"No," he said inly, "I must wrench | Paris are not so serious as they mostly myself from the very memory of that are in London; and Bacourt, a pleasant haunting face, the friend and pupil of philosopher of the school of Aristippus, Madame de Grantmesnil, the associate of was no unfrequent nor ungenial guest at Gustave Rameau, the rival of Julie Cau-any banquet in which the Graces relaxed martin, the aspirant to that pure atmos- their zones. Martial glory was also repphere of art in which there are no vulgar resented at that social gathering by a connubial prejudices! Could I - wheth- warrior, bronzed and decorated, lately arer I be rich or poor-see in her the ideal rived from Algiers, on which arid soil he of an English wife? As it is as it is-had achieved many laurels and the rank with this mystery which oppresses me, of Colonel. Finance contributed Dupleswhich, till solved, leaves my own career sis. Well it might; for Duplessis had insoluble, as it is, how fortunate that I just assisted the host to a splendid coup did not find her alone - did not utter the at the Bourse. words that would fain have leapt from my heart did not say, 'I may not be the rich man I seem, but in that case I shall be yet more ambitious, because struggle and labour are the sinews of ambition! Should I be rich, will you adorn my station? should I be poor, will you enrich poverty with your smile? And can you, in either case, forego— really, painlessly forego, as you led me to hope — the pride in your own art?' My ambition were killed did I marry an actress, a singer. Better that than the hungerer after excitements which are never allayed, the struggler in a career which admits of no retirement - the woman to whom mar-ble, ruinous to the digestion - contribute riage is no goal-who remains to the last the property of the public, and glories to dwell in a house of glass into which every bystander has a right to peer. Is this the ideal of an Englishman's wife and home? No-no!-woe is me, no!"

BOOK SIXTH.

CHAPTER I.

A FEW weeks after the date of the preceding chapter, a gay party of men were assembled at supper in one of the private salons of the Maison Dorée. The supper was given by Frederic Lemercier, and the guests were, though in various ways, more or less distinguished. Rank and fashion were not unworthily represented by Alain de Rochebriant and Enguerrand de Vandemar, by whose supremacy as "lion" Frederick still felt rather humbled, though Alain had contrived to bring them familiarly together. Art, Literature, and the Bourse had also their representatives in Henri Bernard, a rising young portraitpainter whom the Emperor honoured with his patronage; the Vicomte de Brézé, and M. Savarin. Science was not altogether forgotten, but contributed its agreeable delegate in the person of the eminent physician to whom we have been before introduced-Dr. Bacourt. Doctors in

"Ah, cher M. Savarin," says Enguerrand de Vandemar, whose patrician blood is so pure from revolutionary taint that he is always instinctively polite, "what a masterpiece in its way is that little paper of yours in the Sens Commun,' upon the connection between the national character and the national diet, so genuinely witty! for wit is but truth made amusing."

"You flatter me," replied Savarin, modestly; "but I own I do think there is a smattering of philosophy in that trifle. Perhaps, however, the character of a people depends more on its drinks than its food. The wines of Italy - heady, irrita

to the character which belongs to active brains and disordered livers. The Italians conceive great plans, but they cannot digest them. The English common people drink beer, and the beerish character is stolid, rude, but stubborn and enduring. The English middle class imbibe port and sherry; and with these strong potations their ideas become obfuscated. Their character has no liveliness; amusement is not one of their wants; they sit at home after dinner and doze away the fumes of their beverage in the dulness of domesticity. If the English aristocracy is more vivacious and cosmopolitan, it is thanks to the wines of France, which it is the mode with them to prefer; but still, like all plagiarists, they are imitators, not inventors— - they borrow our wines and copy our manners. The Germans

"Insolent barbarians!" growled the French Colonel, twirling his moustache ; "if the Emperor were not in his dotage, their Sadowa would ere this have cost them their Rhine."

"The Germans," resumed Savarin, unheeding the interruption, "drink acrid wines, varied with beer, to which last their commonalty owes a quasi resemblance in stupidity and endurance to the English masses. Acrid wines rot the teeth: Germans are afflicted with toothache from in

fancy. All people subject to toothache | be the best or the worst. For my own

part, I trouble my head very little about politics, and shrug my shoulders at essays which reduce the government of flesh and blood into mathematical problems. But these articles seem to be written by a man of the world, and, as a man of the world myself, I read them."

"But," said the Vicomte de Brézé, who piqued himself on the polish of his style, they are certainly not the composition of any eminent writer. No eloquence, no sentiment; though I ought not to speak disparagingly of a fellow-contributor."

are sentimental. Goethe was a martyr to
toothache. Werter was written in one of
those paroxysms which predispose genius
to suicide. But the German character is
not all toothache; beer and tobacco step
in to the relief of Rhenish acridities,
blend philosophy with sentiment, and give
that patience in detail which distinguishes
their professors and their generals. Be-
sides, the German wines in themselves"
have other qualities than that of acridity.
Taken with sour krout and stewed prunes,
they produce fumes of self-conceit. A
German has little of French vanity; he
has German self-esteem. He extends the
esteem of self to those around him; his
home, his village, his city, his country.
all belong to him. It is a duty he owes
to himself to defend them. Give him his
pipe and his sabre- and, M. le Colonel,
believe me, you will never take the Rhine
from him."

"P-r-r," cried the Colonel; "but we have had the Rhine."

"We did not keep it. And I should not say I had a franc-piece if I borrowed it from your purse and had to give it back the next day."

Here there arose a very general hubbub of voices, all raised against M. Savarin. Enguerrand, like a man of good ton, hastened to change the conversation.

"Let us leave these poor wretches to their sour wines and toothaches. We drinkers of the champagne, all our own, have only pity for the rest of the human race. This new journal Le Sens Commun' has a strange title, M. Savarin."

"Yes; Le Sens Commun' is not common in Paris, where we all have too much genius for a thing so vulgar."

"Pray," said the young painter, "tell me what you mean by the title - Le Sens Commun. It is mysterious."

"True," said Savarin; "it may mean the Sensus communis of the Latins, or the Good Sense of the English. The Latin phrase signifies the sense of the common interest; the English phrase, the sense which persons of understanding have in common. I suppose the inventor of our title meant the latter signification."

"And who was the inventor?" asked Bacourt.

"That is a secret which I do not know myself," answered Savarin.

"I guess," said Enguerrand, "that it must be the same person who writes the political leaders. They are most remarkable; for they are so unlike the articles in other journals, whether those journals

"All that may be very true," said Savarin, "but M. Enguerrand is right. The papers are evidently the work of a man of the world, and it is for that reason that they have startled the public, and established the success of Le Sens Commun? But wait a week or two longer, Messieurs, and then tell me what you think of a new roman by a new writer, which we shall announce in our impression to-morrow. I shall be disappointed, indeed, if that does not charm you. No lack of eloquence and sentiment there."

"I am rather tired of eloquence and sentiment," said Enguerrand. "Your editor, Gustave Rameau, sickens me of them with his 'Starlit Meditations in the Streets of Paris,' morbid imitations of Heine's enigmatical Evening Songs.' Your journal would be perfect if you could suppress the editor."

Suppress Gustave Rameau!" cried Bernard the painter; "I adore his poems, full of heart for poor suffering humanity."

"Suffering humanity so far as it is packed up in himself," said the physician, dryly, "and a great deal of the suffering is bile. But à propos of your new jour nal, Savarin, there is a paragraph in it today which excites my curiosity. It says that the Vicomte de Mauléon has arrived in Paris, after many years of foreign travel; and then, referring modestly enough to the reputation for talent which he had acquired in early youth, proceeds to indulge in a prophecy of the future political career of a man who, if he have a grain of sens commun, must think that the less said about him the better. I remember him well; a terrible mauvais sujet, but superbly handsome. There was a shocking story about the jewels of a foreign duchess, which obliged him to leave Paris."

"But," said Savarin, "the paragraph you refer to hints that that story is a groundless calumny, and that the true

more natural, nor more simple. By the way, Alain, you dine with Louvier tomorrow, do you not?-a dinner in honour of our rehabilitated kinsman. I and Raoul go."

"Yes, I shall be charmed to meet again a man who, whatever might be his errors in youth, on which," added Alain, slightly colouring, "it certainly does not become me to be severe, must have suffered the most poignant anguish a man of honour can undergo viz., honour sus

"Nevertheless I cannot think that society will receive him," said Bacourt. "When he left Paris, there was one joyous sigh of relief among all men who wished to avoid duels, and keep their wives out of temptation. Society may welcome back a lost sheep, but not a re-pected; and who now, whether by years invigorated wolf."

or sorrow, is so changed that I cannot recognize a likeness to the character I have just heard given to him as mauvais sujet and vaurien."

-

"Bravo!" cried Enguerrand; "all honour to courage and at Paris it requires great courage to defend the absent."

66

"I beg your pardon, mon cher," said Enguerrand; "society has already opened its fold to this poor ill-treated wolf. Two days ago Louvier summoned to his house the surviving relations or connections of De Mauléon among whom are the Marquis de Rochebriant, the Counts De Passy, De Beauvilliers, De Chavigny, my father, and of course his two sons- and submitted to us the proofs which completely clear the Vicomte de Mauléon of even a suspicion of fraud or dishonour in the affair of the jewels. The proofs in- "You say M. de Mauléon is changed," clude the written attestation of the Duke | said De Brézé; yes, he must be growhimself, and letters from that nobleman ing old. No trace left of his good after De Mauléon's disappearance from looks?"

Nay," answered Alain, in a low voice. "The gentilhomme who will not defend another gentilhomme traduced, would, as a soldier, betray a citadel and desert a flag."

66

Paris, expressive of great esteem, and, in- "Pardon me," said Enguerrand, "he deed, of great admiration for the Vi-is bien conservé, and has still a very comte's sense of honour and generosity handsome head and an imposing presof character. The result of this family ence. But one cannot help doubting council was, that we all went in a body whether he deserved the formidable repto call on De Mauléon. And he dined utation he acquired in youth; his manwith my father that same day. You know enough of the Count de Vandemar, and, I may add, of my mother, to be sure that they are both, in their several ways, too regardful of social conventions to lend their countenance even to a relation without well weighing the pros and cons. And as for Raoul, Bayard himself could not be a greater stickler on the point of honour."

This declaration was followed by a silence that had the character of stupor.

ner is so singularly mild and gentle, his conversation so winningly modest, so void of pretence, and his mode of life is as simple as that of a Spanish hidalgo."

"He does not, then, affect the role of Monte Christo,” said Duplessis, "and buy himself into notice like that hero of romance?"

Certainly not: he says very frankly that he has but a very small income, but more than enough for his wants-richer than in his youth; for he has learned content. We may dismiss the hint in Le Sens Commun' about his future political career: at least he evinces no such am

At last Duplessis said, "But what has Louvier to do in this galère? Louvier is no relation of that well-born vaurien; why should he summon your family coun-bition." cil?"

"How could he as a Legitimist ?" said Alain, bitterly. "What department would elect him?"

"But is he a Legitimist?" asked De Brézé.

"Louvier excused his interference on the ground of early and intimate friendship with De Mauléon, who, he said, came to consult him on arriving at Paris, and who felt too proud or too timid to address relations with whom he had long dropped all intercourse. An intermediary was required, and Louvier volunteered "His father was as good a De Mauto take that part on himself; nothing | léon as himself, I presume," rejoined De

"I take it for granted that he must be that," answered Alain, haughtily, “for he is a De Mauléon."

Brézé, dryly; "and he enjoyed a place nominal editor than Savarin supposed or at the Court of Louis Philippe, which a my reader might detect. In the first Legitimist could scarcely accept. Victor place, Gustave himself, with all his dedid not, I fancy, trouble his head about fects of information and solidity of intelpolitics at all, at the time I remember lect, was not without real genius; and a him; but to judge by his chief associ- sort of genius that when kept in restraint, ates, and the notice he received from the and its field confined to sentiment or sarPrinces of the House of Orleans, I should casm, was in unison with the temper of guess that he had no predilections in fa- the day in the second place, it was only vour of Henri V." through Gustave that Lebeau could have got at Savarin; and the names which that brilliant writer had secured at the outset, would have sufficed to draw attention to the earliest numbers of the "Sens Commun," despite a title which did not seem "At all events," said Duplessis, " M. alluring. But these names alone could de Mauléon appears to be a philosopher not have sufficed to circulate the new of rare stamp. A Parisian who has journal to the extent it had already known riches and is contented to be poor, reached. This was due to the curiosity is a phenomenon I should like to study." excited by leading articles of a style new "You have that chance to-morrow to the Parisian public, and of which the evening, M. Duplessis," said Enguer- authorship defied conjecture. They were rand.

"I should regret to think so," said Alain, yet more haughtily, "since the De Mauléons acknowledge the head of their house in the representative of the Rochebriants."

"What! at M. Louvier's dinner? Nay, I have no other acquaintance with M. Louvier than that of the Bourse, and the acquaintance is not cordial."

"I did not mean at M. Louvier's dinner, but at the Duchesse de Tarascon's ball. You, as one of her special favourites, will doubtless honour her réunion." | "Yes; I have promised my daughter to go to the ball. But the Duchesse is Imperialist. M. de Mauléon seems to be either a Legitimist, according to M. le Marquis, or an Orleanist, according to our friend De Brézé."

"What of that? Can there be a more loyal Bourbonite than De Rochebriant? and he goes to the ball. It is given out of the season, in celebration of a family marriage. And the Duchesse de Tarascon is connected with Alain, and therefore with De Mauléon, though but distantly."

"Ah! excuse my ignorance of genealogy."

"As if the genealogy of noble names were not the history of France," muttered Alain, indignantly.

signed Pierre Firmin- supposed to be a nom de plume, as that name was utterly unknown in the world of letters. They affected the tone of an impartial observer; they neither espoused nor attacked any particular party; they laid down no abstract doctrines of government. But somehow or other, in language terse yet familiar, sometimes careless yet never vulgar, they expressed a prevailing sentiment of uneasy discontent, a foreboding of some destined change in things established, without defining the nature of such change, without saying whether it would be for good or for evil. In his criticisms upon individuals, the writer was guarded and moderate-the keenesteyed censor of the press could not have found a pretext for interference with expression of opinions so polite. Of the Emperor, these articles spoke little, but that little was not disrespectful; yet, day after day, the articles contributed to sap the Empire. All malcontents of every shade comprehended, as by a secret of freemasonry, that in this journal they had an ally. Against religion not a word was uttered, yet the enemies of religion bought that journal; still, the friends of religion bought it too, for those articles treated with irony the philosophers on paper who thought that their contradictory crotchets could fuse themselves into any single Utopia, or that any social edifice, hurriedly run up by the crazy few, could become a permanent habitation for the turbulent many, without the clamps

of a creed.

The tone of these articles always corresponded with the title of the journal —

"Common-sense." It was to common- | see as little as possible of the Vicomte de sense that it appealed — appealed in the Mauléon. He reasoned thus: -" Of evutterance of a man who disdained the ery charge which society made against subtle theories, the vehement declama- this man he is guiltless. But of all the tion, the credulous beliefs, or the inflated claims to admiration which society acbombast, which constitute so large a por- corded to him, before it erroneously contion of the Parisian press. The articles demned, there are none which make me rather resembled certain organs of the covet his friendship, or suffice to dispel English press, which profess to be blind-doubts as to what he may be when soed by no enthusiasm for anybody or any-ciety once more receives him. And the thing, which find their sale in that sym- man is so captivating that I should dread pathy with ill-nature to which Huet as- his influence over myself did I see much cribes the popularity of Tacitus, and, al- of him." ways quietly undermining institutions with a covert sneer, never pretend to a spirit of imagination so at variance with common-sense as a conjecture how the institutions should be rebuilt or replaced. Well, somehow or other the journal, as I was saying, hit the taste of the Parisian public. It intimated, with the easy grace of an unpremeditated agreeable talker, that French society in all its classes was rotten, and each class was willing to believe that all the others were rotten, and agreed that unless the others were reformed, there was something very unsound in itself.

The ball at the Duchesse de Tarascon's was a brilliant event. The summer was far advanced; many of the Parisian holiday-makers had returned to the capital, but the season had not commenced, and a ball at that time of year was a very unwonted event. But there was a special occasion for this fête a marriage between a niece of the Duchesse and the son of a great official in high favour at the Imperial Court.

The dinner at Louvier's broke up early, and the music for the second waltz was sounding when Enguerrand, Alain, and the Vicomte de Mauléon ascended the stairs. Raoul did not accompany them; he went very rarely to any balls never to one given by an Imperialist, however nearly related to him the Imperialist might be. But, in the sweet indulgence of his good-nature, he had no blame for those who did go not for Enguerrand, still less, of course, for Alain.

Raoul kept his reasonings to himself, for he had that sort of charity which indisposes an amiable man to be severe on bygone offences. In the eyes of Enguerrand and Alain, and such young votaries of the mode as they could influence, Victor de Mauléon assumed almost heroic proportions. In the affair which had inflicted on him a calumny so odious, it was clear that he had acted with chivalrous delicacy of honour. And the turbulence and recklessness of his earlier years, redeemed as they were, in the traditions of his contemporaries, by courage and generosity, were not offences to which young Frenchmen are inclined to be harsh. All question as to the mode in which his life might have been passed during his long absence from the capital, was merged in the respect due to the only facts known, and these were clearly proved in his pièces justificatives. Ist, That he had served under another name in the ranks of the army in Algiers; had distinguished himself there for signal valour, and received, with promotion, the decoration of the cross. His real name was known only to his Colonel, and on quitting the service, the Colonel placed in his hands a letter of warm eulogy on his conduct, and identifying him as Victor de Mauléon. 2dly, That in California he had saved a wealthy family from midnight murder, fighting single-handed against and overmastering three ruffians, and declining all other reward from those he had preserved than a written attestation of their gratitude. In all countries, valour ranks high in the list of virtues; in no country does it so absolve from vices as it does France.

Something, too, might well here be said as to his feeling towards Victor de Mauléon. He had joined in the family acquit-in tal of that kinsman as to the grave charge of the jewels; the proofs of innocence thereon seemed to him unequivocal and decisive, therefore he had called on the Vicomte and acquiesced in all formal civilities shown to him. But, such acts of justice to a fellow-gentilhomme and a kinsman duly performed, he desired to

But as yet Victor de Mauléon's vindication was only known by a few, and those belonging to the gayer circles of life. How he might be judged by the sober middle class, which constitutes the most important section of public opinion to a candidate for political trusts and distinctions, was another question.