Thus without any taste of his own, he knew how to be the first to
adopt and the first to abandon a new fashion. Accused of nothing worse
than spending too much time at his toilet and wearing a corset, he
presented the type of those persons who displease no one by adopting
incessantly the ideas and the follies of everbody, and who, astride of
circumstance, never grow old.
As a husband, he was pitied; people thought Beatrix inexcusable for
deserting the best fellow on earth, and social jeers only touched the
woman. A member of all clubs, subscriber to all the absurdities
generated by patriotism or party spirit ill-understood (a compliance
which put him in the front rank /a propos/ of all such matters), this
loyal, brave, and very silly nobleman, whom unfortunately so many rich
men resemble, would naturally desire to distinguish himself by
adopting some fashionable mania. Consequently, he glorified his name
principally in being the sultan of a four-footed harem, governed by an
old English groom, which cost him monthly from four to five thousand
francs.
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