the head, assured us of the man of action, whose
physical strength and presence of mind would always command an
ascendancy over the multitude.

[Illustration: _The Chourineur, Rodolph, and La Goualeuse_
Etching by Adrian Marcel, after the drawing by Frank T. Merrill]

In his struggle with the Chourineur, Rodolph had neither betrayed anger
nor hatred. Confident in his own strength, his address, and agility, he
had only shown a contempt for the brute beast which he subdued.

We will finish this bodily picture of Rodolph by saying that his
features, regularly handsome, seemed too beautiful for a man. His eyes
were large, and of a deep hazel, his nose aquiline, his chin rather
projecting, his hair bright chestnut, of the same shade as his eyebrows,
which were strongly arched, and his small moustache, which was fine and
silky. Thanks to the manners and the language which he assumed with so
much ease, Rodolph was exactly like the other guests of the ogress.
Round his graceful neck, as elegantly modelled as that of the Indian
Bacchus, he wore a black cravat, carelessly tied, the ends of which fell
on the collar of his blue blouse. A double row of nails decorated his
heavy shoes, and, except that his hands were of most aristocratic shape,
nothing distinguished him from the other guests of the _tapis-franc_;
though, in a moral sense, his resolute air, and what we may term his
bold serenity, placed an immense distance between them.

On entering the _tapis-franc_, the Chourineur, laying one of his heavy
hands on the shoulders of Rodolph, cried, "Hail the conqueror of the
Chourineur! Yes, my boys, this springald has floored me; and if any
young gentleman wishes to have his ribs smashed, or his 'nob in
Chancery,' even including the Schoolmaster and the Skeleton, here is
their man; I will answer for him, and back him!"

At these words, all present, from the ogress to the lowest ruffian of
the _tapis-franc_, contemplated the victor of the Chourineur with
respect and fear. Some, moving their glasses and jugs to the end of the
table at which they were seated, offered Rodolph a seat, if he were
inclined to sit near them; others approached the Chourineur, and asked
him, in a low voice, for the particulars of this unknown, who had made
his entrance into their world in so striking a manner.

Then the ogress, accosting Rodolph with one of her most gracious
smiles,--a thing unheard of, and almost deemed fabulous, in the annals
of the W