charm of that rural scenery amid which he now found himself. Poverty did not hide, in shame and degradation, beneath the feet of wealth. On the contrary it made itself manifest, light-hearted and free, on a soil which proudly bore its emblems, wild flowers and vagabond plants, the humble moss and the wood-strawberry, the water-cress on the brink of a stream with no well-defined bed, and the ivy clinging to a rock that had obstructed the path for centuries, without attracting the attention of the police. He loved the branches which overhung the road and were respected by passers-by; the bog-holes in which the frog croaked softly as if to warn the traveller,--a more vigilant sentinel than he who guards a king's palace; the old crumbling walls around the enclosure, which no one thought of rebuilding, the powerful roots which pushed up the ground and dug holes at the foot of the venerable trees; all that lack of art which makes nature ingenuous and which harmonizes so well with the severe type and grave and simple costume of the peasant. But let that parasitic insect, that _monsieur_ with the black coat, cleanly shaven chin, gloved hands and shambling legs, appear in the midst of that austere and impressive scene, which carries the imagination back to the epoch of primitive poesy, and that king of society becomes simply a ridiculous blotch, an annoying imperfection in the picture. What business have your funereal garments in this bright sunlight, where their creases seem to laugh scornfully as at a victim? Your offensive, misplaced costume inspires more pity than the poor man's rags; we feel that you are out of place in the fresh air and that your livery crushes you. Never had these reflections presented themselves so vividly to Emile's mind as when Galuchet appeared before him, hat in hand, climbing the hill with a painful exertion which caused his coat-tails to flutter in laughable fashion, and pausing to brush away with his handkerchief the traces of frequent falls. Emile was strongly inclined to laugh at first; and then he asked himself angrily why the parasite was buzzing around the sacred hive. He urged his horse to a gallop, passed Galuchet without seeming to recognize him, arrived first at Châteaubrun, and announced the other's coming to Gilberte as an unavoidable calamity. "Oh! father," said she, "don't receive that ill-bred, disagreeable man, I entreat you! let us not spoil our Châteaubrun, our home, our pleasant, unceremonious life, by the presence of this stranger, who never can and never will be in sympathy with us." "What do you expect me to do with him, for heaven's sake?" said Monsieur de Châteaubrun, sorely embarrassed. "I invited him to come whenever he chose; I could not foresee that you, who are usually so long-suffering and generous, would take such a dislike to a poor devil because of his bad manners and his unattractive face. For my part I pity such people; I see that everyone spurns them and that life is a bore to them."