serve as a model.

But a mere enumeration of her advantages affords but a faint idea of the fascination of that young girl, of the charm with which her whole person was instinct, of the sweet melody of her voice, and of the pleasure that one felt in hearing it.

Sometimes one remains unmoved before the most unexceptionable beauty; for that which attracts and captivates us is not so much the perfection of the features, the regularity of the outlines of a face, as its amiable and gracious expression—a second element of beauty which many times exerts more power than the first; but when the two are combined, when nature has endowed a single woman with both, then it is that it is very difficult to avoid losing one's heart and one's reason.

And that lovely, graceful, fascinating girl was the daughter of Landry and Dame Ragonde!

Nature sometimes indulges in such strange whims. Do we not see flowers whose perfume intoxicates us and whose gorgeous colors dazzle our eyes, blooming upon stunted, thorny stalks?

As Bathilde's beauty would have attracted too many gallants, too many seducers, to Master Landry's shop, the girl never appeared there, nor did she wait upon the ladies who patronized her father's baths.

Bathilde had been brought up very strictly; almost always confined to her bedroom, which did not look on the street, the girl never went out except with her mother; and then a long veil, attached to her hood, covered almost the whole of her face, leaving nothing in sight save the end of her nose. If the sweet girl ventured to disarrange the veil and to expose one of her pink and white cheeks to the air for a moment, Dame Ragonde would instantly exclaim in her shrill, harsh voice:

"Your veil! your veil! Take care!"

Bathilde knew what that meant, and would hasten to swathe her lovely face anew.

Certainly, if Master Landry had desired that his establishment should be besieged by crowds of customers, he could easily have gratified his wish: nothing more would have been necessary than to allow his daughter to come to the shop now and then. Bathilde's beauty would have made a sensation, the court and the city would have been stirred to their depths, everyone would have desired to know that plebeian chef-d'œuvre, and, with the inevitable vogue of his place of business, the bath keeper's fortune would have been assured.

But in this respect Bathilde's parents proved that their own honor and their child's virtue were to them treasures more precious than gold.

Some neighbors, knowing how strictly Bathilde had been brought up, said, and with some show of reason, that a mother should be able to watch over her daughter without converting her house into a prison. That to keep a child from knowledge of the world was not the way to protect her from the dangers that are encountered there at every step; and that it was downright barbarity to deprive a girl of all the pleasures suited to her years because it had pleased the Creator to endow her with all those physical qualities which charm and fascinate.

If these or other similar remarks reached Dame Ragonde's ears, it is probable that she paid little heed to them and that they made little impression on her. Immovable in her determination, impassible in her nature, rigorous in her conduct, she made no change whatever in her methods with her daughter.

And as for Master Landry, although he loved Bathilde dearly and was very proud of her, he looked upon his wife as the general whose duty it was to manage the internal economy of his household. As such general, he obeyed her promptly, reserving to himself only the command of the two apprentices employed in his baths.

However, Landry's establishment was prosperous, as were almost all the baths of those days, because they were very few in number.

The neighborhood of Rue Dauphine, which was less thickly populated than Rue Saint-Jacques, already contained some noble mansions and fine houses, occupied by magistrates, members of the Parliament, men of the robe, and rich annuitants. Moreover, the proximity of the Pré-aux-Clercs, which was still a favorite promenade, although some buildings were beginning to be erected there, contributed to attract to Master Landry's baths a more distinguished and more fashionable clientèle, better society, in a word, than the ordinary patrons of his confrère, Master Hugonnet.

Furthermore, although the fascinating Bathilde was concealed from prying eyes, beauty spreads about it a perfume which causes its presence to be divined, and which attracts connoisseurs, even though they are destined to have nothing to show for their pains.

Despite all the precautions taken by Dame Ragonde, she could not prevent her neighbors from talking; they repeated, to whoever chose to listen, that Master Landry had a daughter more beautiful than the marvellous princesses of the Thousand and One Nights; that her surpassing beauty was the reason that her father and mother concealed her from all eyes, because they feared that somebody would take her away from them; and that they destined her for some wealthy foreign prince.

Others declared, on the contrary, that Master Landry's daughter was a monster of ugliness and deformity, and that it was to shelter the poor girl from the ridicule which was certain to be poured out upon her that they were careful to keep her out of sight.

This last version, however, obtained little credence. As a general rule, people do not take so many precautions with an ugly girl, or keep such close watch over one who has no reason to fear the enterprises of gallants.

Mystery always arouses curiosity, and the veil in which Dame Ragonde swathed Bathilde's face intensified the general desire to see it. Extremes are dangerous in everything: the man who puts too many bolts on his door arouses a suspicion that he possesses a treasure.

Chance had brought Landry and his confrère Hugonnet together. One evening, when the latter was returning home, as usual, after a merry evening over the bottle at a wine shop recently opened in the Cité, at some distance from his house, he lost his way. Alone, late at night, the barber wandered for a long while through the dark and muddy lanes which were then called streets, feeling his way along the walls, seeking his own door, and cursing because he did not find it.

Two men, emerging suddenly from a blind alley, walked toward the drunken man, who at once asked them to direct him. But he had applied to a pair of vagabonds, whose only reply was to set about robbing Master Hugonnet of his purse, his cloak, his great fur cap—in fact, of a large part of his clothes. At the outset, as a result of his intoxication, which entirely changed his disposition, Hugonnet placidly allowed himself to be stripped, thinking that he had to do with unfortunate creatures who needed all those things for their families. But one of the marauders having been so imprudent as to strike him on the head, the blow, by sobering the barber, instantly changed the face of affairs. Restored to his senses, and realizing with what manner of men he had to do, he defended himself stoutly; he dealt the two robbers some lusty blows, and they, irritated at meeting with such stubborn resistance from an intoxicated man, were already brandishing the daggers which they proposed to use, when Master Landry appeared upon the stage of this nocturnal attack.

To draw the rapier which he always carried under his cloak, to rush to the assistance of the man who was beset, to attack the two robbers with cut and thrust, to put them to flight, and to restore to Master Hugonnet his cloak, which had fallen to the ground—all this was the affair of a moment for the old trooper of Henri IV.

Hugonnet, completely sobered by the combat, offered Landry his hand and exclaimed:

"Vertudieu! I am inclined to think, comrade, that but for you those scoundrels would have made me pass a bad quarter of an