. The table-cloth was soiled, and the conversation was not of the
purest; and very often the conduct of the mistress of the house was
commented upon, in words to be sure that were slightly veiled, so as not
to frighten the child. This evening there was a grand discussion as to
the refusal of the Fathers to receive the boy. The coachman declared
that it was all for the best,--that the priests would have made of the
child "a hypocrite and a Jesuit."

Constant protested against these words. She was not a professor of
religion, she said, but she would not hear it spoken ill of. Then the
discussion changed to the great disappointment of Jack, who listened
with all his little ears, hoping to hear why this priest, who appeared
so good, was not willing to receive him.

But for the moment Jack was of little consequence; each was absorbed in
narrating his or her religious convictions.

The coachman, who had been drinking, said that his God was the sun; in
fact, he, like the elephants, adored the sun! Suddenly some one asked
how he knew that elephants adored the sun.

"I saw it once in a photograph," said he, sternly. Upon which
Mademoiselle Constant vehemently accused him of impiety and atheism;
while the cook, a stout Picardian with true peasant shrewdness, told
them to be quiet.

"Hush!" she said; "you should never quarrel over your religions."

And Jack--what was he doing all this time?

At the end of the table, stupefied by the heat and the interminable
discussions of these brutes, he slept, with his head on his arms, and
his fair curls spread over his velvet sleeves. In his unrestful slumber
he heard the hum of the servants' voices, and at last he fancied that
they were talking of him; but the voices seemed to reach from afar
off--through a fog, as it were.

"Who is he, then?" asked the cook.

"I don't know," answered Constant; "but one thing is certain, he can't
remain here, and she wishes me to find a school for him."

Between a yawn and a hiccough, the coachman spoke,--

"I know a capital school, and one that will, just answer your purpose.
It is called the Moronval College--no, not college--but the Moronval
Academy. But what of that? it is a college all the same. I put my child
there once, when I was ordered off with the Egyptian army. The grocer
gave me the prospectus, and I think I have it still."

He looked in his portfolio, and from among the tumbled and soiled papers
he extracted one, dirtier even than