village"--they were unsparingly devoured by the minotaur of the Rue
Servandoni. All were turned out of doors, with a conscientious blow in
the face, by the justly irritated spouse. When he became a widower
he gave himself up to his liaisons in perfect security, but without
scandal, of course, as to his passion for servants. New country-girls,
wearing strange headdresses, responded favorably, in various patois, to
his propositions. An Alsatian bow reigned six months; a Breton cap more
than a year; but at last what must inevitably take place happened.
The beautiful Berenice definitely bound with fetters of iron the old
libertine. She was now all-powerful in the house, where she reigned
supreme through her beauty and her talent for cooking; and as she saw
her master's face grow more congested at each repast, she made her
preparations for the future. Who could say but that M. Gaufre, a real
devotee after all, would develop conscientious scruples some day, and
end in a marriage, in extremis?

M. Violette knew all this; nevertheless it was important that Amedee
should not be forgotten by his old relative, and sometimes, though
rarely, he would leave his office a little earlier than usual, call for
his son as he left the Batifol boarding-school, and take him to the Rue
Servandoni.

The large drawing-rooms, transformed into a shop, where one could still
see, upon forgotten panels, rococo shepherds offering doves to their
shepherdesses, were always a new subject of surprise to little Amedee.
After passing through the book-shop, where thousands of little volumes
with figured gray and yellow covers crowded the shelves, and boys
in ecru linen blouses were rapidly tying up bundles, one entered the
jewellery department. There, under beautiful glass cases, sparkled
all the glittering display and showy luxury of the Church, golden
tabernacles where the Paschal Lamb reposed in a flaming triangle,
censers with quadruple chains, stoles and chasubles, heavy with
embroidery, enormous candelabra, ostensories and drinking-cups incrusted
with enamel and false precious stones-before all these splendors the
child, who had read the Arabian Nights, believed that he had entered
Aladdin's cave, or Aboul-Cassem's pit. From this glittering array one
passed, without transition, into the sombre depot of ecclesiastical
vestments. Here all was black. One saw only piles of cassocks and
pyramids of black hats. Two manikins, one clothed in a cardinal's pur