so far as could be judged,
the occurrence foretold was not imminent. Monsieur de La Rochecoupee
viewed events as a statesman, and statesmen never look beyond the
present moment. I am speaking of the shrewdest and most far-sighted.
After all, supposing one day the King's daughter did fall asleep for a
hundred years, it was, in his eyes, purely a family matter, seeing that
women were excluded from the throne by the Salic Law.

He had, as he said, plenty of other fish to fry. Bankruptcy, hideous
bankruptcy was ever present, threatening to consume the wealth and the
honour of the nation. Famine was raging in the kingdom, and millions of
unfortunate wretches were eating plaster instead of bread. That year the
opera ball was more brilliant and the masques finer than ever.

The peasantry, artisans, and shopkeepers, and the girls of the theatre,
vied with one another in grieving over the fatal curse inflicted by
Alcuine upon the innocent Princess. The lords of the Court, on the
contrary, and the princes of the blood royal, appeared very indifferent
to it. And there were on all hands men of business and students of
science who did not believe in the award of the fairies, for the very
good reason that they did not believe in fairies.

Such a one was Monsieur Boulingrin, Secretary of State for the Treasury.
Those who ask how it was possible that he should not believe in them
since he had seen them are unaware of the lengths to which scepticism
can go in an argumentative mind. Nourished on Lucretius, imbued with
the doctrines of Epicurus and Gassendi, he often provoked Monsieur de La
Rochecoupee by the display of a cold disbelief in fairies.

The Prime Minister would say to him: "If not for your own sake, be a
believer for that of the public. Seriously, my dear Boulingrin, that
there are moments when I wonder which of us two is the more credulous in
respect of fairies. I never think of them, and you are always talking of
them."

Monsieur de Boulingrin dearly loved the Duchess of Cicogne, wife of the
ambassador to Vienna, first lady-in-waiting to the Queen, who belonged
to the highest aristocracy of the realm; a witty woman, somewhat lean,
and a trifle close, who was losing her income, her estates, and her very
chemise at faro. She showed much kindness to Monsieur de Boulingrin,
lending herself to an intercourse for which she had no temperamental
inclination, but which she thought suitable to her rank, and useful to
her interes