ty, and one could admire the
lines and the puckers which wrinkle the faces of bankers and which are
to be seen in the money-changers of Quintin Matsys.

His beginnings were humble and his success amazing. He married an ugly
woman and they saw themselves reflected in their children as in a
mirror. Baron Max Everdingen's large mansion, which rears itself on the
heights of the Trocadero, is crammed with the spoils of Christian
Europe.

The Baron received Arcade and Prince Istar in his study,--one of the
most modest rooms in his mansion. The ceiling is decorated with a fresco
of Tiepolo, taken from a Venetian palace. The bureau of the Regent,
Philip of Orleans, is in this room, which is full of cabinets,
show-cases, pictures, and statues.

Arcade allowed his gaze to wander over the walls.

"How comes it, my brother Sophar," said he, "that you, in spite of your
Jewish heart, obey so ill the commandment of the Lord your God who said:
'Thou shalt have no graven images'? for here I see an Apollo of Houdon's
and a Hebe of Lemoine's, and several busts by Caffieri. And, like
Solomon in his old age, O son of God, you set up in your dwelling-place
the idols of strange nations: for such are this Venus of Boucher, this
Jupiter of Rubens, and those nymphs that are indebted to Fragonard's
brush for the gooseberry jam which smears their gleaming limbs. And here
in this single show-case, Sophar, you keep the sceptre of St. Louis, six
hundred pearls of Marie Antoinette's broken necklace, the imperial
mantle of Charles V, the tiara wrought by Ghiberti for Pope Martin V,
the Colonna, Bonaparte's sword--and I know not what besides."

"Mere trifles," said Max Everdingen.

"My dear Baron," said Prince Istar, "you even possess the ring which
Charlemagne placed on a fairy's finger and which was thought to be lost.
But let us discuss the business on which we have come. My friend and I
have come to ask you for money."

"I can well believe it," replied Max Everdingen. "Everyone wants money,
but for different reasons. What do you want money for?"

Prince Istar replied simply:

"To stir up a revolution in France."

"In France!" repeated the Baron, "in France? Well, I shall give you no
money for that, you may be quite sure."

Arcade did not disguise the fact that he had expected greater liberality
and more generous help from a celestial brother.

"Our project," he said, "is a vast one. It embraces both Heaven and
Earth. It is settled in