In ours they lived once, but that troubled sort of life they have
survived. Still we amuse them as stage-players and puppets amuse
ourselves. One of these Lookers-on completed the party at the house of
Duplessis.

How lively, how animated the talk was at the financier's pleasant table
that day, the 8th of July! The excitement of the coming war made itself
loud in every Gallic voice, and kindled in every Gallic eye. Appeals at
every second minute were made, sometimes courteous, sometimes sarcastic,
to the Englishman--promising son of an eminent statesman, and native of a
country in which France is always coveting an ally, and always suspecting
an enemy. Certainly Graham could not have found a less propitious moment
for asking Isaura if she really were changed. And certainly the honour
of Great Britain was never less ably represented (that is saying a great
deal) than it was on this occasion by the young man reared to diplomacy
and aspiring to Parliamentary distinction. He answered all questions
with a constrained voice and an insipid smile,--all questions pointedly
addressed to him as to what demonstrations of admiring sympathy with the
gallantry of France might be expected from the English Government and
people; what his acquaintance with the German races led him to suppose
would be the effect on the Southern States of the first defeat of the
Prussians; whether the man called Moltke was not a mere strategist on
paper, a crotchety pedant; whether, if Belgium became so enamoured of the
glories of France as to solicit fusion with her people, England would
have a right to offer any objection,&c., &c. I do not think that during
that festival Graham once thought one-millionth so much about the fates
of Prussia and France as he did think, "Why is that girl so changed to
me? Merciful heaven! is she lost to my life?"

By training, by habit, even by passion, the man was a genuine politician,