YALE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY PICTURES THE FRENCH: A SERIES OF LITERARY AND GRAPHIC DELINEATIONS OF FRENCH CHARACTER. By JULES JANIN, BALZAC, CORMENIN, AND OTHER CELEBRATED FRENCH AUTHORS. WITH NEARLY ONE HUNDRED ENGRAVINGS. DRAWN ON THE WOOD BY GAVARNI, H. MONNIER, AND MEISSONIER, AND ENGRAVED BY LAVIEJLLE, ETC. LONDON: PRINTED FOR THOMAS TEGG, 73, CHEAPSIDE. MDCCCXLII. TABLE OF CONTENTS. SUBJECT. AUTHOR. PAGE Introduction iii The Stockbroker Frederick Soulie . 1 Designed by Gavarni — engraved by Guilbaut. The Model E. De Labedollierre 9 Designed by Gavarni — engraved by Porret. Tiie Chimney-sweeper A. Fremy .... 17 Designed by Gavarni — engraved by Louis. , The Parisian Lioness E. Guinot. ... 25 Designed by Gavarni — engraved by Barat. The Schoolmaster E. Megnault . . . 3P Designed by Gavarni — engraved by Guillaumot. The Pew-opener F. Coquille ... 41 Designed by Gavarni — engraved by Breval. The Governess Louise Colet ... 49 Designed by Gagniet — engraved by Barat. The Gamin Jules Janin ... 56 Designed by Charlet — engraved by Porret. The Police Agent A. Durantin ... 65 Designed by Gavarni — engraved by Gerard. The Diligence Conductor J. Hilpert ... 73 Designed by Monnier — engraved by Lavieille. The Notary De Balzac . . . 81 Designed by Gavarni — engraved by Stypulkowski. The Theatrical Agent Charles Fries . . 89 Designed by Monnier — engraved by Loiseau. The Young Lady Anna Marie ... 97 Designed by Gavarni — engraved by Gerard. The Coucou-driver //. Couailhac . . .111 Designed by Monnier — engraved by Barat. SUBJECT. AUTHOR. TAGF The. Schoolboy H. Rolland . . . 119 Designed by Charlet — engraved by Guilbaut. The Petty Lawyer E. Dufour ... 130 Designed by Daumier — engraved by Birouste. The Lady's Companion Cordellier Delanoue 135 Designed by Geniole — engraved by Loiseau. The Coffee-house Waiter A. Ricard . . . 144 Designed by Monnier — engraved by Barat. The Pensioner E. De Labedollierre 153 Designed by Charlet & H. Monnier— engraved by Gerard & Porret. The Poet E. De Labedollierre 167 Designed by Gavarni — engraved by Lavieille and Gerard. The Mute Petrus Borel . . . 183 Designed by Monnier — engraved by Louis. The Money-lender L. Jousserandot . . 192 Designed by Gavarni — engraved by Lavieille, INTRODUCTION The great difference between French and English society lies chiefly in the manners and habits of the two nations, and this difference is even more marked in the lower than in the upper classes. The following sketches are translated from a periodical publication of very great popularity on the continent, to which all the most talented writers in France are contributors. A selection has been made of characters variously placed in the social scale ; and if a certain degree of extravagance is observable in some ofthe descriptions, the English editor must not be blamed : he has studied to reproduce as faithfully as possible in an En glish dress the sketches drawn by the original authors, and the work now sub mitted to the public is, as the title imports, pictures of the French, drawn by themselves. In times of revolution and great political excitement, changes are rapidly wrought in the manners and habits of a nation ; and amongst our neighbours the recent social transformations have been manifold and great. The French as a nation however still retain the distinctive character so easily recognizable what ever their station in society. Beneath the same forms varied to infinity, the same vices, the same peculiarities, and the same good qualities, remain un changed, and plainly perceptible to the observer of mankind. The elegant and refined society of the last century, the delightful but impru dent and enervating indolence which so many writers have deplored as fled for ever, are still as flourishing in France as formerly, though presenting a different aspect, and speaking another language. All the alluring vices of the reign of Louis XV., since so vehemently censured, did not disappear with Madame Dubarry and the guillotine. Alas ! no ; they VI are still fashionable, and if not as prevalent as in former times, nor practised so openly as after the ministry of Cardinal Fleury, French society is not free from their influence. Licentiousness, love of pleasure, love of dress and display, did not share the fate of the Bastille, the Convention, the CEil de Boeuf, and the Mousquetaires Gris. Neither are betrayed husbands no longer to be found in France. Finan ciers, procureurs, army contractors, still abound ; — There bankers, business- agents, and money-brokers — men of equivocal fortunes, who have risen to opu lence by gambling in the funds ; Turcarets and Frontins are always to be rret with in Paris. The crutch of the renowned Asmodeus would, in the nineteenth century, dis close beneath the roofs of the French capital frivolous and enterprising old beaux striving to be young ; fair ladies wearied and agitated with they know not what; marriageable daughters sold to wealthy dotards, and young men allying them selves to crabbed age and wrinkles, to be enabled to pay their debts ; all the bril liant and disguised dissipation and refined vices of their ancestors ; the same mer cenary barter of heart and mind; the same selfishness and improbity in money transactions ; the same riots ; the same follies ; yet there is this material differ ence : the bad example does not emanate from the court — the excesses are com mitted in silence and secrecy; and no busy tongues noise them abroad to the glory of the culprits. In the lower classes, the change that has been working during the last half century is, however, much more striking. From the eleventh to the fifteenth century, Philip Augustus, Louis the Eighth, Saint Louis, Charles the Seventh, and Louis the Eleventh, successively put the power of the people to the most severe test, ere yet the masses had learnt to appreciate their .own strength. One monarch used them as instru ments of conquest, another, as the tools of vengeance. Aided by the people, the nobles carried on the wars in the Holy Land ; with the aid of the people, Charles the Seventh drove the English from France; supported by their strong arm, Louis the Eleventh kept in subjection his insurgent vassals. The people were then the rod or the scourge ; — never the sword. The right of possessing a few roods of land, a drove of cattle, or a house, the right, in short, of being a proprietor, contributed immensely to the progressive Vll enfranchisement of the people. Goaded by the over-severity of their rulers, or impelled by a mysterious impulse, the people have been gradually and steadily advancing towards liberty; and it might be asserted, towards comfort and happiness. The people had but little share in the foreign and domestic wars anciently sus tained by royalty. The army, both officers and soldiers, was exclusively com posed of men of a certain aristocratical distinction. There was no infantry, and some title to nobility was required to mount a war-horse in the king's service. It was not until the battle of Pavia that infantry were called to the field, and from that battle the introduction of the French people to the career of arms may be said to date. All the great military achievements, to the glory (or misfor tune) of France, which took place prior to that period, were accomplished by the nobles: the gains and losses of the nation were their work. It is apparent from history, that if the nobility had not fought their own battles, France would have become part of the English territory after the reign of Charles the Sixth, even as two centuries later she would have been subjugated by Russia and Germany, but for the courage of her people in their own defence. Thus a great debt of gratitude is due from the people to the nobles, as well as from the nobles to the people, for their mutual services. In the reign of Louis the Twelfth, the popular power was much increased by the agricultural improvements, which became still more extended in the reign of Henry the Fourth. The Thirteenth Louis fitted out the first great naval arma ment ; and in the reign of Louis XIV. , the navy was chiefly in the hands of men risen from the ranks of the people. The French nobility were still opulent ; but the industrious classes were more than opulent, they were wealthy. They were then called the "bourgeoisie" in common parlance, and the " tiers-etat" in the language of the law. The bourgeoisie has been likened to the honey and wax of the people. Once in a half-century the hive is emptied, and the swarming ensues : the hive is in a state of confusion ; there is much humming and stinging while it lasts; but the revolutionary sun rises, the hive is righted, and the harvest of honey gathered in. No important change can now be accomplished in France in opposition to the will of the tiers etat. Louis the Fourteenth was the first to give them access everywhere; they were admitted by him in the ranks of his armies, and Vill within his gilded council chamber. In his reign they were generals, cabinet- ministers, priests, doctors, admirals, and poets. Louis the Fifteenth submitted with a bad grace ; but his successor was compelled, to yield without resistance to the popular power that was so soon to sweep, all before it. In 1789, a priest— it could only be a priest: all great heresies, from Alius to Lamennais, have emanated from the priesthood— in 1789, the Abbe Sieves pub lished the notorious pamphlet, entitled, " What is the tiers etat ?" The pamph leteer's answer to that leading question was, The tiers etat, is all. He goes on asking, What has it been until the present time in the constitution ? Nothing. What does it want then ? — To be something. A bad writer, but a thorough logician, the Abbe Sieyes neglected to shew the importance the tiers etat had really held in the social scale. They had, in fact, a considerable weight in the state ; whence their title of tiers etat, or a third of the nation. But what share of political power are the tiers etat invested with ? asked the Abbe, and so put, the question was unanswerable. The tiers etat were " nothing," or almost nothing in a political sense ; yet they formed the ma jority in the army, the whole of the working classes, the entire body of tax-pay ers ; since, in 1 789, there were only two hundred^thousand privileged persons, inclusive ofthe nobility and clergy, out of a population of twenty-six millions. In the same year, 1 789, the Revolution broke out. The tiers etat then became everything, which is rather more than something, according to the first hum ble request of the Abbe Sieyes. Three years afterwards the nobility and clergy were exiled, and the king had lost his head on the scaffold. Politically and soci ally the man of the people had triumphed. In 1793 he traversed in three steps, like the fabled coursers ofthe ancients, the whole extent of the moral world. He overturned everything in his passage, to rebuild it on his return. He began to feel the country his own, and made equality the law of the land. Men baptized in blood were named citizens. Another code of morality, other habits were required ; the man of the people created them. Other institutions were found necessary; the man of the people established them. War was declared by the people against the world. The man of the people was, in turn, rebel, pamphleteer, tribune, orator soldier, legislator, executioner — magnanimous, merciless, chivalrous, sober, cyni cal, impious, invincible : the man of the people was all this, nor did he stop theie. He wiote with the subtle logic of Belial,' and signed Sieyes. With mar vellous eloquence he harangued the States-general in the person of Mirabeau. He made laws that sunk deep into the nation like aquafortis into copper, under the names of Merlin, Carnot, Danton. He assassinated with both hands, with fearful sang-froid, and called himself Marat, Robespierre, Couthon. The man of the people who on the tenth of August put to death the Swiss guards, who from the second to the sixth of September, butchered in the pri sons, was the same who conquered twenty days afterwards at Valmy. A con queror wherever he carried his arms, in the interior, on the frontier, and in fo reign lands, he was at home the embodiment of the legislative and executive power. The man of the people placed his country in jeopardy, the man of the people rescued her from peril. Having achieved "liberty" for his own land, he wished to extend the blessings of revolution to the other nations of the world. " Glory" attended his steps. Led on by Napoleon, the man par excellence of the people, Italy, Egypt, and Germany were successively subjected to the rege nerating influence of revolutionized France. Serf in 1600, subject in 1789, citi zen in 1793, the man of the people was, in 1804, crowned emperor in the person of. Napoleon Bonaparte. But if we turn from public to private life, we find that, notwithstanding the gradual emancipation of the people, and their increasing influence, the lower classes are no more exempt in Paris than in London from misery that has found no remedy yet in the progress of civilization. Let us examine the condition of some of the lower classes in the French metropolis. It is a winter's morning, and scarcely day-break ; the wind scatters the snow through the fog, and the ground presents the appearance of a frozen pond. The shadowy forms flitting to and fro through the brume are ten thousand of God's creatures, our fellow beings grown old in poverty, lean with hunger. With bare heads, naked legs, and a broom in their hands, they push the mud from the street to the sewer, while other sweepers under ground drive it into the Seine. Among this ghostly legion are young men, old men such as Fenelon loved to see walking in Salente, poor girls who in their childhood were bright and fail. Sorrowful sight ! At the same hour the markets of Paris are supplied with provisions ; the treasures of market produce arrive. The cold is no obstacle to the victualling of the great capital ; savoury vegetables, nutritious esculents, fine fruits are borne along packed in osier baskets, within arm's length of the wretched scavengers, as if in mockery of their hunger and poverty. They turn aside, and steal not. Seven o'clock strikes, and every avenue on both sides of the Seine is crowded with busy hurrying groups — the two hundred thousand workmen of Paris. Their day's work is about to begin, and it will not close till eight at night. Very few have stockings, not one a great coat. Some for thirty, some for fifteen, some for even ten sous, are about, drop by drop, to barter thirteen hours of their life, which is after all reckoned by pulsations, the same as the richest banker's. At this early hour what temptations beset them at every step ! The draper un- rols in their sight the cloth soft and warm to the touch, and handsome to behold; the mercer displays his brocades, his waistcoatings, and his satins within a few inches of their tattered garments ; the jeweller exposes in his window the ruby pin and diamond studs, destined to shine in the plaits of a cambric shirt, to the gaze of those who have not always a shirt to we j. Magnanimity of poverty ! Their hands embroidered the silks; they dyed the cloth; they polished the jewels; stone by stone they built the houses beneath the walls of which they are thread ing their way with half a loaf under their arm. They pass on and do not steal. Another circle of the Parisian social hell : — a lurid and nebulous sunbeam, gloomy and doubtful, shows Paris in all its misery. Bevies of young girls pass without jostling the early wayfarers in the streets ; crossing lakes of mud without soiling their neat attire, on their way to their work-rooms or shop, to the print-colourer's attic, or to the basket-maker's cellar, or perhaps to the tailor's or shoemaker's, to support by the labour of their attenuated fingers, some a father, others a mother, and many a family of orphan children. If they are ugly, their fortune is the worse, for they will not find a husband ; if beau tiful, they are still more unfortunate, for they will never be married. They live on till they are thirty, leading an existence, often aggravated in its misery by some unfortunate attachment, and they become childless and homeless mothers for they have as much right to love as their more fortunate sisters. Many of them become prostitutes, and are degraded to a circle of our social hell into which we will not follow them. Yet they pass on, and do not steal. It is five o'clock ; the exchange is closed, and the opera is not yet open the restaurants are crowded with the wealthy, who are satisfying the caprices of an Xl appetite whetted and sharpened at pleasure. Thirty thousand hungry citizens make no dinner at all ! While for others every delicious production of the animal and vegetable kingdoms is prepared with all the appliances of the culi nary art; a thin sheet of glass alone separating these from the Eden of abund ance ; behind them gaunt hunger, insidious and provocative ; on the other side the fragile panes of glass are piled rare fish of which they have never even heard, and the remembrance of them will haunt which in their dreams ; viands dressed, by fairy cooks, fruits grown five hundred leagues from Paris. What have they done to be debarred from partaking of this good cheer ? What crime have they committed to be shut out from this banquet to which the more fortunate sit down ? We are not speaking of the workmen, whose wants are easily satisfied, and who are besides busily employed at this hour ; we speak of men placed at the extremity of the two classes, having neither the courage nor the industry of the poor, and burning with the passions of the rich. They have intelligence, fatal intelligence. They have pride, they have love ; pride of great things — love of all social pleasures. And they do not get on ; they are condemned always to desire, and never to be satisfied. They have had no youth ; their hair has whitened before old age, they have existed on their own morbid imagination, they will die of despair or resignation — the cloak of despair which shows its shape so plainly. Yet these people expire, and do not steal. Let us go a little farther. It is midnight, and all who have beds to go to are at rest ; this number does not include thirty thousand houseless wretches, who having eaten nothing all day do not know where to repose their heads. The streets, abandoned by the very dogs, are their only asylum ; the dogs have pro tection, and a lair to go to at night. This nocturnal errant population has re duced statists to consider their existence during the night as a mystery. It is asserted that they sleep in out-buildings, in ruins, in unfinished houses, under bridges, and on the quays. Some have learnt to sleep standing, like horses. Paris is in possession of such as these from midnight till five in the morning ; its sleeping inhabitants lie happy around them, unharmed and unmolested. It would be out of place here to enter into a more extended view of the moral condition of the contemporary population of France. Our only object has been to take a rapid survey of the changes that have been wrought among the lower orders of French society ; nor must we omit to add that in the midst of Xll the miseiy to which so many thousands are doomed, there is not wanting the proverbial liveliness of the French character, tempered by a slight feeling of resignation. The lower classes have not been excluded from the following papers. They will have in future an equal claim upon the historian and the moralist, as upon the legislator. ^CWmW THE STOCKBROKER BY FREDERIC SOULIE. \f ERILY the Parisian Stockbroker is one of those cha racters who lay open the present century to a multi tude of fine phrases from future moralists, against the barbarism and disorder of the age we live in. Some 'Alexis Monteil," or "Dupin,"or "Isambert" of the ^twenty-sixth century, turning over the worm-eaten an nals of our courts of justice, and the leaves of some of our books, of which, perchance, a copy or two will still exist in a forgotten corner — will search out our laws, and the state of society flourishing under their regulations. After having studied the useful trades, and made himself thoroughly ac quainted with the respective businesses of our Fruiterers, Feuilletonistes , Old Clothesmen, Porkmen, &c, the Dupin of A. D. 2640 will in due course come to the Stockbroker ; and having discovered the articles of our Code of Laws* * The number of Stockbrokers in Paris is limited. They are appointed by Government on the presentation of their predecessors in office. It is enacted by the Code penal, that all bets on the public funds shall be punished by a fine not exceeding £400, and an imprisonment not exceeding twelve months. It is also enacted that Stockbrokers who become Bankrupts shall be liable to imprison ment with hard labour, to be extended in case of fraud lo the term of theirnatural life. A THE STOCKBROKER. that strictly define his duties and their limits, he will at first fancy that he has found a clue to the knowledge of this public crier of the National Debt. He will suppose that a few desperate gamesters, having taken to bet on the rise and the fall of the Public Funds, the Stockbrokers, being Government officers, were not allowed to lend their assistance to these speculators ; and he will commend the salutary regulations that under severe penalties interdicted Stockbrokers from being agents to any bargain not having for its object an actual purchase or sale. The wish on the part of the Legislature to repress gambling transactions will at the same time account to our future antiquary for the rigour ofthe enactments that declare all Stockbrokers who fail to be fraudu lent bankrupts ; it being evident that no Stockbroker who limits his transactions to the prescribed duties of his profession, can possibly fail. The Stockbroker receives money to purchase stock or some other public security, pays for the same with capital entrusted to him for that purpose, transfers his title, and receives his per centage on the amount. Such is his duty, and in the eye of the law he has no other. However, by dint of researches in our books, and even in the archives of our justiciary courts, the inquisitive Dupin of future ages will discover records of numerous Stockbrokers' bankruptcies ; and will find that, notwithstanding the law, they were arranged as easily as those of common tradesmen. This will lead to fresh enquiries, and finally to the discovery of an abuse that will, no doubt, appear enormous : namely, that in the face of the law of France, the Stock broker's daily practices were nothing less than a perpetual lie given to that law ; that the object for which he was appointed was a very subordinate, almost insignificant, branch of his business ; and that though he occasionally per formed his professional duties, he constantly practised what was expressly forbidden. The indefatigable ardour of an old book and forgotten archive-hunter in search of some extraordinary conjecture, is almost incredible. Having pushed his en quiries so far, the literary or legal resurrectionist will dive deeply into the annals of the courts and tribunals, in order to discover the suits recorded and sen tences pronounced within their walls ; perhaps after days and nights spent in laborious research, he will find a little cause in which a Stockbroker was con demned to pay the amount of a wager which his losing customer refused to set tle; and this, be it remarked, without the guilty party being otherwise punished by imprisonment, fine, or the forfeiture of his office. Perhaps our Dupin may find a sentence or two of censure pronounced by M. Seguier, First Presid t f the Court of Appeal, against the fatal mania of gambling on the Exchane d the total disregard paid by the company of Stockbrokers to the laws of th ' institution. Then strange suppositions will follow. Our learned rnor 1' 2640, taking in earnest the censure of the Judge, as recorded, will be inci ¦ regard M. President Seguier as a magistrate of first eminence, one of th THE STOCKBROKER. acute and incorruptible judges who sternly set their faces against the venality of their times and the misrule gradually gaining ground in society. M. Seguier will be proclaimed a great man. — Equally right will be the supposition that the formidable company of Stockbrokers could only act with such insulting impunity by bribing magistrates and ministers with heaps of gold ; and it will hereafter be held an undoubted truth that this redoubtable association of brigands kept the law captive in their cash-boxes, thanks to the corruption of its administrators. All this will come to pass exactly as we state ; we speak with confidence, having ourselves occasionally superintended and verified the researches of antiquaries, and being well acquainted with their mode of reasoning and de ducing facts. It will not be supposed four centuries hence that all this was so, simply be cause it happened to be so; but whatever posterity may think, the Stockbroker is not one of those malefactors who exercise a sway over society by the power of their criminal audacity; he is what he is, only because he is not disturbed, and especially because he is the active agent of our ruling passion — love of gambling. Thus much premised, the Stockbroker is like other men, so far as his moral or immoral attributes are concerned : a good father, he buys a substitute for his son when the latter is ordered for military service ; a good husband, he gives his wife a box at the Italian Opera ; a good citizen, he is very punctual in the discharge of his duties as staff officer in the National Guard. To these qualities may be added others that place him on a level with the opulent citizens of Paris: as keeping an Opera-dancer, playing deep, pretending to buy only thorough-bred horses, driving a stylish tilbury, and professing the greatest con tempt for literary gentlemen. In short, he is a worthy man — neither more wicked, nor worse than the majority of his neighbours. However the Stockbroker has features in his character quite peculiar to him self, which make him the personage we would attempt to describe. On entering a drawing-room in which you know there are Stockbrokers, if you should observe a quiet, unobtrusive man who obligingly makes way for you to pass, who quietly takes up his station in a corner, converses in a subdued voice, and listens with evident pleasure to the orchestra or to the singer : — move on, this modest gentleman is not a Stockbroker. If a little farther on you should see a person with an earnest and intelligent countenance speaking with great fluency and gesticulating perhaps with more vehemence than is necessary to convince his auditors, but whose looks and language betray the depth of his convictions: — do not fall into the error of mistaking that eloquent speaker for a Stockbroker. If in a retired corner of the room you should find a gentleman with a slightly contemptuous expression of countenance, in conversation with a group of half-a-dozen plain-looking or middle-aged ladies, besprinkling his dis course with pointed remarks and elegant witticisms, proceed : — he is no Stock broker. The man who says nothing ; the man who politely answers your ques- 4 v, THE STOCKBROKER. tion ; he who at play wins without affected indifference, and loses without parade — neither of these is a Stockbroker. But if, as you are passing from one room to another, you find in your way a stiff, starched man planted like a sign-post, who stops you for ten minutes with out deigning to perceive it ; , if you remark a bold, confident man conversing in a loud voice during the concert, and contemptuously disregarding the diffident " hush !" of the, impassioned amateur standing near him ; if you notice a man who carries his head proudly, like a Norman charger, a man who in argument pronounces a sentence or two which he seems to consider a final decree ; if you see a fat young dandy leaning with his back to the fire-place in the principal drawing-room, addressing in a subdued voice very dull nonsense to the hand somest woman present about her toilette and her bouquet, as if a pearl or a diamond fell from his mouth at every word he uttered ; if you take a seat at a card-table where one of the players, whether he loses or wins, ostentatiously rattles his gold ; if finally you are pursued by a fashionable middle-aged man who makes a point of appropriating to himself as much room as he can, as many seats, and as much of the air and of the lights, as one person can possibly en joy : — you have found your man, you have discovered a Stockbroker. Let us not be misunderstood. The Stockbroker is not a coarse, vulgar fellow, but a man of infinite self-importance, infinitely 'pleased with himself, infinitely confident of his own intelligence. Whatever may be said of him he has only one cause of uneasiness : he is miserable, because he is a Stockbroker. The Stockbroker generally is a goodlooking man, under forty years of age ; has received a tolerably good education, is neither absolutely ignorant, nor absolutely a fool; is sometimes rich, and must always appear so. He has taken a prominent position in the world, and has, perhaps unconsciously, con stituted himself the aristocrat of the day. Now all this is irksome to him • he is still so near his origin, that he feels himself to be a parvenu. It seems but yesterday that he was a clerk, earning a hundred and twenty pounds a year in the office of which to-day he is the principal ; then he enjoyed a good-hu moured laugh at the self-importance of his employer, who had not paid for his office, yet who gave himself the airs of a man of millions ; yesterday he danced and enjoyed himself, went to the pit of the Opera, and when he played was sorry if he lost, and delighted if he won ; yesterday he had a pretty little mistress who doted on him, and who only desired to be taken on Sundays to the Gaiete and the Ambigu,* where he laughed and wept by turns at the vaudeville and the melodrama; yesterday he was a man, to-day he is a Stock broker. This terrible title weighs on every hour of his life, and makes his intercourse with society a constant and wearisome piece of acting. * Two ofthe minor Paris Theatres. THE STOCKBROKER. 5 *{'¦ How should one whose fortune is always at stake, be cheerful and happy? How should the depository of so many fortunes enjoy even occasional gaiety? The speculator who lives by an unintermitting course of active schemes, cannot be possessed of a quiet mind ; and when the business of his life is to watch the progress of political events in which his very existence is involved, he cannot find leisure for merry thoughts. Now if, under such cir- circumstances, the Stockbroker were exclusively a man of business, entirely devoted to his counting-house and his ledgers, his position would not be an un natural one. But since the revolution of 1 830, he has set up for a man of the world; to circumstances only he owes this position, but he tenaciously main tains it. When he goes into fashionable circles, he is overwhelmed with the weight of his business, and hence the appearance of a butterfly with leaden wings that seems his characteristic. He would in his person unite all the importance of a capitalist to the careless ease of a man of fashion • he would be as magnificent as a fermier general, and yet preserve the grave decorum of a responsible financial agent who calculates all his expenses. He resembles a man walking in one place, tied to a rope made fast in another; he is, to borrow a simile frequently applied to dandies, like an ass in a lion's skin, but the tips of his ears always peep out. In a word, his life gives a perpetual lie to his position ; he is a man of business, whose manners, wit, and language are tinctured by his daily avocations, yet he apes the exterior of a man of leisure, whose intelligence and refinement are constantly improving amidst the pursuits of his elegant life. Hence, some Stockbrokers who might have been distinguished men if they had been without professions, or who might have been pleasant members of society, had they been hosiers or silk-mercers, are clumsy, stiff, awkward, and important, because they contrive to blend the habits of fashionable life with their money-making avocations. Setting up for one of the kings of fashion, he never loses sight of his as sumed character. His apartments are an elegant receptacle for the richest fancy articles, and most costly trifles — they are displayed everywhere, in the antechamber, dining-room, drawing-rooms, and boudoir. The furniture, either antique, of the middle-ages, or of the style of the age of Louis XV., imitated with the utmost nicety, is always new and in the best taste ; his tables are strewn with rich albums, and books in elegant bindings ; and little groups of statuary and bronzes adorn every room. But the Stockbroker has no real taste for these productions of art — he scarcely knows anything about them, except that he has paid for them, and he enjoys them only for the pleasure of exciting envy among his visitors. His possessions give him no happiness ; they are no more than outward indications of his wealth. The Stockbroker's real apartment is an office furnished with numerous drawers, presses, and bill-files, a leathern arm-chair, and a few quires of ruled paper with two columns in red 6 THE STOCKBROKER. ink. When he has to write a note on gilt paper, he can no doubt close it with perfumed wax and a seal bearing an English motto; but this is a bore for him ; he never writes freely and at his ease except on common post paper with printed forms, and he loves to stamp the seal of his letters with the name of his firm. His life, his real existence, is in his office and on the Stock Exchange — everywhere else he is uncomfortable; he feels out of place, and is constantly acting a part directly opposed to his tastes. The Stockbroker's wife alone is at her ease amidst the luxury and elegance that pervade her home. She is only connected with her husband's business by the fortune she brought him, for which he married her, and she has plenty of leisure to be, or rather to become, a fashionable lady; for all Stock brokers' wives are not born ladies, and many only acquire elegant manners by long and careful practice. We could mention a rich clog-maker's daughter, for instance, who, at the time of her marriage, knew neither how to dress, to walk, to sit, nor to speak; and a country merchant's daughter, whose knowledge only enabled her to tell how many leaves a lettuce ought to yield for a salad, yet who, having married Stockbrokers, have become brilliant leaders of fashion. But it is a gift quite peculiar to women : they know how to accommodate themselves to the position in which circumstances place them; and a few months generally suffice to make the Stockbroker's wife the leading patroness of the most elegant dress-makers and fashionable milliners. She reclines as gracefully as the most noble marchioness in a corner of her carriage on its way to the Bois de Boulogne, and is not a whit less apt at exchanging an imper ceptible sign of recognition with a handsome gentleman on horseback. She will, with a glance, survey from head to foot one of her dear friends, without appearing to notice her, and espy a dozen solecisms in her toilette without even exchanging bows. In the world, she quickly learns what is requisite to constitute a lady of fashion; she is capricious, alive to the least trifles, haughty, patronizing, and im pertinent. At home, she knows how to receive and how to welcome ; the elegant display so irksome to her husband, seems quite natural to her: she is fond of these costly trifles, and her admiration is free from any vulgar affectation. Thus the Stockbroker's position as a husband is most critical ; for though many persons may be blind to the contradictions of his existence, he cannot conceal them from his wife, especially as he does not consider himself bound to keep up in her presence the farce he plays in public. He pursues his weari some calculations in the midst of her refined life ; he plants his ponderous ledger on the fragile and elegant desk of velvet and ebony where she writes illegible notes, and its weight breaks the pretty bauble ; when she dreams of poetry he talks of the funds, and casts aloud while she is practising an Italian aria : in short, he is in her presence a plain man of business, and she is a fashionable lady. THE STOCKBROKER. 7 Such a contrast inevitably brings one of two misfortunes. His wife has acute- ness enough to perceive that her husband shows himself to her in his true colours, and that it is before the world only that he parades great manners and affects refinement. Then she concludes that their dispositions are quite unsuitable, that affectionate and light-hearted as she is, she will never be understood by her cold and calculating husband ; unable to live in such estrangement, she listens to a lover. This, for the Stockbroker, is the most fortunate occurrence. Or, she believes her husband to be in earnest in his assumed character with the world, and seeing that he does not behave to her as to every one else, she becomes jealous, ill-tempered, and exacting ; she looks upon herself as an ill- used, despised, and neglected woman. Quarrels, hysterics, and fits of sullen ness ensue ; with all the matrimonial miseries to which the condition of a be trayed husband is almost preferable. In this emergency the Stockbroker, who is fully occupied with the part he has to play in public, considers how he may best pacify his wife, and, like most men in such cases, tries the first means that occur to him. Money seems to him an universal panacea, and on every fresh outbreak of his wife's spleen, he lavishes money for her dress, her carriage, her horses, a country-seat, balls and parties. Thus we see Stockbrokers' wives indulging with tearful eyes extravagant luxuries, and parading at parties their care-worn and miserable countenances. This it is that too often entails bankruptcy on the husband, who after having failed to secure his conjugal happiness, finds himself ruined. Such is, if we mistake not, the Stockbroker's actual position. The political influence he possessed a few years ago, which he derived from the Eevolution of 1830, is gradually diminishing, and will soon disappear. The Stockbrokers were indeed the first to pay court to the new dynasty. They were at the beginning welcomed and feasted, and for their loyalty re warded with colonelships in the National Guard. But around this dynasty, now firmly established, is congregating a more congenial aristocracy which refuses to admit the Stockbroker in its ranks. It is composed of the king's aides-de camp, the peers of his creation, the rising politicians and legislators ofthe day, and many adherents of the old dynasty who rally round the throne. A few years more, and the Stockbroker will have returned to the more modest station he occupied ten years ago, which indeed he ought never to have quitted. This is owing to a circumstance which it may be worth while to explain. The company of Stockbrokers would be a formidable body if they possessed political influence ; but fortunately for the state, their professional duties prevent them from taking any direct part in the government. For in a country where public credit is considered of vital importance to the well-being of the state, an association of individuals who, however unable to improve public credit, could at least affect it materially, and cause disastrous panics amongst capitalists, must necessarily be a formidable body. But the Stockbroker, as a political man, is THE STOCKBROKER. necessarily siding with the existing government — building his fortune, as he does, on the quicksand of the public funds, which the slightest overflow of revolutionary ideas may undermine and wash away. If the Stockbroker could obtain political influence, it is to be feared that, without regard to his fortune, he would profess opinions of his own, and even aspire to a seat m the cabinet. Now a few resolute Stockbrokers, in the Chamber of Deputies would suffice to peril every day the existence ofthe French monarchy. This, however, they are unable to do, as they cannot sit in the Chamber. Not that they are disqualified by law ; no, circumstances alone which might, indeed, oppose the election of many besides Stockbrokers, prevent their sitting as deputies. The Stockbroker must himself transact his business; he must in person attend the Stock Exchange at the precise moment that the legislators are laughing in each other's faces, exchanging jokes, or speaking in earnest. The attorney- general may plead by substitute; in the judge's place may sit a learned brother; and a general may issue his commands through his aide-de-camp ; but the Stockbroker must himself sell and buy stock : for this reason he can never sit in the Chamber of Deputies. Thus inevitably cut off from politics, the Stockbroker's financial importance is also daily diminishing. Under the name of coulisse, a piratical money- trade has of late years been established, to the Stockbroker's great prejudice. The marron (unsworn broker) is preying on the Stockbroker, without the lat ter being able to defend himself; for it is possible for him, as we have shown, to act in opposition to the law, although by the law instituted ; but it would be difficult for the Stockbroker to require the law to punish parties committing the same offence as himself, and who might at least plead in their defence, that their practices are not so formally forbidden. However, let what may happen, the Stockbroker will never lose his impor tance. Perhaps this epithet is not personal enough to express the peculiar importance ofthe Stockbroker. In the age we live in, real importance is attached to all who have and all who are supposed to have money. Thus the banker, the notary the receiver-general are necessarily important, and owe their importance solely to their profession. Importance always follows money, as naturally as little spaniels follow old women. Nay, it attaches to any profession in which certain members chance to be capitalists. There are important booksellers, (very few, important meaning rich,) and important ragmen; important patten-makers, and important thieves: but we declare that, though there are vain, conceited, and if you will insolent authors, we do not know a single important one, in the same sense as the Stockbroker. Authors indeed are endowed with numerous failings but Providence spared them the ridicule of financial importance. We, the writer of this article, vouch for the truth of what we here advance. aSSi THE MODEL. BY E. de la BEDOLLIERRE. ENTURE with us into one of the crooked and dirty streets, so numerous in the French metropolis ; ascend a staircase that may be described as some thing between a ladder and a climbing mast in a gymnastic ground, and if you wish to restore to life on canvass any celebrated personage of ancient or modern times — whether you want a Spartacus, a - Csesar, a Cicero, a St. Stephen, a Clovis, or a Moliere ; m>pbedience. They set off cheerfully in a travelling carriage ; and this journey was for Alix a twofold initiation: she entered at once and at full gallop into conjugal and fashionable life. Ten years have passed since then, f Placed by her marriage in a brilliant sta tion, Madame Dureynel was soon remarked amongst the divinities of Parisian fashion, and now she is foremost in the elite of the merveilleuses, those indefati gable amazons who are to be seen in all elegant reunions — who, disdaining the suitable recreations of their sex, abdicate the soft empire of modest grace to fol low our dandies to the race, and meddle with the great and little manoeuvres of the Jockey Club ; queens ofthe race-course who have been surnamed Lionesses from their extraordinary strength and intrepidity, and from the arduous toil of their every day life. / There are some women who claim all the rights and privileges that the laws and custom have reserved exclusively for man. They would be admitted to all places in the government, to power in all its degrees, and to superintend the working ofthe social system in all its functions. The Lioness is less ambitious ; she confines her emancipation in narrower limits, and leaving to the stronger sex the weight of affairs, and the exercise of an acknowledged authority, she only asks, or rather takes the liberty of sharing the pleasures, habits, manners', inde pendence, whims, absurdities, and elegancies of the male exquisite. It is only in the habits of fashionable life that she must have unlimited freedom; for everything else she condescends to adhere strictly to the feelings and duties of a woman. But if you wish to be thoroughly acquainted with the Parisian Lioness, we must pass a day with Madame Dureynel, to study all the shades of her character all the details of her public and private existence. Let us enter her newly-built house at the extremity of the Chaussee d'Antin. What a charming habitation! The elegant entrance, the noble portico, the fragrant flowers, the brilliant exotics, the graceful statues, all claim our admira- THE PARISIAN LIONESS. 27 tion ; few Lionesses no doubt have so fine a cage. But we must not loiter here, it is already eight o'clock, and the Lioness is an early riser. Madame Dureynel is just awake ; she rings for her maid who assists her in her first toilette for the morning. These cares only occupy a quarter of an hour, when the Lioness dis misses her maid, saying, — ..„".Send Job here." ' The apartments of Madame Dureynel merit the honour of a description; they are composed of four rooms decorated in the style ofthe middle ages. The bedroom is hung with blue damask, and furnished with a canopied bed ; a.prie- Dieu, six arm-chairs, and two magnificent cabinetss, all in ebony beautifully sculptured ; Venice glasses, gilt lustres and candelabra, vases and cups of sil ver exquisitely chased; two pictures, a "Judith" by Paul Veronese, and a " Diana hunting," by Andrea del Sarto, complete the furniture of this room. The drawing-room is overloaded with ornaments, furniture, pictures, and nick- knackeries of all sorts, which give it the appearance of a rich curiosity- shop ; and particularly remarkable arnongst this heap of miscellaneous objects are the arms which garnish the wallsJ There are lances, swords, poignards, gauntlets, helmets, axes, coats-of-mail, in fact a complete equipment for ten knights. The boudoir and the bath-room have the same gothic appearance, severe and martial. Nothing is more strange than to see the elegant trifles belonging to a woman's attire, thrown in the midst of this warlike insignia, and formidable relics of the olden time: — a lace scarf suspended to an iron spear; — a pink satin hat on the pommel of a rapier; — a parasol thrown on a shield ; — a tiny slipper crushed be neath the ponderous cuirass of a captain of Lansquenets. The Lioness in her morning costume might easily be taken for a nice-looking young man of seventeen, rather than a woman of eight-and-twenty. She wears a dressing-gown of green cachmere, lined with red silk, very ample in its folds, and falling to her feet, which are hidden in large turkish slippers. A foulard cravat encircles her throat, and her head is covered with a black velvet cap, from which is suffered to escape on each side a single lock of hair. I Thus attired, she goes into her boudoir, where her first occupation is the perusal of the news papers; not those light and frivolous journals consecrated to fashion, literature, and the theatres, but the Journal des Haras, the Journal des Chasseurs, and two or three political newspapers. She reads them from beginning to end that she may be aware of all that is going oruj Madame Dureynel is interrupted in her pleasant occupation by Job, who pre sents himself according to her orders. Job is the groom of the Lioness. " How is Pembroke this morning ? I intend to mount him to day, get him ready ; you will follow on Fenella. Here is a letter and a rouleau of twenty- five louis that you must take to M. Arthur de Sareuil. You are to deliver it to himself, you understand, Job." " Must I bring a receipt ? " 28 THE PARISIAN LIONESS. " What nonsense ! You are then to go to my hatter's, and say that I must absolutely have my brown beaver hat by twelve o'clock. Make haste." " Has Madame any other orders to give? Will Madame see any one this morning ? " " Has anybody called already ? " " The saddler waits Madame's pleasure to see him." " For his account, I suppose. Those tradesmen are all alike, always in a hurry for their money. After him there will be the others. You will tell Joseph that I will not see any one on business this morning ; I expect company to breakfast, and cannot be disturbed." Job retires, and the Lioness left alone is absorbed for a few moments by se rious reflections on the expediency of getting rid of her creditors; she regrets the good old times for persons of condition, when, if their tradespeople permit ted themselves to be troublesome, they were thrust from the door, or haply thrown from the window ; but as in these degenerate days to pay is the only way not to be importuned, and as people must pay after all, she thinks it better to begin at once. I" Let me see, says she ; "what I owe to Cremieux, to Verdier, to my milliner, my tailor, my saddler, my linendraper, amounts to 20,000 francs. I calculated on the races helping me to settle these arrears, but on the contrary I have been sadly unlucky in all my bets ; now I have only two ways to act : either to retrench my expenses and become economical — and that will be very long and very difficult— or to sell out a certain quantity of stock, which will be more sure and expeditious." The clock is striking ten as Madame Dureynel arrives at this satisfactory con clusion, and Joseph the footman announces that her fencing-master is there, and asks if she will take a lesson this morning. Fencing has been recommended to Madame Dureynel by her medical atten dant, an excellent doctor for Lionesses, skilful in advising only what he knows will please, and regulating his prescriptions by the tastes, habits, and passions of his patients, a medical system which has great success in the fashionable world. jLionesses delight in all masculine exercises ; moreover, fencing is a pastime salutary for health and favorable to the developement of grace and beauty. 1 " NeT replies Madame Dureynel, " I shall not take a lesson to day, particu larly as here come my guests. Bring breakfast." Madame Dureynel's guests are two Lionesses, Madame de Tressy, and Madame Primeville, her most intimate friends, or rather as she calls them her dearest comrades. As she shakes hands cordially with them,— " I told you," says she, "it was to be without ceremony,' quite a bachelor's breakfast, nothing more :-oysters, a pate-de-foie-gras, and a few other trifles - by the bye, I hope they have not forgotten to ice the Champagne. They sit down to table, a large breach is made in the pate ; the trifles present THE PARISIAN LIONESS. 29 themselves under the substantial form of a truffled poulade, and several other dishes of the same importance. (The three Lionesses partake of everything in a manner to sustain the honour of their name, that is to say with an appetite truly leonine. While doing justice to the repast, they gossip freely, and sometimes they all talk together like other women, for Lionesses do not renounce all the privileges and fascinating weaknesses of their sex.] Whatever may be done to counteract tho natural disposition, it takes refuge somewhere, and inevitably shows itself. Metamorphosed as she is by the ec centric part she plays, the Lioness remains still a woman by the profusion of her words. Between the three friends the conversation turns of course to fashionable topics, and scandal is not more excluded than amongst devotees and blue-stockings. " Is there anything new," asks Madame Dureynel. " Very little, truly, but yet we are not quite in the dead season for scandal !" " Have you read Balzac's last novel ?" " I never read novels." " Nor I." " Nor I." " So the Viscount de L has sold his grey horse ?" " No, he lost it at bouillotte, and it is the luckiest thing that ever happened to him." "What! to lose a horse which cost him 10,000 francs, call you that good luck?" " Ten thousand, you think : it cost him more than a hundred thousand, and that is why he gains by his loss. M. de L had such an excessively good opinion of his horse's qualities, that he accepted and proposed constantly enormous bets upon him ; the horse was always beaten, but these defeats did not alter in the least the opinion that the Viscount had conceived of the unfortunate animal, so that this obstinacy cost him in less than a year four or five thousand louis." " I did not think him rich enough to sustain so much bad luck." " Did you hear Mario last Monday ? he sang like an angel." "And what think you of the new ballet?" " It would be perfect if there were any male dancers, forthey are indispensable to a fine ballet, notwithstanding our friends of the Jockey Club would only see women at the Opera." " Has Madame B reappeared in the world ?" " No, she is still inconsolable; she regrets the time when like the Duchesse de la Valliere de serted ladies could shut themselves up at the Carmelites. But we have no longer any convents for this purpose, and it is unfortunate ; for nothing can be more tiresome than a grief that must be kept at home." " Why does she not imitate Madame D'A who never mourns a desertion more than three days." "Consolation is easy for oft recurring misfortunes." "Apropos of Madame D'A , they say that little Roland is entirely ruined." " What will become of him?" "Will he turn horse-dealer?" "No, he is going to undertake a scientific voyage to California ; he has an uncle Academician who has promised to get him received savant, and to have him elected member of the Institute." " It is a great pity, he rode a capital steeple-chase." " Had he not a horse killed under him ?" " Yes, Mustaplia, belonging to Capt. Kernok, which was struck with apoplexy, crossing the Bievre in a steeple-chase." " A legal action arose 30 THE PARISIAN LIONESS. out of this occurrence, the Captain wished to withdraw his stakes, and all the betters upon Mustapha maintained that the bets ought to be cancelled." " That appears to me just, apoplexy is certainly a weighty impediment." " However, the judges decided differently." "Are you quite sure, my dear Primeville ?" " I have some reason to remember it ; I lost fifty louis in the business. I had bet upon MustapM against Miss Annette." " At equal stakes ?" " No, one to three." "Yes, that was about the proportion." "You are not always so unfortunate. How much did you win at Chantilly?" "Three hundred louis. Alfred arranged my bets ; he understands it!" "He is the best speculator on the turf." " And you, Dureynel, what luck have you had lately ?" '* Very bad, I kept an account of my losses, but they became so large, that I destroyed it. Yesterday again, at the Porte Maillot meeting, I lost five and twenty louis to M. de Sareuil; and have just sent them to him. If this continue I must leave off betting. Last week I was obliged to borrow a thousand crowns of Armand." " Your husband, how is he? Shall we see him to day ?" " I know not ; it is four and twenty hours since we met, and I did not go to his apartment this morning by'discretion. Armand is my best friend, a charming person whom I love with all my soul, and whom I would not vex for the world ; but I am his wife, and in this character there are things I must not know officially." " You are right ; conjugal friendship has its scruples, and you understand them admira bly." "Yes, my dear creature ; your sentiments are irreproachable, and your breakfasts are like your sentiments. What shall we do now?" "If you like, we will go to the pigeon match, at Tivoli, and then to the Bois de Boulogne ; there is a private match to come off to-day, between Marietta and Leporello." " Yes, our horses are waiting for us at the entrance of Auteuil; we can drive there in your carriage." It is one o'clock, the Lionesses drive to Tivoli. All the noted fashionables are assembled in the shooting gallery; the best shot amongst them brings down twenty-five in thirty. Considerable bets are made. Madame Dureynel, whose skill is well known, takes a prominent part in the exercise; she seizes the gun with a steady hand, adjusts it with the greatest ease, fires, and the pigeon falls : the spectators applaud, and the Lioness is prouder of this prowess than she would be of the most brilliant conquest. The carriage is then ordered to Auteuil. Soon after the three friends mount their horses and gallop to the race-course. The Lionesses and sporting men shake hands cordially a VAnglaise. " Will you take your revenge ?" asks M. de Sareuil of Madam Dureynel. "Willingly. On which do you bet?" " On Mariette, Thirty louis against twenty-five." " How kind of you ! But let us exchange. You take Leporello at twenty- five, and I Mariette at thirty. If you are bent on Mariette, put forty louis against my twenty-five. I have just seen the bets, and they are made upon this footing." THE PARISIAN LIONESS. 31 " Not all; there are some even doing at par ; but however to give you hand somely your revenge, let it be forty." The signal is given, the two horses start, Leporello arrives first at the stand : but a difficulty arises from an accident of the race. The betters on each side warmly sustain their interests. M. de Sareuil is far from conciliatory in the dis cussion, and Madame Dureynel defends herself like a Lioness; hasty words are exchanged, and until the judgment is pronounced, the gentlemen will not yield to the ladies ; for this is a question of money, and not of compliments. If some exquisite of the olden times, ignorant ofthe manners of our modern fashionables, could overhear these singular discussions, he would exclaim, " The days of chi valry are indeed flown, and the charming reserve of tbe fair sex, what has be come of it ? " However the judges decide against Leporello, and Madame Dureynel retires in a passion, and swearing at the judges in cavalier style. The three Lionesses have determined to spend the day together, and coming from the Bois de Bou logne, they agree to proeeed to the swimming school. After the bath, Madame Dureynel and her friends go to dinner, and then pro eeed in brilliant and eccentrie toilettes to the Opera. The particular aim of the Lioness is not to be dressed like other people ; she seeks all the strangest \ material and oddest fashions ; her natural audacity is shewn in her costume ; she invents constantly, and dares much, and by these means she is always sure of being remarked. Between the acts of Robert-le-Diable, Jules de Rouvray, a young dandy of eighteen, and cousin to Madame Dureynel, enters the Lioness's box. Jules is gifted with a very interesting face, and he looks at his cousin with a tender and pensive air. As the curtain rises he takes his leave, and Madame de Primeville begins to quiz good-naturedly his backwardness and timidity. "Not so timid, either," says Madame Dureynel, laughing. "Look, here is a note he slipped into my hand very adroitly, upon my word. A declaration, only that ! Read it ; what do you think of the style ? Poor boy ! what can I do with his passion ? His choice is very unfortunate." Jules in fact does not know that a Lioness has very little heart ; she cares not for love, and it is very difficult to please her, unless you be a prince, or have V the finest horses in Paris. Before the end ofthe piece, the three Lionesses leave the Opera, and go to finish the evening at the Baronne de B's, who receives on Wednesdays. Madame Dureynel, who loves gambling, begins to play bouillotte, and stakes very boldly; fortune favors her at first, and then by a sudden reverse, she loses all by a single stroke; at this moment, she sees her husband coming towards her. "Ah! arrived at last," cries she gaily. "I was sure I should meet you here, my dear ; and I am very glad, for I want to speak to you." 32 THE PARISIAN LIONESS. " I am all attention. But first tell me, my dear friend, if you have been well amused to-day. I thought of joining you at the Bois de Boulogne, but I could not possibly go. Some tiresome business on the exchange prevented me. The Railway shares are down again to day. Were you at the Opera ? " " Yes, and there I received this letter." " Mons. Dureynel took Jules's letter, read it, and returned it to his wife with the greatest coolness, saying— " Well ! what have I to do with it? These are details that concern you, and in which I am not accustomed to interfere." "You are right, and I am quite able to take care of myself; therefore I have never troubled you with these sort of adventures ; but this is a particular case : Jules is my cousin, and I don't wish to reduce him quite to despair." " I do not understand you." " Let me explain. I am not Jules's first love, I know that last year on leaving college he was greatly smitten with a dancer, Mademoiselle Irma, in whom they say you take a good deal of interest. This cousin of mine you see takes advan tage of his relationship ; he attacks you right and left, and not succeeding with your favorite dancer, he is trying to gain the heart of your wife. The enemy is dangerous ; we must capitulate with him. You know me too well to suppose for a moment that I am jealous ; I only speak from prudence and devoted friend ship. They say that you ruin yourself for this Irma. You are wrong. Will you follow good advice ? Resign in favour of our little cousin. You will thus act as a wise man and a kind relative." " Really, if you wish it, I have no objection, particularly as I begin to be rather tired of her. To-morrow I will take Jules to breakfast there." " That's right, dear ; I am quite pleased with you." And Madame Dureynel returns to the bouillotte, where she remains till tw o o'clock in the morning. The history of her life is in this one day ; and time or fortune alone checks her career. At forty, Madame Dureynel retires from this brilliant and agitated world. What becomes of her afterwards ? What is the fate of the Lioness grown old? This would be a fine subject for a second La Fontaine. PM,i&ET LHIEIUf THE SCHOOLMASTER. BY E. REGNAULT. ry?\ OSING every day part of her influence under re peated attacks, the French University, that eldest daughter of kings, has suffered many humiliations, and submitted to many outrages; yet she is still standing, and continues to rule the education of the French youth, and to preside over their future des tiny. The truth is, that despite all its defects, the University system owes it predominance to the still greater faults of all the other systems introduced by modern reformers. ( A complete insight into the details of college life and disci pline would afford no gratification; but still more revoltingjsjhe ..economy of Frenchjjoardjng-jchools. The colleges embody the principle of those vices which in boarding-schools are fully developed. The odium of this extensive evil does not attach, however, to the Schoolmas ter, but to the heads of families, who make Schoolmasters what they are. IA boarding-school is an asylum open to the weakness of parents, whose fond ness dreads the fancied over-severe discipline of college, to children spoiled from their cradle by injudicious maternal indulgence — to tardy intellects that universlty~3iscipline has failed to illumine. It may be considered as an hospital — — -J V. 34 THE SCHOOLMASTER. for the moral and intellectual infirmities of a whole family ; but those infirmities are incurable ; and for an incurable disease no physician is needed. Such pa tients require a quack; and a quack, perforce, must the Schoolmaster be, in spite of his conscience. A pupil is brought to him tqeducate, but he has been pre viously trained to vicious habite that no master can .eradicate. The Schoolmas ter's advice is asked, but at the same, time an opinion is imposed upon him; he is required to say the truth, but he must utter falsehood to avoid giving offence. Deceit is partof his profession; he must practice deception, or starve. Between two such alternatives he has no choice. Hence the very failings that promote the success of boarding-schools, encourage the vices by which those establish ments are generally disgraced. Education is a matter of such extreme social importance that it is lamentable to see the future destiny of whole generations abandoned like a toy to the ca price of a weak woman. Most mothers are accustomed to regard their children as their personal property, and of this property they are more jealous than of any other, because they control it without their husband's legal authority. And to use the words of the Roman law, they use and abuse this right. A child is to them a mere puppet to dress and undress, and shew off for the gratification of their vanity ; they make of it an idol or a slave, and play wfth it as they played with their dolls. If they do not send their sons to college, they prepare for the Schoolmaster a most arduous task. Many restrictions are imposed upon him when they entrust their property to his -care. There is no end to their pre cautions. They ensure a close attention to their instructions, by making it a condition, sine qua non, of their engagement with the Schoolmaster; and they confine him in such narrow limits that he is left without authority, and his influence is lost at the outset^] Many men there are who in this respect are like women. " I am the best judge what education will befit my son," cries one. Now this we dispute. A father has none of a judge's qualifications. Ye fathers ! adore your sons since such is your pleasure, and make them your idols. Admire in them your own image ; but do not enter the temple of education ; there you can only commit sacrilege. Certain country families and shopkeepers ofthe Rue St. Denis send their sons - to a boarding-school from economical motives. They suppose in their simpli city that they will have to pay only a certain sum per annum. But as the state budget has its items of extraordinary expenses, so at boarding-schools there are numerous "extras;" and cheap education is nearly as visionary a scheme as cheap government. It is a happy moment in the schoolmaster's life when he sees a stranger enter his drawing-room leading by the hand a little boy ten or twelve years old. But, before the instalment of his new pupil, before he can add another to his flock, the Schoolmaster must submit to numerous senseless commentaries and im- THE SCHOOLMASTER. 35 pertinent dissertations. " Sir," a lawyer or a physician will say, " the system of education followed at our universities is inconsistent with the progress of the times. Pray what, let me ask, is the use of Greek and Latin, the wretched lega cy of the Jesuits ? The natural sciences, Sir, the natural sciences ought to form the basis of every good education." Here follows a long physiological harangue which the Schoolmaster takes care not to interrupt; for one of the golden rules of his profession is, never to be unseasonably clever. " Above all, Sir," con= tinues the father, " no bigotry, none of those narrow-minded precepts that cramp a child's understanding. I decidedly object to confession. I do not see any necessity for a child to revive his past faults ; and as to the punishments he may deserve, I trust to you to inflict them." No sooner has the Schoolmaster bowed the sceptical father out of his house, than he receives a visit from a pious mother, who has recourse to him because \J the colleges seem to her dens of irreligion ; in a private institution she hopes to meet with the holy traditions that are gradually passing away, and some remains of that faith no longer to be found in the government schools. The Schoolmaster is now obliged to assume as much devotion as a few minutes before he displayed indifference. He readily finds some pious words, quotes a text or two from the New Testament ; deplores the corruption of the age, and nets another pupil. Thus he passes his life. Dragged in contrary directions, assaulted by the most opposite ideas ; acquiescing in all, but determined to foster none — he com bats no prejudice — he submits to all sorts of vanities, he encourages every weak ness. But do not accus!Thim~ofrIypl)cri5y ; he only fulfils the conditions of his ! existence, and obeys the law of his being ; such is the line of conduct marked / out for him, and from it he cannot swerve. Talk to the Schoolmaster of truth, I indeed ! Why, truth would be the ruin of him. The more numerous his pupils, the more concessions the Schoolmaster has to t make, the more caprices he has to soothe, the more prejudices he has to flatter. ¦ His moral turpitude is exactly proportioned to his income; his income increases j in inverted ratio to his probity. fFettered as he is on all sides by so many conflicting injunctions from parents, it is no wonder that the Schoolmaster cannot pursue a methodical system of tui tion or discipline. The boarding-school having been preferred in order to avoid college regulations, every parent has " regulations" of his own. i There are pupils who go home every fortnight, and others who go home every week ; one leaves on Saturday night, another on Sunday morning ; one before mass, another after mass. One boy is instructed in Greek and Latin, another in Latin without Greek ; one studies the living languages only, the studies of another are confined to the natural sciences; one follows Jacotot's system, another Robertson's, and the third, according to his father's express will, follows no system at all. Auarchy is imposed on the Schoolmaster and the children; anarchy in his studies, anar- chy in discipline, anarchy in morals. Pupils delight in it ; but it is only with sor- 36 THE SCHOOLMASTER. row that the Schoolmaster submits to it. I Those conscientious Schoolmasters who attempt to resist the contagion, expose themselves to increasing toil and struggle. \Many give way ; a few, (and very rare exceptions they are,) succeed : by far the greater number accept the yoke, and make the best of it. But no one has turned his ever-ready compliance with parental injunctions to better account than worthy M. Moisson. M. Moisson is about fifty years of age, short and stout, yet active and smart; ively and loquacious, despite his pretensions to dignity. His small bright eyes are continually revolving in their orbits, as if their owner were always in the presence of a troop of unruly boys. It is plain that he is accustomed to look half-a-dozen ways at once in his schoolroom. There is about him a certain mix ture of haughtiness and servility, of humility and pride, indicative of his nature being made up of these two very opposite elements. But they are distributed in such equal proportions that it would be difficult to say whether obedience has taught him to command, or whether the habit of commanding has taught him to obey. By his side, in all the beatitude of a well-assorted union, flourishes Madame Moisson, the faithful keeper of the keys of the cellar, the vigilant she-dragon who guards the pantry and larder from the depredations of servants and pupils. She it is who waters the wine, distributes rations of bread, cuts up the meat into slices, always mindful of the geometrical definition of surface — "Length and breadth without thickness." Madame Moisson rarely makes her appearance in the drawing-room : her temple is the pantry; the kitchen is her sanctuary. Theire she receives the compliments of anxious mothers desirous of studying the culinary and dietetic departments ofthe establishment. (She proudly displays the broth browned with sugar, and boasts that it contains no burnt onions. \ With unwearied assiduity she watches the servants' every motion, finds fault if they are a moment unoc cupied, personally superintends all that is going forward, turns everything to the utmost possible account, and not unreasonably glories in being the keystone of the establishment. If a Schoolmaster would succeed, he must provide himself with a wife who fears neither smoke nor grease spots. He who prefers an amia ble helpmate to a good housekeeper, will never make a fortune : it is doubtful if he will ever obtain the cross of the Legion of Honour. Madame Moisson also superintends in person the washing, repairing, and ironing of the scholars'' linen. She loves to display the numbered clothes of each boy in their proper compartment. ^To do her justice, the laundering and repairing ofthe boys' linen are very creditable to her. But it must be added, that in every trunk two or three towels are invariably missing. The parents being always ignorant of the deficiency until their son leaves school, the loss is attributed to the thoughtlessness natural to childhood, or to the ravages of that destructive spoiler, time. I THE SCHOOLMASTER. 37 One of the rules of the school is, on the departure of each boy, to levy a pair of sheets on his stock — "for the use ofthe infirmary." Now this infirmary is quite nominal; for in the event of a severe fit of illness, the mother invariably has her son at home ; and when his indisposition is only slight, the scholar reposes in the linen room, where he is so drenched with camomile tea that he soon longs to return to schoolroom diet. No valid reason can be opposed to the levy of the sheets, it being duly set forth in the prospectus of the school; and with prospectuses, as with laws, every body is supposed to be acquainted. Be this as it may, certain it is that this contribution is very productive to Madame Moisson, who is a farmer's daughter, and consequently inherits an inor dinate love of hoarding linen, of which she has more than enough for several generations. In the indulgence of her rustic and primitive avarice, she accumu lates linen in presses instead of gold in a strong box ; and this her ruling pas sion enables her to assume a sublime stoicism upon the unexpected departure of a pupil. " My dear," she calmly replies to her husband's expressions of regret, "it will be another pair of sheets." His pupils' instruction gives M. Moisson very little anxiety. But academical prizes, being of considerable importance for a private school, because they make a surprising number of dupes in the eighty-six departments of France, M. Moisson knows how to obtain for his establishment a creditable share in their distribution. Every year he regularly consults the lists of successful competitors for the prizes given by the university, and makes enquiry into the circumstances of their parents ; the poorer of them he makes it his business to visit, to propose a free admission into his boarding school. " It is arule sanctioned by longusage," says he, "to educate the deserving poor." Thus he disguises his speculation under charitable pretences, and his offer is rarely declined ; for the parents, giving the lie to their conscience, affect a complete belief in the Schoolmaster's generous disposition, while in fact they are making shameful merchandize of their children. It is in short neither more nor less than a slightly modified slaving transaction, in which young souls and intelligent minds are bartered for a paltry pittance and parsimonious hospitality. In this way the innocent glory of the academical competitions becomes a chain to the young laureate ; his suc cess is turned to account, his vigils are made profitable ; and like the Roman slave, he hands over to his master the fruit of his labours. Thanks to this well-organised traffic, M. Moisson's " Academy" shines in the university com petitions; and the speculator never fails every year to go over the market, and make fresh purchases of intellect which to him is a double source of profit. The hard-working children of the poor help to build up his reputation, while the over-indulged children of the rich bring him a handsome yearly income. It is known that in a boarding-school the private distribution of prizes is only a well managed division of crowns among all the pupils. M. Moisson is too 38 THE SCHOOLMASTER. well acquainted with his trade not to be a strict observer of the good old custom. From the student of natnral philosophy down to the child in his accidence, every scholar has his share in the awarded prizes. This bait is so plain, this charla tanism so glaring, that it would seem astonishing how year after year the same thing is repeated with periodical obstinacy in presence of parents, without open ing their eyes. But no; this is no wonder, nor is the schoolmaster deserving of censure. Again we have to plead for him, fatal necessity. The Schoolmaster knows that all mothers, aye, and most fathers, will accuse him of the want of success of their sons. He must therefore get up a little success for every one of them. There is no father who sees any partiality in his son's triumph ; he may complain ofthe multiplicity ofthe prizes, but he will firmly believe that his son unquestionably deserved his. M. Moisson knows all this, and takes care never to lose a pupil through an unseasonable regard to truth. Abstract principles are unprofitable things, and the Schoolmaster foregoes them for action : he may contemn foibles, but he flatters them for the sake of the rich harvest he reaps by his sophistry. The ceremony of the distribution of prizes is attended by a solemn pomp that adds to the maternal illusions, and throws a classical colouring over the affair. The boys' red coverlets serve for temporary hangings, and are suspended round the dining-room, cleared of the table for the occasion. Festoons of ivy decorate the walls, of which the doubtful colour and stains are scarcely hidden by the designs of the most eminent draughtsmen of the school, and the specimens of writing by the most able calligraphers. An old carpet is thrown over a clumsy temporary dais, raised three or four steps from the floor, on which stands a long table heaped with books and laurel crowns. In the centre are placed three arm-chairs covered with cotton velvet; one is for the mentor who is to distribute the prizes, the other two being reserved for the parish priest and the mayor of the arrondissenient. M. Moisson's policy is always to be on good terms with authorities spiritual and temporal. Accompanied by the priest and the Mayor— supported, as it were, by church and state— M. Moisson gravely makes his entry. His step is stately, his coun tenance beams with happiness, his looks are radiant. Deliberately he ascends the dais, obsequiously offers an arm-chair to each of his august guests, and takes his stand in a meditative attitude. He brings forward his leg, throws out his breast, and with head erect prepares to speak. "Young pupils !"— (here he pauses, the auditory being on the tenter-hooks of suspense.)— "The sun has at last risen on the auspicious day fixed for the close of your labours, and their re ward"— (another solemn pause).— " How delightful the task to proclaim the names ofthe glorious young laureates, whom my lessons have led on to victory ' Affecting triumphs! pacific struggles! in which the competitors are brothers', and conquerors and conquered are united by the ties of mutual friendship "— Here a third solemn pause.) We will not follow M. Moisson through all the THE SCHOOLMASTER. 39 labyrinth of his rhetoric; suffice it to say, that if his speech is not a literary production of rare excellence, it is at least a masterpiece of speculation. Every tender hint likely to touch the sensibility of a mother, every sonorous apos trophe calculated to flatter paternal vanity, he one by one skilfully employs. His voice is trained to the most varied modulations, now soft and melodious, in celebration ofthe joys of the family circle, now stirring as the trumpet blast as he proclaims the young laureate's glory. At last, after dragging in the Marechal de Villar's hackneyed saying, he invariably winds up with these words : — " Come then, young champions of seience, and receive the reward of your intelligent efforts." And now a deafening shout of applause bursts from every part of the room ; the pupils' mothers wave their handkerchiefs, and the noise only ceases to be renewed again as each name is called, until all have been proclaimed and all applauded : when M. Moisson modestly steals away from the eager compliments of his voluntary dupes, whom he leaves enraptured with the merits of a boarding- school in which every scholar is " head boy." There is in every year another day marked by M. Moisson for a display of eloquence and pomp, namely his jour de fete. His patron saint is that of the great majority of the middle class, Saint John, beyond question the most feted saint in the kalendar. A few weeks prior to the happy anniversary, the head usher, dubbed for the nonce " inspector," makes the scholars write a circular letter, which always begins nearly as follows : — " My dear Mamma, — It being the earnest wish of myself and schoolfellows to agreeably surprise our excellent Schoolmaster on his jour defete, &c." The letter is purposely addressed to the mothers, because they are more easily induced to consent to these apparently voluntary contributions. The father of each pupil considers himself bound to give no less than the rest ; so that the false tenderness of the wives, combined with the puerile vanity of their husbands, speedily produces a good round sum to mark the pupils' gratitude. The inspector being the confidant of his young friends' intention, is naturally appointed to receive their parents' contributions ; he also is commissioned to select the article to be presented as a token of their united feelings. Of course M. Moisson is consulted by the usher on this important subject; and as his tastes are particularly bent towards the useful, he generally selects a piece of plate, which never loses its value. In this manner the worthy M. Moisson, by a long series of unexpected presents from his scholars, has become the owner of a handsome service of plate, which might have excited the envy of many members of the aristocracy, when there was an aristocracy in France. The anniversary arrived, the scholars, who know that a surprise is also in store for them, in the shape of a holiday, dress themselves in their best clothes ; and 40 THE SCHOOLMASTER. immediately after breakfast, falling into ranks and headed by the inspector, rush into the drawing-room, where, by a singular chance, they find M. Moisson, full dressed as if for the occasion. The Schoolmaster assumes his annual look of good- humoured astonishment. When all the scholars have ranged themselves in a circle, the piece of plate is produced and placed on the table, and the rhetorician of the school delivers an address, composed in Latin verse, in praise of good masters. As the Virgilian harangue proceeds, M. Moisson's emotion in creases ; his bosom heaves, and his humid eyes wander from the plate to his pupils, from his pupils to the plate. " My dear young friends," he cries directly the orator has concluded, " my beloved pupils, my heart is too full for me to make a suitable acknowledgement of your delicate attention, as unexpected as undeserved. I can only regret that you have testified your affection by so ex pensive a gift. A simple flower would have sufficed, if a flower were as lasting as my tender interest for your welfare and happiness." He concludes by invi ting the boys to partake of a rural dinner in the Bois de Boulogne. The reader must not imagine that M. Moisson on this occasion orders an ex pensive dinner at a restaurateur's ; that would be paying too dearly for the piece of plate. Legs of mutton were roasted overnight, and these, with a plentiful supply of sausages, and a few scraggy chickens, make up the feast. The arrangements are soon made, and the pupils set out, one carrying plates, another bread, a third a leg of mutton. The wine M. Moisson buys on the spot, outside the barriers, to save the town duty. Certainly one must have a heart susceptible of all the facile joys of childhood, to find pleasure in a dinner on the grass. To us, indeed, it seems a little too patriarchal, but the scholars are delighted with anything for a change. Bound by the rules of the school to observe silence at meals, they are conscious of temporary freedom in being able to speak, and it seems to them that their power increases in the same ratio as their uproar. They make a liberal use of this unwonted privilege, and intoxicate themselves with words. On the appearance of dessert, M. Moisson again addresses the schoolboys, and after congratulating himself on the happy day, he humbly apologises for the simple fare. "However," he adds, "when I contemplate the happy faces around me, all animated by the same sentiment of unfeigned joy, I may surely say with the poet — "Forsan et haec olim meminisse juvabit." M. Moisson has long since reaped the fruit of his patient deceptions. Pro prietor of more than one estate, he has already the required qualifications to be an elector or a deputy. When he gives up his school, it is his intention to con test his department, and so preside over the destinies of France, when he shall be too old to preside over his school. THE PEW-OPENER.* BY F. COQUILLE. CHURCH considered only in a temporal point of view, (and it would be most indecorous and much against our feelings to speak of it other wise in this paper,) might be called a building ornamented with a Pew-opener. In these days when the architectural form has no distinguishing expression, the Pew-opener is, for a sacred building, a sure characteristic some of our modern churches have attempted, amidst other recent innovations, to dispense with bells and steeple, those signs so long proverbial, but none ever tried to do with out a Pew-opener. She is the necessary appendage which distinguishes a church from any other building, she gives it life and movement, in fact, she con stitutes it a church. When the shadows of night have descended upon the im- * In most churches in France there are no pews, and seats consist of chairs, for the use of which a fixed price (generally a, halfpenny) is to be paid by those who visit the church. This species of tax is farmed out, for the benefit of the church, and the contractor being al most universally a female, is called " La Loueuse de Chaises." The proper name for the subject of this paper would be, therefore, "the chair-letter;" but to be better understood, we have preserved the English name of " Pew-opener.'' F 42 THE PEW-OPENER. mense aisle, the whole edifice seems buried in profound repose. At intervals the solemn silence is disturbed by some noise from without, which faintly repeated by the echo, dies away in a prolonged murmur. Soon after, day breaks, the city wakens, and the bells announce the Angelus. The clerk makes his appearance, the dispenser of the holy water arrives shivering, and showing that frozen look which forms one of his attributes — the seller of wax-candles prepares a complete illumination. Some poor women are on their knees praying while they are waiting for the first mass; but the church is still slumbering, as a man is restless and breathing heavily, just before he wakens entirely. At last the Pew-opener appears, and the building, on her arrival, seems to undergo a complete change. She visits her domain in every part; the flagstones resound with the noise of the chairs, as she arranges them in rows, or piles them one upon the other. Some amongst them bear not her mark, and their elegance contrasts with the coarse simplicity of the others; they are made of polished mahogany; the straw work is fine, and the form graceful, and while the back is fitted with a sort of desk upon which the arms may lean comfortably, there is also a thick hassock to receive the knees ofthe fair devotee. The Pew-opener moves these aristocratic chairs with a reveren tial hand ; and as she carefully replaces them, she calculates the profits they will bring her — so much for the right of having a privileged seat ; so much every Sunday for the pleasure of finding the chair in the same place ; so much at Christmas and parish fetes, without counting little extras. Knowing the value of tinoe^ she attends to many things at once, and finds be sides a moment jQ^gfjssip with the clerk ana the beadle, and to hear the civil speeches of the^m^'andle-'seller. All these persons belonging to the church, have some affinity in manners, language, habits, and interests. They may be seen in the morning descanting together upon the intrigues of the vestry, and the rivalries ofthe choir; they jump by bold transitions from sacred to profane histories; the beadle of course is scandalized, and makes signs to the interrup ters; he affects to pass and repass by them, but, oh, frail humanity ! this grave personage, after vainly trying to catch some words ofthe conversation by stretch ing out his neck to listen, unable any longer to repress his curiosity, joins at last - the group ; and as he speaks rarely and is not in the habit of modulating his tones, he makes more noise than all the rest. The Pew-opener never allows herself to be detained more than a few minutes by these conferences ; whether she be talking or listening, she looks full of busi ness, and appears always on the move ; her hands are fidgetting in the empty pockets of her apron. And when the officiating priest ascends the altar, she returns to her duties. While she goes her round, let us explain in a few words her functions and their privileges. We must preface by stating for the edification of our readers, that the hire of THE PEW-OPENER. 43 the chairs in the principal churches in Paris, brings in a considerable reve nue ; there are some parishes where the sum paid by contract to the churchwar dens, is not less than One Thousand pounds per annum. It is not our province to discuss here the advantages or disadvantages of this species of tax levied upon the people attending church ; but we hope that the time may come when gratuitous accommodation will be provided in the house of God. However, at present this contract is become at the expiration of each lease, the object of violent competition. The churchwardens are not allowed to sleep for a fortnight; the candidates exert themselves as if for the most valua ble sinecure. But the office is far from being a sinecure, it is a business like any other, and requires the most persevering exertions. The contractor attends to it from morning till night ; there is no rest, no intermission. This valuable privilege is generally granted to a female. To carry off the prize from her rivals she must command considerable interest ; she can be no thing less than the widow ofthe parish clerk, who died a favourite with the vicar- the god-daughter of a churchwarden; or the niece of the curate. A celebrated preacher, or a rich banker upholds her with his patronage ; the rector is warmly solicited in her favour ; spiritual and temporal powers rise to her aid ; and her talent for intrigue, and her diplomatic skill do the rest. She has at last suc ceeded in obtaining the high title which will hereafter become her only appel lation; her neighbours and her relatives perhaps may still call her Widow Groslichard or Madame Piedfort; but she will be known only by the frequenters of the church as the " Loueuse de Chaises." The Widow Groslichard is past thirty — how much is of little consequence; it is a secret which she keeps most religiously to herself, and even her confessor is not more favoured on this delicate point than any of her confidants. She maintains that people are never older than they look, and therefore she endea vours to look as young as possible. Madame Groslichard is a little plump rosy woman, exquisitely clean, lively, and active, lt is said that she was very gay in her youth, and the high situation she has just obtained does not contradict the assertion — quite the contrary. It would be most unfair to judge her by the simplicity of her dress, which she has slipped on in haste, for she must attend the first mass, but for the sake only of the pecuniary profits she expects from it. She knows well how much women may be indebted to their dress; and if she is never seen with a worldly attire, which in her situation would appear more exceptionable than attractive ; there is in the simplicity cf her costume a wonderful skill, and even in its occasi onal displays, her art is never wanting in discretion. She is distinguished for the refined coquetry, quite peculiar to the church people — far superior to that of the world. Madame Groslichard is not unlike the chameleon, her face varies for each ser vice, she has even for each person a different expression of countenance. It is 44 THE PEW-OPENER. not with the same manner that she takes the money from the poor woman, or receives it from the rich devotees. With the former she is somewhat harsh and imperious; her voice, which she can soften at pleasure, is shrill; her eyes so meek and coaxing when she likes, look fierce, and when she says, "Your chairs if you please" — the "if you please" sounds like an imperative command. Her hooked fingers seem incessantly tendered towards you. Do not think to escape her observation ; she loses sight of no one in her round : she ap proaches you little by little, in a minute she will be by your side; mechanically you feel in your pockets, and unlucky will it be for you if they are empty ; for the Pew-opener, like the ant in Lafontaine's fable, does not like to give credit; you of course are aware of it, and this thought sadly disturbs your meditations and prayers. It is in vain that you attempt to avoid her by taking refuge in an obscure corner; she watches, she follows you, she is behind you in an instant, and you are scarcely seated when you hear the fatal " Your chair, if you please." Observe how in a similar position the most elegant ladies ask in a soft and humble voice credit till next Sunday. Almost invariably Madame Groslichard resigns herself to consent readily to this forced loan; she tries even to call up a smile, although from the bottom of her heart she detests those who forget their purses when they come to prayers. However she derives a little consola tion from the thought of her magnanimous generosity ; but at the same time she never neglects to take an exact description of her debtors, and as with a pa tronising air she turns away, she seems to say, " A lady of such an age, with such a face, and such a dress, owes me one penny." Behind her, and at a suitable distance, walks the silent beadle or the majes tic Swiss. He marches up the aisle, and announces his coming by striking the stones with his staff, and crying in a fluted voice, "For the poor, if you please," or oftener still, "For repairs of the church." On this subject we have a word to say : Many people imagine that there is a competition between the collectors and the Pew-opener, and that they vie with one another for precedence. This is an error. The order in which they follow has been cleverly arranged : the tribute levied'by the Pew-opener is forced, the other is voluntary ; and people absorbed in their prayers could very well be excused for not taking out their purses for the poor, still less for the church; but they must allow themselves to be distur bed to pay for their chairs, and while they have still the money in their hands, the collector arrives a-propos on the steps of the Pew-opener, who thus plays the character of the pilot to the shark. She loses nothing by it and the poor are benefited, to say nothing of the church. From the ease of her deportment, and the airs she assumes, it is easy to per ceive that at church Madame Groslichard is quite at home. Household cares are unknown to her: she lives by the church and in the church. She can scarcely consent to eat and sleep elsewhere, and would willingly give her ad dress— Madame Groslichard, at Saint * * * 's church. She is quite con- THE PEW-OPENER. 45 scious of her dignity, and carries her head high. She yields neither to the ill temper of the vicar, nor to the caprices of the curate. These great dignitaries generally greet her with a word and a smile ; but, must it be avowed ? Madame Groslichard is not sufficiently impressed with the feelings of respect and vene ration which are their due : she lives too near the sanctuary. " No man is a prophet in his own country," has been long a proverb ; we will hazard a little variation, and say, " No priest is a saint in the vestry of his church." Madame Groslichard raised to her eminent situation and high credit, sharing the incense of the priest and treasuring up the profits of her contract, is very excusable in not condescending to notice the humble dispenser of the holy water, and in treating without much ceremony the pompous clerk, the hoarse choris ters who compliment her with psalm-singing voices, and even the organist whom people are surprised to hear speak like other men. These, however, are so many aspirants either for her hand or her good graces. She plays the coquette with them, one days holds out some hopes, and the next is most peremptory in refusing every offer. She likes, in this manner, to keep them in suspense. Occasionally she condescends to tap the plump and rosy cheeks ofthe infant choristers, and honours the superb Suisse with a sly glance. These Suisses have much to answer for. Whatever may have been the case formerly, Madame Groslichard has now the reputation of being strictly correct in her conduct ; it is one of the conditions of her contract, and she has lived long enough not to sacrifice her interest to her feelings : happily the sacrifice does not always prove necessary. We have quoted already one of her favorite maxims, "People are never older than they look;" she is also accustomed to say, "Persons are only what they appear to be." And perhaps with her it is better not to pursue our investigation too far ; for instance, she affects all the outward semblance of piety ; and you will see her at the beginning of mass devoutly kneeling, and apparently absorbed in pious meditation ; but she has selected the best place to command the whole church; and mark her, you will see he r piercing and inquisitive eyes wander without ceasing, and notice the entrance into the church of every member of the congre gation. Her voice is never heard joining in the praises of God ; when she sings, it is to herself, and only because the service has been good, she means by it her collection abundant, and when she feels in her large pocket pieces of silver mingled in a satisfactory proportion with the copper. It is her duty to assist at all the ceremonies affecting the destinies of man. The bell-ringer, who from the top of his tower, announces a death or a christen ing, much resembles the man working the telegraph, he does not understand the news he is transmitting. But the Pew -opener has an intelligent part to play in these worldly pomps, and her countenance assumes on every occasion a suitable expression. At a christening, she takes the liveliest interest in the infant ; she 46 THE PEW-OPENER. is extremely attentive to the sponsors ; and from the pure and unaffected joy which sparkles in her eyes, from her almost maternal anxiety, you would take her for an aunt, or a grandmother, or certainly some near relative of the family. These demonstrations form part of the church ceremonies, and belong to the Pew-opener's department ; a regular fee is exacted for them. But the scene changes abruptly ; the church is hung with black ; a family are deeply affected ; friends weep and pray round a coffin. The Pew-opener puts on her most sor rowful face, her eyes are red ; she steps with a noiseless tread, and seems to say to each assistant, "What a calamity! — Your chair, if you please." While one eye is still weeping with the friends of the deceased, the other smiles at the wedding which is now approaching. It is a brilliant party ; the bride is pretty, and the happy bridegroom will no doubt be generous. Madame Groslichard is in extacies ; her little sly look says all sorts of things ; without her the whole ceremony would be wrong. There she is to render prompt assist ance to the fainting bride, and receive her in her arms. She will be unremit ting in those little attentions for which a mother is disabled by her agitation, and which would now be unbecoming in the bridegroom : he is only entitled to pay for them. On these occasions the Pew-opener is a mother given, or rather lent on hire by the church. Madame Groslichard understands neither the love of country, nor national va nity, but she is proud of her church. Talk to her of a chorister with an extra ordinary voice, of an altar richly decorated, of a splendid organ, of some cele brated saint ; her chorister is sure to sing more wonderfully, her altar to be richer, her organ to be more magnificent, her saint to perform more extraordi nary miracles. The church belongs to her; all that is done there, is done for her. It is for her that mass is said, that the altar is decorated and illuminated, that the bells ring, that the choristers sing, and that the organ peals in harmo nious concert. It is for her also that people are born and die ; and those fash ionable preachers who are sure to attract a large congregation, who fulminate anathemas against vice, and vehemently exclaim against avarice and selfishness, labour no doubt to reap a rich harvest for heaven, but the first gatherings are for the Pew-opener; she has an infallible means of appreciating these sacred orators, and is never at a loss to estimate their merit. She does not judge them by what they say, but by what their sermons bring her; she weighs their repu tation in solid money. Although the pious exhortation may fall unheeded on the ears of the congregation, the Pew-opener stores away carefully the fruit she has reaped from it. Madame Groslichard should be seen on the grand fete days, on the anniver sary of the birth, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, when the church shines forth in all its splendour, and when the price of the chairs is double ! These are truly important epochs. For Madame Groslichard they are the hap piest days in the year. If they would but happen a little oftener! She looks THE PEW-OPENER. 47 forward to them with impatience; she calculates beforehand the money they will bring her ; she hopes the parishioners will manifest much religious fervour, and that a crowd of spectators, attracted by the pomp of the ceremonies, will swell the assemblage and the receipt. From early morn she is dressed in her best ; she takes with her as an indispensable auxiliary, as a faithful lieutenant, a daughter, or a neice, whose shyness is betrayed by her embarrassed counte nance. She assigns to her assistant the least important posts. The nave ofthe church is surrounded by a wooden balustrade, and resembles a citadel ; under the organ there is a narrow space reserved for the elect of this world, who will also be the elect and well-beloved of the Pew-opener ; there she establishes her daughter. She remains a few moments by her side to assist her with her advice, and encourage her by her example ; and then, like a skilful general, she visits the different posts ; and reserves for herself the most arduous : she takes the out skirts and cross allies. She threads her way carefully through the ever-moving crowd, and the densest mass does not impede her progress ; she is everywhere at once. Little feminine scruples she treads under foot ; she thinks not in these moments of her elegant appearance ; she sacrifices her handsome dress ; she cares little that her clothes should be torn or crushed in the crowd where she forces herself; this is not the time to be prudish and vain, or over-cautious, the precious moments must be turned to better account. Observe her when the service is nearly over, and that her gleaning is only half finished. What anxiety, what restlessness ! Her eyes are at once upon those who remain, those who are going, and those who are preparing to go; she does not walk, she glides along. Do not detain her for change of your silver coin, lest she return you as many maledictions as pence. But the last sound of the organ is dying away ; Madame Groslichard worn out with fatigue, lets a few women escape without paying, and she remains exhausted on the field of battle. Soon she walks off with her earnings and the poor who have caught the metallic sound of her pockets, follow her a long time with their supplications ; but they obtain nothing from her but a piece of five centimes, which she strongly suspects to be a false coin. The Pew-opener generally amasses a considerable income. She establishes her daughter, and makes over to her, as a wedding present, the contract that has been so profitable to herself. She leaves the church to enter the world . The older she grows, the more coquettish she becomes, and her love of flattery, dress, and scandal is unbounded. When at church she cannot endure to be disturbed to pay for her chair ; and she is particularly annoyed that at the grand fetes the price should be doubled. It is said that mingling the sacred and the profane, the chairs in the gardens of the Tuileries, the Champs Elysees, and the Boulevarts, belong also to Madame Groslichard : we cannot believe it. To pass from the shade and cool atmosphere into the dust and burning sun, to be dependent for her gains upon 48 THE PEW-OPENER. the caprice of the fashion, or the weather, would be beneath her dignity, and besides, would not be so profitable. However if the person letting out the chairs in the public walks does not belong to the church, sometimes there are indications which tend to prove that she has once belonged to it. The failure of a banker, or a notary, an unfortu nate speculation in the Spanish funds, the Asphalte companies, or the railways, may perhaps have swallowed up at once the capital she had accumulated penny by penny, and she is reduced in her old age to have recourse to her for mer trade. But she feels degraded from her sphere; she has no sympathy with the joyous crowd, through which she passes and repasses. Old and wrinkled, she abhors the sight of youth and beauty ; the gay dresses, the animated groups, the con fused murmur of a hundred different conversations, the various effects of light and shade produced by the moving foliage of the trees, the rich rays of the set ting sun, the bright hues of heaven and earth sadden and discompose her. She experiences a cruel pleasure in dispelling the most agreeable reveries, and in-< terrupting the most interesting tete-a tetes. She appears suddenly, and stands before you like a living reproach, straight and rigid, with a harsh and austere countenance. She looks so grief-worn, that at her approach the tongue is hushed, and the laugh expires upon the lips : one feels obliged to have some respect for a woman, who from her appearance must have been crushed by some misfortune. Of all her former person she retains only her red nose, and hooked fingers ; these seem to grow longer every year. She is a sort of wandering Jew ; nothing stops her, nothing draws her atten tion from her task ; she goes her waytaking a survey of every new physiogno my, and counting each party as they make their appearance. Some people are known to establish themselves upon her chairs, and to occupy them for hours. She throws at these from time to time glances of indignation, and seems always inclined to make them pay twice. In the midst of an interesting conversation, if her eyes should be intently fixed upon you, you will perhaps imagine that she is trying to overhear what you are saying; she does not care the least in the world about it — she is only thinking " have they paid me? " The year has but one short season for her, and alas ! the days of rain and cold shorten it still more. When the leaves fade and fall covering the walks not long ago so frequented, the Chair-letter disappears; she is seen only on Sundays in the Tuileries, and she wanders to and fro like a troubled spirit. THE GOVERNESS. BY MADAME LOUISE COLLET. IFFERENT in many respects are the characters of -/^ mistress averages from forty to sixty ; she is rather the manager than the teacher of her establish- | ment, she is more preoccupied with its profits, ; than by the studies that are there followed, and it is more important for her to be a good house keeper than a well informed woman. The supe rintendence ofthe lessons she confides entirely to rthe teachers she engages, and the lessons them selves she leaves to the masters. Information and accomplishments would in her be mere superfluities, and she is not always over-particular in her spelling. As there is no inconsistency in a theatrical manager not being a dramatic author, so is it not requisite that a Schoolmistress should be a learned or a talented woman ; this might be illustrated by many examples. But let us come at once to our subject. All governesses, from whatever cause they engage in the profession, are from twenty-five to thirty-five years of age, never less, seldom more. Until she reaches twenty-five, the young lady brought up as a governess is teacher in the school where she has been educated. She is generally the daughter of some 50 THE GOVERNESS. small tradesman, or petty " bourgeois," who expects that all his children will manage to get their own living as early as possible, and she devotes herself to tuition, just in the same way as she would be a milliner, a dressmaker, or a shopwoman, to gain her daily bread. She is under the necessity of choosing a profession, and from vocation she becomes a Governess. She knows just enough of grammar, history, geogra phy, music and drawing, with a smattering of English and Italian, to present herself to those thoughtless mothers who almost blindly entrust to a stranger the direction of their daughters' hearts and minds. With her superficial knowledge, she fancies herself competent to undertake and complete education. Truly conscious of her worth, she sets forth boldly, but without ostentation or affected modesty, her universal acquirements, and on the strength of her own estimate, she obtains a situation ; but ere long her abili ties are questioned. The pupil makes no progress, and in self-defence the Gover ness complains of her inattention and want of application, and proposes that mas ters should be engaged to rouse her from her indolence and thoughtlessness. Two lessons a week, she says, and for accomplishments only will be sufficient. However, soon after, the mother delighted with the unexpected progress of her daughter, engages masters to come every day, and teach not only accom plishments, but languages, history, and everything that the Governess still pro fesses to know thoroughly ; from this moment she becomes a mere superinten dent, in reality useless ; yet it is difficult to dispense with her, for she is willing to render every service in her power. She excels in needle- work, makes purses and Greek caps for the gentleman, works collars and handkerchiefs for the lady, trims her pupil's ball dresses, and occasionally dresses her hair. She also em broiders articles of furniture for the drawing-room, reads aloud to the family, writes the invitations, settles the accounts, and looks after the servants. Thus she acts as a sort of factotum, and remains only a nominal governess. Generally speaking, the Governess prefers an engagement in one of those families whose income, although moderate, enables them to enjoy all the com forts of life. She contributes her mite to the calm pleasures of their peaceful household, seldom disturbed by the storm of passions, but where order and eco nomy are paramount. Some relations and a few old friends dine there regularly once a week, when they are called upon to judge of the progress of her pupil, which the Governess shows offwith the greatest solicitude. She performs in those family circles an important part, she accompanies ballads, plays quadrilles out of time and tune, gets up charades, presides at the tea-table, and cuts the cake. In her hours of solitary leisure the Governess often reads some treatise on edu cation. She goes through the book by routine, as the priest reads his breviary, but she thus contrives to be always mindful of her duties, and she fills her memory with pedantic maxims, unproductive seeds which she scatters indiscriminately in the young minds committed to her care, creating there nothing but ennui. THE GOVERNESS. 51 The Governess by vocation, is, on the whole, a good creature, she has neither wit nor imagination ; but her natural good sense enables her to steer her way through the various families in which she passes her life. She follows the hum ble tenor of her path, and treads in the little furrow marked out before her, con tending steadily against every obstacle she meets. She is not without a tinge of shrewdness, but in her honest heart integrity predominates, and if it were only from interested motives, the Governess, having adopted teaching as a profession, must preserve her character unsullied to be able to secure at all times a situa tion. She is, on some points, rather punctilious : she takes great care not to be too familiar with the brothers and cousins of her pupils, but she is much pleased with the attentions of the old bachelor uncles. Thus, she sometimes enjoys the hope of marrying comfortably ; but in her unsophisticated dreams she never thinks of accomplishing her object by any culpable intrigues. The Governess is generally short, and rather stout, with a rosy, good natured, but common looking face. Her dress is neat, rather than elegant ; brown is her favorite winter colour, and she wears pink in summer. She never buys more than two dresses and two bonnets a year. There is in her a spirit of economy verging on avarice — and this innate passion grows stronger with age. All her salary goes to the savings bank, and she gives only to her parents what she can spare from the presents she receives at Christmas, and on her birth-day. When she is five-and-thirty, the Governess, whose savings bring her in a small income, marries a clerk in the post, or some Government office; she then becomes a prudent housekeeper, and if she have children, a severe and pedantic mother. When she makes up her mind to remain single, she purchases the good- will of a boarding-school, as one buys an attorney's business with his clients, and there she lords it the remainder of her days. Good living is then her pleasure, she has a puppy and a parrot which are her delights ; she is incessantly tormenting both pupils and teachers, happy to inflict in her turn those petty persecutions which made her so long miserable. Reader, have you ever noticed in some fashionable school, or in one of the royal establishments of the " Legion of Honour," at St. Denis, for instance, a pale young lady, pensive, ennuyee, tired of life at twenty, taking a solitary walk in some gloomy alley of the gardens, when the air is resounding with the bursts of joy of her young and happy companions ? that pale girl, melancholy from disap pointment than from real grief, is fated to belong to a peculiar class of gover nesses. She is the daughter of a general in the army, or of some eminent contractor who made his fortune in the time of the Empire, and was ruined by the restoration ; or, perhaps she is the unacknowledged child of a high personage, whom she has been taught to call her uncle. From her infancy she has been surrounded with wealth and splendour, and all the luxuries of high life have followed her to school ; she could hardly speak when already she had jewels and trinkets, and was 52 THE GOVERNESS. waited upon by a " femme de chambre," who was made the slave of her tyranni cal caprices ; her health has been impaired by the most injudicious indulgence, and while she lived on sweatmeats, her mind was corrupted by reading fashion able novels, instead of books of a moral and wholesome tendency ; and her heart before awakening to feeling, was spoiled by the excitement of artificial passion. Thus has the child grown up, separated from her family, and spoiled by the dangerous indulgence of all sorts of luxuries; and when, after reaching eighteen, the poor girl already satiated with the enjoyment of balls, and pleasures of every description, which her companions only fancy in their dreams, expects to enter the world, and to play a prominent part among the ladies of fashion, she is one morning summoned into the presence of the scholmistress, who had until then treated her with the utmost respect, and there she is abruptly informed that the friends on whonj she depended are either dead or ruined, and that she must forthwith think about procuring a situation ; — she is told, as a consolation, that her talents are a sure resource which ought not to be neglected. At this unexpected intelligence, the pale girl becomes still paler, but she re members positions, similar to her own in the novels she has read ; she fancies herself a heroine, she sets bad fortune at defiance, and leaves with a tearless eye, and without regret, the happy home consecrated to careless youth, but where she has not lived in peace, for she has known no infantine joys, no pure hopes, no maidenly dreams, and her mind has been filled only with vanity and with am bitious aspirations now. bitterly disappointed. However, the world is open before her, she enters it readily — she is alone, poor, and without protection, but she is free, she has an adventurous spirit ; her affected but graceful manners cannot fail to succeed in an affected world, and her languid beauty so well adapted to her destiny is sure to create sympathy, and command interest. Of that brilliant society where but yesterday she expected to appear as a queen, she knows the wealthiest and the most powerful ; long has she been their equal, she cannot now beg alms of them, but she will go to them as a ruined sister, and they will not allow her poverty to be exposed before people who are not of their rank. She is welcomed, sought af*^ catering for novelty, the writers for the press and the theatres seek for subjects in all classes of society. There are no places, however high, or however ob scure, — boudoirs, garrets, palaces, or hovels, that are sacred from their bold intrusion : and their analysis of all varieties of human nature extends to the most minute details. One type only seems r^-> hitherto to have escaped their scrutiny. Whether from contempt or forgetfulness we cannot affirm ; we only know that such is the fact, that an inedited individual still exists, that he is at this moment close to us, and reduced to solicit at our hands his share of public notice. Poor Diligence Conductor ! ! And yet it is to him that authors and vaudevillistes owe the enjoyment of the choicest foreign produce, the unacknowledged source of many of their works. First and foremost he brings them the soothing cigar, " Dont la blanche fumee Faitnaitre la pensee." And to him they are indebted for the delicacies from Strasbourg and Toulouse, Ostend, and Perigueux, those dainty additions to their epicurean repasts. K 74 THE DILIGENCE CONDUCTOR. Through him barren winter is decked in the riches of summer ; the interval between spring, summer, and autumn disappears. And when at convivial meetings the jest flags, and the laugh is expiring, what gives a fresh impulse to the wit and gaiety, but the sparkling Champagne and the delicate Burgundy brought from Ay and Chambertin, by the faithful Conductor? And the friend whom they expect, and the wife whom they are so impatient to press again to their heart, who will restore them to their love ? To whom for whole days and nights together are the lives of all they hold most dear blindly confided ? To the Diligence Conductor. Yet they do not appreciate him ; they have given the preference to the postilion, who is the mere executor of his in structions. They have already brought him triumphantly on the stage ; they have reserved the sweetest perfumes, the most flexible roulades to do him honour, they have refused no laurel to his glory, and his praises are sung every day in the harmonious accents of the street organ ! They have done everything for him, and said everything of him — except the truth. Here will begin the Conductor's vengeance. His faithful portrait will shame them for their neglect and disdain. The conductor has many points of resemblance with the hussar. They have the same consciousness of superiority, the same spirit of insubordination, the same coquetry in their dress; there is not a lass at an inn, or a farm on the road, whose heart, being more or less susceptible, can resist the Conductor, who like the hussar, seems to be gifted by nature with the power of attraction. They are both, it is true, under a severe discipline ; they are subjected to a passive obedience towards their superiors, from the colonel to the corporal, from the proprietor to the clerk of the coach-office. The hussar has the difficult duty of keeping his equipment in order, the conductor has the care of his tools, such as knife, hatchet, chain, and cord, with which he must always be provided in case of accidents. For each are made unbending and inexorable regulations, and both are liable to severe punishment: the soldier when found in fault, has extra duties to perform, or is ordered to prison ; the Diligence conductor is sus pended, or condemned to pay fines, rapidly increasing from five francs to five hundred. These are sharp thorns in their path, but they are not felt at first, and remain some time concealed by the flowers scattered over them. Is there, in fact, anything more fascinating than the curled moustachio, the handsome jacket, and the sky-blue cap of the hussar ? Is anything more be coming than the stylish cap, or the embroidered collar, where gold, silver, and bright coloured silks seem to vie with each other in setting off the Conductor? And then his money-bag contains many crowns, of which, on every voyage, he receives a share for, his allowance. Decidedly we give the palm to the Conductor. ¦For the Conductor, emblematic language is not yet obsolete ; he is a modern knight-errant, and his lady is the company whom he serves; you may recog nize her by the colours she permits him to wear. THE DILIGENCE CONDUCTOR. 75 Here are the Conductors of three principal establishments. Look at the first : the golden horn of Orlando is hung round his neck ; his lady is La Royale, and this talisman, the source of so many wonders, accounts for the prodigious riches which she boasts of. The next has for his insignia a silver wand : La Generate is his mistress ; in placing herself under Mercury's wing, she invokes the god of messengers and commerce* The third is the devoted slave of La Franqaise; he is newly entered in the lists, and displays with pride the gold and silver of his double branch of oak. May it prove to him a fruitful bough ! " Union is strength," is his motto. May God and his lady protect him ! Hide your diminished heads, all you who usurp the name, conductors of coucous, train waggons, omnibusses, &c. To journey over a smooth road for a few hours, to watch without fatigue the steam curling into its thousand eddies, to survey, during the day, the muddy pavements of Paris, are these the functions of the real Conductor? Once mounted to your seats, have you your passengers to keep in order, the ostlers to threaten, the postilions to punish? Can he whom you parody, take his rest at night in a comfortable bed? Does he always find, at a fixed hour, his meals ready for him ? Have you, like him, to be ex posed to the summer's scorching sun in the landes, or to the stormy winter's cold in the Jural And this is not all ; privations and dangers of all kinds, accidents of all natures are his daily lot, his hourly existence. Make way, make way for the real Conductor ! There are many decided varieties in this numerous family; all equally easy to distinguish. We intend to sketch some of the principal. They are :— 1 , The Worsted Leg; 2, The Dandy; 3, The Jolly Fellow ; 4, The Grumbler ; 5, The Braggart ; and 6,— last though not least,— The Thorough-bred. The Worsted Legf may be known by his awkward manners, his heavy gait, his slovenly dress, by his shirt collar going over his ears, in spite of the uniform. His accent is Auvergnat or Flemish ; in his ears are agreeably dangling large gold rings; unfitted, morally and physically, for the dischrrge of the different duties of his situation, at each journey he is sure to experience some new loss. On the road the slightest accident occasions him considerable delay ; he has no authority over the postilions who laugh at his awkwardness in clambering on the roof. Every innkeeper, when it his day to stop there, takes advantage of his dul- ness, and without fear of being leported, deliberately warms up, for the comfort of the travellers, the dinner ofthe- day before. Horses, repasts, nothing is ready. Nobody obeys his voice. * There are in France three Joint Stock Companies, proprietors of stage coaches, running on the principal road— La Compagnie Royale, La Compagme Generate, La Compagnie Franchise. The last has however disappeared since the original paper was written.— fid. f La Jambe de Laine. 76 THE DILIGENCE CONDUCTOR. One Worsted Leg on the road is enough to disturb the best arrangements. And yet he is an honest man, mild tempered, economical, and incapable of appropriating a centime not strictly his own. He never eomplains except when at last, in his own interest, he is requested to retire, and often will try to go on till the last shilling of the two hundred pounds he is obliged to leave with the company, as security, is absorbed in fines, or in making good the loss of property committed to his charge. The Dandy is a young man well educated; he has been a lawyer's clerk, or a linendraper's assistant. Some frolics, or a wish to see the country, induced him to change his profession; but he cannot entirely divest himself of his former habits. His linen is always white, his uniform of the finest cloth, and his nails most carefully attended to ; he has the strongest aversion to the black and oily grease used for the wheels of his diligence. There is a slight affecta tion in his manner of speaking ; he is fond of displaying his knowledge to his passengers ; his familiarity is annoying to them, and to his self-importance he is indebted for the hatred of all office-keepers on the road, and for many fines. " He plays the gentleman," is the common remark of his comrades; and this fatal phrase flies along the line of road traversed by the dandy. It precedes him at the relays, the inns, at the coach-offices ; and whether it be envy, or a spirit of vengeance on the part ofthe subordinates, or a want of personal exertions on his part, his coach is always behind time. It is remarked that no Dandy has grown old in the uniform of a Conductor; six months, or a year at most, suffice to cure him of his roving propensities. The Worsted Leg and the Dandy are the two plagues of all Diligence pro prietors. With as many faults as good qualities, the Jolly Fellow* and the Grumblerf form two varieties of distinctly opposite natures. One is liveliness personified ; the other morose beyond all expression. Could Democritus and Heraclitus make their reappearance in this world attired in a Conductor's uniform, one would be the Jolly Fellow, and the other the Grumbler. The Jolly Fellow laughs at everything, and is a never ending joker. Active and intelligent, he obtains by his fun what the Grumbler owes to his peevish tones and cross looks ; the idol of the .postilions, who call him the " Good Fellow " he is ever ready to give them money for drink. More than once his coach has been nearly overturned while he was playing tricks with them. His opposite never jokes, and only escapes by a miracle from a like accident ; for the postilion, at the risk of breaking his own neck, turns too short round the •corners out of revenge for the Grumbler's stinginess. They are both proficients in driving, and thoroughly acquainted with the duties of their situation. They would be irreproachable, if it were not that the Grumbler *> La Bamboche. + Le Potin THE DILIGENCE CONDUCTOR. 77 being always disposed to make complaints of everything and everybody, excites disputes; and that the Jolly Fellow aids and abets the quarrels for the sake of the amusement to be derived from them. Besides, one is sulky with his pas sengers, the other too jovial. The Grumbler, not to encumber the place he has reserved for himself on the roof, that he may sleep more at his ease, refuses, in spite of the most urgent entreaties, to make room for the box containing the best bonnet of a fair passenger. The Jolly Fellow, braving the rules, boldly takes his seat in the coupe, and freely enters into conversation with the pretty lady sitting there alone. They are both on excellent terms with the excise and police officers : the Jolly fellow amuses them, and everybody knows that when a gendarme laughs, he is disarmed; the Grumbler, thanks to his rough appearance and manners, is not even suspected. So that for them nothing is more rare than condemnations and fines. The excise officers'* business would be considerably lightened, if the Jolly Fellow and the Grumbler were the only Diligence Conductors. But happily for them, the Braggartf exists. This variety, always at war with the excise, whose agents he is sometimes successful in deceiving, is the object of particular watchfulness on their part. Similar to the hawk that pounces upon the small bird by hovering over it, they dog his footsteps, observe his movements, and when they sieze him, bind him fast and make him pay dearly enough for his delinquencies. The Braggart may be recognised by many different signs. His clothes of rich material and carefully arranged, are sure to be decorated with some orna ment not mentioned in the prescribed uniform However severely he may be punished for it, he could sooner be rendered dumb, than prevented from wear ing his gold or silver lacing wider than the regular width. Sometimes he adorns his cap with a cockade; at others, he ties round his waist a large red scarf. A hair chain, a gold watch, and frills to his shirt, complete his fanciful toilette. His whole bearing is bold, and we may add, often imprudent ; a large tuft covers his chin ; with his hands in his pockets, and standing on his legs, he loves to attitudinize ; his walk, although disparaged by an oscillatory movement, is yet easy, and even . graceful, and he is irresistable to the Charlottes and Pamelas of the hotels and taverns. He could more easily enumerate the innumerable small glasses of liqueur he swallows during the day, than the con quests he makes on his road. The Braggart thinks himself the equal of any, and very superior to the mere clerks, to whom he only consents by dint of fines, to carry the tips of his fingers to the extreme edge of his cap, by way of salutation. He is, however, generous '< his purse is open at the first thought of a charitable action ; his comrades always find him ready in case of need ; nevertheless, he is not a favourite ; jealous of his * They have the superintendence of the regulations concerning the stage coaches, &c. t Le Flambant. I I 78 THE DILIGENCE CONDUCTOR. activity, of his temerity, of his skill in blowing the horn, or what not, they give him behind his back the names of " swallow-all," " spoil-trade," &c. ; and yet they endeavour as much as possible to imitate him, and succeed wonderfully— as to his faults. Unfortunate would it be for any one to speak ill before him of. the company which he represents. Rivalry is his dream, his happiness, his god. A rough tilter, he soon disables all champions and their steeds, who enter the lists to give him battle. To pass a rival, he fears not to descend a steep hill at full gal lop : an imprudence that is most often crowned, we must say, with extreme good luck. He appears to have a decided objection to marriage ; yet lovers of scandal affirm that he does not fear bigamy. Be this as it may, he is very particular about decorum; and his wives, fortunately separated by great distances, are never known to one another. His favourite game is billiards, in which he excels. He occasionally also con descends to play picquet and dominos. We should, perhaps, be partial to the Braggart, if it were not that some evi dences of fraud and smuggling have tarnished his reputation. His imagination fy cannot remain inactive ; he has always some new and ingenious contrivances, and in carrying them into effect he does not submit to be bound by the common rules applicable to traffic ; he knows no law, he acknowledges no frontiers, he is most averse to pay any duty. Strange inconsistency of the human heart ! this same man who would blush to commit a petty theft, robs without shame the public re venue, and never scruples in the least to cheat his employers out of the carriage of the goods he transports on his own account. He seems, on the contrary, to pride himself upon these exploits, and looks with contempt upon those in the frater nity who do not understand their business. Although preferable to the other varieties, the Braggart cannot, in his turn stand a comparison with the Thorough-bred Conductor. This is truly the pat tern conductor. It is sad that the variety should be so rare ! The Thorough-bred Conductor is no longer youthful, but he is still hale and hearty, and his scanty grey locks testify long and honourable services. His em bonpoint, far from being against him, gives to his appearance a certain conse quence which accords remarkably well with his character. Add to this a German accent, a pipe, the indispensable appendage to his equipment, always strictly conformable to rules, and you would be able to recognize, from this description, the pattern of the profession. Three objects share almost equally in the affections of the true Conductor, namely, his coach, his wife, and his dog. We regret that it is not consistent with truth to place the wife first; but as faithful historians, we are reluctantly obliged to admit that, to the best of our belief, she occupies the position we have assigned her. THE DILIGENCE CONDUCTOR. 79 His dog is his inseparable companion; he cheers him on the road, keeps guard over the coach when his master leaves it, sits by him awake while he sleeps, and caresses him when he wakens. His wife is generally a good manager of the old school ; during her husband's absence, she turns to profitable account the various articles he brings home every week. Apart from the vortex of luxury which in these days carries away all classes of society, the Conductor's wife has still preserved her simplicity, and seeks to raise herself only in her children, by giving them a better education than that of their father. The boys, however, when arrived at a suitable age, for the most part mount the coach-box ; they have been accustomed from their childhood to regard it as their patrimony, and worthily continue the career open to them. It is thus, in our days, that the Thorough-bred race is perpetuated. May the blood lose nothing of its vigour by running in younger veins, or of its brightness by the more care ful nurture of its young shoots ! Nothing can exceed the Thorough-bred Conductor's love for his coach ; it may be likened to a mother's tenderness for her new-born infant, or the first passion of a youthful heart; he contemplates it with delight and pride, and on the journey, should any accident occur to it, he is sure to have about him the means to set it to rights. A favourite with many a traveller, there are always some awaiting his turn to start. On the important day, he superintends the packing of his coach, assorts the luggage for the roof, the boot, &c. ; and his inspection over, the horses neigh ing impatient to be gone, while the hour for startingis still striking, look at him giving the signal ; with his way-bills between his teeth, he springs with one bound to his seat, and blows his horn for adieu. The coach starts ; from that moment he is no longer a simple mortal, but a demigod on his triumphal car. The country through which he passes is bright and beautiful, the hills look golden, the vallies smiling and gay. For him are the best postilions, the freshest horses, the most delicious repasts ! The poor villager whom he has spared a long and weary walk by giving him a lift, gratis, bows low on his approach ; the young girl smiles at him, for it was with him that her sweetheart started last year for the great town, and it is he who will soon (at least, she hopes so,) restore him to her faithful and affectionate as before. Even the little children hail his appearance with joyous shouts, and they are sure to receive some sweetmeats as a reward for their innocent flattery. Such is Father Frangois ; the following anecdote, for the truth of which we vouch, will complete his portrait. It was a summer's evening, the last rays of the sun had faded from the hori zon, and the cloudless sky seemed to announce one of those fine nights so desi rable at this season ofthe year for the enjoyment ofthe traveller. All at once the air freshened; a black speck appeared in the sky, which gra- 80 THE DILIGENCE CONDUCTOR. dually increased in size, and approached nearer and nearer. To a few large drops succeeded torrents of rain, which inundated the road, ploughing it up on all sides. The feeble light of the coach lamp had been extinguished at the first breath of the storm ; and the darkness would have been impenetrable if the frequent flashes of lightning had not illumined the road they were journeying. Father Frangois calmed the terror of his passengers, kept up the postilion's courage, whose every movement he was carefully watching, and seemed to struggle single-handed against the united elements. But soon the storm raged with redoubled fury. Frightened at the continual claps of thunder, excited by the screams which are heard from the inside of the coach, the horses no longer obey the unsteady hand that guides them ; they start to the edge of the road — another moment, and the diligence will be drag ged down the precipice — already it balances on the brink of the ab .ss — every passenger is terrified into a dead silence, that is broken only by the sound of a heavy fall, which the mountain echo prolongs. ..... The passengers were 6aved — thanks to the admirable presence of mind and intrepidity of Father Francois, who with his experienced eye had calculated beforehand the danger. To jump to the ground at the most critical moment, to cut the traces with a firm and skilful hand, had been for him the affair of an instant, and the poor horses alone rolled down the precipice. The violence of the storm having abated, the passengers reached the neigh bouring village on foot, and there receeivd the necessary assistance. As to Father Frangois, one thought only seemed to pre-occupy him ; he was anxiously examining every part of his cherished coach, and after ascertaining that it had not suffered in the least, and that a fresh relay of horses could be procured to continue the journey, he joined the rest ofthe party. They press round him to thank and compliment him ; then for the first time do they perceive a handkerchief saturated with blood bound round his arm. He has hurt himself severely. The praises are redoubled ; every assistance is offered him for the present, and money for the future. Insensible to everything but the attraction of a glass of brandy, " It's my duty," said he, " this is nothing Coach is waiting, ladies and gentlemen." Then addressing the postilion, and rising his elbow on a level with his chin, so as to make him understand the reward that awaited him, he said, " You are good for nothing; make up for lost time. Start !" Father Frangois is not the only Conductor who would have acted thus. Similar accidents occur only too often in the adventurous life of a Conductor, and his courage and devotedness are the more praiseworthy that he expects to reap from them neither recompence nor glory. Hurrah, then, and three cheers for the real conductor. THE NOTARY BY H. DE BALZAC '_ ERGING towards forty, plump, short, hale, and HI TJHI dressed in black, the personage we are here in- '- [ traducing is apparently full of confidence in him self, rather stiff, and decidedly pedantic and af- j^l fected. Upon his features you observe a mask of bland silliness, which, feigned at first, has be come by practice, the confirmed expression of his ^- countenance — showing the passive calmness of the diplomatist, without his acuteness. The yellowish tint of his bald forehead, is indicative of long toil, internal struggles, many cares, and a stormy youth, but bears no trace of actual passion : — " This man must be a Notary," you at once exclaim. The tall, thin Notary is an exception. Physiologically speaking, notarial avocations are incompatible with some constitutions. An irritible and nervous disposition, which may occasionally be observed in attorneys, would be fatal to the Notary. His profession requires extreme patience ; he must obtain such control over himself as to be able to listen with apparently unaffected resigna tion to the interminable communications of his clients, each of whom thinks that his business is the only one in the world worthy of attention. The attorney's client is passionate ; he wants to carry on the war, to prepare l 5(2 THE NOTARY. the attack, to make good his defence. Peace alone is the Notary's province, though he is the victim of a thousand conflicting personal interests, assuming all possible shapes. What he is doomed to undergo may only be compared to the sufferings of blank paper and — women, two things apparently so tractable. Sometimes the Notary resists, but the angles of his features disappear in the struggle. His flattened face presents ideas the most commonplace, and his dis course is made up of aphorisms totally innocent of meaning. No artist can en dure to look him in the face. " There is a Notary," says every one who sees him ¦ and the expressive phrase, " Notarial look," has become proverbial. Yet the Notary is a victim. Dull and heavy as he now appears, he was once blithe and merry ; he may have been witty, and was perhaps once in love. Mysterious being! deserving of pity, as much when you are fond of your pro fession, as when you hold it in abhorrence, it is our intention, as it is our duty, to make you better known. Simple-minded, yet cunning, you are at once an Cfidipus and a Sphinx ; you resemble the one in your obscure phraseology, while you possess also the shrewdness of the other. To many you are certainly incomprehensible, though we think you are not indefinable ; nor are we deterred from trying to portray your character by the conviction that we must necessa rily reveal many of your secrets. The Notary presents the curious phenomenon ofthe caterpillar tribe, but with him their order is inverted. His first stage is that of the butterfly; and, un fortunately, the remembrance of his wings and gaudy colours haunts him when a chrysalis, and even when he has degenerated into a grub. This cruel meta morphosis ofthe light-hearted and happy clerk into — the Notary, is of gradual, but certain, accomplishment The Notary is the offspring of society. His fea tures, from which all expression has progressively disappeared, may be taken as a specimen of those of the middle classes. What their profession dooms them to see, hear, and reflect upon every day ; the dramas acted by clients for them alone in their own offices afford Notaries ample scope for the exercise of wit and satire, yet cannot but give them a bad opinion of human nature ; neither may they laugh and indulge in raillery. Clients would be afraid of a witty Notary; he must neither say too much when he speaks, nor alarm by his silence; his thoughts and opinions he must lock up in his breast. Should he presume to be openly quick-sighted and penetrating, he would soon find himself without a client. His clients rule his existence and condemn him to the perpetual use of his notarial mask, which he hardly dares throw aside even amid his family enjoyments. He always has a part to play; he must be grave with his clients and his clerks. Professionally, he is obliged to guess what could not be explained to him without many blushes, and to seem unconscious of what he understands too well. He is always searching into the innermost recesses of his clients' hearts, and not unfrequently he makes fearful discoveries. To hear him trying mildly to discountenance some ungenerous or THE NOTARY. 83 dishonest plan! "Sir," he will say to one, "you really cannot do this; it it is not in keeping with your character ; excuse my telling you that you quite mistake the meaning of the law, which may happen to the best-in tentioned man in the world, &c." Or, " Madam, I cannot but approve your feelings — they are natural, and so far honourable ; but I cannot advise you to carry out your intentions. Your high sense of what is truly honest, must remain unquestion able, even after your death." After such a preamble, while the client is still hesitating, the Notary con tinues, "You will certainly not act in this manner; and if you do not take my advice, I cannot lend you my assistance for such a proceeding." His professio nal eloquence can no farther go than this last word of a Ministerial Officer, as Notaries are called by the French law. Obliged to appear sad in the presence of heirs who would shout with joy if they were alone; to condole with widows who feel in their hearts the happiest women in the world ; to talk of death and children, of wills and marriage settle ments to young and thoughtless girls ; to throw away the same words and the same reasoning upon persons of every age and condition ; to see everything without appearing to look, and to look without appearing to see ; to go into feigned passions; to laugh without cause; to argue in earnest upon the most trivial circumstances ; to preach morals exactly as a cook dresses dishes ;— Notaries grow stupid as artillerymen grow deaf. Clever men do not constitute the majority in this world : dulness prevails, and the Notary must bend his mind to the level of his clients. He cannot resist the power of habit, and his intellect is soon narrowed by his profession : nor is this all. He is so tormented by his clients that he becomes himself an insuffer able bore in society ; there be carries the same hackneyed arguments that he gravely delivers in his office. Mixed up with so many conflicting interests, he is interested in nothing. The ingratitude with which he is repaid for every ser vice he renders, makes him callous to all human suffering. Yet is the Notary not without a certain greatness ; in spite of all the perversity of this world, amidst the intricate contention of private interests incessantly at war in his presence, and often through his agency — his character remains un sullied, and he preserves his honest}*. Lakes of asphaltum, in which so many private fortunes will be swallowed up, lie open before him, but he does not throw in his line. He draws the deeds of partnership of all joint-stock com panies, but nothing farther; he remains as much a stranger to the consequences as the net-maker to the birds ensnared. This state of things is the final result of divers transformations wrought since he entered the profession. Nature who takes so long to form a perfect shell, is certainly surpassed by civilisation in the creation of the social crustacea, called a Notary. > Sometimes the Notary begins as an errand boy, as a lad ambitious of dying a general, would enlist for a soldier. He goes through all the stages of the pro- 84 THE NOTARY. fession. A young man who has spent five or six years in one or more offices, cannot be expected to retain much of his simplicity : he has seen the under work of many fortunes; witnessed the selfish quarrels of heirs and legatees, in the presence of corpses still warm; he has often observed human avarice arrested only in its schemes by the penal enactments of the law, Of the corruption in cessantly finding its way into the Notary's office, many clients are the active agents. The daughter loudly complains of her father ; parents expose the per versity of their children. All the bad feelings seeking assistance for the execu tion of vindictive plans or deeds of a discreditable nature, resort to the Notary's office. Nothing can be more painful than the task too often necessary of taking an inventory of the goods, chattels, and papers of the dead; and this duty comes within the exclusive province of the notary. A mother dies, surrounded by her weeping family, who are overwhelmed with unfeigned marks of love and respect. Her eyes are scarcely closed before the Notary is summoned; and assisted by a clerk, he forthwith commences his investigation. Private papers are found bearing evidence of criminal conduct, and are instantly destroyed; and when, a few days after, the Notary has to listen to pompous encomia on the character of the deceased lady, he does not disturb the happy illusions of the family ; he and his clerk preserve a generous silence ; but indescribable smiles may be seen on their lips, and they exchange significant looks as they leave the house. They know that the great diplomatist whom they have just left, the statesman who can blind the eyes of all Europe, has been deceived like a child by his own wife. Again the Notary and his clerk proceed to the house of a professed philan- throphist deceased, the funeral panegyric of whose rare virtues has just been pronounced in the presence of numerous mourning friends. Our men of the law naturally expect to find treatises on great social questions, benevolent plans in dustriously devised for the universal benefit of mankind. Alas ! the venerable magistrate was a debauchee, and the clerk discovers a library of infamous books, which he carries triumphantly to the office : for it is a rule of long standing that all immoral books are to be omitted in the inventory, and become in conse quence the perquisite ofthe Notary's clerks. Papers being divided into several files, each designated by a letter, the irreligious and indecent prints are collected under the letter G, and this letter belongs to the clerks. " Have you brought the letter G?" is the general cry in the office when a clerk returns from taking an inventory. The contents of letter G. are regularly divided ; and of the witty comments and pointed remarks which ensue between the young men, in the ab sence of their principal, the less said the better. All this takes place in the presence of a boy ten or twelve years old, generally clever and intelligent, we mean the junior, generally called " the little clerk," the anointed emperor of the gamins of Paris. The youngster is ashamed to ap- THE NOTARY. 85 pear less knowing than his fellow clerks, and accordingly outvies them all in ri baldry ignorant, however, of the meaning of half he utters. The standard of his depravity may easily be appreciated. There is a public office at the courts of jus tice in Paris, where the signatures of Notaries have to be certified ; it is crowded every morning with junior clerks, sportive as gold fish, and mischievous as monkeys, who so pester the crabbed old clerk in attendance, that he scarcely considers himself safe behind his iron railings. A policeman or two are required to keep this small fry in order, and it is said that an application had been made to the Prefect of Police ; but he, doubtless, dreads a contamination of his agents by this swarm of disorderly imps, whose language would make a convict's hair stand on end, and at whose actions Lucifer would shudder. They know every thing, say everything, and laugh at everything. They have originated a sort of telegraph amongst themselves, by means of which all notarial news is simultane ously circulated through every office in Paris. Does a Notary quarrel with his wife, or does a misfortune happen in his family; every particular spreads like wildfire, and within twenty-four hours is known in every attorney's and notary's office in Paris, by means ofthe errand clerks. The three junior clerks in a Notary's office, who generally intend to follow the profession, have little to distinguish them from other young men beginning the world. The third clerk is twenty years of age ; he prepares drafts of deeds of convey ance, and reports on wills, part of his time being devoted to the study of the law ; it is also his business to pay to the proper office the sums (usually large) due for stamps and duty, to obtain the signatures of clients to deeds of im portance, and see them properly executed. These duties teach him that discre tion and probity are indispensible qualifications for a Notary, that caution is one of his professional instincts. Authors, artists, and men of science often preserve all their life the frank and open-hearted candour of a school-boy. The Notary's clerk, at twenty, has more reserve : not to be discreet, and withal scrupulously honest, would be for a third clerk to renounce his profession. Very few clerks indeed require twice warning upon the subject, in fact they would be discharged on the second breach of confidence, as utterly unworthy of trust. The second clerk's responsibility is even more serious. He is the cashier of the office. The sealing, engrossing, execution, and registration of deeds are in his province. The third clerk is more grave than his juniors, the second hardly enjoys a joke ; he may occasionally indulge in a more or less sarcastic sally in his admonitions to his juniors, but he already feels by anticipation on his shoul ders the official silk collar, the badge of the Notary. Certainly there are some few clerks, under five-and-twenty, who have not yet renounced all the gaieties of youth, who dance at the Chaumiere, and from time to time, take a short trip into the country, near Paris. But once twenty-five, every second clerk, despair ing of ever being able to pay the enormous price of a practice in Paris, has se- 86 THE NOTARY. rious thoughts of settling in the country, and looks about him for an office in some little country town, where he may preside without control. The plodders among Parisian Notaries' clerks have instituted a kind of club, called among themselves Conference. The members meet by appointment usually on Sunday mornings, to debate and consider the nicer points of jurispru dence; the " conference" generally ending in a breakfast provided by fines and penalties for non-attendance, which constitute tho funds ofthe club. There is at these meetings, a great deal of speaking, the result of which is to confirm every embryo lawyer in his own opinion ; resembling, in so far, the two cham bers, though without ever coming to a division. Most Notaries' clerks come of industrious families, and their schooling is generally summed up in the words " Go, and make your fortune ;" hence, hard work at their office from morning till night does not disagree with them. Of love, they know very little ; if ever a pretty face disturbs their studies for a few hours, the fancy only inspires an attempt or two at a female portrait sketched with pen and ink on the back of a draft paper. They are ignorant of the mean ing of the word gallantry ; and generally affect a peculiar expression of counte nance, blending the plain straightforwardness of the tradesman, with the rough bluntness ofthe soldier. There is something evidently exaggerated, and put on, about their brusque and unpolished manners ; probably proceeding from the desire of increasing their importance, or from their wish to appear of more diffi cult access to their friends or future clients. But whatever the shade of their character, or the tone of their manners, they become in due time head clerks, when they may be considered half Notaries^ The head clerk's grand object is to make it understood that his employer, with out his assistance, would commit innumerable blunders. Indeed, he not unfre quently tyrannises over his principal, often entering his private office to submit remarks or suggestions, and returning discontented. The Notary exclusively trusts him with many important deeds ; and though there are some transactions which the principal must conduct in person, the head clerk invariably enjoys his unlimited confidence. The head clerk is presently absorbed by the idea of purchasing a practice for himself; and now he contrives to gain introductions into families that include portioned but unmarried daughters ; he becomes remarkably economical, and assumes the exterior of a steady, settled man of the world. Some aspirants to Notarial dignity affect elegant manners, take to the use of spectacles as confer ring gravity and importance, and assiduously visit all rich families where they can get introduced. This is a specimen of their polite language when they address the mistress of the house, showing at the same time that they are acquainted with every member of the family : " I was glad to hear from the brother of your son-in-law, that your daughter is quite recovered from her long illness." The head-clerk is as well aware of the marriage connexions to be formed THE NOTARY. 87 within his circle of visits, as a French minister is acquainted with the alliances of princely German houses : it is for one, as for the other, a matter of business. He professes to be a conservative in politics, and scrupulously regulates his con duct by the highest standard of moral principles. He never plays high in so ciety, but frequently joins his colleagues in private meetings, which often termi nate in a supper far superior to the celebrated revelries of dan lies. During the last twelve years, several head clerks, perhaps thirty or forty in a hundred, impatient of making a rapid fortune, have abandoned the profession, turned directors of insurance or other joint stock companies, and given them selves up to speculation. These renegades do not require particular notice here. With a few such exceptions, however, all head clerks become in due time Nota ries ; nor is there in any condition of life, neither in the church, the army, nor at court, nor even on the stage, such a revolution as the change perceptible in the head clerk after being sworn in a Notary. His countenance at once loses every remaining spark of expression, a more certain sign of his new dignity than even his official silk collar. His manners to the clerks — yesterday his intimate ac quaintance — undergo an instantaneous change ; from familiar and frank he becomes cold and distant. He retains nothing of his former self. The phenomenon of his third and final transformation is accomplished : he is a Notary. Formerly great intimacy subsisted between the Parisian Notaries; it is even said that, in the time of the Empire, they used to console themselves for their reserve in public by getting up private convivial parties of the most festive nature. But of late years, Notaries have been less friendly with each other. Previous to 1814, they seldom remained less than thirty years in the profes sion ; now they generally retire at the end of ten years practice. Impatient to make a rapid fortune, and to enjoy it as men of leisure, they have lost much of their pristine character: no longer confidential magistrates appointed by families to watch over and guard their interests, they have almost turned specu lators. Two ways are open to the Notary : he may either wait for clients and busi ness at his office, or go abroad to seek them. The married Notary who retains a certain respect for the tenets of the old school, is always to be found at his office ; there he will, with the utmost patience and attention, listen to a client's circumlocutory statement, and endeavour to enlighten him to his own interest ; but he finds his business rather on the decline. His bows to his clients are dis- criminately regulated according to their rank and station, and the nature of their business. Before the nobleman, he bows to the ground ; rich clients he greets with a very respectful and cordial nod, confining himself to returning the bow of those who are in difficulties; while he shows his poor client to the door without answering his good morning. The little Notary who may so frequently be seen in a cabriolet in business hours, is not yet married. He is still thin, goes a great deal into society, and at all balls THE NOTARY. and parties seeks to distinguish himself by his elegant manners. His office is situated in a fashionable street, and he treats all his clients with equal courtesy: he would bow to the column of the Place Vendome if he could turn the acquaint anceship to any account. His obsequiousness may be laughed at, but what does he care ? His business is prosperous, and to keep it flourishing is his object. The Notary might hope to find in conjugal affection some consolation for the cares and anxieties of business ; but to him the marriage yoke is heavier than to any other man. As a king marries for the sake of his subjects, so the Notary marries on account of his profession, and not for himself. The father who mar ries his daughter to a Notary does not think of the man, but of his practice. An heiress in worsted stockings, a girl whose large marriage portion was earned behind the counter, and even a lady, if perchance he happen to meet with one, are all the same to him. If there is anything stranger iu society than a set of Notaries, it is a set of Notaresses. Notaresses are extremely severe to each other, are afraid of being two at the same party, and shun all approach to acquaintance ship. However obscure their origin, they all are anxious to become great ladies, and maintain a rather expensive establishment : some keep a carriage and frequent the Opera Comique. When they chance to pay a visit to the Italian Opera, they create such a sensation that the fashionable ladies among the audience enquire of one another who that person can be. They are remark able neither for the refinement of their minds nor the depth and delicacy of their feelings. They know they were married only for their money ; and their hus bands' occupations leaving them abundant leisure, they take tolerable care of themselves, and attend most particulary to their personal comfort. Paris, how ever, is rich in wonders ; and it is not impossible when you meet with a fasci nating woman, or a true Parisian lady, that your Beatrice be a Notary's wife. In almost all Notaries' establishments there is now no communication between the office and the private apartments ; and Notaries' wives love to boast that they do not know their husbands' clerks, either by name or by sight. Some years ago, Notary, wife, clerks, and children, used patriarchally to dine at the same table; but the revolutionary reforms introduced into modern society have swept away that good old custom. At the present day, the head clerk only has a room in the Notary's house; but he is not generally admitted to his prin cipal's table, which arrangement is perhaps more convenient to all parties. If, perchance, the Notary have not the flat, expressionless countenance we have described; if he be not endowed with the undoubted mediocrity which in his client's eyes constitutes the best security; if he be not wholly destitute of fancy, imagination and taste for the fine arts,— then is he a lost man. Sooner or later he goes off his rail, becomes a bankrupt, and absconds to Brussels, the America of ruined French Notaries and stockbrokers; carrying off his clients' money and the regret of his few friends, and leaving his wife free in Paris. THE THEATRICAL AGENT. BY CHARLES FRIES. 0MEDIANS TO BE HAD HERE, WHOLESALE AND RE TAIL: ALSO SCENERY, MUSIC, DRESSES, DECORA TIONS, AND ALL OTHER PROPERTIES, AT THE LOW EST possible price. Country and foreign or ders EXECUTED. Such is the notice that the Theatrical Agent, fol lowing the example of grocers, hosiers, Sec., would post over his door, printed in bold type, if now-a- days things were called by their right names. But this not being the case, there is no such announcement of the Theatrical Agent's profession : nay, a stranger, on being introduced to his presence, finds him giving himself the lofty airs of a government officer, comfortably reclining in his easy chair from ten in the morning till four in the afternoon, precisely. It is not more than forty years since the first Theatrical Agency Office was opened in Paris, for the purpose of negotiating engagements between managers and the numerous class of actors. It was originated by a poor devil of a country actor, who, going to Paris in search of an engagement, and having his services refused at every theatre, from the Theatre Frangais, downwards, found himself 90 THE theatrical agent in the unpleasant situation of a man without sixpence in his pocket, or an hour's credit. To run to the next bridge and throw himself into the Seine seemed the only resource left him; yet did he find a less desperate means of extricating him self from his critical position. The idea occurred to him, that by establishing himself as a medium of communication between managers and actors, he could materially assist the latter in procuring engagements, and even support himself by the business. " There are" soliloquised our famishing Roscius, " register offices for cooks, housemaids, clerks, and coachmen, but where can the manager in want of actors apply? This is a blank I will undertake to fill up. I will take jn my province, managers, tragedians, comedians, singers, &c. Under my espe cial care will be placed all who, to amuse the public, laugh, weep, declaim, mimic, smile, sigh, and gesticulate ; and as it is but fair that I should be remunerated for my pains, every actor who, through my agency, concludes an engagement, shall pay me a commission, say of two-and-a-half per cent, on his salary. Actors in general not being rich, I shall not object, whenever it may be necessary, to wait for my commission till the first payment of their salary takes place. Yes, ladies and gentlemen of the sandal and buskin, fortwo and a half per cent, com mission, I will undertake to procure engagements for ye all !" The first step was to take an office and enter into correspondence with actors and managers, as theatrical agent, though all who have recourse to his agency have long since dubbed him " human flesh dealer." Such was the success of the first tradesman in the line that, after a few years, he realised an income of £700, on which he modestly retired. There are at the present day, in Paris, eight Theatrical Agents. The one who is most in vogue, who is also the special correspondent of the St. Petersburgh managements, recently received from the Emperor Nicholas a flattering autograph letter, together with a gold snuff-box, ornamented with diamonds, in token of his imperial admiration of the graceful pirouettes of Mdlle. Taglioni. The Agent does little business with the Paris theatres, and the reason of this is obvious. The directors seldom engage actors whose reputation is not in some way established. Occasionally, however, he obtains a dSbut for some actor of provincial celebrity. When any actor or actress is allowed leave of absence, the Agent undertakes also to treat in his or her name with the country managers, who wish to secure them. If Paris theatres are not supplied by him, the rest of France, Belgium, Prussia, Germany, England, Eussia, and even Turkey and the United States are inundated by his exportations. There is not, on the sur face of the globe, a city, a borough, or a village, no matter in what latitude, so long as it can boast of a theatre, that is not perfectly well known to him. How would a Philanthropist shudder with indignation, should a letter from a manager to one of these flesh merchants ever fall into his hands. For these men, an actor is nothing but merchandize, a bale of goods which they select and send off by coach or ship, exactly in the same manner as the slave .trade is con- THE THEATRICAL AGENT. 91 ducted in the colonies. We should not wonder if some day their scrutiny were carried so far as to look into the postulants' mouths, to count, or ascertain, the teeth they have left, and the amount of their salary would be reduced in pro portion to the deficiency. For the gratification of our readers who may be curious to know the style of a manager's communication, here is a specimen :— " Dear Sir, " Neither of the three ' lovers' successively received will suit us. The first has bandy legs ; the second is too stout ; and the third's nose is ridiculously flat. People here prefer legs straight, noses idem, and reasonable dimensions. Keep these requisites in view, and endeavour to send us something better. The deuce take it ! we pay the price ; we ought to be better served." A well-stocked wardrobe is a necessary complement, an essential condition of success, for all provincial actors. It is particularly on the stage that a prepos sessing appearance is most welcome, and many actors owe all the applause they obtain to their dress ! The Agent need never fear to be short oi goods. Actors come to him without his being obliged to seek them. At the news of a vacancy, they crowd in dozens to his office, and when he has made his selection, his only trouble is to dismiss those that he cannot or will not engage. For he has his proteges, his favourite customers, whom he naturally tries to push before others. However, he makes few enemies, thanks to the wonderful address with which he gilds the pill for the discontented. He says to one, — " I did not send you there, because it is sure to be a failure : the audience is so bad that all the actors who go are hissed ; " and to another, — " This would not suit you at all ; I have something better in view for you." Thus, by a little well-timed flattery, he manages to please everybody. If the Agent has any relative in the profession, he becomes, through his (the Agent's) influence, a regular plague for the theatres. Tolerable or bad, he must be engaged. Is he hissed in comedy, he reappears in tragedy. Should he fail in the first parts, he quickly studies the second. It is all the same to him ; till at last the public, tired of hissing him, let him quietly earn his sixty or eighty pounds a-year without further opposition. We have already mentioned that the Agent never experiences a dearth of comedians. When he receives an order, he has only to obtain the signature of the object of his choice to the written agreement, and to despatch him and his wardrobe by the first conveyance. The arrival is acknowledged, as would be the receipt of a bale of cotton or a cask of sugar ; and— the transaction is at an end. The Actor's success or failure is not in the Agent's province. His best customers, we do not mean those who reflect the most credit on his taste and judgment, but those who are the most profitable, are the failures. Too bad tobe endured anywhere, their occupation consists in going from one 92 THE THEATRICAL AGENT. place to another, to play once, and then to leave, on the payment of a month's salary, the usual indemnity in such cases. These sticks being constantly in want of fresh engagements, are obliged to have recourse to his assistance, and he turns their dulness to the best advantage. However, a time arrives when there must be an end to the many unsuccessful trials of such an actor. There remains at last not a single theatre but where he has been hissed, groaned at, hooted. After changing his name a hundred times, he is sure to be recognized in whatever disguise he may assume. Then, he is completely " blown upon," and, after innumerable failures in every depart ment, not being able to fail any more, he is obliged to renounce his country expeditions, and thinks himself fortunate in obtaining, in some minor theatre, a situation as prompter or chorus-singer. Sometimes he unites with a certain number of strolling actors, of equal talent with himself, and gives a few repre sentations in the suburbs of Paris. He might be seen also carrying into an architect's or artist's studio, such letters as the following : — " Gentlemen, " As a dramatic artist just arrived from the country, and being at presrnt without any engagement, I take the liberty of soliciting your attention for one half-hour, while I recite my parts of Orosmane, Tancrede, Buridan, Oreste, Neron, or any other character you may select. " Feeling pretty certain that my talent will please, I flatter myself that you will kindly, with the permission of your estimable professors, comply with my request. " I have the honour to be, &c. &c. &c, " From the Imperial Theatre of St. Petersburgh, of the Conservatoire in 18. ., and Pupil of the late Mr. Talma." This man often ends his career by throwing himself from the tower of Notre Dame, or from the column of the Place Vendome. This is the last and most complete of his falls. The Agent is not unfrequently assailed by very troublesome visitors. For instance, there is one who has just introduced himself. He is a tall young man, rather good-looking, and his dress is not wanting in a certain elegance, although his linen is not particularly white. " Have I the honour of addressing Mr. , the Theatrical Agent?" " Yes, Sir. In what way can I serve you ?" " Sir, I am a singer, and wish to procure an engagement." " Very well. Where have you been engaged lately ?" " Oh ! I have never been on the stage yet. But, having a very good tenor THE THEATRICAL AGENT. 93 voice" — Here the young man places his hat upon a chair, and begins to sing, in Stentorian tones, " Oh Mathilde" .... " 1 beg your pardon. I do not doubt the beauty of your voice ; but, to play the tenors, you must have some practical knowledge of the stage." " Yes, so I have been told. However, that does not cause me the least uneasiness. I expect, when once engaged, to be able to perfect my acting. Allow me to continue. ' Oh Mathilde, idole '".... " I am sorry to interrupt you, but it is impossible for me to judge in this manner. I must see you play a whole scene before I can tell what you can do. Try to find some one to give you the cue, and I shall then have much pleasure in going to hear you." " Oh dear ! is there so much difficulty about it ? I thought you would en gage me directly; if that is the case I must wait . . I shall see . . it is surpri sing all the same when one can sing the high si ! Listen, sir, si, si; I have the honour to wish you good morning. ' Oh Mathilde, idole de mon dme /' " As soon as this original is bowed out, in steps another, who may be recognized at once as a provincial actor. His braided frock coat, ornamented with large lappels, forms a curious contrast with his once white summer trowsers, and an old brown beaver hat, so small as only to admit of being perched on the top of his head. " Good morning, Sir." " Good morning, my boy." "Have you heard of any thing that can suit me? " No, my dear fellow, no. If you could sing, with the knowledge of the stage that you possess, I could have placed you over and over again." " What can I do! Every one to his style. To think that I played the first parts in Strasbourg ! (sighing.) Ah ! I enjoyed myself very much in that town ! " " I have told you before that comedy does not take at all now. There is hardly anything doing but in Opera, either seria or buffa. Singers, singers, nothing but singers ! that is the cry of the managers. The public will not listen to any thing else; it is all the rage. But it can't last for ever; they will get tired of music, and return to dramas and comedies. Then I can do something for you." " I shall be very much obliged to you. I shall never forget that at Stras bourg." "How is your little boy?" " He is as well as possible. Bye the bye, do you know that my wife is just confined with her second ? Children are sure to arrive when one has enough to do to provide for oneself. My wife was certainly an immense favorite at Strasbourg! And now we are both thrown out! Upon my word it is too pro voking ! Pray try to get us something to do : I do not ask a thousand crowns a month; in fact if we had only a little to keep us going, I should not mind. I 94 THE THEATRICAL AGENT. have certainly a right to be more particular. When one has played the first parts at Strasbourg!" " I must know perfectly well that you played the first parts at Strasbourg, since your engagement was made by me. But make yourself easy; I will look out for something, you may be sure." "Goodbye, then. I shall depend upon hearing from you." The provincial actor may be heard murmuring as he descends the stairs, "To think that I played the first parts in Strasbourg! What a rascally set those managers are !" On leaving the Agent's, he proceeds to meet some com panions in misfortune in the gardens of the Palais Royal, the favourite rendez vous of unengaged actors. It is there that they console themselves for their misfortune, by railing against the managers and the public. But it is worthy of remark that they never enter the adjacent coffee-houses: they are content with the cooling shade of the trees. Even the Pont des Arts, which from its name, ought properly to be open to them, is, on account of the toll, almost forbidden ground. Happily hope never deserts them. Cheered by her benign influence, the needy group dream of brilliant engagements, showers of laurels, and glorious immortality. But to return to the Agent. It is not so easy to ascertain and record what takes place in his office, when ha is there closeted with an actress seeking an en gagement. We do not like to be positive on the subject ; but we are not quite satisfied that the two and a half per cent, on the amount of the salary is in all cases the only commission he expects from her. He frequents the theatres with great assiduity, and never misses a firstrepresentation. The stage door opens to him, as well as the public entrance. He may be seen in the orchestra, talking familiarly to the journalists ; and behind the scenes, with his back against the wings, taking snuff without ceremony with the actors, and gossiping with them all, from the most obscure to the highest. And this is not surprising; for those who are to day the idols of the public, have been once poor and unknown, and at that time his clients. He it is who has pushed them forward and enabled them to win their spurs. Nobody has better materials to publish curious memoirs. He knows all the bons mots of the favorite actors, and current scandal of all the theatres. He could tell at any time the number of lovers of Mademoiselle A., and the exact amount of the debts of Mademoiselle B. There is no chronicler more favorably placed for collecting all the gossip and anecdotes of the green-room, and in general the thousand nothings so eagerly sought after by the Parisian public. Several celebrated actors do not disdain to consult him on the manner of ending a soliloquy, and upon the effects to be pro duced on the stage. Sometimes he is, or has been an actor of more or less talent. We have now a favourite actor at one of the minor theatres who is at the same time rather a noted Theatrical Agent. The Agent is usually remarkable foi his good nature, and well deserves the THE THEATRICAL AGENT. 95 name of the artists' friend. He has always at their service some kind and con soling words, and, what is more substantial, some five-franc pieces to lend them in urgent cases, He ought, therefore, to meet with gratitude ; but this is not always the case. Some comedians (melancholy victims of the injustice of the public) are very inveterate against the poor Agent, and lay all their misfortunes at his door. Ye Gods ! how they do treat him ! To hear them, you would suppose that no jew, no usurer, was ever half so rapacious. The failure of a man of talent, the success of a bad actor, is all laid to his account ! The Agent resembles the Actor in his choice of apartments. He generally lodges on the third or fourth floor above the entresol. The number of his rooms varies of course according to the number of his family, but the two best rooms are always devoted to his profession : the largest is the waiting room, the other is the office. This last is furnished like a petty attorney's office, except that there is certain to be, instead of a learned judge's portrait, a sketch, in pen or pencil, of some dramatic scene, and a likeness of some celebrated actor, "pre sented to his friend * * *, Theatrical Agent, as a token of esteem." Fre quently he employs a clerk, at sixty pounds a year, who does the writing, and represents him in his absence. Towards Easter, when the theatrical year is near its close, and engagements for the ensuing one have to be completed, the waiting room of the Agentpresents a curious appearance. It is so crowded that there is scarcely a seat to be had. The faces of the male part of the company are shaved with the greatest care. There is not the slightest vestige of beard, whiskers, or moustachios. This is one of the conditions of the profession, and the disciples of Thalia and Melpo mene must deposit their beards as an offering on the shrines of their respective deities. Indian ink and sepia afford them, in case of necessity, an easy sub stitute. Any common observer, with a little tact, would easily assign to each actor, from his outward appearance, the line of characters he is accustomed to play. The lover is distinguishable by his dress coat, his straw-coloured gloves, and Adonis-like curls. The leading tragedian paces to and fro, draped majestically in his cloak. The comic actor, carrying his drollery off the stage, is continually provoking all within hearing to laughter by his humourous sallies. The tenor may be known by his rotundity, and by the number of rings ornamenting his fat fingers. The prima donna hums an air more or less in tune. The continual noise and buzzing heard in tnis room might remind one of the Confusion of Tongues. The walls of the apartment are covered with bills and advertisements of all sorts, in the clerk's hand-writing. On one side you read, — " An excellent table-d'hote at eleven pence, consisting of soup, three dishes at choice, dessert, half a pint of wine, and bread at discretion." A little farther, — " Superfine rouge to be sold, at the office." On the other side, — " The handsome wardrobe of a first-rate actor to be disposed of. Facilities will be given for the pay ment, &c. &c." 96 THE THEATRICAL AGENT. On the Agent entering the room all conversation ceases. They crowd towards him, until he is completely surrounded. He shakes hands right and left ; for one he has a compliment on the success he has just obtained ; for another, a word of consolation for his ill luck. " Well, Casimir," says he, addressing himself to a man who takes the first parts, " I hope you are pleased with your brilliant success at Lyons ?" " Yes, yes," replies Casimir, drawing himself up, " it was not too bad. But this season they will not have me for less than two hundred and forty pounds, besides a benefit. These are my terms." " And you, my poor Saulieu, you did not meet, then, with much encourage ment at Rouen ?" " Oh ! do not mention it. I made my debut in the same piece as my wife. She made an immense hit, and I was hissed down from the first scene to the last. Every time I opened my mouth, there was noise enough to bring down the theatre. Everybody is taken in, in that rascally town ! Adolphe, (you know that first-rate for k — the fellow who is always hungry) — came out the next day in a capital part. But that was another failure, and yet he is a clever actor. What vexed me the most, was to leave my wife there ; for, of course I was obliged to seek another engagement." We must leave this dealer in human flesh in the midst of his merchandize good or bad, sound or damaged, and finish in a few words what remains for us to say. The end of the Agent offers nothing remarkable. He retires like any other merchant, when he has gained a sufficient income. Only by one of those sin gularities so common to our nature, it is observed that after having made his fortune by trafficking with his fellow-creatures, like so much cattle, he becomes in his old age a philanthropist, and excessively punctilious in all that relates to the dignity of man. We know at tne present time a late Theatrical Agent, who is one of the most zealous opponents of the slave trade. THE YOUNG LADY. BY ANNA MARIE. AUGHTER of a noble family, Mademoiselle Marguerite De Bussy, was in person pretty, rather tall, pale, fragile, and delicately fair, with hands and feet as small as a child's, and an expression of countenance fine, animated, and slightly satirical ; she was endowed with that easy self-possession which belongs to all young persons brought up in the midst of the great world ; an air of distinction and exquisite refinement pervaded all her movements ; she could neither walk, nor sit down, nor speak, nor be silent, but everybody could perceive she was highly born, so much was her whole demeanour characteristic of a truly great lady. Her own apartment in the splendid family mansion in the Faubourg St. Germain, was remarkable for its elegant simplicity, and for the chaste taste of its ornaments. In this room, redolent of the sweetest perfumes, and embellished with a thousand charming trifles, Mademoiselle De Bussy was seated before a table of precious wood, upon which might be seen a tortoise- shell inkstand, inlaid with gold, writing paper stamped with her crest, scented wax, and a variety of seals, of the newest and most elegant devices. o 98 THE YOUNG LADY. She had begun to write with great fluency, but on a sudden she paused. She appeared to muse, then essayed again to write ; but whether she was at a loss to express some idea, or whether she was thinking of too many things at once, she finally laid down her pen, and seemed wholly absorbed by melancholy reflections. She still retained her pensive attitude, when a very light tap was heard at her door, and a lady, young and lovely, entered her room unannounced. " Ah ! my dear Diana, is it you ? What an unexpected happiness to see you !" exclaimed Marguerite. " I thought you were in London, and, look ! I was writing to you." " Hush !" said the lady, putting two fingers on her lips in sign of mystery; " do not name me, dear Marguerite ; I am only passing through Paris, and I particularly wish my journey not to be known. You must not mention that you have seen me, even to your mother. I know she is out ; I ascertained that before I came here." " Why all this mystery, dear Lady L " said Marguerite. " Oh ! nothing ; I will tell you about it another time," answered the lady, with a slight English accent, exceedingly graceful in a pretty mouth. " This journey is a freak, a whim, a foolish fancy ; in fact," added she, in a tone which she tried to render light, but in which some embarrassment was perceptible, " I shall see nobody in Paris." " What ! not even my dear mother, who would be so glad to enjoy your company ?" " No, not anybody ; I was hardly allowed to call upon you ; but I would not be in Paris without embracing my dear Marguerite-" And the fair foreigner threw her arms round her friend's waist, with a mix ture of gaucherie and grace, the one belonging to English manners, and the other inseparable from youth and beauty. Marguerite returned her caress, and expressed her joy at her friend's unex pected arrival. "I have so many things to tell you," continued Mademoiselle De Bussy, when they had seated themselves upon a little causeuse, " but, first, let me inquire after Lord L. He is here, of course ?" " No," replied Lady L., slightly embarrassed ,¦ and, seeing the astonishment ot her friend, she hastened to add, blushing like a child when telling an untruth, "he is to rejoin me shortly and his horses, his dogs He is so fond of them, that he could not leave them so quickly !" " You are then travelling with your mother ?" " No ; but, in pity, do not torture your brains to guess the circumstances of my journey ; I will tell you all about it another time, and let us now speak of all the things that you have to tell me ; I have very little time to stay, and I want to know everything that concerns ycu. We have been so long separated ! ! THE YOUNG LADY. 99 and God only knows when we may meet again !" murmured she, but so low, that Marguerite did not hear the last words. " Yes, we have indeed been separated, dear Diana. Luckily, you have arrived at the moment that I most want your advice and your friendship — not to help me to a decision, for I am already decided ; but to give me courage to fulfil my resolutions." " My friendship is all your own, dear girl, that you know ; as to my advice, I must warn you that it is not considered very good." In saying these words, Diana had risen to put in order her brown and glossy ringlets, which the wind had slightly disarranged ; and, as she did so, the glass reflected one of those fair faces which may be dreamed of elsewhere, but which are only seen in England. "But first," continued Diana, " give orders that you are not at home, that no one may interrupt us, nor see me here, and remember that you must not mention my visit to anybody." " What is the matter, my dear Diana ? your hurried and agitated manner alarms me. What can have happened ?" "Nothing — nothing has happened, I assure you. My joy at seeing you makes me appear agitated. Ah ! dear Marguerite, the sight of you reminds me of so many sweet remembrances ! such happy days it recals to my recollection ! " Ah ! the time of your marriage, is it not ? when I saw you so happy, so desperately in love with the handsome Jemmy ! /" "Oh no, indeed; my thoughts were more distant; I was thinking of the time when, a happy thoughtless girl, ' the world was all before me where to choose.' How delighted I was to muse over my idle fancies on the sea-shore; my hopes were then as unbounded as the ocean !" "Truly, you have much to complain of, my fair dreamer, to have replaced your vague illusions by a marriage of affection. What would you say, my poor Diana, if you had exchanged all the heavenly joys which every young girl pic tures to herself, against the cold and heavy chain of such a marriage as mine will be?" " You are going to be married, Marguerite: oh! I am so glad; tell me all about it." From the manner in which these last words were said by Lady L., it might perhaps have been perceived that, apart from the interest she took in the news, she experienced a certain relief in escaping from her friend's observation by throwing all Marguerite's attention upon herself. " Ah! you are going tobe married !" she repeated, seeing that Mademoiselle' De Bussy remained silent. " Yes, and there is nothing very satisfactory about it, I assure you." Sh«. tried to smile, but her eyes filled with tears, which brushing hastily away, she continued, " I am not fated to enjoy, like my fair Diana, the happiness of a o 2 100 THE YOUNG LADY. mutual attachment : no long and sentimental walks by moonlight, no sighs,' no transports of ecstatic joys, the only dream of which is so attractive to a poor gin like myself, brought up in the French fashion, and destined to be married in the French fashion, which is undoubtedly the most stupid fashion in the world. Ah ! dear Diana, how I envied your happiness !" " What sort of marriage is yours to be, then ?" interrupted Lady L., with an unaccountable smile, in which appeared an impatience, ill suppressed. "Alas ! mine will be a marriage like most of those I see around me ; a mar riage productive at first of ennui, and soon after of grief, unless I die of con sumption." " Why, then, do you marry ?" " Why, because things must have an end." " A good reason, truly !" cried Diana, bursting into an involuntary laugh, for getting for a moment the anxiety and constraint under which she was labouring. " Yes, really to make an end of it," replied Mademoiselle De Bussy. " You do not understand me, I see, because you do not know what it is in France to be that insipid, tiresome, and weary thing, called a marriageable daughter." " Oh ! would that I were that thing still !" said Diana, suppressing a sigh. " Indeed," replied Mademoiselle De Bussy, " I am not surprised at it. In England, a young girl's existence is delightful ; she reigns over all that surrounds her ; all fetes, all pleasures, are for her ; the spring of the year is less bright and sunny than hers. As long as an Englishwoman is not under the yoke (some times rather heavy) of marriage, she isa queen, a fairy, environed only by smiles and happiness : she is free, she is proud, and her will is a law to all who approach her. It has been often said that one should be a young girl in England, and a married woman in France." " I should have liked very well to unite the two," said Diana, half gaily, half sorrowfully. " It only depends upon yourself, Diana ; come and spend next winter in Paris." " I know not what I may do next winter ; I live from day, not liking to think of the morrow. But, tell me, what is the life of young girls in France ; you never spoke to me of it ?" " I did not know much about it then ; but two years bring many changes. At our age we grow curious, and learn many things to which we paid no attention before; well ! this is our life : Young persons, as we are called, even at six- and-thirty, if unmarried, young persons count for nothing in the Faubourg St. Germain : everything is done for them, they say, but nothing by them." " This is a maxim that governments would like to adopt for the people." " Yes, and the people revolt ; but we, who are always supposed to be lambs or doves, we must submit to this iron rule, and it is often abused ; at least it is the case in the families who have not yet adopted the new fashion, and do not force upon their children marriages of affection." THE VOUNG LADY. 101 " Force a marriage of affection ! Fie, Marguerite, you are laughing at your poor English friend's ignorance." " No, I am quite serious, it is a new fashion ; but one must be very rich to be able to follow it ; the young lady should have at least four thousand a-year, whereas the son of her most intimate friend has only the half of it ; but he bears an historical name, which constitutes in itself a dignity ; then the two mothers arrange the marriage of their children in a fit of sentimental expansion, just bursting out after tenyears's preparation. However, it is decided that the young people are not to be united until they are attached to each other, and on the oc casion some very affecting maxims are brought forward, for all mothers are fond of talking of love. From this moment the young gentleman is fully authorised to make himself agreeable ; and as the four thousand a-year is an immense attrac tion, he tries hard to succeed ; he cuts the Jockey Club, and gives up those ex pensive amusements which might injure his cause if they were known ; at balls he dances only with his future fortune ; when she drives out with her mother, he is sure to be hovering near the carriage. If she likes dogs, he has a sudden passion for the canine race ; if she is musical, he loves music ; he is lively, if she is lively ; if she is melancholy, he reads Byron and our lachrymose poets ; in fact, for six months he is as complete a hypocrite as we are forced to be by education from our cradle to our marriage contract." " But the relatives, the friends, do they not say anything ?" " No, they are all in the secret, and from them you only hear such remarks as these : " How handsome M. Such-a-one is ! how agreeable ! how well he rides ! what elegant manners ! &c, &c. The mother says to her daughter. 'How af fectionate he is to his mother ! he is good, gentlemanly, and clever ! He will be a Peer some day, and will certainly distinguish himself in parliament.' For in these times, you see, however great a name may be, people are obliged to re- gild their titles with some degree of personal merit." " And what says the young girl to all this?" " She blushes a little, and remembers that a half-suppressed sigh escaped him when he heard she was going into the country — but it is in the country that the finishing strokes are to be given. This journey is the more necessary, as it has been discovered that the poor girl, having repeatedly heard love-matches extolled before her, has taken the thing in earnest, and appears to have a pre ference for a cousin ; cousins, they say, are the plagues of families, and perhaps it is true." " And you, Marguerite, have you not a cousin ?" " Yes, the Prince de M." said Marguerite, blushing a little; " but I am not speaking of myself, let me complete the history ofthe marriage of affection." " The young lady's family start for the country ; a week afterwards the voung 102 THE YOUNG LADY. gentleman arrives with his mother. Time presses, they fear the return ofthe cousin, as he is expected in the autumn. Then the young gentleman becoming desperately in love is made to sigh and groan for three months, more or less ; but at the end of that time he must be either very unfortunate or very awk ward not to have made some impression upon the young lady." " Marguerite, you astonish me ! Where did you learn all this ?" •' I learnt it from one of my friends who was thus induced to marry a man she could not endure, and with whom she lives very unhappily, because he was passionately in love with her fortune, and cared nothing for her." " Your marriages of affection are very amusing." " Not particularly so, I assure you." " Then yours is not to be such a marriage ? " No, no ! I am not rich enough to fall in love with anybody, and I am con stantly told that girls of high birth should have no preference. Only if some very rich nobleman would be kind enough to be desperately smitten with me, Mama would be the happiest of mothers. Poor Mama, she will wait a long time. Young men, lately, are too well versed in arithmetic to think of me. Arith metic is the sworn enemy of young girls ; it is a certain preservative against the love they might otherwise inspire." " But you are rich, are you not ?" " No, not at all. My mother has a very handsome dower, and appears rich, but I have brothers and sisters all married, and having lawful heirs. I have only four hundred a year : therefore I can only be loved by those who have nothing." " And how so ? I do not understand the logic of this." " Because those who possess only an income of two hundred and forty pounds, are infinitely richer, as bachelors, than married with six hundred and forty My mother knows this well, therefore, she has placed her hopes elsewhere • and to try the effect of my charms, she has taken me for two years to all the Em bassies that we may meet foreigners." " Why, foreigners ?" " Because they pass for richer and less good calculators than Frenchmen." " That may be a great mistake." " Very likely. And besides, I cannot make myself agreeable to all the old Princes, Russians, Germans, Goths, Visigoths, Ostrogoths, one-eyed, hump backed, lame, or maimed, that our mothers take such pains to catch for us. Therefore, Mama says, laughingly, but with regret at the bottom of it, that I am very difficult to get rid of." " Why, then, does she wish to get rid of you?" " Because she must establish her daughter." " From what necessity ?" THE YOUNG LADY. 103 " Custom. A mother is not considered to have fulfilled her duty, until bv some means or other, she has married all her children." " French society seems, indeed, strangely constituted. And you, my dear Marguerite, who used to have such different ideas, you are going to marry only to conform to custom, and make an end of it, as you said just now. And what sort of man is your intended husband ?" " I hardly know," replied Marguerite, carelessly. " Is he handsome ?" " That's quite an English question. No, he is neither handsome nor ugly." " Is he young ?" " Neither old nor young; about thirty-three." " Is he rich ?" " No, I should say that he is neither rich nor poor, if it were not that he is certainly not nearly rich enough for the high society in which his marriage will place him. Therefore, it will be necessary for us to spend a great deal of our time in the country, not to enjoy more freely all the advantages of our position, as the Aristocracy do in England, but to live sparingly for eight months, in order to be able to pass the remaining four months of the year comfortably in Paris." " But is bis mind cultivated enough toprevent the time from weighing heavily upon you, during your long seclusion in the country?" ". Alas ! no. I will not say that he is stupid, but he cannot boast much intel ligence ; he is not kind ; at least, he has not that expansive and noble goodness which only belongs to the few ; but he is not of a bad disposition; he is neither tall nor short ; he is not very provincial, although he comes from Amiens ; he has neither a great name nor a very obscure one ; he is in the medium for every thing ; even his voice (for he sings) obeys that inevitable law of his existence. It is a barytone, for which I have a decided aversion." " But, my poor child, you, who like nothing but extremes, and to whom me diocrity has always been odious, what will you do ?" " I do not know." "I do not give you two years to die of grief and ennui." " I am afraid you prophesy right." And Mademoiselle De Bussy, her head upon her hand, danced one of her little feet quickly up and down, as persons do sometimes, to appear outwardly calm, when they are inwardly much agitated. " What folly," said Diana ; " really, Marguerite, I cannot understand you. It is easytoperceive that you have no idea of what marriage is ; you know nothing of its difficulties, its exactions, its despotism. If you could only understand how profound the mutual sympathy must be to ensure the happiness of a married couple ! Love itself is not sufficient ; that may die away," added she, in a voice full of grief, " and persons, who fancied themselves made for each other, 104 THE YOUNG LADY. find they have been strangely mistaken. Believe me, Marguerite, husband and wife must have one heart, one soul; they must belong, if I may say so, to the same moral region. Otherwise, each feels the misery of an exile who never hears the language of his own country : nor is this all, my child ; for, in the anguish inflicted by such torture, reason may give way ; a voice may be heard, whose accents find a responsive chord in the inmost recesses of the heart ; the victim maybe fascinated by such accents, fall under the charm, and only see the danger when it is too late to escape from it, for guilt has been the consequence." Marguerite raised her eyes to Lady L.,and saw that she was weeping. Diana would not meet her friend's gaze ; her bosom heaved with sobs, but she exclaimed abruptly, " This marriage must be broken off." Marguerite, on seeing Diana's tears, which she thought were shed for her, had lost a little of her firmness, but she recovered herself, and replied, " No, everything is settled, and the contract is to be signed this evening ; it is too late to break it off, and besides, what should I gain by waiting ? This match is one of the best that have been proposed for some time ; all the arrangements are made, and I must abide by the result." " But my dear girl, explain to me what can have induced you (who formerly seemed so determined to marry, as we Englishwomen do, from affection,) to con-. sent to the foolish affair you are on the point of concluding ? Is there on your part any disappointment ? have your wishes been thwarted ? Otherwise, I am at a loss to understand your decision." " There is no other reason in the world but the censure of being une fllle a marier : I marry to be married, that there may be no more question about it, and that I may not become some day like my aunt Eleonore : poor creature ! she has grown old in the daily expectation of an offer ; and notwitstanding her five-and-forty years, she carries her head high, and puts on her best smiles when ever a bachelor passes near her. She reminds me of Frederick the Great's horse, who, in his old age, pricked up his ears and pawed the ground when he heard the sound ofthe trumpet." " If you laugh, Marguerite, all is lost, for it is certain symptom that you will persevere in your folly." " Folly, indeed ! ask my mother if it is not a most reasonable determination. Listen, dear Diana, I will tell you a secret; my light hair and fair complexion make me look youthful, but I have passed my twenty-fourth year. In a few months I shall have lost all hope of being married as a young girl, and my only chance will rest with respectable bachelors above forty. Should it be my misfortune to reach thirty unmarried, I shall be taught to look up only to well- looking men of fifty. Then each succeeding year will count as four, and in a little time I shall become a worthy young woman, and a very suitable match for widowers of sixty, gouty, asthmatic, or deaf, who will think much of my virtues, THE YOUNG LADY. 105 and will be most happy to receive at my hands in their old age, flannels, gruels, and nursing. Alas ! this is my last year of youth, and I must take advantage of it." " To make a good ending, truly !" " How can I help it, Diana? Things are so arranged in France, that having reached twenty-four without changing my condition, I have no chance to do better." " Why did you not marry sooner?" " Why," replied Marguerite, sighing, " because I had one grain of romance in my heart, and mama, ten grains of ambition in her head. On my first appear ance in the world I was thought pretty." " I think you are now prettier than ever." ' ' Perhaps so; but I have been seen eight years in society, and that goes a great length to depreciate my value. However, I cannot help it ! The first season I came out, I had the happiness (as my mother would say) to please the young Prince De N." " Prince Frederick De N. !" repeated Diana, in a singular tone. A rapid blush spread over her face, and left it very pale. " The same," said Marguerite, "his attentions were rather marked during the whole winter." " And did they please you ?" asked Diana, still in the same tone. " They say he is — very agreeable." " They did not displease me, because they made me the fashion." " Solely on that account ?" "Yes, for he is very fair, and I do not like fair men." " Ob! that's a capital reason," said Diana, half laughing. " As to my mother, she conducted herself with much dignity and reserve in society, but at home, her joy broke out." " It seems to me that everything was going on extremely well," said Diana, not without a little bitterness." " Yes, my history might have become a short romance, and ended like a vaude ville. But the old Prince De N. was not so delighted at the prospect ; so one fine day he carried off his son into Germany. Mama has told me since (to con sole herself) that he has turned rather badly, and has been much talked of for his gallant adventures in Germany, and also in England." Lady L. made no answer, but she appeared oppressed and ill at ease : after a short pause she recovered herself and said, " Well, have you not had some other noble and handsome suitor?" " During two years, several excellent matches were proposed, but I declined, because none came up to the ideal my imagination had formed ; and my mother declined also, because they were neither dukes nor princes, for Prince Frederick's attentions had considerably raised the standard of her hopes. I p 106' THE YOUNG LADY. could not, according to her idea, be less than a duchess : mothers often deceive themselves sadly. And so, through a series of refusals, I reached one-and- twenty. The year I was to attain my majority was terrible; for to be pro claimed j^fe majeure is a dreadful thing for a young lady, and to avoid it I be lieve I could have renonnced my romantic dreams, and my mother, her desire to see me titled. But what was to be done ? One must get accustomed to every thing, even to growing old," continued Marguerite, with a charming little pout; and casting a glance at her dressing-glass, placed opposite the auseuse, she could not help smiling as the face there reflected was anything but old. " However, after the fatal day which saw me enrolled amongst the filles majeures, we thought over all the examples of times past and present which could cheer us, and we resumed by degrees our hopes and illusions." " And how is it that you have never met with your beau-ideal? That seldom fails to happen," said Diana, blushing. "How can I tell? Some did not please me, others I did not please. In France, the young men pay court to the married women, and the young ladies have no claim on their attentions; for our innocence forbids us to speak on any subject." " I have heard that in Paris, conversation is often very free, therefore, I sup pose sometimes you hear rather singular things." " Yes, everything is spoken of before us, stories of gallantry, anecdotes tolera bly scandalous, and witticisms not over-refined ; but we dare not appear to com prehend anything; we must neither smile nor blush, for fear of appearing to know more than is becoming for young girls." " And are you in fact so ignorant ?" "Oh! I believe," said Marguerite, laughing, " we are rather like children before they can speak : at least, their nurses boast, that they understand every thing." "You flatter yourself, my dear child," said Diana, with a certain pedantry indicative of her position as a married woman. Marguerite blushed, and feared to have implied more than she thought ; but she went on, " With snch a system, we play a most stupid part in society; and it is very difficult for a young girl to see her romantic dreams converted into realities. I have thus reached four-and-twenty, another fatal epoch ! and now my mother's brilliant hopes have all vanished, and an inordinate wish, a hopeless impatience have taken possession of her. She talks of marrying me in the day she dreams of it in the night; all her friends are on the look out, and we never pass a week without having at least one interview." ¦' What do you mean by an interview ?" enquired Lady L. " Oh ! happy Englishwoman, not even to know the meaning of the word !" cried Marguerite with amusing earnestness. " An interview is a most tiresome and foolish invention in our match-making arrangements; it is the accidental THE YOUNG LADY. 107 meeting, fixed beforehand, of a young lady who is quite unconscious of the same, and a gentleman in search of a wife. Have you ever seen a horse sold ?" " I have, at least, seen many bought." " You know, then, how he is made to walk, to trot, to gallop ; his feet and teeth are inspected ; innumerable questions are asked respecting his qualities, and I know not what besides. Well ! this exhibition is nothing to what a poor creature subjected to ' an interview' has to undergo. Her dress is made to set her off to the best advantage, she is placed in the most becoming light ; if she shine in a ball-room, it is there she is shown ; if she sing, a concert is chosen for an interview ; if she be not too stupid, a dinner party is made up, and every one questions her as to her tastes, or accomplishments ; one talks of music, anotherof drawing, and a third asksherwhom she admires the most, Victor Hugo or Lamartine : — all this to bring her out. For myself, I have had interviews everywhere, and I had such a horror of them that they were all failures ! At a ball, when I suspected an interview, my hair was sure to be badly dressed, I felt awkward, which was certain to render me really so, and all the inquisitive looks contributed to put me ill at ease ; at a concert, I sang out of tune, and missed all my rouldes," "But at the dinners, at least, you were not stupid, I imagine ?" "You are quite mistaken, my dear; I always happened to sustain, by I know not what fatality, some argument obnoxious to all husbands. One day, amongst others, (I was not, it is true in the secret of the interview) I wished to prove with the best faith possible, and not thinking any harm, I assure you, that the only happy women that I knew were all young widows ; my mother coughed : I took her to witness; she coughed still louder, but I was in such high spirits, I went on citing examples, and only stopped when the hero of the interview said to me, with a face swollen with rage, ' Mademoiselle, if the state of widowhood seems to you the most desirable thing in the world, few persons, I apprehend, will be inclined to offer you the means of .attaining it.' I looked at him much sur prised, and he had an air of offended dignity, so absurd and so ludicrous, that I burst into a fit of uncontrollable laughter." " What a brute he must have been, if he could not enjoy a joke !" " At other times, I have said that I was fond of society before a man who liked only retirement ; or that my health was delicate, in presence of another who had a horror of a sickly wife. It is admitted that a courtier should have neither humour nor honour; well ! my dear, a girl on preferment should have neither heart, nor liver, nor lungs, nor tastes, nor opinions, nor eyes, nor ears, lest any one of these things should interfere with the particular notions ofthe lord and master who comes to scrutinize her in an ' interview.' I knew two mothers who carried their precautions so far, as not to bring up their daughters in any particular religion, that they might be able to marry according to circumstances, either a Ca tholic or Protestant. But these are rare cases, because almost all men, whatever their own ideas of religion may be, like their wives to be pious." " And if they are not religious, what does it signify to them ?" 108 THE YOUNG LADY. " They think it is a safeguard. " An account of all my ' interviews' would fill a volume. I rarely pleased anybody, and nobody pleased me. It must be confessed that the most agreeable man in the world becomes intolerable in an ' interview,' and that a woman is necessarily frightful, stiff, and stupid : one might as well be sentenced to hard labour ; and since my last unfortunate birthday has thrown my mother into an alarming state of anxiety, I am made perpetually to endure these odious meetings. It is, moreover, painful to see that every day the standard of the qualifications required of the suitor is lowered. We listen now to proposals that nobody would have dared to make a few years since. It is sad, indeed, to be going down so rapidly, that, unless some good stroke of fortune should raise the shares, there is no telling how low they may be." " And this cousin of yours, whom you will not let me speak of, I well remem ber the time when he felt for you one of those strong affections which begin in infancy, and may last through life." Marguerite blushed excessively, and she answered with impatience, " Roger has two thousand a year, and his mother has forbidden him to think of me ; he pretends that he shall wait till she relents, but I would not choose to be the cause of any estrangement between my aunt and him, and although I feel for him, not love, but a kind and sincere affection, I do not intend to wait either the conde scending good-will ofthe Princess deM., or Roger's return from the long voyage she has made him undertake. In a word, I will put an end to it." " That seems the burthen of your song. But would it not be a hundred times better to remain single allyour life than to end by an unhappy union ?" "Oh fie ! remain single like my aunt Eleonore ! I would rather be buried alive ; I am fond of society, and the part assigned to old maids in the world is truly irk some. They are thought ridiculous, they command no respect, they have no one to protect them ; moreover, they enjoy none of the comforts that fortune procures, for at no age will parents allow a daughter what they would give to a son-in-law. An unmarried lady is in guardianship as long as she has the happiness of having a father and mother. She has scarcely an apartment. You see mine ; it is only ray mother's dressing-room, and she does not think it necessary to provide me with one more agreeable and more convenient, because, forsooth, I am going to be married. I am handsomely attired to be paraded about, but I want a great many necessaries * What is the use of giving me this or that, am I not going to be married, and have a superb trousseau ? Why purchase the smallest trinket, shall I not have a splendid corbeille? In fine, restraint and ennui are our lot at home, with a wretched and irksome part to play abroad. The result of all this my dear Diana, is, that, instead of being able, as you have done, to make a choice which ensures the happiness of my life, I am going to bury myself in the saddest ofall tombs — a suitable marriage which suits me not. But, hush ! here is my mo ther's carriage." Diana rose abruptly, exclaiming, — THE YOUNG LADY. 109 '¦Good heavens! what shall I do? She must not see me here." Marguerite reflected an instant, and rising in her turn, said, " Come quick ly; you cannot leave my room without passing through my mother's ; but you can Jo so before she reaches it." In saying these words, she conducted the trembling Lady L. across Madame De Bussy's apartment, and opening the door of a small closet which led into the lady's maid's room, they came to a private staircase, where Marguerite showed Lady L. the way to regain her carriage, which awaited her at a little distance. But, when about to leave her, she said, " Why all this agitation, dear Diana, and this hasty flight ? Why do you leave me so soon ? Your whole manner quite alarms me." " I must go, I must go ; you shall know all. I will write to you. Promise to love me always ; alas ! soon, perhaps, you will be the only one !" And the beautiful Diana threw herself sobbing into the arms of her young friend. But, hearing a noise, she tore herself away, and hastened to descend the little stair case ; after going down a few steps, she returned and said, — " Marguerite, I intreat you not to conclude this marriage. Do not either mar ry for love ; it will cause the misery of your life," and she disappeared. " This is all inexplicable," thought Marguerite ; " what can be the matter ? Is it possible that she is unhappy ?" And the young girl went back to her room, anxiously thinking of her friend. A moment after, Madame De Bussy entered ; she appeared agitated, but singularly happy. " My dearest Marguerite," said she, kissing her daughter's forehead, and taking the seat Lady L. had just left, " I bring you great news, and thank God I knew it in time ! Oh, how happy I am ! Our cousin the old Marquis De Bussy is dead." " I am very sorry," said Marguerite, " he was so kind to me !" " Of course, of course, my dear; I regret him very much also ; but, in dying, he remembered that he was your godfather; and, instead of disseminating his fortune amongst his twenty nephews, he has left you heiress to above two thou sand ayear, besides a very handsome house in Paris. You are'now an excellent match, and already the Duke De C, a relative ofthe late Marquis De Bussy, in sending me the news, makes you the offer of his hand, to strengthen, he says, the ties of friendship which unite him to my family." " And my JiancS, who is to come this evening," said Marguerite, with a pretty arch smile ; " what do you mean to do with him ?" " Why, this morning, as soon as I was acquainted with the chsnge in your for. tune, I wrote to him, before the news got abroad, that having reflected upon the difference of your dispositions and tastes, I begged to decline the honour of his alliance." " Indeed," replied Marguerite ; "I am certainly not sorry. Still I must say that the proceeding appears to me rather harsh. He is considered good enough 1 10 THE YOUNG LADY. for four hundred a year, and thrown off when one has two thousand. What will the world say ?" " It is my duty as a mother to well establish my children, and nobody can blame me for performing it," said Madame De Bussy, in a mild but decided tone. " You may now aspire to anybody, and I hope you will make a magnifi cent marriage." " So I am still, it seems, to be on the look-out for a husband. But now that I am rich, my dearest Mama, why should I not marry for love ? Not in the French fashion, but like Lady L. Do you remember, when we were in England, how delightful it was to see her and her husband ; they were so happy ! For tune, it appears to me, may be turned to better account than to seek fortune Don't you think so, too, Mama ?" " A marriage like Lady L.'s is indeed desirable ! Wait a moment." Madame De Bussy rang for her maid, and telling her to bring an English newspaper lying upon her toilette table, read from it the following paragraph : — " The beautiful and fascinating Lady Diana L , in consequence of severe domestic grief, has eloped from her husband's mansion in Portland-Place, with Prince Frederick de N , well known in England for his success in more than one quarter. It is said that the fugitives are on their way to Italy, through France." Marguerite was in utter consternation. Madame De Bussy, very proud of her argument, even at a friend's expense, added, looking at Marguerite, — ''That is the end of all your love-matches." " Can it be possible !" said Marguerite. " This, then, explains the ....'> But, fearful of betraying the secret of the morning visit, she stopped ; a moment afterwards, she said, " In truth, I do not understand how one is to marry, if marriages of fortune and love marriages are to be equally feared." Marguerite reflected seriously on this subject some months longer, not as she had done before, with the ideas the world had given her, but with the true ideas suggested by the misery of Lady L., who had married for love ; and the unhappi- ness of most of her acquaintance, who had married for fortune or position. Du ring this time, Madame De Bussy made, unmade, and remade an infinite number of matrimonial arrangements, to which her daughter paid little attention. About this period, Roger de M., her cousin, returned from his travels. Time had only strengthened his attachment for her ; and, in their frequently- renewed conversations, marriage appeared to them in its sacred and true light. They loved each other ; and Marguerite married, to become a good and faithful wife, not, as she had so long wished, to escape from being that thing so dull, so helpless, so artificial, that dares neither think nor act ; that has no individuality, no colour, no taste ; that is nothing, knows nothing, wishes nothing, except to please everybody ; the nonentity, called, in France, Une Demoiselle a Marier. THE COUCOU DRIVER BY L. COTJAILHAC. EAR to our grandfathers' memory, the Paris coucou, and the Lille vinaigrette are the only vehicles of the olden time still in existence. The coucou is a kind of box with compartments, to which is attached, generally, a poor, broken- winded horse ; the vinaigrette is the juste-milieu between the sedan-chair and the wheelbarrow. The vinaigrette has been preserved by the patronage of the old ; the coucou is still the fa vourite conveyance of the young. It is a delight ful carriage for persons who like to be closely packed, and who care not how nearly they may be stifled. It recalls all the joyous follies ofthe good old times, when the Desgrieux of the French guards, or of the law-offices, went to dine outside the barriers in company with their Manon Lescauts. It brings back to memory many a mad frolic at the time when grisettes wore short petticoats, and their little wooden shoes resounded gaily on the pavement ; when their dresses were as low as those of great ladies, and when they laughed at everything with Madelon Friquet ! Oh ! the coucou is a capital coach ! So at least think all lovers 112 THE COUCOU DRIVER. Our ancestors were greater rakes than we are, and the coucou is a striking proof of it. We may laugh at their knee breeches, and their powdered wigs ; but they were more advanced than we are in the art of spending time joyously. They understood well all the refinements, all the delicate attentions, all the charming nothings that should form part of a love adventure. Certainly it would never have entered their heads to invent omnibusses for their short excursions to the environs of Paris; to sit there under the immediate survey of seven other couples watching all their movements ; neither would they have had the idea of engaging, to go to St. Cloud, a hackney coach holding six persons, and thus to expose their youthful feelings to the jealous or angry looks of cousins, uncles, or guardians, — no — to their honour be it said ! they invented the coucou ! Have you ever, on a fine Sunday morning, walked towards the Place de la Bastille? Have you ever seen the coucous start for St. Marrde, for Fontenay- sous-Bois, for Nogent, for Neuilly-sur-Marne, for Noisy-le Sec, or any of these delightful little villages situate on the borders of a thick wood, or on the banks of the prettiest river in the world ? Have you seen the arrival in swarms of grisettes and students ? If so, you must have remarked that the gayest, the handsomest, the youngest couples never hesitate a moment; they never stop before the solitary cabriolet, or try to cheapen the fare of the melancholy hack ney coach, the usual vehicle for the shopkeepers' families laden with provisions for their dinners on the grass. They never imprison themselves in the heavy stage coaches, with the travelling clerks and infantry lieutenants ; they all jump into coucous ! You may call it intelligence, or caprice, or gratitude ; it signifies little. It is not the less true, that while every other conveyance opens its doors to all the infirmities, moral and physical, of the Parisian race, the coucou is always freighted with the youngest and the fairest. The coucou being full, " All's right, coachman," and off they go. If the coucou is a peculiar institution, the driver is a type. The institution is departing, alas ! soon, therefore, the type will be no more seen ! Let us hasten to give him a place in our gallery. Jacques, our Coucou Driver, is no longer young. He received the reins from the hands of his father, about the year, 1790. His coucou is an hereditary con cern. More lucky than many a king's son, Jacques succeeded quietly to his an cestors' throne, we mean his ancestors' seat. He considers his coucou as his patrimony, and he feels for it the respect that the young nobleman formerly felt for the feudal castle, the stone archives of his family. He loves it as the landlord loves his houses, he cherishes it as the miser cherishes his gold, and he is as pleased with it as a child with a new plaything. He is never happy but when driving his carriage, whip in hand, and holding his head high, between two fine rows of poplar trees, on a flat and even road, far from the great city, its noise, its inspectors, its private carriages, and the English coachmen with their pow dered wigs. THE COUCOU DRIVER. 113 Jacques does not share the common passion of coachmen for their horses, his idol is his coucou ; horses appear to him only useful and good, because they are harnessed to his coucou. He treats them as a king treats his ministers. When they become lame and worn out, he dismisses them ; he must have his coucou well drawn : a king is sometimes wrong in having too long harnessed to his state carriage, horses which can no longer walk strait, notwithstanding the loud and frequent warnings administered by the whip of public opinion. Jacques never falls into such an error; that his coach may roll on smoothly he does not hesitate to change frequently his ministers. The Coucou Driver has seen the last festivities of the old regime, the patriotic ceremonies ofthe revolution, the orgies of the directory, the victories of the em pire, the processions of the restoration, and the popular triumph of July. His hair is turning as white as snow, but his countenance is always bright and joy ous, and when, on a fine day, his hat is coquettishly stuck on one side, and he has a rose in his button-hole, he looks worthy to be the charioteer of the prettiest pair of lovers ever seen since the days of Abelard and Eloise, or, if you like it better, since Hero and Leander. He has passed through various historical epochs, and his costume bears the stamp of each. Of the fashions of 1 799, he retains the three-cornered hat, and the pig-tail ; since the empire, he wears the trousers adopted for the uniform of the imperial guard; and dates from 1818 his coffee-eoloured cloak. Thus equipped, our Driver is an historical monument, and deserves a place in a museum. Jacques regrets the time when the coach made the law for the traveller, and not the traveller for the coach. The world seems to him on the verge of ruin since conveyances were made to start at a fixed hour, and that guards and postillions are nothing more than so many regulated machines like Breguet watches, under the control of the clerk of the coach-office. What fine times were those when the Driver started at his own will and pleasure; when his vehicle was full; when he had comfortably sipped his wine; when he had taken an affec tionate leave of his wife and children; when the sky was bright and cloudless ; he would then condescend to say to the travellers, as the captain of a merchant ship says to his passengers, "We are going to start; the wind is favorable." In Jacques's eyes the old coach was the beau ideal of public conveyances. There people used to travel two hours in the evening to avoid the great heat of the day, to stop to take part in the village festivals, or the religious processions of the towns, and at that time could, at the solicitations of an anxious nurse, wait "till the child had finished cutting its first tooth, before resuming the route. Now to Jacques's dismay, the mails start and arrive almost to a minute, and scarcely give a traveller time to ask for some slight refreshment from the window. Jacques would not submit to the yoke of starting at a fixed hour; he has pre served his independence, and in bright colours and enormous letters he has had Q 114 THE COUCOU DRIVER. written on his coucou these proud words, "Voiture a volonte" ; which must not be understood to mean that the coucou is at the will of the passengers, but thai the passengers are at the will of the coachman. Jacques is so proud of his liberty — he fears so much to be confounded with what he calls the slaves of the fixed hour — that he never neglects an opportunity of manifesting his independence. For instance, if he is hired at nine o'clock in the morning, he takes care not to arrive till one hour later, and then looks at his customers with an air of defiance. At another time, when his coach is full, he seldom fails to keep his passengers waiting under one pretext and another, merely to prove that his coucou is not a diligence. If, on the road, anybody should recommend him to take the turning to the left, he will directly gallop off to the right. Each of his acts is a direct protest against all adopted innovations, and it is thus- only that he takes his revenge and keeps up his courage. The Coucou Driver is the best guide for an excursion to the environs of Paris. He is not a savant ; he has no taste for the beauties of nature or art ; he will not point out to the traveller the magnificent views, the historical ruins, or the celebrated public buildings ; but he will tell you of all the famous res taurateurs, and take you where you can have the best dinner in the most plea sant retreat. This is certainly something. One does not leave the city for the suburbs to pursue antiquarian research ; in fact, where would materials be found for such studies ? They have long been destroyed by speculators. Excepting St. Denis and its old tombs, and Versailles and its palace, there is nothing to be seen round Paris but little eating-houses, where wine and refresh ments may be had at all prices, and almost in all styles. What can a citizen requiring a little change of scene, and particularly one who is not very conver sant with history, want more ? As to the views, they have been spoilt every where by modern buildings. Instead of fine trees and tufted woods, one may see now little white houses, that are to be let six months in the year ; they generally consist of five rooms, wine-cellar, and loft, with a quarter of an acre of garden ; and it is there that the worthy shopkeeper takes rest on the Sunday from his labours of the weeK. To find real country, one must now go fifty miles from Paris ; therefore Jacques, whose trips never extend so far, is quite right not to affect learning, nor to be an admirer of the beauties of nature, but to con tent himself with giving to his customers well-timed information for their mate rial comfort. When he hears some retired tradesman say to his wife at the moment of start ing, " Come, my love, we are going to breathe a little fresh air, and rest our selves in the shade," he cannot help smiling ; for he knows that in the environs of Paris there is no fresh air, and that there is still less shade to be found than in the city, where the high walls and the large buildings may perchance serve as a protection against the ardent rays ofthe sun. THE COUCOU DlilVEIt. 115 If Jacques patronises all the Vatels in the suburbs, he is well rewarded for his services. There is always a corner at the fire and a place at the table for him; the most delicate morsels, with smiles and compliments, are showered upon him. As soon as the landlady perceives in the distance the lean horse and well-worn coucou, a knife and fork are laid for father Jacques, as he is call ed ; and if he will not get down, the maid servant brings out upon a plate a glass of wine. While he drinks it, Jacques, who is quite a wag, gives a sly look at the' girl, chucks her under the chin, and by way of thanks, wishes her a good husband for the next year. When he has not breakfasted, and his appetite is keen, he has not so much consideration for his customers; he jumps from his seat, and accepts the invita tion to eat a morsel. But he is only at Sevres, and his destination is Versailles. What matters it to him ? has he not established a system of absolute indepen dence towards the public ? The passengers may storm and grumble ; he takes no other notice than occasionally peeping at them from the window, while he re lishes the excellent ragout that has been placed before him. " But, Coachman," says a bright-eyed woman, " Coachman, pray let us go on. My cousin expects me at eleven o'clock in the park, and it is now a quar ter past." " Jacques, my good Jacques" says an old gentleman, at whose buttonhole hangs the order of St. Louis, " how long do you mean to keep us here ? My friend, the Chevalier De Vorbel is waiting breakfast for me; and you know how punctual old sailors are." Nothing moves Jacques ; he continues to do ample justice to the ragout ; but if deaf he is not dumb, for, having finished his meal, he sings a comic song to the infinite delight of his kind entertainers. "Oh ! this is really too bad" cries a man half dead with the heat, and squeezed in between a market woman and a handsome carabinier, " this is really too bad ; coachman, I shall report you to your inspector." Jacques laughs heartily at this threat, for he is under neither law nor master, and is in the habit of being his own inspector. At this moment a young man who seems in a greater hurry than the rest, jumps down from his seat and runs towards Versailles across the fields. He is in love, and has an appointment. This escape makes no difference to Jacques ; the fares are all paid beforehand, and as the young man was a "lapin" — that is, had a place on the box with the coachman — his absence will leave Jacques more room, or at least admit of his picking up another " lapin" on the road. At last, having sipped his coffee, and the customary glass of liqueur, as a qualifier, joked with the mistress, and the servant, caressed the dog, smoked his pipe and replaced it in its case ; Jacques determines to resume the whip and reins. Angry and abusive epithets are showered on his head; his sang-froid never forsakes him ; he hums a tune, talks to his horse, or cries in a stento ian 116 THE COUCOU DRIVER. voice, " A ' lapin' for Versailles !" He meets with a " lapin"; this delays him another few minutes, for he only sets off again when he has drunk another glass of brandy with his new customer. At twelve o'clock, he enters Versailles, and in setting down his passengers he does not fear to say to them, " Started from Paris at quarter to nine; hav'nt we come in good time, my dears ?" Jacques has nothing to fear from the anger of the public ; he knows full well that on the first fine day, thousands of Parisians will rush from the city and crowd at the barriers into every available vehicle. He relies with perfect confi dence on the sun and the rain. Although living a sort of wandering life, Jacques has not given up all the ob ligations that society imposes. He has a wife and children ; but his home has little attraction, for him. Scarcely two or three times a week does he repose under his own roof; he seems hardly able to breathe at his ease within the bar riers; often, sooner than return to the town, he stops half way, unharnesses his horse, and passes the night upon the not over soft cushions of his coucou. It is rare that he does not meet with some belated couple who will readily engage his coach to return to Paris. The couple conceal themselves on the innermost bench, Jacques pretends to sleep, and Cocotte, proud of his master's confidence' stops only in the middle of Paris, after having escaped all accidents by the way. There is no man better acquainted than the Coucou Driver with particulars concerning the functionaries of all little places round Paris. He knows by heart the name of every mayor ; he will relate to you all the circumstances attending his election, his trade, his politics ; the sub-Prefect of Sceaux cannot take nor per form an act unknown to him; only listen to him, and you will find him an inde fatigable chronicler. Father Jacques is an excellent almanack ; he knows the dates and the amuse ments of all the village festivals that can attract the Parisian. Nogent-sur-marne, August 15, fireworks, dance on the green, in the presence ofthe mayor with his insignia, three gendarmes in full uniform, numerous grisettes, and linendrapers' shopmen, &c, &c, &c. Montmorency, May 1, programme ditto. Charen- ton, July 3, programme, ditto. If it be true that pleasure is much increased by variety, one would think that people must be prodigiously wearied atthese rustic fetes ; yet there is much to enjoy. Plump and rosy girls heartily dancing to the tones of a discordant fiddle ; the mayor awarding the prize to the most succes- ful in the race; the mayoress giving, by three claps of her hands, the signal for the rural fireworks : — all these things are certainly worth seeing. But Jacques, the chronicler and kalendar of the environs of Paris, has many other qualities. He is a perfect physiognomist ; he knows at once the characters of his customers as they enter his vehicle ; and without being told takes the young dandies and opera-dancers to Ranelagh gardens, the new married couples to the He d'Amour ; the old soldiers to the Gros-Caillou ; the wine-merchants THE COUCOU DRIVER. 117 to Bercy, the milliners to the He St. Denis ; the poor poets to Montmartre ; the artists to Versailles ; the shareholders in the joint stock companies to Charenton (the French Bedlam) : he never makes a mistake. Jacques is also a Matthew Laensberg of the first order. He prophesies fine weather or foretels a storm a month beforehand. When you see him cleaning the body of his old coach to revive the colours ; and bringing out his brush and pot of varnish to touch up the harness, you may be sure that the barometer is fixed at " fair" ; but when he looks with indifference on the numberless splashes bedaubing his well-beloved coucou, the horizon is charged with heavy though invisible clouds : this oracle is more to be depended on than that of Calchas. Jacques is weatherwise on terra firma as an old sailor is at sea. Suppose it is Sunday morning ; the sky is clear, and the rays of the sun are bright and warm. The Parisians crowd into the hackney coaches, coucous, cabriolets, and vehicles of all sizes and descriptions. Jacques indulges in a sly smile, for he feels sure that it will rain ; and even while hurrying passengers into his machine, he says in a low voice to a comrade standing by, "I say, friend Landry, it will be nice weather for the ducks, this evening !" The coolness and courage of the diligence conductor in the midst of danger on the road have been much extolled ; his presence of mind has passed into a proverb ; that is the way of the world ! flatteries are always showered upon the great. Who is more distinguished for his coolness and courage than the Coucou Driver? What better evidence of his coolness than the ever-increasing slowness with which he performs the same journey every day, assailed on all sides by im patient travellers ? For his courage has he not fought a hundred times with the tipsy soldier, or the riotous workman, who, from having drunk too much, refused him the pourboire, to which he always considers himself entitled ? Talk of the presence of mind of the diligence conductor ! how often has the Coucou Driver by purposely jolting his vehicle, warned the young lovers who were tenderly pressing each other's hands, that the papa had turned his eyes towards them. But despite his rare qualities, he is not vain ! You may praise at his expense anybody more fortunate or in a better situation than himself, only pay a little higher fare, and he cares not. for your panegyric. Jacques is good natured and of an easy temper, but he has one antipathy which he cannot overcome. He detests excise officers, and he abuses them in no measured terms. The sight only of their green uniform quite upsets him ; it would appear, according to his idea, that the visit to which he is obliged to submit from them, quite sullies his dear coucou ; for during the whole time it lasts, he grumbles between his teeth certain cabalastic words as if he were exor cising an evil spirit. But he takes care to express himself in a low tone of voice since the day that an ill-tempered officer took him before the magistrate for his abusive language, and he was fined to the amount of a fortnight's earnings. In Jacques's estimation, the head quarters of tyranny is the excise office, the oppres sors of the people are excisemen. 118 THE COUCOU DRIVER. Railways have no more declared enemy than Jacques. The day when that of Versailles was opened, he put a crape on his hat ; he talks with unfeigned sor row of the ruin this detestable invention will cause him : twenty times a day he wishes James Watt and M. Pereyre* at the devil. He has not seen St. Ger main for two years ; he will never see Versailles again ; he flies from the smoke of the locomotives as from a plague ; and he lives in fear that the retreat he has now chosen will not remain long unmolested. When he read in a newspaper that a railway had been projected from Paris to St Maur, passing through Vin- cennes, he shed bitter tears. Where can the coucou take refuge, when thus deprived of its empire? What! no longer to carry the young milliner's girls to the ball of the Corybante, where non-commissioned artillery officers expect them ! the lovers to the calm and romantic shades of Fond de Beaute, so full of remini scences of Agnes Sorel ! the English to see Papavoine's tree ! the citizens to dine under the bridge at Joinville, in the middle of the pretty gay little river Marne ! What then will become of the coucou ? — it will be reduced to carry vegetables to market, or to give up its body to be converted into a railway car riage. Dreadful necessity ! We sincerely sympathize in the concou's distress; the railway is no doubt useful to the merchant pressed for time, or to the govern ment messenger; but to idle travellers, its strait lines will never be so attractive as the charming irregularities of the coucou and the diligence. I ask the ques tion of all poets, with or without long beards. Years begin to weigh heavily on Jacques's head. His hand trembles, and his sight is dim. He will soon surrender his coucou to Jacquot, his eldest boy, whom he has brought up to succeed him ; for himself, he will retreat to the summit of Montmartre, far from the railways, the coaches that start at a fixed hour, and the omnibus conductors. May he not live to see the coucou com pletely superseded. * Director of the Railway to St. Germain. ^¦likS^J',^ THE SCHOOLBOY. BY H. ROLLAND. IKE a crucible in which is produced from the same raw material a base dross that is thrown away, or a Fife precious sparkling jewel, the school is the labora tory in which ferment the future destinies of forth coming generations. By the word Scholar we under stand all who receive instruction ; from the ragged i urchin who spells through the alphabet in a chari table institution, to the philosophical student, who seated on a bench at a public lecture, complacently listens to wiredrawn dissertations on Locke, Hobbes, or Spinoza. It is enough for us to mention the disciples of the freres ignorantins and even those who receive the first rudiments of education through the more popular method of Abbe Gaultier. Their scholastic career is not extensive enough to require a more lengthened record; for after a few elements, more or less incom plete, of reading, writing, and arithmetic, they for the most part put on the leather or serge apron, the emblem of apprenticeship. But we intend to devote our at tention to the elite of our youth, whose best years are consecrated to serious studies, and who furnish authors, physicians, and lawyers to society, orators to the tribune, and men of talent and learning to the nation. 120 THE SCHOOLBOY. The college was formerly a sorrowful and sombre pile, with thick walls and windows securely barred and latticed. Inside, a cloistral silence, vast solitudes, gratings instead of doors, loopholes behind which peered inquisitive eyes, gloomy corridors where black shades with soured faces were seen gliding along the walls. Then, there were terrible punishments, a competition of severity which made the old men hesitate between the Orators and Benedictines, but of which the Josephists bore off the prize. Now, the appearance of the college is less austere ; it is a white and smiling building, inundated through many win dows with a flood of light; there are airy walks, a garden in which the tufted trees spread their branches beyond the walls. The corrector, that grotesque executioner, who was a necessary actor of the old penitentiary system, has dis appeared. There is no longer a head master in a black coat, with a frown ing brow, and the implacable countenance of an inquisitor; but a principal with obliging manners, almost gallant, honied as a prospectus, who promises a comfortable home, paternal cares, with wholesome and abundant food. Verily there is a great improvement from the past to the present, though too often this seductive exterior is only another bait: in the interior speculation sways; par simony and avarice stop the realisation of useful reforms. In the government colleges, as in the private institutions in France, there are two kinds of scholars, the boarder and the day-boy. The day-boy is the envied and happy being, who has a foot in the world, of which the boarder catches only a transient glimpse; his movements are free; with his studies are blended out-door enjoyments, the pleasures of the city, the joys of the family circle, and affectionate cares. The boarder's lot is absolute dependence, the monotonous uniformity of daily duties, limited horizon, and an almost complete seclusion from his friends. Their appearance presents a striking contrast. The boarder abandoned to himself, wretched by physical discomfort, as well as from moral neglect, bears as little resemblance to the day-boy — a merry, mischievous, well- dressed child, as a snarling vicious, unkempt cur to an agile and shapely grey hound. However the day-boy is the tie that connects the boarder to the world from which he is shut out. He it is who imports balls, tops, toys of all sorts, and above all fruits and other eatables, which transform occasionally the sorry school fare into a regal banquet. It is he also'who introduces the delightful novels that are devoured behind a dictionary, while a classical book is hypocri tically opened on the desk, and the hand seems to be tracing characters on the paper. This distinction ofthe pupils in all government and private schools into boar ders and day-boys always bears strongly marked features. The professors more over establish two categories, that of the clever pupils in their classes, the plod ders, and that of the less intellectual boys, who are branded with the name of " the idle" (in a technical style the piocheurs and the cancres): for dulness is always considered as proceeding (not from incapacity, but) from indolence, THE SCHOOLBOY. 121 inasmuch as the master indiscriminately declares to every parent that the boy has abilities. The Schoolboy, himself, admits no such classification. Idleness is a palatable fruit, which he gorges with too much pleasure to make it a cause of degradation. He maintains the superiority of bodily strength, the supremacy of the law of the fist over intellectual power which he despises, most frequently because he is not possessed of it. Nor is this, after all, so very irrational, inas much as the pre-eminence of strength generally belongs to those who are the more advanced ¦ in age, and consequently in their studies : so that respect and deference increase in proportion to the elevation of the classes. If, however, in solence to the lower orders can be admitted as a proof of nobility, this aristo cracy possesses that qualification in the highest degree, and the so-much boasted equality ofthe college in reality does not exist. The lofty patricians injuriously designate the little plebeians that surround them, moutards or momes ; and freely indulge towards them all the abuses of power that characterise oriental despotism. It would be difficult to describe in general terms the French Schoolboy. It maybe said thathehasamischiev- ous expression of countenance, a --n n bold eye, a perpetual smile on his lips, a turned-up nose, indicative of malice and impudence, rosy cheeks, hair (once kept short, but now) carefully allowed to grow, since a government order has di rected precisely the contrary. His j clothes are too integral a part of the Schoolboy for us not to mention them ; but we must premise that we are speaking of the day-boy, and not of the boarder, the cut of whose clothes is invariably uniform. The Schoolboy has, in the first place, his head protected by a cap ornamented with a collossal peak, which the owner during his leisure hours whittles into lace with his penknife. This peak is percepti ble only during the first week or two, aprompt divorce doing justice to so inconvenient an accessory. A crumpled shirt collar peeps out from the black cravat thrown negligently round his neck, with its ends loosely tied and hanging down. The blouse is R 122 THE SCHOOLBOY. the most common habiliment of the French Schoolboy during his first years ; but this infantine costume is soon replaced by one of those ambiguous garments that partake the nature of the jacket and the coat. The sleeves are generally too short by three inches ; the stuff is worn threadbare, and is stained with mon strous spots; the collar is in tatters, the linings are greasy; and if some, to pre serve their clothes, carefully place their arms under the protection of brown hol- land sleeves, they are branded with the name of grocers. To a batton-hole is tied an elegant piece of string, which serves as a guard for the key of the Scholar's desk. Next comes his waistcoat, too short, loose for want of buttons, and separated from the trousers by an interval of two inches, allowing the display of his list braces, and a portion of his shirt. The waistcoat is a transient garment, disappearing with the first heats of summer. The trousers bear witness to their owner's growth ; they leave open to view speckled stockings which lose themselves in shapeless shoes of inflexible leather, with thick soles protected by hobnails. Torn and dogs- eared books are artistically strapped together and slung over his shoulder; some times they are contained in a vast green cardboard box hung on his breast by a strap. It is needless to add that gloves are considered quite a luxury. A Schoolboy who should think proper to wear them would be called a fop. One of the most striking characteristics of the Schoolboy is his impudence. By means of this precious quality he unblushingly repels with a flat denial all accu sations, even when caught in the very act. "You are chattering, Sir," cries the usher. "I! no Sir," meekly interrupts the delinquent, breaking off the con versation with the next boy, and assuming an expression of hypocritical astonish ment mingled with the tone of injured innocence. To excuse himself from the infraction of a rule of discipline, he invents with promptitude a plea of which the most clear-sighted is at a loss to find the weak side. He thus acquires an habitual disregard to truth to such a degree, that candour is considered a proof of imbe cility, and falsehood an absolute necessity to serve the double purpose of avoid ing punishment' and annoying the usher, against whom, the Schoolboy glories in waging open and incessant war. In colleges, where he is a government officer, and where he is supported by the head master, who would not hesitate to expel an intractable pupil, the usher is at least respected. But in private schools the expulsion of the guilty party would entail upon the master a proportionate loss; and the Schoolboy, conscious of his ad vantage, maintains a struggle as strongly marked with hatred, and as obstinate as that ofthe Guelfs and Gibelins, — a struggle continued from generation to gene ration, and in which are wasted floods of ink. The pupil brings to it his intract- ibility, his perverse disposition, his obstinacy, and his mischievous tricks. The usher meets these with all the authority that devolves on him, and strengthens the feud by his prodigality in the infliction of impositions, confinements, and bad marks. -The usher is commonly some artizan's son, who leaves college with the bare rudiments of education, and a profound contempt for the calling of his THE SCHOOLBOY. 123 father. He dreams at first ofthe most brilliant destiny, but his abilities will not stand a severe test, and his ambition being soon reduced to a lower standard, he becomes an usher. His position in that humble capacity varies according to his disposition. If he be a lenient usher, he is treated like Phaedrus's log, the inert king whom the frogs, his subjects, covered with mud and spawn. He is laughed at, mocked, hooted and insulted, for there is no limit to the Schoolboy's impudence, when he is sure of impunity. The schoolroom becomes a hotbed of disorder; while active gossip, reiterated neglect, quarrels begun with the tongue and terminated with the fist, incessantly augment the discord. The benevolent warnings of the master are totally disregarded. The Schoolboy knows no medium ; he cannot use, he can only abuse. The aggravated usher generally renounces indulgence and turns to the extreme of severity; and by the harrassed schoolboys is then nicknamed — dog. When the Schoolboy is impertinent and attempts to argue with the usher; when he calls him by offensive epithets, and picks a quarrel with him, he is looked up to by the rest of the boys as a hero. He who dares to brave tyranny is generally praised by his schoolfellows, and becomes the leader in all games and mischief: he is sure to have numerous partners. This kind of partnership con sists of a fraternal union with a comrade, the first result of which is to put in com mon toys, pocket-money, confidence and tribulation ; a true and naive friendship, without any under-current of egotism or self-interest, and which is very seldom found away from college. The other capital faults of the Schoolboy are idleness and a proverbial intemperance of tongue ; no lazzarone with more delight in dulges the pleasure ofthe dolcefar niente; no nun or talking bird, instructed by an old woman, is gifted with such a superabundance of words. These two hundred-headed hydras, impositions and detentions cannot subjugate. It is not only idleness seeking oblivion of duty in frivolous amusement ; it is inert, brute idleness, the idleness that makes the human body like an unwound clock, the idleness of the savage, by which absolute lethargy is thrown into all the springs of thought and action. The love of chattering so keenly enjoyed by boys is an exuberant superabundance, or rather an immense inundation, before which no resource is left but to resign oneself and fold one's arms : it is like the overflow ing talk of a dumb man suddenly recovering the faculty of speech. The quarrelsome disposition manifested by the Schoolboy towards his supe riors is easily explained by their respective positions; but it is known that there is no greater pleasure than chaffing a new boy, — a poor lad just arrived from the country, whom all the school contrive to tease and pester by all sorts of tricks. To torment, is the weapon of the weak; but persevering provocations soon rouse the new comer's angry feeel'ings, and bloody battles often ensue. As soon as two boys begin to seize each other by the collar, their schoolfellows hasten to the spot and form a ring round them to witness the fight ; each taking 124 THE SCHOOLBOY. the part of one of the two champions, and distributing censure or applause as a well aimed blow blackens an eye, or flattens a nose. The usher plays here the part of the gods of Homer ; he interferes at the end ofthe drama, and makes conqueror and conquered alike expiate by punishment both victory and defeat. Gluttony is another of the Schoolboy's vices; but shame prevents its mani festation among the elder boys. It reveals itself amongst the juniors in exchanges of provisions, in pilfering a few dainties, and in an enormous consumption of barley sugar and bulls' eyes. The latter are of marvellous effect in beguiling the length of evenings devoted to study. The dainty appetite of grown-up boys shews itself in visits on Sundays to the most noted pastrycooks in Paris. If to the qualities we enumerate are added an insatiable love, of amusement, the giddiness natural to youth, and a store of national malice, the Schoolboy's character will be complete ; a character in' which the vices singularly outweigh the virtues. But goodness of heart, and a natural love of right are not wanting ; and when properly repressed by parental management, all the defects of the Schoolboy's character disappear as he grows up and begins to reflect. One trait which we must not forget to mention in speaking of the School boy, is his fondness for animals. When the school rules are not over severe, he keeps in cages, magpies and rooks ; if such an indulgence is denied him, he hides silkworms in his desk; nor is it an easy task to procure them mulberry leaves, and prevent their seizure by the ushers. Sometimes he contrives to stable there a pair of white mice. Then to see how carefully he tends his dwarfish pets, what a pretty little buggy he constructs for them of the covers of his old books, the miniature harness he makes ofthe chin-strap of his cap, and with what envious eyes his Tom Thumb's coach is admired by his formfellows. When these would be con sidered a breach of discipline, the Schoolboy consoles himself with butterflies, horned beetles, and cockchafers. He displays a wonderful talent for drawing and natural history, robes ill-starred cockchafers in full canonicals, and places them in paper pulpits, or saddles them with little imps cut out of the cover of an old copybook. How great his joy when the astounded usher almost falls SHILBAUT * CAanJ't THE SCHOOLBOY. 125 from his stool at the sight of one of these insects in disguise crawling over the open book in his hand while he is hearing a boy's lesson ! For such a feat as this the whole school is generally kept in for the day. Truly the Schoolboy is a fit subject for observation. He has not yet learned to conceal his sentiments and passions beneath a mask ; they dissimulate but poorly on his unskilful face. You discern plainly expressions of jealousy, envy» and foolish self-love that the man of the world will never outwardly betray. The boasted system of public education admirably serves to develop these bad propensities. A constant struggle between rival intelligences, excites the con queror's pride ; and the envy of the conquered seldom fails to undervalue his adversary's talent, or to accuse the judge of partiality. These circumstances make of the studious boy a being little loved by his schoolfellows ; he is sneered at for his anxiety to succeed, for his vexation after defeat, for the suspicious watch he keeps over the plagiary looks of his formfellows. They are enchanted when he is disappointed and annoyed. They animadvert upon his vanity ; and unwilling to admit humiliating inferiority, they console themselves by proclaim ing that a college triumph is very far from being a decisive test of abilities; that, though clever at a theme, their successful rival is after all a very stupid fellow ; and finally, that those bright meteors that burst forth at school generally die away in some obscure country town, or, are doomed to exchange their auroela for some mechanical trade. We must not close this general portrait of the Schoolboy without pointing out the irksome position of the boursiers,* poor devils from whom the usher con siders it his duty to exact more application than from the rest, as if to make them thus pay the privilege granted them. At private schools, there are no boursiers ; but by the selfish manoeuvre we have already explained,! the direc tors give a gratuitous education to a fe w fortuneless children, which acts of charity are ostentatiously paraded, and cruelly dinned in the ears ofthe poor pupils, if they do not bring honour to the school by success in their studies. The Schoolboy rises at five in the summer, and at a quarter past five in the winter. The sound of a bell wakens and warns him to rise, and the bell is ac cordingly hated by scholars. After the revolution of 1830, a military reaction took place in the government colleges : the bell was banished and gave place to the drum. But not so in young gentlemen's boarding schools. The Schoolboy lies in bed grumbling until the last vibration has ceased ; when crawling forth with swollen eyelids, yawning and stretching his arms, he hastily dresses, and slipshod and unbuttoned, crosses the piercing draughts of the corridors into the * Those who are kept at school at the expense of the government, or of the towns where their families reside, are called boursiers. They are, generally, boys showing early manifes tations of talent, and belonging to poor families. f Vide the Schoolmaster. 126 THE SCHOOLBOY, schoolroom. Prayers over, the boys proceed to wash, very reluctantly, especi ally in winter when the water is freezing. After the allotted time, each scholar takes his place at his desk, and produces the books required for his matutinal studies; the usher enthrones himself on his raised chair, whence his eye commands the whole school. The morning is ordinarily consecrated to lessons ; each in his turn, after more or less study, goes to the master's desk to repeat his task, in a drawling monotonous voice, after much coughing, hesitation, and clearing of the voice, to the great satisfaction of the master who holds the book. Delightful task to listen, hour after hour, to disjecta? membrae of Latin and Greek j closely to watch each pupil in order to detect the deception commonly resorted to — as looking over the next boy's book, sticking a page on the desk, or in a cap, making use of a prompter, writing the lesson on the finger nails and palms of the hands. The lesson bungled through, the promising pupil hastens back to his noisy play, shortly interrupted by the welcome sound of the breakfast bell. Each boy's allowance consists of a thick slice of bread — happy he to whose share falls the coveted crust ! The scholars are' wont to dig a deep hole in their bread, and fill it up with jam, or a piece of salt butter. The meal over, they flock to the playground. Several hours of study succeed to a short interval of relaxation, and twelve o'clock striking announces dinner. Let us pass over the parsimony and neglect that generally prevail in the culinary department of a boarding-school ; happy the reader who has not to consult his memory to bring to mind the scanty and ill- dressed fare forced on the inmates of private schools, to the great preju dice of their health and spirits. We need not urge in this place the necessity that exists for a thorough and stringent reform of the dietetic system there pre valent. Let it not be objected that government sends inspectors into private boarding-schools to examine into and report upon the household discipline and economy of each, as well as the system of instruction adopted. So far as learning and intelligence go, boys mechanically trained to answer certain questions on ap pearing before the inspectors of schools, cannot give a very fair criterion of the system of instruction ; and with respect to the diet, they taste only the broth and the wine reserved for the master's table. In fact the inspector's visit is a farce on all sides. After dinner, followed by half an hour's play, a few hours are devoted to study ; then comes the four o'clock meal, which differs in no respect from breakfast. The sound of the bell again summons the scholars from the playground to a re newal of scholastic duties that last till bedtime. When night sets in, the boys work by the faint and lurid light of common tin lamps, scantily fed with rancid oil. In the evening, the poets of the college invoke their muse, excited by the silence reigning within and without, and by a certain exaltation of mind that often succeeds to the fatigue of study. Bedtime comes at last, after an undi gested supper, to the great satisfaction of the Schoolboy, who, buried beneath his bedclothes, finds a comfortable warmth that in the day is denied him by the THE SCHOOLBOY. 127 schoolroom stove, an unwieldy cast iron machine, in which a green log or two smoke for hours but give no heat. In bed he may lose himself in thought, and chew the cud of sweet and bitter fancy, until sleep seals his eyes, without dread of being recalled to himself by the usher's detested voice. In this manner day succeeds day in frightful sameness, till Sunday mercifully opens the doors to those captives who are not under imposition or confinement. The Schoolboy's heart leaps with joy as the hour approaches that restores him to freedom, when he may once more mix with the busy throng b the street, and turn his back for a few hours on his prison house. Dread of detention on this auspicious day is a powerful auxiliary of the master's ; it is a spur to idleness, a curb on obstinacy ; and not to forfeit this precious privilege, there is no obstacle the Schoolboy will not surmount — despite the prospective terrors of black Monday. Thursday is to Sunday what the reflector is to the taper ; for the show of liberty it brings in the shape of a walk in rank and file in the public gardens, is completely illusory. Apple-women and lollipop-sellers tempt the prisoners at large with their wares ; but the tantalized captives are forbidden to purchase, and the usher in the rear keeps his lynx eye fixed on one and all, with the vigilance of a tidewaiter on the look out. Besides Sundays, Thursdays, and the festivals of the kalendar, the Schoolboy has two other holidays in the year — the anniversary of St. Charlemagne, com memorated by an entertainment given to the senior pupils, and the breaking-up day, the St. Sylvester of the scholastic year, when the prizes are distributed. The pedagogue's pedantry and previously prepared extemporisations, the mock solemnity. of the ceremony, the hypocrisy that invariably attends it, the laureates' and their parents' pride, the dejected and mournful looks of the unsuccessful competitors, have been so often turned into ridicule that we need not dwell on them here. We have described the Schoolboy at school, and recorded the daily routine of his duties ; but we need scarcely remark that his disposition and habits materi ally change as he grows up, and the time approaches for him to leave school. Let us complete our sketch by briefly noticing these modifications year by year, natur ally passing over the lighter shades in order to generalize our picture. Taking the average number of years that a boy attends school at eight or nine, he is for the first two, the little urchin in frock and trousers, who every morning starts from home carrying a wicker handbasket containing a slender sandwich or two, and a bottle of water or weak negus for his dinner. The master tyrannizes with impunity over his pupils at this tender age, making them tremble by the sound of his voice, and even by a look, and unsparingly using the ferula to punish their tender hands. But when five o'clock strikes, fools' cap and punish ments, Chapsal and Lhomond are all forgotten. The small fry rush into the street like a swarm of bees, make grimaces at the grocer, steal a handful of his 128 THE SCHOOLBOY prunes, and spit in his cask of sardines. They show their happy mothers their good marks, and on rare occasions a medal awarded for good conduct and appli cation. In the third year the Schoolboys are admitted into college, where they are al the outset remarkable for their torn, soiled, and ink-spotted clothes, and for the pile of books with which they are mostly incumbered. They walk at the head of the phalanx, and are looked down upon by their schoolfellows. The ushers are particularly severe with them. The masters overwhelm them with tasks and im positions ; for everything is so well ordered, that the more the boys are, by their physical strength and their habits, becoming qualified for study, the less they have to do. The literary exercises of these tyroes go no farther than reading Berquin and Robinson Crusoe, and they receive for a prize at the end of the scholastic year, a copy of Numa Pompilius or Telemachus. If at college there is a prouder being than the head boy, it is certainly the last boy but one. Of this the Schoolboy in his fourth year is a proof; for he visits tenfold on the class from which he has just risen a step, all annoyance and con tempt that he himself had to submit to. Yet the fourth year scarcely differs from the third. For the Schoolboy still continues to make bread balls and paper boats, and to scribble comic heads on the fly-leaves and covers of his copy-book ; but he has a passion for new books, leaves off pinafores (though he still retains a frill to his shirt), and shares Nemorin's passion for the fair Estelle, and the solitude of Robinson Crusoe on his island. In his fifth scholastic year he generally takes his first communion, which sancti fies for awhile his boyish pursuits. He eschews profane conversation, and looks with a kind of terror upon the student of philosophy, who is said to be in love with a pretty grisette. Religious books supersede for a limited time novels and playbooks. In his sixth year the veil that religion had thrown over his eyes gradually falls away; he is no longer shocked at impure language, and secretly indulges in voluptuous dreams. He ridicules his schoolfellows who are less depraved than himself, and glories in having a pretty cousin for a sweetheart. He no longer writes lampoons against ushers, but spends whole hours composing verses addres sed to his mistress. These, however, he hides as carefully from his schoolfel lows as from the masters, for Latin poetry alone is tolerated at college. In the seventh year his hitherto innocent passions degenerate into sensuality. He devours the lascivious pages of modern French novelists, and sifts out the mean ing of every ambiguous passage. He smokes his first cigar in secret ; though the precaution is useless, as the indulgence cannot long be hidden. In the next year the Schoolboy becomes a dandy, has his hair curled on Sundays, and takes to the use of gloves. Novels no longer satisfy him ; he reads in secret Louvet and Casanova. About this time he writes caustic satires on the frailty of woman ; and indignant that his native language should possess no THE SCHOOLBOY. 129 epic poem, he resolutely determines to lose no time in supplying the deficiency. The class of rhetorical students is divided into two sections, the old and the new. The " veterans" are as careless and untidy as professional savants; they are assiduous but routine-ridden scholars — poor devils confined within their col lege walls, and unblessed by the smallest ray from the outer world. Their only mistresses are Dido and Lavinia; they study La Harpe and the Modeles de Litterature, back Racine, and decry Victor Hugo. Between the old and new section of rhetoric there generally exists a deadly feud. The disciples ofthe first year deprecate the pedantry and exclusively classical doctrines of the veterans ; affect the moustache, yellow gloves, and spurs; and are never seen out of college without a lighted cigar in their mouth. Instead of reading Virgil and Horace, and composing Latin pentameters, the young gentlemen ofthe new section form their style by the perusal of works of the modern romantic school, and debates in the Chambers, as reported by the newspapers. The more timid of the crew write vaudevilles. The philosophical student never confesses his connexion with college without a blush ; he attends it only en amateur. If he belong to a rich and noble family, he is a dandy, sits in the stalls at the opera, and displays his horsemanship in the Bois de Boulogne. If a plebeian, he prepares for the life of a law or medical student, takes to the use of a pipe as a first step, and dances at the Chaumiere. Such are the various characteristics of the boy and the young man in the French schools and colleges, a mixture of vices and good qualities, not unlike the statue of Babouc the Scythian, composed half of jewels and half of clay. The picture has been drawn from very recent recollections ; and however deficient the painter's talent, the general likeness will, he hopes, be admitted at all hands. THE PETTY LAWYER BY KMILE DUFOUR. ARIS may be likened unto an immense hive where indefatigable bees work day and night to accumulate riches, a large portion of which is devoured by a numerous swarm of voracious and idle wasps. One might wonder to see their depredations so easily committed, but the truth is, that between them and the Parisian bees there exists more harmony than between real bees and wasps. There are in Paris many individuals whose ex istence appears a problem to all, but who assuming an honourable character to the world, ever going and coming with a busy air, seem to follow some profes" sion, while in fact their real business is to turn to the best possible account the ignorance and credulity of their industrious fellow citizens. The artful and under hand dealings of these unclassified preyers on the unwary are, however, easily detected by an attentive observer, and we shall endeavour to expose them. Many and most varied are their avocations. A certain number of them, re markable on account of their peculiar manners, their erratic existence, and their THE PETTY LAWYER. 131 shrewdness, get their living by the ignorance of debtors and creditors, and some times by the bad faith of unscrupulous dealers. We allude to the unli censed solicitors, commonly called Defenseurs Officieux.* Ten years ago the number of these subaltern law agents was extremely limit ed; but it has been gradually increasing with the dulness and difficulty of trade. The glorious sun of July 1830, whose regenerating rays were to pro duce such happy effects, has incubated and hatched not a few broods of these obscure birds of prey. Despairing of ever obtaining a regular practice of his own, and emboldened by the success of some of his comates, a sheriff's officer's clerk bids his employ er and his office an enforced or voluntary adieu, and hires at the lowest possible rent in or near Paris, two rooms, one of which he furnishes with an old table and three chairs: he has the word office painted on the door, dubs himself Jurisconsulte, and — behold him a Petty Lawyer in search of clients. He now passes all his time in justice rooms, never misses hearing a cause, insinuates himself into the private discussions of pleaders waiting their turn to be heard, gives his advice, proffers his services, and, in a word, moves heaven and earth to get a cause to defend. This lawyer inpartibus is easily recognized by his bland and honied voice. He invariably wears a brown napless five franc hat, and threadbare coat of doubt ful colour, but which has the appearance of having been at some remote period black ; his right hand covered with a grey or brown cotton glove, is bcessant- ly smoothing a crumpled shirt frill, soiled with yellow spots bearing witness to the wearer's frequent use of snuff. He is never seen without an immense bundle of law papers under his arm, flanked by an old octavo copy of the Nine Codes ; these are the only papers that can be found in his office, and the single volume constitutes his whole library. His step is short, quick, and hurried, and he always seems absorbed in thought, and bent on an important errand. To see him so serious amidst the gay bustle of the streets of Paris, one might suppose him to be overwhelmed with business, though nothing could be farther from the truth. He is only going to get a judgment against a debtor, who does not dispute his creditor's demand. For this purpose he is arranging in his mind a piece of splendid ora tory (which he will forget in court,) trying to recollect precedents and legal enactments bearing cn the case, and victoriously drawing his conclusions. Hav ing anticipated the everlasting " We therefore request judgment against, &c "— he deliberately wipes his forehead with his red cotton pocket handkerchief, looks around him with a self-satisfied air, and indulges himself after his mental toil by aspiring into his nostrils a large pinch of snuff. * There is no English equivalent for Defenseur Officieux. This petty lawyer is allowed to appear only before the small courts, held by the justices of peace in Paris, for the recovery .of small debts and the punishment of petty offences. 132 THE PETTY LAWYER. If, undeterred by the inclemency ofthe weather, or the length of the walk, curiosity prompts you to follow him into court, soon to resound with the thun ders of his declamation, and where you may yawn at your leisure, if indeed you do not shrug your shoulders at the disgusting spectacle of petty manoeuvres and low cunning — you will be initiated into the mysteries of a dozen wretched cau ses, that disgrace alike their pleaders, plaintiffs, and defendants; you will hear our lawyer unfold the rich stores of his inexhaustible eloquence during five minutes at least, without stopping to take breath. He habitually exercises his oratorical talent in the small justiciary courts of the twelve arrondissements of Paris, or in those of the suburbs ; he prefers the latter, where the simplicity of the pleaders holds out a more certain and easy bait to his speculations. In the neighbourhood of the small courts are situate several public houses ; to which the plaintiffs, defendants, and lawyers are in the habit of resorting to await the arrival of the judge. Follow the Petty Lawyer into one of these, take a seat in a corner"and watch what is going forward. Almost before you have taken up your position, these special pleaders make their appearance. Look at those two arguing a point of law. They gesticulate, turn over the leaves of their Code, sneer at and abuse each other, and finally part in dudgeon. Another gravely peruses a file of papers just confided to him by a client. A third is haranguing a little group, who listen with the most re spectful attention. If a new comer chances to ask Ins name of a bystander it is pronounced with reverence, and heard with admiration. That eminent counsel is the most loquacious and the most ignorant member of his profession, yet is his reputation the highest. Our friend at last enters with a low bow (all THE PETTY LAWYER. 133 the fraternity are obsequiously polite, especially to gendarmes and police magis trates) — and blandly exchanges a few words with his brother practitioners, whom he pompously styles " Maitre." * See how affably he shakes each of them by the hand, and how anxiously he enquires after their health. Suddenly his smi ling features grow serious ; he speaks of an important affair entrusted to him, of an interview he has had with a celebrated counsel, — (whom, by the way, he has never seen,) — of the certainty of his success, and of his rich harvest of fees and laurels. Some one approaches him, and in a very low whisper asks permission to say two words. Perceiving that he is wanted, the Petty Lawyer coughs, pulls up his shirt collar, assumes additional importance, and leads the new comer apart. Having in a whining voice stated his case, twirling what serves, him for a hat all the while, the poor debtor (for such he is) implores his professional ad viser to contrive a delay, if only of twenty-four hours, his case coming on that very day. The pleader listens to his client with the utmost attention, and with tbe greatest assurance promises that his request shall be granted by the magis trate, stipulating only for his fee in advance. Inspired with the hope of obtain ing the wished-for delay, the unlucky debtor hesitates not to pay the fee, and offers his lawyer a glass of wine, which is declined on the plea of his not having breakfasted. The hint is taken: what indeed can the client do less than pro pose a chop, which is at first refused with dignity, but upon a little pressing accepted. The cloth is laid ; the cutlet soon disappears ; the Lawyer calls for another, and dessert and wine follow : the professional friend being a breakfast- eater, and blessed with as good an appetite as a lover at fifteen. The client whom his hungry lawyer compliments all the while on the justice of his demand for delay, enlarges with warmth on his creditor's harshness, and neglects to taste the good things before him ; nor is he pressed by his guest. At one o'clock the parties rise from table, and the poor debtor, like Gil Bias, pays a long bill for a breakfast which most certainly will not disagree with him. However, he grumbles not ; nor would he stop at even a greater sacrifice to ob tain the delay. He repairs to the justice room full of hopes ; but despite the entreaties of the pleader who supports him, and makes out a case strong in pro portion to the quantity of wine he has imbibed, the unfortunate debtor to his mortification and_ regret hears the judge refuse his request, as being not suffici ently justified. When the cause is of a more important nature, the petty special pleader dis turbs the silence of the court by a torrent of incoherent vociferations hashed up from judgments delivered by the most eminent judges. He quotes Pothier, Sirey, Delvincourt, legal writers whom he has never read ; confuses one article of law with another; gesticulates, thumps the bar; and having formally submit ted his conclusions to the court, looks triumphantly at his legal opponent, who * The distinctive title of French legal practitioners. 134 THE PETTY LAWYER. has been all the while listening to his harangue with an air of contemptuous superiority. The business of the court over, the Petty Lawyer returns to the pothouse, his second if not his principal office. He loudly trumpets forth his own praise, and speaks not in the most respectful terms of his brother practitioners. He reviews the principal cases that have been brought before the court, comments on them, and summarily disposes of their respective merits. Has he been suc cessful, he lauds the justice of the sentence ; has he failed, he bitterly inveighs against the judge's ignorance and iniquity. He finds no difficulty in levying a dinner at the expense of one or other of his clients and skilfully interweaves with his conversation, always besprinkled with protestations of friendship, the sketch of his previous life. He represents himself to be a country attorney ; he had, of course, a good practice, but his wife eloped and robbed him of all he possessed ; or — his clerk absconded with an immense sum ; or — he was struck off the rolls through the envy of his fellow practitioners, and the injustice of the court. Having got up a few tears to the memory of his past misfortunes, with one hand he wipes his eyes and with the other fills his glass. He is continually looking at the clock, and alluding to an important appointment, which, how ever, does not hinder him from prolonging the sitting several hours. He is generally accompanied abroad by a pale, lean man in tattered garments, whom he calls his head cleik ; this worthy lives as well as he can on the crumbs that fall from his master's table, whose old clothes are amongst the perquisites of his office. His duty is to follow his principal everywhere, and to carry his papers. The unlicensed lawyer is rarely a married man, though his domestic establish ment generally includes a female — an unfortune client, who, unable to pay him for his services in defending her, becomes his most humble and devoted slave. Her business is to clean her master's boots, to write down the names of the few visitors who call in his absence, and to perform the joint duties of housekeeper and cock. Our high principled Lawyer to screen himself from any responsibi lity, hires his lodgings and pays (whenever he does pay) his rent in her name ; and rewards her services by turning her out of doors at the twelve month's end, to replace her by another unfortunate who will receive no better treatment at his hands. The Petty Lawyer not only defends his clients before justices of peace ; he also protects the interests of bankrupts' creditors, and sometimes attends in be half of bankrupts themselves ; he draws up deeds of partnership, leases and agreements for the sale and purchase of stock in trade and goodwill, and acts as factotum to bailiff's men, who pay him well for his trouble. He also pro fesses to reconcile conjugal differences, and to make up quarrels between father and son: in a word, he at once dabbles in the duties of solicitor, notary, sheriffs officer, and justice of the peace. THE PETTY LAWYtR. 135 If his multifarious avocations enable him by dint of economy to scrape together a lew hundred francs, no one knows better how to turn a little capital to good account. He buys good debts at a low rate, discounts bills at usurious interest, lends money at cent, per cent., and with wonderful success speculates on the embarrassments of an heir presumptive. By such transactions he soon contrives to increase his capital tenfold. His business prospering, he removes into a leading thoroughfare, and takes chambers on the first floor. He now begbs to enjoy a position in the world ; he extends the circle of his acquaintance, frequents the theatres by means of orders begged of his clients, is incorporated into a company ofthe national guard, and subscribes to three newspapers — the Gratis, the Estafette, and the Presse. The walls of his office are adorned with expensive prints framed and glazed ; there are also book cases well filled, chiefly with legal writers, handsome lamps, a clock in a mimic steeple of ormolu, a showy inkstand, and several statuettes. Nothing, in short, is neglected that may inspire in the mind of visitors the be lief that the owner of this office is a prosperous if not a wealthy man. He now becomes a general business agent, and no longer haunts the small courts of jus tice, the scenes of his early triumphs, except when important business requires his presence there. He sends on ordinary occasions one of his clerks officiously to defend his poor litigious clients. The successful unlicensed lawyer having contrived by means not over credit able to create for himself a position in the world, is the object of tht cordial de testation of a swarm of confiding debtors to whom he sticks like a horseleech, and whose difficulties have been aggravated by his assistance. He is not on very good terms with the ministerial officers, particularly with certain solicitors against whom he wages incessant war, and who for that reason consider it incum bent on them to show him some deference. Two or three Petty Lawyers in a hundred thus amass a fortune of some thousand francs per annum; they then dispose of their practice, hire apartments in Paris and a box in the country, and still give a share of their time and atten tion to business. Pettifogging and litigation are as necessary to their existence as the air they breathe ; they would not survive a week after ceasing to scribble over stamped parchment and make cases for imbecile clients. The greater number vegetate on the profits of their intervention in innumer able little suits which it is their interest to prolong. They change their resi dence every six months, pay no taxes, and never muster with the national guard. Sometimes they disappear for whole weeks together ; whether placed in limbo by a knowing client with whom they have gone too far, or sent to the hospital by a blow from one of their exasperated victims, deponent saith not. At last, hav ing worn out all their poor clients, and exhausted the patience of their rich ones, their name and residence gradually cease to be remembered. Rich or poor, the Petty Lawyer, whose life can only have been a prolonged 136 THE PETTY LAWYER. struggle with his own as well as his client's creditors and debtors, his landlord, sheriffs' officers, and gendarmes, is at last summoned to that awful tribunal from which there is no appeal; and where, his unfortunate clients happily having no farther occasion for his services, he may concentrate his talents in his own defence. THE LADY'S COMPANION. BY CORDELLIER DELANOUE. T N surveyingthe whole range of misplaced destinies, from the portress "who has seen better days" to the under teacher in a school, who could have mar ried the son of a peer of France, we find the house keeper, a grave and majestic type who laughs not or laughs little, and whom Collin d'Harleville has sketched so perfectly in the person of Madame Evrard. Above Madame Evrard, but very much above her, in quite another world, far from the contact of country cousins, and the asthmatic moans of the kind M. Dubriage, we find the Lady's Companion, who bears the same relation to the housekeeper as the latter does to the nurse, the steward to the secretary, and the secretary to the groom. The Companion is a luxury re served exclusively for the rich ; and known only by hearsay to the middle class, they think of it as a no less extraordinary thing than a complete service in Sevres china, thorough-bred horses, the Baden mineral springs, migraines, and deli cate nerves. ? T 138 the lady's companion. A lady with delicate nerves cannot possibly do without a Companion. At court, there are the maids of honour and the ladies in waiting, and that is easily understood. All queens and princesses have their ladies who act as their ministers, and occasionally bear their trains. In ancient tragedies, the suivante, or the confidente, was a necessary personage : Cleon waits on Hermione ; . Cephise on Andromaque ; Fatime on Zaire ; Fulvie on Emilie : these ladies were all companions. But in these days queens and princesses keep up less state than they did formerly, they wear their dresses shorter, and have less often occasion to faint away; they have also fewer secrets to confide, or if not, they tell them to their husbands, or cousins, or uncles ; for now-a-days sovereigns have families like plain citizens. Manners have been thus gradually modified. Tragedy suivantes have disappeared with the soubrettes of comedy. CEnone has been exiled with Marton. The appointments of a lady of honour, of lady of the bedchamber, and of Companion, are becoming quite sinecures. Ladies are now willing to be their own companions. And yet the situation exists as a thing for show and parade. It will be long before we shall see the absurd appointments of equerries, heralds, and ladies of honour, done away with; and the Companion has many years to live. It is there fore our purpose to enquire what are her especial duties. In the first place, what is the meaning of the word ? Can any one undertake to be always companionable to another ? However entertaining and witty they may be, whatever new and unexpected grace they may throw into their conver sation, do they not risk in the long run to weary their listener ? It will be said, that sometimes a mutual affection springs up between a lady and her companion; they may findthat they are necessary to each other's happiness ; — in which case, all that is done is favourably judged of, and even silence has its charm. This is very possible, but it must be owned that it is rather a sorry amusement to have only a silent companion. The jesters of former times were obliged to excite laughter under pain of the whip. The Companion is not paid to be taciturn. A Companion then to be worthy of the name must speak and be silent be present or absent, always at the seasonable time. This in fact constitutes the most complete, the most irksome, and the most humiliating of all servitudes. Formerly, when to bear her lady's train or pick up her fan were the suivante's chief duties, her task was quite simple. Now that her occupations are no longer defined, that she is engaged as Companion, she knows not were her services are expected to begin, nor were they are to end. She must ever fear to go too far and thereby fatigue, or to be too backward and offend. In fact, to fulfil pro perly the situation, there should be much study, much good sense, and much intelligence to escape all the quicksands of the voyage ; for the least awkward ness, the least forgetfulness, the least inattention, is sufficient to cause shipwreck. Thus no position in the world is more trying and more wearisome. A Lady's Companion always belongs, by manners, education, and sometimes even by birth the lady's companion. 139 to the station where she is only admitted on a footing of dependence. What a world of bitterness for her ! what secret repinings ! what wounded pride ! what heart struggles ! When she is spoken of, she is always called the " Companion." — "Ask my Companion;" or, — "I only saw the Companion," with no more respect than they would say "That is the lady's maid," — " Ask my lady's maid." It seems also part ofthe duties of a companion to endure without murmuring the caprices, or ill humour, or anger of her lady. A proud word, or an indignant gesture., would be met with a dismissal, and we suppose that Companions gene rally wish to retain their situations. It is not uncommon to see amongst the advertisements in the newspapers, in the midst cf horses to sell and cooks to hire, such a paragraph as the following. " Wanted, as Companion, a young lady, well born, of prepossessing appear ance, and superior education, to travel with an English family. She must be musical, and speak Italian. Address, etc." Victorine Dujariier one day read such an advertisement, and it led her to re flect that her family were poor, although highly respectable, and that the educa tion she had received might be turned to good account. Victorine was besides pretty, musical, and she knew Italian. Uniting, therefore, all the required con ditions, she replied to the advertisement, and received the following note in answer. " Mademoiselle Dujarrier is requested to call between twelve and two, a No. — , Rue du Helder." V.'hat a variety of thoughts and emotions filled the young girl's heart, on her way to the appointment ! It was a great and important day to her. Victorine was hazarding alone her first step in the world. She had no one to accompany her ! Her father was ill and almost childish, and alas, poor girl, she had no mother. A stepmother now ruled the house, and Victorine had neither advice nor affec tion to expect from her. Victorine was alone, without a guide, without protec tion, and had to take upon herself, the heavy responsibility of her future existence. No. — , Rue du Helder, was rather dull looking at first sight, like most ofthe modern buildings in the Chaussee d'Antin, but it had a fine frontage towards the street. The large gates closely shut resembled the entrance to a handsome se pulchre, not unlike some they are raising at the aristocratic cemetry " De 1'Est." Victorine knocked softly; the gates opened into a courtyard, also ex tremely dull, surrounded by a very high wall. On the right were the coach house and stables. A groom in a red waistcoat was cleaning some harness under a sort of shed, while the porter, also in red livery, was throwing pails of water over the flag-stones. To be brief, the aspect of the house altogether bespoke opulence, and what the English call comfort. And yet everything bore a melan choly and gloomy look, as if ennui reigned throughout the house. When Victorine entered the drawing room, M. R., who was ensconced in an 140 the lady s companion. easy chair reading the newspaper, rose and advanced three steps towards her. She trembled ; he offered her his hand, made her sit down, and entered into conversation with her upon general topics. We will pass over the prelimmaries, to come at once to the point, which M. R. only reached after many politenesses and commonplace questions. " Mademoiselle," said he, " I spend generally six months of the year m the country, in rather a gloomy castle that belongs to me near Valence. But this is not the place I would propose for your residence. My wife is there at this mo ment ; we shall only join her and proceed to Italy. Madame R. will be de lighted to see you, to be acquainted with you. She has long asked me to engage her a Companion. It will be a great pleasure for her to find in you a friend, and a friend so charming and so well informed." " Sir," . . . .interupted Victorine, timidly, and looking on the ground. " No, I assure you I mean sincerely what I say. I am pleased with you, Mademoiselle, very much pleased indeed. I shall most gladly endeavour to make you happy." The tone in which the last words were said sounded strange to Victorine. She raised her eyes for the first time to M. R. and asked him if it was his inten- to remain long in Italy. " Very long," he answered at first ; and then added in a lower voice, " as long as it will be agreeable to you." Victorine gently slid back her chair, for M. R. in talking, had considerably lessened the distance between them. The interview was now very animated and vehement on M. R.'s side, who was .really much struck with Victorine's appearance. He overwhelmed her with flattery, offers of service, and promises. He spoke of his fortune, of all the ad vantages that riches give : in fact he did all that a wealthy and tolerably clever man does to gain the heart of a young girl by attacking her vanity. But Victorine understood nothing of these Lovelace stratagems. She could not imagine why this man should thus boast of his riches and splendour. Novice that she was, she was astonished to he the object of so much attention. She bad arrived trembling at the step she had taken, agitated by the fear of a re fusal ; and found herself courted, flattered, praised by' a man who knew her not and who might merely have treated her with the condescending airs of patron age. At first this affability delighted her. But soon the singularity of such a reception alarmed the poor girl, and suggested thoughts that made her feel very uncomfortable at her situation. From this moment her words became few her questions brief, and she sought only the best means of effecting her retreat as quickly as possible. M. R., perceiving the small effect his conversation had produced, fancied he had not been sufficiently explicit, and changing his tone abruptly, he said to the astonished girl, " Mademoiselle, what is the use of these windings ? You came here no doubt the lady's companion. 141 thinking to see a lady, and you find a gentleman, a gentleman alone ; and you do not appear extremely surprised. Do you not see our mutual position, and that all I have told you about my wife, my castle, my intention of introducing you as Companion to Madame R. — " "Well, Sir?" " That it is a mere invention, and that there is no such person as Madame R. That I am a bachelor, that I have no estate near Valence ; that I am weary of my solitude, and that I am seeking a Companion for myself? That" .... Victorine, who had risen at the first word, now interrupted him, saying, in a tone full of indignation, " Allow me to retire, Sir." " But, Mademoiselle," said M. R., mildly, " why then did you come ?" Thus terminated the interview. Victorine made a low curtsey to M. R., and left the bouse never to enter it again. Some features of this adventure may be found in the history of certain Com panions whose vocation leads them to cheer the solitude of bachelors. M. R.'s question then, " Why did you come ?" should not create so much surprise. In fact, as Victorine had come, he supposed her to know what was required. If she had any experience, she would not have been caught in the deceitful snare of tbe advertisement, and M. R. would not have received his visit. To be companion to a single man is a dehcate and perilous position, open to much calumny. It is but right to add, therefore, that very few Companions place themselves b such a situation. It is with ladies, and particularly with single ladies, that they are usually seen. Let us explain. In France, the attraction to a young girl in the prospect of marriage is the liberty that a married woman enjoys. When married, what she loves the best is not always her husband, but the right to be called Madame, to wear jewels and expensive clothes. We speak only, be it understood, of the first ambition of a young girl just emancipated from school, whose heart is untouched, and whose head is full of coquetry and frivolity. When all these childish whims have been gratified, she begins to think that her life is very dull, a tete-a-tete very monotonous ; that her husband makes her live too retired ; that she is no longer a child; that she is married, and, therefore, free to go anywhere or see anyone she pleases without difficulty. What is the use of being married if she cannot do as she likes ? A husband is a passport for everything. But for those who have no husband, for those who have not been able to pro cure themselves this passport, and who would, otherwise, pass an unquiet life in fear of what the world might say, society has invented the Companion. — A charm ing invention, which serves as a shield and buckler against calumny. The Com panion replaces advantageously a husband. She is attentive and obliging ; she knows when to absent herself apropos : and these are qualities not often met with even in the most devoted husband. 142 the lady's companion. This is not all. In certain difficult circumstances, the Companion takes all the responsibility upon -herself. She receives messages which she faithfully transmits, and undertakes to furnish the answers. She is loaded with sarcasms by the malignity of the world. ' Scandal, misled by her, attacks her only. The Companion often endures all the annoyance of life, while the lady enjoys all its pleasures. But there are two sides to every question, and the Companion has also some privileges. Thus in opposition to the example we have just cited, she sometimes shields herself behind the reputation of the lady with whom she resides. On the stage we often see these mistakes represented, and in the world they are of daily oc currence. The adventures of the suivante are attributed to her lady, who has thus to answer for all the billet-doux, the scaling of walls, the scandalous reports, and duels which take place in the neighbourhood. Is a man seen hovering about the house ; it is evidently for the lady. It is remarked that the young Comte Horace D's visits are of an unreasonable length at the Viscountess De' — s ? There is no enquiry as to whether these visits are tete-a-tete, or whether (as is the truth) the presence ofthe Companion is the real attraction to the young Comte; the gossips are certain to say that the Viscountess is in love, and, therefore, an unblemished reputation is at the mercy of Parisian scandal. Then what is to be done ? how is a person to act under such circumstances ? To keep the Com panion will be to nourish a serpent ; to dismiss her will give an opportunity to the malignant to assert that an btrusive witness has been got rid off. Sad per plexity on both sides. To prevent these annoyances a lady generally chooses a Companion who is ugly, or nearly so : following in this the same tactics as for a lady's maid, another dangerous species ! But when a lady is ugly, there is sometimes a difficulty in finding a Companion ugly enough, that is, uglier than herself. In this case she engages one older, which answers the same purpose. There are in this style some very curious assortments. The Companion's occupations consist chiefly in supplying Lhe place of the mistress ofthe house, when the latter is either indisposed or absent ; to do the honours for her ; to receive and entertain the visitors ; aud to devise the best means of ridding the house of those who may be obnoxious to the fastidious lady. This department requires much judgment and cleverness. Some Companions become in time the real mistresses, and the lady finds hejaelf playing second to her. The Companion is sometimes required as,a--feader. This is a variety of the species. The reader is generally a tall serious looking person of a certain age, who was born rich, but whose life has been full of romance and misfortunes. Listen to her, and the history of her existence is as long as an epic poem which you must hear to the last stanza, or rather to the last but one ; for the poor the lady's companion. 143 woman has still much to endure. To suffer seems to be her especial province. She invariably scribbles, and employs all her leisure in the composition of a novel of which she is the heroine, and where she sets forth that amidst the miseries of a false position, resignation is a sublime virtue ; that Apollo was once a shepherd to Admetus ; and a thousand other things as consoling as new. To make a change in these sorrowful reminiscences which frequently assad her, she sighs forth from time to time romantic love verses, which she has written as the thoughts occurred to her, without the least intention of their being known ; for she aspires riot, the poor wounded dove, to what in the world is called fame. What could fame do for her ? for her who has missed her vocation here below ? The vocation of the reader, be it known, was to be rich, titled ; to possess estates, equipages ; and to revel in all the luxuries that wealth procures. Alas ! these possessions have nearly been within her reach. A foreigner, as handsome as Apollo, and the owner of numberless thousands, made her, a few years ago, the offer of his hand. Her father was alive then, a violent and cruel father if ever there was one. This untractable father did not believe in the handsome Ame rican's sincerity. He imagined him to be plotting an infamous seduction. In vain the suitor offered to realize the whole of his fortune ; in vain he solicited three months for the voyage. Three months ! what was that ? The inflexible father refused, and the young man took his leave with a broken heart. Since that time he has not been heard of, and now the poor woman is alone in the world, for her obstinate father died, leaving her his blessing and his debts. Every day she expects the return of her lover : but he returns not. No wonder; he married, three months after, the daughter of a rich planter, who brought him as her portion a hundred and fifty negroes and a thousand acres of land planted with tobacco. It is not very uncommon for the reading-companion by dint of lamentations and elegiac moans to interest in her favour a gouty general, decorated and pen sioned, and who needs in his old age a kind and careful nurse. Then our sor rowing heroine is really married, and titled, and rich. Alas ! this is not the way in which the romance she was planning was to end. The general is old, tyran nical, infirm and very cross, and talks of nothing but the emperor. What a difference if she had married the young and wealthy American! Luckily there is always a nephew whose leave of absence from his regiment gives him an opportunity of enlivening the monotonous life of his uncle's wife. As a general rule, sons are dangerous neighbours for the Companion. We might with as much truth perhaps reverse the observation, and say that Lady's Companions are dangerons neighbours for sons and nephews. THE COFFEE-HOUSE WAITER. BY AUGUSTE RICARD. NIVERSALLY his shirt is of. the finest lineri; his stockings of Parisian manufacture ; his patent leather shoes have been made to order by a boot maker in the Rue Fivieune ; he uses only the most perfumed soap, the smoothest almond paste ; / his dentist is Desirabode ; his hairdresser, Mi- chalon : he has taken lessons in the art of perpe tual smiling from a retired opera mime ; he is patient, polite, obliging .... You imagine, no doubt, that we are speaking of a groom of the chambers to a prince of the blood, of a diplomatist, or a senti mental ballad -singer. Not at all. We have been describing a Coffee-house Waiter. This profession generally descends from father to son. The man who serves the ices at the Cafe de Foi, or the brandy cherries at La Mere Saguet's at the Barriere du Maine,had a great great grandfather who exercised these functions before him, as a Seguier, a Mole, a Crillon, had ancestors in the magistracy or the army. Tbe art of pouring out coffee and liqueurs, of glidy adroitly through THE COFFEE-HOUSE WAITER. 145 the labyrinth of tables and stools, carrying in the right hand a tray of glasses, a complete tea service, or a phalanx of decanters of orgeat, requires long practice. To make a good waiter one must begb very early, and should be trained under a father's eye. There are, however, exceptions to this rule. There may be found in the inter esting class that now engages our attention, some practitioners who were not brought up to the profession, and who at fifteen could not have washed a glass without breaking it. This is a variety of the species in whom genius has shone forth all at once. The events of their early life could be traced only in the chronicles of the Chaumiere and the Courtille, or have been buried in the smoky atmosphere of a hundred taverns. Most of these waiters have inherited some property from a relative in Normandy or Perche, which they soon contrived to run through by indulging in every sort of amusement. They have dashed away in hired cabriolets in carnival time ; they have played the horn at the wine shops in the Rue Montorgueil ; they have worn away the turf in the romantic wood of Romainville, by their indefatigable dancing, till one day they tender their last crown at an office for advertisements, and become waiters in a coffee-house. The latter variety are not the least skilful in performing their manifold duties. Their long experience makes them excellent arbitrators in a dispute at billiards, draughts, or dominoes. They well know what is most acceptable to viveurs, just risen from table, and they have no fear of drunkards. Whether brought up to the trade or not, the Coffee-house Waiter is always a man of strict integrity and strong health. A vigorous constitution and an honest heart are indispensable to the profession. It may easily be supposed that the master's eye cannot survey at once all the bottles, decanters, glasses, cups, and coffee-pots in the laboratory. Nothing could be easier than for the waiter to appropriate .to himself in the midst of the enormous consumption and incessant receipts of some establishments, a few drops from the ocean of refreshing bever ages and liqueurs, a few fractions from the sum total that his employer reckons up at the last hour of every night to the great annoyance of the belated rake changing his last half franc at midnight for a bottle of beer. The Waiter is then necessarily an honest man. From the rising of the sun to the turning off of the gas, he is always handling other people's money. He is a confidential agent, an in-door collector of considerable amounts in very small sums. His constitution, no less than his integrity, must be proof against any weak ness. Day dawns, and the Waiter, who always goes to bed late, must be up early. At the hour when in Paris none are stirring but fruiterers, sweepers, and water-carriers, this man whose life is passed in the midst of those who indulge in all sorts of luxuries and refinements, must tear himself from the sweets of re pose. His task is to work; and it is his duty to unite the coquettish elegance of a paroquet to the vigilance of the cock. He wakens then, stretches forth his arms, and encounters the legs ofthe tables between which he has thrown his mat- u 116 THE COFFEE-HOUSE WAITER. tress the night before ; for he quits neither night nor day the scenes of his labours Like the soldier campaigning, he sleeps on the field of battle ; and, in truth, the soldier is best off, for snow and rain do not always fall, whatever pompous descrip tions of battles and wars, and military vaudevilles, may say to the contrary. At the bivouac the fresh morning air, the cheering rays of the sun, the singing of the birds, reanimate the weary soldier. The waiter V vhen he rises is sur rounded by a heavy atmosphere impregnated with the exhalations from the gas > to whieh may be added strong fumes of punch, mulled wine, and harricoed mut ton, the latter dish being the usual supper of the proprietor and his establish ment. Instead of the bright sun, the coffee room is illumined only by the feeble rays of a lamp that is constantly kept burning ; and as to the harmonious sounds which usually proclaim in the fields the dawn of day, they are only represented to the Waiter by the shrill notes of his mistress's canaries impatient for their daily supply of chickweed. But the footstep ofthe master treading hurriedly overhead shakes the ceiling. In an instant the mattresses of the Waiters disappear. The task does not re quire much strength, for though hard their small mattresses are very light. They are all thrown pell meil behind an old screen with the broken billiard- queues, watering pots, damaged chessmen, and the antique counter bought ori ginally with the business, but long since replaced by a more modern and splendid one. Then the shutters are taken down, the milkwoman calls, the master comes down with a bag of small change; the mistress is dressing, breakfast is preparing, and, in a word, all the bees in this hive are industriously employed. The first bustle over, the Waiter in almost all the quarters of Paris has a few moments of leisure. While waiting for customers he opens the newspapers and makes him self acquainted with what is going on in politics and literature. In general, the political opinions of the Waiter are the same as those of the government and the national guard. His literary attainments go no farther than the comprehension of charades, and the price of the funds. From eight o'clock till ten, the calls for coffee occupy the Waiter incessantly. These early customers bring but little profit to the concern ; they consist chiefly of old bachelors, clerks, and country folks lodging in the furnished apartments of the neighbourhood. These three classes of individuals always live as econo mically as possible; the Waiter reckons upon them as a small certain amount of gratification, but he is never more than distantly polite to them ; he tells them always that the newspapers are engaged, and when they take their seats at the little round marble tables, he dusts them very slightly with his napkin • an extra polish is due for a cup of coffee with bread and butter, and so on in pro portion. From twelve to two o'clock consumers of pure coffee, brandy, rum and kirsch absorb his whole attention, all his politeness. The customers at this period of the day are slightly excited by the chablis and the sauterne that they have im THE COFFEE-HOUSE WAITER. 147 bibed at breakfast. They are, either folks whose sole occupation is to live joy ously, military officers, commercial travellers who have succeeded in procuring advantageous orders, or young dandies whose morning pastime has been a duel at thirty-five paces with pocket-pistols. Such persons as these pay without reckoning, for they have no anxieties; they call the waiter "mon cher," take snuff with him, and require him to give them a detailed analysis of the last new play criticised in the day's newspaper. Before leaving the coffee-room they stand while the Waiter reinducts them into their coat or macintosh ; and having handed them their hat, cane, and gloves, he ends his services by a graceful bow that it would be vain to look for out of Paris. Add a little more liberality on one side, and a little more attention on the other, and you will have an exact idea of the relation subsisting between the Waiter and his after-dinner customers. The manners, habits, and even the dress of the Coffee-house Waiter vary ac cording to the neighbourhood in which he is located. In the Palais Royal, on the Boulevards, from the Madeleine to the Fauxbourg du Temple, and in some parts of the Fauxbourg St. Germain, he is ever nice, ever attentive. Shirts of fine linen no longer content him ; he must have cambric fronts. He changes his aprons as often as kings change their ministers. His hair, always dressed in the latest fashion, is redolent of the sweetest perfume ; his jacket cannot be more than a jacket^ but it is remarkable for the fineness of its texture, and its grace ful form. His hands are white and taper. He expresses himself in the most refined language, and condescends to read only in books elegantly bound. When anybody complains of the coffee that he has just poured out, he raises his eyes to heaven, sighs, and handing another cup fills it from the same coffee-pot, saying, " This time, Sir, I know you will be satisfied !" Does a regular customer enter yawnbg or complaining of head-ache or rheumatism, " What can we expect, Sir ? The weather is so changeable ! Will you take a glass of rum this evening, Sir ?" Endowed with a lively imagination, a large portion of vanity, and with much flexibility of mind, he with great facility assumes the manners, the tempers, and the language, of those on whom he habitually waits. The Waiter in the neighbourhood of the Boulevard St. Martin, notwithstand ing an affectation of steadiness, is rather rakish in consequence of being so near the Courtille ; he is also extremely literary, being daily in the habit of waiting on the authors who write for the minor theatres, the Ambigu, the Gaiete, and the Porte St. Martin. He knows at his fingers' ends how many times the plays of Gaspardo and Le Sonneur de St. Paul, have been represented ; he can re peat the witticisms of M. Harel; has spoken twice to Madlle. Georges, and often lends his snuffbox to Bocage. There is a decided improvement in the manners of this class of Waiters since the horsedealers (formerly the habitual frequenters of these coffee-houses) transact their business at a greater distance. At the Cafe de Paris the waiter is learned in all the details, all the science of the steeple chace. He overwhelms with his contempt those unfortunate in- 148 THE COFFEE-HOUSE WAITEH dividuals who wear silk hats and no straps to their trowsers. He abominates boiled beef, he begins to be tired of Duprez ; he calls a cab a vehicle, and when out for a holiday smokes only the best cigars. Formerly the waiter at the Cafe Desmares was prodigiously military. He knew all the superior officers in the royal guard, all the on dits at the barrack of the Gardes du Corps. He is no longer so martial, buj; he is still aristocrati- cal ; he is ever sighing and lamenting, and like the great people of the Fauxbourg St. Germain, he waits for brighter days. The waiters in the coffee-houses in the Quartier Latin* have also their pe culiar physiognomy. The influence "of the schools, the scientific societies, the Chamber of Peers may easily be discerned in their opinions and their tastes. They are first rate domino players. The Cafede Foy is the establishment where the waiter makes the most rapid fortune; at least this is the received opinion. It must be generally allowed that in no other coffee-house is his training so perfect. He unites the several advan tages of the other waiters with a certain air of dignity and a diplomatic polite ness, which indicate a more frequent contact with really good company. The waiters at the Cafe de Foy resemble no others ; they may be said to form a class by themselves. The first thing remarkable is their height. It is commonly said in the neighbourhood of the Palais Royal " as tall as a waiter at the Cafe de Foy." In military phrase one may say that they are the grenadiers of the army of waiters. Of all public places of the same kind, this is the most simple in its decorations. Here the sight is not dazzled by any profusion of gildmg, paintings, and looking-glasses of extraordinary dimensions. The coffee-room is very poorly ornamented, sustained by a few bare columns, and warmed by a stove which has nothing remarkable about it but its size. Unmoved by the daily improvements and decorative embellishments in all the coffee-houses in Paris, the Cafe de Foy has lived quietly for some years on the reputation of a quail painted on the ceiling by Carle Vernet, where it may be seen to this hour. The house is old-fashioned, and conducted on the old principles ; but the waiter is always a picked man. He enters there young, and grows grey in the service. He passes his life in the twenty square feet where a select public assemble every day ; and here we do not mean the smokers who in summer surround the tables in the garden : we speak only of the interior, for it must be confessed that the patrons of the real Havannah do not always form the most select company. There was once upon a time a Baron. Poor gentleman ! he was much to be pitied. His family estates had been sold during the first Revolution, as national property ; his fine chargers had been killed in the wars of emigration, and his diamonds had been confided to the keeping of a German jew, as security for a sum of money advanced for one of the royal princes, who according to custom * So called from the students who live there. THE COFFEE-HOUSE WAITER. 149 never repaid him. Nothing was left him but an income of fifty pounds per an- . num, and the liberty to live, which was graciously accorded to him by a letter that Buonaparte then First Consul, commanded to be written to him in a mo ment of good temper. Returned to Paris the Baron de K. wisely determined to give up frequenting the opera, to play no more at Pharoah, to buy an umbrella' and to take his meals at a cheap restaurant's. But there was one thing he could not do without, and that was his cup of coffee after dinner. It was as dear to him as his cross of St. Louis; he could no more dispense with it than change his political opinions. Dressed with the peculiar nicety of an old soldier, he might be seen every evening at the Cafe de«Foy sipping his coffee. This was his only enjoyment among all the gay doings at this time, when France had just won laurels at Marengo, and the guillotine was at rest. He invariably took his seat at the same little table, and was, in consequence, always served by the same waiter, each of the servants having his own line of tables to superintend. The Baron De K. brought up in the midst of opulence, had been accustomed from his childhood to pay most handsomely. By force of habit he entered the Cafe de Foy. One evening, having just a penny in his pocket, he took his coffee as usual; when he wished to go, he drew out his purse. The waiter saw immedi ately by the emigrant's look of consternation the sad state of his finances, and as he removed the cup he said in a low tone, " It is paid, Sir." In fact, he himself paid for the coffee. It would require a bottle of ink, a packet of pens, and a ream of paper to describe the feelings of the poor Baron when the next evening at the same hour he was still penniless. He entered the coffee-house, however, impelled by a want as terrible as hunger, or rather it was a hunger of another kind. His coffee was again paid by the Waiter. And so it went on for several years, the head of the establishment remaining in total ignorance of the occur rence. The exquisite politeness of the old gentleman who never entered the house or took his departure without bowing low, in the old courtier style, was always the admiration of the master. Alas ! the old gentleman believed he was bowing to his creditor, and his real creditor was the Waiter, whose discreet kind ness never betrayed itself, and who, bearing with the utmost patience the re bukes of the Baron when the coffee was not as hot as usual, carried every even ing to the lady presiding at the counter the money as if he had just received it. Tt is well known that the French emigrants were indemnified some twenty years ago, and rather largely ! One day our Baron entered the Cafe de Foy with a large white cockade, and a pocket-book well furnished with bank notes. He asked for his account, and was told that he owed nothing. He expressed his astonishment, and the waiter was called. The kind hearted man owned with much embarrassment that for some years he had paid for the Baron's coffee. The old nobleman burst into tears, and, before everybody, embraced the waiter, whom on the following day, he provided with the necessary money to purchase an establishment. 150 THE COFFER-HOUSE WAITER. This Waiter was a decided Buonapartist. The waiter in the billiard room, and the waiter who superintend the culinary department, are two distinct types, and have nothing in common with the Waiter in the coffee-room. The latter, waiting on everybody is known to every body ; the two others are nailed to one place : the one before the fire where he prepares the coffee, chocolate, &c. ; the other at the billiard table, which he takes at a certain rent from the master, speculating on the passions of the play ers. The physiology of these two individuals should only be treated upon by an alchymist and a first rate billiard player. We consider ourselves totally unqua lified for the task, being unable to make even water boil without burning our fingers ; nor are we an adept at billiards. The Coffee-house Waiter of the new school is not in a hurry to embarrass him self with a family. Being, as matter of course well lookmg and well brought up, he lives a sultan's life in the midst of the young ladies presiding at the vari ous counters. He has only, the lucky dog, to throw them the handkerchief, we should rather say the napkin. It is they who get his shirt frill so well plaited, who harass the laundress to keep Oscar or Alfred's linen of an exquisite white ness. Confiding in their zeal and economy, the Waiter leaves all these details to their oare, even to paying the bills. When he reaches thirty he begins to think of his future prospects ; he buys a black coat to wear on his holidays, makes use of thePate de Regnault, and takes his savings to the bank. Ambition alone reigns in his heart : his sleep is continually haunted by dreams of an establish ment of his own, with a large coffee-room resplendent with gold like one of the palaces, described in the Arabian Nights, a counter in citron wood, torrents of gas, and paintings by Ciceri. From this time he has his name enrolled in a com pany ofthe National Guard. He looks out for a wife, and a new house forming the corner of a street. When he has met with the one and the other, he calls to gether all the most clever artistes — like the Medicis when they gave orders for the building of a palace — and he sets painters, gilders, and moulders to work. Soon the bare walls are covered with frescoes. In the place of Napoleons scrawled in chalk, appear rich and handsome Indians — stage Indians, hunting the royal tiger on their thorough-bred horses ; tournaments in which Bertrand Duguesclin carries off the prize before all the ladies of Brittany ; enchanting nymphs; Psyches flying; Mercuries carrying through the air their patrons' commands. There may be seen also birds of all shades, and fruits of all colours. The counter, the chef d'oeuvreof a first rate cabinetmaker, placed in a richly gilded recess, is ornamented with china cups that Benvenuto Cellini might have been proud to own. And a beauty has condescended to occupy in consideration of a hundred francs a month, this magnificent throne. The Waiter becomes master in his turn, obtains on credit from the wholesale merchants the articles he will retail to the public. A dozen puffing advertisements, in which the new coffee-house is likened unto the palaces of Armida and Cleopatra, are sent to all THE COFFEE-HOUSE WAITER. ] 5 1 the newspapers ; and at last arrives the important opening day. On that and the following days the establishment returns six thousand francs. The proprie tor has cambric frills put to all his shirts ; he cheapens a tilbury, and already meditates purchasing an estate in Beauce or Normandy He swears by his National Guard uniform that he would not dispose of his house for less than six hundred thousand francs, and says at every opportunity, " The hole that they call the Cafe de Fov!" But another madman opens in the neighbourhood a coffee-house still more splendid. He has expended a hundred thousand francs in gilding, paintings, and looking glasses. The Parisian public who love variety flock in crowds to this new fairy palace, leaving the other palace like that of a minister out of office, utterly deserted. The ci-devant waiter is then compelled to compromise with his creditors he pays them three farthings in the pound. He realizes what he can, and retires with the residue to his native place. There he lives upon his small income ; he has only two small garden beds for his cabbages, and a pond for his ducks. The disease peculiar (it has been thought) to dethroned kings, attacks him, and he soon dies of ennui. The Waiter ofthe old school has almost always a wife and children in lodgings in the neighbourhood of this establishment. The wife is frequently a waistcoat maker. Each member of this family invests his savings in the bank. The man most perseveringly heaps penny upon penny for years ; he always pleads poverty, until one fine day he also takes an establishment. But he wastes neither his time nor his money in creating wonders. In consequence of the numerous failures, he purchases almost for nothing one which is already ornamented with eighty thousand francs worth of paintings, looking-glasses, and stock in excellent con dition. Rising on the rubs of others, the old waiter keeps up during four years a very good connexion, and his savings are already sufficient to satisfy his ambi tion. Then he prudently ceases to tempt fortune, and sells at a high price what cost him but a trifle. He generally afterwards turns usurer, and lives in a small house protected by a door well furnished with iron bars, and a dog always snarl ing in the yard. Arrived at this era, it is easy to recognise him. In a coffee-house he never gives anything to the waiter. He lives either at the Marais, in the Rue de Charonne, or at the Batignolles ,- he has a very high shirt collar, the accent of lower Normandy, and a look of fifteen per cent. Industrious, faithful, and well behrved, the Waiter endures, even without shrugging his shoulders, the countrified ways of certain customers who recom mend him to pour the liqueur over the glasses, and drink out of their saucers. He is on his feet from morning till night, and often by his manner and his attention gains custom for the house, while his master is playing quietly at dominoes, or, perchance, speculating in the funds. The witness, and in fact the chief instru- 152 THE COFFEE-HOUSE WAITER, ment of the enormous profits of his employer, he receives thankfully his penny piece without envy. He can, when required, reply properly to any questions asked by those who prefer talking to drinking. To conclude, be it said in his praise, that as so many good qualities and virtues are necessary to make a good waiter, there are a crowd of men in the army, the magistracy, the government offices, and among the tribe of literary gentlemen, tutors, and schoolmasters, who would be incapable of wearing, worthily, the white apron. THE PENSIONER BY E. DE LABEDOLLIERRE. EVERYBODY knows the exterior of the Hotel des Invalides, and it would therefore be useless to describe it. The reader has doubtless often been struck by the imposing appearance ofthe noble fabric, which con tarns a population as nume rous as that of the majority of small towns. A correct idea of the vast size of the edifice can, however, only be formed by visiting every part of its interior. It may not unaptly be compared to the Hebrew palaces created by the pencil of Martin, in which the boundless extent of pile above pile of towers is lost in the horizon. Most visitors to tbe Invalides leave the building with vague and confused no tions of what they have seen. A guide receives them at the iron gates ; and after having admired tbe pieces of ordnance captured by French arms, they enter the grand quadrangle, which is surrounded by two stages of galleries. They are conducted to the kitchen, and shown the immense cauldrons, the two largest of which contain each one thousand two hundred pounds weight of meat. Then they inspect the church, with its narrow nave, its dome similar to that of St. Pe ter's at Rome, and the colours of all nations that decorate its vaulted roof. And they leave without learning anything of the interesting occupants : they have admired the body, without bestowing a thought upon the soul by which it is animated. I followed another plan, and with what success the reader shall judge. Upon my arrival I was referred to M. Teller, the venerable octogenarian Pensioner whose portrait has been so faithfully drawn by Henry Monnier. When I entered the courtyard of the Hotel, I saw an old man almost bent double with age and bard service. I approached, and asked him if he knew M. Teller. 154 THE PENSIONER. "What do you say, Sir?" " Where can I find M. Teller, formerly trumpet-major in the Dauphin's own Regiment of Dragoons. ? " " I cannot hear you, Sir." I repeated my question in a louder key, but failed to make him hear me. The fact was I had addressed myself to one incapable of answering me ; a wound received in battle had deprived the veteran of that sense of which certain . actors make us cruelly to expiate the possession. He explained to me that ever since Friedland he had been " rather hard of hearing," which meant, that he was incurably deaf. I left him, and entered a labyrinth of corridors, observing as I passed that all bore the names of towns inscribed in capitals on the walls : Corridor du Havre, Corridor du Perpignan, Corridor de Honfleur, &c. Without staying to enquire the meaning of these geographical denomina tions, I proceeded boldly onwards, and presently came to a room in which seve ral Pensioners were collected, warming themselves. A gloomy twilight pre vailed in the apartment, which smelt rather close. From what I. overheard I guessed that the conversation was on the subject of battles. A game of dominoes was being played at the nearest table. " Sir," said 1, addressing one ofthe players, " can you inform me where I may find M. Teller, formerly trumpet-major in the Dauphin's own Regiment of Dragoons ?" " Beg your pardon, Sir. What did you say ?" I repeated my question, which was heard and understood. " I am unable to direct you, Sir. You had better enquire at the Secretary's office." " Will you have the kindness to shew me the way there?" The dombo-player turned to me with surprise, and I perceived that he was blind, as were all his companions ; they were playing at dominoes and cards with inconceivable dexterity by means of the touch. I retired in haste, and after some time spent in search of my future cicerone, I at last discovered him. Having explained my business, I invited him to partake of a little wbe, and to the canteen, which is fitted up in the very plainest style, we accordbgly repaired. I called for wine and biscuits, filled and lighted my pipe, and drawing a stool near the table, I prepared to open the conversation. " Sir," said the waiter, civilly, " you may smoke, but sitting is not allowed. If you cannot drink your wine standing, you may have it conveyed to M. Teller's room, but no one is permitted to sit in the canteen." I thought it disagreeable enough to be obliged to drink and talk in an upright position ; and unable to make up my mind to the trial, I deferred our conversa tion to the next day, when I returned about noon. The soldiers about to mount guard were defiling in the quadrangle, under the inspection of the adjutant- major. A hundred halt and maimed composed the troop, and they seemed to THE PENSIONER. 155 have been selected from amongst the most crippled in the establishment. Most of them were utterly incapable of obeying the words of com mand to shoulder arms, right or left foot forward, &c. ; and the little drummer at the head of the troop seemed the only man among them with the na tural number of sound limbs. I observed M. Teller in the midst of the group. I joined him at the guard house, when he informed me that it was impossible for him to speak with me that day. " But I have not forgotten you," added he, " drawing a paper from his pocket. " This will give you all the informa tion you require. I immediately opened it, and found its contents as follows : " Jean Christophe Teller, born at Strasbourg in the month of June, 1758. " Entered the army in 1777, as drummer in the Dauphin's own Regiment of Dragoons (now the 7th). " Was in all the campaigns of 1792, with the northern army under Lafayette ; in those of La Champagne, under Dumouriez. Was present at Valmy, Fleurens, Maastricht, &c, &c. &c, &c. " Under Veronne, was wounded in the neck by a musket-ball that the surgeons could not extract : and near Mauberge his head was cleft with a sabre cut. "Pensioned in 1813." The worthy fellow, in imagining that his services were all at an end, had un consciously revealed a distinctive trait of the Pensioner's character ; but his note afforded me little information relative to Pensioners in general. I was therefore obliged to pursue my perquisitions and interrogatories. From the stove-rooms and canteen, I proceeded round the tables in the dining-room, and visited the infirmary. The following pages, which resume the results of my re searches, are perhaps unworthy the labour they cost me. The qualifications for admission into the Hotel des Invalides are, first, the loss of one or more limbs fighting for France ; secondly, severe wounds equivalent to the loss ofa limb or limbs ; or, thirdly, sixty years of age and thirty of service. The 156 THE PENSIONER. Pensioner exchanges the slender annuity which would be allowed him, for an asylum in the Hotel ; the most maimed are the best qualified for admission, and the most unfortunate in the wars are the most lucky survivors. Twenty slight wounds are insufficient to qualify a soldier to enter the Invalides, unless he has served the whole thirty years. The three thousand Pensioners inhabiting the Hotel are divided into fourteen companies. Every recent battle has its representatives. One lost an arm at Aboukir ; another had his arm divided at the shoulder by a Bavarian hussar at Hainhault. One veteran left an eye in Austria, and a leg in Spain ; another was abandoned, wounded and bleeding, on the plains of Jena. A tawny mulatto was one of General Moreau's company of guides. A sun-burnt Arab, a half- volun tary partisan ofthe new masters of Algeria, assisted at the taking of Constantine. All these brave fellows are so many living leaves of the national history of France, so many human medals commemorating her triumphs — the Victoires et Con- quctes in flesh and blood. All the governments that have succeeded each other in France have respectively supplied each a contingent of Pensioners. Hence the Hotel is divided into vari ous parties and factions, as distinctly marked as the political systems they may be said in some sort to represent. A glance, a gesture, a peculiarity in the dress, a word, or, above all, a snatch of a song, is enough to signalize them. The French are a nation of singers, and a song is the touchstone of the national and indivi dual character; nor do the Pensioners form an exception to the rule. When you hear " Les dragons Dauphin Aiment le bon vin, Sj-c." the Pensioner of Louis the Sixteenth may be recognised. In " Plutot la mort que I'esclavage, C'est la devise des Francois," the old republican soldier stands revealed. While " Ah! qu'on estfier d'etre Francais Quand on regard la colonne .'" is the favorite ditty ofthe veteran of Napoleon's guards. These three classes of Pensionerswe proceed to describe in chronological order. The Pensioner of Louis the Sixteenth's army fought in the Hanoverian wars before 1783; and since that period he has successively served under the Con vention, the Consulate, the Empire, and the Restoration, with the same indiffer ence and passive fidelity. He has witnessed so many revolutions that he has faith in nothing but himself; a belief shared by many others. It is said that noble blood circulates in his veins, and that the rich old lord who left him a life annuity of twenty-six pounds was no other than his father. Be this as it may he has all the failings and good qualities of a gentleman. He is over-polite, affectedly-gallant, and fond of dress almost to foppishness. He is affable in man- THE PENSIONER. 157 ner without being kind-hearted, ur bane, but not benevolent. Hale and hearty at upwards of eighty, his looks attest the nutritious fare allotted to the Pensioners ; besides he occasion ally indulges in dainties not supplied by the Hotel. He used to love to display the cross of St Louis, with which Louis the Eighteenth deco rated him; but since 1830 he has been as anxious to conceal as he for merly was to show it. Without mak ing any allowance for the feeling that prompts this voluntary sacrifice, the republican trooper calls him " aris- crat." The Republican Pensioner assisted at the siege of Breda, and was one of the detachment of cavalry that in the C^io year III. captured the Dutch fleet detained in the Texel by the frost. He was pensioned in 1804. but received his last wound in 1814, at the siege of Paris. He has a horror of priests and every thing appertaining to their sacred calling ; and never visits his sister, his only relative, because she has a situation in a convent. He omits the prefix when he has occasion to mention a street named after a saint, and always says, Rue Domi nique, Fauxbourg Honore, and even Rue Roch. He cherishes the memory of Hoche and Kleber, and always speaks of Napoleon as General Buonaparte. "Baonaparte! Baonaparte!" angrily retorts the Pensioner of the emperor's guards. " Napoleon, if you please, or I must beg you to draw and defend your self — General, indeed ! why one half your gold lace and plumed generals are not fit to clean his boots. And to think that the English have detained him at St. Helena ! But no, he is not dead, and whoever says so does not know him ; he is immortal. What work there would be if he were to come back !" The speaker is an individual with a scarred face, wearing blue trowsers and white gaiters, (in December) and smoking a pipe. This model ofa sol dier, inured to all the hardships of service, to discipline, fatigue, and privation, entered the guards when the regiment was first formed, and served in it until it was disbanded. His existence began at Austerlitz, and ended at Mont St. Jean. The Emperor galloping in the midst of clouds of dust and smoke, charges, and fusil lades — that has been all his life ; all before and after is a blank. He still thinks himself in the imperial guards ; the ribbon of his cross is folded like that of the old soldiers of Napoleon's time, and he takes care to have his new hats fashioned 158 THE PENSIONER. by one of his comrades to resemble the cap of his beloved uniform. Leaning against a cannon bearing the Austrian arms, he still fancies himself at Vienna. Napoleon's is, to his thinking, the only great legitimate, and logical government. If the conversation turns on the ministry, " Don't speak of them," he says, pet tishly ; the servile wretches are the mere tools of foreign powers. The Emperor acted differently. Your cock is not equal to our eagle." " But consider how cruelly the ministers are harassed by the opposition." " Don't tell me of the opposition ; it is composed of a pack of grumblers who know neither what they say nor what they want." " The newspapers . . . ." " Newspapers indeed ! The emperor knew how to stop the mouths ofthe gen tlemen of the press." "The Chamber...." " As for the Chamber, the Deputies are one and all a set of long-winded bab blers whom the emperor would have thrown out of window. They are good for nothing else." " Of whom shall I talk to you then ?" " Ofthe Emperor." This fanaticism for the Emperor is shared by almost all the Pensioners. But the ornaments ofthe Hotel commemorate only events anterior to the Revolution. Louis the Fourteenth is particularly conspicuous; his equestrian statue sur mounts the principal entrance ; the four nations conquered by his generals writhe at the angles of the facade ; the frescoes in the four refectories represent the bat tles gained by his armies. Napoleon has only a plaster cast of the statue of the Place Vendome, and a painting by Ingres in the library. But though the Em peror's memory is not preserved in these places by monuments, it lives in all hearts, which is a much better homage. It is true that the Pensioners owe much to Napoleon, the greatest cripple- manufacturer of modern times. Since his reign they have been treated like princes, and have been happier than princes, for they are not exposed to revolu tions. The 1 ,800,000 francs set apart for them by Napoleon has been dis continued, but they have their revenue annually voted with the budget. Their great council and staff are composed of men of deserved reputation. Each Pensioner is allowed three francs a month (the older inmates of the Hotel call it three livres), out of which he has to pay a sous to the barber every time he shaves him. They have two meals a day, breakfast at ten and dinner at four o'clock, composed of rich soups and excellent ragouts ; the dishes are two in number for the privates, and three for the officers. No fasting is observed in the Hotel, not even on Good Friday. The monthly bill of fare, drawn up by the board, and signed by the governor, is exposed on the walls of the dining-rooms to the censure of all interested. As soon as the drum beats for meals, the rat tling of saucepans shakes the kitchens ; bright flames ascend from th° furnaces, THE PENSIONER. 159 and shed a red light on the copper cauldrons. The officers' plate, presented by Maria Louisa, is produced clean and bright from its receptacle. Legions of cooks, turnspits, and waiters, pile the smoking viands on trucks, pewter baskets and trays, and hasten to the dining rooms. If the Pensioners have any employment without the Hotel, they easily obtain per mission provided they are of good character, to carry home their rations to their families. The discipline to which they have to submit is not over rigorous. Nearly all that is required of them is, to be present at the nine o'clock muster, when they have not permission to sleep out; to attend with their clothes in proper order the monthly inspection ; and to wear their swords when on service. They rise, go and come, enter and quit the Hotel, whenever they please. They are to be seen in all the quarters of Paris, leaning on their walking-sticks, or carry ing them suspended to their button-holes, without reckoning those who are em ployed to survey the repairs of public buildings and the streets — feeble pro tectors more imposing from what they were than from what they are. Some historians contend that Louis the Fourteenth's architect reserved vast apartments for the head quarters, and lodged the Pensioners in attics ; but this is very far from the truth. It is certain that the Pensioners' rooms are neither wabscotted nor carpeted, and that they resemble those in village inns : but order and cleanliness reign within them all, and they are properly ventilated and lighted. The walls are painted with common yellow paint, and decorated with portraits of Napoleon ; in the dormitories a cupboard is placed near each bed, with a case for the reception of the occupant's wooden leg, if he have one. Though the dor mitories are not artificially heated, the number of blankets allowed the Pension ers varies from one to three, according to the season ; and during the winter months, spacious rooms well warmed by means of stoves are in the day the ral- lying-point of numerous amateurs of piquet and dominoes. So much is the com- sort of the old servants of the country studied, that rooms are exclusively re served for smokers, and there are others were no smoking is allowed. The more infirm and helpless the Pensioners, the greater care is taken of them. The board of health, organized with the most scrupulous regularity, is divided into two sections, that of chronic disease, and that of wounds and sores. The former comprises rather valetudinarians under diet than patients under medical treatment, and whose age, generally attended by severe rheumatism, is their principal disease. Most of them have great repugnance to the barley-water and infirmary regimen, and when they succeed in obtaining from the physician a day's leave of absence, their name generally stands the next morning in the re port as follows : — " No. — . Returned in astate of drunkenness." The attendant is consequently desired by the doctor to stop their wine, and to make them wear the the infirmary cap. Those whose old wounds have never completely healed go to have them dres- 160 THE PENSIONER. sed every morning at the surgery. On Sundays the medical officers assemble in council, and solemnly receive the oral petitions of the Pensioners. Some want flannel waistcoats, others spectacles, &c. Numerous are the demands, and active the competition : Paul wants the same as Peter, and the board of health, having compassion on their petitioners' moral and physical infirmities, endeavour to please all by an equal distribution of favours. When the Pensioners are so old and weak as to be no longer capable of waiting on themselves, they are tenderly nursed by women. The most decrepit are lodged in the infirmary, particularly in the Salle de la Victoire, despite its resounding title, a receptacle of human miseries, a kind of antechamber to the tomb, where each fragment of humanity awaits his turn with more or less apathetic philosophy. " Well, Bouffi," says the doctor, addressing a wretched object as thin as a sword blade, stretched on his bed sucking a stick of barley sugar, " how are you getting on ?" " Getting on indeed ! You're joking, doctor. I can't stir a peg." " How are you to day ?" "Half dead, doctor." "In ten more years," answers the benevolent surgeon, " you will be three quarters dead." " I don't know why I should wish to live so long, unless to save myself the trouble of being buried." Some are a constant prey to incipient hallucbaticns. "Good morning, comrade," says the doctor, addressing one of these, "have your enemies been tormenting you last night ?" " Oh Sir, thay have been at me againj guards of mails and stage coaches blow ing horns in my ears, and frightening me almost to death." Other shattered relics of humanity, once remarkable for their intelligence, and even for the extent of their information, have been for many years unable to utter a single phrase. " How are you to-day, father Thomas ?" " Yes, yes, yes." " Come, come and tell us something." "Yes, yes, yes:" and the old man, almost bent double with age and infirmity, turns away from his importunate questioner. Poor fellows! they might as well have been killed outright as spared to lead this bivalve existence. Frequently in their lucid intervals they regret not having been left on the field of battle, when death was glorious in their eyes, almost coveted ; but they thank heaven that their time is almost ud. In vain chaplains, surgeons, and apothecaries, zealously afford them spiritual and temporal succour. Exhortations and physic only prepare the soul and body of these dying men for their last hour, and their eyes are closed by sis ters of charity from St. Vincent de Paul, the ministering angels of these men of war. THE PENSIONER. 161 Why should not the protection of government be extended to their ashes ? Why should Napoleon's project of converting the Esplanade into a military bu rial-ground, not be carried out? The soldiers who die in the Hotel are thrown into a corner of the cemetry of Mount Parnasse ; their names are forgotten ; the discharge of half-a-dozen muskets over their grave is their only apotheosis, and the small black wooden crosses placed at the head of their tomb soon mingle with the dust of their last resting place. Their children in due time replace them in the ranks, and some of the num ber are spared to succeed them in the Hotel. They make their debut as their fathers wind up their career, they rise as their fathers descend ; they will be what their fathers have been. Devoted to their service, and having their daily occupations regulated by the sound ofthe drum, these soldier apprentices soon acquire a military strut, and learn to ape the manners of troops in garrison. " Will you come and have a game at nine-pins, comrade?" says one. " Obliged to refuse, going to take my wife for a walk this afternoon," answers the trooper of thirteen: his wife being the little daughter of some apple woman of the Quinconce. At the head of the drummer lads struts an elegant drum- major. To judge from his erect . and martial carriage, and the scars, that while they ennoble his countenance do not add to his beauty, it is pretty evident that he has not always led child ren, and that he still remem bers the time when, at the head of his regiment, he was the first to present his athletic breast to the enemy's balls. This fine tall fellow is a favourite of the ladies; his elegant uniform, his remarkable neatness, and the gallantry of his discourse com bining to make his company much sought for in the wine shops near the barriers. The young soldiers pretend that he is dangerous company for a lady. He frequents the Salle de Mars and the Grand Vainqueur, where on red letter days he dances quadrilles from morning till night. His only rival is one of his fellow pensioners with two wooden legs, «ho was taught to waltz by the fair peasant girls on the banks of the Bhine. His agility is astonishing. The orchestra has the greate.st difficulty to follow his 162 THE PKNS10NER. motions, while all in the gallery gaze on him with admiration akin to envy. He pirouettes on his oaken stumps with more ap parent ease than a peasant of the Landes walks on his stilts. He is a Taglioni in Pensioner's uniform, a Vestris with wooden legs. The public gardens frequent ed on Sundays by more or less indefatigable dancers on one or two legs, are the daily rendez vous of a great number of Pen sioners. The regular allowance of the establishment is not enough for many of these thirstv ©ld men. Sometimes even their palled palate rejects wine as too a weak beverage, and they sell their rations to and one that has- long ranked high in their ZJacT-M- buy brandy, a more military liquor, estunation. At the lateral extremities of the Hotel are situated narrow strips of ground divided into little gardens. When the Inva lides was first instituted, each :" Ornate had his allotted border ; but the wars have so multiplied '"_ the number of Pensioners, that at the present day it is a very difficult matter to obtain a plot of a few square yards. Inva lides in possession ofthe valued privilege are generally passion ately fond of gardening. The vines are mostly trained to a trellis that serves as an arbour Ibia plaster statue of Napoleon ; this idol is, however, carefully removed under shelter during the winter. The owner crowns it, covers it with bouquets, dis- THE PENSIONER. 163 plays round it tri-coloured flags, regards it with admiration, and sometimes for gets himself in his transport so far as to empty his watering-pot over his uniform, thrown off to work with greater freedom. The contemplation of his fetish is alone able to divert for a moment the indefatigable gardener from the culture of his dahlias. Heaven help all intruders into this temple of Napoleon! The old soldier once broke the head ofa drummer-boy whom curiosity attracted to inspect the statue ; and he killed outright a dog that he caught in the act of immodestly defiling the pedestal. He is for the rest a very good man. The Angling Pensioner seeks by the water side an enjoyment no less peaceable and delightful than that found by the horticul turist in the rearing of flowers. At dawn he takes his station near the mouth of a drain with rod, line, and landing-net, and patiently awaits whole hours for a bite. The spot thus selected by him is not a very odoriferous one, albeit it is well chosen for the sport. If the gudgeons are shy, he is satisfied wn0 minnow for his frying-pan : all are fish that come to his net. ft very often happens that just as he has tantalized a wary thorn- back from a cautious nibble to the biting point, the St. Cloud steam-boat passing, hinders him of his expected prey, and spoils m..*« his sport for that morning. " The devil take steam !" grum bles the baffled angler. " It is impossible to catch a minnow. In the Em peror's time such nuisances would not have been permitted to hinder a poor man's day's sport." And packing up his tackle and implements, he returns to the Hotel, cursing steam and steamboats. Two Pensioners of the same division rarely meet out of the Hotel without being affected by a contagious thirst, they repair to the nearest cabaret, enter into conversation concerning the empire and the emperor, and soon attract round them a group of attentive auditors. Sometimes an animated discussion ensues; opinions differ on a particular point — as to the policy of a particular military movement, or whether a skirmish, in which both fought, took place in Prussia or Champagne, or whether a certain charge was made by the dragoons or the 164 THE PENSIONED. hussars. The disputants being unable to convince one another, from foul words, soon come to hard blows. The table is upset, and the interference of a sober *— c>icl>vt<>=» comrade or two is generally necessary to restore peace. When the extent of the mischief is ascertained, the brawlers shake hands and club together to indem nify the cabaretier. To wash down all feelings of resentment they call for more wine, when not unfrequently fresh contention arises as to who shall treat tbe other, each being desirous okshowing by his generosity how completely he has *> LffVAL EiUl forgotten the late fracas. Wine soon overcomes old sol diers; they find it a more insidu- ous enemy than England, a more formidable one than Austria. Men who never flinched before the hot test fire of artillery, stagger help lessly into the Hotel, where they are received in the Salle de Police, and made to exchange their uni form hat for the fool's cap — the badge, in the Hotel, of the wearer's disgrace. The poor fellows scarcely deserve any punishment. The re membrance of their glorious cam- =Hl paigns conspired as much as the treacherous wine to unseat their reason. Tippling does not constitute the Pensioners' sole recreation. Some THE PENSIONER 165 OS Jo 1/ there are amongstthem whoare still irresistably attached to the (we cannot in jus tice say "fair") sex. Though haply short of a leg or arm, their heart remains intact, and though cooled, the flame that first lighted their bosom is not yet extinct. Their looks and years militate against these old goats ; but in every other respect they are wor thy of their mistresses, whose ears they tickle with indecent songs and smuttier jests. But their gal lantry has turned sour, their faults have degenerated into vices. The dry ditches of the Champ de Mars are the scenes of loving interviews over which night sheds her chari table mantle : Let us follow the night's example, nor expose the vain passions of sexagenarian lovers which only provoke aggravating a*— "-> »l/j ,io.- . , , comparisons between the present and the past. After having been the happy lover of an infinity of Dutch and Flemish women, Italians, Spaniards, fair dames of Berlin and Vienna, and even Moorish and Egyptian maidens, to be reduced to take up with a decayed harridan of the Gros Cfillou! But what is a man to do? a defaut de roses, les soucis. There is among the pensioners a superior class who are alike above garden ing, fishing, wine-shops, and women. The members of this select society may be recognised by their intelligent looks, their open forehead, and their bald head covered with a black silk cap. They meet in the library, and devour the nu merous memoirs of the imperial epoch. Often also they assemble beneath the porticoes to discuss political questions. They with their canes trace the plans of battle, in saliva, on the marble pavement, mark the course of rivers, and re present the sites of batteries by pinches of snuff. They pass their opinion on generals, and draw parallels after the manner of Plutarch. They know to whom is due the success of a battle won, also the real cause of the inaction of Berna- dotte at Averstaedt, and of another general in Spain. They can repeat the ener getic speech of Cambronne at Waterloo. Passing from Hondschoote to Weis- sembourg, from Borodino to the Beresma, from Jena to Leipzig; they smile at the remembrance of every victory, and drop a tear for every reverse. Thank God they have but few tears left to shed! In describing the Pensioners (Invalides) of Paris, I have already drawn the 166 THE PENSIONER. moral picture of those at Avignon, where a branch institution was established after the Egyptian expedition. The kind of life led is the same, modified by the distance from the capital, and by a little more rigorously enforced discipline, the Pensioners being only five hundred in number. The general health is better, and the longevity greater on the banks of the Rhone, than on the banks of the Seine. The Hotel at Avignon is composed of two ancient monastic buildings, the interiors of which remain nearly in the same state as when they were de voted to the service of religion. In the centre of the principal yard is a foun tain bearing this inscription : — NAIAS HOSPITA MART1S, which would not be much relished by the drinkers of its waters, if they under stood Latin. Adjoining the building is a park planted with elms and plane trees in spacious avenues bearing the names of Jena. Austerlitz, Wagram, &c. The walls that enclose this park present a recapitulation ofthe military history of France from 1792 to the present day, in graphic pictures, commemorating the principal bat tles ; while inscriptions record the dates, the names of those most distinguished at them, their most renowned atchievements, and their memorable sayings. In short, the park is a kind of pantheon in the open air. What deathless reminiscences are inseparable from the veterans domiciliated in these two hospitals, preparing by a quiet old age for the eternal repose of the tomb ! Despite individual imperfections, how imposing as a whole is this vast assemblage of men escaped from the slaughter of a thousand battle fields ! THE POET. BY E. DE LABEDOLLIERRE. Que les gens d'-esprit snnt betes 1 BRAUMAIIf'UAIS. Nescio quid nugaram mediums Totus inillis. H Oil ACE. UP POSING the word poet to apply only to those great writers who have clothed profound thoughts in melodious and picturesque language, we could assuredly name but few in the past, and still fewer in the present age ; but if we comprehend under the name all those whose predisposition to Alexandrine measures and natural facility in rhyming lead them to imagine themselves entitled to the appellation, we shall find rather a numerous class whose peculiarities are discernable to the observer without a magnifying-glass. Shall we attempt to sketch the habits of this singular and little known class ? The author of La Metromanie has done it before us, and although the interval ofa century has elapsed, it has only modified the costume without changing the 168 THE POET. individual. The Poet is now, as then, the same unequal, fantastic personage, dreaming and absent-minded ; he has changed his gold-laced coat and orna mented buttons for more sombre habiliments, but he is still more particular in his style than his toilette, when he does not neglect both the one and the other, and exhibit in his dress and'his thoughts a perfect harmony of disarrangement. His hair is no longer powdered, but the same eccentric ideas take root under his flowing curls : an inoffensive sword no longer dangles at his side, yet his gait is not the less embarrassed and irregular, rapid as a locomotive engine, or slow as a carrier's waggon ; his breast is no longer decorated with lace frills spotted with snuff, but the breast palpitating with the fire of genius, is still swoln with pride and vanity. Vanity ! This is the peculiar failing of the Poet ! When a schoolboy has scribbled five stanzas in honour of his professor's birth-day, he imagines he has in his desk a source of fame and fortune ; he hastens to read his production to those who have the misfortune to be his friends, and becomes the lion of many parties where Poets are served up after coffee, by way of refreshment. Certain families delight in making a collection of rhymers who at length become part and parcel of the household ; each in his turn places himself in the centre of the drawing room, where he is examined like a curious specimen in natural history, and after a few moments devoted to bashful hesitation, proceeds to enchant his hearers with his last effusion. Nothing is altered since Moliere's time in the arrangement of literary circles. There is wanting neither the exclamations of a Philaminte and a Belise, nor the pretention of a Trissotin and a Vadius : only in these days authors have more policy than formerly ; their jealousy is concealed under a mask of reciprocal enthusiasm ; and when they meditate in secret how to depreciate their fellow poets, they do so more effectually, not by quarrelling, as heretofore, but by praising each other. Although inundated in every drawing-room with compliments and weak tea, the Poet frequents but little the collection of Zeros ycleped the world ; to be presentable he must dress himself, and dressing is an occupation so trivial, so irksome, so intolerable ! To interrupt the composition of a stanza to seek a cravat or a waistcoat ; to barter his pen for a brush or a razor ; to descend from the heights of Parnassus to the thousand details of the toilette ; to waste thus idly the precious moments which should be entirely consecrated to his <*enius ! and for what ? — to make his bow in a drawing-room ; to whisper soft nothings to stiff and affected women ; to discuss the most important questions with a no tary's clerk; to play at boston; to swallow glasses of orgeat; to listen to the jingling notes of a bad piano, or the shrill voice ofa Parisian prima donna: a series of entertainments as amusing and diversified as a waterfall. The Poet, therefore, usually remains at home, giving way by degrees to his natural indolence, and awaiting inspiration with the immobility of a fakeer. Unlike Seneca, who wrote on a golden table a treatise on poverty, from his gar- THE POET. 169 ret he descants on the advantages of wealth. Alas ! how can he ever enjoy those advantages, now that poetry is so poorly recompensed ! Lately, a justly cele brated writer, a man of fine feelings and distinguished talent, was reduced to solicit five francs in advance on a poem that was to be published the following day in a newspaper, wanting the money to procure a dinner : — he was told " to call again to-morrow." It is easy to understand the Poet's reluctance to associate a wife and children with his miserable destiny. He is besides too much in love with the sex in gene ral, to attach himself to one woman in particular. To flutter from flower to flower ; to be caught quickly ; to forget still more quickly ; to dream of the fair hair of one, the dark eyes of another, the touching melancholy of a third ; to build a romance on the grisette he may meet in the street, on the peasant girl in the fields, or on the lady whose brilliant equipage has just passed him ; these are his joys and pleasures — innocent pleasures apart from all thoughts of posses sion, and which disturb neither the happiness of families, nor that of any union whatever. Sweeter pleasures than the reality, for he creates to his fancy most charming mistresses — graceful, ethereal beings, beautiful as houris, and pure as Madonnas. And if he were to take his lantern and search such round the world, he might die, perhaps, before being able to find them. The independent humour of the Poet would yield with difficulty to the matri monial yoke. He must have liberty of thought and action, which would assimi late badly with the order of a household. He may take a fancy at two o'clock in the morning to admire the landscape by moonlight, and quit his wife to ramble in the fields ; if a rhyme that he has long sought should occur to him, even in the middle of the night, he would get up, and exclaiming, " I have found it ! I have found it !" with no less joy than Archimedes, proceed to finish his poem. \\ hat woman would accustom herself to these poetic pranks ? and under such circum stances refuse herself the gratification of appearing as an injured wife, of pro claiming her husband a monster to the world, and treating him as such ? The noise of children would be sufficient alone to render his home intolerable to the Poet ; he has a horror of everything that disturbs his meditations, as the barking of a dog, the cracking of a whip, or even the buzzing of flies. When he is lost in the boundless regions of fancy, if he is abruptly reminded of the misery of this world, of the short span of mortal existence, of his limited sphere of action, he sighs and groans, and feels as utterly wretched as a poor fallen an gel, a dethroned king, or a martyr at the stake. Such are, we think, some ofthe more prominent general characteristics of in dividuals addicted to rhyming ; but the style which they adopt diversifies them, and if after having observed them in their persons, we study them in their works, it will be found that the type is much modified according to the style of their poems, whether they are elegiac, sacred, classical, light pieces, gloomy, familiar, romantic, or sonnets. 170 THE POET. The Elegiac Poet's first essay is s collec tion of verses, long or short, the harmony of which is more or less doubtful, and its composition more or less grammatical ; but it has invariably some pompous title, such as First Sighs, Love Songs, Reveries, Lamentations, Meditations, Contempla tions, Hours of Sadness, or Heavenly Musings. Once thus baptized, three hun dred copies of the work are printed; of this number, one hundred are given away by the author with autograph dedications, equally flattering to the giver and the receiver ; and the publisher sells about twenty by dint of the stereotyped puff appropriately printed in the leading journals " that the want of such a work had long been uni versally felt." The verses of the Elegiac Poet generally treat of his reveries, his feelings, and the rapid consumption which is fast hurry ing him to the grave. " Poor young man !" exclaim his fair readers : " how pale and worn he must be I He is, no doubt, sadly in want of consolation. How we wish we could cheer him !" Never fear, gentle la dies; your dying hero enjoys amazingly good health; this unfortunate rhymer is remarkably fond of all the good things of this life ; this melancholy wreck reels occa sionally from some coffee-house in a state certainly anything but poetical. Yet if you ask him for a few stanzas he will not fail to address you in such a lachrymose and lamentable strain as this : 0 lady, ask me not to sing. Why seek to wake my plaintive strain ? Pale grief has dipt my Poet's wing : Alas ! I ne'er may sing again. Smile not away my scalding tears ; No garlands wreathe to deck my brow : The cypress-branch, of cares and fears Fit emblem sad, becomes me now. THE POET. 171 Unheard I've struck my mournful lyre; In vain, alas ! I've courted fame; Will not the muse my bosom fire ? Must I then die and leave no name ? This disciple of Millevoie, so sorrowful, so sympathising, supposes himself, no doubt, the most compassionate of human beings. But he pities imaginary sorrows without bestowing a thought on the misery that surrounds hira. His sympathy is all for chimeras. He affects fine feelings, but has no sensibility ; he has a head, but no heart; tears for vague sufferings, but no commiseration for real grief. The same contrast often exists between the conduct and the works of the Sacred Poet. Full of oriental images, he wanders unceasingly on the banks of the Kedron and the summit of Golgotha. On his knees, and covered with dust and ashes, he invokes Jehovah, supplicates Elohim, and the Lord of Hosts, deplores the ruin of the Ark of the Covenant, and the House of Israel, tnd paraphrases the forty-two chapters of the book of Job with a patient industry worthy of the patriarch himself. City of Zion ! when, in thy bless'd realms Shall I, upborne on wings of seraphs bright, Behold Jehovah, the great King of Kings, And all the heav'nly host enthroned in light ? How bless'd the man, around whose death-bed still Images of his virtues past arise, Whose sins, repented, his calm soul can't fill With dread to meet his God ; whose feeble eyes Cherubim and seraphim close! His flight Like mighty eagle of the rock, he wings ! Upon his sight, undazed by heav'nly light, Burst Zion's glories ! While inspired hymns And canticles of love greet his rapt ear, Th' angelic choir hosannas louder raise To bid him welcome ! He approaches near Th' Almighty's throne, aud joins in^ongs of praise. 172 THE POET. But be it known that these rhapsodies mean nothing. The Sacred Poet is religious only in his writings. Although he chaunts the praises of the Only Ruler ;>t Princes, to imaginary accompaniment on the harp, sackbut, and psaltery, he would be sadly embarrassed if he were asked to repeat even the creed. He is a worldly hermit, an apostle of the boudoir — oftener met at the opera than at church. Between the acts he composes an ode on the last judgment ; but in his heart he is most probably an atheist, like Hebert; or a materialist, like many surgeons. Let us now speak of the little old man with powdered hair and thin visage, whose manners are so affable and honied, who has preserved almost in its pristine perfection the costume of the olden time, the flowered waistcoat, knee breeches, silk stockings, and shoes with enormous buckles, and who is so often seen in the vicinity of the Pont des Arts: he is a fervent catholic. lie never misses a service, his black silk cap is easily distinguishable amidst the uncovered heads. He glories in the title of church warden, and anxiously watches over the in terests ofthe vestry. Now this zealous de votee /swears only by Jupiter, knows no other gods than those of Olympus, no other heaven than the Elysian fields. If you speak to him of Satan, he mentions Pluto-: he is a Classical Poet. Shades of Boucher, Delille, Rosset, Fontanes, Esmenard, Saint Lambert, Dumolard, how must you thrill with delight at the contemplation of this last relie of imperial literature ! He alone elaborates didactic poems, he alone pens idyls and eclogues, and calls his characters Acis, Themire, Almedon, Philis Dolon, Zenis, Phylamandre, Amarylle, and Myras; he alone dares to invoke the Muses and Apollo, and to use the language of the gods, that is to say, a jargon incomprehensible to simple mortals. Each of his productions should have appended a special glossary : A telescope becomes Cassbi's tube of observation. A trumpet A flute The coffee-plant A ploughshare The mulberry tree A doctor A gun The brazen clarion of war. The tuneful reed. Mocha's fragrant shrub. The agriculturist's weapon. Thisbe's tree. A son of Galen. A fiery cylinder. THE POET. 173 Bayonne's thirsty steel. Resounding parchment stretched o'er hollow brass. Old Ocean's restless waves. The amphibious courser of Nilus' slimy banks. A bayonet „ A drum ,, The sea „ The hippopotamus „ &c, &c, &c. His- poems are so many enigmas destined to exercise the patience of his read ers, happily, few in number. He has a horror of trivialities, and clothes every thing in the inflated and grandiose style. If he had to versify Henry the Fourth's popular saying—" The peasant shall have a fowl in the pot for every Sunday," he would write Far as fair France extends her wide domain, And proud Navarre, that owns our sceptre's sway, Henry, the king, wills that, each sabbath day Shall be a day of rest for every swain : Also, henceforth, that through our smiling land (Peace and content still going hand in hand) Plenty abound ; — in proof whereof and sign A Sunday dinner of one capon fine Shall grace the board in every cot in France : And let the day end with a festive dance. The Classic Poet came into the world two thousand years too late. It is true that he is totally ignorant of Greek, which indeed was not much studied in the time of the Directory ; yet, if you speak to him of Lamartine, he will recite an ode in honour of the Olympic games, by Pindar ; whenever he hears Beranger's Hirondelles sung, he answers with Anacreon's Swallow. Admire Decamp's pictures in his presence, and he will inform you that Dibutade invented drawing. Arago's astro nomical researches are little known to him, but in stead he talks of Hipparchus, Pitheas, Aratus, and Tymocharis. In geography he prefers the study of Strabo and Pomponius Mela to that of Maltebrun. He calls Languedoc, Occitania; Hungary, Pannonia; Spain, Iberia; Italy, Anso- nia; Naples, Parthenope; and Paris, Lutetia Parisiorum. He passes with indifference be fore the great works of Robert De Luzarches, lean De Chelles, and other catholic artichects ; but cannot control his delight at the sight of a pediment supported by a monotonous row of Co rinthian colums. Next the Classical Poet comes the author of 174 THE POET. light poems. He is a man of leisure, that is to say, a being whose occupation consists in doing nothing, in receiving and returning visits, and consuming in town the produce of the country. "If he would give himself the trouble," he says, "he could easily eclipse Victor Hugo." But at present he has turned his attention to poetry merely as a relaxation from more serious studies. The gen tleman condescends to rhyme ! he manufactures short complimentary epigrams, epitaphs, charades, and acrostics. He delights especially in the madrigal. TO A LADY* WHO HAD INVITED ME TO HER COUNTRY SEAT, AND TO WHOM I HAD EXPRESSED MY REGRET AT NOT BEING ABLE TO GO, BEING DETAINED IN PARIS BY A LOVE AFFAIR. Tempt me not, lady, to thy fairy bower,f Where grace and beauty hold full sway and power, The abode of love. I am enamoured of another belle,{ But seeing thee, my heart would fain rebel And faithless prove. Some years ago a reaction took place against classic poetry, and like all reac tions it went too far. It brought forward a set of rhymesters who may be de- //A signated Gloomy Poets, who in hatred of the Greeks and Romans have taken * All the world will rccogniss under this simple appellation the lovely Baronne De — , born Comtesse De — , whose beauty and accomplishments shed a lustre over the distinguished cir- iles in Paris of which she is the brightest ornament. — (Note by the Author.) f Allusion to the charming, country seat of the Baronne De — born Comtesse De — , in the pleasant village of , near the Hills, so renowned for their plaster quarries. (Note by the Author. J % The blooming Marquise De— , now Madame De — , in whose affections I supplanted the Chevalier De — , one of the Lords in Waiting on his late Majesty, Charles X. ( Note by the Author.) THE POET. 175 much pains to imitate the English and Germans, who ape Lord Byron, Schiller, Goethe, and Hoffmann ; and who make all that is fantastic and fanciful the or der of the day. The Gloomy Poet amalgamates everything hideous in nature and art. He groups all the monstrosities that can be conceived in the real and ima ginary world. '• Betake you, sister, to your broom And, through foul midnight's deepest gloom, Follow Behemoth To the Black Mountain's misty height, Where our wierd sisters meet to night To celebrate the mystic rite Of our Sabbaoth." Hark, the hellish din's beginning ; Ravens, bats, and owls are singing ; While clanking chain The Mountain-side quick up and down Drag stalwart devils, goaded on By Nick himself; and loud and long The crew complain. Shouts of wild laughter rend the air, Mix'd with unholy cries ; The angry winds the sounds upbear To heav'n : amaz'd the angels hear The discord fell, and shake with fear At the discordant noise. Now the hubbub's at its height, Merrily plays the water-sprite By stream and lake ; The hoarse winds whistle o'er the iea, While, crawling from beneath a tree, A deadlv, spoaeu snak Enters a farm, and softly, unseen, creeps Into the cradle where the infant sleeps. " Goblins, fiends, and spirits foul, Vampires, hobgoblins, ghost and ghoul, Haste, repair Where Satan waits ye all this night By the murderer's gibbet ; there He'll have the table spread." " The fara You agile imps with all your might Prepare, prepare : 176 the poet. Hasten new-made graves to plunder ; Bring festering corpses from the tomb. ' The table's laid : hark, hellish thunder Proclaims the sabbath dire begun. Sudden the rabble rout decamp In haste to shun the break of day, The storm clears off, and " night's pale lamp" Shines forth with mild, effulgent ray. On hearing their unearthly cries And curses, as they through the air Retreat, the timid trav'ller hies Onward, and falters forth a prayer. Such verses and others no less rugged are hampered with epi graphs out of number. These the Gloomy Poet is amazingly prodi gal of, and lays them on with a lavish hand ; they are usually se lections from the works of foreign ers. When he excerpts from French authors, it is only to glo rify his friends and acquaintance, whose unpublished poetry fur nishes him with ample materials " for extracts. "Helas! Heias!" — Shakespeare, trad, de Letourneuh. " This wond'rous sight deserves, I ween, Through open windows to be seen." — Aristippe Greluchard, Saynetes. " Qu'elle etait belle !" — Byron, trad, inedit. . . . . . . " Oh ! society Will wear one's heart out with satiety." — Count Alfred De Balangy, Desperatio. " Oh, sjnlime extacies !" — Gabriel Romanovich Derzhavin, Ode to the Deity. the poet. 177 " Hark ! St. Sepulchre's tolls eighth Alas ! the dismal boding knell Booms through my narrow prison grate To summon me to heav'n — or hell !" Sylvestre de la Morandiere, Last day ofa Condemned Prisoner. " 9S£ho serueg Sgs la&ge fafrtjfbllte Jste louetf) tfoo, ne louetf) three, i@,e leman touetetb, I tots, Sbaue s&e tohose troth's splggfiteb &bs." Jehan Momoiffrom a collection of poems ofthe [Fourteenth century. " A mortal pallor her sunk cheeks o'erspread." Kotzebue, Adelaide De Wolfingen, Act II., Scene VII. Sometimes to pass himself off for a man of much learning, the Gloomy Poet pilfers from grammars and vocabularies, mottoes in English, German, Spanish, Turkish, Russian, Chinese, and even Sanscrit, of which languages he knows not a single syllable. He also affects much eccentricity in versification, and is never at a loss to drag in a rhyme. When battle rages o'er the plain Amain, The clangour fierce of " hostile arms" Alarms The peaceful hbds. The cannon's breath Death Deals far and near ; while every blow Low Lays gallant men. Of such a fight The sight Delights Abaddon and his crew, Who, In hell, attend the souls of all Who fall Unshriven: for them let us pray, Oh pray ! The Familiar Poet as well as the Gloomy Poet is a modern creation ; he is a confirmed lounger and passes his time looking out of window, rambling in the A A 178 the poet. streets and fields, and watching the butterflies — all very harmless pastimes, if he did not keep a poetical journal of his thoughts and actions. 'Twas yesterday I left my humble home To wander at mine ease in solitude, And musingly I took the shortest way To the cool Montmartre — my favourite walk (More freely midst the fields I seem to breathe Than in the pent-up city). Seated on a bank, I thence contemplated the mighty Paris Spread at my feet like giant laid at rest. The glorious setting sun was peeping through A mist, that almost veiled the lovely scene ; The birds sang merrily, and from the grass Arose the insects' song; under the trees The happy lover wandered with his maid. My heart felt light, but, suddenly, my eyes Grew dim with tears : alas ! they lighted on The tombs, beneath the fair hill's brow, where sleep The once gay denizens of merry Paris. Alas ! the mournful sight my pleasure chill'd And pensively I wander'd home again. The Familiar Poet has a particular affection for sonnets. He composes them in honour of anybody or nobody, and to express no matter what idea. The cold North- West has ceased to blow ; The rivulets begin to flow Unfrozen. From their snug retreat, To meet the squirrels, dormice creep. The almond-tree its silver bloom Puts forth, and with its rich perfume Embalms the air ; the feathered throng Pour out their throats in liquid song. Fair spring has donn'd her mantle green, The glorious sun shines bright ; — Let us, my friend, our footsteps bend From this great city, Paris hight : Let's roam o'er mountain and through wood In search of happiness in solitude. THE POET. 179 The manufacturer of sentimental ballads unites the different styles of the Elegiac, the Gloomy, and the familiar Poets. He is the author of the Peasant's Song, My Rural Cot, The Tyrolese Hunter, Flower of the Fields. The Even ing Breeze, Ever thine, Absent from thee, my faithful Heart, and scores of barcaroles, serenades, &c. Although he is obliged to give way to the caprice of the musical composer, he attributes to himself exclusively the success of their jomt production. " Do you know my last song? " I have heard it sung; the air is charming." "The music is horrid ; the words alone make it passable. I intend in future to employ another composer." The composer tells another story. " Have you heard my last song?" " Yes; I think it beautiful." " You flatter me. It certainly has met with success, notwithstanding the wretched trash to which the air is set. I shall take care another time to apply to a better poet." What a difference exists between the senti mental ballad-maker and his colleague the song ster ! This latter is a remnant of the ancient and modern Caveau ; he is perpetual president at all convivial meetings, member ofthe society ofthe Gymnase Lyric, and the faithful supporter of the fal-de-ras and other old fashioned refrains of the Theatre de la Foire. The songwriter glides down the stream of life, enlivening it by his gay sallies. Singing is his natural language, and when he talks like other people, he deviates from his usual habits. His pre sence gives life to the banquet ; he accom panies each course with a verse, and blesses the man who originated the practice of en graving songs on plates. " Ladies and gentlemen, I am going to sing a song on champagne ; I have to en treat your indulgence for a few minutes. I will propose a toast after each verse, and C==E==^> shame be to those who will not do it honour. Air: Fill, fill your glasses to the brim, My friends, nor deem me vain Four verses if I try to sing In praise of bright Champagne. 180 THE POET. To muse-invoking I'm averse, This bumper thus I drab — How can I sing in halting verse Inspir'd by bright Champagne ? Champagne, Champagne ! " To the memory of Desaugiers ! — three times three — Now, ladies and gen tlemen, I come to the political verse. None of us need be ashamed of the sen timents it expresses. Here's to our good king-citizen — Long may he happy reign, Bless'd by his faithful subjects, and Thus toasted in Champagne. How could his feeble ministers Their tott'ring seats retain, Unbacked by votes too cheaply bought With hampers of Champagne ? Champagne, Champagne ! "God save King Louis Philippe., Next follows the anacreontic verse. Ladies are requested to prepare their fans and pocket-handkerchiefs, and are not required to join in the chorus. Why fret and sigh, fond lover pale ? Confess to me your pain — What, is your mistress cruel still ? Are all entreaties vain ? Take my advice, and in a trice Her heart you shall obtain ; — Ask her to supper at Vefour's, And — ply her with Champagne, Champagne, Champagne ! " To tbe sex who are at once the charm and torment of our existence — to the ladies. . My fourth and last verse is patriotic, and no one present, I am sure, need be entreated to do it fitting honour. Prosperity to La belle France, Bourdeaux, and La Lorraine, Chateau- Margaux, Ai, La Bourgogne, Above all, La Champagne ! Though scarce begun, my song is done ; To end it gives me pain, For I'm a king while thus I sing The praises of Champagne, Champagne, Champagne ! " Prosperity to France!" THE POIiT. 181 All the guests rise ; plaudits, shouts, and ringing of glasses resound on all sides. The songwriter's triumph is complete. And why ? because he has awakened national feelings which may smoulder, but are never extinguished in a Frenchman's breast ; because his doggrel enshrines popular sentiments. Those who are enviers of his success accuse him of repeating at every wedding the same song, which suits all marriages, as the seven-league hoots suited all feet. For instance : — ***** Be rul'd by me, ye lovers all, Take my advice in time ; — Your happiness haste to secure At Hymen's holy shrine. It is said that he rarely drinks a cup of coffee without quoting a song upon the subject. Take this specimen : — ****** Then Mocha's fragrant berry rare Let's try to sing this day ; By it the wit of great Voltaire Was oft inspired, they say. His maligners affirm, moreover, that he has annually improvised for the last five-and-twenty years the same song in honour of the twelfth-night king. ***** Unprompted by self-interest, To the best of my powers, This song I've sung to praise a king Who only reigns twelve hours. Yet, despite these drawbacks, despite his ragged rhyme and faulty metre, the songwriter is, perhaps, of all the fraternity of rhymesters, the only one who, by addressing himself to the people by both form and substance, has most chance of being read and understood. " How comes it that Poets, in general, have so little success ?" asked we of an old friend whose age has not impaired the vigour of his mind. " Is the form of their poetry defective ? or is it deficient in harmony, in apt metaphor, or pic turesque expressions ? Why does the economical amateur hesitate to pay seven francs and a half for a few rhymes that meander monotonously over a vast desert of margin ?" " In my youth," replied our Nestor, " I witnessed the commencement of a movement still in operation, indicative of contempt for the past, and the precursor of a complete social revolution. Every individual is seeking the solution of an unknown problem, and each fancies he beholds on the social body symptoms of an evil that kings have no longer power to cure. In the midst of this general agitation, what interest think you can be taken in mere machines constructed, like barrel organs, to give forth certain sounds in empty but sonorous words, 182 THE POET. and which at all times, in all places, in all seasons, in peace and in war, intrude their insipid monotonous effusions ? Would not one be justified in saying to the dullards, ' 0 versifiers, Plato banished you from his republic ; and there is a much stronger reason why you should be banished from a state that cries aloud for so many reforms, and requires enlightened and patriotic statesmen to propose and carry them out? Are ye the partisans of improvement ? Do ye put your shoul ders to the wheel in the great cause ? — No. When you are called upon for a great and useful work, you answer by a rolling fire of rhymes, on some commonplace and threadbare subject. Scorned by the great-minded, you cannot be classed even with buffoons, for it was the province of hired jesters to amuse, and you only weary : buffoons excited the laughter of their masters, but if you suc ceed in raising a laugh at all, it is against yourselves.' " This sweeping sentence of my irascible old friend is far from being correct to the letter. But how many Poets are there who seem strivbg to justify it ? h >> /#./&«&,. THE MUTE BY PETRUS BOREL. C'est ainsi qu'on descend gaiment Le fleuve de la vie ! INCE we do not intend to describe the charac teristics of our subject with tbe minute accuracy required from a Professor of Natural History, nor to enter into a psycological analysis of his moral attributes, we commence by stating that in Paris there are three kinds of Mutes (nicknamed Croquemorts ), namely, the parish Mutes, the supernumemary, and the occasional Mutes. The parish Mutes (forty-eight in number, being four for each arrondissement*), although placed under the authority of the municipal body, are in fact maintabed by the company of Pompes et Services Funebres.\ Each Mute's annual salary is * Each of the twelve arrondissements into which Paris is divided has its municipal officers, mayor, &c, f The trade carried on in England by undertakers is in Paris the subject of a privilege, one Company having the exclusive right of supplying coffins and performing the public ser vice of funerals. The charges are made according to a regulation of the municipal body, and the Company pay an annual contribution for the benefit of the town. 184 THE MUTE. about one thousand francs (forty pounds), which would go but little way to quench the insatiable thirst that torments the tribe, were not this regular salary considerably increased by the fees he contrives to extort from mourners. So skilful is he in extracting gratifications, and so faithfully does he carry them to the wine-shop, that he could convert by no very slow process a pumice stone into a sponge, and draw off malmsey from Diogenes' tub. The twelve or fifteen supernumerary Mutes have much in common with the Mutes of the parish, but they are the servants of the Company only. They are quite as fond of drinking as their official brethren, and whenever taken to task on the subject of this favourite propensity, jovially hiccup in excuse a wretched pun on the name of the Company* whose servants they are. The supernumerary's services are only occasional, and his salary is proportionately small. Precarious as is his position, he, however, generally grows old in it. We know a supernume rary Mute who has served in that capacity twenty-seven years, and the number of corpses that have passed through his hands may be reckoned at forty-nine thousand. Aussitot que la lumieie Vient redorer nos coteaux the Miite rises, thrice does homage to Bacchus, and after numerous liba tions of brandy offered by the way, knocks at the door of a family just plunged into distress by the loss of a dear member ; with the perfect uncon cern of a man engaged in the common routine of his daily avocations he takes the admeasurement of the corpse. A beautiful young girl who died gathering flowers, a few days before the loveliest amongst her lovely companions, is in his eyes no more than a corpse five feet by fifteen inches. In the fat dow ager, or the middle-aged man grown corpulent in the indulgence of the good things of this life, he only beholds a subject requiring an octagonal coffin. He scarcely believes in grief, yet is he ever ready to mourn with the afflicted. He well knows that it is a profitable thing to sacrifice to false gods, and on this principle he sympathises with the sorrow of legatees. A wo-begone countenance doubles his perquisites. Such is his facility that he can on occasion shed showers of tears, and for sixpence extra will feign inconsolable grief. Like a verger at the approach of Christmas, his obsequiousness knows no bounds. How gently he pulls the bell ! how considerately he lowers his voice ! what respect he pays to the silent affliction of the bereaved family ! how softly he crosses the room, divesting his clumsy shoes for the nonce of their accustomed creak ! how care fully, to spare the feelings of the family, he attempts to screen with the narrow skirt of his coat the great coffin he brings in under his arm ! The corpse once lodged in the coffin, if the deceased is young, he tenderly places it upon his knees: if old, he whisperingly asks permission to deposit it upon a couch in order * The French vrat&pompe signifies pump, and also pomp, ceremonial. THE MUTE. 185 to make the least noise possible; he then proceeds to nail down the lid with such piecaution that not a single stroke of the hammer can be overheard in the next room, where the heart-broken survivors are mingling their tears. Bacchus is the most despotic of deities. He subjugates both mind and body of those who consecrate themselves to his service, and the Mute's habitual state of intoxication is a constant cause of never-ending mistakes; he is sure neither of his memory nor of his legs. Half tipsy, he carries a coffin to a house where a set of young men are indulging in revelry, and have the loss of no friend to mourn. Or he will mistake two addresses, and leave at Philip the Long's the coffin intended for Pepin the Short, and take to Tom Thumb's the coffin made for Daniel Lambert. Again, he will screw his coat tail down with the lid, and when he attempts to leave the room be dragged back by the dead. Sometimes at the top of a staircase he drops a coffin, and down it rolls to the bottom. Once, either from excess of emotion, or in a fit of drunkenness, a Mute fell head long into a grave with the coffin. The innocent little beings who die at the threshold of life, whom God in his mercy recals to himself, unsullied by any contact with the world, have not, like adults, the advantage of being drawn in a hearse. They are simply carried on the shoulder, and as it rarely happens that any mourners follow on such occasions, the Mutes, left to themselves, indulge without reserve their drinking propen sities, and stop at every public house on their road. No wonder they need so much refreshment ; the distance is so great, and their burden so heavy ! The halts are so frequent that sometimes night overtakes them ere they reach their destination; or they fall in with acquaintances, and in the conviviality that ensues the bier is forgotten. When the next day the bereaved mother repairs to the cemetery to strew flowers on her infant's grave; she finds it empty ! Dry your tears, daughter of affliction; the sainted object of your maternal sorrow is not lost ; the coffin containing its remains is safely deposited beneath a table in a neighbouring tavern. Though the Mute may be said to be exclusively addicted to the service of the Pompes Funebres and Bacchus, his leisure hours are sometimes devoted to the pursuit of some genteel trade. In the Rue des Fosses du Temple he keeps an elegant little shop for the sale of baked apples and liquorice water. His wife also exercises some professional calling, as worming ladies' lap-dogs, or selling groundsel and chickweed. We mention his wife as a matter of course, foi the Mute in his younger days feels the want of a companion always at hand to undress and put him to bed on his return home, and he marries early. Not that, if we are to believe the gay song of Beranger, he always finds it easy to enter into the holy state of matri mony ; and it must be confessed that his profession and his propensities are not calculated to prove very attractive. The office of parish Mute is hereditary, or may be transferred at the will of the J) B 186 THE MUTE. holder. Thus he has the right of nominating his successor, and upon his death the situation is in the gift of his widow. It not unfrequently happens that the transmission of the defunct's funeral uniform is accompanied by a more precious treasure in the affections of the widow. Should we be reproached with having too charitably thrown a veil over many of the Mute's faults, we do not intend to deny it; but after all he is so good a creature that, in spite of his many defects, it is impossible not to love him Is not the sun liable to eclipse ? and who amongst us has not his moments of weak ness? Higher personages have been, like the Mute, subjugated by the bottle. The sultan Mahmoud who so lately descended to the tomb, reigned long and glo riously, full of enlightened views and strong liquors ! Bassompierre was a de termined drinker, and Lucius Piso, the conqueror of Thrace, and Cossus, the counsellor of Tiberius, were both such inveterate topers that they were frequently carried drunken from the senate. The reader, doubtless, expected in the subject of this paper a dark and gloomy picture, grief and tears instead of intoxication. The contrast may astonish at first, but on examining a little closer it will be found natural. The daily, we may say hourly, contemplation of the nothingness of grandeur and all sublunary matters, leads to carelessness and frivolity. The contbual contact with death and all its mournful appliances, engenders a pity near akin to con tempt of men and things. Life is felt to be too short to be spent in self-denial; and unrestrained bdulgence is soon followed by excess. Bayard, himself, after a fortnight's service at the Pompes Funebres, would have become a silly fellow ; and if Napoleon had only been a Mute for three days, Harlequin's bat would have better suited him than a sceptre. But, jesting apart, if the ancient French liveliness has taken refuge anywhere, it is assuredly at the Pompes Funebres ; and the directors of the Company, whom one might suppose constantly over whelmed with sorrow, are jolly roystering fellows who always look at the bright side of things, and lead the merriest lives. For many years the administrators of the Pompes Funebres have been the most popular vaudevillists, and enjoying the monopoly of all the minor theatres, as well as of the cemeteries. Piis, Barre, Panard, and Sedaine, wrote many a gay song in the council room where no strangers are admitted, and where, instead of attending to the gloomy business of the Pompes, directors crack their wittiest jokes and smoke their best cigars. Such is the origin of some of the most suc cessful theatrical entertainments in Paris — vaudevilles and farces: puns and couplets have often sprung from the Pompes Funebres. When a new vaudeville, the joint production of two or three witty directors, is to be brought forward, every Mute, parochial supernumerary, and occasional, every servant of the Pompes Funebres receives an order, and is summoned to ensure the success of the new piece. On these nights there are no dead, how ever eminent they may have been during their lives, who could be buried. All the Pompes Funebres are engage 1 to laugh by appointment at the theatre. j. n Ji luuiin 187 This will, we are certain, appear monstrous extraordinary, incredible to the reader. Yet there are not in Paris two things more closely connected, more intimately allied, than the vaudeville and the Pompes Funebres, and any ser vant of the Company who has the least interest with a theatrical manager or popular dramatic writer is sure to stand the best chance of promotion. The person who supplies the supplementary coach and horses undertakes also to furnish a coachman. He is generally a helper in the stables, and nothing can be more striking, we had almost said diverting, than the jolly faces of these supernumerary mourning coachmen equip ped in the lugubrious costume of the Pompes Funebres. Imagine them in boots not unlike Don Giovanni's, only black instead of buff, a waistcoat hanging over the hips, and a loose great coat of rusty black, too large each way — the whole surmounted by a cocked hat, from one corner of which dangles a torn, limp remnant ofa crape weeper. The regular hearse driver, though almost al ways a hard drinker, is a shade or two less be sotted than the Mute. As it is impossible to ap proach a Mute without noticing a strong fetid smell, mingled with the effluvium of brandy, so the hearse driver savours at once of the stable and the wine-shop ; his fate much resembles that of the hackney coach-horse : he has formerly lived in the service of a nobleman or gentleman, and broken down by age and misfortunes, from one step to another he has been compelled to accept at last this situation. When completely worn out and unfit for use, his grateful country sends him to Bicetre, if, as often happens, he does not die of apoplexy in the exercise of his functions. The Mute's occupation is subject to the same fluctuations as other trades. There are good and bad customers, flourishing and dull seasons. The dead season is not that in which mortality is prevalent, but rather that in which there are few deaths : their best time is when deaths are frequent, but, still not to ex cess. The cholera was considered most disastrous ; there was then too much work on hand to do it well ; everything was done in a hurry ; there was no time to indulge relatives in the luxuries of the Pompes Funebres ; the Company had not a sufficient quantity of hearses ; no funeral could be got up nicely ; decidedly the cholera was a bad season ; but nothing can be better than mild influenzas ; they are the fortune and the joy of the Mutes. &W0UST E . sc. 188 Whenever Paris is visited by an epidemic, the men and the horses of the Pompes Funebres are no longer sufficient, and the Company are under the neces sity of hiring Mutes and horses for the additional funerals. The hired Mute is generally chosen amongst porters and shoeblacks ; sometimes, however, the de mand is so great that passengers in the streets are almost impressed into the ser vice. " Will you earn thirty sous ?" is the phrase with which you are accosted, and before you can reply, you are, nolens volens, compelled to don the Mute's solemn eostume — as at a fire you would be compelled by the police to assist in working the engine. In such cases as these the funeral is turned into a masque rading farce. Some of the attendants may be seen in garments that sit on them like sacks, while others of herculean frame have been bducted into trousers whieh scarcely cover their knees, and coats that would serve them better as cravats. : The cart-driver of the Pompes Funebres is an insignificant variety of the Mute, properly so called. It is his business to carry the decorations to the house of the deceased, to assist in arranging them, &c. He is always a disreputable character, and too often a thorough rogue. When his work is done he seldom fails, upon receiving his gratuity, to offer his services to fetch the holy water, and he contrives by this means to pocket an extra allowance ; for he never goes to church for the holy water, and at the wine-shop where he spends the money he has" just received, he easily fills his pitcher with filtered water. " Holy or filtered water," says he to himself, "what matter? Dead men never grumble." Very true, but they are cheated for all that. The starched personage who stalks before the hearse, wearing a cocked hat, a black coat, a scarf round his waist, pumps, or clumsily made boots, coarse or fine trousers, and, who, in rainy weather carries an open umbrella, is no less than the leader of the procession. He often fancies himself the representative of the mayor, who can not attend, or the head of the Company ; hence his self-sufficient strut. He handles his official cane, ornamented with a cenerary urn, as if it were a sceptre, and would fain believe that there is something truly majestic about him. He is not however, so wrapped up in his elevated position but that he willingly drinks with the beadles, and even with the mutes and coachmen He is gene rally selected among the superannuated sub-pre fects, or cashiered journalists. THE MUTE. 189 Upon the death of a person of rank or fortune, one of the clerks of the Company quits the pen for the sword, replaces his threadbare office coat by a black mantle, lays aside his gossamer for a plumed cocked hat, and suddenly transforms him self into the noble and imposing personage of whom Henri Monnier has given the faithful sketch in the margin. Thus disguised, the majestic clerk assumes the high-sounding title of master of the ceremonies ; the entire management of the funeral belongs to him, and all the servants of the Company are, for the time being, placed under his authority. A tall and dignified master of the ceremonies ^3 costs ten francs; if of middle height, he only fetches eight ; if bow-legged, the sum is reduced to seven ; and formerly those with crooked legs could be had under four francs. But, alas ! the Pompes Funebres have had also their revolution, and every day brings fresh innovations. The ancient and primitive simplicity has given place to showy and pompous display ; and so far has this been carried that the manes and tails of the horses are now plaited and disposed with as much care as a lady's hair. Their heads are decorated with cockades of ribbon, and their hoofs polished with varnish blacking. In a word, everything is done by the Company that can conduce to the comfort of both the dead and their survivors. Mourners may be accommodated with second-hand clothes, or new suits made for the occasion. For country funerals, splendid berlins beautifully painted and varnished, with patent springs, are always on hire for the conveyance of corpses These carriages are elegant, and their real use is so well disguised that they might pass unsuspected amongst the gayest equipages at Longchamps. When a man starts on a journey to take a country gentleman's corpse to his family seat, or to carry home the remains of a baronet come over to learn good manners and overtaken by death in his laborious education, he takes great care to provide himself with a gun, powder, and shot, and all the way along wages war against the feathered tribe, the rumble-tumble serving him for his game-bag. But as providing the mortal remains of a relative so luxurious a conveyance to their last resting place costs two shillings a mile, many economical individuals make use of the carriers' vans for the purpose ; they book the coffins of their relatives at the nearest office, and are charged for carriage and porterage according to weight. It is now some years since the establishment at No. 18, Rue St. Marc Feydeau of a splendid branch dep6t ofthe grand company of the Faubourg St. 190 THE MUTE. Denis. The arrangements of this establishment are on such a comprehensive scale that it would be an unpardonable omission on our part to pass over it in silence. Has any one lost a member of his family, let him repair to the Rue St. Marc; there, for a small commission, everything connected with the funeral will be undertaken, from the Pompes Funebres to the sexton, not forgetting the distri bution of alms ; so that, the order given, the mourner may shut himself up in his closet and abandon himself to the free indulgence of his sorrow. Let us add that there is always kept on view for the mspection of customers a great variety of small sepulchres, little tomb-gardens, minute gravestones, imperceptible urns, and portable coffins, all at fixed prices, and warranted ofthe very best materials and workmanship. Should you wish to embalm the cherished object of your affections, perfect specimens of three years' standmg are submitted for your inspection. The Company as well as the mortuary masons keep a large number of agents and travelling clerks, who are always on the look out for disease and death. As soon as you take cold, or — die, these birds of ill omen flock round your door, and very often raise a dispute for precedence. Sometimes these agents go so far as to bribe the porter to give them notice of the departure of their prey, and intro duce them to the survivors to the exclusion of their competitors. Ere the weeping widow has well closed her deceased husband's eyes she is informed that a gentleman in black who appears to take the liveliest interest in her melan choly situation desires the favour of an interview ; she gives orders for him to be admitted. The stranger enters, handkerchief in hand, and in obedience to the lady's sign quietly takes a chair. " Madam, you have suffered a great loss." " Indeed, Sir, my grief is too deep for words." " I believe it, Madam, and sin cerely sympathise." " Alas ! there is no consolation left for me in this world." " You must, Madam, submit to God's decree, and supplicate from above resigna tion to bear unrepinbgly a loss that in the first gush of your grief seems past endurance. God is merciful, and will not try you beyond your strength." " Sir, your kindness quite overpowers me. But I cannot remember that I ever had the honour of seeing you before. To what may I attribute this solicitude on your part ?" " Madam, I am sure a good wife would neglect nothing con ducive to the befitting sepulture of so excellent a husband. This world is a vale of tears, and many and bitter are the afflictions that overtake us on our thorny path. I have the honour to represent Messrs. , of Rue , &c.,and I have taken the liberty of waiting upon you to solicit the favour of an order for a tombstone to the memory of M. . We have an immense assort ment of new and second-hand slabs, tablets, headstones, urns, &c, in the most approved taste " The condolent visitor here has to put up with a volley of indignant reproaches, for which, however, he is prepared; and bravely he stands the shock. " Good God, Sir, are you so wholly destitute of heart and feeling that you can thus intrude your employers' business into the sacred privacy of a THE MUTE. 191 heart-stricken widow who has scarcely closed her husband's eyes ! Your in famous trade is perfectly disgraceful. Heaven knows, &c." The gentieman in black does not stay to defend himself and his calling, but allows the servant to conduct him down stairs. However, he repeats his visits the next day, nor quits the charge until he has extorted an order. In the Faubourg du Roule dwells an illustrious worker in ebony, with the singularly appropriate name of Homo. In his manufactory are constructed coffins of oak and mahogany, tulip and sandal wood; coffins with compartments and secret closets : and musical coffins. But the village of La Gare is the great seat of the manufacture of the deal coffins, in universal use for the lower classes. The proprietor of this extensive establishment is bound by contract to the Pompes Funebres always to have, at least, six thousand ready made, and a suffi cient number for use at each Mairie. We need scarcely add that the mono- maker is not making a fortune, but augmenting an immense one already accu mulated. It is, of course, understood that the subject of this paper is the Parisian Mute. Undertakers' men in the provinces vary to infinity, but, everything considered, they are always mere provincials. Funerals are less sumptuously performed in the country than b the capital, and the costume of the Mutes, especially, is wofully neglected. Hearses, upon which the Parisians are wont to pride them selves, — so much so, indeed, that there is a saying among the vulgar classes that a day will, sooner or 19ter, come when each of them shall ride in his carriage, — are in the country not generally adopted, and in all probability the time is far distant when they will be in common use. In many towns the idea of conveying a corpse to the tomb in a vehicle drawn by horses is held in horror as a kind of sacrilege ; and it is not long since an unlucky hearse that chanced to be driven through the town of Moulins was thrown into the river by the indignant mob. THE MONEY-LENDER. BY L. JOUSSERANDOT. EAVING to others the discussion of all economi cal questions concernbg money, the regulation of its value, and the laws of its circulation, it is our present purpose to describe the character, habits, and tactics of the class of men known by the appellation of Money-lenders — thirsty vam- pyres, ever ready to prey upon our purse and help us to lead a dissipated and improvident life, like the noisome bat which, in the American forests, sucks the blood of the traveller whom he has lulled to sleep with the drowsy flapping of his wings. Life at twenty is a sumptuous banquet, at which pleasure presides, and the impetuous guest is heedless of the smothered laughter of the attendants, who inwardly deride his folly, and reckon beforehand their profits on his ruin. The Usurer is our steward ; him we entrust with the management of our affairs, to him we apply for money ; to him we send our creditors, nor pause a moment to reflect until he thinks proper to send in his account. Then wo betide us ! Whenever he aban dons his prey, we may be sure there is nothing left to tempt his cupidity. mVIElUE ' THE MONEY-LENDER. 193 The difference that exists between the Parisian and provincial Money-lenders is very great, notwithstanding that they both employ the same means to arrive at the same end. The provincial Usurer is nearly always an old retired trades man, who having, in thirty or forty years, saved some two thousand pounds, quietly lives on his little fortune, which by skilful management yields him an income of two hundred, or two hundred and fifty pounds. This worthy capitalist is always to be seen at the most popular coffee-house in the town, which, bdeed, is his principal place of business. In dull country towns where everybody seeks the news ofthe day, the coffee-house is the only refuge against ennui. The idle young men of the place pass most of their time there, smoking, drinkbg, and gambling; at first, the stakes are only refreshments, but soon money is played for ; when cash runs short, recourse is had to the landlord, sub sequently to friends, and finally to the respectable old folks who look on but never play, and content themselves with offering their opinion. When a young man is reduced to the last extremity for want of money, and begins to curse his hard fate, one of these "respectable old men" — an usurer — is ever at his elbow to offer him consolation. " You owe," he says, " twelve pounds to the landlord, and eight more to your friends. Do not worry yourself about the matter; I was once young myself: Call upon me to-morrow morning." The next day the young man accordingly visits his kind-hearted friend, who, instead of advancing the bare twenty pounis of which he stands in need, makes it five-and-twenty, drawing upon him at twelve months for tbe amount and interest at the rate of five per cent. Astonished and gratified by this generosity, our young friend returns home ready to quarrel with any one who should assert that there is a rogue in the world. In fact, excepting the smalLaffair of the bill and the interest, which is as reasonable as possible, his own father could not have extricated him better." Alas ! allured by the tempting bait, he takes no heed of the deadly-hook it hides. Happy and contented as the day he left school, he now pursues his course without fear or anxiety for the future ; expenses follow expenses, one folly begets another; his exchequer is soon exhausted, and his friends to whom he applies are no richer than himself. But what matter? why be alarmed ? has he not a worthy friend ever ready to assist him with his purse ? For six months his expenditure goes on increasing in consequence of the facility with which he knows he can find money ; and at last he applies to his Providence. " My dear Sir, may I once more throw myself upon your kindness, for assist ance in a rather awkward affair?'' " In what way can I serve you ?" answers the Usurer, blandly. ' T want a thousand francs to day." " Beware, my excellent young friend, you are running at the top of your speed," replies the Usurer, in the same tone as a doting mother would answer a first application of the kind from a spoiled child. o c )94 THE MONEY-LENDER. " Pooh, pooh ! you know that my father is rich. . . . Come will you do me this service?" " You do just as you please with me," rejoins the old gentleman, with an air of resignation. " Let us see what arrangement we can make. You owe me already twenty-five pounds for your former bill, which has only six months to run. Now that we will cancel, and its amount added to the forty pounds you want, and four more which I will give you so as not to leave you entirely without cash when your debts are paid, will make a total of seventy pounds ; to which I will only add ten pounds for interest, and you can give me a note of hand for eighty : thus all will be settled. Before taking this step, our young man might have retrieved himself by con fessing to his friends faults that are easily forgiven ; and hence the cunning Usurer's accommodating terms. But when he next has recourse to the Money lender, it will no longer be for a little debt of five hundred francs, that any friend or relation could advance ; but for sums of four, five, or six thousand francs, and he will not dare to confess such heavy liabilities to his father. Then the Usurer will have got him completely in his power: at every fresh loan he renews his securities, and at each renewal, in default of payment, exorbitant interest is added ; stamped bills are substituted for notes of hand, the debt swells to a frightful amount, and if the debtor ventures to offer a remark, " Pay it off, if you are not satisfied," cooly rejoins the Money-lender. Nor can his unfortunate victim help himself. The Usurer is but too well aware that when a young man has gone so far, it is too late for him to retract, and that henceforth he (the Usurer) may make his own terms. At the expira tion of eight or ten years a debt of forty or fifty thousand francs is thus incurred to a creditor who has not actually advanced more than ten or twelve : and when the young man comes into his patrimony he finds that he has completely fore stalled its enjoyment, and is compelled to sell or mortgage his property to satisfy the unjust, though legal, claims of an Usurer. This is a moral sore that nothing can cure ; the French laws are powerless against the cunning of these wretches. The Usurer who, by speculating on their reckless love of pleasure, ruins young men with good expectations, is certainly very guilty; but nothing can be more atrocious than those devouring wolves who take advantage of poverty to enrich themselves : although living in the midst of civilized society, they are more cruel and more heartless than the savages of the desert. How many (seeming) stout peasants may be seen in the country, knobby stick in hand, and a belt lined with gold pieces round their waist, haunting fairs and markets to offer their assistance ! Let us follow and observe one of them. A poor farmer casts a wishful glance on half-a-dozen head of cattle for sale. " Fine beasts, master, are they not ?" says the officious Money-lender. " Indeed they are," replies the unsuspecting rustic," and the very animals I am in want of, the murrain having killed all mine." THE MONEY-LENDER. 195 "Why not buy them?" " Because, unfortunately, I am short of money," says the simple farmer, with downcast eyes. " But how can you work without a team ?". continues the man with the knobby stick. "Come, come, let us see: perhaps I may be able to lend you a hand." And taking advantage of the farmer's poverty, the Usurer lends him four or five- and twenty louis, on condition of receiving thirty after harvest. If the money is not ready the day it becomes due, payment is enforced, and the debtor's ruin is the consequence. Has the poor man a field or a vineyard, it becomes the prey of his remorseless creditor ; has he nothing besides his farming implements, even these are sold. This nuisance is more pregnant with danger in the country, because there the Usurer's nefarious transactions are carried on less openly than in cities, and he is, if not the friend, at least, nearly always the intimate acquaintance of his prey. He makes no show ; is incessantly complaining of poverty and lamenting the hard ness of the times, and affects to be poorer and poorer the richer he grows. In short, tbe country Money-lender is ashamed of his calling. But let us turn to the Paris Usurer. He affects neither the outward seeming of a small fortune, nor has recourse to any stratagem to obtain customers ; with cool impudence he carries on his trade in the broad face of day, surrounded by all the luxuries of life. Perhaps you have remarked in the Bois de Boulogne a tall handsome man driving an elegant tilbury, with a diminutive tiger by his side. This exquisite who handles his whip so gracefully, who emits the smoke of his cigar with so much nonchalance, who wears yellow gloves and dresses so elegantly, is not worth rnore than twenty thousand pounds. He is in the good graces of an opera dancer who costs him eight hundred a year ; dines at the Cafe Anglais or the Cafe de Paris ; lodges in splendid apartments in the Rue St. Lazare, and " He must be a conjuror." No, gentle reader, he is only an Usurer. Oh for the good old times when transactions of this kind were conducted through a valet, and when a Money-lender who presumed to be impertinent or importunate was soundly thrashed ! Now-a-days, the gentlemen must be accosted with head uncovered and a smile on the lips, and too happy we es teem ourselves when they condescend to acknowledge our politeness. This is one of the blessings of equality. But, to return to our "lion." We say lion — the Paris Money-lender being often a lion, and a most ferocious one ; a prouder dandy than a ruined marquis, a vainer one than a parvenu. Our young lions are worthy, good fellows, whose errors lie in too constantly striving after effect ; they admire themselves, and think none so fine as they ; but this is only a foible not inexcusable — for which of us is without his foible ? Moreover, they are nearly always young men of property who know 196 THE MONEY-LENDER. the world, lead a voluptuous and brilliant life, and in the end become excellent nusbands. But the Usurer of aristocratical pretensions is the most insolent dog in Paris, particularly to those who are compelled to seek his assistance. — It is worthy of remark, that when a young man applies to a more or less honest Money-lender, he seems to be seized at once with the consciousness of his false situation ; he speaks almost tremblingly, and with the air of a man imploring pity : this, doubtless, has given the rich Usurer the air of impertinent and patronizing familiarity that characterises him. So true it is that when pressed by want we become the very humble servants of the party whose assistance we require, however despicable his character may be in our estimation. The Usurer of whom we are now speaking is ever extremely careful of concealing his pro fession, and for that reason never acts in his own name ; he is always the pre tended agent of a third party, and his signature never appears on the bills. When a loan is solicited of him, he begins by stating that he has no money, and cannot raise any. His style of living is too expensive, he says, to enable him to save money to oblige his friends ; nay, he is in debt himself. However, he will try to assist the person who needs his aid ; he hopes one of his acquain tance will be able to lend him the sum required ; but, for his own part, it is quite certain that he has no money ; he has not e,yen enough to live on, without attending to business — but he does business on a large scale, and the trifle now proposed is beneath his attention. By such talk as this, the Usurer makes it appear that he wants simply to oblige, and is not seeking to make any profit by it. Having made the desired impression, he wishes his visitor " Good morning," and tells him to call again in a few days when he hopes to give him good news. When, two or three days after, the borrower returns to the Usurer. " Well," says the latter, " I believe I have succeeded, but not without some difficulty, I promise you." " Oh, Sir, I can never be sufficiently grateful." " Nay, no thanks are due to me. The fact is, a friend of mine will receive a thousand crowns in a few days; I have solicited the loan of them for you, and he promised me to let you have them." " Upon what terms ?" " Not a word was said about that. What do you propose ?" The borrower offers ten or twelve per cent, at twelve months and retires, say ing, that he will call agab very soon, to enquire if the friend has received his thousand crowns. A series of calls on the Usurer next ensues, till the borrower is tired of being told that the bill has been dishonoured and the friend obliged to apply to the Tribunal of Commerce for the recovery ofthe money he expected. The young gentleman in difficulties then insists, supplicates the Usurer to try some one else— he who has so many rich friends ; adding, that money he must have at any price. This is precisely the point the Usurer wishes to THE MONEY-LENDER. 197 arrive at, his only object in making his customer call so repeatedly being to tire him out ; he knows that expectation whets desire, and wisely reckons that the longer he waits the more easy it will be to make him consent to any terms. At last, he proposes to procure the thousand crowns, but for six months only, and at fifteen per cent. Frightened at the high interest and short date, the borrower declares, that he cannot accept the loan on such hard terms — and leaves without concluding. A few hours' reflection, however, makes him feel that he wants the money, and has no one else to apply to for it. But, when he goes the next day to announce his acceptance of the terms proposed, " You are too late," says the Usurer, " my friend has found another investment for his money." The victim renews his entreaties, and is made to wait another fortnight to convince him how difficult it is to procure money. Finally, he accepts a bill for three thousand francs at six months, in exchange for which he receives two thousand, two hundred, and fifty francs. We allude only to the Parisian Money-lender on a large scale, as the petty Usurer is the same in Paris as in country towns ; excepting that being not in daily contact with his customers, he is less dangerous. In the country, the lender nearly always meets the borrower half-way, whereas, in Paris, precisely the contrary is the case ; for it is difficult in this ever-changing, modern Babylon, to follow a man at every step of his life, and obtain influence enough over his conduct to make him select one course in preference to another. The Usurer who preys on petty tradesmen and their sons is generally a good sort of man, who leads a quiet life, takes his afternoon nap, punctually pays his rent, and mounts guard regularly. But the proceedings of the Money-lender of higher pretensions, particularly in Paris, present very curious traits ; and borrowers may sometimes think themselves in luck when they receive their loan in the shape of hard cash, even when they have an enormous interest to pay. Suppose, for instance, a bill for six thousand francs is proposed to an Usurer to discount, his first step is to take a long time to consider of it. The holder calls on him again and again, and being in very urgent want of money he contrives to obtain by a few hundred francs at a time nearly three thousand francs. There the Usurer stops. " I have found a party willing to do your bill," he says at last, " but on certain conditions only. He proposes to give you three thousand francs, (which will just cover my advances,) and pay the balance in goods, which, however, you can easily dispose of. The indignant bill-holder cries out against the injustice of such an arrangement, and declares that he has been entrapped. " Then return me three thousand francs you have received and get your bill done elsewhere," rejoins the Usurer; well knowing that this is out of the power of his customer, who has no alterna tive but to accept the terms proposed. The goods generally consist of silk 198 THE MONEY-LENDER. handkerchiefs, snuffboxes, or pipes ; sometimes, indeed, of articles more difficult to sell. A young spendthrift was once induced to receive in part payment of a bill a quantity of rough paving stones and blocks of granite lying in a stone mason's yard. The day after the bargain was made, the mason gave the young man to understand, that wanting room in his yard, the stone must be at once re moved ; and the consequence was that he was obliged to sell his bulky property for what it would fetch, at a loss of about sixty per cent. Another party was compelled to take for part payment of a loan the goodwill of a coffee-house, and a third a dressmaker's business. A dandy of considerable notoriety a few years ago, had, one morning, a complete menagerie driven into his courtyard, bears, camels, apes, and two cart-loads of mousetraps ; and all in payment of a bill of exchange. The dandy's vexation may easily be imagined. Finding it impossible to get rid of the animals, nothing was left for him but to erect cages for them on the Boulevart du Temple, and hire keepers to shew them to the public at five sous each person. An exquisite to become a wild beast proprietor ! what a falling off was there. But we should never have done enumerating all the Usurer's methods of pinching his victim ; to say nothing of the debtors' prison at Clichy, always ready to receive him in case of default of payment. This reminds us of a droll adventure that happened a short time ago at Clichy, and deserves a place in this paper, as an Usurer was the principal party con cerned in it. The said Usurer, whom we will call M. Blabval, is a Parisian lion, and with an income of twenty thousand francs, contrives to spend fifty thousand without ruining himself. Though forty-five, M. Blabval is not only a subscriber to the opera, but generally keeps a dancer to amuse his leisure ; at the time to which we refer, his mistress was a certain Mdlle. Juliette, and he was actually fool enough to fancy her in love with him. So far, however, from this being the case, the poor girl, who was only seventeen, refused for some time to accept his protection, and would never have yielded had he not threatened to have her hissed on the boards, and to procure her dismissal from the corps de ballet. Yet Juliette was a very clever dancer. But this is the way things are managed at the opera ; the subscribers are alla-powerful, why, we know not ; they have made this theatre a seraglio, and have only to throw their handkerchief: this accounts for Juliette's ruin. Sometime after her connexion with Blabval, she met a fine looking, handsome young man, whom we will call Charles ; the comparison be tween him and her protector was too much in favour of the former for her to resist, and the intrigue had gone on three months without discovery, when one day her maid in a fit of revengeful passion revealed all to Blabval. His anger of course knew no bounds ; his first impulse was to rush to his mistress's apart ments and destroy everything. But he conquered his rage, and summoned cool reflection to his aid. " If I make a scandalous exposure," said he to himself, " all the riducule will fall on me. I cannot break off my connection with THE MONEY-LENDER. 199 Juliette without a motive, and if it were once known that she has been playing me false for three months, I should be the laughing-stock of all the young dandies in Paris. Before casting her off I will revenge myself both on her and her lover. " Thus keeping his own counsel he continued to visit her as usual, and that without any very great effort, his vanity only having been wounded, and not his affections. About this time Charles was in want of money, and was almost reduced to despair when one of his friends recommended him to apply to Blabval. Un luckily he was ignorant of the character ofthe latter, and, moreover, had not the remotest idea of the connexion subsisting between him and Juliette. Accordingly he called without the slightest suspicion on Blabval, a very few days after the maid had betrayed her mistress. He wanted to borrow a thousand crowns for a .. month ; Blabval lent them with great apparent good will at five per cent, with out taking any other security than an acceptance, and the additional precaution of a cognovit duly executed. Nothing could be urged against so reasonable a proposition ; but at the end of the month Charles was unable to pay ; he had been disappointed in two or three different quarters, and the consequence was that the bill was protested. He was not, however, alarmed. " I will demand a few day's delay," said he to himself, " and no doubt they will be granted." But Charles had no mercy to expect at Blainval's hands, and two days after wards he was safely lodged at Clichy. Before he had been an hour in confine ment the jailor informed him that he was free : Blainval had not relented : Juliette had pawned her jewels. Charles was shortly afterwards enabled to prove to her the extent of his grati- titude by the timely death of an old aunt who left him thirty thousand francs a year. He, however, has not forgotten Blainval, and has never since his bcar- tion put his name to a bill of exchange. If the bill system were abolished, what would become of the Usurer ? FINIS. BALNE BROTHERS, PRINTERS, GRACECHTJRCII STKEET. YALE UNIVERSITY a39002 0031<+9