tes against your own people
for you! Surely, surely, sir, your first duty should have been to have
ensured our safety against such mutinies on the part of the rabble of
Bellecour."

The Seigneur angrily stamped his foot. In his choler he was within
an ace of striking Ombreval, and might have done so had not the
broad-minded and ever-reasonable old Des Cadoux interposed at that
moment to make clear to the Marquis's guests a situation than which
nothing could have been clearer. He put it to them that the times
were changed, and that France was no longer what France had been; that
allowances must be made for M. de Bellecour, who was in no better case
than any other gentleman in that unhappy country! and finally, that
either they must look to arming and defending themselves or they must
say their prayers and submit to being butchered with the ladies.

"For ourselves," he concluded calmly, tapping his gold snuffbox and
holding it out to Bellecour, for all the world with the air of one
who was discussing the latest fashion in wigs, "I can understand your
repugnance at coming to blows with this obscene canaille. It is doing
them an honour of which they are not worthy. But we have these ladies
to think of, Messieurs, and--" he paused to apply the rappee to
his nostrils--"and we must exert ourselves to save them, however
disagreeable the course we may be compelled to pursue. Messieurs, I am
the oldest here; permit that I show you the way."

His words were not without effect; they kindled chivalry in hearts that,
after all, were nothing if not prone to chivalry--according to their own
lights--and presently something very near enthusiasm prevailed. But the
supercilious and very noble Ombreval still grumbled.

"To ask me to fight this scum!" he ejaculated in horror "Pardi! It is
too much. Ask me to beat them off with a whip like a pack of curs, and
I'll do it readily. But fight them--!"

"Nothing could delight us more, Vicomte, than to see you beat them off
with a whip," Des Cadoux assured him. "Arm yourself with a whip, by all
means, my friend, and let us witness the prodigies you can perform with
it."

"See what valour inflames the Vicomte, Suzanne," sneered a handsome
woman into Mademoiselle's ear. "With what alacrity he flies to arms that
he may defend you, even with his life."

"M. d'Ombreval is behaving according to his lights," answered Suzanne
coldly.

"Ma foi, then his lights are unspeakably dim," was the contemp