ch as Ganguernet: and secondly; that of always being carried in
a sedan-chair by porters, when she went abroad. One evening she went to a
ball, given by the first president of the court of assizes, a ball at
which Ganguernet was also present. She left about midnight, carried as
usual in her sedan-chair through a pelting shower of rain. At the moment
she got under one of those loop-holes in the eaves-gutters, through which
the rain pours down into the street in long dashing cascades, two or three
shrill whistles were heard on the right and left hand. Immediately four
men in masks made their appearance, at sight of whom the porters,
abandoning their charge, took to their heels; but at the moment when the
noble dame believed herself on the point of being assassinated, a terrible
dash of cold water upon her head took away her breath, and almost deprived
her of consciousness. The top of the chair had disappeared as if by magic,
and the gutter poured its contents directly into the vehicle, the occupant
of which in vain attempted to force open the door. She beat and thumped
against it with fury, mounted the seat, and like an incarnate fiend,
invoked the divine wrath upon the vile miscreants, who were giving her
such a cruel shower-bath; and who only replied to her invectives by
profound bows, and the most humble salutations. The worst part of this
wicked trick was, that the lady wore hair-powder, and the mystifiers
carried umbrellas.

My acquaintance with Ganguernet continued about ten years. In the low and
vulgar circles of society which he was fond of frequenting, he was held up
as the most jovial, the best-natured, and the most amusing fellow in the
world; although there were some, whose sense of propriety and moral
feelings were not entirely destroyed, who held him in merited contempt.
For my own part, I always had a dread of the man. That odious smile,
forever hanging on those large red lips, singularly annoyed me; that
imperturbable gayety, exhibited on all occasions of life, troubled me like
the constant presence of a hideous phantom; that phrase, which he appended
like a moral to every thing he did, that detested phrase, 'A capital
joke,' sounded in my ears as doleful and sombre as the Trappists' motto,
'_Brother, we must die_!'

There was a fatality about the man; and it was destined that a life should
be sacrificed to his mad propensity for mischief. A day came, on which his
famous words, 'A capital joke!' was to be