in the last elections?" said the statesman,
looking hard at Gazonal.

"No; but what you have just said in my hearing has bribed me; on the
word of a commandant of the National Guard I'll have your candidate
elected--"

"Very good; will you guarantee your cousin?" asked the young man,
turning to Leon.

"We are forming him," said Bixiou, in a tone irresistibly comic.

"Well, I'll see about it," said the young man, leaving his friends and
rushing precipitately back to the Chamber.

"Who is that?" asked Gazonal.

"The Comte de Rastignac; the minister of the department in which your
affair is brought up."

"A minister! Isn't a minister anything more than that?"

"He is an old friend of ours. He now has three hundred thousand francs
a year; he's a peer of France; the king has made him a count; he
married Nucingen's daughter; and he is one of the two or three statesmen
produced by the revolution of July. But his fame and his power bore him
sometimes, and he comes down to laugh with us."

"Ah ca! cousin; why didn't you tell us you belonged to the Opposition?"
asked Leon, seizing Gazonal by the arm. "How stupid of you! One deputy
more or less to Right or Left and your bed is made."

"We are all for the Others down my way."

"Let 'em go," said Bixiou, with a facetious look; "they have Providence
on their side, and Providence will bring them back without you and in
spite of themselves. A manufacturer ought to be a fatalist."

"What luck! There's Maxime, with Canalis and Giraud," said Leon.

"Come along, friend Gazonal, the promised actors are mustering on the
stage," said Bixiou.

And all three advanced to the above-named personages, who seemed to be
sauntering along with nothing to do.

"Have they turned you out, or why are you idling about in this way?"
said Bixiou to Giraud.

"No, while they are voting by secret ballot we have come out for a
little air," replied Giraud.

"How did the prime minister pull through?"

"He was magnificent!" said Canalis.

"Magnificent!" repeated Maxime.

"Magnificent!" cried Giraud.

"So! so! Right, Left, and Centre are unanimous!"

"All with a different meaning," observed Maxime de Trailles.

Maxime was the ministerial deputy.

"Yes," said Canalis, laughing.

Though Canalis had already been a minister, he was at this moment
tending toward the Right.

"Ah! but you had a fine triumph just now," said Maxime to Canalis; "it
was you who forced the minister into the tr