themselves the bright and cheering prospect of a revivified
political existence.
An old man, decorated with the cross of Saint Louis, now rose
and proposed the health of King Louis XVIII. It was the Marquis de
Saint-Meran. This toast, recalling at once the patient exile of
Hartwell and the peace-loving King of France, excited universal
enthusiasm; glasses were elevated in the air a l'Anglais, and the
ladies, snatching their bouquets from their fair bosoms, strewed
the table with their floral treasures. In a word, an almost
poetical fervor prevailed.
"Ah," said the Marquise de Saint-Meran, a woman with a stern,
forbidding eye, though still noble and distinguished in appearance,
despite her fifty years — "ah, these revolutionists, who have
driven us from those very possessions they afterwards purchased for
a mere trifle during the Reign of Terror, would be compelled to
own, were they here, that all true devotion was on our side, since
we were content to follow the fortunes of a falling monarch, while
they, on the contrary, made their fortune by worshipping the rising
sun; yes, yes, they could not help admitting that the king, for
whom we sacrificed rank, wealth, and station was truly our `Louis
the well-beloved,' while their wretched usurper his been, and ever
will be, to them their evil genius, their `Napoleon the accursed.'
Am I not right, Villefort?"
"I beg your pardon, madame. I really must pray you to excuse me,
but — in truth — I was not attending to the conversation."
"Marquise, marquise!" interposed the old nobleman who had
proposed the toast, "let the young people alone; let me tell you,
on one's wedding day there are more agreeable subjects of
conversation than dry politics."
"Never mind, dearest mother," said a young and lovely girl, with
a profusion of light brown hair, and eyes that seemed to float in
liquid crystal, "'tis all my fault for seizing upon M. de
Villefort, so as to prevent his listening to what you said. But
there — now take him — he is your own for as long as you like. M.there — now take him — he is your own for as long as you like. M.
Villefort, I beg to remind you my mother speaks to you."
"If the marquise will deign to repeat the words I but
imperfectly caught, I shall be delighted to answer," said M. de
Villefort.
"Never mind, Renee," replied the marquise, with a look of
tenderness that seemed out of keeping with her harsh dry features;
but, however all other feelings may be withered in a woman's
nature, there is always one bright smiling spot in the desert of
her heart, and that is the shrine of maternal love. "I forgive you.
What I was saying, Villefort, was, that the Bonapartists had not
our sincerity, enthusiasm, or devotion."
"They had, however, what supplied the place of those fine
qualities," replied the young man, "and that was fanaticism.
Napoleon is the Mahomet of the West, and is worshipped by his
commonplace but ambitions followers, not only as a leader and
lawgiver, but also as the personification of equality."
"He!" cried the marquise: "Napoleon the type of equality! For
mercy's sake, then, what would you call Robespierre? Come, come, do
not strip the latter of his just rights to bestow them on the
Corsican, who, to my mind, has usurped quite enough."
"Nay, madame; I would place each of these heroes on his right
pedestal — that of Robespierre on his scaffold in the Place Louis
Quinze; that of Napoleon on the column of the Place Vendome. The
only difference consists in the opposite character of the equality
advocated by these two men; one is the equality that elevates, the
other is the equality that degrades; one brings a king within reach
of the guillotine, the other elevates the people to a level with
the throne. Observe," said Villefort, smiling, "I do not mean to
deny that both these men were revolutionary scoundrels, and that
the 9th Thermidor and the 4th of April, in the year 1814, were
lucky days for France, worthy of being gratefully remembered by
every friend to monarchy and civil order; and that explains how itevery friend to monarchy and civil order; and that explains how it
comes to pass that, fallen, as I trust he is forever, Napoleon has
still retained a train of parasitical satellites. Still, marquise,
it has been so with other usurpers — Cromwell, for instance, who
was not half so bad as Napoleon, had his partisans and
advocates."
"Do you know, Villefort, that you are talking in a most
dreadfully revolutionary strain? But I excuse it, it is impossible
to expect the son of a Girondin to be free from a small spice of
the old leaven." A deep crimson suffused the countenance of
Villefort.
"'Tis true, madame," answered he, "that my father was a
Girondin, but he was not among the number of those who voted for
the king's death; he was an equal sufferer with yourself during the
Reign of Terror, and had well-nigh lost his head on the same
scaffold on which your father perished."
"True," replied the marquise, without wincing in the slightest
degree at the tragic remembrance thus called up; "but bear in mind,
if you please, that our respective parents underwent persecution
and proscription from diametrically opposite principles; in proof
of which I may remark, that while my family remained among the
stanchest adherents of the exiled princes, your father lost no time
in joining the new government; and that while the Citizen Noirtier
was a Girondin, the Count Noirtier became a senator."
"Dear mother," interposed Renee, "you know very well it was
agreed that all these disagreeable reminiscences should forever be
laid aside."
"Suffer me, also, madame," replied Villefort, "to add my earnest
request to Mademoiselle de Saint-Meran's, that you will kindly
allow the veil of oblivion to cover and conceal the past. What
avails recrimination over matters wholly past recall? For my own
part, I have laid aside even the name of my father, and altogether
disown his political principles. He was — nay, probably may still
be — a Bonapartist, and is called Noirtier; I, on the contrary, am