The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from The Exiles by Honore de Balzac: was however justified by the luxury Tirechair had lavished on their
adornment. Flanders tapestry hung on the walls, and a large bed with a
top valance of green serge, like a peasant's bed, was amply furnished
with mattresses, and covered with good sheets of fine linen. Each room
had a stove called a /chauffe-doux/; the floor, carefully polished by
Dame Tirechair's apprentices, shone like the woodwork of a shrine.
Instead of stools, the lodgers had deep chairs of carved walnut, the
spoils probably of some raided castle. Two chests with pewter
mouldings, and tables on twisted legs, completed the fittings, worthy
of the most fastidious knights-banneret whom business might bring to
Paris.
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