ever got the better of Gaudissart, the illustrious Gaudissart, and

nobody ever will. Yes, I say it! no one ever outwitted me, and no one
can--in any walk of life, politics or impolitics, here or elsewhere.

But, for the time being, I must give myself wholly to the capitalists;
to the 'Globe,' the 'Movement,' the 'Children,' and my article Paris."

"You will be brought up with a round turn, you and your newspapers.
I'll bet you won't get further than Poitiers before the police will

nab you."
"What will you bet?"

"A shawl."
"Done! If I lose that shawl I'll go back to the article Paris and the

hat business. But as for getting the better of Gaudissart--never!
never!"

And the illustrious traveller threw himself into position before
Jenny, looked at her proudly, one hand in his waistcoat, his head at

three-quarter profile,--an attitude truly Napoleonic.
"Oh, how funny you are! what have you been eating to-night?"

Gaudissart was thirty-eight years of age, of mediumheight, stout and
fat like men who roll about continually in stage-coaches, with a face

as round as a pumpkin, ruddy cheeks, and regular features of the type
which sculptors of all lands adopt as a model for statues of

Abundance, Law, Force, Commerce, and the like. His protuberant stomach
swelled forth in the shape of a pear; his legs were small, but active

and vigorous. He caught Jenny up in his arms like a baby and kissed
her.

"Hold your tongue, young woman!" he said. "What do you know about
Saint-Simonism, antagonism, Fourierism, criticism, heroicenterprise,

or woman's freedom? I'll tell you what they are,--ten francs for each
subscription, Madame Gaudissart."

"On my word of honor, you are going crazy, Gaudissart."
"More and more crazy about YOU," he replied, flinging his hat upon the

sofa.
The next morning Gaudissart, having breakfasted gloriously with Jenny,

departed on horseback to work up the chief towns of the district to
which he was assigned by the various enterprises in whose interests he

was now about to exercise his great talents. After spending forty-five
days in beating up the country between Paris and Blois, he remained

two weeks at the latter place to write up his correspondence and make
short visits to the various market towns of the department. The night

before he left Blois for Tours he indited a letter to Mademoiselle
Jenny Courand. As the conciseness and charm of this epistle cannot be

equalled by any narration of ours, and as, moreover, it proves the
legitimacy of the tie which united these two individuals, we produce

it here:--
"My dear Jenny,--You will lose your wager. Like Napoleon,

Gaudissart the illustrious has his star, but NOT his Waterloo. I
triumph everywhere. Life insurance has done well. Between Paris

and Blois I lodged two millions. But as I get to the centre of
France heads become infinitely harder and millions correspondingly

scarce. The article Paris keeps up its own little jog-trot. It is
a ring on the finger. With all my well-knowncunning I spit these

shop-keepers like larks. I got off one hundred and sixty-two
Ternaux shawls at Orleans. I am sure I don't know what they will

do with them, unless they return them to the backs of the sheep.
"As to the article journal--the devil! that's a horse of another

color. Holy saints! how one has to warble before you can teach
these bumpkins a new tune. I have only made sixty-two 'Movements':

exactly a hundred less for the whole trip than the shawls in one
town. Those republican rogues! they won't subscribe. They talk,

they talk; they share your opinions, and presently you are all
agreed that every existing thing must be overturned. You feel sure

your man is going to subscribe. Not a bit of it! If he owns three
feet of ground, enough to grow ten cabbages, or a few trees to

slice into toothpicks, the fellow begins to talk of consolidated
property, taxes, revenues, indemnities,--a whole lot of stuff, and

I have wasted my time and breath on patriotism. It's a bad
business! Candidly, the 'Movement' does not move. I have written

to the directors and told them so. I am sorry for it--on account
of my political opinions.

"As for the 'Globe,' that's another breed altogether. Just set to
work and talk new doctrines to people you fancy are fools enough

to believe such lies,--why, they think you want to burn their
houses down! It is vain for me to tell them that I speak for

futurity, for posterity, for self-interest properly understood;
for enterprise where nothing can be lost; that man has preyed upon

man long enough; that woman is a slave; that the great
providential thought should be made to triumph; that a way must be

found to arrive at a rational co-ordination of the social fabric,
--in short, the whole reverberation of my sentences. Well, what do

you think? when I open upon them with such ideas these provincials
lock their cupboards as if I wanted to steal their spoons and beg

me to go away! Are not they fools? geese? The 'Globe' is smashed.
I said to the proprietors, 'You are too advanced, you go ahead too

fast: you ought to get a few results; the provinces like results.'
However, I have made a hundred 'Globes,' and I must say,

considering the thick-headedness of these clodhoppers, it is a
miracle. But to do it I had to make them such a lot of promises

that I am sure I don't know how the globites, globists, globules,
or whatever they call themselves, will ever get out of them. But

they always tell me they can make the world a great deal better
than it is, so I go ahead and prophesy to the value of ten francs

for each subscription. There was one farmer who thought the paper
was agricultural because of its name. I Globed HIM. Bah! he gave

in at once; he had a projecting forehead; all men with projecting
foreheads are ideologists.

"But the 'Children'; oh! ah! as to the 'Children'! I got two
thousand between Paris and Blois. Jolly business! but there is not

much to say. You just show a little vignette to the mother,
pretending to hide it from the child: naturally the child wants to

see, and pulls mamma's gown and cries for its newspaper, because
'Papa has DOT his.' Mamma can't let her brat tear the gown; the

gown costs thirty francs, the subscription six--economy; result,
subscription. It is an excellent thing, meets an actual want; it

holds a place between dolls and sugar-plums, the two eternal
necessities of childhood.

"I have had a quarrel here at the table d'hote about the
newspapers and my opinions. I was unsuspiciously eating my dinner

next to a man with a gray hat who was reading the 'Debats.' I said
to myself, 'Now for my rostrum eloquence. He is tied to the

dynasty; I'll cook him; this triumph will be capital practice for
my ministerial talents.' So I went to work and praised his

'Debats.' Hein! if I didn't lead him along! Thread by thread, I
began to net my man. I launched my four-horse phrases, and the F-

sharp arguments, and all the rest of the cursed stuff. Everybody
listened; and I saw a man who had July as plain as day on his

mustache, just ready to nibble at a 'Movement.' Well, I don't know
how it was, but I unluckily let fall the word 'blockhead.'

Thunder! you should have seen my gray hat, my dynastic hat
(shocking bad hat, anyhow), who got the bit in his teeth and was

furiously angry. I put on my grand air--you know--and said to him:
'Ah, ca! Monsieur, you are remarkablyaggressive; if you are not

content, I am ready to give you satisfaction; I fought in July.'
'Though the father of a family,' he replied, 'I am ready--'

'Father of a family!' I exclaimed; 'my dear sir, have you any
children?' 'Yes.' 'Twelve years old?' 'Just about.' 'Well, then,

the "Children's Journal" is the very thing for you; six francs a
year, one number a month, double columns, edited by great literary

lights, well got up, good paper, engravings from charming sketches
by our best artists, actual colored drawings of the Indies--will

not fade.' I fired my broadside 'feelings of a father, etc.,
etc.,'--in short, a subscription instead of a quarrel. 'There's

nobody but Gaudissart who can get out of things like that,' said