works, I am regarded as an atheist and a Jacobin; aside from these two
little defects, they think well enough of me. Besides, it is a notorious
fact that I have rejected several offers from the present government,
and refused last year the 'croix d'honneur'; this makes amends and washes
away half my sins. Finally, I have the reputation of having a certain-
knowledge of heraldry, which I owe to my uncle, a confirmed hunter after
genealogical claims. This gains me a respect which makes me laugh
sometimes, when I see people who detest me greet me as cordially as the
Cure of Saint-Eustache greeted Bayle, for fear that I might destroy their
favorite saint. However, in this society, I am no longer Gerfaut of the
Porte-Saint-Martin, but I am the Vicomte de Gerfaut. Perhaps, with your
bourgeois ideas, you do not understand--"

"Bourgeois!" exclaimed Marillac, bounding from his seat, "what are you
talking about? Do you wish that we should cut each other's throats
before breakfast to-morrow? Bourgeois! why not grocer? I am an artist--
don't you know that by this time?"

"Don't get angry, my dear fellow; I meant to say that in certain places
the title of a Vicomte has still a more powerful attraction than you,
with your artistic but plebeian ideas, would suppose in this year of our
Lord 1832."

"Well and good. I accept your apology."

"A vicomte's title is a recommendation in the eyes of people who still
cling to the baubles of nobility, and all women are of this class. There
is something, I know not what, delicate and knightly in this title, which
suits a youngish bachelor. Duke above all titles is the one that sounds
the best. Moliere and Regnard have done great harm to the title of