will soon begin their removal of what it considers to be dearest."

"I sympathize with them and you," Chrysler said.

"Ecclesiasticism ruins us!" exclaimed Quinet the Radical, who was with
them:

"Quiconque me resiste et me brave est impie
Ce qu'ici-bas j'ecris, la-haut Dieu la copie."

"You should moderate your animosity," Chamilly said. "These Jesuits are
most certainly humble, self-devoted men?"

"I detest them as machines, not as men!" retorted the Radical.

CHAPTER XIX.

HUMAN NATURE.

"Va ...
A monsieur le Cure
Lui dire que sa paroisse
Est tout bouleversee."

--POPULAR BALLAD.

Cure L'Archeveque, black skull-cap on head, was in the best of humour,
playing with his little dog in the ample reception-room of the
parsonage, when a laborer came and brought an account of several late
doings in the village.

When Messire heard what had been said at Zotique's, his rotund black
stole writhed as if founts of lava boiled in him; his face swelled to
the likeness of a fiery planet; indignation choked his speech for four
minutes by the face of the tall clock in his sitting-room; and then the
lava rose to the surface in jets:

"Gang of accurseds!"

"Atheists!"

"Freemasons!"

He turned for a moment to the laborer again who had come to inform him.
Then he exploded successively as before:

"They laughed?"

"They laughed!"

"I will make them laugh!"

The young cure, his vicar, who was present, tried to calm him, but could
not.

His energies turned to action; he dismissed the parishioner, who, hat
in hand, stood humbly by the door, and sitting down began to write
letters and concoct vows.

The first of the latter was to announce a spiritual boycott from the
pulpit on Zotique and his iniquitous hall; and with this he wrote to the
Attorney-General on the scandal of the gross misuse of the Circuit Court
and the bad character of the local Registrar.

The second bitter vow was that the Liberals should lose their election:
this inspired a letter to Grandmoulin, the "Cave" Chief.

There were other vows and other letters; one each to the Bishop and the
Archbishop,--whose contents are unknown.

At similar times, however, the Reverend gentleman had a recreation to
which he was accustomed to turn for refreshment, and this was not long
in rising in his mind. By law he was Visitor to the secular school: than
which there was nothing he considered more nearly the root of all evil.
H