s, and other Frenchmen
originally from Belgium, or coming lately thence, whose birth or wealth
won them admittance among the great seigneurs who at that time gave the
tone to social life. Young Claes found several relations and friends
ready to launch him into the great world at the very moment when that
world was about to fall. Like other young men, he was at first more
attracted by glory and science than by the vanities of life. He
frequented the society of scientific men, particularly Lavoisier, who
at that time was better known to the world for his enormous fortune as
a "fermier-general" than for his discoveries in chemistry,--though later
the great chemist was to eclipse the man of wealth.

Balthazar grew enamored of the science which Lavoisier cultivated,
and became his devoted disciple; but he was young, and handsome as
Helvetius, and before long the Parisian women taught him to distil wit
and love exclusively. Though he had studied chemistry with such ardor
that Lavoisier commended him, he deserted science and his master for
those mistresses of fashion and good taste from whom young men take
finishing lessons in knowledge of life, and learn the usages of good
society, which in Europe forms, as it were, one family.

The intoxicating dream of social success lasted but a short time.
Balthazar left Paris, weary of a hollow existence which suited neither
his ardent soul nor his loving heart. Domestic life, so calm, so tender,
which the very name of Flanders recalled to him, seemed far more fitted
to his character and to the aspirations of his heart. No gilded Parisian
salon had effaced from his mind the harmonies of the panelled parlor and
the little garden where his happy childhood had slipped away. A man
must needs be without a home to remain in Paris,--Paris, the city of
cosmopolitans, of men who wed the world, and clasp her with the arms of
Science, Art, or Power.

The son of Flanders came back to Douai, like La Fontaine's pigeon to
its nest; he wept with joy as he re-entered the town on the day of the
Gayant procession,--Gayant, the superstitious luck of Douai, the glory
of Flemish traditions, introduced there at the time the Claes family
had emigrated from Ghent. The death of Balthazar's father and mother had
left the old mansion deserted, and the young man was occupied for a time
in settling its affairs. His first grief over, he wished to marry; he
needed the domestic happiness whose every religious aspect h