During the Mass he made the responses in an audible voice, and at its conclusion invariably put a five-franc piece into the plate.

This, his subscription to the newspaper, and the sum he paid for being shaved twice each week, constituted the whole of his outlay upon himself.

He kept an excellent table, however; plump fowls, vegetables of all kinds, and the most delicious fruit were never absent from it.

Everything, however, that appeared upon his well-plenished board was the produce of his fields, gardens, or woods.

The nobility and gentry of the neighborhood frequently invited him to their hospitable tables, for they looked upon him as the head and chief of the nobility of the county; but he always refused their invitations, saying plainly, "No man who has the slightest respect for himself will accept hospitalities which he is not in a position to return." It was not the grinding clutch of poverty that drove the Duke to this exercise of severe economy, for his income from his estates brought him in fifty thousand francs per annum; and it was reported that his investments brought him in as much more.