eur Jacotot. You may feel
assured, Jacotot, I make no mistake in the friends I introduce here."

The old man gave a smile of pleasure; while, turning to me, he said,--

"He is discretion itself; and I am but too happy to make your
acquaintance. And now, Chevalier, one word with you."

He retreated towards the door, holding Duchesne's arm, and whispering as
he went. Duchesne's face, however, expressed his impatience as he spoke;
and at last he said,--

"As you please, my worthy friend; I always submit to your wiser
counsels. So farewell for the present."

He looked after the old man as he slowly descended the stairs, and then
closing the door and locking it, he exclaimed,--

"_Parbleu!_I found it very hard to listen to his prosing with even a
show of patience, and was half tempted to tell him that the Bourbons
could wait, though the soup could not."

"Then Monsieur Jacotot is a Royalist, I presume?"

"Ay, that he is; and so are all they who frequent this house. Don't
start; the police know it well, and no one is more amused at their
absurd plottings and conspirings than Fouche himself. Now and then, to
be sure, some fool, more rash and brainless than the others, will come
up from La Vendee and try to knock his head against the walls of the
Temple,--like De Courcelles there, who has no other business in Paris
except to be guillotined, if it were worth the trouble. Then the
minister affects to stir himself and be on the alert, just to terrify
them; but he well knows that danger lurks not in this quarter. Believe
me, Burke, the present rulers of France have no greater security than
in the contemptible character of all their opponents. There is no course
for a man of energy and courage to adopt. But I ask your pardon, my dear
friend, for this treasonable talk. What think you of the dinner? The
Royalists would never have fallen if they had understood government as
well as cuisine. Taste that _supreme_, and say if you don't regret the
Capets,--a feeling you can indulge the more freely because you never
knew them."

"I cannot comprehend, Duchesne, what are the grievances you charge
against the present Government of France. Had you been an old courtier
of the last reign,--a hanger-on of Versailles or the Tuileries,--the
thing were intelligible; but you, a soldier, a man of daring and
enterprise--"

"Let me interrupt you. I am so only because it is the taste of the day;
but I despise the parade of military glory we ha