manner in which he had provided for her client, Dubois.

"Dubois! Dubois!" said the lady, "I know of no Dubois."

The whole affair had entirely escaped her memory. Fouche assisted in
recalling it.

"Oh, true!" she said, "the brother of my chambermaid; well, did you give
him any little employment? What did you make of him?"

Fouche saw his error, bit his lips, and let the subject pass.

That very evening a messenger was despatched to recall Dubois--and home he
came; but "with money in both pockets"--a little capital of solid francs.
Poet as he was, the man had sense; he did not spend, but invested it, and
the revenue enabled him to assume the life and bearing of a gentleman. We
leave him prospering, and to prosper.

It is said, that Fouche did all he could to keep this story secret. But
Pauline discovered the truth, and was malicious enough to disclose it to
Napoleon, who more than once jested his minister on his governor of Elba.

There is a sort of _premier pas_ known, we believe, amongst gamesters--at
least trusted to very implicitly, we remember, amongst schoolboy
gamesters--that which commences a run of good luck. When the cards, or the
dice, have been cruelly against us, if the tide _once_ turn, it will flow
steadily for some time in its new and happier direction. In the palace of
a certain Russian prince, whose name of course it is impossible to
remember, for it is one of those names you do not think of attempting to
pronounce even to yourself--you _look_ at it merely, and use it as the
Chinese their more learned combinations of characters, where they pass at
once from the visible sign to the idea, without any intermediate oral
stage. In the palace of this prince, you are surprised to see in the most
splendid of its splendid suite of apartments, suspended behind a glass
case--a set of harness!--common harness for a couple of coach horses, such
as you may see in any gentleman's stable. Of course, it attracts more
attention than all the pictures, and statues, and marble tables with their
porphyry vases and gold clocks.

"The thing you know is neither rich nor rare,
But wonder how the devil it got there!"

You inquire, and are told the following story.

The Prince of -------- was one night led into deep and desperate play. He
had staked estate after estate, and lost them; he had staked his plate,
his pictures, his jewels, the furniture of his house, and lost them; his
mansion itself, and lost it. The lu