of the hand on another, Monseigneur affably
passed through his rooms to the remote region
of the Circumference of Truth. There, Monseigneur
turned, and came back again, and so in
due course of time got himself shut up in his
sanctuary by the chocolate sprites, and was seen
no more.

The show being over, the flutter in the air
became quite a little storm, and the precious
little bells went ringing down stairs. There was
soon but one person left of all the crowd, and
he, with his hat under his arm and his snuff-box
in his hand, slowly passed among the mirrors on
his way out.

"I devote you," said this person, stopping
at the last door on his way, and turning
in the direction of the sanctuary, "to the
Devil!"

With that, he shook the snuff from his fingers
as if he had shaken the dust from his feet, and
quietly walked down stairs.

He was a man of about sixty, handsomely
dressed, haughty in manner, and with a face
like a fine mask. A face of a transparent paleness;
every feature in it clearly defined; one set
expression on it. The nose, beautifully formed
otherwise, was very slightly pinched at the top
of each nostril. In those two compressions, or
dints, the only little change that the face
ever showed, resided. They persisted in
changing colour sometimes, and they would be
occasionally dilated and contracted by something
like a faint pulsation; then, they gave a
look of treachery, and cruelty, to the whole
countenance. Examined with attention, its
capacity of helping such a look was to be
found in the line of the mouth, and the lines of
the orbits of the eyes, being much too
horizontal and thin; still, in the effect the face
made, it was a handsome face, and a remarkable
one.

Its owner went down stairs into the courtyard,
got into his carriage, and drove away.
Not many people had talked with him at the
reception; he had stood in a little space apart,
and Monseigueur might have been warmer in
his manner. It appeared, under the circumstances,
rather agreeable to him to see the
common people dispersed before his horses, and
often barely escaping from being run down.
His man drove as if he were charging an
enemy, and the furious recklessness of the man
brought no check into the face, or to the lips,
of the master. The complaint had sometimes
made itself audible, even in that deaf city and
dumb age, that, in the narrow streets without
footways, the fierce patrician custom of hard
driving endangered and maimed the mere vulgar
in a barbarous manner. But, few cared enough
for that to think of it a second time, and, in this
matter, as in all others, the common wretches
were left to get out of their difficulties as they
could.

With a wild rattle and clatter, and an
inhuman abandonment of consideration not easy
to be understood in these days, the carriage
dashed through streets and swept round corners,
with women screaming before it, and men clutching
each other and clutching children out of its
way. At last, swooping at a street corner by
a fountain, one of its wheels came to a sickening
little jolt, and there was a loud cry from
a number of voices, and the horses reared and
plunged.

But for the latter inconvenience, the carriage
probably would not have stopped; carriages
were often known to drive on, and leave their
wounded behind, and why not? But, the
frightened valet had got down in a hurry, and
there were twenty hands at the horses'
bridles.

"What has gone wrong?" said Monsieur,
calmly looking out.

A tall man in a nightcap had caught up a
bundle from among the feet of the horses, and
had laid it on the basement of the fountain, and
was down in the mud and wet, howling over it
like a wild animal.

"Pardon, Monsieur the Marquis!" said a
ragged and submissive man, "it is a child."

"Why does he make that abominable noise?
Is it his child?"

"Excuse me, Monsieur the Marquis—it is a
pity—yes."

The fountain was a little removed; for the
street opened, where it was, into a space some
ten or twelve yards square. As the tall man
suddenly got up from the ground, and came
running at the carriage, Monsieur the Marquis
clapped his hand for an instant on his sword-hilt.

"Killed!" shrieked the man, in wild
desperation, extending both arms at their
length above his head, and staring at him.
"Dead!"

The people closed round, and looked at
Monsieur the Marquis. There was nothing revealed
by the many eyes that looked at him but watchfulness
and eagerness; there was no visible menacing
or anger. Neither did the people say anything;
after the first cry, they had been silent, and
they remained so. The voice of the submissive
man who had spoken, was flat and tame in its extreme
submission. Monsieur the Marquis ran his
eyes over them all, as if they had been mere
rats come out of their holes.

He took out his purse.

"It is extraordinary to me," said he, "that
you people cannot take care of yourselves and
your children. One or the other of you is for
ever in the way. How do I know what injury
you have done my horses. See! Give him
that."

He threw out a gold coin for the valet to pick
up, and all the heads craned forward that all the
eyes might look down at it as it fell. The tall
man called out again with a most unearthly cry,
"Dead!"

He was arrested by the quick arrival of
another man, for whom the rest made way.
On seeing him, the miserable creature fell upon
his shoulder, sobbing and crying, and pointing
to the fountain, where some women were stooping
over the motionless bundle, and moving