for there is no more resemblance between the English and the French
constitutions than between the two lands.

Thus Marcas' place was in the political press. Being poor and unable to
secure his election, he hoped to make a sudden appearance. He resolved
on making the greatest possible sacrifice for a man of superior
intellect, to work as a subordinate to some rich and ambitious deputy.
Like a second Bonaparte, he sought his Barras; the new Colbert hoped to
find a Mazarin. He did immense services, and he did them then and there;
he assumed no importance, he made no boast, he did not complain of
ingratitude. He did them in the hope that his patron would put him in a
position to be elected deputy; Marcas wished for nothing but a loan
that might enable him to purchase a house in Paris, the qualification
required by law. Richard III. asked for nothing but his horse.

In three years Marcas had made his man--one of the fifty supposed great
statesmen who are the battledores with which two cunning players toss
the ministerial portfolios exactly as the man behind the puppet-show
hits Punch against the constable in his street theatre, and counts on
always getting paid. This man existed only by Marcas, but he had just
brains enough to appreciate the value of his "ghost" and to know that
Marcas, if he ever came to the front, would remain there, would be
indispensable, while he himself would be translated to the polar zone of
Luxembourg. So he determined to put insurmountable obstacles in the way
of his Mentor's advancement, and hid his purpose under the semblance
of the utmost sincerity. Like all mean men, he could dissimulate to
perfection, and he soon made progress in the ways of ingratitude, for he
felt that he must kill Marcas, not to be killed by him. These two men,
apparently so united, hated each other as soon as one had deceived the
other.

The politician was made one of a ministry; Marcas remained in the
opposition to hinder his man from being attacked; nay, by skilful
tactics he won him the applause of the opposition. To excuse himself for
not rewarding his subaltern, the chief pointed out the impossibility of
finding a place suddenly for a man on the other side, without a great
deal of manoeuvring. Marcas had hoped confidently for a place to enable
him to marry, and thus acquire the qualification he so ardently desired.
He was two-and-thirty, and the Chamber ere long must be dissolved.
Having detected his man in this fl