"Eagle of Meaux, down with your paws! You produce no effect upon me with your gesture of Hippocrates refusing the _bric-à-brac_ of Artaxerxes. You need not attempt to calm me; and besides, I am melancholy. What would you have me say? Man is bad, man is a deformity; the butterfly is a success, but man a mistake. God made a failure with that animal. A crowd is a choice of uglinesses: the first comer is a scoundrel. _Femme_ rhymes with _infâme._ Yes, I have the spleen, complicated with melancholy, home-sickness, and a dash of hypochondria, and I fret, I rage, I yawn, I weary myself, I bore myself, and I find it horribly dull." "Silence, Big R," Bossuet remarked again, who was discussing a legal point with some chums, and was sunk to his waist in a sentence of judicial slang, of which the following is the end:-- "For my part, although I am scarce an authority, and at the most an amateur lawyer, I assert this, that, according to the terms of the customs of Normandy, upon the Michaelmas day and in every year an equivalent must be paid to the lord of the manor, by all and singular, both by landowners and tenants, and that for every freehold, long lease, mortgage--" "Echo, plaintive nymph!" Grantaire hummed, dose to Grantaire, at an almost silent table, a quire of paper, an inkstand, and a pen between two small glasses announced that a farce was being sketched out. This great affair was discussed in a low voice, and the heads of the workers almost touched. "Let us begin with the names, for when you have the names you have the plot." "That is true: dictate, and I will write." "Monsieur Dorimon?" "An annuitant?" "Of course. His daughter Celestine." "-tine. Who next?" "Colonel Sainval." "Sainval is worn out. Say Valsin." By the side of these theatrical aspirants another group, which also took advantage of the noise to talk low, were discussing a duel. An old student of thirty was advising a young man of eighteen, and explaining with what sort of adversary he had to deal. "Hang it! you will have to be careful, for he is a splendid swordsman. He can attack, makes no useless feints, has a strong wrist, brilliancy, and mathematical parries. And then he is left-handed." In the corner opposite to Grantaire, Joly and Bahorel were playing at dominos and talking of love affairs. "You are happy," said Joly; "you have a mistress who is always laughing." "It is a fault she commits," Bahorel answered; "a man's mistress does wrong to laugh, for it encourages him to deceive her, for seeing her gay saves you from remorse. If you see her sad you have scruples of conscience." "Ungrateful man! a woman who laughs is so nice, and you never quarrel." "That results from the treaty we made; on forming our little holy alliance, we gave each other a frontier which we never step beyond. Hence comes peace." "Peace is digesting happiness." "And you, Jolllly, how does your quarrel stand with Mamselle--you know whom I mean?"