calm and monotonously regular in this old edifice? It contained a
library; but that was placed below the level of the river. The books

were well bound and shelved, and the dust, far from injuring them,
only made them valuable. They were preserved with the care given in

these provinces deprived of vineyards to other native products,
desirable for their antiqueperfume, and issued by the presses of

Bourgogne, Touraine, Gascogne, and the South. The cost of
transportation was too great to allow any but the best products to be

imported.
The basis of Mademoiselle Cormon's society consisted of about one

hundred and fifty persons; some went at times to the country; others
were occasionally ill; a few travelled about the department on

business; but certain of the faithful came every night (unless invited
elsewhere), and so did certain others compelled by duties or by habit

to live permanently in the town. All the personages were of ripe age;
few among them had ever travelled; nearly all had spent their lives in

the provinces, and some had taken part in the chouannerie. The latter
were beginning to speak fearlessly of that war, now that rewards were

being showered on the defenders of the good cause. Monsieur de Valois,
one of the movers in the last uprising (during which the Marquis de

Montauran, betrayed by his mistress, perished in spite of the devotion
of Marche-a-Terre, now tranquilly raising cattle for the market near

Mayenne),--Monsieur de Valois had, during the last six months, given
the key to several choice stratagems practised upon an old republican

named Hulot, the commander of a demi-brigade stationed at Alencon from
1798 to 1800, who had left many memories in the place. [See "The

Chouans."]
The women of this society took little pains with their dress, except

on Wednesdays, when Mademoiselle Cormon gave a dinner, on which
occasion the guests invited on the previous Wednesday paid their

"visit of digestion." Wednesdays were gala days: the assembly was
numerous; guests and visitors appeared in fiocchi; some women brought

their sewing, knitting, or worsted work; the young girls were not
ashamed to make patterns for the Alencon point lace, with the proceeds

of which they paid for their personal expenses. Certain husbands
brought their wives out of policy, for young men were few in that

house; not a word could be whispered in any ear without attracting the
attention of all; there was therefore no danger, either for young

girls or wives, of love-making.
Every evening, at six o'clock, the long antechamber received its

furniture. Each habitue brought his cane, his cloak, his lantern. All
these persons knew each other so well, and their habits and ways were

so familiarly patriarchal, that if by chance the old Abbe de Sponde
was lying down, or Mademoiselle Cormon was in her chamber, neither

Josette, the maid, nor Jacquelin, the man-servant, nor Mariette, the
cook, informed them. The first comer received the second; then, when

the company were sufficiently numerous for whist, piquet, or boston,
they began the game without awaiting either the Abbe de Sponde or

mademoiselle. If it was dark, Josette or Jacquelin would hasten to
light the candles as soon as the first bell rang. Seeing the salon

lighted up, the abbe would slowly hurry to come down. Every evening
the backgammon and the piquet tables, the three boston tables, and the

whist table were filled,--which gave occupation to twenty-five or
thirty persons; but as many as forty were usually present. Jacquelin

would then light the candles in the other rooms.
Between eight and nine o'clock the servants began to arrive in the

antechamber to accompany their masters home; and, short of a
revolution, no one remained in the salon at ten o'clock. At that hour

the guests were departing in groups along the street, discoursing on
the game, or continuing conversations on the land they were covetous

of buying, on the terms of some one's will, on quarrels among heirs,
on the haughtyassumption of the aristocraticportion of the

community. It was like Paris when the audience of a theatre disperses.
Certain persons who talk much of poesy and know nothing about it,

declaim against the habits of life in the provinces. But put your
forehead in your left hand, rest one foot on the fender, and your

elbow on your knee; then, if you compass the idea of this quiet and
uniform scene, this house and its interior, this company and its

interests, heightened by the pettiness of its intellect like goldleaf
beaten between sheets of parchment, ask yourself, What is human life?

Try to decide between him who scribbles jokes on Egyptian obelisks,
and him who has "bostoned" for twenty years with Du Bousquier,

Monsieur de Valois, Mademoiselle Cormon, the judge of the court, the
king's attorney, the Abbe de Sponde, Madame Granson, and tutti quanti.

If the daily and punctual return of the same steps to the same path is
not happiness, it imitates happiness so well that men driven by the

storms of an agitated life to reflect upon the blessings of
tranquillity would say that here was happiness ENOUGH.

To reckon the importance of Mademoiselle Cormon's salon at its true
value, it will suffice to say that the born statistician of the

society, du Bousquier, had estimated that the persons who frequented
it controlled one hundred and thirty-one votes in the electoral

college, and mustered among themselves eighteen hundred thousand
francs a year from landed estate in the neighborhood.

The town of Alencon, however, was not entirely represented by this
salon. The higher aristocracy had a salon of their own; moreover, that

of the receiver-general was like an administration inn kept by the
government, where society danced, plotted, fluttered, loved, and

supped. These two salons communicated by means of certain mixed
individuals with the house of Cormon, and vice-versa; but the Cormon

establishment sat severely in judgment on the two other camps. The
luxury of their dinners was criticised; the ices at their balls were

pondered; the behavior of the women, the dresses, and "novelties"
there produced were discussed and disapproved.

Mademoiselle Cormon, a species of firm, as one might say, under whose
name was comprised an imposing coterie, was naturally the aim and

object of two ambitious men as deep and wily as the Chevalier de
Valois and du Bousquier. To the one as well as to the other, she meant

election as deputy, resulting, for the noble, in the peerage, for the
purveyor, in a receiver-generalship. A leading salon is a difficult

thing to create, whether in Paris or the provinces, and here was one
already created. To marry Mademoiselle Cormon was to reign in Alencon.

Athanase Granson, the only one of the three suitors for the hand of
the old maid who no longer calculated profits, now loved her person as

well as her fortune.
To employ the jargon of the day, is there not a singular drama in the

situation of these four personages? Surely there is something odd and
fantastic in three rivalries silently encompassing a woman who never

guessed their existence, in spite of an eager and legitimate desire to
be married. And yet, though all these circumstances make the

spinsterhood of this old maid an extraordinary thing, it is not
difficult to explain how and why, in spite of her fortune and her

three lovers, she was still unmarried. In the first place,
Mademoiselle Cormon, following the custom and rule of her house, had

always desired to marry a nobleman; but from 1788 to 1798 public
circumstances were very unfavorable to such pretensions. Though she

wanted to be a woman of condition, as the saying is, she was horribly
afraid of the Revolutionary tribunal. The two sentiments, equal in

force, kept her stationary by a law as true in ethics as it is in
statics. This state of uncertainexpectation is pleasing to unmarried

women as long as they feel themselves young, and in a position to
choose a husband. France knows that the political system of Napoleon

resulted in making many widows. Under that regime heiresses were
entirely out of proportion in numbers to the bachelors who wanted to

marry. When the Consulate restored internal order, external
difficulties made the marriage of Mademoiselle Cormon as difficult to

arrange as it had been in the past. If, on the one hand, Rose-Marie-
Victoire refused to marry an old man, on the other, the fear of

ridicule forbade her to marry a very young one.
In the provinces, families marry their sons early to escape the

conscription. In addition to all this, she was obstinately determined
not to marry a soldier: she did not intend to take a man and then give

him up to the Emperor; she wanted him for herself alone. With these
views, she found it therefore impossible, from 1804 to 1815, to enter

the lists with young girls who were rivalling each other for suitable
matches.

Besides her predilection for the nobility, Mademoiselle Cormon had
another and very excusable mania: that of being loved for herself. You

could hardly believe the lengths to which this desire led her. She