y dear; I don't smoke; my wife cannot bear a cigar.'

"His wife! thought I; always his wife: and I remember Juliette, who
really grew sick at the smell of a pipe, and Harmodius would smoke,
until, at last, the poor thing grew to smoke herself, like a trooper.
To compensate, however, as much as possible for the loss of my cigar,
Dambergeac drew from his pocket an enormous gold snuff-box, on which
figured the self-same head that I had before remarked in plaster, but
this time surrounded with a ring of pretty princes and princesses, all
nicely painted in miniature. As for the statue of Louis Philippe, that,
in the cabinet of an official, is a thing of course; but the snuff-box
seemed to indicate a degree of sentimental and personal devotion, such
as the old Royalists were only supposed to be guilty of.

"'What! you are turned decided juste milieu?' said I.

"'I am a sous-prefet,' answered Harmodius.

"I had nothing to say, but held my tongue, wondering, not at the change
which had taken place in the habits, manners, and opinions of my friend,
but at my own folly, which led me to fancy that I should find the
student of '26 in the functionary of '34. At this moment a domestic
appeared.

"'Madame is waiting for Monsieur,' said he: 'the last bell has gone, and
mass beginning.'

"'Mass!' said I, bounding up from my chair. 'You at mass like a decent
serious Christian, without crackers in your pocket, and bored keys to
whistle through?'--The sous-prefet rose, his countenance was calm, and
an indulgent smile played upon his lips, as he said, 'My arrondissement
is very devout; and not to interfere with the belief of the population
is the maxim of every wise politician: I have precise orders from
Government on the point, too, and go to eleven o'clock mass every
Sunday."'

There is a great deal of curious matter for speculation in the accounts
here so wittily given by M. de Bernard: but, perhaps, it is still
more curious to think of what he has NOT written, and to judge of his
characters, not so much by the words in which he describes them, as by
the unconscious testimony that the words all together convey. In the
first place, our author describes a swindler imitating the manners of a
dandy; and many swindlers and dandies be there, doubtless, in London
as well as in Paris. But there is about the present swindler, and
about Monsieur Dambergeac the student, and Monsieur Dambergeac the
sous-prefet, and his friend, a rich store