Etre pauvre à Paris, c'est être pauvre deux fois. - Émile Zola

When younger, he had been fun-loving to the point of tedium.

The pride of abnegation had vanished, and she was willing that those she loved should be happy through other instrumentality than her own.

The Empire had just been proclaimed, after that famous journey during which the Prince President had succeeded in arousing the enthusiasm of some Bonapartist departments. Silence reigned both at the tribune and in the press. Society, saved once more, was congratulating itself and indolently resting, now that a strong government was protecting it and relieving it even of the trouble of thinking and of attending to its own business.