"Oh! you know very well of whom I speak, I speak of your Bonaparte."

Mr. Goulden, seeing her anger, turned round to his counter to avoid a
dispute. He seemed to be examining a watch, and I followed his example.

"Yes," said she, speaking still louder, "his evil deeds are commencing
again; just as we thought all was finished! and he comes back again
worse than ever! What a pest!"

I could hear her voice tremble. Mr. Goulden kept on with his work, and
asked, without turning round, "Whose fault is it, Mother Gredel? Do
you think that those processions, atonements, and the sermons in regard
to the national domains and the 'rebellion of twenty-five years,' these
continual menaces of establishing the old order of things, the order to
close the shops during the service, do you think all that could
continue? Did any one, let me ask, ever see since the world began,
anything more calculated to rouse a nation against those who attempt to
degrade it! You would have said that Bonaparte himself had whispered
in the ears of those Bourbons, all the stupidities which would be
likely to disgust the people. Tell me, might we not expect just what
has come to pass?"

He kept on looking at the watch through his glass in order to keep
calm. While he was speaking I had looked at Aunt Gredel out of the
corner of my eye. She had changed color two or three times, and
Catherine, who was behind us near the stove, made signs to her not to
make trouble in our house, but the wilful woman disregarded all signs.

"You, too, are satisfied then, are you? you change from one day to
another like the rest of them, you always bring out your republic when
it suits you."

On hearing this, Mr. Goulden coughed softly, as if he had something in
his throat, and for half a minute he seemed to be considering, while
aunt looked on. He recovered himself at last and said slowly: "You are
wrong, Madame Gredel, to reproach me, for if I had wished to change I
should have begun sooner. Instead of being a clock-maker in Pfalzbourg
I should have been a colonel or a general, like the others, but I
always have been, I am now, and shall remain till I die, for the
Republic and the Rights of Man."

Then he turned suddenly round, and looking at aunt from head to foot,
and raising his voice; he went on: "And that is the reason why I like
Bonaparte better than the Comte d'Artois, the emigres, the
missionaries, and the workers of miracles; at least he is forced