had joined the Strike, I believe that he felt very
much inclined to pay another visit to the port,
and drop quietly into deep water when nobody
happened to be looking. What had he done?
He had united himself to this band of young
men, who had pledged themselves not to marry
till a marked change had taken place in the
habits of the young lady population of
Marseilles. Extravagance in dress, general
luxuriousness of life, crinoline, a certain arrogance
of tone, total ignorance of domestic matters,
and an inordinate love of pleasures of an
undomestic sort—these were some of the subjects
at issue between the young men and the
young women of Marseilles, and till these
should consent to reform their milliners' bills,
to study housekeeping, and generally to come
down a peg or two, the Strike was to continue,
and the registrar of marriages was to enjoy a
sinecure.

Pierre Grandal went about his avocations on
that day, and on many subsequent days, in a
very disconsolate frame of mind. He was so
unhappy that he could not always hide his
melancholy, and some of his friends, and
especially such as were included among the United
Strikers, rallied him. It was an unfortunate
part of the thing, too, that he could not always
avoid the company of Mademoiselle Eugénie
as much as he could have wished. In the
daytime, he had his business to attend to, and
constant application kept him from thinking; but,
in the evening, it was different. Meetings of
the two families, from which Pierre could not
always absent himself, were frequent. The
agonies endured by our young friend on these
occasions were very great. Till now he had
never known how much he had admired
Mademoiselle Eugénie; only now, when that little
sort of understanding between them, which had
once existed, was at an end. He began to
curse his folly in having ever spoken to her
on the subject of economy in dress. He
accused himself of having been a meddling prig.
He had been egged on to that step, if the
truth must be told, by a certain married sister
of his, who had represented to him that
Mademoiselle Beaucour's style of dressing was
altogether beyond her station, and would certainly
prove the ruin of any man who should be rash
enough to take her to wife. "Why could not
my married sister keep her advice to
herself?"

One evening he sat gnawing his moustache,
watching Eugénie. She was in the coolest way
imaginable working at her embroidery, and
listening to the conversation of Sub-Lieutenant
Lemorier, with his thin waist—curse him!

This young officer and his attentions had
been the subject of many conversations; but,
as the young lady had always laughed at the
lieutenant in a very satisfactory manner, such
discussions had ever terminated peacefully, and
had left our friend Pierre feeling quite comfortable
—a master of the situation. But now,
everything was topsy-turvy, and the very position
of the sub-lieutenant and of himself seemed
to be reversed. Mademoiselle Beaucour
actually treated his rival with a certain consideration.
She listened when he talked, which she
had never done before. She laughed when he
was facetious, which was still more wonderful.
She patronised him, on the contrary, to a very
great extent. At length this gallant officer
began to give himself little victorious airs, and
to think that his waist and his gummed
moustache had done their work.

Sub-Lieutenant Lemorier had never joined
the celebrated Marseilles Strike. He was a free
man to do what he liked. Pierre was angry
with himself for what he had done, and angry
—now more than ever—with Mademoiselle
Eugénie because she showed no signs of giving
in, nor any, even the faintest, indication of
regret at the loss of her lover. The only solace
which was within reach of Monsieur Pierre
was found in the society of those other
members of the Strike with whom it was his
custom to associate—for it was the practice of
those gentlemen to hold frequent meetings,
with the view of mutually shoring each other up,
and sustaining each other in a firm adherence
to the illustrious cause. Many great and
remarkable sentiments found utterance when the
members of the brotherhood met thus, in cafés
or elsewhere.

"This movement of ours," a striker would
remark on some one of these occasions, "cannot
fail to attract universal attention. The eyes of
Europe will be upon us."

There was a little man among the
members of this band, whom an ironical destiny had
cursed with the name of Legrand, an authority
in all matters with which "le sexe" was
connected. This small gentleman was much
addicted to holding forth on the subject of the
Strike.

"I like it," he said one night, when some of
the strikers, our unhappy Pierre among them,
were assembled at a certain cafe in the Rue
Cannebière. "The Strike suits me well. The
women are ready to devour one already. Long
live the Strike!" said the little man, taking a
sip of eau sucrée with a flourish.

A striker with a red nose and a crimson neck-
ribbon, worn, perhaps, with a view to the
subduction of the feature in question, remarked that
it was his experience also that the sex had
become infinitely amiable of late; a bachelor
was overwhelmed with civilities since the Strike
had been started.

"I am free to confess," continued the little
man, "that with regard to the sex, I have never
had much to complain of. I don't know how it
is, but I believe I have a way with me which
they like. Always full of complaisance, they
are now, however, ready to fall at one's feet."

"Not all of them," thought poor Pierre; but
he did not say anything.

"What I like about it is this," remarked a
very young man indeed, who was possessed of
two goggle eyes, a turned-up nose, and a fatuous
mouth. "What pleases me is, that now we
shall be able at last to RULE."