hat of Suzanne's mother. The chevalier died with the
monarchy, in August, 1830. He had joined the cortege of Charles X. at
Nonancourt, and piously escorted it to Cherbourg with the Troisvilles,
Casterans, d'Esgrignons, Verneuils, etc. The old gentleman had taken
with him fifty thousand francs,--the sum to which his savings then
amounted. He offered them to one of the faithful friends of the king
for transmission to his master, speaking of his approaching death, and
declaring that the money came originally from the goodness of the
king, and, moreover, that the property of the last of the Valois
belonged of right to the crown. It is not known whether the fervor of
his zeal conquered the reluctance of the Bourbon, who abandoned his
fine kingdom of France without carrying away with him a farthing, and
who ought to have been touched by the devotion of the chevalier. It is
certain, however, that Cesarine, the residuary legate of the old man,
received from his estate only six hundred francs a year. The chevalier
returned to Alencon, cruelly weakened by grief and by fatigue; he died
on the very day when Charles X. arrived on a foreign shore.

Madame du Val-Noble and her protector, who was just then afraid of the
vengeance of the liberal party, were glad of a pretext to remain
incognito in the village where Suzanne's mother died. At the sale of
the chevalier's effects, which took place at that time, Suzanne,
anxious to obtain a souvenir of her first and last friend, pushed up
the price of the famous snuff-box, which was finally knocked down to
her for a thousand francs. The portrait of the Princess Goritza was
alone worth that sum. Two years later, a young dandy, who was making a
collection of the fine snuff-boxes of the last century, obtained from
Madame du Val-Noble the chevalier's treasure. The charming confidant
of many a love and the pleasure of an old age is now on exhibition in
a species of private museum. If the dead could know what happens after
them, the chevalier's head would surely blush upon its left cheek.

If this history has no other effect than to inspire the possessors of
precious relics with holy fear, and induce them to make codicils to
secure these touching souvenirs of joys that are no more by
bequeathing them to loving hands, it will have done an immense service
to the chivalrous and romantic portion of the community; but it does,
in truth, contain a far higher moral. Does it not show the necessity
for a