Here, as in the Chamber of Deputies, we are compelled to call for a
division of the house:

1.--As to your wife.

Your wife is to inherit the property of a maternal uncle, a gouty old
fellow whom she humors, nurses, caresses, and muffles up; to say
nothing of her father's fortune. Caroline has always adored her uncle,
--her uncle who trotted her on his knee, her uncle who--her uncle
whom--her uncle, in short,--whose property is estimated at two hundred
thousand.

Further, your wife is well preserved, though her age has been the
subject of mature reflection on the part of your son-in-law's
grandparents and other ancestors. After many skirmishes between the
mothers-in-law, they have at last confided to each other the little
secrets peculiar to women of ripe years.

"How is it with you, my dear madame?"

"I, thank heaven, have passed the period; and you?"

"I really hope I have, too!" says your wife.

"You can marry Caroline," says Adolphe's mother to your future
son-in-law; "Caroline will be the sole heiress of her mother, of her
uncle, and her grandfather."

2.--As to yourself.