n, and he remained
mute and motionless. Those who passed him took no notice of the beggar,
who sat in silence and darkness! They had been so lucky as to escape
complaints and importunities, and were glad to turn away their eyes too.

Suddenly the great gate turned on its hinges; and a very low carriage,
lighted with silver lamps and drawn by two black horses, came slowly
out, and took the road toward the Faubourg St. Germain. I could just
distinguish, within, the sparkling diamonds and the flowers of a
ball-dress; the glare of the lamps passed like a bloody streak over
the pale face of the beggar, and showed his look as his eyes opened and
followed the rich man's equipage until it disappeared in the night.

I dropped a small piece of money into the hat he was holding out, and
passed on quickly.

I had just fallen unexpectedly upon the two saddest secrets of the
disease which troubles the age we live in: the envious hatred of him
who suffers want, and the selfish forgetfulness of him who lives in
affluence.

All the enjoyment of my walk was gone; I left off looking about me, and
retired into my own heart. The animated and moving sight in the streets
gave place to inward meditation upon all the painful problems which
have been written for the last four thousand years at the bottom of each
human struggle, but which are propounded more clearly than ever in our
days.

I pondered on the uselessness of so many contests, in which defeat and
victory only displace each other by turns, and on the mistaken zealots
who have repeated from generation to generation the bloody history of
Cain and Abel; and, saddened with these mournful reflections, I walked
on as chance took me, until the silence all around insensibly drew me
out from my own thoughts.

I had reached one of the remote streets, in which those who would live
in comfort and without ostentation, and who love serious reflection,
delight to find a home. There were no shops along the dimly lighted
street; one heard no sounds but of distant carriages, and of the steps
of some of the inhabitants returning quietly home.

I instantly recognized the street, though I had been there only once
before.

That was two years ago. I was walking at the time by the side of the
Seine, to which the lights on the quays and bridges gave the aspect of
a lake surrounded by a garland of stars; and I had reached the Louvre,
when I was stopped by a crowd collected near the parapet they had