The Count de Morseiul was half an hour before his time; he walked somewhat slowly, and in picturing the feelings which a contemplative mind might experience in passing through Paris, we have pictured those which pressed for his attention, and crossed from time to time the current of his other thoughts. At length, however, he entered the Rue des Jacobins, and easily found the house to which he had been directed. It was a tall building of six stories, with a bookseller's shop upon the ground floor. Very different indeed, however, was it from a gay dwelling such as Paris now exhibits, with every new publication in blue and yellow flaming in the windows: but, through a small door, entrance was obtained into a long dark shop, where, on shelves, and in cases, and on benches, and on counters, were piled up manifold dusty volumes, whose state of tranquil slumber seemed to have been long undisturbed. A single pale apprentice, with an apron on and a brush in his hand, walked from one end of the shop to the other, or examined with slow inactivity the sheets of some unbound work, moving about his task with the same indifference to its speedy execution, as if the years of Mathuselah were bound up in his indentures. The Count looked at the shop well, to ascertain that he was right, and then entered; but in the long dim vista of the counters and packages, the person he sought for was not to be seen; and not having contemplated such an occurrence, he was somewhat embarrassed as to the person he should ask for. To have inquired whether a lady were waiting for him there or not, might perhaps have been received as an insult by the master of the house, and yet he thought it would be imprudent to risk the name of Clémence de Marly, when she herself might not have given it. He felt sure that had she arrived, her attendant Maria would have been at the post where she had promised to place her; and, in order to occupy the time till she came, he determined to ask for some book, and then enter into desultory conversation with the lad in the shop, after having bought it. He had scarcely spoken, however, when from behind a pile of solid literature which obscured still farther the end of the shop, the servant Maria came forth and advanced towards him. The matter was then easily explained, and the youth seemed in no degree surprised at the appointment, but proceeded to tie up the book which the Count had demanded, while Maria told him that her young lady had only just arrived, and was waiting for him up stairs. He followed her with a rapid step as she led the way, and at the third turning of a long dim narrow staircase, he found Clémence waiting at a door and listening as if for his arrival.