There was something natural and frank in this man, bad as he was, which won even upon the fastidious old noble, who, perhaps, understood his faults better than any man living. He smiled faintly, and held out his hand. “Ah! my son, have you yet to learn that extravagance is not necessary to the maintenance of a great name?” “No, father; but one cannot live upon a great name. Sometimes I have found it an incumbrance; the people distrust the aristocracy which traces too far back; and, spite of everything, my lot is cast with the people.” “Against the court? Do I live to hear a son of mine say that?” “I have not said that. But the court, and that proud Austrian woman at its head, have repudiated me from the first. It is royal scorn and courtly injustice that has driven me into the arms of the people, who adore me; the more because I am turned out from my own class and belong to them. In this way my nobility is worth something.” “I have heard of your apostacy, and read your speeches, with shame and bitter sorrow,” said the old man, with touching earnestness. “If any severity of mine has driven you into this ruinous course of thought and action, I have come to redeem the mistake. Throw off these associations, so unworthy of your birth and breeding; return to the higher associations which you have abandoned; stand firmly by our good king and most gracious queen in the troubles and perils that gather around them, and no man in all France can rise higher or win such gratitude from king and people. Do this, my son, and all my poor possessions shall be divided with you from the hour of your renewed allegiance.” CHAPTER XXIV. THE OLD NOBLEMAN MAKES CONCESSIONS. Mirabeau looked at his father in amazement a moment, then he turned upon his heel and walked the room with quick, heavy strides, gnawing his under lip and working his fingers with nervous energy, as if the thoughts in his bosom were crowding upon him almost to suffocation. At last he stopped, and stood before his father again; his eyes, burning with restless fire, and his face pale, as if the struggle of a moment had drank up all its color. “And if I did, there would be no frank reception of my homage. That haughty queen would throw it back with such scorn as only a beautiful woman can use in crushing the man who might have worshipped her. Were I to follow your advice, and offer to wield the mighty power, which it were folly to say I do not possess, in favor of the court; were I to defend it with my eloquence; sustain it with my pen; cast myself in the breach between royalty and its foes; what reward should I have?—the covert scorn of this royal beauty, the distrust of the king; a defection of the people, for a time, at least, perhaps an entire loss of popularity, which alone enables me to be of service anywhere.” “But you would be doing right, my son.”