meed of applause to this young artist with the whole public, when, I know not how, it occurred to me to make a moral reflection.  I said to my companion, “How handsomely this boy was dressed, and how well he looked! who knows in how tattered a jacket he may sleep to-night!” All had already risen, but the crowd prevented our moving.  A woman who had sat by me, and who was now standing close beside me, chanced to be the mother of the young artist, and felt much offended by my reflection.  Unfortunately, she knew German enough to understand me, and spoke it just as much as was necessary to scold.  She abused me violently.  Who was I, she would like to know, that had a right to doubt the family and respectability of this young man?  At all events, she would be bound he was as good as I; and his talents might probably procure him a fortune, of which I could not even venture to dream.  This moral lecture she read me in the crowd, and made those about me wonder what rudeness I had committed.  As I could neither excuse myself, nor escape from her, I was really embarrassed, and, when she paused for a moment, said without thinking, “Well! why do you make such a noise about it?—­to-day red, to-morrow dead.” [Footnote:  A German proverb, “Heute roth, Morgen todt.”] These words seemed to strike the woman dumb.  She stared at me, and moved away from me as soon as it was in any degree possible.  I thought no more of my words; only, some time afterwards, they occurred to me, when the boy, instead of continuing to perform, became ill, and that very dangerously.  Whether he died, or not, I cannot say.

Such intimations, by an unseasonably or even improperly spoken word, were held in repute, even by the ancients; and it is very remarkable that the forms of belief and of superstition have always remained the same among all people and in all times.

From the first day of the occupation of our city, there was no lack of constant diversion, especially for children and young people.  Plays and balls, parades, and marches through the town, attracted our attention in all directions.  The last particularly were always increasing, and the soldiers’ life seemed to us very merry and agreeable.

The residence of the king’s lieutenant at our house procured us the advantage of seeing by degrees all the distinguished persons in the French army, and especially of beholding close at hand the leaders whose names had already been made known to us by reputation.  Thus we looked from stairs and landing-places, as if from galleries, very conveniently upon the generals who passed by.  More than all the rest do I remember the Prince Soubise as a handsome, courteous gentleman; but most distinctly, the Marechal de Broglio, who was a younger man, not tall, but well built, lively, nimble, and abounding in keen glances, betraying a clever mind.