“How strange! and would he accept it?”
“Some say no; I say yes; and Louis Napoleon, who knows men thoroughly, agrees with me. 'Mon cher Cham,'—he always called me Cham,—'talk as people will, it is a very pleasant thing to sit on a throne, and it goes far towards one's enjoyment of life to have so many people employed all day long to make it agreeable.'” If Tony thought at times that his friend was a little vainglorious, he ascribed it to the fact that any man so intimate with the great people of the world, talking of them as his ordinary every-day acquaintances, might reasonably appear such to one as much removed from all such intercourse as he himself was. That the man who could say, “Nesselrode, don't tell me,” or “Rechberg, my good fellow, you are in error there!” should be now sitting beside him, sharing his sandwich with him, and giving him to drink from his sherry-flask; was not that glory enough to turn a stronger head than poor Tony's? Ah, my good reader, I know well that you would not have been caught by such blandishments. You have “seen men and cities.” You have been at courts, dined beside royalties, and been smiled on by serene highnesses; but Tony has not had your training; he has had none of these experiences; he has heard of great names just as he has heard of great victories. The illustrious people of the earth are no more within the reach of his estimation than are the jewels of a Mogul's turban; but it is all the more fascinating to him to sit beside one who “knows it all.”
Little wonder, then, if time sped rapidly, and that he never knew weariness. Let him start what theme he might, speak of what land, what event, what person he pleased, the Colonel was ready for him. It was marvellous, indeed,—so very marvellous that to a suspicious mind it might have occasioned distrust,—with how many great men he had been at school, what shoals of distinguished fellows he had served with. With a subtle flattery, too, he let drop the remark that he was not usually given to be so frank and communicative. “The fact is,” said he, “young men are, for the most part, bad listeners to the experiences of men of my age; they fancy that they know life as well, if not better, than ourselves, and that our views are those of 'bygones.' You, however, showed none of this spirit; you were willing to hear and to learn from one of whom it would be false modesty were I not to say, Few know more of men and their doings.”
Now Tony liked this appreciation of him, and he said to himself, “He is a clever fellow,—not a doubt of it; he never saw me till this evening, and yet he knows me thoroughly well.” Seeing how the Colonel had met with everybody, he resolved he would get from him his opinion of some of his own friends, and, to lead the way, asked if he was acquainted with the members of the English Legation at Turin.'
“I know Bathurst,—we were intimate,” said he; “but we once were in love with the same woman,—the mother of an empress she is now,—and as I rather 'cut him out,' a coldness ensued, and somehow we never resumed our old footing. As for Croker, the Secretary, it was I got him that place.”
“And Damer,—Skeff Damer,—do you know him?”
“I should think I do. I was his godfather.”
“He's the greatest friend I have in the world!” cried Tony, in ecstasy at this happy accident.
“I made him drop Chamberlayne. It was his second name, and I was vain enough to be annoyed that it was not his first. Is he here now?”
“Yes, he is attached to the Legation, and sometimes here, sometimes at Naples.”