"Pardi!" said my host, "ces Messieurs Anglais sont des gens très extraordinaires"—And having said and sworn it he went out.
As I am at Versailles, thought I, why should I not go to the Count de B——, and tell him my story? So seeing a man standing with a basket on the other side of the street, as if he had something to sell, I bid La Fleur go up to him and enquire for the count's hotel.
La Fleur returned a little pale; and told me it was a Chevalier de St. Louis selling pâtés. He had seen the croix set in gold, with its red ribband, he said, tied to his button-hole—and had looked into the basket and seen the pâtés which the chevalier was selling.
Such a reverse in man's life awakens a better principle than curiosity—I got out of the carriage and went towards him. He was begirt with a clean linen apron, which fell below his knees, and with a sort of bib that went half way-up his breast; upon the top of this hung his croix. His basket of little pâtés was covered over with a white damask napkin; and there was a look of propreté and neatness throughout, that one might have bought his pâtés of him, as much from appetite as sentiment.
He was about 48—of a sedate look, something approaching to gravity. I did not wonder—I went up rather to the basket than him, and having lifted up the napkin, and taken one of his pâtés into my hand I begged he would explain the appearance which affected me.
He told me in a few words, that the best part of his life had pass'd in the service, in which he had obtained a company and the croix with it; but that, at the conclusion of the last peace, his regiment being re-formed and the whole corps left without any provision, he found himself in a wide world without friends, without a livre—"And indeed," said he, "without anything but this" (pointing, as he said it, to his croix). The king could neither relieve nor reward everyone, and it was only his misfortune to be amongst the number. He had a little wife, he said, whom he loved, who did the pâtisserie; and added, he felt no dishonour in defending her and himself from want in this way—unless Providence had offer'd him a better.
It would be wicked to pass over what happen'd to this poor Chevalier of St. Louis about nine months after.
It seems his story reach'd at last the king's ear—who, hearing the chevalier had been a gallant officer, broke up his little trade by a pension of 1,500 livres a year.