"I left my car, or my diligence,--I am not sure which I was in,--and walked about at random. The Bal de Sceaux, once so brilliant and crowded, has lost much of its popularity. Everything has its day, messieurs! open-air balls as well as great empires, and beauty! The Vendanges de Bourgogne had ceased to exist. That lively restaurant, where so many banquets and ultra _chicard_ balls used to be given, and where the women danced in _tableau vivant_ costume,--a place that owed its vogue originally to its excellent sheep's trotters,--has closed its doors; let us hope that it will reopen them. And even the Méridien!--the Méridien! I will not insult you by asking you if you ever went there! Who is the man, provided he is ever so little a lady's man, who has not been to the Méridien, where the private rooms were so well arranged for congenial parties? Well, messieurs, that charming little restaurant, which, as you know, was close by here, has also closed its doors. In fact, everything has been demolished, even the Cadran Bleu. That once famous resort has vanished from Boulevard du Temple. Upon my word, it is really heartrending! Where shall we go now to dine, when we have a pretty woman to entertain? I am grieved to say it, messieurs, but suitable places are becoming very rare in Paris; one must needs go _extra muros_ to find silence, secrecy, and all the comforts which add to the charm of a tête-à-tête; and one has not always the leisure to go out of Paris. "Excuse me for indulging in these reflections--I return to my subject. I had been strolling about Sceaux for some time, and I noticed that those peasant girls who were dressed coquettishly and arrayed in all their finery, those, in short, who seemed disposed to dance and enjoy themselves generally, were leaving the town and going in the direction of Fontenay-aux-Roses. "I at once made inquiries of a worthy woman who sold gingerbread, and who seemed to view with an expression of alarm the general desertion of the population. By the purchase of a huge gingerbread man for four sous, for which I paid cash, and by praising her cookery, I gained the huckster's good will. "'Where are all these girls going in their Sunday clothes?' I inquired, bravely attacking my gingerbread man's foot. "'Mon Dieu! monsieur, as if there was any need of asking! _Pardine!_ they're going to Fontenay, on the pretext that there's a fête there to-day; and there'll be a little fair, and a man to tumble and play tricks, and make a fool of himself. As if it wasn't a hundred times nicer here! As if our ball wasn't a hundred times finer! But they all have the devil in 'em, and they lead each other on. There's no way to stop 'em. So you're my first customer to-day; I ain't sold two sous' worth all day long.' "'Well, why don't you do as everybody else does? What is there to hinder you from moving your stall and your gingerbread to Fontenay-aux-Roses?'