ced the two coffins.
"This is a magnificent habitation," said Beauchamp, looking towards the
mausoleum; "a summer and winter palace. You will, in turn, enter it, my
dear d'Epinay, for you will soon be numbered as one of the family. I, as
a philosopher, should like a little country-house, a cottage down there
under the trees, without so many free-stones over my poor body. In
dying, I will say to those around me what Voltaire wrote to Piron: 'Eo
rus, and all will be over.' But come, Franz, take courage, your wife is
an heiress."

"Indeed, Beauchamp, you are unbearable. Politics has made you laugh at
everything, and political men have made you disbelieve everything.
But when you have the honor of associating with ordinary men, and the
pleasure of leaving politics for a moment, try to find your affectionate
heart, which you leave with your stick when you go to the Chamber."

"But tell me," said Beauchamp, "what is life? Is it not a hall in
Death's anteroom?"

"I am prejudiced against Beauchamp," said Albert, drawing Franz away,
and leaving the former to finish his philosophical dissertation with
Debray. The Villefort vault formed a square of white stones, about
twenty feet high; an interior partition separated the two families, and
each apartment had its entrance door. Here were not, as in other tombs,
ignoble drawers, one above another, where thrift bestows its dead and
labels them like specimens in a museum; all that was visible within the
bronze gates was a gloomy-looking room, separated by a wall from the
vault itself. The two doors before mentioned were in the middle of this
wall, and enclosed the Villefort and Saint-Meran coffins. There grief
might freely expend itself without being disturbed by the trifling
loungers who came from a picnic party to visit Pere-la-Chaise, or by
lovers who make it their rendezvous.

The two coffins were placed on trestles previously prepared for their
reception in the right-hand crypt belonging to the Saint-Meran family.
Villefort, Franz, and a few near relatives alone entered the sanctuary.

As the religious ceremonies had all been performed at the door, and
there was no address given, the party all separated; Chateau-Renaud,
Albert, and Morrel, went one way, and Debray and Beauchamp the other.
Franz remained with M. de Villefort; at the gate of the cemetery, Morrel
made an excuse to wait; he saw Franz and M. de Villefort get into the
same mourning coach, and thought this meeting f