Land. Exactly so—a wonderful young man.
Beau. How, wonderful?—Are his cabbages better than other people’s
Land. Nay, he don’t garden any more; his father left him well off. He’s only a genus.
Gla. A what?
Land. A genus!—a man who can do everything in life except anything that’s useful—that’s a genus.
Beau. You raise my curiosity;—proceed.
Land. Well, then, about four years ago, old Melnotte died, and left his son well to do in the world. We then all observed that a great change came over young Claude: he took to reading and Latin, and hired a professor from Lyons, who had so much in his head that he was forced to wear a great full-bottom wig to cover it. Then he took a fencing-master, and a dancing-master, and a music-master; and then he learned to paint; and at last it was said that young Claude was to go to Paris, and set up for a painter. The lads laughed at him at first; but he is a stout fellow, is Claude, and as brave as a lion, and soon taught them to laugh the wrong side of their mouths; and now all the boys swear by him, and all the girls pray for him.
Beau. A promising youth, certainly! And why do they call him Prince?
Land. Partly because he is at the head of them all, and partly because he has such a proud way with him, and wears such fine clothes—and, in short, looks like a prince.
Beau. And what could have turned the foolish fellow’s brain? The Revolution, I suppose?