intercourse between places separated by any
great distance, it seldom happened that the
traveller, who was going all the way, met
with a companion similarly intentioned.
For the most part, people descended at
intermediate towns, where others supplied their
places; but it not infrequently chanced that
a dreary blank with no new faces intervened,
creating that worst of all sensations
a Frenchman can experience, the intolerable
ennui of having nobody to talk to.

Henri Bodry's prospect at starting was
of the latter cheerless character; for, after
passing Trevoux, he found himself the sole
occupant of the coche, and this irksome
solitude lasted until he reached the ancient
city of Mâcon. The coche, as soon as it was
dark, put up for the night at the auberge
called The Cross of Burgundy, and in a
large room, containing four beds, the usual
complement at that time, Henri was left to
sup and sleep, and make it out how he
might until eight o'clock on the following
morning, when the vehicle would be once
more in motion.

With a long November evening before
him, the prospect was not a pleasant one;
but, while he was waiting for his promised
supper, a stranger entered the apartment,
dressed as if for a journey, and carrying a
small valise in his hand. He was a young
man, apparently about the same age as
Bodry, good-looking, and of a cheerful,
pleasant countenance. After bestowing a
glance on the occupant of the chamber, the
stranger looked about him, as if to see which
bed was unoccupied, and then took possession
of one of them by throwing his cloak,
hat, and valise upon it. This act of appropriation
performed, he approached the table
where Bodry sat, and, without any preamble,
asked him if he was travelling, and which
way he was going. With the frankness of
his age, Henri at once told him his
destination, at which the new-comer expressed
great satisfaction, he being also bound for
Paris, and, as freely as he had inquired,
went on to say, that he had come some
distance across the country, was very cold
and hungry, and if Monsieur had not already
eaten his supper, would be most happy in
being permitted to share that meal with
him. Bodry was delighted to have a
companion so agreeable, and acquiesced in the
proposal most readily; the supper was
soon served, and over a bottle of Moulin à
Vent, the wine for which Mâcon is still so
famous, the young men rapidly made
acquaintance. At twenty years of age, there
are no reserves; Bodry entered into his
own affairs without the slightest concealment,
described his position, stated the
object of his journey, and fairly acknowledged,
in reply to a laughing question from the
other, that he had no great vocation for his
impending marriage.

In return for this confession, the stranger
said, his name also was Henri—Henri
Blaireau,—the son of an avocat at Bourg-en-
Bresse; that he was not over burthened with
money, but hoped to acquire it by following
his father's profession, after he had studied
enough law at the college in the Rue St.
Jean de Beauvais. As to the law itself, it
was not his choice; he would rather have
spent a fortune, than be at the trouble of
making one,—but what would you have?

The intimacy which thus sprang up
between the travellers was not diminished by
the time they reached Paris. On the
contrary, it had grown into a strong friendship.
Their habits and tastes were so closely allied,
that what the one proposed, the other was
sure to agree to.

Amongst the subjects which engaged them
during the latter part of their journey was
the question where they should lodge on
their arrival in the capital. Bodry knew
nothing of Paris, and therefore made no
objection to the Quartier Latin when it was
proposed by Blaireau; so they went to the
Ecu d'Argent, in the Rue des Carmes—an
auberge which the latter had heard his father
praise, when slightly in his cups, as being
the only place in Paris for drinking Vin
de Beaune. It was not a fashionable part of
the town, but the college was near and the
residence of Monsieur Gombert not remote.

Notwithstanding this proximity, it seemed
that neither love nor law was meant to be
the first consideration with Messieurs Bodry
and Blaireau. Together, they saw the
Marionettes on the Boulevard du Temple;
together they went to dance at the gardens
of the Colisée; together they dined at the
Moulin de Janelle, the most celebrated of all
the extra-mural taverns of Paris; together,
they went everywhere, in short, except to the
College of Law and the Church of Saint
Merri.

One evening, when they were returning
home, accident led them through the Rue
Saint Martin, and a qualm of conscience
came over Bodry when he remembered that
he had been already three weeks in the
capital without delivering his letter of
introduction or making any inquiries after
Monsieur Gombert and Mademoiselle
Madeleine. A qualm of conscience sometimes
arises from a physical cause. Henri Bodry
was a little out of sorts, and proposed—like
a certain gentleman when he fell sick—to do
something extraordinary by way of amendment.
When he reached the Ecu d'Argent,
however, he felt so much worse that he
went directly to bed; in the course of the
night he was seized with a violent fever,
and, though it in some degree abated on the
following morning, he remained very ill.
Nothing could exceed the kindness and attention
of Henri Blaireau. He sat by his friend's
bedside all night, ministered to all his wants,
soothed him by his care and encouraged him
by his conversation.