ation when a time for action comes--for great deeds to
be done by thorough men, and genuine mettle. When a man says he shrinks
from shedding blood, and would not crush a worm, I say it is his own
blood he is so chary of, and shrinks from shedding. At that time Death
was the Parisian's familiar,--his bosom friend; together they fought
and won the Emperor's great victories.' And then my master went on to
talk of a ball where his father had been; they called it 'le bal
des Zephirs,' because it was given on a spot which had been a
churchyard--I forget the name of the church. And just above the skull
and cross-bones upon the gateway, they had put up a transparency with
the inscription: 'Le bal des Zephirs;' and they had danced like mad
upon the graves and tombstones, till morning.

"All this time, my dear young count sat grave and silent, opposite his
father, whose discourse, I could plainly see, appeared as blasphemous
to him, as it did to me; but he spoke very calmly, and beautiful were
the things he said:--'Man has progressed since then,' he said; 'it
requires more energy to build up than to destroy.' In his opinion: 'a
world without a sense of veneration must necessarily decay and fall in
pieces, like a building without cement;' and more of the like which I
have forgotten, more's the pity; but when he spoke, I used rather to
watch his eyes, than mind his lips! His eyes would grow so clear, you
could look right through them. Only one thing more I recollect; he
said: 'A generation that can dance on the graves of its fathers, will
assuredly care little for its children; a man who tramples upon the
past, is unworthy of a future--'

"As these words escaped him, he turned red and stopped short,--fearful
lest his father should be offended by them. But, bless you, he was not
used to mind such trifles!

"'Bah!' says he: 'we are all the same--only we are quieter; we do the
same things, only not to the sound of fifes and trumpets--we have no
piping to our dancing. In every generation man is selfish, and has a
right to be. There was another kind of ball in those days, they called
it le bal des victimes. When the Convention had confiscated the
property of the guillotined, it was returned to their heirs, after the
9th Thermidor. Thus many of them held their lands, par la grace de
Robespierre. Young men began to live fast again, and to enjoy
themselves. They gave balls where only those were admitted who could
prove that some very ne