Even those who had merely howled by instinct, asking no recompense of the rising Empire, were greatly annoyed to see that, thanks to them, the poorest and least reputable of them all should be decorated with the red ribbon.

The whole yellow drawing-room ought to have been decorated! "Not that I value the decoration," Roudier said to Granoux, whom he had dragged into the embrasure of a window.

"I refused it in the time of Louis-Philippe, when I was purveyor to the court.

Ah! Louis-Philippe was a good king.

France will never find his equal!" Roudier was becoming an Orleanist once more.