clerks wrote his little epigram; Vimeux himself, good-natured fellow
that he was, subscribed under the name of "Miss Fairfax."

Handsome clerks of the Vimeux style have their salaries on which to
live, and their good looks by which to make their fortune. Devoted to
masked balls during the carnival, they seek their luck there, though
it often escapes them. Many end the weary round by marrying milliners,
or old women,--sometimes, however, young ones who are charmed with
their handsome persons, and with whom they set up a romance
illustrated with stupid love letters, which, nevertheless, seem to
answer their purpose.

Bixiou (pronounce it Bisiou) was a draughtsman, who ridiculed Dutocq
as readily as he did Rabourdin, whom he nicknamed "the virtuous
woman." Without doubt the cleverest man in the division or even in the
ministry (but clever after the fashion of a monkey, without aim or
sequence), Bixiou was so essentially useful to Baudoyer and Godard
that they upheld and protected him in spite of his misconduct; for he
did their work when they were incapable of doing it for themselves.
Bixiou wanted either Godard's or du Bruel's place as under-head-clerk,
but his conduct interfered with his promotion. Sometimes he sneered at
the public service; this was usually after he had made some happy hit,
such as the publication of portraits in the famous Fualdes case (for
which he drew faces hap-hazard), or his sketch of the debate on the
Castaing affair. At other times, when possessed with a desire to get
on, he really applied himself to work, though he would soon leave off
to write a vaudeville, which was never finished. A thorough egoist, a
spendthrift and a miser in one,--that is to say, spending his money
solely on himself,--sharp, aggressive, and indiscreet, he did mischief
for mischief's sake; above all, he attacked the weak, respected