Monseigneur has obtained a reprieve for him."

"Ah!" exclaimed Ursule, whose tongue itched to spread the news about the
village, "monsieur has plenty of time to carry them that comfort while I
get breakfast ready. The Tascherons' house is beyond the village; follow
the path below that terrace and it will take you there."

As soon as Ursule lost sight of the abbe she went down into the village
to disseminate the news, and also to buy the things needed for the
breakfast.

The rector had been informed, while in church, of a desperate resolution
taken by the Tascherons as soon as they heard that Jean-Francois's
appeal was rejected and that he had to die. These worthy souls intended
to leave the country, and their worldly goods were to be sold that
very morning. Delays and formalities unexpected by them had hitherto
postponed the sale. They had been forced to remain in their home until
the execution, and drink each day the cup of shame. This determination
had not been made public until the evening before the day appointed for
the execution. The Tascherons had expected to leave before that fatal
day; but the proposed purchaser of their property was a stranger in
those parts, and was prevented from clinching the bargain by a delay in
obtaining the money. Thus the hapless family were forced to bear their
trouble to its end. The feeling which prompted this expatriation was
so violent in these simple souls, little accustomed to compromise with
their consciences, that the grandfather and grandmother, the father and
the mother, the daughters and their husbands and the sons, in short, all
who bore and had borne the name of Tascheron or were closely allied to
it made ready to leave the country.

This emigration grieved the whole community. The mayor entreated the
rector to do his best to retain these worthy people. According to the
new Code the father was not responsible for the son, and the crime
of the father was no disgrace to the children. Together with other
emancipations which have weakened paternal power, this system has led
to the triumph of individualism, which is now permeating the whole
of modern society. He who thinks on the things of the future sees
the spirit of family destroyed, where the makers of the new Code have
introduced freedom of will and equality. The Family must always be the
basis of society. Necessarily temporary, incessantly divided, recomposed
to dissolve again, without ties between the future and the