Chapter 5 - Page 2

the bluff, cool as a package
of furs free from moth, and fresh and beautiful as a Holland tulip, with
the dew on it."

"To resemble the latter, one might consent to walk blindfold, dearest
uncle; and so we dismiss the subject. François, fais moi le plaisir de
porter ce petit livre; malgré la fraîcheur de la fôret, j'ai besoin de
m'évanter."

The valet took the book, with an empressement that defeated the more tardy
politeness of the Patroon; and when he saw, by the vexed eye and flushed
cheek of his young mistress, that she was incommoded rather by an internal
than by the external heat, he whispered considerately,--

"Que ma chère Mademoiselle Alide ne se fâche pas! Elle ne manquerait
jamais d'admirateurs, dans un désert. Ah! si Mam'selle allait voir la
patrie de ses ancêtres!--"

"'Merci bien, mon cher; gardez les feuilles, fortement fermées. Il y a des
papiers dedans."

"Monsieur François," said the Alderman, separating his niece, with little
ceremony, from her nearly parental attendant, by the interposition of his
own bulky person, and motioning for the others to proceed, "a word with
thee in confidence. I have noted, in the course of a busy and I hope a
profitable life, that a faithful servant is an honest counsellor. Next to
Holland and England, both of which are great commercial nations, and the
Indies, which are necessary to these colonies, together with a natural
preference for the land in which I was born, I have always been of
opinion, that France is a very good sort of a country. I think, Mr.
Francis, that dislike to the seas has kept you from returning thither,
since the decease of my late brother-in-law?"

"Wid like for Mam'selle Alide, Monsieur, avec votre permission."

"Your affection for my niece, honest François, is not to be doubted. It is
as certain as the payment of a good draft, by Crommeline, Van Stopper, and
Van Gelt, of Amsterdam. Ah! old valet! she is fresh and blooming as a
rose, and a girl of excellent qualities! 'Tis a pity that she is a little
opinionated; a defect that she doubtless inherits from her Norman
ancestors; since all of my family have ever been remarkable for listening
to reason. The Normans were an obstinate race, as witness the siege of
Rochelle, by which oversight real estate in that city must have lost much
in value!"

"Mille excuses, Monsieur Bevre'----; more beautiful as de rose, and no
opinâtre du tout. Mon Dieu! pour sa qualité, c'est une famille tres
ancienne."

"That was a weak point with my brother Barbérie, and, after all, it did