rs of age, have the wisdom
to listen to it?

Alas! when, at half-past two o'clock, Oscar entered the salon of the
Rocher de Cancale,--where were three invited persons besides the clerks,
to wit: an old captain of dragoons, named Giroudeau; Finot, a journalist
who might procure an engagement for Florentine at the Opera, and du
Bruel, an author, the friend of Tullia, one of Mariette's rivals,--the
second clerk felt his secret hostility vanish at the first handshaking,
the first dashes of conversation as they sat around a table luxuriously
served. Georges, moreover, made himself charming to Oscar.

"You've taken to private diplomacy," he said; "for what difference is
there between a lawyer and an ambassador? only that between a nation and
an individual. Ambassadors are the attorneys of Peoples. If I can ever
be useful to you, let me know."

"Well," said Oscar, "I'll admit to you now that you once did me a very
great harm."

"Pooh!" said Georges, after listening to the explanation for which
he asked; "it was Monsieur de Serizy who behaved badly. His wife!
I wouldn't have her at any price; neither would I like to be in the
count's red skin, minister of State and peer of France as he is. He has
a small mind, and I don't care a fig for him now."

Oscar listened with true pleasure to these slurs on the count, for they
diminished, in a way, the importance of his fault; and he echoed the
spiteful language of the ex-notary, who amused himself by predicting
the blows to the nobility of which the bourgeoisie were already
dreaming,--blows which were destined to become a reality in 1830.

At half-past three the solid eating of the feast began; the dessert did
not appear till eight o'clock,--each course having taken two hours to
serve. None but clerks can eat like that! The stomachs of eighteen and
twenty are inexplicable to the medical art. The wines were worthy of
Borrel, who in those days had superseded the illustrious Balaine, the
creator of the first restaurant for delicate and perfectly prepared food
in Paris,--that is to say, the whole world.

The report of this Belshazzar's feast for the architriclino-basochien
register was duly drawn up, beginning, "Inter pocula aurea restauranti,
qui vulgo dicitur Rupes Cancali." Every one can imagine the fine page
now added to the Golden Book of jurisprudential festivals.

Godeschal disappeared after signing the report, leaving the eleven
guests, stimulated by the old captain of the