possession of millions, obtained a half-scholarship for her son, Oscar
Husson, at the school of Henri IV.; and he sent her regularly, by
Pierrotin, such supplies from the estate at Presles as he could
decently offer to a household in distress.

Oscar was the whole life and all the future of his mother. The poor
woman could now be reproached with no other fault than her exaggerated
tenderness for her boy,--the bete-noire of his step-father. Oscar was,
unfortunately, endowed by nature with a foolishness his mother did not
perceive, in spite of the step-father's sarcasms. This foolishness
--or, to speak more specifically, this overweening conceit--so troubled
Monsieur Moreau that he begged Madame Clapart to send the boy down to
him for a month that he might study his character, and find out what
career he was fit for. Moreau was really thinking of some day
proposing Oscar to the count as his successor.

But to give to the devil and to God what respectively belongs to them,
perhaps it would be well to show the causes of Oscar Husson's silly
self-conceit, premising that he was born in the household of Madame
Mere. During his early childhood his eyes were dazzled by imperial
splendors. His pliant imagination retained the impression of those
gorgeous scenes, and nursed the images of a golden time of pleasure in
hopes of recovering them. The natural boastfulness of school-boys
(possessed of a desire to outshine their mates) resting on these
memories of his childhood was developed in him beyond all measure. It
may also have been that his mother at home dwelt too fondly on the
days when she herself was a queen in Directorial Paris. At any rate,
Oscar, who was now leaving school, had been made to bear many
humiliations which the paying pupils put upon those who hold
scholarships, unless the scholars are able to impose respect by