THE PUKSE.
as those of a sergeant of the Old Guard. This
room served as a muséum for certain tilings
whieh are only met with in these sorts of am-
phibious households, objects without a name,
partaking at once of luxury and poverty.'
Amongst other curiosities, Hippolyte remarked
a magnificently ornamental telescope, hanging-
above thc little greenish glass which decorated
the chimney. To match this strange piece of
furniture, there was a shabby buffet, paiuted
like mahogany—the wood of all others most
difficult to imitate—between the chimney and
the partition. But the red* and slippery floor,
the little bits of shabby carpet placed before the
chairs, the furniture, everything, shone with
that laborious cleanliness which lends a false
luster to old things, whilst showing up still
more strongly their defects, their age, and long-
service. There reigned in this room an inde-
finable odor, resulting from the exhalations of
the capliarnaum, mixed with the vapors of the
dining-room and the staircase, although the win-
dow was left open and the street air stirred the
muslin curtains, which were carefully drawn in
order to hide the embrasure, where preceding
tenants had left signs of their presence in divers
incrustations or species of domestic frescoes.
Adelaide quickly opened the door of the other
room, into which she introduced the painter
with a certain pleasure. Hippolyte, who had
formerly seen iu his mother's time the same
signs of indigence, remarked them with the
singular vivacity which characterizes the first
acquisitions of memory, and entered, far better
than another could have done, into the details
of this existence On recognizing the familiar
objects of his infancy, this good young man felt
neither contempt for this hidden misery, nor
pride in the luxury he had just won for his
mother..
" Well, sir, 1 tope you do not feel the effects
of your fall," said the old mother, rising from
an old-fashioned easy-chair placed at the corner
of the chimney, and offering him a seat.
" No, madame. I am come to thank you for
your kind offices, and particularly mademoiselle,
who heard me fall."
In making this speech, stamped with the
adorable stupidity which springs from the first
embarrassment of real love, Hippolyte looked
at the young girl. Adélaïde was lighting the
lamp à double courant d'air, nu doubt in order
to render invisible a candle stuck in a large
brass candlestick, and ornamented with some
striking designs by an extraordinary guttering.
She bowed slightly, went to put the candlestick
in the antechamber, returned to place the lamp
on the chimney, and sat down by her mother, a
little behind the painter, in order to be able to
look at him at her ease, whilst appearing very
much occupied with the burning up of the
lamp, whose flame, damped by the moisture of
a dull glass, sputtered aud struggled with a
black and badly cut wick. Seeing the large
glass which adorned the chimney, Hippolyte
quickly cast his eyes on it to admire Adélaïde.
Thus, the little ruse of the young girl only
served to embarrass them both.
Whilst talking to Madame Leseigneur—for
Hippolyte gave her this name at all hazards—
he examined the drawing-room, but decently
and stealthily. You could scarcely see the
Egyptian figures of the iron hand-irons in a
hearth full of cinders, on which two brands
tried to keep together before a sham log of brick,
buried as carefully as the treasure of a miser.
An old Aubusson carpet, much mended, much
faded, and as well-worn as a pensioner's coat,
did not cover all the floor, which struck cold to'
the feet. The walls were ornamented with a
reddish paper, representing a China silk with a
yellow pattern. In the middle of the wall, op-
posite the windows, *the painter saw a chink
and the break produced in the paper by the two
doors of an alcove, in which Madame Leseign-
eur slept, no doubt, whicli were scarcely
masked by a sofa placed before them. Opposite
the chimney, over a mahogany chiffonier of a
style not without richness and good taste, hung
the portrait of a soldier of high rank, which the
feeble light did not allow the painter to see dis-
tinctly, but, from what he could perceive, lie
fancied this frightful daub must have been
painted in China. At the windows, the red
silk curtains were as discolored as the red and
yellow tapestry of the furniture of this double-
functioned room. On the marble of the 'chif-
fonier stood a valuable malachite salver, contain-
ing a dozen coffee-cups magnificently painted,
* In the old-fashioned houses Of Paris the floors were
sometimes of red tiles, and never carpeted all over.
and manufactured, no doubt, at Sèvres. On the
mantelpiece figured the eternal clock of the em-
pire, a warrior guiding the four horses of a
chariot, whose wheel bears at every spoke the
number of an hour. The wax candles in the
candelabra were turned yellow by the smoke,
and at each corner of the mantelpiece was a
porcelain vase surmounted by flowers, full of
dust and garnished with moss. In tbe middle
of the room, Hippolyte remarked a card-table
all prepared, with some new cards on it. There
was somethifTg inexpressibly affecting- to an ob-
server in the sight of this poverty painted like
an old woman who tries to make her face lie.
At this spectacle, every man of sense would
have proposed to himself secretly, and from the
beginning, this species of dilemma: either these
two women are honesty itself, or they live by
intrigue and play. But on looking at Adélaïde,
a young man as pure as Schinner would believe
in the most perfect innocence, and attribute the
incongruities of this furnishing to the most hon-
orable causes.
" My child," said the old lady to the young
girl, "T am cold; make up the Are, and give me
my shawl."
Adelaide went into the adjacent room, where,
no doubt, she slept, and returned, bringing to
her mother a cashmere shawl which must liave
cost a great deal when it was new, for tlie pat-
tern was Indian ; but, old, faded, and full of
darns, it harmonized with the furniture. Ma-
dame Leseigneur put it on very artistically, and
with thc tact of an old woman who wishes the
truth of her words to be believed. The young-
girl ran nimbly to the capharmaum, and reap-
peared with a handful of small wood, which she
threw boldly on the fire to make it burn up.
It would be difficult to transcribe the conver-
sation which took place between these three per-
sons. Guided by the tact almost always ac-
quired by a childhood spent in misfortune, Hip-
polyte'carefully avoided the least observation
relative to the position of his neighbors, seeing
around him the symptoms of an embarrassment
so badly disguised. The most simple question
might have been indiscreet, unless from the
mouth of an old friend. Nevertheless, the
painter was profoundly affected by this hidden
misery; his generous heart suffered; but,
knowing how offensive any kind of pity, even
the most friendly may appear, he felt ill at ease
from the discordance which existed between his
thoughts and his words. The two ladies talked
at first about painting, for women divine so
well the secret embarrassment of a first visit:
perhaps they feel it themselves, and their femi-
nine instinct furnishes them with a thousand re
sources for putting an end to it. Whilst ques-
tioning the young man about the mateiial pro-
cess of his art, and about his studies, Adelaide
and her mother inspired him with courage to
talk. The indefinable workings of their con-
versation, animated with benevolence, led on
Hippolyte quite naturally to let fall remarks or
reflections which indicated the. nature of his
habits and his heart.
Grief had prematurely aged the face of the old
lady, doubtless handsome in its day; but there
remained nothing but the striking features, the
outline—in a word, the skeleton" of a counte-
nance whicli, taken altogether, indicated great
refinement; much grace in the play of the eyes,
which recalled the expression peculiar to the
women of the old court, and which no words
can define. These features, so small and so
refined, might just as well denote an evil dispo-
sition, and indicate feminine cunning and craft
carried to a high degree of perversity, as reveal
the delicacy of a noble mind. In fact, the fem-
inine physiognomy is so far embarrassing to
common observers, that the difference between
frankness and duplicity, between the spirit of
intrigue and the spirit of honor, is impercepti-
ble. The man endowed with penetrating in-
sight divines the imperceptible shades pro-
duced by a profile more or less bold, a dimple
more or less hollow, a feature more or less
arched or prominent. The appreciation of these
diagnostics is entirely in the domain of intuition,
which alone can discover what everybody is in-
terested in concealing. It was the same with the
countenance of the old lady as with the apart-
ments she inhabited; it seemed as difficult to
tell whether their poverty sheltered viciousness
or strict probity, as to decide whether the
mother of Adélaïde was an old coquette, ac-
customed to weigh everything, to calculate
everything, and to sell everything, or an affec-
tionate woman, full of nobility and amiable
qualities. But at the age of Schinner, the first
impulse of the heart is to believe in good; and
in contemplating the noble and almost disdain-
ful brow of Adélaïde, and looking into her eyes
full of soul and of thought, he inhaled, so to
speak, the sweet and modest perfume of virtue.
ln the ijiiddle of the conversation, he seized the
opportunity of talking about portraits in gen-
eral, in order to have a right to examine the
frightful pastel, the colors of which had all
faded, and the principal part of its surface fallen
away.
"You prize this picture, no doubt, for the
sake of the likeness, ladies, for the drawing is
horrible," said he, looking at Adélaïde.
"It was done at Calcutta, in great haste,"
replied the mother in a voice of emotion.
She gazed at the shapeless sketch with the
profound abstraction caused by the recollections
of happiness, when they awake and fall on the
heart, like a beneficent dew to whose refreshing
influence we love to abandon ourselves; but
there were also in the expression of the counte-
nance of the old lady thc vestiges of an eternal
mourning. At least, the painter chose thus to
interpret the attitude and the physiognomy of
his neighbor, by whose side he came and sat
down.
"Madame," said he, "in a very short time
the colors of this pastel will have disappeared.
The portrait will exist no longer except in
your memory. Where you see a face dear to
you, others will perceive nothing. Will you
permit me to transfer this likeness to canvas?
It will be more firmly fixed on that than it is on
this paper. Allow me, as a neighbor, the pleas-
ure of rendering you this service. There are
always hours iu which an artist is happy to
amuse himself, after his grand compositions, by
works of a less elevated character, and it will
be an amusement for me to reproduce this
head."
The old lady heard these words with a start
of joy, and Adélaïde cast on the painter one of
those concentrated glances which seem to be an
emanation of the soul. Hippolyte wished to at-
tach himself to his two neighbors by some tie,
and to obtain the right of mingling with their
life. His offer, addressed to the warmest affec-
tions of the heart, was the only one he could
possibly make; it gratified his artist's pride, and
could not offend the two ladies. Madame
Leseigneur accepted it without eagerness or re-
luctance, but with the conscientiousness of
great minds which comprehend the extent of
the ties formed by^ such obligations, and consti-
tute them a magnificent eulogy, a proof of es-
teem.
"This uniform," said the painter, " seems to
be that of a naval officer?"
" Yes," said she; "it is that of a post cap-
tain. Monsieur de Rouville, my husband, died
at Batavia, of a wound received in a combat
with an English vessel which he encountered
on the coast of Asia. He commanded a frigate
of fifty-six guns, and the Bevenge was a ship of
ninety six. The combat was very unequal, but
he defended himself so courageously that he
kept it up until night enabled him to escape.
When I returned to France, Bonaparte was not
yet in power, and they refused me a pension.
When I renewed my application lately, the min-
ister harshly told me that if the Baron de Rouville
had emigrated, i should not have lost him; that
he would doubtless have been a rear-admiral by
this time; in short, his Excellency concluded by
referring me to I don't know what law of for-
feiture. 1 only took this step, to which 1 was
urged by my friends, for the sake of my poor
Adélaïde. I have always had a repugnance to
hold out my hand iu the name of an' affliction
which deprives a woman of speech and strength.
I do not like this pecuniary valuation of blood
irreparably spilt."
" Mamma, this subject of conversation al-
ways upsets you."
At this remark of Adelaide's, the Baroness
Leseigneur de Rouville bowed her head and re-
mained silent.
" Sir," said the young girl to Hippolyte, " 1
thought that a painter's work was not generally
very noisy."
At this question Schinner began to blush at
the remembrance of the disturbance he had
made. Adélaïde did not finish, and spared him
some falsehood by rising suddenly at the sound
of a carriage which stopped at the door. She
went into her room, and returned immediately
carrying two gilt candlesticks holding half-burnt
wax candles, which she quickly lighted; and
without waiting for the ringing of the bell, she
opened the door of the first room, and left the
lamp there. The sound of a kiss given and re-
ceived re-echoed   in the   heart of   Hippolyte.