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With sad faces and longing eyes they watched the passing of the train of plunder-laden carts, piled high with rich furniture, silks, velvets, tapestries, carvings, and precious metals, which had been the pride of many a lordly home in fair Auvergne or the wealthy Bourbonnais. Let no man think that in these wars England alone was face to face with France alone.

Just before we started the father came and asked if it was all the same to me whether we went by Burgundy or the Bourbonnais. "Certainly. Do you prefer any particular route?" "If I went through Nevers I might be able to collect a small account." "Then we will go by the Bourbonnais."

Desirous of seeing the green lanes of Berry, the rocky heaths of Bourbonnais, the descriptions of which in Valentine and Jeanne had charmed him so strongly, the traveller chose a route that brought him to within a few miles of her home: "I addressed to Madame Sand," he tells us, "the sort of letter of which she must in her lifetime have had scores a letter conveying to her, in bad French, the youthful and enthusiastic homage of a foreigner who had read her works with delight."

Whether owing to these occurrences, or to grounds for suspicion before mentioned, certain reports spread in the Bourbonnais embodying some of the real facts; portions of them reached the ears of the count and countess, but they had only the effect of renewing their grief without furnishing a clue to the truth. Meanwhile, the count went to take the waters at Vichy.

I thought myself wise in only taking Costa, but the inspiration came from my evil genius. I took the Bourbonnais way, and on the third day I arrived at Paris, and lodged at the Hotel du St. Esprit, in the street of the same name. Before going to bed I sent Costa with a note to Madame d'Urfe, promising to come and dine with her the next day.

The dowager countess, who had arrived at the chateau the same day, unable to convince herself as to this news, had the pleasure of satisfying her self respecting it. The count and countess were much beloved in the Bourbonnais province; this event caused therein a general satisfaction, particularly in the numerous houses attached to them by consanguinity.

It will now be in place to state who the inmates of the chateau were, and to relate some previous occurrences to explain subsequent ones. The Marshal de Saint-Geran, of the illustrious house of Guiche, and governor of the Bourbonnais, had married, for his first wife, Anne de Tournon, by whom he had one son, Claude de la Guiche, and one daughter, who married the Marquis de Bouille.

"But," said the host, "is there no hope of catching him again?" "Not the slightest, if he has taken the road to the Bourbonnais; for I believe there are in that province noblemen belonging to his family who will not allow him to be rearrested."

I asked for the shortest way, and hurried through the field paths of the Bourbonnais, bearing, as it were, a dead man on my back. The nearer I came to the Chateau de Montpersan, the more aghast I felt at the idea of my strange self-imposed pilgrimage. Vast numbers of romantic fancies ran in my head.

I thought myself wise in only taking Costa, but the inspiration came from my evil genius. I took the Bourbonnais way, and on the third day I arrived at Paris, and lodged at the Hotel du St. Esprit, in the street of the same name. Before going to bed I sent Costa with a note to Madame d'Urfe, promising to come and dine with her the next day.