church, what the company's child is to the regiment, what the
figurante is to a theatre; something artless, naive, innocent, a being

blinded by illusions. Without illusions what would become of any of
us? They give strength to bear the res angusta domi of arts and the

beginnings of all science by inspiring us with faith. Illusion is
illimitable faith. Now the supernumerary has faith in the

administration; he never thinks it cold, cruel, and hard, as it really
is. There are two kinds of supernumeraries, or hangers-on,--one poor,

the other rich. The poor one is rich in hope and wants a place, the
rich one is poor in spirit and wants nothing. A wealthy family is not

so foolish as to put its able men into the administration. It confides
an unfledged scion to some head-clerk, or gives him in charge of a

directory who initiates him into what Bilboquet, that profound
philosopher, called the high comedy of government; he is spared all

the horrors of drudgery and is finally appointed to some important
office. The rich supernumerary never alarms the other clerks; they

know he does not endanger their interests, for he seeks only the
highest posts in the administration. About the period of which we

write many families were saying to themselves: "What can we do with
our sons?" The army no longer offered a chance for fortune. Special

careers, such as civil and military engineering, the navy, mining, and
the professorial chair were all fenced about by strict regulations or

to be obtained only by competition; whereas in the civil service the
revolving wheel which turned clerks into prefects, sub-prefects,

assessors, and collectors, like the figures in a magic lantern, was
subjected to no such rules and entailed no drudgery. Through this easy

gap emerged into life the rich supernumeraries who drove their
tilburys, dressed well, and wore moustachios, all of them as impudent

as parvenus. Journalists were apt to persecute the tribe, who were
cousins, nephews, brothers, or other relatives of some minister, some

deputy, or an influential peer. The humbler clerks regarded them as a
means of influence.

The poor supernumerary, on the other hand, who is the only real
worker, is almost always the son of some former clerk's widow, who

lives on a meagre pension and sacrifices herself to support her son
until he can get a place as copying-clerk, and then dies leaving him

no nearer the head of his department than writer of deeds, order-
clerks, or, possibly, under-head-clerk. Living always in some locality

where rents are low, this humble supernumerary starts early from home.
For him the Eastern question relates only to the morning skies. To go

on foot and not get muddied, to save his clothes, and allow for the
time he may lose in standing under shelter during a shower, are the

preoccupations of his mind. The street pavements, the flaggings of the
quays and the boulevards, when first laid down, were a boon to him.

If, for some extraordinary reason, you happen to be in the streets of
Paris at half-past seven or eight o'clock of a winter's morning, and

see through piercing cold or fog or rain a timid, pale young man loom
up, cigarless, take notice of his pockets. You will be sure to see the

outline of a roll which his mother has given him to stay his stomach
between breakfast and dinner. The guilelessness of the supernumerary

does not last long. A youth enlightened by gleams by Parisian life
soon measures the frightful distance that separates him from the head-

clerkship, a distance which no mathematician, neither Archimedes, nor
Leibnitz, nor Laplace has ever reckoned, the distance that exists

between 0 and the figure 1. He begins to perceive the impossibilities
of his career; he hears talk of favoritism; he discovers the intrigues

of officials: he sees the questionable means by which his superiors
have pushed their way,--one has married a young woman who made a false

step; another, the natural daughter of a minister; this one shouldered
the responsibility of another's fault; that one, full of talent, risks

his health in doing, with the perseverance of a mole, prodigies of
work which the man of influence feels capable" target="_blank" title="a.无能力的；不能的">incapable of doing for himself,

though he takes the credit. Everything is known in a government
office. The capable" target="_blank" title="a.无能力的；不能的">incapable man has a wife with a clear head, who has pushed

him along and got him nominated for deputy; if he has not talent
enough for an office, he cabals in the Chamber. The wife of another

has a statesman at her feet. A third is the hidden informant of a
powerful journalist. Often the disgusted and hopeless supernumerary

sends in his resignation. About three fourths of his class leave the
government employ without ever obtaining an appointment, and their

number is winnowed down to either those young men who are foolish or
obstinate enough to say to themselves, "I have been here three years,

and I must end sooner or later by getting a place," or to those who
are conscious of a vocation for the work. Undoubtedly the position of

supernumerary in a government office is precisely what the novitiate
is in a religious order,--a trial. It is a rough trial. The State

discovers how many of them can bear hunger, thirst, and penury without
breaking down, how many can toil without revolting against it; it

learns which temperaments can bear up under the horrible experience--
or if you like, the disease--of government official life. From this

point of view the apprenticeship of the supernumerary, instead of
being an infamousdevice of the government to obtain labor gratis,

becomes a useful institution.
The young man with whom Rabourdin was talking was a poor supernumerary

named Sebastien de la Roche, who had picked his way on the points of
his toes, without incurring the least splash upon his boots, from the

rue du Roi-Dore in the Marais. He talked of his mamma, and dared not
raise his eyes to Madame Rabourdin, whose house appeared to him as

gorgeous as the Louvre. He was careful to show his gloves, well
cleaned with india-rubber, as little as he could. His poor mother had

put five francs in his pocket in case it became absolutely necessary
that he should play cards; but she enjoined him to take nothing, to

remain standing, and to be very careful not to knock over a lamp or
the bric-a-brac from an etagere. His dress was all of the strictest

black. His fair face, his eyes, of a fine shade of green with golden
reflections, were in keeping with a handsome head of auburn hair. The

poor lad looked furtively at Madame Rabourdin, whispering to himself,
"How beautiful!" and was likely to dream of that fairy when he went to

bed.
Rabourdin had noted a vocation for his work in the lad, and as he

himself took the whole service seriously, he felt a lively interest in
him. He guessed the poverty of his mother's home, kept together on a

widow's pension of seven hundred francs a year--for the education of
the son, who was just out of college, had absorbed all her savings. He

therefore treated the youth almost paternally; often endeavoured to
get him some fee from the Council, or paid it from his own pocket. He

overwhelmed Sebastien with work, trained him, and allowed him to do
the work of du Bruel's place, for which that vaudevillist, otherwise

known as Cursy, paid him three hundred francs out of his salary. In
the minds of Madame de la Roche and her son, Rabourdin was at once a

great man, a tyrant, and an angel. On him all the poor fellow's hopes
of getting an appointment depended, and the lad's devotion to his

chief was boundless. He dined once a fortnight in the rue Duphot; but
always at a family dinner, invited by Rabourdin himself; Madame asked

him to evening parties only when she wanted partners.
At that moment Rabourdin was scolding poor Sebastien, the only human

being who was in the secret of his immense labors. The youth copied
and recopied the famous "statement," written on a hundred and fifty

folio sheets, besides the corroborative documents, and the summing up
(contained in one page), with the estimates bracketed, the captions in

a running hand, and the sub-titles in a round one. Full of enthusiasm,
in spite of his merely mechanicalparticipation in the great idea, the

lad of twenty would rewrite whole pages for a single blot, and made it
his glory to touch up the writing, regarding it as the element of a

noble undertaking. Sebastien had that afternoon committed the great
imprudence of carrying into the general office, for the purpose of

copying, a paper which contained the most dangerous facts to make
known prematurely, namely, a memorandum relating to the officials in

the central offices of all ministries, with facts concerning their
fortunes, actual and prospective, together with the individual

enterprises of each outside of his government employment.
All government clerks in Paris who are not endowed, like Rabourdin,

with patrioticambition or other marked capacity, usually add the
profits of some industry to the salary of their office, in order to

eke out a living. A number do as Monsieur Saillard did,--put their
money into a business carried on by others, and spend their evenings

in keeping the books of their associates. Many clerks are married to
milliners, licensed tobacco dealers, women who have charge of the

public lotteries or reading-rooms. Some, like the husband of Madame