“Come!” said the father, taking him by the hand and leading him into the great hall.

At this epoch of our history, a duke and peer, with great possessions, holding public offices and the government of a province, lived the life of a prince; the cadets of his family did not revolt at serving him.  He had his household guard and officers; the first lieutenant of his ordnance company was to him what, in our day, an aide-de-camp is to a marshal.  A few years later, Cardinal de Richelieu had his body-guard.  Several princes allied to the royal house—­Guise, Conde, Nevers, and Vendome, etc.—­had pages chosen among the sons of the best families,—­a last lingering custom of departed chivalry.  The wealth of the Duc d’Herouville, and the antiquity of his Norman race indicated by his name ("herus villoe"), permitted him to imitate the magnificence of families who were in other respects his inferiors, —­those, for instance, of Epernon, Luynes, Balagny, d’O, Zamet, regarded as parvenus, but living, nevertheless, as princes.  It was therefore an imposing spectacle for poor Etienne to see the assemblage of retainers of all kinds attached to the service of his father.

The duke seated himself on a chair of state placed under a “solium,” or dais of carved word, above a platform raised by several steps, from which, in certain provinces, the great seigneurs still delivered judgment on their vassals,—­a vestige of feudality which disappeared under the reign of Richelieu.  These thrones, like the warden’s benches of the churches, have now become objects of collection as curiosities.  When Etienne was placed beside his father on that raised platform, he shuddered at feeling himself the centre to which all eyes turned.

“Do not tremble,” said the duke, bending his bald head to his son’s ear; “these people are only our servants.”

Through the dusky light produced by the setting sun, the rays of which were reddening the leaded panes of the windows, Etienne saw the bailiff, the captain and lieutenant of the guard, with certain of their men-at-arms, the chaplain, the secretaries, the doctor, the majordomo, the ushers, the steward, the huntsmen, the game-keeper, the grooms, and the valets.  Though all these people stood in respectful attitudes, induced by the terror the old man inspired in even the most important persons under his command, a low murmur, caused by curiosity and expectation, made itself heard.  That sound oppressed the bosom of the young man, who felt for the first time in his life the influence of the heavy atmosphere produced by the breath of many persons in a closed hall.  His senses, accustomed to the pure and wholesome air from the sea, were shocked with a rapidity that proved the super-sensitiveness of his organs.  A horrible palpitation, due no doubt to some defect in the organization of his heart, shook him with reiterated blows when his father, showing himself to the assemblage like some majestic old lion, pronounced in a solemn voice the following brief address:—­