are those of a soldier; frank and rough, of course, but he
seems to me both intelligent and sincere. Manners! It is a little late
in the day to talk of them, when most of the Marshals of France and the
new nobility have none better. Do you fancy yourself back in the
eighteenth century, my poor Herve?"

"Very well--but you would not like Georges to bring such manners home
from Spain!"

"If Georges distinguishes himself, and gains the Emperor's favour, he
may bring home what he likes," said Madame de Sainfoy, scornfully.
"However, there is no danger; he is our son."

"I should have thought that our son-in-law mattered at least as much."

"We are not responsible for him. By the bye, as to the General's
appearance, you can hardly object to that without bordering on treason.
For my part, I call him a handsome man."

"A handsome butcher!" said Anne de la Mariniere, under her breath.

"He is--he is a butcher's son," cried Joseph, suddenly. "I know it--the
Prefect told me. His father is still alive--old Ratoneau--a wholesale
butcher at Marseilles. He was one of the foremost among the
Revolutionists there--a butcher, indeed. Oh, madame, Herve is right! But
it is more than ridiculous--it is impossible. Why, the very name is
enough! Ratoneau!"

Madame de Sainfoy hardly seemed to hear him. She put him on one side
with the slightest movement of her hand.

"Next year, probably," she said, "General Ratoneau will be a Marshal of
France and ennobled. He will be the equal of all those other men who
have already married into our best families. At this moment a friend of
his, the Baron de Beauclair, formerly his equal, is an equerry to the
Empress. General Ratoneau has only to do the Emperor's work here, to--to
pacify and reconcile the West, and his turn will come."

She gave herself credit for not repeating Ratoneau's own words as to
sweeping out the Chouans. Joseph de la Mariniere did not deserve such
consideration, but she wished to be careful and politic.

"After all, do you not see how inconsistent we are?" she said to the
company generally. "We take all the benefits of the Empire, we submit to
a successful soldier, accept a new regime for ourselves, and refuse it
for our children. Is it not unreasonable?"

"On the face of it, yes," said Urbain, speaking for the first time. "And
there is nothing, they say, that pleases the Emperor so much as the
marriage of his officers with young ladies of good family. I have no
doubt at