rom this point he proceeded to classify
the world at large. All these fine distinctions seem very far away."

"Ah!" said Blondet, "you have set your finger on a great calamity. If
Marcel had been properly understood, there would have been no French
Revolution."

"It had been Godefroid's privilege to run over Europe," resumed Bixiou,
"nor had he neglected his opportunities of making a thorough comparative
study of European dancing. Perhaps but for profound diligence in the
pursuit of what is usually held to be useless knowledge, he would never
have fallen in love with this young lady; as it was, out of the three
hundred guests that crowded the handsome rooms in the Rue Saint-Lazare,
he alone comprehended the unpublished romance revealed by a garrulous
quadrille. People certainly noticed Isaure d'Aldrigger's dancing; but in
this present century the cry is 'Skim lightly over the surface, do not
lean your weight on it;' so one said (he was a notary's clerk), 'There
is a girl that dances uncommonly well;' another (a lady in a turban),
'There is a young lady that dances enchantingly;' and a third (a woman
of thirty), 'That little thing is not dancing badly.'--But to return to
the great Marcel, let us parody his best known saying with, 'How much
there is in an _avant-deux_.'"

"And let us get on a little faster," said Blondet; "you are maundering."

"Isaure," continued Bixiou, looking askance at Blondet, "wore a simple
white crepe dress with green ribbons; she had a camellia in her hair,
a camellia at her waist, another camellia at her skirt-hem, and a
camellia----"

"Come, now! here comes Sancho's three hundred goats."

"Therein lies all literature, dear boy. _Clarissa_ is a masterpiece,
there are fourteen volumes of her, and the most wooden-headed playwright
would give you the whole of _Clarissa_ in a single act. So long as I
amuse you, what have you to complain of? That costume was positively
lovely. Don't you like camillias? Would you rather have dahlias? No?
Very good, chestnuts then, here's for you." (And probably Bixiou flung a
chestnut across the table, for we heard something drop on a plate.)

"I was wrong, I acknowledge it. Go on," said Blondet.

"I resume. 'Pretty enough to marry, isn't she?' said Rastignac, coming
up to Godefroid de Beaudenord, and indicating the little one with the
spotless white camellias, every petal intact.

"Rastignac being an intimate friend, Godefroid answered in a low
voice, 'Well