f
St. Orberosia, which had for five hundred years been exposed to the
veneration of the faithful in the Church of St. Mael, was transported
into the town-hall and submitted to the examination of a jury of experts
appointed by the municipality. It was made of gilded copper in shape
like the nave of a church, entirely covered with enamels and decorated
with precious stones, which latter were perceived to be false. The
chapter in its foresight had removed the rubies, sapphires, emeralds,
and great balls of rock-crystal, and had substituted pieces of glass in
their place. It contained only a little dust and a piece of old linen,
which were thrown into a great fire that had been lighted on the Place
de Greve to burn the relics of the saints. The people danced around it
singing patriotic songs.

From the threshold of their booth, which leant against the town-hall,
a man called Rouquin and his wife were watching this group of madmen.
Rouquin clipped dogs and gelded cats; he also frequented the inns. His
wife was a ragpicker and a bawd, but she had plenty of shrewdness.

"You see, Rouquin," said she to her man, "they are committing a
sacrilege. They will repent of it."

"You know nothing about it, wife," answered Rouquin; "they, have become
philosophers, and when one is once a philosopher he is a philosopher for
ever."

"I tell you, Rouquin, that sooner or later they will regret what they
are doing to-day. They ill-treat the saints because they have not helped
them enough, but for all that the quails won't fall ready cooked into
their mouths. They will soon find themselves as badly off as before, and
when they have put out their tongues for enough they will become pious
again. Sooner than people think the day will come when Penguinia will
again begin to honour her blessed patron. Rouquin, it would be a good
thing, in readiness for that day, if we kept a handful of ashes and some
rags and bones in an old pot in our lodgings. We will say that they are
the relics of St. Orberosia and that we have saved them from the flames
at the peril of our lives. I am greatly mistaken if we don't get honour
and profit out of them. That good action might be worth a place from the
Cure to sell tapers and hire chairs in the chapel of St. Orberosia."

On that same day Mother Rouquin took home with her a little ashes and
some bones, and put them in an old jam-pot in her cupboard.

II. TRINCO

The sovereign Nation had taken possession o