have so many affairs of moment on my hands, that I find it difficult
to steal away even for a month or two.' St. Aubert remaining silent,
M. Quesnel proceeded: 'I have sometimes wondered how you, who have
lived in the capital, and have been accustomed to company, can exist
elsewhere;--especially in so remote a country as this, where you can
neither hear nor see any thing, and can in short be scarcely
conscious of life.'

'I live for my family and myself,' said St. Aubert; 'I am now
contented to know only happiness;--formerly I knew life.'

'I mean to expend thirty or forty thousand livres on improvements,'
said M. Quesnel, without seeming to notice the words of St. Aubert;
'for I design, next summer, to bring here my friends, the Duke de
Durefort and the Marquis Ramont, to pass a month or two with me.' To
St. Aubert's enquiry, as to these intended improvements, he replied,
that he should take down the whole east wing of the chateau, and
raise upon the site a set of stables. 'Then I shall build,' said he,
'a SALLE A MANGER, a SALON, a SALLE AU COMMUNE, and a number of rooms
for servants; for at present there is not accommodation for a third
part of my own people.'

'It accommodated our father's household,' said St. Aubert, grieved
that the old mansion was to be thus improved, 'and that was not a
small one.'

'Our notions are somewhat enlarged since those days,' said M.
Quesnel;--'what was then thought a decent style of living would not
now be endured.' Even the calm St. Aubert blushed at these words,
but his anger soon yielded to contempt. 'The ground about the