"You beat us; but when you play with Monsieur de Valois you never do otherwise.""How much did he win?"
"Well, to-night, three or four francs; he never loses.""True; and don't you know there are three hundred and sixty-five days a year? At that price his gains are the value of a farm.""Ah! what hands we had to-night!"
"Here you are at home, monsieur and madame, how lucky you are, while we have half the town to cross!""I don't pity you; you could afford a carriage, and dispense with the fatigue of going on foot.""Ah, monsieur! we have a daughter to marry, which takes off one wheel, and the support of our son in Paris carries off another.""You persist in making a magistrate of him?""What else can be done with a young man? Besides, there's no shame in serving the king."Sometimes a discussion on ciders and flax, always couched in the same terms, and returning at the same time of year, was continued on the homeward way.If any observer of human customs had lived in this street, he would have known the months and seasons by simply overhearing the conversations.
On this occasion it was exclusively jocose; for du Bousquier, who chanced to march alone in front of the groups, was humming the well-known air,--little thinking of its appropriateness,--"Tender woman!
hear the warble of the birds," etc.To some, du Bousquier was a strong man and a misjudged man.Ever since he had been confirmed in his present office by a royal decree, Monsieur du Ronceret had been in favor of du Bousquier.To others the purveyor seemed dangerous,--a man of bad habits, capable of anything.In the provinces, as in Paris, men before the public eye are like that statue in the fine allegorical tale of Addison, for which two knights on arriving near it fought; for one saw it white, the other saw it black.Then, when they were both off their horses, they saw it was white one side and black the other.