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Cosmopolis — Volume 1 by Paul Bourget
page 68 of 81 (83%)
whose tomb is to be seen in Rome, with that melancholy epitaph upon it,
written by himself:

Here lies one whose name was writ in water.

It was seldom that Dorsenne returned home without repeating to himself
the translation he had attempted of that beautiful 'Ci-git un don't le
nom, jut ecrit sur de l'eau'.

Sometimes he repeated, at evening, this delicious fragment:

The sky was tinged with tender green and pink.

This time he entered in a more prosaic manner; for he addressed the
concierge in the tone of a jealous husband or a debtor hunted by
creditors:

"Have you given the key to any one, Tonino?" he asked.

"Count Gorka said that your Excellency asked him to await you here,"
replied the man, with a timidity rendered all the more comical by the
formidable cut of his gray moustache and his imperial, which made him a
caricature of the late King Victor Emmanuel.

He had served in '59 under the Galantuomo, and he paid the homage of a
veteran of Solferino to that glorious memory. His large eyes rolled with
fear at the least confusion, and he repeated:

"Yes, he said that your Excellency asked him to wait," while Dorsenne
ascended the staircase, saying aloud: "More and more perfect. But this
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