LIBRARY 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 SANTA BARBARA 
 
 PRESENTED BY 
 
 Mr. H. H. Kil iani
 
 UCSB LIBRARY
 
 H. DE BALZAC 
 
 THE COMEDIE HUMAINE
 
 SHE TOOK HER MAID WITH HER, AND THE OLD SOLDIER 
 GALLOPED BESIDE THE CARRIAGE.
 
 H. DE BALZAC 
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY 
 
 (LA FEMME DE TRENTE ANS) 
 
 AND A START IN LIFE 
 
 TRANSLATED BY 
 
 ELLEN MARRIAGE 
 
 WITH A PREFACE BY 
 
 GEORGE SAINTSBURY 
 
 PHILADELPHIA 
 
 THE GEBBIE PUBLISHING Co., Ltd. 
 1898
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 nun 
 PREFACE ix 
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY 
 
 I. EARLY MISTAKES I 
 
 II. A HIDDEN GRIEF 76 
 
 III. AT THIRTY YEARS 99 
 
 IV. THE FINGER OF GOD '. .124 
 
 V. TWO MEETINGS 139 
 
 VI. THE OLD AGE OF A GUILTY MOTHER .... 193 
 
 A START IN LIFE 209
 
 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 SHE TOOK HER MAID WITH HER, AND THE OLD SOLDIER GAL- 
 LOPED BESIDE THE CARRIAGE (p. 36) . . . Frontispiece. 
 
 PACK 
 SHE PUT THE CURTAINS SOFTLY ASIDE 72 
 
 HE TURNED HIS HEAD TOWARD HIS HOST'S DAUGHTER . - 157 
 
 A VAST COLUMN OF SMOKE RISING SPREAD LIKE A BROWN 
 
 CLOUD 187 
 
 Drawn by W. Boucher. 
 
 PIERROTIN SAT DOWN ON ONE OF THE ENORMOUS CURBSTONES . 219 
 Drawn by F. C. Tilney.
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 "LA FEMME DE TRENTE ANS," which opens the volume, 
 is tainted with a kind of sentimentalism which, in Balzac's 
 hands and to English taste, very rarely escapes a smatch of 
 the rancid. As M. de Lovenjoul's patient investigations have 
 shown, and as the curiously wide date 1828-1844 would itself 
 indicate to any one who has carefully studied Balzac's ways of 
 proceeding, it is not really a single story at all, but consists 
 of half a dozen chapters or episodes originally published at 
 different times and in different places, and stuck together with 
 so much less than even the author's usual attention to strict 
 construction, that the general title is totally inapplicable to 
 the greater part of the book, and that the chronology of that 
 part to which it does apply fits in very badly with the rest. 
 This, however, is the least of the faults of the piece. It is 
 more though still not most serious that Balzac never seems 
 to have made up anything like a clear or consistent idea of 
 Julie d'Aiglemont in his mind. First she is a selfish and 
 thoughtless child ; then an angelic and persecuted but faithful 
 wife ; then a somewhat facile victim to a very commonplace 
 seducer, after resisting an exceptional one. So, again, she is 
 first a devoted mother, then an almost unnatural parent, and 
 then again devoted, being punished par ou die a plche [how- 
 ever she may sin] once more. Even this, however, might 
 have been atoned for by truth, or grace, or power of handling. 
 I cannot find much of any of these things here. Not to men- 
 tion the unsavoriness of part of Julie's trials, they are not 
 such as, in me at least, excite any sympathy ; and Balzac has 
 drenched her with the sickly sentiment above noticed to an 
 almost nauseous extent. Although he would have us take the 
 Marquis as a brutal husband, he does not in effect represent 
 
 (ix)
 
 x PREFACE. 
 
 him as such, but merely as a not very refined and rather clumsy 
 "good fellow," who for his sins is cursed with a mijauree 
 [affected] of a wife. The Julie-Arthur love-passages are in the 
 very worst style of "sensibility;" and though I fully ac- 
 knowledge the heroism of my countryman Lord Arthur in 
 allowing his fingers to be crushed and making no sign al- 
 though I question very much whether I could have done the 
 same I fear this romantic act does not suffice to give verisi- 
 militude to a figure which is for the most part mere pasteboard, 
 with sawdust inside and tinsel out. Many of the incidents, 
 such as the pushing of the child into the water, and, still more, 
 the scene on shipboard where the princely Corsair takes mil- 
 lions out of a piano and gives them away, have the crude and 
 childish absurdity of the "CEuvres de Jeunesse," which they 
 very much resemble, and with which, from the earliest date 
 given, they may very probably have been contemporary. 
 Those who are fortunate enough to find Julie, in her early 
 afternoon of femme incomprise [non-compromised woman], 
 attractive, may put up with these defects. I own that I am 
 not quite able to find the compensation sufficient. The worse 
 side of the French "sensibility" school from Rousseau to 
 Madame de Stael appears here ; and Balzac, genius as he was, 
 had quite weak points enough of his own without borrowing 
 other men's and women's. 
 
 It takes M. de Lovenjoul nearly three of his large pages of 
 small type to give an exact bibliography of the extraordinary 
 mosaic which bears the title of " La Femme de Trente Ans." 
 It must be sufficient here to say that most of its parts appeared 
 separately in different periodicals (notably the " Revue de 
 Paris ") during the very early thirties ; that when in 1832 most 
 of them appeared together in the " Scenes de la Vie Prive " 
 they were independent stories ; and that when the author did 
 put them together, he at first adopted the title " Mdme His- 
 toire." 
 
 The second story in the volume, a very slight touch of un-
 
 PREFACE. xi 
 
 necessary cruelty excepted, is one of the truest and most amus- 
 ing of all Balzac's repertoire ; and it is conducted according 
 to the orthodox methods of poetical justice. It is impossible 
 not to recognize the justice of the portraiture of the luckless 
 Oscar Husson, and the exact verisimilitude of the way in which 
 he succumbs to the temptations and practical jokes (the first 
 title of the story was "Le Danger des Mystifications") of his 
 companions. I am not a good authority on matters dramatic ; 
 but it seems to me that the story would lend itself to the stage 
 in the right hands better than almost anything that Balzac 
 has done. Half an enfant terrible and half a Sir Martin Mar- 
 all, the luckless Oscar "puts his foot into it," and emerges in 
 deplorable condition, with a sustained success which would do 
 credit to all but the very best writers of farcical comedy, and 
 would not disgrace the very best. 
 
 In such pieces the characters other than the hero have but 
 to play contributory parts, and here they do not fail to do 
 so. M. de Serizy, whom it pleased Balzac to keep in a dozen 
 books as his stock example of the unfortunate husband, plays 
 his part with at least as much dignity as is easily possible 
 to such a personage. Madame Clapart is not too absurd as 
 the fond mother of the cub ; and Moreau, her ancient lover, 
 is equally commendable in the not very easy part of a " pro- 
 tector." The easy-going ladies who figure in Oscar's second 
 collapse display well enough that rather facile generosity and 
 good-nature which Balzac is fond of attributing to them. 
 As for the "Mystificators," Balzac, as usual, is decidedly 
 more lenient to the artist folk than he is elsewhere to men 
 of letters. Mistigris, or Leon de Lora, is always a pleasant 
 person, and Joseph Bridau always a respectable one. Georges 
 Marest is no doubt a bad fellow, but he gets punished. 
 
 Nor ought we to omit notice of the careful study of the 
 apprenticeship of a lawyer's clerk, wherein, as elsewhere no 
 doubt, Balzac profited by his own novitiate. Altogether the 
 story is a pleasant one, and we acquiesce in the tempering
 
 xii PREFACE. 
 
 of the wind to Oscar when that ordinary person is consoled 
 for his sufferings with the paradise of the French bourgeois 
 a respectable place, a wife with no dangerous brilliancy, 
 and a good dot. 
 
 G. S.
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 To Louis Boulangcr, Painter. 
 I. 
 
 EARLY MISTAKES. 
 
 IT was a Sunday morning in the beginning of April, 1813, a 
 morning which gave promise of one of those bright days when 
 Parisians, for the first time in the year, behold dry pavements 
 underfoot and a cloudless sky overhead. It was not yet noon 
 when a luxurious cabriolet, drawn by two spirited horses, 
 turned out of the Rue de Castiglione into the Rue de Rivoli, 
 and drew up behind a row of carriages standing before the 
 newly opened barrier half-way down the Feuillant Terrace. 
 The owner of the carriage looked anxious and out of health ; 
 the thin hair on his sallow temples, turning gray already, gave 
 a look of premature age to his face. He flung the reins to a 
 servant who followed on horseback, and alighted to take in 
 his arms a young girl whose dainty beauty had already at- 
 tracted the eyes of loungers on the terrace. The little lady, 
 standing upon the carriage step, graciously submitted to be 
 taken by the waist, putting an arm around the neck of her 
 guide, who set her down upon the pavement without so much 
 as ruffling the trimming of her green rep dress. No lover 
 would have been more careful. The stranger could only be 
 the father of the young girl, who took his arm familiarly 
 without a word of thanks, and hurried him into the garden of 
 the Tuileries. 
 
 The old father noted the wondering stare which some of 
 the young men gave the couple, and the sad expression left his 
 face for a moment. Although he had long since reached the 
 
 (1)
 
 2 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 time of life when a man is fain to be content with such illu- 
 sory delights as vanity bestows, he began to smile. 
 
 "They think you are my wife," he said in the young lady's 
 ear, and he held himself erect and walked with slow steps, 
 which filled his daughter with despair. 
 
 He seemed to take up the coquette's part for her ; perhaps 
 of the two, he was the more gratified by the curious glances 
 directed at those little feet, shod with plum-colored prunella ; 
 at the dainty figure outlined by a low-cut bodice, filled in 
 with an embroidered chemisette, which only partially con- 
 cealed the girlish throat. Her dress was lifted by her move- 
 ments as she walked, giving glimpses higher than the shoes of 
 delicately moulded outlines beneath open-work silk stockings. 
 More than one of the idlers turned and passed the pair again, 
 to admire or to catch a second glimpse of the young face, 
 about which the brown tresses played ; there was a glow in its 
 white and red, partly reflected from the rose-colored satin 
 lining of her fashionable bonnet, partly due to the eagerness 
 and impatience which sparkled in every feature. A mischiev- 
 ous sweetness lighted up the beautiful, almond-shaped dark 
 eyes, bathed in liquid brightness, shaded by the long lashes 
 and curving arch of eyebrow. Life and youth displayed their 
 treasures in the petulant face and in the gracious outlines of 
 the bust, unspoiled even by the fashion of the day, which 
 brought the girdle under the breast. 
 
 The young lady herself appeared to be insensible to admi- 
 ration. Her eyes were fixed in a sort of anxiety on the palace 
 of the Tuileries, the goal, doubtless, of her petulant prome- 
 nade. It wanted but fifteen minutes of noon, yet even at that 
 early hour several women in gala dress were coming away 
 from the Tuileries, not without backward glances at the gates 
 and pouting looks of discontent, as if they regretted the late- 
 ness of the arrival which had cheated them of a longed-for 
 spectacle. Chance carried a few words let fall by one of these 
 disappointed fair ones to the ears of the charming stranger,
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 3 
 
 and put her in a more than common uneasiness. The elderly 
 man watched the signs of impatience and apprehension which 
 flitted across his companion's pretty face with interest, rather 
 than amusement, in his eyes, observing her with a close and 
 careful attention, which perhaps could only be prompted by 
 some after-thought in the depths of a father's mind. 
 
 It was the thirteenth Sunday of the year 1813. In two 
 days' time Napoleon was to set out upon the disastrous cam- 
 paign in which he was to lose first Bessieres, and then Duroc ; 
 he was to win the memorable battles of Lutzen and Bautzen, 
 to see himself treacherously deserted by Austria, Saxony, 
 Bavaria, and Bernadotte, and to dispute the dreadful field of 
 Leipsic.* The magnificent review commanded for that day by 
 the Emperor was to be the last of so many which had long 
 drawn forth the admiration of Paris and of foreign visitors. 
 For the last time the Old Guard would execute their scientific 
 military manoeuvres with the pomp and precision which some- 
 times amazed the Giant himself. Napoleon was nearly ready 
 for his duel with Europe. It was a sad sentiment which 
 brought a brilliant and curious throng to the Tuileries. 
 Each mind seemed to foresee the future ; perhaps, too, in every 
 mind another thought was dimly present, how that in that 
 future, when the heroic age of France should have taken the 
 half-fabulous color with which it is tinged for us to-day, men's 
 imaginations would more than once seek to retrace the picture 
 of the pageant which they were assembled to behold. 
 
 " Do let us go more quickly, father ; I can hear the drums," 
 the young girl said, and in a half-teasing, half-coaxing manner 
 she urged her companion forward. 
 
 "The troops are marching into the Tuileries," said he. 
 
 " Or marching out of it everybody is coming away," she 
 answered in childish vexation, which drew a smile from her 
 father. 
 
 * Volkerschlacht : Napoleon's first defeat.
 
 4 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 " The review only begins at half-past twelve," he said ; he 
 had fallen half behind his impetuous daughter. 
 
 It might have been supposed that she meant to hasten their 
 progress by the movement of her right arm, for it swung like 
 an oar-blade through the water. In her impatience she had 
 crushed her handkerchief into a ball in her tiny, well-gloved 
 fingers. Now and then the old man smiled, but the smiles 
 were succeeded by an anxious look which crossed his withered 
 face and saddened it. In his love for the fair young girl by 
 his side, he was as fain to exalt the present moment as to 
 dread the future. "She is happy to-day; will her happiness 
 last?" he seemed to ask himself, for the old are somewhat 
 prone to foresee their own sorrows in the future of the young. 
 
 Father and daughter reached the peristyle under the tower 
 where the tricolor flag was still waving ; but, as they passed 
 under the arch by which people came and went between the 
 gardens of the Tuileries and the Place du Carrousel, the 
 sentries on guard called out sternly 
 
 " No admittance this way ! " 
 
 By standing on tiptoe the young girl contrived to catch a 
 glimpse of a crowd of well-dressed women, thronging either 
 side of the old marble arcade along which the Emperor was 
 to pass. 
 
 " We were too late in starting, father; you can see that 
 quite well." A little piteous pout revealed the immense 
 importance which she attached to the sight of this particular 
 review. 
 
 " Very well, Julie let us go away. You dislike a crush." 
 
 " Do let us stay, father. Even here I may catch a glimpse 
 of the Emperor; he might die during this campaign, and then 
 I should never have seen him." 
 
 Her father shuddered at the selfish speech. There were 
 tears in the girl's voice ; he looked at her, and thought that 
 he saw tears beneath her lowered eyelids ; tears caused not so 
 much by the disappointment as by one of the troubles of early
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 5 
 
 youth, a secret easily guessed by an old father. Suddenly 
 Julie's face flushed, and she uttered an exclamation. Neither 
 her father nor the sentinels understood the meaning of the 
 cry ; but an officer within the barrier, who sprang across the 
 court toward the staircase, heard it, and turned abruptly at 
 the sound. He went to the arcade by the gardens of the 
 Tuileries, and recognized the young lady who had been hidden 
 for a moment by the tall bearskin caps of the grenadiers. He 
 set aside in favor of the pair the order which he himself had 
 given. Then, taking no heed of the murmurings of the 
 fashionable crowd seated under the arcade, he gently drew 
 the enraptured child toward him. 
 
 "I am no longer surprised at her vexation and enthusiasm, 
 if you are in waiting," the old man said with a half-mocking, 
 half-serious glance at the officer. 
 
 " If you want a good position, Monsieur le Due," the young 
 man answered, " we must not spend any time in talking. The 
 Emperor does not like to be kept waiting, and the grand 
 marshal has sent me to announce our readiness." 
 
 As he spoke, he had taken Julie's arm with a certain air of 
 old acquaintance, and drew her rapidly in the direction of the 
 Place du Carrousel. Julie was astonished at the sight. An 
 immense crowd was penned up in a narrow space, shut in 
 between the gray walls of the palace and the limits marked 
 out by chains round the great sanded squares in the midst of 
 the courtyard of the Tuileries. The cordon of sentries posted 
 to keep a clear passage for the Emperor and his staff had great 
 difficulty in keeping back the eager humming swarm of human 
 beings. 
 
 "Is it going to be a very fine sight ? " Julie asked (she was 
 radiant now). 
 
 " Pray take care ! " cried her guide, and, seizing Julie by 
 the waist, he lifted her up with as much vigor as rapidity and 
 set her down beside a pillar. , 
 
 But for his prompt action, his gazing kinswoman would
 
 6 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 have come into collision with the hindquarters of a white 
 horse which Napoleon's Mameluke held by the bridle ; the 
 animal in its trappings of green velvet and gold stood almost 
 under the arcade, some ten paces behind the rest of the 
 horses in readiness for the Emperor's staff. 
 
 The young officer placed the father and daughter in front 
 of the crowd in the first space to the right, and recommended 
 them by a sign to the two veteran grenadiers on either side. 
 Then he went on his way into the palace ; a look of great joy 
 and happiness had succeeded to his horror-stricken expression 
 when the horse backed. Julie had given his hand a mysterious 
 pressure ; had she meant to thank him for the little service he 
 had done her, or did she tell him: "After all, I shall really 
 see you? " She bent her head quite graciously in response to 
 the respectful bow by which the officer took leave of them 
 before he vanished. 
 
 The old man stood a little behind his daughter. He looked 
 grave. He seemed to have left the two young people together 
 for some purpose of his own, and now he furtively watched 
 the girl, trying to lull her into false security by appearing to 
 give his whole attention to the magnificent sight in the Place 
 du Carrousel. When Julie's eyes turned to her father with 
 the expression of a schoolboy before his master, he answered 
 her glance by a gay, kindly smile, but his own keen eyes had 
 followed the officer under the arcade, and nothing of all that 
 passed was lost upon him. 
 
 "What a grand sight ! " said Julie in a low voice, as she 
 pressed her father's hand ; and, indeed, the pomp and pic- 
 turesqueness of the spectacle in the Place du Carrousel drew 
 the same exclamation from thousands upon thousands of spec- 
 tators, all agape with wonder. Another array of sightseers, 
 as tightly packed as the ranks behind the old noble and his 
 daughter, filled the narrow strip of pavement by the railings 
 which crossed the Place du Carrousel from side to side in a 
 line parallel with the Tuileries. The dense living mass, varie-
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 7 
 
 gated by the colors of the women's dresses, traced out a bold 
 line across the centre of the Place du Carrousel, filling in 
 the fourth side of a vast parallelogram, surrounded on three 
 sides by the Tuileries itself. Within the precincts thus railed 
 off stood the regiments of the Old Guard about to be passed 
 in review, drawn up opposite the palace in imposing blue 
 columns, ten ranks in depth. Without and beyond in the 
 Place du Carrousel stood several regiments likewise drawn up 
 in parallel lines, ready to march in through the arch in the 
 centre ; the Triumphal Arch, where the bronze horses of St. 
 Mark from Venice used to stand in those days. At either 
 end, by the Louvre Galleries, the regimental bands were 
 stationed, masked by the Polish Lancers then on duty. 
 
 The greater part of the vast graveled space was empty as an 
 arena, ready for the evolutions of those silent masses disposed 
 with the symmetry of military art. The sunlight blazed back 
 from ten thousand bayonets in thin points of flame; the 
 breeze ruffled the men's helmet plumes till they swayed like 
 the crests of forest trees before a gale. The mute, glittering 
 ranks of veterans were full of bright contrasting colors, thanks 
 to their different uniforms, weapons, accoutrements, and 
 aiguillettes; and the whole great picture, that miniature battle- 
 field before the combat, was framed by the majestic towering 
 walls of the Tuileries, which officers and men seemed to rival 
 in their immobility. Involuntarily the spectator made the 
 comparison between the walls of men and the walls of stone. 
 The spring sunlight, flooding white masonry reared but yes- 
 terday and buildings centuries old, shone full likewise upon 
 thousands of bronzed faces, each one with its own tale of 
 perils passed, each one gravely expectant of perils to come. 
 
 The colonels of the regiments came and went alone before 
 the ranks of heroes; and behind the masses of troops, checkered 
 with blue and silver and gold and purple, the curious could 
 discern the tricolor pennons on the lances of some half-a- 
 dozen indefatigable Polish cavalry, rushing about like shep-
 
 8 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 herds' dogs in charge of a flock, caracoling up and down be- 
 tween the troops and the crowd, to keep the gazers within their 
 proper bounds. But for this slight flutter of movement, the 
 whole scene might have been taking place in the courtyard of 
 the palace of the Sleeping Beauty. The very spring breeze, ruf- 
 fling up the long fur on the grenadiers' bearskins, bore witness 
 to the men's immobility, as the smothered murmur of the 
 crowd emphasized their silence. Now and again the jingling 
 of Chinese bells, or a chance blow to a big drum, woke the 
 reverberating echoes of the Imperial Palace with a sound like 
 the far-off rumblings of thunder. 
 
 An indescribable, unmistakable enthusiasm was manifest in 
 the expectancy of the multitude. France was about to take 
 farewell of Napoleon on the eve of a campaign of which the 
 meanest citizen foresaw the perils. The existence of the 
 French Empire was at stake to be, or not to be. The whole 
 citizen population seemed to be as much inspired with this 
 thought as that other armed population standing in serried 
 and silent ranks in the inclosed space, with the Eagles and 
 the genius of Napoleon hovering above them. 
 
 Those very soldiers were the hope of France, her last drop 
 of blood ; and this accounted for not a little of the anxious 
 interest of the scene. Most of the gazers in the crowd had 
 bidden farewell perhaps farewell for ever to the men who 
 made up the rank and file of the battalions ; and even those 
 most hostile to the Emperor, in their hearts, put up fervent 
 prayers to heaven for the glory of France ; and those most 
 weary of the struggle with the rest of Europe had left their 
 hatreds behind as they passed in under the Triumphal Arch. 
 They, too, felt that in the hour of danger Napoleon meant 
 France herself. 
 
 The clock of the Tuileries struck the half-hour. In a 
 moment the hum of the crowd ceased. The silence was so 
 deep that you might have heard * a child speak. The old 
 noble and his daughter, wholly intent, seeming to live only
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 9 
 
 by their eyes, caught a distinct sound of spurs and clank of 
 swords echoing up under the sonorous peristyle. 
 
 And suddenly there appeared a short, somewhat stout figure 
 in a green uniform, white trousers, and riding boots; a man 
 wearing on his head a cocked hat well-nigh as magically 
 potent as its wearer ; the broad red ribbon of the Legion of 
 Honor rose and fell on his breast, and a short sword hung at 
 his side. At one and the same moment the man was seen by 
 all eyes in all parts of the square. 
 
 Immediately the drums beat a salute, both bands struck up 
 a martial refrain, caught and repeated like a fugue by every 
 instrument from the thinnest flutes to the largest drum. The 
 clangor of that call to arms thrilled through every soul. The 
 colors dropped and the men presented arms, one unanimous 
 rhythmical movement shaking every bayonet from the fore- 
 most front near the palace to the last rank in the Place du 
 Carrousel. The words of command sped from line to line 
 like echoes. The whole enthusiastic multitude sent up a 
 shout of " Long live the Emperor ! " 
 
 Everything shook, quivered, and thrilled at last. Napoleon 
 had mounted his horse. It was his movement that had put 
 life into those silent masses of men ; the dumb instruments 
 had found a voice at his coming, the Eagles and the colors 
 had obeyed the same impulse which had brought emotion into 
 all faces. 
 
 The very walls of the high galleries of the old palace seemed 
 to cry aloud, " Long live the Emperor! " 
 
 There was something preternatural about it it was magic 
 at work, a counterfeit presentment of the power of God ; or 
 rather it was a fugitive image of a reign itself so fugitive 
 though brilliant. 
 
 And HE the centre of such love, such enthusiasm and devo- 
 tion, and so many prayers, he for whom the sun had driven 
 the clouds from the sky, was sitting there on his horse, three 
 paces in front of his Golden Squadron, with the grand marshal
 
 10 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 on his left, and the marshal-in-waiting on his right. Amid all 
 the outburst of enthusiasm at his presence not a feature of his 
 face appeared to alter. 
 
 " Oh ! yes. At Wagram, in the thick of the firing, on the 
 field of Borodino, among the dead, always as cool as a cucum- 
 ber HE is ! " said the grenadier, in answer to the questions 
 with which the young girl plied him. For a moment Julie was 
 absorbed in the contemplation of that face, so quiet in the 
 security of conscious power. The Emperor noticed Mile, de 
 Chatillonest, and leaned to make some brief remark to Duroc, 
 which drew a smile from the grand marshal. Then the review 
 began. 
 
 If hitherto the young lady's attention had been divided 
 between Napoleon's impassive face and the blue, red, and 
 green ranks of troops, from this time forth she was wholly 
 intent upon a young officer moving among the lines as they 
 performed their swift symmetrical evolutions. She watched 
 him gallop with tireless activity to and from the group where 
 the plainly dressed Napoleon shone conspicuous. The officer 
 rode a splendid black horse. His handsome sky-blue uniform 
 marked him out amid the variegated multitude as one of the 
 Emperor's orderly staff-officers. His gold lace glittered in 
 the sunshine which lighted up the aigrette on his tall, narrow 
 shako, so that the gazer might have compared him to a will- 
 o'-the wisp, or to a visible spirit emanating from the Emperor 
 to infuse movement into those battalions whose swaying bayo- 
 nets flashed into flames; for, at a mere glance from his eyes, 
 they broke and gathered again, surging to and fro like the 
 waves in a bay, or again swept before him like the long ridges 
 of high-crested waves which the vexed ocean directs against 
 the shore. 
 
 When the manoeuvres were over the officer galloped back at 
 full speed, pulled up his horse, and awaited orders. He was 
 not ten paces from Julie as he stood before the Emperor, 
 much as General Rapp stands in Gerard's Battle of Austerlitz.
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 11 
 
 The young girl could behold her lover in all his soldierly 
 splendor. 
 
 Colonel Victor d' Aiglemont, barely thirty years of age, was 
 tall, slender, and well made. His well-proportioned figure 
 never showed to better advantage than now as he exerted his 
 strength to hold in the restive animal, whose back seemed to 
 curve gracefully to the rider's weight. His brown masculine 
 face possessed the indefinable charm of perfectly regular feat- 
 ures combined with youth. The fiery eyes under the broad 
 forehead, shaded by thick eyebrows and long lashes, looked 
 like white ovals bordered by an outline of black. His nose 
 had the delicate curve of an eagle's beak ; the sinuous lines 
 of the inevitable black mustache enhanced the crimson of the 
 lips. The brown and tawny shades which overspread the 
 wide high-colored cheeks told a tale of unusual vigor, and his 
 whole face bore the impress of dashing courage. He was the 
 very model which French artists seek to-day for the typical 
 hero of Imperial France. The horse which he rode was 
 covered with sweat ; the animal's quivering head denoted the 
 last degree of restiveness; his hind hoofs were set down wide 
 apart and exactly in a line ; he shook his long thick tail to the 
 wind ; in his fidelity to his master he seemed to be a visible 
 presentment of that master's devotion to the Emperor. 
 
 Julie saw her lover watching intently for the Emperor's 
 glances, and felt a momentary pang of jealousy, for as yet 
 he had not given her a look. Suddenly at a word from his 
 sovereign Victor gripped his horse's flanks and set out at a 
 gallop, but the animal took fright at a shadow cast by a post, 
 shied, backed, and reared up so suddenly that his rider was 
 all but thrown off. Julie cried out, her face grew white, 
 people looked at her curiously, but she saw no one, her eyes 
 were fixed upon the too mettlesome beast. The officer gave 
 the horse a sharp admonitory cut with the whip, and galloped 
 off with Napoleon's order. 
 
 Julie was so absorbed, so dizzy with sights and sounds, that
 
 12 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 unconsciously she clung to her father's arm so tightly that he 
 could read her thoughts by the varying pressure of her fingers. 
 When Victor was all but flung out of the saddle, she clutched 
 her father with a convulsive grip as if she herself were in dan- 
 ger of falling, and the old man looked at his daughter's tell- 
 tale face with dark and painful anxiety. Pity, jealousy, 
 something even of regret stole across every drawn and 
 wrinkled line of mouth and brow. When he saw the un- 
 wonted light in Julie's eyes, when that cry broke from her, 
 when the convulsive grasp of her fingers drew away the veil 
 and put him in possession of her secret, then with that reve- 
 lation of her love there came surely some swift revelation of 
 the future. Mournful forebodings could be read in his own 
 face. 
 
 Julie's soul seemed at that moment to have passed into the 
 officer's being. A torturing thought more cruel than any 
 previous dread contracted the old man's pain-worn features, as 
 he saw the glance of understanding that passed between the 
 soldier and Julie. The girl's eyes were wet, her cheeks 
 glowed with unwonted color. Her father turned abruptly and 
 led her away into the garden of the Tuileries. 
 
 "Why, father," she cried, " there are still the regiments in 
 the Place du Carrousel to be passed in review." 
 
 " No, child, all the troops are marching out." 
 
 "'I think you are mistaken, father; Monsieur d'Aiglemont 
 surely told them to advance " 
 
 "But I feel ill, my child, and I do not care to stay." 
 
 Julie could readily believe the words when she glanced at 
 his face ; he looked quite worn out by his fatherly anxieties 
 and cares. 
 
 "Are you feeling very ill?" she asked indifferently, her 
 mind was so full of other thoughts. 
 
 "Every day is a reprieve for me, is it not?" returned her 
 father. 
 
 " Now do you mean to make me miserable again by talking
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 13 
 
 about your death ? I was in such spirits ! Do pray get rid of 
 those horrid, gloomy ideas of yours." 
 
 The father heaved a sigh. "Ah ! spoiled child," he cried, 
 " the best hearts are sometimes very cruel. We devote our 
 whole lives to you, you are our one thought, we plan for your 
 welfare, sacrifice our tastes to your whims, idolize you, give 
 the very blood in our veins for you, and all this is nothing, 
 is it ? Alas ! yes, you take it all as a matter of course. If we 
 would always have your smiles and your disdainful love, we 
 should need the power of God in heaven. Then comes an- 
 other, a lover, a husband, and steals away your heart." 
 
 Julie looked in amazement at her father ; he walked slowly 
 along, and there was no light in the eyes which he turned 
 upon her. 
 
 "You hide yourself even from us," he continued, "but, 
 perhaps, also you hide yourself from yourself " 
 
 " What do you mean by that, father?" 
 
 " I think that you have secrets from me, Julie. You love," 
 he went on quickly, as he saw the color rise to her face. 
 " Oh ! I hoped that you would stay with your old father until 
 he died. I hoped to keep you with me, still radiant and 
 happy, to admire you as you were but so lately. So long as I 
 knew nothing of your future I could believe in a happy lot for 
 you; but now I cannot possibly take away with me a hope of 
 happiness for your life, for you love the colonel even more 
 than the cousin. I can no longer doubt it." 
 
 "And why should I be forbidden to love him?" asked 
 Julie, with lively curiosity in her face. 
 
 " Ah, my Julie, you would not understand me," sighed the 
 father. 
 
 "Tell me, all the same," said Julie, with an involuntary 
 petulant gesture. 
 
 "Very well, child, listen to me. Girls are apt to imagine 
 noble and enchanting and totally imaginary figures in their 
 own minds ; they have fanciful extravagant ideas about men,
 
 14 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 and sentiment, and life; and then they innocently endow 
 somebody or other with all the perfections of their day- 
 dreams, and put their trust in him. They fall in love with 
 this imaginary creature in the man of their choice; and then, 
 when it is too late to escape from their fate, behold their first 
 idol, the illusion made fair with their fancies, turns to an 
 odious skeleton. Julie, I would rather have you fall in love 
 with an old man than with the colonel. Ah ! if you could 
 but see things from the standpoint of ten years hence, you 
 would admit that my old experience was right. I know what 
 Victor is, that gayety of his is simply animal spirits the 
 gayety of the barracks. He has no ability, and he is a spend- 
 thrift. He is one of those men whom heaven created to eat 
 and digest four meals a day, to sleep, to fall in love with the 
 first woman that comes to hand, and to fight. He does not 
 understand life. His kind heart, for he has a kind heart, will 
 perhaps lead him to give his purse to a sufferer or to a com- 
 rade ; but he is careless, he has not the delicacy of heart which 
 makes us slaves to a woman's happiness, he is ignorant, he is 
 
 selfish. There are plenty of buts " 
 
 " But, father, he must surely be clever, he must have ability, 
 
 or he would not be a colonel " 
 
 "My dear, Victor will be a colonel all his life. I have 
 seen no one who appears to me to be worthy of you," the old 
 father added, with a kind of enthusiasm. 
 
 He paused an instant, looked at his daughter, and added, 
 " Why, my poor Julie, you are still too young, too fragile, too 
 delicate for the cares and rubs of married life. D'Aiglemont's 
 relations have spoiled him, just as your mother and I have 
 spoiled you. What hope is there that you two could agree, 
 with two imperious wills diametrically opposed to each other? 
 You will be either the tyrant or the victim, and either alterna- 
 tive means, for a wife, an equal sum of misfortune. But you 
 are modest and sweet-natured, you would yield from the first. 
 In short," he added, in a quivering voice, "there is a grace
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 15 
 
 of feeling in you which would never be valued, and then " 
 
 he broke off, for the tears overcame him. 
 
 "Victor will give you pain through all the girlish qualities 
 of your young nature," he went on, after a pause. "I know 
 what soldiers are, my Julie ; I have been in the army. In a 
 man of that kind, love very seldom gets the better of old 
 habits, due partly to the miseries amid which soldiers live, 
 partly to the risks they run in a life of adventure." 
 
 " Then do you mean to cross my inclinations, do you, 
 father?" asked Julie, half in earnest, half in jest. "Am I to 
 marry to please you and not to please myself? " 
 
 "To please me ! " cried her father, with a start of surprise. 
 "To please me, child? when you will not hear the voice that 
 upbraids you so tenderly very much longer ! But I have always 
 heard children impute personal motives for the sacrifices that 
 their parents make for them. Marry Victor, my Julie ! Some 
 day you will bitterly deplore his ineptitude, his thriftless ways, 
 his selfishness, his lack of delicacy, his inability to understand 
 love, and countless troubles arising through him. Then, re- 
 member, that here, under these trees, your old father's pro- 
 phetic voice sounded in your ears in vain." 
 
 He said no more ; he had detected a rebellious shake of the 
 head on his daughter's part. Both made several paces toward 
 the carriage which was waiting for them at the grating. 
 During that interval of silence, the young girl stole a glance 
 at her father's face, and, little by little, her sullen brow 
 cleared. The intense pain visible on his bowed forehead 
 made a lively impression upon her. 
 
 "Father," she began in gentle, tremulous tones, "I promise 
 to say no more about Victor until you have overcome your 
 prejudices against him." 
 
 The old man looked at her in amazement. Two tears 
 which filled his eyes overflowed down his withered cheeks. 
 He could not take Julie in his arms in that crowded place; 
 but he pressed her hand tenderly. A few minutes later, when
 
 16 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 they had taken their places in the cabriolet, all the anxious 
 thought which had gathered about his brow had completely 
 disappeared. Julie's pensive attitude gave him far less con- 
 cern than the innocent joy which had betrayed her secret 
 during the review. 
 
 Nearly a year had passed since the Emperor's last review. 
 In early March, 1814, a caleche* was rolling along the high 
 road from Amboise to Tours. As the carriage came out from 
 beneath the green-roofed aisle of walnut-trees by the post-house 
 of La Frilliere, the horses dashed forward with such speed that 
 in a moment they gained the bridge built across the Cise at 
 the point of its confluence with the Loire. There, however, 
 they came to a sudden stand. One of the traces had given 
 way in consequence of the furious pace at which the post-boy, 
 obedient to his orders, had urged on four horses, the most 
 vigorous of their breed. Chance, therefore, gave the two re- 
 cently awakened occupants of the carriage an opportunity of 
 seeing one of the most lovely landscapes along the enchanting 
 banks of the Loire, and that at their full leisure. 
 
 At a glance the travelers could see to the right the whole 
 winding course of the Cise meandering like a silver snake 
 among the meadows, where the grass had taken the deep, 
 bright green of early spring. To the left lay the Loire in all 
 its glory. A chill morning breeze, ruffling the surface of the 
 stately river, had fretted the broad sheets of water far and 
 wide into a network of ripples, which caught the gleams of the 
 sun, so that the green islets here and there in its course shone 
 like gems set in a gold necklace. On the opposite bank the 
 fair rich meadows of Touraine stretched away as far as the eye 
 could see ; the low hills of the Cher, the only limits to the 
 view, lay on the far horizon, a luminous line against the clear 
 blue sky. Tours itself, framed by the trees on the islands in 
 a setting of spring leaves, seemed to rise like Venice out of 
 * Open carriage.
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 17 
 
 the waters, and her old cathedral towers soaring in air were 
 blended with the pale fantastic cloud shapes in the sky. 
 
 Over the side of the bridge, where the carriage had come to 
 a stand, the traveler looks along a line of cliffs stretching as 
 far as Tours, Nature in some freakish mood must have raised 
 these barriers of rock, undermined incessantly by the rippling 
 Loire at their feet, for a perpetual wonder for spectators. 
 The village of Vouvray nestles, as it were, among the clefts 
 and crannies of the crags, which begin to describe a bend at 
 the junction of the Loire and Cise. A whole population of 
 vine-dressers lives, in fact, in appalling insecurity in holes 
 in their jagged sides for the whole way between Vouvray and 
 Tours. In some places there are three tiers of dwellings hol- 
 lowed out, one above the other, in the rock, each row com- 
 municating with the next by dizzy staircases cut likewise in 
 the face of the cliff. A little girl in a short, red petticoat 
 runs out into her garden on the roof of another dwelling ; you 
 can watch a wreath of hearth-smoke curling up among the 
 shoots and trails of the vines. Men are at work in their almost 
 perpendicular patches of ground, an old woman sits tranquilly 
 spinning under a blossoming almond tree on a crumbling 
 mass of rock, and smiles down on the dismay of the travelers 
 far below her feet. The cracks in the ground trouble her as 
 little as the precarious state of the old wall, a pendent mass 
 of loose stones, only kept in position by the crooked stems 
 of its ivy mantle. The sound of coopers' mallets rings 
 through the skyey caves ; for here, where Nature stints human 
 industry of soil, the soil is everywhere tilled, and everywhere 
 fertile. 
 
 No view along the whole course of the Loire can compare 
 with the rich landscape of Touraine, here outspread beneath 
 the traveler's eyes. The triple picture, thus barely sketched 
 in outline, is one of those scenes which the imagination en- 
 graves for ever upon the memory ; let a poet fall under its 
 charm, and he shall be haunted by visions which will re- 
 2
 
 18 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 produce its romantic loveliness out of the vague substance of 
 dreams. 
 
 As the carriage stopped on the bridge over the Cise, white 
 sails came out here and there from among the islands in the 
 Loire to add new grace to the perfect view. The subtle scent 
 of the willows by the water's edge was mingled with the damp 
 odor of the breeze from the river. The monotonous chant of 
 a goatherd added a plaintive note to the sound of birds' songs 
 in a chorus which never ends; the cries of the boatmen 
 brought tidings of distant busy life. Here was Touraine in 
 all its glory, and the very height of the splendor of spring. 
 Here was the one peaceful district in France in those troublous 
 days ; for it was so unlikely that a foreign army should trouble 
 its quiet that Touraine might be said to defy invasion. 
 
 As soon as the caleche stopped, a head covered with a 
 foraging cap was put out of the window, and soon afterward 
 an impatient military man flung open the carriage-door and 
 sprang down into the road to pick a quarrel with the postil- 
 lion, but the skill with which the Tourangeau was repairing 
 the trace restored Colonel d'Aiglemont's equanimity. He 
 went back to the carriage, stretched himself to relieve his be- 
 numbed muscles, yawned, looked about him, and finally laid 
 a hand on the arm of a young woman warmly wrapped up in 
 a furred pelisse. 
 
 "Come, Julie," he said hoarsely, "just wake up and take 
 a look at this country. It is magnificent." 
 
 Julie put her head out of the window. She wore a traveling 
 cap of sable fur. Nothing could be seen of her but her face, 
 for the whole of her person was completely concealed by the 
 folds of her fur pelisse. The young girl who tripped to the 
 review at the Tuileries with light footsteps and joy and glad- 
 ness in her heart was scarcely recognizable in Julie d'Aigle- 
 mont. Her face, delicate as ever, had lost the rose-color 
 which once gave it so rich a glow. A few straggling locks 
 of black hair, straightened out by the damp night-air, en-
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 19 
 
 hanced its dead whiteness, and all its life and sparkle seemed 
 to be torpid. Yet her eyes glittered with preternatural bright- 
 ness in spite of the violet shadows under the lashes upon her 
 wan cheeks. 
 
 She looked out with indifferent eyes over the fields toward 
 the Cher, at the islands in the river, at the line of the crags 
 of Vouvray stretching along the Loire toward Tours ; then 
 she sank back as soon as possible into her seat in the caleche. 
 She did not care to give a glance to the enchanting valley of 
 the Cise. 
 
 " Yes, it is wonderful," she said, and out in the open air 
 her voice sounded weak and faint to the last degree. Evi- 
 dently she had had her way with her father, to her misfortune. 
 
 " Would you not like to live here, Julie ? " 
 
 " Yes; here or anywhere," she answered listlessly. 
 
 "Do you feel ill?" asked Colonel d'Aiglemont. 
 
 "No, not at all," she answered with momentary energy ; 
 and, smiling at her husband, she added, " I should like to go 
 to sleep." 
 
 Suddenly there came a sound of a horse galloping toward 
 them. Victor d'Aiglemont dropped his wife's hand and turned 
 to watch the bend in the road. No sooner had he taken 
 his eyes from Julie's pale face than all the assumed gayety 
 died out of it ; it was as if a light had been extinguished. 
 She felt no wish to look at the landscape, no curiosity to see 
 the horseman who was galloping toward them at such a furious 
 pace, and, ensconcing herself in her corner, stared out before 
 her at the hindquarters of the post-horses, looking as blank as 
 any Breton peasant listening to his rector's sermon. 
 
 Suddenly a young man riding a valuable horse came out 
 from behind the clump of poplars and flowering briar-rose. 
 
 "It is an Englishman," remarked the colonel. 
 
 "Lord bless you, yes, general," said the post-boy; "he 
 belongs to the race of fellows who have a mind to gobble up 
 France, they say."
 
 20 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 The stranger was one of the foreigners traveling in France 
 at the time when Napoleon detained all British subjects within 
 the limits of the Empire, by way of reprisals for the violation 
 of the Treaty of Amiens, an outrage of international law per- 
 petrated by the court of St. James. These prisoners, com- 
 pelled to submit to the Emperor's pleasure, were not all 
 suffered to remain in the houses where they were arrested, nor 
 yet in the places of residence which at first they were per- 
 mitted to choose. Most of the English colony in Touraine 
 had been transplanted thither from different places where 
 their presence was supposed to be inimical to the interests of 
 the Continental Policy. 
 
 The young man, who was taking the tedium off the early 
 morning hours on horseback, was one of these victims of 
 bureaucratic tyranny. Two years previously, a sudden order 
 from the Foreign Office had dragged him from Montpellier, 
 whither he had gone on account of consumptive tendencies. 
 He glanced at the Comte d'Aiglemont, saw that he was a 
 military man, and deliberately looked away, turning his head 
 somewhat abruptly toward the meadows by the Cise. 
 
 " The English are all as insolent as if the globe belonged 
 to them," muttered the colonel. "Luckily, Soult will give 
 them a thrashing directly." 
 
 The prisoner gave a glance to the caleche as he rode by. 
 Brief though that glance was, he had yet time to notice the 
 sad expression which lent an indefinable charm to the coun- 
 tess' pensive face. Many men are deeply moved by the mere 
 semblance of suffering in a woman ; they take the look of 
 pain for a sign of constancy or of love. Julie herself was so 
 much absorbed in the contemplation of the opposite cushion 
 that she saw neither the horse nor the rider. The damaged 
 trace meanwhile had been quickly and strongly repaired ; the 
 count stepped into his place again ; and the post-boy, doing 
 his best to make up for lost time, drove the carriage rapidly 
 along the embankment. On they drove under the overhang-
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 21 
 
 ing cliffs, with their picturesque vine-dressers' huts and stores 
 ofcwine maturing in their dark sides, till in the distance 
 uprose the spire of the famous abbey of Marmoutiers, the re- 
 treat of St. Martin. 
 
 f t "What can that diaphanous milord want with us?" ex- 
 claimed the colonel, turning to assure himself that the horse- 
 man who had followed them from the bridge was the young 
 Englishman. 
 
 After all, the stranger committed no breach of good man- 
 ners by riding along on the footway, and Colonel d' Aiglemont 
 was fain to lie back in his corner after sending a scowl in the 
 Englishman's direction. But in spite of his hostile instincts, 
 he could not help noticing the beauty of the animal and the 
 graceful horsemanship of the rider. The young man's face 
 was of that pale, fair-complexioned, insular type, which is 
 almost girlish in the softness and delicacy of its color and 
 texture. He was tall, thin, and fair-haired, dressed with the 
 extreme and elaborate neatness characteristic of a man of 
 fashion in prudish England. Any one might have thought 
 that bashfulness rather than pleasure at the sight of the countess 
 had called up that flush into his face. Once only Julie raised 
 her eyes and looked at the stranger, and then only because 
 she was in a manner compelled to do so, for her husband 
 called upon her to admire the action of the thoroughbred. 
 It so happened that their glances clashed ; and the shy 
 Englishman, instead of riding abreast of the carriage, fell 
 behind on this, and followed them at a distance of a few 
 paces. 
 
 Yet the countess had scarcely given him a glance ; she saw 
 none of the various perfections, human and equine, com- 
 mended to her notice, and fell back again in the carriage 
 with a slight movement of the eyelids intended to express her 
 acquiescence in her husband's views. The colonel fell asleep 
 again, and both husband and wife reached Tours without 
 another word. Not one of those enchanting views of ever-
 
 22 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 changing landscape through which they sped had drawn so 
 much as a glance from Julie's eyes. 
 
 Mme. d'Aiglemont looked now and again at her sleeping 
 husband. While she looked, a sudden jolt shook something 
 down upon her knees. It was her father's portrait, a miniature 
 which she wore suspended about her neck by a black cord. 
 At the sight of it, the tears, till then kept back, overflowed 
 her eyes, but no one, save perhaps the Englishman, saw them 
 glitter there for a brief moment before they dried upon her 
 pale cheeks. 
 
 Colonel d'Aiglemont was on his way to the South. Marshal 
 Soult was repelling an English invasion of Beam ; and d'Aigle- 
 mont, the bearer of the Emperor's orders to the marshal, 
 seized the opportunity of taking his wife as far as Tours to 
 leave her with an elderly relative of his own, far away from 
 the dangers threatening Paris. 
 
 Very shortly the carriage rolled over the paved road of 
 Tours, over the bridge, along the Grande-Rue, and stopped 
 at last before the old mansion of the ci-devant Marquise de 
 Listomere-Landon. 
 
 The Marquise de Listomere-Landon, with her white hair, 
 pale face, and shrewd smile, was one of those fine old ladies 
 who still seem to wear the paniers of the eighteenth century, 
 and affect caps of an extinct mode. They are nearly always 
 caressing in their manner, as if the heyday of love still lin- 
 gered on for these septuagenarian portraits of the age of 
 Louis Quinze, with the laint perfume of marshal powder al- 
 ways clinging about them. Bigoted rather than pious, and 
 less of bigots than they seem, women who can tell a story well 
 and talk still better, their laughter comes more readily for an 
 old memory than for a new jest the present intrudes upon 
 them. 
 
 When an old waiting-woman announced to the Marquise de 
 Listomere-Landon (to give her the title which she was soon 
 to resume) the arrival of a nephew whom she had not seen
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 23 
 
 since the outbreak of the war with Spain, the old lady took 
 off her spectacles with alacrity, shut the " Galerie de 1'ancienne 
 Cour" (her favorite work), and recovered something like 
 youthful activity, hastening out upon the flight of steps to greet 
 .he young couple there. 
 
 Aunt and niece exchanged a rapid glance of survey. 
 
 "Good-morning, dear aunt," cried the colonel, giving the 
 old lady a hasty embrace. " I am bringing a young lady to 
 put under your wing. I have come to put my treasure in your 
 keeping. My Julie is neither jealous nor a coquette, she is 
 as good as an angel. I hope that she will not be spoiled here," 
 he added, suddenly interrupting himself. 
 
 "Scapegrace!" returned the marquise, with a satirical 
 glance at her nephew. 
 
 She did not wait for her niece to approach her, but with a 
 certain kindly graciousness went forward herself to kiss Julie, 
 who stood there thoughtfully, to all appearance more embar- 
 rassed than curious concerning her new relation. 
 
 "So we are to make each other's acquaintance, are we, my 
 love?" the marquise continued. "Do not be too much 
 alarmed of me. I always try not to be an old woman with 
 young people." 
 
 On the way to the drawing-room, the marquise ordered 
 breakfast for her guests in provincial fashion ; but the count 
 checked his aunt's flow of words by saying soberly that he 
 could only remain in the house while the horses were changing. 
 On this the three hurried into the drawing-room. The colonel 
 had barely time to tell the story of the political and military 
 events which had compelled him to ask his aunt for a shelter 
 for his young wife. While he talked on without interruption, 
 the older lady looked from her nephew to her niece, and took 
 the sadness in Julie's white face for grief at the enforced sepa- 
 ration. " Eh ! eh ! " her looks seemed to say, " these young 
 things are in love with each other." 
 
 The crack of the postillion's whip sounded outside in the
 
 24 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 silent old grass-grown courtyard. Victor embraced his aunt 
 once more and rushed out. 
 
 "Good-by, dear," he said, kissing his wife, who had fol- 
 lowed him down to the carriage. 
 
 "Oh! Victor, let me come still farther with you," she 
 pleaded coaxingly. "I do not want to leave you " 
 
 " Can you seriously mean it?" 
 
 "Very well," said Julie, "since you wish it." The car- 
 riage disappeared. 
 
 "So you are very fond of my poor Victor? " said the mar- 
 quise, interrogating her niece with one of those sagacious 
 glances which dowagers give younger women. 
 
 "Alas, madame ! " said Julie, " must one not love a man 
 well indeed to marry him?" 
 
 The words were spoken with an artless accent which re- 
 vealed either a pure heart or inscrutable depths. How could 
 a woman, who had been the friend of Duclos and the Marechal 
 de Richelieu, refrain from trying to read the riddle of this 
 marriage? Aunt and niece were standing on the steps, gaz- 
 ing after the fast-vanishing caleche. The look in the young 
 countess' eyes did not mean love as the marquise understood 
 it. The good lady was a Provenc.ale, and her passions had 
 been lively. 
 
 " So you were captivated by my good-for-nothing of a 
 nephew?" she asked. 
 
 Involuntarily Julie shuddered, something in the experienced 
 coquette's look and tone seemed to say that Mme. de Listo- 
 mere-Landon's knowledge of her husband's character went 
 perhaps deeper than his wife's. Mme. d'Aiglemont, in dis- 
 may, took refuge in this transparent dissimulation, ready to 
 her hand, the first resource of an artless unhappiness. Mme. 
 de Listomere appeared to be satisfied with Julie's answers ; but 
 in her secret heart she rejoiced to think that here was a love 
 affair on hand to enliven her solitude, for that her niece had 
 some amusing flirtation on foot she was fully convinced.
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 25 
 
 In the great drawing-room, hung with tapestry framed in 
 strips of gilding, young Mme. d'Aiglemont sat before a blaz- 
 ing fire, behind a Chinese screen placed to shut out the cold 
 draughts from the windows, and her heavy mood scarcely 
 lightened. Among the old eighteenth-century furniture, under 
 the antique paneled ceiling, it was not very easy to be gay. 
 Yet the young Parisienne took a sort of pleasure in this en- 
 trance upon a life of complete solitude and in the solemn 
 silence of the old provincial house. She exchanged a few 
 words with the aunt, a stranger, to whom she had written a 
 bride's letter on her marriage, and then sat as silent as if she 
 had been listening to an opera. Not until two hours had been 
 spent in an atmosphere of quiet befitting La Trappe did she 
 suddenly awaken to a sense of uncourteous behavior, and be- 
 think herself of the short answers which she had given her aunt. 
 Mme. de Listomere, with the gracious tact characteristic of a 
 bygone age, had respected her niece's mood. When Mme. 
 d'Aiglemont became conscious of her shortcomings, the dow- 
 ager sat knitting, though as a matter of fact she had several 
 times left the room to superintend preparations in the Green 
 Chamber, whither the countess' luggage had been transported ; 
 now, however, she had returned to her great armchair, and 
 stole a glance from time to time at this young relative. Julie 
 felt ashamed of giving way to irresistible broodings, and tried 
 to earn her pardon by laughing at herself. 
 
 " My dear child, we know the sorrows of widowhood," re- 
 turned her aunt. But only the eyes of forty years could 
 have distinguished the irony hovering about the old lady's 
 mouth. 
 
 Next morning the countess improved. She talked. Mme. 
 de Listomere no longer despaired of fathoming the new-made 
 wife, whom yesterday she had set down as a dull, unsociable 
 creature, and discoursed on the delights of the country, of 
 dances, of houses where they could visit. All that day the mar- 
 quise's questions were so many snares; it was the old habit of
 
 26 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 the old court, she could not help setting traps to discover her 
 niece's character. For several days Julie, plied with tempta- 
 tions, steadfastly declined to seek amusement abroad ; and 
 much as the old lady's pride longed to exhibit her pretty 
 niece, she was fain to renounce all hope of taking her into 
 society, for the young countess was still in mourning for her 
 father, and found in her loss and her mourning dress a pretext 
 for her sadness and desire for seclusion. 
 
 By the end of a week the dowager admired Julie's angelic 
 sweetness of disposition, her diffident charm, her indulgent 
 temper, and thenceforward began to take a prodigious interest 
 in the mysterious sadness gnawing at this young heart. The 
 countess was one of those women who seem born to be loved 
 and to bring happiness with them. Mme. de Listomere found 
 her niece's society grown so sweet and precious that she doted 
 upon Julie, and could no longer think of parting with her. 
 A month sufficed to establish an eternal friendship between 
 the two ladies. The dowager noticed, not without surprise, 
 the changes that took place in Mme. d'Aiglemont; gradually 
 her bright color died away and her face became dead white. 
 Yet, Julie's spirits rose as the bloom faded from her cheeks. 
 Sometimes the dowager's sallies provoked outbursts of merri- 
 ment or peals of laughter, promptly repressed, however, by 
 some clamorous thought. 
 
 Mme. de Listomere had guessed by this time that it was 
 neither Victor's absence nor a father's death which threw a 
 shadow over her niece's life; but her mind was so full of dark 
 suspicions that she found it difficult to lay a finger upon the 
 real cause of the mischief. Possibly truth is only discover- 
 able by chance. A day came, however, at length when Julie 
 flashed out before her aunt's astonished eyes into a complete 
 forgetfulness of her marriage ; she recovered the wild spirits 
 of careless girlhood. Mme. de Listomere then and there 
 made up her mind to fathom the depths of this soul, for its 
 exceeding simplicity was as inscrutable as dissimulation.
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 27 
 
 Night was falling. The two ladies were sitting by the win- 
 dow which looked out upon the street, and Julie was looking 
 thoughtful again, when some one went by on horseback. 
 
 "There goes one of your victims," said the marquise. 
 
 Mme. d'Aiglemont looked up; dismay and surprise blended 
 in her face. 
 
 " He is a prim young Englishman, the Honorable Arthur 
 Ormond, Lord Grenville's eldest son. His history is inter- 
 esting. His physicians sent him to Montpellier in 1802; it 
 was hoped that in that climate he might recover from the 
 lung complaint which was gaining ground. He was detained, 
 like all his fellow-countrymen, by Buonaparte when war broke 
 out. That monster cannot live without fighting. The young 
 Englishman, by way of amusing himself, took to studying his 
 own complaint, which was believed to be incurable. By de- 
 grees he acquired a liking for anatomy and physic, and took 
 quite a craze for that kind of thing, a most extraordinary taste 
 in a man of quality, though the Regent certainly amused him- 
 self with chemistry ! In short, Monsieur Arthur made aston- 
 ishing progress in his studies; his health did the same under 
 the faculty of Montpellier; he consoled his captivity, and at 
 the same time his cure was thoroughly completed. They say 
 that he spent two whole years in a cowshed, living on cresses 
 and the milk of a cow brought from Switzerland, breathing as 
 seldom as he could, and never speaking a word. Since he 
 came to Tours he has lived quite alone; he is as proud as a 
 peacock; but you have certainly made a conquest of him, for 
 probably it is not on my account that he has ridden under the 
 window twice every day since you have been here. He has 
 certainly fallen in love with you." 
 
 That last phrase roused the countess like magic. Her in- 
 voluntary start and smile took the marquise by surprise. So 
 far from showing a sign of the instinctive satisfaction felt by 
 the most strait-laced of women when she learns that she has 
 destroyed the peace of mind of some male victim, there was a
 
 28 A WOMAN OF THIKTY. 
 
 hard, haggard expression in Julie's face a look of repulsion 
 amounting almost to loathing. 
 
 A woman who loves will put the whole world under the ban 
 of Love's empire for the sake of the one whom she loves ; but 
 such a woman can laugh and jest ; and Julie at that moment 
 looked as if the memory of some recently escaped peril was 
 too sharp and fresh not to bring with it a quick sensation of 
 pain. Her aunt, by this time convinced that Julie did not 
 love her nephew, was stupefied by the discovery that she loved 
 nobody else. She shuddered lest a further discovery should 
 show her Julie's heart disenchanted, lest the experience of a 
 day, or perhaps of a night, should have revealed to a young 
 wife the full extent of Victor's emptiness. 
 
 "If she has found him out, there is an end of it," thought 
 the dowager. " My nephew will soon be made to feel the 
 inconveniences of wedded life." 
 
 The marquise now proposed to convert Julie to the monarch- 
 ical doctrines of the times of Louis Quinze; but a few hours 
 later she discovered, or, more properly speaking, guessed, the 
 not uncommon state of affairs, and the real cause of her niece's 
 low spirits. 
 
 Julie turned thoughtful on a sudden, and went to her room 
 earlier than usual. When her maid left her for the night, 
 she still sat by the fire in the yellow velvet depths of a great 
 chair, an old-world piece of furniture as well suited for sorrow 
 as for happy people. Tears flowed, followed by sighs and 
 meditation. After a while she drew a little table to her, 
 sought writing materials, and began to write. The hours 
 went by swiftly. Julie's confidences made to the sheet of 
 paper seemed to cost her dear ; every sentence set her dream- 
 ing, and at last she suddenly burst into tears. The clocks 
 were striking two. Her head, grown heavy as a dying 
 woman's, was bowed over her breast. When she raised it, 
 her aunt appeared before her as suddenly as if she had stepped 
 out of the background of tapestry upon the walls.
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 29 
 
 "What ca be the matter with >ou, child?" asked the 
 marquise. "Why are you sitting u^ so late? And why, in 
 the first place, are you crying alone, at your age?" 
 
 Without further ceremony she sat down beside her niece, 
 her eyes the while devouring the unfinished letter. 
 
 " Were you writing to your husband ? " 
 
 " Do I know where he is ? " returned the countess. 
 
 Her aunt thereupon took up the sheet and proceeded to 
 read it. She had brought her spectacles ; the deed was pre- 
 meditated. The innocent writer of the letter allowed her to 
 take it without the slightest remark. It was neither lack of 
 dignity nor consciousness of secret guilt which left her thus 
 without energy. Her aunt had come in upon her at a crisis. 
 She was helpless ; right or wrong, reticence and confidence, 
 like all things else, were matters of indifference. Like some 
 young maid who has heaped scorn upon her lover, and feels 
 so lonely and sad when evening comes that she longs for him 
 to come back or for a heart to which she can pour out her 
 sorrow, Julie allowed her aunt to violate the seal which honor 
 places upon an open letter, and sat musing while the marquise 
 read on : 
 
 " MY DEAR LOUISA : Why do you ask so often for the fulfill- 
 ment of as rash a promise as two young and inexperienced 
 girls could make ? You say that you often ask yourself why 
 I have given no answer to your questions for these six months. 
 If my silence told you nothing, perhaps you will understand 
 the reasons for it to-day, as you read the secrets which I am 
 about to betray. I should have buried them for ever in the 
 depths of my heart if you had not announced your own ap- 
 proaching marriage. You are about to be married, Louisa. 
 The thought makes me shiver. Poor little one ! marry, yes, 
 and in a few months' time one of the keenest pangs of regret 
 will be the recollection of a self which used to be, of the two 
 young girls who sat one evening under one of the tallest oak-
 
 30 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 trees on the hillside at Ecouen, and looked along the fair 
 valley at our feet in the light of the sunset, which caught us 
 in its glow. We sat on a slab of rock in ecstasy, which 
 sobered down into melancholy of the gentlest. You were the 
 first to discover that the far-off sun spoke to us of the future. 
 How inquisitive and how silly we were ! Do you remember 
 all the absurd things we said and did ? We embraced each 
 other; 'like lovers,' said we. We solemnly promised that 
 the first bride should faithfully reveal to the other the mys- 
 teries of marriage, the joys which our childish minds imagined 
 to be so delicious. That evening will complete your despair, 
 Louisa. In those days you were young and beautiful and 
 careless, if not radiantly happy ; a few days of marriage, and 
 you will be, what I am already ugly, wretched, and old. 
 Need I tell you how proud I was and how vain and glad to be 
 married to Colonel Victor d'Aiglemont ? And, beside, how 
 could I tell you now ? for I cannot remember that old self. 
 A few moments turned my girlhood to a dream. All through 
 the memorable day which consecrated a chain, the extent of 
 which was hidden from me, my behavior was not free from 
 reproach. Once and again my father tried to repress my 
 spirits ; the joy which I showed so plainly was thought unbe- 
 fitting the occasion, my talk scarcely innocent, simply because 
 I was so innocent. I played endless child's tricks with my 
 bridal veil, my wreath, my gown. Left alone that night in the 
 room whither I had been conducted in state, I planned a piece 
 of mischief to tease Victor. While I awaited his coming, my 
 heart beat wildly, as it used to do when I was a child stealing 
 into the drawing-room on the last day of the old year to catch 
 a glimpse of the New Year's gifts piled up there in heaps. 
 When my husband came in and looked for me, my smothered 
 laughter, ringing out from beneath the lace in which I had 
 shrouded myself, was the last outburst of the delicious merri- 
 ment which brightened our games in childhood "
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 31 
 
 When the dowager had finished reading the letter, and 
 after such a beginning the rest must have been sad indeed, 
 she slowly laid her spectacles on the table, put the letter down 
 beside them, and looked fixedly at her niece. Age had not 
 dimmed the fire in those green eyes as yet. 
 
 " My little girl," she said, " a married woman cannot write 
 such a letter as this to a young unmarried woman ; it is 
 scarcely proper " 
 
 "So I was thinking," Julie broke in upon her aunt. "I 
 felt ashamed of myself while you were reading it." 
 
 " If a dish at table is not to our taste, there is no occasion 
 to disgust others with it, child," the old lady continued be- 
 nignly, "especially when marriage has seemed to us all, from 
 Eve downward, so excellent an institution. You have no 
 mother?" 
 
 The countess trembled, then she raised her face meekly, 
 and said 
 
 " I have missed my mother many times already during the 
 past year; but I have myself to blame, I would not listen to 
 my father. He was opposed to my marriage ; he disapproved 
 of Victor as a son-in-law." 
 
 She looked at her aunt. The old face was lighted up with 
 a kindly look, and a thrill of joy dried Julie's tears. She held 
 out her young, soft hand to the old marquise, who seemed to 
 ask for it, and the understanding between the two women was 
 completed by the close grasp of their fingers. 
 
 "Poor orphan child! " 
 
 The words came like a final flash of enlightenment to Julie. 
 It seemed to her that she heard her father's prophetic voice 
 again. 
 
 "Your hands are burning! Are they always like this?" 
 asked the marquise. 
 
 " The fever only left me seven or eight days ago." 
 
 "You had a fever upon you, and said nothing about it to 
 me!"
 
 32 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 " I have had it for a year," said Julie, with a kind of timid 
 anxiety. 
 
 " My good little angel, then your married life hitherto has 
 been one long time of suffering ? " 
 
 Julie did not venture to reply, but an affirmative sign 
 revealed the whole truth. 
 
 " Then you are unhappy? " 
 
 " Oh ! no, no, aunt. Victor loves me, he almost idolizes 
 me, and I adore him, he is so kind." 
 
 " Yes, you love him ; but you avoid him, do you not ? " 
 
 "Yes sometimes. He seeks me too often." 
 
 " And often when you are alone you are troubled with the 
 fear that he may suddenly break in upon your solitude? " 
 
 " Alas ! yes, aunt. But, indeed, I love him, I do assure 
 you." 
 
 " Do you not, in your own thoughts, blame yourself because 
 you find it impossible to share his pleasures ? Do you never 
 think at times that marriage is a heavier yoke than an illicit 
 passion could be?" 
 
 " Oh ! that is just it," she wept. " It is all a riddle to me, 
 and can you guess it all ? My faculties are benumbed, I have 
 no ideas, I can scarcely see at all. I am weighed down by 
 vague dread, which freezes me till I cannot feel, and keeps 
 me in continual torpor. I have no voice with which to pity 
 myself, no words to express my trouble. I suffer, and I am 
 ashamed to suffer when Victor is happy at my cost." 
 
 "Babyish nonsense and rubbish, all of it ! " exclaimed the 
 aunt, and a gay smile, an after-glow of the joys of her own 
 youth, suddenly lighted up her withered face. 
 
 "And do you too laugh!" the younger woman cried 
 despairingly. 
 
 " It was just my own case," the marquise returned promptly. 
 " And now that Victor has left you, you have become a girl 
 again, recovering a tranquillity without pleasure and without 
 pain, have you not?"
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 33 
 
 Julie opened wide eyes of bewilderment. 
 
 " In fact, my angel, you adore Victor, do you not? But 
 still you would rather be a sister to him than a wife, and, in 
 short, your marriage is emphatically not a success?" 
 
 "Well no, aunt. But why do you smile?" 
 
 "Oh! you are right, poor child! There is nothing very 
 amusing in all this. Your future would be big with more than 
 one mishap if I had not taken you under my protection, if 
 my old experience of life had not guessed the very innocent 
 cause of your troubles. My nephew did not deserve his good- 
 fortune, the blockhead ! In the reign of our well-beloved 
 Louis Quinze, a young wife in your position would very soon 
 have punished her husband for behaving like a ruffian. The 
 selfish creature ! The men who serve under this Imperial 
 tyrant are all of them ignorant boors. They take brutality 
 for gallantry ; they know no more of women than they know of 
 love ; and imagine that, because they go out to face death on 
 the morrow, they may dispense to-day with all consideration 
 and attentions for us. The time was when a man could love 
 and die too at the proper time. My niece, I will form you. 
 I will put an end to this unhappy divergence between you, a 
 natural thing enough, but it would end in mutual hatred and 
 desire for a divorce, always supposing that you did not die on 
 the way to despair." 
 
 Julie's amazement equaled her surprise as she listened to 
 her aunt. She was surprised by her language, dimly divining 
 rather than appreciating the wisdom of the words she heard, 
 and very much dismayed to find that this relative, out of a 
 great experience, passed judgment upon Victor as her father 
 had done, though in somewhat milder terms. Perhaps some 
 quick prevision of the future crossed her mind ; doubtless, at 
 any rate, she felt the heavy weight of the burden which must 
 inevitably overwhelm her, for she burst into tears and sprang 
 to the old lady's arms. " Be my mother," she sobbed. 
 
 The aunt shed no tears. The Revolution had left old ladies 
 3
 
 34 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 of the Monarchy but few tears to shed. Love, in bygone 
 days, and the Terror at a later time, had familiarized them 
 with extremes of joy and anguish in such a sort that, amid the 
 perils of life, they preserved their dignity and coolness, a 
 capacity for sincere but undemonstrative affection which 
 never disturbed their well-bred self-possession, and a dignity 
 of demeanor which a younger generation has done very ill to 
 discard. 
 
 The dowager took Julie in her arms and kissed her on the 
 forehead with a tenderness and pity more often found in 
 women's ways and manner than in their hearts. Then she 
 coaxed her niece with kind, soothing words, assured her of a 
 happy future, lulled her with promises of love, and put her to 
 bed as if she had not been a niece, but a daughter, a much- 
 loved daughter whose hopes and cares she had made her own. 
 Perhaps the old marquise had found her own youth and inex- 
 perience and beauty again in this nephew's wife. And the 
 countess fell asleep, happy to have found a friend, nay, a 
 mother, to whom she could tell everything freely. 
 
 Next morning, when the two women kissed each other with 
 heartfelt kindness, and that look of intelligence which marks 
 a real advance in friendship, a closer intimacy between two 
 souls, they heard the sound of horsehoofs, and, turning both 
 together, saw the young Englishman ride slowly past the 
 window, after his wont. Apparently he had made a certain 
 study of the life led by the two lonely women, for he never 
 failed to ride by as they sat at breakfast, and again at dinner. 
 His horse slackened pace of its own accord, and, for the space 
 of time required to pass the two windows in the room, its 
 rider turned a melancholy look upon the countess, who seldom 
 deigned to take the slightest notice of him. Not so the mar- 
 quise. Minds not necessarily little find it difficult to resist the 
 little curiosity which fastens upon the most trifling event that 
 enlivens provincial life ; and the Englishman's mute way of 
 expressing his timid, earnest love tickled Mme. de Listomere.
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 35 
 
 For her the periodically recurrent glance became a part of 
 the day's routine, hailed daily with new jests. As the two 
 women sat down to table, both of them looked out at the same 
 moment. This time Julie's eyes met Arthur's with such a 
 precision of sympathy that the color rose to her face. The 
 stranger immediately urged his horse into a gallop and went. 
 
 "What is to be done, madame?" asked Julie. "People 
 see this Englishman go past the house, and they will take it 
 for granted that I " 
 
 "Yes," interrupted her aunt. 
 
 "Well, then, could I not tell him to discontinue his prom- 
 enades?" 
 
 " Would not that be a way of telling him that he was dan- 
 gerous ? You might put that notion into his head. And, beside, 
 can you prevent a man from coming and going as he pleases? 
 Our meals shall be served in another room to-morrow ; and, 
 when this young gentleman sees us no longer, there will be an 
 end of making love to you through the window. There, dear 
 child, that is how a woman of the world does." 
 
 But the measure of Julie's misfortune was to be filled. The 
 two women had scarcely risen from table when Victor's man 
 arrived in hot haste from Bourges with a letter for the countess 
 from her husband. The servant had ridden by unfrequented 
 ways. 
 
 Victor sent his wife news of the downfall of the Empire 
 and the capitulation of Paris. He himself had gone over to 
 the Bourbons, and all France was welcoming them back with 
 transports of enthusiasm. He could not go so far as Tours, 
 but he begged her to come at once to join him at Orleans, 
 where he hoped to be in readiness with passports for her. 
 His servant, an old soldier, would be her escort as far as Or- 
 leans ; he (Victor) believed that the road was still open. 
 
 "You have not a moment to lose, madame," said the man. 
 " The Prussians, Austrians, and English are about to effect a 
 junction either at Blois or at Orleans."
 
 36 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 A few hours later, Julie's preparations were made, and she 
 started out upon her journey in an old traveling carriage lent 
 by her aunt. 
 
 " Why should you not come with us to Paris? " she asked, 
 as she put her arms about the marquise. "Now that the 
 Bourbons have come back, you would be " 
 
 " Even if there had not been this unhoped-for return, I 
 should still have gone to Paris, my poor child, for my advice 
 is only too necessary to both you and Victor. So I shall 
 make all my preparations for rejoining you there." 
 
 Julie set out. She took her maid with her, and the old 
 soldier galloped beside the carriage as escort. At nightfall, 
 as they changed horses for the last stage before Blois, Julie 
 grew uneasy. All the way from Amboise she had heard the 
 sound of wheels behind them, a carriage following hers had 
 kept at the same distance. She stood on the step and looked 
 out to see who her traveling companions might be, and in the 
 moonlight saw Arthur standing three paces away, gazing 
 fixedly at the chaise which contained her. Again their eyes 
 met. The countess hastily flung herself back in her seat, but 
 a feeling of dread set her pulses throbbing. It seemed to her, 
 as to most innocent and inexperienced young wives, that she 
 was herself to blame for this love which she had all unwit- 
 tingly inspired. With this thought came an instinctive terror, 
 perhaps a sense of her own helplessness before aggressive 
 audacity. One of a man's strongest weapons is the terrible 
 power of compelling a woman to think of him when her 
 naturally lively imagination takes alarm or offense at the 
 thought that she is followed. 
 
 The countess bethought herself of her aunt's advice, and 
 made up her mind that she would not stir from her place 
 during the rest of the journey; but every time the horses were 
 changed she heard the Englishman pacing round the two car- 
 riages, and again upon the road heard the importunate sound 
 of the wheels of his caleche. Julie soon began to think that,
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 37 
 
 when once reunited to her husband, Victor would know how 
 to defend her against this singular persecution. 
 
 "Yet suppose that, in spite of everything, this young man 
 does not love me?" This was the thought that came last 
 of all. 
 
 No sooner did she reach Orleans than the Prussians stopped 
 the chaise. It was wheeled into an innyard and put under a 
 guard of soldiers. Resistance was out of the question. The 
 foreign soldiers made the three travelers understand by signs 
 that they were obeying orders, and that no one could be 
 allowed to leave the carriage. For about two hours the 
 countess sat in tears, a prisoner surrounded by the guard, 
 who smoked, laughed, and occasionally stared at her with 
 insolent curiosity. At last, however, she saw her captors fall 
 away from the carriage with a sort of respect, and heard at 
 the same time the sound of horses entering the yard. An- 
 other moment, and a little group of foreign officers, with an 
 Austrian general at their head, gathered about the door of 
 the traveling carriage. 
 
 "Madame," said the general, "pray accept our apologies. 
 A mistake has been made. You may continue your journey 
 withour fear ; and here is a passport which will spare you all 
 further annoyance of any kind." 
 
 Tremblingly the countess took the paper and faltered out 
 some vague words of thanks. She saw Arthur, now wearing 
 an English uniform, standing beside the general, and could 
 not doubt that this prompt deliverance was due to him. The 
 young Englishman himself looked half-glad, half-melancholy; 
 his face was turned away, and he only dared to steal an oc- 
 casional glance at Julie's face. 
 
 Thanks to the passport, Mme. d'Aiglemont reached Paris 
 without further misadventure, and there she found her hus- 
 band. Victor d'Aiglemont, released from his oath of allegi- 
 ance to the Emperor, had met with a most flattering reception 
 from the Comte d'Artois, recently appointed lieutenant-general
 
 38 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 of the kingdom by his brother, Louis XVIII. D'Aiglemont 
 received a commission in the Life Guards, equivalent to the 
 rank of general. But, amid the rejoicings over the return of 
 the Bourbons, fate dealt poor Julie a terrible blow. The 
 death of the Marquise de Listomere-Landon was an irreparable 
 loss. The old lady died of joy and of an accession of gout to 
 the heart when the Due d'Angouldme came back to Tours, 
 and the one living being entitled by her age to enlighten 
 Victor, the woman who, by discreet counsels, might have 
 brought about perfect unanimity of husband and wife, was 
 dead ; and Julie felt the full extent of her loss. Henceforward 
 she must stand alone between herself and her husband. But 
 she was young and timid ; there could be no doubt of the 
 result, or that from the first she would elect to bear her lot in 
 silence. The very perfection of her character forbade her to 
 venture to swerve from her duties or to attempt to inquire 
 into the cause of her sufferings, for to put an end to them 
 would have been to venture on delicate ground, and Julie's 
 girlish modesty shrank from the thought. 
 
 A word as to M. d'Aiglemont's destinies under the Res- 
 toration. 
 
 How many men are there whose utter incapacity is a secret 
 kept from most of their acquaintance. For such as these 
 high rank, high office, illustrious birth, a certain veneer of 
 politeness, and considerable reserve of manner, or the prestige 
 of great fortunes, are but so many sentinels to turn back critics 
 who would penetrate to the presence of the real man. Such 
 men are like kings, in that their real figure, character, and 
 life can never be known nor justly appreciated, because they 
 are always seen from too near or too far. Factitious merit 
 has a way of asking questions and saying little ; and under- 
 stands the art of putting others forward to save the necessity 
 of posing before them ; then, with a happy knack of its own, 
 it draws and attaches others by the thread of the ruling passion 
 or self-interest, keeping men of far greater abilities in play
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 39 
 
 like puppets, and despising those whom it has brought down 
 to its own level. The petty fixed idea naturally prevails; it 
 has the advantage of persistence over the plasticity of great 
 thoughts. 
 
 The observer who should seek to estimate and appraise the 
 negative values of these empty heads needs subtlety rather 
 than superior wit for the task ; patience is a more necessary 
 part of his judicial outfit than great mental grasp, cunning 
 and tact rather than any elevation or greatness of ideas. Yet 
 skillfully as such usurpers can cover and defend their weak 
 points, it is difficult to delude wife and mother and children 
 and the house-friend of the family ; fortunately for them, 
 however, these persons almost always keep a secret which in 
 a manner touches the honor of all, and not unfrequently go 
 so far as to help to foist the imposture upon the public. And 
 if, thanks to such domestic conspiracy, many a noodle passes 
 current for a man of ability, on the other hand many another 
 who has real ability is taken for a noodle to redress the balance, 
 and the total average of this kind of false coin in circulation 
 in the state is a pretty constant quantity. 
 
 Bethink yourself now of the part to be played by a clever 
 woman quick to think and feel, mated with a husband of this 
 kind, and can you not see a vision of lives full of sorrow and 
 self-sacrifice? Nothing upon earth can repay such hearts so 
 full of love and tender tact. Put a strong-willed woman in 
 this wretched situation, and she will force a way out of it for 
 herself by a crime, like Catherine II., whom men nevertheless 
 style " the Great." But these women are not all seated upon 
 thrones, they are for the most part doomed to domestic un- 
 happiness none the less terrible because obscure. 
 
 Those who seek consolation in this present world for their 
 woes often effect nothing but a change of ills if they remain 
 faithful to their duties ; or they commit a sin if they break 
 the laws for their pleasure. All these reflections are applicable 
 to Julie's domestic life.
 
 40 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 Before the fall of Napoleon nobody was jealous of d'Aigle- 
 mont. He was one colonel among many, an efficient orderly 
 staff-officer, as good a man as you could find for a dangerous 
 mission, as unfit as well could be for an important command. 
 D'Aiglemont was looked upon as a dashing soldier such as 
 the Emperor liked, the kind of man whom his mess usually 
 calls "a good fellow." The Restoration gave him back his 
 title of marquis, and did not find him ungrateful ; he followed 
 the Bourbons into exile at Ghent, a piece of logical loyalty 
 which falsified the horoscope drawn for him by his late father- 
 in-law, who predicted that Victor would remain a colonel all 
 his life. After the Hundred Days he received the appoint- 
 ment of lieutenant-general, and for the second time became 
 a marquis ; but it was M. d' Aiglemont's ambition to be a peer 
 of France. He adopted, therefore, the maxims and the 
 politics of the " Conservateur," cloaked himself in dissimu- 
 lation which hid nothing (there being nothing to hide), culti- 
 vated gravity of countenance and the art of asking questions 
 and saying little, and was taken for a man of profound 
 wisdom. Nothing drew him from his intrenchments behind 
 the forms of politeness ; he laid in a provision of formulas, 
 and made lavish use of his stock of the catchwords coined at 
 need in Paris to give fools the small change for the ore of 
 great ideas and events. Among men of the world he was 
 reputed a man of taste and discernment ; and as a bigoted 
 upholder of aristocratic opinions he was held up for a noble 
 character. If by chance he slipped now and again into his 
 old light-heartedness or levity, others were ready to discover 
 an undercurrent of diplomatic intention beneath his inanity 
 and silliness. "Oh! he only says exactly as much as he 
 means to say," thought these excellent people. 
 
 So d'Aiglemont's defects and good qualities stood him alike 
 in good stead. He did nothing to forfeit a high military 
 reputation gained by his dashing courage, for he had never 
 been a commander-in-chief. Great thoughts surely were en-
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 41 
 
 graven upon that manly aristocratic countenance, which im- 
 posed upon every one but his own wife. And when every- 
 body else believed in the Marquis d'Aiglemont's imaginary 
 talents, the marquis persuaded himself before he had done 
 that he was one of the most remarkable men at court, where, 
 thanks to his purely external qualifications, he was in favor 
 and taken at his own valuation. 
 
 At home, however, M. d'Aiglemont was modest. Instinc- 
 tively he felt that his wife, young though she was, was his 
 superior ; and out of this involuntary respect there grew an 
 occult power which the marquise was obliged to wield in spite 
 of all her efforts to shake off the burden. She became her 
 husband's adviser, the director of his actions and his fortunes. 
 It was an unnatural position ; she felt it as something of a 
 humiliation, a source of pain to be buried in the depths of 
 her heart. From the first her delicately feminine instinct told 
 her that it is a far better thing to obey a man of talent than to 
 lead a fool ; and that a young wife compelled to act and 
 think like a man is neither man nor woman, but a being who 
 lays aside all the charms of her womanhood along with its 
 misfortunes, yet acquires none of the privileges which our 
 laws give to the stronger sex. Beneath the surface her life 
 was a bitter mockery. Was she not compelled to protect her 
 protector, to worship a hollow idol, a poor creature who flung 
 her the love of a selfish husband as the wages of her continual 
 self-sacrifice ; who saw nothing in her but the woman ; and 
 who either did not think it worth while, or (wrong quite as 
 deep) did not think at all of troubling himself about her 
 pleasures, of inquiring into the cause of her low spirits and 
 dwindling health? And the marquis, like most men who 
 chafe under a wife's superiority, saved his self-love by arguing 
 from Julie's physical feebleness a corresponding lack of mental 
 power, for which he was pleased to pity her ; and he would 
 cry out upon fate which had given him a sickly girl for a 
 wife. The executioner posed, in fact, as the victim.
 
 42 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 All the burdens of this dreary lot fell upon the marquise, 
 who still must smile upon her foolish lord, and deck a house 
 of mourning with flowers, and make a parade of happiness in 
 a countenance wan with secret torture. And with this sense 
 of responsibility for the honor of both, with the magnificent 
 immolation of self, the young marquise unconsciously acquired 
 a wifely dignity, a consciousness of virtue which became her 
 safeguard amid many dangers. 
 
 Perhaps, if her heart were sounded to the very depths, this 
 intimate closely hidden wretchedness, following upon her un- 
 thinking girlish first-love, had aroused in her an abhorrence 
 of passion; possibly she had no conception of its rapture, nor 
 of forbidden but frenzied bliss for which some women will 
 renounce all the laws of prudence and the principles of con- 
 duct upon which society is based. She put from her like a 
 dream the thought of bliss and tender harmony of love prom- 
 ised by Mme. de Listomere-Landon's mature experience, and 
 waited resignedly for the end of her troubles with a hope that 
 she might die young. 
 
 Her health had declined daily since her return from Tou- 
 raine ; her life seemed to be measured to her in suffering ; 
 yet her ill-health was graceful, her malady seemed little more 
 than languor, and might well be taken by careless eyes for a 
 fine lady's whim of invalidism. 
 
 Her doctors had condemned her to keep to the sofa, and 
 there among her flowers lay the marquise, fading as they faded. 
 She was not strong enough to walk, nor to bear the open air, 
 and only went out in a closed carriage. Yet with all the 
 marvels of modern luxury and invention about her, she looked 
 more like an indolent queen than an invalid. A few of her 
 friends, half in love perhaps with her sad plight and her fragile 
 look, sure of finding her at home, and speculating no doubt 
 upon her future restoration to health, would come to bring 
 her the news of the day, and keep her informed of the thousand 
 and one small events which fill life in Paris with variety.
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 43 
 
 Her melancholy, deep and real though it was, was still the 
 melancholy of a woman rich in many ways. The Marquise 
 d'Aiglemont was like some bright flower, with a dark insect 
 gnawing at its root. 
 
 Occasionally she went into society, not to please herself, 
 but in obedience to the exigencies of the position which her 
 husband aspired to take. In society her beautiful voice and 
 the perfection of her singing could always gain the social suc- 
 cess so gratifying to a young woman ; but what was social suc- 
 cess to her, who drew nothing from it for her heart or her 
 hopes? Her husband did not care for rnusic. And, more- 
 over, she seldom felt at her ease in salons, where her beauty 
 attracted homage not wholly disinterested. Her position ex- 
 cited a sort of cruel compassion, a morbid curiosity. She was 
 suffering from an inflammatory complaint not infrequently 
 fatal, for which our nosology as yet has found no name, a 
 complaint spoken of among women in confidential whispers. 
 In spite of the silence in which her life was spent, the cause 
 of her ill-health was no secret. She was still but a girl in 
 spite of her marriage ; the slightest glance threw her into con- 
 fusion. In her endeavor not to blush, she was always laugh- 
 ing, always apparently in high spirits; she would never admit 
 that she was not perfectly well, and anticipated questions as to 
 her health by shame-stricken subterfuges. 
 
 In 1817, however, an event took place which did much to 
 alleviate Julie's hitherto deplorable existence. A daughter 
 was born to her, and she determined to nurse her child her- 
 self. For two years motherhood, its all-absorbing multipli- 
 city of cares and anxious joys, made life less hard for her. 
 She and her husband lived necessarily apart. Her physicians 
 predicted improved health, but the marquise herself put no 
 faith in these auguries based on theory. Perhaps, like many 
 a one for whom life has lost its sweetness, she looked forward 
 to death as a happy termination of the drama. 
 
 But with the beginning of the year 1819 life grew harder
 
 44 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 than ever. Even while she congratulated herself upon the 
 negative happiness which she had contrived to win, she caught 
 a terrifying glimpse of yawning depths below it. She had 
 passed by degrees out of her husband's life. Her fine tact 
 and her prudence told her that misfortune must come, and 
 that not singly, of this cooling of an affection already luke- 
 warm and wholly selfish. Sure though she was of her ascen- 
 dency over Victor, and certain as she felt of his unalterable 
 esteem, she dreaded the influence of unbridled passions upon 
 a head so empty, so full of rash self-conceit. 
 
 Julie's friends often found her absorbed in prolonged 
 musings; the less clairvoyant among them would jestingly ask 
 her what she was thinking about, as if a young wife would 
 think of nothing but frivolity, as if there were not almost al- 
 ways a depth of seriousness in a mother's thoughts. Unhap- 
 piness, like great happiness, induces dreaming. Sometimes as 
 Julie played with her little Helene, she would gaze darkly at 
 her, giving no reply to the childish questions in which a mother 
 delights, questioning the present and the future as to the destiny 
 of this little one. Then some sudden recollection would bring 
 back the scene of the review at theTuileries and fill her eyes with 
 tears. Her father's prophetic warnings rang in her ears, and 
 conscience reproached her that she had not recognized its 
 wisdom. Her troubles had all come of her own wayward 
 folly, and often she knew not which among so many was the 
 hardest to bear. The sweet treasures of her soul were un- 
 heeded, and not only so, she could never succeed in making 
 her husband understand her, even in the commonest every- 
 day things. Just as the power to love developed and grew 
 strong and active, a legitimate channel for the affections of 
 her nature was denied her, and wedded love was extinguished 
 in grave physical and mental sufferings. Add to this that she 
 now felt for her husband that pity closely bordering upon con- 
 tempt, which withers all affection at last. Even if she had 
 not learned from conversations with some of her friends, from
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 45 
 
 examples in life, from sundry occurrences in the great world, 
 that love can bring ineffable bliss, her own wounds would have 
 taught her to divine the pure and deep happiness which binds 
 two kindred souls each to each. 
 
 In the picture which her memory traced of the past, Ar- 
 thur's frank face stood out daily nobler and purer ; it was but 
 a flash, for upon that recollection she dared not dwell. The 
 young Englishman's shy, silent love for her was the one event 
 since her marriage which had left a lingering sweetness in her 
 darkened and lonely heart. It may be that all the blighted 
 hopes, all the frustrated longings which gradually clouded 
 Julie's mind, gathered, by a not unnatural trick of imagina- 
 tion, about this man whose very manners, sentiments, and 
 character seemed to have so much in common with her own. 
 This idea still presented itself to her mind fitfully and vaguely, 
 like a dream ; yet from that dream, which always ended in a 
 sigh, Julie awoke to greater wretchedness, to keener con- 
 sciousness of the latent anguish brooding beneath her imagi- 
 nary bliss. 
 
 Occasionally her self-pity took wilder and more daring 
 flights. She determined to have happiness at any cost ; but 
 still more often she lay a helpless victim of an indescribable 
 numbing stupor, the words she heard had no meaning to her, 
 or the thoughts which arose in her mind were so vague and 
 indistinct that she could not find language to express them. 
 Balked of the wishes of her heart, realities jarred harshly 
 upon her girlish dreams of life, but she was obliged to devour 
 her tears. To whom could she make complaint? Of whom 
 be understood ? She possessed, moreover, that highest degree 
 of woman's sensitive pride, the exquisite delicacy of feeling 
 which silences useless complainings and declines to use an 
 advantage to gain a triumph which can only humiliate both 
 victor and vanquished. 
 
 Julie tried to endow M. d'Aiglemont with her own abilities 
 and virtues, flattering herself that thus she might enjoy the
 
 46 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 happiness lacking in her lot. All her woman's ingenuity and 
 tact was employed in making the best of the situation ; pure 
 waste of pains unsuspected by him, whom she thus strength- 
 ened in his despotism. There were moments when misery 
 became an intoxication, expelling all ideas, all self-control ; 
 but, fortunately, sincere piety always brought her back to one 
 supreme hope ; she found a refuge in the belief in a future 
 life, a wonderful thought which enabled her to take up her 
 painful task afresh. No elation of victory followed those 
 terrible inward battles and throes of anguish ; no one knew 
 of those long hours of sadness ; her haggard glances met no 
 response from human eyes, and during the brief moments 
 snatched by chance for weeping, her bitter tears fell unheeded 
 and in solitude. 
 
 One evening in January, 1820, the marquise became aware 
 of the full gravity of a crisis, gradually brought on by force 
 of circumstances. When a husband and wife know each 
 other thoroughly, and their relation has long been a matter 
 of use and wont, when the wife has learned to interpret every 
 slightest sign, when her quick insight discerns thoughts and 
 facts which her husband keeps from her, a chance word, or a 
 remark so carelessly let fall in the first instance, seems, upon 
 subsequent reflection, like the swift breaking out of light. A 
 wife not seldom suddenly awakes upon the brink of a preci- 
 pice or in the depths of the abyss ; and thus it was with the 
 marquise. She was feeling glad to have been left to herself 
 for some days, when the real reason of her solitude flashed 
 upon her. Her husband, whether fickle and tired of her or 
 generous and full of pity for her, was hers no longer. 
 
 In the moment of that discovery she forgot herself, her 
 sacrifices, all that she had passed through, she remembered only 
 that she was a mother. Looking forward, she thought of her 
 daughter's fortune, of the future welfare of the one creature 
 through whom some gleams of happiness came to her, of her 
 Helene, the only possession which bound her to life.
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 47 
 
 Then Julie wished to live to save her child from a step- 
 mother's terrible thralldom, which might crush her darling's 
 life. Upon this new vision of threatened possibilities followed 
 one of those paroxysms of thought at fever-heat which con- 
 sume whole years of life. 
 
 Henceforward husband and wife were doomed to be sepa- 
 rated by a whole world of thought, and all the weight of that 
 world she must bear alone. Hitherto she had felt sure that 
 Victor loved her, in so far as he could be said to love ; she 
 had been the slave of his pleasures which she did not 
 share ; to-day the satisfaction of knowing that she pur- 
 chased his contentment with her tears was hers no longer. 
 She was alone in the world, nothing was left to her now but 
 a choice of evils. In the calm stillness of the night her 
 despondency drained her of all her strength. She rose from 
 her sofa beside the dying fire and stood in the lamplight 
 gazing, dry-eyed, at her child, when M. d'Aiglemont came 
 in. He was in high spirits. Julie called to him to admire 
 Helene as she lay asleep, but he met his wife's enthusiasm 
 with a commonplace 
 
 " All children are nice at that age." 
 
 He closed the curtain about the cot after a careless kiss 
 on the child's forehead. Then he turned his eyes on Julie, 
 took her hand and drew her to sit beside him on the sofa, 
 where she had been sitting with such dark thoughts surging 
 up in her mind. 
 
 " You are looking very handsome to-night, Mme. d'Aigle- 
 mont," he exclaimed, with the gayety intolerable to the 
 marquise, who knew its emptiness so well. 
 
 "Where have you spent the evening?" she asked, with a 
 pretense of complete indifference. 
 
 "At Madame de Serizy's." 
 
 He had taken up a fire-screen and was looking intently at 
 the gauze. He had not noticed the traces of tears on his 
 wife's face. Julie shuddered. Words could not express the
 
 48 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 overflowing torrent of thoughts which must be forced down 
 into inner depths. 
 
 "Madame de Serizy is giving a concert on Monday, and 
 is dying for you to go. You have not been anywhere for 
 some time past, and that is enough to set her longing to see 
 you at her house. She is a good-natured woman, and very 
 fond of you. I should be glad if you would go ; I all but 
 promised that you should " 
 
 "I will go." 
 
 There was something so penetrating, so significant in the 
 tones of Julie's voice, in her accent, in the glance that went 
 with the words, that Victor, startled out of his indifference, 
 stared at his wife in astonishment. 
 
 That was all. Julie had guessed that it was Mme. de Serizy 
 who had stolen her husband's heart from her. Her brooding 
 despair benumbed her. She appeared to be deeply interested 
 in the fire. Victor meanwhile still played with the fire-screen. 
 He looked bored, like a man who has enjoyed himself else- 
 where, and brought home the consequent lassitude. He 
 yawned once or twice, then he took up a candle in one hand, 
 and with the other languidly sought his wife's neck for the 
 usual embrace ; but Julie stooped and received the good-night 
 kiss upon her forehead ; the formal, loveless grimace seemed 
 hateful to her at that moment. 
 
 As soon as the door closed upon Victor, his wife sank into 
 a seat. Her limbs tottered beneath her, she burst into tears. 
 None but those who have endured the torture of some such 
 scene can fully understand the anguish that it means or divine 
 the horror of the long-drawn tragedy arising out of it. 
 
 Those simple, foolish words, the silence that followed be- 
 tween the husband and wife, the marquis' gesture and expres- 
 sion, the way in which he sat before the fire, his attitude as 
 he made that futile attempt to put a kiss on his wife's throat, 
 all these things made up a dark hour for Julie, and the catas- 
 trophe of the drama of her sad and lonely life. In her mad-
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 49 
 
 ness she knelt down before the sofa, burying her face in it to 
 shut out everything from sight, and prayed to heaven, putting 
 a new significance into the words of the evening prayer, till it 
 became a cry from the depths of her own soul, which would 
 have gone to her husband's heart if he had heard it. 
 
 The following week she spent in deep thought for her future, 
 utterly overwhelmed by this new trouble. She made a study 
 of it, trying to discover a way to regain her ascendency over 
 the marquis, scheming how to live long enough to watch over 
 her daughter's happiness, yet to live true to her own heart. 
 Then she made up her mind. She would struggle with her 
 rival. She would shine once more in society. She would 
 feign the love which she could no longer feel, she would cap- 
 tivate her husband's fancy ; and, when she had lured him into 
 her power, she would coquet with him like a capricious mis- 
 tress who takes delight in tormenting a lover. This hateful 
 strategy was the only possible way out of her troubles. In 
 this way she would become mistress of the situation ; she would 
 prescribe her own sufferings at her good pleasure, and reduce 
 them by enslaving her husband and bringing him under a 
 tyrannous yoke. She felt not the slightest remorse for the 
 hard life which he should lead. At a bound she reached cold, 
 calculating indifference for her daughter's sake. She had 
 gained a sudden insight into the treacherous, lying arts of 
 degraded women; the wiles of coquetry, the revolting cun- 
 ning which arouses such profound hatred in men at the mere 
 suspicion of innate corruption in a woman. 
 
 Julie's feminine vanity, her interests, and a vague desire 
 to inflict punishment, all wrought unconsciously with the 
 mother's love within her to force her into a path where new 
 sufferings awaited her. But her nature was too noble, her 
 mind too fastidious, and, above all things, too open, to be 
 the accomplice of these frauds for very long. Accustomed as 
 she was to self-scrutiny, at the first step in vice for vice it 
 was the cry of conscience must inevitably drown the clamor 
 4
 
 50 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 of the passions and of selfishness. Indeed, in a young wife 
 whose heart is still pure, whose love has never been mated, 
 the very sentiment of motherhood is overpowered by modesty. 
 Modesty ; is not all womanhood summed up in that ? But just 
 now Julie would not see any danger, anything wrong, in her 
 new life. 
 
 She went to Mme. de Serizy's concert. Her rival had ex- 
 pected to see a pallid, drooping woman. The marquise wore 
 rouge, and appeared in all the splendor of a toilet which en- 
 hanced her beauty. 
 
 Mme. de Serizy was one of those women who claim to ex- 
 ercise a sort of sway over fashions and society in Paris ; she 
 issued her decrees, saw them received in her own circle, and 
 it seemed to her that all the world obeyed them. She aspired 
 to epigram, she set up for an authority in matters of taste. 
 Literature, politics, men and women, all alike were submitted 
 to her censorship, and the lady herself appeared to defy the 
 censorship of others. Her house was in every respect a model 
 of good taste. 
 
 Julie triumphed over the countess in her own salon, filled 
 as it was with beautiful women and women of fashion. Julie's 
 liveliness and sparkling wit gathered all the most distinguished 
 men in the rooms about her. Her costume was faultless, to 
 the despair of the women, who one and all envied her the 
 fashion of her dress, and attributed the moulded outline of 
 her bodice to the genius of some unknown dressmaker, for 
 women would rather believe in miracles worked by the science 
 of chiffons than in the grace and perfection of the form 
 beneath. 
 
 When Julie went to the piano to sing Desdemona's song, 
 the men in the rooms flocked about her to hear the celebrated 
 voice so long mute, and there was a deep silence. The mar- 
 quise saw the heads clustered thickly in the doorways, saw all 
 eyes turned upon her, and a sharp thrill of excitement quivered 
 through her. She looked for her husband, gave him a coquet-
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 51 
 
 tish side-glance, and it pleased her to see that his vanity was 
 gratified to no small degree. In the joy of triumph she sang 
 the first part of "Al piu salice." Her audience was enrap- 
 tured. Never had Malibran or Pasta sung with expression and 
 intonation so perfect. But at the beginning of the second part 
 she glanced over the listening groups and saw Arthur. He 
 never took his eyes from her face. A quick shudder thrilled 
 through her, and her voice faltered. Up hurried Mme. de 
 Serizy from her place. 
 
 " What is it, dear? Oh ! poor little thing ! she is in such 
 weak health ; I was so afraid when I saw her begin a piece so 
 far beyond her strength." 
 
 The song was interrupted. Julie was vexed. She had not 
 courage to sing any longer, and submitted to her rival's 
 treacherous sympathy. There was a whisper among the 
 women. The incident led to discussions ; they guessed that 
 the struggle had begun between the marquise and Mme. de 
 Serizy, and their tongues did not spare the latter. 
 
 Julie's strange, perturbing presentiments were suddenly 
 realized. Through her preoccupation with Arthur she had 
 loved to imagine that with that gentle, refined face he must 
 remain faithful to his first-love. There were times when she 
 felt proud that this ideal, pure, and passionate young love 
 should have been hers ; the passion of the young lover whose 
 thoughts are all for her to whom he dedicates every moment 
 of his life, who blushes as a woman blushes, thinks as a woman 
 might think, forgetting ambition, fame, and fortune in devo- 
 tion to his love she need never fear a rival. All these things 
 she had fondly and idly dreamed of Arthur ; now all at once 
 it seemed to her that her dream had come true. In the young 
 Englishman's half-feminine face she read the same deep 
 thoughts, the same pensive melancholy, the same passive ac- 
 quiescence in a painful lot, and an endurance like her own. 
 She saw herself in him. Trouble and sadness are the most 
 eloquent of love's interpreters, and response is marvelously
 
 52 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 swift between two suffering creatures, for in them the powers 
 of intuition and of assimilation of facts and ideas are well- 
 nigh unerring and perfect. So with the violence of the shock 
 the marquise's eyes were opened to the whole extent of the 
 future danger. She was only too glad to find a pretext for 
 her nervousness in her chronic ill-health, and willingly sub- 
 mitted to be overwhelmed by Mme. de Serizy's insidious com- 
 passion. 
 
 That incident of the song caused talk and discussion which 
 differed with the various groups. Some pitied Julie's fate, 
 and regretted that such a remarkable woman was lost to 
 society ; others fell to wondering what the cause of her ill- 
 health and seclusion could be. 
 
 "Well, now, my dear Ronquerolles," said the marquis, 
 addressing Mme. de Serizy's brother, " you used to envy me 
 my good-fortune, and you used to blame me for my infideli- 
 ties. Pshaw, you would not find much to envy in my lot if, 
 like me, you had a pretty wife so fragile that for the past two 
 years you might not so much as kiss her hand for fear of 
 damaging her. Do not you encumber yourself with one of 
 these fragile ornaments, only fit to put in a glass case, so 
 brittle and so costly that you are always obliged to be careful 
 of them. They tell me that you are afraid of snow or wet for 
 that fine horse of yours; how often do you ride him? That 
 is just my own case. It is true that my wife gives me no 
 ground for jealousy, but my marriage is a purely ornamental 
 business ; if you think that I am a married man, you are grossly 
 mistaken. So there is some excuse for my unfaithfulness. I 
 should dearly like to know what you gentlemen who laugh at 
 me would do in my place. Not many men would be so con- 
 siderate as I am. I am sure" (here he lowered his voice) 
 "that Mme. d'Aiglemont suspects nothing. And then, of 
 course, I have no right to complain at all ; I am very well off. 
 Only there is nothing more trying for a man who feels things
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 53 
 
 than the sight of suffering in a poor creature to whom you are 
 attached " 
 
 "You must have a very sensitive nature, then," said M. de 
 Ronquerolles, " for you are not often at home." 
 
 Laughter followed on the friendly epigram ; but Arthur, 
 who made one of the group, maintained a frigid imperturba- 
 bility in his quality of an English gentleman who takes gravity 
 for the very basis of his being. D' Aiglemont's eccentric con- 
 fidence, no doubt, had kindled some kind of hope in Arthur, 
 for he stood patiently awaiting an opportunity of a word with 
 the marquis. He had not long to wait. 
 
 " My lord marquis," he said, " I am unspeakably pained to 
 see the state of Madame d'Aiglemont's health. I do not 
 think that you would talk jestingly about it if you knew that 
 unless she adopts a certain course of treatment she must die 
 miserably. If I use this language to you, it is because I am 
 in a manner justified in using it, for I am quite certain that I 
 can save Madame d'Aiglemont's life and restore her to health 
 and happiness. It is odd, no doubt, that a man of my rank 
 should be a physician, yet nevertheless chance determined 
 that I should study medicine. I find life dull enough here," 
 he continued, affecting a cold selfishness to gain his ends; 
 " it makes no difference to me whether I spend my time and 
 travel for the benefit of a suffering fellow-creature or waste it 
 in Paris on some nonsense or other. It is very, very seldom 
 that a cure is completed in these complaints, for they require 
 constant care, time, and patience, and, above all things, 
 money. Travel is needed, and a punctilious following out 
 of prescriptions, by no means unpleasant, and varied daily. 
 Two gentlemen" (laying a stress on the word in its English 
 sense) " can understand each other. I give you warning that, 
 if you accept my proposal, you shall be a judge of my conduct 
 at every moment. I will do nothing without consulting you, 
 without your superintendence, and I will answer for the 
 success of my method if you will consent to follow it. Yes,
 
 54 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 unless you wish to be Madame d'Aiglemont's husband no 
 longer, and that before long," he added in the marquis' ear. 
 
 The marquis laughed. " One thing is certain that only 
 an Englishman could make me such an extraordinary pro- 
 posal," he said. "Permit me to leave it unaccepted and 
 unrejected. I will think it over; and my wife must be con- 
 sulted first in any case." 
 
 Julie had returned to the piano. This time she sang a 
 song from " Semiramide : Son regina, son gtierriera,"* and the 
 whole room applauded, a stifled outburst of well-bred accla- 
 mation which proved that the Faubourg Saint-Germain had 
 been roused to enthusiasm by her singing. 
 
 The evening was over. D'Aiglemont brought his wife 
 home, and Julie saw with uneasy satisfaction that her first 
 attempt had been at once successful. Her husband had been 
 roused out of indifference by the part which she had played, 
 and now he meant to honor her with such a passing fancy as 
 he might bestow upon some opera nymph. It amused Julie 
 that she, a virtuous married woman, should be treated thus. 
 She tried to play with her power, but at the outset her kind- 
 ness broke down once more, and she received the most 
 terrible of all the lessons held in store for her by fate. 
 
 Between two and three o'clock in the morning Julie sat up, 
 sombre and moody, beside her sleeping husband, in the room 
 dimly lighted by the flickering lamp. Deep silence prevailed. 
 Her agony of remorse had lasted near an hour ; how bitter her 
 tears had been none perhaps can realize save women who have 
 known such an experience as hers. Only such natures as 
 Julie's can feel her loathing for a calculated caress, the horror 
 of a loveless kiss, of the heart's apostasy, followed by dolor- 
 ous prostitution. She despised herself; she cursed marriage. 
 She could have longed for death ; perhaps if it had not been 
 for a cry from her child, she would have sprung from the 
 window and dashed herself upon the pavement. M. d'Aigle- 
 * His queen, his warrior.
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 55 
 
 mont slept on peacefully at her side; his wife's hot dropping 
 tears did not waken him. 
 
 But next morning Julie could be gay. She made a great 
 effort to look happy, to hide, not her melancholy as hereto- 
 fore, but an insuperable loathing. From that day she no 
 longer regarded herself as a blameless wife. Had she not 
 been false to herself? Why should she not play a double part 
 in the future, and display astounding depths of cunning in 
 deceiving her husband ? In her there lay a hitherto undis- 
 covered latent depravity, lacking only opportunity, and her 
 marriage was the cause. 
 
 Even now she had asked herself why she should struggle 
 with love, when, with her heart and her whole nature in revolt, 
 she gave herself to the husband whom she loved no longer. 
 Perhaps, who knows ? some piece of fallacious reasoning, 
 some bit of special pleading, lies at the root of all sins, of all 
 crimes. How shall society exist unless every individual of 
 which it is composed will make the necessary sacrifices of in- 
 clination demanded by its laws? If you accept the benefits of 
 civilized society, do you not by implication engage to observe 
 the conditions, the conditions of its very existence? And 
 yet, starving wretches, compelled to respect the laws of prop- 
 erty, are not less to be pitied than women whose natural in- 
 stincts and sensitiveness are turned to so many avenues of 
 pain. 
 
 A few days after that scene of which the secret lay buried 
 in the midnight couch, d'Aiglemont introduced Lord Gren- 
 ville. Julie gave the guest a stiffly polite reception, which did 
 credit to her powers of dissimulation. Resolutely she silenced 
 her heart, veiled her eyes, steadied her voice, and so kept her 
 future in her own hands. Then, when by these devices, this 
 innate womancraft, as it may be called, she had discovered 
 the full extent of the love which she inspired, Mme. d'Aigle- 
 mont welcomed the hope of a speedy cure, and no longer op- 
 posed her husband, who pressed her to accept the young
 
 56 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 doctor's offer. Yet she declined to trust herself with Lord 
 Grenville until, after some further study of his words and 
 manner, she could feel certain that he had sufficient generosity 
 to endure his pain in silence. She had absolute power over 
 him, and she had begun to abuse that power already. Was 
 she not a woman ? 
 
 Montcontour is an old manor-house built upon the sandy 
 cliffs above the Loire, not far from the bridge where Julie's 
 journey was interrupted in 1814. It is a picturesque, white 
 hall, with turrets covered with fine stone carving like Mechlin 
 lace ; a mansion such as you often see in Touraine, spick and 
 span, ivy-clad, standing among its groves of mulberry-trees 
 and vineyards, with its hollow walks, its stone balustrades, 
 and cellars mined in the rock escarpments mirrored in the 
 Loire. The roofs of Montcontour gleam in the sun ; the 
 whole land glows in the burning heat. Traces of the romantic 
 charm of Spain and the south hover about the enchanting 
 spot. The breeze brings the scent of bell-flowers and golden- 
 broom, the air is soft ; all about you lies a sunny land, a land 
 which casts its dreamy spell over your soul, a land of languor 
 and of soft desire, a fair, sweet-scented country, where pain is 
 lulled to sleep and passion wakes. No heart is cold for long 
 beneath its clear sky, beside its sparkling waters. One ambi- 
 tion dies after another, and you sink into a serene content and 
 repose, as the sun sinks at the end of the day swathed about 
 with purple and azure. 
 
 One warm August evening in 1821 two people were climb- 
 ing the paths cut in the crags above the hall, doubtless for the 
 sake of the view from the heights above. The two were Julie 
 and Lord Grenville, but this Julie seemed to be a new creature. 
 The unmistakable color of health glowed in her face. Over- 
 flowing vitality had brought a light into her eyes, which 
 sparkled through a moist film with that liquid brightness
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 57 
 
 which gives such irresistible charm to the eyes of children. 
 She was radiant with smiles ; she felt the joy of living and all 
 the possibilities of life. From the very way in which she 
 lifted her little feet, it was easy to see that no suffering tram- 
 meled her lightest movements; there was no heaviness nor 
 languor in her eyes, her voice, as heretofore. Under the 
 white silk sunshade which screened her from the hot sunlight, 
 she looked like some young bride beneath her veil, or a maiden 
 waiting to yield to the magical enchantments of Love. 
 
 Arthur led her with a lover's care, helping her up the path- 
 way as if she had been a child, finding the smoothest ways, 
 avoiding the stones for her, bidding her see glimpses of dis- 
 tance, or some flower beside the path, always with the unfail- 
 ing goodness, the same delicate design in all that he did, the 
 intuitive sense of this woman's well-being seemed to be innate 
 in him, and as much, nay, perhaps more, a part of his being 
 as the pulse of his own life. 
 
 The patient and her doctor went step for step. There was 
 nothing strange for them in a sympathy which seemed to 
 have existed since the day when first they walked together. 
 One will swayed them both ; they stopped as their senses 
 received the same impression ; every word and every glance 
 told of the same thought in either mind. They had climbed 
 up through the vineyards, and now they turned to sit on one 
 of the long white stones, quarried out of the caves in the 
 hillside ; but Julie stood awhile gazing out over the landscape. 
 
 " What a beautiful country ! " she cried. " Let us put up 
 a tent and live here. Victor, Victor, do come up here ! " 
 
 M. d'Aiglemont answered by a halloo from below. He 
 did not, however, hurry himself, merely giving his wife a 
 glance from time to time when the windings of the path gave 
 him a glimpse of Ivy. Julie breathed the air with delight. 
 She looked up at Arthur, giving him one of those subtle 
 glances in which a clever woman can put the whole of her 
 thought.
 
 58 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 " Ah, I should like to live here always," she said. "Would 
 it be possible to tire of this beautiful valley? What is the 
 picturesque river called, do you know?" 
 
 "That is the Cise." 
 
 "The Cise," she repeated. "And all this country below, 
 before us?" 
 
 " Those are the low hills above the Cher."* 
 
 "And away to the right? Ah, that is Tours. Only see 
 how fine the cathedral towers look in the distance." 
 
 She was silent, and let fall the hand which she had 
 stretched out toward the view upon Arthur's. Both admired 
 the wide landscape made up of so much blended beauty. 
 Neither of them spoke. The murmuring voice of the river, 
 the pure air, and the cloudless heaven were all in tune with 
 their thronging thoughts and their youth and the love in their 
 hearts. 
 
 "Oh! my God, how I love this country !" Julie continued, 
 with growing and ingenuous enthusiasm. " You lived here 
 for a long while, did you not ? " she added after a pause. 
 
 A thrill ran through Lord Grenville at her words. 
 
 "It was down there," he said, in a melancholy voice, in- 
 dicating as he spoke a cluster of walnut-trees by the roadside, 
 " that I, a prisoner, saw you for the first time." 
 
 " Yes, but even at that time I felt very sad. This country 
 
 looked wild to me then, but now " She broke off, and 
 
 Lord Grenville did not dare to look at her. 
 
 "All this pleasure I owe to you," Julie began at last, after 
 a long silence. " Only the living can feel the joy of life, 
 and until now have I not been dead to it all ? You have 
 given me more than health, you have made me feel all its 
 worth " 
 
 Women have an inimitable talent for giving utterance to 
 strong feeling in colorless words; a woman's eloquence lies 
 in tone and gesture, manner and glance. Lord Grenville hid 
 * A tributary of the Loire.
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 59 
 
 his face in his hands, for the tears filled his eyes. This was 
 Julie's first word of thanks since they left Paris a year ago. 
 
 For a whole year he had watched over the marquise, putting 
 his whole self into the task. D'Aiglemont seconding him, he 
 had taken her first to Aix, then to La Rochelle, to be near 
 the sea. From moment to moment he had watched the 
 changes worked in Julie's shattered constitution by his wise 
 and simple prescriptions. He had cultivated her health as an 
 enthusiastic gardener might cultivate a rare flower. Yet, to 
 all appearance, the marquise had quietly accepted Arthur's 
 skill and care with the egoism of a spoiled Parisienne, or like 
 a courtesan who has no idea of the cost of things, nor of the 
 worth of a man, and judges of both by their comparative 
 usefulness to her. 
 
 The influence of places upon us is a fact worth remarking. 
 If melancholy comes over us by the margin of a great water, 
 another indelible law of our nature so orders it that the moun- 
 tains exercise a purifying influence upon our feelings, and 
 among the hills passion gains in depth by all that it apparently 
 loses in vivacity. Perhaps it was the sight of the wide country 
 by the Loire, the height of the fair sloping hillside on which 
 the lovers sat, that induced the calm bliss of the moment when 
 the whole extent of the passion that lies beneath a few insig- 
 nificant-sounding words is divined for the first time with a 
 delicious sense of happiness. 
 
 Julie had scarcely spoken the words which had moved Lord 
 Grenville so deeply, when a caressing breeze ruffled the tree- 
 tops and filled the air with coolness from the river; a few 
 clouds crossed the sky, and the soft cloud-shadows brought 
 out all the beauty of the fair land below. 
 
 Julie turned away her head, lest Arthur should see the tears 
 which she succeeded in repressing ; his emotion had spread at 
 once to her. She dried her eyes, but she dared not raise 
 them lest he should read the excess of joy in a glance. Her 
 woman's instinct told her that during this hour of danger she
 
 60 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 must hide her love in the depths of her heart. Yet silence 
 might prove equally dangerous, and Julie saw that Lord 
 Grenville was unable to utter a word. She went on, there- 
 fore, in a gentle voice 
 
 "You are touched by what I have said. Perhaps such a 
 quick outburst of feeling is the way in which a gracious and 
 kind nature like yours reverses a mistaken judgment. You 
 must have thought me ungrateful when I was cold and re- 
 served, or cynical and hard, all through the journey which, 
 fortunately, is very near its end. I should not have been 
 worthy of your care if I had been unable to appreciate it. I 
 have forgotten nothing. Alas ! I shall forget nothing, not 
 the anxious way in which you watched over me as a mother 
 watches over her child, nor, and above all else, the noble 
 confidence of our life as brother and sister, the delicacy of 
 your conduct winning charms, against which we women are 
 defenseless. My lord, it is out of my power to make you 
 a return " 
 
 At those words Julie hastily moved farther away, and Lord 
 Grenville made no attempt to detain her. She went to a rock 
 not far away, and there sat motionless. What either felt re- 
 mained a secret known to each alone ; doubtless they wept in 
 silence. The singing of the birds about them, so blithe, so 
 overflowing with tenderness at sunset time, could only 
 increase the storm of passion which had driven them apart. 
 Nature took up their story for them, and found a language for 
 the love of which they did not dare to speak. 
 
 " And now, my lord," said Julie, and she came and stood 
 before Arthur with a great dignity, which allowed her to take 
 his hand in hers. " I am going to ask you to hallow and 
 purify the life which you have given back to me. Here, we 
 will part. I know," she added, as she saw how white his face 
 grew, " I know that I am repaying you for your devotion by 
 requiring of you a sacrifice even greater than any which you 
 have hitherto made for me, sacrifices so great that they should
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 61 
 
 receive some better recompense than this. But it must be. 
 You must not stay in France. By laying this command upon 
 you, do I not give you rights which shall be held sacred?" 
 she added, holding his hand against her beating heart. 
 
 "Yes," said Arthur, and he arose. 
 
 He looked in the direction of d'Aiglemont, who appeared 
 on the opposite side of one of the hollow walks with the 
 child in his arms. He had scrambled up on the balustrade by 
 the manor-house that little Helene might jump down. 
 
 "Julie, I will say not a word of my love; we understand 
 each other too well. Deeply and carefully though I have 
 hidden the pleasures of my heart, you have shared them all. I 
 feel it, I know it, I see it. And now, at this moment, as I 
 receive this delicious proof of the constant sympathy of our 
 hearts, I must go. Cunning schemes for getting rid of him 
 have crossed my mind too often ; the temptation might be 
 irresistible if I stayed with you." 
 
 "I had the same thought," she said, a look of pained sur- 
 prise in her troubled face. 
 
 Yet in her tone and involuntary shudder there was such 
 virtue, such certainty of herself, won in many a hard-fought 
 battle with a love that spoke in Julie's tones and involuntary 
 gestures, that Lord Grenville stood thrilled with admiration 
 of her. The mere shadow of a crime had been dispelled 
 from that clear conscience. The religious sentiment en- 
 throned on the fair forehead could not but drive away the 
 evil thoughts that arise unbidden, engendered by our imperfect 
 nature, thoughts which make us aware of the grandeur and 
 the perils of human destiny. 
 
 "And then," she said, " I should have drawn down your scorn 
 
 upon me, and I should have been saved," she added, 
 
 and her eyes fell. "To be lowered in your eyes, what is 
 that but death?" 
 
 For a moment the two heroic lovers were silent, choking 
 down their sorrow. Good or ill, it seemed that their thoughts
 
 62 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 were loyally one, and the joys in the depths of their hearts 
 were no more experiences apart than the pain which they 
 strove most anxiously to hide. 
 
 "I have no right to complain," she said after a while, 
 "my misery is of my own making," and she raised her tear- 
 filled eyes to the sky. 
 
 " Perhaps you don't remember it, but that is the place 
 where we met each other for the first time," shouted the 
 general from below, and he waved his hand toward the dis- 
 tance. "There, down yonder, near those poplars ! " 
 
 The Englishman nodded abruptly by way of answer. 
 
 " So I was bound to die young and to know no happiness," 
 Julie continued. "Yes, do not think that I live. Sorrow is 
 just as fatal as the dreadful disease which you have cured. I 
 do not think that I am to blame. No. My love is stronger 
 than I am, and eternal ; but all unconsciously it grew in me ; 
 and I will not be guilty through my love. Nevertheless, 
 though I shall be faithful to my conscience as a wife, to my 
 duties as a mother, I will be no less faithful to the instincts 
 of my heart. Hear me," she cried in an unsteady voice, 
 " henceforth I belong to him no longer." 
 
 By a gesture, dreadful to see in its undisguised loathing, 
 she indicated her husband. 
 
 " The social code demands that I should make his existence 
 happy," she continued. " I will obey, I will be his servant, 
 my devotion to him shall be boundless ; but from to-day I am 
 a widow. I will neither be a prostitute in my own eyes nor 
 in those of the world. If I do not belong to Monsieur 
 d'Aiglemont, I will never belong to another. You shall have 
 nothing, nothing save this which you have wrung from me. 
 This is the doom which I have passed upon myself," she said, 
 looking proudly at him. " And now, know this if you give 
 way toasingiecriminal thought, Monsieurd'Aiglemont's widow 
 will enter a convent in Spain or Italy. By an evil chance we 
 have spoken of our love ; perhaps that confession was bound to
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 63 
 
 come ; but our hearts must never again vibrate like this. To- 
 morrow you will receive a letter from England, and we shall 
 part and never see each other again." 
 
 The effort had exhausted all Julie's strength. She felt her 
 knees trembling, and a feeling of deathly cold came over her. 
 Obeying a woman's instinct, she sat down, lest she should 
 sink into Arthur's arms. 
 
 " Julie /" cried Lord Grenville. 
 
 The sharp cry rang through the air like a crack of thunder. 
 Till then he could not speak ; now, all the words which the 
 dumb lover could not utter gathered themselves in that heart- 
 rending appeal. 
 
 "Well, what is wrong with her?" asked the general, who 
 had hurried up at that cry, and now suddenly confronted the 
 two. 
 
 "Nothing serious," said Julie, with that wonderful self- 
 possession which a woman's quick-wittedness usually brings to 
 her aid when it is most called for. " The chill, damp air 
 under the walnut-tree made me feel quite faint just now, and 
 that must have alarmed this doctor of mine. Does he nbt 
 look on me as a very nearly finished work of art? He was 
 startled, I suppose, by the idea of seeing it destroyed." With 
 ostentatious coolness she took Lord Grenville's arm, smiled 
 at her husband, took a last look at the landscape, and went 
 down the pathway, drawing her traveling companion along 
 with her. 
 
 "This certainly is the grandest view that we have seen," 
 she said; "I shall never forget it. Just look, Victor, what 
 distance, what an expanse of country, and what variety in it ! 
 I have fallen in love with this landscape." 
 
 Her laughter was almost hysterical, but to her husband it 
 sounded natural. She sprang gayly down into the hollow 
 pathway and vanished. 
 
 "What?" she cried, when they had left M. d'Aiglemont 
 far behind. "So soon? Is it so soon? Another moment,
 
 64 A IVOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 and we can neither of us be ourselves ; we shall never be our- 
 selves again, our life is over, in short " 
 
 "Let us go slowly," said Lord Grenville, "the carriages 
 are still some way off, and if we may put words into our 
 glances, our hearts may live a little longer." 
 
 They went along the footpath by the river in the late even- 
 ing light, almost in silence ; such vague words as they uttered, 
 low as the murmur of the Loire, stirred their souls to the 
 depths. Just as the sun sank, a last red gleam from the sky 
 fell over them ; it was like a mournful symbol of their ill- 
 starred love. 
 
 The general, much put out because the carriage was not at 
 the spot where they left it, followed and outstripped the pair 
 without interrupting their conversation. Lord Grenville's 
 high-minded and delicate behavior throughout the journey 
 had completely dispelled the marquis' suspicions. For some 
 time past he had left his wife in freedom, reposing confidence 
 in the noble amateur's Punic faith. Arthur and Julie walked 
 on together in the close and painful communion of two hearts 
 laid waste. 
 
 So short a while ago as they climbed the cliffs at Montcon- 
 tour, there had been a vague hope in either mind, an uneasy 
 joy for which they dared not account to themselves ; but now 
 as they came along the pathway by the river, they pulled 
 down the frail structure of imaginings, the child's card-castle, 
 on which neither of them had dared to breathe. That hope 
 was over. 
 
 That very evening Lord Grenville left them. His last look 
 at Julie made it miserably plain that since the moment when 
 sympathy revealed the full extent of a tyrannous passion, he 
 did well to mistrust himself. 
 
 The next morning M. d'Aiglemont and his wife took their 
 places in their carriage without their traveling companion, 
 and were whirled swiftly along the road to Blois. The mar- 
 quise was constantly put in mind of the journey made in 1814,
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 65 
 
 when as yet she knew nothing of love, and had been almost 
 ready to curse it for its persistency. Countless forgotten im- 
 pressions were revived. The heart has its own memory. A 
 woman who cannot recollect the most important great events 
 will recollect through a lifetime things which appealed to her 
 feelings; and Julie d'Aiglemont found all the most trifling 
 details of that journey laid up in her mind. It was pleasant 
 to her to recall its little incidents as they occurred to her one 
 by one ; there were points in the road when she could even 
 remember the thoughts that passed through her mind when 
 she saw them first. 
 
 Victor had fallen violently in love with his wife since she 
 had recovered the freshness of her youth and all her beauty, 
 and now he pressed close to her side like a lover. Once he 
 tried to put his arm round her, but she gently disengaged 
 herself, finding some excuse or other for evading the harmless 
 caress. In a little while she shrank from the close contact 
 with Victor, the sensation of warmth communicated by their 
 position. She tried to take the unoccupied place opposite, 
 but Victor gallantly resigned the back seat to her. For this 
 attention she thanked him with a sigh, whereupon he forgot 
 himself, and the Don Juan of the garrison construed his wife's 
 melancholy to his own advantage, so that at the end of the 
 day she was compelled to speak with a firmness which im- 
 pressed him. 
 
 " You have all but killed me, dear, once already, as you 
 know," said she. " If I were still an inexperienced girl, I 
 might begin to sacrifice myself afresh ; but I am a mother, 
 I have a daughter to bring up, and I owe as much to her as 
 to you. Let us resign ourselves to a misfortune which affects 
 us both alike. You are the less to be pitied. Have you not, 
 as it is, found consolations which duty and the honor of both, 
 and (stronger still) which Nature forbids to me? Stay," she 
 added, "you carelessly left three letters from Madame de 
 Serizy in a drawer ; here they are. My silence about this 
 5
 
 66 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 matter should make it plain to you that in me you have a wife 
 who has plenty of indulgence and does not exact from you 
 the sacrifices prescribed by the law. But I have thought 
 enough to see that the roles of husband and wife are quite 
 different, and that the wife alone is predestined to misfortune. 
 My virtue is based upon firmly fixed and definite principles. 
 I shall live blamelessly, but let me live." 
 
 The marquis was taken aback by a logic which women 
 grasp with the clear insight of love, and overawed by a cer- 
 tain dignity natural to them at such crises. Julie's instinctive 
 repugnance for all that jarred upon her love and the instincts 
 of her heart is one of the fairest qualities of woman, and 
 springs perhaps from a natural virtue which neither laws nor 
 civilization can silence. And who shall dare to blame women? 
 If a woman can silence the exclusive sentiment which bids 
 her " forsake all other " for the man whom she loves, what is 
 she but a priest who has lost his faith ? If a rigid mind here 
 and there condemns Julie for a sort of compromise between 
 love and wifely duty, impassioned souls will lay it to her 
 charge as a crime. To be thus blamed by both sides shows 
 one ot two things very clearly that misery necessarily follows 
 in the train of broken laws, or else that there are deplorable 
 flaws in the institutions upon which society in Europe is based. 
 
 Two years went by. M. and Mme. d'Aiglemont went their 
 separate ways, leading their life in the world, meeting each 
 other more frequently abroad than at home, a refinement 
 upon divorce, in which many a marriage in the great world 
 is apt to end. 
 
 One evening, strange to say, found husband and wife in 
 their own drawing-room. Mme. d'Aiglemont had been dining 
 at home with a friend, and the general, who almost invariably 
 dined in town, had not gone out for once. 
 
 "There is a pleasant time in store for you, Madame la Mar- 
 guise," said M. d'Aiglemont, setting his coffee cup down upon
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY 67 
 
 the table. He looked at the guest, Mme. de Wimphen, and 
 half-pettishly, half-mischievously added, " I am starting off 
 for several days' sport with the master of the hounds. For a 
 whole week, at any rate, you will be a widow in good 
 earnest; just what you wish for, I suppose. Guillaume," he 
 said to the servant who entered, "tell them to put the 
 horses in." 
 
 Mme. de Wimphen was the friend to whom Julie had 
 begun the letter upon her marriage. The glances exchanged 
 by the two women said plainly that in her Julie had found an 
 intimate friend, an indulgent and invaluable confidant. 
 Mme. de Wimphen's marriage had been a very happy one. 
 Perhaps it was her own happiness which secured her devotion 
 to Julie's unhappy life, for, under such circumstances, dissimi- 
 larity of destiny is nearly always a strong bond of union. 
 
 "Is the hunting season not over yet?" asked Julie, with 
 an indifferent glance at her husband. 
 
 "The master of the hounds comes when and where he 
 pleases, madame. We are going boar-hunting in the Royal 
 Forest." 
 
 "Take care that no accident happens to you." 
 
 "Accidents are usually unforeseen," he said, smiling. 
 
 "The carriage is ready, my lord marquis," said the servant. 
 
 "Madame, if I should fall a victim to the boar " he 
 
 continued, with a suppliant air. 
 
 "What does this mean?" inquired Mme. de Wimphen. 
 
 "Come, come," said Mme. d'Aiglemont, turning to her 
 husband; smiling at her friend as if to say, "You will soon 
 see." 
 
 Julie held up her head ; but as her husband came close to 
 her, she swerved at the last, so that his kiss fell not on her 
 throat, but on the broad frill about it. 
 
 "You will be my witness before heaven now that I need a 
 firman to obtain this little grace of her," said the marquis, 
 addressing Mme. de Wimphen. "This is how this wife of
 
 68 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 mine understands love. She has brought me to this pass, by 
 
 what trickery I am at a loss to know A pleasant time to 
 
 you ! " and he went. 
 
 "But your poor husband is really very good-natured," 
 cried Louisa de Wimphen, when the two women were alone 
 together. He loves you." 
 
 " Oh ! not another syllable after that last word. The name 
 I bear makes me shudder " 
 
 "Yes, but Victor obeys you implicitly," said Louisa. 
 
 " His obedience is founded in part upon the great esteem 
 which I have inspired in him. As far as outward things go, I 
 am a model wife. I make his house pleasant to him ; I shut 
 my eyes to his intrigues ; I touch not a penny of his fortune. 
 He is free to squander the interest exactly as he pleases ; I 
 only stipulate that he shall not touch the principal. At this 
 price I have peace. He neither explains nor attempts to ex- 
 plain my life. But though my husband is guided by me, that 
 does not say that I have nothing to fear from his character. 
 I am a bear-leader who daily trembles lest the muzzle should 
 give way at last. If Victor once took it into his head that I 
 had forfeited my right to his esteem, what would happen next 
 I dare not think ; for he is violent, full of personal pride, and 
 vain above all things. While his wits are not keen enough to 
 enable him to behave discreetly at a delicate crisis when his 
 lowest passions are involved, his character is weak, and he 
 would very likely kill me provisionally even if he died of re- 
 morse next day. But there is no fear of that fatal good-for- 
 tune." 
 
 A brief pause followed. Both women were thinking of the 
 real cause of this state of affairs. Julie gave Louisa a glance 
 which revealed her thoughts. 
 
 "I have been cruelly obeyed," she cried. "Yet I never 
 forbade him to write me. Oh ! he, he has forgotten me, and 
 he is right. If his life had been spoiled, it would have been 
 too tragical ; one life is enough, is it not ? Would you be-
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 69 
 
 lieve it, dear ; I read English newspapers simply to see his 
 name in print. But he has not yet taken his seat in the 
 House of Lords." 
 
 " So you know English ? " 
 
 " Did I not tell you ? Yes, I learned." 
 
 "Poor little one ! " cried Louisa, grasping Julie's hand in 
 hers. " How can you still live ? " 
 
 "That is a secret," said the marquise, with an involuntary 
 gesture almost childlike in its simplicity. "Listen, I take 
 laudanum. That duchess in London suggested the idea ; you 
 know the story, Maturin made use of it in one of his novels. 
 My drops are very weak, but I sleep ; I am only awake for 
 seven hours in the day, and those hours I spend with my 
 child." 
 
 Louisa gazed into the fire. The full extent of her friend's 
 misery was opening out before her for the first time and she 
 dared not look into her face. 
 
 "Keep my secret, Louisa," said Julie, after a moment's 
 silence. 
 
 Just as she spoke the footman brought in a letter for the 
 marquise. 
 
 " Ah ! " she cried, and her face grew white. 
 
 "I need not ask from whom it comes," said Mme. de 
 Wimphen, but the marquise was reading the letter, and 
 heeded nothing else. 
 
 Mme. de Wimphen, watching her friend, saw strong feel- 
 ing wrought to the highest pitch, ecstasy of the most danger- 
 ous kind painted on Julie's face in swift-changing white and 
 red. At length Julie flung the sheet into the fire. 
 
 " It burns like fire," she said. " Oh ! my heart beats till 
 I cannot breathe." 
 
 She rose to her feet and walked up and down. Her eyes 
 were blazing. 
 
 " He did not leave Paris ! " she cried. 
 
 Mme. de Wimphen did not dare to interrupt the words
 
 70 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 that followed, jerked-out sentences, measured by dreadful 
 pauses in between. After every break the deep notes of her 
 voice sank lower and lower. There was something awful 
 about the last words. 
 
 "He has seen me, constantly, and I have not known it. 
 A look, taken by stealth, every day, helps him to live. 
 Louisa, you do not know ! He is dying. He wants to say 
 good-by to me. He knows that my husband has gone away 
 for several days. He will be here in a moment. Oh ! I 
 shall die : I am lost. Listen, Louisa, stay with me ! Two 
 
 women and he will not dare Oh ! stay with me ! I am 
 
 afraid!" 
 
 " But my husband knows that I have been dining with you ; 
 he is sure to come for me," said Mme. de Wimphen. 
 
 "Well, then, before you go I will send him away. I will 
 play the executioner for us both. Oh me ! he will think that 
 
 I do not love him any more And that letter of his ! 
 
 Dear, I can see those words in letters of fire." 
 
 A carriage rolled in under the archway. 
 
 "Ah ! " cried the marquise, with something like joy in her 
 voice, "he is coming openly. He makes no mystery of it." 
 
 "Lord Grenville," announced the servant. 
 
 The marquise stood up rigid and motionless ; but at the 
 sight of Arthur's white face, so thin and haggard, how was 
 it possible to keep up the show of severity? Lord Grenville 
 saw that Julie was not alone, but he controlled his fierce an- 
 noyance, and looked cool and unperturbed. Yet for the two 
 women who knew his secret, his face, his tones, the look in 
 his eyes had something of the power attributed to the torpedo. 
 Their faculties were benumbed by the sharp shock of contact 
 with his horrible pain. The sound of his voice set Julie's 
 heart beating so cruelly that she could not trust herself to 
 speak ; she was afraid that he would see the full extent of his 
 power over her. Lord Grenville did not dare to look at 
 Julie, and Mme. de Wimphen was left to sustain a conversa-
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 71 
 
 tion to which no one listened. Julie glanced at her friend 
 with touching gratefulness in her eyes to thank her for coming 
 to her aid. 
 
 By this time the lovers had quelled emotion into silence, 
 and could preserve the limits laid down by duty and conven- 
 tion. But M. de Wimphen was announced, and as he came 
 in the two friends exchanged glances. Both felt the difficulties 
 of this fresh complication. It was impossible to enter into 
 explanations with M. de Wimphen, and Louisa could not 
 think of any sufficient pretext for asking to be left. 
 
 Julie went to her, ostensibly to wrap her up in her shawl. 
 "I will be brave," she said, in a low voice. "He came 
 here in face of all the world, so what I have to fear? Yet, 
 but for you, in that first moment, when I saw how changed he 
 looked, I should have fallen at his feet." 
 
 " Well, Arthur, you have broken your promise to me," she 
 said, in a faltering voice, when she returned. Lord Grenville 
 did not venture to take the seat upon the sofa by her side. 
 
 " I could not resist the pleasure of hearing your voice, of 
 being near you. The thought of it came to be a sort of mad- 
 ness, a delirious frenzy. I am no longer master of myself. 
 I have taken myself to task ; it is no use, I am too weak, I 
 ought to die. But to die without seeing you, without having 
 heard the rustle of your dress, or felt your tears. What a 
 death ! " 
 
 He moved farther away from her ; but in his hasty uprising 
 a pistol fell out of his pocket. The marquise looked down 
 blankly at the weapon ; all passion, all expression had died 
 out of his eyes. Lord Grenville stooped for the thing, raging 
 inwardly over an accident which seemed like a piece of love- 
 sick strategy. 
 
 "Arthur /" 
 
 "Madame," he said, looking down, "I came here in utter 
 desperation; I meant " he broke off. 
 
 " You meant to die by your own hand here in my house ! "
 
 72 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 "Not alone," he said in a low voice. 
 
 " Not alone ! My husband, perhaps ? " 
 
 " No, no," he cried in a choking voice. " Reassure your- 
 self," he continued, " I have quite given up my deadly pur- 
 pose. As soon as I came in, as soon as I saw you, I felt that 
 I was strong enough to suffer in silence, and to die alone." 
 
 Julie sprang up, and flung herself into his arms. ThrougK 
 her sobbing he caught a few passionate words, "To know 
 happiness, and then to die. Yes, let it be so." 
 
 All Julie's story was summed up in that cry from the depths ; 
 it was the summons of nature and of love at which women with- 
 out a religion surrender. With the fierce energy of unhoped- 
 for joy, Arthur caught her up and carried her to the sofa ; 
 but in a moment she tore herself from her lover's arms, 
 looked at him with a fixed despairing gaze, took his hand, 
 snatched up a candle, and drew him into her room. When 
 they stood by the cot where Helene lay sleeping, she put the 
 curtains softly aside, shading the candle with her hand, lest 
 the light should dazzle the half-closed eyes be-neath the trans- 
 parent lids. Helene lay smiling in her sleep, with her arms 
 outstretched on the coverlet. Julie glanced from her child 
 to Arthur's face. That look told him all. 
 
 " We may leave a husband, even though he loves us : a man 
 is strong ; he has consolations. We may defy the world and 
 its laws. But a motherless child ! " all these thoughts, and 
 a thousand others more moving still, found language in that 
 glance.- 
 
 " We can take her with us," muttered he ; "I will love her 
 dearly." 
 
 "Mamma! " cried little Helene, now awake. Julie burst 
 into tears. Lord Grenville sat down and folded his arms in 
 gloomy silence. 
 
 " Mamma ! " At the sweet childish name, so many nobler 
 feelings, so many irresistible yearnings awoke, that for a mo- 
 ment love was effaced by the all-powerful instinct of mother-
 
 SHE PUT THE CURTAINS SOFTLY ASIDE
 
 A WO MAN OF THIRTY. 73 
 
 hood ; the mother triumphed over the woman in Julie, and 
 Lord Grenville could not hold out, he was defeated by Julie's 
 tears. 
 
 Just at that moment a door was flung noisily open. " Mad- 
 ame d'Aiglemont, are you hereabout?" called a voice which 
 rang like a crack of thunder through the hearts of the two 
 lovers. The marquis had come home. 
 
 Before Julie could recover her presence of mind, her hus- 
 band was on the way to the door of her room which opened 
 into his. Luckily, at a sign, Lord Grenville escaped into 
 the dressing-closet, and she hastily shut the door upon him. 
 
 "Well, my lady, here am I," said Victor, "the hunting 
 party did not come off. I am just going to bed." 
 
 "Good-night, so am I. So go and leave me to undress." 
 
 " You are very cross to-night, Madame la Marquise." 
 
 The general returned to his room, Julie went with him to 
 the door and shut it. Then she sprang to the dressing-closet 
 to release Arthur. All her presence of mind returned ; she 
 bethought herself that it was quite natural that her sometime 
 doctor should pay her a visit ; she might have left him in the 
 drawing-room while she put her little girl to bed. She was 
 about to tell him, under her breath, to go back to the drawing- 
 room, and had opened the door. Then she shrieked aloud. 
 Lord Grenville's fingers had been caught and crushed in the 
 door. 
 
 "Well, what is it? " demanded her husband. 
 
 " Oh ! nothing, nothing, I have just pricked my finger with 
 a pin." 
 
 The general's door opened at once. Julie imagined that 
 the irruption was due to a sudden concern for her, and cursed 
 a solicitude in which love had no part. She had barely time 
 to close the dressing-closet, and Lord Grenville had not ex- 
 tricated his hand. The general did, in fact, appear, but his 
 wife had mistaken his motives; his apprehensions were en- 
 tirely on his own account.
 
 74 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 " Can you lend me a bandana handkerchief? That stupid 
 fool Charles leaves me without a single one. In the early 
 days you used to bother me with looking after me so carefully. 
 Ah, well, the honeymoon did not last very long for me, nor 
 yet for my cravats. Nowadays I am given over to the secular 
 arm, in the shape of servants who do not care one jack-straw 
 for what I say." 
 
 "There ! There is a bandana for you. Did you go into 
 the drawing-room ? " 
 
 "No." 
 
 " Oh ! you might perhaps have been in time to see Lord 
 Grenville." 
 
 "Is he in Paris?" 
 
 "It seems so." 
 
 " Oh ! I will go at once. The good doctor." 
 
 " But he will have gone by now ! " exclaimed Julie. 
 
 The marquis, standing in the middle of the room, was 
 tying the handkerchief over his head. He looked compla- 
 cently at himself in the glass. 
 
 "What has become of the servants is more than I know," 
 he said. " I rang the bell three times for Charles, and he 
 did not answer it. And your maid is not here either. Ring 
 for her. I should like another blanket on my bed to-night." 
 
 " Pauline is out," the marquise said drily. 
 
 " What, at midnight ? " exclaimed the general. 
 
 " I gave her leave to go to the opera." 
 
 "That is funny!" returned the husband, continuing to 
 undress. " I thought I saw her coming upstairs." 
 
 "She has come in then, of course," said Julie, with as- 
 sumed impatience, and to allay any possible suspicion on her 
 husband's part she pretended to ring the bell. 
 
 The whole history of that night has never been known, but 
 no doubt it was as simple and as tragically commonplace as 
 the domestic incidents that preceded it.
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 75 
 
 Next day the Marquise d'Aiglemont took to her bed, nor 
 did she leave it for some days. 
 
 " What can have happened in your family so extraordinary 
 that every one is talking about your wife?" asked M. de Ron- 
 querolles of M. d'Aiglemont'a short time after that night of 
 catastrophes. 
 
 "Take my advice and remain a bachelor," said d'Aigle- 
 mont. "The curtains of Helene's cot caught fire and gave 
 my wife such a shock that it will be a twelvemonth before she 
 gets over it ; so the doctor says. You marry a pretty wife, 
 and her looks fall off; you marry a girl in blooming health, 
 and she turns into an invalid. You think she has a passionate 
 temperament, and find her cold, or else under her apparent 
 coldness there lurks a nature so passionate that she is the death 
 of you, or she dishonors your name. Sometimes the meekest 
 of them will turn out crotchety, though the crotchety ones 
 never grow any sweeter. Sometimes the mere child, so simple 
 and silly at first, will develop an iron will to thwart you and 
 the ingenuity of a fiend. I am tired of marriage." 
 
 "Or of your wife?" 
 
 " That would be difficult. By-the-by, do you feel inclined 
 to go to Saint-Thomas d'Aquin with me to attend Lord Gren- 
 ville's funeral ?" 
 
 " A singular way of spending time. Is it really known how 
 he came by his death ? " added Ronquerolles. 
 
 " His man says that he spent a whole night sitting on some- 
 body's window-sill to save some woman's character, and it has 
 been infernally cold lately." 
 
 " Such devotion would be highly creditable to one of us old 
 stagers ; but Lord Grenville was a youngster and an English- 
 man. Englishmen never can do anything like anybody else." 
 
 " Pooh ! " returned d'Aiglemont, " these heroic exploits all 
 depend upon the woman in the case, and it certainly was not 
 for one that I know that poor Arthur came by his death."
 
 n, 
 
 A HIDDEN GRIEF. 
 
 Between the Seine and the little river Loing lies a wide flat 
 country, skirted on the one side by the Forest of Fontaine- 
 bleau, and marked out as to its southern limits by the towns 
 of Moret, Montereau, and Nemours. It is a dreary country ; 
 little knolls of hills appear only at rare intervals, and a cop- 
 pice here and there among the fields affords cover for game ; 
 and beyond, upon every side, stretches the endless gray or 
 yellowish horizon peculiar to Beauce, Sologne, and Berri. 
 
 In the very centre of the plain, at equal distances from 
 Moret and Montereau, the traveler passes the old castle of 
 Saint-Lange, standing amid surroundings which lack neither 
 dignity nor stateliness. There are magnificent avenues of elm- 
 trees, great gardens encircled by the moat, and a circumfer- 
 ence of walls about a huge memorial pile which represents the 
 profits of the maltdte (illegal taxation), the gains of farmers- 
 general, legalized malversation, or the vast fortunes of great 
 houses now brought low beneath the hammer of the Civil 
 Code. 
 
 Should any artist or dreamer of dreams chance to stray along 
 the roads full of deep ruts, or over the heavy land which se- 
 cures the place against intrusion, he will wonder how it hap- 
 pened that this romantic old place was set down in a savanna 
 of grain-land, a desert of chalk, and sand, and marl, where 
 gayety dies away and melancholy is a natural product of the 
 soil. The voiceless solitude, the monotonous horizon-line 
 which weigh upon the spirits, are negative beauties, which 
 only suit with sorrow that refuses to be comforted. 
 
 Hither, at the close of the year 1820, came a woman, still 
 (76)
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 77 
 
 young, well known in Paris for her charm, her fair face, and 
 her wit ; and to the immense astonishment of the little village 
 a mile away, this woman of high rank and corresponding for- 
 tune took up her abode at Saint-Lange. 
 
 From time* immemorial, farmers and laborers had seen no 
 gentry at the mansion. The estate, considerable though it 
 was, had been left in charge of a land-steward and the house 
 to the old servants. Wherefore the appearance of the lady of 
 the manor caused a kind of sensation in the district. 
 
 A group had gathered in the yard of the wretched little wine- 
 shop at the end of the village (where the road forks to Nemours 
 and Moret) to see the carriage pass. It went by slowly, for 
 the marquise had come from Paris with her own horses, and 
 those on the lookout had ample opportunity of observing a 
 waiting-maid, who sat with her back to the horses holding a 
 Mttle girl, with a somewhat dreamy look, upon her knee. 
 The child's mother lay back in the carriage ; she looked like 
 a dying woman sent out into country air by her doctors as a 
 last resource. Village politicians were by no means pleased 
 to see the young, delicate, downcast face; they had hoped 
 that the new arrival at Saint-Lange would bring some life and 
 stir into the neighborhood, and clearly any sort of stir or 
 movement must be distasteful to the suffering invalid in the 
 traveling carriage. 
 
 That evening, when the notables of Saint-Lange were 
 drinking in the private room of the wineshop, the longest 
 head among them declared that such depression could admit 
 of but one construction the marquise was ruined. His lord- 
 ship the marquis was away in Spain with the Due d'AngoulSme 
 (so they said in the papers), and beyond a doubt her ladyship 
 had come to Saint-Lange to retrench after a run of ill-luck on 
 the Bourse. The marquis was one of the greatest gamblers 
 on the face of the globe. Perhaps the estate would be cut up 
 and sold in little lots. There would be some good strokes of 
 business to be made in that case, and it behooved everybody
 
 78 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 to count up his cash, unearth his savings, and to see how he 
 stood, so as to secure his share of the spoil of Saint-Lange. 
 
 So fair did this future seem that the village worthies, dying 
 to know whether it was founded on fact, began to think of 
 ways of getting at the truth through the servants at the manor- 
 house. None of these, however, could throw any light on 
 the calamity which had brought their mistress into the country 
 at the beginning of winter, and to the old castle of Saint- 
 Lange of all places, when she might have taken her choice of 
 cheerful country-houses famous for their beautiful gardens. 
 
 His worship the mayor called to pay his respects ; but he 
 did not see the lady. Then the land-steward tried with no 
 better success. 
 
 Madame la Marquise kept her room, only leaving it, while 
 it was set in order, for the small adjoining drawing-room, 
 where she dined ; if, indeed, to sit down to a table, to look 
 with disgust at the dishes, and taking the precise amount of 
 nourishment required to prevent death from sheer starvation, 
 can be called dining. The meal over, she returned at once 
 to the old-fashioned low chair, in which she had sat since the 
 morning, in the embrasure of the one window that lighted 
 her room. 
 
 Her little girl she only saw for a few minutes daily, during 
 the dismal dinner, and even for that short time she seemed 
 scarcely able to bear the child's presence. Surely nothing 
 but the most unheard-of anguish could have extinguished a 
 mother's love so early. 
 
 None of the servants were suffered to come near, her own 
 woman was the one creature whom she liked to have about 
 her; the castle must be perfectly quiet, the child must play at 
 the other end of the house. The slightest sound had grown 
 so intolerable that any human voice, even the voice of her 
 own child, jarred upon her. 
 
 At first the whole countryside was deeply interested in these 
 eccentricities j but time passed on, every possible hypothesis
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 79 
 
 had been advanced to account for them, and the peasants and 
 dwellers in the little country towns thought no more of the 
 invalid lady. 
 
 So the marquise was left to herself. She might live on, 
 perfectly silent, amid the silence which she herself had cre- 
 ated ; there was nothing to draw her forth from the tapestried 
 chamber where her grandmother had died, whither she her- 
 self had come that she might die, gently, without witnesses, 
 without importunate solicitude, without suffering from the 
 insincere demonstrations of egoism masquerading as affection, 
 which double the agony of death in great cities. 
 
 She was twenty-six years old. At that age, with plenty of 
 romantic illusions still left, the mind loves to dwell on the 
 thought of death when death seems to come as a friend. But 
 with youth, death is coy, coming up close only to go away, 
 showing himself and hiding again, till youth has time to fall 
 out of jlove with him during this dalliance. There is that un- 
 certainty, too, that hangs over death's to-morrow. Youth 
 plunges back into the world of living men, there to find the 
 pain more pitiless than death, that does not wait to strike. 
 
 This woman who refused to live was to know the bitterness 
 of these reprieves in the depths of her loneliness ; in moral 
 agony, which death would not come to end, she was to serve 
 a terrible apprenticeship to the egoism which must take the 
 bloom from her heart and break her in to the life of the 
 world. 
 
 This harsh and sorry teaching is the usual outcome of our 
 early sorrows. For the first, and perhaps for the last time in 
 her life, the Marquise d'Aiglemont was in very truth suffering. 
 And, indeed, would it not be an error to suppose that the 
 same sentiment can be reproduced in us? Once develop the 
 power to feel, is it not always there in the depths of our na- 
 ture? The accidents of life may lull or awaken it, but there 
 it is, of necessity modifying the self, its abiding-place. Hence, 
 every sensation should have its great day once and for all, its
 
 80 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 first day of storm, be it long or short. Hence, likewise, pain, 
 the most abiding of our sensations, could be keenly felt only 
 at its first irruption, its intensity diminishing with every sub- 
 sequent paroxysm, either because we grow accustomed to 
 these crises, or perhaps because a natural instinct of self-pre- 
 servation asserts itself and opposes to the destroying force of 
 anguish an equal but passive force of inertia. 
 
 Yet of all kinds of suffering, to which does the name of an- 
 guish belong ? For the loss of parents, Nature has in a manner 
 prepared us ; physical suffering, again, is an evil which passes 
 over us and is gone ; it lays no hold upon the soul ; if it per- 
 sists, it ceases to be an evil, it is death. The young mother 
 loses her firstborn, but wedded love ere long gives her a suc- 
 cessor. This grief, too, is transient. After all, these, and 
 many other troubles like unto them, are in some sort wounds 
 and bruises ; they do not sap the springs of vitality, and only 
 a succession of such blows can crush in us the instinct that 
 seeks happiness. Great pain, therefore pain that rises to an- 
 guish should be suffering so deadly that past, present, and 
 future are alike included in its grip and no part of life is left 
 sound and whole. Never afterward can we think the same 
 thoughts as before. Anguish engraves itself in ineffaceable 
 characters on mouth and brow; it passes through us, destroying 
 or relaxing the springs that vibrate to enjoyment, leaving be- 
 hind in the soul the seeds of a disgust for all things in this 
 world. 
 
 Yet, again, to be measureless, to weigh like this upon body 
 and soul, the trouble should befall when soul and body have 
 just come to their full strength, and smite down a heart that 
 beats high with life. Then it is that great scars are made. 
 Terrible is the anguish. None, it may be, can issue from this 
 soul-sickness without undergoing some dramatic change. 
 Those who survive it, those who remain on earth, return to 
 the world to wear an actor's countenance and to play an 
 actor's part. They know the side-scenes whither actors retire
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 81 
 
 to calculate chances, shed their tears, or pass their jests. 
 Life holds no inscrutable dark-places for those who have 
 passed through this ordeal ; their judgments are Rhada- 
 manthine. 
 
 For young women of the Marquise d'Aiglemont's age, this 
 first, this most poignant pain of all, is always referable to the 
 same cause. A woman, especially if she is a young woman, 
 greatly beautiful and by nature great, never fails to stake her 
 whole life as instinct and sentiment and society all unite to 
 bid her. Suppose that that life fails her, suppose that she still 
 lives on, she cannot but endure the most cruel pangs, inas- 
 much as a first-love is the loveliest of all. How comes it that 
 this catastrophe has found no painter, no poet ? And yet, 
 can it be painted ? Can it be sung ? No ; for the anguish 
 arising from it eludes analysis and defies the colors of art. 
 And more than this, such pain is never confessed. To con- 
 sole the sufferer, you must be able to divine the past which she 
 hugs in bitterness to her soul like a remorse ; it is like an 
 avalanche in a valley, it laid all waste before it found a per- 
 manent resting-place. 
 
 The marquise was suffering from this anguish, which will 
 for long remain unknown, because the whole world condemns 
 it, while sentiment cherishes it, and the conscience of a true 
 woman justifies her in it. It is with such pain as with chil- 
 dren steadily disowned of life, and therefore bound more 
 closely to the mother's heart than other children more boun- 
 teously endowed. Never, perhaps, was the awful catastrophe 
 in which the whole world without dies for us, so deadly, so 
 complete, so cruelly aggravated by circumstance as it had 
 been for the marquise. The man whom she had loved was 
 young and generous ; in obedience to the laws of the world, 
 she had refused herself to his love, and he had died to save a 
 woman's honor, as the world calls it. To whom could she 
 speak of her misery ? Her tears would be an offense to her 
 husband, the origin of the tragedy. By all laws written and 
 6
 
 82 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 unwritten she was bound over to silence. A woman would 
 have enjoyed the story ; a man would have schemed for his 
 own benefit. No ; such grief as hers can only weep freely in 
 solitude and in loneliness ; she must consume her pain or be 
 consumed by it; die or kill something within her her con- 
 science, it may be. 
 
 Day after day she sat gazing at the flat horizon. It lay out 
 before her like her own life to come. There was nothing to 
 discover, nothing to hope. The whole of it could be seen at a 
 glance. It was the visible presentment in the outward world 
 of the chill sense of desolation which was gnawing restlessly 
 at her heart. The misty mornings, the pale, bright sky, the 
 low clouds scudding under the gray dome of heaven, fitted 
 with the moods of her soul-sickness. Her heart did not con- 
 tract, was neither more nor 'less seared, rather it seemed as if 
 her youth, in its full blossom, was slowly turned to stone by 
 an anguish intolerable because it was barren. She suffered 
 through herself and for herself. How could it end save in 
 self-absorption ? Ugly torturing thoughts probed her con- 
 science. Candid self-examination pronounced that she was 
 double, there were two selves within her ; a woman who felt 
 and a woman who thought ; a self that suffered and a self that 
 would fain suffer no longer. Her mind traveled back to the 
 joys of childish days ; they had gone by, and she had never 
 known how happy they were. Scenes crowded up in her 
 memory as in a bright mirror-glass, to demonstrate the decep- 
 tion of a marriage which all that it should be in the eyes of 
 the world was in reality so wretched. What had the delicate 
 pride of young womanhood done for her the bliss forgone, 
 the sacrifices made to the world? Everything in her ex- 
 pressed love, awaited love ; her movements still were full of 
 perfect grace; her smile, her charm, were hers as before; 
 why? she asked herself. The sense of her own youth and 
 physical loveliness no more affected her than some meaning- 
 less reiterated sound. Her very beauty had grown intolerable
 
 A WOMAN OF THIKTY. 83 
 
 to her as a useless thing. She shrank aghast from the thought 
 that through the rest of life she must remain an incomplete 
 creature; had not the inner self lost its power of receiving 
 impressions with that zest, that exquisite sense of freshness 
 which is the spring of so much of life's gladness? The im- 
 pressions of the future would for the most part be effaced as 
 soon as received, and many of the thoughts which once would 
 have moved her now would move her no more. 
 
 After the childhood of the creature dawns the childhood of 
 the heart ; but this second infancy was over, her lover had 
 taken it down with him into the grave. The longings of youth 
 remained ; she was young yet ; but the completeness of youth 
 was gone, and with that lost completeness the whole value 
 and savor of life had diminished somewhat. Would she not 
 always bear within her the seeds of sadness and mistrust, ready 
 to grow up and rob emotion of its springtide of fervor? Con- 
 scious she must always be that nothing could give her now the 
 happiness so longed for, that seemed so fair in her dreams. 
 The fire from heaven that sheds abroad its light in the heart, 
 in the dawn of love, had been quenched in tears, the first real 
 tears which she had shed ; henceforth she must always suffer, 
 because it was no longer in her power to be what once she 
 might have been. This is a belief which turns us in aversion 
 and bitterness of spirit from any proffered new delight. 
 
 Julie had come to look at life from the point of view of 
 age about to die. Young though she felt, the heavy weight 
 of joyless days had fallen upon her, and left her broken- 
 spirited and old before her time. With a despairing cry, she 
 asked the world what it could give her in exchange for the 
 love now lost, by which she had lived. She asked herself 
 whether in that vanished love, so chaste and pure, her will 
 had not been more criminal than her deeds, and chose to 
 believe herself guilty ; partly to affront the world, partly for 
 her own consolation, in that she had missed the close union 
 of body and soul, which diminishes the pain of the one who
 
 84 A WOMAN t>F THIRTY. 
 
 is left behind by the knowledge that once it has known and 
 given joy to the full, and retains within itself the impress of 
 that which is no more. 
 
 Something of the mortification of the actress cheated of 
 her part mingled with the pain which thrilled through every 
 fibre of her heart and brain. Her nature had been thwarted, 
 her vanity wounded, her woman's generosity cheated of self- 
 sacrifice. Then, when she had raised all these questions, set 
 vibrating all the strings in those different phases of being 
 which we distinguish as social, moral, and physical, her ener- 
 gies were so far exhausted and relaxed that she was powerless 
 to grasp a single thought amid the chaos of conflicting ideas. 
 
 Sometimes, as the mists fell, she would throw her window 
 open, and would stay there, motionless, breathing in unheed- 
 ingly the damp earthy scent in the air, her mind to all ap- 
 pearance an unintelligent blank, for the ceaseless burden of 
 sorrow humming in her brain left her deaf to earth's harmonies 
 and insensible to the delights of thought. 
 
 One day, toward noon, when the sun shone out for a little, 
 her maid came in without a summons. 
 
 "This is the fourth time that Monsieur le Cure has come 
 to see Madame la Marquise ; to-day he is so determined 
 about it that we did not know what to tell him." 
 
 " He has come to ask for some money for the poor, no 
 doubt; take him twenty-five louis from me." 
 
 The woman went only to return. 
 
 "Monsieur le Cure will not take the money, my lady; he 
 wants to speak to you." 
 
 " Then let him come ! " said Mme. d'Aiglemont, with an 
 involuntary shrug which augured ill for the priest's reception. 
 Evidently the lady meant to put a stop to persecution by a 
 short and sharp method. 
 
 Mme. d'Aiglemont had lost her mother in her early child- 
 hood, and, as a natural consequence in her bringing-up, she had 
 felt the influences of the relaxed notions which loosened the
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 85 
 
 hold of religion upon France during the Revolution. Piety 
 is a womanly virtue which women alone can really instill ; 
 and the marquise, a child of the eighteenth century, had 
 adopted her father's creed of philosophism and practiced no 
 religious observances. A priest, to her way of thinking, was a 
 civil servant of very doubtful utility. In her present position, 
 the teaching of religion could only poison her wounds; she 
 had, moreover, but scanty faith in the lights of country 
 parsons, and made up her mind to put this one gently but 
 firmly in his place, and to rid herself of him, after the manner 
 of the rich, by bestowing a benefit. 
 
 At first sight of the cure the marquise felt no inclination 
 to change her mind. She saw before her a stout, rotund little 
 man, with a ruddy, wrinkled, elderly face, which awkwardly 
 and unsuccessfully tried to smile. His bald, quadrant-shaped 
 forehead, furrowed by intersecting lines, was too heavy for 
 the rest of his face, which seemed to be dwarfed by it. A 
 fringe of scanty, white hair encircled the back of his head, 
 and almost reached his ears. Yet the priest looked as if by 
 nature he had a genial disposition ; his thick lips, his slightly 
 curved nose, his chin which vanished in a double fold of 
 wrinkles all marked him out as a man who took cheerful 
 views of life. 
 
 At first the marquise saw nothing but these salient charac- 
 teristics, but at the first word she was struck by the sweetness 
 of the speaker's voice. Looking at him more closely, she 
 saw that the eyes under the grizzled eyebrows had shed tears, 
 and his face, turned in profile, wore so sublime an impress 
 of sorrow that the marquise recognized the man in the cure". 
 
 " Madame la Marquise, the rich only come within our 
 province when they are in trouble. It is easy to see that 
 the troubles of a young, beautiful, and wealthy married woman, 
 who has lost neither children nor relatives, are caused by 
 wounds whose pangs religion alone can soothe. Your soul is 
 in danger, madame. I am not now speaking of the hereafter
 
 86 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 which awaits us. No, I am not in the confessional. But it 
 is my duty, is it not, to open your eyes to your future life 
 here on earth? You will pardon an old man, will you not, 
 for the importunity which has your own happiness for its 
 object?" 
 
 "There is no more happiness for me, monsieur. I shall 
 soon be, as you say, in your province ; but it will be for 
 ever." ' 
 
 " Nay, madame. You will not die of this pain which lies 
 heavy upon you, and can be read in your face. If you had 
 been destined to die of it, you would not be here at Saint- 
 Lange. A definite regret is not so deadly as hope deferred. 
 I have known others pass through more intolerable and more 
 awful anguish, and yet they live." 
 
 The marquise looked incredulous. 
 
 " Madame, I know a man whose affliction was so sore that 
 your trouble would seem to you to be light compared with 
 his." 
 
 Perhaps the long solitary hours had begun to hang heavily ; 
 perhaps in the recesses of the marquise's mind lay the thought 
 that here was a friendly heart to whom she might be able to 
 pour out her troubles. However it was, she gave the rector a 
 questioning glance which could not be mistaken. 
 
 " Madame," he continued, " the man of whom I tell you 
 had but three children left of a once large family circle. He 
 lost his parents, his daughter, and his wife, whom he dearly 
 loved. He was left alone at last on the little farm where he 
 had lived so happily for so long. His three sons were in the 
 army, and each of the lads had risen in proportion to his time 
 of service. During the Hundred Days, the oldest went into 
 the Guard with a colonel's commission ; the second was a 
 major in the artillery ; the youngest a major in a regiment of 
 dragoons. Madame, those three boys loved their father as 
 much as he loved them. If you but knew how careless young 
 fellows grow of home ties when they are carried away by the
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 87 
 
 current of their own lives, you would realize from this one 
 little thing how warmly they loved the lonely old father, who 
 only lived in and for them never a week passed without a 
 letter from one of the boys. But, then, he on his side had 
 never been weakly indulgent, to lessen their respect for him ; 
 nor unjustly severe, to thwart their affection ; nor apt to 
 grudge sacrifices, the thing that estranges children's hearts. 
 He had been more than a father ; he had been a brother to 
 them, and their friend. 
 
 "At last he went to Paris to bid them good-by before they 
 set out for Belgium ; he wished to see that they had good 
 horses and all that they needed. And so they went, and the 
 father returned to his home again. Then the war began. 
 He had letters from Fleurus, and again from Ligny. All went 
 well. Then came the battle of Waterloo, and you know the 
 rest. France was plunged into mourning ; every family 
 waited in intense anxiety for news. You may imagine, mad- 
 ame, how the old man waited for tidings, in anxiety that 
 knew nor peace nor rest. He used to read the gazettes ; he 
 went to the coach-office every day. One evening he was told 
 that the colonel's servant had come. The man was riding 
 his master's horse what need was there to ask any questions ? 
 the colonel was dead, cut in two by a shell. Before the 
 evening was out the youngest son's servant arrived the 
 youngest had died on the eve of the battle. At midnight 
 came a gunner with tidings of the death of the last ; upon 
 whom, in those few hours, the poor father had centred all his 
 life. Madame, they all had fallen." 
 
 After a pause the good man controlled his feelings, and 
 added gently 
 
 "And their father is still living, madame. He realized 
 that if God had left him on earth, he was bound to live on 
 and suffer on earth ; but he took refuge in the sanctuary. 
 What could he be?" 
 
 The marquise looked up and saw the curb's face, grown
 
 88 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 sublime in its sorrow and resignation, and waited for him to 
 speak. When the words came, tears broke from her. 
 
 "A priest, madame; consecrated by his own tears pre- 
 viously shed at the foot of the altar." 
 
 Silence prevailed for a little. The marquise and the cure 
 looked out at the foggy landscape, as if they could see the 
 figures of those who were no more. 
 
 " Not a priest in a city, but a simple country cure," added 
 he. 
 
 "At Saint-Lange ? " she said, drying her eyes. 
 
 "Yes, madame." 
 
 Never had the majesty of grief seemed so great to Julie. 
 The two words sank straight into her heart with the weight of 
 an infinite sorrow. The gentle, sonorous tones troubled her 
 heart. Ah ! that full, deep voice, charged with undulated 
 vibration, was the voice of one who had suffered indeed. 
 
 "And if I do not die, monsieur, what will become of me ? " 
 The marquise spoke almost reverently. 
 
 " Have you not a child, madame? " 
 
 "Yes," she said stiffly. 
 
 The cure gave her a glance such as a doctor gives a patient 
 whose life is in danger. Then he determined to do all that 
 in him lay to combat the evil spirit into whose clutches she 
 had fallen. 
 
 " We must live on with our sorrows you see it yourself, 
 madame and religion alone offers us real consolation. Will 
 you permit me to come again ? to speak to you as a man who 
 can sympathize with every trouble, a man about whom there 
 is nothing very alarming, I think?" 
 
 "Yes, monsieur, come back again. Thank you for your 
 thought of me." 
 
 "Very well, madame; then I shall return very shortly." 
 
 This visit 'relaxed the tension of soul, as it were ; the heavy 
 strain of grief and loneliness had been almost too much for the 
 marquise's strength. The priest's visit had left a soothing
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 89 
 
 balm in her heart, his words thrilled through her with healing 
 influence. She began to feel something of a prisoner's satis- 
 faction when, after he has had time to feel his utter loneliness 
 and the weight of his chains, he hears a neighbor knocking on 
 the wall, and welcomes the sound which brings a sense of 
 human fellowship. Here was an unhoped-for confidant. But 
 this feeling did not last for long. Soon she sank back into 
 the old bitterness of spirit, saying to herself, as the prisoner 
 might say, that a companion in misfortune could neither 
 lighten her own bondage nor her future. 
 
 In the first visit the cure had feared to alarm the suscepti- 
 bilities of self-absorbed grief, in a second interview he hoped 
 to make some progress toward religion. He came back again 
 two days later, and from the marquise's welcome it was plain 
 that she had looked forward to the visit. 
 
 " Well, Madame la Marquise, have you given a little thought 
 to the great mass of human suffering ? Have you raised your 
 eyes above our earth and seen the immensity of the universe ? 
 the worlds beyond worlds which crush our vanity into insig- 
 nificance, and with our vanity reduce our sorrows? " 
 
 "No, monsieur," she said ; "I cannot rise to such heights, 
 our social laws lie too heavily upon me and rend my heart 
 with a too poignant anguish. And laws, perhaps, are less cruel 
 than the usages of the world. Ah ! the world ! " 
 
 " Madame, we must obey both. Law is the doctrine, and 
 custom the practice of society." 
 
 "Obey society?" cried the marquise, with an involuntary 
 shudder. "Eh ! monsieur, it is the source of all our woes. 
 God laid down no law to make us miserable ; but mankind, 
 uniting together in social life, have perverted God's work. 
 Civilization deals harder measure to us women than nature 
 does. Nature imposes upon us physical suffering which you 
 have not alleviated ; civilization has developed in us thoughts 
 and feelings which you cheat continually. Nature ^termi- 
 nates the weak ; you condemn them to live, and, by ; ;o doing,
 
 90 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 consign them to a life of misery. The whole weight of the 
 burden of marriage, an institution on which society is based, 
 falls upon us ; for the man liberty, duties for the woman. We 
 must give up our whole lives to you, you are only bound to 
 give us a few moments of yours. A man, in fact, makes a 
 choice, while we blindly submit. Oh, monsieur, to you I can 
 speak freely. Marriage, in these days, seems to me to be 
 legalized prostitution. This is the cause of my wretchedness. 
 But among so many miserable creatures so unhappily yoked, 
 I alone am bound to be silent, I alone am to blame for my 
 misery. My marriage was my own doing." 
 
 She stopped short, and bitter tears fell in the silence. 
 
 " In the depths of my wretchedness, in the midst of this sea 
 of distress," she went on, "I found some sands on which to 
 set foot and suffer at leisure. A great tempest swept every- 
 thing away. And here am I, helpless and alone, too weak to 
 cope with storms." 
 
 " We are never weak while God is with us," said the priest. 
 "And if your cravings for affection cannot be satisfied here 
 on earth, have you no duties to perform?" 
 
 "Duties continually!" she exclaimed, with something of 
 impatience in her tone. " But where for me are the senti- 
 ments which give us strength to perform them ? Nothing from 
 nothing, nothing for nothing this, monsieur, is one of the 
 most inexorable laws of nature, physical or spiritual. Would 
 you have these trees break into leaf without the sap which 
 swells the buds? It is the same with our human nature ; and 
 in me the sap is dried up at its source." 
 
 " I am not going to speak to you of religious sentiments of 
 which resignation is born," said the rector, "but of mother- 
 hood, madame, surely " 
 
 "Stop, monsieur!" said the marquise, "with you I will 
 be sincere. Alas ! in future I can be sincere with no one ; I 
 am condemned to falsehood. The world requires continual 
 grimaces, and we are bidden to obey its conventions if we
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 91 
 
 would escape reproach. There are two kinds of motherhood, 
 monsieur ; once I knew nothing of such distinctions, but I 
 know them now. Only half of me has become a mother; it 
 were better for me if I had not been a mother at all. Helena 
 is not his child ! Oh ! do not start. At Saint-Lange there 
 are volcanic depths whence come lurid gleams of light and 
 earthquake shocks to shake the fragile edifices of laws not 
 based on nature. I have borne a child, that is enough, I am 
 a mother in the eye of the law. But you, monsieur, with 
 your delicately compassionate soul, can perhaps understand 
 this cry from an unhappy woman who has suffered no lying 
 illusions to enter her heart. God will judge me, but surely I 
 have only obeyed His laws by giving way to the affections 
 which He Himself set in me, and this I have learned from 
 my own soul. What is a child, monsieur, but the image of 
 two beings, the fruit of two sentiments spontaneously blended? 
 Unless it is owned by every fibre of the body, as by every 
 chord of tenderness in the heart ; unless it recalls the bliss 
 of love, the hours, the places where two creatures were 
 happy, their words that overflowed with the music of humanity, 
 and their sweet imaginings, that child is an incomplete crea- 
 tion. Yes, those two should find the poetic dreams of their 
 intimate double life realized in their child as in an exquisite 
 miniature; it should be for them a never-failing spring of 
 emotion, implying their whole past and their whole future. 
 
 "My poor little Helene is her father's child, the offspring 
 of duty and of chance. In me she finds nothing but the 
 affection of instinct, the woman's natural compassion for the 
 child of her womb. Socially speaking, I am above reproach. 
 Have I not sacrificed my life and my happiness to my child? 
 Her cries go to my heart; if she were to fall into the water, I 
 should spring to save her, but she is not in my heart. 
 
 " Ah ! love set me dreaming of a motherhood far g r eater 
 and more complete. In a vanished dream I held in r y arms 
 a child conceived in desire before it was begotten, the ex-
 
 92 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 quisite flower of life that blossoms in the soul before it sees 
 the light of day. I am Helene's mother only in the sense 
 that I brought her forth. When she needs me no longer, 
 there will be an end of my motherhood ; with the extinction 
 of the cause, the effects will cease. If it is a woman's adorable 
 prerogative that her motherhood may last through her child's 
 life, surely that divine persistence of sentiment is due to the 
 far-reaching glory of the conception of the soul ? Unless a 
 child has lain wrapped about from life's first beginnings by 
 the mother's soul, the instinct of motherhood dies in her as 
 in the animals. This is true ; I feel that it is true. As my 
 poor little one grows older, my heart closes. My sacrifices 
 have driven us apart. And yet I know, monsieur, that to 
 another child my heart would have gone out in inexhaustible 
 love ; for that other I should not have known what sacrifice 
 meant, all had been delight. In this, monsieur, my instincts are 
 stronger than reason, stronger than religion or all else in me. 
 Does the woman who is neither wife nor mother sin in wish- 
 ing to die when, for her misfortune, she has caught a glimpse 
 of the infinite beauty of love, the limitless joy of motherhood ? 
 What can become of her? /can tell you what she feels. I 
 cannot put that memory from me so resolutely but that a 
 hundred times, night and day, visions of a happiness, greater 
 it may be than the reality, rise before me, followed by a 
 shudder which shakes brain and heart and body. Before 
 these cruel visions, my feelings and thoughts grow colorless, 
 and I ask myself: ' What would my life have been if- ? ' " 
 
 She hid her face in her hands and burst into tears. 
 
 "There you see the depths of my heart ! " she continued. 
 " For his child I could have acquiesced in any lot however 
 dreadful. He who died, bearing the burden of the sins of the 
 world, will forgive this thought of which I am dying; but the 
 world, I know, is merciless. In its ears my words are blas- 
 phemies ; I am outraging all its codes. Oh ! that I could wage 
 war against this world and break down and refashion its laws
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 93 
 
 and traditions ! Has it not turned all my thoughts, and feel- 
 ings, and longings, and hopes, and every fibre in me into so 
 many sources of pain? Spoiled my future, present and past? 
 For me the daylight is full of gloom, my thoughts pierce me 
 like a sword, my child is and is not. 
 
 " Oh, when Helene speaks to me, I wish that her voice were 
 different, when she looks into my face I wish that she had 
 other eyes. She constantly keeps me in mind of all that 
 should have been and is not. I cannot bear to have her near 
 me. I smile at her, I try to make up to her for the real affec- 
 tion of which she is defrauded. I am wretched, monsieur, too 
 wretched to live. And I am supposed to be a pattern wife. 
 And I have committed no sins. And I am respected ! I 
 have fought down forbidden love which sprang up unaware 
 within me ; but if I have kept the letter of the law, have I 
 kept it in my heart? There has never been but one here," 
 she said, laying her right hand on her breast, " one and no 
 other ; and my child feels it. Certain looks and tones and 
 gestures mould a child's nature, and my poor little one feels 
 no thrill in the arm I put about her, no tremor comes into my 
 voice, no softness into my eyes when I speak to her or take 
 her up. She looks at me, and I cannot endure the reproach 
 in her eyes. There are times when I shudder to think that 
 some day she may be my judge and condemn her mother un- 
 heard. Heaven grant that hate may not grow up between us ! 
 Ah ! God in heaven, rather let the tomb open for me, rather 
 let me end my days here at Saint-Lange ! I want to go back 
 to the world where I shall find my other soul and become 
 wholly a mother. Ah ! forgive me, sir, I am mad. Those 
 words were choking me ; now they are spoken. Ah ! you are 
 weeping too ! You will not despise me " 
 
 She heard the child come in from a walk. "Helene, 
 Helene, my child, come here!" she called. The words 
 sounded like a cry of despair. 
 
 The little girl ran in, laughing and calling to her mother to
 
 94 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 see a butterfly which she had caught ; but at the sight of that 
 mother's tears she grew quiet of a sudden, and went up close, 
 and received a kiss on her forehead. 
 
 "She will be very beautiful some day," said the priest. 
 
 "She is her father's child," said the marquise, kissing the 
 little one with eager warmth, as if she meant to pay a debt of 
 affection or to extinguish some feeling of remorse. 
 
 " How hot you are, mamma ! " 
 
 " There, go away, my angel," said the marquise. 
 
 The child went. She did not seem at all sorry to go ; she 
 did not look back ; glad perhaps to escape from a sad face, 
 and instinctively comprehending already an antagonism of 
 feeling in its expression. A mother's love finds language in 
 smiles ; they are a part of the divine right of motherhood. 
 The marquise could not smile. She flushed red as she felt 
 the cure's eyes. She had hoped to act a mother's part before 
 him, but neither she nor her child could deceive him. And, 
 indeed, when a woman loves sincerely, in the kiss she gives 
 there is a divine honey ; it is as if a soul were breathed forth 
 in the caress, a subtle flame of fire which brings warmth to the 
 heart ; the kiss that lacks this delicious unction is meagre and 
 formal. The priest had felt the difference. He could fathom 
 the depths that lie between the motherhood of the flesh and 
 the motherhood of the heart. He gave the marquise a keen, 
 scrutinizing glance, then he said 
 
 " You are right, madame ; it would be better for you if you 
 were dead " 
 
 "Ah!" she cried, "then you know all my misery ; I see 
 you do if, Christian priest as you are, you can guess my de- 
 termination to die and sanction it. Yes, I meant to die, but 
 I have lacked the courage. The spirit was strong, but the 
 flesh was weak, and when my hand did not tremble, the spirit 
 within me wavered. 
 
 " I do not know the reason of these inner struggles and 
 alternations. I am very pitiably a woman, no doubt, weak in
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 95 
 
 my will, strong only to love. Oh, I despise myself. At 
 night, when all my household was asleep, I would go out 
 bravely as far as the lake ; but when I stood on the brink my 
 cowardice shrank from self-destruction. To you I will confess 
 my weakness. When I lay in my bed again, shame would 
 come over me and courage would come back. Once I took 
 a dose of laudanum ; I was ill, but I did not die. I thought 
 I had emptied the phial, but I had only taken half the dose." 
 
 "You are lost, madame," the cure said gravely, with tears 
 in his voice. " You will go back into the world, and you will 
 deceive the world. You will seek and find a compensation 
 (as you imagine it to be) for your woes ; then will come a day 
 of reckoning for your pleasures " 
 
 " Do you think," she cried, " that I shall bestow the last, 
 the most precious treasures of my heart upon the first base im- 
 postor who can play the comedy of passion ? That I would 
 pollute my life for a moment of doubtful pleasure? No ; the 
 flame which shall consume my soul shall be love, and nothing 
 but love. All men, monsieur, have the senses of their sex, 
 but not all have the man's soul which satisfies all the require- 
 ments of our nature, drawing out the melodious harmony 
 which never breaks forth save in response to the pressure of 
 feeling. Such a soul is not found twice in our lifetime. The 
 future that lies before me is hideous ; I know it. A woman is 
 nothing without love ; beauty is nothing without pleasure. 
 And even if happiness were offered to me a second time, 
 would not the world frown upon it ? I owe my daughter an 
 honored mother. Oh ! I am condemned to live in an iron 
 circle, from which there is but one shameful way of escape. 
 The round of family duties, a thankless and irksome task, is 
 in store for me. I shall curse life ; but my child shall have at 
 least a fair semblance of a mother. I will give her treasures 
 of virtue for the treasures of love of which I defraud her. 
 
 " I have not even the mother's desire to live to enjoy her 
 child's happiness. I have no belief in happiness. What will
 
 96 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 Helene's fate be ? My own, beyond doubt. How can a 
 mother insure that the man to whom she gives her daughter 
 will be the husband of her heart ? You pour scorn on the 
 miserable creatures who sell themselves for a few coins to any 
 passer-by, though want and hunger absolve the brief union ; 
 while another union, horrible for quite other reasons, is toler- 
 ated, nay, encouraged, by society, and a young and innocent* 
 girl is married to a man whom she has only met occasionally 
 during the previous three months. She is sold for her whole 
 lifetime. It is true that the price is high ! If you allow her 
 no compensation for her sorrows, you might at least respect 
 her; but no, the most virtuous of women cannot escape 
 calumny. This is our fate in its double aspect. Open pros- 
 titution and shame ; secret prostitution and unhappiness. 
 As for the poor, portionless girls, they may die or go mad, 
 without a soul to pity them. Beauty aud virtue are not 
 marketable in the bazaar where souls and bodies are bought 
 and sold in the den of selfishness which you call society. 
 Why not disinherit daughters? Then, at least, you might 
 fulfill one of the laws of nature, and, guided by your own in- 
 clinations, choose your companions." 
 
 " Madame, from your talk it is clear to me that neither the 
 spirit of family nor the sense of religion appeals to you. Why 
 should you hesitate between the claims of the social selfishness 
 which irritates you and the purely personal selfishness which 
 craves satisfactions " 
 
 "The family, monsieur does such a thing exist? I de- 
 cline to recognize as a family a knot of individuals bidden by 
 society to divide the property after the death of father and 
 mother, and to go their separate ways. A family means a 
 temporary association of persons brought together by no will 
 of their own, dissolved at once by death. Our laws have 
 broken up homes and estates, and the old family tradition 
 handed down from generation to generation. I see nothing 
 but wreck and ruin about me."
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 97 
 
 " Madame, you will only return to God when His hand 
 has been heavy upon you, and I pray that you have time 
 enough given to you in which to make your peace with Him. 
 Instead of looking to heaven for comfort, you are fixing your 
 eyes on earth. Philosophism and personal interest have in- 
 vaded your heart ; like the children of the skeptical eighteenth 
 century, you are deaf to the voice of religion. The pleasures 
 of this life bring nothing but misery. You are about to make 
 an exchange of sorrows, that is all." 
 
 She smiled bitterly. 
 
 " I will falsify your predictions," she said. " I shall be 
 faithful to him who died for me." 
 
 "Sorrow," he answered, " is not likely to live long save 
 in souls disciplined by religion," and he lowered his eyes 
 respectfully lest the marquise should read his doubts in them. 
 The energy of her outburst had grieved him. He had seen 
 the self that lurked beneath so many forms, and despaired of 
 softening a heart which affliction seemed to sear. The divine 
 Sower's seed could not take root in such a soil, and His gentle 
 voice was drowned by the clamorous outcry of self-pity. Yet 
 the good man returned again and again with an apostle's 
 earnest persistence, brought back by a hope of leading so 
 noble and proud a soul to God ; until the day when he made 
 the discovery that the marquise only cared to talk with him 
 because it was sweet to speak of him who was no more. He 
 would not lower his ministry by condoning her passion, and 
 confined the conversation more and more to generalities and 
 commonplaces. 
 
 Spring came, and with the spring the marquise found dis- 
 traction from her deep melancholy. She busied herself for 
 lack of other occupation with her estate, making improve- 
 ments for amusement. 
 
 In October she left the old castle. In the life of leisure at 
 Saint-Lange she had recovered from her grief and grown fair 
 and fresh. Her grief had been violent at first in its course. 
 7
 
 98 
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 as the quoit hurled forth with all the player's strength, and 
 like the quoit after many oscillations, each feebler than the 
 last, it had slackened into melancholy. Melancholy is made 
 up of a succession of such oscillations, the first touching upon 
 despair, the last on the border between pain and pleasure ; in 
 youth, it is the twilight of dawn ; in age, the dusk of nighL 
 As the marquise drove through the village in her traveling 
 carnage, she met the priest on his way back from the church. 
 She bowed in response to his farewell greeting, but it was 
 with lowered eyes and averted face. She did not wish to see 
 him again. The village rector had judged this poor Dianq 
 of Ephesus only too well.
 
 III. 
 
 AT THIRTY YEARS. 
 
 Madame Firmiani was giving a ball. M. Charles de Vande- 
 nesse, a young man of great promise, the bearer of one of 
 those historic names which, in spite of the efforts of legislation, 
 are always associated with the glory of France, had received 
 letters of introduction to some of the great lady's friends in 
 Naples, and had come to thank the hostess and to take his 
 leave. 
 
 Vandenesse had already acquitted himself creditably on 
 several diplomatic missions ; and now that he had received an 
 appointment as attache to a plenipotentiary at the Congress 
 of Laybach, he wished to take advantage of the opportunity 
 to make some study of Italy on the way. This ball was a sort 
 of farewell to Paris and its amusements and its rapid whirl 
 of life, to the great eddying intellectual centre and mael- 
 strom of pleasure ; and a pleasant thing it is to be borne along 
 by the current of this sufficiently slandered great city of Paris. 
 Yet Charles de Vandenesse had little to regret, accustomed 
 as he had been for the past three years to salute European 
 capitals and turn his back upon them at the capricious bidding 
 of a diplomatist's destiny. Women no longer made any 
 impression upon him ; perhaps he thought that a real passion 
 would play too large a part in a diplomatist's life ; or perhaps 
 that the paltry amusements of frivolity were too empty for a 
 man of strong character. We all of us have huge claims to 
 strength of character. There is no man in France, be he 
 never so ordinary a member of the rank and file of humanity, 
 that will waive pretensions to something beyond mere clever- 
 ness. 
 
 Charles, young though he was he was scarcely turned 
 
 (99)
 
 100 A WOMAN OF 7HIRTY. 
 
 thirty looked at life with a philosophic mind, concerning 
 himself with theories and means and ends, while other men of 
 his age were thinking of pleasure, sentiments, and the like illu- 
 sions. He forced back into some inner depth the generosity 
 and enthusiasms of youth, and by nature he was generous. He 
 tried hard to be cool and calculating, to coin the fund of 
 wealth which chanced to be in his nature into gracious 
 manners, and courtesy, and attractive arts; 'tis the proper 
 task of an ambitious man to play a sorry part to gain " a good 
 position," as we call it in modern days. 
 
 He had been dancing, and now he gave a farewell glance 
 over the rooms, to carry away a distinct impression of the 
 ball, moved, doubtless, to some extent by the feeling which 
 prompts a theatre-goer to stay in his box to see the final 
 tableau before the curtain falls. But M. de Vandenesse had 
 another reason for his survey. He gazed curiously at the 
 scene before him, so French in character and in movement, 
 seeking to carry away a picture of the light and laughter and 
 the faces at this Parisian fete, to compare with novel faces and 
 picturesque surroundings awaiting him at Naples, where he 
 meant to spend a few days before presenting himself at his 
 post. He seemed to be drawing the comparsion now between 
 this France so variable, changing even as you study her, with 
 the manners and aspects of that other land known to him as 
 yet only by contradictory hearsay tales or books of travel, for 
 the most part unsatisfactory. Thoughts of a somewhat poetical 
 cast, albeit hackneyed and trite to our modern ideas, crossed 
 his brain, in response to some longing of which, perhaps, he 
 himself was hardly conscious, a desire in the depths of a 
 heart fastidious rather than jaded, vacant rather than seared. 
 
 " These are the wealthiest and most fashionable women and 
 the greatest ladies in Paris," he said to himself. " These are 
 the great men of the day, great orators and men of letters, 
 great names and titles ; artists and men in power ; and yet in 
 it all it seems to me as if there were nothing but petty in-
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 101 
 
 trigues and still-born loves, meaningless smiles and causeless 
 scorn, eyes lighted by no flame within, brain-power in abun- 
 dance running aimlessly to waste. All those pink-and-white 
 faces are here not so much for enjoyment, as to escape from 
 dullness. None of the emotion is genuine. If you ask for 
 nothing but court feathers properly adjusted, fresh gauzes and 
 pretty toilets and fragile, fair women, if you desire simply to 
 skim the surface of life, here is your world for you. Be con- 
 tent with meaningless phrases and fascinating simpers, and do 
 not ask for real feeling. For my own part, I abhor the stale 
 intrigues which end in sub-prefectures and receiver-generals' 
 places and marriages ; or, if love comes into the question, in 
 stealthy compromises, so ashamed are we of the mere sem- 
 blance of passion. Not a single one of all these eloquent 
 faces tells you of a soul, a soul wholly absorbed by one idea 
 as by remorse. Regrets and misfortune go about shame- 
 facedly clad in jests. There is not one woman here whose 
 resistance I should care to overcome, not one who could drag 
 you down to the pit. Where will you find energy in Paris ? A 
 poniard here is a curious toy to hang from a gilt nail, in a pic- 
 turesque sheath to match. The women, the brains, and hearts 
 of Paris are all on a par. There is no passion left, because we 
 have no individuality. High birth and intellect and fortune 
 are all reduced to one level ; we have all taken to the uniform 
 black coat by way of mourning for a dead France. There is 
 no love between equals. Between two lovers there should be 
 differences to efface, wide gulfs to fill. The charm of love fled 
 from us in 1789. Our dullness and our humdrum lives are the 
 outcome of the political system. Italy, at any rate, is the 
 land of sharp contrasts. Woman there is a malevolent 
 animal, a dangerous unreasoning siren, guided only by her 
 tastes and appetites, a creature no more to be trusted than a 
 
 tiger " 
 
 Mme. Firmiani here came up to interrupt this soliloquy 
 made up of vague, conflicting, and fragmentary thoughts
 
 102 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 which cannot be reproduced in words. The whole charm of 
 such musing lies in its vagueness what is it but a sort of 
 mental haze? 
 
 " I want to introduce you to some one who has the greatest 
 wish to make your acquaintance, after all that she has heard 
 of you," said the lady, taking his arm. 
 
 She brought him into the next room, and, with such a smile 
 and glance as a Parisienne alone can give, she indicated a 
 woman sitting by the hearth. 
 
 "Who is she? " the Comte de Vandenesse asked quickly. 
 
 " You have heard her name more than once coupled with 
 praise or blame. She is a woman who lives in seclusion a 
 perfect mystery." 
 
 " Oh ! if ever you have been merciful in your life, for pity's 
 sake, tell me her name." 
 
 "She is the Marquise d'Aiglemont." 
 
 "I will take lessons from her; she has managed to make a 
 peer of France of that eminently ordinary person her husband, 
 and a dullard into a power in the land. But, pray tell me this, 
 did Lord Grenville die for her sake, do you think, as some 
 women say? " 
 
 "Possibly. Since that adventure, real or imaginary, she is 
 very much changed, poor thing ! She has not gone into so- 
 ciety since. Four years of constancy that is something in 
 
 Paris. If she is here to-night " Here Mme. Firmiani 
 
 broke off, adding with a mysterious expression, " I am forget- 
 ting that I must say nothing. Go and talk with her." 
 
 For a moment Charles stood motionless, leaning lightly 
 against the frame of the doorway, wholly absorbed in his 
 scrutiny of a woman who had become famous no one knew 
 exactly how or why. Such curious anomalies are frequent 
 enough in the world. Mme. d'Aiglemont's reputation was 
 certainly no more extraordinary than plenty of other great rep- 
 utations. There are men who are always in travail of some 
 great work which never sees the light, statisticians held to be
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 103 
 
 profound on the score of calculations which they take very 
 good care not to publish, politicians who live on a newspaper 
 article, men of letters and artists whose performances are never 
 given to the world, men of science who pass current among 
 those who know nothing of science, much as Sganarelle is a 
 Latinist for those who know no Latin ; there are the men who 
 are allowed by general consent to possess a peculiar capacity 
 for some one thing, be it for the direction of arts, or for the 
 conduct of an important mission. The admirable phrase, "A 
 man with a special subject," might have been invented on 
 purpose for these acephalous species in the domain of literature 
 and politics. 
 
 Charles gazed longer than he intended. He was vexed 
 with himself for feeling so strongly interested ; it is true, how- 
 ever, that the lady's appearance was a refutation of the young 
 man's ballroom generalizations. 
 
 The marquise had reached her thirtieth year. She was 
 beautiful in spite of her fragile form and extremely delicate 
 look. Her greatest charm lay in her still face, revealing un- 
 fathomed depths of soul. Some haunting, ever-present thought 
 veiled, as it were, the full brilliance of eyes which told" of a 
 fevered life and boundless resignation. So seldom did she 
 raise the eyelids soberly downcast, and so listless were her 
 glances, that it almost seemed as if the fire in her eyes were 
 reserved for some occult contemplation. Any man of genius 
 and feeling must have felt strangely attracted by her gentle- 
 ness and silence. If the mind sought to explain the myste- 
 rious problem of a constant inward turning from the present 
 to the past, the soul was no less interested in initiating itself 
 into the secrets of a heart proud in some sort of its anguish. 
 Everything about her, moreover, was in keeping with these 
 thoughts which she inspired. Like almost all women who 
 have very long hair, she was very pale and perfectly white. 
 The marvelous fineness of her skin (that almost unerring sign) 
 indicated a quick sensibility which could be seen yet more
 
 104 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 unmistakably in her features ; there was the same minute and 
 wonderful delicacy of finish in them that the Chinese artist 
 gives to his fantastic figures. Perhaps her neck was rather 
 too long, but such necks belong to the most graceful type, and 
 suggest vague affinities between a woman's head and the mag- 
 netic curves of the serpent. Leave not a single one of the 
 thousand signs and tokens by which the most inscrutable char- 
 acter betrays itself to an observer of human nature, he has but 
 to watch carefully the little movements of a woman's head, 
 the ever-varying expressive turns and curves of her neck and 
 throat, to read her nature. 
 
 Mme. d'Aiglemont's dress harmonized with the haunting 
 thought that informed the whole woman. Her hair was 
 gathered up into a tall coronet of broad plaits, without orna- 
 ment of any kind ; she seemed to have bidden farewell foi 
 ever to elaborate toilettes. Nor were any of the small arts of 
 coquetry which spoil so many women to be detected in her. 
 Perhaps her bodice, modest though it was, did not altogethei 
 conceal the dainty grace of her figure ; perhaps, too, her gown 
 looked rich from the extreme distinction of its fashion ; and 
 if it is permissible to look for expression in the arrangement 
 of stuffs, surely those numerous straight folds invested her with 
 a great dignity. There may have been some lingering trace 
 of the indelible feminine foible in the minute care bestowed 
 upon her hand and foot ; yet, if she allowed them to be seen 
 with some pleasure, it would have tasked the utmost malice of 
 a rival to discover any affectation in her gestures, so natural 
 did they seem, s6 much a part of old childish habit, that her 
 careless grace absolved this vestige of vanity. 
 
 All these little characteristics, the nameless trifles which 
 combine to make up the sum of a woman's prettiness or ugli- 
 ness, her charm or lack of charm, can only be indicated, 
 when, as with Mine. d'Aiglemont, a personality dominates 
 and gives coherence to the details, informing them, blending 
 them all in an exquisite whole. Her manner was perfectly in
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 105 
 
 accord with her style of beauty and her dress. Only to 
 certain women at a certain age is it given to put language 
 into their attitude. Is it joy or is it sorrow that teaches a 
 woman of thirty the secret of that eloquence of carriage, so 
 that she must always remain an enigma which each interprets 
 by the aid of his hopes, desires, or theories ? 
 
 The way in which the marquise leaned both elbows on the 
 arm of her chair, the toying of her interclasped fingers, 
 the curve of her throat, the indolent lines of her languid but 
 lissome body as she lay back in graceful exhaustion, as it 
 were ; her indolent limbs, her unstudied pose, the utter lassi- 
 tude of her movements, all suggested that this was a woman 
 for whom life had lost its interest, a woman who had known 
 the joys of love only in dreams, a woman bowed down by the 
 burden of memories of the past, a woman who had long since 
 despaired of the future and despaired of herself, an unoccupied 
 woman who took the emptiness of her own life for the nothing- 
 ness of life. 
 
 Charles de Vandenesse saw and admired the beautiful pic- 
 ture before him, as a kind of artistic success beyond an ordi- 
 nary woman's powers of attainment. He was acquainted with 
 d'Aiglemont ; and now, at the first sight of d'Aiglemont's 
 wife, the young diplomatist saw at a glance a disproportionate 
 marriage, an incompatibility (to use the legal jargon) so great 
 that it was impossible that the marquise should love her hus- 
 band. And yet the Marquise d'Aiglemont's life was above 
 reproach, and for any observer the mystery about her was the 
 more interesting on this account. The first impulse of sur- 
 prise over, Vandenesse cast about for the best way of approach- 
 ing Mme. d'Aiglemont. He would try a commonplace piece 
 of diplomacy, he thought ; he would disconcert her by a 
 piece of clumsiness and see how she would receive it. 
 
 " Madame," he said, seating himself near her, " through a 
 fortunate indiscretion I have learned that, for some reason 
 unknown to me, I have had the good fortune to attract your
 
 106 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 notice. I owe you the more thanks because I have never 
 been so honored before. At the same time, you are respon- 
 sible for one of my faults, for I mean never to be modest 
 again " 
 
 "You will make a mistake, monsieur," she laughed; 
 " vanity should be left to those who have nothing else to 
 recommend them." 
 
 The conversation thus opened ranged at large, in the usual 
 way, over a multitude of topics art and literature, politics, 
 men and things till insensibly they fell to talking of the 
 eternal theme in France and all the world over love, senti- 
 ment, and women. 
 
 " We are bond-slaves." 
 
 "You are queens." 
 
 This was the gist and substance of all the more or less 
 ingenuous discourse between Charles and the marquise, as of 
 all such discourses past, present, and to come. Allow a 
 certain space of time, and the two formulas shall begin to 
 mean " Love me," and " I will love you." 
 
 "Madame," Charles de Vandenesse exclaimed under his 
 breath, " you have made me bitterly regret that I am leaving 
 Paris. In Italy I certainly shall not pass hours in intellectual 
 enjoyment such as this has been." 
 
 " Perhaps, monsieur, you will find happiness, and happiness 
 is worth more than all the brilliant things, true and false, that 
 are said every evening in Paris." 
 
 Before Charles took leave, he asked permission to pay a 
 farewell call on the Marquise d'Aiglemont, and very lucky did 
 he feel himself when the form of words in which he expressed 
 himself for once was used in all sincerity ; and that night, and 
 all day long on the morrow, he could not put the thought of 
 the marquise out of his mind. 
 
 At times he wondered why she had singled him out, what 
 she had meant when she asked him to come to see her, and 
 thought supplied an inexhaustible commentary. Again it
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 107 
 
 seemed to him that he had discovered the motives of her curi- 
 osity, and he grew intoxicated with hope or frigidly sober 
 with each new construction put upon that piece of common- 
 place civility. Sometimes it meant everything, sometimes 
 nothing. He made up his mind at last that he would not 
 yield to this inclination, and went to call on Mme. d' Aigle- 
 mont. 
 
 There are thoughts which determine our conduct, while \vc 
 do not so much as suspect their existence. If at first sight 
 this assertion appears to be less a truth than a paradox, let 
 any candid inquirer look into his own life and he shall find 
 abundant confirmation therein. Charles went to Mme. 
 d'Aiglemont, and so obeyed one of these latent, preexistent 
 germs of thought, of which our experience and our intel- 
 lectual gains and achievements are but later and tangible de- 
 velopments. 
 
 For a young man a woman of thirty has irresistible attrac- 
 tions. There is nothing more natural, nothing better estab- 
 lished, no human tie of stouter tissue than the heart-deep at- 
 tachment between such a woman as the Marquise d'Aiglemont 
 and such a man as Charles de Vandenesse. You can see ex- 
 amples of it every day in the world. A girl, as a matter of 
 fact, has too many young illusions, she is too inexperienced, 
 the instinct of sex counts for too much in her love fora young 
 man to feel flattered by it. A woman of thirty knows all that 
 is involved in the self-surrender to be made. Among the im- 
 pulses of the first, put curiosity and other motives than love ; 
 the second acts with integrity of sentiment. The first yields ; 
 the second makes deliberate choice. Is not that choice in 
 itself an immense flattery ? A woman armed with experience, 
 forewarned by knowledge, almost always dearly bought, seems 
 to give more than herself; while the inexperienced and cred- 
 ulous girl, unable to draw comparisons for lack of knowledge, 
 can appreciate nothing at its just worth. She accepts love and 
 ponders it. A woman is a counselor and a guide at an age
 
 108 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 when we love to be guided and obedience is delight ; while a 
 girl would fain learn all things, meeting us with a girl's 
 naivete instead of a woman's tenderness. She affords a single 
 triumph : with a woman there is resistance upon resistance to 
 overcome ; she has but joy and tears, a woman has rapture 
 and remorse. 
 
 A girl cannot play the part of a mistress unless she is so 
 corrupt that we turn from her with loathing ; a woman has a 
 thousand ways of preserving her power and her dignity ; 
 she has risked so much for love that she must bid him pass 
 through his myriad transformations, while her too submissive 
 rival gives a sense of too serene security which palls. If the 
 one sacrifices her maidenly pride, the other immolates the 
 honor of a whole family. A girl's coquetry is of the simplest, 
 she thinks that all is said when the veil is laid aside; a 
 woman's coquetry is endless, she shrouds herself in veil after 
 veil, she satisfies every demand of man's vanity, the novice 
 responds but to one. 
 
 And there are terrors, fears, and hesitations trouble and 
 storm in the love of a woman of thirty years, never to be 
 found in a young girl's love. At thirty years a woman asks 
 her lover to give her back the esteem she has forfeited for his 
 sake ; she lives only for him, her thoughts are full of his future, 
 he must have a great career, she bids him make it glorious ; she 
 can obey, entreat, command, humble herself, or rise in pride ; 
 times without number she brings comfort when a young girl 
 can only make moan. And with all the advantages of her 
 position, the woman of thirty can be a girl again, for she can 
 play all parts, assume a girl's bashfulness, and grow the fairer 
 even for a mischance. 
 
 Between these two feminine types lies the immeasurable 
 difference which separates the foreseen from the unforeseen, 
 strength from weakness. The woman of thirty satisfies every 
 requirement ; the young girl must satisfy none, under penalty 
 of ceasing to be a young girl. Such ideas as these, developing
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 109 
 
 in a young man's mind, help to strengthen the strongest of 
 all passions, a passion in which all spontaneous and natural 
 feeling is blended with the artificial sentiment created by 
 conventional manners. 
 
 The most important and decisive step in a woman's life is 
 the very one that she invariably regards as the most insignifi- 
 cant. After her marriage she is no longer her own mistress, 
 she is the queen and the bond-slave of the domestic hearth. 
 The sanctity of womanhood is incompatible with social liberty 
 and social claims; and for a woman emancipation means cor- 
 ruption. If you give a stranger the right of entry into the 
 sanctuary of home, do you not put yourself at his mercy? 
 How then if she herself bids him enter? Is not this an 
 offense, or, to speak more accurately, a first step toward an 
 offense? You must either accept this theory with all its con- 
 sequences, or absolve illicit passion. French society hitherto 
 has chosen the third and middle course of looking on and 
 laughing when offenses come, apparently upon the Spartan 
 principle of condoning the theft and punishing clumsiness. 
 And this system, it may be, is a very wise one. 'Tis a most 
 appalling punishment to have all your neighbors pointing the 
 finger of scorn at you, a punishment that a woman feels in her 
 very heart. Women are tenacious, and all of them should be 
 tenacious of respect ; without esteem they cannot exist, esteem 
 is the first demand that they make of love. The most corrupt 
 among them feels that she must, in the first place, pledge the 
 future to buy absolution for the past, and strives to make her 
 lover understand that only for irresistible bliss can she barter 
 the respect which the world will henceforth absolutely refuse 
 to her. 
 
 Some such reflections cross the mind of any woman who for 
 the first time and alone receives a visit from a young man ; 
 and this especially when, like Charles de Vandenesse, the 
 visitor is handsome or clever. And similarly there are not 
 many young men who would fail to base some secret wish on
 
 110 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 one of the thousand and one ideas which justify the instinct 
 that attracts them to a beautiful, witty, and unhappy woman 
 like the Marquise d'Aiglemont. 
 
 Mme. d'Aiglemont, therefore, felt troubled when M. de 
 Vandenesse was announced ; and, as for him, he was almost 
 confused in spite of the assurance which is like a matter of 
 costume for a diplomatist. But not for long. The marquise 
 took refuge at once in the friendliness of manner which women 
 use as a defense against the misinterpretations of fatuity, a 
 manner which admits of no afterthought, while it paves the 
 way to sentiment (to make use of a figure of speech), temper- 
 ing the transition through the ordinary forms of politeness. 
 In this ambiguous position, where the four roads leading re- 
 spectively to Indifference, Respect, Wonder, and Passion 
 meet, a woman may stay as long as she pleases, but only at 
 thirty years does she understand all the possibilities of the 
 situation. Laughter, tenderness, and jest are all permitted to 
 her at the crossing of the ways ; she has acquired the tact by 
 which she finds all the responsive chords in a man's nature, 
 and skill in judging the sounds which she draws forth. Her 
 silence is as dangerous as her speech. You will never read 
 her at that age, nor discover if she is frank or false, nor how 
 far she is serious in her admissions or merely laughing at you. 
 She gives you the right to engage in a game of fence with her, 
 and suddenly by a glance, a gesture of proved potency, she 
 closes the combat and turns from you with your secret in her 
 keeping, free to offer you up to a jest, free to interest herself 
 in you, safe alike in her weakness and your strength. 
 
 Although the Marquise d'Aiglemont took up her position 
 upon this neutral ground during the first interview, she knew 
 how to preserve a high womanly dignity. The sorrows of 
 which she never spoke seemed to hang over her assumed 
 gayety like a light cloud obscuring the sun. When Vande- 
 nesse went out, after a conversation which he had enjoyed 
 more than he had thought possible, he carried with him the
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. Ill 
 
 conviction that this was like to be too costly a conquest for 
 his aspirations. 
 
 "It would mean sentiment from here to yonder," he 
 thought, "and correspondence enough to wear out a deputy 
 second-clerk on his promotion. And yet if I really cared " 
 
 Luckless phrase that has been the ruin of many an infatu- 
 ated mortal. In France the way to love lies through self-love. 
 Charles went back to Mme. d'Aiglemont, and imagined that 
 she showed symptoms of pleasure in his conversation. And 
 then, instead of giving himself up like a boy to the joy of 
 falling in love, he tried to play a double role. He did his 
 best to act passion and to keep cool enough to analyze the 
 progress of this flirtation, to be lover and diplomatist at once ; 
 but youth and hot blood and analysis could only end in one 
 way, over head and ears in love ; for, natural or artificial, the 
 marquise was more than his match. Each time as he went 
 out from Mme. d'Aiglemont, he strenuously held himself to 
 his distrust, and submitted the progressive situations of his 
 case to a rigorous scrutiny fatal to his own emotions. 
 
 " To-day she gave me to understand that she has been very 
 unhappy and lonely," said he to himself, after the third visit, 
 "and that but for her little girl she would have longed for 
 death. She was perfectly resigned. Now as I am neither 
 her brother nor her spiritual director, why should she confide 
 her troubles to me? She loves me." 
 
 Two days later he came away apostrophizing modern man- 
 ners. 
 
 " Love takes on the hue of every age. In 1822 love is a 
 doctrinaire. Instead of proving love by deeds, as in times 
 past, we have taken to argument and rhetoric and debate. 
 Women's tactics are reduced to three shifts. In the first 
 place, they declare that we cannot love as they love. (Co- 
 quetry ! the marquise simply threw it at me, like a challenge, 
 this evening!) Next they grow pathetic, to appeal to our 
 natural generosity or self-love ; for does it not flatter a young
 
 112 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 man's vanity to console a woman for a great calamity. And, 
 lastly, they have a craze for virginity. She must have thought 
 that I thought her very innocent. My good faith is like to 
 become an excellent speculation." 
 
 But a day came when every suspicious idea was exhausted. 
 He asked himself whether the marquise was not sincere ; 
 whether so much suffering could be feigned, and why she 
 should act the part of resignation ? She lived in complete 
 seclusion ; she drank in silence of a cup of sorrow scarcely 
 to be guessed unless from the accent of some chance exclama- 
 tion in a \ oice always well under control. From that moment 
 Charles felt a keen interest in Mme. d'Aiglemont. And yet, 
 though his visits had come to be a recognized thing, and in 
 some sort a necessity to them both, and though the hour was 
 kept free by tacit agreement, Vandenesse still thought that 
 this woman with whom he was in love was more clever than 
 sincere. " Decidedly, she is an uncommonly clever woman," 
 he used to say to himself as he went away. 
 
 When he came into the room, there was the marquise in 
 her favorite attitude, melancholy expressed in her whole form. 
 She made no movement when he entered, only raised her 
 eyes and looked full at him, but the glance that she gave him 
 was like a smile. Mme. d'Aiglemont's manner meant con- 
 fidence and sincere friendship, but of love there was no trace. 
 Charles sat down and found nothing to say. A sensation for 
 which no language exists troubled him. 
 
 "What is the matter with you?" she asked in a softened 
 voice. 
 
 " Nothing. Yes ; I am thinking of something of which, as 
 yet, you have not thought at all." 
 
 "What is it?" 
 
 "Why the Congress is over." 
 
 "Well," she said, "and ought you to have been at the 
 Congress?" 
 
 A direct answer would have been the most eloquent and
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 113 
 
 delicate declaration of love ; but Charles did not make it. 
 Before the candid friendship in Mme. d'Aiglemont's face all 
 the calculations of vanity, the hopes of love, and the diplo- 
 matist's doubts died away. She did not suspect, or she 
 seemed not to suspect, his love for her ; and Charles, in utter 
 confusion turning upon himself, was forced to admit that he 
 had said and done nothing which could warrant such a belief 
 on her part. For M. de Vandenesse that evening, the mar- 
 quise was, as she had always been, simple and friendly, sincere 
 in her sorrow, glad to have a friend, proud to find a nature 
 responsive to her own nothing more. It had not entered 
 her mind that a woman could yield twice ; she had known 
 love love still lay bleeding in the depths of her heart, but 
 she did not imagine that bliss could bring her its rapture 
 twice, for she believed not merely in the intellect, but in the 
 soul ; and for her love was no simple attraction ; it drew her 
 with all noble attractions. 
 
 In a moment Charles became a young man again, enthralled 
 by the splendor of a nature so lofty. He wished for a fuller 
 initiation into the secret history of a life blighted rather by 
 fate than by her own fault. Mme. d'Aiglemont heard him 
 ask the cause of the overwhelming sorrow which had blended 
 all the harmonies of sadness with her beauty ; she gave him 
 one glance, but that searching look was like a seal set upon 
 some solemn compact. 
 
 "Ask no more such questions of me," she said. "Four 
 years ago, on this very day, the man who loved me, for whom 
 I would have given up everything, even my own self-respect, 
 died, and died to save my name. That love was still young 
 and pure and full of illusions when it came to an end. Before I 
 gave way to passion and never was woman so urged by fate 
 I had been drawn into the mistake that ruins many a girl's life, 
 a marriage with a man whose agreeable manners concealed his 
 emptiness. Marriage plucked my hopes away one by one. 
 And now, to-day, I have forfeited happiness through marriage, 
 8
 
 114 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 as well as the happiness styled criminal, and I have known no 
 happiness. Nothing is left to me. If I could not die. at the 
 least I ought to be faithful to my memories." 
 
 No tears came with the words. Her eyes fell, and there 
 was a slight twisting of the fingers interclasped, according to 
 her wont. It was simply said, but in her voice there was a 
 note of despair, deep as her love seemed to have been, which 
 left Charles without a hope. The dreadful story of a life told 
 in three sentences, with that twisting of the fingers for all 
 comment, the might of anguish in a fragile woman, the dark 
 depths masked by a fair face, the tears of four years of mourn- 
 ing, fascinated Vandenesse ; he sat silent and diminished in 
 the presence of her woman's greatness and nobleness, seeing 
 not the physical beauty so exquisite, so perfectly complete, 
 but the soul so great in its power to feel. He had found, at 
 last, the ideal of his fantastic imaginings, the ideal so vigor- 
 ously invoked by all who look on life as the raw material of a 
 passion for which many a one seeks ardently, and dies before 
 he has grasped the whole of the dreamed-of treasure. 
 
 With those words of hers in his ears, in the presence of her 
 sublime beauty, his own thoughts seemed poor and narrow. 
 Powerless as he felt himself to find words of his own, simple 
 enough and lofty enough to scale the heights of this exaltation, 
 he took refuge in platitudes as to the destiny of women. 
 
 " Madame, we must either forget our pain or hollow out a 
 tomb for ourselves." 
 
 But reason always cuts a poor figure beside sentiment ; the 
 one being essentially restricted, like everything that is positive, 
 while the other is infinite. To set to work to reason where 
 you are required to feel is the mark of a limited nature. 
 Vandenesse therefore held his peace, sat awhile with his eyes 
 fixed upon her, then went away. A prey to novel thoughts 
 which exalted woman for him, he was in something the same 
 position as a painter who has taken the vulgar studio model 
 for a type of womanhood, and suddenly confronts the
 
 A WOMAN OF TffIJtTY. 115 
 
 Mnemosyne of the Museum that noblest and least appre- 
 ciated of antique statues. 
 
 Charles de Vandenesse was deeply in love. He loved Mme. 
 d'Aiglemont with the loyalty of youth, with the fervor that 
 communicates such ineffable charm to a first passion, with a 
 simplicity of heart of which a man only recovers some frag- 
 ments when he loves again at a later day. Delicious first 
 passion of youth, almost always deliciously savored by the 
 woman who calls it forth ; for at the golden prime of thirty, 
 from the poetic summit of a woman's life, she can look out 
 over the whole course of love backward into the past, for- 
 ward into the future and, knowing all the price to be paid 
 for love, enjoys her bliss with the dread of losing it ever 
 present with her. Her soul is still fair with her waning youth, 
 and passion daily gathers strength from the dismaying pros- 
 pect of the coming days. 
 
 "This is love," Vandenesse said to himself this time as he 
 left the marquise, "and for my misfortune I love a woman 
 wedded to her memories. It is hard work to struggle against 
 a dead rival, never present to make blunders and fall out of 
 favor, nothing of him left but his better qualities. What is it 
 but a sort of high treason against the Ideal to attempt to break 
 the charm of memory, to destroy the hopes that survive a lost 
 lover, precisely because he only awakened longings, and all 
 that is loveliest and most enchanting in love?" 
 
 These sober reflections, due to the discouragement and 
 dread of failure with which love begins in earnest, were the 
 last expiring effort of diplomatic reasoning. Thenceforward 
 he knew no afterthoughts, he was the plaything of his love, 
 and lost himself in the nothings of that strange inexplicable 
 happiness which is full fed by a chance word, by silence, or a 
 vague hope. He tried to love Platonically, came daily to 
 breathe the air that she breathed, became almost a part of her 
 house, and went everywhere with her, slave as he was of a 
 tyrannous passion compounded of egoism and devotion of
 
 116 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 the completest. Love has its own instinct, finding the way to 
 the heart, as the feeblest insect finds the way to its flower, 
 with a will which nothing can dismay nor turn aside. If feel- 
 ing is sincere, its destiny is not doubtful. Let a woman begin 
 to think that her life depends on the sincerity or fervor or 
 earnestness which her lover shall put into his longings, and is 
 there not sufficient in the thought to put her through all the 
 tortures of dread ? It is impossible for a woman, be she wife or 
 mother, to be secure from a young man's love. One thing it 
 is within her power to do to refuse to see him as soon as she 
 learns a secret which she never fails to guess. But this is too 
 decided a step to take at an age when marriage has become a 
 prosaic and tiresome yoke, and conjugal affection is some- 
 thing less than tepid (if indeed her husband has not already 
 begun to neglect her). Is a woman plain ? She is flattered 
 by a love which gives her fairness. Is she young and charm- 
 ing ? She is only to be won by a fascination as great as her 
 own power to charm ; that is to say, a fascination well-nigh 
 irresistible. Is she virtuous ? There is a love sublime in its 
 earthliness which leads her to find something like absolution 
 in the very greatness of the surrender and glory in a hard 
 struggle. Everything is a snare. No lesson, therefore, is too 
 severe where the temptation is so strong. The seclusion in 
 which the Greeks and Orientals kept and keep their women, 
 an example more and more followed in modern England, is 
 the only safeguard of domestic morality ; but under this 
 system there is an end of all the charm of social intercourse ; 
 and society, and good breeding, and refinement of manners 
 become impossible. The nations must take their choice. 
 
 So a few months went by, and Mme. d'Aiglemont discov- 
 ered that her life was closely bound with this young man's 
 life, without overmuch confusion in her surprise, and felt with 
 something almost like pleasure that she shared his tastes and 
 his thoughts. Had she adopted Van denesse's ideas? Or was 
 it Vandenesse who had made her lightest whims his own ?
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 117 
 
 She was not careful to inquire. She had been swept out 
 already into the current of passion, and yet this adorable 
 woman told herself, with the confident reiteration of mis- 
 giving 
 
 "Ah ! no. I will be faithful to him who died for me." 
 Pascal said that " the doubt of God implies belief in God." 
 And similarly it may be said that a woman only parleys when 
 she has surrendered. A day came when the marquise ad- 
 mitted to herself that she was loved, and with that admission 
 came a time of wavering among countless conflicting thoughts 
 and feelings. The superstitions of experience spoke their 
 language. Should she be happy ? Was it possible that she 
 should find happiness outside the limits of the laws which 
 society rightly or wrongly has set up for humanity to live by? 
 Hitherto her cup of life had been full of bitterness. Was there 
 any happy issue possible for the ties which united two human 
 beings held apart by social conventions? And might not 
 happiness be bought too dear ? Still, this so ardently desired 
 happiness, for which it is so natural to seek, might perhaps be 
 found after all. Curiosity is always retained on the lover's 
 side in the suit. The secret tribunal was still sitting when 
 Vandenesse appeared, and his presence put the metaphysical 
 spectre, reason, to flight. 
 
 If such are the successive transformations through which a 
 sentiment, transient though it be, passes in a young man and 
 a woman of thirty, there comes a moment of time when the 
 shades of difference blend into each other, when all reasonings 
 end in a single and final reflection which is lost and absorbed 
 in the desire which it confirms. Then the longer the resist- 
 ance, the mightier the voice of love. And here endeth this 
 lesson, or rather this study made from the ecorche, to borrow 
 a most graphic term from the studio, for in this history it 
 is not so much intended to portray love as to lay bare its 
 mechanism and its dangers. From this moment every day 
 adds color to these dry bones, clothes them again with living
 
 118 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 flesh and blood and the charm of youth, and puts vitality into 
 their movements ; till they glow once more with the beauty, 
 the persuasive grace of sentiment, the loveliness of life. 
 
 Charles found Mme. d'Aiglemont absorbed in thought, and 
 to his : " What is it ? " spoken in thrilling tones grown persua- 
 sive with the heart's soft magic, she was careful not to reply. 
 The delicious question bore witness to the perfect unity of 
 their spirits; and the marquise felt, with a woman's wonder- 
 ful intuition, that to give any expression to the sorrow in her 
 heart would be to make an advance. If, even now, each one 
 of those words was fraught with significance for them both, 
 in what fathomless depths might she not plunge at the first 
 step ? She read herself with a clear and lucid glance. She 
 was silent, and Vandenesse followed her example. 
 
 " I am not feeling well," she said at last, taking alarm at the 
 pause fraught with such great moment for them both, when the 
 language of the eyes completely filled the blank left by the 
 helplessness of speech. 
 
 " Madame," said Charles, and his voice was tender but un- 
 steady with strong feeling, "soul and body are both depen- 
 dent on each other. If you were happy, you would be young 
 and fresh. Why do you refuse to ask of love all that love has 
 taken from you? You think that your life is over when it is 
 only just beginning. Trust yourself to a friend's care. It is 
 so sweet to be loved." 
 
 "I am old already," she said; " there is no reason why I 
 should not continue to suffer as in the past. And ' one must 
 love,' do you say? Well, I must not, and I cannot. Your 
 friendship has put some sweetness into my life, but beside you 
 I care for no one, no one could efface my memories. A friend 
 I accept ; I should fly from a lover. Beside, would it be a 
 very generous thing to do, to exchange a withered heart for 
 a young heart ; to smile upon illusions which now I cannot 
 share, to cause happiness in which I should either have no
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 119 
 
 belief, or tremble to lose ? I should perhaps respond to his 
 devotion with egoism, should weigh and deliberate while he 
 felt ; my memory would resent the poignancy of his happi- 
 ness. No, if you love once, that love is never replaced, you 
 see. Indeed, who would have my heart at this price?" 
 
 There was a tinge of heartless coquetry in the words, the 
 last effort of discretion. 
 
 " If he loses courage, well and good, I shall live alone and 
 faithful." The thought came from the very depths of the 
 woman, for her it was the too slender willow twig caught in 
 vain by a swimmer swept out by the current. 
 
 Vandenesse's involuntary shudder at her dictum pled more 
 eloquently for him than all his past assiduity. Nothing moves 
 a woman so much as the discovery of a gracious delicacy in 
 us, such a refinement of sentiment as her own, for a woman 
 the grace and delicacy are sure tokens of truth. Charles' 
 start revealed the sincerity of his love. Mme. d'Aiglemont 
 learned the strength of his affection from the intensity of his 
 pain. 
 
 " Perhaps you are right," he said coldly. " New love, new 
 vexation of spirit." 
 
 Then he changed t-he subject, and spoke of indifferent mat- 
 ters ; but he was visibly moved, and he concentrated his gaze 
 on Mme. d'Aiglemont as if he were seeing her for the last 
 time. 
 
 "Adieu, madame," he said, with emotion in his voice. 
 
 "Au revoir" said she, with that subtle coquetry, the secret 
 of a very few among women. 
 
 He made no answer and went. 
 
 When Charles was no longer there, when his empty chair 
 spoke for him, regrets flocked in upon her, and she found 
 fault with herself. Passion makes an immense advance as soon 
 as a woman persuades herself that she has failed somewhat in 
 generosity or hurt a noble nature. In love there is never any 
 need to be on our guard against the worst in us; that is a
 
 120 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 safeguard ; a woman only surrenders at the summons of a 
 virtue. " The floor of hell is paved with good intentions," it 
 is no preacher's paradox. 
 
 Vandenesse stopped away for several days. Every evening 
 at the accustomed hour the marquise sat expectant in remorseful 
 impatience. She could not write that would be a declara- 
 tion, and, moreover, her instinct told her that he would come 
 back. On the sixth day he was announced, and never had 
 she heard the name with such delight. Her joy frightened 
 her. 
 
 "You have punished me well," she said, addressing him. 
 
 Vandenesse gazed at her in astonishment. 
 
 " Punished !" he echoed. " And for what ? " He under- 
 stood her quite well, but he meant to be avenged for all that 
 he had suffered as soon as she suspected it. 
 
 "Why have you not come to see me?" she demanded 
 with a smile. 
 
 "Then have you seen no visitors?" asked he, parrying 
 the question. 
 
 " Yes. Messieurs de Ronquerolles and de Marsay and 
 young d'Escrignon came and stayed for nearly two hours, 
 the first two yesterday, the last this morning. And, beside, I 
 have had a call, I believe, from Madame Firmiani and from 
 your sister, Madame de Listomere." 
 
 Here was a new infliction, torture which none can com- 
 prehend unless they know love as a fierce and all-invading 
 tyrant whose mildest symptom is a monstrous jealousy, a per- 
 petual desire to snatch away the beloved from every other in- 
 fluence. 
 
 "What!" thought he to himself, "she has seen visitors, 
 she has been with happy creatures, and talking to them, while 
 I was unhappy and all alone ! " 
 
 He buried his annoyance forthwith, and consigned love to 
 the depths of his heart, like a coffin to the sea. His thoughts 
 were of the kind that never find expression in words ; they
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 121 
 
 pass through the mind swiftly as a deadly acid, that poisons 
 as it evaporates and vanishes. His brow, however, was over- 
 clouded ; and Mme. d'Aiglemont, guided by her woman's 
 instinct, shared his sadness without understanding it. She 
 had hurt him, unwittingly, as Vandenesse knew. He talked 
 over his position with her, as if his jealousy were one of 
 those hypothetical cases which lovers love to discuss. Then 
 the marquise understood it all. She was so deeply moved 
 that she could not keep back the tears and so these lovers 
 entered the heaven of love. 
 
 Heaven and hell are two great imaginative conceptions 
 formulating our ideas of joy and sorrow those two poles 
 about which human existence revolves. Is not heaven a 
 figure of speech covering now and for evermore an infinity of 
 human feeling impossible to express save in its accidents 
 since that joy is one ? And what is hell but the symbol of 
 our infinite power to suffer tortures so diverse that of our pain 
 it is possible to fashion works of art, for no two human sor- 
 rows are alike ? 
 
 One evening the two lovers sat alone and side by side, 
 silently watching one of the fairest transformations of the sky, 
 a cloudless heaven taking hues of pale gold and purple from 
 the last rays of the sunset. With the slow fading of the day- 
 light, sweet thoughts seem to awaken, and soft stirrings of 
 passion and a mysterious sense of trouble in the midst of calm. 
 Nature sets before us vague images of bliss, bidding us enjoy 
 the happiness within our reach, or lament it when it has fled. 
 In those moments fraught with enchantment, when the tender 
 light in the canopy of the sky blends in harmony with the 
 spells working within, it is difficult to resist the heart's desires 
 grown so magically potent. Cares are blunted ; joy becomes 
 ecstasy; pain, intolerable anguish. The pomp of sunset gives 
 the signal for confessions and draws them forth. Silence 
 grows more dangerous than speech, for it gives to eyes all the 
 power of the infinite of the heavens reflected in them. And
 
 122 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 for speech, the least word has irresistible might. Is not the 
 light infused into the voice and purple into the glances? Is 
 not heaven within us, or do we feel that we are in the 
 heavens ? 
 
 Vandenesse and Julie for so she had allowed herself to be 
 called for the past few days by him whom she loved to speak 
 of as Charles Vandenesse and Julie were talking together, 
 but they had drifted very far from their original subject ; and 
 if their spoken words had grown meaningless, they listened in 
 delight to the unspoken thoughts that lurked in the sounds. 
 Her hand lay in his. She had abandoned it to him without 
 a thought that she had granted a proof of love. 
 
 Together they leaned forward to look out upon a majestic 
 cloud country, full of snows and glaciers and fantastic moun- 
 tain peaks with gray stains of shadow on their sides, a picture 
 composed of sharp contrasts between fiery red and the shadows 
 of darkness, filling the skies with a fleeting vision of glory 
 which cannot be reproduced magnificent swaddling-bands 
 of sunrise, bright shrouds of the dying sun. As they leant, 
 Julie's hair brushed lightly against Vandenesse's cheek. She 
 felt that light contact, and shuddered violently, and he even 
 more, for imperceptibly they both had reached one of those in- 
 explicable crises when quiet has wrought upon the senses until 
 every faculty of perception is so keen that the slightest shock 
 fills the heart lost in melancholy with sadness that overflows in 
 tears ; or raises joy to ecstasy in a heart that is lost in the ver- 
 tigo of love. Almost involuntarily Julie pressed her lover's 
 hand. That wooing pressure gave courage to his timidity. 
 All the joy of the present, all the hopes of the future were 
 blended in the emotion of a first caress, the bashful trembling 
 kiss that Mme. d'Aiglemont received upon her cheek. The 
 slighter the concession, the more dangerous and insinuating it 
 was. For their double misfortune it was only too sincere a 
 revelation. Two noble natures had met and blended,* drawn 
 
 * Mler6.
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 123 
 
 each to each by every law of natural attraction, held apart by 
 every ordinance. 
 
 General d'Aiglemont came in at that very moment. 
 
 "The Ministry has gone out," he said. " Your uncle will 
 be in the new cabinet. So you stand an uncommonly good 
 chance of an embassy, Vandenesse." 
 
 Charles and Julie looked at each other and flushed red. 
 That blush was one more tie to unite them ; there was one 
 thought and one remorse in either mind ; between two lovers 
 guilty of a kiss there is a bond quite as strong and terrible 
 as the bond between two robbers who have murdered a man. 
 Something had to be said by way of reply. 
 
 "I do not care to leave Paris now," Charles said. 
 
 " We know why," said the general, with the knowing air of 
 a man who discovers a secret. " You do not like to leave 
 your uncle, because you do not wish to lose your chance of 
 succeeding to the title." 
 
 The marquise took refuge in her room, and in her mind 
 passed a pitiless verdict upon her husband. 
 
 " His stupidity is really beyond anything ! "
 
 IV. 
 
 THE FINGER OF GOD. 
 
 Between the Barriere d 1 Italic and the Barriere de la Bante", 
 along the boulevard which leads to the Jardin des Plantes, you 
 have a view of Paris fit to send an artist or the tourist, the 
 most blast in matters of landscape, into ecstasies. Reach the 
 slightly higher ground where the line of boulevard, shaded by 
 tall, thick-spreading trees, curves with the grace of some green 
 and silent forest avenue, and you see spread out at your feet a 
 deep valley populous with factories looking almost countrified 
 among green trees and the brown streams of the Bievre or the 
 Gobelins. 
 
 On the opposite slope, beneath some thousands of roofs 
 packed close together like heads in a crowd, lurks the squalor 
 of the Faubourg Saint-Marceau. The imposing cupola of the 
 Pantheon and the grim melancholy dome of the Val-du- 
 Grace tower proudly up above a whole town in itself, built 
 amphitheatre-wise; every tier being grotesquely represented 
 by a crooked line of street, so that the two public monuments 
 look like a huge pair of giants dwarfing into insignificance the 
 poor little houses and the tallest poplars in the valley. To 
 your left behold the observatory, the daylight, pouring athwart 
 its windows and galleries, producing such fantastical, strange 
 effects that the building looks like a black spectral skeleton. 
 Farther yet in the distance rises the elegant lantern tower of 
 the Invalides, soaring up between the bluish pile of the Lux- 
 embourg and the gray towers of Saint-Sulpice. From this 
 standpoint the lines of the architecture are blended with green 
 leaves and gray shadows, and change every moment with every 
 aspect of the heavens, every alteration of light or color in the 
 sky. Afar, the skyey spaces themselves seem to be full of 
 (124)
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 125 
 
 buildings; near, wind the serpentine curves of waving trees 
 and green footpaths. 
 
 Away to your right, through a great gap in this singular 
 landscape, you see the canal Saint-Martin, a long pale stripe 
 with its edging of reddish stone quays and fringes of lime 
 avenues. The long rows of buildings beside it, in genuine 
 Roman style, are the public granaries. 
 
 Beyond, again, on the very last plane of all, see the smoke- 
 dimmed slopes of Belleville, covered with houses and wind- 
 mills, which blend their freaks of outline with the chance 
 effects of clouds. And still, between that horizon, vague as 
 some childish recollection, and the serried range of roofs in 
 the valley, a whole city lies out of sight : a huge city, ingulfed, 
 as it were, in a vast hollow between the pinnacles of the 
 Hopital de la Pitie and the ridge line of the Cimetiere de 
 1'Est, between suffering on the one hand and death on the 
 other; a city sending up a smothered roar like ocean grum- 
 bling at the foot of a cliff, as if to let you know that " I am 
 here ! " 
 
 When the sunlight pours like a flood over this strip of Paris, 
 purifying and etherealizing the outlines, kindling answering 
 lights here and there in the window-panes, brightening the red 
 tiles, flaming about the golden crosses, whitening walls and 
 transforming the atmosphere into a gauzy veil, calling up rich 
 contrasts of light and fantastic shadow ; when the sky is blue 
 and earth quivers in the heat, and the bells are pealing, then 
 you shall see one of the eloquent fairy scenes which stamp 
 themselves forever on the imagination, a scene that shall find 
 as fanatical worshipers as the wondrous views of Naples and 
 Byzantium or the isles of Florida. Nothing is wanting to 
 complete the harmony, the murmur of the world of men and 
 the idyllic quiet of solitude, the voices of a million human 
 creatures and the voice of God. There lies a whole capital 
 beneath the peaceful cypresses of Pere-Lachaise cemetery. 
 
 The landscape lay in all its beauty, sparkling in the spring
 
 126 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 sunlight, as I stood looking out over it one morning, my back 
 against a huge elm-tree that flung its yellow flowers to the 
 wind. And, at the sight of the rich and glorious view before 
 me, I thought bitterly of the scorn with which even in our 
 literature we affect to hold this land of ours, and poured male- 
 dictions on the pitiable plutocrats who fall out of love with fair 
 France, and spend their gold to acquire the right of sneering 
 at their own country, by going through Italy at a gallop and 
 inspecting that desecrated land through an opera-glass. I 
 cast loving eyes on modern Paris ; I was beginning to dream 
 dreams, when the sound of a kiss disturbed the solitude and 
 put philosophy to flight. Down the sidewalk, along the steep 
 bank, above the rippling water, I saw beyond the Pont des 
 Gobelins the figure of a woman, dressed with the daintiest 
 simplicity ; she was still young, as it seemed to me, and the 
 blithe gladness of the landscape was reflected in her sweet 
 face. Her companion, a handsome young man, had just set 
 down a little boy. A prettier child has never been seen, and 
 to this day I do not know whether it was the little one or his 
 mother who received the kiss. In their young faces, in their 
 eyes, their smile, their every movement, you could read the 
 same deep and tender thought. Their arms were interlaced 
 with such glad swiftness ; they drew close together with such 
 marvelous unanimity of impulse that, conscious of nothing but 
 themselves, they did not so much as see me. A second child, 
 however a little girl, who had turned her back upon them in 
 sullen discontent threw me a glance, and the expression of 
 her eyes startled me. She was as pretty and as engaging as 
 the little brother whom she left to run about by himself, some- 
 times before, sometimes after their mother and her companion ; 
 but her charm was less childless, and now, as she stood mute 
 and motionless, her attitude and demeanor suggested a torpid 
 snake. There was something indescribably mechanical in the 
 way in which the pretty woman and her companion paced up 
 and down. In absence of mind, probably, they were content
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 127 
 
 to walk to and fro between the little bridge and a carriage 
 that stood waiting near by at a corner in the boulevard, turn- 
 ing, stopping short now and again, looking into each other's 
 eyes, or breaking into laughter as their casual talk grew lively 
 or languid, grave or gay. 
 
 I watched this delicious picture a while from my hiding- 
 place by the great elm-tree, and should have turned away no 
 doubt and respected their privacy, if it had not been for a 
 chance discovery. In the face of the brooding, silent, elder 
 child I saw traces of thought over-deep for her age. When 
 her mother and the young man at her side turned and came 
 near, her head was frequently lowered ; the furtive sidelong 
 glances of intelligence that she gave the pair and the child 
 her brother were nothing less than extraordinary. Sometimes 
 the pretty woman or her friend would stroke the little boy's 
 fair curls, or lay a caressing finger against the baby throat or 
 the white collar as he played at keeping step with them ; and 
 no words can describe the shrewd subtlety, the ingenuous 
 malice, the fierce intensity which lighted up that pallid little 
 face with the faint circles already round the eyes. Truly 
 there was a man's power of passion in that strange-looking, 
 delicate little girl. Here were traces of suffering or of 
 thought in her ; and which is the more certain token of death 
 when life is in blossom physical suffering, or the malady of 
 too early thought preying upon a soul as yet in bud ? Perhaps 
 a mother knows For my own part, I know of nothing more 
 dreadful to see than an old man's thoughts on a child's fore- 
 head ; even blasphemy from girlish lips is less monstrous. 
 
 The almost stupid stolidity of this child who had begun to 
 think already, her rare gestures, everything about her, inter- 
 ested me. I scrutinized her curiously. Then the common 
 whim of the observer drew me to compare her with her 
 brother, and to note their likeness and unlikeness. 
 
 Her brown hair and dark eyes and look of precocious 
 power made a rich contrast with the little one's fair curled
 
 128 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 head and sea-green eyes and winning helplessness. She, per- 
 haps, was seven or eight years of age ; the boy was full four 
 years younger. Both children were dressed alike ; but here 
 again, looking closely, I noticed a difference. It was very 
 slight, a little thing enough ; but in the light of after-events 
 I saw that it meant a whole romance in the past, a whole 
 tragedy to come. The little brown-haired maid wore a linen 
 collar with a plain hem, her brother's was edged with dainty 
 embroidery, that was all ; but therein lay the confession of a 
 heart's secret, a tacit preference which a child can read in 
 the mother's inmost soul as clearly as if the spirit of God re- 
 vealed it. The fair-haired child, careless and glad, looked 
 almost like a girl, his skin was so fair and fresh, his move- 
 ments so graceful, his look so sweet ; while his older sister, in 
 spite of her energy, in spite of the beauty of her features and 
 her dazzling complexion, looked like a sickly little boy. In 
 her bright eyes there was none of the humid softness which 
 lends such charm to children's faces; they seemed, like 
 courtiers' eyes, to be dried by some inner fire; and in her 
 pallor there was a certain swarthy olive tint, the sign of vigor- 
 ous character. Twice her little brother came to her, holding 
 out a tiny hunting-horn with a touching charm, a winning 
 look, and wistful expression, which would have sent Charlet 
 into ecstasies, but she only scowled in answer to his " Here, 
 Helene, will you take it? " so persuasively spoken. The little 
 girl, so sombre and vehement beneath her apparent indiffer- 
 ence, shuddered and even flushed red when her brother came 
 near her ; but the little one seemed not to notice his sister's 
 dark mood, and his unconsciousness, blended with earnest- 
 ness, marked a final difference in character between the child 
 and the little girl, whose brow was overclouded already by 
 the gloom of a man's knowledge and cares. 
 
 " Mamma, Helene will not play," cried the little one, seiz- 
 ing an opportunity to complain while the two stood silent on 
 the Pont des Gobelins.
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 129 
 
 "Let her alone, Charles; you know very well that she is 
 always cross." 
 
 Tears sprang to Helene's eyes at the words so thoughtlessly 
 uttered by her mother as she turned abruptly to the young 
 man by her side. The child devoured the speech in silence, 
 but she gave her brother one of those sagacious looks that 
 seemed inexplicable to me, glancing with a sinister expression 
 from the bank where he stood to the Bievre,* then at the bridge 
 and the view, and then at me. 
 
 I was afraid lest my presence should disturb the happy 
 couple ; I slipped away and took refuge behind a thicket of 
 alder trees, which completely screened me from all eyes. 
 Sitting quietly on the summit of the bank, I watched the ever- 
 changing landscape and the fierce-looking little girl, for with 
 my head almost on a level with the boulevard I could still see 
 her through the leaves. Helene. seemed uneasy over my dis- 
 appearance, her dark eyes looked for me down the alley and 
 behind the trees with indefinable curiosity. What was I to 
 her? Then Charles' baby laughter rang out like a bird's song 
 in the silence. The tall, young man, with the same fair hair, 
 was dancing him in his arms, showering kisses upon him, and 
 the meaningless baby words of that "little language" which 
 rises to our lips when we play with children. The mother 
 looked on smiling, now and then, doubtless, putting in some 
 low word that came up from the heart, for her companion 
 would stop short in his full happiness, and the blue eyes that 
 turned toward her were full of glowing light and love and 
 worship. Their voices, blending with the child's voice, 
 reached me with a vague sense of a caress. The three figures, 
 charming in themselves, composed a lovely scene in a glorious 
 landscape, filling it with a pervasive unimaginable grace. A 
 delicately fair woman, radiant with smiles, a child of love, a 
 young man with the irresistible charm of youth, a cloudless 
 sky ; nothing was wanting in nature to complete a perfect har- 
 
 * This river was noted for its beavers, hence the name. 
 9
 
 130 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 mony for the delight of the soul. I found myself smiling as 
 if their happiness had been my own. 
 
 The clocks struck nine. The young man gave a tender em- 
 brace to his companion, and went toward the tilbury which an 
 old servant drove slowly to meet him. The lady had grown 
 grave and almost sad. The child's prattle sounded unchecked 
 through the last farewell kisses. Then the tilbury rolled away, 
 and the lady stood motionless, listening to the sound of the 
 wheels, watching the little cloud of dust raised by its passage 
 along the road. Charles ran down the green pathway back 
 to the bridge to join his sister. I heard his silver voice call- 
 ing to her. 
 
 " Why did you not come to say good-by to my good 
 friend?" cried he. 
 
 Helene looked up. Never, surely, did such hatred gleam 
 from a child's eyes as from hers at that moment when she 
 turned them on the brother who stood beside her on the bank 
 side. She gave him an angry push. Charles lost his footing 
 on the steep slope, stumbled over the roots of a tree, and fell 
 headlong forward, dashing his forehead on the sharp-edged 
 stones of the embankment, and, covered with blood, dis- 
 appeared over the edge into the muddy river. The turbid 
 water closed over a fair, bright head with a shower of splashes; 
 one sharp shriek after another rang in my ears ; then the sounds 
 were stifled by the thick stream, and the poor child sank with 
 a dull sound as if a stone had been thrown into the water. 
 The accident had happened with more than lightning swift- 
 ness. I sprang down the footpath, and Helene, stupefied with 
 horror, shrieked again and again 
 
 "Mamma! mamma!" 
 
 The mother was there at my side. She had flown to the 
 spot like a bird. But neither a mother's eyes nor mine could 
 find the exact place where the little one had gone under. 
 There was a wide space of black hurrying water, and below in 
 the bed of the Bievre ten feet of mud. There was not the
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 131 
 
 smallest possibility of saving the child. No one is stirring at 
 that hour on a Sunday morning, and there are neither barges 
 nor anglers on the Bievre. There was not a creature in sight, 
 not a pole to plumb the filthy stream. What need was there for 
 me to explain how the ugly-looking accident had happened 
 accident or misfortune, whichever it might be? Had Helene 
 avenged her father? Her jealousy surely was the sword of 
 God. And yet when I looked at the mother I shivered. 
 What fearful ordeal awaited her when she should return to her 
 husband, the judge before whom she must stand all her days? 
 And here with her was an inseparable, incorruptible witness. 
 A child's forehead is transparent, a child's face hides no 
 thoughts, and a lie, like a red flame set within, glows out in 
 red that colors even the eyes. But the unhappy woman had 
 not thought as yet of the punishment awaiting her at home ; 
 she was staring into the Bievre. 
 
 Such an event must inevitably send ghastly echoes through 
 a woman's life, and here is one of the most terrible of the re- 
 verberations that troubled Julie's love from time to time. 
 
 Several years had gone by. The Marquis de Vandenesse 
 wore mourning for his father and succeeded to his estates. 
 One evening, therefore, after dinner it happened that a notary 
 was present in his house. This was no pettifogging lawyer 
 after Sterne's pattern, but a very solid, substantial notary of 
 Paris, one of your estimable men who do a stupid thing 
 pompously, set down a foot heavily upon your private corn, 
 and then ask what in the world there is to cry out about ? If, 
 by accident, they come to know the full extent of the enor- 
 mity: "Upon my word," cry they, "I hadn't a notion!" 
 This was a well-intentioned ass, in short, who could see 
 nothing in life but deeds and documents. 
 
 Mme. d'Aiglemont had been dining with M. de Van- 
 denesse ; her husband had excused himself before dinner was 
 over, for he was taking his two children to the play. They
 
 132 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 were to go to some boulevard theatre or other, to the Ambigu- 
 Coraique or the Gaiete, sensational melodrama being judged 
 harmless here in Paris, and suitable pabulum for childhood, 
 because innocence is always triumphant in the fifth act. The 
 boy and girl had teased their father to be there before the 
 curtain rose, so he had left the table before dessert was 
 served. 
 
 But the notary, the imperturbable notary, utterly incapable 
 of asking himself why Mme. d'Aiglemont should have allowed 
 her husband and children to go without her to the play, sat 
 on as if he were screwed to his chair. Dinner was over, des- 
 sert had been prolonged by discussion, and coffee delayed. 
 All these things consumed time, doubtless precious, and drew 
 impatient movements from that charming woman ; she looked 
 not unlike a thorough-bred pawing the ground before a race; 
 but the man of law, to whom horses and women were equally 
 unknown quantities, simply thought the marquise a very lively 
 and sparkling personage. So enchanted was he to be in the 
 company of a woman of fashion and a political celebrity, that 
 he was exerting himself to shine in conversation, and, taking 
 the lady's forced smile for approbation, talked on with unflag- 
 ging spirit, till the marquise was almost out of patience. 
 
 The master of the house, in concert with the lady, had 
 more than once maintained an eloquent silence when the 
 lawyer expected a civil reply ; but these significant pauses 
 were employed by the talkative nuisance in looking for anec- 
 dotes in the fire. M. de Vandenesse had recourse to his watch ; 
 the charming marquise tried the experiment of fastening her 
 bonnet strings, and made as if she would go. But she did 
 not go, and the notary, blind and deaf, and delighted with 
 himself, was quite convinced that his interesting conversa- 
 tional powers were sufficient to keep the lady on the spot. 
 
 "I shall certainly have that woman fora client," said he 
 to himself. 
 
 Meanwhile the marquise stood, putting on her gloves,
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 133 
 
 twisting her fingers, looking from the equally impatient 
 Marquis de Vandenesse to the lawyer, still pounding away. 
 At every pause in the worthy man's fire of witticisms the 
 charming pair heaved a sigh of relief, and their looks said 
 plainly, " At last ! He is really going ! " 
 
 Nothing of the kind. It was a nightmare which could only 
 end in exasperating the two impassioned creatures, on whom 
 the lawyer had something of the fascinating effect of a snake 
 on a pair of birds ; before long they would be driven to cut 
 him short. 
 
 The clever notary was giving them the history of the dis- 
 creditable ways in which one du Tillet (a stockbroker then 
 much in favor) had laid the foundations of his fortune-; all the 
 ins and outs of the whole disgraceful business were accurately 
 put before them ; and the narrator was in the very middle of 
 his tale when M. de Vandenesse heard the clock strike nine. 
 Then it became clear to him that his legal adviser was very 
 emphatically an idiot who must be sent forthwith about his 
 business. He stopped him resolutely with a gesture. 
 
 "The tongs, my lord marquis?" queried the notary, 
 handing the object in question to his client. 
 
 "No, monsieur, I am compelled to send you away. Mme. 
 d'Aiglemont wishes to join her children, and I shall have the 
 honor of escorting her." 
 
 " Nine o'clock already ! Time goes like a shadow in 
 pleasant company," said the man of law, who had talked on 
 end for the past hour. 
 
 He looked for his hat, planted himself before the fire, with 
 a suppressed hiccough ; and, without heeding the marquise's 
 withering glances, spoke once more to his impatient client 
 
 " To sum up, my lord marquis. Business before all things. 
 To-morrow, then, we must subpoena your brother ; we will 
 proceed to make out the inventory, and faith, after that " 
 
 So ill had the lawyer understood his instructions that his 
 impression was the exact opposite to the one intended. It
 
 134 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 was a delicate matter, and Vandenesse, in spite of himself, 
 began to put the thick-headed notary right. The discussion 
 which followed took up a certain amount of time. 
 
 "Listen," the diplomatist said at last at a sign from the 
 lady, " you are puzzling my brains; come back to-morrow at 
 nine o'clock, and bring my attorney with you." 
 
 "But, as I have the honor of observing, my lord marquis, 
 we are not certain of finding Monsieur Desroches to-morrow, 
 and if the writ is not issued by noon to-morrow, the days of 
 grace will expire, and then " 
 
 As he spoke, a carriage entered the courtyard. The poor 
 woman turned sharply away at the sound to hide the tears in 
 her eyes. The marquis rang to give the servant orders to say 
 that he was not at home ; but before the footman could answer 
 the bell, the lady's husband reappeared. He had returned 
 unexpectedly from the Gaiete, and held both children by the 
 hand. The little girl's eyes were red; the boy was fretful 
 and very cross. 
 
 "What can have happened? " asked the marquise. 
 
 " I will tell you by-and-by," said the general, and, catching 
 a glimpse through an open door of newspapers on the table 
 in the adjoining sitting-room, he went off. The marquise, at 
 the end of her patience, flung herself down on the sofa in des- 
 peration. The notary, thinking it incumbent upon him to 
 be amiable with the children, spoke to the little boy in an in- 
 sinuating tone 
 
 " Well, my little man, and what is there on at the theatre?" 
 
 " ' The Valley of the Torrent,' " said Gustave sulkily. 
 
 "Upon my word and honor," declared the notary, "au- 
 thors nowadays are half crazy. ' The Valley of the Torrent ! ' 
 Why not the Torrent of the Valley? It is conceivable that a 
 valley might be without a torrent in it ; now if they had said 
 the Torrent of the Valley, that would have been something 
 clear, something precise, something definite and comprehen- 
 sible. But never mind that. Now, how is a drama to take
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 135 
 
 place in a torrent and in a valley? You will tell me that in 
 these days the principal attraction lies in the scenic effect, 
 and the title is a capital advertisement. And did you enjoy 
 it, my little friend?" he continued, sitting down before the 
 child. 
 
 When the notary pursued his inquiries as to the possibilities 
 of a drama in the bed of a torrent, the little girl turned slowly 
 away and began to cry. Her mother did not notice this in 
 her intense annoyance. 
 
 "Oh! yes, monsieur, I enjoyed it very much," said the 
 child. " There was a dear little boy in the play, and he was 
 all alone in the world, because his papa could not have been 
 his real papa. And when he came to the top of the bridge 
 over the torrent, a big, naughty man with a beard, dressed all 
 in black, came and threw him into the water. And then 
 Helene began to sob and cry, and everybody scolded us, and 
 father brought us away quick, quick " 
 
 M. de Vandenesse and the marquise looked on in dull 
 amazement, as if all power to think or move had been sud- 
 denly paralyzed. 
 
 " Do be quiet, Gustave ! " cried the general. " I told you 
 that you were not to talk about anything that happened at 
 the play, and you have forgotten what I said already." 
 
 "Oh, my lord marquis, your lordship must excuse him," 
 cried the notary. " I ought not to have asked questions, but 
 I had no idea " 
 
 " He ought not to have answered them," said the general, 
 looking sternly at the child. 
 
 It seemed that the marquise and the master of the house 
 both perfectly understood why the children had come back so 
 suddenly. Mme. d'Aiglemont looked at her daughter, and 
 rose as if to go to her, but a terrible convulsion passed over 
 her face, and all that could be read in it was relentless severity. 
 
 "That will do, Helene," she said. "Go into the other 
 room, and leave off crying."
 
 136 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 " What can she have done, poor child ? " asked the notary, 
 thinking to appease the mother's anger and to stop Helene's 
 tears at one stroke. " So pretty as she is, she must be as good 
 as can be ; never anything but a joy to her mother, I will be 
 bound. Isn't that so, my little girl?" 
 
 Helene cowered, looked at her mother, dried her eyes, 
 struggled for composure, and took refuge in the next room. 
 
 "And you, madame, are too good a mother not to love all 
 your children alike. You are too good a woman, beside, to 
 have any of those lamentable preferences which have such fatal 
 effects, as we lawyers have only too much reason to know. 
 Society goes through our hands ; we see its passions in that 
 most revolting form greed. Here it is the mother of a 
 family trying to disinherit her husband's children to enrich 
 the others whom she loves better ; or it is the husband who 
 tries to leave all his property to the child who has done his 
 best to earn his mother's hatred. And then begin quarrels, 
 and fears, and deeds, and defeasances, and sham sales, and 
 trusts, and all the rest of it a pretty mess ; in fact, it is piti- 
 able, upon my honor pitiable ! There are fathers that will 
 spend their whole lives in cheating their children and robbing 
 their wives. Yes, robbing is the only word for it. We were 
 talking of tragedy ; oh ! I can assure you of this, that if we 
 were at liberty to tell the real reasons of some donations that 
 I know of, our modern dramatists would have the material for 
 some sensational bourgeois dramas. How the wife manages to 
 get her way, as she invariably does, I cannot think ; for, in 
 spite of appearances and in spite of their weakness, it is al- 
 ways the women who carry the day. Ah ! by the way, they 
 don't take me in. I always know the reason at the bottom of 
 those predilections which the world politely styles ' unaccount- 
 able.' But in justice to the husbands, I must say that they 
 never discover anything. You will tell me that this is a mer- 
 ciful dispens " 
 
 Helene had come back to the drawing-room with her father,
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 137 
 
 and was listening attentively. So well did she understand all 
 that was said that she gave her mother a frightened glance, 
 feeling, with a child's quick instinct, that these remarks would 
 aggravate the punishment hanging over her. The marquise 
 turned her white face to Vandenesse ; and, with terror in her 
 eyes, indicated her husband, who stood with his eyes fixed 
 ] absently on the flower pattern of the carpet. The diploma- 
 list, accomplished man of the world though he was, could no 
 longer contain his wrath, he gave the man of law a withering 
 glance. 
 
 " Step this way, sir," he said, and he went hurriedly to the 
 door of the antechamber ; the notary left his sentence half 
 finished, and followed, quaking, and the husband and wife 
 were left together. 
 
 "Now, sir," said the Marquis de Vandenesse he banged 
 the drawing-room door and spoke with concentrated rage 
 " ever since dinner you have done nothing but make blunders 
 and talk folly. For heaven's sake, go. You will make the 
 most frightful mischief before you have done. If you are a 
 clever man in your profession, keep to your profession ; and 
 if by any chance you should go into society, endeavor to be 
 more circumspect." 
 
 With that he went back to the drawing-room, and did not 
 even wish the notary good-evening. For a moment that 
 worthy stood dumfounded, bewildered, utterly at a loss. 
 Then, when the buzzing in his ears subsided, he thought he 
 heard some one moaning in the next room. Footsteps came 
 and went, and bells were violently rung. He was by no 
 means anxious to meet the marquis again, and found the use 
 of his legs to make good his escape, only to run against a 
 hurrying crowd of servants at the door. 
 
 " Just the way with all these grand folk," said he to him- 
 self outside in the street as he looked about for a cab. 
 " They lead you on to talk with compliments, and you think 
 you are amusing them. Not a bit of it. They treat you in-
 
 138 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 solently ; put you at a distance ; even put you out at the door 
 without scruple. After all, I talked very cleverly, I said 
 nothing but what was sensible, well turned, and discreet ; and, 
 upon my word, he advises me to be more circumspect in 
 future. I will take good care of that ! Eh ! the mischief 
 take it ! I am a notary and a member of my chamber ! 
 Pshaw ! it was an ambassador's fit of temper, nothing is 
 sacred for people of that kind. To-morrow he shall explain 
 what he meant by saying that I had done nothing but blunder 
 and talk nonsense in his house. I will ask him for an expla- 
 nation that is, I will ask him to explain my mistake. After 
 
 all is done and said, I am in the wrong perhaps Upon 
 
 my word, it is very good of me to cudgel my brains like this. 
 What business is it of mine?" 
 
 So the notary went home and laid the enigma before his 
 spouse, with a complete account of the evening's events re- 
 lated in sequence. 
 
 And she replied : "My dear Crottat, his excellency was per- 
 fectly right when he said that you had done nothing but 
 blunder and talk folly." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 " My dear, if I told you why, it would not prevent you 
 from doing the same thing somewhere else to-morrow. I tell 
 you again talk of nothing but business when you go out ; 
 that is my advice to you." 
 
 "If you will not tell me, I shall ask him to-morrow." 
 
 " Why, dear me ! the veriest noodle is careful to hide a 
 thing of that kind, and do you suppose that an ambassador 
 will tell you about it? Really, Crottat, I have never known 
 you so utterly devoid of commonsense." 
 
 "Thank you, my dear."
 
 V. 
 
 TWO MEETINGS. 
 
 One of Napoleon's orderly staff- officers, who shall be known 
 in this history only as the general or the marquis, had come 
 to spend the spring at Versailles. He had made a large fortune 
 under the Restoration ; and, as his place at Court would not 
 allow him to go very far from Paris, he had taken a country 
 house between the church and the barrier of Montreuil, on the 
 road that leads to the Avenue de Saint-Cloud. 
 
 The house had been built originally as a retreat for the short- 
 lived loves of some great lord. The grounds were large ; the gar- 
 dens on either side extending from the first houses of Montreuil 
 to the thatched cottages near the barrier, so that the owner 
 could enjoy all the pleasures of solitude with the city almost 
 at his gates. By an odd piece of contradiction, the whole 
 front 01 the house itself, with the principal entrance, gave 
 directly upon the street. Perhaps in time past it was a toler- 
 ably lonely road, and indeed this theory looks all the more 
 probable when one comes to think ot it ; for not so very far 
 away, on this same road, Louis Quinze built a delicious summer 
 villa for Mile, de Romans, and the curious in such things 
 will discover that the wayside casinos (summer-houses) are 
 adorned in a style that recalls traditions of the ingenious 
 taste displayed in debauchery by our ancestors who, with all 
 the license laid to their charge, sought to invest it with secrecy 
 and mystery. 
 
 One winter evening the family were by themselves in the 
 lonely house. The servants had received permission to go to 
 Versailles to celebrate the wedding of one of their number. 
 It was Christmas-time, and the holiday makers, presuming 
 upon the double festival, did not scruple to outstay their leave 
 
 ' (139)
 
 140 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 of absence ; yet, as the general was well known to be a man 
 of his word, the culprits felt some twinges of conscience as 
 they danced on after the hour of return. The clocks struck 
 eleven, and still there was no sign of the servants. 
 
 A deep silence prevailed over the countryside, broken only 
 by the sound of the northeast wind whistling through the black 
 branches, wailing about the house, dying in gusts along the 
 corridors. The hard frost had purified the air, and held the 
 earth in its grip ; the roads gave back every sound with the 
 hard metallic ring which always strikes us with a new surprise ; 
 the heavy footsteps of some belated reveler, or a cab returning 
 to Paris, could be heard for a long distance with unwonted 
 distinctness. Out in the courtyard a few dead leaves set 
 a-dancing by some eddying gust found a voice for the night 
 which fain had been silent. It was, in fact, one of those 
 sharp, frosty evenings that wring barren expressions of pity 
 from our selfish ease for wayfarers and the poor, and fills us 
 with a luxurious sense of the comfort of the fireside. 
 
 But the family party in the salon at that hour gave not a 
 thought to absent servants nor houseless folk, nor to the 
 gracious charm with which a winter evening sparkles. No 
 one played the philosopher out of season. Secure in the pro- 
 tection of an old soldier, women and children gave themselves 
 up to the joys of home life, so delicious when there is no re- 
 straint upon feeling ; and talk and play and glances are bright 
 with frankness and affection. 
 
 The general sat, or more properly speaking, lay buried, in 
 the depths of a huge, high-back armchair by the hearth. The 
 heaped-up fire burnt scorchingly clear with the excessive cold 
 of the night. The good father leaned his head slightly to 
 one side against the back of the chair, in the indolence of 
 perfect serenity and a glow of happiness. The languid, half- 
 sleepy droop of his outstretched arms seemed to complete his 
 expression of placid content. He was watching his youngest, 
 a boy of five or thereabout, who, half-clad as he was, declined
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 141 
 
 to allow his mother to undress him. The little one fled from 
 the night-gown and cap with which he was threatened now 
 and again, and stoutly declined to part with his embroidered 
 collar, laughing when his mother called to him, for he saw 
 that she, too, was laughing at this declaration of infant inde- 
 pendence. The next step was to go back to a game of romps 
 with his sister. She was as much a child as he, but more mis- 
 chievous ; and she was older by two years, and could speak 
 distinctly already, whereas his inarticulate words and confused 
 ideas were a puzzle even to his parents. Little Mo'ina's play- 
 fulness, somewhat coquettish already, provoked inextinguish- 
 able laughter, explosions of merriment which went off like 
 fireworks for no apparent cause. As they tumbled about be- 
 fore the fire, unconcernedly displaying little plump bodies 
 and delicate white contours, as the dark and golden curls 
 mingled in a collision of rosy cheeks dimpled with childish 
 glee, a father surely, a mother most certainly, must have under- 
 stood those little souls, and seen the character and power of 
 passion already developed before their eyes. As the cherubs 
 frolicked about, struggling, rolling, and tumbling without fear 
 of hurt on the soft carpet, its flowers looked pale beside the 
 glowing white and red of their cheeks and the brilliant color 
 of their shining eyes. 
 
 On the sofa by the fire, opposite the great armchair, the 
 children's mother sat among a heap of scattered garments, 
 with a little scarlet shoe in her hand. She seemed to have 
 given herself up completely to the enjoyment of the moment ; 
 wavering discipline had relaxed into a sweet smile engraved 
 upon her lips. At the age of six-and-thirty, or thereabout, 
 she was a beautiful woman still, by reason of the rare perfec- 
 tion of the outlines of her face, and at this moment light and 
 warmth and happiness filled it with preternatural brightness. 
 
 Again and again her eyes wandered from her children, and 
 their tender gaze was turned upon her husband's grave face;
 
 142 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 and now and again the eyes of husband and wife met with a 
 silent exchange of happiness and thoughts from some inner 
 depth. 
 
 The general's face was deeply bronzed, a stray lock of gray 
 hair scored shadows on his forehead. The reckless courage 
 of the battlefield could be read in the lines carved in his hol- 
 low cheeks, and gleams of rugged strength in the blue eyes ; 
 clearly the bit of red ribbon flaunting at his button-hole had 
 been paid for by hardship and toil. An inexpressible kindli- 
 ness and frankness shone out of the strong, resolute face which 
 reflected his children's merriment ; the gray-haired captain 
 found it not so very hard to become a child again. Is there 
 not always a love of little children in the heart of a soldier 
 who has seen enough of the seamy-side of life to know some- 
 thing of the piteous limitations of strength and the privileges 
 of weakness ? 
 
 At a round table rather farther away, in a circle of bright 
 lamplight that dimmed the feebler illumination of the wax 
 candles on the mantel, sat a boy of thirteen, rapidly turning 
 the pages of a thick volume which he was reading, undisturbed 
 by the shouts of the children. There was a boy's curiosity in 
 his face. From his lyceens uniform he was evidently a school- 
 boy, and the book he was reading was the " Arabian Nights." 
 Small wonder that he was deeply absorbed. He sat perfectly 
 still in a meditative attitude, with an elbow on the table, and 
 his hand propping his head the white fingers contrasting 
 strongly with the brown hair into which they were thrust. 
 As he sat, with the light turned full upon his face, and the 
 rest of his body in shadow, he looked like one of Raphael's 
 dark portraits of himself a bent head and intent eyes filled 
 with visions of the future. 
 
 Between the table and the marquise a tall, beautiful girl sat 
 at her tapestry frame ; sometimes she drew back from her 
 work, sometimes she bent over it, and her hair, picturesque 
 in its ebony smoothness and darkness, caught the light of the
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 143 
 
 lamp. Helena was a picture in herself. In her beauty there 
 was a rare distinctive character of power and refinement. 
 Though her hair was gathered up and drawn back from her 
 face, so as to trace a clearly marked line about her head, so 
 thick and abundant was it, so recalcitrant to the comb, that 
 it sprang back in curl-tendrils to the nape of her neck. The 
 bountiful line of eyebrows was evenly marked out in dark con- 
 trasting outline upon her pure forehead. On her upper lip 
 beneath the Grecian nose with its sensitively perfect curve of 
 nostril, there lay a faint, swarthy shadow, the sign-manual 
 of coyrage ; but the enchanting roundness of contour, the 
 frankly innocent expression of her other features, the trans- 
 parence of the delicate carnations, the voluptuous softness of 
 the lips, the flawless oval of the outline of the face, and with 
 these, and more than all these, the saintlike expression in the 
 girlish eyes, gave to her vigorous loveliness the distinctive 
 touch of feminine grace, that enchanting modesty which we 
 look for in these angels of peace and love. Yet there was no 
 suggestion of fragility about her ; and, surely, with so grand 
 a woman's frame, so attractive a face, she must possess a corre- 
 sponding warmth of heart and strength of soul. 
 
 She was as silent as her schoolboy brother. Seemingly a 
 prey to the fateful maiden meditations which baffle a father's 
 penetration and even a mother's sagacity, it was impossible 
 to be certain whether it was the lamplight that cast thos-e 
 shadows that flitted over her face like thin clouds over a 
 bright sky, or whether they were passing shades of secret and 
 painful thoughts. 
 
 Husband and wife had quite forgotten the two older chil- 
 dren at that moment, though now and again the general's 
 questioning glance traveled to that second mute picture ; a 
 larger growth, a gracious realization, as it were, of the hopes 
 embodied in the baby forms rioting in the foreground. Their 
 faces made up a kind of living poem, illustrating life's various 
 phases. The luxurious background of the salon, the different
 
 144 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 attitudes, the strong contrasts of coloring in the faces, differ- 
 ing with the character of differing ages, the modeling of the 
 forms brought into high relief by the light altogether it was 
 a page of human life, richly illuminated beyond the art of 
 painter, sculptor, or poet. Silence, solitude, night, and winter 
 lent a final touch of majesty to complete the simplicity and 
 sublimity of this exquisite effect of nature's contriving. Mar- 
 ried life is full of these sacred hours, which perhaps owe their 
 indefinable charm to some vague memory of a better world. 
 A divine radiance surely shines upon them, the destined com- 
 pensation for some portion of earth's sorrows, the solace which 
 enables man to accept life. We seem to behold a vision of 
 an enchanted universe, the great conception of its system 
 widens out before our eyes, and social life pleads for its laws 
 by bidding us look to the future. 
 
 Yet in spite of the tender glances that Helene gave Abel 
 and Moina after a fresh outburst of merriment ; in spite of 
 the look of gladness in her transparent face whenever she stole 
 a glance at her father, a deep melancholy pervaded her ges- 
 tures, her attitude, and, more than all, her eyes veiled by 
 their long lashes. Those white, strong hands, through which 
 the light passed, tinting them with a diaphanous almost fluid 
 red those hands were trembling. Once only did the eyes 
 of the mother and daughter clash without shrinking, and the 
 two women read each other's thoughts in a look, cold, wan, 
 and respectful on Helene's part, sombre and threatening on 
 her mother's. At once Helene's eyes were lowered to her 
 work, she plied her needle swiftly, and it was long before she 
 raised her head, bowed as it seemed by a weight of thought 
 too heavy to bear. Was the marquise over-harsh with this 
 one of her children ? Did she think this harshness needful ? 
 Was she jealous of Helene's beauty? She might still hope to 
 rival Helene, but only by the magic arts of the toilet. Or, 
 again, had her daughter, like many a girl who reaches the 
 clairvoyant age, read the secrets which this wife (to all ap-
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 145 
 
 pearance so religiously faithful in the fulfillment of her duties) 
 believed to be buried in her own heart as deeply as in a 
 grave ? 
 
 Helene had reached an age when purity of soul inclines to 
 pass over-rigid judgments. A certain order of mind is apt 
 to exaggerate transgression into crime ; imagination reacts 
 upon conscience, and a young girl is a hard judge because she 
 magnifies the seriousness of the offense. Helene seemed to 
 think herself worthy of no one. Perhaps there was a secret 
 in her past life, perhaps something had happened, unintelligi- 
 ble to her at the time, but with gradually developing signifi- 
 cance for a mind grown susceptible to religious influences; 
 something which lately seemed to have degraded her, as it 
 were, in her own eyes and according to her own romantic 
 standard. This change in her demeanor dated from the day 
 of reading Schiller's noble tragedy of "William Tell" in a 
 series of translations. Her mother scolded her for letting the 
 book fall, and then remarked to herself that the passage which 
 had so worked on Helene's feelings was the scene in which 
 William Tell, who spilt the blood of a tyrant to save a nation, 
 fraternizes in some sort with John the Parricide. Helene 
 had grown humble, dutiful, and self-contained ; she no longer 
 cared for gayety. Never had she made so much of her father, 
 especially when the marquise was not by to watch her girlish 
 caresses. And yet, if Helene's affection for her mother had 
 cooled at all, the change in her manner was so slight as to be 
 almost imperceptible; so slight that the general could not 
 have noticed it, jealous though he might be of the harmony 
 of home. No masculine insight could have sounded the 
 depths of those two feminine natures ; the one was young and 
 generous, the other sensitive and proud ; the first had a 
 wealth of indulgence in her nature, the second was full of 
 craft and love. If the marquise made her daughter's life a 
 burden to her by a woman's subtle tyranny, it was a tyranny 
 invisible to all but the victim ; and, for the rest, these con- 
 10
 
 146 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 jectures only called forth after the event must remain conjec- 
 tures. Until this night no accusing flash of light had escaped 
 either of them, but an ominous mystery was too surely growing 
 up between them, a mystery known only to themselves and 
 God. 
 
 " Come, Abel," called the marquise, seizing on her oppor- 
 tunity when the children were tired of play and still for a 
 moment. " Come, come, my child ; you must be put to 
 bed " 
 
 And with a glance that must be obeyed, she caught him up 
 and took him on her knee. 
 
 " What ! " exclaimed the general. " Half-past ten o'clock, 
 and not one of the servants has come back ! The rascals ! 
 Gustave," he added, turning to his son, "I allowed you to 
 read that book only on the condition that you should put it 
 away at ten o'clock. You ought to have shut up the book at 
 the proper time and gone to bed, as you promised. If you 
 mean to make your mark in the world, you must keep youi 
 word ; let it be a second religion to you and a point of honor. 
 Fox, one of the greatest of English orators, was remarkable, 
 above all things, for the beauty of his character, and the very 
 first of his qualities was the scrupulous faithfulness with which 
 he kept his engagements. When he was a child, his father 
 (an Englishman of the old school) gave him a pretty strong 
 lesson which he never forgot. Like most rich Englishmen, 
 Fox's father had a country house and a considerable park 
 about it. Now, in the park there was an old summer-house, 
 and orders had been given that this summer-house was to be 
 pulled down and put up somewhere else where there was a 
 finer view. Fox was just about your age, and had come home 
 for the holidays. Boys are fond of seeing things pulled to 
 pieces, so young Fox asked to stay on at home for a few days 
 longer to see the old summer-house taken down ; but his 
 father said that he must go back to school on the proper day, 
 so there was anger between father and son. Fox's mother
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 147 
 
 (like all mammas) took the boy's part. Then the father 
 solemnly promised that the summer-house should stay where 
 it was till the next holidays. 
 
 " So Fox went back to school ; and his father, thinking that 
 lessons would soon drive the whole thing out of the boy's 
 mind, had the summer-house pulled down and put up in the 
 new position. But, as it happened, the persistent youngster 
 thought of nothing but that summer-house ; and as soon as he 
 came home again, his first care was to go out to look at the 
 old building, and he came in to breakfast looking quite dole- 
 ful, and said to his father: 'You have broken your promise.' 
 The old English gentleman said with confusion full of dignity, 
 * That is true, my boy ; but I will make amends. A man 
 ought to think of keeping his word before he thinks of his 
 fortune ; for by keeping to his word he will gain fortune, 
 while all the fortunes in the world will not efface the stain left 
 on your conscience by a breach of faith.' Then he gave 
 orders that the summer-house should be put up again in the 
 old place, and when it had been rebuilt he had it taken down 
 again for his son to see. Let this be a lesson to you, Gustave." 
 
 Gustave had been listening with interest, and now he closed 
 the book at once. There was a moment's silence, while the 
 general took possession of MoYna, who could scarcely keep her 
 eyes open. The little one's languid head fell back on her 
 father's breast, and in a moment she was fast asleep, wrapped 
 round about in her golden curls. 
 
 Just then a sound of hurrying footsteps rang on the pave- 
 ment out in the street, immediately followed by three knocks 
 on the street-door, waking the echoes of the house. The re- 
 verberating blows told, as plainly as a cry for help, that here 
 was a man flying for his life. The house dog barked furiously. 
 A thrill of excitement ran through Helene and Gustave and 
 the general and his wife ; but neither Abel, with the night- 
 cap strings just tied under his chin, nor Mo'ina awoke. 
 
 "The fellow is in a hurry! " exclaimed the general. He
 
 148 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 put the little girl down on the chair and hastened out of the 
 room, heedless of his wife's entreating cry : " Dear, do not go 
 down " 
 
 He stepped into his own room for a pair of pistols, lighted 
 a dark lantern, sprang at lightning speed down the staircase, 
 and in another minute reached the house-door, his oldest boy 
 fearlessly following. 
 
 " Who is there? " demanded he. 
 
 "Let me in," panted a breathless voice. 
 
 " Are you a friend ? " 
 
 "Yes, friend." 
 
 "Are you alone?" 
 
 " Yes ! But let me in ; they are after me ! " 
 
 The general had scarcely set the door ajar before a man 
 slipped into the porch with the uncanny swiftness of a shadow. 
 Before the master of the house could prevent him, the intruder 
 had closed the door with a well-directed kick, and set his back 
 against it resolutely, as if he were determined that it should 
 not be opened again. In a moment the general had his lan- 
 tern and pistol at a level with the stranger's breast, and beheld 
 a man of medium height in a fur-lined pelisse. It was an old 
 man's garment, both too large and too long for its present 
 wearer. Chance or caution had slouched the man's hat over 
 his eyes. 
 
 "You can lower your pistol, sir," said this person. "I 
 do not claim to stay in your house against your will ; but if I 
 leave it, death is waiting for me at the barrier. And what a 
 death ! You would be answerable to God for it ! I ask for 
 your hospitality for two hours. And bear this in mind, sir, 
 that, suppliant as I am, I have a right to command with the 
 despotism of necessity. I want the Arab's hospitality. Either 
 I and my secret must be inviolable, or open the door and I 
 will go to my death. I want secrecy, a safe hiding-place, and 
 water. Oh! water!" he cried again, with a rattle in his 
 throat.
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 149 
 
 "Who are you?" demanded the general, taken aback by 
 the stranger's feverish volubility. 
 
 "Ah ! who am I? Good, open the door, and I will put a 
 distance between us," retorted the other, and there was a 
 diabolical irony in his tone. 
 
 Dexterously as the marquis passed the light of the lantern 
 over the man's face, he could only see the lower half of it, 
 and that in nowise prepossessed him in favor of this singular 
 claimant of hospitality. The cheeks were livid and quivering, 
 the features dreadfully contorted. Under the shadow of the 
 hat-brim a pair of eyes gleamed out like flames; the feeble 
 candlelight looked almost dim in comparison. Some sort of 
 answer must be made however. 
 
 "Your language, sir, is so extraordinary that in my place 
 you yourself " 
 
 "My life is in your hands ! " the intruder broke in. The 
 sound of his voice was dreadful to hear. 
 
 "Two hours?" said the marquis wavering. 
 
 "Two hours," echoed the other. 
 
 Then quite suddenly, with a desperate gesture, he pushed 
 back his hat and left his forehead bare, and, as if he meant to 
 try a final expedient, he gave the general a glance that seemed 
 to plunge like a vivid flash into his very soul. That electrical 
 discharge of intelligence and will was swift as lightning and 
 crushing as a thunderbolt ; for there are moments when a 
 human being is invested for a brief space with inexplicable 
 power. 
 
 " Come, whoever you may be, you shall be in safety under 
 my roof," the master of the house said gravely at last, acting, 
 as he imagined, upon one of those intuitions which a man 
 cannot always explain to himself. 
 
 "God will repay you!" said the stranger, with a deep, 
 involuntary sigh. 
 
 " Have you weapons? " asked the general. 
 
 For all answer the stranger flung open his fur pelisse,
 
 150 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 and scarcely gave the other time for a glance before he 
 wrapped it about him again. To all appearance he was un- 
 armed and in evening dress. Swift as the soldier's scrutiny 
 had been, he saw something, however, which made him ex- 
 claim 
 
 "Where the devil have you been to get yourself in such a 
 mess in such dry weather? " 
 
 " More questions ! " said the stranger haughtily. 
 
 At the words the marquis caught sight of his son, and his 
 own late homily on the strict fulfillment of a given word came 
 up in his mind. In lively vexation, he exclaimed, not with- 
 out a touch of anger 
 
 "What ! little rogue, you here when you ought to be in 
 bed?" 
 
 "Because I thought I might be some good in danger," 
 answered Gustave. 
 
 " There, go up to your room," said his father, mollified by 
 the reply. "And you" (addressing the stranger), "come 
 with me." 
 
 The two men grew as silent as a pair of gamblers who watch 
 each other's play with mutual suspicions. The general him- 
 self began to be troubled with ugly presentiments. The 
 strange visit weighed upon his mind already like a nightmare ; 
 but he had passed his word, there was no help for it now, 
 and he led the way along the passages and stairways till they 
 reached a large room on the third floor immediately above the 
 salon. This was an empty room where linen was dried in the 
 winter. It had but the one door, and for all decoration 
 boasted one solitary, shabby looking-glass above the mantel, 
 left by the previous owner, and a great pier-glass, placed 
 provisionally opposite the fireplace until such time as a use 
 should be found for it in the rooms below. The four yellow- 
 ish walls were bare. The floor had never been swept. The 
 huge attic was icy-cold, and the furniture consisted of a couple 
 of rickety straw-bottomed chairs, or rather frames of chairs.
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 151 
 
 The general set the lantern down upon the mantel. Then he 
 spoke : 
 
 " It is necessary for your own safety to hide you in this 
 comfortless attic. And, as you have my promise to keep your 
 secret, you will permit me to lock you in." 
 
 The other bent his head in acquiescence. 
 
 "I asked for nothing but a hiding-place, secrecy, and 
 water," returned he. 
 
 " I will bring you some directly," said the marquis, shutting 
 the door cautiously. He groped his way down into the salon 
 for a lamp before going to the kitchen to look for a carafe. 
 
 "Well, what is it?" the marquise asked quickly. 
 
 "Nothing, dear," he returned coolly. 
 
 "But we listened, and we certainly heard you go upstairs 
 with somebody." 
 
 " Helene," said the general, and he looked at his daughter, 
 who raised her face, "bear in mind that your father's honor 
 depends upon your discretion. You must have heard nothing." 
 
 The girl bent her head in answer. The marquise was con- 
 fused and smarting inwardly at the way in which her husband 
 had thought fit to silence her. 
 
 Meanwhile the general went for the bottle and a tumbler, 
 and returned to the room above. His prisoner was leaning 
 against the mantel, his head was bare, he had flung down his 
 hat on one of the two chairs. Evidently he had not expected 
 to have so bright a light turned upon him, and he frowned 
 and looked anxious as he met the general's keen eyes ; but his 
 face softened and wore a gracious expression as he thanked 
 his protector. When the latter placed the bottle and glass on 
 the mantel-shelf, the stranger's eyes flashed out on him again ; 
 and when he spoke, it was in musical tones with no sign of 
 the previous guttural convulsion, though his voice was still 
 unsteady with repressed emotion. 
 
 " I shall seem to you to be a strange being, sir, but you 
 must pardon the caprices of necessity. If you propose to re-
 
 152 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 main in the room, I beg that you will not look at me while I 
 am drinking." 
 
 Vexed at this continual obedience to a man whom he dis- 
 liked, the general sharply turned his back upon him. The 
 stranger thereupon drew a white handkerchief from his pocket 
 and wound it about his right hand. Then he seized the 
 carafe and emptied it at a draught. The marquis, staring 
 vacantly into the tall mirror across the room, without a 
 thought of breaking his implicit promise, saw the stranger's 
 figure distinctly reflected by the opposite looking-glass, and 
 saw, too, a red stain suddenly appear through the folds of the 
 white bandage the man's hands were steeped in blood. 
 
 "Ah ! you saw me ! " cried the other. He had drunk off 
 the water and wrapped himself again in his cloak, and now 
 scrutinized the general suspiciously. " It is all over with me ! 
 Here they come ! " 
 
 "I don't hear anything," said the marquis, 
 
 "You have not the same interest that I have in listening 
 for sounds in the air." 
 
 " You have been fighting a duel, I suppose, to be in such a 
 state?" queried the general, not a little disturbed by the 
 color of those broad, dark patches staining his visitor's shabby 
 cloak. 
 
 "Yes, a duel; you have it," said the other, and a bitter 
 smile flitted over his lips. 
 
 As he spoke a sound rang along the distant road, a sound 
 of galloping horses ; but so faint as yet that it was the merest 
 dawn of a sound. The general's trained ear recognized the 
 advance of a troop of regulars. 
 
 "That is the gendarmerie," said he. 
 
 He glanced at his prisoner to reassure him after his own 
 involuntary indiscretion, took the lamp, and went down to the 
 salon. He had scarcely laid the key of the room above upon 
 the mantel when the hoof-beats sounded louder and came 
 swiftly nearer and nearer the house. The general felt a shiver
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 153 
 
 of excitement, and indeed the horses stopped at the house- 
 door; a few words were exchanged among the men, and one 
 of them dismounted and knocked loudly. There was no help 
 for it ; the general went to open the door. He could scarcely 
 conceal his inward perturbation at the sight of half a dozen 
 gendarmes outside, the metal rims of their caps gleaming like 
 silver in the moonlight. 
 
 " My lord," said the corporal, " have you heard a man run 
 past toward the barrier within the last few minutes? " 
 
 "Toward the barrier? No." 
 
 " Have you opened the door to any one? " 
 
 " Now, am I in the habit of answering the door myself, 
 what ?" 
 
 " I ask your pardon, general, but just now it seems to me 
 that " 
 
 "Really! " cried the marquis wrathfully. "Have you a 
 mind to try joking with me? What right have you ?" 
 
 "None at all, none at all, my lord," cried the corporal, 
 hastily putting in a soft answer. "You will excuse our zeal. 
 We know, of course, that a peer of France is not likely to 
 harbor a murderer at this time of night ; but as we want any 
 information we can get " 
 
 "A murderer ! " cried the general. " Who, then, can have 
 been " 
 
 " Monsieur le Baron de Mauny has just been murdered. It 
 was a blow from an axe, and we are in hot pursuit of the 
 criminal. We know for certain that he is somewhere in this 
 neighborhood, and we shall hunt him down. By your leave, 
 general," and the man swung himself into the saddle as he 
 spoke. It was well that he did so, for a corporal of gendar- 
 merie trained to alert observation and quick surmise would 
 have had his suspicions at once if he had caught sight of the 
 general's face. Everything that passed through the soldier's 
 mind was faithfully revealed in his frank countenance. 
 
 " Is it known whom the murderer is? " asked he.
 
 154 A WOMAN OF THIRTY, 
 
 "No," said the other, now in the saddle. "He left the 
 bureau full of bank-notes and gold untouched." 
 
 "It was revenge, then," said the marquis. 
 
 " On an old man ? pshaw ! No, no, the fellow hadn't time 
 to take it, that was all," and the corporal galloped after his 
 comrades, who were almost out of sight by this time. 
 
 For a few minutes the general stood, a victim to perplexities 
 which need no explanation ; but in a moment he heard the 
 servants returning home, their voices were raised in some sort 
 of dispute at the cross-roads of Montreuil. When they came 
 in he gave vent to his feelings in an explosion of rage, his 
 wrath fell upon them like a thunderbolt, and all the echoes of 
 the house trembled at the sound of his voice. In the midst 
 of the storm his own man, the boldest and cleverest of the 
 party, brought out an excuse; they had been stopped, he said, 
 by the gendarmerie at the gate of Montreuil, a murder had 
 been committed, and the police were in pursuit. In a mo- 
 ment the general's anger vanished, he said not another word ; 
 then, bethinking himself of his own singular position, drily 
 ordered them all off to bed at once, and left them amazed at 
 his readiness to accept their fellow-servant's lying excuse. 
 
 While these incidents took place in the yard, an apparently 
 trifling occurrence had changed the relative positions of three 
 characters in this story. The marquis had scarcely left the 
 room before his wife looked first toward the key on the man- 
 tel-shelf and then at Helene, and, after some wavering, bent 
 toward her daughter and said in a low voice, " Helene, your 
 father has left the key on the mantel." 
 
 The girl looked up in surprise and glanced timidly at her 
 mother. The marquise's eyes sparkled with curiosity. 
 
 "Well, mamma?" she said, and her voice had a troubled 
 ring. 
 
 " I should like to know what is going on upstairs. If 
 there is anybody up there, he has not stirred yet. Just go 
 quietly up "
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 155 
 
 "/?" cried the girl, with something like horror in her 
 tones. 
 
 "Are you afraid? " 
 
 "No, mamma, but I thought I heard a man's footsteps,'* 
 she answered. 
 
 *' If I could go myself, I should not have asked you to go, 
 Helene," said her mother with cold dignity. " If your father 
 were to come back and did not see me, he would go to look 
 for me, perhaps, but he would not notice your absence.'' 
 
 "Madame, if you bid me go, I will go," said Helene, 
 " but I shall lose my father's good opinion " 
 
 "What is this?" cried the marquise in a sarcastic tone, 
 "But, since you take a thing that was said in joke in earnest, 
 I now order you to go upstairs and see whom it is in the room 
 above. Here is the key, child. When your father told you 
 to say nothing about this thing that happened, he did not 
 forbid you to go up to the room. Go at once and learn 
 that a daughter ought never to judge her mother." 
 
 The last words were spoken with all the severity of a justly 
 offended mother. The marquise took the key and handed it 
 to Helene, who rose without a word and left the room. 
 
 " My mother can always easily obtain her pardon," thought 
 the girl ; " but as for me, my father will never think the same 
 of me again. Does she mean to rob me of his tenderness? 
 Does she want to turn me out of his house? " 
 
 These were the thoughts that set her imagination in a 
 sudden ferment, as she went down the dark passage to the 
 mysterious door at the end. When she stood before it, her 
 mental confusion grew to a fearful pitch. Feelings hitherto 
 forced down into inner depths crowded up at the summons of 
 these confused thoughts. Perhaps hitherto she had never be- 
 lieved that a happy life lay before her, but now, in this awful 
 moment, her despair was complete. She shook convulsively 
 as she set the key in the lock ; so great, indeed, was her agita- 
 tion that she stopped for a moment and laid her hand on her
 
 156 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 heart, as if to still the heavy throbs that sounded in her ears. 
 Then she opened the door. 
 
 The creaking of the hinges sounded doubtless in vain on 
 the murderer's ears. Acute as were his powers of hearing, he 
 stood as if lost in thought, and so motionless that he might 
 have been glued to the wall against which he leaned. In the 
 circle of semi-opaque darkness, dimly lit by the bull's-eye 
 lantern, he looked like the shadowy figure of some dead 
 knight, standing for ever in his shadowy mortuary niche in 
 the gloom of some Gothic chapel. Drops of cold sweat 
 trickled over the broad, sallow forehead. An incredible fear- 
 lessness looked out from every tense feature. His eyes of fire 
 were fixed and tearless; he seemed to be watching some 
 struggle in the darkness beyond him. Stormy thoughts passed 
 swiftly across a face whose firm decision spoke of a character 
 of no common order. His whole person, bearing, and frame 
 bore out the impression of a tameless spirit. The man looked 
 power and strength personified ; he stood facing the darkness 
 as if it were the visible image of his own future. 
 
 These physical characteristics had made no impression upon 
 the general, familiar as he was with the powerful faces of the 
 group of giants gathered about Napoleon ; speculative curi- 
 osity, moreover, as to the why and wherefore of the apparition 
 had completely filled his mind; but Helene, with feminine 
 sensitiveness to surface impressions, was struck by the blended 
 chaos of light and darkness, grandeur and passion, suggesting 
 a likeness between this stranger and Lucifer recovering from 
 his fall. Suddenly the storm apparent in his face was stilled 
 as if by magic ; and the indefinable power to sway which the 
 stranger exercised upon others, and perhaps unconsciously 
 and as by reflex action upon himself, spread its influence about 
 him with the progressive swiftness of a flood. A torrent of 
 thought rolled away from his brow as his face resumed its 
 ordinary expression. Perhaps it was the strangeness of this 
 meeting, or perhaps it was the mystery into which she had
 
 HE TURNED HIS HEAD TOWARD HIS HOST'S DAUGHTER.
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 157 
 
 penetrated, that held the young girl spellbound in the door- 
 way, so that she could look at a face pleasant to behold and 
 full of interest. For some moments she stood in the magical 
 silence; a trouble had come upon her never known before 
 in her young life. Perhaps some exclamation broke from 
 Helene, perhaps she moved unconsciously ; or it may be that 
 the hunted criminal returned of his own accord from the 
 world of ideas to the material world and heard some one 
 breathing in the room ; however it was, he turned his head 
 toward his host's daughter and saw dimly in the shadow a 
 noble face and queenly form, which he must have taken for 
 an angel's, so motionless she stood, so vague and like a spirit. 
 
 "Monsieur " a trembling voice cried. 
 
 The murderer trembled. 
 
 " A woman ! " he cried under his breath. " Is it possible ? 
 Go," he cried ; " I deny that any one has a right to pity, to 
 absolve, or condemn me. I must live alone. Go, my child," 
 he added, with an imperious gesture ; " I should ill requite the 
 service done me by the master of the house if I were to allow 
 a single creature under his roof to breathe the same air with 
 me. I must submit to be judged by the laws of the world." 
 
 The last words were uttered in a lower voice. Even as he 
 realized with a profound intuition all the manifold misery 
 awakened by that melancholy thought, the glance that he 
 gave Helene had something of the power of the serpent, stir- 
 ring a whole dormant world in the mind of the strange girl 
 before him. To her that glance was like a light revealing 
 unknown lands. She was stricken with strange trouble, help- 
 less, quelled by a magnetic power exerted unconsciously. 
 Trembling and ashamed, she went out and returned to the 
 salon. She had scarcely entered the room before her father 
 came back, so that she had not time to say a word to her 
 mother. 
 
 The general was wholly absorbed in thought. He folded 
 his arms, and paced silently to and fro between the windows
 
 158 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 which looked out upon the street and the second row which 
 gave upon the garden. His wife held the sleeping Abel on 
 her knee, and little MoTna lay in untroubled slumber in the 
 low chair, like a bird in its nest. Her elder sister stared 
 into the fire, a skein of silk in one hand, a needle in the 
 other. 
 
 Deep silence prevailed, broken only by lagging footsteps 
 on the stairs, as one by one the servants crept away to bed ; 
 there was an occasional burst of stifled laughter, a last echo of 
 the wedding festivity, or doors were opened as they still 
 talked among themselves, then shut. A smothered sound 
 came now and again from the bedrooms, a chair fell, the old 
 coachman coughed feebly, then all was silent. 
 
 In a little while the dark majesty with which sleeping earth 
 is invested at midnight brought all things under its sway. 
 No lights shone but the light of the stars. The frost gripped 
 the ground. There was not a sound of a voice, nor a living 
 creature stirring. The crackling of the fire only seemed to 
 make the depth of the silence more fully felt. 
 
 The church clock of Montreuil had just struck one, when 
 an almost inaudible sound of a light footstep came from the 
 second flight of stairs. The marquis and his daughter, both 
 believing that M. de Mauny's murderer was a prisoner above, 
 thought that one of the maids had come down, and no one 
 was at all surprised to hear the door open in the antechamber. 
 Quite suddenly the murderer appeared in their midst. The 
 marquis himself was sunk in deep musings, the mother and 
 daughter were silent, the one from keen curiosity, the other 
 from sheer astonishment, so that the visitor was almost half- 
 way across the room when he spoke to the general. 
 
 "Sir, the two hours are almost over," he said, in a voice 
 that was strangely calm and musical. 
 
 " You here /" cried the general. "By what means ?" 
 
 and he gave wife and daughter a formidable questioning 
 glance. Helene grew red as fire.
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 159 
 
 "You ! " he went on, in a tone filled with horror. "You 
 among us ! A murderer covered with blood ! You are a blot 
 on this picture ! Go, go out ! " he added in a burst of 
 rage. 
 
 At that word " murderer," the marquise cried out; as for 
 Helene, it seemed to mark an epoch in her life, there was not 
 a trace of surprise in her face. She looked as if she had been 
 waiting for this for him. Those so vast thoughts of hers had 
 found a meaning. The punishment reserved by heaven for 
 her sins flamed out before her. In her own eyes she was as 
 great a criminal as this murderer; she confronted him with 
 her quiet gaze ; she was his fellow, his sister. It seemed to 
 her that in this accident the command of God had been made 
 manifest. If she had been a few years older, reason would 
 have disposed of her remorse, but at this moment she was 
 like one distraught. 
 
 The stranger stood impassive and self-possessed ; a scornful 
 smile overspread his features and his thick, red lips were 
 curled ironically. 
 
 "You appreciate the magnanimity of my behavior very 
 badly," he said slowly. " I would not touch with my 
 fingers the glass of water you brought me to allay my thirst ; 
 I did not so much as think of washing my blood-stained 
 hands under your roof; I am going away, leaving nothing of 
 my crime" (here his lips were compressed) ' ' but the memory ; 
 I have tried to leave no trace of my presence in this house. 
 Indeed, I would not even allow your daughter to " 
 
 "My daughter /" cried the general, with a horror-stricken 
 glance at Helene. " Vile wretch, go, or I will kill you " 
 
 "The two hours are not yet over," said the other ; " if you 
 kill me or give me up, you must lower yourself in your own 
 eyes and in mine." 
 
 At these last words, the general turned to stare at the crimi- 
 nal in dumb amazement ; but he could not endure the intoler- 
 able light in those eyes which for the second time disorganized
 
 160 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 his being. He was afraid of showing weakness once more, 
 conscious as he was that his will was weaker already. 
 
 "An old man ! You can never have seen a family," he 
 said, with a father's glance at his wife and children. 
 
 "Yes, an old man," echoed the stranger, frowning slightly. 
 
 "Fly! " cried the general, but he did not dare to look at 
 his guest. "Our compact is broken. I shall not kill you. 
 No ! I will never be purveyor to the scaffold. But go out. 
 You make us shudder." 
 
 " I know that," said the other patiently. " There is not a 
 spot on French soil where I can set foot and be safe ; but if 
 man's justice, like God's, took all into account, if man's jus- 
 tice deigned to inquire which was the monster the murderer 
 or his victim then I might hold up my head among my fel- 
 lows. Can you not guess that other crimes preceded that 
 blow from an axe? I constituted myself his judge and exe- 
 cutioner; I stepped in where man's justice failed. That was 
 my crime. Farewell, sir. Bitter though you have made 
 your hospitality, I shall not forget it. I shall always bear in 
 my heart a feeling of gratitude toward one man in the world, 
 and you are that man. But I could wish that you had showed 
 yourself more generous ! " 
 
 He turned toward the door, but in the same instant Helena 
 leaned to whisper something in her mother's ear. 
 
 "Ah ! " 
 
 At the cry that broke from his wife, the general trembled as 
 if he had seen MoTna lying dead. There stood Helene, and 
 the murderer had turned instinctively, with something like 
 anxiety about these folk in his face. 
 
 "What is it, dear?" asked the general. 
 
 "Helene wants to go with him." 
 
 The murderer's face flushed. 
 
 " If that is how my mother understands an almost involun- 
 tary exclamation," Helene said in a low voice, " I will fulfill 
 her wishes." She glanced about her with something like
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 161 
 
 fierce pride; then the girl's eyes fell, and she stood, admirable 
 in her modesty. 
 
 " Helene, did you go up to the room where ? " 
 
 "Yes, father." 
 
 " Helene " (and his voice shook with a convulsive tremor), 
 " is this the first time that you have seen this man ? " 
 
 "Yes, father." 
 
 "Then it is not natural that you should intend to " 
 
 " If it is not natural, father, at any rate it is true." 
 
 "Oh! child," said the marquise, lowering her voice, but 
 not so much but that her husband could hear her, "you are 
 false to all the principles of honor, modesty, and right which 
 I have tried to cultivate in your heart. If until this fatal hour 
 your life has only been one lie, there is nothing to regret in 
 your loss. It can hardly be the moral perfection of this 
 stranger that attracts you to him? Can it be the kind of 
 power that commits crime ? I have too good an opinion of 
 you to suppose that " 
 
 " Oh, suppose everything, madame," Helene said coldly. 
 
 But though her force of character sustained this ordeal, her 
 flashing eyes could scarcely hold the tears that filled them. 
 The stranger, watching her, guessed the mother's language 
 from the girl's tears, and turned his eagle glance upon the 
 marquise. An irresistible power constrained her to look at 
 this terrible seducer; but as her eyes met his bright, glitter- 
 ing gaze, she felt a shiver run through her frame, such a shock 
 as we feel at the sight of a reptile or the contact of a Leyden 
 jar. 
 
 "Dear! " she cried, turning to her husband, "this is the 
 Fiend himself! He can divine everything ! " 
 
 The general rose to his feet and went to the bell. 
 
 " He means ruin for you," Helene said to the murderer. 
 
 The stranger smiled, took one forward stride, grasped the 
 general's arm, and compelled him to endure a steady gaze 
 which benumbed the soldier's brain and left him powerless. 
 11
 
 162 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 " I will repay you now for your hospitality," he said, " and 
 then we shall be quits. I will spare you the shame by giving 
 myself up. After all, what should I do now with my life?" 
 
 "You could repent," answered Helene, and her glance con- 
 veyed such hope as only glows in a young girl's eyes. 
 
 " I shall never repent" said the murderer in a sonorous 
 voice, as he raised his head proudly. 
 
 "His hands are stained with blood," the father said. 
 
 " I will wipe it away," she answered. 
 
 " But do you so much as know whether he cares for you ? " 
 said her father, not daring now to look at the stranger. 
 
 The murderer came up a little nearer. Some light within 
 seemed to glow through Helene's beauty, grave and maidenly 
 though it was, coloring and bringing into relief, as it were, 
 the least details, the most delicate lines in her face. The 
 stranger, with that terrible fire still blazing in his eyes, gave 
 one tender glance to her enchanting loveliness, then he spoke, 
 his tones revealing how deeply he had been moved. 
 
 "And if I refuse to allow this sacrifice of yourself, and so 
 discharge my debt of two hours of existence to your father ; 
 is not this love, love for yourself alone ?" 
 
 "Then do you too reject me?" Helene's cry rang pain- 
 fully through the hearts of all who heard her. "Farewell, 
 then, to you all ; I will die." 
 
 " What does this mean ? " asked the father and mother. 
 
 Helene gave her mother an eloquent glance and lowered her 
 eyes. 
 
 Since the first attempt made by the general and his wife to 
 contest by word or action the intruder's strange presumption 
 to the right of staying in their midst, from their first experi- 
 ence of the power of those glittering eyes, a mysterious torpor 
 had crept over them, and their benumbed faculties struggled 
 in vain with a preternatural influence. The air seemed to 
 have suddenly grown so heavy that they could scarcely 
 breathe ; yet, while they could not find the reason of this
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 163 
 
 feeling of oppression, a voice within told them that this mag- 
 netic presence was the real cause of their helplessness. In 
 this moral agony, it flashed across the general that he must 
 make every effort to overcome this influence on his daughter's 
 reeling brain ; he caught her by the waist and drew her into 
 the embrasure of a window, as far as possible from the mur- 
 derer. 
 
 "Darling," he murmured, "if some wild love has been 
 suddenly born in your heart, I cannot believe that you have 
 not the strength of soul to quell the mad impulse ; your inno- 
 cent life, your pure and dutiful soul, has given me too many 
 proofs of your character. There must be something behind 
 all this. Well, this heart of mine is full of indulgence, you 
 can tell everything to me ; even if it breaks, dear child, I can 
 be silent about my grief, and keep your confession a secret. 
 What is it ? Are you jealous of our love for your brothers or 
 your little sister ? Is it some love trouble ? Are you unhappy 
 here at home ? Tell me about it, tell me the reasons that urge 
 you to leave your home, to rob it of its greatest charm, to 
 leave your mother and brothers and your little sister?" 
 
 " I am in love with no one, father, and jealous of no one, 
 not even of your friend the diplomatist, Monsieur de Van- 
 denesse." 
 
 The marquise turned pale; her daughter saw this, and 
 stopped short. 
 
 " Sooner or later I must live under some man's protection, 
 must I not ?" 
 
 "That is true." 
 
 "Do we ever know," she went on, "the human being to 
 whom we link our destinies? Now, I believe in this man." 
 
 "Oh, child," said the general, raising his voice, "you 
 have no idea of all the misery that lies in stoie for you." 
 
 " I am thinking of his." 
 
 "What a life ! " groaned the father. 
 
 "A woman's life," the girl murmured.
 
 164 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 "You have a great knowledge of life!" exclaimed the 
 marquise, finding speech at last. 
 
 " Madame, my answers are shaped by the questions; but if 
 you desire it, I will speak more clearly." 
 
 " Speak out, my child I am a mother." 
 
 Mother and daughter looked each other in the face, and the 
 marquise said no more. At last she said 
 
 " Helene, if you have any reproaches to make, I would 
 rather bear them than see you go away with a man from whom 
 the whole world shrinks in horror." 
 
 " Then you see yourself, madame, that but for me he would 
 be quite alone." 
 
 " That will do, madame," the general cried ; " we have but 
 one daughter left to us now," and he looked at Mo'ina, who slept 
 on. " As for you," he added, turning to Helene, "I will put 
 you in a convent." 
 
 "So be it, father," she said, in calm despair, "I shall die 
 there. You are answerable to God alone for my life and for 
 his soul." 
 
 A deep, sudden silence fell after those words. The on- 
 lookers during this strange scene, so utterly at variance with all 
 the sentiments of ordinary life, shunned each other's eloquent 
 eyes. 
 
 Suddenly the marquis happened to glance at his pistols. 
 He caught up one of them, cocked the weapon, and pointed 
 it at the intruder. At the click of firearms the other turned 
 his piercing gaze full upon the general ; the soldier's arm 
 slackened indescribably and fell heavily to his side. The 
 pistol dropped to the floor. 
 
 "Girl, you are free," said he, exhausted by this ghastly 
 struggle. "Kiss your mother, if she will let you kiss her. 
 For my own part, I wish never to see nor to hear of you 
 again." 
 
 " Helene," the mother began, " only think of the wretched 
 life before you."
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 165 
 
 A sort of rattling sound came from the intruder's deep 
 chest, all eyes turned to him. Disdain was plainly visible in 
 his face. 
 
 The general rose to his feet. " My hospitality has cost me 
 dear," he cried. "Before you came you had taken an old 
 man's life ; now you are dealing a deadly blow at a whole 
 family. Whatever happens, there must be unhappiness in this 
 house." 
 
 "And if your daughter is happy?" asked the other, gazing 
 steadily at the general. 
 
 The father made a superhuman effort for self-control. " If 
 she is happy with you," he said, "she is not worth re- 
 gretting." 
 
 Helene knelt timidly before her father. 
 
 "Father, I love and revere you," she said, "whether you 
 lavish all the treasures of your kindness upon me or make me 
 feel to the full the rigor of disgrace. But I entreat that your 
 last words of farewell shall not be words of anger." 
 
 The general could not trust himself to look at her. The 
 stranger came nearer ; there was something half-diabolical, 
 half-divine in the smile that he gave Helene. 
 
 "Angel of pity, you that do not shrink in horror from a 
 murderer, come, since you persist in your resolution of intrust- 
 ing your life to me." 
 
 "Inconceivable ! " cried her father. 
 
 The marquise looked strangely at her daughter, opened her 
 arms, and Helene fled to her in tears. 
 
 " Farewell," she said ; " farewell, mother ! " The stranger 
 trembled as Helene, undaunted, made sign to him that she 
 was ready. She kissed her father's hand ; and, as if perform- 
 ing a duty, gave a hasty kiss to MoVna and little Abel, then 
 she vanished with the murderer. 
 
 "Which way are they going?" exclaimed the general, lis- 
 tening to the footsteps of the two fugitives. " Madame," he 
 turned to his wife, " I think I must be dreaming ; there is
 
 166 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 some mystery behind all this, I do not understand it ; you 
 must know what it means." 
 
 The marquise shivered. 
 
 " For some time past your daughter has grown extraordi- 
 narily romantic and strangely high-flown in her ideas. In 
 spite of the pains I have taken to combat these tendencies in 
 her character " 
 
 "This will not do " began the general; but fancying 
 
 that he heard footsteps in the garden, he broke off to fling 
 open the window. 
 
 " Helene! " he shouted. 
 
 His voice was lost in the darkness like a vain prophecy. 
 The utterance of that name, to which there should never be 
 answer any more, acted like a counter-spell ; it broke the 
 charm and set him free from the evil enchantment which lay 
 upon him. It was as if some spirit passed over his face. He 
 now saw clearly what had taken place, and cursed his incom- 
 prehensible weakness. A shiver of heat rushed from his heart 
 to his head and feet ; he became himself once more, terrible, 
 thirsting for revenge. He raised a dreadful cry. 
 
 " Help ! " he thundered ; " help ! " 
 
 He rushed to the bell-pull, pulled till the bells rang with a 
 strange clamor of din, pulled till the cord gave way. The 
 whole house was roused with a start. Still shouting, he flung 
 open the windows that looked upon the street, called for the 
 police, caught up his pistols, and fired them off to hurry the 
 mounted patrols, the newly aroused servants, and the neigh- 
 bors. The dogs barked at the sound of their master's voice ; 
 the horses neighed and stamped in their stalls. The quiet 
 night was suddenly filled with hideous uproar. The general 
 on the staircase, in pursuit of his daughter, saw the scared 
 faces of the servants flocking from all parts of the house. 
 
 " My daughter ! " he shouted. " Helene has been carried 
 off. Search the garden ! Keep a lookout on the road ! 
 Open the gates for the gendarmerie ! Murder ! Help ! "
 
 A WOMAN OF 7'HIRTY. 167 
 
 With the strength of fury he snapped the chain and let 
 loose the great house-dog. 
 
 "Helene!" he cried ; " Helene ! " 
 
 The dog sprang out like a lion, barking furiously, and 
 dashed into the garden, leaving the general far behind. A 
 troop of horse came along the road at a gallop, and he flew 
 to open the gates himself. 
 
 " Corporal ! " he shouted, " cut off the retreat of Monsieur 
 de Mauny's murderer. They have gone through my garden. 
 Quick ! Put a cordon of men to watch the ways by the Butte 
 de Picardie. I will beat up the grounds, parks, and houses. 
 The rest of you keep a lookout along the road," he ordered 
 the servants ; " form a chain between the barrier and Ver- 
 sailles. Forward, every man of you ! " 
 
 He caught up the rifle which his man had brought out, and 
 dashed into the garden. 
 
 " Find them ! " he called to the dog. 
 
 An ominous baying came in answer from the distance, and 
 he plunged in the direction from which the growl seemed to 
 come. 
 
 It was seven o'clock in the morning ; all the search made 
 by gendarmes, servants, and neighbors had been fruitless, and 
 the dog had not come back. The general entered the salon, 
 empty now for him though the other three children were 
 there ; he was worn out with fatigue, and looked old already 
 with that night's work. 
 
 "You have been very cold to your daughter," he said, 
 turning his eyes on his wife. "And now this is all that is 
 left to us of her," he added, indicating the embroidery frame, 
 and the flower just begun. "Only just now she was there, 
 and now she is lost lost ! " 
 
 Tears followed ; he hid his face in his hands, and for a few 
 minutes he said no more ; he could not bear the sight of the 
 room, which so short a time ago had made a setting to a pic- 
 ture of the sweetest family happiness. The winter dawn was
 
 168 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 struggling with the dying lamplight ; the tapers burned down 
 to their paper-wreaths and flared out ; everything was all in 
 keeping with the father's despair. 
 
 "This must be destroyed," he said after a pause, pointing 
 to the tambour-frame. " I shall never bear to see anything 
 again that reminds us of her.'" 
 
 The terrible Christmas night when the marquis and his wife 
 lost their oldest daughter, powerless to oppose the mysterious 
 influence exercised by the man who involuntarily, as it were, 
 stole Helene from them, was like a warning sent by Fate. 
 The marquis was ruined by the failure of his stockbroker ; he 
 borrowed money on his wife's property, and lost it in the 
 endeavor to retrieve his fortunes. Driven to desperate expe- 
 dients, he left France. Six years went by. His family seldom 
 had news of him ; but a few days before Spain recognized the 
 independence of the American Republics, he wrote that he 
 was coming home. 
 
 So, one fine morning, it happened that several French 
 merchants were on board a Spanish brig that lay a few leagues 
 out from Bordeaux, impatient to reach their native land again, 
 with wealth acquired by long years of toil and perilous adven- 
 tures in Venezuela and Mexico. 
 
 One of the passengers, a man who looked aged by trouble 
 rather than by years, was leaning against the bulwark netting, 
 apparently quite unaffected by the sight to be seen from the 
 upper deck. The bright day, the sense that the voyage was 
 safely over, had brought all the passengers above to greet their 
 native land. The larger number of them insisted that they 
 could see, far off in the distance, the houses and lighthouses 
 on the coast of Gascony and the Tower of Cordouan, melting 
 into the fantastic erections of white cloud along the horizon. 
 But for the silver fringe that played about their bows and the 
 long furrow swiftly effaced in their wake, they might have 
 been perfectly still in mid-ocean, so calm was the sea. The 
 sky was magically clear, the dark blue of the vault above
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 169 
 
 paled by imperceptible gradations, until it blended with the 
 bluish water, a gleaming line that sparkled like stars marking 
 the dividing line of sea. The sunlight caught myriads of 
 facets over the wide surface of the ocean, in such a sort that 
 the vast plain of salt water looked perhaps more full of light 
 than the fields of sky. 
 
 ] The brig had set all her canvas. The snowy sails, swelled 
 by the strangely soft wind, the labyrinth of cordage, and the 
 yellow flags flying at the masthead, all stood out sharp and 
 uncompromisingly clear against the vivid background of space, 
 sky, and sea; there was nothing to alter the color but the 
 shadow cast by the great cloudlike sails. 
 
 A glorious day, a fair wind, and the fatherland in sight, a 
 sea like a mill-pond, the melancholy sound of the ripples, a 
 fair solitary vessel, gliding across the surface of the water like 
 a woman stealing out to a tryst it was a picture full of har- 
 mony. That mere speck full of movement was a starting-point 
 whence the soul of man could descry the immutable vastness 
 of space. Solitude and bustling life, silence and sound, were 
 all brought together in strange abrupt contrast ; you could not 
 tell where life, or sound, or silence, and nothingness lay, and 
 no human voice broke the divine spell. 
 
 The Spanish captain, the crew, and the French passengers 
 sat or stood in a mood of devout ecstasy, in which many 
 memories blended. There was idleness in the air. The 
 beaming faces told of complete forgetfulness of past hard- 
 ships, the men were rocked on the fair vessel as in a golden 
 dream. Yet, from time to time the elderly passenger, leaning 
 over the bulwark nettings, looked with something like uneasi- 
 ness at the horizon. Distrust of the ways of Fate could be read 
 in his whole face ; he seemed to fear that he should not reach 
 the coast of France in time. This was the marquis. Fortune 
 had not been deaf to his despairing cry and struggles. After 
 five years of endeavor and painful toil, he was a wealthy man 
 once more. In his impatience to reach his home again and
 
 170 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 to bring the good news to his family, he had followed the 
 example set by some French merchants in Havana, and em- 
 barked with them on a Spanish vessel with a cargo for Bor- 
 deaux. And now, grown tired of evil forebodings, his fancy 
 was tracing out for him the most delicious pictures of past 
 happiness. In that far-off brown line of land he seemed to 
 see his wife and children. He sat in his place by the fireside ; 
 they were crowding about him ; he felt their caresses. Mo'fna 
 had grown to be young girl ; she was beautiful, and tall, and 
 striking. The fancied picture had grown almost real, when 
 the tears filled his eyes, and, to hide his emotion, he turned 
 his face toward the sea-line, opposite the hazy streak that 
 meant land. 
 
 "There she is again She is following us ! " he said. 
 
 "What?" cried the Spanish captain. 
 
 "There is a vessel," muttered the general. 
 
 "I saw her yesterday," answered Captain Gomez. He 
 looked at his interlocutor as if to ask what he thought ; then 
 he added, in the general's ear, " She has been chasing us all 
 along." 
 
 "Then why she has not come up with us, I do not know," 
 said the general, "for she is a faster sailer than your damned 
 Saint-Ferdinand." 
 
 " She will have damaged herself, sprung a leak " 
 
 " She is gaining on us ! " the general broke in. 
 
 " She is a Colombian privateer," the captain said in his 
 ear, " and we are still six leagues from land, and the wind is 
 dropping." 
 
 "She is not going ahead, she is flying, as if she knew that 
 in two hours' time her prey would escape her. What 
 audacity ! " 
 
 "Audacity ! " cried the captain. "Oh ! she is not called 
 the Othello for nothing. Not so long back she sank a Spanish 
 frigate that carried thirty guns ! This is the one thing I was 
 afraid of, for I had a notion that she was cruising about some-
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 171 
 
 where off the Antilles. Aha! " he added after a pause, as 
 he watched the sails of his own vessel, " the wind is rising; 
 we are making away. Get through we must, for ' the Parisian ' 
 will show us no mercy." 
 
 " She is making way, too ! " returned the general. 
 
 The Othello was scarce three leagues away by this time ; and 
 although the conversation between the marquis and Captain 
 Gomez had taken place apart, passengers and crew, attracted 
 by the sudden appearance of a sail, came to that side of the 
 vessel. With scarcely an exception, however, they took the 
 privateer for a merchantman, and watched her course with 
 interest, till at once a sailor shouted with some energy of 
 language 
 
 " By Saint-Jacques, it is all up with us ! Yonder is the 
 Parisian captain ! " 
 
 At that terrible name dismay, and a panic impossible to 
 describe, spread through the brig. The Spanish captain's 
 orders put energy into the crew for a while ; and in his reso- 
 lute determination to make land at all costs, he set all the 
 studding sails and crowded on every stitch of canvas on 
 board. But all this was not the work of a moment ; and 
 naturally the men did not work together with that wonderful 
 unanimity so fascinating to watch on board a man-of-war. 
 The Othello meanwhile, thanks to the trimming of her sails, 
 flew over the water like a swallow ; but she was making, to all 
 appearance, so little headway, that the unlucky Frenchman 
 began to entertain sweet delusive hopes. At last, after un- 
 heard-of efforts, the Saint-Ferdinand sprang forward, Gomez 
 himself directing the shifting of the sheets with voice and 
 gesture, when all at once the man at the tiller, steering at 
 random (purposely, no doubt), swung the vessel round. The 
 wind striking athwart the beam, the sails shivered so unex- 
 pectedly that the brig heeled to one side, the booms were 
 carried away, and the vessel was completely out of hand. 
 The captain's face grew whiter than his sails with unutterable
 
 172 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 rage. He sprang upon the man at the tiller, drove his dagger 
 at him in such blind fury, that he missed him, and hurled the 
 weapon overboard. Gomez took the helm himself, and strove 
 to right the gallant vessel. Tears of despair rose to his eyes, 
 for it is harder to lose the result of our carefully laid plans 
 through treachery than to face imminent death. But the 
 more the captain swore, the less the men worked, and it was 
 he himself who fired the alarm-gun, hoping to be heard on 
 shore. The privateer, now gaining hopelessly upon them, re- 
 plied with a cannon-shot, which struck the water ten fathoms 
 away from the Saint-Ferdinand. 
 
 "Thunder of heaven !" cried the general, "that was a 
 close shave ! They must have guns made on purpose." 
 
 "Oh ! when that one yonder speaks, look you, you have to 
 hold your tongue," said a sailor. "The Parisian would not 
 be afraid to meet an English man-of-war." 
 
 " It is all over with us," the captain cried in desperation ; 
 he had pointed his telescope landward, and saw not a sign 
 from the shore. "We are further from the coast than I 
 thought." 
 
 "Why do you despair?" asked the general. "All your 
 passengers are Frenchmen ; they have chartered your vessel. 
 The privateer is a Parisian, you say? Well and good, run up 
 the white flag, and " 
 
 " And he would run us down," retorted the captain. " He 
 can be anything he likes when he has a mind to seize on a 
 rich booty ! " 
 
 " Oh ! if he is a pirate " 
 
 "Pirate!" said the ferocious-looking sailor. "Oh! he 
 always has the law on his side, or he knows how to be on the 
 same side as the law." 
 
 "Very well," said the general, raising his eyes, "let us 
 make up our minds to it," and his remaining fortitude was 
 still sufficient to keep back the tears. 
 
 The words were hardly out of his mouth before a second
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 173 
 
 cannon-shot, better aimed came crashing through the hull of 
 the Saint-Ferdinand. 
 
 "Heave to ! " cried the captain gloomily. 
 The sailor who had commended the Parisian's law-abiding 
 proclivities showed himself a clever hand at working a ship 
 after this desperate order was given. The crew waited for 
 half an hour in an agony of suspense and the deepest dismay. 
 The Saint-Ferdinand had four millions of piastres on board, 
 the whole fortunes of the five passengers, and the general's 
 eleven hundred thousand francs. At length the Othello lay 
 not ten gunshots away, so that those on the Saint-Ferdinand 
 could look into the muzzles of her loaded guns. The vessel 
 seemed to be borne along by a breeze sent by the devil him- 
 self, but the eyes of an expert would have discovered the 
 secret of her speed at once. You had but to look for a 
 moment at the rake of her stern, her long, narrow keel, her 
 tall masts, to see the cut of her sails, the wonderful lightness 
 of her rigging, and the ease and perfect seamanship with 
 which her crew trimmed her sails to the wind. Everything 
 about her gave the impression of the security of power in this 
 delicately curved inanimate creature, swift and intelligent as 
 a greyhound or some bird of prey. The privateer crew stood 
 silent, ready in case of resistance to shatter the wretched 
 merchantman, which, luckily for her, remained motionless, 
 like a schoolboy caught in the act of doing wrong by a master. 
 
 "We have guns on board! "cried the general, clutching 
 the Spanish captain's hand. But the courage in Gomez's 
 eyes was the courage of despair. 
 
 " Have we men ? " he said. 
 
 The marquis looked round at the crew of the Saint Ferdi- 
 nand, and a cold chill ran through him. There stood the 
 four merchants, pale and quaking for fear, while the crew 
 gathered about some of their own number who appeared to be 
 arranging to go over in a body to the enemy. They watched 
 the Othello with greed and curiosity on their faces. The cap-
 
 174 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 tain, the marquis, and the mate exchanged glances ; they 
 were the only three who had a thought for any but them- 
 selves. 
 
 " Ah ! Captain Gomez, when I left my home and country, 
 my heart was half dead with the bitterness of parting, and now 
 must I bid it good-by once more when I am bringing back 
 happiness and ease for my children ? " 
 
 The general turned his head away toward the sea with tears 
 of rage in his eyes and saw the steersman swimming out to 
 the privateer. 
 
 " This time it will be good-by for good," said the captain 
 by way of answer, and the dazed look in the Spaniard's 
 eyes startled the Frenchman. 
 
 By this time the two vessels were almost alongside, and at 
 the first sight of the enemy's crew the general saw that 
 Gomez's gloomy prophecy was only too true. The three men 
 at each gun might have been bronze statues, standing like 
 athletes, with their rugged features, their bare, sinewy arms, 
 strong men whom Death himself had scarcely thrown off their 
 feet. 
 
 The rest of the crew, well armed, active, light, and vigor- 
 ous, also stood motionless. Toil had hardened and the sun 
 had deeply tanned those energetic faces ; their eyes glittered 
 like sparks of fire with infernal glee and clear-sighted courage. 
 Perfect silence on the upper deck, now black with men, bore 
 abundant testimony to the rigorous discipline and strong will 
 which held these fiends incarnate in check. 
 
 The captain of the Othello stood with folded arms at the 
 foot of the mainmast ; he carried no weapons, but an axe lay 
 on the deck beside him. His face was hidden by the shadow 
 of a broad, felt hat. The men looked like dogs crouching 
 before their master. Gunners, soldiers, and ship's crew 
 turned their eyes first on his face and then on the merchant 
 vessel. 
 
 The two brigs came up alongside, and the shock of contact
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 175 
 
 roused the privateer captain from his musings ; he spoke a 
 word in the ear of the lieutenant who stood beside him. 
 
 "Grappling irons!" shouted the latter, and the Othello 
 grappled the Saint-Ferdinand with miraculous quickness. 
 The captain of the privateer gave his orders in a low voice 
 to the lieutenant, who repeated them ; the men, told off in 
 succession for each duty, went on the upper deck of the Saint- 
 Ferdinand, like seminarists going to mass. They bound crew 
 and passengers hand and foot and seized the booty. In the 
 twinkling of an eye, provisions and barrels full of piastres 
 were transferred to the Othello ; the general thought that he 
 must be dreaming when he himself, likewise bound, was flung 
 down on a bale of goods as if he had been part of the cargo. 
 
 A brief conference took place between the captain of the 
 privateer and his lieutenant and a sailor, who seemed to be 
 the mate of the vessel ; then the mate gave a whistle, and the 
 men jumped on board the Saint-Ferdinand and completely 
 dismantled her with the nimble dexterity of a soldier who 
 strips a dead comrade of a coveted overcoat and shoes. 
 
 "It is all over with us," said the Spanish captain coolly. 
 He had eyed the three chiefs during their confabulation, and 
 saw that the sailors were proceeding to pull his vessel to 
 pieces. 
 
 " Why so? " asked the general. 
 
 "What would you have them do with us?" returned the 
 Spaniard. "They have just come to the conclusion that they 
 will scarcely sell the Saint-Ferdinand in any French or Spanish 
 port, so they are going to sink her to be rid of her. And as 
 for us, do you suppose that they will put themselves to the 
 expense of feeding us, when they don't know what port they 
 are to put into?" 
 
 The words were scarcely out of the captain's mouth before a 
 hideous outcry went up, followed by a dull splashing sound, 
 as several bodies were thrown overboard. He turned, the 
 four merchants were no longer to be seen, but eight ferocious-
 
 176 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 looking gunners were still standing with their arms raised 
 above their heads. He shuddered. 
 
 "What did I tell you?" the Spanish captain asked very 
 coolly. 
 
 The marquis rose to his feet with a spring. The surface of 
 the sea was quite smooth again ; he could not so much as see 
 the place where his unhappy fellow-passengers had disappeared. 
 By this time they were sinking down, bound hand and foot, 
 below the waves, if, indeed, the fish had not devoured them 
 already. 
 
 Only a few paces away, the treacherous steersman and the 
 sailor who had boasted of the Parisian's power were fraterniz- 
 ing with the crew of the Othello, and pointing out those 
 among their own number who, in their opinion, were worthy 
 to join the crew of the privateer. Then the boys tied the rest 
 together by the feet in spite of frightful oaths. It was soon 
 over; the eight gunners seized the doomed men and flung 
 them overboard without more ado, watching the different 
 ways in which the drowning victims met their death, their 
 contortions, their last agony, with a sort of malignant curi- 
 osity, but with no sign of amusement, surprise, or pity. For 
 them it was an ordinary event to which seemingly they were 
 quite accustomed. The older men looked instead with grim, 
 set smiles at the casks of piastres about the mainmast. 
 
 The general and Captain Gomez, left seated on a bale of 
 goods, consulted each other with well-nigh hopeless looks; they 
 were, in a sense, the sole survivors of the Saint-Ferdinand, for 
 the seven men pointed out by the spies were transformed amid 
 rejoicings into Peruvians. 
 
 "What atrocious villains! " the general cried. Loyal and 
 generous indignation silenced prudence and pain on his own 
 account. 
 
 "They do it because they must," Captain Gomez answered 
 coolly. " If you came across one of those fellows, you would 
 run him through the body, would you not?"
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 177 
 
 The lieutenant now came up to the Spaniard. 
 
 "Captain," said he, "the Parisian has heard of you. He 
 says that you are the only man who really knows the passages 
 of the Antilles and the Brazilian coast. Will you 
 
 The captain cut him sort with a scornful exclamation. 
 
 "I shall die like a sailor," he said, "and a loyal Spaniard 
 and a Christian. Do you hear?" 
 
 "Heave him overboard," shouted the lieutenant, and a 
 couple of gunners seized on Gomez. 
 
 "You cowards ! " roared the general, seizing hold of the 
 men. 
 
 "Don't get too excited, old boy," said the lieutenant. 
 " If your red ribbon has made some impression upon our cap- 
 tain, I myself do not care a rap for it. You and I will have 
 our little bit of talk together directly." 
 
 A smothered sound, with no accompanying cry, told the 
 general that the gallant captain had died "like a sailor," as 
 he had said. 
 
 " My money or death ! " cried the marquis, in a fit of rage 
 terrible to see. 
 
 "Ah! now you talk sensibly!" sneered the lieutenant. 
 " That is the way to get something out of us " 
 
 Two of the men came up at a sign and hastened to bind 
 the Frenchman's feet, but with unlooked-for boldness he 
 snatched the lieutenant's cutlass and laid about him like a 
 cavalry officer who knows his business. 
 
 " Brigands that you are ! You shall not chuck one of Na- 
 poleon's old troopers over a ship's side like an oyster ! " 
 
 At the sound of pistol-shots fired point-blank at the French- 
 man, "the Parisian" looked round from his occupation of 
 superintending the transfer of the rigging from the Saint- 
 Ferdinand. He came up behind the brave general, seized 
 him, dragged him to the side, and was about to fling him 
 over with no more concern than if the man had been a 
 broken spar. They were at the very edge when the general 
 12
 
 178 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 looked into the tawny eyes of the man who had stolen his 
 daughter. The recognition was mutual. 
 
 The captain of the privateer, his arm still upraised, suddenly 
 swung it in the contrary direction as if his victim was but a 
 feather weight, and set him down at the foot of the main- 
 mast. A murmur rose on the upper deck, but the captain 
 glanced round, and there was a sudden silence. 
 
 "This is Helene's father," said the captain in a clear, firm 
 voice. " Woe to any one who meddles with him ! " 
 
 A hurrah of joy went up at the words, a shout rising to the 
 sky like a prayer of the church ; a cry like the first high-notes 
 of the Te Deum. The lads swung aloft in the rigging, the 
 men below flung up their caps, the gunners pounded away on 
 the deck, there was a general thrill of excitement, an outburst 
 of oaths, yells, and shrill cries in voluble chorus. The men 
 cheered like fanatics, the general's misgivings deepened, and 
 he grew uneasy ; it seemed to him that there was some hor- 
 rible mystery in such wild transports. 
 
 "My daughter!" he cried, as soon as he could speak. 
 " Where is my daughter? " 
 
 For all answer, the captain of the privateer gave him a 
 searching glance, one of those glances which throw the bravest 
 men into a confusion which no theory can explain. The 
 general was mute, not a little to the satisfaction of the crew ; 
 it pleased them to see their leader exercise the strange power 
 which he possessed over all with whom he came in contact. 
 Then the captain led the way down a staircase and flung open 
 the door of a cabin. 
 
 "There she is," he said, and disappeared, leaving the 
 general in a stupor of bewilderment at the scene before his 
 eyes. 
 
 Helene cried out at the sight of him, and sprang up from 
 the sofa on which she was lying when the door flew open. So 
 changed was she that none but a father's eyes could have 
 recognized her. The sun of the tropics had brought warmer
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 179 
 
 tones into the once pale face, and something of Oriental 
 charm with that wonderful coloring ; there was a certain gran- 
 deur about her, a majestic firmness, a profound sentiment 
 which impresses itself upon the coarsest nature. Her long, 
 thick hair, falling in large curls about her queenly throat, 
 gave an added idea of power to the proud face. The con- 
 sciousness of that power shone out from every movement, 
 every line of Helene's form. The rose-tinted nostrils were 
 dilated slightly with the joy of triumph ; the serene happiness 
 of her life had left its plain tokens in the full development of 
 her beauty. A certain indefinable virginal grace met in her 
 with the pride of a woman who is loved. This was a slave 
 and a queen, a queen who would fain obey that she might 
 reign. 
 
 Her dress was magnificent and elegant in its richness ; India 
 muslin was the sole material, but her sofa and cushions were 
 of cashmere. A Persian carpet covered the floor in the large 
 cabin, and her four children playing at her feet were building 
 castles of gems and pearl necklaces and jewels of price. The 
 air was full of the scent of rare flowers in Sevres porcelain 
 vases painted by Mme. Jacotot ; tiny South American birds, 
 like living rubies, sapphires, and gold, hovered among the 
 Mexican jessamines and camellias. A pianforte had been 
 fitted into the room, and here and there on the paneled 
 walls, covered with red silk, hung small pictures by great 
 painters a Sunset by Hippolyte Schinner beside a Terburg, 
 one of Raphael's Madonnas scarcely yielded in charm to a 
 sketch by Gericault, while a Gerard Dow eclipsed the painters 
 of the Empire. On a lacquered table stood a golden plate 
 full of delicious fruit. Indeed, Helene might have been the 
 sovereign lady of some great country, and this cabin of hers a 
 boudoir in which her crowned lover had brought together all 
 earth's treasures to please his consort. The children gazed 
 with bright, keen eyes at their grandfather. Accustomed as 
 they were to a life of battle, storm, and tumult, they recalled
 
 180 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 the Roman children in David's Brutus, watching the fighting 
 and bloodshed with curious interest. 
 
 " What ! is it possible ? " cried Helene, catching her father's 
 arm as if to assure herself that this was no vision. 
 
 "Helene!" 
 
 "Father!" 
 
 They fell into each other's arms, and the old man's em- 
 brace was not so close and warm as Helene's. 
 
 " Were you on board that vessel ? " 
 
 "Yes," he answered sadly, and looking at the little ones, 
 who gathered about him and gazed with wide-open eyes. 
 
 "I was about to perish, but " 
 
 "But for my husband," she broke in. "I see how it was." 
 
 "Ah!" cried the general, "why must I find you again 
 like this, Helene ? After all the many tears that I have shed, 
 must I still groan for your fate? " 
 
 "And why?" she asked smiling. "Why should you be 
 sorry to learn that I am the happiest woman under the sun ? ' ' 
 
 "Happy?" he cried, with a start of surprise. 
 
 "Yes, happy, my kind father," and she caught his hands 
 in hers and covered them with kisses, and pressed them to her 
 throbbing heart. Her caresses and a something in the car- 
 riage of her head were interpreted yet more plainly by the 
 joy sparkling in her eyes. 
 
 "And how is this? " he asked, wondering at his daughter's 
 life, forgetful now of everything but the bright glowing face 
 before him. 
 
 "Listen, father, I have for lover, husband, servant, and 
 master one whose soul is as great as the boundless sea, as in- 
 finite in his kindness as heaven, a god on earth ! Never 
 during these seven years has a chance look, or word, or ges- 
 ture jarred in the divine harmony of his talk, his love r his 
 caresses. His eyes have never met mine without a gleam of 
 happiness in them ; there has always been a bright smile on 
 his lips for me. On deck, his voice rises above the thunder
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 181 
 
 of storms and the tumult of battle ; but here below it is soft 
 and melodious as Rossini's music for he has Rossini's music 
 sent for me. I have everything that woman's caprice can 
 imagine. My wishes are more than fulfilled. In short, I am 
 a queen on the seas ; I am obeyed here as perhaps a queen 
 may be obeyed. Ah!" she cried, interrupting herself, 
 " happy did I say? Happiness is no word to express such 
 bliss as mine. All the happiness that should have fallen to 
 all the women in the world has been my share. Knowing 
 one's own great love and self-devotion, to find in his heart an 
 infinite love in which a woman's soul is lost, and lost for ever 
 tell me, is this happiness? I have lived through a thousand 
 lives even now. Here, I am alone ; here I command. No 
 other woman has set foot on this noble vessel, and Victor is 
 never more than a few paces distant from me, he cannot 
 wander further from me than from stern to prow," she added, 
 with a shade of mischief in her manner. " Seven years ! A 
 love that outlasts seven years of continual joy, that endures 
 all the tests brought by all the moments that make up seven 
 years is this love? Oh, no, no ! it is something better than 
 
 all that I know of life human language fails to express 
 
 the bliss of heaven." 
 
 A sudden torrent of tears fell from her burning eyes. The 
 four little ones raised a piteous cry at this, and flocked like 
 chickens about their mother. The oldest boy struck the 
 general with a threatening look. 
 
 "Abel, darling," said Helene, "I am crying for joy." 
 
 Helene took him on her knee, and the child fondled her, 
 putting his arms about her queenly neck, as a lion's whelp 
 might play with the lioness. 
 
 "Do you never weary of your life?" asked the general, 
 bewildered by his daughter's enthusiastic language. 
 
 "Yes," she said, "sometimes, when we are on land, yet 
 even then I have never parted from my husband." 
 
 " But you used to be fond of music and balls and fdtes."
 
 182 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 "His voice is music for me; and for fgtes, I devise new 
 toilets for him to see. When he likes my dress, it is as if all 
 the world admired me. Simply for that reason I keep the 
 diamonds and jewels, the precious things, the flowers and 
 masterpieces of art that he heaps upon me, saying, ' Helene, 
 as you live out of the world, I will have the world come to 
 you.' But for that I would fling them all overboard." 
 
 " But there are others on board, wild, reckless men, whose 
 passions " 
 
 "I understand, father," she said, smiling. "Do not fear 
 for me. Never was empress encompassed with more obser- 
 vance than I. The men are very superstitious ; they look 
 upon me as a sort of tutelary genius, the luck of the vessel. 
 But he is their god ; they worship him. Once, and once only, 
 one of the crew showed disrespect, mere words," she added, 
 laughing; "but before Victor knew of it, the others flung 
 the offender overboard, although I forgave him. They love 
 me as their good angel ; I nurse them when they are ill ; 
 several times I have been so fortunate as to save a life, by con- 
 stant care such as a woman can give. Poor fellows, they are 
 giants, but they are children at the same time." 
 
 "And when there is fighting overhead?" 
 
 " I am used to it now ; I quaked for fear during the first 
 engagement, but never since. I am used to such peril, and 
 I am your daughter," she said ; "I love it." 
 
 " But how if he should fall ? " 
 
 "I should die with him." 
 
 " And your children ? " 
 
 " They are children of the sea and of danger ; they share 
 the life of their parents. We have but one life, and we do 
 not flinch from it. We have but the one life, our names are 
 written on the same page of the book of Fate, one skiff bears 
 us and our fortunes, and we know it." 
 
 " Do you so love him that he is more to you than all 
 beside?"
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 183 
 
 "All beside?" echoed she. " Let us leave that mystery 
 alone. Yet stay ! there is this dear little one well, this too 
 is ht," and straining Abel to her in a tight clasp, she set eager 
 kisses on his cheeks and hair. 
 
 " But I can never forget that he has just drowned nine 
 men ! " exclaimed the general. 
 
 " There was no help for it, doubtless," she said, " for he is 
 generous and humane. He sheds as little blood as may be, 
 and only in the interests of the little world which he defends 
 and the sacred cause for which he is fighting. Talk to him 
 about anything that seems to you to be wrong, and he will 
 convince you, you will see." 
 
 "There was that crime of his," muttered the general to 
 himself. 
 
 "But how if that crime was a virtue?" she asked, with 
 cold dignity. " How if man's justice had failed to avenge a 
 great wrong ? ' ' 
 
 " But a private revenge ! " exclaimed her father. 
 
 " But what is hell," she cried, " but a revenge through all 
 eternity for the wrong done in a little day? " 
 
 " Ah ! you are lost ! He has bewitched and perverted you. 
 You are talking wildly." 
 
 " Stay with us one day, father, and if you will but listen to 
 him, and see him, you will love him." 
 
 "Helene, France lies only a few leagues away," he said 
 gravel y. 
 
 Helene trembled ; then she went over to the port-hole and 
 pointed to the savannas of green water spreading far and wide 
 before them. 
 
 " There lies my country," she said, tapping the carpet with 
 her foot. 
 
 " But are you not coming with me to see your mother and 
 your sister and brothers ? " 
 
 " Oh ! yes," she cried, with tears in her voice, " if he is 
 willing, if he will come with me."
 
 184 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 11 So," the general said sternly, " you have neither country 
 nor kin now, Helene ? " 
 
 " I am his wife," she answered proudly, and there was 
 something very noble in her tone. "This is the first happi- 
 ness in seven years that has not come to me through him," 
 she said then, as she caught her father's hand and kissed it 
 " and this is the first word of reproach that I have heard." 
 
 ".And your conscience ? " 
 
 " My conscience ; he is my conscience ! " she cried, trem- 
 bling from head to foot. " Here he is ! Even in the thick 
 of a fight I can tell his footstep among all the others on deck," 
 she cried. 
 
 A sudden crimson flushed her cheeks and glowed in her 
 features, her eyes lighted up, her complexion changed to vel- 
 vet whiteness ; there was joy and love in every fibre, in the 
 blue veins, in the unconscious trembling of her whole frame. 
 That quiver of the sensitive plant softened the general. 
 
 It was as she had said. The captain came in, sat down in 
 an easy-chair, took up his oldest boy, and began to play with 
 him. There was a moment's silence, for the general's deep 
 musing had grown vague and dreamy, and the daintily fur- 
 nished cabin and the playing children seemed like a nest of 
 halcyons, floating on the waves, between sky and sea, safe in 
 the protection of this man who steered his way amid perils 
 of war and tempest, as other heads of households guide those 
 in their care among the hazards of common life. He gazed 
 admiringly at Helene a dreamlike vision of some sea goddess, 
 gracious in her loveliness, rich in happiness ; all the treasures 
 about her grown poor in comparison with the wealth of her 
 nature, paling before the brightness of her eyes, the indefinable 
 romance expressed in her and her surroundings. 
 
 The strangeness of the situation took the general by sur- 
 prise ; the ideas of ordinary life were thrown into confusion 
 by this lofty passion and reasoning. Chill and narrow social 
 conventions faded away before this picture. All these things
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 185 
 
 the old soldier felt, and saw no less how impossible it was that 
 his daughter should give up so wide a life, a life so variously 
 rich, filled to the full with such passionate love. And Helene 
 had tasted danger without shrinking ; how could she return 
 to the petty stage, the superficial circumscribed life of society? 
 
 It was the captain who broke the silence at last. 
 
 "Am I in the way?" he asked, looking at his wife. 
 
 "No," said the general, answering for her. "Helene has 
 told me all. I see that she is lost to us " 
 
 "No," the captain put in quickly; "in a few years' time 
 the statute of limitations will allow me to go back to France. 
 When the conscience is clear, and a man has broken the law 
 
 in obedience to " he stopped short, as if scorning to justify 
 
 himself. 
 
 "How can you commit new murders, such as I have seen 
 with my own eyes, without remorse?" 
 
 "We had no provisions," the privateer captain retorted 
 calmly. 
 
 "But if you had set the men ashore " 
 
 " They would have given the alarm and sent a man-of-war 
 after us, and we should never have seen Chili [Peru] again." 
 
 " Before France would have given warning to the Spanish 
 admiralty " began the general. 
 
 "But France might take it amiss that a man, with a warrant 
 still out against him, should seize a brig chartered by Bordeaux 
 merchants. And for that matter, have you never fired a shot 
 or so too many in battle ? " 
 
 The general shrank under the other's eyes. He said no 
 more, and his daughter looked at him half-sadly, half-trium- 
 phantly. 
 
 "General," the privateer continued, in a deep voice, "I 
 have made it a rule to abstract nothing from booty. But 
 even so, my share will, beyond a doubt, be far larger than 
 your fortune. Permit me to return it to you in another 
 form "
 
 186 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 He drew a pile of bank-notes from the piano, and with, 
 out counting the packets handed a million of francs to the 
 marquis. 
 
 " You can understand," he said, " that I cannot spend my 
 time in watching vessels pass by to Bordeaux. So unless the 
 dangers of this Bohemian life of ours have some attraction for 
 you, unless you care to see South America and the nights of 
 the tropics, and a bit of fighting now and again for the pleas- 
 ure of helping to win a triumph for a young nation, or for the 
 name of Simon Bolivar, we must part. The long-boat, manned 
 with a trustworthy crew, is ready for you. And now let us 
 hope that our third meeting will be completely happy." 
 
 "Victor," said Helene in a dissatisfied tone, "I should 
 like to see a little more of my father." 
 
 " Ten minutes more or less may bring up a French frigate. 
 However, so be it, we shall have a little fun. The men find 
 things dull." 
 
 "Oh, father, go!" cried Helene, "and take these keep- 
 sakes from me to my sister and brothers and mother," she 
 added. She caught up a handful of jewels and precious 
 stones, folded them in an Indian shawl, and timidly held it 
 out. 
 
 "But what shall I say to them from you?" asked he. 
 Her hesitation on the word " mother" seemed to have struck 
 him. 
 
 " Oh ! can you doubt me ? I pray for their happiness every 
 day." 
 
 " Helene," he began, as he watched her closely, "how if 
 we should not meet again ? Shall I never know why you left 
 us?" 
 
 " That secret is not mine," she answered gravely. "Even 
 if I had the right to tell it, perhaps I should not. For ten 
 years I was more miserable than words can say " 
 
 She broke off, and gave her father the presents for her 
 family. The general had acquired tolerably easy views as to
 
 A VAST COLUMN OF SMOKE RISING SPREAD LIKE A 
 BROWN CLOUD.
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 187 
 
 booty in the course of a soldier's career, so he took Helene's 
 gifts and comforted himself with the reflection that the Parisian 
 captain was sure to wage war against the Spaniards as an hon- 
 orable man, under the influence of Helene's pure and high- 
 minded nature. His passion for courage carried all before it. 
 It was ridiculous, he thought, to be squeamish in the matter ; 
 so he shook hands cordially with his captor, and kissed Helene, 
 his only daughter, with a soldier's expansiveness ; letting fall 
 a tear on the face with the proud, strong look that once he 
 had loved to see. "The Parisian," deeply moved, brought 
 the children for his blessing. The parting was over, the last 
 good-by was a long farewell-look, with something of tender 
 regret on either side. 
 
 A strange sight to seaward met the general's eyes. The 
 Saint-Ferdinand was blazing like a huge bonfire. The men 
 told off to sink the Spanish brig had found a cargo of rum 
 on board ; and, as the Othello was already amply supplied, 
 had lighted a floating bowl of punch on the high-seas, by way 
 of a joke ; a pleasantry pardonable enough in sailors, who 
 hail any chance excitement as a relief from the apparent 
 monotony of life at sea. As the general went over the side 
 into the long-boat of the Saint-Ferdinand, manned by six 
 vigorous rowers, he could not help looking at the burning 
 vessel, as well as at the daughter who stood by her husband's 
 side on the stern of the Othello. He saw Helene's white 
 dress flutter like one more sail in the breeze ; he saw the tall, 
 noble figure against a background of sea, queenly still even 
 in the presence of Ocean ; and so many memories crowded 
 up in his mind, that, with a soldier's recklessness of life, he 
 forgot that he was being borne over the grave of th,e brave 
 Gomez. 
 
 A vast column of smoke rising spread like a brown cloud, 
 pierced here and there by fantastic shafts of sunlight. It was 
 a second sky, a murky dome reflecting the glow of the fire as
 
 '188 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 if the under surface had been burnished ; but above it soared 
 the unchanging blue of the firmament, a thousand times fairer 
 for the short-lived contrast. The strange hues of the smoke- 
 cloud, black and red, tawny and pale by turns, blurred and 
 blending into each other, shrouded the burning vessel as it 
 flared, crackled, and groaned; the hissing tongues of flame 
 licked up the rigging and flashed across the hull, like a rumor 
 of riot flashing along the streets of a city. The burning rum 
 sent up blue flitting lights. Some sea god might have been 
 stirring the furious liquor as a student stirs the joyous flames 
 of punch in an orgie. But in the overpowering sunlight, 
 jealous of the insolent blaze, the colors were scarcely visible, 
 and the smoke was but a film fluttering like a thin scarf in 
 the noonday torrent of light and heat. 
 
 The Othello made the most of the little wind she could gain 
 to fly on her new course. Swaying first to one side, then to 
 the other, like a stag-beetle on the wing, the fair vessel beat to 
 windward on her zigzag flight to the south. Sometimes she 
 was hidden from sight by the straight column of smoke that 
 flung fantastic shadows across the water, then gracefully she 
 shot out clear of it, and Helene, catching sight of her father, 
 again waved her handkerchief for yet one more farewell greet- 
 ing. 
 
 A few more minutes, and the Saint-Ferdinand went down 
 with a bubbling turmoil, at once effaced by the ocean. Noth- 
 ing of all that had been was left but a smoke-cloud hanging 
 in the breeze. The Othello was far away, the long-boat had 
 almost reached land, the cloud came between the frail skiff 
 and the brig, and it was through a break in the swaying smoke 
 that the general caught the last glimpse of Helene. A pro- 
 phetic vision ! Her dress and her white handkerchief stood 
 out against the murky background. Then the brig was not 
 even visible between the green water and the blue sky, and 
 Helene was nothing but an imperceptible speck, a faint grace- 
 ful line, an angel in heaven, a mental image, a memory.
 
 A IV OMAN OF THIRTY. 189 
 
 The marquis had retrieved his fortunes, when he died, worn 
 out with toil. A few months after his death, in 1833, tne 
 marquise was obliged to take MoTna to a watering-place in the 
 Pyrenees, for the capricious child had a wish to see the beauti- 
 ful mountain scenery. They left the baths, and the following 
 tragical incident occurred on their way home. 
 
 " Dear me, mother," said MoTna, " it was very foolish of us 
 not to stay among the mountains a few days longer. It was 
 much nicer there. Did you hear that horrid child moaning 
 all night, and that wretched woman, gabbling away in patois 
 no doubt, for I could not understand a single word she said. 
 What kind of people can they have put in the next room to 
 ours? This is one of the most horrid nights I have ever spent 
 in my life." 
 
 "I heard nothing," said the marquise, "but I will see the 
 landlady, darling, and engage the next room, and then we 
 shall have the whole suite of rooms to ourselves, and there 
 will be no more noise. How do you feel this morning? 
 Are you tired?" 
 
 As she spoke, the marquise rose and went to Moi'na's 
 bedside. 
 
 "Let us see," she said, feeling for the girl's hand. 
 
 "Oh ! let me alone, mother," said MoTna; "your fingers 
 are cold." 
 
 She turned her head round on the pillow as she spoke, pet- 
 tishly, but with such engaging grace, that a mother could 
 scarcely have taken it amiss. Just then a wailing cry echoed 
 through the next room, a faint prolonged cry, that must surely 
 have gone to the heart of any woman who heard it. 
 
 " Why, if you heard that all night long, why did you not 
 wake me ? We should have ' ' 
 
 A deeper moan than any that had gone before it interrupted 
 the marquise. 
 
 "Some one is dying there," she cried, and hurried out of 
 the room.
 
 190 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 "Send Pauline to me!" called MoTna. "I shall get up 
 and dress." 
 
 The marquise hastened downstairs, and found the landlady 
 in the courtyard with a little group of people about her, 
 apparently much interested in something that she was telling 
 them. 
 
 "Madame, you have put some one in the next room who 
 seems to be very ill indeed " 
 
 " Oh ! don't talk to me about it ! " cried the mistress of the 
 house. "I have just sent some one for the mayor. Just 
 imagine it ; it is a woman, a poor unfortunate creature that 
 came here last night on foot. She comes from Spain ; she 
 has no passport and no money ; she was carrying her baby 
 on her back, and the child was dying. I could not refuse 
 to take her in. I went up to see her this morning myself; 
 for when she turned up yesterday, it made me feel dread- 
 fully bad to look at her. Poor soul ! she and the child 
 were lying in bed, and both of them at death's door. 
 'Madame,' says she, pulling a gold ring off her finger, 
 ' this is all that I have left ; take it in payment, it will be 
 enough ; I shall not stay here long. Poor little one ! we 
 shall die together soon ! ' she said, looking at the child. I 
 took her ring, and I asked her who she was, but she never 
 would tell me her name. I have just sent for the doctor 
 and Monsieur le Maire." 
 
 "Why you must do all that can be done for her," cried 
 the marquise. " Good heavens ! perhaps it is not too late ! I 
 will pay for everything that is necessary " 
 
 " Ah ! my lady, she looks to me to be uncommonly proud, 
 and I don't know that she would allow it." 
 
 " I will go to see her at once." 
 
 The marquise went up forthwith to the stranger's room, 
 without thinking of the shock that the sight of her widow's 
 weeds might give to a woman who was said to be dying. At 
 the sight of that dying woman the marquise turned pale. In
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 191 
 
 spite of the changes wrought by fearful suffering in Helene's 
 beautiful face, she recognized her eldest daughter. 
 
 But Helene, when she saw a woman dressed in black, sat 
 upright in bed with a shriek of horror. Then she sank back ; 
 she knew her mother. 
 
 "My daughter," said Mme. d'Aiglemont, "what is to be 
 done? Pauline! Molna ! " 
 
 "Nothing now for me," said Helene faintly. "I had 
 
 hoped to see my father once more, but your mourning " 
 
 she broke off, clutched her child to her heart as if to give it 
 warmth, and kissed its forehead. Then she turned her eyes 
 on her mother, and the marquise met the old reproach in 
 them, tempered with forgiveness, it is true, but still reproach. 
 She saw it, and would not see it. She forgot that Helene 
 was the child conceived amid tears and despair, the child of 
 duty, the cause of one of the greatest sorrows in her life. 
 She stole to her eldest daughter's side, remembering nothing 
 but that Helene was her firstborn, the child who had taught 
 her to know the joys of motherhood. The mother's eyes 
 
 were full of tears. "Helene, my child! " she cried, 
 
 with her arms about her daughter. 
 
 Helene was silent. Her own babe had just drawn its last 
 breath on her breast. 
 
 Moi'na came into the room with Pauline, her maid, and 
 the landlady and the doctor. The marquise was holding her 
 daughter's ice-cold hand in both of hers, and gazing at her 
 in despair ; but the widowed woman, who had escaped ship- 
 wreck with but one of all her fair band of children, spoke in 
 a voice that was dreadful to hear. "All this is your work," 
 she said. " If you had but been for me, all that " 
 
 "Moi'na, go! Go out of the room, all of you!" cried 
 Mme. d'Aiglemont, her shrill tone drowning Helene's voice. 
 "For pity's sake," she continued, "let us not begin these 
 miserable quarrels again now " 
 
 "I will be silent," Helene answered with a preternatural
 
 192 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 effort. " I am a mother, I know that Mo'ina ought not, 
 must not Where is my child ? " 
 
 MoYna came back, impelled by curiosity. 
 
 " Sister," said the spoilt child, " the doctor " 
 
 " It is all of no use," said Helene. " Oh ! why did I not 
 die as a girl of sixteen when I meant to take my own life? 
 
 There can be no happiness outside the laws. Mo'ina 
 
 you ' ' 
 
 Her head sank till her face lay against the face of the little 
 one ; in her agony she strained her babe to her breast, and 
 died. 
 
 "Your sister, Molna," said Mme. d'Aiglemont, bursting 
 into tears when she reached her room, " your sister meant no 
 doubt to tell you that a girl will never find happiness in a 
 romantic life, in living as nobody else does, and, above all 
 things, far away from her mother."
 
 VI. 
 
 THE OLD AGE OF A GUILTY MOTHER. 
 
 It was one of the earliest June days of the year 1844. 
 A lady of fifty or thereabout, for she looked older than her 
 actual age, was pacing up and down one of the sunny paths 
 in the garden of a great mansion in the Rue Plumet in Paris. 
 It was noon. The lady took two or three turns along the 
 gently winding garden-walk, careful never to lose sight of a cer- 
 tain row of windows, to which she seemed to give her whole 
 attention ; then she sat down on a bench, a piece of elegant 
 semi-rusticity made of branches with the bark left on the 
 wood. From the place where she sat she could look through 
 the garden railings along the inner boulevards to the wonder- 
 ful dome of the Invalides rising above the crests of a forest 
 of elm-trees, and see the less striking view of her own grounds 
 terminating in the gray-stone front of one of the finest hotels 
 in the Faubourg Saint-Germain. 
 
 Silence lay over the neighboring gardens and the boule- 
 vards stretching away to the Invalides. Day scarcely begins 
 at noon in that aristocratic quarter, and masters and servants 
 are all alike asleep, or just awakening, unless some young lady 
 takes it into her head to go for an early ride, or a gray-headed 
 diplomatist rises betimes to redraft a protocol. 
 
 The elderly lady stirring abroad at that hour was the Mar- 
 quise d'Aiglemont, the mother of Mme. de Saint-Hereen, to 
 whom the great house belonged. The marquise had made 
 over the mansion and almost her whole fortune to her daugh- 
 ter, reserving only an annuity for herself. 
 
 The Comtesse Mo'ina de Saint-Hereen was Mme. d'Aigle- 
 mont's youngest child. The marquise had made every sacri- 
 fice to marry her daughter to the eldest son of one of the 
 13 (193)
 
 194 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 greatest houses of France ; and this was only what might have 
 been expected, for the lady had lost her sons, first one and 
 then the other. Gustave, Marquis d'Aigleraont, had died of 
 the cholera; Abel, the second, had fallen in Algeria. Gus- 
 tave had left a widow and children, but the dowager's affec- 
 tion for her sons had been only moderately warm, and for the 
 next generation it was decidedly tepid. She was always civil 
 to her daughter-in-law, but her feeling toward the young mar- 
 quise was the distinctly conventional affection which good 
 taste and good manners require us to feel for our relatives. 
 The fortunes of her dead children having been settled, she 
 could devote her savings and her own property to her darling 
 Mo'ina. 
 
 Moina, beautiful and fascinating from childhood, was Mme. 
 d'Aiglemont's favorite ; loved beyond all the others with an 
 instinctive or involuntary love, a fatal drawing of the heart, 
 which sometimes seems inexplicable, sometimes, and to a close 
 observer, only too easy to explain. Her darling's pretty face, 
 the sound of Moina's voice, her ways, her manner, her looks 
 and gestures, roused all the deepest emotions that can stir a 
 mother's heart with trouble, rapture, or delight. The springs 
 of the marquise's life, of yesterday, to-morrow, and to-day, 
 lay in that young heart. Mo'ina, with better fortune, had 
 survived four older children. As a matter of fact, Mme. 
 d'Aiglemont had lost her eldest daughter, a charming girl, in 
 a most unfortunate manner, said gossip, nobody knew exactly 
 what became of her ; and then she lost a little boy of five by 
 a dreadful accident. 
 
 The child of her affections had, however, been spared to 
 her, and doubtless the marquise saw the will of heaven in that 
 fact; for of those who had died, she kept but very shadowy 
 recollections in some far-off corner of her heart ; her mem- 
 ories of her dead children were like 'the headstones on a battle- 
 field, you can scarcely see them for the flowers that have 
 sprung up about them since. Of course, if the world had
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 195 
 
 chosen, it might have said some hard truths about the mar- 
 quise, might have taken her to task for shallowness and an 
 overweening preference for one child at the expense of the 
 rest ; but the world of Paris is swept along by the full flood 
 of new events, new ideas, and new fashions, and it was inevi- 
 table that Mme. d'Aiglemont should be in some sort allowed 
 to drop out of sight. So nobody thought of blaming her for 
 coldness or neglect which concerned no one, whereas her 
 quick, apprehensive tenderness for Moina was found highly 
 interesting by not a few who respected it as a sort of supersti- 
 tion. Beside, the marquise scarcely went into society at all ; 
 and the few families who knew her thought of her as a kindly, 
 gentle, indulgent woman, wholly devoted to her family. 
 What but a curiosity, keen indeed, would seek to pry beneath 
 the surface with which the world is quite satisfied ? And what 
 would we not pardon to old people, if only they will efface 
 themselves like shadows, and consent to be regarded as mem- 
 ories and nothing more ! 
 
 Indeed, Mme. d'Aiglemont became a kind of example 
 complacently held up by the younger generation to fathers of 
 families, and frequently cited to mothers-in-law. She had 
 made over her property to Moma in her own lifetime; the 
 young countess' happiness was enough for her, she only lived 
 in her daughter. If some cautious old person or morose 
 uncle here and there condemned the course with "Perhaps 
 Madame d'Aiglemont may be sorry some day that she gave 
 up her fortune to her daughter ; she may be sure of Mo'i'na, 
 but how can she be equally sure of her son-in-law ?" these 
 prophets were cried down on all sides, and from all sides a 
 chorus of praise went up for Moina. 
 
 " It ought to be said, in justice to Madame de Saint-Hereen, 
 that her mother cannot feel the slightest difference," re 
 marked a young married woman. " Madame d'Aiglemont is 
 admirably well housed. She has a carriage at her disposal, 
 and can go everywhere just as she used to do "
 
 196 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 "Except to the Italiens," remarked a low voice. (This 
 was an elderly parasite, one of those persons who show their 
 independence as they think by riddling their friends with 
 epigrams.) " Except to the Italiens. And if the dowager 
 cares for anything on this earth but her daughter it is music. 
 Such a good performer she was in her time ! But the coun- 
 tess' box is always full of young butterflies, and the countess' 
 mother would be in the way ; the young lady is talked about 
 already as a great flirt. So the poor mother never goes to the 
 Italiens." 
 
 "Madame de Saint-Hereen has delightful 'At Homes' 
 for her mother," said a rosebud. "All Paris goes to her 
 salon." 
 
 "And no one pays any attention to the marquise," returned 
 the parasite. 
 
 "The fact is that Madame d'Aiglemont is never alone," 
 remarked a coxcomb, siding with the young women. 
 
 " In the morning," the old observer continued in a discreet 
 voice, " in the morning dear Mo'ina is asleep. At four o'clock 
 dear Molha drives in the Bois. In the evening dear Mo'ina 
 goes to a ball or to the Bouffes. Still, it is certainly true that 
 Madame d'Aiglemont has the privilege of seeing her dear 
 daughter while she dresses, and again at dinner, if dear 
 Mo'ina happens to dine with her mother. Not a week ago, 
 sir," continued the elderly person, laying his hand on the 
 arm of the shy tutor, a new arrival in the house, " not a week 
 ago, I saw the poor mother, solitary and sad, by her own fire- 
 side. 'What is the matter?' I asked. The marquise looked 
 up smiling, but I am quite sure that she had been crying. 
 ' I was thinking that it is a strange thing that I should be left 
 alone when I have had five children,' she said, 'but that is our 
 destiny ! And, beside, I am happy when I know that Mofna 
 is enjoying herself.' She could say that to me, for I knew 
 her husband when he was alive. A poor stick he was, and 
 uncommonly lucky to have such a wife ; it was certainly
 
 A WOMAN- OF THIRTY. 197 
 
 owing to her that he was made a peer of France, and had a 
 place at Court under Charles X." 
 
 Yet such mistaken ideas get about in social gossip, and such 
 mischief is done by it, that the historian of manners is bound 
 to exercise his discretion, and weigh the assertions so reck- 
 lessly made. After all, who is to say that either mother or 
 daughter was right or wrong. There is but One who can read 
 and judge their hearts ! And how often does He wreak His 
 vengeance in the family circle, using throughout all time chil- 
 dren as his instruments against their mothers, and fathers 
 against their sons, raising up peoples against kings, and princes 
 against peoples, sowing strife and division everywhere? And 
 in the world of ideas, are not old opinions and feelings ex- 
 pelled by new feelings and opinions, much as withered leaves 
 are thrust forth by the young leaf-buds in the spring ? all in 
 obedience to the immutable Scheme ; all to some end which 
 God alone knows. Yet, surely, all things proceed to Him, 
 or rather, to Him all things return. 
 
 Such thoughts of religion, the natural thoughts of age, 
 floated up now and again on the current of Mme. d'Aiglemont's 
 thoughts ; they were always dimly present in her mind, but 
 sometimes they shone out clearly, sometimes they were car- 
 ried under, like flowers tossed on the vexed surface of a stormy 
 sea. 
 
 She sat on the garden -seat, tired with walking, exhausted 
 with much thinking with the long thoughts in which a 
 whole lifetime rises up before the mind, and is spread out 
 like a scroll before the eyes of those who feel that Death is 
 near. 
 
 If a poet had chanced to pass along the boulevard, he would 
 have found an interesting picture in the face of this woman, 
 grown old before her time. As she sat under the dotted 
 shadow of the acacia, the shadow the acacia casts at noon, a 
 thousand thoughts were written for all the world to see on her 
 features, pale and cold even in the hot, bright sunlight.
 
 198 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 There was something sadder than the sense of waning life in 
 that expressive face, some trouble that went deeper than the 
 weariness of experience. It was a face of a type that fixes you 
 in a moment among a host of characterless faces that fail to 
 draw a second glance, a face to set you thinking. Among a 
 thousand pictures in a gallery you are strongly impressed by 
 the sublime anguish on the face of some Madonna of Murillo's ; 
 by some Beatrice Cenci in which Guide's art portrays the 
 most touching innocence against a background of horror and 
 crime ; by the awe and majesty that should encircle a king, 
 caught once and for ever by Velasquez in the sombre face of 
 a Philip II., and so is it with some living human faces; they 
 are tyrannous pictures which speak to you, submit you to 
 searching scrutiny, and give response to your inmost thoughts, 
 nay, there are faces that set forth a whole drama, and Mme. 
 d'Aiglemont's stony face was one of these awful tragedies, 
 one of such faces as Dante Alighieri saw by thousands in his 
 vision. 
 
 For the little season that a woman's beauty is in flower it 
 serves her admirably well in the dissimulation to which her 
 natural weakness and our social laws condemn her. A young 
 face and rich color, and eyes that glow with light, a gracious 
 maze of such subtle, manifold lines and curves, flawless and 
 perfectly traced, is a screen that hides everything that stirs the 
 woman within. A flush tells nothing, it only heightens the 
 coloring so brilliant already ; all the fires that burn within can 
 add little light to the flame of life in eyes which only seem the 
 brighter for the flash of a passing pain. Nothing is so discreet 
 as a young face, for nothing is less mobile; it has the serenity, 
 the surface smoothness, and the freshness of a lake. There is 
 no character in women's faces before the age of thirty. The 
 painter discovers nothing there but pink and white, and the 
 smile and expression that repeat the same thought in the same 
 way a thought of youth and love that goes no further than 
 youth and love. But the face of an old woman has expressed
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 199 
 
 all that lay in her nature ; passion has carved lines on her 
 features; love and wifehood and motherhood, and extremes 
 of joy and anguish, have wrung them, and left their traces in 
 a thousand wrinkles, all of which speak a language of their 
 own ; then is it that a woman's face becomes sublime in its 
 horror, beautiful in its melancholy, grand in its calm. If it is 
 permissible to carry the strange metaphor still further, it might 
 be said that in the dried-up lake you can see the traces of all 
 the torrents that once poured into it and made it what it is. 
 An old face is nothing to the frivolous world ; the frivolous 
 world is shocked by the sight of the destruction of such come- 
 liness as it can understand \ a commonplace artist sees nothing 
 there. An old face is the province of the poets among poets 
 of those who can recognize that something which is called 
 Beauty, apart from all the conventions underlying so many 
 superstitions in art and taste. 
 
 Though Mme. d'Aiglemont wore a fashionable bonnet, it 
 was easy to see that her once black hair had been bleached 
 by cruel sorrows ; yet her good taste and the gracious acquired 
 instincts of a woman of fashion could be seen in the way she 
 wore it, divided into two bandeaux, following the outlines of 
 a forehead that still retained some traces of former dazzling 
 beauty, worn and lined though it was. The contours of her 
 face, the regularity of her features, gave some idea, faint in 
 truth, of that beauty of which surely she had once been proud ; 
 but those traces spoke still more plainly of the anguish which 
 had laid it waste, of sharp pain that had withered the temples, 
 and made those hollows in her cheeks, and empurpled the 
 eyelids and robbed them of their lashes, and the eyes of their 
 charm. She was in every way so noiseless ; she moved with 
 a slow, self-contained gravity that showed itself in her whole 
 bearing, and struck a certain awe into others. Her diffident 
 manner had changed to positive shyness, due apparently to a 
 habit now of some years' growth, of effacing herself in her
 
 200 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 daughter's presence. She spoke very seldom, and in the low 
 tones used by those who perforce must live within themselves 
 a life of reflection and concentration. This demeanor led 
 others to regard her with an indefinable feeling which was 
 neither awe nor compassion, but a mysterious blending of the 
 many ideas awakened in us by compassion and awe. Finally, 
 there was something in her wrinkles, in the lines of her face, 
 in the look of pain in those wan eyes of hers, that bore elo- 
 quent testimony to tears that never had fallen, tears that had 
 been absorbed by her heart. Unhappy creatures, accustomed 
 to raise their eyes to heaven, in mute appeal against the bit- 
 terness of their lot, would have seen at once from her eyes 
 that she was broken in to the cruel discipline of ceaseless 
 prayer, would have discerned the almost imperceptible symp- 
 toms of the secret bruises which destroy all the flowers of the 
 soul, even the sentiment of motherhood. 
 
 Painters have colors for these portraits, but words, and the 
 mental images called up by words, fail to reproduce such 
 impressions faithfully ; there are mysterious signs and tokens 
 in the tones of the coloring and in the look of human faces, 
 which the mind only seizes through the sense of sight ; and 
 the poet is fain to record the tale of the events which wrought 
 the havoc to make their terrible ravages understood. 
 
 The face spoke of cold and steady storm, an inward con- 
 flict between a mother's longsuffering and the limitations of 
 our nature, for our human affections are bounded by our 
 humanity, and the infinite has no place in finite creatures. 
 Sorrow endured in silence had at last produced an indefinable 
 morbid something in this woman. Doubtless mental anguish 
 had reacted on the physical frame, and some disease, perhaps 
 an aneurism, was undermining Julie's life. Deep-seated grief 
 lies to all appearance very quietly in the depths where it is 
 conceived, yet, so still and apparently dormant as it is, it 
 ceaselessly corrodes the soul, like the terrible acid which eats 
 away crystal.
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 201 
 
 Two tears made their way down the marquise's cheeks; 
 she rose to her feet as if some thought more poignant than 
 any that preceded it had cut her to the quick. She had 
 doubtless come to a conclusion as to Moina's future ; and 
 now, foreseeing clearly all the troubles in store for her child, 
 the sorrows of her own unhappy life had begun to weigh once 
 more upon her. The key of her position must be sought in 
 her daughter's situation. 
 
 The Comte de Saint-Hereen had been away for nearly six 
 months on a political mission. The countess, whether from 
 sheer giddiness, or in obedience to the countless instincts of 
 woman's coquetry, or to essay its power with all the vanity 
 of a frivolous fine lady, all the capricious waywardness of a 
 child was amusing herself, during her husband's absence, by 
 playing with the passion of a clever but heartless man, dis- 
 tracted (so he said) with love, the love that combines readily 
 with every petty social ambition of a self-conceited coxcomb. 
 Mme. d'Aiglemont, whose long experience had given her a 
 knowledge of life, and taught her to judge of men and to 
 dread the world, watched the course of this flirtation, and saw 
 that it could only end in one way, if her daughter should fall 
 into the hands of an utterly unscrupulous intriguer. How 
 could it be other than a terrible thought for her that her 
 daughter listened willingly to this roue ? Her darling stood 
 on the brink of a precipice, she felt horribly sure of it, yet 
 dared not hold her back. She was afraid of the countess. 
 She knew, too, that Mo'ina would not listen to her wise warn- 
 ings; she knew that she had no influence over that nature 
 iron for her, silken-soft for all others. Her mother's tender- 
 ness might have led her to sympathize with the troubles of a 
 passion called forth by the nobler qualities of a lover, but 
 this was no passion it was coquetry, and the marquise despised 
 Alfred de Vandenesse, knowing that he had entered upon this 
 flirtation with MoVna as if it were a game of chess. 
 
 But if Alfred de Vandenesse made her shudder with disgust,
 
 202 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 she was obliged unhappy mother ! to conceal the strongest 
 reason for her loathing in the deepest recesses of her heart. 
 She was on terms of intimate friendship with the Marquis de 
 Vandenesse, the young man's father ; and this friendship, a 
 respectable one in the eyes of the world, excused the son's 
 constant presence in the house, he professing an old attach- 
 ment, dating from childhood, for Mme. de Saint-Hereen. 
 More than this, in vain did Mme. d'Aiglemont nerve herself 
 to come between MoTna and Alfred de Vandenesse with a 
 terrible word, knowing beforehand that she would not succeed ; 
 knowing that the strong reason which ought to separate them 
 would carry no weight ; that she should humiliate herself 
 vainly in her daughter's eyes. Alfred was too corrupt; 
 MoTna too clever to believe the revelation ; the young countess 
 would turn it off and treat it as a piece of maternal strategy. 
 Mme. d'Aiglemont had built her prison walls with her own 
 hands; she had immured herself only to see Moina's happi- 
 ness ruined thence before she died ; she was to look on help- 
 lessly at the ruin of the young life which had been her pride 
 and joy and comfort, a life a thousand times dearer to her 
 than her own. What words can describe anguish so hideous 
 beyond belief, such unfathomed depths of pain ? 
 
 She waited for Mo'ina to rise, with the impatience and 
 sickening dread of a doomed man, who longs to have done 
 with life, yet turns cold at the thought of the headsman. 
 She had braced herself for a last effort, but perhaps the pros- 
 pect of the certain failure of the attempt was less dreadful to 
 her than the fear of receiving yet again one of those thrusts 
 that went to her very heart before that fear her courage 
 ebbed away. Her mother's love had come to this. To love 
 her child, to be afraid of her, to shrink from the thought of 
 the stab, yet to go forward. So great is a mother's affection in 
 a loving nature that, before it can fade away into indifference, 
 the mother herself must die or find support in some great 
 power without her, in religion or another love. Since the
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 203 
 
 marquise rose that morning, her fatal memory had called up 
 before her some of those things, so slight to all appearance, 
 that make landmarks in a life. Sometimes, indeed, a whole 
 tragedy grows out of a single gesture ; the tone in which a 
 few words were spoken rends a whole life in twain ; a glance 
 into indifferent eyes is the death-blow of the gladdest love ; 
 and, unhappily, such gestures and such words were only too 
 familiar to Mme. d'Aiglemont she had met so many glances 
 that wound the soul. No, there was nothing in those memories 
 to bid her hope. On the contrary, everything went to show 
 that Alfred had destroyed her hold on her daughter's heart, 
 that the thought of her was now associated with duty not 
 with gladness. In ways innumerable, in things that were 
 mere trifles in themselves, the countess' detestable conduct 
 rose up before her mother; and the marquise, it may be, 
 looked on Moi'na's undutifulness as a punishment, and found 
 excuses for her daughter in the will of heaven, that so she 
 still might adore the hand that smote her. 
 
 All these things passed through her memory that morning, 
 and each recollection wounded her afresh so sorely that, with 
 a very little additional pain, her brimming cup of bitterness 
 must have overflowed. A cold look might kill her. 
 
 The little details of domestic life are difficult to paint ; but 
 one or two, perhaps, will suffice to give an idea of the rest. 
 
 The Marquise d'Aiglemont, for instance, had grown rather 
 deaf, but she could never induce MoVna to raise her voice for 
 her. Once, with the naivete of suffering, she had begged 
 Mo'ina to repeat some remark which she had failed to catch, 
 and Mo'ina obeyed, but with so bad a grace that Mme. d'Aigle- 
 mont had never permitted herself to make her modest request 
 again. Ever since that day, when Mo'ina was talking or retail- 
 ing a piece of news, her mother was careful to come near to 
 listen ; but this infirmity of deafness appeared to put the 
 countess out of patience, and she would grumble thoughtlessly 
 about it. This instance is one from among very many that
 
 204 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 must have gone to the mother's heart ; and yet nearly all of 
 them might have escaped a close observer, they consisted in 
 faint shades of manner invisible to any but a woman's eyes. 
 Take another example : Mme. Aiglemont happened to say one 
 day that the Princesse de Cadignan had called upon her. 
 " Did she come to see you ! " MoTna exclaimed. That was all ; 
 but the countess' voice and manner expressed surprise and 
 well-bred contempt in semitones. Any heart, still young and 
 sensitive, might well have applauded the philanthropy of 
 savage tribes who kill off their old people when they grow too 
 feeble to cling to a strongly shaken bough. Mme. d' Aigle- 
 mont rose smiling, and went away to weep alone. 
 
 Well-bred people, and women especially, only betray their 
 feelings by imperceptible touches; but those who can look 
 back over their own experience on such bruises as this mother's 
 heart received, know also how the heart-strings vibrate to these 
 light touches. Overcome by her memories, Mme. d' Aigle- 
 mont recollected one of those microscopically small things, 
 so stinging and so painful was it that never till this moment 
 had she felt all the heartless contempt that lurked beneath 
 smiles. 
 
 At the sound of shutters thrown back at her daughter's 
 windows, she dried her tears, and hastened up the pathway 
 by the railings. As she went, it struck her that the gardener 
 had been unusually careful to rake the sand along the walk 
 which had been neglected for some little time. As she stood 
 under her daughter's windows, the shutters were hastily closed. 
 
 " MoTna, is it you?" she asked. 
 
 No answer. 
 
 The marquise went on into the house. 
 
 " Madame la Comtesse is in the little drawing-room," said 
 the maid, when the marquise asked whether Mme. de Saint- 
 Hereen had finished dressing. 
 
 Mme. d' Aiglemont hurried to the little drawing-room ; her 
 heart was too full, her brain too busy to notice matters so
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 205 
 
 slight ; but there on a sofa sat the countess in her loose morn- 
 ing gown, her hair in disorder under the cap tossed carelessly 
 on her head, her feet thrust into slippers. The key of her 
 bedroom hung at her girdle. Her face, aglow with color, 
 bore traces of almost stormy thought. 
 
 " What makes people come in ! " she cried crossly. "Oh ! 
 it is you, mother?" she interrupted herself, with a preoccupied 
 look. 
 
 "Yes, child ; it is your mother." 
 
 Something in her tone turned those words into an out- 
 pouring of the heart, the cry of some deep inward feeling, 
 only to be described by the word " holy." So thoroughly in 
 truth had she rehabilitated the sacred character of a mother 
 that her daughter was impressed, and turned toward her, with 
 something of awe, uneasiness, and remorse in her manner. 
 The room was the farthest of a suite, and safe from indiscreet 
 intrusion, for no one could enter it without giving warning of 
 approach through the previous apartments. The marquise 
 closed the door. 
 
 " It is my duty, my child, to warn you in one of the most 
 serious crises in the lives of us women ; you have perhaps 
 reached it unconsciously, and I am come to speak to you as a 
 friend rather than as a mother. When you married, you 
 acquired freedom of action ; you are only accountable to your 
 husband now ; but I asserted my authority so little (perhaps I 
 was wrong) that I think I have a right to expect you to listen 
 to me, for once at least, in a critical position when you must 
 need counsel. Bear in mind, Moina, that you are married to 
 a man of high ability, a man of whom you may well be proud, 
 a man who " 
 
 " I know what you are going to say mother ! " MoTna broke 
 in pettishly. " I am to be lectured about Alfred " 
 
 "Moina," the marquise said gravely, as she struggled 
 with her tears, " you would not guess at once if you did not 
 feel "
 
 206 A WOMAN OF THIRTY, 
 
 "What?" asked MoTna, almost haughtily. "Why, really, 
 mother " 
 
 Mme. d'Aiglemont here summoned up all her strength. 
 "Moi'na," she said, "you must attend carefully to this that 
 I ought to tell you " 
 
 "I am attending," returned the countess, folding her arms 
 and affecting insolent submission. " Permit me, mother, to 
 ring for Pauline," she added, with incredible self-possession ; 
 "I will send her away first." 
 
 She rang the bell. 
 
 " My dear child, Pauline cannot possibly hear " 
 
 "Mamma," interrupted the countess, with a gravity which 
 must have struck her mother as something unusual, " I 
 must " 
 
 She stopped short, for the woman was in the room. 
 
 " Pauline, go yourself to Baudran's and ask why my hat has 
 not yet been sent." 
 
 Then the countess reseated herself and scrutinized her 
 mother. The marquise, with a swelling heart and dry eyes, 
 in painful agitation, which none but a mother can fully under- 
 stand, began to open Mo'ina's eyes to the risk that she was 
 running. But either the countess felt hurt and indignant at 
 her mother's suspicions of a son of the Marquis de Vandenesse 
 or she was seized with a sudden fit of inexplicable levity 
 caused by the inexperience of youth. She took advantage of 
 a pause. 
 
 "Mamma, I really thought you were only jealous of the 
 father " she said, with a forced laugh. 
 
 Mme. d'Aiglemont shut her eyes and bent her head at the 
 words, with a very faint, almost inaudible sigh. She looked 
 up and out into space, as if she felt the common overmastering 
 impulse to appeal to God at the great crises of our lives ; then 
 she looked at her daughter, and her eyes were full of awful 
 majesty and the expression of profound sorrow. 
 
 "My child," she said, and her voice was hardly recog-
 
 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 207 
 
 nizable, " you have been less merciful to your mother than he 
 against whom she sinned ; less merciful than perhaps God 
 himself will be!" 
 
 Mme. d' Aiglemont rose ; at the door she turned ; but she 
 saw nothing but surprise in her daughter's face. She went 
 out. Scarcely had she reached the garden when her strength 
 failed her. There was a violent pain at her heart, and she 
 sank down on a bench. As her eyes wandered over the path, 
 she saw fresh marks impressed on it, a man's footprints were 
 distinctly recognizable. It was too late, then, beyond a doubt. 
 Now she began to understand the reason for that order given 
 to Pauline, and with these torturing thoughts came a revelation 
 more hateful than any that had gone before it. She drew her 
 own inferences the son of the Marquis de Vandenesse had 
 destroyed all feeling of respect for her in her daughter's mind. 
 The physical pain grew worse ; by degrees she lost conscious- 
 ness, and sat like one asleep upon the garden-seat. 
 
 The Countess de Saint-Hereen, left to herself, thought that 
 her mother had given her a somewhat shrewd home-thrust, 
 but a kiss and a few attentions that evening would make all 
 right again. 
 
 A shrill cry came from the garden. She leaned carelessly 
 out, as Pauline, not yet departed on her errand, called out for 
 help, holding the marquise in her arms. 
 
 " Do not frighten my daughter ! " these were the last words 
 the mother uttered. 
 
 Moina saw them carry in a pale and lifeless form that 
 struggled for breath, and arms moving restlessly as in protest 
 or effort to speak ; and overcome by the sight, Mo'ina followed 
 in silence, and helped to undress her mother and lay her on 
 her bed. The burden of her fault was greater than she could 
 bear. In that supreme hour she learned to know her mother 
 too late, she could make no reparation now. She would 
 have them leave her alone with her mother ; and when there 
 was no one else in the ropm, when she felt that the hand
 
 203 A WOMAN OF THIRTY. 
 
 which had always been so tender for her was now grown cold 
 to her touch, she broke out into weeping. Her tears aroused 
 the marquise ; she could still look at her darling Mo'ina ; 
 and at the sound of sobbing, that seemed as if it must rend 
 the delicate, disheveled breast, could smile back at her 
 daughter. That smile taught the unnatural child that for- 
 giveness is always to be found in the great deep of a mother's 
 heart. 
 
 Servants on horseback had been dispatched at once for the 
 physician and surgeon and for Mme. d'Aiglemont's grand- 
 children. Mme. d'Aiglemont the younger and her little sons 
 arrived with the medical men, a sufficiently impressive, silent, 
 and anxious little group, which the servants of the house 
 came to join. The young marquise, hearing no sound, 
 tapped gently at the door. That signal, doubtless, roused 
 Moina from her grief, for she flung open the door and stood 
 before them. No words could have spoken more plainly 
 than that disheveled figure looking out with haggard eyes upon 
 the assembled family. Before that living picture of Remorse, 
 the rest were dumb. It was easy to see that the marquise's 
 feet were stretched out stark and stiff with the agony of death ; 
 and MoYna, leaning against the door-frame, looking in their 
 faces, spoke in a hollow voice 
 
 " I have lost my mother ! " 
 
 PARIS, 1828-1844.
 
 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 Translated by CLARA BELL. 
 
 To Laure, 
 
 To whose bright and modest wit I owe the idea of 
 this Scene. Hers be the honor ! 
 
 Her brother, 
 
 DE BALZAC. 
 
 RAILROADS, in a future now not far distant, must lead to 
 the disappearance of certain industries and modify others, 
 especially such as are concerned in the various modes of 
 transport commonly used in the neighborhood of Paris. In 
 fact, the persons and the things which form the accessories of 
 this little drama will ere long give it the dignity of an archoso- 
 logical study. Will not our grandchildren be glad to know 
 something of a time which they will speak of as the old days? 
 
 For instance, the picturesque vehicles known as coucous, 
 which used to stand on the Place de la Concorde and crowd 
 the Cours-la-Reine, which flourished so greatly during a cen- 
 tury, and still survived in 1830, exist no more. Even on the 
 occasion of the most attractive rural festivity, hardly one is to 
 be seen on the road in this year 1842. 
 
 In 1820 not all the places famous for their situation, and 
 designated as the environs of Paris, had any regular service 
 of coaches. The Touchards, father and son, had acquired a 
 monopoly of conveyances to and from the largest towns within 
 a radius of fifteen leagues, and their establishment occupied 
 splendid premises in the Rue du Faubourg Saint-Denis. In 
 spite of their old standing and their strenuous efforts, in spite 
 of their large capital and all the advantages of strong cen- 
 14 (209)
 
 210 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 tralization, Touchards' service had formidable rivals in the 
 coucous of the Faubourg Saint-Denis for distances of seven or 
 eight leagues out of Paris. The Parisian has indeed such a 
 passion for the country that local establishments also held 
 their own in many cases against the Petites Messageries (little 
 stage-coaches), a name given to Touchards' short-distance 
 coaches, to distinguish them from the Grandes Mcssagcries 
 (large stage-coaches), the general conveyance company, in 
 the Rue Montmartre. 
 
 At that time the success of the Touchards stimulated specu- 
 lation ; conveyances were put on the road to and from the 
 smallest towns handsome, quick, and commodious vehicles, 
 starting and returning at fixed hours ; and these, in a circuit 
 of ten leagues or so, gave rise to vehement competition. 
 Beaten on the longer distances, the coucou fell back on short 
 runs, and survived a few years longer. It finally succumbed 
 when the omnibus had proved the possibility of packing eigh- 
 teen persons into a vehicle drawn by two horses. Nowadays 
 the coucou, if a bird of such heavy flight is by chance still to 
 be found in the recesses of some store for dilapidated vehicles, 
 would, from its structure and arrangement, be the subject of 
 learned investigations, like Cuvier's. researches on the animals 
 discovered in the lime-quarries of Montmartre. 
 
 These smaller companies, being threatened by larger specu- 
 lations competing, after 1822, with the Touchards, had never- 
 theless a fulcrum of support in the sympathies of the residents 
 in the places they plied to. The master of the concern, who 
 was both owner and driver of the vehicle, was usually a 
 tavernkeeper of the district, to whom its inhabitants were as 
 familiar as were their common objects and interests. He was 
 intelligent in fulfilling commissions; he asked less for his 
 little services, and therefore obtained more, than the employes 
 of the Touchards. He was clever at evading the necessity for 
 an excise pass. At a pinch he would infringe the rules as to 
 the number of passengers he might carry. In fact, he was
 
 A START IN LIFE, 211 
 
 master of the affections of the people. Hence, when a rival 
 appeared in the field, if the old-established conveyance ran on 
 alternate days of the week, there were persons who would 
 postpone their journey to take it in the company of the origi- 
 nal driver, even though his vehicle and horses were none of 
 the safest and best. 
 
 One of the lines which the Touchards, father and son, tried 
 hard to monopolize, but which was hotly disputed nay, 
 which is still a subject of dispute with their successors the 
 Toulouses was that between Paris and Beaumont-sur-Oise, a 
 highly profitable district, since in 1822 three lines of convey- 
 ances worked it at once. The Touchards lowered their prices, 
 but in vain, and in vain increased the number of services ; in 
 vain they put superior vehicles on the road, the competitors 
 held their own, so profitable is a line running through little 
 towns like Saint-Denis and Saint-Brice, and such a string of 
 villages as Prerrefitte, Groslay, Ecouen, Poncelles, Moisselles, 
 Baillet, Monsoult, Maffliers, Franconville, Presles, Nointel, 
 Nerville, and others. The Touchards at last extended their 
 line of service as far as to Chambly ; the rivals ran to Cham- 
 bly. And at the present day the Toulouses go as far as 
 Beauvais. 
 
 On this road, the highway to England, there is a place 
 which is not ill-named la Cave (the Cellar), a paved way 
 leading down into one of the most delightful nooks of the 
 Oise valley, and to the little town of 1'Isle-Adam, doubly 
 famous as the native place of the now extinct family of 1' Isle- 
 Adam, and as the splendid residence of the Princes of Bour- 
 bon-Conti. L'Isle-Adam is a charming little town, flanked 
 by two large hamlets, that of Nogent and that of Parmain, 
 both remarkable for the immense quarries which have fur- 
 nished the materials for the finest edifices of Paris, and indeed 
 abroad too, for the base and capitals of the theatre at Brussels 
 are of Nogent stone. 
 
 Though remarkable for its beautiful points of view and for
 
 212 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 famous castles built by princes, abbots, or famous architects, 
 as at Cassan, Stors, le Val, Nointel, Persan, etc., this district, 
 in 1822, had as yet escaped competition, and was served by 
 two coach-owners, who agreed to work it between them. 
 This exceptional state of things was based on causes easily 
 explained. From la Cave, where, on the highroad, begins 
 the fine paved way, due to the magnificence of Princes of 
 Conti, to 1'Isle Adam, is a distance of two leagues; no main- 
 line coach could diverge so far from the highway, especially 
 as 1'Isle-Adam was at that time the end of things in that 
 direction. The road led thither, and ended there. Of late, 
 a highroad joins the valley of Montmorency to that of 1' Isle- 
 Adam. Leaving Saint-Denis, it passes through Saint-Leu- 
 Taverny, Meru, 1' Isle- Adam, and along by the Oise as far as 
 Beaumont. But in 1822 the only road to 1'Isle-Adam was that 
 made by the Princes de Conti. 
 
 Consequently Pierrotin and his colleague reigned supreme 
 from Paris to 1'Isle-Adam, beloved of all the district. Pier- 
 rotin's coach and his friend's ran by Stors, le Val, Parmain, 
 Champagne, Mours, Prerolles, Nogent, Nerville, and Maffliers. 
 Pierrotin was so well known that the residents at Monsoult, 
 Moisselles, Baillet, and Saint-Brice, though living on the high- 
 road, made use of his coach, in which there was more often a 
 chance of a seat than in the Beaumont diligence, which was 
 always full. Pierrotin and his friendly rival agreed to admira- 
 tion. When Pierrotin started from 1' Isle- Adam, the other set 
 out from Paris, and vice-versa. Of the opposition driver, 
 nothing need be said. Pierrotin was the favorite in the line. 
 And of the two, he alone appears on the scene in this vera- 
 cious history. So it will suffice to say that the two coach- 
 drivers lived on excellent terms, competing in honest warfare, 
 and contending for customers without sharp practice. In 
 Paris, out of economy, they put up at the same inn, using the 
 same yard, the same stable, the same coach-shed, the same 
 office, the same booking-clerk. And this fact is enough to
 
 A START IN LIFE. 213 
 
 show that Pierrotin and his opponent were "good dough," 
 as the common folk say. 
 
 That inn, at the corner of the Rue d'Enghien, exists to this 
 day, and is called the Silver Lion (Lion d' Argent). The 
 proprietor of this hostelry a hostelry from time immemorial 
 for coach-drivers himself managed a line of vehicles to Dam- 
 martin on so sound a basis that his neighbors the Touchards, 
 of the Petites Mcssagerics opposite, never thought of starting 
 a conveyance on that road. 
 
 Though the coaches for 1' Isle- Adam were supposed to set 
 out punctually, Pierrotin and his friend displayed a degree of 
 indulgence on this point which, while it won them the affec- 
 tions of the natives, brought down severe remonstrances from 
 strangers who were accustomed to the exactitude of the larger 
 public companies ; but the two drivers of these vehicles, half 
 diligence, half coucou, always found partisans among their 
 regular customers. In the afternoon the start fixed for four 
 o'clock always dragged on till half-past; and in the morning, 
 though eight was the hour named, the coach never got off 
 before nine. 
 
 This system was, however, very elastic. In summer, the 
 golden season for coaches, the time of departure, rigorously 
 punctual as concerned strangers, gave way for natives of the 
 district. This method afforded Pierrotin the chance of 
 pocketing the price of two places for one when a resident in 
 the town came early to secure a place already booked by a 
 bird of passage, who, by ill-luck, was behind time. Such 
 elastic rules would certainly not be approved by a Puritan 
 moralist ; but Pierrotin and his colleague justified it by the 
 hard times, by their losses during the winter season, by the 
 necessity they would presently be under of purchasing better 
 carriages, and, finally, by an exact application of the rules 
 printed on their tickets, copies of which were of the greatest 
 rarity, and never given but to those travelers who were so 
 perverse as to insist.
 
 214 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 Pierrotin, a man of forty, was already the father of a 
 family. He had left the cavalry in 1815, when the army was 
 disbanded, and then this very good fellow had succeeded his 
 father, who drove a coucou between 1' Isle-Adam and Paris on 
 somewhat erratic principles. After marrying the daughter of 
 a small tavernkeeper, he extended and regulated the business, 
 and was noted for his intelligence and military punctuality. 
 Brisk and decisive, Pierrotin a nickname, no doubt had a 
 mobile countenance which gave an amusing expression and a 
 semblance of intelligence to a face reddened by exposure to 
 the weather. Nor did he lack the "gift of the gab," which 
 is caught by intercourse with the world and by seeing different 
 parts of it. His voice, by dint of talking to his horses and 
 shouting to others to get out of the way, was somewhat harsh, 
 but he could soften it to a customer. 
 
 His costume, that of coach-drivers of 'the superior class, 
 consisted of stout, strong boots, heavy with nails, and made 
 at 1'Isle-Adam, trousers of bottle-green velveteen, and a jacket 
 of the same, over which, in the exercise of his functions, he 
 wore a blue blouse, embroidered in colors on the collar, 
 shoulder-pieces, and wristbands. On his head was a cap with 
 i peak. His experience of military service had stamped on 
 Pierrotin the greatest respect for social superiority, and a 
 habit of obedience to people of the upper ranks ; but, while he 
 was ready to be on familiar terms with the modest citizen, he 
 was always respectful to women, of whatever class. At the same 
 time, the habit of "carting folks about," to use his own 
 expression, had led him to regard his travelers as parcels ; 
 though, being on feet, they demanded less care than the 
 other merchandise, which was the aim and end of the service. 
 
 Warned by the general advance, which since the peace had 
 begun to tell on his business, Pierrotin was determined not to 
 be beaten by the progress of the world. Ever since the last 
 summer season he had talked a great deal of a certain large 
 conveyance he had ordered of Farry, Breilmann & Co.,
 
 A START IN LIFE. 215 
 
 the best diligence builders, as being needed by the constant 
 increase of travelers. Pierrotin's plant at that time consisted 
 of two vehicles. One, which did duty for the winter, and 
 the only one he ever showed to the tax-collector, was of the 
 coucou species. The bulging sides of this vehicle allowed it 
 to carry six passengers on two seats as hard as iron, though 
 covered with yellow worsted velvet. These seats were divided 
 by a wooden bar, which could be removed at pleasure or 
 refixed in two grooves in the sides, at the height of a man's 
 back. This bar, perfidiously covered by Pierrotin with 
 yellow velvet, and called by him a back to the seat, was the 
 cause of much despair to the travelers from the difficulty of 
 moving and readjusting it. If the board was painful to fix, 
 it was far more so to the shoulder-blades when it was fitted ; on 
 the other hand, if it was not unshipped, it made entrance and 
 egress equally perilous, especially to women. 
 
 Though each seat of this vehicle, which bulged at the 
 sides, like a woman before childbirth, was licensed to hold no 
 more than three passengers, it was not unusual to see eight 
 packed in it like herrings in a barrel. Pierrotin declared that 
 they were all the more comfortable since they formed a com- 
 pact and immovable mass, whereas three were constantly 
 thrown against each other, and often ran the risk of spoiling 
 their hats against the roof of the vehicle by reason of the 
 violent jolting on the road. In front of the body of this 
 carriage there was a wooden box-seat, Pierrotin's driving-seat, 
 which could also carry three passengers, who were designated, 
 as all the world knows, as lapins (rabbits). Occasionally, 
 Pierrotin would accommodate four lapins, and then sat askew 
 on a sort of box below the front seat for the lapins to rest 
 their feet on ; this was filled with straw or such parcels as 
 could not be injured. 
 
 The body of the vehicle, painted yellow, was ornamented 
 by a band of bright blue, on which might be read in white 
 letters, on each side : L' ISLE-ADAM PARIS; and on the back,
 
 216 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 SERVICE DE L' ISLE-ADAM. Our descendants will be under a 
 mistake if they imagine that this conveyance could carry no 
 more than thirteen persons, including Pierrotin. On great 
 occasions three more could be seated in a square compartment 
 covered with tarpaulin in which trunks, boxes, and parcels 
 were generally piled ; but Pierrotin was too prudent to let 
 any but regular customers sit there, and only took them up 
 three or four hundred yards outside the barrier. These pas- 
 sengers in the poulailler, or hen-coop, the name given by the 
 conductors to this part of a coach, were required to get out 
 before reaching any village on the road where there was a 
 station of gendarmerie ; for the overloading, forbidden by 
 the regulations "for the greater safety of travelers," was in 
 these cases so excessive that the gendarme always Pierrotin's 
 very good friend could not have excused himself from re- 
 porting such a flagrant breach of rules. But thus Pierrotin's 
 vehicle, on certain Saturday evenings and Monday mornings, 
 carted out fifteen passengers ; and then to help pull it, he 
 gave his large but aged horse, named Rougeot, the assistance 
 of a second nag about as big as a pony, which he could never 
 sufficiently praise. This little steed was a mare called Bichette ; 
 and she ate little, she was full of spirit, nothing could tire her, 
 she was worth her weight in gold ! 
 
 " My wife would not exchange her for that fat lazybones 
 Rougeot ! " Pierrotin would exclaim, when a traveler laughed 
 at him about this concentrated extract of horse. 
 
 The difference between this carriage and the other was, 
 that the second had four wheels. This vehicle, a remarkable 
 structure, always spoken of as " the four-wheeled coach," 
 could hold seventeen passengers, being intended to carry 
 fourteen. It rattled so preposterously that the folk in 1'Isle- 
 Adam would say, " Here comes Pierrotin ! " when he had 
 but just come out of the wood that hangs on the slope to the 
 valley. It was divided into two lobes, one of which, called 
 the interieur, the body of the coach, carried six passengers on
 
 A START IN LIFE. 217 
 
 two seats ; and the other, a sort of cab stuck on in front, was 
 styled the coupe. This coupe could be closed by an incon- 
 venient and eccentric arrangement of glass windows, which 
 would take too long to describe in this place. The four- 
 wheeled coach also had on top a sort of gig with a hood, into 
 which Pierrotin packed six travelers ; it closed with leather 
 curtains. Pierrotin himself had an almost invisible perch 
 below the glass windows of the coupe. 
 
 The coach to 1" Isle- Adam only paid the taxes levied on 
 public vehicles for the coucou, represented to carry six travelers, 
 and whenever Pierrotin turned out the " four-wheeled coach " 
 he took out a special license. This may seem strange indeed 
 in these days ; but at first the tax on vehicles, imposed some- 
 what timidly, allowed the owners of coaches to play these 
 little tricks, which gave them the pleasure of " putting their 
 thumbs to their noses" behind the collector's back, as they 
 phrased it. By degrees, however, the hungry Exchequer grew 
 strict ; it allowed no vehicle to take the road without display- 
 ing the two plates which now certify that their capacity is 
 registered and the tax paid. Everything, even a tax, has its 
 age of innocence, and toward the end of 1822 that age was 
 not yet over. Very often, in summer, the four-wheeled coach 
 and the covered chaise made the journey in company, carry- 
 ing in all thirty passengers, while Pierrotin paid only for six. 
 
 On these golden days the convoy started from the Faubourg 
 Saint-Denis at half-past four, and arrived in style at 1'Isle- 
 Adam by ten o'clock at night. And then Pierrotin, proud 
 of his run, which necessitated the hire of extra horses, would 
 say : " We have made a good pace to-day ! " To enable him 
 to do nine leagues in five hours with this machinery, he did 
 not stop, as the coaches usually do on this road, at Saint- 
 Brice, Moisselles, and la Cave. 
 
 The Silver Lion occupied a plot of ground running very far 
 back. Though the front of the Rue Saint-Denis has no more 
 than three or four windows, there was at that time, on one
 
 218 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 side of the long yard, with the stables at the bottom, a large 
 house backing on the wall of the adjoining property. The 
 entrance was through an arched way under the second floor, 
 and there was standing-room here for two or three coaches. 
 In 1822, the booking-office for all the lines that put up at the 
 Silver Lion was kept by the innkeeper's wife, who had a book 
 for each line ; she took the money, wrote down the names, 
 and good-naturedly accommodated passengers' luggage in her 
 vast kitchen. The travelers were quite satisfied with this patri- 
 archally free-and-easy mode of business. If they came too 
 early, they sat down by the fire within the immense chimney- 
 place, or lounged in the passage, or went to the Cafe de 1'Echi- 
 quier, at the corner of the street of that name, parallel to the 
 Rue d'Enghien, from which it is divided by a few houses 
 only. 
 
 Quite early in the autumn of that year, one Saturday morn- 
 ing, Pierrotin, his hands stuffed through holes in his blouse 
 and into his pockets, was standing at the front gate of the 
 Silver Lion, whence he had a perspective view of the inn 
 kitchen, and beyond it of the long yard and the stables at the 
 end, like black caverns. The Dammartin diligence had just 
 started, and was lumbering after Touchard's coaches. It was 
 past eight o'clock. Under the wide archway, over which was 
 inscribed on a long board : HOTEL DU LION D'ARGENT, the 
 stablemen and coach-porters were watching the vehicles start 
 at the brisk pace which deludes the traveler into the belief 
 that the horses will continue to keep it up. 
 
 "Shall I bring out the horses, master?" said Pierrotin's 
 stable-boy, when there was nothing more to be seen. 
 
 "A quarter-past eight, and I see no passengers," said Pier- 
 rotin. " What the deuce is become of them? Put the horses 
 to, all the same. No parcels either. Bless us and save us ! 
 This afternoon, now, he won't know how to stow his passen- 
 gers, as it is so fine, and I have only four booked. There's a
 
 PIERKOTIN SAT DOWN ON ONE OF THE ENORMOUS 
 CURBSTONES.
 
 A START IN LIFE. 219 
 
 pretty lookout for a Saturday ! That's always the way when 
 you're wanting the ready ! It's dog's work, and work for a 
 dog!" 
 
 "And if you had any, where would you stow 'em? You 
 have nothing but your two-wheeled cab," said the luggage- 
 porter, trying to smooth down Pierrotin. 
 
 "And what about my new coach?" 
 
 "Then there is such a thing as your new coach ?" asked 
 the sturdy Auvergnat, grinning and showing his front teeth, 
 as white and as broad as almonds. 
 
 "You old good-for-nothing ! Why, she will take the road 
 to-morrow, Sunday, and we want eighteen passengers to fill 
 her!" 
 
 " Oh, ho ! A fine turn-out ; that'll make the folk stare ! " 
 said the Auvergnat. 
 
 "A coach like the one that runs to Beaumont, I can tell 
 you ! Brand new, painted in red and gold, enough to make 
 the Touchards burst with envy ! It will take three horses. I 
 have found a fellow to Rougeot, and Bichette will trot unicorn 
 like a good 'un. Come, harness up," said Pierrotin, who was 
 looking toward the Porte Saint-Denis while cramming his 
 short pipe with tobacco, " I see a lady out there, and a little 
 man with bundles under his arm. They are looking for the 
 Silver Lion, for they would have nothing to say to the coucous 
 on the stand. Hey-day, I seem to know the lady for a cus- 
 tomer." 
 
 "You often get home filled up after starting empty," said 
 his man. 
 
 "But no parcels!" replied Pierrotin. "By the mass! 
 What devil's luck !" 
 
 And Pierrotin sat down on one of the enormous curbstones 
 which protected the lower part of the wheels from the friction 
 of the walls, but he wore an anxious and thoughtful look that 
 was not usual with him. This dialogue, apparently so trivial, 
 had stirred up serious anxieties at the bottom of Pierrotin's
 
 220 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 heart. And what could trouble Pierrotin's heart but the 
 thought of a handsome coach ? To cut a dash on the road to 
 rival the Touchards, extend his service, carry passengers who 
 might congratulate him on the increased convenience due to 
 the improvements in coach-building, instead of hearing con- 
 stant' complaints of his drags, this was Pierrotin's laudable 
 ambition. 
 
 Now the worthy man, carried away by his desire to triumph 
 over his colleague, and to induce him some day perhaps to 
 leave him without a competitor on the road to 1' Isle-Adam, 
 had overstrained his resources. He had ordered his coach 
 from Farry, Breilmann & Co., the makers who had lately 
 introduced English coach-springs in the place of the swan's- 
 neck and other old-fashioned French springs ; but these hard- 
 hearted and mistrustful makers would only deliver the vehicle 
 for ready cash. Not caring, indeed, to build a conveyance so 
 unsalable if it were left on their hands, these shrewd trades- 
 men had not undertaken the job till Pierrotin had paid them 
 two thousand francs on account. To satisfy their justifiable 
 requirements, Pierrotin had exhausted his savings and his 
 credit. He had bled his wife, his father-in-law, and his 
 friends. He had been to look at the superb vehicle the day 
 before in the painter's shop; it was ready, and waiting to take 
 the road, but in order to see it there on the following day he 
 must pay up. 
 
 Hence Pierrotin was in need of a thousand francs ! Being 
 in debt to the innkeeper for stable-room, he dared not borrow 
 the sum of him. For lack of this thousand francs, he risked 
 losing the two thousand already paid in advance, to say noth- 
 ing of five hundred, the cost of Rougeot the second, and 
 three hundred for new harness, for which, however, he had 
 three months' credit. And yet, urged by the wrath of despair 
 and the folly of vanity, he had just declared that his coach 
 would start on the morrow, Sunday. In paying the fifteen 
 hundred francs on account of the two thousand five hundred,
 
 A START IN LIFE. 221 
 
 he had hoped that the coachmakers' feelings might be touched 
 so far that they would let him have the vehicle; but, after 
 three minutes' reflection, he exclaimed 
 
 " No, no ! they are sharks, perfect skinflints. Supposing I 
 were to apply to Monsieur Moreau, the steward at Presles he 
 is such a good fellow, that he would, perhaps, take my note of 
 hand at six months' date," thought he, struck by a new idea. 
 
 At this instant, a servant out of livery, carrying a leather 
 trunk, on coming across from the Touchards' office, where he 
 had failed to find a place vacant on the Chambly coach start- 
 ing at one o'clock, said to the driver 
 
 ' ' Pierrotin ? Is that you ? " 
 
 "What then?" said Pierrotin. 
 
 " If you can wait less than a quarter of an hour, you can 
 carry my master; if not, I will take his portmanteau back 
 again, and he must make the best of a chaise off the stand." 
 
 " I will wait two three-quarters of an hour, and five 
 minutes more to that, my lad," said Pierrotin, with a glance 
 at the smart little leather trunk, neatly strapped, and fastened 
 with a brass lock engraved with a coat-of-arms. 
 
 "Very good, then, there you are," said the man, relieving 
 his shoulder of the trunk, which Pierrotin lifted, weighed in 
 his hand, and scrutinized. 
 
 "Here," said he to his stable-boy, "pack it round with 
 soft hay, and put it in the boot at the back. There is no 
 name on it," said he. 
 
 "There are monseigneur's arms," replied the servant. 
 
 " Monseigneur ? worth his weight in gold ! Come and 
 have a short drink," said Pierrotin, with a wink, as he led 
 the way to the Cafe of the Echiquiers. "Two absinthes," 
 cried he to the waiter as they went in. "But who is your 
 master, and where is he bound? I never saw you before," 
 said Pierrotin to the servant as they clinked glasses. 
 
 " And for very good reasons," replied the footman. " My 
 master does not go your way once a year, and always then in
 
 222 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 his own carriage. He prefers the road by the Orge valley, 
 where he has the finest park near Paris, a perfect Versailles, a 
 family estate, from which he takes his name. Don't you 
 know Monsieur Moreau?" 
 
 "The steward at Presles?" said Pierrotin. 
 
 "Well, Monsieur le Comte is going to spend two days at 
 Presles." 
 
 "Oh, ho, then my passenger is the Comte de Serizy!" 
 cried Pierrotin. 
 
 "Yes, my man, no less. But, mind, he sends strict orders. 
 If you have any of the people belonging to your parts in your 
 chaise, do not mention the count's name ; he wants to travel 
 incognito, and desired me to tell you so, and promise you a 
 handsome tip." 
 
 " Hah ! and has this hide-and-seek journey anything to do, 
 by any chance, with the bargain that old Leger, the farmer 
 at les Moulineaux, wants to make?" 
 
 "I don't know," replied the man ; " but the fat is in the 
 fire. Last evening I was sent to the stables to order the 
 chaise a la Daumontj* by seven this morning, to drive to 
 Presles ; but at seven my master countermanded it. Augustin, 
 his valet, ascribes this change of plan to the visit of a lady, 
 who seemed to have come from the country." 
 
 " Can any one have had anything to say against Monsieur 
 Moreau? The best of men, the most honest, the king of 
 men, I say ! He might have made a deal more money than 
 he has done if he had chosen, take my word for it " 
 
 "Then he was very foolish," said the servant sententiously. 
 
 " Then Monsieur de Serizy is going to live at Presles at 
 last? The castle has been refurnished and done up," said 
 Pierrotin after a pause. "Is it true that two hundred thou- 
 sand francs have been spent on it already?" 
 
 " If you or I had the money that has been spent there, we 
 could set up in the world. If Madame la Comtesse goes 
 * A carriage known by this name.
 
 A START IN LIFE. 223 
 
 down there, the Moreaus' fun will be over," added the man, 
 with mysterious significance. 
 
 "A good man is Monsieur Moreau," repeated Pierrotin, 
 who was still thinking of borrowing the thousand francs from 
 the steward; "a man that makes his men work, and does not 
 spare them ; who gets all the profit out of the land, and for 
 his master's benefit too. A good man ! He often comes to 
 Paris, and always by my coach ; he gives me something hand- 
 some for myself, and always has a lot of parcels to and fro. 
 Three or four a day, sometimes for monsieur and sometimes 
 for madame ; a bill of fifty francs a month, say, only on the 
 carrier's score. Though madame holds her head a little 
 above her place, she is fond of her children ; I take them 
 to school for her and bring them home again. And she 
 always gives me five francs, and your biggest pot would not 
 do more. And whenever I have any one from them or to 
 them, I always drive right up to the gates of the house I 
 could not do less, now, could I?" 
 
 "They say that Monsieur Moreau had no more than a 
 thousand crowns in the world when Monsieur le Comte put 
 him in as land steward at Presles," said the loquacious man- 
 servant. 
 
 "But in seventeen years' time since 1806 the man must 
 have made something," replied Pierrotin. 
 
 "To be sure," said the servant, shaking his head. "And 
 masters are queer too. I hope, for Moreau' s sake, that he has 
 feathered his nest." 
 
 " I often deliver hampers at your house in the Chaussee- 
 d'Antin," said Pierrotin, "but I have never had the privilege 
 of seeing either the master or his lady." 
 
 "Monsieur le Comte is a very good sort," said the man 
 confidentially; "but if he wants you to hold your tongue 
 about his cognito, there is a screw loose you may depend. 
 At least, that is what we think at home. For why else should he 
 counterorder the traveling carriage? Why ride in a public
 
 224 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 chaise? A peer of France might take a hired chaise, you 
 would think." 
 
 " A hired chaise might cost him as much as forty francs for 
 the double journey; for, I can tell, if you don't know our 
 road, it is fit for squirrels to climb. Everlastingly up and 
 down!" said Pierrotin. "Peer of France or tradesman, 
 everybody looks at both sides of a five-franc piece. If this 
 trip means mischief to Monsieur Moreau dear, dear, I should 
 be vexed indeed if any harm came to him. By the mass ! 
 Can no way be found of warning him? For he is a real 
 good 'un, an honest sort, the king of men, I say " 
 
 " Pooh ! Monsieur le Comte is much attached to Monsieur 
 Moreau," said the other. " But if you will take a bit of good 
 advice from me, mind your own business, and let him mind 
 his. We all have quite enough to do to take care of ourselves. 
 You just do what you are asked to do ; all the more because 
 it does not pay to play fast and loose with monseigneur. 
 Add to that, the count is generous. If you oblige him that 
 much," said the man, measuring off the nail of one finger, 
 " he will reward you that much," and he stretched out his 
 arm. 
 
 This judicious hint, and yet more the illustrative figure, 
 coming from a man so high in office as the Comte de Serizy's 
 second footman, had the effect of cooling Pierrotin's zeal for 
 the steward of Presles. 
 
 "Well, good-day, Monsieur Pierrotin," said the man. 
 
 A short sketch of the previous history of the Comte de 
 Serizy and his steward is here necessary to explain the little 
 drama about to be played in Pierrotin's coach. 
 
 Monsieur Hugret de Serizy is descended in a direct line 
 from the famous President Hugret, ennobled by Francis the 
 First. They bear as arms party per pale or and sable, an 
 orle and two lozenges counterchanged. Motto, / semper 
 melius en's, which, like the two distaffs assumed as supporters,
 
 A START IN LIFE. 225 
 
 shows the modest pretense of the citizen class at a time when 
 each rank of society had its own place in the State, and also 
 the artlessness of the age in the punning motto, where eris 
 with the /at the beginning, and the final 6" of melius, repre- 
 sent the name, Serisi, of the estate, whence the title. 
 
 The present count's father was a president of Parliament 
 before the Revolution. He himself, a member of the High 
 Council of State in 1787, at the early age of two-and-twenty, 
 was favorably known for certain reports on some delicate 
 matters. He did not emigrate during the Revolution, but 
 remained on his lands of Serizy, near Arpajon, where the 
 respect felt for his father protected him from molestation. 
 
 After spending a few years in nursing the old president, 
 whom he lost in 1794, he was elected to the Council of Five 
 Hundred, and took up his legislative functions as a distraction 
 from his grief. 
 
 After the eighteenth Brumaire, Monsieur de Serizy became 
 the object as did all the families connected with the old 
 Parliament of the First Consul's attentions, and by him he 
 was appointed a councilor of State to reorganize one of the 
 most disorganized branches of the administration. Thus this 
 scion of a great historical family became one of the most 
 important wheels in the vast and admirable machinery due to 
 Napoleon. The State councilor ere long left his depart- 
 ment to be made a minister. The Emperor created him 
 count and senator, and he was proconsul to two different 
 kingdoms in succession. 
 
 In 1806, at the age of forty, he married the sister of the 
 one-time Marquis de Ronquerolles, and widow, at the age of 
 twenty, of Gaubert, one of the most distinguished of the 
 Republican generals, who left her all his wealth. This match, 
 suitable in point of rank, doubled the Comte de Serizy's 
 already considerable fortune ; he was now the brother-in-law 
 of the ci-devant Marquis de Rouvre, whom Napoleon created 
 count and appointed to be his chamberlain. 
 35
 
 226 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 In 1814, worn out with incessant work, Monsieur de Serizy 
 whose broken health needed rest, gave up all his appoint- 
 ments, left the district of which Napoleon had made him 
 governor, and came to Paris, where the Emperor was com- 
 pelled by ocular evidence to concede his claims. This inde- 
 fatigable master, who could not believe in fatigue in other 
 people, had at first supposed the necessity that prompted the 
 Comte de Serizy to be simple defection. Though the senator 
 was not in disgrace, it was said that he had cause for com- 
 plaint of Napoleon. Consequently, when the Bourbons came 
 back, Louis XVIII., whom Monsieur de Serizy acknowledged 
 as his legitimate sovereign, granted to the senator, now a peer 
 of France, the highly confidential post of steward of his privy 
 purse, and made him a minister of State. 
 
 On the 2oth March, Monsieur de S6rizy did not follow the 
 King to Ghent ; he made it known to Napoleon that he re- 
 mained faithful to the House of Bourbon, and accepted no 
 peerage during the Hundred Days, but spent that brief reign 
 on his estate of Serizy. After the Emperor's second fall, the 
 count naturally resumed his seat in the Privy Council, was one 
 of the Council of State, and liquidator on behalf of France 
 in the settlement of the indemnities demanded by foreign 
 powers. 
 
 He had no love of personal magnificence, no ambition 
 even, but exerted great influence in public affairs. No import- 
 ant political step was ever taken without his being consulted, 
 but he never went to court, and was seldom seen in his own 
 drawing-room. His noble life, devoted to work from the 
 first, ended by being perpetual work and nothing else. The 
 count rose at four in the morning in all seasons, worked till 
 midday, then took up his duties as a peer, or as vice-president 
 of the Council, and went to bed at nine. 
 
 Monsieur de Serizy had long worn the grand cross of the 
 Legion of Honor; he also had the orders of the Golden 
 Fleece, of Saint Andrew of Russia, of the Prussian Eagle ; in
 
 A START IN LIFE. 227 
 
 short, almost every order of the European Courts. No one was 
 less conspicuous or more valuable than he in the world of 
 politics. As may be supposed, to a man of his temper the 
 flourish of court favor and worldly success were a matter of 
 indifference. 
 
 But no man, unless he is a priest, can live such a life with- 
 out some strong motive ; and his mysterious conduct had its 
 key a cruel one. The count had loved his wife before he 
 married her, and in him this passion had withstood all the 
 domestic discomforts of matrimony with a widow who re- 
 mained mistress of herself, after as well as before her second 
 marriage, and who took all the more advantage of her liberty 
 because Monsieur de Serizy indulged her as a mother indulges 
 a spoilt child. Incessant work served him as a shield against 
 his heart-felt woes, buried with the care that a man engaged 
 in politics takes to hide such secrets. And he fully understood 
 how ridiculous jealousy would be in the eyes of the world, 
 which would certainly never have admitted the possibility of 
 conjugal passion in a time-worn official. 
 
 How was it that his wife had thus bewitched him from the 
 first days of marriage ? Why had he suffered in those early 
 days without taking his revenge ? Why did he no longer dare 
 to be revenged ? And why, deluded by hope, had he allowed 
 time to slip away? By what means had his young, pretty, 
 clever wife reduced him to subjection ? The answer to these 
 questions would require a long story, out of place in this 
 "Scene," and women, if not men, may be able to guess it. 
 At the same time, it may be observed that the count's inces- 
 sant work and many sorrows had unfortunately done much to 
 deprive him of the advantages indispensable to a man who has 
 to compete with unfavorable comparisons. The saddest, per- 
 haps, of all the count's secrets was the fact that his wife's repul- 
 sion was partly justified by ailments which he owed entirely to 
 overwork. Kind, nay, more than kind, to his wife, he made her 
 mistress of herself and house; she received all Paris, she went
 
 228 A START IN LIFE, 
 
 into the country, or she came back again, precisely as though 
 she were still a widow ; he took care of her money, and sup- 
 plied her luxuries as if he had been her agent. 
 
 The countess held her husband in the highest esteem ; in- 
 deed, she liked his turn of wit. Her approbation could give 
 him pleasure, and thus she could do what she liked with the 
 poor man by sitting and chatting with him for an hour. Like 
 the great nobles of former days, the count so effectually pro- 
 tected his wife that he would have regarded any slur cast 
 n her reputation as an unpardonable insult to himself. The 
 world greatly admired his character, and Madame de Serizy 
 owed much to her husband. Any other woman, even though 
 she belonged to so distinguishd a family as that of Ronque- 
 rolles, might have found herself disgraced for ever. The 
 countess was very ungrateful but charming in her ingratitude. 
 Yet from time to time she would pour a balm on the count's 
 heart-wounds. 
 
 We must now explain the cause of the minister's hurried 
 journey and wish to remain unknown. 
 
 A rich farmer of Beaumont-sur-Oise, named Leger, held a 
 farm of which the various portions were all fractions of the 
 estate owned by the count, thus impairing the splendid prop- 
 erty of Presles. The farm-lands belonged to a townsman of 
 Beaumont-sur-Oise, one Margueron. The lease he had granted 
 to Leger in 1799, at a ^ me wnen tne advance since made in 
 agriculture could not be foreseen, was nearly run out, and the 
 owner had refused Lexer's terms for renewing it. Long since, 
 Monsieur de S6rizy, wanting to be quit of the worry and 
 squabbling that come of such inclosed plots, had hoped to be 
 able to buy the farm, having heard that Monsieur Margueron's 
 sole ambition was to see his only son, a modest official, pro- 
 moted to be collector of the revenue at Senlis. 
 
 Moreau had hinted to his master that he had a dangerous 
 rival in the person of old Leger. The farmer, knowing that 
 he could run up the land to a high price by selling it piece-
 
 A START IN LIFE. 229 
 
 meal to the count, was capable of paying a sum so high as to 
 outbid the profit derivable from the collectorship to be be- 
 stowed on the younger Margueron. Two days since, the 
 count, who wanted to have done with the matter, had sent for 
 his notary, Alexandre Crottat, and Derville his solicitor, to 
 inquire into the state of the affair. Though Crottat and Der- 
 ville cast doubts on the steward's zeal and, indeed, it was a 
 puzzling letter from him that gave rise to this consultation 
 the count defended Moreau, who had, he said, served him 
 faithfully for seventeen years. 
 
 " Well," Derville replied, " I can only advise your lordship 
 to go in person to Presles and ask this Margueron to dinner. 
 Crottat will send down his head-clerk with a form of sale ready 
 drawn out, leaving blank pages or lines for the insertion of 
 descriptions of the plots and the necessary titles. Your excel- 
 lency will do well to go provided with a cheque for part of the 
 purchase-money in case of need, and not to forget the letter 
 appointing the son to the collectorship at Senlis. If you do 
 not strike on the nail, the farm will slip through your fingers. 
 You have no idea, Monsieur le Comte, of peasant cunning. 
 Given a peasant on one side and a diplomatist on the other, 
 the peasant will win the day." 
 
 Crottat confirmed this advice, which, from the footman's 
 report to Pierrotin, the count had evidently adopted. On the 
 day before, the count had sent a note to Moreau by the Beau- 
 mont diligence, desiring him to invite Margueron to dinner, 
 as he meant to come to some conclusion concerning the 
 Moulineaux farm-lands. 
 
 Before all this, the count had given orders for the restora- 
 tion of the living-rooms at Presles, and Monsieur Grindot, a 
 fashionable architect, went down there once a week. So, 
 while treating for his acquisition, Monsieur de Serizy pro- 
 posed inspecting the works at the same time and the effect of 
 the new decorations. He intended to give his wife a surprise 
 by taking her to Presles, and the restoration of the castle was
 
 230 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 a matter of pride to him. What event, then, could have hap- 
 pened that the count, who, only the day before, was intend- 
 ing to go overtly to Presles, should now wish to travel thither 
 incognito, in Pierrotin's chaise? 
 
 Here a few words are necessary as to the antecedent history 
 of the steward at Presles. 
 
 This man, Moreau, was the son of a proctor in a provincial 
 town, who at the time of the Revolution had been made a 
 magistrate (jtrocureur-syndic) at Versailles. In this position 
 the elder Moreau had been largely instrumental in saving the 
 property and life of the Serizys, father and son. Citizen 
 Moreau had belonged to the party of Danton; Robespierre, 
 implacable in revenge, hunted him down, caught him, and 
 had him executed at Versailles. The younger Moreau, in- 
 heriting his father's doctrines and attachments, got mixed up 
 in one of the conspiracies plotted against the First Consul on 
 his accession to power. Then Monsieur de Serizy, anxious to 
 pay a debt of gratitude, succeeded in effecting Moreau's escape 
 after he was condemned to death; in 1804 he asked and ob- 
 tained his pardon ; he at first found him a place in his office, 
 and afterward made him his secretary and manager of his 
 private affairs. 
 
 Some time after his patron's marriage, Moreau fell in love 
 with the countess' maid and married her. To avoid the un- 
 pleasantly false position in which he was placed by this union 
 and there were many such at the Imperial Court he asked 
 to be appointed land steward at Presles, where his wife could 
 play the lady, and where, in a neighborhood of small folk, 
 they would neither of them be hurt in their own conceits. 
 The count needed a faithful agent at Presles, because his wife 
 preferred to reside at Se'rizy, which is no more than five 
 leagues from Paris. Moreau was familiar with all his affairs, 
 and he was intelligent ; before the Revolution he had studied 
 law under his father. So Monsieur de Srizy said to him 
 
 " You will not make a fortune, for you have tied a millstone
 
 A START IN LIFE. 231 
 
 around your neck ; but you will be well off, for I will provide 
 for that." 
 
 And, in fact, the count gave Moreau a fixed salary of a 
 thousand crowns, and a pretty little lodge to live in beyond 
 the outbuildings ; he also allowed him so many cords of wood 
 a year out of the plantations for fuel, so much straw, oats, and 
 hay for two horses, and a certain proportion of the payments 
 in kind. A sub-prefect is less well off. 
 
 During the first eight years of his stewardship, Moreau 
 managed the estate conscientiously, and took an interest in 
 his work. The count, when he came down to inspect the 
 domain, to decide on purchases or sanction improvements, 
 was struck by Moreau's faithful service, and showed his appro- 
 bation by handsome presents. But when Moreau found him- 
 self the father of a girl his third child he was so completely 
 established at his ease at Presles that he forgot how greatly 
 he was indebted to Monsieur de Serizy for such unusually 
 liberal advantages. Thus in 1816, the steward, who had 
 hitherto done no more than help himself freely, accepted 
 from a wood-merchant a bonus of twenty-five thousand francs, 
 with the promise of a rise, for signing an agreement for 
 twelve years allowing the contractor to cut fire-logs in the 
 woods of Presles. Moreau argued thus : He had no promise 
 of a pension ; he was the father of a family ; the count cer- 
 tainly owed him so much by way of premium on nearly ten 
 years' service. He was already lawfully possessed of sixty 
 thousand francs in savings ; with this sum added to it he 
 could purchase for a hundred and twenty thousand a farm in 
 the vicinity of Champagne, a hamlet on the right bank of the 
 Oise a little way above 1' Isle-Adam. 
 
 The stir of politics hindered the count and the country- 
 folk from taking cognizance of this investment ; the business 
 was indeed transacted in the name of Madame Moreau, who 
 was supposed to have come into some money from an old 
 great-aunt in her own part of the country, at Saint-L6.
 
 232 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 When once the steward had tasted the delicious fruits of 
 ownership, though his conduct was still apparently honesty 
 itself, he never missed an opportunity of adding to his clan- 
 destine wealth ; the interests of his three children served as 
 an emollient to quench the ardors of his honesty, and we must 
 do him the justice to say that while he was open to a bribe, 
 took care of himself in concluding a bargain, and strained his 
 rights to the last point, he was still honest in the eye of the 
 law; no proof could have been brought in support of any 
 accusation. According to the jurisprudence of the least dis- 
 honest of Paris cooks, he shared with his master the profits 
 due to his sharp practice. This way of making a fortune was 
 a matter of conscience nothing more. Energetic, and fully 
 alive to the count's interests, Moreau looked out all the more 
 keenly for good opportunities of driving a bargain, since he 
 was sure of a handsome douceur. Presles was worth sixty-two 
 thousand francs in cash rents ; and throughout the district, 
 for ten leagues round, the saying was, " Monsieur de Serizy 
 has a second self in Moreau ! " 
 
 Moreau, like a prudent man, had, since 1817, invested his 
 salary and his profits year by year in the Funds, feathering his 
 nest in absolute secrecy. He had refused various business 
 speculations on the plea of want of money, and affected pov- 
 erty so well to the count that he had obtained two scholar- 
 ships for his boys at the College Henri IV. And, at this 
 moment, Moreau owned a hundred and twenty thousand 
 francs in reduced consols, then paying five per cent., and 
 quoted at eighty. These unacknowledged hundred and twenty 
 thousand francs, and his farm at Champagne, to which he had 
 made additions, amounted to a fortune of about two hundred 
 and eighty thousand francs, yielding an income of sixteen 
 thousand francs a year. 
 
 This, then, was the steward's position at the time when the 
 count wished to purchase the farm of les Moulineaux, of which 
 the possession had become indispensable to his comfort. This
 
 A START IN LIFE. 233 
 
 farm comprehended ninety-six plots of land, adjoining, bor- 
 dering, and marching with the estate of Presles, in many cases 
 indeed completely surrounded by the count's property, like a 
 square in the middle of a chess-board, to say nothing of the 
 dividing hedges and ditches, which gave rise to constant dis- 
 putes when a tree was to be cut down if it stood on debatable 
 ground. Any other Minister of State would have fought 
 twenty lawsuits a year over the lands of les Moulineaux. 
 
 Old Leger wanted to buy them only to sell to the count ; 
 and to make the thirty or forty thousand francs of profit he 
 hoped for, he had long been endeavoring to come to terms 
 with Moreau. Only three days before this critical Saturday, 
 Farmer Leger, driven by press of circumstances, had, standing 
 out in the fields, clearly demonstrated to the steward how he 
 could invest the Comte de Serizy's money at two and a half 
 per cent, in purchasing other plots ; that is to say, could, as 
 usual, seem to be serving the count's interests while pocketing 
 the bonus of forty thousand francs offered him on the trans- 
 action. 
 
 "And on my honor," said the steward to his wife as they 
 went to bed that evening, "if I can make fifty thousand 
 francs on the purchase of les Moulineaux for the count will 
 give me ten thousand at least we will retire to 1' Isle-Adam, 
 to the Pavilion de Nogent." 
 
 This pavilion is a charming little house built for a mistress 
 by the Prince de Conti in a style of prodigal elegance and 
 with every convenience. 
 
 " I should like that," said his wife. " The Dutchman who 
 has been living there has done it up very handsomely, and he 
 will let us have it for thirty thousand francs, since he is 
 obliged to go back to the Indies." 
 
 " It is but a stone's throw from Champagne," Moreau went 
 on. " I have hopes of being able to buy the farm and mill 
 at Mours for a hundred thousand francs. We should thus 
 have ten thousand francs a year out of land, one of the pret-
 
 234 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 tiest places in all the valley, close to our farm lands, and six 
 thousand francs a year still in the Funds." 
 
 "And why should you not apply to be appointed justice of 
 the peace at 1'Isle-Adam? It would give us importance and 
 fifteen hundred francs a year more." 
 
 "Yes, I have thought of that." 
 
 In this frame of mind, on learning that his patron was 
 coming to Presles, and wished him to invite Margueron to 
 dinner on Saturday, Moreau at once sent off a messenger, who 
 delivered a note to the count's valet too late in the evening 
 for it to be delivered to Monsieur de Serizy -, but Augustin 
 'laid it, as was usual, on his master's desk. In this letter 
 Moreau begged the count not to take so much trouble; to 
 leave the matter to his management. By his account Mar- 
 gueron no longer wished to sell the lands in one lot, but 
 talked of dividing the farm into ninety-six plots. This, at 
 any rate, he must be persuaded to give up ; and perhaps, said 
 the steward, it might be necessary to find some one to lend 
 his name as a screen. 
 
 Now, everybody has enemies. The steward of Presles and 
 his wife had given offense to a retired officer named de Rey- 
 bert and his wife. From stinging words and pin-pricks they 
 had come to daggers drawn. Monsieur de Reybert breathed 
 nothing but vengeance ; he aimed at getting Moreau deposed 
 from his place and filling it himself. These two ideas were 
 twins. Hence the agent's conduct, narrowly watched for 
 two years past, had no secrets from the Reyberts. At the 
 very time when Moreau was dispatching his letter to Monsieur 
 de Serizy, Reybert had sent his wife to Paris. Madame de 
 Reybert so strongly insisted on seeing the count, that, being 
 refused at nine in the evening, when he was going to bed, she 
 was shown into his study by seven o'clock next morning. 
 
 " Monseigneur," said she to the Minister, "my husband 
 and I are incapable of writing an anonymous letter. I am 
 Madame de Reybert, nee de Corroy. My husband has a pen-
 
 A START IN LIFE. 235 
 
 sion of no more than six hundred francs a year, and we live 
 at Presles, where your land steward exposes us to insult upon 
 insult though we are gentlefolk. Monsieur de Reybert, who 
 has no love of intrigue far from it ! retired as a Captain of 
 Artillery in 1816 after twenty years' service, but he never came 
 under the Emperor's eye, Monsieur le Comte ; and you must 
 know how slowly promotion came to those who did not serve 
 under the Master himself; and, beside, my husband's honesty 
 and plain speaking did not please his superiors. 
 
 " For three years my husband has been watching your 
 steward for the purpose of depriving him of his place. We 
 are outspoken, you see. Moreau has made us his enemies, 
 and we have kept our eyes open. I have come therefore to 
 tell you that you are being tricked in this business of the 
 Moulineaux farm lands. You are to be cheated of a hundred 
 thousand francs, which will be shared between the notary, 
 Leger, and Moreau. You have given orders that Margueron 
 is to be asked to dinner, and you intend to go to Presles 
 to-morrow ; but Margueron will be ill, and Leger is so con- 
 fident of getting the farm that he is in Paris realizing enough 
 capital. As we have enlightened you, if you want an honest 
 agent, engage my husband. Though of noble birth, he will 
 serve you as he served his country. Your steward has made 
 and saved two hundred and fifty thousand francs, so he is not 
 to be pitied." 
 
 The count thanked Madame de Reybert very coldly and 
 answered her with curt speeches, for he greatly detested an 
 informer; still, as he remembered Derville's suspicions, he 
 was shaken in his mind, and then his eye fell on Moreau's 
 letter ; he read it, and in those assurances of devotion, and 
 the respectful remonstrances as to the want of confidence 
 implied by his intention of conducting this business himself, 
 he saw the truth about Moreau. 
 
 "Corruption has come with wealth, as usual," said he to 
 himself.
 
 236 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 He had questioned Madame de Reybert less to ascertain 
 the details than to give himself time to study her, and he had 
 then written a line to his notary to desire him not to send his 
 clerk to Presles, but to go there himself and meet him at 
 dinner. 
 
 "If you should have formed a bad opinion of me, Mon- 
 sieur le Comte, for the step I have taken unknown to my hus- 
 band," said Madame Reybert in conclusion, "you must at 
 least be convinced that we have obtained our knowledge as 
 concerning your steward by perfectly natural means ; the 
 most sensitive conscience can find nothing to blame us for." 
 
 Madame de Reybert nee de Corroy held herself as straight 
 as a pikestaff. 
 
 The count's rapid survey took in a face pitted by the small- 
 pox till it looked like a colander, a lean, flat figure, a pair of 
 eager, light-colored eyes, fair curls flattened on an anxious 
 brow, a faded green silk bonnet lined with pink, a white stuff 
 dress with lilac spots, and kid shoes. Monsieur de Serizy dis- 
 cerned in her the wife of the poor gentleman ; some Puri- 
 tanical soul subscribing to the French " Courrier," glowing 
 with virtue, but very well aware of the advantages of a fixed 
 place, and coveting it. 
 
 " A pension of six hundred francs, you said ? " replied the 
 count, answering himself rather than Madame de Reybert' s 
 communication. 
 
 "Yes, Monsieur le Comte." 
 
 " You were a de Corroy ? " 
 
 " Yes, monsieur, of a noble family of the Messin country, 
 my husband's country." 
 
 "And in what regiment was Monsieur de Reybert?" 
 
 "In the yth Artillery." 
 
 " Good ! " said the count, writing down the number. 
 
 He thought he might very well place the management of 
 the estate in the hands of a retired officer, concerning whom 
 he could get the fullest information at the War Office.
 
 A START IN LIFE. 237 
 
 " Madame," he went on, ringing for his valet, " return to 
 Presles with my notary, who is to arrange to dine there to- 
 night, and to whom I have written a line of introduction ; 
 this is his address. I am going to Presles myself, but secretly, 
 and will let Monsieur de Reybert know when to call on me." 
 
 So it was not a false alarm that had startled Pierrotin with 
 the news of Monsieur de Serizy's journey in a public chaise, 
 and the warning to keep his name a secret ; he foresaw immi- 
 nent danger about to fall on one of his best customers. 
 
 On coming out of the cafe, Pierrotin perceived, at the gate 
 of the Silver Lion, the woman and youth whom his acumen 
 had recognized as travelers ; for the lady, with outstretched 
 neck and an anxious face, was evidently looking for him. 
 This lady, in a re-dyed black silk, a gray bonnet, and an old 
 French cashmere shawl, shod in open-work silk stockings and 
 kid shoes, held a flat straw basket and a bright blue umbrella. 
 She had once been handsome, and now looked about forty ; 
 and her blue eyes, bereft of the sparkle that happiness might 
 have given them, showed that she had long since renounced 
 the world. Her dress no less than her person betrayed a 
 mother entirely given up to her housekeeping and her son. 
 If the bonnet-strings were shabby, the shape of it dated from 
 three years back. Her shawl was fastened with a large broken 
 needle, converted into a pin by means of a head of sealing- 
 wax. 
 
 This person was impatiently awaiting Pierrotin to commend 
 her son to his care ; the lad was probably traveling alone for 
 the first time, and she had accompanied him as far as the 
 coach-office, as much out of mistrust as out of motherly de- 
 votion. The son was in a way supplementary to his mother; 
 and without the mother the son would have seemed less com- 
 prehensible. While the mother was content to display darned 
 gloves, the son wore an olive-green overcoat, with sleeves rather 
 short at the wrists, showing that he was still growing, as lads
 
 238 A START IN LIFE, 
 
 do between eighteen and nineteen. And his blue trousers, 
 mended by the mother, showed that they had been new-seated 
 whenever the tails of his coat parted maliciously behind. 
 
 "Do not twist your gloves up in that way," she was saying 
 when Pierrotin appeared, "you wear them shabby. Are you 
 the driver? Ah ! it is you, Pierrotin ! " she went on, leaving 
 her son for a moment and taking the coachman aside. 
 
 "All well, Madame Clapart?" said Pierrotin, with an ex- 
 pression on his face of mingled respect and familiarity. 
 
 "Yes, Pierrotin. Take good care of my Oscar j he is 
 traveling alone for the first time." 
 
 "Oh! if he is going alone to Monsieur Moreau's ?" 
 
 said Pierrotin, to discover whether it were really there that 
 the young fellow was being sent. 
 
 "Yes/' said the mother. 
 
 "Has Madame Moreau a liking for him, then?" said the 
 man, with a knowing look. 
 
 "Oh! it will not be all roses for the poor boy; but his 
 future prospects make it absolutely necessary that he should 
 go." 
 
 Pierrotin was struck by this remark, and he did not like to 
 confide his doubts concerning the steward to Madame Clapart; 
 while she, on her part, dared not offend her son by giving 
 Pierrotin such instructions as would put the coachman in the 
 position of a mentor. 
 
 During this brief hesitation on both sides, under cover of a 
 few remarks on the weather, the roads, the stopping-places on 
 the way, it will not be superfluous to explain the circumstances 
 which had thrown Pierrotin and Madame Clapart together 
 and given rise to their few words of confidential talk. Fre- 
 quently that is to say, three or four times a month Pierro- 
 tin, on his way to Paris, found the steward waiting at la Cave, 
 and as the coach came up he beckoned to a gardener, who 
 then helped Pierrotin to place on the coach one or two baskets 
 full of such fruit and vegetables as were in season, with fowls,
 
 A START IN LIFE. 233 
 
 eggs, butter, or game. Moreau always paid the carriage him- 
 self, and gave him money enough to pay the excise duties at 
 the barrier, if the baskets contained anything subject to the 
 octroi* These hampers and baskets never bore any label. 
 The first time, and once for all, the steward had given the 
 shrewd driver Madame Clapart's address by word of mouth, 
 desiring him never to trust anybody else with these precious 
 parcels. Pierrotin, dreaming of an intrigue between some 
 pretty girl and the agent, had gone as directed to No. 7 Rue 
 de la Cerisaie, near the Arsenal, where he had seen the Mad- 
 ame Clapart above described, instead of the fair young creature 
 he had expected to find. 
 
 Carriers, in the course of their day's work, are initiated 
 into many homes and trusted with many secrets; but the 
 chances of the social system a sort of deputy providence 
 having ordained that they should have no education or be 
 unendowed with the gift of observation, it follows that they 
 are not dangerous. Nevertheless, after many months Pierrotin 
 could not account to himself for the friendship between 
 Madame Clapart and Monsieur Moreau, from what little he 
 saw of the household in the Rue de la Cerisaie. Though 
 rents were not at that time high in the neighborhood of the 
 Arsenal, Madame Clapart lived on the fourth floor on the 
 inner side of a courtyard, in a house which had been in its 
 day the residence of some magnate, at a period when the 
 highest nobility in the kingdom lived on what had been the 
 site of the Palais des Tournelles and the Hotel Saint-Paul. 
 Toward the close of the sixteenth century the great families 
 spread themselves over vast plots previously occupied by the 
 King's Palace Gardens, of which the record survives in the 
 names of the streets, Rue de la Cerisaie, Rue Beautreillis, 
 Rue des Lions, and so on. This apartment, of which every 
 room was paneled with old wainscot, consisted of three 
 rooms in a row a dining-room, a drawing-room, and a bed- 
 * Collectors of duties payable on goods brought into the cities.
 
 240 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 room. Above were the kitchen and Oscar's room. Fronting 
 the door that opened on to the landing was the door of another 
 room at an angle to these, in a sort of square tower of mas- 
 sive stone built out all the way up, and containing beside a 
 wooden staircase. This tower room was where Moreau slept 
 whenever he spent a night in Paris. 
 
 Pierrotin deposited the baskets in the first room, where he 
 could see six straw-bottomed, walnut-wood chairs, a table, and 
 a sideboard ; narrow russet-brown curtains screened the win- 
 dows. Afterward, when he was admitted to the drawing- 
 room, he found it fitted with old furniture of the time of the 
 Empire, much worn ; and there was no more of it at all than 
 the landlord would insist upon as a guarantee for the rent. 
 The carved panels, painted coarsely in distemper of a dull 
 pinkish white, and in such a way as to fill up the mouldings 
 and thicken the scrolls and figures, far from being ornamental, 
 were positively depressing. The floor, which was never 
 waxed, was as dingy as the boards of a schoolroom. If the 
 carrier by chance disturbed Monsieur and Madame Clapart at 
 a meal, the plates, the glasses, the most trifling things re- 
 vealed miserable poverty ; they had plate, it is true, but the 
 dishes and tureen, chipped and riveted like those of the very 
 poor, were truly pitiable. Monsieur Clapart, in a dirty short 
 coat, with squalid slippers on his feet, and always green spec- 
 tacles to protect his eyes, as he took off a shabby peaked cap, 
 five years old at least, showed a high-pointed skull, with a few 
 dirty locks hanging about it, which a poet would have de- 
 clined to call hair. This colorless creature looked a coward, 
 and was probably a tyrant. 
 
 In this dismal apartment, facing north, with no outlook but 
 on a vine nailed out on the opposite wall, and a well in the 
 corner of the yard, Madame Clapart gave herself the airs of a 
 queen, and trod like a woman who could not go out on foot. 
 Often, as she thanked Pierrotin, she would give him a look 
 that might have touched the heart of a looker-on ; now and
 
 A START IN LIFE, 241 
 
 again she would slip a twelve-sou piece into his hand. Her 
 voice in speech was very sweet. Oscar was unknown to Pier- 
 rotin, for the boy had but just left school, and he had never 
 seen him at home. 
 
 This was the sad story which Pierrotin never could have 
 guessed, not even after questioning the gatekeeper's wife, as 
 he sometimes did for the woman knew nothing beyond the 
 fact that the Claparts' rent was but two hundred and fifty 
 francs ; that they only had a woman in to help for a few hours 
 in the morning ; that madame would sometimes do her own 
 little bit of washing, and paid for every letter as it came as if 
 she were afraid to let the account stand. 
 
 There is no such thing or, rather, there is very rarely such 
 a thing as a criminal who is bad all through. How much 
 more rare it must be to find a man who is dishonest all 
 through ! He may make up his accounts to his own advan- 
 tage rather than his master's, or pull as much hay as possible 
 to his end of the manger ; but, even while making a little for- 
 tune by illicit means, few men deny themselves the luxury of 
 some good action. If only out of curiosity, as a contrast, or 
 perhaps by chance, every man has known his hour of gener- 
 osity ; he may speak of it as a mistake, and never repeat it ; 
 still, once or twice in his life, he will have sacrificed to well- 
 doing, as the veriest lout will sacrifice to the Graces. If 
 Moreau's sins can be forgiven him, will it not be for the sake 
 of his constancy in helping a poor woman of whose favors he 
 had once been proud, and under whose roof he had found 
 refuge when in danger of his life? 
 
 This woman, famous at the time of the Directoire for her 
 connection with one of the five kings of the day, married, 
 under his powerful patronage, a contractor who made millions, 
 and then was ruined by Napoleon in 1802. This man, named 
 Husson, was driven mad by his sudden fall from opulence to 
 poverty ; he threw himself into the Seine, leaving his hand- 
 some wife expecting a child. Moreau, who was on very inti- 
 16
 
 242 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 mate terms with Madame Husson, was at the time under sen- 
 tence of death, so he could not marry the widow, and was in 
 fact obliged to leave France for a time. Madame Husson, 
 only two-and-twenty, in her utter poverty, married an official 
 named Clapart, a young man of twenty-seven a man of 
 promise, it was said. Heaven preserve women from handsome 
 men of promise ! In those days officials rose rapidly from 
 humble beginnings, for the Emperor had an eye for capable 
 men. But Clapart, vulgarly handsome, indeed, had no brains. 
 Believing Madame Husson to be very rich, he had affected a 
 great passion ; he was simply a burden to her, never able, 
 either then or later, to satisfy the habits she had acquired in 
 her days of opulence. Clapart filled badly enough a small 
 place in the Exchequer Office at a salary of not more than 
 eighteen hundred francs a year. 
 
 When Moreau came back to be with the Comte de Serizy 
 and heard of Madame Husson's desperate plight, he succeeded, 
 before his own marriage, in getting her a place as woman of 
 the bedchamber in attendance on MADAME, the Emperor's 
 mother. But in spite of such powerful patronage, Clapart 
 could never get on ; his incapacity was too immediately 
 obvious. 
 
 In 1815 the brilliant Aspasia of the Directory, ruined by 
 the Emperor's overthrow, was left with nothing to live on but 
 the salary of twelve hundred francs attached to a clerkship in 
 the municipal offices, which the Comte de Serizy's influence 
 secured for Clapart. Moreau, now the only friend of a woman 
 whom he had known as the possessor of millions, obtained for 
 Oscar Husson a half-scholarship held by the Municipality of 
 Paris in the College Henri IV., and he sent to the Rue de la 
 Cerisaie, by Pierrotin, all he could decently offer to the im- 
 poverished lady. 
 
 Oscar was his mother's one hope, her very life. The only 
 fault to be found with the poor woman was her excessive fond- 
 ness for this boy his stepfather's utter aversion. Oscar was,
 
 L A START IN LIFE. 243 
 
 unluckily, gifted with a depth of silliness which his mother 
 could never suspect, in spite of Clapart's ironical remarks. 
 This silliness or, to be accurate, this bumptiousness dis- 
 turbed Monsieur Moreau so greatly that he had begged 
 Madame Clapart to send the lad to him for a month that he 
 might judge for himself what line of life he would prove fit 
 for. The steward had some thought of introducing Oscar 
 one day to the count as his successor. 
 
 But, to give God and the devil their due, it may here be 
 observed as an excuse for Oscar's preposterous conceit that he 
 had been born under the roof of the Emperor's mother; in 
 his earliest years his eyes had been dazzled by Imperial 
 splendor. His impressible imagination had no doubt retained 
 the memory of those magnificent spectacles, and an image of 
 that golden time of festivities, with a dream of seeing them 
 again. The boastfulness common to schoolboys, all possessed 
 by desire to shine at the expense of their fellows, had in him 
 been exaggerated by these memories of his childhood ; and at 
 home perhaps his mother was rather too apt to recall with 
 complacency the days when she had been a queen of Paris 
 under the Directory. Oscar, who had just finished his studies, 
 had, no doubt, often been obliged to assert himself as superior 
 to the humiliations which the pupils who pay are always 
 ready to inflict on the "charity-boys" when the scholars 
 are not physically strong enough to impress them with their 
 superiority. 
 
 This mixture of departed splendor and faded beauty, of 
 affection resigned to poverty, of hope founded on this son, 
 and maternal blindness, with the heroic endurance of suffer- 
 ing, made this mother one of the pathetic figures which in 
 Paris deserve the notice of the observer. 
 
 Pierrotin, who, of course, could not know how truly Moreau 
 was attached to this woman, and she, on her part, to the man 
 who had protected her in 1797, and was now her only friend,
 
 244 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 would not mention to her the suspicion that had dawned in 
 his brain as to the danger which threatened Moreau. The 
 manservant's ominous speech : " We have all enough to do to 
 take care of ourselves," recurred to his mind with the instinct 
 of obedience to those whom he designated as " first in the 
 ranks." Also, at this moment Pierrotin felt as many darts 
 stinging his brain as there are five-francs pieces in a thousand 
 francs. A journey of seven leagues seemed, no doubt, quite 
 an undertaking to this poor mother, who in all her fine lady 
 existence had hardly ever been beyond the barrier ; for Pier- 
 
 rotin's replies, "Yes, madame; no, madame " again and 
 
 again, plainly showed that the man was only anxious to escape 
 from her too numerous and useless instructions. 
 
 "You will put the baggage where it cannot get wet if the 
 weather should change?" 
 
 "I have a tarpaulin," said Pierrotin; "and, you see, 
 madame, it is carefully packed away." 
 
 " Oscar, do not stay more than a fortnight, even if you are 
 pressed," Madame Clapart went on, coming back to her son. 
 "Do what you will, Madame Moreau will never take to you; 
 beside, you must get home by the end of September. We 
 are going to Belleville, you know, to your Uncle Cardot's." 
 
 " Yes, mamma." 
 
 "Above all," she added in a low tone, "never talk about 
 servants. Always remember that Madame Moreau was a 
 lady's maid " 
 
 "Yes, mamma." 
 
 Oscar, like all young people whose conceit is touchy, seemed 
 much put out by these admonitions delivered in the gateway 
 of the Silver Lion. 
 
 "Well, good-by, mamma; we shall soon be off, the horse 
 is put in." 
 
 The mother, forgeting that she was in the open street, 
 hugged her Oscar, and taking a nice little roll out of her bag 
 
 "Here," said she, "you were forgetting your bread and
 
 A START IN LIFE. 245 
 
 chocolate. Once more, my dear boy, do not eat anything at 
 the inns ; you have to pay ten times the value for the smallest 
 morsel." 
 
 Oscar wished his mother farther as she stuffed the roll and 
 the chocolate into his pocket. 
 
 There were two witnesses to the scene, two young men a 
 few years older than the newly fledged schoolboy, better 
 dressed than he, and without their mothers, their demeanor, 
 dress, and manner proclaiming the entire independence which 
 is the end of every lad's desire while still under direct mater- 
 nal government. To Oscar, at this moment, these two young 
 fellows epitomized the World. 
 
 " Mamma! says he," cried one of these strangers, with a 
 laugh. 
 
 The words reached Oscar's ears, and in an impulse of in- 
 tense irritation he shouted out 
 
 "Good-by, mother!" 
 
 It must be owned that Madame Clapart spoke rather too 
 loud, and seemed to admit the passers-by to bear witness to 
 her affectionate care. 
 
 "What on earth ails you, Oscar?" said the poor woman, 
 much hurt. " I do not understand you," she added severely, 
 fancying she could thus inspire him with respect a common 
 mistake with women who spoil their children. " Listen, dear 
 Oscar," she went on, resuming her coaxing gentleness, "you 
 have a propensity for talking to everybody, telling everything 
 you know and everything you don't know out of brag and a 
 young man's foolish self-conceit. I beg you once more to 
 bridle your tongue. You have not seen enough of life, my 
 dearest treasure, to gauge the people you may meet, and there 
 is nothing more dangerous than talking at random in a public 
 conveyance. In a diligence well-bred persons keep silence." 
 
 The two young men, who had, no doubt, walked to the end 
 of the yard and back, now made the sound of their boots 
 heard once more under the gateway ; they might have heard
 
 246 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 this little lecture ; and so, to be quit of his mother, Oscar 
 took heroic measures, showing how much self-esteem can 
 stimulate the inventive powers. 
 
 "Mamma," said he, "you are standing in a thorough 
 draught, you will catch cold. Beside, I must take my place." 
 
 The lad had touched some tender chord, for his mother 
 clasped him in her arms as if he were starting on some long 
 voyage, and saw him into the chaise with tears in her eyes. 
 
 "Do not forget to give five francs to the servants," said 
 she. "And write to me at least three times in the course of 
 the fortnight. Behave discreetly, and remember all my in- 
 structions. You have enough linen to need none being 
 washed. And, above all, remember all Monsieur Moreau's 
 kindness; listen to him as to a father and follow his advice." 
 
 As he got into the chaise Oscar displayed a pair of blue 
 stockings as his trousers slipped up, and the new seat to his 
 trousers as his coat-tails parted. And the smile on the faces 
 of the two young men, who did not fail to see these evidences 
 of honorable poverty, was a fresh blow to Oscar's self-esteem. 
 
 "Oscar's place is No. i," said Madame Clapart to Pier- 
 rotin. " Settle yourself in the corner," she went on, still 
 gazing at her son with tender affection. 
 
 Oh ! how much Oscar regretted his mother's beauty, spoilt 
 by misfortune and sorrow, and the poverty and self-sacrifice 
 that hindered her from being nicely dressed. One of the 
 youngsters the one who wore boots and spurs nudged the 
 other with his elbow to point out Oscar's mother, and the 
 other twirled his mustache with an air, as much as to say : "A 
 rather neat figure ! " 
 
 "How am I to get rid of my mother?" thought Oscar, 
 looking quite anxious. 
 
 "What is the matter?" said Madame Clapart. 
 
 Oscar pretended not to hear, the wretch ! And, perhaps, 
 under the circumstances, Madame Clapart showed want of 
 tact ; but an absorbing passion is so selfish !
 
 A START IN LIFE. 247 
 
 " Georges, do you like traveling with children ? " asked one 
 of the young men of his friend. 
 
 " Yes, if they are weaned, and are called Oscar, and have 
 chocolate to eat, my dear Amaury." 
 
 These remarks were exchanged in an undertone, leaving 
 Oscar free to hear or not to hear them. His manner would 
 show the young man what he might venture on with the lad 
 to amuse himself in the course of the journey. Oscar would 
 not hear. He looked round to see whether his mother, who 
 weighed on him like a nightmare, was still waiting ; but, in- 
 deed, he knew she was too fond of him to have deserted him 
 yet. He not only involuntarily compared his traveling com- 
 panion's dress with his own, but he also felt that his mother's 
 costume counted for something as provoking the young men's 
 mocking smile. 
 
 " If only they would go ! " thought he. 
 
 Alas ! Amaury had just said to Georges as he struck the 
 wheel of the chaise with his cane 
 
 "And you are prepared to trust your future career on board 
 this frail vessel ? ' ' 
 
 " Need must ! " replied Georges in a fateful tone. 
 
 Oscar heaved a sigh as he noted the youth's hat, cocked 
 cavalierly over one ear to show a fine head of fair hair elab- 
 orately curled, while he, by his stepfather's orders, wore his 
 black hair in a brush above his forehead, cut quite short like 
 a soldier's. The vain boy's face was round and chubby, 
 bright with the color of vigorous health ; that of " Georges" 
 was long, delicate, and pale. This young man had a broad 
 brow, and his chest filled out a shawl-pattern vest. As Oscar 
 admired his tightly fitting iron-gray trousers and his overcoat, 
 sitting closely to the figure, with Brandenburg braiding and 
 oval buttons, he felt as if the romantic stranger, blessed with 
 so many advantages, were making an unfair display of his 
 superiority, just as an ugly woman is offended by the mere 
 sight of a beauty. The ring of his spurred boot-heels, which
 
 248 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 the young man accentuated rather too much for Oscar's liking, 
 went to the boy's heart. In short, Oscar was as uncomfortable 
 in his clothes, home-made perhaps out of his stepfather's old 
 ones, as the other enviable youth was satisfied in his. 
 
 " That fellow must have ten francs at least in his pocket," 
 thought Oscar. 
 
 The stranger, happening to turn round, what were Oscar's 
 feelings when he discerned a gold chain about his neck with 
 a gold watch, no doubt, at the end of it. 
 
 Living in the Rue de la Cerisaie since 1815, taken to and 
 from school on his holidays by his stepfather Clapart, Oscar 
 had never had any standard of comparison but his mother's 
 poverty-stricken household. Kept very strictly, by Moreau's 
 advice, he rarely went to the play, and then aspired no higher 
 than to the Ambigu-Comique, where little elegance met his 
 gaze, even if the absorbed attention a boy devotes to the stage 
 had allowed him to study the house. His stepfather still wore 
 his watch in a fob in the fashion of the Empire, with a heavy 
 gold chain hanging over his stomach, and ending in a bunch 
 of miscellaneous objects seals, and a watch-key with a flat 
 round top, in which was set a landscape in mosaic. Oscar, 
 who looked on this out-of-date splendor as the ne plus ultra 
 of luxury, was quite bewildered by this revelation of superior 
 and less ponderous elegance. The young man also made an 
 insolent display of a pair of good gloves, and seemed bent on 
 blinding Oscar by his graceful handling of a smart cane with 
 a gold knob. 
 
 Oscar had just reached the final stage of boyhood in which 
 trifles are the cause of great joys and great anguish, when a 
 real misfortune seems preferable to a ridiculous costume ; and 
 vanity, having no great interests in life to absorb it, centres 
 in frivolities, and dress, and the anxiety to be thought a man. 
 The youth magnifies himself, and his self-assertion is all the 
 more marked because it turns on trifles ; still, though he 
 envies a well-dressed noodle, he can be also fired with enthu-
 
 A START IN LIPE. 249 
 
 siasra for talent, and admire a man of genius. His faults, 
 when they are not rooted in his heart, only show the exuber- 
 ance of vitality and a lavish imagination. When a boy of 
 nineteen, an only son, austerely brought up at home as a 
 result of the poverty that weighs so cruelly on a clerk with 
 twelve hundred francs' salary, but worshiped by a mother, 
 who for his sake endures the bitterest privations when such 
 a boy is dazzled by a youth of two-and-twenty, envies him his 
 frogged coat lined with silk, his sham cashmere vest, and a 
 tie slipped through a vulgar ring, is not this a mere peccadillo 
 such as may be seen in every class of life in the inferior who 
 envies his betters? 
 
 Even a man of genius yields to this primitive passion. Did 
 not Rousseau of Geneva envy Venture and Bade? 
 
 But Oscar went on from the peccadillo to the real fault ; 
 he felt humiliated ; he owed his traveling companion a grudge ; 
 and a secret desire surged up in his heart to show him that he 
 was as good a man as he. 
 
 The two young bucks walked to and fro, from the gateway 
 fi^the stables and back, going out to the street ; and, as they 
 turned on their heel, they each time looked at Oscar ensconced 
 in his corner. Oscar, convinced that whenever they laughed 
 it was at him, affected profound indifference. He began to 
 hum the tune of a song then in fashion among the Liberals, 
 " C* est la faute a Voltaire, c'est la faute a Rousseau." (It is 
 all the fault of Voltaire and Rousseau.) This assumption, no 
 doubt, made them take him for some underling lawyer's 
 clerk. 
 
 " Why, perhaps he sings in the chorus at the opera ! " said 
 Amaury. 
 
 Exasperated this time, Oscar bounded in his seat ; raising 
 the back curtain, he said to Pierrotin 
 
 " When are we to be off? " 
 
 " Directly," said the man, who had his whip in his hand, 
 but his eyes fixed on the Rue d'Enghien.
 
 250 A START IN LIFE, 
 
 The scene was now enlivened by the arrival of a young 
 man escorted by a perfect pickle of a boy, who appeared with 
 a porter at their heels hauling a barrow by a strap. The young 
 man spoke confidentially to Pierrotin, who wagged his head 
 and hailed his stableman. The man hurried up to help unload 
 the barrow, which contained, beside two trunks, pails, brushes, 
 and boxes of strange shape, a mass of packets and utensils, 
 which the younger of the two new-comers who had climbed 
 to the box-seat stowed and packed away with such expedition 
 that Oscar, smiling at his mother, who was now watching him 
 from the other side of the street, failed to see any of the 
 paraphernalia which might have explained to him in what 
 profession his traveling companions were employed. The 
 boy, about sixteen years of age, wore a holland blouse with a 
 patent-leather belt ; his cap, knowingly stuck on one side, 
 proclaimed him a merry youth, as did the picturesque disorder 
 of his curly brown hair tumbling about his shoulders. A 
 black silk tie marked a black line on a very white neck, and 
 seemed to heighten the brightness of his gray eyes. The restless 
 vivacity of a sunburnt, rosy face, the shape of his full lips, 
 his prominent ears, and his turn-up nose every feature of his 
 face showed the bantering wit of a Figaro and the recklessness 
 of youth, while the quickness of his gestures and saucy 
 glances revealed a keen intelligence, early developed by the 
 practice of a profession taken up in boyhood. This boy, 
 whom art or nature had already made a man, seemed in- 
 different to the question of dress, as though he were conscious 
 of some intrinsic moral worth ; for he looked at his unpolished 
 boots as if he thought them rather a joke, and at his plain 
 drill trousers to note the stains on them, but rather to study 
 the effect than to hide them. 
 
 " I have acquired a fine tone ! " said he, giving himself a 
 shake, and addressing his companion. 
 
 The expression of the senior showed some authority over 
 this youngster, in whom experienced eyes would at once have
 
 A START IN LIFE. 251 
 
 discerned the jolly art student, known in French studio slang 
 as a rapin. 
 
 "Behave, Mistigris ! "* replied the master, calling him no 
 doubt by a nickname bestowed on him in the studio. 
 
 The elder traveler was a slight and pallid young fellow, 
 with immensely thick black hair in quite fantastic disorder ; 
 but this abundant hair seemed naturally necessary to a very 
 large head with a powerful forehead that spoke of precocious 
 intelligence. His curiously puckered face, too peculiar to be 
 called ugly, was as hollow as though this singular young man 
 were suffering either from some chronic malady or from the 
 privations of extreme poverty which is indeed a terrible 
 chronic malady or from sorrows too recent to have been for- 
 gotten. 
 
 His clothes, almost in keeping with those of Mistigris in 
 proportion to his age and dignity, consisted of a much-worn 
 coat of a dull green color, shabby, but quite clean and well 
 brtohed, a black vest buttoned to the neck, as the coat was 
 too, only just showing a red handkerchief round his throat. 
 Black trousers, as shabby as the coat, hung loosely round his 
 lean legs. His boots were muddy, showing that he had come 
 far, and on foot. With one swift glance the artist took in the 
 depths of the hostelry of the Silver Lion, the stables, the tones 
 of color, and every detail, and he looked at Mistigris, who had 
 imitated him, with an ironical twinkle. 
 
 " Rather nice ! " said Mistigris. 
 
 "Yes, very nice," replied the other. 
 
 "We are still too early," said Mistigris. "Couldn't we 
 snatch a toothful? My stomach, like all nature, abhors a 
 vacuum ! " 
 
 " Have we time to get a cup of coffee ? " said the artist, in 
 a pleasant voice, to Pierrotin. 
 
 "Well, don't be long," said Pierrotin. 
 
 " We have a quarter of an hour," added Mistigris, thus re- 
 
 * The ace of clubs in the game of mouche.
 
 252 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 vealing the genius for inference, which is characteristic of the 
 Paris art student. 
 
 The couple disappeared. Just then nine o'clock struck in 
 the inn kitchen. Georges thought it only fair and reasonable 
 to appeal to Pierrotin. 
 
 " I say, my good friend, when you are the proud possessor 
 of such a shandrydan as this," and he rapped the wheel with 
 his cane, "you should at least make a merit of punctuality. 
 The deuce is in it ! we do not ride in that machine for our 
 pleasure, and business must be devilish pressing before we trust 
 our precious selves in it ! And that old hack you call Rougeot 
 will certainly not pick up lost time ! " 
 
 " We will harness on Bichette while those two gentlemen 
 are drinking their coffee," replied Pierrotin. " Go on, you," 
 he added to the stableman, "and see if old Leger means to 
 come with us " 
 
 " Where is your old Leger? " asked Georges. 
 
 " Just opposite at Number 50; he couldn't find room in the 
 Beaumont coach," said Pierrotin to his man, paying no heed 
 to Georges, and going off himself in search of Bichette. 
 
 Georges shook hands with his friend and got into the chaise, 
 after tossing in a large portfolio, with an air of much im- 
 portance; this he placed under the cushion. He took the 
 opposite corner to Oscar. 
 
 "This ' old Leger ' bothers me," said he. 
 
 "They cannot deprive us of our places," said Oscar. 
 "Mine is No. i." 
 
 "And mine No. 2," replied Georges. 
 
 Just as Pierrotin reappeared, leading Bichette, the stable- 
 man returned, having in tow a huge man weighing about two 
 hundred and forty pounds, apparently. 
 
 Old Leger was of the class of farmer who, with an enormous 
 stomach and broad shoulders, wears a powdered queue and 
 a light coat of blue linen. His white gaiters were tightly 
 strapped above the knee over corduroy breeches, and finished
 
 A START IN LIFE. 253 
 
 off with silver buckles. His hobnailed shoes weighed each a 
 couple of pounds. In his hand he carried a little, knotted 
 red cane, very shiny, and with a heavy knob, secured round 
 his wrist by a leather thong. 
 
 "And is it you who are known as old Leger?"* said 
 Georges gravely as the farmer tried to lift his foot to the step 
 of the chaise. 
 
 "At your service," said the farmer, showing him a face 
 rather like that of Louis XVIII., with a fat, red jowl, while 
 above it rose a nose which in any other face would have 
 seemed enormous. His twinkling eyes were deep set in rolls 
 of fat. 
 
 " Come, lend a hand, my boy," said he to Pierrotin. 
 
 The farmer was hoisted in by the driver and the stableman 
 to a shout of " Yo, heave ho ! " from Georges. 
 
 " Oh ! I am not going far ; I am only going to la Cave ! " 
 said Farmer Light, answering a jest with good humor. In 
 France everybody understands a joke. 
 
 "Get into the corner," said Pierrotin. "There will be 
 six of you." 
 
 " And your other horse ? " asked Georges. " Is it as fabu- 
 lous as the third horse of a post-chaise ? " 
 
 "There it is, master," said Pierrotin, pointing to the little 
 mare that had come up without calling. 
 
 " He calls that insect a horse ! " said Georges, astonished. 
 
 " Oh, she is a good one to go, is that little mare," said the 
 farmer, who had taken his seat. " Morning, gentlemen. 
 Are we going to weigh anchor, Pierrotin ? " 
 
 " Two of my travelers are getting a cup of coffee," said the 
 driver. 
 
 The young man with the hollow cheeks and his follower 
 now reappeared. 
 
 " Come, let us get off," was now the universal cry. 
 
 "We are off we are off!" replied Pierrotin. "Let her 
 
 * Leger light.
 
 254 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 go," he added to his man, who kicked away the stones that 
 scotched the wheels. 
 
 Pierrotin took hold of Rougeot's bridle with an encourag- 
 ing " Tclk, telk" to warn the two steeds to pull themselves 
 together ; and, torpid as they evidently were, they started 
 the vehicle, which Pierrotin brought to a standstill in front 
 of the gate of the Silver Lion. After this purely preliminary 
 manoeuvre, he again looked down the Rue d'Enghien, and 
 vanished, leaving the conveyance in the care of the stableman. 
 
 "Well ! Is your governor subject to these attacks? " Mis- 
 tigris asked of the man. 
 
 " He is gone to fetch his oats away from the stable," 
 replied the Auvergnat, who was up to all the arts in use to 
 pacify the impatience of travelers. 
 
 "After all," said Mistigris, "time is a great plaster. 1 ' 
 
 At that time there was in the Paris studios a mania for dis- 
 torting proverbs. It was considered a triumph to hit on some 
 change of letters or some rhyming word which should suggest 
 an absurd meaning, or even make it absolute nonsense.* 
 
 "And Paris was not gilt in a play," replied his comrade. 
 
 Pierrotin now returned, accompanied by the Comte de 
 Serizy, round the corner of the Rue de 1'Echiquier ; they had 
 no doubt had a short conversation. 
 
 " Pere Leger, would you mind giving your place up to Mon- 
 sieur le Comte? It will trim the chaise better." 
 
 " And we shall not be off for an hour yet if you go on like 
 this," said Georges. "You will have to take out that infernal 
 bar we have had such plaguey trouble to fit in, and everybody 
 will have to get out for the last comer. Each of us has a 
 right to the place he booked. What number is this gentle- 
 man's? Come, call them over. Have you a way-bill? Do 
 you keep a book ? Which is Monsieur le Comte's place ? 
 Count of what?" 
 
 * To translate these not always funny jests is impossible. I have gen- 
 erally tried for no more than an equivalent rendering. TRANSLATOR.
 
 A START IN LIFE. 255 
 
 "Monsieur le Comte," said Pierrotin, visibly disturbed, 
 "you will not be comfortable." 
 
 " Can't you count, man? " said Mistigris. " Short counts 
 make tall friends." 
 
 " Mistigris, behave ! " said his master quite seriously. 
 
 Monsieur de Serizy was supposed by his fellow-travelers to 
 be some respectable citizen called Lecomte. 
 
 "Do not disturb anybody," said the count to Pierrotin; 
 " I will sit in front by you." 
 
 "Now, Mistigris," said the young artist, "remember the 
 respect due to age. You don't know how dreadfully old you 
 may live to be. Manners take the van. Give up your place 
 to the gentleman." 
 
 Mistigris opened the apron of the chaise, and jumped out 
 as nimbly as a frog into the water. 
 
 " You cannot sit as rabbit, august old man ! " said he to 
 Monsieur de Serizy. 
 
 "Mistigris, Tarts are the end of man" said his master. 
 
 "Thank you, monsieur," said the count to the artist, by 
 whose side he now took his seat. And the statesman looked 
 with a sagacious eye at the possessors of the back seat, in a 
 way that deeply aggrieved Oscar and Georges. 
 
 "We are an hour and a quarter behind time," remarked 
 Oscar. 
 
 "People who want a chaise to themselves should book all 
 the places," added Georges. 
 
 The Comte de Serizy, quite sure now that he was not recog- 
 nized, made no reply, but sat with the expression of a good- 
 natured tradesman. 
 
 " And if you had been late, you would have liked us to 
 wait for you, I suppose? " said the farmer to the two young 
 fellows. 
 
 Pierrotin was looking out toward the Porte Saint-Denis, and 
 paused for a moment before mounting to the hard box-seat, 
 where Mistigris was kicking his heels.
 
 256 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 11 If you are still waiting for somebody, I am not the last," 
 remarked the count. 
 
 "That is sound reasoning," said Mistigris. 
 
 Georges and Oscar laughed very rudely. 
 
 "The old gentleman is not strikingly original," said 
 Georges to Oscar, who was enchanted with this apparent 
 alliance. 
 
 When Pierrotin had settled himself in his place, he again 
 looked back, but failed to discern in the crowd the two trav- 
 elers who were wanting to fill up his cargo. 
 
 "By the mass, but a couple more passengers would not 
 come amiss," said he. 
 
 "Look here, I have not paid; I shall get right out," said 
 Georges in alarm. 
 
 "Why, whom do you expect, Pierrotin?" said Leger. 
 
 Pierrotin cried " Gee ! " in a particular tone, which Rou- 
 geot and Bichette knew to mean business at last, and they 
 trotted off toward the hill at a brisk pace, which, however, 
 soon grew slack. 
 
 The count had a very red face, quite scarlet indeed, with 
 an inflamed spot here and there, and set off all the more by 
 his perfectly white hair. By any but quite young men this 
 complexion would have been understood as the inflammatory 
 effect on the blood of incessant work. And, indeed, these 
 angry pimples so much disfigured his really noble face that 
 only close inspection could discern in his greenish eyes all 
 the acumen of the judge, the subtlety of the statesman, and 
 the learning of the legislator. His face was somewhat flat; 
 the nose especially looked as if it had been flattened. His 
 hat hid the breadth and beauty of his brow ; and, in fact, there 
 was some justification for the laughter of these heedless lads, 
 in the strange contrast between hair as white as silver and 
 thick, bushy eyebrows still quite black. The count, who 
 wore a long, blue overcoat, buttoned to the chin in military
 
 A START IN LIFE. 267 
 
 fashion, had a white handkerchief round his neck, cotton- 
 wool in his ears, and a high shirt-collar, showing a square 
 white corner on each cheek. His black trousers covered his 
 boots, of which the tip scarcely showed ; he had no ribbon at 
 his buttonhole, and his hands were hidden by his doeskin 
 gloves. Certainly there was nothing in this man which could 
 betray to the lads that he was a peer of France, and one of 
 the most useful men living to his country. 
 
 Old Pere L^ger had never seen the count, who, on the other 
 hand, knew him only by name. Though the count, as he 
 got into the chaise, cast about him the inquiring glance which 
 had so much annoyed Oscar and Georges, it was because he 
 was looking for his notary's clerk, intending to impress on 
 him the need for the greatest secrecy in case he should have 
 been compelled to travel, like himself, by Pierrotin's convey- 
 ance. But he was reassured by Oscar's appearance and by 
 that of the old farmer, and, above all, by the air of aping the 
 military, with his mustache and his style generally, which 
 stamped Georges an adventurer ; and he concluded that his 
 note had reached Maitre Alexandre Crottat in good time. 
 
 " Pere Leger," said Pierrotin as they came to the steep hill 
 in the Faubourg Saint-Denis, at the Rue de la Fidelite, "sup- 
 pose we were to walk a bit, heh? " On hearing the name, 
 the count observed 
 
 " I will get out too ; we must ease the horses." 
 
 "Oh! If you go on at this rate, we shall do fourteen 
 miles in fifteen days ! " exclaimed Georges. 
 
 "Well, is it any fault of mine," said Pierrotin, "if a 
 passenger wishes to get out ? " 
 
 " I will give you ten louis if you keep my secret as I bid 
 you," said the count, taking Pierrotin by the arm. 
 
 " Oh, ho ! My thousand francs ! " thought Pierrotin, after 
 giving Monsieur de Srizy a wink, conveying, " Trust me ! " 
 
 Oscar and Georges remained in the chaise. 
 
 "Look here, Pierrotin since Pierrotin you are," cried 
 17
 
 258 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 Georges, when the travelers had gotten into the chaise again at 
 the top of the hill, " if you are going no faster than this, say 
 so. I will pay my fare to Saint-Denis, and hire a nag there, 
 for I have important business on hand, which will suffer from 
 delay." 
 
 "Oh! he will get on, never fear," replied the farmer. 
 "And the road is not a long one." 
 
 "I am never more than half an hour late," answered Pier- 
 rotin. 
 
 " Well, well, you are not carting the pope, I suppose," said 
 Georges, " so hurry up a little." 
 
 "You ought not to show any favor," said Mistigris; " and 
 if you are afraid of jolting this gentleman " and he indicated 
 the count " that is not fair." 
 
 "All men are equal in the eye of the coucou" said Georges, 
 "as all Frenchmen are in the eye of the Charter." 
 
 "Be quite easy," said old Leger, "we shall be at la Cha- 
 pelle yet before noon." La Chapelle is a village close to the 
 Barriere Saint-Denis. 
 
 Those who have traveled know that persons thrown together 
 in a public conveyance do not immediately amalgamate; 
 unless under exceptional circumstances, they do not converse 
 till they are well on their way. This silent interval is spent 
 partly in reciprocal examination, and partly in finding each 
 his own place and taking possession of it. The soul, as much 
 as the body, needs to find its balance. When each, severally, 
 supposes that he has made an accurate guess at his companion's 
 age, profession, and temper, the most talkative first opens a 
 conversation, which is taken up all the more eagerly because 
 all feel the need for cheering the way and dispelling the dull- 
 ness. 
 
 This, at least, is what happens in a French coach. In 
 other countries manners are different. The English pride 
 themselves on never opening their lips ; a German is dull in a 
 coach ; Italians are too cautious to chat ; the Spaniards have
 
 A START IN LIFE. 259 
 
 almost ceased to have any coaches ; and the Russians have no 
 roads. So it is only in the ponderous French diligence that 
 the passengers amuse each other, in the gay and gossiping 
 nation where each one is eager to laugh and display his humor, 
 where everything is enlivened by raillery, from the misery of 
 the poorest to the solid interests of the upper middle-class. 
 The police do little to check the license of speech, and the 
 gallery of the Chambers has made discussion fashionable. 
 
 When a youngster of two-and-twenty, like the young gen- 
 tleman who was known so far by the name of Georges, has a 
 ready wit, he is strongly tempted, especially in such circum- 
 stances as these, to be reckless in the use of it. In the first 
 place, Georges was not slow to come to the conclusion that he 
 was the superior man of the party. He decided that the count 
 was a manufacturer of the second class, setting him down as a 
 cutler; the shabby-looking youth attended by Mistigris he 
 thought but a greenhorn, Oscar a perfect simpleton, and the 
 farmer a capital butt for a practical joke. Having thus taken 
 the measure of all his traveling companions, he determined to 
 amuse himself at their expense. 
 
 " Now," thought he, as the coucou rolled down the hill from 
 la Chapelle toward the plain of Saint-Denis, ''shall I pass 
 myself off as Etienne or as Beranger? No, these bumpkins 
 have never heard of either. A Carbonaro ? The devil ! I 
 might be nabbed. One of Marshal Ney's sons ? Pooh, what 
 could I make of that ? Tell them the story of my father's 
 death ? That would hardly be funny. Suppose I were to have 
 come back from the Government colony in America? They 
 might take me for a spy, and regard me with suspicion. I 
 will be a Russian prince in disguise ; I will cram them with 
 fine stories about the Emperor Alexander ! Or if I pretended 
 to be Cousin, the Professor of Philosophy? How I could 
 mystify them ! No, that limp creature with the towzled hair 
 looks as if he might have kicked his heels at lecture at the 
 Sorbonne. Oh, why didn't I think sooner of trotting them
 
 260 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 out ? I can imitate an Englishman so well, I might have been 
 Lord Byron traveling incog. Hang it ! I have missed my 
 chance. The executioner's son ? Not a bad way of clearing 
 a space at breakfast. Oh ! I know ! I will have been in 
 command of the troops under Ali, the Pasha of Janina." 
 
 While he was lost in these meditations, the chaise was 
 making its way through the clouds of dust which constantly 
 blow up from the side-paths of this much-trodden road. 
 
 " What a dust ! " said Mistigris. 
 
 "King Henri is dead," retorted his comrade. "If you 
 said it smelt of vanilla now, you would hit on a new idea ! " 
 
 "You think that funny," said Mistigris. "Well, but it does 
 now and then remind me of vanilla." 
 
 "In the East " Georges began, meaning to concoct a 
 
 story. 
 
 "In the least " said Mistigris' master, taking up 
 
 Georges. 
 
 " In the East, I said, from whence I have just returned," 
 Georges repeated, " the dust smells very sweet. But here it 
 smells of nothing unless it is wafted up from such a manure- 
 heap as this." 
 
 "You have just returned from the East?" said Mistigris, 
 with a sly twinkle. 
 
 "And, you see, Mistigwis, the gentleman is so tired that 
 what he now wequires is west," drawled his master. 
 
 " You are not much sunburnt," said Mistigris. 
 
 " Oh ! I am but just out of bed after three months' illness, 
 caused, the learned doctors say, by an attack of suppressed 
 plague. ' ' 
 
 "You have had the plague? " cried the count, with a look 
 of horror. " Pierrotin, put me out." 
 
 "Get on, Pierrotin," said Mistigris. "You hear that the 
 plague was suppressed," he went on, addressing Monsieur de 
 Serizy. " It was the sort of plague that only comes out in 
 the course of conversation."
 
 A START IN LIFE. 261 
 
 " The plague of which one merely says, ' Plague take it ! ' " 
 cried the artist. 
 
 " Or plague take the man ! " added Mistigris. 
 
 " Mistigris," said his master, " I shall put you out to walk 
 if you get into mischief. So you have been in the East, 
 monsieur? " he went on, turning to Georges. 
 
 " Yes, monsieur. First in Egypt and then in Greece, 
 where I served under Ali Pasha of Janina, with whom I had a 
 desperate row. The climate is too much for most men ; and 
 the excitements of all kinds that are part of an Oriental life 
 wrecked my liver." 
 
 "Oh, ho, a soldier?" said the burly farmer. "Why, 
 how old are you?" 
 
 "I am nine-and-twenty," said Georges, and all his fellow- 
 travelers looked at him. "At eighteen I served as a private 
 in the famous campaign of 1813; but I only was present at 
 the battle of Hanau, where I won the rank of sergeant-major. 
 In France, at Montereau, I was made sub-lieutenant, and I 
 was decorated by no spies here? by the Emperor." 
 
 "And you do not wear the cross of your order?" said 
 Oscar. 
 
 " A cross given by the present set ?* Thank you for nothing. 
 Beside, who that is anybody wears his decorations when 
 traveling? Look at monsieur," he went on, indicating the 
 Comte de Serizy, " I will bet you anything you please " 
 
 " Betting anything you please is the same thing in France 
 as not betting at all," said Mistigris' master. 
 
 " I will bet you anything you please," Georges repeated 
 pompously, " that he is covered with stars." 
 
 "I have, in fact," said Monsieur de Serizy, with a laugh, 
 "the Grand Cross of the Legion of Honor, the Grand Cross 
 of Saint- Andrew of Russia, of the Eagle of Prussia, of the 
 Order of the Annunciada of Sardinia, and of the Golden 
 
 Fleece." 
 
 * Ceux-ci.
 
 262 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 " Is that all ? " said Mistigris. "And it all rides in a public 
 chaise? " 
 
 " He is going it, is the brick-red man?" said Georges in a 
 whisper to Oscar. "What did I tell you?" he remarked 
 aloud. " I make no secret of it, I am devoted to the 
 Emperor ! " 
 
 " I served under him," said the count. 
 
 " And what a man ! Wasn't he ? " cried Georges. 
 
 "A man to whom I am under great obligations," replied 
 the count, with a well-affected air of stupidity. 
 
 " For your crosses ? " asked Mistigris. 
 
 " And what quantities of snuff he took ! " replied Monsieur 
 de Serizy. 
 
 " Yes, he carried it loose in his waistcoat pockets." 
 
 "Sol have been told," said the farmer, with a look of 
 incredulity. 
 
 "And not only that, but he chewed and smoked," Georges 
 went on. " I saw him smoking in the oddest way at Water- 
 loo when Marshal Soult lifted him up bodily and flung him 
 into his traveling carriage, just as he had seized a musket and 
 wanted to charge the English ! " 
 
 "So you were at Waterloo?" said Oscar, opening his eyes 
 very wide. 
 
 "Yes, young man, I went through the campaign of 1815. 
 At Mont Saint-Jean I was made captain, and I retired on the 
 Loire when we were disbanded. But, on my honor, I was 
 sick of France, and I could not stay. No, I should have got 
 myself into some scrape. So I went off with two or three 
 others of the same sort, Selves, Besson, and some more, who 
 are in Egypt to this day in the service of Mohammed Pasha, 
 and a queer fellow he is, I can tell you ! He was a tobacco- 
 nist at la Cavalle, and is now on the way to be a reigning 
 prince. You have seen him in Horace Vernet's picture of the 
 'Massacre of the Mamelukes.' Such a handsome man ! I 
 never would abjure the faith of my fathers and adopt Islam ;
 
 A START IN LIFE. 263 
 
 all the more because the ceremony involves a surgical opera- 
 tion for which I had no liking. Beside, no one respects a 
 renegade. If they had offered me a hundred thousand francs 
 a year, then, indeed and yet no. The pasha made me a 
 present of a thousand talari." 
 
 " How much is that? " asked Oscar, who was all ears. 
 
 "Oh, no great matter. The talaro is much the same as a 
 five-franc piece. And, on my honor, I did not earn enough 
 to pay for the vices I learned in that thundering vile country 
 if you can call it a country. I cannot live now without 
 smoking my narghileh twice a day, and it is very expensive 
 and " 
 
 "And what is Egypt like? " asked Monsieur de Serizy. 
 
 "Egypt is all sand," replied Georges, quite undaunted. 
 "There is nothing green but the Nile valley. Draw a green 
 strip on a sheet of yellow paper, and there you have Egypt. 
 The Egyptians, the fellaheen, have, I may remark, one great 
 advantage over us ; there are no gendarmes. You may go 
 from one end of Egypt to the other, and you will not find 
 one." 
 
 "But I suppose there are a good many Egyptians," said 
 Mistigris. 
 
 "Not so many as you would think," answered Georges. 
 " There are more Abyssinians, Giaours, Vechabites, Bedouins, 
 and Copts. However, all these creatures are so very far from 
 amusing that I was only too glad to embark on a Genoese 
 polacra, bound for the Ionian Islands to take up powder and 
 ammunition for Ali of Tebelen. As you know, the English 
 sell powder and ammunition to all nations, to the Turks and 
 the Greeks; they would sell them to the devil if the devil 
 had money. So from Zante we were to luff up to the coast of 
 Greece. 
 
 "And, I tell you, take me as you see me, the name of 
 Georges is famous in those parts. I am the grandson of that 
 famous Czerni-Georges who made war on the Porte ; but in-
 
 264 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 stead of breaking it down, he was unluckily smashed up. 
 His son took refuge in the house of the French Consul at 
 Smyrna, and came to Paris in 1792, where he died before I, 
 his seventh child, was born. Our treasure was stolen from us 
 by a friend of my grandfather's, so we were ruined. My 
 mother lived by selling her diamonds one by one, till in 1799 
 she married Monsieur Yung, a contractor, and my stepfather. 
 But my mother died ; I quarreled with my stepfather, who, 
 between ourselves, is a rascal ; he is still living, but we never 
 meet. The wretch left us all seven to our fate without a word, 
 orbit or sup. And that is how, in 1813, in sheer despair, I 
 went off as a conscript. You cannot imagine with what joy 
 Ali of Tebelen hailed the grandson of Czerni-Georges. Here 
 I call myself simply Georges. The pasha gave me a seraglio 
 for " 
 
 "You had a seraglio?" said Oscar. 
 
 "Were you a pasha with many tails?" asked Mistigris. 
 
 " How is it that you don't know that there is but one sultan 
 who can create pashas? " said Georges, " and my friend Tebe- 
 len for we were friends, like two Bourbons was a rebel 
 against the padischah. You know or you don't know that 
 the grand seignior's correct title is padischah, and not the 
 grand turk or the sultan. 
 
 " Do not suppose that a seraglio is any great matter. You 
 might just as well have a flock of goats. Their women are 
 great fools, and I like the grisettes of the Chaumi'ere (cottages) 
 at Mont-Parnasse a thousand times better." 
 
 "And they are much nearer," said the Comte de Serizy. 
 
 "These women of the seraglio never know a word of 
 French, and language is indispensable to an understanding. 
 Ali gave me five lawful wives and ten slave girl . At Janina 
 that was a mere nothing. In the East, you see, it is very bad 
 style to have wives ; you have them, but as we here have our 
 Voltaire and our Rousseau ; who ever looks into his Voltaire 
 or his Rousseau? Nobody. And yet it is quite the right
 
 A STAA'T IN LIFE. 265 
 
 thing to be jealous. You may tie a woman up in a sack and 
 throw her into the water on a mere suspicion by an article of 
 their Code." 
 
 " Did you throw any in ? " 
 
 " I ? What ! a Frenchman ! I was devoted to them." 
 
 Whereupon Georges twirled up his mustache, and assumed 
 a pensive air. 
 
 By this time they were at Saint-Denis, and Pierrotin drew 
 up at the door of the inn where the famous cheese-cakes are 
 sold, and where all travelers call. The count, really puzzled 
 by the mixture of truth and nonsense in Georges' rhodomon- 
 tade, jumped into the carriage again, looked under the cushion 
 for the portfolio which Pierrotin had told him that this mys- 
 terious youth had bestowed there, and saw on it in gilt letters 
 the words, " Maitre Crottat, Notaire." The count at once 
 took the liberty of opening the case, fearing, with good reason, 
 that if he did not, Farmer Leger might be possessed with 
 similar curosity; and taking out the deed relating to the 
 Moulineaux farm, he folded it up, put it in the side-pocket of 
 his coat, and came back to join his fellow-travelers. 
 
 "This Georges is neither more nor less than Crottat's junior 
 clerk. I will congratulate his master, who ought to have sent 
 his head-clerk." 
 
 From the respectful attention of the farmer and Oscar, 
 Georges perceived that in them at least he had two ardent 
 admirers. Of course, he put on lordly airs ; he treated them 
 to cheese-cakes and a glass of Alicante, and offered the same 
 to Mistigris and his master, which they refused, asking them 
 their names on the strength of this munificence. 
 
 "Oh, monsieur," said the elder, "I am not the proud 
 owner of so illustrious a name as yours, and I have not come 
 home from Asia." The count, who had made haste to get 
 back to the vast inn kitchen, so as to excite no suspicions, 
 came in time to hear the end of the reply. " I am simply a 
 poor painter just returned from Rome, where I went at the
 
 266 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 expense of the Government after winning the Grand Prize five 
 years ago. My name is Schinner." 
 
 "Halloo, master, may I offer you a glass of Alicante and 
 some cheese-cakes? " cried Georges to the count. 
 
 "Thank you, no," said the count. "I never come out 
 till I have had my cup of coffee and cream." 
 
 "And you never eat anything between meals? How 
 Marais, Place Royale, lie Saint-Louis .' ' ' exclaimed Georges. 
 "When he crammed us just now about his orders, I fancied 
 him better fun than he is," he went on in a low voice to the 
 painter; "but we will get him on to that subject again 
 the little tallow-chandler. Come, boy," said he to Oscar, 
 "drink the glass that was poured out for the grocer, it will 
 make your mustache grow." 
 
 Oscar, anxious to play the man, drank the second glass of 
 wine, and ate three more cheese-cakes. 
 
 "Very good wine it is!" said old Leger, smacking his 
 tongue. 
 
 "And all the better," remarked Georges, "because it 
 comes from Bercy. I have been to Alicante, and, I tell you, 
 this is no more like the wine of that country than my arm is 
 like a windmill. Our manufactured wines are far better than 
 the natural products. Come, Pierrotin, have a glass. What 
 a pity it is that your horses cannot each drink one ; we 
 should get on faster ! ' ' 
 
 "Oh, that is unnecessary, as I have a gray horse already," 
 said Pierrotin (gris, which means gray, meaning also screwed}. 
 
 Oscar, as he heard the vulgar pun, thought Pierrotin a 
 marvel of wit. 
 
 "Off! " cried Pierrotin, cracking his whip, as soon as the 
 passengers had once more packed themselves into the vehicle. 
 
 It was by this time eleven o'clock. The weather, which 
 had been rather dull, now cleared ; the wind swept away the 
 clouds ; the blue sky shone out here and there ; and by the
 
 A START IN LIFE. 267 
 
 time Pierrotin's chaise was fairly started on the ribbon of 
 road between Saint-Denis and Pierrefitte, the sun had finally 
 drunk up the last filmy haze that hung like a diaphanous veil 
 over the views from this famous suburb. 
 
 " Well, and why did you throw over your friend the 
 pasha ? ' ' said the farmer to Georges. 
 
 "He was a very queer customer," replied Georges, with an 
 air of hiding many mysteries. "Only think, he put me in 
 command of his cavalry ! Very well " 
 
 " That," thought poor Oscar, " is why he wears spurs." 
 
 "At that time, AH of Tebelen wanted to rid himself of 
 Chosrew Pasha, another queer fish. Chaureff you call him 
 here, but in Turkey they call him Cosserev. You must have 
 read in the papers at the time that old Ali had beaten Chos- 
 rew and pretty soundly, too. Well, but for me, Ali would 
 have been done for some days sooner. I led the right wing, 
 and I saw Chosrew, the old sneak, just charging the centre 
 oh, yes, I can tell you, as straight and steady a move as if he 
 had been Murat. Good ! I took my time, and I charged at 
 full speed, cutting Chosrew's column in two parts, for he had 
 pushed through our centre, and had no cover. You under- 
 stand 
 
 "After it was all over Ali fairly kissed me." 
 
 "Is that the custom in the East?" said the Comte de 
 Serizy, with a touch of irony. 
 
 "Yes, monsieur, as it is everywhere," answered the painter. 
 
 " We drove Chosrew back over thirty leagues of country 
 like a hunt, I tell you," Georges went on. " Splendid horse- 
 men are the Turks. Ali gave me yataghans, guns, and swords : 
 ' Take as many as you like.' When we got back to the capi- 
 tal, that incredible creature made proposals to me that did 
 not suit my views at all. He wanted to adopt me as his 
 favorite, his heir. But I had had enough of the life ; for, 
 after all, Ali of Tebelen was a rebel against the Porte, and I 
 thought it wiser to clear out. But I must do Monsieur de
 
 268 A START JN LIFE. 
 
 Tebelen justice, he loaded me with presents; diamonds, ten 
 thousand talari, a thousand pieces of gold, a fair Greek girl 
 for a page, a little Arnaute maid for company, and an Arab 
 horse. Well, there ! Ali, the Pasha of Janina, is an unappre- 
 ciated man ; he lacks a historian. Nowhere but in the East 
 do you meet with these iron souls who, for twenty years, 
 strain every nerve, only to be able to take a revenge one fine 
 morning. 
 
 " In the first place, he had the grandest white beard you 
 ever saw, and a hard, stern face " 
 
 "But what became of your treasure?" asked the farmer. 
 
 "Ah! there you are! Those people have no State funds 
 nor Bank of France ; so I packed my money-bags on board 
 a Greek tartane, which was captured by the capitan-pasha 
 himself. Then I myself, as you see me, was within an ace of 
 being impaled at Smyrna. Yes, on my honor, but for Mon- 
 sieur de Riviere, the ambassador, who happened to be on the 
 spot, I should have been executed as an ally of Ali Pasha's. 
 I saved my head, or I could not speak so plainly; but as for 
 the ten thousand talari, the thousand pieces of gold, and the 
 weapons, oh ! that was all swallowed down by that greedy- 
 guts the capitan-pasha. My position was all the more ticklish 
 because the capitan-pasha was Chosrew himself. After the 
 dressing he had had, the scamp had got this post, which is 
 equal to that of high admiral in France." 
 
 "But he had been in the cavalry, as I understood?" said 
 old Leger, who had been listening attentively to this long 
 story. 
 
 "Dear me, how little the East is understood in the De- 
 partment of Seine et Oise!" exclaimed Georges. "Mon- 
 sieur, the Turks are like that. You are a farmer, the padis- 
 chah makes you a field-marshal ; if you do not fulfill your 
 duties to his satisfaction, so much the worse for you. Off 
 with your head ! That is his way of dismissing you. A 
 gardener is made prefect, and a prime minister is a private
 
 A START IN LIFE. 269 
 
 once more. The Ottomans know no laws of promotion or 
 hierarchy. Chosrew, who had been a horseman, was now a 
 sailor. The Padischah Mohammed had instructed him to fall 
 on All by sea; and he had, in fact, mastered him, but only by 
 the help of the English, who got the best of the booty, the 
 thieves ! They laid hands on the treasure. 
 
 " This Chosrew, who had not forgotten the riding-lesson I 
 had given him, recognized me at once. As you may suppose, 
 I was settled oh ! done for ! if it had not occurred to me 
 to appeal, as a Frenchman and a troubadoui, to Monsieur de 
 Riviere. The ambassador, delighted to assert himself, de- 
 manded my release. The Turks have this great merit, they 
 are as ready to let you go as to cut off your head ; they are 
 indifferent to everything. The French consul, a charming 
 man, and a friend of Chosrew's, got him to restore two 
 thousand talari, and his name, I may say, is graven on my 
 heart " 
 
 "And his name ?" asked Monsieur de Serizy. 
 
 He could not forbear a look of surprise when Georges, in 
 fact, mentioned the name of one of our most distinguished 
 consuls-general, who was at Smyrna at the time. 
 
 " I was present, as it fell out, at the execution of the Com- 
 mandant of Smyrna, the padischah having ordered Chosrew 
 to put him to death one of the most curious things I ever 
 saw, though I have seen many. I will tell you all about it 
 by-and-by at breakfast. 
 
 " From Smyrna I went to Spain, on hearing there was a 
 revolution there. I went straight to Mina, who took me for 
 an aide-de-camp, and gave me the rank of colonel. So I 
 fought for the Constitutional party, which is going to the dogs, 
 for we shall walk into Spain one of these days." 
 
 "And you a French officer!" said the Comte de Serizy 
 severely. "You are trusting very rashly to the discretion of 
 your hearers." 
 
 "There are no spies among them," said Georges.
 
 270 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 " And does it not occur to you, Colonel Georges," said the 
 count, " that at this very time a conspiracy is being inquired 
 into by the Chamber of Peers, which makes the Government 
 very strict in its dealings with soldiers who bear arms against 
 France, or who aid in intrigues abroad tending to the over- 
 throw of any legitimate sovereign ?" 
 
 At this ominous remark, the painter reddened up to his ears, 
 and glanced at Mistigris, who was speechless. 
 
 " Well, and what then?" asked old Leger. 
 
 "Why, if I by chance were a magistrate, would it not be 
 my duty to call on the gendarmes of the Brigade at Pierrefitte 
 to arrest Mina's aide-de-camp," said the count, "and to sum- 
 mons all who are in this chaise as witnesses?" 
 
 This speech silenced Georges all the more effectually because 
 the vehicle was just passing the Police Station, where the white 
 flag was, to use a classical phrase, floating on the breeze. 
 
 "You have too many orders to be guilty of such mean con- 
 duct," said Oscar. 
 
 "We will play him a trick yet," whispered Georges to 
 Oscar. 
 
 "Colonel," said Leger, very much discomfited by the 
 count's outburst, and anxious to change the subject, " in the 
 countries where you have traveled, what is the farming like? 
 What are their crops in rotation?" 
 
 " In the first place, my good friend, you must understand 
 that the people are too busy smoking weeds to burn them on 
 the land " 
 
 The count could not help smiling, and his smile reassured 
 the narrator. 
 
 "And they have a way of cultivating the land which you 
 will think strange. They do not cultivate it at all ; that is 
 their system. The Turks and Greeks eat onions or rice ; they 
 collect opium from their poppies, which yields a large revenue, 
 and tobacco grows almost wild their famous Latakia. Then 
 there are dates, bunches of sugar-plums, that grow without any
 
 A START IN LIFE. 27i 
 
 trouble. It is a country of endless resources and trade. 
 Quantities of carpets are made at Smyrna, and not dear." 
 
 "Ay," said the farmer, " but if the carpets are made of 
 wool, wool comes from sheep ; and to have sheep, they must 
 have fields, farms, and farming ' 
 
 " There must, no doubt, be something of the kind," replied 
 Georges. "But rice, in the first place, grows in water; and 
 then I have always been near the coast, and have only seen 
 the country devastated by war. Beside, I have a perfect 
 horror of statistics." 
 
 "And the taxes? " said the farmer. 
 
 "Ah ! the taxes are heavy. The people are robbed of every- 
 thing, and allowed to keep the rest. The Pasha of Egypt, 
 struck by the merits of this system, was organizing the admin- 
 istration on that basis when I left." 
 
 " But how? " said old Leger, who was utterly puzzled. 
 
 "How?" echoed Georges. "There are collectors who 
 seize the crops, leaving the peasants just enough to live on. 
 And by that system there is no trouble with papers and red 
 tape, the plague of France. There you are ! " 
 
 " But what right have, they to do it ?" asked the farmer. 
 
 "It is the land of despotism, that's all. Did you never 
 hear Montesquieu's fine definition of Despotism ' Like the 
 savage, it cuts the tree down to gather the fruit.' ' 
 
 "And that is what they want to bring us to ! " cried Mis- 
 tigris. " But ^burnt rat dreads the mire." 
 
 "And it is what we shall come to," exclaimed the Comte 
 de Serizy. "Those who hold land will be wise to sell it. 
 Monsieur Schinner must have seen how such things are done 
 in Italy." 
 
 "Corpo di Baceo! The pope is not behind his times. But 
 they are used to it there. The Italians are such good people ! 
 So long as they are allowed to do a little highway murdering 
 of travelers, they are quite content." 
 
 "But you, too, do not wear the ribbon of the Legion of
 
 272 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 Honor that was given you in 1819," remarked the count. 
 " Is the fashion universal ? " 
 
 Mistigris and the false Schinner reddened up to their very 
 hair. 
 
 "Oh, with me it is different," replied Schinner. "I do 
 not wish to be recognized. Do not betray me, monsieur. I 
 mean to pass for a quite unimportant painter; in fact, a mere 
 decorator. I am going to a gentleman's house where I am 
 anxious to excite no suspicion." 
 
 " Oh, ho ! " said the count, " a lady ! a love affair ! How 
 happy you are to be young ! " 
 
 Oscar, who was bursting in his skin with envy at being 
 nobody and having nothing to say, looked from Colonel 
 Czerni-Georges to Schinner the great artist, wondering whether 
 he could not make something of himself. But what could 
 he be, a boy of nineteen, packed off to spend a fortnight or 
 three weeks in the country with the steward of Presles ? The 
 Alicante had gone to his head, and his conceit was making 
 the blood boil in his veins. Thus, when the sham Schinner 
 seemed to hint at some romantic adventure of which the joys 
 must be equal to the danger, he gazed at him with eyes 
 flashing with rage and envy. 
 
 "Ah ! " said the count, with a look half of envy and half 
 of incredulity, " you must love a woman very much to make 
 such sacrifices for her sake." 
 
 "What sacrifices?" asked Mistigris. 
 
 "Don't you know, my little friend, that a ceiling painted 
 by so great a master is covered with gold in payment?" 
 replied the count. "Why, if the Civil List pays you thirty 
 thousand francs for those of the two rooms in the Louvre," 
 he went on, turning to Schinner, " you would certainly 
 charge a humble individual, a bourgeois, as you call us in your 
 studios, twenty thousand for a ceiling, while an unknown 
 decorator would hardly get two thousand francs." 
 
 "The money loss is not the worst of it," replied Mistigris.
 
 A START IN LIFE. 273 
 
 " You must consider that it will be a masterpiece, and that 
 he must not sign it for fear of compromising her." 
 
 " Ah ! I would gladly restore all my orders to the sovereigns 
 of Europe to be loved as a young man must be, to be moved 
 to such devotion !" cried Monsieur de Serizy. 
 
 "Ay, there you are," said Mistigris. "A man who is 
 young is beloved of many women ; and as the saying goes, 
 there is safety in grumblers." 
 
 "And what does Madame Schinner say to it?" asked the 
 count, "for you married for love the charming Adelaide de 
 Rouville,* the niece of old Admiral Kergarouet, who got 
 you the work at the Louvre, I believe, through the interest 
 of his nephew the Comte de Fontaine." 
 
 " Is a painter ever a married man when he is traveling ? " 
 asked Mistigris. 
 
 "That, then, is Studio morality?" exclaimed the count in 
 an idiomatic way. 
 
 " Is th2 morality of the courts where you got your orders 
 any better? " said Schinner, who had recovered his presence 
 of mind, which had deserted him for a moment when he 
 heard that the count was so well informed as to the commission 
 given to the real Schinner. 
 
 "I never asked for one," replied the count. "I flatter 
 myself that they were all honestly earned." 
 
 "And it becomes you like a pig in dress-boots," said 
 Mistigris. 
 
 Monsieur de Serizy would not betray himself; he put on 
 an air of stupid good-nature as he looked out over the valley 
 of Groslay, into which they diverged where the roads fork, 
 taking the road to Saint-Brice, and leaving that to Chantilly 
 on their right. 
 
 "Ay, take that ! " said Oscar between his teeth. 
 
 " And is Rome as fine as it is said to be ? " Georges asked 
 of the painter. 
 
 See " The Purse." 
 18
 
 274 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 11 Rome is fine only to those who love it ; you must have a 
 passion for it to be happy there ; but, as a town, I prefer 
 Venice, though I was near being assassinated there." 
 
 "My word! But for me," said Mistigris, "your goose 
 would have been cooked ! It was that rascal Lord Byron who 
 played you that trick. That devil of an Englishman was as 
 mad as a hatter! " 
 
 " Hold your tongue," said Schinner. " I won't have any- 
 thing known of my affair with Lord Byron." 
 
 "But you must confess," said Mistigris, "that you were 
 very glad, indeed, that I had learned to * box ' in our French 
 fashion?" 
 
 Now and again Pierrotin and the count exchanged signifi- 
 cant glances, which would have disturbed men a little more 
 worldly-wise than these five fellow-travelers. 
 
 "Lords and pashas, and ceilings worth thirty thousand 
 francs! Bless me!" cried the 1' Isle- Adam carrier, "I have 
 crowned heads on board to-day. What handsome tips I shall 
 get!" 
 
 "To say nothing of the places being paid for," said Mis- 
 tigris slily. 
 
 "It comes in the nick of time," Pierrotin went on. "For, 
 you know, my fine new coach, Pere Leger, for which I paid 
 two thousand francs on account well, those swindling coach- 
 builders, to whom I am to pay two thousand five hundred francs 
 to-morrow, would not take fifteen hundred francs down and a 
 bill for a thousand at two months. The vultures insist on it all 
 in ready money. Fancy being as hard as that on a man who 
 has traveled this road for eight years, the father of a family, 
 and putting him in danger of losing everything, money and 
 coach both, for lack of a wretched sum of a thousand francs ! 
 Gee up, Bichette. They would not dare to do it to one of the 
 big companies, I lay a wager." 
 
 "Bless me ! No thong, no crupper ! " said the student. 
 
 "You have only eight hundred francs to seek," replied the
 
 A START IN LIFE. 275 
 
 count, understanding that this speech, addressed to the farmer, 
 was a sort of bill drawn on himself. 
 
 " That's true," said Pierrotin. " Come up, Rougeot ; there, 
 Bichette!" 
 
 "You must have seen some fine-painted ceilings at Venice," 
 said the count, speaking to Schinner. 
 
 "I was too desperately in love to pay any attention to what 
 at the time seemed to me mere trifles," replied Schinner. 
 "And' yet I might have been cured of love-affairs ; for in the 
 Venetian States themselves, in Dalmatia, I had just had a sharp 
 lesson." 
 
 "Can you tell the tale?" asked Georges. "I know Dal- 
 matia." 
 
 " Well, then, if you have been there, you know, of course, 
 that up in that corner of the Adriatic they are all old pirates, 
 outlaws, and corsairs retired from business, when they have 
 escaped hanging, all " 
 
 "Uscoques, in short," said Georges. 
 
 On hearing this, the right name, the count, whom Napoleon 
 had sent into the province of Illyria, looked sharply round, so 
 much was he astonished. 
 
 "It was in the town where the maraschino is made," said 
 Schinner, seeming to try to remember a name. 
 
 "Zara," said Georges. "Yes, I have been there; it is on 
 the coast." 
 
 "You have hit it," said the painter. " I went there to see 
 the country, for I have a passion for landscape. Twenty times 
 have I made up my mind to try landscape painting, which no 
 one understands, in my opinion, but Mistigris, who will one 
 of these days be a Hobbema, Ruysdael, Claude Lorraine, 
 Poussin, and all the tribe in one." 
 
 "Well," exclaimed the count, " if he is but one of them, 
 he will do." 
 
 " If you interrupt so often we shall never know where we 
 are."
 
 276 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 " Beside, our friend here is not speaking to you/' added 
 Georges to the count. 
 
 "It is not good manners to interrupt," said Mitigris sen- 
 tentiously. " However, we did the same ; and we should all be 
 the losers if we didn't diversify the conversation by an ex- 
 change of reflections. All Frenchmen are equal in a public 
 chaise, as the grandson of Czerni-Georges told us. So pray 
 go on, delightful old man, more of your bunkum. It is quite 
 the correct thing in the best society ; and you know the saying, 
 Do in Turkey as the Turkeys do." 
 
 "I had heard wonders of Dalmatia," Schinner went on. 
 "So off I went, leaving Mistigris at the inn at Venice." 
 
 " At the locanda" said Mistigris; " put in the local color." 
 
 " Zara is, as I have been told, a vile hole " 
 
 "Yes," said Georges; "but it is fortified." 
 
 "I should say so!" replied Schinner, "and the fortifica- 
 tions are an important feature in my story. At Zara there 
 are a great many apothecaries, and I lodged with one of them. 
 In foreign countries the principal business of every native is 
 to let lodgings, his trade is purely accessory. 
 
 " In the evening, when I had changed my shirt, I went out 
 on my balcony. Now on the opposite balcony I perceived a 
 woman oh ! But a woman ! A Greek ; that says everything, 
 the loveliest creature in all the town. Almond eyes, eyelids 
 that came down over them like blinds, and lashes like paint- 
 brushes; an oval face that might have turned Raphael's brain, 
 a complexion of exquisite hue, melting tones, a skin of velvet 
 hands oh ! " 
 
 "And not moulded in butter like those of David's school," 
 said Mistigris. 
 
 "You insist on talking like a painter ! " cried Georges. 
 
 "There, you see ! drive nature out with a pitchfork and it 
 comes back in a paint-box," replied Mistigris. 
 
 "And her costume a genuine Greek costume," Schinner 
 went on. "As you may suppose, I was in flames. I ques-
 
 A START IN LIFE. 277 
 
 tioned my Diafoirus, and he informed me that my fair neigh- 
 bor's name was Zena. I changed my shirt. To marry Zena, 
 her husband, an old villain, had paid her parents three hun- 
 dred thousand francs, the girl's beauty was so famous ; and 
 she really was the loveliest creature in all Dalmatia, Illyria, 
 and the Adriatic. In that part of the world you buy your 
 wife and without having seen her " 
 
 " I will not go there," said old Leger. 
 
 "My sleep, some nights, is illuminated by Zena's eyes," 
 said Schinner. " Her adoring young husband was sixty-seven. 
 Good ! But he was as jealous not as a tiger, for they say a 
 tiger is as jealous as a Dalmatian, and my man was worse than 
 a Dalmatian ; he was equal to three Dalmatians and a half. 
 He was an Uscoque, a turkey-cock, a high cockalorum game- 
 cock ! " 
 
 " In short, the worthy hero of a cock-and-bull story," said 
 Mistigris. 
 
 " Good for you ! " replied Georges, laughing. 
 
 "After being a corsair, and perhaps a pirate, my man 
 thought no more of spitting a Christian than I do of spitting 
 out of window," Schinner went on. "A pretty lookout for 
 me. And rich rolling in millions, the old villain ! And as 
 ugly as a pirate may be, for some pasha had wanted his ears, 
 and he had dropped an eye somewhere on his travels. But 
 my Uscoque made good use of the one he had, and you may 
 take my word for it when I tell you he had eyes all round his 
 head. ' Never does he let his wife out of his sight,' said 
 my little Diafoirus. ' If she should require your services, I 
 would take your place in disguise,' said I. ' It is a trick that 
 is very successful in our stage- plays. ' It would take too long 
 to describe the most delightful period of my life, three days, 
 to wit, that I spent at my window ogling Zena, and putting 
 on a clean shirt every morning. The situation was all the 
 more ticklish and exciting because the least gesture bore some 
 dangerous meaning. Finally, Zena, no doubt, came to the
 
 278 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 conclusion that in all the world none but a foreigner, a French- 
 man, and an artist would be capable of making eyes at her in 
 the midst of the perils that surrounded him ; so, as she exe- 
 crated her hideous pirate, she responded to my gaze with 
 glances that were enough to lift a man into the vault of par- 
 adise without any need of pulleys. I was screwed up higher 
 and higher ! I was tuned to the pitch of Don Quixote. At 
 last I exclaimed : ' Well, the old wretch may kill me, but here 
 goes ! ' Not a landscape did I study ; I was studying my 
 corsair's lair. At night, having put on my most highly scented 
 clean shirt, I crossed the street and I went in " 
 
 " Into the house ? " cried Oscar. 
 
 " Into the house ? " said Georges. 
 
 "Into the house," repeated Schinner. 
 
 " Well ! you are as bold as brass ! " cried the farmer. " I 
 wouldn't have gone, that's all I can say " 
 
 "With all the more reason that you would have stuck in 
 the door," replied Schinner. "Well, I went in," he con- 
 tinued, " and I felt two hands which took hold of mine. I 
 said nothing; for those hands, as smooth as the skin of an 
 onion, impressed silence on me. A whisper in my ear said 
 in Venetian, 'He is asleep.' Then, being sure that no one 
 would meet us, Zena and I went out on the ramparts for an 
 airing, but escorted, if you please, by an old duenna as ugly 
 as sin, who stuck to us like a shadow; and I could not induce 
 Madame la Pirate to dismiss this ridiculous attendant. 
 
 " Next evening we did the same ; I wanted to send the old 
 woman home ; Zena refused. As my fair one spoke Greek, 
 and I spoke Venetian, we could come to no understanding 
 we parted in anger ! Said I to myself, as I changed my shirt : 
 ' Next time surely there will be no old woman, and we can 
 make friends again, each in our mother tongue.' Well, and 
 it was the old woman that saved me, as you shall hear. It 
 was so fine that, to divert suspicion, I went out to look about 
 me, after we had made it up, of course. After walking round
 
 A START IN LIFE. 279 
 
 the ramparts, I was coming quietly home with my hands in 
 my pockets when I saw the street packed full of people. Such 
 a crowd ! as if there was an execution. This crowd rushed 
 at me. I was arrested, handcuffed, and led off in charge of 
 the police. No, you cannot imagine, and I hope you may 
 never know, what it is to be supposed to be a murderer by a 
 frenzied mob, throwing stones at you, yelling after you from 
 top to bottom of the high street of a country town, and pur- 
 suing you with threats of death ! Every eye is a flame of 
 fire, abuse is on every lip, these firebrands of loathing flare up 
 above a hideous cry of ' Kill him ! down with the murderer ! ' 
 a sort of bass in the background." 
 
 " So your Dalmatians yelled in French?" said the count. 
 " You describe the scene as if it had happened yesterday." 
 
 Schinner was for the moment dumfounded. 
 
 "The mob speaks the same language everywhere," said 
 Mistigris the politician. 
 
 "Finally," Schinner went on again, "when I was in the 
 local Court of Justice and in the presence of the judges of 
 that country, I was informed that the diabolical corsair was 
 dead, poisoned by Zena. How I wished I could put on a 
 clean shirt ! 
 
 " On my soul, I knew nothing about this melodrama. It 
 would seem that the fair Greek was wont to add a little opium 
 poppies are so plentiful there, as monsieur has told you to 
 her pirate's grog to secure a few minutes' liberty to take a 
 walk, and the night before the poor woman had made a mis- 
 take in the dose. It was the damned corsair's money that 
 made the trouble for my Zena ; but she accounted for every- 
 thing so simply that I was released at once on thiJstrength 
 of the old woman's affidavit, with an order from the mayor of 
 the town and the Austrian commissioner of police to remove 
 myself to Rome. Z6na, who allowed the heirs and the officers 
 of the law to help themselves liberally to the Uscoque's wealth, 
 was let off, I was told, with two years' seclusion in a convent,
 
 280 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 where she still is. I will go back and paint her portrait, for 
 in a few years everything will be forgotten. And these are 
 the follies of eighteen ! " 
 
 "Yes, and you left me without a sou in the locanda at 
 Venice," said Mistigris. "I made my way from Venice to 
 Rome, to see if I could find you, by daubing portraits at five 
 francs a head, and never got paid; but it was a jolly time! 
 Happiness, they say, does not dwell under gilt hoofs." 
 
 "You may imagine the reflections that choked me with 
 bile in a Dalmatian prison, thrown there without a protector, 
 having to answer to the Dalmatian Austrians, and threatened 
 with the loss of my head for having twice taken a walk with a 
 woman who insisted on being followed by her housekeeper. 
 That is what I call bad luck ! " cried Schinner. 
 
 " What," said Oscar guilelessly, "did that happen to you? " 
 
 " Why not to this gentleman, since it had already happened 
 during the French occupation of Illyria to one of our most 
 distinguished artillery officers?" said the count with meaning. 
 
 "And did you believe the artillery man?" asked Mistigris 
 slily. 
 
 "And is that all? " asked Oscar. 
 
 "Well," said Mistigris, "he cannot tell you that he had 
 his head cut off. Those who live last live longest." 
 
 "And are there any farms out there?" asked old Leger. 
 "What do they grow there?" 
 
 "There is the maraschino crop," said Mistigris. "A plant 
 that grows just as high as your lips and yields the liqueur of 
 that name." 
 
 "Ah! " said Leger. 
 
 " I was only three days in the town and a fortnight in 
 prison," replied Schinner. "I saw nothing, not even the 
 fields where they grow the maraschino." 
 
 "They are making game of you," said Georges to the 
 farmer. "Maraschino grows in cases." 
 
 "Romances alter cases," remarked Mistigris.
 
 A START IN LIFE. 281 
 
 Pierrotin's chaise was now on the way down one of the 
 steep sides of the valley of Saint-Brice, toward the inn in the 
 middle of that large village, where he was to wait an hour to 
 let his horses take breath, eat their oats, and get a drink. It 
 was now about half-past one. 
 
 " Halloo ! It is Farmer Leger ! ' ' cried the innkeeper, as the 
 vehicle drew up at his door. " Do you take breakfast ? " 
 
 " Once every day," replied the burly customer. " We can 
 eat a snack." 
 
 "Order breakfast for us," said Georges, carrying his cane 
 as if he were shouldering a musket, in a cavalier style that 
 bewitched Oscar. 
 
 Oscar felt a pang of frenzy when he saw this reckless ad- 
 venturer take a fancy straw cigar-case out of his side-pocket, 
 and from it a beautiful tan-colored cigar, which he smoked in 
 the doorway while waiting for the meal. 
 
 " Do you smoke? " said Georges to Oscar. 
 
 " Sometimes," said the schoolboy, puffing out his little 
 chest and assuming a dashing style. 
 
 Georges held out the open cigar-case to Oscar and to Schin- 
 ner. 
 
 " The devil ! " said the great painter. " Ten-sous cigars ! " 
 
 "The remains of what I brought from Spain," said the ad- 
 venturer. "Are you going to have breakfast? " 
 
 "No," said the artist. "They will wait for me at the 
 castle. Beside, I had some food before starting." 
 
 "And you?" said Georges to Oscar. 
 
 "I have had breakfast," said Oscar. 
 
 Oscar would have given ten years of his life to have boots 
 and trouser-straps. He stood sneezing, and choking, and 
 spitting, and sucking up the smoke with ill-disguised grimaces. 
 
 " You don't know how to smoke," said Schinner. " Look 
 here," and Schinner, without moving a muscle, drew in the 
 smoke of his cigar and blew it out through his nose without 
 the slightest effort. Then again he kept the smoke in his
 
 282 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 throat, took the cigar out of his mouth, and exhaled it grace- 
 fully. 
 
 "There, young man," said the painter. 
 
 "And this, young man, is another way, watch this," said 
 Georges, imitating Schinner, but swallowing the smoke so 
 that none returned. 
 
 "And my parents fancy that I am educated," thought poor 
 Oscar, trying to smoke with a grace. But he felt so mortally 
 sick that he allowed Mistigris to bone his cigar and to say, as 
 he puffed at it with conspicuous satisfaction 
 
 " I suppose you have nothing catching." 
 
 But Oscar wished he were only strong enough to hit 
 Mistigris. 
 
 "Why," said he, pointing to Colonel Georges, "eight 
 francs for Alicante and cheese-cakes, forty sous in cigars, and 
 his'breakfast, which will cost " 
 
 " Ten francs at least," said Mistigris. " But so it is, little 
 dishes make long bills." 
 
 "Well, Pere Leger, we can crack a bottle of Bordeaux 
 apiece?" said Georges to the farmer. 
 
 "His breakfast will cost him twenty francs," cried Oscar. 
 " Why, that comes to more than thirty francs ! " 
 
 Crushed by the sense of his inferiority, Oscar sat down on 
 the curbstone lost in a reverie, which hindered his observ- 
 ing that his trousers, hitched up as he sat, showed the line 
 of union between an old stocking-leg and a new foot to it, a 
 masterpiece of his mother's skill. 
 
 "Our understandings are twins, if not our soles," said 
 Mistigris, pulling one leg of his trousers a little way up to 
 show a similiar effect. " But a baker's children are always 
 worst bread." 
 
 The jest made Monsieur de Serizy smile as he stood with 
 folded arms under the gateway behind the two lads. Heedless 
 as they were, the solemn statesman envied them their faults; 
 he liked their bounce, and admired the quickness of their fun.
 
 A START IN LIFE. 283 
 
 " Well, can you get les Moulineaux ? for you went to Paris 
 to fetch the money," said the innkeeper to old Leger, having 
 just shown him a nag for sale in his stables. " It will be a 
 fine joke to screw a bit out of the Comte de Serizy, a peer of 
 France and a State Minister." 
 
 The wily old courtier betrayed nothing in his face, but he 
 looked round to watch the farmer. 
 
 " His goose is cooked ! " replied Leger in a low voice. 
 
 " So much the better ; I love to see your bigwigs done. 
 And if you want a score or so thousand francs, I will lend 
 you the money. But Francois, the driver of Touchards' six- 
 o'clock coach, told me as he went through that Monsieur 
 Margueron is invited to dine with the Comte de Serizy him- 
 self to-day at Presles." 
 
 " That is his excellency's plan, but we have our little 
 notions too," replied the farmer. 
 
 " Ah, but the count will find a place for Monsieur Mar- 
 gueron's son, and you have no places to give away," said the 
 innkeeper. 
 
 " No ; but if the count has the Ministers on his side, I 
 have King Louis XVIII. on mine," said Leger in the inn- 
 keeper's ear, " and forty thousand of his effigies handed over 
 to Master Moreau will enable me to buy les Moulineaux for 
 two hundred and sixty thousand francs before Monsieur de 
 Serizy can step in, and he will be glad enough to take it off 
 my hands for three hundred and sixty thousand rather than 
 have the lands valued lot by lot." 
 
 " Not a bad turn, master," said his friend. 
 
 " How is that for a stroke of business ? " said the farmer. 
 
 "And, after all, the farm lands are worth it to him," said 
 the innkeeper. 
 
 " Les Moulineaux pays six thousand francs a year in kind, 
 and I mean to renew the lease at seven thousand five hundred 
 for eighteen years. So as he invests at more than two and a 
 half per cent., Monsieur le Comte won't be robbed.
 
 284 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 " Not to commit Monsieur Moreau, I am to be proposed 
 to the count by him as a tenant ; he will seem to be taking 
 care of his master's interests by finding him nearly three per 
 cent, for his money and a farmer who will pay regularly " 
 
 " And what will Moreau get out of the job altogether ? " 
 
 " Well, if the count makes him a present of ten thousand 
 francs, he will clear fifty thousand on the transaction ; but he 
 will have earned them fairly." 
 
 "And, after all, what does the count care for Presles? He 
 is so rich," said the innkeeper. "I have never set eyes on 
 him myself." 
 
 " Nor I neither," said the farmer. " But he is coming at 
 last to live there ; he would not otherwise be laying out two 
 hundred thousand francs on redecorating the rooms. It is as 
 fine as the King's palace." 
 
 "Well, then," replied the other, "it is high time that 
 Moreau should feather his nest." 
 
 " Yes, yes ; for when once the master and mis'ess are on 
 the spot, they will not keep their eyes in their pockets." 
 
 Though the conversation was carried on in a low tone, the 
 count had kept his ears open. 
 
 " Here I have all the evidence I was going in search of," 
 thought he, looking at the burly farmer as he went back into 
 the kitchen. " But perhaps it is no more than a scheme as 
 
 yet. Perhaps Moreau has not closed with the offer ! " 
 
 So averse was he to believe that the land steward was capable 
 of mixing himself up in such a plot. 
 
 Pierrotin now came out to give his horses water. The 
 count supposed that the driver would breakfast with the inn- 
 keeper and Leger, and what he had overheard made him fear 
 the least betrayal. 
 
 "The whole posse are in league," thought he; "it serves 
 them right to thwart their scheming. Pierrotin," said he in 
 a low voice as he went up to the driver, " I promised you ten 
 louis to keep my secret ; but if you will take care not to let
 
 A START IN LIFE. 285 
 
 out my name and I shall know whether you have mentioned 
 it, or given the least clue to it, to any living soul, even at 
 I'lsle-Adam to-morrow morning, as you pass the castle, I 
 will give you the thousand francs to pay for your new coach. 
 And for greater safety," added he, slapping Pierrotin's back, 
 " do without your breakfast ; stay outside with your horses." 
 
 Pierrotin had turned pale with joy. 
 
 " I understand, Monsieur le Comte, trust me. It is old 
 Pere Leger " 
 
 " It concerns every living soul," replied the count. 
 
 " Be easy. Come, hurry up," said Pierrotin, half opening 
 the kitchen door, " we are late already. Listen, Pere Leger, 
 there is the hill before us, you know ; I am not hungry ; I 
 will go on slowly, and you will easily catch me up. A walk 
 will do you good." 
 
 " The man is in a devil of a hurry ! " said the innkeeper. 
 "Won't you come and join us? The colonel is standing 
 wine at fifty sous, and a bottle of champagne." 
 
 " No, I can't. I have a fish on board to be delivered at 
 Stors by three o'clock for a big dinner ; and such customers 
 don't see a joke any more than the fish." 
 
 "All right," said Leger to the innkeeper ; " put the horse 
 you want me to buy in the shafts of your gig, and you can 
 drive us on to pick up Pierrotin. Then we can breakfast in 
 peace, and I shall see what the nag can do. Three of us can 
 very well ride in your old jolter." 
 
 To the count's great satisfaction, Pierrotin himself brought 
 out his horses. Schinner and Mistigris had walked forward. 
 
 Pierrotin picked up the two artists half-way between Saint- 
 Brice and Poncelles ; and just as he reached the top of the hill, 
 whence they had a view of Ecouen, the belfry of le Mesnil, 
 and the woods which encircle that beautiful landscape, the 
 sound of a galloping horse drawing a gig that rattled and 
 jingled announced the pursuit of Pere Leger and Mina's 
 colonel, who settled themselves into the chaise again.
 
 286 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 As Pierrotin zigzagged down the hill into Moisselles, 
 Georges, who had never ceased expatiating to old Leger on 
 the beauty of the innkeeper's wife at Saint-Brice, exclaimed 
 
 " I say, this is not amiss by way of landscape, Great 
 Painter?" 
 
 " It ought not to astonish you, who have seen Spain and 
 the East." 
 
 "And I have two of the Spanish cigars left. If nobody 
 objects, will you help me finish them off, Schinner? The 
 little man had enough with a mouthful or two." 
 
 Old Leger and the count kept silence, which was taken for 
 consent. 
 
 Oscar, annoyed at being spoken of as "a little man," re- 
 torted while the others were lighting their cigars 
 
 "Though I have not been Mina's aide-de-camp, monsieur, 
 and have not been in the East, I may go there yet. The 
 career for which my parents intend me will, I hope, relieve 
 me of the necessity of riding in a public chaise when I am as 
 old as you are. When once I am a person of importance, and 
 get a place, I will stay in it " 
 
 "And the rest, certainly!" said Mistigris, imitating the 
 sort of hoarse crow which made Oscar's speech even more 
 ridiculous ; for the poor boy was at the age when the beard 
 begins to grow and the voice to break. "After all," added 
 Mistigris, "extremes bleat." 
 
 " My word," said Schinner, " the horses can scarcely draw 
 such a weight of dignity." 
 
 "So your parents intend to start you in a career," said 
 Georges very seriously. "And what may it be?" 
 
 "In diplomacy," said Oscar. 
 
 Three shouts of laughter went forth like three rockets from 
 Mistigris, Schinner, and the old farmer. Even the count 
 could not help smiling. Georges kept his countenance. 
 
 "By Allah! But there is nothing to laugh at," said the 
 colonel. " Only, young man," he went on, addressing Oscar,
 
 A START IN LIFE. 287 
 
 " it struck me that your respectable mother is not for the mo- 
 ment in a social position wholly beseeming an ambassadress. 
 She had a most venerable straw bag, and a patch on her 
 shoe." 
 
 " My mother, monsieur ! " said Oscar, fuming with indigna- 
 tion. " It was our housekeeper." 
 
 " 'Our ' is most aristocratic ! " cried the count, interrupting 
 Oscar. 
 
 " The king says our," replied Oscar haughtily. 
 
 A look from Georges checked a general burst of laughter ; 
 it conveyed to the painter and to Mistigris the desirability of 
 dealing judiciously with Oscar, so as to make the most of this 
 mine of amusement. 
 
 "The gentleman is right," said the painter to the count, 
 designating Oscar. "Gentlefolk talk of our house; only 
 second-rate people talk of my house. Everybody has a mania 
 for seeming to have what he has not. For a man loaded with 
 decorations ' ' 
 
 " Then, monsieur also is a decorator?" asked Mistigris. 
 
 " You know nothing of court language. I beg the favor of 
 your protection, your excellency," added Schinner, turning 
 to Oscar. 
 
 "I must congratulate myself," said the count, "on having 
 traveled with three men who are or will be famous a painter 
 who is already illustrious, a future general, and a young diplo- 
 matist who will some day reunite Belgium to France." 
 
 But Oscar, having so basely denied his mother, and furious 
 at perceiving that his companions were making game of him, 
 determined to convince their incredulity at any cost. 
 
 "All is not gold that glitters ! " said he, flashing lightnings 
 from his eyes. 
 
 "You've got it wrong," cried Mistigris. "All is not old 
 that titters. You will not go far in diplomacy if you do not 
 know your proverbs better than that." 
 
 " If I do not know my proverbs, I know my way."
 
 288 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 "It must be leading you a long way," said Georges, " for 
 your family housekeeper gave you provisions enough for a sea 
 voyage biscuits, chocolate " 
 
 "A particular roll and some chocolate, yes, monsieur," re- 
 turned Oscar. " My stomach is much too delicate to digest 
 the cagmag you get at an inn." 
 
 "'Cagmag' is as delicate as your digestion," retorted 
 Georges. 
 
 " ' Cagmag ' is good ! " said the great painter. 
 
 "The word is in use in the best circles," said Mistigris; 
 " I use it myself at the coffee-house of the Poule Noire " (black 
 hen). 
 
 " Your tutor was, no doubt, some famous professor Mon- 
 sieur Andrieux of the Academy or Monsieur Royer-Collard ? " 
 asked Schinner. 
 
 " My tutor was the Abbe Loraux, now the Vicar of St. Sul- 
 pice," replied Oscar, remembering the name of the confessor 
 of the school. 
 
 "You did very wisely to have a private tutor," said Misti- 
 gris, " for the fountain of learning brought forth a mouse ; 
 and you will do something for your abbe, of course? " 
 
 " Certainly ; he will be a bishop some day." 
 
 "And through your family interest?" asked Georges quite 
 gravely. 
 
 " We may perhaps contribute to his due promotion, for the 
 Abbe Frayssinous often comes to our house." 
 
 "Oh, do you know the Abbe Frayssinous?" asked the 
 count. 
 
 " He is under obligations to my father," repli-ed the furious 
 Oscar. 
 
 " And you are on your way to your estate, no doubt ? " said 
 Georges. 
 
 " No, monsieur ; but I have no objection to saying where I 
 am going. I am on my way to the mansion of Presles, the 
 Comte de Serizy's."
 
 A START IN LIFE. 289 
 
 " The devil you are ! To Presles? " cried Schinner, turn- 
 ing crimson. 
 
 "Then do you know Monseigneur the Comte de Serizy?" 
 asked Georges. 
 
 Farmer Leger turned so as to look at Oscar with a be- 
 wildered gaze, exclaiming 
 
 "And Monsieur le Comte is at Presles?" 
 
 " So it would seem, as I am going there," replied Oscar. 
 
 "Then you have often seen the count?" asked Monsieur 
 de Serizy. 
 
 " As plainly as I see you. I am great friends with his son, 
 who is about my age, nineteen ; and we ride together almost 
 every day." 
 
 "Kings have been known to harry beggar-maids," said 
 Mistigris sapiently. 
 
 A wink from Pierrotin had relieved the farmer's alarm. 
 
 " On my honor," said the count to Oscar, " I am delighted 
 to find myself in the company of a young gentleman who can 
 speak with authority of that nobleman. I am anxious to secure 
 his favor in a somewhat important business in which his help 
 will cost him nothing. It is a little claim against the American 
 Government. I should be glad to learn something as to the 
 sort of man he is." 
 
 "Oh, if you hope to succeed," replied Oscar, with an as- 
 sumption of competence, "do not apply to him, but to his 
 wife ; he is madly in love with her, no one knows that better 
 than I, and his wife cannot endure him." 
 
 " Why ? " asked Georges. 
 
 " The count has some skin disease that makes him hideous, 
 and Doctor Alibert has tried in vain to cure it. Monsieur de 
 Serizy would give half of his immense fortune to have a chest 
 like mine," said Oscar, opening his shirt and showing a clean 
 pink skin like a child's. "He lives alone, secluded in his 
 house. You need a good introduction to see him at all. In 
 the first place, he gets up very early in the morning, and works 
 19
 
 290 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 from three till eight, after eight he follows various treatments, 
 sulphur baths or vapor baths. They stew him in a sort of 
 iron tank, for he is always hoping to be cured." 
 
 " If he is so intimate with the King, why is he not ' touched ' 
 by him?" asked Georges. 
 
 "Then the lady keeps her husband in hot water," said 
 Mistigris. 
 
 "The count has promised thirty thousand francs to a 
 famous Scotch physician who is prescribing for him now," 
 Oscar went on. 
 
 " Then his wife can hardly be blamed for giving herself the 
 best " Schinner began, but he did not finish his sentence. 
 
 " To be sure," said Oscar. " The poor man is so shriveled, 
 so decrepit, you would think he was eighty. He is as dry 
 as parchment, and, to add to his misfortune, he feels his 
 position " 
 
 "And feels it hot, I should think," remarked the farmer 
 facetiously. 
 
 " Monsieur, he worships his wife, and dares not blame 
 her," replied Oscar. "He performs the most ridiculous 
 scenes with her, you would die of laughing exactly like 
 Arnolphe in Moliere's play." 
 
 The count, in blank dismay, looked at Pierrotin, who, see- 
 ing him apparently unmoved, concluded that Madame Cla- 
 part's son was inventing a pack of slander. 
 
 "So, monsieur, if you wish to succeed," said Oscar to the 
 count, "apply to the Marquis d'Aiglemont. If you have 
 madame's former adorer on your side, you will at one stroke 
 secure both the lady and her husband." 
 
 "That is what we call killing two-thirds with one bone," 
 said Mistigris. 
 
 " Dear me ! " said the painter, " have you seen the count 
 undressed? Are you his valet?" 
 
 " His valet ! " cried Oscar. 
 
 *'By the mass ! A man does not say such things about his
 
 A START IN LIFE. 291 
 
 friends in a public conveyance," added Mistigris. "Discre- 
 tion, my young friend, is the mother of inattention. I simply 
 don't hear you." 
 
 "It is certainly a case of tell me whom you know, and I 
 will tell you whom you hate," exclaimed Schinner. 
 
 "But you must learn, Great Painter," said Georges pom- 
 pously, " that no man can speak ill of those he does not 
 know. The boy has proved at any rate that he knows his 
 Serizy by heart. Now, if he had only talked of madame, it 
 might have been supposed that he was on terms 
 
 " Not another word about the Comtesse de Serizy, young 
 men ! " cried the count. " Her brother, the Marquis de 
 Ronquerolles, is a friend of mine, and the man who is so rash 
 as to cast a doubt on the countess' honor will answer to me 
 for his speech." 
 
 "Monsieur is right," said the artist, "there should be no 
 scandal spoken about women." 
 
 "God, Honor, and the Ladies! I saw a melodrama of 
 that name," said Mistigris. 
 
 "Though I do not know Mina, I know the keeper of the 
 seals," said the count, looking at Georges. "And though I 
 do not display my orders," he added, turning to the painter, 
 " I can hinder their being given to those who do not deserve 
 them. In short, I know so many people, that I know Mon- 
 sieur Grindot, the architect of Presles. Stop at the next inn, 
 Pierrotin ; I am going to get out." 
 
 Pierrotin drove on to the village of Moisselles, and there, 
 at a little country inn, the travelers alighted. This bit of 
 road was passed in utter silence. 
 
 "Where on earth is that little rascal going?" asked the 
 count, leading Pierrotin into the inn-yard. 
 
 "To stay with your steward. He is the son of a poor 
 lady who lives in the Rue de la Cerisaie, and to whom I 
 often carry fruit and game and poultry a certain Madame 
 Husson."
 
 292 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 "Who is that gentleman?" old Leger asked Pierrotin 
 when the count had turned away. 
 
 "I don't know," said Pierrotin. "He never rode with 
 me before ; but he may be the prince who owns the castle of 
 Maffliers. He has just told me where to set him down on the 
 road; he is not going so far as 1'Isle-Adam." 
 
 "Pierrotin fancies he is the owner of Maffliers," said the 
 farmer to Georges, getting back into the chaise. 
 
 At this stage the three young fellows, looking as silly as 
 pilferers caught in the act, did not dare meet each other's eye, 
 and seemed lost in reflections on the upshot of their several 
 fictions. 
 
 " That is what I call a great lie and little wool," observed 
 Mistigris. 
 
 "You see, I know the count," said Oscar. 
 
 "Possibly, but you will never be an ambassador," replied 
 Georges. " If you must talk in a public carriage, learn to 
 talk like me and tell nothing." 
 
 " The mother of mischief is no more than a midge's sting," 
 said Mistigris conclusively. 
 
 The count now got into the chaise, and Pierrotin drove on ; 
 perfect silence reigned. 
 
 " Well, my good friends," said the count, as they reached 
 the wood of Carreau, " we are all as mute as if we were going 
 to execution." 
 
 " Silence gives content. A man should know that silence 
 is a bold 'un," said Mistigris with an air. 
 
 " It is a fine day," remarked Georges. 
 
 "What place is that? " asked Oscar, pointing to the castle 
 of Franconville, which shows so finely on the slope of the 
 great forest of Saint-Martin. 
 
 " What ! " said the count, " you who have been so often to 
 Presles, do not know Franconville when you see it?" 
 
 "Monsieur knows more of men than of houses," said Mis- 
 tigris.
 
 A START IN LIFE. 293 
 
 "A sucking diplomatist may sometimes be oblivious," ex- 
 claimed Georges. 
 
 "Remember my name!" cried Oscar in a fury, "it is 
 Oscar Husson, and in ten years' time I shall be famous." 
 
 After this speech, pronounced with great bravado, Oscar 
 huddled himself into his corner. 
 
 "Husson de what? " asked Mistigris. 
 
 "A great family," replied the count. " The Hussons de la 
 Cerisaie. The gentleman was born at the foot of the Imperial 
 throne." 
 
 Oscar blushed to the roots of his hair in an agony of alarm. 
 They were about to descend the steep hill by la Cave, at the 
 bottom of which, in a narrow valley, on the skirt of the forest 
 of Saint-Martin, stands the splendid castle of Presles. 
 
 "Gentlemen," said Monsieur de Serizy, "I wish you well 
 in your several careers. You, Monsieur le Colonel, make 
 your peace with the King of France ; the Czerni-Georges 
 must be on good terms with the Bourbons. I have no fore- 
 cast for you, my dear Monsieur Schinner ; your fame is already 
 made, and you have won it nobly by splendid work. But 
 you are such a dangerous man that I, who have a wife, should 
 not dare to offer you a commission under my roof. As to 
 Monsieur Husson, he needs no interest ; he is the master of 
 statesmen's secrets, and can make them tremble. Monsieur 
 Leger is going to steal a march on the Comte de Serizy ; I 
 only hope that he may hold his own. Put me down here, 
 Pierrotin, and you can take me up at the same spot to-mor- 
 row ! " added the count, who got out, leaving his fellow- 
 travelers quite confounded. 
 
 "When you take to your heels you can't take too much," 
 remarked Mistigris, seeing how nimbly the traveler vanished 
 in a sunken path. 
 
 " Oh, he must be the count who has taken Franconville ; he 
 is going that way," said Pere Leger. 
 
 " If ever again I try to humbug in a public carriage I will
 
 294 . A START IN LIFE.. 
 
 call myself out," said the false Schinner. "It is partly your 
 fault too, Mistigris," said he, giving his boy a rap on hi? cap. 
 
 "Oh, ho ! I who only followed you to Venice," replied 
 Mistigris. " But play a dog a bad game and slang him." 
 
 "Do you know," said Georges to Oscar, "that if by any 
 chance that was the Comte de Serizy, I should be sorry to 
 find myself in your skin, although it is so free from disease." 
 
 Oscar, reminded by these words of his mother's advice, 
 turned pale, and was quite sobered. 
 
 "Here you are, gentlemen," said Pierrotin, pulling up at 
 a handsome gate. 
 
 "Are where?" exclaimed the painter, Georges, and Oscar 
 all in a breath. 
 
 "That's a stiff one ! " cried Pierrotin. " Do you mean to 
 say, gentlemen, that neither of you has ever been here before ? 
 There stands the castle of Presles ! " 
 
 "All right," said Georges, recovering himself. "I am 
 going on to the farm of les Moulineaux," he added, not choos- 
 ing to tell his fellow-travelers that he was bound for the 
 house. 
 
 "Then you are coming with me," said Leger. 
 
 " How is that ? " 
 
 " I am the farmer at les Moulineaux. And what do you 
 want of me, colonel ? " 
 
 "A taste of your butter," said Georges, pulling out his 
 portfolio. 
 
 "Pierrotin, drop my things at the steward's," said Oscar; 
 " I am going straight to the house." And he plunged into a 
 cross-path without knowing whither it led. 
 
 "Halloo! Mr. Ambassador," cried Pierrotin, "you are 
 going into the forest. If you want to get to the castle, go in 
 by the side-gate." 
 
 Thus compelled to go in, Oscar made his way into the 
 spacious courtyard with a huge stone-edged flower-bed in the 
 middle, and stone posts all round with chains between. While
 
 A START IN LIFE. 295 
 
 Pere Leger stood watching Oscar, Georges, thunderstruck at 
 hearing the burly farmer describe himself as the owner of les 
 Moulineaux, vanished so nimbly that, when the fat man 
 looked round for his colonel, he could not find him. 
 
 At Pierrotin's request the gate was opened, and he went in 
 with much dignity to deposit the Great Schinner's multi- 
 farious properties at the lodge. Oscar was in dismay at 
 seeing Mistigris and the artist, the witnesses of his brag, really 
 admitted to the castle. 
 
 In ten minutes Pierrotin had unloaded the chaise of the 
 painter's paraphernalia, Oscar Husson's luggage, and the neat 
 leather portmanteau, which he mysteriously confided to the 
 lodge-keeper. Then he turned his machine, cracking his whip 
 energetically, and went on his way to the woods of 1'Isle 
 Adam, his face still wearing the artful expression of a peasant 
 summing up his profits. 
 
 Nothing was wanting to his satisfaction. On the morrow 
 he would have his thousand francs. 
 
 Oscar, with his tail between his legs, so to speak, wandered 
 round the great court, waiting to see what would become of 
 his traveling companions, when he presently saw Monsieur 
 Moreau come out of the large entrance-hall known as the 
 guardroom, on to the front steps. The land steward, who 
 wore a long, blue riding-coat cut down to his heels, had on 
 nankin-colored breeches and hunting-boots, and carried a crop 
 in his hand. 
 
 "Well, my boy, so here you are? And how is the dear 
 mother?" said he, shaking hands with Oscar. "Good- 
 morning, gentlemen; you, no doubt, are the painters prom- 
 ised us by Monsieur Grindot, the architect?" said he to 
 the artists. 
 
 He whistled twice, using the end of his riding-whip, and 
 the lodge-keeper came forward. 
 
 "Take these gentlemen to their rooms Nos. 14 and 15; 
 Madame Moreau will give you the keys. Light fires this
 
 296 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 evening, if necessary, and carry up their things. I am in- 
 structed by Monsieur le Comte to ask you to dine with me," 
 he added, addressing the artists. "At five, as in Paris. If 
 you are sportsmen, you can be well amused. I have permis- 
 sion to shoot and fish, and we have twelve thousand acres of 
 shooting outside our own grounds." 
 
 Oscar, the painter, and Mistigris, one as much disconcerted 
 as the other, exchanged glances. Still, Mistigris, faithful to 
 his instincts, exclaimed 
 
 " Pooh, never throw the candle after the shade !* On 
 we go ! " 
 
 Little Husson followed the steward, who led the way, walk- 
 ing quickly across the park. 
 
 "Jacques," said he to one of his sons, "go and tell your 
 mother that young Husson has arrived, and say that I am 
 obliged to go over to les Moulineaux for a few minutes." 
 
 Moreau, now about fifty years of age, a dark man of medium 
 height, had a stern expression. His bilious complexion, 
 highly colored nevertheless by a country life, suggested, at 
 first sight, a character very unlike what his really was. Every- 
 thing contributed to the illusion. His hair was turning gray, 
 his blue eyes and a large aquiline nose gave him a sinister ex- 
 pression, all the more so because his eyes were too close to- 
 gether ; still, his full lips, the shape of his face, and the good- 
 humor of his address, would, to a keen observer, have been 
 indications of kindliness. His very decided manner and 
 abrupt way of speech impressed Oscar immensely with a sense 
 of his penetration, arising from his real affection for the boy. 
 Brought up by his mother to look up to the steward as a great 
 man, Oscar always felt small in Moreau's presence; and now, 
 finding himself at Presles, he felt an oppressive uneasiness, as 
 if he had some ill to fear from this fatherly friend, who was his 
 only protector. 
 
 " Why, my dear Oscar, you do not look glad to be here," 
 * In original : Veni, vidi cecidi.
 
 A START IN LIFE. 297 
 
 said the steward. " But you will have plenty to amuse you; 
 you can learn to ride, to shoot, and hunt." 
 
 "I know nothing of such things," said Oscar dully. 
 
 "But I have asked you here on purpose to teach you." 
 
 " Mamma told me not to stay more than a fortnight, because 
 Madame Moreau " 
 
 " Oh, well, we shall see," replied Moreau, almost offended 
 by Oscar's doubts of his conjugal influence. 
 
 Moreau's youngest son, a lad of fifteen, active and brisk, 
 now came running up. 
 
 "Here," said his father, " take your new companion to 
 your mother." 
 
 And the steward himself went off by the shortest path to a 
 keeper's hut between the park and the wood. 
 
 The handsome lodge, given by the count as his land stew- 
 ard's residence, had been built some years before the Revolu- 
 tion, by the owner of the famous estate of Cassan or Bergeret, 
 a farmer-general of enormous wealth, who made himself as 
 notorious for extravagance as Bodard, Paris, and Bouret, laying 
 out gardens, diverting rivers, building hermitages, Chinese 
 temples, and other costly magnificence. 
 
 This house, in the middle of a large garden, of which one 
 wall divided it from the outbuildings of Presles, had formerly 
 had its entrance on the village High Street. Monsieur de 
 Serizy's father, when he purchased the property, had only to 
 pull down the dividing wall and build up the front gate to 
 make this plot and house part of the outbuildings. Then, by 
 pulling down another wall, he added to his park all the garden 
 land that the former owner had purchased to complete his 
 ring-fence. 
 
 The lodge, built of freestone, was in the Louis XV. style, 
 with linen-pattern panels under the windows, like those on 
 the colonnades of the Place Louis XV., in stiff, angular folds j 
 it consisted, on the first floor, of a fine drawing-room opening 
 into a bedroom, and of a dining-room, with a billiard-room
 
 298 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 adjoining. These two suites, parallel to each other, were 
 divided by a sort of anteroom or hall, and the stairs. The 
 hall was decorated by the doors of the drawing-room and 
 dining-room, both handsomely ornamental. T,he kitchen was 
 under the dining-room, for there was a flight of ten outside 
 steps. 
 
 Madame Moreau had taken the second floor for her own, 
 and had transformed what had been the best bedroom into a 
 boudoir ; this boudoir, and the drawing-room below, hand- 
 somely fitted up with the best pickings of the old furniture 
 from the castle, would certainly have done no discredit to the 
 mansion of a lady of fashion. The drawing-room, hung with 
 blue-and-white damask, the spoils of a state bed, and with 
 old gilded-wood furniture upholstered with the same silk, dis- 
 played ample curtains to the doors and windows. Some pic- 
 tures that had formerly been panels, with flower-stands, a few 
 modern tables, and handsome lamps, beside an antique hang- 
 ing chandelier of cut-glass, gave the room a very dignified 
 effect. The carpet was old Persian. 
 
 The boudoir was altogether modern and fitted to Madame 
 Moreau's taste, in imitation of a tent, with blue silk ropes on 
 a light gray ground. There was the usual divan with pillows 
 and cushions for the feet, and the flower-stands, carefully 
 cherished by the head-gardener, were a joy to the eye with 
 their pyramids of flowers. 
 
 The dining-room and billiard-room were fitted with ma- 
 hogany. All round the house the steward's lady had planned 
 a flower-garden, beautifully kept, and beyond it lay the park. 
 Clumps of foreign shrubs shut out the stables, and to give 
 admission from the road to her visitors she had opened a gate 
 where the old entrance had been built up. 
 
 Thus, the dependent position filled by the Moreaus was 
 cleverly glossed over ; and they were the better able to figure 
 as rich folk managing a friend's estate for their pleasure, be- 
 cause neither the count nor the countess ever came to quash
 
 A START IN LIFE. 299 
 
 their pretensions ; and the liberality of Monsieur de Serizy's 
 concessions allowed of their living in abundance, the luxury 
 of country homes. Dairy produce, eggs, poultry, game, fruit, 
 forage, flowers, wood, and vegetables the steward and his 
 wife had all of these in profusion, and bought literally nothing 
 but butcher's meat and the wine and foreign produce neces- 
 sary to their lordly extravagance. The poultry-wife made 
 the bread ; and, in fact, for the last few years, Moreau had 
 paid his butcher's bill with the pigs of the farm, keeping only 
 as much pork as he needed. 
 
 One day the countess, always very generous to her former 
 lady's-maid, made Madame Moreau a present, as a souvenir 
 perhaps, of a little traveling chaise of a past fashion, which 
 Moreau had furbished up, and in which his wife drove out 
 behind a pair of good horses, useful at other times in the 
 grounds. Beside this pair, the steward had his saddle-horse. 
 He ploughed part of the park-land, and raised grain enough 
 to feed the beasts and servants ; he cut three hundred tons 
 more or less of good hay, accounting for no more than one 
 hundred, encroaching on the license vaguely granted J&y the 
 count ; and instead of using his share of the produce on the 
 premises, he sold it. He kept his poultry-farm, his pigeons, 
 and his cows on the crops from the park-land ; but then the 
 manure from his stables was used in the count's garden. 
 Each of these pilfering acts had an excuse ready. 
 
 Madame Moreau's house-servant was the daughter of one of 
 the gardeners, and waited on her and cooked ; she was helped 
 in the housework by a girl, who also attended to the poultry 
 and dairy. Moreau had engaged an invalided soldier named 
 Brochon to look after the horses and do the dirty work. 
 
 At Nerville, at Chauvry, at Beaumont, at Maffliers, at Pre^ 
 roles, at Nointel, the steward's pretty wife was everywhere 
 received by persons who did not, or affected not to, know her 
 original position in life. And Moreau could confer obliga- 
 tions. He could use his master's interest in matters which are
 
 300 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 of immense importance in the depths of the country though 
 trivial in Paris. After securing for friends the appointments 
 of justice of the peace at Beaumont and at 1'Isle-Adam, he 
 had, in the course of the same year, saved an inspector of 
 forest-lands from dismissal, and obtained the cross of the 
 Legion of Honor for the quartermaster at Beaumont. So 
 there was never a festivity among the more respectable neigh- 
 bors without Monsieur and Madame Moreau being invited. 
 The cure and the Mayor of Presles were to be seen every 
 evening at their house. A man can hardly help being a good 
 fellow when he has made himself so comfortable. 
 
 So Madame la Regisseuse a pretty woman, and full of airs, 
 like every grand lady's servant who, when she marries, apes 
 her mistress introduced the latest fashions, wore the most 
 expensive shoes, and never walked out but in fine weather. 
 Though her husband gave her no more than five hundred 
 francs a year for dress, this in the country is a very large sum, 
 especially when judiciously spent; and his "lady," fair, 
 bright, and fresh-looking, at the age of thirty-six, and remain- 
 ing slight, neat, and attractive in spite of her three children, 
 still played the girl, and gave herself the airs of a princess. 
 If, as she drove past in her open chaise on her way to Beau- 
 mont, some stranger happened to inquire, "Who is that?" 
 Madame Moreau was furious if a native of the place replied, 
 "She is the steward's wife at Presles." She aimed at being 
 taken for the mistress of the mansion. 
 
 She amused herself with patronizing the villagers, as a great 
 lady might have done. Her husband's power with the count, 
 proved in so many ways, hindered the townsfolk from laugh- 
 ing at Madame Moreau, who was a person of importance in 
 the eyes of the peasantry. 
 
 Estelle, however her name was Estelle did not interfere 
 in the management, any more than a stockbroker's wife inter- 
 feres in dealings on the Bourse ; she even relied on her hus- 
 band for the administration of the house and of their income.
 
 A START IN LIFE. 301 
 
 Quite confident in her own powers of pleasing, she was miles 
 away from imagining that this delightful life, which had gone 
 on for seventeen years, could ever be in danger ; however, on 
 hearing that the count had resolved on restoring the splendid 
 castle of Presles, she understood that all her enjoyments were 
 imperiled, and she had persuaded her husband to come to 
 terms with Leger, so as to have a retreat at 1' Isle-Adam. She 
 could not have borne to find herself in an almost servile posi- 
 tion in the presence of her former mistress, who would un- 
 doubtedly laugh at her on finding ner established at the lodge 
 in a style that aped the lady of fashion. 
 
 The origin of the deep-seated enmity between the Reyberts 
 and the Moreaus lay in a stab inflicted on Madame Moreau 
 by Madame de Reybert in revenge for a pin-prick that the 
 steward's wife had dared to give on the first arrival of the 
 Reyberts, lest her supremacy should be infringed on by the 
 lady nee de Corroy. Madame de Reybert had mentioned, 
 and perhaps for the first time informed the neighborhood, of 
 Madame Moreau's original calling. The words lady's-maid 
 flew from lip to lip. All those who envied the Moreaus and 
 they must have been many at Beaumont, at 1'Isle-Adam, at 
 Maffliers, at Champagne, at Nerville, at Chauvry, at Baillet, 
 at Moisselles, made such pregnant comments that more than 
 one spark from this conflagration fell into the Moreaus' home. 
 For four years, now, the Reyberts, excommunicated by their 
 pretty rival, had become the object of so much hostile ani- 
 madversion from her partisans that their position would have 
 been untenable but for the thought of vengeance which had 
 sustained them to this day. 
 
 The Moreaus, who were very good friends with Grindot the 
 architect, had been told by him of the arrival ere long of a 
 painter commissioned to finish the decorative panels at the 
 castle, Schinner having executed the more important pieces. 
 This great painter recommended the artist we have seen
 
 302 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 traveling with Mistigris, to paint the borders, arabesques, and 
 other accessory decorations. Hence, for two days past, 
 Madame Moreau had been preparing her war-paint and sitting 
 expectant. An artist who was to board with her for some 
 weeks was worthy of some outlay. Schinner and his wife had 
 been quartered in the castle, where, by the count's orders, 
 they had been entertained like my lord himself. Grindot, 
 who boarded with the Moreaus, had treated the great artist 
 with so much respect that neither the steward nor his wife 
 had ventured on any familiarity. And, indeed, the richest 
 and most noble landowners in the district had vied with each 
 other in entertaining Schinner and his wife. So now Madame 
 Moreau, much pleased at the prospect of turning the tables, 
 promised herself that she would sound the trumpet before the 
 artist who was to be her guest, and make him out a match in 
 talent for Schinner. 
 
 Although on the two previous days she had achieved very 
 coquettish toilets, the steward's pretty wife had husbanded 
 her resources too well not to have reserved the most bewitch- 
 ing till the Saturday, never doubting that on that day at any 
 rate the artist would arrive to dinner. She had shod herself 
 in bronze kid with fine thread stockings. A dress of finely 
 striped pink-and-white muslin, a pink belt with a chased gold 
 buckle, a cross and heart round her neck, and wristlets of 
 black velvet on her bare arms Madame de Serizy had fine 
 arms, and was fond of displaying them gave Madame 
 Moreau the style of a fashionable Parisian. She put on a 
 very handsome Leghorn hat, graced with a bunch of moss 
 roses made by Nattier, and under its broad shade her fair 
 hair flowed in glossy curls. 
 
 Having ordered a first-rate dinner and carefully inspected 
 the rooms, she went out at an hour which brought her to the 
 large flower-bed in the court of the castle, like the lady of the 
 house, just when the coach would pass. Over her head she 
 held a very elegant pink silk parasol lined with white and
 
 A START IN LIFE. S03 
 
 trimmed with fringe. On seeing Pierrotin hand over to the 
 lodge-keeper the artist's extraordinary-looking baggage, and 
 perceiving no owner, Estelle had returned home lament- 
 ing the waste of another carefully arranged toilet. And, 
 like most people who have dressed for an occasion, she felt 
 quite incapable of any occupation but that of doing nothing 
 in her drawing-room while waiting for the passing of the 
 Beaumont coach which should come through an hour after 
 Pierrotin's, though it did not start from Paris till one o'clock ; 
 thus she was waiting at home while the two young artists were 
 dressing for dinner. In fact, the young painter and Mistigris 
 were so overcome by the description of lovely Madame Moreau 
 given them by the gardener whom they had questioned, that 
 it was obvious to them both that they must get themselves into 
 their best " toggery." So they donned their very best before 
 presenting themselves at the steward's house, whither they were 
 conducted by Jacques Moreau, the eldest of the children, a 
 stalwart youth, dressed in the English fashion, in a round 
 jacket with a turned-down collar, and as happy during the 
 holidays as a fish in water, here on the estate where his mother 
 reigned supreme. 
 
 "Mamma," said he, "here are the two artists come from 
 Monsieur Schinner." 
 
 Madame Moreau, very agreeably surprised, rose, bid her 
 son set chairs, and displayed all her graces. 
 
 " Mamma, little Husson is with father ; shall I fetch him ? " 
 whispered the boy in her ear. 
 
 "There is no hurry, you can stop and amuse him," said 
 the mother. 
 
 The mere words "there is no hurry" showed the two 
 artists how entirely unimportant was their traveling com- 
 panion, but the tone also betrayed the indifference of a step- 
 mother for her stepchild. In fact, Madame Moreau, who, 
 after seventeen years of married life, could not fail to be aware 
 of her husband's attachment to Madame Clapart and young
 
 304 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 Husson, hated the mother and son in so overt a manner that 
 it is easy to understand why Moreau had never till now ven- 
 tured to invite Oscar to Presles. 
 
 " We are requested, my husband and I," said she to the two 
 artists, "to do the honors of the castle. We are fond of art, 
 and more especially of artists," said she, with a simper, "and 
 I beg you to consider yourselves quite at home here. In the 
 country, you see, there is no ceremony ; liberty is indispen- 
 sable, otherwise life is too insipid. We have had Monsieur 
 Schinner here already " 
 
 Mistigris gave his companion a mischievous wink. 
 
 "You know him, of course," said Estelle, after a pause. 
 
 "Who does not know him, madame?" replied the painter. 
 
 " He is as well known as the parish birch," added Mistigris. 
 
 "Monsieur Grindot mentioned your name," said Madame 
 Moreau, "but really I " 
 
 " Joseph Bridau, madame," replied the artist, extremely 
 puzzled as to what this woman could be. 
 
 Mistigris was beginning to fume inwardly at this fair lady's 
 patronizing tone ; still, he waited, as Bridau did too, for some 
 movement, some chance word to enlighten them, one of those 
 expressions of assumed fme-ladyism, which painters, those 
 born and cruel observers of folly the perennial food of their 
 pencil seize on in an instant. In the first place, Estelle's 
 large hands and feet, those of a peasant from the district of 
 Saint-L6, struck them at once ; and before long one or two 
 lady's-maid's phrases, modes of speech that gave the lie to the 
 elegance of her dress, betrayed their prey into the hands of 
 the artist and his apprentice. They exchanged a look which 
 pledged them both to take Estelle quite seriously as a pastime 
 during their stay. 
 
 "You are so fond of art, perhaps you cultivate it with suc- 
 cess, madame?" said Joseph Bridau. 
 
 "No. Though my education was not neglected, it was 
 purely commercial. But I have such a marked and delicate
 
 A START IN LIFE. 305 
 
 feeling for art, that Monsieur Schinner always begged me, 
 when he had finished a piece, to give him my opinion." 
 "Just as Moliere consulted La Foret," said Mistigris. 
 Not knowing that La Foret was a servant-girl, Madame 
 Moreau responded with a graceful droop, showing that in her 
 ignorance she regarded this speech as a compliment. 
 
 " How is it that he did not propose just to knock off your 
 head ? " said Bridau. " Painters are generally on the lookout 
 for handsome women." 
 
 " What is your meaning, pray ? " said Madame Moreau, on 
 whose face dawned the wrath of an offended queen. 
 
 " In studio slang, to knock a thing off is to sketch it," said 
 Mistigris, in an ingratiating tone, " and all we ask is to have 
 handsome heads to sketch. And we sometimes say in admi- 
 ration that a woman's beauty has knocked us over." 
 
 "Ah, I did not know the origin of the phrase ! " replied 
 she, with a look of languishing sweetness at Mistigris. 
 
 "My pupil, Monsieur Leon de Lora," said Bridau, "has a 
 great talent for likeness. He would be only too happy, fair 
 being, to leave you a souvenir of his skill by painting your 
 charming face." 
 
 And Bridau signaled to Mistigris, as much as to say, 
 " Come, drive it home, she really is not amiss ! " 
 
 Taking this hint, Leon de Lora moved to the sofa by 
 Estelle's side, and took her hand, which she left in his. 
 
 " Oh ! if only as a surprise to your husband, madame, you 
 could give me a few sittings in secret, I would try to excel 
 myself. You are so lovely, so young, so charming ! A man 
 devoid of talent might become a genius with you for his 
 
 model ! In your eyes he would find " 
 
 "And we would represent your sweet children in our ara- 
 besques," said Joseph, interrupting Mistigris. 
 
 " I would rather have them in my own drawing-room ; but 
 that would be asking too much," said she, looking coquet- 
 tishly at Bridau. 
 20
 
 306 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 "Beauty, madame, is a queen whom painters worship, and 
 who has every right to command them." 
 
 "They are quite charming," thought Madame Moreau. 
 " Do you like driving out in the evening, after dinner, in an 
 open carriage, in the woods?" 
 
 " Oh ! oh ! oh ! oh ! " cried Mistigris, in ecstatic tones at each 
 added detail. " Why, Presles, will be an earthly paradise." 
 
 " With a fair-haired Eve, a young and bewitching woman," 
 added Bridau. 
 
 Just as Madame Moreau was preening herself, and soaring 
 into the seventh heaven, she was brought down again like a 
 kite by a tug at the cord. 
 
 " Madame ! " exclaimed the maid, bouncing in like a can- 
 non ball. 
 
 " Bless me, Rosalie, what can justify you in coming in like 
 this without being called ? " 
 
 Rosalie did not trouble her head about this apostrophe, but 
 said in her mistress' ear 
 
 " Monsieur le Comte is here." 
 
 " Did he ask for me? " said the steward's wife. 
 
 "No, madame but he wants his portmanteau and the 
 key of his room." 
 
 "Let him have them then," said she, with a cross shrug to 
 disguise her uneasiness. 
 
 " Mamma, here is Oscar Husson ! " cried her youngest son, 
 bringing in Oscar, who, as red as a poppy, dared not come 
 forward as he saw the two painters in different dress. 
 
 " So here you are at last, boy," said Estelle coldly. " You 
 are going to dress, I hope?" she went on, after looking at 
 him from head to foot with great contempt. " I suppose your 
 mother has not brought you up to dine in company in such 
 clothes as those." 
 
 "Oh, no," said the ruthless Mistigris, <f a coming diplo- 
 matist must surely have a seat to his trousers ! A coat to 
 dine saves wine."
 
 A STAR T IN LIFE. 307 
 
 "A coming diplomatist?" cried Madame Moreau. 
 
 The tears rose to poor Oscar's eyes as he looked from 
 Joseph to Leon. 
 
 " Only a jest by the way," replied Joseph, who wished to 
 help Oscar in his straits. 
 
 " The boy wanted to make fun as we did and he tried to 
 humbug," said the merciless Mistigris. "And now he finds 
 himself the ass with a lion's grin." 
 
 " Madame," said Rosalie, coming back to the drawing-room 
 door, "his excellency has ordered dinner for eight persons at 
 six o'clock ; what is to be done? " 
 
 While Estelle and her maid were holding counsel, the 
 artists and Oscar gazed at each other, their eyes big with ter- 
 rible apprehensions. 
 
 " His excellency Who?" said Joseph Bridau. 
 
 "Why, Monsieur le Comte de Serizy," replied little 
 Moreau. 
 
 "Was it he, by chance, in the coucou?" said Leon de 
 Lora. 
 
 "Oh!" exclaimed Oscar, "the Comte de Serizy would 
 surely never travel but in a coach and four." 
 
 " How did he come, madame the Comte de Seiizy?" the 
 painter asked of Madame Moreau when she came back very 
 much upset. 
 
 "I have no idea," said she. "I cannot account for his 
 coming, nor guess what he has come for. And Moreau is 
 out!" 
 
 " His excellency begs you will go over to the castle, Mon- 
 sieur Schinner," said the gardener, coming to the door, "and 
 he begs you will give him the pleasure of your company at 
 dinner, as well as Monsieur Mistigris." 
 
 " Our goose is cooked ! " said the lad with a laugh. "The 
 man we took for a country worthy in Pierrotin's chaise was 
 the count. So true is it that what you seek you never bind," 
 he added.
 
 308 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 Oscar was almost turning to a pillar of salt ; for, on hearing 
 this, his throat felt as salt as the sea. 
 
 "And you ! Who told him all about his wife's adorers and 
 his skin disease?" said Mistigris to Oscar. 
 
 "What do you mean?" cried the steward's wife, looking 
 at the two artists, who went off laughing at Oscar's face. 
 
 Oscar stood speechless, thunderstruck ; hearing nothing, 
 though Madame Moreau was questioning him and shaking 
 him violently by one of his arms, which she had seized and 
 clutched tightly ; but she was obliged to leave him where he 
 was without having extracted a reply, for Rosalie called her 
 again to give out linen and plate, and to request her to attend 
 in person to the numerous orders given by the count. The 
 house-servants, the gardeners, everybody on the place, were 
 rushing to and fro in such confusion as may be imagined. 
 
 The master had in fact dropped on the household like a 
 shell from a mortar. From above la Cave the count had made 
 his way by a path, familiar to him, to the gamekeeper's hut, 
 and reached it before Moreau. The gamekeeper was amazed 
 to see his real master. 
 
 " Is Moreau here, I see his horse waiting ? " asked Monsieur 
 de Sdrizy. 
 
 "No, monseigneur; but as he is going over to les Mou- 
 lineaux before dinner, he left his horse here while he ran 
 across to give some orders at the house." 
 
 The gamekeeper had no idea of the effect of this reply, 
 which, under existing circumstances, was, in the eyes of a 
 clear-sighted man, tantamount to assurance. 
 
 "If you value your place," said the count to the keeper, 
 " ride as fast as you can pelt to Beaumont on this horse, and 
 deliver to Monsieur Margueron a note I will give you." 
 
 The count went into the man's lodge, wrote a line, folded 
 it in such a manner that it could not be opened without detec- 
 tion, and gave it to the man as soon as he was in the saddle.
 
 A START IN LIFE. 309 
 
 "Not a word to any living soul," said he. "And you, 
 madame," he added to the keeper's wife, " if Moreau is sur- 
 prised at not finding his horse here, tell him merely that I 
 took it." 
 
 And the count went off across the park, through the gate 
 which was opened for him at his nod. 
 
 Inured though a man may be to the turmoil of political 
 life, with its excitement and vicissitudes, the soul of a man 
 who, at the count's age, is still firm enough to love, is also 
 young enough to feel a betrayal. It was so hard to believe 
 that Moreau was deceiving him, that at Saint-Brice Monsieur 
 de S6rizy had supposed him to be not so much in league with 
 Leger and the notary as, in fact, led away by them. And so, 
 standing in the inn gateway, as he heard Pere Leger talking 
 to the innkeeper, he intended to forgive his land steward after 
 a severe reproof. 
 
 And then, strange to say, the dishonesty of his trusted 
 agent had seemed no more than an episode when Oscar had 
 blurted out the noble infirmities of the intrepid traveler, the 
 Minister of Napoleon. Secrets so strictly kept could only 
 have been revealed by Moreau, who had no doubt spoken 
 contemptuously of his benefactor to Madame de Serizy's 
 former maid, or to the erstwhile Aspasia of the Directoire. 
 
 As he made his way down the cross-road to the castle, the 
 peer of France, the great minister, had shed bitter tears, 
 weeping as a boy weeps. They were his last tears that he 
 shed ! Every human feeling at once was so cruelly, so merci- 
 lessly attacked, that this self-controlled man rushed on across 
 his park like a hunted animal. 
 
 When Moreau asked for his horse, and the keeper's wife 
 replied 
 
 " Monsieur le Comte has just taken it." 
 
 " Who Monsieur le Comte ? " cried he. 
 
 " Monsieur le Comte de Serizy, the master," said she. 
 "Perhaps he is at the castle," added she, to get rid of the
 
 310 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 steward, who, quite bewildered by this occurrence, went off 
 toward the house. 
 
 But he presently returned to question the keeper's wife, for 
 it had struck him that there was some serious motive for his 
 master's secret arrival and unwonted conduct. The woman, 
 terrified at finding herself in a vise, as it were, between the 
 count and the steward, had shut herself into her lodge, quite 
 determined only to open the door to her husband. Moreau, 
 more and more uneasy, hurried across to the gatekeeper's 
 lodge, where he was told that the count was dressing. Rosa- 
 lie, whom he met, announced: "Seven people to dine at the 
 count's table." 
 
 Moreau next went home, where he found the poultry-girl 
 in hot discussion with an odd-looking young man. 
 
 "Monsieur le Comte told us, ' Mina's aide-de-camp and a 
 colonel,' " the girl insisted. 
 
 "I am not a colonel," replied Georges. 
 
 " Well, but is your name Georges ? " 
 
 "What is the matter?" asked the steward, intervening. 
 
 " Monsieur, my name is Georges Marest ; I am the son of 
 a rich hardware dealer, wholesale, in the Rue Saint-Martin, 
 and I have come on business to Monsieur le Comte de Serizy 
 from Maitre Crottat, his notary I am his second clerk." 
 
 "And I can only repeat, sir, what monsieur said to me 
 ' A gentleman will come,' says he, ' a Colonel Czerni-Georges, 
 aide-de-camp to Mina, who traveled down in Pierrotin's 
 chaise. If he asks for me, show him at once into the drawing- 
 room.' " 
 
 " There is no joking with his excellency," said the steward. 
 "You had better go in, monsieur. But how is it that his 
 excellency came down without announcing his purpose ? And 
 how does he know that you traveled by Pierrotin's chaise?" 
 
 "It is perfectly clear," said the clerk, "that the count is 
 the gentleman who, but for the civility of a young man, would 
 have had to ride on the front seat of Pierrotin's coucou."
 
 A START IN LIFE. 311 
 
 " On the front seat of Pierrotin's coucou ? " cried the stew- 
 ard and the farm-girl. 
 
 "I am quite sure of it from what this girl tells me," said 
 Georges Marest. 
 
 "But how ?" the steward began. 
 
 "Ah, there you are ! " cried Georges. " To humbug the 
 other travelers, I told them a heap of cock-and-bull stories 
 about Egypt, Greece, and Spain. I had spurs on, and I gave 
 myself out as a colonel in the cavalry a mere joke." 
 
 "And what was the gentleman like, whom you believe to 
 be the count?" asked Moreau. 
 
 "Why, he has a face the color of brick," said Georges, 
 "with perfectly white hair and black eyebrows." 
 
 "That is the man!" 
 
 "I am done for ! " said Georges Marest. 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 "I made fun of his orders." 
 
 " Pooh, he is a thorough good fellow ; you will have 
 amused him. Come to the castle forthwith," said Moreau. 
 "I am going up to the count. Where did he leave you?" 
 
 "At the top of the hill." 
 
 "I can make neither head nor tail of it ! " cried Moreau. 
 
 "After all, I poked fun at him, but I did not insult him," 
 said the clerk to himself. 
 
 "And what are you here for?" asked the steward. 
 
 " I have brought the deed of sale of the farm-lands of les 
 Moulineaux, ready made out." 
 
 "Good heavens!" exclaimed Moreau. "I don't under- 
 stand." 
 
 Moreau felt his heart beat painfully when, after knocking 
 two raps on his master's door, he heard in reply 
 
 "Is that you, Monsieur Moreau?" 
 
 "Yes, monseigneur." 
 
 "Come in." 
 
 The count was dressed in white trousers and thin boots, a
 
 312 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 white vest, and a black coat on which glittered, on the right* 
 hand side, the star of the grand cross of the Legion of Honor, 
 and on the left, from a buttonhole, hung that of the Golden 
 Fleece from a gold chain ; the blue ribbon was conspicuous 
 across his vest. He had dressed his hair himself, and had no 
 doubt got himself up to do the honors of Presles to Margueron, 
 and, perhaps, to impress that worthy with the atmosphere of 
 grandeur. 
 
 "Well, monsieur," said the count, who remained sitting, 
 but allowed Moreau to stand, "so we cannot come to terms 
 with Margueron ? " 
 
 " At the present moment he wants entirely too much for 
 his farm." 
 
 " But why should he not come over here to talk about it ? " 
 said the count in an absent-minded way. 
 
 "He is ill, monseigneur " 
 
 " Are you sure?" 
 
 " I went over there " 
 
 "Monsieur," said the count, assuming a stern expression 
 that was terrible, " what would you do to a man whom you 
 had allowed to see you dress a wound you wished to keep 
 secret, and who went off to make game of it with a street 
 trollop?" 
 
 " I should give him a sound thrashing." 
 
 " And if, in addition to this, you discovered that he was 
 cheating your confidence and robbing you?" 
 
 " I should try to catch him out and send him to the hulks." 
 
 "Listen, Monsieur Moreau. You have, I suppose, dis- 
 cussed my health with Madame Clapart and made fun at her 
 house of my devotion to my wife, for little Hussonwas giving 
 to the passengers in a public conveyance a vast deal of infor- 
 mation with reference to my cures, in my presence, this very 
 morning, and in what words ! God knows ! He dared to 
 slander my wife. 
 
 " Again, I heard from Farmer Leger's own lips, as he re-
 
 A START IN LIFE. 313 
 
 turned from Paris in Pierrotin's chaise, of the plan concocted 
 by the notary of Beaumont with him, and with you, with 
 reference to les Moulineaux. If you have been at all to see 
 Margueron, it was to instruct him to sham illness ; he is so 
 little ill that I expect him to dinner, and he is coming. Well, 
 monsieur, as to your having made a fortune of two hundred 
 and fifty thousand francs in seventeen years I forgive you. 
 I understand it. If you had but asked me for what you took 
 from me, or what others offered you, I would have given it to 
 you ; you have a family to provide for. Even with your want 
 of delicacy you have treated me better than another might 
 have done, that I believe - 
 
 " But that you, who know all that I have done for my 
 country, for France, you who have seen me sit up a hundred 
 nights and more to work for the Emperor, or toiling eighteen 
 hours a day for three months on end ; that you, who know my 
 worship of Madame de Serizy, should have gossiped about it 
 before a boy, have betrayed my secrets to the mockery of a 
 Madame Husson " 
 
 " Monseigneur ! " 
 
 " It is unpardonable. To damage a man's interest is 
 nothing, but to strike at his heart ! Ah ! you do not know 
 what you have done ! " 
 
 The count covered his face with his hands and was silent 
 for a moment. 
 
 " I leave you in possession of what you have," he went on, 
 "and I will forget you. As a point of dignity, of honor, 
 we will part without quarreling, for, at this moment, I can 
 remember what your father did for mine. 
 
 " You must come to terms good terms with Monsieur de 
 Reybert, your successor. Be calm, as I am. Do not make 
 yourself a spectacle for fools. Above all, no bluster and no 
 haggling. Though you have forfeited my confidence, try to 
 preserve the decorum of wealth. As to the little wretch who 
 has half killed me, he is not to sleep at Presles. Send him
 
 314 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 to the inn ; I cannot answer for what I might do if he crossed 
 my path." 
 
 "I do not deserve such leniency, monseigneur," said 
 Moreau, with tears in his eyes. " If I had been utterly dis- 
 honest I should have five hundred thousand francs; and 
 indeed I will gladly account for every franc in detail. But 
 permit me to assure you, monseigneur, that when I spoke of 
 you to Madame Clapart it was never in derision. On the 
 contrary, it was to deplore your condition and to ask her 
 whether she did not know of some remedy, unfamiliar to the 
 medical profession, which the common people use. I have 
 spoken of you in the boy's presence when he was asleep but 
 he heard me, it would seem ! and always in terms of the 
 deepest affection and respect. Unfortunately, a blunder is 
 sometimes punished as a crime. Still, while I bow to the 
 decisions of your just anger, I would have you to know what 
 really happened. Yes, it was heart to heart that I spoke of 
 you to Madame Clapart. And only ask my wife ; never have 
 I mentioned these matters to her " 
 
 " That will do," said the count, whose conviction was com- 
 plete. "We are not children; the past is irrevocable 
 
 Go and set your affairs and mine in order. You may remain 
 in the lodge till the month of October. Monsieur and 
 Madame de Reybert will live in the castle. Above all, try to 
 live with them as gentlemen should hating each other, but 
 keeping up appearances." 
 
 The count and Moreau went downstairs, Moreau as white 
 as the count's hair, Monsieur de Serizy calm and dignified. 
 
 While this scene was going forward, the Beaumont coach, 
 leaving Paris at one o'clock, had stopped at the gate of 
 Presles to set down Maitre Crottat, who, in obedience to the 
 count's orders, was shown into the drawing-room to wait for 
 him ; there he found his clerk excessively crestfallen, in com- 
 pany with the two painters, all three conspicuously uncom-
 
 A START IN LIFE. 315 
 
 fortable. Monsieur de Reybert, a man of fifty, with a very 
 surly expression, had brought with him old Margueron and the 
 notary from Beaumont, who held a bundle of leases and title- 
 deeds. 
 
 When this assembled party saw the count appear in full 
 court costume, Georges Marest had a spasm in the stomach 
 and Joseph Bridau felt a qualm ; but Mistigris, who was him- 
 self in his Sunday clothes, and who indeed had no crime on 
 his conscience, said loud enough to be heard 
 
 " Well, he looks much nicer now." 
 
 "You little rascal," said the count, drawing him toward 
 him by one ear, " so we both deal in decorations ! Do you 
 recognize your work, my dear Schinner ? " he went on, point- 
 ing to the ceiling. 
 
 " Monseigneur," said the artist, "I was so foolish as to 
 assume so famous a name out of bravado; but to-day's ex- 
 perience makes it incumbent on me to do something good and 
 win glory for that of Joseph Bridau." 
 
 "You took my part," said the count eagerly, "and I hope 
 you will do me the pleasure of dining with me you and 
 your witty Mistigris." 
 
 "You do not know to what you are exposing yourself," 
 said the audacious youngster; "an empty stomach knows no 
 peers." 
 
 " Bridau," said the count, struck by a sudden reminiscence, 
 "are you related to one of the greatest workers under the 
 Empire, a brigadier in command who died a victim to his 
 zeal?" 
 
 " I am his son, my lord," said Joseph, bowing. 
 
 "Then you are welcome here," replied the count, taking 
 the artist's hand in both his own ; " I knew your father, and 
 you may depend on me as on an American uncle," said 
 Monsieur de Serizy, smiling. "But you are too young to 
 have a pupil to whom does Mistigris belong?" 
 
 " To my friend Schinner, who has lent him to me," replied
 
 316 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 Joseph. " Mistigris' name is Leon de Lora. My lord, if you 
 remember my father, will you condescend to bear in mind his 
 other son, who stands accused of conspiring against the State, 
 and is on his trial before the Supreme Court " 
 
 "To be sure," said the count. "I will bear it in mind, 
 believe me. As to Prince Czerni-Georges, AH Pasha's ally, 
 
 and Mina's aide-de-camp " said the count, turning to 
 
 Georges. 
 
 " He? my second clerk ? " cried Crottat. 
 
 " You are under a mistake, Maltre Crottat," said Monsieur 
 de Serizy, very severely. " A clerk who hopes ever to be- 
 come a notary does not leave important documents in a dili- 
 gence at the mercy of his fellow-travelers ! A clerk who hopes 
 to become a notary does not spend twenty francs between 
 Paris and Moisselles ! A clerk who hopes to become a notary 
 does not expose himself to arrest as a deserter " 
 
 " Monseigneur," said Georges Marest, " I may have amused 
 myself by playing a practical joke on a party of travelers, 
 but " 
 
 " Do not interrupt his excellency," said his master, giving 
 him a violent nudge in the ribs. 
 
 " A notary ought early to develop the gifts of discretion, 
 prudence, and discernment, and not mistake a minister of 
 State for a candlemaker. " 
 
 "I accept sentence for my errors," said Georges; "but I 
 did not leave my papers at the mercy " 
 
 "You are at this moment committing the error of giving 
 the lie to a minister of State, a peer of France, a gentleman, 
 an old man and a client. Look for your deed of sale." 
 
 The clerk turned over the papers in his portfolio. 
 
 "Do not make a mess of your papers," said the count, 
 taking the document out of his pocket. " Here is the deed 
 you are seeking." 
 
 Crottat turned it over three times, so much was he amazed 
 at receiving it from the hands of his noble client.
 
 A START IN LIFE. 317 
 
 "What, sir ! " he at last began, addressing Georges. 
 
 "If I had not taken it," the count went on, " Pere Le^er 
 who is not such a fool as you fancy him from his questions 
 as to agriculture, since they might have taught you that a man 
 should always be thinking of his business Pere Leger might 
 have gotten hold of it and discovered my plans. You also will 
 give me the pleasure of your company at dinner, but on con- 
 dition of telling us the history of the Moslem's execution at 
 Smyrna, and of finishing the memoirs of some client which 
 you read, no doubt, before publication." 
 
 "A trouncing for bouncing ! " said Leon de Lora, in a low 
 voice to Joseph Bridau. 
 
 " Gentlemen," said the count to the notary from Beaumont, 
 to Crottat, Margueron, and Reybert, " come into the other 
 room. We will not sit down to dinner till we have concluded 
 our bargain ; for, as my friend Mistigris says, we must know 
 when to creep silent." 
 
 " Well, he is a thoroughly good fellow," said Leon de Lora 
 to Georges Marest. 
 
 "Yes; but if he is a good fellow, my governor is not, and 
 he will request me to play my tricks elsewhere." 
 
 "Well, you like traveling," said Bridau. 
 
 " What a dressing that boy will get from Monsieur and 
 Madame Moreau ! " cried Leon de Lora. 
 
 " The little idiot ! "said Georges. " But for him the count 
 would have thought it all very good fun. Well, well, it 
 is a useful lesson, and if I am caught chattering in a coach 
 again " 
 
 " Oh, it is a stupid thing to do," said Joseph Bridau. 
 
 "And vulgar, too," said Mistigris. "Keep your tongue 
 to clean your teeth." 
 
 While the business of the farm was being discussed between 
 Monsieur Margueron and the Comtede Serizy, with the assist- 
 ance of the three notaries, and in the presence of Mons. de 
 Reybert, Moreau was slowly making his way home. He went
 
 318 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 in without looking about him, and sat down on a sofa in the 
 drawing-room, while Oscar Husson crept into a corner out of 
 sight, so terrified was he by the steward's white face. 
 
 "Well, my dear," said Estelle, coming in, fairly tired out 
 by all she had had to do, " what is the matter? " 
 
 " My dear, we are ruined, lost beyond redemption. I am 
 no longer land steward of Presles ! The count has withdrawn 
 his confidence." 
 
 "And what has caused " 
 
 "Old Leger, who was in Pierrotin's chaise, let out all about 
 the farm of les Moulineaux ; but it is not that which has cut me 
 off for ever from his favor " 
 
 "What then?" 
 
 "Oscar spoke ill of the countess, and talked of monseig- 
 neur's ailments " 
 
 "Oscar?" cried Madame Moreau. "You are punished 
 by your own act ! A pretty viper you have nursed in your 
 bosom. How often have I told you " 
 
 "That will do," said Moreau hoarsely. 
 
 At this instant Estelle and her husband detected Oscar 
 huddled in a corner. Moreau pounced on the luckless boy 
 like a kite on its prey, seized him by the collar of his olive- 
 green coat, and forcibly dragged him into the daylight of a 
 window. 
 
 " Speak ! What did you say to monseigneur in the coach? 
 What devil loosened your tongue, when you always stand 
 moonstruck if I ask you a question? What did you do it 
 for ? " said the steward with terrific violence. 
 
 Oscar, too much scared for tears, kept silence, as motionless 
 as a statue. 
 
 " Come and ask his excellency's pardon ! " said Moreau. 
 
 "As if his excellency cared about a vermin like him ! " 
 shrieked Estelle in a fury. 
 
 " Come come to the castle ! " Moreau repeated. 
 
 Oscar collapsed, a lifeless heap on the floor.
 
 A START IN LIFE. 319 
 
 " Will you come, I say ? " said Moreau, his rage increasing 
 every moment. 
 
 " No, no; have pity ! " cried Oscar, who could not face a 
 punishment worse than death. 
 
 Moreau took the boy by the collar and dragged him like a 
 corpse across the courtyard, which rang with the boy's cries 
 and sobsj he hauled him up the steps and flung him, howling 
 and as rigid as a post, into the drawing-room at the feet of the 
 count, who, having settled for the purchase of les Moulineaux, 
 was just passing into the dining-room with his friends. 
 
 " On your knees, on your knees, wretched boy. Ask par- 
 don of the man who has fed your mind by getting you a 
 scholarship at college," cried Moreau. 
 
 Oscar lay with his face on the ground, foaming with rage. 
 Everybody was startled. Moreau, quite beside himself, was 
 purple in the face from the rush of blood to his head. 
 
 " This boy is mere vanity," said the count, after waiting in 
 vain for Oscar's apology. " Pride can humble itself, for 
 there is dignity in some self-humiliation. I am afraid you will 
 never make anything of this fellow." 
 
 And the Minister passed on. 
 
 Moreau led Oscar away and back to his own house. 
 
 While the horses were being harnessed to the traveling 
 chaise, he wrote the following letter to Madame Clapart : 
 
 "Oscar, my dear, has brought me to ruin. In the course 
 of his journey in Pierrotin's chaise this morning he spoke of 
 the flirtations of Madame la Comtesse to his excellency him- 
 self, who was traveling incognito, and told the count his own 
 secrets as to the skin disease brought on by long nights of 
 hard work in his various high offices. After dismissing me 
 from my place, the count desired me not to allow Oscar to 
 sleep at Presles, but to send him home. In obedience to his 
 orders I am having my horses put to my wife's carriage, and 
 Brochon, my groom, will take the little wretch to you.
 
 320 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 " My wife and I are in a state of despair, which you may 
 imagine, but which I cannot attempt to describe. I will come 
 to see you in a few days, for I must make my plans. I have 
 three children ; I must think of the future, and I do not yet 
 know what to decide on, for I am determined to show the 
 count the value of seventeen years of the life of such a man 
 as I. I have two hundred and sixty thousand francs, and I 
 mean to acquire such a fortune as will allow me to be, some 
 day, not much less than his excellency's equal. At this in- 
 stant I feel that I could remove mountains and conquer insur- 
 mountable difficulties. What a lever is such a humiliating 
 scene ! 
 
 "Whose blood can Oscar have in his veins? I cannot 
 compliment you on your son ; his behavior is that of an owl. 
 At this moment of writing he has not yet uttered a word in 
 reply to my questions and my wife's. Is he becoming idiotic, 
 or is he idiotic already ? My dear friend, did you not give 
 him due injunctions before he started ? How much misfor- 
 tune you would have spared me by coming with him, as I 
 begged you. If you were afraid of Estelle, you could have 
 stayed at Moisselles. However, it is all over now. Farewell 
 till we meet, soon. 
 
 "Your faithful friend and servant, 
 
 "MOREAU." 
 
 At eight o'clock that evening Madame Clapart had come 
 in from a little walk with her husband, and sat knitting stock- 
 ings for Oscar by the light of a single dip. Monsieur Clapart 
 was expecting a friend named Poiret, who sometimes came in 
 for a game of dominoes, for he never trusted himself to spend 
 an evening in a cafe. In spite of temperance, enforced on 
 him by his narrow means, Clapart could not have answered 
 for his abstinence when in the midst of food and drink, and 
 surrounded by other men, whose laughter might have nettled 
 him.
 
 A START IN LIFE. 321 
 
 " I am afraid Poiret may have been and gone," said he to 
 his wife. 
 
 "The lodge-keeper would have told us, my dear," replied 
 his wife. 
 
 "She may have forgotten." 
 
 " Why should she forget ? " 
 
 " It would not be the first time she has forgotten things 
 that concerts us; God knows, anything is good enough for 
 people who have no servants ! " 
 
 "Well, well," said the poor woman, to change the subject 
 and escape her husband's pin-stabs. " Oscar is at Presles by 
 this time ; he will be very happy in that beautiful place, that 
 fine park " 
 
 "Oh, yes, you expect great things!" retorted Clapart. 
 " He will make hay there with a vengeance ! " 
 
 "Will you never cease to be spiteful to that poor boy? 
 What harm has he done you ? Dear heaven ! if ever we are 
 in easy circumstances we shall owe it to him perhaps, for he 
 has a good heart." 
 
 " Our bones will be gelatine long before that boy succeeds 
 in the world!" said Clapart. "And he will have altered 
 very considerably! Why, you don't know your own boy; 
 he is a braggart, a liar, lazy, incapable " 
 
 " Supposing you were to go to fetch Poiret," said the hap- 
 less mother, struck to the heart by the diatribe she had brought 
 down on her own head. 
 
 " A boy who never took a prize at school ! " added Clapart. 
 
 In the eyes of the commoner sort, bringing home prizes 
 from school is positive proof of future success in life. 
 
 "Did you ever take a prize?" retorted his wife. "And 
 Oscar got the fourth accessit (second-premium) in philoso- 
 phy?" 
 
 This speech reduced Clapart to silence for a moment. 
 
 "And beside," he presently went on, "Madame Moreau 
 must love him as she loves a nail you know where ; she will 
 21
 
 322 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 try to set her husband against him. Oscar steward at Presles ! 
 Why, he must thoroughly understand land-surveying and agri- 
 culture " 
 
 " He can learn." 
 
 " He ! Never ! I bet you that if he got a place there he 
 would not be in it a week before he had done something 
 clumsy, and was packed off by the Comte de Serizy " 
 
 " Good heavens ! How can you be so vicious about the 
 future prospects of a poor boy, lull of good points, as sweet as 
 an angel, and incapable of doing an ill turn to any living 
 soul?" 
 
 At this moment the cracking of a post-boy's whip and the 
 clatter of a chaise at top speed, with the hoofs of horses pulled 
 up sharply at the outer gate, had roused the whole street. 
 Clapart, hearing every window flung open, went out on the 
 landing. 
 
 " Oscar, sent back by post ! " cried he in a tone in which 
 his satisfaction gave way to genuine alarm. 
 
 "Good God! what can have happened?" said the poor 
 mother, trembling as a leaf is shaken by an autumn wind. 
 
 Brochon came upstairs, followed by Oscar and Poiret. 
 
 "Good heavens, what has happened?" repeated she, ap- 
 pealing to the groom. 
 
 " I don't know, but Monsieur Moreau is no longer steward 
 of Presles, and they say it is your son's doing, and monseig- 
 neur has ordered him home again. However, here is a letter 
 from poor Monsieur Moreau, who is so altered, madame, it is 
 dreadful to see." 
 
 " Clapart, a glass of wine for the post-boy and one for 
 monsieur," said his wife, who dropped into an armchair and 
 read the terrible letter. "Oscar," she went on, dragging 
 herself to her bed, " you want to kill your mother! After all 
 
 I said to you this morning " But Madame Clapart did 
 
 not finish her sentence; she fainted with misery. 
 
 Oscar remained standing, speechless. Madame Clapart, as
 
 A START IN LIFE. 323 
 
 she recovered her senses, heard her husband saying to the boy 
 as he shook him by the arm 
 
 "Will you speak?" 
 
 " Go to bed at once, sir," said she to her son. " And leave 
 him in peace, Monsieur Clapart ; do not drive him out of his 
 wits, for he is dreadfully altered ! " 
 
 Oscar did not hear his mother's remark; he had made for 
 bed the instant he was told. 
 
 Those who have any recollection of their own boyhood will 
 not be surprised to hear that, after a day or so full of events 
 and agitations, Oscar slept the sleep of the just in spite of the 
 enormity of his sins. Nay, next day he did not find the whole 
 face of nature so much changed as he expected, and was 
 astonished to find that he was hungry, after regarding himself 
 the day before as unworthy to live. He had suffered only in 
 mind, and at that age mental impressions succeed each other 
 so rapidly that each wipes out the last, however deep it may 
 have seemed. 
 
 Hence corporal punishment, though philanthropists have 
 made a strong stand against it of late years, is in some cases 
 necessary for children ; also, it is perfectly natural, for Nature 
 herself has no other means but the infliction of pain to pro- 
 duce a lasting impression of her lessons. If to give weight to 
 the shame, unhappily too transient, which had overwhelmed 
 Oscar, the steward had given him a sound thrashing, the 
 lesson might have been effectual. The discernment needed 
 for the proper infliction of such corrections is the chief argu- 
 ment against their use ; for Nature never makes a mistake, 
 while the teacher must often blunder. 
 
 Madame Clapart took care to send her husband out next 
 morning to have her son to herself. She was in a pitiable 
 condition. Her eyes red with weeping, her face worn by a 
 sleepless night, her voice broken ; everything in her seemed 
 to sue for mercy by the signs of such grief as she could not 
 have endured a second time. When Oscar entered the room,
 
 324 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 she beckoned to him to sit down by her, and in a mild but feel- 
 ing voice reminded him of all the kindness done them by the 
 steward of Presles. She explained to Oscar that for the last 
 six years especially she had lived on Moreau's ingenious 
 charity. Monsieur Clapart's appointment, which they owed, 
 no less than Oscar's scholarship, to the Comte de Serizy, he 
 would some day cease to hold. Clapart could not claim a 
 pension, not having served long enough either in the Treasury 
 or the city to ask for one. And when Monsieur Clapart 
 should be shelved, what was to become of them ? 
 
 "I," she said, "by becoming a sick-nurse or taking a 
 place as housekeeper in some gentleman's house, could make 
 my living and keep Monsieur Clapart ; but what would be- 
 come of you ? You have no fortune, and you must work for 
 your living. There are but four openings for lads like you 
 trade, the civil service, the liberal professions, and military 
 service. A young man who has no capital must contribute 
 faithful service and brains; but great discretion is needed in 
 business, and your behavior yesterday makes your success very 
 doubtful. For an. official career you have to begin, for years 
 perhaps, as a supernumerary, and need interest to back you ; 
 and you have alienated the only protector we ever had a 
 man high in power. And, beside, even if you were blest with 
 the exceptional gifts which enable a yoting man to rise rapidly, 
 either in business or in an official position, where are we to 
 find the money for food and clothing while you are learning 
 your work?" 
 
 And here his mother, like all women, went off into wordy 
 lamentations. What could she do now that she was deprived 
 of the gifts of produce which Moreau was able to send her 
 while managing Presles? Oscar had overthrown his best 
 friend. 
 
 Next to trade and office work, of which her son need not 
 even think, came the legal profession as a notary, a pleader, 
 an attorney, or a sheriff. But then he must study law for
 
 A START IN LIFE. 326 
 
 three years at least, and pay heavy fees for his admission, his 
 examinations, his theses, and diploma; the number of com- 
 petitors was so great that superior talent was indispensable, 
 and how was he to live ? That was the constantly recurring 
 question. 
 
 "Oscar," she said in conclusion, "all my pride, all my 
 li'fe were centred in you. I could bear to look forward to an 
 old age of poverty, for I kept my eyes on you ; I saw you 
 entering on a prosperous career, and succeeding in it. That 
 hope has given me courage to endure the privations I have 
 gone through during the last six years to keep you at school, 
 for it has cost seven or eight hundred francs a year beside the 
 half-scholarship. Now that my hopes are crushed, I dread to 
 think of your future fate. I must not spend a sou of Mon- 
 sieur Clapart's salary on my own son. 
 
 " What do you propose to do ? You are not a good enough 
 mathematician to pass into a specialist college ; and, beside, 
 where could I find the three thousand francs a year for your 
 training? This is life, my dear child ! Well, you are eigh- 
 teen, and a strong lad enlist as a soldier ; it is the only way 
 you can make a living." 
 
 Oscar as yet knew nothing of life. Like all boys who have 
 been brought up in ignorance of the poverty at home, he had 
 no idea of the need to work for his living ; the word trade 
 conveyed no idea to his mind ; and the words Government 
 office did not mean much, for he knew nothing of the work. 
 He listened with a look of submission, which he tried to 
 make penitential, but his mother's remonstrances were lost in 
 air. However, at the idea of being a soldier, and on seeing 
 the tears in his mother's eyes, the boy, too, was ready to 
 weep. As soon as Madame Clapart saw the drops on her 
 boy's cheeks, she was quite disarmed ; and, like all mothers 
 in a similar position, she fell back on the generalities which 
 wind up this sort of attack, in which they suffer all their own 
 sorrows and their children's at the same time.
 
 326 A START IN LIFE, 
 
 " Come, Oscar, promise me to be more cautious for the 
 future, not to blurt out whatever comes uppermost, to moderate 
 your absurd conceit " and so on. 
 
 Oscar was ready to promise all his mother asked, and, press- 
 ing him gently to her heart, Madame Clapart ended by em- 
 bracing him to comfort him for the scolding he had had. 
 
 "Now," said she, "you will listen to your mother and 
 follow her advice, for a mother can give her son none but 
 good advice. We will go and see your Uncle Cardot. He is 
 our last hope. Cardot owed a great deal to your father, who, 
 by allowing him to marry his sister, with what was then an 
 immense marriage portion, enabled him to make a large 
 fortune in silk. I fancy he would place you with Monsieur 
 Camusot, his son-in-law and successor, in the Rue des Bour- 
 donnais. 
 
 " Still, your Uncle Cardot has four children of his own. 
 He made over his store, the Cocon d'Or (Golden Cocoon), 
 to his eldest daughter, Madame Camusot. Though Camusot 
 has millions, there are the four children, by two wives, and 
 he hardly knows of our existence. Marianne, his second 
 girl, married Monsieur Protez, of Protez and Chiffreville. 
 He paid four hundred thousand francs to put his eldest son in 
 business as a notary ; and he has just invested for his second 
 son Joseph as a partner in the business of Matifat, drug 
 importers. Thus your Uncle Cardot may very well not choose 
 to be troubled about you, whom he sees but four times a year. 
 He has never been to call on me here ; but he could come 
 to see me when I was in Madame Mtrc* s household, to be 
 allowed to supply silks to their Imperial highnesses, and the 
 Emperor, and the grandees at Court. And now the Camusots 
 are Ultras ! Camusot's eldest son, by his first wife, married 
 the daughter of a gentleman usher to the King ! Well, when 
 the world stoops it grows hunchbacked. And, after all, it 
 is a good business; the Cocon d'Or has the custom of the 
 Court under the Bourbons as it had under the Emperor.
 
 A START IN LIFE. 327 
 
 "To-morrow we will go to see your Uncle Cardot, and I 
 hope you will contrive to behave ; for, as I tell you, in him is 
 our last hope." 
 
 Monsieur Jean-Jerome-Severin Cardot had lost his second 
 wife six years since Mademoiselle Husson on whom, in the 
 days of his glory, the contractor had bestowed a marriage 
 portion of a hundred thousand francs in hard cash. Cardot, 
 the head-clerk of the Cocon d'Or, one of the old-established 
 Paris houses, had bought the business in 1793 when its owners 
 were ruined by the maximum, and Mademoiselle Husson's 
 money to back him had enabled him to make an almost colos- 
 sal fortune in ten years. To provide handsomely for his 
 children, he had very ingeniously invested three hundred 
 thousand francs in annuities for himself and his wife, which 
 brought him in thirty thousand francs a year. The rest of 
 his capital he divided into three portions of four hundred 
 thousand francs for his younger children, and the store was 
 taken as representing that sum by Camusot when he married 
 the eldest girl. Thus the old fellow, now nearly seventy, 
 could dispose of his thirty thousand francs a year without 
 damaging his children's interests ; they were all well married, 
 and no avaricious hopes could interfere with their filial affec- 
 tion. 
 
 Uncle Cardot lived at Belleville in one of the first houses 
 just above la Courtille. He rented a second floor, whence 
 there was a fine view over the Seine valley, an apartment for 
 which he paid a thousand francs a year, facing south, with the 
 exclusive enjoyment of a large garden ; thus he never troubled 
 himself about the three or four other families inhabiting the 
 spacious country house. Secure, by a long lease, of ending 
 his days there, he lived rather shabbily, waited on by his old 
 cook and by a maid who had been attached to his late wife, 
 both of whom looked forward to an annuity of some six hun- 
 dred francs at his death, and consequently did not rob him.
 
 328 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 These two women took incredible care of their master, and 
 with all the more devotion since no one could be less fractious 
 or fidgety than he. 
 
 The rooms, furnished by the late Madame Cardot, had re- 
 mained unaltered for six years, and the old man was quite 
 content ; he did not spend a thousand crowns a year there, 
 for he dined out in Paris five days a week, and came home at 
 midnight in a private fly that he took at the Barriere de la 
 Courtille. They had hardly anything to do beyond provid- 
 ing him with breakfast. The old man breakfasted at eleven 
 o'clock, then he dressed and scented himself and went to 
 Paris. A man usually gives notice when he means to dine 
 out ; Monsieur Cardot gave notice when he was to dine at 
 home. 
 
 This little old gentleman, plump, rosy, square, and hearty, 
 was always as neat as a pin, as the saying goes ; that is to say, 
 always in black silk stockings, corded silk knee-breeches, a 
 white marcella vest, dazzlingly white linen, and a dark blue 
 coat ; he wore violet silk gloves, gold buckles to his shoes 
 and breeches, a touch of powder on his hair, and a small 
 queue tied with black ribbon. His face was noticeable for 
 the thick, bushy eyebrows, beneath which sparkled his gray 
 eyes, and a large squarely-cut nose that made him look like 
 some venerable prebendary. This countenance did not belie 
 the man. Old Cardot was, in fact, one of the race of frisky 
 "Gerontes" who are disappearing day by day, and who 
 played the part of Turcaret in all the romances and comedies 
 of the eighteenth century. Uncle Cardot would speak to a 
 woman as " Lady fair; " he would take home any woman in 
 a coach who had no other protector ; he was " theirs to com- 
 mand," to use his own expression, with a chivalrous flourish. 
 His calm face and snowy hair were the adjuncts of an old age 
 wholly devoted to pleasure. Among men he boldly professed 
 Epicureanism, and allowed himself rather a broad style of 
 jokes. He had made no objection when his son-in-law Carm>
 
 A START IN LIFE. 329 
 
 sot attached himself to Coralie, the fascinating actress, for 
 he was, in secret, the Maecenas of Mademoiselle Florentine,* 
 leading dancer at the Gaite theatre. 
 
 Still, nothing appeared on the surface, or in his evident 
 conduct, to tell tales of these opinions and this mode of life. 
 Uncle Cardot, grave and polite, was supposed to be almost 
 cold, such a display did he make of the proprieties, and even 
 a bigot would have called him a hypocrite. This worthy 
 gentleman particularly detested the priesthood, he was one of 
 the large body of silly people who subscribe to the " Consti- 
 tutionnel," and was much exercised about the refusal of rights 
 of burial. He adored Voltaire, though his preference as a 
 matter of taste was for Piron, Verde, and Colle. Of course, 
 he admired Beranger, of whom he spoke ingeniously as the 
 "high-priest of the religion of Lisette." His daughters, 
 Madame Camusot and Madame Protez, and his two sons would 
 indeed have been knocked flat, to use a vulgar phrase, if any 
 one had told them what their father meant by singing "La 
 Mere Godichon." 
 
 The shrewd old man had never told his children of his 
 annuity; and they, seeing him live so poorly, all believed 
 that he had stripped himself of his fortune for them, and 
 overwhelmed him with care and affection. And he would 
 sometimes say to his sons : " Do not lose your money, for I 
 have none to leave you." Camusot, who was a man after his 
 own heart, and whom he liked well enough to allow him to 
 join his little parties, was the only one who knew of his an- 
 nuity of thirty thousand francs. Camusot highly applauded 
 the old fellow's philosophy, thinking that after providing so 
 liberally for his children and doing his duty so thoroughly, he 
 had a right to end his days jovially. 
 
 " You see, my dear fellow," the old master of the Cocon 
 d'Or would say to his son-in-law, " I might have married 
 again, no doubt, and a young wife would have had children. 
 * See " A Provincial at Paris."
 
 330 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 Oh, yes, I should have had children, I was at an age when 
 men always have children. Well, Florentine does not cost 
 me so much as a wife, she never bores me, she will not plague 
 me with children, and will not make a hole in your fortune." 
 And Camusot discovered in old Cardot an admirable feeling 
 for the Family, regarding him as a perfect father-in-law. " He 
 succeeds," he would say, "in reconciling the interests of his 
 children with the pleasures it is natural to indulge in in old 
 age after having gone through all the anxieties of business." 
 
 Neither the Cardots, nor the Camusots, nor the Protez sus- 
 pected what the existence was of their old aunt, Madame Cla- 
 part. The communications had always been restricted to 
 sending formal letters on the occasions of a death or a mar- 
 riage, and visiting cards on New Year's Day. Madame Cla- 
 part was too proud to sacrifice her feelings for anything but 
 her Oscar's interests, and acted under the influence of her re- 
 gard for Moreau, the only person who had remained faithful 
 to her in misfortune. She had never wearied old Cardot by 
 her presence or her importunities, but she had clung to him as 
 to a hope. She called on him once a quarter, and talked to 
 him of Oscar Husson, the nephew of the late respected Mad- 
 ame Cardot, taking the lad to see Uncle Cardot three times a 
 year, in the holidays. On each occasion the old man took 
 Oscar to dine at the Cadran bleu (the Blue Dial), and to the 
 Gaite in the evening, taking him home afterward to the Rue 
 de la Cerisaie. On one occasion, after giving him a new suit 
 of clothes, he had made him a present of the silver mug and 
 spoon and fork required as part of every boarding-school 
 boy's equipment. 
 
 Oscar's mother had tried to convince the old man that 
 Oscar was very fond of him, and she was always talking of the 
 silver mug and spoon and the beautiful suit, of which nothing 
 now survived but the vest. But these little insinuating atten- 
 tions did Oscar more harm than good with so cunning an old 
 fox as Uncle Cardot. Old Cardot had not been devoted to
 
 A START IN LIFE. 331 
 
 his late lamented, a bony red-haired woman ; also he knew the 
 circumstances of the deceased Husson's marriage to Oscar's 
 mother; and without looking down on her in any way, he 
 knew that Oscar had been born after his father's death, so his 
 poor nephew seemed an absolute alien to the Cardot family. 
 Unable to foresee disaster, Oscar's mother had not made up 
 for this lack of natural ties between the boy and his uncle, and 
 had not succeeded in implanting in the old merchant any 
 liking for her boy in his earliest youth. Like all women who 
 are absorbed in the one idea of motherhocd, Madame Clapart 
 could not put herself in Uncle Cardot's place ; she thought 
 he ought to be deeply interested in such a charming boy, 
 whose name, too, was that of the late Madame Cardot. 
 
 " Monsieur, here is the mother of your nephew Oscar," said 
 the maid to Monsieur Cardot, who was airing himself in the 
 garden before breakfast, after being shaved and having his 
 head dressed by the barber. 
 
 " Good-morning, lady fair," said the old silk-merchant, 
 bowing to Madame Clapart, while he wrapped his white quilted 
 dressing-gown across him. "Ah, ha ! your youngster is grow- 
 ing apace," he added, pulling Oscar by the ear. 
 
 " He has finished his schooling, and he was very sorry that 
 his dear uncle was not present at the distribution of prizes at 
 the College Henri IV., for he was named. The name of Hus- 
 son, of which, let us hope, he may prove worthy, was honor- 
 ably mentioned." 
 
 " The deuce it was ! " said the little man, stopping short. 
 He was walking with Madame Clapart and Oscar on a terrace 
 where there were orange-trees, myrtles, and pomegranate 
 shrubs. "And what did he get?" 
 
 "The fourth accessit* in philosophy," said the mother tri- 
 umphantly. 
 
 "Oh, ho. He has some way to go yet to make up for lost 
 time," cried Uncle Cardot. " To end with an accessit\s> 
 * Second best premium.
 
 332 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 not the treasure of Peru. You will breakfast with me ? " 
 said he. 
 
 "We are at your commands," replied Madame Clapart. 
 " Oh, my dear Monsieur Cardot, what a comfort it is to a 
 father and mother when their children make a good start in 
 life. From that point of view, as indeed from every other," 
 she put in, correcting herself, "you are one of the happiest 
 fathers I know. In the hands of your admirable son-in-law 
 and your amiable daughter, the Cocon d'Or is still the best 
 store of the kind in Paris. Your eldest son has been for years 
 as a notary at the head of the best-known business in Paris, 
 and he married a rich woman. Your youngest is a partner in 
 a first-rate druggist's business. And you have the sweetest 
 grandchildren. You are the head of four flourishing familes. 
 Oscar, leave us ; go and walk round the garden, and do not 
 touch the flowers." 
 
 "Why, he is eighteen ! " exclaimed Uncle Cardot, smiling 
 at this injunction, as though Oscar was a child ! 
 
 "Alas ! indeed he is, my dear Monsieur Cardot ; and after 
 bringing him up to that age neither crooked nor bandy, sound 
 in mind and body, after sacrificing everything to give him an 
 education, it would be hard indeed not to see him start on the 
 way to fortune." 
 
 "Well, Monsieur Moreau, who got you his half-scholarship 
 at the College Henri IV., will start him in the right road," 
 said Uncle Cardot, hiding his hypocrisy under an affectation 
 of bluntness. 
 
 "Monsieur Moreau may die," said she. "Beside, he has 
 quarreled beyond remedy with Monsieur le Comte de Serizy, 
 his patron." 
 
 "The deuce he has ! Listen, madame, I see what you are 
 coming to " 
 
 " No, monsieur," said Oscar's mother, cutting the old man 
 short; while he, out of respect for a "lady fair," controlled 
 the impulse of annoyance at being interrupted. "Alas ! you
 
 A START IN LIFE. 333 
 
 can know nothing of the anguish of a mother who for seven 
 years has been obliged to take six hundred francs a year out 
 of her husband's salary of eighteen hundred. Yes, monsieur, 
 that is our whole income. So what can I do for my Oscar? 
 Monsieur Clapart so intensely hates the poor boy that I really 
 cannot keep him at home. What can a poor woman do under 
 such circumstances but come to consult the only relative her 
 boy has under heaven ! " 
 
 "You did quite right," replied Monsieur Cardot, "you 
 never said anything of all this before 
 
 "Indeed, monsieur," replied Madame Clapart with pride, 
 " you are the last person to whom I would confess the depth 
 of my poverty. It is all my own fault ; I married a man 
 whose incapacity is beyond belief. Oh ! I am a most miser- 
 able woman." 
 
 "Listen, madame," said the little old man gravely. "Do 
 not cry. I cannot tell you how much it pains me to see a fair 
 lady in tears. After all, your boy's name is Husson ; and if 
 the dear departed were alive, she would do something for the 
 sake of her father's and brother's name 
 
 "She truly loved her brother! " cried Oscar's mother. 
 
 " But all my fortune is divided among my children, who 
 have nothing further to expect from me," the old man went 
 on. "I divided the two million francs I had among them; 
 I wished to see them happy in my lifetime. I kept nothing 
 for myself but an annuity, and at my time of life a man clings 
 to his habits. Do you know what you must do with this 
 youngster?" said he, calling back Oscar and taking him by 
 the arm. "Put him to study law, I will pay for his matricu- 
 lation and preliminary fees. Place him with an attorney; 
 let him learn all the tricks of the trade ; if he does well, and 
 gets on and likes the work, and if I am still alive, each of my 
 children will, when the time comes, lend him a quarter of the 
 sum necessary to purchase a connection ; I will stand surety 
 for him. From now till then you have only to feed and
 
 334 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 clothe him ; he will know some hard times no doubt, but he 
 will learn what life is. Why, why ! I set out from Lyons 
 with two double louis given me by my grandmother ; I came 
 to Paris on foot and here I am ! Short commons are good 
 for the health. Young man, with discretion, honesty, and 
 hard work, success is certain. It is a great pleasure to make 
 your own fortune ; and when a man has kept his teeth, he eats 
 what he likes in his old age, singing ' La Mere Godichon ' 
 every now and then, as I do. Mark my words: Honesty, 
 hard work, and discretion." 
 
 "You hear, Oscar," said his mother. "Your uncle has 
 put in four words the sum-total of all my teaching, and you 
 ought to stamp the last on your mind in letters of fire." 
 
 " Oh, it is there ! " replied Oscar. 
 
 "Well, then, thank your uncle; do you not understand 
 that he is providing for you in the future ? You may be an 
 attorney in Paris." 
 
 "He does not appreciate the splendor of his destiny," 
 said the old man, seeing Oscar's bewildered face. " He has 
 but just left school. Listen to me : I am not given to wasting 
 words," his uncle went on. "Remember that at your age 
 honesty is only secured by resisting temptations, and in a 
 great city like Paris you meet them at every turn. Live in a 
 garret under your mother's roof; go straight to your lecture, 
 and from that to your office ; work away morning, noon, and 
 night, and study at home ; be a second clerk by the time you 
 are two-and-twenty, and a head-clerk at four-and-twenty. 
 Get learning, and you are a made man. And then if you 
 should not like that line of work, you might go into my son's 
 office as a notary and succeed him. So work, patience, 
 honesty, and discretion these are your watchwords." 
 
 " And God grant you may live another thirty years to see 
 your fifth child realize all our expectations ! " cried Madame 
 Clapart, taking the old man's hand and pressing it with a 
 dignity worthy of her young days.
 
 A START IN LIFE. 335 
 
 "Come, breakfast," said the kind old man, leading Oscar 
 in by the ear. 
 
 During the meal Uncle Cardot watched his nephew on the 
 sly, and soon discovered that he knew nothing of life. 
 
 " Send him to see me now and then," said he, as he took 
 leave of her, with a nod to indicate Oscar. " I will lick him 
 into shape." 
 
 This visit soothed the poor woman's worst grief, for she 
 had not looked for such a happy result. For a fortnight she 
 took Oscar out walking, watched over him almost tyranni- 
 cally, and thus time went on till the end of October. 
 
 One morning Oscar saw the terrible steward walk in to find 
 the wretched party in the Rue de la Cerisaie breakfasting off 
 a salad of herring and lettuce, with a cup of milk to wash it 
 down. 
 
 " We have settled in Paris, but we do not live as we did at 
 Presles," said Moreau, who intended thus to make Madame 
 Clapart aware of the change in their circumstances, brought 
 about by Oscar's misdemeanor. " But I shall not often be in 
 town. I have gone into partnership with old Leger and old 
 Margueron of Beaumont. We are land agents, and we began 
 by buying the estate of Persan. I am the head of the firm, 
 which has altogether a million of francs, for I have borrowed 
 on my property. When I find an opening, Pere Leger and 
 I go into the matter, and my partners each take a quarter and 
 I half of the profits, for I have all the trouble ; I shall always 
 be on the road. 
 
 ' My wife lives in Paris very quietly, in the Faubourg du 
 Roule. When we have fairly started in business, and shall 
 only be risking the interest on our money, if we are satisfied 
 with Oscar, we may, perhaps, give him work." 
 
 "Well, after all, my friend, my unlucky boy's blunder will 
 no doubt turn out to be the cause of your making a fine 
 fortune, for you really were wasting your talents and energy
 
 336 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 at Presles." Madame Clapart then told the story of her 
 visit to Uncle Cardot, to show Moreau that she and her son 
 might be no further expense to him. 
 
 " The old man is quite right," said the ex-steward. "Oscar 
 must be kept to his work with a hand of iron, and he will no 
 doubt make a notary or an attorney. But he must not wander 
 from the line traced out for him. Ah ! I know the man you 
 want. The custom of an estate agent is valuable. I have 
 been told of an attorney who has bought a practice without 
 any connection. He is a young man, but as stiff as an iron 
 bar, a tremendous worker, a perfect horse for energy and go ; 
 his name is Desroches. I will offer him all our business on 
 condition of his taking Oscar in hand. I will offer him a 
 premium of nine hundred francs, of which I will pay three 
 hundred ; thus your son will cost you only six hundred, and 
 I will recommend him strongly to his master. If the boy is ever 
 to become a man, it will be under that iron rule, for he will 
 come out a notary, a pleader, or an attorney." 
 
 "Come, Oscar, thank Monsieur Moreau for his kindness; 
 you stand there like a mummy. It is not every youth who 
 blunders that is lucky enough to find friends to take an interest 
 in him after being injured by him " 
 
 "The best way to make matters up with me," said Moreau, 
 taking Oscar's hand, "is to work steadily and behave well." 
 
 Ten days after this Oscar was introduced by Monsieur 
 Moreau to Maitre Desroches, attorney, lately established in 
 the Rue de Bethisy, in spacious rooms at the end of a narrow 
 court, at a relatively low rent. Desroches, a young man of 
 six-and-twenty, the son of poor parents, austerely brought up 
 by an excessively severe father, had himself known what it was 
 to be in Oscar's position ; he therefore took an interest in him, 
 but only in the way of which he was himself capable, with all 
 the hardness of his character. The manner of this tall, lean 
 young lawyer, with a dull complexion, and his hair cut short
 
 A START IN LIFE. 337 
 
 all over his head, sharp in his speech, keen-eyed, and gloomy 
 though hasty, terrified poor Oscar. 
 
 "We work day and night here," said the lawyer from the 
 depths of his chair, and from behind a long table, on which 
 papers were piled in alps. "Monsieur Moreau, we will not 
 kill him, but he will have to go our pace. Monsieur Godes- 
 chal ! " he called out. 
 
 Although it was Sunday, the head-clerk appeared with a pen 
 in his hand. 
 
 " Monsieur Godeschal, this is the articled pupil of whom I 
 spoke, and in whom Monsieur Moreau takes the greatest in- 
 terest ; he will dine with us, and sleep in the little attic next 
 to your room. You must allow him exactly time enough to 
 get to the law-schools and back, so that he has not five minutes 
 to lose ; see that he learns the Code, and does well at lecture ; 
 that is to say, give him law books to read up when he has done 
 his school work. In short, he is to be under your immediate 
 direction, and I will keep an eye on him. We want to turn 
 him out what you are yourself a capital head-clerk by the 
 time he is ready to be sworn in as an attorney. Go with 
 Godeschal, my little friend ; he will show you your room, and 
 you can move into it." 
 
 "You see, Godeschal?" Desroches went on, addressing 
 Moreau. " He is a youngster without a sou, like myself; he 
 is Mariette's brother, and she is saving for him, so that he 
 may buy a connection ten years hence. All my clerks are 
 youngsters, who have nothing to depend on but their ten 
 fingers to make their fortune. And my five clerks and I work 
 like any dozen of other men. In ten years I shall have the 
 finest practice in Paris. We take a passionate interest here in 
 our business and our clients, and that is beginning to be 
 known. I got Godeschal from my greater brother in the 
 law, Derville ; with him he was second clerk, though only for" 
 a fortnight ; but we had made friends in that huge office. 
 
 " I give Godeschal a thousand francs a year, with board and 
 22
 
 338 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 lodging. The fellow is worth it to me ; he is indefatigable ! 
 I like that boy ! He managed to live on six hundred francs a 
 year, as I did when I was a clerk. What I absolutely insist on 
 is stainless honesty, and the man who can practice it in pov- 
 erty is a man. The slightest failing on that score, and a clerk 
 of mine goes! " 
 
 " Come, the boy is in a good school," said Moreau. 
 
 For two whole years Oscar lived in the Rue de Bethisy, in 
 a den of the law ; for if ever this old-fashioned term could be 
 applied to a lawyer's office, it was to this of Desroches. Under 
 this minute and strict supervision, he was kept so rigidly to 
 hours and to work that his life in the heart of Paris was like 
 that of a monk. 
 
 At five in the morning, in all weathers, Godeschal woke. 
 He went down to the office with Oscar, to save a fire, and 
 they always found the "chief" up and at work. Oscar did 
 the errands and prepared his school-work studies on an enor- 
 mous scale. Godeschal, and often the chief himself, showed 
 their pupil what authors to compare, and the difficulties to be 
 met. Oscar was never allowed to pass from one chapter of 
 the Code to the next till he had thoroughly mastered it, and 
 had satisfied both Desroches and Godeschal, who put him 
 through preliminary examinations, far longer and harder than 
 those of the law-schools. 
 
 On his return from the schools, where he did not spend 
 much time, he resumed his seat in the office and worked 
 again ; sometimes he went into the Courts, and he was at the 
 bidding of the merciless Godeschal till dinner-time. Dinner, 
 which he shared with his masters, consisted of a large dish of 
 meat, a dish of vegetables, and a salad ; for dessert there was 
 a bit of Gruyere cheese. After dinner, Godeschal and Oscar 
 went back to the office and worked there till the evening. 
 
 Once a month Oscar went to breakfast with his Uncle Car 
 dot, and he spent the Sundays with his mother. Moreau from
 
 A START IN LIFE. 339 
 
 time to time, if he came to the office on business, would take 
 the boy to dine at the Palais-Royal and treat him to the play. 
 Oscar had been so thoroughly snubbed by Godeschal and Des- 
 roches on the subject of his craving after fashion that he had 
 ceased to think about dress. 
 
 "A good clerk," said Godeschal, "should have two black 
 coats one old and one new black trousers, black stockings 
 and shoes. Boots cost too much. You may have boots when 
 you are an attorney. A clerk ought not to spend more than 
 seven hundred francs in all. He should wear good, strong 
 shirts of stout linen. Oh, when you start from zero to make 
 a fortune, you must know how to limit yourself to what is 
 strictly needful. Look at Monsieur Desroches ! He did as 
 we are doing, and you see he has succeeded." 
 
 Godeschal practiced what he preached. Professing the 
 strictest principles of honor, reticence, and honesty, he acted 
 on them without any display, as simply as he walked and 
 breathed. It was the natural working of his soul, as walking 
 and breathing are the working of certain organs. 
 
 Eighteen months after Oscar's arrival, the second clerk had 
 made, for the second time, a small mistake in the accounts of 
 his little cash-box. Godeschal addressed him in the presence 
 of all the clerks 
 
 " My dear Gaudet, leave on your own account, that it may 
 not be said that the chief turned you out. You are either in- 
 accurate or careless, and neither of those faults is of any use 
 here. The chief shall not know, and that is the best I can 
 do for an old fellow-clerk." 
 
 Thus, at the age of twenty, Oscar was third clerk in Maltre 
 Desroches' office. Though he earned no salary, yet he was 
 fed and lodged, for he did the work of a second clerk. Des- 
 roches employed two managing clerks, and the second clerk 
 was overdone with work. By the time he had got through his 
 second year at the schools, Oscar, who knew more than many 
 a man who has taken out his license, did the work of the
 
 340 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 Courts very intelligently, and occasionally pleaded in cham- 
 bers. In fact, Desroches and Godeschal expressed themselves 
 satisfied. 
 
 Still, though he had become almost sensible, he betrayed a 
 love of pleasure and a desire to shine, which were only sub- 
 dued by the stern discipline and incessant toil of the life he 
 led. The estate agent, satisfied with the boy's progress, then 
 relaxed his strictness; and when, in the month of July, 1825, 
 Oscar passed his final examination, Moreau gave him enough 
 money to buy some good clothes. Madame Clapart, very 
 happy and proud of her son, prepared a magnificent outfit for 
 the qualified attorney, the second clerk, as he was soon to be. 
 In poor families a gift always takes the form of something use- 
 ful. 
 
 When the Courts reopened in the month of November, 
 Oscar took the second clerk's room and his place, with a 
 salary of eight hundred francs, board and lodging. And 
 Uncle Cardot, who came privately to make inquiries about 
 his nephew of Desroches, promised Madame Clapart that he 
 would put Oscar in a position to buy a connection if he went 
 on as he had begun. 
 
 In spite of such seeming wisdom, Oscar Husson was torn 
 by many yearnings in the bottom of his soul. Sometimes he 
 felt as if he must fly from a life so entirely opposed to his taste 
 and character ; a galley slave, he thought, was happier than 
 he. Galled by his iron collar, he was sometimes tempted to 
 run away when he compared himself with some well-dressed 
 youth he met in the street. Now and then an impulse of 
 folly with regard to women would surge up in him ; and his 
 resignation was only a part of his disgust of life. Kept steady 
 by Godeschal's example, he was dragged rather than led by 
 his will to follow so thorny a path. 
 
 Godeschal, who watched Oscar, made it his rule not to put 
 his ward in the way of temptation. The boy had usually no 
 money, or so little that he could not run into excesses. Dur-
 
 A START IN LIFE. 341 
 
 ing the last year the worthy Godeschal had five or six times 
 taken Oscar out for some " lark," paying the cost, for he per- 
 ceived that the cord round this tethered kid's neck must be 
 loosened ; and these excesses, as the austere head-clerk termed 
 them, helped Oscar to endure life. He found little to amuse 
 him at his uncle's house, and still less at his mother's, for she 
 lived even more frugally than Desroches. 
 
 Moreau could not, like Godeschal, make himself familiar 
 with Oscar, and it is probable that this true protector made 
 Godeschal his deputy in initiating the poor boy into the 
 many mysteries of life. Oscar, thus learning discretion, 
 could at last appreciate the enormity of the blunder he had 
 committed during his ill-starred journey in the coucou ; still, 
 as the greater part of his fancies were so far suppressed, the 
 follies of youth might yet lead him astray. However, as by 
 degrees he acquired knowledge of the world and its ways, his 
 reason developed ; and so long as Godeschal did not lose 
 sight of him, Moreau hoped to train Madame Clapart's son 
 to a good end. 
 
 "How is he going on?" the estate agent asked on his 
 return from a journey which had kept him away from Paris 
 for some months. 
 
 "Still much too vain," replied Godeschal. "You give 
 him good clothes and fine linen, he wears shirt-frills like a 
 stockbroker, and my gentleman goes to walk in the Tuileries 
 on Sundays in search of adventures. What can I say? He 
 is young. He teases me to introduce him to my sister, 
 in whose house he would meet a famous crew I actresses, 
 dancers, dandies, men who are eating themselves out of house 
 and home. He is not cut out for an attorney, I fear. Still, 
 he does not speak badly ; he might become a pleader. He 
 could argue a case from a well-prepared brief." 
 
 In November, 1825, when Oscar Husson was made second 
 clerk, and was preparing his thesis for taking out his license,
 
 342 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 a new fourth clerk came to Desroches' office to fill up the gap 
 made by Oscar's promotion. 
 
 This fourth clerk, whose name was Frederic Marest, was 
 intended for the higher walks of the law, and was now ending 
 his third year at the schools. From information received by 
 the inquiring minds of the office, he was a handsome fellow 
 of three-and-twenty, who had inherited about twelve thousand 
 francs a year at the death of a bachelor uncle, and the son of' 
 a Madame Marest, the widow of a rich lumber merchant. 
 The future judge, filled with the laudable desire to know his 
 business in its minutest details, placed himself under Des- 
 roches, intending to study procedure, so as to be fit to take 
 the place of a managing clerk in two years' time. His pur- 
 pose was to go through his first stages as a pleader in Paris, 
 so as to be fully prepared for an appointment, which, as a 
 young man of wealth, he would certainly get. To see himself 
 a public prosecutor, at the age of thirty, was the height of his 
 ambition. 
 
 Though Frederic Marest was the first cousin of Georges 
 Marest, the practical joker of the journey to Presles, as young 
 Husson knew this youth only by his first name, as Georges, 
 the name of Frederic Marest had no suggestions for him. 
 
 "Gentlemen," said Godeschal at breakfast, addressing all 
 his underlings, " I have to announce the advent of a new 
 student in law ; and as he is very rich, we shall, I hope, make 
 him pay his footing handsomely." 
 
 "Bring out the Book," cried Oscar to the youngest clerk, 
 "and let us be serious, pray." 
 
 The boy clambered like a squirrel along the pigeon-holes 
 to reach a volume lying on the top shelf, so as to collect all 
 the dust. 
 
 " It is finely colored ! " said the lad, holding it up. 
 
 We must now explain the perennial pleasantry which at 
 that time gave rise to the existence of such a book in almost 
 every lawyer's office. An old saying of the eighteenth cen-
 
 A START IN LIFE. 343 
 
 tury " Clerks only breakfast, farmers generally dine, and 
 lords sup" is still true, as regards the faculty of law, of 
 every man who has spent two or three years studying proce- 
 dure under an attorney, or the technicalities of a 'notary's 
 business under some master of that branch. In the life of a 
 lawyer's clerk work is so unremitting that pleasure is enjoyed 
 all the more keenly for its rarity, and a practical joke espe- 
 cially is relished with rapture. This, indeed, is what explains 
 up to a certain point Georges Marest's behavior in Pierrotin's 
 chaise. The gloomiest of law-clerks is always a prey to the 
 craving for farcical buffoonery. The instinct with which a 
 practical joke or an occasion for fooling is jumped at and 
 utilized among law-clerks is marvelous to behold, and is found 
 in no other class but among artists. The studio and the 
 lawyer's office are, in this respect, better than the stage. 
 
 Desroches, having started in an office without a connection, 
 had, as it were, founded a new dynasty. This " Restoration " 
 had interrupted the traditions of the office with regard to the 
 footing of a new-comer. Desroches, indeed, settling in quar- 
 ters where stamped paper had never yet been seen, had put in 
 new tables and clean new file-boxes of white mill-board edged 
 with blue. His staff consisted of clerks who had come from 
 other offices with no connection between them, and thrown 
 together by surprise, as it were. 
 
 But Godeschal, who had learned his fence under Derville, 
 was not the man to allow the precious tradition of the Bien- 
 venue to be lost. The JBienvenue, or welcome, is the break- 
 fast which every new pupil must give to the "old boys" of 
 the office to which he is articled. Now, just at the time when 
 Oscar joined the office, in the first six months of Desroches' 
 career, one winter afternoon when work was through much 
 earlier than usual, and the clerks were warming themselves 
 before going home, Godeschal hit upon the notion of con- 
 cocting a sham register of the fasti and High Festivals of the 
 Minions of the Law, a relic of great antiquity, saved from the
 
 344 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 storms of the Revolution, and handed down from the office of 
 the great Bordin, Attorney to the Chatelet, and the imme- 
 diate predecessor of Sauvagnest, the attorney from whom 
 Desroches had taken the office. The first thing was to find 
 in some stationer's old stock a ledger with paper bearing an 
 eighteenth-century watermark, and properly bound in parch- 
 ment, in which to enter the decrees of the Council. Having 
 discovered such a volume, it was tossed in the dust, in the 
 ashes-pan, in the fireplace, in the kitchen ; it was even left in 
 what the clerks called the deliberating-room ; and it had ac- 
 quired a tint of mildew that would have enchanted a book- 
 worm, the cracks of primeval antiquity, and corners so worn 
 that the mice might have nibbled them off. The edges were 
 rubbed with infinite skill. The book being thus perfected, 
 here are a few passages which will explain to the dullest the 
 uses to which Desroches' clerks devoted it, the first sixty 
 pages being filled with sham reports of cases. 
 
 " In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the 
 Holy Ghost. So be it. 
 
 "Whereas, on this day the Festival of our Lady Saint- 
 Genevieve, patron saint of this good city of Paris, under 
 whose protection the scribes and scriveners of this office have 
 dwelt since the year of our Lord, 1525, we, the undersigned 
 clerks and scriveners of this office of Master Jerosme-Sebastien 
 Bordin, successor here to the deceased Guerbet, who in his 
 lifetime served as attorney to the Chatelet, have recognized 
 the need for us to replace the register and archives of instal- 
 lations of clerks in this glorious office, being ourselves dis- 
 tinguished members of the Faculty of the Law, which former 
 register is now filled with the roll and record of our well- 
 beloved predecessors, and we have besought the keeper of the 
 Palace archives to bestow it with those of other offices, and we 
 have all attended high mass in the parish church of Saint- 
 Severin to solemnize the opening of this our new register.
 
 A START IN LIFE, 346 
 
 " In token whereof, we here sign and affix our names. 
 
 " MALIN, Head-Clerk. 
 
 " GREVIN, Second Clerk. 
 
 "ATHANASE FERET, Clerk. 
 
 "JACQUES HUET, Clerk. 
 
 " REGNALD DE SAINT- JEAN-D'ANGELY, Clerk. 
 
 " BEDEAU, Office Boy and Gutter- jumper. 
 
 "In the year of our Lord, 1787. 
 
 " Having attended mass, we went in a body to la Courtille, 
 and had a great breakfast, which lasted until seven of the 
 next morning." 
 
 This was a miracle of caligraphy. An expert could have 
 sworn that the writing dated from the eighteenth century. Then 
 follow twenty-seven reports in full of "Welcome" break- 
 fasts, the last dating from the fatal year of 1792. 
 
 After a gap of fourteen years, the register reopened in 1806 
 with the appointment of Bordin to be attorney to the lower 
 Court of the Seine. And this was the record of the re-con- 
 stitution of the Kingdom of Basoche (the legal profession 
 generally) : 
 
 "God in His clemency has granted that in the midst of 
 the storms which have devastated France, now a great Empire, 
 the precious archives of the most illustrious office of Master 
 Bordin should be preserved. And we, the undersigned clerks 
 of the most honorable and most worshipful Master Bordin, 
 do not hesitate to ascribe this their marvelous escape, when so 
 many other title-deeds, charters, and letters-patent have van. 
 ished, to the protection of Saint- Genevieve, the patron saint 
 of this office, as likewise to the reverence paid by the last of 
 the attorneys of the old stock to all ancient use and custom. 
 And whereas we know not what share to ascribe to the Lady 
 Saint-Genevieve and what to Master Bordin in the working of
 
 346 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 this miracle, we have resolved to go to the Church of Saint 
 Etienne-du-Mont, there to attend a mass to be said at the 
 altar of that saintly shepherdess who sendeth us so many lambs 
 to fleece, and to invite our chief and master to breakfast, in 
 the hope that he may bear the charges thereof. And to this 
 we set our hand. 
 
 " OIGNARD, Head-Clerk. 
 
 " POIDEVIN, Second Clerk. 
 
 "PROUST, Clerk. 
 
 "BRIGNOLET, Clerk. 
 
 " DERVILLE, Clerk. 
 
 " AUGUSTEN CORET, Office Boy. 
 
 "At the office, this loth day of November, 1806." 
 
 "At three o'clock of the afternoon of the next day, the 
 undersigned, being the clerks of this office, record their grati- 
 tude to their very worshipful chief, who hath feasted them at 
 the shop of one Rolland, a cook in the Rue du Hasard, on 
 good wines of three districts, Bordeaux, Champagne, and 
 Burgundy, and on meats of good savor, from four o'clock of 
 the afternoon until half-past seven, with coffee, liqueurs, and 
 ices galore. Yet hath the presence of the worshipful master 
 hindered us from the singing of laudes (praises) in clerkly 
 modes, nor hath any clerk overstepped the limits of pleasing 
 levity, inasmuch as our worthy, worshipful, and generous 
 master hath promised to take us his clerks to see Talma in 
 ' Britannicus ' at the Theatre Francais. Long may he 
 flourish ! May heaven shed blessings on our worshipful 
 master ! May he get a good price for this his glorious office ! 
 May rich clients come to his heart's desire ! May his bills 
 of costs be paid in gold on the nail ! May all our future mas- 
 ters be like him ! May he be ever beloved of his clerks, even 
 when he is no more." 
 
 Next came thirty-three reports in due form of the receptions
 
 A START IN LIFE. 347 
 
 of clerks who had joined the office, distinguished by various 
 handwritings in different shades of ink, distinct phraseology, 
 and different signatures, and containing such laudatory ac- 
 counts of the good-cheer and wines as seemed to prove that 
 the reports were drawn up on the spot and while they were in 
 their cups. 
 
 Finally, in the month of June, 1822, at the time when Des- 
 roches himself had taken the oaths, there was this page of 
 business-like prose : 
 
 " I, the undersigned Francois-Claude-Marie Godeschal, 
 being called by Maitre Desroches to fulfill the difficult duties 
 of head-clerk in an office where there are as yet no clients, 
 having heard from Maitre Derville, whose chambers I have 
 quitted, of the existence of certain famous archives of Baso- 
 chian banquets and Festivals famous in the Courts, I besought 
 our worshipful master to require them of his predecessor ; for 
 it was important to recover that document, which bore the 
 date A. D. 1786, and was the sequel to the archives, deposited 
 with those of the Courts of Law, of which the existence was 
 certified by MM. Terrasse and Duclos, keepers of the said 
 archives, going back to the year 1525, and giving historical 
 details of the highest value as to the manners and cookery of 
 the law-clerks in those days. 
 
 " This having been granted, the office was put in possession 
 as at this time of these evidences of the worship constantly 
 paid by our predecessors to the Dive Bouteille (divine bottle) 
 and to good-cheer. 
 
 "Whereupon, for the edification of those that come after 
 us, and to continue the sequence of time and cup, I have in- 
 vited MM. Doublet, second clerk ; Vassal, third clerk ; Heris- 
 son and Grandemain, assistant clerks ; Dumets, office-boy, to 
 breakfast on Sunday next at the Red Horse (Cheval Rouge), 
 on the Quai Saint-Bernard, where we will celebrate the re- 
 covery of this volume containing the charter of our guzzlings.
 
 348 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 "On this day, Sunday, June 27th, one dozen bottles of 
 various wines were drunk and found excellent. Noteworthy, 
 likewise, were two melons, pies au jus romanum, a fillet of 
 beef, and a toast Agaricibus. Mademoiselle Mariette, the 
 illustrious sister of the head-clerk, and leading lady at the 
 Royal Academy of Music and Dancing, having given to the 
 clerks of this office stalls for that evening's performance, she 
 is hereby to be remembered for her act of generosity. And 
 it is furthermore resolved that the said clerks shall proceed in a 
 body to return thanks to that noble damsel, and to assure her 
 that on the occasion of her first lawsuit, if the devil involves 
 her in one, she shall pay no more than the bare costs ; to which 
 all set their hand. 
 
 " Godeschal was proclaimed the pride of his profession 
 and the best of good fellows. May the man who treats others 
 so handsomely soon be treating for a business of his own ! " 
 
 The document was bespattered with wine-spots and with blots 
 and flourishes like fireworks. 
 
 To give a complete idea of the stamp of truth impressed on 
 this great work, it will suffice to extract the report of the re- 
 ception supposed to have been provided by Oscar : 
 
 "To-day, Monday, the 25th day of November, 1822, after 
 a meeting held yesterday in the Rue de la Cerisaie, hard by 
 the Arsenal, at the house of Madame Clapart, the mother of 
 the new pupil, by name Oscar Husson, we, the undersigned, 
 declare that the breakfast far surpassed our expectations. It 
 included radishes (red and black), gherkins, anchovies, butter, 
 and olives as introductory hors-d'oeuvres (side-dishes); of a 
 noble rice soup that bore witness to a mother's care, inasmuch 
 as we recognized in it a delicious flavor of chicken ; and by 
 the courtesy of the founder of the feast we were, in fact, in- 
 formed that the trimmings of a handsome cold dish prepared 
 by Madame Clapart had been judiciously added to the stock
 
 A START IN LIFE. 349 
 
 concocted at home with such care as is known only in private 
 kitchens. 
 
 "Item: the aforementioned cold chicken, surrounded by a 
 sea of jelly, the work of the aforenamed mother. 
 
 "Item : an ox-tongue, aux tomates (with tomatoes), on which 
 we proved ourselves by no means au-tomata. 
 
 "Item : a stew of pigeons of such flavor as led us to be- 
 lieve that angels had watched over the pot. 
 
 "Item : a dish of macaroni flanked by cups of chocolate 
 custard. 
 
 "Item : dessert, consisting of eleven dishes, among which, 
 in spite of the intoxication resulting from sixteen bottles of 
 excellent wine, we discerned the flavor of an exquisitely and 
 superlatively delicious preserve of peaches. 
 
 "The wines of Roussillon and of the Cote du Rhone quite 
 outdid those of Champagne and Burgundy. A bottle of 
 Maraschino, and one of Kirsch, finally, and in spite of deli- 
 cious coffee, brought us to such a pitch of oenological rapture, 
 that one of us namely, Master Herisson found himself in 
 the Bois de Boulogne when he believed he was still on the 
 Boulevard du Temple ; and that Jacquinaut, the gutter-jumper, 
 aged fourteen, spoke to citizens' wives of fifty-seven, taking 
 them for women of the street ; to which all set their hand. 
 
 " Now, in the statutes of our Order there is a law strictly 
 observed, which is, that those who aspire to the benefits and 
 honors of the profession of the law shall restrict the magnifi- 
 cence of their 'welcome* to the due proportion with their 
 fortune, inasmuch as it is a matter of public notoriety that no 
 man with a private income serves Themis, and that all clerks 
 are kept short of cash by their fond parents ; wherefore, it is 
 with great admiration that we here record the munificence of 
 Madame Clapart, widow after her first marriage of Monsieur 
 Husson, the new licentiate's father, and declare that it was 
 worthy of the cheers we gave her at dessert ; to which all set 
 their hand."
 
 350 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 This rigmarole had already taken in three new-comers, and 
 three real breakfasts were duly recorded in this imposing 
 volume. 
 
 On the day when a neophyte first made his appearance in 
 the office, the boy always laid the archives on the desk in 
 front of his seat, and the clerks chuckled as they watched the 
 face of the new student while he read these grotesque passages. 
 Each in turn, inter pocula, had been initiated into the secret 
 of this practical joke, and the revelation, as may be supposed, 
 filled them with the hope of mystifying other clerks in the 
 future. 
 
 So, now, my readers can imagine the countenances of the 
 four clerks and the boy, when Oscar, now in his turn the 
 practical joker, uttered the words, " Bring out the Book." 
 
 Ten minutes later, a handsome young man came in, well 
 grown and pleasant-looking, asked for Monsieur Desroches, 
 and gave his name at once to Godeschal. 
 
 " I am Frederic Marest," said he, " and have come to fill 
 the place of third clerk here." 
 
 "Monsieur Husson," said Godeschal, "show the gentle- 
 man his seat, and induct him into our ways of work." 
 
 Next morning the new clerk found the Book lying on his 
 writing-pad ; but after reading the first pages, he only laughed, 
 gave no invitation, and put the book aside on his desk. 
 
 "Gentlemen," said he, as he was leaving at five o'clock, 
 " I have a cousin who is managing-clerk to Maitre Leopold 
 Hannequin, the notary, and I will consult him as to what I 
 should do to pay my footing." 
 
 "This looks badly," cried Godeschal. "Our sucking 
 magistrate is no greenhorn." 
 
 " Oh ! we will lead him a life !" said Oscar. 
 
 Next afternoon, at about two o'clock, Oscar saw a visitor 
 come in, and recognized in Hannequin's head-clerk Georges 
 Marest.
 
 A START IN LIFE. 35! 
 
 "Why, here is AH Pasha's friend!" said he, in an airy 
 tone. 
 
 "What? you here, my lord, the Ambassador?" retorted 
 Georges, remembering Oscar. 
 
 "Oh, ho! then you are old acquaintances?" said Godes- 
 chal to Georges. 
 
 "I believe you! We played the fool in company," said 
 Georges, "above two years ago. Yes, I left Crottat to go to 
 Mannequin in consequence of that very affair." 
 
 " What affair? " asked Godeschal. 
 
 "Oh, a mere nothing," replied Georges, with a wink at 
 Oscar. " We tried to make game of a peer of France, and it 
 was he who made us look foolish. And now, I hear you want 
 to draw my cousin." 
 
 "We do not draw anything," said Oscar with dignity. 
 " Here is our charter." And he held out the famous volume 
 at a page where sentence of excommunication was recorded 
 against a refractory student, who had been fairly driven out 
 of the office for stinginess in 1788. 
 
 "Still, I seem to smell game," said Georges, "for here is 
 the trail," and he pointed to the farcical archives. "How- 
 ever, my cousin and I can afford it, and we will give you a 
 feast such as you never had, and which will stimulate your 
 imagination when recording it here. To-morrow, Sunday, at 
 the Rocher de Cancale, two o'clock. And I will take you 
 afterward to spend the evening with Madame la Marquise de 
 las Florentinas y Cabirolos, where we will gamble, and you 
 will meet the elite of fashion. And so, gentlemen of the 
 lower Court," he went on, with the arrogance of a notary, " let 
 us have your best behavior, and carry your wine like gentlemen 
 of the Regency." 
 
 "Hurrah!" cried the clerks like one man. "Bravo! 
 Very well ! Vivat ! (bravo). Long live the Marests ! " 
 
 " Pontins" added the boy (Les Marais Pontins the Pon- 
 tine Marshes).
 
 352 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 " What is up? " asked Desroches, coming out of his private 
 room. " Ah ! you are here, Georges," said he to the visitor. 
 " I know you, you are leading my clerks into mischief." 
 And he went back into his own room, calling Oscar. 
 
 "Here," said he, opening his cash-box, "are five hundred 
 francs; go to the Palace of Justice and get the judgment in 
 the case of Vandenesse v. Vandenesse out of the copying- 
 clerk's office ; it must be sent in this evening if possible. I 
 promised Simon a refresher of twenty francs ; wait for the 
 copy if it is not ready, and do not let yourself be put off. 
 Derville is quite capable of putting a drag on our wheels if it 
 will serve his client. Count Felix de Vandenesse is more 
 influential than his brother the ambassador, our client. So 
 keep your eyes open, and, if the least difficulty arises, come to 
 me at once." 
 
 Oscar set out, determined to distinguish himself in this 
 little skirmish, the first job that had come to him since his 
 promotion. 
 
 When Georges and Oscar were both gone, Godeschal tried 
 to pump the new clerk as to what jest might lie, as he felt 
 sure, under the name of the Marquise de las Florentinas y 
 Cabirolos ; but Frederic carried on his cousin's joke with the 
 coolness and gravity of a judge, and by his replies and his 
 manner contrived to convey to all the clerks that the Marquise 
 de las Florentinas was the widow of a Spanish grandee, whom 
 his cousin was courting. Born in Mexico, and the daughter 
 of a Creole, this wealthy young widow was remarkable for 
 the free-and-easy demeanor characteristic of the women of 
 the Tropics. 
 
 " ' She likes to laugh, She likes to drink, She likes to sing 
 as we do,' " said he, quoting a famous song by Beranger. 
 "And Georges," he went on, " is very rich; he inherited a 
 fortune from his father, who was a widower, and who left 
 him eighteen thousand francs a year, which, with twelve thou- 
 sand left to each of us by an uncle, make an income of thirty
 
 A START IN LIFE. 353 
 
 thousand francs. And he hopes to be Marquis de las Floren- 
 tinas, for the young widow bears her title in her own right, 
 and can confer it on her husband." 
 
 Though the clerks remained very doubtful as to the mar- 
 quise, the prospect of a breakfast at the Rocher de Cancale, 
 and of a fashionable soiree, filled them with joy. They 
 reserved their opinion as to the Spanish lady, to judge her 
 without appeal after having seen her. 
 
 The Marquise de las Florentinas was, in fact, neither more 
 nor less than Mademoiselle Agathe Florentine Cabirolle, 
 leading dancer at the Gaite Theatre, at whose house Uncle 
 Cardot sang "La Mere Godichon." Within a year of the 
 very reparable loss of the late Madame Cardot, the fortunate 
 merchant met Florentine one evening coming out of Coulon's 
 dancing school. Dazzled by the beauty of this flower of the 
 ballet Florentine was then but thirteen the retired store- 
 keeper followed her to the Rue Pastourelle, where he had the 
 satisfaction of learning that the future divinity of the dance 
 owed her existence to a humble doorkeeper. The mother 
 and daughter, transplanted within a fortnight to the Rue de 
 Crussol, there found themselves in modest but easy circum- 
 stances. So it was to this "Patron of the Arts," to use 
 a time-honored phrase, that the stage was indebted for the 
 budding artist. 
 
 The generous Msecenas almost turned their simple brains 
 by given them mahogany furniture, curtains, carpets, and a 
 well-fitted kitchen ; he enabled them to keep a servant, and 
 allowed them two hundred and fifty francs a month. Old 
 Cardot, with his ailes de pigeon* to them seemed an angel, 
 and was treated as a benefactor should be. This was the 
 golden age of the old man's passion. 
 
 For three years the singer of "La Mere Godichon" was 
 so judicious as to keep Mademoiselle Cabirolle and her 
 mother in this unpretentious house, close to the theatre; then, 
 
 * Pigeon-wings : style of his hair. 
 23
 
 354 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 for love of the Terpsichorean art, he placed his protege 
 under Vestris. And, in 1820, he was so happy as to see 
 Florentine dance her first steps in the ballet of a spectacular 
 melodrama called " The Ruins of Babylon." Florentine was 
 now sixteen. 
 
 Soon after this first appearance Uncle Cardot was "an old 
 screw," in the young lady's estimation; however, as he had 
 tact enough to understand that a dancer at the Gaite Theatre 
 must keep up a position, and raised her monthly allowance to 
 five hundred francs a month, if he was no longer an angel, 
 he was at least a friend for life, a second father. This was 
 the age of silver. 
 
 Between 1820 and 1823 Florentine went through the ex- 
 perience which must come to every ballet-dancer of nineteen or 
 twenty. Her friends were the famous opera-singers Mariette 
 and Tullia, Florine, and poor Coralie, so early snatched from 
 An, Love, and Camusot. And as little Uncle Cardot himself 
 was now five years older, he had drifted into the indulgence 
 of that half-fatherly affection which old men feel for the young 
 talents they have trained, and whose successes are theirs. 
 Beside, how and where should a man of sixty-eight have 
 formed such another attachment as this with Florentine, who 
 knew his ways, and at whose house he could sing " La Mere 
 Godichon " with his friends? So the little man found him- 
 self under a half-matrimonial yoke of irresistible weight. This 
 was the age of brass. 
 
 In the course of the five years of the ages of gold and of 
 silver, Cardot had saved ninety thousand francs. The old man 
 had had much experience ; he foresaw that by the time he was 
 seventy Florentine would be of age ; she would probably 
 come out on the opera stage, and, of course, expect the luxury 
 and splendor of a leading lady. Only a few days before the 
 evening now to be described, Cardot had spent forty-five 
 thousand francs in establishing his Florentine in a suitable 
 style, and had taken for her the apartment where the now
 
 A START IN LIFE, 355 
 
 dead Coralie had been the joy of Camusot. In Paris, apart- 
 ments and houses, like streets, have a destiny. 
 
 Glorying in magnificent plate, the leading lady of the 
 Gaite gave handsome dinners, spent three hundred francs a 
 month on dress, never went out but in a private cabriolet, and 
 kept a maid, a cook, and a page. What she aimed at, indeed, 
 was a command to dance at the opera. The Cocon d'Or laid 
 its handsomest products at the feet of its former master to 
 please Mademoiselle Cabirolle, known as Florentine, just as, 
 three years since, it had gratified every wish of Coralie's; but 
 still without the knowledge of Uncle Cardot's daughter, for 
 the father and his son-in-law had always agreed that decorum 
 must be respected at home. Madame Camusot knew nothing 
 of her husband's extravagance or her father's habits. 
 
 Now, after being the master for seven years, Cardot felt 
 himself in tow of a pilot whose power of caprice was unlimited. 
 But the unhappy old fellow was in love. Florentine alone 
 must close his eyes, and he meant to leave her a hundred 
 thousand francs. The age of iron had begun. 
 
 Georges Marest, handsome, young, and rich, with thirty 
 thousand francs a year, was paying court to Florentine. Every 
 dancer is by way of loving somebody as her protector loves 
 her, and having a young man to escort her out walking or 
 driving, and arrange excursions into the country. And, how- 
 ever disinterested, the affections of a leading lady are always 
 a luxury, costing the happy object of her choice some little 
 trifle. Dinners at the best restaurants, boxes at the play, 
 carriages for driving in the environs of Paris, and choice 
 wines lavishly consumed for ballet-dancers live now like the 
 athletes of antiquity. 
 
 Georges, in short, amused himself as young men do who 
 suddenly find themselves independent of paternal discipline ; 
 and his uncle's death, almost doubling his income, enlarged 
 his ideas. So long as he had but the eighteen thousand francs 
 a year left him by his parents he intended to be a notary;
 
 356 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 but, as his cousin remarked to Desroches' clerks, a man would 
 be a noodle to start in a profession with as much money as 
 others have when they give it up. So the retiring law-clerk 
 was celebrating his first day of freedom by this breakfast, 
 which was also to pay his cousin's footing. 
 
 Frederic, more prudent than Georges, persisted in his legal 
 career. 
 
 As a fine young fellow like Georges might very well marry 
 a rich Creole, and the Marquise de las Florentinas y Cabirolos 
 might very well in the decline of life as Frederic hinted to 
 his new companions have preferred to marry for beauty 
 rather than for noble birth, the clerks of Desroches' office 
 all belonging to impecunious families, and having no acquaint- 
 ance with the fashionable world got themselves up in their 
 Sunday clothes, all impatience to see the Mexican Marquesa 
 de las Florentinas y Cabirolos. 
 
 "What good-luck," said Oscar to Godeschal as he dressed 
 in the morning, " that I should have just ordered a new coat, 
 vest, trousers, and a pair of boots, and that my precious 
 mother should have given me a new outfit on my promotion 
 to be second clerk. I have six fine shirts with frills out of 
 the dozen she gave me. We will make a good show ? Oh ! 
 if only one of us could carry off the marquise from that 
 Georges Marest ! " 
 
 "A pretty thing for a clerk in Maitre Desroches' office ! " 
 cried Godeschal. "Will you never be cured of your vanity 
 brat ! " 
 
 "Oh, monsieur," said Madame Clapart, who had just come 
 in to bring her son some ties, and heard the managing clerk's 
 remarks, " would to God that Oscar would follow your good 
 advice ! It is what I am always saying to him, ' Imitate Mon- 
 sieur Godeschal, take his advice,' is what I say." 
 
 "He is getting on, madame," said Godeschal, "but he 
 must not often be so clumsy as he was yesterday, or he will 
 lose his place in the master's good graces. Maitre Desroches
 
 A START IN LIFE. 357 
 
 cannot stand a man who is beaten. He sent your son on his 
 first errand yesterday, to fetch away the copy of the judg- 
 ment delivered in a will case, which two brothers, men of 
 high rank, are fighting against each other, and Oscar allowed 
 himself to be circumvented. The master was furious. It was 
 all I could do to set things straight by going at six this morn- 
 ing to find the copying-clerk, and I made him promise to let 
 me have the judgment in black and white by seven to-morrow 
 morning." 
 
 "Oh, Godeschal," cried Oscar, going up to his superior 
 and grasping his hand, " you are a true friend ! " 
 
 "Yes, monsieur," said Madame Clapart, "it is a happy 
 thing for a mother to feel that her son has such a friend as 
 you, and you may believe that my gratitude will end only with 
 my life. Oscar, beware of this Georges Marest ; he has al- 
 ready been the cause of your first misfortune in life." 
 
 " How was that ? " asked Godeschal. 
 
 The too-confiding mother briefly told the head-clerk the 
 story of poor Oscar's adventure in Pierrotin's chaise. 
 
 "And I am certain," added Godeschal, "that the humbug 
 has planned some trick on us this evening. I shall not go to 
 the Marquise de las Florentinas. My sister needs my help in 
 drawing up a fresh engagement, so I shall leave you at dessert. 
 But be on your guard, Oscar. Perhaps they will make you 
 gamble, and Desroches' office must not make a poor mouth. 
 Here, you can stake for us both ; here are a hundred francs," 
 said the kind fellow, giving the money to Oscar, whose purse 
 had been drained by the tailor and bootmaker. " Be careful ; 
 do not dream of playing beyond the hundred francs; do not 
 let play or wine go to your head. By the mass ! even a 
 second clerk has a position to respect ; he must not play on 
 promissory-paper, nor overstep a due limit in anything. 
 When a man is second clerk he must remember that he will 
 presently be an attorney. So not to drink, not to play high, 
 and to be moderate in all things, must be your rule of con-
 
 358 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 duct. Above all, be in by midnight, for you must be at the 
 Courts by seven to fetch away the copy of that judgment. 
 There is no law against some fun, but business holds the first 
 place. ' ' 
 
 "Do you hear, Oscar?" said Madame Clapart. "And 
 see how indulgent Monsieur Godeschal is, and how he com- 
 bines the enjoyments of youth with the demands of duty." 
 
 Madame Clapart, seeing the tailor and bootmaker waiting 
 for Oscar, remained behind a moment with Godeschal to re- 
 turn the hundred francs he had just lent the boy. 
 
 "A mother's blessing be on you, monsieur, and on all you 
 do," said she. 
 
 The mother had the supreme delight of seeing her boy well 
 dressed ; she had bought him a gold watch, purchased out of 
 her savings, as a reward for his good conduct. 
 
 "You are on the list for the conscription next week," said 
 she, " and as it was necessary to be prepared in case your 
 number should be drawn, I went to see your Uncle Cardot; he 
 is delighted at you being so high up at the age of twenty, and 
 at your success in the examinations at the law-schools, so he 
 has promised to find the money for a substitute. Do you not 
 yourself feel some satisfaction in finding good conduct so well 
 rewarded? If you still have to put up with some privations, 
 think of the joy of being able to purchase a connection in only 
 five years ! And remember, too, dear boy, how happy you 
 make your mother." 
 
 Oscar's face, thinned down a little by hard study, had de- 
 veloped into a countenance to which habits of business had 
 given a look of gravity. He had done growing and had a 
 beard; in short, from a boy he had become a man. His 
 mother could not but admire him, and she kissed him fondly, 
 saying 
 
 "Yes, enjoy yourself, but remember Monsieur Godeschal's 
 advice. By the way, I was forgetting : here is a present from 
 our friend Moreau a pocketbook."
 
 A START IN LIFE. 369 
 
 " The very thing I want, for the chief gave me five hundred 
 francs to pay for that confounded judgment in Vandenesse, 
 and I did not want to leave them in my room." 
 
 "Are you carrying the money about with you?" said his 
 mother in alarm. "Supposing you were to lose such a sum 
 of money ! Would you not do better to leave it with Mon- 
 sieur Godeschal?" 
 
 " Godeschal ! " cried Oscar, thinking his mother's idea 
 admirable. 
 
 But Godeschal, like all clerks on Sunday, had his day to 
 himself from ten o'clock, and was already gone. 
 
 When his mother had left, Oscar went out to lounge on the 
 boulevards till it was time for the breakfast. How could he 
 help airing those resplendent clothes, that he wore with such 
 pride, and the satisfaction that every man will understand who 
 began life in narrow circumstances. A neat, double-breasted, 
 blue cashmere vest, black kerseymere trousers made with 
 pleats, a well-fitting black coat, and a cane with a silver-gilt 
 knob, bought out of his little savings, were the occasion of 
 very natural pleasure to the poor boy, who remembered the 
 clothes he had worn on the occasion of that journey to Presles, 
 and the effect produced on his mind by Georges. 
 
 Oscar looked forward to a day of perfect bliss ; he was to 
 see the world of fashion for the first time that evening ! And 
 it must be admitted that to a lawyer's clerk starved of pleasure, 
 who had for long been craving for a debauch, the sudden play 
 of the senses was enough to obliterate the wise counsels of 
 Godeschal and his mother. To the shame of the young be it 
 said, good advice and warnings are never to seek. Apart 
 from the morning's lecture, Oscar felt an instinctive dislike of 
 Georges ; he was humiliated in the presence of a man who had 
 witnessed the scene in the drawing-room at Presles, when 
 Moreau had dragged him to the count's feet. 
 
 The moral sphere has its laws ; and we are always punished
 
 360 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 if we ignore them. One, especially, the very beasts obey in- 
 variably and without delay. It is that which bids us fly from 
 any one who has once injured us, voluntarily or involuntarily, 
 intentionally or not. The being who has brought woe or dis- 
 comfort on us is always odious. Whatever his rank, however 
 near be the ties of affection, we must part. He is the emissary 
 of our evil genius. Though Christian theory is opposed to 
 such conduct, obedience to this inexorable law is essentially 
 social and preservative. James II. 's daughter,* who sat on her 
 father's throne, must have inflicted more than one wound on 
 him before her usurpation. Judas must certainly have given 
 Jesus some mortal thrust or ever he betrayed Him. There is 
 within us a second-sight, a mind's eye, which foresees dis- 
 asters ; and the repugnance we feel to the fateful being is the 
 consequence of this prophetic sense. Though religion may 
 command us to resist it, distrust remains and its voice should 
 be listened to. 
 
 Could Oscar, at the age of twenty, be so prudent ? Alas ! 
 When, at two o'clock, Oscar went into the room of the 
 Rocher de Cancale, where he found three guests beside his 
 fellow-clerks to wit, an old dragoon captain named Girou- 
 deau; Finot, a journalist who might enable Florentine to get 
 an engagement at the opera; and du Bruel, an author and 
 friend of Tullia's, one of Mariette's rivals at the opera the 
 junior felt his hostility melt away under the first hand-shaking, 
 the first flow of talk among young men, as they sat at a table 
 handsomely laid for twelve. And indeed Georges was charm- 
 ing to Oscar. 
 
 "You are," said he, "following a diplomatic career, but 
 in private concerns ; for what is the difference between an 
 ambassador and an attorney ? Merely that which divides a 
 nation from an individual. Ambassadors are the attorneys of 
 a people. If I can ever be of any use to you, depend on 
 me." 
 
 * Mary II., Queen of England.
 
 A START IN LIFE. 381 
 
 " My word ! I may tell you now," said Oscar, " you were 
 the cause of a terrible catastrophe for me." 
 
 " Pooh ! " said Georges, after listening to the history of the 
 lad's tribulations. " It was Monsieur de Serizy who behaved 
 badly. His wife ? I would not have her at a gift. And 
 although the count is a minister of State and peer of France, I 
 would not be in his red skin ! He is a small-minded man, and 
 I can afford to despise him now." 
 
 Oscar listened with pleasure to Georges' ironies on the 
 Comte de Serizy, for they seemed to diminish the gravity 
 of his own fault, and he threw himself into the young man's 
 spirit as he predicted that overthrow of the nobility of which 
 the citizen class then had visions, to be realized in 1830. 
 
 They sat down at half-past three ; dessert was not on the 
 table before eight. Each course of dishes lasted two hours. 
 None but law-clerks can eat so steadily ! Digestions of eigh- 
 teen and twenty are inexplicable to the medical faculty. The 
 wine was worthy of Borrel, who had at that time succeeded 
 the illustrious Balaine, the creator of the very best restaurant 
 in Paris and that is to say in the world for refined and per- 
 fect cookery. 
 
 A full report of this Belshazzar's feast was drawn up at 
 dessert, beginning with Inter pocula aurea restauranti, qui 
 vulgo dicitur Rupes Cancalia : and from this introduction the 
 rapturous record may be imagined which was added to this 
 Golden Book of the High Festivals of the Law. 
 
 Godeschal disappeared after signing his name, leaving the 
 eleven feasters, prompted by the old captain of the Imperial 
 Dragoons, to devote themselves to the wine, the liqueurs, and 
 the toasts, over a dessert of pyramids of sweets and fruits like 
 those of Thebes. By half-past ten the "boy" of the office 
 was in a state which necessitated his removal ; Georges packed 
 him into a cab, gave the driver his mother's address, and paid 
 his fare. Then the ten remaining guests, as drunk as Pitt and 
 Dundas, talked of going on foot by the boulevards, the
 
 362 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 night being very fine, as far as the residence of the marquise, 
 where, at a little before midnight, they would find a brilliant 
 company. The whole party longed to fill their lungs with 
 fresh air ; but excepting Georges, Giroudeau, Finot, and du 
 Bruel, all accustomed to Parisian orgies, no one could walk. 
 So Georges sent for three open carriages from a livery-stable, 
 and took the whole party for an airing on the outer boulevards 
 for an hour, from Montmartre to the Barriere du Trone, and 
 back by Bercy, the quays, and the boulevards to the Rue de 
 Vendome. 
 
 The youngsters were still floating in the paradise of fancy 
 to which intoxication transports boys, when their entertainer 
 led them into Florentine's rooms. Here sat a dazzling 
 assembly of the queens of the stage, who, at a hint, no doubt, 
 from Frederic, amused themselves by aping the manners of 
 fine ladies. Ices were handed round, the chandeliers blazed 
 with wax-lights. Tullia's footman, with those of Madame du 
 Val-Noble and Florine, all in gaudy livery, carried round 
 sweetmeats on silver trays. The hangings, choice products 
 of the looms of Lyons, and looped with gold cord, dazzled the 
 eye. The flowers of the carpet suggested a garden-bed. 
 Costly toys and curiosities glittered on all sides. At first, and 
 in the obfuscated state to which Georges had brought them, 
 the clerks, and Oscar in particular, believed in the genuine- 
 ness of the Marquesa de las Florentinas y Cabirolos. 
 
 On four tables set out for play gold-pieces lay in glittering 
 heaps. In the drawing-room the women were playing at 
 Vingt-et-un, Nathan, the famous author, holding the deal. 
 Thus, after being carried tipsy and half-asleep along the 
 dimly-lighted boulevards, the clerks woke to find themselves 
 in Armida's Palace. Oscar, on being introduced by Georges 
 to the sham marquise, stood dumfounded, not recognizing 
 the ballet-dancer from the Gaite in an elegant dress cut aristo- 
 cratically low at the neck and richly trimmed with lace a 
 woman looking like a vignette in a keepsake, who received
 
 A START IN LIFE. 363 
 
 them with an air and manners that had no parallel in the ex- 
 perience or the imagination of a youth so strictly bred as he 
 had been. After he had admired all the splendor of the 
 rooms, the beautiful women who displayed themselves and who 
 had vied with each other in dress for this occasion the in- 
 auguration of all this magnificence Florentine took Oscar 
 by the hand and led him to the table where Vingt-et-un was 
 going on. 
 
 " Come, let me introduce you to the handsome Marquise 
 d'Anglade, one of my friends 
 
 And she took the hapless Oscar up to pretty Fanny Beaupr6, 
 who, for the last two years, had filled poor Coralie's place in 
 Camusot's affections. The young actress had just achieved a 
 reputation in the part of a marquise in a melodrama at the 
 Porte-Sainte-Martin, called the Famille d'Anglade, one of the 
 successes of the day. 
 
 " Here, my dear," said Florentine, " allow me to introduce 
 to you a charming youth who can be your partner in the 
 game." 
 
 "Oh ! that will be very nice?" replied the actress, with 
 a fascinating smile, as she looked Oscar down from head to 
 foot. " I am losing. We will go shares, if you like." 
 
 " I am at your orders, Madame la Marquise," said Oscar, 
 taking a seat by her side. 
 
 "You shall stake," said she, " and I will play. You will 
 
 bring me luck ! There, that is my last hundred francs " 
 
 And the sham marquise took out a purse of which the rings 
 were studded with diamonds, and produced five gold-pieces. 
 Oscar brought out his hundred francs in five-franc pieces, 
 already shamefaced at mingling the ignoble silver cart-wheels 
 with the gold coin. In ten rounds the actress had lost the 
 two hundred francs. 
 
 "Come! this is stupid!" she exclaimed. "I will take 
 the bank. We will still be partners ? " she asked of Oscar. 
 
 Fanny Beaupre rose, and the lad, who, like her, was now
 
 364 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 the centre of attention to the whole table, dared not with- 
 draw, saying that the devil alone was lodged in his purse. 
 He was speechless, his tongue felt heavy and stuck to his 
 palate. 
 
 "Lend me five hundred francs," said the actress to the 
 dancer. 
 
 Florentine brought her five hundred francs, which she bor- 
 rowed of Georges, who had just won at ecarte eight times 
 running. 
 
 "Nathan has won twelve hundred francs," said the actress 
 to the clerk. "The dealer always wins; do not let us be 
 made fools of," she whispered in his ear. 
 
 Every man of feeling, of imagination, of spirit, will under- 
 stand that poor Oscar could not help opening his pocketbook 
 and taking out the five-hundred-franc note. He looked at 
 Nathan, the famous writer, who, in partnership with Florine, 
 staked high against the dealer. 
 
 "Now then, boy, sweep it in!" cried Fanny Beaupre, 
 signing to Oscar to take up two hundred francs that Florine 
 and Nathan had lost. 
 
 The actress did not spare the losers her banter and jests. 
 She enlivened the game by remarks of a character which 
 Oscar thought strange ; but delight stifled these reflections, for 
 the two first deals brought in winnings of two thousand francs. 
 Oscar longed to be suddenly taken ill and to fly, leaving 
 his partner to her fate, but honor forbade it. Three more 
 deals had carried away the profits. Oscar felt the cold sweat 
 down his spine ; he was quite sobered now. The two last 
 rounds absorbed a thousand francs staked by the partners; 
 Oscar felt thirsty and drank off three glasses of iced punch. 
 
 The actress led him into an adjoining room, talking non- 
 sense to divert him ; but the sense of his error so completely 
 overwhelmed Oscar, to whom Desroches' face appeared like a 
 vision in a dream, that he sank on to a splendid ottoman in a 
 dark corner and hid his face in his handkerchief. He was
 
 A START IN LIFE. 355 
 
 fairly crying. Florentine detected him in this attitude, too 
 sincere not to strike an actress; she hurried up to Oscar, 
 pulled away the handkerchief, and seeing his tears led him 
 into a boudoir. 
 
 " What is the matter, my boy?" said she. 
 
 To this voice, these words, this tone, Oscar, recognizing 
 the motherliness of a courtesan's kindness, replied 
 
 "I have lost five hundred francs that my master gave me 
 to pay to-morrow morning for a judgment ; there is nothing 
 for it but to throw myself into the river; I am disgraced." 
 
 "How can you be so silly?" cried Florentine. "Stay 
 where you are, I will bring you a thousand francs. Try to 
 recover it all, but only risk five hundred francs, so as to keep 
 your chief's money. Georges plays a first-rate game at 
 ecarte; bet on him." 
 
 Oscar, in his dreadful position, accepted the offer of the 
 mistress of the house. 
 
 " Ah ! " thought he, " none but a marquise would be capa- 
 ble of such an action. Beautiful, noble, and immensely rich ! 
 Georges is a lucky dog ! " 
 
 He received a thousand francs in gold from the hands of 
 Florentine, and went to bet on the man who had played him 
 this trick. The punters were pleased at the arrival of a new 
 man, for they all, with the instinct of gamblers, went over to 
 the side of Giroudeau, the old Imperial officer. 
 
 "Gentlemen," said Georges, "you will be punished for 
 your defection, for I am in luck. Come, Oscar ; we will do 
 for them." 
 
 But Georges and his backer lost five games running. Hav- 
 ing thrown away his thousand francs, Oscar, carried away by 
 the gambling fever, insisted on holding the cards. As a 
 result of the luck that often favors a beginner, he won ; but 
 Georges puzzled him with advice ; he told him how to discard, 
 and frequently snatched his hand from him, so that the con- 
 flict of two wills, two minds, spoiled the run of luck. In
 
 366 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 short, by three in the morning, after many turns of fortune, 
 and unhoped-for recoveries, still drinking punch, Oscar found 
 himself possessed of no more than a hundred francs. He rose 
 from the table, his brain heavy and dizzy, walked a few steps, 
 and dropped on to a sofa in the boudoir, his eyes sealed in 
 leaden slumbers. 
 
 " Mariette," said Fanny Beaupre to Godeschal's sister, 
 who had come in at about two in the morning, "will you dine 
 here to-morrow? My Camusot will be here and Father Car- 
 dot; we will make them mad." 
 
 "How? "cried Florentine. "My old man has not sent 
 me word." 
 
 " He will be here this morning to tell you that he proposes 
 to sing ' la Mere Godichon,' " replied Fanny Beaupre. " He 
 must give a house-warming too, poor man." 
 
 " The devil take him and his orgies ! " exclaimed Floren- 
 tine. " He and his son-in-law are worse than magistrates or 
 managers. After all, Mariette, you dine well here," she went 
 on. " Cardot orders everything from Chevet. Bring your 
 Due de Maufrigneuse; we will have fun, and make them all 
 dance." 
 
 Oscar, who caught the names of Cardot and Camusot, made 
 an effort to rouse himself; but he could only mutter a word 
 or two which were not heard, and fell back on the silk 
 cushion. 
 
 "You are provided, I see," said Fanny Beaupre to Floren- 
 tine, with a laugh. 
 
 " Ah ! poor boy, he is drunk with punch and despair. He 
 has lost some money his master had intrusted to him for some 
 office business. He was going to kill himself, so I lent him a 
 thousand francs, of which those robbers Finot and Giroudeau 
 have fleeced him. Poor innocent ! " 
 
 "But we must wake him," said Mariette. " My brother 
 will stand no nonsense, nor his master either." 
 
 "Well, wake him if you can, and get him away," said
 
 A START IN LIFE. 307 
 
 Florentine, going back into the drawing-room to take leave of 
 those who were not gone. 
 
 The party then took to dancing character dances, as they 
 were called ; and at daybreak Florentine went to bed very 
 tired, having forgotten Oscar, whom nobody, in fact, remem- 
 bered, and who was still sleeping soundly. 
 
 At about eleven o'clock a terrible sound awoke the lad, who 
 recognized his Uncle Cardot's voice, and thought he might 
 get out of the scrape by pretending still to be asleep, so he 
 hid his face in the handsome, yellow velvet cushions on which 
 he had passed the night. 
 
 "Really, my little Florentine," the old man was saying, 
 " it is neither good nor nice of you. You were dancing last 
 night in the Ruines, and then spent the night in an orgy. 
 Why, it is simply destruction to your freshness, not to say 
 that it is really ungrateful of you to inaugurate this splendid 
 apartment without me, with strangers, without my knowing it 
 who knows what may have happened ! " 
 
 " You old monster ! " cried Florentine. " Have you not a 
 key to come in whenever you like ? We danced till half-past 
 five, and you are so cruel as to wake me at eleven." 
 
 " Half-past eleven, Titine," said the old man humbly. " I 
 got up early to order a dinner from Chevet worthy of an 
 archbishop. How they have spoilt the carpets ! Whom had 
 you here ? ' ' 
 
 "You ought to make no complaints, for Fanny Beaupre" 
 told me that you and Camusot were coming, so I have asked 
 the others to meet you Tullia, du Bruel, Mariette, the Due 
 de Maufrigneuse, Florine, and Nathan. So you will have 
 the five loveliest women who ever stood behind the footlights, 
 and we will dance you a pas de Zephire" 
 
 " It is killing work to lead such a life ! " cried old Cardot. 
 "What a heap of broken glasses, what destruction! The 
 anteroom is a scene of horror ! " 
 
 At this moment the amiable old man stood speechless and
 
 368 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 fascinated, like a bird under the gaze of a reptile. He caught 
 sight of the outline of a young figure clothed in black cloth. 
 
 " Heyday ! Mademoiselle Cabirolle ! " said he at last. 
 
 "Well, what now?" said she. 
 
 The girl's eyes followed the direction of Pere Cardot's 
 gaze, and when she saw the youth still there, she burst into a 
 fit of crazy laughter, which not only struck the old man dumb, 
 but compelled Oscar to look round. Florentine pulled him 
 up by the arm, and half choked with laughter as she saw the 
 hang-dog look of the uncle and nephew. 
 
 " You here, nephew? " 
 
 "Oh ho! He is your nephew?" cried Florentine, laugh- 
 ing more than ever. "You never mentioned this nephew of 
 yours. Then Mariette did not take you home? " said she to 
 Oscar, who sat petrified. " What is to become of the poor 
 boy?" 
 
 "Whatever he pleases!" replied old Cardot drily and 
 turning to the door to go away. 
 
 " One minute, Papa Cardot ; you will have to help your 
 nephew out of the mess he has gotten into by my fault, for he 
 has gambled away his master's money, five hundred francs, be-, 
 side a thousand francs of mine which I lent him to get it 
 back again." 
 
 "Wretched boy, have you lost fifteen hundred francs at 
 play at your age ? ' ' 
 
 "Oh! uncle, uncle!" cried the unhappy Oscar, cast by 
 these words into the depths of horror at his position. He fell 
 on his knees at his uncle's feet with clasped hands. "It is 
 twelve o'clock ; I am lost, disgraced. Monsieur Desroches 
 will show no mercy there was an important business, a matter 
 on which he prides himself I was to have gone this morning 
 to fetch away the copy of the judgment in Vandenesse v. Van- 
 den esse ! What has happened? What will become of me? 
 Save me for my father's sake for my aunt's. Come with me 
 to Maitre Desroches and explain ; find some excuse "
 
 A START IN LIFE. 369 
 
 The words came out in gasps, between sobs and tears that 
 might have softened the Sphinx in the desert of Luxor. 
 
 "Now, old skinflint," cried the dancer in tears, "can you 
 
 leave your own nephew to disgrace, the son of the man to 
 
 whom you owe your fortune, since he is Oscar Husson? 
 
 Save him, I say, or Titine refuses to own you as her milord ! " 
 
 But how came he here?" asked the old man. 
 
 " What ! so as to forget the hour when he should have gone 
 the errand he speaks of? Don't you see, he got drunk and 
 dropped there, dead-tired and sleepy ? Georges and his cousin 
 Frederic treated Desroches' clerks yesterday at the Rocher de 
 Cancale." 
 
 Cardot looked at her, still doubtful. 
 
 " Come, now, old baboon, if it were anything more should 
 I not have hidden him more effectually? " cried she. 
 
 "Here, then, take the five hundred francs, you scamp! " 
 said Cardot to his nephew. " That is all you will ever have 
 of me. Go and make matters up with your master if you can. 
 I will repay the thousand francs mademoiselle lent you, but 
 never let me hear your name again." 
 
 Oscar fled, not wishing to hear more ; but when he was in 
 the street he did not know where to go. 
 
 The chance which ruins men, and the chance that serves 
 them, seemed to be playing against each other on equal terms 
 for Oscar that dreadful morning; but he was destined to fail 
 with a master who, when he made up his mind, never 
 changed it. 
 
 Mariette, on returning home, horrified at what might befall 
 her brother's charge, wrote aline to Godeschal, inclosing a 
 five-hundred-franc note, and telling her brother of Oscar's 
 drunken bout and disasters. The good woman, ere she went 
 to sleep, instructed her nlaid to take this letter to Desroches' 
 chambers before seven. Godeschal, on his part, waking at 
 six, found no Oscar. He" at once guessed what had happened. 
 24
 
 370 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 He took five hundred francs out of his savings and hurried off 
 to the copying-clerk to fetch the judgment, so as to lay it 
 before Desroches for signature in his office at eight. Des- 
 roches, who always rose at four, came to his room at seven 
 o'clock. Mariette's maid, not finding her mistress' brother 
 in his attic, went down to the office and was there met by 
 Desroches, to whom she very naturally gave the note. 
 
 "Is it a matter of business?" asked the lawyer. "lam 
 Maitre Desroches." 
 
 "You can see, monsieur," said the woman. 
 
 Desroches opened the letter and read it. On finding the 
 five-hundred-franc note he went back into his own room, furi- 
 ous with his second clerk. Then at half- past seven he heard 
 Godeschal dictating a report on the judgment to another 
 clerk, and a few minutes later Godeschal came into the room 
 in triumph. 
 
 " Was it Oscar Husson who went to Simon this morning ? " 
 asked Desroches. 
 
 "Yes, monsieur," replied Godeschal. 
 
 "Who gave him the money?" said the lawyer. 
 
 "You," said Godeschal, "on Saturday." 
 
 " It rains five-hundred-franc notes, it would seem ! " cried 
 Desroches. " Look here, Godeschal, you are a good fellow, 
 but that little wretch Husson does not deserve your generosity. 
 I hate a fool, but yet more I hate people who will go wrong 
 in spite of the care of those who are kind to them." He 
 gave Godeschal Mariette's note and the five hundred francs 
 she had sent. " Forgive me for opening it, but the maid 
 said it was a matter of business. You must get rid of Oscar." 
 
 "What trouble I have had with that poor little ne'er-do- 
 well ! " said Godeschal. " That scoundrel Georges Marest 
 is his evil genius ; he must avoid him like the plague, for I 
 do not know what might happen if they met a third time." 
 
 " How is that ?" asked Desroches, and Godschal sketched 
 the story of the practical joking on the journey to Presles.
 
 A START IN LIFE. 371 
 
 "To be sure," said the lawyer. "I remember Joseph 
 Bridau told me something about that at the tirr.-. It was to 
 that meeting that we owed the Comte de Serizy's interest in 
 Bridau's brother." 
 
 At this moment Moreau came in, for this suit over the Van- 
 denesse property was an important affair to him. The mar- 
 quis wanted to sell the Vandenesse estate in lots, and his 
 brother opposed such a proceeding. 
 
 Thus the land agent was the recipient of the justifiable 
 complaints and sinister prophecies fulminated by Desroches 
 as against his second clerk ; and the unhappy boy's most 
 friendly protector was forced to the conclusion that Oscar's 
 vanity was incorrigible. 
 
 " Make a pleader of him," said Desroches ; " he only has 
 to pass his final ; in that branch of the law his faults may 
 prove to be useful qualities, for conceit spurs the tongue of 
 half of our advocates." 
 
 As it happened, Clapart was at this time out of health, and 
 nursed by his wife, a painful and thankless task. The man 
 worried the poor soul, who had hitherto never known how 
 odious the nagging and spiteful taunts can be in which a half- 
 imbecile creature gives vent to his irritation when poverty 
 drives him into a sort of cunning rage. Delighted to have a 
 sharp dagger that he could drive home to her motherly heart, 
 he had suspected the fears for the future which were suggested 
 to the hapless woman by Oscar's conduct and faults. In fact, 
 when a mother has received such a blow as she had felt from 
 the adventure at Presles she lives in perpetual alarm ; and by 
 the way in which Madame Clapart cried up Oscar whenever 
 he achieved a success, Clapart understood all her secret fears 
 and would stir them up on the slightest pretext. 
 
 " Well, well, Oscar is getting on better than I expected of 
 him ; I always said his journey to Presles was only a blunder 
 due to inexperience. Where is the young man who never 
 made a mistake? Poor, boy, he is heroic in his endurance
 
 372 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 of the privations he would never have known if his father 
 had lived. God grant he may control his passions ! " and so 
 on. 
 
 So, while so many disasters were crowding on each other 
 in the Rue de Vendome and the Rue de Bethisy, Clapart, 
 sitting by the fire wrapped in a shabby dressing-gown, was 
 watching his wife, who was busy cooking over the bedroom 
 fire some soup, Clapart's herb tea, and her own breakfast. 
 
 " Good heavens ! I wish I knew how things fell out yester- 
 day. Oscar was to breakfast at the Rocher de Cancale, and 
 spend the evening with some marquise " 
 
 "Oh! don't be in a hurry; sooner or later murder will 
 out," retorted her husband. "Do you believe in the mar- 
 quise ? Go on ; a boy who has his five senses and a love of 
 extravagance as Oscar has, after all can find marquises on 
 every bush costing their weight in gold ! He will come home 
 some day loaded with debt " 
 
 "You don't know how to be cruel enough, and to drive 
 me to despair!" exclaimed Madame Clapart. "You com- 
 plained that my son ate up all your salary, and he never cost 
 you a sou. For two years you have not had a fault to find 
 with Oscar, and now he is second clerk, his uncle and Mon- 
 sieur Moreau provide him with everything, and he has eight 
 hundred francs a year of his own earning. If we have bread 
 in our old age, we shall owe it to that dear boy. You really 
 are too unjust." 
 
 "You consider my foresight an injustice?" said the sick 
 man sourly. 
 
 There came at this moment a sharp ring at the bell. 
 Madame Clapart ran to open the door, and then remained in 
 the outer room, talking to Moreau, who had come himself to 
 soften the blow that the news of Oscar's levity must be to his 
 poor mother. 
 
 "What! He lost his master's money?" cried Madame 
 Clapart in tears.
 
 A START IN LIFE. 375 
 
 "Aha! what did I tell you?" said Clapart, who appeared 
 like a spectre in the doorway of the drawing-room, to which 
 he had shuffled across under the prompting of overweening 
 curiosity. 
 
 "But what is to be done with him?" said his wife, whose 
 distress left her insensible to this stab. 
 
 "Well, if he bore my name," said Moreau, "I should 
 calmly allow him to be drawn for the conscription, and if he 
 should be called to serve, I would not pay for a substitute. 
 This is the second time that sheer vanity has brought him into 
 mischief. Well, vanity may lead him to some brilliant action, 
 which will win him promotion as a soldier. Six years' service 
 will at any rate add a little weight to his feather-brain, and 
 as he has only his final examination to pass, he will not do 
 so badly if he finds himself a pleader at six-and-twenty, if he 
 chooses to go to the bar after paying the blood-tax, as they 
 say. This time, at any rate, he will have had his punishment, 
 he will gain experience and acquire habits of subordination. 
 He will have served his apprenticeship to life before serving 
 it in the Law Courts." 
 
 " If that is the sentence you would pronounce on a son," 
 said Madame Clapart, "I see that a father's heart is very 
 unlike a mother's. My poor Oscar a soldier ?" 
 
 "Would you rather see him jump head-foremost into the 
 Seine after doing something to disgrace himself? He can never 
 now be an attorney ; do you think he is fitted yet to be an 
 advocate? While waiting till he reaches years of discretion, 
 what will he become? A thorough scamp; military disci- 
 pline will at any rate preserve him from that." 
 
 " Could he not go into another office? His Uncle Cardot 
 would certainly pay for a substitute and Oscar will dedicate 
 his thesis to him " 
 
 The clatter of a cab, in which was piled all Oscar's persona! 
 property, announced the wretched lad's return, and in a few 
 minutes he made his appearance.
 
 374 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 "So here you are, Master Joli-Coeur ! "* exclaimed Cla- 
 part. 
 
 Oscar kissed his mother, and held out a hand to Monsieur 
 Moreau, which that gentleman would not take. Oscar an- 
 swered this contempt with a look to which reproach lent a 
 firmness new to the bystanders. 
 
 "Listen, Monsieur Clapart," said the boy, so suddenly 
 grown to be a man; "you worry my poor mother beyond 
 endurance, and you have a right to do so ; she is your wife 
 for her sins. But it is different with me. In a few months I 
 shall be of age, and you have no power over me even while I 
 am a minor. I have never asked you for anything. Thanks 
 to this gentleman, I have never cost you one sou, and I owe 
 you no sort of gratitude ; so, have the goodness to leave me 
 in peace." 
 
 Clapart, startled by this apostrophe, went back to his arm- 
 chair by the fire. The reasoning of the lawyer's clerk and 
 the suppressed fury of a young man of twenty, who had just 
 had a sharp lecture from his friend Godeschal, had reduced 
 the sick man's imbecility to silence, once and for all. 
 
 "An error into which you would have been led quite as easily 
 as I, at my age," said Oscar to Moreau, " made me commit a 
 fault which Desroches thinks serious, but which is really trivial 
 enough ; I am far more vexed with myself for having taken 
 Florentine of the Gaite Theatre, for a marquise, and actresses 
 for women of rank, than for having lost fifteen hundred francs 
 at a little orgy where everybody, even Godeschal, was some- 
 what screwed. This time, at any rate, I have hurt no one 
 but myself. I am thoroughly cured. If you will help me, 
 Monsieur Moreau, I swear to you that in the course of the 
 six years during which I must remain a clerk before I can 
 practice " 
 
 "Stop a bit ! " said Moreau. "I have three children; I 
 can make no promises." 
 
 * Pretty heart.
 
 A START IN LIFE. 375 
 
 "Well, well," said Madame Clapart, with a reproachful 
 look at Moreau, "your Uncle Cardot " 
 
 " No more an Uncle Cardot for me," replied Oscar, and he 
 related the adventure of the Rue de Vendome. 
 
 Madame Clapart, feeling her knees give way under the 
 weight of her body, dropped on one of the dining-room chairs 
 as if a thunderbolt had fallen. 
 
 " Every possible misfortune at once ! " said she, and fainted 
 away. 
 
 Moreau lifted the poor woman in his arms, and carried her 
 to her bed. Oscar stood motionless and speechless. 
 
 "There is nothing for you but to serve as a soldier," said 
 the estate agent, coming back again. " That idiot Clapart 
 will not last three months longer, it seems to me ; your mother 
 will not have a sou in the world ; ought I not rather to keep 
 for her the little money I can spare ? This was what I could 
 not say to you in her presence. As a soldier, you will earn 
 your bread, and you may meditate on what life is to the 
 penniless." 
 
 " I might draw a lucky number," said Oscar. 
 
 "And if you do? Your mother has been a very good 
 mother to you. She gave you an education, she started you 
 in a good way ; you have lost it ; what could you do now ? 
 Without money, a man is helpless, as you now know, and you 
 are not the man to begin all over again by pulling off your 
 coat and putting on a workman's or artisan's blouse. And 
 then your mother worships you. Do you want to kill her ? 
 For she would die of seeing you fallen so low." 
 
 Oscar sat down, and could no longer control his tears, 
 which flowed freely. He understood now a form of appeal 
 which had been perfectly incomprehensible at the time of his 
 first error. 
 
 " Penniless folk ought to be perfect ! " said Moreau to him- 
 self, not appreciating how deeply true this cruel verdict was. 
 
 "My fate will soon be decided," said Oscar; " the num-
 
 376 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 bers are drawn the day after to-morrow. Between this and 
 then I will come to some decision." 
 
 Moreau, deeply grieved in spite of his austerity, left the 
 family in the Rue de la Cerisaie to their despair. 
 
 Three days after Oscar drew Number 27. To help the poor 
 lad, the ex-steward of Presles found courage enough to go to 
 the Comte de Serizy and beg his interest to get Oscar into the 
 cavalry. As it happened, the count's son, having come out 
 well at his last examination on leaving the Polytechnic, had 
 been passed by favor, with the rank of sub-lieutenant, into the 
 cavalry regiment commanded by the Due de Maufrigneuse. 
 And so, in the midst of his fall, Oscar had the small piece of 
 luck of being enlisted in this fine regiment at the Comte de 
 Serizy's recommendation, with the promise of promotion to 
 be quartermaster in a year's time. 
 
 Thus chance placed the lawyer's clerk under the command 
 of Monsieur de Serizy's son. 
 
 After some days of pining, Madame Clapart, who was 
 deeply stricken by all these misfortunes, gave herself up to 
 the remorse which is apt to come over mothers whose conduct 
 has not been blameless, and who, as they grow old, are led to 
 repent. She thought of herself as one accursed. She ascribed 
 the miseries of her second marriage and all her son's ill-for- 
 tune to the vengeance of God, who was punishing her in ex- 
 piation of the sins and pleasures of her youth. This idea soon 
 became a conviction. The poor soul went to confession, for 
 the first time in forty years, to the vicar of the church of 
 Saint-Paul, the Abbe Gaudron, who plunged her into the 
 practices of religion. 
 
 But a spirit so crushed and so loving as Madame Clapart's 
 could not fail to become simply pious. The Aspasia of the 
 Directoire yearned to atone for her sins that she might bring 
 the blessing of God down on the head of her beloved Oscar, 
 and before long she had given herself up to the most earnest
 
 A START IN LIFE. 377 
 
 practices of devotion and works of piety. She believed that 
 she had earned the favor of heaven when she had succeeded 
 in saving Monsieur Clapart, who, thanks to her care, lived to 
 torment her ; but she persisted in seeing in the tyranny of 
 this half-witted old man the trials inflicted by Him who loves 
 while He chastens us. 
 
 Oscar's conduct meanwhile was so satisfactory that in 1830 
 he was first quartermaster of the company under the Vicomte 
 de Serizy, equivalent in rank to a sub-lieutenant of the line, 
 as the Due de Maufrigneuse's regiment was attached to the 
 King's Guards. Oscar Husson was now five-and-twenty. 
 As the regiments of Guards were always quartered in Paris, 
 or within thirty leagues of the capital, he could see his mother 
 from time to time and confide his sorrows to her, for he was 
 clear-sighted enough to perceive that he could never rise to 
 be an officer. At that time cavalry officers were almost always 
 chosen from among the younger sons of the nobility, and men 
 without the distinguishing de got on but slowly. Oscar's 
 whole ambition was to get out of the Guards and enter some 
 cavalry regiment of the line as a sub-lieutenant ; and in the 
 month of February, 1830, Madame Clapart, through the in- 
 terest of the Abbe Gaudron, now at the head of his parish, 
 gained the favor of the Dauphiness, which secured Oscar's 
 promotion. 
 
 Although the ambitious young soldier professed ardent de- 
 votion to the Bourbons, he was at heart a liberal. In the 
 struggle, in 1830, he took the side of the people. This de- 
 fection, which proved to be important by reason of the way in 
 which it acted, drew public attention to Oscar Husson. In 
 the moment of triumph, in the month of August, Oscar, pro- 
 moted to be lieutenant, received the cross of the Legion of 
 Honor, and succeeded in obtaining the post of aide-de-camp 
 to La Fayette, who made him captain in 1832. When this de- 
 votee to "the best of all Republics" was deprived of his 
 command of the National Guard, Oscar Husson, whose devo-
 
 378 A START IX LIFE. 
 
 tion to the new royal family was almost fanaticism, was sent 
 as major with a regiment to Africa on the occasion of the first 
 expedition undertaken by the prince. The Vicomte de 
 Serizy was now lieutenant-colonel of that regiment. At the 
 fight of the Macta, where the Arabs remained masters of the 
 field, Monsieur de Serizy was left wounded under his dead 
 horse. Oscar addressed his company. 
 
 " It is riding to our death," said he, "but we cannot desert 
 our colonel." 
 
 He was the first to charge the enemy, and his men, quite 
 electrified, followed. The Arabs, in the shock of surprise at 
 this furious and unexpected attack, allowed Oscar to pick up 
 his colonel, whom he took on his horse and rode off at a 
 pelting gallop, though in this act, carried out in the midst 
 of furious fighting, he had two cuts from a yataghan on the 
 left arm. 
 
 Oscar's valiant conduct was rewarded by the cross of an 
 officer of the Legion of Honor, and promotion to the rank 
 of lieutenant-colonel. He nursed the Vicomte de Serizy with 
 devoted affection ; the Comtesse de Serizy joined her son and 
 carried him to Toulon, where, as all the world knows, he 
 died of his wounds. Madame de Serizy did not part her 
 son from the man who, after rescuing him from the Arabs, 
 had cared for him with such unfailing devotion. 
 
 Oscar himself was so severely wounded that the surgeons 
 called in by the countess to attend her son pronounced ampu- 
 tation necessary. The count forgave Oscar his follies on the 
 occasion of the journey to Presles, and even regarded him- 
 self as the young man's debtor when he had buried his only 
 surviving son in the chapel of the Chateau de Serizy. 
 
 A long time after the battle of the Macta, an old lady 
 dressed in black, leaning on the arm of a man of thirty-four, 
 at once recognizable as a retired officer by the loss of one arm 
 and the rosette of the Legion of Honor at his button-hole,
 
 A START IN LIFE. 379 
 
 was to be seen at eight o'clock one morning, waiting under 
 the gateway of the Silver Lion, Rue du Faubourg, Saint- 
 Denis, till the diligence should be ready to start. 
 
 Pierrotin, the manager of the coach services of the Valley 
 of the Oise, passing by Saint-Leu- Taverny and 1* Isle- Adam, 
 as far as Beaumont, would hardly have recognized in this 
 bronzed officer that little Oscar Husson whom he had once 
 driven to Presles. Madame Clapart, a widow at last, was 
 quite as unrecognizable as her son. Clapart, one of the vic- 
 tims of Fieschi's machine, had done his wife a belter turn 
 by the manner of his death than he had ever done her in 
 his life. Of course, Clapart, the idler, the lounger, had 
 taken up a place on his boulevard to see his legion re- 
 viewed. Thus the poor bigot had found her name put down 
 by the government for a pension of fifteen hundred francs a 
 year by the decree which indemnified the victims of this in- 
 fernal machine. 
 
 The vehicle, to which four dappled-gray horses were now 
 being harnessed steeds worthy of the Messageries royales 
 was in four divisions, the coupe, the interieur, the rotonde be- 
 hind, and the imperiale at top. It was identically the same 
 as the diligences called Condoles, which, in our day, still 
 maintain a rivalry on the Versailles road with two lines of rail- 
 way. Strong and light, well painted and clean, lined with 
 good blue cloth, furnished with blinds of arabesque design and 
 red morocco cushions, the Hirondelle de t Oise (Swallow of 
 the Oise) could carry nineteen travelers. Pierrotin, though 
 he was by this time fifty-six, was little changed. He still 
 wore a blouse over his black coat, and still smoked his short 
 pipe, as he watched two porters in stable-livery piling numerous 
 packages on the roof of his coach. 
 
 "Have you taken seats?" he asked of Madame Clapart 
 and Oscar, looking at them as if he were searching his mem- 
 ory for some association of ideas. 
 
 "Yes, two inside places, name of Bellejambe, my servant,"
 
 380 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 said Oscar. " He was to take them when he left the house 
 last evening." 
 
 "Oh, then monsieur is the new collector at Beaumont," 
 said Pierrotin. " You are going down to take the place of 
 Monsieur Margueron's nephew?" 
 
 "Yes," replied Oscar, pressing his mother's arm as a hint 
 to her to say nothing. For now he in his turn wished to re- 
 main unknown for a time. 
 
 At this instant Oscar was startled by recognizing Georges' 
 voice calling from the street 
 
 " Have you a seat left, Pierrotin ? " 
 
 " It strikes me that you might say Monsieur Pierrotin with- 
 out breaking your jaw," said the coach-owner angrily. 
 
 But for the tone of his voice Oscar could never have recog- 
 nized the practical joker who had twice brought him such ill- 
 luck. Georges, almost bald, had but three or four locks of 
 hair left above his ears, and carefully combed up to disguise 
 his bald crown as far as possible. A development of fat in 
 the wrong place, a bulbous stomach, had spoiled the elegant 
 figure of the once handsome young man. Almost vulgar in 
 shape and mien, Georges showed the traces of disaster in love, 
 and of a life of constant debauchery, in a spotty red com- 
 plexion, and thickened, vinous features. His eyes had lost 
 the sparkle and eagerness of youth, which can only be pre- 
 served by decorous and studious habits. 
 
 Georges, dressed with evident indifference to his appearance, 
 wore a pair of trousers with straps, but shabby, and of a style 
 that demanded patent-leather shoes ; those he wore, thick and 
 badly polished, were at least three-quarters of a year old, 
 which is in Paris as much as three years anywhere else. A 
 shabby vest, a tie elaborately knotted, though it was but an 
 old bandana, betrayed the covert penury to which a decayed 
 dandy may be reduced. To crown all, at this early hour of 
 the day Georges wore a dress-coat instead of a morning-coat, 
 the symptom of positive poverty. This coat, which must
 
 A START IN LIFE. 381 
 
 have danced at many a ball, had fallen, like its owner, from 
 the opulence it once represented to the duties of daily scrub. 
 The seams of the black cloth showed white ridges, the collar 
 was greasy, and wear had pinked out the cuffs into a dog- 
 tooth edge. Still, Georges was bold enough to invite attention 
 by wearing lemon-colored gloves rather dirty, to be sure, 
 and on one finger the outline of a large ring was visible in 
 black. 
 
 Round his tie, of which the ends were slipped through a 
 pretentious gold ring, twined a brown silk chain in imitation 
 of hair, ending no doubt in a watch. His hat, though stuck 
 on with an air, showed more evidently than all these other 
 symptoms the poverty of a man who never has sixteen francs 
 to spefld at the hatter's when he lives from hand to mouth. 
 Florentine's lover of yore flourished a cane with a chased 
 handle, silver-gilt, but horribly dented. His blue trousers, 
 tartan waistcoat, sky-blue tie, and red-striped cotton shirt 
 bore witness, in spite of so much squalor, to such a passion 
 for show that the contrast was not merely laughable, but a 
 lesson. 
 
 "And this is Georges?" said Oscar to himself. "A man I 
 left in possession of thirty thousand francs a year ! " 
 
 " Has Monsieur de Pierrotin still a vacant seat in his 
 coupe?" asked Georges ironically. 
 
 " No, my coupe is taken by a peer of France, Monsieur 
 Moreau's son-in-law, Monsieur le Baron de Canalis, with his 
 wife and his mother-in-law. I have only a seat in the body 
 of the coach." 
 
 " The deuce ! It would seem that under every form of 
 government peers of France travel in Pierrotin's conveyances ! 
 I will take the seat in the interieur" said Georges, with a 
 reminiscence of the journey with Monsieur de Serizy. 
 
 He turned to stare at Oscar and the widow, but recognized 
 neither mother nor son. Oscar was deeply tanned by the 
 African sun ; he had a very thick mustache and whiskers ; his
 
 382 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 hollow cheeks and marked features were in harmony with his 
 military deportment. The officer's rosette, the loss of an 
 arm, the plain dark dress, would all have been enough to mis- 
 lead Georges' memory, if indeed he remembered his former 
 victim. As to Madame Clapart, whom he had scarcely seen 
 on the former occasion, ten years spent in pious exercises of 
 the severest kind had absolutely transformed her. No one 
 could have imagined that this sort of Gray Sister hid one of 
 the Aspasias of 1797. 
 
 A huge old man, plainly but very comfortably dressed, in 
 whom Oscar recognized old Leger, came up slowly and heavily; 
 he nodded familiarly to Pierrotin, who seemed to regard him 
 with the respect due in all countries to millionaires. 
 
 " Heh ! why, it is Father Leger ! more ponderous than 
 ever ! " cried Georges. 
 
 "Whom have I the honor of addressing ?" asked the 
 farmer very drily. 
 
 "What! Don't you remember Colonel Georges, Ali 
 Pasha's friend ? We traveled this road together, once upon a 
 time, with the Comte de Serizy, who preserved his in- 
 cognito." 
 
 One of the commonest follies of persons who have come 
 down in the world is insisting on recognizing people, and on 
 being recognized. 
 
 "You are very much changed," said the old farmer, now 
 worth two millions of francs. 
 
 "Everything changes," said Georges. "Look at the 
 Silver Lion inn and at Pierrotin's coach, and see if they are 
 the same as they were fourteen years since." 
 
 " Pierrotin is now owner of all the coaches that serve the 
 Oise Valley, and has very good vehicles," said M. Leger. 
 " He is a citizen now of Beaumont, and keeps a hotel there 
 where his coaches put up ; he has a wife and daughter who 
 know their business " 
 
 An old man of about seventy came out of the inn and
 
 A START IN LIFE. 3g 3 
 
 joined the group of travelers who were waiting to be told to 
 get in. 
 
 "Come along, Papa Reybert ! " said Leger. "We have 
 no one to wait for now but your great man." 
 
 "Here he is," said the land steward of Presles, turning to 
 Joseph Bridau. 
 
 Neither Oscar nor Georges would have recognized the 
 famous painter, for his face was the strangely worn counte- 
 nance now so well known, and his manner was marked by the 
 confidence born of success. His black overcoat displayed 
 the ribbon of the Legion of Honor. His dress, which was 
 careful in all points, showed that he was on his way to some 
 country fete. 
 
 At this moment a clerk with a paper in his hand bustled 
 out of an office constructed at one end of the old kitchen of 
 the Silver Lion, and stood in front of the still unoccupied 
 coupe. 
 
 " Monsieur and Madame de Canalis, three places ! " he 
 called out; then, coming to the interieur, he said, "Mon- 
 sieur Bellejambe, two places; Monsieur Reybert, three; 
 Monsieur your name ? " added he to Georges. 
 
 " Georges Marest," replied the fallen hero in an under- 
 tone. 
 
 The clerk then went to the rotonde (the omnibus at the back 
 of the old French diligence), round which stood a little crowd 
 of nurses, country-folk, and small storekeepers, taking leave 
 of each other. After packing the six travelers, the clerk 
 called the names of four youths who clambered up on to the 
 seat on the imperiale, and then said " Right behind ! " as the 
 signal for starting. 
 
 Pierrotin took his place by the driver, a young man in a 
 blouse, who in his turn said, "Get up," to his horses. 
 
 The coach, set in motion by four horses purchased at Roye, 
 was pulled up the hill of the Faubourg Saint-Denis at a 
 gentle trot, but having once gained the level above Saint Lau-
 
 384 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 rent, it spun along like a mail-coach as far as Saint-Denis in 
 forty minutes. They did not stop at the inn famous for 
 cheese-cakes, but turned off to the left of Saint-Denis, down 
 the valley of Montmorency. 
 
 It was here, as they turned, that Georges broke the silence 
 which had been kept so far by the travelers who were study- 
 ing each other. 
 
 " We keep rather better time than we did fifteen years ago," 
 said he, taking out a silver watch. " Eh ! Father Leger? " 
 he asked. 
 
 " People are so condescending as to address me as Monsieur 
 Leger," retorted the millionaire. 
 
 " Why, this is our blusterer of my first journey to Presles," 
 exclaimed Joseph Bridau. " Well, and have you been fight- 
 ing new campaigns in Asia, Africa, and America? " asked the 
 great painter. 
 
 " By Jupiter ! I helped in the Revolution of July, and that 
 was enough, for it ruined me." 
 
 "Oho! you helped in the Revolution of July, did you ?" 
 said Bridau. "lam not surprised, for I never could believe 
 what I was told, that it made itself." 
 
 " How strangely meetings come about," said Monsieur 
 Leger, turning to Reybert. " Here, Papa Reybert, you see 
 the notary's clerk to whom you owe indirectly your place as 
 steward of the estates of Serizy." 
 
 ''But we miss Mistigris, now so famous as Leon de Lora," 
 said Joseph Bridau, " and the little fellow who was such a 
 fool as to tell the count all about his skin complaints which 
 he has cured at last and his wife, from whom he has parted to 
 die in peace." 
 
 " Monsieur le Comte is missing too," said Reybert. 
 
 " Oh ! " said Bridau sadly, "I am afraid that the last ex- 
 pedition he will ever make will be to 1' Isle- Adam, to be pres- 
 ent at my wedding." 
 
 " He still drives out in the park," remarked old Reybert.
 
 A START IN LIFE. 385 
 
 " Does his wife come often to see him ? " asked Leger. 
 
 "Once a month," replied old Reybert. "She still pre- 
 fers Paris ; she arranged the marriage of her favorite niece, 
 Mademoiselle du Rouvre, to a very rich young Pole, Count 
 Laginski, in September last " 
 
 "And who will inherit Monsieur de Serizy's property?" 
 asked Madame Clapart. 
 
 "His wife. She will bury him," replied Georges. "The 
 countess is still handsome for a woman of fifty-four, still very 
 elegant, and at a distance quite illusory " 
 
 "Elusive, you mean? She will always elude you," Leger 
 put in, wishing, perhaps, to turn the tables on the man who 
 had mystified him. 
 
 " I respect her," said Georges in reply. " But, by the way, 
 what became of that steward who was so abruptly dismissed in 
 those days?" 
 
 "Moreau?" said Leger. "He is Deputy now for Seine 
 et Oise." 
 
 "Oh, yes, the famous centre Moreau (of I'Oise) ? "* said 
 Georges. 
 
 "Yes," replied Leger. "Monsieur Moreau (of I'Oise). 
 He helped rather more than you in the Revolution of July, 
 and he has lately bought the splendid estate of Pointel, be- 
 tween Presles and Beaumont." 
 
 " What, close to the place he managed, and so near his old 
 master ! That is in very bad taste," cried Georges. 
 
 "Do not talk so loud," said Monsieur de Reybert, "for 
 Madame Moreau and her daughter, the Baroness de Canalis, 
 and her son-in-law, the late minister, are in the coupe." 
 
 " What fortune did he give her that the great orator would 
 marry his daughter? " 
 
 "Well, somewhere about two millions," said Lger. 
 
 "He had a pretty taste in millions," said Georges, smiling, 
 
 * Moreau (pronounced mo-rO) means extremely well the play is on 
 the centre O in " of I'Oise." 
 25
 
 386 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 and in an undertone, "He began feathering his nest at 
 Presles " 
 
 "Say no more about Monsieur Moreau," exclaimed Oscar. 
 " It seems to me that you might have learned to hold your 
 tongue in a public conveyance ! " 
 
 Joseph Bridau looked for a few seconds at the one-armed 
 officer, and then said 
 
 " Monsieur is not an ambassador, but his rosette shows that 
 he has risen in the world ; and nobly too, for my brother and 
 General Giroudeau have often mentioned you in their dis- 
 patches ' ' 
 
 "Oscar Husson ! " exclaimed Georges Marest. "On my 
 honor, but for your voice, I certainly should never have rec- 
 ognized you." 
 
 " Ah ! is this the gentleman who so bravely carried off the 
 Vicomte Jules de Serizy from the Arabs?" asked Reybert, 
 "and to whom Monsieur le Comte has given the collectorship 
 at Beaumont pending his appointment to Pontoise?" 
 
 "Yes, monsieur," said Oscar. 
 
 "Well, then," said the painter, "I hope, monsieur, that 
 you will do me the pleasure of being present at my marriage, 
 at 1'Isle-Adam." 
 
 " Whom are you marrying? " asked Oscar. 
 
 "Mademoiselle Leger, Monsieur de Reybert's granddaugh- 
 ter. Monsieur le Comte de Serizy was good enough to ar- 
 range the matter for me. I owe him much as an artist, and 
 he was anxious to establish my fortune before his death I 
 had scarcely thought of it " 
 
 "Then Pere Leger married?" said Georges. 
 
 "My daughter," said Monsieur de Reybert, "and without 
 any money." 
 
 "And he has children?" 
 
 " One daughter. Quite enough for a widower who had no 
 children," said Pere Leger. " And, like my partner Moreau, 
 I shall have a famous man for my son-in-law."
 
 A START IN LIFE. 337 
 
 "So you still live at I'Isle-Adam?" said Georges to Mon- 
 sieur Leger, almost respectfully. 
 "Yes; I purchased Cassan." 
 
 " Well, I am happy in having chosen this particular day 
 for doing the Oise Valley," said Georges, "for you may do 
 me a service, gentlemen." 
 
 " In what way ? ' ' asked Leger. 
 
 "Well, thus," said Georges. "I am employed by the 
 Society of r Esperancc* which has just been incorporated, 
 and its by-laws approved by letters-patent from the King. 
 This institution is, in ten years, to give marriage portions to 
 girls and annuities to old people ; it will pay for the educa- 
 tion of children ; in short, it takes care of everybody " 
 
 "So I should think!" said old Leger, laughing. "In 
 short, you are an insurance agent." 
 
 " No, monsieur, I am inspector-general, instructed to estab- 
 lish agencies and correspondents with the company through- 
 out France ; I am acting only till the agents are appointed ; 
 
 for it is a delicate and difficult matter to find honest men " 
 
 " But how did you lose your thirty thousand francs a year ? " 
 asked Oscar. 
 
 "As you lost your arm!" the ex-notary's clerk replied 
 sharply to the ex-attorney's clerk. 
 
 "Then you invested your fortune in some brilliant deed ?" 
 said Oscar, with somewhat bitter irony. 
 
 " By Jupiter ! my investments are a sore subject. I have 
 more deeds than enough." 
 
 They had reached Saint-Leu-Taverny, where the travelers 
 got out while they changed horses. Oscar admired the brisk- 
 ness with which Pierrotin unbuckled the straps of the whiffle- 
 tree, while his driver took out the leaders. 
 
 "Poor Pierrotin!" thought he. "Like me, he has not 
 risen much in life. Georges has sunk into poverty. All the 
 others, by speculation and skill, have made fortunes. Do we 
 *Lit.: Trust company.
 
 388 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 breakfast here, Pierrotin?" he asked, clapping the man on 
 the shoulder. 
 
 " I am not the driver," said Pierrotin. 
 
 "What are you, then?" asked Colonel Husson. 
 
 "I am the proprietor," replied Pierrotin. 
 
 "Well, well, do not quarrel with an old friend," said 
 Oscar, pointing to his mother, but still with a patronizing 
 air ; " do you not remember Madame Clapart ? " 
 
 It was the more graceful of Oscar to name his mother to 
 Pierrotin, because at this moment Madame Moreau (de 1'Oise) 
 had gotten out of the coupe and looked scornfully at Oscar and 
 his mother as she heard the name. 
 
 "On my honor, madame, I should never have known you; 
 nor you either, monsieur. You get it hot in Africa, it would 
 seem?" 
 
 The disdainful pity Oscar had felt for Pierrotin was the last 
 blunder into which vanity betrayed the hero of this scene ; 
 and for that he was punished, though not too severely. On 
 this wise : Two months after he had settled at Beaumont- 
 sur-Oise, Oscar paid his court to Mademoiselle Georgette 
 Pierrotin, whose fortune amounted to a hundred and fifty 
 thousand francs, and by the end of the winter of 1838 he mar- 
 ried the daughter of the owner of the Oise Valley coach ser- 
 vice. 
 
 The results of the journey to Presles had given Oscar dis- 
 cretion, the evening at Florentine's had disciplined his 
 honesty, the hardships of a military life had taught him the 
 value of social distinctions and submission to fate. He was 
 prudent, capable, and consequently happy. The Comte de 
 Srizy, before his death, obtained for Oscar the place of reve- 
 nue collector at Pontoise. The influence of Monsieur Moreau 
 (de 1'Oise), of the Comtesse de Serizy, and of Monsieur le 
 Baron de Canalis, who, sooner or later, will again have a seat 
 in the Ministry, will secure Monsieur Husson 's promotion to
 
 A START IN LIFE. 
 
 389 
 
 the post of receiver-general, and the Camusots now recognize 
 him as a relation. 
 
 Oscar is a commonplace man, gentle, unpretentious, and 
 modest; faithful like the Government he serves to the 
 happy medium in all things. He invites neither envy nor 
 scorn. In short, he is the modern French citizen. 
 
 PARIS, February, 1842.
 
 UCSB LIBRARY
 
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