HIS EXCELLENCY

[SON EXC. EUGÈNE ROUGON]

BY

ÉMILE ZOLA

WITH A PREFACE BY ERNEST A. VIZETELLY

SOLE AUTHORISED ENGLISH VERSION

LONDON
CHATTO & WINDUS
1897

[CONTENTS]

[PREFACE]

We live at such high speed nowadays, and the Second French Empire is already so far behind us, that I am inclined to place Son Excellence Eugène Rougon in the category of historical novels. In some degree it certainly belongs to another class of fiction, the political novel, which in Great Britain sprouted, blossomed, and faded away contemporaneously with the career of Benjamin Disraeli. But, unlike Disraeli's work, it does not deal with theories or possibilities. Whatever political matter it may contain is a record of incidents which really occurred, of intrigues which were matured, of opinions which were more or less publicly expressed while the third Napoleon was ruling France. In my opinion, with all due allowance for its somewhat limited range of subject, Son Excellence Eugène Rougon is the one existing French novel which gives the reader a fair general idea of what occurred in political spheres at an important period of the Empire. It is a book for foreigners and particularly Englishmen to read with profit, for there are yet many among them who cherish the delusion that Napoleon III. was not only a good and true friend of England, but also a wise and beneficent ruler of France; and this, although his reign began with bloodshed and trickery, was prolonged by means of innumerable subterfuges, and ended in woe, horror, and disgrace.

The present translation of M. Zola's book was not made by me, but I have revised it somewhat severely with the object of ensuring greater accuracy in all the more important passages, and of improving the work generally. And, subject to those limitations which deference for the opinion of the majority of English-speaking readers has imposed on the translator and myself, I consider that this rendering fully conveys the purport of the original. During the work of revision I was struck by the great care shown by M. Zola in the handling of his subject. There is, of course, some fiction in the book; but, again and again, page after page, I have found a simple record of fact, just deftly adapted to suit the requirements of the narrative. The history of the Second Empire is probably as familiar to me as it is to M. Zola himself—for, like him, I grew to manhood in its midst, with better opportunities, too, than he had of observing certain of its distinguishing features—and thus I have been able to identify innumerable incidents and allusions, and trace to their very source some of the most curious passages in the book. And it is for this reason, and by virtue of my own knowledge and experience, that I claim for His Excellency the merit of reflecting things as they really were in the earlier years of the Imperial régime.

Against one surmise the reader must be cautioned. Napoleon III. and the Empress Eugénie figure in the following pages without disguise; and wherever the name of the Count de Marsy appears, that of the infamous Duke de Morny—whom Sir Robert Peel, in one of his most slashing speeches, did not scruple to call the greatest jobber in Europe—may be read without a moment's hesitation. But his Excellency Eugène Rougon is not, as many critics and others have supposed, a mere portrait or caricature of his Excellency Eugène Rouher, the famous Vice-Emperor of history. Symbolism is to be found in every one of M. Zola's novels, and Rougon, in his main lines, is but the symbol of a principle, or, to be accurate, the symbol of a certain form of the principle of authority. His face is Rouher's, like his build and his favourite gesture; but with Rouher's words, actions, opinions, and experiences are blended those of half-a-dozen other personages. The forgotten ones! the men whose names were once a terror, but who are as little remembered, as little known, in France to-day, as the satraps of the vanished Eastern realms, as the eunuchs who ruled the civilised world on behalf of effete Emperors when Byzantium, amidst all her splendour, was, like Paris, tottering to ruin. Baroche, Billault, Delangle, Fialin alias Persigny, Espinasse—there is something of each of these, as well as something of Rouher, in the career of Eugène Rougon as narrated by M. Zola. Words which one or another of these men wrote or uttered, things which one or another of them actually did, are fathered upon Rougon. He embodies them all: he is the incarnation of that craving, that lust for power which impelled so many men of ability to throw all principle to the winds and become the instruments of an abominable system of government. And his transformation at the close of the story is in strict accordance with historical facts. He salutes the rise of the so-called 'Liberal' Empire in the very words of Billault—the most tyrannical of all the third Napoleon's 'band.'

Rougon has a band of his own—they all had bands in those days, like the Emperor himself; and since that time we have in a similar way seen Gambetta and his queue and Boulanger and his clique. And, curiously enough, as in Rougon's case, those historic coteries were in each instance the prime factors in their leader's overthrow. Thus we have only to turn to the recorded incidents of history to realise the full truth of M. Zola's account of the Rougon gang. It is a masterly account, instinct with accuracy, as real as life itself.

And Rougon, on whatever patchwork basis he may have been built, is a living figure, one of a nature so direct, so free from intricacy, that few ignorant of the truth would imagine him to be a patchwork creation at all. Surely, to have so fully assimilated in one personage the characteristics of half-a-dozen known men in such wise that, without any clashing of individual proclivities, the whole six are truthfully embodied in one, is a signal proof of that form of genius which lies in the infinite capacity for taking pains.

If we pass from Rougon to Marsy we find another embodiment of that principle of authority which both help to represent. Rougon, as M. Zola says, is the shaggy fist which deals the knock-down blow, while Marsy is the gloved hand which stabs or throttles. Years ago, when I was unacquainted with this comparison, and was contrasting the rising genius of Emile Zola with that of his great and splendid rival, Alphonse Daudet, I likened M. Zola to the fist and M. Daudet to the rapier. A French critic had previously called the former a cactus and the latter an Arab steed. The cactus comparison, as applied to M. Zola, was a very happy one; for I defy anybody, even the smuggest of hypocrites, to read M. Zola's works without some prickings of conscience. And verily I believe that most of the opposition to the author of the Rougon-Macquart series arises from that very cause.

But I must return to Marsy, though he need not detain me long, for he only flits across the following pages with his regal air and sardonic smile. For a fuller and, in some degree, a more favourable portrait, one must turn to the pages of Daudet, who of course could not write ill of the man to whom he owed his start in life. In the present work, slight as is the sketch, Marsy, or Morny, the name signifies little, is shown as he really was—venal, immoral, witty, and exquisitely polite. Then there is Delestang, who, physically, represents M. Magne; while in like way Beulin-d'Orchère, the judge whose sister marries Rougon, is copied from Delangle, whose bulldog face is alluded to by most of the anecdotiers of the Empire. La Rouquette is, by name at all events, a connection of Forcade de la Roquette—a step-brother of Marshal St. Arnaud—who rose to influence and power in the latter days of the Empire; and M. de Plouguern, the profligate old senator, reminds me in some respects of that cynical and eccentric Anglomaniac, the Marquis de Boissy. The various members of Rougon's band are sketched from less-known people. Kahn I cannot quite identify, but I suspect him to be the deputy who was mixed up in the scandal of the Graissesac railway line, to which M. Zola refers as the line from Niort to Angers. However, there is no member of the band that I like better than Béjuin, the silent deputy, who never asks a favour, and yet has favours continually showered upon him. I have known a man of that character connected with English public life.

To return to those of M. Zola's masculine characters who may be identified with real personages, none is more genially, more truthfully, portrayed than Chevalier Rusconi, the Italian or, more correctly, Sardinian, Minister in Paris. Here we have that most amiable of men, Chevalier Nigra, of whom Prosper Mérimée once said in my presence: 'C'est un bohème tombé dans la diplomatie.' Withal, Chevalier Nigra—who, though very aged, still serves his country, I believe, with distinction at Vienna—was a very good diplomatist indeed; one of Cavour's right-hand men, one of those to whom Italy owes union and liberty. And what a career was his in France, and what memoirs might he not write! Few diplomatists ever had stranger experiences: from all the secret plotting which so largely helped to make Victor Emmanuel King of Italy to the surveillance so adroitly practised over the Empress Eugénie, whose support of Pope Pius IX. was ever an obstacle to Italian aspirations. For her Nigra-Rusconi became the handsome, gallant courtier; he was a musician, could sing and dance, was proficient in every society accomplishment, and before long the Empress's Monday receptions at the Tuileries, those petits Lundis enlivened by the wit of Mérimée, were never complete without him. Yet, all the time, a stern duel was being fought between him and the consort of Napoleon III. And so long as her husband ruled France she kept her adversary at bay. Rome, capital of Italy, was but the fruit of Sedan. Yet Nigra was chivalrous. When the bitter hour of reckoning arrived, he stood by the woman who had so long thwarted him. He and Prince Richard Metternich smuggled her out of the Tuileries in order that she might escape to England, beyond the reach of the infuriated Parisians.

We catch a few glimpses of the Empress in the pages of His Excellency. We find her at Compiègne surrounded by the ladies of her Court; we also see her riding in state to Notre Dame to attend the baptism of her infant son. A great day it was, when the Empire reached its zenith: a gorgeous ceremony, too, attended by every pomp. On referring to the newspapers of the time I have found M. Zola's description of the function to be remarkably accurate. We espy the Man of December raising the Prince Imperial in his arms, presenting the heir of the Napoleons to the assembled multitude—even as once before, and in the same cathedral, the victor of Austerlitz presented the infant King of Rome to the homage of France. But neither the son of Marie-Louise nor the son of Eugénie de Montijo was destined to reign. And what a mockery now seems that grand baptismal ceremony, as well as all the previous discussion in the Corps Législatif, of which M. Zola gives such an animated account. What a lesson, too, for human pride, and, in the sequel, what a punishment for human perversity! I often read, I often hear, words of compassion for the Prince Imperial's widowed mother, but they cannot move me to pity, for I think of all the hundreds, all the thousands, of mothers who lost their sons in that most wicked and abominable of wars in the declaration of which the Empress Eugénie played so prominent a part. Her evil influence triumphed in that hour of indecision which came upon her ailing husband; and her war—ma guerre à moi—ensued, with fatal consequences, which even yet disturb the world. And so, however great, however bitter, her punishment, who will dare to say that it was undeserved?

But whilst I consider the Empress to have been, in more than one momentous circumstance, the evil genius of France, even as Marie Antoinette was the evil genius of the crumbling Legitimate monarchy, I am not one of those who believe in all the malicious reports of her to be found in la chronique scandaleuse. That she threw herself at the Emperor's head and compelled him to marry her, may be true, but that is all that can be alleged against her with any show of reason. She undoubtedly proved a faithful wife to a man who was notoriously a most unfaithful husband. There are those who may yet remember how one November morning in the year 1860 the Empress arrived in London, scarcely attended, drove in a growler to Claridge's Hotel, and thence hurried off to Scotland. Her flight from the Tuileries had caused consternation there. For four days the Moniteur remained ominously silent, and when it at last spoke out it was to announce with the utmost brevity that her Majesty was in very delicate health, and had betaken herself to Scotland—in November!—for a change of air. This ridiculous explanation deceived nobody. The simple truth was that the Empress had obtained proof positive of another of her husband's infidelities.

It is needless for me to enlarge upon the subject; I have only mentioned it in corroboration of the portrait of Napoleon III. which M. Zola traces in His Excellency. The Emperor was an immoral man—the Beauharnais if not the Bonaparte blood coursed in his veins—and the names of several of his mistresses are perfectly well known. For the rest, M. Zola pictures him very accurately: moody, reserved, with vague humanitarian notions, and as great a predilection for secret police spying as was evinced by Louis XV. The intrigue between him and M. Zola's heroine, Clorinde, is no extravagant notion. Here again a large amount of actual fact is skilfully blended with a little fiction. Clorinde Balbi at once suggests the beautiful Countess de Castiglione; but in the account of her earlier career one finds a suggestion of the behaviour which innumerable scandalmongers impute—wrongly, I believe—to the Empress Eugénie. In Clorinde's mother, the Contessa Balbi, there is more than a suggestion of Madame de Montijo, who was undoubtedly an adventuress of good birth. Both the Balbis are very cleverly drawn; they typify a class of women that has long flourished in France, where it still has some notorious representatives. It is a class of great popularity with novelists and playwrights, possibly because contemporary history has furnished so many examples of it, from the aforementioned Countess de Castiglione who laid siege to Napoleon III. in order to induce him to further the designs of Cavour and Victor Emmanuel, to the Baroness de Kaulla, who ensnared poor General de Cissey that she might extract from him the military and Foreign Office secrets of France. And with half-a-dozen historical instances in my mind, I find no exaggeration in the character of Clorinde as portrayed in His Excellency.

Having thus passed M. Zola's personages in review, I would now refer to the actual scenes which he describes. The account of the sitting of the Corps Législatif, given in the opening chapter, is as accurate as the official report in the Moniteur of that time. The report on the estimates for the baptism of the Prince Imperial is taken from the Moniteur verbatim. In Chapter III., when the Balbis are shown at home, the description of the house in the Champs Élysées is assuredly that of the famous niche à Fidèle. The baptism, described in Chapter IV., is, as I have already mentioned, very faithfully dealt with. I have by me an account of the day's proceedings written for the Illustrated Times by my uncle, the late Frank Vizetelly, who was killed in the Soudan; and I find him laying stress on the very points which M. Zola brings into prominence, often indeed using almost the same words. However, this is but one of the curious coincidences on which malicious critics found ridiculous charges of plagiarism; for I am convinced that M. Zola never saw the Illustrated Times in his life, and moreover he knows no English. Passing to Chapter V., which narrates the horse-whipping administered by Clorinde to Rougon—an incident which it has been necessary to 'tone down' in this English version—I may remark that this is founded on contemporary scandal, according to which the true scene of the affair would be the Imperial stables at Compiègne, and the recipient of the whipping none other than Napoleon III. himself. In Chapter VI., the scheme for reclaiming the waste Landes of Gascony is well-known matter of history. Suggested to the Emperor, this scheme was ultimately taken up by him with considerable vigour, and though it was never fully carried out it may rank as one of the few really beneficent enterprises of the Imperial régime.

In the ensuing chapter we come to Compiègne, and here I have found nothing to call in question. I was twice at Compiègne myself under the Empire, of course not as a guest, but in connection with work for the Illustrated London News, which brought my father and myself into constant intercourse with the Imperial Court over a term of years. And, judging by my personal recollections, I consider M. Zola's picture of life at Compiègne to be a very true one. He has been attacked, however, for having based his descriptions on a work called Les Confidences d'un Valet de Chambre. Some few years ago Mr. Andrew Lang, in criticising the French original of His Excellency in an English review, sternly reproved M. Zola for relying, in any degree, upon such back-stairs gossip. But a little knowledge is a dangerous thing. Whatever its title may be, Les Confidences d'un Valet de Chambre was not written by a valet de chambre at all. I have a copy of it among my collection of books relating to the Empire. It is brimful of information, bald in style, but severely accurate. As for its authorship, these are the facts: The Court's sojourn at Compiègne, which lasted for a month or six weeks every autumn—having been suggested in part by the Voyages à Fontainebleau of the ancien régime, and in part by the Empress's partiality for the place where she had been wooed and won by Napoleon—had long been the subject of tittle-tattle among the Parisians. The newspapers dared not publish any of the current scandal for fear of being immediately suppressed; however, the impression prevailed, especially among the lower classes, that the Court only betook itself to Compiègne to indulge in a month's orgie far from such prying eyes as might have spied upon any similar excesses at the Tuileries. So many reports circulated, that it was at last deemed expedient to give the entrée to the château to a Court chronicler, who should report what actually took place there, and in this way show the Parisians how foolish were the stories circulated through the cafés and wine-shops. The soi-disant valet de chambre was then, purely and simply, a journalist recommended by Théophile Gautier; and his accounts of the Court at Compiègne were published, in part at all events, by the Paris Figaro, and were subsequently collected in volume form. There is no scandal of any kind in the book: it simply chronicles the day's doings, with descriptions of the various rooms of the château, and accounts of certain Court customs thrown in here and there. Nobody desirous of describing life in Imperial circles at second-hand could do without this little volume, and it is only natural that M. Zola should have consulted it. Its general accuracy I can, by personal knowledge, fully confirm. Among the various incidents which M. Zola has adapted from it I may mention that of the aged dignitary who fondles first the Prince Imperial and afterwards the Emperor's dog Nero. This aged dignitary is a little bit of invention, the real hero of the incident having been a certain M. Leciel, an adjoint to the Mayor of Compiègne, who subsequently got into hot water with the Empress owing to his partiality for irreverent witticisms which usually turned upon his own name. In English we might have called him Mr. Heaven. His residence at Compiègne adjoined the somewhat dirty little inn of the Holy Ghost, which it was at one time proposed to demolish in order to build a new theatre, which was to have been connected with the château by means of a suspension bridge. This gave M. Leciel an opportunity for a most deplorable pun concerning himself and the inn, which he calmly repeated to the Empress, who was considerably incensed thereat. And in the result M. Leciel received no further invitations to the château.

But I must pass from Compiègne to M. Zola's next chapter, in which he deals, indirectly, with the famous Orsini conspiracy. Here we find a story of how the authorities were warned of the approaching attempt at assassination—a story which I have heard told by M. Claude, the famous ex-chief of the detective police, when I was his neighbour at Vincennes in 1881. Something similar, I believe, figures in the so-called Mémoires de M. Claude, but these, based on Claude's papers, which were 'worked up' after his death by an imaginative penny-a-liner, are worthy of little or no credence. It is, however, certain that the French authorities were not only warned from London about the Orsini plot, but obtained additional information in the manner described by M. Zola, and that the incident became the stepping-stone of Claude's subsequent fortune. In His Excellency the Orsini affair is followed by Rougon's return to power. For Rougon one should here read General Espinasse, to whom the Emperor undoubtedly addressed the words: 'No moderation; you must make yourself feared.' All that M. Zola says of the wholesale arrests of French Republicans at that time is quite true. Even the brief interview of the Prefect of the Somme with Rougon is based on historical documents; while that in which figures the editor whose newspaper publishes a story of feminine infidelity is derived from the autobiography of Henri de Villemessant.

In Chapter X., which deals with Rougon's experiences at Niort, we have the story of the arrest of the old notary Martineau. This, again, is true, line for line, almost word for word; but the incident really occurred at Charost, not Coulonges, and the notary's real name was Lebrun. He was a cousin of the illustrious parliamentarian, Michel of Bourges. And once again, fact is piled upon fact in Chapter XI., which describes the Ministerial Council at St. Cloud. The project for the creation of a new nobility emanated from Persigny and Magne; numerous documents concerning it were discovered in the Emperor's study after Sedan; and I may here remark en passant that M. Zola has frequently and rightly availed himself of those Papiers trouvés aux Tuileries as published by the Government of National Defence. And he carries accuracy to such a point that in Chapter XIII., when he is describing Rougon's resignation, he dates the Emperor's acceptance of it from Fontainebleau, as actually happened in the case of Espinasse; and gives us a charity fair at the orangery of the Tuileries as the scene of the minister's receipt of that acceptance—again an historical incident. And finally, in the last chapter, which, like the opening one, deals with the Corps Législatif, we read the very words of Jules Favre and Billault. Moreover, when we here find a clerical deputy exclaiming, 'It displeases me that proud Venice, the Queen of the Adriatic, should become the obscure vassal of Turin,' we must not attribute the remark to M. Zola's imagination; for those words were spoken in that very debate by Kolb. Bernard, who, with Vicomte Lemercier, led the parliamentary group which opposed the Emperor's liberal policy in Italy.

Some readers and some reviewers may think that I have acted somewhat unkindly to M. Zola in thus partially dissecting Son Excellence Eugène Rougon, in showing how little it is a work of imagination and how much a work based upon fact. I could have given many more instances than those I have quoted, but this preface has already stretched to such length that I must stay my hand. I would mention, however, that I could in a similar way dissect most volumes of the Rougon-Macquart series, for these books are novels in their arrangement only. Even when they do not deal with historical personages and publicly recorded facts, they are based on incidents which really happened, and more frequently than otherwise portray people who really lived. The whole series constitutes a truthful, life-like synthesis of a period; and if certain readers recoil from some of the portraits contained in it, this is simply because they will not face the monstrosities of human life. And far from doing my good and clear friend, the author of this imperishable literary edifice, an unkindness by pointing out where and how he has borrowed and adapted, I conceive that I am rendering him a service, for how often has not his accuracy been impugned! Moreover, it is not upon power of imagination that he particularly prides himself—though imagination, and of a high order, is undoubtedly a feature of his genius—he claims rank chiefly by reason of his power of delineation, his power of analysing, blending and grouping facts and characteristics. In one word, he is a Realist. And if he is to describe people as they have lived, incidents as they have really occurred, how can he do otherwise than turn to the records of actual experience, to the unchallenged descriptions of historical episodes? Plagiarism forsooth! When every situation, every dilemma, every experience, every characteristic and every emotion that can enter into the history of the human race have been dealt with time without number by thousands of writers of fiction, either in the form of the novel or the drama! How, then, is it possible for anybody, however great his genius, to be absolutely and perfectly original? Such originality is dead. Let us bow to its grave; we shall never see it more. The only genius in literature which can remain to the writers of to-day and to-morrow is that genius which may lie in the handling of one's materials. The human range of ideas is limited; even madmen—so closely allied to men of genius—cannot carry their fancy beyond certain bounds; and thus the old saws must crop up again and again, distinguished one from another simply by mode of treatment. And as for such charges of plagiarism that may have been brought against M. Zola, I apply to him the words which Molière applied to himself: Il prend son bien où il le trouve. And I will add that he does well in following this course, for over all he casts the magnificent mantle of powers which none of his contemporaries can equal.

E. A. V.

MERTON, SURREY, April 1897.

[HIS EXCELLENCY]

I

THE CORPS LÉGISLATIF

For a moment the President remained standing amidst the slight commotion which his entrance had caused. Then he took his seat, saying carelessly and in an undertone: 'The sitting has commenced.'

He next began to arrange the legislative bills lying upon the desk in front of him. On his left, a short-sighted clerk, with his nose close to the paper he held, read the minutes of the previous sitting in a rapid and confused manner, none of the deputies paying attention to him. In the buzzing noise that filled the Chamber, these minutes were only heard by the ushers, who maintained a very dignified and decorous bearing which contrasted with the lounging attitudes of the deputies.

There were not a hundred members present. Some were reclining in their red velvet-covered seats, with listless eyes, already half-asleep. Others, leaning over their desks, as though wearied by the compulsory labour of a public sitting, were beating a gentle tattoo on the mahogany with their finger-tips. Through the ceiling-window, which revealed a crescent of grey sky, the light of a rainy May afternoon streamed down perpendicularly upon the pompous severity of the Chamber. It spread over the desks in a sheet of gloomy ruddiness, brightening into a rosy glow here and there where some seat remained unoccupied; while, behind the President, the statues and sculpture-work showed in clear white patches.

One of the deputies on the third row to the right still remained standing in the narrow passage between the seats. He was rubbing his rough fringe of grizzly beard with a thoughtful air, but as an usher came by, he stopped him and asked a question in an undertone.

'No, Monsieur Kahn,' replied the usher, 'the President of the Council of State has not yet arrived.'

M. Kahn thereupon sat down, and, abruptly turning to his neighbour on the left, inquired, 'Tell me, Béjuin, have you seen Rougon this morning?'

M. Béjuin, a small, thin man of dark complexion and silent demeanour, raised his head nervously as though his thoughts were altogether elsewhere. He had drawn out the slide of his desk, and was writing a letter on some blue paper with a business heading formed of these words: 'Béjuin and Co. The Saint-Florent Cut-Glass Works.'

'Rougon?' he repeated. 'No, I haven't seen him. I did not have time to go over to the State Council.'

Then he quietly reverted to his work, consulting a memorandum-book, and beginning a second letter, amidst the confused buzzing murmur of the clerk, who was finishing his reading of the minutes.

M. Kahn leant back in his seat and crossed his arms. He had a face with strongly marked features, and his big but well-shaped nose testified to a Jewish descent. He seemed out of sorts. He gazed upwards at the gilt rose-work on the ceiling and listened to the plashing of a shower which at that moment burst down upon the skylight; and then with vaguely wondering eyes he seemed to be examining the intricate ornamentation of the great wall in front of him. His glance lingered for a few seconds upon two panels hung with green velvet and decked with gilt borders and emblems. Then, after he had scanned the columns between which allegorical statues of Liberty and Public Order showed their marble faces and pupil-less eyes, his attention was turned to a curtain of green silk which concealed a fresco representing King Louis Philippe taking the oath to the Constitution.

By this time the clerk had sat down; nevertheless, the scene remained one of noisy confusion. The President was still leisurely arranging his papers. He again and again pressed his hand on his bell, but its loud ringing failed to check any of the private conversations that were going on. However, he at last stood up amidst all the hubbub and for a moment remained waiting and silent.

'Gentlemen,' he began, 'I have received a letter——' Then he stopped short to ring his bell again, and once more kept silent, his grave, bored face looking down from the monumental desk which spread out beneath him with panels of red marble bordered with white. His frock-coat, which was buttoned up, showed conspicuously against the bas-relief behind him, rising like a black bar between the peplum-robed figures of Agriculture and Industry with antique profiles.

'Gentlemen,' he resumed, when he had succeeded in obtaining something like silence, 'I have received a letter from Monsieur de Lamberthon, in which he apologises for not being able to attend to-day's sitting.'

At this a laugh resounded on the sixth row of seats in front of the desk. It came from a deputy who could not have been more than twenty-eight years old. He was fair and effeminately pretty, and was trying with his white hands to stifle an outburst of girlish rippling laughter. One of his colleagues, a man of huge build, came up to him and whispered in his ear: 'Is it really true that Lamberthon has found his wife? Tell me all about it, La Rouquette.'

The President, however, had taken up a handful of papers. He was speaking in monotonous tones, and stray fragments of sentences reached the far end of the Chamber. 'There are applications for leave of absence from Monsieur Blachet, Monsieur Buquin-Lecomte, Monsieur de la Villardière—'

While the Chamber was granting these different requests, M. Kahn, who had probably grown weary of examining the green silk curtain stretched before the seditious portrait of Louis Philippe, turned to glance at the galleries. Above the wall of yellow marble veined with lake red, there was a gallery with hand-rests of amaranthine velvet spanning the spaces from one column to another; and higher up a mantle of embossed leather failed to conceal the gaps left by the suppression of a second tier of seats which had been assigned to journalists and the general public previous to the Empire. The narrow, gloomy boxes between the massive yellowish marble pillars, which stood in somewhat heavy splendour round the semicircle, were for the most part empty, although here and there they were brightened by the light-tinted toilettes of some ladies.

'Ah! so Colonel Jobelin has come!' murmured M. Kahn.

And forthwith he smiled at the colonel, who had perceived him. Colonel Jobelin was wearing the dark-blue frock-coat which he had adopted as a kind of civilian uniform ever since his retirement from the service. He sat quite alone in the questors' gallery, and his rosette as an officer of the Legion of Honour was so large as to look almost like the bow of a cravat.

But M. Kahn's eyes had already strayed to a young man and woman who were nestling in a corner of the gallery of the Council of State. The young man was continually bending his head and whispering to the young woman, who smiled with a gentle air, but did not turn to look at him, her eyes being fixed upon the allegorical figure of Public Order.

'I say, Béjuin,' M. Kahn remarked, nudging his colleague with his knee.

M. Béjuin, who was now busy with his fifth letter, again raised his head with an expression of absent-mindedness.

'Look up there,' continued M. Kahn; 'don't you see little Escorailles and pretty Madame Bouchard? I'll be bound he's making love to her. What eyes she's got! All Rougon's friends seem to have made a point of coming to-day. There's Madame Correur and the Charbonnels up there in the public gallery.'

However, the bell sounded again for some moments, and an usher called out in a fine bass voice: 'Silence, gentlemen!'

Then the deputies began to listen, and the President spoke the following words, not a syllable of which was lost: 'Monsieur Kahn asks permission to publish the speech which he delivered on the bill for the establishment of a municipal tax upon vehicles and horses in Paris.'

A murmur ran along the benches, and then the different conversations were resumed. Quitting his own place, M. La Rouquette came and sat down near M. Kahn. 'So you work for the people, eh?' he said playfully, and, without waiting for a reply, he added: 'You haven't seen or heard anything of Rougon, have you? Everyone is talking about the matter, but it seems that nothing is definitely settled yet.' Then he turned round and glanced at the clock. 'Twenty minutes past two already!' he exclaimed. 'Well, I should certainly be off now, if it were not for the reading of that confounded report. Is it really to come off to-day?'

'We have all been notified to that effect,' M. Kahn replied, 'and I have heard nothing of any change of plans. You had better remain. The 400,000 francs[1] for the baptism will be voted straight off.'

'No doubt,' said La Rouquette. 'Old General Legrain, who has lost the use of both legs, has had himself carried here by his servant, and is now in the Conference Hall waiting till the vote comes on. The Emperor is quite right in reckoning upon the devotion of the whole Corps Législatif. All our votes ought to be given him upon this solemn occasion.'

While speaking the young deputy did his utmost to assume the expression of a serious politician. His doll-like face, which was ornamented by a few pale hairs, wagged gravely over his collar, and he seemed to be relishing the flavour of the two last sentences he had uttered—sentences which he had remembered from somebody else's speech. Then he suddenly broke into a laugh. 'Good gracious!' he exclaimed, 'what frights those Charbonnels are!'

M. Kahn and himself thereupon began to make merry at the Charbonnels' expense. The wife was wearing an outrageous yellow shawl, and her husband sported a country-cut frock-coat which looked as though it had been hewn into shape with an axe. They were both very short, stout and red, and were eagerly pressing forward, with their chins almost resting upon the balustrade of the gallery in order to get a better view of the proceedings, which, judging by their blank, staring eyes, were utterly unintelligible to them.

'If Rougon gets the sack,' said La Rouquette, 'I wouldn't give a couple of sous for the Charbonnels' case. It will be just the same with Madame Correur.' Then he inclined his head towards M. Kahn's ear, and continued in a very low tone: 'You, now, who know Rougon, just tell me who and what that Madame Correur is. She formerly kept a lodging-house, didn't she? Rougon used to lodge with her, and it is even said that she lent him money. What does she do now?'

M. Kahn assumed a very grave expression and slowly rubbed his beard. 'Madame Correur is a highly respectable lady,' he replied curtly.

This answer checked La Rouquette's curiosity. He bit his lips with the expression of a school-boy who has just been lectured. For a moment they both looked in silence at Madame Correur, who was sitting near the Charbonnels. She was wearing a very showy dress of mauve silk, with a profusion of lace and ornaments. Her face showed too much colour, her forehead was covered with little fair dollish curls, and her plump neck, still very comely in spite of her eight-and-forty years, was fully exposed to view.

Just at this moment, however, the sudden sound of a door opening and a rustle of skirts at the far end of the Chamber caused all heads to turn. A tall girl exquisitely beautiful, but strangely dressed in an ill-made sea-green satin gown, had entered the box assigned to the diplomatic body, followed by an elderly lady in black.

'Ah! there's the fair Clorinde!' said M. La Rouquette, who had risen to bow at random.

M. Kahn had also risen; but he stooped towards M. Béjuin, who was now enclosing his letters in envelopes: 'Countess Balbi and her daughter are there,' he said. 'I am going up to ask them if they have seen Rougon.'

The President meanwhile had taken a fresh handful of papers from his desk. Without ceasing his perusal of them he cast a glance at the beautiful Clorinde Balbi, whose arrival had given rise to a buzz of comments in the Chamber. Then, while he passed the papers one by one to a clerk, he said in monotonous tones, never even pausing to punctuate his words: 'Presentation of a bill to continue certain extra duties in the town of Lille ... of a bill to unite into one single commune the communes of Doulevant-le-Petit and Ville-en-Blaisais (Haute-Marne)——'

When M. Kahn came back again he seemed quite disconsolate. 'Really, no one appears to have seen anything of him,' he said to his colleagues, Béjuin and La Rouquette, whom he met at the foot of the semicircle. 'I hear that the Emperor sent for him yesterday evening, but I haven't been able to learn the result of their interview. There is nothing so provoking as being unable to get a satisfactory account of what happens.'

La Rouquette turned round and whispered into M. Béjuin's ear: 'Poor Kahn is terribly afraid lest Rougon should get into disfavour at the Tuileries. He might fish for his railway if that should occur.'

In reply M. Béjuin, who was of a taciturn disposition, said very gravely: 'The day when Rougon retires from the Council of State, we shall all be losers.' Then he beckoned to one of the ushers and gave him the letters which he had just written, to post.

The three deputies remained standing on the left of the President's desk, discreetly discussing the disfavour with which Rougon was threatened. It was an intricate story. A distant relation of the Empress, one Señor Rodriguez, had been claiming a sum of two million francs from the French Government since the year 1808. During the war with Spain, a vessel freighted with sugar and coffee, and belonging to this Rodriguez, who was a shipowner, had been taken in the Bay of Biscay by a French frigate, the Vigilante, and brought to Brest. Acting upon information received from a local commission, the administrative officials had declared the capture to be a valid one, without referring the matter to the Prize Committee. Rodriguez, however, had promptly appealed to the Council of State, and, after his death, his son, under every successive Government, had vainly tried to bring the matter to an issue until the day came when a word from his distant cousin, Eugénie de Montijo, now all-powerful, had secured the insertion of his action in the official cause list.

Of this the three deputies talked, while the President's monotonous voice still resounded above their heads: 'Presentation of a bill authorising the department of Calvados to borrow 300,000 francs ... of a bill authorising the town of Amiens to borrow 200,000 francs for the purpose of making new promenades ... of a bill authorising the department of Côtes-du-Nord to borrow 345,000 francs to cover the deficiencies in the revenues of the last five years.'

'The truth is,' said M. Kahn, again lowering his voice, 'that this Rodriguez had a very artful method of managing his business. He and a son-in-law of his, residing at New York, were the owners of vessels which sailed either under the American flag or the Spanish, according as one or the other might subject them to the least risk during their passage. Rougon told me that the captured vessel was exclusively the property of Rodriguez, and that there is no valid ground whatever for the claims that are made.'

'And then,' interposed M. Béjuin, 'the steps that were taken by the officials cannot be impugned. The administrative officer at Brest was perfectly right in declaring the capture a valid one in accordance with the customs of the port, without referring the matter to the Prize Committee.'

Then they lapsed into silence for a moment while La Rouquette, with his back resting against the marble wall, raised his head, and tried to attract the attention of the fair Clorinde. 'But,' he asked naïvely, 'why does Rougon object to the two millions being paid to Rodriguez? What difference would it make to him?'

'It is a matter of conscience,' said M. Kahn solemnly.

M. La Rouquette glanced at his colleagues one after the other, but, seeing them both so grave, he did not even venture to smile.

'Then, too,' continued M. Kahn, as though he were dwelling upon some thought which he had not expressed aloud, 'Rougon has had a good deal of bother since Marsy has been Minister of the Interior. They have never been able to get on together. Rougon himself told me that, if it had not been for his attachment to the Emperor, for whom he has already done so much, he would long ago have retired into private life. He no longer seems welcome at the Tuileries, and he feels that a change has become necessary for him.'

'He is acting like an honourable man,' remarked M. Béjuin.

'Yes, indeed,' said M. La Rouquette, with a wise look, 'if he wants to retire, the opportunity is a good one. All the same, his friends will be greatly grieved. Just look at the colonel up there, with his anxious face! He has been hoping to fasten the ribbon of Commander of the Legion of Honour round his neck on the 15th of next August. And pretty Madame Bouchard, too, swore that worthy Monsieur Bouchard should be head of department at the Ministry of the Interior before six months were over. Little Escorailles, Rougon's pet, was to put the nomination under Monsieur Bouchard's napkin on Madame's birthday. But where have they got to, pretty Madame Bouchard and little Escorailles?'

The three deputies looked about for them, and at last discovered them ensconced at the back of the gallery, in the front part of which they had been seated at the opening of the sitting. They had taken refuge in the gloom there behind a bald old gentleman, and were both very quiet, though very red.

However, the President was now coming to the end of his reading.

'A bill,' said he, 'to sanction an increase in the rate of interest upon a loan authorised by an Act of the 9th of June, 1853, and to impose an extraordinary rate in the department of La Manche.'

Just then M. Kahn ran forward to meet a deputy who was entering the Chamber, and as he brought him along he exclaimed, 'Here is Monsieur de Combelot. He will give us some news.'

M. de Combelot, an imperial chamberlain whom the department of the Landes had chosen as deputy upon the formally expressed desire of the Emperor, bowed with a discreet air while waiting to be questioned. He was a tall, handsome man, with a very white skin, and an inky black beard which had been the means of winning him great favour among the ladies.

'Well,' asked M. Kahn, 'what do they say at the Tuileries? What has the Emperor decided upon?'

'Well, indeed,' replied M. de Combelot in a guttural tone, 'they say a good many things. The Emperor has the warmest friendship for the President of the Council of State. Their interview was undoubtedly of the most cordial nature. Yes, indeed, most cordial.'

Then he stopped, after carefully weighing his words, as it were, so as to satisfy himself that he had not said too much.

'Then the resignation is withdrawn?' asked M. Kahn, with glistening eyes.

'I did not say that,' replied the chamberlain, uneasily. 'I know nothing about it. You understand that my position is a peculiar one——'

He did not finish what he was going to say, but contented himself with smiling, and then hurried off to take his seat. M. Kahn shrugged his shoulders, and remarked to M. La Rouquette, 'But you, surely, ought to be posted on what is going on. Doesn't your sister, Madame de Llorentz, give you any information?'

'Oh, my sister is even more reserved than Monsieur de Combelot,' replied the young deputy, with a laugh. 'Since she has become one of the ladies-in-waiting, she has put on quite a minister's gravity; though yesterday, indeed, she assured me that the resignation would be accepted. By the way, I can tell you a funny story in connection with this matter. It appears that some lady was sent to Rougon to try to influence him. Now, you would never guess what Rougon did! He turned her out of doors, although she was a delicious creature!'

'Rougon is a very steady fellow,' M. Béjuin declared solemnly.

M. La Rouquette shook with laughter, and, protesting against M. Béjuin's estimate of Rougon, asserted that he could have disproved it by evidence had he chosen. 'And so, Madame Correur, for instance,' said he.

'Pooh! you don't know the truth of that story,' replied M. Kahn.

'And the fair Clorinde?'

'Nonsense, nonsense! Rougon is much too clever a fellow to forget himself with such a wild creature as that!'

Then the three men drew closer, and talked on without any mincing of words. They repeated the stories which were told about those two Italian women—mother and daughter—who were semi-adventuresses and semi-great ladies, and were to be met everywhere, at all parties and gatherings, at the houses of state ministers, in the stage-boxes of minor theatres, on the sands at fashionable watering-places, and even in out-of-the-way hostelries. The mother, it was said, had been the mistress of a royal personage; and the daughter, with an ignorance of French customs and etiquette which had earned her the reputation of being an eccentric, badly brought-up wench, galloped about on horseback till she foundered her mounts, made a display of her dirty stockings and damaged boots on rainy days, and looked around her for a husband with the boldest of smiles. M. La Rouquette told how she had come one night to a ball at the Sardinian Minister's, in the character of the huntress Diana, with so scanty a costume that she had been all but asked in marriage the next morning by old Monsieur de Nougarède, a profligate senator. During the narration of this story, the three deputies cast frequent glances at the fair Clorinde, who, in spite of the regulations, was examining the members of the Chamber one after another through a large pair of opera-glasses.

'No, no!' M. Kahn repeated, 'Rougon would never be such a fool! He says, though, that she is very intelligent, and he has nicknamed her "Mademoiselle Machiavelli." She amuses him, but that's all.'

'At the same time Rougon is wrong in not marrying,' said M. Béjuin. 'It settles a man.'

Then they all three set to work to discuss the sort of woman that it was desirable Rougon should marry. She ought to be a woman of some age, thirty-five at the least, they said, rich, and competent to maintain her house on a footing of high decorum.

Hubbub still prevailed in the Chamber, and the three deputies became so absorbed in the stories they were telling, that they ceased to notice what was taking place around them. Away in the distance, the voices of ushers could be faintly heard calling out, 'To the sitting, gentlemen, to the sitting.'

Fresh deputies were entering from all sides by way of the folding doors of massive mahogany, whose panels gleamed with golden stars. The Chamber, previously half empty, was now gradually filling. The little scattered groups of members talking to each other from one row of seats to another, with an expression of weariness on their faces, or dozing, or trying to conceal their yawns, were now disappearing amid the increasing crowd and general shaking of hands. As the members took their seats, they exchanged smiles; there was a general, almost family likeness about them. By the expression of their faces one and all seemed impressed by the duties they had to fulfil. A stout man, on the last row to the left, had fallen asleep, but was awakened by his neighbour; and, when the latter whispered a few words in his ear, he hastily rubbed his eyes, and assumed a more decorous attitude. The sitting, after dragging on wearily through a series of petty tedious details, was at last about to become supremely interesting.

M. Kahn and his two colleagues were being gradually driven towards their seats by the increasing crowd, almost without being aware of it. They went on with their conversation, every now and then suppressing a laugh. M. La Rouquette began a fresh story about the fair Clorinde. She had taken a strange whim into her head one day, he said; it was to have her room hung with black, spangled with silver tears, and to hold a reception of her friends there; she herself lying in bed, covered up with black drapery which allowed scarcely anything more than her nose to appear.

As M. Kahn at last took his seat, his memory suddenly returned to him. 'La Rouquette is a foolish chatterbox,' he muttered; 'he has made me miss Rougon.' Then he turned towards his neighbour and exclaimed angrily. 'You really might have reminded me, Béjuin!'

Rougon, who had just been introduced with the customary ceremonial, had already taken his seat between two members of the Council of State on the Government bench, a sort of huge mahogany box, situated beneath the President's desk and occupying the place of the suppressed tribune. His broad shoulders tightly distended his uniform of green cloth, ornamented with gold braid at the neck and sleeve-cuffs. His face, with thick grizzly hair clustering over his square brow, was turned towards the Chamber, but his eyes were hidden by their heavy drooping lids. The commonplace plainness of his big nose, fleshy lips, and long cheeks, which his six-and-forty years had not yet furrowed with a single wrinkle, was every now and then irradiated with something like beauty by an expression of great strength. He sat perfectly quiet, leaning back with his chin resting on his coat collar, noticing nobody, and seeming quite indifferent and a little weary.

'He looks just as he does every day,' M. Béjuin remarked.

The deputies were all leaning over to observe Rougon. Whispered remarks on his appearance buzzed from ear to ear. In the galleries especially his entrance had caused lively excitement. The Charbonnels, in their desire to let their presence be known, craned their enraptured faces forward at the risk of falling over; Madame Correur coughed slightly and drew out a handkerchief which she gently waved, while pretending to carry it to her lips; Colonel Jobelin straightened himself; and pretty Madame Bouchard, after tying her bonnet-strings afresh, again hurried down to the front row of the State Council gallery, while M. d'Escorailles remained behind quite still and seemingly much annoyed. As for the fair Clorinde, she did not beat about the bush. Seeing that Rougon did not raise his eyes, she began to tap her opera-glass against the marble column beside which she was leaning, and as these tactics did not succeed in attracting his attention, she said to her mother, in such a clear ringing voice that every one in the Chamber heard her: 'He's in the sulks, the fat sly fellow!'

Several deputies looked round and smiled, and Rougon himself glanced up at the fair Clorinde. As he nodded his head almost imperceptibly towards her, she triumphantly clapped her hands, and leant back, laughing and talking quite loudly to her mother, quite careless of the men down below who were staring at her.

Before Rougon dropped his eyes again he glanced slowly round the gallery, where his comprehensive gaze at once took in Madame Bouchard, Colonel Jobelin, Madame Correur, and the Charbonnels. However, his face remained expressionless. He again let his chin drop and half-closed his eyes as he stifled a slight yawn.

'I'll go and have a word with him now,' M. Kahn whispered into M. Béjuin's ear.

But as he was rising from his seat, the President, who during the last few moments had been looking round to see if all the deputies were in their places, rang his bell authoritatively. Then all at once there was profound silence. A fair-haired member in the first row of seats now stood up, holding a large sheet of paper upon which he kept his eyes fixed as he spoke.

'I have the honour,' he said in a sing-song voice, 'to present a report upon the bill by which it is proposed to include among the estimates of the Ministry of State for 1856 a sum of 400,000 francs, to defray the expenses of the ceremonies and rejoicings connected with the baptism of the Prince Imperial.'

Then he slowly stepped forward as though about to lay the paper on the table of the Chamber, but the deputies cried out unanimously: 'Read it! Read it!'

The deputy who had prepared the report waited till the President gave his sanction. Then he commenced in a voice that seemed affected by emotion: 'Gentlemen, the bill which has been brought before us is one of those which make the customary formalities of voting seem dilatory, since they check the enthusiastic impulses of the Corps Législatif.'

'Hear! hear!' cried several members.

'In the humblest families,' continued the speaker in carefully modulated tones, 'the birth of a son and heir, with all the ideas of transmission which are attached to that title, is a source of such sweet joy that the trials of the past are forgotten, and hope alone hovers over the cradle of the new-born child. What, then, shall we say of such a happy event when it not only prompts the rejoicing of a family but that of a great nation, and is an event of European interest?'

This piece of rhetoric thrilled the Chamber with emotion. Rougon, who appeared to be asleep, could see none but beaming faces in front of him. Some deputies accentuated their attention, holding their hands to their ears so that they might lose nothing of this carefully prepared report. Its author, after a slight pause, raised his voice as he continued, 'To-day, gentlemen, it is indeed the great family of France that invites all its members to give expression to their joy; and what pomp and circumstance would be magnificent enough if it were possible by display to express the grandeur of our legitimate hopes?' Here the reporter paused again.

'Hear! hear!' cried the deputies.

'That's very nicely put,' M. Kahn remarked; 'isn't it, Béjuin?'

M. Béjuin was wagging his head with his eyes fixed on the cut-glass chandelier which hung from the window-ceiling in front of the President's seat. He was in a state of blissful rapture.

Meanwhile in the gallery the fair Clorinde kept her opera-glass to her eyes and lost not a single expression of the reporter's face. The Charbonnels' eyes were moist, and Madame Correur had assumed a decorously attentive attitude, while the colonel expressed his approbation by nodding his head, and pretty Madame Bouchard ventured to lean against M. d'Escorailles' knees. The President and the clerk and the ushers listened solemnly, without making the slightest gesture.

'The cradle of the Prince Imperial,' resumed the reporter, 'is henceforth our security for the future; for, by perpetuating the dynasty which we have all acclaimed, it assures the prosperity of our country, its repose and stability, and, through ours, that of the rest of Europe.'

Cries of 'Hush! hush!' were necessary to subdue the burst of enthusiastic applause which broke out at this touching reference to the cradle.

'Once before a scion of this illustrious race seemed equally intended for a great destiny, but his time and our own have no similarity. Peace is the result of the wise and skilful rule of which we are now reaping the fruits, even as the genius of war dictated that epic poem which forms the story of the first Empire.

'Hailed at his birth by the guns which from north to south proclaimed the successes of our arms, the King of Rome was not even permitted to serve his country; so, indeed, Providence then decreed——'

'What's that he's saying? He's putting his foot in it,' said sceptical M. La Rouquette. 'That's very clumsy; he'll spoil his speech.'

The deputies certainly seemed uneasy. Why was this historical reference dragged in to damp their enthusiasm? Several of them blew their noses. The author of the report, however, only smiled when he saw the chilling effect of his last sentences. He raised his voice and pursued his antithesis, carefully modulating his tones, evidently quite confident that he would make his point.

'But, coming to us at one of those momentous times when the birth of a single life may be regarded as the salvation of all, the Child of France to-day gives to us and to all future generations the right and the privilege of living and dying at our ancestral firesides. Such is the promise vouchsafed to us by the divine kindness.'

This seemed exquisite. Everybody understood, and a murmur of pleasure travelled through the Chamber. The assurance of an everlasting peace was very charming. The tranquillised members once more resumed the pleased expressions of men revelling in rhetoric. There was nothing to disturb them. Europe belonged to their master.

'The Emperor,' continued the speaker with fresh vigour, 'having become the arbiter of Europe, was about to sign that noble peace which, bringing together the productive forces of the different nations, is as much an alliance of peoples as of monarchs,[2] when God was pleased to crown his happiness as well as his glory. Is it not allowable to think that, at that moment, he foresaw many fair and prosperous years while gazing upon that cradle where slumbers, though now but an infant, the heir who is destined to carry on his great policy?'

This, too, was thought very pretty. Such a hope might be justifiably entertained, so the deputies said, as they nodded their heads approvingly. The report, however, was now beginning to seem a trifle long, and several members looked solemn again. Some of them even glanced at the gallery like practical matter-of-fact politicians who felt rather ashamed of being thus seen spending their time in an unbusiness-like way. Others ceased to pay attention, and reverted to their own affairs, or again tapped the mahogany of their desks with their finger-tips; while through the minds of others there flitted vague recollections of other sittings when professions of devotion had been lavished on some other cradle.

As for M. La Rouquette, he turned very frequently to look at the clock, and when the hand pointed to a quarter to three an expression of desperation passed over his face. He would miss an appointment! Meantime M. Kahn and M. Béjuin sat motionless side by side, with crossed arms and blinking eyes, which wandered from the great velvet panels to the bas-relief of white marble across which the President's frock-coat stretched like a black bar. In the diplomatists' gallery the fair Clorinde was still gazing through her opera-glass, making a lengthy examination of Rougon, who preserved the majestic mien of a sleeping bull.

However, the author of the report showed no signs of hurry, but listened to himself as he read on, indulging the while in a rhythmic beatifical motion of the shoulders.

'Let us then display full and complete confidence, and may the Corps Législatif, upon this great and solemn occasion, bear in mind that the Emperor and itself have a common origin, which almost confers upon it a family-right above that which the other State bodies may possess to share in its Sovereign's joy.

'The Corps Législatif, which, like himself, is the offspring of the willing vote of the people, becomes now the mouthpiece of the nation in offering to the august child the homage of its unchangeable respect, of its devotion which nothing can destroy, and of that boundless love which converts political faith into a religion whose duties are blessed.'

The mention of homage and religion and duties seemed to betoken that the speaker was drawing to a conclusion. The Charbonnels therefore ventured to exchange remarks in low tones, and Madame Correur stifled a slight cough in her handkerchief; while Madame Bouchard quietly returned to the rear of the Council of State gallery, and resumed her seat near M. Jules d'Escorailles.

And, indeed, the reporter suddenly changed his tone and came down from the solemn to the familiar, as he quickly gabbled out: 'We propose to you, gentlemen, the adoption of the bill, such as it has been brought forward by the Council of State.'

Then he resumed his seat amidst general applause. Shouts of 'Hear, hear!' rang out from all sides. M. de Combelot, whose smiling attention had not waned for an instant, even cried, 'Long live the Emperor!' but the exclamation was lost amid the hubbub; however, Colonel Jobelin received almost an ovation as he stood at the edge of the gallery, and clapped his withered hands, in spite of the regulations to the contrary. Everybody enthusiastically congratulated everybody else. Work was over, and from row to row kindly remarks were exchanged, while a crowd of friends thronged round the author of the report and energetically shook both his hands.

But above the confusion came a cry of 'Deliberate! deliberate!'

The President had been standing at his desk, apparently expecting this cry. He rang his bell, and as the Chamber suddenly became respectfully attentive, he said: 'Gentlemen, a large number of members desire that we should at once deliberate upon this measure.'

'Yes, yes,' cried the Chamber with one voice.

But there was no deliberation. They proceeded to vote at once. The two clauses of the measure which were successively put to the Chamber were immediately passed by the deputies rising in their places. The President had scarcely finished reading each clause before all the members rose in a mass with much stamping of feet, as though under the influence of some thrill of enthusiasm. Then the urn-shaped ballot-boxes were passed round by the ushers who, threading their way between the seats, received the votes in these zinc receptacles. The 400,000 francs were voted unanimously by the 239 members present.

'That's good work done,' said M. Béjuin naïvely, and he began to laugh as though he had said something witty.

'It's past three o'clock; I'm off,' exclaimed M. La Rouquette, passing in front of M. Kahn.

The Chamber was emptying. The deputies were all making for the doors and seemed to vanish through the walls. The next business consisted of matters of mere local interest, and there was soon no one left on the benches except a few willing deputies who had probably nothing to do elsewhere, and these resumed either their interrupted naps or their conversation at the point where it had been broken off, the sitting concluding, as it had begun, in the midst of listless indifference. Gradually, too, the general buzzing subsided as though the Corps Législatif had dropped off to sleep in some quiet corner of Paris.

'You had better try to get a word with Delestang as you go away,' said M. Kahn to M. Béjuin. 'He came with Rougon, and must know something.'

'Yes, you are right; that's Delestang yonder,' replied M. Béjuin, gazing at the councillor who was sitting on Rougon's left; 'I never know them in those confounded uniforms.'

'I shall stop here so as to have a chance of getting hold of the great man,' added M. Kahn. 'It's necessary that we should know the truth.'

The President was putting to the vote an interminable string of bills, which were passed by the members rising in their places. They all stood up and then sat down again quite mechanically, without ceasing to converse and even without ceasing to sleep. The proceedings were becoming so wearisome that most of the spectators whom curiosity had brought to the gallery took their departure. Only Rougon's friends remained. They were still hoping that he would speak.

Suddenly, a deputy, whose correctly trimmed whiskers bespoke the provincial lawyer, arose. This at once stopped the monotonous mechanism of the voting. Surprise made all the members turn and look at the one who had risen. 'Gentlemen,' said he, standing in his place, 'I ask permission to explain the reasons which, to my great regret, have compelled me to differ from the majority of the Committee.'

His voice was so shrill and comical that the fair Clorinde had to stifle a laugh with her hands. Below in the Chamber itself, the astonishment was increasing. What was the man talking about? By dint of inquiries, the others ascertained that the President had just brought before the Chamber a bill authorising the department of the Pyrénées-Orientales to borrow 250,000 francs wherewith to build a Palace of Justice at Perpignan. The speaker, who was a general councillor of the department, was opposing the bill. The matter seemed likely to be interesting, so the deputies began to listen.

The member with the correctly trimmed whiskers spoke, however, with great circumspection. He used the most guarded language, and referred with the greatest respect to all the authorities; but the expenses of the department, he said, were very heavy, and he dwelt at length upon the financial situation of the Pyrénées-Orientales. Moreover, he did not think that any necessity for a new Palace of Justice had been satisfactorily demonstrated. He continued in this strain for a quarter of an hour, and on sitting down seemed quite overcome with emotion. Then Rougon again slowly dropped his eyelids which he had temporarily raised.

However, the reporter of the Committee which had examined the bill got up. He was a little animated old man who spoke in clear, incisive tones like one who is sure of his ground. He began with a complimentary reference to his honourable colleague, with whom he regretted to find himself in disagreement. But really, he went on to say, the department of the Pyrénées-Orientales was not nearly so heavily burdened as had been alleged, and he brought forward fresh figures which showed the financial position of the department in an entirely different light. Moreover, the absolute necessity for a new Palace of Justice could not be denied. And he entered into details. The old Palace, he said, was situated in such a densely populated neighbourhood that the noise of the streets prevented the judges from hearing counsel speak. Then it was too small; and when the Assizes were being held, and there happened to be a large number of witnesses in attendance, they were obliged to remain on the landings exposed to the solicitations of interested parties who might desire to influence them. The speaker concluded by mentioning as an irresistible argument the fact that the measure had been introduced at the instigation of the Keeper of the Seals himself.

Rougon was sitting quite still, his hands clasped upon his legs and his head resting against the mahogany desk. At the outset of the discussion his shoulders had seemed to sink lower than before, but when the first speaker rose to reply, he raised his big frame without actually getting on to his feet, and said in a husky voice: 'The honourable member who reported upon this measure forgot to mention that it has also received the approval of the Minister of the Interior and the Minister of Finance.'

Then he let himself drop again and resumed the attitude of a drowsy bull. A slight murmur ran through the Chamber, and the deputy who had risen to reply sat down with a low bow. The bill was passed, and those members who had shown any interest in the debate once more assumed an expression of indifference.

Rougon had spoken. From one section of the gallery to another Colonel Jobelin exchanged glances with the Charbonnels, while Madame Correur made ready to leave her place, just as she would have quitted her box at the theatre before the fall of the curtain, if the hero of the play had delivered his last speech. M. d'Escorailles and Madame Bouchard had already taken their departure. Clorinde stood by the velvet-covered balustrade, her majestic figure showing conspicuously as she slowly wrapped her lace shawl about her, glancing round the deputies' seats as she did so. The rain was no longer beating down upon the window, but the sky remained overcast. The mahogany desks looked quite black in that sombre light, and a shadowy mist streamed over the seats, which the bald heads of some of the deputies lighted up here and there with patches of white. Against the marble-work below the vague, pale allegorical figures, the President and the clerks and ushers, all in black and ranged in a line, showed like the stiff silhouettes of a shadow-pantomime. The whole Chamber became blurred in the suddenly waning light.

'Oh, come along!' exclaimed Clorinde, pushing her mother out of the gallery; 'it is enough to kill one in here!'

She quite startled the drowsy ushers in the corridor by the strange fashion in which she had twisted her shawl round her hips.

When they got downstairs into the hall the ladies met Colonel Jobelin and Madame Correur.

'We are waiting for him here,' said the colonel. 'Perhaps he will come out this way. But in any case I have signalled to Kahn and Béjuin to come and give me some information.'

Madame Correur stepped up to the Countess Balbi. 'Ah! it would be a great misfortune,' she said in a disconsolate voice without attempting to explain her meaning.

The colonel raised his eyes to heaven. 'The country has need of men like Rougon,' he resumed after a short pause. 'The Emperor would make a great mistake.'

Then there was another pause. Clorinde tried to peep into the 'Salle des Pas Perdus,' but an usher promptly closed the door. So she came back to her mother, who was standing silent in her black veil. 'What a bore it is having to wait like this!' she muttered.

Some soldiers now made their appearance, and Colonel Jobelin thereupon announced that the sitting was over. Next the Charbonnels came into sight at the top of the staircase, and made their way down very carefully one after the other and each clinging to the balustrade. As soon as M. Charbonnel saw the colonel he called out: 'He didn't say much, but he completely shut them up.'

'He hadn't a proper chance,' the colonel whispered when the other reached him, 'otherwise you would have heard something fine. He wants warming up.'

However, the soldiers had formed a double line from the Chamber to the gallery leading to the President's mansion. Then a procession made its appearance while the drummers beat a salute. At the head walked two ushers, dressed in black with cocked hats under their arms, chains about their necks, and swords with steel hilts at their sides. Then came the President, escorted by two officers. The clerks of the Chamber and the President's secretary followed. As the President passed the fair Clorinde he smiled at her like a homme du monde, notwithstanding the pomp of his procession.

'Ah, you are there!' cried M. Kahn, running up with a distracted look.

Though the public were at that time excluded from the 'Salle des Pas Perdus,' he took them all into it and conducted them to one of the large glass doors which opened upon the garden. He seemed very much annoyed. 'I have missed him again!' he cried. 'He slipped out into the Rue de Bourgogne while I was waiting for him in the Général Foy gallery. But it really makes no difference; we shall get to know everything all the same. I have sent Béjuin after Delestang.'

They waited for another ten long minutes. The deputies were all coming away looking careless and unconcerned. Some of them lingered to light cigars and others stood in little groups, laughing and shaking hands. Madame Correur had stepped aside to inspect the 'Laocoon'; and while the Charbonnels threw back their heads to look at a sea-gull which a whimsical artist had painted on the frame of a fresco, as though it were flying out of the picture, the fair Clorinde, standing in front of the great bronze figure of Minerva, examined the arms and bosom of the gigantic goddess with an air of interest. Meantime in a corner by the glass door Colonel Jobelin and M. Kahn were carrying on an animated conversation in low tones.

'Ah, there's Béjuin!' suddenly exclaimed the latter. Then they all drew together with an expression of anxiety. M. Béjuin was breathing heavily. 'Well?' they asked him.

'Well! the resignation has been accepted, and Rougon retires.'

It was a crushing blow. An interval of deep silence followed. However, Clorinde, who, to employ her nervous fingers, was knotting a corner of her shawl, caught sight of pretty Madame Bouchard walking slowly along the garden, upon M. d'Escorailles' arm, with her head inclined over his shoulder. They had come down before the others, and, taking advantage of an open door, were now strolling like lovers under the lacework of fresh young leaves, in the quiet walks usually utilised for serious meditation. Clorinde beckoned to them.

'The great man has retired!' she said to the smiling young woman.

At this Madame Bouchard abruptly dropped her cavalier's arm, and turned very pale and grave, while M. Kahn, surrounded by Rougon's alarmed friends, despairingly raised his arms to heaven, unable to say a single word.

[II]

RESIGNATION

In the next morning's Moniteur Rougon's resignation was officially announced. It was stated that he had resigned for 'reasons of health.' After his lunch, wishing to set everything in order for his successor, he went down to the Council of State, and installed himself in the spacious room hung with crimson and gold, which was assigned to the President. And there, in front of a large rosewood writing-table, he began to empty the drawers and classify the papers, which he tied up in bundles with pieces of pink tape. All at once, however, he rang the bell, and an usher entered the room—a splendidly built man who had served in the cavalry.

'Give me a lighted candle,' said Rougon.

Then as the usher was leaving the room, after placing on the table a small candlestick taken from the mantelpiece, Rougon called him back. 'Admit nobody, Merle,' he said; 'no one at all, you understand?'

'Yes, Monsieur le Président,' replied the usher, closing the door noiselessly behind him.

A faint smile played over Rougon's face. He turned towards Delestang, who stood at the other end of the room carefully examining the contents of several pasteboard boxes. 'Our friend Merle hasn't read the Moniteur this morning,' he muttered.

Delestang merely shook his head, unable to think of any suitable reply. He had a magnificent head, very bald, indeed, but bald after that precocious fashion which is rather pleasing to women. His bare skull greatly increased the size of his brow and gave him an expression of vast intelligence. His clean-shaven, florid, and somewhat squarely cut face recalled those perfect, pensive countenances which imaginative painters are wont to confer upon great statesmen.

'Merle is extremely devoted to you,' he remarked after a pause.

Then he lowered his head over the pasteboard box which he was examining, while Rougon crumpled up a handful of papers, and after lighting them at the taper threw them into a large bronze vase which stood at the edge of his table. He watched them burn away.

'Don't touch the boxes at the bottom, Delestang,' he said; 'there are papers in them that I must examine myself.'

Then, for another quarter of an hour, they both went on with their respective occupations in silence. It was a very fine day, and the sun streamed in through three large windows which overlooked the quay. Through one of them, which was half open, puffs of fresh air from the Seine were wafted in, occasionally stirring the fringe of the silk curtains, and rustling the crumpled pieces of paper which lay about the floor.

'Just look at this,' said Delestang, handing Rougon a letter which he had found.

Rougon read it and then quietly lighted it at the taper. It was a letter on a delicate matter. The two men carried on a disjointed conversation, breaking off every few moments to bury their faces afresh in the piles of old papers. Rougon thanked Delestang for having come to help him. He was the only person whom he felt that he could trust to assist him in this task of washing the dirty linen of his five years' presidency. They had been friends together in the Legislative Assembly, where they had sat side by side on the same bench. It was there that Rougon had taken a genuine fancy to this splendid-looking man, on finding that he was so delightfully foolish and shallow and proud. He often used to say with an air of conviction that 'that precious Delestang would go a long way.' He did what he could to push him on, gratitude yielding devotion, and he made use of him as a kind of strong box in which he locked up whatever he could not carry about with him.

'How foolish of me to have kept all these papers!' Rougon murmured, as he opened a fresh drawer which was crammed quite full.

'Here is a letter from a lady!' said Delestang winking.

At this Rougon broke out into a loud laugh, and his huge chest shook. He took the letter with a protest. However, as soon as his eyes had glanced over the first lines, he exclaimed: 'It was little Escorailles who let this drop here! They are pretty things those letters. With three lines from a woman, a fellow may go a long way!' Then, as he burnt the letter, he added: 'Be on your guard against women, Delestang!'

Delestang bent his head again. He was perpetually becoming the victim of some hazardous passion. In 1851 he had all but ruined his political prospects. At that time he had been madly infatuated with the wife of a socialist deputy, and to curry favour with her husband had more frequently than not voted with the opposition against the Élysée. The coup d'état of the second of December consequently filled him with terrible alarm, and he shut himself up for a couple of days in distraction, overwhelmed, good for nothing, trembling with fear lest he should be arrested. However, Rougon had helped him out of his awkward position, advising him not to stand at the ensuing elections and taking him down to the Élysée, where he succeeded in getting him a place in the Council of State. Delestang, whose father had been a wine-merchant at Bercy, was himself a retired attorney and the owner of a model farm near Sainte-Menehould. He was worth several millions of francs and lived in a very handsome house in the Rue du Colisée.

'Yes, beware of women,' Rougon repeated, pausing after each word so as to glance at his papers. 'When a woman does not put a crown on your head she slips a halter round your neck. At our age a man's heart wants as carefully looking after as his stomach.'

At this moment a loud noise was heard in the ante-chamber, and Merle's voice could be recognised refusing admission to some visitor. However, a little man suddenly rushed into the room, exclaiming, 'I really must shake hands with my dear friend!'

'Hallo! is it you, Du Poizat?' exclaimed Rougon without rising.

Merle was making sweeping gesticulations to excuse himself, but his master bade him close the door. Then he quietly said to Du Poizat: 'I thought you were at Bressuire. So you desert your sub-prefecture as easily as an old mistress, eh?'

Du Poizat, who was a slightly built man with a mean-looking face and very white irregular teeth, shrugged his shoulders as he replied: 'I arrived in Paris this morning on business, and I did not intend to come and see you till the evening, when I should have called upon you in the Rue Marbeuf and have asked you to give me some dinner. But when I read the Moniteur——' Then he broke off, pulled an easy-chair in front of the writing-table, and seated himself face to face with Rougon. 'Well now, what's been happening, eh?' he resumed. 'I've come from the depths of the Deux-Sèvres. I had heard something down there, but I had no idea of this. Why didn't you write to me?'

Rougon, in his turn, shrugged his shoulders. It was evident that tidings of his disgrace had reached Du Poizat in the country, and that he had hastened to Paris to see if he could find a means of securing stability for his own position. So Rougon gave him a keen glance as he rejoined: 'I should have written to you this evening. Send in your resignation, my good fellow.'

'That's all that I wanted to know. Well, I will resign,' replied Du Poizat quietly.

Then he rose from his seat and began to whistle. As he slowly paced the room he caught sight of Delestang kneeling on the carpet in the midst of a litter of pasteboard boxes. He approached and silently shook hands with him. Then he took a cigar out of his pocket and lighted it at the candle.

'I may smoke here, I suppose, as you are moving?' he said, again sitting down in the easy-chair. 'It's good fun is moving!'

Rougon, however, was absorbed in a bundle of papers which he read with deep attention, sorting them very carefully, burning some and preserving others. Du Poizat, with his head lolling back, and puffing light clouds of smoke from between his lips, remained watching him. They had become acquainted with each other some months before the Revolution of February, 1848. At that time they were both boarding with Madame Correur at the Hôtel Vanneau in the Rue Vanneau. Du Poizat had found himself quite at home there, for he and Madame Correur had both been born at Coulonges, a little town in the district of Niort. His father, a process-server, had sent him to study law in Paris, where he allowed him only a hundred francs a month, although he had amassed large sums by lending money for short periods at extortionate interest. The old man's wealth seemed, indeed, so inexplicably great to his country neighbours that it was said he had discovered a large treasure in an old chest of drawers upon which he had distrained. From the outset of the Bonapartist propaganda Rougon had availed himself of the services of this scraggy youth, who, chafing and fuming, made such short work of his monthly hundred francs, and they dabbled together in the most risky undertakings. Later on, when Rougon was desirous of entering the Legislative Assembly, Du Poizat worked energetically to secure his election for Deux-Sèvres. Then, after the coup d'état, Rougon in his turn used all his influence on behalf of Du Poizat and got him appointed sub-prefect at Bressuire. The young man, then barely thirty years of age, had desired to return in triumph to his own neighbourhood, where he would be near his father, through whose avarice he had led a life of torture ever since leaving college.

'And how is your father?' asked Rougon, without raising his eyes.

'Oh, much too well,' answered Du Poizat bluntly. 'He has sent his last remaining servant away because she ate three pounds of bread a week. Now he keeps a couple of loaded guns behind his door, and when I go to see him I have to parley with him over the wall of the yard.'

While talking, Du Poizat leaned forward and poked his fingers into the bronze vase, where some fragments of paper were lying only half-consumed. Rougon sharply raised his head as he noticed this. He had always felt somewhat distrustful of his old lieutenant, whose irregular white teeth resembled those of a young wolf. In the days when they had worked together he had always made a point of never allowing any compromising document to fall into his hands; and now, as he saw him trying to decipher some words that still remained legible on the charred fragments, he threw a handful of blazing letters into the vase. Du Poizat perfectly understood why he did so; however, he merely smiled and began to joke. 'It's a thorough cleaning you're going in for,' he said.

Then he took a large pair of scissors and began to use them as tongs. He raised the letters which were not consumed to the taper in order to relight them, held up those which had been too tightly crumpled to burn in the vase, and stirred all the flaming ashes as though he were mixing a blazing bowl of punch. The red-hot sparks danced about in the vase, and a cloud of bluish smoke arose and gently curled away towards the open window. At intervals the candle flickered and then burnt brightly again with a straight, tall flame.

'That candle looks like a funeral-taper!' said Du Poizat with a grin. 'Ah! it's really a burial, my poor friend. What a lot of skeletons that require to be reduced to ashes, eh!'

Rougon was about to reply, when a fresh commotion was heard in the ante-chamber. Merle was a second time refusing admission. As the voices grew louder, Rougon at last exclaimed: 'Will you kindly see what it is, Delestang? If I show myself we shall be quite invaded.'

Delestang cautiously opened the door and closed it behind him. But he popped his head into the room almost immediately afterwards, exclaiming: 'It's Kahn!'

'Oh, well!' replied Rougon; 'let him come in; but no one else, mind!' Then he called to Merle and reiterated his orders.

'I beg your pardon, my dear friend,' he said, turning to Kahn, as soon as the usher had left the room; 'but I am so very busy. Sit down beside Du Poizat and keep quite still or I shall be obliged to turn you both out of the room.'

The deputy did not appear in the least offended by Rougon's blunt reception. He was quite accustomed to those ways. He took an easy-chair and sat down beside Du Poizat, who was lighting a second cigar. 'It is getting very warm,' he said, after drawing breath. 'I have just been to the Rue Marbeuf; I expected to find you at home.'

Rougon made no reply, and there was an interval of silence. The ex-President crumpled up some papers and threw them into a basket which he had placed by his side.

'I want to talk to you,' resumed M. Kahn.

'Talk away!' said Rougon; 'I am listening.'

Then the deputy seemed to become suddenly aware of the disorder of the room. 'What are you doing?' he asked with admirably feigned surprise. 'Are you changing your room?'

His tone seemed so sincere that Delestang actually paused in what he was doing in order to hand him the Moniteur.

'Oh dear! Oh dear!' he cried, as soon as he had glanced at the paper. 'I thought the matter was satisfactorily arranged yesterday evening. This comes upon me like a thunderbolt. My dear friend——'

He rose and pressed Rougon's hands. The latter looked at him in silence, while two deep scoffing creases appeared on his heavy face near his under lip. As Du Poizat seemed quite unmoved, he suspected that he and Kahn had already met earlier in the morning, and he was confirmed in this opinion as the deputy had shown no surprise at seeing the sub-prefect. He surmised that one of the pair had come straight to the Council of State while the other hastened to the Rue Marbeuf, so that they might be sure to find him at the one or the other place.

'Well, there is something you want to say to me,' quietly resumed Rougon. 'What is it?'

'Oh, I won't trouble you about that now, my dear friend!' exclaimed the deputy. 'You have got sufficient to worry you as it is. I should be very sorry to bother you with my own troubles at a time like this.'

'Oh, it will be no bother, I assure you. Speak away.'

'Well, then, I wanted to speak to you about that affair of mine, that confounded grant. I am very glad that Du Poizat is here, as he may be able to give us information upon certain points.'

Then he explained at great length the exact position which the matter had reached. It was a scheme for a railway from Niort to Angers, upon which he had been engaged for the last three years. The projected line would pass through Bressuire, where he possessed some blast-furnaces, the value of which it would largely increase. At the present time there were great difficulties in the way of transport, and the business was consequently languishing. M. Kahn had some hopes, too, that he would be able to get some very profitable pickings out of the affair, and so he had greatly exerted himself in order to obtain the grant. Rougon had supported him energetically, and the grant had almost been secured when M. de Marsy, the Minister of the Interior, vexed at having no share in the affair, which he guessed would afford a superb opportunity for jobbery, and being also very desirous of doing anything that might annoy Rougon, had used all his influence to oppose the scheme. With that audacity of his which made him such a terrible opponent, he had even just persuaded the Minister of Public Works to offer the grant to the Western Railway Company, besides circulating a statement that this company alone could successfully carry out the branch line, for the satisfactory working of which some substantial guarantee was required. Thus M. Kahn seemed in great danger of losing all the advantages he had hoped to gain, and Rougon's fall appeared likely to involve him in ruin.

'I heard yesterday,' said he, 'that one of the company's engineers had been instructed to make a survey for the new line. Have you heard anything of it, Du Poizat?'

'Yes, indeed,' replied the sub-prefect. 'The survey has already commenced. They are trying to avoid the detour which you were planning in order to make the line touch Bressuire, and propose to carry it straight along past Parthenay and Thouars.'

A gesture of discouragement escaped the deputy. 'It is sheer persecution!' he exclaimed. 'What harm could it do them to let the line pass my place? But I will protest and write against their plan. I will go back with you to Bressuire.'

'No, no; you had better not wait for me,' said Du Poizat with a smile. 'It seems that I have got to resign.'

M. Kahn fell back in his chair, as though overcome by a final catastrophe. He rubbed his beard with both hands and looked at Rougon with an air of entreaty. The latter had ceased to examine his papers, and was leaning on his elbows and listening.

'I suppose,' he said, somewhat roughly, 'that you want my advice? Well, then, my good friends, just remain quiet and try to keep things as they are until we get the upper hand. Du Poizat is going to resign, because, if he didn't, he would be dismissed within a fortnight. As for you, Kahn, you had better write to the Emperor and use all available means to prevent the grant being obtained by the Western Railway Company. You won't get it for yourself at present, but as long as it is not given to any one else, there is a chance of your winning it later on.' Then, as the two men nodded, he continued: 'Well, that's all I can do for you. I am down and you must give me time to pick myself up again. You don't see me going about with a woe-begone face, do you? Well, I should be much obliged if you wouldn't look as though you were attending my funeral. For my part, I am delighted at retiring into private life again. I shall at last be able to take a little rest.'

He heaved a deep sigh, crossed his arms, and rocked his huge frame backwards and forwards. M. Kahn said nothing more about his scheme, but tried to imitate Du Poizat and appear perfectly indifferent. Delestang had opened some more pasteboard boxes, and worked away so quietly behind the chairs that the slight rustling noise which he made every now and then might have been attributed to a troop of mice flitting across the papers. Meantime the sunlight was travelling over the crimson carpet and lighting up a corner of the writing-table, paling the flame of the candle which was still burning there.

A friendly conversation sprang up amongst the men. Rougon, who was tying up some more bundles of papers, declared that he was really not cut out for politics, and smiled good-naturedly as his heavy eyelids drooped, as though with weariness, over his glistening eyes. He would have liked, he said, to have a large estate to cultivate, fields which he could dig up at his pleasure, and flocks of animals, horses, cattle, sheep, and dogs, of which he would be the one absolute monarch. He told them that in former days, when only a country lawyer at Plassans, his great pleasure had consisted in setting off in a blouse on a shooting expedition of several days through the ravines of La Seille, where he shot eagles. He said that he was a peasant; his grandfather had dug the soil. Then he assumed the air of a man disgusted with the world. Power had grown wearisome to him, and he meant to spend the summer in the country. He declared that he had never felt so light-hearted as he did that morning, and he gave a mighty shrug of his strong shoulders as though he had just thrown off some heavy burden.

'How much did you get here as President?' asked M. Kahn; 'eighty thousand francs?'

Rougon nodded assent.

'And now you'll only have your thirty thousand as a senator.'

However, Rougon exclaimed that this change would not affect him at all. He could live upon next to nothing and indulged in no vices; which was perfectly true. He was neither a gambler, nor a glutton, nor a loose liver. His whole ambition, he declared, was to be his own master. Then he reverted to his idea of a farm, where he would be king of all sorts of animals. His ideal life was to wield a whip and be paramount; to be the master, chief both in intelligence and power. Gradually he grew animated and talked of animals as though they had been men, declaring that the mob liked to be driven, and that shepherds directed their flocks by pelting them with stones. His face seemed transfigured, his thick lips protruded scornfully, while his whole expression was instinct with strength and power. While he spoke he brandished a bundle of papers in his clenched fist, and it seemed every now and then as though he were going to throw it at the heads of M. Kahn and Du Poizat, who watched his sudden outburst of excitement with uneasy anxiety.

'The Emperor has behaved very badly,' at last muttered Du Poizat.

Then Rougon all at once became quite calm again. His face turned loamy and his body seemed to grow flabby and obese. He began to sound the Emperor's praises in an exaggerated fashion. Napoleon III. was a man of mighty intelligence, he declared, with a mind of astonishing depth. Du Poizat and Kahn exchanged a meaning look. But Rougon waxed still more lavish of his praises, and, speaking of his devotion to his master, declared with great humility that he had always been proud of being a mere instrument in the Emperor's hands. He talked on in this strain till he made Du Poizat, who was of a somewhat irritable nature, quite impatient, and they began to wrangle. The sub-prefect spoke with considerable bitterness of all that Rougon and he had done for the Empire between 1848 and 1851, when they were lodging with Madame Correur in a condition of semi-starvation. He referred to the terrible days, especially those of the first year, when they had gone splashing through the mud of Paris, recruiting partisans for the Emperor's cause. Later on they had risked their skins a score of times. And wasn't it Rougon who on the morning of the second of December had taken possession of the Palais Bourbon at the head of a regiment of the line? That was a game at which men staked their lives! Yet now to-day he was being sacrificed and made the victim of a court intrigue. Rougon, however, protested against this assertion. He was not being sacrificed—he was resigning for private reasons. And as Du Poizat, now fully wound up, began to call the folks of the Tuileries a set of 'pigs,' he ended by reducing him to silence by bringing his fist down upon the rosewood writing-table with a force which made it creak.

'That is all nonsense!' he said.

'You are, indeed, going rather far,' remarked M. Kahn.

Delestang was standing behind the chairs looking very pale. He opened the door gently to see if any one were listening, but there was nobody in the ante-chamber excepting Merle, whose back was turned with an appearance of great discretion. Rougon's observation had made Du Poizat blush, and quickly cooling down he chewed his cigar in silent displeasure.

'There is no doubt that the Emperor is surrounded by injudicious advisers,' Rougon resumed after a pause. 'I ventured to tell him as much, and he smiled. He even condescended to jest about it, and told me that my own entourage was no better than his own.'

Du Poizat and Kahn laughed in a constrained fashion. They thought the reply a very good one.

'But,' continued Rougon in meaning tones, 'I repeat that I am retiring of my own free will. If any one questions you, who are my friends, on the matter, you can say that yesterday evening I was quite at liberty to withdraw my resignation. You can contradict, too, the tittle-tattle which is being circulated about Rodriguez's affair, out of which people seem to be making a perfect romance. On this subject no doubt I disagreed with the majority of the Council of State, and there has certainly been a deal of friction in the matter which has hastened my retirement. But I had weightier and earlier reasons than that. For a long time past I had made up my mind to resign the high position which I owed to the Emperor's kindness.'

He punctuated this speech with the gesture of the right hand, in which he constantly indulged when addressing the Chamber. He evidently wished that what he was saying might be made public. M. Kahn and Du Poizat, who knew very well the kind of individual they had to deal with, tried all kinds of stratagems to get at the real truth. They felt quite sure that 'the great man,' as they familiarly called him between themselves, had some formidable scheme in his head. So they turned the conversation on general politics. Rougon then began to scoff at the parliamentary system, which he called 'the dunghill of mediocrity.' The Chamber, he declared, enjoyed quite an absurd amount of liberty even now, and indulged in far too much talk. France required governing, he said, by a suitably devised machine, with the Emperor at the head, and the great state-bodies, reduced to the position of mere working gear, below. He laughed, and his huge chest heaved, as he carried his theory to the point of exaggeration, displaying the while a scornful contempt for the imbeciles who demanded powerful rule.

'But,' interposed M. Kahn, 'with the Emperor at the top, and everybody else at the bottom, matters cannot be very pleasant for any one except the Emperor.'

'Those who feel bored can take themselves off,' Rougon quietly replied. He smiled, and then added: 'They can wait till things become amusing, and then they can come back.'

A long interval of silence followed. M. Kahn began to stroke his beard contentedly. He had found out what he wanted to know. He had made a correct guess at the Chamber on the previous afternoon when he had insinuated that Rougon, finding his influence at the Tuileries seriously shaken, had taken time by the forelock and resigned. Rodriguez's business had afforded him a splendid opportunity for honourable withdrawal.

'And what are people saying?' Rougon at last inquired in order to break the silence.

'Well, I've only just got here,' said Du Poizat, 'but a little while ago I heard a gentleman who wore a decoration declaring in a café that he strongly approved of your retirement.'

'Béjuin was very much affected about it yesterday,' added M. Kahn. 'Béjuin is much attached to you. He's rather slow, but he's very genuine. Little La Rouquette, too, spoke very properly, and referred to you in the kindest terms.'

Other names were mentioned as the conversation continued. Rougon asked direct questions, without showing the least embarrassment, and extracted full particulars from the deputy, who complaisantly gave him an exact account of the demeanour of the Corps Législatif towards him.

'This afternoon,' interrupted Du Poizat, who felt somewhat annoyed at having no information to impart, 'I will take a ramble through Paris, and to-morrow morning, as soon as I'm out of bed, I will come and tell you all I have heard.'

'By the way,' cried M. Kahn, with a laugh, 'I forgot to tell you about Combelot. I never saw a man in greater embarrassment.'

He stopped short on seeing Rougon glance warningly towards Delestang, who, with his back turned towards them, was at that moment standing on a chair removing an accumulation of newspapers which had been stored away atop of a bookcase. M. de Combelot had married one of Delestang's sisters. Delestang himself, since Rougon had fallen into disfavour, had felt a little down-hearted on account of his relationship with a chamberlain; and so, wishing to affect independence, he turned and said with a smile: 'Why don't you go on? Combelot is an ass. That's the long and short of it, eh?'

This ready condemnation of his brother-in-law afforded the others much amusement, and Delestang, noticing his success, continued his attack even to the extent of falling foul of Combelot's beard, that famous black beard which had such a reputation among the ladies. Then, as he threw a bundle of newspapers on to the floor, he said abruptly: 'What is a source of sorrow to some is a source of joy to others.'

This truism led to M. de Marsy's name being introduced into the conversation. Rougon bent his head and devoted himself to a searching examination of a portfolio, leaving his friends to ease their minds. They spoke of Marsy with all the rageful hostility which politicians show for an adversary. They revelled in the strongest language, bringing all kinds of abominable accusations against him, and so grossly exaggerating such stories which had a foundation of truth that they became mere lies. Du Poizat, who had known Marsy in former days, before the Empire, declared that he was kept at that time by a baroness whose diamonds he had exhausted in three months. M. Kahn asserted that there was not a single shady affair started in any part of Paris without Marsy having a hand in it. They encouraged each other in charges of this kind, and went on from worse to worse. In a mining affair Marsy had received a bribe of fifteen hundred thousand francs; during the previous month he had offered a furnished house to little Florence of the Bouffes Theatre, a trifle for which he had paid six hundred thousand francs, his share of the profits of a speculation in Morocco railway stock; finally, not a week ago, a grand scheme for constructing canals in Egypt, which had been got up by certain tools of his, had scandalously collapsed, the shareholders discovering that not a single shovelful of earth had been turned, although they had been paying out money for a couple of years or so. Then, too, they fell foul of Marsy's physical appearance, tried to depreciate his good looks, and even attacked the collection of pictures which he was getting together.

'He's a brigand in the skin of a vaudevillist,' Du Poizat ended by exclaiming.

Rougon slowly raised his head and fixed his big eyes on the two men. 'You are going it well,' he said. 'Marsy manages his affairs in his own way, as you manage yours in your way. As regards myself and him, we don't get on well together, and if ever I have a chance to crush him I shall avail myself of it without hesitation. But all that you have been saying doesn't prevent Marsy from being a very clever fellow, and, if ever the whim takes him, he will only make a mouthful of you two, I warn you of it.'

Then Rougon, tired of sitting, rose and stretched himself. He gave a great yawn, as he added: 'And he will do it all the more easily, my friends, now that I shall no longer be in a position to interfere.'

'Oh, you can lead Marsy a pretty dance if you like,' said Du Poizat, with a faint smile. 'You have some papers here which he would be glad to pay a big price for. Those yonder, I mean, the papers in the Lardenois matter, in which he played such a singular part. There's a very curious letter from him among them, which I recognise as one that I brought you myself at the time.'

Rougon went up to the grate in order to throw the papers with which he had gradually filled his basket into the fire. The bronze vase was no longer large enough. 'We must deal a stunning blow, and not give a mere scratch,' he replied, shrugging his shoulders disdainfully. 'Every one has foolish letters astray in the possession of other people.'

He then lighted the letter just spoken of at the candle, and used it to set fire to the heap of papers in the grate. He remained squatting for a moment, whilst watching the blazing pile. Some thick official documents turned black, and twisted about like sheets of lead; the letters and memoranda, scrawled over with handwriting, threw up little tongues of bluish flame, while inside the grate, amidst a swarm of sparks, half-consumed fragments still remained quite legible.

At this moment the door was thrown wide open, and a laughing voice was heard exclaiming: 'All right! I will excuse you, Merle. I belong to the house, and if you don't let me come in this way, I shall go round by the Council Chamber.'

It was M. d'Escorailles, for whom some six months previously Rougon had obtained an appointment as auditor at the Council of State. On his arm hung pretty Madame Bouchard, looking delightfully fresh in a bright spring toilette.

'Good heavens!' muttered Rougon, 'we've got women here now.'

He did not immediately leave his place by the grate, but still stooping, grasping the shovel, and pressing down the blazing papers so as to guard against an accident, he raised his big face with an air of displeasure. M. d'Escorailles, however, appeared in no way disconcerted. When he and the young woman had crossed the threshold, they ceased to smile, and assumed an expression more suited to the circumstances.

'My dear master,' said Escorailles, 'I bring a friend of yours, who insists upon coming to express her sorrow. We have seen the Moniteur this morning——'

'Oh, you have seen the Moniteur, too,' muttered Rougon, at last rising erect. Then he caught sight of some one whom he had not previously noticed. 'Ah, Monsieur Bouchard also!' he exclaimed, blinking.

It was, indeed, the husband who, silent and dignified, had just entered the room in the wake of his wife's skirts. M. Bouchard was sixty years old: his hair was quite white, his eyes were dim, and his face was worn by twenty-five years of official labour. He did not say a single word, but took Rougon's hand with an appearance of emotion, and gave it three vigorous shakes.

'It is really very kind of you all to come and see me,' said Rougon, 'only you will be terribly in my way. However, come here, will you? Du Poizat, give Madame Bouchard your chair.'

He turned as he spoke, and then saw Colonel Jobelin standing in front of him. 'What! are you here as well, colonel?' he cried.

As a matter of fact, the door had been left open, and Merle had been unable to stop the colonel, who had come up the staircase immediately behind the Bouchards. He was accompanied by his son, a tall lad of fifteen, a pupil at the Louis-le-Grand College. 'I wanted Auguste to see you,' he said. 'It is misfortune that reveals true friends. Auguste, go and give your hand——'

Rougon, however, had sprung towards the ante-room, crying: 'Shut the door, Merle! What are you thinking about? We shall have all Paris in here directly!'

With calm face the usher replied: 'It's all because they caught sight of you, Monsieur le Président.'

Even as he spoke, he was obliged to step back close to the wall, in order to allow the Charbonnels to pass. They came into the room abreast, but not arm-in-arm. They were out of breath, and looked disconsolate and amazed; and they both began to speak at once. 'We have just seen the Moniteur! What dreadful news! How distressed your poor mother will be! And what a sad position, too, it puts us in ourselves!'

More guileless than the others, the Charbonnels were about to enter upon their own little affairs at once, but Rougon stopped them. He shot a bolt, hidden beneath the door lock, and remarked that if any people wanted to come in now, they would have to break the door open. Then, observing that none of his visitors showed signs of leaving, he resigned himself, and tried to finish his task in the midst of these nine people who were crowding his room. The whole place was now in a state of chaotic confusion, there being such a litter of portfolios and papers on the floor that when the colonel and M. Bouchard wanted to reach a window-recess, they had to exercise the greatest care in order to avoid trampling upon some important document. All the chairs were covered with bundles of papers, excepting the one on which Madame Bouchard was now seated. She was smiling at the gallant speeches of Du Poizat and M. Kahn; while M. d'Escorailles, unable to find a hassock, pushed a thick blue portfolio, stuffed with letters, under her feet. The drawers of the writing-table, which had been pushed into a corner of the room, afforded the Charbonnels a temporary seat where they could recover their breath, while young Auguste, delighted at finding himself in the bustle of a removal, poked about till he disappeared behind the mountain of pasteboard boxes, amid which Delestang had previously entrenched himself. As the latter threw down the newspapers from the top of the bookcase, he raised considerable dust, which made Madame Bouchard cough slightly.

'I don't advise you to stay here amidst all this dirt,' said Rougon, who was now emptying the boxes which he had asked Delestang to leave unexamined.

The young woman, however, quite rosy from her fit of coughing, assured him that she was very comfortable, and that the dust would not harm her bonnet. Then all the visitors poured forth their condolences. The Emperor, they declared, must care very little about the real interests of the country to allow himself to be influenced by men so unworthy of his confidence. France was suffering a great loss. But it was ever thus, they said; a man of high intelligence always had every mediocrity leagued against him.

'Governments have no gratitude,' declared M. Kahn.

'So much the worse for them!' exclaimed the colonel; 'they strike themselves when they strike those who serve them.'

However, M. Kahn was desirous of having the last word on the subject, so he turned to Rougon, and said: 'When a man like you falls, it is a subject for public mourning.'