door.
Choulette rang for a long time, and so violently that the bellrope
remained in his hand. Skilful at understanding symbols and the hidden
meaning of things, he understood at once that this rope had not been
detached without the permission of spiritual powers. He made of it
a belt, and realized that he had been chosen to lead back into its
primitive purity the Third Order of Saint Francis. He renounced the
beauty of women, the delights of poetry, the brightness of glory, and
studied the life and the doctrine of Saint Francis. However, he has sold
to his editor a book entitled 'Les Blandices', which contains, he says,
the description of all sorts of loves. He flatters himself that in it
he has shown himself a criminal with some elegance. But far from harming
his mystic undertakings, this book favors them in this sense, that,
corrected by his later work, he will become honest and exemplary; and
the gold that he has received in payment, which would not have been paid
to him for a more chaste volume, will serve for a pilgrimage to Assisi."

Madame Martin asked how much of this story was really true. Vence
replied that she must not try to learn.

He confessed that he was the idealist historian of the poet, and that
the adventures which he related of him were not to be taken in the
literal and Judaic sense.

He affirmed that at least Choulette was publishing Les Blandices, and
desired to visit the cell and the grave of St. Francis.

"Then," exclaimed Madame Martin, "I will take him to Italy with me. Find
him, Monsieur Vence, and bring him to me. I am going next week."

M. Martin then excused himself, not being able to remain longer. He had
to finish a report which was to be laid before the Chamber the next day.

Madame Martin said that nobody interested her so much as Choulette. Paul
Vence said that he was a singular specimen of humanity.

"He is not very different from the saints of whose extraordinary lives
we read. He is as sincere as they. He has an exquisite delicacy of
sentiment and a terrible violence of mind. If he shocks one by many of
his acts, the reason is that he is weaker, less supported, or perhaps
less closely observed. And then there are unworthy saints, just as there
are bad angels: Choulette is a worldly saint, that is all. But his poems
are true poems, and much finer than those written by the bishops of the
seventeenth century."

She interrupted him:

"While I think of it, I wish to congratul