56  .
THE NABOB.
il

hept under control by the master's whip, but
ever ready to burst out at the least sign of the
master's approbation. In the galleries, not
usually spoiled by very picturesque speeches,
but which were now amused by these bandits'
stories as much as by a sens itional novel, there
was a general feeling of merriment, and a joy-
ful animation spread upon the faces of the
women, happy to appear pretty, without pro-
faning the solemnity of the place. The plumes
and flowers of all the pretty bonnets quivered
with emotion, round arms encircled by gold
bracelets leant in an attitude which betokened
attention. The severe Le Merquier had en-
livened the sitting with the fun of the stage,
with that little sprinkling of comicality which
charity concerts allow themselves to attract the
profane.
Unmoved and cold in the midst of his suc-
cess, Le Merquier continued to read with his
doleful voice, penetrating like Lyons rain :
" Now, gentlemen, we may be permitted to
inquire how a stranger, a Provencal just re-
turned from the East and absolutely ignorant of
the wants of that island where he had never set
foot before the election, a true type of what the
Corsicans contemptuously call a "Continental "
—how such a man, I say, has managed to ex-
cite such enthusiasm, a devotion carried to the
verge of crime and .profanation? In his po-
session of boundless wealth we find the answer
to this enigma—we find it in his gold, scattered
about among the electors, forced into, their
pockets with a shameless effrontery of which we
have a thousand proofs." Then followed the
endless series of denunciations: "The under-
signed Croce (Antoine) bears testimony, in the
interest of truth, to the fact that the Police
Magistrate Nardi came one evening to our
house, and told me: 'Listen, Croce (Antoine),
I swear by the flame of that lamp, that if you
vote for Jansoulet you shall have fifty francs to-
morrow morning;' " and this one: " The under-
signed Lavezzi (Jacques Alphonse) declares that
he rejected with scorn seventeen francs, which
the mayor of Pozzo Negro offered him to vote
against bis cousin Sebastiani." It is highly
probable that for three francs more, Lavezzi
(Jacques Alphonse) would have pocketed his
scorn in silence. But the Chamber did not in-
quire into those details.
A holy indignation swayed that incorruptible
Chamber. It stirred uneasily on its soft velvet
benches; it growled, it roared. There went up
" Oh's " of indignant astonishment, eyes opened
like circumflex accents, deputes drew themselves
up in virtuous protest, or sank down in utter
consternation and dismay, as sometimes happens
before the spectacle of human degradation. But
you will notice: that most of the said deputes
had made use of the same electoral maneuvers,
that in the Chamber were to be found the
heroes of those famous rastels — open-air
orgies, where calves, decked out with ribbons and
flowers, were walked about, as they are at those
abundant Kermesses worthy of Gargantua.
The most guilty were precisely those who
shouted the most. They turned angry towards
the high and solitary bench, where the poor
leper listened, motionless, his head sunk in his
hands.
Yet, in the midst of the general hue and cry,
one voice was raised in his defence, but toneless,
inexperienced, not so much a speech as a
sympathizing sputtering of words, amidst which
were vaguely heard: "great services rendered
to the Corsican population—considerable works
— Caisse Territoriale."
The sputterer was a very small man in white
gaiters, with the head of an Albino, and a few
disconnected tufts of bristling hair upon his
face. But the interruption of that awkward
friend only provided Le Merquier with an easy
and natural transition. A hideous smile parted
his .flabby lips: "The honorable Monsieur
Sarigue has mentioned the Caisse Territorials;
we will endeavor to answer him." Indeed,
Paganetti's lair seemed very familiar to him.
In a few clear and spirited sentences, he threw
light into the farthermost recesses of that den,
showed all its snares and its traps, its maze and
abysses, like a guide who waves his torch above
the in pace of some dismal dungeon. He spoke
of the sham quarries, the railways projected but
never even begun, the imaginary steamers van-
ished in their own smoke. The frightful desert
ot Taverna was not forgotten, nor the old Gen-
oese tower, where were situated the offices.of
the steamboat company. But that which most
amused the Chamber wa. an account of ar ex-
travagant ceremony, gone through by the gov-
ernor, on the occasion of a tunnel being opened
through Monte Rotondo—a gigantic work which
had been projected years before, and put off
year after year, wliich required millions of
money, thousands of hands, and which had
been commenced in great pomp a week before
the election day. The report related the thing
with much comicality—the first blow of the
pickaxe given by the candidate, into the enor-
mous mountain covered with centenarian trees,
the prefect's speech, the blessing of the flags
amid cries of " Vive Jansoulet!" and two hun-
dred navvies setting to work on the spot, and
working day and night for a whole week; but,
the election once over, the work had been
abandoned, and fragments of rock left as they
stood, around a ludicrous excavation, which
becomes one more lurking-place, added to the
many others with which tho land is covered,
where the prowlers of the maquis can quietly
lie in wait for their prey. The trick was
played. After having so long extracted the
shareholders' money, the Caisse Territoriale had,
for once, served to extort the votes of the popu-
lation.
"Gentlemen," continued the barrister, "I
have to mention a last detail, which I might
have given you at first, and thus spared your feel-
ings the harrowing picture of this electoral leger-
demain. I understand that a judicial inquiry
has been commenced this very day into the
transactions of the Caisse Territoriale, and that
a serious examination of its books will probably
reveal one of those financial scandals—alas! too
frequent in our times—with which, for the sake
of your own honor, you will not wish that any
member of this Chamber should be connected."
After this sudden revelation, the reporter
stopped one moment, like an actor who makes
a pause to invite applause; and in the dramatic
silence which weighed upon the assembly, was
suddenly heard the slamming of a door. It was
the governor, Paganetti, who was hastily leav-
ing the gallery, his face livid, his eyes glaring
with terror, his lips pouting like those of a
clown who scents in the air some formidable
blow of the lath. Monpavon remained motion ¦
less, expanding his shirt-front. The fat man
panted violently behind the plumes of his wife's
white bonnet.
The old mother was looking at her son.
"Ihave mentioned the honor of the Cham-
ber, gentlemen: let me add a few words on that
subject-----"
Now Le Merquier had ceased reading.
After the reporter, the orator, or rather the
Grand-Justiciary, made his appearance. His
face was impassible, his eyes sheltered behind
his spectacles, and nothing lived or moved, in
that long body, but his right arm—that long
angular arm in a short sleeve—which rose and
fell mechanically, like a sword of justice, and
completed each period with the cruel and inex-
orable gesture of a decapitation. And there
could be no mistake; it was a real execution at
which they were assisting. The speaker was
willing enough to put on one side scandalous
reports, the mystery which surrounded that
colossal fortune, acquired in distant countries,
out of the reach of any possible control. But
there were, besides, in the candidate's life, cer-
tain points difficult to clear up, certain details—
here the good man hesitated, seemed to choose,
to sift his words; but he soon gave it up, find-
ing it impossible to put the charge in decent
language.
" Let us not disgrace this debate, gentlemen.
You understand me. You know the infamous
rumors—I wish I might say slander—to which
I allude. But truth forces me to declare that
when Monsieur Jansoulet was called before
your third committee, and invited to elear up
the imputations directed against him, so vague
and unsatisfactory were his explanations, that,
though we remained persuaded of his innocence,
a scrupulous care for your honor made us reject
a candidate over whose reputation brooded such
suspicions as these. No, that man cannot take
his seat among you, gentlemen. Besides, what
good could he do here? He has lived so long in
the East that he has forgotten the laws, the
manners, and usages of his own country. He
believes in swift justice, in bastinadoes in-
flicted in the streets; he relies upon the abuse
of power, and, what is still worse, upon the
venality and cringing corruption of all men.
:He is the type of those upstart millionaires
who fancy that everything is venal—provided a
sufficient price is offered—even the electors'
votes, and tbe conscience of his colleagues."
You should have seen the innocent admira-
tion of those good, fat deputes, made torpid by
comfort, as they listened to this ascetic barris-
ter, this man of a primitive cast. He reminded
them of St. Jerome, coming from his distant
desert, and denouncing, withering, in an asseni.
bly of the later Roman Empire, the shameless
luxury of unfaithful trustees and extortioners
Now they understood the full meaning of that
fine name, " My conscience," given him by his
colleagues in the Courts of Justice, where he
towered with his high stature, and which he
awed with his inflexible oratory.
In the galleries the enthusiasm was great in-
deed. Pretty little heads bent forward to look
at him, and drink in his words; there arose a
hum of approbation, and bouquets of all colors
were waved towards him—as are waved the ears
of a field of corn by the passing breath of the
wind. A woman's voice was even heard crying
out, with a slight foreign accent, "Bravo,
bravo!"
And the old mother?
Motionless, attentive, and anxious, she tried
to understand something in that legal phrase-
ology, in those mysterious innuendoes, and stood
there like those deaf-and-dumb persons, who
guess what is said before them from the mere
motion of the lips and the expression of the
faces. And it sufficed her to look at her son and
Le Merquier, to understand what wounds the
one was inflicting on the other, what perfidious
and envenomed intentions fell from that long
speech on the unfortunate man, who would have
seemed asleep, had it not been that his strong
shoulders trembled, and his hands quivered over
his face, which he hid, and among his hair,
whicli he tore furiously. Why could she not,
from her place, cry out to him: " Fear not, my
son. If they despise you, your mother loves
you. Let us go together. We have no need of
those men!" One moment she might have be-
lieved that the words she addressed to him in
the depths of her heart had, by a mysterious dis-
pensation, found their way even to him. He
arose, shook his frizzled hair, his blood-shot
face, and moved his lips, trembling with sup-
pressed tears. But, instead of leaving his bench,
he held on to it, and his big hands grasped his
desk convulsively.
The other had done. It was now his turn to
answer:
" Gentlemen," said he.
He stopped immediately, frightened by the
rough, hoarse, and terribly vulgar sound of his
own voice, which he heard now for the first
time in public. During this pause, his features
worked nervously. He tried to find a proper
utterance, but unsuccessfully. He must first
recover strength for his defense. But if that
poor man's anguish was horrible to witness, the
poor mother, bending forward in the gallery,
panting, gasping, nervously moving her lips, as
if to find words for him, presented a perfect
counterpart of his own tortures. He could not
see her, in the position in which he stood, in-
tentionally avoiding to look at that gallery; but
that maternal breath, the burning magnetism of
those black eyes, at last produced their effect.
His tongue and limbs were once more loosed.
"In the first place, gentlemen, I declare to
you that I am not about to defend my election.
If you think that electoral manners and usages
have not always been the same in Corsica, and
that all the irregularities committed there must
be charged to the corrupt influence of my gold,
and not to the wild impassioned nature of the
people, well, then, cancel my election ; it will
be just, and I shall not murmur. But, in the
speech you have just heard, there is something
else than my election. Charges have been made
which attack my honor, question it; and it is
that only I wish to answer."
His voice became firmer, and though it was
still harsh and husky, it had a sympathetic
ring, due to the violent emotion under which
he labored.
He briefly related his life, his first steps inthe
world, his departure for Tunis. It sounded
like one of those old accounts of the eighteenth
century, where we are told of Barbary corsairs
sweeping the Latin seas, of Beys, of bold
Provencals, as brown as crickets, who always
end by marrying some sultana or other, and
"taking the turban," as the old Marseilles
phrase has it.
"I," said the Nabob, with his good-natured
smile, " I had no need of taking the turban in
order to get rich. I had nothing else to do
but bring into those countries of ignorance
and let-things-alone, the industry and "litheness
of a Southern Frenchman; and I succeeded in
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