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They must be able to sign their names, but they are not obliged to know how to read, and eighty per cent. of them are totally illiterate. Their work is done for them very usually by the local schoolmaster. The Senate, therefore, was quite sure of finding among them men absolutely incompetent for the post of juge de paix, and it has found what it wanted.
Here we have a most interesting example of the way democracy strives after incompetence in matters judicial. Owing to the expense entailed by an appeal the jurisdiction of a juge de paix is very often final. He ought to be an instructed person with some knowledge of law and jurisprudence.
He spent the evening alone in front of the Cafe de la Paix, pleasantly occupied in watching the life and movement of that great meeting of the highways. It did not seem possible that he had ever been away. It was as though he had picked up a book and opened it at the page and place at which he had left off reading it a moment before.
A second corps was already preparing, but the Prince de la Paix discovered in the correspondence of Ferdinand the proof of his relations with Beauharnais.
I don't think you know yourself, half your time." Thus agreeably beguiling the way, the pair walked to the shop in the Rue de la Paix, where the lady had seen a brooch entirely to her mind. It was the large enamel rose-leaf, with three charming dew-drops in the shape of brilliants. "They speak English, I hope," said Mr. Cockayne. "We ought to have brought Sophonisba with us."
Nevertheless, as he strolled about, he watched for that occasional velvety glance that gave him pleasure, and amused himself with the types seated around him, or crossing his path heavy, swarthy Argentines, looking like Italian laborers grown rich their heavy, swarthy wives, come out to display all the jewels that could be conveniently worn at once pretty, dark-eyed girls, already with a fatal tendency to embonpoint, wearing diamonds in their ears and round their necks as an added glory to costumes fresh from the rue de la Paix grave little boys, in gloves and patent-leather boots, seated without budging by their mammas, sucking the tops of their canes in imitation of their elder brothers, who wandered about in pairs or groups, all of the latest cut, eying the ladies but rarely addressing them tall Englishmen, who looked taller than they were in contrast to the pudgy race around them, as the Germans looked lighter and the French more blond Italian opera singers, Parisian actresses Spanish dancers, music-hall soubrettes diplomats of all nations clerks out for a holiday sailors on shore tourists come to profit by a spectacle that has no equal in the southern world, and little of the kind that is more amusing in the north.
Malay krisses, double-handed Chinese execution swords; old pepper-pot revolvers, such as may still be found on the African coast; knob-kerries, assegais, steel-spiked balls swinging from whips of raw hide; weapons wild and savage and primitive as those with which Attila drove before him the hordes of the Huns, and modern weapons of to-day and yesterday; the big elephant gun which has been supplanted by the express rifle; the deadly magazine rifle, the latest products of Schaunard of the Rue de la Paix and Westley Richards of London.
For an instant Brett reflected that whilst the other men were fascinated by the spectacle, he would have a good opportunity to shoot some of them without mercy and make a dash for liberty. But at the same moment there came to him an odd thought. His friend the jeweller of the Rue de la Paix had not given him a lesson in vain during the previous afternoon.
The mayor looked at Monsieur Clousier in amazement. Madame Graslin, glad to find in a simple juge de paix a man whose mind was occupied with serious questions, said to Monsieur Roubaud, her neighbor, "Do you know Monsieur Clousier?" "Not rightly until to-day, madame. You are doing miracles," he answered in a whisper. "And yet, look at his brow, how noble in shape!
We found the Grand Hotel du Louvre et de la Paix, and wrote down who we were, where we were born, what our occupations were, the place we came from last, whether we were married or single, how we liked it, how old we were, where we were bound for and when we expected to get there, and a great deal of information of similar importance all for the benefit of the landlord and the secret police.