"So little is he a native of any place, that no one knows where he
comes from," said Madame de Chavoncourt.

"But who is he?" asked Madame de Watteville, taking the Abbe's arm to
go into the dining-room. "If he is a stranger, by what chance has he
settled at Besancon? It is a strange fancy for a barrister."

"Very strange!" echoed Amedee de Soulas, whose biography is here
necessary to the understanding of this tale.

* * * * *

In all ages France and England have carried on an exchange of trifles,
which is all the more constant because it evades the tyranny of the
Custom-house. The fashion that is called English in Paris is called
French in London, and this is reciprocal. The hostility of the two
nations is suspended on two points--the uses of words and the fashions
of dress. _God Save the King_, the national air of England, is a tune
written by Lulli for the Chorus of Esther or of Athalie. Hoops,
introduced at Paris by an Englishwoman, were invented in London, it is
known why, by a Frenchwoman, the notorious Duchess of Portsmouth. They
were at first so jeered at that the first Englishwoman who appeared in
them at the Tuileries narrowly escaped being crushed by the crowd; but
they were adopted. This fashion tyrannized over the ladies of Europe
for half a century. At the peace of 1815, for a year, the long waists
of the English were a standing jest; all Paris went to see Pothier and
Brunet in _Les Anglaises pour rire_; but in 1816 and 1817 the belt of
the Frenchwoman, which in 1814 cut her across the bosom, gradually
descended till it reached the hips.