pay, and the Consul Duilius,
having got rid of his musician, recovered his incognito, and, without
noise, found the door of that little house in the Suburranian Road,
which one victory had closed against him, and which another had
reopened."

"Well," asked the palatine, "what has this story to do with the fear I
have of your being assassinated?"

"What has it to do with it, my mother?" said the prince, laughing. "It
is, that if, instead of the one musician which the Consul Duilius had,
and which caused him such disappointment, I had a regiment of guards,
you may fancy what would happen to me."

"Ah! Philippe, Philippe," answered the princess, laughing and sighing at
the same time, "will you always treat serious matters so lightly!"

"No, mother," said the regent; "and the proof is, that as I presume you
did not come here solely to read me a lecture on my nocturnal courses,
but to speak on business, I am ready to listen to you, and to reply
seriously."

"Yes, you are right," said the princess; "I did come to speak to you of
other things. I came to speak of Mademoiselle de Chartres."

"Yes, of your favorite, mother; for it is useless to deny it, Louise is
your favorite. Can it be because she does not love her uncles much, whom
you do not love at all?"

"No, it is not that, but I confess it is pleasing to me to see that she
has no better opinion of bastards than I have; but it is because, except
as to beauty, which she has and I never had, she is exactly what I was
at her age, having true boy's tastes, loving dogs, horses, and
cavalcades, managing powder like an artilleryman, and making squibs like
a workman; well, guess what has happened to her."----"She wants a
commission in the guards?"

"No, no; she wants to be a nun."

"A nun! Louise! Impossible; it must be some joke of her sisters!"

"Not at all," replied the palatine; "there is no joke about it, I swear
to you."

"How has she got this passion for the cloister?" asked the regent,
beginning to believe in the truth of what his mother told him,
accustomed as he was to live at a time when the most extravagant things
were always the most probable.

"Where did she get it?" replied madame; "why, from the devil, I suppose;
I do not know where else she could have got it. The day before yesterday
she passed with her sister, riding, shooting, laughing; in fact, I had
never seen her so gay; but this evening Madame d'Orleans sent for me. I
found Mademoiselle de Ch