where turkeys were sold. He noticed that those which remained unsold, in
a day or two lost half their value. He asked the old women how the
customers knew the turkeys were not fresh. They replied that the legs
changed from a bright black to a dingy brown. Fabrice went home, was
absent the next day from the _halles_, and on the third day returned
with a bottle of liquid. Seizing hold of the first brown-legged turkey
he met with, he forthwith painted its legs out of the contents of his
bottle, and placing the thus decorated bird by the side of one just
killed, he asked who now was able to see the difference between the
fresh bird and the stale one? The old women were seized with admiration.
They are a curious set of beings, those _dames de la halle_; their
admiration is unbounded for successful adventurers--witness their
enthusiasm for Louis Napoleon. They adopted our friend's idea without
hesitation, made an agreement with him on the principle of the division
of profits; and it immediately became a statistical puzzle with the
curious inquirers on these subjects, how it came to pass that stale
turkeys should have all at once disappeared from the Paris market? It
was set down to the increase of prosperity consequent on the
constitutional _regime_ and the wisdom of the citizen-king. The old
women profited largely; but unfortunately, like the rest of the world,
they in time forgot both their enthusiasm and their benefactor, and Pere
Fabrice found himself involved in a daily succession of squabbles about
his half-profits. Tired out at last, he made an arrangement with the old
dames, and, in military phrase, sold out. Possessed now of about double
the capital with which he entered, he recollected his old friend, the
rag-merchant, and went a second time to propose a partnership. 'I am a
man of capital now,' he said; 'you need not laugh so loud this time.'
The rag-merchant asked the amount of his capital; and when he heard it,
whistled _Ninon dormait_, and turned upon his heel. 'No wonder,' said
Fabrice afterward; 'I little knew then what a rag-merchant was worth.
That man could have bought up two of Louis Philippe's ministers of
finance.' At the time, however, he did not take the matter so
philosophically, and resolved, after the fashion of his class, not to
drown himself, but to make a night of it. He found a friend, and went
with him to dine at a small eating-house. While there, they noticed the
quantity of broken bread thrown