Why, can't I see by the way you look at me that the _young_ man is not
dead in you--as Fenelon put it.--No, this stewardship is not the thing
for you. A man cannot be off with his Paris and with us, old boy, for
the saying! You would die of weariness at Herouville."
"What is to become of me?" said the Baron, "for I will only stay here
till I see my way."
"Well, shall I find a pigeon-hole for you? Listen, you old pirate.
Women are what you want. They are consolation in all circumstances.
Attend now.--At the end of the Alley, Rue Saint-Maur-du-Temple, there
is a poor family I know of where there is a jewel of a little girl,
prettier than I was at sixteen.--Ah! there is a twinkle in your eye
already!--The child works sixteen hours a day at embroidering costly
pieces for the silk merchants, and earns sixteen sous a day--one sou
an hour!--and feeds like the Irish, on potatoes fried in rats'
dripping, with bread five times a week--and drinks canal water out of
the town pipes, because the Seine water costs too much; and she cannot
set up on her own account for lack of six or seven thousand francs.
Your wife and children bore you to death, don't they?--Besides, one
cannot submit to be nobody where one has been a little Almighty.
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