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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from A Start in Life by Honore de Balzac: always in garrison in Paris, or within a circumference of thirty miles
around the capital, he came to see his mother from time to time, and
tell her his griefs; for he had the sense to see that he could never
become an officer as matters then were. At that time the cavalry
grades were all being taken up by the younger sons of noble families,
and men without the article to their names found promotion difficult.
Oscar's sole ambition was to leave the Guards and be appointed sub-
lieutenant in a regiment of the cavalry of the line. In the month of
February, 1830, Madame Clapart obtained this promotion for her son
through the influence of Madame la Dauphine, granted to the Abbe
Gaudron, now rector of Saint-Pauls.
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