l debt is," he
answered. "If France has debts, egad! why should not Victurnien have
debts? At this time and at all times princes have debts, every
gentleman has debts. Perhaps you would rather that Victurnien should
bring you his savings?--Do you know that our great Richelieu (not the
Cardinal, a pitiful fellow that put nobles to death, but the
Marechal), do you know what he did once when his grandson the Prince
de Chinon, the last of the line, let him see that he had not spent his
pocket-money at the University?"

"No, M. le Chevalier."

"Oh, well; he flung the purse out of the window to a sweeper in the
courtyard, and said to his grandson, 'Then they do not teach you to be
a prince here?'"

Chesnel bent his head and made no answer. But that night, as he lay
awake, he thought that such doctrines as these were fatal in times
when there was one law for everybody, and foresaw the first beginnings
of the ruin of the d'Esgrignons.

But for these explanations which depict one side of provincial life in
the time of the Empire and the Restoration, it would not be easy to
understand the opening scene of this history, an incident which took
place in the great salon one evening towards the end of October 1822.
The card-tables were forsaken, the Collection of Antiquities--elderly
nobles, elderly countesses, young marquises, and simple baronesses
--had settled their losses and winnings. The master of the house was
pacing up and down the room, while Mlle. Armande was putting out the
candles on the card-tables. He was not taking exercise alone, the
Chevalier was with him, and the two wrecks of the eighteenth century
were talking of Victurnien. The Chevalier had undertaken to broach the
subject with the Marquis.

"Yes, Marquis," he was saying, "your son is wasting his time and his
youth; you ought to send him to court."

"I have always thought," said the Marquis, "that if my great age
prevents me from going to court--where, between ourselves, I do not
know what I should do among all these new people whom his Majesty
receives, and all that is going on there--that if I could not go
myself, I could at least send my son to present our homage to His
Majesty. The King surely would do something for the Count--give him a
company, for instance, or a place in the Household, a chance, in
short, for the boy to win his spurs. My uncle the Archbishop suffered
a cruel martyrdom; I have fought for the cause without deserting the
camp wit