The Ball at Sceaux

By De Balzac, Honore

Book Id: WPLBN0000677130
Format Type: PDF eBook:
File Size: 0.2 MB
Reproduction Date: 2005

Title:	The Ball at Sceaux
Author:	De Balzac, Honore
Volume:
Language:	English
Subject:	Fiction, Literature, Literature & drama
Collections:	Classic Literature Collection, Penn State University's Electronic Classics Series Collection
Historic Publication Date:
Publisher:	Penn State University's Electronic Classics


Citation APA MLA Chicago De Balzac, B. H. (n.d.). The Ball at Sceaux. Retrieved from http://self.gutenberg.org/

Excerpt
Excerpt: The Comte De Fontaine, head of one of the oldest families in Poitou, had served the Bourbon cause with intelligence and bravery during the war in La Vendee against the Republic. After having escaped all the dangers which threatened the royalist leaders during this stormy period of modern history, he was wont to say in jest, ?I am one of the men who gave themselves to be killed on the steps of the throne.? And the pleasantry had some truth in it, as spoken by a man left for dead at the bloody battle of Les Quatre Chemins. Though ruined by confiscation, the staunch Vendeen steadily refused the lucrative posts offered to him by the Emperor Napoleon. Immovable in his aristocratic faith, he had blindly obeyed its precepts when he thought it fitting to choose a companion for life. In spite of the blandishments of a rich but revolutionary parvenu, who valued the alliance at a high figure, he married Mademoiselle de Kergarouet, without a fortune, but belonging to one of the oldest families in Brittany.