tic with a puree of turnips sweetened with caper
sauce.

Des Hermies bowed under a storm of compliments. Carhaix filled the
glasses, and, somewhat confused in the presence of Gevingey, paid the
astrologer effusive attention to make him forget their former
ill-feeling. Des Hermies assisted in this good work, and wishing also to
be useful to Durtal, brought the conversation around to the subject of
horoscopes.

Then Gevingey mounted the rostrum. In a tone of satisfaction he spoke of
his vast labours, of the six months a horoscope required, of the
surprise of laymen when he declared that such work was not paid for by
the price he asked, five hundred francs.

"But you see I cannot give my science for nothing," he said. "And now
people doubt astrology, which was revered in antiquity. Also in the
Middle Ages, when it was almost sacred. For instance, messieurs, look at
the portal of Notre Dame. The three doors which archeologists--not
initiated into the symbolism of Christianity and the occult--designate
by the names of the door of Judgment, the door of the Virgin, and the
door of Saint Marcel or Saint Anne, really represent Mysticism,
Astrology, and Alchemy, the three great sciences of the Middle Ages.
Today you find people who say, 'Are you quite sure that the stars have
an influence on the destiny of man?' But, messieurs, without entering
here into details reserved for the adept, in what way is this spiritual
influence stranger than that corporal influence which certain planets,
the moon, for example, exercise on the organs of men and women?

"You are a physician, Monsieur Des Hermies, and you are not unaware that
the doctors Gillespin, Jackson, and Balfour, of Jamaica, have
established the influence of the constellations on human health in the
West Indies. At every change of the moon the number of sick people
augments. The acute crises of fever coincide with the phases of our
satellite. Finally, there are _lunatics_. Go out in the country and
ascertain at what periods madness becomes epidemic. But does this serve
to convince the incredulous?" he asked sorrowfully, contemplating his
rings.

"It seems to me, on the contrary, that astrology is picking up," said
Durtal. "There are now two astrologers casting horoscopes in the next
column to the secret remedies on the fourth page of the newspapers."

"And it's a shame! Those people don't even know the first thing about
the science. They are simply tricksters who hope thu