orst a thousand times preferable to
living upon four francs a week. Not that interest has guided me. Many
times have I refused to exchange a lover, who had little or nothing,
for a rich man, that I did not like. Nor have I ever asked anything for
myself. Jacques has spent perhaps ten thousand francs the last three
or four months, yet we only occupy two half-furnished rooms, because
we always live out of doors, like the birds: fortunately, when I first
loved him, he had nothing at all, and I had just sold some jewels
that had been given me, for a hundred francs, and put this sum in the
lottery. As mad people and fools are always lucky, I gained a prize of
four thousand francs. Jacques was as gay, and light-headed, and full of
fun as myself, so we said: 'We love each other very much, and, as long
as this money lasts, we will keep up the racket; when we have no more,
one of two things will happen--either we shall be tired of one another,
and so part--or else we shall love each other still, and then, to remain
together, we shall try and get work again; and, if we cannot do so, and
yet will not part--a bushel of charcoal will do our business!'"

"Good heaven!" cried Mother Bunch, turning pale.

"Be satisfied! we have not come to that. We had still something left,
when a kind of agent, who had paid court to me, but who was so ugly that
I could not bear him for all his riches, knowing that I was living
with Jacques asked me to--But why should I trouble you with all these
details? In one word, he lent Jacques money, on some sort of a doubtful
claim he had, as was thought, to inherit some property. It is with this
money that we are amusing ourselves--as long as its lasts."

"But, my dear Cephyse, instead of spending this money so foolishly, why
not put it out to interest, and marry Jacques, since you love him?"

"Oh! in the first place," replied the Bacchanal Queen, laughing, as her
gay and thoughtless character resumed its ascendancy, "to put money out
to interest gives one no pleasure. All the amusement one has is to look
at a little bit of paper, which one gets in exchange for the nice little
pieces of gold, with which one can purchase a thousand pleasures. As for
marrying, I certainly like Jacques better than I ever liked any one;
but it seems to me, that, if we were married, all our happiness would
end--for while he is only my lover, he cannot reproach me with what has
passed--but, as my husband, he would be stare to upbr