slaus has just quitted the waters of Baden with Queen Marie
Ernestine. He informs us that her majesty will receive with gratitude
the promised advices, and will answer them with her own hand."

"Make a note of it. I will myself write to the queen."

Whilst Rodin was inscribing a few remarks on the margin of the paper,
his master, continuing to walk up and down the room, found himself
opposite to the globe marked with little red crosses, and stood
contemplating it for a moment with a pensive air.

Rodin continued: "In consequence of the state of the public mind in
certain parts of Italy, where sundry agitators have turned their eyes in
the direction of France, Father Arsenio writes from Milan, that it would
be of importance to distribute profusely in that country, some little
book, in which the French would be represented as impious and debauched,
rapacious and bloody."

"The idea is excellent. We might turn to good account the excesses
committed by our troops in Italy during the wars of the Republic. You
must employ Jacques Dumoulin to write it. He is full of gall, spite,
and venom: the pamphlet will be scorching. Besides, I may furnish a
few notes; but you must not pay Dumoulin till after delivery of the
manuscript."

"That is well understood: for, if we were to pay him beforehand, he
would be drunk for a week in some low den. It was thus we had to pay
him twice over for his virulent attack on the pantheistic tendencies of
Professor Martin's philosophy."

"Take note of it--and go on!"

"The merchant announces that the clerk is about to send the banker to
give in his accounts. You understand?' added Rodin, after pronouncing
these words with a marked emphasis.

"Perfectly," said the other, with a start; "they are but the expressions
agreed on. What next?"

"But the clerk," continued the secretary, "is restrained by a last
scruple."

After a moment's silence, during which the features of Rodin's master
worked strongly, he thus resumed: "They must continue to act on the
clerk's mind by silence and solitude; then, let him read once more the
list of cases in which regicide is authorized and absolved. Go on!"

"The woman Sydney writes from Dresden, that she waits for instructions.
Violent scenes of jealousy on her account have again taken place between
the father and son; but neither from these new bursts of mutual hatred,
nor from the confidential communications which each has made to her
against his rival, has