is own removal, and succeeded in entering the
Imperial Guard. He desired at any price to obtain a title, honors, and
consideration in keeping with his present wealth. With this idea in
his mind, he behaved courageously in one of the most bloody battles in
Germany, but, unfortunately, he was too severely wounded to remain in
the service. Threatened with the loss of a leg, he was forced to retire
on a pension, without the title of baron, without those rewards he hoped
to win, and would have won had he not been Diard.

This event, this wound, and his thwarted hopes contributed to change his
character. His Provencal energy, roused for a time, sank down. At first
he was sustained by his wife, in whom his efforts, his courage, his
ambition had induced some belief in his nature, and who showed herself,
what women are, tender and consoling in the troubles of life. Inspired
by a few words from Juana, the retired soldier came to Paris, resolved
to win in an administrative career a position to command respect, bury
in oblivion the quartermaster of the 6th of the line, and secure for
Madame Diard a noble title. His passion for that seductive creature
enabled him to divine her most secret wishes. Juana expressed nothing,
but he understood her. He was not loved as a lover dreams of being
loved; he knew this, and he strove to make himself respected, loved, and
cherished. He foresaw a coming happiness, poor man, in the patience and
gentleness shown on all occasions by his wife; but that patience, that
gentleness, were only the outward signs of the resignation which had
made her his wife. Resignation, religion, were they love? Often Diard
wished for refusal where he met with chaste obedience; often he would
have given his eternal life that Juana might have wept upon his bosom
and not disguised her secret thoughts behind a smiling face which lied
to him nobly. Many young men--for after a certain age men no longer
struggle--persist in the effort to triumph over an evil fate, the
thunder of which they hear, from time to time, on the horizon of their
lives; and when at last they succumb and roll down the precipice
of evil, we ought to do them justice and acknowledge these inward
struggles.

Like many men Diard tried all things, and all things were hostile to
him. His wealth enabled him to surround his wife with the enjoyments of
Parisian luxury. She lived in a fine house, with noble rooms, where she
maintained a salon, in which abounded ar