Kitabı oku: «Balsamo, the Magician; or, The Memoirs of a Physician», sayfa 10

"His Grace your friend?"

Approaching the old courtier who had comprehended from the motion of the pleader's lips, he said:

"I hope Lady Egmont will be well enough to-morrow to come?"

"Certainly, sire. She would be fit for travel this hour, if your majesty desired it." And he saluted with respect and thankfulness.

The king leaned over to the countess' ear and whispered a word.

"Sire, I am your majesty's most obedient servant." Her reverence was accompanied by a most bewitching smile.

The king waved his hand and retired to his own rooms.

Scarcely had he crossed the threshold before the countess turned more frightened than ever to the singular man who had so monopolized her. Like the others, he had bowed as the monarch withdrew, but his brow had worn a haughty, almost menacing aspect. As soon as Louis had disappeared, he came and paused within a step or two of Lady Dubarry.

Urged by invincible curiosity, she took a step toward him, so that he could say in a low voice as he bent to her:

"Am I recognized, lady?"

"Yes, as my prophet of Louis XV. Square."

"Well," queried the man with the clear, steady gaze, "Did I lie when I told you of becoming the Queen of France?"

"No; your prophecy is all but accomplished. Hence, I am ready to keep my promise. Speak your wish."

"The place is ill chosen, and the time has not come."

"I am ready to fulfill it any time."

"Can I come any time?"

"Yes; will it be as Count Fenix?"

"My title will be Count Joseph Balsamo."

"I shall not forget it, Balsamo," repeated the favorite as the mysterious stranger was merged with the crowd.

CHAPTER XXIV
THE DAUPHINESS' RECEPTION

On the following day, Compiegne was intoxicated and transported. The people had not slept through the night from getting ready to welcome the bride of the prince royal.

Latin, French, and German inscriptions adorned the evergreen arches, wound with garlands of roses and lilac.

The royal prince had come down in the night incog, with his two brothers, and they had ridden out to meet the princess from Austria. The gallant idea had not come to the dauphin of his own impulse, but from his tutor, Lord Lavauguyon, who had been instructed by the king on the proper line of conduct to be followed by the heir to the throne. Previous sovereigns had also taken this kind of preliminary view of the fated spouse, without the veil of etiquette.

The eldest prince rode out, grave, and his two brothers, smiling. At half after eight, they came back; the dauphin serious as when he started, Provence almost sulky, and Artois gayer than at the outset. The first was disquieted, the second envious, and the last delighted – for all had found the lady most lovely. Thus each betrayed his temperament.

At the meeting of the two parties, that of the king and the bride of his son, all got out of the carriages, except the king and the archduchess. Around the dauphin were all the young nobles, while the old nobility clustered round the king.

The lady's carriage door opened, and the Austrian princess sprang lightly to the ground. As she advanced toward the royal coach, Louis had the door opened, and eagerly stepped out.

The princess had so exactly calculated the steps that she threw herself on her knees just as he alighted. He stooped to lift her up, and kissed her affectionately, covering her with a look which caused her to redden.

She blushed again as the dauphin was presented to her. She had pleasant words to say to all the royal princes and princesses. But here came a hitch, till the king, glancing around, spied the Countess Dubarry, and took her hand.

Everybody stepped aloof, so that the sovereign was left alone with his favorite and the new arrival.

"I present the Countess Dubarry, my dearest friend!"

The Austrian turned pale, but the most kindly smile glittered on her blanching lips.

"Your majesty is very happy in having so lovely a friend," she said, "and I am not surprised at the attachment she inspires."

All looked on with astonishment approaching stupefaction. It was evident that the new-comer was repeating the Austrian court's instructions – perhaps her mother's own words.

While the princess entered the royal coach, passing the Duke of Choisuel without noticing him, the church bells clanged. Countess Dubarry radiantly got into her coach, up to the door of which came Chevalier Jean.

"Do you know who that young whippersnapper is?" he asked, pointing to a horseman at the dauphiness' coach window. "That is Philip of Taverney, who gave me that sword thrust."

"Well, who is the beautiful girl with whom he is talking?"

"His sister, and to my mind you have the same need to beware of that girl as I of her brother."

"You are mad."

"I have my wits about me. I shall keep an eye on the blade anyhow."

"And I shall watch the budding beauty."

"Hush!" said Jean; "here comes your friend Richelieu."

"What is wrong, my dear duke? You look discontented," said the countess, with her sweetest smile.

"Does it not strike your ladyship that we are all very dull, not to say sad, for such a joyous affair? I can recall going out to meet another princess for the royal couch, amiable like this one, and as fair. It was the dauphin's mother. We were all jolly. Is it because we were younger?"

"No, my dear marshal, it is because the monarchy is older."

All who heard shuddered at this voice behind the duke. He turned and saw an elderly gentleman, stylish in appearance, who laid his hand on his shoulder as he smiled misanthropically.

"Gads my life! it is Baron Taverney. Countess," added the duke, "here is one of my oldest friends, for whom I beg your kindness – Baron Taverney of Redcastle."

"The father of that pair," said Jean and Jeanne to themselves, as they bowed in salutation.

"My lords and gentlemen," shouted the grand master of ceremonies, "to your places in the coaches."

The two aged nobles bowed to the favorite and her brother, and went into the same vehicle, glad to be united after long absence.

"What do you say to that? I do not like the old fellow a whit better than the cubs," said Jean Dubarry.

"What a pity that the little imp, Gilbert, ran away. As he was brought up in their house, he might furnish particulars about the family," said the countess.

The dialogue was broken off by the movement of all the carriages.

After a night at Compiegne, the united courts – the sundown of one era, the sunburst of another – swept intermingled on to Paris, that gulf which was to swallow up the whole of them.

CHAPTER XXV
GILBERT SNAPS GOLDEN CHAINS

It is time to return to Gilbert.

Our little philosopher had cooled in his admiration for Chon since at the outbreak of the collision between Chevalier Jean and Philip of Taverney he had learnt the name of his protectress.

Often, at Taverney, when he was skulking and listening to the chat of the baron and his daughter, he had heard the old noble express himself plainly about the favorite Dubarry. His interested hatred had found a sympathetic echo in the boy's bosom; and Andrea never contradicted her father's abuse, for, it must be allowed, Lady Dubarry's name was deeply scorned in the country.

What completely ranked Gilbert on the side of the old noble was that Nicole had sometimes exclaimed:

"I wish I were Dubarry."

Chon was too busy after the duel to think about Gilbert, who forgot his bad impression as he entered the court capital in his frank admiration. He was still under the spell when he slept in the attic of the royal palace. The only matter in his dreams was that he, the poor boy, was lodged like the foremost noblemen of France, without his being a courtier or a lackey.

Gilbert was in one of the thinking fits common to him when events surpassed his will or comprehension, when he was told that Mademoiselle Chon wanted to see him. She was waiting in her carriage for him to accompany her on a ride. She sat in the front seat, with a large chest and a small dog. Gilbert and a steward named Cranche were to have the other places.

To preserve his position, Gilbert sat behind Chon, and the steward, without even thinking of objecting, sat behind the dog and box.

Like all who lived in Versailles, Chon drew a free breath with pleasure in quitting the grand palace for the woods and pastures, and said as she turned half round on their leaving the town:

"How does the philosopher like Versailles?"

"It is very fine. So we are quitting it so soon?"

"We are going to our place."

"Your place, you mean," grumbled Gilbert in the tone of a bear becoming tamed.

"I mean that I am going to introduce you to my sister, whom you must try to please, for she is hand and glove with all the great lords of the kingdom. By the way, Master Cranche, we must have a suit of clothes made for this young gentleman."

"The ordinary livery?" queried the man.

"Livery?" snarled Gilbert, giving the upper servant a fierce look.

"Oh, no; I will tell you the style after I communicate my notion to my sister. But it must be ready at the same time as Zamore's new clothes."

Gilbert was startled at this talk.

"Zamore is a little playfellow for you, the governor of the royal castle of Luciennes," explained Chon. "Make friends with him, as he is a good fellow, in spite of his color."

Gilbert was eager to know what color Zamore was, but he reflected that philosophers ought not to be reproved for inquisitiveness, and he contained himself.

"I will try," replied the youth with a smile which he thought full of dignity.

Luciennes was what had been described to him.

"So this is the pleasure house which has cost the country so dearly!" he mused.

Joyous dogs and eager servants came to greet the mistress' sister. Jeanne had not come, and Chon was glad to see her first of all.

"Sylvie," she said to a pretty girl who came to take the lap dog and the chest, "give Misapoof and the box to Cranche, and take my little philosopher to Zamore!"

The chambermaid did not know what kind of animal a philosopher was, but Chon's glance directed her to Gilbert, and she beckoned him to follow her. But for the tone of command which Chon had used, the youth would have taken Sylvie for other than a servant. She was dressed more like Andrea than Nicole. She gave Gilbert a smile, for the recommendation denoted that Chon had a fancy, if not affection for the new-comer.

Gilbert was rather daunted by the idea of appearing before so grand an official as a royal governor, but the words that Zamore was a good fellow reassured him. Friend of a viscount and a court lady already, he might face a governor.

"How the court is slandered!" he thought; "for it is easy to make friends among the courtiers. They are kind and hospitable."

In a noble Roman room, on cushions, with crossed legs, squatted Zamore, eating candies out a satin bag.

"Oh!" exclaimed the incipient philosopher, "what do you call this thing?"

"Me no ting – me gubbernor," blubbered Zamore.

Gilbert had never before seen a negro. The uneasy glance which he turned up to Sylvie caused that lively girl to burst into a peal of laughter.

Grave and motionless as an idol, Zamore kept on diving with his paw in the bag of sweetmeats and munching away.

At this moment the door opened to give admission to Steward Cranche and a tailor to take the measures of Gilbert.

"Do not pull him about too much," said the steward.

"Oh, I am done," said the knight of the thimble; "the costume of Sganarelle is a loose one, and we never bother about a fit."

"Oh, he will look fine as Sganarelle," said Sylvie. "And is he to have the high hat like Mother Goose's?"

Gilbert did not hear the reply, as he pushed aside the tailor and would not help any more preparations. He did not know that Sganarelle was a comic character in a popular play, but he saw that it was a ludicrous one, and he was enlightened further by Sylvie's laughter. She departed with tailor and steward, leaving him alone with the black boy, who continued to roll his eyes and devour the bonbons.

What riddles for the country boy! what dreads and pangs for the philosopher who guessed that his manly dignity was in as much danger in Luciennes as at Taverney.

Still he tried to talk to Zamore, but that interesting African, sitting astride of a chair on casters, made it run him round the room a dozen times with a celerity which ought to have shown by anticipation that the velocipede was a practical machine.

Suddenly a bell tinkled and Zamore darted out of the room with as much rapidity as he had shown on the novel quadricycle.

Gilbert would have followed, but on looking through the doorway, he saw the passage so crowded with servants guarding noblemen in gay clothes, that he shivered and slunk back.

An hour passed, without the return of Zamore or Sylvie. Gilbert was longing for human company, when a footman came to take him to Mademoiselle Chon.

Free, after having informed her sister how she had conducted the mission to Lady Bearn, Chon was breakfasting with a hearty appetite, in a loose dressing-gown, in a morning room. She cast a glance on Gilbert without offering him a seat.

"How have you hit off with Zamore?" she inquired, after tossing off a glass of wine like liquid topaz.

"How could I make the acquaintance of a black boy who does not speak, but stares and gulps down candies?"

"I thought you said all were equal?"

"He may be my equal, but I do not think him so," answered Gilbert.

"What fun he is!" muttered Chon: "you seem not to give away your heart in a hurry?"

"With slowness, lady."

"I hoped you held me in affection?"

"I have considerable liking for you personally, but – "

"Thanks for so much! You overpower me. How long does it take for one to win the good graces of so disdainful a fellow?"

"Much time; some would never win them."

"Ah, this explains why you could suddenly leave Taverney Castle after staying there eighteen years. It appears that its masters could not obtain your friendship and confidence?"

"Not all."

"What did they do? Who displeased you?"

"I am not complaining."

"Oh, very well! if you do not want to give your confidence. I might help you to come out even with these Taverneys if you told me what they are like."

"I take no revenge, or I take it with my own hand," said Gilbert proudly.

"Still as you bear a grudge against them, or several, and we have one, we ought to be allies."

"You are wrong, lady. I feel very different toward different members of the family."

"Is Lord Philip one whom you paint black or rosy?"

"I bear no ill to Master Philip, who has done nothing to me one way or another."

"Then you would not be a witness against him in favor of my brother about that duel?"

"I should be bound to speak the truth, and that would be unfavorable toward Chevalier Dubarry."

"Do you make him out wrong?"

"He was so, to insult the dauphiness."

"Are you upholding the dauphiness?"

"I stand for justice."

"You are mad, boy; never talk of justice in a royal residence. When one serves a master, he takes the responsibility."

"Not so; every man should obey his conscience. Any way, I have no master. I did not ask to come here, and now I will go away, freely as I came."

"Oh, no, you don't," cried Chon, amazed at this rebellion and getting angered.

Gilbert frowned.

"No, no, let us have peace. Here you will have but three persons to please. The king, my sister and myself."

"How am I to please you?"

"Well, you have seen Zamore? He gets already so much a year out of the royal private purse; he is governor of Luciennes, and though he may be laughed at for his blubber lips and complexion, he is courted and called my lord."

"I shall not do that."

"What, when you assert that all men are brothers?"

"That is the reason why I will not acknowledge him my lord."

Chon was beaten with her own weapons; she bit her lips.

"You do not seem to be ambitious?"

"Yes, I am," and his eyes sparkled.

"To be a doctor? You shall be a doctor. That was the costume you were measured for. Royal physician, too."

"I? who know not the A B C of medical science. You are mocking at me, lady."

"Does Zamore know anything about governing a castle?"

"I see: you want me to be a sham doctor, a buffoon? The king wants another merry-maker?"

"Why not? Don't you know that the Duke of Tresmes begs my sister to appoint him her monkey. But don't hang your head. Keep that lumpish air for your doctoral uniform. Meanwhile, as you must live on something better than your pills, go and have breakfast with the governor."

"With Zamore? I am not hungry."

"You will be before evening; if we must give you an appetite, we will call in the whipper to the royal pages."

The youth trembled and turned pale.

"Go back to my Lord Zamore," continued Chon, taking the silence for consent, or at least submission. "You will find he is fed daintily. Mind not to be an ingrate, or you will be taught what gratitude is."

A lackey conducted Gilbert to the mock governor's dining-room, but he would not eat anything. Nevertheless, when the costume of the doctor in Molière's comedy was brought, he submitted to being shown how he was to wear it.

"I thought that the doctors of that time carried an inkhorn and a quill to write out their prescriptions," suggested Gilbert.

"By Jove they did!" exclaimed the steward. "Let us have the **** complete while we are about it."

The foreman charged to get the articles, also acquainted Chon, who was going to join her sister in Paris, with the astonishing willingness of her pet. She was so pleased that she sent a little purse with some silver in it, to be added to the doctor's girdle along with the inkhorn.

Gilbert sent his thanks, and expressed a wish to be left alone to put on the costume.

"Make haste," said the steward, "that the young lady may see you before she is off to Paris."

Gilbert looked out of the window to see how the gardens were arranged. Returning to the table, he tore the long black doctoral gown into three strips, which he made a rope of by tying the ends together. On the table he laid the hat and the purse and the following declaration which he wrote:

"Lady: The foremost of boons is Liberty. The holiest of duties is to preserve it. As you do violence to my feelings, I set myself free. Gilbert."

He addressed this epistle to Chon, tied his twelve feet of serge rope to the window sill, glided down like a serpent, and dropped on the terrace at risk of breaking his neck. Though stunned a little by the fall, he ran to some trees, scrambled up among the boughs, slipped downward till he was on a lower level and could reach the ground where he ran away with all his might.

When they came for him half an hour after, he was far beyond their reach.

CHAPTER XXVI
THE OLD BOTANIST

On the trunk of a tree overthrown by a storm in Meudon Woods a man was seated.

Under his grizzled wig he showed a mild and shrewd visage. His brown coat was of good cloth, as were his breeches; and his gray waistcoat was worked on the flaps. His gray cotton stockings imprisoned well-made and muscular legs; his buckled shoes, though dusty in patches, had been washed at the top by the morning dews.

Near him, on the trunk, was a green box, open and stuffed with freshly gathered plants. Between his legs he held a cane with a crutch handle, ending in a sort of pick.

He was eating a piece of bread, and tossing crumbs to the wild birds, which flew down on the pieces and took them off to their nooks with joyful peeps.

Suddenly he heard hurried steps, and seeing on looking up, a young man with disquieting aspect, he rose. He buttoned up his coat and closed his overcoat above it.

His air was so calming that the intruder on his peace came to a stop and doffed his hat.

It was Gilbert. Gilbert, much the worse for his roaming the woods through the night since he had fled from Luciennes in order not to lose his freedom.

Remarking this sudden timidity, the old man appeared to be put at ease by it.

"Do you want to speak to me, my friend?" he asked, smiling, and laying the piece of bread on the tree.

"Yes, for I see that you are throwing away bread on the birds as though it were not written that the Lord provides for the sparrows."

"The Lord provides," returned the old gentleman, "no doubt, young man; but the hand of man is one of the means. You are wrong if you said that as a reproach, for never is cast-away bread – in the desert or on the crowded street – lost to living creatures. Here, the birds get it; there, the beggars."

"Though this be the wilds, I know of a man who wants to dispute that bread with the birds," said Gilbert, though struck by the soft and penetrating voice of the stranger.

"Are you the man – and are you hungered?"

"Sharply so, and if you would allow – "

With eager compassion the gentleman took up the crust, but, suddenly reflecting, he scrutinized Gilbert with a quick yet profound glance.

Gilbert was not so like a starving man that the meditation was warranted. His dress was decent, though earth-stained in places. His linen was white, for he had at Versailles, on the previous evening, changed his shirt out of his parcel; but from its dampness, it was visible that he had slept in the woods. In all this and his white and taper hands, the man of vague reverie was revealed rather than the hard worker.

Not wanting for tact, Gilbert understood the distrust and hesitation of the stranger in respect to him, and hastened to annul conjectures which might be unfavorable.

"After twelve hours, hunger begins, and I have eaten nothing for four-and-twenty," he observed.

The truth of the words was supported by his emotion, the quaver of his voice and the pallor of his face. The old gentleman therefore ceased to waver, or rather to fear. He held out not only the bread, but a handkerchief in which he was carrying cherries.

"I thank you," said Gilbert, repulsing the fruit gently; "only the bread, which is ample."

Breaking the crust in two, he took one portion and pushed back the other. Then he sat on the grass, a yard or two away from the old gentlemen, who viewed him with increasing wonder. The meal did not last long, as the bread was scant and Gilbert hungry. With no words did the observer trouble him, but continued his mute and furtive examination while apparently only attending to his plants and flowers in the box.

But seeing that Gilbert was going to drink at a pool, he quickly called out:

"Do not drink that water, young man. It is infected by the detritus of the plants dead last year and by the frog-spawn swimming on the surface. You had better take some cherries, as they will quench thirst better than water. I invite you to partake as I see you are not an importunate guest."

"It is true, sir; importunity is the opposite of my nature. I fear nothing so much as being importunate, as I have just been proving at Versailles."

"Oh! so you come from Versailles?" queried the stranger, looking hard at him. "A rich place, where only the proud or the poor die of want."

"I am both, sir."

"Have you quarreled with your master?"

"I have no master."

"That is a very lofty answer," said the other, putting away the plants in the box, while regarding the young man.

"Still it is exact."

"No, young man, for everybody has a master here, as we all suffer the domination of a higher power. Some are ruled by men, some by principles: and the sternest masters are not always those who order or strike with the human voice or hand."

"I confess I am ruled by principles," replied Gilbert. "They are the only masters which the mind may acknowledge without shame."

"Oh, those are your principles, are they? You seem very young to have any settled principles."

"I am young but I have studied, or rather read a little in such works as 'On the Inequality of Classes,' and 'The Social Contract;' out of them comes all my knowledge, and perhaps all my dreams."

These words kindled a flame in the hearer's eyes; he so started that he broke a flower rebellious to being packed away.

"These may not be your principles, but they are Rousseau's."

"Dry stuff for a youth," said the other; "sad matter for contemplation at twenty years of age; a dry and scentless flower for imagination in the springtide of life."

"Misfortune ripens a man unseasonably, sir."

"As you study the philosopher of Geneva, do you make a personal allusion there?"

"I do not know anything about him," rejoined Gilbert, candidly.

"Know, young man, that he is an unhappy creature." With a sigh he said it.

"Impossible! Jean Jacques Rousseau unhappy? Is there no justice above more than on earth? The man unhappy who has consecrated his life to the welfare of the race."

"I plainly see that you do not know him; so let us rather speak of yourself. Whither are you going?"

"To Paris. Do you belong there?"

"So far as I am living there, but I was not born in it. Why the question?"

"It is attached to the subject we were talking of; if you live in Paris, you may have seen the Philosopher Rousseau."

"Oh, yes, I have seen him."

"He is looked at as he passes along – they point to him as the benefactor of humanity?"

"No; the children follow him, and, encouraged by their parents, throw stones at him."

"Gracious! still he has the consolation of being rich," said Gilbert, with painful stupefaction.

"Like yourself, he often wonders where the next meal is coming from."

"But, though poor, he is powerful, respected and well considered?"

"He does not know of a night, in lying down, that he will not wake in the Bastille."

"How he must hate men!"

"He neither loves not hates them: they fill him with disgust, that is all."

"I do not understand how he can not hate those who ill use him," exclaimed Gilbert.

"Rousseau has always been free, and strong enough to rely on himself. Strength and liberty make men meek and good; it is only weakness and slavery which create the wicked."

"I guessed this as you explain it; and that is why I wished to be free." I see that we agree on one point, our liking for Rousseau.

"Speak for yourself, young man: youth is the season for illusions."

"Nay; one may be deceived upon things, but not on men."

"Alas, you will learn by and by, that it is men particularly about whom deception is easiest. Perhaps Rousseau is a little fairer than other men; but he has his faults, and great ones."

Gilbert shook his head, but the stranger continued to treat him with the same favor, though he was so uncivil.

"You said you had no master?"

"None, though it dwelt with me to have a most illustrious one; but I refused on the condition that I should make the amusement of noble idlers. Being young, able to study and make my way, I ought not to lose the precious time of youth and compromise in my person the dignity of man."

"This was right," said the stranger gravely; "but have you determined on a career?"

"I should like to be a physician."

"A grand and noble career, where one may decide between true science, modest and martyr-like, and quackery, impudent, rich and bloated. If you love truth, young man, be a doctor. If you love popular applause, be a doctor."

"I am afraid it will cost a lot of money to study, although Rousseau learned for nothing."

"Nothing? oh, young man," said the plant-collector, with a mournful smile, "do you call nothing the most precious of heavenly blessings – candor, health and sleep? That was the price the Genevian seeker of wisdom paid for the little he knows."

"Little! when he is a great musical composer!"

"Pooh, because the king sings 'I have lost my servant,' that does not prove 'The Village Sorcerer' to be a good opera."

"He is a noted botanist!"

"An herb-gatherer, very humble and ignorant amid the marvels known as plants and flowers."

"He is a Latin scholar, for I read that he had translated Tacitus."

"Bah, because in his conceit he wanted to be master of all crafts. But Tacitus, who is a rough antagonist to wrestle with, tired him. No, no, my good young man, in spite of your admiration, there are no more Admirable Crichtons, and what man gains in breadth he loses in depth. Rousseau is a superficial man whose surface is a trifle wider than most men's, that is all."

"Many would like to attain his mark," said the youth.

"Do you slur at me?" asked the stranger with a good nature disarming Gilbert.

"God forbid, for it is too much pleasure to chat for me to disoblige you. You draw me out and I am amazed at the language I am using, for I only picked it out of books, which I did not clearly follow. I have read too much, but I will read again with care. But I forget that while your talk is valuable to me, mine only wastes your time, for you are herb-gathering."

"No," said the botanist, fixing his gray eyes on the youth, who made a move to go but wanted to be detained. "My box is clearly full and I only want certain mosses; I heard that capillary grows round here."

"Stay, I saw some yonder."

"How do you know capillarys?"

"I was born on the woodland; the daughter of the nobleman on whose estate I was reared, liked botany; she had a collection and the objects had their names on labels attached. I noticed that what she called capillary was called by us rustics maidenhair fern."

"So you took a taste for botany?"

"It was this way. I sometimes heard Nicole – she is the maid to Mademoiselle Andrea de Taverney – say that her mistress wanted such and such a plant for her herbarium, so I asked her to get a sketch of them, and I searched in the woods till I raked them up. Then I transplanted them where she must find them, and used to hear the lady, in taking her walk, cry out: 'How odd! here is the very thing I was looking for!'"

The old gentleman looked with more heed and it made Gilbert lower his eyes blushing, for the interest had tenderness in it.

"Continue to study botany, which leads as a flowery path to medicine. Paris has free schools, and I suppose your folks will supply your maintenance."

"I have no relations, but I can earn my living at some trade."

"Yes, Rousseau says in his 'Emile,' that every one should learn a trade even though he were a prince's son."

"I have not read that book, but I have heard Baron Taverney mock at the maxim, and pretend grief at not having made his son a joiner. Instead, he made him a soldier, so that he will dismember instead of joining."