him to the Government." 
 
 "We arc quite prepared to side with you," said Madame 
 Mollot. " My husband told me," she went on in an under- 
 tone, " of all the proceedings here this morning. It was 
 lamentable ! Only one man showed any talent Achille 
 Pigoult. Every one agrees in saying that he is an orator, and 
 would shine in Parliament. And though he has nothing, and 
 my daughter is an only child with a marriage-portion of sixty 
 thousand francs to say nothing of what we may leave her 
 and money from her father's uncle the miller, and from my 
 Aunt Lambert at Troyes well, I declare to you that if Mon- 
 sieur Achille Pigoult should do us the honor of proposing for 
 her, for my part, I would say yes that is, if my daughter 
 liked him well enough. But the little simpleton will not 
 marry any one she does not fancy. It is Mademoiselle Beau- 
 visage who has put that into her head." 
 
 The sub-prefect took this broadside as a man who knows 
 that he has thirty thousand francs a year of his own, and 
 expects to be made prefect. 
 
 " Mademoiselle Beauvisage is in the right," said he, look- 
 ing at Cecile ; " she is rich enough to marry for love." 
 
 " We will not discuss marriage," said Ernestine. " It only 
 distresses my poor little Cecile, who was confessing to me just 
 now that if she could only be married for love, and not for her 
 money, she would like to be courted by some stranger who 
 knew nothing of Arcis or the fortunes which are to make her 
 a female Croesus ; and she only wishes she could go through 
 some romantic adventure that would end in her being loved 
 and married for her own sake " 
 
 "That is a very pretty idea. I always knew that Made-
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 71 
 
 moiselle had as much wit as money!" exclaimed Olivier 
 Vinet, joining the group, in detestation of the flatterers sur- 
 rounding Simon Giguet, the idol of the day. 
 
 "And that was how, from one thing to another, we were 
 led to talk of the Unknown " 
 
 "And then," added Ernestine, "she thought of him as 
 the possible hero of the romance I have sketched " 
 
 " Oh;! " cried Madame Mollot, " a man of fifty 1 Never J " 
 
 "How do you know that he is a man of fifty?" asked 
 Vinet, with a smile. 
 
 "To tell the truth," said Madame Mollot, "I was so 
 mystified, that this morning I took my opera-glasses " 
 
 " Well done ! " exclaimed the inspector of works, who was 
 courting the mother to win the daughter. 
 
 "And so," Madame Mollot went on, "I could see the 
 stranger shaving himself with such elegant razors I Gold 
 handles or silver-gilt." 
 
 " Gold ! gold ! " cried Vinet. " When there is any doubt, 
 let everything be of the best ! And I, who have never even 
 seen the gentleman, feel quite sure that he is at least a count." 
 This, which was thought very funny, made everybody laugh.* 
 
 The little group who could be so merry excited the envy of 
 the dowagers and attracted the attention of the black-coated 
 men who stood round Simon Giguet. As to Giguet himself, 
 he was in despair at not being able forthwith to lay his fortune 
 and his prospects at the heiress' feet. 
 
 "Oh, my dear father," thought the deputy clerk, finding 
 himself complimented for the involuntary witticism, "what 
 a place you have sent me to as a beginning of my experience ! 
 A count comte with an m, ladies," he explained'. "A man 
 as illustrious by birth as he is distinguished in manners ; note- 
 worthy for his fortune and his carriages a dandy, a man of 
 fashion a lemon-kid-glove man- " 
 
 * There is a pun in the French on the words comte, a count, and conte t 
 romance, a fib.
 
 72 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 " He has the smartest tilbury you ever saw, Monsieur 
 Olivier," said Ernestine. 
 
 " And you never told me of his tilbury, Antonin, this 
 morning when we were discussing this dark conspirator; the 
 tilbury is really an attenuating circumstance. A man with a 
 tilbury cannot be a Republican." 
 
 " Young ladies," said Antonin Goulard, " there is nothing 
 I would not do to promote your pleasure. We will know, 
 and that soon, if he is a comte with an m, so that you may 
 be able to construct your conte with an ."* 
 
 "And it may then become history," said the engineer. 
 
 "As written for the edification of sub-prefects," said Olivier 
 Vinet. 
 
 "And how will you set about it?" asked Madame Mollot. 
 
 "Ah!" replied the sub-prefect. "If you were to ask 
 Mademoiselle Beauvisage whom she would marry, if she were 
 condemned to choose from the men who are here now, she 
 would not tell you ! You must grant some reticence to power. 
 Be quite easy, young ladies, in ten minutes you shall know 
 whether the stranger is a count or a drummer." 
 
 Antonin left the little coterie of girls for there were beside 
 Ce'cile and Ernestine, Mademoiselle Berton, the daughter of 
 the collector of revenue, an insignificant damsel who was a 
 sort of satellite to the heiress and the beauty, and Made- 
 moiselle Herbelot, sister of the second notary of Arcis, an 
 old maid of thirty, sour, pinched, and dressed after the man- 
 ner of old maids she wore a green tabinet gown, and a 
 kerchief with embroidered corners, crossed and knotted in 
 front after the manner in fashion during the Reign of Terror. 
 
 " Julien," said the sub-prefect to his servant in the vesti- 
 bule, " you were in service for six months with the Gondre- 
 villes ; do you know a count's coronet when you see it ? " 
 
 "It has nine points, sir, with balls." 
 
 "Very good. Then go over to the Mulct and try to get a 
 * Conte story. Comte and conte are pionuunced alike conte.
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 73 
 
 look at the tilbury belonging to the strange gentleman who is 
 staying there ; and come back and tell me what is painted on 
 it. Do the job cleverly, pick up anything you can hear. If 
 you see the little groom, ask him at what hour to-morrow his 
 master can receive the sub-prefect say Monsieur le Comte, 
 if by chance you see such a coronet. Don't drink, say noth- 
 ing, come back quickly, and when you return let me know by 
 just showing yourself at the drawing-room door." 
 
 "Yes, Monsieur le Sous-prefet." 
 
 The Mulct Inn, as has been said, stands on the square at 
 the opposite corner to the garden wall of Madame Marion's 
 house on the other side of the Brienne road. So the problem 
 would be quickly solved. 
 
 Antonin Goulard returned to his seat by Mademoiselle 
 Beauvisage. 
 
 "We talked of him so much here last evening," Madame 
 Mollot was saying, " that I dreamed of him all night " 
 
 "Dear, dear!" said Vinet; "do you still dream of the 
 Unknown, fair lady?" 
 
 "You are very impertinent. I could make you dream of 
 me if I chose!" she retorted. "So this morning when I 
 got up " 
 
 It may here be noted that Madame Mollot was regarded at 
 Arcis as having a smart wit that is to say, she talked fluently, 
 and took an unfair advantage of the gift. A Parisian wander- 
 ing in those parts, like the Stranger in question, would have 
 probably thought her an intolerable chatterbox. 
 
 "and was dressing, in the natural course of things, as 1 
 looked straight before me " 
 
 "Out of window?" said Goulard. 
 
 " Certainly. My dressing-room looks out on the market- 
 place. You must know that Poupart has given the Stranger 
 one of the rooms that face mine " 
 
 "One room, mamma!" exclaimed Ernestine. "The 
 count has three rooms ! The groom, who is all in black, is
 
 74 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 in the first room ; the second has been turned into a sort of 
 drawing-room ; and the gentleman sleeps in the third." 
 
 " Then he has half the inn," remarked Mademoiselle Her- 
 belot. 
 
 "Well, what has that to do with the man himself?" said 
 Madame Mollot, vexed at being interrupted by girls; " I am 
 speaking of his person." 
 
 " Do not interrupt the orator," said Olivier Vinet. 
 
 " As I was stooping " 
 
 "Sitting," said Antonin Goulard. 
 
 " Madame was as she ought to be dressing, and looking 
 at the Mulct," said Vinet. 
 
 These pleasantries are highly esteemed in the country ; for 
 everybody has said everything there for too long not to be 
 content with the same nonsense as amused our fathers before 
 the importation of English prudery, one of the forms of mer- 
 chandise which custom-houses cannot prohibit. 
 
 " Do not interrupt the orator," said Mademoiselle Beau- 
 visage to Vinet, with a responsive smile. 
 
 " my eyes involuntarily fell on the window of the room 
 in which last night the Stranger had gone to bed at what 
 hour I cannot imagine, for I lay awake till after midnight ! 
 It is my misfortune to have a husband who snores till the walls 
 and ceiling tremble. If I get to sleep first, I sleep so heavily 
 that I hear nothing ; but if Mollot gets the start, my night's 
 rest is done for." 
 
 "There is a third alternative you might go off together," 
 said Achille Pigoult, coming to join this cheerful party. " It 
 is your slumbers that are in question, I perceive " 
 
 " Hold your tongue, and get along with you," said Mad- 
 ame Mollot, very graciously. 
 
 ' V^u see what that means?" said Cecile in Ernestine's 
 >ar. 
 
 "Well, he had not come in by one o'clock," Madame 
 Mollot went on.
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR AKCIS. 75 
 
 " He is a fraud ! Sneaking in when you could not see 
 him," said Achille Pigoult. " Oh, he is a knowing one, you 
 may depend ! He will get us all into a bag and sell us on the 
 market-place ! " 
 
 " To whom ? " asked Vinet. 
 
 " To a business, to an idea, to a system!" replied the 
 notary, and the other lawyer answered with a cunning smile. 
 
 "Imagine my surprise," Madame Mollot returned, "when 
 I caught sight of a piece of stuff, so magnificent, so elegant, 
 so gaudy ! Said I to myself, ' He must have a dressing-gown 
 of that stuff woven with spun glass which we saw at the In- 
 dustrial Exposition.' And I went for my opera-glasses and 
 looked. But, good heavens ! what did I see ? Above the 
 dressing-gown, where his head should have been, I saw a huge 
 mass, like a big knee. No, I cannot tell you how curious I 
 was!" 
 
 "I can quite imagine it," said Antonin. 
 
 "No, you cannot imagine it," said Madame Mollot, "for 
 that knee " 
 
 " Oh, I see it all," said Olivier Vinet, shouting with laugh- 
 ter. "The stranger was dressing too, and you saw his two 
 knees " 
 
 "Not at all," said Madame Mollot; "you are putting 
 things into my mouth. The Stranger was standing up ; he 
 held a sponge over a huge basin, and your rude joke be on 
 your own head, Monsieur Olivier. I should have known if I 
 had seen what you suppose " 
 
 " Oh ! have known Madame, you are committing 
 
 yourself!" said Antonin Goulard. 
 
 "Do let me speak!" said Madame Mollot. "It was his 
 head ! He was washing his head ! he has not a hair." 
 
 "Rash man!" said Antonin Goulard. "He certainly 
 cannot have come to look for a wife. To get married here a 
 man must have some hair. Hair is in great request." 
 
 " So I have my reasons for saying that he must be fifty.
 
 76 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 A man does not take to a wig before that age. For, in fact, 
 the Unknown, when he had finished his toilet, opened his 
 window, and I beheld him from afar, the owner of a splendid 
 head of black hair. He stuck up his eyeglass when I went to 
 the balcony. So, my dear Cdcile, that gentleman will hardly 
 be the hero of your romance." 
 
 " Why not ? Men of fifty are not to be disdained when 
 they are counts," said Ernestine. 
 
 "Perhaps he had hair after all," said Olivier Vinet mis- 
 chievously, "and then he would be very eligible. The real 
 question is whether it was his bald head that Madame Mollot 
 saw, or his " 
 
 " Be quiet ! " said Madame Mollot. 
 
 Antonin Goulard went out to send Madame Marion's ser- 
 vant across to the Mulct with instructions for Julien. 
 
 " Bless me, what does a husband's age matter? " said Made- 
 moiselle Herbelot. 
 
 "So long as you get one," Vinet put in. He was much 
 feared for his cold and malignant sarcasm. 
 
 "Yes," replied the old maid, piqued by the remark, "I 
 would rather have a husband of fifty, kind and indulgent to 
 his wife, than a young man of between twenty and thirty 
 who had no heart, and whose wit stung everybody even his 
 wife." 
 
 "That," said Olivier Vinet, "is mere talk, since to prefer 
 a man of fifty to a young man one must have the choice ! " 
 
 " Oh ! " said Madame Mollot, to stop this squabble between 
 Mademoiselle Herbelot and young Vinet, who always went 
 too far, " when a woman has seen something of life, she knows 
 that whether a husband is fifty or five-and-twenty, it comes to 
 exactly the same thing if he is merely esteemed. The really 
 important thing in marriage is the suitability of circumstances 
 to be considered. If Mademoiselle Beauvisage wishes to live 
 in Paris and that would be my notion in her place I would 
 certainly not marry anybody in Arcis. If I had had such a
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S. 77 
 
 fortune as she will have, I might very well have given my 
 hand to a count, a man who could have placed me in a good 
 social position, and I should not have asked to see his pedi- 
 gree." 
 
 "It would have been enough for you to have seen him at 
 his toilet," said Vinet in a murmur to Madame Moliot. 
 
 "But the King can make a count, madame," observed 
 Madame Marion, who had been standing for a minute or two 
 looking at the circle of young people. 
 
 " But some young ladies like their counts ready-made," said 
 Vinet. 
 
 " Now, Monsieur Antonin," said Cecile, laughing at Olivier 
 Vinet's speech, " the ten minutes arc over, and we do not yet 
 know whether the Stranger is a count." 
 
 " The Government must prove itself infallible," said Vinet, 
 turning to Antonin. 
 
 " I will keep my word," replied the sub-prefect, seeing his 
 servant's face in the doorway. And he again left his seat. 
 
 "You are talking of the Stranger ! " said Madame Marion. 
 " Does any one know anything about him ! " 
 
 "No, madame," said Achille Pigoult. "But he, without 
 knowing it, is like an athlete in a circus the object of interest 
 to two thousand pairs of eyes. I do know something," added 
 the little notary. 
 
 "Oh, tell us, Monsieur Achille!" Ernestine eagerly ex- 
 claimed. 
 
 " His servant's name is Paradis." 
 
 "Paradis ! " echoed everybody. 
 
 " Can any one be called Paradis?" asked Madame Herbe- 
 lot, taking a seat by her sister-in-law. 
 
 "It goes far to prove that his master is an angel," the 
 notary went on, " for when his servant follows him you see 
 then that " 
 
 " ' C est le chemin du Paradis, '* That is really very neat, " 
 * This is the way of Paradise.
 
 78 THE DEPUTY FOR ARClS. 
 
 said Madame Marion, who was anxious to secure Achill* 
 Pigoult in her nephew's interest. 
 
 " Monsieur," Julien was saying to his master in the dining- 
 room, "there is a coat-of-arms on the tilbury." 
 
 " A coat-of-arms ? ' ' 
 
 "And very queer they are. There is a coronet over them 
 nine points with balls " 
 
 "Then he is a count " 
 
 "And a winged monster running like mad, just like a postil- 
 lion that has lost something. And this is what is written on the 
 ribbon," said he, taking a scrap of paper out of his waistcoat 
 pocket. "Mademoiselle Anicette, the Princesse de Cadignan's 
 maid, who had just come in a carriage, of course to bring 
 a letter to the gentleman (and the carriage from Cinq-Cygne 
 is waiting at the door), copied the words down for me." 
 
 "Give it me." 
 
 The sub-prefect read : 
 
 "Quo me trahit ' for tuna" 
 
 Though he was not a sufficiently accomplished herald to 
 know what family bore this motto, Antonin supposed that the 
 Cinq-Cygnes would hardly lend their chaise for the Princesse 
 de Cadignan to send an express messenger to any one not of 
 the highest nobility. 
 
 "Oho ! so you know the princess' maid? You are a lucky 
 beggar," said Antonin to the man. 
 
 Julien, a native of the place, after being in service at Gon- 
 dreville for six months, had been engaged by Monsieur le Sub- 
 prefect, who wished to have a stylish servant. 
 
 " Well, monsieur, Anicette was my father's god-daughter. 
 And father, who felt kindly toward the poor child, as her 
 father was dead, sent her to Paris to learn dressmaking; my 
 mother could not bear the sight of her." 
 
 "Is she pretty?" 
 
 "Not amiss, Monsieur le Sous-prefet. More by token she 
 had her little troubles in Paris. However, as she is clever,
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S, 79 
 
 and can make dresses and understands hairdressing, the prin- 
 cess took her on the recommendation of Monsieur Marin, 
 head-valet to Monsieur le Due de Maufrigneuse." 
 
 "And what did she say about Cinq-Cygne? Is there a 
 great deal of company ? " 
 
 " Yes, sir, a great deal. The princess is there, and Mon- 
 sieur d'Arthez, the Due de Maufrigneuse and the duchess, and 
 the young marquis. In short, the house is full. Monseigneur 
 the Bishop of Troyes is expected this evening." 
 
 "Monseigneur Troubert. Oh, I should like to know 
 whether he makes any stay there." 
 
 "Anicette thought he would. She fancies he has come on 
 account of the gentleman who is lodging at the Mulct. And 
 more people are expected. The coachman said there was a 
 great talk about the elections. Monsieur le President Michu 
 is to spend a few days there." 
 
 " Just try to get that maid into the town on some pretext. 
 Have you any fancy for her ? ' ' 
 
 " If she had anything of her own, there is no knowing. She 
 is a smart girl." 
 
 " Well, tell her to come to see you at the sub-prefecture." 
 
 " Very well, sir ; I will go at once." 
 
 "But do not mention me, or she will not come. Tell her 
 you have heard of a good place " 
 
 " Oh, sir ! I was in service at Gondreville " 
 
 "And you do not know the history of that message sent 
 from Cing-Cygne at such an hour. For it is half- past nine." 
 
 "It was something pressing, it would seem ; for the comte, 
 who had just come in from Gondreville " 
 
 " The Stranger had been to Gondreville ! " 
 
 " He dined there, Monsieur le Sous-preTet. And, you shall 
 see, it is the greatest joke. The little groom is as drunk as an 
 owl, saving your presence. They gave him so much cham- 
 pagne wine in-the servants' hall that he cannot keep on his 
 legs. They did it for a joke, no doubt."
 
 80 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 "Well but the count?" 
 
 " The count had gone to bed, but as soon as he read the 
 note he got up. He is now dressing. They were putting the 
 horse in, and he is going out in the tilbury to spend the rest 
 of the evening at Cinq-Cygne." 
 
 "Then he is a person of importance? " 
 
 " Oh, yes, sir, no doubt ; for Gothard, the steward at Cinq- 
 Cygne, came this morning to see Poupart, who is his brother- 
 in-law, and told him to be sure to hold his tongue about the 
 gentleman and his doings, and to serve him as if he were the 
 King." 
 
 " Then can Vinet be right ? " thought Goulard to himself. 
 " Is there some plot brewing? " 
 
 " It was the Due Georges de Maufrigneuse who sent Mon- 
 sieur Gothard to the Mulct ; and when Poupart came here to 
 the meeting this morning, it was because this count made him 
 come. If he were to tell Monsieur Poupart to set out for 
 Paris to-night, he would go. Gothard told his brother-in-law 
 to throw everything over for the gentleman and hoodwink all 
 inquirers." 
 
 " If you can get hold of Anicette, be sure to let me know," 
 said Antonin. 
 
 "Well, I could go to see her at Clinq-Cygne, sir, if you 
 were to send me out to your house at le Val-Preux." 
 
 " That is a good idea. You might get a lift on the chaise. 
 But what about the little groom ? " 
 
 " He is a smart little chap, Monsieur le Sous-preTet ! Just 
 fancy, sir, screwed as he is, he has just ridden off on his mas- 
 ter's fine English horse, a thoroughbred that can cover seven 
 leagues an hour, to carry a letter to Troyes, that it may reach 
 Paris to-morrow ! And the kid is no more than nine and a 
 half years old ! What will he have become by the time he is 
 twenty?" 
 
 The sub-prefect listened mechanically to this last piece of 
 domestic gossip. Julien chattered on for a few minutes, and
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 81 
 
 Goulard heard him vaguely, thinking all the time of the 
 great Unknown. 
 
 " Wait a little," he said to the servant. 
 
 "What a puzzle! " thought he, as he slowly returned to 
 the drawing-room. "A man who dines with the Comte de 
 Gondreville, and who spends the night at Cinq-Cygne I 
 Mysteries with a vengeance ! " 
 
 "Well ! " cried Mademoiselle Beauvisage's little circle as 
 he joined them. 
 
 " Well, he is a count, and of the right sort, I will answer 
 for it ! " 
 
 "Oh, how I should like to see him ! " exclaimed Cecile. 
 
 "Mademoiselle," said Antonin, with a mischievous smile 
 at Madame Mollot, " he is tall and well made, and does not 
 wear a wig ! His little tiger was as tipsy as a lord j they had 
 filled him up with wine in the servants' hall at Gondreville ; 
 and the child, who is but nine, replied to Julien with all the 
 dignity of an old valet when my man said something about 
 his master's wig. ' A wig ! My master ! I would not stay 
 with him. He dyes his hair, and that is bad enough.' " 
 
 "Your opera-glasses magnify a good deal," said Achille 
 Pigoult to Madame Mollot, who laughed. 
 
 " Well, and this boy of our handsome count's, tipsy as he 
 is, has flown off to Troyes to carry a letter, and will be there 
 in an hour and a quarter, in spite of the darkness." 
 
 " I should like to see the tiger ! " said Vinet. 
 
 " If he dined at Gondreville, we shall soon know all about 
 this count," said Cecile, " for grandpapa is going there to- 
 morrow morning." 
 
 "What will seem even more strange," said Antonin Gou- 
 lard, " is that a special messenger, in the person of Mademoi- 
 selle Anicette, the Princesse de Cadignan's maid, has come 
 from Cinq-Cygne to the stranger, and he is going to spend 
 Ihe night there." 
 
 " Bless me ! " said Olivier Vinet ; " but he is not a man 
 6
 
 82 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 he is a demon, a phoenix ! He is the friend of both parties ! 
 He can ingurgitate " 
 
 " For shame, monsieur ! " said Madame Mollot, " you use 
 words " 
 
 " Ingurgitate is good Latin, madame," replied Vinet very 
 gravely. " He ingurgitates, I say, with King Louis-Philippe 
 in the morning, and banquets at Holyrood in the evening 
 with Charles X. There is but one reason that can allow a 
 respectable Christian to frequent both camps and go alike to 
 the Capulets' and the Montagus'. Ah ! I know what the 
 man is ! He is the manager of the railroad line between 
 Paris and Lyons, or Paris and Dijon, or Montereau and 
 Troyes " 
 
 "Of course!" cried Antonin. "You have hit it. Only 
 finance, interest, or speculation are equally welcome wherever 
 they go." 
 
 "Yes, and just now the greatest names, the greatest fami- 
 lies, the old and the new nobility, are rushing full tilt into 
 joint-stock concerns," said Achille Pigoult. 
 
 " Francs to the Frank ! " said Olivier, without a smile. 
 
 "You can hardly be said to be the olive branch of peace," 
 said Madame Mollot. 
 
 "But is it not disgusting to see such names as Verneuil, 
 Maufrigneuse, and d'Herouville cheek by jowl with Tillet 
 and Nucingen in the quotations on 'Change?" 
 
 " Our stranger is, you may depend, an infant railroad line," 
 said Vinet. 
 
 "Well, all Arcis will be topsy-turvy by to-morrow," said 
 Achille Pigoult. "I will call on the gentleman to get the 
 notary's work in the concern. There will be two thousand 
 deeds to draw up." 
 
 "And so our romance is a locomotive!" said Ernestine 
 sadly to Cecile. 
 
 " Nay, a count and a railway company in one is doubly 
 conjugal," said Achille. " But is he a bachelor ? "
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 83 
 
 " I will find out to-morrow from grandpapa ! " cried C6cile 
 with affected enthusiasm. 
 
 " A pretty joke ! " exclaimed Madame Marion with a forced 
 laugh. "Why, Cecile, child, is your brain running on the 
 Unknown ?" 
 
 "A husband is always the Unknown,'* remarked Olivier 
 Vinet hastily, with a glance at Mademoiselle Beauvisage, 
 which she perfectly understood. 
 
 "And why not?" said she. " There is nothing compro- 
 mising in that. Beside, if these gentlemen are right, he is 
 either a great lord or a great speculator. My word ! I can 
 do with either. I like Paris ! I want a carriage, and a fine 
 house, and a box at the opera, et catcra" 
 
 "To be sure," said Vinet. "Why refuse yourself any- 
 thing in a day-dream ? Now, if I had the honor to be your 
 brother, you should marry the young Marquis de Cinq-Cygne, 
 who is, it strikes me, the young fellow to make the money 
 fly, and to laugh at his mother's objections to the actors in 
 the judicial drama in which our presiding judge's father came 
 to such a sad end." 
 
 "You would find it easier to become prime minister!" 
 said Madame Marion. "There can never be any alliance 
 between Grevin's grand-daughter and the Cinq-Cygnes." 
 
 "Romeo was within an ace of marrying Juliet," said 
 Achille Pigoult ; " and Mademoiselle Cecile is handsomer 
 and " 
 
 "Oh, if you quote opera! " said Herbelot feebly, as he 
 rose from the whist-table. 
 
 "My colleague," said Achille Pigoult, "is evidently not 
 strong in mediseval history." 
 
 " Come along, Malvina," said the sturdy notary, without 
 answering his young brother of the law. 
 
 "Tell me, Monsieur Antonin," said Ce"cile, "you spoke 
 of Anicette, the Princesse de Cadignan's maid do you know 
 her?"
 
 84 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS, 
 
 "No; but Julien does. She is his father's godchild, and 
 they are old friends." 
 
 "Oh, do try, through Julien, to get her for us; mamma 
 will give any wages " 
 
 " Mademoiselle, to hear is to obey, as they say to the des- 
 pots in Asia," replied the sub-prefect. "To serve you, see 
 how prompt I will be." 
 
 He went off to desire Julien to get a lift in the chaise re- 
 turning to Cinq-Cygne, and win over Anicette at any cost. 
 
 At this moment Simon Giguet, who had been put through 
 his paces by all the influential men of Arcis, and who believed 
 himself secure of his election, joined the circle round Cecile 
 and Mademoiselle Mollot. 
 
 It was getting late ; ten had struck. 
 
 Having consumed an enormous quantity of cakes, of orgeat, 
 punch, lemonade, and various fruit syrups, all who had come 
 that evening to Madame Marion's on purely political grounds, 
 and were unaccustomed to tread these boards to them quite 
 aristocratic disappeared promptly, all the more so because 
 they never sat up so late. The party would now be more in- 
 timate in its tone ; Simon Giguet hoped to be able to exchange 
 a few words with Cecile, and looked at her with a conquering 
 air. This greatly offended Cecile, 
 
 " My dear fellow," said Antonin to Simon, as he saw the 
 aureola of triumph on his friend's brow, " you have joined 
 us at a moment when all the men of Arcis are in the wrong 
 box " 
 
 " Quite wrong," said Ernestine, nudged by Cdcile. "We 
 are quite crazy about the Unknown. Cicile and I are quar- 
 reling for him." 
 
 "To begin with, he is no longer unknown," said Cicile. 
 "He is a count." 
 
 " Some adventurer ! " said Simon Giguet scornfully. 
 
 "Would you say that to his face," retorted C6cile, much 
 nettled. " A man who has just had a message by one of the
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 85 
 
 Princesse de Cadignan's servants, who dined to-day at Gon- 
 dreville, and is gone to spend this very evening with the 
 Marquise dc Cinq-Cygne ? " 
 
 She spoke so eagerly and sharply that Simon was put out of 
 countenance. 
 
 "Indeed, mademoiselle," said Oliver Vinet, "if we all 
 said to people's faces what we say behind each other's backs, 
 society would be impossible. The pleasure of society, especi- 
 ally in the country, consists in speaking ill of others." 
 
 "Monsieur Simon is jealous of your enthusiasm about the 
 strange count," remarked Ernestine. 
 
 "It seems to me," said C6cile, " that Monsieur Simon has 
 no right to be jealous of any fancy of mine 1 " 
 
 And saying this in a tone to annihilate Simon, C6cile rose. 
 Everybody made way for her, and she joined her mother, who 
 was settling her gambling account. 
 
 " My dear girl," said Madame Marion, close at her heels, 
 " it seems to me that you are very hard on my poor Simon." 
 
 " Why, what has the dear little puss been doing? " asked 
 her mother. 
 
 " Mamma, Monsieur Simon gave my Unknown a slap in 
 the face by calling him an adventurer." 
 
 Simon had followed his aunt, and was now on the battle- 
 field by the whist-table. Thus the four persons, whose inter- 
 ests were so serious, were collected in the middle of the room ; 
 Cdcile and her mother on one side of the table, Madame 
 Marion and her nephew on the other. 
 
 "Really, madame," said Simon Giguet, "you must con- 
 fess that a young lady must be very anxious to find me in the 
 wrong, to be vexed by my saying that a man of whom all 
 Arcis is talking, and who is living at the Mulct " 
 
 " Do you suppose he is competing with you ? " said Madame 
 Beauvisage jestingly. 
 
 " I should certainly feel it a deep grievance if he should be 
 the cause of any misunderstanding between Mademoiselle
 
 86 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 C6cile and me," said the candidate, with a beseeching look at 
 the girl. 
 
 " But you pronounced sentence, monsieur, in a cutting 
 tone, which proved you to be despotic and you are right ; 
 if you hope ever to be minister, you must cut a good deal ! " 
 
 Madame Beauvisage took Madame Marion by the arm and 
 led her to a sofa. Cdcile, left alone, went to join the circle, 
 that she might not hear any reply that Simon might make ; 
 and he remained by the table, looking foolish enough, me- 
 chanically playing tricks with the bone fish. 
 
 " There are as good fish in the sea ! " said Oliver Vinet, 
 who had observed the little scene ; and Cdcile, overhearing 
 the remark, though it was spoken in a low tone, could not 
 help laughing. 4 
 
 "My dear friend," said Madame Marion to Madame 
 Beauvisage, " nothing now, you see, can hinder my nephew's 
 election." 
 
 "I congratulate you and the Chamber," said Madame 
 Se"verine. 
 
 "And my nephew will make his mark, my dear. I will 
 tell you why : his own fortune, and what his father will leave 
 him, with mine, will bring him in about thirty thousand francs 
 a year. When a man is a member of parliament and has 
 such a fortune, there is nothing he may not aspire to." 
 
 " Madame, he will command our admiration, and our best 
 wishes will be with him throughout his political career, 
 but " 
 
 " I ask for no reply," exclaimed Madame Marion, eagerly 
 interrupting her friend. " I only ask you to think it over. 
 Do our young people like each other? Can we arrange the 
 match? We shall live in Paris whenever the Chambers are 
 sitting, and who knows but the Deputy for Arcis may be 
 settled there by getting some good place in office ? See how 
 Monsieur Vinet of Provins has got on ! Mademoiselle de 
 Chargebceuf was thought very foolish to marry him ; and
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 87 
 
 before long she will be the wife of the keeper of the seals, 
 and Monsieur Vinet may have a peerage if he likes." 
 
 " Madame, it does not rest with me to settle my daughter's 
 marriage. In the first place, her father and I leave her abso- 
 lutely free to choose for herself. If she wanted to marry the 
 Unknown, if he were a suitable match, we should give our 
 consent. Then Cecile depends entirely on her grandfather, 
 who, as a wedding-gift, will settle on her a house in Paris, 
 the Hotel Beauseant, which he bought for us ten years ago, 
 and which at the present day is worth eight hundred thousand 
 francs. It is one of the finest mansions in the Faubourg 
 Germain. He has also a sum of two hundred thousand francs 
 put by for furnishing it. Now a grandfather who behaves in 
 that way, and who will persuade my mother-in-law on her 
 part to do something for her grandchild, has some right to 
 an opinion on the question of a suitable match " 
 
 " Certainly ! " said Madame Marion, amazed at this revela- 
 tion, which would add to the difficulties of her nephew's 
 marriage with C6cile. 
 
 " And even if Cecile had no expectations from her grand- 
 father," Madame Beauvisage went on, "she would not marry 
 without consulting him. The young man my father had 
 chosen is just dead ; I do not know what his present inten- 
 tions may be. If you have any proposals to make, go and 
 see my father." 
 
 " Very well, I will," said Madame Marion. 
 
 Madame Beauvisage signaled to Cecile, and they left. 
 
 On the following afternoon Antonin and Frederic Marest 
 were walking, as was their after-dinner custom, with Monsieur 
 Martener and Olivier under the limes of the Avenue des 
 Soupirs, smoking their cigars. 
 
 They had taken but a few turns when they were joined by 
 Simon Giguet, who said to the sub-prefect with an air of 
 mystery 
 
 " You will surely stick by an old comrade, who will make
 
 88 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 it his business to get you the Legion of Honor and a pre- 
 fecture /" 
 
 "Are you beginning your political career already ?" said 
 Antonin, laughing. " So you are trying to bribe me you 
 who are such a puritan ? " 
 
 "Will you support me?" 
 
 " My dear fellow, you know that Bar-sur-Aube registers its 
 votes here? Who can guarantee a majority under such cir- 
 cumstances? My colleague at Bar-sur-Aube would show me 
 up if I did not do as much as he to support the Government ; 
 and your promises are conditional, while my overthrow would 
 be a certainty." 
 
 " But I have no opponent." 
 
 "So you think," said Antonin. "But one will turn up, 
 there is no doubt of that." 
 
 "And my aunt, who knows that I am on tenter-hooks, has 
 not come back!" cried Giguet. "These three hours may 
 count for three years ! " 
 
 And the great secret came out. He confided to his friend 
 that Madame Marion was gone to propose on his behalf to old 
 Gre'vin for Cecile. 
 
 The friends had walked on as far as the Brienne road, just 
 opposite the Mulct. While Simon stared down the hill, up 
 which his aunt would return from the bridge, the sub-prefect 
 was studying the runlets worn in the ground by the rain. 
 Arcis is not paved with either flagstones or cobbles, for the 
 plains of Champagne afford no building materials, much less 
 any pebbles large enough to make a road. 
 
 At this particular moment the Stranger was returning fronv 
 the Castle of Cinq-Cygne, where he had evidently spent the 
 night. Goulard was determined to clear up for himself the 
 mystery in which the Stranger chose to wrap himself being 
 also wrapped, so far as his outer man was concerned, in a light 
 overcoat or paletot of coarse frieze, such as was then the fashion. 
 A cloak thrown over him hid his figure from view, and an
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 89 
 
 enormous comforter of red cashmere covered his face up to 
 the eyes. His hat, knowingly set on one side, was, neverthe- 
 less, not extravagant. Never was a mystery so mysteriously 
 smothered and concealed. 
 
 " Clear the way ! " cried the tiger, riding in front of the 
 tilbury. " Open the gate, Daddy Poupart ! " he piped in his 
 shrill little voice. 
 
 The three stablemen ran out, and the tilbury went in with- 
 out any one having seen the driver's face. 
 
 The sub-prefect followed it, however, to the door of the inn. 
 
 " Madame Poupart," said Antonin, " will you tell Monsieur 
 Monsieur ? ' ' 
 
 " I do not know his name," said Gothard's sister. 
 
 " Then you are to blame. The police regulations are 
 definite, and Monsieur Groslier does not see a joke like all 
 police authorities when they have nothing to do." 
 
 " Innkeepers are never in the wrong at election time," said 
 the tiger, getting off his horse. 
 
 "I will tell that to Vinet," thought the official. "Go 
 and ask your master to see me, the sub-prefect of Arcis." 
 
 Antonin went back to his three friends, who had stopped 
 outside on seeing the sub-prefect in conversation with the 
 tiger, already famous in Arcis for his name and his ready wit. 
 
 " Monsieur begs that Monsieur le Sous-prefet will walk up. 
 He will be delighted to see him," Paradis came out in a few 
 minutes to say this to Antonin. 
 
 "I say, little man," said Olivier, "how much a year does 
 your master give a youth of your spirit and inches? " 
 
 "Give, monsieur? What do you take me for? Monsieur 
 le Comte allows himself to be done and I am satisfied." 
 
 "That boy is at a good school," said Frederic Marest. 
 
 "The High School, Monsieur le Procureur du Roi," re- 
 plied Paradis, and the five men stared at his cool impudence. 
 
 "What a Figaro ! " exclaimed Vinet. 
 
 " It does not do to sing small," said the boy. " My master 
 
 D
 
 90 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 calls me a little Robert Macaire. Since we have found out 
 how to invest in the Funds, we are Figaro with the savings 
 bank in'.o the bargain." 
 
 " Why, what do you earn ? " 
 
 "There are times when I make a thousand crowns on a 
 race and without selling my master, monsieur." 
 
 " Sublime infant ! He knows the turf " 
 
 "And all the gentlemen riders ! " said the boy, putting out 
 his tongue at Vinet. 
 
 " Paradise Road goes a long way ! " said Frederic Marest. 
 
 Antonin Goulard, meanwhile, shown up by the innkeeper, 
 found the Unknown in the room he used for a drawing-room, 
 and himself under inspection through a most impertinent eye- 
 glass. 
 
 " Monsieur," said Antonin Goulard in a rather lofty tone, 
 " I have just heard from the innkeeper's wife that you refuse 
 to conform to the police regulations ; and as I have no doubt 
 that you are a man of some consequence, I have come myself 
 that" 
 
 "Your name is Goulard?" said the Stranger in a head- 
 voice. 
 
 "I am sub-prefect, monsieur," said Antonin Goulard. 
 
 "Your father, I think, was attached to the Simeuses?" 
 
 "And I am attached to the Government. Times have 
 changed." 
 
 " You have a servant named Julien who wants to bribe 
 away the Princesse de Cadignan's waiting-maid?" 
 
 " Monsieur, I allow no one to speak to me in such a way ; 
 you misunderstand my character " 
 
 " But you wish to understand mine," interrupted the other. 
 "You may write it in the inn-register: 'An impertinent per- 
 son from Paris, age doubtful, traveling for his pleasure.' It 
 would be an innovation highly appreciated in France to imi- 
 tate the English method of allowing people to come and go as 
 they please without annoying them and asking them for their
 
 DEPUTY FOR ARClS. 91 
 
 papers at every turn. I have no passport : what will you do 
 to me?" 
 
 " The public prosecutor is out there under the limes " 
 
 said the sub-prefect. 
 
 "Monsieur Marest? Wish him from me a very good- 
 morning." 
 
 " But who are you ? " 
 
 " Whatever you wish me to be, my dear Monsieur Goulard," 
 said the Stranger, "since it is you who must decide how I 
 should appear before the good folk of this district. Give me 
 some advice as to my demeanor. Here read this." 
 
 And the visitor held out a note reading as follows : 
 
 " (Private.') PREFECTURE OF THE AUBE. 
 
 "MONSIEUR LE SOUS-PREFET: Be good enough to take 
 steps with the bearer as to the election in Arcis, and conform 
 to his requirements in every particular. I request you to be 
 absolutely secret, and to treat him with the respect due to his 
 rank." 
 
 The note was written and signed by the prefect of the de- 
 partment. 
 
 "You have been talking prose without knowing it," said 
 the Stranger, as he took the letter back. 
 
 Antonin Goulard, already impressed by the man's gentle- 
 manly appearance and manner, spoke respectfully. 
 
 " How is that, monsieur?" said he. 
 
 " By trying to bribe Anicette. She came to tell me of 
 Julien's offers you may call him Julian the Apostate, for 
 little Paradis, my tiger, routed him completely, and he ended 
 by confessing that you were anxious to place Anicette in the 
 service of the richest family in Arcis. Now, as the richest 
 family in Arcis are the Beauvisages, I presume that it is Made- 
 moiselle Cecile who is anxious to secure such a treasure." 
 
 "Yes, monsieur."
 
 62 Ttf D&PVTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 "Very well, Mademoiselle Anicette can go to the Beau- 
 visages at once." 
 
 He whistled. Paradis appeared so promptly that his master 
 said 
 
 "You were listening." 
 
 "I cannot help myself, Monsieur le Comte, the walls are 
 made of paper. If you like, Monsieur le Comte, I can go to 
 an upstairs room." 
 
 " No, you may listen ; it is your privilege. It is my business 
 to speak low when I do not want you to he*ar. Now, .go back 
 to Cinq-Cygne, and give this twenty-franc piece to Anicette 
 from me. Julien will be supposed to have bribed her on your 
 account," he added, turning to Goulard. "This gold-piece 
 means that she is to do as Julien tells her. Anicette may pos- 
 sibly be of use to our candidate." 
 
 "Anicette! " 
 
 "You see, Monsieur le Sous-preTet, I have made use of 
 waiting-maids for two-and-thirty years. I had my first adven- 
 ture at the age of thirteen, exactly like the Regent, the present 
 King's great-great-grandfather. Now, do you know the amount 
 of this demoiselle Beauvisage's fortune?" 
 
 " No one can help knowing it, monsieur ; for last evening, 
 at Madame Marion's, Madame Severine said that Monsieur 
 Grvin, Ce'cile's grandfather, would give her the Hotel 
 Beause'ant and two hundred thousand francs on her wedding- 
 day." 
 
 The Stranger's eyes betrayed no surprise; he seemed to 
 think it a very moderate fortune. 
 
 " Do you know Arcis well? " he asked Goulard. 
 
 " I am sub-prefect of the town, and I was born here." 
 
 " Well, then, how can I balk curiosity?" 
 
 " By satisfying it, Monsieur le Comte. Use your Christian 
 name ; enter that and your title on the register." 
 
 " Very good : Comte Maxime." 
 
 "And if you would call yourself the manager of a railway
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 93 
 
 company, Arcis would be content ; you could keep it quiet for 
 a fortnight by flying that flag." 
 
 " No, I prefer water-works ; it is less common. I have come 
 to improve the waste-lands of the province. That, my dear 
 Monsieur Goulard, will be an excuse for inviting myself to 
 dine at your house to meet the Beauvisages to-morrow. I 
 particularly wish to see and study them." 
 
 "I shall only be too happy," said the official. "But I 
 must ask your indulgence for the poverty of my establish- 
 ment " 
 
 " If I succeed in directing the election at Arcis in accord- 
 ance with the wishes of those who have sent me here, you, my 
 
 good friend, will be made a prefect. Read these " and he 
 
 held out two other letters. 
 
 "Very good, Monsieur le Comte," said Goulard, as he re- 
 turned them. 
 
 " Make out a list of all the votes at the disposal of the Gov- 
 ernment. Above all, we must not appear to have any mutual 
 understanding. I am merely a speculator, and do not care a 
 fig about the election." 
 
 " I will send the police superintendent to compel you to 
 write your name on Poupart's register." 
 
 " Yes, that is very good. Good-morning, monsieur. What 
 a land we live in ! " he went on in a loud tone. " It is im- 
 possible to stir a step without having the whole posse at your 
 heels even the sub-prefect." 
 
 "You will have to settle that with the head of the police," 
 replied Antonin emphatically. 
 
 And twenty minutes later there was a great talk at Madame 
 Mollot's of high words between the sub-prefect and the 
 Stranger. 
 
 " Well, and what wood is the log made of that has dropped 
 into our pool ? " asked Olivier Vinet of Goulard, as he came 
 away from the inn. 
 
 " A certain Comte Maxime, come to study the geology of
 
 94 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC IS. 
 
 the district in the hope of finding mineral sources," said 
 Goulard indifferently. 
 
 " Ar-sources you should say," replied Olivier. 
 
 " Does he fancy he can raise any capital in these parts?" 
 asked Monsieur Martener. 
 
 " I doubt our royalist people seeing anything in that form 
 of mining," said Vinet, smiling. 
 
 "What do you expect, judging from Madame Marion's 
 looks and movements?" said Antonin, changing the con- 
 versation by pointing out Simon and his aunt in eager con- 
 ference. 
 
 Simon had gone forward to meet Madame Marion, and 
 stood talking in the square. 
 
 "Well, if he were accepted, a word would be enough to 
 tell him so, I should think," observed Vinet. 
 
 "Well?" asked the two men at once as Simon came up 
 the lime-walk. 
 
 " My aunt has hopes. Madame Beauvisage and old Grevin, 
 who was starting for Gondreville, were not surprised at our 
 proposal ; our respective fortunes were discussed. Cecile is 
 absolutely free to make her own choice. Finally, Madame 
 Beauvisage said that for her part she saw no objection to a 
 connection which did her honor, though, at the same time, 
 she must make her consent depend on my election, and pos- 
 sibly on my appearing in the Chamber ; and old Grevin said 
 he must consult the Comte de Gondreville, as he never came 
 to any important decision without consulting him and taking 
 his advice." 
 
 " So you will not marry Cecile, old boy," said Goulard 
 bluntly. 
 
 "And why not?" said Giguet ironically. 
 
 " My dear fellow, Madame Beauvisage and her daughter 
 spend four evenings a week in your aunt's drawing-room ; 
 Madame Marion is the most thorough fine lady in Arcis. 
 Though she is twenty years the elder, she is the object of
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 95 
 
 Madame Beauvisage's envy ; and do you suppose they could 
 refuse you point-blank without some little civility?" 
 
 " Neither Yes nor No is NO," Vinet went on, " in view of 
 the extreme intimacy of your two families. If Madame Beau- 
 visage is the woman of fortune, Madame Marion is the most 
 looked up to ; for, with the exception of the presiding judge's 
 wife who sees no one she is the only woman who can en- 
 tertain at all ; she is the queen of Arcis. Madame Beauvisage 
 wishes to refuse politely that is all." 
 
 " It seems to me that old Grevin was making a fool of your 
 aunt, my dear boy," said Frederic Marest. "Yesterday you 
 attacked the Comte de Gondreville; you hurt him, you of- 
 fended him deeply for Achille Pigoult defended him bravely 
 and now he is to be consulted as to your marrying Cecile ! " 
 
 " No one can be craftier than old Grevin," said Vinet. 
 
 " Madame Beauvisage is ambitious," Goulard went on, 
 " and knows that her daughter will have two millions of 
 francs. She means to be the mother-in-law of a minister or 
 of an ambassador, so as to lord it in Paris." 
 
 "Well, and why not that?" said Simon Giguet. 
 
 "I wish you may get it ! " replied Goulard, looking at 
 Vinet, and they laughed as they went on their way. " He 
 will not even be elected ! " he went on to Olivier. "The 
 Government has schemes of its own. You will find a letter 
 at home from your father, desiring you to secure every one in 
 your connection who ought to vote for their masters. Your 
 promotion depends upon it, and you are to keep your own 
 counsel." 
 
 "And who is the man for whom they are to vote ushers, 
 attorneys, justice of the peace, and notaries?" asked Vinet. 
 
 " The man I will tell you to vote for." 
 
 " But how do you know that my father has written to me, 
 and what he has written ? " 
 
 "From the Unknown." 
 
 *' The man of mines ? ' '
 
 96 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 " My dear Vinet, we are not to know him ; we must treat 
 him as a stranger. He saw your father as he came through 
 Provins. Just now this individual showed me a letter from 
 the chief prefect instructing me to act in the matter of the 
 elections as I shall be directed by this Comte Maxime. I 
 should not get off without having to fight a battle, that I 
 knew ! Let us dine together and plan our batteries : You 
 want to be public prosecutor at Mantes, and I to be prefect, 
 and we must not appear to meddle in the elections, for we are 
 between the hammer and anvil. Simon is the candidate put 
 forward by the party who want to upset the present ministry, 
 and who may succeed. But for clear-sighted men like us 
 there is but one thing to do." 
 
 "And that is?" 
 
 "To obey those who make and unmake ministries. The 
 letter that was shown to me was from a man in the secrets of 
 the immutable idea." 
 
 Before going any further, it will be necessary to explain 
 who this " miner " was, and what he hoped to extract out of 
 the province of Champagne. 
 
 About two months before Simon Giguet's day of triumph 
 as a candidate, at eleven o'clock one evening, just as tea was 
 being served in the Marquise d'Espard's drawing-room in the 
 Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honore, the Chevalier d'Espard, her 
 brother-in-law, as he set his cup down on the chimney-shelf 
 and looked at the circle round the fire, observed : 
 
 " Maxime was very much out of spirits this evening did 
 not you think so? " 
 
 "Well," replied Rastignac, "his depression is very natural. 
 He is eight-and-forty ; at that age a man does not make friends ; 
 and when we buried de Marsay, Maxime lost the only one who 
 could thoroughly understand him, who could be of use to him, 
 or make use of him." 
 
 " And he probably has some pressing debts. Could not
 
 TttE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S. tf 
 
 you put him in the way of paying them off?" said the mar- 
 quise to Rastignac. 
 
 Rastignac at this juncture was in office for the second time ; 
 he had just been created count, almost in spite of himself; 
 his father-in-law, the Baron de Nucingen, had been made a 
 peer of France ; his brother was a bishop ; the Comte de la 
 Roche-Hugon, his brother-in-law, was ambassador; and he 
 was supposed to be an indispensable element in the composi- 
 tion of any future ministry. 
 
 " You always forget, my dear marquise," replied Rastignac, 
 "that our Government changes its silver for nothing but 
 gold ; it takes no account of men." 
 
 "Is Maxime a man to blow his brains out?" asked du 
 Tillet the banker. 
 
 "You only wish he were ! Then we should be quits," re- 
 plied Maxime de Trailles, who was supposed by all to have 
 left the house. 
 
 And the count rose like an apparition from the depths of a 
 low chair behind that of the Chevalier d'Espard. 
 
 Everybody laughed. 
 
 "Will you have a cup of tea?" asked young Madame de 
 Rastignac, whom the marquise had begged to do the honors 
 of the tea-table. 
 
 "With pleasure," said the count, coming to stand in front 
 of the fire. 
 
 This man, the prince of the rakes of Paris, had, till now, 
 maintained the position of superiority assumed by dandies 
 in those days known in Paris as gants jaunes (lemon-kids}, 
 and since then as "lions." It is needless to tell the story of his 
 youth, full of disreputable adventures and terrible dramas, in 
 which he had always managed to observe the proprieties. To 
 this man women were but means to an end ; he had no belief 
 in their sufferings or their enjoyment ; like the deceased de 
 Marsay, he regarded them as naughty children. 
 
 After running through his own fortune, he had devoured 
 7
 
 98 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 that of a famous courtesan known as the Handsome Dutch* 
 woman, the mother of the no less famous Esther Gobseck. 
 Then he brought trouble on Madame de Restaud, Madame 
 Delphine de Nucingen's sister; the young countess, Rastig- 
 nac's wife, was Madame de Nucingen's daughter. 
 
 Paris society is full of inconceivable anomalies. The Ba- 
 ronne de Nucingen was at this moment in Madame d'Espard's 
 drawing-room, face to face with the author of all her sister's 
 misery *-an assassin who had only murdered a woman's happi- 
 ness. That, no doubt, was why he was there. 
 
 Madame de Nucingen had dined with the marquise, and 
 her daughter with her. Augusta de Nucingen had been 
 married for about a year to the Comte de Rastignac, who had 
 started on his political career by holding the post of under- 
 secretary of State in the ministry formed by the famous de 
 Marsay, the only great statesman brought to the front by the 
 Revolution of July. Count Maxime de Trailles alone knew 
 how much disaster he had occasioned ; but he had always 
 sheltered himself from blame by obeying the code of manly 
 honor. Though he had squandered more money in his life 
 than the felons in the four penal establishments of France 
 had stolen in the same time, justice treated him with respect. 
 He had never failed in any question of technical honor ; he 
 paid his gambling debts with scrupulous punctuality. He was 
 a capital player, and the partner of the greatest personages 
 and ambassadors. He dined with all the members of the 
 corps diplomatic. "* He would fight ; he had killed two or 
 three men in his time nay, he had murdered them, for his 
 skill and coolness were matchless. 
 
 There was not a young man in Paris to compare with him 
 in dress, in grace of manner, in pleasant wit, in ease and 
 readiness, in what used to be called the "grand air." As 
 page to the Emperor, trained from the age of twelve in horse 
 exercise of every kind, he was a noted rider. He had always 
 five horses in his stables, he kept racers, he set the fashion.
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 99 
 
 Finally, no man was more successful than he in giving a 
 supper to younger men ; he would drink with the stoutest, 
 and come out fresh and cool, ready to begin again, as if 
 orgies were his element. 
 
 Maxime, one of the men whom everybody despises, but 
 who control that contempt by the insolence of audacity and 
 the fear they inspire, never deceived himself as to his posi- 
 tion. This was where his strength lay. Strong men can 
 always criticise themselves. 
 
 At the time of the Restoration he had turned his employ- 
 ment as page to the Emperor to good account. He attrib- 
 uted his supposed Bonapartist proclivities to the repulses he 
 had met with from a succession of ministers when he had 
 wanted to serve under the Bourbons ; for, in fact, notwith- 
 standing his connections, his good birth, and his dangerous 
 cleverness, he had never succeeded in getting an appointment. 
 Then he had joined the underground conspiracy, which ended 
 in the fall of the elder branch of the Bourbons. When the 
 younger branch, at the heels of the Paris populace, had 
 trampled down the senior branch and established itself on the 
 throne, Ma,xime made the most of his attachment to Napo- 
 leon, for whom he cared no more than for the object of his 
 first flirtation. He then did good service, for which it was 
 difficult to make a return, as he wanted to be repaid too often 
 by people who knew how to keep accounts. At the first re- 
 fusal Maxime assumed a hostile attitude, threatening to reveal 
 certain not very creditable details ; for a dynasty first set up 
 has, like infants, dirty linen to hide. 
 
 De Marsay, in the course of his career, made up for the 
 blunders of those who had undervalued the usefulness of this 
 person ; he employed him on such secret errands as need a 
 conscience hardened by the hammer of necessity; an address 
 which is equal to any mode of action, impudence, and, above 
 all, the coolness, presence of mind, and swift apprehension of 
 affairs, which are combined to make a bravo of scheming and
 
 100 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 superior policy. Such an instrument is at once rare and in- 
 dispensable. De Marsay intentionally secured to Maxime de 
 Trailles a firm footing in the highest social circles ; he repre- 
 sented him as being a man matured by passion, taught by ex- 
 perience, knowing men and things, to whom traveling and a 
 faculty of observation had given great knowledge of European 
 interests, of foreign cabinets, and of the connections of all 
 the great continental families. De Marsay impressed on 
 Maxime the necessity for doing himself credit ; he explained 
 to him that discretion was not so much a virtue as a good 
 speculation ; he proved to him that power never evades the 
 touch of a strong and trustworthy tool, at the same time 
 elegant and polished. 
 
 "In political life you can only squeeze a man once," said 
 he, blaming him for having uttered a threat. 
 
 And Maxime was the man to understand all the significance 
 of the axiom. 
 
 At de Marsay's death, Comte Maxime de Trailles fell back 
 into his old life. He went every year to gamble at watering- 
 places, and returned to spend the winter in Paris; but, al- 
 though he received from time to time some considerable sums 
 dug out of the depths of very tight-locked chests, this sort of 
 half-pay due to a marr"of spkit, who might at any moment be 
 made use of, and who was in the confidence of many mysteries 
 of antagonistic diplomatists, was insufficient for the extrava- 
 gant splendor of a life like that of this king of the dandies, 
 the tyrant of four or five Paris clubs. Hence the count had 
 many hours of uneasiness over the financial question. 
 
 Having no estates or investments, he had never been able 
 to strengthen his position by being elected deputy; and hav- 
 ing no ostensible duties, it was out of his power to hold the 
 knife to a great man's throat, and get himself made a peer of 
 France. And time was gaining on him ; dissipation of all 
 kinds had damaged his health and person. In spite of a 
 handsome appearance, he knew it ; he did not deceive him-
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 101 
 
 self. He determined to settle, to marry. He was too clever 
 a man to overestimate the true value of his position ; it vras, 
 he knew, an illusion. So he could not find a wife in the 
 highest Paris society, nor in the middle class. He required a 
 vast amount of spite, with apparent sincerity and real service 
 done, to make himself acceptable ; for every one hoped for 
 his fall, and a vein of ill-luck might be his ruin. 
 
 If once he should find himself in prison, at Clichy or 
 abroad, as a result of some bill of exchange that he failed 
 to negotiate, he would drop into the gulf where so many 
 political dead men are to be seen who do not comfort each 
 other. At this very hour he was dreading the falling stones 
 from some portions of the awful vault which debts build up 
 over many a Parisian head. He had allowed his anxiety to 
 be seen in his face ; he had refused to play here at Madame 
 d'Espard's; he had been absent-minded while talking to 
 ladies ; and he had ended by sitting mute and absorbed in 
 the armchair from which he now rose like Banquo's ghost- 
 
 Comte Maxime de Trailles, standing in the middle of the 
 fire-front, under the cross-lights of two large candelabra, found 
 himself the centre of direct or indirect observation. The few 
 words that had been said required him to assume an attitude 
 of defiance ; and he stood there like a man of spirit, but with- 
 out arrogance, determined to show himself superior to sus- 
 picion. A painter could not have had a more favorable 
 moment for sketching this really remarkable man. 
 
 For must not a man have extraordinary gifts to play such a 
 part as his, to have fascinated women for thirty years, to have 
 commanded himself to use his talents only in a secret sphere 
 exciting a people to rebel, discovering the mysteries of the 
 astutest politicians, and triumphing only in ladies' boudoirs 
 or men's private rooms? Is there not something grand in 
 being able to rise to the highest schemes of political life, and 
 then calmly drop back into the insignificance of a frivolous 
 existence ? A ipan must be of iro^ who can live through th?
 
 102 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 alternations of the gaming table and the sudden journeys of a 
 political agent, who can keep up the war-footing of elegance 
 and fashion and the expenses of necessary civilities to the fair 
 sex, whose memory is a perfect library of craft and falsehood, 
 who can hide so many and such different ideas, and so many 
 tricks of craft, under such impenetrable suavity of manner. 
 If the breeze of favor had blown steadily on those overspread 
 sails, if the course of events had served Maxime better, he 
 might have been a Mazarin, a Marechal de Richelieu, a 
 Potemkin* or perhaps, more exactly, a Lauzun, minus Pig- 
 nerol. 
 
 The count, a fairly tall man, and not inclining to be fat, 
 had a certain amount of stomach ; but he suppressed it majes- 
 ticallyto use Brillat-Savarin's words. His clothes, too, were 
 so well made that his figure preserved a youthful aspect, and 
 there was something light and easy in his movements, which 
 was due, no doubt, to constant exercise, to the habit of fencing, 
 riding, and shooting. Maxime had, in fact, all the physical 
 grace and distinction of an aristocrat, enhanced by his ad- 
 mirable "get-up." His face was long, of the Bourbon type, 
 framed in whiskers and a beard under his chin, carefully cut 
 and curled, and as black as jet. This hue, matching that of 
 his thick hair, was preserved by the use of an Indian cosmetic, 
 very expensive, and known only in Persia, of which Maxime 
 kept the secret. He thus cheated the keenest eye as to the 
 white hairs which had long since streaked the natural black. 
 The peculiarity of this dye, used by the Persians for thin 
 beards, is that it does not make the features look hard ; it can 
 be softened by an admixture of indigo, and harmonizes with 
 the color of the skin. This, no doubt, was the operation seen 
 by Madame Mollot ; but it remains to this day a standing joke 
 at Arcis to wonder now and again, at the evening meetings, 
 " what Madame Mollot did see." 
 
 Maxime had a fine forehead, blue eyes, a Grecian nose, a 
 * A noted Russian Minister of State i born 1739, died 1794,
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 103 
 
 pleasant mouth, and well-shaped chin ; but all round his eyes 
 were a myriad wrinkles, as fine as if they had been marked 
 with a razor invisible, in fact, at a little distance. There 
 were similar lines on his temples, and all his face was a good 
 deal wrinkled. His eyes, like those of gamblers who have sat 
 up night after night, were covered with a sort of glaze ; but 
 their look, if dimmed, was only the more terrible nay, terri- 
 fying. It so evidently covered a brooding fire, the lavas of 
 half-extinguished passions. The mouth, too, once fresh and 
 scarlet, had a cold shade, and it was not quite straight ; the 
 right-hand corner drooped a little. This sinuous line seemed 
 to hint at falsehood. Vice had disfigured the smile, but his 
 teeth were still sound and white. 
 
 These blemishes, too, were overlooked in the general effect 
 of his face and figure. His grace was still so attractive that 
 no younger man could compare with Maxime on horseback in 
 the Bois de Boulogne, where he appeared more youthful and 
 graceful than the youngest and most elegant of them all. 
 This privilege of eternal youth has been seen in some men of 
 our day. 
 
 De Trailles was all the more dangerous because he seemed 
 yielding and indolent, and never betrayed his obstinate fore- 
 gone conclusions on every subject. This charming indiffer- 
 ence, which enabled him to back up a seditious mob with as 
 much skill as he could have brought to bear on a Court in- 
 trigue to strengthen the position of a King, had a certain 
 charm. No one, especially in France, ever distrusts what 
 seems calm and homogeneous ; we are accustomed to so much 
 stir about trifles. 
 
 The count, dressed in the fashion of 1839, had on a black 
 coat, a dark blue cashmere vest embroidered with light blue 
 sprigs, black trousers, gray silk socks, and patent-leather shoes. 
 His watch, in his vest pocket, was secured through a button- 
 hole by a neat gold chain. 
 
 " Rastigna.c," said he, as he accepted the cup of tea held,
 
 104 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 out to him by the pretty countess, " will you come with me 
 to the Austrian embassy ? " 
 
 " My dear fellow, I am too recently married not to go home 
 with my wife." 
 
 ''Which means that by-and-by ?" said the young 
 
 countess, looking round at her husband. 
 
 "By-and-by is the end of the world," replied Maxime. 
 " But if you make madame the judge, that will win the case 
 for me, I think?" 
 
 Count Maxime, with a graceful gesture, drew the pretty 
 countess to his side ; she listened to a few words he said, and 
 then remarked: "If you like to go to the embassy with 
 Monsieur de Trailles, my mother will take me home." 
 
 A few minutes later the Baronne de Nucingen and the 
 Countess de Rastignac went away together. Maxime and 
 Rastignac soon followed ; and when they were sitting together 
 in the carriage 
 
 " What do you want of me, Maxime? " asked the husband. 
 " What is the hurry, that you take me by the throat? And 
 what did you say to my wife? " 
 
 "That I wanted to speak to you," replied Monsieur de 
 Trailles. "You are a lucky dog, you are ! You have ended 
 by marrying the sole heiress of the Nucingen millions but 
 you have worked for it. Twenty years of penal servitude 
 like " 
 
 "Maxime!" 
 
 "While I find myself looked at askance by everybody," 
 he went on, without heeding the interruption. " A wretched 
 creature a du Tillet asks if I have courage enough to kill 
 myself! It is time to see where we stand. Do they want me 
 out of the way, or do they not ? You can find out you must 
 find out," said Maxime, silencing Rastignac by a gesture. 
 " This is my plan ; listen to it. You ought to do me a ser- 
 vice^ I have served you, and can serve you again. The life 
 J am leading bores me, and. J want a, pension, Help ipe to
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 105 
 
 conclude a marriage which will secure me half a million ; 
 once married, get me sent as minister to some wretched 
 American republic. I will stay there long enough to justify 
 my appointment to a similar post in Germany. If I am good 
 for anything, I shall be promoted ; if I am good for nothing, 
 I shall be cashiered. I may have a son ; I will bring him 
 up strictly; his mother will be rich; I will train him- up to 
 diplomacy ; he may become an ambassador ! " 
 
 "And this is my answer," said Rastignac. " There is a 
 harder struggle to be fought out than the outside world 
 imagines between a power in swaddling clothes and a child in 
 power. The power in swaddling clothes is the Chamber of 
 Deputies, which, not being restrained by a hereditary Chamber, 
 may " 
 
 " Aha ! " said Maxime, " you are a peer of France ! " 
 
 " And shall I not remain so under any government ? " said 
 the newly made peer. "But do not interrupt, you are in- 
 terested in all this muddle. The Chamber of Deputies will 
 inevitably be the whole of the Government, as de Marsay 
 used to tell us the only man who might have rescued France ; 
 for a nation does not die ; it is a slave or free, that is all. 
 The child in power is the dynasty crowned in the month of 
 August, 1830. 
 
 " The present ministry is beaten ; it has dissolved the 
 Chamber, and will call a general election to prevent the next 
 ministry from having the chance ; but it has no hope of a vic- 
 tory. If it should be 'victorious in the elections, the dynasty 
 would be in danger ; whereas, if the ministry is turned out, 
 the dynastic party may struggle on and hold its own for some 
 time yet. The blunders of the Chamber will turn to the ad- 
 vantage of a Will, which, unfortunately, is the mainspring of 
 politics. When one man is all in all, as Napoleon was, the 
 moment comes when he must have representatives ; and as 
 superior men are rejected, the great Head is not represented. 
 The representative is called the Cabinet, a.nd in France there
 
 IOC THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 is no Cabinet only a Will for life. In France only those 
 who govern can blunder; the Opposition can never blunder; 
 it may lose every battle and be none the worse; it is 
 enough if, like the Allies in 1814, it wins but one victory. 
 With ' three glorious days ' it could destroy everything. 
 Hence not to govern, but to sit and wait, is to be the 
 next heir to power. Now, my personal feelings are on the 
 side of the aristocracy, my public opinions on that of the 
 dynasty of July. The House of Orleans has helped me to 
 reinstate the fortunes of my family, and I am attached to it 
 for ever." 
 
 "The for ever of Monsieur de Talleyrand, of course," de 
 Trailles put in. 
 
 " So at the present moment I can do nothing for you," 
 Rastignac went on. "We shall not be in power these six 
 months. Yes, for those six months, .we shall be dying by 
 inches : I have always known it. We knew our fate from the 
 first \ we were but a stop-gap ministry. But if you distinguish 
 yourself in the thick of the electoral fray that is beginning, 
 if you become a vote a member faithful to the reigning 
 dynasty, your wishes shall be attended to. I can say a great 
 deal about your zeal, I can poke my nose into every secret 
 document, every private and confidential letter, and find 
 you some tough place to work up. If you succeed, I can 
 urge your claims your skill and devotion and demand the 
 reward. 
 
 "As to your marriage, my dear fellow, that can only be 
 arranged in the country witli some family of ambitious manu- 
 facturers. In Paris you are too well known. The thing to 
 find is a millionaire, a parvenu, with a daughter, and possessed 
 with the ambition to swagger at the Tuileries." 
 
 "Well ; but get your father-in-law to lend me twenty-five 
 thousand francs to carry me over meanwhile ; then he will be 
 interested in my not being dismissed with empty promises, 
 a^id will promote my marriage." 1
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S. 107 
 
 "You are wide-awake, Maxime, and you do not trust me, 
 but I like a clever fellow ; I will arrange that little business for 
 you." 
 
 The carriage stopped. 
 
 The Comte de Rastignac saw the minister of the Interior in 
 the embassy drawing-room, and drew him into a corner. The 
 Comte de Trailles was apparently devoting himself to the old 
 Comtesse de Listomere, but in reality he was watching the 
 two men ; he marked their gestures, interpreted their glances, 
 and at last caught a friendly look toward himself from the 
 minister's eye. 
 
 Maxime and Rastignac went away together at one in the 
 morning, and before they each got into his own carriage, Ras- 
 tignac said on the stairs 
 
 " Come to see me when the elections are coming on. Be- 
 tween this and then I shall find out where the Opposition is 
 likely to be strongest, and what remedy may be devised by 
 two such minds as ours." 
 
 " I am in a hurry for those twenty-five thousand francs ! " 
 replied de Trailles. 
 
 " Well, keep out of sight." 
 
 About seven weeks later, one morning before it was light, 
 the Comte de Trailles drove mysteriously in a hackney-coach 
 to the Rue de Varenne. He dismissed the coach on arriving 
 at the door of the minister of Public Works, looked to see that 
 he was not watched, and then waited in a small room on the 
 first floor till Rastignac should be up. In a few minutes the 
 manservant, who had carried in Maxime's card, showed him 
 into his master's room, where the great man was finishing his 
 toilet. 
 
 " My dear fellow," said the minister, " I can tell you a 
 secret which will be published in the newspapers within two 
 days, and which you can turn to good account. That poor 
 Charles Keller, who danced the mazurka so well, has been 
 killed in Africa, and he was our candidate for the borough
 
 108 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 and district of Arcis. His death leaves a gap. Here are 
 copies of the two reports one from the sub-prefect, the other 
 from the police commissioner informing the ministry that 
 there were difficulties in the way of our poor friend's election. 
 In the police commissioner's letter you will find some informa- 
 tion as to the state of the town which will be sufficient to 
 guide a man of your ability, for the ambition of poor Charles 
 Keller's opponent is founded on his wish to marry an heiress. 
 To a man like you this is hint enough. The Cinq-Cygnes, 
 the Princesse de Cadignan, and Georges de Maufrigneuse are 
 within a stone's throw of Arcis ; you could at need secure the 
 legitimist votes. So " 
 
 " Do not wear your tongue out," said Maxime. " Is the 
 police commissioner still at Arcis ? " 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " Give me a line to him." 
 
 " My dear fellow," said Rastignac, giving Maxime a packet 
 of papers, " you will find there two letters written to Gondre- 
 ville to introduce you. You have been a page, he was a 
 senator you will understand each other. Madame Francois 
 Keller is addicted to piety ; here is a letter to her from the 
 Marechale de Carigliano. The marechale is now Orleanist ; 
 she recommends you warmly, and will, in fact, be going to 
 Arcis. I have only one word to add : Be on your guard 
 against the sub-prefect ; I believe him to be very capable of 
 taking up this Simon Giguet as an advocate with the ex- 
 president of the council. If you need more letters, powers, 
 introductions write me." 
 
 "And the twenty-five thousand francs?" asked Maxime. 
 
 " Sign this bill on du Tillet ; here is the money." 
 
 " I shall succeed," said the count, "and you can promise 
 the authorities that the Deputy for Arcis will be theirs, body 
 and soul. If I fail, pitch me overboard ! " 
 
 And within an hour Maxime de Trailles, driving his tilbury, 
 was on the road to
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 109 
 
 As soon as he was furnished with the information supplied 
 by the landlady of the Mulct and Antonin Goulard, Monsieur 
 de Trailles lost no time in arranging the plan of his electoral 
 campaign a plan so obvious that the reader will have divined 
 it at once. This shrewd agent for his own private politics at 
 once set up Phileas as the candidate in opposition to Simon 
 Giguet ; and, notwithstanding that the man was an unlikely 
 cipher, the idea, it must be admitted, had strong chances in 
 its favor. Beauvisage, as wearing the halo of municipal 
 authority, had, with the great mass of indifferent voters, the 
 advantage of being known by reputation. Logic rules the 
 development of affairs here below more than might be sup- 
 posed it is like a wife to whom, after every infidelity, a man 
 is sure to return. 
 
 Plain sense demands that the electors called upon to choose 
 a representative of their common interests should always be 
 amply informed as to his fitness, his honesty, and his char- 
 acter. In practice, no doubt, this theory is often considerably 
 strained ; but whenever the electoral flock is left to follow its 
 instincts, and can believe that it is voting in obedience to its 
 own lights and intelligence, it may be trusted to throw zeal 
 and conscious pride into its decisions ; hence, while knowing 
 their man is half the battle in the electoral sense, to know his 
 name is, at any rate, a good beginning. 
 
 Among lukewarm voters, beginning with the most fervent, 
 Phile'as was certain, in the first instance, to secure the Gondre- 
 ville party. Any candidate would be certain of the support 
 of the "Viceroy" of Arcis, if it were only to punish the 
 audacity of Simon Giguet. The election of an upstart, in the 
 very act of flagrant ingratitude and hostility, worjid cast a slur 
 on the Comte de Gondreville's provincial supremacy, and 
 must be averted at any cost. Still, Beauvisage must expect, 
 at the first announcement of his parliamentary ambition, a 
 far from flattering or encouraging expression of surprise on 
 the part of his father-in-law Grevin. The old. man had, once
 
 110 THE DEPUTY fOR ARCtS. 
 
 for all, taken his son-in-law's measure ; and to a mind as well 
 balanced and clear as his, the notion of Phildas as a states- 
 man would have the same unpleasant effect as a startling dis- 
 cord has on the ear. Also, if .it is true that no man is a 
 prophet in his own country, he is still less so in his own 
 family, where any recognition of even the most indisputable 
 success is grudged or questioned long after it has ceased to be 
 doubted by the outer world. But, the first shock over, Grdvin 
 would probably become accustomed to an alternative, which, 
 after all, was not antagonistic to his own notions for the future 
 existence of Severine. And then what sacrifice would he not 
 be ready to make to save the high influence of the Gondre- 
 villes, so evidently endangered ? 
 
 To the legitimist and republican parties, neither of which 
 could have any weight in the elections excepting to turn the 
 scale, Monsieur de Trailles' nominee had one strange recom- 
 mendation namely, his acknowledged ineptitude. These 
 two fractional elements of the anti-dynastic opposition knew 
 that neither was strong enough to return a member ; hence 
 they would probably be eager to embrace an opportunity of 
 playing a trick on what they disdainfully called the established 
 order of things , and it might confidently be expected that, 
 in cheerful desperation, they would heartily contribute to the 
 success of a candidate so grossly ridiculous as to reflect a 
 broad beam of ridicule on the Government that could sup- 
 port his election. Finally, in the suffrages of the Left Centre, 
 which had provisionally accepted Simon Giguet as its candi- 
 date, Beauvisage would give rise to a strong secession, since 
 he too gave himself out as opposed to the reigning dynasty ; 
 and Monsieur de Trailles, pending further orders, while assur- 
 ing the mayor of the support of the ministry, meant to en- 
 courage that political bias, which was undoubtedly the most 
 popular on the scene of operations. 
 
 Whatever budget of convictions the incorruptible representa- 
 tive might carry with him to Paris, his horoscope was drawn ;
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR A&US. Ill 
 
 it was quite certain that on his very first appearance at the 
 Tuileries, august fascination would win him over to fanaticism, 
 if the mere snares of ministerial enticement were not enough 
 to produce that result. 
 
 Public interest being so satisfactorily arranged for, the 
 electoral agent had now to consider the personal question : 
 Whether, while manufacturing a deputy, he could find the 
 stuff that would also make a father-in-law. The first point 
 the fortune, and the second point the young lady, met his 
 views ; the first without dazzling him, the second without his 
 being blind to the defects of a provincial education which 
 must be corrected from the beginning, but which would prob- 
 ably not offer any serious resistance to his skillful marital 
 guidance. Madame Beauvisage carried her husband away by 
 storm ; she was an ambitious woman, who, in spite of her 
 four-and-forty years, still seemed conscious of a heart. Con- 
 sequently, the best game to play would perhaps be a feint 
 attack on her, to be subsequently turned with advantage on 
 the daughter. 
 
 How far must the advanced works be carried ? A question 
 to be answered as circumstances might direct. In any case, 
 so far as the two women were concerned, Maxime felt that he 
 had the strong recommendation of his title, his reputation as 
 a man of fashion, and his peculiar fitness to initiate them into 
 the elegant and difficult arcana of Paris life ; and, finally, as 
 the founder of Beauvisage' s political fortunes, which promised 
 such a happy revolution in the life of these two exiled ladies, 
 might not Monsieur de Trailles expect to find them enthusi- 
 astically grateful ? 
 
 At the same time, there remained one serious difficulty in 
 the way of a successful matrimonial campaign. He must ob- 
 tain the consent of old Grevin, who was not the man to allow 
 Cecile's marriage without making the strictest inquiries into 
 the past career of her suitor. Now, in the event of such an 
 inquiry, was there not some fear that a punctilious old man
 
 112 THE DZPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 might fail to find a. record of such complete security and con- 
 ventional virtues as his prudence might insist on ? 
 
 The semi-governmental mission which had brought Monsieur 
 de Trailles to Arcis would indeed give a semblance of such 
 importance and amendment as might be calculated to neu- 
 tralize the effect of certain items of information. And if, be- 
 fore this mission were made public, it were confided as a great 
 secret to Grevin by Gondreville, the old man's vanity would 
 be flattered, and that would score in Maxime's favor. 
 
 He then resolved, in this difficult predicament, to adopt 
 the very old trick attributed to Gribouille, consisting in throw- 
 ing himself into the water to avoid getting wet. He would 
 anticipate the old notary's suspicions; he himself would seem 
 to doubt his own prudence; and, by way of a precaution 
 against the temptations that had so long beset him, he deter- 
 mined to make it a preliminary condition that Cecile's for- 
 tune should be expressly settled on herself. By this means 
 they would feel safe against any relapse on his part into habits 
 of extravagance. 
 
 It would be his business to acquire such influence over his 
 young wife as would enable him, by acting on her feelings, to 
 recover the conjugal authority of which such a marriage-con- 
 tract would deprive him. 
 
 At first nothing occurred to make him doubt the wisdom 
 and perspicacity of all these projects. As soon as it was 
 mooted, the nomination of Beauvisage caught fire like a train 
 of gunpowder ; and Monsieur de Trailles thought the success 
 of all his schemes so probable that he felt justified in writing 
 to Rastignac, pledging himself to carry out his mission with 
 the happiest and completest results. 
 
 But, suddenly in opposition to Beauvisage the tViumphant, 
 another candidate appeared on the scene ; and, it may be in- 
 cidentally noted, that, for the good fortune of this piece of 
 history, the competitor presented himself under conditions so 
 exceptional and so unforeseen that, instead of a picture of
 
 -THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 113 
 
 petty conflicts attending a country election, it may very prob- 
 ably afford the interest of a far more exciting drama. 
 
 The man who intervenes in this narrative to fill so high 
 a calling will be called upon to play so important a part 
 that it is necessary to introduce him by a somewhat lengthy 
 retrospective explanation. But at the stage we have reached, 
 to interrupt the story by a sort of argument in the middle 
 would be a breach of all the laws of art, and expose me to the 
 wrath of the Critic, that sanctimonious guardian of literary 
 orthodoxy. 
 
 In the presence of such a dilemma, the author would find 
 himself in serious difficulties, but that his lucky star threw in 
 his way a correspondence in which he found every detail he 
 could wish to place before the reader set forth in order, with 
 a brilliancy and vividness he could not have hoped to achieve. 
 
 These letters are worthy of being read with attention. 
 While they bring on to the scene many actors in the Human 
 Comedy who have appeared before, they explain a number of 
 facts indispensable to the understanding and progress of this 
 particular drama. When they have been presented, and the 
 narrative thus brought up to the point where it now apparently 
 breaks off, it will resume its course without any hiatus ; and 
 the author flatters himself that the introduction for a time of 
 the epistolary form, instead of destroying its unity, may, in 
 fact, enhance it. 
 8
 
 PART II. 
 
 EDIFYING LETTERS. 
 THE COMTE DE I/ESTORADE TO MARIE-GASTON.* 
 
 My DEAR SIR : In obedience to your request, I have seen 
 M. the Prefet of Police, to ascertain whether the pious pur- 
 pose of which you speak in your letter dated from Carrara 
 will meet with any opposition on the part of the authorities. 
 He informs me that the Imperial decree of the 23d Prairial 
 of the year XII. , which is still paramount on all points con- 
 nected with interments, establishes beyond a doubt the right 
 of every landowner to be buried in his own ground. You 
 have only to apply for permission from the prefet of the De- 
 partment Seine-et-Oise and without any further formality, 
 you can transfer the mortal remains of Madame Marie-Gaston 
 to the monument you propose to erect to her in your park at 
 Ville-d'Avray. 
 
 But I may now be so bold as to suggest to you some objec- 
 tions. Are you quite sure that difficulties may not be raised 
 by the Chaulieu family, with whom you are not on the best 
 terms ? In fact, might they not, up to a certain point, be 
 justified in complaining that, by removing a tomb dear to 
 them as well as to you from a public cemetery to private and 
 inclosed ground, you are regulating the visits they may wish 
 to pay to that grave by your own arbitrary will and pleasure ? 
 Since, evidently, it will be in your power to prohibit their 
 coming on to your property. 
 
 I am well aware that, strictly speaking, a wife, living or 
 dead, belongs to her husband, to the exclusion of all other 
 
 * See " Letters of Two Brides." 
 (1H)
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 115 
 
 relationship however near. But if, under the promptings of 
 the ill-feeling they have already manifested toward you on 
 more than one occasion, Madame Marie-Gaston's parents 
 should choose to dispute your decision by an action at law, 
 what a painful business it must be ! You would gain the day, 
 I make no doubt, the Due de Chaulieu's influence being no 
 longer what it was at the time of the Restoration ; but have 
 you considered what venom an advocate's tongue can infuse 
 into such a question, especially when arguing a very natural 
 claim : that of a father, mother, and two brothers, pleading 
 to be left in possession of the melancholy gratification of 
 praying over a grave ? 
 
 And if I must indeed tell you my whole mind, it is with 
 deep regret that I find you inventing new forms of cherishing 
 your grief, too long inconsolable. We had hoped that, after 
 spending two years in Italy, you would return more resigned, 
 and would make up your mind to seek some diversion from 
 your sorrow in active life. But this sort of temple to ardent 
 memories which you are proposing to erect in a place where 
 they already crush you too closely, can only prolong their 
 bitterness, and I cannot approve the perennial renewal you 
 will thus confer on them. 
 
 However, as we are bound to serve our friends in their own 
 way, I have conveyed your message to Monsieur Dorlange ; 
 still, I cannot but tell you that he was far from eager to enter 
 into your views. His first words, when I announced myself 
 as representing you, were that he had not the honor of know- 
 ing you ; and, strange as the reply may seem to you, it was 
 spoken with such perfect simplicity, that at first I imagined I 
 had made some mistake, some confusion of name. However, 
 as your oblivious friend presently admitted that he had been 
 at school at the college of Tours, and also that he was the 
 same M. Dorlange who, in 1831, had taken the first prize for 
 sculpture under quite exceptional circumstances, I could enter- 
 tain no doubt as to his identity. I then accounted to myself
 
 116 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 for his defective memory by the long break in your inter- 
 course, of which you wrote. That neglect must have wounded 
 him more than you imagined ; and when he affected not even 
 to recollect your name, it was a revenge he was not sorry 
 to take. 
 
 This, however, is not the real obstacle. 
 
 Remembering on what brotherly terms you had formerly 
 been, I could not believe that M. Dorlange's wrath would be 
 inexorable. And so, after explaining to him the work he was 
 invited to undertake, I was about to enter on some explana- 
 tions as to his grievance against you, when I was met by the 
 most unlooked-for obstacle. 
 
 "Indeed," said he, " the importance of the commission 
 you are good enough to propose to me, the assurance that no 
 outlay will be thought too great for the dignity and perfection 
 of the work, the invitation to set out myself for Carrara to 
 superintend the choice and extraction of the marbles the 
 whole thing is a piece of such great good fortune for an artist, 
 that at any other time I should have accepted it eagerly. But 
 at this moment, when you honor me with a call, though I 
 have no fixed intention of abandoning my career as an artist, 
 I am possibly about to be launched in political life. My 
 friends are urging me to come forward as a candidate at the 
 coming elections ; and, as you will understand, monsieur, if 
 I should be returned, the complication of parliamentary 
 duties, and my initiation into a new experience, would, for 
 some time at any rate, stand in the way of undertaking such 
 a work as you propose, with the necessary leisure and thought. 
 Also," added M. Dorlange, "I should be working in the 
 service of a great sorrow anxious to find consolation at any 
 cost in the projected monument. That sorrow would natu- 
 rally be impatient ; I should inevitably be slow, disturbed, 
 hindered ; it will be better, therefore, to apply to some one 
 else which does not make me less grateful for the honor and 
 confidence you have shown me."
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 117 
 
 After listening to this little speech, very neatly turned, as 
 you perceive, it struck me that your friend was anticipating 
 parliamentary triumphs, perhaps a little too confidently, and, 
 for a moment, I thought of hinting at the possibility of his 
 failing at the election, and asking whether, in that case, I 
 might call on him again. But it is never polite to cast doubts 
 on popular success ; and as I was talking to a man already 
 much offended, I would not throw oil on the fire by a ques- 
 tion that might have been taken amiss. I merely expressed 
 my regrets, and said I would let you know the result of my 
 visit. 
 
 I need hardly say that within a few days I shall have 
 found out what are the prospects of this parliamentary ambi- 
 tion which has arisen so inopportunely in our way. For my 
 part, there seem to me to be a thousand reasons for expecting 
 it to miss fire. Assuming this, you would perhaps do well to 
 write M. Dorlange ; for his manner, though perfectly polite 
 and correct, appeared to confess a still lively memory of some 
 wrong for which you will have to obtain forgiveness. I know 
 that it must be painful to you to explain the very singular cir- 
 cumstances of your marriage, for it will compel you to retrace 
 the days of your happiness, now so cruelly a memory. But, 
 judging from what I saw of your old friend, if you are really 
 bent on his giving you the benefit of his talents, if you do not 
 apply to him yourself, but continue to employ a go-between, 
 you will be persisting in a course which he finds disobliging, 
 and expose yourself to a final refusal. 
 
 At the same time, if the step I urge on you is really too 
 much for you, there is perhaps another alternative. Madame 
 de 1'Estorade has always seemed to me a very tactful negoti- 
 ator in any business she undertakes, and in this particular in- 
 stance I should feel entire confidence in her skill. She en- 
 dured, from Madame Marie-Gaston's gusts of selfish passion, 
 treatment much like that of which Monsieur Dorlange com- 
 plains. She, better than anybody, will be in a position to ex-
 
 118 TH DEPUTY #0tt ARC1S. 
 
 plain to him the absorbing cares of married life which you shut 
 up in its own narrow folds ; and it seems to me that the ex- 
 ample of longsuffering and patience which she always showed 
 to her whom she would call her "dear crazy thing," cannot 
 fail to infect your mind. 
 
 You have ample time to think over the use you may wish 
 to make of the opening that thus offers. Madame de 1'Esto- 
 rade is just now suffering from a nervous shock, the result of a 
 terrible fright. A week ago our dear little Na'is was within an 
 ace of being crushed before her eyes ; and but for the courage 
 of a stranger who rushed at the horses' heads and brought them 
 up short, God knows what dreadful misfortune would have be- 
 fallen us. This fearful moment produced in Madame de 1'Es- 
 torade an attack of nervous excitement which made us for a 
 time excessively anxious. Though she is much better to-day, 
 it will be some days yet before she can seeMonsieur Dorlange, 
 supposing you should think her feminine intervention desirable 
 and useful. 
 
 Still, once again, my dear sir, would it hot be wiser to give 
 up your idea? All I can foresee as the outcome for you is 
 enormous expense, unpleasant squabbles with the Chaulieus, 
 and a renewal of all your sorrows. Notwithstanding, I am 
 none the less at your service in and for anything, as I cannot 
 fail to be, from every sentiment of esteem and friendship. 
 
 THE COMTESSE DE I/ESTORADE TO MADAME OCTAVE DE CAMPS. 
 
 PARIS, February, 1839. 
 
 DEAR FRIEND: Of all the expressions of sympathy that 
 have reached me since the dreadful accident to my poor child, 
 none has touched me more deeply than your kind letter. To 
 answer your affectionate inquiry, I must say that in that ter- 
 rible moment Na'is was marvelously composed and calm. It 
 would be impossible, I think, to see death more imminent, 
 but neither at the time nor afterward did the brave child
 
 THE DEPUl'Y FOR ARC1S. lid 
 
 flinch ; everything shows her to have a firm nature, and her 
 health, thank God, has not suffered in the faintest degree. 
 
 I, for my part, as a consequence of my intense fright, have 
 had an attack of spasmodic convulsions, and for some days, it 
 would seem, alarmed my doctor, who feared I might go out of 
 my mind. Thanks, however, to a strong constitution, I am 
 now almost myself again, and no traces would remain of that 
 painful shock if it had not, by a singular fatality, been con- 
 nected with another unpleasant circumstance which I had for 
 some time thought fit to fill a place in my life. 
 
 Even before this latest kind assurance of your good-will 
 toward me, I had thought of turning to the help of your 
 friendship and advice ; and now, when you are so good as to 
 write that you would be happy and proud if in any degree you 
 might take the place of poor Louise de Chaulieu, the dear, 
 incomparable friend snatched from me by death, how can I 
 hesitate? I take you at your word, my dear madame, and 
 boldly request you to exert in my favor the delicate skill 
 which enabled you to defy impertinent comment when the 
 impossibility of announcing your marriage to Monsieur de 
 Camps exposed you to insolent and perfidious curiosity the 
 peculiar tact by which you extricated yourself from a position 
 of difficulty and danger in short, the wonderful art which 
 allowed you at once to keep your secret and maintain your 
 dignity. I need their help in the disagreeable matter to 
 which I have alluded. Unfortunately, to benefit by the doc- 
 tor's advice, the patient must explain the case ; and here M. 
 de Camps, with his genius for business, seems to me an atro- 
 cious person. Owing to those odious forges he has chosen to 
 buy, you are as good as dead to Paris and the world. Of old, 
 when you were at hand, in a quarter of an hour's chat I could 
 have told the whole story without hesitancy or preparation ; 
 as it is, I have to think it all out and go through the solemn 
 formality of a confession in black and white. 
 
 After all, effrontery will perhaps best serve my turn ; and
 
 120 tH bEPUTY FOR A&tiS. 
 
 since, in spite of circumlocutions and preambles, I must at 
 last come to the point, why not confess at once that at the 
 kernel of the matter is that very stranger who rescued my poor 
 little girl. A stranger be it clearly understood to M. de 
 1'Estorade, and to all who may have reported the accident; a 
 stranger to the whole world, if you please but not to your 
 humble servant, whom this man has for three months past 
 condescended to honor wfth the most persistent attention. It 
 cannot seem any less preposterous to you than it does to me, 
 my dear friend, that I, at two-and-thirty, with three children, 
 one a tall son of fifteen, should have become the object of 
 unremitting devotion, and yet that is the absurd misfortune 
 against which I have to protect myself. 
 
 And when I say that I know the unknown, this is but partly 
 true : I know neither his name nor his place of residence, nor 
 anything about him ; I never met him in society ; and I may 
 add that though he has the ribbon of the Legion of Honor, 
 nothing in his appearance, which has no trace of elegance, 
 leads me to suppose that I ever shall meet him in society. 
 
 It was at the church of Saint-Thomas d'Aquin, where, as 
 you know, I was in the daily habit of attending mass, that 
 this annoying "shadowing" first began. I also took the 
 children out walking in the Tuileries almost every day, M. de 
 1'Estorade having taken a house without a garden. This 
 custom was soon noted by my persecutor, and gave him bold- 
 ness ; for wherever I was to be found out of doors I had to put 
 up with his presence. But this singular adorer was as prudent 
 as he was daring ; he always avoided following me to my door; 
 and he steered his way at such a distance and so undemon- 
 stratively, that I had at any rate the comforting certainty that 
 his foolish assiduity could not attract the notice of anybody 
 who was with me. And yet, heaven alone knows to what 
 inconveniences and privations I have submitted to put him off 
 my track. I never entered the church but on Sunday ; and 
 to the risk of the dear children's health I have often kept them
 
 THE DEPUTV FOK ARClS. 121 
 
 at home, or invented excuses for not going out with them, 
 leaving them to the servants against all my principles of 
 education and prudence. 
 
 Visits, shopping I can do nothing but in a carriage ; and 
 all this could not hinder that, just when I fancied I had 
 routed this tiresome person and exhausted his patience, he 
 was on the spot to play so brave and providential a part in 
 that dreadful accident to Na'is. But it is this very obligation 
 which I now owe him that introduces a vexatious complica- 
 tion into a position already so awkward. If I had at last 
 been to much annoyed by his persistency I might by some 
 means, even by some decisive action, have put an end to his 
 persecution ; but now, if he comes across my path, what can 
 I do ? How am I to proceed ? Merely to thank him would 
 be to encourage him ; and even if he should not try to take 
 advantage of my civilities to alter our relative position, I 
 should have him at my heels closer than ever. Am I then 
 not to notice him, to affect not to recognize him ? But, my 
 dear madame, think ! A mother who owes her child's life to 
 his efforts and pretends not to perceive it who has not a 
 word of gratitude ! 
 
 This, then, is the intolerable dilemma in which I find my- 
 self, and you can see how sorely I need your advice and 
 judgment. What can I do to break the odious habit this 
 gentleman has formed of following me like my shadow? 
 How am I to thank him without exciting his imagination, 
 or to avoid thanking him without suffering the reproaches 
 of my conscience ? This is the problem I submit to your 
 wisdom. 
 
 If you will do me the service of solving it and I know 
 no one else so capable I shall add my gratitude to the 
 affection 'which, as you know, dear madame, I already feel 
 for you. 
 
 E
 
 122 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 THE COMTE DE I/ESTORADE TO MARIE-GASTON. 
 
 PARIS, February, 1839. 
 
 The public prints, my dear sir, may have been beforehand 
 in giving you an account of a meeting between your friend 
 M. Dorlange and the Due de Rhetore\ But the newspapers, 
 by announcing the bare facts since custom and propriety do 
 not allow them to expatiate on the motives of the quarrel 
 will only have excited your curiosity without satisfying it. I 
 happen to know on good authority all the details of the affair, 
 and I hasten to communicate them to you, as they must to 
 you be of the greatest interest. 
 
 Three days ago, that is to say, on the evening of the day 
 when I had called on M. Dorlange, the Due de Rhetore was 
 in a stall at the opera. M. de Ronquerolles, who has lately 
 returned from a diplomatic mission that had detained him far 
 from Paris for some years, presently took the seat next to him. 
 Between the acts these gentlemen did not leave their places to 
 walk in the gallery ; but, as is commonly done in the theatre, 
 they stood up with their backs to the stage, consequently facing 
 M. Dorlange, who sat behind them and seemed absorbed in 
 the evening's news. There had been a very uproarious scene 
 in the Chamber what is termed a very interesting debate. 
 The conversation turned very naturally on the events in Paris 
 society during M. de Ronquerolles' absence, and he happened 
 to make this remark, which, of course, attracted M. Dorlange's 
 attention : 
 
 " And that poor Madame de Macumer what a sad end, 
 and what a strange marriage ! " 
 
 "Oh, you know," said M. de Rhetore in the high-pitched 
 tone he affects, " my sister had too much imagination not to 
 be a little chimerical and romantic. She was passionately in 
 love with M. de Macumer, her first husband ; still, one may 
 tire of all things, even of widowhood. This M. Marie-Guston
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCfS. 123 
 
 came in her way. He is attractive in person ; my sister was 
 rich, he very much in debt ; he was proportionately amiable 
 and attentive; and, on my honor, the rogue managed so 
 cleverly that, after stepping into M. de Macumer's shoes and 
 making his wife die of jealousy, he got out of her everything 
 that the law allowed the poor silly woman to dispose of. 
 Louise left a fortune of at least twelve hundred thousand 
 francs, to say nothing of magnificent furniture and a delight- 
 ful villa she had built at Ville-d' Avray. Half of this came to 
 our gentleman, the other half to my father and mother, the 
 Due and Duchesse de Chaulieu, who, as parents, had a right 
 to that share. As to my brother Lenoncourt and me we 
 were simply disinherited for our portion." 
 
 As soon as your name was pronounced, my dear sir, M. 
 Dorlange laid down his paper; then, as M. de Rhetore ceased 
 speaking, he rose. 
 
 " I beg your pardon, M. le Due, for taking the liberty of 
 correcting your statements ; but, as a matter of conscience, I 
 must assure you that you are to the last degree misinformed." 
 
 "You say? " replied the duke, half-closing his eyes, 
 
 and in a tone of contempt which you can easily imagine. 
 
 "I say, Monsieur le Due, that Marie-Gaston has been my 
 friend from childhood, and that he has never been called a 
 rogue. On the contrary, he is a man of honor and talent ; 
 and far from making his wife die of jealousy, he made her 
 perfectly happy during three years of married life. As to her 
 fortune " 
 
 "You have considered the consequences of this step?" 
 said the duke, interrupting him. 
 
 " Certainly, monsieur. And I repeat that, with regard to 
 the fortune left to Marie-Gaston by a special provision in his 
 wife's will, he coveted it so little that, to my knowledge, he 
 is about to devote a sum of two or three hundred thousand 
 francs to the erection of a monument to the wife he has never 
 ceased to mourn."
 
 124 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S, 
 
 "And, after all, monsieur, who are you?" the Due de 
 Rhetore broke in again, with growing irritation. 
 
 " In a moment I shall have the honor to inform you," re- 
 plied M. Dorlange. " But, first, you will allow me to add 
 that Madame Marie-Gaston could have no pangs of conscience 
 in disposing as she did of the fortune of which you have been 
 deprived. All her wealth, as a matter of fact, came to her 
 from M. le Baron de Macumer, her first husband, and she 
 had previously renounced her patrimony to secure an adequate 
 position to your brother, M. le Due de Lenoncourt-Givry, 
 who, as a younger son, had not, like yourself, M. le Due, the 
 benefit of the entail." 
 
 M. Dorlange felt in his pocket for his card-case, but it was 
 not there. 
 
 " I have no cards about me," he said ; " but my name is 
 Dorlange a sort of stage-name, and easy to remember 42 
 Rue de 1'Ouest." 
 
 "Not a very central position," M. de Rhetore remarked 
 ironically. 
 
 At the same time he turned to M. de Ronquerolles, and 
 taking him as a witness and as his second 
 
 " I must apologize to you, my dear fellow," said he, "for 
 sending you on a voyage of discovery to-morrow morning." 
 Then he added : " Come to the smoking-room ; we can talk 
 there in peace, and at any rate in security." 
 
 By the emphasis he laid on the last word, it was impossible 
 to misunderstand the innuendo it was meant to convey. The 
 two gentlemen went out, without the scene having given rise 
 to any commotion or fuss; since the stalls all round them were 
 empty, and M. Dorlange then caught sight of M. Stidman, 
 the famus sculptor, at the other end of the stalls. He went 
 up to him. 
 
 "Do you happen to have," said he, "such a thing as a 
 memorandum or sketch book in your pocket?" 
 
 "Yes always."
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 125 
 
 " Then would you lend it to me and allow me to tear a leaf 
 out? I have just had an idea that I do not want to lose. If 
 I should not see you as you go out, to return the book, you 
 shall have it without fail to-morrow morning." 
 
 On returning to his seat M. Dorlange made a hasty pencil 
 sketch ; and when the curtain rose, and MM. de Rhetore and 
 de Ronquerolles came back to their places, he lightly touched 
 the duke on the shoulder, and, handing him the drawing, he 
 said, " My card, which I have the honor of giving to your 
 grace." 
 
 The card was a pretty sketch of sculpturesque architecture 
 set in a landscape. Underneath it was written : " Sketch for 
 a monument to be erected to the memory of Madame Marie- 
 Gaston, nee Chaulieu, by her husband, from the designs of 
 Charles Dorlange, sculptor, Rue 1'Ouest, 42." 
 
 He could have found no more ingenious way of intimating 
 to M. de Rhetore that he had no mean adversary ; and you 
 may observe, my dear sir, that M. Dorlange thus gave weight 
 to his denial by giving substance, so to speak, to his statement 
 as to your disinterestedness and conjugal devotion and grief. 
 
 The performance ended without any further incident. M. 
 de Rhetore parted from M. de Ronquerolles. 
 
 M. de Ronquerolles then addressed M. Dorlange, very cour- 
 teously endeavoring to effect a reconciliation, observing that 
 though he might be in the right, his conduct was unconven- 
 tional and offensive, that M. de Rhetore had behaved with 
 great moderation, and would certainly accept the very slightest 
 expression of regret in fact, said everything that could be 
 said on such an occasion. M. Dorlange would not hear of 
 anything approaching to an apology, and on the following 
 day he received a visit from M. de Ronquerolles and General 
 de Montriveau as representing M. de Rhetore. Again they 
 were urgent that M. Dorlange should consent to express him- 
 self in different language. But your friend was not to be 
 moved from this ultimatum
 
 126 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 " Will M. Rhetord withdraw the expressions I felt myself 
 bound to take exception to? If so, I will retract mine." 
 
 "That is impossible," said they. "The offense was per- 
 sonal to M. de Rhetord, to you it was not. Rightly or 
 wrongly, he firmly believes that M. Marie-Gaston did him an 
 injury. Allowance must always be made for damaged in- 
 terests; perfect justice is never to be gotten from them." 
 
 " So that M. le Due may continue to slander my friend at 
 his pleasure!" said M. Dorlange, "since, in the first place, 
 my friend is in Italy; and in the second, he would always, if 
 possible, avoid coming to extreme measures with his wife's 
 brother. And," he added, "it is precisely this impossibility 
 of his defending himself which gives me a right nay more, 
 makes it my duty to intervene. It was by a special grace of 
 Providence that I was enabled to catch some of the malignant 
 reports that are flying about on the wing ; and since M. le 
 Due de Rheiore sees no reason to mitigate his language, we 
 will, if you please, carry the affair through to the end." 
 
 The dispute being reduced to these terms, the duel was 
 inevitable, and in the course of the day the seconds on both 
 sides arranged the conditions. The meeting was fixed for the 
 next morning; the weapons, pistols. On the ground, M. 
 Dorlange was perfectly cool. After exchanging shots without 
 effect, as the seconds seemed anxious to stop the proceedings 
 
 "Come," said he cheerfully, "one shot more!" as if he 
 were firing at a dummy in a shooting gallery. 
 
 This time he was wounded in the fleshy part of the thigh, 
 not a dangerous wound, but one which bled very freely. 
 While he was being carried to the carriage in which he had 
 come, M. de Rhetore was anxiously giving every assistance, 
 and when he was close to him "All the same," said Dor- 
 lange, "Marie-Gaston is an honest gentleman, a heart of 
 gold " and he fainted away almost as he spoke. 
 
 This duel, as you may suppose, my dear sir, has been the 
 talk of the town .; I have only had to keep my ears open to
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 127 
 
 collect any amount of information concerning M. Dorlange, 
 for he is the lion of the day, and all yesterday it was im- 
 possible to go into a house where he was not the subject of 
 conversation. My harvest was chiefly gathered at Mme. de 
 Montcornet's. She, as you know, has a large acquaintance 
 among artists and men of letters ; and to give you a notion of 
 the position your friend holds in their regard, I need only 
 report a conversation in which I took part last evening in 
 the countess' drawing-room. The speakers were M. Emile 
 Blondet, of the "Debats;" M. Bixiou the caricaturist, one 
 of the best-informed eavesdroppers in Paris I believe you 
 know them both, but at any rate I am sure that you are inti- 
 mate with Joseph Bridau, our great painter, who was the third 
 speaker, for I remember that he and Daniel d'Arthez signed 
 for you when you were married. 
 
 Bridau was speaking when I joined them. 
 
 "Dorlange began splendidly," said he. " There was the 
 touch of a great master even in the work he sent in for com- 
 petition, to which, under the pressure of opinion, the Academy 
 awarded the prize, though he had laughed very audaciously at 
 their programme." 
 
 "Quite true," said M. Bixiou. "And the Pandora he 
 exhibited in 1837, on his return from Rome, was also a very 
 striking work. But as it won him, out of hand, the Legion 
 of Honor and commissions from the Government and the 
 municipality, with at least thirty flaming notices in the papers, 
 I doubt if he can ever recover from that success." 
 
 " That is a verdict a la Bixiou," said Emile Blondet. 
 
 "So it is, and with good reason. Did you ever see thi 
 man?" 
 
 "No, he is seen nowhere." 
 
 " True, that is his favorite haunt. He is a bear, but a bear 
 intentionally ; out of affectation and deliberate purpose." 
 
 "I really cannot see," said Joseph Bridau, "that such a 
 dislike to society is a bad frame of mind for an artist. What
 
 128 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 can a sculptor, especially, gain by frequenting drawing-rooms 
 where men and women have got into the habit of wearing 
 clothes?" 
 
 " Well, even a sculptor may get some amusement which 
 saves him from monomania or brooding. And then he can 
 see how the world wags that 1839 is neither the fifteenth nor 
 the sixteenth century." 
 
 "Wliat!" said Blondet, " do you mean the poor fellow 
 suffers from that delusion?" 
 
 " He ! He talks quite glibly of living the life of the artists 
 of mediaeval times, with all their universal studies and learn- 
 ing, and the terrific labors which we can conceive of in a 
 society that was still semi-barbarous, but that has no place in 
 ours. He is a guileless dreamer, and never perceives that 
 civilization, by strangely complicating our social intercourse, 
 devotes to business, interest, and pleasure thrice as much time 
 as a less advanced social organization would spend on those 
 objects. Look at the savage in his den ! He has nothing to 
 do; but we, with the Bourse, the opera, the newspapers, 
 parliamentary debates, drawing-room meetings, elections, rail- 
 roads, the Cafe de Paris, and the National Guard when, I ask 
 you, are we to find time for work ? ' ' 
 
 "A splendid theory for idlers," said Emile Blondet, 
 laughing. 
 
 " Not at all, my dear boy ; it is perfectly true. The curfew 
 no longer rings at nine o'clock, I suppose ! Well, and only 
 last evening, if my door-porter Ravenouillet didn't give a 
 party ! Perhaps I committed a serious blunder by declining 
 the indirect invitation he sent me." 
 
 " Still," said Joseph Bridau, " it is evident that a man who 
 is not mixed up with the business interests or pleasures of his 
 age may, out of his savings, accumulate a very pretty capital 
 of time. Dorlange, I fancy, has a comfortable income irre- 
 spective of commissions ; there is nothing to hinder him from 
 living as he has a mind to live.
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S. 129 
 
 " And, as you see, he goes to the opera, since it was there 
 he picked up his duel. And, indeed, you have hardly hit the 
 nail on the head by representing him as cut off from all con- 
 temporary interests, when I happen to know that he is on the 
 point of taking them up on the most stirring and absorbing 
 side of the social machine namely, politics ! " 
 
 " What ! he thinks he can be a politician?" asked Emile 
 Blondet scornfully. 
 
 "It is part, no doubt, of his famous scheme of universal 
 efficiency, and you should see how logically and perseveringly 
 he is carrying out the idea. Last year two hundred and fifty 
 thousand francs fell on him from the sky, and my man pur- 
 chased a house in the Rue Saint-Martin as a qualification ; and 
 then, as another little speculation, with the rest of the money 
 he bought shares in the ' National ' newspaper, and I find 
 him in the office whenever I am in the mood to have a laugh 
 at the Republican Utopia. There he has his flatterers ; they 
 have persuaded him that he is a born orator and will make a 
 sensation in the Chamber. There is, in fact, a talk of work- 
 ing up a constituency to nominate him, and on days when 
 they are very enthusiastic they discover that he is like 
 Danton." 
 
 "Oh, this is the climax of burlesque ! " said Emile 
 Blondet. 
 
 I do not know, my dear sir, whether you have ever observed 
 that men of superior talent are always extremely indulgent. 
 This was now proven in the person of Joseph Bridau. 
 
 "I agree with you," said he, "that if Dorlange starts on 
 that track he is almost certainly lost to art. But, after all, 
 why should he not be a success in the Chamber ? He speaks 
 with great fluency, and seems to be full of ideas. Look at 
 Canalis ; when he won his election : ' Faugh ! a poet ! ' 
 said one and another, which has not prevented his making 
 himself famous as an orator and being made minister." 
 
 "Well, the first point is to get elected," said Emil* 
 9
 
 130 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 Blondet. " What place does Dorlange think of standing 
 for?" 
 
 "For one of the rotten boroughs of the 'National,' of 
 course," remarked Bixiou. " However, I do not know that 
 the place is yet decided on." 
 
 "As a general rule," said the "Debats" man, "to be 
 returned as member, even with the hottest support of your 
 party, requires a somewhat extensive political notoriety, or, 
 else, at least, some good provincial status of family or of 
 fortune. Does any one know whether Dorlange can command 
 these elements of success? " 
 
 " As to family status, that would be a particular difficulty 
 with him ; his family is non-existent to a desperate extent." 
 
 " Indeed," said Blondet. " Then he is a natural son ?" 
 
 " As natural as may be father and mother alike unknown. 
 But I can quite imagine his being elected ; it is the rank and 
 file of his political notions that will be so truly funny." 
 
 " He must be a republican if he is a friend of the gentle- 
 men on the ' National/ and has a likeness to Danton." 
 
 "Evidently. But he holds his fellow-believers in utter 
 contempt, and says that they are good for nothing but right- 
 ing, rough play, and big talk. So provisionally he will put up 
 with a monarchy bolstered up by republican institutions 
 though he asserts that this citizen-kingship must infallibly be 
 undermined by the abuse of private interest which he calls 
 corruption. This would tempt him to join the little church 
 of the Left Centre ; but there again there is always a but 
 he can discern nothing but a coalition of ambitious and emas- 
 culated men, unconsciously smoothing the way to a revolution 
 which he sees already on the horizon ; to his great regret, 
 because in his opinion the masses are neither sufficiently pre- 
 pared nor sufficiently intelligent to keep it from slipping 
 through their fingers. 
 
 "As to Legitimism, he laughs at it ; he will not accept it 
 as a principle under any aspect. He regards it simply as a more
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR AKCIS. 131 
 
 definite and time-honored form of hereditary monarchy, allows 
 it no other superiority than that of old wine over new. And 
 while he is neither Legitimist, nor Conservative, nor Left 
 Centre, but a republican who deprecates a republic, he stoutly 
 sets up for being a Catholic and rides the hobby of that party 
 freedom in teaching; and yet this man, who wants freedom 
 in teaching, is, on the other hand, afraid of the Jesuits, and 
 still talks, as if we were in 1829, of the encroachments of the 
 priestly party and the Congregation. 
 
 "And can you imagine, finally, the great party he proposes 
 to form in the Chamber himself, of course, its leader? That 
 of justice, impartiality, and honesty : as if anything of the 
 kind were to be found in the parliamentary pottage, or as if 
 every shade of opinion had not, from time immemorial, 
 flourished that flag to conceal its ugly emptiness?" 
 
 " So that he gives up sculpture once and for all? " said Jo- 
 seph Bridau. 
 
 " Not immediately. He is just finishing a statue of some 
 female saint, but he will not let anybody see it, and does not 
 mean to exhibit it this year. He has notions of his own about 
 that, too." 
 
 "Which are ?" asked mile Blondet. 
 
 " That religious works ought not to be displayed to the 
 judgment of criticism and the gaze of the public cankered by 
 skepticism ; that, without confronting the turmoil of the world, 
 they ought modestly and piously to take the place for which 
 they are intended." 
 
 "Bless me!" exclaimed Blondet. "And such a fervent 
 Catholic could fight a duel?" 
 
 " Oh, there is a better joke than that. Catholic as he is, 
 he lives with a woman he brought over from Italy, a sort ot 
 goddess of Liberty, who is at the same time his model and his 
 housekeeper." 
 
 " What a gossip what a regular inquiry office that Bixiou 
 is ! " they said, as they divided.
 
 132 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 They had just been asked by Madame de Montcornet to 
 accept a cup of tea from her fair hands. 
 
 As you see, my dear sir, M. Dorlange's political aspirations 
 are not regarded very seriously, most people thinking of them 
 very much as I do myself. I cannot doubt that you will write 
 him af once to thank him for his zealous intervention to 
 defend you against calumny. His brave devotion has, in fact, 
 filled me with sympathy for him, and I should be really glad 
 to see you making use of your old friendship for him to hinder 
 him from embarking on the thankless tracks he is so eager to 
 tread. I am not guided by the thought of the drawbacks at- 
 tributed to him by M. Bixiou, who has a sharp and too ready 
 tongue ; like Joseph Bridau, I think little of them ; but a mis- 
 take that every one must regret, in my opinion, would be to 
 abandon a career in which he has already won a high position, 
 to rush into the political fray. Sermonize him to this effect, 
 and, as much as you can, induce him to stick to Art. In- 
 deed, you yourself are interested in his doing so if you are 
 still bent on his undertaking the work he has so far refused to 
 accept. 
 
 In the matter of the personal explanation I advised you to 
 have with him, I may tell you that your task is greatly facili- 
 tated. You are not called upon to enter into any of the de- 
 tails that might perhaps be too painful. Mme. de 1'Estorade, 
 to whom I have spoken of the mediator's part I proposed that 
 she should play, accepts it with pleasure, and undertakes in 
 half an hour's conversation to dissipate the clouds that may 
 still hang between you and your friend. 
 
 While writing you this long letter, I sent to inquire for 
 him : the report is as good as possible, and the surgeons are 
 not in the least uneasy about him, unless some extraordinary 
 and quite unforeseen complications should supervene. He is, 
 it would seem, an object of general interest ; for, according to 
 my servant, people are standing in rows waiting to put their 
 names down.
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S. 138 
 
 There is this also to be said M. de Rhetore is not liked. 
 He is haughty, starchy, and not clever. How different from 
 her who dwells in in our dearest memory ! She was simple 
 and kind, without ever losing her dignity, and nothing could 
 compare with the amiability of her temper, unless it were the 
 brightness of her wit. 
 
 THE COMTESSE DE I/ESTORADE TO MADAME OCTAVE DE CAMPS. 
 
 PARIS, February, 1839. 
 
 Nothing could be better than all you have written, dear 
 madame : it was, in fact, highly probable that this annoying 
 person would not think twice about speaking to me the next 
 time we should meet. His heroism gave him a right to do 
 so, and the most ordinary politeness made it incumbent on 
 him. Unless he were content to pass for the clumsiest of 
 admirers, he could not help asking me how Nai's and I had 
 recovered from the effects of the accident he had been able to 
 forefend. But if, contrary to all expectations, he should per- 
 sist in not stepping out of his cloud, I was fully determined to 
 act on your wise advice. If the mountain did not come to 
 me, I would go to the mountain. Like " Hippolyte " in 
 Theramene's tale, I would "thrust myself on the monster" 
 and fire my gratitude in his teeth. Like you, my dear friend, 
 I quite understood that the real danger of this persecution lay 
 in its continuance, and the inevitable explosion that threatened 
 me sooner or later ; the fact that the servants, or the children, 
 might at any moment detect the secret ; that I should be 
 exposed to the most odious inferences if it were suspected by 
 others ; and, above all, the idea that if this ridiculous mystery 
 should be discovered by M. de 1'Estorade and drive him to 
 such lengths as his Southern nature and past experience in the 
 army made me imagine only too easily all this had spurred 
 me to a point I cannot describe, and I might have gone further 
 even than you advised. I had not only recognized the neces- 
 sity for being the first to speak ; but under the pretext that my
 
 134 THE DEPUTY FOR AKCIS. 
 
 husband would call to thank him under his own roof, I meant 
 to compel him to give me his name and address, and, sup- 
 posing he were at all a possible acquaintance, to invite him 
 forthwith to dinner, and thus entice the wolf into the sheep- 
 fold. 
 
 For, after all, what danger could there be ? If he had but 
 a shade of commonsense when he saw the terms I live on with 
 M. de 1'Estorade, and my "maniacal" passion for my chil- 
 dren, as you call it, in short, the calm regularity of my home- 
 life, would he not understand how vain was his pursuit ? At 
 any rate, whether he should persist or not, his vehemence 
 would have lost its perilous out-of-door character. If I was to 
 be persecuted, it would, at any rate, be under my own roof, 
 and I should only have to deal with one of those common 
 adventures to which every woman is more or less liable. And 
 we can always get over such slippery places with perfect credit, 
 so long as we have a real sense of duty and some little presence 
 of mind. 
 
 Not, I must tell you, that I had come to this conclusion 
 without a painful effort. When the critical moment should 
 come, I was not at all sure that I should be cool enough to 
 confront the situation with such a high hand as was indis- 
 pensable. However, I had fully made up my mind ; and 
 you know me what I have determined on I do. 
 
 Well, my dear madame, all this fine scheme, all my elaborate 
 courage, and your not less elaborate foresight, are entirely 
 wasted. Since your last letter the doctor has let me out of 
 his hands. I have been out several times, always majestically 
 surrounded by my children, that their presence, in case I 
 should be obliged to take the initiative, might screen the 
 crudity of such a proceeding. But in vain have I scanned 
 the horizon on all sides out of the corner of my eye, nothing, 
 absolutely nothing, has been visible that bore the least re- 
 semblance to a deliverer or a lover. What, now, do you say 
 to this new state of affairs? A minute since I spoke of thrust-
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 135 
 
 ing myself on the monster. How was I to interpret this 
 absence ? Had he, with admirable perspicacity, scented the 
 snare in which we meant to entrap him, and was he prudently 
 keeping out of the way ? 
 
 But if this were so, he would be really a man to think 
 seriously about; my dear M. de 1'Estorade, you must take 
 care of yourself! 
 
 You see, my dear friend, I am trying to take the matter 
 lightly, but in my heart of hearts J believe that I sing to 
 keep my courage up. This skillful and unexpected strategy 
 leaves me wondering. 
 
 As to my feeling for the man, you will not misunderstand 
 that. He saved my little girl, it is true, but merely to lay me 
 under an obligation. He is ugly; but there is something 
 vigorous and strongly marked about him which leaves an im- 
 pression on the mind ; one fancies that he must have some 
 powerful and dominating characteristics. So, do what I will, 
 I cannot hinder his occupying my mind. Now, I feel as if I 
 had got rid of him altogether. Well, may I say it ? I am 
 conscious of a void. I miss him as the ear misses a sharp and 
 piercing sound that has annoyed it for a long time. 
 
 What I am going to add will strike you as very childish, 
 but can we control the mirage of our fancy ? I have often 
 told you of my discussions with Louise de Chaulieu as to the 
 way in which women should deal with life. For my part, I 
 always told her that the frenzy with which she never ceased 
 to seek the Infinite was quite ill-regulated and fatal to happi- 
 ness. And she would answer : " You, my dearest, have never 
 loved. Love implies a phenomenon so rare, that we may 
 live all our life without meeting the being on whom nature 
 has bestowed the faculty of giving us happiness. If on some 
 glorious day that being appears to wake your heart from its 
 slumbers, you will take quite another tone." 
 
 The words of those doomed to die are so often prophetic ! 
 Supposing this man should be the serpent, though late, that
 
 136 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 
 
 Louise seemed to threaten me with ; good heavens ! That 
 he should ever represent a real danger, that he should ever be 
 able to tempt me from my duty, there is certainly no fear. I 
 am confidently strong as to any such extreme of ill. I 
 say to you, as MONSIEUR, Louis XIV. 's brother, said to his 
 wife when he brought her papers he had just written, for her 
 to decipher them: "See clearly for me, dear madame, read 
 my heart and brain ; disperse the mists, allay the antagonistic 
 impulses, the ebb and flow of will which these events have 
 given rise to in my mind." Was not my dear Louise mis- 
 taken ? Am I not one of those women on whom love, in her 
 sense, has no hold? The " Being who on some glorious day 
 awoke my heart from its slumbers ' ' was my Armand my 
 Rene my NaYs, three angels for whom and in whom I have 
 hitherto lived ; and for me, I feel, there never can be any 
 other passion. 
 
 THE COMTESSE DE L*ESTORADE TO MADAME OCTAVE DE CAMPS. 
 
 PARIS, March, 1839. 
 
 In about the year 1820, two "new boys," to use my son 
 Armand's technical slang, joined the school at Tours in the 
 same week. One had a charming face ; the other might have 
 been called ugly, but that health, honesty, and intelligence 
 beamed in his features and made up for their homeliness and 
 irregularity. And here you will stop me, dear madame, asking 
 me whether I have quite gotten over my absorbing idea, that 
 I am in the mood to write you a chapter of a novel ? Not at 
 all, and this strange beginning, little as it may seem so, is 
 only the continuation and sequel of my adventure. So I beg 
 you to listen to my tale and not to interrupt. To proceed : 
 Almost from the first, the two boys formed a close friendship ; 
 there was more than one reason for their intimacy. One of 
 them the handsome lad was dreamy, thoughtful, even a 
 little sentimental ; the other eager, impetuous, always burning
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 137 
 
 for action. Thus their two characters supplemented each 
 other the best possible combination for any union that is to 
 prove lasting. Both, too, had the same stain on their birth. 
 The dreamy boy was the son of the notorious Lady Dudley, 
 born in adultery ; he was known as Marie-Gaston, which can 
 hardly be called a name. The other, whose father and mother 
 were both unknown, was called Dorlange which is not a 
 name at all. Dorlange, Valmon, Volmar, Derfcuil, Melcourt, 
 diese are all names adopted for the stage, and that only in the 
 old-fashioned plays, where they dwell now in company with 
 Arnolphe, Alceste, Clitandre, Damis, Eraste, Philinte, and 
 Arsinoe. So another reason why these unhappy no-man's- 
 sons should cling together for warmth was the cruel desertion 
 from which they both suffered. During the seven mortal years 
 of their life at school, not once for a single day, even in holiday 
 time, did the prison doors open to let them out. At long in- 
 tervals Marie-Gaston had a visitor in the person of an old 
 nurse who had served his mother. Through this woman's 
 hands came the quarterly payment for his schooling. 
 
 The money paid for Dorlange came with perfect regularity 
 from some unknown source through a banker at Tours. One 
 thing was observed that this youth's weekly allowance was 
 fixed at the highest sum permitted by the college rules, whence 
 it was concluded that his anonymous parents were rich. Owing 
 to this, but yet more to the generous use he made of his money, 
 Dorlange enjoyed a certain degree of consideration among his 
 companions, though he could in any case have commanded it 
 by the prowess of his fist. At the same time, it was remarked, 
 but not loud enough for him to hear, that no one had ever 
 asked to see him in the parlor, nor had anybody outside the 
 house ever taken the smallest interest in him. 
 
 And the two boys worked, each after his own fashion. At 
 the age of fifteen, Marie-Gaston had produced a volume of 
 verse : satires, elegies, meditations, to say nothing of two 
 tragedies. As for Dorlange, his. gtqdifS led hijn to steal fire-
 
 138 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 logs ; out of these, witn his knife, he carved virgins, grotesques, 
 schoolmasters and saints, grenadiers, and in secret figures 
 of Napoleon. 
 
 In 1827 their school days ended ; the friends left the college 
 of Tours together, and both were sent to Paris. A place had 
 already been secured for Dorlange in Bosio's studio, and 
 thenceforward a certain amount of caprice was discernible in 
 the occult Providence that watched over him. On arriving 
 at the house to which the master of the college had directed 
 him on leaving, he found pleasant rooms prettily furnished for 
 him. Under the glass shade over the clock a large letter, 
 addressed to him, had been so placed as to strike his eye at 
 once. Within the envelope he found a note in these words 
 
 "The day after your arrival in Paris, go, at eight in the 
 morning precisely, to the garden of the Luxembourg, Allee 
 de 1'Observatoire, the fourth bench on the right-hand side 
 from the gate. This is imperative. Do not on any account 
 fail." 
 
 Dorlange was punctual, as may be supposed, and had not 
 waited long when he was joined by a little man, two feet high, 
 who, with his enormous head and thick mop of hair, his 
 hooked nose and chin and crooked legs, might have stepped 
 out of one of Hoffmann's fairy tales. Without a word for to 
 his personal advantages, this messenger added that of being 
 deaf and dumb he placed in the youth's hands a letter and a 
 purse. The letter said that Dorlange's family were much 
 pleased to find that he had a disposition for the fine arts. He 
 was urged to work hard and profit by the teaching of the great 
 master under whose tuition he was placed. He would, it was 
 hoped, be steady, and an eye would be kept on his behavior. 
 On the other hand, he was not to forego the rational amuse- 
 ments suited to his age. For his needs and his pleasures he 
 might count on a sum of twenty-five louis, which would be 
 paid to him every three months at this same place, by the 
 same messenger. With regard to this emissary, Dorlange was
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 189 
 
 expressly forbidden to follow him when he departed after ful- 
 filling his errand. In case of disobedience, either direct or 
 indirect, the penalty was serious no less, in fact, than the 
 withdrawal of all assistance, and complete desertion. 
 
 Now, my dear friend, do you remember that in 1831 I 
 carried you off to the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, where, at 
 that time, the exhibition used to be held of works com- 
 peting for the first prize in sculpture? The subject set for 
 the competition had appealed to my heart Niobe weeping 
 over her children. And do you remember my fury at the 
 work sent in by one of the competitors, round which there 
 was a crowd so dense that we could scarcely get near it ? The 
 insolent wretch had made game of the subject. His Niobe, 
 indeed, as I could not but agree with you and the public, was 
 most touching in her beauty and grief; but to have repre- 
 sented her children as so many monkeys, lying on the ground 
 in the most various and grotesque attitudes what a deplorable 
 waste of talent ! It was in vain that you insisted in pointing out 
 how charming the monkeys were graceful, witty and that 
 it was impossible to laugh more ingeniously at the blindness 
 and idolatry of mothers who regard some hideous brat as a 
 masterpiece of Nature's handiwork. I considered the thing a 
 monstrosity ; and the indignation of the older academicians, 
 who demanded the solemn erasure of this impertinent work 
 from the list of competing sculpture, was, in my opinion, 
 wholly justified. Yielding, however, to public opinion and 
 to the papers, which spoke of raising a subscription to send 
 the sculptor to Rome if the Grand Prix* were given to any- 
 body else, the Academy did not agree with me and with its 
 elders. The remarkable beauty of the Niobe outweighed all 
 else, and this slanderer of mothers found his work crowned. 
 though he had to take a pretty severe lecture which the sec- 
 retary was desired to give him on the occasion. Unhappy 
 youth ! I can pity him now, for he had never known a 
 * First Prize.
 
 140 THE DEPUTY FOR 
 
 mother. He was Dorlange, the youth abandoned at the 
 school at Tours, and Marie-Gaston's friend. 
 
 For four years, frpm 1827 till 1831, when Dorlange was 
 sent to Rome, the two young men had never parted. Dor- 
 lange, with his allowance of two thousand four hundred francs, 
 always punctually paid by the hand of the mysterious dwarf, 
 was a sort of Marquis d'Aligre. Marie-Gaston, on the con- 
 trary, if left to his own resources, would have lived in great 
 penury ; but between persons who truly care for each other, a 
 rarer case than is commonly supposed, on one side plenty, 
 and on the other nothing, is a determining cause of their 
 alliance. Without keeping any score, our two pigeons had 
 everything in common home, money, troubles, pleasures, 
 and hopes; the two lived but one life. Unfortunately for 
 Marie-Gaston, his efforts were not, like his friend's, crowned 
 with success. His volume of verse, carefully recast and re- 
 vised, with other poems from his pen and two or three dramas, 
 all, for lack of good-will on the part of stage-managers and 
 publishers, remained in obscurity. At last the firm of two, 
 by Dorlange's insistency, took strong measures: by dint of 
 strict economy, the needful sum was saved to print and bring 
 out a volume. The title " Snowdrops " was attractive ; the 
 binding was pearl-gray, the margins broad, and there was a 
 pretty title-page designed by Dorlange. But the public was 
 <is indifferent as the publishers and managers it would neither 
 buy nor read ; so much so, that one day when the rent was 
 due, Marie-Gaston, in a fit of despair, sent for an old-book 
 buyer, and sold him the whole edition for three sous a volume, 
 whence a perfect crop of "Snowdrops" was ere long to be 
 seen on every stall along the quays from the Pont Royal to 
 the Pont Marie. 
 
 This wound was still bleeding in the poet's soul when it 
 became necessary for Dorlange to set out for Rome. Life in 
 common was no longer possible. Being informed by the mys- 
 terious dwarf that his allowance would be paid to him as usual
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 141 
 
 in Rome, through Torlonia's bank, it occurred to Dorlange to 
 offer Marie-Gaston the fifteen hundred francs a year granted 
 him on the royal scholarship for the five years while he should 
 remain in Rome. But a heart noble enough to receive a favor 
 is rarer even than that which can bestow one. Marie-Gaston, 
 embittered by constant reverses, had not the necessary courage 
 to meet this sacrifice half-way. The dissolution of partnership 
 too plainly exposed the position of a dependent which he had 
 hitherto accepted. Some trifling work placed in his hands by 
 the great writer Daniel d'Arthez added to his little income 
 would, he said, be enough to live on, and he peremptorily 
 refused what his pride stigmatized as charity. 
 
 Marie-Gaston's poverty increased day by day ; and prompted 
 by inexorable necessity, he had drifted into a most painful 
 position. He had tried to release himself from the constant 
 pinch of want, which paralyzed his flight, by staking every- 
 thing for all or nothing. He imprudently mixed himself up 
 in the concerns of a newspaper, and then, to obtain a ruling 
 voice, took upon himself almost all the expenses of the under- 
 taking. Thus led into debt for a sum of not less than thirty 
 thousand francs, he saw nothing before him but a debtor's 
 prison opening its broad jaws to devour him. 
 
 At this juncture he met Louise de Chaulieu. For nine 
 months, the blossoming time of their marriage, Marie-Gaston's 
 letters were few and far between, and those he wrote were 
 high treason to friendship. Dorlange ought to have been the 
 first person told, and he was told nothing. That most high 
 and mighty dame, Louise de Chaulieu, Baronne de Macumer, 
 would have it so. When the day of the marriage arrived, her 
 passion for secrecy had reached a pitch bordering on mania. 
 I, her closest friend, was scarcely allowed to know it, and no one 
 was admitted to the ceremony. To comply with the require- 
 ments of the law, witnesses were indispensable; but at the 
 time when Marie-Gaston invited two friends to do him this 
 service, he announced that their relations must be finally but
 
 142 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 amiably put an end to. His feelings toward everybody but 
 his wife, whom he exalted to a pure abstraction, " would be," 
 he wrote to Daniel d'Arthez, " friendship independent of the 
 friend." 
 
 As for Louise, she, I believe, for greater security, would 
 have had the witnesses murdered on leaving the mairie, but 
 for a wholesome fear of the public prosecutor ! 
 
 In 1836, when the sculptor came back from Rome, the 
 sequestration of Marie-Gaston was closer and more unrelaxing 
 than ever. Dorlange had too much spirit to steal or force his 
 way into the sanctuary where Louise had sheltered her crazy 
 passion, and Marie-Gaston was too desperately in love to 
 break the spell and escape from Arminda's garden. The 
 friends, incredible as it must seem, never met, nor even ex- 
 changed notes. Still, on hearing of Madame Marie-Gaston's 
 death, Dorlange forgot every slight and rushed off to Ville- 
 d'Avray to offer what consolation he might. Vain devotion. 
 Within two hours of the melancholy ceremony, Marie-Gaston 
 was in a post-chaise flying south to Italy, with no thought for 
 his friend, or a sister-in-law and two nephews, who were 
 dependent on him. Dorlange thought this selfishness of grief 
 rather too much to be borne ; and he eradicated from his 
 heart, as he believed, the last remembrance of a friendship 
 which even the breath of sorrow had not revived. 
 
 A few weeks since, his sorrow, still living and acute, sug- 
 gested an idea to his mind. In the middle of the park at 
 Ville-d'Avray there is a small lake, and in the middle of the 
 lake an island of which Louise was very fond. To this island, 
 a calm and shady retreat, Marie-Gaston wished to transfer his 
 wife's remains, and he wrote us from Carrara to this effect. 
 And then, remembering Dorlange, he begged my husband to 
 call on him and inquire whether he would undertake to exe- 
 cute a monument. Dorlange at first affected not even to 
 remember Marie-Gaston's name, and under a civil pretext 
 refused the commission.
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARGIS. 143- 
 
 But here comes a startling instance of the strength of old 
 association in an affectionate nature. On the evening of the 
 day when he had shown out M. de 1'Estorade, being at the 
 opera, he overheard the Due de Rhetor^ speak slightingly 
 of his old friend, and took the matter up with eager indigna- 
 tion. Hence a duel, in which he was wounded and of 
 which the news must certainly have reached you ; so here is a 
 man risking his life for an absentee whom he had strenuously 
 denied in the morning. 
 
 THE COMTESSE DE I/ESTORADE TO MADAME OCTAVE DE CAMPS. 
 
 PARIS, March, 1839. 
 
 I derived the main facts of the long biographical notice I 
 sent you, my dear friend, from a recent letter written by M. 
 Marie-Gaston. On hearing of the heroic devotion of which 
 he had been the object, his first impulse was to hasten to 
 Paris and see the friend who had made such a noble return 
 for his faithlessness. Unluckily, the day before he should 
 have started, a painful hindrance interfered. By a singular 
 coincidence, while M. Dorlange was wounded in his behalf in 
 Paris, he himself, visiting Savarezza one of the finest marble 
 quarries that are worked at Carrara had a bad fall and 
 sprained his leg. Being obliged to put off his journey, he 
 wrote to M. Dorlange from his bed of suffering to express his 
 gratitude. 
 
 By the same mail I also received a voluminous letter : M. 
 Marie-Gaston, after telling me all the past history of their 
 friendship, begged me to call on his old schoolfellow and 
 advocate his cause. In point of fact, he could not be satis- 
 fied with this convincing proof of the place he still held in 
 M. Dorlange's affections. What he desires is to prove that, 
 in spite of evidence to the contrary, he has never ceased to 
 deserve it. This is a matter of some little difficulty, because 
 he would not on any account consent to attribute the blame
 
 144 THE DEPUTY FOR AKCIS. 
 
 to the real author of the mischief. This, however, is the 
 whole secret of his conduct to M. Dorlange. His wife was 
 bent on having him entirely to herself, and insisted, with 
 extraordinary perversity, on uprooting every other feeling. 
 But nothing would persuade him to admit this, or the sort of 
 moral mediocrity which such ill-regulated and frenzied jeal- 
 ousy denotes. 
 
 My first idea, to this end, was to write a note to his friend 
 the sculptor and beg him to call on me. But, on second 
 thoughts, he has hardly yet got over his wound, and beside, 
 this kind of convocation with a definite object in view would 
 give an absurd solemnity to my part as a go-between. I 
 thought of another plan. Anybody may visit an artist's 
 studio : without any preliminary announcement I could call 
 on M. Dorlange with my husband and Na'i's, under pretense 
 of reiterating the request already put to him to give us the 
 benefit of his assistance. And by seeming to bring my femi- 
 nine influence to bear on this matter, I had a bridge ready 
 made to lead me to the true point of my visit. 
 
 So, on the day after I had come to this happy conclusion, 
 I and my escort found our way to a pleasant little house in 
 the Rue de 1'Ouest, behind the gardens of the Luxembourg, 
 one of the quietest parts of Paris. In the vestibule and pas- 
 sages, fragments of sculpture, bas-reliefs, and inscriptions, 
 nicely arranged against the walls, showed the owner's good 
 taste and betrayed his habitual interests. 
 
 We were met on the steps by a woman to whom M. de 
 1'Estorade has already alluded. The student from Rome, it 
 would seem, could not come away from Italy without bringing 
 some souvenir. This beautiful Italian, a sort of middle-class 
 Galatea, sometimes housekeeper and sometimes a model, repre- 
 senting at once Home and Art, fulfills in M. Dorlange's 
 household if scandal is to be trusted the most perfect ideal 
 of the " woman-of-all-work " so constantly advertised in news- 
 papers.
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 145 
 
 While this handsome housekeeper announced M. le Comte 
 and Mine, la Comtesse de 1'Estorade, M. Dorlange, in a 
 picturesque studio jacket, having his back to us, hastily drew 
 a green baize curtain in front of the statue he was working on. 
 
 The instant he turned round, before I had had time to be- 
 lieve my eyes, imagine my astonishment at seeing Nai's rush 
 up to him and almost into his arms, exclaiming with childish 
 glee 
 
 " Oh ! you are the gentleman who saved me ! " 
 
 What the gentleman who had saved her ? Why, then, M. 
 Dorlange must be that much-talked-of Unknown ? 
 
 Now you say : 
 
 " And you, my dear countess, rushing thus into his studio 
 like ?" 
 
 My dear madame, don't speak of it ! Startled, trembling, 
 red and white by turns, I must for a moment have looked au 
 image of awkward confusion. 
 
 Happily, my husband launched at once into elaborate com- 
 pliments as a happy and grateful father. I, meanwhile, had 
 time to recover myself; and when it came to my turn to speak, 
 I had composed my features to one of my finest expressions 
 a r Estoradc, as you choose to call them ; I then, as you 
 know, register twenty-five degrees below zero, and should 
 freeze the words on the lips of the most ardent adorer. 
 
 "Madame," said the sculptor, "since we are better ac- 
 quainted than we had any reason to suppose, may I be per- 
 mitted to indulge my curiosity ?" 
 
 I fancied I felt the cat's claw extended to play with the 
 mouse, so I replied : 
 
 "Artists, if I am not mistaken, are sometimes very indis- 
 creetly curious " 
 
 And I emphasized my meaning with a marked severity 
 which I hoped would give it point. But my man was not 
 abashed. 
 
 "I hope that will not prove to be the case with my in- 
 10
 
 146 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 quiry," said he. "I only wanted to know if you have a 
 sister?" 
 
 "Well done," thought I. "A way out of the difficulty! 
 The game he means to play is to ascribe his persistent perse- 
 cution to some fancied resemblance." 
 
 But though I should very willingly have given him that 
 loophole in M. de 1'Estorade's presence, I was not free to tell 
 him a lie. 
 
 " No, monsieur," replied I, " I have no sister at any rate, 
 not to my knowledge." 
 
 And I said it with an air of superior cunning so as to make 
 sure of not being taken for a dupe. 
 
 "At any rate," said M. Dorlange, "it was not impossible 
 that my idea was a true one. The family, among whom I 
 once met a lady strikingly like you, is involved in an atmos- 
 phere of mystery which allows every possible hypothesis." 
 
 "And am I indiscreet in asking their name ? " 
 
 " Not in the least. They are people you may perhaps have 
 known in Paris in 1829-30. They kept house in great style, 
 and entertained magnificently. I met them in Italy." 
 
 "But their name?" said I, with a determination that was 
 not prompted,- 1 own, by any charitable motive. 
 
 "Lanty,"* said M. Dorlange, without any hesitation or 
 embarrassment. 
 
 There was, in fact, a family of that name in Paris before I 
 came to live here, and you, like me, may remember hearing 
 some strange tales about them. 
 
 As he answered the question, the sculptor went up to the 
 veiled statue. 
 
 "I have taken the liberty, madame, of giving you the sister 
 you never had," he said, rather abruptly, "and I make so 
 bold as to ask you if you do not yourself discern a family 
 likeness?" 
 
 At the same time he pulled away the baize which hid the 
 
 * Vide " Sarrasine."
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 147 
 
 work, and then, my dear madame, I beheld myself, in the 
 guise of a saint, crowned with a glory. How, I ask you, 
 could I be angry? On seeing the startling likeness that 
 really stared them in the face, my husband and Na'is exclaimed 
 with admiration. 
 
 As for M. Dorlange, he proceeded without delay to explain 
 this rather dramatic surprise. 
 
 "This statue, " said he, " is a' Sainte-Ursule, a commission 
 from a convent in the country. In consequence of circum- 
 stances too long to relate, the features of the young lady I 
 mentioned just now remain deeply stamped on my memory. 
 I began, therefore, to model it from memory ; but one day, 
 madame, in the church of St. Thomas-d'Aquin, I saw you, 
 and I was so superstitious as to believe that Providence had 
 sent you to me as a duplicate for my benefit. From that time 
 you were the model from which I worked ; and as I could not 
 think of asking you to come and sit to me in my studio, I 
 availed myself, as far as possible, of every chance of meeting 
 you. If by any mischance you had happened to notice my 
 persistency in crossing your path, you would have taken me 
 for one of those idlers who hang about in hope of an adven- 
 ture, and I was nothing worse than a conscientious artist, 
 prenant son Men ou il le trouve, like Molie"re, making the most 
 of my chances, and trying to find inspiration in Nature alone, 
 which always gives the best results." 
 
 "Oh, I had noticed you following us," said Nai's, with an 
 all-knowing air. 
 
 Children ! my dear madame does any one understand 
 them ? NaTs had seen all ; at the time of her accident it 
 would have been natural that she should say something to her 
 father or to me about this gentleman, whose constant presence 
 had not escaped her notice and yet, npt a word. Brought 
 up.as she has been by me with such constant care, and hardly 
 ever out of my sight, I am absolutely certain of her perfect 
 innocence. Then it must be supposed that Nature alone can
 
 148 THE DEPUTY FOR AKCIS. 
 
 give a little girl of thirteen an instinctive knowledge of cer- 
 tain secrets. Is it not terrible to think of? 
 
 But husbands ! my dear madame, husbands are what are 
 so truly appalling when, at unexpected moments, we find 
 them abandoned to a sort of blind predestination. Mine, for 
 instance, as it seems to me, ought to have pricked up his ears 
 as he heard this gentleman describe how he had dared to take 
 me for his model. M. de 1'Estorade is not considered a fool ; 
 on all occasions he has a strong sense of the proprieties ; and 
 if ever I should give the least cause, I believe him capable of 
 being ridiculously jealous. And yet, seeing his "belle Renee," 
 as he calls me, embodied in white marble as a saint, threw 
 him, as it seems, into such a state of admiration as altered 
 him out of all knowledge ! 
 
 He and NaTs were wholly absorbed in verifying the fidelity 
 of the copy ; that was quite my attitude, quite my eyes, my 
 mouth, the dimples in my cheeks. In short, I found that I 
 must take upon myself the part which M. de 1'Estorade had 
 quite forgotten, so I said very gravely to this audacious artist 
 
 " Does it not occur to you, monsieur, that thus to appro- 
 priate without leave in short, to put it plainly, thus to steal 
 a stranger's features might strike her, or him, as a rather 
 strange proceeding ? " 
 
 "Indeed, madame," replied he, very respectfully, "my 
 fraudulent conduct would never have gone beyond the point 
 you yourself might have sanctioned. Though my statue is 
 doomed to be buried in a chapel for nuns, I should not have 
 dispatched it without obtaining your permission to leave it as 
 it was. I could, when necessary, have ascertained your ad- 
 dress ; and while confessing the fascination to which I had 
 succumbed, I should have requested you to come to see the 
 work. Then, when you saw it, if a too exact likeness should 
 have offended you, I would have said what I now say : with a 
 few strokes of the chisel I will undertake to mislead the most 
 practiced eye."
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 149 
 
 Diminish the resemblance ! That was no part of the pro- 
 gramme ! My husband, apparently, did not think it close 
 enough, for at this moment he turned to M. Dorlange to say, 
 with beatific blandness 
 
 "Do not you think, monsieur, that Madame de 1'Estorade's 
 nose is just a little thinner ? " 
 
 Thoroughly upset as I was by these unforeseen incidents, I 
 should, I fear, have pleaded badly for M. Marie- Gaston ; how- 
 ever, at my very first allusion to the subject 
 
 "I know," said M. Dorlange, "all you could say in de- 
 fense of the 'faithless one.' I do not forgive, but I will 
 forget. As things have turned out, I was within an ace of 
 being killed for his sake, and it would be really too illogical 
 to owe him now a grudge on old scores. Still, as regards the 
 monument at Ville-d'Avray, nothing will induce me to under- 
 take it. As I have already explained to M. de 1'Estorade, 
 there is an obstacle in the way which grows more definite 
 every day ; I also consider it contemptible in Marie-Gaston 
 that he should persist in chewing the cud of his grief, and I 
 have written him to that effect. He must show himself a 
 man, and seek such consolation as may always be found in 
 study and work." 
 
 The object of my visit was at an end, and for the moment I 
 had no hope of penetrating the dark places, on which, how- 
 ever, I must throw some light. As I rose to leave, M. Dor- 
 lange said 
 
 "May I hope, then, that you will not insist on any too 
 serious disfigurement of my statue?" 
 
 " It is my husband rather than I who must answer that 
 question. We can reopen it on. another occasion, for M. de 
 1'Estorade hopes you will do us the honor to return this call." 
 
 M. Dorlange bowed respectful acquiescence, and we came 
 away. As he saw us to the carriage, not venturing to offer me 
 his arm, I happened to turn round to call Nai's, who was 
 rashly going up to a Pyrenean dog that lay in the forecourt.
 
 150 THR DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 I then perceived the handsome housekeeper behind a window- 
 curtain, eagerly watching me. Finding herself caught in the 
 act, she dropped the curtain with evident annoyance. 
 
 "Well," thought I, "now this woman is jealous of me! 
 Is she afraid, I wonder, that I may become her rival, at least 
 as a model?" 
 
 In fact, I came away in a perfectly vile temper. I was 
 furious with Nai's and with my husband. I could have given 
 him the benefit of a scene of which he certainly could have 
 made neither head'nor tail. 
 
 Now, what do you think of it all ? Is this man one of the 
 cleverest rogues alive, who all in a moment, to get himself 
 out of a scrape, could invent the most plausible fiction ? Or 
 is he, indeed, an artist and nothing but an artist, who artlessly 
 regarded me as the living embodiment of his ideal ? 
 
 THE COMTESSE DE I/ESTORADE TO MADAME OCTAVE DE CAMPS. 
 
 PARIS, March, 1839. 
 
 DEAR MADAME : M. Dorlange dined with us yesterday. 
 My own notion had been to receive him en famille, so as to 
 have him under my eye and catechise him at my ease. 
 But M. de 1'Estorade, to whom I did not communicate my 
 disinterested purpose, pointed out that such an invitation, to 
 meet nobody, might be taken amiss. 
 
 "We cannot treat him," my husband smilingly added, 
 " as if he were one of our farmers' sons who came to display 
 his sub-lieutenant's Epaulette, and whom we should invite 
 quite by himself because we could not send him to the 
 kitchen." 
 
 So to meet our principal guest, we asked M. Joseph Bridau, 
 the painter; the Chevalier d'Espard, M. and Mme. de la 
 Bastie, and M. de Ronquerolles. When inviting this last gentle- 
 man, my husband took care to ask him whether he would 
 object to meeting M. de Rhdtore's adversary for you know,
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 151 
 
 no doubt, that the duke chose for his seconds in the duel 
 General de Montriveau and M. de Ronquerolles. 
 
 "Far from objecting," he replied, "I am delighted to 
 seize an opportunity of improving my acquaintance with a 
 clever man, whose conduct in the affair in which we were 
 concerned was in all respects admirable." 
 
 And when my husband told him of the obligation we owe 
 to M. Dorlange 
 
 " Why, the artist is a hero ! " he exclaimed. " If he goes 
 on as he has begun, we shall not be able to reach to his 
 knees." 
 
 In his studio, with his throat bare so as to give freedom to 
 his head, which is a little large for his body, and dressed in a 
 most becoming loose Oriental sort of garment, M. Dorlange 
 was certainly better looking than in ordinary evening dress. 
 At the same time, when he is talking with animation, his face 
 lights up, and then his eyes seem to pour out a tide of that 
 magnetic fluid of which I had been conscious at our previous 
 meetings. Mme. de la Bastie was no less struck by it. 
 
 I forget whether I told you of the object of M. Dorlange's 
 ambition : he proposes to come forward as a candidate on the 
 occasion of the next elections. This was his reason for de- 
 clining the commission offered him by my husband as repre- 
 senting M. Marie-Gaston. Politics, in fact, are an absorbing 
 and dominating passion which can scarcely allow a second to 
 flourish by its side. Nevertheless, I was bent on studying the 
 situation to the bottom, and after dinner I insidiously drew 
 my gentleman into one of those tte-a-tete chats which the 
 mistress of a house can generally arrange. After speaking of 
 M. Marie-Gaston, our friend in common, of my dear Louise's 
 crazy flights, and my own constant but useless attempts to 
 moderate them, after giving him every opportunity and facility 
 for opening the battle, I asked him whether his Sainte-Ursule 
 was to be sent off soon. 
 
 "It is quite ready to start, madame," said he. "But I
 
 152 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S. 
 
 wait for your permission, your exeat ; for you to tell 'me, in 
 short, whether or not I am to alter anything in the face." 
 
 " First tell me this," replied I. " Supposing I were to wish 
 for any alteration, would such a change greatly injure the 
 statue?" 
 
 " It probably would. However little you clip a bird's 
 wings, it is always checked in its flight." 
 
 " One more question. Is your statue most like me or the 
 other woman ? ' ' 
 
 "You, madame, I need hardly say. You are the present; 
 she is the past." 
 
 " But to throw over the past in favor of the present is called, 
 as you doubtless are aware, monsieur, by an ugly name. And 
 you confess to this evil tendency with a frank readiness that 
 is really quite startling." 
 
 " It is true that art can be brutal," said M. Dorlange, 
 laughing. "Wherever it may find the raw material of a 
 creation, it rushes on it with frenzy." 
 
 "Art," said I, "is a big word, under which a world of 
 things find refuge ! The other day you told me that circum- 
 stances, too long to be related, had contributed to stamp on 
 your mind, as a constant presence, the features of which mine 
 are a reflection, and which have left such an impression on 
 your memory. Was not this saying pretty plainly that it was 
 not the sculptor alone who remembered them?" 
 
 "Indeed, madame, I had not time to explain myself more 
 fully. And in any case, on seeing you for the first time, 
 would you not have thought it extraordinary if I had assumed 
 a confidential tone? " 
 
 "But now? " said I audaciously. 
 
 " Even now, unless under very express encouragement, I 
 should find it hard to persuade myself that anything in my 
 past life could have a special interest for you." 
 
 "But why so? Some acquaintances ripen quickly. Your 
 devotion to my Na'is is a long step forward in ours. Beside,"
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 153 
 
 I added with affected giddiness, " I love a story beyond all 
 things." 
 
 "Beside the fact that mine has no end, it has, even to me, 
 remained a mystery." 
 
 "All the more reason Between us, perhaps, we may 
 
 be able to solve it." 
 
 M. Dorlange seemed to consider the matter; then, after a 
 short silence, he said 
 
 " It is very true ; women are clever in discerning faint 
 traces in facts or feelings where we men can detect none. 
 But this revelation does not involve myself alone, and I must 
 be allowed to beg that it remain absolutely between ourselves. 
 I do not except even M. de 1'Estorade ; a secret ceases to exist 
 when once it goes beyond the speaker and the recipient." 
 
 "M. de 1'Estorade," said I, "is so little accustomed to 
 hear everything from me, that he never saw a single line of 
 my correspondence with Madame Marie-Gaston." 
 
 At the same time I made a mental reservation with refer- 
 ence to you, my dear friend; for are you not the keeper of 
 my conscience? And to a confessor one must confess all, if 
 one is to be judiciously advised. 
 
 Till now M. Dorlange had been standing in front of the 
 fireplace, while I sat at the corner. He now took a chair 
 close to me, and by way of preamble he said : 
 
 "I spoke to you, madame, of the Lanty family " 
 
 At this instant Mme. de la Bastie, as provoking as a shower 
 at a picnic, came up to ask me whether I had seen Nathan's 
 new play ? Much I cared for anybody else's comedy when 
 absorbed in this drama, in which it would seem I had played 
 a pretty lively part ! However, M. Dorlange was obliged to 
 give up his seat by me, and it was impossible to have him to 
 myself any more that evening. 
 
 Nor, in fact, is there anything in this interrupted tale to 
 suggest that love played the part I had insinuated. There are 
 plenty more ways of stamping a personality on one's memory ; 
 
 tf
 
 154 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC IS. 
 
 and if M. Dorlange did not love the woman of whom I re 
 minded him, what grudge can he have against me who am but 
 a sort of second edition ? Nor must we overlook that very 
 handsome housekeeper ; for, granting that she is but a habit, 
 adopted for reasons of commonsense rather than of passion, 
 the woman must still be, at any rate in some degree, a fence 
 against me. Consequently, dear madame, all the alarms I 
 have dinned into your ears would be ridiculous indeed ; I 
 should somewhat resemble Belise in " Les Femmes Savantes," 
 who is haunted by the idea that every one who sees her must 
 fall in love with her. 
 
 But I should be only too glad to come to this dull con- 
 clusion. 
 
 Lover or not, M. Dorlange is a man of high spirit and re- 
 markable powers of mind ; if he does not put himself out of 
 court by any foolish aspirations, it will be an honor and a 
 pleasure to place him on our list of friends. The service he 
 did us predestines him to this, and I should really be sorry to 
 seem hard on him. In that case, indeed, NaTs would quar- 
 rel with me, for she very naturally thinks everything of her 
 rescuer. 
 
 In the evening, when he had left 
 
 "Mamma, how well M. Dorlange talks ! " said she, with a 
 most amusing air of approval. 
 
 Speaking of NaTs, this is the explanation she gives of the 
 reserve that disturbed me so much. 
 
 "Well, mamma," said she, "I supposed that you would 
 have seen him too. But after he stopped the horses, as you 
 did not seem to know him, and as he is rather common-look- 
 ing, I fancied he was a man " 
 
 " A man what do you mean ? " 
 
 "Why, yes; the sort of man of which one takes no notice; 
 but how glad I was when I found that he was a gentleman ! 
 You heard me exclaim : ' Why, you are the gentleman who saved 
 me.'"
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC IS. 155 
 
 Though her innocence is perfect, there is in this explana- 
 tion an ugly streak of pride, on which, you may be sure, I 
 delivered a fine lecture. This distinction between the man 
 and the gentleman is atrocious ; but, on the whole, was not 
 the child in the right? But if I carry my criticism any 
 further, you will be telling me to beware, for that I am al- 
 ready catching it from M. Dorlange. 
 
 THE COMTESSE DE I/ESTORADE TO MADAME OCTAVE DE CAMPS. 
 
 PARIS, April, 1839. 
 
 For nearly a fortnight, my dear madame, we heard no more 
 of M. Dorlange. Not only did he not think proper to come 
 and reopen the confidences so provokingly interrupted by 
 Madame de la Bastie, but he did not seem aware that, after 
 dining with anybody, a card, at least, is due within the 
 week. 
 
 Yesterday morning we were at breakfast, and I had just 
 made a remark to this effect, without bitterness, and merely 
 by way of conversation, when Lucas, who, as an old servant, 
 is somewhat overbold and familiar, made some one throw open 
 the door of the dining-room as if in triumph ; and handing a 
 note first to M. de 1'Estorade, he set down in the middle of 
 the table a mysterious object wrapped in tissue paper, which 
 at first suggested a decorative dish of some kind. 
 
 "What in the world is that? " I asked Lucas, seeing in his 
 face the announcement of a surprise. And I put out my hand 
 to tear away the paper. 
 
 " Oh, madame, be careful ! " cried he. " It is breakable." 
 
 My husband meanwhile had read the note, which he handed 
 to me, saying: "M. Dorlange's apology." 
 
 This is what the artist wrote : 
 
 " Monsieur le Comte, I fancied I could discern that Mad 
 ame de 1'Estorade gave me permission very reluctantly to 
 take advantage of the audacious use I had made of my petty
 
 156 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 larceny. I have therefore bravely determined to alter my 
 work, and at the present moment hardly a likeness is discern- 
 ible between ' the two sisters.' Still, I could not bear that all 
 I had done should be lost to the world, so I had a cast taken 
 of Sainte-Ursule's head before altering it, and made a reduced 
 copy, placing it on the shoulders of a charming countess, who 
 is not yet canonized, thank heaven ! 
 
 " The mould was broken after the first copy was taken, and 
 that only copy I have the honor to beg you to accept. This 
 fact, which was only proper, gives the statuette rather more 
 value. Believe me, etc." 
 
 While I was reading, my husband, Lucas, NaYs, and Rene 
 had been very busy extracting me from my wrappings ; and 
 behold, from a saint I had been converted into a lady of 
 fashion, in the shape of a lovely statuette elegantly dressed. I 
 thought that M. de 1'Estorade and the two children would go 
 crazy with admiration. The news of this wonder having 
 spread through the house, all the servants whom we certainly 
 spoil came in one after another, as if they had been invited, 
 and each in turn exclaimed " How like madame ! " I quote 
 only the leading theme, and do not remember every stupid 
 variation. 
 
 L'Estorade said : " On my way to the Exchequer office I 
 will look in on M. Dorlange. If he is disengaged this even- 
 ing, I will ask him to dine here. Armand, whom he has not 
 yet seen, will be at home ; thus he will see all the family to- 
 gether, and you can express your thanks." 
 
 I did not approve of this family dinner ; it seemed to me to 
 place M. Dorlange on a footing of intimacy which this fresh 
 civility again warned me might be dangerous. When I raised 
 some little difficulty, M. de 1'Estorade remarked 
 
 " Why, my dear, the first time we invited him, you wanted 
 to ask him only, which would have been extremely awkward, 
 rnd now, that it is perfectly suitable, you are making objec- 
 tions ! "
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 157 
 
 To this argument, which placed me entirely in the wrong, 
 I could make no reply, except saying to myself that hus- 
 bands are sometimes very clumsy. 
 
 He also contrived to vex me on another point, on which, 
 as you know, I am never amenable. At dinner M. de 1'Esto- 
 rade reverted to the subject of the elections, disapproving 
 more than ever of M. Dorlange as a candidate, though no 
 longer thinking it ridiculous ; this led to a political discus- 
 sion. Armand, who is a very serious person, and reads the 
 newspapers, joined in the conversation. Unlike most lads of 
 the present day, he shares his father's opinions, that is to say, 
 he is strongly Conservative indeed, rather in excess of that 
 wise moderation which is very rare, no doubt, at sixteen. 
 
 Without being rude, M. Dorlange. seemed to scorn the idea 
 of discussing the matter with the poor boy, and he rather 
 sharply reminded him of his school uniform ; so much so, 
 that I saw Armand ready to lose his temper and answer 
 viciously. As he is quite well bred, I had only to give him 
 a look, and he controlled himself; but seeing him turn 
 crimson and shut himself up in total silence, I felt that his 
 pride had been deeply wounded, and thought it ungenerous 
 of M. Dorlange to have crushed him by his superiority. I 
 know that in these days all children want to be of importance 
 too soon, and that it does them no harm to interfere now and 
 then and hinder them from being men of forty. But Armand 
 really has powers of mind and reason beyond his age. 
 
 Do you want proof? 
 
 Until last year I would never part from him ; he went to 
 the College Henri IV. as a day scholar. Well, it was he who, 
 for the benefit of his studies, begged to be placed there as a 
 boarder, since the constant going to and fro inevitably inter- 
 fered with his work ; and to be allowed, as a favor, to shut him- 
 self up under the ferule of an usher, he exhausted more argu- 
 ments, and wheedled me with more coaxing, than most boys 
 would have used to obtain the opposite result. Thus the
 
 158 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 grown-up manner, which in many schoolboys is intolerably 
 absurd, in him is the evident result of natural precocity, and 
 this precocity ought to be forgiven him, since it is the gift of 
 God. M. Dorlange, owing to the misfortune of his birth, is 
 less able than most men to enter into the feelings of boys, so, 
 of course, he is deficient in indulgence. But he had better 
 be careful ! This is a bad way of paying his court to me, 
 even on the most ordinary footing of friendship. 
 
 Being so small a party, I could not, of course, revert to the 
 history he had to tell me ; but I did not think that he was 
 particularly anxious to recur to the subject. In fact, he was 
 less attentive to me than to Na'is, for whom he cut out black 
 paper figures during an hour or more. It must also be said 
 that Madame de Rastignac came in the way, and that I had 
 to give myself up to her visit. While I was talking to her by 
 the fire, M. Dorlange, at the other end of the room, was 
 making Na'is and Ren6 stand for their portraits, and they 
 presently came exultant to show me their silhouettes, wonder- 
 fully like, snipped out with the scissors. 
 
 "Do you know," said Nai's in a whisper, "M. Dorlange 
 says he will make a bust of me in marble ? " 
 
 All this struck me as in rather bad taste. I do not like to 
 see artists who, when admitted to a drawing-room, still carry 
 on the business, as it were. They thus justify the aristocratic 
 arrogance which sometimes refuses to think them worthy to 
 be received for their own sake. 
 
 M. Dorlange went away early; and M. de 1'Estorade got 
 on my nerves, as he has done so many times in his life, when 
 he insisted on showing out his guest, who had tried to steal 
 away unperceived, and I heard him desire him to repeat his 
 visits less rarely, that I was always at home in the evening. 
 
 The result of this family dinner has been civil war among 
 the children. NaVs, lauding her dear deliverer to the skies, in 
 which she is supported by Rene, who is completely won over 
 by a splendid lancer on horseback, cut out.for him by M. Dor-
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 169 
 
 lange. Armand, on the contrary, says he is ugly, which is 
 indisputable ; he declares he is just like the portraits of Danton 
 in the illustrated history of the Revolution, and there is some 
 truth in it. He also says that in the statuette he has made me 
 look like a milliner's apprentice, which is not true at all. 
 
 B9RLANGE TO MARIE-GASTON. 
 
 PARIS, April, 1839. 
 
 Why do I give up my art, and what do I expect to find in 
 that " galley " called politics ? 
 
 That is what comes, my dear fond lover, of shutting yourself 
 up for years in conventual matrimony. The world, mean- 
 while, has gone on. Life has brought fresh combinations to 
 those whom you shut out, and the less you know of them, the 
 readier you are to blame those you have forgotten. Every one 
 is clever at patching other people's affairs. 
 
 You must know, then, my inquisitive friend, that it was not 
 of my own accord that I took the step for which you would 
 call me to account. My unforeseen appearance in the electoral 
 breach was in obedience to the desire of a very high personage. 
 A father has at last allowed a gleam of light to shine in the 
 eternal darkness; he has three parts revealed himself; and, if 
 I may trust appearances, he fills a place in society that might 
 satisfy the most exacting conceit. 
 
 I spend the evening two or three times a week at the Cafe 
 Greco, the favored haunt of artists, and meet there several 
 Roman students, my contemporaries. They have made me 
 acquainted with some journalists and men of letters, agreeable 
 and superior men, with whom it is both pleasant and profitable 
 to exchange ideas. There is a particular corner where we con- 
 gregate, and where every question of a serious character is 
 discussed and thrashed out ; but, as having the most living 
 interest, politics especially give rise to the most impassioned 
 arguments. In our little club democratic views predominate;
 
 160 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 they are represented in the most diverse shades, including th& 
 Utopia or phalanstery of workers. This will show you that the 
 proceedings of the Government are often severely handled, 
 and that unlimited freedom of language characterizes our 
 verdicts. 
 
 Rather more than a year ago the waiter said to me : 
 
 "You are watched by the police, sir, and you will be wise 
 not to talk always open-mouthed like St. Paul." 
 
 " By the police, my good fellow ! Why, what on earth can 
 it find to watch ? All I can say, and a great deal more, ia 
 printed every morning in the newspapers." 
 
 "That has nothing to do with it. They have an eye on you. 
 I have seen it. There is a little old man who takes a great deal 
 of snuff, and who always sits where he can hear you. When 
 you are speaking he listens much more attentively than to any 
 of the others, and I even caught him once writing something 
 in his pocket-book in signs that were not the alphabet." 
 
 " Very good ; then, next time he comes, show him to me." 
 
 The next time was no further off than the morrow. 
 
 The man pointed out was small and gray-haired, untidy in 
 his appearance, and his face, deeply marked by the smallpox, 
 was, I thought, that of a man of fifty. And he certainly very 
 often took a pinch out of a large snuff-box, and seemed to 
 honor my remarks with a degree of attention which I could, 
 as I chose, regard as highly complimentary or extremely im- 
 pertinent. But of the two alternatives I was inclined to the 
 more charitable by the air of honesty and mildness that per. 
 vaded this supposed emissary of the police. When I remarked 
 on this reassuring aspect to the waiter, who flattered himself 
 that he had scented out a secret agent 
 
 "Oh, yes, indeed ! " said he. "Those are the sweet man- 
 ners the rats, for so we mostly call them, always put on to 
 hide their game." 
 
 Two days after, one Sunday, at the hour of vespers, in the 
 course of one of those long walks all across Paris, which you
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 161 
 
 know I always loved, mere chance led me into the church of 
 Saint-Louis en 1'Ile, the parish church of that God-forsaken 
 quarter. The building is not particularly interesting, in spite 
 of what some historians have said, and following them, every 
 "Stranger's Guide to Paris." I should only have walked 
 through it, but that the wonderful talent of the organist who 
 was playing the service irresistibly held me. When I tell you 
 that the performer came up to my ideal, you will know that is 
 high praise ; for you will, I daresay, remember that I draw a 
 distinction between organ players and organists a rank of 
 the superior nobility to whom I grant the title only on the 
 highest grounds. 
 
 But are not great artists, after all, the real kings by divine 
 right ? Imagine my amazement when, after waiting a few 
 minutes, instead of a perfectly strange face, I saw a man whom 
 I at once vaguely recognized, and knew at a second glance 
 for my watchful listener of the Cafe des Arts. Nor was this 
 all : at his heels came a sort of spoilt attempt at humanity ; 
 and in this misshapen failure, with crooked legs and a thicket 
 of unkempt hair, I discerned eur old quarterly providence, 
 my banker, my money-carrier in short, our respected friend 
 the mysterious dwarf. 
 
 I, you may be sure, did not escape his sharp eye, and I saw 
 him eagerly pointing me out to the organist. Hr instinc- 
 tively, and not probably calculating all that would come of 
 it, turned quickly to look at me, and then, taking no further 
 notice of me, went on his way. The dwarf, meanwhile 
 whom I might recognize as his master's servant by this single 
 detail went familiarly up to the man who distributed holy 
 water and offered him a pinch of snuff; then he hobbled 
 away, never looking at me again, and vanished through a door 
 in a corner under one of the side-aisles. 
 
 I acted on the spur of the moment and rushed after the 
 organist. By the time I had got out of the church door he 
 was out of sight, but chance favored me and led me in the 
 11
 
 162 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC IS. 
 
 direction he had taken ; as I came out on the Quai de B6thune, 
 I saw him in the distance knocking at a door. 
 
 I boldly followed and said to the gate-porter 
 
 "Is the organist of Saint-Louis en 1'Ile within?" 
 
 " M. Jacques Bricheteau ? " 
 
 "Yes, M. Jacques Bricheteau; he lives here, I think?" 
 
 " On the fourth floor above the entresol, the door on the 
 left. He has just come in ; you may catch him up on the 
 stairs." 
 
 Run as fast as I could, by the time I reached my man his 
 key was in the lock. 
 
 " M. Jacques Bricheteau?" I hastily exclaimed. "I have 
 the honor, I think ?" 
 
 " I know no such person," said he coolly, as he turned the 
 key. 
 
 " I may be mistaken in the name ; but M. the organist of 
 Saint-Louis en 1'Ile?" 
 
 "I never heard of any organist living in this house." 
 
 "I beg your pardon, monsieur: there certainly is, for the 
 concierge has just told me so. Beside, you are undoubtedly 
 the gentleman I saw coming out of the organ loft, accompa- 
 nied by a man I may say " 
 
 But before I had finished speaking, this strange individual 
 had balked me of his company and shut his door in my face. 
 
 I proceeded to pull his bell with some energy, quite deter- 
 mined to persist till I knew the reason of this fixed purpose of 
 ignoring me. For some little time the besieged party put up 
 with the turmoil I was making; but I suddenly remarked that 
 the bell had ceased to sound. It had evidently been muffled ; 
 the obstinate foe would not come to the door, and the only 
 way of getting at him would be to beat it in. That, however, 
 is not thought mannerly. 
 
 I went down again to the door-porter, who informed me 
 that M. Bricheteau was a quiet resident, polite but not com- 
 municative ; punctual in paying his rent, but not in easy cir-
 
 THE DEPUTY fOR ARCIS. 163 
 
 cumstances, for he kept no servant not even a maid to clean 
 for him, and he never took a meal at home. He was always 
 out by ten in the morning, and never came in till the evening, 
 and was probably a clerk in an office, or perhaps a music- 
 master giving lessons. 
 
 On my return home I persuaded myself that a pathetic 
 epistle addressed to my recalcitrant friend would induce him 
 to admit me. Seasoning my urgent supplication with a spice 
 of intimidation, I gave him to understand that I was im- 
 movably bent on penetrating, at any cost, the mystery of my 
 birth, of which he seemed to be fully informed. Now that I 
 had some clue to the secret, it would be his part to consider 
 whether my desperate efforts, blindly rushing against the dark 
 unknown, might not entail much greater trouble than the 
 frank explanation I begged him to favor me with. 
 
 My ultimatum thus formulated, to the end that it should 
 reach the hands of M. Jacques Bricheteau as soon as possible, 
 on the following morning, before nine, I arrived at the door. 
 But, in a frenzy of secrecy unless he has some really inex- 
 plicable reason for avoiding me at daybreak that morning, 
 after paying the rent for the current term and for a term's 
 notice, the organist had packed off his furniture ; and it is to 
 be supposed that the men employed in this sudden flitting 
 were handsomely bribed for their silence, since the concierge 
 could not discover the name of the street whither his lodger 
 was moving. The men did not belong to the neighborhood, 
 so there was not a chance of unearthing them and paying 
 them to speak. 
 
 Still, and in spite of the obstinacy and cleverness of this 
 unattainable antagonist, I would not be beaten. I felt there 
 was still a connecting thread between us in the organ of Saint- 
 Louis' ; so on the following Sunday, before the end of high 
 mass, I took up a post at the door of the organ loft, fully de- 
 termined not to let the sphinx go till I had made it speak. 
 Here was a fresh disappointment : M. Jacques Bricheteau was
 
 164 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 represented by one of his pupils, and for three Sundays in 
 succession it was the same. On the fourth I ventured to 
 speak to the substitute and ask him if the maestro were ill. 
 
 " No, monsieur. M. Bricheteau is taking a holiday ; he will 
 be absent for some time, and is away on business." 
 
 " Where then can I write him ? " 
 
 "I do not exactly know. Still, I suppose that you can 
 write and send to his lodgings, close at hand, Quai de 
 Bethune." 
 
 " But he has moved. Did you not know ? " 
 
 " No. Indeed ! and where is he now living ? " 
 
 I was out of luck asking for information from a man who, 
 when I questioned him, questioned me. And as if to drive 
 me fairly beside myself, while investigating matters under 
 such hopeful conditions, I saw in the distance that confounded 
 deaf and dumb dwarf, who positively laughed as he looked at 
 me. 
 
 Happily for my impatience and curiosity, which were en- 
 hanced by every defeat, and rising by degrees to an almost 
 intolerable pitch, daylight presently dawned. A few days 
 after this last false scent, a letter reached me ; and I, a better 
 scholar than the concierge of the Quai de Bethune, at once 
 saw that the postmark was Stockholm, Sweden, which did not 
 excessively astonish me. When in Rome, I had the honor 
 of being kindly received by Thorwaldsen, the great sculptor, 
 and I had met many of his fellow-countrymen in his studio 
 some commission perhaps, for which he had recommended 
 me so imagine my surprise and emotion when, on opening 
 it, the first words I read were 
 
 "Monsieur monfils" (my son). 
 
 The letter was long, and I had not patience enough to read 
 it through before looking to see whose name I bore. So I 
 turned at once to the signature. This beginning, Monsieur 
 monfils, which we often find in history as used by kings when 
 addressing their scions, must surely premise aristocratic par-
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 166 
 
 entage ! My disappointment was great : there was no signa- 
 ture. 
 
 "Monsieur mon fils," my anonymous father wrote, "I 
 cannot regret that your inveterate determination to solve the 
 secret of your birth should have compelled the man who 
 watched over your youth to come here and confer with me as 
 to the steps to which we should be compelled by this danger- 
 ous and turbulent curiosity. I have for a long time cherished 
 an idea which has now come to maturity, and it has been far 
 more satisfactorily discussed in speech than it could have been 
 by correspondence. 
 
 " Being obliged to leave France almost immediately after 
 your birth, which cost your mother her life, I made a large 
 fortune in a foreign land, and I now fill a high position in the 
 Government of this country. I foresee a time when I may 
 be free to give you my name, and at the same time to secure 
 for you the reversion of the post I hold. But, to rise so high 
 as this, the celebrity which, with my permission, you promise 
 to achieve in Art would not be a sufficient recommendation. 
 I therefore wish you to enter on a political career ; and in 
 that career, under the existing conditions in France, there are 
 not two ways of distinguishing yourself you must be elected 
 a member of the Chamber. You are not yet, I know, of the 
 required age, and you have not the necessary qualification. 
 But you will be thirty next year, and that is just long enough 
 to enable you to become a landed proprietor and prove your 
 possession for more than a twelvemonth. On the day after 
 receiving this you may call on the Brothers Mongenod, 
 bankers, Rue de la Victoire ; they will pay you a sum of two 
 hundred and fifty thousand francs. This you must at once 
 invest in the purchase of a house, and devote any surplus to 
 the support of some newspaper which, in due course, will 
 advocate your election after another outlay is met which I 
 shall presently explain.
 
 166 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 "Your aptitude for politics is vouched for by the friend 
 who has watched over you in your deserted existence, with a 
 zeal and disinterestedness that I can never repay. He has for 
 some time followed you and listened to you, and he is con- 
 vinced that you would make a creditable appearance in the 
 Chamber. Your opinions Liberal, and at once moderate 
 and enthusiastic meet my views, and you have, unconsciously, 
 hitherto played into my hand very successfully. 
 
 " I cannot at present reveal to you the place of your prob- 
 able election. It is being prepared with a deep secrecy and 
 skill which will be successful in proportion as they are wrapped 
 in silence and darkness. However, your success may be, 
 perhaps, partly insured by your carrying out a work which I 
 commend to your notice, advising you to accept its apparent 
 singularity without demur or comment. For the present you 
 must still be a sculptor, and you are to employ the talent of 
 which you have given evidence in the execution of a statue of 
 Sainte-Ursule. The subject does not lack poetry or interest ; 
 Sainte-Ursule, virgin and martyr, was, it is generally believed, 
 the daughter of a prince of Great Britain. She was martyred 
 in the fifth century at Cologne, where she had founded a con- 
 vent of maidens known to popular superstition as the Eleven 
 Thousand Virgins. She was subsequently taken as the patron 
 saint of the Ursuline Sisters, who adopted her name ; also of 
 the famous house of the Sorbonne. 
 
 "An artist so clever as you are may, it seems to me, make 
 something of all these facts. 
 
 " Without knowing the name of the place you are to repre- 
 sent, it is desirable that you should at once make due profes- 
 sion of your political tendencies and proclaim your intention 
 of standing for election. At the same time, I cannot too 
 earnestly impress on you the need for secrecy as to this commu- 
 nication, and for patience in your present position. Leave 
 my agent in peace, I beg of you, and setting aside a curiosity 
 which, I warn you, will involve you in the greatest disasters,
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 167 
 
 await the slow and quiet development of the splendid future 
 that lies before you. By not choosing to conform to my 
 arrangement, you will deprive yourself of every chance of being 
 initiated into the mystery you are so eager to solve. However, 
 I will not even suppose that you can rebel ; I would rather be- 
 lieve in your perfect deference to the wishes of a father who 
 feels that the happiest day of his life will be that when he is at 
 last able to make himself known to you. 
 
 "P. S. As your statue is intended for the chapel of an 
 Ursuline convent, it must be in white marble. The height of 
 the figure is to be 1.706 metre, or, in other words, five feet 
 three inches. As it will not stand in a niche, it must be 
 equally well finished on all sides. The cost to be defrayed 
 out of the two hundred and fifty thousand francs advised by 
 the present letter." 
 
 Of course curiosity took me to the bankers ; and, on finding 
 at Messrs. Mongenod's, in hard and ready cash, the two hun- 
 dred and fifty thousand francs promised me, I was, I confess, 
 pleased. It struck me that the determination which began by 
 advancing so large a sum must in fact be serious ; since that 
 power knew all, and I knew nothing, it seemed to me unrea- 
 sonable and inopportune to attempt to struggle. 
 
 I bought the house, I took shares in the " National," and I 
 found ample encouragement in my political schemes, as well 
 as the certainty of a keen contest whenever I should reveal the 
 name of the place I meant to stand for hitherto I have had 
 no difficulty in keeping that secret. 
 
 I also executed the Sainte-Ursule, and I am now waiting for 
 further instructions, which certainly seem to me to be a long 
 time coming, now that I have loudly proclaimed my ambitions 
 and that the stir of a general election is in the air a fight to 
 which I am by no means equal. To obey the instructions of 
 paternal caution I need not, I know, ask you to be absolutely 
 secret about all I confide to you. Reserve is a virtue which I
 
 168 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 know you to have brought to such perfection that I need not 
 preach it to you. The duel fought on your behalf has found 
 me favor in the democracy. 
 
 DORLANGE TO MARIE-GASTON. 
 
 PARIS, April, 1839. 
 
 MY DEAR FRIEND : I am still playing my part as best I 
 may of a candidate without a constituency. My friends are 
 puzzled, and I must confess that I am worried, for there are 
 but a few weeks now till the election ; and if all these myste- 
 rious preparations end in smoke, a pretty figure I shall cut in 
 the eyes of M. Bixiou, whose spiteful comments you reported 
 to me not long ago. Still, one thought supports me : It 
 seems hardly likely that anybody should sow two hundred and 
 fifty thousand francs in my furrow without the definite pur- 
 pose of gathering some sort of crop. Possibly, indeed, if I 
 could see the thing more clearly, this absence of hurry on the 
 part of those who are working for me in such a deliberate and 
 underground manner may, in fact, be the result of perfect 
 confidence in my success. 
 
 In one word I will paint M. Bixiou he is envious. There 
 was in him unquestionably the making of a great artist ; but 
 in the economy of his individuality the stomach has killed 
 the heart and head, and by sheer subjection to sensuous appe- 
 tite he is now for ever doomed to remain no more than a 
 caricaturist, a man, that is to say, who lives from hand to 
 mouth, discounts his talent in frittered work, real penal servi- 
 tude which enables the man to live jovially, but brings him 
 no consideration, and promises him no future ; a man whose 
 talent is a mere feeble abortion ; his mind as much as his face 
 is stamped with the perpetual, hopeless grimace which human 
 instinct has always ascribed to the fallen angels. And just as 
 the Prince of Darkness attacks by preference the greatest 
 saints, as reminding him most sternly of the angelic height!
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 169 
 
 from which he fell, so M. Bixiou sheds his venom on every 
 talent and every character in whose strength, and spirit, and 
 purpose he feels the brave resolve not to waste itself as his 
 has been wasted. But there is one thing which may reassure 
 you as to the outcome of his slander and his abuse for from 
 M. de 1'Estorade's report to you I perceive that he indulges 
 in both : namely, at the very time when he fancies he is most 
 successfully occupied in a sort of burlesque autopsy of my 
 person, he is but a plastic puppet in my hands, a jumping- 
 jack of which I hold the string, and into whose mouth I can 
 put what words I please. 
 
 Feeling sure that a little advertisement should prepare the 
 way for my appearance as a statesman, I looked about me for 
 some public criers, deep-mouthed, as Mine. Pernelle would 
 say, and well able to give tongue. If among blatant trump- 
 eters I could have found one more shrill, more deafeningly 
 persistent than the great Bixiou, I would have preferred him. 
 I took advantage of the malignant inquisitiveness that takes 
 that amiable pest into every studio in turn, to fill himself up 
 with information. I told him everything, of my good luck, 
 of the two hundred and fifty thousand francs, ascribing them 
 to a lucky turn on 'Change, of all my parliamentary schemes, 
 to the very number of the house I had purchased. And I am 
 much mistaken if that number is not written down somewhere 
 in his note-book. 
 
 This, I fancy, is enough to reduce the admiration of his 
 audience at the Montcornets', and prove that this formidable 
 magpie is not quite so miraculously and truthfully informed 
 on all points. 
 
 As to my political horoscope, which he condescended to 
 cast, I cannot say that his astrology, strictly speaking, is far 
 from the truth. It is quite certain that by announcing my 
 intention of never attempting to keep step with other men's 
 opinions I shall attain to the position so clearly set forth by a 
 pleader worthy to be the successor of M. de la Palisse: '* What
 
 170 TME DEPUTY 1-OR ARCIS. 
 
 do you do, gentlemen, to a man whom you place in solitary 
 confinement? You isolate him." Isolation, in fact, must at 
 first be my lot ; and the life of an artist, a solitary life, in 
 which a man spins everything out of himself, has predisposed 
 me to accept the situation. And if I find myself in conse- 
 quence especially as a beginner exempt from all lobby and 
 backstairs influences, this may do me good service as a speaker ; 
 for I shall be able to express myself with unbiased strength 
 and freedom. Never being bound by any pledge, by any 
 trumpery party interest, there will be nothing to hinder me 
 from being myself, or from expressing in their sacred crudity 
 any ideas I think wholesome and true. 
 
 I know full well that in the face of an assembled multitude 
 these poor truths for truth's sake do not always get their 
 chance of becoming infectious, or even of being respectfully 
 welcomed. But have you not observed that by knowing how 
 ta snatch an opportunity we sometimes hit on a day which 
 seems to be a sort of festival of sense and intelligence, when the 
 right thing triumphs almost without an effort ? On those days, 
 in spite of the utmost prejudice in the hearers, the speaker's 
 honesty makes them generous and sympathetic, at any rate 
 for the moment, with all that is upright, true, and magnani- 
 mous. At the same time, I do not deceive myself; though 
 this system of mine may win me some consideration and noto- 
 riety as an orator, it is of very little avail in the pursuit of 
 office, nor will it gain me the reputation as a practical man 
 for which it is now the fashion to sacrifice so much. But if 
 my influence at arm's length should be inconsiderable, I shall 
 be heard at a distance, because I shall, for the most part, 
 speak out of the window outside the narrow and suffocating 
 atmosphere of parliamentary life, and over the head of its 
 petty passions and mean interests. 
 
 This kind of success will be all I need for the purposes my 
 benevolent parent seems to have in view. What he appears 
 to aim at is that I should make a noise and be heard afar;
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S. 171 
 
 and from that side, political life has, I declare, its artistic 
 aspect which will not too monstrously jar with my past life. 
 
 Now, to come to another matter that of my actual or pos- 
 sible passion for Mme. de 1'Estorade. This is your very 
 judicial epitome of the case: In 1837, when you set out for 
 Italy, Mme. de 1'Estorade was still in the bloom of her beauty. 
 Leading a life so calm, so sheltered from passion as hers has 
 always been, it is probable that the lapse of two years has left 
 no deep marks on her ; and the proof that time has stood still 
 for that privileged beauty you find in my strange and audacious 
 persistency in deriving inspiration from it. Hence, if the mis- 
 chief is not already done, at any rate you will give me warn- 
 ing ; there is but one step from the artist's admiration to the 
 man's, and the story of Pygmalion is commended to my pru- 
 dent meditation. 
 
 In the first place, most sapient and learned mythologist, 1 
 may make this observation : The person principally interested 
 in the matter, who is on the spot and in a far better position 
 than you to estimate the perils of the situation, has no anxiety 
 on the subject. M. de 1'Estorade's only complaint is that 
 my visits are not more frequent, and my reticence is, in his 
 eyes, pure bad manners. "To be sure!" you exclaim, "a 
 husband any husband is the last to suspect that his wife is 
 being made love to ! " So be it. But what about Mme. de 
 1'Estorade, with her high reputation for virtue, and the cold, 
 almost calculating reasonableness which she so often brought 
 to bear on the ardent and impassioned petulance of another 
 lady known to you? And will you not also allow that the 
 love of her children, carried to the last degree of fervor, I 
 had almost said fanaticism, that we see in women, must in 
 her be an infallible protection ? So far, and for her, well and 
 good. 
 
 But it is not her peace of mind, but mine, that concerns 
 your friendship; for if Pygmalion had failed to animate his 
 statue, much good his love would have done him ! I might,
 
 172 TffE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 in reply to your charitable solicitude, refer you to my princi- 
 ples though the word and the thing alike are completely out 
 of fashion to a certain very absurd respect that I have al- 
 ways professed for conjugal fidelity, to the very natural obstacle 
 to all such levity of fancy raised in my mind by the serious 
 responsibilities on which I am embarking. And I might also 
 say that, though not indeed by the superiority of my genius, 
 at least by every tendency of mind and character, I am one 
 of that earnest and serious school of a past time who, regard- 
 ing Art as long and Life as short Ars longa et vita brevis 
 did not waste their time and their creative powers in silly, 
 dull intrigues. 
 
 I will here explain the enigma as to Mme. de 1'Estorade : 
 In 1835, the last year I spent in Rome, I was on terms of con- 
 siderable intimacy with a French Academy student named 
 Desroziers. He was a musician, a man of distinguished and 
 observant mind, who would probably have made a mark in 
 his art if he had not been carried off by typhoid fever the 
 year after I left. 
 
 One day when we had taken it into our heads that we would 
 travel as far as Sicily, an excursion allowed by the rules of the 
 Academy, we found ourselves absolutely penniless, and we 
 were wandering about the streets of Rome considering by 
 what means we could repair the damage to our finances, when 
 we happened to pass by the Braschi palace. The doors stood 
 wide open, admitting an ebb and flow of people of all classes 
 in an endless tide. 
 
 " By the mass ! " cried Desroziers, " this is the very thing 
 for us!" 
 
 And without any explanation as to whither he was leading 
 me, we followed in the stream and made our way into the 
 palace. 
 
 After going up a magnificent marble staircase, and through 
 a l^ng suite of rooms, poorly enough furnished as is usual in 
 Roman palaces, where all the luxury consists in fine ceilings,
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARGIS. 178 
 
 pictures, statues, and other works of art we found ourselves 
 in a room hung with black and lighted with many tapers. It 
 was, as you will have understood, a body lying in state. In 
 the middle, on a raised bed covered with a canopy, lay the 
 most hideous and grotesque thing you can conceive of. Im- 
 agine a little old man, with a face and hands withered to such 
 a state of desiccation that a mummy by comparison would 
 seem fat and well-looking. Dressed in black satin breeches, 
 a violet velvet coat of fashionable cut, a white vest embroid- 
 ered with gold, and a full shirt frill of English point-lace, this 
 skeleton's cheeks were thickly coated with rouge, which en- 
 hanced the parchment yellow of the rest of the skin ; and 
 crowning a fair wig, tightly curled, it had a huge hat and 
 feathers tilted knowingly over one ear, and making the most 
 reverent spectator laugh in spite of himself. After glancing 
 at this ridiculous and pitiable exhibition, the indispensable 
 preliminary to a funeral according to the aristocratic etiquette 
 of Rome 
 
 "There you see the end," said Desroziers. "Now, come 
 and look at the beginning." 
 
 So saying, and paying no heed to my questions, because he 
 wanted to give me a dramatic surprise, he led me off to the 
 Albani gallery, and placing me in front of a statue of Adonis 
 reclining on a lion's skin 
 
 "What do you think of that?" said he. 
 
 "That!" cried I at a first glance; "it is as fine as an 
 antique." 
 
 " It is as much an antique as I am," replied Desroziers, and 
 he pointed to a signature on the plinth: "Sarrasine, 1758." 
 
 "Antique or modern, it is a masterpiece," I said, when I 
 had studied this delightful work from all sides. " But how 
 is this fine statue and the terrible caricature you took me to 
 see just now to help us on our way to Sicily ? " 
 
 "In your place, I should have begun by asking who and 
 what was Sarrasine."
 
 174 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 "That was unnecessary," replied I. "I had already 
 heard of this statue. I had forgotten it again, because when 
 I came to see it the Albani gallery was closed for repairs as 
 they say of the theatres. Sarrasine, I was informed, was a 
 pupil of Bouchardon's, and, like us, a pensioner on the King 
 of Rome, where he died within six months of his arrival." 
 
 " But who or what caused his death? " 
 
 "Some illness probably," replied I, never dreaming that 
 my reply was prophetic of the end of the man I was addressing. 
 
 "Not a bit of it," said Desroziers. "Artists don't die in 
 such an idiotic way." 
 
 And he gave me the following details : 
 
 Sarrasine, a youth of genius, but of ungovernable passions, 
 almost as soon as he arrived in Rome, fell madly in love with 
 the principal soprano at the Argentina, whose name was Zam- 
 binella. At that time the pope would not allow women to 
 appear on the stage in Rome. The difficulty was overcome 
 by means well known, and imported from the East. Sarrasine, 
 in his fury at finding his love thus cheated, having already 
 executed an imaginary statue of this imaginary mistress, was 
 on the point of killing the castrate and himself. But the 
 singer was under the protection of a great personage, who, to 
 be beforehand with him, had cooled the sculptor's blood by a 
 few pricks of the stiletto. Zambinella had not approved of 
 this violence, but nevertheless continued to sing at the Argen- 
 tina and on every stage in Europe, amassing an enormous 
 fortune. 
 
 When too old to remain on the stage, the singer shrank 
 into a little old man, very vain, very shy, but as willful and 
 capricious as a woman. All the affection of which he was 
 capable he bestowed on a wonderfully beautiful niece, whom 
 he placed at the head of his household. She was the Madame 
 Denis of this strange Voltaire, and he intended that she should 
 inherit his vast wealth. The handsome heiress, in love with 
 a Frenchman named the Comte de Lanty, who was supposed
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR AKCIS. 175 
 
 to be a highly skilled chemist, though, in fact, little was 
 known of his antecedents, liad great difficulty in obtaining 
 her uncle's consent to her marriage with the man of her 
 choice. And when, weary of disputing the matter, he gave 
 in, it was on condition of not parting from his niece. The 
 better to secure the fulfillment of the bargain, he gave her 
 nothing on her marriage, parting with none of his fortune, 
 which he spent liberally on all who were about him. 
 
 Bored wherever he found himself, and driven by a perpetual 
 longing for change, the fantastic old man had at different 
 times taken up his abode in the remotest parts of the world, 
 always dragging at his heels the family party whose respect 
 and attachment he had secured at least for life. 
 
 In 1829, when he was nearly a hundred years old, and had 
 sunk into a sort of imbecility though still keenly alive when 
 he listened to music a question of some interest to the Lantys 
 and their two children brought them to settle in a splendid 
 house in the Faubourg Saint-Honore. They there received 
 all Paris. The world was attracted by the still splendid beauty 
 of Madame de Lanty, the innocent charm of her daughter 
 Marianina, the really royal magnificence of their entertain- 
 ments, and a peculiar flavor of mystery in the atmosphere 
 about these remarkable strangers. With regard to the old 
 man particularly, comments were endless; he was the object 
 of so much care and consideration, but at the same time so 
 like a petted captive, stealing out like a spectre into the midst 
 of the parties, from which such obvious efforts were made to 
 keep him away, while he seemed to find malicious enjoyment 
 in scaring the company, like an apparition. 
 
 The gunshots of July, 1830, put this phantom to flight. 
 On leaving Paris, to the great annoyance of the Lantys, he 
 insisted on returning to Rome, his native city, where his 
 presence had revived the humiliating memories of the past. 
 But Rome was his last earthly stage ; he had just died there, 
 and it was he whom we had seen so absurdly dressed out and
 
 176 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 lying in state in the Braschi palace he also on whom we 
 now looked, in all his youthful beauty, in the Albani collec- 
 tion. 
 
 "You have skill enough to make a copy of this statue, I 
 suppose?" said Desroziers. 
 
 " At any rate, I like to think so." 
 
 " Well, I am sure of it. Get leave from the curator, and 
 set to work forthwith. I know of a purchaser for such a 
 copy." 
 
 "Why, who will buy it?" 
 
 "The.Comte de Lanty, to be sure. I am giving his 
 daughter lessons in harmony; and when I mention in his 
 house that I know of a fine copy of this Adonis, they will 
 never rest till it belongs to them." 
 
 " But does not this savor somewhat of extortion ? " 
 
 " Not in the least. ' Some time since the Lantys had a 
 painting done of it by Vien, as they could not purchase the 
 marble; the Albani gallery would not part with it at any 
 price. Various attempts have been made at reproducing it in 
 sculpture, but all have failed. You have only to succeed, and 
 you will be paid enough for forty trips to Sicily, for you will 
 have gratified a whim which has become hopeless, and which, 
 when the price is paid, will still think itself your debtor." 
 
 Two days later I had begun the work ; and as it was quite 
 to my mind, I went on so steadily that, three weeks later, the 
 Lanty family, all in deep mourning, invaded my studio, under 
 Desrozjers' guidance, to inspect a sketch in a forward stage 
 of completion. 
 
 Marianina was at that time one-and-twenty. I need not 
 describe her, since you know Mme. de 1'Estorade, whom she 
 strikingly resembles. This charming girl, already an accom- 
 plished musician, had a remarkable talent for every form of 
 art. Coming from time to time to my studio to follow the 
 progress of my work which, after all, was never finished, as 
 it happened she, like Princess Marguerite d'Orleans, took a
 
 THE DEPUTY MR ARCIS. 177 
 
 fancy for sculpture, and until the family left Rome some 
 months before I had to come away Mile, de Lanty came to 
 me for lessons. Nothing could be further from my thoughts 
 than any idea of playing the part of Abelard or Saint-Pruex, 
 but I may say I was most happy in my teaching. My pupil 
 was so intelligent, and so apt to profit by the slightest hint; 
 she had at once such a bright temper and such ripe judgment; 
 her voice, when she sang, went so straight to the heart ; and 
 I heard so constantly from the servants, who adored her, of 
 her noble, generous, and charitable actions, that, but for my 
 knowing of her vast fortune, which kept me at a distance, I 
 might have run into the danger you are warning me to avoid 
 now. 
 
 On my return to Paris, my first visit was to the Hotel 
 Lanty. 
 
 Marianina was too well bred, and too sweet by nature, ever 
 to make herself disagreeable or to be scornful ; but I at once 
 perceived that a singularly cold reserve had taken the place 
 of the gracious and friendly freedom of her manner. It 
 struck me as probable that the liking she had shown me not, 
 indeed, for my person, but for my mind and conversation 
 had been commented on by her family. She had no doubt 
 been lectured, and she seemed to me to be acting under strict 
 orders, as I could easily conclude from the distant and 
 repellent manner of M. and Mme. de Lanty. 
 
 A few months later, at the Salon of 1837, I fancied I saw a 
 corroboration of my suspicions. I had exhibited a statue which 
 made some sensation ; there was always a mob round my 
 Pandora. Mingling with the crowd I used to stand incognito, 
 to enjoy my success and gather my laurels fresh. One Friday, 
 the fashionable day, I saw from afar the approach of the 
 Lanty family. The mother was on the arm of a well-known 
 " buck," Comte Maxime de Traillcs ; Marianina was with her 
 brother ; M. de Lanty, who looked anxious, as usual, was alone ; 
 and, like the man in the song of Malbrouck, " ne portait 
 12
 
 178 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 rien" (wore nothing), carried nothing. By a crafty manoeuvre, 
 while the party were pushing their way through the crowd, I 
 slipped behind them so as to hear what they thought, without 
 being seen. Nil admirari think nothing fine is the natural 
 instinct of every man of fashion ; so, after a summary inspec- 
 tion of my work, M. de Trailles began to discover the most 
 atrocious faults, and his verdict was pronounced in a loud 
 and distinct voice, so that his dictum could not be lost on 
 anybody for some little distance round. Marianina, thinking 
 differently, listened to this profound critic with a shrug or 
 two of her shoulders ; then when he ceased 
 
 " How fortunate it is ! " said she, " that you should have 
 come with us ! But for your enlightened judgment I should 
 have been quite capable, like the good-natured vulgar, of 
 thinking this statue beautiful. It is really a pity that the 
 sculptor should not be here to learn his business from you." 
 
 " But that is just where he is, as it happens, behind you," 
 said a stout woman, with a loud shout of laughter an old 
 woman who kept carriages for hire, and to whom I had just 
 nodded as the owner of the house in which I have my studio. 
 
 Instinct was prompter than reflection ; Marianina involun- 
 tarily turned round. On seeing me, a faint blush colored her 
 face. I hastily made my escape. 
 
 A girl who could so frankly take my part, and then betray 
 so much confusion at being discovered in her advocacy, would 
 certainly not be displeased to see me ; and though at my first 
 visit I had been so coldly received, having now been made 
 chevalfer of the Legion of Honor, in recognition of my ex- 
 hibited work, I determined to try again. The distinction 
 conferred on me might possibly gain me a better reception 
 from the haughty Comte de Lanty. 
 
 I was admitted by an old servant for whom Marianina had 
 great regard. 
 
 "Ah, monsieur," said he, " terrible things have been hap 
 pening here ! "
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 179 
 
 " Why what ? " cried I anxiously. 
 
 " I will take in your name, sir," was his only reply. 
 
 A minute later I was shown into M. de Lanty's study. 
 
 The man received me without rising, and greeted me with 
 these words 
 
 " I admire your courage, monsieur, in showing yourself in 
 this house ! " 
 
 "But I have not been treated here, as yet, in a way that 
 should make me need any great courage." 
 
 "You have come, no doubt," M. de Lanty went on, "to 
 fetch the object you so clumsily allowed to fall into our hands. 
 I will return you that elegant affair." 
 
 He rose and took out of his writing-table drawer a dainty 
 little pocket-book, which he handed to me. 
 
 As I looked at it in blank amazement 
 
 "Oh, the letters, to be sure, are not there," he said. "I 
 supposed that you would allow me to keep them." 
 
 " This pocket-book letters ? The whole thing is a riddle 
 to me, monsieur." 
 
 At this moment Mme. de Lanty came in. 
 
 "What do you want ? " asked her husband roughly. 
 
 "I heard that M. Dorlange was here," said she, "and I 
 fancied that there might be some unpleasant passages between 
 you and him. I thought it my duty, as a wife, to interpose." 
 
 "Your presence, madame," said I, " is not needed to im- 
 pose perfect moderation on me ; the whole thing is the result 
 of some misunderstanding." 
 
 " Oh, this is really too much ! " cried M. de Lanty, going 
 again to the drawer from which he had taken the pocket- 
 book. And rudely pushing into my hands a little packet of 
 letters tied up with pink ribbon, he went on : " Now, I im- 
 agine the misunderstanding will be cleared up." 
 
 I looked at the letters ; they had not been through the 
 post, and were all addressed "A Monsieur Dorlange" in a 
 woman's writing perfectly unknown to me.
 
 180 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 " Indeed, monsieur," said I coldly, " you are better in- 
 formed than I am. You have in your possession letters which 
 seem to belong to me, but which have never reached me." 
 
 "On my word! " cried M. de Lanty, "it must be con- 
 fessed that you are an admirable actor. I never saw inno- 
 cence and amazement more successfully assumed." 
 
 But, while he was speaking, Mme. de Lanty had cleverly 
 contrived to place herself behind her husband; and by a 
 perfectly intelligible pantomime of entreaty, she besought me 
 to accept the situation I was so strenuously denying. My 
 honor was too deeply implicated, and I really saw too little 
 of what I might be doing, to feel inclined to surrender at 
 once. So, with the hope of feeling my way a little, I said 
 
 " But, monsieur, from whom are these letters ? Who ad- 
 dressed them to me ? " 
 
 "From whom are the letters?" exclaimed M. de Lanty, 
 in a tone in which irony was merged in indignation. 
 
 "Denial is useless, monsieur," Madame de Lanty put in. 
 " Marianina has confessed everything." 
 
 "Mademoiselle Marianina wrote those letters to me?" 
 replied I. "Then there is a simple issue to the matter; con- 
 front her with me. From her lips I will accept the most 
 improbable statements as true." 
 
 " The trick is gallant enough," retorted M. de Lanty. 
 " But Marianina is no longer here; she is in a convent, shel- 
 tered for ever from your audacity and from the temptations of 
 her ridiculous passion. If this is what you came to learn, 
 now you know it. That is enough, for I will not deny that 
 my patience and moderation have limits, if your impudence 
 knows none." 
 
 " Monsieur ! " cried I, in great excitement. 
 
 The next day I received a visit from the Abbe Fontanon, 
 the comtesse's confessor. 
 
 As soon as he was seated, he began 
 
 " Monsieur, Mme. la Comtesse de Lanty does me the
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 181 
 
 honor of accepting me as the keeper of her conscience. 
 From her I have heard of a scene that took place yesterday 
 between you and her husband. Prudence would not at the 
 time allow of her giving some explanations to which you 
 have an undoubted right, and I have undertaken to commu- 
 nicate them to you that is the reason of my presence here." 
 
 " I am listening, sir," was all I replied. 
 
 "Some weeks ago," the priest went on, " M. de Lanty 
 purchased an estate in the neighborhood of Paris, and took 
 advantage of the fine weather to go thither with his family. 
 M. de Lanty sleeps badly ; one night when he was lying 
 awake in the dark, he fancied he heard footsteps below his 
 window, which he at once opened, calling out : ' Who's 
 there ? ' in emphatic tones, to the nocturnal visitor he sus- 
 pected. Nor was he mistaken, there was somebody there 
 somebody who made no answer, but took to his heels, two 
 pistol-shots fired by M. de Lanty having no effect. At first 
 it was supposed that the stranger was bent on robbery ; this, 
 however, did not seem likely ; the house was not furnished, 
 the owners had only the most necessary things for a short 
 stay ; thieves, consequently, who generally are well-informed, 
 could not expect to find anything of value; and beside, some 
 information reached M. de Lanty which gave his suspicions 
 another direction. He was told that, two days after his 
 arrival, a fine young man had taken a bedroom in an inn at 
 the neighboring village ; that this gentleman seemed anxious 
 to keep out of sight, and had several times gone out at night ; 
 so not a robber evidently but a lover." 
 
 t( I have never met with a romancer, M. 1'Abbe," said I, 
 " who told his story in better style." 
 
 By this not very complimentary insinuation, I hoped to in- 
 duce the speaker to abridge his story ; for, as you may suppose, 
 I wanted to hear the end. 
 
 " My romance is, unfortunately, painful fact," replied he. 
 " You will see. M. de Lanty had for some time been watching
 
 182 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 his daughter, whose vehement passions must, he feared, ere 
 long, result in an explosion. You yourself, monsieur, had in 
 Rome given him some uneasiness " 
 
 "Quite gratuitous, M. 1'AbbeV' I put in. 
 
 " Yes. I know that in all your acquaintance with Mile, de 
 Lanty your behavior has been perfectly correct. And, in- 
 deed, their leaving Rome put an end to this first ground for 
 uneasiness ; but in Paris another figure seemed to fill her young 
 mind, and day after day M. de Lanty purposed coming to 
 some explanation with his daughter. 
 
 "A maid, accused of receiving a young man who had been 
 prowling around, was desired to leave the house at once. 
 This woman's father is a violent-tempered man, and if she 
 returned home charged with anything so disgraceful she would 
 meet with ruthless severity of treatment. Mile, de Lanty 
 that much justice I must do her had a Christian impulse ; 
 she could not allow an innocent person to be punished in her 
 stead ; she threw herself at her father's feet, and confessed 
 that the nocturnal visit had been for her ; and though she had 
 not authorized it, she was not altogether surprised. 
 
 " M. de Lanty at once named the supposed culprit ; but 
 she would not admit that he had guessed rightly, though she 
 refused to mention any other name instead. 
 
 "What, then, was to be done? It was the imprudent girl 
 herself who suggested the idea of giving a name which, while 
 justifying M. de Lanty's fury, would not cry to him for ven- 
 geance." 
 
 " I understand," I interrupted. "The name of a man of 
 no birth, a person of no consequence, an artist perhaps, a 
 sculptor, or some such low fellow " 
 
 " I think, monsieur," said the abbe, " that you are ascribing 
 to Mademoiselle de Lanty a feeling to which she is quite a 
 stranger. In my opinion her love of the arts is only too 
 strongly pronounced, and that perhaps is what has led to this 
 unfortunate laxity of imagination."
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 183 
 
 "And then, M. 1'Abbd, what about the pocket-book the 
 letters which played so strange a part in yesterday's 
 scene?" 
 
 " That again was a device of Marianina's ; and though, as it 
 has turned out, the strange inventiveness of her wit has had a 
 good result, it was this in her character which, if she had re- 
 mained in the world, would have given cause for uneasiness. 
 When once she and Mme. de Lanty had agreed that you were 
 to be the night-prowler, the statement had to be supported by 
 evidence to favor its success. Instead of words, this terrible 
 young lady determined to act in that sense. She spent the 
 night in writing the letters you saw. She used different kinds 
 of paper, ink of which she altered the tone, and she carefully 
 varied the writing; she forgot nothing. Having written them, 
 she placed them in a pocket-book her father had never seen ; 
 and then, after having made a hunting-dog smell it all over 
 a dog noted for its intelligence and allowed in the house 
 she threw the whole thing into a clump of shrubs in the park, 
 and came back to endure her father's angry cross-examina- 
 tion. 
 
 "The same sharp contest had begun once more when the dog 
 came in carrying the pocket-book to his young mistress. She 
 acted agonized alarm ; M. de Lanty pounced on the object, 
 and to him everything was clear he was deluded, as had been 
 intended." 
 
 "And all these details," said I, with no great air of cre- 
 dulity, "were reported to you by Mme. de Lanty?" 
 
 " Confided to me, monsieur, and you yourself had proof 
 yesterday of their exactitude. Your refusal to recognize the 
 situation might have undone everything, and that was why 
 Mme. de Lanty interposed." 
 
 "And Mademoiselle Marianina?" I asked. 
 
 "As M. de Lanty told you, she was immediately sent away 
 to a convent in Italy." 
 
 Even if my self-respect had not been so aggrieved by this
 
 184 TffE DEPUTY FOR AKCIS. 
 
 story if it were true I should have felt some doubts, for does 
 it not strike you as rather too romantic ? However, an ex- 
 planation has since offered itself, which may afford a clue to 
 the facts. Not long ago Marianina's brother married into the 
 family of a German grand-duke. The Lantys must have had 
 to sacrifice immense sums to achieve such an alliance. May 
 not Marianina have paid the expenses of this royal alliance, 
 since she, by her grand-uncle's will, had the bulk of his for- 
 tune, and was disinherited by taking the veil ? Or, again, 
 may she not have really felt for me the affection expressed in 
 her letters, and have been childish enough to write them, 
 though she would not go so far as to send them ? 
 
 I can believe anything of these Lantys. The head of the 
 family has always seemed to me a very deep and crafty char- 
 acter, capable at a pinch of the blackest designs ; and then, if 
 you remember that these people have all their lives slept, as 
 it were, on the secret knowledge of a fortune so ignobly 
 earned, is it not conceivable that they should be ripe for any 
 kind of intrigues, or can you imagine them dainty in their 
 choice of means to an end ? 
 
 And I may add that the official intervention of the Abbe" 
 Fontanon justifies the worst imputations. I have made in- 
 quiries about him ; he is one of those mischief-making priests 
 who are always eager to have a finger in private family affairs; 
 and it was he who helped to upset the home of M. de Gran- 
 ville, attorney-general in Paris under the Restoration. 
 
 And is it not a really diabolical coincidence that my chisel 
 should be called upon to execute a pale daughter of the clois- 
 ter? Under these circumstances was not my imagination 
 inevitably memory ; could I invent any image but that which 
 possesses my soul and is so deeply graven on my brain ? And 
 behold ! a second Marianina rises up before me in the flesh ; 
 and when, for the better furtherance of the work, the artist 
 takes advantage of this stroke of fortune, he must be supposed, 
 forsooth, to have transferred his affections. Could that frigid
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 18& 
 
 Mme. de 1'Estorade ever fill the place of my enchanting pupil 
 with the added charm and halo of forbidden fruit and of mys- 
 tery? In short, you must give up all your imaginings. 
 
 The other day I was within an ace of relating the whole 
 romance of Mademoiselle de Lanty to her supposed rival. 
 And if I really aspired to this woman's favor but she can 
 love no one but her children a pretty way of courting her it 
 would be, I may say, to tell her that little tale. And so, to 
 return to our starting-point, I care no more for M. Bixiou's 
 opinion than for last year's roses. And so, I really do not 
 know whether I am in love with Marianina ; but I am quite 
 sure that I am not in love with Madame de 1'Estorade. This, 
 it seems to me, is a plain and honest answer. 
 
 Now, let us leave things to the future, who is the master of 
 us all. 
 
 THE COMTESSE DE L*ESTORADE TO MADAME OCTAVE DE CAMPS. 
 
 PARIS, April, 1839. 
 
 MY DEAR MADAME: M. Dorlange came last evening to 
 take leave of us. He is starting to-day for Arcis-sur-Aube, 
 where he is to see his statue set up in its place. That also is 
 the town where the opposition are about to propose him as 
 their candidate. M. de 1'Estorade declares that no worse 
 choice could have been made, and that he has not a chance 
 of being elected but this is not what I have to write 
 about. 
 
 M. Dorlange called early after dinner. I was alone, for M. 
 de 1'Estorade was dining with the minister of the Interior; 
 and the children, who had been on a long excursion in the 
 afternoon, had of their own accord begged to go to bed before 
 the usual hour. Thus the conversation previously interrupted 
 by Madame de la Bastie was naturally reopened ; and I was 
 about to ask M. Dorlange to finish the story, of which he had 
 only given me a hint of the end, when old Lucas came in, 
 
 G
 
 186 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 bringing me a letter. It was from my Armand, to tell me 
 that he had been in the sick-room all day, very unwell. 
 
 " I want the carriage," said I to Lucas, with such agitation 
 as you may suppose. 
 
 " Well, madame, but monsieur ordered it to fetch him at 
 half-past eight, and Tony is gone," replied Lucas. 
 
 "Then get me a hackney-coach." 
 
 " I am sure I don't know whether I can find one," said 
 the old man, who always raises difficulties. " It has just be- 
 gun to rain." 
 
 Without noticing this objection, and quite forgetting M. 
 Dorlange, whom I left somewhat embarrassed, not liking to 
 leave without saying adieu, I went to my room to put on my 
 bonnet and shawl. Having done so in great haste, I returned 
 to the drawing-room, where I still found my visitor. 
 
 "You must excuse me, monsieur," said I, " for leaving you 
 so abruptly ; I am hurrying off to the College Henri IV. I 
 could not endure to spend the night in such anxiety as I am 
 feeling in consequence of a note from my son, who tells me 
 that he has been in the sick-room all day." 
 
 " But surely," said M. Dorlange, "you are not going alone 
 in a hackney-coach to such an out-of-the-way part of the 
 town?" 
 
 " Lucas will come with me." 
 
 At this moment Lucas came in again. His words were ful- 
 filled ; there was not a hack to be had, and it was pouring in 
 torrents. Time was flying ; it was almost too late already to 
 visit the school, where everybody would be in bed by nine 
 o'clock. 
 
 " I must go," said I to Lucas. "Go and put on your thik 
 shoes, and we will go on foot with umbrellas." 
 
 I saw the man's face lengthen ; he is no longer young ; he 
 likes his ease, and he complains of rheumatism in the winter. 
 He suddenly found a number of objections ; it was very late ; 
 we should revolutionize the school ; I should certainly catch
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 187 
 
 cold ; M. Armand could not be very ill since he had written 
 himself my plan of campaign was evidently not at all to my 
 old man's mind. 
 
 Then M. Dorlange very obligingly offered to go for me and 
 come back to report the invalid, but such half-measures will 
 not do for me I wanted to see, and satisfy myself. So, with 
 many thanks to him, I said to Lucas in an authoritative 
 tone 
 
 " Come, go and get ready, and be quick, for one thing you 
 have said that is perfectly true it is growing late." 
 
 Thus nailed to the point, Lucas boldly hoisted the flag of 
 rebellion. 
 
 "It is simply impossible, madame, that you should go out 
 in such weather, and I do not want to get a scolding from the 
 master for giving in to any such idea." 
 
 ''Then you simply do not mean to obey me? " 
 
 "You know, madame, that for anything useful or reason- 
 able I would do whatever you might order, even if it were to 
 walk through fire." 
 
 "To be sure, warmth is good for the rheumatism, and rain 
 is bad for it." 
 
 Then I turned to M. Dorlange without listening to the old 
 rebel's reply, and said to him 
 
 " Since you were good enough to offer to go alone on this 
 errand, I venture to hope that you will not refuse me the sup- 
 port of your arm." 
 
 "Like Lucas," said he, "I do not see that this expedition 
 is indispensable ; however, as I have no fear of being scolded 
 by M. de 1'Estorade, I will, ofc course, have the honor of 
 escorting you." 
 
 We set out. The weather really was horrible ; we had not 
 gone fifty yards when we were already drenched, in spite of 
 Lucas' vast umbrella, held by M. Dorlange so as to shelter me 
 by sacrificing himself. Then a new complication arose. A 
 hackney-coach went past ; my companion hailed the driver ;
 
 188 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 it was empty. To tell my escort that I could not allow him 
 to get in with me was out of the question. Not only would 
 such an implied doubt have been grossly uncivil, but it would 
 have been derogatory to myself even to suggest it. And yet, 
 you see, my dear friend, what slippery ways we tread, and 
 how true it is that from the time of Dido and ^Eneas rain has 
 always served the turn of lovers ! 
 
 When we reached the school, M. Dorlange, after handing 
 me out, understood that he could not go in with me ; he got 
 into the coach again to wait for me. 
 
 Master Armand's indisposition was somewhat of a practical 
 joke so far as I was concerned. His illness was no more than 
 a headache, which since his note was written had completely 
 disappeared. The doctor, who had seen him in the morning, 
 to order something, had prescribed lime-flower tea, and told 
 him he could return to the class-room next day. So I had 
 taken a sledge-hammer to kill a flea, and committed a pre- 
 posterous blunder in arriving at an hour when all the staff 
 were in bed, to find my young gentleman still up and playing 
 a game of chess with ope of the attendants. 
 
 By the time I went out again the rain had ceased, and 
 bright moonlight silvered the pavement, which the rain had 
 so thoroughly washed that there was not a sign of mud. I 
 was so oppressed and vexed that I longed for the fresh air. 
 So I begged M. Dorlange to send away the coach, and we 
 walked home. 
 
 "Come," thought I, "we must come to an end of this 
 story, which is always interrupted, like the famous anecdote 
 of Sancho's goatherd which^ould never be told." 
 
 So, cutting short the theories of education, which he had 
 advanced : 
 
 "It seems to me," said I to my earnest companion, "that 
 this would be a good opportunity for going on with the con* 
 fidential narrative in which you were interrupted. Here we 
 are quite safe from any intrusion."
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 189 
 
 "I am afraid," said M. Dorlange, "that I am but a bad 
 narrator. I exhausted all my genius the other day in com- 
 municating the history to Marie-Gaston." 
 
 "That," said I, with a laugh, "is against your principles 
 of secrecy, in which a third person is one too many." 
 
 "Oh, Marie-Gaston and I are but one person. Beside, I 
 had to give some answer to the odd fancies he had formed as 
 to you and me." 
 
 " What as to me ! " 
 
 "Yes. He opines that by staring too hard at the sun one 
 may be dazzled by its rays." 
 
 "Which, in less metaphorical language, means? " 
 
 "That seeing how strange the circumstances were that led 
 to my having the honor of your acquaintance, I might possi- 
 bly, madame, in your society, fail to preserve my common- 
 sense and self-possession." 
 
 "And your story answers this hypothesis of M. Marie- 
 Gaston's?" 
 
 "You shall judge," said M. Dorlange. 
 
 And then, without further preamble, he told me a rather 
 long story, which I do not repeat to you, my dear madame, 
 because on the one hand it has really nothing to do with your 
 functions as keeper of my conscience, and on the other it is 
 mixed up with a family secret which demands more discretion 
 on my part than I could have anticipated. 
 
 The upshot of the matter is that M. Dorlange is in love 
 with the woman who had sat in his imagination for the Sainte- 
 Ursule. Still, as it must be said that she is apparently for 
 ever out of his reach, it did not seem to me quite impossible 
 that he might sooner or later transfer to me the feeling he still 
 preserves for her. Hence, when, having finished his narra- 
 tive, he asked me whether I did not take it as a triumphant 
 refutation of our mutual friend's absurd and groundless fears, 
 I could but reply 
 
 " Modesty makes it incumbent on me to share your con-
 
 190 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 fidence. At the same time, a cannon-ball often kills by rico- 
 chet." 
 
 "And you believe me guilty of the audacity which Marie- 
 Gaston fears may be so fatal to me?" 
 
 " I do not know that it would be audacity," said I, rather 
 harshly; " but if you had such a fancy and took it to heart, 
 I should, I own, think you greatly to be pitied." 
 
 His reply was a home-thrust 
 
 " Well, madame, you need not pity me. In my opinion, 
 first love is a kind of vaccination which saves a man from 
 catching the complaint a second time." 
 
 This closed the conversation ; the story had been a long 
 one, and we were at home. I asked M. Dorlange to come 
 upstairs, a politeness he accepted, remarking that M. de 1'Es- 
 torade had probably come in, and he could, therefore, say 
 adieu to him. 
 
 My husband was in fact at home. I do not know whether 
 Lucas, to anticipate the blame I should have cast on him, had 
 done his best to misrepresent my proceedings, or whether my 
 maternal exploit prompted M. de 1'Estorade, for the first time 
 in his life, to a spasm of jc.alousy of which he was unable to 
 conceal the unfamiliar symptoms; at any rate, he received 
 me with an indignant rating, saying that nothing was so un- 
 heard of as the idea of going out at this hour, and in such 
 weather, to inquire after an invalid who, by announcing his 
 illness himself, showed it was not in the least serious. 
 
 After allowing him to go on for some time in a highly un- 
 becoming manner, I thought it was time to put an end to the 
 scene. 
 
 " Well," said I sharply, " I wish to get some sleep to-night ; 
 I went to the school in pouring rain. Now I have come back 
 in beautiful moonlight, and I beg to remind you that after 
 kindly consenting to escort me, M. Dorlange, who leaves 
 Paris to-morrow, came upstairs to bid you farewell." 
 
 I have habitually too much influence over M. de 1'Estorade
 
 THE DEPUTY fOR ARCIS. 191 
 
 for this call to order to fail of its effect ; still, I could see that 
 there was something of the aggrieved husband in his tone ; 
 for, having brought in M. Dorlange to divert his thoughts, I 
 soon perceived that I had but made him a victim to my ogre's 
 ill-temper, which was now vented on him. 
 
 "Listen to me, my dear sir," said M. de 1'Estorade to his 
 victim, "when a man rushes into a parliamentary career, he 
 must remember that he has to show every card his public 
 and his private life. His adversaries overhaul his past and 
 present with merciless hands, and woe to him whose life has 
 the shadow of a stain ! Well, I may tell you painly, this 
 evening a little scandal was raked up a very little one in the 
 life of an artist, but one which, as affecting a representative of 
 the people, assumes far more serious proportions. You under- 
 stand me. I am alluding to the handsome Italian woman who 
 lives under your roof. Take care; you may be called to 
 account by some puritan voter for the more or less doubtful 
 morality of her connection with you." 
 
 M. Dorlange's reply was very dignified 
 
 " I can have but one wish for those who choose to question 
 me on that detail of my domestic life," said he, " and that is 
 that they may have nothing worse to look back upon in theirs. 
 If I had not already bored Madame la Comtesse with one 
 interminable story during our walk home, I would tell you 
 that of the pretty Italian, and you would see that her presence 
 in my house need deprive me of none of the esteem you have 
 kindly honored me with." 
 
 "But indeed," said M. de 1'Estorade, suddenly mollified 
 by hearing that our long walk had been spent in narrating 
 history, " you take my remarks far too seriously ! As I said 
 but just now, an artist needs a handsome model, nothing can 
 be more natural ; but it is a piece of furniture that is of no 
 use to gentlemen engaged in politics." 
 
 "What appears to be of more use to them," retorted M. 
 Dorlange, with some vivacity, " is the advantage that may be
 
 192 TBE DEPUTY FOR ARCJS. 
 
 taken of a calumny greedily accepted with vil haste, and 
 with no effort to verify it." 
 
 "So you are going to-morrow ?" asked M. de 1'Estorade, 
 finding that he had started on a path where, instead of bring- 
 ing M. Dorlange to confusion, he had afforded him an oppor- 
 tunity of answering with no little haughtiness of tone and 
 phrase. 
 
 " Yes, and early in the day, so that I will haye the honor 
 now of wishing you good-night, for I still have some packing 
 to finish." 
 
 With these words M. Dorlange rose, and after bowing to 
 me rather formally, he left the room, not shaking hands with 
 my husband, who, indeed, did not offer him the opportunity. 
 
 M. de 1'Estorade, to avoid the impending and inevitable 
 explanation, at once exclaimed 
 
 11 Well, and what was the matter with Armand?" 
 
 "What was the matter with Armand matters little?" re- 
 plied I, "as you may suppose from my having returned with- 
 out him and showing no anxiety ; what is a far more interest- 
 ing question is what is the matter with you, for I never saw 
 you so out of tune, so bitter and cross-grained." 
 
 " What ! Because I told that ridiculous candidate that he 
 might go into mourning at once over his chances? " 
 
 " In the first place, it was not complimentary, and at any 
 rate the time was ill-chosen, when my motherly alarms had 
 just inflicted an odious amount of trouble on the man you 
 attacked." 
 
 "I cannot stand officious people," retorted M. de 1'Esto- 
 rade, in a higher tone than he usually adopts with me. "And, 
 after all, if this gentleman had not been on the spot to offer 
 you his escort, you would not have set out on this unseemly 
 expedition." 
 
 "You are mistaken. I should have gone in a still more 
 unseemly manner ; for I should have gone alone, as your 
 servants are the masters here, and refused to escort me."
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 193 
 
 " But, after all, you must confess that if any one had met 
 you at half-past nine at night, walking arm in arm with M. 
 Dorlange, out by the Pantheon, it would have been thought 
 strange, to say the least." 
 
 Then, affecting to have just discovered what I had known 
 for an hour past 
 
 "Bless me, monsieur!" cried I, "after fifteen years of 
 married life are you doing me the honor of being jealous for 
 the first time? Then, indeed, I can understand that, in 
 spite of your regard for the proprieties, you took advantage 
 of my being present to question M. Dorlange on the not very 
 proper subject of the woman who is supposed to be his mis- 
 tress. It was neither more nor less than very basely perfidi- 
 ous ; you were trying to lower him in my eyes." 
 
 Thus riddled with shot, my hapless husband tried indeed to 
 beat about the bush, and at last found no better alternative 
 than to ring for Lucas, whom he lectured pretty sharply ; and 
 there the matter ended. 
 
 But, then, what is to be said of the conjugal tact which, 
 while trying to make the man of whom I had really been 
 thinking too much commit himself in my presence, gave 
 him an opportunity of appearing in a better light than ever, 
 and to the greatest advantage ? For there is no doubt what- 
 ever that the indignation with which M. Dorlange retaliated 
 on the malignancy of which he was the object was the answer 
 of an easy conscience, sure, too, of being able to refute the 
 calumny. 
 
 Are there, then, in the midst of our small and colorless 
 society still some characters so strongly tempered that they 
 can walk on the very precipice of opportunity and never fall ! 
 What a nature must that be that can plunge through thorns 
 and leave no wool ! I had fancied I could make a friend of 
 him ! 
 
 Nay, I will not play at that game. Supposing this Dante 
 Alighieri of the chisel to be convinced at last that his Beatrice 
 13.
 
 194 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 will never return to him ; supposing that he should again, as 
 he has done once already, look round on me what could I 
 do ? Is a woman ever safe against the powerful fascination 
 that such a man must exert ? As M. de Montriveau said to the 
 poor Duchesse de Langeais, not only must she never touch the 
 axe, but she must keep as far from it as she can, for fear that 
 a beam reflected from such polished steel should blind her 
 eyes. 
 
 Happily, M. de 1'Estorade is already hostile to this dan- 
 gerous man ; but my husband may be quite easy, I shall take 
 care to encourage and cultivate this germ of enmity. And, 
 beside this, if M. Dorlange should be elected, he and my hus- 
 band will be in opposite camps ; and political passions thank 
 heaven ] have often cut short older and better established 
 intimacies than this. 
 
 "But he saved your little girl," you will say, "you were 
 afraid of his loving you, and he does not think of you at all ; 
 he is a man of cultivated intellect and magnanimous feeling, 
 with whom there is not a fault to be found ! " 
 
 What arguments are these, my dear lady? He frightens 
 me, and that is enough. And when I am frightened, I neither 
 argue nor reason ; I only consider whether I have legs and 
 breath, and simply run and run till I feel myself in safety. 
 
 DORLANGE TO MARIE-GASTON. 
 
 PARIS, April, 1839. 
 
 On coming in from taking leave of the Estorades, I find 
 your letter, my dear friend, announcing your immediate ar- 
 rival. I will wait here all to-morrow ; but in the evening, 
 without any further delay, I must set out for Arcis-sur-Aube, 
 where, within a week, the end of my political struggle is to be 
 fought out. What supporters and abettors I have in that town 
 which as I am informed I am so anxious to represent ; on 
 whose help or opposition I am to build my hopes ; in one
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 195 
 
 word, who it is that is making this electoral bed for me to lie 
 in of all this I know no more than I did a year ago when I 
 was first apprised of my parliamentary vocation. 
 
 Only a few days since did I receive a communication 
 emanating from the paternal office, not from Stockholm this 
 time, but with the Paris postmark. 
 
 The note has a title or heading ; as thus : 
 
 WHAT MY SON IS TO DO. 
 
 On receipt of " these presents " I am to send off the " Sainte- 
 Ursule," to see it packed myself in a case, and address it, by 
 quick goods wagon, to Mother Marie des Anges, superior of 
 the house of the Ursuline Sisters at Arcis-sur-Aube, AUBE * 
 you understand? In fact, but for this added information I 
 might have fancied that Arcis-sur-Aube was situated in the de- 
 partment of the Gironde or of Finisterre. I am there to make 
 an arrangement with the carrier's agents to insure the delivery 
 of the parcel my " Sainte-Ursule " a parcel ! at the door of 
 the convent chapel. I am then commanded to start in a very 
 few days later, so as to reach the aforenamed town of Arcis- 
 sur-Aube by the second of May at latest. You see, these are 
 military orders ; so much so that I half thought of taking out a 
 soldier's pass instead of an ordinary permit to travel, and 
 of taking my journey at the regulation fare of three sous per 
 league. 
 
 The hotel I am to put up at is expressly mentioned : I am 
 to stay at the Hotel de la Poste ; hence, if I should happen to 
 prefer the Three Blackamoors or the Silver Lion, which are 
 to be found there, no doubt, as in every country town, I must 
 not indulge the fancy. Finally, on the day before I start, I 
 am to announce, in any newspapers I can work upon, the fact 
 of my intending to stand as a candidate for election in the 
 electoral district of Arcis-sur-Aube (Aube), but not to put 
 forward any declaration of my political creed, which would
 
 196 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 be useless and premature. And the whole concludes with 
 instructions a little humiliating perhaps, but giving me some 
 faith in the progress of affairs to call on the morning of the 
 day when I set out on Mongenod Brothers, where I can again 
 draw a sum of two hundred and fifty thousand francs, which 
 ought to be lying there in my name. " I am to take the 
 greatest care," the document goes on, "that in conveying 
 this sum from Paris to Arcis-sur-Aube it is neither lost nor 
 stolen." 
 
 What, my good sir, do you make of this last clause ? The 
 money " ought to be lying there " then it may not be; and 
 if not, what then? What am I to do with it at Arcis? Am 
 I to work my election in the English fashion ? that, no doubt, 
 is why a profession of faith would be " useless and premature." 
 As to the advice not to lose the money or allow myself to be 
 robbed don't you think it makes me wonderfully young 
 again ? Since reading it I have quite longed to suck my 
 thumb and get a padded cap. 
 
 However, as to my lord and father, though he puts my 
 mind on the rack by all these queer ways of his, I could ex- 
 claim but for the respect I owe him like Don Basilio in 
 speaking of Almaviva: "That devil of a man has his pockets 
 full of irresistible arguments ! " 
 
 So I shut my eyes and give myself up to the stream that is 
 carrying me on ; and in spite of the news of your early advent, 
 I must call to-morrow morning on Mongenod Brothers, and 
 set forth with a brave heart, picturing to myself the amaze- 
 ment of the good people of Arcis when they see me drop into 
 their midst, as sudden and as startling an apparition as a Jack- 
 in-the-box. 
 
 I have already made my mark in Paris. The "National " 
 announced me as a candidate yesterday morning in the most 
 flaming terms ; and this evening it would seem that I was the 
 subject of much discussion at the house of the minister of the 
 Interior, where M. de 1'Estorade was dining. I must in
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 197 
 
 honesty add that, according to M. de 1'Estorade, the general 
 impression was that I must inevitably fail. In the district of 
 Arcis, it would seem, the worst the Government had to fear 
 was a Left-Centre candidate ; the democratic party, which I 
 am by way of representing, can hardly be said to have any 
 existence there. The Left-Centre candidate has already been 
 brought to his senses by the dispatch of a particularly alert 
 and skillful canvasser; and at this moment, when I am flinging 
 my name to the winds, the election of the Conservative is 
 already a certainty. 
 
 Added to these elements of inevitable failure, M. de 1'Esto- 
 rade was good enough to speak of a circumstance as to which, 
 my dear fellow, I am surprised that you should never have 
 given me a sermon, for it is one of the most pleasing of the 
 calumnies set rolling in the Montcornet drawing-room by the 
 honorable and highly honored Monsieur Bixiou. It has to 
 do with a very handsome Italian woman whom I am supposed 
 to have brought with me from Rome, and to be living with in 
 most uncanonical relationship. 
 
 Pray tell me what has kept you from asking for explanations 
 of the matter ? Did you think the case so atrocious that you 
 were shy of offending my sense of decency by alluding to it in 
 any way ? Or is it that you have such confidence in my high 
 moral sense that you need no certificate on that point ? I had 
 not time to go into the necessary explanations with M. de 
 1'Estorade, nor have I time now, nor inclination, to volun- 
 teer them to you. 
 
 I ha\ a strong notion that M. de 1'Estorade would not be 
 best pleased at my succeeding in this electoral campaign. He 
 has never expressed much approbation of my plans, and has 
 constantly done his utmost to divert me from them always 
 indeed by urging considerations in my own interest. But 
 now that the idea has taken shape, and is even discussed in 
 Ministerial circles, my gentleman has turned sour ; and while 
 finding malicious pleasure in promising me defeat, he brings
 
 198 THE DEPUTY FOR AKCIS. 
 
 up the pretty little activity under which he hopes to smother 
 and bury me as a friendly act. Now, why ? 
 
 I will tell you. The fact is, that though he is under an 
 obligation to me, the good man by his high social position 
 feels himself my superior in a way which my election to the 
 Chamber would nullify, and he does not like the notion of 
 renouncing it. For, after all, what is an artist even if he be 
 a genius in comparison with a peer of France, a bigwig who 
 has a finger in the supreme direction of great political and 
 social questions a man who can button-hole the ministers and 
 the King, who, if he were capable of such an audacious flight, 
 has a right to blackball the Appropriations ? And is it con- 
 ceivable that I, in my turn, should want to be such a privi- 
 leged person, with even greater importance and authority as 
 being a member of the elective body ? Is it not a trying piece 
 of insolence and conceit. Hence is M. le Comte furious ! 
 
 Nor is this all. These politicians by right divine have a 
 fixed idea: they believe themselves to have been initiated by 
 long study into a science supposed to be very abstruse, which 
 they call Statecraft, and which they alone have a right to 
 know and practice, as none but physicians may practice medi- 
 cine. So they cannot endure that without having taken out 
 a license, any low fellow such as a journalist, for instance, 
 or, lower still, an artist, an image-maker should dare to 
 poach on their domain and speak as they do. A poet, an 
 artist, a writer may have great gifts that they are ready to 
 grant ; in fact, their business requires it ; but they cannot 
 be statesmen. Chateaubriand himself, though naturally in a 
 position which justified him in making a place for himself in 
 the Olympus of Government, was nevertheless shown the door, 
 and one morning a very brief note, signed "Joseph Villele," 
 sent him packing as was but proper! back to "Rene," 
 " Atala," and other literary trivialities. 
 
 I know that time, and that stalwart posthumous daughter 
 of us all whom we call Posterity, will in the long run do us
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 199 
 
 all full justice and put every man in his right place. In 2039, 
 if the world holds out so long, most men will still know who, 
 in 1839, were Canalis, Joseph Bridau, Daniel d'Arthez, Stid- 
 mann, and Lon de Lora; while only an infinitely small 
 number will be aware that at the same time M. le Comte de 
 1'Estorade was a peer of France and president of the Court of 
 Exchequer ; that M. le Comte de Rastignac was minister of 
 Public Works, and M. le Baron Martial de la Roche-Hugon, 
 his brother-in-law, a diplomatist and privy councilor on special 
 service more or less extraordinary. Still, pending this post- 
 poned resifting and far-off justice, I do not think it a bad 
 thing that these great men in office should have a reminder to 
 the effect that, short of being a Richelieu or a Colbert, they 
 are subject to competition, and must take the consequences. 
 
 Well, I might say of your great griefs what I said just now 
 of the great men in office : they must be regarded in their 
 place in time and space, and then they are intangible, imper- 
 ceptible, they are held of no more account in a man's life 
 when his biography is written than the hairs he combs out of 
 his head every morning. That charming lunatic with whom 
 you spent three years of matrimonial ecstasy put out a hand, 
 as she thought, where Death was and Death, mocking at her 
 schemes, her plans, at the refinement and graces she added to 
 life, snatched at her suddenly and brutally. You remain : 
 You, with youth on your side and the gifts of intellect, and 
 with what is, believe me, an element of power deep and 
 premature disgust of things. Now, why not do as I am doing ? 
 Why not join me in the political arena ? Then there would 
 be two of us to carry out my plans, and the world would see 
 what can be done by two determined and energetic men, 
 yoked together, as it were, and both pulling at the heavy 
 collar of justice and truth. 
 
 But if you think that I am too much bent on becoming 
 infectious, or inoculating all and sundry with my parliamen- 
 tary yellow-fever, return at least to the world of letters where
 
 200 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 you have already made your mark, and exert your imagination 
 to enable you to ignore your heart, which speaks too con- 
 stantly of the past. I, for my part, will make as much stir for 
 you as I can ; and even if it should cost me part of my sleep 
 to keep up our correspondence to divert your mind whether 
 you will or not, I shall take care to keep you informed of all 
 the vicissitudes of the drama I am about to play a part in. 
 
 P. S. You have not arrived, my dear friend, and I must 
 close my letter, which will be handed to you by my house- 
 keeper when you call for, of course, your first visit will be 
 to me. Till then you cannot know that I am gone. 
 
 I went this morning to the bankers Mongenod: the two 
 hundred and fifty thousand francs were ready, but with the 
 most extraordinary directions in the name of M. le Comte 
 de Sallenauve, known as M. Dorlange, sculptor, Rue de t Quest t 
 No. 42. And in spite of this designation, which has never been 
 mine, the money was handed over to me without demur. 
 Under the eyes of the cashier I had presence of mind enough 
 not to seem utterly amazed by my new name and title ; but I 
 had a private interview with M. Mongenod, senior, a man of 
 the highest character in the banking world, and to him I con- 
 fessed my surprise, begging for any explanation he might be 
 able to afford me. He could give me none : the money was 
 forwarded to him through a Dutch bank, his correspondent at 
 Rotterdam, and that is all he knows. 
 
 Bless me ! what next I wonder ? Am I now to be a noble- 
 man ? Has the moment arrived when my father will reveal 
 himself? 
 
 DORLANGE TO MARIE-GASTON. 
 
 ARCIS-SUR-AUBE, May 3, 1839. 
 
 MY DEAR OLD FRIEND : Last evening, at seven o'clock, 
 in the presence of Maitre Achille Pigoult, notary to the King 
 in the town of Arcis-sur-Aube, the obsequies were solemnized
 
 THE DEPUTY fiOR ARCIS. 201 
 
 of Charles Dorlange, who, presently, like a butterfly emerging 
 from the larva, fluttered out on the world under the name and 
 person of Charles de Sallenauve, son of Francois-Henri-Panta- 
 I6on Dumirail, Marquis de Sallenauve. Hereinafter are set 
 forth the recorded facts which preceded this great and glorious 
 metempsychosis. 
 
 On the evening of May ist I left Paris in all the official 
 revelry of St. Philip's Day ; and on the following afternoon, 
 in obedience to paternal instructions, I made my entry into 
 the good town of Arcis-sur-Aube. On getting out of the 
 chaise my amazement was considerable, as you may imagine, 
 on discerning, in the street where the diligence had just 
 arrived, that evasive Jacques Bricheteau whom I had never 
 seen since our strange meeting in the He Saint-Louis. But 
 this time, instead of behaving like Jean de Nivelle, behold 
 him coming toward me with a bmile on his face ; and, holding 
 out his hand, he said : 
 
 " At last, my dear sir, we are almost at an end of these 
 mysteries, and you will soon, I hope, find no further reason 
 to complain of me." 
 
 At the same time, with an air of anxious solicitude that was 
 too much for him, he added : 
 
 " You have brought the money ? " 
 
 "Yes," I replied. "Neither lost nor stolen," and I toot 
 out the pocket-book that contained the two hundred and fifty 
 thousand francs in bank-notes. 
 
 "That is well," said Jacques Bricheteau. " Now we will 
 go to the Hotel de la Poste. You doubtless know who is 
 waiting for you? " 
 
 "No, indeed," said I. 
 
 " Then you did not observe the name under which the 
 money was made payable ? " 
 
 " On the contrary and anything so strange could not fail 
 to strike me and set my imagination working." 
 
 *' Well, presently the veil will be removed of which, so far,
 
 202 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 a corner has just been lifted that you might not be too sud- 
 denly startled by the great and happy event that is about to 
 take place in your life." 
 
 " Is my father here ? " 
 
 I asked the question eagerly, and yet without the deep 
 emotion I should probably have felt at the thought of em- 
 bracing my mother. 
 
 "Yes," replied Jacques Bricheteau. "But I think it well 
 to warn you of a possible chill on your meeting. The 
 marquis has gone through much suffering. The Court life to 
 which he has since been accustomed has made him unready to 
 display any expression of feeling ; beside, he has a perfect 
 horror of anything suggesting bourgeois manners ; so you 
 must not be surprised at the aristocratically cold and dignified 
 reception you may meet with. He is kind at heart, and you 
 will appreciate him more as you know him better." 
 
 "These preliminaries are highly encouraging," thought I. 
 And^as I myself did not feel any very ardent predispositions, 
 I augured that this first interview would be at a temperature 
 of some degrees below zero. 
 
 On going into the room where the marquis awaited me, I 
 saw a very tall, rery thin, very bald man, seated at a table on 
 which he was arranging papers. On hearing the door open, 
 he pushed his spectacles up on his forehead, rested his hands 
 on the arms of his chair, and looking round at us he waited. 
 
 " Monsieur le Comte de Sallenauve," said Jacques Briche- 
 teau, announcing me with the solemnity of an usher of am- 
 bassadors or a groom of the Chambers. 
 
 But in the presence of the man to whom I owed my life the 
 ice in me was instantly melted ; I stepped forward with an 
 eager impulse, feeling the tears rise to my eyes. He did not 
 move. There was not the faintest trace of agitation in his 
 face, which had that peculiar look of high dignity that used 
 to be called " the grand air ; " he merely held out his hand, 
 limply grasped mine, and then said
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 203 
 
 " Be seated, monsieur for I have not yet the right to call 
 you my son." 
 
 When Jacques Bricheteau and I had taken chairs 
 
 "Then you have no objection," said this strange kind of 
 father, "to assuming the political position we are trying to 
 secure for you? " 
 
 "None at all," said I. "The notion startled me at first, 
 but I soon grew accustomed to it ; and, to insure success, I 
 have punctually carried out all the instructions that were con- 
 veyed to me." 
 
 "Excellent," said the marquis, taking up from the table a 
 gold snuff-box which he twirled in his fingers. 
 
 Then, after a short silence, he added 
 
 " Now I owe you certain explanations. Our good friend 
 Jacques Bricheteau, if he will have the kindness, will lay 
 them before you." A sort of echo of the royal formula, 
 " My chancellor will fell you the rest" 
 
 "To begin at the beginning," said Jacques Bricheteau, 
 accepting the task thus thrust upon him, " I ought to tell you, 
 monsieur, that you are not a Sallenauve in the direct line. 
 On his return from the emigration, about the year 1808, 
 M. le Marquis here present made the acquaintance of your 
 mother, and you are the issue of that connection. Your 
 mother, as you already know, died at your birth ; and as mis- 
 fortunes never come singly, shortly after this terrible sorrow 
 M. de Sallenauve, being implicated in a plot against the Im- 
 perial throne, was obliged to fly the country. M. le Marquis, 
 like myself, a native of Arcis, honored me with his confidence, 
 and on the eve of this second exile he placed your young life 
 in my charge. I accepted the responsibility, I will not say 
 gladly, but with sincere gratitude." 
 
 At these words the marquis held out his hand to Jacques 
 Bricheteau, who was sitting near him, and after a silent pres- 
 sure which, I may say, did not seem to agitate them deeply 
 Jacques Bricheteau went on
 
 204 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 "The elaborate and mysterious precautions I so carefully 
 contrived, in order to conceal the functions I had accepted, 
 may be accounted for by many reasons. I might say that 
 every change of government that we have lived under since 
 your birth has indirectly reacted on you. While the Empire 
 lasted, I feared lest a power which was not reputed indulgent 
 to those who attacked it might not include you in your 
 father's banishment, and that first suggested the idea of giving 
 you a sort of anonymous identity. Under the Restoration, I 
 had reason to fear another form of hostility. The Sallenauve 
 family, of which M. le Marquis here present is the sole sur- 
 viving representative, was then all-powerful. The circum- 
 stances of your birth had got wind, and it had not escaped 
 their perspicacity that monsieur your father had taken care 
 not to admit his paternity, so as to be able to leave you his 
 whole fortune, of which, as a recognized natural child, the 
 law would only have allowed a fixed portion. 
 
 " The obscurity that surrounded you seemed to me the best 
 protection against the investigations of your money-seeking 
 relations ; and certain suspicious proceedings on their part to 
 spy on me at different times showed that my anticipations 
 were justified. Finally, after the Revolution of July, I was 
 afraid for you of your connection with me. I had seen the 
 change of dynasty with deep regret ; and having allowed 
 myself to become involved in some overt acts of rebellion, 
 since I had no belief in its stability for men are always 
 ready to fight a government that is forced upon them, and to 
 which they are averse I found myself on the black-list of the 
 police " 
 
 On this, remembering that at the Cafe des Arts Jacques 
 Bricheteau had been the object of very different suspicions, 
 I could not help smiling, and the chancellor, pausing, said 
 with extreme solemnity 
 
 " Do these details that I have the honor of giving you by 
 any misfortune appear to you doubtful ? "
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 205 
 
 When I had accounted for the expression of my face 
 
 "The waiter," said Jacques Bricheteau, "was not alto- 
 gether in the wrong. I have for many years been employed 
 by the police in the public health department ; but I am not 
 a spy on the contrary, I have more than once very nearly 
 been a victim. Now, to return to the secrecy I still preserved 
 as to our connection, though I did not apprehend positive 
 persecution as resulting to you from knowing me, it seemed to 
 me that such an acquaintance might be detrimental to your 
 career. 'Sculptors,' I reflected, 'cannot get on without 
 the support of Government. I might possibly prevent his 
 getting commissions.' I ought also to say that at the time 
 when I gave you notice that your allowance was to cease, I 
 had for some years lost track of Monsieur le Marquis. Of 
 what use was it, then, to tell you the history of the past, 
 since it apparently could have no effect on your future pros- 
 pects ? 
 
 " I decided that it was best to leave you in complete igno- 
 rance, and busied myself in inventing some fiction which 
 might mislead your curiosity, and at the same time relieve me 
 from the long privation I endured by avoiding any direct 
 intercourse with you " 
 
 "The man you employed as your representative," said I, 
 interrupting him, "was well chosen, no doubt, from the 
 point of view of secrecy, but you must admit that he is not 
 attractive." 
 
 " Poor Gorenflot ! " said the organist, laughing. " He is 
 simply one of the parish bell-ringers, and I employ him to 
 blow the organ. I do not know whether the author of 
 ' Notre-Dame de Paris ' had ever seen him when he invented 
 Quasimodo." 
 
 During this parenthesis an absurd sound fell on our ear ; a 
 distinct snore from my father gave us to understand that 
 either he took very little interest in all these explanations 
 given in his name, or that he thought them too prolix.
 
 206 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 Whether it was his conceit as an orator that was nettled, or 
 what else it was that roused Jacques Bricheteau's temper, I 
 know not, but he started to his feet with annoyance, and 
 violently shook the sleeper's arm, exclaiming 
 
 "What, marquis! if you sleep like this when sitting in 
 Council, my word ! the country must be well governed ! " 
 
 M. de Sallenauve opened his eyes, shook himself, and, speak- 
 ing to me, he said 
 
 " Excuse me, M. le Comte, but I have traveled post for 
 ten days and nights without stopping, in order to be in time 
 .to meet you here ; and though I spent last night in a bed, I 
 am still rather tired." 
 
 He then rose, took a large pinch of snuff, and paced the 
 room, while Jacques Bricheteau went on 
 
 " It is rather more than a year since I first heard again 
 from your father. He explained his long silence and his pur- 
 poses for you, saying that, perhaps for some years to come, it 
 was absolutely necessary that he should still maintain the 
 strictest incognito. It was just then that chance threw you 
 in my way. I found you prepared to rush into any folly to 
 get to the bottom of the secret of which you could no longer 
 doubt the existence " 
 
 "You are good at a quick removal ! " said I, with a laugh 
 to the erewhile lodger of the Quai de B6thune. 
 
 " I did better than that. Tormented by the idea that, in 
 spite of my efforts, you would succeed in piercing the darkness 
 I had so elaborately left you in, and at the very moment when 
 M. le Marquis might think it most indispensable " 
 
 "You set out for Stockholm? " 
 
 "No, for your father's residence; but I posted at Stockholm 
 the letter he gave me for you." 
 
 "But I do not quite understand " 
 
 "Nothing can be simpler," said the marquis decisively. 
 " I do not live in Sweden, and we wished to put you off the 
 scent."
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 207 
 
 "Would you wish to tell the rest of the story yourself?" 
 said Jacques Bricheteau, though not seeming anxious to be 
 superseded in his narrative ; for, as you see, he has an easy 
 and elegant flow of language. 
 
 "Not at all, not at all go on," said the marquis; "you 
 are doing it admirably." 
 
 "The presence here of M. le Marquis," Jacques Bricheteau 
 went on, " will not, as I must warn you, immediately clear up 
 all the mysteries which have hitherto complicated your rela- 
 tions. For the furtherance of your future prospects, and of 
 his own, he reserves the right of leaving you in ignorance for 
 some time yet of the name of the country where he hopes to 
 see you invited to succeed him, and of certain other details of 
 his biography. In fact, he is here this day chiefly with a view 
 to avoiding further explanations, and to renew the lease, so to 
 speak, of your patient curiosity. 
 
 " The recognition and legitimization of a natural son is a 
 serious matter, surrounded by legal complications. An au- 
 thenticated affidavit must be taken in the presence of a notary ; 
 and even though the father's personal deposition can be 
 represented by a specially prepared document, M. le Mar- 
 quis thought that the formalities indispensable to make this 
 power of attorney effective might divulge the secret of his 
 identity, not only to your disadvantage, but in the foreign 
 land where he is married, and to some extent naturalized; 
 and that secret it is still incumbent on him to keep for a time. 
 This decided him. He made an excuse to take a few weeks' 
 absence, arrived, posting all the way, and, taking me by sur- 
 prise, arranged for our meeting here. 
 
 " In the course of such a long and hurried journey he feared 
 that the considerable sum of money he is devoting to secure 
 your election might not be quite safe in his keeping, and he 
 therefore transmitted it through his bankers, to be drawn on a 
 certain day. That is why, on your arrival, I asked you the 
 question which may have surprised you. Now I have to ask
 
 208 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 you another of far greater importance : Do you consent to take 
 M. de Sallenauve's name and be acknowledged by him as his 
 son?" 
 
 " I am no lawyer," said I ; " but it seems to me that, even 
 if I did not feel highly honored by it, it does not lie in my 
 hands to decline such a recognition." 
 
 "I beg your pardon," said Jacques Bricheteau ; "you 
 might be the son of a very undesirable father, and find it to 
 your interest to dispute the relationship ; in the case as it 
 stands you could plead, probably with success, to decline the 
 favor proposed. I ought also to tell you and I know that I 
 am expressing the intentions of M. le Marquis that if you do 
 not think a man who has already spent half a million of francs 
 out of pocket with a view to your election a father altogether 
 to your mind, we leave you perfectly free, and have no wish 
 to coerce you." 
 
 "Quite so, quite so," said M. de Sallenauve, in a short, 
 sharp tone and the thin high pipe which is peculiar to these 
 relics of the old aristocracy. 
 
 Mere politeness required me to say that I was only too 
 happy to accept the parentage thus pressed on me ; and in 
 reply to the few words I spoke to that effect, Jacques Briche- 
 teau went on 
 
 "And we do not ask you to 'buy a father in a poke.' Not 
 so much with a view to command your confidence, which he 
 believes he has won, as to enable you to judge of the family 
 whose name you will bear, M. le Marquis will place before 
 you all the title-deeds and parchments that are in his posses- 
 sion ; and beside this, though it is a long time since he left 
 France, he can prove his identity by the evidence of his still 
 living contemporaries, which will serve to corroborate the 
 validity of the act he will put his name to. For instance, 
 among the persons, of unimpeachable honor who have already 
 recognized him, I may mention the venerable mother superior 
 of the Ursuline Sisters here, Mother Marie des Anges for
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCI3. 209 
 
 whom, I may add, you have executed a most glorious master- 
 piece." 
 
 "Yes, on my honor, a very pretty thing," said the mar- 
 quis. " If you are as strong in politics " 
 
 "Well, then, marquis," said Jacques Bricheteau, who 
 seemed to me a little overbearing, "will you and our young 
 friend proceed to verify those family papers?" 
 
 " It is quite unnecessary," said I. 
 
 But my father would not let me off; for more than two 
 hours he spread before me deeds, pedigrees, settlements, 
 letters-patent, a thousand documents, to prove that the Salle- 
 nauves are, with the exception of the Cinq Cygnes, one of the 
 oldest families in the Province of Champagne generally, and 
 of the department of the Aube in particular. I may add that 
 this display of archives had a running accompaniment of end- 
 less details in words, which certainly gave the identity of the 
 last Marquis de Sallenauve a very convincing semblance of 
 genuineness. 
 
 On all other subjects my father is apt to be laconic ; his 
 mind is not, I should say, remarkably open, and he is always 
 ready to leave his chancellor to speak for him. But on the 
 subject of his family papers he was bewilderingly full of anec- 
 dotes, reminiscences, and heraldic information ; in short, the 
 complete gentleman of an older time, ignorant or superficial 
 on most subjects, but a Benedictine for erudition on everything 
 connected with his ancestors. 
 
 We dined, not at the fable (fhdtc, but in a private room. 
 There was nothing remarkable about the meal, unless it were 
 the length of time it lasted in consequence of the absorbed 
 silence and slowness, of the marquis' deglutition, in conse- 
 quence of the loss of all his teeth. 
 
 So by seven o'clock we were at Maitre Pigoult's 
 
 But it is near on two in the morning, and I am dropping 
 asleep; so, till to-morrow when, if I have time, I will go on with 
 this letter and the circumstantial account of all that took place 
 14
 
 210 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S. 
 
 in the notary's office. However, you know the upshot of it 
 all, like a man who turns to the page of a novel to see whether 
 Evelina marries her Arthur, and you may let me off the de- 
 tails. As I step into bed I shall say to myself: Good-night, 
 M. de Sallenauve. 
 
 In fact, that old rascal Bricheteau was clumsy enough in 
 foisting on me such a name as Dorlange ; it was only fit for 
 some hero of romance under the Empire, or one of the pro- 
 vincial tenors on the lookout for an engagement under the 
 meagre shade of the Palais-Royal. 
 
 May 4, five in the morning. 
 
 Arrived at Maitre Pigoult's a maidservant, a country wench 
 of the purest breed, led us through an office of the most ven- 
 erably antique type where, however, no clerks were to be 
 seen working in the evening, as in Paris she showed us into 
 her master's private room, a large room, cold and damp, and 
 barely lighted by two composition candles on the desk. 
 
 Maitre Achille Pigoult, a feeble little man, much marked 
 with smallpox, and afflicted with green spectacles, over which, 
 however, he can flash a look of great keenness and intelligence, 
 asked us if we found the room warm enough. On our reply- 
 ing in the affirmative which he must have seen was a mere 
 form of politeness he had carried his incendiary purpose so 
 far as to strike a match, when, from one of the darkest corners 
 of the room, a broken and quavering voice, whose owner we 
 had not yet discerned, opposed this lavish extravagance. 
 
 "No, no, Achille, do not light the fire," cried the old 
 man. " There are five of us in the room ; the candles 
 give a good deal of heat, and we shall be suffocated before 
 long." 
 
 To these words of this hot-blooded Nestor, the marquis ex- 
 claimed : 
 
 "Why, it is worthy M. Pigoult, the old justice of the 
 peace ! "
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 211 
 
 The old man, thus recognized, rose and came up to my 
 father, whom he examined narrowly. 
 
 "To be sure ! " said he. "And I know you for a native 
 of the province, of the old block ; Achille told me the truth 
 when he promised rne that I should meet two old acquaint- 
 ances. You," said he to the organist, "are little Bricheteau, 
 nephew to the good Mother-superior Marie des Anges. But 
 that tall fellow, with his face like a duke I cannot put a 
 name to him and you must not be too hard on my memory, 
 for after eighty-six years of hard service it has a right to be 
 a little stiff in the joints." 
 
 "Now, then, grandfather," said Achille Pigoult, "try to 
 furbish up your recollections and you, gentlemen, not a 
 word, not a hint. I want to enlighten my faith. I have not 
 the honor of knowing the client on whose behalf I am about 
 to act, and, to be strictly regular, proof of his identity is re- 
 quired. The act of Louis XII., passed in 1498, and Francois 
 I. confirming it, in 1535, make this imperative on notaries 
 gardes-notes as they were called to forefend any substitution 
 of parties to such deeds.* The law is too reasonable to have 
 fallen into desuetude; and, for my part, I should not have 
 the smallest respect for the validity of an act if it could be 
 proved that such identification had been neglected." 
 
 While his son was speaking, old Pigoult had been racking 
 his memory. My father, by good luck, has a queer nervous 
 twitch of his features, which was naturally aggravated under 
 the steady gaze of the certifier. On seeing this muscular 
 movement, the old lawyer at last spotted his man. 
 
 "Ah, I have it ! " he exclaimed. " Monsieur is the Mar- 
 quis de Sallenauve the man we used to call the Grimacier 
 who would, at this day, be the master of the Chateau d'Arcis 
 if he had but married his pretty cousin, who had it for her 
 marriage-portion, instead of going off with the rest of the 
 madmen as an emigre." 
 
 * Notaries public must do the same in this country.
 
 212 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 " Still a bit of a sans-culotte, it would seem," said the mar- 
 quis, laughing. 
 
 "Gentlemen," said the notary impressively, "the test I 
 had planned seems to me to be decisive. This evidence, and 
 the papers which M. le Marquis has been good enough to sub- 
 mit to me, leaving them in my hands, together with the cer- 
 tificate of identity forwarded to me by Mother Marie des 
 Anges, who is prohibited by the rules of her house from com- 
 ing to my office, certainly justify us in completing the deeds 
 which I have already prepared. One of them requires the 
 signature of two witnesses. For one, we have here M. Briche- 
 teau ; for the other, my father, if you will accept him, and 
 the honor, it seems to me, is his by right, for we may say he 
 has won it at the point of his memory." 
 
 "Well, then, gentlemen, let us take our seats ! " exclaimed 
 Bricheteau enthusiastically. 
 
 The notary seated himself at his table ; we made a semi- 
 circle, and he began to read the deeds. The object in view 
 was set forth to authenticate the recognition by Francois- 
 Henri-Pantaleon Dumirail, Marquis de Sallenauve, of his son, 
 in my person ; but here a difficulty arose. Deeds under a 
 notary's certificate must mention the place of residence of the 
 contracting parties, otherwise they are void. Now, where 
 did my father reside ? A blank space had been left by the 
 notary, who wished to fill it up before proceeding any further. 
 
 " In the first place," said Pigoult, " it would seem that M. 
 le Marquis has no place of residence in France, since, in fact, 
 he does not reside in the country, and has for many years 
 owned no land in it." 
 
 "That is true," said the marquis, in a graver tone than 
 the remark seemed to call for; " in France I am but a vaga- 
 bond." 
 
 "Aha!" said Jacques Bricheteau, "but vagabonds like 
 you, who can hand over on the nail such gifts to a son as the 
 sum needed 10 purchase a mansion, are not beggars we need
 
 TffE DEPUTY FOR ARCTS. SIS 
 
 waste our pity on. At the same time, what you say is true 
 equally true in France or elsewhere for, with your mania for 
 eternally wandering, it seems to me pretty difficult to name 
 your place of residence. " 
 
 "Well, well," said Achille Pigoult, "we will not be 
 brought to a standstill by such a trifle as that. Monsieur," 
 and he turned to me, " is now the owner of the Chateau 
 d'Arcis, for an agreement to sell is equivalent to a sale when 
 the parties are agreed as to the terms and price. Then, what 
 can be more natural than that the father's domicile should be 
 stated as at one of his son's estates ; especially when it is 
 family property recovered to the original owners by purchase 
 for that son's benefit, though paid for by the father ; when, 
 moreover, that father was born in the place where the said 
 residence or domicile is situated, and is known and recognized 
 by residents of standing whenever, at long intervals, he 
 chooses to visit it ?" 
 
 "Quite right," said old Pigoult, yielding without hesita- 
 tion to the argument set forth by his son, in that emphatic tone 
 peculiar to men of business when they believe they have laid 
 their finger on a conclusive opinion. 
 
 " Certainly," said Jacques Bricheteau, " if you think the 
 thing can be worked so " 
 
 "You see that my father, a man of great experience, does 
 not hesitate to support my opinion. So we will say," added 
 the notary, taking up his pen : " ' Fran<pois-Henri-Pantaleon 
 Dumirail, Marquis de Sallenauve, residing with M. Charles 
 de Sallenauve, his natural son legitimized by this act, in the 
 house known as the Chateau d'Arcis in the district of Arcis- 
 sur-Aube, department of the Aube.' " And the rest of the 
 deed was read without any hitch. 
 
 Then followed a very ridiculous little scene. 
 
 All having signed, while we were still standing there, Jacques 
 Bricheteau said 
 
 "Now, M. le Comte, embrace your father."
 
 214 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 My father opened his arms with no small indifference, and 
 I coldly fell into them, vexed with myself, however, for not 
 being more deeply moved or feeling in my heart the glow of 
 kindred blood. 
 
 The importance of this property as bearing on my election, 
 even if I had not been instinctively aware of it, would have 
 been made clear to me by a few words that passed between 
 the notary and Jacques Bricheteau. After the manner of sellers, 
 who will still run up the value of their goods even after they 
 have parted with them 
 
 "You may think yourselves lucky," said Achille Pigoult; 
 " you have got that estate for a mere song." 
 
 " Stuff and nonsense ! " retorted Bricheteau. " How long 
 have you had it on your hands? To anybody else your 
 client would have sold it for fifty thousand crowns, but as a 
 family property you made us pay for the chance of having it. 
 We shall have to spend twenty thousand francs in making it 
 habitable ; the ground will hardly return four thousand francs 
 a year ; so our money, including expenses, will not bring in 
 two and a half per cent." 
 
 "What have you to complain of?" replied the notary; 
 " you will have to employ labor, and that is not bad luck for 
 a candidate." 
 
 "Ah, that election," said Jacques Bricheteau. "We will 
 talk that over to-morrow when we come to pay over the 
 money for the house, and our debt to you." 
 
 I will now give my ideas some little order ; I begin at that 
 half-million of francs spent, as you must allow, on a somewhat 
 nebulous dream that of one day possibly seeing me a minis- 
 ter to some imaginary court heaven knows where, the name 
 being carefully concealed. 
 
 Why does the man who recognizes me as his son conceal 
 the name of the place he lives in, and that by which he him- 
 self is known in the unknown northern land where he is said 
 to hold office ? Why so little confidence and so many sacri-
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 215 
 
 fices on my behalf? And does it seem to you that, in spite 
 of his lengthy explanations, Jacques Bricheteau has satis- 
 factorily accounted for the mystery in which he has wrapped 
 my life? Why his dwarf? Why his impudent denial of his 
 own identity the first time I addressed him ? Why that 
 frantic flitting? 
 
 All this, my dear fellow, whirling in my brain and cul- 
 minating in the five hundred thousand francs paid over to 
 me by the Brothers Mongenod, seems to lend substance to a 
 queer notion, at which you will laugh perhaps, but which is 
 not without foundation in the annals of crime. As I said at 
 first, I was invaded by it, and its suddenness seems to give it 
 the character of an instinctive apprehension. One thing is cer- 
 tain : If I had had the most distant inkling of it last evening, 
 I would have had my hand cut off sooner than sign that deed, 
 binding up my life and fortunes with those of a stranger whose 
 destiny may be as dark as a canto of Dante's " Inferno," and 
 who may drag me with him into the blackest depths. 
 
 As you may suppose, I have represented to myself every 
 argument that can tell against this gloomy view of the case ; 
 and if I do not state them here, it is because I wish to have 
 them from you, and so give them a value which they would 
 cease to have if I had inspired them. Of one thing I am 
 certain : I am living in an unwholesome atmosphere, thick 
 and heavy ; I want air I cannot breathe. 
 
 Still, if you can, reassure me, convince me ; I shall be only 
 glad, as you may well suppose, to find it all a bad dream. 
 But, at any rate, no later than to-morrow I mean to have an 
 explanation with both these men, and get a little more light 
 on the subject than has as yet been vouchsafed me. 
 
 Here is a new aspect to the story : While I was writing I 
 heard the clatter of horses in the street. Having grown dis- 
 trustful, and inclined to take a serious view of every incident, 
 I opened my window, and by the pale light of daybreak I saw
 
 216 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCTS. 
 
 at the inn door a post-chaise horses, postillion, and all 
 ready to start, and Jacques Bricheteau talking to somebody 
 inside, whose face was hidden by the peak of his traveling 
 cap. I acted at once : I ran downstairs ; but before I reached 
 the bottom, I heard the dull clatter of wheels and the ringing 
 cracks of the whip a sort of parting song with all postillions. 
 
 At the foot of the stairs I stood face to face with Jacques 
 Bricheteau. 
 
 Not in the least embarrassed, he said, with perfect simplicity: 
 " What ! up already, my dear boy ? " 
 
 " Of course," said I, " the least I could do was to say fare- 
 well to my most kind father." 
 
 " He did not wish it," said the confounded musician, with 
 a cool solemnity that made me long to thrash him. " He 
 was afraid of the agitation of a parting." 
 
 "He is in a devil of a hurry," said I, "if he could not 
 spare one day to his brand-new paternity." 
 
 " What can I say ? He is an oddity. He has done what 
 he came to do, and he saw no reason to remain any longer." 
 
 "To be sure, the high functions he fulfills in that northern 
 court " 
 
 There could be no mistake as to the deeply ironical tone 
 with which I spoke. 
 
 "Till now," said Bricheteau, "you have put more trust 
 in us." 
 
 " Yes, but I confess that my confidence is beginning to be 
 shaken by the ponderous mysteries that are so unmercifully 
 and incessantly piled upon it." 
 
 "I should really be most distressed," said Jacques Briche- 
 teau, " at seeing you give way, at this critical moment, to 
 these doubts, which are certainly justified by the way you have 
 been dealt with during so many years, if I had none but per- 
 sonal arguments or statements to countervail them. But you 
 may remember that old Pigoult, last evening, spoke of an aunt 
 of mine in these parts, and you will see before long that she
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 217 
 
 is a person of considerable importance. I may add that her 
 sacred dignity gives absolute authority to her word. I had 
 arranged* that we should see her in any case to-day; but give 
 me only time to shave myself, and in spite of its being so 
 early we will go at once to the Ursuline convent. You can 
 then question Mother Marie des Anges, who is regarded as 
 a saint throughout the department of the Aube, and by the 
 end of the interview, I fancy, no cloud will hang between 
 us." 
 
 All the time this strange man was talking his countenance 
 was so unmistakably honest and benevolent ; his language 
 always calm, elegant, and moderate is so persuasive to his 
 audience, that I felt the tide of my wrath ebbing and my con- 
 fidence reviving. 
 
 In fact, the answer was final. The Ursuline convent, bless 
 me! cannot be a mint for false coin ; and if Mother Marie des 
 Anges will answer for my father, as it would seem she has 
 already done to the notary, I should be mad to feel any further 
 doubts. 
 
 "Very well," said I, "I will go upstairs for my hat and 
 wait for you on the bank of the river." 
 
 " Do so. And keep an eye on the door of the inn, for fear 
 I should make a bolt, as I did from the Quai de Bethune ! '" 
 
 MARIE-GASTON TO MADAME LA COMTESSE DE I/ESTORADE. 
 
 ARCIS-SUR-AUBE, May 6, 1839. 
 
 MADAME: I should in any case have availed myself with 
 pleasure of your commands that I should write you during 
 my stay here ; but you have no idea how great was your kind- 
 ness in granting me so precious a favor. 
 
 Dorlange, whom I shall not continue to call by that name 
 you shall presently learn why is so much absorbed in the 
 cares of his canvass that I scarcely ever see him. I told you, 
 madame, that I was about to join our friend here in conse- 
 
 H
 
 218 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 quence of some disturbance of mind that I was aware of in a 
 letter telling me of a great change in his life and prospects. I 
 am now allowed to be more explicit on the subject Dorlange 
 at last knows his father. He is the natural son of the Marquis 
 de Sallenauve, the last survivor of one of the oldest families of 
 this province. The marquis, though giving no explanation 
 of the reasons that led to his keeping his son's birth so pro- 
 foundly secret, has just acknowledged him with every legal 
 formality. At the same time, he has purchased for him an 
 estate which had long since ceased to belong to the Salle- 
 nauves, and which will now again be a family possession. It 
 is actually in Arcis, and it seems probable that it may be 
 advantageous to the electoral schemes just now under discus- 
 sion. 
 
 What the ultimate purpose may be of such considerable 
 expenditure the marquis has never explained to Charles de 
 Sallenauve ; and it was this still, hazy horizon to his sky that 
 led the poor fellow to such apprehensions that, as a friend, I 
 could do no less than hasten to alleviate them. Another 
 whim of my lord marquis is having selected as his son's 
 chief elector an old Ursuline nun, by a sort of bargain in 
 which subsequently you, madame, were a factor. Yes ; for 
 the " Sainte-Ursule," for which you unaware were the model, 
 will probably have no little influence over our friend's return 
 to the Chamber. * 
 
 This is what happened : For many years Mother Marie des 
 Anges, superior of the Ursuline Sisters at Arcis-sur-Aube, had 
 dreamed of erecting a statue of the patron saint in the con- 
 vent chapel. But the abbess, being a woman of taste and cul- 
 ture, would have nothing to do with the hawker's images of 
 saints, sold ready-made by the dealers ; on the other hand, 
 she could not in conscience rob the poor of a sum so consid- 
 erable as would pay for a work of art on commission. This 
 excellent lady's nephew is an organist in Paris, and the Mar- 
 quis de Sallenauve while he was traveling all over the world
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 219 
 
 had confided his son to this man's care ; for all these years his 
 first object has been to keep the poor boy in absolute igno- 
 rance of his birth. When it occurred to him to make Salle- 
 nauve a deputy, Arcis was naturally thought of as the place 
 where his family was still remembered, and every way and 
 means was considered of making acquaintance, and utilizing 
 all possible aids to his election. 
 
 Then the organist remembered his aunt's long-cherished 
 ambition ; he knew her to have influence in the district, 
 where she is in great odor of sanctity, and also a touch of the 
 spirit of intrigue, ever ready to rush into an affair that may 
 be difficult and arduous. He went to see her with the Marquis 
 de Sallenauve's concurrence, and told her that one of the 
 most eminent of Paris sculptors was prepared to offer her a 
 statue of the most masterly execution, if she, on her part, 
 would undertake to secure his return as deputy for the district 
 of Arcis at the next election. 
 
 The old abbess did not think this at all beyond her powers. 
 So now she is the proud possessor of the object of her pious 
 ambition ; it came safely to hand a few days since, and is 
 already in its place in the convent chapel, where, ere long, it 
 will be solemnly dedicated. Now it remains to be seen how 
 the good mother will perform her share of the bargain. 
 
 Well, madamc, strange to say, all things weighed and con- 
 sidered, I should not at all wonder if this singular woman 
 were to succeed. From the description given me by Charles, 
 Mother Marie des Anges is a little woman, short but thick-set, 
 with a face that still contrives to be attractive in spite of her 
 wrinkles and the saffron-tinted pallor induced by time and by 
 the austerities of a cloister. She carries the burden of a stout 
 figure and seventy-six years with ease, and is as quick, bright, 
 and spirited as the youngest of us. A thoroughly capable 
 woman, she has gorerned her house for fifty years, and it has 
 always been the best regulated, the most efficient, and at the 
 same time the richest convent in the whole diocese of Troyes,
 
 220 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 No less well qualified for educating girls the great end, as 
 you know, of the Ursuline Sisterhoods she has for the same 
 length of time, through varying fortunes, managed a lay 
 school which is famous in the department and in all the 
 country round. Having thus presided over the education of 
 almost all the daughters of the better families in the province, 
 it is easy to understand that she has ubiquitous influence in 
 the aristocratic circles of Champagne, for a well-conducted 
 education always leads to permanent friendship between the 
 teacher and the pupils. She probably knows very well how 
 to turn these family connections to the best advantage in the 
 contest she has pledged herself to engage in. 
 
 It would seem, too, that, on the other hand, this remarkable 
 woman can absolutely command all the democratic votes in 
 the district. So far, indeed, on the scene of the struggle, 
 this party has but a sickly and doubtful existence ; still, it is by 
 nature active and busy, and it is under that flag, with some little 
 modifications, that our candidate comes forward. Hence, any 
 support from that side is useful and important. You, madame, 
 like me, will certainly admire the bicephalous powers, so to 
 speak, of this old abbess, who contrives at the same time to 
 be in good odor with the nobility and the secular clergy, while 
 wielding the conductor's stick for the radical party, their per- 
 ennial foes. 
 
 Her great influence over the popular party is based on a 
 little contest she once had with them. About the year '93 
 that amiable faction proposed to cut off her head. Turned 
 out of her convent, and convicted of having sheltered a con- 
 tumacious priest, she was imprisoned, brought before the rev- 
 olutionary tribunal, and condemned to the guillotine. The 
 thing came to Danton's knowledge ; he was then a member of 
 the Convention. Danton had been acquainted with Mother 
 Marie des Anges; he believed her to be the most virtuous and 
 enlightened woman he had ever seen. On hearing of her 
 sentence he flew into a terrific rage,, wrote a letter from his
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 221 
 
 "high horse" to the revolutionary municipality, and com- 
 manded a respite with such authority as no man in Arcis 
 would have dreamed of disputing. He stood up in the tribune 
 that very day ; and after alluding in general terms to certain 
 sanglants imbeciles whose insane folly was damaging the pros- 
 pects of the Revolution, he explained who and what Mother 
 Marie des Anges was, spoke of her wonderful gifts for the 
 training of the young, and laid before the meeting a sketch 
 for a decree by which she was to be placed at the head of a 
 Great National Gynecaeum, the details to be regulated by sub- 
 sequent enactment. 
 
 Robespierre, who would have regarded the Ursuline nun's 
 superior intelligence as an additional qualification for the scaf- 
 fold, was not that day present at the sitting ; the motion was car- 
 ried with enthusiasm. As Mother Marie des Anges could not 
 possibly carry out the decree thus voted without a head on her 
 shoulders, she was allowed to retain it, and the executioner 
 cleared away his machinery. And though the former decree, 
 authorizing the Grand National Gynecseum, was presently for- 
 gotten, the Convention having quite other matters to occupy 
 it, the good sister carried it out on her own lines ; and instead 
 of something Grand, Greek, and National, with the help of 
 some of her former associates she started a simple lay school at 
 Arcis, to which, as soon as order was to some degree restored 
 in the land and in men's minds, pupils flocked from all the 
 neighboring country. 
 
 Under the Emperor, Mother Marie des Anges reconstituted 
 her house, and her first act of government was a signal piece 
 of gratitude. She decided that on the 5th of April every 
 year, the anniversary of Danton's death, mass should be said 
 in the convent chapel for the repose of his soul. 
 
 To some who objected to this service for the dead 
 
 "Do you know many persons," she would reply, "for 
 whom it is more necessary to implore Divine mercy?" 
 
 After the Restoration, the performance of this mass became
 
 222 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 a matter of some little difficulty; but Mother Marie des Anges 
 would never give it up, and the veneration with which she was 
 regarded even by those who were most set against what they 
 called a scandal, ended in their making the best of it. Under 
 the July Revolution, as you may suppose, this courageous 
 perversity had its reward. Mother Marie des Anges is now 
 in high favor at Court ; there is nothing she cannot obtain 
 from the most august persons in command ; still, it is but fair 
 to add that she asks for nothing, not even to help the poor ; 
 she finds the means of supplying most of their wants by her 
 judicious economy in dealing with the funds of the community. 
 What is even more obvious is that her gratitude to the great 
 revolutionary leader is a strong recommendation to that party ; 
 this, however, is not the whole secret of her influence with 
 them. The representative in Arcis of the Extreme Left is a 
 wealthy miller, named Laurent Goussard, who owns two or 
 three mills on the river Aube. It was this man, formerly a 
 member of the revolutionary municipality of Arcis, and a par- 
 ticular friend of Danton's, who wrote that terrible Cordelier 
 to tell him of the axe that hung over the Ursuline prioress' 
 head, though this did not hinder that worthy sans-culotte from 
 purchasing a large part of the convent lands when they were 
 sold as nationalized property. 
 
 Then, when Mother Marie des Anges was enabled to re- 
 constitute her sisterhood, Laurent Goussard, who had not as 
 it happened found the estate very profitable, came to the 
 worthy abbess and proposed to reinstate her in the former 
 possessions of the abbey. The goodman was not making a 
 bad bargain ; the mere difference of value between silver and 
 the assignats he had paid in was a handsome turn of profit. 
 But Mother Marie des Anges, who had not forgotten that but 
 for his intervention Danton could have known nothing, de- 
 termined to do better than that for the man who had really 
 saved her life. The Ursuline sisterhood, when Laurent Gous- 
 sard proposed this arrangement, was, financially speaking, in
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 223 
 
 a flourishing position. Since its reestablishment it had come 
 in for some liberal donations, and the mother superior had 
 put away a considerable sum during her long management of 
 the lay school ; this she generously handed over for the use of 
 the convent. Laurent Goussard was, no doubt, somewhat 
 amazed when she spoke to this effect : 
 
 "I cannot accept your offer; I cannot buy at the lowest 
 price ; my conscience forbids it. Before the Revolution the 
 convent lands were valued at so much ; this is the price I 
 propose to pay, not that to which they were brought down as 
 a result of the general depreciation in value of all the national- 
 ized lands. In short, my good sir, I mean to pay more if 
 that meets your views." 
 
 Laurent Goussard thought at first that he misunderstood 
 her, or had been misunderstood ; but when it dawned upon 
 him that the mother superior's scruples of conscience would 
 bring him a profit of about fifty thousand francs, he had no 
 wish to coerce so delicate a conscience, and pocketing this god- 
 send, which had really fallen from heaven, he made the aston- 
 ishing facts known far and wide ; and this, as you may suppose, 
 madame, raised Mother Marie des Anges to such estimation 
 in the eyes of every buyer of nationalized lands that she will 
 never have anything to fear from any revolution. Personally, 
 Laurent Goussard is her fanatical adorer ; he never does a 
 stroke of business or moves a sack of corn without consulting 
 her ; and, as she said jestingly the other day, if she had a 
 mind to treat the sub-prefect like John the Baptist, in a 
 quarter of an hour Laurent Goussard would bring her that 
 official's head in a sack. Does not that sufficiently prove, 
 madame, that at a nod from our abbess he will vote, and get 
 all his friends to vote, for the candidate of her choice ? 
 
 Mother Marie des Anges has, of course, a wide connection, 
 among the clergy, both by reason of her habit and her reputa- 
 tion for distinguished virtue; and among her most devoted 
 allies may be numbered Monseigneur Troubert, the bishop of
 
 224 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 the diocese, who, though formerly an adherent of the Con 
 gregation, would, under the dynasty of July, put up with an 
 . archbishopric as preliminary to the cardinal's hat. Now if, 
 to assist him in this ambition justified, it must be said, by 
 great and indisputable capabilities Mother Marie des Anges 
 were to write a few lines to the Queen, it is probable that his 
 promotion would not be too long deferred. But it will be 
 give and take. If the Ursuline abbess works for the arch- 
 bishopric, Monseigneur de Troyes will work the election. 
 
 Winning the clergy almost certainly secures the Legitimist 
 vote, for that party is no less passionately bent on freedom in 
 teaching; and, out of hatred for the new (Orleans) dynasty, 
 does not even take fright at seeing that principle in monstrous 
 alliance with radical politics. The head of that party in this 
 district is the family of Cinq-Cygne. The old marquise, 
 whose haughty temper and determined will are known to you, 
 madame, never comes to the Chateau of Cinq-Cygne without 
 visiting Mother Marie des Anges, whose pupil her daughter 
 Berthe formerly was now the Duchesse de Maufrigneuse ; as 
 to the duke, he will certainly support us, for, as you know, 
 Daniel d' Arthez is a great friend of mine, and through Arthez 
 we are certain to secure the interest of the Princesse de 
 Cadignan, our handsome duke's mother, so we may count on 
 him. 
 
 If we now turn to a more obdurate party the Conserva- 
 tives, who must not be confounded with the Ministerialists 
 their leader is the Comte de Gondreville, your husband's 
 colleague in the Upper Chamber. At his heels comes a very 
 influential voter, his old friend, the former mayor and notary 
 of Arcis, who in his turn drags in his train a no less important 
 elector, Maitre Achille Pigoult, to whom, on retiring, he 
 sold his connection. But Mother Marie des Anges has a 
 strong hold on the Comte de Gondreville through his daugh- 
 ter, the Mar6chale de Carigliano. This great lady, who, as 
 you are aware, is immensely devout, comes every year to the
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 225 
 
 Ursuline convent for a penitential retreat. Mother Marie des 
 Anges says, moreover, though she gives no explanations, that 
 she has a hold on the old count through some circumstances 
 known only to herself; and, in fact, this regicide's career 
 becoming a senator, a count of the Empire, and now a peer 
 of France must have led him through devious and subterra- 
 nean ways, making it probable that there have been secret 
 passages which he would not care to have brought to light. 
 Now, Gondreville is one with Grevin, for fifty years his second 
 self and active tool ; and even supposing that by some impos- 
 sible chance their long union should be severed, at least we 
 should be sure of Achille Pigoult, Grevin' s successor as notary 
 to the Ursuline sisterhood ; indeed, at the time of the acqui- 
 sition of the estate in Arcis by the Marquis de Sallenauve, 
 which was effected through him, 'the purchaser took care to 
 pay him a honorarium so large so electoral that he pledged 
 himself merely by accepting it. 
 
 As to the ruck of the voters, our friend is certain to recruit 
 a strong force, since he is about to give them employment on 
 the important repairs he proposes to begin at once ; for the 
 castle, of which he is now the proprietor, is, fortunately, fall- 
 ing into ttrin In many places. We may also trust to the effect 
 of a magniloquent profession of principles which Charles de 
 Sallenauve has just had printed, setting forth in lofty terms 
 that he will accept neither favors nor office from the Govern- 
 ment. 
 
 You have some kind feeling for me, because the fragrance 
 still clings to me of our beloved Louise ; have then some little 
 regard for the man whom I have dared to speak of throughout 
 this letter as our friend. If indeed, do what he will, he be- 
 trays a sort of insufferable greatness, should we not rather pity 
 him than call him to a strict account ? Do we not know, you 
 and I, by cruel experience, that the noblest and most glorious 
 lights are those which first sink into the extinction of eternal 
 darkness? 
 15
 
 226 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 MARIE-GASTON TO THE COMTESSE DE I/ESTORADE. 
 
 ARCIS-SUR-AUBE, May 13, 1839. 
 
 MADAME : You, too, have the election fever, and you 
 have been good enough to transmit as a message from M. de 
 1'Estorade a certain list of discouragements, which no doubt 
 deserve consideration. I may, however, say at once that this 
 communication does not seem to me to be so important as 
 you, perhaps, think ; and even before your official warning 
 reached us, the difficulties in our course had not failed to 
 occur to us. We knew already of the confidential mission 
 undertaken by M. de Trailles, though for some days he tried, 
 not very successfully, to disguise it under a pretense of com- 
 mercial business. We even knew what you, madame, do not 
 seem to have known, that this ingenious instrument of the 
 ministerial mind had contrived to combine the care of his 
 personal interests with that of party politics. 
 
 M. Maxime de Trailles, if we are correctly informed, was 
 not long since on the point of sinking under the last and 
 worst attack of a chronic malady from which he has long 
 suffered. This malady is Debt for we do not speak of M. 
 de Trailles' debts, but of his Debt, as of the National Debt of 
 England. In extremis, the gentleman, bent on some desperate 
 remedy, seems to have hoped for a cure in marriage a mar- 
 riage in extremis, as it might well be called, since he is said 
 to be very near fifty. Being well known that is to say, in 
 his case, much depreciated in Paris, like trades-people whose 
 goods are out of date, he packed himself off to the country, 
 and unpacked himself at Arcis-sur-Aube just as the fun of the 
 election was beginning, wisely supposing that the rather up- 
 roarious tumult of this kind of political scrimmage might favor 
 the slightly shady character of his proceedings. 
 
 From the point of view of public affairs, M. Beauvisage, 
 whose name, madame, you will certainly remember, has the
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 227 
 
 immense advantage of having thoroughly beaten and crushed 
 the nomination of a little attorney named Simon Giguet, who, 
 to the great indignation of the Government, wanted to take 
 his seat with thei,eft Centre. This ousting of a pert upstart 
 on the side of the Opposition was thought such an inestimable 
 boon, that it led folk to overlook the notorious and indis- 
 putable ineptitude of this Beauvisage, and the ridicule which 
 his return could not fail to bring on those who should vote 
 for his election. 
 
 But then we appeared on the scene. We are of the province ; 
 Champions by the name that dropped on us one morning 
 from the skies ; we make ourselves even more so by acquiring 
 land in the district ; and, as it happens, the country is bent 
 at this election on sending no one to the Chamber but a 
 specimen of its own vintage ! 
 
 We are not quite so idiotic as Beauvisage ; we do not in- 
 variably make ourselves ridiculous ; we do not, indeed, make 
 cotton night-caps, but we make statues for which we have 
 earned the Legion of Honor ; religious statues, to be dedi- 
 cated with much pomp in the presence of Monseigneur the 
 Bishop, who will condescend to give an address, and of the 
 municipal authorities ; statues which the whole of the town 
 that part of it which is not admitted to the ceremony is 
 crowding to admire at the house of the Ursulines, who are 
 vain enough of this magnificent addition to their gem of a 
 chapel, and threw open their public rooms and oratory to all 
 comers for the whole day and this you may be sure tends .to 
 make us popular. 
 
 What contributes even better to this popularity is that we 
 are not mean like Beauvisage, and do not hoard our income 
 sou by sou ; that we are employing thirty workmen at the 
 castle painters, masons, glaziers, gardeners, trellis-makers ; 
 and that while the mayor of the town trudges shabbily on 
 foot, we are to be seen driving through Arcis in an elegant 
 open chaise with two prancing steeds, which our father not
 
 228 THE DEPUTY FOR AKCIS. 
 
 in heaven, but in Paris anxious to be even more delightful 
 at a distance than on the spot, sent hither post-haste, with a 
 view, I believe, to snuffing out M. de Trailles' tilbury and 
 tiger. These, I may tell you, before our arrival were the talk 
 of the town. 
 
 Yesterday, madame, we drove out in our chaise to the 
 Chateau of Cinq-Cygne, where Arthez introduced us to the 
 Princesse de Cadignan. That woman is really miraculously 
 preserved ; she seems to have been embalmed by the happi- 
 ness of her liaison with the great writer. " They are the 
 prettiest picture of happiness ever seen," you said, I remem- 
 ber, of M. and Mme. de Portenduere ; and you might say the 
 same of Arthez and the princess, altering the wo.d "pretty" 
 in consideration of their Indian summer. 
 
 Mme. de Maufrigneuse and the old Marquise de Cinq- 
 Cygne were wonderfully kind in their reception of Dorlange 
 Sallenauve, I should say, but I find it difficult to remem- 
 ber ; as they are less humble than you are, they were not 
 frightened at any loftiness they might meet with in our 
 friend, and he, in an interview which was really rather diffi- 
 cult, behaved to perfection. It is very strange that after 
 living so much alone, he should at once have turned out per- 
 fectly presentable. Is it perhaps that the Beautiful, which 
 has hitherto been the ruling idea of his life, includes all that 
 is pleasing, elegant, and appropriate things which are gen- 
 erally learned by practice as opportunity offers ? But this 
 cannot be the case, for I have seen very eminent artists, 
 especially sculptors, who, outside their studios, were simply 
 unendurable. 
 
 May 10. 
 
 Yesterday we gave a notable dinner, dear madame ; it was 
 a magnificent affair, and will, I fancy, be long talked of in 
 Arcis. Sallenauve has in the organist who, by the way, at 
 the ceremony of the statue yesterday, displayed his exquisite
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 229 
 
 talent on the good sister's organ a sort of steward and fac- 
 totum transcending all the Vatels that ever lived. He is not 
 the man to fall on his sword because the fish is late. Colored 
 lamps, transparencies, garlands, and drapery to decorate the 
 dining-room, even a little packet of fireworks which had been 
 stowed in the boot of the chaise by that surly and invisible 
 father who has his good side, however nothing was wanting 
 to the festivities. They were kept up till a late hour in the 
 gardens of the castle, to which the plebs were admitted to 
 dance and drink copiously. 
 
 Almost all our guests appeared, excepting those whom we 
 had asked merely to compromise them. The invitation was 
 so short a difficulty inevitable and pardonable under the 
 circumstances that it was quite amusing to see notes of 
 excuse arriving up to the very dinner hour, for Sallenauve had 
 ordered that they should all be brought to him as soon as 
 they arrived. And as he opened each letter he took care to 
 say quite audibly: " M. le Sous-prefet M. le Procureur du 
 Roi The Deputy Judge expresses his regrets at being unable 
 to accept my invitation. 
 
 All these "refusals of support" were listened to with sig- 
 nificant smiles and whispering ; but when a note was brought 
 from Beauvisage, and Dorlange read aloud that M. le Maire 
 " found it impossible to correspond to his polite invitation," 
 laughter was loud and long, as much at the matter as the 
 manner of the refusal. It ended only on the arrival of a M. 
 Martener, examining judge here, who snowed the highest 
 courage in accepting this dinner. At the same time, it may 
 be noted that an examining judge is in his nature a divisible 
 entity. As a judge he is a permanent official ; all the change 
 he can be subject to is that of his title, and the loss of the 
 small additional salary he is allowed, with the right to issue 
 summonses and catechise thieves, grand privileges of which 
 he may be deprived by the fiat of the keeper of the seals. 
 
 In the presence of the Due de Maufrigneuse, of Arthez,
 
 230 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 and, above all, of Monseigneur the Bishop, who is spending a 
 few days at Cinq-Cygne, one absentee was much commented 
 on, though his reply, sent early in the day, was not read to 
 the company. This was the old notary Grevin. As to the 
 Comte de Gondreville, also absent, nothing could be said > 
 the recent death of his grandson Charles Keller prohibited his 
 presence at this meeting ; and Sallenauve, by making his invi- 
 tation in some sort conditional, had been careful to suggest 
 the excuse; but Grevin, the Comte de Gondreville's right 
 hand, who has certainly made greater and more compromising 
 efforts for his friend than that of dining out Grevin's absence 
 seemed to imply that his patron was still a supporter of Beau- 
 visage, now almost deserted. And this influence lying low, in 
 sporting phrase is really of no small importance to us. Maitre 
 Achille Pigoult, Grevin's successor, explained, it is true, that 
 the old man lives in complete retirement, and can hardly be 
 persuaded to dine even with his son-in-law two or three times 
 a year ; but the retort was obvious that when the sub-prefect 
 had lately given a dinner to introduce the Beauvisage family 
 to M. Maxime de Trailles, Grevin had been ready to accept 
 his invitation. So there will be some little pull from the 
 Gondreville party, and Mother Marie des Anges will, I believe, 
 have to bring her secret thrust into play. 
 
 The pretext for the dinner being the dedication of the 
 Sainte-Ursule, an event which the sisterhood could not cele- 
 brate by a banquet, Sallenauve had a fine opportunity at dessert 
 for proposing a toast 
 
 "To the mother of the poor ; to the noble and saintly spirit 
 which for fifty years has shone on our Province, and to whom 
 is due the prodigious number of cultivated and accomplished 
 women who adorn this beautiful land ! " 
 
 You yourself mentioned to me that your son Armand saw a 
 strong resemblance in Sallenauve to the portraits of Danton ; 
 it would seem that the remark is true, for I heard it on all 
 sides, applied not to the portraits, but to the man himself, by
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 231 
 
 guests who had known the great revolutionary well. Laurent 
 Goussard, as the head of a party, had of course been invited. 
 He was not only Dan ton's friend, he was in a way his brother- 
 in-law ; Danton, who was a scapegrace wooer, having paid his 
 court for several years to one of the honest miller's sisters. 
 Well, the likeness must in fact be striking ; for after dinner, 
 while we were drinking our coffee, the wine of the country 
 having mounted a little to the good man's brain for there 
 had been no stint, as you may suppose he went up to Salle- 
 nauve and asked him point-blank if he could by any chance 
 be mistaken as to his father, and if he were sure that Danton 
 had had nothing to do with the begetting of him. 
 
 Sallenauve laughed at the idea, and simply did a little sum 
 
 " Danton died on April 5, 1793. To be his son I must 
 have been born in 1794 at the latest, and should be five-and- 
 forty now. Now, as the register in which my birth was 
 entered father and mother unknown is dated 1809, that 
 and I hope my face as well prove me to be but just thirty." 
 
 "Quite true," said Laurent Goussard, "the figures bowl 
 me over. Never mind ; we will elect you all the same." 
 
 And I believe the man is right ; this whimsical likeness will 
 be of immense weight in turning the scale of the election. 
 And it must not be supposed that Danton is an object of 
 execration and horror to the citizens of Arcis, in spite of the 
 dreadful associations that surround his memory. In the first 
 place, time has softened them, and there yet remains the rec- 
 ollection of a strong mind and great brain that they are proud 
 of owning in a fellow-countryman. At Arcis curiosities and 
 notabilities are scarce ; here the people speak of Danton as at 
 Marseilles they would speak of the Cannebiere. 
 
 These voters, extra mttros, are sometimes amusingly art- 
 less ; a little contradiction does not stick in their throat. 
 Some agents sent out into the neighboring country have already 
 made good use of this resemblance ; and as in canvassing the 
 rustics it is more important to strike hard than to strike
 
 232 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 straight, Laurent Goussard's explanation, apocryphal as it is, 
 has gone the round of the rural hamlets with a precision that 
 has met with no contradiction. And while this revolutionary 
 parentage, though purely imaginary, is serving our friend 
 well, on the other hand we say to those worthy voters who 
 are to be caught by something at once more accurate and not 
 less striking 
 
 " He is the gentleman who has just bought the Chateau 
 d'Arcis." 
 
 And as the Chateau d'Arcis towers above the town and is 
 known to everybody for miles round, it is a sort of landmark; 
 and at the same time, with a perennial instinct of reversion to 
 old-world traditions, less dead and buried than might be sup- 
 posed. 
 
 "Oho ! he is the lord of the chateau," they sgy, a free but 
 respectful version of the idea suggested to them. 
 
 So this, madame, saving your presence, is the procedure in 
 the electoral kitchen, and the way to dress and serve up a 
 Deputy of the Chamber. 
 
 MARIE-GASTON TO MADAME DE I/ESTORADE. 
 
 ARCIS-SUR-AUBE, May ir, 1839. 
 
 MADAME: Since you do me the honor to say that my 
 letters amuse you, I am bound not to be shy of repeating 
 them. But is not this a little humiliating? and when I think 
 of the terrible grief which was our first bond of union, is it 
 possible that I should be an amusing man all the rest of my 
 days? Here, as I have told you, I am in an atmosphere that 
 intoxicates me. I have made a passion of Sallenauve's 
 success, and being, as I am, of a gloomy and hopeless nature, 
 an even greater passion perhaps of the wish to hinder the 
 triumph of ineptitude and folly under the patronage of base 
 interest and intrigue. 
 
 To-day, madame, the grotesque is paramount ; we are on
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 233 
 
 full parade. Notwithstanding M. de 1'Estorade's discouraging 
 warnings, we are led to suppose that the Ministry has not very 
 exultant tidings from its agent ; and this is what makes us think 
 so : We are no longer at the Hotel de la Poste ; we have left 
 it for our castle. But, thanks to a long-standing rivalry 
 between the two inns, la Poste and le Mulct where M. de 
 Trailles has his headquarters we still have ample information 
 from our former residence ; and our host there is all the more 
 zealous and willing because I strongly suspect that he had a 
 hand, greatly to his advantage I should think, in arranging 
 and furnishing the banquet. 
 
 From this man, then, we learn that immediately after our 
 departure, a journalist from Paris put up at the hotel. This 
 gentleman, whose name I have forgotten which is well for 
 him, considering how glorious a mission he bears also an- 
 nounced that he came as a champion to lend the vis of his 
 Parisian wit to the war of words to be opened on us by the 
 local press, subsidized by the " office of public spirit." So 
 far there is nothing very droll or very depressing in the pro- 
 ceedings; ever since the world began Governments have been 
 able to find pens for hire, and have never been shy of hiring 
 them. Where the comedy begins is at the co-arrival at the 
 Hotel de la Poste of a damsel of very doubtful virtue, who is 
 said indeed to have accompanied his excellency the Ministerial 
 newsmonger. The young lady's name, by the way, I happen 
 to remember : she is designated on her passport as Mademoi- 
 selle Chocardelle, of independent means ; but the journalist 
 in speaking of her never calls her anything but Antonia, or, 
 if he yearns to be respectful, Mademoiselle or Miss Antonia. 
 
 But what has brought Mile. Chocardelle to Arcis? A little 
 pleasure trip, no doubt ; or perhaps to serve as an escort to 
 Monsieur the Journalist, who is willing to give her a share m 
 the credit account opened for him on the secret-service fund 
 for the daily quota of defamation to be supplied by contract ? 
 No, madame. Mile. Chocardelle has come to Arcis on busi-
 
 234 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 ness to recover certain moneys. It would seem that before 
 leaving for Africa, where he has met a glorious death, young 
 Charles Keller signed a bill in favor of Mile. Antonia, an 
 order for ten thousand francs, value received in furniture, a 
 really ingenious quibble, the furniture having obviously been 
 received by Mile. Chocardelle, who thus priced the sacrifice 
 she made in accepting it at ten thousand francs. At any rate, 
 the bill being nearly due, a few days after hearing of the death 
 of her debtor Mile. Antonia called at the Kellers' office to 
 know whether it would be paid. The cashier, a rough cus- 
 tomer, as all cashiers are, replied that he did not know how 
 Mile. Antonia could have the face to present such a claim ; 
 but that in any case the Brothers Keller, his masters, were at 
 present at Gondreville, where all the family had met on hear- 
 ing the fatal news, and that he should not pay without refer- 
 ring the matter to them. 
 
 ''Very well, I will refer it myself," said the young lady, 
 who would not leave her bill to run beyond its date. 
 
 Thereupon, just as she was arranging to set out alone for 
 Arcis, the Government suddenly felt a call to abuse us, if not 
 more grossly, at any rate more brilliantly than the provincials 
 do ; and the task of sharpening these darts was confided to a 
 journalist of very mature youth, to whom Mile. Antonia had 
 been kind in the absence of Charles Keller ! 
 
 "I am off to Arcis ! " the scrivener and the lady said at 
 the same moment ; the commonest and simplest lives offer 
 such coincidences. So it is not very strange that, having set 
 out together, they should have arrived together, and have put 
 up at the same inn. 
 
 And now I would beg you to admire the concatenation of 
 things. Mile. Chocardelle, coming here with an eye solely 
 to finance, the lady has suddenly assumed the highest political 
 importance ! And, as you will see, her valuable influence will 
 amply compensate for the stinging punishment to be dealt us 
 by her gallant fellow-traveler.
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 235 
 
 In the first place, it appears that on learning that M. de 
 Trailles was in Arcis, Mile. Chocardelle's remark was 
 
 " What ! he here that horrid rip? " 
 
 The expression is not parliamentary, and I blush as I write 
 it. But it refers to previous relations business relations 
 again between Mile. Antonia and the illustrious confidant of 
 the Ministerial party. M. de Trailles, accustomed as he is to 
 pay his court only to ladies of position who help to reduce 
 his debt rather than to add to the burden once in his life 
 took it into his head to be loved not "for himself alone," 
 and to be useful rather than expensive. He consequently 
 bought a circulating library for Mademoiselle Antonia in the 
 Rue Coquenard, where for some time she sat enthroned. But 
 the business was not a success ; a sale became necessary ; and 
 M. Maxime de Trailles, with an eye to business as usual, com- 
 plicated matters by the purchase of the furniture, which 
 slipped through his fingers by the cleverness of a rascal more 
 rascally than himself. By these manoeuvres Mile. Antonia 
 lost all her furniture, which the vans were waiting to remove ; 
 and another young lady Hortense, also " of private means," 
 and attached to old Lord Dudley gained twenty-five louis by 
 Antonia's mishap. 
 
 The journalist has much to do : to write his articles in the 
 first place, and to do various small jobs for M. de Trailles, at 
 whose service he is to be. Hence Mile. Antonia is often left 
 to herself, and, idle and bored as she is, so bereft of any kind 
 of opera, Ranelagh, Boulevard des Italiens, she has found for 
 herself a really desperate pastime. Incredible as it seems, 
 this amusement is not, after all, utterly incomprehensible, as 
 the device of a Parisienne of her class exiled to Arcis. Quite 
 close to the Hotel de la Poste is a bridge over the Aube, 
 Below the bridge, down a rather steep slope, a path has been 
 made leading to the water's edge, and so far beneath the high 
 road which, indeed, is not much frequented as to promise 
 precious silence and solitude to those who choose to go the**
 
 230 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 and dream to the music of the waters. Mile. Antonia at first 
 betook herself to sit there with a book ; but perhaps, from a 
 painful association with the remembrance of her reading-room, 
 "books," as she says, "are not much in her line;" and at 
 last the landlady of the inn, seeing how tired the poor soul 
 was of herself, happily thought of offering her guest the use 
 of a very complete set of fishing-tackle belonging to her hus- 
 band, whose multifarious business compels him to leave it for 
 the most part idle. 
 
 The fair exile had some luck with her first attempts, and 
 took a great liking for the pastime, which is evidently very 
 fascinating, since it has so many fanatical devotees ; and now 
 the few passers-by, who cross the bridge, may admire, on the 
 banks of the Aube, a charming water-nymph in flounced 
 skirts and a broad-brimmed straw hat, casting her line with the 
 conscientious gravity of the most sportsmanlike Paris arab, in 
 spite of the changes of our yet unsettled temperature. 
 
 So far so good, and at present the lady's fishing has not 
 much to do with our election ; but if you should happen to 
 remember in " Don Quixote " a book you appreciate, mad- 
 ame, for the sake of the good sense and mirthful philosophy 
 that abound in it a somewhat unpleasant adventure that be- 
 falls Rosinante among the muleteers, you will anticipate, be- 
 fore I tell you, the good luck to us that has resulted from 
 Mademoiselle Antonia's suddenly developed fancy. Our 
 rival, Beauvisage, is not merely a hosier (retired) and an ex- 
 emplary mayor, he is also a model husband, never having 
 tripped in the path of virtue, respecting and admiring his 
 wife. Every evening, by her orders, he is in bed by ten 
 o'clock, while Madame Beauvisage and her daughter go into 
 what Arcis is agreed to call Society. But silent waters are 
 the deepest, they say, and nothing could be less chaste and 
 well regulated than the calm and decorous Rosinante in the 
 meeting I have alluded to. In short, Beauvisage, making the 
 rounds of his town his laudable and daily habit standing
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC IS. 237 
 
 on the bridge, happened to remark the damsel, her arm ex- 
 tended with manly vigor, her figure gracefully balanced, ab- 
 sorbed in her favorite sport. A bewitching, impatient jerk 
 as the fair fisher-maiden drew up the line when she had not a 
 nibble, was, perhaps, the electric spark which fired the heart 
 of the hitherto blameless magistrate. None, indeed, can tell 
 how the matter came about, nor at what precise moment. 
 
 I may, however, observe that in the interval between his 
 retirement from the cotton night-cap trade and his election 
 as mayor, Beauvisage himself had practiced the art of angling 
 with distinguished skill, and would do so still but for his 
 higher dignity, which unlike Louis XIV. keeps him from 
 the shore. It struck him, no doubt, that the poor girl, with 
 more good- will than knowledge, did not set to work the right 
 way ; and it is not impossible that, as she is temporarily under 
 his jurisdiction, the idea of guiding her into the right way was 
 the origin of his apparent misconduct. This alone is certain : 
 crossing the bridge with her mother, Mile. Beauvisage, like an 
 enfant terrible, suddenly exclaimed 
 
 " Why, papa is talking to that Paris woman ! " 
 
 To make sure, by a glance, of the monstrous fact ; to rush 
 down the slope ; to face her husband, whom she found beam- 
 ing with smiles and the blissful look of a sheep in clover; to 
 crush him with a thundering "Pray, what are you doing 
 here? " to leave him no retreat but into the river, and issue 
 her sovereign command that he should go this, madame, was 
 the prompt action of Mme. Beauvisage nee Grevin ; while 
 Mile. Chocardelle, at first amazed, but soon guessing what 
 had happened, went into fits of the most uncontrollable 
 laughter. And though these proceedings may be regarded as 
 justifiable, they cannot be called judicious, for the catastrophe 
 was known to the whole town by the evening, and M. Beau- 
 visage, convicted of the most deplorable laxity, saw a still 
 further thinning of his reduced phalanx of followers. 
 
 However, the Gondreville-Grevin faction still held its own,
 
 238 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 till would you believe it? Mile. Antonia once more was 
 the means of overthrowing their last defenses. 
 
 This is the history of the marvel : Mother Marie des Anges 
 wished for an interview with the Comte de Gondreville ; but 
 she did not know how to manage it, as she thought it an ill- 
 timed request. Having some severe remarks to make, it 
 would seem, she would not ask the old man to visit her on 
 purpose ; it was too cruel an offense to charity. Beside, com- 
 minations fired point-blank at the culprit miss their aim quite 
 as often as they frighten him ; whereas observations softly in- 
 sinuated are far more certain to have the desired effect. Still, 
 time was fleeting ; the election takes place to-morrow Sun- 
 day and to-night the preliminary meeting is to be held. The 
 poor, dear lady did not know which way to turn, when some 
 information reached her which was not a little flattering. A 
 fair sinner, who had come to Arcis intending to get some 
 money out of Keller, Gondreville's son-in-law, had heard of 
 the virtues of Mother Marie des Anges, of her indefatigable 
 kindness and her fine old age in short, all that is said of her 
 in the district where she is, next to Danton, the chief object 
 of interest ; and this minx's great regret was that she dared 
 not ask to be admitted to her presence. 
 
 An hour later, this note was delivered at the Hotel de la 
 Poste : 
 
 " MADEMOISELLE: I am told that you wish to see me, and 
 do not know how. Nothing can be easier : ring at the door 
 of my solemn dwelling, ask the sister who opens it for me, do 
 not be overawed by my black dress and grave face, nor fancy 
 that I force my advice on pretty girls who do not ask it, and 
 may one day be better saints than I am. 
 
 "That is the whole secret of an interview with Mother Marie 
 des Anges, who greets you in the Lord Jesus Christ. t" 
 
 As you may suppose, madame, there was no refusing so
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 239 
 
 gracious an invitation, and before long Mile. Antonia, in the 
 soberest garb at her command, was on her way to the convent. 
 I much wish I could give you authentic details of the meeting, 
 which must have been a curious one; but nobody was present, 
 nor have I been able to hear what report of it was given by 
 the wandering lamb, who came away moved to tears. 
 
 When the journalist tried to make fun of her converted 
 airs 
 
 "There, hold your tongue!" said Mile. Antonia. "You 
 never in your life wrote such a sentence ! " 
 
 " What was the sentence, come? " 
 
 "'Go, my child,' said the good old lady, 'the ways of 
 God are beautiful and little known ; there is more stuff to 
 make a saint of in a Magdalen than in many a nun.' ' 
 
 And I may add, madame, that as she repeated the words 
 the poor girl's voice broke, and she put her handkerchief to 
 her eyes. The journalist a disgrace to the press, one of 
 those wretches who are no more typical of the press than a 
 bad priest is of religion the journalist began to laugh, but 
 scenting danger, he added : "And, pray, when do you mean 
 really to go to Gondreville to speak to Keller, whom I shall 
 certainly end by kicking in a corner of some article in 
 spite of all Maxime's instructions to the contrary?" 
 
 "Am I going to meddle with any such dirty tricks?" 
 asked Antonia, with dignity. 
 
 " What ? So now you do not mean to present your bill ! " 
 
 "I!" replied the devotee of Mother Marie des Anges, 
 probably echoing her sentiments, but in her own words. "/ 
 try to blackmail a family in such grief? Why, the recollection 
 of it would stab me on my death-bed, and I could never hope 
 that God would have mercy upon me." 
 
 "Well, then, become an Ursuline and have done with it." 
 
 " If only I had courage enough, I should perhaps be hap- 
 pier; but, at any rate, I will not go to Gondreville. Mother 
 Marie des Anges will settle everything."
 
 240 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 "Why, most wretched child, you never left the bill with 
 her, eh?" 
 
 " I was going to tear it up, but she stopped me, and told 
 me to give it to her, and that she would manage to pull me 
 through by hook or by crook." 
 
 " Oh, very well ! You were a creditor you will be a 
 beggar " 
 
 " No, for I am giving alms. I told Madame the Abbess to 
 keep the money for the poor." 
 
 " Oh, if you are going to be a benefactress to convents 
 with your other vice of angling, you will be pleasant com- 
 pany ! " 
 
 " You will not have my company for long, for I am off this 
 evening, and leave you to your dirty job." 
 
 ''Halloo ! Going to be a Carmelite?" 
 
 "Carmelite is good," retorted Antonia sharply; "very 
 good, old boy, when I am leaving a Louis XIV." 
 
 For even the most ignorant of these girls all know the 
 story of la Valliere, whom they would certainly adopt as 
 their patron saint, if Sainte-Louise of mercy had ever been 
 canonized. 
 
 Now, how Mother Marie des Anges worked the miracle I 
 know not, but the Comte de Gondreville's carriage was stand- 
 ing this morning at the convent gate ; the miracle, be it under- 
 stood, consisting not in having brought that old owl out, for 
 he hurried off, you may be sure, as soon as he heard of ten 
 thousand francs to be paid, though the money was not to 
 come out of his purse, but Keller's it was the family's, and 
 such misers as he have a horror of other people spending when 
 they do not think the money well laid out. But Mother 
 Marie des Anges was not content with having got him to the 
 convent ; she did our business too. On leaving, the peer 
 drove to see his friend Grevin ; and in the course of the day 
 the old notary told a number of persons that really his son-in- 
 law was too stupid by half, that he had got himself into ill
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 241 
 
 odor through this affair with the Parisian damsel, and that 
 nothing could ever be made of him. 
 
 Meanwhile, it was rumored that the priests of the two 
 parishes had each received, by the hand of Mother Marie 
 des Anges, a sum of a thousand crowns for distribution among 
 the poor, given to her by a benevolent person who wished to 
 remain unknown. Sallenauve is furious because some of our 
 agents are going about saying that he is the anonymous bene- 
 factor, and a great many people believe it, though the story 
 of Keller's bill has got about, and it would be easy to trace 
 this liberality to the real donor. 
 
 M. Maxime de Trailles cannot get over it, and there is 
 every probability that the defeat, which he must now see is 
 inevitable, will wreck his prospects of marriage. All that can 
 be said with regard to his overthrow is what we always say of 
 an author who has failed he is a clever man, and will have 
 his revenge. 
 
 MARIE-GASTON TO THE COMTESSE DE I/ESTORADE. 
 
 ARCis-sUR-AuBE, Sunday, May 12, 1839. 
 
 MADAME: Yesterday evening the preliminary meeting was 
 held, a somewhat ridiculous business, and uncommonly dis- 
 agreeable for the candidates; however, it had to be faced. 
 When people are going to pledge themselves to a representa- 
 tive for four or five years, it is natural that they should wish 
 to know something about him. Is he intelligent ? Does he 
 really express the opinions of which he carries the ticket ? 
 Will he be friendly and affable to those persons who may have 
 to commend their interests to his care ? Has he determina- 
 tion ? Will he be able to defend his ideas if he has any ? 
 In a word, will he represent them worthily, steadily, and 
 truly ? 
 
 But every medal has its reverse ; and on the other side we 
 may see the voter at such meetings puffed up with arrogance, 
 16
 
 242 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 eager to display the sovereign authority which he is about to 
 transfer to his deputy, selling it as dear as he is able. From 
 the impertinence of some of the questions put to the candi- 
 date, might you not suppose that he was a serf, over whom 
 each voter had the power of life and death? There is not a 
 corner of his private life which the unhappy mortal can be 
 sure of hiding from prying curiosity ; as to merely stupid 
 questions, anything is conceivable as " Does he prefer the 
 wines of Champagne to those of Bordeaux? " At Bordeaux, 
 where wine is the religion, such a preference would prove a 
 lack of patriotism, and seriously endanger his return. Many 
 voters attend solely to enjoy the confusion of the nominees. 
 They cross-examine them, as they call it, to amuse themselves, 
 as children spin a cockchafer ; or as of yore old judges 
 watched the torture of a criminal, and even nowadays young 
 doctors enjoy an autopsy or an operation. Many have not 
 even so refined a taste ; they come simply for the fun of the 
 hubbub, the confusion of voices which is certain to arise 
 under such circumstances ; or they look forward to an oppor- 
 tunity for displaying some pleasing accomplishment ; for in- 
 stance, at the moment when as the reports of the sittings in 
 the Chamber have it the tumult is at its height, it is not un- 
 common to hear a miraculously accurate imitation of the 
 crowing of a cock, or the yelping of a dog when his foot is 
 trodden on. Intelligence, which alone should be allowed to 
 vote, having, like d'Aubigne Mme. de Maintenon's brother 
 taken its promotion in cash, we cannot be surprised to find 
 stupid people among the electors, and indeed they are numer- 
 ous enough in this world to have a claim to be represented. 
 
 The meeting was held in a good-sized hall, where a restau- 
 rant-keeper gives a dance every Sunday. There is a raised 
 gallery for the orchestra, which was reserved as a sort of plat- 
 form, to which a few non-voters were admitted ; I was one of 
 these privileged few. Some ladies occupied front seats : Mme. 
 Marion, the aunt of Giguet the advocate, one of the candi-
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S. 243 
 
 dates ; Mmc. and Mile. Mollot, the wife and daughter of the 
 clerk of assize ; and a few others whose names and position I 
 have forgotten. Mme. and Mile. Beauvisage, like Brutus and 
 Cassius, were conspicuous by their absence. 
 
 Giguet was the first candidate to address the meeting, his 
 father, the colonel, being in the chair ; his speech was long, 
 a medley of commonplace ; very few questions were put to 
 him to be recorded in this report. Every one felt that the 
 real battle was not to be fought here. 
 
 Then M. Beauvisage was called for. Maitre Achille Pigoult 
 rose and begged to be allowed to speak, and said 
 
 " M. le Maire has been very unwell since yesterday " 
 
 Shouts and roars of laughter interrupted the speaker. 
 
 Colonel Giguet rang the bell, with which he had been duly 
 provided, for a long time before silence was restored. At the 
 first lull, Maitre Pigoult tried again 
 
 "As I had the honor of saying, gentlemen, M. le Maire, 
 suffering as he is from an attack, which, though not serious, 
 may " 
 
 A fresh outbreak, more noisy than the first. Like all old 
 soldiers, Colonel Giguet's temper is neither very long-suffering 
 nor altogether parliamentary. He started to his feet, exclaim- 
 ing 
 
 "Gentlemen, this is not one of Frappart's balls" (the 
 name of the owner of the room) ; " I must beg you to behave 
 with greater decency, otherwise I shall resign the chair." 
 
 It is supposed that a body of men prefer to be rough-ridden, 
 for this exhortation was received with applause, and silence 
 seemed fairly well restored. 
 
 "As I was saying, to my regret," Maitre Achille began 
 once more, varying his phrase each time, " having a tiresome 
 indisposition which, though not serious, will confine him to 
 his room for some days " 
 
 " Loss of voice ! " said somebody. 
 
 "Our excellent and respected mayor," Achille Pigoult
 
 244 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 went on, heedless of the interruption, "could not have the 
 pleasure of attending this meeting. However, Madame Beau- 
 visage, whom I had the honor of seeing but just now, told me, 
 and commissioned me to tell you, that for the present M. 
 Beauvisage foregoes the honor of claiming your suffrages, beg- 
 ging such gentlemen as had expressed their interest in his 
 election to transfer their votes to M. Simon Giguet." 
 
 This Achille Pigoult is a very shrewd individual, who had 
 very skillfully brought about the intervention of Mme. Beau- 
 visage, thus emphasizing her conjugal supremacy. The as- 
 sembly were, however, too thoroughly provincial to appreciate 
 this dirty little trick. In the country women are constantly 
 mixed up with their husbands' concerns, even the most mas- 
 culine; and the old story of the priest's housekeeper, who 
 replied quite seriously: "We cannot say mass so cheap as 
 that," has to us a spice of the absurd which in many small 
 towns would not be recognized. 
 
 Finally, Sallenauve rose, and after briefly enumerating the 
 facts which tie him to the district, and alluding with skill and 
 dignity to his birth, as " not being the same as most people's," 
 monsieur set forth his political views. He esteems a republic 
 as the best form of government, but believes it impossible to 
 maintain in France; hence he cannot wish for it. He believes 
 that really representative government, with the politics of the 
 camarilla so firmly muzzled that there is nothing to be feared 
 from its constant outbreaks and incessant schemes, may tend 
 largely to the dignity and prosperity of a nation. Liberty 
 and Equality, the two great principles which triumphed in 
 '89, have the soundest guarantees from that form of govern- 
 ment. As to the possible trickery that kingly power may 
 bring to bear against them, institutions cannot prevent it. 
 Men and the moral sense, rather than the laws, must be on 
 the alert in such a case ; and he, Sallenauve, will always be 
 one of these living obstacles. He expressed himself as an 
 ardent supporter of freedom in teaching, said that in his opin-
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 245 
 
 ion further economy might be brought to bear on the budget, 
 that there were too many paid officials in the Chamber, and 
 that the Court especially was too strongly represented. The 
 electors who should vote for him were not to expect that he 
 would ever take any step in their behalf which was not based 
 on reason and justice. It had been said that the word " im- 
 possible" was not French. Yet there was one impossibility 
 that he recognized, and by which he should always feel it an 
 honor to be beaten, namely, any infringement of justice or 
 the least attempt to defeat the right. (Loud applause.) 
 
 Silence being restored, one of the electors spoke 
 
 "Monsieur," said he, after due license from the chairman, 
 " you have said that you will accept no office from the Govern- 
 ment. Is not that by implication casting a slur on those who 
 are in office ? My name is God i vet ; I am the town registrar ; 
 I do not therefore conceive- myself open to the scorn of my 
 respected fellow-citizens." 
 
 Said Sallenauve 
 
 " I am delighted, monsieur, to hear that the Government 
 has conferred on you functions which you fulfill, I am sure, 
 with perfect rectitude and ability. But may I inquire whether 
 you were from the first at the head of the office you manage? " 
 
 " Certainly not, monsieur. I was for three years super- 
 numerary ; I then rose through the various grades ; and I may 
 honestly say that my modest promotion was never due to 
 favor." 
 
 " Well, then, monsieur, what would you say if I, with my 
 title as deputy supposing me to secure the suffrages of the 
 voters in this district I, who have never been a super- 
 numerary, and have passed no grade, who should have done 
 the Ministry no service but that of voting on its side if I 
 were suddenly appointed to be director-general of your 
 department and such things have been seen ? " 
 
 " I should say I should say, monsieur, that the choice was 
 a good one, since the King would have made it."
 
 246 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 " No, monsieur, you would not say so ; or if you said it 
 aloud, which I cannot believe possible, you would think to 
 yourself that such an appointment was ridiculous and unjust. 
 ' Where the deuce did the man learn the difficult business of 
 an office when he has been a sculptor all his life ? ' you would 
 ask. And you would be right not to approve of the royal 
 caprice ; for acquired rights, long and honorable service, and 
 the regular progression of advancement would be nullified by 
 this system of selection by the sovereign's pleasure. And it 
 is to show that I disapprove of the crying abuse I am de- 
 nouncing; it is because I do not think it just, or right, or 
 advantageous that a man should be thus raised over other 
 men's heads to the highest post in the public service, that I 
 pledge myself to accept no promotion. And do you still 
 think, monsieur, that I am contemning such functions ? Do 
 I not rather treat them with the greatest respect?" 
 
 M. Godivet expressed himself satisfied. 
 
 "But look here, sir," cried another elector, after request- 
 ing leave in a somewhat vinous voice, "you say you will 
 never ask for anything for your electors ; then what good will 
 you be to us?" 
 
 " I never said, my good friend, that I would ask for nothing 
 for my constituents; I said I would ask for nothing but what 
 was just. That, I may say, I will demand with determination 
 and perseverance, for justice ought always to be thus served." 
 
 "Not but what there are other ways of serving it," the man 
 went on. "For instance, there was that lawsuit what they 
 made me lose against Jean Remy we had had words, you 
 see, about a landmark " 
 
 "Well," said Colonel Giguet, interposing, "you are not, 
 I suppose, going to tell us the history of your lawsuit and 
 speak disrespectfully of the magistrates?" 
 
 " The magistrates, colonel ? I respect them, which I was 
 a member of the municipality for six weeks in '93, and I 
 know the law. But to come back to my point. I want to
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 247 
 
 ask the gentleman, who is here to answer me just as much as 
 the others, what is his opinion of the licensed tobacco jobs." 
 
 " My opinion of tobacco licenses? That would be a little 
 difficult to state briefly. However, I may go so far as to say 
 that, if I am correctly informed, they do not seem to me to 
 be always judiciously granted." 
 
 "Well done you! You are a man!" cried the voter, 
 "and I shall vote for you, for they won't make a fool of you 
 in a hurry. I believe you ; the tobacco licenses are given 
 away anyhow. Why, there is Jean Remy's girl a bad neigh- 
 bor he was ; he has never been a yard away from his plough 
 tail, and he fights with his wife every day of the week, and 
 beside " 
 
 "But, my good fellow," said the chairman, interrupting 
 him, "you are really encroaching on these gentlemen's pa- 
 tience " 
 
 " No, no ; let him speak ! " was shouted on all sides. 
 
 The man amused them, and Sallenauve gave the colonel to 
 understand that he too would like to know what the fellow 
 was coming to. So the elector went on 
 
 " Then what I say is this, saving your presence, my dear 
 colonel, there was that girl of Jean Remy's and I will never 
 give him any peace, not even in hell, for my landmark was in 
 its right place and your experts were all wrong well, what 
 does the girl do ? There she leaves her father and mother, 
 and off she goes to Paris : what is she up to in Paris? Well, 
 I didn't go to see ; but if she doesn't scrape acquaintance 
 with a member of the Chamber, and at this day she has a 
 licensed tobacco store in the Rue Mouffetard, one of the 
 longest streets in Paris; whereas, if I should kick the bucket 
 to-day or to-morrow, there is my wife, the widow of a hard- 
 working man, crippled with rheumatism all along of sleeping 
 in the woods during the terror of 1815 and where's the 
 tobacco license she would get, I should like to know ! " 
 
 "But you are not dead yet," said one and another in reply
 
 248 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 to this wonderful record of service. And the colonel, to put 
 an end to this burlesque scene, gave the next turn to a little 
 pastrycook, a well-known Republican. 
 
 The new speaker asked Sallenauve in a high falsetto voice 
 this insidious question, which at Arcis indeed may be called 
 national. 
 
 " What, sir, is your opinion of Danton ? " 
 
 " Monsieur Dauphin," said the president, "I must be 
 allowed to point out to you that Danton is now a part of 
 history." 
 
 " The Pantheon of History, Monsieur le President, is the 
 proper term." 
 
 "Well, well! History, or the Pantheon of History 
 Danton seems to me to have nothing to do with the matter 
 in hand." 
 
 "Allow me, Mr. President," said Sallenauve. "Though 
 the question has apparently no direct bearing on the objects 
 of this meeting, still, in a town which still rings with the 
 fame of that illustrious name, I cannot shirk the opportunity 
 offered me for giving a proof of my impartiality and inde- 
 pendence by pronouncing on that great but unhappy man's 
 memory." 
 
 " Yes, yes ! hear, hear ! " cried the audience, almost unani- 
 mously. 
 
 "I am firmly convinced," Sallenauve went on, "that if 
 Danton had lived in times as calm and peaceful as ours, he 
 would have been as indeed he was a good husband, a good 
 father, a warm and faithful friend, an attaching and amiable 
 character, and that his remarkable talents would have raised 
 him to an eminent position in the State and in society." 
 
 " Hear, hear ! bravo ! capital ! " 
 
 "Born, on the contrary, at a period of great troubles, in 
 the midst of a storm of unchained and furious passions, Dan- 
 ton, of all men, was the one to blaze up in this atmosphere of 
 flame. Danton was a burning torch, and his crimson glow
 
 THE DEPUTY *OR ARCIS. 249 
 
 was only too apt for such scenes of blood and horror as I will 
 not now remind you of. 
 
 " But, it has been said, the independence of the nation had 
 to be saved ; traitors and sneaks had to be punished ; in short, 
 a sacrifice had to be consummated, terrible but necessary for 
 the requirements of public safety. Gentlemen, I do not ac- 
 cept this view of the matter. To kill wholesale, and, as has 
 been proved twenty times over, without any necessity to kill 
 unarmed men, women, and prisoners is under any hypothesis 
 an atrocious crime; those who ordered it, those who allowed 
 it, those who did the deed are to me included in one and the 
 same condemnation ! 
 
 "Still," he went on, "there are two possible sequels to a 
 crime committed and irreparable repentance and expiation. 
 Danton expressed his repentance not in words, he was too 
 proud for that he did better, he acted ; and at the sound of 
 the knife of the head-cutting machine, which was working 
 without pause or respite, at the risk of hastening his turn to 
 lose his own, he ventured to move for a Committee of Clem- 
 ency. It was an almost infallible way of inviting expiation, 
 and when the day of expiation came we all know that he did 
 not shrink ! By meeting his death as a reward for his brave 
 attempt to stay the tide of bloodshed, it may be said, gentle- 
 men, that Danton's figure and memory are purged of the 
 crimson stain that the terrible September had left upon them. 
 Cut off at the age thirty-five, flung to posterity, Danton dwells 
 in our memory as a man of powerful intellect, of fine private 
 virtues, and of more than one generous action these, then, 
 were himself; his frenzied crimes were but from the contagion 
 of the age. 
 
 " In short, in speaking of such a man as he was, the justice 
 is most unjust which is not tempered with large allowances 
 and, gentlemen, there is a woman who understood and pro- 
 nounced on Danton better than you or I, better than any 
 orator or historian the woman who, in a sublime spirit of 
 

 
 260 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 charity, said to the relentless, ' He is with God ! Let us pray 
 for the peace of his soul ! ' " 
 
 The snare thus avoided by this judicious allusion to Mother 
 Marie des Anges, the meeting seemed satisfied, and we might 
 fancy that the candidate was at the end of his examination. 
 The colonel was preparing to call for a show of hands when 
 several voters demurred, saying that there were still two mat- 
 ters requiring explanation by the nominee Sallenauve had 
 said that he would always stand in the way of any trickery 
 attempted by the sovereign authority against national institu- 
 tions. What were they to understand by resistance ; did he 
 mean armed resistance, riots, barricades? 
 
 "Barricades," said Sallenauve, "have always seemed to 
 me to be machines which turn and crush those who erected 
 them ; nay, we are bound to believe that it is in the nature of 
 a rebellion to serve, ultimately, the purpose of the Govern- 
 ment, since on every occasion the police is presently accused 
 of beginning it. The resistance I shall offer will always be 
 legal, and carried on by lawful means the press, speeches in 
 the Chamber, and patience the real strength of the oppressed 
 and vanquished." 
 
 If you knew Latin, madame, I would say: "In cauda vene- 
 num," that is to say, that the serpent's poison is in its tail 
 a statement of the ancients which modern science has failed 
 to confirm. 
 
 M. de 1'Estorade was not mistaken: Sallenauve's private 
 life was made a matter of prying inquiry ; and, under the 
 inspiration, no doubt, of Maxime, the virtuous Maxime, who 
 had flung out several hints through the journalist intrusted 
 with his noble plot, our friend was at last questioned as to the 
 handsome Italian he keeps "hidden" in his house in Paris. 
 When a body of men are assembled together, madame, as your 
 husband may have told you, they are like grown-up children, 
 who are only too glad to hear a long story
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 251 
 
 SALLENAUVE TO MADAME DE L'ESTORADE. 
 
 Seven o 1 clock in the evening. 
 
 MADAME: The rather abrupt manner of my leave-taking 
 when I bade you and M. de 1'Estorade farewell, that night 
 after our excursion to the College Henri IV., is by now quite 
 accounted for, no doubt, by the anxieties of every kind that 
 were agitating me ; Marie-Gaston, I know, has told you the 
 result. I must own that in the state of uneasy excitement in 
 which I then was, the belief which M. de 1'Estorade seemed 
 inclined to give to the scandal he spoke of caused me both 
 pain and surprise. "What," thought I to myself, "is it 
 possible that a man of so much moral and commonsense as 
 M. de 1'Estorade can a priori suppose me capable of loose 
 conduct, when on all points he sees me anxious to give my 
 life such gravity and respectability as may command esteem ? 
 And if he has such an opinion of my libertine habits, it would 
 be so Amazingly rash to admit me on a footing of intimacy in 
 his house with his wife, that his present politeness must be 
 essentially temporary and precarious." 
 
 As to M. de 1'Estorade, I was, I confess, nettled with him, 
 finding him so recklessly ready to echo a calumny against 
 which I thought he might have defended me, considering the 
 nature of the acquaintance we had formed, so to him I would 
 not condescend to explain : this I now withdraw, but at the 
 time it was the true expression of very keen annoyance. 
 
 The chances of an election contest have necessitated my 
 giving the explanation, in the first instance, to a public meet- 
 ing, and I have been so happy as to find that men in a mass 
 are more capable perhaps than singly of appreciating a gen- 
 erous impulse and the genuine ring of truth. I was called 
 upon, madame, under circumstances so unforeseen and so 
 strange as to trench yery nearly on the ridiculous, to make a 
 statement of almost incredible facts to an audience of a very 
 mixed character.
 
 252 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 This is my story, very much as I told it to my constituents 
 at their requisition 
 
 Some months before I left Rome, we received a visit 
 almost every evening in the cafe where the Academy pupils 
 are wont to meet from an Italian named Benedetto. He 
 called himself a musician, and was not at all a bad one ; but 
 we were warned that he was also a spy in the employment of 
 the Roman police, which accounted for his constant regularity 
 and his predilection for our company. At any rate, he was a 
 very amusing buffoon ; and as we cared not a straw for the 
 Roman police, we were more than tolerant of the fellow ; we 
 tempted him to frequent the place a matter of no great 
 difficulty, since he had a passion for zabajon, poncio spongato, 
 and spuma di latte. 
 
 One evening as he came in, he was asked by one of our 
 party who the woman was with whom he had been seen walk- 
 ing that morning. 
 
 "My wife, signer ! " said the Italian, swelling with p\ide. 
 
 " Yours, Benedetto ? You the husband of such a beauty ? " 
 
 " Certainly, by your leave, signor." 
 
 "What next ! You are stumpy, ugly, a toper. And it is 
 said that you are a police agent into the bargain ; she, on the 
 other hand, is as handsome as the huntress Diana." 
 
 "I charmed her by my musical gifts; she dies of love for 
 me." 
 
 "Well, then, if she is your wife, you ought to let her pose 
 for our friend Dorlange, who at this moment is meditating a 
 statue of Pandora. He will never find such another model." 
 
 " That may be managed," replied the Italian. 
 
 And he went off into the most amusing tomfoolery, which 
 made us all forget the suggestion that had been made. 
 
 I was in my studio next morning, and with me certain 
 painters and sculptors, my fellow-pupils, when Benedetto 
 came in, and with him a remarkably beautiful woman. I 
 need not describe her to you, madame ; you have seen her.
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR A I? CIS. 253 
 
 A cheer of delight hailed the Italian, who said, addressing 
 me: 
 
 " Ecco la Pandora /* Well, what do you think of her ? " 
 
 " She is beautiful ; but will she sit ? " 
 
 "Pooh! " was Benedetto's reply, as much as to say, "I 
 should like to see her refuse." 
 
 " But," said I, "so perfect a model will want high pay." 
 
 "No, the honor is enough. But you will make a bust of 
 me a terra-cotta head and make her a present of it." 
 
 " Well, then, gentlemen," said I to the others, " you will 
 have the goodness to leave us to ourselves." 
 
 No one heeded ; judging of the wife by the husband, all 
 the young scapegraces crowded rudely round the woman, 
 who, blushing, agitated, and scared by all these eyes, looked 
 rather like a caged panther baited by peasants at a fair. Bene- 
 detto went up and took her aside to explain to her in Italian 
 that the French signor wanted to take her likeness at full 
 length, and that she must dispense with her garments. She 
 gave him one fulminating look and made for the door. Bene- 
 detto rushed forward to stop her, while my companions the 
 virtuous brood of the studio barred the way. 
 
 A struggle began between the husband and wife ; but as I 
 saw that Benedetto was defending his side of the argument 
 with the greatest brutality, I flew into a passion ; with one 
 arm, for I am luckily pretty strong, I pushed the wretch off, 
 and turning to the youths with a determined air " Come," 
 said I, "let her pass! " I escorted the woman, still quiver- 
 ing with anger, to the door. She thanked me briefly in 
 Italian, and vanished without further hindrance. 
 
 On returning to Benedetto, who was gesticulating threats, 
 I told him to go, that his conduct was infamous, and that if 1 
 should hear that he had ill-treated his wife, he would have an 
 account to settle with me. 
 
 " Debate /" (idiot !) said the wretch with a shrug. 
 
 * Behold your Pandora.
 
 264 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S. 
 
 But he went, followed, as he had been welcomed, by a 
 cheer. 
 
 Some days elapsed. We saw no more of Benedetto, and at 
 first were rather uneasy. Some of us even tried to find him 
 in the Trastevere suburb, where he was known to live ; but 
 research in that district is not easy ; the French students are 
 in ill-odor with the Trasteverini, who always suspect them of 
 schemes to seduce their wives and daughters, and the men are 
 always ready with the knife. 
 
 By the end of the week no one, as you may suppose, ever 
 thought of the buffoon again. 
 
 Three days before I left Rome his wife came into my studio. 
 She could speak a little bad French. 
 
 " You go to Paris," said she. " I come to go with you." 
 
 " Go with me ? And your husband ? " 
 
 " Dead," said she calmly. 
 
 An idea flashed through my brain. 
 
 "And you killed him?" said I to the Trasteverina. She 
 nodded 
 
 " But I try to killed me too." 
 
 "How?" asked I. 
 
 "After he had so insult me," said she, "he came to our 
 house, he beat me like always, and then went out all day. 
 The night he came back and showed me a pistol -gun. I 
 snatch it away ; he is drunk ; I throw that briccone (wretch) on 
 bed; and he go to sleep. Then I stuff up the door and the 
 window, and I put much charcoal on a brasero, and I light it ; 
 and I have a great headache, and then I know nothing till the 
 next day. The neighbors have smell the charcoal, and have 
 make me alive again but he he is dead before." 
 
 "And the police?" 
 
 " The police know ; and that he had want to sell me to an 
 English. For that he had want to make me vile to you, then 
 I would not want to resist. The judge he tell me go quite 
 fight. So I have confess, and have absolution."
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 255 
 
 "But, cara mia, what can you do in France? lam not 
 rich as the English are." 
 
 A scornful smile passed over her beautiful face. 
 
 "I shall cost you nothing," said she. "On the contrary, 
 I shall save much money." 
 
 "How?" said I. 
 
 "I will be the model for your statues; yes, I am willing. 
 Benedetto used to say I was very well made and a very good 
 house-wife. If Benedetto would have agreed, we could have 
 lived happily, perche I have a talent too." 
 
 And taking down a guitar that hung in a corner of my 
 studio, she sang a bravura air, accompanying herself with im- 
 mense energy. 
 
 " In France," she said when it was finished, " I shall have 
 lessons and go on the stage, where I shall succeed that was 
 Benedetto's plan." 
 -"But why not go on the stage in Italy?" 
 
 "Since Benedetto died, I am in hiding; the Englishman 
 wants to carry me off. I mean to go to France ; as you see, I 
 have been learning French. If I stay here, it will be in the 
 Tiber." 
 
 M. de 1'Estorade will admit that by abandoning such a 
 character to its own devices, I might fear to be the cause of 
 some disaster, so I consented to allow Signora Luigia to 
 accompany me to Paris. I gave my housekeeper a singing 
 master, and she is now ready to appear in public. 
 
 In spite of her dreams of the stage, she is pious, as all 
 Italian women are ; she has joined the fraternity of the Virgin 
 at Saint-Sulpice, my parish church, and during the month of 
 Mary, now a few days old, the good woman who lets chairs 
 counts on a rich harvest from her fine singing. She attends 
 every service, confesses and communicates frequently ; and 
 her director, a highly respectable old priest, came to me lately 
 to beg that she might no longer serve as the model for my 
 statues, saying that she would never listen to his injunctions
 
 256 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 on the subject, fancying her honor pledged to me. I yielded, 
 of course, to his representations, all the more readily because 
 in the event of my being elected, as seems extremely probable, 
 I intend to part with this woman. In the more conspicuous 
 position which I shall then fill, she would be the object of 
 comments not less fatal to her reputation and prospects than 
 to my personal dignity. 
 
 I have spoken with Marie-Gaston of the difficulty I antici- 
 pate in the way of this separation. He fears it, Jie says, even 
 more than I. Hitherto, to this poor soul, Paris has been my 
 house, and the mere idea of being cast alone into the whirl- 
 pool which she has never even seen, is enough to terrify her. 
 One thing struck Marie-Gaston in this connection. He does 
 not think that the intervention of the confessor can be of any 
 use ; the girl, he says, would rebel against the sacrifice if she 
 thought it was imposed on her by rigorous devotion. 
 
 Marie-Gaston is of opinion that the intervention and coun- 
 sels of a person of her own sex, with a high reputation for 
 virtue and enlightenment, might in such a case be more effica- 
 cious, and he declares that I know a person answering to this 
 description, who, at our joint entreaty, would consent to under- 
 take this delicate negotiation. But, madame, I ask you what 
 apparent chance is there that this notion should be realized ? 
 The lady to whom Marie-Gaston alludes is to me an acquaint- 
 ance of yesterday ; and one would hardly undertake such a 
 task even for an old friend. I know you did me the honor 
 to say some little while since that some acquaintanceships 
 ripen fast. And Marie-Gaston added that the lady in question 
 was perfectly pious, perfectly kind, perfectly charitable, and 
 that the idea of being the patron saint of a poor deserted 
 creature might have some attractions for her. In short, 
 madame, on our return we propose to consult you, and you 
 will tell us whether it may be possible to ask for such valuable 
 assistance. 
 
 By this time to-morrow, madame, I shall have met with a
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 257 
 
 repulse which will send me back, once for all, to my work as 
 an artist, or I shall have rny foot set on a new path. Need I 
 tell you that I am anxious at the thought ? The effect of the 
 unknown, no doubt. 
 
 I had almost forgotten to tell you a great piece of news 
 which will be a protection to you against the ricochet of cer- 
 tain projectiles. I confided to Mother Marie des Anges of 
 whom Marie-Gaston had told you wonders all my suspicions 
 as to some violence having been used toward Mile. Lanty, 
 and she is sure that in the course of no very long time she 
 can discover the convent where Marianina is probably de- 
 tained. 
 
 MARIE-GASTON TO THE COMTESSE DE I/ESTORADE. 
 
 ARCIS-SUR-AUBE, May 13, 1839. 
 
 We have had a narrow escape, madame, while sleeping. 
 And those blundering rioters, of whose extraordinary out- 
 break we have news to-day by telegraph, for a moment im- 
 periled our success. No sooner was the news of the rising in 
 Paris yesterday known, through the bills posted by order of 
 the sub-prefect, than it was cleverly turned to account by the 
 ministerial party. 
 
 " Elect a democrat if you will ! " they cried on all sides, 
 "that his speeches may make the cartridges for insurgent 
 muskets ! " 
 
 This argument threw our phalanx into disorder and doubt. 
 Fortunately, as you may remember, a question not appar- 
 ently so directly to the point had been put to Sallenauve at 
 the preliminary meeting, and there was something prophetic 
 in his reply. 
 
 Jacques Bricheteau had the happy thought of getting a little 
 handbill printed and widely distributed forthwith : 
 
 17
 
 268 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 "A RIOT WITH HARD FIGHTING TOOK PLACE YESTERDAY 
 IN PARIS. 
 
 " Questioned as to such criminal and desperate methods of 
 opposition, one of our candidates, M. de Sallenauve, at the 
 very hour when those shots were being fired, was using these 
 very words "- followed by some of Sallenauve's speech, which 
 I reported to you. Then came, in large letters : 
 
 "THE RIOT WAS SUPPRESSED; WHO WILL BENEFIT BY IT?" 
 
 This little bill did wonders, and balked M. de Trailles' 
 supreme effort, though, throwing aside his incognito, he spent 
 the day speechifying in white gloves in the market-place and 
 at the door of the polling-room. 
 
 This evening the result is .known : Number of voters, 201. 
 
 Beauvisage .... 2 
 
 Simon Giguet .... 29 
 Sallenauve . . . .170 
 
 Consequently M. Charles de Sallenauve is elected 
 
 DEPUTY FOR ARCIS.
 
 PART III. 
 
 THE COMTE DE SALLENAUVE. 
 
 On the evening of the day following the election that had 
 ended so disastrously for his vanity, Maxime de Trailles re- 
 turned to Paris. 
 
 On seeing him make a hasty toilet and order his carriage as 
 soon as he reached home, it might have been supposed that 
 he was going to call on the Comte de Rastignac, minister of 
 Public Works, to give an account of his mission and explain 
 its failure ; but a more pressing interest seemed to claim his 
 attention. 
 
 " To Colonel Franchessini's," said he to the coachman. 
 
 When he reached the gate of one of the prettiest houses in 
 the Breda quarter, the concierge, to whom he nodded, gave 
 M. de Trailles the significant glance which conveyed that 
 "monsieur was within." And at the same moment the por- 
 ter's bell announced his arrival to the manservant who opened 
 the hall door. 
 
 " Is the colonel visible ? " said he. 
 
 " He has just gone in to speak to madame. Shall I tell 
 him you are here, Monsieur le Comte ?" 
 
 " No, you need not do that. I will wait in his study." 
 
 And, without requiring the man to lead the way, he went 
 on, as one familiar with the house, into a large room with 
 two windows opening on a level with the garden. This study, 
 like the Bologna lute included in the " Avare's " famous in- 
 ventory, was "fitted with all its strings, or nearly all;" in 
 other words, alt the articles of furniture which justified its 
 designation, such as a writing-table, bookcases, maps, and 
 globes, were there, supplemented by other and very hand- 
 some furniture ; but the colonel, an ardent sportsman, and 
 
 (259)
 
 -260 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 one of the most energetic members of the Jockey Club, had 
 by degrees allowed this sanctuary of learning and science to 
 be invaded by the appurtenances of the smoking-room, the 
 fencing-school, and the harness-room. Pipes and weapons of 
 every form, from every land, including the wild Indian's club, 
 saddles, hunting-crops, bits and stirrups of every pattern, fenc- 
 ing-masks, and boxing-gloves, lay in strange and disorderly 
 confusion. However, by thus surrounding himself with the 
 accessories of his favorite occupations and studies, the colonel 
 showed that he had the courage of his opinions. In fact, in 
 his opinion no reading was endurable for more than a quarter 
 of an hour, unless indeed it were the "Stud Journal." 
 
 It must be supposed, however, that politics had made their 
 way into his life, devoted as it was to the worship of muscular 
 development and equine science, for Maxime found strewn 
 on the floor most of the morning's papers, flung aside with 
 contempt when the colonel had looked them through. From 
 among the heap M. de Trailles picked up the " National," 
 and his eye at once fell on these lines, forming a short para- 
 graph on the front page 
 
 "Our side has secured a great success in the district of 
 Arcis-sur-Aube. In spite of the efforts of local functionaries, 
 supported by those of a special agent sent by the Government 
 to this imperiled outpost, the Committee is almost entirely 
 composed of the adherents of the most advanced Left. We 
 may therefore quite confidently predict the election to-morrow 
 of M. Dorlange, one of our most distinguished sculptors, a 
 man whom we have warmly recommended to the suffrages of 
 our readers. They will not be surprised at seeing him re- 
 turned, not under the name of Dorlange, but as Monsieur 
 Charles de Sallenauve. 
 
 " By an act of recognition, signed and witnessed on May 
 2d, at the office of Maitre Achille Pigonlt, notary at Arcis, 
 M. Dorlange is authorized to take and use the name of one of
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 261 
 
 the best families in Champagne, to which he did not till then 
 know that he belonged. But Dorlange or Sallenauve, the new 
 deputy is one of US, a fact of which the Government will 
 ere long be made aware in the Chamber." 
 
 Maxime tossed the sheet aside with petulant annoyance and 
 picked up another. This was an organ of the Legitimist party. 
 In it he read under the heading of Elections 
 
 "The staff of the National Guard and the Jockey Club, 
 who had several members in the last Chamber of Deputies, 
 have just sent one of their most brilliant notables to the 
 newly elected Parliament, of which the first session is about 
 to open. Colonel Franchessini, so well known for his zealous 
 prosecution of National Guards who shirk service, was elected 
 almost unanimously for one of the rotten boroughs of the 
 Civil List. It is supposed that he will take his seat with the 
 phalanx of the aides-de-camp, and that in the Chamber, as in 
 the office of the staff, he will be a firm and ardent supporter 
 of the policy of the status quo." 
 
 As Maxime got to the end of this paragraph the colonel 
 came in. 
 
 Colonel Franchessini, for a short time in the Imperial 
 army, had, under the Restoration, figured as a dashing officer; 
 but in consequence of some little clouds that had tarnished 
 the perfect brightness of his honor, he had been compelled 
 to resign his commission, so that in 1830 he was quite free to 
 devote himself with passionate ardor to the " dynasty of July." 
 He had not, however, reentered the service, because, not long 
 after his little misadventure, he had found great consolation 
 from an immensely rich Englishwoman who had allowed her- 
 self to be captivated by his handsome face and figure, at that 
 time worthy of Antinous, and had annexed him as her hus- 
 band. He had ultimately resumed his epaulettes as a member
 
 262 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 of the staff of the citizen militia. He had revealed himself in 
 that position as the most turbulent and contentious of swash- 
 bucklers, and by the aid of the extensive connections secured 
 to him by his wealth and this influential position, he had now 
 pushed his way the news was correct into a seat in the 
 Chamber. 
 
 "Well, Maxime," said he, holding out a hand to his ex- 
 pectant visitor, " from where in the devil do you come? We 
 have not seen a sign of you at the club for more than this 
 fortnight past." 
 
 "Whither have I come?" repeated Monsieur de Trailles. 
 "I will tell you. But first let me congratulate you." 
 
 "Yes," said the colonel afrily, "they took it into their 
 heads to elect me. On my word, I am very innocent of it 
 all ; if no one had worked any harder for it than I " 
 
 "My dear fellow, you are a man of gold for any district, 
 and if only the voters I have had to deal with had been equally 
 intelligent " 
 
 "What, have you been standing for a place? But from the 
 state the somewhat entangled state of your finances I did 
 not think you were in a position " 
 
 " No ; and I was not working on my own account. Ras- 
 tignac was worried about the voting in Arcis-sur-Aube, and 
 asked me to spend a few days there." 
 
 " Arcis-sur-Aube ! But, my dear fellow, if I remember 
 rightly some article I was reading this morning in one of those 
 rags, they are making a shocking bad choice some plaster- 
 cast maker, an image-cutter, whom they propose to send up 
 to us?" 
 
 "Just so, and it is about that rascally business that I came 
 to consult you. I have not been two hours in Paris, and I 
 shall see Rastignac only as I leave this." 
 
 "He is getting on famously, that little minister ! " said the 
 colonel, interrupting the skillful modulation through which 
 Maxime by every word had quietly tended to the object of
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 263 
 
 his visit. " He is very much liked at the Ch&teau. Do you 
 know that little Nucingen girl he married?" 
 
 "Yes, I often see Rastignac; he is a very old friend of 
 mine." 
 
 " She is a pretty little thing," the colonel went on. " Very 
 pretty ; and when the first year of matrimony is dead and 
 buried, I fancy that a rnild charge in that quarter might be 
 ventured on with some hope of success." 
 
 "Come, come!" said Maxime, "a man of position like 
 you, a legislator ! Why, after merely stirring the electoral 
 pot for somebody else, I have come back quite a settled and 
 reformed character." 
 
 " Then you went to Arcis-sur-Aube to hinder the election 
 of this hewer of stone?" 
 
 " Not at all; I went there to scotch the wheels of a Left 
 Centre candidate." 
 
 " Pooh ! I am not sure that it is not as bad as the Left 
 out and out. But take a cigar ; I have some good ones there 
 the same as the princes smoke." 
 
 Maxime would have gained nothing by refusing, for the 
 colonel had already risen to ring for his valet, to whom he 
 merely said : "Lights." 
 
 " At first everything was going splendidly. To oust the 
 candidate who had scared the ministry a lawyer, the very 
 worst kind of vermin I disinterred a retired hosier, the 
 mayor of the town, idiot enough for anything, whom I per- 
 suaded to come forward. This worthy was convinced that 
 he, like his opponent, belonged to the Opposition. That is 
 the prevalent opinion in the whole district at the present 
 time, so that the election, by my judicious manoeuvring, was 
 as good as won. And our man once safe in Paris, the great 
 wizard at the Tuileries would have spoken three words to 
 him, and this rabid antagonist, turned inside out like a stock- 
 ing of his own making, would have been anything we 
 wished."
 
 CGI THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 " Well played," said the colonel ; " I see the hand of my 
 Maxime in it all." 
 
 "You will see it yet plainer when he tells you that in this 
 little arrangement, without taking toll from his employers, he 
 expected to turn an honest penny. To engraft on that dull 
 stock some sort of parliamentary ambition, I had to begin by 
 making myself agreeable to his wife, a not unpalatable country 
 matron, though a little past the prime " 
 
 "Yes, yes; very good " said Franchessini. "The 
 
 husband a deputy satisfied ?" 
 
 " You are not near it, my dear fellow. There is a daughter 
 in the house, an only child, very much spoilt, nineteen? nice- 
 looking, and with something like a million francs of her 
 own." 
 
 " But, my dear Maxime, I passed by your tailor's yesterday 
 and your coachmaker's, and I saw no illuminations." 
 
 " They would, I am sorry to say, have been premature. 
 But so matters stood : the two ladies crazy to make a move to 
 Paris ; full of overflowing gratitude to the man who could 
 get them there through the door of the Palais Bourbon ; the 
 girl possessed with the idea of being a countess ; the mother 
 transported at the notion of holding a political drawing-room 
 you see all the obvious openings that the situation afforded, 
 and you know me well enough to believe that I was not 
 behindhand to avail myself of such possibilities when once I 
 had discerned them." 
 
 "I am quite easy on that score," said the colonel, as he 
 opened a window to let out some of the cigar smoke that by 
 this time was filling the room. 
 
 " So I was fully prepared," Maxime went on, " to swallow 
 the damsel and the fortune as soon as I had made up my mind 
 to leap plump into this mesalliance ; when, falling from the 
 clouds, or to be accurate, shot up from underground, the gen- 
 tlemen with two names, of whom you read in the ' National ' 
 this morning, suddenly came on the scene."
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 265 
 
 "By the way," said the colonel, "what may this act of 
 recognition be which enables a man to take a name he had 
 never heard of only a day since? " 
 
 " The recognition of a natural son in the presence of a 
 notary. It is perfectly legal." 
 
 "Then our gentleman is of the interesting tribe of the 
 nameless? Yes, yes, those rascals often have great luck. I 
 am .not at all surprised that this one should have cut the 
 ground from under your feet." 
 
 " If we were living in the Middle Ages," said Maxime, "I 
 should account for the unhorsing of my man and the success 
 of this fellow by magic and witchcraft ; for he will, I fear, be 
 your colleague. How can you account for the fact that an 
 old tricoteuse, formerly a friend of Danton's, and now the 
 mother superior of an Ursuline convent, with the help of a 
 nephew, an obscure Paris organist whom she brought out as 
 the masculine figurehead of her scheme, should have hood- 
 winked a whole constituency to such a point that this stranger 
 actually polled an imposing majority?" 
 
 "Well, but some one knew him, I suppose?" 
 
 "Not a soul, unless it were this old hypocrite. Till the 
 moment of his arrival he had no fortune, no connections not 
 even a father ! While he was taking his boots off he was 
 made heaven knows how the proprietor of a fine estate. 
 Then, in quite the same vein, a gentleman supposed to be a 
 native of the place, from which he had absented himself for 
 many years, presented himself with this ingenious schemer in 
 a notary's office, acknowledged him post-haste as his son, and 
 vanished again in the course of the night, no one knowing by 
 which road he went. This trick having come off all right, 
 the Ursuline and her ally launched their nominee; republi- 
 cans, legitimists, and conservatives, the clergy, the nobility, 
 the middle-classes one and all, as if bound by a spell cast 
 over the whole land, came round to this favorite of the old 
 nun-witch ; and, but for the sacred battalion of officials who,
 
 266 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S. 
 
 under my eye, put a bold face on the matter, and did not 
 break up, there was nothing to hinder his being returned 
 unanimously, as you were." 
 
 "And so, my poor friend, farewell to the fortune?" 
 
 "Well, not so bad as that. But everything is put off. 
 The father complains that the blissful peace of his existence 
 is broken, that he has been made quite ridiculous when the 
 poor man is so utterly ridiculous to begin with. The daughter 
 would still like to be a countess, but the mother cannot make 
 up her mind to see her political drawing-room carried down 
 stream ; God knows to what lengths I may have to go in con- 
 solation ! Then I myself am worried by the need for coming 
 to an early solution of the problem. There I was there was 
 the girl I should have gotten married ; I should have taken 
 a year to settle my affairs, and then by next session I should 
 have made my respectable father-in-law resign, and have 
 stepped into his seat in the Chamber. You see what a horizon 
 lay before me." 
 
 "But, my dear fellow, apart from the political horizon, 
 that million must not be allowed to slip." 
 
 "Oh, well, so far as that goes, I am easy; it is only post- 
 poned. My good people are coming to Paris. After the re- 
 pulse they have sustained, Arcis is no longer a possible home 
 for them. Beauvisage particularly I apologize for the name, 
 but it is that of my fair one's family Beauvisage, like Corio- 
 lanus, is ready to put the ungrateful province to fire and sword. 
 And indeed the hapless exiles will have a place here to lay 
 their heads, for they are the owners, if you please, of the 
 Hotel Beausdant." 
 
 "Owners of the Hotel Beauseant ! " cried the colonel in 
 amazement." 
 
 " Yes, indeed ; and, after all Beauseant Beauvisage ; only 
 the end of the name needs a change. My dear fellow, you 
 have no idea of what these country fortunes mount up to, 
 accumulated sou by sou, especially when the omnipotence of
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 267 
 
 thrift is supported by the incessant suction of the leech we call 
 trade ! We must make the best of it ; the middle-classes are 
 rising steadily like a tide, and it is really very kind of them 
 to buy our houses and lands instead of cutting off our heads, 
 as they did in '93 to get them for nothing." 
 
 " But you, my dear Maxime, have reduced your houses and 
 lands to the simplest expression." 
 
 " No- since, as you perceive, I am thinking of reinstating 
 myself." 
 
 "The Hotel Beauseant! I remember it well; it was quite a 
 royal residence," said the colonel. 
 
 "Happily, everything has been completely spoilt. It was 
 let for years to some English people, and now extensive 
 repairs are needed. This is a capital bond between me and 
 my country friends, for without me they have no idea how to 
 set to work. It is understood that I am to be director-general 
 of the works ; but I have promised my future mother-in-law 
 another thing, and I need your assistance, my dear fellow, to 
 enable me to perform it." 
 
 "You do not want a license for her to sell tobacco and 
 stamps?" 
 
 "No, nothing so difficult as that. These confounded 
 women, when they are possessed by a spirit of hatred or 
 revenge, have really wonderful instinct ; and Madame Beau- 
 visage, who roars like a lioness at the mere name cf Dor- 
 lange, has taken it into her head that there must be some 
 dirty intrigue wriggling at the bottom of his incomprehensible 
 success. It is quite certain that the apparition and disappear- 
 ance of this ' American ' father give grounds for very odd 
 surmises; and it is quite possible that if we pressed the button, 
 the organist, who is said to have taken entire charge of this 
 interesting bastard's education, and to know the secret of his 
 parentage, might afford the most unexpected revelations. 
 
 " And thinking of this, I remembered a man over whom you 
 have, I fancy, considerable influence, and who in this ' Dor-
 
 268 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 lange hunt ' may be of great use to us. You recollect the 
 robbery of Jenny Cadine's jewels, which she lamented so 
 bitterly one evening when supping with you at V6ry's?" 
 
 "Yes," said the colonel, "I remember very well. My 
 audacity was lucky. But I may tell you frankly, that with 
 more time for thought, I should not have dealt so cavalierly 
 with Monsieur de Saint-Esteve. He is a man to be ap- 
 proached with respect." 
 
 " Bless me ! Why, is not he a retired criminal who has 
 served his time on the hulks, and whose release you helped to 
 obtain who must have for you some such veneration as 
 Fieschi showed to one of his protectors? " 
 
 " Very true. Monsieur de Saint-Esteve, like his prede- 
 cessor Bibi-Lupin, has had his troubles. But he is now at the 
 head of the criminal police, with very important functions 
 that he fulfills with remarkable address. If this were a matter 
 strictly within his department, I should not hesitate to give 
 you an introduction ; but the affair of which you speak is a 
 delicate business, and first and foremost I must feel my way 
 to ascertain whether he will even discuss it with you." 
 
 " Oh, I fancied he was entirely at your commands. Say 
 no more about it if there is any difficulty." 
 
 " The chief difficulty is that I never see him. I cannot, of 
 course, write him about such a thing ; I lack opportunity 
 the chance of a meeting. But why not apply to Rastignac, 
 who would simply order him to take steps? " 
 
 " Rastignac, as you may understand, will not give me a 
 very good reception. I had promised to succeed, and I have 
 come back a failure; he will regard this side-issue as one of 
 those empty dreams a man clutches at to conceal a defeat." 
 
 "I will do my best for you, only it will take time," said 
 the colonel, rising. 
 
 Maxime had paid a long visit, and took the hint to cut it 
 short ; he took leave with a shade of coolness, which did no* 
 particularly disturb the colonel.
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 269 
 
 As soon as Monsieur de Trailles was gone, Franchessini 
 took the knave of spades out of a pack of cards, and cut the 
 figure out from the background. Placed between two thick 
 folds of letter-paper, he tucked it into an envelope, which he 
 addressed in a feigned hand to Monsieur de Saint-Esteve, 
 Petite Rue Sainte-Anne, Pres du Quai des Orfevres. 
 
 This done, he rang, countermanded his carriage, which he 
 had ordered before Maxime's visit, and, setting out on foot, 
 mailed the securely sealed strange missive with his own hand 
 in the first letter-box he came to. 
 
 At the close of the elections, which were now over, the 
 Government, against all expectations, still had a majority in 
 the Chamber, but a problematical and provisional majority, 
 promising but a struggling and sickly existence to the Ministry 
 in power. Still, it had won the numerical success which is 
 held to be satisfactory by men who wish to remain in office 
 at any price. Every voice in the Ministerial camp was raised 
 in a Te Deum, which as often serves to celebrate a doubtful 
 defeat as an undoubted victory. 
 
 Madame de 1'Estorade, who was too much taken up by her 
 children to be very punctual in her social duties, had long 
 owed Madame de Rastignac a visit in return fey that paid by 
 the minister's wife on the evening when the sculptor, now 
 promoted to be deputy, had dined there after the famous oc- 
 casion of the statuette, as related by her to Madame Octave 
 de Camps. Monsieur de 1'Estorade, a zealous Conservative, 
 as we know, had insisted that, on a day when politics and 
 politeness were both on the same side, his wife should dis- 
 charge this debt already of long standing. Madame de 1'Es- 
 torade had gone early to have done with the task as soon as 
 possible, and so found herself at the upper end of the group 
 of seated ladies ; while the men stood about, talking. Her 
 chair was next to Madame de Rastignac, who sat nearest to 
 the fire. At official receptions this is usual, a sort of guide to
 
 270 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 the new-comers who know where to go at once to make their 
 bow to the lady of the house. 
 
 But Madame de 1'Estorade's hopes of curtailing her visit 
 had not taken due account of the fascinations of conversation 
 in which, on such an occasion, her husband w?.s certain to be 
 involved. 
 
 Monsieur de 1'Estorade, though no great orator, was influ- 
 ential in the Upper Chamber, and regarded as a man of great 
 foresight and accurate judgment ; and at every step he took 
 as he moved round the rooms, he was stopped either by some 
 political bigwig or by some magnate of finance, of diplomacy, 
 or merely of the business world, and eagerly invited to give 
 his opinion on the prospects of the opening session. 
 
 Monsieur de 1'Estorade talked so long and so well that at 
 last the drawing-room was almost empty, and only a small 
 circle was left of intimate friends, gathered round his wife 
 and Madame de Rastignac. The minister himself, as he re- 
 turned from seeing off the last of his guests to whose impor- 
 tance such an attention was due, rescued Monsieur de 1'Estor- 
 ade from the clutches as he thought somewhat perilous of a 
 Wurtemberg baron, the mysterious agent of some Northern 
 Power, who, helped by his orders and his gibberish, had the 
 knack of acquiring rather more information about any given 
 matter than his interlocutor intended to give him. 
 
 Hooking his arm confidentially through that of the guileless 
 Monsieur de 1'Estorade, who was lending a gullible ear to the 
 trans-Rhenish rhodomontade in which the wily Teuton care- 
 fully wrapped up the curiosity he dared not frankly avow 
 
 "That man, you know, is a mere nobody," said Rastignac, 
 as the foreigner made him a humbly obsequious bow. 
 
 " He does not talk badly," replied Monsieur de 1'Estorade. 
 " If it were not for his villainous accent " 
 
 " That, on the contrary, is his strong point, as it is Nucin- 
 gen's, my father-in-law. With their way of mutilating the 
 French language, and always seeming to be in the clouds,
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 271 
 
 these Germans have the cleverest way of worming out a 
 secret " 
 
 As they joined the group about Madame de Rastignac 
 
 "Madame," said the minister to the countess, "I have 
 brought you back your husband, having caught him red- 
 handed in ' criminal conversation ' with a man from the 
 Zollverein, who would probably not have released him this 
 night." 
 
 " I was about to ask Madame de Rastignac if she could 
 give me a bed,' to set her free at any rate, for Monsieur de 
 1'Estorade's interminable conversations have hindered me 
 from leaving her at liberty." 
 
 "Oh, my dear!" cried Rastignac. "The session will 
 open immediately; pray give yourself no scornful airs to the 
 elect representatives of the nation ! Beside, you will get into 
 Madame de 1'Estorade's black books. One of our newly 
 made sovereigns is, I am told, high in her good graces." 
 
 "In mine?" said Madame de 1'Estorade with a look of 
 surprise, and she colored a little. 
 
 "To be sure! quite true," said Madame de Rastignac. 
 " I had quite forgotten that artist who, on the last occasion 
 of my seeing you at your own house, was cutting out such 
 charming silhouettes for your children, in a corner. I must 
 own that I was then far from supposing that he would become 
 one of our masters." 
 
 "But even then he was talked of as a candidate," replied 
 Madame de 1'Estorade ; " though, to be sure, it was not taken 
 very seriously." 
 
 "Quite seriously by me," said Monsieur de 1'Estorade, 
 eager to add a stripe to his reputation as a prophet. " From 
 the very first talk on political matters that I had with our 
 candidate, I expressed my astonishment at his breadth of 
 view Monsieur de Ronquerolles is my witness." 
 
 "Certainly," said this gentleman, "he is no ordinary 
 youth ; still, I do not build much on his future career. He
 
 272 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 is a man of impulse, and, as Monsieur de Talleyrand well ob- 
 served, the first impulse is always the best." 
 
 "Well, then, monsieur ! " said Madame de 1'Estorade in- 
 nocently. 
 
 "Well, madame," replied Monsieur de Ronquerolles, who 
 piqued himself on skepticism, "heroism is out of date; it is 
 a desperately heavy and clumsy outfit, and sinks the wearer 
 on every road." 
 
 "And yet I should have supposed that great qualities of 
 heart and mind had something to do with the composition of 
 a man of mark." 
 
 " Qualities of mind, yes you are right there ; but even so, 
 on condition of their tendency in a certain direction. But 
 qualities of heart of what use, I ask you, can they be in a 
 political career? To hoist you on to stilts on which you walk 
 far less firmly than on your feet, off which you tumble at the 
 first push and break your neck." 
 
 "Whence we must conclude," said Madame de Rastignac, 
 laughing, while her friend preserved a disdainful silence, 
 " that the political world is peopled with good-for-noth- 
 ings." 
 
 " That is very near the truth, madame ; ask ' Lazarille ! ' 
 And with this allusion to a pleasantry that is still famous on 
 the stage, Monsieur de Ronquerolles laid his hand familiarly 
 on the minister's shoulder. 
 
 " In my opinion, my dear fellow, your generalizations are 
 rather too particular," said Rastignac. 
 
 "Nay," said Monsieur de Ronquerolles, "come now; let 
 us be serious. To my knowledge, this Monsieur de Sallenauve 
 the name he has assumed, I believe, instead of Dorlange, 
 which he himself said frankly enough was a name for the 
 stage has committed two very handsome deeds within a 
 short time. In my presence, aiding and abetting, he was 
 within an ace of being killed by the Due de Rhetore for a 
 few unpleasant remarks made on one of his friends."
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 273 
 
 Before the other " handsome deed " could be brought into 
 the discussion, at the risk of seeming rude by interrupting the 
 course of the argument, Madame de 1'Estorade rose and gave 
 her husband an imperceptible nod to signify that she wished 
 to leave. 
 
 Monsieur de 1'Estorade took advantage of the slightness 
 of the signal to ignore it, and remained immovable. Mon- 
 sieur de Ronquerolles went on 
 
 " His other achievement was to fling himself under the feet 
 of some runaway horses and snatch Madame de 1'Estorade' s 
 little daughter from certain death." 
 
 Everybody looked at Madame de 1'Estorade, who this time 
 blushed crimson ; but at the same instant she found words, 
 feeling that she must by some means keep her countenance, 
 and she said with some spirit 
 
 " It would seem, monsieur, that you wish to convey that 
 Monsieur de Sallenauve was a great fool for his pains, since 
 he risked his life, and would thus have cut short all his 
 chances in the future. I may tell you, however, that there is 
 one woman whom you would hardly persuade to share that 
 opinion and that is my child's mother." 
 
 As she spoke, Madame de 1'Estorade was almost in tears. 
 She warmly shook hands with Madame de Rastignac, and so 
 emphatically made a move, that this time she got her fixture 
 of a husband under way. 
 
 Madame de Rastignac, as she went with her friend to the 
 drawing-room door, spoke in an undertone 
 
 "I really thank you," said she, "for having boldly held 
 your own against that cynic. Monsieur de Rastignac has 
 some unpleasant allies left from his bachelor days." 
 
 As she returned to her seat, Monsieur de Ronquerolles was 
 speaking 
 
 "Aha," said he, "these life-preservers! Poor 1'Estorade 
 is, in fact, as yellow as a lemon ! " 
 
 "Indeed, monsieur, you are atrocious ! " said Madame de 
 18
 
 274 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 Rastignac indignantly. "A woman whom calumny has 
 never dared to blight, who lives solely for her husband and 
 children, and who has tears in her eyes at the mere remote 
 recollection of the danger that threatened one of them ! " 
 
 "Bless me, madame," said Monsieur de Ronquerolles, 
 heedless of this little lecture, " I can only tell you that your 
 Newfoundland dog is a dangerous and unwholesome breed. 
 After all, if Madame de 1'Estorade should think herself too 
 seriously compromised, she has always this to fall back on 
 she can get him to marry the girl he saved." 
 
 Monsieur de Ronquerolles had no sooner spoken than he 
 was conscious of the hideous blunder he had made by uttering 
 such a speech in Augusta de Nucingen's drawing-room. It 
 was his turn to redden though he had lost the habit of it, 
 and deep silence, which seemed to enfold him, put the crown- 
 ing touch to his embarrassment. 
 
 " That clock is surely slow," said Rastignac, to make some 
 sound of whatever words, and also to put an end to a sitting 
 at which speech was so luckless. 
 
 "It is indeed," said Monsieur de Ronquerolles, after look- 
 ing at his watch. " Just on a quarter-past twelve " the hour 
 was half-past eleven. 
 
 He bowed formally to the mistress of the house, and went, 
 as did the rest of the company. 
 
 "You saw how distressed he was," said Rastignac to his 
 wife, as soon as they were alone. " He was a thousand miles 
 away from any malicious intent." 
 
 " No matter ; as I was saying just now to Madame de 1'Es- 
 torade, your bachelor life has left you heir to some odious 
 acquaintances." 
 
 " But, my dear child, the King is civil every day to people 
 he would be only too glad to lock up in the bastille, if there 
 still were a bastille, and the Charter would allow it." 
 
 Madame de Rastignac made no reply; she went up to her 
 room without saying good-night.
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 275 
 
 Not long after, the minister tapped at a side-door of the 
 room, and finding it locked 
 
 "Augusta," said he, in the voice which the most ordinary 
 bourgeois of the Rue Saint-Denis would have adopted under 
 similar circumstances. 
 
 The only answer he heard was a bolt shot inside. 
 
 " There are some things in the past," said he to himself, 
 with much annoyance, "that are quite unlike that door 
 they always stand wide open on the present. 
 
 "Augusta," he began again, " I wanted to ask you at what 
 hour I might find Madame de 1'Estorade at home. I mean 
 to call on her to-morrow after what has happened " 
 
 "At four o'clock," the lady called back, "when she comes 
 in from the Tuileries, where she always walks with the chil- 
 dren." 
 
 One of the questions which had been most frequently mooted 
 in the world of fashion since Madame de Rastignac's marriage 
 was this : " Does Augusta love her husband ? " 
 
 Doubt was allowable ; Mademoiselle de Nucingen's mar- 
 riage had been the ill-favored and not very moral result of an 
 intimacy such as is apt to react on the daughter's life when it 
 has lasted in the mother's till the course of years and long 
 staleness have brought it to a state of atrophy and paralysis. 
 In such unions, where love is to be transferred to the next 
 generation, the husband is usually more than willing, for he 
 is released from joys that have turned rancid, and avails him- 
 self of a bargain like that offered by the magician in the 
 "Arabian Nights" to exchange old lamps for new. But the 
 wife is in the precisely opposite predicament ; between her 
 and her husband there stands an ever-present memory which 
 may come to life again. Even apart from the dominion of 
 the senses, she must be conscious of an older power antagonistic 
 to her newer influence ; must she not almost always be a vic- 
 tim, and can she be supposed to feel impassioned devotion to 
 the maternal leavings ? Rastignac had stood waiting outside
 
 276 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 the door tor about as long as it has taken to give this brief 
 analysis of a not uncommon conjugal situation. 
 
 "Well, good-night, Augusta," said he, preparing to depart. 
 
 As he piteously took his leave, the door was suddenly opened, 
 and his wife, throwing herself into his arms, laid her head on 
 his shoulder, sobbing. 
 
 The question was answered : Madame de Rastignac loved 
 her husband. And yet the distant murmuring of a nice little 
 hell might be heard under the flowers of this paradise. 
 
 Rastignac was less punctual than usual next morning ; and 
 by the time he went into his private office, the anteroom be- 
 yond was already occupied by seven applicants armed with 
 letters of introduction, beside two peers and seven members 
 of the Lower Chamber. 
 
 A bell rang sharply, and the usher, with such agitation as 
 proved contagious among the visitors, hurried into the min- 
 ister's room. A moment later he reappeared with the stereo- 
 typed apology 
 
 "The minister is called to attend a Council. He will, 
 however, have the honor of receiving the deputies of the 
 Upper and Lower Chambers. The rest of the gentlemen are 
 requested to call again." 
 
 "But when again?" asked one of the postponed victims. 
 "This is the third time I have called within three days, and 
 all for nothing." 
 
 The usher shrugged his shoulders, as much as to say, 
 "That is no fault of mine; I only obey orders." However, 
 hearing some murmurs as to the privilege accorded to the 
 honorable deputies 
 
 " Those gentlemen," said he, with some pomposity, " come 
 to discuss matters of public interests." 
 
 The visitors having been paid in this false coin, the bell 
 rang again, and the usher put on his most affable smile. 
 
 " Whom shall I have the honor of announcing first?"
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 277 
 
 "Gentlemen," said Colonel Franchessini, "I believe I 
 have seen you all come in ? " 
 
 And he went toward the door which the usher threw open, 
 announcing in a loud, distinct voice 
 
 "Monsieur le Colonel Franchessini." 
 
 " Ah, a good beginning this morning ! " said the minister, 
 going forward a few steps and holding out his hand. " What 
 do you want of me, my dear fellow ? A railway, a canal, a 
 suspension bridge ? " 
 
 " I have come, my dear friend, to trouble you about a little 
 private affair a matter that concerns both you and me?" 
 
 "That is not the happiest way of urging the question, for 
 I must tell you plainly I hold no good recommendation to 
 myself." 
 
 "You have had a visitor lately?" said the colonel, pro- 
 teeding to the point. 
 
 " A visitor ? Dozens. I always have." 
 
 "Yes. But on the evening of Sunday the i2th the day 
 of the riot?" 
 
 " Ah ! now I know what you mean. But the man is going 
 mad." 
 
 " Do you think so^ " said the colonel dubiously. 
 
 "Well, what am I to think of a sort of visionary who 
 makes his way in here under favor of the relaxed vigilance 
 which in a Ministerial residence always follows on musket- 
 firing in the streets ; who proceeds to tell me that the Govern- 
 ment is undermined by the Republican party, at the very 
 moment when the staff-officers of the National Guard assure 
 me that we have not had even a skirmish ; and who finally 
 suggests that he is himself the only man who can insure the 
 future safety of the dynasty ? " 
 
 " So that you did not welcome him very cordially?" 
 
 "So that I soon showed him out, and rather peremptorily, 
 in spite of his persistency. At any time, and under any cir- 
 cumstances, he is a visitor I could never find agreeable ; but
 
 278 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 when, on my pointing out to him that he holds a post for 
 which he is admirably fitted, and which he fills with the greatest 
 skill, so that it must be the utmost limit of his ambition, the 
 maniac replies that unless his services are accepted France is 
 on the brink of a precipice, you may suppose I had but one 
 thing to say namely, that we hope to save it without his 
 help." 
 
 " Well, it is done ! " said the colonel. "But now, if you 
 will allow me to explain matters " 
 
 The minister, sitting at his table with his back to the fire, 
 leaned round to look at the clock. 
 
 "Look here, my dear fellow," said he, after seeing what 
 the time was, " I have a suspicion that you will not be brief, 
 and there is a hungry pack waiting outside that door ; even if 
 I could give you time, I could not listen properly. Be so 
 kind as to go for an airing till noon, and come back to break- 
 fast." 
 
 "That will suit me perfectly," said the colonel, leaving. 
 As he crossed the waiting-room 
 
 "Well, gentlemen," said he, "I have not kept you long, 
 have I?" 
 
 He shook hands with one and another, and went away. 
 
 Three hours later, when the colonel appeared in Madame 
 de Rastignac's drawing-room where he was introduced to 
 her he found there Nucingen, the minister's father-in-law, 
 who came almost every day to breakfast there on his way to 
 the Bourse; Emile Blondet, of the "Debats;" Messrs. 
 Moreau (de 1'Oise), Dionis, and Camusot, three fierce Con- 
 servative members ; and two of the newly elect, whose names 
 it is not certain that Rastignac himself knew. Franchessini 
 also recognized Martial de la Roche-Hugon, the minister's 
 brother-in-law ; the inevitable des Lupeaulx, a peer of France ; 
 and a third figure, who talked for a long time with Rastignac 
 in a window recess. He, Emile Blondet explained in reply 
 to the colonel's inquiries, was a former functionary of the
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S. 279 
 
 secret police, who still carried on his profession as an amateur, 
 making the round of all the Government offices every morn- 
 ing, under every ministry, with as much zeal and punctuality 
 as if it still were his duty. 
 
 Madame de Rastignac, seen close, was fair but not lym- 
 phatic. She was strikingly like her mother, but with the 
 shade of greater elegance, which in parvenu families grows 
 from generation to generation as they get farther from the 
 source. The last drop of the- original Goriot seemed to have 
 evaporated in this lovely young woman, who was especially 
 distinguished by the fine hands and feet, which show breed- 
 ing, and of which the absence in Madame de Nucingen, in 
 spite of her beauty, had always stamped her so distressingly 
 as the vermicelli-maker's daughter. 
 
 The colonel, as a man who might subsequently have ideas 
 of his own, showed repressed eagerness in his attentions to 
 Madame de Rastignac, with the gallantry, now rather out of 
 date, which seems addressed to Woman rather than to the in- 
 dividual woman ; idle men alone, especially if they have been 
 soldiers, seem to preserve a reflection of this condition. The 
 colonel, whose successes in the boudoir had been many, knew 
 that this distant method of preparing the approaches is a very 
 effective strategy in besieging a place. 
 
 The colonel, as he meant to be asked to the house again, 
 took care to speak of his wife. " She lived," he said, " very 
 much in the old English way, in her old home ; but he would 
 be happy to drag her out of her habitual retirement to intro- 
 duce her to a lady of such distinguished merit as Madame de 
 Rastignac, if indeed she would allow him to bring her. In 
 spite of a wide difference in age between his wife and his 
 friend the minister's, they would find, he thought, one happy 
 point of contact in a similar zeal for good works." 
 
 In fact, Franchessini had hardly entered the room when he 
 found himself obliged to take from Madame de Rastignac a 
 ticket for a ball of which she was a lady patroness, to be got
 
 280 THE DEPUTY FOR ARMS. 
 
 up for the benefit of the victims of the recent earthquake m' 
 Martinique. 
 
 It was the fashion then among women to display in such 
 acts of charity an audacity beyond all bounds; now, as it 
 happened, Madame Franchessini was an Irishwoman of great 
 piety, who spent in good works most of her spare time after 
 superintending the management of her house, and a large 
 part of the sums she reserved for her own use apart from her 
 husband's. So the offer of an intimacy with a woman who 
 would be so ready to give her money and her exertions when 
 needed for a creche, or infant schools, or children orphaned 
 by the cholera, was a really skillful stroke of diplomacy ; and 
 it shows that the sportsman in the colonel had not altogether 
 killed the faculty of foresight. 
 
 Breakfast over, the guests left or withdrew to the drawing- 
 room ; and Franchessini, who had sat at Madame de Rastig- 
 nac's right hand, continued his conversation with her. 
 
 " Now for you and me, my friend ! " said Rastignac to the 
 colonel, and they went into the garden. 
 
 "I, less fortunate than you," said Franchessini, taking up 
 his story at the point where it had been interrupted a few 
 hours previously, " have kept up communications with the 
 man we spoke of not constant, indeed ; but a sort of evil 
 concatenation of contact. To avoid ever having him in my 
 house, we agreed that whenever he wanted to speak to me he 
 should write to me without any signature and tell me where 
 to meet him. In the almost impossible event of my wishing 
 to see him, I was to send a playing-card figure cut out to his 
 den in the Rue Sainte-Anne, and he would notify the spot 
 where we might meet undisturbed. He may be trusted for a 
 clever choice of a suitable place; no man knows his Paris 
 better, or the ways of moving about underground" 
 
 "High political qualifications!" said Rastignac sarcasti- 
 cally. 
 
 "I tell you the whole truth, you see," replied the colonel,
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARClS. 28 1 
 
 "to prove to you that, in my opinion, this is a man to be 
 treated with respect ; and, at the same time, that you may not 
 suppose that I am showing you a mere phantasmagoria with a 
 view to persuading .you into doing a thing quite contrary to 
 your first intentions." 
 
 "Pray go on," said Rastignac, pausing to gather a full- 
 blown China rose by way, perhaps, of showing his perfect 
 openness oi mind. 
 
 " On the evening of the very day when you had given him 
 so rough a reception, and my election was already known by 
 telegraph and announced in an evening paper, I received a 
 note from him, a thing that had not happened for the last 
 eighteen months very short and concise : ' To-morrow 
 morning, six o'clock Redoute de Clignancourt.' ' 
 
 "Like a challenge," observed Rastignac. 
 
 "The man whom you call a visionary," Franchessini went 
 on, "was, when I joined him, sitting on a knoll, his head 
 between his hands. When he heard me, and as I went close 
 to him, he rose in a state of high excitement, took me by the 
 hand, led me to the spot very little altered where the duel 
 took place, and in the strident voice you know so well : 
 ' What did you do here, nearly five-and-twenty years ago ? ' 
 said he. 'A thing,' said I, 'of which, 'pon my honor, I 
 repent.' 'And I too. And for whom?' As I made no 
 reply, he went on ' For a man whose fortune I wanted to 
 make. You killed the brother to please me, that the sister 
 might be a rich heiress for him to marry ' ): 
 
 "But it was all done without my knowledge," Rastignac 
 hastily put in; " and I did everything in my power to prevent 
 it." 
 
 "So I told him," said the colonel, "and he paid no heed 
 to the remark, but only grew more frantic, exclaiming: 'Well, 
 and when I go to that man's house, not to ask him a favor, 
 but to offer him my services, he shows me the door ! And 
 does he think I am going to overlook it ?' " 
 
 K
 
 282 THE DEPUTY FOX ARCIS. 
 
 "He is remarkably touchy," said Rastignac quietly. "I 
 did not show him the door. I only rather roughly cut short 
 his boasting and exaggeration." 
 
 "He then went on," said the colonel, "to relate his in- 
 terview with you the previous evening ; the proposal he had 
 made to give up his place in the criminal police in favor of a 
 post as superintendent far more needed, in his opinion of 
 political .malefactors. 'I am sick,' said he, 'of liming twigs 
 to catch thieves, such an idiotic kind of game-bird that all 
 their tricks are stale to me. And, then, what interest can I 
 find in nabbing men who would steal a silver mug or a few 
 bank-notes, when there are others only waiting for a chance 
 to grab at the crown ? ' ' 
 
 "Very true," said Rastignac, with a smile, "if it were not 
 for the National Guard, and the army, and the two Chambers, 
 and the King who can ride." 
 
 "He added," said Franchessini, "that he was not appre- 
 ciated, and, with a reminiscence of the lingo of the past, that 
 he was fagged out over mere child's play ; that he had in him 
 very powerful qualities adapted to shine in a higher sphere ; 
 that he had trained a man to take his place ; that I must 
 positively see and talk to you ; and that now I was a member, 
 I had a right to speak and impress on you the possible results 
 of a refusal." 
 
 "My dear fellow," said Rastignac decisively, " I can but 
 say, as I did at the beginning of our conversation, the man is 
 a lunatic, and I have never been afraid of a madman, whether 
 a cheerful or a furious one." 
 
 " I do not deny that I myself saw great difficulties in the 
 way of satisfying his demand. However, I tried to soothe 
 him by promising to see you, pointing out to him that noth- 
 ing could be done in a hurry ; and in point of fact, but for an 
 accessory circumstance, I should probably not have mentioned 
 the matter for some long time to come." 
 
 "And that circumstance ?" asked the minister.
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC2S. 2g3 
 
 "Yesterday morning," replied the colonel, "I had a visit 
 from Maxime, who had just returned from Arcis-sur-Aube ' ' 
 
 " I know," said Rastignac. " He mentioned the matter to 
 me an idea devoid of commonsense. Either the man on 
 whom he wants to set your bloodhound is good for something 
 or he is not. If he is not, it is perfectly useless to employ 
 a dangerous and suspected instrument to destroy the thing 
 that does not exist. If, on the other hand, we have to do 
 with a good man in the right place, he has, on the platform 
 of the Chamber, and in the newspapers, every means, not 
 only of parrying such blows as we may be able to strike with 
 muffled swords, but of turning them against ourselves. Take 
 it as a general rule, in a country like ours, crazy for publicity, 
 wherever the hand of the police is seen, even if it were to 
 unveil the basest turpitude, you maybe sure that there will be 
 an outcry against the Government. Opinion in such a case 
 behaves like the man to whom some one sang an air by Mozart 
 to prove how great a composer he was. The hearer, conquered 
 by the evidence, said at last to the singer: 'Well, Mozart 
 may be a great musician, but you, my good friend, may con- 
 gratulate yourself on having a great cold ! ' ' 
 
 "Indeed, there is much truth in your remark," said Fran- 
 chessini. "Still, the man Maxime wants to unmask can only 
 be of respectable mediocrity ; and without being able to lunge 
 with such force as you suppose, he may nevertheless tease you 
 a good deal." 
 
 " I expect to ascertain the true worth of your new colleague 
 ere long from a quarter where I may count on better informa- 
 tion than Monsieur de Trailles can command. On this occa- 
 sion he has let himself in, and is trying to make up for lack 
 of skill by vehemence. As to your incubus whom I should 
 not, in any case, employ to carry out Maxime's dream as he 
 seems not altogether useless, at least from the point of riew 
 of your connection with him, just to give him an answer I 
 should say "
 
 284 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 " Well, what ? " said Franchessini, with increased attention. 
 
 " I should tell him that, quite apart from his criminal ex- 
 perience, which, as soon as he heads the political ranks, might 
 expose him to serious outrages that would recoil on us, there 
 are in his past life some very ugly records " 
 
 "But records only," replied Franchessini. "For you un- 
 derstand that when he ventured into your presence it was, so 
 to speak, in a new skin." 
 
 "I know all," said Rastignac. "You do not suppose that 
 he is the only police spy in Paris. After his visit I made in- 
 quiries, and I heard that since 1830, when he was placed at 
 the head of his department, he had lived a middle-class life of 
 the strictest respectability ; the only fault I have to find with 
 it is that it is too perfect a disguise:" 
 
 "Nevertheless " said the colonel. 
 
 "He is rich," Rastignac went on; "his salary is twelve 
 thousand francs a year from the Government ; with three 
 hundred thousand he inherited from Lucien de Rubempre, 
 and the profits from a patent-leather factory which he has 
 near Gentilly, and which is paying very well. His aunt, 
 Jacqueline Collin, who keeps house with him, still dabbles in 
 certain dirty jobs, from which, of course, she derives large 
 profits ; and I have strong reason to believe that they have 
 both gambled successfully on the Bourse. 
 
 "Now all this, my dear colonel, is too bucolic to lead up 
 to the superintendence of the political police. Let him bestir 
 himself a little this old ' Germeuil ' fling a little money 
 about, give some dinners ! Why, the executioner could get 
 men to dine with him if he wished it." 
 
 "I quite agree with you," said Franchessini. "I think 
 that he keeps himself too much curled up for fear of attracting 
 notice." 
 
 "Tell him, on the contrary, to uncurl ; and, since he wants 
 to have a finger in public business, he should find some credit- 
 able opportunity for being talked about. Does he fancy that,
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 285 
 
 hide in what corner he will, the press will not know where to 
 find him? Let him do as the niggers do; they do not try to 
 wash themselves white, but they have a passion for bright 
 colors, and dress in scarlet coats covered with gold braid. I 
 know what I should do in his place : to appear thoroughly 
 cleaned, I should take up with some actress, some one very 
 notorious, conspicuous, before the public. I do not say that 
 I would ruin myself, but I would seem to ruin myself for her, 
 with all the airs of one of those frenzied passions for which the 
 public is always indulgent, if not sympathetic. I should dis- 
 play all my luxury on this idol's account ; people would come, 
 not to my house, but to hers. Then, thanks to my mistress, 
 I should be endured at my own table, and by degrees I should 
 make a connection. 
 
 "All this, my dear fellow, will not, of course, make him a 
 Saint- Vincent de Paul though he too had been on the gal- 
 leys but it would get him classed among the third or fourth- 
 rate notabilities a man possible to deal with. The road thus 
 laid, Monsieur de Saint-Esteve might prove 'negotiable;' 
 and if he then came to me, and I were still in power, I might 
 be able to listen to him. 
 
 "But at any rate," added Rastignac, going up the steps to 
 return to the drawing-room, "make him clearly understand 
 that he misinterpreted my way of receiving him. That even- 
 ing I was naturally absorbed in anxious reflections." 
 
 " Be quite easy," said Franchessini, " I will talk to him in 
 the right way; for, as I must repeat, he is not a man to drive 
 to extremities ; there have been incidents in our past which 
 cannot be wiped out." 
 
 And as the minister made no reply, it was sufficiently ob- 
 vious that he appreciated the observation at its true value. 
 
 " You will be here for the King's -speech, I hope," said 
 Rastignac to the colonel ; " we want to work up a little en- 
 thusiasm." 
 
 Franchessini, before leaving, asked Madame de Rastignac
 
 286 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCJS. 
 
 to name a day when he might have the honor of bringing 
 his wife to call. 
 
 "Any day," replied Augusta, "but more especially any 
 Friday." 
 
 At the hour when Rastignac, by his wife's instructions,! 
 thought himself sure to find Madame de 1'Estorade, he did 
 not fail to call. Like all who had been present at the little 
 scene to which Monsieur de Ronquerolles' remarks had given 
 rise, the minister had been struck by the countess' agitation ; 
 and without concerning himself to gauge the nature or deptli 
 of her feelings toward the man who had saved her child, he 
 was convinced that she was at least greatly interested by him. 
 
 The unexpected feat of winning his election attracted the 
 attention of the Government to Sallenauve, all the more be- 
 cause at first his nomination had hardly been taken seriously. 
 Rastignac, while affecting to discard with vehemence the idea 
 of an attack from that side, in his own mind did not alto- 
 gtther renounce the possibility of using means which he fore- 
 saw would be difficult to handle ; he would fall back on them 
 only if it were obviously necessary. - In this state of things 
 Madame de 1'Estorade might be useful in two ways : through 
 her it seemed easy to arrange an accidental meeting with the 
 new deputy, so as to study him at ease and ascertain whether 
 there were any single point at which he might prove accessible 
 to terms. 
 
 And all this would follow naturally from the step the min- 
 ister was now taking. By seeming to call on purpose to 
 apologize for Monsieur de Ronquerolles' mode of speech, he 
 would allude in the most natural manner possible to the man 
 who had been the occasion and the object of it ; and the con- 
 versation once started on these lines, he must be clumsy in- 
 deed if he could not achieve one or the other, or possibly 
 both, of the results he aimed at. 
 
 Monsieur dc Rastignac's plan of action was, however,
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 287 
 
 destined to be modified. The servant, who happened to be 
 speaking to the gatekeeper, had just informed the visitor that 
 Madame de 1'Estorade was not at home, when Monsieur de 
 1'Estorade came in on foot, and, seeing the minister's carriage, 
 rushed forward. However well a man may stand with the 
 world, it always seems a pity to dismiss a visitor of such im- 
 portance ; and the accountant-general was not the man to 
 resign himself to such a misfortune without a struggle. 
 
 "But my wife will soon be in," he insisted as he saw his 
 house threatened with the loss of such a piece of food-fortune. 
 "She is gone to Ville d'Avray with her daughter and Mon- 
 sieur and Madame Octave de Camps. Monsieur Marie- 
 Gaston, a great friend of ours the charming poet, you know, 
 who married Louise de Chaulieu has a house there, where his 
 wife died. He has never till now set foot in it since that 
 misfortune. " 
 
 "But in that case Madame de 1'Estorade's visit may last 
 till late," said Rastignac. "It was to her, and not to you, 
 my dear count, that I came to offer my apologies for the little 
 scene last evening, which seemed to annoy her a good deal. 
 Will you kindly express to her from me " 
 
 " I will stake my head on it, my dear sir, that by the time 
 you turn the street corner, my wife will be here; she is 
 absolutely punctual in everything she does, and to me it is 
 simply miraculous that she should be even a few minutes 
 late." 
 
 Seeing him so bent on detaining him, Rastignac feared to 
 be disobliging, and made up his mind to be dragged out of 
 his carriage, and await the countess' return in her drawing- 
 room ; for, often enough, for less than this a faithful voter has 
 been lost. 
 
 "So Madame Octave de Camps is in Paris?" said he, for 
 the sake of saying something. 
 
 " Yes, she made her appearance unexpectedly without letting 
 my wife know, though they are in constant correspondence.
 
 288 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 Her husband has, I think, some request to make to you. You 
 have not seen him?" 
 
 " No ; but I think I remember seeing his card." 
 
 " It is some mining business he is projecting ; and as I 
 have your ear, allow me to tell you something about it." 
 
 "Excuse my interrupting you," said he, "we will return 
 to the subject; but at this moment I am in some uneasiness." 
 
 "How is that?" 
 
 "Your friend Sallenauve's election has made a devil of a 
 rumpus. The King was speaking of him to me this morning, 
 and he was not particularly delighted when I communicated 
 to him the opinion you expressed only last evening as to our 
 new adversary." 
 
 "Bless me! But, as you know, the tribune is a rock on 
 which many a ready-made reputation is wrecked. And I am 
 sorry too that you should have spoken of Sallenauve to the 
 King as a friend of ours. It is not I who direct the elections. 
 You should appeal to the minister of the Interior. I can only 
 say that I tried fifty ways to hinder the tiresome man from 
 standing." 
 
 " But you must see that the King can owe you no grudge 
 because you happen to know a candidate so absolutely un- 
 dreamed of " 
 
 " No. But last evening in your own drawing-room you 
 remarked to my wife that she seemed greatly interested in 
 him. I could not contradict before others, because it is 
 monstrous to deny knowledge of a man to whom we lie under 
 so serious an obligation. But, in fact, my wife especially has 
 felt that obligation a burden since the day when he went off to 
 stand for election. We have decided to quietly drop him." 
 
 "Not, I hope," interrupted Rastignac, "before you have 
 done rne the service I came to ask." 
 
 "At your service, my dear minister, whatever it may be." 
 
 " To plunge in head foremost, then : before seeing this man 
 in the Chamber I want to take his measure, and for that pur
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 289 
 
 pose I want to meet him To invite him to dine with us 
 would be useless ; under the eye of his party he would nut 
 dare to accept, even if he wished. Beside, he would be on 
 his guard, and I should not see him as he is. But if we came 
 across each other by chance, I should find him, as it were, in 
 undress, and could feel my way to discover if he has a weak 
 spot." 
 
 " If I asked him to meet you at dinner here, there would 
 be the same difficulty. Supposing I were to find out some 
 evening that he intended to call, and sent you word in the 
 course of the day? " 
 
 " We should be too small a party," said Rastignac, " and 
 then a separate conversation between two is hard to manage ; 
 the meeting is so intimate that any tte-a-t$te betrays the 
 aggravating circumstance of premeditated arrangement " 
 
 " Stay ! " cried Monsieur de 1'Estorade, " I have a bright 
 idea .-" 
 
 "If the idea is really bright," thought the minister, "I 
 shall have gained by not finding the lady in, for she certainly 
 would not have been so particularly anxious to help in carry- 
 ing out my wishes." 
 
 "One day soon," 1'Estorade went on, "we are giving a 
 little party, a children's dance. It is a treat my wife, tired 
 of refusing, has promised our little girl, in fact, as a festival 
 to celebrate our joy at still having her with us. The Pre- 
 server, as you perceive, is an integral and indispensable item, 
 and I think I may promise you noise enough to enable you to 
 take your man aside without any difficulty, while at a party of 
 that kind premeditation can hardly be suspected." 
 
 "The idea is certainly a good one probability alone is 
 wanting." 
 
 "Probability?" 
 
 " Certainly. You forget that I have been married scarcely 
 a vear, and that I have no contingent to account for my 
 presence that evening among your party." 
 19
 
 290 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS, 
 
 "That is true. I had not thought of that." 
 
 "But let me consider," said the minister. " Among your 
 guests will there be the little Roche-Hugons? " 
 
 "No doubt; the children of a man I should esteem most 
 highly even if he had not the honor of so near a relationship 
 to you." 
 
 "Well, then, all is plain sailing. My wife will come with 
 her sister-in-law, Madame de la Roche-Hugon, to see her 
 nieces dancing nothing is more complimentary on such 
 occasions than to drop in without the formality of an invita- 
 tion ; and I, without saying anything to my wife, am gallant 
 enough to come to take her home." 
 
 " Admirable! " said Monsieur de 1'Estorade, " and we by 
 this little drama gain the delightful reality of your presence 
 here ! " 
 
 " You are too kind," said Rastignac, shaking hands cordi- 
 ally. " But I believe it will be well to say nothing to Madame 
 de 1'Estorade. Our puritan, if he got wind of the plan, is 
 the man to stay away. It will be better that I should pounce 
 on him unexpectedly like a tiger on its prey." 
 
 " Quite so. A surprise for everybody ! " 
 
 " Then I am off," said Rastignac, " for fear I should drop 
 a word to Madame de 1'Estorade. I shall be able to amuse 
 the King to-morrow by telling him of our little plot and the 
 education of children to be political go-betweens." 
 
 " Well, well," said Monsieur de 1'Estorade philosophically, 
 " is not this the whole history of life : great effects from small 
 causes ? ' ' 
 
 Rastignac had only just left when Madame de 1'Estorade, 
 her daughter Na'is, and her friends Monsieur and Madame 
 Octave de Camps came into the drawing-room where the con- 
 spiracy had been laid against the new deputy's independence 
 a plot here recorded at some length as a specimen of the 
 thousand-and-one trivialities to which a constitutional minister 
 not infrequently has to attend.
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARClS. 29l 
 
 "And do you not smell the scent of a minister here?" 
 said Monsieur de 1'Estorade. 
 
 " Not such a very delicious scent, I am sure," replied Mon- 
 sieur de Camps, who, as a Legitimist, belonged to the Oppo- 
 sition. 
 
 " That is a matter of taste," said the peer. " My dear," 
 he went on, addressing his wife, " you have come so late that 
 you have missed a distinguished visitor." 
 
 "Who is that?" the countess asked indifferently. 
 
 " The minister of Public Works, who came to offer you an 
 apology. He had noted with regret the unpleasant impres- 
 sion made upon you by the theories put forward by that 
 wretch of a Ronquerolles." 
 
 "That is disturbing himself fora very small matter," re- 
 plied Madame de 1'Estorade, who was far from sharing her 
 husband's excitement. 
 
 "At any rate," replied he, " it was very polite of him to 
 have noticed the matter." 
 
 Madame de 1'Estorade, without seeming to care much, 
 asked what had passed in the course of the visit. 
 
 "We discussed indifferent subjects," said Monsieur de 
 1'Estorade craftily. " However, I took the opportunity of 
 getting a word in on the subject of Monsieur de Camps' 
 business." 
 
 "Much obliged," said Octave, with a bow. "If only 
 you could have persuaded the gentleman to grant me a sight 
 of his private secretary, who is as invisible as himself, be- 
 tween them they might arrange to give me an interview." 
 
 "You must not be annoyed with him," said Monsieur de 
 1'Estorade. " Though his office is not strictly political, Ras- 
 tignac has, of course, been much taken up with election 
 matters. Now that he is freer, we will, if you like, call on 
 him together one morning." 
 
 " I hesitate to trouble you about a matter that ought to go 
 smoothly of itself; I am not asking a favor. I never will ask
 
 292 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 one of this Government ; but since Monsieur de Rastignac is 
 the dragon in charge of the metallic treasures of the soil, 
 I am bound to go through the regular channel and apply to 
 him." 
 
 " We can settle all that, and I have started the thing in 
 the right direction," replied Monsieur de 1'Estorade. 
 
 Then, to change the conversation, he said to Madame de 
 Camps 
 
 " Well, and the chalet, is it really such a marvel? " 
 
 "Oh," said Madame Octave, "it is a fascinating place; 
 you can have no idea of such elegant perfection and such ideal 
 comfort." 
 
 " And Marie-Gaston ? " asked Monsieur de 1'Estorade, much 
 as Orgon asks, "And Tartuffe?" but with far less anxious 
 curiosity. 
 
 " He was I will not say quite calm," replied Madame de 
 1'Estorade, " but certainly quite master of himself. His be- 
 havior was all the more satisfactory because the day began 
 with a serious disappointment." 
 
 " What happened? " asked Monsieur de 1'Estorade. 
 
 " Monsieur de Sallenauve could not come with him," cried 
 NaTs, making it her business to reply. 
 
 She was one of those children, brought up in a hot-house, 
 who intervene rather oftener than they ought in matters that 
 are discussed in their presence. 
 
 "NaTs," said her mother, "go and ask Mary to put your 
 hair up." 
 
 The child perfectly understood that she was sent away to 
 her English nurse for having spoken out of season, and she 
 went off with a little pout. 
 
 "This morning," said Madame de 1'Estorade, as soon as 
 Na'is had closed the door, " Monsieur Marie-Gaston and Mon- 
 sieur de Sallenauve were to have set out together for Ville- 
 d'Avray, to receive us there, as had been arranged ; last even- 
 ing they had a visit from the organist who was so active in
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 293 
 
 promoting Monsieur de Sallenauve's election he came to 
 hear the Italian housekeeper sirig and decide as to whether she 
 were fit to appear in public." 
 
 "To be sure!" said Monsieur de 1'Estorade. "Now we 
 have ceased to make statues, we must quarter her somewhere ! " 
 
 "As you say," answered his wife, rather tartly. "Mon- 
 sieur de Sallenauve, to silence slander, was anxious to enable 
 her to follow out her own idea of going on the stage ; but he 
 wished first to have the opinion of a judge who is said to be 
 remarkably competent. The two gentlemen "went with the 
 organist to Saint-Sulpice, where the handsome Italian sings 
 every evening in the services for the month of Mary. After 
 hearing her ' That contralto has at least sixty thousand francs 
 in her throat ! ' the organist remarked." 
 
 "Just the income I derive from my forges!" remarked 
 Octave de Camps. 
 
 "On returning home," Madame de 1'Estorade went on, 
 " Monsieur de Sallenauve told his housekeeper of the opinion 
 pronounced on her performance, and with the utmost circum- 
 spection he insinuated that she must now soon be thinking of 
 making her living, as she had always intended. ' Yes, I think 
 the time is come,' said Signora Luigia. Then she closed the 
 conversation, saying, ' We will speak of it again.' This morn- 
 ing at breakfast they were much surprised at having seen 
 nothing of the signora, who was habitually an early riser. 
 Fancying she must be ill, Monsieur de Sallenauve sent a 
 woman who comes to do the coarser cleaning to knock at her 
 door. No answer. More and more anxious, the two gentle- 
 men went themselves to find out what was happening. 
 
 "After knocking and calling in vain, they determined to 
 turn the key and go in. In the room nobody ; but instead, 
 a letter addressed to Monsieur de Sallenauve. In this letter 
 the Italian said that, knowing herself to be in his way, she 
 was retiiing to the house of a woman she knew, and thanked 
 him for all his kindness to her."
 
 294 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 " The bird had felt its wings ! " said Monsieur de 1'Estor- 
 ade. "It had flown away." 
 
 "That was not Monsieur de Sallenauve's idea," said the 
 countess. " He does not for an instant suspect her of an im- 
 pulse of ingratitude. Before explaining to the meeting of 
 voters the relation in which they stood, Monsieur de Salle- 
 nauve, having ascertained that he would be questioned about 
 it, had with great delicacy written asking her whether this 
 public avowal would not be too painful to her. She replied 
 that she left it entirely to him. At the same time, he no- 
 ticed on his return that she was out of spirits, and treated him 
 with more than usual formality ; whence he now concludes 
 that, fancying herself a burden to him, in one of those fits of 
 folly and temper of which she is peculiarly capable, she has 
 thought it incumbent on her to leave his house without allow- 
 ing him in any way to concern himself with providing for her 
 in the future." 
 
 " Well, well," said Monsieur de 1'Estorade, " luck go with 
 her! A good riddance." 
 
 "Neither Monsieur de Sallenauve nor Monsieur Marie- 
 Gaston takes such a stoical view of the matter. Knowing the 
 woman's determined and headstrong nature, they fear lest she 
 should have laid violent hands on her life an idea which her 
 previous history justifies. Or else they fear that she has been 
 ill advised." 
 
 " I adhere to my opinion," replied Monsieur de 1'Estorade. 
 "And in spite of immaculate virtue on both sides, I maintain 
 that he has been caught by her." 
 
 "At any rate," remarked Madame de 1'Estorade, empha- 
 sizing the word, " it does not seem that she has been caught." 
 
 "1 do not agree with you," said Madame de Camps. 
 "Flying from a person is more than often a proof of very 
 true love." 
 
 Madame de 1'Estorade looked at her friend with some 
 vexation, and a faint color flushed her cheeks. But this no
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 295 
 
 one noticed, the servant having thrown the double doors open 
 and announced that dinner was served. 
 
 After dinner, they proposed to go to the play ; it is one of 
 the amusements that Parisians most miss in the country; and 
 Monsieur Octave de Camps, whose odious ironworks, as 
 Madame de 1'Estorade called them, had made him a sort of 
 " Wild Man of the Woods," had come to town eager for this 
 diversion, for which his wife, a serious and stay-at-home 
 woman, was far from sharing his taste. 
 
 So when Monsieur de Camps spoke of going to the Porte 
 Saint-Martin to see a fairy piece that was attracting all Paris, 
 his wife replied 
 
 " Neither I nor Madame de 1'Estorade have any wish to go 
 out. We are very tired with our expedition, and will give up 
 our places to NaTs and Rene, who will enjoy the marvels of 
 the 'Rose-fairy' far more than we should." 
 
 The two children awaited the ratification of this plan with 
 such anxiety as may be imagined. Their mother made no 
 objection ; and thus, a few minutes later, the two ladies, who 
 since Madame de Camps' arrival in Paris had not once been 
 able to escape from their surroundings for a single chat, found 
 themselves left to an evening of confidential talk. 
 
 "Not at home to anybody," said Madame de 1'Estorade to 
 Lucas, when the party were fairly off. 
 
 Then, taking as her starting-point the last words spoken by 
 Madame de Camps before dinner 
 
 "You really have, my dear friend," said she, "a stock of 
 the sharpest little arrows, which go as straight to their mark 
 as so many darts." 
 
 " Now that we are alone," replied Madame Octave, " I am 
 going to deal you blows with a bludgeon ; for, as you may 
 suppose, I have not traveled two hundred leagues and aban- 
 doned the care of our business, which Monsieur de Camps 
 has trained me to manage very competently when he is absent, 
 only to tell you sugared truths."
 
 296 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 " I am willing to hear anything from you," said Madame 
 de 1'Estorade, pressing her friend's hand her dear conscience- 
 keeper, as she called her. 
 
 "Your last letter simply frightened me." 
 
 ' ' Why ? Because I myself told. you that this man frightened 
 me, and that I would find some means of keeping him at a 
 distance? " 
 
 " Yes. Until then I had doubted what my advice ought to 
 be ; but from that moment I became so uneasy about you, that 
 in spite of all Monsieur de Camps' objections to my making 
 the journey, I was determined to come and here I am." 
 
 " But, I assure you, I do not understand " 
 
 "Well, supposing Monsieur de Camps, Monsieur Marie- 
 Gaston or even Monsieur de Rastignac, though his visits 
 intoxicate your husband with delight were either of them to 
 get into the habit of regular calling, would it disturb you as 
 much?" 
 
 " No, certainly not ; but neither of these men has any 
 such claim on me as this man has." 
 
 "Do you believe, tell me truly, that Monsieur de Salle- 
 nauve is in love with you?" . 
 
 " No. I believe, I am perfectly certain, that he is not ; 
 but I also believe that on my part " 
 
 " We will come to that presently. What I want to know 
 now is whether you wish that Monsieur de Sallenauve should 
 fall in love with you?" 
 
 "God forbid?" 
 
 " Well, an excellent way of drawing him to your heel is to 
 hurt his conceit, to be unjust and ungrateful to compel him, 
 in short, to think about you." 
 
 "But is not that a rather far-fetched notion, my'dear?" 
 
 " Why, my dear child, have you never observed that men, 
 if they have any subtlety of feeling, are more readily caught 
 by severity than by softness; that we plant ourselves most 
 solidly in their minds by a stern attitude ; that they are very
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 287 
 
 like those little lap-dogs, who never want to bite till you 
 snatch away your hand? " 
 
 " If that were the case, every man we scorn and never even 
 think of glancing at would be a lover ! " 
 
 " Now, my dear, do not put nonsense into my mouth. 
 Though he may not love you, he loves your semblance; and, 
 as you said the other day, wittily enough, what is there to 
 prevent him, now that the other is evidently lost beyond 
 recall, from a ricochet into love for you? " 
 
 " But, on the contrary, he has better hopes than ever of 
 finding the lady, by the help of a very clever seeker who is 
 making inquiry." 
 
 " Well and good ; but supposing he should not find her for 
 a long time to come, are you to spend the time in getting him 
 on your hands?" 
 
 " Dear Dame Morality, I do not at all accept your theory, 
 at any rate so far as he is concerned : he will be very busy ; 
 he will be far more devoted to the Chamber than to me ; he is 
 a man of high self-respect, who would be disgusted by such 
 mean behavior on my part, and think it supremely unjust and 
 ungrateful ; and if I try to put two feet of distance between 
 us, he will put four, you may be quite certain." 
 
 "But you, my dear?" said her friend. 
 
 "How I?" 
 
 " Yes you who are not so busy, who have not the Chamber 
 to absorb you, who have I will allow plenty of self-respect, 
 but who know as much about affairs of the heart as a school- 
 girl or a wet-nurse what is to become of you under the per- 
 ilous regimen you propose to follow?" 
 
 "I! If I do not love him when I see him, I shall still 
 less love him when he is absent." 
 
 "So that if you found hinv accepting this ostracism with 
 indifference, your woman's pride would not be in the least 
 shocked?" 
 
 " Of course not ; it is that at which I aim."
 
 298 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 "And Na'fs, who dreams only of him, and who will say even 
 more emphatically than on the day when he first dined with 
 you : ' How well he talks, mamma ! ' " 
 
 " Oh ! if you take a child's silly chatter into account " 
 
 "And Monsieur de 1'Estorade, who annoys you already 
 when, in his blind devotion to party spirit, he utters some ill- 
 natured insinuation about Monsieur de Sallenauve will you 
 silence him on every occasion when he is perpetually talking 
 about this man, denying his talents, his public spirit? You 
 know the verdict men always pronounce on those who do not 
 agree with their opinions." 
 
 "In short," said Madame de 1'Estorade, "you mean to say 
 that I shall never be so much tempted to think of him as when 
 he has gone quite out of my ken ? " 
 
 " What has happened to you once, my dear, when he fol- 
 lowed you about, and his sudden disappearance surprised you, 
 like the silence when a drum that has been deafening you for 
 an hour on end abruptly stops its clatter." 
 
 '' In that there was reason. His absence upset a plan." 
 
 "Listen to me, my dear," said Madame de Camps gravely; 
 "I have read and re-read your letters. In them you were 
 more natural and less argumentative ; and they left me one 
 clear impression that Monsieur Sallenauve had certainly 
 touched your heart if he had not invaded it." 
 
 At a gesture of denial from Madame de 1'Estorade, her 
 strenuous Mentor went on 
 
 " I know you have fortified yourself against such a notion. 
 And how could you admit to me what you have so carefully 
 concealed from yourself? But the thing that is, is. You 
 cannot feel the magnetic influence of a man ; you cannot be 
 aware of his gaze even without meeting his eye ; you cannot 
 exclaim, 'You see, madame, I am invulnerable to love,' with- 
 out having been more or less hit already." 
 
 "But so many things have happened since I wrote those 
 preposterous things ! "
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. . 299 
 
 " It is true, he was only a sculptor, and now, in the course 
 of time, he may possibly be in the Ministry, like I will not 
 say Monsieur de Rastignac, for that is not saying much, but 
 like Canalis the great poet." 
 
 -"I like a sermon to have some conclusion," said Madame 
 de 1'Estorade pettishly. 
 
 "You say to me," replied Madame de Camps, ''exactly 
 what Vergniaud said to Robespierre on the 3ist of May, for 
 in the solitude of our wilderness I have been reading the his- 
 tory of the French Revolution ; and I reply in Robespierre's 
 words, ' Yes, I am coming to the conclusion ' a conclusion 
 against your pride as a woman, who having reached the age of 
 two-and-thirty without suspecting what love might be even in 
 married life, cannot admit that at so advanced an age she 
 should yield to the universal law; against the memory of 
 all your sermons to Louise de Chaulieu, proving to her that 
 there is no misfortune so great as a passion that captures the 
 heart very much as if you were to argue that an inflammation 
 of the lungs was the worst imprudence a sick man could 
 commit ; against your appalling ignorance, which conceives 
 that merely saying '/ will not ' in a resolute tone is stronger 
 than an inclination complicated by a concurrence of circum- 
 stances from which the cleverest woman could scarcely shake 
 herself free." 
 
 "But the practical conclusion?" said Madame de 1'Esto- 
 rade, impatiently patting her knee with her pretty hand. 
 
 " My conclusion is this," replied her friend. " I do not 
 really see any danger of your drowning unless you are so 
 foolish as to try to stem the stream. You are firm-tempered, 
 you have good principles, and are religious ; you worship your 
 children, and for their sakes you esteem their father, Monsieur 
 de 1'Estorade, who has now for more than fifteen years been 
 the companion of your life. With so much ballast you will 
 not upset, and, believe me, you are well afloat." 
 
 "Well, then?" said Madame de 1'Estorade.
 
 300 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S. 
 
 " Well, then, there is no necessity for violent efforts, with 
 very doubtful results, in my opinion, to preserve an unmoved 
 attitude under impossible conditions, when you have already 
 to a great extent abandoned it. You are quite sure that Mon- 
 sieur de Sallenauve will never think of inviting you to take a 
 step further; you have said that he is leagues away from 
 thinking of such a thing." 
 
 " Then I am to make a friend of Monsieur de Sallenauve ? " 
 said Madame de 1'Estorade pensively. 
 
 " Yes, my dear, to save yourself from his becoming a fixed 
 idea a regret a remorse three things which poison life." 
 
 " With the world looking on ; with my husband, who has 
 already had one fit of jealousy ! " 
 
 " My dear, you may compromise yourself just as much or 
 more in the eyes of the world by your efforts to mislead it as 
 by the liberty you frankly allow yourself. Do you imagine, 
 for instance, that your abrupt departure last evening from the 
 Rastignacs', in order to avoid any discussion of your obliga- 
 tions to Monsieur de Sallenauve, can have escaped observa- 
 tion ? 
 
 "Your husband is, I think, somewhat altered, and not for 
 the better. What used to be attractive in him was the perfect 
 respect, the unlimited deference he showed for your person, 
 your ideas, your impressions, everything about you ; that sort 
 of dog-like submissiveness gave him a dignity he had no idea 
 of, for there is real greatness in knowing how to obey and to 
 admire. I may be mistaken, but I think politics have spoilt 
 him ; as you cannot fill his seat in the Upper Chamber, it has 
 dawned on his mind that he could quite well live without 
 you. In your place I should keep a sharp eye on such fancies 
 for independence ; and since this question is the order of the 
 day, I should make it a cabinet question on the point of Mon- 
 sieur de Sallenauve." 
 
 "But do you know, my dear friend," said Madame de 
 1'Estorade, laughing, " that you are delightfully pestilential,
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR AKCIS. 301 
 
 and that if I acted on your advice I should bring down fire 
 and sword ?" 
 
 "Not at all, my child; I am simply a woman of five-and- 
 forty, who has always looked on things in their practical 
 aspect ; and I did not marry my husband, to whom I am 
 passionately attached, till I was well assured, by putting him 
 to a severe test, that he also was worthy of my esteem. It is 
 not I who make life what it is ; I take it as I find it, trying to 
 bring order and possibility into all the incidents that may 
 occur. I am not frantic passion like Louise de Chaulieu, nor 
 am I exaggerated good sense like Renee de 1'Estorade. I am 
 a sort of Jesuit in petticoats, convinced that rather wide sleeves 
 are more serviceable than sleeves that are too tight about the 
 wrists ; and I never set my heart on the Quest of the Abso- 
 lute." 
 
 At this moment Lucas opened the drawing-room door and 
 announced Monsieur de Sallenauve. 
 
 As Sallenauve took his seat in a chair the man pushed for- 
 ward for him 
 
 "You see," Madame de Camps whispered to her friend, 
 "the servants even have an instinctive idea that he is not a 
 mere 'anybody.' ' 
 
 Madame de Camps, who had never met the new deputy, 
 devoted her whole attention to studying him, and saw no 
 reason to repent of preaching that he was not to be outraged. 
 Sallenauve accounted for his visit by his anxious curiosity to 
 know how matters had gone off at Ville-d'Avray ; if he should 
 hear that Marie-Gaston had been too much upset, he was quite 
 prepared, though it was already late, to set out at once and 
 join him. 
 
 As to the business that had occupied his day, he had as yet 
 had no form of success. He had availed himself of his title 
 of deputy, a sort of universal pass-key, to interview the pre- 
 fect of police, who had referred him to Monsieur de Saint- 
 Esteve of the detective department. Sallenauve, knowing, as
 
 302 THE DPt7TY FOR ARC1S. 
 
 all Paris knew, the past history of this man, was amazed to 
 find him an official of good manners. But the great detective 
 had not given him much hope. 
 
 "A woman hidden in Paris," said he, "is literally an eel 
 hidden in the deepest hole." 
 
 He himself, with the help of Jacques Bricheteau, meant to 
 continue the search during the whole of the next day ; but if, 
 by the evening, neither he nor the great official inquisitor had 
 discovered anything, he was determined to go then to Ville- 
 d'Avray to be with Marie-Gaston, concerning whom he was 
 far more uneasy than Madame de 1'Estorade. 
 
 As he said good-night, before the return of Monsieur de 
 1'Estorade and Monsieur de Camps who was to call for his 
 wife 
 
 "Do not forget," said Madame de 1'Estorade, "that Na'is' 
 party is on the evening after to-morrow. You will offend her 
 mortally if you fail to appear. Try to persuade Marie-Gaston 
 to come with you; it will be a little diversion at any rate." 
 
 On coming in from the theatre, Monsieur Octave de Camps 
 declared that it would be many a long day before he would 
 ever go to another fairy extravaganza. Na'is, on the contrary, 
 still bewitched by the marvels she had seen, began to give an 
 eager report of the play, which showed how deeply it had 
 struck her young imagination. 
 
 As Madame de Camps went away with her husband, she 
 remarked 
 
 "That little girl would make me very anxious; she re- 
 minds me of MoYna d'Aiglemont. Madame de 1'Estorade 
 has brought her on too fast, and I should not be surprised if 
 in the future she gave them some trouble." 
 
 It is difficult to fix the exact date in the history of modern 
 manners, when a sort of new religion had its rise which may 
 be called the worship of children. Nor would it be any easier 
 to determine what the influence was under which this cult 
 acquired the extensive vogue it has now attained. Children
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARClS. 30JJ 
 
 now fill the place in the family which was held among the 
 ancients by the household gods; and the individual who 
 should fail to share this devotion would be thought not so 
 much a fractious and cross-grained person, perverse and con- 
 tradictory, as simply an atheist. The influence of Rousseau, 
 however who for a while persuaded all mothers to suckle 
 their infants has now died out ; still, he must be a superficial 
 observer who would find a contradiction in this to the next 
 remark. Any one who has ever been present at the tremen- 
 dous deliberations held over the choice of a wet-nurse to live 
 in the house, and understood the position this queen of the 
 nursery at once takes up in the arrangements of the household, 
 may be quite convinced that the mother's renunciation of her 
 rights is on her part only the first of many acts of devotion 
 and self-sacrifice. The doctor and the accoucheur, whom she 
 does not try to influence, declare that she is not equal to the 
 task; and it is an understood thing that, solely for the sake 
 of the being she has brought into the world, she resigns 
 herself to the inevitable. But, then, having secured for the 
 child what schoolmasters describe as excellent and abundant 
 board, what frantic care and anxiety surround it ! How often 
 is the doctor called up at night to certify that the mildest in- 
 digestion is not an attack of much-dreaded croup ! How 
 often is he snatched away from the bedside of the dying, and 
 urgently plied with agonized questions by a mother in tears, 
 who fancies that her cherub looks " peeky " or "pasty," or 
 has not soiled its napkins quite as usual ! 
 
 At last the baby has got over this first difficult stage ; re- 
 leased from the wet-nurse's arms, it no longer wears a King 
 Henry IV. hat, decked with plumes and tufts like an Andalusian 
 mule; but then the child, and its companions, still remind us 
 of Spain : dedicated to the Virgin and arrayed in white, they 
 might be taken for young statues of the Commendatore in the 
 opera of " Don Giovanni." Others, reminding us of Walter 
 Scott and the " White Lady," look as if they had come down
 
 304 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCtS. 
 
 from the Highlands, of which they display the costume the 
 short jacket and bare knees. 
 
 More often the sweet idols supply in their dress what M. 
 Ballanche would have called a palingenesis of national history. 
 As we see, in the Tuileries, hair cut square a la Charles VI. , 
 the velvet doublets, lace and embroidered collars, the cavalier 
 hats, short capes, ruffles and shoes with roses, of Louis XIII. 
 and Louis XIV., we can go through a course of French 
 history related by tailors and dressmakers with stricter exacti- 
 tude than by Mezeray and President Renault. 
 
 Next come anxieties, if not as to the health, at any rate as 
 to the constitution of our little household gods for they are 
 always so delicate ; and to strengthen them, a journey every 
 year to the sea, or the country, or the Pyrenees, is imperatively 
 ordered. And, of course, during the five or six months spent 
 by the mother in these hygienic wanderings, the husband, if 
 he is detained in Paris, must make the best of his widowhood, 
 of his empty and dismantled house, and the upheaval of all 
 his habits. 
 
 Winter, however, brings the family home again ; but do 
 you suppose that these precious darlings, puffed up with pre- 
 cocity and importance, can be amused, like the children born 
 in the ages of heartless infanticide, with rattles, dolls, and 
 twopenny Punches? What next, indeed! The boys must 
 have ponies, cigarettes, and novels; the little girls must 
 be allowed to play on a grand scale at being grown-up mistress 
 of the house; they give afternoon dances, and evening parties 
 with the genuine Guignol puppets from the Champs-Elysees, 
 or Robert Houdin promised on the invitation card ; nor are 
 these like Lambert and Moliere, you may depend on it ; once 
 on the programme, they are secured. 
 
 Finally, now and again these little autocrats, like NaTs de 
 1'Estorade, get leave to give a party on a snffieiently grown-up 
 scale to make it necessary to engage a few police to guard the 
 door; while at Nattier's, at Delisle's, and at Provost's the
 
 THE JJ&PUTY fOJt AKCIS. 305 
 
 event casts its shadow before in the purchase of silks, artificial 
 flowers, and real bouquets for the occasion. From what we 
 have seen of Na'fs, it will be understood that no one was more 
 capable than she of filling the part and the duties that devolved 
 on her by her mother's temporary abdication in her favor of 
 all her power and authority. 
 
 This abdication had dated from some days before the even- 
 ing now arrived ; for it was Mademoiselle NaTs de 1'Estorade 
 who, in her own name, had requested the guests to do her the 
 honor of spending the evening with her ; and as Madame de 
 1'Estorade would not carry the parody to such a length as to 
 allow the cards to be printed, NaYs had spent several days 
 in writing these invitations, taking care to add in the corner 
 the sacramental formula " Dancing." 
 
 Nothing could be stranger, or, as Madame Octave de Camps 
 would have said, more alarming than the perfect coolness of 
 this little girl of thirteen, standing, as she had seen her 
 mother do on similar occasions, at the drawing-room door, 
 and toning the warmth of her welcome to the finest shades as she 
 received her guests, from the most affectionate cordiality to a 
 coolness verging on disdain. With her bosom friends she 
 warmly shook hands in the English fashion ; for others, she had 
 smiles graduated for different degrees of intimacy ; a bow or 
 nod to those whom she did not know or care for ; and from 
 time to time the most amusing little motherly air and pet 
 words for the tiny ones who are necessarily included in these 
 juvenile routs, difficult and perilous as such company is to 
 manage. 
 
 To the fathers and mothers of her guests, as the party 
 was not given for them, and she was acting strictly on the 
 Evangelical precept, -Smite parvulos venire ad me, NaTs aimed 
 at distant but respectful politeness. But when Lucas, revers- 
 ing the usual order of things, in obedience to her instructions, 
 announced: " Mesdemoiselles de la Roche-Hupron. Madame 
 la Baronne de la Roche-Hugon, and Madame la Comtesse de 
 20
 
 306 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 Rastignac," the cunning little puss abandoned this studied 
 reserve ; she rushed forward to meet the minister's wife, and, 
 with the prettiest possible grace, she seized her hand and 
 kissed it. 
 
 Nai's could not accept every invitation to dan a which the 
 elegant little dandies vied with each other in pressing on her, 
 and, indeed, she got a little confused over the order of her 
 engagements. In spite of the famous "entente cordiale," her 
 heedlessness was near causing a revival of the perennial rivalry 
 of France and perfidious Albion. A quadrille promised twice 
 over to a young English nobleman, aged ten, and a boy from 
 a preparatory naval school Barniol's school was about to 
 result in something more than railing accusations, for the 
 young heir to the English peerage had already doubled his 
 fist in attitude to box. 
 
 This squabble being settled, another disaster befell : a very 
 small boy, seeing the servant bring in a tray of cakes and 
 cooling drinks after a polka, which had made him very hot, 
 was anxious to refresh himself; but as he was too short to 
 reach the level at which the objects of his desire were held by 
 the footman, he unfortunately tried clinging to the rim of the 
 tray to bring it within reach ; the tray tilted, lost its balance, 
 and one of its corners serving as a gutter, there flowed, as 
 from the urn of a mythological river-god, a sort of cascade of 
 mingled orgeat, currant-syrup, and capillaire, of which the 
 fountain-head was the overturned glasses. It would have been 
 well if only the rash infant himself had suffered from the sud- 
 den sticky torrent ; but in the confusion caused by the catas- 
 trophe, ten innocent victims were severely splashed, among 
 them five or six infant bacchantes, who, enraged at seeing 
 their garments stained, seemed ready to make a second Or- 
 pheus of the luckless blunderer. 
 
 While he was rescued with difficulty from their hands, and 
 delivered over to those of a German governess, who had has- 
 tened to the scene of the uproar
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 307 
 
 
 
 "What could Na'is be thinking of," said a pretty, fair- 
 haired little girl to a youthful Highlander with whom she had 
 been dancing all the evening, " to invite little children no 
 bigger than that?" 
 
 "Oh, I quite understand," said the Highlander; " he is a 
 little boy belonging to the Accountant Office people; Nais 
 was obliged to ask him on account of his parents ; it was a 
 matter of civility." 
 
 At the same time putting his hand through a friend's arm 
 
 " I say, Ernest," he went on, " I could smoke a cigar ! 
 Suppose we try and find a corner out of all this riot." 
 
 "I cannot, my dear fellow," replied Ernest mysteriously. 
 "You know that Leontine always makes a scene when she 
 finds out that I have been smoking. She is in the sweetest 
 mood to-night. There, look what she has just given me ! " 
 
 "A horse-hair ring, with two flaming hearts!" said the 
 Highlander scornfully. "Why, every schoolboy makes 
 them ! " 
 
 "Then, pray, what have you to show?" retorted Ernest, 
 much nettled. 
 
 " Oh ! " said the Highlander, " better than that." 
 
 And with a consequential air he took out of the sporran,* 
 which formed part of his costume, a sheet of scented blue 
 paper. 
 
 "There," said he, holding it under Ernest's nose, "just 
 smell that." 
 
 Ernest, with conspicuous lack of delicacy, snatched at the 
 note and got possession of it ; the Highlander, in a rage, 
 struggled to get it back. Then Monsieur de 1'Estorade inter- 
 vened, and having not the remotest suspicion of the cause 
 of the fray, separated the combatants, so that the spoiler 
 could enjoy the fruits of his crime unmolested in a corner. 
 The paper was blank. The young rascal had stolen the sheet 
 of scented paper that morning from his mamma's blotting- 
 * The pouch of fur worn in front of the kilt.
 
 '60S THEr DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 book she perhaps would have made some less immaculate 
 thing of it. 
 
 Ernest presently returned it to the Highlander 
 
 " Here; I give you back your letter," said he, in a tone of 
 derision. "It is desperately compromising ! " 
 
 "Keep it, sir," replied the other. " I will ask you for it 
 to-morrow under the chestnut-trees in the Tuileries. Mean- 
 while, you must understand that we can have nothing more to 
 say to each other ! " 
 
 Ernest's demeanor was less chivalrous. His only reply was 
 to put the thumb of his right hand to his nose, spreading his 
 fingers and turning an imaginary handle an ironical demon- 
 stration which he had learned from seeing it performed by his 
 mother's coachman. Then he went off to find his partner 
 for a quadrille that was being formed. 
 
 Sallenauve, who had returned about four in the afternoon 
 from spending two days at Ville-d'Avray, could not give 
 Madame de 1'Estorade a good report of his friend. Under 
 a mask of cold resignation, Marie-Gaston was in deep dejec- 
 tion ; and the most serious cause of anxiety, because it was so 
 unnatural, was that he had not yet been to visit his wife's 
 grave ; it was as though he foresaw the risk of such agitation 
 as he really dared not face. This state of mind had so 
 greatly disturbed Sallenauve, that, but for fear of really dis- 
 tressing Nais by not appearing at her ball, he would not have 
 left his friend, who was by no means to be persuaded to come 
 to Paris with him. 
 
 It may be remembered that one of Bixiou's chief grievances 
 against Dorlange had been the sculptor's ambition, if not 
 indeed to know everything, at any rate to examine every- 
 thing. During the last year especially Sallenauve, having 
 spent no time in his art but what was needed for the " Sainte- 
 Ursule," had been at leisure to devote himself to the scientific 
 studies which justify a parliamentary representative in speak-
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 809 
 
 ing with authority when they can serve to support or illustrate 
 his political views. 
 
 Hence, though in talking to Monsieur Godivet, the registrar 
 of taxes at Arcis, he had modestly expressed himself as igno- 
 rant of the details of that official's functions, he had given his 
 attention to the various elements on which they bore the 
 customs, conveyancing-fees, stamps, and direct or indirect 
 taxes. Then, in turning to the science so problematical, 
 and yet so self-confident that it has assumed a name Poli- 
 tical Economy Sallenauve had studied with no less care the 
 various sources which contribute to form the mighty river of 
 the nation's wealth ; and the branch of the subject relating to 
 mines, the matter just now of preponderating interest to Mon- 
 sieur de Camps, had not been neglected. The ironmaster had 
 been so exclusively interested in the question of iron ores 
 that he had much to learn in the other branches of metallurgy, 
 and his delight may be imagined on hearing from the newly 
 made deputy a sort of "Arabian Nights' " tale of the riches 
 of the land, though, certified by science, there could be no 
 doubt of the facts. 
 
 "Do you mean, monsieur," cried Monsieur de Camps, 
 "that beside our coal and iron mines we have deposits of 
 copper, lead, and even of silver?" 
 
 "If you will only consult some specialist, he will tell you 
 that the famous mines of Bohemia and Saxony, of Russia and 
 of Hungary, are not to be compared to those that exist in the 
 Pyrenees; in the Alps from Briancon to the Isere ; in the 
 Cevennes, especially about the Lozere ; in the Puy-de-D6me ; 
 in Brittany and in the Vosges. In the Vosges, not far from 
 the town of Saint-Die, I can tell you of a single vein of silver 
 ore that runs with a width of from fifty to eighty metres for a 
 distance of about eight miles." 
 
 " How is it, then, that this mineral wealth has never been 
 worked ? ' ' 
 
 "It was, at one time," said Sallenauve, "at a distant period,
 
 310 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 especially during the Roman dominion in Gaul. These mines 
 were abandoned at the fall of the Roman Empire, but worked 
 again during the Middle Ages by the clergy and the lords of 
 the soil ; then, during the struggle between the feudal nobles 
 and the sovereign, and the long civil wars which devastated 
 the country, the working was given up, and no one has taken 
 it up since." 
 
 " And you are sure of the facts ? " 
 
 "Ancient writers, Strabo and others, all speak of these 
 mines; the tradition of their working survives in the districts 
 where they lie ; imperial decrees and the edicts of kings bear 
 witness to their existence and to the value of their output ; 
 and in some places there is still more practical evidence in 
 excavations of considerable length and depth, shafts and 
 caverns hewn out of the living rock, and all the traces which 
 bear witness to the vast undertakings that immortalized Roman 
 enterprise. To this may be added the evidence of modern 
 geological science, which has everywhere confirmed and am- 
 plified these indications." 
 
 But here Lucas threw open the drawing-room door and 
 announced in his loudest and most impressive tones: "Mon- 
 sieur the Minister of Public Works." 
 
 The effect on the assembly was electrical ; it even broke in 
 on the tgte-a-tfte of the two new friends. 
 
 "Let us have a look at this little Rastignac who has blos- 
 somed into a public personage," said Monsieur de Camps dis- 
 dainfully, as he rose. 
 
 But in his heart it struck him that this was an opportunity 
 of getting hold of the inaccessible minister ; in virtue of the 
 sound principle that a bird in hand is worth two in the bush, 
 he left the hidden fortune revealed to him by Sallenauve to 
 rest in peace, and went back to his iron-mine. Sallenauve, 
 on his part, foresaw an introduction to be inevitable ; it seemed 
 to him impossible but that Monsieur de 1'Estorade's Conser- 
 vative zeal would contrive to bring it about.
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 311 
 
 And what would his allies of the Opposition say to the 
 news, which would certainly be reported on the morrow, that 
 a representative of the Extreme Left had been seen in a 
 drawing-room in conversation with a minister so noted for his 
 ardor and skill in making political proselytes? Sallenauve 
 had already had a taste of his party's ideas of tolerance in the 
 office of the " National ; " he had heard it insinuated that the 
 affectation of moderation promised by his profession of polit- 
 ical faith was not to be taken literally as to his parliamentary 
 conduct; that, in fact, he would soon find himself deserted 
 if he should attempt to make his practice agree with his 
 theories. 
 
 Anxious as he was, too, about Marie-Gaston, having put in 
 an appearance at NaTs' party, he was eager now to return to 
 the Ville-d'Avray, and for all these reasons he determined to 
 profit by the general excitement and beat a retreat. By quiet 
 and simple tactics he got round to the door, and hoped to 
 escape without being observed. But he had reckoned without 
 NaVs, to whom he had promised a quadrille. The instant he 
 laid his hand on the door-handle the little girl sounded the 
 alarm, and Monsieur de 1'Estorade, with what precipitancy 
 may be imagined, took her part to detain the deserter. Seeing 
 that his ruse had failed, Sallenauve dared not commit himself 
 to a retreat which would have been in bad taste by assuming 
 an importance suggestive of political priggishness ; so he took 
 his chance of what might happen, and, after graciously allow- 
 ing himself to be reinstated on Mademoiselle NaTs' list of 
 partners, he remained. 
 
 Monsieur de 1'Estorade knew Sallenauve to be too clever a 
 man to become the dupe of any finessing he might attempt to 
 throw in the minister's way. He therefore acted with perfect 
 simplicity ; and a quarter of an hour after Monsieur de Ras- 
 tignac's arrival, they came to the deputy arm in arm, the host 
 saying 
 
 " Monsieur de Rastignac, minister of Public Works, has
 
 312 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S. 
 
 desired me before the battle begins to introduce him to one 
 of the generals of the hostile force." 
 
 " Monsieur le Ministre does me too much honor," said 
 Sallenauve ceremoniously. " Far from being a general, I 
 am but one of the humblest and least known of the rank and 
 file." 
 
 " Nay ! " said the minister, "the fight at Arcis-sur-Aube was 
 no small victory ; you sent our men pretty smartly to the right- 
 about, monsieur." 
 
 "There was nothing," said de Sallenauve, "very astonish- 
 ing in that, monsieur ; as you may have heard, we had a saint 
 on our side." 
 
 "At any rate," replied Rastignac, " I prefer such an issue 
 to that which had been planned for us by a man whom I had 
 believed to be more capable, and whom we sent down to the 
 scene of action. That Beauvisage would seem to be hope- 
 lessly stupid ; he would have reflected on us if we had got him 
 in ; and, after all, he was only Left Centre, like that lawyer, 
 Giguet. Now the Left Centre is, in fact, our worst enemy, 
 because, while traversing our politics, it aims principally at 
 getting into office." 
 
 " Oh ! " said Monsieur de 1'Estorade, " from what you were 
 told of the man, he would have been whatever he was bidden 
 to be." 
 
 " No, no, my dear fellow, don't fancy that. Fools often 
 cling more closely than you might believe to the flag under 
 which they have enlisted. Going over to the enemy implies 
 a choice, and that means a rather complicated mental process; 
 obstinacy is far easier." 
 
 " I quite agree with the minister," said Sallenauve; "the 
 extremes of innocence and cunning are equally proof against 
 being talked over." 
 
 "You kill your man kindly," said Monsieur de 1'Estorade, 
 patting Sallenauve on the shoulder. 
 
 Then seeing, or pretending to see, in the mirror over the
 
 Tff DEPUTY FOR ARClS. 313 
 
 chimney-shelf by which they stood, a signal that he was 
 wanted 
 
 "Coming," said he over his shoulder, and having thus 
 thrown the foes together, he went off, as if he were required 
 for some duty as host. 
 
 Sallenauve was determined not to look like a schoolgirl 
 frightened out of her wits at the notion of being left alone with 
 a gentleman ; since they had met, he would put a good face on 
 the matter, and, speaking at once, he asked whether the min- 
 istry had any large number of bills to lay before the Houses, 
 which would meet a few days hence. 
 
 "No, very few," replied Rastignac. "We honestly did 
 not expect to remain in office ; we appealed to an election 
 because in the confusion of public opinion forced on by the 
 press, we felt it our duty to bring it to its bearings, and com- 
 pel it to know its own mind by requiring it to declare itself. 
 We had no hope of the result proving favorable to ourselves ; 
 and the victory, it must be confessed, finds us quite unpre- 
 pared." 
 
 "Like the peasant," said Sallenauve, laughing, "who, 
 expecting the end of the world, did not think it worth while 
 to sow his field." 
 
 " Oh ! " said Rastignac modestly, " we did not regard our 
 retirement as the end of the world. We believe that there 
 will be men after us, and many of them, perfectly able to 
 govern ; only, in that temporary sojourn known as office, as 
 we expected to give very few performances, we did not unpack 
 our scenery and dresses. The session was not in any case to 
 be one of business ; the question now to be decided is between 
 what is called the Chateau, the personal influence of the sov- 
 ereign, and parliamentary supremacy. This question will 
 inevitably come to the front when we are required to ask for 
 the Secret Service fund. When.it has been settled one way or 
 the other, the appropriations are passed, and a few acts of 
 
 minor importance, parliament will have gotten through its 
 
 L
 
 314 THE DEPUTY FOR AKCIS. 
 
 task with credit, for it will have put an end to a heart-breaking 
 struggle, and the country will know once and for all to which 
 of the i wo powers it is to look with assurance for the promo- 
 tion of its prosperity." 
 
 "Then you think," said Sallenauve, "that this is a very 
 useful question to settle in the economy of a constitutional 
 government?" 
 
 " Well 7 , it was not we who raised it," said Rastignac. " It 
 is perhaps the outcome of circumstances ; and, to a great ex- 
 tent, of the impatience of some ambitious men, and of party 
 tactics." 
 
 " So that, in your opinion, sir, one of those powers is in no 
 respect to blame, and has nothing whatever to repent of?" 
 
 "You are a Republican," replied Rastignac, "and conse- 
 quently a priori an enemy of the dynasty. It would be, I 
 conceive, pure waste of time on my part to try to rectify your 
 ideas as to what constitutes the course of conduct of which 
 you accuse it." 
 
 "You are quite mistaken," said the supporter of the theo- 
 retical, imaginable future republic. " I have no preconceived 
 hatred of the reigning dynasty. I even think that in its past 
 history, variegated, if I may say so, with royal relationship 
 and revolutionary impulses, there are all the elements that 
 should commend it to the liberal and monarchical instincts of 
 the people. At the same time, you will fail to convince me 
 that the present head of the royal family is untainted by those 
 extravagant notions of personal prerogative which, in the long 
 run, must undermine, disfigure, and wreck the most admirable 
 and the strongest institutions." 
 
 "Yes," said Rastignac sarcastically, " their salvation is to 
 be found in the famous saying of the member for Sancerre : 
 { The King reigns ; he does not govern ! ' ' 
 
 Whether it was that he was tired of standing or that he 
 wished to show that he was quite at his ease in avoiding the 
 pitfall that had so evidently been laid for him, Sallenauve,
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 515 
 
 before he answered, pulled forward an armchair for the min- 
 ister, and, after seating himself, replied 
 
 "Will you allow me, monsieur, to quote the example of 
 another royal personage ? a prince who was not thought to be 
 indifferent to the prerogatives of his crown, and who certainly 
 was not ignorant of constitutional procedure. In the first 
 place, because, like our present King, he was not ignorant on 
 any subject whatever ; and, in the second place, because he 
 himself had introduced the constitutional system into our 
 country." 
 
 "Louis XVIII. ," said Rastignac, "or, as the newspapers 
 have it : ' The illustrious author of the Charter ? ' " 
 
 " Just so," said Sallenauve. " Now, let me ask you, where 
 did he die?" 
 
 "At the Tuileries, of course." 
 
 " And his successor ? " 
 
 " In exile. I see your point." 
 
 "My point is not, in fact, very difficult to discern. But 
 have you observed, sir, the inference to be drawn from that 
 royal career for which I, for my part, profess entire respect ? 
 Louis XVIII.* was not a citizen king. He vouchsafed the 
 Charter ; it was not wrung from him. He was born nearer 
 to the throne than the King whose unfortunate tendencies I 
 have mentioned and was bound to inherit a larger share of 
 the ideas, infatuations, and prejudices of Court life. His per- 
 son was laughable and this in France means degeneracy; he 
 had to make the best of a new regime following a government 
 which had intoxicated the people with that fine gilded smoke 
 called glory ; also, if he was not actually brought in by for- 
 eigners, he at least came in at the heels of an invasion by 
 Europe in arms. And now, shall I tell you why, in spite of 
 his own original sin, and in spite of a standing conspiracy 
 against his rule, he was allowed to die in peace under his 
 canopy at the Tuileries ? " 
 
 * This king fav.ored the Revolution in its first stages.
 
 $16 THE DZPtJTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 "Because he was constitutional?" said Rastignac, with a 
 shrug. " But can you say that we are not ? " 
 
 " In the letter, yes ; in the spirit, no. When King Louis 
 XVIII. placed his confidence in a prime minister, it was com- 
 plete and entire; he played no underhand game, but supported 
 him to the utmost. Witness the famous edict of the 5th of 
 September, and the dismissal of the undiscoverable Chamber, 
 which was more royalist than himself a thing he was well 
 advised enough to disapprove. Later, a revulsion of opinion 
 shook the minister who had prompted him to this action. 
 That minister was his favorite his child, as he called him. 
 No matter; yielding to constitutional necessity, after wrapping 
 him in orders and titles, and everything that could deaden 
 the shock of a fall, he courageously sent him abroad ; and 
 then he did not dig mines, or set watch, or try to make 
 opportunities for surreptitiously recalling him to power. That 
 minister never held office again." 
 
 "For a man who does not hate Us," said Rastignac, "you 
 are pretty hard upon Us. We are little short of forsworn to 
 the constitutional compact, and Our policy, by your account, 
 is ambiguous and tortuous, and suggests a certain remote like- 
 ness to M. Doublemain, the sly and wily clerk in the ' Manage 
 de Figaro.'" 
 
 " I would not say that the evil lay so deep or came from 
 so far," replied Sallenauve. " We are perhaps merely a busy- 
 body only in the sense, of course, of loving to have a finger 
 in everything." 
 
 " Well, monsieur, but if We were the cleverest politician in 
 the kingdom ! " 
 
 "That does hinder the kingdom which is all the world 
 from having the luck now and again of being as clever as We 
 are." 
 
 "On my word ! " said Rastignac, in the tone which seems 
 to emphasize the climax of a conversation, "I wish I could 
 realize a dream "
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 317 
 
 " Of what ?" said Sallenauve. 
 
 ' ' Of seeing you face to face with that meddlesome clever- 
 ness which you seem to me to hold so cheap." 
 
 "You know, monsieur, that three-quarters of every man's 
 life are spent in imagining the impossible." 
 
 "Impossible! Why? Would you be the first Opposition 
 member ever seen at the Tuileries ? And an invitation to 
 dinner quite publicly and ostensibly given that would 
 bring you nearer to what you judge so hardly from a dis- 
 tance ?" 
 
 "I should do myself the honor of refusing it, monsieur," 
 and he accentuated the honor in such a way as to give his own 
 meaning to the word. 
 
 "That is just like you, all you men of the Opposition," 
 cried Rastignac, " refusing to see the light when the occasion 
 offers incapable of seeing it, in fact ! " 
 
 " Do you see the light to any particular advantage, mon- 
 sieur, when, in the evening, as you pass a druggist's store, 
 you get full in your eyes a glare from those gigantic glass 
 jars which seem to have been invented expressly to blind peo- 
 ple?" 
 
 "You are not afraid of Our beams, but of the dark lantern 
 of your colleagues making their rounds." 
 
 " There is perhaps some truth in that, Monsieur le Ministre. 
 A party, and the man who craves the honor of representing 
 it, are like a married couple, who, if they are to get on to- 
 gether, must treat each other with mutual consideration, sin- 
 cerity, and fidelity, in fact as well as in form." 
 
 "Then try to be moderate! Your dream, indeed, is far 
 more impossible to realize than mine ; you will have some ex- 
 perience yet of the consideration shown you by your chaste 
 spouse." 
 
 " If there was any misfortune I might be certain of, it was 
 that, no doubt." 
 
 "You think that J And you, with the noble and generous
 
 318 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 feeling that is evident in you can you even endure unmoved 
 the slander which is perhaps already sharpening its darts?" 
 
 " Have you yourself, monsieur, never felt its sting ? or, if 
 you have, did it turn you aside from the road you were follow- 
 ing?" 
 
 "But if I were. to tell you," said Rastignac, lowering his 
 voice, " that I have already had occasion to decline certain 
 officious proposals to stir the depths of your private life, on 
 a side, which, being a little less open to daylight than the 
 others, has seemed particularly adapted for the setting of a 
 snare ? ' ' 
 
 " I will not thank you, sir, for merely doing yourself justice 
 by scorning the attemps of these meddlers, who are neither of 
 your party nor of mine whose only party is that of their own 
 low greed and interest. But even if by some impossible chance 
 they had found a loophole through which to approach you, 
 believe me, that any purpose sanctioned by my conscience 
 would not have been in the least affected." 
 
 "Still, do but consider the constituent elements of your 
 party: a rabble of disappointed schemers, of envious bru- 
 tality, base imitators of '93, despots disguised as devotees of 
 liberty." 
 
 "My party has not, and wants to have. Yours calls itself 
 Conservative and with good reason its principal aim being 
 to keep power, places, fortune, everything it has, in its clutches. 
 But at bottom, monsieur, the cooking is the same : eat, but do 
 not see the process ; for, as la Bruyere says: ' If you see a meal 
 anywhere but on a well-laid table, how foul and disgusting it 
 is ! '" 
 
 " But, at any rate, monsieur, We are not a blind alley We 
 lead to something. Now, the more you rise by superior 
 character and intelligence, the less you will be allowed to get 
 through with your horde of democrats in your train, for its 
 triumph would mean not a mere change of policy, but a 
 revolution."
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 319 
 
 " But who says that I want to get through, to arrive any- 
 where?" 
 
 " What, merely march without trying to attain ! A certain 
 breadth of faculty not only gives a man the right to aim at 
 the conduct of affairs, it makes it his duty." 
 
 "To keep an eye on those who conduct them is surely a 
 useful function too, and, I may add, a very absorbing one." 
 
 " You do not imagine, my dear sir," said Rastignac, " that 
 I should have taken so much trouble to convince Beauvisage ; 
 to be sure, it must be said that with him I should have had an 
 easier task." 
 
 "One happy result will ensue from the introduction which 
 chance has brought about," said Sallenauve. "We shall feel 
 that we know each other, and in our future meetings shall be 
 pledged to courtesy which will not diminish the strength of 
 our convictions." 
 
 "Then I am to tell the King, for I had special instructions 
 from his majesty " 
 
 Rastignac could not finish the sentence which was his last 
 cartridge, as it were ; for, as the band played the introductory 
 bars of a quadrille, NaYs rushed up to him, and, with a coquet- 
 tish curtsey, said 
 
 " Monsieur le Ministre, I am very sorry, but you have taken 
 possession of my partner, and you must give him up to me. 
 I have his name down for the eleventh quadrille, and if I miss 
 a turn it makes such dreadful confusion ! " 
 
 " You will excuse me, monsieur," said Sallenauve, laughing. 
 "You see I am not a very red Republican." 
 
 And he went with Na'is, who dragged him away by the hand. 
 
 Madame de 1'Estorade had had a kindly thought. It had 
 occurred to her that Sallenauve's good-natured consent to 
 humor Na'is might cost his dignity a prick, so she had con- 
 trived that some papas and mammas should join in the quad- 
 rille he had been drawn into ; and she herself, with the young 
 Highlander, the hero of the blank billets-doux who, little as
 
 330 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 she suspected it, was quite capable of making mischief for her 
 took the place of vis-a-vis to the little girl. 
 
 Na'is was beaming with pride and delight ; and at a moment, 
 when in the figure of the dance she had to take her mother's 
 hand 
 
 "Poor mamma," said she, giving it an ecstatic clutch, 
 " but for him you would not have me here now ! " 
 
 The sudden and unexpected expression of this reminiscence 
 so startled Madame de 1'Estorade that she was seized with a 
 return of the nervous spasm that had attacked her at the sight 
 of the child's narrow escape. She was obliged to take a seat, 
 and seeing her turn pale, Sallenauve, NaTs, and Madame de 
 Camps all three came up to know if she was ill. 
 
 " It is nothing," said Madame de 1'Estorade, as she turned 
 to Sallenauve " only this child reminded me of our immense 
 obligation to you. ' But for him,' she said to me, ' you would 
 not have me here, poor mamma ! ' And it is true, monsieur, 
 but for your magnanimous courage, where would she be now ? " 
 
 "Come, come, be calm," said Madame Octave, hearing 
 that her friend's voice was broken and hysterical. " Have you 
 no sense that you can be so upset by a little girl's speech?" 
 
 "She has more feeling than we have," replied Madame de 
 1'Estorade, throwing her arms round NaTs, who, with the rest, 
 was saying: " Come, mamma, be calm." 
 
 " There is nothing in the world that she thinks more of 
 than her preserver while her father and I we have hardly 
 expressed our gratitude." 
 
 "Why, you have overwhelmed me, madame," said Salle- 
 nauve politely. 
 
 " Overwhelmed? " said Nai's, shaking her pretty head dubi- 
 ously. " If any one had saved my daughter, I should treat 
 him very differently ! " 
 
 "Na'is," said Madame de Camps severely, "little girls 
 should be seen and not heard when their opinion is not 
 asked."
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 321 
 
 "What is the matter? " said Monsieur de 1'Estorade, who 
 now joined the group. 
 
 "Nothing," said Madame de Camps. "Dancing made 
 Renee a little giddy." 
 
 " And is she all right again ? " 
 
 " Yes, I have quite recovered," replied Madame de 1'Esto- 
 rade. 
 
 " Then come to say good-night to Madame de Rastignac ; 
 she is just going." 
 
 In his eagerness to attend the minister's wife, Monsieur de 
 1'Estorade did not think of giving his arm to his own wife. 
 Sallenauve offered her his. As they crossed the room, Mon- 
 sieur de 1'Estorade leading the way so that he could not hear, 
 his wife said to Sallenauve 
 
 " You were talking to Monsieur de Rastignac for a long 
 time. He tried, no doubt, to convert you ? " 
 
 " Do you think he has succeeded ? " asked Sallenauve. 
 
 "No; but these attempts at inveiglement are always un- 
 pleasant. I can only beg you to believe that I was no party 
 to the conspiracy. I am not such a frenzied ministerialist as 
 my husband." 
 
 " Nor am I such a rabid revolutionary as seems to be sup- 
 posed." 
 
 " I only hope that these vexatious politics, w-hich will bring 
 you more than once into antagonism with Monsieur de 1'Esto- 
 rade, will not sicken you of including us among your friends." 
 
 "Nay, madame, that is an honor and a happiness." 
 
 "It is not honor but pleasure that I would have you look 
 for," said Madame de 1'Estorade eagerly. " I must parody 
 Na'is ' If I had saved anybody's daughter, I should be less 
 ceremonious.' ' 
 
 And having said this, without waiting for a reply, she re- 
 leased her hand from Sallenauve's arm, and left him not a 
 little surprised at her tone. 
 
 21
 
 322 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 My readers will hardly be surprised to find Madame de 
 1'Estorade so entirely obedient to Madame Octave's advice, 
 ingenious perhaps rather than judicious. In fact, they must 
 long since have suspected that the unimpressionable countess 
 had yielded to a certain attraction toward the man who had 
 not only saved her child's life, but also appealed to her imag- 
 ination through such singular and romantic accessory facts. 
 No one but herself, it is quite certain, had been deluded into 
 security by a conviction of Sallenauve's perfect indifference. 
 The certainty of his not caring for her was, in fact, the only 
 snare into which she could trip ; as a declared lover he would 
 have been infinitely less dangerous. 
 
 In considering the success that had hitherto crowned her 
 stern task, one of the first elements to be reckoned with was 
 the circumstance of Louise de Chaulieu. To her that poor 
 reasonless woman had been like the drunken slaves, by whose 
 example the Spartans were wont to give a living lesson to 
 their children, and a sort of tacit wager had existed between 
 the two friends. Louise de Chaulieu having thrown herself 
 into the part of unchecked passion, Renee had assumed that 
 of sovereign reason ; and, to gain the stakes, she had exerted 
 such brave good sense and prudence as, but for this incite- 
 ment, would perhaps have seemed a far greater sacrifice. But 
 here was a man who cared not for her, though he thought her 
 beauty ideal, who perhaps loved another woman ; a man who, 
 after snatching her child from death, looked for no reward ; 
 who was dignified, reserved, and absorbed in quite other in- 
 terests how, when he came into her life by a side-path, was 
 she to think of him as dangerous, or to refuse him from the 
 first the calm cordiality of friendship? 
 
 Sallenauve, meanwhile, was on his way to Ville-d'Avray, 
 whither he had set out in spite of the lateness of the hour, pos- 
 sessed by his fears for his friend. And this was what he was 
 thinking about 
 
 Without having anything definite to complain of in the
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 323 
 
 countess* attitude, Sallenauve had certainly never found her 
 at all warm in her regard, and he had formed the same estimate 
 of her temper and character as the rest of the world around 
 her. He had seen her as a woman of remarkable intellectual 
 gifts, but paralyzed as to her heart, by her absorbing and ex- 
 clusive passion for her children. " The ice-bound Madame 
 de 1'Estorade," Marie-Gaston had once called her; and it was 
 correct if he had ever thought of making a friend of her that 
 is to say, of becoming her lover. 
 
 Nor was it only as regarded Madame de 1'Estorade, but as 
 regarded her husband, too, that Sallenauve had doubted the 
 future permanency of their alliance. " We shall quarrel over 
 politics," he had told himself a dozen times, and the reader 
 may remember one of his letters in which he had contem- 
 plated this conclusion with some bitterness. So when Mad- 
 ame de 1'Estorade had seemed to encourage him to take up 
 an attitude of more effusive intimacy with her, what had most 
 surprised him was the marked distinction she had drawn be- 
 tween her husband's probable demeanor and her own. Before 
 a woman would say with such agitation as she had put into the 
 inviting words : " I only hope that these vexatious politics will 
 not disgust you with us as friends," she must have, Sallenauve 
 thought, to speak so warmly, a warmer heart than she was 
 generally credited with; and this profession of alliance was 
 not, he felt sure, to be taken as a mere drawing-room civility, 
 or the thoughtless utterance of a transient and shallow im- 
 pulse, as the little nervous attack had been which led to it 
 all. 
 
 Having thus analyzed this somewhat serious flirtation to 
 repay Madame de 1'Estorade's politeness the statesman did 
 not scorn to descend to a remark, which was illogical, it must 
 be owned, as regards his usual reserve, and certain memories 
 of his past life. He recollected that more than once, at 
 Rome, he had seen Mademoiselle de Lanty dance, and, com- 
 paring the original with the duplicate, he could assure himself
 
 324 THE DEPUTY FOfc ARCfS. 
 
 that, notwithstanding the difference in their age, the girl had 
 not a more innocent air, nor had she struck him as more 
 elegant and graceful. 
 
 And in view of this fact, will not the clear-sighted reader 
 who may some time since have begun to suspect that these 
 two natures, apparently so restrained, so intrenched in their 
 past experiences, might ultimately come into closer contact 
 discern a certain convergence of gravitation though hitherto 
 scarcely perceptible? It was, if you please, solely out of def- 
 erence to Madame de Camps' advice that Madame de 1'Es- 
 torade had so completely modified her austere determination ; 
 still, short of admitting some slight touch of the sentiment 
 her friend had hinted at, is it likely that she would have given 
 such singular vehemence to her expression of grateful regard, 
 or that a mere remark from a child would have strung her 
 nerves up to such a point as to surprise her into making the 
 outburst ? 
 
 On his part, not having taken advantage of the privileged 
 position thus recklessly thrown open to him, our deputy was 
 tempted to think, with a persistency which, if not very im- 
 prudent, was at least very unnecessary, of these superficial 
 graces. Madame de Camps had spoken truly: "Friendship 
 between a man and woman is neither an impossible dream 
 nor an ever-yawning gulf." But in practice, it must be said, 
 that this sentiment, by which we delude ourselves, proves to 
 be a very narrow and baseless bridge across a torrent, need- 
 ing in those who hope to cross it without difficulty much 
 presence of mind on both sides and nerves less sensitive than 
 Madame de 1'Estorade's; while it is a necessary precaution 
 never to look to right and left, as Sallenauve had just been 
 doing. 
 
 However, on arriving at Ville-d'Avray, Sallenauve found 
 himself face to face with a strange event ; and who does not 
 know how, in spite of our determination, events often disperse 
 our maturest plans ?
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 325 
 
 Sallenauve had not been mistaken in his serious anxiety as 
 to his friend's mental condition. 
 
 When Marie-Gaston abruptly fled after his wife's death 
 from the spot where that cruel parting had occurred, he would 
 have been wise to pledge himself never to see it again. 
 Nature and Providence have willed it that in presence of the 
 stern decrees of Death he who is stricken through the person 
 of those he loves, if he accepts the stroke with the resignation 
 demanded under the action of every inevitable law, does not 
 for long retain the keen stamp of the first impression. In his 
 famous letter against suicide, Rousseau says : " Sadness, weari- 
 ness, regret, despair are but transient woes which never take 
 root in the soul, and experience exhausts the feeling of bitter- 
 ness which makes us think that our sorrow must be eternal." 
 
 But this is no longer true for those rash beings who, trying 
 to escape from the first grip of the jaws of grief, evade it 
 either by flight or by some immoderate diversion. All mental 
 suffering is a kind of illness for which time is a specific, and 
 which presently wears itself out, like everything violent. If, 
 on the contrary, instead of being left to burn itself out slowly 
 on the spot, it is fed by change of scene or other extreme 
 measures, the action of Nature^is hampered. The sufferer 
 deprives himself of the balm of comparative forgetfulness 
 promised to those who can endure ; he merely transforms into 
 a chronic disease, less visible perhaps, but more deeply seated, 
 an acute attack, thrown in by checking its healthy crisis. 
 The imagination sides with the heart, and, as the heart is by 
 nature limited while the fancy is boundless, there is no possi- 
 bility of calculating the violence of the excesses by which a man 
 may be carried away under its ere-long absolute dominion. 
 
 Marie-Gaston, as he wandered through this home where he 
 had believed that after the lapse of two years he should find 
 only the pathos of remembrance, had not taken a step, had 
 not met with an object in his path that could fail to revive all 
 bis, happiest days ?m4 a t the same tinis the disaster th?U had,
 
 326 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 ended them. The flowers his wife had loved, the lawns and 
 trees verdurous under the soft breath of spring, while she 
 who had formed the lovely spot lay under the cold earth all 
 the dainty elegance brought together to decorate this exquisite 
 nest for their love, combined to sing a chorus of lamentation, 
 a long-drawn wail of anguish in the ears of him who dared to 
 breathe the dangerous atmosphere. Terrified when half-way 
 by the overwhelming sorrow that had seized on him, Marie- 
 Gaston, as Sallenauve had observed, had not dared accomplish 
 the last station of his Calvary. In absence, he had calmly 
 busied himself with drawing up an estimate for the private 
 tomb he had intended to build for the remains of his beloved 
 Louise ; but here he could not endure even to do them pious 
 homage in the village graveyard where they were laid. 
 
 The worst, in short, might be feared from a sorrow which, 
 instead of being soothed by the touch of time, was, on the 
 contrary, aggravated by duration, having as it seemed found 
 fresh poison for its sting. 
 
 The door was opened by Philippe, the old man who in 
 Madame Marie-Gaston's time had been the house steward. 
 
 " How is your master? " asked Sallenauve. 
 
 " He is gone, sir," replied Philippe. 
 
 " Gone where ?" 
 
 " Yes, sir, with the English gentleman who was here when 
 you left." 
 
 " But without a word for me, without telling you where 
 they were going?" 
 
 "After dinner, when all was well, my master suddenly said 
 that he wanted a few things packed for a journey, and he saw 
 to them himself. At the same time, the Englishman, after 
 saying he would walk in the park and smoke a cigarette, 
 mysteriously asked me where he could write a letter without 
 being seen by my master. I took him into my own room, but 
 I dared not ask him anything about this journey, for I never saw 
 any one less communicative or open. When he had written
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC IS. 327 
 
 the letter everything was ready ; and then, without a word of 
 explanation, the two gentlemen got into the English gentle- 
 man's chaise, and I heard them tell the coachman to drive to 
 Paris " 
 
 "But the letter?" said Sallenauve. 
 
 " It is addressed to you, sir, and the Englishman gave it 
 me in secret, as he had written it." 
 
 "Then give it me, my goodman ! " cried Sallenauve; and 
 without going any farther than the hall where he had stood 
 questioning Philippe, he hastily read it. 
 
 His features, as the man studied them, showed great distress. 
 
 " Tell them not to take the horses out," said he. And he 
 read the letter through a second time. 
 
 When the old servant came back from delivering the order 
 
 "At what hour did they start?" Sallenauve inquired. 
 
 " At about nine o'clock." 
 
 "They have three hours' start," said the new deputy to 
 himself, looking at his watch, which marked some minutes 
 past midnight. 
 
 He turned to get into the carriage that was to take him 
 away again. Just as he was stepping into it, the steward ven- 
 tured to ask: "There is nothing alarming, I hope, in that 
 letter, sir? " 
 
 "No, nothing. But your master may be absent some little 
 time; take care to keep the house in good order." 
 
 And then, like the two who had preceded him, he said : 
 "To Paris." 
 
 Next morning, pretty early, Monsieur de 1'Estorade was in 
 his study very busy in a strange way. It may be remembered 
 that Sallenauve had sent him a statuette of Madame de 1'Es- 
 torade ; he had never been able to find a place where the work 
 stood to his mind in a satisfactory light. But ever since the 
 hint given him by Rastignac that his friendship with the 
 sculptor might serve him but ill at Court, he had begun to
 
 328 THE DEPUTY FOR ARClS. 
 
 with his son Armand that the artist had made Madame de 
 1'Estorade look like a milliner's apprentice; and now, when 
 by his obduracy to the minister's inveiglements Sallenauve 
 had shown himself irreclaimably opposed to the Government, 
 the statuette its freshness a little dimmed, it must be owned, 
 by the dust no longer seemed presentable, and the worthy 
 peer was endeavoring to discover a corner, in which it would 
 be out of sight, so that he might not be required to tell the 
 name of the artist, which every visitor asked, without making 
 himself ridiculous by removing it altogether. So he was 
 standing on the top step of a library ladder with the sculptor's 
 gift in his hands and about to place it on the top of a tall 
 cabinet. There the hapless sketch was to keep company with 
 a curlew and a cormorant, shot by Armand during his last 
 holidays. They were the firstfruits of the young sportsman's 
 prowess, and paternal pride had decreed them the honors of 
 stuffing. 
 
 At this juncture Lucas opened the door to show in 
 
 "Monsieur Philippe." 
 
 The worthy steward's age, and the confidential position he 
 held in Marie-Gaston's household, had seemed to the 1'Esto- 
 rade's factotum to qualify him for the title of " monsieur " a 
 civility to be, of course, returned in kind. 
 
 The master of the house, descending from his perch, asked 
 Philippe what had brought him, and whether anything had 
 happened at Ville-d'Avray. The old man described his mas- 
 ter's strange departure, followed by the no less strange disap- 
 pearance of Sallenauve, who had fled as if he were at the heels 
 of an eloping damsel, and then he went on 
 
 "This morning, as I was putting my master's room tidy, a 
 letter fell out of a book, addressed to Madame la Comtesse. 
 As it was sealed and ready to be sent off, I thought that, per- 
 haps in the hurry of packing, my master had forgotten to give 
 it to me to rnajl. At any rate, \ have brought it ; Madame 
 \a Comtessft rrjay, perhaps, flnc} \\\\\ it contains ?om<5
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 329 
 
 tion of this unexpected journey I have dreamed of nothing 
 else all night." 
 
 Monsieur de 1'Estorade took the letter. 
 
 "Three black seals," said he, turning it over. 
 
 "It is not the color that startles me," said Philippe. 
 "Since madame died, monsieur uses nothing but black; but 
 I confess the three seals struck me as strange." 
 
 "Very good," said Monsieur de 1'Estorade; "I will give 
 the letter to my wife." 
 
 " If there should be anything to reassure me about my 
 master," said Philippe wistfully, "would you let me know, 
 Monsieur le Comte ? '-' 
 
 "You may rely on it, my good fellow. Good-morning." 
 
 " I humbly beg pardon for having an opinion to offer," 
 said the old servant, without taking the hint thus given him ; 
 " but for fear of there being any bad news in the letter, do 
 not you think, Monsieur le Comte, that it would be well to 
 know it, so as to prepare Madame la Comtesse ? " 
 
 "Why! What! Do you suppose? " Monsieur de 
 
 1'Estorade began, without finishing his question. 
 
 " I do not know. My master has been very much depressed 
 these last few days." 
 
 "It is always a very serious step to open a letter not ad- 
 dressed to one's self," said the accountant-general. "This case 
 is peculiar the letter is addressed to my wife, but in fact was 
 never sent to her it is really a puzzling matter " 
 
 "Still, if by reading it you could prevent something dread- 
 ful " 
 
 "Yes that is just what makes me hesitate." 
 
 Madame de 1'Estorade settLed the question by coming into 
 the room. Lucas had told her of old Philippe's arrival. 
 
 "What can be the matter?" she asked, with uneasy curi- 
 osity. 
 
 All Sallenauve's apprehensions of the n.j|ht before recurred, 
 to her mind.
 
 330 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 When the steward had repeated the explanations he had 
 already given to Monsieur de 1'Estorade, she unhesitatingly 
 broke the seals. 
 
 " I know so much now," she said to her husband, who tried 
 to dissuade her, " that the worst certainly would be preferable 
 to the suspense we should be left in." 
 
 Whatever the contents of this alarming epistle, the countess' 
 face told nothing. 
 
 "And you say that your master went off accompanied by 
 this English gentleman," said she, " and not under any com- 
 pulsion?" 
 
 "On the contrary, madame, he seemed quite cheerful." 
 
 "Well, then, there is nothing to be frightened about. 
 This letter has been written a long time ; and, in spite of the 
 three black seals, it has no bearing on anything to-day." 
 
 Philippe bowed and departed. When the husband and wife 
 w?re alone : 
 
 "What does he say?" asked Monsieur de 1'Estorade, and 
 he put out his hand for the letter his wife still held. 
 
 "No. Do not read it," said the countess, not surrender- 
 ing it. 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 " It will pain you. It is quite enough that I should have 
 had the shock, and in the presence of the old steward, before 
 whom I had to control myself." 
 
 " Does it speak of any purpose of suicide ? " 
 
 Madame de 1'Estorade did not speak, but she nodded 
 affirmatively. 
 
 " But a definite, immediate purpose ? " 
 
 "The letter was written yesterday morning; and to all 
 appearance, but for the really providential presence of this 
 stranger, last evening, during Monsieur de Sallenauve's ab- 
 sence, the wretched man would have carried out his fatal 
 purpose." 
 
 " The Englishman has, no doubt, carried him off solely to
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 331 
 
 hinder it. That being the case, he will not lose sight of 
 him." 
 
 "We may also count on Monsieur de Sallenauve's interven. 
 tion," observed Madame de 1'Estorade. " He has probably 
 followed them." 
 
 " Then there is nothing so very alarming in the lette'f," 
 said her husband. And again he held out his hand for it. 
 
 "But when I entreat you not to read it," said Madame de 
 1'Estorade, holding it back. " Why do you want to agitate 
 yourself so painfully? It is not only the idea of suicide our 
 unhappy friend's mind is completely unhinged." 
 
 At this instant piercing shrieks were heard, uttered by 
 Rend, the youngest of the children, and this threw his mother 
 into one of those maternal panics of which she was quite 
 unable to control the expression. 
 
 "Good God ! What has happened?" she cried, rushing 
 out of the room. 
 
 Monsieur de 1'Estorade, less easily perturbed, only went as 
 far as the door to ask a servant what was the matter. 
 
 " It is nothing, Monsieur le Comte. Monsieur Rene in 
 shutting a drawer pinched the tip of his finger." 
 
 The peer of France did not think it necessary to proceed 
 to the scene of the catastrophe ; he knew that in these cases 
 he must leave his wife to give free course to her extravagant 
 motherly solicitude, or take a sharp wigging. As he returned 
 to his seat by the table he felt a paper under his foot ; it was 
 the famous letter, which Madame de 1'Estorade had dropped 
 as she flew off without observing its fall. 
 
 Opportunity, and a sort of fatality that rules human 
 affairs, prompted M. de 1'Estorade, who could not under- 
 stand his wife's objections ; he hastened to satisfy his curiosity. 
 
 Marie-Gaston wrote as follows : 
 
 " MADAME : This letter will not be so amusing as those I 
 wrote to you from Arcis-sur-Aube. But you must not be
 
 332 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 frightened by the determination to which I have come. I am 
 simply going to join my wife, from whom I have been too 
 long parted, and to-night, soon after midnight, I shall be with 
 her, never to leave her again. You and Sallenauve have, no 
 doubt, remarked that it is strange that I should not yet have 
 been to visit her tomb ; two of my servants were saying so 
 the other day, not knowing that I could overhear them. But 
 I should have been a great fool to go to a graveyard and stare 
 at a block of stone that cannot speak to me, when every night 
 as midnight strikes I hear a little tap at my bedroom door, 
 which I open at once to our dear Louise, who is not altered 
 at all ; on the contrary, I think she is fairer and lovelier. 
 She has had great difficulty in getting my discharge from this 
 world from Mary the queen of the angels ; but last night she 
 brought me my papers properly made out, sealed with a large 
 seal of green wax, and at the same time she gave me a tiny 
 phial of hydrocyanic acid. One drop sends me to sleep, and 
 when I wake I am on the other side. 
 
 "Louise also gave me a message for you; to tell you that 
 Monsieur de 1'Estorade has a liver complaint and cannot live 
 long ; and that when he is dead you are to marry Sallenauve, 
 because over there you are always restored to the husband you 
 loved ; and she thinks our party of four will be much pleas- 
 anter with you and me and Sallenauve than with your Mon- 
 sieur de 1'Estorade, who is enough to bore you to death, and 
 whom you married against your will. 
 
 " My message delivered, I have only to wish you good 
 patience, madame, during the time you have still to spend 
 down here, and to subscribe myself your affectionate humble 
 servant." 
 
 If, on finishing this letter, it had occurred to Monsieur de 
 1'Estorade to look at himself in a glass, he would have seen 
 in the sudden crestfallen expression of his features the effects 
 pf the unftYQwecJ but terrible bjgw he ha<J dealt himself by his
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S. 333 
 
 luckless curiosity. His feelings, his mind, his self-respect had 
 all felt one and the same shock ; and the quite obvious in- 
 sanity revealed in the prediction of which he was the subject 
 only made it seem more threatening. Believing, like the 
 Moslems, that madmen are gifted with a sort of second- 
 sight, he gave himself over at once, felt a piercing pain in his 
 diseased liver, and was seized with a jealous hatred of Salle- 
 nauve, his designate successor, such as must cut off any kind 
 of friendly relations between them. 
 
 At the same time, as he saw how ridiculous, how absolutely 
 devoid of reason, was the impression that had taken possession 
 of him, he was terrified lest any one should suspect its exist- 
 ence; and with the instinctive secretiveness which always 
 prompts the mortally sick to hide the mischief, he began to 
 consider how he could keep from his wife the foolish act that 
 had blighted his whole existence. It would seem incredible 
 that lying under his very eye the fatal letter should have 
 escaped his notice ; and from this to the suspicion that he had 
 read it the inference was only too plain. 
 
 He rose, and softly opening the door of his room, after 
 making sure that there was nobody in the drawing-room be- 
 yond, he went on tiptoe to throw the letter on the floor at 
 the farthest side of the room, where Madame de 1'Estdrade 
 would suppose that she had dropped it. Then, like a school- 
 boy who had been playing a trick, and wishes to put the 
 authorities off the scent by an affectation of studiousness, he 
 hastily strewed his table with papers out of a bulky official 
 case, so as to seem absorbed in accounts when his wife should 
 return. 
 
 Meanwhile, as need scarcely be said, he listened in case 
 anybody but Madame de 1'Estorade should come into the 
 outer room where he had laid his trap ; in that case he would 
 have intervened at once to hinder indiscreet eyes from inves- 
 tigating the document that held such strange secrets. 
 
 Madame de 1'Estorade's voice speaking to some one, and
 
 334 THE DEPUTY FOK ARClS. 
 
 her appearance in his room in a few minutes after with 
 sieur Octave de Camps, showed that the trick had succeeded. 
 By going forward as his visitor came in, he could see through 
 the half-open door the spot where he had left the letter. Not 
 only was it gone, but he could detect by a movement of his 
 wife's that she had tucked it into her morning-gown in the 
 place where Louis XIII. dared not seek the secrets of Made- 
 moiselle de Hautefort. 
 
 " I have come to fetch you to go with me to Rastignac, as 
 we agreed last evening," said de Camps. 
 
 "Quite right,' said his friend, putting up his papers with 
 a feverish haste that showed he was not in a normal frame of 
 mind. 
 
 "Are you ill?" said Madame de 1'Estorade, who knew her 
 husband too well not to be struck by the singular absence of 
 mind he betrayed ; and at the same time, looking him in the 
 face, she observed a strange change in his countenance. 
 
 "You do not look quite yourself, indeed," said Monsieur 
 de Camps. "If you had rather, we will put off this visit." 
 
 "Not at all," said Monsieur de 1'Estorade; " I have wor- 
 ried myself over this work, and want pulling together. But 
 what about Rend?" said he to his wife, whose inquisitive eye 
 oppressed him. "What was the matter that he screamed so 
 loud?" 
 
 "A mere trifle ! " said Madame de 1'Estorade, still studying 
 his face. 
 
 "Well, then, my dear fellow," said her husband, assuming 
 as indifferent a manner as he could command, " I have only 
 to change my coat and I am yours." 
 
 When the countess was alone with Monsieur de Camps : 
 
 "Does it not strike you," said she, "that Monsieur de 
 1'Estorade seems quite upset this morning? " 
 
 <'As I said just now, he is not at all himself. But the ex- 
 planation is perfectly reasonable ; we disturbed him in the 
 middle of his work. Office work is unhealthy ; I never in my
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S. 335 
 
 life was so well as I have been since I took over the ironworks 
 you so vehemently abuse." 
 
 "To be sure," said Madame de 1'Estorade, with a deep 
 sigh; "he needs exercise, an active life; there can be no 
 doubt that he has some incipient liver disease." 
 
 "Because he looks yellow? But he has looked so ever 
 since I have known him." 
 
 " Oh ! monsieur, I cannot be mistaken. There is some- 
 thing seriously wrong, and you would do me the greatest 
 service " 
 
 " Madame, you have only to command me." 
 
 "When Monsieur de 1'Estorade comes back, we will speak 
 of the little damage Rend has done to his finger. Tell me 
 that trifling accidents, if neglected, may lead to serious mis- 
 chief that gangrene has been known to supervene and make 
 amputation necessary. That will give me an excuse for send- 
 ing for Dr. Bianchon." 
 
 'Certainly," said Monsieur de Camps. "I do not think 
 medical advice very necessary; but if it will reassure you 
 that " 
 
 At this moment Monsieur de 1'Estorade came back ; he had 
 almost recovered his usual looks, but a strong smell of Eau de 
 Melisse des Carmes proved that he had had recourse to that 
 cordial to revive him. Monsieur de Camps played his part 
 as Job's comforter to perfection ; as to the countess, she had 
 no need to affect anxiety ; her make-believe only concerned 
 its object. 
 
 "My dear," said she to her husband, after listening to 
 the ironmaster's medical discourse, "as you come home from 
 the minister's I wish you would call on Dr. Bianchon." 
 
 "What next!" said he, shrugging his shoulders, "call 
 out such a busy man for what you yourself say is a mere 
 trifle ! " 
 
 "If you will not go, I will send Lucas. Monsieur de 
 Camps has quite upset me."
 
 336 TH DEPUTY FOR ARCtS. 
 
 " If you choose to be ridiculous," said her husband sharply, 
 "I know no means of preventing it; but one thing I may 
 remind you, and that is, that if you send for a medical man 
 when there is nothing the matter, under serious circumstances 
 you may find that he will not come." 
 
 " And you will not go ? " 
 
 "I certainly will not," said Monsieur de 1'Estorade; "and 
 if I had the honor of being master in my own house,, I should 
 forbid your sending any one in my stead." 
 
 "My dear, you are the master, and since you refuse so 
 emphatically we will say no more about it. I will try not to 
 be too anxious." 
 
 "Are you coming, de Camps?" said Monsieur de 1'Esto- 
 rade, " for at this rate I shall be sent off directly to order the 
 child's funeral." 
 
 "But, my dear, are you ill," said the countess, taking his 
 hand, " that you can say such shocking things in cold blood ? 
 It is not like your usual patience with my little motherly 
 fussiness nor like the politeness on which you pride your- 
 self to everybody, including your wife." 
 
 "No, but the truth is," said Monsieur de 1'Estorade, irri- 
 tated instead of soothed by this gentle and affectionate remon- 
 strance, "your motherly care is really becoming a monomania; 
 you make life unbearable to everybody but your children. 
 Deuce take it all ! if they are our children, I am their father; 
 and if I am not adored as they are, at any rate I have the 
 right to expect that my house may not be made uninhabit- 
 able !" 
 
 While he poured out this jeremiad, striding up and down 
 the room, the countess was gesticulating desperately to Mon- 
 sieur de Camps as if to ask him whether he did not discern a 
 frightful sympton in this scene. 
 
 To put an end to this painful contest, of which he had so 
 involuntarily been the cause, he now said 
 
 "Are we going?"
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 337 
 
 "Come along," said Monsieur de 1'Estorade, leading the 
 way, without taking leave of his wife. 
 
 "Oh, I was forgetting a message for you," added the iron- 
 master, turning back. " Madame de Camps will call for you 
 at about two o'clock to choose some spring dress-stuffs ; she 
 has settled that we shall all four go on afterward to the flower- 
 show. When we leave Rastignac, 1'Estorade and I will come 
 back to fetch you, and if you are not in we will wait." 
 
 The countess scarcely heeded this programme; a flash of 
 light had come to her. As soon as she was alone she took 
 out Marie-Gaston's letter, and finding it folded in the original 
 creases 
 
 "Not a doubt of it!", she exclaimed. "I remember 
 replacing it in the envelope folded inside out. The unhappy 
 man has read it." 
 
 Some hours later Madame de 1'Estorade and Madame de 
 Camps were together in the drawing-room where only a few 
 days since Sallenauve's cause had been so warmly discussed 
 and argued. 
 
 "Good heavens! what is the matter with you?" cried 
 Madame de Camps, on finding her friend in tears as she 
 finished writing a letter. 
 
 The countess told her of all that had passed, and read her 
 Marie-Gaston's letter. At any other time the disaster it so 
 plainly betrayed would have greatly grieved her friend ; but 
 the secondary misfortune which it had apparently occasioned 
 absorbed all her thoughts 
 
 "And are you quite sure that your husband mastered the 
 contents of that ill-starred letter?" she asked. 
 
 "How can I doubt it?" replied Madame de 1'Estorade. 
 "The paper cannot have turned itself inside out ; and beside, 
 when I recall it all, I fancy that at the moment when I flew 
 off to Ren I let something drop. As ill-luck would have it, 
 I did not stop to look." 
 22
 
 338 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 " But very often, when you rack your memory, you remem- 
 ber- things that did not happen." 
 
 "But, my dear friend, the extraordinary change that so 
 suddenly took place in Monsieur de 1'Estorade could only be 
 due to some overpowering shock. He looked like a man 
 struck by lightning." 
 
 "Very well; but then if it is to be accounted for by a 
 painful surprise, why do you insist on regarding it as the 
 result of a liver complaint?" 
 
 "Oh, that is no new thing to me," said Madame de 1'Es- 
 torade. "Only, when sick people make no complaints one 
 is apt to forget. Look here, my dear," she went on, pointing 
 to a volume that lay open near her, "just before your arrival 
 I was reading in this medical dictionary that persons with 
 liver disease become gloomy, restless, and irritable. And for 
 some little time past I have noticed a great change in my 
 husband's temper; you yourself remarked on it the other 
 day ; and this little scene, at which Monsieur de Camps was 
 present unprecedented, I assure you, in our married life 
 seems to me a terrible symptom." 
 
 " My dear, good child, you are like all people when they 
 are bent on worrying themselves. In the first place, you 
 study medical books, which is the most foolish thing in the 
 world. I defy you to read the description of a disease without 
 fancying that you can identify the symptoms in yourself or in 
 some one for whom you care. And beside, you are mixing up 
 things that are quite different : the effects of a fright with 
 those of a chronic complaint they have nothing on earth in 
 common." 
 
 " No, no, I am not confusing them ; I know what I am 
 talking about. Do not you know that in our poor human 
 machinery, if any part is already affected, every strong emo- 
 tion attacks that spot at once? " 
 
 "At any rate," said her friend, to put an end to the medi- 
 cal question, " if that unhappy madman's letter is likely to
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 339 
 
 have some ulterior influence on your husband's health, it 
 threatens far more immediately to imperil your domestic 
 peace. That must be considered first." 
 
 "There is no alternative," said the countess. "Monsieur 
 de Sallenauve must never again set foot in the house." 
 
 "There is a good deal to be said on that point, and it is 
 just what I want to talk over with you. Do you know that 
 yesterday I found you lacking in that moderation which has 
 always been a prominent trait in your character " 
 
 "When was that?" asked Madame de 1'Estorade. 
 
 "At the moment when you favored Monsieur de Sallenauve 
 with such a burst of gratitude. When I advised you not to 
 avoid him for fear of tempting him to seek your company, I 
 certainly did not advise you to fling your kindness at his head, 
 so as to turn it ! As the wife of so zealous an adherent of the 
 reigning dynasty, you ought to know better what is meant by 
 Le juste milieu" (the happy medium). 
 
 " Oh, my dear, no witticisms at my husband's expense ! " 
 
 " I am not talking of your husband, but of you, my dear. 
 You amazed me so much last night, that I felt inclined to 
 recall all I had said on my first impulse. I like my advice to 
 be followed but not too much followed." 
 
 "At any other moment I would ask you to tell me wherein 
 I so far exceeded your instructions; but now that fate has 
 settled the question, and Monsieur de Sallenauve must be 
 simply cleared out of the way, of what use is it to discuss the 
 exact limit-line of my behavior to him?" 
 
 "Well," said Madame de Camps, "to tell you the whole 
 truth, I was beginning to think the man a danger to you on 
 quite another side." 
 
 "Which is? " 
 
 "Through Na'is. That child, with her passion for her pre- 
 server, really makes me very anxious." 
 
 "Oh," said the countess, with a melancholy smile, "is not 
 that ascribing too much importance to a child's nonsense?"
 
 340 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 "NaTs is a child, no doubt, but who will be a woman 
 sooner than most children. Did you not yourself write me 
 that she had intuitions on some subjects quite beyond her 
 years ? ' ' 
 
 " That is true. But in what you call her passion for Mon- 
 sieur de Sallenauve, beside its being quite natural, the dear 
 child is so frank and effusive that the feeling has a genuinely 
 childlike stamp." 
 
 " Well trust me, and do not trust to that; not even when 
 this troublesome person is out of the way ! Think, if when 
 the time came to arrange for her marriage this liking had 
 grown up with her a pretty state of things ! " 
 
 "Oh, between this and then thank heaven! " said 
 
 the countess incredulously. 
 
 "Between this and then," replied Madame de Camps, 
 " Monsieur de Sallenauve may have achieved such success 
 that his name is in everybody's mouth ; and with her lively 
 imagination, Nais would be the first to be captivated by such 
 brilliancy." 
 
 "But still, my dear, the difference of age " 
 
 " Monsieur de Sallenauve is thirty; Nais is nearly thirteen. 
 The difference is exactly the same as between your age and 
 Monsieur de 1'Estorade's, and you married him." 
 
 "Quite true; you may be right," said Madame de 1'Esto- 
 rade; "what I did as a matter of good sense, NaTs might 
 insist on passionately. But be easy ; I will so effectually 
 shatter her idol " 
 
 " That again, like the hatred you propose to act for your 
 husband's benefit, requires moderation. If you do not manage 
 it gradually, you may fail of your end. You must allow it to 
 be supposed that circumstances have brought about a feeling 
 which should seem quite spontaneous." 
 
 "But do you suppose," cried Madame de 1'Estorade ex- 
 citedly, " that I need act aversion for this man ? Why, I hate 
 him 1 He is our evil genius ! "
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 341 
 
 "Come, come, my dear, you must compose yourself! I 
 really do not know you. You who used to be unruffled rea- 
 son incarnate ! " 
 
 Lucas at this moment came in to ask the countess if she 
 could see a Monsieur Jacques Bricheteau. 
 
 Madame de 1'Estorade looked at her friend, saying 
 
 " The organist who was so helpful to Monsieur de Sallenauve 
 at the time of his election. I do not know what he can want 
 of me." 
 
 "Never mind; see him," said her friend. "Before open- 
 ing hostilities, it is not amiss to know what is going on in the 
 enemy's camp." 
 
 " Show him in," said the countess. 
 
 Jacques Bricheteau came in. So sure had he been, on the 
 other hand, of being among friends, that he had given no 
 special attention to his toilet. A capacious chocolate-brown 
 overcoat, whose cut it would have been vain to assign to any 
 date of fashion ; a checked vest, gray and green, buttoned 
 to the throat ; a black cravat, twisted to a rope, and worn 
 without a collar, while it showed an inch of very doubt- 
 fully clean shirt-front ; yellow drab trousers, gray stockings, 
 and tied shoes this was the more than careless array in 
 which the organist ventured into the presence of the elegant 
 countess. 
 
 Scarcely bidden to take a seat 
 
 "Madame," said he, "I have perhaps taken a liberty in 
 presenting myself to you, unknown ; but Monsieur Marie- 
 Gaston spoke to me of your possibly wishing that I should 
 give some lessons to mademoiselle your daughter. I told him 
 at first that there might be some little difficulty, as all my time 
 was filled up; but the prefect of police has just set me at 
 leisure by dismissing me from a post I held in his department, 
 so I am happy to be able to place myself entirely at your 
 service." 
 
 "And has your dismissal, monsieur, been occasioned by the
 
 342 THE DEPUTY FOR AKCIS. 
 
 part you played in Monsieur de Sallenauvc's election ? " asked 
 Madame de Camps. 
 
 "As no reason was assigned, it seems probable; all the more 
 so that, in the course of twenty years' service, this discharge 
 is the very first hitch that has ever arisen between me and my 
 superiors. ' ' 
 
 " It cannot be denied," said Madame de 1'Estorade, sharply 
 enough, " that you very seriously interfered with the intentions 
 of the Government." 
 
 " Yes, madame, and I accepted my dismissal as a disaster I 
 was quite prepared for. After all, what was the loss of my 
 small appointment in comparison with the election of Mon- 
 sieur de Sallenauve ? " 
 
 "I am really distressed," the countess went on, " to make 
 no better return for the eagerness you are good enough to 
 express ; but I may as well tell you that I have no fixed pur- 
 pose as to choosing a master for my daughter, and in spite of 
 the immense talent for which the world gives you credit, I 
 should be afraid of such serious teaching for a little girl of 
 thirteen." 
 
 " Quite the reverse, madame," replied the organist. " No- 
 body credits me with talent. Monsieur de Sallenauve and 
 Monsieur Marie-Gaston have heard me two or three times, but 
 apart from that, I am a mere unknown teacher, and perhaps 
 you are right perhaps a very tiresome one. So, setting aside 
 the question of lessons to mademoiselle your daughter, let me 
 speak of the thing that has really brought me here Monsieur 
 de Sallenauve." 
 
 " Did Monsieur de Sallenauve charge you with any mes- 
 sage to my husband?" said Madame de 1'Estorade, with 
 marked coldness. 
 
 "No, madame, he has, I grieve to say, charged me with 
 nothing. I went to call on him this morning, but he was 
 absent. I went to Ville-d'Avray, where I was told that I 
 should find him, and learned that he had started on a journey
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 343 
 
 with Monsieur Marie-Gaston. Then, thinking that you might 
 possibly know the object of this journey, and how long he 
 would be away " 
 
 'Nothing of the kind," said Madame de 1'Estorade, in- 
 terrupting him in a hard tone. 
 
 "I had a letter this morning," Jacques Bricheteau went 
 on, " from Arcis-sur-Aube. My aunt, Mother Marie des 
 Anges, warns me, through Monsieur de Sallenauve's notary, 
 that a base conspiracy is being organized, and our friend's 
 absence complicates matters very seriously. I cannot under- 
 stand what put it into his head to vanish without warning 
 anybody who takes an interest " 
 
 " That he should not have given you notice," said Madame 
 de 1'Estorade, in the same tone, "may possibly surprise you. 
 But so far as my husband and I are concerned, there is noth- 
 ing to be astonished at." 
 
 The significance of this uncivil distinction was too clear to 
 be misunderstood. Jacques Bricheteau looked at the countess, 
 and her eyes fell ; but the whole expression of her face, set 
 due North, confirmed the meaning which it was impossible to 
 avoid finding in her words. 
 
 After an awkward pause : 
 
 "I beg your pardon, madame," said he, rising. "I did 
 not know I could not have supposed that you were so utterly 
 indifferent to Monsieur de Sallenauve's prospects and honor. 
 But a minute ago, in the anteroom, when your servant was in 
 doubt about announcing me, mademoiselle your daughter, on 
 hearing that I was a friend of his, eagerly took my part ; and 
 I was so foolish as to conclude that she represented the general 
 good feeling of the family." 
 
 After pointing this distinction, which was quite a match 
 for Madame de 1'Estorade's, thus paying her back in her own 
 coin, Jacques Bricheteau bowed ceremoniously, and was about 
 to leave. 
 
 The two ladies exchanged a glance, as if to ask each other
 
 844 
 
 whether it would be well to let this man depart thus after 
 shooting so keen a parting dart. 
 
 In fact, a crushing contradiction was at this instant given 
 to the countess' assumption of indifference : NaTs came fly- 
 ing in. 
 
 " Mamma ! " she cried exultantly, " a letter from Monsieur 
 de Sallenauve ! " 
 
 The countess blushed purple. 
 
 "What manners are these, bouncing in like a mad thing?" 
 said she severely. "And how do you know that the letter is 
 from that gentleman ? " 
 
 "Oh ! " said NaTs, turning the blade in the wound, "when 
 he wrote to you from Arcis, I got to know his writing." 
 
 " You are a silly, inquisitive child," said her mother, roused 
 out of her usual indulgence by so many luckless speeches. 
 "Go to nurse." 
 
 Then to give herself some countenance 
 
 "Allow me, monsieur," said she to Jacques Bricheteau, as 
 she opened the letter so inappropriately delivered. 
 
 "Nay, Madame la Comtesse," replied the organist, "it is 
 I who crave your permission to wait till you have read your 
 letter. If by any chance Monsieur de Sallenauve should give 
 you any account of his movements, you would perhaps have 
 the kindness to give me the benefit of it " 
 
 Having looked through the letter 
 
 " Monsieur de Sallenauve," said the countess, "desires me 
 to tell my husband that he is 'on his way to England Han- 
 well, in the county of Middlesex. He is to be addressed 
 under cover to Doctor Ellis." 
 
 Jacques Bricheteau again bowed with due formality, and 
 left the room. 
 
 " NaYs has just treated you to a taste of her girl-in-love 
 tricks," said Madame de Camps. "But you had well earned 
 it. You had behaved to that poor man with a hardness that 
 deserved a severer sally than his parting retort. He seems to
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 345 
 
 have a ready wit of his own ; and 'If by any chance ' Monsieur 
 de Sallenauve had given you any information, was rather neat 
 under the circumstances." 
 
 " What is to be done? " said her friend ; "the day began 
 badly; all the rest is to match." 
 
 " What about the letter? " 
 
 " It is heart-breaking. Read it." 
 
 "MADAME: I succeeded in overtaking Lord Lewin a few 
 leagues beyond Paris he is the Englishman of whom I spoke 
 to you, and Providence sent him to spare us a terrible catas- 
 trophe. Possessed of a large fortune, he, like many of his 
 countrymen, is liable to attacks of depression, and only his 
 strength of mind has saved him from the worst results of the 
 malady. His indifference to life, and the cool stoicism with 
 which he speaks of voluntary death, won him at Florence, 
 where they met, our unhappy friend's confidence. Lord 
 Lewin, who is interested in the study of vehement emotions, 
 is intimately acquainted with Dr. Ellis, a physician famous 
 for his treatment of the insane, and his lordship has often 
 spent some weeks at the Hanwell Asylum for Lunatics in 
 Middlesex. It is one of the best-managed asylums in Eng- 
 land, and Dr. Ellis is at the head of it. 
 
 " Lord Lewin, on arriving at Ville-d'Avray, at once dis- 
 cerned in Marie-Gaston the early symptoms of acute mania. 
 Though not yet obvious to superficial observers, they did not 
 escape Lord Lewin's practiced eye. ' He picked and hoarded,' 
 said he, in speaking of our poor friend ; that is to say, .as they 
 walked about the park Marie-Gaston would pick up such rub- 
 bish as straws, old bits of paper, and even rusty nails, putting 
 them carefully in his pocket ; and this, it would seem, is a 
 symptom familiar to those who have studied the progress of 
 mental disease. Then, by recurring to the discussions they 
 had held at Florence, Lord Lewin had no difficulty in dis- 
 covering his secret purpose of killing himself. Believing that 
 
 M
 
 346 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 his wife visited him every evening, the poor fellow had deter- 
 mined on the very night of your little dance to follow his 
 adored Louise, as he said. So, you see, my fears were not 
 exaggerated, but were the outcome of an instinct. 
 
 " Lord Lewin, instead of opposing his resolution, affected 
 to participate in it. 
 
 " ' But men like us,' said he, ' ought not to die in any vulgar 
 way, and there is a mode of death of which I had thought for 
 myself, and which I propose that we should seek in common. 
 In South America, not far from Paraguay, there is one of the 
 most tremendous cataracts in the world, known as the Falls 
 of Gayra. The spray that rises from the abyss is to be seen 
 for many leagues, and reflects seven rainbows. A vast volume 
 of water, spreading over a breadth of more than twelve thou- 
 sand feet, is suddenly pent up in a narrow channel, and falls 
 into a gulf below with a sound more deafening than a hundred 
 thunderclaps at once. That is where I have always dreamed 
 of dying.' 
 
 " ' Let us be off,' said Marie-Gaston. 
 
 "'This very minute,' said Lord Lewin. 'Pack your 
 things; we will sail from England, and be there in a few 
 weeks.' 
 
 "And in this way, madame, the clever foreigner succeeded 
 in putting our friend off from his dreadful purpose. As you 
 may understand, he is taking him to England to place him 
 in Dr. Ellis' care, since he Lord Lewin says has not his 
 match in Europe for treating the very sad case that is to be 
 confided to him. 
 
 " Informed by a letter left for me by Lord Lewin at Ville- 
 d'Avray, I immediately set out in pursuit ; and at Beau va is, 
 whence I am writing, I came up with them in a hotel, where 
 Lord Lewin had put up to enable the patient to benefit by 
 sleep, which had happily come over him in the carriage, after 
 several weeks of almost total insomnia. Lord Lewin looks 
 upon this as a very favorable symptom, and he says that the
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 347 
 
 malady thus treated, as it will be from the beginning, has the 
 best possible chance of cure. 
 
 " I shall follow them closely to Han well, taking care not 
 to be seen by Marie-Gaston, since, in Lord Lewin's opinion, 
 my presence might disturb the comparative tranquillity of 
 mind that he has derived from the thought of the pompous 
 end he is going to find. On reaching the asylum, I shall 
 wait to hear Dr. Ellis' verdict. 
 
 " The session opens so soon that I fear I may not be back 
 in time for the first sittings ; but I shall write to the president 
 of the Chamber, and if it should happen that any difficulty 
 arise as to the leave of absence for which I must petition, I 
 venture to rely on Monsieur de 1'Estorade's kindness to certify 
 the absolute necessity for it. At the same time, I must beg 
 him to remember that I cannot authorize him on any con- 
 sideration to reveal the nature of the business which has com- 
 pelled me to go abroad. However, the mere statement of a 
 fact by such a man as M. de 1'Estorade must be enough to 
 secure its acceptance without any explanation. 
 
 "Allow me, madame, to remain, etc." 
 
 As Madame de Camps finished reading, carriage wheels 
 were heard. 
 
 "There are our gentlemen back again," said the countess. 
 " Now, shall I show this letter to my husband ? " 
 
 "You cannot do otherwise. There would be too great a 
 risk of what Nai's might say. Beside, Monsieur de Sallenauve 
 writes most respectfully ; there is nothing to encourage your 
 husband's notions." 
 
 As soon as Monsieur de 1'Estorade came in, his wife could 
 see that he had recovered his usual looks, and she was about 
 to congratulate him, when he spoke first. 
 
 "Who is the man of very shabby appearance," asked Mon- 
 sieur de 1'Estorade, " whom I found speaking to NaYs on the 
 stairs?"
 
 348 THE DEPUTY FOR ARIS. 
 
 As his wife did not seem to know what he was talking 
 about, he went on : "A man very much marked by the small- 
 pox, with a greasy hat and a brown overcoat ? " 
 
 "Oh!" said Madame de Camps to her friend, "our 
 visitor ! Na'fs could not resist the opportunity of talking 
 about her idol." 
 
 " But who is the man?" 
 
 " Is not his name Jacques B.richeteau ? " said the countess, 
 " a friend of Monsieur de Sallenauve's." 
 
 Seeing a cloud fall on her husband's countenance, Madame 
 de 1'Estorade hurriedly explained the two objects of the or- 
 ganist's visit, and she gave the member's letter to Monsieur 
 de 1'Estorade. 
 
 While he was reading it 
 
 "He seems better, do you think?" the countess asked 
 Monsieur de Camps. 
 
 "Oh, he is perfectly right again," said the ironmaster. 
 " There is not a sign of what we saw this morning. He had 
 worried himself over his work ; exercise has done him good ; 
 and yet it is to be observed that he had an unpleasant shock 
 just now at the minister's." 
 
 "Why, what happened? " asked Madame de 1'Estorade. 
 
 "Your friend Monsieur de Sallenauve's business seems to 
 be in a bad way." 
 
 " Thank you for nothing ! " said Monsieur de 1'Estorade, 
 returning the letter to his wife. " I shall certainly not do 
 the thing he asks me." 
 
 "Then have you heard anything against him?" said she, 
 trying to appear perfectly indifferent as she asked the question. 
 
 " Yes ; Rastignac told me that he had letters from Arcis ; 
 some very awkward discoveries have been made there." 
 
 " Well, what did I tell you ? " cried Madame de 1'Estorade. 
 
 "What did you tell me?" 
 
 " To be sure. Did I not give you a hint some time ago 
 that Monsieur de Sallenwe was a man to be let drop?
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 349 
 
 Those were the very words I used, as I happen to just remem- 
 ber/' 
 
 " But was it I who brought him here? " 
 
 "You can hardly say that it was I. Only just now, before 
 knowing anything of the distressing facts you have just 
 learned, I was speaking to Madame de Camps of another 
 reason which should make us anxious to put an end to the 
 acquaintance." 
 
 "Very true," said Madame de Camps. "Your wife, but 
 a minute ago, was talking of the sort of frenzy that possesses 
 Na'is with regard to her preserver, and she foresaw great diffi- 
 culties in the future." 
 
 " It is an unsatisfactory connection in every way," said 
 Monsieur de 1'Estorade. 
 
 "It seems to me," said Monsieur de Camps, who was not 
 behind the scenes, " that you are rather in a hurry. Some 
 compromising discoveries are said to have been made with 
 reference to Monsieur de Sallenauve, but what is the value of 
 these discoveries? Wait before you hang him, at least till he 
 has been tried ? " 
 
 "My husband can do what he thinks proper," said the 
 countess. " For my part, I do not hesitate to throw him over 
 at once. My friends, like Caesar's wife, must be above sus- 
 picion." 
 
 "The awkward thing," said Monsieur de 1'Estorade, "is 
 that we are under such an annoying obligation to him " 
 
 "But, really," exclaimed Madame de 1'Estorade, " if a 
 convict had saved my life, should I be obliged to receive him 
 in my drawing-room ? " 
 
 "Indeed, my dear, you are going too far," said Madame 
 de Camps. 
 
 "Well, well," said Monsieur de 1'Estorade, "there is no 
 occasion to raise a scandal ; things must be allowed to take 
 their course. The dear man is abroad now ; who knows if 
 he will ever come back ? "
 
 360 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 "What, he has fled at a mere rumor?" said Monsieur de 
 Camps. 
 
 " Not precisely on that account," replied the count. " He 
 had a pretext but once out of France " 
 
 "As to that conclusion," said Madame de 1'Estorade, " I 
 do not for a moment believe in it. His pretext is a good 
 reason, and as soon as he hears from his friend the organist he 
 will hurry back. So, my dear, you must take your courage in 
 both hands and cut the intimacy short at a blow if you do 
 not intend it to continue." 
 
 "And that is really your meaning?" said Monsieur de 
 1'Estorade, looking keenly at his wife. 
 
 " I ? I would write him without any sort of ceremony, 
 and tell him that he will oblige us by calling here no more. 
 At the same time, as it is a little difficult to write such a 
 letter, we will concoct it together if you like." 
 
 ;< We will see," said her husband, beaming at the sugges- 
 tion ; "the house is not falling yet. The most pressing 
 matter at the moment is the flower-show we are to go to 
 together. It closes, I think, at four o'clock, and we have but 
 an hour before us." 
 
 Madame de 1'Estorade, who had dressed before Madame 
 de Camps' arrival, rang for the maid to bring her bonnet and 
 shawl. 
 
 As she was putting them on in front of a glass 
 
 "Then you really love me, Renee?" said her husband in 
 her ear. 
 
 "Can you be so silly as to ask?" replied she, giving him 
 her most affectionate look. 
 
 " Well, I have a confession to make to you I read the 
 letter Philippe brought." 
 
 "Then I am no longer surprised at the change that came 
 over you. I too must tell you something. When I proposed 
 that we should concoct Monsieur de Sallenauve's dismissal 
 between us, I had already written it directly after you went
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 351 
 
 out ; and you can take it out of my blotting-book and post it 
 if you think it will do." 
 
 Quite beside himself with joy at finding that his hypo- 
 thetical successor had been so immediately sacrificed, Mon- 
 sieur de 1'Estorade threw his arms round his wife and kissed 
 her effusively. 
 
 " Well done ! " cried Monsieur de Camps. " This is better 
 than this morning ! " 
 
 "This morning I was a fool," said the count, as he turned 
 over the blotting-book to find the letter, which he might have 
 taken his wife's word for. 
 
 "Say no more," said Madame de Camps in an undertone 
 to her husband. "I will explain all this pother to you pres- 
 ently." 
 
 Younger again by ten years, the count offered his arm to 
 Madame de Camps, while his wife took that of the provincial 
 ironmaster's. 
 
 "And Nais?" said Monsieur de 1'Estorade, seeing the 
 little girl looking forlorn as they went. " Is not she coming 
 tuo!" 
 
 " No," said her mother; " I am not pleased with her." 
 
 "Pooh ! " said the father, " I proclaim an amnesty. Run 
 and put your bonnet on," he added to the child. 
 
 Nais looked at her mother for the ratification which she 
 thought necessary under the hierarchy of power as it existed 
 in the 1'Estorade household. 
 
 "Go," said the countess, " since your father wishes it." 
 
 While they waited for the little girl 
 
 " To whom are you writing, Lucas?" asked the count of 
 the manservant, who had begun a letter on the table by which 
 he stood. 
 
 " To my son," said Lucas, " who is very anxious to get his 
 sergeant's stripes. I am telling him that you promised me a 
 note to his colonel, Monsieur le Comte. " 
 
 " Perfectly true, on my honor ; and I had quite forgotten it.
 
 862 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 Remind me to-morrow morning ; I will write it the first thing 
 when I get up." 
 
 <{ You are very good, sir " 
 
 " Here," said Monsieur de 1'Estorade, putting his fingers 
 in his vest pocket and taking out three gold-pieces, " send 
 these to the corporal from me, and tell him to get his men to 
 drir.k to his stripes." 
 
 Lucas was amazed ; he had never known his master so 
 genial and liberal. 
 
 When NaTs was ready, Madame de 1'Estorade, proud of 
 having had the courage to leave her in disgrace for half an 
 hour, hugged her as if she had not seen her for two years ; 
 then they all set out for the Luxembourg, where the Horticul- 
 tural Society at that time held its shows. 
 
 Toward the end of the interview which Monsieur Octave de 
 Camps, under the auspices of Monsieur de 1'Estorade, had at 
 last been able to get with Rastignac, the minister's usher had 
 come in to give him the cards of Monsieur le Procureur- 
 General Vinet and Monsieur Maxime de Trailles. 
 
 "Very well," said the minister. "Tell the gentlemen I 
 will see them in a few minutes." 
 
 Soon after, the ironmaster and Monsieur de 1'Estorade rose 
 to leave; and it was then that Rastignac had briefly told the 
 count of the danger looming on the parliamentary horizon 
 of his friend Sallenauve. At the word " friend," Monsieur 
 de 1'Estorade had protested. 
 
 "I do not know, my dear minister," said he, "why you 
 persist in giving that name to a man who is really no more 
 than an acquaintance, I might say a provisional acquaintance, 
 if the reports you have mentioned should prove to have any 
 foundation." 
 
 "I am delighted to hear you say so," replied Rastignac. 
 " For in the thick of the hostilities which seem likely to arise 
 between that gentleman and our side, I confess that the warm
 
 TtfE DEPL TY FOR ARCfe. 353 
 
 feeling I imagined you to have toward him would somewhat 
 have fettered me." 
 
 " I am grateful for your consideration," replied the count ; 
 "but pray understand that I give you a free hand. It is a 
 matter entirely at your discretion to treat Monsieur de Salle- 
 nauve as a political foe, without any fear that the blows you 
 deal him will at all h-urt me." 
 
 Thereupon they left, and Messieurs Vinet and de Trailles 
 had been shown in. 
 
 Vinet, the attorney-general, and father of Olivier Vinet, 
 whom the reader already knows, was one of the warmest 
 champions and most welcome advisers of the existing Govern- 
 ment. Designate as the minister of justice at the next shuf- 
 fling of the Cabinet, he was behind the scenes of every am- 
 biguous situation ; and in every secret job nothing was con- 
 cocted without his cooperation, in the plot at least, if not in 
 the doing. 
 
 The electoral affairs of Arcis had a twofold claim on his in- 
 terference. First, because his son held a position among the 
 legal magnates of the town ; secondly, because as connected 
 through his wife with the Chargebceufs of la Brie, the Cinq- 
 Cygnes of Champagne being a younger branch of that family, 
 this aristocratic alliance made him think it a point of honor 
 to assert his importance in both districts, and never to miss a 
 chance of interfering in their affairs. 
 
 So, that morning, when Monsieur de Trailles had called 
 on the minister, armed with a letter from Madame Beau- 
 visage, full of compromising scandal concerning the new 
 deputy for Arcis 
 
 "Find Vinet, as coming from me," said Rastignac, with- 
 out listening to any explanations, "and try to bring him here 
 as soon as possible." 
 
 At Maxime's bidding who offered to fetch him in his 
 carriage Vinet was quite ready to go to Rastignac ; and now 
 that he has made his way to the minister's private room, we 
 23
 
 364 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC15. 
 
 shall be better informed as to the danger hanging over Salle- 
 nauve's head, of which Jacques Bricheteau and Monsieur de 
 1'Estorade have given us but a slight idea. 
 
 "Then you mean, my dear friends," said the minister as 
 soon as they had settled to their talk, " that we may get some 
 hold on this political purist ! I met him yesterday at 1'Es- 
 torade's, and he struck me as most undauntedly hostile." 
 
 Maxime, whose presence was in no sense official, knew 
 better than to answer this remark. Vinet, on the contrary, 
 almost insolently conscious of his political importance, public 
 prosecutor as he was, had too much of the advocate in his 
 composition to miss a chance of speaking. 
 
 "When, only this morning, monsieur" and he bowed to 
 Maxime " did me the honor to communicate to me a letter 
 he had received from Madame Beauvisage, I had just had one 
 from my son, in which he gave me, with slight variations, 
 the same information. I agree with him that the matter 
 looks ugly for our adversary but it will need nice manage- 
 ment." 
 
 "I really hardly know what the matter is," said the min- 
 ister. "As I particularly wished for your opinion on the 
 case, my dear Vinet, I begged Monsieur de Trailles to post- 
 pone the details till we were all three together." 
 
 This was authorizing Maxime to proceed with the narrative, 
 but Vinet again seized the opportunity for hearing his own 
 voice. 
 
 "This," said he, " is what my son Olivier writes to me, 
 confirming Madame Beauvisage's letter she, I may say in- 
 cidentally, would have made a famous deputy to parliament, 
 my dear sir. On 'a market-day not long since, Pigoult the 
 notary, who has the management of all the new deputy's 
 business matters, received a visit, it would seem, from a peas- 
 ant-woman from Romilly, a large village not far from Arcis. 
 To hear the Marquis de Sallenauve, who has so suddenly 
 reappeared, you would think that he was the only existing
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR AKCIS. 355 
 
 Scion of the Sallenauve family ; but this did not prevent this 
 woman from displaying some papers in due form, proving that 
 she too is a living Sallenauve, in the direct line, and related 
 nearly enough to claim her part in any heritable property." 
 
 "Well," said Rastignac, "but did she know no more of 
 the marquis' existence than he knew of hers?" 
 
 "That did not plainly appear from her statements," said 
 Vinet; "but that very confusion seems to me most convinc- 
 ing, for, as you know, between relations in such different 
 positions great difficulties are apt to arise." 
 
 "Kindly proceed with the story," said the minister. 
 " Before drawing conclusions, we must hear the facts 
 though, as you know by experience, that is not the invariable 
 practice in parliament." 
 
 "Not always to the dissatisfaction of the ministers," said 
 Maxime, laughing. 
 
 "Monsieur is right," said Vinet; "all hail to a successful 
 muddler ! But to return to our peasant-woman, who, in con- 
 sequence of the ruin of the Sallenauve family, has fallen into 
 great poverty and a station far beneath her birth ; she first 
 appeared as a petitioner for money, and it seems probable 
 that prompt and liberal generosity would have kept her quiet. 
 But it is also likely that she was but ill-pleased by M?itre 
 Achille Pigoult's reception of her demands; for on leaving 
 his office she went to the market-square, and seconded by a 
 neighbor, a lawyer from the village, who had come with her, 
 she disburdened herself of various statements relating to my 
 highly esteemed fellow-member which were not very flattering 
 to his character ; declaring that the Marquis de Sallenauve 
 was not his father; and again, that there was no Marquis de 
 Sallenauve in existence. And at any rate, she concluded, 
 this newly made Sallenauve was a heartless wretch who would 
 have nothing to say to his relations. But, she added, she 
 could make him disgorge, and, with the help of the clever 
 man who had come with her to support her by his advice,
 
 356 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 Monsieur le Deput might be sure that they ' would make him 
 dance to another tune.' ' 
 
 "I have not the slightest objection," said Rastignac. 
 " But the woman has, I suppose, some proof in support of her 
 statements?" 
 
 "That is the weak point of the matter," replied Vinet. 
 " But let me go on. At Arcis, my dear sir, the Government 
 has a remarkably devoted and intelligent servant in the head 
 of the police. Moving about among the people, which is his 
 practice on market-days, he picked up some of the woman's 
 vicious remarks, and going off at once to the mayor's house, 
 he asked to see, not the mayor himself, but Madame Beau- 
 visage, to whom he told what was going on." 
 
 "Then is the candidate whom you had choosen for a 
 crowning treat a perfect idiot ?" Rastignac asked Maxime. 
 
 "The very man you wanted," replied Monsieur de Trailles, 
 "imbecile to a degree ! There is nothing I would not do to 
 reverse this vexatious defeat." 
 
 "Madame Beauvisage," Vinet went on, "at once thought 
 she would like to talk to this woman of the ready tongue ; and 
 to get hold of her, it was not a bad idea to desire Groslier, 
 the police sergeant, to go and fetch her with a sternly threat- 
 ening air, as if the authorities disapproved of her levity in 
 using such language with regard to a member of the National 
 Chamber, and to bring her forthwith to the mayor's house." 
 
 "And it was Madame Beauvisage, you say, who suggested 
 this method of procedure ?" said Rastignac. 
 
 " Oh, yes, she is a very capable woman," said Maxime. 
 
 "Driven hard," continued the speaker, "by Madame the 
 Mayoress, who took care to secure her husband's presence at 
 the cross-examination, the woman proved to be anything 
 rather than coherent. How she had ascertained that the 
 deputy could not be the marquis' son, and her confident 
 assertion, on the other hand, that the marquis did not even 
 exist, were not by any means conclusively proved. Hearsay.
 
 THJS PEPUTY FOR ARGIS. 357 
 
 vague reports, inferences drawn by her village attorney were 
 the best of the evidence she could bring." 
 
 "Well, then," said Rastignac, "what is the upshot of it 
 all?" 
 
 "JV*/from the legal point of view," replied Vinet. "For 
 even if the woman could prove that it is a mere whim on the 
 part of the Marquis de Sallenauve to recognize the man Dor- 
 lange as his son, she would have no ground for an action in 
 disproof. According to Section 339 of the Civil Code, a 
 positive and congenital right alone can give grounds for dis- 
 puting the recognition of a natural child ; in other words, 
 there must be a direct claim on the property in which the 
 child whose birth is disputed is enabled to claim a share." 
 
 "Your balloon collapsed! " observed the minister. 
 
 "Whereas, on the other hand, if the good woman chooses 
 to dispute the existence of the Marquis de Sallenauve, she 
 would disinherit herself, since she certainly has no claim on 
 the estate of a man who would then be no relation of hers; 
 beside, it is the duty of the crown, and not her part at all, to 
 prosecute for the assumption of a false identity ; the utmost 
 she could do would be to bring the charge." 
 
 "Whence you conclude?" said Rastignac, with the sharp 
 brevity which warns a too diffuse talker to abridge his story. 
 
 " Whence I conclude, legally speaking, that this Romilly 
 peasant, by taking up either charge as the basis for an action, 
 would find it a bad speculation, since in one case she must 
 obviously lose, and in the other which, in fact, she cannot 
 even bring she would get nothing out of it. But, politically 
 speaking, it is quite another story." 
 
 " Let us see the political side then," said Rastignac; " for, 
 so far, I can make nothing of it." 
 
 "In the first place," replied the lawyer, " you will agree 
 with me that it is always possible to fight a bad case? " 
 
 "Certainly." 
 
 *' And then, I do not suppose that you would care whether
 
 858 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S. 
 
 this woman fights an action which would only end in her hav- 
 ing to pay a lawyer's bill." 
 
 " No ; I confess it is a matter to me of perfect indifference." 
 
 " And if you had cared, I should, all the same, have advised 
 you to let matters take their course ; for the Beauvisages have 
 undertaken all the costs, including a visit to Paris for this 
 woman and her legal adviser." 
 
 "Well, well the action brought, what comes of it?" said 
 Rastignac, anxious to end. 
 
 "What comes of it?" cried the lawyer, warming to the 
 subject. " Why, everything you can manage to make of it ; 
 if, before it is argued, you can work up comments in the 
 papers and insinuations from your friends. What comes of 
 it? Why, the utmost discredit for our antagonist, if he is 
 suspected of having assumed a name to which he has no right. 
 What comes of it? Why, an opportunity for a fulminating 
 speech in the Chamber " 
 
 " Which you, no doubt, will undertake ? " asked Rastignac. 
 
 "Oh, I do not know. The case must be thoroughly stud- 
 ied ; I must see what turn it is likely to take." 
 
 " Then for the moment," the minister observed, " it is all 
 reduced to an application, hit or miss, of Basile's famous 
 theory of calumny that it is always well to keep it stirred, 
 and that something will stick." 
 
 "Calumny? Calumny?" replied Vinet. " That we shall 
 see ; it may be no more than honest evil-speaking. Monsieur 
 de Trailles, here, knows what went on much better than we 
 do. He will tell you that all through the district the father's 
 disappearance as soon as he had legally acknowledged his son 
 had the very worst effect ; that everybody retained a vague 
 impression of mysterious complications to favor the election 
 of this man about whom we are talking. 
 
 "You have no idea, my dear fellow, what can be got out 
 of a lawsuit cleverly kept simmering, and in my long and 
 busy career as a pleader I have seen miracles worked by such
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 359 
 
 means. A parliamentary struggle is quite another matter. 
 There proof is not needed ; you may kill your man with noth- 
 ing but hypotheses and asseverations if you stick to them de- 
 fiantly enough." 
 
 "Well, to sum up," said Rastignac, speaking as a man of 
 method, " how do you recommend that the affair should be 
 managed ?" 
 
 "In the first place," replied the lawyer, " I should allow 
 the Beauvisages since they have a fancy for it to pay all 
 the expenses of moving the peasant-woman and her friend, 
 and subsequently the costs of the action." 
 
 " Do I make any objection ?" said the minister. " Have 
 I either the right or the means ? " 
 
 "The case," Vinet went on, " must be put into the hands 
 of a wily and clever lawyer. Desroches, for instance, Mon- 
 sieur de Trailles' lawyer. He will know how to fill out the 
 body of a case which, as you justly observe, is very thin." 
 
 " I certainly should not say to Monsieur de Trailles, ' I 
 forbid you to allow anybody you please to secure the services 
 of your solicitor,' " said Rastignac. 
 
 " Then we want an advocate who can talk with an air of 
 ' The Family ' as a sacred and precious thing ; who will wax 
 indignant at the surreptitious intrigues by which a man may 
 scheme to insinuate himself within its holy pale." 
 
 " Desroches can find your man ; and again, the Govern- 
 ment is not likely to hinder a pleader from talking or from 
 being transported with indignation ! " 
 
 " But, Monsieur le Ministre," Maxime put in, startled out 
 of his attitude of passive attention by Rastignac's indifference, 
 " is non-interference all the support to be hoped for from the 
 Government in this struggle ? " 
 
 " I hope you did not think that we should take up the action 
 on our own account ? " 
 
 " No, of course not ; but we had a right to imagine that 
 you would take some interest in it,"
 
 860 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 " How in what way ? " 
 
 " How can I tell ? As Monsieur Vinet was saying just 
 now, by tuck of drum in the subsidized newspapers by get- 
 ting your supporters to spread the gossip by using the influ- 
 ence which men in power always have over the bench." 
 
 " Thank you for nothing," said the minister. " When you 
 want to secure the Government as an accomplice, my dear 
 Maxime, you must have a rather more solidly constructed 
 scheme to show. Your air of business this morning made me 
 think you really had a strong hand, and I have troubled our 
 excellent friend the public prosecutor, who knows how high 
 a value I set on his learning and advice ; but really your plot 
 strikes me as too transparent, and the meshes so thin that I 
 can see through them an inevitable defeat. If I were a bache- 
 lor and wanted to marry Mademoiselle Beauvisage, I daresay 
 I might be bolder, so I leave it to you to carry on the action 
 in any way you please. I will not say that Government will 
 not watch your progress with its best wishes ; but it certainly 
 will not tread the path with you." 
 
 " Well, well," said Vinet, hindering Maxime's reply, which 
 would, no doubt, have been a bitter one, "but supposing we 
 take the matter into court ; suppose that the peasant-woman, 
 prompted by the Beauvisages, should denounce the man who 
 was identified before the notary as being a spurious Sallenauve; 
 then the deputy is guilty of conspiracy, and for that we have 
 him before the superior court." 
 
 "But, again, where are your proofs?" asked Rastignac. 
 " Have you a shadow of evidence? " 
 
 " You admitted just now," observed Maxime, " that a bad 
 case may be fought out." 
 
 "A civil action, yes ; a criminal charge is quite another 
 matter. And this would break down, for it means disputing 
 the validity of an act drawn up by a public official, and with- 
 out a particle of proof. A pretty piece of work ! The case 
 would be simply dismissed before it came to be argued in
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 361 
 
 court. If we wanted to perch our enemy on a pedestal as 
 high as the column of July, we could not go about it more 
 effectually." 
 
 " So that in your opinion there is nothing to be done?" 
 asked Maxime. 
 
 " By us nothing. But you, my dear Maxime, who have 
 no official position, and can at a pinch use your pistol in sup- 
 port of the attack on Monsieur de Sallenauve's character 
 there is nothing to hinder you from trying your luck in the 
 contest." 
 
 "Yes," said Maxime petulantly, "I am a sort of ' condot- 
 tiere/'" 
 
 " Not at all ; you are a man with an instinctive conviction 
 of certain facts that cannot be legally proven, and you would 
 not be afraid to stand at the judgment seat of God." 
 
 Monsieur de Trailles rose, considerably annoyed. Vinet 
 also rose, and giving Rastignac his hand as he took leave 
 
 "I cannot deny," said he, "that your conduct is dictated 
 by great prudence ; and I will not say but that in your place I 
 should do the same." 
 
 " No ill-feeling, at any rate, Maxime," said the minister, 
 and Maxime bowed with icy dignity. 
 
 When the two conspirators were in the outer room alone 
 
 "Do you understand what this prudery means?" asked 
 Maxime. 
 
 "Perfectly," said Vinet, "and for a clever man you seem 
 to me easily taken in." 
 
 " No doubt making you lose your time, beside losing my 
 own to have the pleasure of hearing a man lay himself out for 
 the reward of virtue " 
 
 "It is not that. I think you very guileless to believe in 
 the refusal of support that has vexed you so much." 
 
 "What? You think " 
 
 " I think that the business is a toss-up. If the plan suc- 
 ceeds, the Government, sitting with its arms folded, will get
 
 362 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 all the benefit ; if, on the contrary, success is not for us, it 
 would, as soon as not, keep out of the risk of defeat. But, 
 take my word for it, I know Rastignac ; looking quite impas- 
 sive, and without compromising himself at all, he will perhaps 
 serve us better than by outspoken connivance. Just reflect : 
 Did he say a single word against the moral side of the attack ? 
 Did he not repeat again and again ' I make no objection ? I 
 have no right to hinder you.' And what fault had he to find 
 with the snake's venom? That its action was not deadly 
 enough ! The fact is, my dear sir, that there will be a sharp 
 tug of war, and it will take all Desroches' skill to put a good 
 face on the business." 
 
 "Then you think I had better see him?" 
 
 " Do I think so? Why, this moment, when we part." 
 
 " Do not you think it would be well that he should go and 
 talk matters over with you?" 
 
 " No, no, no ! " said Vinet. " I may be the man to do 
 the talking in the Chamber. Desroches might be seen at my 
 house, and I must seem immaculate." 
 
 Thereupon he bowed to Maxime, and left him in some 
 haste, excusing himself by having to go to the Chamber and 
 hear what was going on. 
 
 "And if I," said Maxime, running after him as he left, "if 
 I should need your advice ? " 
 
 " I am leaving Paris this evening to look after my court in 
 the country before the session opens." 
 
 "And the question in the Chamber that you may be called 
 upon to ask?" 
 
 " Oh, if it is not I, it will be some one else. I shall return 
 as soon as possible ; but you will understand that I must set 
 my shop in order before I come away for at least five or six 
 months." 
 
 "Then ban voyage, monsieur," said Maxime sarcastically, 
 and parting from him at last. 
 
 Rastignac's behavior especially nettled him when he looked
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 363 
 
 back on their first meeting, just twenty years ago, at Madame 
 de Restaud's. He, then already a formed man holding the 
 sceptre of fashion, and Rastignac a poor student, not know- 
 ing how to enter or leave a room, and dismissed from the 
 door of that handsome house when he called after his first 
 visit, in the course of which he had contrived to commit two 
 or three incongruous blunders ! And now Rastignac was a 
 peer of France and in office"] while he, Maxime, no more 
 than his tool, was obliged to listen with grounded arms when 
 he was told that his man-traps were too artless, and that if he 
 fancied them, he must work them alone. 
 
 But this prostration was but a lightning flash. 
 
 " Well, then ! " he said to himself. " Yes, I will try the 
 game single-handed. My instinct assures me that there is 
 something in it. 
 
 " What next ! A Dorlange, a nobody, is to keep me in 
 check, me, Comte Maxime de Trailles, and make my defeat a 
 stepping-stone ? There are too many dark places in that 
 rogue's past life for it not to be possible sooner or later to 
 open one to the light of day " 
 
 "To the lawyer's," said he to the coachman as he opened 
 his carriage-door. 
 
 And when he was comfortably seated on the cushions 
 
 "After all, if I cannot succeed in overthrowing this upstart, 
 I will put myself in the way of his insulting me ; I shall have 
 the choice of weapons, and will fire first. I will do better 
 than the Due de Rhetore, my insolent friend ! I will kill 
 you, never fear ! " 
 
 Desroches was at home, and Monsieur de Trailles was at 
 once shown in to his private room. 
 
 In 1839 Desroches was an honest attorney in good prac- 
 tice ; that is to say, he conducted his clients' business with 
 zeal and skill ; he never would countenance any underhand 
 proceedings, much less would he have lent them a hand, As
 
 364 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 to the fine bloom of delicate honesty which existed in Der- 
 ville and some other men of that stamp, beside the impossi- 
 bility of preserving it from rubbing off in the world of busi- 
 ness in which, as Monsieur de Talleyrand ^said : ''Business 
 means other people's money " it can never be the second 
 development of any life. The loss of that down of the soul, 
 like that of anything virginal, is irreparable; so Desroches 
 had made no attempt to restore it. He would have nothing 
 to say to what was ignoble or dishonest ; but the above-board 
 tricks allowed by the Code of Procedure, the recognized sur- 
 prises and villainies to steal a march on an adversary, he was 
 ready to allow. 
 
 Then, Desroches was an amusing fellow; he liked good 
 living ; and, like all men who are incessantly absorbed by the 
 imperious demands of hard thinking, he felt a craving for 
 highly spiced enjoyments snatched in haste, and strong to the 
 palate. So, while he had by degrees cleansed his ways as a 
 lawyer, he was still the favorite attorney of men of letters, 
 artists, and actresses, of popular courtesans and dandy bohe- 
 mians such as Maxime ; because he was content to live their 
 life, all these people attracted him, and all relished his society. 
 Their slang and wit, their rather lax moral views, their some- 
 what picaresque adventures, their expedients, their brave and 
 honorable toil in short, all their greatness and all their 
 misery were perfectly understood by him, and like an ever- 
 indulgent providence, he gave them advice and help when- 
 ever they asked for them. 
 
 But to the end that his serious and paying clients should 
 not discover what might be somewhat compromising in his 
 intimacy with these clients of his heart, he had days when he 
 was the husband and father more especially Sundays. Rarely 
 did he fail to be seen in his quiet little carriage, in the Bois 
 de Boulogne, his wife by his side the largeness of her fortune 
 stamped in her ugliness. On the opposite seat were the three 
 children in a group, all unfortunately like their mother.
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 8& 
 
 So it was to this relatively honest lawyer that Monsieur de 
 Trailles had come for advice, as he never failed to do in 
 every more or less tight place in his career. Desroches, as 
 had long been his habit, listened without interrupting him to 
 the long statement of the case as it was unfolded to him, in- 
 cluding the scene that had just taken place at Rastignac's. 
 As Maxime had no secrets from this confessor, he gave all his 
 reasons for owing Sallenauve an ill-turn, and represented him, 
 with perfect conviction, as having stolen the name under 
 which he would sit in the Chamber. His hatred appeared to 
 him in the light of positive evidence of a felony that was 
 hardly probable or possible. In the bottom of his heart 
 Desroches had no wish to undertake a case in which he at 
 once foresaw not the smallest chance of success ; and his lax 
 honesty was shown in his talking to his client as if it were a 
 quite ordinary legal matter, and in not telling him point-blank, 
 his opinion of an action which was simply an intrigue. 
 
 "To begin with, my dear sir," said the attorney, "a civil 
 action is not to be thought of: if your Romilly peasant had 
 her pockets full of proofs, her application would be refused 
 because, so far, she can have no direct interest in disputing 
 the affiliation of the opposing party." 
 
 " Yes, that is what Vinet said just now." 
 
 ''As to a criminal prosecution, that, of course, you might 
 bring about by lodging an information of false personation." 
 
 "Vinet seemed in favor of that course," said Maxime. 
 
 "Well, but there are many objections to this method of 
 procedure. In the first place, merely to get the information 
 heard, you must have something resembling proof; next, if 
 the information is lodged and the Crown decides to prosecute, 
 to get a verdict there must be far stronger evidence of the 
 felony ; and if, after all, the crime were proved against the 
 self-styled Marquis de Sallenauve, how are you to show that 
 his self-styled son is in the conspiracy, since he may have been 
 deceived by an impostor."
 
 366 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 " But what motive could that impostor have," said Maxime, 
 " for giving this Dorlange all the advantages that accrue to 
 him from being recognized as the Marquis de Sallenauve's 
 son?" 
 
 "Oh, my dear fellow," replied Desroches, "when you 
 come to State questions, any eccentricity is possible. No sort 
 of trials or actions has furnished so many romances to the 
 compilers of causes ctttbr'es or to novelists. But there is 
 another point : the assumption of a false identity is not in 
 itself a crime in the eye of the law." 
 
 " How is that? " cried Maxime. " Impossible ! " 
 
 "Look here, my lord," said Desroches, taking down the 
 Five Codes, "have the kindness to read Section 145 of the 
 Penal Code the only one which seems to lend an opening to 
 the action you propose to bring, and see whether the mis- 
 demeanor we are discussing is contemplated." 
 
 Maxime read aloud Section 145, as follows: 
 
 " Any functionary or public officer who shall have com- 
 mitted forgery in the exercise of his functions either by 
 forged signatures, or by defacing and altering deeds, docu- 
 ments, or signatures or by assuming a false identity " 
 
 "Then, you see," said Maxime, "false identity " 
 
 "Read to the end," said Desroches. 
 
 " Or by altering or adding to a register or any other public 
 document, after it has been legally attested and sealed, is 
 liable to penal servitude for life." 
 
 Monsieur de Trailles rolled the words unctuously on his 
 tongue as a foretaste of the fate in store for Monsieur de Salle- 
 nauve. 
 
 " My dear count," said Desroches, " you read as the parties 
 to a suit always do ; they never study a point of law but from 
 their own side of the case. You fail to observe that, in this 
 section, mention is made only of ' functionaries and public 
 officers; ' it has no bearing on the false identity of any other 
 class of persons."
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARClS. 367 
 
 Maxima re-read the paragraph, and saw that Desroches was 
 right. 
 
 "Still," he remarked, "there must be something elsewhere 
 to that effect?" 
 
 "Nothing of the kind; take my word for it as a lawyer; 
 the Code is absolutely silent on that point." 
 
 " Then the crime we should inform against has the privilege 
 of impunity?" 
 
 "That is to say," replied Desroches, " that its punishment 
 is doubtful at best. A judge sometimes by induction extends 
 
 the letter of the law " He paused to turn over a volume 
 
 of leading cases. 
 
 "Here, you see, reported in Carnot's 'Commentaries on 
 the Penal Code/ two judgments delivered at Assizes one of 
 July 7, 1814, and the other of April 24, 1818, both confirmed 
 in the Court of Appeal, which condemned certain individuals 
 who were neither functionaries nor public officers for assuming 
 false names and identity ; but these two verdicts, exceptional 
 in every way, are based on a section in which this particular 
 misdemeanor is not even mentioned, and it was only by very 
 recondite argument that it was brought to bear on the cases. 
 So you will understand that the outcome of such an action 
 must always be doubtful, since, in the absence of any pos- 
 itive rule, it is impossible to say what the judges' decision 
 may be." 
 
 " Consequently, it is your opinion, as it is Rastignac's, that 
 we may send our countrywoman back to Romilly, and that 
 there is nothing to be done." 
 
 "There is always something to be done," replied Des- 
 roches, " when you know how to set about it. There is a 
 further complication which does not seem to have occurred to 
 you or Monsieur de Rastignac, or even to Monsieur Vinet ; 
 and that is that, apart from the legal point, you need authority 
 from the Chamber before you can prosecute a member of the 
 representative body in a criminal court."
 
 888 TtiE DEPUTY FOR ARC& 
 
 "That is true," said Maxime; "but how does a further 
 complication help us out of our difficulty? " 
 
 " You would not be sorry, I fancy," said the lawyer, laugh- 
 ing, " to send your enemy to the hulks ? " 
 
 "A scoundrel," said Maxime, with a droll twinkle, "who 
 has perhaps caused me to miss a good marriage, who sets 
 up for austere virtue, and allows himself such audacious 
 tricks ! " 
 
 " Well ; you must, nevertheless, put up with some less 
 showy revenge. If you create a scandal, throw utter dis- 
 credit on your man that, I suppose, would, to some extent, 
 achieve your end? " 
 
 " No doubt ; half a loaf is better than no bread." 
 
 "Your ideas thus reduced, this is what I should advise: 
 Do not urge your woman to bring an action against this gen- 
 tleman who annoys you so much, but get her to place a peti- 
 tion for authority to prosecute in the hands of the president 
 of the Chamber. She will most probably not obtain it, and 
 the affair will collapse at that stage ; but the fact of the appli- 
 cation will be rumored in the Chamber, the papers will have 
 every right to mention it, and the Government will be free, 
 behind the scenes, to add venom to the imputation by the 
 comments of its supporters." 
 
 "Peste J" exclaimed Maxime, enchanted at seeing an out- 
 let for his instincts of aversion, " you are a clever fellow 
 far cleverer than all your self-styled statesmen. But as to this 
 petition to the Chamber for leave to prosecute, who can draw 
 that up?" 
 
 "Not I," replied Desroches, who did not care to go any 
 further in such dirty work. " What you want is not a judicial 
 document, but a weapon, and that is no part of my business. 
 But there are dozens of attorneys without clients who are 
 always ready to put a finger into a political pie Massol, for 
 instance, will do your job as well as any man." 
 
 " Good ! " said Maxime, "I will take the responsibility,
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S. 369 
 
 and in that shape, perhaps, Rastignac may at last swallow the 
 scheme." 
 
 " Mind you do not make an enemy of Vinet, for he will 
 think you have taken a great liberty in having thought of a 
 thing that ought at once to have occurred to such a practiced 
 parliamentary tactician as he is." 
 
 " Oh, before very long," said Maxime, rising, " I hope that 
 Vinet, Rastignac, and the rest will have to reckon with me. 
 Where are you dining to-night ? " he added. 
 
 It is a question which one "man about town" often asks 
 another. 
 
 "In a cave/' said Desroches, "with the banditti." 
 "Where is it ? " 
 
 "Why, in the course of your erotic experiences you have, 
 no doubt, had recourse to the good offices of an old ward- 
 robe-buyer named Madame de Saint-Esteve ? " 
 
 "No," said Maxime; "I always manage my own busi- 
 ness." 
 
 "Ah, I was not thinking," said the lawyer. "You have 
 always been a conqueror in high life, where such go-betweens 
 are not employed. However, the woman's name is not un- 
 known to you ?" 
 
 "Quite true. Her store is in the Rue Saint-Marc. It was 
 she who brought about the meeting between Nucingen and 
 that little slut Esther, who cost him something like five hun- 
 dred thousand francs. She must be related to a villain of the 
 same kidney who is now at the head of the detective force, 
 and goes by the same name." 
 
 "That I do not know," replied Desroches. "But lean 
 tell you this much : she made a fortune by her trade as dresser 
 (appareilleuse, as it was called at a time when the world was 
 less prudish than it is now), and to-day the worthy lady is 
 magnificently housed in the Rue de Provence, where she is at 
 the head of a matrimonial agency." 
 " And you are dining there ? " 
 24
 
 370 ''THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 "Yes, my dear sir, with the manager of an opera house in 
 London, with Emile Blondet, Andoche Finot, Lousteau, Feli- 
 cien Vernou, Theodore Gaillard, Hector Merlin, and Bixiou, 
 who was instructed to invite me, because my experience and 
 great knowledge of business are to be called into play." 
 
 " Bless me ! is there some great financial enterprise at the 
 back of that dinner?" 
 
 " A joint-stock undertaking, my dear friend, and a theatrical 
 engagement, and I am to read through the two agreements. 
 As regards the last, you understand that the distinguished 
 guests invited to meet me will proceed to blow the trumpet as 
 soon as the deed is signed." 
 
 "And who is the star whose engagement needs so much 
 ceremony?" 
 
 " Oh, a star who may look forward, it would seem, to 
 European glory ! An Italian woman discovered by a great 
 Swedish nobleman, Count Halphertius, through the ministra- 
 tions of Madame de Saint-Esteve. To have her brought out 
 on the opera stage in London, the illustrious stranger becomes 
 a sleeping partner with the impresario to the tune of a hun- 
 dred thousand crowns." 
 
 " So the Swedish count is marrying her ? " 
 
 " H'm," said Desroches, " I have not as yet been asked to 
 draw up the settlements. Madame de Saint-Esteve, as you 
 may suppose, still has some connection with the ' thirteenth 
 arrondissement ' in her agency business." 
 
 "Well, my good fellow, I hope you will enjoy the party," 
 said Maxime, leaving. " If your star is a success in London, 
 we shall probably see her in Paris this winter. I will be off 
 to put a spoke, if I can, in the chariot wheels of the rising sun 
 of Arcis. By the way, where does Massol live?" 
 
 " On my word, I cannot tell you. I have never taken him 
 a brief ; I have no use for pleaders who meddle in politics ; 
 but you can send for his address to the office of the ' Gazette 
 des Tribunaux; ' he writes for it, I know."
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 371 
 
 Maxime himself went to the office to ask where Massol 
 lived ; but the office-boy had strict orders not to give his 
 address to anybody, probably with a view to the calls of duns. 
 He fortunately remembered that Massol rarely missed a per- 
 formance at the opera, and he felt tolerably certain of finding 
 him in the lounging-room after dinner. In the evening he 
 met Massol, as he expected, at the opera. Addressing him 
 with his usual rather haughty politeness 
 
 " I should like to talk with you, monsieur," said he, " over 
 a -partly legal and partly political matter. If it were not neces- 
 sary to observe the strictest secrecy in every way, I would have 
 had the honor of calling at your office, but I believe we shall 
 discuss it in greater privacy at my house, where I can put you 
 into direct communication with two interested persons. May 
 I hope that you will give me the pleasure of taking a cup of 
 tea with me to-morrow morning soon after eleven ? " 
 
 " I shall have the honor of waiting on you to-morrow at the 
 hour you name," he eagerly replied. 
 
 " You know," said Maxime, " the Rue Pigalle? " 
 
 "Perfectly," replied Massol, "close to the Rue de la 
 Rochefoucauld." 
 
 On the evening when Sallenauve, Marie-Gaston, and Jacques 
 Bricheteau had gone together to Saint-Sulpice to hear Signora 
 Luigia sing, a little incident had occurred in the church which 
 had scarcely been noticed. Through the little-used door, 
 opening on the Rue Palatine, opposite the Rue Servandoni, a 
 fair-haired youth hastily came in. He seemed so agitated and 
 hurried that he even forgot to take off a cap of shiny leather, 
 shaped like those worn by the students at German universities. 
 As he pushed forward to where the crowd was thickest, he 
 felt himself gripped by the arm, and his face, which was florid 
 and rosy, turned lividly pale ; but on turning round he saw 
 that he had been alarmed without cause. It was only the 
 g^yiss, or beadle, who said in impressive tones
 
 372 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 " Young man, is your cap nailed to your head ? " 
 
 "I beg pardon, monsieur," said the youth. "It was an 
 oversight." 
 
 And after obeying this lesson in reverence, human and 
 divine, he lost himself in the densest part of the crowd, 
 through which he roughly made his way with his elbows, get- 
 ting a few blows in return, about which he did not trouble 
 himself. Having reached an open space, he looked round 
 with a hasty, anxious eye ; then leaving by the door on the 
 side to the Rue Garanciere, almost opposite to that he hati 
 come in by, he flew off at a great pace, and vanished down 
 one of the deserted streets that lie about the Marche Saint- 
 Germain. 
 
 A few seconds after the irruption of this strange worshiper, 
 in at the same door came a man with a deeply seamed face 
 framed in white whiskers ; thick hair, also white, but some- 
 what rusty, and falling to his shoulders, gave him the look of 
 some old member of the Convention, or of Bernardin de 
 Saint-Pierre* after having had the smallpox. 
 
 He obviously was bent on following the light-haired youth, 
 but he was not so clumsy as to rush after him through the 
 mass of people in front of the high altar, in which, as he 
 understood, the fugitive had tried to be lost. So, working 
 round the building, close to the wall, in a contrary direction, 
 he had every chance of reaching the other door as soon as his 
 prey ; but, as has happened to many another, his cleverness 
 played him a trick. As he passed a confessional, he perceived 
 a kneeling form very like that of the man he was chasing. 
 Attributing to him an ingenuity that would, no doubt, have 
 been his in similar circumstances, it struck him that, to put 
 him off the scent, his escaped victim had suddenly thrown 
 himself on the penitential tribunal. In the time it took him 
 to make sure of the man's identity, which as we know was not 
 confirmed, he was outstripped. So practiced a hunter at once 
 * Author of " Paul and Virginia,"
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 373 
 
 gave up the useless chase ; he understood that the game was up 
 for to-day, and he had missed his chance. 
 
 He too was about to leave the church, when, after a brief 
 prelude on the organ, Signora Luigia's contralto voice in a 
 few deep notes began the glorious melody to which the "Lit- 
 anies to the Virgin " are sung. The beauty of her voice, the 
 beauty of the strain, the beauty of the words of that sacred 
 hymn, which her admirable style gave out with perfect dis- 
 tinctness, seemed to impress this strange man deeply. Far 
 from leaving, as he had intended, he took his stand in the 
 shadow of a pillar, not looking for a seat ; but at the moment 
 when the last notes of the canticle died away, he had fallen 
 on his knees, and any one looking at his face would have seen 
 that two large tears were trickling down his cheeks. 
 
 The benediction having been pronounced, and the greater 
 part of the crowd having left the church 
 
 "What a fool I am ! " said he, as he rose and wiped his 
 eyes, and hailed a hack : 
 
 " Rue de Provence, and look sharp, my good fellow. It 
 will be worth your while," said he. 
 
 On reaching the house where he stopped the coach, he ran 
 past the gatekeeper's lodge and made for the backstairs, not 
 wishing to be seen ; but the porter, who was conscientious in 
 the discharge of his duty, came to his door and called after 
 him 
 
 "Pray, where are you going, sir?" 
 
 "To Madame de Saint-Esteve," replied the visitor in a 
 tone of annoyance. 
 
 Immediately after he rang at a back door, which was opened 
 by a negro. 
 
 " Is my aunt in ? " he asked. 
 
 "Oh yes, missy at home," replied the black man, putting 
 on the most gracious smile he could command, which made 
 him look like an ape cracking nuts. 
 
 Making his way along the passages, which gave an idea of
 
 374 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 the extent of the apartments, the new-comer reached the 
 drawing-room door; the negro threw it open, announcing 
 " Monsieur Saint-Hesteve," with a violent aspirate. 
 
 The head of the detective police went into a room remark- 
 able for its magnificence, but yet more so for the extraordinary 
 bad taste of the furniture. Three women of venerable an- 
 tiquity were sitting at a round table, solemnly playing domi- 
 noes. Three glasses, a silver bowl drained empty, and a 
 vinous perfume that was unpleasantly conspicuous on coming 
 into the room, showed that the worship of the double-sixes 
 was not the only cult solemnized there. 
 
 "Good-evening, ladies," said the great man, taking a 
 chair, " I am glad to find you all together, for I have some- 
 thing to say to each of you." 
 
 "We will listen presently," said his aunt; "let us finish 
 the game. I am playing for fours." 
 
 " Double-blank," said one of the antiquities. 
 
 " Domino ! " cried Madame de Saint-Esteve, " and game. 
 You two must certainly have four points between you, and all 
 the blanks are out." 
 
 So speaking, she put out a bony hand to take the punch- 
 ladle and fill the glasses ; but finding the bowl empty, instead 
 of rising to pull the bell, she rang a peal with the spoon in 
 the silver basin. 
 
 The negro came in. 
 
 " Have something put into that," said she, handing it to 
 him ; " and bring a glass for monsieur." 
 
 "Thanks; I will take nothing," said Saint-Esteve. 
 
 " I have had a sufficiency," said one of the old ladies. 
 
 "And I have been put upon milk," said the other, "by 
 the doctor, on account of my gastripes." 
 
 "You are all milksops together," said the mistress of the 
 house. " Here, clear all this away," said she to the negro ; 
 "and, above all, don't let me catch you listening at the door 1 
 You remember the clawing you got ?"
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 375 
 
 "Oh, yes, I 'member," said the man, his shoulders shaking 
 with laughter, " me got no ears now." 
 
 And he went away. 
 
 " Well, Tommy, it is your turn now," said the old aunt to 
 Saint-Esteve, after a stormy settlement of accounts between 
 the three witches. 
 
 " You, Madame Fontaine," said the head detective, turning 
 to one of them, who by her fly-away looks, her disorderly 
 gray hair, and her frightfully crooked green silk bonnet, 
 might have been taken for a blue-stocking in labor with an 
 article on the fashions, " you forget yourself too much ; you 
 never send us 'in any report, while, on the contrary, we hear 
 too many reports about you. Monsieur le Prefet does not at 
 all care for establishments of your class. I only keep you go- 
 ing for the sake of the services you are supposed to do us ; 
 but without pretending, as you do, to look into the future, I 
 can positively predict that if you continue to afford us so little 
 information, your fortune-telling den will be shut before long." 
 
 "There you go!" retorted the pythoness. "You pre- 
 vented my taking the rooms Mademoiselle Lenormand had in 
 the Rue de Tournon. Who do you suppose will come to me 
 in the Rue Vieille-du-Temple ? Poor clerks, cooks, laborers, 
 and apprentice-girls ! And you want me to go tattling to 
 you of what I pick up from such folk ? " 
 
 "Madame Fontaine, you didn't ought to say that," said 
 Madame de Saint-Estdve ; " why, I send some of my customers 
 to you most days." 
 
 " Not more than I send you of mine ! " 
 
 "And not above four days' since," the matrimonial agent 
 went on, " that Italian woman went to you from me. She is 
 not a milliner's apprentice, she is not ; and she lives with a 
 deputy who is against the Government ! You might have 
 reported that." 
 
 "There is one thing in particular," said the detective, 
 "which is constantly mentioned in the reports that reach me
 
 376 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S. 
 
 about you that foul creature you make use of in your divina- 
 tions " 
 
 "Who? Astaroth?" asked Madame Fontaine. 
 
 "Yes; that batrachian, that toad, to speak plainly, whom 
 you pretend to consult. A little while since it would seem a 
 woman was so upset by its horrible appearance that she " 
 
 "There, there," the fortune-teller broke in, "if I am to 
 do nothing now but read the cards, you may as well ruin me 
 at once cut my throat and have done with it ! Because a 
 woman has a still-born child, are you going to get rid of toads 
 altogether in this world ? If so, what did God create them 
 for?" 
 
 "My dear madame," said the man, "there was a time 
 when you would have been less partial to such help. In 1617 
 a philosopher named Vanini was burnt at Toulouse solely be- 
 cause he kept a toad in a bottle." 
 
 "Ay, but we live in an age of enlightenment," said Mad- 
 ame Fontaine cheerfully, " and the police are not so hard 
 upon us." 
 
 You, Madame Nourrisson," said the detective, turning to 
 the other old woman, "pick the fruit too green, I am told. 
 Having kept store so long as you have, you must be well 
 aware of the laws and regulations, and I am surprised at hav- 
 ing to remind you that morals must be respected under one- 
 and-twenty." 
 
 Madame Nourrisson had, in fact, been, under the Empire, 
 what Parent du Chatelet (whose work is such a curious study 
 of the great plague of prostitution) euphemistically called a 
 "Dame de Maison." She had afterward set up in the Rue 
 Neuve-Saint-Marc the store for buying and selling old clothes. 
 
 "And you, you great bully, you respected morality, I sup- 
 posed when, in 1809, you placed that girl of seventeen from 
 Champagne in my care ! " 
 
 '*If it is thirty years since that folly was committed in my 
 name," replied the man, "that is thirty years' record in my
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 377 
 
 favor; for it was the last into which I was ever drawn by a 
 petticoat. However, dear ladies, you can make such use as 
 you please of my warnings. If mischief overtakes you, you 
 cannot now complain that you had not due notice. 
 
 "As to you, my little aunt, what I have to say to you is 
 private and confidential." 
 
 At this hint the other two prepared to leave. 
 
 "Shall I send for a hack for you?" Madame de Saint- 
 Esteve asked Madame Fontaine. 
 
 "No, indeed," said the fortune-teller. "I am going to 
 walk ; I am told to take exercise. I told my forewoman, 
 Ma'ame Jamouillot, to come for me." 
 
 " And you, Madame Nourrisson ? " 
 
 " That's a good 'un ! " said the woman. "A hack to go 
 from the Rue de Provence to the Rue Neuve-Saint-Marc ! 
 Why, we are quite near neighbors." 
 
 In point of fact, the old clothes-woman had come in every- 
 day attire : a white cap with yellow ribbons, a patent front of 
 jet black curls, a black silk apron, and a cotton print gown 
 with a dark blue ground ; and, as she said facetiously, it was 
 most unlikely that any one should want to run away with her. 
 
 In this public protector, who on the evening of the out- 
 break on the 1 2th of May had offered his services to Rastignac, 
 every reader will have recognized the notorious Jacques Collin, 
 alias Vautrin, one of the most familiar and elaborately drawn 
 figures of the Human Comedy. 
 
 But, as he had told his old friend Colonel Franchessini, he 
 was tired of perpetual thief-hunting ; there was no longer any 
 hazard or anything unforeseen in the game ; and, like a too 
 experienced gambler, he had ceased to take an interest in it. 
 For some years there had been still some spice in the business, 
 and that had given him endurance for the endless attacks 
 and ambushes planned against him by his old chums on the 
 hulks, who were furious at what they called his treason : but
 
 378 THE DEPUTY FOR ARGIS. 
 
 by this time his cleverness and his good luck, which had 
 always protected him from their conspiracies, had discouraged 
 his foes, and they had laid down their arms. Since then his 
 duties had lost all their charm ; he was anxious to change his 
 sphere of employment and transfer his marvelous instincts as 
 a spy and his indefatigable energy to that of politics. 
 
 Colonel Franchessini had taken care to see him again after 
 his visit to Rastignac ; and his old fellow-boarder at Madame 
 Vauquer's was not the man to under-estimate the purport of 
 the minister's views as to the luxury of such a plain citizen 
 life as he had suggested to cast oblivion on the odious past 
 that weighed on him. 
 
 "Haha!"said he, "the pupil then has outstripped his 
 master ! His advice deserves consideration ; I will think 
 about it." 
 
 In fact, he had thought about it, and it was under the in- 
 fluence of much meditation and careful examination of the 
 scheme proposed to him that he had now come to see his aunt, 
 Jacqueline Collin otherwise known as Madame de Saint- 
 Esteve an alias they had agreed to adopt, which, while 
 masking the past history of this formidable pair, marked their 
 close relationship. 
 
 Jacqueline Collin herself, beside taking an active part in 
 many of her nephew's enterprises, had led an adventurous 
 life; and on one of the many occasions when Vautrin found 
 himself at variance with the law, an examining judge had thus 
 summed up the antecedent history of his much-respected aunt, 
 from certain data furnished by the police, of which there is 
 no reason to doubt the accuracy : 
 
 " She is, it would seem, an extremely cunning receiver of 
 stolen goods for no proof can be brought against her. She 
 is said to have been Marat's mistress, and after his death she 
 lived with a chemist, executed in the year VIII. (1799) as a 
 false coiner. She was witness at the trial. While with him 
 she acquired much dangerous knowledge of poisons. From
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 379 
 
 the year IX., till 1805, she dealt in old clothes. She was in 
 prison for two years, 1807-8, for entrapping girls under age. 
 
 " You, Jacques Collin, were at that time on your trial for 
 forgery ; you had left the banking-house where your aunt had 
 apprenticed you as clerk under favor of the education you 
 had received and the influence she could wield over persons 
 for whose depravity she had entrapped victims." 
 
 Since the time when this edifying biography had been 
 placed in her nephew's hands, Jacqueline Collin, without 
 falling again into the clutches of the public prosecutor, had 
 enlarged her borders ; and when Vautrin renounced the ways 
 of wickedness, she was far from assuming an equally immacu- 
 late garb of innocence. But having as he had made a 
 great deal of money, she would now pick and choose ; she 
 had kept at a safe distance from the arm of the law; and 
 under the pretense of a more or less decent line of business, she 
 had carried on certain underground practices, to which she 
 devoted really diabolical intelligence and energy. 
 
 We have really learned from Desroches that the more or 
 less matrimonial agency managed by Madame de Saint- 
 Esteve was situated in the Rue de Provence ; and we may add 
 that it was carried on on an extensive scale, occupying all the 
 second floor of one of the enormous houses which Paris 
 builders raise from the earth as if by magic. They are 
 scarcely finished, and never free from debt, when they are filled 
 with tenants, at any price, while waiting for a buyer to whom 
 they are sold out of hand. If the builder finds a fool to deal 
 with, he does a fine stroke .of business ; if, on the other hand, 
 the purchaser is a tough customer, the builder has to be con- 
 tent with recovering his outlay, with a few thousand francs as 
 interest ; unless, while the work is going on, the speculation 
 has been hampered by one of those bankruptcies which in the 
 building trade are among the commonest and most familiar 
 complications. 
 
 Women of the town, business agents, still-born insurance
 
 380 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS, 
 
 companies, newspapers fated to die young, the offices of im- 
 possible railroad companies, discount brokers who borrow 
 instead of lending, advertisement agents, who lack the pub- 
 licity they profess to sell ; in short, all descriptions of shy or 
 doubtful enterprise and trade combine to provide the tem- 
 porary inhabitants of these republics. 
 
 They are built for show, "run up" with perfect indiffer- 
 ence to the fact that in the course of a few months settle- 
 ment will hinder the windows from opening, warping will 
 split the doors, the seams of the flooring will yawn, the 
 drains, gutter-pipes, and sinks will leak, and the whole card- 
 board structure be uninhabitable. That is the purchaser's 
 business ; and he, after patching the house up, is at liberty to 
 be more fastidious in the choice of his tenants, and to raise 
 the rents. 
 
 Mme. de Saint-Esteve issued a document which was to offer 
 the assistance of a strictly commercial agency through which, 
 on the most moderate terms, wedding outfits and presents 
 could be procured from Paris, suitable to every fortune or 
 sum in settlement. It was only as a modest N. B., after an 
 estimate of cost of the objects commonly included in such 
 lists, divided, somewhat like an undertaker's prospectus, into 
 first, second, third, and fourth classes, that Madame de Saint- 
 Esteve hinted at her " being enabled, through her high social 
 connections, to facilitate introductions between persons wish- 
 ing to marry." 
 
 In Paris the lady herself appealed to public credulity, and 
 her means were as ingenious as they were various. She made 
 a bargain with a livery-man, who sent two or three decent- 
 looking carriages to stand for hours at her door. Then, in 
 her waiting-room, supposed clients of both sexes, well dressed, 
 and affecting great impatience, took it in turns to come in 
 and out, so as to suggest a constant crowd ; and, as may be 
 supposed, the conversation of these confederates who pre- 
 tended not to know each other expatiated in suitable terms
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 381 
 
 on the merits and superior adroitness of Madame de Saint- 
 Esteve. 
 
 The ingenious adventuress, by some donations to the poor 
 and to the charities of Notre-Dame de Lorette, her parish, got 
 an occasional call from a priest, which was at once a voucher 
 of respectability and of the genuineness of her matrimonial 
 undertakings. Another of her ingenious tricks was to keep 
 herself supplied by the market-woman with lists of all the 
 fashionable weddings in Paris, and to be seen in the church 
 very handsomely dressed, arriving in a carriage with men- 
 servants, so as to allow it to be inferred that she had had 
 something to do with bringing about the union she had 
 honored with her presence. 
 
 On one occasion, however, a not very tolerant family ob- 
 jected to the idea of serving her purpose of advertisement, and 
 had treated her with contumely ; so she was now cautious as 
 to how she tried this plan for which she had substituted a 
 system of rumor less compulsory and far less dangerous. 
 Having known Madame Fontaine for many years for there 
 is a natural affinity among all these underground traffickers 
 she had plotted with her for a sort of reciprocal insurance 
 company for working on the credulity of the Parisians ; and 
 between these two hags the terms were thus arranged : when a* 
 woman goes to have her fortune told, at least eight times out 
 of ten her curiosity turns on the question of marriage. So 
 when the sorceress announced to one of her fair clients, in 
 time-honored phraseology, that she would ere long meet her 
 fate in the person of a light-haired or a dark-haired man, she 
 took care to add : " But the union can only be brought about 
 through the agency of Madame de Saint-Esteve, a very rich 
 and highly respectable woman, living in the Rue de Provence 
 Chaussee-d'Antin, who has a passion for match-making." 
 While Madame de Saint-Esteve on her part, when she pro- 
 posed a match, if she thought there was any chance of thus 
 promoting its success, would say: "But go at any rate and
 
 382 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 consult the famous Madame Fontaine as to the outcome of the 
 negotiation Rue Vieille-du-Temple her reputation as a 
 fortune-teller by the cards is European ; she never makes a 
 mistake ; and if she tells you that I have made a good hit, you 
 may conclude the bargain in perfect confidence." 
 
 " My dear granny," said Vautrin, to begin the conversation 
 for which he had come, " I have so many things to tell you 
 that I do not know where to begin." 
 
 "I believe you why, I have not seen you for nearly a 
 week." 
 
 "To begin with, I may as well tell you that I just missed a 
 splendid stroke of business." 
 
 ''What sort?" asked Jacqueline Collin. 
 
 " Oh, all in the way of my vile trade. But this time the 
 game was worth the trouble. Do you remember that little 
 Prussian engraver about whom I sent you to Berlin? " 
 
 "Who forged the Vienna bank-notes in such an astounding 
 manner? " said the aunt, finishing the story. 
 
 " Well, not an hour ago in the Rue Servandoni, where I 
 had been to see one of my men who is on the sick list, pass- 
 ing by a greengrocer's shop, I fancied I recognized my man 
 buying a slice of le Brie cheese, which was being wrapped in 
 'paper." 
 
 "It would seem that he is not much the richer then, for all 
 he knows so much about bank-notes " 
 
 " My first thought," Vautrin went on, "was to rush into 
 the store the door was shut and to collar my rogue ; but, 
 not having seen his face very close, I was afraid of being mis- 
 taken. He, it would seem, had kept a lookout; he saw some 
 one spying him through the window, and presto ! he vanished 
 into the back-store, and I saw him no more " 
 
 "Then, old boy, that is what comes of wearing long haiv 
 and a beard all round your chin. The game scents you a 
 hundred yards away ! " 
 
 " But then, as you know, my fancy for being easily recog-
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 383 
 
 nized is what most impresses my customers. ' He must be 
 jolly well sure of himself,' they say, 'never to want any dis- 
 guise ! ' Nothing yet could or has done so much to make me 
 popular." 
 
 "Well," said Jacqueline, "so your man was in the back- 
 store?" 
 
 " I hastily took stock of the premises," Vautrin went on. 
 " The store was on one side of an arched entry; at the bot- 
 tom of the alley the door was open to a courtyard, into which 
 there would be a door from the back-store ; consequently, un- 
 less the fellow lived in the house, I was in command of all the 
 exits. I waited about a quarter of an hour ; it is a long time 
 when you are waiting. I looked into the store in vain, no 
 sign of him. Three customers went in ; the woman served 
 them without seeming to be aware of any one keeping an eye 
 on her, she never gave a glance one way or the other, or 
 seirmed at all on the watch. ' Well ! ' said I to myself at last, 
 ' tie must be a lodger; if not, the woman would certainly 
 have been more puzzled at his going out the back way.' So I 
 determined to drop in and ask a question or two. Pff ! I 
 had scarcely crossed the threshold when I heard steps in the 
 street the bird had flown." 
 
 "You were in too great a hurry, my dear. And yet, only 
 the other day you said to me ' P-o-l-i-c-e spells patience.' " 
 
 "Without waiting for further information," said Vautrin, 
 "I was off in pursuit. Exactly facing the Rue Servandoni 
 the name of the architect who built Saint-Sulpice there is a 
 door into the church, which was open because of the month 
 of Mary, service being held there every afternoon. My rascal, 
 having the advantage of me, flew through this door, and was 
 so effectually lost in the crowd that when I went in I could 
 nowhere find him." 
 
 "Well," said the woman, "I cannot be sorry that the ras- 
 cal stole a march on you. I always feel some interest in a 
 smasher. Coining is a neat sort of crime, and clean ; no
 
 384 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 blood spilt, no harm done but to that mean hunks the Govern- 
 ment." 
 
 " In spite of your admiration, you will have to go to-morrow 
 and pick up some information from the greengrocer woman, 
 who must certainly know him, since she winked at his escape. 
 When I went back to the store I found shutters and doors all 
 shut up. I had lost some time in the church " 
 
 "Listening to a singer, I bet," interrupted the aunt. 
 
 " Quite true. How did you know? " 
 
 " Why, all Paris is crowding to hear her," replied Jacque- 
 line Collin, "and I know her, too, in my own little way." 
 
 " What ! That voice that touched me so deeply, that took 
 me back fifty years to my first communion under the good ora- 
 torian fathers, who brought me up that woman who made 
 me cry, and transformed me for five minutes into a saint 
 and you have her on your books ? " 
 
 "Yes," said Madame de Saint-Esteve carelessly, "I have 
 a transaction on hand for her : I am getting her on to the 
 stage." 
 
 "Aha! So you are a dramatic agent too ? Matrimony is 
 not enough? " 
 
 " This is the case in two words, my boy : She is an Italian, 
 as handsome as can be, come from Rome with an idiot of a 
 sculptor, whom she worships without his supecting it. Indeed, 
 this Joseph cares so little about her that, after using her as his 
 model for a statue, he has never yet been at the pains to be 
 more than civil." 
 
 "That is a man who ought to do well in his art," remarked 
 Jacques Collin, " with such a contempt for women and so 
 much strength of mind." 
 
 " And the proof of that," replied Jacqueline, " is that he 
 has just given up his art to become a deputy of the Chamber. 
 It was about him that I said to old Fontaine that she might 
 have found something to write you. I sent my Italian to 
 her, and she told the cards as regards this ice-bound lover."
 
 THE DEPUTY FO& ARCtS. 385 
 
 " A.nd how did you come to know the woman ? " 
 
 " Through old Ronquerolles. Having gone to see the 
 sculptor one day, in the matter of a duel in which he \V3% 
 second, he saw this jewel of a woman, and became quite Nu- 
 cingen about her." 
 
 " And you undertook the negotiations? " 
 
 " As you say. It was above a month ago, and the poor 
 man had had all his pains for nothing. Now I, having the 
 matter in hand, made inquiries ; I found out that the beauty 
 was a member of the sisters of the Virgin ; thereupon I called 
 on her as a Dame de Charite, or charitable lady, and imagine 
 what luck for me as a beginning the sculptor was in the 
 country getting himself elected " 
 
 " I have no fears about you ; at the same time, a lady of 
 charity who undertakes a theatrical agency ! " 
 
 "By the time I had seen her twice she had told me all her 
 little secrets," the old woman went on. " That she could no 
 longer bear life with that man of marble ; that she was deter- 
 mined to owe nothing to him; and that having studied for 
 the stage, if she could only secure an engagement, she would 
 run away. So one day I went off to her and arrived quite 
 out of breath to tell her that a friend of mine a great lord, 
 highly respectable, old, virtuous to whom I had spoken of 
 her, would undertake to get her an opening and I asked her 
 to let me take him to see her." 
 
 "A word and a blow ! " said Jacques Collin. 
 
 " Yes; but she, a devil for suspiciousness, and less bent on 
 deserting her sculptor than she had thought, kept me, shilly- 
 shally, from day to day. So at last, to give her a shove, I 
 hinted that she should go and consult old Fontaine, as indeed 
 she was ready enough to do. 
 
 " It is of no use to talk ; I must proceed with caution. If 
 
 he should make difficulties about our enticing away the 
 
 woman, whom he would perhaps think he wanted as soon as 
 
 she ceased to want him, he would hold a very strong hand. 
 
 25
 
 386 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 And that selfish old brute Ronquerolles, who is only a mem- 
 ber of the Upper House, would not be much protection 
 against a deputy of the Chamber " 
 
 " That old rip Ronquerolles is not the man for that woman," 
 said Jacques Collin. "If she is an honest woman, we must 
 keep her so. I know a really respectable man who will get 
 her on to the stage on honorable terms, and secure her a 
 splendid position without asking for anything in return." 
 
 "What! you know of any such phenomenon? I should 
 be truly glad to have his address ; I would leave a card on 
 him." 
 
 "All right Petite Rue Sainte-Anne, Quai des Orfevres: 
 you will find a man there of your acquaintance." 
 
 "Are you guying me?" cried the woman, who in her as- 
 tonishment fell back on the low slang which she had spoken 
 so fluently of yore. 
 
 " No, I am quite serious. That woman touched me ; she 
 interests me; and I have another reason " 
 
 Vautrin then related his proceedings with regard to Ras- 
 tignac, Colonel Franchessini's intervention, the minister's 
 reply, and his transcendental theories of social reorganiza- 
 tion. 
 
 "And that little ape thinks he can teach us!" exclaimed 
 the aunt. 
 
 "He is in the right," said Vautrin, "only the woman was 
 wanting; you have found her for me." 
 
 "Yes, but it will be sheer ruination." 
 
 "And for whom are we saving? We have no heirs, and I 
 do not suppose you feel urgently drawn to found a hospital, 
 or prizes for distinguished merit?" 
 
 " I am not such a softhead," replied the woman. " Beside, 
 as you know, my Jacques, I have never kept an account 
 against you. Still, I foresee one difficulty : this woman is as 
 proud as a Roman which she is, and your confounded duties 
 are
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S. 387 
 
 "There, you see," Jacques Collin eagerly put in, "I must 
 at any price escape from a life where one is liable to such 
 insults. But be easy ; I can avert this particular offense. My 
 business justifies me in playing every part in turn ; and, as you 
 will remember, I am not a bad actor. I may put a whole 
 rainbow of orders in my button-hole to-morrow and take a 
 house in any aristocratic name I may choose to assume. The 
 fun of the carnival lasts all the year round for a detective. 
 
 " I have already hit on a plan. I know the man I mean to 
 be. You may tell your Italian that Count Halphertius a 
 great Swedish lord, crazy about music and philanthropy 
 takes a great interest in her advancement. In point of fact, 
 I will furnish a house for her ; I will strictly observe the vir- 
 tuous disinterestedness to which you may pledge me ; in short, 
 I will be her recognized patron. As to the engagement she 
 wishes for, I wish it too ; for my own future purpose I want her 
 to be glorious and brilliant ; and we are not Jacques and 
 Jacqueline Collin if, with her gifts and our gold and determi- 
 nation, we fail in making her so." 
 
 " But then comes the question whether Rastignac will think 
 you have won ; it was Monsieur de Saint-Esteve, the head of 
 the detective police, that he told you to whitewash." 
 
 " Not at all, old lady. There is no such person as Saint- 
 Esteve, no Jacques Collin, no Vautrin, no Trompe-la-Mort, 
 no Carlos Herrera : there is a remarkably powerful mind, 
 strong and vigorous, offering its services to the Government. 
 I am bringing it from the North, and christening it with a 
 foreign name, and this makes me all the better fitted for the 
 political and diplomatic police whose functions I henceforth 
 intend to exercise." 
 
 " You forge ahead ! it is wonderful. But first we must 
 catch the jewel who is to make such a show for you, and we 
 have not got her yet." 
 
 " That is no difficulty; I have seen you at work, and when 
 you will you can."
 
 388 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 " I will try," said Jacqueline Collin diffidently. "Come 
 and see me again to-morrow night, at any rate \ perhaps I 
 may have something to show." 
 
 "And meanwhile, do not forget the greengrocer's store in 
 the Rue Servandoni, No. 12, where you are to make inquiries. 
 That capture, as being important to a foreign government, 
 has a political air about it that would be of service toward 
 helping me to my end." 
 
 " I will give you a good account of the storewoman, never 
 fear," said Jacqueline. " But the other affair is rather more 
 ticklish ; we must not handle it roughly." 
 
 "You have a free hand," replied Vautrin. " I have always 
 found you equal to any undertaking, however difficult. So 
 farewell till to-morrow." 
 
 On the following day Vautrin was sitting in his office in 
 the Petite Rue Sainte-Anne when he received the following 
 note 
 
 "You are much to be pitied, my old boy; everything is 
 working out as you want it. Early this morning I was told 
 that a lady wished to speak to me. Who should come in but 
 our Italian, to whom I had given my address in case she 
 should need me in a hurry. Her Joseph having spoken last 
 evening, in cheerful terms, of his intention that they should 
 part company, the poor dear had not closed her eyes all 
 night, and her little brain is in such a pother that she came 
 straight to me, begging me to introduce her to my respectable 
 friend, in whose hands she is prepared to place herself if he is 
 to be trusted, because she feels it a point of honor to owe 
 nothing more to that icicle who can disdain her. So come at 
 once in the new skin you have chosen, and then it is your 
 business to make your way to the charmer's good graces. 
 " Your affectionate aunt, 
 
 " J. C. DE SAINT-ESTVE."
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 389 
 
 Vautrin replied as follows 
 
 " I will be with you this evening at nine. I hope the change 
 in my decorative treatment will be so handsome that if I had 
 not told you the name I shall assume, you would find it diffi- 
 cult to recognize me. I have already taken steps in the mat- 
 ter of the engagement, and can speak of it in such a way that 
 the charmer will form a good idea of her Papa 's wealth and 
 influence. 
 
 " Sell some stock out in the course of the day for a rather 
 considerable sum ; we must have ready money ; I, on my 
 part, will do the same. Till this evening, 
 
 "Your nephew and friend, 
 
 "SAINT-ESTEVE." 
 
 That evening, punctual to the hour he had fixed, Vautrin 
 went to his aunt's rooms. On this occasion he went up the 
 main staircase, and was announced as Monsieur le Comte 
 Halphertius by the negro, who did not recognize him. 
 
 Warned though she was of his metamorphosis, Jacqueline 
 stood in amazement at this really great actor, who was alto- 
 gether another man. His long hair, a la Franklin, was now 
 short and curled and powdered ; his eyebrows and whiskers, 
 cutlet-shaped, in the style of the Empire, were dyed dark 
 brown, in strong contrast with the powdered wig ; and a false 
 mustache of the same hue gave his not naturally noble features 
 a stamp of startling originality, which might, by a stretch of 
 imagination, be called distinction. A black satin stock gave 
 deportment to his head. He wore a blue tail-coat, buttoned 
 across, and in one button-hole an inch of ribbon displayed 
 the colors of half the orders of Europe. A nankeen vest, vis- 
 ible below the coat-front, effected a harmonious transition to 
 pearl-gray trousers ; patent-leather boots and lemon kid gloves 
 completed the "get-up," which aimed at careless elegance, 
 The powder, of which the last wearers could now easily be
 
 390 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 counted, gave the crowning touch to an old foreign diplo- 
 matist, and a very happy sobriety to a costume which, but for 
 that corrective, might have appeared too juvenile. 
 
 After giving a few minutes to admiration of his disguise, 
 Vautrin asked his aunt 
 
 -Is she here?" 
 
 "Yes," said Jacqueline. "The angel retired to her room 
 half an hour ago to tell her beads, now that she is deprived of 
 attending the services of the month of Mary. But she impa- 
 tiently awaits your visit, seeing how I have sung your praises 
 all day." 
 
 "And what does she think of your house ? Does she repent 
 of the step she has taken ? " 
 
 " Her pride would in any case be too great to allow of her 
 showing such a feeling. Beside, I have cleverly won her con- 
 fidence, and she is one of those persons who are determined 
 never to look back when once they have started." 
 
 " The best of the joke," said Vautrin, " is that her deputy, 
 who is worried about her, was sent to me by Monsieur le 
 Prefet that I might help him to find her." 
 
 "He wants her, then?" 
 
 " He is not in love with her, you understand, but he con- 
 sidered her as being in his care, and he was afraid that she 
 might have taken it into her head to kill herself, or might 
 have fallen into the hands of some intriguing woman. And 
 you know that, but for my fatherly intervention, he would 
 have laid his finger on the spot." 
 
 "And what did you say to your flat? " 
 
 " Oh, of course, I allowed him to hope, but really and truly 
 I was sorry not to be able to do what he asked me. I took a 
 fancy to him at once; he has a pleasant way with him, ener- 
 getic and clever, and it strikes me that our friends the Min- 
 istry will find him a pretty tough customer." 
 
 " So much the worse for him ; he should not have driven 
 the. dear child, tp extremjties," s.aid. the aunt "And. the
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 391 
 
 engagement, for which you said you had the irons in the 
 fare?" 
 
 "You know what a queer thing luck is, my beauty," re- 
 plied Vautrin, taking out a newspaper. " Good or bad, it 
 always comes in squalls. This morning, after receiving your 
 letter, which brought me such good news, I opened this the- 
 atrical journal and read this paragraph : ' The Italian opera 
 season in London, which began so badly by the lawsuit that 
 brought to light the pecuniary difficulties under which Sir 
 Francis Drake's management is struggling, seems still further 
 embarrassed by the serious illness of la Serboni, necessitating 
 her absence from the stage for an indefinite period. Sir 
 Francis arrived yesterday at the Hotel des Princes, Rue de 
 Richelieu, having come in search of two desiderata a prima 
 donna and some funds. But the hapless impresario is moving 
 *n a vicious circle ; for without money no prima donna, and 
 without a prima donna no money. 
 
 "'We may hope, however, that he will escape from this 
 dead-lock ; for Sir Francis Drake has a character for being 
 honest and intelligent, and with such a reputation he will 
 surely not find every door closed to him.' ' 
 
 " Men of the world are your journalists ! " said the old aunt 
 with a knowing air. " Is every door to be thrown open be- 
 cause a man is honest and intelligent? " 
 
 " In the present case," said Vautrin, " the phrase is not so 
 far wrong ; for the moment I had read the article I figged 
 myself out, as you see, took a private coach, and went off to 
 the address given. 
 
 " ' Sir Francis Drake? ' I asked. 
 
 " ' I do not know whether he can see you, sir,' says the 
 gentleman's gentleman, coming forward ; he was there, I 
 strongly suspect, to give the same answer to any one who 
 might call. ' He is with the Baron de Nucingen,' he added 
 apologetically. 
 
 ' I made believe to look through a pocket-book well
 
 392 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 stuffed with bank-notes for a card, which, of course, I had 
 not got. 
 
 " ' Well,' said I, with a slight German accent and a sprink- 
 ling of Germanisms, ' I am Count Halphertius, a Swedish 
 gentleman. Tell Sir Francis Drake I had come for to discuss 
 some business. I shall go to the Bourse, where I give some 
 orders to my broker, and I shall come back after a half- 
 hour.' 
 
 "Saying this in the most lordly tone, I went back to my 
 carriage. I had only set foot on the step when the lackey, 
 running after me, said he had made a mistake ; that Mon- 
 sieur de Nucingen was gone, and his master could see me 
 at once." 
 
 " Trying their games on us ! " said Jacqueline Collin, with 
 a shrug. 
 
 " Sir Francis Drake," Vautrin went on, " is a regular Eng- 
 lishman, very bald, with a red nose, and large prominent 
 yellow teeth. He received me with frigid politeness, and 
 asked me in good French what my business was. 
 
 '"Just now,' said I, 'at the Cafe de Paris, I read this,' 
 and I handed him the paper, pointing to the place. 
 
 "'It is inconceivable,' said he, returning me the news- 
 paper, ' that a man's credit should be thus cried down pub- 
 licly.' 
 
 " ' The journalist is wrong ? You have no want of money ? ' 
 
 "'You may imagine, monsieur, that I should not in any 
 case try to obtain it through the medium of a theatrical 
 journal.' 
 
 "'Very good! Then have we nothing to talk about?' 
 said I, rising. ' I come to put some money in your busi- 
 ness.' 
 
 "'I would rather you had a prima donna to offer me!' 
 said he. 
 
 " ' I offer you both,' said I, sitting down again. ' One not 
 without {he other.'
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 393 
 
 " ' Of well-known talent ? ' asked the impresario. 
 
 "'Not at all known,' replied I. 'Never seen yet at any 
 theatre.' 
 
 " 'Hum risky,' said the gentleman with a cunning look. 
 ' The protectors of youthful talent often make great mis- 
 takes.' 
 
 "'But I offer you a hundred thousand crowns as an in- 
 vestment for you only for to listen to my nightingale." 
 
 " 'That would be a large sum for so little trouble, and but 
 a small one as a help to my management if it were in such 
 difficulties as your paper says.' 
 
 " 'Well, then, hear us for nothing; if we are what you 
 want, and you make a handsome offer, I will put down twice 
 so much.' 
 
 " ' You speak with a freedom that invites confidence ; from 
 what country is your young prima ? ' 
 
 " ' Roman of Rome a pure-bred Italian, and very hand- 
 some. You may believe if I am interested in her; I went 
 mad about her, only for that I had heard her a long way off 
 in a church. I did not see her till afterward.' 
 
 " ' But it strikes me,' said the Englishman, ' that women 
 do not sing in church in Italy.' ' 
 
 "Well!" said Madame de Saint-Esteve, "are there 
 churches nowhere but in Italy?" 
 
 "Precisely," said Vautrin. "I felt that to give some ap- 
 pearance of reality to my disguise and my proceedings, I must 
 assume some suspicion of eccentricity ; so seizing the oppor- 
 tunity of getting up a German quarrel 
 
 " ' I beg to remark, monsieur/ said I in a very pugnacious 
 tone, ' that you have done me the honor of give me the one 
 lie.' 
 
 " ' What ! ' said the Englishman in amazement, ' nothing 
 could be further from my thoughts.' 
 
 "'It is plainly so, all the same, 1 said I. 'I tell you, I 
 heard the signora in church ; you say : " Women do not sing
 
 394 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 in church in Italy " that is so much as to say I shall not 
 have heard her.' 
 
 " ' But you may have heard her in another country.' 
 
 " 'You should have thought of that,' said I, in the same 
 quarrelsome tone, ' before you made that remark extraordi- 
 nary remark. At any rate, I see we shall not agree. The 
 signora can wait till the Italian opera opens in Paris in Oc- 
 tober. Artists get much better known here. So, Monsieur 
 Drake, I wish you a good-morning.' And I really seemed 
 about to leave." 
 
 " Well played ! " said his aunt. 
 
 In all the most risky affairs undertaken by them in common, 
 they had always duly considered the artistic side. 
 
 "Well, to make a long story short," said Vautrin, "hav- 
 ing thus brought my man to the sticking-point, we parted on 
 these terms I am to put down a hundred thousand crowns 
 in money, the signora gets fifty thousand crowns for the re- 
 mainder of the season, supposing her voice is satisfactory ; 
 and, to judge of her quality, we are to meet to-morrow at two 
 o'clock at Pape's, where Sir Francis Drake will have brought 
 two or three friends to assist him, to whose presence I have 
 consented. We are to be supposed to have gone to choose a 
 piano. I said, just to keep up the game, that the lady might 
 be terrified at the solemnity of a formal hearing, and that we 
 are more sure in this way of knowing what she can really do." 
 
 "But I say, old boy," said Jacqueline, "a hundred thou- 
 sand crowns is a lot of money ! " 
 
 " Just the sum that I inherited from that poor boy Lucien 
 de Rubempre," said Vautrin carelessly. "However, I have 
 gone into the matter. Sir Francis Drake, with some one to 
 back him, may have a very good season. There is my secre- 
 tary, Theodore Calvi, who is mine for life or death. He is 
 very alert on all questions of interest. I have secured him 
 the place of cashier, and he will keep an eye on the partner's 
 profits, NOW, there is but one thing that I am anxious
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 395 
 
 Signora Luigia moved me deeply, but I am no connoisseur ; 
 artists may not think of her as I do." 
 
 "Artists have pronounced on her, my ducky; her sculptor 
 never thought of giving her the key of the fields till she had 
 been heard by a certain Jacques Bricheteau, an organist and a 
 first-rate musician. They were at Saint-Sulpice the very even- 
 ing of your pious fit, and the organist declared that the woman 
 had sixty thousand francs in her voice whenever she pleased 
 those were his words." 
 
 "Jacques Bricheteau! " said Vautrin ; "why, I know the 
 man. There is a fellow of that name employed in one of the 
 police departments." 
 
 "Well, then," said his aunt, "it is your nightingale's 
 good fortune to be under the protection of the police ! " 
 
 " No, I remember," said Vautrin. "This Jacques Briche- 
 teau was an inspector of nuisances, who has just been dis- 
 missed for meddling in politics. Well, now, suppose you 
 were to effect the introduction. It is late." 
 
 Jacqueline Collin had hardly left the room to go for Luigia, 
 when there was a great commotion in the anteroom leading to 
 it. Immediately after the door was thrown open, and in 
 spite of a desperate resistance on the part of the negro, who 
 had been expressly ordered to admit nobody whatever, in 
 came a personage whose advent was, to say the least, inoppor- 
 tune, if not altogether unexpected. In spite of an insolently 
 aristocratic demeanor, the new-comer, caught in his violence 
 by a stranger, was for a moment disconcerted, and Vautrin 
 was malicious enough to intensify the situation by saying with 
 Teutonic bluntness 
 
 "Monsieur is an intimate friend of Madame de Saint- 
 Esteve's?" 
 
 "I have something of importance to say to her," replied 
 the intruder, " and that servant is such an ass that he cannot 
 1..11 you plainly whether his mistress is at home or qut."
 
 396 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 " I can bear witness that she is out," replied the supposed 
 Count Hnlphertius. " For more than an hour I have wait for 
 to see her, by her own appointment. She is a flighty thing, 
 and I believe she is gone to the theatre, for what her nephew 
 have sent her a ticket, the negro telled me." 
 
 " At whatever hour she may come in I must see her," said 
 the new-comer, taking an easy-chair, into which he settled 
 himself. 
 
 " For me, I wait no longer," replied Vautrin. 
 
 And, having bowed, he prepared to leave. Then Madame 
 de Saint-Esteve appeared on the scene. Warned by the negro, 
 she had put on a bonnet and thrown a shawl over her shoulders, 
 to appear as if she had just come in. 
 
 "Gracious!" she exclaimed, with well-feigned surprise. 
 " Monsieur de Ronquerolles, here, at this hour! " 
 
 " Devil take you ! what do you mean by shouting out my 
 name?" said her customer in an undertone. 
 
 Vautrin, entering into the farce, turned back, and coming 
 up with an obsequious bow 
 
 "Monsieur le Marquis de Ronquerolles? " said he, " peer 
 of France, formerly her ambassador. I am glad to have 
 spent a minute with a statesman so well known a so perfect 
 diplomatist ! " 
 
 And with a respectful flourish he went to the door. 
 
 "What, baron, going so soon?" said the old woman, 
 trying to assume the tone and accent of a dowager of the 
 Faubourg Saint-Germain. 
 
 "Yes. Monsieur le Marquis has much to talk to you. I 
 shall return back to-morrow at eleven and be punctual." 
 
 "Very well; to-morrow at eleven," said his aunt. "But 
 I may tell you everything is going on swimmingly ; the lady 
 thinks you will be all she could wish." 
 
 Another bow and Vautrin was gone. 
 
 "Who in the world is that strange creature?" asked 
 Ronquerolles.
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 397 
 
 "A Prussian baron for whom I am finding a wife," replied 
 the woman. "Well," she went on, "is there anything new 
 that you so pressingly want to speak to me? " 
 
 "Yes. And something which you ought to have known ! 
 The fair one left the sculptor's house this morning." 
 
 " Pooh ! " said Jacqueline. " Who told you that ?" 
 
 "My man, who has seen the maid-of-all-work." 
 
 " Hah ! Then you keep several irons hot ! " said she, glad 
 of an excuse for a quarrel. 
 
 " My good woman, you were making no way at all, and the 
 matter has been in hand a month " 
 
 "You seem to think that all you want is to be had ready- 
 made, and that an Italian is the same soft tinder as your Paris 
 sluts ! And then you are so liberal ! " 
 
 "Why, you have extracted more than three bank-notes for 
 a thousand francs already for your sham expenses." 
 
 " A perfect fortune ! And what about the engagement you 
 undertook to arrange ? " 
 
 " Can I open the Italian opera expressly for that woman ? 
 If she would have sung at the French house " 
 
 " There is Italian opera in London though not in Paris for 
 the moment, and the manager, as it happens, is over here in 
 search of a^n'ma." 
 
 "So I saw in the papers, of course ; but what good could 
 I do by trying to deal with a bankrupt ? " 
 
 " Why, that is your best chance. You bolster up the man, 
 and then, out of gratitude " 
 
 "Oh, certainly!" said the marquis, shrugging his shoul- 
 ders. " A mere trifle of five hundred thousand francs what 
 la Torpille cost Nucingen ! " 
 
 " My good man, you want the woman or you don't. Es- 
 ther had tried the streets. This Italian is at least as hand- 
 some, and virtuous green seal ! Then she has a glorious 
 voice. You have forked out three thousand-franc bills ; 
 what is that, pray, to make sUch a noise about ? "
 
 398 TffE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S. 
 
 " Did you or did you not undertake the business?" 
 " I did. And I ought to have it left entirely to me ; and 
 if I had supposed that I was going to be checked off by your 
 manservant, I would have asked you to apply elsewhere. I 
 do not care to have a partner in the game." 
 
 " But, you conceited old thing, but for that fellow, would 
 you have known what I have just told you?" 
 "And did he tell you the rest of the story? " 
 " The rest of the story ? What ? " said the marquis eagerly. 
 " Certainly. Who got the bird out of its nest, and in what 
 cage it may be at this present speaking." 
 "Then you know?" cried Ronquerolles. 
 " If I do not know, I can make a guess." 
 ''Then, tell me," said he, in great excitement. 
 " You, who know every queer specimen, old or young, in 
 the Paris menagerie, must certainly have heard of Count Hal- 
 phertius, a Swede enormously rich, and just arrived." 
 "I never heard his name till this moment." 
 "You had better ask your servant ; he can tell you." 
 " Come, come ; do not try finessing. This Count Hal- 
 
 phertius, you say ?" 
 
 "Is music-mad and as woman-mad as Nucingen." 
 "And you think that la Luigia will have flown that way?" 
 " I know that he was hovering round her ; he even charged 
 me to make her splendid offers, and if I had not pledged my- 
 self to you " 
 
 " Oh, I daresay ; you are a dame of such lofty virtue ! " 
 "Is that the way you take it?" said Jacqueline Collin, 
 putting her hand in her pocket and pulling out a purse fairly 
 well filled with notes. " You can take your money back, my 
 boy, and I only beg you to trouble me no further." 
 
 "Get along, you wrong-headed creature," replied the mar- 
 quis, seeing three thousand-franc notes held out to him. 
 "What I have given, you know I never take back." 
 
 " And I never keep what I have not earned. You are done,
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARClS. 399 
 
 Monsieur le Marquis. I am working for Count Halphertius; 
 I brought away the lady; she is hidden here, in my rooms, 
 and to-morrow morning she and the Swede set out for Lon- 
 don, where a splendid engagement awaits her ! " 
 
 " No, no, I do not believe that you would cheat me," said 
 Ronquerolles, fancying that the fact thus fired at him point- 
 blank was really the sarcasm it appeared. "We are old 
 friends, you know ; pocket those bank-notes, and tell me hon- 
 estly what you think of this rich foreigner as a rival." 
 
 " Well, I have told you. He is enormously rich ; he will 
 stick at no sacrifice ; and I know that he has had several talks 
 with Madame Nourrisson." 
 
 "Then you learned all those facts from that old carrion?" 
 
 " Madame Nourrisson is my friend," said Madame de Saint- 
 Esteve, with much dignity. "We may be competing to gain 
 the same prize, but that is no reason for her being evil-spoken 
 of in my presence." 
 
 " Did she tell you at least where this Count Halphertius is 
 living?" 
 
 " No. But I know that he was to start for London yester- 
 day. That is why I ran alongside before I put the flea in 
 your ear." 
 
 "It is very evident the Italian woman is gone off to join 
 him." 
 
 "You may very likely be right." 
 
 "A pretty mess you have made of it ! " said Ronquerolles 
 as he rose. 
 
 "Indeed!" said Jacqueline insolently. "And were you 
 never checkmated in your diplomatic business?" 
 
 "Do you suppose you will get any more exact informa- 
 tion?" 
 
 " We will see," said she. It was her formula for promising 
 her assistance. 
 
 "But no underhand tricks," cried the marquis. "You 
 know I do not understand a joke."
 
 400 THE DEPUTY FOR AKC1S. 
 
 " Will the case be brought before the Chamber of Peers?" 
 said Madame de Saint-Esteve, who was not a woman to be 
 easily daunted. 
 
 Without answering this piece of insolence, Ronquerolles 
 only remarked : 
 
 "You might perhaps desire your nephew to help in your 
 inquiries." 
 
 "Yes," said Jacqueline; ."I think it would not be amiss 
 to tell him something about the matter without naming you, 
 of course." 
 
 " And if at any time I can be of use to him with his chief, 
 you know, I am as stanch a friend as I am a dangerous 
 foe." 
 
 Thereupon Madame de Saint-Esteve and her client parted, 
 and as soon as the enemy's coach-wheels were heard in the 
 distance, the virtuous matron had no occasion to go in search 
 of her nephew. He had gone round by a back passage, and 
 come to wait in the room behind the drawing-room, whence 
 he had overheard everything. 
 
 "You tricked him neatly ! " said Vautrin. "We will con- 
 trive by little scraps of information to keep his head in the 
 trough for a few days longer ; but now go at once and fetch 
 our 'Helen,' for unless it is too late you ought to introduce 
 us." 
 
 "Be easy; I will settle that," said his aunt, who a minute 
 later came back with the handsome housekeeper. 
 
 " Signora Luigia Monsieur le Comte Halphertius," said 
 she, introducing them to each other. 
 
 " Signora," said Vautrin in the most respectful tone, " my 
 friend Madame de Saint-Esteve tells me you will permit me 
 to take some interest for your affairs " 
 
 "Madame de Saint-Esteve," replied Luigia, who had 
 learned to speak French perfectly, " has spoken of you as a 
 man with a great knowledge of art." 
 
 " That is to say, I am passionately devoted to it, and my
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 401 
 
 fortune allows me to do all I can to encourage it. You, mad- 
 ame, have a splendid gift." 
 
 " That remains to be proved, if I am so fo/tunate as to get 
 a chance of being heard." 
 
 " You may come out when you choose. I have seen the 
 manager of the Italians theatre in London ; he shall hear you 
 to-morrow it is settled." 
 
 " I am deeply grateful for the trouble you have been so good 
 as to take ; but before accepting your kind offices, I wish to 
 come to a clear understanding." 
 
 "I love to be frank," said Vautrin. 
 
 "I am poor and alone in the world," said Luigia; "I am 
 considered good-looking, and at any rate I am young. It be- 
 hooves me, therefore, to be circumspect in accepting the eager 
 benevolence that is shown me. In France, I am told, it is 
 rarely disinterested." 
 
 "Disinterestedness," said Vautrin, "I shall promise. But 
 as to hindering tongues of talking I shall not promise." 
 
 "Oh ! as for talk," said his aunt, " that you may make up 
 your mind to. Monsieur le Comte's age even will not stop 
 their wagging for, in fact, a younger man is more likely to 
 
 devote himself to a woman without any idea of In Paris 
 
 your old bachelors are all reprobates ! " 
 
 " I shall not have ideas," said Vautrin. " If I am so happy 
 to be of use for the signora, which I admire her talent so 
 much, she shall let me be her friend ; but if I fail in my re- 
 spect to her, she shall be independent for that talent, and 
 she shall turn me out of her door like a servant that shall rob 
 her." 
 
 "And I hear, Monsieur le Comte, that you have already 
 been kind enough to inquire about an engagement for me? " 
 
 "It is almost settled," said Vautrin. "To-morrow you 
 shall sing ; and if your voice shall satisfy the manager of the 
 Italians in London, it is fifty thousand francs for the rest of 
 the season." 
 26
 
 402 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 "It is a dream," said Luigia. "And perhaps when he 
 shall have heard me " 
 
 " He will be of the same opinion as that Monsieur Jacques 
 Bricheteau," replied Jacqueline. "He said you had sixty 
 thousand francs in your voice so you are still robbed of ten 
 thousand francs." 
 
 " Oh ! as to his promise to pay fifty thousand francs as soon 
 as he has heard you," said Vautrin, " I have no fear. Then 
 to pay them that is another thing. He wants money, they 
 say. But we will have the agreement made by some clever 
 man, Madame de Saint-Esteve shall find him ; and the signora 
 shall not have to think about the money that is her friend's 
 concern. She shall think only of her parts." 
 
 Vautrin, as he said: "Then to pay them that is another 
 
 thing " had managed to touch his aunt's foot with his 
 
 own. She understood. 
 
 "On the contrary," said she, "I believe he will pay very 
 punctually. He will not care to quarrel with us, my dear 
 count. It is not every day that you come across a man who, 
 to secure an engagement, is ready to risk a sum of a hundred 
 thousand crowns." 
 
 " What, monsieur ! you are prepared to make such a sacri- 
 fice for my sake ! I can never allow it " 
 
 " My good Madame de Saint-Esteve," said Vautrin, "you 
 are a tell-tale. I am risking nothing ; I have looked into the 
 matter, and at the end of the season I shall have my benefits ; 
 beside, I am v-e-ery rich, I am a widower, I have not children; 
 and if part of that money shall be lost, I shall not for that 
 hang myself." 
 
 " Nevertheless, monsieur, I will not permit such a piece of 
 folly." 
 
 " Then you do not want me for your friend, and you are 
 afraid you shall be compromised if I help you? " 
 
 " In Italy, monsieur, such a protector is quite recognized ; 
 and so long as there is nothing wrong, nobody cares for ap-
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 403 
 
 pearances ; but I cannot entertain the idea of allowing you to 
 risk so large a sum on my account." 
 
 "If it were a risk, no. But the risk is so small that your 
 engagement and the hundred thousand crowns are two sepa- 
 rate things, and I shall enter into partnership with the director 
 even if you refuse." 
 
 " Come, come, pretty one," said Jacqueline, " you must 
 make up your mind to owe this service to my friend Hal- 
 phertius ; you know that if I thought it was likely to carry you 
 further than you think quite right, I should have nothing to 
 do with it. Talk it over with your confessor, and you will 
 see what he says about it." 
 
 " I would in Italy ; but in France I should not consult him 
 about a theatrical engagement." 
 
 "Well, then, signora," said Vautrin, in the kindest way, 
 "consider your career as an artist. It lies before you, a 
 splendid road ! And when every paper in Europe is full of 
 the Diva Luigia, there will be a good many people greatly 
 vexed to think that they failed to recognize so great an artist, 
 and to keep on friendly terms with her." 
 
 Vautrin knew men's minds too well not to have calculated 
 the effect of this allusion to the secret sorrow of the Italian 
 girl's heart. The poor woman's eyes flashed, and she gasped 
 for breath. 
 
 " Monsieur le Comte," said she, " may I really trust you? " 
 
 " Undoubtedly ; and all the more so, because if I spend the 
 money, I expect to get some little return." 
 
 "And that is ?"-said Luigia. 
 
 " That you show me some kind feeling ; that the world 
 shall believe me to be happier than I really shall be ; and that 
 you do nothing to deprive me of that little sop to my pride, 
 with which I promise to be content." 
 
 " I do not quite understand," said the Italian, knitting her 
 brows. 
 
 "And yet nothing can be plainer," said Madame de Saint-
 
 404 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 Esteve. " My friend here does not wish to look a fool; and 
 if while he is visibly your protector you were to take up with 
 your deputy again, or fall in love with somebody else, his 
 part, as you may understand, would not be a handsome one." 
 
 " I shall never be anything to the count but a grateful and 
 sincere friend," said Luigia. "But I shall be no more for 
 any other man especially for the man of whom you speak. 
 I did not break up my life, dear madame, without due con- 
 sideration." 
 
 "But you see, my dear," said the old woman, thus showing 
 a profound knowledge of the human heart, " that the men of 
 whom we declare that we have washed our hands are often 
 just the most dangerous." 
 
 "You speak as a Frenchwoman, madame," said the Italian. 
 
 " Then to-morrow," said Vautrin, " I have your permission 
 to come for you and take you to meet this manager? Of 
 course, you know many of the parts in stock operas?" 
 
 "L know all the parts taken by Malibran and Pasta," said 
 Luigia, who had been studying indefatigably for two years 
 past. 
 
 "And you will not change your mind in the course of the 
 night?" said Vautrin insinuatingly. 
 
 "Here is my hand on it," said Luigia, with artless frank- 
 ness. " I do not know whether bargains are ratified so in 
 France." 
 
 "Ah, Diva, Diva ! " cried Vautrin, with the most burlesque 
 caricature of dilettante admiration ; and he lightly touched 
 the fair hand he held with his lips. 
 
 When we remember the terrible secret of this man's past 
 life, it must be admitted that the Human Comedy nay, I 
 should say, Human Life has some strange doublings. 
 
 The success of the singer's trial was far beyond Vautrin's 
 expectations. The hearers were unanimously in favor of 
 Luigia's engagement. Nay, if they had listened to Sir Francis 
 Drake, it would have been signed then and there, and the
 
 THE DEPUTY fOR ARClS. 405 
 
 singer would have set out the same day for London, where, 
 owing to la Serboni's illness, her majesty's theatre was in 
 great straits. 
 
 As he was starting for England, he said to his aunt 
 
 "To-day is the xyth of May ; at seven in the evening on 
 the 2ist, I shall be back in Paris with Sir Francis Drake. 
 Meanwhile take care that our protege is provided with a 
 suitable outfit. No absurd magnificence, as if you were dress- 
 ing up a courtesan, but handsome things in the best style, not 
 loud or too startling to the signora's good taste. In short, 
 just what you would buy for your daughter, if you had one, 
 and she were going to be married. 
 
 "For that same day, the 2ist, order a dinner for fifteen 
 from Chevet. The party will consist of the leaders of the 
 press; your client Bixiou will get them together. You, of 
 course, as mistress of the house; but I entreat you, dress 
 quietly nothing to scare the guests. Then I must have a 
 clever man of business to look through the papers before we 
 sign, and a pianist to accompany the Diva, who shall sing us 
 something after dinner. You must prepare her to give a taste 
 of her best quality to all those trumpeters of fame. Sir 
 Francis Drake and I make the party up to fifteen. I need 
 not say that it is your friend Count Halphertius who gives the 
 dinner at your house, because he has none of his own in Paris ; 
 and everything is to be of the best, elegant and refined, that 
 it may be talked about everywhere." 
 
 After giving these instructions, Vautrin got into a post- 
 chaise, knowing Jacqueline Collin well enough to feel sure 
 that his orders would be carried out with intelligence and 
 punctuality. 
 
 END OF PART I.
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS 
 PART II. 
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 *'Ls DfcPUTfi D'ARCIS," like the still less generally known 
 "Les Petits Bourgeois," stands on a rather different footing 
 from the rest of Balzac's work. Both were posthumous, and 
 both, having been left unfinished, were completed by the 
 author's friend, Charles Rabou. Rabou is not much known 
 nowadays as a man of letters; he must not be confused with 
 the writer Hippolyte Babou, the friend of Baudelaire, the 
 reputed inventor of the title " Fleurs du Mai," and the 
 author of some very acute articles in the great collection of 
 Crepet's "Poetes Francais." But he figures pretty frequently 
 in association of one kind or another with Balzac, and would 
 appear to have been thoroughly imbued with the scheme and 
 spirit of the Comedie. At the same time, it does not appear 
 that even the indefatigable and most competent M. de Loven- 
 joul is perfectly certain where Balzac's labors end and those 
 of Rabou begin. 
 
 It would seem, however (and certainly internal evidence 
 has nothing to say on the other side), that the severance, or 
 rather the junction, must have taken place somewhere about 
 the point where, after the introduction of Maxime de Trailles, 
 the interest suddenly shifts altogether from the folk of Arcis 
 and the conduct of their election to the hitherto unknown 
 Comte de Sallenauve. It would, no doubt, be possible, and 
 even easy, to discover in Balzac's undoubted work for in- 
 stance, in "Le Cur6 de Village" and "Illusions Perdues " 
 instances of shiftings of interest nearly as abrupt and of 
 changes in the main centre of the story nearly as decided. 
 Nor is it possible, considering the weakness of constructive 
 finish which always marked Balzac, to rule out offhand the 
 substitution, after an unusually lively and business-like begin- 
 
 O ()
 
 x PREFACE. 
 
 ning, of the nearly always frigid scheme of letters, topped up 
 with a conclusion in which, with very doubtful art, as many 
 personages of the Comedie, and even direct references to as 
 many of its books as possible, are dragged in. But it is as 
 nearly as possible certain that he would never have left things 
 in such a condition, and I do not even think that he would 
 ever have arranged them in quite the same state, even as an 
 experiment. 
 
 The book belongs to the Champenois or Arcis-sur-Aube 
 series, which is so brilliantly followed by " Une Tenebreuse 
 Affaire." It is curious and worth notice, as showing the con- 
 scientious fashion in which Balzac always set about his mature 
 work, that though his provincial stories are taken from parts 
 of France widely distant from one another, the selection is 
 by no means haphazard, and arranges itself with ease into 
 groups corresponding to certain haunts or sojourns of the 
 author. There is the Loire group, furnished by his youthful 
 remembrances of Tours and Saumur, and by later ones down 
 to the Breton coast. There is the group of which Alencjon 
 and the Breton-Norman frontiers are the field, and the scenery 
 of which was furnished by early visits of which we know little, 
 but the fact of the existence of which is of the first impor- 
 tance, as having given birth to the "Chouans," and so to the 
 whole Comedie in a way. There is the Angoumois-Limousin 
 group, for which he informed himself during his frequent 
 visits to the Carraud family. And lastly, there is one of 
 rather wider extent, and not connected with so definite a 
 centre, but including the Morvan, Upper Burgundy, and 
 part of Champagne, which seems to have been commended 
 to him by his stay at Sache and other places. This was his 
 latest set of studies, and to this "Le Depute d'Arcis" of 
 course belongs. To round off the subject, it is noteworthy 
 that no part of the coast except a little in the north, with the 
 remarkable exceptions of the scenes of " La Recherche de 
 1'Absolu " and one or two others ; nothing in the greater part
 
 PREFACE. 3d 
 
 of Brittany and Normandy; nothing in Guienne, Gascony, 
 Languedoc, Provence, or Dauphine, seems to have attracted 
 him. Yet some of these scenes and with some of them he 
 had meddled in the Days of Ignorance are the most tempt- 
 ing of any in France to the romancer, and his abstention from 
 them is one of the clearest proofs of his resolve to speak only 
 of that he did know. 
 
 The certainly genuine part of the present book is, as cer- 
 tainly, not below anything save his very best work. It be- 
 longs, indeed, to the more minute and " meticulous " part of 
 that work, not to the bolder and more ambitious side. There 
 is no Goriot, no Eugenie Grandet, not even any Corentin or 
 Vautrin, hardly so much as a Rastignac about it. But the 
 good little people of Arcis-sur-Aube are represented " in their 
 natural," as Balzac's great compatriot would have said, with 
 extraordinary felicity and force. The electoral meeting in 
 Madame Marions' house is certainly one of the best things in 
 the whole Comedie for completeness within its own limits, 
 and none of the personages, official or other, can be said to 
 suffer from that touch of exaggeration which, to some tastes, 
 interferes with the more celebrated and perhaps more generally 
 attractive delineations of Parisian journalism in "Illusions 
 Perdues " and similar books. In fact, in what he wrote of 
 "Le Depute d'Arcis," Balzac seems to have had personal 
 knowledge to go upon, without any personal grievances to 
 revenge or any personal crazes to enforce. The latter, it is 
 true, often prompted his sublimest work ; but the former 
 frequently helped to produce his least successful. In " Le 
 Depute d'Arcis" he is at the happy mean. It is not neces- 
 sary to give an elaborate bibliography of it ; for, as has been 
 said, only the "Election" part is certainly Balzac's. This 
 appeared in a newspaper, "L'Union Monarchique," for April 
 and May 1847. 
 
 G. S.
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 THE least known of Balzac's works is undoubtedly " Les 
 Petits Bourgeois;" it was not published until 1854, more 
 than three years after his death, being the last, with the ex- 
 ception of a few minor pieces, to reach the public. It is 
 believed that Charles Rabou who finished " Le Depute 
 d'Arcis" completed this. Much of it seems quite foreign 
 to Balzac's style, particularly the often long drawn-out dia- 
 logues ; much of which must be that of another hand. Then 
 the abrupt breaks, though Balzac was not by any means free 
 from this vice, give a further tendency to this opinion. 
 
 It will be noted that, in a sense, he clears the stage of a 
 number of his characters Corentin, Popinot, ctal.; the former 
 of whom resigns his ba'ton to his successor, and the latter, one 
 of his pet. goody characters, being found decently interred, 
 though honored still. Lousteau, after a long rest, is again 
 shown in his great forte of "turning an honest dollar " in 
 connection with the despised press, in the sale of the "Echo 
 de la Bievre." Cerizet, first met with in " Illusions Perdues," 
 comes more fully on the scene than in any other volume the 
 same villain still. The spy, Dutocq, who was the cause of 
 Rabourdin's downfall in "Les Employes," drops out without 
 his meed of poetical justice. To give Balzac his proper due, 
 it must be said that he seldom controverts the happenings of 
 real life to attain the " married and live-happy-ever-after 
 style" of the usual novel. 
 
 In "Les Petits Bourgeois" several new characters appear, 
 perhaps the three most notable ones being Madame Cardinal, 
 Louis-JerSmc Thuillier (only slightly mentioned in "Les 
 Employes"), and Mademoiselle Marie-Jeanne-Brigitte Thuil- 
 lier ; of the first we would have wished to see more ; the sec' 
 (xii)
 
 PREFACE. xiii 
 
 ond is a careful study of the clerk-beau arrived at middle age ; 
 while the last mentioned is a clean, delightful sketch per- 
 haps a little harsh at times of the old maid who has " made 
 her way." One finds in Brigitte traces of Cousin Bette, with- 
 out her evil mind, and of Mademoiselle Cormon in " Les 
 Rivalites." 
 
 " Les Petits Bourgeois " has little of history to record. As 
 said it was not published until 1854, although Balzac says of 
 it, in March, 1844: "I may tell you that my work called 
 ' Les Petits Bourgeois,' owing to much difficulty of construc- 
 tion, requires a full month of labor ; still it is entirely written. " 
 In October, 1846, he says again : "It is to these scruples that 
 the delay which has injured some of my works is due ; for 
 example : 'Les Paysans,' which has been nearly completed for 
 a long time, and 'Les Petits Bourgeois,' which has been in 
 type at the printery for quite eighteen months." 
 
 Now this seems strange in view of the fact that Balzac 
 always needed money. In other of these prefaces it has been 
 shown what "finished" and "completed" often meant. It was 
 this that caused the trouble between himself and the publisher 
 of" Le Lys dans la Vallee," his leaving it in an incomplete state 
 after it was "finished." In the case of the present volume, 
 neither the MS. nor proofs were ever seen by anybody. It 
 really first came out in the "Pays," in the Autumn of the 
 year mentioned. 
 
 PUBLISHER'S EDITOR.
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 PART II. 
 
 WHEN Vautrin had mentioned Bixiou as the recruiting-ser- 
 geant of his company, this was what he had meant by calling 
 him her "client." Unless one has never read Moliere's 
 "Avare," he cannot but be aware of Maitre Simon, who ever 
 stands as a screen between the usurer's traffic and the arm of 
 the law. 
 
 Now, Master Bixiou, whose extremely free-and-easy life 
 frequently compelled him to have recourse to his credit, had, 
 through an intermediary, found himself in business relations 
 with Jacqueline Collin ; and by his monkey-skill in worming 
 out mysteries, especially such as might interest himself, in 
 spite of the queer disguises in which she involved herself, he 
 had succeeded in getting face to face with his creditor. Then, 
 one day, being quite unable to meet a bill which would fail 
 due- on the morrow, he had boldly attacked the ogress, to 
 work the miracle of extracting a renewal on favorable terms. 
 The woman liked a man of spirit, and, like all wild beasts, 
 she had her intervals of ruth. It need hardly be said that 
 Bixiou had done his utmost to propitiate her ; he was witty 
 under his reverses, full of dazzling paradoxes and theories of 
 jovial immorality, which so effectually bewildered the money- 
 lender, that not only did she renew the bill, but she had even 
 lent him a further sum ; and this sum, to crown the marvel, 
 he had actually repaid her. 
 
 Hence, between the artist and the "matrimonial agent" 
 there arose a certain friendly feeling. Bixiou, not knowing 
 whom the terrible creature was with whom he rubbed shoulders, 
 flattered himself that it was his cleverness that made her laugh, 
 
 (1)
 
 2 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 and now and then, when he was at his wits' end, enabled him 
 to soften her to the extent of a few napoleons ; he did not 
 know that he was the dog of the raree show in the lion's den; 
 and that this woman, in whose past life there had been 
 incidents a la Brinvilliers, was not incapable of making him 
 pay with his life for his insolent familiarity, to say nothing of 
 the interest on her loans. 
 
 Meanwhile, and pending this fatal termination which was not 
 very probable, Jacqueline Collin did not hesitate to employ 
 this jovial gossip in the ferreting he practiced so successfully; 
 indeed, she not infrequently gave him, without his knowning 
 it, a part to play in the shady imbroglios that were the occupa- 
 tion of her life. 
 
 In the affair of Luigia, the caricaturist was wonderfully 
 useful ; through him she could insure publicity for the rumor 
 of Count Halphertius' appearance on the Parisian horizon, 
 his passion for the singer, and the immense sums he was pre- 
 pared to put down in her behalf. 
 
 On the 2ist, at seven o'clock precisely, all the guests, of 
 whom Desroches had given Bixiou the list, and Dcsroches 
 himself, were assembled in the drawing-room in the Rue de 
 Provence when the negro announced Sir Francis Drake and 
 Count Halphertius, who had insisted on not being named 
 first. 
 
 As he glanced at the assembled circle, Vautrin was an- 
 noyed to perceive that his aunt's habits and instincts had 
 proved stronger than his special and express injunctions, and 
 a sort of turban, green and yellow, would have put him seri- 
 ously out of temper, but that the skill she had shown in carry- 
 ing out all his other wishes won forgiveness for her head-dress. 
 As for Luigia, dressed, as usual, in black, having had the 
 wisdom to refuse the assistance of a hairdresser who had 
 vainly attempted to reduce what he had called the disorder 
 of her hair, she was supremely beautiful ; and an air of mel-
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 3 
 
 ancholic gravity stamped on all her person compelled a feeling 
 of respect, which surprised these men, to whom Bixiou had 
 spoken of her as awaiting their verdict. 
 
 The only person who was specially introduced to Vautrin 
 was Desroches, whom Bixiou brought up to him with this 
 jovially emphatic formula 
 
 " Maltre Desroches, the most intelligent attorney of modern 
 times." 
 
 As to Sir Francis Drake, if he seemed a shade less scornful 
 than he had intended to be of the influence of journalism as 
 affecting the supply of capital, it was because he happened to 
 be acquainted with Felicien Vernou and Lousteau, two writers 
 for the journalistic press, with whom he shook hands warmly. 
 
 Before dinner was announced, Count Halphertius thought 
 it his part to make a little speech ; and after a few minutes' 
 conversation with Signora Luigia, to whom he had good taste 
 enough not to speak till he had been in the room a short 
 while, he ostensibly addressed Madame de Saint-Esteve, but 
 loud enough to be heard by all who were present. 
 
 " My dear madame," said he to his aunt, "you are really 
 a wonderful woman. The first time I find myself in a Paris 
 drawing-room, and you make me to meet all that is most dis- 
 tinguished in literature, in arts, and in the world of business. 
 I, what am only a northern barbarian, though my country has 
 its famous men Linnaeus, Berzelius, the great Thorvaldsen, 
 Tegner, Franzen, Geier, and our charming novelist, Fre"de>ica 
 Bremer I am here astonished and timid, and I do not know 
 how to say to you that I am so extraordinary obliged." 
 
 "Well, through Bernadotte,"* said the lady, whose eru- 
 dition took her so far as that, " France and Sweden clasped 
 hands." 
 
 " It is quite certain," said Vautrin, " that our beloved sov- 
 ereign Charles XIV. " 
 
 * Jean-Baptiste-Jules Bernadotte, a French general raited to the Swed- 
 ish throne. 1812.
 
 4 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S. 
 
 He was interrupted by a butler, who threw open the doors 
 and announced dinner. 
 
 Madame de Saint-Esteve took Vautrin's arm, and whispered 
 as they went 
 
 "Don't you think it all very well done? " 
 
 "Yes," said Jacques Collin, "it is very well gotten up. 
 Nothing is wrong but your diabolical parrot-colored turban, 
 which startled me a good deal." 
 
 " No, no," said Jacqueline, " with my Javanese phiz " (she 
 was born, in fact, in Java) " something Oriental carries it off." 
 
 The dinner was not, on the whole, particularly lively. The 
 Human Comedy has more than once had occasion to include 
 a picture of the cheerful race who were here present in force, 
 under the brilliant light of the triclinium; but then they had 
 not been muzzled as they were at this banquet. Bixiou, as a 
 message from Madame de Saint-Esteve, had particularly im- 
 pressed on all the guests that they were to say nothing that 
 could distress the chaste ears of the pious Italian. So these 
 men, forced to be cautious, all men of wit and feeling more 
 or less, as a famous critic said, had lost their spirit ; and fall- 
 ing back on the dinner, which was excellent, they murmured 
 in undertones, or reduced the conversation to commonplace 
 remarks. In short, they ate and they drank under protest, so 
 to speak ; but they did not really dine. 
 
 Bixiou, to whom such a state of things was quite unendur- 
 able, was bent on making some break in this monotony. The 
 intimacy between a foreign nobleman and their hostess had 
 given him food for thought ; he had also been struck by a 
 certain inefficiency in the Amphitryon ; and he had said to 
 himself that a genuine nobleman would at a smaller cost have 
 succeeded in putting some life into the party. So, in order 
 to feel his way, it occurred to him to test the count by speak- 
 ing of Sweden, and at the beginning of the second course he 
 asked him all across the table 
 
 " Monsieur le Comte, you are too young, I imagine, to
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 5 
 
 have known Gustavus III., whom Scribe and Auber have set 
 in an opera, and who in France has given his glorious name 
 to a galop" 
 
 "I beg your pardon," replied Vautrin, seizing the oppor- 
 tunity thus offered to him; "lam very nearly sixty, which 
 would make me thirteen in 1792, when our beloved sovereign 
 was killed by the assassin Anckastroem ; so I can remember 
 those times." 
 
 Having said this, by the help of a volume called " Carac- 
 teres et Anecdotes de la cour de Suede " (published by Arthus 
 Bertrand in 1808 without the author's name), which he had 
 picked up at a bookstall since his incarnation as a Swede, 
 Vautrin was in a position to defy pitfalls. He improved the 
 occasion ; like a speaker who only waits to be started on a 
 familiar text to display his powers to the best advantage, no 
 sooner was the tap turned on than he flowed with such eru- 
 dition and pertinence on all the great men of his country, 
 gave so many circumstantial details, related so many curious 
 and secret facts, especially with regard to the famous Coup 
 d' Etat, by which Gustavus III. emancipated the crown in 
 1772 ; in short, was so precise and so interesting that, as they 
 rose from table, Emile Blondet said to Bixiou 
 
 " I was like you a foreign count, introduced by this match- 
 monger, at first struck me as suspicious. But not only was 
 the dinner really princely; this man knows his Swedish Court 
 in a way that is not to be obtained from books. He is un- 
 doubtedly a man of good family ; and if only I had time, I 
 could make a very interesting pamphlet out of all he has told 
 us. But the diva is about to sign her agreement." 
 
 "He is a very cunning fox," said Desroches to Bixiou as 
 they came to the drawing-room. " He must be enormously 
 rich; he paid the Englishman a hundred thousand crowns 
 down in bank-bills on the spot; and when I wanted to insert 
 a rather stringent clause in the agreement as to the payment 
 of the lady's salary for Sir Francis Drake has not a reputa-
 
 6 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 tion for paying ' on the tail,' as L6on de Lora would say 
 our gentleman would allow no written expression of distrust 
 whence I conclude that the fair Italian keeps him at arm's 
 length, and that he is not sorry to have some hold over her 
 through arrears of pay." 
 
 " And your fees," said Bixiou. " Did he happen to men- 
 tion them? I told old Saint-Esteve that she must not expect 
 a man of your consequence to put himself out of the way for 
 soup and beef that they must be flavored with mint-sauce." 
 
 " Here you are ! " said Desroches, taking out of his pocket 
 a gold box, oval in shape, and very, handsomely chased. 
 "Just now, while I was reading the indentures, I had laid my 
 snuff-box of Irish horn worth about ten francs perhaps on 
 the table by my side. Our friend interrupted me to ask for a 
 pinch. When I had done reading and wanted it, in the 
 place of my box, which had vanished, I found this gem." 
 
 " Your 'uncle,' " said Bixiou, "would lend you three or 
 four hundred francs on it, which would mean a value of about 
 a thousand." 
 
 "As I protested against such an exchange," Desroches 
 went on, " ' I am the gainer by it,' says he. ' I have a relic 
 of the Napoleon of attorneys.' ' 
 
 "Mighty genteel ! " said Bixiou, " and please God and the 
 old woman I will cultivate his acquaintance. I say, supposing 
 I were to sketch him in an early number of the ' Charivari ' ? " 
 
 " First we must find out whether he has enough French wit 
 in him to be pleased to see himself caricatured." 
 
 At this moment a chord on the piano announced that the 
 Signora Luigia was about to face the enemy. She sang the 
 "Willow Song" with a depth of expression which touched 
 her audience, though the trial was held by an areopagus who 
 was digesting a dinner of no sparing character. 
 
 The song ended, Vernou and Lousteau, going up to Sir 
 Francis Drake, said, with an assumption of indignation as 
 flattering to his skill as to his hopes as a manager
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 1 
 
 " What a mean wretch you must be to have secured such an 
 artist for fifty thousand francs a mere song ! " 
 
 Luigia then sang an air from " Nina," by Paesiello, and in 
 this light and vivacious character revealed a gift of impersona- 
 tion at least equal to her talent as a singer. 
 
 "She startled me!" said the old aunt to Vautrin. "I 
 fancied I saw Peyrade's daughter."* 
 
 What crowned Luigia' s success, and recommended her 
 especially to her reporters, was her modesty a sort of igno- 
 rance of her wonderful gifts in the midst of the praises that 
 were showered on her. This little crowd of journalists, 
 accustomed to the extravagant vanity and insolent assumption 
 of the smallest stage queens, could not get over the humility 
 and artlessness of this Empress of Song, who seemed quite 
 surprised at the effect she had produced. 
 
 A few words skillfully whispered at parting to each of these 
 great men, and a card left at their lodgings next day by Count 
 Halphertius, secured for his protege, at any rate for the mo- 
 ment, a chorus of admiration which would echo across the 
 channel, and be almost as good as a brilliant debut at the 
 Italian opera house in Paris. 
 
 Some days before Luigia's journey, the Boulogne boat car- 
 ried another person of this drama to England. 
 
 As soon as he had ascertained where he could find Salle- 
 nauve, to give him the information he thought so urgent, 
 Jacques Bricheteau abandoned the idea of writing him. He 
 thought it simpler and safer to go and see him. 
 
 On reaching London, the traveler was somewhat surprised 
 to learn that Hanwell was one of the most famous lunatic 
 asylums in the three kingdoms. If he had but remembered 
 the apprehensions his friend had felt at the state of Marie- 
 Gaston's brain, he would have guessed the truth ; but he was 
 quite at sea when he was further informed that this asylum, 
 * See "The Harlot's Progress."
 
 8 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 maintained by the taxes, was open only to mad people of the 
 lower classes, and not to paying patients. 
 
 Hanwell is a large building of not unhandsome appearance ; 
 the front, nine hundred and ninety-six feet in length, is 
 broken by three octagonal towers, three stories high one at 
 each end, and one in the middle ; the monotony is thus re- 
 lieved, though the melancholy purpose of the building neces- 
 sitated a very moderate use of ornament. 
 
 The asylum is pleasantly situated at the foot of a hill on 
 the borders of Jersey (sic) * and Middlesex. The extensive 
 grounds, gardens, and farms lie between the Uxbridge road, 
 the river Brent, and the Grand Junction canal ; nine hundred 
 patients can be accommodated and treated there. As it is well 
 known that manual labor is one of the most valuable elements 
 of the cure, the house contains workshops for carpentry, smiths' 
 work, painting, glazing, and brushmaking ; cotton is spun, 
 shoes, baskets, strawberry pottles, and straw hats are made, 
 and other light work for women. The finer qualities of work 
 are sold to visitors in a bazaar, and bring in a considerable 
 profit. 
 
 Such patients as are incapable of learning a trade work in 
 the garden and farm, which supply many of the wants of the 
 establishment; bread and ale are made on the premises; all 
 the necessary linen is made up and washed by means of a 
 steam engine, which also heats every part of the building. A 
 chapel with a fine organ, a library, and a concert-room the 
 salutary effect of music on the patients being amply proved 
 show that, hand in hand with intelligent care given to physical 
 suffering, the needs of the spiritual and intellectual man are 
 not neglected. 
 
 Finally, as Lord Lewin had told Sallenauve in his letter, 
 the superintendent and director was Dr. Ellis, a distinguished 
 physician to whom we owe a valuable treatise on the develop- 
 
 * This curious mistake seems to have arisen from the proximity of 
 Oiterley Park, Lord Jersey's residence.
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 9 
 
 ment and therapeutics of mental disease. In his treatment of 
 these maladies this learned man does not despise the aid.of 
 phrenology. 
 
 On being shown into the doctor's room, the organist asked 
 him whether a Frenchman named Sallenauve were not staying 
 for a time at Hanwell. Here, again, Bricheteau paid the 
 penalty of his neglected and shabby appearance ; without 
 vouchsafing any inquiries or explanations, Dr. Ellis shortly 
 replied that he had never even heard Monsieur de Sallenauve's 
 name. This, after all, was very probable ; so Jacques Briche- 
 teau withdrew, much disappointed; and fancying that Madame 
 de 1'Estorade had misread, or he himself had mistaken, the 
 name of Hanwell, he spent some days in running about the 
 county of Middlesex visiting every spot of which the name 
 ending in ell invited his attention. 
 
 All his inquiries having resulted in nothing, as he rarely 
 allowed his persevering and resourceful spirit to be beaten in 
 anything he undertook, Jacques Bricheteau resolved to make 
 another attempt on Hanwell by letter, thinking, very rightly, 
 that a letter sometimes got in where a man was barred out. 
 In point of fact, on the evening of the day when he posted 
 his letter he received a reply from Sallenauve, inviting him 
 to call at the asylum, where he was promised a most cordial 
 welcome. 
 
 Dr. Ellis' conduct was accounted for when Jacques Briche- 
 teau learned the extent of the disaster that had befallen Marie- 
 Gaston. Discretion is, of course, one of the most indispen- 
 sable virtues in the head of an asylum for the insane ; since 
 every day, by his position, he becomes the depository of 
 secrets which affect the honor of whole families. 
 
 When Bricheteau arrived at the asylum, and was introduced 
 by Sallenauve as his friend, he was heartily welcomed. Dr. 
 Ellis made every apology ; and having on various occasions 
 in the course of his practice found really wonderful benefit 
 derived from music, he said that he regarded the organist's
 
 10 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 arrival as quite a godsend, since his great musical talent might 
 be of immense use as a means toward effecting the cure of the 
 patient. 
 
 Since leaving Ville-d'Avray, Marie-Gaston's state had un- 
 fortunately become seriously complicated. Until he reached 
 England he had been comparatively cheerful and docile to 
 Lord Lewin's advice ; they might have been supposed to be 
 friends traveling together for pleasure. But when, instead oi 
 embarking at once for South America, Lord Lewin, under the 
 pretext of business to transact in the neighborhood of London, 
 proposed to Marie-Gaston to accompany him, the madman 
 began to suspect some snare into which he had been wheedled. 
 He allowed himself, nevertheless, to be driven to Hanwell, 
 represented by Lord Lewin as one of the royal residences ; he 
 had not even resisted when invited to cross the threshold ot 
 his prison ; but once in the presence of Dr. Ellis, who had 
 been forewarned by a letter from Lord Lewin, a sort of in- 
 stinct, of which the insane are very capable, seemed to tell 
 the unhappy man that his freedom was in danger. 
 
 "I do not like that man's face," he said aloud to Lord 
 Lewin. " Let us go." 
 
 The doctor had tried to laugh off the remark ; but Marie- 
 Gaston, getting more and more excited, exclaimed : 
 
 "Hold your tongue! Your laughter is intolerable. You 
 look just like an executioner." 
 
 And it is possible that the deep attention with which mad 
 doctors must study the countenance of a patient, added to the 
 stern fixed gaze by which they are often compelled to control 
 a maniac, may at last give their features an expression of in- 
 quisitorial scrutiny. This, no doubt, has a highly irritating 
 effect on the overstrung nervous sensibilities of the unhappy 
 creatures brought within their ken. 
 
 "You will not deprive me, I hope," said the doctor, " of 
 the pleasure of keeping you and my friend Lord Lewin to 
 dinner?"
 
 TIME DEPUTY fOR ARCIS. u 
 
 "I! Dine with you?" cried Marie-Gaston vehemently. 
 " What that you may poison me 1 " 
 
 "Well, but poison is just what you want, surely?" said 
 Lord Lewin quickly. "Were you not talking the other day 
 of a dose of prussic acid ? " 
 
 Lord Lewin was not, as might perhaps be supposed, merely 
 rash in making this pointed speech ; he had studied mad per- 
 sons, and he discerned that a deeply hostile aversion for the 
 doctor was seething in Marie-Gaston's mind ; so, being strong 
 and active, he intended to divert on himself the storm that 
 was about to burst. It fell out as he had expected. 
 
 "Vile scoundrel!" cried Marie-Gaston, seizing him by 
 the throat, " you are in collusion with the other, and sell- 
 ing my secrets ! " 
 
 It was with some difficulty, and the help of two warders, 
 that Lord Lewin had shaken off his desperate clutch ; the 
 poor man had developed raving mania. 
 
 The paroxysm, after lasting some days, had yielded to 
 care and treatment ; the patient was now gentle and quiet, 
 and showed some hopeful symptoms ; but Sir William Ellis 
 hoped to induce a final crisis, and he was considering the 
 way and means to this end when M. Jacques Bricheteau ar- 
 rived. 
 
 As soon as Sallenauve found himself alone with the organist, 
 he questioned him as to the motives that had prompted him 
 to follow him, and it was not without indignation that he 
 heard of the intrigue which Maxime and the Beauvisages 
 seemed to be plotting against him. His old suspicions re- 
 vived 
 
 "Are you quite certain," he asked, "that the man I but 
 just saw was in fact the Marquis de Sallenauve ? " 
 
 "Mother Marie des Anges and Achille Pigoult," replied 
 Bricheteau, " who warned me of this plot, have no more doubt 
 of the marquis' identity than I have. And in all the gossip 
 which they are trying to work up into a scandal, one thing
 
 12 THE DEPUTY hOR ARC1S. 
 
 alone seems to me at all serious, and that is, that by your 
 absence you leave the field free to your enemies." 
 
 "But the Chamber will not condemn me unheard," re- 
 plied the member. " I wrote the president to ask leave of 
 absence; and in the event of its being refused, which is most 
 improbable, I have asked 1'Estorade, who knows my reasons 
 for being here, to answer for me." 
 
 "You also wrote to madame his wife?" 
 
 "I wrote only to his wife," replied Sallenauve. "I an- 
 nounced to her the misfortune that has overtaken our friend, 
 and at the same time begged her to explain to her husband 
 the good offices I requested of him." 
 
 "If that is the case," said Jacques Bricheteau, "do not 
 depend for anything on the 1'Estorades. A rumor of the 
 blow about to be dealt you had no doubt already reached 
 them." 
 
 And after telling him of the reception he had met with, as 
 well as the unkind speeches made by Madame de 1'Estorade, 
 Jacques Bricheteau drew the conclusion that in the impending 
 struggle no help could be hoped for from that quarter. 
 
 "I have some right to be surprised at such a state of 
 things," said Sallenauve, "after Madame de 1'Estorade's 
 pressing assurances of unfailing good-will; however,' he 
 added with a shrug, "nothing is impossible, and calumny 
 has ere now undermined closer friendships." 
 
 " So now, as you must understand," said the organist, " we 
 must set out for Paris without delay ; all things considered, 
 your presence here is really far less necessary." 
 
 "On the contrary," replied Sallenauve, "only this morn- 
 ing the doctor was congratulating himself on my having de- 
 cided on coming, saying that at the right moment my inter- 
 vention might be invaluable. In fact, I have not yet been 
 allowed to see Marie-Gaston, reserving my appearance as a 
 surprise at need." 
 
 "The use fulness of your presence," replied Jacques Bridie-
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 13 
 
 teau, " is nevertheless problematical ; while, by remaining 
 here for an indefinite period, you are most certainly imperil- 
 ing your political future, your social position, everything of 
 which the most ardent friendship has no right to demand the 
 sacrifice." 
 
 "We will go and talk it over with the doctor," said Sal- 
 lenauve at length, for he could not fail to see that Jacques 
 Bricheteau's importunity was justified. 
 
 On being asked whether Marie-Gaston's stay in the asylum 
 was liable to be prolonged 
 
 "Yes, I think so," said the doctor; "I have just seen our 
 patient, and the cerebral irritation, which must give way to 
 the material action of medicines before we can attempt to 
 bring any moral influence to bear, seems to me most unfortu- 
 nately on the high way to a fresh outbreak." 
 
 " Still," said Sallenauve anxiously, "you have not lost all 
 hope of a cure? " 
 
 " Far from it \ I believe firmly in a favorable termination. 
 But these dreadful disorders often present frequent alterna- 
 tions of aggravation and improvement ; and I am beginning 
 to foresee that the case will be a longer 'one than I had at first 
 hoped." 
 
 " I have just been elected a deputy to the Lower Chamber," 
 said Sallenauve, " and the opening of the session demands my 
 return to Paris. It is no less required by urgent private mat- 
 ters which Monsieur Bricheteau came expressly to discuss. So 
 unless I thought that my presence here would be immediately 
 needed " 
 
 "Go," said the doctor, "it may be a very long business. 
 If the patient's condition had not shown a relapse, I had in- 
 tended to arrange some startling scene with your help and 
 that of Monsieur Bricheteau's music, aided too by a young 
 lady, a relation of my wife's, who on various occasions has 
 seconded me very intelligently a little dramatic shock from 
 which I hoped for good results. But, in the first place, my
 
 14 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC IS. 
 
 young relation is absent, and for the moment nothing can be 
 done but by medical agents. So, for the moment, go ! " 
 
 Sallenauve gratefully pressed the doctor's hand, seeing his 
 eager wish to reassure him. He then took leave of Mrs. Ellis, 
 who promised no less warmly than her husband the devoted 
 care of a mother's watchfulness. As to Lord Lewin, Salle- 
 nauve's character had won his most friendly esteem, and his 
 conduct in the past was a guarantee of all that might be ex- 
 pected of him now and in the future. So Bricheteau had no 
 difficulty about getting off without any further delay. 
 
 They reached London at about five in the afternoon, and 
 would have gone on to Paris the same evening but for a sur- 
 prise which awaited them. Their eyes fell immediately on 
 enormous posters, on a scale which only English " puff" can 
 achieve, announcing at the corner of every street the appear- 
 ance that same evening of SIGNORA LUIGIA at Her Majesty's 
 theatre. The name alone was enough to arrest the travelers' 
 attention ; but the papers to which they had recourse for in- 
 formation supplied them, in the English fashion, with so 
 many circumstantial facts as to the debutante's career, that 
 Sallenauve could not doubt the transformation of his late 
 housekeeper into one of the brightest stars that had risen for 
 a long time above the horizon of England. If he had list- 
 ened to Jacques Bricheteau, he would have been content to 
 hail from afar the triumph of the handsome Italian, and have 
 gone on his way. But having calculated that one evening spent 
 in London would make no serious delay in his arrival, Salle- 
 nauve was bent on judging for himself, by his own eyes and 
 ears, what the enthusiasm was worth -which was expressed on 
 all sides for the new prima donna. 
 
 Sallenauve went off at once to the box office, which he 
 found closed, but he was enabled to perceive that the singer's 
 success was immense. Every seat had been sold by two in 
 the afternoon, and he thought himself lucky to secure two 
 stalls at a private ticket office for the sum of five pounds.
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR AJRCfS. 15 
 
 The London opera-house had never perhaps held a more 
 brilliant assembly ; and it is impossible not to be struck by the 
 capricious vicissitudes of human life, when we reflect that all 
 this concourse of the English aristocracy was brought about 
 originally by the ambition of a man who had been a felon on 
 the hulks to rise, as a member of the police, to a rather better 
 rank in its hierarchy. 
 
 By a no less singular coincidence the piece announced was 
 Paesiello's "Nina, o la Pazza per Amore " (mad for love), 
 from which Luigia had sung an air after the dinner given by 
 Madame de Saint-Esteve. 
 
 When the curtain rose, Sallenauve, having spent nearly a 
 week at Hanwell in the midst of mad people, could all the 
 better appreciate the prodigious gifts as an actress displayed 
 by his former housekeeper in the part of Nina ; and in the 
 face of her heart-rending imitation, he went through a renewal 
 of all the distress of mind he had just gone through while 
 watching the dreadful reality of Marie-Gaston's insanity. 
 
 Bricheteau, in spite of his annoyance at first at Sallenauve's 
 dawdling, as he called it, finally fell under the spell of the 
 singer's power; and at last, seeing the whole house frantic 
 with enthusiasm, and the stage strewn with bouquets, he said 
 
 "On my word, I can wish you nothing better than a suc- 
 cess in any degree like this on another stage ! " and then he 
 rashly added : " But there are no such triumphs in politics I 
 Art alone is great " 
 
 "And la Luigia is its prophet ! " replied Sallenauve, smil- 
 ing through the tears that admiration had brought to his eyes. 
 
 On coming out of the theatre, Bricheteau looked at his 
 watch ; it was a quarter to eleven, and by making great haste 
 there was still time to get on board the packet starting at 
 eleven. But when the organist looked round to urge this on 
 Sallenauve, who was to follow him through the crowd, he no 
 longer saw his man : the deputy had vanished.
 
 16 THE DEPlTY FOR AKClS. 
 
 A quarter of an hour later Luigia's dresser came into a 
 room where her mistress was receiving the compliments of the 
 greatest names in England, introduced to her by Sir Francis 
 Drake. She gave the signora a card. The prima donna as 
 she read it changed color, and whispered a few words to the 
 maid. And she then showed such obvious anxiety to be rid 
 of her throng of admirers, that some budding adorers could 
 not help betraying their surprise. 
 
 As soon as she was alone, she hastily resumed her ordinary 
 dress ; the manager's carriage had soon conveyed her to the 
 hotel where she had been living since her arrival; and, on 
 entering her sitting-room, she found Sallenauve, who had 
 arrived there before her. 
 
 " You here, monsieur ! " said she. " It is a dream ! " 
 
 " Especially to me," replied Sallenauve, "since I find you 
 in London after having sought you in vain in Paris." 
 
 " You took so much trouble but why? " 
 
 " You left us in so strange a manner, your moods are so 
 hasty, you knew so little of Paris, and so many dangers 
 might await your inexperience, that I feared everything for 
 you." 
 
 " What harm could come to me? " said she. " And I was 
 neither your wife, nor your sister, nor your mistress; I was 
 only your " 
 
 " I had believed," Sallenauve eagerly put in, " that you 
 were my friend." 
 
 " I was your debtor," said Luigia. " I saw that I was a 
 trouble to you in your new position. Could I do otherwise 
 than relieve you of my presence ? " 
 
 "Pray, who had impressed you with that intolerable con- 
 viction ? Had I said or hinted anything to that effect ? Was 
 it impossible to discuss a plan of life for you without so far 
 offending your susceptibilities? " 
 
 " I feel what I feel," said the Italian. "I myself was 
 conscious that you wished me anywhere rather than in your
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 17 
 
 house. You had afforded me the means of having no fears 
 for the future ; indeed, as you see, it promises to be anything 
 rather than alarming." 
 
 " On the contrary, it promises to be so brilliant that but 
 for the fear of seeming too presuming, I should make so bold 
 as to ask from whose hand, happier than mine, you have ob- 
 tained such prompt and efficient help." 
 
 " A great Swedish nobleman," replied Luigia without hes- 
 itation, "who spends part of an immense fortune in the 
 encouragement of art, procured me this engagement at Her 
 Majesty's; the kind indulgence of the public did the rest." 
 
 " Your talent, you should say. I heard you this evening." 
 
 "And were you pleased with your humble servant?" said 
 the singer, with a coquettish curtsey. 
 
 " Your musical achievements did not surprise me ; I knew 
 your gifts already, and an infallible judge had answered for 
 them ; but your flights of dramatic passion, your acting, at 
 once so strong and so sure of itself that indeed amazed me." 
 
 "I have suffered much," said the Italian, "and grief is a 
 great master." 
 
 "Suffered! " said Sallenauve; "in Italy, yes. But since 
 you came to France I like to flatter myself " 
 
 "Everywhere," said Luigia in a broken voice. "I was 
 not born under a happy star." 
 
 "That 'Everywhere' has to me a touch of reproach. It 
 is late, indeed, to be telling me of any wrong I may have 
 done you." 
 
 " You have not done me the smallest wrong. The mischief 
 was there ! " said Luigia, laying her hand on her heart. " I 
 alone was in fault." 
 
 " From some fancy, I dare say, as foolish as your notion 
 that it was a point of honor that you should quit my house? " 
 
 " Oh, I was not dreaming then," said the Italian. " How 
 well I knew what lay at the bottom of your mind ! If it were 
 only in return for all you had done for me, I ought to long 
 2
 
 18 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 for your esteem, and yet I was forbidden even to aspire so 
 high." 
 
 " But, my dear Luigia, there is no word for such ideas. 
 Did I ever fail in consideration and respect? And beside, 
 has not your conduct always been exemplary? " 
 
 "Yes, I have tried never to do anything that could make 
 you think ill of me. But I was Benedetto's widow, all the 
 same." 
 
 " What ! Do you fancy that that disaster, the outcome of 
 just revenge " 
 
 " Nay. It was not- the man's death that could lower me in 
 your eyes ; quite the contrary. But I had been the wife of a 
 buffoon, of a police spy, of a wretch always ready to sell me 
 to any buyer " 
 
 ' ' While you were in that position, I felt that you were to 
 be pitied, but scorned ? Never ! " 
 
 "Well," said the Italian, "we had lived together, alone, 
 under the same roof, for nearly two years." 
 
 "Certainly; and to me it had become a delightful habit." 
 
 "Did you think me ugly?" 
 
 "You know I did not, since I took you for the model of 
 my best statue." 
 
 "A fool?" 
 
 " A woman cannot be a fool who puts so much soul into a 
 part." 
 
 " Well then ; it is evident that you despised me ! " 
 
 Sallenauve was utterly amazed at this prompt logic ; he 
 thought himself clever to reply * 
 
 " It seems to me that if I had behaved differently, I should 
 have given greater proof of contempt." 
 
 But he had to deal with a woman who in all things in 
 her friendships and aversions, in act as well as in word went 
 straight to the mark. 
 
 She went on as if she were afraid that he had not understood 
 her.
 
 THE DEPUTY fOR ARCIS, 19 
 
 "At this day, monsieur, I can say everything, for I am 
 talking of the past, and the future is no longer in my hands. 
 Since the day when you were kind to me, ind when by your 
 generous protection I was rescued from an outrageous insult, 
 my heart has been wholly yours." 
 
 Sallenauve, who had never suspected the existence of this 
 feeling, and who, above all, could not conceive of its avowal, 
 made with such artless crudity, did not know what to say. 
 
 "I was well aware," the strange creature went on, "that I 
 should have much to do to raise myself from the base con- 
 dition in which you had seen me at our first meeting. If even 
 at the moment when you consented to take me with you I had 
 seen any signs of gallantry in your . behavior, any hint that 
 you might take advantage of the dangerous position in which 
 I had placed myself by my own act, my heart would have 
 shrunk into itself, you would have been but an ordinary man, 
 and to rehabilitate me after Benedetto it was not enough " 
 
 "And so," said Sallenauve, " to love you would have been 
 an insult, and not to love was cruelty. What a woman ! 
 How is it possible to avoid offending you ? " 
 
 " I did not want you to love me when you did not know 
 'me," said the singer, "when I had scarcely shaken off the 
 mire, for then it would have been only the love of the eye and 
 of the taste, which it is never wise to trust. But when, after 
 living in your house for two years, you could know by my 
 conduct that I was worthy of your esteem ; when, without ever 
 craving a single pleasure, and devoted to the care of your 
 house, with no relaxation but the study which was to raise me 
 to the dignity of an artist like yourself, I could, merely for 
 the happiness of seeing you create a masterpiece, sacrifice the 
 womanly modesty which on another occasion you had seen 
 me defend with vehemence then you were cruel not to un- 
 derstand ; and your imagination can never, never picture what 
 I have suffered, or how many tears I have shed ! " 
 
 " But, my dear Luigia, you were my guest ; even if I could
 
 20 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 have suspected what you now reveal to me, my duty as a man 
 of honor required me to see nothing, understand nothing, but 
 on the plainest evidence." 
 
 " And was not my perpetual melancholy proof enough ? If 
 my heart had been free, should I not have been less reserved 
 and more familiar ? No the case is plain enough : you could 
 see nothing; your fancy was fixed elsewhere." 
 
 "Well, and if it were?" 
 
 "It ought not to have been," said the Italian stringently. 
 " That woman was not free ; she had a husband and children ; 
 and, though you chose to make a saint of her, even if I had 
 no advantage over her excepting in youth though that is, of 
 course, quite absurd it seems to me that she was not to com- 
 pare with me." 
 
 Sallenauve could not help smiling. However, he replied 
 quite gravely : 
 
 "You are altogether mistaken as to your rival. Madame 
 de 1'Estorade has never been anything to me but a head to 
 study, and even so, of no interest whatever but for her like- 
 ness to another woman. That woman I knew at Rome before 
 I ever saw you. She had beauty, youth, and a great talent 
 for Art. 'At this day she is captive in a convent ; so, like you, 
 she has paid tribute to sorrow ; as you see, all your perfec- 
 tions " 
 
 " What ! Three love stories, and all ending in air ! " said 
 Luigia. "You were born under a strange star, indeed ! Of 
 course when I was so misunderstood, it was only because I 
 was under its maleficent influence, and in that case you must 
 be forgiven." 
 
 " Then, since you admit me to mercy, pray allow me to 
 return to my former question. The future, you tell me, is 
 no longer in your hands ; the astounding frankness of your 
 avowal leads me to infer that, to give you such boldness, a 
 very solid barrier must have been raised between you and me. 
 Then what is the power by which, at one leap, you have
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 21 
 
 sprung so high ? Have you, then, made a bargain with the 
 devil?" 
 
 "Perhaps so," said Luigia, laughing. 
 
 " Do not laugh," said Sallenauve. " You chose to face the 
 hell of Paris alone ; it would not at all surprise me to hear 
 that you met with some dangerous acquaintance at starting. 
 I know the difficulties that the greatest artists have to sur- 
 mount before they can get a hearing. Do you know whom the 
 foreign gentleman is who has leveled every road before you ? " 
 
 " I know that he has put down a fabulous sum to secure my 
 engagement ; that I am to be paid fifty thousand francs ; and 
 that he did not even accompany me to London." 
 
 "Then all this devotion is free, gratis?" 
 
 " Not at all. My patron has reached the age at which a 
 man no longer loves, but has a great deal of conceit. So his 
 protection is to be widely proclaimed, and I have pledged 
 myself to do nothing, say nothing, that may give the lie to 
 his fictitious happiness. To you alone did I owe the truth ; 
 but I know you to be trustworthy, and I entreat you to keep 
 it absolutely secret." 
 
 "And it does not seem improbable to you that this state 
 of things should last ? But how and where did you make 
 acquaintance with this man whom you think you can for ever 
 feed on air?" 
 
 " Through a Dame de Charite who came to see me while 
 you were away. She had been struck by my voice at Saint- 
 Sulpice during the services of the month of Mary, and she 
 wanted to bribe me away to sing at her parish church, Notre- 
 Dame de Lorette." 
 
 "What was the lady's name?" 
 
 "Madame de Saint-Esteve." 
 
 Though he did not know all the depths of Jacqueline Col- 
 lin's existence, Sallenauve had heard of Madame de Saint- 
 Esteve as a money-lender and go-between ; he had heard 
 Bixiou speak of her.
 
 22 7WE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 "That woman," said he, "has a notoriously bad reputation 
 in Paris. She is an agent of the lowest intrigues." 
 
 "So I suspected," said Luigia, " but what does that matter 
 tome?" 
 
 " If the man she has introduced to you " 
 
 "Were such another as herself?" interrupted the singer. 
 "But that is not likely. The hundred thousand crowns he 
 has placed in the manager's hands have floated the theatre 
 again." 
 
 " He may be rich and yet be scheming against you. The 
 two are not incompatible." 
 
 "He may have schemes against me," said Luigia, "but 
 they will not be carried out. Between them and me / 
 stand." 
 
 " But your reputation ? " 
 
 "That I lost when I left your house. I was generally sup- 
 posed to be your mistress ; you had to give your own explana- 
 tion to your constituency ; and you contradicted the report, 
 but do you imagine that you killed it ?" 
 
 "And my esteem, on which you set such value ? " 
 
 " I no longer need it. You did not love me when I wanted 
 it; you will not love me when I no longer care." 
 
 "Who can tell?" said Sallenauve. 
 
 "There are two reasons against it," replied the Italian. 
 "In the first place, it is too late; and in the second, we no 
 longer tread the same road." 
 
 " What do you mean ? " 
 
 " I am an artist, you have ceased to be one. I am rising, 
 you are going down." 
 
 "You call it going down to rise perhaps to the highest dig- 
 nities of State?" 
 
 " Whether you rise or not," cried Luigia ecstatically, " you 
 will be beneath your past self and the splendid future that lay 
 before you. Indeed, I believe I have deceived you ; I believe 
 if you had still been a sculptor, I should yet for some time
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC2S, 2 3 
 
 have endured your coldness and disdain : at any rate, I should 
 have waited till after my first trials in my art, hoping that 
 the halo which lends glory to a woman on the stage might at 
 last, perhaps, have made you aware of my existence there at 
 your side. But from the day of your apostasy, I could no 
 longer persist in my humiliating sacrifice. There is no future 
 in common for us." 
 
 "What!" said Sallenauve, holding out his hand, which 
 Luigia did not take, " are we not even to remain friends ? " 
 
 "A friend a man friend you have already. No, it is all 
 over and done with. We shall hear of each other ; and from 
 afar as we cross in life we shall wave each other a greeting, 
 but nothing more." 
 
 " And this is how all is to end between you and me ! " 
 said Sallenauve sadly. 
 
 The singer looked at him for a moment, and tears sparkled 
 in her eyes. 
 
 "Listen," said she, in a sincere and resolute tone, "this 
 much is possible. I have loved you, and after you no man 
 will find a place in the heart you scorned. You will be told 
 that I have lovers : the old man whom I am pledged to own 
 to, and others after him perhaps; but you will not believe it, 
 remembering the woman that I am. And, who knows? By 
 and by your life may be swept clear of the other affections 
 which barred the way for mine, and the freedom, the eccen- 
 tricity of the avowal I have just made will perhaps remain 
 stamped on your memory then it is not altogether impossible 
 that after such long wandering you may at last want me. If 
 that should happen if, as the result of bitter disappointments, 
 you should be brought back to the belief in Art well, then, 
 if time has not made love a too ridiculous dream for us, re- 
 member this night. 
 
 " Now we must part, for it is late for a tlte-a-ttte, and it is 
 the semblance of fidelity to my elderly protector that I am 
 pledged to preserve."
 
 24 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S. 
 
 So speaking, she took up a candle and vanished into the 
 adjoining room, leaving Sallenauve in a state of mind that 
 may be imagined after the surprises of every kind that this 
 interview had brought him. 
 
 On returning to the hotel whither he had taken his things 
 on arriving from Hanwell, he found Bricheteau waiting for 
 him at the door. 
 
 "Where the devil have you been?" cried the organist, 
 frantic with impatience. " We might have got off by to- 
 night's boat." 
 
 "Well, well," said Sallenauve carelessly, "I shall have a 
 few more hours for playing truant." 
 
 " And meanwhile the enemy is pushing forward the mine ! " 
 
 " What do I care ? In that cave called political life must 
 we not be prepared for whatever happens? " 
 
 "I suspected as much," said Bricheteau. "You have 
 been to see la Luigia; her success has turned your head, and 
 the statuary is breaking out through the deputy." 
 
 "You yourself an hour since said Art alone is great." 
 
 "But the orator, too, is an artist," said Bricheteau, " and 
 the greatest of all ; for other artists appeal to the intellect 
 and the feelings, he alone addresses the conscience and the 
 will. Beside, this is not the time to look back ; you have a 
 duel to fight with your opponents. Are you a man of honor 
 or a rogue who has stolen a name? That is the question 
 which is perhaps being discussed and answered in your ab- 
 sence in the full light of the Chamber." 
 
 "I am sadly afraid that you have misled me; I had a 
 jewel in my hands, and have flung it at my feet " 
 
 "That," retorted the organist, "is happily a vapor that 
 will vanish with the night. To-morrow you will remember 
 your promises to your father and the splendid future that lies 
 before you." 
 
 The Chambers were opened ; Sallenauve had not been
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 25 
 
 present at the royal sitting, and his absence had not failed to 
 cause some sensation in the democratic party. At the 'office 
 of the " National " especially there had been quite a commo- 
 tion. It seemed only natural to expect that, as part owner 
 of the paper and often to be seen at the office before the elec- 
 tions, having indeed contributed to its pages, he should, after 
 being returned, have appeared there to get news when Parlia- 
 ment opened. 
 
 " Now he is elected," said some of the editors, comment- 
 ing on the new deputy's total disappearance, "does my gen- 
 tleman think he is going to play the snob ? It is rather a 
 common trick with our lords and masters in Parliament to 
 pay us very obsequious court as long as they want supporters, 
 and let us severely alone, like their old coats, as soon as they 
 have climbed the tree. But we cannot allow this gentleman 
 to play that game ; there are more ways than one of turning 
 the tables on a man." 
 
 The chief editor, less easily disturbed, had tried to soothe 
 this first ebullition ; but Sallenauve's non-appearance at the 
 opening of the session had, nevertheless, struck him as 
 strange. 
 
 On the following day, when the government officials were 
 to be appointed the presidents and secretaries a business 
 which is not unimportant, because it affords a means of esti- 
 mating the majority, Sallenauve's absence was of more real 
 consequence. In the office to which fate had attached him, 
 the election of the head was carried by the Ministerialists by 
 only one vote ; thus the presence of the Deputy for Arcis 
 would have turned the scale in favor of the Opposition. 
 Hence the expression of strong disapproval in the organs of 
 that party, explaining its defeat by this unforeseen defection, 
 of which they spoke with some acrimonious surprise. They 
 applied no epithets to the absentee's conduct, but they spoke 
 of it as quite " inexplicable." 
 
 Maxime on his part kept a sharp lookout; he was only
 
 26 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 waiting till the official ranks of the Chamber should be filled 
 to lay before the House, in the name of the Romilly peasant- 
 woman, a petition to prosecute. This document had been 
 drawn up by Massol, and under his practiced pen, the facts he 
 had undertaken to set forth had assumed the air of probability 
 which attorneys contrive to give to their statements and de- 
 positions even when furthest from the truth. And now, when 
 Sallenauve's absence was so prolonged as to seem scandalous, 
 he went once more to call on Rastignac ; and availing him- 
 self of the ingenious plan of attack suggested by Desroches, 
 he asked the minister if he did not think that the moment 
 had come when he, Rastignac, should abandon the attitude 
 of passive observation which he had hitherto chosen to main- 
 tain. 
 
 Rastignac was, in fact, far more explicit. Sallenauve in a 
 foreign land figured in his mind as a man conscience-stricken, 
 who had lost his balance. He therefore advised Monsieur de 
 Trailles to bring forward the preliminaries of the action that 
 very day, and no longer hesitated to promise his support for 
 the success of a scheme which now looked so hopeful, and 
 from which a very pretty scandal might reasonably be looked 
 for. 
 
 The effects of his underground influence were obvious on 
 the very next day. The order of the day in the Lower 
 Chamber was the verification of the returns. The deputy 
 whose duty it was to report on the election at Arcis-sur-Aube 
 happened to be a trusty Ministerialist, and, acting on the 
 private instructions that had reached him, he took this view 
 of the case : 
 
 The constituents of Arcis had elected their member accord- 
 ing to law. Monsieur de Sallenauve had, in due course, sub- 
 mitted to the examining committee all the documents needed 
 to prove his eligibility, and there was no apparent difficulty 
 in the way of his taking his seat. But reports of a strange 
 character had arisen, even at the time of the election, as to
 
 Tff DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 27 
 
 the new deputy's identification, and in further support of 
 those rumors a petition had now been presented to the House 
 to authorize a criminal prosecution. This petition set forth a 
 very serious accusation : Monsieur de Sallenauve was said to 
 have assumed the name he bore without any right, and this 
 assumption being certified on an official document, was in- 
 dictable as a forgery committed for the purpose of false persona- 
 tion. "A circumstance much to be regretted," the speaker 
 went on, "was Monsieur de Sallenauve's absence; instead of 
 appearing to contradict the extraordinary accusation lodged 
 against him, he had remained absent from the sittings of the 
 .Chamber ever since the opening of the session, and nobody had 
 seen him. Under these circumstances could his election be 
 officially ratified ? The committee had thought not, and pro- 
 posed that a delay should be granted." 
 
 Daniel d'Arthez, a member of the Legitimist Opposition, 
 whom, as we saw at Arcis, was in favor of Sallenauve's return, 
 at once rose to address the Chamber, and begged to point out 
 how completely out of order such a decision would be. 
 
 "The legality of the election was beyond dispute. No 
 irregularity had been proved. Hence, the Chamber had no 
 alternative ; they must put the question to the vote, and recog- 
 nize the election as regular and valid, since there was nothing 
 to invalidate it. To confuse with that issue the question as 
 to a petition to prosecute would be an abuse of power, be- 
 cause, by hindering any preliminary discussion of that ques- 
 tion, and relieving the indictment of the usual formalities be- 
 fore its acceptance or rejection, it would assume a singular 
 and exceptional character that, namely, of a suspension of 
 the mandate granted to their member by the sovereign power 
 of the electors. And who," added the orator, "can fail to 
 perceive that by giving effect to this petition for authority to 
 prosecute, in any form whatever, we prejudge its justification 
 and importance ; whereas the presumption of innocence, which 
 is the prerogative of every accused person, ought to be es-
 
 28 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S. 
 
 pecially extended to a man whose honesty has never been 
 open to doubt, and who has so lately been honored by the 
 suffrages of his fellow-citizens." 
 
 A prolonged discussion followed, the Ministerial speakers 
 naturally taking the opposite view; then a difficulty arose. 
 The president for the time being, in right of seniority for 
 the Chamber had not yet elected its chief was a weary old 
 man, who, in the complicated functions so suddenly conferred 
 on him by his register of birth, was not always prompt and 
 competent. Sallenauve's application for leave of absence 
 had reached him the day before; and if it had occurred to 
 him to announce it to the Chamber at the beginning of the 
 sitting as he ought to have done the discussion would 
 probably have been nipped in the bud. But there is luck 
 and ill-luck in parliamentary business; and when the Chamber 
 learned from this letter, at last communicated, that Charles 
 de Sallenauve was abroad, and had no ground to offer for this 
 application for unlimited leave but the vague commonplace of 
 "urgent private affairs," the effect was disastrous. 
 
 " It is self-evident," said all the Ministerialists, like Rastig- 
 nac," he is in England, where every form of failure takes refuge. 
 He is afraid of the inquiry; he knows he will be unmasked." 
 
 This opinion, apart from all the political feeling, was shared 
 by some of the sterner spirits, who could not conceive that a 
 man should not appear to defend himself against so gross an 
 accusation. In short, after a very strong and skillful speech 
 from Vinet the public prosecutor, who had found courage in 
 the absence of the accused, the confirmation of the election 
 was postponed, though by a very small majority ; at the same 
 time, a week's leave of absence was voted to the accused 
 member. 
 
 On the day after these proceedings, Maxime wrote as follows 
 to Madame Beauvisage : 
 
 "MADAME: The enemy met with a terrible reverse yester-
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 29 
 
 day ; and in the opinion of my friend Rastignac, a very ex- 
 perienced and intelligent judge of parliamentary feeling, Dor- 
 lange, whatever happens, cannot recover from the blow thus 
 dealt him. If we should fail to procure any positive proof in 
 support of our worthy countrywoman's charge, it is possible 
 that the scoundrel, by sheer audacity, may finally be accepted 
 by the Chamber, if, indeed, he dares show his face in France. 
 But even then, after dragging on a sordid existence utterly 
 unrecognized, he will inevitably ere long be driven to resign ; 
 then M. Beauvisage will be elected beyond doubt, for the 
 constituency, ashamed of having been taken in by an adven- 
 turer, will be only too happy to reinstate themselves by a 
 choice that will do them honor, beside having been their first 
 instinctive selection. 
 
 "This result, madame, will be due to your remarkable 
 sagacity ; for, but for the sort of second-sight which enabled 
 you to divine the precious truth hidden under the peasant- 
 woman's story, we should have overlooked that valuable in- 
 strument. I may tell you, madame, even if it should inflate 
 your pride, that neither Rastignac nor Vinet, the public 
 prosecutor, understood the full importance of your discovery ; 
 indeed, I myself, if I had not been so happy as to know you, 
 so as to be able to appreciate the value attaching to any idea 
 of yours, might very probably have shared the indifference of 
 these two statesmen as to the useful weapon you were putting 
 into our hands. But, as the gift came from you, I at once 
 understood its importance; and while pointing out to Ras- 
 tignac the means of utilizing it, I succeeded in making my 
 friend the minister an eager partner in the plot, and, at the 
 same time, a sincere admirer of the skill and perspicacity of 
 which you had given proof. 
 
 " Thus, madame, if I should ever be so happy as to be 
 connected with you by the bond of which we have already 
 spoken, I shall not need to initiate you into political life; yoj 
 have found the path so well unaided.
 
 30 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 "Nothing new can happen within the next week, the length 
 of leave granted to our man. If after that date the absentee 
 does not appear, there is, I think, no doubt that the election 
 will be pronounced null and void ; for yesterday's vote, which 
 you will have read in the papers, is a positive summons to him 
 to appear in his place. You may be sure that between this 
 and his return if he should return I shall not fail to devote 
 myself to fomenting the antagonistic feeling of the Chamber 
 both by the press and by private communications. Rastignac 
 has also issued orders to this end, and it is safe to conclude 
 that the foe will find public opinion strongly prejudiced 
 against him. 
 
 "Allow me, madame, to beg you to remember me to Made- 
 moiselle Cecile, and accept for yourself and Monsieur Beau- 
 visage the expression of my most respectful regard." 
 
 A few words of instructions to the Ministerial press had, in 
 fact, begun to surround the name of Sallenauve with a sort of 
 atmosphere of disrespect and ridicule ; the most insulting 
 innuendoes ascribed to his absence the sense of a retreat from 
 his foes. The effect of these repeated attacks was all the more 
 inevitable because Sallenauve was but feebly defended by the 
 politicians of his own party. 
 
 On the day when his week's leave ended, Sallenauve, not 
 having yet returned, a second-rate Ministerial paper published, 
 under the heading of "Lost, a Deputy!" an insolent and 
 witty article which made a considerable sensation. 
 
 That evening Madame de 1'Estorade called on Madame de 
 Camps, and found her alone with her husband. She was 
 greatly excited, and exclaimed as she went in 
 
 "Have you read that infamous article?" 
 
 "No," said Madame de Camps. "But my husband has 
 told me about it ; it is really disgraceful that the Ministry 
 should order, or at least encourage, anything so utterly vile 
 and atrocious."
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 3J 
 
 " I am half-crazed by it," said Madame de 1'Estorade, " for 
 it is all our doing." 
 
 " That is carrying conscientious scruples too far," said 
 Madame de Camps. 
 
 "Not at all," said the ironmaster. " I agree with madame. 
 All the venom of this attack would be dispersed by a single 
 step on 1'Estorade's part ; and by refusing to take it, if he is 
 not the originator, he is at least the abettor of the scandal." 
 
 "Then you have told him ?" asked the countess re- 
 proachfully. 
 
 "Why, my dear," replied Madame Octave, "though we 
 have our little women's secrets, I could not but explain to 
 my husband what had given rise to the sort of monomania 
 that possesses Monsieur de 1'Estorade. It would have been 
 such a distrust of my second self as would have hurt him 
 deeply; and such explanations as I felt bound to give him 
 have not, I think, made me a faithless depository of any secret 
 that concerns you personally." 
 
 "Ah, you are a happy couple! " said Madame de 1'Esto- 
 rade, with a sigh. " However, I am not sorry that Monsieur 
 de Camps should have been admitted to our confidence; the 
 point is, to find some way out of the difficult position in 
 which I am struggling, and two opinions are better than one." 
 
 "Why, what has happened?" asked Madame de Camps. 
 
 " My husband's head is quite turned," replied the countess. 
 " He seems to me to have lost every trace of moral sense. 
 Far from perceiving that he is, as Monsieur de Camps said 
 just now, the abettor of the odious contest now going on, 
 without having as those had who started it the excuse of 
 ignorance, he seems to exult in it. He brought me that de- 
 testable paper with an air of triumph, and I found him quite 
 ready to take offense because I did not agree with him in 
 thinking it most amusing and witty." 
 
 "That letter," said Madame Octave, "was a terrible blow 
 to him ; it hit him body and soul at once,"
 
 32 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 "That I grant," cried the ironmaster. "But deuce take 
 it ! If you are a man, you take a lunatic's words for what 
 they are worth." 
 
 " Still, it is very strange," said his wife, " that Monsieur 
 de Sallenauve does not come back ; for, after all, that Jacques 
 Bricheteau to whom you gave his address must have written 
 him." 
 
 "What is to be done ! " exclaimed the countess. " There 
 has been a fatality over the whole business. To-morrow the 
 question is to be discussed in the Chamber as to whether or 
 not Monsieur de Sallenauve's election is to be ratified ; and 
 if he should not then be in his place, the Ministry hopes to 
 be able to annul it." 
 
 "But it really is atrocious!" said Monsieur de Camps; 
 " and though my position hardly justifies me in taking such a 
 step, a very little would make me go straight to the president 
 of the Chamber and tell him a few home truths " 
 
 " I would have begged you to do so, I think, even at the 
 risk of my husband's detecting my intervention, but for one 
 consideration it would distress Monsieur de Sallenauve so 
 greatly that his friend's unhappy state should be made 
 public." 
 
 "Certainly," said Madame Octave. " Such a line of de- 
 fense would evidently be contrary to his intentions ; and, after 
 all, he may yet arrive in time. Beside, the decision of the 
 Chamber still remains problematical, while, Monsieur Marie- 
 Gaston's madness once known, he can never get over the 
 blow." 
 
 "And then," added Madame de 1'Estorade, " all the odious 
 part that my husband has taken so far in this dreadful business 
 is as nothing in comparison with a really diabolical idea 
 which he communicated to me just now before dinner." 
 
 " What can that be? " asked Madame de Camps anxiously. 
 
 " His idea is that to-morrow I am to go with him to the 
 gallery reserved for the peers to hear the question discussed."
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARC1S. 33 
 
 " Really he is losing his wits ! " said Monsieur de Camps. 
 " It is quite like Diafoirus the younger, who offers his bride- 
 elect the diversion of seeing a dissection " 
 
 Madame de Camps shook her head meaningly at her hus- 
 band, as much as to say: " Do not pour oil on the flames." 
 She merely asked the countess if she had not shown Monsieur 
 de 1'Estorade how monstrous such a singular proceeding would 
 appear. 
 
 "At the very first word I spoke to that effect, he flew into 
 a rage," said Madame de 1'Estorade, " telling me that I was 
 apparently only too glad to perpetuate a belief in our intimacy 
 with this man, since, on an opportunity when I could so natu- 
 rally proclaim our rupture to the public, I so resolutely de- 
 clined it." 
 
 " Well, then, my dear, you must go," said Madame Octave. 
 "Domestic peace before all things. Beside, after all, your 
 presence at the sitting may equally well be regarded as a proof 
 of kindly interest." 
 
 " For fifteen years," said the ironmaster, " you have reigned 
 and ruled at home, and this is a revolution which seriously 
 shifts the focus of power." 
 
 " But, monsieur, I beg you to believe that I should never 
 have made such use of the sovereignty, which indeed I have 
 always tried to conceal." 
 
 " Do I not know it ? " replied Monsieur de Camps warmly, 
 as he took Madame de 1'Estorade's hands in his own. "But 
 I agree with my wife this cup must be drained." 
 
 "I shall die of shame as I listen to the infamous charges 
 the Ministerial party will bring ! I shall feel as if they were 
 murdering a man under my own eyes, whom I could save by 
 merely putting my hand out and I cannot do it " 
 
 "Yes, it is so," said Monsieur de Camps. "And a man, 
 too, who has done you signal service ; but would you rather 
 bring hell into your house, and aggravate your husband's un- 
 healthy state? " - 
 3
 
 34 THE DEPUTY FOR AKCfS. 
 
 " Listen, my dear," said Madame de Camps. " Tell Mon. 
 sieur de 1'Estorade that I also wish to go to this sitting ; that 
 it will give less cause for comment if you are seen there with 
 a person who is uninterested and merely curious; and on that 
 point do not give way. Then, at any rate, I shall be there to 
 keep your head straight on your shoulders and preserve you 
 from yourself." 
 
 " I should not have dared to ask it of you," replied Madame 
 de 1'Estorade, " for one does not like to ask any one to assist 
 in evil-doing ; but since you are so generous as to offer it, I 
 feel I am a degree less wretched. Now, good-night, for my 
 husband must not find me out when he comes in. He was to 
 dine with Monsieur de Rastignac, and no doubt they have 
 plotted great things for to-morrow." 
 
 " Go then ; and in an hour or so I will send you a note, as 
 though I had not seen you, to ask if you have any power to 
 admit me to the Chamber to-morrow, as the meeting promises 
 to be interesting." 
 
 " Oh ! To be brought so low as to plot and contrive " 
 
 said Madame de 1'Estorade, embracing her friend. 
 
 "My dear child," replied Madame de Camps, "it is said 
 that the life of the Christian is a warfare ; but that of a woman 
 married to a certain type of man is a pitched battle. Be 
 patient and take courage." 
 
 And so the friends parted. 
 
 At about two o'clock on the following day Madame de 
 1'Estorade, with her husband and Madame de Camps, took 
 her seat in the peers' gallery ; she looked ill, and returned the 
 bows that greeted her from various parts of the Chamber with 
 cool indifference. Madame de Camps, who had never before 
 found herself in the parliamentary Chamber, made two obser- 
 vations : In the first place, she exclaimed at the slovenly ap- 
 pearance of so many of the honorable members ; and then she 
 was struck by the number of bald heads which, as she looked
 
 THE DEPtJTY FOR ARC1S. 3 
 
 down on them from the gallery that gave her a bird's-eye 
 view of the assembly, surprised her greatly. 
 
 She then listened while Monsieur de 1'Estorade named the 
 notabilities present ; first of all the bigwigs, who need not be 
 mentioned here, since their names dwell in everybody's mem- 
 ory ; then Canalis the poet, who had, she thought, an Olym- 
 pian air; d'Arthez, whose modest demeanor greatly attracted 
 her; Vinet, who, as she said, was like a viper in spectacles; 
 Victorin Hulot, one of the orators of the Left Centre. 
 
 It was written by the finger of fate that Madame de 1'Esto- 
 rade should be spared no form of annoyance. Just as the sit- 
 ting was about to open, the Marquise d'Espard, escorted by 
 Monsieur de Ronquerolles, came into the gallery, and took a 
 seat close to her. Though they met in society, the two women 
 could not endure each other. Madame de 1'Estorade scorned 
 the spirit of intrigue, the total want of principle, and the 
 spiteful, bitter temper which the marquise concealed under 
 the most elegant manners ; while Madame d'Espard had even 
 deeper contempt for what she called the " pot-boiling " virtues 
 of the countess. It must be added that Madame de 1'Estorade 
 was two-and-thirty, and of a type of beauty that time had 
 spared ; while Madame d'Espard was forty-four, and, in spite 
 of the arts of the toilet, her looks were altogether passe. 
 
 " Do you often come here? " she said to the countess, after 
 a few indispensable civilities as to the pleasure of meeting her. 
 
 "Never," said Madame de 1'Estorade. 
 
 " I am a constant visitor," said Madame d'Espard. 
 
 Then, with the air of making a discovery 
 
 "To be sure," she added, "you have a special interest in 
 the meeting to-day. Some one you know, I believe, is on his 
 trial." 
 
 "Yes, Monsieur de Sallenauve has visited at my house." 
 
 "It is most distressing," said the marquise, " to see a man 
 who, as Monsieur de Ronquerolles assures me, was quite a hero 
 in his way thus called to account by the police."
 
 36 T&E DEPUTY FOJt AKCIS. 
 
 " His chief crime, so far, is his absence," said the countess 
 drily. 
 
 "And he is consumed by ambition, it would seem," Mad- 
 ame d'Espard went on. " Before this attempt to get into 
 Parliament he had matrimonial projects, as you no doubt 
 know, and had tried to marry into the Lanty family a scheme 
 which, so far as the handsome heiress was concerned, ended 
 in her retirement to a convent." 
 
 Madame de 1'Estorade was not astonished to find that this 
 story, which Sallenauve had believed to be a perfect secret, 
 was known to the marquise; she was one of the best-informed 
 women in Paris. An old Academician had called her draw- 
 ing-room, in mythological parlance, "The Temple of Fame." 
 
 "They are about to begin, I think," said the countess, 
 who, always expecting to feel Madame d'Espard's claws, was 
 not sorry to close the conversation. 
 
 The president had in fact rung his bell, the members were 
 settling into their places, the curtain was about to rise. 
 
 To give the reader a faithful account of the sitting, we think 
 it will be at once more exact and more convenient to copy 
 the report as printed in one of the papers of the day. 
 
 CHAMBER OF DEPUTIES. 
 MONSIEUR COINTET (Vice-President) in the Chair. 
 
 May 2$J. 
 
 The President took the chair at two o'clock. 
 On the Ministers' bench were the Keeper of the Seals, the 
 Minister of the Interior, and the Minister of Public Works. 
 The report of the last meeting was read and passed. 
 The order of the day was to discuss the validity of the 
 election of the member returned by the borough of Arcis- 
 sur-Aube. 
 
 The President The representative of the Commission of 
 Inquiry will read his report.
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 37 
 
 The Reporter Gentlemen, the strange and unsatisfactory 
 position in which Monsieur de Sallenauve has thought proper 
 to place himself has not ended as we had reason to hope. 
 Monsieur de Sallenauve's leave of absence expired yesterday, 
 and he still remains away from the sittings of the Chamber ; 
 nor has any letter from him applying for further extension 
 reached the President's hands. This indifference as to the 
 functions which Monsieur de Sallenauve had sought, it would 
 seem, with unusual eagerness (murmurs from the Left), would 
 under any circumstances* be a serious defection ; but when it 
 is coupled with the prosecution now threatened, does it not 
 assume a character highly damaging to his reputation ? (Mur- 
 murs from the Left. Applause from the Centre.) Your Com- 
 missioners, compelled to seek the solution of a question which 
 may be said to be unexampled in parliamentary annals, when 
 considering the steps to be taken, were divided by two oppo- 
 site opinions. The minority, of which I am the sole repre- 
 sentative the Commissioners being but three thought that 
 a plan should be laid before you which I may call radical in 
 its character, and which aims at settling the difficulty by sub- 
 mitting it to its natural judges. Annul M. de Sallenauve's 
 election hie et nunc, and send him back to the constituency 
 which returned him, and of which he is so faithless a repre- 
 sentative: this is the first alternative I have to offer you. 
 (Excitement on the Left.) The majority, on the contrary, 
 pronounced that the electors' vote must be absolutely re- 
 spected, and the shortcomings of a man honored by their 
 confidence must be overlooked to the utmost limits of patience 
 and indulgence. Consequently, the Commission requires me 
 to propose that you should officially extend M. de Sallenauve's 
 leave of absence to a fortnight from this date (murmurs from 
 the Centre. "Hear, hear," from the Left) with the full 
 understanding that if by the end of that time M. de Salle- 
 nauve has given no sign of life, he is to be regarded as simply 
 having resigned his seat without entangling this House in any
 
 08 TftE DEPUTY FO& ARCIS. 
 
 irritating and useless discussion of the matter. (Excitement 
 on all sides.) 
 
 M. le Colonel Franchessini, who, during the reading of the 
 report, had been engaged in earnest conversation with the 
 Minister of Public Works on the Ministers' bench, anxiously 
 begged to be heard. 
 
 The President M. de Canalis wishes to speak. 
 
 M. de Canalis Gentlemen, M. de Sallenauve is one of 
 those bold men who, like me, believe that politics are not a 
 forbidden fruit to any intelligent mind ; but that the stuff of 
 which a statesman is made may be found in a poet or an artist 
 quite as much as in a lawyer, an official, a doctor, or a land- 
 owner. In virtue, then, of our common origin, M. de Salle- 
 nauve has my fullest sympathy, and no one will be surprised 
 to see me mount this tribune to support the recommendation 
 of the Commission. Still, I cannot agree to their final de- 
 cision ; for the idea of our colleague being regarded, by the 
 mere fact of his prolonged absence beyond the limit of leave, 
 as having resigned his seat, is repugnant both to my conscience 
 and my reason. You have heard it remarked that M. de 
 Sallenauve's carelessness as to his duties is all the less excusable 
 because he lies under a serious charge ; but supposing, gentle- 
 men, that this charge were the actuating cause of his absence. 
 (Laughter from the Centre.) Allow me I am not so guile- 
 less as the laughers seem to fancy. It is my good fortune, by 
 nature, that base suggestions do not occur to me; and that 
 M. de Sallenauve, with the high position he had achieved as 
 an artist, should plot to take his seat in this Chamber by 
 means of a crime, is a theory I refuse to admit. Two foul 
 spiders are ever ready to spin their web about a man with 
 such a stain on his birth Chicanery and Intrigue. But I, 
 far from admitting that he would have fled before the charge 
 brought against him, I say, suppose that at this moment, 
 abroad, he were collecting the evidence for his defense ? 
 ("Hear, hear; well said!" from the Left.) In this belief,
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 39 
 
 a very plausible one, as it seems to me far from being 
 justified in requiring a strict account of his absence, ought 
 we not rather to regard it as a. proof of respect for this House, 
 as feeling himself unworthy to take his place in it till he was 
 in a position to defy his accusers ? 
 
 A Voice Ten years' leave of absence, like Telemachus, to 
 look for his father. (General laughter.) 
 
 M. de Canalis I did not expect so romantic an interrup- 
 tion ! But since we are referred to the Odyssey, I may re- 
 mind you that Ulysses, after suffering every outrage, at last 
 drew his bow, very much to the discomfiture of the suitors. 
 (Loud murmurs from the Centre.) I vote for a fortnight's 
 further leave, and a reopening of the question at the end of 
 that time. 
 
 M. le Colonel Franchessini I do not know whether the 
 last speaker intended to intimidate the Chamber; for my 
 part, such arguments affect me very little, and I am always 
 prepared to return them to those who utter them. (" Order, 
 order," from the Left.) 
 
 M. le President No personalities, colonel. 
 
 M. le Colonel Franchessini At the same time, I am so far 
 of the same opinion as the last speaker that I do not believe 
 that the delinquent has fled from the charge brought against 
 him. Neither that accusation, nor the effect it may have on 
 your minds or on others, nor even the annulling of his elec- 
 tion, has any interest for him at present. Do you wish to 
 know what M. de Sallenauve is doing in England ? Then 
 read the English papers. They have for some days been full 
 of the praises of a prima donna who has just come out at Her 
 Majesty's theatre. (Groans and interruptions.) 
 
 A Voice Such gossip is unworthy of this Chamber. 
 
 M. le Colonel Franchessini Gentlemen, I am more accus- 
 tomed to the blunt speech of camps than to the proprieties 
 of the Chamber; I am perhaps rash in thinking aloud. The 
 honorable gentleman who spoke last said that he believed that
 
 40 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 M. de Sallenauve had gone in search of evidence for his de- 
 fense. I say not I believe, but I know, that a wealthy for- 
 eigner has extended his protection to a handsome Italian who 
 was formerly honored by that of our college Phidias. (Fresh 
 interruptions. " Order, order ; this is not to be allowed ! ") 
 A Voice Monsieur le President, will you not silence this 
 speaker ? 
 
 Colonel Franchessini, folding his arms, waited till silence 
 should be restored. 
 
 M. le President I must request the speaker to adhere to 
 the question. 
 
 M. le Colonel Franchessini I have never deviated from it ; 
 however, as the Chamber refuses to hear me, I can but say 
 that I vote with the minority. It seems to me a very natural 
 course to send Monsieur de Sallenauve back to his constitu 1 
 ency, and so ascertain whether they meant to elect a deputy 
 or a lover. (" Order, order !" A great commotion ; excite- 
 ment at the highest pitch.) 
 
 M. de Canalis hastily tried to mount the tribune. * 
 M. le President The Minister of Public Works wishes to 
 speak, and as one of the King's Ministry, he has always a 
 right to be heard. 
 
 M. de Rastignac It is no fault of mine, gentlemen, that 
 you have not been saved from this scandal in the Chamber. 
 I tried, out of regard for my old friendship with Colonel Fran- 
 chessini, to persuade him not to speak on so delicate a matter, 
 since his inexperience of parliamentary rule, aggravated by 
 his ready wit and fluency, might betray him into some regret- 
 table extravagance. It was to this effect that I advised him 
 in the course of the short conversation we held at my seat 
 before he addressed the 'House ; and I myself asked to be 
 heard after him expressly to correct any idea of my collusion 
 
 * It must be remembered that the speaking member of the French 
 Chambers does not address his audience from his seat, but mounts the 
 provided rostrum after being recognized by the president. PUP-.
 
 / THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 41 
 
 in the indiscretion he has committed in my opinion by de- 
 scending to the confidential details with which he has thought 
 proper to trouble you. However, against my intention, and 
 so to say, against my will, I have mounted the tribune, though 
 no ministerial interest detains me here, may I be allowed to 
 make a few brief remarks? ("Speak, speak!" from the 
 Centre.) 
 
 The Minister of Public Works proceeded to show that the 
 absent deputy's conduct was characterized by marked con- 
 tempt for the Chamber. He had treated it with cavalier in- 
 difference. He had indeed asked leave of absence ; but how? 
 By writing from abroad. That is to say, he first took leave, 
 and then asked for it. Had he, as was customary, assigned 
 any reason for the request ? Not at all. He simply an- 
 nounced that he was compelled to be absent on urgent private 
 business, a trumpery pretext which might at any time reduce 
 the assembly by half its members. But supposing that M. de 
 Sallenauve's business were really urgent, and that it were of a 
 nature which he thought it undesirable to explain in a letter 
 to be made public, why could he not have laid it in confi- 
 dence before the President, or even have requested one of his 
 friends of such standing as would secure credit for his mere 
 word, to answer for the necessity for his absence without any 
 detailed explanation. 
 
 At this moment the Minister was interrupted by a bustle in 
 the passage to the right ; several of the deputies left their 
 places ; others standing on the seats and craning their necks 
 were looking at something. The Minister, after turning to 
 the President, to whom he seemed to appeal for an explana- 
 tion, went down from the tribune and returned to his seat, 
 when he was immediately surrounded by a number of deputies 
 from the Centre, among whom M. Vinet was conspicuous by 
 his gesticulations. Other groups formed in the arena ; in fact, 
 the sitting was practically suspended. 
 
 In a few minutes the President rang his bell.
 
 42 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 The ushers Take your seats, gentlemen. 
 
 The members hastily returned to their places. 
 
 M. le President M. de Sallenauve will now speak. 
 
 M. de Sallenauve, who had been talking to M. d'Arthez and 
 M. de Canalis since his arrival had suspended business, went 
 up to the tribune. His manner was modest, but quite free 
 from embarrassment. Everybody was struck by his resem- 
 blance to one of the most fiery of the revolutionary orators. 
 
 A Voice Danton minus the smallpox. 
 
 M. de Sallenauve (deep silence) Gentlemen, I am under 
 no illusion as to my personal importance, and do not imagine 
 that I myself am the object of a form of persecution, which 
 would rather seem to be directed against the opinions I have 
 the honor to represent. However that may be, my election 
 seems to have assumed some importance in the eyes of the 
 Ministry. To contest it, a special agent and special press 
 writers were sent to Arcis ; and a humble servant of the Gov- 
 ernment, whose salary, after twenty years of honorable service, 
 had reached the figure of fifteen hundred francs a year, was 
 suddenly dismissed from his post for being guilty of contribu- 
 ting to my success. (Loud murmurs from the Centre.) I 
 can only thank the gentlemen who are interrupting me, for 
 I suppose their noisy disapprobation is meant for this singular 
 dismissal, and not to convey a doubt of the fact, which is 
 beyond all question. (Laughter from the Left.) So far as I 
 am concerned, as I could not be turned out, I have been 
 attacked with another weapon ; judicial calumny combined 
 with my opportune absence 
 
 The Minister of Public Works It was the Ministry evi- 
 dently that procured your extradition to England? 
 
 M. de Sallenauve No, Monsieur le Ministre, I do not ascribe 
 my absence either to your influence or to your suggestions ; it 
 was an act of imperative duty, and the result of no one's bid- 
 ding ; but as regards your share in the public accusations brought 
 against me, I shall proceed to lay the facts before this assembly,
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 43 
 
 and leave the matter to their judgment. (A stir of interest.) 
 The law which, in order to protect the independence of a 
 member of this Chamber, lays down the rule that a criminal 
 prosecution cannot be instituted against any membe; without 
 the preliminary authority of the Chamber, has been turned 
 against me, I must say with consummate skill. The indict- 
 ment, if presented to the Attorney-General in Court, would 
 have been at once dismissed, for it stands alone without the 
 support of any kind of proof; and, so far as I know, the 
 Ministry of this nation is not in the habit of prosecuting any- 
 body on the strength of the allegation of the first comer. I 
 cannot, therefore, but admire the remarkable acumen which 
 discerned that, by appealing to this Chamber, the charge 
 would have all the advantages of a political attack, though 
 it had not the elements of the simplest criminal case. 
 (Murmurs.) And then, gentlemen, who is the skillful parlia- 
 mentary campaigner to be credited with this masterly device ? 
 As you know, it is a woman, a peasant, claiming only the 
 humble rank of a hand-worker; whence we must infer that the 
 countrywomen of Champagne can boast of an intellectual 
 superiority of which hitherto you can surely have had no con- 
 ception. (Laughter.) It must, however, be added that 
 before setting out for Paris to state her grievance, my accuser 
 would seem to have had an interview, which may have thrown 
 some light on her mind, with the Mayor of Arcis, my minis- 
 terial opponent for election ; and it is furthermore to be sup- 
 posed that this magistrate had some interest in the prosecution 
 to be instituted, since he thought it his duty to pay the 
 traveling expenses both of the plaintiff and of the village 
 lawyer who accompanied her. (" Ha-ha! " from the Left.) 
 This remarkably clever woman having come to Paris, on whom 
 does she first call? Well, on that very gentleman who had 
 been sent to Arcis by the Government as a special agent to 
 insure the success of the ministerial candidate. And who 
 then made it his business to apply for authority to prosecute?
 
 44 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 Not indeed that same special agent, but a lawyer directed by 
 him, after a breakfast to which the peasant-woman and her 
 rustic adviser were invited, to supply the necessary grounds. 
 (Much excitement and a long buzz of talk.) 
 
 The Minister of Public Works, from his bench Without 
 discussing the truth of facts of which I personally have no 
 knowledge, I may state on my honor that the Government 
 was absolutely unaware of all the intrigues described, and 
 repudiates and blames them in unqualified terms. 
 
 M. le Sallenauve After the express denial which I have 
 been so fortunate as to elicit, I feel, gentlemen, that it would 
 be ungracious to insist on foisting on the Government the 
 responsibility for these proceedings ; but that I should have 
 made the mistake will seem to you quite natural if you re- 
 member that at the moment when I entered this hall the 
 Minister for Public Works was speaking from the tribune and 
 taking part in a very unusual way in a discussion bearing on 
 the rules of this Chamber, while trying to convince you that 
 I had treated its members with either contempt or irreverent 
 contumely. 
 
 The Minister for Public Works made some remark which 
 was not heard ; there then followed a long burst of private 
 discussion. 
 
 M. Victorin Hulot* I would beg the President to desire 
 the Minister for Public Works not to interrupt. He will have 
 the opportunity of replying. 
 
 M. de Sallenauve According to M. de Rastignac, I failed 
 in respect to this Chamber by applying from abroad for the 
 leave of absence which I had already taken before obtaining 
 the permission I affected to ask. But, in his anxiety to 
 prove me in the wrong, the Minister overlooks the fact that 
 at the time when I set out the session had not begun, and that 
 by addressing such a request to the President of the Chamber 
 \ should have appealed to a pure abstraction. (" Quite true," 
 * Vide " Cousin Betty.''
 
 THE DEPUTY FOR AA'CIS. 45 
 
 from the Left.) As to the inadequacy of .the reasons assigned 
 for my absence, I regret to say that I was unable to be more 
 explicit ; that if I should reveal the true cause of my journey, 
 1 should betray a secret that is not mine. At the same time, 
 I was fully aware that by this reserve which I must even now 
 maintain I exposed my actions to monstrous misinterpreta- 
 tion, and might expect to see a mixture of the burlesque and 
 the offensive in the explanation that would be given as a sub- 
 stitute for the facts. (Excitement.) In reality, I was so 
 anxious not to pretermit any of the formalities required by 
 my position, that I, like the Minister himself, had thought of 
 the arrangement by which I fancied I had put everything in 
 order. A man of the highest honor, and, like myself, in pos- 
 session of the secret that compelled me to travel, had been 
 requested by me to guarantee to the President of this Cham- 
 ber the imperative necessity to which I had yielded. But 
 calumny had, no doubt, so far done its work, that this hon- 
 orable gentleman feared to compromise himself by affording 
 the signal protection of his name and word to a man threat- 
 ened with a criminal action. Although at this moment danger 
 seems to be receding from me, I shall not destroy the incog- 
 nito in which he has thought it proper and wise to shroud his 
 defection. The less I was prepared for this egotistic prudence, 
 the more have I the right to be surprised and pained by it ; 
 but the more careful shall I be to let this breach of friendship 
 remain a secret between myself and his conscience, which 
 alone will blame him. 
 
 At this stage there was a great commotion in the gallery 
 reserved for the Peers of the Upper House, everybody crowd- 
 ing to help a lady who had a violent attack of hysterics. 
 Several deputies hurried to the spot, and some, doctors no 
 doubt, left the Chamber in haste. The sitting was interrupted 
 for some minutes. 
 
 The President Ushers, open the ventilators. It is want 
 pf air that has led to this unfortunate incident. M. de Salle*
 
 46 THE DEPUTY FOR ARCIS. 
 
 nauve, I regret the interruptions ; be so good as to go on with 
 your speech. 
 
 M. de Sallenauvc To resume briefly : The application for 
 authority to prosecute, of which you have heard, has now, no 
 doubt, lost much of its importance in the eyes of my col- 
 leagues, even of the more hostile. I have here a letter in 
 which the peasant-woman, my relation, withdraws her charge 
 and confirms the statements I have had the honor of laying 
 before you. I might read the letter, but I think it better 
 simply to place it in the President's hands. ("Quite right, 
 quite right!") As regards the illegality of my absence, I 
 returned to Paris this morning ; and by being in my place at 
 the opening of this sitting, I could have been in my seat in 
 Parliament within the strict limits of the time so generously 
 granted me by this Chamber. But, as M. de Canalis sug- 
 gested to you, I was determined not to appear here till the 
 cloud that hung over my character could be cleared off. This 
 task filled up the morning. Now, gentlemen, it is for you to 
 decide whether one of your colleagues is to be sent back to 
 his constituents, for a few hours' delay in coming to claim his 
 seat in this Chamber. After all, whether I am to be regarded 
 as a forger, a desperate lover, or merely as a careless repre- 
 sentative, I am not uneasy as to what their verdict will be ; 
 and after the lapse of a few weeks, the probable result, as I 
 believe, will be that I shall come back again. 
 
 On all sides cries of " Divide." 
 
 On descending from the tribune, M. de Sallenauve was 
 warmly congratulated. 
 
 The President I put it to the vote : Whether or not, the 
 election of M. de Sallenauve, returned as Deputy for Arcis, is 
 or is not valid ? 
 
 Almost every deputy present rose to vote in favor of the 
 admission of the new member ; a few deputies of the Centre 
 abstained from voting on either side. 
 
 M. de Sallenauve was admitted and took the oaths.
 
 TffE tiEPtSTV FOR ARClS. 4t 
 
 M. le President The order of the day includes the first 
 reading of the Address, but the Chairman of the Committee 
 informs me that the draft will not be ready to be laid before 
 this Chamber till to-morrow. Business being done, I pro- 
 nounce the sitting closed. 
 
 The Chamber rose at half-past four. 
 
 NOTE : This Scene of Political Life remained unfinished by the 
 Author. PUBLISHER.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 TRANSLATED BY JNO. RUDD, B.A. 
 
 To Constance- Victoire. 
 
 Here, madame, is one of those works, we know not 
 whence, which falls into an author 1 s mind and afford* 
 him pleasure before he can estimate how it will be 
 welcomed by the public, the supreme judge of our gener- 
 ation. Feeling assured of your compliance at my in- 
 fatuation, to you I dedicate this book : is it not right 
 that it should be yours as in other days tithes belongea 
 to the church, in memory of God who makes all things 
 grow, all ripen, both in the fields and in our intel- 
 lects ? 
 
 Some lumps of clay, left by Moliere at the base of 
 the colossal statue of Tartuffe, have been moulded by a 
 hand more audacious than able ; but, at whatever dis- 
 tance I may be 'neath the greatest of humorists, I 
 shall be satisfied to have utilized these little pieces 
 from before the curtain of his stage to show Tip the 
 modern hypocrite at work. The reason that most en- 
 couraged me in this difficult undertaking was finding 
 it incompatible with any religious question, since for 
 you, so pious, I must necessarily avoid them, in spite 
 of what a great writer calls the general indifference 
 to religious matters. 
 
 May the double meaning of your names be a 
 prophecy of the book! Be pleased to regard this 
 as a respectful recognition by one who ventures to call 
 himself the most devoted of your servants. 
 
 DE BALZAC. 
 (48)
 
 FART I. 
 
 THE turnstile Saint- Jean, of which a description seemed un- 
 necessary at the time of the commencement of the study en- 
 titled "A Second Home;" this primitive relic of old Paris 
 has no longer an existence but in that story. The erection of 
 the H6tel de Villc, as it stands to-day, has cleared out the 
 whole quarter. 
 
 In 1830 passers-by could still see the turnstile painted on 
 the sign of a wine-dealer, but that house, its last sanctuary, 
 has since been torn down. Alas ! old Paris is vanishing with 
 frightful rapidity. Here and there, in these works, there will 
 remain some typical house of the Middle Ages, like that de- 
 scribed at the opening of the " Cat and Racket," one or two 
 such specimens still exist ; for instance, the house occupied by 
 Judge Popinot, Rue du Fowarre, is an example of old bour- 
 geoisie dwellings. Here, the remains of the Fulbert house ; 
 there, the old basin of the Seine during the reign of Charles 
 IX. \yhy does not the historian of French society, like a 
 new " Old Mortality," search out these singular records of the 
 past like the old man of Walter Scott's restored the tomb- 
 stones? Certainly, for nearly ten years, the protests of litera- 
 ture were not superfluous ; art is beginning to disguise with its 
 flowers the hideous fronts of the trading marts in Paris, and 
 which one of our writers has merrily compared to commodes. 
 
 It may be remarked that the creation of a municipal com- 
 mission del ornamento which supervises, in Milan, the archi- 
 tecture of the street-fronts, and which compels every proprietor 
 to submit his plans thereto, dates, from the twelfth century. 
 Now who can have failed to note in that pretty capital the 
 effects of patriotism for their town alike in the middle-class 
 and the nobles, and to admire to the full the character and 
 originality of the buildings ? 
 
 4 (49)
 
 60 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 The startling and hideous speculations which, year after 
 year, squeeze a suite of rooms into the space of a salon, 
 waging war to the death against the gardens, must inevitably 
 influence the manners of Parisians. Before long we shall be 
 compelled to live out of our houses more than in them. The 
 sanctity of private life, the liberty of the home, where can it 
 be found ? It means an income of fifty thousand francs. 
 Again, few millionaires even permit themselves the luxury of 
 a little mansion, protected by a courtyard from the street, 
 and sheltered from the prying eyes of the public by the leafy 
 shade of a garden. 
 
 By leveling all fortunes, the Code which regulates the suc- 
 cessions, or legacies, has produced these phalansteries in which 
 to lodge thirty families, bringing in one hundred thousand 
 francs a year. Thus, in fifty years we shall be able to count 
 the houses resembling that occupied, at the time we begin this 
 story, by the Thuillier family ; really a curious house and well 
 deserving of a detailed description, if only done for the pur- 
 pose of comparing the middle-class lives of other days with 
 those of our own time. 
 
 The situation and appearance of the house, the frame to 
 this picture of manners, has the imprint, the aroma," of the 
 lower middle-class, which may attract or repulse the attention 
 according to each one's inclination. 
 
 To commence, the Maison Thuillier did not belong to either 
 M. or Mme., but to Mademoiselle Thuillier, the eldest sister 
 of M. Thuillier. 
 
 This house, purchased in the first six months following the 
 revolution of 1830 by Mile. Jeanne-Brigitte Thuillier, senior, 
 is situated near the middle of the Rue Saint-Dominique- 
 d'Enfer, to the right on entering by the Rue d'Enfer. Thus 
 the house occupied by M. Thuillier has a southern exposure. 
 
 The progressive movement of the Parisian populace toward 
 the higher ground on the right bank of the river Seine, de- 
 serting the left bank, had for a long time prevented the sale
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 51 
 
 of properties in the Latin quarter, so-called, who, for various 
 reasons, which will be deduced from the character and habits 
 of M. Thuillier, determined his sister to purchase a freehold ; 
 this one she was able to buy for the merely nominal price of 
 forty-six thousand francs; the fixtures and so forth amounted 
 to six thousand additional, or fifty-two thousand francs in all. 
 A detailed description by the proprietor, in the style of an 
 advertisement, and the changes made by M. Thuillier will 
 fully show the way in which some fortunes were made in July, 
 1830, while others lost their all. 
 
 On the street the front was of stucco masonry, weather- 
 beaten and rain-furrowed, and grooved by the plasterer's tool 
 in imitation of blocks of stone. This kind of house-front is so 
 common in Paris, and so ugly, that the town ought to give 
 prizes to owners who are willing to build their new facades of 
 carved stone. This drab wall, pierced by seven windows, was 
 raised three stories, and terminated in a mansard roof covered 
 with tiles. The carriage gate, wide and strong, showed in 
 make and style that that part of the building toward the street 
 had been erected during the Empire, one part of the courtyard 
 utilized having formerly formed part of a very large, older hab- 
 itation, surviving from the time when the Enfer quarter enjoyed 
 more favor. 
 
 On one side was found the janitor's lodge ; on the other the 
 stairs went up the front. Two wings, adjoining the neighbor- 
 ing houses, had formerly served as the stables, coach-house, 
 kitchens, and servants' quarters; but, since 1830, these had 
 been converted into warehouses. 
 
 The right side was rented by a wholesale stationer, called 
 M. Metivier nephew ; the left side by a bookseller named 
 Barbet. The offices of each tradesman were over the ware- 
 rooms, the bookseller being on the second and the stationer 
 on the third floor of .the house on the street. Metivier nephew, 
 more a commission agent for paper than a merchant j Barbet, 
 more a bill-broker than a bookseller, had one of these exten
 
 52 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 sive premises in use for storing job lots of paper bought from 
 necessitous manufacturers; the other of editions of works given 
 as pledges for loans. 
 
 This shark of the booksellers and this pike of the paper 
 trade lived on good terms with each other, and their transac- 
 tions, having none of the bustle or energies of retail trade, 
 brought so few carriages into that habitually quiet courtyard 
 that the janitor was compelled to 'weed-out the grass now and 
 again from between the paving-stones. MM. Barbet and 
 Metivier, who fill but a minor part in this story, made but 
 few visits to their landlord, and their exactitude in paying 
 their rent caused them to be classed as good tenants ; they 
 were regarded as very honest people in the eyes of the Thuil- 
 lier circle. 
 
 On the third floor on the street side were two suites of 
 rooms, one occupied by M. Dutocq, clerk to a justice of the 
 peace, an old, retired government employe, a frequenter of 
 the Thuilliers' salon ; the other by the hero of this Scene. 
 We must be content for the present, though, to know what 
 rent he paid seven hundred francs and the position he had 
 taken in the heart of the place, three years previous to the 
 curtain rising on this domestic drama. 
 
 The clerk, a bachelor of fifty, occupied, out of the two 
 suites of the three, the larger one ; he had a cook and paid a 
 rent of one thousand francs. Two years after her acquisition, 
 Mademoiselle Thuillier was getting seven thousand francs in 
 rent for one house ; the former owner had furnished it with 
 outside shutters, had restored the interior, ornamenting it with 
 mirrors, without succeeding in either letting or selling it ; and 
 the Thuilliers, very handsomely lodged, as will be seen, had 
 the enjoyment of one of the most beautiful gardens in the 
 quarter, whose trees shaded the deserted little street, the Rue 
 Neuve-Sainte-Catherine. 
 
 Situated between the courtyard and the garden, that part 
 of the house which they occupied seemed to have been th
 
 53 
 
 caprice of some wealthy citizen, in the days of Louis XIV., 
 or that of a president of the Parlement, or some quiet, peace- 
 loving student. This lodge had five windows and was of two 
 stories above the first floor, being prettily capped with a four- 
 gabled roof, ending in a weathercock, pierced by handsome, 
 large chimneys and oval windows. Perhaps this structure 
 was built from the remains of some great mansion ; but, after 
 studying the plans of old Paris, I have been unable to find 
 anything to substantiate this theory ; and, for that matter, the 
 title deeds of Mile. Thuillier mention as proprietor, under 
 Louis XIV., one Petitot, the famous painter of camels, he 
 having it from President Lecamus. It is probable that the 
 president lived here during the erection of his celebrated 
 mansion on the Rue de Thorigny. 
 
 Thus the Robe and Art had alike left their traces. But, 
 then, what a liberal idea of necessity and pleasure had ruled 
 in the arrangements of the interior of this lodge ! To the 
 right, on entering the hall, is a spacious vestibule whence 
 ascends a stairway of stone, with two windows overlooking the 
 garden ; under the stairs is the doorway to the cellar. From 
 the vestibule, which communicates with the dining-room, with 
 windows to the courtyard. This dining-room has a side-door 
 to the kitchens adjoining Barbel's warehouse. At the back 
 of the stairs on the garden side was a fine, large study, with 
 two windows. The first and second stories each formed a 
 separate set of two suites of rooms; and the servants' quarters 
 were indicated, under the four-gabled roof, by the oval win- 
 dows. A handsome, large stove ornamented the great vesti- 
 bule ; its two glass doors, facing each other, gave ample light. 
 This hall was paved in black and white marble, and had a 
 decorated coffered ceiling, the joists of which had at one time 
 been painted and gilded, but had, since the Empire, un- 
 doubtedly been whitewashed. Facing the stove was a red 
 marble basin. The three doors of the study, of the salon 
 and the dining-room were surmounted with oval panels con-
 
 64 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 taining pictures which cried aloud for much-needed restoration, 
 though the decorations were not without merit. 
 
 The salon, wainscoted in wood, recalled the century of 
 magnificence by its Languedoc marble mantel, in its ceiling 
 with ornamented corners, and by the shape of its windows, 
 in which were preserved the little diamond panes. The 
 dining-room, level with the salon and having double doors 
 between, was floored with marble; the ceiling of chestnut- 
 wood was unpainted; but the atrocious modern paper-hang- 
 ings had replaced the tapestry of the olden time. The study, 
 modernized by Thuillier, was now utterly discordant. 
 
 The gold and white panels of the salon were so faded that 
 nothing but red lines could be perceived where the gold had 
 formerly been, and the white was yellow, streaky, and falling 
 off. The Latin words, Otium cum dignitate, had never, to the 
 eyes of a poet, had so excellent a commentary as in this noble 
 dwelling. The iron-work of the balustrade to the stairs was 
 worthy the magistrate and the artist ; but, to discern their 
 traces to-day in the remains of a dignified antiquity, the 
 observing eyes of the artist are necessary. 
 
 The Thuilliers and their predecessors had much dishonored 
 this gem of the higher bourgeoisie by their middle-class habits 
 and lack of taste. Can you imagine walnut-wood chairs with 
 horsehair seats ; a mahogany table with an oilcloth cover ; 
 a crumb-cloth under the table ; lamps of black metal ; a cheap 
 paper with a red border ; execrable black and white engrav- 
 ings on the walls ; and cotton curtains with red borders in this 
 dining-room in which Petitot and his friends had feasted ? 
 
 Can you conceive of the effect of this in the salon where 
 the portraits of M. of Mme. of Mile. Thuillier, by Pierre 
 Grassou, the painter of the middle-classes; of card-tables 
 that had done twenty years' service ; of consoles of the 
 time of the Empire; a tea-table supported on a huge lyre; 
 a coarse mahogany suite upholstered in printed velvet on a 
 chocolate ground ; of the mantel, with its plock which
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 66 
 
 represented la Bellone of the Empire ; of candelabra with 
 fluted columns; of curtains of worsted damask and of em- 
 broidered lawn, looped back with stamped brass chains ? A 
 second-hand carpet covered the floor. The handsome vesti- 
 bule was furnished with benches covered with plush, the 
 carved panels being hidden behind wardrobes of divers dates, 
 which had been removed from the various apartments formerly 
 occupied by the Thuilliers. A shelf covered the marble 
 basin and bore a smoky lamp dating from 1815. As a finish- 
 ing touch, fear, that hideous bugbear, had provided double 
 doors both on the garden and the courtyard sides of the 
 house, strongly sheathed in iron, which stood back against the 
 wall by day and at night were securely closed. 
 
 It is an easy matter to explain the deplorable desecration 
 of this monument of private life of the seventeenth century 
 by the same life of the nineteenth century. At the com- 
 mencement of the Consulate, perhaps, some master-builder, 
 having acquired this little mansion, conceived the idea of 
 making some use of the ground facing the street ; he had 
 most likely pulled down a beautiful coach-way gate flanked by 
 little lodges which added importance to this pretty sejour, to 
 use an old French word, and the shrewdness of a Parisian 
 builder implanted its blight on the front of this elegance; as 
 the newspapers and their printing-presses, the factories and 
 their warerooms, trade and its counting-rooms, have ousted 
 the aristocracy, the old bourgeoisie, finance and the law, 
 wherever they once displayed their splendor. A curious study 
 is that of the title-deeds in Paris ! A mad-house, on the Rue 
 des Batailles, occupies the site where once stood the dwelling 
 of the Chevalier Pierre Bayard du Terrail ; the third estate 
 has built a whole street where once stood the Hotel Necker. 
 Old Paris is going following the kings who are gone. For 
 one chef (F ceuvrc of architecture saved by a Polish princess,* 
 
 * The H6tel Lambert, He Saint-Louis, occupied by the Princess Czar- 
 toriska. [Note in original edition.}
 
 66 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 how many smaller palaces have fallen, like Petitot's dwelling, 
 into the hands of Thuilliers. Here are the reasons which 
 led Mademoiselle Thuillier to become the owner of this house : 
 
 At the fall of the Villele ministry M. Louis-Jer6me Thu- 
 illier, who had then been for twenty-six years a clerk in the 
 Bureau of Finance, became second clerk ; but he had barely 
 had his fill of the joys of authority in that subaltern position, 
 once the smallest of his hopes, when the events of July, 
 1830, compelled him to resign. He very ingeniously calcu- 
 lated that his pension would be honorably and munificently 
 dealt with by the new men, who would be only too well 
 pleased to have the disposal of another place at their com- 
 mand ; and this was well reasoned, for it was at once granted 
 at seventeen hundred francs. 
 
 When the prudent sub-chief first spoke of retiring from the 
 administration, his sister, far more the partner of his life than 
 was his wife, trembled for the employe's future. 
 
 "What would become of Thuillier?" was the question 
 Madame and Mademoiselle Thuillier addressed to each other 
 with equal fears ; they were then living in a small flat on the 
 third floor, Rue d'Argenteuil. 
 
 "Getting his pension into proper shape will occupy him 
 for some time," said Mile. Thuillier; "but I think I will so 
 place my savings as to keep him pretty well occupied. Yes, 
 by giving him an estate to manage it will be almost equal to 
 his being in the service." 
 
 "Oh ! my dear sister, you will save his life ! " cried Mme. 
 Thuillier. 
 
 'J Well, I have always foreseen this crisis in Jerome's life ! " 
 replied the old maid, with an air of patronage. 
 
 Mile. Thuillier had too frequently heard her brother re- 
 mark : " Such-a-one is dead; he only lasted two years after 
 he retired ! " She well remembered hearing Colleville, Thuil- 
 lier's intimate friend, employed in the same office, jesting 
 about the climacteric of bureaucracy, and saying: "We
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 57 
 
 shall some time come to it the same as the rest!" not to 
 realize the danger threatening her brother. The transition 
 from activity to idleness is, in fact, the critical time for the 
 employe. Those who cannot enter upon some substituted 
 occupation for the one they have left change remarkably : 
 some die; a great number take to fishing, a distraction very 
 akin to their former labors (sic} in the office ; some others, 
 malicious men, become stock-brokers, lose their savings in the 
 concern, and are glad to finish by taking a situation in the 
 business, after the first bankruptcy and liquidation, which be- 
 comes successful in the hands of more capable ones on the 
 lookout for just such chances ; then the ex-clerk can rub his, 
 now empty, hands and say : "I always knew there was a great 
 future for this business." But most of them keep up a constant 
 struggle against their old habits. 
 
 "Some of them," said Colleville, "are devoured by a 
 spleen "* (he pronounced it "splane ") " peculiar to govern- 
 ment clerks ; they die of suppressed circula(f)tion ; afflicted 
 with red-tape worm. The little Poiret could not see a blue- 
 bordered cardboard box without his face changing color ; he 
 turned from yellow to green." 
 
 Mile. Thuillier was looked upon as the good genius of her 
 brother's household ; that she had plenty of force and de- 
 cision her personal story will demonstrate. This relative 
 superiority enabled her to gauge her brother, though she 
 adored him. After seeing the wreck of her hopes founded 
 on her idol, she experienced a feeling of maternity which 
 caused her to overestimate the social qualities of the sub- 
 chief. 
 
 Thuillier and his sister were the children of the head porter 
 to the Minister of Finance. Jerome had escaped, thanks to 
 his being short-sighted, from every possible form of requisi- 
 tion and conscription. His father's ambition was to make 
 him an employ^. At the opening of- this century there were 
 *Blue devils.
 
 68 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 so many places to fill in the army that it caused many vacan- 
 cies in the offices, thus the removal of inferior clerks gave the 
 burly old Thuillier a chance so see his son take his first de- 
 crees in the hierarchy of bureaucracy. 
 
 The porter died in 1814, at the time when Jerome was to 
 succeed the old sub-chief, but all the fortune he was able to 
 leave him was this hope. Old Thuillier and his wife, who 
 died in 1810, had retired in 1806, with a retiring pension 
 their sole fortune, having expended their earnings in giving 
 Jerome his education and in supporting him and his sister. 
 
 We know the effect of the Restoration on the bureaux. 
 The suppression of forty-one departments caused the dismissal 
 of a horde of clerks, honest men quite prepared to accept 
 offices inferior in grade to those formerly occupied by them. 
 The rights of these men were further impinged upon by the 
 pretensions of exiled families ruined by the Revolution. 
 Squeezed between these two sources, Jerome thought himself 
 more than lucky not to be dismissed on some frivolous pre- 
 text. Till the day when by chance he became second-clerk 
 he had quaked about his retiring pension. 
 
 This short review explains the limited conceptions and lack 
 of general knowledge of M. Thuillier. He had acquired 
 Latin, mathematics, history, and geography, as boys are 
 taught at school ; but he had not risen higher than is known 
 as the second class, his father having profited by the chance 
 of getting him into office, boasting of his son's "splendid 
 hand." So, though little Thuillier wrote the first inscrip- 
 tions in the ledger, he was not up in rhetoric or philosophy. 
 
 A cogwheel in the ministerial machine, he but little culti- 
 vated letters and still less troubled art ; he acquired a super- 
 ficial knowledge of his own line ; and when, on the occasion 
 of his rise, under the Empire, he mixed with the higher class 
 of employes, he caught the superficial manner which concealed 
 the porter's son, but he utterly failed to catch a ready wit. 
 His ignorance caused his silence, and his silence well served
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 59 
 
 him. He was accustomed to render, under the Imperial 
 regime, that passive obedience which is so appreciated by 
 superiors ; and it was to this quality that he afterward owed 
 his promotion to the grade of sub-chief. This routine life 
 gave him a great experience; his silent manner covered his 
 lack of education. 
 
 Mile. Thuillier, knowing how her brother abhorred reading 
 and his inability to replace the tasks of the office by any 
 business, had wisely resolved to give him the care of her 
 property, the culture of the garden, the little trivialities of 
 middle-class life found in the intrigues of the neighborhood. 
 
 The transplanting of the Thuillier household from the Rue 
 d'Argenteuil to the Rue Saint-Dominique-d'Enfer, the atten- 
 tion necessary to the purchase, the selection of a janitor, the 
 search for good tenants, kept Thuillier fully occupied through 
 1831 and 1832. When this phenomenal transplantation was 
 effected, when the sister saw that Jerome had survived his up- 
 rooting, she found him still other employment, as we shall 
 learn, for she recognized a similar disposition to her own in 
 Thuillier, which it may not be useless to here describe. 
 
 Although only the son of a minister's porter, Thuillier was 
 what is known as a fine man ; above the medium height, 
 slight, of agreeable physiognomy when he wore his spectacles, 
 but ugly, like most persons afflicted with myopia, when he 
 doffed them ; for the habit of looking through glasses had 
 cast a species of mist over his eyeballs. 
 
 Between the age of eighteen and thirty, young Thuillier 
 was a favorite with women in that social sphere that exists in 
 the lower middle-class and ends below the chiefs of the de- 
 partments ; but, as all are aware, under the Empire the wars 
 left Parisian society somewhat bereft by absorbing every man 
 of energy into the fields of battle ; and perhaps, as suggested 
 by a celebrated physician, this is the cause of the decadence 
 of the generation that lived during the middle of the nine- 
 teenth century.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 Thuillier, compelled to shine by accomplishments other 
 than intellectual, learned to waltz and dance so well as to be- 
 come noted for it in the city; he was called "Handsome 
 Thuillier;" he was an expert billiard player; he was clever 
 at cutting out figures ; his friend Colleville had so well in- 
 structed him that he could troll out some fancy ballads in 
 great style. All this resulted in gaining him that spurious 
 success which deceives the young and deludes them as to the 
 future. From 1806 to 1814 Mile. Thuillier believed in her 
 brother as Mile. d'Orleans believed in Louis-Philippe; she 
 was proud of Jerome, she saw him arrive at the highest post 
 in the office ; thanks to the popularity which at that time gave 
 him the entrance to some salons where he most decidedly 
 would not have been seen only for the circumstances which, 
 under the Empire, made society a perfect medley. 
 
 He acquired a habit of looking at himself in the glass, 
 posing with his hands on his hips to set off his figure, and 
 assuming the deportment of a dancing-master, all of which 
 helped to prolong the lease of 'his nickname "Handsome 
 Thuillier." 
 
 But the truth in 1806 became mockery in 1826. He still 
 retained some vestiges of the dandy's dress of the Empire, 
 nor were they unbecoming to the dignity of an old second- 
 clerk. He still wore the white cravat with numerous pleats 
 in which his chin was buried, the two ends of which menaced 
 passers-by as they projected to the right and left of a neatly 
 tied knot, in former days fastened by the hands of dainty 
 beauties. He followed the fashions at a respectful distance, 
 but he adapted them to his own style ; he wore his hat far 
 back; low shoes in summer with fine stockings; his overcoat 
 was reminiscent of the levites of the Empire; he would not 
 abandon his pleated shirt-frills and white vests ; he was all 
 the time making play with his thin cane, the style of 1810, 
 and held himself upright. None who saw Thuillier prome- 
 nading the boulevards would have taken him for the son of a
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 61 
 
 man who served the employes' breakfasts in the Bureau of 
 Finance, and who wore the livery of Louis XVI. ; he more 
 resembled an imperial diplomat or a sub-prefect. 
 
 Another household transplanted into the same neighborhood 
 was that of which M. Colleville, Thuillier's most intimate 
 friend, was the head. But before painting Pylades it is first 
 indispensable to have done with Orestes, as it is necessary to 
 explain why Thuillier, Handsome Thuillier, found himself 
 without a family, for a family cannot be without children ; 
 and here must be revealed one of those deep mysteries which 
 lie entombed in the arcana of private life, and whose symp- 
 toms arise at times to the surface when the anguish of a hidden 
 sorrow becomes too great to be silently borne, as instance 
 that of Mme. and Mile. Thuillier, for, up to the present, we 
 have only seen, so to speak, the public life of Jerome Thuillier. 
 
 Marie-Jeanne-Brigitte Thuillier, four years older than her 
 brother, had been immolated on her brother's altar ; it was 
 easier to give him a profession than to give the other a mar- 
 riage-portion. Ill-fortune, to certain natures, is a lighthouse 
 illuminating the dark and squalid in social life. Superior to 
 her brother, alike in energy and commonsense, Brigitte pos- 
 sessed a nature which the sledge-hammer of persecution had 
 made dense, compact, and of great resistance, not to mention 
 inflexible. Jealous of her independence, she made up her 
 mind, by some means, to leave behind her the life at the 
 porter's lodge and become the sole arbiter of her fate. 
 
 At fourteen years of age she took up her abode in a garret, 
 some few steps from the Treasury, then in the Rue Vivienne, 
 not far from the Rue de la Vrilliere, where to-day the Bank 
 stands. She bravely started out in an unfamiliar business, 
 privileged, thanks to her father's patrons ; and which con- 
 sisted of manufacturing cash-bags for the Bank, the Treasury, 
 and other great banking houses. She had, at the end of three 
 years, two workwomen employed. Placing her savings in the 
 Funds, by 1814 she owned an income of three thousand six
 
 52 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 hundred francs a year, which had been made in fifteen years. 
 She spent but little, dining every day with her father as long 
 as he lived ; now, as all know, the Funds during the last con 
 vulsions of the Empire went down to forty-odd francs so this 
 result, apparently exaggerated, is easily explained. 
 
 On the death of the old porter, Brigitte and Jerome, one 
 aged twenty-seven, the other twenty-three, united their desti- 
 nies. The brother and sister had the fullest affection for each 
 other. So when Jerome, then in the time of his success, needed 
 any money, his sister, dressed in coarse woolen cloth, her 
 fingers showing the wear of the thread with which she sewed, 
 always had a few louis to offer him. In Brigitte's eyes Jerome 
 was the most handsome man and more charming than any 
 other in the whole French Empire. 
 
 To keep house for this adored brother, to be initiated into 
 the secrets of Lindoro and Don Juan, to be his servant, his 
 faithful spaniel, was Brigitte's ideal dream ; she immolated 
 herself with ardor to an idol whose egoism she could aggran- 
 dize by her sacrifice. She sold her business to her forelady 
 for fifteen thousand francs, then went and established herself 
 in the Rue d'Argenteuil with Thuillier, making herself the 
 mother, protector, slave, of that "darling of the ladies." 
 
 Brigitte, with the natural prudence of a maid who owed her 
 all to her own discretion and toil, hid the extent of her for- 
 tune from her brother; she no doubt \vas afraid of the prodi- 
 galities of such a man of the world, bringing to the common 
 stock but six hundred francs; this, though, with the eighteen 
 hundred of Jerome's, enabled her to make both ends meet 
 each year. 
 
 From the first day of their partnership, Thuillier listened to 
 his sister as to an oracle; he consulted her in the smallest 
 affairs, concealed no secrets from her, and thus gave her a 
 taste of the fruits of domination which became the besetting 
 sin of her nature. But, really, the sister had been altogether 
 sacrificed to her brother, she had staked her all on his heart,
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 63 
 
 she lived but in him. Brigitte's ascendency over Jerome was 
 singularly confirmed by the marriage she procured for him 
 about 1814. 
 
 Seeing the violent nip of the new-comers, which came with 
 the Restoration, in all the government offices, particularly by 
 the return of the old society which trampled under foot the 
 middle-classes, Brigitte understood, and indeed her brother 
 explained to her, the social crisis that bade fair to extinguish 
 all their hopes. Further success was out of the question for 
 Handsome Thuillier among the nobility who had succeeded in 
 routing the plebeians of the Empire. 
 
 Under these conditions a woman, as zealous as Brigitte 
 was, wished and determined to have her brother marry, quite 
 as much for her own sake as for his, for only she herself could 
 achieve his happiness, Madame Thuillier being merely the in- 
 dispensable accessory for the production of one or two chil- 
 dren. Though Brigiite's intellect did not compare with her 
 will, for all that she had the instinct of despotism ; for though 
 she had received no education, she went straight ahead with 
 the persistency of a nature accustomed to succeed. She had 
 a natural genius for household management, the sense of thrift, 
 and a love of work. She divined that she would never be 
 successful in marrying Jerome in a higher sphere than their 
 own, where the family would make inquiry as to their style 
 of life, possibly to be alarmed at finding a mistress already 
 established in the dwelling; she searched, therefore, in a 
 grade below their own for the people she might dazzle, and 
 she came across the very party. 
 
 The senior messenger of the Bank, named Lemprun, had 
 an only daughter called Celeste. Mile. Celeste Lemprun 
 would inherit her mother's fortune, the only daughter of a 
 truck-farmer. This property consisted of some acres of land 
 in the environs of Paris which the old man still worked ; then 
 the fortune of old Lemprun, a man who, after being employed 
 in the banks of Thelusson and Keller, had entered the service
 
 64 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 of the Bank at its foundation, would also be hers. Lemprun, 
 then the head messenger, enjoyed the respect and esteem of 
 the government and the inspectors. 
 
 The Board of Directors, hearing that the marriage of Celeste, 
 to an honorable employe in the Bureau of Finance, was 
 arranged, promised a present of six thousand francs ; this gift 
 added to the twelve thousand francs given by did Lemprun, 
 and twelve thousand francs given by Sieur Galard, the truck- 
 farmer at Auteuil, made a dot of thirty thousand francs. Old 
 Galard and M. and Mme. Lemprun were enchanted with this 
 alliance ; the chief messenger knew Brigitte for one of the 
 most worthy and respectable young women in Paris. Brigitte 
 gave lustre by her descriptions of investments in the Funds 
 and informing the Lempruns that she would never marry, and 
 neither the chief messenger nor his wife, people of the Golden 
 Age, allowed themselves to criticise Brigitte. They were 
 especially struck by the high position of Handsome Thuillier, 
 and the marriage had been settled, to use the accustomed 
 formula, to the general satisfaction of all. 
 
 The governor and secretary of the Bank acted as witnesses 
 for the bride, the same as M. de la Billardiere, chief of his 
 department, and M. Rabourdin, chief of the bureau, did for 
 Thuillier. 
 
 Six years after this marriage old Lemprun was the victim of 
 a most audacious robbery, spoken of in the journals of that 
 time, but quite forgotten in the events of 1815. The thieves 
 had completely eluded every search. Lemprun wished to pay 
 for the loss, and, although the Bank charged the amount to 
 profit and loss, the poor old man died of vexation caused by 
 the "disaster. He regarded it as a blow at his probity of 
 seventy years' standing. 
 
 Mme. Lemprun abandoned all her inheritance to her 
 daughter, Mme. Thuillier, going to live with her father at 
 Auteuil, where the old man died of an accident in 181 7. Afraid 
 of either managing or letting her father's fields, Mme. Lem-
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 65 
 
 prun begged Brigitte, at whose capabilities and honesty she was 
 astonished, to realize the estate of old Galard and so arrange 
 things that her daughter should take everything, allowing her 
 fifteen hundred francs a year and leaving her the house at 
 Auteuil. The fields of the old truck-farmer, sold in lots, brought 
 thirty thousand francs, and the two fortunes, added to the 
 dot, amounted in 1818 to ninety thousand francs. 
 
 At the beginning of that year, with the results of opera- 
 tions on 'Change, Thuillier's salary and the dividend on Bank 
 shares, the annual sum passing through Brigitte's uncontrolled 
 hands, amounted to eleven thousand francs. It is necessary 
 to have this financial question understood, not only to dis- 
 sipate objections, but to leave a clear course for the drama. 
 
 From the very first Brigitte broke in the unfortunate Mme. 
 Thuillier by a free use of the spurs and making her feel the 
 curb. This luxury of tyranny was quite useless ; the victim 
 promptly yielded. Celeste had been reckoned up by Brigitte, 
 who found her devoid of pluck and education, accustomed to a 
 sedentary life, a tranquil atmosphere, and of excessively mild 
 nature ; she was pious as the word ; she had expiated by 
 hardest penace each involuntary fault that could cause pain to 
 another. She was quite ignorant of life ; accustomed to be 
 waited upon by her mother, who did her own housework ; 
 compelled to keep in a state of rest by a lymphatic constitu- 
 tion, becoming fatigued at the least exertion. She was just a 
 daughter of the people of Paris, where the children, rarely 
 pretty, are the production of poverty, overwork, of airless 
 homes, without freedom of action, and the lack of every con- 
 venience of life. 
 
 At the time of her wedding Celeste was a little woman, a 
 faded blonde, nauseatingly so; fat, slow, and of most stupid 
 appearance. Her too-large forehead, prominent, and suggest- 
 ing water on the brain ; and under that dome of a waxy hue 
 a face evidently too small and ending in a point like the snout 
 of a mouse, gave fear to arise that at some time she would 
 5
 
 66 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 lose her mind. Her pale blue eyes and lips, set in a petrified 
 smile, did not disabuse one of this idea. She had, on the 
 solemn day of her wedding, the attitude, air, and manner of 
 one condemned to death, and who hopes it will soon be over. 
 
 " She's a bit soft ! " said Colleville to Thuillier. 
 
 Brigitte was the good knife that should stab this nature, 
 which presented so violent a contrast to her own. She 
 possessed a sort of beauty in her correct, regular features, but 
 it had been massacred by toil which, from infancy, had bound 
 her hard down to uncongenial, rough work, and by the secret 
 privations she had voluntarily undergone to increase her com- 
 petency. Her dappled skin had the hue of steel. Her brown 
 eyes were surrounded with black, or, rather, bruised circles; 
 her upper lip was ornamented with dark down, looking some- 
 what as it had been smoked ; she had thin lips, and her im- 
 perious forehead had once been crowned with hair that was 
 black, but which was now changing to chinchilla. She was 
 as erect as any handsome woman, and everything about her 
 betrayed a life of toil, suppressed fires, and, as is said of the 
 huzzars, "at the cost of her achievements." 
 
 To Brigitte Celeste was but a fortune to pick up, a mother 
 to mate, one subject more in her empire. She very soon re- 
 proached her for being " flabby " a constant word of hers 
 and this jealous old maid, who would have despaired if she 
 had found a managing sister-in-law, took a savage delight in 
 stinging this feeble creature into activity. Celeste, ashamed 
 of seeing her sister-in-law displaying such vim and energy in 
 her household duties, made an effort to assist her ; she fell ill ; 
 at once Brigitte gave her whole care to Mme. Thuillier, she 
 nursed her like a sister, saying before Jer6me : 
 
 " You are not strong enough ; eh, well, do nothing, my 
 pet!" she made the most of the incapacity of Celeste with 
 that display of pity by which the strong, pretending much 
 compassion for the weak, manage to chant their own eulogy. 
 
 When Mme. Thuillier's health was reestablished, Brigitte
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 6? 
 
 would say, in such manner that none could help hearing : 
 "Dish-rag, good-for-nothing," and the like. Celeste would 
 weep in her own room, and, when Thuillier surprised her in 
 tears, he excused his sister, saying : 
 
 "She's all right, but she's hot-tempered; she loves you in 
 her way ; she is just the same with me." 
 
 Celeste, remembering the maternal care she had received, 
 pardoned her sister-in-law. Brigitte looked upon her brother 
 as king of the house ; she lauded him to Celeste and treated 
 him as an autocrat, a Ladislas, an infallible pope. Mme. 
 Thuillier, bereft of her father and grandfather, and all but 
 abandoned by her mother, who came on Thursdays to see 
 her, while they visited her on Sundays in the summer, had no 
 one but her husband to love ; first, because he was her hus- 
 band, and also because he remained to her Handsome Thuil- 
 lier. And sometimes he really treated her as though she were 
 his wife ; all these reasons combined caused her to worship 
 him. Now Thuillier dined at home, but went to bed very 
 late ; he went to balls in his own circle alone and precisely the 
 same as though he was a bachelor. Thus the two women were 
 always together. 
 
 Celeste assumed a passive attitude, and, agreeable to Bri- 
 gitte's desire, became a regular slave. The Queen Elizabeth 
 of the household passed from despotism to a sort of pity for this 
 perpetually sacrificed victim. Finally she laid aside her high 
 and mighty airs, her stinging words, her tone of contempt, 
 when she was assured that she had broken her sister into pas- 
 sive slavery. 
 
 The poor creature might have become something in the 
 household that lived upon her money though she was un- 
 aware of the fact all of which she obtained being the crumbs 
 that fell from the table ; she had one chance by which her 
 spirit might have been roused to defend herself, to be some- 
 thing, but, alas ! that chance did not materialize. 
 
 Six years had gone, but Celeste had not borne a child.
 
 68 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 This infecundity, which, month after month, caused her tor- 
 rents of tears, for a long time did but add fuel to Brigitte's 
 flame ; she reproached her for being no good at all, not even 
 to bear children. This old maid, who had promised herself 
 the pleasure of loving her brother's child, was slow in be- 
 coming used to the idea that this sterility was irremediable. 
 
 At the time when this story commences, in 1840, at the 
 age of forty-six, Celeste had stopped crying, for she was 
 mournfully certain that the power of becoming a mother had 
 departed. Time, ample means, the incessant little frictions 
 of daily life, had rubbed off the corners, and that, together 
 with Celeste's lamblike resignation and sweetness, led to a 
 serene, mild fall. Brigitte became as fond of Cdleste as she 
 was of her. And the two women were further united by the 
 sole sentiment they had ever known their adoration for the 
 happy and selfish Thuillier. 
 
 This spurious motherhood, quite as absorbing as the real, 
 needs an explanation which brings us to the heart of the 
 drama and is the reason why Mile. Thuillier found plenty of 
 occupation for her brother. 
 
 Thuillier had entered as a supernumerary in the bureau at 
 the same time as Colleville, who has already been spoken of 
 as his intimate friend. Compared to the dull and rigid 
 household of Thuillier's, social nature had formed Colleville's 
 as a perfect contrast, and though it was impossible that this 
 peculiar contrast is far from moral, it needs to be added that 
 before jumping to a conclusion of the drama, unfortunately 
 only too true, it were as well to read the story to the end, 
 otherwise the author cannot be held responsible. 
 
 This Colleville was the only son of a talented musician, 
 formerly the first violin at the opera during Francceur's and 
 Rebel's time. Colleville and Thuillier were inseparable 
 friends, having no secrets from each other ; their friendship, 
 commenced when they were but fifteen, remained cloudless in 
 the year 1839.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 69 
 
 Colleville, beside being an employe, was what was known 
 as a "Cumulator" in the bureau; he was first clarionet at 
 the Opera-Comique thanks to his father's name now, when 
 a bachelor, he was better off than Thuillier, and often shared 
 with his friend. But, contrary to Thuillier, Colleville married, 
 to please himself Mile. Flavie, natural daughter of a cele- 
 brated dancer who pretended that she was a de Bourguier, 
 one of the richest contractors of his day, but who had been 
 ruined in 1800, and who more completely forgot his child, 
 as he cherished doubts as to the faithfulness of this famous 
 comedienne. 
 
 By her appearance and birth Flavie was destined to a 
 grievous fate at the time when Colleville, who had frequent 
 occasion to visit her mother, who had lived luxuriously, fell 
 in love with Flavie and married her. Prince Galathionne, 
 her protector, in September, 1815, when the illustrious dancer 
 was bringing her brilliant career to a close, gave twenty 
 thousand francs as a wedding-present, and her mother added 
 a most elaborate trousseau. The frequenters of her house and 
 her comrades at the opera made her presents of jewelry and 
 plate, so that the Colleville household was much richer in 
 superfluities than cash. Flavie, raised in luxury, at first had 
 a charming suite of rooms which had been furnished by her 
 mother's decorator, and where this young wife held court, 
 airing her taste for the arts, artists, and for a certain elegance. 
 
 Mme. Colleville was at once pretty and piquante, bright, 
 gay, gracious, and an expounder of that name a jolly good 
 fellow. The dancer, now aged forty-three, retired from the 
 stage and went to live in the country, which deprived her 
 daughter of the benefit to be derived from her mother's luxury 
 and extravagance. Mme. Colleville's house was very pleasant, 
 but tremendously expensive. Between 1816 to 1826 she had 
 five children. A musician in the evening, from seven to nine 
 in the morning Colleville kept the books of a merchant. By 
 ten o'clock he was at the bureau. Thus by blowing into a
 
 70 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 wooden pipe in the evening, and writing out accounts in 
 double entry in the morning, he made seven to eight thousand 
 francs per annum. 
 
 Mme. Colleville played the lady of high society ; she re- 
 ceived on Wednesdays ; she gave a musicale each month, and 
 a dinner every fortnight. She only saw Colleville at dinner 
 in the evening ; when he returned toward midnight, she very 
 often had not yet come in. She was at the play, for she often 
 had a box given her, or she would leave word for Colleville to 
 call for her at some house where she was at a dance or a 
 supper. Excellent fare was provided by Mme. Colleville, 
 and the society, somewhat mixed, was excessively amusing ; 
 she received famous actresses, painters, men of letters, and 
 some wealthy men. Mme. Colleville's elegance was on a par 
 with that of Tullia, the operatic premier danseuse, of whom 
 she saw a great deal ; but, though the Collevilles dipped into 
 their capital, often finding it difficult to make both ends meet, 
 at the month's end Flavie was never in debt. 
 
 Colleville was very happy ; he still loved his wife and was 
 always her good friend. Ever welcomed with an affectionate 
 smile and infectious, pretty manner, he yielded to her irresist- 
 ible graces and fascination. The ferocious activity he em- 
 ployed in his three several callings were well suited to his 
 character and temperament. He was a big, burly, good- 
 natured fellow, florid, jovial, lavish, and full of whims. In 
 ten years there had not been a single quarrel in his household. 
 He passed at the bureau as a scatterbrain, the character given 
 all artists, but they were superficial thinkers who mistake the 
 constant haste of a busy man for the bustle of a muddler. 
 
 Thanks to the relations of Mme. Colleville, the theatre and 
 the department bowed to the exigencies of the cumulatist, 
 who, in addition to his other duties, was training a young man 
 earnestly recommended by his wife, a great musician of the 
 future, who often took his place in the orchestra, being prom- 
 ised his succession.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 71 
 
 As a matter of fact, in 1827, this young man became the 
 first clarionet, on Colleville's retirement. 
 
 All the criticism that Flavie aroused was in the words : 
 " She is a little bit of a flirt, this Madame Colleville ! " 
 
 The eldest of the Colleville children, born in 1816, was the 
 living image of the jolly Colleville. In 1818 Mme. Colleville 
 thought the cavalry was everything, even ranking the arts; she 
 smiled upon a sub-lieutenant of the Saint-Chamans dragoons, 
 the young and wealthy Charles Gondreville, who afterward 
 died in the Spanish campaign ; her second son was already 
 destined for a military career. In 1820 she looked upon the 
 bank as the foster-mother of industry, the backbone of the 
 State, and the great Keller, the famous orator, was her idol ; 
 then she had another son, Franc. ois, who was to go into 
 mercantile pursuits and would never lack the protection of 
 Francois Keller. 
 
 Toward the end of 1820, Thuillier, the intimate friend of 
 M. and Mme. Colleville, and Flavie's admirer, felt the neces- 
 sity of confiding his sorrows io the bosom of that excellent 
 woman, to whom he recounted his conjugal miseries ; for six 
 years he had tried for. children, but God had not blessed his 
 efforts; for poor Mme. Thuillier had vainly said novenas ; 
 she had even gone to Notre-Dame de Liesse ! He depicted 
 Celeste in every phase, and the word', " Poor Thuillier " fell 
 from Mme. Colleville's lips, who, on her part, was much de- 
 pressed ; just now she had no predominant opinion. She 
 poured her vexation into Thuillier's heart. The great Keller, 
 the hero of the Left, was awfully mean ; she had seen the 
 wrong side of glory, the follies of the bank, the shallowness of 
 the Tribune. The orator never spoke, save in the Chamber, 
 and he had treated her very badly. 
 
 Thuillier was indignant. 
 
 "It's not only brutes that know how to love," said he; 
 "take me ! " 
 
 And Handsome Thuillier was said to be making up to Mme.
 
 72 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 Colleville, paying her "attentions," in the words of the Em- 
 pire. 
 
 "Ah ! you are mashed on my wife ! " said Colleville, laugh- 
 ing. "But lookout or she'll shake you like all the others." 
 
 A shrewd speech, allowing Colleville to preserve his mari 
 tal dignity in the bureau. In 1820-21 Thuillier, under his 
 authority as a friend of the family, was able to assist Colle- 
 ville, who had so frequently of old helped him ; during eigh- 
 teen months he had loaned the Collevilles ten thousand francs, 
 never intending to afterward speak of it. In the spring of 
 1821 Madame Colleville was confined with a handsome little 
 girl, to whom M. and Mme. Thuillier acted as godfather and 
 godmother ; she was named Celeste- Louise-Caroline-Brigitte. 
 Mile. Thuillier wished that one of her names should be given 
 to this little angel. The name of Caroline was a compliment 
 to Colleville. 
 
 Old Mamma Lemprun took upon herself the putting out to 
 nurse of the pretty creature, which was kept under her own 
 eyes at Auteuil, where Celeste and her sister-in-law went to 
 see her twice each week. As soon as Mme. Colleville was 
 about again, she said to Thuillier, very frankly and in a 
 serious tone : 
 
 "My dear friend, if we wish to remain good friends, you 
 cannot be more than my friend ; Colleville loves you : well, 
 then, one in the family is quite enough." 
 
 "Explain to me," said Handsome Thuillier to Tullia, the 
 dancer, trho had made a call on Mme. Colleville, " why 
 women are so little attached to me. I am not the Apollo 
 Belvidere, but on the other hand neither am I a Vulcan ; I 
 am passable, I am intelligent, I am faithful " 
 
 "Would you have the truth ? " asked Tullia. 
 
 "Yes," said Handsome Thuillier. 
 
 "Well, then, although sometimes we may love an idiot, we 
 can never love a fool." 
 
 These words killed Thuillier ; he couldn't get over it; he
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 73 
 
 had a spell of melancholy and accused women of being fantas- 
 tical. 
 
 " Didn't I give you the tip ? " said Colleville ; " I am not 
 Napoleon, dear boy ; I might be sorry if I were ; but I have 
 my Josephine a pearl ! " 
 
 The minister's secretary, des Lupeaulx, who was supposed 
 by Mme. Colleville to have more influence than he really had. 
 of whom she used afterward to say : " He was one of my 
 mistakes," was during a long time the great man of the Colle- 
 ville salon ; but as he had not the power necessary to have 
 Colleville named for the division of Bois-Levant, Flavie had 
 the good sense to resent his attentions to Mme. Rabourdin, 
 wife of the chief of the bureau, a minx, as she said, to whose 
 home she had never been invited, and whom on two different 
 occasions had had the impertinence to stay away from her 
 musicales. 
 
 Mme. Colleville acutely felt the shock of young Gondre- 
 ville's death ; she was quite inconsolable ; she saw in it, she 
 said, the hand of God. In 1824 she mended her ways, talked 
 economy, gave up her receptions, occupied herself with her 
 children, and became a good mother of her family; and her 
 friends had no knowledge of an attendant favorite ; but she 
 went to church, she reformed her dress, she wore sober colors, 
 she talked of Catholicism and the proprieties, and all this 
 mysticism resulted in the production of a bouncing boy, in 
 1825, whom she named Theodore, that is to say, " the gift of 
 'God;" 
 
 So, in 1826, the good times of the Congregation, Colleville 
 was appointed sub-chief in Clergeot's division, becoming, in 
 1828, a revenue collector in a Paris arrondissement. He also 
 obtained the cross of the Legion of Honor, which in the end 
 entitled him to the education of his daughter at Saint-Denis. 
 In 1832, by the advice of Mile. Thuillier, he settled near 
 them, where he obtained a clerkship in the mayor's office, 
 paying one thousand crowns.
 
 74 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 Charles Colleville had just entered the Naval School. The 
 colleges to which the other young Collevilles went were in 
 the same quarter. The seminary of Saint-Sulpice, where the 
 youngest was to be entered some day, was close by the Lux- 
 embourg. Finally, Thuillier and Colleville should properly 
 end their days together. 
 
 In 1833 the Colleville family, after leading a life first of 
 show and dissipation, then of tranquil retirement, was become 
 reduced to middle-class obscurity, on a total income of five 
 thousand four hundred francs. 
 
 Celeste was now twelve ; she promised to be pretty ; she 
 needed masters; that would cut down their income by two 
 thousand francs. Her mother felt the need of placing her 
 under the eyes of her godfather and godmother. So she had 
 adopted the proposition, so wisely thought out, of Mile. 
 Thuillier, who, without committing herself, gave Mme. Colle- 
 ville to understand pretty plainly that her brother's, her sister- 
 in-law's, and her own fortune were destined for Celeste. 
 
 The little frolic had seen more of Mile, and Mme. Thuillier 
 than of her mother until she went home, after Mme. Lem- 
 prun's death, in 1829. In 1833 she fell more than ever under 
 Flavie's management, who tried to do her whole duty by her, 
 and, without being severe, she was very strict with her ; over- 
 doing it, as women do who are tortured by remorse. Flavie, 
 without being a bad mother, was rigid enough with her 
 daughter ; she had her properly instructed, and, remembering 
 her own early training, vowed secretly that she would make 
 an honest woman of Celeste and not a light one. She took 
 her to mass, and she had her prepared for her first communion 
 under the direction of a Paris cure, who has since become a 
 bishop. Celeste was the more pious because Mme. Thuillier, 
 her godmother, was a perfect saint, and the child adored her 
 godmother; she felt that she was more genuinely loved by 
 this poor, lonely woman than by her mother. 
 
 Thuillier had not been able to withstand the action of the
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 75 
 
 rolling-mill of administrative routine, where the brains are 
 worn thin in proportion as they are flattened out. Used up 
 by fastidious work, beside counting his successes as a lady's 
 man, the ex-sub-chief had lost all his best faculties by the time 
 he had moved to the Rue Saint-Dominique, but his drawn 
 features, which wore a rather arrogant expression, with a 
 mixture of self-satisfaction, which may have been the fatuity 
 of the superior employe, deeply impressed Celeste. She alone 
 adored that sallow face. She knew that she was the joy of 
 the Thuillier household. 
 
 The Collevilles and their childrenj together with an ex- 
 clerk of La Billardiere's division, Monsieur Phellion, formed 
 the nucleus of Mile. Thuillier's society. Phellion was one of 
 the most respected men in the arrondissement ; he had be- 
 come, too, a major in the National Guard. He had one 
 daughter, formerly an under-teacher in the Lagrave school, 
 now married to a professor in the Rue Saint-Hyacinthe, M. 
 Barniol. 
 
 Phellion 's eldest son was a professor of mathematics in a 
 royal college and gave lessons, coached pupils, and devoted 
 himself, as his father expressed it, to pure mathematics. The 
 second son was at the College of Engineers. Phellion had a 
 pension of nine hundred francs, some little interest on his 
 savings during thirty years of thrift, and owned a little house 
 with a garden attached, in which he lived on the Impasse des 
 Feuillantines. (In thirty years he had not once used the old 
 term cul-de-sac*') 
 
 Dutocq, clerk to a justice of the peace, had formerly been 
 employed in the ministry of finance ; he had been sacrificed 
 on one of those necessities of a government which is represen- 
 tative ; he had permitted himself to be made the scapegoat in 
 a scandal occurring in the office of the committee on appro- 
 priations, for which he received a fairly round sum ; this had 
 enabled him to purchase his clerkship. This man, of little 
 # fUind alley or court.
 
 76 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 honor, the spy of the bureau, was not received in the manner 
 he thought his due by the Thuilliers ; but his landlord's cold- 
 ness only made him more persistent in his visits. 
 
 He remained a bachelor, and indulged his vices ; his life 
 was carefully hidden, and he was an adept at flattering his 
 superiors. The justice of the peace had a great esteem for 
 Dutocq. That infamous person made himself tolerated by 
 the Thuilliers by base and gross adulation which never fails 
 in its effects. He knew the bottom of Thuillier's life, his re- 
 lations with Colleville, and more so with madame; they 
 feared his formidable tongue, and the Thuilliers, without 
 admitting him to their friendship, permitted his visits on 
 sufferance. 
 
 The family that became the flower of the Thuilliers' salon 
 was that of a poor, petty clerk, who had been the object of 
 compassion in the bureau, and who, driven by penury, had 
 left the bureau in 1827 to throw himself into trade with an 
 idea. 
 
 Minard foresaw a fortune in one of those perverse concep- 
 tions which are a disgrace to French commerce, but which, 
 in 1827, had not yet been blown on by publicity. Minard 
 bought some tea and mixed it with dried tea-leaves ; then he 
 practiced changing the constituents of chocolate, altering it 
 so that he could sell it as a bargain. This trade in colonial 
 produce, begun in the Saint-Marcel quarter, set Minard up in 
 trade ; he had a factory, and, through his connections, was 
 now able to obtain the raw materials from their source ; thus 
 on an honorable and large scale he carried out the business he 
 had started in such a shady manner. He became a distiller, 
 enormous quantities of raw imports were handled by him, till 
 he came to pass, in 1835, as the richest trader in the Place 
 Maubert quarter. He bought one of the most beautiful houses 
 on the Rue des Magons-Sorbonne ;* he had been deputy and, 
 in 1839, was named for mayor of his arrondissement and 
 * Now the Rue Champollion.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 77 
 
 judge of the Chamber of Commerce. He kept a carriage, 
 had a country place near Lagny; his wife wore diamonds at 
 the Court balls, and he flaunted the rosette of officer of the 
 Legion of Honor in his button-hole. 
 
 Minard and his wife were always excessively beneficent. 
 Perhaps they wished to restore retail to the poor what they 
 exacted wholesale from the public. Phellion, Colleville, and 
 Thuillier encountered Minard during the elections, which re- 
 sulted in an acquaintance, soon to become intimate, between 
 the Minards, Collevilles, and Thuilliers, because Madame 
 Zelie Minard appeared enchanted to introduce her "young 
 miss " to Celeste Colleville. The Minards gave a fine ball 
 for Celeste's debut into society, she being then sixteen-and-a- 
 half; her dress befitted her name and seemed prophetic of 
 good for her life. 
 
 Minard's eldest son was a barrister ; he had the hope of 
 succeeding some of those advocates who, since 1830, by their 
 political opinions had become estranged from the Court ; he 
 was the genius of the family, and his mother, not less than his 
 father, aspired to see him well married. 
 
 Zelie Minard, formerly an artificial flower-maker, had an 
 ardent passion for moving in the higher social circles, which 
 she thought to penetrate into by the marriage of her son and 
 daughter, while Minard, wiser than she, and, being imbued 
 with the power of the middle-class resulting from the Revolu- 
 tion of July, had his every fibre infiltrated with a desire for 
 wealth. 
 
 He haunted the Thuilliers' salon to learn Celeste's prospects 
 as an heiress. He knew, like Dutocq and Phellion, the scandal 
 occasioned by Thuillier's intimacy with Flavie, and with half 
 an eye he was able to see the idolatry of the Thuilliers for 
 their goddaughter. Dutocq, eager for admission to the Min- 
 ards, fawned on them prodigiously. When Minard, the Roths- 
 child of the arrondissement, first appeared at the Thuilliers, 
 he compared him, almost wittily, to Napoleon, as he now saw
 
 78 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 him burly, fat, and flourishing, whereas, when he last knew 
 him at the bureau, he was lean, pale, and sickly. 
 
 "When you were in La Billardiere's division," said he, 
 " you were like Napoleon before the i8th Brumaire, and I 
 see you now the Napoleon of the Empire." 
 
 Nevertheless Minard treated him coldly and extended no 
 invitation for a visit to his house ; so he made a mortal enemy 
 of the venomous clerk. 
 
 The Phellions had designs on Celeste, it struck them that 
 she was the very thing for their son the professor. So they 
 lined up a phalanx of seven, all fairly faithful to each other ; 
 the 'Colleville family was equally numerous, so that on occa- 
 sional Sundays there would be as many as thirty persons in 
 the Thuillier salon. Thuillier renewed his acquaintance with 
 the Saillards, the Baudoyers, the Falleixs,* all people of impor- 
 tance in the Place-Royale quarter, and frequently invited to 
 dinner. 
 
 Mme. Colleville, among the women, was the most distin- 
 guished personage of this circle, like as also Minard's son 
 and Professor Phellion were its superior men ; for all the 
 others, without education and ideas, and risen from the lower 
 ranks, were types of the absurd in the lower middle-classes. 
 Although a fortune made in the past seems to possess merit, 
 Minard was but an inflated balloon. He floundered in long- 
 drawn phrases, took obsequiousness for politeness and the 
 form for the spirit, and uttered his commonplaces in such style 
 and mouthings that they were accepted as eloquence. These 
 phrases which say nothing and answer every purpose progress, 
 steam, asphalt, National Guard, order, democratic spirit, 
 power of cooperation, legality, motion and resistance, intimi- 
 dation seemed at each political crisis to have been invented 
 for Minard, who then paraphrased the ideas of his newspaper. 
 Julien Minard, the young barrister, suffered under his father 
 what his father suffered under his wife. In fact, with her for- 
 * See " Les Employes."
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 79 
 
 tune, Z6lie had assumed pretensions, though she could never 
 learn to speak decent French ; she had become fat, and in 
 her handsome attire looked like a cook who had married her 
 master. 
 
 Phellion, that model of a lower bourgeois, was equally 
 blessed with virtues and absurdities. A subordinate during 
 his bureaucratic life, he highly respected social superiority. 
 In the presence of Minard he was silent. He had admirably 
 resisted, by his own efforts, the critical times of superannuation, 
 and this is how : never had the worthy and excellent man 
 had a chance of indulging his tastes. He loved the city of 
 Paris; he took intense interest in the improvements and em- 
 bellishments ; he was the man who would be arrested, for two 
 hours running, by the demolition of a house. 
 
 He could stand surprised, bravely planted on his two feet, 
 nose in air, watching for the fall of a stone which the mason was 
 dislodging with a crowbar from the top of a wall, and did not 
 even quit his place when the stone fell ; when all was over off 
 he would go as happy as an Academician at the damning of a 
 melodrama. Veritable components of the great social comedy, 
 Phellion, Laudigeois, and the like, represent the functions of 
 the antique chorus. They weep when others weep, laugh 
 when expected to laugh, singing in chorus over public catas- 
 trophes and popular rejoicings, triumphant in their own corner 
 over the triumphs of Algiers, Constantine, Lisbon, and Saint- 
 Jean-d'Ulloa ; equally deploring the death of Napoleon and 
 the fatal disasters of Saint-Merri and the Rue Transnonnain ; 
 regretting the famous men who are the most unknown of 
 them. 
 
 Still Phellion showed two faces ; if any street fighting oc- 
 curred he stoutly declared himself in the sight of his neigh- 
 bors; he would be in his place on the parade ground of his 
 regiment, the Place Saint-Michel; he pitied the government, 
 but he did his duty; he would help suppress a riot, supported 
 the reigning dynasty, and when the political trials followed
 
 80 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 made excuses for the culprits. These " weather-cockish " 
 opinions were harmless and permeated his political views : 
 
 Answerable for all was the Colossus of the North. As 
 for England, she was like the old " Constitutionnel," a double- 
 dealing gossip; by turns Machiavellian Albion and a model 
 country Machiavellian when she jostled the interests of 
 France or bruised Napoleon ; a model country when the 
 faults of his government were in question. 
 
 This honorable old man was always dignified ; dignity was 
 the keynote of his life. He raised his children with dignity ; 
 in their eyes he was always the father ; he insisted on respect 
 being paid him at home, as he honored power and his supe- 
 riors. He never had a debt. A juryman, his conscience 
 made him sweat blood and water as he followed the pleadings 
 of a trial ; he never laughed, not even should the court laugh, 
 or the judge or public authorities.. Always at the service of 
 all, he gave his care, his time, all except his money. Felix 
 Phellion, his son, the professor, was his idol ; he thought 
 him capable of gaining the Academy of Science. Thuillier, 
 between the audacious stupidity of Minard and the candid 
 simplicity of Phellion, was like a neutral element, but there 
 was in him that of each in his melancholy experience. He 
 hid his addled brain by his banalities, like as he covered the 
 yellow skin of his skull under the thin wisps of his gray hair, 
 artfully combed back by the barber. 
 
 " In all other walks of life," said he, speaking of the 
 bureau, " I could surely have had better luck." 
 
 He had seen the good, that which is possible in theory and 
 improbable in practice ; the results contradicted the premises ; 
 he would relate the intrigues, the injustice of the Rabourdin 
 affair. 
 
 " After that, how much is one to believe ? " said he. " Ah ! 
 a queer thing is the administration, and I am very happy in 
 not having a son, so that I cannot see him hustling for a 
 post."
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 81 
 
 Colleville, always gay, rotund, good-fellow, joker, and 
 quibbler, inventing his anagrams, always hustling, represented 
 the bourgeois meddler and mocker, the ability without the 
 success, persistent hard work without result, but also the re- 
 signed jollity, narrow intelligence, art wasted (he was an 
 excellent musician), for he only played now to amuse his 
 daughter. 
 
 The women of the Thuillier salon were all for the Jesuits ; 
 the men defended the University; but the women generally 
 listened. A man of intelligence, if he could have endured 
 the tedium of these soirees, would have laughed as much as at 
 a comedy by Moliere, to hear, after a long discussion, such a 
 speech as this: 
 
 "The Revolution of 1789 could have been averted, eh? 
 Louis XIV. 's borrowing opened the way. Louis XV., an 
 egoist, a man with the spirit of ceremony " (he had said: 
 "If I were Chief of Police I would abolish cabriolets ") "a 
 dissolute king you know all about his dear park ! * con- 
 tributed largely to open the gulf of revolution. M. de 
 Necker, a malevolent Genevese, agitated it. Foreigners have 
 always had it in for France. The Maximum did much harm 
 to the Revolution. By right, Louis XVI. ought not to have 
 been condemned ; a jury would have acquitted him. Why 
 was Charles X. overthrown ? Napoleon was a great man and 
 the details which attest his genius are found in anecdotes 
 of him. He took five pinches of snuff a minute, keeping it 
 loose in his vest pocket lined with leather. He checked off 
 all the contractors' accounts, and went to the Rue Saint-Denis 
 to learn the cost of things. Talma was his friend ; Talma 
 taught him all his gestures, and yet he always refused to deco- 
 rate Talma. The Emperor mounted guard one time for a 
 sentry who had fallen asleep and thus saved him from being 
 shot. For these things the soldiers worshiped him. Louis 
 XVIII. , although a smart man, showed a lack of justice in 
 * Pare aux cerfs.
 
 82 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 regard to him when he spoke of him as Monsieur de Bona 
 parte. The fault of the present government is that it allows 
 itself to be led, instead of leading. It places itself too low. 
 It fears men of energy ; it should have torn up the treaties of 
 1815 and demanded the Rhine of Europe. The ministry 
 plays too much with the same men." 
 
 "There, you have displayed enough intelligence now," 
 said Mile. Thuillier, after one of these luminous reflections; 
 " the altar is dressed, come and play your little game." 
 
 The old maid ended all these discussions, such a bore to the 
 women, by this suggestion. 
 
 If all these anterior facts, all these generalizations had not 
 been given, as the gist of the argument, to provide a fitting 
 set for this Scene, giving a due idea of the spirit of this 
 society, perhaps the drama would be the sufferer. This 
 sketch is faithfully and historically truthful, and shows up a 
 social stratum of some importance in this chronicle of manners, 
 more especially when the political system of the younger 
 branch took it as its fulcrum. 
 
 The winter of the year 1839 was, in some sort, the time 
 when the Thuillier salon attained its greatest splendor. The 
 Minards were seen there nearly every Sunday ; they com- 
 menced by passing an hour there when they were obliged to 
 attend other soirees, and oftener than not Minard would leave 
 his wife there, taking with him his daughter and his eldest son, 
 the barrister. This assiduity of the Minards was caused by a 
 meeting between Messrs. Metivier, Barbel, and Minard, on 
 one evening when these two important tenants had remained 
 later than usual to chat with Mile. Thuillier. Minard was 
 apprised by Barbet that the old demoiselle took of him in the 
 neighborhood of thirty thousand francs in notes each six 
 months ; and that she took a like amount from Metivier, so 
 that she must have in her hands at least one hundred and 
 eighty thousand francs. 
 
 " I loan on books at twelve per cent., taking only the best
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 83 
 
 names. Nothing suits me better," said Barbet, in conclusion. 
 "I say that she must have one hundred and eighty thousand 
 francs, for she cannot give notes for more than ninety days at 
 the Bank." 
 . "She has, then, an account at the Bank? " said Minard. 
 
 "So I believe," answered Barbet. 
 
 Friendly with a governor of the Bank, Minard learned that 
 Mile. Thuillier had in fact an account there amounting to 
 about two hundred thousand francs, guaranteed by a deposit 
 of forty shares of stock. This security was, he said, unneces- 
 sary ; the Bank had the highest regard for a person so well 
 known as the responsible manager of Celeste Lemprun's 
 affairs, the daughter of an employe who had seen as many 
 years of service as the Bank had been in existence. Mile. 
 Thuillier had not once overdrawn her account in twenty 
 years. She always placed in sixty thousand francs in notes at 
 three months, which came to about one hundred and sixty 
 thousand. The deposited shares represented one hundred and 
 twenty thousand francs, so there was no risk, for the notes 
 were of the full value of sixty thousand francs. "Indeed," 
 said the comptroller, " if she sent us, in the third month, one 
 hundred thousand francs in notes we should not reject a single 
 one. She has a house of her own which is not mortgaged and 
 is worth more than one hundred thousand francs. Beside, all 
 the notes come through Barbet and Metivier, and are thus 
 endorsed with four signatures, including her own." 
 
 "Why does Mademoiselle Thuillier work so hard? " asked 
 Minard of Metivier. "Why, this is the very one for you," 
 he added. 
 
 "Oh! as to me," replied Metivier, "I can do better by 
 marrying one of my cousins ; my Uncle Metivier has promised 
 me his business; he has a hundred thousand francs in the 
 Funds and only two daughters." 
 
 However secret Mile. Thuillier might be, saying nothing of 
 her affairs to any person, not even her brother ; and although
 
 84 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 she amassed in one lump sum her own investments and those 
 of Mme. Thuillier's beside her own, it was almost an impos- 
 sibility that no ray of light should at length pierce through 
 the wooden bushel measure in which she secured her treasure. 
 
 " Celeste will have two hundred thousand francs from us in 
 cold cash," said the old maid, in confidence toBarbet; "and 
 Madame Thuillier on the signing of her contract will settle 
 her property upon her. As for myself, my will is made. My 
 brother is given a life interest in all, and Celeste will have 
 the reversion. Monsieur Cardot, my notary, is my execu- 
 tor." 
 
 Cardot, the notary, presented a suitor in the person of 
 Maitre Godeschal, attorney-at-law, successor to Derville, a 
 man of thirty-six, very capable, who had paid one hundred 
 thousand francs on his connection, which two hundred thou- 
 sand francs of a dot would clear off. Minard soon cleared 
 him off the deck by informing Mile. Thuillier that Celeste 
 would have for a sister-in-law the famous Mariette, an opera- 
 dancer. 
 
 "She was one of that sort," said Colleville, alluding to his 
 wife, "and she doesn't intend returning." 
 
 "Monsieur Godeschal is altogether too old for Celeste," 
 said Brigitte. 
 
 "And then," added Mme. Thuillier, timidly, "would it 
 not be better for her to marry some one of her choice and be 
 happy? " 
 
 The poor woman had perceived in Felix Phellion a true 
 love for Celeste, a love such as a woman, crushed by Brigitte 
 and chilled by Thuillier's indifference, who cared no more 
 for the society of his wife than for that of a servant-girl, might 
 well dream of, bold at heart, shy on the surface, at the same 
 time strong and timid, concentrated before all, and expand- 
 ing to the heavens. At twenty-three, Felix Phellion was a 
 gentle young man, who had been well brought up by his 
 father ; one who loved learning for its own sake. He was of
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 85 
 
 medium height, with light, chestnut hair, gray eyes, a much 
 freckled skin, of easy manners, very little given to gesticula- 
 tions, thoughtful, never talking nonsense, never contradicting 
 any one, incapable of a sordid thought or an egoistical calcula- 
 tion. 
 
 "That's the kind of husband I should have liked mine to 
 hare been ! " Mme. Thuillier often told herself. 
 
 About the beginning of 1840, in the month of February, 
 the personages whose silhouettes have here been made, were 
 assembled in the Thuilliers' salon. It was near the end of 
 the month. Barbet and Metivier waited, as they each wanted 
 to borrow thirty thousand francs from Mile. Brigitte. Celeste 
 and Prudence Minard were sitting together. Young Phellion 
 listening to Mme. Thuillier could gaze at Celeste. 
 
 On the other side of the fireplace, enthroned on an easy- 
 chair, was the Queen Elizabeth of the family, dressed as 
 plainly as when she was thirty years old, for prosperity was 
 unabte to cause a change in her habits. Her chinchilla hair 
 was surmounted by a gauze bonnet ornamented with Charles 
 X.-Geranium flowers; her Cornith-plum colored stuff gown 
 might have cost as much as fifteen francs ; her embroidered 
 collarette, worth about six francs, hardly hid the deep hollow 
 produced by the two muscles which attach the head to the 
 spine. Monvel, when he played Augustus in his latter days, 
 had no sterner profile than this autocratic knitter of stockings 
 for her brother. In front of the fireplace posed Thuillier, pre- 
 pared to receive any arrivals; by his side stood a young man 
 whose entree had produced a great effect, when the janitor, 
 who on Sunday donned his best clothes to act the footman, 
 had announced "Monsieur Olivier Vinet." 
 
 He was here as the result of a confidential hint given by 
 Cardot to this young magistrate's father, a famous public 
 prosecutor. Cardot had estimated the present value of the 
 money to be left to Celeste at seven hundred thousand francs 
 at least. Vinet's son had appeared delighted at being given
 
 86 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 the privilege of going on Sunday as a guest of the Thuilliers. 
 Large marriage-portions in these days lead to the grossest 
 follies without the least pudency. 
 
 Ten minutes after, another young man, who was chatting 
 with Thuillier before the arrival of Vinet, raised his voice in 
 the heat of a political discussion, making the young lawyer do 
 the same by the force of the debate. The question was the 
 vote by which the Chamber of Deputies overthrew the minis- 
 try of May 1 2th, in refusing the grant demanded for the Due 
 de Nemurs. 
 
 "Most decidedly," said the young man, "I am very far 
 from belonging to the dynastic party, and I am quite as far 
 from approving the elevation of the bourgeoisie into power. 
 The middle-class has no more right now than the aristocracy 
 had then to preeminence in the State. But the French 
 middle-Classes set up a new dynasty for themselves, a royalty 
 of their own, and how did they treat it ! When the people 
 allowed Napoleon to raise himself, he created on his side a 
 splendid monumental edifice ; he was proud of his grandeur, 
 he nobly gave his blood and his sweat for the purpose of con- 
 solidating the Empire. Between the magnificence of the 
 aristocratic enthronement and the Imperial purple, between 
 the great and the populace, the bourgeoisie are mean and 
 niggardly ; they drag down the powers that be to their own 
 ignoble level, instead of trying to raise themselves. The 
 economies of the candle-ends of the back-shops they practice 
 on their princes ; but what is a virtue in their storehouses is a 
 fault and a crime in high places. I wish for many things that 
 would be good for the people, but I would retrench by cutting 
 off ten millions from the new civil list. Now almost all-pow- 
 erful in France, the bourgeoisie ought to insure the happiness 
 of the people, of splendor without extravagance and grandeur 
 without privilege." 
 
 Olivier Vinet's father was not quite in harmony with the 
 present government he had not yet obtained the robes of
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 87 
 
 keeper of the seals, his great ambition ; so the young judge 
 hardly knew how to answer. 
 
 " You are quite right, monsieur," said Olivier Vinet. 
 "But before beginning the parade, the middle-class owes a 
 duty to France. The luxury of which you speak comes after 
 duty. That which you seem to think as worthy of reproach 
 was a necessity of the moment. The Chamber is far from 
 having a full pan in affairs ; the ministers work far less for 
 France than for the crown, and the Parliament wishes to see 
 a ministry, like that in England, which has a strength of its 
 own, not a reflected, borrowed power. The day that the 
 ministry acts for itself and represents the power of the execu- 
 tive in the Chamber, the same as the Chamber represents the 
 country, so soon will the Parliament be liberal to the crown. 
 That's the milk in the cocoanut ; I merely give it without 
 saying aught of my personal opinion, since the duties of my 
 office require, in politics, a species of fealty to the crown." 
 
 "Leaving the political question," replied the young man, 
 whose accent indicated a son of Provence, " it cannot be the 
 less true that the bourgeoisie have failed to understand their 
 mission ; we see public prosecutors, first presidents, peers of 
 France riding in 'busses, judges who have to live on their 
 salaries, prefects without private means, ministers in debt ; 
 while the middle-class, who have now possession of all these 
 places, ought to do honor to them as before the aristocracy 
 did honor; instead of holding them with the intention of 
 making a fortune, as has been demonstrated in numerous 
 scandalous trials, they should be occupied with a due ex- 
 penditure " 
 
 "Who is this young man?" said Olivier Vinet, hearing 
 him with wonder. "Is he a relative? Cardot should have 
 accompanied me the first time." 
 
 "Who is the little monsieur?" asked Minard of Barbet, 
 " I have seen him here several times." 
 
 "He is a tenant," replied Metivier, dealing the cards.
 
 88 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 " A barrister," said Barbet in a low voice ; " he has a small 
 suite on the third-floor front. Oh ! he's no great shakes, and 
 owns nothing." 
 
 "What's his name?" asked Olivier Vinet of M. Thuillier. 
 
 "The"odose de la Peyrade; he is a barrister," whispered 
 Thuillier. 
 
 All turned around to look at the young man, and Mme. 
 Minard could not refrain saying to Colleville : 
 
 " He's a good-looking young fellow." 
 
 "I have made an anagram of his name," said Celeste's 
 father ; "the letters of Charles-Marie-Theodose de la Peyrade 
 spell out this prophecy : Eh ! Monsieur payerer, de la dot, des 
 oies et le cher Be careful, my dear Madame Minard, to keep 
 from giving him your daughter." 
 
 "They find him nicer looking than my son," said Mme. 
 Phellion to Mme. Colleville; " what do you think? " 
 
 "Oh! as for looks," replied Mme. Colleville, "it would 
 be a toss-up for choice." 
 
 Vinet looked around at the roomful of middle-class people 
 and thought it might be amiss to exalt them ; he made out 
 that it was monstrous to try and save out of the emoluments 
 of an appointment, everything had so increased in cost, and 
 so on. 
 
 "My father," said he, in conclusion, "allows me a thou- 
 sand crowns a year, and, including my salary, I can hardly 
 make both ends meet." 
 
 When the young lawyer ventured on this treacherous ground, 
 the Provencal, who had led up to it, winked at Dutocq, just 
 as he was about taking his place at bouillotte. 
 
 " I have not yet had the pleasure of hearing you in court," 
 said Vinet to M. de la Peyrade. 
 
 " I am the lawyer of the poor ; I only plead before justices 
 of the peace," replied the Provencal. 
 
 When Mile. Thuillier heard the young barrister's remarks 
 as to the necessity of spending one's whole income, she took
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 89 
 
 on a most prim and ceremonious look, of which the Provencal 
 and Dutocq both well knew the significance. Vinet shortly 
 after took his leave, taking with him Minard and Julien. 
 
 " The higher bourgeoisie," said Dutocq to Thuillier, " will 
 conduct themselves just as the aristocracy were formerly wont 
 to do. The nobles wanted girls with money to improve their 
 lands; our parvenus of to-day want handsome portions to 
 feather their nests." 
 
 "That is what Monsieur Thuillier was saying this morn- 
 ing," replied the Provencal, with careless mendacity. 
 
 "His father," replied Dutocq, "married a demoiselle de 
 Chargebceuf, and he has assumed the ideas of the nobility ; he 
 must have a fortune at whatever cost ; his wife keeps it up in 
 royal fashion." 
 
 "Oh!" said Thuillier, stirred up by the envy of the 
 middle-class against each other, " turn such people out of 
 their places, and down they go to the mud they sprang 
 from ! " 
 
 Mile. Thuillier was so rapidly knitting that it might be said 
 to have been a machine that was driven by steam. 
 
 "Now you can come in the game, Monsieur Dutocq," said 
 Mme. Minard, as she rose. " My feet are cold," she added, 
 going to the fire, which made the gold on her turban scintil- 
 late like fireworks in the light of the candles in the hanging 
 "Aurore," which vainly strove to illuminate the spacious 
 salon. 
 
 "He is but a Saint-John,* this suckling-barrister!" said 
 Mme. Minard, glancing at Mile. Thuillier. 
 
 "A Saint-John, say you?" said Jhe Provencal, "that is 
 exceedingly witty, madame " 
 
 "But madame is witty at all times," said Handsome Thu- 
 illier. 
 
 Mme. Colleville was studying the Provencal at this time, so 
 it affords a good opportunity to describe this singular person 
 
 * Correggio's " St. John," at the breast.
 
 90 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 who played a great role among the Thuilliers, and who merits 
 the appellation of a great actor. 
 
 There exists in Provence, particularly at the port of Avignon, 
 a race of men with blonde or chestnut hair, of delicate skin 
 and almost weak eyes, whose pupils are rather soft, calm, or 
 languishing, than fiery, ardent, or deep, as those of South- 
 erners mostly are. It may be observed, by the way, that, 
 among Corsicans, a people subject to sudden fits of fury and 
 dangerous angers, one often encounters blondes of apparently 
 passive natures. These fair complexioned men, apt to be 
 stout, dull eyes, green or blue, are the worst species in Prov- 
 ence, and Charles-Marie-Theodose de la Peyrade afforded a 
 splendid type of this race, whose constitution would amply 
 repay examination on the part of medical science and philo- 
 sophical physiology. There is in their make-up a species of 
 bile, of bitter humor, which mounts to their head, rendering 
 them capable of ferocious deeds, done apparently in cold 
 blood. 
 
 Born in the neighborhood of Avignon, the young Pro- 
 vencal was of medium height, well proportioned, rather stout, 
 clear but dull complexion, not livid, not pale, not florid, 
 but gelatinous, for that face can only be thus described. His 
 eyes, coldly blue, generally wore a deceptive air of melan- 
 choly, which no doubt had for women a great charm. His 
 high forehead did not lack nobleness, his light chestnut hair, 
 thin, with a natural curl at the ends, agreeably finished it. His 
 nose was exactly that of a hunting dog broad, cleft at the 
 tip, inquisitive, intelligent, prying, always alert ; it lacked 
 good-nature, but showed irony and sarcasm ; but this double- 
 faced nature was only to be detected when he was off his 
 guard a thing which rarely happened ; it was only when he 
 was in a fury that he vented the sarcastic wit and satire which 
 poisoned his infernal jesting. 
 
 His mouth was prettily shaped, his lips were red and like a 
 pomegranate, seeming to be the marvelous instrument of a
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES, 91 
 
 voice of which the medium tones were sweet, Thiodose usually 
 spoke in that register, and the higher notes of which vibrated 
 like the sounds of a gong. The falsetto being the voice of his 
 nerves and his rage. His face, denuded of expression by his 
 command, was oval. His manner, which accorded with the 
 calm, priest-like demeanor of his face, was full of reserve and 
 propriety. 
 
 Charm, when it has its source in the heart, leaves a deep 
 impression ; when it is produced artificially, like spurious 
 eloquence, it may enjoy a passing triumph ; it will strive for 
 effect at whatever cost. 
 
 Among all maniacs the heart resembles those boxes with 
 compartments in which sugar-plums are arranged in assorted 
 colors ; suum cuique tribuere is their device, they measure each 
 duty by the dose. Now this youth of seven and twenty was a 
 philanthropist, but only among the very poor, the paupers of 
 the Saint-Jacques and Saint-Marceau quarters ; the decent poor 
 of the middle-class, capable men of genius on their uppers, he 
 would not grant admittance into charity's fold. There are 
 philanthropists who have only pity for the sins of condemned 
 criminals. Certainly vanity is at the root of all philanthropy, 
 but in our Provencal it was calculation, a part to be played, a 
 hypocrisy liberal and democratic, played with such perfection 
 that no actor could have achieved. He, acknowledged him- 
 self as having been at one time a fervent discipk of Saint- 
 Simon, but this was an error only to be ascribed to the faults 
 of extreme youth. An ardent Catholic, like all the people of 
 his district, he attended early mass and concealed his piety. 
 He was like all philanthropists in that he was sordidly parsi- 
 monious, he gave nothing to the poor but his time, his coun- 
 sel, his eloquence, and such money as he could pluck from 
 the wealthy. 
 
 To finish this portrait of the Advocate of the Poor, it may 
 not be amiss to relate his debut into the Thuillier family. 
 
 Theodose had come toward the end of the year 1837 ; he
 
 92 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 had been admitted as an attorney five years previously, and 
 he then went through his term in Paris to become a barrister ; 
 but some unknown circumstances, as to which he retained 
 'silence, had prevented him from being duly registered as a 
 barrister in Paris, and so he still remained an attorney. 
 
 He furnished his third floor as befitted his profession, and 
 became an advocate in the Assize Court. The whole of the 
 year 1838 was given up to this change in his situation ; he led 
 a perfectly regular life; he studied in the morning till time 
 for dinner, sometimes going to the courts to listen to import- 
 ant cases. Having, with difficulty, said Dutocq, made friends 
 with Dutocq, he helped some unfortunates in the faubourg 
 Saint-Jacques, whom he had recommended, by arguing their 
 cases before the tribunal ; out of charity he obtained them the 
 interest of pleaders, who, by the statutes, take each their turn 
 in defending the causes of the impecunious; and by taking 
 none but absolutely sure cases he gained each one. He thus 
 made a connection with some lawyers, these praiseworthy 
 efforts made him known, and he soon became a registered 
 member of the Paris bar. He became the advocate of the 
 poor before the justices of the peace, and was always the pro- 
 tector of the common people. These services of Thdodose's 
 caused his clients to express their gratitude and admiration in 
 the lodges of the janitors, and, in spite of the young advo- 
 cate's injunctions, a good many of these traits were retailed 
 before their masters. Delighted to have so excellent and 
 charitable a man as a tenant, the Thuilliers were wishing to 
 attract him as a frequenter of their salon ; they questioned 
 Dutocq about him. The clerk spoke like an envious man ; 
 while doing the young man justice, he said that his avarice 
 was something remarkable, though that might be caused 
 by his poverty. 
 
 " I have inquired about him. He belongs to the family of 
 la Peyrades, an old family of the county of Avignon ; he came 
 here at the end of 1829 to look up an uncle who possessed, or
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 93 
 
 was so supposed, a considerable fortune ; he finally discovered 
 this relative's residence three days after the death of the old 
 man, and the sale of the effects of the deceased only just suf- 
 ficed to pay his debts. A friend of this useless uncle pressed 
 one hundred louis upon him, and told him to seek his fortune 
 by engaging in the study of the law, and to try for the higher 
 walks of his profession ; this hundred louis defrayed all his 
 expenses for more than three years in Paris, where he fared 
 like an anchorite ; but, as he was unable to find his unknown 
 benefactor, the poor student suffered from the greatest distress 
 in 1833. 
 
 " He then, like all licentiates, turned to politics and litera- 
 ture, barely able to support himself; for his father, the 
 youngest brother of the uncle, who had died in the Rue des 
 Moineaux, has eleven children living with him on a little 
 domain called Canquoelles. At length he got on the staff of 
 a ministerial paper edited by the famous Cerrizet. The gov- 
 ernment, after this man left his own party to support them, 
 did not prevent his being ruined by the Republicans. This 
 will account for his being at the present time a mere copying 
 clerk under me. 
 
 " Well, when Cerizet was flourishing and who is a right 
 good sort of a fellow, but a little too fond of the women, good 
 cheer and dissipation he befriended Theodose and was very 
 useful to him. In 1834 and 1835, ^ e was a g am pretty hard 
 up, notwithstanding his talent, for his work on a ministerial 
 newspaper told against him. ' Only for my religious princi- 
 ples,' he said to me at that time, ' I should throw myself into 
 the Seine.' But at last it seems that his uncle's friend heard 
 of his straitened circumstances and again came to his relief; 
 money enough was sent to enable him to receive his diploma, 
 but he never learned the name of his mysterious protector. 
 But he will get on ! He will secure a brilliant position ; he 
 has tenacity, probity, and courage ! He studies he perse- 
 veres. ' '
 
 94 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 Gradually Maitre le Peyrade attended the Thuilliers more 
 frequently than at first ; he was invited to all their dinners, 
 and if at any time he called to see Thuillier about four o'clock 
 he would join their meal, taking " pot-luck." Mile. Thuillier 
 saying : 
 
 "We are sure then that hejias dined well, the poor young 
 man ! " 
 
 A social phenomenon, which must certainly have been ob- 
 served, but which has not hitherto been formulated, or pub- 
 lished, if you will, although it deserves being established, is 
 that of a return to the habits, jests, and manners of their 
 primitive condition of certain people, who from youth to old 
 age have raised themselves above it. So Thuillier had, 
 morally speaking, relapsed into the porter's son ; he would 
 use some of his father's little jokes, and at length permitted 
 to appear on the surface of his life, in his declining years, a 
 little of the mud of his early days. 
 
 About five or six times a month, when the soup was good 
 and thick, he would say, like it was something quite new: 
 
 " This shin soup is better to get than a kick on the shins ! " 
 
 Hearing this joke for the first time, Theodose, who did not 
 know it, lost his gravity and laughed with such heartiness 
 that Thuillier, Handsome Thuillier, felt his vanity immensely 
 tickled, such as it had never been before. This explains why 
 on the same morning of the soiree : 
 
 " You are more witty than you think ! " 
 
 Had received this answer : 
 
 " In any other career, my dear Theodose, I should have 
 traveled far on the good road, but the Emperor's fall broke 
 my neck." 
 
 " There is yet time for you," said the young advocate. 
 " Whence comes it that that mountebank Colleville has the 
 cross? " 
 
 There, Maitre de la Peyrade touched the raw place that 
 Thuillier had hidden from all eyes, even those of his sister,
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 95 
 
 who knew nothing of it ; but this young man, interested in 
 studying all the bourgeois' traits, had guessed the secret envy 
 eating up the heart of the ex-sub-chief. 
 
 " If you will so honor me, you with all your experience, 
 by being guided by my counsel," the philanthropist went 
 on, "and more than all will never speak of our compact with 
 any person, not even your excellent sister, at least without my 
 consent, I will undertake to have you decorated with the 
 acclamations of the whole quarter." 
 
 " Oh ! if we could but accomplish this," Thuillier had ex. 
 claimed, " you don't know what I would do for you ! " 
 
 This will explain why Thuillier had so visibly puffed him- 
 self out, when Theodose had been so audacious as to proffer 
 him his opinions. 
 
 In the arts, and perhaps Moliere ranked hypocrisy in the 
 arts by always classing Tartuffe with the comedians, there exists 
 a pitch of perfection above talent to which only genius can 
 attain. There is so little difference between the work of 
 genius and the work of talent that the man of genius only 
 can appraise the distance which separates Raphael from Cor- 
 reggio, Titian from Rubens. Plenty of peasant-women carry 
 their children the same way as the celebrated Madonna of 
 Dresden carries hers. Eh, well, the acme of art, in a man of 
 such strength as The'odose, is to have said of him later : " All 
 the world would have been taken in ! " 
 
 In Colleville Theodose saw the clear, critical insight of an 
 unsuccessful artist. He knew that Colleville did not like 
 him ; Colleville had begun to believe in his anagrams ; none 
 of them had failed as prophecies. As an employ^ he had been 
 mocked at for having rendered Minard's anagram -J' amassai 
 une si grandc fortune* or I amassed such a large fortune. 
 Minard was then very poor, but after ten years events had 
 justified it. Now Theodose's anagram was unlucky. His 
 wife's, too, made him tremble; he had never told it to any 
 * Vidt " Les Employes."
 
 96 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 one, for Flavie Minard Colleville gave : La vieille C * * *, 
 nom fletri, vole (Old Madame C., a blighted name, steals). 
 
 After the game was ended, Colleville drew Thuillier aside 
 and said : 
 
 "You allowed him to step a bit too far, this young advo- 
 cate. He was quite too forward in this evening's conversa- 
 tion." 
 
 " Thanks, my friend, a man warned is twice armed ! " 
 answered Thuillier, mocking in his sleeve at Colleville. 
 
 "Madame," said he in the ear of the pious Mme. Colle- 
 ville, for he could judge that Colleville was speaking of him 
 to Thuillier, " believe me, that if any one here can appreciate 
 you it is myself. One can only say on seeing you, here is a 
 pearl fallen in the mire, for a woman is only as old as she 
 seems ; many a woman of thirty, not at all to be compared 
 with you, would only be too happy to have your tall, sublime 
 figure and lovely face on which love has set its stamp 
 without ever having filled the void in your heart. You have 
 given yourself to God, I know. I am too religious to wish 
 to be more than your friend ; but you have given yourself to 
 Him for the reason that you have never found a man worthy 
 of you. Certainly you have been loved, but you have never 
 been worshiped. But here comes your husband, who has never 
 been able to provide a position for you in harmony with your 
 deserts ; he hates me because he imagines that I should dare 
 to love you, and thinks to hinder my speaking to you as he 
 suspects that I may be about telling you that I think I have 
 found a sphere for you in which is your high destiny. No, 
 madame," said he, in a louder voice, " it is not the Abbe 
 Gondrin who this year is the Lenten preacher in our humble 
 church of Saint-Jacques du Haut-Pas; it is Monsieur d'Esti- 
 val, one of my compatriots, who devotes himself to preaching 
 in the benefit of the poorer classes, and you will hear one of 
 the most unctuous preachers that I know, a priest of little 
 attractiveness outwardly, but what a soul ! "
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 97 
 
 "Then my desires will be accomplished," said poor Mme. 
 Thuillier; "I never could at all understand our famous 
 preachers. ' ' 
 
 A faint smile was noticed on the lips of Mile. Thuillier and 
 on those of several others. 
 
 ''They occupy too much of their discourse in theological 
 demonstrations; this has been my opinion for some time," 
 said Theodose. " But I never talk religion, and only that 
 Madame de Colleville " 
 
 " There are, then, demonstrations in theology?" queried, 
 innocently, the professor of mathematics. 
 
 "I cannot think, monsieur," replied Theodose, looking at 
 Felix Phellion, " that you ask that question seriously." 
 
 " Felix," said old Phellion, coming ponderously to the help 
 of his son, as he noted an expression of pain on Mme. Thuil- 
 lier's face ; "Felix divides religion into two categories; he 
 regards it from the human standpoint and from the divine ; 
 tradition and reason." 
 
 "What heresy, monsieur ! " said Theodose. "Religion is 
 one; it places faith before all." 
 
 Old Phellion, nailed with this speech, looked at his wife : 
 
 "It is time, my good friend " 
 
 And he looked at the clock. 
 
 "Oh ! Monsieur Felix," said C6leste, in a whisper to the 
 candid mathematician, " cannot you, like Pascal and Bossuet, 
 be at the same time wise and pious ? " 
 
 The Phellions leaving, the Collevilles soon followed, and 
 none remained but Dutocq, Thdodose, and the Thuilliers. 
 
 The flatteries addressed by Theodose to Flavie were of the 
 commonest character, but it should be remarked in the in- 
 terest of this story that the advocate studied these vulgar 
 spirits ; he sailed on their waters, he spoke their language. 
 His painter was Pierre Grassou, not Joseph Bridau; his novel 
 was " Paul and Virginie." The greatest living poet for him 
 was Casimir Delavigne ; in his eyes the mission of art was its 
 7
 
 98 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 utility. Parmentier, the author of the potato, was to him worth 
 twenty Raphaels ; the man in the blue blouse appeared to him 
 as "A Sister of Charity." These expressions of Thuillier's 
 he would at times repeat. 
 
 After further eulogizing religion and saying that " Science 
 had pensioned off God," and a few " Bless me's ! " ThSodose 
 went away, after bidding good-night to the three Thuilliers, 
 accompanied by Dutocq. 
 
 " That young man is full of strength ? " said the sententious 
 Thuillier. 
 
 "Yes, on my faith," replied Brigitte, putting out the 
 lamps. 
 
 "He is religious," said Mme. Thuillier, being the first 
 to go. 
 
 "Mosieur," said Phellion to Colleville, when they reached 
 the School of Mines, and after he had looked around to see 
 that no one could overhear him ; " I surrender to the superior 
 knowledge of others, yet I cannot but see that this young 
 advocate plays the master just a bit too much at the Thuil- 
 liers." 
 
 "It's my private opinion," said Colleville, who was walk- 
 ing with Phellion behind his wife, Celeste, and Mme. Phellion, 
 " that he is a Jesuit, and I've no use for such the best of 
 them are no good. To me, a Jesuit is craftiness ; he cheats 
 with intent ; it is a pleasure for him to deceive, and, as the 
 saying goes, to keep his hand in. That's my opinion, and 
 there are no flies on it." 
 
 "I understand you, mosieur," replied Phellion, who had 
 given his arm to Colleville. 
 
 "No, Monsieur Phellion," remarked Flavie, in a high, 
 head voice, "you don't understand Colleville; but I well 
 know his meaning, and it would be best for him to say no 
 more." 
 
 "You are quite right, my wife," said Colleville.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 99 
 
 As they bade each other good-night, at the corner of the 
 Rue Deux-Eglises, Felix said to Colleville : 
 
 "Monsieur, your son Francois could, by being pushed, 
 enter the Ecole Polytechnique ; I offer to assist him in pass- 
 ing the examination this year." 
 
 " That is too good to refuse ! thank you, my friend," said 
 Colleville; "we will attend to it." 
 
 " Good ! " said Phellion to his son. 
 
 " There is nothing slow about that ! " exclaimed his mother. 
 
 " Why, what is there in it ? " asked Felix. 
 
 " That is a clever method of paying court to the parents of 
 Celeste." 
 
 " May I never solve my problems if I ever gave it such a 
 thought," exclaimed the young professor. " I found, by talk- 
 ing to the young Colleville, that Francois had a vocation for 
 mathematics, so I thought it only my duty to so inform his 
 father " 
 
 " Good, my son ! " repeated Phellion. " I would not have 
 you otherwise. My wishes are granted ; in my son I find 
 probity, honor, and every public and private virtue I can 
 desire." 
 
 After Mme. Colleville had gone to bed, she said to her 
 husband : 
 
 " Colleville, don't be so ready to crudely pronounce judg- 
 ment on people unless you know them thoroughly. When 
 you speak of Jesuits I know you are thinking of priests, and to 
 oblige me I must beg you to be more careful in expressing 
 your opinions on religion in the presence of your daughter. 
 We are our own masters in respect to sacrificing our own souls, 
 but not those of our children. Do you wish to see your 
 daughter a creature without religion ? Beside, my ducky, we 
 are at the mercy of the world, we have four children for whom 
 to provide, can you say that at some time or other you may 
 not need the help of this one or that one? Do not make 
 enemies ; you have none ; you are a good fellow, and thanks
 
 100 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 to that quality, which is so charming in you, we have got 
 along in life pretty smoothly thus far " 
 
 "There, that will do ! "' said Colleville, who had thrown 
 his coat over a chair and was now removing his cravat ; " I 
 was wrong, you were right, my beautiful Flavie." 
 
 "At the first chance, my burly lamb," said the cunning 
 prattler, patting her husband's cheeks, "do the civil to that 
 little advocate ; he is pretty fly ; we need him on our side. 
 He is playing a part, eh ? Well, play the comedy with him ; 
 be his apparent dupe, and, if he is smart, if he has a future, 
 make him your friend. Think you that I want to see you for- 
 ever the mayor of an arrondissement ? " 
 
 "Come, here, wife Colleville," said the smiling ex-clarionet 
 of the Opera-Comique, tapping on his knees as a sign for his 
 wife to perch thereon, "let us toast our tootseys and chat. 
 When I look at you I am more than ever convinced of this 
 truth, that the youth of women is in their figure " 
 
 " And in their hearts " 
 
 "In both," answered Colleville; "a light figure and a 
 heavy heart " 
 
 "No, big silly deep." 
 
 " What is so nice about you is that you have preserved your 
 fresh complexion without growing fat ! But, there you have 
 small bones. I tell you what, Flavie, if I had to begin life 
 over again I should not wish for any other wife than thee." 
 
 "And you know very well that I always liked you better 
 than the others. How unfortunate that monseigneur is dead ! 
 Do you know what I should like?" 
 
 "No." 
 
 " A job under the city, a place at about twelve thousand 
 francs, something like a cashier's, either in this municipality 
 or at Poissy, or as agent." 
 
 " Either would suit me." 
 
 "Well, then, if that monster of an advocate could do 
 something; he can intrigue, you bet. I'll sound him just
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 101 
 
 leave him to me and more than all else, don't buck against 
 his game at the Thuilliers." 
 
 Theodose had touched the sore spot in Flavie Colleville's 
 heart, and this deserves an explanation which may, perhaps, 
 give a synthetic touch on the lives of women. 
 
 At forty years of age, a woman, particularly if she has 
 tasted the poisoned apple of passion, becomes aware of a 
 solemn dread ; she perceives that two deaths are hers ; the 
 death of the body and the death of the heart. Dividing 
 women into two great categories which answer to the com- 
 mon idea of them, the so-called virtuous and the culpables, it 
 is permissible to say, that all alike, after that terrible time of 
 life, resent the anguish of that acute pain. If virtuous and 
 defrauded in their nature's cravings, be it borne with courage 
 or resignation, whether they have buried their revolt in theii 
 hearts or at the foot of the altar, they cannot say, without 
 some feeling of horror, that: "all is over for me." This 
 thought has such strange and infernal depths that we very 
 often find in it the cause of those apostasies which now and 
 again surprise and astonish the world. 
 
 The culpables they are in one of those dizzy positions 
 which frequently, alas, end in death or terminate in passions 
 as tremendous as the situation. Either she has been happy in 
 an atmosphere of incense, moving only in the flowery air of 
 flatteries which is one long caress, so how can she renounce it? 
 Or, a phenomenon more fantastic than rare, she is spurred to 
 her play like a gambler making a double or quit throw, 
 for, to her, the last days of her beauty are the last things 
 that she risks on the cards of despair. 
 
 "You have been loved, but never worshiped ! " 
 
 These word of Theodose, accompanied by a look which 
 read, not in her heart, but in her life, was the missing word 
 of an nigma, and Flavie felt herself divined. 
 
 A young officer, two dudes, a banker, a clumsy little young 
 man, and the poor Colleville, this was a grievous outfit,
 
 102 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 Once in her life Madame Colleville had dreamed of happiness, 
 but she had never felt it ; then death had hatefully broken off 
 the only passion in which Flavie had found any real charm. 
 For two years she had listened to the voice of religion, which 
 had told her that neither the church nor society speaks of 
 happiness, of love, but of duty and resignation ; that, in the 
 eyes of these two great powers, happiness lies in the satisfac- 
 tion arising from painful or costly duties, and that the reward 
 is not of this world. But she heard a more clamorous voice, 
 so, as her religion was but a necessary mask, not a conversion, 
 and as she dared not remove it, for she looked upon it as a 
 resource for the future, she hung on to the church, the same 
 as a man at the cross-roads in a forest, seated on a bank, 
 reading the guide-posts of the road, but trusting to chance as 
 to what might happen when the night came. 
 
 She knew that Theodose had surreptitiously watched her ; 
 she had dressed at him, wearing at times her dress of gray 
 moire, her black lace, and her headdress of flowers twisted in 
 her mechlin, making the most of herself, and he had known 
 it every man does when a woman dresses for him. 
 
 Flavie had been expecting, Sunday after Sunday, that Tho- 
 dose would make a declaration. She said to herself: 
 
 " He knows I am ruined and he has not a sou ! Perhaps, 
 though, he is really pious ! " 
 
 Thdodose had no desire to hurry matters, and, like a com- 
 petent musician, he had marked the place in the symphony 
 where he meant to give the thump on the big drum. As he 
 went to bed he reflected : 
 
 "The wife is on my side; the husband cannot suffer me; 
 just now they are quarreling, and I shall come out on top, for 
 she can do as she wills with her husband." 
 
 The Provencal was mistaken, as there had not been the least 
 dispute, and Colleville slept beside his dear Flavie while she 
 said to herself: 
 
 "Theodose is a superior man."
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 103 
 
 The following Sunday he was almost certain to find Mad- 
 ame Colleville at church ; in fact, they came out at the same 
 time, meeting on the Rue des Deux-Eglises. Theodose of- 
 fered Flavie his arm, which she accepted, telling her daughter 
 to walk on in front with her brother Anatole. 
 
 " Have you done me the honor and favor of thinking over 
 what I so clumsily said the other day? " asked the wheedling 
 advocate of the pretty devotee as he pressed her arm to his 
 heart with a movement at once gentle and firm, for he pre- 
 tended to dissemble his feelings and appear respectful against 
 his impulse. " Do not mistake my intentions," he continued, 
 receiving a look from Madame Colleville one of those 
 glances with which women who have tasted and practiced 
 passion can express either severe reproof or a secret commun- 
 ity of sentiment. 
 
 Then he told her how Christian charity embraces the strong 
 equally with the weak, that its treasures are for all. That it 
 was sad to see so refined, elegant, and graceful a woman in 
 such dire surroundings, adding : 
 
 "Oh, if only I were wealthy. Ah, if I had but power, 
 your husband, who is certainly a good devil, should become 
 a receiver-general, and you could make him a deputy. 
 
 " But I am poor and ambitious, my first duty is to crush 
 my ambition. I find myself at the bottom of^he bag like the 
 last number in a lottery ; I can only offer my arm where I 
 fain would give my heart. All my hopes rest on a good mar- 
 riage, and, believe me, I should make my wife's lot a happy 
 one ; not only that, but I should raise her to be one of the 
 first in the State if only she finds me the means for my ad- 
 vancement. It is a lovely day, come for a stroll in the 
 Luxembourg? " 
 
 The listless arm held in his own indicated a tacit consent, 
 and, as she deserved the honor of a species of violence, he 
 dragged her more rapidly along, adding : 
 
 " Come along, we shall never have such an excellent oppor-
 
 104 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 tunity. Oh ! " he cried, "your husband sees us; he is at the 
 window; walk more slowly." 
 
 "There is nothing to fear from Monsieur Colleville," said 
 Flavie, smiling. "He leaves me the absolute mistress of my 
 actions." 
 
 "Oh! here is the woman of whom I have dreamed!" 
 exclaimed the Provengal, with that ecstasy and accent ema- 
 nating only from the souls and spoken by the lips of South- 
 erners. 
 
 "Pardon me, madame," said he, checking himself and re- 
 turning from that lofty sphere to the exiled angel whom he 
 piously regarded. "Excuse me! to return to what I was 
 
 saying Ah ! how can I be otherwise than sensible of 
 
 the sorrows I myself experience when I see the lot of a being 
 to whom life should only bring joy and happiness? Your 
 sufferings are mine; I am no more in my right place than 
 you are in yours. Ah ! dear Flavie, the first time it was 
 granted me to see you was on the last Sunday in the month 
 of September, 1838. You were lovely; I shall often recall 
 you in that little dress of mousseline de laine, colored like the 
 tartan of some Scottish clan. On that day I said to myself: 
 ' Why is this woman at the home of the Thuilliers, and 
 why, above all, should she ever have had relations with a 
 Thuillier?'" 
 
 " Monsieur ! said Flavie, startled at the rapid flow which 
 the Provencal gave to the conversation. 
 
 "Oh ! I know all," cried he, with an expressive shrug of 
 the shoulder, "and can explain everything to myself; I do 
 not esteem you the less. There ! these are not the faults of 
 an ugly or humpbacked woman. You have to gather the fruit 
 of your error, and I will help you. Celeste will be very rich 
 and there is where your future prospects must be found ; you 
 cannot have more than one son-in-law, so choose him with 
 care. An ambitious man may become a minister, but you 
 become humiliated j he would annoy you, and make your
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 105 
 
 daughter unhappy ; and, if he loses her fortune, he will cer- 
 tainly never re-make it. Eh, well, yes, I love you," said he; 
 "and I love you with an affection without bounds; you are 
 above a crowd of petty considerations that bind simpletons. 
 We understand each other " 
 
 Flavie was simply astounded ; nevertheless, she was sensible 
 of the excessive frankness of speech; she said to herself: 
 " There is no mystery in such talk as this." But she was fain 
 to acknowledge that never before had she been so deeply 
 moved and agitated as by this young man. 
 
 " Monsieur, I don't know by whom you have been misled 
 in regard to my past life, and by what right you " 
 
 "Ah! pardon me, madame," interrupted the Provencal, 
 with a frigidity bordering on scorn ; " I have been dreaming ! 
 I said to myself: ' She is all that ; ' but I was deceived. I now 
 know why you will always remain aloft on the fourth floor in 
 the Rue d'Enfer." 
 
 A gesture of the arm toward the window at which Colleville 
 stood emphasized this retort. 
 
 " I have been frank, I expected reciprocity. Many a day 
 I have gone without bread, madame ; I managed to live, 
 studied, obtained the grade of licentiate in Paris, my whole 
 capital being two thousand francs ; and I came through the 
 barriere d' Italic with five hundred francs in my pocket, vow- 
 ing, like one of my compatriots, that some day I would be- 
 come the leading man in my country. And the man who has 
 often rifled his breakfast out the restaurateurs' baskets into 
 which his leavings were thrown, and which are emptied out- 
 doors at six o'clock in the morning, when the second-hand 
 eating-houses can find nothing more fit to take that man will 
 not shrink from any available chance. Eh, now ! do you 
 believe me the friend of the people?" said he, smiling; 
 " fame needs a loud voice ; she cannot be heard speaking with 
 half-closed lips ; and without renown, what is the use of talent? 
 Say, now, have I not opened all before you ? Open your heart
 
 106 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 to me. Say to me : ' We are friends,' and we shall all some 
 day be happy." 
 
 "My God! why did I come herewith you? Why did I 
 take your arm ? " cried Flavie. 
 
 "Because it is your destiny ! " replied he. "Eh, my dear 
 and best-loved Flavie," added he, pressing her arm to his 
 heart ; " you did not expect commonplaces from me, did you? 
 We are brother and sister that is all." 
 
 And they turned toward the Rue d'Enfer. 
 
 Flavie experienced a great fear beneath the satisfaction that 
 a woman finds in violent emotions, she wrongly imagined this 
 dread for a new passion beginning ; but she was under a spell 
 and walked along in deep silence. 
 
 "Of what are you thinking?" he asked, when half-way 
 along the path. 
 
 " Of all that you brought me here to say," she replied. 
 
 "But," he answered, "at our age, we skip the prelim- 
 inaries; we are not children, and we both live in a sphere in 
 which we should understand each other. In short, believe 
 me," he added, as they turned into the Rue d'Enfer, " I am 
 wholly yours," and he made a profound salutation. 
 
 "The irons are in the fire ! " said he to himself, as his eye 
 followed his giddy prey. 
 
 On returning to his home, Theodose found on his landing 
 a person who in this story figures somewhat as a sub-marine, 
 or otherwise like unto a buried church upon which has been 
 erected the front of a palace. 
 
 The sight of this man, who had vainly pulled his door-bell, 
 startled the Provencal, but he did not betray his hidden 
 emotion. This man was Cerizet, Dutocq's copying-clerk. 
 
 Ce>izet, only eight and thirty, looked like a man of fifty, 
 who has become old by all that ages a man. His bald head 
 offered to view a yellow skull barely covered by a rusty, dis- 
 colored wig; his face, pale, flaccid, irregularly chiseled and 
 harsh, seeming all the more ugly by a much-disfigured nose,
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 107 
 
 but not so badly so as to necessitate his wearing a false one ; 
 from the bridge at the forehead to the nostrils it existed as 
 nature had made it, but disease had destroyed its wings 
 toward the end, leaving two holes of fantastic appearance, 
 thickening his pronunciation and impeding his speech. His 
 eyes, formerly fine, but now weakened by every manner of 
 vice and wear, by nights formerly given to work ; they had 
 become trimmed with red and gave a damaged appearance ; 
 his look, when stirred by an expression of malice, had fright- 
 ened both judges and criminals, even those who are afraid of 
 nothing. 
 
 His denuded mouth, apparently only containing a few 
 blackened stumps of teeth, was sinister; it was frothy with a 
 white saliva which did not, however, moisten his thin, pallid 
 lips. 
 
 Cerizet, a little man, less lean than shrunken, endeavored 
 to correct the misfortunes to his person by his apparel, and, 
 if his dress was not magnificent, it was at least scrupulously 
 clean, which, perhaps, only intensified its wretchedness. 
 Everything about him seemed doubtful his age, his nose, 
 his looks. It was impossible to say whether he was eight and 
 thirty or sixty; whether his faded blue trousers, neatly strapped, 
 would presently be in fashion or dated from the year 1835. 
 His limp boots, carefully blacked, resoled for the third time, 
 had most likely trodden the carpets of ministers' offices. His 
 overcoat, trimmed with heavy braid, drenched by the rains, 
 with oval buttons that indiscreetly displayed their moulds, 
 showed by its cut that it had once been elegant. His collar 
 and satin tie happily hid his lack of linen, but at the back the 
 teeth of the buckle had frayed it, and the satin shone with 
 the friction and grease of his wig. In the days of its youth 
 his vest had not been wanting in smartness, but it was one of 
 those vests which are to be purchased for four francs out of 
 the depths of a ready-made tailor-shop. Each article had 
 been carefully brushed, including the bruised and shining
 
 108 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 stovepipe hat. Everything harmonized and matched the 
 black gloves which hid the hands of this Mephistopheles. 
 
 He was an artist in evil. Becoming the owner of a printing 
 business by acting treacherously to his master, he afterward 
 figured as the publisher of a liberal newspaper; there he be- 
 came the pet victim of the Royalist ministers after the Resto- 
 ration, being known as the " unfortunate " Cerizet. In 1830 
 his patriotic renown gained him a sub-prefecture, whence he 
 was ousted after six months ; he raised such a hullabaloo about 
 it, saying he had been condemned unheard, that Casimir 
 Perier's ministry made him the editor of an anti-Republican 
 paper in the pay of the government. Afterward he went into 
 business and was mixed up in one of the most disastrous 
 joint-stock companies that ever called for criminal prosecution ; 
 quite serenely he accepted his severe sentence, blaming the 
 Republicans for it. His term of imprisonment was passed in 
 a lunatic asylum. The government cast him off; they were 
 ashamed of a man with such a disgraceful swindling record, 
 done in combination with a retired banker named Claparon, 
 and which brought him down to a well-deserved reprobation. 
 In the depths of his misery this man dreamed of revenge, 
 and, as he had nothing to lose, he was ready for anything 
 that might encompass it. Dutocq and himself were as one in 
 their habitual depravity. Cerizet was to Dutocq what the 
 greyhound is to the courser. 
 
 Cdrizet, who knew all that misfortune can bring, lent 
 money in trifling loans on short time at ruinous interest ; he 
 had commenced as Dutocq's partner, and this old gutter-snipe 
 had become the street-hawker's banker; this push-cart huck- 
 ster's bill-discounter was the gnawing worm of two faubourgs. 
 
 When the advocate of the poor arrived, he let into his 
 apartments Cerizet and Dutocq. All three crossed a small 
 room paved in red encaustic tiles, which by their waxed sur- 
 face reflected the daylight entering through two cotton cur- 
 tains. From it they went into a little sitting-room furnished
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 109 
 
 with red curtains, a mahogany suite, covered with red Utrecht 
 velvet ; on a wall was a bookcase filled with law books. The 
 mantel was ornamented with vulgar gewgaws, a clock with 
 four mahogany columns, and candlesticks under glass-shades. 
 The study, where, in front of a coal-fire, the three friends 
 seated themselves, was that of a sucking-calf of the law ; it was 
 furnished with an office desk, an armchair, little, green silk 
 curtains at the windows, a green carpet, a set of pigeon-holes, 
 and a couch, over which hung an ivory crucifix mounted in 
 velvet. The bedroom, kitchen, and the rest of the rooms 
 overlooked the courtyard. 
 
 "Well," said Cerizet, "how goes it? Is everything on 
 the go?" 
 
 " Yes," replied Theodose. 
 
 "Confess that I had a bright idea, eh?" cried Dutocq, 
 " when I thought up a scheme to get round that imbecile of 
 aThuillier " 
 
 "Yes, but I'm not behindhand," exclaimed Cdrizet. "I 
 have come this morning to give you the cord for tying the 
 thumbs of the old maid so as to make her spin like a teetotum. 
 Don't make any mistake ! Mademoiselle Thuillier is everything 
 in this matter ; only get over her and you have captured the 
 town. Talk little, but talk well, like people who know their 
 business. My old associate, Claparon, you know, is an idiot ; 
 he will always remain what he has always been a mere 
 stalking-horse. Just now his name is being used by a notary 
 of Paris in association with some builders, who, builders and 
 notary, are all going to the dogs ! Claparon is the scapegoat, 
 he has not yet been a bankrupt, but every one must have a 
 beginning, and, at this very moment, he is hiding in my den 
 at the Rue des Poules, where he will never be discovered. 
 My Claparon is furious, he hasn't got a sou ; and among the 
 five or six houses which have to be sold, one is a perfect gem of 
 a house, built of squared stone and right near the Madeleine- 
 it has a front patterned like a melon and ravishing sculpture
 
 110 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 but, not being finished, it might be given for at most one hun- 
 dred thousand francs; by spending twenty-five thousand francs 
 on it, the buyer in two years could make ten thousand francs 
 per annum. In helping Mademoiselle Thuillier to secure this, 
 you can gain her esteem, for you can give her to understand 
 that such can be picked up through you every year. Vanity 
 can be worked by flattering its self-conceit ; money-grubbers 
 either by an attack on or replenishing their purses. And as, 
 after all, working for Thuillier is working for ourselves, it is 
 only fair to let her profit, by this lucky stroke." 
 
 "And the notary," said Dutocq, "why does he let it 
 slip?" 
 
 " The notary, my poor boy? It is he who saves us. Being 
 compelled to see his connection in fact ruined, he is reserving 
 this part of the crumbs of his cake. Believing in the honesty 
 of that imbecile Claparon, he has instructed him to find a 
 nominal purchaser ; for he looks equally for prudence and 
 confidence. We just allow him to think that Mademoiselle 
 Thuillier is an honest maiden lady, who gives the use of her 
 name to poor Claparon, and then both Claparon and the 
 notary will be caught. I owe this little turn to my good 
 friend Claparon for letting me in to bear the brunt of the 
 matter in his stock concern, which was smashed by Couture, 
 in whose skin you would hate to find yourselves! " said he, 
 with a flash of infernal hatred in his dull, fishy eyes. " I have 
 said, monseigneurs ! " added he in a rough voice, which 
 passed loud through his nose-holes, and assuming a dramatic 
 pose, for once, at a time of extreme poverty, he had been an 
 actor. 
 
 As he finished the door-bell rang, and la Peyrade went to 
 open the door. 
 
 " Are you altogether sure of him ? " said Cerizet to Dutocq. 
 "I detect a manner about him in short, I have known 
 traitors." 
 
 "He is completely in our hands," said Dutocq; "so I
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. Ill 
 
 haven't given myself the trouble of watching him ; but, be- 
 tween ourselves, I did not think him so smart as he is. We 
 had an idea that we had placed a sorrel horse between the 
 legs of a man who didn't know how to ride, and the lubber 
 is an old jockey ! And there you are ! " 
 
 " He had better lookout ! " said Cerizet, in an undertone. 
 " I can puff him over like a castle of cards. As to you, 
 Daddy Dutocq, you can watch him at work and see him at 
 every moment ; just keep him under surveillance. I'll feel 
 his pulse, too; I'll get Claparon to employ him to get rid of 
 us ; then we can judge where we stand." 
 
 " That's a good scheme," said Dutocq ; " your eyes are as 
 good as most folks." 
 
 " We are all in the same boat ; that's "all there is to it ! " 
 replied Cerizet. 
 
 When the advocate reappeared Cerizet was examining all in 
 the study. 
 
 " It is Thuillier," said Theodose. " I expected him call- 
 ing. He is in the salon. It won't do for him to see Cdri- 
 zet's overcoat," added he, smiling; " the frogs on it would 
 startle him." 
 
 " Bah ! you rescue the unfortunate, that is your part in the 
 play. Do you need some money?" asked Cerizet, and 
 brought out one hundred francs from his trousers' pocket. 
 " There, see, that looks well ; " and he placed the pile on the 
 mantel-shelf. 
 
 " We shall be able to get out through the bedroom," said 
 Dutocq. 
 
 "Well, then, adieu," said the Provencal, as he opened the 
 door for them leading from the office to the bedroom. 
 " Come in, my dear Monsieur Thuillier," he called out to the 
 dude of the Empire. 
 
 When he saw that he had reached the door of his office, 
 and could no longer see on to the landing, he went to let out 
 his two associates by the other way.
 
 112 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 " In six months you should by rights be the husband of 
 Celeste, and doing well. You're a lucky dog; you haven't 
 found yourself in the police dock twice, as I have the first 
 time in 1825 under a constructive process, or treason, follow- 
 ing a series of articles that I never wrote ; and the second time 
 for appropriating the profits of a concern that didn't pan 
 out ! Now set the pot a-boiling ; by a paper-sack ! Dutocq 
 and myself need that twenty-five thousand francs, each of us, 
 as soon as may be; be of good courage, my friend," added 
 he, proffering his hand to Theodose, and proving him by his 
 
 grip- 
 
 The Provencal gave his right hand and wrung his with 
 much unction. 
 
 " My dear boy, you may be well assured that in every posi- 
 tion I attain I shall not forget that from which you rescued 
 me by placing me on horseback here. I am your bait, but 
 you give me the greater portion, and I should be worse than 
 a convict who has become a police-spy if I did not play a 
 square game." 
 
 Cerizet, as soon as the door was closed upon him, peered 
 through the key-hole to try and catch the expression on the 
 other's face, but the lawyer had turned his back and went to 
 join Thuillier, so his suspicious ally could not detect aught. 
 
 Theodose, though, saw a multiplying chance of success ; he 
 flattered himself that he could get rid of his sordid friends, 
 although all he had he owed to them. 
 
 "Well, my dear Theodose," said Thuillier, "we have 
 been hoping to see you each day since Sunday, but each even- 
 ing has seen our hopes delayed. As this Sunday is our 
 dinner-day, my sister and wife charged me to bid you 
 come " 
 
 " I have had so much business," said Theodose, " that I 
 have not had two minutes to give to a soul, not even you, 
 whom I count in the number of my friends, and with whom I 
 have particularly wished to speak."
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 113 
 
 "How! You seriously think of that you told me?" ex- 
 claimed Thuillier, interrupting Theodose. 
 
 " If you hadn't called to clinch the business, I should not 
 esteem you as I do," said Theodose, smiling. "You have 
 been a sub-chief; therefore you must have more or less ambi- 
 tion, and in you it is legitimate, or the deuce is in it. See, 
 now ! between you and me, when we see a Minard, a gilded 
 blockhead, complimented by the King and doing the swagger-' 
 act in the Tuileries ; a Popinot in the track of becoming a 
 minister and you, a man inured into the work of the ad- 
 ministration, a man who has had thirty years' experience, who 
 has seen six governments, left to transplant his balsam seed- 
 lings ! What then ? I am frank, my dear Thuillier, I want 
 to give you a push, because you will pull me after you. 
 
 "Well, then, here is my plan. We have to name a mem- 
 ber of the Municipal Council for this arrondissement, and 
 that man must be you ! and," said he, emphasizing the 
 word " must be you ! Some day you will most assuredly 
 be the deputy from the arrondissement, when we reelect the 
 Chamber it's not far off. The voices which nominate you for 
 the Municipal Council will be there when the time for elect- 
 ing a deputy comes ; you leave it to me." 
 
 "But what means have you?" exclaimed Thuillier. fasci- 
 nated. 
 
 " You shall know ; but leave me alone to manage this long 
 and difficult business; if you commit any indiscretion on what 
 we have said as to our plans or the arrangements between 
 us, I leave you to yourself, and remain yours truly ! " 
 
 " Oh ! you may count on the absolute dumbness of an old 
 sub-chief; I have had secrets " 
 
 " Good ! but you must keep these secrets from your wife, 
 your sister, and Monsieur and Madame Colleville, when we 
 are with them." 
 
 " I won't let a muscle play in my face," said Thuillier, put- 
 ting it in repose. 
 8
 
 114 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 " Good ! " replied la Peyrade ; "and I will test you. To 
 be eligible, it is necessary to -pay your full taxes, and you 
 don't do this." 
 
 " Your pardon ! for a seat in the Municipal Council I 
 am all right; I pay two francs and eighty-six centimes." 
 
 "Yes, but for the Chamber the amount is five hundred 
 francs, and there is no time to be lost, for possession is neces- 
 sary for a year." 
 
 "The devil ! " said Thuillier. " Here in a year's time \ 
 have to be assessed at five hundred francs." 
 
 " By the end of July, if not earlier, you may be paying it ; 
 my devotion to you leads me to confide to you the secret of 
 an affair by which you may gain thirty or forty thousand 
 francs a year with a capital of one hundred and fifty thou- 
 sand at the most. But, in your household, it is your sister 
 who for a long time has had the direction of your affairs; 
 with that I have no fault to find ; she has, as I said before, 
 the best judgment in the world ; therefore it will be requisite, 
 as a start, that I conquer her esteem ; the affection of Made- 
 moiselle Brigitte may be accomplished by proposing this in- 
 vestment to her, and here is why : iff Mademoiselle Thuillier 
 has not faith in my relics, we should get into trouble ; then 
 how are we to suggest to your sister that she should purchase 
 the property in your name ? It were better that the idea 
 should come from me. You shall, in the meantime, both be 
 enabled to judge of this business. As to the means I have to 
 push you into the Municipal Council of the Seine, here they 
 are: 
 
 " Phellion has the disposition of one-fourth of the votes 
 in the quarter; he and Laudigeois have lived there thirty 
 years ; they are looked upon as oracles. I have a friend who 
 controls another fourth, and the curd of Saint- Jacques, who 
 is not without a certain influence due to his virtues, may secure 
 some votes. Dutocq, by his intimacy with his justice of the 
 peace, will do his utmost for me, especially if it is not done
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 115 
 
 for my personal benefit ; finally Colleville, as secretary to the 
 mayor, represents one- fourth of the votes." 
 
 " Why, you are right ; I am elected ! " cried Thuillier. 
 
 "You think so?" said la Peyrade, and his voice had an 
 alarming irony; "well, then, only go to your friend Colle- 
 ville asking him to assist you ; you will see what he says. 
 Every success in election matters is not made by the candi- 
 date himself, but by his friends. He must ask for nothing 
 for himself, he must leave himself in the hands of his friends; 
 you must wait to be begged to accept it, seeming to be with- 
 out the ambition." 
 
 " La Peyrade ! " exclaimed Thuillier, rising and taking 
 the hand of the young advocate; " you are an awfully smart 
 man." 
 
 "Not up to you, but I have my little merits," replied the 
 Provencal, smiling. 
 
 "And if we succeed, how can I recompense you?" asked 
 Thuillier, innocently. 
 
 "Ah! that's it! You will think me impertinent; but 
 bear in mind that there is within me a feeling which must be 
 my excuse ; for it has given me the pluck to try every resource. 
 I am in love, I give you my confidence " 
 
 " But with whom?" said Thuillier. 
 
 " Your darling little Celeste," replied la Peyrade ; "and my 
 love is surety for my devotion to you ; what would I not do 
 for a father-in-law / It is but selfishness, I do but work for 
 myself " 
 
 " Chut ! " cried Thuillier. 
 
 "Eh, my friend," said la Peyrade, taking Thuillier by the 
 hips, " if I had not had Flavie for me, and if I had not 
 known all, should I speak of it to you ? Only mind this, don't 
 mention a word on this subject to her. Listen to me, I am 
 of the stuff that ministers are made, I do not want to wear 
 Celeste until I have won her. To become a deputy for Paris 
 you must first annul Minard ; wipe him out, you must still
 
 116 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 hold your influence over him ; to this end let them still hope 
 to win Celeste, and we'll trick them all. I don't want her 
 for her fortune, I want her for herself. You see that I have 
 no underhand scheme, while you six months after entering 
 the Council will have the Cross, and as soon as you are 
 elected deputy will be made an officer of the Legion of 
 Honor. Well, then, trust to me ; do not think of making 
 me a member of your family until you have the ribbon in your 
 button-hole, on the day following that on which you enter the 
 Chamber ; nevertheless, I can do still more : I can get you 
 forty thousand francs a year." 
 
 "For only one of these three things you could have our 
 Celeste." 
 
 " What a gem ! " said la Peyrade, raising his eyes to heaven. 
 " I am foolish enough to pray God for her every day. She 
 is charming she is very like you, very. Well, well, you 
 need not fear my discretion. My God, it was Dutocq who 
 told me all. Till this evening. By-the-by, don't forget that 
 you never intended Celeste for me. Above all, say nothing 
 to Flavie." 
 
 As Thuillier went out he said to himself: 
 
 " That's a very superior man ! We shall get along together 
 famously, and, my faith, it would be hard to beat him as a 
 match for Celeste;" and so forth. 
 
 The house toward which Theodose soon afterward went his 
 way had been the hoc erat in votis of Phellion during twenty 
 years past ; it was as much the house of Phellion as the 
 braiding, the brandebourgs, were an integral portion of Ceri- 
 zet's overcoat and its indispensable ornament. 
 
 This building, planked up against a great house, of the 
 depth of one room only, some twenty feet, had a species of 
 little wing or lean-to on either side, each having one window. 
 It had for chief charm a garden some thirty fathoms wide, 
 but longer than the frontage by the width of a court from the 
 street, and a row of lime-trees.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 117 
 
 This edifice of rough stone, stuccoed over, three stories 
 high, was yellow-washed, with Venetian blinds above and 
 plain, broad shutters below, painted green. The kitchen oc- 
 cupied the first floor of the wings at the end, by the court- 
 yard ; a stout, strong girl, protected by two great dogs, was 
 the cook and janitor. The front had five windows, beside the 
 two wings which projected about six feet, and was in the 
 " Style Phellion." Above the door he had inserted a marble 
 tablet, on which was inscribed in letters of gold : Aurea me- 
 diocritas. Over a sun-dial he had a tablet on which was traced 
 this sage maxim : Umbra mea vita sic ! 
 
 He had lately restored the window-sills with Languedoc red 
 marble which he had picked up in a stonemason's yard. At 
 the end of the garden was a colored statue which passers-by 
 thought looked like a nurse suckling a baby. This small 
 freehold, which had been long coveted by the Phellions, had 
 cost eighteen thousand francs in 1831. 
 
 Such was the retreat of this great but unknown citizen, who 
 now enjoyed the sweets of repose, after having paid his 
 debt to his country by working in the Bureau of Finance 
 from which he had retired as first-clerk after thirty-six years' 
 service. 
 
 In 1832 he had led his battalion of the National Guard in 
 the attack at Saint-Merri, but his neighbors saw tears in his 
 eyes at the thought of being compelled to fire on the misled 
 Frenchmen. His virtuous hesitancy gained him the esteem 
 of his quarter, but it lost him the decoration of the Legion of 
 Honor. The worthy man only wished this to fill his cup of 
 happiness. He had thought of asking Minard to help him in 
 his secret ambition, but had not as yet been able to screw 
 himself up to this pome. 
 
 When la Peyrade presented himself the family was com- 
 plete, each one being present in their Sunday best and sitting 
 before the fire in the salon a room wainscoted in wood, 
 painted in two tints of gray they all started when the cook
 
 118 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 announced the very man whom they had all been discussing 
 in reference to Celeste, Felix's love carrying him so far as to 
 cause him to go to mass in order to see her. 
 
 "Alas! the Thuilliers appear to me to be set upon a really 
 dangerous man," said Mme. Phellion; "he took Madame 
 Colleville on his arm this morning and they went off together 
 to the Luxembourg." 
 
 "He has something peculiarly sinister about him," cried 
 Felix, "has that advocate; if told that he had committed 
 some crime, I should not be at all astonished." 
 
 "You are going too far," said his father; "he is cousin- 
 german to Tartuffe, that immortal figure cast in bronze by 
 our honest Moliere, for Moliere, my children, had honesty 
 and patriotism for the basis of his genius." 
 
 Thus speaking he perceived Genevieve enter, who said : 
 
 " Here is -Monsieur de la Peyrade, who wishes to speak to 
 monsieur." 
 
 " To me!" cried M. Phellion. " Bid him enter !" added he 
 with that solemnity in little things that gave him a ridiculous 
 air, but not so to his family upon whom it always imposed, 
 and all of whom accepted him as their king. 
 
 " To what do we owe the honor of your visit, monsieur ? " 
 said Phellion severely. 
 
 "To your importance in the quarter, my dear Monsieur 
 Phellion, and to public affairs," replied Theodose. 
 
 "Then we will pass through to my study," said Phellion. 
 
 "No, no, my friend," said Mme. Phellion, a little woman, 
 as flat as a flounder, and who still retained on her face the 
 grim severity which is habitual to the professor of music in 
 young ladies' seminaries; "we will leave you here." 
 
 An upright Erard piano placed between the two windows 
 and fronting the fireplace proclaimed her pretensions to still 
 rank as a virtuoso. 
 
 "Am I so unhappy as to cause you to take flight?" said 
 Theodose, pleasantly smiling at the mother and daughter.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 119 
 
 "You have a delightful retreat here," continued he, "and 
 you only need the presence of a pretty daughter-in-law to en- 
 able you to pass the remainder of your days in that aurea 
 mediocritas, the vow of the Latin poet, in the midst of family 
 joys. Your antecedents merit this recompense, after all that 
 you have done, my dear Monsieur Phellion ; you are at once 
 a good citizen and a patriarch " 
 
 "Mosieur," said Phellion, quite embarrassed; " mosieur, 
 I have done myjooty (duty) and that is orl (all)." 
 
 At the word "daughter-in-law," spoken by Theodose, 
 Mme. Barniol, who was as like her mother, Mme. Phellion, 
 as two drops of water resemble each other, looked at Mme. 
 Phellion and Felix in a manner which seemed to say : " Can 
 we be mistaken ? " 
 
 The desire to talk about this incident occasioned the four 
 to go out into the garden, for, in March, 1840, the weather 
 was quite fine, at least in Paris. 
 
 "Commandant," said Theodose when alone with the 
 honest burgher, who was flattered at being thus addressed, 
 "I came to speak with you on election matters." 
 
 "Ah ! yes, we have to nominate a municipal councilor," 
 said Phellion, interrupting him. 
 
 "And it is in reference to a candidate that I have ventured 
 to trouble your Sunday enjoyment ; but, perhaps, we may not, 
 after all, go beyond the family circle." 
 
 It was impossible that Phellion could be more Phellion at 
 this moment than Theodose was Phellion. 
 
 "I will not allow you to say another word," replied the 
 commandant, profiting by a pause made by Theodose to cut 
 in : " My choice is made." 
 
 "We have, then, the same idea," cried Theodose, " people 
 of good intent meet on a common ground the same as men ot 
 genius." 
 
 " I don't know about that being so this time, it would be 
 phenomenal," answered Phellion. " This arrondissement has
 
 120 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 had as a representative on the Municipal Council the most 
 virtuous of men, who was also a great judge, you know, the 
 late Monsieur Popinot, who died as councilor of State. When 
 it was necessary to replace him, his nephew, who inherits his 
 beneficence, was not then a resident in the quarter, but, since 
 then, he has purchased and now occupies the house that be- 
 longed to his uncle, on the Rue de la Montagne-Sainte-Gene- 
 vieve; he is doctor at the Polytechnic and also at one of the 
 hospitals; he is an ornament to our quarter; by these titles, 
 and to honor in the person of the nephew the memory of the 
 uncle, some residents of the quarter and myself have resolved 
 to carry Dr. Horace Bianchon, member of the Academy of 
 Sciences, as you know, and one of the new glories of the illus- 
 trious school (of medicine) of Paris. A man is not great in 
 our eyes simply because he is celebrated, but the late Coun- 
 cilor Popinot was, in my opinion, nearly a Saint-Vincent de 
 Paul." 
 
 "A doctor is not an administrator," replied Theodose; 
 " and I have come to ask your vote for a man which in your 
 own interests demands the sacrifice of any predilection, which 
 after all is a matter of indifference to the public." 
 
 "Ah! monsieur! " cried Phellion, rising and posing like 
 Lafon in his "LaGlorieux" attitude, "can you so belittle 
 me as to think that my personal interests can ever influence 
 my political conscience? On the side of public matters, I am 
 a citizen, nothing more, nothing less." 
 
 Theodose smiled in his sleeve at the thought of the struggle 
 about to pass between the father and the citizen. 
 
 "Don't engage your convictions too earnestly, I entreat 
 you," said la Peyrade; " for the happiness of your dear Felix 
 is at stake." 
 
 "What do you mean by those words?" asked Phellion, 
 standing in the middle of the room, in the favorite pose of the 
 famous Odilon Barrot. 
 
 "Why, I have come on behalf of our mutual friend, the
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 121 
 
 worthy and excellent Monsieur Thuillier, whose influence over 
 the destinies of the lovely Celeste Colleville are not unknown 
 to you. Your admirable son might make any family proud of 
 his entry into it ; now you cannot better further his marriage 
 with the charming Celeste than by earning the eternal grati- 
 tude of the Thuilliers, which you can do by recommending 
 him to your fellow-citizens for their suffrages. I have devoted 
 myself, monsieur, to the service of the humble, as did the late 
 Councilor Popinot, a sublime man, as you say; and if my 
 destiny were not in some sense religious, and thus antagonistic 
 to the obligations of marriage, my taste, my further vocation, 
 would be for the service of God by His church. I am not al- 
 ways on the carpet like other philanthropists ; I do not write, 
 I work, for I am a man who has vowed to do all for the good 
 of Christian charity. I have guessed at the ambition of our 
 friend Thuillier, and I wished to contribute to the* happiness 
 of two beings, made for each other, by offering you the means 
 of gaining access to the heart, a somewhat cold one, of 
 Thuillier." 
 
 Phellion was dumfounded by this excellent harangue, 
 cleverly spoken ; he was dazed, startled ; but he remained the 
 same Phellion ; he went toward the advocate and extended 
 his right hand, and la Peyrade gave him his. 
 
 Both gave one of those wrings of the hand such as were 
 given, about August, 1830, between a bourgeoisie and a man 
 of the morrow. 
 
 "Mosieur," said the commandant, with feeling, "I judged 
 you wrongly. What you have given me the honor of con- 
 fiding here will here die," pointing to his heart. "Real 
 worth is so rare, that in our weak nature we are apt to be dis- 
 trustful of it when it appears. In me you have a friend, if you 
 will allow me to do myself the honor of taking such title. 
 But, m6sieur, you must learn to know me ; I should sink in 
 my own estimation if I proposed Thuillier. No, my son must 
 never know happiness at the cost of a bad act done by his
 
 122 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 father. I shall not change my vote to another candidate to 
 there find my son's interest. That is virtue, mosieur! " 
 
 La Peyrade took out his handkerchief, rubbed it into his 
 eye and brought forth a tear, and said, extending his hand to 
 Phellion and turning his head : 
 
 " There, monsieur, is the sublimity of private life and politi- 
 cal life in conflict ! Not for anything would I have missed this 
 spectacle my visit is not wasted. What would you? in your 
 place I should do the same. You are the noblest work of 
 God an honest man ; a good man, a fellow-citizen of Jean- 
 Jacques ! More of such citizens, then, oh, France, my country, 
 what might you not become ! This is me, monsieur, I crave 
 the honor of being your friend." 
 
 "What's happening?" cried Mme. Phellion, who was 
 looking at the scene through the window. "Your father and 
 that monster of a man are embracing each other ! " 
 
 Phellion and the advocate went out to rejoin the family in 
 tne garden. 
 
 " My dear Felix," said the old man, pointing to la Peyrade, 
 who bowed to Mme. Phellion, " be very grateful to this worthy 
 young man; he will be more helpful than injurious to you." 
 
 For about five minutes the lawyer walked under the leafless 
 lime-trees with Mme. Phellion, and during that time gave 
 them a bit of counsel, which was to bear fruit that evening ; 
 the first happy result being to cause the ladies to admire his 
 talents, candor, and other inappreciable qualities. 
 
 After he had bidden them adieu, Mme. Phellion took her 
 husband's arm to reenter the salon, and said to him : 
 
 "And what, my friend, you, so good a father, made you 
 by an excessive delicacy throw obstacles in the way of so 
 good a marriage for our FeUix? " 
 
 "My dear little woman," replied Phellion, "the great men 
 of antiquity, such as Brutus and others, were never fathers 
 when they had to be citizens. The middle-class has, even 
 more than the aristocracy which it is called upon to replace,
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 123 
 
 to exerciw the hightest virtues. Monsieur de Saint-Hilaire 
 thought not of the loss of his arm when he saw Turenne lay 
 dead before him. Shall I betray sue*" feelings in the bosom 
 of the family where I have taught them ? No. Weep to-day, 
 my dear, to-morrow you will esteem me!" he added, as he 
 perceived tears in the eyes of his little skinny wife. 
 
 These grandiloquent words were spoken on the threshold 
 of the door over which was written : Aurea mtdiocritas. 
 
 " I should have added : et digna / " added Phellion, point- 
 ing upward to the tablet; "but those two words are too 
 eulogistic." 
 
 "But, father," said Marie-Theodore Phellion, the future 
 engineer of roads and bridges, when they were again in the 
 salon, "it seems to me that a man does not fail in the matter 
 of honor by changing his determination in regard to an unim- 
 portant matter when it does not concern the public." 
 
 " Unimportant, my son ! " cried Phellion. " Between our- 
 selves, and Fdlix partakes my convictions, Mdsicur Thuillier 
 is without any kind of capacity ; he knows nothing. Horace 
 Branchon is a capable man ; he would get a thousand things 
 done for the arrondissement, and Thuillier not one. Beside, 
 if man does not blame, God will. My conscience is free 
 from blame, and I wish to leave my memory unblemished to 
 you. Therefore nothing can change my opinion." 
 
 "Oh! my good father," cried the little Mme. Barniol, 
 throwing herself on a cushion at the knees of Phellion, " don't 
 mount the high horse ! There are lots of imbeciles and sim- 
 pletons in the Municipal Council, but France goes on just the 
 same. He'll vote the same as others, this brave Thuillier. 
 Remember that Celeste will have five hundred thousand francs 
 perhaps." 
 
 "She might have millions," said Phellion, "yet I would 
 leave them there. I will not propose Thuillier, when my 
 duty to the memory of the great virtues of the best man who 
 ever lived says nominate Horace Bianchon. From high in 
 
 S
 
 124 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 the heavens, Popinot contemplates and applauds me," cried 
 Phellion enthusiastically. 
 
 "My father is right," said Felix, arousing from a brown 
 study; "he deserves our respect and love, like as he has 
 always done in the course of life, unpretending and honored. 
 I love Celeste as much as I love my family, but I do not wish 
 to rise at the cost of my father's honor; and," he added, 
 " the moment the question becomes one of conscience, let no 
 more be said." 
 
 Phellion, his eyes filled with tears, went to his eldest son, 
 took him in his arms, and said : 
 
 " My son, my son ! " in a broken voice. 
 
 "This is all rubbish," said Mme. Phellion, in a whisper to 
 Mme. Barniol ; " come and help me dress, we must put an end 
 to this ; I know your father, he is an obstinate. To carry out 
 the scheme which that noble and pious young man gave me, 
 Theodore, I shall need your support therefore be ready, my 
 son." 
 
 At this moment Genevieve came in and delivered a letter to 
 M. Phellion. 
 
 " An invitation to dine with the Thuilliers, my wife, myself, 
 and Felix," said he. 
 
 The magnificent and startling idea of the advocate of the 
 poor had caused as much turmoil at the Thuilliers as upset at 
 the Phellions ; and Jerome, without confiding anything to 
 his sister, for he piqued himself on his honor to his Mephis- 
 topheles, had gone to her room and said : 
 
 "Good little woman " (he always caressed her heart with 
 these words), "we shall have some top sawyers to dinner 
 to-day ; I shall invite the Minards, so let us have a good 
 dinner; I have written the Phellions an invitation, it is a 
 little late, but with them it won't matter. As to the Minards, 
 I must throw dust in their eyes ; I need them." 
 
 " Four Minards, three Phellions, four Collevilles, and our- 
 selves that is thirteen."
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 125 
 
 " La Peyrade, fourteen ; it might be as well to invite 
 Dutocq ; he can give us a push ; I'll go up to him." 
 
 " What are you up to? " cried his sister; " fifteen to din- 
 ner, that means at least forty francs sent dancing ! " 
 
 "Don't regret that, my good little woman ; above all, be 
 as adoring as possible to our young friend la Peyrade. He is 
 a friend he will prove it ! If you love me, care for him like 
 the apple of your eye." 
 
 Ana he left Brigitte stupefied. 
 
 "Yes, yes, I will wait till he does prove it," said she to 
 herself. " He can't catch me with pretty words, not me ! 
 He is a nice boy, but, before carrying him my heart, I must 
 study him a little more." 
 
 Thuillier invited Dutocq ; then off to Zelie, whom he bam- 
 boozled into coming; then to the Minards. Minard had 
 bought one of those great, sumptuous dwellings which the old 
 religious orders had erected in the vicinity of the Sorbonne. 
 As he ascended the broad, stone stairway, with a balustrade, 
 which showed how well the second order of arts had flourished 
 under Louis XIII. , he envied the mayor his hotel and posi- 
 tion. 
 
 In this handsome house, with a garden in the rear and a court- 
 yard in front, lived a retired grocer, a successful cheat. 
 Thuillier's name opened the doors of the salon where, among 
 red velvet and gold, in the midst of the most magnificent 
 Chinese stuffs, a poor woman sat, who at every popular ball 
 crushed the hearts of the princes and princesses at the Chateau. 
 
 " Is she not rightly given the name of ' the Caricature ? ' ' 
 said a smiling pseudo-lady of the bed-chamber to a duchess 
 who could not refrain from laughing at the appearance of 
 Zelie tricked out in her diamonds, red as a poppy, squeezed 
 into a spangled dress, and rolling about like one of the 
 barrels of her old store. 
 
 "Can you pardon me, fair lady," said Thuillier, wriggling 
 around and ending by striking an attitude, number two of his
 
 126 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 repertoire of 1807, " for having left on my desk this invita- 
 tion which I really thought had been sent you ? It is for to- 
 day ; perhaps I come too late " 
 
 Zelie examined her husband's face, as he advanced to meet 
 Thuillier, and responded : 
 
 " We had intended going to have a look at the country 
 and dine by chance at a restaurant, but we can readily re- 
 nounce the project^ all the more willingly because it seems to 
 me so devilish common to go out of Paris on a Sunday." 
 
 " We can have a little hop to the piano for the youngsters, 
 if there'll be enough of us, and I presume there will be, as I sent 
 word to Phellion, whose wife is intimate with Madame Prou, 
 the successor " 
 
 "The successtress," interrupted M. Minard. 
 
 " Oh, no," replied Thuillier, " it would be successoress, as 
 we say the mayoress, of the demoiselle Lagrave, and who was 
 a Barniol." 
 
 " Is it necessary to dress?" asked Mme. Minard. 
 
 " Oh, well, yes ! " said Thuiller ; " I should get in trouble 
 with my sister. No, no, though, it is only in the family. 
 Under the Empire, madame, we learned to know each other 
 by dancing. In those glorious days, a good dancer was as 
 much as a fine soldier. To-day people are too matter of 
 fact " 
 
 " We won't talk politics," said the mayor, smiling. " The 
 King is a great man and very smart. I live in admiration of 
 my times and its institutions which we have given ourselves. 
 The King understands what he is doing when he develops 
 our industries ; it is a hand-to-hand fight with England, and 
 this second peace is doing us more good than all the wars of 
 the Empire." 
 
 "What a deputy Minard would make," said Zlie naively. 
 " Between you and I, he tries to speak when we are alone ; you 
 would help to get him returned, would you not, really, Thuil- 
 lier?"
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 127 
 
 "No talking politics," replied Thuillier. "Come at five 
 o'clock." 
 
 'That little Vinet, is he to be there?" asked Minard. 
 "Without doubt he has an eye on Celeste." 
 
 "Then he may order his crepe," answered Thuillier. 
 "Brigitte would not lend ear to him." 
 
 Ze"lie and Minard exchanged smiles of satisfaction. 
 
 After inviting the Laudigeois when he left the Minards, he 
 then called on the Collevilles to be sure that Celeste wore a 
 pretty toilette. He found Flavie somewhat pensive, and 
 Thuillier had to overcome her indecision. 
 
 "My old and my ever-young love," said he, putting his 
 arm about her waist, for she was alone in her room, " I can- 
 not have any secrets from you. I have a most important affair 
 on hand. I cannot say more, but I can ask you to be particu- 
 larly gracious to a young man " 
 
 "Who?" 
 
 "Young la Peyrade." 
 
 "And why, Charles?" 
 
 " He holds my future in his hands; then, too, he is a man 
 of genius. Oh ! I know. Between us it is give and take." 
 
 " How ! You want me to play the coquette with him? " 
 
 "Not too much, my angel," replied Thuillier, with a fatu- 
 ous air. 
 
 And off he went without noticing a species of amazement 
 that had befallen Flavie. 
 
 "That is a power," said she to herself, " that young man. 
 We shall see." 
 
 At half-past four Theodose was at his post ; he had assumed 
 a simple air, part servile, and a soft voice ; and first he went 
 with Thuillier into the garden. 
 
 " My friend, I have not the least doubt of your success, but 
 I must once more impress upon you at all times to keep abso- 
 lute silence. If any one questions you about Celeste give 
 evasive answers, such as you learned so well at the bureau."
 
 128 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "All right!" answered Thuillier. "But is it a cer- 
 tainty?" 
 
 "You will see the dessert I have prepared. Be modest, 
 above all. Here are the Minards, leave me to lime them." 
 
 After saluting them, la Peyrade kept close by M. the Mayor, 
 and at an opportune moment he took him aside and said to 
 him : 
 
 "Monsieur the Mayor, a man of your political importance 
 does not face the ennui of dining here without having some end 
 in view ; I do not for a moment ask your motives, I have no 
 right so to do ; it is not my part here below to interfere in 
 the business of this world's powers ; but pardon my boldness 
 and deign to listen to the counsel that I can give you. If I 
 am able to do you a service to-day, you are in a position to 
 render me two to-morrow, so if you listen to me a moment it 
 is in my own interest. Our friend Thuillier is in despair at 
 being a nobody, and he is intending to become something, a 
 personage in the arrondissement." 
 
 "Ah!" said Minard. 
 
 " Oh ! nothing much ; he wants the nomination as a mem- 
 ber of the Municipal Council. I know that Phellion, divining 
 an equal advantage from doing him a service, intends to pro- 
 pose our poor friend as a candidate. Well, perhaps you might 
 find it necessary to your project to be forehanded with him. 
 The nomination of Thuillier will not only be favorable to 
 you I should think it would also be agreeable ; he will do 
 well in the council ; there are worse than he there. And 
 then if he is indebted to you for his advancement he will see 
 through your eyes ; he will regard you as the shining light of 
 the town " 
 
 "My dear sir, I thank you," said Minard; "you have 
 rendered me a service which I shall never forget, and that 
 proves to me " 
 
 "That I don't care for the Phellions," replied la Peyrade, 
 profiting by the mayor's hesitation, fearing that he might
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 129 
 
 bring forth some speech disdainful of the advocate. " I hate 
 people who trade on their honesty and make cash of their 
 noble sentiments." 
 
 "You thoroughly understand them," said Minard ; " they 
 are sycophants. That man, all his life, for the past ten years, 
 is explained by that scrap of red ribbon," added the mayor, 
 showing his own button-hole. 
 
 "Lookout, though," said the lawyer, "his son loves 
 Celeste and is in the citadel." 
 
 "Yes, but my son has twelve thousand livres of income 
 himself " 
 
 "Oh ! " said the advocate, with a shrug, " Mademoiselle 
 Brigitte said the other day that she wanted at least that from 
 suitors for Celeste. And, after all, before six months are 
 over, you will see that Thuillier will have a freehold bring- 
 ing in forty thousand francs a year." 
 
 "The deuce! I never doubted it," replied the mayor. 
 " Well, he shall be a member of the council." 
 
 " In any case, don't mention me in the matter," said the 
 advocate of the poor, who pressed forward to greet Mme. 
 Phellion, who had just arrived. " Well, my fair lady, have 
 you succeeded?" 
 
 "I waited until four o'clock, but the worthy and excellent 
 man would not listen at all ; he is too much occupied to 
 accept such a charge, and Monsieur Phellion has a letter in 
 which Dr. Bianchon thanks him for his good intentions, and 
 says that, for himself, his candidate is Monsieur Thuillier. 
 He is using his influence in his favor and prays my husband to 
 do the same." 
 
 " And what says your excellent spouse ? " 
 
 "'I have done my duty,' he replied. 'I have been no 
 traitor to my conscience, and henceforth I am wholly for 
 Thuillier.'" 
 
 "Well, that's all fixed then," said la Peyrade. "Forget 
 my visit, the whole credit of the idea is your own." 
 9
 
 130 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 Then turning to Mme. Colleville, with a most respectful 
 attitude, he said : 
 
 " Madame, be so good as to introduce me to our good 
 Papa Colleville ; I propose a little surprise for Thuillier, and 
 he must be i:i the secret." 
 
 As la Peyiade played his part for Thuillier's benefit, Mme. 
 Colleville was hearing such remarks as made her ears tingle ; 
 it was a mystery to her. 
 
 "I wish I knew what Messrs. Colleville and la Peyrade are 
 saying that they laugh so much?" said Mme. Thuillier, 
 simply, looking out through the window. 
 
 " They are speaking just such rubbish as all men talk be- 
 tween themselves," answered Mile. Thuillier, who frequently 
 attacked the men by a kind of instinct natural in old maids. 
 
 " He is incapable of such a thing," said Phellion, gravely; 
 " for Mdsieur de la Peyrade is one of the most virtuous 
 young people whom I have met. I put him on a par with 
 Felix; nay, I wish that my son had a little of Mdsieur 
 Thdodose's pretty piety." 
 
 "He is, in fact, a man of merit, who will get on," ob- 
 served Minard. " As for me, my best wishes I won't say 
 my protection are his." 
 
 "He spends more in lamp-oil than bread," said Dutocq; 
 "that I know." 
 
 " His mother, if she still survives, must be proud of him," 
 said Mme. Phellion, sententiously. 
 
 " You may confide to him your secrets and your fortune," 
 said Thuillier ; "in these days that is not such a small thing 
 to say of the best of men." 
 
 " It is Colleville who is making him laugh," cried Dutocq. 
 
 Just then Colleville and la Peyrade were at the bottom of 
 the garden, the best friends in the world. 
 
 "Gentlemen," said Brigitte, "soup and the King must not 
 be kept waiting; hand in the ladies." 
 
 This pleasant jest, inherited from the janitor's lodge,
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 131 
 
 ushered the whole party, with the exception of the dreadful 
 C6rizet, into the dining-room. Every principal character in 
 this drama was seated around the board. 
 
 The characteristics of the middle-class cook in 1840 is 
 necessary to a picture of its manners; good housekeepers 
 may learn a lesson therefrom. A woman does not for twenty 
 years occupy herself in making cash-bags without looking up 
 some means of filling a few. Now Brigitte had this peculi- 
 arity, with the thrift necessary for laying the foundation of a 
 fortune she combined that of dispensing sufficient for necessi- 
 ties. Her relative extravagance, when it had to do with her 
 brother or Celeste, was the antitype of miserliness. As a 
 fact, she often commisserated herself for not being avaricious. 
 
 The soup offered was bouillon, extremely pale ; for, even on 
 an occasion such as this, she had enjoined the cook to make 
 plenty of it ; then, as the beef had to serve the family on the 
 morrow and the day after, the less of its juices it furnished 
 to the bouillon, the more substantial it would be. The beef, 
 underdone, was always removed at a little speech of Brigitte's, 
 said by her as Thuillier essayed to carve : 
 
 "I guess it's rather tough; never mind, Thuillier, no one 
 will care to eat of it, we have other things." 
 
 The bouillon was, in fact, flanked by four dishes standing 
 on hot copper double plates off which the silver-plating was 
 worn. At this dinner, called the candidature, the first course 
 was composed of two ducks aux olives, having opposite a 
 large pie aux quenelles and an eel with tartar sauce, with a 
 fricandeau on endive. The second course had for its centre- 
 piece a fine roast goose stuffed with chestnuts, a corn-salad 
 ornamented with slices of red beet, opposite a dish of cup- 
 custards, and a tureen of sweet turnips looked down upon a 
 bowl of macaroni. This dinner, well suited to be that of a 
 janitor's wedding festivities, would be produced, for, at the 
 most, twenty francs; the relics would keep the house for two 
 days, and Brigitte would say :
 
 132 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "Dame; when one receives, the cash goes ! It's frightful/' 
 
 The table was lighted by two hideous silver-plated candle- 
 sticks with four branches, in which twinkled that economical 
 candle called the Aurore. The linen was resplendently white, 
 and the old thread-pattern plate was a paternal heritage, the 
 fruit of a purchase made during the Revolution by old Thuil- 
 lier, and had served in the quasi restaurant he had kept in 
 his lodge, but which was suppressed in 1816 in all the offices. 
 Thus the fare harmonized with the dining-room, with the 
 house, and with the Thuilliers, whose fate it was not to rise 
 above their own style. The Minards, the Collevilles, and la 
 Peyrade exchanged a few smiles, which communicated a sati- 
 rical, but not expressed thought. They alone knew of any 
 superior luxury, and the Minards said plainly enough that 
 they had some afterthoughts in accepting such a dinner. La 
 Peyrade, who sat beside Flavie, whispered her : 
 
 " You see they need some one who can teach them how to 
 live; you are eating what is commonly called cag-mag, an 
 old friend of mine. But these Minards ; what horrible cupid- 
 ity ! Your daughter would be lost to you. These parvenus 
 have the vices of the great nobles of other days, without their 
 elegance. Their son, who has twelve thousand francs income, 
 can well find a family in the Potash set without dragging their 
 rake here on speculation. It is a pleasure to play upon such 
 people like as if they were a bass or a clarionet." 
 
 Flavie listened with a smile ; she did not remove her foot 
 when Thiodose lightly pressed it with his boot. 
 
 As the dishes of the second course were being removed, 
 Minard, afraid that Phellion would forestall him, said to 
 Thuillier, very gravely : 
 
 " My dear Thuillier, if I accepted your dinner it was be- 
 cause I had an important communication to make to you, one 
 which honors you so much that I choose to have as witnesses 
 all your guests." 
 
 Thuillier became pale.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 133 
 
 "You obtained for me the Cross? " cried he, as he got a 
 look from Theodose, and to prove that he was not without 
 finesse. 
 
 "You will have that some day," replied the mayor; " but 
 this is more than that. The Cross is a favor due to the good 
 opinion of a minister, whereas this is now the question, so 
 to say, of an election due to the sentiments of your fellow- 
 citizens. In a word, a great number of the electors of your 
 arrondissement have cast their eyes upon you, and wish to 
 honor you with their confidence by charging you with their 
 representation of this arrondissement in the Municipal Council 
 of Paris, which, as all the world knows, is the council general 
 of the Seine." 
 
 " Bravo ! " said Dutocq. 
 
 Phellion rose. 
 
 " Monsieur the Mayor has anticipated me," said he, in a 
 voice broken with emotion ; " but it is so flattering for our 
 friend to be the object of interest on the part of all good 
 citizens, and to obtain the public vote from all parts of the 
 capital, that I must not complain of being the second in line; 
 beside I bow to the power of authority! " (And he bowed 
 respectfully to Minard.) "Yes, Mosieur Thuillier, many 
 electors think of giving you their votes in that portion of the 
 arrondissement where I have my humble Penates; and you 
 have the particular advantage of being designated by an illus- 
 trious man (Sensation), by a man whom we designed to honor 
 for the sake of one of the most distinguished inhabitants of 
 the arrondissement, who was, I might say, for twenty years 
 its father. I allude to the late Monsieur Popinot. But his 
 nephew, Doctor Bianchon, one of our glories, has, owing to 
 his pressing duties, declined to serve us. He thanked us for 
 the compliment paid, but indicated for our suffrages the can- 
 didate of Monsieur the Mayor, as being, in his opinion, the 
 more capable from the position he formerly occupied." 
 
 And Phellion sat down amid an acclamative murmur.
 
 184 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "Thuillier, you may count on your old friend," said Colle- 
 ville. 
 
 At this moment the guests were all touched by the sight 
 presented by old Brigitte and Mme. Thuillier. Brigitte, pale 
 as if about to faint, let the slow tears run unheeded down her 
 cheeks, tears of deepest joy; and Mme. Thuillier sat as though 
 struck by a thunderbolt, her eyes fixed. All at once the old 
 maid sprang into the kitchen, crying to Josephine the cook : 
 
 " Come into the cellar, my girl ; we must get out the wine 
 from behind the fagots." 
 
 " My friends," said Thuillier, in a choking voice, "this is 
 the grandest day in my life, happier than that of my election, 
 should I permit myself to ask the suffrages of my fellow-citi- 
 zens " (Certainly, of course!), "for I feel myself much run 
 down with thirty years of public service, and you may surely 
 believe that a man of honor has need to consult his strength 
 before he assumes the functions of an adile" 
 
 "I expected nothing less of you, Monsieur Thuillier," cried 
 Phellion. " Pardon me, this is the first time in my life that 
 I ever interrupted any one, and one who was formerly my 
 superior, too; but under the circumstances " 
 
 "Accept, accept," cried Zelie. " In the name of the little 
 man ! we need such men as you for governor." 
 
 " Resign yourself, my chief," said Dutocq ; " and long live 
 our future councilor But we have nothing to drink " 
 
 "Well, all is said," replied Minard, "you are our candi- 
 date, eh?" 
 
 " You think too much of me," said Thuillier. 
 
 " That's all right," cried Colleville; " a man who for thirty 
 years has worked in the galleys of the Bureau of Finance 
 should be a treasure to the town." , 
 
 "You are much too modest," said young Minard; "your 
 capacity is not unknown to us ; it is remembered even at the 
 bureau." 
 
 "As you all insist "
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 135 
 
 " The King will be well pleased with our choice, I can tell 
 you that," said Minard, interrupting Thuillier in a pompous 
 manner. 
 
 "Gentlemen," said la Peyrade, "will you permit a recent 
 inhabitant of the Saint-Jacques faubourg to make a little re- 
 mark, which may not be unimportant? 
 
 "The influence of the mayor of an adjoining arrondisse- 
 ment, immense in ours, where he has left such an excellent 
 memory that of Monsieur Phellion, the oracle yes, I repeat 
 it, the oracle " noticing a negative gesture of Phellion's 
 " of his battalion ; the influence of Monsieur Colleville, pow- 
 erful by his frank urbanity; that of Monsieur the Clerk of the 
 Peace, no less valuable ; and my own humble efforts, all are 
 pledges of success, but they are not success itself. To obtain 
 triumph let us here and now pledge ourselves to keep a pro- 
 found silence as to our intentions. Otherwise, we should 
 excite, not willing or desiring it, envy and the like passions, 
 which would erect obstacles in our path necessary to be over- 
 come. Some would see good in our efforts, others evil : it is 
 not for me to judge between such in the presence of minds 
 before whose superiority I bow; I content myself by pointing 
 out the dangers our friend must encounter. The writ for 
 election may not take effect for another month. From now 
 until then imagine the intrigues ! Do not offer, I entreat you, 
 our friend Thuillier to the blows of his opponents ; let us not 
 deliver him over to public discussion, that modern harpy, the 
 trumpet of calumny and envy, the pretext of inimical feelings 
 calculated to belittle all that is great, that dishonors all that 
 is sacred, and befouls the respectable. Rather let us do as the 
 third party is doing in the Chamber vote and say nothing ! " 
 
 Envy had turned Minard's son green and yellow. 
 
 "Perfectly true and well said," cried Minard. 
 
 "Unanimously carried," said Colleville. 
 
 "Whoso desires the end adopts the means," said Phellion, 
 emphatically.
 
 186 THE MIDDLE CLASSES, 
 
 At this moment appeared Mile. ThuiUier, followed by two 
 domestics ; stuck in her belt was the key of the cellar, and 
 three bottles of champagne, two of old hermitage, and one of 
 Malaga wine were placed upon the table ; but she herself car- 
 ried a little bottle with respectful care, much like a fairy 
 Carabosse, which she placed before herself. In the midst 
 of the hilarity caused by this abundance of choice cheer, a 
 fruit of her gratitude, poured out by the old maid in the 
 delirium of her joy, there arrived numerous dishes of dessert : 
 a heaped-up dish of raisins, figs, almonds, and nuts;* pyra- 
 mids of oranges; confections, candied fruits brought from the 
 depths of her closets, and which, but for the circumstances, 
 would have never figured on the table-cloth. 
 
 "Celeste, they will bring you a bottle of brandy that my 
 father got in 1802 ; make an orange salad ! " cried she to her 
 sister-in-law. "Monsieur Phellion, open the champagne; 
 this bottle is for you three ! Monsieur Dutocq, take this one ! 
 Monsieur Colleville, you can make the corks pop ! " 
 
 The two maids distributed champagne glasses, claret glasses, 
 and liqueur glasses, for Josephine carried in three more bottles 
 of Bordeaux. 
 
 "The year of the comet," cried Thuillier. " Gentlemen, 
 you have caused my sister to lose her head." 
 
 "And this evening punch and cakes," she said. " I have 
 sent out to the drug-store to buy some tea. My God ! if 
 only I had known that this dinner had to do with an elec- 
 tion," exclaimed she to her sister-in-law, " I would have served 
 the turkey." 
 
 A general laugh greeted this speech. 
 
 "Oh ! we have a goose," said Minard's son, smiling. 
 
 "It's an ill wind that blows no one good,"f exclaimed 
 Mme. Thuillier, as she saw marrons glacis and meringues 
 handed round. 
 
 * Quatrt-mtndiants "the four beggars; " a popular French dessert. 
 \ Lts ckarrettes y versent the carts are unloading.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 137 
 
 Mile. Thuillier had a face of fire ; she was a superb sight ; 
 never had a sister's love assumed such a frenzied expression. 
 
 "To those who know her it is quite touching," remarked 
 Mme. Colleville. 
 
 The glasses were filled, whereupon la Peyrade said : 
 
 "Let us drink to something sublime ! " 
 
 All looked up in astonishment. 
 
 "To Mademoiselle Brigitte." 
 
 All arose and with one voice cried: "Vive Mademoiselle 
 Thuillier." 
 
 After a toast by Phellion to M. Minard and his wife, Thuil- 
 lier proposed : 
 
 " The King and the royal family ; I add nothing, the toast 
 says all." 
 
 "To the election of my brother," said Mile. Thuillier. 
 
 La Peyrade was the next on his feet. 
 
 " To the ladies, that bewitching sex to whom we owe our 
 happiness, not to mention our mothers, sisters, and wives." 
 
 After the hilarity caused by this toast, Colleville, already 
 gay, exclaimed : 
 
 " Wretch ! you have stolen my speech." 
 
 After some conversation and a few unimportant toasts, 
 Celeste Colleville said, timidly: 
 
 " Mamma, will you allow me to give a toast ? " 
 
 The poor girl had seen the puzzled face of her godmother ; 
 she, the mistress of the house, had the expression of a dog 
 which is in doubt which master to obey ; she consulted each 
 countenance and was oblivious of herself, but the joy on a 
 face so unaccustomed to its visits had the effect of a pale 
 wintry sun behind a mist, which grudgingly shone through 
 the flabby, faded features. Her ill-dressed hair and dingy 
 attire combined with her woeful look of joy stimulated the 
 affection of the young Celeste, who, alone in the world, knew 
 the value of that woman's heart ; suffering from all, yet con- 
 soling herself in God and this child alone.
 
 M8 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "Let the dear child give her little toast," said la Peyrade 
 to Mme. Colleville. 
 
 "Go on, my daughter," said Colleville; "we have the 
 hermitage yet to drink, and it's hoary with age." 
 
 "To my good godmother!" said the girl, inclining her 
 glass respectfully before Mme. Thuillier and holding it toward 
 her. 
 
 The poor woman, quite scared, looked through a veil of 
 tears, alternately, at her sister and her husband ; but her 
 position in the family was so well understood, and the homage 
 paid by innocence to weakness had such a lovely side to it, 
 that the emotion was general ; every man rose and bowed to 
 Mme. Thuillier. 
 
 " Ah ! Celeste, I wish I had a kingdom to lay at your 
 feet ! " said Felix Phellion. 
 
 " Now, it's my turn," said Colleville, posing like an athlete. 
 "Listen to me. To friendship! Empty your glasses; refill 
 your glasses. Good. To the fine arts ! the flower of social 
 life. Empty your glasses; refill your glasses. To another 
 such festival the day after the election ! " 
 
 "What is in that little bottle?" asked Dutocq of Mile. 
 Thuillier. 
 
 "This," said she, "is one of my three bottles of Madame 
 Amphoux liqueur; the second is for Celeste's wedding, and 
 the last for the christening of her first child." 
 
 The dinner ended with a toast by Thuillier, suggested to 
 him by Th6odose, when the Malaga sparkled in the glasses 
 like so many rubies. 
 
 "Colleville, gentlemen, drank \.Q friendship ; for myself, I 
 drink, in this generous wine, to my friends." 
 
 Cheers greeted this speech ; but Dutocq remarked aside to 
 Theodose : 
 
 " It is murder to pour such Malaga down such a class of 
 throats." 
 
 "Ah! if we could only imitate this, my dear," said Mi-
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES, 189 
 
 nard's wife to her spouse, after tasting it; "what fortunes 
 we could make." 
 
 "Yes," answered Minard, "but ours is made." 
 
 "Don't you think, sister, that we had better take coffee in 
 the salon?" said Brigitte to her sister. 
 
 Mme. Thuillier obediently assumed the air of mistress of 
 the house and arose. 
 
 " Ah ! you are a great wizard," said Flavie Colleville tc la 
 Peyrade, as she took his arm. 
 
 "And yet I only care to bewitch you," replied he. 
 
 "Madame Phellion will play the piano," cried Colleville. 
 "We must all dance to-night the bottles, Brigitte's twenty- 
 sous-pieces, and our little girls. I'll go and fetch my clar- 
 ionet." He handed his empty coffee-cup to his wife, and 
 smiled to see her such a good friend of la Peyrade's. 
 
 "What have you done and said to my husband?" asked 
 Flavie of the seducer. 
 
 " Well, since you tell me all your secrets," said he, letting 
 himself out in a spirit of gayety, always Provencal and always 
 apparently so charming, so natural, so unaffected, " I won't 
 conceal from you a pain that I have in my heart." He led 
 her to a window and said, smiling : 
 
 " Colleville, poor man, has seen in me the artist crushed 
 by all these bourgeois ; silent before them because I was mis- 
 understood, misjudged, repelled ; but he felt the heat of the 
 sacred fire which was devouring me. Yes, I am," said he in 
 a tone of intense conviction, "an artist in words after the 
 manner of Berryer ; I could make juries weep by weeping 
 myself, for I am as nervous as a woman. Then your husband, 
 who looks upon the middle-classes with horror, made game of 
 them with me ; we began by laughing, but eventually became 
 serious, and he found me as strong as himself. I told him of 
 the scheme to make something of Thuillier ; I showed him all 
 the good he could do himself by becoming a political mani- 
 kin, if only, said I, to be called a de Colleville, and to put
 
 140 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 your charming wife in the position I should like to see her, as 
 the wife of a receiver-general, whence you could become a 
 deputy. Good reasons disguised in a jest have the knack of 
 penetrating deeper into some minds than if soberly stated ; so 
 Colleville and I became the best friends in the world. Don't 
 you remember at table he said : ' Wretch, you have stolen my 
 speech.' By the end of the evening we shall be theeing and 
 thouing. I shall before long invite him to a jolly party, such 
 as always allures artists who have become broken to domestic 
 rule, and get him to kick over the traces. It will make us as 
 solid friends as he and Thuillier are, or more so, for I have 
 told him that Thuillier will be bursting with jealousy when he 
 sees his rosette. Colleville will adopt me ; so that I may visit 
 at your house by his invitation. But what wouldn't you make 
 me do? Lick lepers, swallow live toads, seduce Brigitte 
 yes, I would impale my heart on that picket-fence, if I needed 
 her for a crutch to drag me to your knees ! " 
 
 "You are, I must own, a most extraordinary man." 
 
 "Oh, no; my smallest as well as my greatest efforts are 
 but the reflection of the flame which you have kindled ; I 
 intend to become your son-in-law, so that we may never part. 
 My wife, oh, my God ! she could be no more than a machine 
 to bear children; but the supreme being, the divinity, will 
 be you," he whispered in her ear. 
 
 " You are Satan ! " said she, with a sort of terror. 
 
 " No, I am something of a poet, like all the people of my 
 country. Come, be my Josephine. I'll come and see you 
 to-morrow at two o'clock ; I long to see the pearl in its shell." 
 
 He slipped cleverly away after these words, not giving her 
 a chance to reply. 
 
 Flavie, who in all her life had not been made love to in the 
 language of romance, sat still, but happy ; her heart palpitated ; 
 she told herself it was difficult to resist such influence. Theo- 
 dose was admirably dressed and the only person present who 
 had the deportment of a gentleman ; in fact, he was the only
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 141 
 
 one with any style or air among the now rapidly arriving 
 guests. 
 
 Madame Prou, nee Barniol, came with two school-girls aged 
 seventeen, confided to her motherly care by families residing 
 in Martinique. M. Prou, a professor of rhetoric in a school 
 managed by priests, was of the Phellion model, but instead of 
 expanding on the surface in phrases and demonstrations, and 
 posing as an example, he was dry and sententious. He en- 
 joyed much influence in that part of the quarter bounded by 
 the boulevard of Mont-Parnasse, the Luxembourg, and the 
 Rue de Sevres. Phellion at once button-holed him on behalf 
 of Thuillier. 
 
 Felix, still under the aeep emotion imparted by Celeste's 
 generous act and the cry that sprang from the girl's heart, 
 though no one but Mme. Thuillier still bore it in mind, be- 
 came inspired by one of those ingenious impulses which form 
 the artlessness of true love ; but he was not to the " manor 
 born;" mathematics had made him rather absent-minded. 
 He stationed himself by Mme. Thuillier, imagining that Ce- 
 leste would be thither attracted. This ruse was admirably 
 successful. 
 
 "Who but must love Celeste?" said Felix to Mme. 
 Thuillieur. 
 
 " Poor little dear, no one in the world loves me but her," 
 replied the poor slave, restraining her tears. 
 
 " Oh ! madame, we both love you," said this candid Ma- 
 thieu Laensberg, smiling. 
 
 " What are you talking about ? " asked Celeste of her 
 godmother. 
 
 " My child," replied the pious victim, drawing her god- 
 child down to her and kissing her on the forehead, " he said 
 you both loved me." 
 
 " Do not be angry at my presumption, mademoiselle," said 
 the future candidate for the Academy of Sciences ; "but allow 
 me the honor of realizing it. It is my nature injustice re-
 
 142 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 volts me deeply. Yes, the Saviour of the world was right in 
 promising the future to the meek heart, to the sacrificed lamb. 
 But innocence is the sole consolation of the martyr. Happy 
 the man whom you will choose." 
 
 " Dear godmother, with what eyes does Monsieur Felix see 
 me?" 
 
 " He properly appreciates you, my little angel; I shall pray 
 God for both of you." 
 
 Noticing her daughter glowing with happiness, exhaling 
 rapture through every pore of her face, beautiful in the love- 
 liness of the first roses of an indirect declaration, Flavie felt 
 a pang of jealousy in her heart ; she went to Celeste and whis- 
 pered to her : 
 
 "You are not behaving at all nicely, my daughter, every- 
 body is observing you ; you will compromise yourself by talk- 
 ing so long with Monsieur Fe"lix without knowing whether it 
 has our approval." 
 
 " But, mamma, my godmother is here." 
 
 "Ah! pardon me, dear friend," said Mme. Colleville, "1 
 did not see you." 
 
 " Like all the rest of the world." 
 
 This retort stung Mme. Colleville, who took it as a barbed 
 arrow. She glanced haughtily at Felix, and said to Celeste : 
 "Sit there, my daughter," seating herself beside Mme. Thuil' 
 Her and pointing to a chair at her side. 
 
 Madame Thuillier sat pensively listening to the noise of a 
 witch's Sabbath made by her sister-in-law, a real horse at hard 
 work, lending her hand to help the two servants clear the 
 table, take everything out of the dining-room, to make room 
 for the dancers, vociferating like the captain of a frigate on 
 his quarter-deck while preparing for an attack : " Have you 
 any currant syrup? Run out and buy some orgeat!" or, 
 " There's not enough glasses ! and too little eau rougie ! 
 (wine and water) ; take those six bottles of vin ordinaire and 
 make more. Keep an eye on Coffinet, the porter, that he
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 148 
 
 doesn't get at anything ! Caroline, my girl, wait at the side- 
 board ; you shall have a slice of ham if they keep it up till 
 the morning hours. But no waste, mind you. Keep an eye 
 on everything. Pass the broom here, and do you put more oil 
 in the lamps; don't have any accidents. Arrange the remains 
 of the dessert, so as to make a show on the buffet ! Why 
 doesn't my sister come and give us a lift ? I can't think what 
 she's about a dawdle, her ! My God ! how slow she is ! 
 Here, take away these chairs ; they need all the room they 
 can get ! " 
 
 The announcement of a dance at the Thuilliers had got 
 noised about in the Luxembourg. As a consequence the salon 
 was full of Barniols, Collevilles, Phellions, Laudigeois, and 
 the like. 
 
 "And you, Brigitte, are you ready? " said Colleville, rush- 
 ing into the dining-room ; " it is nine o'clock. They are 
 packed as close as herrings in the salon ; the whole faubourg 
 Saint-Antoine is rushing in. Can't we move the piano in' 
 here?" 
 
 It were useless to paint a ball of this kind. The toilettes, 
 faces, conversations, were all in keeping with one detail which 
 will surely suffice the least lively imagination ; they were all 
 of one character and color. They passed round, on tarnished 
 shabby trays, common glasses filled with wine, eau rougie, and 
 can sucrie. At longer intervals appeared the trays bearing 
 orgeat and syrups. There were five card-tables for twenty-five 
 players and eighteen dancing couples. At one o'clock in the 
 morning Mme. Thuillier, Mile. Brigitte, Mme. Phellion and 
 her husband were dragged into a vulgar country dance known 
 as la Boulangere, in which Dutocq figured with a veil over his 
 head, and looking like a Kabyl.* When this interminable 
 round had lasted for a full hour, and Brigitte announced 
 supper, they wished to carry her in triumph ; but she per- 
 ceived the necessity of hiding a dozen bottles of old Bur- 
 * Berber, native of Barbary.
 
 144 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 gundy wine. Everybody was so well pleased, matrons as well 
 as maids, that Thuillier was able to say : 
 
 " Well, this morning, we little thought we should have such 
 fun to-night." 
 
 "One never has so much pleasure," said Cardot, "than at 
 this sort of impromptu dance. Don't talk to me of parties 
 at which each one is on his ceremony ! " 
 
 This opinion is an axiom among the middle-classes. 
 
 "Ah, bah ! " said Madame Minard, "for me I love my 
 papa's way. I love those of my mamma." 
 
 " We did not mean that remark for you, madame ; at your 
 home pleasure elects to reign," said Dutocq. 
 
 The Boulangerc finished, Thdodose drew Dutocq from the 
 buffet, where he was preparing to eat a slice of tongue, and 
 said : 
 
 " Let's be off, for to-morrow we must see C6rizet ; we need 
 to think over that affair; it is not quite so easily managed as 
 C^rizet seems to think." 
 
 "And why?" asked Dutocq, eating his tongue sandwich 
 as he went toward the salon. 
 
 " But you know the laws?" 
 
 " I know enough to be aware of the dangers of the busi- 
 ness. If the notary wants the house and we filch it from 
 him, he has ways and means by which to recover it ; he can 
 put himself in the skin of a recorded creditor. By the 
 present state of the law of mortgage, when a house is sold at 
 the behest of creditors, and if the amount realized is not suffi- 
 cient to pay all creditors, they have the right to bid it in ; 
 and the notary, once caught, will be twice shy." 
 
 "This has been one of the greatest days in our life," said 
 Brigitte to her brother, when, at half-past two o'clock in the 
 morning, they were alone in the deserted salon. " What an 
 honor to be chosen by your fellow-citizens." 
 
 "You don't tumble to one fact, though, Brigitte; we owe 
 all this, my child, to one man "
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 145 
 
 "To whom?" 
 
 " Our friend la Peyrade." 
 
 It was not on the next day, Monday, but the next but one, 
 Tuesday, that Dutocq and Theodose called on Cerizet, it 
 having been called to the latter's attention the fact that on 
 Sundays and Mondays he took advantage of a total lack of 
 business, these days being devoted to dissipation by the com- 
 mon people. The house to which their steps were bent is a 
 striking feature of the faubourg Saint-Jacques. It has never 
 been known, and no commission has inquired into, why or 
 for what reason or cause certain quarters of Paris sink into 
 vice and vulgarity, morally as well as physically ; how the old 
 centres of the Court and the church, the Luxembourg and the 
 Latin quarter, have become what they are to-day, in spite of 
 the finest palaces in the world, in spite of the soaring dome of 
 Sainte-Genevieve, that of Mansard's on the Val-de-Grzlce, and 
 the charms of the Jardin des Plantes. One asks himself why 
 the elegance of life has shaken the dust of that quarter from 
 off its feet the Phellion and Thuillier houses swarm here, 
 and boarding-houses displace the formerly so numerous noble 
 and religious edifices ; and why mud and dirty forms of trade 
 and poverty have fastened on this hill, instead of spreading 
 out upon the plain beyond the old and noble city. Once 
 dead, the angel whose beneficent sway had blessed this quarter, 
 the lowest form of usury rushed in. To the Councilor Popi- 
 not succeeded a Cerizet ; and, stranger still, a good matter 
 for study, the effects produced, socially speaking, were little 
 different. Popinot loaned without interest, and was willing 
 to lose; Cerizet lost-nothing, and compelled the unfortunates 
 to work hard and learn wisdom. The poor adored Popinot, 
 but they did not hate Cerizet. Here is the lowest round of 
 Parisian finance. At the top the firm of Nucingen, the Kel- 
 lers, the du Tillets, the Mongenods; a little further down, 
 the Palmas, the Gigonnets, the Gobsecks; still lower, the 
 10
 
 148 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 Samanou, the Chaboisseaus, the Barbets ; then, ending, after 
 the pawnshops, that king of usurers, who spreads his nets at 
 the corners .of the streets to entangle all the vario'us forms of 
 misery and miss none that sharp spider, Cerizet. 
 
 This house, blotched with nitre, the walls of which oozed a 
 fetid humidity r was enameled all over with huge slabs of mold. 
 Standing at the corner of the Rue des Postes and the Rue des 
 Poules, it showed a first-floor partly occupied by a vendor of 
 the commonest kind of wine, a bright-red bottle painted as a 
 sign ; the windows decorated with red calico curtains; furnished 
 with a leaden counter and armed with formidable bars. 
 
 Above the door of an odious court hung a frightful lantern, 
 on which was painted " Night Lodgings Here." The outer 
 walls displayed iron cross-clamps, apparently to show the 
 insecurity of the building of which the wine merchant was the 
 owner, and who occupied the entresol in addition to the store. 
 Madame the Widow Poiret (nte Michonneau) kept the fur- 
 nished rooms, which composed the second, third, and fourth 
 floors, arranged in chambers for the use of laborers and the 
 poorest class of students. 
 
 C6rizet occupied one room on the first floor and one in the 
 entresol, to which he ascended by an interior stairway ; this 
 upper room looked out upon a horrible courtyard, from which 
 arose mephitic odors. Cerizet gave forty francs for his 
 breakfast and dinner; he thus conciliated the hostess of this 
 boarding-house ; he made himself acceptable to the wine- 
 dealer, too, by procuring him an enormous trade in his wines 
 and spirits, profits realized before the sun was up. The 
 counting-rooms of the Sieur Cadenet were opened even before 
 those of Cerizet, who began his operations on Tuesday, by 
 three o'clock in the morning in summer and five in winter. 
 
 The opening of the Great Market, which so many of his male 
 and female clients attended, determined Cirizet's early hours 
 for his frightful transactions. Cadenet, in consideration of the 
 custom of Cerizet's clients, had rented to him the two rooms
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 147 
 
 for eighty francs a year, giving him a lease for twelve years, and 
 which Cdrizet alone had the right to break, without paying 
 indemnity, at three months' notice. Every day Cadenet 
 brought up a bottle of excellent wine for the dinner of this 
 precious tenant; and when Cerizet was "short," he had only 
 to say : "Cadenet, my good fellow, let me have a hundred 
 crowns." But he always faithfully repaid them. Cadenet 
 was said to have proof that the Widow Poiret had put in 
 Cirizet's hands some two thousand francs for investment ; this 
 may explain his rapid increase in business. 
 
 The " lender by the little week " was perfectly safe in his 
 den, where he could have, if needed, strong assistance. For 
 on certain mornings there would be not less than sixty to 
 eighty people, men and women, either in the wine-dealer's, 
 in the court, sitting on the stairs, or in his office, for the 
 distrustful Ce"rizet would only admit six persons at once. The 
 first comers were the first served, and, as each one was only 
 admitted according to his number, the wine-dealer or his head- 
 helper chalked it on the men's hats and on the backs of the 
 women. 
 
 They would sell, like cabmen in a line, one number high 
 up for one lower down, with something to boot. On certain 
 days when business was pressing in the Market, a head number 
 would fetch as much as a glass of brandy and a sou. The 
 numbers as they went out of Cdrizet's office bawled out the 
 succeeding numbers, and, if any dispute arose, it was soon 
 quieted by Cadenet saying : 
 
 "When you succeed in getting the police here, will you 
 get your advances? He would shut up shop." 
 
 Cerizet's name was He. When, in the course of the day, 
 an unfortunate, despairing woman, without an atom of bread 
 in the house, seeing her children pale with hunger, would 
 'come to borrow ten or twenty sous: 
 
 " Is He here ? " she would anxiously ask the wine-dealer oi 
 his head-helper.
 
 148 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 Cadenet, who seemed like an angel to these poor mothers, 
 would reply : 
 
 " He told me you were an honest woman and that I might 
 give you forty sous. You know what you must do." And, 
 a strange thing, He was blessed, even as had been Popinot 
 before him. 
 
 But they cursed Cerizet on Sunday morning, when accounts 
 were straightened up; they cursed him still more on Saturday, 
 when it became necessary to work in order to pay the sum 
 borrowed, with interest. Still he was Providence, he was God, 
 from Tuesday to Friday, every week. 
 
 His ofhce was formerly the kitchen of the next story ; the 
 floor was bare, smoke still discolored the once whitewashed 
 walls and ceiling, and the stone floor retained and exhaled 
 moisture. The window was furnished with inside shutters 
 of iron and enormously thick, and fastened with an iron-bar. 
 The door commanded respect by a similar armor. 
 
 At the end of the room, in an angle, was a spiral stair 
 brought from some demolished store and bought by Cadenet 
 on the Rue Chapon, who had fitted it into the entresol. To 
 prevent all communication with the second floor, Cerizet had 
 stipulated that the door opening on to the landing should 
 be walled up. The place had thus became a fortress. He 
 shaved himself before a glass on the mantel. He owned two 
 pairs of muslin sheets and six cotton shirts ; the rest of his 
 attire being of equal elegance. Once or twice Cadenet had 
 seen Cerizet dressed as a fashionable dandy ; so it must be 
 that he kept hidden away in the bottom drawer of his 
 bureau a complete disguise in which he could go to the opera, 
 or see society and yet not be recognized, for, only for his 
 voice, Cadenet would have asked him: " What can I do for 
 you?" 
 
 Cerizet, Cadenet and his two helpers lived in the bosom of 
 frightful misery, but preserved the calmness of undertakers 
 in the midst of the heirs of the deceased, of old sergeants of the
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES* 149 
 
 Guard among heaps of the dead ; they no more shuddered 
 when they heard the cries of the famishing or of despair than do 
 surgeons groan when they hear their patients in the hospitals ; 
 they said, as the soldiers and the nurses said : " Have pa- 
 tience, a little courge ! Be brave ! No use to kill yourself! 
 One can get used to anything; have a little reason ! " 
 
 Although Cerizet took the precaution of hiding the money 
 necessary for his morning's operations in the double seat of 
 the chair on which he sat, never taking out more than one 
 hundred francs at a time, and always between the exit of one 
 batch of clients and the entry of another keeping his door 
 locked and not opening it until the cash was in his pocket 
 as a matter of fact, he need have feared nothing from the 
 numerous despairs which found their way to this rendezvous 
 of money. Undoubtedly there are many different ways of 
 being honest and virtuous, and the " Monograph of Virtue "* 
 has no other basis than this social axiom. Cerizet depended on 
 the honor of his clients ; he never made a mistake, nor did 
 his poor borrowers ; it was the reciprocity of capital and 
 desires. Many times Cerizet, who was born one of the 
 people, had corrected one week the unseen error of a previous 
 week, to the benefit of some poor devil who had not dis- 
 covered it. He went by the name of dog, but he was an 
 honest dog; his word in the midst of that city of sorrows was 
 sacred. A woman died who owed thirty francs. 
 
 " There are my profits," said he to the assemblage, " and 
 you howl at me ! Nevertheless I shall not trouble the kids ; 
 in fact, Cadenet has taken them bread and piquette'' (wine- 
 lees or paltry wine). 
 
 Since that, a smart business stroke, it was said of him in 
 the faubourgs : 
 
 " He's not such a bad sort." 
 
 * The Monographie de la vertu; a work in the same vein as the Phvs- 
 iologit du marriage, on which the author has been working since 1833, 
 when it was first announced. AUTHOR'S NOTE.
 
 150 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 The "loan by the little week," as heard from Cerizet's 
 customers, is not, taking all things into account, so cruel a 
 system as the pawnbroker's. Cerizet gave ten francs on 
 Tuesday on condition that he received twelve on Sunday 
 morning. In five weeks he doubled his capital, but he had 
 frequent compositions. His kindness consisted in accepting, 
 from time to time, eleven francs and fifty centimes, and the 
 rest stood over. When he loaned fifty francs for sixty to a 
 little huckster, or a hundred francs for one hundred and 
 twenty to a vendor of peat, he ran some risk. 
 
 When they arrived at the Rue des Poules by way of the 
 Rue des Postes, Theodose and Dutocq saw a great crowd of 
 men and women, and, by the light from the lamps in the 
 wine-dealer's windows, they were horrified at seeing that mass 
 of red faces, seamed, grimy, and haggard ; dejected by suf- 
 fering, withered, distorted, bloated with wine, emaciated With 
 spirits ; some resigned, some threatening, some jeering, some 
 sarcastic, and others stupefied, all clad in the miserable rags 
 which no caricaturist can surpass in his most extravagant 
 phantasies. 
 
 " I shall be recognized," said Theodose. " We were fool- 
 ish to come here in the midst of his business." 
 
 " Then let us all meet at the Cheval Rouge, on the Tour- 
 nelle quay," replied Dutocq. " It won't matter about them 
 seeing me." 
 
 Dutocq went alone into the midst of that congress of beg- 
 gars, and he heard his own name from mouth to mouth, for it 
 was almost impossible that some jail-bird should be met who 
 was not familiar with his justice-court, just as sure as Theodose 
 would have encountered some client. 
 
 In these quarters the justice of the peace is the supreme 
 tribunal ; all legal authority is centred in his court, especially 
 since legislation has made his decisions final in all cases in- 
 volving not more than one hundred and forty francs. A 
 passage was made for the clerk, who was not feared less than
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. Ill 
 
 the Judge himself. He saw women on the stairs, a horrible 
 display like flowers ranged on stages, amongst them were 
 some young, pale, and suffering. The diversity of colors in 
 fichus, bonnets, dresses, and aprons rendered the comparison 
 more exact, perhaps, than it should be. Dutocq was nearly 
 asphyxiated when he opened the door of the rooni in which 
 already sixty persons had left their odors. 
 
 "Your number! the number!" shouted a host of voices. 
 
 " Hold your jaw! " cried a hoarse voice from the street, 
 " that's the judge's pen ! " 
 
 "It can't be done like that, Daddy Lantimeche," Ce'rizet 
 was saying to a tail, old man, who appeared to be about 
 seventy, standing in front of him, a red woolen cap in his 
 hand, showing a bald head, and a breast covered with white 
 hairs visiVle through his shabby blouse. " Tell me what you 
 want a hundred francs for? even to get back one hundred 
 and twenty it can't be let loose like a dog in a church." 
 
 The five other customers present, among whom were two 
 women nursing infants, one suckling her baby, the other one 
 knitting, burst out laughing. 
 
 When he saw Dutocq, Cerizet rose respectfully and went 
 hastily to meet him. 
 
 "You can have time to think about it; for, see you, I'm 
 not satisfied a hundred francs demanded by a blacksmith's 
 helper." 
 
 "But it's to start an invention," cried the old workman. 
 
 "An invention and a hundred francs, you don't know the 
 laws; it takes two thousand francs," said Dutocq. "You 
 must get a patent, you need backers." 
 
 "That's the truth," said Cdrizet, who reckoned on such 
 chances ; " go now, daddy, and come again to-morrow morn- 
 ing at six o'clock; we can't talk invention before others." 
 
 Cerizet listened to Dutocq, whose first words were : 
 
 " If all goes right, half profits." 
 
 " Why did you get up as early as this to say that to me ? "
 
 152 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 asked the distrustful Cerizet, much annoyed at the mention 
 of half profits. " You could have seen me at the office." 
 
 And he looked askance at Dutocq, who, while telling 'him 
 how matters stood, speaking of Claparon and the necessity 
 of pushing Theodose's affair as rapidly as possible, seemed 
 confused. t 
 
 "You could have seen me at the office," replied Cerizet, 
 as he conducted Dutocq to the door. 
 
 "There's one," said he, resuming his seat, "who seems to 
 me to have blown out the lantern so that I may not see clearly. 
 Well, I'll give up that job as copyist. Ah ! your turn, my 
 little mother!" he exclaimed. "You invent children! 
 That's amusing, too. It's a good enough game, and they all 
 do it." 
 
 It is useless to recount the conversation which took place 
 between the three associates, the more so as they alluded to 
 the arrangements to be the basis of certain confidences be- 
 tween Thdodose and Mile. Thuillier ; but it is essential to 
 say that la Peyrade's craftiness seemed to dismay Cerizet and 
 Dutocq. Now, the banker of the poor, finding his antagonists 
 such strong players, resolved to make sure of his own stake 
 at the first chance. To win the game by cheating expert 
 gamblers is an inspiration to the votaries of the green-cloth. 
 From this came the terrible blow that la Peyrade was destined 
 to receive. 
 
 He had his hands filled in following the twinings of Dutocq 
 and Cerizet ; they were both experts in humbug. An immo- 
 bile face like Talleyrand's would have made them break at 
 once with the Provencal, it was necessary to make a show of 
 confidence and of playing above-board, which is certainly the 
 acme of art. To delude the pit is an every-day triumph, but 
 to take in Mile. Mars, Frederick Lemaitre, Potier, Talma, 
 and Monrose is the height of acting. 
 
 The day after this conference la Peyrade dined with the
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 153 
 
 Thuilliers, and on the pretext of paying a visit carried off his 
 wife, leaving Thdodose with Brigitte. Neither Theodose, nor 
 Thuillier, nor his sister were duped by this comedy ; but the 
 old buck of the Empire gave it the name of diplomacy. 
 
 " Young man, do not take advantage of my sister's inno- 
 cence, respect it," said Thuillier as he departed. 
 
 To get the upper hand of Brigitte would be in this long 
 struggle like carrying the great redoubt of the Moskowa. 
 But it was necessary to possess that old maid as the devil was 
 said to possess man in the Middle Ages, and to prevent any 
 possible awakening by her. He had studied and measured 
 the ground for the past three days. Flattery, that almost in- 
 fallible means in adroit hands, would not be listened to by a 
 woman who for a very long time had known that she was with- 
 out beauty. But to a man of powerful will nothing is impreg- 
 nable ; the Lamarques could never have failed to carry Caprea. 
 
 "You have shown your affection for us," said Brigitte, 
 when they were alone. 
 
 "Your brother has told you?" 
 
 " No ; he merely said you wished to speak with me." 
 
 "Yes, mademoiselle, for you are the man of the family; 
 but in reflecting over this matter I find a number of dangers, 
 such as a man risks only for those who are near and dear to 
 him. A whole fortune is involved, thirty to forty thousand 
 francs a year, and not in the least speculative a freehold. 
 The need of giving a fortune to Thuillier fascinated me from 
 the first. I told him frankly that in working for his interests 
 I advanced my own, as I will later also explain to you. If 
 he wishes to be a deputy, two things are absolutely necessary : 
 to comply with the law as to assessment, then to win some 
 kind of celebrity for his name. If I push my devotion to the 
 extent of assisting him in writing a book on some political 
 question no matter what so as to get him that celebrity, I 
 must needs think of his property also ; it would be absurd of 
 you to give him this house."
 
 154 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 " What! for ray brother? Why, I'd put it in his name to- 
 morrow," exclaimed Brigitte; "you don't know me." 
 
 "I do not entirely know you," said la Peyrade, "but I 
 know enough to cause me to regret that I did not acquaint 
 you with the whole business since its origin." 
 
 "But this business," said Brigitte, "of what nature are the 
 obstacles?" 
 
 "Mademoiselle, the difficulty is existent in my conscience 
 ^ I certainly could not help you in this matter without first 
 consulting my confessor. To the world, oh, the affair is per- 
 fectly legal, .and I am you understand me an authorized 
 barrister, a member of the bar controlled by most rigid rules; 
 I am incapable of suggesting an enterprise which might give 
 rise to blame. My excuse, first, is that I don't accept a single 
 iiard out of it." 
 
 Brigitte was on a gridiron, her face was aflame ; she broke 
 her wool, knotted it together again, and did not know how to 
 contain herself. 
 
 "One can't do that," said she; "in this day a rental of 
 forty thousand francs means a property costing one million 
 eight hundred thousand francs." 
 
 " Well, you shall see the property and estimate its probable 
 revenue, of which I can make Thuillier the owner for fifty 
 thousand francs." 
 
 "Well, then, you only get us that !" exclaimed Brigitte, 
 wound up to the highest pitch by the key of her avarice. " Go 
 on, my dear Monsieur Th6odose " 
 
 She stopped short. 
 
 "Well, mademoiselle." 
 
 "You will perhaps have labored to your own advan- 
 tage." 
 
 "Ah! if Thuillier has told you ray secret, I leave your 
 house." 
 
 Brigitte looked up. 
 
 " Has he told you that I love Celeste?"
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 155 
 
 "No; as I'm an honest woman!" exclaimed Brigitte; 
 " but I myself was just about to speak of her." 
 
 " And to offer her to me? Oh ! no, may God forgive us; 
 I want her only of her free choice. No, no, all I ask of you 
 is your good-will and favor. Promise me that, treat me as a 
 son ; should you do this I will abide by your decision in this 
 matter ; I will not consult my confessor. You can help me 
 in so many ways, you could attend to the details of our for- 
 tune, so that I need not neglect anything that would tend to 
 my political career. I admired you on Sunday evening. 
 How you made things fly ; I guess the dining-room was cleared 
 out in ten minutes. Without leaving your home, all was at 
 hand for the refreshments and supper. ' There/ said I to 
 myself, ' is a mistress-woman.' ' 
 
 Brigitte's nostrils dilated, she breathed in the words of 
 the young lawyer. He looked askance at her to enjoy his 
 triumph ; he had twanged the chord responsive. 
 
 "Now here is where we stand, my dear aunt, for you are 
 an aunt in some sort " 
 
 " Hush you, naughty fellow ! " said Brigitte, " and go on.** 
 
 "Well, the matter crudely is this: remark that I com* 
 promise myself by telling you these secrets, for they are con- 
 fided to me as an attorney. We are both, therefore, as it 
 were, committing a crime lese-cabinet or legal high treason. 
 A notary of Paris (although the law does not permit specula- 
 tion by notaries) was in copartnership with an architect; 
 they bought land and built upon it ; just now they are embar- 
 rassed the bottom dropped out of things. Among these 
 houses is an excellent one not quite finished ; this must con- 
 sequently be sold at a great loss, so that the price asked is only 
 one hundred thousand francs, although the land and building 
 cost at the least four hundred thousand. The interior to 
 complete will run up to fifty thousand more. Now, by its 
 location, this house, when completed, will bring in at teast 
 forty thousand francs, exclusive of taxes." 
 
 T
 
 156 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "Well, and of what does the difficulty consist?" 
 
 "Just this: the notary wants to save this piece of cake 
 from the wreck he must abandon ; under the name of a friend 
 he is the creditor who petitions for the sale of the property by 
 the assignee of the bankruptcy. It has not gone into court, 
 the costs would count up so rapidly; the sale is by voluntary 
 agreement. This notary's friend is a client of mine; my 
 client is a poor devil who says to me: 'There's a fortune to 
 be made out of that house by tricking the notary.' " 
 
 "That's fair in trade," said Brigitte quickly. 
 
 "If this were the only obstacle," answered Theodose, "it 
 would be as a friend of mine said to a pupil of his who com- 
 plained of the difficulties encountered in producing a master- 
 piece of painting : { My dear boy, were it not so footmen would 
 paint.' But, mademoiselle, if we get the better of this notary 
 for he deserves it, he has compromised many private for- 
 tunes it might be hard to do it at a second turn. When one 
 purchases real estate, that is at a low price at forced sale, the 
 mortagees have the right, until the expiration of a certain 
 fixed time, to buy it in ; that is to offer a larger sum and keep 
 the property. If this trickster can't be tricked as to the sale 
 being a genuine one and hindered from raising the price until 
 the time limit expires, well, then, some other scheme must be 
 worked. But is this business legal ? Shall a man undertake 
 such for the benefit of a family he seeks to enter ? That is a 
 question my mind has been revolving for the past three days." 
 
 It must be admitted that this made Brigitte pause ; Theo- 
 dose put forth the last resource : 
 
 " Take to-night for reflection ; to-morrow we will talk it 
 over." 
 
 "Listen, my boy," said Brigitte, looking almost lovingly 
 t the lawyer ; "the first thing is to see the house. Where 
 is it ? " 
 
 " Near the Madeleine. In ten years that will be the heart 
 of Paris. And, you know, land has been in request there
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 15? 
 
 since 1819; du Tillet the banker made his fortune there. 
 Birotteau, the perfumer, Roguin, the notary, were ruined by 
 speculating there too wildly." 
 
 " Can we go there to-morrow?" 
 
 " Dear aunt, I am at your command." 
 
 "Mercy me! don't call me that before folk. As to this 
 business," she went on, "one must see the house before de- 
 ciding." 
 
 "It has six stories; nine windows in front, a fine court- 
 yard, four stores and stands on a corner. Oh ! that notary 
 is smart. But events may occur that will depreciate the 
 Funds, one hundred and twenty-two, it is a fabulous price ; I 
 should hurry to sell your own and Madame Thuillier's and 
 purchase this fine piece of property for Thuillier; and you 
 could recover the fortune of that poor, pious creature by the 
 savings from the rental." 
 
 Brigitte licked her lips ; she saw how she might keep her 
 own fortune intact, and enrich her brother by making this 
 use of Mme. Thuillier's fortune. 
 
 "My brother is right," said she to Theodose, "you are a 
 remarkable man, you will go far " 
 
 "And he will march before me," replied Theodose, with 
 an artlessness that captivated the old maid. 
 
 " Till to-morrow, then, toward noon, when we will view the 
 house," said Brigitte, holding out her hand for Theodose to 
 shake ; but he pressed upon it a kiss, respectful and tender. 
 
 "Adieu, my boy," said she, as she reached the door; "it 
 is God himself who has placed him in our house," she added 
 to herself. 
 
 Five days later, in the month of April, the ordinance was 
 issued for the nomination of a member of the Municipal 
 Council; it was inserted in the "Moniteur" and placarded 
 all about Paris. Brigitte was in a charming humor ; she had 
 verified the statements of Theodose ; the property had been 
 inspected by old Chaffaroux, a wealthy ex-contractor, an
 
 158 TffE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 uncle of the Comtesse du Bruel, formerly Tullia the dancer, 
 at one time a crony of Flavie Colleville's, who had been 
 privately requested to do this office for Brigitte. Poor Grin- 
 dot, the architect who was interested with the notary in this 
 speculation, thought he was being employed in the interests 
 of the contractor; the old fellow thought he was acting in 
 the interest of his niece, Flavie, and he passed it as in his 
 opinion only thirty thousand francs would be necessary to 
 thoroughly finish the property. Thus in one week la Peyrade 
 became Brigitte's god ; she proved to him that fortune should 
 be seized when it presented itself. 
 
 "Beside, if there is any sin in the affair," said she, as they 
 stood in the middle of the garden, "you can confess it." 
 
 "There, my friend," said Thuillier, "what, the devil! 
 a man owes himself to his relations." 
 
 "I have decided to do it," said la Peyrade. "Only, my 
 good friend, and you too, my little aunt, keep absolute 
 secrecy regarding me in this matter ; and do not pay heed to 
 the calumnies which the men I nip will serve out against me. 
 I shall become, see you, a vagabond, ambitious, a swindler, a 
 Jesuit can you hear such unmoved ? " 
 
 "Be easy," said Brigitte. 
 
 From that day forward Thuillier was " my good friend." 
 Good friend was the name given him by Thdodose, with a vari- 
 ety of inflections of voice fitted to the occasion. My "little 
 aunt," a name which vastly flattered Brigitte, was only used 
 by him in the privacy of the family circle. The activity of 
 the Thuillier workers was extreme. Great and small put their 
 hands to the plough. On April 3oth, Thuillier was elected 
 by an immense majority and was proclaimed member of the 
 Council-general of the department of the Seine. On May 
 ist he went to the Tuileries with the municipal body to con- 
 gratulate the King on his fete day. He returned radiant. 
 He had trod the path of Minard.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 159 
 
 Ten days later a yellow placard announced the sale of the 
 house after due publication ; the price of upset being seventy- 
 five thousand francs ; the final adjudication to be made on 
 July ist. On this matter Claparon and Cerizet had an argu- 
 ment by which the latter pledged fifteen thousand francs to 
 Claparon, if he kept the notary deceived until the expiration 
 of the time needed to withdraw the property. This money was 
 to go through la Peyrade's hands, being furnished by Mile. 
 Thuillier. The young notary, one of those who run after 
 fortune instead of leisurely following it, saw another future 
 ahead ; he was trying to so manage his present affairs as to be 
 at liberty to lay hands thereon. He had an interview with 
 Claparon at midnight at which he offered him ten thousand 
 france to secure him, this amount only to be paid on receipt 
 of a counter-deed from the nominal purchaser of the property. 
 He felt sure of his man, for he knew that Claparon needed this 
 amount to extricate himself from his liabilities. 
 
 Then Cerizet offered twelve thousand francs to Claparon 
 and at once demanded fifteen thousand from la Peyrade, in- 
 tending to put the balance in his own pocket. All these scenes 
 between the four men were seasoned with pretty words about 
 sentiment and honesty, on the honor that men owed to each 
 other in business transactions. Meanwhile Theodose was 
 assisting the new councilor in writing his masterly work ; he 
 became absolutely necessary to him ; he was each day more 
 convinced that Th6odose's marriage to Celeste was a ne- 
 cessity. Now Theodose made an admirable "friend of the 
 family;" he disarmed jealousy by his manner of effacing 
 himself; he was more like a new piece of furniture than any- 
 thing else ; this allayed all the suspicion of the Mindards and 
 Phellions, who fondly thought he had been found too light in 
 the balance by both Brigitte and Thuillier. 
 
 " He thinks that perhaps my sister may put him in her 
 will," said Thuillier to Minard, one day; "he doesn't know 
 her, though."
 
 160 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 This speech, prompted by Theodose, calmed Minard's dis- 
 trust. It gave, him what he wanted more than all, the con- 
 tempt of his antagonists. For four months in succession his 
 face maintained the torpid expression of a snake which has 
 swallowed and is digesting its prey. 
 
 "And you," said he to Flavic, the evening before the 
 purchase of the house, "don't you pity me? A man like 
 me, creeping like a cat, having to choke down every retort, 
 chewing my gall, submitting to your rebuffs." 
 
 "My friend, my child," said Flavie, who still remained 
 undecided about him. 
 
 All this time Felix Phellion was instructing young Colle- 
 ville. Flavie was for ever making for him either a purse, a 
 pair of slippers, a cigar case, and so on for the happy young 
 man. Old Phellion rubbed his hands as he realized how 
 things were ; he already saw Celeste wedded to his fine, his 
 noble Felix. 
 
 As stated, the final sale was fixed for the end of July. 
 Theodose, therefore, advised Mile. Thuillier to be prepared 
 with the necessary cash ; accordingly, she sold out her own 
 and sister-in-law's Funds. The catastrophe of the treaty of 
 the four powers, an insult to France, but now a matter of his- 
 tory, is necessary to be retold that the reader may thus 
 understand that Funds declined from July to the end of 
 August ; this was caused by the prospect of war, a fear 
 which M. Thiers did too much to promote; they fell twenty 
 francs and Three-per-cents went down to sixty. This also had 
 an evil influence on real estate in Paris, which rapidly de- 
 clined. All this caused Theodose to be regarded as a 
 prophet. Thus, when the purchase was completed, Thuil- 
 lier's importance was magnified tenfold. Meanwhile, Th6o- 
 dose, assured of his supremacy, put on a rather less servile 
 manner. Brigitte and Thuillier said to him once : 
 
 " Nothing can take from you our esteem ; in this house you 
 are in your own home ; the opinion of Minard and Phellion,
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 161 
 
 which you seem to fear, is not of more value to us than a line 
 by Victor Hugo. Let them talk ; hold your head up ! " 
 
 She saw her brother secure of his forty thousand francs per 
 annum, exclusive of his pension ; she had reinvested Mme. 
 Thuillier's fortune in Three-per-cents at sixty, which brought 
 her in twelve thousand francs. Her own balance was also 
 thus invested and was of the annual value of ten thousand 
 francs ; for the future she would only invest in the Funds ; she 
 had now, herself, a total income of eighteen thousand francs, 
 beside the house in which they lived and which she valued at 
 eight thousand. 
 
 " We are worth quite as much as the Minards," she said. 
 
 "Don't be too ready to sing victory/' said Thdodose ; 
 " the right of exemption does not expire for a week yet. I 
 have attended to your affairs, but my own are in an awful 
 mess." 
 
 "My dear boy, you have friends! " cried Brigitte ; "and 
 if you ever need twenty-five louis, you can find them here." 
 
 Theodose at this speech exchanged a smile of meaning 
 with Thuillier, who hastened to take him off, saying to him : 
 
 " Excuse my poor sister ; she sees the world through the 
 mouth of a bottle. But if you want twenty-five thousand 
 francs, I will lend them to you out of my first rents," he 
 added. 
 
 " Thuillier, I have a rope around my neck," cried Tho- 
 dose. " Ever since I have been a lawyer I have had to give 
 acceptances. But mum, not a word," added Theodose, 
 frightened himself at having let the cat out of the bag. 
 " I'm in the clutches of scoundrels, but I hope to best them." 
 
 In telling this secret Theodose had a double purpose : first, 
 to test Thuillier, next to avert a terrible blow, liable at any 
 day to be dealt him in the secret, sinister struggle in which 
 he was engaged. This was it : 
 
 In the midst of the deep poverty through which he had 
 passed, none but Cerizet had gone to see him in the garret 
 11
 
 162 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 where, in cold weather, he had lain in bed for lack of clothes. 
 He had but one shirt left. For three days he lived on one 
 loaf of bread, carefully cut into measured pieces, and asking 
 himself: "What next?" Just then his former protector 
 appeared, just pardoned out of prison. Of the projects 
 which these two men then formed before the fire of kindling- 
 wood, one wrapped in his landlady's bed-quilt, the other in 
 his infamy, it is needless to recapitulate. The following day, 
 Cerizet, who had talked with Dutocq, returned, bringing 
 with him a pair of trousers, a vest, coat, hat, and boots, all 
 purchased in the Temple ; then carried him off to dinner. 
 The Provencal ate at Pinson's, Rue de 1'Ancienne Come"die, 
 half of a dinner costing forty-seven francs. At dessert, be- 
 tween two glasses of wine, Cdrizet said to his friend : 
 
 "Will you sign acceptances for me for fifty thousand francs, 
 giving yourself the title of barrister? " 
 
 "You couldn't raise five thousand francs on them," re- 
 plied The"odose. 
 
 "That doesn't concern you; you'll pay all right; this is 
 our business, or monsieur's who has just regaled us. It is 
 an affair in which you risk nothing, but by which you will 
 obtain the title of barrister, a good clientage, and the hand of 
 a girl in marriage of the age of an old dog, and who is worth 
 not less than twenty to thirty thousand francs a year. Neither 
 Dutocq nor myself can marry her ; we must rig you up, give 
 you the air of an honorable man, feed and lodge you, and fix 
 you up generally. Therefore, we shall need our guarantee. 
 I don't say this for myself, but for monsieur, who will have 
 the use of my name. We equip you as a pirate that does the 
 white slave trade, eh ! If we don't capture that dot, well, 
 we'll try some other little scheme. Between ourselves we 
 needn't handle things with tongs that's sure. We'll give 
 you instructions later. Here's the stamps." 
 
 " Waiter, a pen and the ink ! " cried The"odose. 
 
 " That's your sort of man," said Dutocq.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 163 
 
 "Sign 'Th6odose de la Peyrade,' and add 'Barrister, 
 Rue Saint-Dominique-d'Enfer,' under the words: 'Accepted 
 for ten thousand francs.' We'll date the notes and sue you, 
 of course secretly, so as to be able to capture and imprison 
 your body. The privateer-owner must have some security 
 when the captain and brig are at sea." 
 
 On the morrow the clerk of the judge served la Peyrade 
 for Cerizet, secretly. The Tribunal of Commerce has hun- 
 dreds of such cases every term. The strict rules of the Asso- 
 ciation of Barristers would cause the disbarring of a member 
 liable to be committed to Clichy. Thus Cerizet and Dutocq 
 had their measures taken to secure twenty-five thousand francs 
 each out of Celeste's dot. Now, when Th6odose signed the 
 notes he only saw his living assured, but when he saw the 
 horizon growing clearer, as he rose step by step to a higher 
 position on the social ladder, then he wished to be rid of his 
 two associates. Now, in asking twenty-five thousand francs 
 of Thuillier he hoped to settle his notes to Cerizet on a fifty 
 per cent, basis. 
 
 Up to the present neither of the three men had kicked or 
 groaned. Each knew his own strength and recognized his 
 danger. Equals in distrust, in watchfulness, and in apparent 
 confidence; equals also in stolid silence and gloomy looks 
 when mutual suspicion arose to the surface, betrayed by the 
 play of their features or words. For two months past Theo- 
 dose had gradually acquired the strength of a detached for- 
 tress. But Dutocq and Cerizet had under their skiff a mass 
 of powder, the torch already alight ; but the wind might blow 
 out the match or the devil flood the mine. 
 
 A reaction of envy was gathering like an avalanche in 
 Cerizet. Dutocq saw himself at the mercy of his copyist, 
 who had become enriched. Theodose would have liked to 
 burn his partners, if only he could be assured that their papers 
 would be consumed with them. Thdodose lived three lives in 
 hell as he thought of how the cards might turn, then of hi
 
 164 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 own game, and then of the future. His speech to Thuillier 
 was the cry of despair; he had thrown his sounding-lead into 
 the waters of the old bourgeois and had found there no more 
 than twenty-five thousand francs. 
 
 "And," said he to himself, "perhaps nothing, one month 
 hence." 
 
 He now hated the Thuilliers with a profound hatred. But 
 he held Thuillier by the harpoon stuck into the man's vanity 
 that of the projected work, " Taxation and Redemption ; " 
 he intended rearranging the ideas of "The Globe" in its 
 Saint-Simonism, and coloring them with his fervid Southern 
 diction. 
 
 The evening before the right of redemption of equity ex- 
 pired Claparon and Cerizet proceeded thus : Cerizet, to whom 
 the other had given the password and the address of the 
 notary's retreat, went out to him, and said : 
 
 " One of my friends, Claparon, whom you know, has asked 
 me to call upon you ; he expects you to-morrow evening, you 
 know where ; he has the paper you expect from him ; he will 
 exchange it with you for the ten thousand francs, but I must 
 be present, for of that amount five thousand belongs to me ; 
 I give you notice, monsieur, that a blank remains for the 
 name." 
 
 " I shall be there," said the notary. 
 
 The poor devil waited the whole night with what agony one 
 may imagine, for his safety or inevitable ruin were in the 
 balance. But at sunrise, instead of Claparon, he saw an officer 
 of the Tribunal of Commerce, who produced a judgment 
 against him in due form, requiring him to accompany him to 
 Clichy. 
 
 Cerizet had bargained with a creditor to deliver the un- 
 lucky notary up for one-half the amount of the debt. Out of 
 the ten thousand he had reserved for Claparon he was com- 
 pelled to disgorge six thousand to obtain his liberty. 
 
 Cerizet then went to the notary and said :
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 165 
 
 "Claparon is a scoundrel, monsieur; he received five thou- 
 sand frarcs from the alleged purchaser of your house, which 
 makes him the owner. Threaten him with disclosing his 
 retreat to his creditors and to have him adjudged a fraudu- 
 lent bankrupt, then he'll turn over half of it to you." 
 
 In his rage the notary wrote Claparon an abusive letter ; 
 he, in despair, feared arrest, and Cerizet promised to obtain 
 a passport for him. 
 
 " You have played me many a trick, Claparon," said Ceri- 
 zet ; " but listen to me, then you can judge me. All I possess 
 is one thousand crowns I'll give you that. Go to America, 
 and trade and make your fortune there, the same as I am 
 trying to make mine here." 
 
 That very evening Claparon, cleverly disguised by Cerizet, 
 left by the diligence for Havre. Thus Cerizet remained 
 master of the fifteen thousand francs demanded by Claparon, 
 and awaited Theodose with tranquillity. He had another 
 string to his bow. 
 
 " The limit of the equity is passed," said Theodose, going 
 himself to find Dutocq to get him to bring Cerizet to his 
 office. 
 
 "You won't be able to settle this transaction anywhere but 
 in Cerizet's place, since Claparon is in it," replied Dutocq. 
 
 Theodose went between seven and eight o'clock to this 
 banker of the poor, whom the clerk had notified. They 
 promenaded the miserable kitchen like two beasts in a cage, 
 playing the scene thus : 
 
 " Have you brought the fifteen thousand francs?" 
 
 " No, but I have them home." 
 
 " Why, then, have not you them in your pocket ? " 
 
 " I'll explain why," replied the advocate, who, between the 
 Rue Saint-Dominique and the Estrapade, had laid out his 
 course of action. 
 
 The Provencal, writhing on the gridiron to which his part- 
 ners had bound him, had a bright idea which flashed up from
 
 166 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 the bosom of the hot coals. Peril at times has gleams of 
 light. 
 
 " Good ! " said C6rizet, " now the farce begins." 
 
 This was a sinister word and seemed to be forced through 
 the nose with horrible accent. 
 
 " You have placed me in a most splendid position, and I 
 shall never forget it, my friend," said Th6odose, with emotion. 
 
 "Ah ! that's it, eh ! " said Cerizet. 
 
 " Listen to me ; you don't know my intentions." 
 
 " So? truly ! " replied the leaner by the little week. 
 
 "No." 
 
 " You don't intend to put up those fifteen thousand francs." 
 
 Theodose looked fixedly at C^rizet and shrugged his shoul- 
 ders. These two things caused the latter to keep silence. 
 
 " Would you, in my position, knowing yourself within 
 range of a cannon loaded with grape-shot, live thus without 
 making an effort to end it ? Listen to me. You are in a 
 dangerous trade ; some time you will be glad of good, solid 
 protection in the courts of Paris. I, if I continue in my 
 present course, shall become deputy attorney-general, maybe 
 attorney-general, in three years' time. To-day I offer you a 
 devoted friendship which will be of service to you. Here are 
 my conditions." 
 
 "Conditions?" cried Cerizet. 
 
 " In ten minutes I will bring you twenty-five thousand 
 francs for all the claims you hold against me." 
 
 "And Dutocq? And Claparon ? " exclaimed Cerizet. 
 
 "Leave them in the lurch," said Theodose, in his friend's 
 ear. 
 
 "How sweet!" replied Cdrizet. "And you play this 
 little three-card-monte, finding that you hold fifteen thousand 
 francs that don't belong to you." 
 
 " But I add ten thousand to them. See here, you and I 
 know each other." 
 
 " If you have power enough to get ten thousand francs out
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 167 
 
 of your bourgeois," said Cerizet, eagerly, " you can quite as 
 easily ask fifteen. For thirty, I'm your man. Frankness for 
 frankness." 
 
 "You ask the impossible," exclaimed Theodose. "At 
 this moment, if you had Claparon to deal with, your fifteen 
 thousand francs would be lost, for the house is Thuillier's 
 now." 
 
 " I'll see what Claparon has to say," replied Cerizet, pre- 
 tending to go and consult Claparon, mounting upstairs to the 
 chamber whence he had just gone, bag and baggage, in a 
 hack. 
 
 The five minutes during which Theodose heard what he 
 believed to be the murmur of two voices was positive torture 
 to him, for his whole life was the stake. Cerizet came down, 
 a smile upon his lips, his eyes brilliant with an infernal 
 malice, dancing with glee, he was a Lucifer in his gayety. 
 
 "I know nothing," said he, shrugging his shoulders; 
 " but Claparon, he knows it all. He used to work hand in 
 glove with some top-notch bankers. When I told him what 
 you wanted he laughed and said: 'I don't doubt it.' To- 
 morrow you will have to bring me those twenty-five thousand 
 francs you offered me ; and no less beside to redeem your 
 acceptances, my boy." 
 
 "And why? " asked Theodose, who felt as if his backbone 
 were liquefying ; as though melted by the discharge of some 
 interior electric shock. 
 
 " The house is ours." 
 
 "And how?" 
 
 "Claparon has formally bid it in under the name of a 
 dealer, the first one to take proceedings against him, a little 
 toad named Sauvaignou. Desroches, the attorney, has the 
 matter in hand, and to-morrow morning you'll receive due 
 notification. This business will compel me, Claparon, and 
 Dutocq to raise the wind. What would become of me with- 
 QUt Claparon ? So I must forgive him. I forgive him : you
 
 168 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 may not believe it, my dear friend, but we actually embraced 
 each other. Change your terms." 
 
 The last words were appalling, especially in the comment 
 offered by the face of Cerizet, who was amusing himself by 
 playing a scene from " Legataire," in the midst of which he 
 studied attentively the Provencal's character. 
 
 " Oh ! Cerizet, and I wished you so well ! " 
 
 "See you, my dear," replied Cerizet, " between us this is 
 needed," and he struck his heart, "of which you haven't the 
 least bit. When you imagined you had us then came the 
 squeeze. I saved you from vermin and the horrors of starva- 
 tion. You'll die like an idiot. We put you on the way to 
 fortune, we put you inside a pretty society-skin, by which 
 you could have grasped a fortune and after all that ! Well, 
 now I know you; we tramp under arms." 
 
 "Then it is war," said The'odose. 
 
 " You fired first," said Cerizet. 
 
 "But if you demolish me then farewell to all your hopes; 
 and if you are not able to down me, you have an enemy in 
 me." 
 
 "Exactly what I said to Dutocq yesterday," answered 
 Cerizet, coolly. " But how can it be helped. We chose 
 between the two circumstances govern cases. I'm a pretty 
 good fellow," he went on after a pause, "to-morrow bring 
 me your twenty-five thousand francs and Thuillier shall retain 
 
 the house. We'll help you at both ends, but you must pay 
 
 Now after what has passed that's not so much amiss, eh?" 
 
 "Say to-morrow at noon," said the Provencal, "for there 
 are a number of irons to heat." 
 
 " I'll endeavor my best with Claparon, but he's a pretty 
 tough fellow when he's in a hurry." 
 
 "Oh, well! to-morrow then," said Thodose, in the tone 
 of a man decided on his course. 
 
 "Good-morning, friend," said Cerizet in such a horrible 
 nasal tone that degraded the most beautiful worcj \\\ the,
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 16d 
 
 language. "There goes a sucker," said he to himself, look- 
 ing after Th6odose passing down the street like a man in a 
 daze. 
 
 As he left the idea came to him to go to Flavie and tell her 
 everything. Southern natures are thus strong up to a cer- 
 tain point of passion, then a collapse. He entered. Flavie 
 was alone in her chamber ; she saw Theodose and thought he 
 had come to violate or kill her. 
 
 "What is the matter? " she cried. 
 
 "I I Do you love me, Flavie?" said he. 
 
 " Oh ! can you doubt it ? " 
 
 "But absolutely love me even if I were a criminal?" 
 
 "Has he then killed somebody?" said she to herself; 
 answering him with a nod of assent. 
 
 Theodose, happy at even grasping this branch of willow, 
 burst into a passion of sobs, torrents of tears ran down his 
 cheeks. Flavie went out and said to her maid : "I am not 
 at home to any one ; " then she closed all doors and returned 
 to Theodose. 
 
 " I have but you in the world," cried he, seizing Flavie's 
 hands and kissing them with a sort of fury. "If you only 
 remain true to me as the body is to the soul then," he 
 added, recovering himself with infinite grace, "I should have 
 the courage." 
 
 He rose and paced the room. 
 
 " Yes, I can struggle ; I will recover my strength, like 
 Antaeus, from a fall ; with my own hands will I strangle the 
 serpents that entwine me, that give me serpent-kisses, that 
 slaver my cheeks, that suck my blood, my honor. Oh ! that 
 poverty ! Far better have died than lived for this. A coffia 
 is a softer bed in comparison than my present life. For 
 eighteen months I have been fed on bourgeois ; and after that 
 horrid feast, when all is propitious of attaining an honest, 
 fortunate life and a great future, when I was about seating 
 myself at the banquet of society, the executioner taps me on
 
 170 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 the shoulder : ' Pay thy tithes to the devil, or die ! ' And I, 
 shall I not trample them underfoot ! and I, shall I not ram my 
 arm down their throats to their very entrails ! Ah ! yes, I 
 will, I will. See you, Flavie, my eyes are dry. And pres- 
 ently I shall laugh ; I feel my power. Oh ! say to me that 
 you love me say it once again. At this moment it sounds 
 like the word 'Pardon ' to the condemned?" 
 
 "You are terrible, my friend," said Flavie. "Oh! you 
 bruise me." 
 
 She knew nothing of the meaning of this, but she fell on 
 the couch half-dead, so agitated was she by this scene ; and 
 then Theodose flung himself on his knees before her. 
 
 " Pardon me ! forgive me," he said. 
 
 "But what does it all mean ! " she asked. 
 
 " They wish to ruin me. Oh ! promise me Celeste ; you 
 shall see in what a glorious life I will make you a sharer. If 
 you hesitate well, that will mean you shall be mine ; I will 
 have you ! " 
 
 He started up with such vehemence that Flavie, terrified, 
 rose and walked away. 
 
 "Oh ! my angel ! at your feet, there what a miracle. For 
 certainly God is for me. Thanks, my good angel; great 
 Theodosius ! you have saved me." 
 
 Flavie admired that chameleon being; he was a fervent 
 Catholic; he reverently crossed himself; it was as fine as the 
 communion of Saint-Jerdme. 
 
 "Adieu," he said, in a melancholy voice; then rushed 
 away ; but in the street he turned and saw her at the window, 
 he made a sign of triumph. 
 
 " What a man ! " said she. 
 
 " My good friend," said Theodose, in a gentle, calm voice, 
 almost coaxing, to Thuillier, after reaching home, "we have 
 fallen into the hands of atrocious scoundrels; but I intend 
 giving them a little lesson." 
 
 " What is wrong?" said Brigitte.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 171 
 
 " Well, they want twenty-five thousand francs, and so, to 
 get the better of us, have arranged to bid in the property. 
 Put five thousand francs in your pocket and come with me ; 
 I'll assure you that house. I am making implacable enemies 
 for myself," he exclaimed ; " they seek to destroy me morally. 
 Should you despise their calumnies and feel no change toward 
 me, I shall be content. And what is this, after all ? If 
 I succeed, you have paid for the house one hundred and 
 twenty-five thousand francs instead of paying one hundred 
 and twenty." 
 
 "Will it happen again?" demanded Brigitte, uneasily, 
 whose eyes dilated with a horrible suspicion. 
 
 " None but preferred creditors have the right of redemption, 
 and as in this case there is but one that has used this right, we 
 can take it quietly. His debt is but two thousand francs ; but 
 of course there are the costs of the lawyers in affairs like this 
 which must be paid, and it wouldn't be amiss to give a per- 
 quisite of a thousand francs to the creditor." 
 
 " Go, Thuillier," said Brigitte ; " take your hat and gloves, 
 and get the cash you know where." 
 
 "As I let that fifteen thousand francs go without result, I 
 don't wish any more money to pass through my hands. Thuil- 
 lier can pay it himself," said Theodose, when he found him- 
 self alone with Brigitte. "You have made twenty thousand 
 francs by the bargain I made with Grindot ; he thought he 
 was assisting the notary, and you own a property which in five 
 years will be worth nearly a million. It is at a corner of the 
 boulevard." 
 
 Brigitte was uneasy, and listened exactly like a cat that 
 smells mice under the floor. She looked very earnestly, and 
 half doubtfully, at Theodose. 
 
 "What is it, little aunt?" 
 
 " Oh ! I shall be in deadly fear until we are the real owners," 
 she replied. 
 
 " Where are we going?" asked Thuillier.
 
 172 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "To Maitre Godeschal, whom we must employ as our 
 attorney." 
 
 "But we refused Celeste to him," exclaimed the old maid. 
 
 "The more reason for employing him," said Theodose. 
 
 Godeschal was Derville's successor, whose head-clerk he 
 had been for more than ten years. There was the utmost 
 intimacy between them, and ties like these in Paris form a 
 true fraternity. They give and take, in all possible conces- 
 sions, on the strength of the old proverbs: "Pass me the 
 rhubarb, I'll pass the senna," or, "One good turn deserves 
 another;" which is put in practice, in every profession, be- 
 tween ministers, officers, lawyers, merchants, everywhere, in 
 fact, where enmity has not raised too strong barriers between 
 the parties. 
 
 Now la Peyrade, a smart man, had not trailed his robe 
 about the Palace so long without being aware how best these 
 judicial amenities would serve his ends. It was eleven o'clock 
 at night, but la Peyrade was not wrong in thinking that a 
 newly fledged attorney would be found in his office, even 
 late as it was. 
 
 "To what do I owe this visit, Monsieur 1'Avocat?" said 
 Godeschal, meeting la Peyrade. 
 
 Foreigners, provincials, men of the world, perhaps, are not 
 aware that barristers (avocats} are to attorneys what generals 
 are to marshals ; a strict line of demarkation divides them. 
 However venerable may be the attorney, however competent, 
 he must go the barrister. The attorney is the one who lays 
 out the campaign, who collects the munitions of war, and sets 
 everything on the move ; the barrister gives battle. It is not 
 explained why the law gives the client two men instead of 
 one, any more than it is known why the author needs both a 
 printer and publisher. The Association of Barristers forbids 
 its members to perform any act pertaining to that of the 
 attorney. It very rarely happens that a barrister sets foot in 
 an Attorney's office, they meet in the Palace. Qf Justice ; but.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 173 
 
 in society, these barriers are thrown down, and sometimes 
 barristers, in a position similar to that of la Peyrade, demean 
 themselves by calling upon an attorney ; but such occurrences 
 are rare, and special urgency is urged as an excuse. 
 
 "Eh, man Dieu," said la Peyrade, "it is a grave affair, 
 and between us we must settle a very delicate piece of busi- 
 ness. Thuillier is below in a carriage, and I come, not in my 
 capacity as a barrister, but as a friend of Thuillier's. You are 
 in a position in which you can be of immense service to him, 
 and I told him that you were of too noble a soul (for you are 
 a worthy successor of the great Derville) not to place at his 
 direction your utmost capacity. This is the business." 
 
 After explaining wholly to his own advantage the trick 
 which must, he said, be balked by ability, and lawyers meet 
 more clients that lie than those who speak the truth, the bar- 
 rister developed his plan of campaign. 
 
 "You ought, my dear maitre, to go this very night to see 
 Desroches, explain the whole plot, persuade him to send for 
 this client of his to-morrow, this Sauvaignou ; we between us 
 three will properly confess him ; if he wants a perquisite of 
 say a thousand francs we'll stand that, in addition to five 
 hundred each for yourself and Desroches, only provided that 
 Thuillier obtains from Sauvaignou a letter renouncing his bid 
 before ten o'clock to-morrow. This Sauvaignou, what does 
 he want? His money! Well, then, such a peddler as that 
 wouldn't resist the appeal of a thousand-franc bill, so especially 
 if he is but the agent of a cupidity backing him. The fight 
 between him and the others is no matter of concern to us. 
 Come, do your best to get the Thuillier family out of this." 
 
 "I'll go at once and see Desroches," said Godeschal. 
 
 " No ; not before Thuillier gives you a power of attorney 
 and five thousand francs. Money talks in such a case as this." 
 
 La Peyrade's whole future and fortune lay in the outcome : 
 for he had arranged to meet Godeschal at Desroches' office on 
 the morrow at seven o'clock. It is not astonishing, therefore.
 
 174 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 that he disregarded the traditions of the bar and went thither 
 to study Sauvaignou and to take part in the struggle. 
 
 As he entered and made his salutations he examined Sau- 
 vaignou. He was, as his name indicated, from Marseilles, 
 and was foreman to a master-carpenter, or rather a kind of 
 clerk of the works, standing between the master-carpenter and 
 the workmen. The profit of the work consisted in what he 
 could make out of the price paid him by the boss-carpenter 
 and the labor he employed ; he received no profit out of the 
 materials used. The master-carpenter had failed. Sauvaig- 
 nou at once appealed to the Tribunal of Commerce and had a 
 lien placed on the property. He was a little, squat man, who 
 wore a gray linen blouse, cap on head, and sat in an armchair 
 in the office. Three bills of a thousand francs each laying 
 before him, on Desroches' desk, showed la Peyrade that the 
 engagement was over, and the attorneys worsted. Godeschal's 
 eyes told the rest, and the glance which Desroches, the most 
 feared of every attorney in Paris, cast on the "poor man's 
 advocate " was like the blow of a pick in a grave. Stimulated 
 by danger the Provencal was magnificent ; he laid his hand on 
 the three bills of one thousand each, and folded them as if 
 about to put them into his pocket. 
 
 "Thuillier won't make the deal," said he to Desroches. 
 
 "Well, then, we are all agreed," replied the terrible 
 attorney. 
 
 "Yes; your client must now hand over to us fifty thousand 
 francs expended by us in furnishing the property, under the 
 contract between Thuillier and Grindot. I did not inform 
 you of that yesterday," said he, turning to Godeschal. 
 
 "You hear that?" said Desroches to Sauvaignou. "I 
 shall not touch this case without being guaranteed." 
 
 "But, gentlemen," said the tradesman, "I cannot deal 
 with this matter until I have seen the worthy man who gave 
 me five hundred francs on account for having signed a power 
 of attorney to him."
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 175 
 
 "Are you from Marseilles?" said la Peyrade to him, in 
 Sauvaignou's own patois. 
 
 "Yes, monsieur." 
 
 "Well, poor devil, you, don't you see they wish to ruin 
 you? Don't you know what to do? Pocket those three 
 thousand francs, and, when the other fellow turns up, take 
 out your rule and give him a pounding; tell him that he is a 
 scoundrel, that he wants you to do his dirty work, that instead 
 of doing this you revoke your power of attorney, and that., 
 further, you will return him the five hundred francs the first 
 week in which there are three Thursdays. Then be off to 
 Marseilles with that three thousand five hundred francs and 
 your savings. If anything goes wrong, let me know through 
 these gentlemen ; I'll get you out of the scrape, for not only 
 am I a good Provencal, but also one of the leading barristers 
 in Paris and the friend of the poor." 
 
 When the workman found a compatriot supporting his own 
 wishes, also learning that he was really a barrister and able to 
 do as promised, he signed the relinquishment, but stipulated 
 for three thousand five hundred francs; this with the cross 
 receipts settled the whole matter. 
 
 "You must at once acquaint your man with what is done 
 and let him know that the proxy is revoked," said Desroches 
 to Sauvaignou, as he sent the latter out through his back office. 
 
 "There is something behind all this," said Desroches to 
 Godeschal after Th^odose had gone. 
 
 "The Thuilliers get a magnificent freehold for next to 
 nothing, that's all," Godeschal replied. 
 
 "La Peyrade and Cerizet seem to me like two divers fight- 
 ing under the sea. What am I to tell Cerizet, who placed 
 the affair in my hands?" asked Desroches as the barrister 
 returned. 
 
 "Say that Sauvaignou forced your hand," said la Peyrade. 
 
 " And you fear nothing ! " said Desroches pointedly. 
 
 "What, me? I have only given Cerizet a lesson."
 
 176 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "To-morrow I shall learn the whole," said Desroches to 
 Godeschal ; "no one blabs like a beaten man." 
 
 At eleven o'clock la Peyrade was in the court of the justice 
 of the peace; he saw Cerizet come in, pale with rage, his 
 eyes full of venom ; he said in his ear, in a calm, firm voice : 
 
 " My friend, I also am a pretty good sort of .fellow myself; 
 I still hold these twenty-five thousand francs in bank-bills at 
 your disposal ; they are yours in exchange for my acceptances." 
 
 Cerizet gazed at the advocate of the poor, but was quite 
 unable to make any answer; he was green; his bile had 
 struck in. 
 
 " I am now incontestably a property owner," cried Thuillier 
 when he returned from his notary, Jacquinot, the son-in-law 
 and successor of Cardot. " No human power can now dis- 
 possess me ; so they say ! " 
 
 "Ah!" said Brigitte, "what an awful fright our dear 
 Thdodose gave me." 
 
 " Halloo ! my best friend ; but what do you suppose Car- 
 dot said ? he asked me who had put me in the way of this 
 stroke, and said that I ought to give him at least ten thou- 
 sand francs as a present. As a fact, I do owe all to him." 
 
 " But he is the same as our own boy," said Brigitte. 
 
 " Poor fellow, I'll do him the justice of saying that he does 
 not ask for anything." 
 
 "Well, my good friend," said la Payrade, who returned at 
 three o'clock from the justice of the peace, "here you are, 
 Mister Richman." 
 
 "And through you, my dear Th6odose." 
 
 " And you, little aunt, have you come to life again? Ah ! 
 you were not so much afraid as I was. I put your interests 
 before my own. Tenez ! I couldn't breathe freely till eleven 
 o'clock ; still I am sure now of having two mortal enemies at 
 my heels in the persons of the two whom I tricked for you. 
 As I came home I wondered what had possessed me by your in- 
 fluence to make me commit this sort of crime ! Whether the
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 177 
 
 honor of being one of your family and becoming your son 
 will ever efface from my conscience the stain I have put upon 
 it." 
 
 "Bah ! you can confess it," said Thuillier, the freethinker. 
 
 " Now," said Theodose to Brigitte, "you may pay in security 
 the price of the house, eighty thousand francs, and thirty thou- 
 sand to Grindot, in all, with the costs you have paid, one hun- 
 dred and twenty thousand francs; the last twenty thousand 
 make it in all one hundred and forty thousand. If you lease the 
 whole to one tenant, ask for the last year's rent in advance, 
 and reserve for me and my wife all the floor above the entre- 
 sol. You can then even get forty thousand francs a year for 
 twelve years. Then, if at any time you wish to move nearer 
 the Chamber and desire to quit this quarter, you can stay with 
 me ; there are stables and coach-house, and so forth, pertain- 
 ing to it. Meanwhile, Thuillier, I am going to get you the 
 cross of the Legion of Honor." 
 
 Hearing this last promise, Brigitte cried : 
 
 "My faith ! my boy, you've done our business so well that 
 I shall leave you that of leasing the house." 
 
 "Don't abdicate, good aunt," said Theodose; "and God 
 preserve me from taking one step without you. You are the 
 good genius of the family. You will have forty thousand 
 francs in hand inside of two months. And, beside all, that 
 won't prevent Thuillier from handling his ten thousand in 
 rent per quarter." 
 
 After having thrown this hope at the old maid, who was 
 jubilant, he took Thuillier into the garden and said, without 
 beating about the bush : 
 
 " My good friend, find some means to get me ten thousand 
 francs from your sister; but don't let her know they are for 
 me ; tell her they are needed for the formalities of getting the 
 Cross ; that you know just who will get the cash." 
 
 "That's all right," said Thuillier; "I can repay her when 
 I get my rents." 
 12
 
 78 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 Theodose now hurried off to Mme. Colleville, to whom he 
 cried as he entered : 
 
 "I have conquered; we shall have secured for Cdeste a 
 property worth a million francs, a life interest in which will 
 be given in her marriage-contract by Thuillier ; but keep my 
 secret, or your daughter will be in demand by the peers of 
 France. Now dress yourself and let us call upon the Com- 
 tesse du Bruel, she can get Thuillier the cross. While you 
 are getting under arms I'll do a little courting of Celeste; 
 you and I can talk in the carriage." 
 
 Now he had noticed that Felix and Celeste were alone in 
 the salon ; for her mother had full faith in Celeste. The 
 couple were discussing religion. Felix, like most geometri- 
 cians, chemists, mathematicians, and great naturalists, had 
 subjected religion to reason ; he saw in it a problem as insolu- 
 ble as the squaring of the circle. In petto a deist, he still 
 professed the religion of the majority of the French, without 
 attaching more importance to it than to the new laws 
 of July. There must needs be a God in heaven, the same as 
 there must be a bust of the King in the mayor's office. The 
 young girl professed a horror for atheism, and her confessor 
 had told her that a deist was cousin-german to an atheist. 
 
 " Have you thought, Felix, of the promise you made me," 
 asked Celeste, when Mme. Colleville had left them. 
 
 " No, my dear Celeste," replied Felix. 
 
 " Oh ! to break a promise," cried she, dolefully. 
 
 "It would have been profanation," said Felix. " I love 
 you so much, and with a tenderness which makes me so weak 
 against your requests, that I promised something against my 
 conscience. Conscience, Celeste, is our treasure, our strength, 
 our mainstay. How could you desire me to go to church and 
 kneel before a priest in whom I can only see a man. You 
 would despise me if I obeyed you." 
 
 "So, my dear Felix, you will not go to church?" said 
 Celeste, casting a tearful look at the man she loved. "If I
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 179 
 
 were your wife, you would leave me to go alone, eh ? You do 
 not love me as I love you for until this moment I have had 
 in my heart a feeling for an atheist against the command of 
 God?" 
 
 " An atheist ! " cried Felix. " Oh ! no. Listen, Celeste ; 
 I know of a certainty that there is a God ; I believe that, but 
 I have a much higher opinion of Him than your priests have ; 
 I have no desire to bring Him down to my level, I try to raise 
 myself to Him. I hearken to the voice He has planted within 
 me, a voice which honest men call conscience, and I try to 
 not betray that divine ray as it reaches me. I will never in- 
 jure any person ; I will not do aught to break the command- 
 ments of universal morality, which formed those of Confu- 
 cius, Moses, Pythagoras, Socrates, as well as of Jesus Christ. 
 I remain before God ; my acts shall be my prayers ; I will 
 never lie, my word is sacred ; and I will do nothing vile or 
 evil. These are the precepts of my virtuous father, these I 
 wish to leave to my children. What can you ask more than 
 this?" 
 
 This profession of faith caused Celeste to sadly shake her 
 head. 
 
 "Read attentively," said she, " 'The Imitation of Christ.' 
 Strive to be converted to the Holy church, Catholic, Apostolic, 
 and Roman, then you will learn how absurd your words are. 
 Listen, Felix, marriage, says the church, is not the affair of a 
 day, the satisfaction of desire ; it is made for all eternity. 
 What ! shall we be united by day and night, shall we be one 
 flesh, one spirit, and yet speak two languages, have two 
 faiths in our hearts, two religions ; a cause of perpetual dis- 
 sension ? Could I address myself in peace to God when He 
 always had His right arm bared against you ? Your deistic 
 blood, your convictions, might animate my children. Oh, 
 my God ! how wretched for a wife. Do not place a gulf 
 between us. If you loved me, you would already have read 
 the 'Imitation of Christ.' "
 
 180 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 The Phellions, children of the " Constitutionnel," have 
 no love for priests. Flix had the imprudence to reply to 
 this species of supplication from the depths of an ardent soul : 
 
 " You are repeating, Celeste, the lesson taught by your con- 
 fessor, and nothing can be more fatal to happiness, I think, 
 than the interference of priests in one's household." 
 
 "Oh !" cried Celeste, "you do not love me;" for she 
 was pierced to the quick, being inspired of love. 
 
 She enveloped herself in noble silence ; Felix went to the 
 window and thrummed upon the panes ; a music familiar 
 to those who have indulged in poignant reflections. The 
 Phellion conscience argued thus : 
 
 " Celeste is a rich heiress, and, by yielding, contrary to 
 the voice of natural religion, to her ideas, it would be done 
 for the purpose of making an advantageous marriage: an in- 
 famous act. I ought not, as a father of a family, to allow a 
 priest to have any influence in my home ; if I submit to-day I 
 do a weak act, which will lead to many such, pernicious to 
 the authority of a father and husband. All this is beneath 
 the dignity of a philosopher." 
 
 Then he returned to his beloved. 
 
 " Celeste," he said, " on my knees I beg you not to confound 
 things. Each has his own way of salvation ; as to society, it 
 is not obeying God to obey its laws. Christ said : ' Render 
 unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's.' Caesar is the 
 body politic. Forget this little quarrel, dear." 
 
 "Little quarrel ! " cried the young enthusiast. "I wish 
 for you to have my whole heart as I would have all yours ; 
 but you would divide it into two parts. Is not that awful ? 
 You forget that marriage is a sacrament." 
 
 "Your priests have turned your brain," cried the mathe- 
 matician, impatiently. 
 
 "Monsieur Phellion," said Celeste, hastily interrupting 
 him, " that's enough of this subject." 
 
 It was at this point of the controversy that Thdodose, who
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 181 
 
 had not disdained to listen outside the door, deemed it judi- 
 cious to make his entry. He found Celeste pale and the 
 young professor uneasy as a lover should be who has just 
 vexed his mistress. 
 
 " I heard the word 'enough,' has there been too much?" 
 asked he, looking by turns at Celeste and Felix. 
 
 "We were talking religion," replied Felix. " I was tell- 
 ing mademoiselle how evil the influence of clerics must be in 
 a family." 
 
 "That was not the point at all, monsieur," said Celeste, 
 sharply; "but that I wanted to know if husband and wife 
 could be of one heart when one was an atheist and the other 
 a Catholic." 
 
 " Is it possible that there are atheists?" exclaimed Theo- 
 dose, showing signs of deep amazement. " Is it that a Catholic 
 could possibly marry a protestant ? But it is impossible that 
 safety ca.n be found for a married couple unless there is per- 
 fect agreement in their religious opinions. I am, of a truth, 
 from the Comtat, of a family which counts a pope among its 
 ancestors ; for our arms are : gules with a key argent, our 
 supporters, a monk holding a church and a pilgrim bearing a 
 staff, the motto being : 'J'ouvre etjeferme,' or, I open and I 
 shut. I am, I may say, fiercely dogmatic on the subject. But 
 to-day, thanks to our system of modern education, it is not 
 in the least strange that religion should be called in question. 
 But, as I tell myself, I would never marry a protestant even 
 if she possessed millions ; nor even if I had lost my reason 
 for love of her. Faith is outside discussion. Una fides , unus 
 Dominus one faith, one Lord that is my living motto." 
 
 "You hear ! " cried Celeste, looking at Felix. 
 
 "I am not too devout," la Peyrade continued. " I go to 
 mass every morning at six o'clock, that I may not be ob- 
 served ; I fast on Fridays ; I am, in short, a son of the 
 church ; I would not commence any undertaking without 
 prayer, after the ancient custom of my ancestors ; but I do
 
 182 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 not obtrude my religion on people. In the Revolution of 
 1789 an incident occurred that bound us more firmly than 
 ever to our holy mother, the church. A poor young lady of 
 the elder branch of la Peyrades, who owned the little estate 
 of la Peyrade (for we are the Peyrades of Canquoelle, but 
 both branches inter-inherit), well, this demoiselle married, 
 six years before the Revolution, a barrister, who after the 
 fashion of the times was a Voltairean, that is, an unbeliever, 
 or, if you like, a deist. He took up all the revolutionary 
 ideas, practicing the pleasing rites of which you have heard, 
 in the worship of the goddess of Reason. He came to our 
 part of the country soaked in the fanaticism of the Convention. 
 His wife was very handsome ; he compelled her to play the 
 r6le of Liberty; the poor unfortunate went mad she died 
 insane. Ah, well, as things seem to be going, we may yet see 
 another 1793." 
 
 This romance, forged on the spot, made such an impres- 
 sion on the young, fresh imagination of Celeste that she rose, 
 curtsied low to the two young men, and retired to her cham- 
 ber. 
 
 "Ah, monsieur, why did you tell her that?" exclaimed 
 Felix, stricken to the heart by the cold look of indifference 
 cast upon him by Celeste. 
 
 " I am ready," said Mme. Colleville, appearing in a tasteful 
 toilet. " But what ails my poor daughter? She is crying ! " 
 
 "Crying, madame ! " cried Felix. "Tell her, madame, 
 that I will at once begin to study the ' Imitation of Christ.' ' 
 
 An hour later Mme. Colleville, Celeste, Colleville, and 
 Theodose were entering the Thuilliers' home to dine with 
 them. Theodose and Flavie took Thuillier into the garden, 
 where Theodose said : 
 
 " My good friend, you will have the Cross within a week. 
 Listen, this dear friend will tell you all about our visit to the 
 Comtesse du Bruel." 
 
 Thdodose left them, having caught sight of Desroches ap-
 
 THE MIDbLE CLASSES. 183 
 
 proaching, convoyed by Brigitte ; a chilling, dread presenti- 
 ment bade him go to meet the attorney. 
 
 "My dear maitre," whispered Desroches to Th6odose, "I 
 am here to see if you can at once furnish twenty-five thousand 
 francs, plus two thousand six hundred and eighty francs, sixty 
 centimes, for costs." 
 
 "Are you Cerizet's attorney?" 
 
 " He has placed all the acceptances into Louchard's hands ; 
 you know what you must expect after arrest. Is Cdrizet 
 wrong in believing that you have twenty-five thousand francs 
 in your desk? You offered them to him; he finds it only 
 natural that they should not make their home with you." 
 
 "I am greatly obliged for the course you have taken, my 
 dear maitre," said Theodose; "I expected this attack." 
 
 "Between ourselves," replied Desroches, "you jollied him 
 finely. The rascal will stop at nothing to be revenged upon 
 you, for he will lose all if you are willing to cast off your 
 robe, throw it to the sharks, and go to prison." 
 
 "Me?" exclaimed Theodose. "I shall pay him. But 
 even then he will still retain five acceptances of mine, each of 
 which is for five thousand francs : what does he mean to do 
 with them?" 
 
 " Oh ! after the affair of this morning, it is impossible to 
 guess ; but my client is a crafty, mangy dog, and has, without 
 a doubt, his little schemes." 
 
 "See, now, Desroches," said Theodose, taking the hard, 
 lean lawyer by the waist ; " have you not got the notes? " 
 
 "Will you pay them? " 
 
 "Yes; in three hours." 
 
 "Good; then be at my place at nine o'clock; I'll receive 
 the cash and give you the acceptances ; but, mind, at half-past 
 nine they pass to Louchard." 
 
 "All right, this evening at nine o'clock," said Theodose. 
 
 "At nine," said Desroches, embracing the whole company 
 in a comprehensive glance.
 
 184 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 At daybreak the following morning, Theodose went to the 
 banker of the poor to see what effect his prompt payment had 
 had upon his enemy, and to make one more effort to rid him- 
 self of his horse-fly. 
 
 He found Cerizet in colloquy with a woman ; he was im- 
 peratively requested to keep at a distance and not to interrupt 
 the interview. Theodose had a presentiment, though a vague 
 one, that the result of this conference would in some wise 
 affect Cerizet's arrangements as to himself, for he saw on his 
 face the change that comes of hope. 
 
 " But, my dear Mamma Cardinal" 
 
 " Yes, my wofthy sir " 
 
 " What do you want? " 
 
 " It must be decided " 
 
 These beginnings and ends of sentences were the only 
 gleams of light on the animated conversation. 
 
 Mme. Cardinal was one of Cerizet's first customers; she 
 was a fish-hawker. As she stood in Cerizet's office she had 
 all the value of an isolated masterpiece of her kind ; she was a 
 perfect type of her species. 
 
 She was mounted on muddy sabots peasants' wooden shoes 
 but her feet, beside being well inclosed in gaiters, were 
 further protected by good, thick woolen stockings. Her 
 print dress, enriched with flounces of mud, bore the imprint 
 of the strap which supported the huckster's basket, cutting 
 across the back to below the waist. Her principal garment 
 was a shawl of rabbit-skin cashmere, so-called, the two ends 
 of which were knotted behind above her bustle for only this 
 fashionable word will properly describe the cabbage-like effect 
 produced by the pressure of the basket upon her form. A 
 coarse neckerchief served as a fichu, which revealed a red 
 throat covered with wrinkles, like the surface of the ice on 
 the Villette pond after skating. Her coiffure was a yellow 
 bandanna twisted into the shape of a picturesque turban. 
 
 Short and stout, a skin rich in color, Mother Cardinal took
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 185 
 
 her morning nip of brandy. She had once been handsome. 
 The Market had reproached her, in their vigorous figure of 
 speech, of having earned more than one day's wages at night. 
 Her voice, to be brought down to the pitch of ordinary con- 
 versation, had to be stifled by her as is done in a sick-room ; 
 but then it came out thick and muffled from a throat so used 
 to shouting the names of each fish in its season in a tone to 
 reach the deepest recess of the highest garrets. Her nose, 
 a la Roxelane, her well-shaped mouth, her blue eyes, all that 
 had at one time made up her beauty, was now buried in folds 
 of vigorous fat which plainly told of an open-air life and 
 occupation. The stomach and bust could have been recom- 
 mended as being of an amplitude worthy of Rubens' pencil. 
 
 "And do you wish to see me lying on straw?" said she to 
 Cerizet. "What do I care for the Toupilliers? Ain't I a 
 Toupillier myself? Where do you wish me to fish for those 
 Toupilliers?" 
 
 This savage outburst was silenced by Cerizet with a pro- 
 longed " hush ! " always obeyed by every conspirator. 
 
 "Well, go and see what you can do about it and then 
 comeback to me," said Cerizet, pushing her toward the door 
 and whispering in her ear. 
 
 " Well, my dear friend," said Theodose to Cerizet, " so 
 you have got your money? " 
 
 "Yes," answered Cerizet; "we have measured our claws, 
 they are equally sharp, long, and strong. What follows? " 
 
 "Am I to tell Dutocq that you have received twenty-five 
 thousand francs? 
 
 "Oh! my dear friend, not one word, if you love me," 
 exclaimed Cerizet. 
 
 " Listen," said Theodose. " I must know once for all what 
 it is you want. I have firmly made up my mind not to stay 
 for another twenty-four hours on the gridiron to which you 
 have bound me. You may cheat Dutocq all you like, I don't 
 care about that, but I intend to know where I stand. It is a
 
 186 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 fortune that I have paid you, twenty-five thousand francs, for 
 you must have made ten thousand by your traffic ; it ought to 
 give you a start as an honest man." 
 
 "Here are my conditions, take them or leave them, they 
 are not subject to discussion. You will get for me the lease 
 of Thuillier's house for eighteen years, then I hand you out 
 one of the five acceptances canceled. You won't afterward 
 find me in your way; as to Dutocq, you'll have to settle with 
 him for the remaining four. You beat me ; Dutocq is not 
 smart enough to buck against you." 
 
 "Agreed, if you will give forty-eight thousand francs a 
 year for the rent of the house, the last in advance, and begin 
 the tenancy in October." 
 
 "Yes, but I shall only give forty-three thousand francs in 
 cash, your acceptance will make the balance, the forty-eight. 
 I have had a good look at the house, I've examined it; it's 
 just the thing I want." 
 
 "One last condition," said Thgodose, "you'll lend me a 
 hand against Dutocq?" 
 
 "No," replied CSrizet ; "you have done him brown 
 enough now, without having me to help you baste him : you 
 can roast him dry. But be reasonable. The poor man 
 knows not which way to turn to pay the last fifteen thousand 
 francs due on his position ; you should remember that you can 
 get all your acceptances back for fifteen thousand francs." 
 
 "Well, give me two weeks to get the lease." 
 
 "Not one day past Monday next. On Tuesday your 
 acceptance for five thousand francs will be in Louchard's 
 hands, unless you pay me on Monday or get Thuillier to grant 
 me the lease." 
 
 "Well, Monday be it, " said Theodose, as he shook hands, 
 each saying: "So long." 
 
 For ten years Cdrizet had seen a number of people getting 
 rich by the business of sub-letting property. The principal 
 tenant is, in Paris, to the owner of houses what farmers are to
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 187 
 
 * 
 
 country landowners. All Paris has seen how a famous tailor 
 built at his own cost a sumptuous structure on the site of the 
 celebrated Frascati, paying as principal tenant fifty thousand 
 francs as rent for the building, which in nineteen years was to 
 become the property of the landowner. Notwithstanding the 
 cost of construction, about seven hundred thousand francs, 
 those nineteen years' profits in the end proved enormous. 
 
 Cerizet had seen the possibilities of the house which 
 Thuillier had "stolen" (in his idea); he therefore arranged 
 to sell his banking business to Cadenet and the Widow Poiret 
 for ten thousand francs, he had amassed thirty thousand, and 
 the two would enable him to pay the last year's rent usually 
 demanded by Paris house-owners on a long lease, as a guar- 
 antee. He fell asleep dreaming of becoming a bourgeois, a 
 Minard, a Thuillier. But, lo, he had a waking of which he 
 had not dreamt. He found Fortune standing before him, 
 pouring out riches from a gilded horn, in the person of 
 Madame Cardinal. 
 
 Now Mme. Cardinal, widow of a porter in the Market, had 
 an only daughter whose beauty Cerizet had often heard tell 
 of by her mother's cronies. Olympe Cardinal was about 
 thirteen when, in 1837, Cerizet began to "bank" in the 
 quarter ; and with a view to infamous libertinism, he had paid 
 much attention to the mother, whom he had rescued from 
 abject poverty, hoping to make Olympe his mistress ; but in 
 1838 the daughter left her mother and had undoubtedly 
 "made her own life," to use the term given by the Parisian 
 populace to the destruction of the most precious gifts of 
 nature and youth. 
 
 Searching for a girl in Paris is like looking for a minnow in 
 the Seine ; it is all chance if it comes to net. The chance 
 came. Mother Cardinal, who was standing treat to a chum, 
 visited the Bobino Theatre, where she recognized in the lead- 
 ing lady her own daughter, and who for three years had been 
 under the domination of the first comedian. The mother at 
 
 u
 
 188 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 first was flattered to see her daughter in a lovely gauze be- 
 spangled attire, her hair dressed like that of a duchess, wear- 
 ing clocked stockings, satin shoes, and applauded when she 
 appeared ; but she ended by howling from her seat : 
 
 "You shall hear from me again, murderess of your mother ! 
 I'll soon know whether measly play-actors have any right to 
 come and debauch girls of sixteen ! " 
 
 She waited at the stage-door to intercept her daughter, but 
 she had wisely dropped down from the stage and gone out 
 with the audience. 
 
 The next day Mme. Cardinal intended consulting Cerizet, 
 as he was in the office of a justice of the peace, but before 
 arriving at his den on the Rue des Poules she met a porter 
 who lived in the same house as an old uncle of hers, one 
 Toupillier, who told her that the old man had barely two 
 days to call his own, being in the last extremity. 
 
 "Well, can I help that?" asked the Widow Cardinal. 
 
 " We count on you, dear Madame Cardinal ; you won't 
 forget the good advice we can give you. Here's the thing : 
 For the last month or so your poor uncle, who has been 
 unable to get around, trusted us to collect his rent for his 
 house on Rue Notre-Dame de Nazareth, and the arrears of 
 dividends due on a Treasury bond for eighteen hundred 
 francs " 
 
 And now the eyes of the Widow Cardinal became staring 
 instead of wandering. 
 
 "Yes, my dear," continued the noble Perrache, a little 
 humpbacked porter; "and being as how you are the only one 
 who ever thinks on him, why we thought as you sometimes 
 came to see him and brought him a bit of fish at times, why, 
 as how he might make you his heir like." 
 
 "You might well think, you old leather-thumper," replied 
 Mother Cardinal to the porter, who had been a shoemaker. 
 Then she hurried off at her top-rate of speed to the wretched 
 garret in which her uncle lived. "What?" said she, "my
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 18$ 
 
 Uncle Toupillier rich ! The good beggar of the church of 
 Saint-Sulpice." 
 
 "Ah!" the porter responded, "but he fed well. Every 
 night when he went to bed he took with him his best friend 
 a bottle of Roussillon wine. My wife has tasted it, but he 
 told us it was cheap stuff, six-sous wine." 
 
 " Don't you let drop one word of all this, my good fellow," 
 said the widow. "I'll remember you if anything comes 
 of it." 
 
 This Toupillier, an old drum-major in the Guards, had 
 gone into the service of the church two years before 1789 by 
 becoming the swiss (or sexton) of Saint-Sulpice. The Revo- 
 lution deprived him of that post, and he fell into abject 
 poverty. He then took up the profession of model, for he 
 enjoyed a fine physique. 
 
 When worship was again allowed, he resumed his staff; but in 
 1816 he was dismissed, as much on account of his immorality as 
 for his political opinions ; he passed as a Bonapartist. Never- 
 theless, as a sort of pension, he was allowed to stand by the 
 door and distribute the holy water. Later on an unfortunate 
 business, which will presently be related, caused him to lose 
 his holy sprinkler; but, still finding means to hang about the 
 sanctuary, he was finally suffered at the door of the church as 
 a licensed beggar. At this time, being seventy-two years old. 
 he made himself ninety-six, going into business as a cen- 
 tenarian. 
 
 In the whole of Paris it was impossible to find a beard and 
 hair such as Toupillier's. He walked bent nearly double ; in 
 one trembling hand he carried a cane a hand that looked as 
 if covered with the lichen that grows on granite ; in the other 
 he held out the classic hat, greasy, broad-brimmed, and bat- 
 tered, into which there tumbled an abundance of alms. His 
 legs, swathed in rags and bandages, dragged along a pair of 
 wretched overshoes of coarse-matting, hiding excellent com- 
 fortable inner soles of cork. He smeared his face with certain
 
 190 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 ingredients, which gave it an appearance of some late severe 
 illness, and he played the senility of centenarism most ad- 
 mirably. He had become a hundred in 1830, although in 
 reality but eighty years old. He was chief of the beggars, 
 the high muck-a-muck ; and all others who came to beg under 
 the porches of the church, safe from the persecutions of the 
 police by the protection of the sexton and holy-water sprinkler 
 and the parish church, had to pay him a kind of tithing. 
 
 When an heir, a bridegroom, or a godfather said, as he 
 came out of church : " Here, this is for all of you, don't 
 bother any of my party," Toupillier, named by the sexton, 
 his successor, to receive these alms, pocketed three-quarters 
 and gave one-quarter only to his acolytes, and their tribute 
 was one sou per day. Money and wine were his two last 
 passions ; but he regulated the second one, giving himself up 
 to the first, not, however, neglecting his personal comfort. 
 He drank only in the evening, after dinner, when the church 
 was closed ; he slept every night for twenty years in the arms 
 of drunkenness his last mistress. The beadle and sprinkler, 
 with whom he most likely had an understanding, would say 
 of him: 
 
 " He is a poor man of the church ; he used to know the 
 Cure Languet, who built Saint-Sulpice ; he was sexton here 
 for twenty years ; before and after the Revolution ; he is now 
 a hundred years old." 
 
 This best of advertisements lined his hat so as none others 
 
 
 
 were equal to it. He bought his house in 1826, and in 1830 
 invested in the Funds. From the two sources he must have 
 made something like six thousand francs per annum, and most 
 likely he put some out in Cerizet's manner, for the cost of his 
 house was forty thousand francs, and he had forty-eight thou- 
 sand in the Funds. His niece was as much deceived by the 
 old man as was the public ; she believed him to be a most 
 miserable pauper, and, when she had any fish getting " high," 
 she would carry some to the poor man.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 191 
 
 After making an inspection of the sick man, Mother Car- 
 dinal hurried off to consult Cdrizet, for she knew she was too 
 ignorant to be able, successfully, to get the property unaided. 
 The banker of the poor, like the other scavengers, had at last 
 found diamonds in the slime he had been raking over, always 
 looking to pick up such a chance. This, then, was the secret 
 of his gentle dealing with the man whom he had promised 
 to ruin. He was not the man to shrink from a crime should 
 necessity arise, so especially when others might do that and 
 reap the benefits. 
 
 "My Benjamin," said the huckster, rushing into Cerizet's 
 office, with a face inflamed as much by cupidity as haste, " my 
 uncle sleeps on more than one hundred thousand francs in 
 gold; and I'm sure that the Perraches, under pretense of car- 
 ing for him, have an eye on the blunt." 
 
 "Shared up among forty heirs," said Cerizet, "it won't 
 make much of a fortune for each. Listen here, Mother Car- 
 dinal, I'll marry your daughter ; give her your uncle's gold 
 and I'll leave to you the Funds and the house for life." 
 
 " Shall we run no risk? " 
 
 "None at all." 
 
 " Done ! " said Madame Widow Cardinal, clasping hands 
 with her future son-in-law. "Six thousand francs a year oh ! 
 the jolly life !" 
 
 "And a son-in-law like me, beside," added the amiable 
 Cerizet. 
 
 " Now," resumed he, after they had embraced each other, 
 " I must look over the ground. Do not leave there ; tell the 
 porter you expect a doctor. I shall be the doctor ; when I 
 come you mustn't know me." 
 
 "You're no fool, you old rogue," said la Cardinal, giving 
 him a punch in the stomach by way of farewell. 
 
 An hour after, Cerizet, dressed in black, disguised in a 
 rusty wig and an artistically made-up face, arrived in the 
 Rue Honors-Chevalier, in a coach. He asked the porter for
 
 192 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 Toupillier's address. He was taken up the back stairs of the 
 house, leading to the wretched garret occupied by the beggar. 
 
 The house in which Toupillier lived is one of those which 
 have been compelled to lose one-half by being cut through in 
 widening the street, for the Rue Honore-Chevalier is one of 
 the straitest in the Saint-Sulpice quarter. The owner, for- 
 bidden by law to repair it, was compelled to rent out the 
 wretched building as it was. The coach-way to the courtyard 
 was made in a circular form, this shape being indispensable in 
 a street so narrow that two carriages could not pass. 
 
 C6rizet laid hands on the rope that served as a hand-rail to 
 a kind of ladder that ascended to the room where the alleged 
 centenarian lay dying ; n this chamber was being played the 
 odious spectacle of pretended poverty. 
 
 In Paris all that is done with an end in view is done to 
 perfection. The would-be poor are as clever in such lines as 
 the storekeepers in dressing their show windows, or as the 
 sham wealthy are in obtaining credit. 
 
 The floor had never been swept ; the bricks had disappeared 
 under a litter of filth, dust, dried mud, and every kind of 
 rubbish thrown down by Toupillier. A poor cast-iron stove, 
 with a pipe bricked into a crumbling fire-place, was the best 
 appearing thing in the lair. In a recess was a bed with a 
 head-pole from which hung a curtain of green serge, eaten 
 into lace by moths. The nearly useless window had a dense 
 coat of greese on its panes, which dispensed with the necessity 
 for a curtain. The whitewashed walls were fuliginously tinted 
 with the smoke of wood and peat burned in the stove. On 
 the mantel stood a broken water pitcher, two bottles, and a 
 cracked plate. A miserable, worm-eaten bureau held his 
 linen and decent clothes ; the other furniture consisted o< a 
 night-table of the commonest kind, another table worth about 
 forty sous, and two kitchen chairs, with the straw seats about 
 gone. The very picturesque costume of the centenarian beggar
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 193 
 
 hung from a nail, and below it, on the floor, the shapeless 
 coarse hempen gaiters which served him as shoes, and, with 
 his prodigious staff and his hat, formed a sort of panoply of 
 poverty. 
 
 When Cerizet entered the old man did not move, even on 
 hearing the groaning of the heavy door, armed with iron- 
 lining and furnished with bolts to secure his domicile. 
 
 " Is he conscious? " said Cdrizet, before whom Mme. Car- 
 dinal started back, for she did not recognize him until he 
 spoke. 
 
 " Very nearly," said Mme. Cardinal. 
 
 " Come out on the stairs, for we don't want him to hear 
 us. This is what we must do," whispered he to his future 
 mother-in-law. " He is weak, but he isn't so very sick-look- 
 ing; we shall have about eight days before us. I'll find a 
 doctor that will suit us, do you catch on ? I'll return later 
 with six poppy-heads. In the state he is, you see, a good 
 strong tea of poppy will send him off to sleep. I'll send you 
 in a cot-bed, under the pretense of your sleeping here. Then 
 we'll move him from one bed to the other; thus when we've 
 counted the money hidden in his mattress we can easily carry 
 it off. But we ought to know what sort of tenants there are 
 in the barrack. The doctor will say that he has some days 
 to live and that he should make his will." 
 
 "My son! " 
 
 " But we must learn about the occupants ; for if Perrache 
 gives the alarm so many lodgers, so many spies." 
 
 "Bah! I know all that already," replied Mme. Cardinal. 
 " Du Portail, the little old man who rents the second floor, 
 has charge of a mad girl whom I heard called Lydie this 
 morning by an old woman named Katt. The old man has 
 only one servant, a valet, another old man named Bruno, who 
 does everything but cook." 
 
 " Well, we must study the matter," said he, in the tone of 
 a man whose plans are not yet decided upon. "I'll goto 
 13
 
 194 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 the mayor's office, get Olympe's register of birth, and have 
 the banns published. Next Saturday but one, the wedding." 
 
 " How he goes it, this old rascal ! " said Mother Cardinal, 
 giving a frisky push with her shoulder to her son-in-law. 
 
 As he went downstairs Crizet looked in the rooms used as 
 workshops and counted the workers. Then he departed, 
 turning over in his mind the numerous difficulties that might 
 arise to prevent the carrying off of the gold hidden under the 
 dying man. 
 
 "Lift it all at night, eh?" said he to himself; "why 
 those parties are always on the watch ; and in the day one 
 would be seen by twenty people. It's hard to carry twenty- 
 five thousand francs in gold on one's self." 
 
 Society has two forms of perfection : the first is a stage of 
 civilization in which morality, being equally infused, does not 
 permit of crime even in thought ; the Jesuits have reached 
 this point, which was presented in the early church ; the 
 second is the state of another civilization in which the 
 mutual supervision of its citizens renders crime an impossi- 
 bility. The end which modern society has placed in view is 
 the latter, namely, that a crime shall offer such difficulties 
 that a man must be really without reason to attempt it. To 
 live at ease crime must have a sanction like that granted by 
 the Bourse, or like that given to Cerizet by his clients, who 
 never grumbled, and who would, indeed, be troubled in 
 mind if their flayer had not been found in his kitchen on 
 Tuesdays. 
 
 " Well, my dear sir," said the porter's wife, as Cerizet 
 went past the lodge ; '* how is that friend of God, the poor 
 man?" 
 
 "I am not the doctor," Cdrizet made answer, who now 
 decidedly renounced the part; "I am Madame" Cardinal's 
 man of business; I have advised her to have a cot-bed 
 brought in, so she may be here day and night, though sha 
 may have to engage a regular nurse."
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 19$ 
 
 "I could give her good service," said Mme. Perrache ; 
 "I nurse women in confinement." 
 
 "Well, we'll see," said Cerizet. "I'll arrange all that. 
 Who is your second-floor tenant ? " 
 
 " Monsieur du Portail. He has lodged there thirty year. 
 He is a man with a good income, a very respectable man. 
 You know, bondholders, who live on the Funds. For more 
 than eleven years he has been trying to restore the reason 
 of a daughter of one of his friends, Mademoiselle Lydie de 
 la Peyrade. She gets the best of advice, I tell you ; why, 
 only this morning there were two celebrated physicians what 
 had a consultation. But up to now nothing has cured her ; 
 they have to watch her pretty close, too, I tell you ; for at 
 times she gets up in the night." 
 
 " Mademoiselle Lydie de la Peyrade ! " exclaimed Cerizet. 
 " You are quite sure that is her name ? " 
 
 " Madame Katt, her nurse, who does the little cooking for 
 the household, has told me a thousand times, though, as a 
 general thing, neither Monsieur Bruno, the valet, nor Madame 
 Katt chatter much. We have been porters here for twenty 
 years and haven't yet found anything out about Monsieur du 
 Portail. Beside that he owns the house alongside. You can 
 see the door, there. Well, you see, he can go out that way 
 and receive his company and us know nothing about it." 
 
 " Then you didn't see the gentleman who is talking to him 
 in the garden go by this way ? " 
 
 " Not much ! Certainly not ! " 
 
 Now as Cerizet was coming down the rickety ladder he 
 had seen the second-floor tenant in conversation with the 
 Comte Martial de la Roche-Hugon, an important member of 
 the government. 
 
 " Ah ! " said Cerizet, as he got into the coach, " this is the 
 daughter of Th6odose's uncle. Du Portail may be the bene- 
 factor who one time sent two thousand five hundred francs to 
 my rascal. I might send an anonymous letter to the little
 
 196 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 old fellow telling him of the danger that Monsieur 1'Avocafc 
 is in owing to those twenty-five thousand francs' worth of 
 acceptances." 
 
 An hour later a complete cot-bed had arrived for Mme. 
 Cardinal, to whom the inquisitive porter's wife offered her ser- 
 vices to bring her something to eat. 
 
 "Do you want to see the cure?" asked Mme. Cardinal of 
 the old man ; she had noticed that the arrival of the bed had 
 roused him from his somnolence. 
 
 " I want some wine," he replied. 
 
 " How do you find yourself now, Father Toupillier ? " asked 
 Mme. Perrache, coaxingly. 
 
 "I tell you I want some wine," repeated the old fellow 
 with a scarcely looked-for insistent energy. 
 
 "We must first know if it is good for you, Unky Bunky," 
 said she, caressingly. "Wait till the doctor gives his idea." 
 
 "Doctor ! I won't have one," cried Toupillier. "What 
 are you doing here, anyhow? I don't want anybody." 
 
 " My good uncle, I just came to know if you could fancy a 
 bit of something tasty ; I have a nice fresh flounder : eh ! a 
 tccnty flounder served with a dash of lemon-juice ? " 
 
 "It's fine, is your fish," answered Toupillier; "it is real 
 stinking; the last you brought me, six weeks ago, is still in 
 the closet ; you can take it away with you." 
 
 "Gracious me, how ungrateful sick people are," said la 
 Cardinal, speaking low to Lady Perrache. 
 
 " Leave me alone, I want nobody here ; I only want some 
 wine; leave me in peace," said Toupillier, angrily. 
 
 " Don't get vexed, little uncle ; we'll find you some wine." 
 
 " The wine at six Rue des Canettes," cried the beggar. 
 
 "Yes," said Mother Cardinal ; "but let me count up my 
 coppers. I want to get the best he has in the cellar. You 
 see, an uncle is a kind of second father ; we ought to do what's 
 right by him." 
 
 While speaking she sat down, her legs wide apart, on one
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. \tf 
 
 of the two dilapidated chairs, then turned out on her apron 
 all the contents of her pockets: a knife, her snuff-box, two 
 pawn-tickets, some crusts of bread, and a handful of coppers, 
 from which she extracted a few silver-pieces. Then spying 
 behind the night-table a dirty bottle which might hold about 
 two litres : 
 
 " Wasn't it Rue des Canettes that he said ? " she asked the 
 portress. 
 
 " Corner of Rue Guisarde," was the reply. " Mister Le- 
 grelu, a big, fat man, with fine whiskers and a bald head." 
 Then, dropping her voice, " his six-at wine is the best Rous- 
 sillon. It will be quite sufficient to let him know that you 
 come from his customer, the beggar of Saint-Sulpice. " 
 
 "I don't need telling twice," said la Cardinal; she opened 
 the door and made a false start, for she returned and said : 
 " What does he burn in the stove, in case I need to heat any- 
 thing for him ? I must get in some food and fuel ; I hope 
 nobody will see what I bring." 
 
 "I'll lend you a rush-basket," said the ever-officious por- 
 tress. 
 
 "Thanks! I'll buy a market-basket," answered the fish- 
 hawker, who was more anxious as to what she could carry 
 avray than what she might bring. " I guess there's an Au- 
 vergnat somewhere about here who sells wood and charcoal ? " 
 
 "At the corner of the Rue Ferou you'll easily find the 
 place; a fine establishment, where the logs are painted on an 
 awning like so many bottles ; they look like faces that want to 
 talk to you." 
 
 She had hesitated, had Mme. Cardinal, about leaving the 
 portress alone with the sick man. She now acted a part of 
 deep hypocrisy : 
 
 " Madame Perrache," said she, " you won't leave him, the 
 dear man, not till I return?" 
 
 Ce>izet was yet undecided on the course to adopt ; when 
 alone, he saw the difficulties of playing doctor, with a nurse,
 
 198 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 notary, and others complicating matters. It might be a long 
 and troublesome affair to bring the old beggar to making a 
 will ; it was true that, unless a will was made, the income in 
 the Funds and the house in Rue Notre-Dame de Nazareth 
 would go to the heirs-at-law, Mme. Cardinal only getting her 
 share. He therefore resolved on the simplest manoeuvre the 
 poppy-heads. He was on his way back with this simple nar- 
 cotic when he encountered Mme. Cardinal, basket on arm, 
 who had already secured the desired panacea. 
 
 " So ! ". said the usurer, " this is how you guard your post ? " 
 
 "I had to go out to fetch him some wine," replied la 
 Cardinal. " He howled like one broiling on a gridiron that 
 he wanted to be left in peace, and that he be given his booze. 
 The man's idea is that Roussillon is the one thing needed for 
 his cure; I'll give him a bellyful ; when he's boozy, perhaps 
 he'll be quieter." 
 
 "Quite right," said Crizet, pompously. "It is bad 
 policy to contradict a sick person : but this wine can be im- 
 proved by medicating it with these " lifting one of the lids 
 of the basket, he here slipped in the poppy-heads " it will 
 enable the poor man to get a nap for five or six hours ; this 
 evening I'll call upon you ; I don't fancy there'll be much to 
 prevent us examining the value of the heritage." 
 
 "I twig! " said Mme. Cardinal, with a wink. 
 
 When Mme. Cardinal reached her uncle's garret she relieved 
 Mme. Perrache, giving her adieu at the 'door, as she received 
 a quantity of wood already sawed. Into an earthen pot of the 
 right size to fit the hole in the stoves of the poor in which 
 they put their soup-kettles into this she threw the poppy- 
 heads, and poured over it about two-thirds of the wine she 
 had brought ; then she lighted the fire under the pot so as to 
 get the decoction as soon as possible. 
 
 The crackling of the wood and the warmth spreading about 
 the room brought Toupillier out of his stupor. Seeing the 
 Stove lighted
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 199 
 
 "A fire here ! " cried he ; "do you want to burn the house 
 down?" 
 
 " Why, Unky Bunky," replied la Cardinal, " this is wood 
 that I bought myself, to warm your wine. The doctor doesn't 
 wish you to drink it cold." 
 
 "Where is it, that wine?" asked Toupillier, who was 
 calmed by the thought that the fire was not burning at his 
 expense. 
 
 " It must boil first," said his nurse ; " the doctor insisted 
 on that. Still, if you'll keep quiet I'll give you a little, just 
 to wet your whistle ; but don't say anything about it." 
 
 " I won't have a doctor come here ; they are scoundrels 
 who put men out of the world. Come, give me that wine." 
 
 When she passed it to him he grasped it with his bony, 
 eager fingers, gulped it down at a breath, and 
 
 " What a little drop, and watered beside," he said. 
 
 "Ah, now! don't say that Unky Bunky; I fetched it my- 
 self from old Legrelu's. But when the rest has simmered a 
 bit you can have it all, the doctor says." 
 
 At the end of fifteen minutes she brought him a cup filled 
 to the brim with the mixture. The avidity with which he 
 drank it did not permit him to notice the taste of the wine, 
 but as he swallowed the last drops the bitter, nauseating taste 
 betrayed itself; he flung the cup on the bed and cried out 
 that she had poisoned him. 
 
 "Get out! there is your poison," replied the huckster, 
 pouring the few drops that remained into her own mouth, 
 declaring that if the wine did not taste as usual it was because 
 his mouth had a " bad taste." 
 
 Before the dispute was ended the narcotic began to take 
 effect ; in an hour he was sound asleep. 
 
 She had an idea that it would be as well to avoid the vigi- 
 lance of the Perraches, if they wished to transport the treasure, 
 so she amiably called in the portress, after throwing out the 
 poppy-heads, and said to her :
 
 200 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 " Take a taste of his wine. You would have thought when 
 you listened to his talk that he was ready for a barrel, 
 wouldn't you? Well, a cupful satisfied him." 
 
 " Here's to you ! " said the portress, clinking glasses with 
 la Cardinal, who was careful to fill her glass with the natural 
 wine. 
 
 A less distinguished connoisseur than the beggar, Mme. 
 Perrache found nothing amiss in the insidious liquid, for 
 when she drank it had become cold ; she declared that it was 
 quite velvety and wished her husband could have had some. 
 After a long gossip the two separated. Mme. Cardinal ate 
 some food and then indulged in a siesta which lasted until 
 dark. 
 
 She had barely taken a glance at Toupillier when a cautious 
 knock was heard on the door, and Cerizet entered. 
 
 " Well ? " said he, as he came in. 
 
 " Well, he's taken the dose. He's been for these four 
 hours as dead as Jesus. He was dreaming and talking of dia- 
 monds, just now." 
 
 " These beggars pile up everything when they get miserly," 
 said Cdrizet. 
 
 " By-the-by, little father, what was your idea in telling 
 Mme. Perrache that you are my man of business and not a 
 doctor? It was arranged this morning that you were to 
 come as a doctor " 
 
 " I saw that the woman was going to propose a consulta- 
 tion, so I got out of it like that." 
 
 " Did they notice you come in, those porters?" 
 
 " It seemed to me that the woman was asleep in her chair," 
 replied Cerizet. 
 
 " She should be sound," said la Cardinal, witn a signifi- 
 cant shrug. 
 
 " What ! Really ? " asked Cerizet. 
 
 "Parbleu!" said the fish-hawker. "Enough for one is 
 enough for two ; I gave her the rest of the dose."
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 201 
 
 "As to her husband," said Cerizet, " he is there, for as he 
 drew his thread he made me a gracious sign of recognition, 
 which I could well have dispensed with, as I passed." 
 
 " Leave it till night has fallen ; then we'll have a little 
 game that will bother him." 
 
 In fact, a quarter of an hour after, with a nerve that aston- 
 ished the usurer, she carried through a farce of seeing a 
 "monsieur" out, who begged her to not take such trouble. 
 Making a manner of seeing the pretended doctor as far as the 
 gate on the street, half-way across the courtyard she pre- 
 tended that the wind had blown out her light, and, under the 
 pretext of relighting it, she extinguished Perrache's light as 
 well. All this play, accompanied with much gesticulations 
 and loquacious vociferations, was so cleverly done, that the 
 porter before any judge would not have hesitated to make 
 oath that the doctor, whom he had ushered in that evening, 
 had come down from the beggar's room and left the house 
 between nine and ten. 
 
 When she returned to the room she acted on Beranger's 
 hint and hung up her old shawl at the window, as though to 
 screen Lisette's amours. In the Luxembourg life's stir is 
 over early. Before ten all was quiet, inside the house as well 
 as out. If it did not take long to find the treasure la Cardinal 
 could have the front gate left open, so that in case of having 
 to fetch medicine she could get handily to the drug-store. 
 Then if the porters acted as porters mostly do, when in their 
 first slumber, pull the cord of the latch without getting out of 
 bed, Cerizet could get out at the same time, and they could 
 thus carry off at least a portion of the cash and place it 
 securely away. 
 
 Toupillier, under the brawny hands of the fish-hawker, was 
 soon transferred to the other bed, and the mattress was eagerly 
 searched. At first they found nothing, and the fish-hawker, 
 being pressed to explain how that morning she was sure of 
 ]ier uncle sleeping on one hundred thousand francs in gold,
 
 202 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 was obliged to confess that her conversation with Perrache 
 and her brilliant imagination were the basis of her pretended 
 certainty. Cerizet was furious. After all this time cherishing 
 the idea and hope of a fortune, and making up his mind to 
 embark on dangerous and compromising undertakings, in the 
 end to find himself face to face with emptiness ! The disap- 
 pointment was so cruel that, only that he dreaded an en- 
 counter with so muscular a future mother-in-law, he would 
 have been carried to extreme rage. 
 
 At the least he could vent his choler in words. Rudely 
 assailed, la Cardinal would only keep saying that all was not 
 yet lost, and, with the faith that removes mountains, con- 
 tinued to tumble the bed over from top to bottom. 
 
 So that she might have nothing to reproach herself with, la 
 Cardinal, notwithstanding Cerizet's objections, who thought 
 it ridiculous, insisted on removing the sacking of the bedstead 
 bottom ; certainly the vainless search had whetted her facul- 
 ties, for when she lifted the wood frame she heard the sound 
 of some small object, which had become detached, as it fell 
 on the floor. 
 
 Ascribing to this detail a possibly undue importance, the 
 eager explorer soon got a light and after some time found a 
 small polished steel barrel among the filth, of which the use 
 to her was an inexplicable mystery. 
 
 " That's a key ! " exclaimed Cerizet, who at once changing 
 from indifference let his imagination off at a gallop. 
 
 "Ah, ah! you see?" said la Cardinal, triumphantly; 
 "but what can it open?" added she, after reflection; "a 
 doll's trunk?" 
 
 "That's not all," answered Cerizet. "This is a modern 
 invention and very strong locks may be opened with this 
 little instrument." 
 
 At the same time he made a rapid survey, embracing all the 
 furniture in the chamber, went to the bureau, drew out the 
 drawers, looked into the stpve, under the table; but not a
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 203 
 
 thing could he see of a single lock which this little key would 
 fit. 
 
 Mme. Cardinal struck a bright idea. 
 
 " Stay," said she ; " I noticed that as he lay on his bed the 
 old thief never ceased to keep his eye on the wall opposite 
 him." 
 
 "A closet concealed in the wall? anyway that's not im- 
 possible," said Cerizet, taking up the candle. 
 
 After he had carefully examined the door in the alcove 
 which faced the head of the bed, he found nothing but heavy 
 hangings of cobwebs and dust. He then tried the sense of 
 touch, which is occasionally keener, and sounded and felt the 
 wall all over. At the spot where Toupillier had ever kept his 
 eyes he found a circumscribed space which was certainly hollow ; 
 and it was wood. He rolled his handkerchief into a ball and 
 rubbed the spot hard, and under the layer of dirt thus cleaned 
 he found a little oak board closely adjusted in the wall ; on 
 one end of this board was a little round hole, this was the 
 keyhole that the key fitted. 
 
 While Cerizet unlocked the door, which he did without 
 difficulty, la Cardinal, who held up the candle, became pale 
 and gasping ; but, cruel disappointment, the closet was opened 
 and nothing was to be seen but an empty space. Leaving 
 the fury to fulminate her despairing exclamations and to 
 salute her uncle's soul with every conceivable abusive epithet 
 of which she could think, Cerizet kept calm and quiet. 
 
 After putting his arm in the opening and around the bottom 
 of it, he cried : 
 
 " Here is an iron box ! " 
 
 Then he snatched the candle out of the bottle in which it 
 was stuck and moved it around the iron cover he had found. 
 
 "It has no keyhole," said he; "it must have a secret 
 lock." 
 
 After feeling about it for some time he said : 
 
 "Ah! I have it," Under the pressure of his fingers the
 
 204 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 lid sprang open. During this time Mme. Cardinal's life 
 seemed to be suspended. The iron side had arisen, and, 
 among a mass of gold thrown loosely into a deep recess, lay 
 a red morocco case, which from its size and general appear- 
 ance promised magnificent booty. 
 
 "I take the diamonds for the dot, " said Cerizet, when he 
 saw the splendid jewels it contained. "You, my mother, 
 would not know how to dispose of them ; I'll leave the gold for 
 your share. As to the Funds and the house, they are not 
 worth the trouble of getting the worthy man to make 
 another will." 
 
 "Just a minute, my boy!" replied la Cardinal, who 
 found this division rather too summary; " we will first count 
 the cash." 
 
 " Hush ! " said Cdrizet, stopping in a listening attitude. 
 
 "Why?" asked la Cardinal. 
 
 Cerizet made her a sign to remain silent, and listened with 
 more attention. 
 
 "I hear the sound of steps on the stairs," said he soon 
 after ; then he hastily restored the jewel-case in the closet and 
 vainly tried to lower the panel. 
 
 " Indeed, yes, somebody is coming. Ah, bah ! it is only 
 the mad girl, I suppose ; she does walk in the night." 
 
 If it was the insane girl she had a key to the room, for it 
 was inserted in the lock ; la Cardinal was too late in trying 
 to bolt the door, so blew out the light to give less chances of 
 discovery by the darkness. Useless precaution ! the spoil- 
 sport carried a candle in his hand. 
 
 When she saw that the intruder in their business was a little 
 old man of puny appearance, Mme. Cardinal, her eyes flam- 
 ing, sprang before him, like a lioness seeking to protect her 
 cubs from the hunter. 
 
 "Calm yourself, my good lady," said the old man, 
 banteringly, "the police are sent for, they will be here in n, 
 moment."
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 205 
 
 The word " police " broke, as the common saying is, Mme. 
 Cardinal's legs. 
 
 "But, monsieur, the police!" said she; "we are not 
 robbers." 
 
 " Just the same, were I in your place, I shouldn't wait for 
 them," said the little old man; " they make unfortunate mis- 
 takes at times." 
 
 " Can I get, then ? " said the fish-hawker, incredulously. 
 
 " Yes, when you return to me anything that may by acci- 
 dent have gotten into your pockets." 
 
 " Oh ! my good sir, I have nothing in my hands, nothing 
 in my pockets; I wouldn't harm anybody in the world ; I am 
 only here to look after this poor cherub, my uncle ; search me 
 if you want to." 
 
 " That will do ; now get out," said the old man. 
 
 The fish-hawker needed no second telling, but rapidly 
 scuttled down the stair. C6rizet seemed about to take the 
 same way. 
 
 "You, monsieur, that is another matter," said the old man ; 
 " you and I can have a little chat together; but if you prove 
 tractable, things may be satisfactorily arranged." 
 
 It may be that the effects of the narcotic had ceased, for 
 Toupillier now opened his eyes and looked about him with the 
 manner of a man who wonders where he is ; then, seeing his 
 closet open, he cried out : " Thieves ! thieves ! " 
 
 " No, Toupillier," said the little old man ; " you have not 
 been robbed; I arrived in time; nothing has been touched." 
 
 "And you, why don't you arrest that villain?" said the 
 beggar, pointing to Cerizet. 
 
 " Monsieur is not a thief," replied the old man ; "on the 
 contrary, he came up with me to give me his help." Then, 
 turning to C6rizet, he said : " I think, my friend, that we had 
 better postpone our interview until the morrow. At ten 
 o'clock come to the next house and inquire for Monsieur 
 du Portail."
 
 206 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 Cirizet, finding that he was not to be treated more rigor- 
 ously than Mrne. Cardinal, gave his promise and slipped 
 away; more especially as the little monsieur had recognized 
 him as the "brave Cerizet." 
 
 The next day Cerizet did not fail to appear at the rendez- 
 vous, as directed. He was ushered into the study of Du 
 Portail, whom he found writing. Without rising, he made a 
 sign that his guest be seated and went on with his letter. 
 When it was finished he rang for Bruno, his valet, and, 
 giving him the letter, he said : 
 
 " For Monsieur the Justice of the Peace of the arrondisse- 
 ment." 
 
 Then he carefullly wiped the steel pen that he had used, 
 symmetrically replaced all the articles that he had moved on 
 his desk, and it was only when these little matters had been 
 duly attended to that he turned to Cerizet and said : 
 
 " You know that we have lost poor Monsieur Toupillier in 
 the night?" 
 
 "Truly, no," said Cerizet, putting on the best look of 
 sympathy he could assume. ' : This is my first tidings of 
 it." 
 
 " You at least might have expected it ; when one gives a 
 dying man a big bowl of hot wine, narcotized beside, for, 
 after drinking but a little glass, Perrache's wife lay in a leth- 
 argy the whole night through, it becomes quite evident that 
 this catastrophe had been arranged for and hastened." 
 
 "I am ignorant, monsieur," said Cerizet with dignity, 
 " of what Madame Cardinal may have given her uncle. 
 Doubtless I committed an indiscretion in helping that woman 
 to preserve her inheritance to which she gave me assurances 
 that she had a legal right ; but I am incapable of attempting 
 the life of that old man ; such a thought never entered my 
 mind." 
 
 "Was it you that wrote' me this letter?" said du Portail, 
 brusquely, offering a paper to Cerizet.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 2tf 
 
 "A letter?" replied he, with the hesitation of a man who 
 wonders whether to lie or speak the truth. 
 
 " I have a mania for autographs ; I am positive this is 
 yours, for I have one of them when the Opposition elevated 
 you to the glorious state of martyr. The letter you hold in 
 your hand tells me of the monetary straits of young la 
 Peyrade." 
 
 " Well," said the man of the Rue des Poules, "as I knew 
 that you had in your care a demoiselle de la Peyrade, I 
 guessed that you were Thdodose's unknown protector. Now, 
 having a sincere affection for that poor boy, it was in his in- 
 terests that I made so bold " 
 
 " You were right," interrupted du Portail. " I am pleased 
 to encounter a friend of his. It was this that saved you last 
 night. But what about those twenty-five thousand francs' 
 worth of acceptances ? Is he leading a dissipated life?" 
 
 "On the contrary," replied C6rizet, "he's a puritan. 
 He is just on the point of making a wealthy marriage." 
 
 " Ah ! he is to be married ; to whom, pray ? " 
 
 Then Cerizet proceeded to inform him of the circumstances 
 of Celeste Thuillier. When he had concluded du Portail 
 said: 
 
 " But you wrote me that those acceptances were in favor of 
 Monsieur Dutocq. Is it a kind of matrimonial brokerage?" 
 
 "Something of the sort," said Cerizet. "You know, 
 monsieur, that such transactions are common enough in Paris ; 
 the clergy doesn't disdain putting their finger in them." 
 
 " Well, even if the marriage is a settled thing, I must get 
 you, my dear sir, to put an end to it ; I have other views for 
 Thodose another match to propose to him." 
 
 "Excuse me," replied Cerizet; "should this marriage be 
 broken off, it would be impossible for him to meet those ac- 
 ceptances." 
 
 "Monsieur Dutocq's debt," replied du Portail, "you shall 
 yourself pay off. Should not Theodose prove amenable to
 
 208 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 my projects, those acceptances in our hands might compel 
 him to do so ; you could sue him in your name ; I will pay 
 the notes and your costs in suing Theodose." 
 
 "That's fair, I must say, monsieur," said Cerizet. "Per- 
 haps you may afford me some light on why you do me the 
 honor of confiding this matter to my hands." 
 
 "You mentioned a minute ago the cousin of la Peyrade, 
 Mademoiselle Lydie de la Peyrade. That young lady, no 
 longer in her first youth, for she is nearly thirty, is the natural 
 daughter of la Beaumesnil, of the Theatre-Francais, and de la 
 Peyrade, commissary-general of police under the Empire, the 
 uncle of your friend. At his death, which occurred suddenly, 
 I, his best friend, took upon myself the care of his daughter 
 whom he passionately loved." 
 
 "You have faithfully performed that duty," said Cerizet, 
 anxious to let the other know that he was acquainted with 
 some details of his inner life. 
 
 " Yes," answered du Portail, " the poor child was so cruelly 
 tried by the death of her father that her mind became some- 
 what affected. But fortunately a change has occurred for the 
 better; yesterday Doctor Bianchon and two other eminent 
 physicians in consultation declared that marriage and a first 
 child would infallibly restore her. You can well see that the 
 remedy is too easy and too pleasant not to be given a trial." 
 
 " Then," said Cerizet, " it is to his cousin that you propose 
 to marry Thdodose." 
 
 "You have said it," replied du Portail. "You must not 
 suppose, though, that by accepting this marriage he is dis- 
 playing a gratuitous devotion. Lydie is agreeable in her per- 
 son, is talented, has a charming nature, and can bring high 
 favor to bear in her husband's behalf. She has also a pretty 
 fortune, and my property will be wholly secured to her in the 
 contract ; and, added to this, she has inherited an important 
 accession the past night." 
 
 "How!" said Cerizet; "has that old Toupillier ?"
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 209 
 
 " By a holograph will, which I have here, the beggar con- 
 stitutes her his universal legatee ; you see it was our property 
 you and Madame Cardinal were trying to pillage. Beside, 
 the will only makes a restitution." 
 
 " A restitution ! " exclaimed Cerizet. 
 
 "A restitution," repeated du Portail, "and nothing is 
 easier to establish. You remember the theft of diamonds 
 from one of our dramatic celebrities some ten years ago? " 
 
 " Yes, certainly ; the actress who lost them was the famous 
 Mademoiselle Beaumesnil." 
 
 "Precisely, the mother of Lydie de la Peyrade." 
 
 " So that the wretched Toupillier But no, I remem- 
 ber, the thief was convicted. He was known as Charles 
 Crochard. He was said to be, under the rose, the natural 
 son of a great personage, the Comte de Granville." 
 
 " Well," said du Portail, " it happened thus : The robbery, 
 you remember, was committed in a mansion on the Rue du 
 Tournonj occupied by Mademoiselle Beaumesnil. Charles 
 Crochard, a handsome fellow, had the run of her*house." 
 
 "Yes, yes," said Cerizet, "I recall her embarrassment 
 when she gave her testimony ; and also how she lost her voice 
 when asked her age." 
 
 "The robbery," continued du Portail, "was audaciously 
 committed in the daytime ; no sooner had Crochard got the 
 casket than he went to the church of St. Sulpice, where he 
 had arranged to meet an accomplice. He was to receive the 
 diamonds from his hands, and, having a passport already pro- 
 vided, he was to at once start for foreign parts. It chanced 
 that the expected one was detained for some time and was 
 late in arriving at the church. Charles Crochard found him- 
 self face to face with a celebrated detective who knew him 
 perfectly well, as the young rogue had had several encounters 
 with the police already. The absence of his friend, the 
 rencounter with the detective, and a. rapid movement made 
 by the latter troubled his mind ; he thought he was being 
 14
 
 210 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 watched. He lost his head under this idea, and wished him- 
 self well rid of his prize. At this moment he caught sight of 
 Toupillier, then the holy-water distributer. ' My dear fel- 
 low,' said he, assuring himself that no one could hear him, 
 ' will you oblige me by taking care of this little parcel ? It 
 is a box of lace. I am about calling on a countess to collect 
 a bill ; if she saw this she would want it on credit ; that I don't 
 want to do. But,' added he, 'on no account touch the paper 
 wrapper, for there is nothing so difficult as to rewrap it in the 
 old creases.' ' 
 
 "The dummy ! " exclaimed C6rizet, na'ively; " why, it was 
 a recommendation for the man to open it." 
 
 "You are a practiced moralist," said du Portail. "One 
 hour after, Crochard, finding nothing happened to him, pre- 
 sented himself at the church to recover his deposit. Toupil- 
 lier was no longer in the place. You can figure to yourself 
 how, on the next day, at first mass, Charles Crochard ap- 
 proached the holy-water distributer, who had returned to the 
 performance of his duty ; but night, as they say, brings coun- 
 sel ; the dear man, with bold effrontery, declared that nothing 
 had been left with him, and he did not know what he was 
 talking about." 
 
 "And not the least good to argue about it," said C6rizet, 
 who was not far from sympathizing in so bold a play, " for 
 that would have meant exposure." 
 
 " No doubt the robbery was already noised around," du 
 Portail went on, " and Toupillier, a smart fellow, had rightly 
 calculated that the thief by accusing him would discover him- 
 self. In the trial Charles Crochard never spoke one word of 
 his misadventure, and, condemned to ten years, six of which 
 he passed on the hulks, during his incarceration he did not 
 open his lips about the treachery. In that interval Madame 
 Beaumesnil died, leaving her daughter some small remains of 
 a great fortune ; she mentioned the diamonds, and expressly 
 stated that they became hers, 'if they were ever recovered.' "
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 211 
 
 "Ah ! " said Cdrizet, " that made it bad for Toupillier, for 
 having a man of your mettle to deal with " 
 
 "All thoughts of Charles Crochard were first turned to 
 vengeance on his release ; he denounced Toupillier as the 
 receiver of the casket. Taken under hand by Justice, he 
 defended himself most good-humoredly, singularly so, and 
 proved that no suspicion attached to him, and the case was 
 dismissed. But this affair cost Toupillier his position ; he 
 obtained, not without difficulty, the right of begging in the 
 porch of St. Sulpice. As for myself, I was satisfied of his 
 guilt, and, without being suspected, I had the closest watch 
 kept upon him ; in order to unmask him, I did one of the 
 smartest tricks in my life. I became the tenant of the room 
 adjoining his on the Rue Cceur- Volant ; I drilled a hole 
 through the party-wall, and one evening saw him take out the 
 casket from a cleverly contrived hiding-place, open it, and 
 gaze upon the contents and fondle them. The man loved 
 them for themselves alone ; he had no thought of converting 
 them into money." 
 
 "I understand," said CSrizet, "a mania of the same kind 
 as Monsieur Cardillac, the jeweler, which has just been drama- 
 tized." 
 
 "The same," returned du Portail ; " the wretch was in love 
 with them, so that when I entered his room and told him I 
 knew all, he asked me not to dispossess him of them while he 
 lived, and at his death his whole hoard of gold, his cash in 
 the Funds, and his house should become the heritage of Made- 
 moiselle de la Peyrade. 
 
 " Well, my dear sir, I was not mistaken in trusting him. 
 I exacted that he should occupy a room in the same house as 
 myself; I assisted in building that hiding-place of his, the 
 secret of which you so ingeniously discovered ; but, in your 
 ignorance, you did not discover that when you touched the 
 secret spring you also rang a bell in my chamber which 
 warned me of any attempt to steal our hoard."
 
 212 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "Poor Madame Cardinal," cried Ce>izet, with pleasantry, 
 "she counted her chickens too soon." 
 
 " Now, on account of the interest I feel in the nephew of 
 my late friend, this marriage seems to me most desirable," 
 said du Portail. " Theodose may object, owing to his cousin's 
 mental state. You have turned up on my way ; you are smart 
 and crafty, so I put this matrimonial negotiation in your 
 charge. You may speak to him of a pretty girl with a good 
 fortune, with one slight drawback, but mention no "names." 
 
 "Your confidence honors me," replied Cerizet; "I will 
 justify it to the best of my ability." 
 
 "Get those acceptances from Dutocq; we shall not haggle 
 over a few thousand francs, but when the affair is arranged 
 Dutocq must give us his assistance. After what you have told 
 me of the other marriage, you can scarcely waste any time," 
 concluded du Portail. 
 
 " Two days hence I have an appointment with Theodose," 
 said Cerizet. 
 
 " So be it," said du Portail ; " that is not delaying much. 
 Now, remember, monsieur, if you succeed you have a man 
 who may assist you, instead of bringing you to account." 
 
 Then the pair separated. 
 
 The same as the Tourniquet Saint-Jean, the Rocher de Can- 
 cale, whence this scene is changed to, is to-day but a memory. 
 A wine-dealer who uses a pewter-topped counter has replaced 
 that Temple of Taste, that sanctuary of European fame, which 
 had seen the passing of gastronomy under the Empire and 
 the Restoration. 
 
 The evening of the day arranged upon for a meeting la 
 Peyrade had received this simple word from Cerizet : 
 
 " To-morrow, lease or no lease, at the Rocher, at six 
 thirty." Dutocq received his invitation by word of mouth; 
 but his time was "quarter past six, sharp." It was evident 
 that Cerizet wanted that fifteen minutes with him before the
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 213 
 
 arrival of la Peyrade. That fifteen minutes the usurer in- 
 tended to employ in jockeying Dutocq in the purchase of the 
 acceptances ; he thought a sudden proposition to purchase 
 would be accepted more readily than if time were given for 
 thinking. Moreover, let it be said that Cerizet was bound to 
 try and scrape something out of his dear friend ; it was an 
 instinct, his nature. He had the same horror of a straight 
 line as the amateurs in English gardens have of a straight 
 path. 
 
 At a quarter after six Dutocq punctually made his appear- 
 ance, for a dinner at the Rocher de Cancale was something 
 of an event. 
 
 "It is funny," said he, " that we again meet; the three 
 emperors, except that our present tryst is preferable to our 
 former one." 
 
 "My faith!" replied Cerizet, "I don't quite know that 
 the results justify the change, for, frankly, where are the 
 profits of our triumvirate ? " 
 
 "Well, but it was a bargain," said Dutocq, "with a long 
 term attached. It can't be claimed that la Peyrade has lost 
 much time, pardon the pun, in becoming installed at the 
 T(Ji)uilcric$. The rascal has gone ahead pretty fast." 
 
 " Not so fast but that his marriage is anything but a settled 
 matter," said Cerizet. 
 
 "Not settled; why?" 
 
 " Yes, I am charged to propose to him another wife. I am 
 not so sure that he will be allowed to choose." 
 
 " But what, the devil ! my dear, lending your hand to help 
 on another marriage when you know we have the first hypoth- 
 ecated ! " 
 
 " My friend, one cannot always control circumstances. I 
 saw that the other was gone overhead ; I look now to guide 
 our feet to pastures new." 
 
 "They can't fool me ; la Peyrade signed the acceptance" 
 and he must pay them."
 
 214 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "The question is, will he pay them ? You are not a mer- 
 chant, neither is Theodose ; suppose he disputes the accept- 
 ances; he might deny their validity. The tribunal might 
 annul them as having been given without consideration re- 
 ceived. Now you, as clerk to a justice, might find that the 
 chancellor could have a little case with you ; as for myself, 
 I've seen to my interests. I choose to save myself by a sac- 
 rifice." 
 
 " What kind of a sacrifice ? " 
 
 " Parbleu, I have sold my share," said Cerizet. 
 
 " Who was the buyer? " 
 
 " Who, think you, would step into my shoes but those 
 urging on this other marriage ? " 
 
 " Doubtless, then, my share would be of use also ? " 
 
 " Well, you see, I could not offer them until I had seen 
 you." 
 
 "On what terms?" 
 
 "I let them have my acceptances for fifteen thousand 
 francs." 
 
 " Oh ! then your game is to make a commission out of 
 mine to makeup your loss if you've had one beside, it may 
 be but a scheme between you and la Peyrade," said Dutocq. 
 
 "At least, my dear, you don't mince your words; you 
 have an infamous thought and state it with charming aban- 
 don." 
 
 "Well, I withdraw the insinuation, as you say that you are 
 going to make the offer to Theodose in my presence." 
 
 " See here, my poor friend, how I reasoned ; I said to my- 
 self: 'This good Dutocq is being pressed for the last pay- 
 ment on his office ; he will find enough to pay it off at one 
 stroke ; events have shown that uncertainties exist about the 
 compromising of la Peyrade ; here's cash down, on the nail; ' 
 the bargain ain't so bad, either." 
 
 "All the same, it's a loss of two-fifths." 
 
 "You just spoke of commissions; you only help me over
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 215 
 
 this other matter and I don't fear but what I can obtain you 
 a round twenty thousand francs." 
 
 " Then you think this new proposal may not be acceptable 
 to la Peyrade ? Why should he object ? Is it then some 
 heiress from whom the rascal has already had something ! " 
 
 ''All that I can say is that trouble is expected in conclud 
 ing it." 
 
 At this moment the door opened and the other guest 
 arrived. " You may serve dinner," said C6rizet to the at- 
 tendant ; "we expect no one else." 
 
 They could see that Theodose had begun to take his flight 
 toward higher social spheres ; elegance had become his con- 
 stant ambition. He had made an evening toilet, dress suit 
 and patent-leather shoes, while the other two received him in 
 loose coats and muddy boots. 
 
 "Gentlemen," said he, "I think I am somewhat late, but 
 that devil of a Thuillier, with the pamphlet I am concocting 
 for him, is one of the most intolerable of human beings. I 
 was so unfortunate as to arrange to revise the proofs with him; 
 at each paragraph we had a fight : ' What I don't under- 
 stand,' he kept saying, 'the public can't understand, either. 
 I'm not a man of letters, but I am a practical man ; ' and it 
 was the same battle over every sentence. I thought this 
 seance would nevter come to an end." 
 
 " What would you, my dear? " said Dutocq ; "when a man 
 wants to get there he must have some courage ; once the mar- 
 riage is made you can hold up your head." 
 
 "Oh ! yes," said la Peyrade, "I'll raise it; for since you 
 have given me this bread of bitterness, I've become heartily 
 tired of it." 
 
 " Cerizet," said Dutocq, "has to-day some more succulent 
 food to place before you." 
 
 For the time being nothing more was said, they had to do 
 justice to the goodly cheer ordered for them by Cerizet in 
 honor of the first tenant. It was not until dessert was served
 
 216 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 that Cerizet decided to ask la Peyrade what resolution had 
 been come to in reference to the lease. 
 
 "Nothing, my dear," replied la Peyrade. 
 
 " How, nothing ? I left you time enough to decide in." 
 
 " And, in fact, something is decided ; there will be no first 
 tenant, Mademoiselle Brigitte will herself sub-let the house." 
 
 "That's a different story," said C6rizet, with a lordly air. 
 "After your promise to me, I avow that I did not expect such 
 a result as this." 
 
 " What could I do, my dear ? I made my promise subject to 
 contingencies ; I wasn't able to give another turn to the busi- 
 ness. In her quality as master-woman and sample of per- 
 petual motion, Mademoiselle Thuillier has reflected that she 
 might as well undertake the task of managing the property 
 and pocketing the profits herself that you intended making. 
 I put in all I could about the annoyances, inconveniences, and 
 so forth, but ' Bah ! rubbish ! ' she replied ; ' it will stir my 
 blood and be good for my health.' " 
 
 "But this is pitiable," said CSrizet ; " the poor old maid 
 doesn't know what it means to get tenants from top to bot- 
 tom." 
 
 "I used all those arguments," replied la Peyrade, "but 
 only to strengthen her resolution. There you are, my dear 
 democrats, you fomented the revolution of '9 ; you thought 
 it an excellent speculation to dethrone the nobles by the 
 bourgeoisie; it ends in yourselves being elbowed out. It 
 seems like a paradox, but you've found out now that the 
 country-jay can't be forced down and kept under like the 
 noble. The aristocracy had a care for its dignity; it pro- 
 hibited itself a host of petty details, even of learning to 
 write; it found itself dependent on a host of plebeian servitors 
 to whom it confided three-fourths of the actions of their lives. 
 But to-day utilitarian theories rule : ' We are never so well 
 served as by ourselves.' 'It's not disgraceful to know one's 
 own business;' and a thousand other middle-class proverbs,
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 217 
 
 which have done away with the need of intermediaries. Why 
 should not Brigitte Thuillier have the pretensions to manage 
 her house, when dukes and peers of France go personally to 
 the Bourse, when the same persons sign their own leases, and 
 read them first, and discuss every point with the notary at 
 his own place, one whom they formerly accounted as a scriv- 
 ener?" 
 
 "What you are preaching," said C6rizet, carelessly, "is 
 mighty clever ; but it seems to prove, also, that you are not 
 on such a footing of intimacy with Mile. Thuillier as you 
 would have us believe. I begin to think that the marriage 
 is far from being so settled a matter as Dutocq and myself 
 fancied." 
 
 " Without doubt," replied la Peyrade, "there are yet some 
 careful touches to be given to our sketch before it is finished, 
 but I think it nears completion." 
 
 "For my part I am of the contrary opinion, you have lost 
 ground, and the reason is simple ; you have done an immense 
 service to these people, and they will never forgive you for 
 it." 
 
 "Well, wait and see," said la Peyrade; " I hold them by 
 more than one string." 
 
 " No, you are wrong. If I were you I shouldn't feel quite 
 so sure of treading on solid ground ; if something else turned 
 up that presented a good chance " 
 
 "What ! because I couldn't get you the lease to eat, must 
 I throw the handle after the axe ? " 
 
 "I repeat to you," said Cerizet, "that I'm not looking at 
 it from the side of my own interests ; but as you have doubt- 
 less and truly tried your level best to promote them, I think 
 that the way in which you have been pushed aside is a dis- 
 quieting symptom." 
 
 " 'Ah! fa/" said la Peyrade, "what are you getting at? 
 Is it that you have something to propose to me ? What's it 
 to cost?"
 
 218 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "My dear fellow," replied Cerizet, ignoring this imper- 
 tinence, "yourself shall judge of the value of finding a young 
 woman, well brought up, adorned with beauty and talent, a 
 dot equivalent to or no less than Celeste's, in her own right, 
 plus one hundred thousand francs in diamonds (as Mile. 
 Georges says on her posters in the provinces), beside political 
 influence for her husband's benefit." 
 
 "And this treasure you have in your hand?" asked la 
 Peyrade, with an incredulous air. 
 
 " Better than that, I am authorized to make you the offer ; 
 I may even say that I am charged so to do." 
 
 " My friend, either you are mocking me, unless, as I sup- 
 pose, this phoenix has some prohibitory defect." 
 
 "I acknowledge," said Cerizet, " that there exists one slight 
 defect, but not on the score of family, for she has none." 
 
 "Ah ! " said la Peyrade, "of course, a natural child what 
 beside?" 
 
 " Beside? Well, she is not so young as to wear the hood 
 of St. Catherine; she is, say, about twenty-nine; but an 
 elderly girl can be imagined into a young widow nothing 
 easier." 
 
 "And is that all the venom?" 
 "Yes, all that is irreparable." 
 
 " What do you mean by that ? A case of rhinoplasty ? " 
 This so pertinent a word, as addressed to Cerizet, was given 
 with an aggressive air ; this manner, indeed, had been notice- 
 able throughout the dinner, even in the conversation of the 
 barrister. But it was not to the purpose of the negotiator 
 to resent it. 
 
 "No," he responded; "we have as good a nose as feet 
 and waist; but we might perhaps have a touch of hysteria." 
 "Very good ! " said la Peyrade, "and as from hysteria to 
 
 insanity there is but a step " 
 
 "Well, yes," eagerly interrupted CSrizet; "sorrows have 
 left our brain slightly deranged, but the doctors, after a care-
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 21 
 
 fill diagnosis, say that after bearing a first child not the least 
 tra.cc of this trouble will remain." 
 
 " I willingly admit that Messieurs the Doctors are absolutely 
 infallible," replied the barrister; "but, in spite of your dis- 
 couragement?, you must excuse me if I still continue to ad- 
 dress Mademoiselle Colleville. It is perhaps ridiculous to 
 avow this, but the fact is that I am gradually falling in love 
 with that little girl. It is not that she is very beautiful, or 
 that the glamour of her dot has enamored me, but in that child 
 is an innocent mind joined to sound sense ; and, what to my 
 mind is of more consequence, she possesses a sincere and solid 
 Piety." 
 
 "Yes," said Cirizet, who, having been on the stage, may 
 well have remembered Moliere's: "Your hymen shall be 
 soaked in sweetness and joy." 
 
 This allusion to Tartuffe was keenly felt by la Peyrade, who 
 hotly retorted : 
 
 " The contact of innocence will disinfect me of the vile 
 company I have kept for so long a time." 
 
 "And you will pay your acceptances, which I urge you to 
 do without delay," said Cerizet. " Dutocq here was just say- 
 ing that he would like to see the color of your money." 
 
 "Me? oh, not at all," said Dutocq; "I think, on the 
 contrary, our friend is perfectly right in his delay." 
 
 "Well, for myself," said la Peyrade, "I am quite of 
 C6rizet's opinion ; I hold that the less the debt is due, and 
 therefore the more insecure, the sooner should one free him- 
 self by paying it." 
 
 "But, my dear la Peyrade," said Dutocq, "you speak so 
 bitterly." 
 
 Drawing from his pocket a portfolio, la Peyrade said: 
 
 "Have you the acceptances with you, Dutocq?" 
 
 "Faith, no, dear fellow," said the clerk; "I don't carry 
 them around, beside they are in Cerizet's hands." 
 
 "Well," said the barrister, as he arose, "whenever you 
 
 V
 
 220 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 bring them to ray office, the cash is ready. Cerizet can 
 prove that." 
 
 "What! are you leaving us without waiting for coffee?" 
 said the usurer, much amazed. 
 
 "Yes; at eight o'clock I have an arbitration case. Beside, 
 all has been said ; you haven't got the lease, but you have 
 gotten your twenty-five thousand francs, and Dutocq can have 
 his whenever he likes to present his acceptances at my office ; 
 I don't see anything that should prevent me going about my 
 own affairs, therefore I give you a cordial good-day." 
 
 " Dear me ! " said Cerizet, as la Peyrade went out, " this 
 means a rupture." 
 
 " And carefully prepared at that," remarked Dutocq. 
 "With what an air he produced his portfolio ! " 
 
 "But where the devil did he get his money?" asked the 
 usurer. 
 
 "No doubt," replied the clerk, ironically, "whence he got 
 that with which he paid off in full your acceptances on which 
 you made such a sacrifice." 
 
 " Well, I was instructed to buy up your acceptances ; you 
 will recollect that I had risen to twenty thousand when he 
 came in." 
 
 " All right, when we leave here we'll go to your house for 
 those notes ; I mean to give him the chance to pay me while 
 his humor is hot." 
 
 " Quite correct ; for I can tell you right here that there 
 will very soon be an upset in his life." 
 
 "Then you were really serious about that crazy marrying 
 him. I must say that I should have adopted the same 
 course ; Ninas and Ophelias are very interesting on the stage, 
 but in our households " 
 
 "In the households, when they bring a dot, we become 
 their guardian," replied the sententious Cerizet. " Really 
 we get a fortune and not a wife." 
 
 "Let's have our coffee elsewhere," said Cdrizet; "I want
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 221 
 
 to get out of this room, I can't breathe in it." He rang for 
 the gar^on ; "the bill ? " said he. 
 
 "But, m'sieur, it is paid." 
 
 "Paid! and by whom?" 
 
 "By the gentleman who just left. Shall I bring in the 
 coffee it is paid for, before he left?" 
 
 "An excellent reason for refusing it," answered Cerizet 
 angrily. "It is really inconceivable that in a house like this 
 such a blunder should be allowed. What do you think of 
 such impertinence? " he bitterly added, when the waiter had 
 gone. 
 
 " Pshaw ! it's only a schoolboy's move to show that he has 
 money in his pocket ; it is something new to him." 
 
 "No, no, that's not it at all," said Cerizet; "it was his 
 way of emphasizing the rupture. ' I will not even owe a 
 dinner to you' is what he says/' 
 
 Dutocq was the guide to a low caf6 in the Passage du 
 Saumon, where Cerizet soon recovered his good humor; like 
 a fish who had been out of water returned to his native ele- 
 ment, so Cerizet had become so degraded that he felt ill at 
 ease in good society resorts. In this vulgar place a game of 
 pool was being played. Now Cdrizet enjoyed the reputation 
 of being a skillful player in the establishment, and he was en- 
 treated to take a cue. In the parlance of the place he 
 " bought a ball ;" that is, one of the players sold him his turn 
 and score. 
 
 Soon after, in his shirt-sleeves, a pipe between his teeth, he 
 made a masterly stroke which evoked tumults of applause. 
 He looked triumphantly around, graciously receiving the ad- 
 miration of the gods, when his eyes alighted on a terrible kill- 
 joy. Standing amongst the spectators, looking over his hand 
 resting on his cane, du Portail was watching him. Cerizet 
 reddened, lost his presence of mind, made a few bad strokes, 
 and was soon out of the game. As he was gloomily donning 
 his coat du Portail brushed by him :
 
 222 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "Rue Montmartre, at the end of the court," said he in a 
 low voice. 
 
 When they met C6rizet was so dumb as to try and explain 
 why he was found in such disreputable company. 
 
 "But," said du Portail, " to see you there I had also to be 
 there myself." 
 
 "That is true," replied the usurer; "I was astonished to 
 find a quiet inhabitant of the St. Sulpice quarter there." 
 
 "That proves to you," retorted the other, in a tone which 
 effectually cut off curious questioning, " that I am in the 
 habit of going everywhere, and my lucky star usually leads 
 me to those whom I wish to meet. Well, what have you 
 done?" 
 
 Cdrizet explained all that had occurred, and that there was 
 no chance of Dutocq's acceptances being secured. 
 
 "Then does he regard his marriage with the demoiselle 
 Colleville as a settled thing? " 
 
 " Not only that, but he pretended that it is a love-match. 
 He tried to persuade me of that by a long, tiresome tirade." 
 
 "Well, now cease your charge; you have failed in this, 
 but I have other uses for you. ' ' 
 
 As he spoke he hailed a passing hack, nodded to Cirizet, 
 got in and told the man to drive to the Rue Honor6-Chevalier. 
 
 As he walked down the Rue Montmartre, to regain the 
 Estrapade quarter, Cirizet puzzled his brain in guessing what 
 that little old man, with curt speech, imperious manners, and 
 a tone that seemed to cast a spell as strong as a grappling- 
 iron over a person, could be ; why, too, should a man like 
 him come such a distance to spend his evening, especially in 
 such a place where he must assuredly be out of his element? 
 He had just reached the Market when he was rudely aroused 
 from his meditation by a rough shake and a punch in his 
 back. He turned hastily around, and found himself face to 
 face with Mme. Cardinal. For the past two days she had 
 been taking "drops of consolation" over her defeat in the
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 223 
 
 numerous liquor-dealers' taverns of the quarter. With thick- 
 ened speech and face aflame : 
 
 "Well, papa," said she to Cdrizet, "how did you come on 
 with the little old man ? " 
 
 "I gave him my word," replied the usurer, "that so far as 
 I was concerned it was all a mistake. You, my poor Madame 
 Cardinal, behaved in this affair with much heedlessness ; why 
 should you ask me to assist you in getting your uncle's in- 
 heritance when it has for a long time been manifest that he 
 had a natural daughter to whom he had left all. That little 
 old man is her guardian." 
 
 " Ah ! talk to me of guardian," said la Cardinal, " a nobby 
 guardian. To talk as he did to a woman of my age, only be- 
 cause she wanted to find out if her uncle had anything to 
 leave. And then to talk to me, me ! of the police ! It's 
 horrible, it's dcguslating / " 
 
 " Come ! " said Cirizet, "you got off very well, Mammy 
 Cardinal." 
 
 "Well, and you, you who broke the locks and said you 
 would accept the diamonds under pretense of marrying my 
 daughter. As if she wanted you, my daughter, my legitimate 
 daughter, like she is. ' 'Never, my mother,' said she to me; 
 ' I will never give my heart to a man with half a nose, like 
 his.' " 
 
 " So you've found her, then ? " 
 
 " Only last evening; she has left her drunken actor, and is 
 now, I flatter myself, in a splendid position ; she can eat 
 money, has a coach hired by the month, and is much esteemed 
 by a barrister who would marry her off the reel, but he has to 
 wait for the death of his parents ; for his father happens to be 
 mayor, and the government would be against it." 
 
 "My worthy woman," said Cirizet, "what the devil are 
 you gabbling about ? ' It happens that his father is his 
 
 mother* ' ' 
 
 * farce que le pire se trouve itre maire : mire mother ; maire mayor.
 
 224 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 __ "What stuff! Mayor of his arrondissement, the eleventh, 
 Monsieur Minard, a retired cocoa-dealer, enormously rich." 
 
 " Oh ! very good, I know him. And you say that Olympe 
 is living with his son ? " 
 
 " Well, that is to say, not living together, for that makes 
 talk, that he visits her with a good motive ; he lives at home 
 with his father, but he has bought their furniture and him and 
 my daughter has took a lodgings, where it and my daughter 
 is housed, on the Chauss6e-d'Antin : stylish quarter, ain't 
 it?" 
 
 "It seems nicely arranged," said Cerizet. 
 
 "Yes; and there's something I want to consult you 
 about." 
 
 "What is it?" 
 
 "It's this: my daughter's in luck, I ought not to go on 
 crying fish up and down the streets ; and then I find myself 
 disinherited by my uncle ; it seems to me, therefore, that I've 
 a right to a elementary allowance." 
 
 " You dream, my poor woman. Your daughter is a minor ; 
 it's you should be feeding her; she ought not to provide the 
 alimentaries." 
 
 "Then," said Mme. Cardinal, vexed and disagreeable, 
 " that means that us who have nothing must give to those who 
 have plenty. That's a proper sort of a law ; it's as bad as your 
 guardians who prate about sending for the police. Well, yes, 
 I'd like to see 'em send the police ! Let them guillotine me ! 
 It won't stop me saying that the rich are all swindlers; it's 
 about time the people made another revolution for their right- 
 ful rights, my boy. You, my daughter, the barrister Minard, 
 and that little old guardian, see you, you would all be done 
 away with." 
 
 Seeing that his ex-mother-in-law had worked herself up to a 
 becoming degree of exaltation that was far from assuring, 
 C6rizet abruptly left her, but even then she sent her epithets 
 after him for a hundred feet or more ; but he promised him-
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 225 
 
 self the pleasure of getting even with her the next time she 
 came to the bank in the Rue des Poules to ask for an "easy 
 let down." 
 
 As he neared his house, Cerizet, who was anything but 
 brave, felt an emotion of fear ; he noticed a figure ambushed 
 by his door ; as he approached nearer it detatched itself to 
 come and meet him ; happily it was none other than Dutocq. 
 He had come for his acceptances. C6rizet returned them, 
 with some ill-humor ; he complained of the distrust implied 
 by a visit for such a purpose at that hour. Dutocq paid no 
 attention to his touchy susceptibilities, but the next morning 
 presented them to la Peyrade, who paid him as he had prom- 
 ised. Dutocq made a few sentimental remarks when he had 
 gotten the cash, but he was answered by a marked coolness. 
 
 As he conducted his creditor to the door he found himself 
 face to face with a woman dressed as a servant, who was just 
 about to ring the bell. She seemed to be known to Dutocq, 
 for he said : 
 
 "Ah ! little mother; so you feel the necessity of consulting 
 a barrister ? You are right ; at the family council some serious 
 charges were brought against you." 
 
 " Thank God ! I have no fear of any one ; I can walk with 
 my head erect," answered the woman. 
 
 " Well, be careful, my dear lady, for I tell you that when 
 you get before the judge who is to inquire into the matter, 
 you'll be finely pulled to pieces. The relatives are furious 
 against you; they can't get the idea out of their heads that 
 you have become very rich." 
 
 Here Theodose requested his client to enter. 
 
 This is what had taken place the day before. 
 
 It will be remembered that la Peyrade was in the habit of 
 
 attending the first mass in his parish church. For some time 
 
 he had found himself the object of particular attention on the 
 
 part of the woman who had just entered his house, and who, 
 
 15
 
 226 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 as the saying goes, like Dorine in " Tartuffe," had taken care 
 to attend regularly at "his exact hour ; " these singular pro- 
 ceedings had embarrassed him considerably. 
 
 An affair of the heart ? This explanation scarcely com- 
 ported with the saintly maturity of a person who, wearing 
 the plain caj-, known in the quarter as a janstniste, the nur.- 
 like covering for the hair that distinguished the female vota- 
 ries of that sect. On the morning of the day of the dinner, 
 la Peyrade went to the woman and asked if there was any- 
 thing he could do for her. 
 
 " Monsieur," she replied in a mystical voice, " is I believe 
 the celebrated Monsieur de la Peyrade, the advocate of the 
 poor?" 
 
 " I am la Peyrade ; and I have at times been able to be of 
 service to the poor of this quarter." 
 
 " If you would listen to and grant me a consultation, mon- 
 sieur." 
 
 "This is not a fitting place," replied la Peyrade, "fora 
 conference. I live near here, Rue Saint-Dominique d'Enfer; 
 if you will take the trouble to come to my office " 
 
 "It will not trouble monsieur?" 
 
 " Not the least in the world ; my business is to attend my 
 clients." 
 
 "At what hour, for I would not disturb monsieur?" 
 
 " Whenever you please ; I shall be home all the morning ? " 
 
 "Then I will hear another mass and take the communion ; 
 I am too agitated just now. I will be at monsieur's house at 
 eight o'clock, if that hour won't be inconvenient." 
 
 At the hour named, not one minute before or past, the 
 pious woman rang the bell, but the barrister had some diffi- 
 culty in getting her to be seated and to state her case. Then 
 that delaying little cough, so often used in like cases, seized 
 her ; but at last she touched the object of her visit. 
 
 " This is it," said she, " whether monsieur would be so 
 kind as to let me know if it was true that a very charitable
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 227 
 
 man had given a fund as a reward to servants who have faith- 
 fully served their masters?" 
 
 " There is this to say," replied la Peyrade, " that Monsieur 
 de Montyon founded a prize of virtue which, in fact, has 
 often been awarded to zealous and exemplary servants ; but 
 good conduct only is not enough, there must be some act of 
 high devotion and a truly Christian abnegation." 
 
 "Religion," replied the pious woman, "enjoins humility, 
 and so I cannot praise myself; but for twenty years I have 
 been in the service of an old man, dull in the extreme, a 
 savant, who has eaten up all his substance by inventing 
 things, and whom I have been obliged to feed and clothe ; so 
 some people think I am not unworthy of obtaining the 
 prize." 
 
 " That is, in fact, the conditions under which the Academy 
 chooses its candidates," replied la Peyrade. "What is your 
 master's name? " 
 
 " Father Picot ; they all call him that in our quarter. He 
 takes no care for his dignity; he is occupied with his own 
 ideas ; I wear myself out getting him tasty food, but if one 
 asks him what he had for dinner he cannot remember." 
 
 " Is your master a mathematician ? " 
 
 "Yes, monsieur ; they have been his bane." 
 
 "Well," said la Peyrade, " let me have the testimony prov- 
 ing your devotion to this old man, and I will prepare a peti- 
 tion to the Academy and have it presented." 
 
 " Monsieur is very good," said the pious woman; "if he 
 would allow me to speak of a little difficulty " 
 
 "What is that?" 
 
 " They tell me, monsieur, that the prize can only be won 
 by a very poor person." 
 
 " Not exactly so ; still, the Academy does in effect try to 
 choose people in straitened circumstances and who have made 
 sacrifices beyond their means." 
 
 "Sacrifices! I flatter myself that I have made them; all
 
 228 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 my little heritage from my parents has gone in keeping him, 
 and, beside, for fifteen years I have not had a sou of wages, 
 which, at three hundred francs a year and compound interest, 
 would make a right pretty sum, as monsieur will allow." 
 
 At the words compound interest, which was evidence of a 
 certain degree of cultured financial experience, la Peyrade 
 looked upon this Antigone with attention. 
 
 "In short," said he, "this difficulty of yours " 
 
 "Monsieur," the pious one replied, "will not deem it 
 strange that a very rich uncle of mine has died in England 
 and left me twenty-five thousand francs; one, too, that had 
 done nothing for his family before?" 
 
 "Assuredly there is nothing in that but what is right and 
 properly legal," said the barrister. 
 
 "But, monsieur, having this might lose me the prize; be- 
 side, it is in the greatest danger from my master." 
 
 "How is that?" asked la Peyrade, curiously. 
 
 "Eh! monsieur, if he only got wind of that money, it 
 would go at one mouthful ; his invention of perpetual motion 
 and the like have already ruined both him and me." 
 
 "Then you would have the knowledge withheld from the 
 Academy and master, both?" 
 
 " How clever monsieur is; he fully understands at once," 
 said the religious woman, smiling. 
 
 "And what do you want to do with the money?" asked 
 the barrister. "You want to get it out of your hands?" 
 
 "For fear that the master might swoop down upon it, 
 certainly. How well monsieur understands; now, if it was 
 at interest, I could get him a few delicacies now and again ; 
 that's why I should like it to bear interest." 
 
 "And as high as possible, eh ?" said the barrister. 
 
 " Dame, yes, five or six per cent." 
 
 "Then it was about both these things that you wished to 
 consult me?" 
 
 "Monsieur is so kind, so charitable, so encouraging."
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 229 
 
 "After a few inquiries the petition can easily be drawn ; but 
 to invest with security and secrecy, both, is rather more diffi- 
 cult." 
 
 "Ah ! if I only dared," said she. 
 
 " What ? " said la Peyrade. 
 
 " Monsieur understands me." 
 
 " Me ? not the least idea in the world." 
 
 "I have prayed well this hour past that monsieur might 
 take charge of this money ; I should be sure of its safety and 
 of nothing being said about it." 
 
 La Peyrade received at this moment the fruit of his farce of 
 devotion to the necessitous class. The chorus of porters in 
 the quarter had carried his praises to this domestic. He 
 thought of Dutocq, and firmly believed that this woman had 
 been wafted to him by Providence. He resolved to play a 
 deep game. 
 
 "My dear lady," said he to his pious client, "I am in no 
 need of money ; and I am not rich enough to pay you interest 
 on twenty-five thousand francs without investing it. All I 
 could do would be to put it in the hands of the notary Dupuis 
 in my name, a pious man whom you may see every Sunday on 
 the wardens' bench in our parish church. Notaries, you 
 know, give no receipt, therefore I cannot give you one. I 
 can but leave a note among my papers, which will be found 
 at my death, showing the transaction. You see, it is a confi- 
 dential business ; it is only done to oblige a pious and devoted 
 person who possesses charitable sentiments." 
 
 " If monsieur can find no other way " 
 
 " That is the only one that seems possible," said la Peyrade. 
 " However, I don't know but what I can get you six per cent., 
 and I will see that it is paid promptly. But on the least in- 
 discretion on your part the money will be at once returned to 
 you." 
 
 " Oh ! monsieur, think you that I am a woman who would 
 talk about what she should keep silent ? "
 
 280 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "My blessing! my dear lady, we must provide against 
 everything in such a business. Take time to think it over. 
 Come again in a day or two, I may evolve another plan ; I 
 confess this does not please me over-well ; I may think of 
 other difficulties that have escaped my notice." 
 
 This adroit menace thrown in clinched the business. 
 
 " I have reflected," said piety ; " with a man so religious as 
 yourself, monsieur, I cannot see any risk." 
 
 And, taking from under her chemisette a little pocket-book, 
 she drew out twenty-five bank-bills. Her manner of counting 
 them, the dexterity she showed, was to la Peyrade a revelation. 
 The woman was well accustomed to handling cash, and a 
 singular idea struck him : 
 
 "Suppose that lam receiving stolen No," said he; 
 
 " in order to draw up your petition I must make a few in- 
 quiries, so in the ordinary course of things I will wait on you 
 presently. At what hour are you alone? " 
 
 " On the stroke of four, monsieur goes for a promenade to 
 the Luxembourg." 
 
 "And where do you live? " 
 
 "No. 9 Rue du Val-du-Grace." 
 
 " Well, then, four o'clock ; if, as I believe is likely, I find 
 all is right, then I can take your money." 
 
 "Oh! monsieur is prudent," said she, thinking the matter 
 settled. "This money, thank God, I have not stolen, and 
 monsieur can so inform himself about me in the quarter." 
 
 "That is just what I shall be compelled to do," said la 
 Peyrade, who did not quite like, under the exterior of sim- 
 plicity, that lively intelligence which penetrated his every 
 thought. 
 
 "As monsieur pleases," said the pious one ; " you are doing 
 me too great a service to complain of your precautions." 
 
 And, after an unctuous salutation, she went out, carrying 
 her money with her. 
 
 "The devil!" thought la Peyrade, "that woman is as
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES, 831 
 
 strong as myself; she swallows an affront with a gratified air 
 and without the shadow of a grimace." 
 
 The information he gathered in the quarter was contradic- 
 tory; some gave his client the name of saint, others presented 
 her as a very cunning, artful woman ; but, summing all up, 
 there was nothing that inculpated her morality or such as 
 would deter la Peyrade from accepting the good fortune that 
 she offered him. 
 
 At four o'clock he found her of the same mind. The cash 
 in his pocket, he went to the Rocher de Cancale, and perhaps 
 it was the day's excitement that had caused him to assume the 
 petulant manner he had with his two associates. In fact, the 
 money had rather turned his brain ; he had rid himself of 
 C6rizet without even consulting Brigitte. Thus through the 
 whole day la Peyrade had not shown himself the man so com- 
 pletely infallible as we had credited him with being. It is 
 perhaps more difficult to keep one's head level in good than 
 in evil fortune. 
 
 The Farnesse Hercules, calm in repose, shows more fully 
 the plenitude of muscular force than the other Hercules in 
 violent agitation and represented in the excitement of their 
 labors.
 
 PART II. 
 
 Between the two parts of this story an important event had 
 taken place in the life of Phellion. 
 
 There is no one but has heard of the Odeon's ill-luck, that 
 fatal theatre which had for years spelt the ruin of its directors. 
 Rightly or wrongly the quarter in which stands this dramatic 
 impossibility is absolutely convinced that its prosperity in a 
 high degree depends upon it ; more than once the mayor and 
 notables of the arrondissement have tried every desperate 
 effort to galvanize the corpse, with a courage equal to their 
 honor. 
 
 Now to have a finger in the pie theatrical is one of the 
 eternal, ever-living ambitions of the middle-class. Thus the 
 successive saviours of the Odeon feel themselves amply re- 
 warded when they are given a share, be it ever so small, in 
 the administration of the concern. It was at such a combina- 
 tion of circumstances that Minard, in his quality as mayor of 
 the eleventh arrondissement, had been called to preside over 
 the committee on reading plays, with power to select as assess- 
 ors a certain number of notables of the Latin quarter the 
 choice being left to him. 
 
 Now as both the Minards and Phellions had seen the 
 advance made by la Pcyrade in the securing of Celeste's dot, 
 they each felt a loss of that prejudice which had formerly ani- 
 mated them ; there is nothing binds and soothes men so much 
 as a feeling of checkmate felt in common. Thus when the 
 mayor had to bring to head the question of the composition 
 of his dramatic customs-house, he gave immediate thought to 
 Phellion. 
 
 One can well understand that so high and sacred a mission 
 (282)
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 233 
 
 was not lightly undertaken by a man of Phellion's solemnity ; 
 to himself he said that he was called upon to exercise magis- 
 tracy, priesthood. 
 
 "To judge men," he had replied to Minard, who was 
 astonished at his hesitation, "is an alarming task; but to 
 judge of intellects who can believe himself equal to such a 
 mission ?" 
 
 Phellion, to use his own term, had become a member of the 
 Areopagus presided over by Minard, and he had just come 
 home from the exercise of his functions both "delicate and 
 interesting," quoting himself again, when the conversation we 
 are about to repeat took place. 
 
 The session of the committee had been particularly stormy. 
 On discussing a tragedy, having for title "The Death of 
 Hercules," those classically imbued and the others tinctured 
 with romance, carefully balanced by the mayor in forming the 
 committee, had nearly come to the hair-pulling stage. Twice 
 had Phellion asked to put in a word, and every one was as- 
 tounded at the flood of metaphors with which the speech of a 
 major of the National Guard could flow when his literary con- 
 victions were assailed. The result of the vote was a victory 
 for the opinions of which Phellion was the eloquent mouth- 
 piece. 
 
 As they descended the stairs together Phellion remarked to 
 Minard: "'The Death of Hercules' reminded me of Luce 
 de Lancival's 'Death of Hector; ' it is full of sublimity." 
 
 "Yes," said Minard, " it is in good taste. It is far better 
 literature than Colleville's anagrams." 
 
 "Oh!" said Phellion, "they are mere witticisms; they 
 have nothing in common with the severe accents of Mel- 
 pomene." 
 
 "And yet," replied Minard, "I can affirm that he attaches 
 much importance to that stuff. But it seems to me that not 
 only Colleville, but his wife, daughter, the Thuilliers, and the 
 rest of the whole coterie have assumed airs of importance,
 
 234 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 hardly justified by their having moved into the Madeleine 
 quarter." 
 
 " What would you ? " said Phellion ; " it requires a strong 
 head to stand the fumes of opulence. Our friends have grown 
 very rich by the purchase of that house ; we must excuse a 
 little intoxication ; yesterday they gave us a good house- 
 warming dinner, well spread and succulent." 
 
 " I also," said Minard, " have, I flatter myself, given a few 
 remarkable dinners at which men high in the government 
 have not disdained to attend, but I am not unduly puffed 
 up." 
 
 " You, Monsieur le Maire, you have for a long time enjoyed 
 a handsome mode of life in your high commercial capacity ; 
 our friends have but just made their fortunes ; they have hardly 
 got their sea-legs yet." 
 
 "Are you going through the Luxembourg ? " asked Minard. 
 
 " I shall go that way, but not to stay. I have to meet 
 Madame Phellion at the end of the broad walk; she will 
 await me there with the Barniol children." 
 
 " Well," said Minard, " I shall have the pleasure of salut- 
 ing Madame Phellion." 
 
 Minard quite realized that Phellion had not voluntarily fol- 
 lowed him in his caustic remarks on the Thuilliers, so he did 
 not offer to renew the subject, but he felt sure that Mme. 
 Phellion would reecho his animadversions. 
 
 "Well, fair lady," said he, "and what did you think of 
 the dinner yesterday?" 
 
 "It was well put up," replied Mme. Phellion, "and the 
 poiage a la bisque* I could tell, showed the hand of a master, 
 like Chevet, who must have replaced their own cook. But 
 there seemed a lack of gayety ; there was none of the cordial- 
 ity that marks our little reunions in the Latin quarter. Be- 
 side, one could hardly fail to see that Madame and Mile. 
 Thuillier did not seem at home. I felt like I was dining with 
 * A rich soup
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 235 
 
 Madame what's her name? I cannot keep myself in 
 
 mind of it." 
 
 "Torna, Comtesse de Godollo," said Phellion, interrupt- 
 ing. " Still the name is most euphonistic." 
 
 " Euphonistic as you wish, my friend ; but for me, I can't 
 think it's a name at all." 
 
 " It is a Magyar, or, vulgarly speaking, a Hungarian name. 
 Our name, for instance, may be said to be borrowed from the 
 Greek." 
 
 " That is possible, but we have the advantage of being well- 
 krjown, not only in our own quarter, but in the whole world 
 of education, where our parvenus have conquered an honor- 
 able position ; not like that Hungarian countess who makes 
 rain and sunshine in the Thuilliers' house. Whence came she? 
 How comes it that having all the manners of a great lady, 
 with such a distinguished air, she should fall into the arms of 
 Brigitte, who, between us, tastes of the sod, and is so the por- 
 ter's daughter as to nauseate one ? " 
 
 "Dear me," said Minard, "don't you know how the inti- 
 macy began between the Comtesse de Godollo and the 
 Thuihiers?" 
 
 "That she is a tenant of theirs, she occupies the entresol." 
 
 " True, but there's more than that in it. Zelie, my wife, 
 had it from Josephine, who was quitting their service for ours, 
 but did not, as our own Francoise, change her mind about 
 getting married. You must know, fair lady, that it was 
 Madame de Godollo who caused the migration of the Thu- 
 illiers ; she was, one might say, their upholsterer." 
 
 "How, their upholsterer!" cried Phellion, "that stylish 
 woman of whom one might truly say : Incessa patuit dca, 
 which, in French, is so imperfectly expressed by saying : ' the 
 bearing of a queen.' ' 
 
 " Permit me," said Minard ; " I don't mean she was actu- 
 ally theii upholsterer, but when Mademoiselle Thuillier de- 
 cided by la Peyrade's advice to manage the house herself.
 
 236 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 he could not persuade her to move into that sumptuous apart- 
 ment where they received us yesterday." 
 
 " Five- franc pieces form her jingling music \ so when la 
 Peyrade and Thuillier urged her removal she only thought of 
 the cost it would entail." 
 
 "There you have the universal link," exclaimed Phellion ; 
 " you see, from the summit of society, luxury sooner or later 
 infiltrates itself through the lower classes and involves em- 
 pires in ruin." 
 
 "That is a knotty point in political economy," said 
 Minard. " But to go on : Madame de Godollo told her that 
 a friend of hers, a Russian princess, had a fine suite of furni- 
 ture, most of it entirely new. She had been recalled to Russia 
 by the Czar, a gentleman whom it is no joke to cross; so 
 the poor woman had no recourse but to sell at the best 
 obtainable price. This idea of doing a good stroke of busi- 
 ness and a chance of refurnishing decided the matter. In 
 that old maid, you see, there is always more or less of Madame 
 la Ressource, in ' The Miser.' ' 
 
 " I think, Monsieur the Mayor, that you are in error," said 
 Phellion ; " la Ressource is a character in 'Turcaret,' a very 
 immoral play by the late Le Sage." 
 
 " Well, be that as it may, this caused the foreign countess 
 to get on a good footing with Brigitte. You may have ob- 
 served also the signs of a coming struggle between the two 
 influences, the personal and the real estate?" 
 
 "Why, yes," said Mme. Phellion, with a beaming expres- 
 sion, evincing her interest. " It did appear that the grand 
 lady allowed herself to contradict the barrister, and with an 
 amount of asperity, too." 
 
 "Well, his interest is waning in the house," said Minard. 
 " He cannot get a freehold every day for his ' good friend,' as 
 he calls him, for a crumb of bread." 
 
 " How did they get it so cheap ? " asked Mme. Phellion. 
 
 " Oh ! by a dirty intrigue. Desroches, the attorney, told
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 887 
 
 i 
 
 me all about it. Now our Thuillier finds a tit-bit in the 
 Chamber. Eating gives appetite, but he cannot dupe us 
 this time like he did before. That is why they turn to 
 the Comtesse de Godollo, whom it seems has high connec- 
 tions in political circles. There is this further : Instead of 
 being a parasite, like the Provensal, this foreigner has a 
 fortune of her own which she uses beneficently. She it 
 was who gave the two dresses of Brigitte's and Madame 
 Thuillier's ; she came herself to arrange the toilettes of our 
 amphitryonesses, which accounts for them not being found in 
 their usual dowdy fashion." 
 
 "I do not accept for my friends," said Phellion, "the 
 derogatory remarks you make about them. There may be a 
 lack of experience, and the noble lady may have given of her 
 knowledge to them; but " 
 
 " Well, but, my dear commander, what about the idea of 
 giving Celeste to la Peyrade ; is not that something beyond a 
 mere want of experience ? It is at the same time stupidity 
 and immorality ; for, really, the scandalous flirtation of that 
 barrister with Madame Colleville " 
 
 "Monsieur le Maire," interrupted Phellion, with redoubled 
 solemnity, " the law-giver, Solon, decreed no punishment for 
 parricide, declaring it an impossible crime. I think the same 
 may be said of the gross misconduct to which you allude. 
 That Madame Colleville granting favors to Monsieur la Pey- 
 rade and the while intending to give him her daughter is 
 no, monsieur, no ! it is beyond imagination. Questioned on 
 this subject before the Tribunal, Madame Colleville, like 
 Marie-Antoinette, might respond : ' I appeal to all mothers.' ' 
 
 "Nevertheless, my friend, allow me to remind you that 
 Madame Colleville is abominably profligate and has given 
 very sure proof of it." 
 
 "That's enough, my dear," said Phellion. "The dinner 
 hour calls us ; I fancy we have allowed our conversation to 
 drift toward the miry banks of slander."
 
 288 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 And each party, after mutual salutations, went their way. 
 
 It was impossible that la Peyrade should not be aware that 
 a change was taking place in the Thuillier household. His 
 influence was fast waning before that of the stranger ; but the 
 countess did not limit herself to a simple struggle for influence; 
 she made no pretense of being otherwise than utterly opposed 
 to his suit for Celeste's hand ; more, she gave her approval to 
 the love of Felix Phellion. 
 
 La Peyrade was perhaps more distressed at this because he 
 had brought this undermining force into the heart of the 
 citadel. 
 
 His first mistake was the sterile satisfaction of refusing the 
 lease to Cerizet. If it had not been that Brigitte had taken 
 the matter into her own hands, by his advice, it was unlikely 
 that she would have become known to Madame de Godollo. 
 
 Another blunder was in persuading the Thuilliers to leave 
 the Latin quarter. Just then Theodose looked upon his mar- 
 riage as a settled thing ; he therefore supported the views of 
 the Hungarian in the sale of the furniture and in having her 
 installed as a tenant ; he felt that he thus sent the Thuilliers 
 before him to make ready his bed in the splendid suite he in- 
 tended sharing with them. 
 
 The Collevilles had followed their friends into the house in 
 the Madeleine, where the rear entresol had been conceded to 
 them at a price conformable to their means. But Colleville 
 found that it lacked light and air, and, obliged to go daily from 
 the Madeleine boulevard to the St. Jacques' faubourg, where his 
 office was situated, he railed against the arrangement of which 
 he was the victim, and at times rated la Peyrade as a tyrant. 
 On the other hand, Mme. Colleville, under the pretense of 
 being a resident in such an aristocratic quarter, had rushed 
 into a frightful orgy of new bonnets, mantles, and dresses, 
 which necessitated the presentation of a pile of bills and caused 
 frequent stormy scenes in the household. 
 
 But all this was as nothing when weighed with another
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 239 
 
 cause for his diminished influence. He had promised Thuil- 
 lier that the Cross should be his, after a little delay and the 
 expenditure of ten thousand francs. Two months had elapsed 
 since then, and yet no sign was there of that glorious bauble. 
 To be sure, la Peyrade had mentioned an unforeseen and 
 unaccountable obstacle which had paralyzed every effort of 
 the Comtesse du Bruel ; but Thuillier was sick of being paid 
 in explanations, and on some days when his disappointment 
 was particularly acute, he would often, like Chicaneau in 
 " Les Plaideurs," be within- an ace of saying: "Then give 
 me back my cash ! " 
 
 La Peyrade felt that he had reached a point at which he 
 must strike a blow in order to restore his rapidly evaporating 
 influence. It was just that nagging, haggling, proof-revising 
 that afforded the barrister a chance to use a scheme both bold 
 and deep. 
 
 One day, when they were at work on the last pages of the 
 pamphlet, a discussion arose over the word " nepotism," 
 which Thuillier would have eliminated from one of the sen- 
 tences written by la Peyrade, declaring that he had never met 
 with it, and that, properly, it was "neologism," which, in 
 the literary ideas of the bourgeoisie, is about equivalent to the 
 notion of '93 and the Reign of Terror. 
 
 Generally, la Peyrade took the ridiculous notions of his 
 "dear friend" in good part; but this day he became highly 
 excited ; he signified that Thuillier might finish the work him- 
 self, as he was able to criticise so intelligently, and for some 
 days he was not seen again. 
 
 Thuillier at first laid it to a mere passing effect of ill-humor, 
 but la Peyrade' s prolonged absence made him feel the neces- 
 sity of seeking him and making reconciliation. He therefore 
 visited the Provencal's room, and, with an off-hand manner, 
 said: 
 
 "Well, my dear fellow, I find we were both right; nepotism 
 means the authority that the nephews of popes take in affair*
 
 J4d THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 political. I have searched the dictionary, and I find no other 
 explanation ; but, from what Phellion says, it appears that in 
 the vocabulary of politics the word has been extended to 
 cover the influence which corrupt ministers allow certain per- 
 sons to illegally exercise ; I think, therefore, that we can let 
 the term stand ; at the same time, it is not so used by Napo- 
 leon Landais." 
 
 La Peyrade, who, while receiving his visitor, had pretended 
 to be exceedingly busy in arranging his papers, contented 
 himself with shrugging his shoulders, but made no answer. 
 
 "Well," went on Thuillier, "have you looked over the 
 proofs of the last two sheets ? For we ought to be getting 
 along." 
 
 " If you have sent nothing to the printers," replied la Pey- 
 rade, " we are not very like to have proofs; for my own part, 
 I have not touched the manuscript." 
 
 "But, my dear Th^odose," said Thuillier, "it cannot be 
 possible that you are vexed about such a trifle. I don't pre- 
 tend to be a writer ; all the same, as I sign the thing, it seems 
 I might have my opinion about a word." 
 
 "But M6sieu Phellion," replied the barrister, "is a writer; 
 and, as you have consulted him, I don't see why you shouldn't 
 engage him to finish the work ; as for myself, I promise you I 
 won't cooperate any more." 
 
 "Dieuf what a temper!" exclaimed Brigitte's brother; 
 " here you are mad as a hornet just because I doubt an ex- 
 pression and took another opinion. Shall I give you an idea 
 of the confidence I have in you? The Comtesse de Godollo, 
 to whom last evening I read a few pages, told me that the 
 pamphlet was apt to cause me trouble with the public prose- 
 cutor ; can you for a moment think anything like that would 
 stop me? " 
 
 "Well," said la Peyrade, ironically, "I think that the 
 oracle of your house sees the thing clearly ; I have no desire 
 to bring your head to the scaffold."
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 241 
 
 " That's all bosh. Do you or do you not intend to leave 
 me in the lurch? " 
 
 " Literary questions," replied the barrister, " breed quarrels 
 among the best of friends ; I wish to put an end to such dis- 
 cussions between us." 
 
 " Theodose," said Thuillier, " you have something on your 
 mind that you don't tell me ; it is unnatural that for a simple 
 tiff about a word you should wish to lose a friend as influential 
 as myself." 
 
 " Well, yes," said la Peyrade, with an air of decision, " I 
 don't like ingratitude." 
 
 " Nor I any more than you; I don't like it," said Thuillier 
 with some heat, "and if you think of accusing me of aught so 
 base and vile, I summon you to explain ; we come oul of equiv- 
 ocations: Of what do you complain? What reproach can 
 you have against one whom only the other day you called 
 your friend ? " 
 
 "Nothing and everything," said la Peyrade; "your sister 
 and yourself are too clever to openly make a rupture with a 
 man, who, at the risk of his reputation, has put a million in 
 your hands ; but, all the same, I am not so simple but that I 
 can detect a change. There are people about who set them- 
 selves to undermine me ; and Brigitte has but one thought, 
 and that is how to find a reasonable pretext of not keeping 
 her promises." 
 
 "Come, come," said Thuillier, seeing a tear in the bar- 
 rister's eye, by the glitter of which he was completely duped, 
 " I don't know what Brigitte may have done, but one thing 
 is quite certain, that I have never ceased to be your most de- 
 voted friend." 
 
 " Well, you always see Madame Godollo alongside Brigitte ; 
 she seems now that she cannot live without her." 
 
 "Oh, ho! it is perhaps a little jealousy on our mind!" 
 said Thuillier slyly, 
 
 "Jealousy!" answered la Peyrade. "I don't know 
 16
 
 242 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 whether that's the proper word ; but anyhow your sister, who 
 is not at all above the ordinary, and whom I am astonished 
 that a man of your intellectual superiority should allow to 
 assume a supremacy which she uses and abuses " 
 
 "How can I help it, dear fellow?" interrupted Thuillier, 
 sucking in the compliment; "she is so entirely devoted to 
 me." 
 
 " I acknowledge the weakness," replied la Peyrade ; " but, 
 I repeat it, your sister cannot step in your track. What I say 
 is that when a man of the value which you claim to recognize 
 in me does her the honor of advising her, and who devotes 
 himself to her as I have done, it cannot be agreeable to see 
 himself supplanted by a woman come from who knows where, 
 and all on account of some trumpery curtains and a few old 
 chairs she has helped her to purchase." 
 
 "With women, as you well know, household affairs come 
 before all else," replied Thuillier. 
 
 " Another thing I can tell you, Brigitte, who has a finger in 
 everything, has an equal pretension to use a high hand in our 
 love affairs ; you, being so remarkably clear-sighted, must have 
 seen that to Brigitte nothing is less certain than my marriage 
 with Mademoiselle Colleville ; now, my love has been solemnly 
 authorized by you." 
 
 "By the rood ! " said Thuillier, "I should like to see any 
 one dare to interfere with my arrangements." 
 
 " There is some one else though outside of Brigitte, Cileste 
 herself; in spite of the bickerings about religion, her mind is 
 not the less filled with that little Phellion." 
 
 "But why not have Flavie put a stop to it?" 
 
 " Flavie, my dear ! no one knows as much of her as you. 
 She is a woman rather than a mother ; I have found it neces- 
 sary to do a little courting in that quarter myself; and you 
 understand that, though she may will the marriage, she would 
 not urge it very much." 
 
 "Well," said Thuillier, "leave that matter to me; I'll
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 343 
 
 speak to Cdleste; I won't have a chit of a girl laying down 
 the law for me." 
 
 "That's just what I don't wish you to do," exclaimed la 
 Peyrade; "don't interfere in this at all. Outside of your 
 relations with your sister you have an iron will ; it shall never 
 be said that I took advantage of your authority over Celeste 
 to have her placed in my arms ; on the contrary, I wish her to 
 have full control in the disposition of her heart ; only I think 
 that she should be required to definitely decide between my- 
 self and Monsieur Felix, for I don't want to remain in this 
 equivocal position. Beside all, although we agreed that this 
 marriage should not take place until you were a deputy, yet I 
 feel that makes too much of a bargain and sale of this business, 
 and, more, I cannot allow my life's greatest event to be at the 
 mercy of doubtful circumstances. Dutocq may have informed 
 you that an heiress has been offered me who has a larger for- 
 tune than Mademoiselle Colleville. I refused that because I 
 foolishly let my heart be won, and because an alliance with a 
 family as honorable as your own seemed the more to be de- 
 sired ; but, after all, it might be as well to let Brigitte under- 
 stand that, in case Celeste should refuse me, I shall not be 
 pushed into the street." 
 
 "I can easily believe that," said Thuillier ; "but as for 
 putting all the decision of this affair at the mercy of that girl's 
 head, and if, as you say, she has a fancy for that Felix " 
 
 " That may be," said the barrister; " but I cannot remain 
 any longer in my present position. You talk about your 
 pamphlet, I am in no fit condition to finish it; you are a 
 ladies' man and can understand the domination that those 
 creatures fatally exercise over our minds." 
 
 "Pshaw ! " said Thuillier, conceitedly, "they took to me, 
 but I didn't" often care for them; I just took them and left 
 them." 
 
 "Yes, but I, with my Southern nature, am passionate; and 
 then Celeste has other attractions beside fortune. Brought up by
 
 244 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 yourself, under your own eyes, you have made her an adorable 
 child ; only it was a great weakness to allow that boy, who is 
 not in any degree suited to her, to install himself in her 
 fancy." 
 
 " You are right ten times over ; but it was first a childish 
 fancy. Fdlix and she played together ; you came much later, 
 and it proves our high regard for you that when you presented 
 yourself we renounced our former projects." 
 
 "You, yes," said la Peyrade. "With a head filled with 
 literary manias, which are marked with bright wit and full of 
 intelligence, you have a heart of gold; but Brigitte is another 
 matter ; your friendship is a surety, and you know what you 
 mean." 
 
 "Well, I think that Brigitte has always wanted you and 
 would like you for a son-in-law, if I may so speak. But in 
 any case I intend to be obeyed." 
 
 " I think I will finish your pamphlet, for, before all else, I 
 think of you." 
 
 "Certainly," said Thuillier, "we ought not to sink in 
 port." 
 
 " It seems to me that a girl should be able to make up her 
 mind in fifteen days." 
 
 "Without a doubt," replied Thuillier; "but I have the 
 greatest repugnance in allowing Celeste to decide without 
 appeal." 
 
 "I'll take the chances; but, between you and I, it is not 
 shooting at a venture; it is not in fifteen days that a son of 
 Phellion, who is, one may say, obstinacy incarnate in silliness, 
 will make an end of his philosophical hesitations, and certainly 
 Celeste will never accept him for her husband until he gives 
 her proof of his conversion." 
 
 " That is probable. But if Celeste dawdles over the matter, 
 suppose she won't accept the alternative? " 
 
 "You will have to look after that," said the Provencal. 
 " I don't know how you manage families in Paris, but in our
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 245 
 
 country of Avignon it would be without parallel that a young 
 woman should be given such liberty. If all of you cannot 
 prevail on a girl to exercise her own free choice between two 
 suitors well, the sooner you write over the door of the house 
 that Celeste is queen and sovereign the better." 
 
 "We've not come to that yet," said Thuillier, with a firm 
 manner. "I'll open it frankly with Brigitte, and / will no> 
 have any objections." 
 
 "Ah ! my poor fellow," said la Peyrade, clapping him on 
 the shoulder, "since Chrysale, in ' Femmes Savantes,' who 
 has not continually seen many brave warriors who have 
 struck their flags before the powerful will of women used to 
 domineer." 
 
 " We'll see about that," said Thuillier, making a theatrical 
 exit. 
 
 When he returned home Thuillier at once put the question 
 before Brigitte. She, with her native wit, good sense, and 
 egotism, pointed out that by thus hurrying on the previous 
 arrangements for the marriage they were disarming them- 
 selves ; they could not say when the election would be held, 
 nor that when it occurred whether the barrister would be as 
 energetic for success. "It might be," said the old maid, 
 "the same as the Cross." 
 
 "There's a difference," replied Thuillier ; "the Cross did 
 not depend directly on la Peyrade, but his influence in the 
 arrondissement he employs as he wills." 
 
 "And if he wills," retorted Brigitte, "after we have 
 feathered his nest, to work on his own account? he's very 
 ambitious." 
 
 This danger did not fail to strike the future candidate, who 
 nevertheless thought he might depend upon the honor of la 
 Peyrade. 
 
 "It is not a particularly delicate honor," replied Brigitte, 
 "when a man tries to get out of a bargain he made, and his 
 idea of dangling a lump of sugar before us about getting
 
 24 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 'your' pamphlet finished doesn't please me at all. Couldn't 
 Phellion help you ? Or, I think, Madame de Godollo, who 
 is well known in political circles, could hire you a journalist ; 
 there are plenty of such on their uppers ; you could get the 
 whole thing done for a twenty-crown piece." 
 
 " No, I must have Th6odose, otherwise the secret might get 
 into the papers. Beside, after all, we promised him Celeste, 
 it is only fulfilling the promise a little earlier ; the King, of 
 course, may dissolve the Chamber at any moment." 
 
 "But if Celeste won't have him ?" objected Brigitte. 
 
 " Celeste ! Celeste ! " ejaculated Thuillier ; " she can't have 
 whom she wills, but whom we choose." 
 
 "So you really believe," said the skeptical Mile. Thuillier, 
 " that should Celeste decide in favor of Felix, you can still 
 count on la Peyrade's devotion?" 
 
 " What else can I do? Those are his conditions. Beside, 
 he has made calculations of the whole business, he knows that 
 Felix will not so soon decide to bring Celeste a certificate of 
 confession, and if he does not do this that little witch will not 
 accept him for her husband. La Peyrade plays a clever 
 game." 
 
 "Too clever," said Brigitte; "I won't interfere ; settle it 
 as you please; all this scheming is not to my taste." 
 
 Thuillier saw Mme. Colleville, and intimated to her that 
 Celeste must be informed of the projects about her. 
 
 When informed that she must choose between Felix and la 
 Peyrade, the naive child was only struck by the advantage 
 of one side of the attractions offered ; she thought she did 
 herself a favor by consenting to an arrangement which made 
 herself the mistress of disposing of her person and to bestow 
 her heart as she wished. But la Peyrade had not miscalcu- 
 lated when he reckoned that the religious intolerance on one 
 part and on the other side the philosophical inflexibility of 
 Phellion would create an invincible obstacle to their coming 
 together.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 247 
 
 The evening of the same day when Fiavie had been in- 
 structed to communicate to Celeste the sovereign will of the 
 Thuilliers, the Phellions came to pass their evening with 
 Brigitte, and a sharp engagement took place between the 
 young people. Celeste did not need telling by her mother, 
 for she had too much delicacy of feeling, that she must not 
 allow herself to mention to Felix the conditional approval of 
 his suit. Theological arguments occupied the time they were 
 together, and Phellion junior was in the encounter more than 
 usually unlucky and blundering. He would concede nothing ; 
 he took on an air of airy and ironical importance and ended 
 by fairly putting Celeste beside herself; she made a definite 
 rupture with him and forbade him appearing in her presence 
 for the future. 
 
 It was just a case for lovers of experience, which the young 
 savant was not, to turn up the very next day, for hearts never 
 approach so near to an understanding as when they have de- 
 clared the necessity for an eternal separation. But this law is 
 not logarithms, and Felix Phellion, incapable of guessing it, 
 believed himself seriously and very positively proscribed ; to 
 that extent indeed that during the fifteen days given to the 
 young girl for her decision, and although he was expected by 
 Celeste day by day and minute by minute, who thought no 
 more of la Peyrade than if he was entirely out of the question, 
 this deplorable boy had not the most distant thought fo break- 
 ing the ban. 
 
 Luckily for this benighted lover a beneficent fairy was watch- 
 ing over him, and the day before the one on which Celeste 
 must declare her choice, this came to pass. It was Sunday, 
 the day on which the Thuilliers still affected their periodical 
 receptions. 
 
 Convinced that the leakage, vulgarly known as the "basket 
 dance," was the ruin of the fortunes of the best establishments, 
 Mme. Phellion was in the habit of going in person to purchase 
 from her tradespeople. From time immemorial in the Phel-
 
 24$ THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 lion household, Sunday was the day of the pot-au-fcu* and the 
 wife of that great citizen, in an intentionally dowdy costume, 
 such as good housewives bundle themselves up in when they 
 go marketing, was returning from the butcher's, followed by 
 her cook, who carried in her basket a fine cut of rump of beef. 
 Twice had she rung her door-bell, and threatening was the 
 storm brewing for the servant-boy, who was placing his mis- 
 tress in a position less tolerable than that of Louis XIV., who 
 only " nearly " waited, by not opening her door. Just as she 
 gave the bell a third feverish, excited pull, you can judge of 
 her confusion when she perceived a coupe draw up, and de- 
 scending therefrom a lady whom she recognized, at this un- 
 timely hour, as the elegant Comtesse Torna de Godollo, the 
 Hungarian. 
 
 Becoming a scarlet-purple, the unhappy bourgeoise com- 
 pletely lost her head, she floundered in excuses, each more 
 awkward than the last, when Phellion, attired in a dressing- 
 gown and Greek cap, came out of his study to learn what the 
 matter was. After a speech, the pomposity of which made 
 ample amends for the neglige of his costume, the great citizen, 
 with that serenity which never deserted him, gallantly offered 
 his hand to the stranger, and after having installed her in the 
 salon : 
 
 "Perhaps, without indiscretion, I might ask Madame la 
 Comtesse," said he, " to what I am indebted for the advan- 
 tages, so unhoped for, of this visit?" 
 
 "I desired," replied the Hungarian, "to have a talk with 
 Madame Phellion on a subject of vital interest to her ; I have 
 taken the liberty of calling upon her, although so little known 
 to madame." 
 
 Before Phellion could reply Mme. Phellion appeared ; a cap 
 with ribbons had replaced the market-hat and a large shawl 
 concealed the other things lacking in the matutinal toilet. On 
 
 * A popular French dish of stewed beef: the same name is given to the 
 tock-pot.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 249 
 
 the entrance of his wife the great citizen made as though he 
 would retire. 
 
 " Monsieur Phellion," said the countess, " you are not out of 
 place in our conference; on the contrary, your excellent judg- 
 ment may be of the utmost benefit in clearing up a question 
 not less interesting to your wife than to your dignified self; I 
 allude to the marriage of monsieur, your son/' 
 
 " The marriage of my son ! " said Mine. Phellion, with an 
 air of astonishment; "but I am not aware that anything of 
 the kind is on the tapis at present." 
 
 " The marriage of Monsieur Felix with Celeste is, I think, 
 your desire," replied the countess ; " one of your projects? " 
 
 "We have never, madame," said Phellion, "taken any 
 special steps toward that object." 
 
 "I know that full well," replied the Hungarian; "on the 
 contrary, each one of your family seems to study how to 
 nullify my efforts ; but one thing is clear, that is, the young 
 people love each other, and in spite of your reserve, and to 
 prevent the unhappiness they will experience if they do not 
 marry, it is to prevent that catastrophe that I came here this 
 morning." 
 
 "We cannot, madame," said Phellion, "fail to be pro- 
 foundly touched by your interest in " 
 
 "But the explanation is very simple," interrupted the 
 countess, with animation. " Celeste is a dear, innocent child, 
 and I detect a moral value in her that makes me regret to see 
 her sacrificed." 
 
 " It is true," said Mme. Phellion, " that Celeste is an angel 
 of sweetness." 
 
 " While, as for Monsieur Felix, I dare to interest myself in 
 him because, first, he is the worthy son of the most virtuous 
 of fathers " 
 
 "Madame, I beg " said Phellion with a graceful 
 
 obeisance. 
 
 "And further by the awkwardness of his true love, which
 
 260 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 is apparent in his every act and word. We more mature 
 women can find an inexpressible charm in watching the passion 
 under a form which does not menace us with deceptions and 
 misunderstandings. ' ' 
 
 "In fact, my son, is not brilliant," said Mme. Phellion, 
 with a suspicion of tartness in her tone; " he is not a young 
 man of fashion." 
 
 " But he has the more essential qualities," replied the 
 countess ; "a merit which ignores itself, which in every intel- 
 lectual superiority " 
 
 "In truth, madame," said Phellion, "you compel us to 
 hear things " 
 
 "That are not beyond the truth," interrupted the countess. 
 " I have another reason : I am not particularly desirous that 
 la Peyrade should be made happy, he is false and avaricious. 
 On the ruin of their hopes this man counts on building his 
 swindling schemes." 
 
 " It is certain," said Phellion, "that Monsieur de la Pey- 
 rade has dark depths which the light has never penetrated. 
 You have told us of where we are remiss, it appears to me 
 that you should plainly indicate what you would have us do 
 for the future." 
 
 "Well, it is fifteen days of absence from the Thuilliers 
 of the whole of your family; do you imagine that nothing 
 of importance could occur in that time?" said the Hun^ 
 garian. 
 
 "Of a truth, those three glorious days were enough, in 
 1830, to throw down a perjured dynasty and lay the founda- 
 tion of the order of things under which we are now gov- 
 erned." 
 
 " You see it yourself," said the countess. " And on that 
 last evening did nothing occur between Celeste and monsieur, 
 your son? " 
 
 "Truly," replied Phellion, "a disagreeable conversation 
 on the subject of religion ; it must be allowed that our good
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 261 
 
 Celeste, who in every other respect has a most lovely nature, 
 is a little fanatical in the matter of piety." 
 
 " I agree with you," said the countess ; " but she was raised 
 by the mother whom you know ; she has never been shown 
 the face of sincere piety ; she has only seen its mask ; repent- 
 ant Magdalens of Madame Colleville's kind always wear an 
 air of wishing to retire into the desert in company with a 
 death's head and cross-bones. They think that's the best 
 market at which to get religion. After all, now, what was it 
 that Celeste asked of Monsieur Felix ? Only that he would 
 read 'The Imitation of Christ.' " 
 
 " He has done that, madame," replied Phellion ; " he finds 
 it a well-written book, but his convictions that's the mis- 
 fortune have not in the least changed by its perusal." 
 
 "Do you think it shows much cleverness not to let his 
 mistress see some little change in the inflexibility of his 
 convictions? " 
 
 "My son, madame, has never received from me the least 
 lesson in smartness ; loyalty and the right, these are the prin- 
 ciples I have inculcated." 
 
 "Allowing all that need he, think you, have capped his 
 proceedings by a long sulk, which has struck the girl's heart 
 with despair and, also, a deep feeling of irritation." 
 
 " My son is incapable of acting thus. I know nothing of 
 what you allude to," said Phellion. 
 
 " Nothing is more true, though. Young Colleville, home 
 for his half-holiday, has just told us that since last Sunday but 
 one Monsieur Felix, who had always gone with the utmost 
 punctuality to teach him, has not been near him. Unless 
 your son is ill, this is a grievous blunder." 
 
 The Phellions, husband and wife, stared at each other as if 
 consulting how to reply. 
 
 "My son," said Mme. Phellion, "is not exactly ill; but, 
 as you have seen fit to reveal this to us, a thing very strange and 
 not at all like himself, we see, since Celeste told him that all 
 
 W
 
 252 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 was over between her and Felix, that a most extraordinary 
 change has passed over him ; Monsieur Phellion and myself 
 are very uneasy about it." 
 
 "And yet," said Mme. de Godollo, "nothing but what is 
 natural happened ; lovers always make the worst of every- 
 thing." 
 
 "But he is terribly excited," said Phellion. "You speak 
 to him and he seems not to hear you ; he sits at table and 
 forgets to eat ; or else he takes his food so absent-mindedly as 
 to be, so say the medical profession, most injurious to the 
 digestive process ; his duties, his regular occupations, we have 
 to remind him of, he so extremely regular, so punctual. The 
 other day while he was at the Conservatory, where he now 
 passes all his evenings, only returning home in the small 
 hours, I went into his room and looked into his papers ; ma- 
 dame, I was absolutely alarmed on seeing a paper covered 
 with algebraic calculations which, by their extent, seemed to 
 me to pass far beyond the limits of the human intellect." 
 
 " Perhaps," said the countess, " he is on the eve of the dis- 
 covery of a mighty problem." 
 
 "Or else on the road to lunacy," said Mme. Phellion. 
 
 "A mind equable and calm as is his need not be afraid 
 of that," said the countess. "But a greater danger threatens 
 his understanding. Unless we stop it this evening by a master- 
 stroke, Celeste is lost to him forever." 
 
 " How is that ? " said the Phellions, with one voice. 
 
 " Perhaps you are ignorant of the fact that Thuillier and 
 his sister had entered into an express engagement with la 
 Peyrade that he should marry Celeste," said the countess. 
 
 " We at least had our misgivings," said Phellion. 
 
 "It would be useless to tell you of the manoeuvres la Pey- 
 rade has practiced to hasten this marriage, but it concerns 
 you to know that, thanks to his duplicity, Celeste was forced 
 to decide in fifteen days between him and Monsieur Felix ; 
 that time expires to-morrow, and, owing to the unfortunate
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 253 
 
 turn taken through your son's attitude, there is imminent 
 danger of her sacrificing her wounded feelings on the altar 
 of her love and instincts." 
 
 "But what can be done to hinder this, madame?" asked 
 Phellion. 
 
 "Fight, monsieur; come this evening in full force to the 
 Thuilliers ; induce your son to come ; lecture him until he 
 becomes rather more flexible in his philosophical opinions. 
 'Paris,' said Henry IV., 'is worth a mass; ' but tell him to 
 avoid such questions ; any man who loves a woman can find 
 enough to talk about to move a woman ; so little satisfies her. 
 I will help where I can. One thing is sure, we have to fight 
 a big battle ; if we do not each one strive our utmost, la Pey- 
 rade will gain the victory." 
 
 " My son is not here, madame," said Phellion. " I wish 
 he had been,<tyou might have aroused him from his torpor." 
 
 " It is unnecessary to say," added the countess, as she rose, 
 " that we must be careful not to give any appearance of col- 
 lusion ; it would be better, in fact, not to be seen speaking 
 together." 
 
 "I can assure you, madame, of my prudence," replied 
 Phellion, "and you will please to accept the assurance " 
 
 "Of your most distinguished sentiments," interrupted the 
 countess, laughing. 
 
 " No, madame," gravely responded Phellion, " I reserve 
 that formula for the conclusion of my letters ; but you will 
 please accept the most unutterable gratitude of myself." 
 
 "We will speak of that when we are beyond all danger," 
 said Mme. de Godollo, going toward the door, " and if Mad- 
 ame Phellion, the tenderest of mothers, will grant me a little 
 place in her regards, I shall be fully repaid." 
 
 Mme. Phellion launched into an endless sea of compliments. 
 The countess in her carriage was some distance away before 
 Phellion had ceased offering his most respectful salutations. 
 
 By degrees the salon of Brigitte became more select and
 
 254 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 less insidious, a livelier Parisian element began to infiltrate 
 therein. The new councilor had made a number of recruits 
 from among his associates in the council ; the Latin quarter 
 element became less. The mayor of his arrondissement 
 and several deputy mayors had called upon him after the 
 removal to the Madeleine quarter. Thuillier had hastened to 
 return the civility ; he had also the same experience with a 
 number of the superior officers of the First Legion. Among 
 others came Rabourdin, the former head of Thuillier's bureau, 
 who had lost his wife ; Rabourdin occupied as a bachelor the 
 third floor of their house over the entresol. He was now a 
 director in one of the numerous railroads, ever projected but 
 always delayed by the indecision of the Chamber or rival 
 claims ; but he had now become one of the most important 
 personages in the world of finance. At the time of his resig- 
 nation, under deplorable circumstances, of his position in the 
 bureaux, Phellion was the only one in his office who had stood 
 by him. Being now in a position to reward his friends, Ra- 
 bourdin, meeting once more his faithful subordinate, at once 
 made him an offer of an easy, lucrative position. 
 
 " Mosieur," replied Phellion, " your kindness both touches 
 and honors me, but my frankness owes you a confession which 
 I trust you will not take amiss. I have no belief in these iron 
 roads, or ' railroads,' as the English call them." 
 
 "You have a perfect right to have your own opinion," said 
 Rabourdin, smiling, "but in the interim, until the contrary 
 appears, we pay our servants very satisfactorily, and I should 
 be pleased to have you with me. I know by experience that 
 you are fully reliable." 
 
 " Mosieur," replied the great citizen, " I did my duty and 
 nothing more. As for the offer you have been so good as to 
 make me, I cannot accept it. Satisfied with my humble lot, 
 I feel neither the need nor the desire to again embark on an 
 administrative career, and, with the Latin poet, I may say : 
 " ' Claudite jam rivos, pueri, sat prata biberunt.' "
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 255 
 
 Thus elevated in the social scale, the Thuillier salon still 
 needed another element of vitality, and, to speak as Madelon 
 in the " Precieuses ridicules," this " frightful lack of amuse- 
 ment," signified by Mme. Phellion, required remedying. 
 Thanks to the attention of Mme. de Godollo, the great or- 
 ganizer, who happily profited by the former relations of Colle- 
 ville with the musical world, a few artists came to make a 
 diversion from bouillolte and boston. Out of fashion and old, 
 these two games had to beat a retreat before whist, the only 
 manner, said the Hungarian countess, by which respectable 
 people can kill time. 
 
 Like Louis XVI.,* who began by putting his hand to re- 
 forms which should subsequently engulf his throne, Brigitte 
 at first encouraged this interior revolution. But the day on 
 which occurred the scene we are about to relate, an apparently 
 trivial detail had revealed to her the danger of the slope upon 
 which she was standing. The greater number of the new 
 guests introduced by Thuillier were unaware of the supremacy 
 of his sister in the household ; upon arrival they naturally 
 asked Thuillier to present them to " madame; " of course it 
 was impossible that he could inform them that his wife was 
 but a dummy queen who groaned under the iron hand of a 
 Richelieu, the sole authority. Therefore it was not until after 
 this presentation that they were led up to Brigitte, but the 
 stiffness she manifested in her displeasure did not encourage 
 them in paying her further attentions. Quick to realize this 
 transfer of power : 
 
 "If I don't look out," said this Queen Elizabeth to herself, 
 with that profound instinct of despotism which was her ruling 
 passion, "I shall soon be a nobody here." 
 
 Pondering over this idea, she saw that the audacious la 
 
 Peyrade would not scotch this decline of prestige ; a further 
 
 intuition whispered her that Felix Phellion, absorbed in his 
 
 mathematical abstractions, would be a more suitable match 
 
 * His want of decision led to the revolution of 1 792.
 
 266 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 than the enterprising barrister. She was the first to regret 
 that the Phellions had come without their son. Despite Mme. 
 de Godollo's advances, this terrible lover had taken as guide 
 the last line of Millevoye's famous elegy: Et son amante ne 
 vint pas the beloved came not. 
 
 As for Mme. de Godollo, who possessed a remarkably fine 
 voice, she went up to ask Mme. Phellion to accompany her 
 on the piano, to whom she whispered in her ear, between two 
 verses of a fashionable ballad : 
 
 " Well, and monsieur, your son ? " 
 
 "He is coming," replied Mme. Phellion; "his father 
 spoke most emphatically to him ; but it seems that to-night 
 there is a conjunction of some planets ; it is a grand occasion 
 for the gentlemen of the Observatory; he did not feel as 
 though he could dispense " 
 
 " This is simply inconceivable, that he could be so foolish," 
 said the countess ; " was it not enough that he brought his 
 theology here that he should now blunderingly drag in his 
 astronomy." 
 
 Her song was finished, as the English say, amid thunders 
 of applause. La Peyrade, who dreaded her excessively, was 
 among the first to congratulate her, but she received his com- 
 pliments most coldly, and he turned away to find consolation 
 with Mme. Colleville. Flavie had too many pretensions to 
 beauty not to feel an enmity toward a woman who in a manner 
 intercepted her due homage. 
 
 "And you also mean to say that that woman sings well?" 
 asked Mme. Colleville of the barrister. 
 
 "At least I had to tell her so," replied la Peyrade, "be- 
 cause there's no security of Brigitte without her. But look at 
 C6leste; every time a tray is brought in she turns to the 
 door." 
 
 " Don't worry me ! " said Flavie ; " I know what that fool- 
 ish girl has in her mind ; your marriage will take place only 
 too soon."
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES, 257 
 
 "But is it for my own sake?" said la Peyrade; "it is 
 necessary for the future of the whole of us. Come, there are 
 tears in your eyes. I shall leave you ; you are unreasonable. 
 The devil ! as that old prude Phellion says, if you want the 
 end you need the means." 
 
 And he went toward a group in the centre ; Mme. Colle- 
 ville followed, and under the strong feeling of jealousy she 
 had just displayed she became a savage mother. 
 
 " Celeste," said she, " why don't you sing? A number of 
 gentlemen wish to hear you." 
 
 "Oh, mamma! " said Celeste, "how can I, with my poor 
 thread of a voice, sing after madame. Beside, you know that 
 I have a cold." 
 
 "That means that you intend to be disagreeable; people 
 sing as they can, every voice has its own merits." 
 
 "My dear love," said Colleville, who had just lost twenty 
 francs at a card-table, and found the nerve in his vexations to 
 oppose his wife, " to say one sings as he can is a bourgeois 
 maxim ; people sing with a voice if they have one, but not 
 after hearing an operatic voice like that of Madame la Com- 
 tesse's ; for my part, I am perfectly willing to let Celeste off 
 warbling a sentimental ditty." 
 
 "It's a grand idea to spend so much money on expensive 
 masters," said Flavie, as she left the group, "and then get 
 nothing in return." 
 
 "So," said Colleville, resuming the conversation in which 
 he had been interrupted by the invasion of Mme. Colleville, 
 " Felix no longer inhabits the earth ; he passes his time among 
 the stars?" 
 
 "My dear old colleague," said Phellion, "I am as much 
 annoyed as yourself with my son for neglecting the oldest 
 friends of his family ; and, though the contemplation of the 
 great luminous bodies suspended in space by the hand of the 
 Creator present, in my opinion, more interest to me than your 
 overwrought brain seems to imagine, yet I think that Felix 
 17
 
 258 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 shows a lack of propriety by not coming here to-night, espe- 
 cially as he gave me his promise." 
 
 "Science," said la Peyrade, " is a fine thing, but, unfortu- 
 nately, it has the drawback of making bears and maniacs." 
 
 "Without counting," said Celeste, "the undermining of 
 all religion." 
 
 " In that, my child, you are mistaken," said the countess. 
 " Pascal, himself a shining example of the falsity of your view, 
 says, if I am not mistaken, that a little science leads us 
 away from religion but a great deal draws us back to it." 
 
 " Bring back a savant to the practice of religion, madame," 
 said la Peyrade, " it seems to me a difficult task ; these gentle- 
 men put their studies before everything else ; tell a geome- 
 trician or geologist, for example, that the church imperatively 
 insists on the sanctification of Sunday and a suspension of every 
 kind of work, and they shrug their shoulders, although God 
 himself did not disdain to rest." 
 
 " Therefore by not coming here this evening," said Celeste, 
 innocently, "he not only commits a breach of good manners, 
 but also sins." 
 
 " But tell me, my handsome," replied Mme. de Godollo, 
 " do you think that our assembling here to sing ballads and 
 eat ices and speak evil of others, as is the practice in draw- 
 ing-rooms, is more pleasing to God than seeing a scientific 
 man in his observatory engaged in studying the magnificent 
 secrets of the creation ? " 
 
 "There's a time for all things," said Celeste, "and, as 
 Monsieur la Peyrade says, 'God did not disdain to rest.' ' 
 
 ""But, my dear love," said Mme. de Godollo, "God has 
 the time so to do ; He is eternal." 
 
 "That," said la Peyrade, " is one of the wittiest impieties 
 ever issued. Those kind of arguments serve the turn of folk 
 of the world. They interpret and explain away the com- 
 mands of God, they interpret, take, choose among them as 
 they will ; the free-thinker subjects them to his sovereign re-
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 259 
 
 vision, and free-thinking is but a short distance from free- 
 conduct." 
 
 During this tirade Mme. de Godollo was watching the 
 clock ; it now marked eleven. The salon began to empty. 
 Only one table was going on, the players being Minard, 
 Thuillier, and two new acquaintances. All tended to show 
 that the hope of seeing the tardy lover was evidently lost. 
 
 "Monsieur," said the countess to la Peyrade, "do you 
 think the gentlemen of the Rue des Postes have the honor of 
 being good Catholics ? " 
 
 "Without a doubt," answered the barrister; " religion has 
 no more earnest supporters." 
 
 "Well, this morning," continued the countess, "I had the 
 honor of being received by Father Anselme. He is considered 
 the model of every Christian virtue, yet this good father is a 
 very learned mathematician." 
 
 "I did not say, madame, that the two qualities were in- 
 compatible." 
 
 " But you did say that a good Christian would do no man- 
 ner of work on Sunday ; thus Father Anselme must be a mis- 
 creant ; for at the moment I gained access to his room I found 
 him standing in front of a blackboard, a piece of chalk in his 
 hand, busy with a difficult problem, for the board was covered 
 with algebraic characters, and, further, he didn't seem to 
 realize that he might create a scandal, for with him was a 
 person whom I am not at liberty to name, but it was a young 
 scientist of great promise, who shared his profane occupa- 
 tion." 
 
 Celeste and Mme. Thuillier as they looked at each other 
 saw a gleam of hope in each other's eyes. 
 
 "Then you know a number of young savants?" asked 
 
 Celeste ; " this one and Monsieur Felix make two." 
 
 ' 
 
 "As for me," said la Peyrade, ironically, "I shouldn't be 
 in the least surprised if Father Anselme's collaborator was 
 precisely that Felix Phellion ; Voltaire always kept up close
 
 260 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 relations with the Jesuits who brought him up, only he did 
 not discuss religion with them." 
 
 "Well, my young savant he does discuss it with his vener- 
 able confrere in the sciences; he explains his doubts to him, 
 and, in fact, this was the commencement of their scientific 
 friendship." 
 
 "And Father Anselme," asked Celeste, "does he hope to 
 convert this young man ? " 
 
 "He is sure of so doing," replied the countess. "His 
 young collaborator, apart from religious education, which he 
 never received, is a man of most excellent parts and the 
 highest principles ; moreover, he well knows that his conver- 
 sion would give happiness to a charming young girl whom he 
 loves and who loves him in return. Now, my dear child, you 
 won't get another word out of me; you can fancy what you 
 please." 
 
 " Oh ! my godmother," said Celeste, yielding to the inno- 
 cence of her impressions, "if it were he ! " 
 
 At this moment the servant opened the door of the salon 
 and, singular coincidence, announced: "Monsieur Felix 
 Phellion." 
 
 The young professor entered, bathed in perspiration, his 
 cravat askew, and himself out of breath. 
 
 "A pretty time, this," said Phellion, with severity, "to 
 present yourself." 
 
 "My father," said Felix, moving to where Mme. Thuillier 
 *nd Celeste were seated, " I was unable to leave before the 
 close of the phenomenon ; I could find no coach and have run 
 all the way." 
 
 "Your ears must have burned on the road," said la Pey- 
 rade, sneeringly, " for you have occupied the thoughts of 
 these ladies up to now ; you have been the subject of a 
 great problem to them." 
 
 Felix did not answer ; he went to greet Brigitte, who had 
 just entered from the dining-room. After she had reproached
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 261 
 
 him for the rarity of his visits and receiving her pardon in a 
 " Better late than never," he turned to his pole and was as- 
 tonished to hear Madame de Godollo say to him : 
 
 " Monsieur, you must pardon my indiscretion done in the 
 heat of conversation about you ; I have told them where I met 
 you this morning." 
 
 "Where have I had the honor of meeting you?" said 
 Felix; "but, madame, I did not see you." 
 
 A faint smile lighted up la Peyrade's lips. 
 
 "You saw me sufficiently well to ask my confidence as to 
 where I found you ; but at least I did not go further than to say 
 that I had seen you with Father Anselme sometimes, and that 
 you had some scientific relations with each other ; and also 
 that you defended your doubts against his arguments the 
 same as you do with Celeste." 
 
 "Father Anselme ! " said the stupid Phellion. 
 
 "Yes, without doubt," said la Peyrade, "a great mathe- 
 matician who does not despair of converting you ; Made- 
 moiselle Celeste has shed tears of joy." 
 
 Felix looked around with an air of bewilderment. Ma- 
 dame de Godollo looked at him with eyes the language of 
 which a poodle would have understood. 
 
 " I wish," said he, finally, " that I could have done a thing 
 so agreeable to Mademoiselle Celeste, but I am afraid, ma- 
 dame, that you labor under an error." 
 
 "Listen to me, monsieur, it seems that I must needs be 
 more precise ; and if your timidity prompts you to continue 
 denying a step that can only honor you, then you may con- 
 tradict me ; I must bear the annoyance of having divulged a 
 secret which I had promised you faithfully to keep." 
 
 Measuring each word, she said : 
 
 "I have told these ladies, because I know how they wish 
 your salvation, and because you were accused of audaciously 
 defying God's commandments by working on Sunday, that I 
 had met you this morning at Father Anselme's house, a scien-
 
 262 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 tist like yourself, with whom you were engaged in solving a 
 problem ; I said that this had led up to other explanations 
 between you, and that he did not despair of refuting your 
 arguments. In confirming my words, there can be nothing 
 to wound your self-esteem. It was only intended as a sur- 
 prise for Celeste, but I was so stupid as to divulge it." 
 
 "Come, monsieur," said la Peyrade, "there's nothing 
 ridiculous in searching for the light ; you, so honorable, such 
 a foe to untruth, can scarcely deny what madame so reso- 
 lutely affirms." 
 
 " Well," said Felix, after a slight pause, " will you, Made- 
 moiselle Celeste, permit me to say a few words to you in 
 private, without witnesses?" 
 
 Celeste, after an approving nod from Mme. Thuillier, rose, 
 and Felix took her hand and led her to a window recess. 
 
 " Celeste," he said, "I beg you to wait a little longer. 
 See," he added, pointing to the constellation of the chariot,* 
 " beyond those visible stars, there lies a future for us. As 
 regards what has been said about Father Anselme, I cannot 
 admit it, for it is not true. It is a pleasing story ; but 
 patience, you shall hear things " 
 
 Celeste left him, and he remained gazing at the stars. 
 
 " He is mad," said the young girl in accents of despair, as 
 she resumed her seat by Mme. Thuillier. 
 
 F6lix confirmed this prognostication by rushing out of the 
 room without perceiving the emotion with which his father 
 followed him. 
 
 Shortly after this exit, which had stupefied everybody, la 
 Peyrade approached Mme. de Godollo and respectfully said : 
 
 " You must admit, madame, that it is very difficult to draw 
 a man out of the water when he is intent on drowning " 
 
 "I had no idea," replied the countess, "of such unpar- 
 alleled simplicity ; it is too silly for anything. I shall go 
 over to the enemy, and with that enemy I am, when he 
 * Ursa Major.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 263 
 
 pleases, ready to go into a full and frank explanation in my 
 own rooms." 
 
 The next day Theodose felt himself possessed by two 
 curiosities : How Celeste would behave in the option pre- 
 sented for her acceptance ? Then this Comtesse Torna de 
 Godollo, what did she mean by what she had said ; and what 
 did she want of him? 
 
 He sent his porter for a hack and about three o'clock 
 drove from the Rue Saint- Dominique-d'Enfer toward the 
 fashionable neighborhood of the Madeleine. His toilet was 
 naturally the subject of some thought, and presented a com- 
 promise between the negligent ease of morning attire and the 
 ceremonious style of evening dress. Necessitated by his pro- 
 fession to wear a white cravat, which he rarely laid aside, and 
 not being well-disposed to dispense with a dress-coat, he felt 
 drawn to one of the extremes he was desirous of avoiding. 
 But by buttoning his coat and wearing tan instead of lemon- 
 colored kids he managed to " unsolemnize " himself, and 
 thus avoided the provincial and poor-relation aspect which a 
 man in full dress always conveys to the mind when seen on 
 the streets of Paris. 
 
 Arrived he rang the bell, and after some little delay was 
 ushered into a severely luxurious dining-room, where he was 
 requested to wait. A minute later the attendant returned and 
 he was admitted into a most coquettish and splendid salon. 
 The divinity of the place sat before a table covered with 
 Venetian cloth, in which gold thread sparkled among the 
 rich embroidery. As la Peyrade went in the countess bowed 
 without rising. 
 
 "Will monsieur allow me to seal a letter of some im- 
 portance ? " said the comtesse. 
 
 The barrister made a bow of assent ; the handsome foreigner 
 then took from a tortoise-shell inlaid desk a sheet of blue-tint 
 English paper which she placed in an envelope ; after she had 
 written the address, she rose and rang the bell. The maid
 
 264 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 appeared and lighted a small spirit lamp ; over the lamp was 
 hung a silver-gilt crucible-shaped vessel, in which was a scrap 
 of scented sealing-wax ; as soon as the flame had melted this 
 the maid poured it on the envelope and handed her mistress 
 an armorial seal. This she impressed with her own fair hands 
 on the wax, and said : " Take it at once to that address." 
 
 As the woman made a movement to take the letter she 
 inadvertently let it fall, near to la Peyrade's feet, who made a 
 quick movement to pick it up and read thereon: " M. the 
 Minister of Foreign Affairs," added below being: "For him 
 only." 
 
 " Thanks, monsieur," said the countess, for he had the good 
 sense to return it to her. "Be so good, mademoiselle, as 
 not to lose it," she added severely to the maid. 
 
 The countess then left the table and took her seat on a 
 lounge covered with pearl gray satin. You may say that you 
 cannot know all a woman's perfections unless you have seen 
 her in the prismatic atmosphere of her own drawing-room ; 
 but guard against pretending to judge and know her if you 
 have never seen her anywhere else. 
 
 "Monsieur," said she, with a smile and a slightly foreign 
 accent which gave an added charm to her words, " I cannot 
 help thinking what a queer thing it is that a man of your 
 spirit and rare penetration should have an idea that you had 
 an enemy in me." 
 
 "But, Madame la Comtesse," replied la Peyrade, allowing 
 her to read in his eyes the astonishment he felt, not unmingled 
 with distrust, " you will admit that every appearance was of 
 that nature. A rival crops up when I was already justified in 
 considering my marriage fully settled ; he becomes absolutely 
 stupid and awkward so that I could easily have set him aside, 
 when suddenly a most unlooked-for auxiliary rushes in and 
 assists him on his most vulnerable point." 
 
 " What a great misfortune it would be," replied the 
 foreigner with charming audacity, " if your marriage with
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. J66 
 
 mademoiselle were prevented. Do you really care so very 
 much for that schoolgirl ? " 
 
 In that last word there was not more of contempt than 
 hatred. This did not escape an observer of la Peyrade's 
 keeness. But he only went on to say: 
 
 " Madame, the vulgar expression ' to settle down ' sums up 
 the situation, where, after a long-drawn fight, a man reaches 
 the end of his illusions, and when he would fain compromise 
 with his future. Now, when this end is presented in the form 
 of a young girl with more virtue than beauty, I won't deny, 
 but one who brings to her husband the fortune so indispensable 
 to the welfare of conjugal companionship, why it should ex- 
 cite astonishment that his heart is filled with gratitude and 
 that he should eagerly welcome the prospect of peaceful 
 happiness?" 
 
 "I had always imagined," replied the countess, "that a 
 man's intelligence and power should be the measure of his 
 ambition ; one, I should think, so wise as to make himself the 
 poor man's advocate would have less modesty and fewer pas- 
 toral aspirations." 
 
 "Ah! madame," said la Peyrade, "the iron hand of 
 necessity makes one resign himself, it forces stranger things 
 upon us than that; the question of daily bread is one before 
 which everybody debases himself. Apollo, was he not com- 
 pelled to 'make a living' by tending Admetus' sheep?" 
 
 " Admetus' sheep-fold," objected Mine, de Godollo, "was 
 at least a sheep-fold of royalty ; but certainly Apollo would 
 never .have submitted to become the shepherd of a bour- 
 geois." 
 
 The pause which preceded the last word of the handsome 
 foreigner seemed to convey the meaning of a proper name 
 instead of the one used. 
 
 "I believe, madame, that your distinction is not less true 
 than subtle," answered la Peyrade; "but Apollo has no 
 choice."
 
 266 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "I don't like people who charge too much," said the 
 countess, "neither do I like those who sell their goods below 
 the market price, I am always afraid lest they should make me 
 the victim of some knavish trick. You well know your own 
 value, monsieur, and your hypocritical humility annoys me 
 immensely; it shows me that my kindly overtures have not 
 even produced the beginning of confidence between us." 
 
 "I assure you, madame, that up to now my life has not 
 given me any reason to think myself possessed of dazzling 
 superiority." 
 
 "Well," said the Hungarian, "perhaps I ought to admit 
 the modesty of the man who will accept the pitiable finale of 
 his life which I have intended to do my best to prevent." 
 
 "So, perhaps, as I myself," replied la Peyrade, "might 
 believe in that benevolence which in order to rescue me has 
 treated me so roughly." 
 
 The countess threw a reproachful glance at her guest ; her 
 hands toyed with the ribbons of her dress ; she cast down her 
 eyes and allowed a sigh to escape her, so faint as to be scarcely 
 perceptible, so slight in fact that it might have passed as her 
 regular breathing. 
 
 "You are rancorous," said she, "and judge people by 
 yourself. After all," she added, as if in reflection, " you may 
 possibly be right in reminding me that I have gone a long and 
 roundabout way in meddling in interests that are none of my 
 concern. Go on, dear monsieur, and prosper in this so glo- 
 rious marriage which offers you such a combination of in- 
 ducements ; only let me hope that you may never repent your 
 course, which I will no longer try to postpone." 
 
 The Provencal had not been spoilt by women. The poverty 
 against which he had been so long struggling never leads to 
 affairs of gallantry, and, since he had thrown off its worst 
 clutches, his mind had been given up to the anxious work of 
 providing for his future ; with the exception of the farce played 
 with Mnie. Co}leville, he had never had an affair qf the heart
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 267 
 
 during his whole life. We can thus understand the perplexity 
 of this novice. Like all overbusy men when they are goaded 
 by the demon of lust, he was content to accept the ignoble 
 love that any night can be bought at corner crossings, and 
 that is easily reconciled with the exterior of devotion. 
 
 Suppose this kindness, but poorly explained as it seemed to 
 him, of which he had so suddenly become the object was but 
 a bait to entice him toward a snare which might be used to 
 compromise him with the Thuilliers, what a blow at his sup- 
 posed shrewdness, what a part to play ; that of the dog drop- 
 ping the meat to grasp the shadow. 
 
 We know that la Peyrade was something after the school of 
 Tartuffe, and the frankness which that master declares to 
 Elmire that unless a few of the promised favors are granted 
 he could no longer trust her tender advances, seemed almost 
 adapted to the occasion, though there was more softness in its 
 form. 
 
 " Madame la Comtesse," said he, "you have made of me a 
 man who is much to be pitied ; I was marching gayly to this 
 marriage, and you take from me all my faith ; and yet, what 
 if I break it off, what can I, with that great capacity you 
 credit me with, do with the liberty thus acquired ?" 
 
 " La Bruyere has said, if I am not mistaken, that nothing 
 so refreshes the blood as to avoid committing a folly." 
 
 " I grant that ; but that is a negative benefit ; I am of an 
 age and in such a position as to desire more serious results. 
 The interest you show in me cannot, I imagine, end at leaving 
 a blank page. I love mademoiselle with a love, not, it is 
 true, with an imperative, dominating passion, but still I do 
 love her, her hand is promised to me, and before renoun- 
 cing " 
 
 "So," said the countess, briskly, "in a given case you 
 would not object to a rupture? And," added she, in a calmer 
 tone, " you might be ready to break it off; that is, in case a 
 more suitable marriage were to offer?"
 
 268 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "At the very least, madame, I should want to definitely 
 foresee this." 
 
 This determination lobe on the safe side appeared to annoy 
 the countess. 
 
 " Faith, monsieur," said she, "is only a virtue when it 
 accepts without seeing. You doubt yourself, another form of 
 stupidity. I am not happy in my proteges." 
 
 "But, madame, it cannot be very indiscreet to ask for 
 the least intimation of what your benevolence has designed 
 forme?" 
 
 " Very indiscreet," replied the Hungarian, coldly, " for h 
 shows me that you only offer me a confidence on conditions. 
 Say no more. You have gone far with Mademoiselle Colle- 
 ville ; you say she suits you in many things, marry her ; one 
 more attack, you won't again find me in your way." 
 
 "But does mademoiselle really suit me?" replied la Pey- 
 rade ; " that is exactly where you have raised my doubts. 
 Don't you think you are cruel in casting me first in one 
 direction and then in another without offering anything to 
 support me?" 
 
 "Ah ! you want my opinion ; well, there is one fact : C6- 
 leste does not love you." 
 
 " I think myself," said la Peyrade, " that I am on the way 
 to a marriage of convenience." 
 
 "And she cannot love you," continued Mme. de Godollo, 
 with animation, " for she cannot understand you. The man 
 who should be her husband is that blonde young man, as shy 
 and pale-faced as herself; the contact of these two natures 
 without life and heat will result in that lukewarm duet which 
 jn the opinion of the world in which she was born constitutes 
 the ne plus ultra of conjugal felicity. Enriched bourgeois. 
 parvenus, there's the roof under which you intend resting after 
 your hard labors and long trials. And don't you know that 
 twenty times a day they will make it manifest to you that your 
 share in the partnership is very light against their money ?
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 289 
 
 The artist, the man of imagination, who tumbles into the 
 middle-class atmosphere, shall I tell you to what I compare 
 him ? To Daniel cast into the den of lions, less the miracle 
 of the Scriptures." 
 
 "Ah, madame ! " exclaimed la Peyrade, " how eloquently 
 you present the thoughts that have been mine so often. But 
 I felt lashed to the cruel necessity of gaining a position." 
 
 " Necessity, position ! " interrupted the countess, again 
 elevating the temperature of her words, " words without 
 meaning ! They have no sound- to men of ability, though 
 they bar fools as though they were formidable obstacles. 
 Necessity, does that exist for noble natures who know how to 
 will ? A Gascon minister said these words, which should be 
 graven over every door of all careers : ' All things come to 
 him who knows how to wait.' Are you ignorant that mar- 
 riage to men of superior stamp is either a chain which rivets 
 them to the most vulgar of existences, or a wing that bears 
 them to the highest summits of the social world ? The wife 
 you need, monsieur, and she would not be long lacking in 
 your career if you had not with such incredible haste offered 
 yourself to the first fortune which turned up. The one you 
 should have chosen is a woman capable of understanding you, 
 able to read you ; one who would be a collaborator, an in- 
 telligent confidant, not a mere incarnation of pot-au-feu ; who 
 to-day is your secretary, but to-morrow may be the true wife 
 of a deputy or an ambassador ; in short, one who could offer 
 you her heart for a mainspring, her salon for a stage, her 
 friends for a ladder, and who in return for all you gave of 
 ardor and strength would ask no more than to sit near your 
 throne in the glare of the prosperity and glory that she fore- 
 saw would be your lot." 
 
 Intoxicated by her own words the Hungarian was magnifi- 
 cent, her eyes sparkled, her notrils dilated ; the perspective 
 her vivid eloquence had unfurled she appeared to see, to 
 touch with her hands. For a moment la Peyrade was daz
 
 270 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 zled with this kind of sunrise which burst suddenly upon his 
 life. 
 
 All the same, he was an eminently prudent man, who had 
 made it a rule to never lend anything except on the soundest 
 security ; he was impelled to still weigh the situation. 
 
 " Madame la Comtesse," said he, " you just now reproached 
 me with speaking like a bourgeois, and I, in turn, fear that 
 you talk like a goddess. I admire you, I listen to you, but I 
 am not convinced. These devotions, these sublime abnega- 
 tions, are perhaps met with in heaven ; but on our earth who 
 may boast that he has seen them ? " 
 
 "You are mistaken, monsieur," said the countess, solemnly, 
 " such cases are rare, but neither impossible nor incredible ; 
 the fault is only in not having the skill to find and the hand 
 to grasp them when offered to you." 
 
 So saying she majestically rose. 
 
 La Peyrade comprehended that he had ended by displeas- 
 ing her ; he felt that she dismissed him ; he rose in his turn, 
 bowed respectfully, and begged to be allowed to call again. 
 
 " Monsieur," replied Mme. de Godollo, " among we Hun- 
 garians, a primitive people and almost savages, when a door 
 is open, both leaves are opened ; but when it is closed, it is 
 double-locked." 
 
 This dignified and ambiguous response was accompanied 
 by an inclination of the head. Bewildered, confounded by 
 this behavior, which was so new to him, which bore little 
 resemblance to that of Flavie, Brigitte, and Mme. Minard, 
 he went away asking himself if he had played his game 
 aright. 
 
 On leaving Mme. de Godollo, la Peyrade felt that he must 
 have time to think. What could he see beneath the conver- 
 sation, a springe or a rich wife offered to him ? Under such 
 a doubt, to press Celeste for an immediate answer was neither 
 wise nor prudent. Consequently, in lieu of going to the 
 Thuilliers he went home and wrote the following note :
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 271 
 
 MY DEAR THUILLIER : 
 
 I daresay you will not think it strange that I have not presented myself 
 at your house to-day ; partly because I dread the sentence and because I 
 do not care to be taken for an impatient, ill-bred creditor. A few days, 
 more or less, will matter little under the circumstances, and yet Mile. 
 Colleville may rind them desirable as giving her entire freedom of choice. 
 I shall not call, therefore, until you write me. I am now calmer, and I 
 have added a few more pages to our manuscript; it needs but little more 
 to be ready for the printer. Ever yours, 
 
 THEODOSE DE LA PEYRADE. 
 
 Two hours later a servant dressed in what was evidently the 
 first transition toward a livery, the "male" servant spoken 
 of by Minard, which as yet the Thuilliers did not wish to 
 risk, brought la Peyrade this answer : 
 
 Come this evening without fail ; we will talk the whole affair over with 
 Brigitte. 
 
 Your most affectionately devoted, 
 
 JERSME THUILLIER. 
 
 "Good," said la Peyrade, "there is a hitch somewhere; 
 I shall have time to turn myself around." 
 
 When he arrived, and after talking of the weather and so 
 forth, as people do who have met to discuss a delicate subject 
 about which they are not sure of coming to an understanding, 
 the matter was brought up by Brigitte, who had sent out her 
 brother to take his walk on the boulevards, telling him to 
 leave her to manage the business. 
 
 " My dear boy," said Brigitte, " it was a gentlemanly thing 
 of you not to come here to-day like a ' grab-all,' to put your 
 pistol to our throats, for we are not, as it happens, quite ready 
 to answer you. I really think," she added, "that Celeste 
 needs a little more time." 
 
 " So," said la Peyrade, quickly, " she has not then decided 
 in favor of Monsieur Felix Phellion ? " 
 
 "Rogue!" replied the old maid, "you fixed that last
 
 272 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 night ; but you know, also, that she inclines a little to that 
 side." 
 
 "Well, how does Celeste take the matter? Has she re- 
 fused me? " 
 
 " It is much worse than that. She accepts you, saying 
 that she had given her word ; but it is easy to see that she 
 looks upon herself as a victim. If I were in your place, I 
 should not consider my success either assuring or flattering." 
 
 In any other state of mind, la Peyrade would have answered 
 that he accepted the sacrifice and would make it his business 
 to win her heart, which, for the moment, had been given so 
 reluctantly ; but delay better suited his end. 
 
 " What is your advice?" he asked Brigitte. 
 
 "For the first thing," said Brigitte, "I would finish the 
 pamphlet of Thuillier's, he is going crazy for it, and leave 
 me to work your interests," replied Brigitte. 
 
 " But if I am not in friendly hands? for, little aunt, I could 
 not help seeing that you have changed somewhat in your 
 feelings toward me." 
 
 " I am changed toward you ! and in what do you see me 
 changed, you dreamer?" 
 
 "Oh! in little things," said la Peyrade; "but it is sure 
 that since the introduction here of this Countess Torna " 
 
 " My poor boy, the Hungarian has been of much service to 
 me, I must acknowledge that ; but is that any reason why I 
 should be false to you, you who have done us much greater 
 services?" 
 
 "Still," said the crafty la Peyrade, "you know that she 
 has spoken much that is bad about me?" 
 
 "That's the simplest matter, whatever she may have said; 
 those fine ladies expect the whole world to adore them, and 
 she knows that your head is full of Celeste ; but all she has 
 said about you runs off me like water off oilcloth." 
 
 "So, little aunt," asked la Peyrade, "I am to count on 
 you?"
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 273 
 
 '.'Yes; if you don't torment me and allow me to manage 
 matters." 
 
 "Well, tell me, then, what you intend doing," said la 
 Peyrade, with an air of jolly good-humor. 
 
 "First, I shall forbid Felix the house." 
 
 " Is that possible? " said the barrister, " or is it the least bit 
 civil?" 
 
 "Very possible, and I shall make Phellion himself tell him. 
 As he makes a hobby-horse of his principles, he'll see that if 
 his son won't do what is necessary to win the hand of Celeste, 
 that he ought to deprive us of his presence." 
 
 "And afterward? " said la Peyrade. 
 
 "Afterward I shall signify to Celeste that as she was allowed 
 the liberty of choosing a husband from one or the other, and., 
 as she did not choose Felix, she must put up with you, who 
 are such a pious fellow, such as she wants. You be easy ; I'll 
 make the best of you, especially your generosity in not press- 
 ing your attentions when you might have profited thereby. 
 But that will take quite a week, and if Thuillier's pamphlet 
 is not finished by then, I don't know but what we shall be 
 obliged to send him to Charenton." 
 
 " In two days the pamphlet can be ready ; but are we quite 
 sure, little aunt, that you are playing a square game? The 
 saying is that mountains cannot meet, but men do ; and, cer- 
 tainly, when the time for election comes, I can do Thuillier 
 good or bad service. The other day, do you know, I had a 
 terrible fright. I had about me a letter in which he spoke of the 
 pamphlet as being written by me. I thought for a moment 
 that I had lost that letter at the Luxembourg. If I had, what 
 a scandal there would have been in the quarter." 
 
 " Is there any one who would care to play tricks on such a 
 sly fellow as you?" said the old maid, quite understanding 
 the covert threat implied. "But, really," added she, "why 
 should you find fault with us ? Is it not yourself that is be- 
 hindhand with your promises ? That Cross which was to be 
 18
 
 274 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 given within a week, that pamphlet that should have been out 
 long ago?" 
 
 "The pamphlet and the Cross will each bring the other," 
 replied la Peyrade, rising. " Tell Thuillier to come and see 
 me to-morrow evening. I think by then we can correct the 
 last sheet. But don't lend an ear to the machinations of 
 Madame de Godollo ; I have an idea that she designs to make 
 herself the entire mistress of this house ; she wants to alienate 
 all your friends, and in the meantime to appropriate Thuil- 
 lier." 
 
 "In fact," said the old maid, whom the infernal barrister 
 had touched in a tender spot, the love of authority, " I must 
 see into this; she is a little coquette, that little madame." 
 
 Four days later the printer, the stitcher, and the hot-presser 
 had done their work; Thuillier, in the evening, could give 
 himself the inexpressible honor of commencing a walk on the 
 boulevards, which he continued through the passages of the 
 Palais-Royal, pausing before every bookstore window to steal 
 a glance at a yellow poster, shining in black letters, with the 
 famous title : 
 
 DE L'IMPOT ET DE AMORTISSEMENT. 
 
 PAR J. THUILLIER, 
 Membre du conseil general de la Seine. 
 
 Having managed to persuade himself that the care he had 
 given to the proof-reading and revising had the merit of 
 making the work his own, his paternal heart, like that of the 
 Maitre Corbeau, could not hold itself for joy. It should be 
 added that he had but little opinion of those booksellers who 
 did not announce this latest new work for sale, destined, as he 
 fondly believed, to be a European event. Without really being 
 able to see how he could punish them for their indifference, 
 he nevertheless made a list of these recalcitrant persons, and
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 275 
 
 wished them all possible evils, as though it were a personal 
 affront. 
 
 The next day he spent in the delightful occupation of ad- 
 dressing a number of presentations, wrapping up fifty sample 
 copies to which the inscription: "From the author," com* 
 municated an inestimable prize. 
 
 But the third day of the sale brought his happiness a check. 
 He had chosen for his publisher a young man, who, rushing 
 his business at a break-neck pace, had lately established him- 
 self in the Passages des Panoramas, where he paid a ruinous 
 rent. A nephew of Barbet, the publisher, whom Brigitte had 
 for a tenant in her old house ; he flinched at nothing, and 
 when his uncle recommended him to Thuillier, he was as- 
 sured that unless he was restricted in the advertising that he 
 would sell the first edition and print another within a week. 
 
 Now Thuillier had spent about fifteen hundred francs for 
 advertising; such as sending a profusion of copies to the 
 journals, and, after three days had gone by, only SEVEN copies 
 had been sold, and three of these on credit. It might be pre- 
 sumed that the young publisher would have lost some of his 
 assurance with this ; but, to the contrary, this Guzman of the 
 book-trade said : 
 
 "I am delighted at what has happened. If we had sold a 
 hundred copies I should be very uneasy as to the fifteen hun- 
 dred we have printed ; I call this hanging fire, whereas this 
 paltry sale goes to prove that the edition will go off with a 
 bang." 
 
 "Then you don't think that the sale is hopeless ?" said 
 Thuillier. 
 
 " On the contrary, I take a most favorable view of this. As 
 soon as the 'Debats,' the Constitutionnel,' the 'Siecle,' and 
 the ' Press ' have reviewed it, especially if it gets ' hammered ' 
 by the ' Debats,' which is ministerial, it will go." 
 
 "You rattle that off right easily," replied Thuillier, "but 
 how shall we get hold of the gentlemen of the press ? "
 
 276 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "Leave that to me," said Barbet, "I am on the best of 
 terms with the chief editors ; they say the devil is in me and 
 that I remind them of Ladvocat in his best days." 
 
 " Then, my dear boy, you ought to have seen to this be- 
 fore." 
 
 "Ah ! but permit me, Papa Thuillier, there's only one way 
 of ' seeing ' a newspaper-man ; as you grumbled about the 
 fifteen hundred francs, I didn't want to suggest another ex- 
 pense to you." 
 
 " Expense for what ? " 
 
 "When you were nominated for the Council," replied the 
 book-seller, " where was your election planned ? " 
 
 "Parbleu! in my home," answered Thuillier. 
 
 "At your home, without doubt, but at a dinner followed 
 by a ball and the ball followed by a supper. Well, my dear 
 master, there are not two ways to do this business ; Boileau 
 says: 
 
 " ' We govern our times the best with our dinners, 
 
 It's by dining alone that we keep check on our sinners.' " 
 
 " But that costs money ; journalists are all a lot of gour- 
 mands." 
 
 " Pshaw ! twenty francs per head, without the wine. Given, 
 say, ten of them, with a hundred crowns you could do it 
 fine." 
 
 "How you talk, young man," said Thuillier. 
 
 "Dame, everybody knows that it costs to get a nomination, 
 and you will thus prepare for it." 
 
 "But how shall I invite these gentlemen ? Must I go and 
 invite them myself?" 
 
 " Not at all ; you have sent them your pamphlet, now you 
 beg them to meet you at Philippe's or VeTour's ; they'll catch 
 on all right." 
 
 "Ten guests," said Thuillier, entering into the idea, "I 
 did not know there were so many important journalists ?"
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 277 
 
 "Quite true," replied the publisher, "but we must have 
 the curs, for they bark the loudest. The breakfast is sure to 
 be well talked about ; they will think you have been picking 
 and choosing, and each one left out would become your 
 enemy." 
 
 " If I were sure that this expense would have the desired 
 effect," said Thuillier, with indecision. 
 
 "If I were sure is very pretty," said Barbet, with impor- 
 tance ; " but, my dear master, this is money placed on mort- 
 gage ', with that I can guarantee you selling the fifteen hun- 
 dred copies. That at forty sous, and allowing the discounts, 
 makes three thousand francs. You see that covers your costs 
 and extras more than covers them." 
 
 "So ! I'll talk it over with la Peyrade," said Thuillier as 
 he went out. 
 
 "As you will, dear master, but decide quickly, for nothing 
 gets mildewed so soon as a book ; write hot, serve hot, sell it 
 hot ; that's the rule of three for authors, publishers, and the 
 public ; outside of that everything falls flat, and is no good to 
 touch." 
 
 When la Peyrade was consulted he did not really think so 
 much of the plan ; but now he had begun to feel the bitterest 
 animosity against Thuillier, so he was quite delighted to see 
 this new tax levied on his self-conceit, inexperience, and 
 pomposity. 
 
 Now Thuillier's mania for posing as a statesman decided 
 him on following Barbel's advice. He called upon him there- 
 fore for the list of guests. Barbet gayly produced his little 
 catalogue. Fifteen instead of the original number were down, 
 without counting himself or la Peyrade, whom Thuillier felt he 
 should need in encountering a crowd of men with whom he 
 had reason to think he would be out of place. When Thuillier 
 had cast his eyes over the paper : 
 
 " Ah, there ! my dear boy," said he to the publisher, " you 
 have given me the names of journals that I never even heard
 
 278 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 tell of. What is this 'Moralisateur,' that 'Lanterne,' the 
 ' Diogene,' or the ' Pelican,' and that ' Echo de la Bievre ? ' " 
 
 "You do well," replied Barbet, " to fall foul of ' Echo de 
 la Bievre,' a paper printed in the twelfth arrondissement and 
 read by all the rich tanners in the quarter." 
 
 " Well, pass that, then ; but the < Pelican ? ' " 
 
 "The 'Pelican?' why that journal is on every dentist's 
 waiting-room table ; dentists make more puffs than all the rest 
 of the world ; how many teeth do you suppose are daily drawn 
 in Paris?'! 
 
 " Oh ! bosh," said Thuillier. 
 
 Finally the list was finished at fourteen guests and the meet- 
 ing appointed at Vefour's, the one most extensively patron- 
 ized by the bourgeoisie and provincials. Barbet arrived 
 even before Thuillier, wearing a cravat so enormous as to 
 itself become a feature among those satirical guests. The 
 publisher had taken it upon himself to change sundry of the 
 dishes : instead of having the champagne served in the 
 bourgeois fashion with the dessert, he ordered it placed on 
 the table at the commencement of the repast, properly iced, 
 together with a few dishes of shrimps, of which the amphi- 
 tryon had not thought. 
 
 Thuillier, who gave a verbal approval to these changes, was 
 followed by la Peyrade ; then a long pause before any others 
 appeared. Breakfast was ordered for eleven, but at a quarter 
 before twelve not a guest had come. Barbet, never at a loss, 
 made the crushing remark that breakfasts at a restaurant were 
 like funerals, when eleven meant twelve. As a fact, just before 
 that hour two goat-bearded gentlemen arrived, exhaling a 
 strong odor of the smoking-room. Thuillier effusively 
 thanked them for the "honor" they were about to do him ; 
 and then came another long period of waiting. At one, five 
 only of the invited guests had arrived. They took their 
 places at table ; a few polite speeches reached Thuillier' s ears 
 as to the " immense " interest the publication of his pamphlet
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES, 279 
 
 had excited, but this failed to blind him to the fact of a dis- 
 mal failure. Only for the vivacity of the publisher, who had 
 seized the reins dropped by his patron, gloomy as Hippolytus 
 on the way to Mycenae, nothing could have equaled the de- 
 pression and the icy coldness of this meeting. 
 
 After the removal of the oysters the champagne and 
 Chablis had begun to give a slight rise to the temperature 
 when a youngster in a cap rushed into the banqueting-room 
 and gave Thuillier a most unexpected and crushing blow. 
 
 "Boss," said the new-comer to Barbet he was a clerk in 
 the bookseller's store " we are done for ! The police have 
 raided us; a commissary and two men have come to seize 
 monsieur's pamphlet; they left this paper with me for you." 
 
 " See what this says, Monsieur the Barrister," said Barbet 
 as he handed the paper to la Peyrade. At this stroke his 
 habitual assurance paled somewhat. 
 
 "A summons to shortly appear before the Assize Court," 
 said la Peyrade, after reading the sheriff's scrawl. 
 
 Becoming as pale as death : 
 
 " Then didn't you fill all the necessary formalities ? " asked 
 Thuillier in a choking voice. 
 
 "Oh! This is not a question of formalities," replied la 
 Peyrade, " it is seized as illegal printed matter, which excites 
 hatred and contempt for the government. You will find at 
 home, my poor Thuillier, a similar compliment awaiting 
 you." 
 
 "But this must be treason, then ! " said Thuillier, who had 
 completely lost his head. 
 
 "Dame/ my dear boy, you must know what you put in the 
 pamphlet; for my part, I didn't see anything bad enough to 
 whip a cat for." 
 
 "There's a misunderstanding somewhere," said Barbet, 
 recovering a little courage. " It will be all explained, the result 
 will be a fine cause for complaints to be made, is not that so, 
 gentlemen?"
 
 280 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 " Waiter, a pen and ink," exclaimed one of the journalists 
 thus appealed to. 
 
 "You'll have time enough to write your article," said one 
 of his colleagues; "what has a bomb in common with this 
 filet saute?" 
 
 This was a parody on a famous speech of Louis XII., of 
 Sweden, whom a cannon-ball interrupted while he was dic- 
 tating to his secretary. 
 
 " Gentlemen," said Thuillier, rising, " you will excuse me ; 
 if, as Monsieur Barbel thinks, it is all a mistake, it ought to be 
 explained immediately : I shall at once, with your permission, 
 go to the court. La Peyrade," added he, significantly, "you 
 will not refuse, I think, to accompany me. And you, my 
 dear publisher, had better come with_us." 
 
 " My faith, no ! " said Barbel ; " when I breakfast I break- 
 fast ; if the police have blundered, so much the worse for 
 them." 
 
 " But suppose the action is a serious one ? " exclaimed Thu- 
 illier, greatly agitaled. 
 
 " Well, all I should say, which is perfeclly true, that I had 
 not read a single line of your pamphlet. There is only one 
 annoying feature about it those damned juries hate beards, so 
 if I am to appear in court I must cut mine off." 
 
 " Come, my dear amphitryon, sit down again," said the 
 editor-in-chief of the "Echo de la Bievre," "we'll stand by 
 you ; I have already written an article which will stir up all 
 the peat-hawkers, and that is a power, that honorable cor- 
 poration." 
 
 "No, gentlemen," said Thuillier, "no, a man like me 
 cannot rest a single half-hour under such an accusation. Con- 
 tinue without us ; I hope soon to return lo you. La Peyrade, 
 are you coming ?" 
 
 When Thuillier left the office of the court he could no longer 
 indulge illusions-. He was under a most serious charge, and the 
 severe manner in which he had been received made him under-
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 281 
 
 stand that when the trial came on he would be treated without 
 leniency. Then he turned, as is the manner with accomplices 
 when things turn out wrongly, upon la Peyrade in the bitterest 
 vituperations : He had paid no attention to what he was 
 writing ; he had given full rein to his stupid ideas on Saint- 
 Simonism ; he didn't care about the consequences ; he wouldn't 
 have to pay the fine or go to prison ! Then, when la Pey- 
 rade said the case did not seem serious to him, and that he 
 looked for an acquittal, Thuillier burst furiously upon him : 
 
 " Certainly ! all is very simple," replied Thuillier, " mon- 
 sieur sees nothing in it ; all you can see is a chance for a showy 
 defense ; but I shan't put my honor and fortune in the hands 
 of one of your ilk. I shall take some great barrister, if the 
 case comes to trial. I've had about enough of your collabo- 
 ration." 
 
 Under the injustice of these reproaches la Peyrade felt his 
 anger rising. He did not wish to come to an open rupture, 
 so he left him, saying that he forgave him, as he was naturally 
 so excited. He would wait upon him in the evening, when 
 he would probably be calmer. 
 
 Accordingly, about four o'clock, the Provencal called at 
 the house in the Place de la Madeleine. Thuillier was quieter, 
 but consternation, 'frightful despair, had taken its place. As 
 for Brigitte, she had no mercy in her speech ; her bitter, viru- 
 lent abuse was quite out of proportion to the fault. La Pey- 
 rade felt that all was lost for him in the Thuillier household, 
 they seemed to hail with joy the chance for throwing him 
 over. On an ironical illusion by Brigitte to the manner in 
 which he had decorated his friends, he rose and took his leave, 
 without their making an effort to retain him. 
 
 After walking the streets for a little while his indignation 
 calmed down to thoughts of Madame de Godollo. To have 
 paid her another visit immediately would have been anything 
 but skillful, but a sufficient time had now elapsed to prove that 
 he was the master of himself. So he turned his steps back to
 
 282 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 the Boulevard de la Madeleine, and, without asking if the 
 countess was at home, he passed the lodge as if he was return- 
 ing to the Thuilliers, and rung the bell of the entresol. 
 
 As before, he was asked to wait while the maid notified her 
 mistress ; but this time it was in a little library. He waited 
 long and wondered at the meaning of the delay ; but finally 
 the maid reappeared : 
 
 "Madame la Comtesse," said she, "is engaged on a busi- 
 ness matter. Would monsieur be so kind as to wait ? He 
 might amuse himself with some of the books, as she would 
 possibly be detained for some time." 
 
 He did not open any of the rosewood cases, for he saw on 
 a claw- footed table a medley of books. But as he opened 
 the volumes, one after another, he fancied that a Tantalus' 
 feast was before him ; one book was in English, another 
 German, the next Russian, and one he found with crabbed 
 Turkish characters. Was this a polyglot joke that she had 
 arranged for him ? 
 
 One volume at length arrested his attention. The binding, 
 he noticed, unlike those of the other books, was not so rich 
 as pretty. It lay by itself on a corner of the table. It was 
 open, the back upward, and the edges of the leaves rested on 
 the green tablecloth like a tent. La Peyrade took it up, when 
 it proved to be a volume of the illustrated edition of Scribe's 
 works. The engraving displayed was taken from a scene 
 at the Gymnase, entitled " The Hatred of a Woman." 
 Few but know the story and the conclusion of the drama. 
 The principal personage is a young widow who desperately 
 pursues a young man. One speech is: "There are some 
 women who would spit on the dish to cause disgust and pre- 
 vent others eating of it." Hatred pursues the unhappy 
 one everywhere. Her deviltries make him to nearly lose 
 his reputation and do prevent his making a wealthy mar- 
 riage ; but it ends by her giving him more than she had 
 deprived him of, and she makes him her husband.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 283 
 
 If it was chance that had placed this volume in its isolated 
 position, it was opened at the precise spot which seemed 
 pertinent to what had passed between himself and the countess 
 chance is at at times adroit and clever. As he thought over 
 this enigma the sound of an opening door reached his ear, 
 and he detected the rather drawling voice of the countess, 
 who was accompanying some one to the door. 
 
 " I may say then," said the voice of a man, " that you 
 promise the ambassadress that you will honor the ball with 
 your presence this evening? " 
 
 "Yes, commander, if my somewhat mitigated headache 
 will permit." 
 
 " Au revoir, then, my most adorable lady," said the voice 
 of her interlocutor. Then the door closed and silence again 
 reigned. 
 
 The title of commander somewhat reassured la Peyrade, 
 for it is not in common used to young fops. He was curious 
 enough to know whom this person might be that had so 
 long occupied the time of the countess. As he did not 
 hear any one approaching the library he '.Tent softly toward 
 the window and carefully opened the curtain, prepared to 
 drop it immediately if any sound was heard. An elegant 
 coupe, standing in waiting, was drawn up to the door. A 
 footman in dashing livery opened the door, and a little, 
 dandified old man, with a brisk, jaunty movement, stepped 
 into the carriage, being rapidly driven away. La Peyrade 
 had opportunity to notice that his breast was covered with 
 decorations. This, taken in connection with his powdered 
 hair, gave evidence of a diplomatic personage. 
 
 La Peyrade had returned to his book so as to be discovered 
 reading, when the maid appeared and invited him to follow 
 her. He replaced the volume not in the place in which he 
 had found it and an instant later was in the presence of the 
 countess. Beside her on the couch lay a gilt-edged letter in 
 that free, large writing that betrays an official communication.
 
 284 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 In her hand was a crystal bottle with a gold stopper, from 
 which she inhaled the odor of English toilet vinegar, which 
 permeated the room. 
 
 "You are not well, madame?" asked la Peyrade, with 
 anxiety. 
 
 " Oh ! it is nothing," said the foreigner, " but a headache ; 
 I am subject to them. But you, monsieur, where have you 
 been ? I despaired of seeing you again. Have you some 
 important news to make known to me ? The date of your 
 marriage to Mademoiselle Colleville must be sufficiently neai 
 that you may now state it." 
 
 This opening slightly disconcerted la Peyrade. 
 
 "But, madame," he replied almost sharply, "it seems to 
 me that you know everything that transpires in the Thuilliers' 
 household, you must therefore well know that the event o( 
 which you speak is not even a probability." 
 
 " No, I give you my word, I know nothing. I have strictly 
 made up my mind to take no further interest in the affair. 
 Madame Brigitte speaks of everything but Celeste's marriage." 
 
 "Well, madame, your judgment as to my marriage was 
 certainly correct." 
 
 " What ? " said the countess, eagerly. " Has the seizure ot 
 the pamphlet happening after Thuillier's failure to obtain the 
 Cross led to a rupture ? ' ' 
 
 "No," said la Peyrade, "my influence in the Thuilliet 
 establishment rests on a solid foundation. The services 1 
 have rendered mademoiselle and her brother quite outweigh 
 these two checks, which happily are not irreparable." 
 
 " You think so ? " interrupted the countess, incredulously. 
 
 "Certainly," replied la Peyrade. "When Madame du 
 Bruel seriously means to get the red ribbon she can do it in 
 spite of all the obstacles that may be placed in her way." 
 
 The countess received this assurance with a smile, and 
 shook her head. 
 
 "You must surely forget that it is unusual to decorate a
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 285 
 
 man who is under a summons of the court. It betokens a 
 strong feeling against Thuillier, and perhaps against yourself, 
 too ; for you are the real culprit. The law, in this case, does 
 not appear to have acted independently." 
 
 La Peyrade looked at the countess. 
 
 "I must confess," replied he, after that rapid glance, 
 " that I have vainly tried to find a single phrase in the whole 
 work that would give cause for its seizure." 
 
 " But it seems to me that the King's people must have a 
 vivid imagination to find anything seditious in the work," 
 said the countess. "And this proves the strength of the under- 
 ground power which thwarts your every intention in favor of 
 that excellent Monsieur Thuillier." 
 
 " Is it that you know our secret enemies ? " said la Peyrade. 
 
 "Perhaps," said the countess, smiling again. 
 
 "May I dare to venture a suspicion?" asked la Peyrade, 
 considerably agitated. 
 
 " Speak," replied Mme. de Godollo ; " I won't blame you 
 if you guess aright." 
 
 "Well, madame, our enemies, Thuillier's and mine, are 
 a woman." 
 
 "Even so," said the countess. "Know you how many 
 lines of handwriting Richelieu needed before hanging a man ?" 
 
 "Four," answered la Peyrade. 
 
 "You can then satisfy yourself that a pamphlet of two hun- 
 dred pages can easily furnish a well a, say, intriguing woman 
 with ground enough for prosecution." 
 
 "I cease my struggle," said la Peyrade. Then, assuming 
 an air of contrition : 
 
 " My God ! madame," added he, "you must, indeed, hate 
 me." 
 
 "Not to the extent that you imagine," replied the coun- 
 tess ; " but, after all, suppose that I did ? " 
 
 "Ah, madame," said la Peyrade, "I should then be the 
 happiest of unfortunates ; for this hate would be to me a
 
 286 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 thousand times more precious than your indifference. But 
 you hate me not. Why should you show to me that blessed 
 feminine sentiment which is described by Scribe with such 
 intelligence and delicacy?" 
 
 Mme. de Godollo made no immediate reply ; she cast down 
 her eyes and her deep breathing gave a tremulous tone to her 
 voice : 
 
 " The hate of a woman ! " she replied, " can a man of 
 your stoicism be able to perceive it ? " 
 
 " Oh ! yes, madame," answered la Peyrade, " I do perceive 
 it, but not to rebel against it ; on the contrary, I bless the 
 harshness that deigns to injure me. My beautiful enemy now 
 known and confessed, I shall not despair of touching her 
 heart, for I will never again tread a path that is not hers ; 
 never will I march under any banner that she has not made 
 her own. In everything I will be her auxiliary, her slave ; if 
 she repulses me with her darling foot, punishes me with her 
 white hand, I will endure it with pleasure. For all this sub- 
 mission and obedience I will crave but one favor that I may 
 kiss the print of the foot that spurns me, of bathing with tears 
 the hand that is raised to strike me." 
 
 During this long outcry of a transported and distracted 
 heart, which the joy of triumph had wrung from the impres- 
 sible nature of the Provencal, he had glided from his chair, 
 and at the end found himself on one knee before the countess 
 in the conventional attitude of the stage, but which is far 
 more common in real life than most people think. 
 
 "Rise, monsieur," said the countess, "and please answer 
 me." 
 
 Then, giving him a questioning gaze beneath the lovely, 
 frowning eyebrows : 
 
 " Have you carefully weighed," said she, " the meaning of 
 what you have just said ? Have you gauged the pledge, and 
 plumbed its depths? Your hand on your heart and con- 
 science, are you the man to redeem this promise; are you not
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 287 
 
 one of the falsely humble and perfidious men who only affect 
 to embrace our knees to make us the more easily lose our bal- 
 ance, both of will and reason ? " 
 
 " I ! " exclaimed la Peyrade ; " never can a reaction occur 
 against the fascinations which enthralled me at our first inter- 
 view. I have said aloud to-day what my heart has long held ; 
 I have struggled against your allurements ; it has ended in 
 giving me a firm, deliberate will, understanding itself, and 
 refusing to be cast down by your severity." 
 
 "Severity, that is possible," said the countess, "but you 
 ought also to think of the kindness ; we foreign women do 
 not understand the levity with which your Frenchwomen 
 enter upon the most solemn engagement. With us yes is a 
 sacred bond ; our word is our act. We do nothing by halves. 
 Our family arms seem pertinent to the circumstances : ALL OR 
 NOTHING." 
 
 "That is the understanding I have of my pledge," replied 
 the barrister; "my first step on leaving you will be to go and 
 put an end to that ignoble past which I once placed in the 
 balance against my present intoxicating future." 
 
 "No," said the countess, "do it calmly and with due 
 thought. I shouldn't like to see you lose your head and going 
 about smashing window-panes. The Thuilliers are not such 
 bad folk at the bottom ; they humiliated you without knowing 
 it ; their world is not yours. Is that their fault? Untie the 
 knot, don't break it. Your conversion to my belief is of very 
 recent date. What man can be sure what his heart will say 
 to-morrow? " 
 
 " I, madame, am that man. We men of the South do not 
 love in the French fashion." 
 
 "But I thought," said the Hungarian, with a charming 
 smile, "that our discussion was on hatred." 
 
 "Ah ! madame, that word hurts me ; the rather tell me that 
 you love me." 
 
 " My friend," replied the countess, accenting the word,
 
 288 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 " one of our moralists says : ' There are those who say : this is 
 or this is not ; such need take no oath ; ' do me the honor of 
 counting me among such people." As she spoke she held 
 out her hand with a graceful gesture. La Peyrade, quite be- 
 side himself, rapturously kissed it, and they bade each other 
 adieu. 
 
 On the stairs La Peyrade stopped to exhale, one might say, 
 the happiness with which his heart was too full. When oppo- 
 site the Thuillier door he cried : 
 
 "At last I have fame, fortune, happiness; more than all, I 
 can give myself the pleasure of revenge. After Dutocq and 
 C6rizet I will crush you, vile bourgeoise brood?" and he 
 shook his fist at the innocent double-door. 
 
 The next day, the tempest heaving in his breast, la Peyrade 
 went to see Thuillier in the most hostile mood. How amazed 
 he became when, as soon as Thuillier saw him, he threw him- 
 self into his arms. 
 
 "My friend," said the ex-sub-chief, "my political fortune 
 is made, every paper without exception speaks this morning 
 of the pamphlet being seized ; you should see how the Oppo- 
 sition sheets peg into the government." 
 
 "Yes, but you have an enemy who is working against you; 
 the same hand that prevented your getting the Cross is the 
 one that seized your pamphlet ; you are being assassinated by 
 premeditation." 
 
 " Then if this dangerous enemy is known to you, why don't 
 you unmask him to me ? " said Thuillier. 
 
 " I don't know, but I have suspicions," replied la Peyrade ; 
 " this is what you get by playing such a deep game." 
 
 "How! a deep game?" said the simple Thuillier, who 
 well knew he had nothing of the kind with which to reproach 
 himself. 
 
 "Certainly," replied the barrister. "You have used 
 Celeste as a kind of decoy-duck in your salon ; the whole 
 world has not the magnanimity of Monsieur Godeschal, who
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 289 
 
 so generously forgave you and managed that business of the 
 house." 
 
 "Explain yourself/* said Thuillier, "I can't yet compre- 
 hend." 
 
 "Nothing is easier. Without counting me, how many pre- 
 tenders have you had to Celeste's hand ? Godeschal, Minard 
 junior, young Phellion, Olivier Vinet, all men who have been 
 told to walk their chalks like as I have been." 
 
 " Olivier Vinet, the substitute," exclaimed Thuillier, struck 
 with a new light ; " that's the one, of course, that caused this 
 blow. His father, they say, has a very long arm. But it can- 
 not be said that we made him walk his chalk, to use your ex- 
 pression, which seems unseemly to me; for no offer was made 
 by him or Minard or Phellion. Godeschal is the only one 
 who took the risk of a direct refusal, and this was done before 
 he had even dipped his beak in the water." 
 
 "Quite true," said la Peyrade, looking for a new ground 
 of quarrel ; "sly men always brag of having fooled men of 
 their word and decisive people." 
 
 "Now what are you aiming at by those insinuations? 
 Didn't you properly settle everything with Brigitte the other 
 day ? It's a nice time to bother me about your love affairs 
 while the sword of justice hangs over my head." 
 
 " Oh ! that's it," said la Peyrade, ironically ; " I knew how 
 it would be when your pamphlet came out the old cry of 
 not getting out of me all that you expected ! " 
 
 "Well, I did think that our friendship was too true and 
 devoted for you to fling sarcasms at me when I only looked 
 for your services." 
 
 "What services?" asked la Peyrade. " Did you not say 
 yesterday that you would not accept my assistance under any 
 circumstances ? You said when I offered to defend you that 
 you would employ a great barrister." 
 
 " Yes, in the first shock of surprise ; I was foolish, naturally, 
 but after reflection I see that you could better defend me than 
 19
 
 290 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 others, as you know thoroughly what you have written with 
 your own pen. You should forgive that momentary irritation. 
 You are caustic as well as cruel." 
 
 "Well, I refuse to do anything of the kind. Things have 
 changed since yesterday. I see to-day that you had better get 
 some big-wig of the law, because Vinet's antagonism is taking 
 on such proportions that I should be afraid to tackle the re- 
 sponsibilities." 
 
 "I understand," said Thuillier, sarcastically; "monsieur 
 has an eye on the magistracy and does not want to quarrel 
 with one who is slated for keeper of the seals. Quite prudent, 
 quite; still I don't think it will help on your marriage." 
 
 "That is to say," said la Peyrade, catching the ball on its 
 rebound, " that to get you out of the clutches of the jury is 
 the thirteenth labor of Hercules that you would impose upon 
 me to gain the hand of Mademoiselle Colleville. I fully ex- 
 pected that the exigencies would multiply in proportion to 
 my devotion. But just that same thing has worn me out ; 
 to-day I have come to put an end to this exploitation of my- 
 self. You may dispose of Celeste's hand as you are disposed ; 
 so far as I am concerned I am no longer a suitor." 
 
 This abrupt and unexpected declaration left Thuillier speech- 
 less, the more so as that moment Brigitte entered. Her ani- 
 mosity had declined ; she greeted him with amicable famil- 
 iarity : 
 
 " Ah ! there you are," said she to la Peyrade, " good wheat 
 of a barrister ! " 
 
 "Mademoiselle, I salute you," gravely responded the Pro- 
 
 "Well," she went on, not paying any attention to la Pey- 
 rade's ceremonious manner, " the government has done it by 
 seizing your pamphlet. You should just see how the morning 
 papers go for it. Here," she added, passing to Thuillier a 
 small sheet printed on sugar-paper, in coarse type and scarcely 
 legible, " this is one that you've not- yet seen ; this is the journal
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 291 
 
 of our old quarter, the ' Echo de la Bievre.' It's wfote splen- 
 did ; it's queer though how careless these journalists are ; 
 most of them write your name without the h you ought to 
 complain about it." 
 
 Never before had Brigitte troubled about the papers except 
 to see whether they might be of a proper size in which to 
 wrap a package ; but now, under the influence of sisterly 
 affection, she pointed out to Thuillier the especially bright 
 spots. 
 
 "Yes," said Thuillier, refolding the paper, "that's pretty 
 warm, beside being very flattering to me. But there is 
 another very important matter : monsieur, here present, has 
 come to inform me that he is no longer a claimant for 
 Celeste's hand." 
 
 " That is he means," said Brigitte, " that he won't take on 
 the case unless he is married out of hand as soon as it is over. 
 Well, it seems only reasonable, poor man. When he has 
 done that there should not be any further delay ; she must 
 accept him; everything has an end." 
 
 "You hear, my dear sir," said la Peyrade, seizing upon 
 Brigitte's commentary; "when I have pleaded, the wedding 
 comes. Your sister is frankness itself; she is not the least 
 diplomatic." 
 
 "Diplomatic!" exclaimed Brigitte. "I'd like to see 
 myself grubbing under a business ; I say as I think ; the 
 workman has done his work, now he should be paid in full." 
 
 "Be quiet, do," said Thuillier; "I say that la Peyrade 
 returns us our pledges ; he claims that we are asking another 
 service off him for Celeste's hand ; he thinks he has done 
 quite enough as it is." 
 
 "He has done us some service, undoubtedly," replied 
 Brigitte; "we are not ungrateful to him. All the same, it 
 was he that caused you the trouble. It seems only fair that 
 he should get you out of it." 
 
 " There might be some sense of justice in your remarks,"
 
 202 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 answered la Peyrade, " if I were the only barrister in Paris ; 
 but, unhappily, the streets are black over with them. Now, 
 as to the marriage, as I don't intend being made the object 
 of any further brutal bargaining, I am here to renounce it in 
 the most formal manner, and nothing now prevents Celeste 
 accepting Monsieur Phellion with all his numerous advan- 
 tages." 
 
 "At your pleasure, my dear monsieur," replied Brigitte, 
 " if that is your last word. We shall be at no loss in finding 
 a husband for Celeste. But the reason you give is not the 
 real one. We can't dance faster than the fiddlers go, the 
 banns have to be published ; you have sense enough to know 
 that no wedding can take place till all formalities have been 
 complied with, and long before then Thuillier's trial will be 
 over." 
 
 "Yes," said la Peyrade, "and if I lose the case it will ba 
 me who has sent him to prison, the same as yesterday I 
 caused the seizure." 
 
 " Well, it does seem to me that if you hadn't wrote some- 
 thing there would be nothing to bite at by the police." 
 
 "My dear Brigitte," interposed Thuillier, who had noted 
 la Peyrade shrug his shoulders, "it is not la Peyrade's fault if 
 persons high in station are conspiring against us. That little 
 Vinet who came to one of our receptions, you remember him 
 well, his father is furious because we didn't want him for 
 Celeste." 
 
 "Well, what other reason than monsieur's fine eyes had 
 we for refusing?" said Brigitte. "After all, a substitute is 
 a very desirable catch." 
 
 "Undoubtedly," said la Peyrade, nonchalantly; "only 
 you see he didn't bring you a million ! " 
 
 "Ah! " said Brigitte, flaming up, "if you are going to 
 talk again about the house you got us to buy, I don't mind 
 telling you pretty plainly that if you had had the money 
 yourself you wouldn't have told us about it. You would have
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 263 
 
 
 
 tricked the notary for yourself. Beside, we've had to pay a 
 lot more than you said it would cost." 
 
 "Come, now," said Thuillier, "don't speak of trifles." 
 
 " Trifles ! trifles ! " repeated Brigitte. " Did we pay more 
 than we expected, or didn't we ? " 
 
 " My dear Thuillier," said la Peyrade, " discussion is use- 
 less ; my mind is made up ; I shall not be Celeste's husband, 
 but we may be good friends ; ' ' and he rose to leave. 
 
 "One moment, monsieur," said Brigitte, barring his 
 way; "there is one matter yet unsettled, if we are not to 
 have anything conjointly again, perhaps you will be so good as 
 to inform me what became of that ten thousand francs given 
 you by Thuillier to bribe those scoundrels of government 
 officials to get the Cross we never got." 
 
 "Brigitte," cried Thuillier with anguish, "you have the 
 tongue of hell ; you learned that from me once when I was 
 in a bad humor, you promised you would never mention it 
 again." 
 
 "No; but," replied the implacable Brigitte, "when 
 people part they should settle up pay their debts. Ten 
 thousand francs, a real Cross is dear enough at that price ; but 
 for a Cross that has wilted away, monsieur will admit the 
 price is. rather steep." 
 
 "Monsieur," said la Peyrade, ignoring Brigitte, and pale 
 with rage, "I am not prepared to instantly return you the 
 amount which has been so insolently demanded. But should 
 you be pleased to grant me some little delay and accept my 
 note, why " 
 
 "To the devil with a note," said Thuillier, " you owe me 
 nothing ; in fact, by what Cardot said, we are indebted to you ; 
 he said we ought to have given you not less than ten thou- 
 sand francs." 
 
 "Cardot! Cardot!" said Brigitte, "he is very generous 
 with other people's money. We were giving monsieur 
 C6leste, that's better than ten thousand francs."
 
 294 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 
 
 La Peyrade was too fine a comedian to allow such an affair 
 as this pass without changing it to a scenic finale. With tears 
 in his voice, which presently rolled down his cheek : 
 
 "Mademoiselle," said he, "when I had the honor of 
 being received by you, I was poor ; you saw rne accept every 
 indignity with forbearance, for you knew what poverty must 
 undergo. To-day when I release you of anxiety, by giving 
 you the chance of attaining the husband you wish for 
 Celeste for if you were honest you would acknowledge that 
 you had that thought we might still remain friends. Thank 
 heaven, I have in my heart some religious sentiment; the 
 gospel to me is not a dead letter, so, pray understand me, / 
 forgive you. It is not to Thuillier, who would refuse to accept 
 them, that I shall offer the ten thousand francs, which you 
 believe me to have appropriated to my own use, but to you. 
 If at that time you feel how unjust your suspicions were and 
 should scruple to keep the money, you can hand it over to the 
 Bureau of Benevolence " 
 
 " To the Bureau of Benevolence ! " cried Brigitte, interrupt- 
 ing him ; " thanks, not much. What ! for them crowd of 
 junketing do-nothings to have that distributed amongst them ; 
 folk who would eat off the head of the good God ! I've 
 been poor myself, my boy ; I made bags for people to put 
 money in before I'd any of my own ; now that I've got some 
 I mean to keep it ; so, whenever you're ready to cash up, well, 
 I'll receive that ten thousand francs and keep it, too. If you 
 didn't know better than to try and put salt on a cock- 
 sparrow's tail, why so much the worse for you." 
 
 La Peyrade saw that he had missed his aim and had not in 
 the slightest degree impressed Brigitte's granite ; he cast a 
 disdainful look at her and went out majestically. Arriv- 
 ing at his own home the barrister completed his emanci- 
 pation by writing to Mme. Colleville that, the marriage with 
 Celeste being broken off, he thought that propriety required 
 his abstaining from visiting her house for the future.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 295 
 
 The next day Colleville, on the way fo his office, called on 
 la Peyrade and asked what " stupidity " he had written Flavie, 
 whom he had left plunged in the direst despair from it. The 
 barrister with the utmost gravity reproduced a copy for the 
 husband ; it was certainly not a love letter that had been sent 
 to his wife. 
 
 "And so that is what you call being a friend?" said 
 Colleville, who for a long time had familiarly thoud the 
 Provencal. "You don't marry us but is that any reason 
 for breaking with the girl's parents? It is as though we were 
 responsible for Thuillier's and your quarrel. Is this the 
 regard that you profess for us ? My wife, has she not always 
 treated you kindly?" 
 
 " I have never been received but with the utmost kindness 
 and the greatest consideration by Madame Colleville," replied 
 la Peyrade. 
 
 "And so for this you would let her die of grief? Never 
 since yesterday has she laid down her handkerchief; I tell 
 you she will be really ill." 
 
 "Well, I must frankly tell you," said la Peyrade, "that 
 my visits have excited comment ; it is my plain duty to put 
 a stop to this calumny." 
 
 "What ! " exclaimed the husband, "a man of your intel- 
 ligence taking notice of such puerile twaddle. Why she has 
 been talked about for five and twenty years has my wife, and 
 only because she happens to be better looking than a Madame 
 Thuillier or Brigitte. I must be a greater scoundrel than you, 
 for this tittle-tattle has not caused a quarter of an hour's un- 
 easiness in our household." 
 
 " I admire your strength of mind, but it is rash to go 
 against public opinion." 
 
 "What next! " said Colleville; "I trample it underfoot, 
 this public opinion, the prostitute ! It is Minard who has 
 done this gossiping, all because his fat cook of a wife has 
 never attracted the attention of any decent man. He had
 
 296 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 better look after his son, who is ruining himself with an elderly 
 actress at the Bobino." 
 
 "Well, my dear friend," said la Peyrade, "try and bring 
 back Flavie to her senses." 
 
 "To the good speech," said Colleville, vigorously shaking 
 the hand of the barrister ; " you call her Flavie as of old ; I 
 have recovered my friend." 
 
 "Certainly," replied la Peyrade, serenely, "friends are 
 always friends." 
 
 "Yes, friends are friends," repeated Colleville; "friend- 
 ship is a present from the gods, and consoles us for all the 
 crosses of life. I understand, then, that you will call upon 
 my wife and replace our household's sorrow with joy and 
 serenity." 
 
 La Peyrade made a vague promise and wondered whether 
 the husband a type more plentiful than supposed was an 
 actor or genuine. 
 
 At the time when la Peyrade was about laying the freedom 
 he had recovered at the feet of the countess, he received a per- 
 fumed note on which he recognized the famous seal : ALL OR 
 NOTHING, which was to govern the relations between them. 
 
 " Dear Monsieur," said Mme. de Godollo, " I have heard of 
 your determination, thanks ! But now I must arrange to take 
 my own ; -I cannot, you must see, continue to reside in a 
 sphere so far from that of ours, one, too, in which we have 
 nothing in common. To make this arrangement so as to 
 avoid explanations for the reason why the entresol welcomes 
 the voluntary exile from the first floor, I shall need to-day and 
 to-morrow for myself. Therefore, do not call to see me until 
 the following day. By that time I shall have executed Bri- 
 gitte, as they say on the Bourse, and have much to tell you. 
 
 "Tua Tota, 
 " Comtesse de Godollo."
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 297 
 
 That "wholly thine " in Latin seemed charming to la Pey- 
 rade; it did not astonish him, for he knew that the Latin 
 tongue with the Hungarians was almost a second national 
 language. 
 
 In the interval of waiting he was agitated with an ardent 
 passion, which was but increased by his enforced absence. He 
 ran lightly up the stairs and put out his hand to ring the bell, 
 but the silken cord was missing ; he thought that illness might 
 have caused this, so that all noise should be silenced ; but then 
 he noticed that the soft carpet on the landing had been re- 
 moved and the portieres taken down. He had to resign him- 
 self to take the same means employed when'visiting a milliner's 
 apprentice to make known his presence he rapped with his 
 knuckles. The hollow sound revealed the void within ; it was 
 intonuere caverna. Convinced at length of a total removal, 
 he thought it had most probably been caused by some insolence 
 of the old maid. But what an idea to place him in the ridic- 
 ulous position called by the vulgar by the picturesque appella- 
 tion of "meeting the wooden face." Being determined to 
 fully satisfy himself, before going, he made a furious assault 
 upon the door. 
 
 " Whose that hammering at the door as if he wanted to pull 
 down the house?" shouted the janitor up the stairway. 
 
 "Madame de Godollo does she not still reside here?" 
 asked la Peyrade. 
 
 " Certainly she doesn't live here now since she's left. Had 
 monsieur told me he was seeking her, I would have spared 
 him the trouble of battering down the door." 
 
 " I knew she was about leaving this suite," said la Peyrade, 
 "but was ignorant that she had already done so." 
 
 "I think it must have been done in a hurry," said the 
 janitor, " since she went off early this morning with post- 
 horses." 
 
 " Post-horses ! " repeated la Peyrade, stupefied; "then has 
 she quit Paris? "
 
 298 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "Well, people don't usually go post from one quarter of 
 Paris to another," said the porter. 
 
 " Did she say where she was going ? " 
 
 "What a funny idea, monsieur; do such folk give any ac- 
 count of themselves to the like of us?" 
 
 " Did she leave no messages? " 
 
 " Nothing, monsieur; except that any letters which might 
 arrive would be called for by the little commander." 
 
 La Peyrade went away with despair in his heart. After some 
 reflection he muttered to himself: 
 
 " These female diplomats are often charged with important 
 secret missions, where discretion is a necessity and the utmost 
 rapidity of motion required." 
 
 Here a sudden revulsion of feeling came over him : 
 
 "But suppose she is but an adventuress, one of those em- 
 ployed by foreign governments as secret agents? Suppose 
 that the story of the Russian princess, more or less likely, 
 being obliged to sell her furniture to Brigitte is also that of 
 this Hungarian lady? But yet," added he, as his brain made 
 a third revolution, "her education, manners, speech, every- 
 thing, proclaim her a woman of the highest position ; then, 
 beside, if she were but a bird of passage, why try to win me 
 over?" 
 
 La Peyrade might have continued his pleading, for and 
 against, for a much longer time, if he had not felt himself 
 suddenly seized by the shoulders by a strong arm, while a 
 voice he well knew cried : 
 
 " My dear barrister, lookout ! a frightful danger menaces 
 you ; you are running into it headlong." 
 
 La Peyrade turned round to find himself in Phellion's arms. 
 A house was being torn down and Phellion, with his spoken- 
 of fondness for the like, stood, watch in hand, looking at the 
 workmen and calculating how long a time would elapse before 
 a great wall would topple over. 
 
 "You there, are you deaf and blind?" ran the speech
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 299 
 
 of the man employed to warn the passers-by, in a tone that 
 may be imagined. 
 
 " Thanks, my dear monsieur," said la Peyrade, " I should 
 have been erased like an idiot only for you." And he pressed 
 Phellion's hand. 
 
 " My reward," replied he, " is in the satisfaction of know- 
 ing that you are saved from imminent danger. I may add 
 that the gratification is increased by a certain pride, for I 
 was not mistaken to a moment in the time I had reckoned upon 
 for the instant when the centre of gravity of that formidable 
 mass would be displaced. But of what were you thinking ? 
 Perhaps of the plea you would make in the Thuillier case. 
 You have a noble cause to defend, monsieur. Between you 
 and I," added the great citizen in a low voice, " I think it a 
 mean action on the part of the government." 
 
 " I am of the same opinion," said la Peyrade, " but I am 
 not charged with the defense." 
 
 " Poor man," said Phellion ; " I called to see him when 
 the blow fell. (I am on my way to see him now.) I saw 
 only Brigitte, who was conversing with Madame de Godollo ; 
 that is a woman who possesses strong political views. It 
 appears that she predicted that the seizure would occur." 
 
 " Did you know that the countess had left Paris ? " said la 
 Peyrade. 
 
 "Ah! she has gone," said Phellion. "Well, monsieur, I 
 must tell you that though there was little sympathy between 
 you and her, yet I look upon her departure as a misfortune ; 
 she leaves a serious void in the salon of our friends ; I say 
 this because I think it, I am not used to at all disguise my feel- 
 ings." 
 
 "Yes," said la Peyrade, "she is a most distinguished 
 woman ; I think, in spite of her predilections against me, that 
 we should have come eventually to some kind of an under- 
 standing of each other; but this morning she hastily left by 
 post."
 
 300 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "Postl" exclaimed Phellion. "I don't know whether 
 monsieur agrees with me, but I think traveling post is most 
 agreeable. It is certain that Louis XL, to whom we owe this 
 institution, had a very happy thought ; although in other 
 matters his sanguinary and despotic rule was not, to my way 
 of thinking, quite devoid of reproach. Only once in my life 
 have I so traveled, but I may truly say that I found it far 
 superior, in spite of the relative increase of speed, to the mad 
 rush of the iron roads or ' railways,' as the English call them, 
 and where speed is acquired at the cost of safety and the 
 taxpayer. ' ' 
 
 La Peyrade paid but small attention to Phellion's phrase- 
 ology. "Whither has she gone?" This was the one ques- 
 tion round which all his thoughts hovered. But the great 
 citizen continued : 
 
 " It was at the time of Madame Phellion's last confinement. 
 She was at Perche with her mother, when I learned that serious 
 complications had ensued, together with milk-fever. A wound 
 in the pocket is never fatal, as they say, so, overwhelmed with 
 terror at the danger threatening my wife, I at once proceeded 
 to the coach-office to obtain a seat in the coach ; all were 
 taken, and had been for a week in advance. My mind was at 
 once made up. I went to the Rue Pigalle, and, by paying 
 gold down on the spot, I obtained a chaise and two horses; 
 but unfortunately I had neglected the formality of a passport, 
 without which, by the decrees of the consulate 01 17 Nivose 
 of the year XII., they are not allowed to deliver horses to a 
 traveler " 
 
 The last words were a flash of light to la Peyrade ; without 
 the finish of the posting Odyssey, he started off at once to the 
 Rue Pigalle. Arrived at the establishment of the royal post, 
 la Peyrade wondered of whom he might best inquire. He 
 explained to the porter that he wished to send a letter to a 
 lady of his acquaintance ; that this lady had neglected to 
 leave her address, and he thought he might possibly learn it
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 301 
 
 by means of the passport which must have been presented in 
 order to obtain horses. 
 
 " This lady traveler, had she a maid with her ? This one 
 I picked up near the Madeleine," said a postillion who sat in 
 a corner of the room. 
 
 " Exactly," said la Peyrade, advancing eagerly to the man 
 of providence, and slipping a crown of a hundred sous into 
 his hand. 
 
 "She's a rum sort of a traveler," said the post-boy; "she 
 told me to take her to the Bois du Boulogne, there she made 
 me drive around for an hour ; then we came back to the bar- 
 rier de 1'Etoile, where she gave me a good tip and got into 
 a hack, telling me to take the chaise to the man she had hired 
 it from on the Cour des Coches, Faubourg St. Honored" 
 
 "The name of the man? " demanded la Peyrade. 
 
 "Sieur Simonin," replied the postillion. 
 
 Armed with this information, la Peyrade took his course, 
 and in a quarter of an hour was questioning the livery-stable 
 keeper; that individual could only say that the chaise had 
 been hired for half a day without horses, and that it had been 
 returned at noon by a postillion of the royal post. 
 
 "Never mind," said la Peyrade, "I am certain that she 
 has not left Paris, and is not avoiding me ; most likely she 
 uses this pretended journey to utterly break with the Thuil- 
 liers. Fool that I am, a letter assuredly awaits me at my 
 home to inform me of all." 
 
 Worn out with hunger and fatigue, he took a hack to his 
 home, but there he had to wait for the porter, Coffinet, who 
 since Brigitte's departure had been remiss in his duties. La 
 Peyrade had rushed at once to the lodge, but the porter and 
 his wife were both absent, she about the house, he in a wine- 
 shop, where between two drinks he defended the right of people 
 to own property, as against the opinion held by a republican 
 who was speaking disrespectfully the other way. 
 
 It was over twenty minutes before this worthy janitor re-
 
 302 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 membered that he had certain "property" confided to him 
 and returned to his functions. One can figure to himself the 
 deluge of reproaches with which la Peyrade saluted him. He 
 made some kind of an excuse, and handed a letter to him which 
 bore the Paris postmark. Rather with his heart than his eyes 
 the Provencal recognized the writing ; the arms and the motto, 
 when he turned the missive over, confirmed the hope and put 
 an end to the crudest emotion he had ever experienced. 
 
 To read this letter before the janitor were profanation ; by 
 a delicacy of feeling which all lovers will understand, he did 
 himself the pleasure of deferring his happiness ; he would not 
 even break the seal of that so precious missive until, safe be- 
 hind his own closed door, he could revel to his heart's con- 
 tent in the ravishments it promised. 
 
 Flying up the stair, two steps at a time, the amorous Pro- 
 vencal had the childishness to turn the key in the door ; then, 
 installed before his desk, he, with pious dexterity, broke the 
 seal ; it seemed as if his heart would break his ribs. 
 
 "Dear monsieur," was written, "I disappear forever, for 
 my role is played out. I give you my thanks for having ren- 
 dered it pleasant and easy. By embroiling you with the 
 Thuilliers and Collevilles, who are now fully informed as to 
 your sentiments about them, and having taken great care to 
 expatiate to extravagant lengths, in a manner most mortifying 
 to their bourgeois self-conceit, on the real cause of your sud- 
 den and ruthless rupture with them, I am most happy to say 
 that I have rendered a most signal service to you. The girl 
 does not love you, and you only love the beautiful eyes of her 
 dot. So I have saved the pair of you from a hell. In ex- 
 change for the one to whom you aspired, another is destined 
 for you ; she is richer, more beautiful than Mile. Colleville, 
 and, speaking for myself, in conclusion, much freer than 
 " Your very unworthy servant, 
 
 " Wife TORNA, COMTESSE DE GODOLLO.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 303 
 
 " P. S. For further information, apply without delay to M. 
 du Portail, gentleman, Rue Honors-Chevalier, near the Rue 
 Cassette, quarter of Saint-Sulpice, who is expecting you." 
 
 When he had finished this screed, the advocate of the poor 
 put his head in his hands ; he saw nothing, heard nothing, 
 thought nothing ; he was annihilated. 
 
 Several days were necessary to la Peyrade before he could 
 recover the shock. The blow, in fact, was a terrible one; 
 coming out of that golden dream in which he had seen a 
 perspective of the future in such a radiant atmosphere, he 
 found himself the victim of a hoax which wounded him most 
 severely in his self-conceit and all his pretensions to cunning 
 and cleverness ; broken with the Thuilliers irrevocably ; loaded 
 with a debt of twenty-five thousand francs, of course not^.im- 
 mediately due ; and also engaged by his dignity to pay Brigitte 
 another ten thousand francs ; to complete all, he felt that he 
 was not radically cured of his passionate feelings for the femi- 
 nine author of this great disaster and the instrument of his 
 ruin. We might go further and say that he never ceased to 
 long for her. That desire to find her he dubbed curiosity, 
 ardor for vengeance, and, as a consequence, he evolved the 
 ingenious deductions : 
 
 " Cerizet spoke to me of a rich heiress ; the countess in her 
 letter intimates that the whole intrigue in which she entangled 
 me was to lead to a wealthy marriage ; rich marriages are not 
 so plentifully thrown at a man's head that two such should 
 come my way in a few weeks; therefore, the match offered 
 me by Cerizet and that proposed by the countess must be the 
 same crazy girl they are so strangely bent on making me 
 marry ; therefore, Cerizet, being in the plot, must know the 
 countess; therefore, I shall get upon the Hungarian's track 
 through him. In any case I shall get some information about 
 this strange choice that has befallen me ; evidently these peo- 
 ple, whoever they may be, who can use such well-dressed pup-
 
 304 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 pets, must occupy positions of considerable importance. I'll 
 go, therefore, and see Cerizet." 
 
 And he went to see Cerizet. 
 
 Since the dinner at the Rocher de Cancale, the two old 
 cronies had not met. Once or twice, at the Thuilliers, la 
 Peyrade had asked Dutocq, who now seldom went there on 
 account of its distance, what had become of his copying- 
 clerk. 
 
 " He never mentions you," was the answer. 
 
 It might well be supposed, therefore, that resentment reigned 
 in the breast of the vindictive usurer, the manet alta mente re- 
 postum. Such a consideration as this could not detain la 
 Peyrade. He was not about to ask for anything ; he was 
 using the pretext of renewing the affair about which Cerizet 
 had spoken ; Cerizet never had any part in things that were 
 not of material interest to himself; the chances were then 
 that he would be received with enthusiasm. He called upon 
 him at the justice of the peace office ; he did not pause in the 
 waiting-room but pushed through to the office adjoining that 
 of Dutocq. There he found Ce"rizet seated at a blackened 
 wooden desk, at which another clerk, then absent, occupied 
 the opposite place. 
 
 Seeing the entrance of the barrister, Cerizet cast a savage 
 look at him, without moving or ceasing from his work of copy- 
 ing a judgment. 
 
 "Halloo!" said he, "you, Sieur la Peyrade. Well, you 
 made a pretty mess for your friend Thuillier with your pam- 
 phlet ! " 
 
 "How are you?" asked la Peyrade, in a tone at once 
 resolute and amicable. - 
 
 "I," replied Cerizet, "as you see, am still rowing my gal- 
 ley ; and, to follow out the nautical metaphor, may I ask what 
 wind has blown you here ; perhaps it chances to be the wind 
 of adversity?" 
 
 La Peyrade did not answer this, but took a chair which he
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 906 
 
 placed alongside his questioner, after which he gravely 
 said : 
 
 " My dear, we must have a few words with each other." 
 
 "It appears," said the venomous C6rizet, " the Thuilliers 
 have become furiously chilly since the pamphlet was seized." 
 
 "They are ungrateful people; I have broken with them," 
 said la Peyrade. 
 
 "Rupture or dismissal," replied Ce>izet, "their door is 
 none the less closed against you ; from what Dutocq tells me, 
 Brigette doesn't spare you. You see, my friend, what comes 
 of trying to run things alone ; there is no one to help smooth 
 off the angles. If you had got the lease for me, I should have 
 been introduced to the Thuilliers; Dutocq would not have 
 deserted you, and we should have steered you safely into 
 port." 
 
 "And if I don't want to arrive into port? " replied la Pey- 
 rade. "I tell you I've done with the Thuilliers; it was I 
 broke with them first ; I told them to keep out of my sun- 
 shine ; and if Dutocq told you anything different, you may 
 tell him from me that he lies : is that straight enough ? It 
 seems to me that I speak plainly." 
 
 " Oh, just so, my dear, if you are so mad at all these Thuil- 
 lierieses, why that was the reason you should have planted me 
 among them, then you would have seen me revenge you and 
 show 'em up." 
 
 "You have reason on your side," said la Peyrade; "I 
 should have been glad to sicke you at their legs ; but I had 
 nothing to do with the matter of the lease." 
 
 "Doubtless," said C^rizet, "it was your conscience that 
 caused you to tell Brigette that the twelve thousand francs 
 were as good in her pocket as in mine." 
 
 " It seems that Dutocq," said the barrister, "still continues 
 on his honorable course of spy, which he practiced in the 
 Bureau of Finance. Like others who follow that dirty pro- 
 fession, he makes his reports more amusing than truthful." 
 20
 
 806 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 " Be careful," said C6rizet, " you are speaking of my patron 
 in his own lair." 
 
 " Some time ago you spoke to me of a girl whom I could 
 marry rich, matured, and suffering the least in the world 
 with hysteria, as you euphemistically phrased it." 
 
 "So, there! I've been waiting for this," exclaimed the 
 usurer; "but you've been full slow in getting here." 
 
 " In offering me this heiress, what had you in your mind ? " 
 
 " Parbleu / to assist you in making a good strike ; you only 
 had to stoop to conquer. I was charged to make a formal 
 proposal to you; and, as there wasn't any brokerage in it for 
 me, I relied wholly on your generosity," said Cerizet. 
 
 "You are not the only one that made me that offer; a 
 woman made the same, eh ? " 
 
 "A woman?" replied Cerizet, in so natural a tone, cer- 
 tainly of surprise. "Not that I'm aware of." 
 
 " Yes, a foreigner, young and handsome, whom you must 
 have met in the family of the future bride, and who seems to 
 be entirely devoted to them." 
 
 "Never," said Cerizet, "has there been the trace of a 
 woman in the negotiations ; I have every reason to think that 
 I alone had the charge of it." 
 
 "What," said la Peyrade, fixing Cerizet with his eye; "do 
 you mean to tell me that you never heard of the Comtesse 
 Torna de Godollo?" 
 
 " Never in all the days of my life ; it's the first time I ever 
 heard the name pronounced." 
 
 "Then it must have been another match," said la Peyrade; 
 " this was a young person much richer than Mademoiselle 
 Colleville." 
 
 "And matured? And hysterical ?" asked Cerizet. 
 
 "No; the proposal was not embellished with those acces- 
 sories ; there is one other detail may give you the clue ; Ma- 
 dame de Godollo desired me, if I wished more information 
 to see a Monsieur du Portail, gentleman."
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES, 807 
 
 "Rue Honor6- Chevalier ?" said Cirizet, quickly. 
 
 "Exactly." 
 
 " Then it is the same marriage offered from two different 
 sides ; the only strange thing about it is that I should not 
 have been informed of my collaborator." 
 
 At this moment the door of the office was cautiously opened ; 
 a woman's head was seen and a voice, immediately recognized 
 by la Peyrade, said, addressing the clerk : 
 
 " Ah ! your pardon ; monsieur is busy. May I be allowed 
 to say a word to you when you are alone ? " 
 
 Cdrizet, whose eye was as quick as his pen, noticed this: 
 La Peyrade sat so that the visitor could not see him, but he 
 no sooner heard the honeyed drawl than he hurriedly turned 
 his head to hide his features. Instead, then, of dismissing 
 her roughly, the usual treatment accorded intruders by this 
 least pleasant of copying-clerks : 
 
 " Come in, come in, Madame Lambert," the modest visitor 
 heard. "You would have to wait so long a time." 
 
 "Ah ! Monsieur the Advocate of the Poor," cried his 
 creditor. "How pleased I am to meet monsieur. I have 
 been several times to your house to see if you had attended to 
 my little matter." 
 
 " Truly," said la Peyrade, " for some time I have had many 
 occupations that have kept me from my office ; but all is in 
 order and the petition, properly prepared, has been sent to 
 the secretary." 
 
 "How good monsieur is," said the pious woman, clasping 
 her hands. 
 
 "Ttens/ you and Madame Lambert have business to- 
 gether ! " said Cerizet; "you never told me that. Are you 
 old Picot's counsel ? " 
 
 " Unfortunately, no," said the devotet ; " my master won't 
 take advice from any one; he is such a stupid, willful man. 
 But, my worthy sir, is it true that another family council is to 
 meet?"
 
 808 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "Certainly," replied C6rizet, "and not later than to- 
 morrow." 
 
 "But why is this, monsieur, when the judges of the court 
 have decided that the family have no rights ? " 
 
 "Well, yes," answered the copying-clerk, "the judge of 
 the lower court, followed by that of the court of appeals, re- 
 jected the application of the relations, the same as their appli- 
 cation for a commission in lunacy. But now they are taking 
 it up from another point of view and wish to have a trustee 
 for the estate appointed. It strikes me, my dear Madame 
 Lambert, that old Picot will be leashed up. There are some 
 very grave allegations advanced ; to pinch a little is all right, 
 but to grab the lot is a bit too much." 
 
 "Does monsieur believe? " said the pious woman, 
 
 raising her hands and lifting her shoulders. 
 
 "Ill believe nothing," said CSrizet ; "I'm not the judge 
 in the case. But the relatives say that you have made away 
 with considerable sums of money, beside making investments 
 into which they mean to inquire." 
 
 " My God ! " said she, " they can look ; I have not a bond, 
 a share, or a note, not the least thing of value in my pos- 
 session." 
 
 "Ah ! " said Cerizet, with a sidelong glance at la Peyrade, 
 
 " you have obliging friends who hold well, it has nothing 
 
 to do with me; each must manage for himself; what was it 
 that you particularly wished to see me about ? " 
 
 " I wished for you to speak for us to the justice of the 
 peace ; the vicar of St. Jacques will give us a good recom- 
 mendation. It is hard that the poor man," she added, weep- 
 ing, " should be tormented so. They will be the death of 
 him." 
 
 " Well, as I told you before, the judge is against you. It's 
 my opinion that you make yourself out to be much poorer 
 than you are ; if my friend, la Peyrade, was not bound by 
 the obligations of his profession "
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 309 
 
 " I," interrupted la Peyrade, quickly, " I know nothing of 
 madame's business. She called on me to draw up a memo- 
 rial for her that has nothing in common with justice or 
 finance." 
 
 "Ah! that's so," said C6rizet, "she came about the peti- 
 tion on the day when Dutocq met her the day, you know, 
 before the famous dinner at the Rocher de Cancale, when you 
 played the Roman." 
 
 Then, as if he attached no significance to this reminiscence : 
 "Well, my worthy Madame Lambert," said he, "I'll get 
 my patron to speak to the justice, but I give you warning that 
 he is not on your side." 
 
 Mme. Lambert made her exit with numerous curtseys and 
 protestations of gratitude. 
 
 "Well," said la Peyrade, when they were alone, "what 
 about this du Portail?" 
 
 " Just this : he is a little old man as clear as amber," re- 
 plied Cerizet, " and who, it seems to me, has the devil's own 
 credit. Go and see him. It costs nothing, as they say." 
 
 As he finished speaking Dutocq came in, accompanied by 
 his assistant clerk. 
 
 "Halloo!" said he, seeing la Peyrade and Cerizet to- 
 gether, "see the reconstituted trinity; but the object of the 
 alliance, the casus fcederts, is gone down the stream. What 
 have you done, my dear la Peyrade, to that good Brigitte? 
 She hates you with a mortal hatred." 
 " And Thuillier ? " asked the barrister. 
 It was the scene in Moliere upside down ; Tartuffe asking 
 for news of Orgon. 
 
 " Thuillier in the beginning was not so hostile ; but it 
 appears that the business of the seizure is not so bad after all. 
 As he needs you less he swims the more in the wake of his 
 sister. If it is decided that there is no case against him, you 
 will be only fit for hanging, in his opinion." 
 
 " I am well out of that mess," said la Peyrade, " and when
 
 810 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 I get caught again in such another festival Farewell, 
 
 my dears," he added. 
 
 When la Peyrade got into the courtyard, he was accosted 
 by Mme. Lambert, who was awaiting him. 
 
 " Monsieur," said she, with unction, " I hope you do not 
 doubt that I came by my money from my uncle in England ; 
 and that monsieur does not believe the horrible things 
 Monsieur C6rizet said before you?" 
 
 "That's all very well," said la Peyrade, "but you must 
 understand that, with all the yarns circulated by your master's 
 relatives, there is little chance of your getting the prize for 
 virtue." 
 
 " If it be the will of God that I should not obtain it " 
 
 "You must see, too, how important it is to keep your secret 
 to yourself as to the service I rendered you. On the first in- 
 discretion the cash will be returned." 
 
 "Oh ! monsieur may rest easy about that." 
 "Well, then, farewell, my dear," said la Peyrade, in a 
 patronizing voice. 
 
 Brigitte had so strong an instinct of despotism that it was 
 not only without regret but with secret joy that she saw the 
 disappearance of Mme. de Godollo. That woman was in a 
 crushing manner her superior ; this added much to the good 
 ordering of the house, but made her feel ill at ease. Bri- 
 gitte felt when she had gone like those kings who for a long 
 time had been dominated by capable ministers, and who re- 
 joice when death steps in to remove the tyrant whose services 
 and rival influences he has had to endure. 
 
 Thuillier felt much the same about it ; but la Peyrade was a 
 different thing, he felt the lack of his assistance. The coun- 
 cilor was called upon to draw up an official report. After 
 having written such a pamphlet, it was impossible he should 
 decline the task. But it was in vain that he shut himself up 
 in his study, gorged himself with black coffee, mended his 
 pens times without number, to write: "A Report to the Gen-
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 311 
 
 tlemen, the Members of the Municipal Council of the City of 
 Paris," time after time. Then, after starting off on another 
 sheet: "Gentlemen," he would rush madly from the room, 
 complaining of the terrible racket which had stopped his 
 ideas, when some one had opened a closet door or moved a 
 chair. This did not advance the business, nor even begin it. 
 
 But here Rabourdin came to the rescue. He wished some 
 little alterations in his rooms. This Thuillier willingly al- 
 lowed, and spoke to him of the difficulty of his task. Ra- 
 bourdin, with his constant practice in official matters, gave an 
 explanation, but when he had concluded he perceived plainly 
 that Thuillier did not understand. He then informed him 
 that he had an old report on a similar subject, and lent him 
 the manuscript, from which he extracted more than enough 
 for a capable, if inept, report. This report when read at the 
 council was a great success, and Thuillier came home beaming 
 with the compliments lavished upon him. Up to his death 
 he spoke of " that report I had the honor of laying before the 
 Municipal Council of the Seine." La Peyrade had sunk in 
 his estimation he could do without him. 
 
 A parliamentary crisis was impending ; advantage was taken 
 of this by the ministry to relax the stringent laws against the 
 press and to extend clemency to political suspects, with the 
 idea of disarming opposition. Thuillier was included in this 
 hypocritical amnesty. 
 
 Then Dutocq's prophesy was realized. With this load 
 taken off his back, Thuillier insolently swaggered over the 
 dismissal of the case, and, with Brigitte chanting in chorus, 
 spoke of la Peyrade as a sneak whom he had fed, who owed 
 him considerable sums, and who had behaved with the worst 
 ingratitude. Orgon was in full revolt, and, like Dorine, was 
 re^dy to cry : 
 
 "A pauper who came without wearing shoes, 
 In old, draggled clothes that no beggar would choose."
 
 312 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 Dutocq faithfully reported all this to Cdrizet, but he had 
 no opportunity of retailing them to la Peyrade, for they had 
 not met since the interview in the justice's office. La Pey- 
 rade found it out himself. It happened in this wise : 
 
 Constantly pursued by thoughts of the handsome Hunga- 
 rian and not waiting to know what Cerizet could learn, he 
 scoured Paris in every direction. He might have been taken 
 for the most indifferent of strollers. He was to be seen in 
 the most crowded places; his heart ever telling him that 
 sooner or later he would encounter the object of his ardent 
 search. 
 
 One evening, it was about the middle of October, the 
 fall, as often happens in Paris, was magnificent, and out- 
 doors was as bustling as at midsummer. On the Boulevard 
 des Italiens, once known as the Boulevard de Gaud, as he 
 wandered past the long line of chairs in front of the Cafe de 
 Paris, where, in the midst of some women of the Chause d' 
 Antin, accompanied by their husbands and children, may be 
 seen in the evening an espalier of beautiful night flowers 
 waiting only the gloved hand to pluck them, la Peyrade was 
 struck to the heart ; in the distance he fancied he saw his 
 adored countess. 
 
 She was alone, in a splendid toilette which seemed rather 
 out of place, taken in connection with her isolation ; before 
 her, mounted on a chair, trembled a white lap-dog which she 
 caressed with her hands. After assuring himself that he was 
 not mistaken la Peyrade was about to dart upon that so celes- 
 tial vision, when he was forestalled by a lion of the most dis- 
 tinguished type; without throwing aside his cigar, without 
 even putting his hand to his hat, this handsome young man 
 entered into conversation with his ideal. When she saw the 
 Provencal, pale and disposed to address her, the siren doubt- 
 less became alarmed, for she rose and took the arm of the 
 man who was talking to her. 
 
 " Is your carriage here, Emile?" said she. "This is the
 
 
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 313 
 
 evening for the closing of the Mabile. I should like to 
 
 go." ' 
 
 As thrown in the teeth of the unhappy barrister, the name 
 of this disreputable place instead of causing a wound was a 
 real charity, for it saved him from a silly action, that of 
 addressing on the arm of her cavalier the unworthy creature 
 of whom a few moments earlier he had thought of with a 
 treasure of tenderness. 
 
 " She is not worthy an insult," he said to himself. 
 
 But as lovers are a people not easily driven to raise a siege 
 when they have begun it, the Provenal was not as yet con- 
 vinced that he had got to the bottom of the affair. Not far 
 away sat another woman near the place whence the Hunga- 
 rian had gone ; but this one, ripe in years, feathers on her 
 bonnet, showed beneath the folds of a colored shawl the sad 
 relics of departed splendor. Her aspect was not imposing ; 
 it was the contrary. La Peyrade seated himself near and 
 addressed her: 
 
 "Do you know, madame," he asked, without ceremony, 
 " who the woman is that went away leaning on the arm of a 
 gentleman?" 
 
 " Certainly, monsieur, I know all the ladies who come 
 here." 
 
 "And her name is?" 
 
 "Madame Komorn." 
 
 " Is she as impregnable as the fortress by that name? " 
 
 " Is it that monsieur has an idea of making her acquaint- 
 ance?" 
 
 " I don't know," said the Provencal, "but she is a woman 
 who makes people think of her." 
 
 "And who is a very dangerous woman, monsieur," replied 
 the matron, " a dreadful spendthrift, but one who makes little 
 return in favors for what may be done for her. I am able to 
 speak as to that ; when she arrived here from Berlin, six 
 months ago, she was warmly introduced to me."
 
 314 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 " Ah ! " exclaimed la Peyrade. 
 
 " Yes, at that time, in the neighborhood of the Ville 
 d'Avray a pretty little place with a park, covert, and fish- 
 lakes an( j being dull there and all alone, and had not the 
 fortune necessary to lead the life of a castle, a number of 
 gentlemen and ladies suggested that I should organize parties 
 on the line of picnics. ' Madame Louchard,' says they " 
 
 "Madame Louchard ! " repeated la Peyrade. "Are you 
 then any relation to Monsieur Louchard of the commercial 
 police ? ' ' 
 
 " His wife, monsieur, but with a legal separation. He's a 
 terror of a man who wants me to go back to him ; but I, 
 though willing to forgive most things, I can't stand a lack of 
 respect. Why, one day he raised his hand to strike me " 
 
 "In fact," said la Peyrade, interrupting her to call up 
 the subject again, " you arranged these picnics and Madame 
 de Godo I mean Madame Komorn ?" 
 
 " Was one of the first in my home. She there picked up 
 with an Italian, a fine man, rich, and a political refugee, but 
 high and mighty. You can quite understand that it did not 
 suit my purpose that intrigues should be carried on in my 
 house ; still the man was so much in love, and so unhappy 
 because he couldn't get Madame Komorn to care for him, 
 that it ended in my being interested in his love affairs. It 
 brought lots of grist to madame's mill, for she managed to get 
 heaps of money out of that Italian. Well, would you credit 
 it? being just then in need of a little help, when I asked her 
 to advance me a little cash, she absolutely refused and left my 
 house, taking her lover along with her. He can't be very- 
 thankful for the connection though, poor man." 
 
 "Why, what came of him?" asked la Peyrade. 
 
 " Why it happened that this serpent knew every European 
 language she is smart to her finger ends, but more intriguing 
 than smart so being, as it seemed, employed by the police in 
 some capacity, she turned over to the government a lot of
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 315 
 
 correspondence which the Italian had inadvertently left laying 
 around, so he was expelled France." 
 
 "And after the departure of the Italian, this Madame 
 Komorn ? " 
 
 "Had a number of adventures and broke up some fine 
 fortunes ; I thought she had left Paris. For two months past 
 she has not been seen. I believed she had totally disappeared, 
 but the other day she turned up again more brilliant than 
 ever. My advice to monsieur would be to leave her alone ; 
 but monsieur is a Southerner, he has the passion of the South- 
 erners, perhaps what I have said may only serve to fire you 
 up. However, she's a very fascinating creature oh ! very 
 fascinating. Although we parted bad friends she came up to 
 me and asked my address and said that she would call upon 
 me sometime." 
 
 "Well, madame, I'll think about it," said la Peyrade, ris- 
 ing and making a bow to his informant. 
 
 It was a cold salutation, and his abrupt departure indicated 
 that the man was not serious in his attentions. 
 
 The investment of the Thuilliers, prepared with such care 
 by la Peyrade, at the price of such sacrifice of pride, was en- 
 tirely useless. Flavie well avenged for the odious farce he 
 had played with her, his position worse than when he was 
 rescued by Cerizet and Dutocq, his heart filled with venge- 
 ful projects against the woman who had so easily beaten him 
 out like a stupid sheep, the memory of what he had been 
 subject to in his self-abasement these were the thoughts and 
 emotions of his sleepless night, except the few moments 
 shaken by hideous dreams. 
 
 On the next day la Peyrade was a prey to fever, the symp- 
 toms became most alarrsing, the physician took every means 
 to forfend brain fever ; bleeding, cupping, ice on the head 
 this was the agreeable finale to his dream of love. But it must 
 be said he arose cured, mentally as well as physically; he 
 retained no other sentiment than cold contempt for the 
 
 Y
 
 316 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 treacherous Hungarian, a sentiment that did not even rise to 
 a desire for vengeance. 
 
 Once more on his feet he reckoned with his future; he 
 asked himself whether he should attempt the reconquest of 
 the Thuilliers, or whether he should fall back upon the 
 crazy girl who had riches where the others had brains. Great 
 commotions of the soul are like storms that purify the atmos- 
 phere ; they induce good counsel and generous resolve. The 
 bar was open to him ; that was a broad path which was able 
 to lead him to the acme of his ambition. Like Figaro, who 
 showed more science and ability in order to live, than states- 
 men had shown in a thousand years in the government of 
 Spain, he, in order to establish himself in the Thuillier 
 household, to marry the daughter of a clarionet and a flirt, 
 had expended more art, more wit, more dishonesty than 
 would have made him successful in an honorable career. 
 
 "Enough," said he, "of such acquaintances as Dutocq 
 and Cerizet ; enough of the nauseating atmosphere breathed 
 by the Minards, Phellions, Collevilles et al. Living in Paris," 
 added he, "I'll shake off this provincial life, a thousand 
 times more ridiculous and paltry than the provincialism of the 
 country; that with all its narrowness has its individuality and 
 customs, a sui generis dignity; they are frankly what they 
 profess themselves, the antipodes of the Parisian ; this other 
 is only a parody." 
 
 With this determination la Peyrade called upon two or 
 three attorneys who had offered to introduce him to the courts 
 by giving him a few minor cases to plead. He accepted ; he 
 was no longer the advocate of the poor, but a recognized 
 pleader. 
 
 He had become comparatively successful when one morning 
 he received a letter from the president of the association of 
 barristers asking him to call upon him, as he had somewhat of 
 importance to speak of. At once la Peyrade thought of the 
 Madeleine house transaction this must have come to the
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 817 
 
 knowledge of the Board of Discipline. It might be that du 
 Portail had been told the whole story by Cerizet. It was 
 plain that this man would stop at nothing, as witness his em- 
 ployment of the Hungarian. Was it that this virulent man 
 whom he had never seen, seeing that he was becoming success- 
 ful in his career, had determined to blight it by informing 
 upon him ? The barrister remained in cruel suspense for the 
 hour when he might learn the truth. While he ruminated over 
 his breakfast, Mme. Coffinet, who had the honor of being his 
 housekeeper, entered to say that a Monsieur Etienne Loustea-u 
 wished to see him. 
 
 " Show him into my office," said he to the portress. 
 
 A moment later he met his visitor, whom he seemed to have 
 a faint recollection of having seen before. 
 
 " Monsieur," said la Peyrade's guest, " I had the honor of 
 once breakfasting with you at M. Vefour's; I was invited 
 to that meeting, which was afterward somewhat troubled, by 
 Monsieur Thuillier, your friend." 
 
 "Ah! very good," said the barrister, pushing a chair 
 toward him, "you are attached to the staff of some news- 
 paper?" 
 
 " Editor-in-chief of the 'Echo de la Bivre;' it is on that 
 matter I wish to speak to you. You know what has happened ? ' ' 
 
 "No," said la Peyrade. 
 
 " What, are you ignorant that the ministry met a frightful 
 reverse yesterday. But instead of resigning they are going 
 to throw themselves upon the country; so the Chamber is 
 dissolved." 
 
 " I did not know that ; I've not read the morning papers." 
 
 " All aspirants for a nomination as deputy are now in the 
 field ; I believe that Monsieur Thuillier intends to offer him- 
 self for the twelfth arrondissement." 
 
 "I believe such is his thought." 
 
 "Well, I am willing, monsieur, to place at his disposal an 
 organ of which I think you will not fail to estimate the value,
 
 818 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 The ' Echo dc la Bievre,' a trade paper, can have a decisive 
 influence in that quarter on the election." 
 
 "And are you seriously disposed," asked the barrister, " to 
 make that journal support Thuillier's candidature?" 
 
 'Better than that," replied Lousteau, "I am here to pro- 
 pose to Monsieur Thuillier that he purchase the organ ; should 
 he become the owner he could use it as he wished." 
 
 "But in the first place," answered la Peyrade, "^what is 
 the present condition of the enterprise? Being a trade 
 journal, as you just called it, I have seen it but seldom ; it 
 would be unknown to me only for the remarkable article you 
 were so kind as to devote to Thuillier's defense when the 
 pamphlet was seized." 
 
 Lousteau bowed his thanks, and replied : 
 
 " The position of the paper is excellent; we can sell on 
 easy terms, for we were about giving up its publication." 
 
 "That is strange with a journal that is prosperous," said 
 the barrister. 
 
 " Nothing more natural, on the contrary," replied Lousteau ; 
 " the founders having gained the ends for which it was estab- 
 lished, the ' Echo de la Bievere ' has thus become an effect 
 without a cause." 
 
 "I should have thought, however," said la Peyrade, in- 
 sistingly, " that a journal would be a lever that depended for 
 its force on the number of its subscribers." 
 
 " Not for such as have a definite aim," replied Lousteau, 
 dogmatically. " In such a case subscribers are an embarrass- 
 ment, for you have to cater to and amuse them ; and, during 
 this time, the real object must be neglected. A paper which 
 has but a circumscribed orbit should be like the stroke of that 
 pendulum which, always striking steadily on one spot, fires at 
 the right moment the cannon at the Palais-Royal." 
 
 "Well, what price do you put upon this publication, which 
 may not even pay its expenses and is devoted to an utterly 
 different purpose ? "
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES, 31 
 
 "Before answering, I beg to ask you another question: 
 Have you any intention of buying? " 
 
 " That depends upon circumstances," said the barrister ; " I 
 should naturally have to first present the matter to Thuillier, 
 whom, I may remark, knows absolutely less than nothing of a 
 newspaper and its workings. So that if you ask an alarming 
 price I can inform you here and now that it would be useless 
 for me to mention it to him ; he certainly would not touch 
 it." 
 
 " No," replied Lousteau, " I told you we should be reason- 
 able ; these gentlemen have given me a free hand ; only I 
 wish to remark that we have several propositions and I crave 
 an early answer. The proposition is made to Monsieur 
 Thuillier to pay him a particular courtesy. When may I hope 
 for your reply?" 
 
 "To-morrow, most likely," answered la Peyrade, bowing 
 out his visitor. 
 
 By the manner in which the Provencal had received the 
 proposition to become the intermediary with Thuillier, the 
 reader will see that a sudden change had taken place in his 
 ideas. Evidently his "good friend" would have to come 
 back to him ; Thuillier's eager desire to be elected would 
 hand him over tied hand and foot. Was not this the right 
 moment to. renew the affair of his marriage with Celeste? 
 Moreover, if he received, as he dreaded, one of these cen- 
 sures which would ruin his future at the bar, it was the 
 Thuilliers, the ones who profited by the cause of his fall, that 
 his instinct claimed should afford him an asylum. Thinking 
 thus, la Peyrade went to see the president of the barristers' 
 association. 
 
 It was just as he had guessed ; in a clear and very circum- 
 stantial report the matter of the buying of the house had 
 been laid before the notice of his peers ; the highest digni- 
 tary of the order admitted that an anonymous communication 
 must always be regarded with distrust, but that he was ready
 
 320 THE MIDDLE CLASSES, 
 
 to hear any explanations he might wish to make. La Peyrade 
 dare not intrench himself in an absolute denial; the hand 
 which had delivered the blow, as he thought, was far too deter- 
 mined and adroit to not hold the proof as well. But while 
 admitting the facts in general, he gave them a pleasing color. 
 He saw that he had not succeeded, when the president said : 
 
 " As soon as the next vacation is ended I shall send a re- 
 port to the Council of qur order of the charges made and the 
 explanations you have given. The Council only can pro- 
 nounce on a matter of such importance." 
 
 Thus dismissed, la Peyrade felt that his future at the bar 
 was imperiled, but at least he had a respite. He put on his 
 gowri and went to the fifth court, where he had to plead a 
 case. As he left the court, carrying a bundle of papers tied 
 up with a strip of cotton webbing, and carried by the fore- 
 arm being pressed against the chest, la Peyrade paced the 
 Salle des Pas Perdues, with that worried look which distin- 
 guishes the overworked barrister ; he perspired and mopped 
 his brow as he walked, when, in the distance he saw Thuillier, 
 who had just caught sight of him in that vast hall. 
 
 He was not surprised at meeting him. On leaving home 
 he had informed Mme. Coffinet that he was going to the 
 Palais and should be there until three o'clock, and she might 
 send any person there who came to ask for him. 
 
 He had no wish to make his accosting by Thuillier a too 
 easy matter, so he turned abruptly and took his way to one of 
 the benches, as if he had changed his purpose, and there 
 seated himself, taking a paper from the bundle and seemingly 
 absorbed in its contents. During this tirrie he watched Thu- 
 illier out of the corner of his eye ; so Thuillier, thinking he 
 was engaged on some serious matter, doubted whether to 
 address him. After some backings and fillings the municipal 
 councilor made up his mind and sailed straight before the 
 wind, heading for the spot for which during the past fifteen 
 minutes he had been steering.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 821 
 
 "Halloo! Theodose," he exclaimed. "Then do you 
 often come to the Palais now ? " 
 
 "Well, to me it seems that barristers in the Palais are like 
 Turks in Constantinople, where a friend of mine assures me 
 that plenty are to be seen. It is I that should be astonished 
 at seeing you here." 
 
 "Not at all," replied Thuillier, carelessly; "I'm here 
 about that cursed pamphlet. Is there ever any end to your 
 justice? I was summoned here this morning, but I don't 
 regret it, as I have had the pleasure of meeting you." 
 
 " The same by myself," said la Peyrade. " I am enchanted 
 to see you, but I must leave you. I have an appointment. 
 You, too, have to go on the floor." 
 
 " I've been," said Thuillier. 
 
 " Your intimate enemy is in that court, Olivier Vinet. 
 Did you speak to him?" asked la Peyrade. 
 
 "No, I didn't see him," and he named another judge. 
 
 " Tiens ! that's queer," said the barrister. "He's held 
 court there since morning ; he has just given a decision in a 
 case I pleaded." 
 
 Thuillier colored, and, making the best of his blunder : 
 
 " By the Virgin," said he, " I cannot tell one of you gen- 
 tlemen of the robe from the other." 
 
 La Peyrade shrugged his shoulders, and said to himself 
 aloud : 
 
 " Always the same man ! Cunning, wriggling, never going 
 straightforward." 
 
 "Of whom do you speak?" asked Thuillier, rather non- 
 plussed. 
 
 " Why of you, my dear ; do you take me for an idiot ? As 
 if I and everybody else did not know that your pamphlet affair 
 tumbled overhead two weeks ago. Why then should you be 
 summoned on the floor ? " 
 
 " Well, it was something about fees it's all Greek to me," 
 said Thuillier. 
 21
 
 322 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "And they choose the precise day that the 'Moniteur' tells 
 of the resignation of the ministry, that made you think of the 
 twelfth arrondissement, eh?" 
 
 "And why not?" answered Thuillier, "what has paying 
 my fees to do with my candidacy?" 
 
 " I'll tell you why," said la Peyrade, drily. "The court 
 is essentially amiable and complaisant. ' Ticns? it said to 
 itself, ' here is the good Thuillier a candidate for the lower 
 Chamber ; how hampered he is with the attitude his ex- 
 friend la Peyrade has assumed ; he wishes now that he hadn't 
 quarreled with him ; let us summons him for the fees he 
 doesn't owe ; that will bring him to the Palais where la Pey- 
 rade comes daily, thus he can meet him by chance, and avoid 
 taking a step which would bruise his self-love.' " 
 
 "Well, that's just where you are wrong," replied Thuillier, 
 breaking the ice ; " I used so little cunning, as you call it, as 
 to go to your house, and your porter told me you were here." 
 
 "Ah! that's better," said la Peyrade. "lean get along 
 with folk who play straight. Have you come to talk about 
 your election ? I've already begun to work on it." 
 
 "Truly?" said Thuillier. "How?" 
 
 "Here," said la Peyrade, feeling under his robe for a 
 pocket and bringing forth a paper, "read this; it's what I 
 scribbled while the barrister on the other side was arguing." 
 
 The paper read thus : 
 
 ESTIMATE FOR A PAPER, QUARTO SIZE, AT THIRTY FRANCS 
 A YEAR. 
 
 Calculating the edition at five thousand, the costs per 
 month are : 
 
 Francs. 
 
 Paper, five reams at 12 fr 1860 
 
 Composition 2400 
 
 Printing - 450 
 
 Editor 250 
 
 One clerk 100 
 
 Amount carried forward 5060
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 328 
 
 France. 
 
 Amount brought forward 56 
 
 Managing editor, also cashier 200 
 
 Delivery clerk IOO 
 
 Folders 120 
 
 Office boy 80 
 
 Wrappers and office expenses 1 5 
 
 Rent loo 
 
 License stamps and postage 75 
 
 Editing and reporting 1800 
 
 Total per month I5> 110 
 
 " " annum . 181,320 
 
 " Do you want to start a paper ? " asked Thuillier in dismay. 
 
 "I," said la Peyrade, "I want nothing at all; it is you 
 that ask to be made a deputy." 
 
 "Undoubtedly; but consider, my dear fellow, one hun- 
 dred and eighty-one thousand three hundred and twenty 
 francs to plank down. Have I fortune large enough to meet 
 the demand?" 
 
 "Yes," said la Peyade, "seeing the end you have in 
 view. In England they make far greater sacrifice .to get a 
 seat in Parliament, but some of the cost could be altogether 
 cut off. You don't need a manager you are an old account- 
 ant, I am an old journalist, we can well manage that rent 
 we needn't reckon ; your old room, still vacant, in the Rue 
 Saint-Dominique would make a fine office." 
 
 " But does a newspaper seem to you to be essential ? " 
 
 " So much so that unless we have that power in our hands 
 I won't have anything to do with the election. You do not 
 live in the quarter any more, your election could be balked 
 by one word the one the English call absenteeism. This 
 makes a hard game of it." 
 
 "I admit that," said Thuillier, "but the paper needs a 
 name, and " 
 
 "You don't suppose that I intend we should start a new
 
 3i4 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 paper, not much. Here is one ready made, the ' Echo de la 
 Bievre,' a treasure for a man standing in the twelfth arron- 
 dissement. Only say the word and I place it in your hands." 
 
 "How?" asked Thuillier. 
 
 " Parbleu ! by buying it ; it can be had for a song." 
 
 "See there, now," said Thuillier, "you never counted in 
 the cost of purchase." 
 
 " That's nothing," said la Peyrade, with a shrug of his 
 shoulders; " there are other difficulties to solve." 
 
 "Other difficulties ! " echoed Thuillier. 
 
 "Why, do you for one moment imagine," exclaimed la 
 Peyrade, " that, after all that has taken place between us, I 
 should boldly go in for your election without knowing ex- 
 actly what I am to get for my services ? " 
 
 "But," said Thuillier, somewhat astonished, "I thought 
 friendship was a full exchange for services." 
 
 " Certainly ; but when the exchange always consists in one 
 side giving all and the other side nothing, friendship is in- 
 clined to grow stale. It asks for a rather more equitable 
 settlement." 
 
 " But, my dear fellow, what then can I offer that you have 
 not refused?" 
 
 " I refused because the offer was not frankly and heartily 
 made, beside being seasoned with Mademoiselle Brigitte's 
 special brand of vinegar; any self-respecting man would have 
 played the same part that I did. You cannot give a thing 
 and keep it is an axiom in law, but you persisted in trying so 
 to do." 
 
 " I think you were unreasonable, but I have always treated 
 you in good faith. What guarantees do you want? " 
 
 " I ask that it shall be Celeste's husband that manages 
 your election, and not Theodose de la Peyrade." 
 
 "Well, hurry as we might," said Thuillier, "as Brigitte 
 said, it would take fifteen days, and just think two weeks 
 wasted out of the eight we have before us."
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 325 
 
 "The banns can be published the day after to-morrow, for 
 the first time in the mayor's office ; then, though the banns 
 is not a step from which there is no retreat, it is at least a 
 pledge before the public and a stride in the right direction ; 
 then your notary can draw the contract immediately. In 
 addition, if you buy the paper, that will be another reason 
 why you wouldn't go back on me, for the gun will be too 
 heavy for you to handle for me to be afraid of your trying to 
 fire it alone." 
 
 " Very good, my dear," said Thuillier. "Look properly 
 after my interests. If the paper is all right, we'll buy it." 
 
 " Then I, on my part, will do everything for you as if it 
 were for myself, which, by-the-by, is not altogether an 
 hypothesis ; I have even now received suggestions touching 
 my own candidacy ; if I were vindictive " 
 
 " Certainly," said Thuillier, with humility, "you would 
 make a better deputy than I. But you, it seems to me, are 
 not of legal age." 
 
 "There is a much better reason than that you are my 
 friend ; I find you again what you had been before. As for 
 the election, I would rather hear: 'He makes deputies, but 
 will not be made one.' Now I must leave you to keep my 
 appointment ; come to my office to-morrow and see me." 
 
 Who that has ever been a newspaper-man will ever be one : 
 that horoscope is as sure as that of drunkards. 
 
 Whoever has tasted of that feverish occupation and relative 
 idleness and independence ; whoever has exercised that sover- 
 eignty which criticises intellect, art, genius, glory, virtue, 
 absurdity, and even truth itself; whoever has ascended the 
 tribune erected by his own hands, fulfilled for only one short 
 hour the functions of that censorship to which he is self- 
 appointed, that proxy of the public's opinion, looks upon 
 himself when retired to private life as royalty did at Cher 
 bourg in lonely exile ; the moment a chance offers he 
 thrusts forth a hand eager to again clutch the crown.
 
 326 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 For the reason that la Peyrade had once been a journalist, 
 when Lousteau placed within his grasp the weapon known as 
 the "Echo de la Bievre," all his instincts as a newspaper- 
 man were revived, notwithstanding the inferior quality of the 
 blade. The paper had failed ; la Peyrade was sure he could 
 revivify it. The barrister threatened with being disbarred 
 had at once a certain situation ; he could hold it as a de- 
 tached fort and compel his enemies to reckon with him. The 
 Thuilliers would be bound to him by ties of self-interest, for 
 their capital would be involved in the business ; therefore, he 
 need not fear their caprices or ingratitude. The cost of 
 the purchase was absolutely low; a bank-bill for five hundred 
 francs, for which Etienne Lousteau never satisfactorily ac- 
 counted to the shareholders, put Thuillier in full ownership 
 of the title, property, furniture, and good-will of the paper, 
 which they at once proceeded to reorganize. 
 
 During the operation of this regeneration Cerizet one morn- 
 ing called upon du Portail, with whom more than ever la Pey- 
 rade was determined to hold no communication. 
 
 " Well," said the little old man, " what effect had the news 
 we gave the president of the association on our man ? " 
 
 "Phew!" said Cerizet, whose frequent intercourse with 
 du Portail had made him more familiar ; " there's no more 
 any question of that now ; the eel has slipped away again ; 
 neither gentleness nor violence has any effect on that devil of 
 a man ; he has quarreled with the association, but is thicker 
 than ever with the Thuilliers. 'Necessity,' says Figaro, 'an- 
 nihilates distance.' Thuillier needs him for his candidature 
 in the St. James' quarter, so they kissed and made friends." 
 
 "Doubtless the marriage is arranged for an early date?" 
 asked du Portail. 
 
 "Quite so," said Cerizet ; "and then there's another ma- 
 chine to work ; that crazy fellow has induced Thuillier to buy 
 a newspaper; he'll let them in for forty thousand francs. 
 When Thuillier once gets fairly involved he'll want to get
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 327 
 
 his money back, so I expect to see them stick together for the 
 rest of their lives." 
 
 "What paper is it?" asked du Portail, indifferently. 
 
 "A cabbage leaf called the 'Echo de la Bievre,' a jour- 
 nal," said Cerizet, scornfully, "that an old journalist set up 
 by the help of a lot of tanners in the Mouffetard quarter 
 the location of that trade." 
 
 "Well, for a local service it is not such a bad venture," 
 said du Portail. "La Peyrade is talented, active, and has a 
 bright intellect ; he may make the ' Echo ' resound. Under 
 what banner does Messire Thuillier present himself?" 
 
 " Thuillier ! " replied the banker of the poor ; "he has no 
 more opinion than an oyster. Until he published his pam- 
 phlet he was like all the rest of those bourgeois, a conserva- 
 tive ; but since its seizure he has gone over to the Opposition. 
 Self-interest for these people is the mainspring of their con- 
 victions." 
 
 "Peste/" said du Portail; " this combination of our bar- 
 rister may rise to the importance of becoming a political 
 danger from my view, which is conservative and govern- 
 mental. I believe," said he, after a reflective pause, "that 
 you worked on a newspaper once upon a time ; you, ' Cerizet 
 the Brave.'" 
 
 "Yes, and finely la Peyrade and I got paid for it," replied 
 the usurer. 
 
 "Well," said du Portail, "why don't you go into jour- 
 nalism again ?" 
 
 Cerizet regarded du Portail with dumb amazement. 
 
 "Ah fd/" said he at last. "Are you the devil, monsieur 
 the gentleman, that nothing remains hidden from you?" 
 
 "Yes," said du Portail, " I know a few things. But what 
 is arranged between you and la Peyrade? " 
 
 "Just this; he remembered my experience in the business, 
 and, not knowing whom else to employ, offered me the man- 
 agement of the paper."
 
 328 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "I did not know that, but I thought it very likely," said 
 du Portail. " Did you accept ? " 
 
 " Conditionally. I asked time for reflection. I wirhed to 
 know what you thought of the offer." 
 
 "Parbleu! I think that out of evil good may come, es- 
 pecially when it cannot be avoided. I had rather see you in- 
 side than outside that concern." 
 
 " Very good, but to get in there's this difficulty : La Pey- 
 rade is well aware that I have debts; he won't help me with 
 the security for thirty-three thousand francs which must be 
 posted in my name. I haven't got that amount, and if I had 
 I should not care for it to be known and thus expose myself to 
 my creditors." 
 
 "You have still a good part of that twenty-five thousand 
 francs left that la Peyrade paid you not more than two months 
 ago; is it not so? " 
 
 "Just two thousand two hundred francs and fifty centimes," 
 replied Cerizet; "I cast it up last night. The remainder 
 went to pay off pressing debts." 
 
 "But if you have paid your debts you can't have cred- 
 itors." 
 
 "Yes, those I paid I don't owe; but those I didn't pay I 
 still owe," said Cerizet. 
 
 "You don't mean to tell me that you owed more than 
 twenty-five tkousand francs?" said du Portail, incredu- 
 lously. 
 
 "Would a man go into bankruptcy for less?" asked he, 
 as though stating an axiom. 
 
 "I see I've got to stand the money myself," said du Por- 
 tail, with some anger; "but the question is: whether your 
 presence in the job is worth to me the interest represented by 
 three hundred and thirty thousand three hundred and thirty- 
 three francs and thirty-three centimes?" 
 
 "Dame/" said Cdrizet; "if I were only installed there I 
 would very soon have la Peyrade and Thuillier at loggerheads.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 329 
 
 In the business of running a newspaper there are constant dis- 
 agreements arising ; now by taking the side of the ninny 
 against the clever man you increase the conceit of the one and 
 wound that of the other that it soon becomes impossible for 
 them to work together. Beside, if, as you just now intimated, 
 a shove now and again in the direction of political danger 
 would assist " 
 
 "There's some truth in that," said du Portail; "la 
 Peyrade's defeat is the aim." 
 
 "I've another gun to fire which would help to demolish 
 him in the Thuilliers' estimation." 
 
 "Speak out then and let me know what it is," said du 
 Portail, irritably ; " you beat about the bush the same as if I 
 were a man that could be finessed." 
 
 "You remember," said C6rizet, "that some time ago we 
 wondered where la Peyrade obtained the twenty-five thousand 
 francs with which he paid Dutocq off? " 
 
 "Ha!" said the gentleman, eagerly; "have you dis- 
 covered the origin of that very improbable sum in the hands 
 of the barrister?" 
 
 "Here it is," said Cerizet. 
 
 Then he related the whole details of Mme. Lambert's affair, 
 but he acknowledged that all the sharp cross-questions of 
 Dutocq and himself had failed to elicit a confession from her; 
 but that both were convinced by her manner of the correct- 
 ness of their suspicions. 
 
 Du Portail took the address of Mme. Lambert and told 
 C6rizet to come and see him again on the morrow, adding : 
 
 "Accept la Peyrade's offer, but ask for a delay of twenty- 
 four hours in which to obtain your security ; if I find it to 
 my interest I will furnish it if not, you can get out of it by 
 breaking your promise; you can't be sent to the court of 
 assize for that." 
 
 Independently of an inexplicable kind of fascination that 
 he exercised over his agent, du Portail never missed an
 
 830 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 occasion to remind him of the very shady commencement of 
 their intercourse. 
 
 The next day, when Cerizet was again with the gentle- 
 man: 
 
 "You guessed rightly," said du Portail ; "compelled to 
 hide the existence of her booty, the woman, Lambert, who 
 desired to draw some interest out of it, formed the idea of 
 placing it in la Peyrade's hands ; his devotional exterior may 
 have suggested this to her; she most probably gave him the 
 money without taking any receipt. In what kind of money 
 was Dutocq paid ? ' ' 
 
 " In nineteen bills of one thousand francs each, and twelve 
 of five hundred francs." 
 
 "That's it, exactly," said du Portail; "there is no longer 
 room for doubt. Now how do you intend to use this infor- 
 mation to bear upon Thuillier? " 
 
 " I shall tell him that la Peyrade borrows enormous secret 
 loans ; that he means to gnaw the profits of the newspaper to 
 the bone; that the position of a man before the public must 
 be compromised when it is known what manner of person his 
 right hand is," said Cerizet. 
 
 "That's all right," said du Portail, "but Thuillier has not 
 as yet learned who prompted that seizure of his pamphlet, 
 has he?" 
 
 "Yes, he has," replied Cerizet; "la Peyrade was telling 
 me yesterday, when he was explaining Thuillier's simplicity, 
 that he gave him a silly humbugging, informing him that the 
 seizure was instigated by Olivier Vinet's father, because that 
 young man had once aspired to Mademoiselle Colleville's 
 hand and been refused." 
 
 "Better and better," said du Portail; "well, to-morrow 
 he shall receive a sharp note from Monsieur Vinet denying in 
 full any such abuse of power this will do as a basis for your 
 other versions." 
 
 "Yes?" asked Cerizet, inquisitively.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 331 
 
 "Another explanation must be given," continued du 
 Portail ; " you can assure Thuillier that he is the victim of the 
 machinations of the police. You know that that is all the 
 police are good for machinations?" 
 
 " Perfectly," said the usurer; " I have sworn to that twenty 
 times when I worked on a Republican newspaper and " 
 
 "When you were the 'brave Cerizet,' " interrupted du 
 Portail. "But for the present machination here it is: The 
 government was much annoyed to see Thuillier elected to the 
 Council without ministerial influence ; it did not care to see 
 an independent and patriotic citizen, who showed he could 
 do without its aid ; it further learned that this distinguished 
 citizen was writing a pamphlet on finance, always a delicate 
 subject, so what then did this corrupt government do, why it 
 suborned a man in whom it was thought Thuillier had every 
 confidence and for the sum of twenty-five thousand francs a 
 mere bagatelle to the police this treacherous friend agreed to 
 insert a few dangerous phrases which should expose it to 
 seizure and cause the arrest of its author. Then clinch it by 
 telling him that the very next day la Peyrade, whom Thuillier 
 knows had not a sou, paid Dutc cq that said amount of twenty- 
 five thousand francs." 
 
 "The devil! " said Cerizet. " That's a good trick. All 
 Thuillier's species believe anything that's said about the 
 police." 
 
 " Well, he did you out of the lease and you are aiming at 
 his happiness, so you need have no compunctions about what 
 you do in this matter," said du Portail. 
 
 "It is a fact," said the wily usurer," that such an event 
 will absolve me. Yes, I'll do as you wish ; I follow the 
 road you have pointed out. Still there's another thing : I 
 cannot in my first appearance step up and make my revela- 
 tion ; that will need some time, but the security must be paid 
 at once." 
 
 "Listen, Monsieur Cerizet," said du Portail j "if the
 
 332 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 marriage of la Peyrade with my ward takes place it is my 
 intention to reward your services with thirty thousand francs; 
 now that amount on one side and twenty-five thousand on the 
 other, you will get in all fifty-five thousand francs out of your 
 friend la Peyrade's matrimonial combinations. Now if you 
 risk your own money you will be eager to do the best for my 
 cause; if on the contrary my money is at stake, you won't be 
 nearly so ingenious in your dealings; if you are successful 
 you will gain about a hundred per cent. That's my last word, 
 I don't enter into any argument." 
 
 Cerizet had no time to make any, for at this moment the 
 door of the office opened and a fair, slender woman, whose 
 features showed angelic sweetness, came hastily into the 
 room. 
 
 On her arm, wrapped in long, beautiful clothes, lay the 
 form of an infant. 
 
 "There," said she, "that wicked Katt ; she told me that 
 you were not the doctor ; I knew better ; yes, I saw you come 
 in. Well, doctor," she went on, addressing Cerizet, "I am 
 not at all satisfied with the baby's condition ; she is pale, she 
 has grown so thin. I think it must be her teeth." 
 
 Du Portail made a sign to Cerizet to take up the role so sud- 
 denly thrust upon him, and which in some sense reminded 
 him of the part he had assigned himself in connection with 
 Mme. Cardinal. 
 
 "Evidently," replied he, "it is the teeth ; children always 
 grow pallid at such times ; but there's nothing, madame, that 
 need make you anxious." 
 
 "You really think so, doctor," answered the crazed girl 
 whom the reader, without a doubt, will guess to be Lydie, du 
 Portail's ward " but see her poor arms, look how thin they 
 have become, they have dwindled to nothing." 
 
 Then taking out the pins that held the outer wrappings, she 
 showed Cerizet a bundle of rags which, to her poor intellect, 
 represented a sweet red and white baby.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 333 
 
 " But no, no," said Cerizet ; " she is a little thin, perhaps, 
 but the flesh is clear and firm and color excellent." 
 
 "Poor darling ! " said Lydie, kissing her dream lovingly. 
 " What had I better give her, doctor? She won't take pap 
 and soup disgusts her." 
 
 "Does she like sweet things?" 
 
 "Oh! immensely," said the crazy girl, brightening up, 
 "she loves them ; is chocolate good for her ? " 
 
 "Certainly," said Cerizet, "but without vanilla; vanilla 
 is heating." 
 
 "Then I'll get health chocolate," said Lydie, with all the 
 intonations of a mother who listens to the assurances of the 
 doctor as to tKe voice of a god. " Uncle," said she, address- 
 ing du Portail, "ring for Bruno and tell him to fetch some 
 pounds from Marquis." 
 
 "Bruno has just gone out," he replied, "but there is no 
 hurry ; later in the day will do." 
 
 "See now," said Cerizet, "she has gone to sleep," for he 
 was anxious, hardened as he was, to put an end to this painful 
 scene. 
 
 "True," said Lydie, as she replaced the bandages; "I'll 
 put her to bed. Farewell, doctor ; if you doctors knew what 
 good you can do a poor anxious mother, you would come 
 more frequently. Oh ! she is crying." 
 
 " She is so sleepy," said Cerizet; "she'll be much better 
 in her cradle." 
 
 " Yes, and I'll play her that sonato that my dear papa used 
 to like the one from Beethoven ; it is very charming. Fare- 
 well, doctor," and she threw him a kiss from the threshold 
 of the door. 
 
 Cerizet was quite overcome. 
 
 "You see," said du Portail, " she is an angel, always the 
 same, never the least ill-temper, nor a cross word ; sometimes 
 sad, but ever with a motherly solicitude. This it is that first 
 gave the doctors an idea that if the reality replaced the hally-
 
 334 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 cination, she might recover her reason. Well, this is the girl 
 that ass of a la Peyrade refused, with the accompaniment of a 
 handsome dot. But it has got to come to pass or I perjure my 
 name. Listen ! " he added, as the tones of a piano were heard ; 
 " hark ! what talent ! A mad woman ! why there are a hun- 
 dred thousand sane women who are not to be compared to 
 her except on the surface." 
 
 When the sound of the playing ceased, Cerizet heard a 
 woman's voice which was not that of Lydie. 
 
 " Is he in his office, the dear commander?" said a voice 
 with a foreign accent. 
 
 " Yes, madame ; but enter the salon, monsieur is not alone ; 
 I will inform him you are here." 
 
 And this last was the voice of Katt, the old Dutch house- 
 keeper. 
 
 "Here this way out," said du Portail to Cerizet with 
 sharpness. And he opened a hidden door which led through 
 a dark passage and on to the stairs. 
 
 The salutatory article by which new editors of every news- 
 paper lay their "profession of faith" before the public is 
 always a laborious and difficult case of child-birth. In this 
 case it was necessary that Thuillier's candidature should be 
 hinted at at least. The terms of this manifesto, after la Pey- 
 rade had drawn a rough draft of it, had resulted in a long 
 discussion. This debate took place before Cerizet, who had 
 accepted the management but postponed the payment of the 
 security through the days of grace allowed in all changes of 
 proprietorship, such as is allowed to the new officials. 
 
 The discussion was assisted by the facile master-knave who 
 had constituted himself Thuillier's flatterer from the start; it 
 more than once grew stormy, then bitter, but as the deed of 
 partnership left all decision as to the editing to la Peyrade, he 
 finally closed the matter by sending the manifesto to the 
 printer exactly as he had first written it. 
 
 Thuillier was furious at what he called an abuse of power,
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 336 
 
 and on the following day, finding himself alone with Cerizet, 
 he hastened to pour his woes and grievances into the bosom 
 of his faithful manager; this gave a natural chance to in- 
 sinuate the calumnious revelations already plotted with the 
 man in the Rue Honore-Chevalier. 
 
 This insinuation was presented with such art, with such skill 
 and moderation, that it would have duped a much shrewder 
 soul than Thuillier's. 'Cerizet appeared alarmed at having 
 been entrapped into the betrayal of a secret, wrung from him 
 by the ardor of his zeal and a sympathy which had been 
 commanded by " the lofty mind and character which from 
 the first had struck him about Monsieur Thuillier." The 
 latter reassured the traitor that he should never be brought 
 into the inquiry, which must of necessity follow such an 
 alarming statement ; he would say that other parties had in- 
 formed him ; if necessary he would throw suspicion upon 
 Dutocq. 
 
 The scene had taken place at the newspaper office. Since 
 he had concluded the purchase Thuillier came to the office 
 two hours before it was necessary ; he spent his day there and 
 wore everybody out with his ardent activity. Now, being 
 filled with this terrible revelation, he could not keep it to 
 himself, he wished to unburden himself to some one. He 
 sent for a hack and half an hour after had confided the whole 
 story to his Egeria. 
 
 Brigitte from the first had vehemently opposed any further 
 relations with la Peyrade, not even for the purpose of Thu- 
 illier's election would she make up with him. In the first 
 place she had treated him badly, a good reason for disliking 
 him ; then she feared that if he married Celeste she would 
 lose much of her authority, for her second-sight showed her 
 some of the depths of his nature. So up to the present she 
 had met her brother with fierce opposition in all matters relat- 
 ing to the newspaper : 
 
 " Ruin yourself, my dear," said she to Thuillier, " you are
 
 336 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 your own master and can do as you like ; what comes in by 
 the flute goes out by the drum." 
 
 When, therefore, her brother related his confidences she 
 did not reproach him, but gave a crow of triumph in honor 
 of her own perceptions. 
 
 "So much the better," she exclaimed; "it is as well to 
 know at last that he is a spy. I always thought so, a mean 
 sneak. Throw him out of doors without any explanation. 
 We don't need him, we can run the paper without him. That 
 Monsieur Cerizet, who, from what you say, is after all a right 
 good fellow, can easily find us somebody in his place." 
 
 "How fast you go," said Thuillier. "La Peyrade, my 
 dear, has only been accused, he must be granted a hearing ; 
 beside a deed binds us." 
 
 " Oh ! very well," said Brigitte, " I see the whole thing; 
 you'll let that man twist you round his finger ; a deed with a 
 spy; as if deeds would stand with such fellows." 
 
 "Come, come, be calm, my dear Brigitte," replied Thu- 
 illier, " we must not act too hastily; if a justification, clear, 
 categorical, and convincing, is not forthcoming, I shall break 
 with him ; I'll prove that I am not a plucked chicken. C6ri- 
 zet himself is not certain ; they are only his deductions ; 
 why I came to you was to see what you thought about de- 
 manding an explanation." 
 
 " Certainly, and if you don't get to the bottom of this 
 affair I'll cast you off as my brother." 
 
 "That "is sufficient," said Thuillier, solemnly; "you will 
 find that we have one mind in such matters." 
 
 Thuillier found la Peyrade at his post as editor-in-chief; 
 but during the last quarter of an hour he had found himself 
 in a position of much embarrassment, caused by his high- 
 handed assumption of being the sole selector of articles and 
 contributors. Phellion pressed by his family, and as a con- 
 sequence of being on the reading committee of the Odeon, 
 had come to offer himself as dramatic critic.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. $37 
 
 " My dear, sir," said he, addressing la Peyrade, after hav- 
 ing asked Thuillier as to his health, " I was a good student 
 of the theatre in my youth ; the play and its scenery have 
 during my life had an especial attraction for me ; the white 
 hairs which now crown my brow do not seem any obstacle 
 to me giving you some very profitable and interesting studies 
 from my experience. As a member of the reading committee 
 of the Odeon, I am also familiar with the modern drama ; 
 and, being sure of your discretion, I may confidentially in- 
 form you that among my papers it would not be impossible 
 for me to find a certain tragedy entitled ' Sapor,' which in 
 my younger days gave me some celebrity when read in draw- 
 ing-rooms." 
 
 "Well," said la Peyrade, trying to gild the inevitable 
 refusal, " why not try and have it placed on the stage ? We 
 might be able to assist you on that line." 
 
 "Certainly," said Thuillier, "the director of any theatre 
 to whom we should introduce : " 
 
 " No," replied Phellion. "In the first place, as a member 
 of the reading committee of the Odeon, having to sit in 
 judgment on others, it would ill become me to enter the 
 arena myself. I am an old athlete ; my part is -now to judge 
 of the blows I can no longer deliver. In this sense criticism 
 is within my sphere, the more so as I have some quite new 
 ideas on the correct manner in which theatrical articles should 
 be done. Castigat ridendo mores, by my humble lights, ought 
 to be the great law, I might even say, the only law of the 
 stage. Therefore I should show myself merciless in dealing 
 with works of pure imagination in which morality plays no 
 part, and which the ever-unerring discretion of the mothers of 
 families " 
 
 " Pardon me," said la Peyrade, " for interrupting you, but 
 before allowing you to take the trouble to develop your 
 poetical theories, I ought to inform you that our arrangements 
 for the dramatic criticisms are already completed." 
 22
 
 338 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "Ah! that is different," said Phellion, "an honest man 
 must keep his word." 
 
 "Yes," said Thuillier, "we have our dramatic critic, it 
 was far beyond our hopes that you would offer your valuable 
 collaboration." 
 
 "Well," said Phellion, grown somewhat cunning for 
 there is something in the newspaper atmosphere that flies to 
 the head, especially a middle-class head " as you think that 
 my pen might be susceptible of giving you good service, a 
 series of detached articles, perhaps, on divers subjects, which 
 I should venture to entitle ' varieties,' might be of an inter- 
 esting nature." 
 
 "Yes," said la Peyrade, with a maliciousness that was 
 entirely lost upon Phellion, " thoughts, something in the 
 style of Rochefoucauld or de la Bruyere, these might do 
 what say you, Thuillier ? " 
 
 He intended leaving the matter of refusals, as far as possi- 
 ble, with the proprietor. ,"; .- 
 
 " But I should imagine," said Thuillier, " that detached 
 thoughts would be rather wanting in connection." 
 
 "Obviously," replied Phellion, "when I say detached 
 thoughts I imply the idea of a great range of subjects over 
 which an author allows his pen to stray without presenting 
 them as a whole." 
 
 " Of course you would sign every communication ? " queried 
 la Peyrade. 
 
 "Oh, no! messieurs," replied Phellion, dismayed. "I 
 could not under any circumstances place myself on exhibition 
 in that manner." 
 
 "Your modesty, which I fully comprehend and approve," 
 said la Peyrade, " settles the matter. Thoughts are individ- 
 uals, they require personifying by a name. Of this you your- 
 self must be well aware. ' Sundry Thoughts, by M. Three- 
 Stars,' means nothing to the public." 
 
 Seeing that Phellion was about returning to the charge>
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 339 
 
 Thuillier, who was in a hurry to get his hands in la Peyrade's 
 hair, cut him off rather curtly : 
 
 "My dear Phellion," said he, "I ask your excuses for 
 being compelled to say that I cannot longer be able to enjoy 
 your conversation, but la Peyrade and myself have to consult 
 on a matter of much importance ; in a newspaper office the 
 time flies devilishly fast. If you wish, we will postpone the 
 matter till a later day. Madame Phellion and Felix are well, 
 I trust?" 
 
 " Perfectly," replied the" great citizen, rising and not seem- 
 ing to resent his dismissal. ''When does the first number 
 come out ? " he added. ''It is eagerly awaited in the arron- 
 dissement." 
 
 "To-morrow, I think," said Thuillier, conducting him to 
 the door, "our profession of faith will make its appearance. 
 You will have a copy sent you, my dear friend ; come and see 
 us again and bring that manuscript ; la Peyrade's point of 
 view is not absolute here." 
 
 This balm shed on the wound, and Phellion gone, Thuil- 
 lier rang for the office boy. 
 
 "You would recognize that gentleman again who just went 
 out?" said the own brother of Brigitte. 
 
 "Yes, m'sieu ; anybody would remember that funny ball of 
 a head; and, beside, it's M'sieu Phellion; I've opened the 
 door for him hundreds of times." 
 
 " Well, whenever he comes here again, neither I nor Mon- 
 sieur la Peyrade are ever in. Don't you forget the prescrip- 
 tion ; now leave us." 
 
 "The devil!" said la Peyrade, when they were alone, 
 " how you manage bores. But lookout ; sometimes electors 
 may be among the number; you were right in promising 
 Phellion a copy of the paper ; he possesses influence in the 
 quarter." 
 
 " Well, he's gone. Now be seated ; I have something very 
 serious to say to you," said Thuillier.
 
 340 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "Do you know, my dear fellow," answered la Peyrade, 
 laughing, " that journalism is making you preternaturally sol- 
 emn ? ' Be seated, Cinna ' Caesar Augustus would have said 
 it no differently." 
 
 " Cinnas are, unfortunately, more numerous than people 
 think," said Thuillier. 
 
 He still felt Brigitte's prod and he intended being cuttingly 
 ironical ; the top still rotated under the lashing it had received 
 from the old maid's whip. The Provencal was seated and yet 
 Thuillier did not commence ; he went to the door, which 
 stood ajar, intending to close it, but he first called to the 
 office boy : 
 
 "Not in to anybody," he cried. " Now, my dear fellow," 
 added he, addressing la Peyrade, "we can talk. My dear," 
 said Thuillier, starting with sarcasm for he had heard that 
 this was a good way to nonplus an adversary " I have learned 
 something that will please you: I now know why the pam- 
 phlet was seized." 
 
 And he looked fixedly at la Peyrade. 
 
 "Parbleu!" said the latter in a natural tone of voice, " it 
 was seized because they wanted to seize it. They sought and 
 found, as you may always expect them to find the things they 
 desire, known by the King's adherents as 'subversive doc- 
 trines.' " 
 
 " No, you are wrong," replied Thuillier j "the seizure was 
 arranged for, concocted, and planned beforehand." 
 
 " Between whom ? " asked la Peyrade. 
 
 "Between those who desired the death of the pamphlet 
 and the miscreants who pledged themselves to betray it," 
 said Thuillier. 
 
 "In any case those who bought," said la Peyrade, "got 
 but a poor bargain ; for, persecuted though it was, I don't see 
 that it made much noise." 
 
 "But what about the vendors?" said the more than ever 
 ironical Thuillier.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 341 
 
 "Those who sold were the smartest, undoubtedly," said la 
 Peyrade. 
 
 " Oh ! I know you have a great esteem for smartness ; but 
 permit me to inform you that the police, whose hand is ap- 
 parent in all this, is not apt to throw its money away." 
 
 And he stared anew at la Peyrade. 
 
 "So," replied the barrister, without blinking, "you have 
 discovered that the police plotted in advance to smother your 
 pamphlet ? " 
 
 "Yes, my dear friend, and I know for a fact to whom the 
 money was paid and the precise amount that honorable person 
 received." 
 
 "The person," said la Peyrade; "I might guess the per- 
 son, but as to the amount that is beyond me." 
 
 "Well, I can tell you that: twenty-five thousand francs," 
 said Thuillier, emphasizing each word; "that was the sum 
 paid to Judas." 
 
 "Allow me, my dear, twenty-five thousand francs is a lot 
 of money. I won't deny that you are a most important man ; 
 nevertheless, you are not such a bugbear to the government as 
 to cause them to make such a sacrifice. Twenty-five thousand 
 francs is as much as they would give for the suppression of 
 some celebrated pamphlet against the administration of the 
 civil list ; but our lucubration on finance was not bad like 
 that, and such a sum taken from the secret service fund merely 
 to plague you seems to me fabulously great." 
 
 "Apparently," replied Thuillier, with bitterness, "the 
 honest intermediary may have exaggerated my value; one 
 thing is certain, this monsieur had a debt of twenty-five thou- 
 sand francs which was a great worry to him ; and a short time 
 before the seizure this same monsieur all at once found means 
 to pay; unless you can tell me whence he obtained that 
 money, I don't believe it is very hard to draw the infer- 
 ence." 
 
 In his turn la Peyrade gazed fixedly at Thuillier.
 
 342 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "Monsieur Thuillier," said he, raising his voice, "let us 
 get out of generalities and enigmas ; this person will you do 
 me the favor to name him ? " 
 
 "Well, NO," said Thuillier, striking the table; "I shall 
 not name him because of the sentiments of affection which at 
 one time united us ; but you have understood me, Monsieur 
 de la Peyrade." 
 
 "It is a fact, I should have understood," said the Provencal, 
 in a voice broken with emotion, "that in introducing a ser- 
 pent here it would not be long before I should be soiled by 
 its venom. Poor fool, you ! don't you see that this is one of 
 Cerizet's calumnies, of which you have made yourself the 
 echo." 
 
 " Cerizet has nothing whatever to do with it ; 'on the con- 
 trary, he has nothing but good to say of you ; how was it that 
 you, not having a sou the night before (and I have cause to 
 know this), that you were able to pay Dutocq the round sum 
 of twenty-five thousand francs the next day, paid in bills of 
 a known denomination ? " 
 
 La Peyrade reflected a moment. 
 
 "No," said he, " Dutocq did not tell you; he is not the 
 man who dare tackle me unless it would be of great benefit to 
 him. The infamous calumniator is Cerizet, from whose hands 
 I wrung your house on the Madeleine Cerizet whom, in my 
 kindness, I sought on .his own dunghill to place him in an hon- 
 orable position ; that is the wretch to whom a benefit is only 
 an encouragement to further treachery. Tiens ! if I should 
 tell you what manner of man that is, I should fill your heart 
 with loathing ; in the sphere of infamy he has discovered new 
 W0 rlds " 
 
 Thuillier this time made an apt reply. 
 
 "I know nothing about Cerizet except through you," said 
 he ; " you it was who offered him the management, giving 
 every assurance that he was reliable ; but, by making him 
 blacker than the devil, and even allowing that this communi-
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 343 
 
 cation comes from him, I don't see, my boy, that it makes you 
 any the whiter." 
 
 "I was, without doubt, to blame in bringing him, but he 
 understands the newspaper business ; I thought he had re- 
 formed, that he was a man of straw, but I find him as he ever 
 was, a man of mud." 
 
 "That's all well and good," said Thuillier, "but the 
 twenty-five thousand francs which came so opportunely into 
 your hands, whence came they? That is what you fail to 
 explain." 
 
 "But use a bit of commonsense," replied la Peyrade; "a 
 man in my position in the pay of the police, and yet so poor 
 that I could not throw in the face of that harpy, your sister, 
 ,the ten thousand francs she so insolently demanded of me." 
 
 " To end it all," said Thuillier, " if the origin of the money 
 is honest, as I am most anxious to believe, what prevents you 
 telling me who gave it to you?" 
 
 "That I cannot do," replied the barrister, " the source of 
 that cash is a professional secret." 
 
 " See now, you told me yourself that the rules of your order 
 prevented your entering into business of any description." 
 
 " It would be strange, if I had done something not quite 
 in the regular course, that you should reproach me after doing 
 what I did for you in the matter of the house." 
 
 " My poor friend, you are trying to put the hounds off the 
 scent, but you can't put me off the track; I am the master of 
 my confidence and esteem, and, if I pay you the amount stip- 
 ulated in the deed, I take the paper into my own hands." 
 
 "So you mean to turn me out ! " exclaimed la Peyrade. 
 " The money you have put into this business, your chances 
 of election, all sacrificed on one calumny brought by a Cer- 
 izet." 
 
 "In the first place," answered Thuillier, "a new editor-in- 
 chief can soon be found to replace you, my dear ; they said 
 long ago that no man is indispensable. As to the election, I
 
 344 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 would sooner not win it than owe it to the help of one 
 who " 
 
 "Go ahead ! " said la Peyrade, seeing that Thuillier hesi- 
 tated, " or, no, rather be silent, for in less than an hour you 
 will blush at your suspicions and ask my pardon on your 
 knees." 
 
 The Provencal saw that without a confession he would have 
 the newly recovered future cut from beneath his feet. He re- 
 sumed his speech with great gravity. 
 
 "You will remember, my friend," said he, "that you were 
 absolutely without pity, and that by subjecting me to a kind 
 of moral torture you compelled me to reveal a secret which is 
 not my own." 
 
 "Go on, all the same," replied Thuillier, "I'll take the 
 whole responsibility ; make me see the light in all this dark- 
 ness, and I will be the first to recognize that I was wrong." 
 
 "Well," said la Peyrade, "those twenty-five thousand 
 francs are the savings of a domestic who came with them to 
 me asking me to pay her interest on them." 
 
 "A domestic who has saved twenty-five thousand francs ! 
 Strike me ! it seems to me she must have lived in a bully 
 house." 
 
 "On the contrary, she is the housekeeper of an old, infirm 
 savant ; it was for this reason of the discrepancy that you 
 suggest that she wished to put the cash in my hands as a kind 
 of fiduciary agent." 
 
 "By my faith, my friend," said Thuillier, in a flippant 
 voice, " you said we needed a romancist, but with your talent 
 we can rest quite easy. Here's imagination ! " 
 
 "How's that?" said la Peyrade, angrily; "you don't 
 believe me? " 
 
 " No, I don't believe you ; twenty-five thousand francs of 
 savings made in the service of an old professor ; why, that's 
 about as credible as that captain of the White Lady buying 
 a castte out of his pay."
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 345 
 
 " But if I prove the truth of my explanation if I let you 
 put your finger in the wound?" 
 
 " In that case, like Saint-Thomas, I shall lower my flag 
 before the evidence ; but you must permit me to wait until 
 you give that proof." 
 
 Thuillier thought himself superb. 
 
 "I would have given two louis," said he to himself, "if 
 Brigitte were only here to see how I did it." 
 
 "Come then," said la Peyrade, "suppose that without 
 going outside this office, and by means of a note which shall 
 pass before your eyes, I bring before you the person from 
 whom I received the money ; if she confirms my statement, 
 shall you believe then?" 
 
 This proposition and the assurance with which it was made 
 staggered Thuillier. 
 
 " Then, of course," replied he, changing his tune. "But 
 this must be done before the seance is over, eh? " 
 
 " Without going out from here, I said ; it seems to me that 
 is clear enough." 
 
 " And who will carry your note when you have written it ? " 
 asked Thuillier. He thought he displayed much acumen by 
 looking after each detail. 
 
 " Who will carry it ? " said la Peyrade. " Parbleu ! your 
 office boy; you can send him yourself." 
 
 "Write it then," said Thuillier, determined to push him 
 to the wall. 
 
 La Peyrade took a sheet of paper with the letter-head and 
 wrote, reading aloud, as follows : 
 
 Mme. Lambert is requested to come immediately on urgent business to 
 the office of the " Echo de la Bievre," Rue Saint-Dominique-d'Enfer, 
 whither the bearer will conduct her. She is impatiently awaited by hei 
 devoted servant, 
 
 THEODOSE DE LA PEYRADE. 
 
 "Well, will that suit?'* said the barrister, passing it to 
 Thuillier.
 
 346 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 " Perfectly," said he, at the same time taking the precaution 
 to fold the paper and to seal it himself. " Now add the 
 address," he added. 
 
 Thuillier rang for Coffinet. 
 
 "You will go," said he, "to that address with this note, 
 and the person will return with you." 
 
 When they were alone, la Peyrade took up a paper and 
 appeared to be absorbed in its contents. 
 
 Thuillier by this time was somewhat uneasy.' 
 
 " I ought not to have carried the matter so far," said he to 
 himself; " I should have torn up the note." Then trying to 
 show that he reinstated la Peyrade in the position from which 
 he had threatened to dismiss him : 
 
 " Oh," said he, "I have just come from the printer; the 
 new type has arrived ; we can, I guess, make our appearance 
 to-morrow." 
 
 La Peyrade made no reply, but got up and read his paper 
 nearer the window. 
 
 " He is vexed," said Thuillier to himself; "well, if he is 
 innocent, he is like to be ; but why, after all, should he have 
 brought such a man as Cerizet here? " 
 
 La Peyrade returned to the table, took up some paper and 
 with feverish rapidity wrote like a man who is violently agi- 
 tated, making the pen fairly fly across the paper. 
 
 Thuillier from the corner of his eye tried hard to see what 
 la Peyrade was writing ; he noticed it was arranged in num- 
 bered paragraphs: 
 
 " Halloo ! " said he, " are you drafting a new law? " 
 
 "Yes," answered la Peyrade coldly, "the law of the 
 vanquished." 
 
 Soon after the boy opened the door and introduced Mme. 
 Lambert, who arrived looking rather afraid and minus much 
 of her unctuous suavity. 
 
 " You are Madame Lambert? " asked Thuillier, in the tone 
 of a magistrate.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 847 
 
 " Yes, monsieur," replied the pious woman, in an anxious 
 voice. 
 
 Requesting her to be seated and noticing that the office 
 boy remained as if expecting further orders : 
 
 "That will do," said Thuillier, "go; and admit no one." 
 
 The gravity and lordly tone of Thuillier deeply impressed 
 Mme. Lambert ; moreover, the scene took place in a news- 
 paper office, and we all know that, particularly in the eyes of 
 the pious, everything that has to do with the press savors of 
 the infernal and diabolical. 
 
 "Well, my dear fellow," said Thuillier to the barrister, 
 " it seems to me that nothing hinders your explaining to 
 madame why you have sent for her." 
 
 " We wish to ask you, madame," said la Peyrade ex 
 abrupto, "if it is not true that about two and a half months 
 ago you placed in my hands, subject to interest, the sum of 
 twenty-five thousand francs?" 
 
 Madame Lambert could not restrain a start, though she felt 
 the eyes of both were fixed upon her. 
 
 " Our Lord above ! " she exclaimed, " and where should I 
 get such a sum as that ? " 
 
 La Peyrade showed no sign of the uneasiness he might have ' 
 been supposed to experience. 
 
 As for Jerome Thuillier, who now glanced at him with 
 commiseration : 
 
 " You see, my dear fellow " said he. 
 
 "So," went on the Provencal, "you are quite certain, 
 madame, that you did not place in my hands the sum of 
 twenty-five thousand francs ; you declare it ? You would 
 swear to this?" 
 
 "Why, monsieur, is it at all likely that twenty-five thou- 
 sand francs would knock at the door of such a poor woman 
 as myself? Even the little I had has gone to help the house- 
 keeping of that poor, dear gentleman whose servant I have 
 been for twerjty years."
 
 348 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "This," said the pompous Thuillier, "seems unan* 
 swerable." 
 
 La Poyrade showed no sign of annoyance ; on the contrary, 
 he seemed to have an air of playing into the hand of 
 Thuillier : 
 
 "You hear, my dear," said he to him, "and if necessary 
 I shall call upon you to so testify, that madame here never 
 had twenty-five thousand francs ; consequently she could not 
 have given that amonnt to me ; and as the notary Dupuis, 
 with whom I fancied I had placed them, left Paris this morn- 
 ing for Brussels, carrying with him all his clients' money, I 
 have a clear account with madame, and the flight of the notary 
 Dupuis " 
 
 "The notary Dupuis has absconded!" cried Mme. Lam- 
 bert, carried away by this dreadful news out of her usual 
 dulcet tones and Christian resignation ; " the wretch, the 
 villain, when only this morning he took the communion at 
 St. Jacques du Haut-Pas." 
 
 "That was doubtless to pray for a safe journey," replied 
 la Peyrade. 
 
 "Monsieur can talk lightly enough about it," continued 
 Mme. Lambert, " but that brigand has carried off ail my 
 savings; but I gave them to monsieur, and monsieur, of 
 course, is responsible for them ; he is the only one I know in 
 the matter." 
 
 " Heinf" said la Peyrade to Thuillier, pointing to Mme. 
 Lambert, whose demeanor had something of a she-wolf who 
 has had her whelps ravished from her; "is that nature? tell 
 me, have we gotten up this comedy? " 
 
 "lam speechless," replied Thuillier, "at the audacity of 
 that Cerizet ; struck dumb by my own stupidity, I can but 
 surrender at discretion." 
 
 "Madame," said la Peyrade gayly, "will please excuse 
 me for alarming her, it was an absolute necessity. The 
 notary Dupuis remains a pious gentleman, and incapable of
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 349 
 
 injuring his clients. Your secret is as safe with him as me, 
 so far as this gentleman is concerned." 
 
 "Very good, monsieur," said Mme. Lambert, "then you 
 have nothing more to say to me? " 
 
 "No, my dear madame, except to beg your pardon for the 
 slight fright we caused you." 
 
 But as Mme. Lambert went out she intimated that she would 
 need the money very soon as she had "heard of a little 
 property she meant to purchase." She was reassured by la 
 Peyrade, who explained that she could get it any time by 
 giving notice, and she then bade him adieu. 
 
 "You see, my dear," said Theodose, when he and Thuil- 
 lier were alone, "into what a scrape your sick imagination 
 has brought me. The debt was dormant, you have awakened 
 it. Now she will press for it." 
 
 "I am desolate, my dear friend, for my silly credulity; 
 but don't be uneasy about that matter, we can arrange all that, 
 even if I have to go your security or make an advance on the 
 wedding dot," 
 
 " For the rest, my excellent friend," said la Peyrade, " we 
 will begin by taking stock of our mutual relationship ; I have 
 no appetite for being haled up every morning and interrogated 
 as to my conduct ; just now while we awaited that woman I 
 drew up a little memorandum which we will talk over and 
 sign, by your leave, before we issue the first number." 
 
 "But our deed of partnership," said Thuillier, "seems to 
 me a chart " 
 
 "That by a paltry forfeit of five thousand francs, as by 
 clause 14," interrupted Theodose, "you can, when you wish, 
 put me in the soup. Thanks ! we will have something rather 
 more definite." 
 
 At this moment entered Cerizet bubbling over with vain- 
 glory. 
 
 "My masters," said he, "I have brought the capital and 
 in an hour the security can be perfected."
 
 350 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 But seeing that the news was received with marked frigidity: 
 
 " Well," said he, " what's up now?" 
 
 "It is this," said Thuillier, " that I refuse to associate with 
 double-faced men and calumniators; we have use for neither 
 you nor your money, and I beg you to no longer honor these 
 premises with your company." 
 
 "Dear, oh me!" said Cerizet, "so Daddy Thuillier has 
 allowed himself to be caught again." 
 
 " Go away," said Thuillier, " we have no use for you." 
 
 "My boy," said Cerizet to la Peyrade, "it seems that 
 .you've twisted the good bourgeois round your finger again. 
 Well, he's not the inventor of the printing press ; and as for 
 you, we have seen the kind of work you can turn out. Well, 
 it doesn't matter, but all the same you were wrong in not call- 
 ing upon du Portail, I shall tell him " 
 
 " Will you go away, monsieur? " cried Thuillier, threaten- 
 ingly. 
 
 "After all, my dear sir," continued the usurer, " it was not 
 I that looked you up. I was doing well enough before you 
 sent for me, and I shall do quite as well after. Only you try 
 and avoid paying that twenty-five thousand francs out of your 
 own pocket, for that's hanging to your nose I know all about 
 it." 
 
 As he said this Cerizet replaced his pocket-book containing 
 the cash in his breast-pocket, and, after smoothing his hat on 
 his coat sleeve, went out. 
 
 Thuillier had been led by listening to Cerizet into a most 
 disastrous campaign. Become the humble servant of de la 
 Peyrade, he was compelled to bow to his conditions : five 
 hundred francs a month for the barrister's services on the 
 paper ; his editorship of the journal to be paid for at the rate 
 of fifty francs per column an enormous sum, taking into ac- 
 count the small size of the sheet ; a pledge to issue the paper 
 for at least six months, this under a forfeit of fifteen thousand 
 francs; the most absolute omnipotence as editor-in-chief, being
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 351 
 
 free to insert, alter, or reject any article without being com- 
 pelled to explain his reasons therefor ; these were the stipula- 
 tions signed in duplicate by both parties in "good faith." 
 
 But, in virtue of another private agreement, Thuillier gave 
 security for the payment of the sum of twenty-five thousand 
 francs for which la Peyrade was accountable to the pious one, 
 "the said Maitre la Peyrade," binding himself, in case the 
 repayment was required before his marriage with Mile. Colle- 
 ville could take place, to acknowledge the said sum as being 
 an advance on account of the dot. In this ingenious manner, 
 the crafty Provencal got around the law which provides 
 against such forestalling of the consideration mentioned in 
 the marriage-contract. 
 
 Matters being thus arranged and everything being accepted 
 by the candidate who, if he lost la Peyrade, could see no 
 chance of his election, Thuillier had a happy thought. He 
 went to the Cirque-Olympique, where he remembered in the 
 box-office a former employe of his in his bureau a man 
 named Fleury, to whom he proposed the post as manager. 
 An old soldier, a good shot and capital swordsman, Fleury 
 would be properly respected in a newspaper office. Not less 
 clever in the art of " leading his creditors a dance," he was 
 the first clerk in the Bureau of Finance to hit on the ingenious 
 idea of inventing spurious suits against his salary, thus pre- 
 venting the collection of any legal attachments that might be 
 taken. He took the same proceedings to preserve from his 
 creditors the three thousand three hundred and thirty-three 
 francs thirty-three centimes, which were required by the law 
 to be deposited in his name. The working staff being thus 
 constituted, the first number was launched. 
 
 Thuillier now recommenced his explorations about Paris as 
 we previously saw on the publication of his pamphlet. Walk- 
 ing into a reading-room or cafe, he asked for the " Echo de la 
 Bievre," and when, as was unfortunately too often the case, 
 he was told they did not know of such a paper :
 
 352 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "Tliis is incredible! " he would exclaim, "that a place 
 with any pretensions to respect does not take such a popular 
 paper. ' ' 
 
 Then he would depart in disdain, without seeing that in 
 many places where this drummer's dodge was quite under- 
 stood they were laughing under his nose. 
 
 The evening of the day of the salutatory article, Brigitte, 
 although it was not Sunday, had her salon thronged. Recon- 
 ciled with la Peyrade, the old maid went so far as to say that 
 his leading editorial was a "hit." The remainder of the 
 company said the public was enchanted with the first number. 
 The -public ! everybody knows what that is ; the man who 
 has launched a few lines in print upon a trusting world has 
 his public in five or six intimates, who, from a desire to 
 avoid a quarrel with the author, make some favorable com- 
 ment upon his lucubrations. 
 
 "As for myself," said Colleville, " I can say that it is the 
 first political editorial that did not send me to sleep." 
 
 " It is certain," said Phellion, " that the editorial appears 
 to me to be stamped with vigor combined with an attic style 
 which we may search in vain for in the columns of the ordi- 
 nary public prints." 
 
 The next day Thuillier was early at the office, to be the 
 first to meet the formidable fire of the ministerial press. 
 After looking through every paper he found that not one of 
 them had even mentioned the "Echo de la Bievre," no 
 more than if it did not exist. When la Peyrade arrived he 
 found his unhappy friend in despair. 
 
 "That is nothing to be surprised at," said la Peyrade, 
 tranquilly. "I let you enjoy yourself yesterday in the hope 
 of a hot encounter with the press ; but I well knew that it was 
 most unlikely that any mention of us would appear in the 
 morning papers. Is not every paper^ brought out with any 
 brilliancy, bound to be met with a conspiracy of silence?" 
 
 "A conspiracy of silence ! " echoed Thuillier, admiringly.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 353 
 
 He did not understand what this meant, but the words had 
 a grand sound and appealed to the imagination. Then la 
 Peyrade explained that by agreement no new journal was men- 
 tioned by the others lest it might serve to advertise the bant- 
 ling. The explanation was not so good as the phrase. The 
 middle-class is ever thus j words are coins which pass without 
 question. For a word he becomes exalted or abased, will in- 
 sult or applaud. With a word he can be brought to make a 
 revolution and overthrow the government he has chosen. 
 
 But the journal was a means to an end. In a few days a 
 letter from several electors appeared thanking the " Echo " 
 for its firm stand and their delegate in the Council for look- 
 ing after the welfare of his district. " This attitude," said 
 the letter, "had brought down upon him the persecution of 
 the government, which, towed in the wake of foreign powers, 
 had sacrificed Poland and sold itself to England. The arron- 
 dissement needed such a man to represent it in the Chamber " 
 and so on. 
 
 This trial balloon had the happiest effect ; the ten or twelve 
 names thus pressed to the front were those who (supposedly) 
 represented the will of the electors and were called " the voice 
 of the quarter." Thus from the start Thuillier's candidature 
 had made such a sprint on the way that Minard hesitated 
 about putting his own claims in rivalry. 
 
 Brigitte was delighted with the course of events ; she now 
 urged that it was high time the marriage was arranged. A 
 thorough explanation took place between the Provencal and 
 the old maid. She told him of her apprehensions as to his 
 taking the lead in the household, and further said that unless 
 they could agree it were better that he should have his own 
 home, adding: "We should not be the less friends for 
 that." 
 
 La Peyrade replied by telling her that nothing was further 
 from his thoughts, nothing in the world could induce him to 
 consent to such an arrangement; he should feel the greatest 
 23
 
 354 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 security if only Brigitte would continue to exercise equally 
 good management when he became one of the family, as she 
 had done in the past. In short, he so completely reassured 
 her that she urged upon him that immediate steps be taken 
 for the publication of the banns and the signing of the mar- 
 riage-contract. She, herself, was to mention the subject to 
 Celeste. 
 
 "My dear child," said she one morning, "I think you 
 have given up all thoughts of becoming Felix Phellion's wife. 
 In the first place, he is more an atheist than ever, and, on the 
 the other, you must have noticed yourself that his mind is 
 unhinged. At Madame Minard's you have seen that Madame 
 Marmus, who married a professor, an officer of the Legion of 
 Honor and a member of the Institute. There could be no 
 more unhappy woman ; her husband has taken her to live at 
 the rear of the Luxembourg, near the Rue Notre-Dame des 
 Champs, in the Rue Duguay-Trouin, a small street that is 
 neither paved nor lighted. When he goes out he does not 
 know which way he is walking ; he finds himself in the Champ 
 de Mars when he meant going to the faubourg Poissonniere ; 
 he is incapable of even giving his address to a hack-driver; 
 and he is so absent-minded that he doesn't know whether or 
 not he has had his dinner. You can imagine what kind of a 
 time a wife must have with a man who has always got his nose 
 in a glass and snuffing at stars." 
 
 "But Felix," said Celeste, " is not as absent-minded as all 
 that." 
 
 " Of course not ; he's much younger ; but by the time he 
 gets that age both his absence of mind and his atheism will 
 increase ; we are all of one accord that he is not a suitable 
 husband for you : your mother, your father, Thuillier, and 
 myself everybody that has any commonsense we have de- 
 cided, therefore, that you shall take la Peyrade, who will put 
 your godfather in the Chamber, and will make his own way 
 beside. We shall give you a much larger dot than we intended
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 35o 
 
 giving any other husband. So it must be considered as settled. 
 The banns will be published and a week from to-day the con- 
 tract will be signed. We shall give a big dinner and your 
 trousseau and corbeille will be shown. Now don't be a baby, 
 but accept it nicely." 
 
 "But, Aunt Brigitte," began Celeste, timidly. 
 
 "There's no 'but' about it, nor <ifs' either," replied the 
 old maid, imperiously. "It's all laid out and will be carried 
 through unless, mademoiselle, you think you know more than 
 your relatives." 
 
 "I will do as you wish, my aunt," answered Celeste, who 
 felt as though a cloud had burst above her head ; she knew 
 only too well that she had not the strength to struggle against 
 the iron will that had just pronounced her doom. She went 
 and sought her godmother, but Mme. Thuillier advised resig- 
 nation and patience ; the poor child saw there was not even a 
 passive resistance to be looked for in that quarter ; her sacri- 
 fice, was virtually accomplished. 
 
 The dinner was ordered from Chabot and Potel, not from 
 Chevet ; for by doing thus Brigitte set her initiative and proved 
 her emancipation from Mme. de Godollo. When the time 
 came to take their places at table three guests were missing 
 two Minards, father and son, and the notary Dupuis. The 
 latter had written saying that it was impossible to be at the 
 dinner, but that he would arrive with the contract at nine 
 o'clock. Julian Minard, said his mother, was suffering with a 
 sore-throat ; Minard senior's absence was unexplained by Mme. 
 Minard, but she begged them not to wait for him as he would 
 assuredly come later. Brigitte on this ordered the soup to be 
 kept hot for him, for among the middle-class code of manners 
 a dinner without soup is not a dinner at all. 
 
 The meal was anything but cheerful, the fare was better, 
 but the life and animation which had graced the famous nomi- 
 nation banquet was sadly missing. The absence of three of 
 the guests may have been one cause ; then Flavie was very
 
 356 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 glum, she had had an interview with la Peyrade at her own 
 house which had ended in tears ; Celeste, even had she been 
 happy in her choice, could not well, as a matter of propriety, 
 have shown too much joy on her countenance ; she made no 
 attempt to brighten a sorrowful face, and dared not look at her 
 godmother, whose appearance looked, so to speak, like one 
 long bleat. The poor girl, seeing this, feared to exchange a 
 look with her, lest she might bring tears to her eyes. Thuil- 
 lier had now become of such importance that he was stiff 
 and pompous ; while Brigitte seemed uneasy, awkward, and 
 constrained. 
 
 Colleville tried a few of his facetious remarks to raise the 
 temperature of the assembly, but the coarse flavor of his 
 artist-jests, in the atmosphere in which they were produced, 
 had an effect like a loud laugh in a sick chamber ; a mute 
 hint from Thuillier, la Peyrade, and his wife that he should 
 behave himself effectually squelched his turbulence. 
 
 Singularly the person who succeeded, aided by Rabourdin, in 
 warming the air was the gravest person of the party. The 
 Abb Gondrin, a man of cultivated and refined mind. He 
 was the former vicar of St. Jacques de Haut-Pas, whose learn- 
 ing and gift of preaching had been the cause of the arch- 
 bishop removing him from that poor quarter to that of the 
 Madeleine. Since Mme. Thuillier and Celeste had again 
 become his parishioners, the young abbe paid them occasional 
 visits. Thuillier had explained to him the merits of the 
 choice of la Peyrade and had culumniated the religious views 
 of Felix Phellion, and had easily got him to contribute by 
 his persuasive words to the resignation of the victim. He 
 had just succeeded in getting off the frost when Minard came 
 in. 
 
 After excusing himself on the ground of his official duties, 
 he exchanged a significant look with his wife, which seemed 
 to give an appearance that he had been detained by some 
 private matter. La Peyrade and Thuillier caught this wink;
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 357 
 
 they had received an order for a box for the celebrated fairy 
 burlesque of " Love's Telegraph," in which Olympe Cardinal 
 was to make her debut, and they were not altogether con- 
 vinced of Julian Minard's indisposition ; they therefore also 
 exchanged significant glances, and wondered if the young 
 gentleman's pot of roses had been discovered and whether the 
 task of the elder one had not been that of learning the truth. 
 
 Being accustomed to pick up the thread of conversation 
 wherever he found it, he tried to hide under a perfect free- 
 dom of spirit his parental anxieties : 
 
 "Gentlemen," said Minard, as soon as he had swallowed a 
 few mouthfuls, " have you heard the great news?" 
 
 " What is that ? " asked several voices at once. 
 
 "The Academy of Sciences has received to-day the par- 
 ticulars of an extraordinary discovery ; the heavens have an- 
 other star." 
 
 " Tt'ens/" said Colleville; "well, that will do to replace 
 that one which Beranger thought had gone from its place, 
 when, to the tune of ' Octavia,' he grieved over Chateaubri- 
 and's departure : ' Chateaubriand, why fly your land ? ' ' 
 
 This quotation, which he sang, exasperated Flavie, and, if it 
 had been the custom for wives to sit next their husbands at 
 table, the old first clarionet of the Opera-Comique would not 
 have got off with a mere " Colleville," which called him to 
 order from the distance. 
 
 "What will give this meeting which I have the honor of 
 addressing," said Minard, "a special interest in the great 
 astronomical event is that the author lives in the twelfth 
 arrondissement, which a number of you still inhabit or did 
 inhabit for a long period of time. Indeed, everything con- 
 nected with this great scientific fact is most remarkable. The 
 Academy, on reading the communication which announced it, 
 was so convinced of its existence, that a deputation was 
 appointed to visit the domicile of this modern Galileo and 
 compliment him on behalf of the whole body ; and yet this
 
 358 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 star is not visible either to the eye even through the telescope ; 
 it is by the force of reasoning and calculation that its exist- 
 ence and the place it occupies are proved beyond all doubt. 
 ' There must be an unknown star in that spot. I cannot see 
 it, but I an: sure of it.' That is what this savant said to the 
 Academy, which he at once convinced by his deductions. And 
 do you know, gentlemen, whom this Christopher Columbus is 
 of the new celestial world ? An old, purblind man, who has 
 'difficulty in seeing his way across the street." 
 
 "That is admirable! marvelous!" cried several guests, 
 with one accord. 
 
 " What is the name of this savant?" asked several voices. 
 
 " Monsieur Picot, or, if you prefer, * old ' Picot, for that is 
 the name everybody gives him in the Rue du Val-de-Grace, 
 where he lives ; he is simply an old professor of mathematics, 
 who, for the rest, has turned out some first-class pupils by- 
 the-by, Felix Phellion, whom we all know, he studied under 
 him, it was he who, on the part of his old master, read the 
 memorial to the Academy." 
 
 At the name of Felix, and remembering the promise to lift 
 her to the sky, which when he said it seemed to savor of 
 lunacy, Celeste looked at Mme. Thuillier, whose face had 
 grown quite animated, and seemed to say to her : 
 
 " Courage, my child, all is not lost." 
 
 " My dear fellow," said Thuillier to la Peyrade, " Felix is 
 coming here this evening, you try and corner him and obtain 
 the communication ; it would be a lucky scoop for our ' Echo ' 
 if we only could get it out first." 
 
 " Oh ! " said Minard, volunteering a reply, " it would just 
 be to the taste of a curious public, for it has made an im- 
 mense sensation. The deputation, not finding Monsieur Picot 
 at home, returned to the office of the minister of public in- 
 struction ; at once the minister hastened off to the Tuileries, 
 and the 'message,' which was issued early this evening, an- 
 nounces that Monsieur Picot is nominated a chevalier of the
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 359 
 
 Legion of Honor and is granted a pension of eighteen hun- 
 dred francs from the fund for the encouragement of the sci- 
 ences and letters." 
 
 "There," said Thuillier, " is a Cross well bestowed." 
 
 " I rather think," said la Peyrade, " that the worthy Mon- 
 sieur Picot is not being well cared for ; for just at this time 
 his family, after failing to get a commission in lunacy, are 
 trying to have trustees appointed. They claim that he is 
 being robbed by a servant who lives with him. Parbleu ! 
 Thuillier, you know her ; it is that woman who came the other 
 day to the office, and who had been led to think that Dupuis, 
 the notary, had gone off with some funds of hers." 
 
 "Yes, yes, very well," said Thuillier, significantly; "yes, 
 you are right, I do know her." 
 
 "It's queer," said Brigitte, improving the occasion to em- 
 phasize the argument she had had with Celeste about Mar- 
 mus', the mathematician, absence of mind, "that all these 
 savants, outside their learning, are good for nothing, and 
 that, when they are at home, they have to be cared for like 
 children." 
 
 "That proves," said the Abbe Gondrin, " how greatly they 
 are absorbed in their studies ; but at the same time they pos- 
 sess an artlessness of nature which is most touching." 
 
 " When they are not as perverse as donkeys," replied Bri- 
 gitte, testily. "As forme, Monsieur 1'Abbe, I can tell you 
 that, if ever I thought of marrying, a professor would not suit 
 me. In the first place, what do they work at, these savants? 
 At stupidities the most part of their time ; for here you are 
 all admiring the discovery of a star, and what good will that 
 do any of us? For my part, I think we have plenty of stars 
 already." 
 
 "Bravo! " Brigitte, said Colleville, again forgetting him- 
 self; " you are truth itself, my girl, and, like you, I think the 
 man who can only discover a new dish would deserve better 
 of mankind."
 
 360 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "Colleville," said Flavie, "I must say that your remarks 
 are in the worst possible taste." 
 
 " My dear demoiselle," said the Abb6 Gondrin, addressing 
 Brigitte, "you might be right if man consisted of matter 
 only, and if there were not bound to our body a soul having 
 instincts and cravings that need to be satisfied. Now I think 
 this sense of the infinite which dwells within us, and which 
 each in his own way endeavors to satisfy, is wonderfully 
 helped by the searchings of astronomy, that from time to time 
 reveals to us new worlds which the hand of the Creator has 
 strewn through space. The infinite within you finds another 
 outlet ; this passion for the welfare of those about you, this 
 warm affection, so ardent, so devoted, which you feel for your 
 brother, are at once the manifestations of the aspirations which 
 have nothing of the material in them, which in seeking their 
 end and object will never ask : ' What good is all this? What 
 is the use of that?' Again, I must assure you that the stars 
 are not without their uses, as you would seem to suppose; 
 without these, navigators would be seriously, impeded in their 
 steering across the seas ; they would be puzzled how to bring 
 from distant lands the vanilla which has served to flavor this 
 delicious cream that I am now eating. So, as observed by 
 Monsieur Colleville, there is much affinity between a dish and 
 a star ; we should decry no person, be it an astronomer or a 
 housekeeper." 
 
 The abb< was interrupted by a noise of loud altercation in 
 the antechamber. 
 
 " I tell you I will go in," shouted a voice. 
 
 "No, monsieur, you shall not go in," replied the "male" 
 domestic. "They are at table, I tell you;, no one should 
 force his way into a private house." 
 
 Thuillier turned pale ; since the seizure of the pamphlet, he 
 fancied all improvised visits betokened the advent of the 
 police. 
 
 Among the various social dogmas laid down by Mnae. de
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 361 
 
 Godollo for Brigitte's guidance, the one that had needed the 
 oftenest repeating was never, as mistress of the house, to rise 
 from the table unless it was intended as the signal for retir- 
 ing ; but present circumstances seemed to give amnesty to the 
 injunction. 
 
 "I'll go and see what it all means," she said to Thuillier, 
 quickly, as she noted his uneasiness. "What is it?" she 
 asked the servant, when she reached the scene of the conflict. 
 
 " Here is a gentleman who is determined to come in ; he 
 says no one dines at eight o'clock." 
 
 "But who are you, monsieur?" said Brigitte to an old 
 man, strangely attired, and whose eyes were protected by a 
 green shade. 
 
 "Madame, I am neither a beggar nor a vagabond," re- 
 plied the old man in a sonorous voice. " I am professor of 
 mathematics, by name Picot." 
 
 "Rue du Val-de-Grace ? " asked Brigitte. 
 
 "Yes, madame, No. 9, next door to the fruit store." 
 
 "Come in, monsieur, come in, we are only too happy to 
 receive you," cried Thuillier, who, hearing the name, had 
 hurried out to meet the savant. 
 
 "He arrived like the 'Great Bear,' " said Colleville, de- 
 ranging a proverb in Leon de Lora's style. 
 
 "Heinf scallawag," said the savant, turning to where the 
 servant had been standing when he entered, but who had re- 
 tired when he saw everything was amicably settled. 
 
 Pere Picot was a tall, spare man, with a severe, angular face, 
 which, in spite of the softening effect of a blonde wig with 
 heavy curls, and the pacific green shade we previously spoke 
 of, had a truculent and surly cast, and which hard study had 
 ornamented with a surface of sickly pallor. He had given 
 proof of his snappish, quarrelsome mind before entering the 
 dining-room, where every one rose to receive him. 
 
 His costume consisted of an over-large frock-coat, some- 
 thing between an overcoat and a dressing-gown \ under thi*
 
 362 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 was a big vest of iron-gray cloth, fastened from the throat to 
 the pit of the stomach with a double row of buttons, huzzar 
 style, and looking like a breast-plate. His trousers, though 
 October was near its close, were of black thin serge, and gave 
 testimony to long wear by dull-looking patches breaking the 
 shining surface caused by wear, and a rough darn covered one 
 knee. But, by daylight, his most striking feature was a pair 
 of Patagonian feet, imprisoned in beaver cloth slippers, which, 
 being moulded upon the mountainous excrescences of gigantic 
 bunions, made one involuntarily think of a dromedary or an 
 advanced case of elephantiasis. 
 
 When he was installed on the chair eagerly placed for him, 
 and the company had resumed their seats at the table, amid 
 the silence born of curiosity : 
 
 " Where is he," cried the old man, in a voice of thunder, 
 " the villain, the scoundrel ? Bring him forth, let me hear 
 his voice." 
 
 "To whom do you refer, my dear sir?" asked Thuillier, 
 in a conciliatory voice, in which was a slight tone of patron- 
 age. 
 
 "A scallawag whom I could not find at his residence, mon- 
 sieur, and they informed me that he was at this house. I 
 am, I believe, in the home of Monsieur Thuillier, member of 
 Council, Place de la Madeleine, first floor above the en- 
 tresol?" 
 
 " Precisely, monsieur," replied Thuillier, "and allow me to 
 add, monsieur, that we are all your respectful sympathizers." 
 
 "And you will permit me, I hope," said Minard, "as th& 
 mayor of the adjoining arrondissement to that in which you 
 reside, to congratulate myself in being present in the com- 
 pany of Monsieur Picot, the one who is without a doubt the 
 discoverer of a star, and by this has immortalized his name." 
 
 "Yes, monsieur," replied the professor, raising once more 
 the stentorian diapason of his voice, " I am Picot (Ne"pomu- 
 cdne), the on$ you speak of, but I have discovered no star.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 363 
 
 I am not such a faddist, my eyes are very weak ; that insolent 
 rascal is making me ridiculous with that hoax. I don't find 
 him here ; he is in hiding, the coward, and dare not sniffle a 
 word before my face." 
 
 "Who is this person you are so annoyed with?" was 
 asked the old man by a number of voices. 
 
 "An unnatural pupil," replied the old mathematician ; "a 
 good-for-nothing a man of parts, though his name is Felix 
 Phellion." 
 
 This name was heard with amazement, as may be imagined. 
 Finding the situation so funny, Colleville and la Peyrade 
 shouted with laughter. 
 
 "You laugh, wretch," cried the irate old man rising from 
 his seat; "just come and laugh within the length of my 
 arm." 
 
 And he brandished an enormous, heavy stick with a China 
 knob, which he used as a guiding cane, thereby nearly knock- 
 ing over a heavy candelabrum on the table on to Mme. 
 Minard's head. 
 
 "You are mistaken, monsieur," said Brigitte, seizing his 
 arm in the nick of time, " Monsieur Felix Phellion is not 
 here. He will most likely be here at our reception, some- 
 what later, but he has not yet arrived." 
 
 " They don't begin very early, your soirees" said the old 
 man, " it is past eight o'clock. However, as Monsieur Felix 
 will come later, you will permit me to wait for him. You 
 were eating dinner, I think ; pray don't allow me to disturb 
 you." 
 
 And he quietly sat down. 
 
 "May I offer you anything?" asked Brigitte; "a glass 
 of champagne and a biscuit ? " 
 
 "As you are so kind, madame," replied the old man. 
 " one never refuses champagne, and I can always eat between 
 meals; you dine very late, though." 
 
 A place was found for him at the table between CoUevill*
 
 364 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 and Mme. Minard ; the musician filled the glass of his new 
 neighbor, before whom was placed a dish of little cakes. 
 
 " Monsieur," said la Peyrade, in a wheedling voice, " you 
 must have seen how surprised we were to hear you complain 
 of Monsieur Felix Phellion, a so gentle young man, so in- 
 offensive. What has he really done that your indignation is 
 so great ? ' ' 
 
 His mouth full of pastry, which he was consuming at a rate 
 which caused Brigitte much agitation, the professor signed 
 that he would give an answer presently. Then, mistaking 
 his glass and gulping down the contents of Colleville's : 
 
 "What has that insolent done?" he replied. "The mis- 
 erable thing and not for the first time, either. He knows 
 that I cannot suffer stars, and with good cause. In 1807, 
 being attached to the Bureau of Longitudes, I took part in a 
 scientific expedition that was sent to Spain under the direction 
 of my friend and colleague, Jean-Baptiste Biot, to determine 
 the arc of the meridian from Barcelona to the Belearic Isles. 
 I was just observing a star, perhaps the very star my rogue of 
 a pupil has discovered, when suddenly, war in the meantime 
 having broken out between France and Spain, the peasants, 
 seeing me perched with a telescope at the top of Mont Galazzo, 
 figured it out that I was signaling to the enemy. An infuri- 
 ated rabble smashed my instruments and talked of stringing 
 me up ; I was go gone up only that the captain of a ship 
 took me prisoner and thrust me into the citadel of Belver, 
 where I spent three years in dire captivity. Since that time, 
 as you may well believe, I have let the whole celestial system 
 alone; though I was, without being aware of the fact, the 
 first to observe the famous comet of 1811 ; but I should have 
 been careful to have said nothing about it only that Monsieur 
 Flauguergues was so foolish as to publish it. Like all rhy 
 pupils, Phellion knows my declared aversion to the stars, and 
 he knew right well that the best trick that he could play upon 
 me would be to saddle one on my back. So that deputation.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 365 
 
 that went through the farce of coming to compliment me was 
 more than lucky in not finding me at home, for, if they had, the 
 respected gentlemen the academicians, and all the Academy 
 included, would have passed a bad quarter of an hour." 
 
 Everybody found the greatest pleasure in this singular mono- 
 mania of the old mathematician. Only la Peyrade was be- 
 ginning to understand the part played by Felix, and he was 
 vexed that he had insisted on the explanation. 
 
 "Still, Monsieur Picot," said Minard, "if Felix Phellion 
 is only culpable by crediting you with this discovery, it seems 
 to me that his indiscretion has been compensated to some ex- 
 tent ; the cross of the Legion of Honor, a pension, and the 
 glory that will accrue to your name." 
 
 "The Cross and the pension I take," said the old man, 
 emptying his glass, which to the great horror of Brigitte he 
 replaced upon the table with such force as to break the stem- 
 "For twenty years the government has owed me them, not 
 for discovering stars, either (things that I have always scorned), 
 but for my celebrated treatise on ' Differential Logarithms,' 
 which Kepler thought proper to term monologarithms, a 
 sequel to Napier's tables; for my ' Postulatum ' of Euclid, 
 which I was the first to solve ; but, above all, for my theory 
 of 'Perpetual Motion,' four volumes, octavo, with plates: 
 Paris, 1825. You can thus see, monsieur, that to give me 
 glory is to pour water into the river. I had so little need of 
 Monsieur Phellion to make me a position in the scientific 
 world, that a long time ago I turned him out of my house in 
 disgrace." 
 
 " Then this is not the first star that he has thrust upon you 
 for a joke?" asked Colleville, flippantly. 
 
 "He did worse than that," cried the old man; "he has 
 tarnished my fame. My theory of ' Perpetual Motion,' the 
 printing of which cost me my all, when it ought to have been 
 printed at the Royal Printery, was enough to have made my 
 fortune and render me immortal-. Well, that wretch, of 4
 
 366 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 Felix hindered it all. From time to time, pretending that he 
 knew my publisher: 'Father Picot,' he would say (the young 
 sycophant), 'here are five hundred francs, or fifteen crowns, 
 or, as it was one time, two thousand francs, which the pub- 
 lisher gave me for you, for your book is selling finely.' This 
 went on for years, and my publisher, who was in the con- 
 spiracy, would say to me when I went to his place : ' Oh ! yes, 
 it is not doing so badly, it fairly bubbles, we shall soon get 
 through the first edition.' I didn't suspect anything, and of 
 course pocketed the money; I thought to myself: 'My book 
 is to their taste, the idea will make its way ; from day to day I 
 may expect that some capitalist will come forward and propose 
 to apply my system to ' " 
 
 "The 'Absorption of Liquids?' " asked Colleville, who 
 had been constantly engaged in filling the old lunatic's glass. 
 
 "No, monsieur, my theory of 'Perpetual Motion,' 4 vols. 
 in 4to, with plates: Paris, 1825. But, bah! days passed 
 along and nobody ever came ; so, thinking my publisher was 
 not energetic enough, I tried to arrange for a second edition 
 with another publisher. This it was, monsieur, that allowed 
 me to discover the whole plot, and I turned the serpent out 
 of doors. In six years there had been only nine copies sold ; 
 kept lulled in false security, I had done nothing to push my 
 book, which had been left to take care of itself; thus was I 
 the victim of jealousy and the blackest malice, and was un- 
 justly despoiled of the value of my labors." 
 
 "But," said Minard, who had constituted himself the 
 mouthpiece of the company, " may we not regard this as an 
 act equally delicate and ingenious to " 
 
 "To give me alms, is that what you mean?" interrupted 
 the old man with a roar that made Mile. Minard jump in her 
 chair; "to humiliate me, dishonor me me, his old tutor; is 
 it that I need the succor of charity ? Has Picot I, Nepo- 
 mucene to whom his wife brought a dowry of one hundred 
 thousand francs, ever held his hand out to anybody? But
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. $67 
 
 nowadays nothing is respected ; old fellows, as they call us, 
 our religion, our good faith is taken advantage of, so that the 
 younger generation may say to the public : ' These old do- 
 tards, can't you see plainly that they are good for nothing? 
 it needs us, the modern men, us, Young France, to step in 
 and bring them up by hand.' You, hobbledehoy, you try to 
 feed me ! But these old dotards have more knowledge in 
 their little finger than you have in your whole brain ; you will 
 never be worth as much as us, miserable little intriguers as 
 you are. As for that matter, I can wait for my revenge ; that 
 young Phellion is bound to come to a bad end ; that which he 
 did to-day, reading before the full board at the Academy a 
 statement in my name, was nothing less than forgery, and the 
 law punishes forgery with the galleys." 
 
 "Quite true," said Colleville, "the forgery of a public 
 star."* 
 
 Brigitte trembled for her glassware, and her nerves tingled 
 at the slaughter of cakes and pastry, so she gave the signal to 
 return to the salon, where a number of guests had already as- 
 sembled. Colleville politely offered his arm to the professor. 
 
 "No, monsieur," said he, "permit me to stay here. I am 
 not dressed for a soiree, and, beside, a strong light injures my 
 eyes. Then, I have no fancy to make an exhibition of my- 
 self; it will be best that the explanation between myself and 
 my pupil should take place between ' four eyes,' as the saying 
 goes." 
 
 No one insisted ; the old man, all unconsciously, had un- 
 crowned himself in the opinion of the guests. But the thrifty 
 housewife, before leaving him, removed everything of a fragile 
 nature from within his reach ; then, by way of a slight recom- 
 pense : 
 
 " Will you take coffee ? " she asked. 
 
 "I'll take it, madame," replied old Picot, "and some 
 cognac, too." 
 
 * It is impossible to produce the pun in English.
 
 3&} WE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 " Bless my life ! he takes everything," said Brigitte to the 
 " male " domestic. 
 
 When Brigitte reentered the salon she found the Abb6 
 Gondrin the centre of a great circle ; as she approached she 
 heard him say : 
 
 "I thank heaven for having granted me such happiness. 
 Never have I felt such an emotion as that aroused by the 
 scene in which we have just participated ; even the somewhat 
 burlesque form of the confidence, certainly very artless, for it 
 was wholly involuntary, but adds to the glory of the astound- 
 ing generosity revealed to us. Placed by my sacred calling 
 in the way of learning of many charities, often also either the 
 witness or intermediary of kindly actions, I think that never 
 in my life before have I met with a so touching or more inge- 
 nious devotion. Keeping the left hand in ignorance of the 
 doings of the right is a great step in Christianity ; but to go 
 so far as to rob one's self of one's own fame to benefit another 
 under such singular circumstances, with every risk of being 
 told he lied, is the gospel applied in its highest precepts ; it is 
 being more than a sister of charity, it is worthy the apostle of 
 benevolence. I would that I knew this noble young man, 
 that I might shake him by the hand." 
 
 Her arm passed through that of her godmother, Celeste was 
 standing near the priest. Her ear heard every word, and as 
 he talked of and analyzed Felix's generous conduct, she 
 clung more closely to Mme. Thuillier's arm, saying in a low- 
 voice : 
 
 "You hear, godmother, you hear ! " 
 
 To crush the inevitable effect which this eulogy would have 
 on Celeste : 
 
 "Unfortunately, Monsieur I'Abbd," said Thuillier, "this 
 young man on whom you have made such a ' grand oration * 
 is not unknown to you. I have had before now occasion to 
 speak of him to you, regretting that we had found it impos- 
 sible to carry out certain plans we had arranged in connection
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 36d 
 
 with him ; I allude to the very compromising attitude he 
 affects in his religious opinions." 
 
 "Oh! is that the young man?" said the abbe; "you 
 surprise me greatly ; I must say that I should not have formed 
 such an idea." 
 
 "You will see him presently, Monsieur 1'Abbd," said la 
 Peyrade, "and if you question him on certain points you will 
 have no difficulty in discovering the ravages that the pride of 
 science can exercise in the most happily tempered souls." 
 
 " I am afraid I shall not see him," said the abbe, "as my 
 black robe would be out of place in the midst of the fashion- 
 able splendor that will soon fill this drawing-room. But you, 
 Monsieur la Peyrade, are a man of sincere religious convic- 
 tions, and as you doubtless feel an interest in that young man's 
 welfare, as I do myself, I just say to you in parting : Do not 
 be uneasy about him ; soon or late such souls always come 
 back to us, and, if the return of these prodigals may be long 
 delayed, I should not despair of seeing them going to God, 
 or that His infinite mercy would fail them." 
 
 As he spoke the abbe looked around for his hat, intending 
 to slip quietly away ; just as he thought it possible to be done 
 unnoticed, he was accosted by Minard : 
 
 "Monsieur," said the Mayor of the Eleventh, "permit me 
 to press your hand and thank you for the felicitous words of 
 tolerance that have fallen from your lips. Oh ! if all priests 
 were like you, religion would soon be victorious. I am in 
 domestic trouble and have to decide on a line of conduct 
 about which I should be glad of your advice." 
 
 " Whenever you please, monsieur," replied the abbe ; " Rue 
 de la Madeleine, No. 8, in rear of the Cite Berryer; after six 
 o'clock mass, I am generally in the whole morning." 
 
 As soon as the abbe had gone, taking Mme. Minard aside : 
 
 " Well, it is true," said Minard, " and the anonymous letter 
 does not misinform us. Monsieur Julian is keeping an actress 
 from Bobino's; it was to be present at her debut at the Folies* 
 24
 
 370 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 Dramatiques that he made a pretense of his throat being sore. 
 .The porter's wife is on bad terms with the creature's mother, 
 an old fish-hawker, and for a hundred sous crown-piece she 
 gave me the full account. This evening I shall have a serious 
 explanation with monsieur, my son." 
 
 "My friend," said Mme. Minard, theatrically, "I implore 
 you, be not violent." 
 
 " Lookout," said Minard ; " everybody can see us. I have 
 just asked the Abbe Gondrin to give us the benefit of his ad- 
 vice ; we may scout the priests when all goes well, but when 
 trouble comes " 
 
 " But, my friend, you take the matter too seriously ; he is 
 but young." 
 
 "Yes," said Minard, "but there are things that cannot be 
 overlooked. The son of a family in the hands of women like 
 her ; it is disreputable ; it is the ruin of his family. You don't 
 know, Zelie, what this dangerous class of actresses are Phryne, 
 Lais, all. They say that our money earned in trade is but 
 stolen ; that it is gained by adulteration and trickery ; they 
 empty our pockets, as they claim, to make us disgorge they 
 mean to, and do, use every means to effect our ruin." 
 
 All at once a terrific uproar put a stopper on this conjugal 
 aside. Into the dining-room rushed Brigitte, whence came 
 the sound of falling furniture and crashing glass ; there she 
 found Colleville engaged in rearranging his cravat and assur- 
 ing himself that his coat, crumpled and dragged out of shape, 
 had not one or more rents in it. 
 
 " What's the matter ? " asked Brigitte. 
 
 "Why this old fool," said Colleville, "is gone crazy. I 
 came here to take my coffee in his company, and, at a little 
 joke I made, he flew into so violent a passion that he seized 
 me by the collar, dragged me over two or three chairs and a 
 tray of glasses, because Josephine was not able to get out of 
 his way in time." 
 
 "It's all because you've been teasing him," said Brigitte,
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 371 
 
 crossly ; " you would have done better to have stayed in the 
 salon instead of coming in here to play your jokes, as you call 
 it, eh ? You always think that you are in the orchestra of the 
 Opera-Comique." 
 
 With this sharp speech, Brigitte, resolute woman that she 
 was, felt that she must get rid of this ferocious old man who 
 threatened her household with fire and blood. She approached 
 old Picot, who was tranquilly amusing himself by burning 
 brandy in his saucer. 
 
 " Monsieur," she cried at the top of her voice, as if she was 
 speaking to a deaf person (she evidently thought a blind one 
 needed the same treatment) ; " I am here to tell you some- 
 thing which you will not like. Monsieur and Madame Phel- 
 lion are now here and inform us that Monsieur Felix, their 
 son, is not coming. He has a sore-throat." 
 
 "Which he got by reading that paper," cried the old pro- 
 fessor, joyfully. "Well, that is justice. Madame, where do 
 you purchase your brandy ? " 
 
 "From my grocer, of course," said Brigitte, taken aback 
 at the question. 
 
 " Well, madame, I think you ought to know that in a house 
 where one can get such excellent champagne, which reminds 
 me of that we used to quaff at de Fontane's table, grand- 
 master of the University, it is shameful to keep such brandy. 
 With the same frankness I put into everything, I tell you 
 plainly that it is only fit to wash your horse's feet in ; if I had 
 not the chance to burn it " 
 
 "He must be the devil in person," said Brigitte; "not a 
 word to excuse himself about all that glass, and now jaws 
 about my brandy ! Monsieur," said she, in the same raised 
 diapason, "Monsieur Felix is not coming; I think your 
 family will be anxious at your long absence, eh?" 
 
 " Family, madame ; I have no family, as they want to make 
 me out to be a lunatic ; however, I have a housekeeper, Ma- 
 dame Lambert ; I think she will be surprised at my being so
 
 372 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 long away. I think I had better go ; but I must confess that 
 I am not sure I can find my way in this strange quarter." 
 
 "Then take a hack." 
 
 "A hack to go, a hack to come; this would be an excel- 
 lent chance for my relatives to say I am a spendthrift," said 
 the testy old fellow. 
 
 " I have an important message to send into your quarter," 
 said Brigitte, who found it was necessary to bear the cost ; 
 " my porter is about taking a hack there if you would care 
 to take advantage of that " 
 
 "I take it, madame," said the old professor, rising; "if it 
 comes to the worst you can testify for me that I was too nig- 
 gardly to pay for hack hire." 
 
 "Henri," said Brigitte to her domestic, " take monsieur 
 down to the janitor x and tell him to do the errand I told him 
 about ; also to take monsieur to his own door and be careful 
 of him." 
 
 "Be careful ! be careful ! " said the old man, refusing the 
 arm of the servant; "what do you take me for, madame, a 
 trunk or a piece of cracked china? " 
 
 Seeing that she had got her man fairly to the door, Brigitte 
 gave her mind free vent : 
 
 " What I said, monsieur, is for your own good, and permit 
 me to remark that you are not of the most agreeable disposi- 
 tion." 
 
 " Be careful ! " repeated the old man ; "but you, perhaps, 
 don't know, madame, that it is words like that that brings a 
 commission in lunacy? However, I won't be too rude in 
 return for your hospitality, the more so that I have been able 
 to put Monsieur Felix, who has purposely missed me, in his 
 right place." 
 
 "Get out, you old brute; get out," said Brigitte, shutting 
 the door behind him. 
 
 The restraint she had placed upon herself compelled her to 
 drink a whole glass of water before returning to the salon ;
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 373 
 
 this obstreperous guest had given her "quite a turn," by her 
 own expression. 
 
 The next morning Minard was shown into Phellion's study. 
 The great citizen and his son Felix were absorbed in an inter- 
 esting conversation. 
 
 "My dear F6lix," said the Mayor of the Eleventh, shak- 
 ing hands heartily with the young professor, " it is you that 
 brings me here this morning ; I come to offer you my con- 
 gratulations." 
 
 " What has happened, then ? " asked Phellion ; " the Thuil- 
 liers, have they at last " 
 
 "It has nothing to do with the Thuilliers," interrupted the 
 mayor. "But," he added, looking at Felix, "you don't 
 mean to tell me that that sly-boots has kept the matter even 
 from you?" 
 
 " I do not think," said the great citizen, " that my son has 
 ever hidden aught from me." 
 
 " So, then, the sublime astronomical discovery which he 
 has communicated to the Academy of Sciences, you know all 
 about?" 
 
 "Your kindly feeling for me, Monsieur le Maire," said 
 Felix, quickly, " has misled you ; I was but the reader, not the 
 author, of the paper." 
 
 "Oh! be quiet!" said Minard, "the reader only! all is 
 known." 
 
 "But see," said Felix, offering Minard the " Constitu- 
 tionnel," "here's the newspaper, which announces the dis- 
 coverer to be Monsieur Picot ; not only so, but it mentions 
 the rewards, without the loss of a moment, that have been 
 bestowed upon him by the government." 
 
 " Felix is right," said Phellion, " that is a faithful journal ; 
 I think the government has acted in this with commendable 
 promptitude." 
 
 "But, my dear commander, I repeat that the secret is
 
 174 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 blown ; your son is shown to be a most admirable fellow. 
 Placing to the account of his old professor his own discovery 
 so as to obtain for him the -favors of the authorities, I cer- 
 tainly do not know of any finer tr,ait in all antiquity." 
 
 "Felix," said Phellion, testifying some emotion, "the 
 immense labor to which you have devoted yourself so persist- 
 ently, those never-ceasing visits to the Observatory " 
 
 "But, my father, Monsieur Minard has been misinformed." 
 
 " Misinformed ! " repeated Minard, " when the whole busi- 
 ness was made known by Monsieur Picot himself." 
 
 At this statement, made in such a way as to preclude all 
 doubt, the truth began to dawn upon Phellion. 
 
 "Felix, my son," he cried, rising to embrace his son. 
 
 But he was compelled to sit down again ; his legs refused 
 to support him, he became pale, and his nature, usually so im- 
 passible, seemed ready to give way under this sudden happy 
 shock. 
 
 "MonDieuf" said Felix, alarmed, "he is ill; ring for 
 help, I beg you, Monsieur Minard." 
 
 He rushed to the old man, rapidly loosened his cravat and 
 collar, and slapped his hands. But this faintness was only 
 temporary, he was soon himself again ; Phellion pressed his 
 son to his breast and there held him for some time ; then, in 
 a voice broken with emotion : 
 
 "Felix, my noble son," said he, "so large of heart, so 
 great in mind." 
 
 The bell had meanwhile been given a resounding peal by 
 the magisterial hand ; the whole household was on its feet. 
 
 "It is nothing, nothing," said Phellion, dismissing the 
 servants, who had rushed in. But at the same moment he 
 caught sight of his wife, who had entered with the others, 
 and resumed his habitual pomposity : 
 
 "Madame Phellion," said he, pointing to Felix, "how 
 many years is it since you brought that young man into the 
 world?"
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 375 
 
 Mme. Phellion, bewildered by the question, hesitated for a 
 moment before replying : 
 
 "Twenty-five years next January." 
 
 "Have you not thought," continued Phellion, "up to 
 now that God has amply gratified your maternal longings by 
 making this child of your womb an honest man, a dutiful 
 son, and one gifted as a mathematician, the science of 
 sciences? " 
 
 "Undoubtedly," said Mme. Phellion, understanding less 
 and less at what her husband was driving. 
 
 " Well," went on Phellion, " you owe heaven an additional 
 meed of thanks for granting that you should become mother 
 of a genius ; those toils, which so lately we condemned and 
 from which we feared the loss of our boy's reason, formed 
 the rough and steep path by which men attain fame." 
 
 "Ah fd/" said Mme. Phellion, "don't you think it would 
 be as well if you would explain yourself? " 
 
 "Monsieur, your son," said Minard, being more cautious 
 this time in administering the happiness he was about to 
 bestow, and fearing another new fainting-fit of joy, "has just 
 made an important astronomical discovery." 
 
 "Truly?" said Mme. Phellion, going up to Felix and 
 taking him by both hands quite lovingly. 
 
 "When I say important," continued Minard, " I only try 
 to spare your maternal emotions ; it is a great, a bewildering 
 discovery, as I said. He is but twenty-five, yet his name is 
 already immortal." 
 
 "And this is the man," said Mme. Phellion, effusively 
 embracing her son Felix, " to whom that la Peyrade is pre- 
 ferred ! " 
 
 "They do not prefer him, madame," said Minard, "for 
 the Thuilliers are not the dupe of that intriguer ; but he has 
 become necessary to them. Thuillier thinks that by his 
 means he can become a deputy. The election is not yet 
 won ; they are sacrificing Celeste in gaining it."
 
 376 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 " But that is atrocious," said Mrae. Phellion, " to consider 
 ambition before a child's happiness." 
 
 "Ah!" sa'id Minard, "Celeste is not their child; she is 
 their adopted daughter." 
 
 "Yes, on Brigitte's side," said Mme. Phellion; "but on 
 the side of Handsome Thuillier " 
 
 " My dear," said Phellion, " no recriminations ; the good 
 God has sent us much comfort. Beside, that marriage, about 
 which I regret to see Felix does not behave with his custom- 
 ary philosophy, may still not take place." 
 
 Felix shook his head incredulously. 
 
 "Yes," said Minard, observing this, "the commander is 
 right. Last evening, when the contract was to be signed, 
 a hitch occurred. You were not present, by-the-by; your 
 absence was remarked." 
 
 "We were invited," said Phellion, "but at the last mo- 
 ment we felt that we should be placed in an equivocal posi- 
 tion, and then Felix was overcome with excitement and fatigue 
 which is now apparent as having been caused by his essay 
 read before the Academy. It would have been bad form to 
 go without him, so we absented ourselves." 
 
 The vicinage of the man whom he had come to pronounce 
 immortal did not prevent Minard, when the chance was thus 
 presented, of rolling under his tongue that most tender morsel 
 of the middle-classes gossip. 
 
 "Figure to yourself," said he, "the most extraordinary 
 things that occurred at the Thuilliers last night, one succeed- 
 ing the other." Then he started off with the funny episoda 
 of old Picot's visit, following this by the warm approval 
 given to Felix by the Abbe Gondrin and the desire expressed 
 by the young preacher of meeting him. 
 
 " I'll call on him," said Felix; " do you know where he 
 resides?" 
 
 "Rue de la Madeleine, No. 8," replied Minard; " I have 
 just this minute left him. I saw him on a most delicate mat-
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 377 
 
 ter, and his advice was shrewd and charitable. But that was 
 not the great event of the evening. Every one was present to 
 hear the contract read ; they watted in expectation of the 
 notary for a full hour, but he never came." 
 
 "Then the contract was not signed," said Felix eagerly. 
 
 " Nor even read, my friend. All at once some one came 
 in to say that the notary had started for Brussels. ' ' 
 
 "Undoubtedly on more urgent business," said Phellion, 
 innocently. 
 
 "Much more urgent," replied Minard, "a little bank- 
 ruptcy of five hundred thousand francs, which the gentleman 
 skipped." 
 
 " But whom is this public officer," demanded Phellion, 
 " so recreant to his trust, as, in this scandalous manner, to 
 forego the sacred duties of his calling ? " 
 
 " Think now ! your neighbor, on the Rue St. Jacques, 
 the notary Dupius." 
 
 "What ! " said Mme. Phellion, "so pious a man as he? 
 Why he is the parish churchwarden." 
 
 "Ah! madame," said Minard, "it is just those very peo- 
 ple who go it ; he is not the only one." 
 
 " Tell us all about it," said Mme. Phellion, with animation. 
 
 "Well, it seems," Minard went on, "that this canting 
 swindler had the savings of a number of servants placed in his 
 hands, and that Monsieur la Peyrade you see they are all in 
 a clique, these pious folk was charged with the duty of 
 recruiting clients for him among that class." 
 
 "I always said he was no good, that Provencal," said 
 Mme. Phellion. 
 
 "Just recently," replied the mayor, "he had placed with 
 Dupuis the savings of an old housekeeper, herself one of the 
 pious, amounting to quite a nice little sum ; my faith ! it was 
 worth a care twenty-five thousand francs, if you please ; this 
 housekeeper, named Madame Lambert " 
 
 "Madame Lambert," interrupted Felix, in his turn; "but
 
 378 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 that is M. Picot's housekeeper scrimpy-cap, a pale, thin 
 face, shows no hair, al way % speaks with lowered eyes? " 
 
 "That's the very woman, a true picture of a hypocrite," 
 said Minard. 
 
 "Twenty-five thousand francs of savings!" said Felix; 
 "I am no longer astonished that poor old Picot is always 
 pinched." 
 
 "So that some one had to meddle with the sale of his 
 books," said Minard, slyly. " Well, however that may be, 
 you can imagine that she was in a dreadful state when she 
 heard of the notary's flight. First, she went to la Peyrade's 
 lodgings out, but dining at the Thuilliers ; to the Thuilliers 
 then, arriving there at ten o'clock, when all the gaping com- 
 pany sat wondering what next to do, neither Brigitte nor 
 Thuillier having sense enough to redeem such an awkward 
 position ; I can tell you we all missed the finesse of Madame 
 de Godollo and the talent of Madame Phellion " 
 
 "You are too polite, Monsieur le Maire," said Mme. Phel- 
 lion, primly. 
 
 '*Well, as I said, there she was in the vestibule and asking 
 for la Peyrade, of course being greatly excited." 
 
 "Quite naturally," said Phellion, "he was the interme- 
 diary, the woman had the right to question him." 
 
 "You should just have seen the Tartuffe," continued 
 Minard. " He had scarcely left the room when he returned 
 with the news. As everybody was anxious to be going, there 
 was a general stampede. Then what does our man do ? He 
 goes back to Madame Lambert, who never ceased crying she 
 was ruined ! she was lost ! which, of course, may have been 
 true, but might also merely have been a scene carefully ar- 
 ranged between them before all the guests in the ante- 
 chamber. 'Reassure yourself, my worthy woman,' said the 
 editor-in-chief of the ' Echo de la Bievre,' ' the investment was 
 made at your own request; consequently, I owe you nothing; 
 but it is sufficient that as the money passed through my hands
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 379 
 
 my conscience tells me that I am responsible ; if the assignees 
 of the notary do not realize enough, I will pay you in 
 full.' " 
 
 "Yes, just what I should have done and said," put in Phel- 
 lion. " Such upright conduct cannot be termed Jesuitism." 
 
 "You! why, certainly you would have acted the same, so 
 should I," said Minard ; " but we should not have performed 
 it to the sound of a brass band, but have paid it quietly, like 
 gentlemen. But this election manipulator, with what can he 
 pay? Out of the dot/" 
 
 At this moment entered the little servant-boy, who handed 
 a letter to Phellion junior recognizing it as from M. Picot, 
 and written by Mme. Lambert. Obtaining permission to 
 peruse it, and informing them whom it was from, he passed it 
 to his father : 
 
 " You may read it aloud, if you wish," said he. 
 
 "He rakes your hair nicely, I guess," said Minard. "I 
 never saw anything so comical as his fury last night." 
 
 Phellion took the letter and in a pompous voice and man- 
 ner: 
 
 " My dear Filix," began the great citizen, " I have just received your 
 note ; it arrived in the nick of time, for they tell me that I was in a rage 
 with you. You say that in being culpable in abusing my confidence (about 
 which I proposed giving you a good whigging), in order to give a knock- 
 out blow to my family by showing that a man who was capable of making 
 the elaborate calculations necessary for this discovery you have made was 
 not by any means the man to be accounted a lunatic, and to have his af- 
 fairs controlled by others. This argument pleases me, it is such an excel- 
 lent answer to the infamous proceedings taken against me by my relations; 
 I must commend you for thinking of it. But you sold that idea pretty 
 dear when you placed it in juxtaposition with a star, making me, me ! its 
 philosopher and friend. It is not at my age and when I have solred the 
 great problem of ' perpetual motion ' that a man should trouble himself 
 about such trumpery rubbish ; all right for such. gabies and sucking-scien- 
 tists as yourself; that is just wh.it I said to the Minister of Instruction this 
 morning, by whom I must acknowledge I was received with great urban- 
 ity. I asked him whether, as he had made a mistake and sent them to 
 
 2 A
 
 380 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 the wrong address, he had perhaps better take back his Cross and his pen. 
 sion, though I certainly deserved them for other things. 
 
 " ' The government,' answered the minister, ' is not in the habit of mak- 
 ing mistakes; what it does, it always does well; it never annuls an ordi- 
 nance given under the hand of his majesty ; your excellent work has well 
 merited the two favors granted by the King ; it is an old debt, I am only 
 too pleased to pay it off in his name.' 
 
 " ' But Felix ? ' I said ; ' for after all, for a young man, it was not such a 
 bad discovery.' 
 
 " ' Monsieur Felix Phellion,' the minister replied, ' will to-day receive 
 his appointment as chevalier of the Legion of Honor; the King will sign 
 the order this morning ; it happens, too, that just now there is a vacancy 
 in the Academy of Sciences, and if you are not a candidate ' 
 
 " ' I in the Academy ! ' I interrupted, with the frankness of speech you 
 know so well, 'I execrate all the academies; they are wet blankets, as- 
 semblies of slothfulness, stores with fine signs and nothing to sell.' 
 
 Well,' said the minister, smiling, ' I think at the forthcoming election 
 M. Felix Phellion has every chance of being elected, the influence of the 
 government will be at his back, which I account a potent factor.' 
 
 " There, my poor boy, this is all that I have been able to do to-day to re- 
 ward you for your good intentions and to prove that I no longer bear malice. 
 I think my relations will pull a rather long face. Come and talk it over 
 with me as soon as possible, say about four o'clock for I don't dine after 
 bedtime, as I saw a lot of folk doing last night in a house where I took 
 occasion to speak of your talent in a manner much to your advantage. 
 Mme. Lambert, who can handle a pan better than a pen, will distinguish 
 herself, although it is Friday, and you know she never lets me off on a 
 fast day; but she promises me a dinner for an archbishop, with a half- 
 bottle of champagne, which if required can be doubled, to redden the 
 ribbon. Your old professor and friend, 
 
 " Pi COT, 
 " Chevalier of the Legion of Honor. 
 
 " P. S. Is it possible to obtain from your worthy mother a little flask 
 of that excellent old cognac that you once gave me ? Not a drop is left, 
 and yesterday I was compelled to drink some that wasn't good enough to 
 wash a horse's feet in ; I did not hesitate to so inform the charming Hebe 
 who served me." 
 
 " Certainly, yes, he shall have some," said Mme. Phellion ; 
 "and not a flask only, but a litre."
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 381 
 
 "And I," said Minard, "who pique myself on mine, will 
 also send him a few bottles ; but pray don't let him know 
 from whom it came be my sponsor for there is no saying 
 how he would take it." 
 
 "Wife," said Phellion, "bring me a white cravat and a 
 black coat. Monsieur the Mayor will excuse me, if I leave 
 him." 
 
 " I must be going myself," said Minard, " for I have a little 
 affair on with monsieur, my son, who has not discovered a 
 star." 
 
 Phellion, not saying whither he was going, though anxiously 
 questioned by his wife, sent for a hack, and half-an-hour after 
 found himself in the presence of Brigitte, who was superin- 
 tending the careful putting away of the china, glass, and silver 
 used the previous night. 
 
 "Well, Papa Phellion," said the old maid, they had pro- 
 ceeded into the salon, "you gave us the slip yesterday; you 
 had a keener, nose than the others. Do you know the trick 
 the notary played us?" 
 
 " I know all," said Phellion, " and the unexpected check you 
 have received in the execution of your projects is what I shall 
 take as my text for the important conversation which I wish to 
 have with you. At times it seems as though Providence took 
 pleasure in counteracting our best-devised plans ; sometimes 
 it seems also to intimate that we tend too much to the right 
 or left, and the obstacles it raises in our path are apparently 
 meant to give us a pause that we may reflect upon our way." 
 
 "Providence! Providence!" said the strong-minded Bri- 
 gitte, "it seems to me has something else to do than look 
 after us." 
 
 " That is one opinion," replied Phellion, " but I have often 
 seen its decrees in the little as in the great things of life ; and 
 certainly if it had permitted the fulfillment of your arrange- 
 ments with M. de la Peyrade to have been begun as intended, 
 you would not have seen me here."
 
 382 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "Then," said Brigitte, "you think that the notary having 
 defaulted, the marriage will not take place, eh ? But for lack 
 of a monk the abbey did not close." 
 
 "My dear lady," said the great citizen, "you will do me 
 the justice to acknowledge that neither my wife nor myself 
 have attempted at any time to influence your decision ; we 
 have allowed the young people to love each other without 
 troubling ourselves as to where such attachment might lead 
 and " 
 
 "To upsetting their minds," interrupted Brigitte; "that 
 is just what love does, and that is why I deprived myself of 
 it." 
 
 " What you remark is indeed true as regards my unhappy 
 son," replied Phellion; "for, notwithstanding the lofty occu- 
 pations by which he has tried to distract his thoughts, he is so 
 overcome this morning, despite the glorious success he has 
 attained, that he is talking of circumnavigating the globe 
 an undertaking which would mean his absence from home for 
 three years, if, indeed he escaped the dangers of a voyage so 
 prolonged." 
 
 " Well," said Brigitte, " it is not such a bad idea ; he would 
 return consoled, especially if he discovered two or three or 
 more stars." 
 
 " His present discovery satisfies us," replied Phellion, with 
 double his usual solemnity. "It is under the auspices of that 
 triumph which has raised his name so high in the world of 
 science that I have the assurance to say to you point-blank : 
 I come, mademoiselle, to ask you, on behalf of my son, Felix 
 Phellion, who loves and is beloved, for the hand of Made- 
 moiselle Celeste Colleville." 
 
 "But, my little father," replied Brigitte, " you are too 
 late ; remember that we are diametrically engaged to la Pey- 
 rade." 
 
 "It is never too late to do well, they say ; yesterday, in my 
 idea, would have been too soon to have presented myself.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 383 
 
 My son, having no compensation to offer for the disparity in 
 fortune, could not then have said : ' If Celeste by your 
 generosity has a dot which mine is far from equaling, I have 
 the honor of being a member of the royal order of the Legion 
 of Honor, and shall soon, to all appearance, be a member of 
 the Academy of Sciences, one of the five branches of the 
 Institute.' " 
 
 "Certainly," said Brigitte, "Felix is becoming a very 
 pretty match, but our word is passed to la Peyrade ; his name 
 has been put up with Celeste's at the mayor's office, and 
 only for an extraordinary accident the contract would have 
 been signed ; he is engaged in Thuillier's election, which he 
 has put in good shape ; we have capital invested with him in 
 this newspaper business ; it would be impossible for us to go 
 back on our promise even if we so desired." 
 
 " So," said Phellion, " in one of those rare occasions in 
 which reason and inclination point the same way, you think 
 you must be only guided by the question of interest ? Ce- 
 leste, we all know, has no inclination for la Peyrade. Brought 
 up with Felix " 
 
 " Brought up with Felix ! " interrupted Brigitte, "she was 
 given a certain length of time to choose between Monsieur de 
 la Peyrade and monsieur, your son, that's how we coerce her, 
 and she would have nothing to say to Monsieur Felix, whose 
 atheism is well known." 
 
 " You are mistaken, mademoiselle, my son is not an atheist ; 
 for Voltaire himself doubted if there could be atheists ; no 
 later than yesterday, in this very house, an ecclesiastic, as 
 celebrated for his talent as for his virtue, after making an 
 eulogistic speech in favor of my son, expressed the desire of 
 becoming known to him." 
 
 "Parbleu ! to convert him," said Brigitte ; " but as for this 
 business of the marriage, I am sorry to tell you that the mus- 
 tard is mixed too late for the dinner ; never will Thuillier give 
 up his la Peyrade."
 
 384 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 " Mademoiselle," said Phellion, rising, "I feel no humili- 
 ation in having taken this useless step ; I do not even request 
 you to keep it secret, for I shall be the first to talk of it to all 
 our acquaintances and friends." 
 
 "Talk away, my good man, to whoever you wish," said 
 Brigitte, bitterly. "Just because your son has discovered a 
 star, if, indeed, he did really discover it, and not that old 
 man whom the government has decorated, do you think that 
 he can marry one of the daughters of the King of the 
 French?" 
 
 " Enough," said Phellion, " we will say no more ; without 
 wishing to depreciate the Thuilliers, I might reply that the 
 Orleans family seems to me the more distinguished of the 
 two. But I do not wish to introduce ascerbity into our con- 
 versation, and, therefore, begging you to receive the assurance 
 of my humble respects, I will retire." 
 
 This said he made a majestic exit, leaving Brigitte under 
 the sting of his comparison, discharged after the manner of the 
 Parthian's* arrow in extremis, and she in a rage all the more 
 savage because the evening before Mme. Thuillier, after the 
 guests had gone, had had the incredible audacity to say some- 
 thing in favor of Felix. It is needless to say that the helot 
 was brutally snubbed and told to mind her own business. But 
 this attempt at showing a will of her own on the part of her 
 sister-in-law had already put the old maid in a vile humor, 
 and Phellion, speaking on the same subject, had further exas- 
 perated her. 
 
 Josephine the cook and the "male" domestic received 
 the full force of the after-clap resulting from this scene. Bri- 
 gitte found that in her absence everything had been wrongly 
 done, so "turning to" herself, at the risk of her neck, she 
 clambered on a chair to reach the topmost shelves of the 
 closet in which she kept her choicest china under lock and 
 key. 
 
 * Fighting only on horseback, they were noted archers.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 385 
 
 This day, which for Brigitte had opened so badly, was to 
 turn out one of the busiest and stormiest of all this story. 
 
 As an exact historian we must go back and begin the day at 
 six o'clock in the morning, when we see Mme. Thuillier 
 on her way to the Madeleine to hear the mass which the 
 Abbe Gondrin celebrated at that hour, and afterward to ap- 
 proach that holy table, a viaticum which pious souls never 
 fail to fortify themselves with when it is in their minds to 
 accomplish some great resolution. 
 
 At eight o'clock, as we have learned, Minard had called 
 upon the young vicar by virtue of his appointment. The 
 Abbe Gondrin gently blamed him for training his son to a 
 profession which, while it seems to lead to a life of hard work 
 and study, really tempts a youth to every folly : barristers 
 without briefs and doctors without patients, when impecu- 
 nious, are the nursery grounds of revolution and mischief; so, 
 when they are rich, they ape the youthful aristocracy, which, 
 bereft of all its privileges but the dolce far niente, devotes the 
 leisure of an idle and useless life to training horses for the 
 course or women for the stage. 
 
 In this particular instance the strong proceedings contem- 
 plated by the Mayor of the Eleventh were purely chimerical. 
 There is no longer a Saint-Lazare for the accommodation of 
 wild youth, and Manon Lescauts are no longer kidnapped to 
 America. The abbe suggested that the father should suffer 
 some pecuniary sacrifice ; the siren should be paid off and 
 married out of the way ; thus would morality triumph in two 
 ways. As the girl had a mother, the better plan would be for 
 Minard to send for and treat with her. 
 
 About mid-day the Abbe Gondrin had a visit paid him by 
 Mme. Thuillier and Celeste. The poor child wanted some 
 further explanation of the words by which the priest, in 
 Brigitte's salon, had vouched for Felix Phellion's salvation. 
 It seemed strange to this young theologian that without 
 25
 
 386 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 practicing religion a soul could be admitted to mercy by 
 Divine justice, for surely the anathema is explicit: " Out of 
 the church there is no salvation." 
 
 "My dear child," said the Abbe Gondrin, "you must 
 learn to better understand those words which seem so inexor- 
 able. It is spoken more to the glorification of those who 
 have the happiness to dwell within the pale of our holy mother 
 the church than a malediction on those who are so unfortunate 
 as to be separated from it. God sees the depths of all hearts 
 and knows His elect ; and so great is the treasure of His 
 loving-kindness that it has been given to none to limit its 
 generosity and abundance. Who shall dare to say to God, 
 the Omnipotent : < Thus far Thou shall be generous and 
 munificent.' Jesus Christ forgave the woman taken in 
 adultery ; on the cross He promised paradise to the repentant 
 thief; these show us that His wisdom and mercy and not man's 
 judgments shall be supreme. He who thinks himself a 
 Christian may in the eyes of God be but an idolater ; another 
 who may be thought to be a pagan may, by his feelings and 
 actions, and unknown to himself, be a Christian. Our holy 
 religion has this that is divine about it all generosity, all 
 grandeur, all heroism, are but the practice of its precepts. 
 As I said yesterday to Monsieur de la Peyrade, pure souls 
 must always be won over in the end ; we have but to give 
 them time ; it is most important to give them due credit, a 
 confidence which returns great dividends ; beside all, charity 
 commends it." 
 
 "Oh! my God!" cried Celeste, "to see this too late; 
 I who could have chosen between Felix and la Peyrade, and 
 dared not follow the dictates of my heart. Oh ! monsieur, 
 could you not speak to my mother? She always listens to 
 your words." 
 
 "That is impossible, my child," replied the vicar; " if I 
 had the direction of the conscience of Madame Colleville 
 I might perhaps say a word, but we are too often accused of
 
 THE MIDDLE. CLASSES. 387 
 
 imprudently intermeddling in family affairs. Believe me, 
 my intervention would be more like to do harm than good. 
 It is for yourself and those who love you," he added, glancing 
 at Mme. Thuillier, " to see if the already so advanced arrange- 
 ments could not be changed in the direction of your wishes." 
 
 It was written that the poor child was to drink to the dregs 
 the cup of her own intolerance ; as the abb6 finished speaking 
 his housekeeper came in to ask if he would receive M. Felix 
 Phellion. Thus, like the charter of 1830, Mme. de Godollo's 
 officious mendacity had become a truth. 
 
 " Pass out this way," said the vicar hastily, showing out his 
 two penitents by a private passage. 
 
 Life has such strange encounters that it does at times happen 
 that the same form of proceeding must be used by a courtesan 
 as a man of God. 
 
 " Monsieur 1'AbbeV' said Felix, " I have heard of the very 
 kind manner in which you spoke of me yesterday in Monsieur 
 Thuillier's salon ; I should have hastened to call upon you to 
 express my thanks even if another interest had not brought 
 me hither." 
 
 The Abbe Gondrin hastily passed over the compliments, 
 being anxious to learn in what manner his services might be 
 useful. 
 
 "With thoughts which I believe to be charitable," said the 
 young professor, " you were spoken to yesterday about the 
 state of my soul. Those who read it so fluently are able to 
 know far more about my inner being ; for during the past few 
 days I have experienced strange, inexplicable feelings. I 
 have never denied God ; but face to face with that infinitude 
 in which he has permitted my mind to follow the traces of 
 His work, I seem to have gathered a less vague sense of Him, 
 and one more immediate ; this has led me to ask whether an 
 honest, upright life is the only homage His omnipotence 
 expects of me. And yet there are numberless objections 
 which arise in my mind against the worship of which you are
 
 &8 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 a minister, and, while sensible of the beauty of the exterior 
 form, in many of its precepts and practices I find myself 
 deterred by my reason. I may pay dearly, perhaps the hap- 
 piness of my whole life, for the indifference and delay which I 
 have shown in seeking the solution of my doubts. It is now 
 that I have decided to search them to the bottom. None 
 better than yourself, Monsieur 1'Abbe", can solve my doubts. 
 It is a cruelly afflicted soul that appeals to you. Is this not 
 a good preparation for receiving the seed of your word ? By 
 what studies can I pursue the search for light?" 
 
 The abbe protested his joy which, notwithstanding his in- 
 sufficiency, he would endeavor to reply to the scruples ad- 
 vanced by the young professor. After inviting him to often 
 call upon him, and begging Felix to accept him as his friend, 
 he asked him to read as a first step the "Thoughts" of 
 Pascal. A natural affinity in their talent for geometry might 
 be found to exist between them. 
 
 While this scene was passing, another one of sharp and 
 bitter discord, that chronic malady of middle-class house- 
 holds, where the pettiness of mind and deep passion leaves an 
 open door by which it enters, was raging in the Thuillier 
 house. 
 
 Mounted on her chair, her hair in disarray, her hands and 
 face disfigured by dust and dirt, Brigitte, feather-duster in 
 hand, was cleaning the shelves of the closet in which she was 
 replacing her library of plates, dishes, and sauce-boats, when 
 Flavie came in. 
 
 "Brigitte," said she, "when you have finished what you 
 are about you had better come and see us, or else I will send 
 Celeste to you, it seems to me she intends giving us some of 
 her nonsense." 
 
 " In what way ? " asked Brigitte, going on with her dusting. 
 
 "Yes, I think she and Madame Thuillier went this morn- 
 ing to see the Abbe Gondrin, for she has given me a fine 
 setting-to about Felix Phellion, talking of him as if he were a
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 389 
 
 god ; you can easily understand that to refuse la Peyrade is 
 but another step." 
 
 "Those cursed skull-caps," said Brigitte, "they are all the 
 time meddling in something. I didn't want to invite him, 
 but you would insist." 
 
 " But it was only proper." 
 
 "What do I care for what is proper?" replied the old 
 maid. " He is a maker of long speeches, who puts his foot 
 into it. Send Celeste to me. I'll fix her " 
 
 At this instant the servant announced the arrival of the 
 head-clerk of the notary, chosen in default of Dupuis, to draw 
 up the contract. Not giving a thought to her disordered 
 appearance, Brigitte ordered him to be shown in. However, 
 she had the decency to come down from her perch to talk to 
 him. 
 
 " Monsieur Thuillier," said the clerk, " came to our office 
 this morning and explained the clauses of the contract he is 
 so good as to intrust to us. But before writing out the stipu- 
 lations of the marriage, we usually obtain from the mouth of 
 each donor a direct expression of their intentions. Monsieur 
 informed us that he intended giving the bride, at his death, 
 the reversion of the house he inhabits, which, I presume, is 
 this one." 
 
 "Yes," said Brigitte. "As for me, I give three thousand 
 francs per year in the Three-per-cents, capital and interest ; 
 but the bride is married under the dotal system." 
 
 " That is so," said the clerk, consulting his notes. " Now 
 there is Madame Celeste Thuillier, wife of Louis-Jerome 
 Thuillier, who gives six thousand in the Three-per-cents, with 
 six thousand more at her death." 
 
 " That," said Brigitte, " is as safe as if the notary had seen 
 her ; however, if it is usual for you to see them, my sister-in- 
 law is here ; they will conduct you to her." 
 
 And the old maid told the servant to take the clerk to Mme. 
 Thuillier. A moment later the clerk returned, saying there
 
 390 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 was evidently some misunderstanding, for Mme. Thuillier 
 said she had no intention of making any settlement whatever 
 in the contract. 
 
 "Here's a pretty go," said Brigitte; "come with me, 
 monsieur." 
 
 And like a cyclone she rushed into Mme. Thuillier' s cham- 
 ber. She was pale and trembling. 
 
 " What is this you have told monsieur, that you give noth- 
 ing toward Celeste's dot?" 
 
 "Yes," said the slave, declaring insurrection, but in a 
 skaking voice; "my intention is to do nothing." 
 
 "Your intentions!" said Brigitte, scarlet with rage; 
 " that's something new." 
 
 " They are my intentions," said the mutineer. 
 
 "At least you will give your reason why?" 
 
 "The marriage does not suit me." 
 
 "Ah ! since when?" 
 
 "It is useless that monsieur should listen to our discus- 
 sion," said Mme. Thuillier, " it will not appear in the con- 
 tract." 
 
 "You do well to be ashamed of yourself," said Brigitte, 
 "for you don't appear in a very favorable light Mon- 
 sieur," said she, turning to the clerk, "it is easier to mark 
 out things in a contract than to add them, eh?" 
 
 The clerk nodded in the affirmative. 
 
 " Then draw it up as originally told ; later, if madame still 
 persists, you can strike it out." 
 
 The clerk bowed and left the room. When the two sisters- 
 in-law were alone : 
 
 "So you've lost your head, have you?" asked Brigitte. 
 "What freak is this you have taken? " 
 
 "It is a not a freak ; it is a solid idea." 
 
 " For which we have to thank your Abb6 Gondrin ; you 
 dare not deny that you went with Celeste to see him?" said 
 Brigitte.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 891 
 
 " Yes, Celeste and I did call this morning upon our con- 
 fessor, but I did not open my mouth about what I intended." 
 
 "So, then, it sprouted out of your empty head?" 
 
 " I told you yesterday that a more suitable marriage could 
 be arranged for Celeste than this; I don't see that I should 
 despoil myself in favor of a marriage that I do not approve." 
 
 " That you approve ! Upon my word, we must begin and 
 ask madame's advice." 
 
 "I know well enough that I have been a nobody in the 
 house," said Mme. Thuillier. "But I don't care for myself; 
 I do, though, care for the happiness of a child, which I look 
 upon as if she were my own " 
 
 " You were never smart enough to have one," cried Brigitte; 
 'for certainly Thuillier " 
 
 "Sister," said Mme. Thuillier, with dignity, "I took the 
 communion this morning; those are things that I cannot 
 listen to." 
 
 "There's just our good sacrament-eaters," cried Brigitte, 
 "acting the holy hypocrite and bringing trouble into the 
 household. And you think it will end here, do you? Thuil- 
 lier will be here soon ; he'll shake you up " 
 
 By calling on the marital authority, Brigitte made confes- 
 sion of her weakness before the unexpected resistance made 
 to her inveterate tyranny. Mme. Thuillier became calmer as 
 Brigitte waxed more wroth ; she could return nothing but 
 insolence : 
 
 "A drawl," she shrieked, "a lazy, good-for-nothing, in- 
 capable of even picking up her handkerchief this wants to be 
 mistress of the house ! " 
 
 "That I don't wish to be, but I will be mistress of my own 
 property, and I shall keep it to use as I think best." 
 
 " Good dog, there ! " said Brigitte, ironically, " her prop- 
 erty?" 
 
 "Mine, yes, that which I had from my father and my 
 mother, which I brought a my dot to Monsieur Thuillier,"
 
 392 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "And who was it then that turned it over this money, and 
 made it bring in twelve thousand francs a year?" 
 
 "I have asked account of nothing," replied Mme. Thuil- 
 lier, gently; " if it had been lost in the uses you made of it 
 you would not have heard a word of complaint from me, as it 
 has prospered it is only fair I should reap the benefit. I do 
 not reserve it for myself." 
 
 " That's how it may happen if you give yourself such airs; 
 it is not so sure that you and I will long pass in and out by the 
 same door." 
 
 "You think, perhaps, that Monsieur Thuillier will cast me 
 off? He must have cause, thank God, before he can do that. 
 I have been a wife without reproach." 
 
 " Viper ! hypocrite ! heartless ! " cried Brigitte, at the end 
 of her arguments. 
 
 " My sister," said Mme. Thuillier, "you are in my apart- 
 ments." 
 
 " Get out then, dish-rag," yelled the old maid, in a parox- 
 ysm of fury. "If I didn't restrain myself " 
 
 And she made a gesture of insulting menace. 
 
 Mme. Thuillier rose to leave the room. 
 
 "No, you don't," cried Brigitte, pushing her down again, 
 " and until Thuillier returns and decides what is to be done 
 with you, I shall leave you locked up where you are." 
 
 When Brigitte, her face aflame, returned to Mme. Colle- 
 ville, she found her brother, whose early return she had pre- 
 dicted. He was radiant. 
 
 " My dear," said he, not noticing the state she was in, " all 
 goes well ; the conspiracy of silence is at an end ; two papers, 
 the ' National ' and a Carlist journal, have this morning re- 
 produced two of our articles, and there's a little attack in a 
 ministerial paper." 
 
 "All is not going well here, though," replied Brigitte, "and 
 if things continue as they are I shall leave the barracks," 
 
 " What has upset you?" asked Thuillier,
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 393 
 
 "Your insolent wife, who has made quite a scene; it has 
 caused me to tremble all over." 
 
 "Celeste made a scene!" said Thuillier; " then it's the 
 first time in her life." 
 
 " Everything has a beginning, and if you don't bring her to 
 order " 
 
 " But what is it all about this scene? " 
 
 "About Madame Thuillier not agreeing that la Peyrade 
 should have her goddaughter ; she says she will give nothing 
 in the contract." 
 
 "Come, compose yourself," said Thuillier, whom the ad- 
 mission of the " Echo " into the field polemic had made into 
 another Pangloss; " I'll soon settle all this." 
 
 "You," said Brigitte to Flavie, "had better return home 
 and tell Celeste not to see me; I don't like conspiracies, and 
 I might box her ears. You can tell her that if she doesn't 
 want to see her dot reduced to less than a bank messenger can 
 carry in his eye which is as much as you are able to give her 
 that she " 
 
 "But, my dear Brigitte," interrupted Flavie, turning res- 
 tive under such impertinence, " you may dispense with re- 
 minding us of our poverty ; for after all we have never asked 
 you for anything and we pay our rent punctually, and beside 
 all Monsieur Felix Phellion would gladly take Celeste even if 
 she had no more dot than a bank messenger could carry in a 
 bag." 
 
 And she did not forget to accent this word as she pro- 
 nounced it. 
 
 "Oh ! so you are going to meddle, too," cried Brigitte; 
 " eh, well, go and get your Felix. I know very well, my 
 little mother, that this marriage doesn't suit you ; it is dis- 
 agreeable to be nothing more than, mother-in-law to your son- 
 in-law." 
 
 At this moment Thuillier returned ; his beatific air was 
 flown,
 
 394 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "My dear Brigitte," said he, "you have a most excellent 
 heart, but at times you seem apt to be violent " 
 
 "The deuce!" cried the old maid; "I am tackled on 
 that side, too." 
 
 "But, my dear friend, to raise your hand against your 
 sister." 
 
 " I lift my hand against that ninny ? That's a good *un." 
 
 "And then," continued Thuillier, "a woman of Celeste's 
 age cannot be made a prisoner." 
 
 "Your wife ; have I put her in prison ? " 
 
 " You can't dispute my word, for I found the door double- 
 locked." 
 
 "Parbleu/ that's because in my anger at the infamous 
 things she vomited at me that I turned the key without 
 thinking." 
 
 "Come, come," said Thuillier; "these are not proper 
 things for people of our class to do." 
 
 " Oh ! after twenty years of devotion to be treated like ';he 
 scum of the earth," replied Brigitte. 
 
 And rushing to the door, which she violently slammed after 
 her, she went away. 
 
 Thuillier stayed behind with Flavie and commenced to ex- 
 patiate to her on the great political and literary good luck of 
 the morning when he was again interrupted, this time by 
 Josephine, the cook : 
 
 " Monsieur," said she, " will you tell me where I can find 
 the key of the great chest ? " 
 
 "What for?" asked Thuillier. 
 
 "For mademoiselle, who told me to take it to her room." 
 
 " What is she going to do with it ? " 
 
 " Mademoiselle is doubtless going a journey ; she is getting 
 her linen out of the drawers, and all her dresses are on the 
 bed." 
 
 "I don't know anything about it," said Thuillier; "go 
 and tell her it is lost,"
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 395 
 
 "Oh ! yes," said Josephine, "I should like to see myself 
 doing that." 
 
 Just then the door-bell rang. 
 
 "That is la Peyrade, I guess," said Thuillier in a tone of 
 satisfaction. In fact, the Provencal was admitted. 
 
 "Faith, my friend," said Thuillier, " you come just in the 
 nick of time, for the house, all on your account, is turned up- 
 side down ; it needs your silvery tongue to restore it to peace 
 and propriety." 
 
 Then he told the barrister the cause of the declaration of 
 this civil war. 
 
 Addressing Mme. Colleville : 
 
 "Under the circumstances," said Theodose, "I may, I 
 think, without impropriety be allowed a few moments' inter- 
 view with Mademoiselle Colleville." 
 
 Here the Provensal showed his usual acumen ; he grasped 
 the idea at once, that the key to the situation was Mademoi- 
 selle Celeste by her means alone could pacification be ac- 
 complished. 
 
 "I will send for her and leave you alone together," said 
 Flavie. 
 
 " My dear Thuillier," said la Peyrade, " you must, without 
 being harsh, let Celeste understand that she must give her 
 consent without further delay. After that leave her to me ; 
 I will do the rest." 
 
 When Celeste came in to her godfather : 
 
 "My child," said Thuillier, "your mother has told us 
 things that have astonished us ; can it really be true that, 
 with the contract all but signed, you have not yet decided to 
 accept the marriage arranged for you?" 
 
 "My godfather," replied Celeste, rather surprised at the 
 abrupt interrogation, " it seems to me that I never said this 
 to my mamma." 
 
 " Did you not just now speak of Monsieur Felix Phellion ju 
 terms of extravagant praise ? "
 
 396 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 " I spoke of Monsieur Phellion as every one else is speak- 
 ing of him." 
 
 " Come, now," said Thuillier, authoritatively, " let us have 
 no more equivocation ; do you yes or no refuse to marry 
 Monsieur de la Peyrade ? ' ' 
 
 "My good friend," said the Provengal, intervening, "your 
 way of putting the case is too crude and rough, and, with me 
 present, it seems altogether out of place. I should like, if 
 mademoiselle will permit me, I am sure Madame Colleville 
 will not object ; there can be nothing in my request for an 
 interview to alarm her maternal prudence." 
 
 "So be it," said Mme. Colleville; " you account yourself 
 very smart, but if you let that child get the better of you, so 
 much the Worse for yourself. Come, Thuillier, it seems we 
 are in the way here." 
 
 As soon as the two designed for each other were left alone : 
 
 " Mademoiselle," said la Peyrade, placing a chair for Ce- 
 leste and taking one himself, " you will admit, I think, that I 
 have not pestered you with my attentions. I have known 
 both the impulse of your heart and the repugnance of your 
 conscience ; I hoped that after a time I should have made an 
 agreeable refuge for those two currents of sentiments, but we 
 have now reached a point where I think it is not impertinent 
 or indiscreet to beg you to let me know upon what course you 
 have decided." 
 
 " Monsieur," said Celeste, "as you speak so frankly and 
 kindly to me, I will tell you, what you already know, that, 
 brought up as I was with Monsieur Felix Phellion, knowing 
 him longer by far than I have known you, the idea of mar- 
 riage was less repugnant in regard to him than it would be to 
 others." 
 
 "At one time," remarked Thodose, " you were allowed a 
 choice " 
 
 " True, but at that time religious difficulties beset the 
 way,"
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 397 
 
 "And to-day those difficulties have disappeared ? " 
 
 " Nearly," answered Celeste. "I am in the habit of sub- 
 ordinating my opinion to that of others who are wiser than 
 myself, monsieur, and yesterday you heard the manner in 
 which the Abbe Gondrin spoke of Monsieur Phellion. And 
 this morning he went to see him." 
 
 " Oh ! " said la Peyrade, with a touch of irony, " it seems 
 he must certainly have seen Father Anselme, then ? But, 
 admitting that he has become all you wish on the religious 
 side, have you reflected on the great event which has just taken 
 place in his life?" 
 
 " Most certainly, but that is not a reason for thinking less 
 of him." 
 
 " No, but it is a reason why he should think more of him- 
 self. His present modesty, and the humility, once the chief 
 charm of his character, may be replaced by great assumption. 
 He has discovered one world, mademoiselle ; will he not strive 
 to discover two? Your rival will be the whole firmament." 
 
 ''You plead your cause most intelligently," said Celeste, 
 smiling, " so that I can fancy you the barrister fully as trouble- 
 some as a husband as would be M. Phellion the astron- 
 omer.", 
 
 " Mademoiselle," said la Peyrade, " let us speak seriously, 
 I am confident of your extreme delicacy. But do you know 
 what is happening to M. Felix Phellion ? He has not lost 
 anything by his devotion to his old master ; his pious fraud is 
 known to all, the discovery has been granted as his, and Mon- 
 sieur Minard says that he is to be made chevalier of the Le- 
 gion of Honor and a member of the Academy of Sciences. 
 Now, if I were a woman, I own that I should be distressed if, 
 at the very time I had decided to take a man into favor, such 
 an avalanche of good things should fall upon him ; I should 
 dread lest the world should say I adored the rising sun." 
 
 " Oh ! monsieur," said Celeste, quickly, " you cannot be- 
 lieve roe capable of such baseness."
 
 398 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 " I, no," said the Provencal ; " I should affirm precisely the 
 contrary ; but the world is rash and unjust and perverse in its 
 judgments." 
 
 He saw that he had caused inquietude and a sense of dis- 
 may in the young girl, who made no reply. 
 
 " Now," continued la Peyrade, " to speak of a much worse 
 aspect of your situation, one which is not merely personal, a 
 question, one may say, between you and yourself: are you 
 aware that at this moment you are the cause in this very house 
 of terrible and most regrettable scenes? " 
 
 "I, monsieur?" said Celeste, with surprise not unmingled 
 with dread. 
 
 "Yes; concerning your godmother; by the extreme af- 
 fection that she bears you she seems to have become an en- 
 tirely different woman ; for the first time in her life she shows 
 a will of her own. She declares that she will not make her 
 proposed liberal gift to you ; I need not inform you, of course, 
 whom the person is that this rigor is directed against." 
 
 "But, monsieur, I assure you that this idea of my god- 
 mother's was quite unknown to me." 
 
 " I know that," said la Peyrade ; " it would also be a matter 
 of minor importance but for the fact that Brigitte takes your 
 godmother's attitude as an insult to herself. Painful expla- 
 nations have taken place. Thuillier, between the hammer and 
 the anvil, could do nothing ; indeed, he further imbittered 
 matters, till now Mademoiselle Brigitte is packing up to leave 
 the house." 
 
 " Monsieur ! what is this you are saying ? " exclaimed Ce- 
 leste, horrified. " I cannot be the cause of such terrible 
 harm." 
 
 " You did not intend to be, but the harm is done ; I pray 
 heaven it may not be irremediable." 
 
 " But what can I do, my God ? " said Celeste, wringing her 
 hands. 
 
 *' I should reply, unhesitatingly, sacrifice yourself, if it were.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 399 
 
 not that in the present circumstances I should have to play 
 the ignoble part of victimizes " 
 
 "Monsieur," said Celeste, "you do not interpret me 
 aright ; I have certainly had a preference, but I never con- 
 sidered myself a victim ; whatever may be necessary to restore 
 peace to this house I will most willingly do." 
 
 " That for me," said la Peyrade, with much humility, 
 "would be more than I dare ask for myself; but for all our 
 sakes I must say that something further is needed. It is 
 necessary ths.t Madame Thuillier should hear this from your 
 own lips. She will never, after what has occurred, take the 
 word of another. Let it seem that you accede to my suit 
 with eagerness of course assumed, but sufficiently so for her 
 to fully believe it." 
 
 "So be it," said Celeste. "I shall know how to seem 
 smiling and happy. My godmother, monsieur, has been to 
 me a mother ; and for such a mother what would I not un- 
 dergo?" 
 
 The position was so pathetic, and Celeste had so artlessly 
 betrayed the depth and, at the same time, her determination 
 to make the sacrifice, that, if la Peyrade had possessed any 
 heart at all, he must have loathed his part ; but to him Celeste 
 was but a rung, and, provided the ladder can hold and raise 
 you, who would bother to ask whether it cared or not ? 
 Therefore it was decided that Celeste should go to her god- 
 mother and prove to her that it was all a mistake to suppose 
 she had expressed objection to la Peyrade. Then la Peyrade 
 was to take upon himself the task of making peace between 
 the two sisters-in-law ; and it may be supposed that he was 
 not wanting in words to promise the innocent girl a life in 
 the future, when, by his unfailing respect, affection, and devo- 
 tion, he would spare her every regret for the necessity under 
 which she had accepted him. 
 
 When Celeste went to her godmother she found it but a 
 slight task to convince her. The tension of will necessary
 
 400 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 for her late rebellion was almost superhuman, for she was 
 acting against her every instinct. She was thus an easy dupe 
 to the comedy played for la Peyrade's benefit in Celeste's 
 tender heart. The tempest calmed on this side, la Peyrade 
 had no difficulty in showing Brigitte that she had gone rather 
 too far in her attempt at suppressing the revolt against her 
 authority. That authority being no longer disputed, Brigitte 
 was no longer incensed against her sister-in-law whom she 
 had been on the point of slapping, so the quarrel was settled 
 with a few pleasant words and a kiss, poor Celeste paying the 
 war indemnity. 
 
 After dinner, which was only a family meal, the notary 
 having the contract in hand made a call with a " fair copy ; " 
 he came to submit it before having it engrossed. This atten- 
 tion was not surprising in a man just entering into business 
 relations with so important a person as a municipal councilor, 
 whom it was to his interest firmly to hook as a regular client. 
 La Peyrade was too shrewd to object to any of the clauses in 
 the contract as it was read. A few of Brigitte's changes 
 gave the new notary a high opinion of the business capacity 
 of the old maid, and showed la Peyrade that more precautions 
 were inserted against him than were altogether in good taste ; 
 but he raised no difficulties, he knew the meshes of no con- 
 tract could be so closely drawn that a determined and smart 
 man could not in some way edge through them. The appoint- 
 ment was made for the contract to be signed at two o'clock 
 next day, at the notary's office. 
 
 During the rest of the evening, taking advantage of Celeste's 
 promise to seem smiling and happy, la Peyrade played, as it 
 were, the poor child, forcing her to respond to him in a 
 manner far from the real feeling of her heart, now wholly 
 filled by Felix. Flavie, seeing the Provencal putting forth 
 all his fascinations, remembered how, not so long ago, he 
 had used the same seductive manner to entangle her. "The 
 monster! " she said in a hissing mutter; but she was forced
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 401 
 
 to mask the torture beneath a smiling face. La Peyrade was 
 approved of all, but he was to be shown a hero in a past 
 service he had done the house of Thuillier. 
 
 Minard was announced. 
 
 " My dear friends," said he, as he came in, " I have come 
 to make a little revelation to you which will cause much 
 surprise. It will, I think, be a lesson to all of us when the 
 question of receiving foreigners in our houses comes to the 
 fore." 
 
 "How is that? " said Brigitte, inquisitively. 
 
 " That Hungarian woman with whom you were so delighted, 
 that Madame Torna, Comtesse de Godollo " 
 
 "Well?" said the old maid. 
 
 " Well," Minard went on, " she is no better than she should 
 be ; for two months you petted in your house one of the most 
 impudent of kept women." 
 
 "Who crammed you with that yarn?" said Brigitte, not 
 willing to admit that she had been made a dupe of. 
 
 "It is no yarn," replied the mayor; "I know the facts 
 myself de visit" 
 
 " Humph ! then you associate with kept women, eh?" said 
 Brigitte, assuming the offensive. "A nice state of affairs, and 
 suppose Zelie knew? " 
 
 " It is not he," said Thuillier, knowingly, " who keeps such 
 company, but monsieur his son ; we have heard about it." 
 
 "Well, yes," said Minard, quite provoked at the manner 
 in which his communication had been received ; " and since 
 that impudent rascal has had the impudence to introduce his 
 trumpery actress to you so that she might be written up in 
 your paltry sheet for I know about this I cannot conceal it. 
 It was in her company that I met your friend, Madame de 
 Godollo. It seems to me I speak plainly enough." 
 
 " Perhaps it may be plain enough to you," replied Brigitte, 
 "but unless you are one of those worthy men, fathers whom 
 their sons introduce to their mistresses, I should like to know 
 26
 
 402 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 how you, you, found yourself in company of Monsieur Julian's 
 'fair?'" 
 
 "Ah! you play yourself," said Minard, in a fury; "do 
 you suppose that I am the man to lend a hand to my son's 
 profligacy?" 
 
 "I suppose nothing," retorted Brigitte; "you said: 'I 
 found myself in her company 
 
 "I said nothing of the kind," interrupted Minard; "I 
 did say that I had seen Madame de Godollo, whose real name 
 is Komorn, and is no more a countess than you or Madame 
 Colleville are, in the company of an unworthy creature with 
 whom my son wastes his money and time. Now, perhaps you 
 would like me to explain the how and why of the meeting." 
 
 " Why, yes/' said Brigitte, incredulously ; " the explanation 
 does not seem unnecessary." 
 
 " To show the manner in which I shut my eyes on my son's 
 misconduct, when I was warned by an anonymous letter tell- 
 ing of his debaucheries, I took steps to have the evidence of 
 my own eyes ; for I know how far an anonymous letter is to 
 be relied on." 
 
 "By-the-by," said Brigitte, in a parenthesis, and turning 
 to la Peyrade, " it's funny we have had none about you." 
 
 " If you don't care to listen," said Minard, nettled at 
 being interrupted, " it is useless to ask for particulars." 
 
 "That's so," replied Brigitte, "we are listening. You 
 wished to see with your own eyes " 
 
 "Yes," said Minard, "and on the day of your dinner, 
 when I came in so late, I had been to the Folies-Dramatiques, 
 the scene of Julian's dissipations, where this creature was to 
 make her dbut. I wanted to see if that young scoundrel was 
 really there ; it is funny how these actresses will cause such a 
 lunatic to make excuses you know he said he was too ill to 
 come here." 
 
 "Was he there?" said Brigitte, showing little sympathy 
 for the woes of M. the Mayor. 
 
 Mfe
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 403 
 
 "Yes, but not in the audience; he was on the stage talking 
 to a fireman \ he was so far forward as to interrupt the view of 
 some one in the theatre, who shouted : ' Turn out that cocoa- 
 nut.' Judge how my paternal heart must have rejoiced on 
 hearing this agreeable admonition." 
 
 "It is because you have spoiled him, your dear Julian." 
 
 "Spoiled him, far from that; I should have handled him 
 without gloves only for having taken the advice of the Abbe 
 Gondrin, who counseled tolerance." 
 
 "Just as if priests understood anything? " saiu JBrigitte, in 
 great disdain. 
 
 "Well, anyway, it was by his advice that I was successful 
 in arranging with the creature's mother. I further told her 
 that I should cut off the supplies. She said a good round 
 sum was just the thing, as there was a copying clerk in the 
 twelfth arrondissement who had his eye on Olympe, and 
 would take her at once." 
 
 " This copying clerk," said la Peyrade, "did she mention 
 his name?" 
 
 " I think not," said Minard ; " at any rate, if she did I have 
 forgotten it ; I settled everything in a moment with the mother, 
 who seems to me a pretty good sort of woman." 
 
 "But in all this I see no Madame de Godollo," said 
 Brigitte. 
 
 " Hold yourself in patience," said Minard. " ' The only 
 thing I fear,' said the mother of the actress, ' is the bad 
 advice which may be given by a Polish woman, one named 
 Madame Cramone, who has my girl by the hair and does as 
 she likes with ; perhaps if you saw her and hinted at some 
 little perquisite for herself, she might help to play our game. 
 Shall I call her? I won't name no names, I'll just tell her: 
 " Here's a gentleman as wants to see you." The lady was 
 brought in ; you can imagine how astounded I was when I 
 found myself face to face with your Madame Godollo, who 
 ran off, laughing, as soon as she saw me."
 
 404 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "And you are sure of it being her ? " asked Brigitte. " If 
 you only saw her " 
 
 The wily Provencal was not the man to let such an occasion 
 as this slip, beside retaliating on the Hungarian's practical 
 joke. 
 
 "Monsieur le Maire is not mistaken," said he with 
 authority. 
 
 "Oh, so you know her too," said Mile. Thuillier, "and 
 you allowed vermin like this to consort with us?" 
 
 "On the contrary," said la Peyrade, " it was I who with- 
 out any fuss or scandal, and without informing any person, 
 rid your house of her company. You remember how suddenly 
 the woman went away ; it was I, who, having discovered what 
 she was, gave her two days in which to clear out, threatening 
 unless she did so to discover the whole truth to you." 
 
 "My dear fellow," said Thuillier, seizing the hand of the 
 barrister, " you acted with great prudence and determination. 
 This is but another obligation you have placed us under." 
 
 "You see, mademoiselle," said la Peyrade, addressing 
 Celeste, " the strange protectress a friend of yours had." 
 
 "Thank God! " replied Mme. Thuillier, "Felix Phellion 
 is above all such vile things." 
 
 "Oh ! there, Papa Minard," said Brigitte, "we'll all keep 
 mum as to this. Our mouths shall be kept locked about Mon- 
 sieur Julian's escapades. You will take a cup of tea?" 
 
 "Willingly," replied Minard. 
 
 "Celeste," said the old maid, "ring for Henri and have 
 him put the large kettle on the fire." 
 
 The next day Brigitte, to quote Thuillier, got on the 
 "rampage" early in the morning, although the visit to the 
 notary was not to be made until two in the afternoon. She 
 prevented Thuillier going to the office ; she worried Josephine 
 the cook about hurrying on the breakfast, and, notwithstand- 
 ing the results of the previous day, with difficulty restrained 
 herself from nagging at Mme. Thuillier. Then she went in to
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 405 
 
 the Collevilles and made the same disturbance ; Flavie was 
 too elegant ; Celeste was not wearing the hat and dress in 
 which she wished her to appear ; Colleville, who could not be 
 detained from his office, must go in his dress suit and had to 
 set his watch by hers that he might have no excuse for being 
 tardy. The most amusing thing of it all was that Brigitte, 
 looking so much after the others, was very nearly late herself. 
 
 At half-past one la Peyrade, Thuillier, Colleville, Mme. 
 Thuillier, and Celeste were assembled in the salon. Flavie 
 ' joined them soon after, fastening her bracelets as she came to 
 disarm any squabbling ; she was relieved to find that she was 
 ready before Brigitte. As for her, already furious at finding 
 herself late, she found another cause for vexation. The 
 event seemed to require the wearing of a corset, a refinement 
 in which she seldom indulged. Now, the unhappy maid, who 
 was at that time engaged in lacing her, tried to discover just 
 how tight she wanted them drawn ; she alone knew the storms 
 and terrors of a corset-day. 
 
 "I had rather," said the girl, "lace the obelisk; I believe 
 it would turn out a better shape ; I know, at any rate, it 
 couldn't use its mouth as much." 
 
 While those in the salon were laughing and talking, under 
 their breaths, at the flagrant breach of punctuality in which 
 Queen Elizabeth was caught, the porter came in and gave a 
 sealed package to Thuillier, addressed to " M. Thuillier, pro- 
 prietor of the ' Echo de la Bievre ' Urgent." 
 
 Opening the envelope he found it contained a copy of a 
 ministerial paper which had hitherto shown itself discourteous 
 and hostile, refusing to "exchange," a thing usually made 
 willingly between all newspapers. 
 
 Puzzled at this being sent to his house instead of the office 
 of the " Echo," he hastily unfolded the sheet and read with an 
 emotion that may be imagined the following article, recom- 
 mended to his especial notice by a circle in red ink :
 
 406 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 An obscure organ was about expiring in its darkness, when a person of 
 recent ambition bethought himself of galvanizing it. His object was to 
 make it a stepping-stone to climb from his municipal functions to the 
 envied one of a deputy. By good fortune this intrigue has floated to the 
 surface. The electors will certainly not be caught by such a cunning 
 manner of advancing one's own interests ; when the proper time arrives, 
 if ridicule has not already done justice by routing this absurd candidate, 
 we shall ourselves prove to the nincompoop that for a man to attain to the 
 honor of representing the country, something more is required than 
 having the money with which to buy a paper and to hire a whilewasher to 
 put the horrid jargon of his articles and pamphlets into decent French. 
 We confine ourselves to-day to this brief notice, but our readers may rely 
 on us keeping them fully posted as to the progress of this electoral farce, 
 if such be the case that the thing is courageously continued. 
 
 Thuillier twice read this declaration of war, which left him 
 anything but calm and impassive; then, taking la Peyrade 
 aside : 
 
 " See this," said he ; "it looks serious." 
 
 "Well?" said he. 
 
 " How well ? " asked Thuillier. 
 
 "Yes, what is there particularly serious in this?" 
 
 " What is there that is serious ? Why, the article is injurious 
 to me." 
 
 "You cannot doubt," said la Peyrade, "that some virtuous 
 C6rizet is doing it in a spirit of revenge by throwing this 
 fire-cracker between your legs." 
 
 " Cerizet or anybody else who wrote this diatribe is an in- 
 solent fellow," said Thuillier, getting excited, " and the matter 
 shall not rest here." 
 
 "As for me," said la Peyrade, "I should make no re- 
 joinder. You are not named, though the attack is aimed at 
 you ; we should let the enemy more openly declare himself, 
 then when we discover him rap his knuckles." 
 
 " Not at all," said Thuillier ; "it is impossible that I should 
 rest under such an insult." 
 
 "The devil!" said tne barrister] " what a thin skin you
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 407 
 
 have. You must bear in mind, my dear boy, that you are a 
 journalist, and a candidate ; you must harden yourself to the 
 like of this." 
 
 " I, my friend ; I make it a principle of mine that I allow 
 no one to tread on my toes. They announce, beside, that 
 they will keep it up. So I am going to cut off these imperti- 
 nences." 
 
 " Well," said la Peyrade, " in journalism, as in being a 
 candidate, a hot temper has its benefits ; it makes a man re- 
 spected; it stops attacks " 
 
 "Certainly" said Thuillier, " principiis obsta. Not to-day, 
 for we haven't the time, but to-morrow, I shall lay this article 
 before the court." 
 
 " The court ! " exclaimed the Provencal ; " go to law about 
 such a matter as this ? But there is no case ; neither you nor 
 the paper is named ; beside, a lawsuit is a pitiable business ; 
 you'll look like a boy who has been fighting and got licked 
 running to complain to his mammy or his schoolmaster. Now, 
 if you said that you would allow Fleury to be put into the 
 question, I could understand it, though even then it would 
 be difficult to do, for this is so entirely personal, it would 
 seem." 
 
 " Pshaw ! " said Thuillier, " do you imagine, for example, 
 that I am going to commit myself with a Cerizet or any other 
 newspaper knocker-out ? I pique myself, my dear, on possess- 
 ing civic courage which does not give in to prejudice ; and 
 which, instead of taking the law into its own hands, has re- 
 course to that means of defense provided by law. Beside, the 
 new law against dueling may be enforced ; I have no desire 
 to spend one or two years in prison." 
 
 "We can discuss all this later," said la Peyrade; "here is 
 your sister ; she would think all was lost if it reached her 
 ears." 
 
 Seeing Brigitte come in, Colleville shouted: "Standing 
 room only," and sang the refrain of "la Parisienne."
 
 408 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "God's sake! Colleville, how vulgar you are," said tne 
 tardy one, hastening to throw a stone into the other's garden 
 before one could be thrown into hers. 
 
 " Well, are we all ready ? " she added, arranging her cloak 
 before the glass. " What time is it ? It won't do to be there 
 before time like country people." 
 
 " One fifty," said Colleville ; " I go by the Tuileries." 
 
 "We are just right, then," said Brigitte; "it will take 
 about that much time to get to the Rue Caumartin. Jose- 
 phine," she cried, going to the door of the drawing-room, 
 " we dine at six ; therefore, be sure to put the turkey to roast 
 at the right time, and just don't let it burn, like the last one. 
 Gracious! what's that?" and with a hasty movement she 
 closed the door she had been holding open. " What a nui- 
 sance ! I hope Henri will have sense enough to say we are 
 out." 
 
 Not at all ; Henri came in to say that an aged gentleman, 
 wearing decorations, very genteel, had asked to be received 
 on urgent business. 
 
 "Why didn't you say we were out, Mister Orator?" 
 
 "I should have done so, if mademoiselle had not opened 
 the door of the salon sO that the gentleman could see all the 
 family assembled." 
 
 " Of course ; you're never in the wrong, are you ? " 
 
 " What answer shall I make him ? " asked the servant. 
 
 "Say," replied Thuillier, "that we are exceedingly sorry 
 that we are unable to receive monsieur, but that we are ex- 
 pected at the notary's to sign a marriage-contract, and that if 
 he will return in two hours " 
 
 "I have already told him all that," said Henri, "but he 
 says the matter is more important to yourself than him." 
 
 "Then show him into my study," said Thuillier; and, 
 opening a door from the salon, he went in first to receive his 
 guest. 
 
 Instantly Brigitte's eye was at the keyhole:
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 409 
 
 " What an imbecile that Thuillier is ; he has given him a 
 seat at the farther end of the room so it is impossible that I 
 can hear what they are saying." 
 
 La Peyrade covered an inward agitation by an outward air 
 of indifference ; he approached the three ladies and greeted 
 Celeste most graciously, who responded with the smiling, 
 happy satisfaction that her part consisted in. As for Colle- 
 ville, he was composing an anagram on these six words : If 
 journal I' "Echo de la Bievrc" and had arrived at the follow- 
 ing combination of letters, little reassuring, as far as it went, 
 to the future of that paper: O d' Echo, jarni ! la bevue 
 
 reel ; but a final E was lacking to complete O but the 
 
 Echo's a blunder : this, of course, was an imperfect finish. 
 
 "He takes a lot of snuff," said the peeping Brigitte, her 
 eye glued to the keyhole ; "his gold snuff-box is larger than 
 Minard's; I never saw one so large; perhaps, though," said 
 she, as a running comment, " it's only silver-gilt. He's doing 
 the talking and Thuillier sits listening like a dunderhead. 
 Pretty soon I shall go in and tell them they can't keep ladies 
 waiting like this." 
 
 Just as she had put her hand on the lock she heard Thuil- 
 lier raise his voice, and that made her take another squint 
 through the keyhole. 
 
 " He's standing up; he's evidently going away," said she, 
 with satisfaction. 
 
 A moment later she saw she was mistaken, for the little old 
 man had only left his chair to amble up and down the room 
 to continue the conversation with greater freedom. 
 
 "By my faith ! I'm going in," said she, " to tell Thuillier 
 we are going without him ; he can follow us." 
 
 So saying the old maid gave two imperious sharp raps on 
 the door, and then resolutely entered the study. 
 
 La Peyrade, goaded by anxiety, had the bad taste to look 
 through the keyhole; he thought he recognized the "com- 
 mander" who had waited upon Mme. de Godollo. Then he
 
 410 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 saw Thuillier addressing his sister with gestures of authority 
 very unlike his usual style of deference and submission. 
 
 " Thuillier finds some interest in that creature's talk," said 
 Brigitte, reentering the salon. " He told us to wait until he 
 is through, ordering me very bluntly to leave them. Really 
 it seems to me that since he has begun to make newspapers 
 that I don't know him ; one would think he led the world with 
 a wand." 
 
 " I am afraid he is being entangled by some adventurer," 
 said la Peyrade. " That old man I think I saw with Madame 
 Komorn on the day I told her to clear out ; he must belong to 
 the same crowd." 
 
 "Why, you ought to have told me this! " said Brigitte; 
 1 ' I should mighty soon have asked after the countess, and let 
 him know what we think of his Hungarian." 
 
 Soon Thuillier entered the room, his face clouded with care, 
 his manner exceedingly grave. 
 
 " My dear la Peyrade," said he, " you did not inform me 
 that another proposal of marriage had been seriously con- 
 sidered by you? " 
 
 " Indeed I did ; I told you that I had been offered a very 
 wealthy heiress, but that my heart was here ; I did not choose 
 to go further into the matter, and so nothing came of it." 
 
 " My friend, the conversation I have just had has been 
 most instructive to me ; when you know what I know,with many 
 other things personal to yourself, of which I shall inform you 
 privately, I believe you will enter into my ideas. One thing 
 is positive, we shall not go to the notary's to-day. Were I in 
 your place I should at once go and see Monsieur du Portail." 
 
 "Again that name ! it pursues me like remorse," cried la 
 Peyrade. 
 
 " But, my poor boy," said Brigitte to Thuillier, " you have 
 been bamboozled by a rascal ; this man belongs totheGodollo 
 clique." 
 
 "Madame de Godollo," replied Thuillier, "is not at all
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 411 
 
 what you suppose her to be ; the best thing this house can do is 
 never to say anything about her, good or evil. As to la Pey- 
 rade, as this is not the first invitation he has received, I cannot 
 for the life of me see why he hesitates to go and see Monsieur 
 du Portail." 
 
 " The deuce is in it if that old fellow has not completely 
 fooled you," said Brigitte. 
 
 "I tell you this, that that old man is all that his exterior 
 shows. He has seven crosses, he drives a handsome equipage, 
 and he has told me things that have absolutely astounded 
 me." 
 
 "Well, perhaps he's a fortune-teller, like Madame Fon- 
 taine." 
 
 "Well, if he is not a magician, he has a very long arm," 
 said Thuillier, " and no good can be had by neglecting his 
 advice. Why, he only caught one glance at you, Brigitte, 
 and he said you were a master-woman and born to com- 
 mand." 
 
 " The fact is," replied Brigitte, licking her chops after this 
 compliment like a cat lapping cream, " he has a well-bred air, 
 this little old man. Listen to me, my dear boy," added she, 
 turning to and addressing la Peyrade, " when such a bigwig 
 wants to see you, why go and see him them's my advice. 
 Go and see this du Portail. I don't see that it would commit 
 you to anything." 
 
 "Most certainly," said Collevjlle ; "were I but you I 
 would pay thirty calls on du Portail, or all the Portats* or 
 Port<?rj, or Portz/j, or Porlwines on earth, if I should only 
 be asked." 
 
 The scene was beginning to be very like that in the "Bar- 
 bier de Seville," when everybody tells Basil to go to bed, till 
 he feels in quite a fever. La Peyrade took up his hat in a 
 huff and went whither his destiny called him : Quo sua fata 
 
 vocabant. 
 
 * A pun impossible to translate. 
 
 2 B
 
 412 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 On arriving at the Rue Honore-Chevalier, la Peyrade felt 
 a doubt ; the dilapidated appearance of the house where he 
 was to call made him think he had mistaken the number. 
 How could a person of M. du Portail's importance live in 
 such a place ! But when he introduced himself, the deport- 
 ment of Bruno, the old valet, the appearance of the furniture 
 and the other appurtenances made him think he had come 
 aright. His surprise was great when he found himself in the 
 presence of the corrrmander, so-called by Mme. de Godollo, 
 the very man whom he had so recently seen at Thuillier's. 
 
 "At last," said du Portail, rising and drawing forward a 
 chair, "we meet my recalcitrant gentleman; your ear has 
 taken some pulling, though." 
 
 "May I know, monsieur," said la Peyrade, haughtily, and 
 not taking the seat offered him, "what interest you can pos- 
 sibly have in meddling in my affairs? I do not know you, 
 but I may add that the place in which I once happened to see 
 you did not create an absolutely unconquerable desire to make 
 your acquaintance." 
 
 " Where did you see me ? " asked du Portail. 
 
 " In the lodging of a kind of street-walker, who went by 
 the name of Madame la Comtesse de Godollo." 
 
 " Where monsieur himself was presumably calling, with a 
 less disinterested reason than my own," said the little old 
 man. 
 
 " I am not here," said Theodose, " to bandy wit. I have 
 the right, monsieur, to demand an explanation of your pro- 
 ceedings in reference to myself. Do not, I beg you, delay 
 them with a facetiousness that I shall be far from appreci- 
 ating." 
 
 "Then, my dear fellow," said du Portail, "do sit down; 
 I am not in the humor to dislocate my neck by talking to such 
 a great height as you are at." 
 
 This was a reasonable intimation, and was given in such a 
 manner as to convey the fact that lordly airs would not alarm
 
 I 
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 413 
 
 the old gentleman. La Peyrade, as offensively as might be, 
 therefore deferred to his host's wishes. 
 
 "Monsieur Cerizet," said du Portail, "a man of exceed- 
 ingly high position in the world, and who has the honor to 
 be one of your friends " 
 
 "I no longer see the man," said la Peyrade, tartly, under- 
 standing the old man's malicious insinuation. 
 
 "But the time has been," replied du Portail, "when you 
 did occasionally see him, as, for example, when you paid for 
 his dinner at the Rocher de Cancale I was about to say that 
 I requested the virtuous Monsieur Cerizet to sound you as to 
 a marriage " 
 
 "Which I refused," interrupted Thdodose, "and which I 
 still refuse, with more energy than ever." 
 
 "Precisely," replied the gentleman, "that is the question ; 
 it is to talk of that business that I have waited so long a time 
 to meet you. I think, too, that you will accept it." 
 
 "But this crazy girl that you are flinging at my head," 
 said la Peyrade, "who is she? She is not your daughter, 
 nor a relative, I suppose, for in such a case you would show 
 more decency in chasing a husband for her." 
 
 "This girl," said du Portail, "is the daughter of one of 
 my friends ; she lost her father some ten years ago, since which 
 time she has been living with me ; I have given her every care 
 demanded by her sad condition. Her fortune, to which I 
 have greatly added, in addition to my own which I intend 
 leaving her, will make her a very wealthy heiress. ! know 
 that you have no aversion to handsome dots, for you have 
 sought for them in even the lowest ranks, in the Thuilliers' 
 house, for instance ; or, to use your own words, in that of a 
 street-walker whom you hardly knew ; I could therefore figure 
 on your being willing to accept at my hands a very rich young 
 woman, especially as her infirmity is pronounced curable by 
 the best physicians ; whereas you can never cure Monsieur 
 and Mademoiselle Thuillier the one of being a fool, the
 
 414 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 other of being a termagant any more than you could cure 
 Madame Komorn of being extremely giddy and of an easy 
 virtue." 
 
 " It might suit my convenience," replied la Peyrade, "to 
 marry the goddaughter of a fool and vixen if I choose her 
 myself, or I might become the husband of a coquette, if the 
 passion so seized me ; but the Queen of Sheba, if imposed 
 upon me, neither you, monsieur, nor the most able or power- 
 ful man living could force me lo accept." 
 
 " So for that very reason I address myself to your good 
 sense and intelligence ; but in order to speak to people we 
 have to come face to face with them. Just let us see what 
 your position is. Don't get angry if, like a surgeon who 
 wishes to save his patient, I place my hands mercilessly on 
 the wounds of a life up to now so laborious and tempest- 
 tossed. The first point to make is that the Celeste Colleville 
 affair is ended for you." 
 
 " Why so ? " asked la Peyrade. 
 
 " Because I have just seen Thuillier and terrified him with 
 a picture of all the disasters he has already incurred, and those 
 he will further incur if he persists in the thought of giving 
 you his goddaughter in marriage. He knows that it was I 
 who annulled Madame du Bruel's kindness in the matter of 
 the Cross ; that it was I who had his pamphlet seized ; that I 
 sent that Hungarian into his house to play you all so neatly ; 
 that it has been my care to see that the ministerial journals 
 have commenced a fire which will grow fiercer with each suc- 
 ceeding day not to mention other machinery which will be 
 set in motion to oppose his candidacy. So you see, my dear 
 sir, not only will you lose the credit of being the great help 
 of his election, but that you are actually the stumbling-block 
 to Thuillier's ambition. This is enough to prove to you that 
 the side by which you imposed yourself upon that family, 
 who never liked you at the bottom, is now quite reduced and 
 dismantled."
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 415 
 
 " But you that flatter yourself that you have done all this," 
 said la Peyrade, " who are you ? " 
 
 " I won't reply that you are very inquisitive, for I intend 
 later to answer your question ; but with your permission, for 
 the present at least, we will continue your life's autopsy 
 now a dead life, but to which I propose to give a glorious 
 resurrection. You are twenty-eight ; you have barely started 
 on the career in which I forbid you taking another step. 
 Some few days hence the Barristers' Association will meet and 
 will censure you, more or less severely, for the manner in 
 which you placed that property in the Thuilliers' possession. 
 Have no illusions. Censure I mention only your least peril 
 for a lawyer is not like a hack-driver whom the disapproval 
 of the court does not prevent his driving his coach ; if you 
 are but mildly censured, you might as well have your name 
 stricken off the roll." 
 
 " And it is to your benevolence, doubtless, that I shall owe 
 this precious result," said la Peyrade. 
 
 " I am proud to believe so," answered du Portail ; " for in 
 order to tow you back into port it was necessary to cut away 
 your rigging ; unless this had been done, you would always 
 have been trying to navigate under your own sails among the 
 shoals of the middle-classes." 
 
 Seeing that he had to play against a strong hand, the adroit 
 Provencal took a more respectful manner : 
 
 " Permit me to await further explanations before making 
 my acknowledgments," said he. 
 
 " Here you stand then," said du Portail. "Twenty-eight, 
 without a sou, without a profession, with antecedents that are 
 well very mediocre ; with associates like Dutocq and the 
 ' brave ! Cdrizet ; ' owing Mademoiselle Thuillier ten thousand 
 francs, which your pretty conscience urges you to pay (even 
 if your still prettier vanity did not insist) ; to Madame Lam- 
 bert twenty-five thousand francs more, which you of course 
 will be only too glad to replace in her hands ; and as an end-
 
 416 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 all, this marriage, your last hope, your plank of safety, has 
 just been rendered an impossibility. Between ourselves, if I 
 make any reasonable proposition, do you not think you had 
 better place yourself at my disposal ? " 
 
 "I cannot form any resolution until your designs are more 
 fully explained," said la Peyrade. 
 
 "At my instigation you were spoken to in reference to a 
 marriage," said du Portail ; "that marriage is, at least in my 
 idea, closely connected with a past existence by which a kind 
 of hereditary duty devolves upon you. That uncle of yours 
 in Paris, to whom you applied in 1829, whom in your family 
 was thought to be a millionaire, what was he? He died sud- 
 denly, almost a pauper; he did not leave enough money with 
 which to bury him ; this was his end." 
 
 " Then you knew him ? " 
 
 " He was my oldest, my best friend," replied du Portail. 
 
 "But," said la Peyrade, eagerly, "a sum of one hundred 
 louis, which in my first days in Paris came to me from an 
 unknown source " 
 
 " Was sent by me," replied the gentleman ; " unfortunately 
 at that time I was overwhelmed with a rush of business, so I 
 could not follow your fortunes closely ; this will explain why 
 I left you on the straw in a garret, to ripen, like medlars, to 
 that maturity of poverty which brought you into the meshes 
 of a Dutocq and a Cerizet." 
 
 "I am not the less grateful, monsieur; if I had known or 
 by any means discovered my benefactor, I should have 
 hastened " 
 
 " A truce to compliments," said du Portail. " Your uncle 
 was an agent of that occult power which forms the theme of 
 so many absurd fables and is the object of such silly preju- 
 dices." 
 
 " I cannot grasp your meaning, may I beg you to be more 
 explicit." 
 
 "If your uncle were living to-day," said du Portail, "and
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 417 
 
 should say : ' You seek fortune and influence, you wish to rise 
 above the multitude, you wish to play your part in the events 
 of the epoch, you want to employ an active mind, resourceful, 
 with a trend to intrigue ; in short, an opportunity to exert in 
 a higher, more elegant sphere that strength of will and sub- 
 tlety now utterly wasted in grappling with that most barren, 
 hide-bound animal on earth a bourgeois. Well, nephew 
 mine, lower your head, creep in after me through that little 
 door which I will open 'to you ; it gives entrance to a great 
 house, of not much repute, but far above its reputation. 
 Statesmen, kings even, will give you their most inmost 
 thoughts; none of the joys that money and the highest power 
 can bestow upon a man will be lacking to you.' ' 
 
 ''But, monsieur, while not understanding you, I might 
 remark that my uncle died so poor that, as you inform me, he 
 was buried at the expense of public charity." 
 
 " Yes ; he was a man of rare talent, but he had a weak side ; 
 he was eager for pleasure, a spendthrift, without a thought for 
 the future ; he wanted to taste those joys intended for the 
 common order of men, but which in great vocations are snares 
 and impediments the joys of family life. He had a 
 daughter, whom he madly loved ; through her his terrible 
 business prepared the awful catastrope which ended his 
 life." 
 
 " And this you think is an encouragement for me to tread 
 the path in which he would have bidden me follow him?" 
 
 " But if I should offer to guide you? " said du Portail. 
 
 "You, monsieur ! " said la Peyrade, in amazement. 
 
 " Yes, I, who was first your uncle's pupil and afterward his 
 protector and providence ; I, whose influence for a half-cen- 
 tury has had a daily increase; I, to whom all governments, 
 falling over each other like houses of cards, come to ask for 
 safety and for the power with which to build their future ; I, 
 who am the manager of a great theatre of marionettes, which 
 includes in its cast Columbines of the style of Madame de 
 27
 
 41g THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 Godollo ; I, who to-morrow, if it became necessary to the 
 success of one of my burlesques or dramas, might present 
 myself before your eyes the wearer of the grand cordon of the 
 Legion of Honor, the Golden Fleece, or the Garter. Would 
 you know w'.iy neither you nor I will die by poison ? Why 
 it is that I, happier than my contemporary kings, can transmit 
 my sceptre to whom I choose ? It is because I, like you, my 
 young friend, in spite of your Southern complexion, have 
 been cool and calculating, never tempted to waste my time 
 trifling on the threshold ; because my ardor, when circum- 
 stances compelled me to use it, never lay deeper than the sur- 
 face. It is more than likely that you have heard of me ; well, 
 for your benefit I will open a window in my darkness ; look 
 closely upon me, observe me well ; I have not a cloven hoof 
 nor a tail at the base of my spine ; on the contrary, I seem to 
 be the most inoffensive of gentlemen in the St. Sulpice quar- 
 ter ; in that quarter where I have enjoyed for five-and-twenty 
 years, I may say, the esteem of all ; I am known as dn Por- 
 tail, but to you, by your permission, I shall call myself 
 CORENTIN." 
 
 " Corentin ! " exclaimed la Peyrade, with dismay and as- 
 tonishment. 
 
 "Yes, monsieur, and as you must see, by revealing my 
 secret to you I lay my hand upon you and you are enlisted. 
 Corentin, ' the greatest man in the police of modern times,' 
 as the author of an article in the ' Biographies of Living 
 Men ' has said of me though I ought, to do him justice, to 
 remark that he doesn't know the least thing about my life." 
 
 " Monsieur, I can assure you that I shall keep your secret ; 
 but as to the police ; to be in your employ " 
 
 "That makes you uneasy," said Corentin. "But why? 
 Are you afraid to encounter the terrible prejudice that it 
 brands on the brow?" 
 
 "It is certainly a necessary institution," said la Peyrade; 
 "I don't know that it is always calumniated. If it is an
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 419 
 
 honorable business, why do those who pursue it conceal them- 
 selves?" 
 
 "Because all that threatens society," replied Corentin, 
 "and which the mission of the police is to suppress, is plotted 
 and arranged in the shadow. Do thieves and conspirators 
 wear on their hats : ' I am Guillot, the shepherd of this flock;' 
 or ought we when we go to search for them to be preceded by 
 a clanging bell to let them know we are coming like as the 
 health-officer does on his rounds every morning to see that 
 the janitors sweep in front of each door?" 
 
 "Monsieur," said la Peyrade, " when a sentiment is uni- 
 versal it ceases to be a prejudice, it becomes an opinion ; this 
 same opinion should be a law to every man who desires his 
 own esteem and that of others." 
 
 "And when you despoiled that bankrupt notary," exclaimed 
 Corentin, " you stripped a corpse to enrich the Thuilliers to 
 your own advantage ; this, I suppose, you will pretend was in 
 keeping with your esteem, but did it hold that of the barris- 
 ters? Now, I have done naught of which I need feel ashamed. 
 My care of the daughter of my old friend, Peyrade, has not 
 been a path strewn with roses. As I feel the years advance, 
 I offer you my position, to fit you to take my place, a bride 
 with two heaping bags of money " 
 
 "What!" cried la Peyrade, "is that girl my uncle's 
 daughter?" 
 
 " Yes ; the girl I wish you to marry is the daughter of 
 your Uncle Peyrade,* for he democratized his name, or, if you 
 like it better, she was the daughter of Father Canquoelle, a 
 name taken from the estate on which your father starves with 
 eleven children. You turn your nose up at the police, but, 
 as the common folk have it, you owe the best of your nose to 
 the police. Your uncle was born in the purple ; the King, 
 Louis XVIII., delighted in his conversation. The question 
 now before us is that of succeeding me me, Corentin. Do 
 * See " The Harlot's Progress."
 
 420 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 you think you can escape this by any foolish considerations of 
 a bourgeois vanity ? " 
 
 Corentin arose; he saw that la Peyrade was smiling, showing 
 that at heart he was not so opposed to the proposal as his 
 words would imply. 
 
 " The police ! " said Corentin, pacing the room as he spoke, 
 " it might be said of the police, as Basile said of calumny to 
 Bartholo : ' The police, monsieur, you know not what you 
 despise.' And in fact," he went on, after a pause, "who are 
 they that despise it? Idiots, who know no better than to in- 
 sult the power which protects them. Suppress the police, you 
 destroy civilization. Do the police ask the respect of these 
 people? It seeks but to impress them with one sentiment 
 fear that great lever which moves mankind ; an impure race, 
 whose horrible instincts God, hell, the executioner, and the 
 gendarme can scarcely restrain." 
 
 Stopping in front of la Peyrade, looking at him with a 
 disdainful smile: 
 
 "And you are one of those simpletons," continued the 
 panegyrist, "who see in the police nothing but a horde of 
 spies and informers ? And you have never suspected the states- 
 men, the diplomatists, the Richelieus it has produced? But 
 Mercury, monsieur, Mercury, the most intellectual of pagan 
 gods, what then was he but the police incarnate? It is true 
 that he was also the god of thieves. We are better than he, 
 for so far we have not doubled the parts." 
 
 "And yet," said la Peyrade, " Vautrin, the famous chief of 
 the detective police " 
 
 "Eh! yes, in the lower grades," replied Corentin, re- 
 suming his march, " there is always some mud ; still, don't 
 make any mistake, Vautrin is a genius, but his passions, like 
 those of your uncle, dragged him astray. But mounting 
 higher (for the gist of the whole question, to wit, the finding 
 of the rung of the ladder on which a man must perch) is the 
 whole thing : The prefect of police, a minister, honored, re-
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 421 
 
 spected, flattered is he a spy ? Well, I, monsieur, I am the 
 prefect of the occult police of diplomacy of the highest 
 statesmanship ; and you hesitate to mount the throne which I, 
 Charles V., in my old age think of abdicating? To appear 
 small and yet do great things ; to live in a comfortable den like 
 this, and command the light ; to have ever at your hand an in- 
 visible army always ready, always devoted, always submissive ; 
 to know the other side of everything ; never to be the dupe of 
 any wire-puller, for you hold all the wires yourself; to peer 
 through every partition ; to penetrate all secrets ; search all 
 hearts, all consciences ; these are the things you fear ! And 
 yet you were not afraid to wallow in the foul, dark bog of a 
 Thuillier's household ; you, a thoroughbred, allowed yourself 
 to be harnessed to a hack, to the ignoble career of an election 
 agent, and of a paper run by a rich bourgeois." 
 
 " One must do what first turns up," replied la Peyra>je. 
 
 " It is most remarkable," Corentin went on, taking up 
 again his former line of thought, " the language has done us 
 more justice than opinion, for it made the word ' police ' 
 the synonym of civilization and the antipodes of savage life 
 when it wrote : /' Etat policed I can assure you that we care 
 little for the prejudice that tries to injure us; none can under- 
 stand men as we know them ; to know them is to scorn their 
 contempt, as we have contempt for their esteem." 
 
 " There is certainly much of truth in what you have advanced 
 with so much warmth," said la Peyrade. 
 
 " Much truth ! " replied Corentin, going back to his chair, 
 " say rather it is all true, and nothing but the truth ; but 
 enough for to-day, monsieur. To be my successor in these 
 functions and to marry your cousin with a dot that will not be 
 less than five hundred thousand francs, that is my offer. I do 
 not ask you for an answer now. I should have no confidence 
 in a decision not seriously reflected upon. To-morrow I 
 
 * From the Greek irohiTeia policy: hence policy of State.- [TRANS- 
 LATOR.]
 
 422 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 shall be here all the morning ; I shall hope that my conviction 
 may have convinced you." 
 
 Dismissing his visitor with a curt little bow, he added : " I 
 do not say adieu, but au rcvoir, Monsieur de la Peyrade." 
 
 Fatality seemed lavish in the offer of inducements for him 
 to succumb. Mme. Lambert, now become an importunate 
 creditor, had at length been promised repayment the day after 
 to-morrow, this being the 315! of October; November 2d was 
 the day on which the courts would reopen. To the summons 
 to give an account of his transactions before his peers, he re- 
 plied that he did not recognize the right of the Board to ques- 
 tion him on his private affairs. This was some kind of an 
 answer, certainly. It meant most inevitably that his name 
 would be stricken from the rolls, but seemed in a measure to 
 have arj, air of dignity and saved his self-love. 
 
 Finally he wrote Thuillier, in which he informed him that 
 his visit to du Portail had resulted in his being obliged to 
 make another marriage. All this was curtly said, without the 
 slightest expression of regret for the marriage he renounced. 
 A postscript read: "We shall be obliged to meet and discuss 
 my position on the newspaper," hinting that he might also 
 withdraw from that, too. He was careful to make a copy of 
 this letter, so, when later in Corentin's study he was asked as 
 to his night's reflections, he simply presented for all answer 
 the matrimonial renunciation he had written out. 
 
 "That is good," said Corentin, "but your position on the 
 paper you had better retain for a little while ; that fool's can- 
 didacy ruffles the government, we must in some manner trip 
 up the heels of this municipal councilor; as editor-in-chief, 
 you may turn a trick on him ; I really don't think you would 
 kick much at the ordeal." 
 
 " Certainly not," said la Peyrade; "the remembrance of 
 the humiliations to which he has so long exposed me will 
 give a keen relish to the lash I should apply to that middle- 
 class brood.*'
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 4 
 
 "Be cautious," said Corentin, "you are but young, you 
 must guard against vengeful feelings. In our austere profes- 
 sion we love nothing, hate nothing. Now let us speak of 
 your cousin, whom I should imagine you have some curiosity 
 to know." 
 
 La Peyrade was not obliged to pretend eagerness ; the feeU 
 ing was genuine. 
 
 " LydJe* de la Peyrade," said Corentin, "is nearly thirty, 
 but her innocence, joined to a gentle form of mania, has kept 
 her apart from all those passions, ideas, and impressions which 
 rise up in life, and has embalmed her, as one might say, in a 
 kind of perpetual youth. She always carries in her arms a 
 bundle of linen which she nurses and fondles as a sick baby. 
 She thinks that all other men than myself and Bruno are 
 doctors; she consults them about her child, and listens to 
 them as to oracles. A crisis which occurred some little time 
 ago has convinced Horace Bianchon, that prince of science, 
 that, if the reality were substituted for this long illusion of 
 motherhood, her reason would be soon completely restored. 
 Is it not a worthy task to bring back light to a soul that is 
 barely clouded ? Does it not strike you that the bond of 
 relationship between you makes it more than ever your part 
 to be the means of effecting that cure ? Now I will take you 
 to Lydie's presence ; remember to play the r61e of doctor ; 
 for the refusal to enter into her notion is the only thing that 
 upsets her serenity." 
 
 After passing through several rooms, Corentin was on the 
 point of taking la Peyrade into the one usually occupied by 
 Lydie, when they were arrested by the sound of two or three 
 chords struck by the hand of a master on the piano. 
 
 "What is that?" asked la Peyrade. 
 
 " That is Lydie," said Corentin, with what might be termed 
 a sort of paternal pride ; " she is an admirable musician ; she 
 was an excellent composer, but lately has not written anything, 
 though she improvises, and in a manner that mores me to the
 
 424 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 soul the soul of Corentin," added the little old man, smiling 
 at the thought. 
 
 La Peyrade was amazed as he listened ; his impressionable 
 nature was deeply stirred by this inspiration and science. 
 
 To a very quick scherzo the player added the first notes of 
 an adagio. After a few measures of a ritornella in arpeggio, a 
 vibrant voice was heard which seemed to stir the Provencal to 
 the depths of his being. 
 
 "How the music moves you!" said Corentin. "You 
 most undoubtedly were made for each other." 
 " Oh, my God ! the same air ! the same voice ! " 
 " Have you, do you mean, ever met Lydie before?" asked 
 the great master of the police. 
 
 "I don't know. I I think not," answered la Peyrade, 
 in a stammering manner; "and yet in any case it must have 
 
 been long ago But that air ! That voice ! It seems to 
 
 me " 
 
 "Enter," said Corentin, suddenly pushing open the door 
 and pulling the young man after him into the room. 
 
 Lydie, sitting with her back to the door, and prevented by 
 the sound of the piano from hearing them, did not notice 
 their entrance. La Peyrade advanced a step. No sooner 
 had he seen the face of the crazy girl than : 
 
 " It is she ! " he cried, wildly clasping his hands over his 
 head. 
 
 "Silence," cried Corentin. 
 
 But Lydie had heard Theodose's exclamation, and turning 
 round she fixed her attention on Corentin. 
 
 "How naughty and troublesome you are to come and 
 bother me," said she. " I don't like being listened to. Oh ! 
 you have brought the doctor; that's right, I was going to send 
 for him." 
 
 Then she arose and ran for what she called her child in a 
 corner of the room. So she went toward la Peyrade, carry- 
 ing her precious bundle in one hand, arranging its little cap
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 425 
 
 with the other, but as she neared him, pale, trembling, with 
 a glassy eye, Theodose now fully recognized Mile, de la 
 Peyrade. He retired in evident terror, not pausing until a 
 chair behind him stopped his progress ; losing his equilibrium, 
 he fell into it. 
 
 So strong a man as Corentin, knowing as he did every 
 incident in the tragedy by which Lydie had lost her reason, 
 had already guessed the truth. 
 
 "Look, doctor," said Lydie, presenting the bundle, "does 
 she not grow thinner and thinner ? " 
 
 La Peyrade was unable to reply. He buried his face in his 
 handkerchief; his breath came so fast that he was incapable 
 of uttering a word. 
 
 Then in a gesture of feverish impatience, to which her mental 
 state predisposed her : 
 
 "But look at the doctor," she cried, pulling his arm vio- 
 lently and thus compelling him to show his features. " My 
 God ! " said she, when she saw the face of the Provencal. 
 
 And, dropping the bundle of linen, she started back ; her 
 eyes grew haggard ; she passed her clammy hands through 
 her hair and over her forehead, and seemed to be making a 
 frantic effort to revive some dormant memory to her mind. 
 Then like a frightened filly who comes to smell an object that 
 has alarmed it, she slowly neared the Provencal, stooping to 
 look into his face, which he kept lowered, and amid a pro- 
 found silence examined him for a few seconds. Suddenly 
 a terrible cry escaped her throat, she sought refuge in the 
 arms of Corentin, and, pressing against him with all her 
 strength : 
 
 "Save me! Save me!" she shrieked. "It is he; the 
 wretch, the villain ! That is he who did it all ! " 
 
 And with her finger extended she seemed to nail the miser- 
 able object of her aversion to the spot. 
 
 After this explosion she grew limp, and Corentin laid her 
 on the couch, insensible.
 
 426 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 " Do not stay here, monsieur," said Corentin. " Go into 
 my study ; I will join you presently." 
 
 Shortly after, when he had summoned help and sent for 
 Dr. Bianchon, Corentin rejoined la Peyrade. 
 
 "You see," said he, with solemnity, "that while following 
 up this marriage with a sort of passionate zeal, I was doing 
 the will of God." 
 
 " Monsieur," said la Peyrade, with compunction, " I should, 
 indeed, confess to you " 
 
 "It is useless," interrupted Corentin, "you can tell me 
 nothing I do not already know; on the contrary, there is 
 much I can tell you. Old Peyrade, your uncle, in trying to 
 earn a dot for his idolized daughter, entered into a dangerous 
 private enterprise ; a thing I would advise you to always 
 avoid. He encountered Vautrin on his way. Your uncle, 
 clever as he was, could not cope with that man, who rejected 
 no aid to success neither murder, poison, nor rape. To 
 paralyze your uncle's efforts, Lydie was enticed to a seem- 
 ingly respectable house ; there she was kept concealed for ten 
 days. She was told this was done at her father's wish, so, 
 not being alarmed, she spent her time well, you remember 
 how she can sing." 
 
 "Oh!" ejaculated la Peyrade, covering his face with his 
 hands. 
 
 " Held as a hostage," continued Corentin, " the unfortu- 
 nate young girl, in case her father did not do as was required 
 of him within ten days, was reserved for a most horrible fate. 
 A narcotic and a man were to play the executioner with the 
 daughter of Sejanus " 
 
 "Monsieur, monsieur; have mercy," groaned la Peyrade. 
 
 "I told you yesterday that you might have more on your 
 conscience than that house of the Thuilliers' ; but you were 
 young then. Without experience, bringing with you the 
 brutality of your country, you had that frenzied Southern blood,' 
 which on occasion flings itself blindly on. Then your relation-
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 427 
 
 ship was known to those who were plotting the ruin of this 
 new Clarissa Harlowe ; fortunately Providence has permitted, 
 in this appalling history, that there is nothing irreparable in 
 it. The same poison, as it may be employed, gives death or 
 health." 
 
 "But, monsieur, shall I not always be an object of horror 
 to her?" 
 
 "The doctor, monsieur," said Katt, opening the door. 
 
 " How is Mademoiselle Lydie ? " asked la Peyrade, eagerly. 
 
 "Quite calm," answered Katt; "and just now when we 
 persuaded her to go to bed though she did not want to go, 
 saying she was not ill I took her the bundle of rags : ' What 
 do you suppose I want with that, my poor Katt ? ' said she 
 with a puzzled air ; ' if you want me to play with a doll, get 
 me one that is made with more care and turned out in better 
 shape than that one.' " 
 
 "You see," said Corentin to the Provencal, "you have be- 
 come the lance of Achiles." 
 
 Then he left the room to receive Dr. Bianchon. Soon 
 after the door opened and Cerizet was ushered in. 
 
 " Ha ! ha ! I knew it," cried the copying clerk. " I knew 
 you would see du Portail in the end. And the marriage 
 how is it coming on ? " 
 
 "It is of yours we expect news," said la Peyrade. 
 
 "The deuce ! then you have heard of it ? My faith ! yes, 
 my dear. All things must have an end, after a long voyage 
 on storm-swept seas. You know the bride, do you?" 
 
 " Yes, a young actress, Olympe Cardinal, a protege of the 
 Minards, who are to give her thirty thousand francs for set- 
 ting her up." 
 
 "And that," said C6rizet, "added to thirty thousand 
 promised by du Portail and the twenty-five I got out of your 
 marriage which didn't come to pass, makes up a total capital 
 of eighty-five thousand francs ; with that and a pretty wife a 
 man must be forsaken of hearen if he cannot succeed in a few
 
 428 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 speculations. But du Portail sent me to see if we could not 
 arrange some scheme to prevent Thuillier's election. Can 
 you suggest any scheme? " 
 
 "No;" replied la Peyrade, "and I don't feel any way 
 imaginative either." 
 
 "Well, here is how the thing stands: the government is 
 afraid that Thuillier might get elected ; Minard, afraid of his 
 popularity, mopes in a corner and takes no steps. Pompous 
 idiots like Thuillier are embarrassing when in the Opposi- 
 tion ; they are pitchers without handles, you cannot tell how 
 to hold them." 
 
 " You seem well informed as to the government's inten- 
 tions," said la Peyrade, curious to learn how far he had been 
 admitted to Corentin's confidence. 
 
 "Oh, no, indeed; I only tell you what Monsieur du Por- 
 tail instructed me." 
 
 "So ! " said la Peyrade, lowering his voice; "who is this 
 du Portail ? You appear to have been intimate with him for 
 some time. A man so penetrative as yourself should have 
 gauged the depths of this person who, between you and I, 
 seems t(3 partake somewhat of the mysterious order." 
 
 " My friend," said Cerizet, " is a deuced strong man. He's 
 a downy old boy and has had, I fancy, some post in the ad- 
 ministration ; I think he may have been employed in some 
 department suppressed with the Empire." 
 
 "Yes? " said la Peyrade. 
 
 " There, I guess," said Cerizet, " is where he made his roll, 
 and, being an ingenious kind of a fellow, and having a natural 
 daughter to marry, he has concocted this philanthropic yarn 
 of her being the daughter of an old friend named Peyrade; 
 your name being the same suggested, I suppose, the idea of 
 fastening upon you." 
 
 "That may be so," replied la Peyrade, "but explain his 
 connection with the government and his interest in the elec- 
 tions."
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. . 429 
 
 "That's easy. Du Portail is a man who loves money, and 
 likes to finger it ; he has done some little service to Rastignac, 
 that great manipulator of elections, a compatriot of his ; in 
 return he gives the other hints in his stock-gambling on the 
 Bourse." 
 
 "Did he give you all this confidential information?" 
 asked la Peyrade. 
 
 " What do you take me for ? " replied Cerizet ; " with this 
 worthy man, who has already promised me thirty thousand 
 francs, as you see, I play the simpleton, but I make Bruno 
 talk; you may ally yourself to this family without fear; why, 
 my dear boy, this du Portail is enormously wealthy ; he can 
 get you made a sub-prefect, from whence to a prefecture and 
 a fortune it is but a step." 
 
 "Thanks," said la Peyrade. "But how came you to know 
 him?" 
 
 "Oh ! that is quite a history; by my intervention he was 
 able to recover a lot of diamonds that had been stolen." 
 
 At this moment Corentin appeared : 
 
 "All is going well," said he to la Peyrade. "There are 
 signs of returning reason. Bianchon would like to talk to 
 you, so Monsieur Cerizet will excuse us until this evening." 
 
 On the day following Thuillier was discussing with Bri- 
 gittte Theodose's letter renouncing Celeste's hand, particu- 
 larly dwelling on the postscript which intimated that la Peyrade 
 might not continue as editor of the " Echo de la Bievre." At 
 this moment Henri, his servant, came in to ask if he would 
 receive M. Cerizet. 
 
 Thuillier's first impulse was 'to deny himself. Then, think- 
 ing better of it, he reflected that Cerizet might prove a re- 
 source if he were left in the lurch. Cerizet presented him- 
 self without the least embarrassment. 
 
 " Well, my dear sir," said he to Thuillier, " you are begin- 
 ning, I suppose, to get posted as to the Sieur la Peyrade ? " 
 
 "What do you mean by that?" asked the old beau.
 
 430 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 " Well, I should think a man who for a long time has been 
 intriguing to marry your goddaughter abruptly breaks off the 
 marriage, as he will sometime also do about the contract he 
 made you sign about his editorship, cannot be the object of 
 the blind confidence you formerly reposed in him." 
 
 "So," said Thuillier, quickly, " you know something then 
 of his intentions to leave the paper? " 
 
 " No," said the banker of the poor, " we are not now on 
 such terms as that I should be given his confidence. I draw 
 my inference from what I know of his character." 
 
 " You have had some former dealings with him then?" 
 
 "Yes, indeed," replied Cerizet. "That business of your 
 house ; I started the hare in that. He was to put me in com- 
 munication with you and make me the first lessee ; but the 
 unfortunate event of the bidding-in gave him the opportunity 
 to swindle me and to keep all the profits himself." 
 
 " Profits ! " exclaimed Thuillier. " I can't see that he got 
 anything out of that beyond the marriage that he refused." 
 
 "What!" said the usurer, "ten thousand francs for the 
 Cross which you never received ; the twenty-five thousand due 
 Madame Lambert, which you went surety for, which, like a 
 good boy, you are apt to have to pay." 
 
 " What's this I hear ! " cried Brigitte, bounding out of her 
 chair; "twenty-five thousand francs you stand security for?" 
 
 "Yes, mademoiselle," replied Cerizet, "behind the sum 
 that woman was said to have lent him there was some mys- 
 tery, but la Peyrade was smart enough not only to whitewash 
 himself before your brother, but also to get him to 
 secure " 
 
 "But," interrupted Thuillier, "if you have not seen him, 
 how did you learn that I had become his surety? " 
 
 "From the servant herself, monsieur, who tells the whole 
 story now she is sure of being paid." 
 
 " Monsieur Ceriret," said Thuillier, holding himself on his 
 reserve, " as I once told la Peyrade, no man is indispensable;
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 431 
 
 now, if the editorship of my paper becomes vacant, I can 
 readily find persons eager to proffer their services to me." 
 
 "Is it for my benefit you speak like that?" asked Ce>izet. 
 "You make a bad mistake if it is, for I have no desire to offer 
 mine. For a long time I have been disgusted with journalism. 
 I let la Peyrade jolly me into it, why I don't know, but I 
 have now abjured it for ever. I came to see you about another 
 thing." 
 
 "Ah !" said Thuillier. 
 
 "Yes," replied C6rizet; "remembering the handsome 
 manner in which you acted in the business of this house, in 
 which you do me the honor of receiving me, it occurred to 
 me that I could not do better than to call your attention to a 
 similar case I have in hand. It is a purely business transac- 
 tion and I expect to make my profit on it. Now, as the sub- 
 letting of this house must be a terrible humbug to made- 
 moiselle, for I notice that all the stores still remain unlet, it 
 would suit me to become the principal tenant I think that 
 might be calculated as part of the profits." 
 
 "But this affair?" said Brigitte, " that is the first thing to 
 know." 
 
 "It is exactly," said Cerizet, " the contrary to that trans- 
 action you had with la Peyrade. You got this house for next 
 to nothing, but were worried by a higher bidder. Now, this 
 is a farm, in Beauce, which has just been sold for a crumb of 
 bread, as they say ; it has been placed in my hands to resell 
 at a small advance ; you could get it at a fabulously low 
 price." 
 
 Then Cerizet set forth the details which had more fascina- 
 tion for Brigitte than it would be like to have for the reader. 
 The statement was precise and interested Thuillier in spite of 
 himself; it was a good speculation. 
 
 "Only," said Brigitte, " we must see the farm.** 
 
 "Nothing is easier," said Cerizet. "I want to see it my. 
 self, and intended making an excursion there to-day. If you
 
 432 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 say so, I'll take you down, calling at your door for you this 
 afternoon with a chaise ; we shall be there early to-morrow 
 morning, examine the farm, have breakfast, and return in 
 time for dinner." 
 
 "A post-chaise," said Brigitte, "is very lordly. The dili- 
 gence seems to me " 
 
 "They are too uncertain," said Cerizet. "But you need 
 not think of the expense, for I shall have to go, and otherwise 
 it would be alone ; I am only too happy to offer you two seats 
 in my carriage." 
 
 To the avaricous little gains often determine great events ; 
 after a little resistance, pro forma, Brigitte accepted, and that 
 day the three set out on the road to Chartres, Cerizet advising 
 Thuillier not to send word to la Peyrade lest he might play 
 "some dirty trick " on him. 
 
 The next evening by five o'clock the trio had returned ; 
 and the brother and sister, who kept their opinions to them- 
 selves in Cerizet's presence, were both of one mind', that the 
 purchase was a good thing, and this idea of becoming the 
 mistress of rural property seemed to Brigitte the final conse- 
 cration of opulence. 
 
 " Minard," said she, "has nothing but his town-house and 
 invested capital, whereas we shall not only have those but a 
 country place beside. One can't be really rich without 
 that." 
 
 Thuillier was not sufficiently charmed by this dream to for- 
 get the paper and his candidacy. He no sooner got back 
 than he asked for the "Echo" issued that morning. 
 
 "It has not yet been delivered." replied the servant. 
 
 " That's a pretty delivery," said Thuillier peevishly, "when 
 even the owner cannot get served." 
 
 Although it was late and he was tired, he ordered a hack 
 and drove to the office of the " E*cho." There a new disap- 
 pointment awaited him ; the new issue was made up and all 
 the employes had left, even la Peyrade. Coffinet was not at
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 433 
 
 his post as office boy, he had "gone of a arrand," said his 
 wife, and had taken the key of the closet in which the remain- 
 ing copies of the paper were locked up. It was impossible to 
 get a copy of the journal which the unhappy proprietor had 
 come so far to procure. 
 
 To paint Thuillier's indignation is impossible. He marched 
 about the room, talking aloud to himself, as people often do 
 under great excitement. 
 
 "I'll turn them all out!" he cried. We are compelled 
 to omit his further objurgations. 
 
 While he fulminated his anathema there was a knock at the 
 door. 
 
 " Come in," thundered Thuillier, in a voice of wrath and 
 frantic impatience. 
 
 Minard appeared, who precipitated himself into his arms. 
 
 " My good, my excellent friend," began the Mayor of the 
 Eleventh, his embrace ending in an earnest handshaking. 
 
 " Why ? what is it ? " said Thuillier, understanding nothing 
 of this vehement demonstration. 
 
 "Ah! my dear friend," continued Minard, "such an ad- 
 mirable proceeding, one may say really chivalrous, most dis- 
 interested ! The effect throughout the arrondissement is enor- 
 mous." 
 
 "But what ? again I ask," exclaimed Thuillier, impatiently. 
 
 "The article, the new departure," said Minard, "all so 
 noble, so elevated." 
 
 "But what article? What departure?" said the owner of 
 the " I^cho," beside himself with irritation. 
 
 "The article of this morning," said Minard. 
 
 "The article of this morning?" 
 
 " Come, you didn't write it while you slept, or are you 
 like Monsieur Jourdain writing prose, heroical without know- 
 ing it?" 
 
 " I ! I have written no article," cried Thuillier. " I have 
 been absent from Paris since yesterday. I don't even know 
 88
 
 434 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 what is in the paper this morning, and there is no office boy 
 here to give me a copy." 
 
 "I have one," said Minard, pulling the much-desired 
 number from his pocket. " If the editorial is not yours, you 
 must have inspired it, and, in any case, the deed is done." 
 
 Thuillier had snatched the sheet that Minard held out to 
 him, and devoured, rather than read, the following : 
 
 For a long time the owner of this regenerated journal submitted, with- 
 out complaint or reply, to the cowardly insinuations with which a venal 
 press insults all citizens who, strong in their convictions, refuse to pass 
 under the Caudine Forks of power. So during this long time, a man, 
 who has given proof of his devotion and abnegation in the important 
 functions of an sedile of Paris, has endured the imputation of being nothing 
 but an ambitious intriguer. M. Jerome Thuillier, strong in his dignity, 
 has suffered these coarse attacks to pass with his scorn, but, encouraged by 
 this contemptuous silence, the stipendiaries of the press have dared to state 
 that this journal, an outcome of intense conviction and disinterested patriot- 
 ism, was but the stepping-stone of a man, the speculation of a seeker after 
 an election. M. JerOme Thuillier, in his high dignity, has held himself 
 immovable before these shameless imputations because truth and justice 
 are patient, and he wished to crush the reptile with a blow. The day of 
 execution has arrived. 
 
 "A devil of a la Peyrade ! " said Thuillier, stopping short 
 at that phrase. " How he hits it off." 
 "It is magnificent," said Minard. 
 Reading aloud, Thuillier went on : 
 
 All the world, enemies and friends, can testify that M. JerOme Thuillier 
 has done nothing to seek a candidacy which was spontaneously offered 
 him. 
 
 " That's evident," said Thuillier, interrupting himself. 
 Then he continued : 
 
 But seeing his sentiments have been so shamefully misreoresented, nil 
 intentions so foully travestied, M. Thuillier owes it to himself, and, abort
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 435 
 
 all, to the great national party in which he is but the humblest soldier, to 
 give an example which shall confound the vile sycophants of power. 
 
 "Truly, la Peyrade gives me full credit," said Thuillier, 
 pausing again in his reading. "I see now why he didn't 
 send me the paper; he wanted to enjoy my surprise : 'Con- 
 found the vile sycophants of power,' " repeated he, after roll- 
 ing it in his mind : 
 
 M. Thuillier was so far from founding a paper in opposition to the 
 dynasty to support and promote his election, that at the very time when 
 his election seems to be assured, and most disheartening for his rivals, 
 he here publicly declares, and in the most formal, absolute, and irrevocable 
 terms, that he RENOUNCES HIS CANDIDACY. 
 
 "What ? How ? " cried Thuillier, thinking he had misread 
 or misunderstood. 
 
 " Go on," said the Mayor of the Eleventh. 
 
 And as Thuillier, with a bewildered manner, seemed indis- 
 posed to continue his reading, Minard took the paper in his 
 hands and read, in his stead : 
 
 He withdraws from the contest and requests the electors to transfer to 
 M. Minard, mayor of the eleventh arrondissement, and his friend and col- 
 league in his municipal functions, all the votes they seemed disposed to 
 honor him with. 
 
 "But this is infamous!" cried Thuillier, recovering his 
 speech, "you have bought that Jesuit, la Peyrade." 
 
 "So," said Minard, stupefied by Thuillier's attitude, "the 
 article was not arranged between you?" 
 
 " The wretch has profited by my absence to slip it in the 
 paper; this explains why he prevented a copy reaching me." 
 
 "My dear fellow," said Minard, "what you are saying 
 will seem incredible to the public." 
 
 "But I tell you it is treason, a beastly trick. Renounce 
 my candidature why should I renounce it?"
 
 436 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "You will fully understand, my friend," said Minard, 
 "that if this is an abuse of confidence, I am made desolate; 
 but I have issued my electoral circular, and, by my faith ! 
 luck to the lucky." 
 
 "Leave me," said Thuillier, pointing to the door, "you 
 have paid for this hoax." 
 
 "Monsieur Thuillier," said Minard, in a threatening tone, 
 " I would advise you not to repeat those words unless you 
 intend giving me your reason." 
 
 Happily for the "civic courage" of Thuillier he was re- 
 relieved from a reply by Coffinet, who opened the door of the 
 editorial sanctum, announcing : 
 
 "The gentlemen electors of the twelfth arrondissement." 
 
 This consisted of a deputation of six, an apothecary being 
 the president, who, addressing Thuillier, said they had read 
 the article of that morning and wished to clearly understand 
 what it meant. He was told that a candidate does not belong 
 to himself, but to the electors who have supported him. 
 "But," he finished up, casting his eye on Minard, "the 
 presence in these precincts of the candidate for whom you 
 have gone out of your way to recommend to us, indicates a 
 connivance between you." 
 
 "No, gentlemen, no," said Thuillier, "I have not re- 
 nounced my candidacy ; that editorial was written unknown 
 to me and without my consent. To-morrow the denial will 
 appear in the same paper ; you will learn, too, that the infa- 
 mous wretch who betrayed me has been dismissed the edi- 
 torship." 
 
 "Then," said the orator, "you are still a candidate and 
 will support the Opposition? " 
 
 "Yes, gentlemen, to the death," said Thuillier. 
 
 "Good ! Very good ! " cried the deputation. 
 
 Then, after a cordial handshake all round, Thuillier con- 
 ducted them to the outer door. 
 
 He had barely reentered the room when :
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 437 
 
 "Gentlemen the electors of the eleventh arrondissement," 
 said Coffiaet, opening the door. 
 
 This time the arrondissement consisted of seven persons. 
 A dry-goods man was the president, his little speech ran : 
 
 " Monsieur, it is with a sincere admiration that we were 
 apprised this morning that the great art of public virtue, which 
 has greatly touched us all, is not lost. You have proved, by 
 thus retiring, a disinterestedness far from the ordinary, and 
 the esteem of your fellow-citizens " 
 
 "Permit me," said Thuillier, interrupting him, "I cannot 
 allow you to continue ; the article upon which you congratu- 
 late me was inserted by mistake." 
 
 "What! " said the dry-goods man, "do you mean to say 
 that you don't retire from the contest ? It will be a great 
 pity if you lose this chance to place yourself in the eyes of 
 your fellow-citizens by the side of Washington and other 
 famous men of antiquity." 
 
 "I will to-morrow make all clear to you," said Thuillier. 
 " I trust when you know the whole truth I shall not suffer in 
 your esteem." 
 
 "This seems a funny sort of a game," shouted an elector. 
 
 " Yes," growled another, " it seems like they were making 
 fools of us." 
 
 Whereupon the deputation retired. 
 
 It is hardly probable that Thuillier would have gone further 
 with them than the office door, but if he had so intended it 
 was prevented by the entrance of la Peyrade. 
 
 "I have just come from your house, my dear fellow," said 
 the Provencal, "they told me I should find you here." 
 
 "And you came, doubtless, to explain to me the strange 
 editorial you allowed yourself to insert in my name?" 
 
 "Exactly," said la Peyrade. "The man of whom you 
 know, and whose far-reaching influence you have already felt, 
 confided in me yesterday, to the interest both of yourself and 
 the government, and I saw it was inevitable that you would
 
 438 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 be defeated. I therefore arranged a dignified and honorable 
 retreat for you." 
 
 " Very good, monsieur," said Thuillier, " but you will 
 understand that from the present you are no longer the editor 
 of this paper." 
 
 " That is what I came to tell you." 
 
 "And doubtless also to settle up the little account we have 
 together." 
 
 " Gentlemen," said Minard, "I see you have business to 
 attend, I make you my bow." 
 
 Minard gone : 
 
 "Here are ten thousand francs," said la Peyrade, "which 
 I beg you to hand to Mademoiselle Brigitte ; here, also, is the 
 bond by which you secured to Madame Lambert the payment 
 of twenty-five thousand francs, to which is attached her re- 
 ceipt in full." 
 
 "Quite right, monsieur," said Thuillier. 
 
 La Peyrade bowed and went out. 
 
 "Serpent ! " said Thuillier, watching him out. 
 
 " Cdrizet struck the right word," said la Peyrade, " he is a 
 pompous idiot." 
 
 The blow struck at Thuillier's candidacy was mortal, but 
 Minard did not profit thereby. While they disputed for the 
 suffrages of the electors, a "castle-man," an aide-de-camp of 
 the King, arrived on the scene, his hands full of tobacco 
 licenses and other the like electioneering small change, and, 
 like the third thief, he stole in between the two candidates who 
 were busy eating each other. It goes without saying that 
 Brigitte did not get her farm at Beauce; this was only a 
 mirage, by the help of which Thuillier was enticed from 
 Paris to enable la Peyrade to deliver his knock-out blow. A 
 service rendered the government, and which was at the same 
 time a full revenge for the humiliations the Provencal had 
 uffered. 
 
 Thuillier had some general suspicions as to C^rizet's com-
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. ttt 
 
 plicity, but that gentleman justified himself, and, by engineer- 
 ing the sale of the " Echo de la Bievre," which had become a 
 nightmare to its unfortunate proprietor, he made himself as 
 white as snow. Bought out by Corentin, the poor sheet of 
 the Opposition became a "canard " sold on Sundays in the 
 taverns after being concocted in the den of the police. 
 
 About a month after the scene in which la Peyrade had 
 been shown that through a crime in the past his future was 
 irrevocably settled, he had married his victim, who now had 
 long intervals of lucidity, though the full return of her reason 
 could not be counted upon until the time and conditions pre- 
 viously indicated by the physicians had become fulfilled. One 
 morning Corentin was closeted with his successor. Taking part 
 in his labors, and serving his apprenticeship for the delicate 
 and arduous duties of his office, Thdodose did not bring that 
 acumen and spirit into the work that Corentin desired. He 
 saw that his pupil had cherished a feeling of degradation ; 
 time would heal the wound, but the callus was as yet un- 
 formed. 
 
 Opening a number of sealed envelopes containing his agents' 
 reports, most of which were contemptuously pitched into the 
 waste-paper basket, to be afterward burnt, the great man gave 
 particular attention to one he came across; as he read it he 
 slightly smiled once or twice, and when he had finished: 
 
 " Here," said he to la Peyrade, passing the manuscript 
 over, "this will interest you; it shows that our profession, 
 which at present seems to you unpleasantly tragic, does at 
 times dabble in comedy, in addition. Read it aloud, it will 
 amuse us." 
 
 Before la Peyrade had commenced to read : 
 
 "I ought to let you know," added Corentin, "that this 
 report is from a man named Henri, whom Madame Komorn 
 placed in service with the Thuilliers." 
 
 "So," said la Peyrade, " you have servants to your hand; 
 is that one of your methods? "
 
 440 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "Sometimes," replied Corentin, "to know all, all means 
 must be utilized ; but, on this subject, many lies are spoken 
 about us. It is not true that the police make a regular system 
 of this. But I wanted an eye and ear in the Thuillier house- 
 hold, so I let the Godollo loose upon it ; she in turn installed 
 one of our men there, quite an intelligent fellow, as you will 
 learn. But suppose another servant came and said he was 
 willing to sell me the secrets of his master, I should have him 
 arrested and let a warning be sent to the family to distrust the 
 other servants." 
 
 Monsieur the Chief of the Secret Police, I did not stay long with the 
 little baron ; he is a man wholly absorbed in frivolous pleasures ; there 
 was nothing to gather worthy of a report. I have another situation 
 though where I have seen a number of things which have a bearing on 
 the mission intrusted to me by Mme. de Godollo ; I take the liberty of 
 acquainting you with them. The household in which I am now in ser- 
 vice is that of an old professor, M. Picot, who lives on a first flooi, Place 
 de la Madeleine, in the suite and house lately occupied by my former mas- 
 ters, the Thuilliers. 
 
 "What!" cried la Peyrade, interrupting himself, "Old 
 Picot, that ruined old lunatic, occupying such splendid apart- 
 ments?" 
 
 " Go on., go on ! " cried Corentin ; " life is full of stranger 
 things than that ; you will find the explanation lower ; our 
 correspondents it's one of their defects are too fond of 
 drawing facts in detail ; they are always over careful in dot- 
 ting their *'s." 
 
 The man Henri went on : 
 
 The Thuilliers, some time ago, left here to return to their Latin quarter. 
 Mile. Brigitte never really liked our sphere ; her total lack of education 
 made her uncomfortable. Because I spoke correctly she dubbed me " the 
 orator," and her porter she disliked, because, being sexton at the Made- 
 leine church, he has some manners ; she even complained of the market- 
 peonle in the market at the rear of the church, and said they gave them-
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 441 
 
 elves " capable " airs, only for that they are not so coarse^tongued as 
 those of the Halle, and laughed when she tried to beat down their prices. 
 She has let her house now to an ugly man with only half a nose, one 
 Cerizet, who pays a rent of fifty-five thousand francs. This leaseholder 
 seems to know his road about; he has just married an actress at a minor 
 theatre and was about to occupy this floor, using it also as offices for a 
 company issuing policies .for marriage-portions, when M. Picot, arriving 
 from England with his wife, a very wealthy Englishwoman, saw the suite 
 of rooms and offered so large a rental that M. C6rizet felt constrained to 
 accept it. It was then that being introduced by M. Pascal, the janitor, I 
 took service with M. Picot. 
 
 " M. Picot, married to a very rich Englishwoman," said la 
 
 Peyrade, again interrupting himself; " it is inconceivable !" 
 
 " Read on," said Corentin ; " you will comprehend later." 
 
 The fortune of my new master is quite a history, and Mme. de Godollo 
 was mixed up with the marriage of a pupil of his a M. Felix Phellion, 
 the inventor of a star who in despair at not being able to marry that 
 demoiselle whom they wanted to give to M. la Peyrade, of whom Mme. 
 de Godollo made such an ass 
 
 "Scoundrel!" said the Provencal, in a parenthesis; "is 
 that how he speaks of me ? He doesn't know yet with whom 
 he has to deal." 
 
 Corentin laughed heartily and told his pupil to go ahead. 
 
 and who in despair at not being allowed to marry her had gone off to 
 England, whence he was to set off on a journey round the world ; just a 
 lover's notion. Hearing of this departure, M. Picot, his old professor, 
 went after him to prevent this nonsense, which was not a difficult matter. 
 The English are naturally very jealous about discoveries, and when they 
 saw M. Phellion about to embark with their own professors they asked 
 him if he had an order from the Admiralty ; not being provided with this, 
 they laughed in his face and would not permit him on board at all ; they 
 feared he would prove more learned than they. 
 
 " He seems to think a great deal of the entente cordiale, 
 your M. Henri," said la Peyrade, jokingly.
 
 442 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "Yes," replied Corentin, "you will be struck in there- 
 ports of our agents with this general and continued spirit of 
 calumniation. But what can be done ! we cannot expect 
 angels to take up the trade of spies." 
 
 Left upon the shore, Telemachus and Mentor thought best to return to 
 France ; they were about doing so when M. Picot received a letter such 
 as none but an Englishwoman could have written. It said that the writer 
 had read his theory of " Perpetual Motion," and had also heard of the 
 wonderful discovery of a star ; she regarded him as a genius next only to 
 Newton; if the hand of her who addressed him, joined to eighty thousand 
 pounds, or two million francs, suited his convenience, she was at his dis- 
 posal. M. Picot liked the offer; he met the English lady, a woman of 
 forty at the least, with a red nose, long teeth, and spectacles. He had in- 
 tended offering her his pupil, but he saw that this was out of the question, 
 so he told her that he was old, half-blind, had not discovered the star, and 
 did not possess a sou. She replied that Milton was not a young man and 
 was stone-blind ; as for the star, she did not care much about that ; that 
 the author of " Perpetual Motion " was, and had been for ten years past, 
 the man of her dreams ; and she again offered herself with a dot of eighty 
 thousand pounds sterling ; beside, he only had a cataract on his eyes ; she 
 was the daughter of a noted oculist and knew this. M. Picot made 
 answer that if his sight were restored and she would consent to live in 
 Paris, for he hated England, he would permit himself to be married. The 
 operation was successfully performed, and, at the end of three weeks, the 
 newly wedded couple arrived in the capital. All these details I learned 
 from madame's maid with whom I am on intimate terms. 
 
 "You see, conceited puppy ! " said Corentin laughing. 
 
 But the remainder of what I have to inform M. the Chief are facts of 
 which I speak de visu. When the Picots were comfortably installed they 
 gave invitations to a dinner to all the guests, and a few others, who had 
 attended a dinner at which M. Picot had had a funny encounter with 
 Mile Thuillier. The whole company were on hand at the time named, 
 but M. Picot did not appear. The guests were received by Madame, who 
 does not speak French and could only say : " My husband will soon be 
 here; " at last M. Picot arrived, and they were stupefied on seeing, instead 
 of a shabby, blind old man, a handsome, hale, young old man, carrying 
 his years jauntily, like M. Ferville, of the Gymnase, and saying:
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 443 
 
 " I beg your pardon, ladies, for not being here when you arrived, but I 
 was at the Academy of Sciences, awaiting the result of an election that 
 of Monsieur Felix Phellion, who was unanimously elected less three 
 yotes." 
 
 The news seemed to be well received by the company. 
 
 " I must also ask your pardon, ladies, for my rather peculiar behavior 
 in this very place, a few weeks ago. My excuses are my late infirmity, 
 the annoyances of a law-suit, and an old housekeeper who robbed and 
 plagued me in a thousand ways and of whom I have the happiness of 
 being now delivered. To-day you see me rejuvenated, married to an 
 amiable spouse, and with only one cloud to obscure my happiness that 
 of my young friend who has been crowned by the Academy ; all here are 
 more or less guilty toward him ; I, for my ingratitude, when he turned 
 over to me the benefits of his discovery and the reward of his immortal 
 labors; that young lady I see there with tears in her eyes, for having 
 foolishly accused him of atheism ; that other stern-looking one, for replying 
 with harshness to his proposals made by his worthy father, whose white 
 hairs she should rather have honored ; M. Thuillier, for having sacrificed 
 him to ambition ; M Colleville, for not having done his part as a father, 
 and choosing the most worthy man; M. Minard, for giving in to his 
 jealousy and trying to foist his son in his place. There are but two 
 present who have done him common justice Madame Thuillier and M. 
 the Abbe Gondrin. I shall now ask that man of God whether we may 
 not almost doubt Divine justice, when we see this generous young man, 
 the victim of all of us, tossed at the mercy of the waves and tempest, 
 to which for three long years he is consigned before he returns ? " 
 
 "Providence is mighty, monsieur," said the abbe; "God will protect 
 M. F61ix Phellion in the midst of peril ; in three years let us have the firm 
 hope that he will be safely restored to us." 
 
 "But three years," said M. Picot. " Will it still be time ? Mile. Colle- 
 ville, will she wait for him ? " 
 
 "Yes, I swear it," cried the young girl, carried away by an uncontrol- 
 lable impulse. 
 
 "And you, Mile. Thuillier," continued Picot, "and you, Mme. Colle- 
 ville, will you allow this ? " 
 
 "Yes, yes," cried everybody; for M. Picot's voice, full and sonorous, 
 had tears in it. 
 
 "It is time, then," said M. Picot, "to grant an amnesty to Providence." 
 Thenrushing to the door where my ear was glued to the keyhole by 
 Gorge ! he nearly caught me : 
 
 2 C
 
 444 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 
 
 "Announce," said he to me, " M. Felix Phellion and family." 
 
 Thereupon a door opened and five or six persons came out, who were 
 led by M. Picot into the salon. 
 
 At the sight of her lover Mile. Colleville fell in a faint, but the spell 
 was soon over, and, seeing M. Felix at her feet, she threw herself, weep- 
 ing, into Mme. Thuillier's arms, crying: 
 
 " Godmother, you always told me to hope." 
 
 Mile. Thuillier, who, as I have always thought, despite her harsh nature 
 and lack of education, is a very remarkable woman, had a happy inspi- 
 ration : 
 
 " On* moment," she said, for they were just starting for the dining- 
 room. " Monsieur Phellion," she said, going up to him, " monsieur and 
 old friend, I ask for the hand of M. Felix Phellion for our adopted daugh- 
 ter, Mile. Colleville." 
 
 " Bravo, bravo ! " cried all in chorus. 
 
 " My God ! " said M. Felix Phellion, tearfully, " what have I done to 
 deserve so great a happiness ! " 
 
 " You have been an honest man and a Christian without knowing it," 
 replied the Abbe Gondrin. 
 
 Here la Peyrade flung down the letter. 
 
 "Well! you haven't finished it?" said Corentin, picking 
 it up. "But there's not much more; M. Henri just informs 
 me that he was ' moved ' him ! no, wait," added Corentin, 
 " here's another detail of some importance : " 
 
 The Englishwoman made it known during dinner that, having no heirs, 
 her fortune after the deaths of herself and husband, will go to Felix, who, 
 as a consequence, will become enormously wealthy. 
 
 La Peyrade had risen and was striding rapidly about the 
 room. 
 
 "Well, what's the matter?" asked Corentin. 
 
 "Nothing," answered the Provencal. 
 
 "Yes, there is," replied the detective; "I think you are a 
 little jealous of that young man's good fortune. My dear fel- 
 low, allow me to suggest to you that if you wished such a%on- 
 clusion for yourself, you should have acted as he has done.
 
 THE MIDDLE CLASSES. 445 
 
 When I sent you one hundred louis to study law, I did not 
 then intend you as my successor ; I expected you to labor at 
 the oars of your own galley, to have the courage for obscure 
 and hard toil; your day must have come. But you choose to 
 violate Fate." 
 
 " Monsieur ! " said la Peyrade. 
 
 " I mean, hastened it cutting the hay while yet green. 
 You took a fling at journalism ; you made acquaintances of 
 Cerizet and Dutocq ; and, frankly, I think you very fortunate 
 in reaching the port in which you have now found a refuge. 
 Beside, you are not of a nature sufficiently simple-hearted to 
 enjoy such bliss as is reserved for Felix Phellion and " 
 
 " These middle-classes," said la Peyrade, quickly ; " I know 
 them now, to my cost. They have great absurdities, great 
 vices even ; but they have their virtues, or, at the least, very 
 estimable qualities ; in them lies the vital force of our corrupt 
 society." 
 
 " Your society !" said Corentin, smiling; "you speak as 
 if you were still in the ranks. You are struck off the roll, my 
 dear, and you must learn to be more content with your lot; 
 governments pass ; societies perish or dwindle ; but we we 
 dominate all things; and the Police is eternal."
 
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