Page:A French Volunteer of the War of Independence.djvu/291

Rh of this second King Theodore, more of a Corsican even than his ancestors.

My brother's appearance was so simple, his face was so calm, and his bearing so much in harmony with figures, and bookkeeping by double entry, that on seeing him at his desk, you would have sworn that he had been brought up to the business all his life. He was quietly working one morning, when a young man in a frock coat buttoned up to his chin, entered, and asked if that was the house of the banker, Joseph la Brosse. My brother inclined his head slightly, and looked at the stranger with Teutonic unconcern. The young man took out of his pocket-book a draft for a large sum, on the firm of Joesph la Brosse.

My brother quickly noticed that the stranger had a pocketful of these documents, and the unknown, not caring to preserve his incognito any longer, stated that he was the King of Westphalia, and undoing his coat displayed a whole row of orders, the indubitable signs of the forced attentions which all the monarchs of Europe were compelled to pay to all