“Monsieur le Baron de la Billardiere died this morning, after a long and painful illness.  The king loses a devoted servant, the Church a most pious son.  Monsieur de la Billardiere’s end has fitly crowned a noble life, consecrated in dark and troublesome times to perilous missions, and of late years to arduous civic duties.  Monsieur de la Billardiere was provost of a department, where his force of character triumphed over all the obstacles that rebellion arrayed against him.  He subsequently accepted the difficult post of director of a division (in which his great acquirements were not less useful than the truly French affability of his manners) for the express purpose of conciliating the serious interests that arise under its administration.  No rewards have ever been more truly deserved than those by which the King, Louis XVIII., and his present Majesty took pleasure in crowning a loyalty which never faltered under the usurper.  This old family still survives in the person of a single heir to the excellent man whose death now afflicts so many warm friends.  His Majesty has already graciously made known that Monsieur Benjamin de la Billardiere will be included among the gentlemen-in-ordinary of the Bedchamber.

“The numerous friends who have not already received their notification of this sad event are hereby informed that the funeral will take place to-morrow at four o’clock, in the church of Saint-Roch.  The memorial address will be delivered by Monsieur l’Abbe Fontanon.”

——­

“Monsieur Isidore-Charles-Thomas Baudoyer, representing one of the oldest bourgeois families of Paris, and head of a bureau in the late Monsieur de la Billardiere’s division, has lately recalled the old traditions of piety and devotion which formerly distinguished these great families, so jealous for the honor and glory of religion, and so faithful in preserving its monuments.  The church of Saint-Paul has long needed a monstrance in keeping with the magnificence of that basilica, itself due to the Company of Jesus.  Neither the vestry nor the curate were rich enough to decorate the altar.  Monsieur Baudoyer has bestowed upon the parish a monstrance that many persons have seen and admired at Monsieur Gohier’s, the king’s jeweller.  Thanks to the piety of this gentleman, who did not shrink from the immensity of the price, the church of Saint-Paul possesses to-day a masterpiece of the jeweller’s art designed by Monsieur de Sommervieux.  It gives us pleasure to make known this fact, which proves how powerless the declamations of liberals have been on the mind of the Parisian bourgeoisie.  The upper ranks of that body have at all times been royalist and they prove it when occasion offers.”

“The price was five thousand francs,” said the Abbe Gaudron; “but as the payment was in cash, the court jeweller reduced the amount.”

“Representing one of the oldest bourgeois families in Paris!” Saillard was saying to himself; “there it is printed,—­in the official paper, too!”