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38 reputation, he is all powerful against me, against you, even against his king. Dear Maximilian, I assure you that I attempt not to resist, more on your account than my own, for I would not peril your safety."

"But wherefore, Valentine, do you view everything through so gloomy a medium why picture the future so fraught with evil?"

"Because I judge it from the past."

"Still, consider that although I may not be, strictly speaking, what is termed an illustrious match for you, I am, for many reasons, not altogether so much beneath your alliance. The days when there were two Frances in France exist no longer, and the first families of the monarchy have intermarried with those of the empire. The aristocracy of the lance has allied itself with the nobility of the cannon. Now I belong to this last-named class; and my prospects of military preferment are encouraging. My fortune, though small, is unfettered, and the memory of my late father respected in our country, Valentine, as that of the most upright and honorable merchant of the city. I say our country, because you were born not far from Marseilles."

"Name not Marseilles, I beseech you, Maximilian; that one word brings back my mother to my recollection my angel mother, whom all regret, who, after watching over her child during the brief period allotted to her in this world, now, I hope, watches over her from the eternal abode on high. Ah, were she still living, we need fear nothing, Maximilian, for I would confide our love to her, and she would aid and protect us."

"I fear, Valentine," replied the lover, "that were she living I should never have had the happiness of knowing you; you would then have been too happy to have stooped from your grandeur to bestow a thought on me."

"It is you who are unjust, now, Maximilian," cried Valentine; "but there is one thing I wish to know."

"And what is that?" inquired the young man, perceiving that Valen tine hesitated and seemed at a loss how to proceed.

"Tell me truly, Maximilian, whether in former days, when our fathers dwelt at Marseilles, there ever existed any misunderstanding between them?"

"Not that I am at all aware of," replied the young man, "unless it arose from your father being a zealous partisan of the Bourbons, while mine was wholly devoted to the emperor. Dearest, why do you ask?"

"I will tell you," replied his companion, "for it is but right you should know all. Then I must begin by referring to the day when your being made an officer of the Legion of Honor was publicly announced in the papers. We were all sitting in the apartments of my grandfather,