Monsieur Alain paused to put the fire together; that done, he resumed:—­

“Two weeks later I received a letter from Bordin asking me to go to his office and get my receipt.  I went.  ’I tried to get fifty of your louis for you,’ he said, ’but the birds had flown.  Say good-by to your yellow boys; those pretty canaries are off to other climes.  You have had to do with a sharper; that’s what he is.  He declared to me that his wife and father-in-law had gone to the United States with sixty of your louis to buy land; that he intended to follow, for the purpose, he said, of making a fortune and paying his debts; the amount of which, carefully drawn up, he confided to me, requesting me to keep an eye on what became of his creditors.  Here is a list of the items,’ continued Bordin, showing me a paper from which he read the total, —­’Seventeen thousand francs in coin; a sum with which a house could be bought that would bring in two thousand francs a year.’  After replacing the list in the case, Bordin gave me a note for a sum equivalent to a hundred louis in gold, with a letter in which Mongenod admitted having received my hundred louis, on which he owed interest.  ‘So now I am all right,’ I said to Bordin.  ‘He cannot deny the debt,’ replied my old master; ’but where there are no funds, even the king—­I should say the Directory—­can’t enforce rights.’  I went home.  Believing that I had been robbed in a way intentionally screened from the law, I withdrew my esteem from Mongenod, and resigned myself philosophically.

“If I have dwelt on these details, which are so commonplace and seem so slight,” said the worthy man, looking at Godefroid, “it is not without good reason.  I want to explain to you how I was led to act, as most men act, in defiance of the rules which savages observe in the smallest matters.  Many persons would justify themselves by the opinion of so excellent a man as Bordin; but to-day I know myself to have been inexcusable.  When it comes to condemning one of our fellows, and withdrawing our esteem from him, we should act from our own convictions only.  But have we any right to make our heart a tribunal before which we arraign our neighbor?  Where is the law? what is our standard of judgment?  That which in us is weakness may be strength in our neighbor.  So many beings, so many different circumstances for every act; and there are no two beings exactly alike in all humanity.  Society alone has the right over its members of repression; as for punishment, I deny it that right.  Repression suffices; and that, besides, brings with it punishment enough.

“So,” resumed Monsieur Alain, continuing his history, having drawn from it that noble teaching, “after listening to the gossip of the Parisian, and relying on the wisdom of my old master, I condemned Mongenod.  His play, ‘Les Peruviens,’ was announced.  I expected to receive a ticket from Mongenod for the first representation; I established in my own mind a sort of claim on him.  It seemed