, less taken by show, less prone
to set an undue value on outside excellence - to make much of the attentions of
people remarkable chiefly for so many feet of stature, »des couleurs de poupée,«
»un nez plus ou moins bien fait,« and an enormous amount of fatuity - I might
yet prove an useful, perhaps an exemplary, character. But, as it was -- And
here, the little man's voice was for a minute choked.
    I would have looked up at him, or held out my hand, or said a soothing word;
but I was afraid, if I stirred, I should either laugh or cry; so odd, in all
this, was the mixture of the touching and the absurd.
    I thought he had nearly done: but no; he sat down that he might go on at his
ease.
    »While he, M. Paul, was on these painful topics, he would dare my anger for
the sake of my good, and would venture to refer to a change he had noticed in my
dress. He was free to confess that when he first knew me - or, rather, was in
the habit of catching a passing glimpse of me from time to time - I satisfied
him on this point: the gravity, the austere simplicity, obvious in this
particular, were such as to inspire the highest hopes for my best interests.
What fatal influence had impelled me lately to introduce flowers under the brim
of my bonnet, to wear des cols brodés, and even to appear on one occasion in a
scarlet gown -- he might indeed conjecture, but, for the present, would not
openly declare.«
    Again I interrupted, and this time not without an accent at once indignant
and horror-struck.
    »Scarlet, Monsieur Paul? It was not scarlet! It was pink, and pale pink,
too; and further subdued by black lace.«
    »Pink or scarlet, yellow or crimson, pea-green or sky-blue; it was all one:
these were all flaunting, giddy colours; and as to the lace I talked of, that
was but a colifichet de plus.« And he sighed over my degeneracy. »He could not,
he was sorry to say, be so particular on this theme as he could wish: not
possessing the exact names of these babioles, he might run into small verbal
errors which would not fail to lay him open to my sarcasm, and excite my
unhappily sudden and passionate disposition. He would merely say, in general
terms - and in these
