"
Happy thought, indeed! We drank our coffee and went straight to my old
house, with the wish (immediate father to the deed) that Gogo should be
there, once more engaged in his long forgotten accomplishment of
painting coats of arms.
It was a beautiful Sunday morning, and we found Gogo hard at work at a
small table by an open window. The floor was covered with old deeds and
parchments and family papers; and le beau Pasquier, at another table,
was deep in his own pedigree, making notes on the margin--an occupation
in which he delighted--and unconsciously humming as he did so. The sunny
room was filled with the penetrating soft sound of his voice, as a
conservatory is filled with the scent of its flowers.
By the strangest inconsistency my dear father, a genuine republican at
heart (for all his fancied loyalty to the white lily of the Bourbons), a
would-be scientist, who in reality was far more impressed by a clever
and industrious French mechanic than by a prince (and would, I think,
have preferred the former's friendship and society), yet took both a
pleasure and a pride in his quaint old parchments and obscure
quarterings. So would I, perhaps, if things had gone differently with
me--for what true democrat, however intolerant of such weakness in
others, ever thinks lightly of his own personal claims to aristocratic
descent, shadowy as these may be!
He was fond of such proverbs and aphorisms as "noblesse oblige," "bon
sang ne sait mentir," "bon chien chasse de race," etc.
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