hirty-six, of which some were breeding
mothers. Not content with providing Fario's store-house with these
boarders, the Knights made holes in the roof of the old church and
put in a dozen pigeons, taken from as many different farms. These
four-footed and feathered creatures held high revels,--all the more
securely because the watchman was enticed away by a fellow who kept him
drunk from morning till night, so that he took no care of his master's
property.

Madame Bridau believed, contrary to the opinion of old Hochon, that her
brother has as yet made no will; she intended asking him what were his
intentions respecting Mademoiselle Brazier, as soon as she could take a
walk with him alone,--a hope which Flore and Maxence were always holding
out to her, and, of course, always disappointing.

Meantime the Knights were searching for a way to put the Parisians to
flight, and finding none that were not impracticable follies.

At the end of a week--half the time the Parisians were to stay in
Issoudun--the Bridaus were no farther advanced in their object than when
they came.

"Your lawyer does not understand the provinces," said old Hochon to
Madame Bridau. "What you have come to do can't be done in two weeks, nor
in two years; you ought never to leave your brother, but live here
and try to give him some ideas of religion. You cannot countermine the
fortifications of Flore and Maxence without getting a priest to sap
them. That is my advice, and it is high time to set about it."

"You certainly have very singular ideas about the clergy," said Madame
Hochon to her husband.

"Bah!" exclaimed the old man, "that's just like you pious women."

"God would never bless an enterprise undertaken in a sacrilegious
spirit," said Madame Bridau. "Use religion for such a purpose! Why, we
should be more criminal than Flore."

This conversation took place at breakfast,--Francois and Baruch
listening with all their ears.

"Sacrilege!" exclaimed old Hochon. "If some good abbe, keen as I have
known many of them to be, knew what a dilemma you are in, he would not
think it sacrilege to bring your brother's lost soul back to God, and
call him to repentance for his sins, by forcing him to send away the
woman who causes the scandal (with a proper provision, of course), and
showing him how to set his conscience at rest by giving a few thousand
francs a year to the seminary of the archbishop and leaving his property
to the rightful heirs."

Th