with a lawsuit, the scandal of which he wished to avoid.  Courtecuisse, out of a job, purchased from Rigou for two thousand francs the little property of La Bachelerie, enclosed in the Aigues estate, and wearied himself, without gain, in the management of his land.  He had a daughter who was tolerably pretty and eighteen years old in 1823.  At this time she was in the service of Mme. Mariotte the elder, at Auxerre.  Courtecuisse was given the sobriquet of “Courtebotte”—­short-boot. [The Peasantry.]

COURTECUISSE (Madame), wife of the preceding; in abject fear of the miser, Gregoire Rigou, mayor of Blangy, Burgundy. [The Peasantry.]

COURTEVILLE (Madame de), cousin of Comte de Bauvan on the maternal side; widow of a judge of the Seine Court.  She had a very beautiful daughter, Amelie, whom the comte wished to marry to his secretary, Maurice de l’Hostal. [Honorine.]

COURTOIS, Marsac miller, near Angouleme during the Restoration.  In 1821 rumor had it that he intended to wed a miller’s widow, his patroness, who was thirty-two years old.  She had one hundred thousand francs in her own right.  David Sechard was advised by his father to ask the hand of this rich widow.  At the end of 1822 Courtois, now married, sheltered Lucien de Rubempre, returning almost dead from Paris. [Lost Illusions.]

COURTOIS (Madame), wife of the preceding, who cared sympathetically for Lucien de Rubempre, on his return. [Lost Illusions.]

COUSSARD (Laurent). (See Goussard, Laurent.)

COUTELIER, a creditor of Maxime de Trailles.  The Coutelier credit, purchased for five hundred francs by the Claparon-Cerizet firm, came to thirty-two hundred francs, seventy-five centimes, capital, interest and costs.  It was recovered by Cerizet by means of a strategy worthy of a Scapin. [A Man of Business.]

COUTURE, a kind of financier-journalist of an equivocal reputation; born about 1797.  One of Mme. Schontz’s earliest friends; and she alone remained faithful to him when he was ruined by the downfall of the ministry of March 1st, 1840.  Couture was always welcome at the home of the courtesan, who dreamed, perhaps, of making him her husband.  But he presented Fabien du Ronceret to her and the “lorette” married him.  In 1836, in company with Finot and Blondet, he was present in a private room of a well-known restaurant when Jean-Jacques Bixiou related the origin of the Nucingen fortune.  At the time of his transient wealth Couture splendidly maintained Jenny Cadine.  At one time he was celebrated for his waistcoats.  He had no known relationship with the widow Couture. [Beatrix.  The Firm of Nucingen.] The financier drew upon himself the hatred of Cerizet for having deceived him in a deal about the purchase of lands and houses situated in the suburbs of the Madeleine, an affair in which Jerome Thuillier was afterwards concerned. [The Middle Classes.]

COUTURE (Madame), widow of an ordonnance-commissary of the French Republic.  Relative and protectress of Mlle. Victorine Taillefer with whom she lived at the Vauquer pension, in 1819. [Father Goriot.]