“You do not forget me in the midst of your distinctions,” he said, “there is only a hand’s-breadth, however, between a chemist and a perfumer.”
“Ah, monsieur! between your genius and the plainness of a man like me there is infinity. I owe to you what you call my distinctions: I shall never forget it in this world, nor in the next.”
“Oh! in the next they say we shall be all alike, kings and cobblers.”
“Provided kings and cobblers lead a holy life here below,” said Birotteau.
“Is that your son?” asked Vauquelin, looking at little Popinot, who was amazed at not seeing anything extraordinary in the sanctum, where he expected to find monstrosities, gigantic engines, flying-machines, and material substances all alive.
“No, monsieur, but a young man whom I love, and who comes to ask a kindness equal to your genius,—and that is infinite,” said Cesar with shrewd courtesy. “We have come to consult you, a second time, on an important matter, about which I am ignorant as a perfumer can be.”
“Let me hear what it is.”
“I know that hair has lately occupied all your vigils, and that you have given yourself up to analyzing it; while you have thought of glory, I have thought of commerce.”
“Dear Monsieur Birotteau, what is it you want of me,—the analysis of hair?” He took up a little paper. “I am about to read before the Academy of Sciences a monograph on that subject. Hair is composed of a rather large quantity of mucus, a small quantity of white oil, a great deal of greenish oil, iron, a few atoms of oxide of manganese, some phosphate of lime, a tiny quantity of carbonate of lime, a little silica, and a good deal of sulphur. The differing proportions of these component parts cause the differences in the color of the hair. Red hair, for instance, has more greenish oil than any other.”
Cesar and Popinot opened their eyes to a laughable extent.