apier, ornamented with pink
ribbon. Enormous bows of the same color on his high-heeled shoes almost
entirely concealed his feet, which after the fashion of the day he
turned very much out. He frequently twisted a small curling moustache,
and before entering combed his small pointed beard. There was but one
exclamation when he was announced.

"Here he is at last!" cried a young and rich voice. "He has made us
wait long enough for him, the dear Desbarreaux. Come, take a seat! place
yourself at this table and read."

The speaker was a woman of about four-and-twenty, tall and handsome,
notwithstanding her somewhat woolly black hair and her dark olive
complexion. There was something masculine in her manner, which she
seemed to derive from her circle, composed entirely of men. She took
their arm unceremoniously, as she spoke to them, with a freedom which
she communicated to them. Her conversation was animated rather than
joyous. It often excited laughter around her; but it was by dint of
intellect that she created gayety (if we may so express it), for her
countenance, impassioned as it was, seemed incapable of bending into a
smile, and her large blue eyes, under her jet-black hair, gave her at
first rather a strange appearance.

Desbarreaux kissed her hand with a gallant and chivalrous air. He then,
talking to her all the time, walked round the large room, where were
assembled nearly thirty persons-some seated in the large arm chairs,
others standing in the vast chimney-place, others conversing in the
embrasures of the windows under the heavy curtains. Some of them were
obscure men, now illustrious; others illustrious men, now obscure for
posterity. Thus, among the latter, he profoundly saluted MM. d'Aubijoux,
de Brion, de Montmort, and other very brilliant gentlemen, who were
there as judges; tenderly, and with an air of esteem, pressed the hands
of MM. Monteruel, de Sirmond, de Malleville, Baro, Gombauld, and other
learned men, almost all called great men in the annals of the Academy of
which they were the founders--itself called sometimes the Academic des
Beaux Esprits, but really the Academic Francaise. But M. Desbarreaux
gave but a mere patronizing nod to young Corneille, who was talking in
a corner with a foreigner, and with a young man whom he presented to
the mistress of the house by the name of M. Poquelin, son of the
'valet-de-chambre tapissier du roi'. The foreigner was Milton; the young
man was Moliere.

Befo