that remarkable King of Belgium and the Bourse. But by this time
the gay Baron d'Azan had become stout, the pillar of his neck seemed
shorter because it was thicker, and the rose in his bold cheek had
the purplish tint of a crimson rambler. So he died of an apoplexy
during the festivities, and his son brought him back to the Chateau
d'Azan, and buried him there with due honor, and mourned for him
as was fitting. Thus Albert, third Baron d'Azan, entered upon his
inheritance.

It seemed, at first, to consist mainly of debts. These were paid by
the sale of the deforested lands and of certain detached woodlands.
By the same method, much as he disliked it, he made a modest
provision of money for continuing his education and beginning his
travels. He knew that he had much to learn of the world, and he
was especially desirous of pursuing his favorite study of botany,
which a wise old priest at Louvain had taught him to love. So he
engaged an intelligent and faithful forester to care for the trees
and the estate, closed the house, and set forth on his journeys.

They led him far and wide. In the course of them no doubt he
studied other things than botany. It may be that he sowed some of
the wild oats with which youth is endowed; but not in the gardens
of others; nor with that cold self-indulgence which transforms
passionate impulse into sensual habit. He had a permanent and
regulative devotion to botanical research; and that is a study which
seems to promote modesty, tranquillity, and steadiness of mind in
its devotees, of whom the great Linnaeus is the shining exemplar.
Young Albert d'Azan sat at the feet of the best masters in Europe
and America. He crossed the western continent to observe the oldest
of living things, the giant Sequoias of California. He went to