There is about half the book to come, but no more abstract can be necessary. The way in which Jean is delivered from his Adelaide and rewarded with his Caroline, if not quite probable (for Adelaide is made to blacken her own character to her rival), is not without ingenuity. And the narrative (which has Paul de Kock's curious "holding" quality for the hour or two one is likely to bestow on it) is diversified by the usual duel, by Jean's noble and rather rash conduct, in putting down his pistols to bestow sacks of five-franc pieces on his two old friends (who try to burgle and--one of them at least--would rather like to murder him), etc., etc.[50] But the real value--for it has some--of the book lies in the vivid sketches of ordinary life which it gives. The curious Cockneydom, diversified by glimpses of a suburban Arcadia, in which the French _bourgeois_ of the first half of the nineteenth century seems to have passed his time; the humours of a _coucou_ journey from Paris to Saint-Germain; all sorts of details of the Durand and Chopard households--supply these. And not the least of them is given by the bachelor menage of Bellequeue with his eighteen-year-old _bonne_ Rose, the story whereof need not sadden or shock even Mrs. Grundy, unless she scents unrecounted, indeed not even hinted at, improprieties. Bellequeue, as noted above, is by no means a fool, and achieves as near an approach to a successful "character" as Paul de Kock has ever drawn; while Rose plays the same part of piebald angel as Lucile in _Andre_, with a little more cleverness in her espieglerie and at least no vouched-for unlawfulnesses. [Sidenote: _La Femme, le Mari et l'Amant._]