lesson in French.”
“Ah, I don’t profess to teach English, certainly,” said M. Nioche. “But for my own admirable tongue I am still at your service.”
“Since you are here, then,” said Newman, “we will begin. This is a very good hour. I am going to have my coffee; come every morning at half-past nine and have yours with me.”
“Monsieur offers me my coffee, also?” cried M. Nioche. “Truly, my
beaux jours
11 are coming back.”
“Come,” said Newman, “let us begin. The coffee is almighty hot. How do you say that in French?”
Every day, then, for the following three weeks, the minutely respectable figure of M. Nioche made its appearance, with a series of little inquiring and apologetic obeisances, among the aromatic fumes of Newman’s morning beverage. I don’t know how much French our friend learned; but, as he himself said, if the attempt did him no good, it could at any rate do him no harm. And it amused him; it gratified that irregularly sociable side of his nature which had always expressed itself in a relish for ungrammatical conversation, and which often, even in his busy and preoccupied days, had made him sit on rail fences in young Western towns, in the twilight, in gossip hardly less than fraternal with humorous loafers and obscure fortune-seekers. He had notions, wherever he went, about talking with the natives; he had been assured, and his judgment approved the advice, that in travelling abroad it was an excellent thing to look into the life of the country. M. Nioche was very much of a native, and, though his life might not be particularly worth looking into, he was a palpable and smoothly-rounded unit in that picturesque Parisian civilisation which offered our hero so much easy entertainment and propounded so many curious problems to his inquiring and practical mind. Newman was fond ofstatistics; he liked to know how things were done; it gratified him to learn what taxes were paid, what profits were gathered, what commercial habits prevailed, how the battle of life was fought. M. Nioche, as a reduced capitalist, was familiar with these considerations, and he formulated his information, which he was proud to be able to impart, in the neatest possible terms and with a pinch of snuff between finger and thumb. As a Frenchman—quite apart from Newman’s napoleons—M. Nioche loved conversation, and even in his decay his urbanity had not grown rusty. As a Frenchman, too, he could give a clear account of things, and—still as a Frenchman—when his knowledge was at fault he could supply its lapses with the most convenient and ingenious hypotheses. The little shrunken financier was intensely delighted to have questions asked him, and he scraped together information, by frugal processes, and took notes, in his little greasy pocket-book, of incidents which might interest his munificent friend. He read old almanacs at the book-stalls on the quays, and he began to frequent another
café
, where more newspapers were taken and his post-prandial
demitasse
12 cost him a penny extra, and where he used to con 13 the tattered sheets for curious anecdotes, freaks of nature, and strange coincidences. He would relate with solemnity the next morning that a child of five years of age had lately died at Bordeaux, whose brain had been found to weigh sixty ounces—the brain of a Napoleon or a Washington! or that Madame P—–,
charcutière
14 in the Rue de Clichy, 15 had found in the wadding of an old petticoat the sum of three hundred and sixty francs, which she had lost five years before. He pronounced his words with great distinctness and sonority, and Newman assured him that his way of dealing with the French tongue was very superior to the bewildering chatter that he heard in other mouths. Upon this M. Nioche’s accent became more finely trenchant than ever; he offered to read extractsfrom Lamartine, 16 and he protested that, although he did endeavour according to his feeble lights to cultivate
“Ah, I don’t profess to teach English, certainly,” said M. Nioche. “But for my own admirable tongue I am still at your service.”
“Since you are here, then,” said Newman, “we will begin. This is a very good hour. I am going to have my coffee; come every morning at half-past nine and have yours with me.”
“Monsieur offers me my coffee, also?” cried M. Nioche. “Truly, my
beaux jours
11 are coming back.”
“Come,” said Newman, “let us begin. The coffee is almighty hot. How do you say that in French?”
Every day, then, for the following three weeks, the minutely respectable figure of M. Nioche made its appearance, with a series of little inquiring and apologetic obeisances, among the aromatic fumes of Newman’s morning beverage. I don’t know how much French our friend learned; but, as he himself said, if the attempt did him no good, it could at any rate do him no harm. And it amused him; it gratified that irregularly sociable side of his nature which had always expressed itself in a relish for ungrammatical conversation, and which often, even in his busy and preoccupied days, had made him sit on rail fences in young Western towns, in the twilight, in gossip hardly less than fraternal with humorous loafers and obscure fortune-seekers. He had notions, wherever he went, about talking with the natives; he had been assured, and his judgment approved the advice, that in travelling abroad it was an excellent thing to look into the life of the country. M. Nioche was very much of a native, and, though his life might not be particularly worth looking into, he was a palpable and smoothly-rounded unit in that picturesque Parisian civilisation which offered our hero so much easy entertainment and propounded so many curious problems to his inquiring and practical mind. Newman was fond ofstatistics; he liked to know how things were done; it gratified him to learn what taxes were paid, what profits were gathered, what commercial habits prevailed, how the battle of life was fought. M. Nioche, as a reduced capitalist, was familiar with these considerations, and he formulated his information, which he was proud to be able to impart, in the neatest possible terms and with a pinch of snuff between finger and thumb. As a Frenchman—quite apart from Newman’s napoleons—M. Nioche loved conversation, and even in his decay his urbanity had not grown rusty. As a Frenchman, too, he could give a clear account of things, and—still as a Frenchman—when his knowledge was at fault he could supply its lapses with the most convenient and ingenious hypotheses. The little shrunken financier was intensely delighted to have questions asked him, and he scraped together information, by frugal processes, and took notes, in his little greasy pocket-book, of incidents which might interest his munificent friend. He read old almanacs at the book-stalls on the quays, and he began to frequent another
café
, where more newspapers were taken and his post-prandial
demitasse
12 cost him a penny extra, and where he used to con 13 the tattered sheets for curious anecdotes, freaks of nature, and strange coincidences. He would relate with solemnity the next morning that a child of five years of age had lately died at Bordeaux, whose brain had been found to weigh sixty ounces—the brain of a Napoleon or a Washington! or that Madame P—–,
charcutière
14 in the Rue de Clichy, 15 had found in the wadding of an old petticoat the sum of three hundred and sixty francs, which she had lost five years before. He pronounced his words with great distinctness and sonority, and Newman assured him that his way of dealing with the French tongue was very superior to the bewildering chatter that he heard in other mouths. Upon this M. Nioche’s accent became more finely trenchant than ever; he offered to read extractsfrom Lamartine, 16 and he protested that, although he did endeavour according to his feeble lights to cultivate
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