“Well, then, after what has occurred, I need scarcely say your acquaintance with him had better cease. There is no middle course in these matters. Circumstances will not bring you, as formerly, into each other's company; and to continue your intimacy would be offensive to his Majesty.” “But surely, sir, the friendship of persons so humble as we are can be a subject neither for the Emperor's satisfaction nor displeasure, if he even were to know of it?” “You must take my word for that,” replied the general, somewhat sternly. “The counsel I have given to-day may come as a command to-morrow. The Chevalier Duchesne has given his Majesty great and grave offence; see that you are not led to follow his example.” With a marked emphasis on the last few words, and with a cold bow, he left the room. “That I am not led to follow his example!” said I, repeating his words over slowly to myself. “Is that, then, the danger of which he would warn me?” The remembrance of the misfortunes which opened my career in life came full before me,--the unhappy acquaintance with De Beauvais, and the long train of suspicious circumstances that followed; and I shuddered at the bare thought of being again involved in apparent criminality. And yet, what a state of slavery was this! The thought flashed suddenly across my mind, and I exclaimed aloud, “And this is the liberty for which I have perilled life and limb,--this the cause for which I have become an alien and an exile!” “Most true, my dear friend,” said Duchesne, gayly, as he slipped into the room, and drew his Chair towards the fire. “A wise reflection, but most unwisely spoken. But there are men nothing can teach; not even the 'Temple' nor the 'Palais de Justice.'” “How, then,--you know of my unhappy imprisonment?” “Know of it? To be sure I do. Bless your sweet innocence! I have been told, a hundred times over, to make overtures to you from the Faubourg. There are at least a dozen old ladies there who believe firmly you are a true Legitimist, and wear the white cockade next your heart. I have had, over and over, the most tempting offers to make you. Faith, I 'm not quite certain if we are not believed to be, at this very moment, concocting how to smuggle over the frontier a brass carronade and a royal livery, two pounds of gunpowder and a court periwig, to restore the Bourbons!” He burst into a fit of laughing as he concluded; and however little disposed to mirth at the moment, I could not refrain from joining in the emotion.