my doors, even whilst crime and political intrigue were more
rife in Paris than they had been in the most corrupt days of the
Revolution and the Consulate.

I told you, I think, that I had forgiven Theodore his abominable
treachery in connexion with the secret naval treaty, and we were the
best of friends--that is, outwardly, of course. Within my inmost heart
I felt, Sir, that I could never again trust that shameless
traitor--that I had in very truth nurtured a serpent in my bosom. But
I am proverbially tender-hearted. You will believe me or not, I simply
could not turn that vermin out into the street. He deserved it! Oh,
even he would have admitted when he was quite sober, which was not
often, that I had every right to give him the sack, to send him back
to the gutter whence he had come, there to grub once more for scraps
of filth and to stretch a half-frozen hand to the charity of the
passers by.

But I did not do it, Sir. No, I did not do it. I kept him on at the
office as my confidential servant; I gave him all the crumbs that fell
from mine own table, and he helped himself to the rest. I made as
little difference as I could in my intercourse with him. I continued
to treat him almost as an equal. The only difference I did make in our
mode of life was that I no longer gave him bed and board at the
hostelry where I lodged in Passy, but placed the chair-bedstead in the
anteroom of the office permanently at his disposal, and allowed him
five sous a day for his breakfast.

But owing to the scarcity of business that now came my way, Theodore
had little or nothing to do, and he was in very truth eating his head
off, and with that, grumble, grumble all the time, threatening to
leave me, if you please, to leave my service for more remunerative
occupation. As if anyone else would dream of employing such an
out-at-elbows mudlark--a jail-bird, Sir, if you'll believe me.

Thus the Spring of 1816 came along. Spring, Sir, with its beauty and
its promises, and the thoughts of love which come eternally in the
minds of those who have not yet wholly done with youth. Love, Sir! I
dreamed of it on those long, weary afternoons in April, after I had
consumed my scanty repast, and whilst Theodore in the anteroom was
snoring like a hog. At even, when tired out and thirsty, I would sit
for a while outside a humble cafe on the outer boulevards, I watched
the amorous couples wander past me on their way to happiness. At night
I could not s