e to the Widow Martial, I presume; what fresh act of daring
has she committed?"

"You shall hear. She had requested permission to share her daughter's
cell until the final moment arrived; her wish was complied with. Her
daughter, far less hardened than her parent, appeared to feel contrition
as the hour of execution approached, while the diabolical assurance of
the old woman seemed, if possible, to augment. Just now the venerable
chaplain of the prison entered their dungeon to offer to them the
consolations of religion. The daughter was about to accept them, when
the mother, without for one instant losing her coolness or frigid
self-possession, began to assail the chaplain with such insulting and
derisive language that the venerable priest was compelled to quit the
cell, after trying in vain to induce the violent and unmanageable woman
to listen to one word he said.

"It is a fearful fact connected with this family that a sort of
depravity seems to pervade it. The father was executed, a son is now in
the galleys, a second has only escaped a public and disgraceful end by
flight; while the eldest son and two young children have alone been able
to resist this atmosphere of moral contagion.

"What a singular circumstance connected with this double execution it is
that the day of mid-Lent should have been selected. At seven o'clock
to-morrow, the hour fixed, the streets will be filled with groups of
masqueraders, who, having passed the night at the different balls and
places of entertainment beyond the barriers, will be just returning
home; added to which, at the place of execution, the Barriere St.
Jacques, the noise of the revels still being kept up in honour of the
carnival can be distinctly heard."

* * * * *

The following morning's sun rose bright and cloudless. At four o'clock
in the morning various troops of soldiers surrounded the approaches to
Bicetre.

We shall now return to Calabash and her mother in their dungeon.

CHAPTER IX.

THE TOILET.

The condemned cell of Bicetre was situated at the end of a gloomy
passage, into which a trifling portion of light and air was admitted by
means of small gratings let into the lower part of the wall. The cell
itself would have been wholly dark but for a kind of wicket, let into
the upper part of the door, which opened into the corridor before
mentioned.

In this wretched dungeon, whose crumbling ceiling, damp, mouldy walls,