cousin who
had remained a bachelor and who owned a fine piece of property in some
corner of the Haute Marne; but, as all intercourse had long been broken
off between the two families, M. de Buxieres the elder had mentioned the
subject only in relation to barely possible hopes which had very little
chance of being realized. Julien had never placed any reliance on this
chimerical inheritance, and he received almost with indifference the
official announcement of the death of Claude Odouart de Buxieres.

By direct line from his late father, he became in fact the only
legitimate heir of the chateau and lands of Vivey; still, there was a
strong probability that Claude de Buxieres had made a will in favor of
some one more within his own circle. The second missive from Arbillot
the notary, announcing that the deceased had died intestate, and
requesting the legal heir to come to Vivey as soon as possible, put
a sudden end to the young man's doubts, which merged into a complex
feeling, less of joy than of stupefaction.

Up to the present time, Julien de Buxieres had not been spoiled by
Fortune's gifts. His parents, who had died prematurely, had left him
nothing. He lived in a very mediocre style on his slender salary as
comptroller of direct contributions, and, although twenty-seven years
old, was housed like a supernumerary in a small furnished room on the
second floor above the ground. At this time his physique was that of
a young man of medium height, slight, pale, and nervous, sensitive in
disposition, reserved and introspective in habit. His delicate features,
his intelligent forehead surmounted by soft chestnut hair, his pathetic
blue eyes, his curved, dissatisfied mouth, shaded by a slight, dark
moustache, indicated a melancholy, unquiet temperament and precocious
moral fatigue.

There are some men who never have had any childhood, or rather, whose
childhood never has had its happy time of laughter. Julien was one of
these. That which imparts to childhood its charm and enjoyment is the
warm and tender atmosphere of the home; the constant and continued
caressing of a mother; the gentle and intimate creations of one's native
country where, by degrees, the senses awaken to the marvellous sights
of the outer world; where the alternating seasons in their course first
arouse the student's ambition and cause the heart of the adolescent
youth to thrill with emotion; where every street corner, every tree,
every turn of the soil