"I have a toast for you." "For me, Monsieur," cried La Boulaye, with surprised humility.

"It were too great an honour." "Do as you are bidden, man," returned this very peremptory courier.
"There; now let us see how your favour runs.

Cry 'Long Live the King!'" Holding the brandy-glass, which the man had forced upon him, La Boulaye eyed him whimsically for a second.
"There is no toast I would more gladly drink," said he at last, "if I considered it availing.

But--alas--you propose it over-late." "Diable! What may you mean ?" "Why, that since the King is dead, it shall profit us little to cry, 'Long Live the King!'" "The King, Monsieur, never dies," said Cadoux sententiously.
"Since you put it so, Monsieur," answered La Boulaye, as if convinced, "I'll honour the toast." And with the cry they asked of him he drained his glass.
"And so, my honest fellow," said Des Cadoux, producing his eternal snuff-box, "it seems that you are a Royalist.

We did but test you with that toast, my friend." "What should a poor fellow know of politics, Messieurs ?" he deprecated.
"These are odd times.