till have to tell, forming as they do
a sort of second existence lived by this creature--may I not say this
creation?--in whom everything was to be so extraordinary, even his end.

When Louis returned to Blois, his uncle was eager to procure him some
amusement; but the poor priest was regarded as a perfect leper in that
godly-minded town. No one would have anything to say to a revolutionary
who had taken the oaths. His society, therefore, consisted of a
few individuals of what were then called liberal or patriotic, or
constitutional opinions, on whom he would call for a rubber of whist or
of boston.

At the first house where he was introduced by his uncle, Louis met a
young lady, whose circumstances obliged her to remain in this circle, so
contemned by those of the fashionable world, though her fortune was such
as to make it probable that she might by and by marry into the highest
aristocracy of the province. Mademoiselle Pauline de Villenoix was sole
heiress to the wealth amassed by her grandfather, a Jew named Salomon,
who, contrary to the customs of his nation, had, in his old age, married
a Christian and a Catholic. He had only one son, who was brought up in
his mother's faith. At his father's death young Salomon purchased what
was known at that time as a _savonnette a vilain_ (literally _a cake of
soap for a serf_), a small estate called Villenoix, which he contrived
to get registered with a baronial title, and took its name. He died
unmarried, but he left a natural daughter, to whom he bequeathed the
greater part of his fortune, including the lands of Villenoix. He
appointed one of his uncles, Monsieur Joseph Salomon, to be the girl's
guardian. The old Jew was so devoted to his ward that he seemed
willing to make great sacrifices for the sake of marrying her well. But
Mademoiselle de Villenoix's birth, and the cherished prejudice against
Jews that prevails in the provinces, would not allow of her being
received in the very exclusive circle which, rightly or wrongly,
considers itself noble, notwithstanding her own large fortune and her
guardian's.

Monsieur Joseph Salomon was resolved that if she could not secure
a country squire, his niece should go to Paris and make choice of
a husband among the peers of France, liberal or monarchical; as to
happiness, that he believed he could secure her by the terms of the
marriage contract.

Mademoiselle de Villenoix was now twenty. Her remarkable beauty and
gifts of