“Hold!” said Clamens. “Do you see this expanse of asphaltum, which extends from where we stand to the ChaussÉe d’Antin?”

“Yes,” replied Eusebe: “it is the Boulevard des Italiens.”

“Just so. Well, all humanity is represented in this narrow space, which is hardly more extensive than your father’s garden. Take a seat, and observe, and in one hour you will know Paris as well as if you had made it; and Paris is the universe. The other cities of the world, such as Bordeaux, Lyons, London, Berlin, Rome, and St. Petersburg, are rivers for which Paris is the sea. Every variety of the human species flows hither, to roll and writhe, like furious waves, in that sublime tempest which we call life. You wish to investigate this billowy mass. You will find nothing there but froth and foam, or you will drown yourself for want of that life-preserver which is called experience.”

“Better to drown oneself at once than to die of weariness on a rock whence nothing but a void is visible; but, indeed, it seems to me we are employing very large words to speak of very small things.”

“Ah,” rejoined Clamens, “there is nothing insignificant in this world. A drop of water may save a man; three may kill him; a hundred will fill a gutter; a thousand will form a rivulet. Multiply ten times these numbers by themselves, and you will have a torrent which may inundate France. Men are like drops of water. Look at them separately, and you see nothing terrible; but when, by a mysterious free-masonry, they assemble and arrange themselves according to their vices, their merits, their passions, or their aspirations, they can convulse society to its very centre.”

“What is one to do in the midst of such a tumult?” inquired Eusebe.

“Laugh,” responded the poet; “laugh, so that you may not weep; turn to account the vices of one class and the virtues of another, and close your eyes to what the morrow may bring forth.”

“Admitting the justness of this theory,” said Eusebe, “it seems to me very difficult to gain a sufficient knowledge of men to enable one to profit by their merits or weaknesses.”

“One knows everybody else better than one knows one’s self. Do you see that gentleman who is walking before us? He is dressed like a prince, dines at the best tables, and denies himself nothing. Four years ago, he arrived at Paris in sabots. Now he is in debt for his boots,—which explains the whole mystery. That fellow would refuse the pension of a Councillor of State: he gains more by borrowing.”

“I understand, then, that he has a confirmed vice. But what advantage can you draw from his peculiar defect?”

“I borrow money of him.”

Eusebe was inclined to think that Clamens was quizzing him, as Paul Buck had quizzed Bonnaud on the railroad; but the poet did not give him time to determine whether this suspicion was justifiable.

“I borrow money of him,” continued Clamens, “and he loans it because he appreciates better than anybody else the necessity of having it. Adroit himself in chasing up twenty-franc pieces, he thinks he has in me a promising pupil. Then his loans to me serve as an excuse to his conscience. If he strips others, he considers that I strip him, and, therefore, concludes that, instead of practising the trade of a sharper, he is only making an application of the lex talionis. The man is not exactly a dangerous character; but he has ten thousand confrÈres, who prey upon forty thousand fools, and their mode of life operates to the detriment of a hundred thousand poor devils, who perish from hunger or find their way to the galleys. I suppose that the term ‘usurer’ represents to your mind a miserly old man in a brown overcoat and a black silk cap?”

“There is in my native province,” replied Eusebe, “an old man named Gardet, who is said to be very grinding on the poor who borrow money from him; and it is a fact that this creature is attired nearly as you say, with the exception of the black silk cap. In a number of books that I have read during the past two years, the usurer is always described as dressed in that style.”

“It is an error. Now-a-days, the evil-doer is young. That is one of the most curious characteristics of our age. The young men gamble at the Bourse, while the old devote their attention to trade. The young men keep the women; the old conceal themselves in their closets. It is a sad thing to contemplate; but such is nevertheless the case. Revenons À nos moutons. Those two young dandies before us, who balance their canes with such an air, count hardly fifty years between them; yet they are the most unmerciful Jews in Paris.”

“But,” interrupted Eusebe, “I thought you were a Jew.”

“I am an Israelite,” responded Clamens, rather hastily,—“which is not at all the same thing. Such as you see them, that fashionable youth and his dazzling friend have ruined many people. At this moment, they are not merely promenading, as you might perhaps suppose: they are seeking custom. Have you need of money?”

“My friend,” said Eusebe, “you know that I am quite a barbarian, and ignorant of many features of Parisian life. Do me the favor, then,—if I do not try your patience,—to define more exactly the profession of these men.”

“That is easy enough. These fellows have comprehended the fact that the want of money is the complaint of almost everybody, and they have undertaken to supply the needful by founding a loan-and-trust company,—which would be quite philanthropic if the premium were not cent. per cent. For example: they loan on security five hundred francs for six months; at the expiration of that time they receive one thousand for their five hundred.”

“Why a thousand?”

“For the interest of the money advanced for six months.”

“If they make that much, they ought to lend the money for a year: they would then have no need to give any at all.”

“An original idea! I must communicate it to them.”

“You know these persons, then?”

“They are my friends.”

“You astonish me!”

“Let us understand each other. I am not procureur-impÉrial. Their conduct does not concern me. Let them continue to dupe fools: that is an affair between their consciences and human stupidity. For myself, I have always found them very agreeable: they have often proved serviceable in lending me money.”

“At cent. per cent.?”

“At nothing per cent.”

“Then they are not such usurers as you wish to represent.”

“They go further in that direction than I care to say; but not with me. Why? The day is approaching when their fortunes will be made. They will abandon their business, keep their carriages, maintain mistresses, marry heiresses, and endeavor to make a figure in society. But there is one thing they cannot purchase,—social esteem. They count upon me to help them in that particular and set them in a favorable light before the public.”

“Sad! sad!” murmured Eusebe.

“No matter: such is the world.”

“Well, then I would rather not make its acquaintance,” rejoined Eusebe.

“You are wrong. You ought to learn many curious things which it is important that you should know. The first thing to do is to learn the vices of the times, so as to be able to avoid them.”

“I would prefer knowing what they are to scrutinizing them too closely,” responded the provincial. “A thousand thanks to you, my dear Clamens, for wishing to be my guide. But I feel that I am too feeble to seek an object by paths so perilous. You know the mud of all the ruts, the briers of all the bushes: you will reach your object, no doubt. But what could I do, simple and artless as I am, pursuing such dangerous ways? Let each one take his own road. You may advance, confident of the future; I will return to the joys I already know.”

“What do you call your joys?”

“The woman I love, and the poets of whom I spoke to you last evening.”

“Alas! my friend,” said Clamens, “such joys will not last. Woman is a bell that will not always ring. As to the poets, their charms will not prove so enduring as those of your mistress,—since we have but three. The most bitter sadness characterizes these three great geniuses. The first died out of heart: he will dishearten you. The second lived in exile, where every thing was mournful. The third, disgusted with the ingratitude of his contemporaries, imposed silence upon the harmonious orchestra of his soul, to sit down, in despair, by the wayside, and play the clarionet.”