othing is easier than to be a great minister. It only demands a
determination to do good!"

"And the power to do it," replied his friend Granet, somewhat
ironically.

What! power? Nothing was more simple, since Vaudrey held the reins of
power!--If others wrecked the hopes of their friends, it was because
they had not dared, because they had not the will!

They would now see what he would do himself! Not to-morrow either, nor
in a month--but at once.

He entered the ministry boldly, like a good-natured despot, determined
to reform, study and rearrange everything; and a victim to the feverish
and glorious zeal of a neophyte, he was a little surprised to encounter,
at the very outset, the obstinate resistance of routine, ignorance, and
the unyielding mechanism of that vast machine, more eternal than
empires: Ad-min-is-tra-tion.

Bah! he would have satisfaction! Patience would overcome all. After all,
time is on one's side.

"Time? Already!" replied Granet, who was a perpetual scoffer.

Adrienne, overwhelmed with surprise, enjoyed the reflections from the
golden aurora of power that so sweetly tinted Sulpice's life. She
shared her husband's triumphs without haughtiness, and now, however she
might love her domestic life, it was incumbent upon her to pass more of
her time in society than formerly, _to show herself_, as Sulpice said,
and, surrounded by the success and flattery she enjoyed, she felt that
that obligation was only an added joy, whose contentment she reflected
on her husband.

When she entered a salon, she was greeted with a flattering murmur of
admiration and good-natured curiosity. The women looked at her and the
men surrounded her.

"Madame Vaudrey?"

"The minister's wife!"

"Charming!"

"Quite young!"

"Somewhat provincial!"

"So much the more attractive!"

"That is true, as fresh as a peach!"

She endeavored to atone by a gracious, very sincere modesty, for the
enviable position in which chance had suddenly placed her. It was said
of her that she accepted a compliment as timidly as a boarding-school
miss receives a prize. They forgave her for retaining her rosy cheeks
because of her white and exquisitely shaped hands. She was not
considered to be "_trop de Grenoble_." Witty people called her the
pretty _Dauphinoise_, and the flatterers the little Dauphine.

In short, her _success_ was great! So said the chroniclers; the entrance
of a fashionable woman into a salon being daily compared