If I can't do it, then that I have tried
to do it will be endorsed on the foot of the bill."
No one could move him, not even Judge Carcasson, who from his armchair in
Montreal wrote a feeble-handed letter begging him to believe that it was
"well within his rights as a gentleman"--this he put in at the request of
M. Mornay--to take advantage of the privileges of the Bankruptcy Court.
Even then Jean Jacques had only a few moments' hesitation. What the
Judge said made a deep impression; but he had determined to drink the cup
of his misfortune to the dregs. He was set upon complete renunciation;
on going forth like a pilgrim from the place of his troubles and sorrows,
taking no gifts, no mercies save those which heaven accorded him.
When the day of the auction came everything went. Even his best suit
of clothes was sold to a blacksmith, while his fur-coat was bought by a
horse-doctor for fifteen dollars. Things that had been part of his life
for a generation found their way into hands where he would least have
wished them to go--of those who had been envious of him, who had cheated
or deceived him, of people with whom he had had nothing in common.
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