"I am sure of it," said Merlin. "Bossuet would have been a journalist to-day."
"To Bossuet the Second!" cried Claude Vignon, raising his glass with an ironical bow.
"To my Christopher Columbus!" returned Lucien, drinking a health to
Dauriat.
"Bravo!" cried Nathan.
"Is it a nickname?" Merlin inquired, looking maliciously from Finot to
Lucien.
"If you go on at this pace, you will be quite beyond us," said Dauriat; "these gentlemen" (indicating Camusot and Matifat) "cannot follow you as it is. A joke is like a bit of thread; if it is spun too fine, it breaks, as Bonaparte said."
"Gentlemen," said Lousteau, "we have been eye-witnesses of a strange, portentous, unheard-of, and truly surprising phenomenon. Admire the rapidity with which our friend here has been transformed from a provincial into a journalist!"
"He is a born journalist," said Dauriat.
"Children!" called Finot, rising to his feet, "all of us here present have encouraged and protected our amphitryon in his entrance upon a career in which he has already surpassed our hopes. In two months he has shown us what he can do in a series of excellent articles known to us all. I propose to baptize him in form as a journalist."
"A crown of roses! to signalize a double conquest," cried Bixiou, glancing at Coralie.