ith horrors served
up to them of late in cold blood, he might reveal the calm atrocities,
the surpassing tragedies concealed under family life. But he chooses
in preference gentler events,--those where scenes of purity succeed the
tempests of passion; where woman is radiant with virtue and beauty. To
the honor of the _Thirteen_ be it said that there are such scenes in
their history, which may have the honor of being some day published as
a foil of tales to listeners,--that race apart from others, so curiously
energetic, and so interesting in spite of its crimes.

An author ought to be above converting his tale, when the tale is true,
into a species of surprise-game, and of taking his readers, as certain
novellists do, through many volumes and from cellar to cellar, to show
them the dry bones of a dead body, and tell them, by way of conclusion,
that _that_ is what has frightened them behind doors, hidden in the
arras, or in cellars where the dead man was buried and forgotten. In
spite of his aversion for prefaces, the author feels bound to place the
following statement at the head of this narrative. Ferragus is a
first episode which clings by invisible links to the "History of the
_Thirteen_," whose power, naturally acquired, can alone explain certain
acts and agencies which would otherwise seem supernatural. Although it
is permissible in tellers of tales to have a sort of literary coquetry
in becoming historians, they ought to renounce the benefit that may
accrue from an odd or fantastic title--on which certain slight successes
have been won in the present day. Consequently, the author will now
explain, succinctly, the reasons that obliged him to select a title to
his book which seems at first sight unnatural.

_Ferragus_ is, according to ancient custom, a name taken by the chief or
Grand Master of the Devorants. On the day of their election these chiefs
continue whichever of the dynasties of their Order they are most
in sympathy with, precisely as the Popes do, on their accession, in
connection with pontifical dynasties. Thus the Devorants have "Trempe-la
Soupe IX.," "Ferragus XXII.," "Tutanus XIII.," "Masche-Fer IV.," just
as the Church has Clement XIV., Gregory VII., Julius II., Alexander VI.,
etc.

Now, then, who are the Devorants? "Devorant" is the name of one of
those tribes of "Companions" that issued in ancient times from the great
mystical association formed among the workers of Christianity to rebuild
the t