15 Took the throne on the death of his brother, George IV, in 1830.
Chapter Four: The De La Mole Mansion
luck. Living as you do in a great lord's house, remember what the Duke de Castries16 said of d'Alembert17 and Rousseau: 'They argue about everything, and don't have any income worth talking about.'" "They find out everything," Julien thought, "here, too, just as in the seminary." He had written eight or ten rather rhetorical pages, a kind of eulogy of the old surgeon-major who, he always said, had made a man of him. "And that little notebook," he reminded himself, "has always been locked away!" He went up to his room, burned the manuscript, and returned to the drawing room. The radiant rogues were all gone; only the men with medals were left. Around the table, just brought in by the servants, with everything set out and ready, there were seven or eight distinguished women of thirty or thirty-five, deeply devout, very conceited. Madame de Fervaques, a gay and shining marshall's widow, came in, busily making excuses for her late arrival. It was after midnight; she went to sit next to the marquise. Her appearance moved Julien: she had Madame de Rênal's eyes, and her look. Mademoiselle de La Mole's group was still well populated. She and her friends had been making fun of the unlucky Count de Thaler.18 This was the only son of the famous Jew, celebrated for the wealth he'd acquired, lending money to kings so they could oppress their own people. The old Jew had just died, leaving his son an income of three hundred thousand francs a month and a name, alas, only too well known! This peculiar position would require a mind of great simplicity, or one with a powerful will. Unfortunately, the count was only a nice man, totally wrapped in pretensions created by his flatterers. Monsieur de Caylus declared they had puffed him up with a determination to seek Mademoiselle de La Mole's hand (to whom the Marquis de Croisenois, who would be a duke, but with an income of only fifteen thousand francs, was paying court). "Ah, don't accuse him of being determined," said Norbert, woefully. What was most lacking in poor Count de Thaler, in all likelihood, was indeed willpower. Looking at this aspect of the young man, he would have made a worthy king. Endlessly taking advice from all sides, he did not have the tenacity to follow any suggested course to its end. His face, Mademoiselle de La Mole declared, was in itself sufficient to inspire her with eternal joy. It was an odd blend of nervousness and disappointment, though from time to time it clearly displayed flushes of self-importance and of the sharp voice to be expected from the richest man in France, who after all was rather good-looking and not yet thirty-six. "He's shyly insolent," said Monsieur de Croisenois. Count de Caylus, Norbert, and two or three other young men with mustaches joked as they liked about him, bantering back and forth, without his knowing what they were up to. And then, as one o'clock sounded, they sent him on his way: "Are your famous Arab horses waiting at the gate, and in this weather?" Norbert asked him. "No, these are new, and cost a lot less," replied Monsieur de Thaler. "The left-hand horse cost me five thousand francs, and that on the right was only three thousand. But do please understand that I use the latter only at night, because his trot perfectly matches the other one's."