space which lay between the house and the lawn with its flower-beds.

From the gestures of the poet, and the air and manner of the young
heiress, it was easy to see that she was listening favorably to him.

The two demoiselles d'Herouville hastened to interrupt the scandalous
tete-a-tete; and with the natural cleverness of women under such

circumstances, they turned the conversation on the court, and the
distinction of an appointment under the crown,--pointing out the

difference that existed between appointments in the household of the
king and those of the crown. They tried to intoxicate Modeste's mind

by appealing to her pride, and describing one of the highest stations
to which a woman could aspire.

"To have a duke for a son," said the elder lady, "is an actual
advantage. The title is a fortune that we secure to our children

without the possibility of loss."
"How is it, then," said Canalis, displeased at his tete-a-tete being

thus broken in upon, "that Monsieur le duc has had so little success
in a matter where his title would seem to be of special service to

him?"
The two ladies cast a look at Canalis as full of venom as the tooth of

a snake, and they were so disconcerted by Modeste's amused smile that
they were actuallyunable to reply.

"Monsieur le duc has never blamed you," she said to Canalis, "for the
humility with which you bear your fame; why should you attack him for

his modesty?"
"Besides, we have never yet met a woman worthy of my nephew's rank,"

said Mademoiselle d'Herouville. "Some had only the wealth of the
position; others, without fortune, had the wit and birth. I must admit

that we have done well to wait till God granted us an opportunity to
meet one in whom we find the noble blood, the mind, and fortune of a

Duchesse d'Herouville."
"My dear Modeste," said Helene d'Herouville, leading her new friend

apart, "there are a thousand barons in the kingdom, just as there are
a hundred poets in Paris, who are worth as much as he; he is so little

of a great man that even I, a poor girl forced to take the veil for
want of a 'dot,' I would not take him. You don't know what a young man

is who has been for ten years in the hands of a Duchesse de Chaulieu.
None but an old woman of sixty could put up with the little ailments

of which, they say, the great poet is always complaining,--a habit in
Louis XIV. that became a perfectly insupportable annoyance. It is true

the duchess does not suffer from it as much as a wife, who would have
him always about her."

Then, practising a well-knownmanoeuvrepeculiar to her sex, Helene
d'Herouville repeated in a low voice all the calumnies which women

jealous of the Duchesse de Chaulieu were in the habit of spreading
about the poet. This little incident, common as it is in the

intercourse of women, will serve to show with what fury the hounds
were after Modeste's wealth.

Ten days saw a great change in the opinions at the Chalet as to the
three suitors for Mademoiselle de La Bastie's hand. This change, which

was much to the advantage" target="_blank" title="n.不利(条件)；损失">disadvantage of Canalis, came about through
considerations of a nature which ought to make the holders of any kind

of fame pause, and reflect. No one can deny, if we remember the
passion with which people seek for autographs, that public curiosity

is greatly excited by celebrity. Evidently most provincials never form
an exact idea in their own minds of how illustrious Parisians put on

their cravats, walk on the boulevards, stand gaping at nothing, or eat
a cutlet; because, no sooner do they perceive a man clothed in the

sunbeams of fashion or resplendent with some dignity that is more or
less fugitive (though always envied), than they cry out, "Look at

that!" "How queer!" and other depreciatory exclamations. In a word,
the mysterious charm that attaches to every kind of fame, even that

which is most justly due, never lasts. It is, and especially with
superficial people who are envious or sarcastic, a sensation which

passes off with the rapidity of lightning, and never returns. It would
seem as though fame, like the sun, hot and luminous at a distance, is

cold as the summit of an alp when you approach it. Perhaps man is only
really great to his peers; perhaps the defects inherent in his

constitution disappear sooner to the eyes of his equals than to those
of vulgar admirers. A poet, if he would please in ordinary life, must

put on the fictitious graces of those who are able to make their
insignificances forgotten by charming manners and complying speeches.

The poet of the faubourg Saint-Germain, who did not choose to bow
before this social dictum, was made before long to feel that an

insulting provincialindifference had succeeded to the dazed
fascination of the earlier evenings. The prodigality of his wit and

wisdom had produced upon these worthy souls somewhat the effect which
a shopful of glass-ware produces on the eye; in other words, the fire

and brilliancy of Canalis's eloquence soon wearied people who, to use
their own words, "cared more for the solid."

Forced after a while to behave like an ordinary man, the poet found an
unexpected stumbling-block on ground where La Briere had already won

the suffrage of the worthy people who at first had thought him sulky.
They felt the need of compensating themselves for Canalis's reputation

by preferring his friend. The best of men are influenced by such
feelings as these. The simple and straightforward young fellow jarred

no one's self-love; coming to know him better they discovered his
heart, his modesty, his silent and sure discretion, and his excellent

bearing. The Duc d'Herouville considered him, as a political element,
far above Canalis. The poet, ill-balanced, ambitious, and restless as

Tasso, loved luxury, grandeur, and ran into debt; while the young
lawyer, whose character was equable and well-balanced, lived soberly,

was useful without proclaiming it, awaited rewards without begging for
them, and laid by his money.

Canalis had moreover laid himself open in a special way to the
bourgeois eyes that were watching him. For two or three days he had

shown signs of impatience; he had given way to depression, to states
of melancholy without apparent reason, to those capricious changes of

temper which are the natural results of the nervoustemperament of
poets. These originalities (we use the provincial word) came from the

uneasiness that his conduct toward the Duchesse de Chaulieu which grew
daily less explainable, caused him. He knew he ought to write to her,

but could not resolve on doing so. All these fluctuations were
carefully remarked and commented on by the gentle American, and the

excellent Madame Latournelle, and they formed the topic of many a
discussion between these two ladies and Madame Mignon. Canalis felt

the effects of these discussions without being able to explain them.
The attention paid to him was not the same, the faces surrounding him

no longer wore the entranced look of the earlier days; while at the
same time Ernest was evidently gaining ground.

For the last two days the poet had endeavored to fascinate Modeste
only, and he took advantage of every moment when he found himself

alone with her, to weave the web of passionate language around his
love. Modeste's blush, as she listened to him on the occasion we have

just mentioned, showed the demoiselles d'Herouville the pleasure with
which she was listening to sweet conceits that were sweetly said; and

they, horriblyuneasy at the sight, had immediate recourse to the
"ultima ratio" of women in such cases, namely, those calumnies which

seldom miss their object. Accordingly, when the party met at the
dinner-table the poet saw a cloud on the brow of his idol; he knew

that Mademoiselle d'Herouville's malignity allowed him to lose no
time, and he resolved to offer himself as a husband at the first

moment when he could find himself alone with Modeste.
Overhearing a few acid though polite remarks exchanged between the

poet and the two noble ladies, Gobenheim nudged Butscha with his
elbow, and said in an undertone, motioning towards the poet and the

grand equerry,--
"They'll demolish one another!"

"Canalis has genius enough to demolish himself all alone," answered
the dwarf.

CHAPTER XXII
A RIDDLE GUESSED

During the dinner, which was magnificent and admirably well served,
the duke obtained a signal advantage over Canalis. Modeste, who had

received her habit and other equestrian equipments the night before,
spoke of taking rides about the country. A turn of the conversation

led her to express the wish to see a hunt with hounds, a pleasure she
had never yet enjoyed. The duke at once proposed to arrange a hunt in

one of the crown forests, which lay a few leagues from Havre. Thanks
to his intimacy with the Prince de Cadignan, Master of the Hunt, he