Notre Dame de Paris - Bartleby.com

“Croix-Dieu!” resumed Coppenole, sorely exercised at having to lower his voice, “I am devoured by
the desire to plump myself down cross legged on the floor as I do in my own shop.”
“You had best beware of doing so, Maître Jacques,” was the reply.
“Heyday! Maître Guillaume, may a man then be only on his feet here?”
“Or on his knees,” said Rym. At that moment the King raised his voice and they ceased their talking.
“Fifty sols for the gowns of our valets, and twelve livres for the mantles of the crown clerks! That’s the
way! Pour out the gold by tons! Are you crazed, Olivier?”
As he spoke the old man raised his head, and you could see the golden shells of the collar of
Saint-Michael glittering round his neck. The candle shone full on his fleshless and morose countenance.
He snatched the paper from the hands of the other.
“You are ruining us!” he cried, casting his hollow eyes over the schedule. “What’s all this? What need
have we of so prodigious a household? Two chaplains at ten livres a month each, and a chapel clerk at a
hundred sols! A valet-de-chambre at ninety livres a year! Four kitchen masters at a hundred and sixty
livres a year each! A roaster, a soup-dresser, a sauce-dresser, a head cook, an armourer, two sumpter
men at the rate of ten livres a month each! Two turn-spits at eight livres! A groom and his two helpers at
four and twenty livres a month! A porter, a pastry-cook, a baker, two carters, each at sixty livres a year!
And the marshal of forges a hundred and twenty livres! And the master of our exchequer chamber twelve
hundred livres! And a comptroller five hundred livres! And God knows what besides! It’s raving
madness! The wages of our domestics are simply stripping France bare. All the treasure of the Louvre
would melt away before such a blaze of expense! We shall have to sell our plate! And next year, if God
and Our Lady (here he raised his hat) grant us life, we shall have to drink our tisanes from a pewter
pot!”
At which he glanced at the silver goblet sparkling on the table, coughed, and went on:
“Master Olivier, princes who reign over great realms as kings and superiors should not allow
sumptuousness to be engendered in their households, inasmuch as that is a fire which will spread from
thence to the provinces. And so, Master Olivier, make no mistake about this. Our expenses increase with
every year, and the thing displeases us. Why, pasque-Dieu! up till ’79 it never exceeded thirty-six
thousand livres. In ’80 it rose to forty-three thousand six hundred and nineteen livres. I have the figures
in my head. In ’8I it was sixty-six thousand six hundred and eighty livres, and this year, faith of my body!
it will come to eighty thousand livres. Doubled in four years! Monstrous!”
He stopped to take breath, then resumed with vehemence: “I see none about me but people fattening on
my leanness. Ye suck my money from me at every pore!”
All kept silence. It was one of those fits of anger that must be allowed to run their course. He continued
his complaints.
“It is the same thing with that Latin memorial from the great lords of France requesting us to
re-establish what they call the great offices of the Crown. Offices! call them rather burdens—burdens
that crush us to the ground. Ah, messieurs! you tell us we are no King to reign dapifero nullo buticulario
nullo! 89 But we will let you see, pasque-Dieu! whether we are a King or no!”