“But then, my dear fellow, you ought to have seen to this earlier.”
“Ah! excuse me, papa Thuillier; there’s only one way of seeing to the journalists; but as you grumbled about the fifteen hundred francs for the advertisements, I did not venture to propose to you another extra expense.”
“What expense?” asked Thuillier, anxiously.
“When you were nominated to the municipal council, where was the plan mooted?” asked the publisher.
“Parbleu! in my own house,” replied Thuillier.
“Yes, of course, in your own house, but at a dinner, followed by a ball, and the ball itself crowned by a supper. Well, my dear master, there are no two ways to do this business; Boileau says:—
“‘All is done through the palate, and not through the mind;
And it is by our dinners we govern mankind.’”
“Then you think I ought to give a dinner to those journalists?”
“Yes; but not at your own house; for these journalists, you see, if women are present, get stupid; they have to behave themselves. And, besides, it isn’t dinner they want, but a breakfast—that suits them best. In the evening these gentlemen have to go to first representations, and make up their papers, not to speak of their own little private doings; whereas in the mornings they have nothing to think about. As for me, it is always breakfasts that I give.”
“But that costs money, breakfasts like that,” said Thuillier; “journalists are gourmands.”