"Augustin Leger," he resumed, "was a man, grave and austere. His long life was but a continued series of virtuous and benevolent acts. He was entirely devoted to the holy, the legitimate cause of----" _He was a regicide!_ "The rights of the sovereign people. His disinterestedness----" _He was a usurer!_ "His laudable economy, his aversion to luxury, his unassuming and modest deportment, had gained for him universal esteem. But still more worthy of admiration were his virtues in private life--his patience, his humility, and his devoted and unchangeable attachment to the wife of his bosom, the lady of his choice." _He had been divorced!_ "For his children he cherished the most affectionate and tender regard." _He had driven them from his house!_ "Virtuous friend! May the earth rest lightly on thy coffin!" THE DUC DE L'OMELETTE. BY EDGAR A. POE. And stepped at once into a cooler clime. _Cowper_. Keats fell by a criticism. Who was it died of _The Andromache_?[1] Ignoble souls!--De L'Omelette perished of an ortolan. _L'histoire en est breve_--assist me Spirit of Apicius! [Footnote 1: Montfleury. The author of the _Parnasse Reformé_ makes him thus express himself in the shades. "The man then who would know of what I died, let him not ask if it were of the fever, the dropsy, or the gout; but let him know that it was of The Andromache."] A golden cage bore the little winged wanderer, enamored, melting, indolent, to the _Chaussée D'Antin_, from its home in far Peru. From its queenly possessor La Bellissima, to the Duc De L'Omelette, six peers of the empire conveyed the happy bird. It was "All for Love." That night the Duc was to sup alone. In the privacy of his bureau, he reclined languidly on that ottoman for which he sacrificed his loyalty in outbidding his king--the notorious ottoman of Cadêt. He buries his face in the pillow--the clock strikes! Unable to restrain his feelings, his Grace swallows an olive. At this moment the door gently opens to the sound of soft music, and lo! the most delicate of birds is before the most enamored of men! But what inexpressible dismay now overshadows the countenance of the Duc?----"_Horreur!_--_chien!_--_Baptiste!_--_l'oiseau! ah, bon Dieu! cet oiseau modeste que tu as deshabillé de ses plumes, et que tu as servi sans papier!_" It is superfluous to say more--the Duc expired in a paroxysm of disgust. * * * * * "Ha! ha! ha!"--said his Grace on the third day after his decease. "He! he! he!"--replied the Devil faintly, drawing himself up with an air of hauteur. "Why, surely you are not serious"--retorted De L'Omelette. "I have sinned--_c'est vrai_--but, my good {151} sir, consider!--you have no actual intention of putting such--such--barbarous threats into execution." "No _what?_"--said His Majesty--"come sir, strip!"