"Ten years or more, Monsieur de la Roche-Noire!"
"Did you know the late owner of the château—the sugar manufacturer?"
"Very little; he was a fool, an ignoramus; he never received his friends, never entertained! He was wrapped up in his beets!"
"Well! I mean to entertain, to receive my friends.—Are there any distinguished people in the neighborhood?"
"Not many; a few countrymen, a few obtuse creatures, who do not even send their children to my school."
"Ah! do you keep a school?"
"Yes, Monsieur de la Roche-Noire, a school for males. I take children from the age of two to the age of twenty-five; I teach them everything, no matter what! When they leave my hands, they strike everybody dumb with amazement; they floor all their adversaries by the force of their logic! Belles-lettres, philosophy, physics, philology, chemistry, mathematics, dead languages, living languages, English handwriting, round-hand and copying-hand. I teach all these to my day scholars for six francs a month!"
"That’s nothing at all," said Edouard.
"Is it not, monsieur?—Well! these Auvergnats prefer to let their children play tip-cat rather than send them to me!—O tempora, O mores!"
"Is the society of Saint-Amand select?" inquired Robineau.