“Not if ‘Le beau est toujours le vrai.’ My father, no inexperienced nor unwise politician, in repeating the royal words, remarked: ‘The fallacy of the Count’s argument is in its metaphor. A man is not a shore. Do you not think that the seamen on board the wrecks would be more grateful to him who did not complacently compare himself to a shore, but considered himself a human being like themselves, and risked his own life in a boat, even though it were a cockleshell, in the chance of saving theirs?” Alain de Rochebriant was a brave man, with that intense sentiment of patriotism which characterizes Frenchmen of every rank and persuasion, unless they belong to the Internationalists; and, without pausing to consider, he cried, “Your father was right.” The Englishman resumed: “Need I say, my dear Marquis, that I am not a Legitimist? I am not an Imperialist, neither am I an Orleanist nor a Republican. Between all those political divisions it is for Frenchmen to make their choice, and for Englishmen to accept for France that government which France has established. I view things here as a simple observer. But it strikes me that if I were a Frenchman in your position, I should think myself unworthy my ancestors if I consented to be an insignificant looker-on.” “You are not in my position,” said the Marquis, half mournfully, half haughtily, “and you can scarcely judge of it even in imagination.” “I need not much task my imagination; I judge of it by analogy. I was very much in your position when I entered upon what I venture to call my career; and it is the curious similarity between us in circumstances, that made me wish for your friendship when that similarity was made known to me by Lemercier, who is not less garrulous than the true Parisian usually is. Permit me to say that, like you, I was reared in some pride of no inglorious ancestry. I was reared also in the expectation of great wealth. Those expectations were not realized: my father had the fault of noble natures,--generosity pushed to imprudence: he died poor and in debt. You retain the home of your ancestors; I had to resign mine.” The Marquis had felt deeply interested in this narrative, and as Graham now paused, took his hand and pressed it. “One of our most eminent personages said to me about that time, ‘Whatever a clever man of your age determines to do or to be, the odds are twenty to one that he has only to live on in order to do or to be it.’ Don’t you think he spoke truly? I think so.” “I scarcely know what to think,” said Rochebriant; “I feel as if you had given me so rough a shake when I was in the midst of a dull dream, that I am not yet quite sure whether I am asleep or awake.” Just as he said this, and towards the Paris end of the Champs Elysees, there was a halt, a sensation among the loungers round them; many of them uncovered in salute.