[124] DEBARRASSE-MOI DE TOUT CECI.  A contemptuous expression by which Dorante designates Lisette.  It is entirely in keeping with the manners of the day.

[125] NE TE LIVRE POINT. Livrer is here taken in the sense of ‘betray.’

[126] LA QUESTION EST VIVE, ‘That is a leading question.’

[127] UN PETIT BRIN.  Equivalent to un petit peu. Brin means ‘spear’ (of grass, etc.), and, as in the case of goutte (drop) and of mie (crumb), has come to indicate any small particle.  Often idiomatically translated by ‘bit.’

[128] J’AI PEUR D’EN COURIR LES CHAMPS, ‘I am afraid of losing my reason.’  Compare the expression, etre fou a courir les rues, a courir les champs, ’to be stark mad ’ (Littre, “courir,” 23 deg.).

[129] DECOMPTER, ‘Deduct.’  Still used, though not commonly, for rabattre.

[130] LES MAITRES. On may be followed by the plural, if taken in a plural sense, although some later editions give the singular, le maitre.  In fact, after this indefinite pronoun, a noun, adjective, or participle may agree in gender and number with the person or persons to whom the indefinite refers.

[131] FONT ...  A LEUR TETE, ‘Have their own way.’  The idiom faire a sa tete means ‘to do as one pleases.’

[132] BEAU JEU.  The idiom avoir beau jeu is a card term, and means first, ‘to hold the best cards,’ and hence, ‘to have a good opportunity.’

[133] PERRETTE OU MARGOT.  Names of the lower classes among servants.  The idea is carried out by the reference to the visit to the cellar and the flat candlestick.  Compare:  “Ne semble-t-il pas qu’il faille tant de ceremonies pour parler a madame?  On parle bien a Perrette” (Marianne, 2e partie). Perrette, from the well-known fable of La Fontaine, Perrette et le pot at lait, has come down to us as the personification of the dreamer, the builder of air-castles. Margot, a diminutive of Marguerite, is a common term for the chatterbox.

[134] FAUTES D’ORTHOGRAPHE, ‘Misapprehensions as to real rank.’  The ordinary meaning of the expression, used figuratively, is fautes de conduite.

[135] NE VOILA-T-IL PAS!  An exclamation of surprise.  It might here be translated, ‘Just listen to that.’  It is more correctly expressed by ne voila pas, the barbarism resulting from the consideration of voila as a verb and the introduction of the euphonic t and the il of impersonal verbs (Littre, “voila,” 10 deg.),

[136] MA MIE.  A curious example of deformation.  Originally feminine nouns beginning with a vowel took the feminine ma before them, the vowel of ma being elided.  Thus, m’amie; but later the word was modified to its present form.

[137] QU’ON NE LES APPELLE. Que in the sense of sans que requires the negative particle ne.  It is less frequently used to-day than in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Sans qu’on les appelle might replace this expression.