miable and ready to welcome him so
long as he did not appear as a suppliant; he saw at once that the surest
way of obtaining nothing was to ask for something. At Paris, if the
first impulse moves people to protect, second thoughts (which last
a good deal longer) impel them to despise the protege. Independence,
vanity, and pride, all the young Count's better and worse feelings
combined, led him, on the contrary, to assume an aggressive attitude.
And therefore the Ducs de Verneuil, de Lenoncourt, de Chaulieu, de
Navarreins, d'Herouville, de Grandlieu, and de Maufrigneuse, the Princes
de Cadignan and de Blamont-Chauvry, were delighted to present the
charming survivor of the wreck of an ancient family at court.

Victurnien went to the Tuileries in a splendid carriage with his
armorial bearings on the panels; but his presentation to His Majesty
made it abundantly clear to him that the people occupied the royal
mind so much that his nobility was like to be forgotten. The restored
dynasty, moreover, was surrounded by triple ranks of eligible old men
and gray-headed courtiers; the young noblesse was reduced to a cipher,
and this Victurnien guessed at once. He saw that there was no suitable
place for him at court, nor in the government, nor the army, nor,
indeed, anywhere else. So he launched out into the world of pleasure.
Introduced at the Elyess-Bourbon, at the Duchesse d'Angouleme's, at the
Pavillon Marsan, he met on all sides with the surface civilities due to
the heir of an old family, not so old but it could be called to mind by
the sight of a living member. And, after all, it was not a small thing
to be remembered. In the distinction with which Victurnien was honored
lay the way to the peerage and a splendid marriage; he had taken the
field with a false appearance of wealth, and his vanity would not
allow him to declare his real position. Besides, he had been so much
complimented on the figure that he made, he was so pleased with his
first success, that, like many other young men, he felt ashamed to draw
back. He took a suite of rooms in the Rue du Bac, with stables and a
complete equipment for the fashionable life to which he had committed
himself. These preliminaries cost him fifty thousand francs, which
money, moreover, the young gentleman managed to draw in spite of all
Chesnel's wise precautions, thanks to a series of unforeseen events.

Chesnel's letter certainly reached his friend's office, but Maitre
Sorbier was