The ex-professor of Plessis had carefully examined the papers of these lawsuits. For love of his pupil he had become almost a lawyer. The rights of the Marquis appeared to him evident; nothing was needed, he said, but patience, and some day the suits would indubitably be gained. More and more enthusiastic in his admiration of the Marquis, he boldly compared him to Alcibiades, so seductive was his fascination. Jean François Dominique modestly reserved to himself the austere part of Socrates, and did not cease to predict the most brilliant fortune for his pupil. "But, my poor Dominique," the young man would say, "I have only my cloak and my sword,--no protector; but for you I should be alone in the world." "But you are _charmant_, my child; all must love you as soon as they see you; all cherish you as soon as they know you, on account of your good and generous nature; you have talent; you know Latin and Greek as well as I do; you understand German as your native tongue, thanks to your late father, who caused you to be brought up by a German valet; you are a noble gentleman, although you do not trace your lineage back to Euryales, son of Ajax, as did Alcibiades, whom I call my hero, because you resemble him extremely. Have patience, then; your career will perhaps be more brilliant than my hero's. . . Yes, it will surely be! . . . as true as that Socrates saved the life of his pupil at Potidæa! But I know your heart, and I am sure that when you are on the pinnacle of prosperity you will not forget the old Jean-François Dominique, as Alcibiades forgot the old philosopher!" However odd and foolish these predictions may have seemed to the young Marquis, they sufficed for a long time to sustain his courage, to give him some hope of gaining one of his lawsuits, and above all, to prevent his enlisting as a private soldier, as he had often threatened to do, to the great alarm of Dominique. Madelaine Landry soon reached the Rue Florentin. Having mounted the five flights of stairs which led to the apartments of her debtor, she stopped a moment on the landing-place to recover breath, in order that she might give free expression to her wrath. When she had sufficiently recovered from her rapid ascent, she knocked; the door was opened. To her profound astonishment, a frightfully ugly man appeared before her. This was the ex-professor of Plessis. Jean-François Dominique was about fifty years old; he was large and bony; his lean face, pale, and very long, bore traces of the ravages of small-pox; his thin, gray hair was tied at the back of his head with a piece of tape. An old woollen coverlet, in which he had majestically draped himself, served him as a dressing-gown. His countenance wore an expression of pedantic surliness and of self-satisfaction in strange combination.