our judgment is
said to be perfect."

"Charming, absolutely charming!" said he, in an attitude of affected
admiration. "It is only such taste as yours could have devised anything
so beautiful. Yet the roses,--I half think I should have preferred them
white."

"You can scarcely imagine that vain fellow with the long ringlets the
boldest soldier of the French army," said the general, in a low whisper,
as he drew me to one side.

"Indeed! And who is he, then?"

"You a hussar, and not know him! Why, Murat, to be sure."

"So, then, Madame, all my news of Monsieur Talleyrand's ball, it seems,
is stale already. You 've heard that the russian and Austrian ministers
both sent apologies?"

"Oh dear!" said she, sighing; "have I not heard it a thousand times, and
every reason for it canvassed, until I wished both of their excellencies
at--at Madame Lefebvre's dinner-party?"

"That was perfect," cried Murat, aloud; "a regular bivouac in a salon.
You'd think that the silver dishes and the gilt candelabras had just
been captured from the enemy, and that the cuisine was made by beat of
drum."

"The general is an honest man and a brave officer," said D'Auvergne,
somewhat nettled at the tone Murat spoke in.

"No small boast either," replied the other, shrugging his shoulders
carelessly, "in the times and the land we live in."

"And what of Cambaceres's soiree,--how did it go off?" interposed Madame
Bonaparte, anxious to relieve the awkward pause that followed.

"Like everything in his hotel,--sombre, stately, and stupid; the company
all dull, who would be agreeable everywhere else; the tone of the
reception labored and affected; and every one dying to get away to
Fouche's,--it was his second night for receiving."

"Was that pleasanter, then?"

"A hundred times. There are no parties like his: one meets everybody;
it is a kind of neutral territory for the Faubourg and the Jacobin, the
partisan of our people and the followers of Heaven knows who. Fouche
slips about, whispering the same anecdote in confidence to every one,
and binding each to secrecy. Then, as every one comes there to spy his
neighbor, the host has an excellent opportunity of pumping all in turn;
and while they all persist in telling him nothing but lies, they forget
that with him no readier road could lead to the detection of truth."

"The Consul!" said a servant, aloud, as the door opened and closed with
a crash; and Bonaparte, dressed in the uniform of t