ry instincts. About to die, they experience none of
the reactions of blood and rage, the universal and sudden restoration of
the forces, the murderous spasm, the blind irresistible need of striking
those who strike them. If a gentleman is arrested in his own house by
a Jacobin we never find him splitting his head open.[2329] They allow
themselves to be taken, going quietly to prison; to make an uproar would
be bad taste; it is necessary, above all things, to remain what they
are, well-bred people of society. In prison both men and women dress
themselves with great care, pay each other visits and keep up a
drawing-room; it may be at the end of a corridor, by the light of three
or four candles; but here they circulate jests, compose madrigals, sing
songs and pride themselves on being as gallant, as gay and as gracious
as ever: need people be morose and ill-behaved because accident has
consigned them to a poor inn? They preserve their dignity and their
smile before their judges and on the cart; the women, especially, mount
the scaffold with the ease and serenity characteristic of an evening
entertainment. It is the supreme characteristic of good-breeding,
erected into an unique duty, and become to this aristocracy a second
nature, which is found in its virtues as well as in its vices, in its
faculties as well as in its impotencies, in its prosperity as at its
fall, and which adorns it even in the death to which it conducts.

*****

NOTES:

[Footnote 2301: Champfort, 110.]

[Footnote 2302: George Sand, V. 59. "I was rebuked for everything; I
never made a movement which was not criticized."]

[Footnote 2303: "Paris, Versailles, et les provinces," I. 162.--"The
king of Sweden is here; he wears rosettes on his breeches; all is
over; he is ridiculous, and a provincial king." ("Le Gouvernement de
Normandie," by Hippeau, IV. 237, July 4, 1784.]

[Footnote 2304: Stendhal, "Rome, Naples and Florence," 379. Stated by an
English lord.]

[Footnote 2305: Marivaux, "La Petit-Maitre corrige.--Gresset, "Le
Mechant." Crebillon fils, "La Nuit et le Moment," (especially the scene
between the scene between Citandre and Lucinde).--Colle, "La Verite
dans le Vin," (the part of the abbe with the with the presidente).--De
Bezenval, 79. (The comte de Frise and Mme. de Blot). "Vie privee du
Marechal de Richelieu," (scenes with Mme. Michelin).--De Goncourt, 167
to 174.]

[Footnote 2306: Laclos, "Les Liaisons Dangereuses." Mme. de Merteu