searching from door to door
and from street to street for his honour the superintendent, whom I have
at last been fortunate enough to find here, for I know perfectly well
that he is present, and that if he have ears he hears me now. I am come
to request him to order his scoundrelly myrmidons who have seized my
carriage to give it up, so that I may continue my journey. If the laws
bid me pay twelve hundred francs for seven ounces of snuff for my own
private use, I renounce those laws and declare that I will not pay a
farthing. I shall stay here and send a messenger to my ambassador, who
will complain that the 'jus gentium' has been violated in the
Ile-de-France in my person, and I will have reparation. Louis XV. is
great enough to refuse to become an accomplice in this strange onslaught.
And if that satisfaction which is my lawful right is not granted me, I
will make the thing an affair of state, and my Republic will not revenge
itself by assaulting Frenchmen for a few pinches of snuff, but will expel
them all root and branch. If you want to know whom I am, read this."

Foaming with rage, I threw my passport on the table.

A man picked it up and read it, and I knew him to be the superintendent.
While my papers were being handed round I saw expressed on every face
surprise and indignation, but the superintendent replied haughtily that
he was at Amiens to administer justice, and that I could not leave the
town unless I paid the fine or gave surety.

"If you are here to do justice, you will look upon my passport as a
positive command to speed me on my way, and I bid you yourself be my
surety if you are a gentleman."

"Does high birth go bail for breaches of the law in your country?"

"In my country men of high birth do not condescend to take dishonourable
employments."

"No service under the king can be dishonourable."

"The hangman would say the same thing."

"Take care what you say."

"Take care what you do. Know, sir, that I am a free man who has been
grievously outraged, and know, too, that I fear no one. Throw me out of
the window, if you dare."

"Sir," said a lady to me in the voice of the mistress of the house, "in
my house there is no throwing out of windows."

"Madam, an angry man makes use of terms which his better reason disowns.
I am wronged by a most cruel act of injustice, and I humbly crave your
pardon for having offended you. Please to reflect that for the first time
in my life I have been oppre