"Pardon, it is not ridiculous," said Madame de Sainfoy. "Your prejudices will end by sending Hélène into a convent; this, I believe, is the fourth good proposal that you have laughed at. Yes, a good proposal--listen, Urbain, I know you will agree with me, for every sensible man must. You talk of General Ratoneau's birth! All honour to him, that his talents and courage have raised him above it. As to his manners, they are those of a soldier; frank and rough, of course, but he seems to me both intelligent and sincere. Manners! It is a little late in the day to talk of them, when most of the Marshals of France and the new nobility have none better. Do you fancy yourself back in the eighteenth century, my poor Hervé?" "Very well--but you would not like Georges to bring such manners home from Spain!" "If Georges distinguishes himself, and gains the Emperor's favour, he may bring home what he likes," said Madame de Sainfoy, scornfully. "However, there is no danger; he is our son." "I should have thought that our son-in-law mattered at least as much." "We are not responsible for him. By the bye, as to the General's appearance, you can hardly object to that without bordering on treason. For my part, I call him a handsome man." "A handsome butcher!" said Anne de la Marinière, under her breath. "He is--he is a butcher's son," cried Joseph, suddenly. "I know it--the Prefect told me. His father is still alive--old Ratoneau--a wholesale butcher at Marseilles. He was one of the foremost among the Revolutionists there--a butcher, indeed. Oh, madame, Hervé is right! But it is more than ridiculous--it is impossible. Why, the very name is enough! Ratoneau!" Madame de Sainfoy hardly seemed to hear him. She put him on one side with the slightest movement of her hand. "Next year, probably," she said, "General Ratoneau will be a Marshal of France and ennobled. He will be the equal of all those other men who have already married into our best families. At this moment a friend of his, the Baron de Beauclair, formerly his equal, is an equerry to the Empress. General Ratoneau has only to do the Emperor's work here, to--to pacify and reconcile the West, and his turn will come." She gave herself credit for not repeating Ratoneau's own words as to sweeping out the Chouans. Joseph de la Marinière did not deserve such consideration, but she wished to be careful and politic. "After all, do you not see how inconsistent we are?" she said to the company generally. "We take all the benefits of the Empire, we submit to a successful soldier, accept a new régime for ourselves, and refuse it for our children. Is it not unreasonable?"