le of it. In answer to this, Bertram had declared his
intention of going to Paris, but had promised to go down to Hurst
Staple as soon as he returned home.

At this time the popularity of Louis Philippe was on the wane. The
grocers of Paris were becoming sick of their paternal citizen king,
who, in spite of his quiet family costume and citizen umbrella,
seemed to think as much as some other kings of crowds of soldiers,
of fortifications, and war taxes; who seemed to think also that
free-spoken deputies might be judiciously controlled, that a
paternally-royal family might be judiciously enriched, and that
a good many of the old crown tenets and maxims might again be
judiciously brought to bear upon the commonwealth. Poor grocers! too
much prosperity had made them over-nice. When Mr. Smith had been
about six months gone from them, how gladly would they have had him
back again!

But they are again satisfied. The grocer interest, which on the
whole may perhaps be looked on as predominant in Paris, is once more
swathed in rose-leaves. The swathings certainly are somewhat tight;
and rose-leaves may be twisted till there is no breaking them.
But there will still remain the fragrance, the _pot-pourri_ odour
which is so delectable to ancient housewives, the oily savour of
plenteousness. If a king can so devise that chocolate shall be
sold--and paid for--what more can a grocer interest need? What more
than this, that having sold its daily quantum of chocolate, it shall
have a theatre to go to, a spectacle to look at, ices, coffee, and
_eau sucree!_ Since the world began to open its young eyes and look
about it with any understanding, what else has been desirable? What
does a man and a grocer want? _Panem et circenses_; soup that shall
not be too maigre; and a seat at the Porte St. Martin that shall not
be too dear. Is it not all written in that?

England a nation of shopkeepers! No, let us hope not; not as yet,
at any rate. There have been nations to whom the buying and selling
of bread and honey--especially of honey--has been everything; lost
nations--people deadened, whose souls were ever sleeping, whose
mouths only and gastric organs attested that life was in them. There
were such people in the latter days of ancient Rome; there were such
also in that of Eastern Rome upon the Bosphorus; rich and thriving
people, with large mouths and copious bellies, wanting merely the
salt of life. But let us hope that no English people w