them! Your father has shaved those stupid
fiends enough, and my father pulled the wool over their eyes,[9] and, as
good children of our parents, we ought to do so too."

[Footnote 9: Lombard's father was a hair-dresser, and his wife's father
a barber. Lombard liked to jest about his descent, particularly at the
dinner-table of some prince or minister. He always alluded to his father
in the following terms: "_Feu mon pere de poudreuse memoire!_"]

"Oh, Lombard, just listen," wailed his wife, "they are knocking at the
door with heavy clubs; we must perish if they succeed in forcing it open
and entering the house. They will assassinate you, for you have heard
their imprecations against you."

"_Ma chere_," said Lombard, composedly, "this is not the first time that
I discover that the people despise and persecute me. I knew it long ago.
These blockheads will never forgive me for being a Frenchman, and for
having, consequently, a predilection for France and her heroic emperor.
And not only they, but the so-called educated and high-born classes
also, hate me intensely. Throughout all Europe I have been branded as a
traitor in the pay of Napoleon. Conspiracies were got up everywhere to
bring about my removal. All the princes of the royal house--nay, the
queen herself, united against me.[10] But you see, my dear, that they
did not succeed after all in undermining my position; and the howling
rabble outside will have no better success. Indeed, the fellows seem to
be in earnest. Their blows shake the whole house!"

[Footnote 10: Lombard's own words.--Vide Gentz's Diary in his
"Miscellanies," edited by G. Schlesier, vol. iv.]

"They will succeed in breaking in," said his wife, anxiously; "and then
they will assassinate all of us."

"They will do no such thing, for they do not come for spoils, but only
for news," said Lombard. "And then, my love, they know just as well as I
the German maxim: 'The people of Nuremberg do not hang anybody unless
they have got him!' but they will not get me, for there comes my
faithful Jean across the yard.--Well, Jean, is every thing ready?" he
said to the approaching footman.

"Yes," he replied. "The carriage with four excellent horses is waiting
for you, sir. I ordered it, however, not to stop at the garden gate, but
a little farther down, in front of another house."

"That was well done, my sagacious Jean. But I hope you did not forget
either to place several bottles of Tokay wine and some