The old fellow has been in a dreadful passion." "I got wind of it at dinner," spoke up a valet de chambre: "the count restrained himself enough not to burst out before me; but he rolled his eyes fiercely." "What can be the matter ?" "Pshaw! that's more than they know themselves.

Why, Denis, before whom they always speak freely, says that they often wrangle for hours together, like dogs, about things which he can never see through." "Ah," cried out a young fellow, who was being trained to service, "if I were in the viscount's place, I'd settle the old gent pretty effectually!" "Joseph, my friend," said the footman pointedly, "you are a fool.

You might give your father his walking ticket very properly, because you never expect five sous from him; and you have already learned how to earn your living without doing any work at all.

But the viscount, pray tell me what he is good for, what he knows how to do?
Put him in the centre of Paris, with only his fine hands for capital, and you will see." "Yes, but he has his mother's property in Normandy," replied Joseph.
"I can't for the life of me," said the valet de chambre, "see what the count finds to complain of; for his son is a perfect model, and I shouldn't be sorry to have one like him.

There was a very different pair, when I was in the Marquis de Courtivois's service.