liant skin, with frequent blotches, which belongs to persons
with red hair; but his clear brow, his eyes the color of a grey-veined
agate, his pleasant mouth, his fair complexion, the charm of his modest
youth and the shyness which grew out of his deformity, all inspired
feelings of protection in those who knew him: we love the weak, and
Popinot was loved. Little Popinot--everybody called him so--belonged
to a family essentially religious, whose virtues were intelligent, and
whose lives were simple and full of noble actions. The lad himself,
brought up by his uncle the judge, presented a union of qualities which
are the beauty of youth; good and affectionate, a little shame-faced
though full of eagerness, gentle as a lamb but energetic in his work,
devoted and sober, he was endowed with the virtues of a Christian in the
early ages of the Church.

When he heard of a walk in the Tuileries,--certainly the most eccentric
proposal that his august master could have made to him at that hour of
the day,--Popinot felt sure that he must intend to speak to him about
setting up in business. He thought suddenly of Cesarine, the true queen
of roses, the living sign of the house, whom he had loved from the day
when he was taken into Birotteau's employ, two months before the advent
of du Tillet. As he went upstairs he was forced to pause; his heart
swelled, his arteries throbbed violently. However, he soon came down
again, followed by Celestin, the head-clerk. Anselme and his master
turned without a word in the direction of the Tuileries.

Popinot was twenty-one years old. Birotteau himself had married at
that age. Anselme therefore could see no hindrance to his marriage
with Cesarine, though the wealth of the perfumer and the beauty of the
daughter were immense obstacles in the path of his ambitious desires:
but love gets onward by leaps of hope, and the more absurd they are
the greater faith it has in them; the farther off was the mistress of
Anselme's heart, the more ardent became his desires. Happy the youth
who in those levelling days when all hats looked alike, had contrived
to create a sense of distance between the daughter of a perfumer and
himself, the scion of an old Parisian family! In spite of all his doubts
and fears he was happy; did he not dine every day beside Cesarine? So,
while attending to the business of the house, he threw a zeal and energy
into his work which deprived it of all hardship; doing it for the sake
of