Page:The Ladies' Cabinet of Fashion, Music & Romance 1832.pdf/161



THE damage of my fortune led to that of my reputation. Merit is only measured by prosperity.- THEOPHILUS.

TOWARDS the close of the year 1749, two carriages were rolling briskly along the road from Paris to Versailles. The first was a stage-coach, with but one inside passenger, Monsieur Pigafet, a respectable man enough ; the second was a dashing equipage whirled along by two high-mettled horses, and conveyed the person of the Count de M * *--then celebrated throughout Europe for his talents, his wealth, and his adventures, -- to the presence of his sovereign. The noble horses were in the act of sweeping by and leaving far behind them the miserable old hacks that drew the stage, when the two axles came in contact, and so violent was the shock that the stage-coach was upset. Monsieur Pigafet was taken up with his arm broken. The Count sprung from his carriage, poured forth his excuses and regrets, and had him placed in his carriage for the remainder of the journey. The coachman was indemnified for the accident, and on his arrival at Versailles, the Count procured a skilful surgeon to set Monsieur Pigafet's fractured limb. The latter, touched with the assiduous attentions of his new host, and with the pain which he seemed to feel at being the cause of the trivial accident which had befallen him, thought he might as well set his conscience at rest by telling him that the shock of the two carriages was neither to be attributed to the spirit of his horses, or to the awkwardness of his coachman, but to the waywardness of his own evil destiny, which was ever sure to place a dyke for him near the end of his path, and a rock at the entrance of his haven.

"My journey from Paris to Versailles," continued he, “ was to realize or to mar one of my greatest hopes. I was nearing the goal, when lo ! I was precipitated into the swamp. I might have expected as much, everything is as it should be, and it is really something new and satisfactory to find a noble MARCH, 1839.