s' leave of absence; her place is a permanent one, and she must not
risk it. As for me, in the month of October I have an important work,
which Schinner has just obtained for me from a peer of France; so you
see, madame, my future fortune is in my brushes."

This speech was received by Madame Hochon with much amazement. Though
relatively superior to the town she lived in, the old lady did not
believe in painting. She glanced at her goddaughter, and again pressed
her hand.

"This Maxence is the second volume of Philippe," whispered Joseph in
his mother's ear, "--only cleverer and better behaved. Well, madame," he
said, aloud, "we won't trouble Monsieur Hochon by staying very long."

"Ah! you are young; you know nothing of the world," said the old lady.
"A couple of weeks, if you are judicious, may produce great results;
listen to my advice, and act accordingly."

"Oh! willingly," said Joseph, "I know I have a perfectly amazing
incapacity for domestic statesmanship: for example, I am sure I don't
know what Desroches himself would tell us to do if my uncle declines to
see us."

Mesdames Borniche, Goddet-Herau, Beaussier, Lousteau-Prangin and Fichet,
decorated with their husbands, here entered the room.

When the fourteen persons were seated, and the usual compliments were
over, Madame Hochon presented her goddaughter Agathe and Joseph. Joseph
sat in his armchair all the evening, engaged in slyly studying the
sixty faces which, from five o'clock until half past nine, posed for
him gratis, as he afterwards told his mother. Such behavior before the
aristocracy of Issoudun did not tend to change the opinion of the
little town concerning him: every one went home ruffled by his sarcastic
glances, uneasy under his smiles, and even frightened at his face,
which seemed sinister to a class of people unable to recognize the
singularities of genius.

After ten o'clock, when the household was in bed, Madame Hochon kept her
goddaughter in her chamber until midnight. Secure from interruption,
the two women told each other the sorrows of their lives, and exchanged
their sufferings. As Agathe listened to the last echoes of a soul that
had missed its destiny, and felt the sufferings of a heart, essentially
generous and charitable, whose charity and generosity could never be
exercised, she realized the immensity of the desert in which the powers
of this noble, unrecognized soul had been wasted, and knew that she
herself, with the lit