_Jean_--Don't be embarrassed--we keep on calling him Father Giraud all the same. He is a gardener still, only he gardens on his own account. He owns the house that your father was obliged to sell a while ago. My father has never had but one idea,--our Father Giraud,--and that is to be a land-owner; I bought that piece of property for him, and so he is as happy as a fish in the water. If you like, we will go and take breakfast with him to-morrow morning. He will be delighted to see you. How things change, eh? There, where a while ago we were the servants, now we are the masters; though we are not so very proud, for all that. _Countess Savelli_ [_aside_]--He has passed the Rubicon of parvenus! He has confessed his father! Now nothing can stop his way! _Jean_ [_to De Charsay_]--I have wanted to see you for a long time, but I have not been sure how you would meet me. _René_--I would have met you with pleasure, as my uncle would have met you. One cannot utter reproaches to a man who has made his own fortune, except when he has made it by dishonest means; a man who owes it to his intelligence and his probity, who uses it worthily, everybody is ready to meet kindly, as you are met here. _Jean_--Sir, it is not necessary that a man should use his fortune nobly, provided it is made--that is the main thing! _Madame Durieu_--Oh, oh, M. Giraud! there you spoil everything that you have said. _Jean_--I don't say that of my own case, madam, but I say just what I say,--money is money, whatever may be the kind of hands where it sticks. It is the sole power that one never disputes. You may dispute virtue, beauty, courage, genius; but you can't dispute money. There is not one civilized being, rising in the morning, who does not recognize the sovereignty of money, without which he would have neither the roof which shelters, him, nor the bed in which he sleeps, nor the bread that he eats. Whither are bound these masses of people crowding in the streets?--from the employé sweating under his too heavy burden, to the millionaire hurrying down to the Bourse behind his two trotters? The one is running after fifteen sous, the other after one hundred thousand francs. Why do we all have these shops, these railroads, these factories, these theatres, these museums, these lawsuits between brothers and sisters, between fathers and sons, these revelations, these divisions in families, these murders? All for pieces, more or less numerous, of that white or yellow metal which people call silver or gold. And pray who will be the most thought of at the end of this grand race after money? The man who brings back the most of it. Ah, nowadays a man has no business to have more than one object in life--and that is to become as rich as possible! For my part, that has always been my idea; I have carried it out: I congratulate myself on it. Once upon a time everybody found me homely, stupid, a bore; to-day everybody finds me handsome, witty, amiable,--and the Lord knows if