To expatiate on the perfections of
Mademoiselle Natalie would be a waste of ink and paper; it is sufficient
to say that she really was a very charming girl, with a fortune which,
though not large, would have been a most desirable addition to De
Chaulieu, who had nothing. Neither was the fair Natalie indisposed to
listen to his addresses; but her father could not be expected to
countenance the suit of a gentleman, however well-born, who had not
a ten-sous piece in the world, and whose prospects were a blank.
Whilst the ambitious and love-sick barrister was thus pining in
unwelcome obscurity, his old acquaintance, Jacques Rollet, had been
acquiring an undesirable notoriety. There was nothing really bad in
Jacques; but having been bred up a democrat, with a hatred of the
nobility, he could not easily accommodate his rough humor to treat them
with civility when it was no longer safe to insult them. The liberties
he allowed himself whenever circumstances brought him into contact
with the higher classes of society, had led him into many scrapes, out
of which his father's money had in one way or another released him;
but that source of safety had now failed.
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