The prince very soon learned from me all the secrets of the craft, but, as he became more sure and confident in them, I fell lower and lower in his estimate. The first two months he paid my salary punctually, but the third month he told me right out that the whole of me was not worth two sous. When I tried to move him with entreaties, referring to my aged mother and my maiden sister, whose only treasure on earth is her virtue, he not only refused to hear the voice of generosity, but even permitted himself certain ambiguities concerning the virtue of my poor dear sister. [Illustration: “STROLLING ABOUT THE BOULEVARDS.” ] While waiting till God should soften his heart, I was forced to be content with receiving my board and lodging. Yet even this much cost me bitter insults. They took away my former bed and replaced it by a thing for which in our sweet language there is no name. At table they constantly mocked and jeered at me, and took to habitually calling me “rascal.” Unhappily, I was so imprudent as to let out on one occasion that I had sometimes been beaten in Paris when fulfilling my duties, and by this needless frankness I, as it were, laid myself open to the most monstrous and outrageous jests, in which these people (who have no inventive capacity of their own) indulged at my expense. Moreover, at every meal they would purposely leave me without some particular dish (as a general rule, with a refinement of cruelty, they would choose whichever dish I liked best); and when I complained of hunger they would unceremoniously send me into the servants’ hall. But what hurt me most of all was the fact that they insulted in my presence my most gracious sovereign and emperor, Napoleon III., and in his person my dear, beautiful France. Thus, for instance, they would ask me was it true that Napoleon (they purposely pronounced his name _Napoleòschka_—a contemptuous diminutive) sold geese in London? or was it true that he and Morny together had kept a house of tolerance in New York? etc.... And all this frivolous jesting at the moment when the terrible Eastern Question stood before us!... So it went on until autumn. The cold weather began, but they neither put double windows into my room nor heated it. I was never of a rebellious temperament, but at the first cruel grasp of cold, even _my_ self-abnegation broke down. Only then did I become fully convinced that the hope that God would touch the heart of my exalted amphytrion was a hope in the last degree illusory and vain. Gathering up my courage, I decided to brave the inhospitable Steppes and appealed to the prince to grant me the necessary sum to reach the banks of the Seine. “I no longer demand the payment of what is due to me, monseigneur,” said I; “the payment of what I have earned, far away from my beloved country, while subsisting on the bitter bread of exile....” “You’re wise not to demand it—Chenapan!” he remarked, coldly.