Then allusion being made in the course of conversation to the troubles agitating Paris, the incendiary articles in the papers, the incipient popular disturbances which followed the calls to arms nightly raised at public meetings, she waxed wroth with the Republicans.

What on earth did those dirty people who never washed really want?
Were folks not happy?
Had not the emperor done everything for the people?
A nice filthy lot of people! She knew 'em; she could talk about 'em, and, quite forgetting the respect which at dinner she had just been insisting should be paid to her humble circle in the Rue de la Goutte-d'Or, she began blackguarding her own class with all the terror and disgust peculiar to a woman who had risen successfully above it.

That very afternoon she had read in the Figaro an account of the proceedings at a public meeting which had verged on the comic.

Owing to the slang words that had been used and to the piggish behavior of a drunken man who had got himself chucked, she was laughing at those proceedings still.
"Oh, those drunkards!" she said with a disgusted air.

"No, look you here, their republic would be a great misfortune for everybody! Oh, may God preserve us the emperor as long as possible!" "God will hear your prayer, my dear," Muffat replied gravely.