dy he had come
to Meaux,--the town that was so astir, busy, thoroughly alive!
Inexperienced in worldly ways he came. His face was beautiful with its
refinement and power of expression. His eyes were full of eloquence;
so also was his voice. When he came from Picardy to Meaux, his old
neighbors prophesied for him. He knew their prophecies, and purposed to
fulfil them. He ceased from dreaming, when he came to Meaux. He was not
dreaming, when he looked on Jacqueline. He was aware of what he read,
and how she listened, under those chestnut-trees.

The burden of the tracts he read to Jacqueline was salvation by faith,
not of works,--an iconoclastic doctrine, that was to sweep away
the great mass of Romish superstition, invalidating Papal power.
Image-worship, shrine-frequenting sacrifices, indulgences, were esteemed
and proved less than nothing worth in the work of salvation.

"Did you understand John, when he said that the priests deceived us and
were full of robberies, and talked about the masses for the dead, and
said the only good of them was to put money into the Church?" asked
Jacqueline.

"I believe it," he replied, with spirit.

"That the masses are worth nothing?" she asked,--far from concealing
that the thought disturbed her.

"What can they be worth, if a man has lived a bad life?"

"_That_ my father did _not!_" she exclaimed.

"If a man is a bad man, why, then he is. He has gone where he must be
judged. The Scripture says, As a tree falls, it must lie."

"My father was a good man, Victor. But he died of a sudden, and there
was no time."

"No time for what, Jacqueline? No time for him to turn about, and be a
bad man in the end?"

"No time for confession and absolution. He died praying God to forgive
him all his sins. I heard him. I wondered, Victor, for I never thought
of his committing sins. And my mother mourned for him as a good wife
should not mourn for a bad husband."

"Then what is your trouble, Jacqueline?"

"Do you know why I came here to Meaux? I came to get money,--to earn it.
I should be paid more money here than I got for any work at home, they
said: that was the reason. When I had earned so much,--it was a large
sum, but I knew I should get it, and the priest encouraged me to think
I should,--he said that my heart's desire would be accomplished. And I
could earn the money before winter is over, I think. But now, if"----

"Throw it into the Seine, when you get it, rather than pay it to