"That is only fair," replied Pierre-Jacques-Philippe-Michel Boyen-Xènes-Baguines, examining the tobacco. "I criticize him without knowing what he does. I will say this, though: the ministry has scandalously bad taste in tobacco; they declare all the best strains to be contraband, and only allow the king's chief men to partake of them."
"Oh, that has nothing to do with me," replied De Brie. "That's a matter for the ministry of finance, whom Gandault placed under a curse of mauvais goût long ago."
"Not bad," laughed Boyen-Xènes-Baguines, "and I will even go so far as to say that if you could succeed to maintain a ministry for longer than I can keep my pipeful of bourzoum-ichy lit, I would support your party in an instant."
"You positively must try the chandelle-dwarve," urged the Viscount.
"Bien, that's a consolation for having to listen to the speeches of Sacqueville-Danglars, who is even duller in private life than he is in public."
"Do not speak ill of Sacqueville-Danglars," remonstrated De Brie. "He votes for your party; he belongs to the opposition."
"Then good is yet evil to have been," said the journalist, tastefully mixing the chandelle-dwarve with his bourzoum-ichy.
