fore I came to a decision. The
subtleties of law displeased me, but the study of medicine, depending
upon the observation of facts, attracted me, and I decided to become a
doctor."

"A marriage of reason."

"No, a marriage for love. Because, if I had consulted reason, it would
have told me that to marry medicine when one has nothing--neither family
to sustain you nor relatives to push you--would be to condemn yourself to
a life of trials, of battles, and of misery. My student life was happy; I
worked hard, and by giving lessons in Latin I had enough to eat. When I
received as house-surgeon six, eight, nine hundred francs, I thought it a
large fortune, and I would have remained in this position for the rest of
my life if I had been able to do so, but when I took my degree of doctor
I was obliged to leave the hospital. The possessor of several thousand
francs, I should have followed rigorously my dream of ambition. While
attending the mistress of one of my comrades I made the acquaintance of
an upholsterer, who suggested that he should furnish an apartment for me,
and that I might pay him later. I yielded to temptation. Remember, I had
passed eight years in the Hotel du Senat, and I knew nothing of Paris
life. A home of my own! My own furniture, and a servant in my anteroom! I
should be somebody! My upholsterer could have installed me in his own
quarter of Paris, and perhaps could have obtained some patients for me
among his customers, who are rich and fashionable. But he did not do
this, probably concluding that with my awkward appearance I would not be
a success with such people. When you are successful it is original to be
a peasant--people find you clever; but before success comes to you it is
a disgrace. He furnished me an apartment in a very respectable house in
the Rue Louis-le-Grand. When I went into it I had debts to the amount of
ten thousand francs behind me, the interest on this sum, the rent of two
thousand four hundred francs, not a sou in my pocket, not a relative--"

"That was courageous."

"I did not know that in Paris everything is accomplished through
influence, and I imagined that an intelligent man could make his way
without assistance. I was to learn by experience. When a new doctor
arrives anywhere his brother doctors do not receive him with much
sympathy. 'What does this intruder want?' 'Are there not enough of us
already?' He is watched, and the first patient that he loses is made use
of as an