“Come, and let us all be merry,
     Pretty maids and soldiers gay!”

M. Saval, thunderstruck, remained standing in evening dress under the chandelier.  The procession of revellers caught sight of him, and uttered a shout: 

“A Jeames!  A Jeames!”

And they began whirling round him, surrounding him with a circle of vociferations.  Then they took each other by the hand and went dancing about madly.

He attempted to explain: 

“Messieurs—­messieurs—­mesdames——­”

But they did not listen to him.  They whirled about, they jumped, they brawled.

At last, the dancing ceased.  M. Saval said: 

“Gentlemen——­”

A tall young fellow, fair-haired and bearded to the nose, interrupted him: 

“What’s your name, my friend?”

The notary, quite scared, said: 

“I am M. Saval.”

A voice exclaimed: 

“You mean Baptiste.”

A woman said: 

“Let the poor waiter alone!  You’ll end by making him get angry.  He’s paid to wait on us, and not to be laughed at by us.”

Then, M. Saval noticed that each guest had brought his own provisions.  One held a bottle of wine, and the other a pie.  This one had a loaf of bread, and one a ham.

The tall, fair young fellow placed in his hands an enormous sausage, and gave orders: 

“Here, go and arrange the sideboard in the corner over there.  Put the bottles at the left and the provisions at the right.”

Saval, getting quite distracted, exclaimed:  “But, messieurs, I am a notary!”

There was a moment’s silence and then a wild outburst of laughter.  One suspicious gentleman asked: 

“How came you to be here?”

He explained, telling about his project of going to the opera, his departure from Vernon, his arrival in Paris, and the way in which he had spent the evening.

They sat around him to listen to him; they greeted him with words of applause, and called him Scheherazade.

Romantin did not return.  Other guests arrived.  M. Saval was presented to them so that he might begin his story over again.  He declined; they forced him to relate it.  They seated and tied him on one of three chairs between two women who kept constantly filling his glass.  He drank; he laughed; he talked; he sang, too.  He tried to waltz with his chair, and fell on the ground.

From that moment, he forgot everything.  It seemed to him, however, that they undressed him, put him to bed, and that he was nauseated.

When he awoke, it was broad daylight, and he lay stretched with his feet against a cupboard, in a strange bed.

An old woman with a broom in her hand was glaring angrily at him.  At last, she said: 

“Clear out, you blackguard!  Clear out!  What right has anyone to get drunk like this?”

He sat up in bed, feeling very ill at ease.  He asked: