"Mon cher Monsieur, "Paris, 8 Juillet 1823.
"Voici ce que Monsieur le Supérieur m'a dit de vous répondre. 'Si vous voulez être bien raisonnable, bien gentil, être bon chrétien, vous conformer en tout aux règles de la maison, vous n'avez qu'à revenir au plus tôt. Je ferai votre affaire.' Voilà ses propres paroles.
"Je me réjouis de cette heureuse nouvelle que je vous apprends. Je dis que c'est pour vous une heureuse et très-heureuse nouvelle, car où peut-on être mieux que dans une maison où, si l'on veut, l'on peut se sanctifier si facilement et mériter le bonheur du paradis? Venez donc au plus vite, venez dans ce saint séminaire, où vous vous rendrez digne du ciel, j'en suis sûr. Je suis avec amitié votre très-devoué, "Jean-Baptiste C----."
"P. S. Je me porte beaucoup mieux."
THE TABLE D'HÔTE.
If our landlord supplies us with beef and with fish,
Let each guest bring himself, and he brings the best dish.
--Retaliation.
The table d'hôte of the Boule d'Or at le Mans was like an olla podrida. There was a little of every thing; all the odd ends and scraps of society bashed up in one dish. Next to me, on the left, was an old noble, Grand Cordon of one of the orders of merit, who had come to put his son to the college at la Flèche. He had seen much of the world--had been an emigrant and a wanderer. There were the traces of many sorrows, dangers, and cares, on his countenance; but if ever the heart finds an interpreter in the eye, his had not been hardened by the trials of life. He had that sort of urbanity in his face, which probably in youth had been accompanied by a gayer and a quicker spirit, though years had left nothing but the calm placidity of demeanour, which, if it does not spring from benevolence, at least appears to do so.
On my other hand was a young travelling linen draper--a good example of French education. He had been brought up at a college, but that had not spoiled him for trade. He would talk with equal learning of Horace and cambric, and spoke as scientifically of the measurement of angles as the measuring of ribbons. He had scraps of Latin and samples of cloth, and added, moreover, a political system, which was certainly of his own manufacture. Neat my friend sat a very elegant old man, with a long-waisted Windsor gray coat, and ruffles, in the mode of 17--, to his shirt, which peeped timidly out from under the cuffs of his coat, like a ci-devant ashamed to show himself amongst the upstarts of fashion. They were kept in countenance, however, by a powdered wig, with two long rows of curls on each side, and a tapering pigtail that, like a ship, furrowing its way through the sea, marked the coat with a white track all down the centre of his back. Towards the end of the meal, a priest, newly arrived, came in with his servant, and they both sat down to table together. Each was as dirty as can well be imagined, but the master was, in this respect, pre-eminent. Nature had kneaded him with a round, fat, copper-coloured face, which had evidently little acquaintance with soap and water, and his black rugged beard apparently went from Sunday to Sunday without the touch of innovating steel. His hands, which probably fate had originally designed for pig-driving, were now as dirty as if they still followed that employment, and these he thrust unmannerly into the dish, without vouchsafing a word or a look to those around him.
It is the poetry of life to see a man superior to his station, and rising above his fate; but it is distressing to find the station thus degraded by the man. However, he and his servant sat together; and talked together, and ate together; and, most probably, the servant would have been very ill pleased if he had dined on meaner fare than his master. A Frenchman of this class can live upon any thing. If he cannot get better, a galette and butter-milk, or soupe maigre and a beurrée, will content him. But, if they be within reach, two services and a dessert are not at all too much for him. An Englishman of the same rank never aspires to more than a piece of meat and a mug of ale; but he must have that, or he cries starvation.