"Moreover, Comte Léodgard cannot accuse Fortune with a good grace; for if she is adverse to him at play, with the fair she seems to treat him like a spoiled child." "There is a report of a certain _bonne fortune_ with a damsel on Rue Dauphine; and I hear that the little one is as beautiful as Cupid. She was kept carefully concealed, but that devil of a Léodgard would discover her kind at the bottom of a well or on top of the steepest cliffs!" "Come, Léodgard, tell us about this intrigue." "Yes, yes! tell us about this bourgeois _bonne fortune_. It will help us to pass the time until Montrevert comes; he must have fallen into some hole in the road." Léodgard stretched himself out carelessly on the grass and looked at his companions, saying: "Has anyone anything to drink? I am extremely thirsty, and I can't tell my story unless I have something to drink." "By Saint Jacques! I would like a drink, too!" muttered young Monclair, making vain efforts to sit up. "What! not a drop? and no wine shops near by!" "A cheerful spot, the neighborhood of this horrible Pont-aux-Choux!--There is not a house in sight--not even a hovel!" "Wait, my friends, wait.--Holà! Bruno!" The Marquis de Sénange's valet approached the group. "Bruno, do you not always carry a gourd, like the pilgrims when they set out on a long journey?" "Yes, seigneur, I do." "What is there in your gourd?" "There is some--some very bad eau-de-vie." "Very bad!--Ah! you rascal! from the way in which you say that, I would swear that you are lying. Give us your gourd; and we will judge whether its contents are so bad as you say." "But, seigneur, I have been drinking from it, and I could not allow----" "Give it to me, all the same; we must be governed by circumstances. Come, gallows bird! I verily believe that you hesitate!" Repressing a sigh, the valet handed his master an enormous gourd. Sénange swallowed a mouthful, then cried: "Ah! I suspected as much; it is exquisite, delicious,--it is thirty years old, I will stake my head! The villain must have stolen it from my father's cellar.--Here, Léodgard, judge for yourself." Léodgard took the gourd and drank slowly but at great length, so that the young men called out: "Enough, count, enough!--He will drink it all! We too want a chance to judge of the liquor!" At last Léodgard passed the gourd to his neighbor, who, after drinking, passed it to another. They did not cease to drink, until they had exhausted the contents of the gourd. Then they returned it to Bruno and made themselves comfortable on the grass, some half reclining, others at full length. Léodgard, who had maintained a sitting posture, with his head resting on his left hand, said to his companions: "What do you wish me to tell you about, messieurs? an amourette among the common people? Mon Dieu! it is always the same story! They kept the girl closely confined, but not so closely that she did not see me pacing the street under her window."