An hour after the boys were gone Eugene Mihailovich, the owner of the shop, came home, and began to count his receipts. “Oh, you clumsy fool! Idiot that you are!” he shouted, addressing his wife, after having seen the coupon and noticed the forgery. “But I have often seen you, Eugene, accepting coupons in payment, and precisely twelve ruble ones,” retorted his wife, very humiliated, grieved, and all but bursting into tears. “I really don’t know how they contrived to cheat me,” she went on. “They were pupils of the school, in uniform. One of them was quite a handsome boy, and looked so comme il faut.” “A comme il faut fool, that is what you are!” The husband went on scolding her, while he counted the cash. . . . When I accept coupons, I see what is written on them. And you probably looked only at the boys’ pretty faces. “You had better behave yourself in your old age.”...
An Inquiry into the Principle of Right and of GovernmentPreface. The following letter served as a preface to the first edition of this memoir: — “To the Members of the Academy of Besançon. “PARIS, June 30, 1840. “GENTLEMEN, — In the course of your debate of the 9th of May, 1833, in regard to the triennial pension established by Madame Suard, you expressed the following wish: — “ ‘The Academy requests the titulary to present it annually, during the first fortnight in July, with a succinct and logical statement of the various studies which he has pursued during the year which has just expired.’ “I now propose, gentlemen, to discharge this duty. “When I solicited your votes, I boldly avowed my intention to bend my efforts to the discovery of some means of ameliorating the physical, moral, and intellectual condition of the mere numerous and poorer classes. This idea, foreign as it m...