the shop out of the back-shop, the present dining-room, and kitchen. I
hire the first floor of the next house, and open a door into it
through the wall. I turn the staircase so as to pass from house to
house on one floor; and we shall thus get a grand appartement,
furnished like a nest. Yes, I shall refurnish your bedroom, and
contrive a boudoir for you and a pretty chamber for Cesarine. The
shop-girl whom you will hire, our head clerk, and your lady's-maid
(yes, Madame, you are to have one!) will sleep on the second floor. On
the third will be the kitchen and rooms of the cook and the
man-of-all-work. The fourth shall be a general store-house for bottle,
crystals, and porcelains. The workshop for our people, in the attic!
Passers-by shall no longer see them gumming on the labels, making the
bags, sorting the flasks, and corking the phials. Very well for the
Rue Saint-Denis, but for the Rue Saint-Honore--fy! bad style! Our shop
must be as comfortable as a drawing-room. Tell me, are we the only
perfumers who have reached public honors? Are there not vinegar
merchants and mustard men who command in the National Guard and are
very well received at the Palace? Let us imitate them; let us extend
our business, and at the same time press forward into higher society."

"Goodness! Birotteau, do you know what I am thinking of as I listen to
you? You are like the man who looks for knots in a bulrush. Recollect
what I said when it was a question of making you deputy-mayor: 'your
peace of mind before everything!' You are as fit, I told you, 'to be
put forward in public life as my arm is to turn a windmill. Honors
will be your ruin!' You would not listen to me, and now the ruin has
come. To play a part in politics you must have money: have we any?
What! would you burn your sign, which cost six hundred francs, and
renounce 'The Queen of Roses,' your true glory? Leave ambition to
others. He who puts his hand in the fire gets burned,--isn't that