is.'

'But is he clever?'

'Able as Satan himself, they say. He is a really dangerous, bad man.
You could not have been curious about a worse one.'

'Politically, you mean.'

'Of course I do.'

The lady had not thought of any other kind of danger from a man of that
station.

The likening of one to Satan does not always exclude meditation upon him.
Clotilde was anxious to learn in what way her talk resembled Alvan's. He
being that furious creature, she thought of herself at her wildest, which
was in her estimation her best; and consequently, she being by no means a
furious creature, though very original, she could not meditate on him
without softening the outlines given him by report; all because of the
likeness between them; and, therefore, as she had knowingly been taken
for furious by very foolish people, she settled it that Alvan was also a
victim of the prejudices he scorned. It had pleased her at times to
scorn our prejudices and feel the tremendous weight she brought on
herself by the indulgence. She drew on her recollections of the Satanic
in her bosom when so situated, and never having admired herself more
ardently than when wearing that aspect, she would have admired the man
who had won the frightful title in public, except for one thing--he was a
Jew.