empered face, somewhat pale, the blue ecstatic eyes
and the inquisitive nose of that good old man, when you learn that,
in the morning, wearing a silk head kerchief and tightened in a
dressing-gown, the illustrious professor--he is a professor--resembled
an old woman so much that a young man who came from the depths of
Saxony, of Weimar, or of Prussia, expressly to see him, said to him,
"Forgive me, Madame!" and withdrew.

This silhouette of one of the most learned and most venerated
members of the Institute betrays so well enthusiasm for study and
absent-mindedness caused by application to the quest of truth, that you
must recognize in it the celebrated Professor Jean Nepomucene Apollodore
Marmus de Saint-Leu, one of the most admirable men of genius of our
time.

III

MADAME ADOLPHE

When the old man--the professor counted then sixty-two summers--had
walked three steps, he turned his head at this question, hurled in an
acute tone by a voice that he recognized:

"Have you a handkerchief?"

A woman stood on the step of the garden door and was watching her
master with solicitude.

She seemed to be fifty years of age, and her dress indicated that she
was one of those servants who are invested with full authority in
household affairs.

She was darning stockings.

The man of science came back and said naively:

"Yes, Madame Adolphe, I have my handkerchief."

"Have you your spectacles?" she asked.

The man of science felt the side pocket of his waistcoat.

"I have them," he replied.

"Show them to me," she said. "Often you have only the case."

The professor took the case out of his pocket and showed the
spectacles with a triumphant air.

"You would do well to keep them on your nose," she said.

M. de Saint-Leu put on his spectacles, after rubbing the glasses with
his handkerchief.

Naturally, he thrust the handkerchief under his left arm while he set
his spectacles on his nose. Then he walked a few steps towards the Rue
de Fleurus and relaxed his hold on the handkerchief, which fell.

"I was sure of it," said Madame Adolphe to herself. She picked up the
handkerchief and cried:

"Monsieur! Monsieur!"

"Well!" exclaimed the professor, made indignant by her watchfulness.

"I beg your pardon," he said, receiving the handkerchief.

"Have you any money?" asked Madame Adolphe with maternal solicitude.

"I need none," he replied naively,