his mental capacity does not seem to me
remarkable, and he willingly allowed his _mouthpiece_ to talk for him.
But here, in the matter of his parchments, he was loquaciously full of
anecdotes, recollections, heraldic knowledge; in short, he was exactly
the old noble, ignorant and superficial in all things, but possessed of
Benedictine erudition where the genealogy of his family was concerned.

The _session_ would, I believe, be still going on, if Jacques Bricheteau
had not intervened. As the marquis was preparing to read a voluminous
memorandum refuting a chapter in Tallemant des Reaux' "Historiettes"
which did not redound to the credit of the great house of Sallenauve,
the wise organist remarked that it was time we dined, if we intended
to keep an appointment already made for seven o'clock at the office of
Maitre Achille Pigoult the notary.

We dined, not at the table-d'hote, but in private, and the dinner seemed
very long on account of the silent preoccupation of the marquis, and the
slowness with which, owing to his loss of teeth, he swallowed his food.

At seven o'clock we went to the notary's office; but as it is now two
o'clock in the morning, and I am heavy with sleep, I shall put off till
to-morrow an account of what happened there.

May 4, 5 A.M.

I reckoned on peaceful slumbers, embellished by dreams. On the contrary,
I did not sleep an hour, and I have waked up stung to the heart by an
odious thought. But before I transmit that thought to you, I must tell
you what happened at the notary's.

Maitre Achille Pigoult, a puny little man, horribly pitted with the
small-pox, and afflicted with green spectacles, above which he darts
glances of vivacious intelligence, asked us if we felt warm enough, the
room having no fire. Politeness required us to say yes, although he had
already given signs of incendiarism by striking a match, when, from a
distant and dark corner of the room, a broken, feeble voice, the
owner of which we had not as yet perceived, interposed to prevent the
prodigality.

"No, Achille, no, don't make a fire," said an old man. "There are five
in the room, and the lamp gives out a good heat; before long the room
would be too hot to bear."

Hearing these words, the marquis exclaimed:--

"Ah! this is the good Monsieur Pigoult, formerly justice of the peace."

Thus recognized, the old man rose and went up to my father, into whose
face he peered.

"_Parbleu_!" he cried, "I recognize you for