ere
matter of exchange. He thought that in the end he should have quite as
much risk with coin as with paper. Besides, legally, Mademoiselle had no
right to receive any payment except in assignats. "Legally" is a fine,
robust adverb, which bolsters up many a fortune! Moreover, he reflected
that ever since great estates and land-agents had existed, that is, ever
since the origin of society, the said agents had set up, for their own
use, an argument such as we find our cooks using in this present day.
Here it is, in its simplicity:--

"If my mistress," says the cook, "went to market herself, she would have
to pay more for her provisions than I charge her; she is the gainer,
and the profits I make do more good in my hands than in those of the
dealers."

"If Mademoiselle," thought Gaubertin, "were to manage Les Aigues
herself, she would never get thirty thousand francs a year out of it;
the peasants, the dealers, the workmen would rob her of the rest. It is
much better that I should have it, and so enable her to live in peace."

The Catholic religion, and it alone, is able to prevent these
capitulations of conscience. But, ever since 1789 religion has no
influence on two thirds of the French people. The peasants, whose
minds are keen and whose poverty drives them to imitation, had
reached, specially in the valley of Les Aigues, a frightful state of
demoralization. They went to mass on Sundays, but only at the outside of
the church, where it was their custom to meet and transact business and
make their weekly bargains.

We can now estimate the extent of the evil done by the careless
indifference of the great singer to the management of her property.
Mademoiselle Laguerre betrayed, through mere selfishness, the interests
of those who owned property, who are held in perpetual hatred by
those who own none. Since 1792 the land-owners of Paris have become of
necessity a combined body. If, alas, the feudal families, less numerous
than the middle-class families, did not perceive the necessity of
combining in 1400 under Louis XI., nor in 1600 under Richelieu, can we
expect that in this nineteenth century of progress the middle classes
will prove to be more permanently and solidly combined that the old
nobility? An oligarchy of a hundred thousand rich men presents all the
dangers of a democracy with none of its advantages. The principle of
"every man for himself and for his own," the selfishness of individual
interests, will kil