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La Fleur returnd a little pale; and told me it was a Chevalier de St. Louis3 selling patésIt is impossible, La Fleur! said I.La Fleur could no more account for the phenomenon than myself; but persisted in his story: he had seen the croix set in gold, with its red ribband, he said, tied to his buttonholeand had lookd into the basket and seen the patés which the Chevalier was selling; so could not be mistaken in that. Such a reverse in mans life awakens a better principle than curiosity: I could not help looking for some time at him, as I sat in the remisethe more I lookd at him, his croix and his basket, the stronger they wove themselves into my brainI got out of the remise, and went towards him. He was begirt with a clean linen apron which fell below his knees, and with a sort of a bib that went half way up his breast; upon the top of this, but a little below the hem, hung his croix. His basket of little patés was coverd over with a white damask napkin; another of the same kind was spread at the bottom; and there was a look of propreté and neatness throughout, that one might have bought his patés of him, as much from appetite as sentiment. He made an offer of them to neither; but stood still with them at the corner of a hôtel, for those to buy who chose it, without solicitation. He was about forty-eightof a sedate look something approaching to gravity. I did not wonderI went up rather to the basket than him, and having lifted up the napkin, and taken one of his patés into my handI beggd he would explain the appearance which affected me. He told me in a few words, that the best part of his life had passd in the service, in which, after spending a small patrimony, he had obtaind a company and the croix with it; but that at the conclusion of the last peace, his regiment being reformed, and the whole corps, with those of some other regiments, left without any provision, he found himself in a wide world without friends, without a livreand indeed, said he, without any thing but this(pointing, as he said it, to his croix)The poor chevalier won my pity, and he finishd the scene with winning my esteem too. The king, he said, was the most generous of princes, but his generosity could neither relieve or reward every one, and it was only his misfortune to be amongst the number. He had a little wife, he said, whom he loved, who did the patisserie; and added, he felt no dishonour in defending her and himself from want in this wayunless Providence had offerd him a better. It would be wicked to with-hold a pleasure from the good, in passing over what happend to this poor Chevalier of St. Louis about nine months after. It seems he usually took his stand near the iron gates which lead up to the palace, and as his croix had caught the eye of numbers, numbers had made the same inquiry which I had doneHe had told them the same story, and always with so much modesty and good sense, that it had reachd at last the kings earswho hearing the chevalier had been a gallant officer, and respected by the whole regiment as a man of honour and integrityhe broke up his little trade by a pension of fifteen hundred livres a year. As I have told this to please the reader, I beg he will allow me to relate another out of its order, to please myselfthe two stories reflect light upon each otherand tis a pity they should be parted. |
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