way, when the service was over, before the priests. Through a
large fissure of the rock that hid her, she saw the Abbe Gudin mounting
a block of granite which served him as a pulpit, where he began his
sermon with the words,--

"_In nomine Patris et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti_."

All present made the sign of the cross.

"My dear friends," continued the abbe, "let us pray in the first place
for the souls of the dead,--Jean Cochegrue, Nicalos Laferte, Joseph
Brouet, Francois Parquoi, Sulpice Coupiau, all of this parish, and dead
of wounds received in the fight on Mont Pelerine and at the siege of
Fougeres. _De profundis_," etc.

The psalm was recited, according to custom, by the congregation and the
priests, taking verses alternately with a fervor which augured well for
the success of the sermon. When it was over the abbe continued, in a
voice which became gradually louder and louder, for the former Jesuit
was not unaware that vehemence of delivery was in itself a powerful
argument with which to persuade his semi-savage hearers.

"These defenders of our God, Christians, have set you an example of
duty," he said. "Are you not ashamed of what will be said of you in
paradise? If it were not for these blessed ones, who have just been
received with open arms by all the saints, our Lord might have thought
that your parish is inhabited by Mahometans!--Do you know, men, what
is said of you in Brittany and in the king's presence? What! you don't
know? Then I shall tell you. They say: 'Behold, the Blues have cast down
altars, and killed priests, and murdered the king and queen; they mean
to make the parish folk of Brittany Blues like themselves, and send them
to fight in foreign lands, away from their churches, where they run the
risk of dying without confession and going eternally to hell; and yet
the gars of Marignay, whose churches they have burned, stand still with
folded arms! Oh! oh! this Republic of damned souls has sold the property
of God and that of the nobles at auction; it has shared the proceeds
with the Blues; it has decreed, in order to gorge itself with money
as it does with blood, that a crown shall be only worth three francs
instead of six; and yet the gars of Marignay haven't seized their
weapons and driven the Blues from Brittany! Ha! paradise will be closed
to them! they can never save their souls!' That's what they say of you
in the king's presence! It is your own salvation, Christians, which is
at stake.