we've got a little machine more powerful than all the forts in the
world,--a machine, due to a doctor, which cured more people during the

short time we worked it than the doctors ever killed."
"How you talk!" exclaimed Gazonal, whose flesh began to creep at

Publicola's air and manner.
"Ha! that's the thing we rely on! We follow Saint-Just and

Robespierre; but we'll do better than they; they were timid, and you
see what came of it; an emperor! the elder branch! the younger branch!

The Montagnards didn't lop the social tree enough."
"Ah ca! you, who will be, they tell me, consul, or something of that

kind, tribune perhaps, be good enough to remember," said Bixiou, "that
I have asked your protection for the last dozen years."

"No harm shall happen to you; we shall need wags, and you can take the
place of Barere," replied the corn-doctor.

"And I?" said Leon.
"Ah, you! you are my client, and that will save you; for genius is an

odious privilege, to which too much is accorded in France; we shall be
forced to annihilate some of our greatest men in order to teach others

to be simple citizens."
The corn-cutter spoke with a semi-serious, semi-jesting air that made

Gazonal shudder.
"So," he said, "there's to be no more religion?"

"No more religion OF THE STATE," replied the pedicure, emphasizing the
last words; "every man will have his own. It is very fortunate that

the government is just now endowing convents; they'll provide our
funds. Everything, you see, conspires in our favour. Those who pity

the peoples, who clamor on behalf of proletaries, who write works
against the Jesuits, who busy themselves about the amelioration of no

matter what,--the communists, the humanitarians, the philanthropists,
you understand,--all these people are our advanced guard. While we are

storing gunpowder, they are making the tinder which the spark of a
single circumstance will ignite."

"But what do you expect will make the happiness of France?" cried
Gazonal.

"Equality of citizens and cheapness of provisions. We mean that there
will be no persons lacking anything, no millionaires, no suckers of

blood and victims."
"That's it!--maximum and minimum," said Gazonal.

"You've said it," replied the corn-cutter, decisively.
"No more manufacturers?" asked Gazonal.

"The state will manufacture. We shall all be the usufructuaries of
France; each will have his ration as on board ship; and all the world

will work according to their capacity."
"Ah!" said Gazonal, "and while awaiting the time when you can cut off

the heads of aristocrats--"
"I cut their nails," said the radicalrepublican, putting up his tools

and finishing the jest himself.
Then he bowed very politely and went away.

"Can this be possible in 1845?" cried Gazonal.
"If there were time we could show you," said his cousin, "all the

personages of 1793, and you could talk with them. You have just seen
Marat; well! we know Fouquier-Tinville, Collot d'Herbois, Robespierre,

Chabot, Fouche, Barras; there is even a magnificent Madame Roland."
"Well, the tragic is not lacking in your play," said Gazonal.

"It is six o'clock. Before we take you to see Odry in 'Les
Saltimbauques' to-night," said Leon to Gazonal, "we must go and pay a

visit to Madame Cadine,--an actress whom your committee-man Massol
cultivates, and to whom you must therefore pay the most assiduous

court."
"And as it is all important that you conciliate that power, I am going

to give you a few instructions," said Bixiou. "Do you employ workwomen
in your manufactory?"

"Of course I do," replied Gazonal.
"That's all I want to know," resumed Bixiou. "You are not married, and

you are a great--"
"Yes!" cried Gazonal, "you've guessed my strong point, I'm a great

lover of women."
"Well, then! if you will execute the little manoeuvre which I am about

to prescribe for you, you will taste, without spending a farthing, the
sweets to be found in the good graces of an actress."

When they reached the rue de la Victoire where the celebratedactress
lived, Bixiou, who meditated a trick upon the distrustful provincial,

had scarcely finished teaching him his role; but Gazonal was quick, as
we shall see, to take a hint.

The three friends went up to the second floor of a rather handsome
house, and found Madame Jenny Cadine just finishing dinner, for she

played that night in an afterpiece at the Gymnase. Having presented
Gazonal to this great power, Leon and Bixiou, in order to leave them

alone together, made the excuse of looking at a piece of furniture in
another room; but before leaving, Bixiou had whispered in the

actress's ear: "He is Leon's cousin, a manufacturer, enormously rich;
he wants to win a suit before the Council of State against his

prefect, and he thinks it wise to fascinate you in order to get Massol
on his side."

All Paris knows the beauty of that young actress, and will therefore
understand the stupefaction of the Southerner on seeing her. Though

she had received him at first rather coldly, he became the object of
her good graces before they had been many minutes alone together.

"How strange!" said Gazonal, looking round him disdainfully on the
furniture of the salon, the door of which his accomplices had left

half open, "that a woman like you should be allowed to live in such an
ill-furnished apartment."

"Ah, yes, indeed! but how can I help it? Massol is not rich; I am
hoping he will be made a minister."

"What a happy man!" cried Gazonal, heaving the sigh of a provincial.
"Good!" thought she. "I shall have new furniture, and get the better

of Carabine."
"Well, my dear!" said Leon, returning, "you'll be sure to come to

Carabine's to-night, won't you?--supper and lansquenet."
"Will monsieur be there?" said Jenny Cadine, looking artlessly and

graciously at Gazonal.
"Yes, madame," replied the countryman, dazzled by such rapid success.

"But Massol will be there," said Bixiou.
"Well, what of that?" returned Jenny. "Come, we must part, my

treasures; I must go to the theatre."
Gazonal gave his hand to the actress, and led her to the citadine

which was waiting for her; as he did so he pressed hers with such
ardor that Jenny Cadine exclaimed, shaking her fingers: "Take care! I

haven't any others."
When the three friends got back into their own vehicle, Gazonal

endeavoured to seize Bixiou round the waist, crying out: "She bites!
You're a fine rascal!"

"So women say," replied Bixiou.
At half-past eleven o'clock, after the play, another citadine took the

trio to the house of Mademoiselle Seraphine Sinet, better known under
the name of Carabine,--one of those pseudonyms which famous lorettes

take, or which are given to them; a name which, in this instance, may
have referred to the pigeons she had killed.

Carabine, now become almost a necessity for the banker du Tillet,
deputy of the Left, lived in a charming house in the rue Saint-

Georges. In Paris there are many houses the destination of which never
varies; and the one we now speak of had already seen seven careers of

courtesans. A broker had brought there, about the year 1827, Suzanne
du Val-Noble, afterwards Madame Gaillard. In that house the famous