The Parisians, Book 5.

s and haunts of the mode. It had been furnished and inhabited by a brilliant young provincial from Bordeaux, who, coming into an inheritance of one hundred thousand francs, had rushed up to

d a share in the hated drudgery of the avoue's business,-his apartment was to be had for a tenth part of the original cost of its furniture. A certain Chevalier de Finisterre, to whom Louvier had introduced the Marquis as a useful fellow who knew Paris, and would save him from being cheated, had secured this bijou of an apartment for Alain, and concluded the bargain for the bagatelle of L500. The Chevalier took the same advantageous occasion to purchase the English well-bred hack and the neat coupe and horses which the Bordelais was also necessitated to dispose of. These purchases made, the Marquis had some five thousand francs (L200) left out of Louvier's premium of L1,000. The Marquis, however, did not seem alarmed or dejected by the sudden diminution of capital so expeditiously effected. The easy life thus commenced seemed to him too n

fect, not only on the habits, but on the character and cast of thought, which

t Paris. If Paris has the credit, or discredit, of it more than any other capital, it is because in Paris more than in any other capital it charms the eye by grace and amuses the ear by wit. A philosophy which takes the things of this life very easily; which has a smile and a shrug of the shoulders for any pretender to the Heroic; which subdivides the wealth of passion into the pocket-money of caprices, is always in or out of love ankle-deep, never venturing a plunge; which, light of heart as of tongue, turns "the solemn plausibilities" of earth into subjects for epigrams and bons mots,- jests at loyalty to kings and turns up its nose at enthusiasm for commonwealths, abjures all grave studies and shuns all profound emotions. We have crowds of such philosophers in London; but there they are less noticed, because the agreeable attributes of the sect are there dimmed and obfuscated. It is not a philosophy that flowers richly in the reek of fogs and in the teeth of east winds; it wants for full developm

ing to his college friend, of whom we have so long lost sight, Frederic Lemercier. Frederic had breakfasted with Alain,-a breakfast such as m

favour, my allegiance to Duplessis, though that clever fellow has just made a wondrous coup in the Egyptians, and I gain forty thousand francs by having followed his advice. But if Dup

cannot obl

oing, or mean to do, without some fresh addition to your income, than a lio

eft, net and clear. My rooms and stables are equipped, and I have twenty-five hundred francs in hand. On seven hundred napoleons a year, I calculate th

bove all, you do not calculate the chief part of one's expenditure,-the unfor

never tou

au seigneur, I presume you are not going to resuscitate the part of the Ermite

om I shall

you. Before another month has flown yo

n my illusions, if illusions they be. Ah, you cannot conceive what a new life opens to the man who, like myself, has passed the dawn of hi

xperience at stake, or if you were in the position of men like myself,-free from the encumbrance of a great name and heavily mortgaged lands. Should you f

if I believe De Finisterre, he has taken a sincere liking to me on account of affection to my poor father. But why should not the interest be paid regularly? The revenues from Rocheb

ow

list who is disposed to make a contract for their sale at the fall this year, and may proba

rre is not a man I should imp

as his name may tell you, a fellow-Breton. You yourself allow, and so does Enguerrand, that

't know him personally,-I am not in his set. I have no valid reason to disparage his character, nor do I conjecture any m

I ask

ence warned me against making the Chevalier's acquaintance, and said to me, in his blunt way, 'De Finisterre came to Paris with nothing; he has succeeded to nothing; he belongs to no ostensible profession by which a

ur sagacio

less

ut for pigeons. I fancy that Duplessis is, like all those money- getter

et it be dropped; only make me one promise,-that if you should be in arrear, or if need presses, you will come at once to

cheerfully, but yet with a secret emotion of tenderness and gratitude. "And now, mon cher, what da

heres, and I shall not trespass on yours. Je suis trop bo

thus? My dear fellow, my fri

walk; and I prefer my Bohemian royalty to vassalage in higher regions. Say no more of it. It will flatter my vanity enough if you will now

e Champs Elysees, to humble us with your boast of having

lame Ruy Blas for accepting the love of a queen, but I do blame him for passing himself off as a noble,-a plagiarism, by the by, from an

her h

belle I

id Alain, sli

emercier to introduce him to his kinsman. "Enguerrand, I present

M. Lemercier's acquaintance. Bold and assured as Frederic was in his own circles, he was more discomposed than set at ease by the gracious accost of a lion

and I have met him in the Coulisses and the Bal Mabille. I think, too, that he plays at the Bourse, and is lie w

him, and was not prepo

a man much to be ad

y s

art of making what we all covet,-

n already i

society which I have recently been permitted by my fa

society, and the

ans; and my father begins to own that truth, th

Rao

ld solidly; and that whatever we do build could be upset any day by a Paris mob, which he declares to be the only institution we have left. A wonderful fellow is Raoul,-full of mind, though he does little with it; full of heart, which he devotes to suffering humanity, and to a poetic, knightly reverence (not to be confounded with earthly love, and not to be degraded into that sickly sentiment called Platonic affection) for the Comtesse di Rimini, who is six years older than himself, and who is very faithfully attached to her husband, Raoul's intimate friend, whose honour he would guard as his own. It is an episode in the drama of Parisian life, and one not so uncommon as the malignant may suppose. Di Rimini knows and approves of his veneration; my mother, the best of women, sanctions it, and deem

that a few months ago he would have sought as example and model. He

ly affection. I come to take you to your relation, the Duchesse of Tarascon. I have

I no longer feel quite the same prejudices against her and the I

Yours can meet you where