Page:Novels of Honoré de Balzac Volume 23.djvu/245

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The elections of 1830 brought some credit to the heirs, who, through the pains of Désiré Minoret and Goupil, formed a committee in Nemours whose efforts caused the liberal candidate to be returned at Fontainebleau. Massin exercised a tremendous influence over the country constituents. Five of the postmaster’s tenants were electors. Dionis represented more than eleven votes. Through assembling at the notary’s house, Crémière, Massin, the postmaster and their adherents ended by falling into the habit of meeting there. Upon the doctor’s return, Dionis’ salon had then become the camp of the heirs. The justice of the peace and the mayor, who then formed a league to resist the liberals of Nemours, and who were beaten by the opposition in spite of the efforts of the aristocracy situated in the neighborhood, were closely linked together by their defeat. When Bongrand and the Abbé Chaperon told the doctor the result of this antagonism which, for the first time, formed two parties in Nemours, Charles X. was leaving Rambouillet for Cherbourg. Désiré Minoret, who shared the opinions of the Paris bar, had sent to Nemours for fifteen friends commanded by Goupil, and whom the postmaster supplied with horses to hasten to Paris, where they arrived at Désiré’s during the (215)