"Very good, very good, Adamas! Talk about something else. Recite some verses to me as you shave me; for I feel depressed, and I might truly say with Monsieur d'Urfé, speaking of Astrée, that the effervescence of my ennui disturbs the repose of my stomach and the breath of my life." "_Numes célestes_! monsieur," cried the faithful Adamas, who loved to use his master's favorite expressions; "so you are still thinking of your brother?" "Alas! his memory came back to me yesterday, I don't know why. There are such days in every man's life, you know, when a slumbering sorrow wakes. It is like the wounds one brings back from the war. Let me tell you something of which that orphan's pretty ways made me think just now. It is that I am growing old, my poor Adamas!" "Monsieur is jesting!" "No, we are growing old, my friend, and my name will die with me. I have a few distant cousins, to be sure, for whom I care but little, and who will perpetuate my father's name, if they can; but I shall be the first and last of the Bois-Dorés, and my marquisate will descend to no one, being entirely honorary and determinable at the king's pleasure." "I have often thought about it, and I regret that monsieur has always been too active to consent to put an end to his bachelor life and marry some beautiful nymph of this neighborhood." "To be sure, I have done wrong not to think of it. I have roamed too much from fair to fair, and although I never met Monsieur d'Urfé, I would stake my life that, having heard of me somewhere, he intended to describe me under the features of Hylas the shepherd." "And suppose it were so? That shepherd is a very amiable man, exceedingly clever, and the most entertaining, in my opinion, of all the heroes of the book." "True; but he is young, and I tell you again that I am beginning not to be young any more and to regret very bitterly my having no family. Do you know that I have had the idea of adopting a child, or have been conscious of a longing to do so, at least a score of times?" "I know it, monsieur; whenever you see a pretty, attractive little baby, that idea comes back to you. Well, what prevents you?" "The difficulty of finding one with an attractive face and a good disposition, who has no parents likely to take him away from me when I have brought him up; for to dote on a child just to have him taken from you at the age of twenty or twenty-five----" "But the interval, monsieur." "Oh! time flies so fast! one is not conscious of its flight! You know that I once thought of taking some young poor relation into my house; but my family are all old Leaguers, and their children are ugly, or obstreperous, or dirty." "It is certain, monsieur, that the younger branch of the Bourons is not attractive. You appropriated the stature, all the charm and all the gallantry of the family, and no one but yourself can give you an heir worthy of you." "Myself!" said Bois-Doré, slightly dazed by this declaration.