sian salons excepted) the curious observer finds
folly a constant quantity beneath a more or less transparent varnish.
Conversation with any substance in it is a rare exception, and
boeotianism is current coin in every zone. In the higher regions they
must perforce talk more, but to make up for it they think the less.
Thinking is a tiring exercise, and the rich like their lives to flow by
easily and without effort. It is by comparing the fundamental matter of
jests, as you rise in the social scale from the street-boy to the peer
of France, that the observer arrives at a true comprehension of M. de
Talleyrand's maxim, "The manner is everything"; an elegant rendering of
the legal axiom, "The form is of more consequence than the matter." In
the eyes of the poet the advantage rests with the lower classes, for
they seldom fail to give a certain character of rude poetry to their
thoughts. Perhaps also this same observation may explain the sterility
of the salons, their emptiness, their shallowness, and the repugnance
felt by men of ability for bartering their ideas for such pitiful small
change.

The Duke suddenly stopped as if some bright idea occurred to him, and
remarked to his neighbour:

"So you have sold Tornthon?"

"No, he is ill. I am very much afraid I shall lose him, and I should be
uncommonly sorry. He is a very good hunter. Do you know how the Duchesse
de Marigny is?"

"No. I did not go this morning. I was just going out to call when
you came in to speak about Antoinette. But yesterday she was very ill
indeed; they had given her up, she took the sacrament."

"Her death will make a change in your cousin's position."

"Not at all. She gave away her property in her lifetime, only keeping
an annuity. She made over the Guebriant estate to her niece, Mme de
Soulanges, subject to a yearly charge."

"It will be a great loss for society. She was a kind woman. Her family
will miss her; her experience and advice carried weight. Her son Marigny
is an amiable man; he has a sharp wit, he can talk. He is pleasant, very
pleasant. Pleasant? oh, that no one can deny, but--ill regulated to
the last degree. Well, and yet it is an extraordinary thing, he is
very acute. He was dining at the club the other day with that moneyed
Chaussee-d'Antin set. Your uncle (he always goes there for his game
of cards) found him there to his astonishment, and asked if he was a
member. 'Yes,' said he, 'I don't go into society now; I am living a