nguant,
Entraine Athenes,
Come un torrent!"

--JACQUES VIORR--LE JARGON DU BEL-ESPRIT.

The events to which all others were leading now began to happen.

The great nomination day,--Sunday--is here. Mass is over, the whole
parish, aye and crowds from far and near behind, surge all over the
square, where the Church looks down upon them in serenity and silence.

When Chrysler came up, the Cure and his vicar were sitting on their
gallery, and a man of strong frame stood upon the crier's rostrum
looking round with the assertive consciousness that he was a recognized
figure. His face wore a beard of strong but thin black wisps, which
would have been Vandyke in form had it been heavier, but allowed the
forcible outlines of his chin and cheek to be visible; and his locks,
imitated by many a follower throughout the Province, were worn like
Gainbetta's in a long and swelling black mass behind. His countenance,
evidently from long experience, was so controlled that no trace of
natural expression could be discerned upon it beyond an appearance of
caution and diplomacy; but whatever its specific character, it bore
without gainsay the stamp of power.

The man was Grandmoulin.

After looking this way and that way for several moments allowing the
assemblage to hush, he began in a quiet tone.

"My friends!"

He paused deliberately some moments to permit the people's curiosity to
concentrate upon him.

"My brothers!"

This with a rising, powerful voice.--Then higher:

"French--Canadians!!" separating the two words.

The audience strained with attention to hear him. What he had to say
next became a matter of suspense.

Then with inflection of passionate enthusiasm:

"Canadian FRENCHMEN!!!" he cried, hurling out all his force. And the
people could no longer restrain themselves; the rhetorical artifice took
them by storm, and they shouted and cheered with one loud, far-echoing,
unanimous voice.

Grandmoulin kept his attitude erect and immovable.

"My friends," he proceeded, when the applause began to subside, "I
address you as heritors and representatives of a glorious national
title. To wear it--to be called 'Frenchman' is to stand in the ranks of
the nobility of the human race. I address you as a generous, a great, a
devoted people, a people brave of heart and unequalled in intellectual
ability, a people proud of themselves, their deeds and the deeds of
their fathers in New France and in the fair France