Every Saturday, May 5, 1806.] TURNING THE TABLES. "Tell me how I should know anything of it in the past," replied Hector, contritely. "O, you good apostle! Look out. To defend one's self without accusation is almost to own the crime." Hector smiled. "With you, who are sheltered from all the petty errors of the heart, one can well admit this sort of thing. Doubtless the example of certain ladies whom you have designated has given the sign of this unbridled luxury. I use the expression that fine ladies are ambitious of employing." "Oh!" exclaimed Camille. "Faith! yes," cried Hector, "the word is low. They say all manner of bad things of these ladies; and no one has anything more attractive to do than They do not deserve, believe to imitate them. me, either this excess of indignation or of honor. The most part, I assure you, have great airs, and a grand tone; but it all has a sign it would be well Why follow in their footsteps? to leave to them. Is it, then, in the hope of denying them some butterflies who would burn their wings? It is at once imprudent and impolitic. For, in fine, when there are young idlers in a fair way to waste their time, and spend their fortunes on these charming Madeleines, you will allow, dear cousin, that they are only after same easy amour, and know their own impotence in the presence of a delicate sense of genuine love. Such is it that renders the contest with a true woman so completely unequal, and even dangerous." The young woman showed evidence of incredulity. "You doubt," continued Hector, "but it is truly that one of the rare virtues, which has a power of its own to-day. These seducers, who run up a list of amours with any seriousness of passion, are just the merest inventions of the penny journalists. These debauchees, riddled with debts, Don Juans of the Café Anglais and of the Maison Dorée, dandies all hair, are only interlopers in good society. Cut off such excrescences, and you get rid of such swaggering vices, and you have a young generation, wellbred, neither too lively nor too sedate, just fit for the world as it is, filling the right place in the salon, and just as capable of becoming good husbands and good papas as the most virtuous of -" "O, it is not necessary to have a reason for 66 "Then," said he, eagerly, "I pray for such a "What folly!" replied Camille, sighing. "How But I coquetry as would serve me so well." can I believe that you came here to know: wait till Cécile comes; she is the one doubtless that you-" Hector did not stay for the finishing of the sena child!" tence, but cried, "O Madame, how could you think it! Cécile, "But she is adorably pretty, sir." "Very well." "So, jealous!" thought Hector. Then thinking that Cécile might indeed make a somewhat inopportune appearance, and that he had yet considerable to do to complete his conquest of Camille, he proposed a walk in the garden. The plan was too nearly her own not to be accepted eagerly. "Let us continue our talk, Madame, for I see that to convince you I have still much to tell you. Will you take my arm?" "Gladly." "I shall be happy if this delicious contact does something for my suit." "You have too little confidence in your own merits, and are too modest, dear cousin." "Is it not a trait of genuine affection not to flatter itself of success?" "A complete metamorphosis," cried Camille, laughing. 66 Laugh away; it only renders you the more charming." Upon my word, I won't listen to a word more, Hector"; and so, quitting his arm, she went to a bell-pull and rung. III. AFTER all, the author must introduce his amusing valet. Call him Jobin, and let us suppose he is "another Sosie of the actor Priston, at the Palais Royal. You can fancy the nasal, drawling voice, the great, stupid eyes, and the dumfounded look of our new personage. "So be it;-but the women do bet at the races"Certainly they do; but, nevertheless, they have another mission than that to fill. Finally one goes to the Bois de Boulogne, and it is not the less amusing without doubt; but it is very futile, when one looks there in vain -" "For what?" asked the curious Camille. "For the very thing you can't find in the salon." The other thought that here at last was something ingenuous and serious; and so she looked at "Is it that Hector out of the corner of her eye. "What he is indeed a cousin?" said she to herself. heart! what delicacy! In faith, I have misjudged him." Hector made the same reflections on his part. Camille, wishing to push matters, said, "So you sought for "Yes, what Diogenes did, and I am afraid"Away with you, for a trivial, inconstant "It is exactly this inconstancy, which, leaving the heart so completely void, makes more sensible a sincere affection undisguised to all." An affection born so quickly "O, take care! is not the thing; and there is often the uttermost indifference under the mask." "Plague on you, cousin, for a piece of subtlety! And how do you know?" "My parasol," said Camille to the valet when he answered the bell. Meanwhile Hector was contemplating the charming widow in a mirror that reflect"She is adorable, and I have not "She is more dangerous ed all her graces. found it out," he thought. than I had any idea of. What life! what grace! and just the degree of coquetry to render her adorable. Where have my eyes been?" Meanwhile Camille, a little dreamy, was deciding that her cousin had never before seemed quite as he self- a week earlier. did now; that he would have endangered even her Jobin entered with the parasol. "Come, Hector," said the lady. And he hastened to offer his arm; when they soon disappeared among the linden shades of the garden alleys, where the clematis and the ivy-grape grew. Jobin, flattening his nose against a pane in the glass-gallery, followed them with a curious eye, and delivered himself in this wise: "M. de Sévigny and Madame seem very well content with one another to-day. After all, once is not always; and, as the - doctor says, kings have wooed shepherdesses; but deed a woman. Here I am a child who can do Madame is not a shepherdess of Nanterre, and M. nothing at these things. But they will see, neverHector is no king of Longchamps. Hector! There's theless." Some vague disturbance came upon her. nothing like fellowship on the turf to beget intimacy." But this is perhaps a wrong I am going to comThe Bourse can do great things!" He took an eye- mit, just on the verge of O, should anybody glass from the pocket of his red waistcoat, and tried know it! Very well, I will return to my dear colto fasten it under his brow. "When Madame rung ony, for there, at least, I am a sovereign without I was coming to tell this dear friend-there you have rival: my caprices are my orders; my fantasies, it fine- that Mlle. Cécile begged him to wait in the laws, which find none to disobey them." salon till she had finished her toilette-there you Her cousin's voice only confirmed her resolution. have it a little better. When Mlle. is at her toi-"You are an angel," said he to Camille, “and I love lette, it is no short job; that's perfectly right! O, these fine ways! I have spent time to acquire them, as well as the superlative speech; but I have got them. What a charming creature is Mlle. Cécile, and would n't she look well 'side of me in calèche. I could love her, though, the young Creole. Madame is not bad; but then she has married once. It is growing warm out there in the garden, bless me ! Ah, Hector kissing his cousin's hand! It is n't much, but it's the right sort." you." "You shall find out," said Cécile, "if I am the simpleton you take me for." So she dropped back in her chair with the most indifferent air. IV. ON re-entering the room, Hector had the air of a conqueror, and Camille was radiant. "A complete triumph," she whispered to Cécile, embracing her; then turning to the young man, What say you to our flowers, dear cousin,- to those of Cécile above all? for it is to her that we owe a part of this collection." So the valet Jobin, enchanted with his own wit," his person, and his ability to keep his eye-glass in place according to the mode, twirled about on his right foot, and found himself face to face with Cécile just entering the room, and laughing violently over the funny object before her. "Well, Master Jobin, these are manners! Eh! goodness gracious, a quizzing-glass too! Well, hand me a book," said she, as she threw herself into an easy-chair. The book lay upon a little table quite within her reach, while Jobin searched the apartment through, and then asked where it was. "There," replied Cécile; "don't you see it?" Jobin hastened to obey. "How lazy!" said he to himself. "Well, patience, Jobin; when you are rich, you shall make your footman read to you!" Here, sir, where is M. de Sévigny? Did you not tell him?" asked Cécile. 66 "Pardon, Mademoiselle, if, that is to say, No! because Monsieur has gone into the garden with Madame Damberg, and I could not "Very well"; and, pointing to a tabouret close by, she added, "Jobin, place that tabouret under my feet." The valet obeyed, and thought as he left the room, that had he been she, and needed a tabouret, he would have made one of Jobin. Cécile fell lazily back in her chair, and, closing her eyes, set to thinking. "A walk in the garden, well, that were agreeable; but then it is horrid hard work. So I stay here. Then my presence would only spoil matters, for Camille has got that impertinent fop, Hector, in hand to give him a lesson." At this moment a silvery laugh caught her ear; she looked up, and perceived Hector and Camille just at the end of the gallery; but her indolence was too much for her curiosity. 66 "She can Everything is right," she thought. play the coquette on him, and I could do the same. Just so; only they try to make me out a child; but I can have my turn at it too, I hope." She got up with utter nonchalance, but not without grace, and went towards the gallery. "Camille is coquette, wit, and what not, and knows just how to come off victor in all these skirmishes of the salons. As for me," and she gazed at herself in the glass with a smile full of malice and vague indications, "why, I am commonplace, indolent, lazy. Well, what matters it? no worse for that! Is there not some other means of conquest than this wit and its battles? Well, I am willing. Yonder, under the beautiful skies of the Isle of France, there I was in "They are charming." "O, they are but poor specimens of the marvellous tropics," said Cécile. "Transplanted to our soil, they lose all their glory. A flower only flourishes where it is native." "Nevertheless, they are not altogether worthless to such as never leave home," said Hector. "There's a gallant for you, Cécile !" said Camille. "Bah! nonsense for country wit! and if one should give him occasion, this poor cousin of ours would make both of us believe that he adored us, singly and together." 66 If I could have the pretence, I would proclaim neither my success nor my failure, but the thing would be impertinent on my part." "So that you would not decline wholly the proposition," said Camille, a little seriously; "only in confessing that there might be some difficulty in succeeding, you wish to show your discretion,faith! it is a very nice sort of business." "Eh? But it is not so vulgar a matter, as times go," replied Hector, opening the book which Cécile had thrown aside. "Yes, plume yourself on your discretion," said Cécile. "Are n't you the one who would like to find out my secrets, and divine my sympathies?" "But it is all fair play!" replied Hector. “Ah, very dangerous reading this!" "What is it?" asked Camille. "Paul and Virginia, of sentimental memory," said Hector. "And you think that dangerous?" asked Cécile. Dangerous for me, certainly; for how can I stand such an eclipse?" "Paul is dead," said Camille, "while you are "That's consoling, certainly. Paul is a dead prince and I a live shepherd." "I think you are both wrong," said Cécile. "Paul is no more dead than Virginia; both are immortal." Hector hummed, - Saturday "Dear cousin, the commission charged with that statistical labor has not yet reported; but they have slipped out an indiscretion. Commissions don't do anything else—" "True!" cried Camille; "and this indiscretion -" "Tells us of the transformation of the species Paul," said Hector, talking attentively at the two; "and, according to these savants But I'd better leave on them all the responsibility of their opinions: the women will not complain of it too much." "Women! is it possible?" cried Cécile; "but the Virginias!" "The indiscretion of these savants has not reached that; and I don't know that they have decided upon the same transformation in the species Virginia." These savants seem to me very impertinent," said Camille. "And their transformation is not encouraging," added Cécile. "The worm passes for an ugly thing, it is true; but the chrysalis is very inconstant." "Don't believe a word of it!" cried Hector. "They are flowers without scent that incite these ugly stories." "Bah! It is easy to see the meaning of such pretexts," said Camille. "It is always the last flower which is the most beautiful and dispenses the sweetest perfume." "You calumniate the winged things, ladies, which pass by the beauty of the camellias to pilfer the sweets of the roses and violets." Cécile fancied the distinction clever; of course she did, for did not her cousin mean the violet for herself? As for Camille, she questioned if Hector did not dream of sharing these compliments, and tried to change the conversation; but Hector had a mind of his own, and hurried on, "But permit me to ask of both of you, and you first, my pretty Cécile, if really you have dreamed out a type of husband like this Paul here?" and he showed the book. world that we must submit to. A husband like Paul would be rather too rustic to-day. The world must have a share of you. Be a Virginia in your household, but a woman of the world, and something of a coquette in society. In your family relations you were right; outside of that, you were wrong." "I understand," said Camille, "it is a Paul of high life that would suit her; now for me!" "You, my adorable widow, the life of the salon is your sphere, fit to shine among all by your wit and your beauty. It would indeed be a crime to keep you in a nest to coo eternally. You need candles and fêtes and music and dancing. Such a flower as you would wither away in the bucolic atmosphere of the good Bernardin. You understand, then, how you were wrong." "I am ready to admit it; but how can I be at the same time right, my paradoxical sir?” "That is easy to show you. You and the man of your choice are people of the world. You sacrifice to the exigencies; you coquette on your part,—that is the woman's privilege. Your husband must sacrifice you in the salon, and let you alone in the centre of that circle where you are queen. But in his home life he throws off this restraint of the world, and your charms no longer meet his indifference. He hastens to change his lion's skin for the lamb's. You find then for yourself that type of lover you have dreamed of. In the one case the lover should transform himself into the man of the world; in the other, the man of society gives place to the lover. And this is the way, my dear Camille, after having been wrong, you are right." All this pleased Camille much, for she took it all as proof of her coquetry's power over him. "This would be very well," said Cécile, "if one could choose Hector interrupted, "But you choose often on one side, dear ladies, and in deceiving yourself you deceive him who thinks to have divined your heart's secret. Alas! if you were not so often incomprehensible, there would be few bachelors among us." Camille smiled maliciously. "How, coz ! are you dreaming of marriage, — you?" One "Faith, this bachelor life is so monotonous. is nothing in society without bonds, without position, without serious attachment." "How, you, young, rich, so elegant that others copy you," cried Cécile, "you bid farewell to that life whose praises you have so often sounded. It is beyond belief.” Hector cast a fascinating eye upon his two cousins. "Ah, what would you? that one should weary himself out, till, without knowing it, he is past the time for happiness; or that about him he should find some charming woman, with whom it would be sweet to pass life, and then brave sarcasm — "That's for Camille," thought Cécile; "but I have not had my last word yet." every caprice and every fantasy, is the true happi-ing, was resting on her left hand; and her arm, exness!" Camille was serious. "That is your mind, then," said she. "Precisely. Whoever puts restrictions on love does not understand it!" "That's a delicate way of putting it, surely," said Cécile; "and if all marriages were thus "Almost slavery," cried Camille; "Hector makes the men too perfect and the women too exacting." "As for myself, who am not rich, happily," cried Cécile, "I hope to be loved for myself alone; if not, I would rather remain as I am." Camille looked savagely at her cousin. "How dare you make reference to my fortune, which is, lucklessly, considerable.” Cécile seemed contrite. "How could you think it?" she cried, and threw herself with feigned sadness into Camille's arms, who equalled her hypocrisy in saying, "We can be happy, each for herself, can't we?" Meanwhile, the happy Hector bit his moustache and said to himself, "Now for a grand stroke of my evil intention." The door opened and the squeaking voice of Jobin announced M. Beauclerc, the notary of the family. At this the two ladies colored profusely. "Admit him," said Camille, briskly, and turning to Hector, "Excuse me, my friend, you must know widows are sometimes troubled with business." 66 'Nothing more natural. Certainly go, sweet coz." Nevertheless Camille hesitated for an instant, to look at Cécile and try to divine her thoughts. But the placid and tranquil face of the young woman reassured her completely. She thought that her victory was too certain to entertain any doubt of her cousin, the child! and so went out, smiling and triumphant. "Now for my turn!" thought Cécile. V. WITH Cécile, Hector had another part to play. For several months her heart had been proof against every variety of his assaults, and he had only got laughed at for his pains. Accordingly he depended upon a well-preserved indifference for success to-day. So he sat down at the other end of the salon, and began examining very attentively the designs in an album. The young woman contemplated him for a moment with a smile, and then, sinking with provoking nonchalance into her chair, she called out, "Hector!" He was deaf. "My coz," she said, trying a sweeter tone. "My coz,' was the perfectly indifferent reply. "So this is the way you treat me, off there, some miles away. It is very evident Camille is no longer posed by the drooping sleeve down to her elbow, was perfect in its roundness, and had that milky whiteness peculiar to blondes. Her body, lightly inclined on one side, showed a bust the most beautiful in the world. Hector was roused. "Charming! ecstatic!" "Put this tabouret-there-under my feet. I am very lazy, am I not?" "You are divine!" When Hector pushed the tabouret she raised her robe a little, disclosing the finely arched foot of a Cinderella, and an ankle so beautiful that he was for an instant dazzled! This was all done with such well-feigned nonchalance that even a sceptic would not have suspected it. "It is something," said she, languidly, "to talk with a friend." "A friend," cried Hector; "better than that!” "A cousin, if you prefer it." "Better still, dear Cécile," said the amorous swain; and taking her hand he kissed it and protested it was charming, delicate, and all that. "What are you doing?" cried she, withdrawing it. 66 Ah, Cécile, you must know that contact with you has some danger in it; that you are, of all women, one of the handsomest and most engaging, and one would be a thousand times happier living with you for you Cécile smiled, enjoying her triumph, and, wishing to conceal her blushing, turned to take a fan from a table behind her; while Hector, staying her arm, got it for her, but just then catching a glimpse of her face, stood mutely regarding her. "I am wrong," said he at last, "in speaking of the world, of society. One ought to pass his life only near you, far from the crowd. 66 "9 Hector, cousin, you tell me things that I ought not, cannot, listen to; leave me." Hector threw himself at her feet. Stay, dear Cécile, stay. I pray you let me tell you "But I cannot hear you. Ah, if you knew "I know that I am fascinated, overcome, that my heart beats, my head is on fire, and that Vainly the young woman tried to escape; Hector was always on his knees pressing her hand to his lips. She, worked to excitement, prayed him to leave her. "Ah," cried she, "if they should only see us, I am lost." But this cry of conscience made no difference to Hector. "Listen to me," he answered, "I am at your feet; I love you!" At this moment the door again opened, and Camille, pale and speechless, with a bitter smile on her lips, appeared to the two in all their confusion. VI. CECILE concealed her blushes behind her fan. Hector seemed to be trying to find something on the floor. Camille advanced calm and majestic. She had lost her case; but she did not wish to have Cécile gain hers; and so, addressing Hector, she said, "Cécile has without doubt told you "What's that?" interrupted Hector, hoping to have found matter for his relief. "That M. Beauclerc, my notary, has come to draw the marriage contracts." "Contracts!" "Yes,mine first, M. de Sévigny. I must inform you of my immediate marriage to M. de Fon Cécile interrupted him with asking him to pick up her handkerchief, which she had just dropped. This done, he found Cécile had posed herself in a most bewitching attitude. Her head, always charm- | tenay." Every Saturday, May 5, 1806. DONKEY-RIDING ON PARNASSUS. Hector asked himself if it were all a dream. "Ah, the coquette!" he murmured. "As to Cécile," replied Camille, "I leave to that dear cousin the pleasure of telling you "Yes," said the other, making a violent effort to conceal her shame and emotion," it is just, I had forgotten What then?" Hector broke in, completely dis tracted. "Alas! that I am punished!" thought Cécile, and then aloud she added, "my marriage with "Your marriage!" cried Hector, thinking to have misunderstood her. DONKEY-RIDING ON PARNASSUS. IT has been calculated that, at some period or other of their lives, most men and all women have have been perhaps an excepbeen guilty of the crime of writing indifferent verses. other favored persons Senior wranglers, and attorneys' clerks, and a few verseless youth. But the majority of mankind have tion to the rule, and have passed a dry, chippy, Parnassus, and have exhausted the ordinary commonknown the gentle pleasures of donkey-riding upon The first and flowers and bowers, and the moon. places and rhymes about despair, and broken hearts, the male portion of our species is to make them effect of the sprouting of the juvenile affections on "She also!" cried preternaturally gloomy. They have really themHector was deaf with rage. he. "Ah, I am played upon like a fool. And she selves to blame, for they begin by fixing their young goes! Heavens! I'll have the last word." And hearts on all sorts of impossible and unattainable at so, laughing satirically, he continued, "It is pleas-objects. Either it is a married cousin twice their ant, very pleasant, all this in you! Indeed the moment when-ha! ha!— I shall always think of it. Of this M. Beauclerc, is it he you have spoken of? O, indeed, it is very original in you. Ha! ha! ha!" "Yes, cousin, my marriage with M. Laville, who takes me back to the Colonies." Hector only laughed at his mouth's corners, for at heart he was furious with the trick he had been caught in. "Very well," said they. age, or it is their tutor's chubbiest daughter, or else "But this same notary is mine, and I suppose he own miserable condition is much worse than that of has warned you "Of what?" said Camille, impatiently. Hector, wishing to draw out his revenge, contented himself with saying, " Truly, it has been very discreet on his part." "How so?" "Hec"Well, he has drawn up for me also a "Mestor stopped short; he smiled a malicious smile, and then in a very ceremonious tone added, dames, I have the honor of announcing to you my immediate union with Mlle. Claire d'Elbis; and I have come from Paris purposely to give you this piece of news." "Ah, surely this is wonderful," said Camille, in a bitter-sweet tone, which ill concealed her anger. "How, you?" cried Cécile. "I swoon!" Hector went on, "Permit me, ladies, to wish you joy." "What a lesson!" thought Camille. "What a school!" Hector thought on his part. Jobin came to say breakfast was ready, and that the General had just alighted, accompanied by MM. de Fontenay and Laville. "My intended husband," Cécile thought, "provided he does not find out " Camille interrupted further thought with, "Come, let us go and present you, dear cousin." "That would be charming." "One might call it a breakfast of the betrothed, but unfortunately one is wanting." "Yes," added Cécile, forcing a smile, "this pretended one of our cousin, this Virginia." "Truly, that would make the thing complete," Hector replied, thinking how furious they were, and of his victory. "Come, coz, your arm!" said Camille. Hector advanced and offered his arm; and they were all going when suddenly Cécile called the servant. Jobin," said the indolent Creole, "my handkerchief." "What a matter this is," murmured the lackey; "but patience: two-three marriages-presents -must come out of all this; after that we shall see!" all the heroes of whom they have read. Swimming the Hellespont, and finding Hero waiting on the other side, was a much easier affair than telegraphcent young angels during divine service, or suming the state of one's heart to decorous and innomoning up courage to tell the gay and unconscious married cousin all the torments she has inflicted, she will be heartless enough to laugh when she is with the horrid possibility in the background, that told. victim. Placed in this sad predicament, between emotion tionality on the other, the juvenile lover believes on the one side and the cold code of social convenUnder such circumstances, he feels that very naturally that Destiny has marked him for her Horace and Ovid and Sappho and Byron have sued. They wrote poetry when they were in love, chalked out beforehand the proper course to be purand the only thing to be done is to follow the example. The chief difficulty is in finding material. Rhymes and metres are not invincible obstacles, but been described as light-hearted and careless, and when the cruel being who is the cause of all has said. When the sea, and the woods, and the rocks, her victim as hopelessly blighted, almost all has been behavior, scarcely anybody is left except the moon; and the daffodils, have in turn been informed of her and it is impossible to go on for months keeping one's self to, the moon. Shelley and Byron could not literary company with, and exclusively addressing to maintain his verses at the proper astronomical have done it themselves; and after a feeble effort elevation, the youthful lover terminates his donkeyball with a feeling of concealed indignation at the ride on Parnassus, and returns to cricket and footYoung poetesses are more prolific and more pawant of sustained romantic power in his donkey. tient than the young poets in this respect. Like of gloom; though it is not produced, as in the case the latter, they start, as a rule, in a proper temper of the male juvenile, by unrequited affection. With of the iron discipline of the schoolthe consequence the young lady, the gloom, generally speaking, is |