the manners, customs, and physiognomy of the family. For the last
fifty years the du Guaisnics have received their friends in the two
rooms just described, in which, as in the court-yard and the external
accessories of the building, the spirit, grace, and candor of the old
and noble Brittany still survives. Without the topography and
description of the town, and without this minute depicting of the
house, the surprising figures of the family might be less understood.
Therefore the frames have preceded the portraits. Every one is aware
that things influence beings. There are public buildings whose effect
is visible upon the persons living in their neighborhood. It would be
difficult indeed to be irreligious in the shadow of a cathedral like
that of Bourges. When the soul is everywhere reminded of its destiny
by surrounding images, it is less easy to fail of it. Such was the
thought of our immediate grandfathers, abandoned by a generation which
was soon to have no signs and no distinctions, and whose manners and
morals were to change every decade. If you do not now expect to find
the Baron du Guaisnic sword in hand, all here written would be
falsehood.



II

THE BARON, HIS WIFE, AND SISTER

Early in the month of May, in the year 1836, the period when this
scene opens, the family of Guenic (we follow henceforth the modern
spelling) consisted of Monsieur and Madame du Guenic, Mademoiselle du
Guenic the baron's elder sister, and an only son, aged twenty-one,
named, after an ancient family usage, Gaudebert-Calyste-Louis. The