They were strenuous days for Andre-Louis, more strenuous than he
had ever known, even when he had been at work to build up the Binet
Company; but it follows that they were days of extraordinary
prosperity. He comments regretfully upon the fact that Bertrand des
Amis should have died by ill-chance on the very eve of so profitable
a vogue of sword-play.
The arms of the Academie du Roi, to which Andre-Louis had no title,
still continued to be displayed outside his door. He had overcome
the difficulty in a manner worthy of Scaramouche. He left the
escutcheon and the legend "Academie de Bertrand des Amis, Maitre en
fait d'Armes des Academies du Roi," appending to it the further
legend: "Conducted by Andre-Louis."
With little time now in which to go abroad it was from his pupils
and the newspapers - of which a flood had risen in Paris with the
establishment of the freedom of the Press - that he learnt of the
revolutionary processes around him, following upon, as a measure
of anticlimax, the fall of the Bastille.
Pages:
403
404
405
406
407
408
409
410
411
412
413
414
415
416
417
418
419
420
421
422
423
424
425
426
427