Unpublished Passages
IN THE LIFE OF 
Vidocq, The French Minister of Police

No. III

The Seducer

by J.M.B.

Pierre Marcel was the cultivator of a small but profitable vineyard, on the banks of the Garonne, a few leagues from Toulouse, where the principal part of his life had been passed in the almost daily occupation of tending his vines, and rendering his little plot of ground the fairest for many a mile around. In early life his wife, whom he had passionately adored, had fallen the victim of a lingering illness, leaving him an only child, a daughter, whom he cherished both for its own and mother’s sake, with unusual tenderness. The little Louise was the solace of his days, and the prattle of her infant tongue sounded to him the sweetest music nature could invent; but when her growing years gave token of equalling her mother’s beauty and symmetry of form, his satisfaction was unbounded to think that he alone, without a mother’s fostering hand, had reared a flower so lovely. Oft, when working in his vineyard, would he pause as his daughter tript by with fawn-like step, and gaze with true affection on his heart’s dearest object, whilst in his mind he conjured up bright dreams of the future, and tried to trace her coming years.

A short distance from Marcel’s house was the chateau of the Marquis de St. Brie, who was usually resident there with his daughter. The family of the Marquis consisted only of his daughter and a son, an officer in a light cavalry regiment. A friendship more strong than those usually subsisting between persons of different stations in life, had grown up betwixt Louise and Emile de St. Brie, and it had been one of the chief amusements of the latter to instruct Louise in those accomplishments she herself so much excelled in, often remarking, that… Read More