ghing; I felt inclined
to roll on the ground with amusement.

In about a minute I managed to say, indignantly: "And you received him,
uncle, you? You, a Freethinker, a Freemason? You did not have him thrown
out-of-doors?"

He seemed confused, and stammered:

"Listen a moment, it is so astonishing--so astonishing and providential!
He also spoke to me about my father; it seems he knew him formerly."

"Your father, uncle? But that is no reason for receiving a Jesuit."

"I know that, but I was very ill, and he looked after me most devotedly
all night long. He was perfect; no doubt he saved my life; those men are
all a little bit of a doctor."

"Oh! he looked after you all night? But you said just now that he had
only been gone a very short time."

"That is quite true; I kept him to breakfast after all his kindness. He
had it at a table by my bedside while I drank a cup of tea."

"And he ate meat?"

My uncle looked vexed, as if I had said something very much out of
place, and then added:

"Don't joke, Gaston; such things are out of place at times. He has shown
me more devotion than many a relation would have done, and I expect to
have his convictions respected."

This rather upset me, but I answered, nevertheless: "Very well, uncle;
and what did you do after breakfast?"

"We played a game of bezique, and then he repeated his breviary while I
read a little book which he happened to have in his pocket, and which
was not by any means badly written."

"A religious book, uncle?"

"Yes, and no, or rather--no. It is the history of their missions in
Central Africa, and is rather a book of travels and adventures. What
these men have done is very grand."

I began to feel that matters were going badly, so I got up. "Well,
good-bye, uncle," I said, "I see you are going to leave Freemasonry for
religion; you are a renegade."

He was still rather confused, and stammered:

"Well, but religion is a sort of Freemasonry."

"When is your Jesuit coming back?" I asked.

"I don't--I don't know exactly; to-morrow, perhaps; but it is not
certain."

I went out, altogether overwhelmed.

My joke turned out very badly for me! My uncle became radically
converted, and if that had been all I should not have cared so much.
Clerical or Freemason, to me it is all the same; six of one and
half-a-dozen of the other; but the worst of it is that he has just made
his will--yes, made his will--and he has disinherited me in favor of
tha