"After all, it is only three swains to a shepherdess."
"The deuce! Pere Lousteau loved Madame Rouget; isn't it better to love a housekeeper who is not yoked?"
"If the defunct Rouget was Max's father, the affair is in the family."
"Liberty of opinion now-a-days!"
"Hurrah for Max!"
"Down with all hypocrites!"
"Here's a health to the beautiful Flore!"
Such were the eleven responses, acclamations, and toasts shouted forth by the Knights of Idleness, and characteristic, we may remark, of their excessively relaxed morality. It is now easy to see what interest Max had in becoming their grand master. By leading the young men of the best families in their follies and amusements, and by doing them services, he meant to create a support for himself when the day for recovering his position came. He rose gracefully and waved his glass of claret, while all the others waited eagerly for the coming allocution.
"As a mark of the ill-will I bear you, I wish you all a mistress who is equal to the beautiful Flore! As to this irruption of relations, I don't feel any present uneasiness; and as to the future, we'll see what comes—"
"Don't let us forget Fario's cart!"