avoured, with all his might, to preserve the little that still
remained, and resolved to translate into a humbler sphere that gallantry
which he had no longer opportunities of displaying in the world of rank
and fashion.

CHAPTER TWELVE

HE EFFECTS A LODGMENT IN THE HOUSE OF A RICH JEWELLER.

In consequence of this determination, he to the uttermost exerted his
good-humour among the few friends of consequence his fortune had left,
and even carried his complaisance so far as to become the humble servant
of their pleasures, while he attempted to extend his acquaintance in an
inferior path of life, where he thought his talents would shine more
conspicuous than at the assemblies of the great, and conduce more
effectually to the interest of all his designs. Nor did he find himself
disappointed in that expectation, sanguine as it was. He soon found
means to be introduced to the house of a wealthy bourgeois, where every
individual was charmed with his easy air and extraordinary
qualifications. He accommodated himself surprisingly to the humours of
the whole family; smoked tobacco, swallowed wine, and discoursed of
stones with the husband, who was a rich jeweller; sacrificed himself to
the pride and loquacity of the wife; and played upon the violin, and sung
alternately, for the amusement of his only daughter, a buxom lass, nearly
of his own age, the fruit of a former marriage.

It was not long before Ferdinand had reason to congratulate himself on
the footing he had gained in this society. He had expected to find, and
in a little time actually discovered, that mutual jealousy and rancour
which almost always subsist between a daughter and her step-dame,
inflamed with all the virulence of female emulation; for the disparity in
their ages served only to render them the more inveterate rivals in the
desire of captivating the other sex. Our adventurer having deliberated
upon the means of converting this animosity to his own advantage, saw no
method for this purpose so feasible as that of making his approaches to
the hearts of both, by ministering to each in private, food for their
reciprocal envy and malevolence; because he well knew that no road lies
so direct and open to a woman's heart as that of gratifying her passions
of vanity and resentment.

When he had an opportunity of being particular with the mother, he
expressed his concern for having unwittingly incurred the displeasure of
Mademoiselle, which, he obs