The cashier was a man of five-and-forty or thereabouts. As he sat at
the table, the light from a moderator lamp shining full on his bald
head and glistening fringe of iron-gray hair that surrounded it--this
baldness and the round outlines of his face made his head look very
like a ball. His complexion was brick-red, a few wrinkles had gathered
about his eyes, but he had the smooth, plump hands of a stout man. His
blue cloth coat, a little rubbed and worn, and the creases and
shininess of his trousers, traces of hard wear that the clothes-brush
fails to remove, would impress a superficial observer with the idea
that here was a thrifty and upright human being, sufficient of the
philosopher or of the aristocrat to wear shabby clothes. But,
unluckily, it is easy to find penny-wise people who will prove weak,
wasteful, or incompetent in the capital things of life.
The cashier wore the ribbon of the Legion of Honor at his
button-hole, for he had been a major of dragoons in the time of the
Emperor. M. de Nucingen, who had been a contractor before he became a
banker, had had reason in those days to know the honorable disposition
of his cashier, who then occupied a high position.
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