LE DIAMANCHE. would have given up one to have been master of it. I tossed and turned it almost all night long in my brains to no manner of purpose; and when I awoke in the morning, I found my spirit as much troubled with my dreams, as ever the king of Babylon had been with his; and I will not hesitate to affirm, it would have pazzled all the wise men of Paris, as much as those of Chaldea, to have given its interpretation. LE DIAMANCHE. PARIS. Ir was Sunday--and when La Fleur came in, in the morning, with my coffee and roll and butter, he had got himself so gallantly arrayed, I scarce knew him. I had covenanted at Montriul, to give him anew hat with a silver button and loop, and four louis d'ors, pour s'adoniser, when we got to Paris; and the poor fellow, to do him justice, had done wonders with it. --- He had bought a bright, clean, and good scarlet coat, and a pair of breeches of the sameThey were not a crown worse, he said, for the PARIS. ing-I wished him hanged for telling me they looked so fresh, that though I knew the thing could not be done, yet I would rather have imposed upon my fancy with thinking I had bought them new for the fellow, than that they had come out of the Rue de Friperie. This is a nicety which makes not the heart sore at Paris. He had purchased, moreover, a handsome blue sattin waistcoat, fancifully enough embroi dered this was, indeed, something the worse for the services it had done, but it was clean scoured the gold had been touched up, and, upon the whole, was rather showy than other wise and as the blue was not violent, it suited with the coat and breeches very well:-he had sque ezed out of the money, moreover, a new bag and a solitaire; and had insisted with the fripier upon a gold pair of garters to the breeches knees -Ile had purchased muslin rufles, bien brodees, with four livres of his own money and a pair of white silk stockings for five more and to top all, nature had given him a handsome figure, without costing him a sous. He entered the room thus set off, with his hair dressed in the first style, and with a handsome bouquet in his breast-In a word, there was that look of festivity in every thing about him, which at once put me in mind it was Sunday—and by SONS AND DAUGHTERS OF LIBERTY. combining both together, it instantly struck me, that the favour he wished to ask of me the night before was to spend the day as every body in Paris spent it besides. I had scarce made the conjecture, when La Fleur, with infinite hu mility, but with a look of trust as if I should not refuse him, begged I would grant him the day, pour faire le galant vis-a-vis de sa maitresse. Now it was the very thing I intended to do myself vis-a-vis Madame de R****— I had retained the remise on purpose for it, and it would not have mortified my vanity to have had a servant, so well dressed as La Fleur was, to have got up behind it: I never could have worse spared him. But we must feel, not argue in these embarrass ments the sons and daughters of service part with liberty, but not with nature, in their contracts; they are flesh and blood, and have their little vanities and wishes in the midst of the house of bondage, as well as their task-masters-no doubt, they have set their self-denials at a price-and their expectations are so unreasonable, that I would often disappoint them, but that their condition puts it so much in my power to do it. Behold! Behold! I am thy servant→disarms me at once of the powers of a master. -Thou shalt go, La Fleur! said I. —And what mistress, La Fleur, said I, canst PARIS. thou have picked up in so little time at Paris? -La Fleur laid his hand upon his breast, and said 'twas a petite demoiselle at Monsieur le Compte de B****'s-La Fleur had a heart made for society; and, to speak the truth of him, let as few occasions slip him as his master -so that some how or other, but how heaven knows he had connected himself with the demoiselle upon the landing of the staircase, during the time I was taken up with my Passport; and as there was time enough for me to win the Count to my interest, La Fleur had contrived to make it do to win the maid to his-the family, it seems, was to be at Paris that day, and he had made a party with her, and two or three more of the Count's household, upon the boulevardes. Happy people! that once a week, at least, are sure to lay down your cares together; and dance, and sing, and sport away the weights of grievance, which bow down the spirit of other nations to the earth. A LA Fleur had left me something to amuse myself with for the day, more than I had bargained for, THE FRAGMENT. or could have entered either into his head or mine, He had brought the little print of butter upon a currant leaf; and, as the morning was warm, and he had a good step to bring it, he had begged a sheet of waste paper to put betwixt the currant leaf and his hand.-As that was plate sufficient, I bade him lay it upon the table as it was; and, as I resolved to stay within all day, I ordered him to call upon the traiteur, to bespeak my dinner, and leave me to breakfast by myself. When I had finished the butter, I threw the currant leaf out of the window, and was going to do the same by the waste paper-but stopping to read a line first, and that drawing me on to a second and third-I thought it better worth, so I shut the window, and drawing a chair up to me, I sat down to read it. It was in the old French of Rabelais's time, and for aught I know might have been wrote by him-it was moreover in a Gothic letter, and that so faded and gone off by damps and length of time, it cost me infinite trouble to make any thing of it-I threw it down; and then wrote a letter to Eugenius-then I took it up again, and embroiled my patience with it afresh-and then, to cure that, I wrote a letter to Eliza→→ Still it kept hold of me; and the difficulty of understanding it increased but the desire. *G |