Penguin Island .....................................................................................................................................................1

Anatole France .........................................................................................................................................1

Mael, a scion of a royal family of Cambria, was sent in his ninth year to the Abbey of Yvern so that he might

there study both sacred and profane learning. At the age of fourteen he renounced his patrimony and took a

vow to serve the Lord. His time was divided, according to the rule, between the singing of hymns, the study

A celestial perfume soon disclosed the virtues of the monk throughout the cloister, and when the blessed Gal,

the Abbot of Yvern, departed from this world into the next, young Mael succeeded him in the government of

the monastery. He established therein a school, an infirmary, a guesthouse, a forge, workshops of all kinds,

and sheds for building ships, and he compelled the monks to till the lands in the neighbourhood. With his

own hands he cultivated the garden of the Abbey, he worked in metals, he instructed the novices, and his life

was gently gliding along like a stream that reflects the heaven and fertilizes the fields.

At the close of the day this servant of God was accustomed to seat himself on the cliff, in the place that is

today still called St. Mael's chair. At his feet the rocks bristling with green seaweed and tawny wrack

seemed like black dragons as they faced the foam of the waves with their monstrous breasts. He watched the

sun descending into the ocean like a red Host whose glorious blood gave a purple tone to the clouds and to

the summits of the waves. And the holy man saw in this the image of the mystery of the Cross, by which the

divine blood has clothed the earth with a royal purple. In the offing a line of dark blue marked the shores of

the island of Gad, where St. Bridget, who had been given the veil by St. Malo, ruled over a convent of

Now Bridget, knowing the merits of the venerable Mael, begged from him some work of his hands as a rich

present. Mael cast a handbell of bronze for her and, when it was finished, he blessed it and threw it into the

sea. And the bell went ringing towards the coast of Gad, where St. Bridget, warned by the sound of the bell

upon the waves, received it piously, and carried it in solemn procession with singing of psalms into the

Thus the holy Mael advanced from virtue to virtue. He had already passed through twothirds of the way of

life, and he hoped peacefully to reach his terrestrial end in the midst of his spiritual brethren, when he knew

by a certain sign that the Divine wisdom had decided otherwise, and that the Lord was calling him to less

One day as he walked in meditation to the furthest point of a tranquil beach, for which rocks jutting out into

the sea formed a rugged dam, he saw a trough of stone which floated like a boat upon the waters.

It was in a vessel similar to this that St. Guirec, the great St. Columba, and so many holy men from Scotland

and from Ireland had gone forth to evangelize Armorica. More recently still, St. Avoye having come from

England, ascended the river Auray in a mortar made of rosecoloured granite into which children were

afterwards placed in order to make them strong; St. Vouga passed from Hibernia to Cornwall on a rock

whose fragments, preserved at Penmarch, will cure of fever such pilgrims as place these splinters on their

heads. St. Samson entered the Bay of St. Michael's Mount in a granite vessel which will one day be called St.

Samson's basin. It is because of these facts that when he saw the stone trough the holy Mael understood that

the Lord intended him for the apostolate of the pagans who still peopled the coast and the Breton islands.

He handed his ashen staff to the holy Budoc, thus investing him with the government of the monastery. Then,

furnished with bread, a barrel of fresh water, and the book of the Holy Gospels, he entered the stone trough

This island is perpetually buffeted by the winds. In it some poor men fished among the clefts of the rocks and

labouriously cultivated vegetables in gardens full of sand and pebbles that were sheltered from the wind by

walls of barren stone and hedges of tamarisk. A beautiful figtree raised itself in a hollow of the island and

thrust forth its branches far and wide. The inhabitants of the island used to worship it.

And the holy Mael said to them: "You worship this tree because it is beautiful. Therefore you are capable of

feeling beauty. Now I come to reveal to you the hidden beauty." And he taught them the Gospel. And after

The islands of Morbihan were more numerous in those times than they are today. For since then many have

been swallowed up by the sea. St. Mael evangelized sixty of them. Then in his granite trough he ascended the

river Auray. And after sailing for three hours he landed before a Roman house. A thin column of smoke went

up from the roof. The holy man crossed the threshold on which there was a mosaic representing a dog with its

hind legs outstretched and its lips drawn back. He was welcomed by an old couple, Marcus Combabus and

Valeria Moerens, who lived there on the products of their lands. There was a portico round the interior court

the columns of which were painted red, half their height upwards from the base. A fountain made of shells

stood against the wall and under the portico there rose an altar with a niche in which the master of the house

had placed some little idols made of baked earth and whitened with whitewash. Some represented winged

children, others Apollo or Mercury, and several were in the form of a naked woman twisting her hair. But the

holy Mael, observing those figures, discovered among them the image of a young mother holding a child

"That is the Virgin, the mother of God. The poet Virgil foretold her in Sibylline verses before she was born

and, in angelical tones he sang Jam redit et virgo. Throughout heathendom prophetic figures of her have been

made, like that which you, O Marcus, have placed upon this altar. And without doubt it is she who has

protected your modest household. Thus it is that those who faithfully observe the natural law prepare

Marcus Combabus and Valeria Moerens, having been instructed by this speech, were converted to the

Christian faith. They received baptism together with their young freedwoman, Caelia Avitella, who was

dearer to them than the light of their eyes. All their tenants renounced paganism and were baptized on the

Marcus Combabus, Valeria Moerens, and Caelia Avitella led thenceforth a life full of merit. They died in the

For thirtyseven years longer the blessed Mael evangelized the pagans of the inner lands. He built two

Now on a certain day in the city of Vannes, when he was preaching the Gospel, he learned that the monks of

Yvern had in his absence declined from the rule of St. Gal. Immediately, with the zeal of a hen who gathers

her brood, he repaired to his erring children. He was then towards the end of his ninetyseventh year; his

figure was bent, but his arms were still strong, and his speech was poured forth abundantly like winter snow

Abbot Budoc restored the ashen staff to St. Mael and informed him of the unhappy state into which the

Abbey had fallen. The monks were in disagreement as to the date an which the festival of Easter ought to be

celebrated. Some held for the Roman calendar, others for the Greek calendar, and the horrors of a

There also prevailed another cause of disorder. The nuns of the island of Gad, sadly fallen from their former

virtue, continually came in boats to the coast of Yvern. The monks received them in the guesthouse and from

"Since the coming of these nuns the innocence and peace of the monks are at an end."

"I readily believe it," answered the blessed Mael. "For woman is a cleverly constructed snare by which we are

taken even before we suspect the trap. Alas! the delightful attraction of these creatures is exerted with even

greater force from a distance than when they are close at hand. The less they satisfy desire the more they

Thus we see, my son, that the blandishments of carnal love have more power over hermits and monks than

over men who live in the world. All through my life the demon of lust has tempted me in various ways, but

his strongest temptations did not come to me from meeting a woman, however beautiful and fragrant she was.

They came to me from the image of an absent woman. Even now, though full of days and approaching my

ninetyeighth year, I am often led by the Enemy to sin against chastity, at least in thought. At night when I

am cold in my bed and my frozen old bones rattle together with a dull sound I hear voices reciting the second

verse of the third Book of the Kings: 'Wherefore his servants said unto him, Let there be sought for my lord

the king a young virgin: and let her stand before the king, and let her cherish him, and let her lie in thy

bosom, that my lord the king may get heat,' and the devil shows me a girl in the bloom of youth who says to

me: 'I am thy Abishag; I am thy Shunamite. Make, O my lord, room for me in thy couch.'

"Believe me," added the old man, "it is only by the special aid of Heaven that a monk can keep his chastity in

Applying himself immediately to restore innocence and peace to the monastery, he corrected the calendar

according to the calculations of chronology and astronomy and he compelled all the monks to accept his

decision; he sent the women who had declined from St. Bridget's rule back to their convent; but far from

driving them away brutally, he caused them to be led to their boat with singing of psalms and litanies.

"Let us respect in them," he said, "the daughters of Bridget and the betrothed of the Lord. Let us beware lest

we imitate the Pharisees who affect to despise sinners. The sin of these women and not their persons should

be abased, and they should be made ashamed of what they have done and not of what they are, for they are all

"When it does not yield to the rudder," said he to them, "the ship yields to the rock."

The blessed Mael had scarcely restored order in the Abbey of Yvern before he learned that the inhabitants of

the island of Hoedic, his first catechumens and the dearest of all to his heart, had returned to paganism, and

that they were hanging crowns of flowers and fillets of wool to the branches of the sacred figtree.

The boatman who brought this sad news expressed a fear that soon those misguided men might violently

The holy man resolved forthwith to visit his faithless children, so that he might lead them back to the faith

and prevent them from yielding to such sacrilege. As he went down to the bay where his stone trough was

moored, he turned his eyes to the sheds, then filled with the noise of saws and of hammers, which, thirty

years before, he had erected on the fringe of that bay for the purpose of building ships.

At that moment, the Devil, who never tires, went out from the sheds and, under the appearance of a monk

"Father, the inhabitants of the island of Hoedic commit sins unceasingly. Every moment that passes removes

them farther from God. They are soon going to use violence towards the chapel that you have raised with

your own venerable hands on the shore of their island. Time is pressing. Do you not think that your stone

trough would carry you more quickly towards them if it were rigged like a boat and furnished with a rudder, a

mast, and a sail, for then you would be driven by the wind? Your arms are still strong and able to steer a

small craft. It would be a good thing, too, to put a sharp stem in front of your apostolic trough. You are much

"Truly time is pressing," answered the holy man. "But to do as you say, Samson, my son, would it not be to

make myself like those men of little faith who do not trust the Lord? Would it not be to despise the gifts of

"Father, is it praiseworthy to wait, with our arms folded, until help comes from on high, and to ask everything

from Him who can do all things, instead of acting by human prudence and helping ourselves?

"It certainly is not," answered the holy Mael, "and to neglect to act by human prudence is tempting God."

"What do you know about it? It goes like Abbot Budoc's mule. It is a regular old tub. Are you forbidden to

"My son, clearness adorns your words, but they are unduly overconfident. Remember that this vessel is

"It is, father. A granite trough that floats on the water like a cork is a miraculous trough. There is not the

"I am greatly perplexed. Is it right to perfect so miraculous a machine by human and natural means?"

"Father, if you lost your right foot and God restored it to you, would not that foot be miraculous?"

"Well, then, if you believe that one may cover a miraculous foot with a natural shoe, you should also believe

that we can put natural rigging on a miraculous boat. That is clear. Alas! Why must the holiest persons have

their moments of weakness and despondency? The most illustrious of the apostles of Brittany could

accomplish works worthy of eternal glory . . . But his spirit is tardy and his hand is slothful. Farewell then,

father! Travel by short and slow stages and when at last you approach the coast of Hoedic you will see the

smoking ruins of the chapel that was built and consecrated by your own hands. The pagans will have burned

it and with it the deacon you left there. He will be as thoroughly roasted as a black pudding."

"My trouble is extreme," said the servant of God, drying with his sleeve the sweat that gathered upon his

brow. "But tell me, Samson, my son, would not rigging this stone trough be a difficult piece of work? And if

"Ah! father," exclaimed the Devil, "in one turning of the hourglass the thing would be done. We shall find

the necessary rigging in this shed that you have formerly built here on the coast and in those storehouses

abundantly stocked through your care. I will myself regulate all the ship's fittings. Before being a monk I was

a sailor and a carpenter and I have worked at many other trades as well. Let us to work."

Immediately he drew the holy man into an outhouse filled with all things needful for fitting out a boat.

Then, himself bearing a stem and a rudder with its screw and tiller, and seizing a carpenter's bag full of tools,

he ran to the shore, dragging the holy man after him by his habit. The latter was bent, sweating, and

The Devil, having tucked his clothes up to his armpits, dragged the trough on the sand, and fitted the rigging

As soon as the holy Mael had embarked, the vessel, with all its sails set, cleft through the waters with such

speed that the coast was almost immediately out of sight. The old man steered to the south so as to double the

Land's End, but an irresistible current carried him to the southwest. He went along the southern coast of

Ireland and turned sharply towards the north. In the evening the wind freshened. In vain did Mael attempt to

By the light of the moon the immodest sirens of the North came around him with their hempencoloured

hair, raising their white throats and their rosetinted limbs out of the sea; and beating the water into foam

Whither go'st thou, gentle Mael, In thy trough distracted? All distended is thy sail Like the breast of Juno

For a moment their harmonious laughter followed him beneath the stars, but the vessel fled on, a hundred

times more swiftly than the red ship of a Viking. And the petrels, surprised in their flight, clung with their

Soon a tempest arose full of darkness and groanings, and the trough, driven by a furious wind, flew like a

After a night of three times twentyfour hours the darkness was suddenly rent and the holy man discovered

on the horizon a shore more dazzling than diamond. The coast rapidly grew larger, and soon by the glacial

light of a torpid and sunken sun, Mael saw, rising above the waves, the silent streets of a white city, which,

vaster than Thebes with its hundred gates, extended as far as the eye could see the ruins of its forum built of

The ocean was covered with floating icebergs around which swam men of the sea of a wild yet gentle

Moreover, on a block of ice which floated at the same rate as the stone trough there was seated a white bear

holding her little one in her arms, and Mael heard her murmuring in a low voice this verse of Virgil, Incipe

The fresh water had frozen and burst the barrel that contained it. And Mael was sucking pieces of ice to

quench his thirst, and his food was bread dipped in dirty water. His beard and his hair were broken like glass.

His habit was covered with a layer of ice and cut into him at every movement of his limbs. Huge waves rose

up and opened their foaming jaws at the old man. Twenty times the boat was filled by masses of sea. And the

ocean swallowed up the book of the Holy Gospels which the apostle guarded with extreme care in a purple

Now on the thirtieth day the sea calmed. And lo! with a frightful clamour of sky and waters a mountain of

dazzling whiteness advanced towards the stone vessel. Mael steered to avoid it, but the tiller broke in his

hands. To lessen the speed of his progress towards the rock he attempted to reef the sails, but when he tried to

knot the reefpoints the wind pulled them away from him and the rope seared his hands. He saw three

demons with wings of black skin having hooks at their ends, who, hanging from the rigging, were puffing

Understanding from this sight that the Enemy had governed him in all these things, he guarded himself by

making the sign of the Cross. Immediately a furious gust of wind filled with the noise of sobs and howls

struck the stone trough, carried off the mast with all the sails, and tore away the rudder and the stem.

The trough was drifting on the sea, which had now grown calm. The holy man knelt and gave thanks to the

Lord who had delivered him from the snares of the demon. Then he recognised, sitting on a block of ice, the

mother bear who had spoken during the storm. She pressed her beloved child to her bosom, and in her hand

she held a purple book marked with a golden cross. Hailing the granite trough, she saluted the holy man with

The holy man recognised his evangelistary, and, full of astonishment, he sang in the tepid air a hymn to the

After having drifted for an hour the holy man approached a narrow strand, shut in by steep mountains. He

went along the coast for a whole day and a night, passing around the reef which formed an insuperable

barrier. He discovered in this way that it was a round island in the middle of which rose a mountain crowned

with clouds. He joyfully breathed the fresh breath of the moist air. Rain fell, and this rain was so pleasant that

The strand was deserted. Worn out with fatigue and hunger, he sat down on a rock in the hollow of which

there lay some yellow eggs, marked with black spots, and about as large as those of a swan. But he did not

"Birds are the living praises of God. I should not like a single one of these praises to be lacking through me."

The holy man had gone almost entirely round the island without meeting any inhabitants, when he came to a

vast amphitheatre formed of black and red rocks whose summits became tinged with blue as they rose

The reflection from the polar ice had hurt the old man's eyes, but a feeble gleam of light still shone through

his swollen eyelids. He distinguished animated forms which filled the rocks, in stages, like a crowd of men

on the tiers of an amphitheatre. And at the same time, his ears, deafened by the continual noises of the sea,

heard a feeble sound of voices. Thinking that what he saw were men living under the natural law, and that the

"Inhabitants of this island," said he, "although you be of small stature, you look less like a band of fishermen

and mariners than like the senate of a judicious republic. By your gravity, your silence, your tranquil

deportment, you form on this wild rock an assembly comparable to the Conscript Fathers at Rome

deliberating in the temple of Victory, or rather, to the philosophers of Athens disputing on the benches of the

Areopagus. Doubtless you possess neither their science nor their genius, but perhaps in the sight of God you

are their superiors. I believe that you are simple and good. As I went round your island I saw no image of

murder, no sign of carnage, no enemies' heads or scalps hung from a lofty pole or nailed to the doors of your

villages. You appear to me to have no arts and not to work in metals. But your hearts are pure and your hands

Now what he had taken for men of small stature but of grave bearing were penguins whom the spring had

gathered together, and who were ranged in couples on the natural steps of the rock, erect in the majesty of

their large white bellies. From moment to moment they moved their winglets like arms, and uttered peaceful

cries. They did not fear men, for they did not know them, and had never received any harm from them; and

there was in the monk a certain gentleness that reassured the most timid animals and that pleased these

penguins extremely. With a friendly curiosity they turned towards him their little round eyes lengthened in

front by a white oval spot that gave something odd and human to their appearance.

"Inhabitants of this island, the earthly day that has just risen over your rocks is the image of the heavenly day

that rises in your souls. For I bring you the inner light; I bring you the light and heat of the soul. Just as the

sun melts the ice of your mountains so Jesus Christ will melt the ice of your hearts."

Thus the old man spoke. As everywhere throughout nature voice calls to voice, as all which breathes in the

light of day loves alternate strains, these penguins answered the old man by the sounds of their throats. And

The holy man, persuaded that they belonged to some idolatrous people and that in their own language they

"I think," said he to them, "that you bathe often, for all the hollows of the rocks are full of pure water, and as I

came to your assembly I saw several of you plunging into these natural baths. Now purity of body is the

"Baptism," said he to them, "is Adoption, New Birth, Regeneration, Illumination."

Then, having previously blessed the water that fell from the cascades and recited the exorcisms, he baptized

those whom he had just taught, pouring on each of their heads a drop of pure water and pronouncing the

When the baptism of the penguins was known in Paradise, it caused neither joy nor sorrow, but an extreme

surprise. The Lord himself was embarrassed. He gathered an assembly of clerics and doctors, and asked them

"Why is it void?" asked St. Gal, who had evangelized the people of Cornwall and had trained the holy Mael

"The sacrament of baptism," answered St. Patrick, "is void when it is given to birds, just as the sacrament of

"What relation do you claim to establish between the baptism of a bird and the marriage of a eunuch? There

is none at all. Marriage is, if I may say so, a conditional, a contingent sacrament. The priest blesses an event

beforehand; it is evident that if the act is not consummated the benediction remains without effect. That is

obvious. I have known on earth, in the town of Antrim, a rich man named Sadoc, who, living in concubinage

with a woman, caused her to be the mother of nine children. In his old age, yielding to my reproofs, he

consented to marry her, and I blessed their union. Unfortunately Sadoc's great age prevented him from

consummating the marriage. A short time afterwards he lost all his property, and Germaine (that was the

name of the woman), not feeling herself able to endure poverty, asked for the annulment of a marriage which

was no reality. The Pope granted her request, for it was just. So much for marriage. But baptism is conferred

without restrictions or reserves of any kind. There is no doubt about it, what the penguins have received is a

"In order to know if a baptism is valid and will produce its result, that is to say, sanctification, it is necessary

to consider who gives it and not who receives it. In truth, the sanctifying virtue of this sacrament results from

the exterior act by which it is conferred, without the baptized person cooperating in his own sanctification by

any personal act; if it were otherwise it would not be administered to the newly born. And there is no need, in

order to baptize, to fulfil any special condition; it is not necessary to be in a state of grace; it is sufficient to

have the intention of doing what the Church does, to pronounce the consecrated words and to observe the

prescribed forms. Now we cannot doubt that the venerable Mael has observed these conditions. Therefore the

"Do you think so?" asked St. Guenole. "And what then do you believe that baptism really is? Baptism is the

process of regeneration by which man is born of water and of the spirit, for having entered the water covered

with crimes, he goes out of it a neophyte, a new creature, abounding in the fruits of righteousness; baptism is

the seed of immortality; baptism is the pledge of the resurrection; baptism is the burying with Christ in His

death and participation in His departure from the sepulchre. That is not a gift to bestow upon birds. Reverend

Fathers, let us consider. Baptism washes away original sin; now the penguins were not conceived in sin. It

removes the penalty of sin; now the penguins have not sinned. It produces grace and the gift of virtues,

uniting Christians to Jesus Christ, as the members to the body, and it is obvious to the senses that penguins

cannot acquire the virtues of confessors, of virgins, and of widows, or receive grace and be united to"

"That proves," said he warmly, "that the baptism was useless; it does not prove that it was not effective."

"But by this reasoning," said St. Guenole, "one might baptize in the name of the Father, of the Son, and of the

Holy Ghost, by aspersion or immersion, not only a bird or a quadruped, but also an inanimate object, a statue,

a table, a chair, etc. That animal would be Christian, that idol, that table would be Christian! It is absurd!"

"I am going," said the ardent bishop of Hippo, "to show you, by an example, the power of formulas. It deals,

it is true, with a diabolical operation. But if it be established that formulas taught by the Devil have effect

upon unintelligent animals or even on inanimate objects, how can we longer doubt that the effect of the

"This is the example. There was during my lifetime in the town of Madaura, the birthplace of the philosopher

Apuleius, a witch who was able to attract men to her chamber by burning a few of their hairs along with

certain herbs upon her tripod, pronouncing at the same time certain words. Now one day when she wished by

this means to gain the, love of a young man, she was deceived by her maid, and instead of the young man's

hairs, she burned some hairs pulled from a leather bottle, made out of a goatskin that hung in a tavern. During

the night the leather bottle, full of wine, capered through the town up to the witch's door. This fact is

undoubted. And in sacraments as in enchantments it is the form which operates. The effect of a divine

formula cannot be less in power and extent than the effect of an infernal formula."

One of the blessed, of an advanced age and having a melancholy appearance, asked permission to speak. No

one knew him. His name was Probus, and he was not enrolled in the canon of the saints.

"I beg the company's pardon," said he, "I have no halo, and I gained eternal blessedness without any eminent

distinction. But after what the great St. Augustine has just told you I believe it right to impart a cruel

experience, which I had, relative to the conditions necessary for the validity of a sacrament. The bishop of

Hippo is indeed right in what he said. A sacrament depends on the form; its virtue is in its form; its vice is in

its form. Listen, confessors and pontiffs, to my woeful story. I was a priest in Rome under the rule of the

Emperor Gordianus. Without desiring to recommend myself to you for any special merit, I may say that I

exercised my priesthood with piety and zeal. For forty years I served the church of St.

ModestusbeyondtheWalls. My habits were regular. Every Saturday I went to a tavernkeeper called

Barjas, who dwelt with his winejars under the Porta Capena, and from him I bought the wine that I

consecrated daily throughout the week. During that.long space of time I never failed for a single morning to

consecrate the holy sacrifice of the mass. However, I had no joy, and it was with a heart oppressed by sorrow

that, on the steps of the altar I used to ask, 'Why art thou so heavy, O my soul, and why art thou so disquieted

within me?' The faithful whom I invited to the holy table gave me cause for affliction, for having, so to speak,

the Host that I administered still upon their tongues, they fell again into sin just as if the sacrament had been

without power or efficacy. At last I reached the end of my earthly trials, and failing asleep in the Lord, I

awoke in this abode of the elect. I learned then from the mouth of the angel who brought me here, that Barjas,

the tavernkeeper of the Porta Capena, had sold for wine a decoction of roots and barks in which there was

not a single drop of the juice of the grape. I had been unable to transmute this vile brew into blood, for it was

not wine, and wine alone is changed into the blood of Jesus Christ. Therefore all my consecrations were

invalid, and unknown to us, my faithful and myself had for forty years been deprived of the sacrament and

were in fact in a state of excommunication. This revelation threw me into a stupor which overwhelms me

even today in this abode of bliss. I go all through Paradise without ever meeting a single one of those

Christians whom formerly I admitted to the holy table in the basilica of the blessed Modestus. Deprived of

the bread of angels, they easily gave way to the most abominable vices, and they have all gone to hell. It

gives me some satisfaction to think that Barjas, the tavernkeeper, is damned. There is in these things a logic

worthy of the author of all logic. Nevertheless my unhappy example proves that it is sometimes inconvenient

that form should prevail over essence in the sacraments, and I humbly ask, Could not, eternal wisdom remedy

"No," answered the Lord. "The remedy would be worse than the disease. It would be the ruin of the

"Alas! Lord," sighed the humble Probus. "Be persuaded by my humble experience; as long as you reduce

"I know that better than you do," replied the Lord. "I see in a single glance both the actual problems which

are difficult, and the future problems which will not be less difficult. Thus I can foretell that when the sun

"It is," resumed the Lord, "a manner of speaking in accordance with my old cosmogony and one which I

"After the sun, then, will have turned another two hundred and forty times round the earth, there will not be a

single cleric left in Rome who knows Latin. When they sing their litanies in the churches people will invoke

Orichel, Roguel, and Totichel, and, as you know, these are devils and not angels. Many robbers desiring to

make their communions, but fearing that before obtaining pardon they would be forced to give up the things

they had robbed to the Church, will make their confessions to travelling priests,who, ignorant of both Italian

and Latin, and only speaking the patois of their village, will go through cities and towns selling the remission

of sins for a base price, often for a bottle of wine. Probably we shall not be inconvenienced by those

absolutions as they will want contrition to make them valid, but it may be that their baptisms will cause us

some embarrassment. The priests will become so ignorant that they will baptize children in nomine patria et

filia et spirita sancta, as Louis de Potter will take a pleasure in relating in the third volume of his

'Philosophical, Political, and Critical History of Christianity.' It will be an arduous question to decide on the

validity of such baptisms; for even if in my sacred writings I tolerate a Greek less elegant than Plato's and a

scarcely Ciceronian Latin, I cannot possibly admit a piece of pure patois as a liturgical formula. And one

shudders when one thinks that millions of newborn babes will be baptized by this method. But let us return

"Your divine words, Lord, have already led us back to them," said St. Gal. "In the signs of religion and the

laws of salvation form necessarily prevails over essence, and the validity of a sacrament solely depends upon

its form. The whole question is whether the penguins have been baptized with the proper forms. Now there is

The fathers and the doctors agreed, and their perplexity became only the more cruel.

"The Christian state," said St. Cornelius, "is not without serious inconveniences for a penguin. In it the birds

are obliged to work out their own salvation. How can they succeed? The habits of birds are, in many points,

contrary to the commandments of the Church, and the penguins have no reason for changing theirs. I mean

that they are not intelligent enough to give up their present habits and assume better."

"Nevertheless," resumed St. Cornelius, "in virtue of their baptism their actions no longer remain indifferent.

"It is indeed," resumed St. Gal. "And I admit that my disciple, the holy Mael, has, in his blind zeal, created

great theological difficulties for the Holy Spirit and introduced disorder into the economy of mysteries."

"Allow me to speak," said he; "the holy Mael has not intuitive knowledge like you, my blessed ones. He does

not see me. He is an old man burdened by infirmities; he is half deaf and three parts blind. You are too severe

"Luckily it is but a passing disorder," said St. Irenaeus. "The penguins are baptized, but their eggs are not,

"Do not speak thus, Irenaeus my son," said the Lord. "There are exceptions to the laws that men of science

lay down on the earth because they are imperfect and have not an exact application to nature. But the laws

that I establish are perfect and suffer no exception. We must decide the fate of the baptized penguins without

violating any divine law, and in a manner conformable to the decalogue as well as to the commandments of

"Alas! Lord, what would they do with it," sighed Lactantius. "They have not tuneful voices to sing your

"They could not," continued St. Augustine. "And if, Lord, in your wisdom, you pour an immortal soul into

them, they will burn eternally in hell in virtue of your adorable decrees. Thus will the transcendent order, that

"You propose a correct solution to me, son of Monica," said the Lord, "and one that accords with my

wisdom. But it does not satisfy my mercy. And, although in my essence I am immutable, the longer I endure,

the more I incline to mildness. This change of character is evident to anyone who reads my two Testaments."

As the discussion continued without much light being thrown upon the matter and as the blessed showed a

disposition to keep repeating the same thing, it was decided to consult St. Catherine of Alexandria. This is

what was usually done in such cases. St. Catherine while on earth had confounded fifty very learned doctors.

She knew Plato's philosophy in addition to the Holy Scriptures, and she also possessed a knowledge of

St. Catherine entered the assembly, her head encircled by a crown of emeralds, sapphires, and pearls, and she

was clad in a robe of cloth of gold. She carried at her side a blazing wheel, the image of the one whose

"Lord, in order to solve the problem you deign to submit to me I shall not study the habits of animals in

general nor those of birds in particular. I shall only remark to the doctors, confessors, and pontiffs gathered in

this assembly that the separation between man and animal is not complete since there are monsters who

proceed from both. Such are chimerashalf nymphs and half serpents; such are the three Gorgons and the

Capripeds; such are the Scyllas and the Sirens who sing in the sea. These have a woman's breast and a fish's

tail. Such also are the Centaurs, men down to the waist and the remainder horses. They are a noble race of

monsters. One of them, as you know, was able, guided by the light of reason alone, to direct his steps towards

eternal blessedness, and you sometimes see his heroic bosom prancing on the clouds. Chiron, the Centaur,

deserved for his works on the earth to share the abode of the blessed; he it was who gave Achilles his

education; and that young hero, when he left the Centaur's hands, lived for two years, dressed as a young girl,

among the daughters of King Lycomedes. He shared their games and their bed without allowing any

suspicion to arise that he was not a young virgin like them. Chiron, who taught him such good morals, is,

with the Emperor Trajan, the only righteous man who obtained celestial glory by following the law of nature.

"I think I have proved by this example that, to reach eternal blessedness, it is enough to possess some parts of

humanity, always on the condition that they are noble. And what Chiron, the Centaur, could obtain without

having been regenerated by baptism, would not the penguins deserve too, if they became half penguins and

half men? That is why, Lord, I entreat you to give old Mael's penguins a human head and breast so that they

can praise you worthily. And grant them also an immortal soulbut one of small size."

Thus Catherine spoke, and the fathers, doctors, confessors, and pontiffs heard her with a murmur of

But St. Anthony, the Hermit, arose and stretching two red and knotty arms towards the Most High:

"Do not so, O Lord God," he cried, "in the name of your holy Paraclete, do not so!"

He spoke with such vehemence that his long white beard shook on his chin like the empty nosebag of a

"Lord, do not so. Birds with human heads exist already. St. Catherine has told us nothing new."

"The imagination groups and compares; it never creates," replied St. Catherine drily.

"They exist already," continued St. Antony, who would listen to nothing. "They are called harpies, and they

are the most obscene animals in creation. One day as I was having supper in the desert with the Abbot St.

Paul, I placed the table outside my cabin under an old sycamore tree. The harpies came and sat in its

branches; they deafened us with their shrill cries and cast their excrement over all our food. The clamour of

the monsters prevented me from listening to the teaching of the Abbot St. Paul, and we ate birds' dung with

our bread and lettuces. Lord, it is impossible to believe that harpies could give thee worthy praise.

"Truly in my temptations I have seen many hybrid beings, not only womenserpents and womenfishes, but

beings still more confusedly formed such as men whose bodies were made out of a pot, a bell, a clock, a

cupboard full of food and crockery, or even out of a house with doors and windows through which people

engaged in their domestic tasks could be seen. Eternity would not suffice were I to describe all the monsters

that assailed me in my solitude, from whales rigged like ships to a shower of red insects which changed the

water of my fountain into blood. But none were as disgusting as the harpies whose offal polluted the leaves of

"Harpies," observed Lactantius, "are female Monsters with birds' bodies. They have a woman's head and

breast. Their forwardness, their shamelessness, and their obscenity proceed from their female nature as the

"Let us not speak of the curse of Eve," said the Lord. "The second Eve has redeemed the first."

Paul Orosius, the author of a universal history that Bossuet was to imitate in later years, arose and prayed to

"Lord, hear my prayer and Anthony's. Do not make any more monsters like the Centaurs, Sirens, and Fauns,

whom the Greeks, those collectors of fables, loved. You will derive no satisfaction from them. Those species

of monsters have pagan inclinations and their double nature does not dispose them to purity of morals."

"He who has just spoken is assuredly the best historian in Paradise, for Herodotus, Thucydides, Polybius,

Livy, Velleius Paterculus, Cornelius Nepos, Suetonius, Manetho, Diodorus Siculus, Dion Cassius, and

Lampridius are deprived of the sight of God, and Tacitus suffers in hell the torments that are reserved for

blasphemers. But Paul Orosius does not know heaven as well as he knows the earth, for he does not seem to

bear in mind that the angels, who proceed from man and bird, are purity itself."

"We are wandering," said the Eternal. "What have we to do with all those centaurs, harpies, and angels? We

"You have spoken to the point, Lord," said the chief of the fifty doctors, who, during their mortal life had

been confounded by the Virgin of Alexandria, "and I dare express the opinion that, in order to put an end to

the scandal by which heaven is now stirred, old Mael's penguins should, as St. Catherine who confounded us

has proposed, be given half of a human body with an eternal soul proportioned to that half."

At this speech there arose in the assembly a great noise of private conversations and disputes of the doctors.

The Greek fathers argued with the Latins concerning the substance, nature, and dimensions of the soul that

"Confessors and pontiffs," exclaimed the Lord, "do not imitate the conclaves and synods of the earth. And do

not bring into the Church Triumphant those violences that trouble the Church Militant. For it is but too true

that in all the councils held under the inspiration of my spirit, in Europe, in Asia, and in Africa, fathers have

torn the beards and scratched the eyes of other fathers. Nevertheless they were infallible, for I was with

"I will praise you, Lord, for that you caused my mother, Saphira, to be born amidst your people, in the days

when the dew of heaven refreshed the earth which was in travail with its Saviour. And will praise you, Lord,

for having granted to me to see with my mortal eyes the Apostles of your divine Son. And I will speak in this

illustrious assembly because you have willed that truth should proceed out of the mouths of the humble, and I

will say: 'Change these penguins to men. It is the only determination conformable to your justice and your

Several doctors asked permission to speak, others began to do so. No one listened, and all the confessors were

"Let us not deliberate any longer," said he. "The opinion broached by gentle old Hermas is the only one

conformable to my eternal designs. These birds will be changed into men. I foresee in this several

disadvantages. Many of those men will commit sins they would not have committed as penguins. Truly their

fate through this change will be far less enviable than if they had been without this baptism and this

incorporation into the family of Abraham. But my foreknowledge must not encroach upon their free will.

"In order not to impair human liberty, I will be ignorant of what I know, I will thicken upon my eyes the veils

I have pierced, and in my blind clearsightedness I will let myself be surprised by what I have foreseen."

"Go and find the holy Mael," said he to him; "inform him of his mistake and tell him, armed with my Name,

The archangel, having gone down into the Island of the Penguins, found the holy man asleep in the hollow of

a rock surrounded by his new disciples. He laid his hand on his shoulder and, having waked him, said in a

The holy man, dazzled by a vivid light, inebriated by a delicious odour, recognised the angel of the Lord, and

"Mael, know thy error, believing that thou wert baptizing children of Adam thou hast baptized birds; and it is,

"Arise, Mael, arm thyself with the mighty Name of the Lord, and say to these birds, 'Be ye men!'"

And the holy Mael, having wept and prayed, armed himself with the mighty Name of the Lord and said to the

Immediately the penguins were transformed. Their foreheads enlarged and their heads grew round like the

dome of St. Maria Rotunda in Rome. Their oval eyes opened more widely on the universe; a fleshy nose

clothed the two clefts of their nostrils; their beaks were changed into mouths, and from their mouths went

forth speech; their necks grew short and thick; their wings became arms and their claws legs; a restless soul

However, there remained with them some traces of their first nature. They were inclined to look sideways;

they balanced themselves on their short thighs; their bodies were covered with fine down.

And Mael gave thanks to the Lord, because he had incorporated these penguins into the family of Abraham.

But he grieved at the thought that he would soon leave the island to come back no more, and that perhaps

when he was far away the faith of the penguins would perish for want of care like a young and tender plant.

"I know not the designs of eternal Wisdom," said he to himself. "But if God wills that this island be

And the holy man made a very fine cord about forty feet long out of the flax of his stole. He fastened one end

of the cord round a point of rock that jutted up through the sand of the shore and, holding the other end of the

The trough glided over the sea and towed Penguin Island behind it; after nine days' sailing it approached the

One day St. Mael was sitting by the seashore on a warm stone that he found. He thought it had been warmed

by the sun and he gave thanks to God for it, not knowing that the Devil had been resting on it. The apostle

was waiting for the monks of Yvern who had been commissioned to bring a freight of skins and fabrics to

Soon he saw a monk called Magis coming ashore and carrying a chest upon his back. This monk enjoyed a

When he had drawn near to the old man he laid the chest on the ground and wiping his forehead with the

"Nothing is more needful, my son," said the old man. "Since they have been incorporated into the family of

Abraham these penguins share the curse of Eve, and they know that they are naked, a thing of which they

were ignorant before. And it is high time to clothe them, for they are losing the down that remained on them

"It is true," said Magis as he cast his eyes over the coast where the penguins were to be seen looking for

shrimps, gathering mussels, singing, or sleeping, "they are naked. But do you not think, father, that it would

be better to leave them naked? Why clothe them? When they wear clothes and are under the moral law they

"Is it possible, my son," sighed the old man, "that you understand so badly the effects of the moral law to

"The moral law," answered Magis, "forces men who are beasts to live otherwise than beasts, a thine that

doubtless puts a constraint upon them, but that also flatters and reassures them; and as they are proud,

cowardly, and covetous of pleasure, they willingly submit to restraints that tickle their vanity and on which

they found both their present security and the hope of their future happiness. That is the principle of all

morality. . . . But let us not mislead ourselves. My companions are unloading their cargo of stuffs and skins

on the island. Think, father, while there is still time I To clothe the penguins is a very serious business. At

present when a penguin desires a penguin he knows precisely what he desires and his lust is limited by an

exact knowledge of its object. At this moment two or three couples of penguins are making love on the beach.

See with what simplicity! No one pays any attention and the actors themselves do not seem to be greatly

preoccupied. But when the female penguins are clothed, the male penguin will not form so exact a notion of

what it is that attracts him to them. His indeterminate desires will fly out into all sorts of dreams and

illusions; in short, father, he will know love and its mad torments. And all the time the female penguins will

cast down their eyes and bite their lips, and take on airs as if they kept a treasure under their clothes! . . . what

"The evil will be endurable as long as these people remain rude and poor; but only wait for a thousand years

and you will see, father, with what powerful weapons you have endowed the daughters of Alca. If you will

allow me, I can give you some idea of it beforehand. I have some old clothes in this chest. Let us take at

hazard one of these female penguins to whom the male penguins give such little thought, and let us dress her

"Here is one coming towards us. She is neither more beautiful nor uglier than the others; she is young. No

one looks at her. She strolls indolently along the shore, scratching her back and with her finger at her nose as

she walks. You cannot help seeing, father, that she has narrow shoulders, clumsy breasts, a stout figure, and

short legs. Her reddish knees pucker at every step she takes, and there is, at each of her joints, what looks like

a little monkey's head. Her broad and sinewy feet cling to the rock with their four crooked toes, while the

great toes stick up like the heads of two cunning serpents. She begins to walk, all her muscles are engaged in

the task, and, when we see them working, we think of her as a machine intended for walking rather than as a

machine intended for making love, although visibly she is both, and contains within herself several other

pieces of machinery, besides. Well, venerable apostle, you will see what I am going to make of her."

With these words the monk, Magis, reached the female penguin in three bounds, lifted her up, carried her in

his arms with her hair trailing behind her, and threw her, overcome with fright, at the feet of the holy Mael.

And whilst she wept and begged him to do her no harm, he took a pair of sandals out of his chest and

"Her feet," observed the old man, "will appear smaller when squeezed in by the woollen cords. The soles,

being two fingers high, will give an elegant length to her legs and the weight they bear will seem magnified."

As the penguin tied on her sandals she threw a curious look towards the open coffer, and seeing that it was

The monk twisted her hair on the back of her head and covered it with a chaplet of flowers. He encircled her

wrist with golden bracelets and making her stand upright, he passed a large linen band beneath her breasts,

alleging that her bosom would thereby derive a new dignity and that her sides would be compressed to the

When he had, with much care and study, enclosed the soft parts of her bust in this way, he covered her whole

And bending forward with her head on one side and her chin on her shoulder, she kept looking attentively at

Magis asked her if she did not think the dress a little long, but she answered with assurance that it was

Immediately, taking the back of her skirt in her left hand, she drew it obliquely across her hips, taking care to

disclose a glimpse of her heels. Then she went away, walking with short steps and swinging her hips.

She did not turn her head, but as she passed near a stream she glanced out of the corner of her eye at her own

A male penguin, who met her by chance, stopped in surprise, and retracing his steps began to follow her. As

she went along the shore, others coming back from fishing, went up to her, and after looking at her, walked

Unceasingly, as she advanced, fresh penguins, descending from the paths of the mountain, coming out of

clefts of the rocks, and emerging from the water, added to the size of her retinue.

And all of them, men of ripe age with vigorous shoulders and hairy breasts, agile youths, old men shaking the

multitudinous wrinkles of their rosy, and whitehaired skins, or dragging their legs thinner and drier than the

juniper staff that served them as a third leg, hurried on, panting and emitting an acrid odour and hoarse gasps.

"Father," cried Magis, "notice how each one advances with his nose pointed towards the centre of gravity of

that young damsel now that the centre is covered by a garment. The sphere inspires the meditations of

geometers by the number of its properties. When it proceeds from a physical and living nature it acquires new

qualities, and in order that the interest of that figure might be fully revealed to the penguins it was necessary

that, ceasing to see it distinctly with their eyes, they should be led to represent it to themselves in their minds.

I myself feel at this moment irresistibly attracted towards that penguin. Whether it be because her skirt gives

more importance to her hips, and that in its simple magnificence it invests them with a synthetic and general

character and allows only the pure idea, the divine principle, of them to be seen, whether this be the cause I

cannot say, but I feel that if I embraced her I would hold in my hands the heaven of human pleasure. It is

certain that modesty communicates an invincible attraction to women. My uneasiness is so great that it would

He spoke, and, gathering up his habit, he rushed among the crowd of penguins, pushing, jostling, trampling,

and crushing, until he reached the daughter of Alca, whom he seized and suddenly carried in his arms into a

Then the penguins felt as if the sun had gone out. And the holy Mael knew that the Devil had taken the

features of the monk, Magis, in order that he might give clothes to the daughter of Alca. He was troubled in

spirit, and his soul was sad. As with slow steps he went towards his hermitage he saw the little penguins of

six and seven years of age tightening their waists with belts made of seaweed and walking along the shore

The holy Mael felt a profound sadness that the first clothes put upon a daughter of Alca should have betrayed

the penguin modesty instead of helping it. He persisted, none the less, in his design of giving clothes to the

inhabitants of the miraculous island. Assembling them on the shore, he distributed to them the garments that

the monks of Yvern had brought. The male penguins received short tunics and breeches, the female penguins

long robes. But these robes were far from creating the effect that the former one had produced. They were not

so beautiful, their shape was uncouth and without art, and no attention was paid to them since every woman

bad one. As they prepared the meals and worked in the fields they soon had nothing but slovenly bodices and

The male penguins loaded their unfortunate consorts with work until they looked like beasts of burden. They

knew nothing of the troubles of the heart and the disorders of passion. Their habits were innocent. Incest,

though frequent, was a sign of rustic simplicity and if drunkenness led a youth to commit some such crime he

The island did not preserve the rugged appearance that it had formerly, when, in the midst of floating

icebergs it sheltered a population of birds within its rocky amphitheatre. Its snowclad peak had sunk down

into a hill from the summit of which one could see the coasts of Armorica eternally covered with mist, and

Its coasts were now very extensive and clearly defined and its shape reminded one of a mulberry leaf. It was

suddenly covered with coarse grass, pleasing to the flocks, and with willows, ancient figtrees, and mighty

oaks. This fact is attested by the Venerable Bede and several other authors worthy of credence.

To the north the shore formed a deep bay that in after years became one of the most famous ports in the

universe. To the east, along a rocky coast beaten by a foaming sea, there stretched a deserted and fragrant

heath. It was the Beach of Shadows, and the inhabitants of the island never ventured on it for fear of the

serpents that lodged in the hollows of the rocks and lest they might encounter the souls of the dead who

resembled livid flames. To the south, orchards and woods bounded the languid Bay of Divers. On this

fortunate shore old Mael built a wooden church and a monastery. To the west, two streams, the Clange and

Now one autumn morning, as the blessed Mael was walking in the valley of Clange in company with a monk

of Yvern called Bulloch, he saw bands of fiercelooking men loaded with stones passing along the roads. At

the same time he heard in all directions cries and complaints mounting up from the valley towards the

"I notice with sadness, my son, that since they became men the inhabitants of this island act with less wisdom

than formerly. When they were birds they only quarrelled during the season of their love affairs. But now

they dispute all the time; they pick quarrels with each other in summer as well as in winter. How greatly have

they fallen from that peaceful majesty which made the assembly of the penguins look like the Senate of a

"Look towards Surelle, Bulloch, my son. In yonder pleasant valley a dozen men penguins are busy knocking

each other down with the spades and picks that they might employ better in tilling the ground. The women,

still more cruel than the men, are tearing their opponents' faces with their nails. Alas! Bulloch, my son, why

"From a spirit of fellowship, father, and through forethought for the future," answered Bulloch. "For man is

essentially provident and sociable. Such is his character and it is impossible to imagine it apart from a certain

appropriation of things. Those penguins whom you see are dividing the ground among themselves."

"Could they not divide it with less violence?" asked the aged man. "As they fight they exchange invectives

and threats. I do not distinguish their words, but they are angry ones, judging from the tone."

"They are accusing one another of theft and encroachment," answered Bulloch. "That is the general sense of

"Do you see, my son," he exclaimed, "that madman who with his teeth is biting the nose of the adversary he

has overthrown and that other one who is pounding a woman's head with a huge stone?"

"I see them," said Bulloch. "They are creating law; they are founding property; they are establishing the

principles of civilization, the basis of society, and the foundations of the State."

"By setting bounds to their fields. That is the origin of all government. Your penguins, O Master, are

performing the most august of functions. Throughout the ages their work will be consecrated by lawyers, and

Whilst the monk, Bulloch, was pronouncing these words a big penguin with a fair skin and red hair went

down into the valley carrying a trunk of a tree upon his shoulder. He went up to a little penguin who was

And having delivered himself of this stout utterance he brought down his club on the head of the little

At this sight the holy Mael shuddered through his whole body and poured forth a flood of tears.

"O Lord, my God, O thou who didst receive young Abel's sacrifices, thou who didst curse Cain, avenge, O

Lord, this innocent penguin sacrificed upon his own field and make the murderer feel the weight of thy arm.

Is there a more odious crime, is there a graver offence against thy justice, O Lord, than this murder and this

"Take care, father," said Bulloch gently, "that what you call murder and robbery may not really be war and

conquest, those sacred foundations of empires, those sources of all human virtues and all human greatness.

Reflect, above all, that in blaming the big penguin you are attacking property in its origin and in its source. I

shall have no trouble in showing you how. To till the land is one thing, to possess it is another, and these two

things must not be confused; as regards ownership the right of the first occupier is uncertain and badly

founded. The right of conquest, on the other hand, rests on more solid foundations. It is the only right that

receives respect since it is the only one that makes itself respected. The sole and proud origin of property is

force. It is born and preserved by force. In that it is august and yields only to a greater force. This is why it is

correct to say that he who possesses is noble. And that big red man, when he knocked down a labourer to get

possession of his field, founded at that moment a very noble house upon this earth. I congratulate him upon

Having thus spoken, Bulloch approached the big penguin, who was leaning upon his club as he stood in the

"Lord Greatauk, dreaded Prince," said he, bowing to the ground, "I come to pay you the homage due to the

founder of legitimate power and hereditary wealth. The skull of the vile Penguin you have overthrown will,

buried in your field, attest for ever the sacred rights of your posterity over this soil that you have ennobled.

Blessed be your suns and your sons' sons! They shall be Greatauks, Dukes of Skull, and they shall rule over

Mael remained silent and motionless, with his eyes raised towards heaven; he felt a painful uncertainty in

judging the monk Bulloch's doctrine. It was, however, the doctrine destined to prevail in epochs of advanced

civilization. Bulloch can be considered as the creator of civil law in Penguinia.

"Bulloch, my son," said old Mael, "we ought to make a census of the Penguins and inscribe each of their

"It is a most urgent matter," answered Bulloch, "there can be no good government without it."

Forthwith, the apostle, with the help of twelve monks, proceeded to make a census of the people.

"Now that we keep a register of all the inhabitants, we ought, Bulloch, my son, to levy a just tax so as to

provide for public expenses and the maintenance of the Abbey. Each ought to contribute according to his

means. For this reason, my son, call together the Elders of Alca, and in agreement with them we shall

The Elders, being called together, assembled to the number of thirty under the great sycamore in the

courtyard of the wooden monastery. They were the first Estates of Penguinia. Threefourths of them were

substantial peasants of Surelle and Clange. Greatauk, as the noblest of the Penguins, sat upon the highest

The venerable Mael took his place in the midst of his monks and uttered these words:

"Children, the Lord when he pleases grants riches to men and he takes them away from them. Now I have

called you together to levy contributions from the people so as to provide for public expenses and the

maintenance of the monks. I consider that these contributions ought to be in proportion to the wealth of each.

Therefore he who has a hundred oxen will give ten; he who has ten will give one."

When the holy man had spoken, Morio, a, labourer at AnisontheClange, one of the richest of the

"O Father Mael, I think it right that each should contribute to the public expenses and to the support of the

Church. or my part I am ready to give up all that I possess in the interest of my brother Penguins, and if it

were necessary I would even cheerfully part with my shirt. All the elders of the people are ready, like me, to

sacrifice their goods, and no one can doubt their absolute devotion to their country and their creed. We have,

then, only to consider the public interest and to do what it requires. Now, Father, what it requires, what it

demands, is not to ask much from those who possess much, for then the rich would be less rich and the poor

still poorer. The poor live on the wealth of the rich and that is the reason why that wealth is sacred. Do not

touch it, to do so would be an uncalled for evil. You will get no great profit by taking from the rich, for they

are very few in number; on the contrary you will strip yourself of all your resources and plunge the country

into misery. Whereas if you ask a little from each inhabitant without regard to his wealth, you will collect

enough for the public necessities and you will have no need to enquire into each citizen's resources, a thing

that would be regarded by all as a most vexatious measure. By taxing all equally and easily you will spare the

poor, for you Will leave them the wealth of the rich. And how could you possibly proportion taxes to wealth?

Yesterday I had two hundred oxen, today I have sixty, tomorrow I shall have a hundred. Clunic has three

cows, but they are thin; Nicclu has only two, but they are fat. Which is the richer, Clunic or Nicclu? The signs

of opulence are deceitful. What is certain is that everyone eats and drinks. Tax people according to what they

"I ask that this speech be graven on bronze," cried the monk, Bulloch. "It is spoken for the future; in fifteen

The Elders were still applauding when Greatauk, his hand on the pommel of his sword, made this brief

"Being noble, I shall not contribute; for to contribute is ignoble. It is for the rabble to pay."

As in Rome, a new census was taken every five years; and by this means it was observed that the population

increased rapidly. Although children died in marvellous abundance and plagues and famines came with

perfect regularity to devastate entire villages, new Penguins, in continually greater numbers, contributed by

During these times there lived in the island of Alca a Penguin whose arm was strong and whose mind was

subtle. He was called Kraken, and had his dwelling on the Beach of Shadows whither the inhabitants never

ventured for fear of serpents that lodged in the hollows of the rocks and lest they might encounter the souls of

Penguins that had died without baptism. These, in appearance like livid flames, and uttering doleful groans,

wandered night and day along the deserted beach. For it was generally believed, though without proof, that

among the Penguins that had been changed into men at the blessed Mael's prayer, several had not received

baptism and returned after their death to lament amid the tempests. Kraken dwelt on this savage coast in an

inaccessible cavern. The only way to it was through a natural tunnel a hundred feet long, the entrance of

which was concealed by a thick wood. One evening as Kraken was walking through this deserted plain he

happened to meet a young and charming woman Penguin. She was the one that the monk Magis had clothed

with his own hands and thus was the first to have worn the garments of chastity. In remembrance of the day

when the astonished crowd of Penguins had seen her moving gloriously in her robe tinted like the dawn, this

* "Orb, poetically, a globe when speaking of the heavenly bodies. By extension any species of globular

At the sight of Kraken she uttered a cry of alarm and darted forward to escape from him. But the hero seized

"Is it you, I see, sir," she asked him, trembling, "or is it not rather your troubled spirit?"

She spoke in this way because the inhabitants of Alca, having no news of Kraken since he went to live on the

Beach of Shadows, believed that he had died and descended among the demons of night.

"Cease to fear, daughter of Alca," answered Kraken. "He who speaks to thee is not a wandering spirit, but a

"How dost thou think of acquiring great riches, O Kraken, since thou art a child of Penguins?"

"I know," said Orberosia, "that in the time that thou dwelt among us thou wert renowned for thy skill in

hunting and fishing. No one equalled thee in taking fishes in a net or in piercing with thy arrows the

"It was but a vulgar and laborious industry, O maiden. I have found a means of gaining much wealth for

"Orberosia, come into my house; it is that of the bravest and most ingenious of the sons of the Penguins. If

It is thus that the fair Orberosia became the consort of the hero Kraken. This marriage was not celebrated

with songs and torches because Kraken did not consent to show himself to the people of the Penguins; but

"We afterwards went to visit the cabinet of natural history. . . . The caretaker showed us a sort of packet

bound in straw that he told us contained the skeleton of a dragon; a proof, added he, that the dragon is not a

fabulous animal."Memoirs of Jacques Casanova, Paris, 1843. Vol. IV., pp. 404, 405

In the meantime the inhabitants of Alca practised the labours of peace. Those of the northern coast went in

boats to fish or to search for shellfish. The labourers of Dombes cultivated oats, rye, and wheat. The rich

Penguins of the valley of Dalles reared domestic animals, while those of the Bay of Divers cultivated their

orchards. Merchants of PortAlca carried on a trade in salt fish with Armorica and the gold of the two

Britains, which began to be introduced into the island, facilitated exchange. The Penguin people were

enjoying the fruit of their labours in perfect tranquillity when suddenly a sinister rumour ran from village to

village. It was said everywhere that frightful dragon had ravaged two farms in the Bay of Divers.

A few days before, the maiden Orberosia had disappeared. Her absence had at first caused no uneasiness

because on several occasions she had been carried off by violent men who were consumed with love. And

thoughtful people were not astonished at this, reflecting that the maiden was the most beautiful of the

Penguins. It was even remarked that she sometimes went to meet her ravishers, for none of us can escape his

destiny. But this time, as she did not return, it was feared that the dragon had devoured her. The more so as

the inhabitants of the valley of Dalles soon knew that the dragon was not a fable told by the women around

the fountains. For one night the monster devoured out of the village of Anis six hens, a sheep, and a young

orphan child called little Elo. The next morning nothing was to be found either of the animals or of the child.

Immediately the Elders of the village assembled in the public place and seated themselves on the stone bench

to take counsel concerning what it was expedient to do in these terrible circumstances.

Having called all those Penguins who had seen the dragon during the disastrous night, they asked them:

And a woman of Anis, who was regarded as intelligent and of sound judgment and from whom the dragon

"He is formed like a man. The proof is that I thought he was my husband, and I said to him, 'Come to bed,

"I saw the dragon taking off his head in the barn so that he might give a kiss to my sister Minnie."

"His head is bright green, his wings are brilliant orange tinged with pink, his limbs are silver grey, his

hindquarters and his tail are striped with brown and pink bands, his belly bright yellow spotted with black."

After hearing this evidence the Elders remained uncertain as to what should be done. Some advised to watch

for him, to surprise him and overthrow him by a multitude of arrows. Others, thinking it vain to oppose so

powerful a monster by force, counselled that he should be appeased by offerings.

"Pay him tribute," said one of them who passed for a wise man. "We can render him propitious to us by

Others held for poisoning the fountains where he was accustomed to drink or for smoking him out of his

But none of these counsels prevailed. The dispute was lengthy and the Elders dispersed without coming to

During all the month dedicated by the Romans to their false god Mars or Mavors, the dragon ravaged the

farms of Dalles and Dombes. He carried off fifty sheep, twelve pigs, and three young boys. Every family was

in mourning and the island was full of lamentations. In order to remove the scourge, the Elders of the

unfortunate villages watered by the Clange and the Surelle resolved to assemble and together go and ask the

On the fifth day of the month whose name among the Latins signifies opening, because it opens the year, they

went in procession to the wooden monastery that had been built on the southern coast of the island. When

they were introduced into the cloister they filled it with their sobs and groans. Moved by their lamentations,

old Mael left the room in which he devoted himself to the study of astronomy and the meditation of the

Scriptures, and went down to them, leaning on his pastoral staff. At his approach, the Elders, prostrating

themselves, held out to him green branches of trees and some of them burnt aromatic herbs.

And the holy man, seating himself beside the cloistral fountain under an ancient figtree, uttered these words:

"O my sons, offspring of the Penguins, why do you weep and groan? Why do you hold out those suppliant

boughs towards me? Why do you raise towards heaven the smoke of those herbs? What calamity do you

expect that I can avert from your heads? Why do you beseech me? I am ready to give my life for you. Only

"O Mael, father of the sons of Alca, I will speak for all. A horrible dragon is laying waste our lands,

depopulating our cattlesheds, and carrying off the flower of our youth. He has devoured the child Elo and

seven young boys; he has mangled the maiden Orberosia, the fairest of the Penguins with his teeth. There is

not a village in which he does not emit his poisoned breath and which he has not filled with desolation. A

prey to this terrible scourge, we come, O Mael, to pray thee, as the wisest, to advise us concerning the safety

of the inhabitants of this island lest the ancient race of Penguins be extinguished."

"O chief of the Elders of Alca," replied Mael, "thy words fill me with profound grief, and I groan at the

thought that this island is the prey of a terrible dragon. But such an occurrence is not unique, for we find in

books several tales of very fierce dragons. The monsters are oftenest found in caverns, by the brinks of

waters, and, in preference, among pagan peoples. Perhaps there are some among you who, although they have

received holy baptism and been incorporated into the family of Abraham, have yet worshipped idols, like the

ancient Romans, or hung up images, votive tablets, fillets of wool, and garlands of flowers on the branches of

some sacred tree. Or perhaps some of the women Penguins have danced round a magic stone and drunk water

from the fountains where the nymphs dwell. If it be so, believe, O Penguins, that the Lord has sent this

dragon to punish all for the crimes of some, and to lead you, O children of the Penguins, to exterminate

blasphemy, superstition, and impiety from amongst you. For this reason I advise, as a remedy against the

great evil from which you suffer, that you carefully search your dwellings for idolatry, and extirpate it from

Thus spoke the holy Mael. And the Elders of the Penguin people kissed his feet and returned to their villages

Following the counsel of the holy Mael the inhabitants of Alca endeavoured to uproot the superstitions that

had sprung up amongst them. They took care to prevent the girls from dancing with incantations round the

fairy tree. Young mothers were sternly forbidden to rub their children against the stones that stood upright in

the fields so as to make them strong. An old man of Dombes who foretold the future by shaking grains of

However, each night the monster still raided the poultryyards and the cattlesheds. The frightened peasants

barricaded themselves in their houses. A woman with child who saw the shadow of a dragon on the road

through a window in the moonlight, was so terrified that she was brought to bed before her time.

In those days of trial, the holy Mael meditated unceasingly on the nature of dragons and the means of

combating them. After six months of study and prayer he thought he had found what he sought. One evening

as he was walking by the sea with a young monk called Samuel, he to him in these terms:

"I have studied at length the history and habits of dragons, not to satisfy a vain curiosity, but to discover

examples to follow in the present circumstances. For such, Samuel, my son, is the use of history.

"It is an invariable fact that dragons are extremely vigilant. They never sleep, and for this reason we often

find them employed in guarding treasures. A dragon guarded at Colchis the golden fleece that Jason

conquered from him. A dragon watched over the golden apples in the garden of the Hesperides. He was killed

by Hercules and transformed into a star by Juno. This fact is related in some books, and if it be true, it was

done by magic, for the gods of the pagans are in reality demons. A dragon prevented barbarous and ignorant

men from drinking at the fountain of Castalia. We must also remember the dragon of Andromeda, which was

slain by Perseus. But let us turn from these pagan fables, in which error is always mixed with truth. We meet

dragons in the histories of the glorious archangel Michael, of St. George, St. Philip, St. James the Great, St.

Patrick, St. Martha, and St. Margaret. And it is in such writings, since they are worthy of full credence, that

"The story of the dragon of Silena affords us particularly precious examples. You must know, my son, that on

the banks of a vast pool close to that town there dwelt a dragon who sometimes approached the walls and

poisoned with his breath all who dwelt in the suburbs. And that they might not be devoured by the monster,

the inhabitants of Silena delivered up to him one of their number expressed his thought every morning. The

victim was chosen by lot, and after a hundred others, the lot fell upon the king's daughter.

"Now St. George, who was a military tribune, as he passed through the town of Silena, learned that the king's

daughter had just been given to the fierce beast. He immediately mounted his horse, and, armed with his

lance, rushed to encounter the dragon, whom he reached just as the monster was about to devour the royal

virgin. And when St. George had overthrown the dragon, the king's daughter fastened her girdle round the

"That is an example for us of the power of virgins over dragons. The history of St. Martha furnishes us with a

"There was in a forest on the banks of the Rhone, between Arles and Avignon, a dragon half quadruped and

half fish, larger than an ox, with sharp teeth like horns and hugewings at his shoulders. He sank the boats

and devoured their passengers. Now St. Martha, at the entreaty of the people, approached this dragon, whom

she found devouring a man. She put her girdle round his neck and led him easily into the town.

"These two examples lead me to think that we should have recourse to the power of some virgin so as to

"For this reason, Samuel thy son, gird up thy loins and go, I pray thee, with two of thy companions, into all

the villages of this island, and proclaim everywhere that a virgin alone shall be able to deliver the island from

"'O sons of the Penguins, if there be among you a pure virgin, let her arise and go, armed with the sign of the

Thus the old man spake, and Samuel promised to obey him. The next day he girded up his loins and set out

with two of his companions to proclaim to the inhabitants of Alca that a virgin alone would be able to deliver

Orberosia loved her husband, but she did not love him alone. At the hour when Venus lightens in the pale

sky, whilst Kraken scattered terror through the villages, she used to visit in his moving hut, a young shepherd

of Dalles called Marcel, whose pleasing form was invested with inexhaustible vigour. The fair Orberosia

shared the shepherd's aromatic couch with delight, but far from making herself known to him, she took the

name of Bridget, and said that she was the daughter of a gardener in the Bay of Divers. When regretfully she

left his arms she walked across the smoking fields towards the Coast of Shadows, and if she happened to

meet some belated peasant she immediately spread out her garments like great wings and cried:

"Passer by, lower your eyes, that you may not have to say, 'Alas! alas! woe is me, for I have seen the angel of

The villagers tremblingly knelt with their faces to the round. And several of them used to say that angels,

whom it would be death to see, passed along the roads of the island in the night time.

Kraken did not know of the loves of Orberosia and Marcel, for he was a hero, and heroes never discover the

secrets of their wives. But though he did not know of these loves, he reaped the benefit of them. Every night

he found his companion more goodhumoured and more beautiful, exhaling pleasure and perfuming the

nuptial bed with a delicious odour of fennel and vervain. She loved Kraken with a love that never became

This lucky infidelity of Orberosia was destined soon to save the hero from a great peril and to assure his

fortune and his glory for ever. For it happened that she saw passing in the twilight a neatherd from Belmont,

who was goading on his oxen, and she fell more deeply in love with him than she had ever been with the

shepherd Marcel. He was hunchbacked; his shoulders were higher than his ears; his body was supported by

legs of different lengths; his rolling eyes flashed, from beneath his matted hair. From his throat issued a

hoarse voice and strident laughter; he smelt of the cowshed. However, to her he was beautiful. "A plant," as

Now, one day, as she was sighing within the neatherd's arms in a village barn, suddenly the blasts of a

trumpet, with sounds and footsteps, fell upon her ears; she looked through the window and saw the

inhabitants collected in the marketplace round a young monk, who, standing upon a rock, uttered these words

"Inhabitants of Belmont, Abbot Mael, our venerable father, informs you through my mouth that neither by

strength nor skill in arms shall you prevail against the dragon; but the beast shall be overcome by a virgin. If,

then, there be among you a perfectly pure virgin, let her arise and go towards the monster; and when she

meets him let her tie her girdle round his neck and she shall lead him as easily as if he were a little dog."

And the young monk, replacing his hood upon his head, departed to carry the proclamation of the blessed

Orberosia sat in the amorous straw, resting her head in her hand and supporting her elbow upon her knee,

Although, so far as Kraken was concerned, she feared the power of a virgin much less than the strength of

armed men, she did not feel reassured by the proclamation of the blessed Mael. A vague but sure instinct

ruled her mind and warned her that Kraken could not henceforth be a dragon with safety.

"It is certain that dragons laid waste the earth in ancient times and some have been seen as large as

mountains. But they come no longer, and I believe that what has been taken for a dragon is not one at all, but

pirates or merchants who have carried off the fair Orberosia and the best of the children of Alca in their ships.

But if one of those brigands attempts to rob me of my oxen, I will either by force or craft find a way to

This remark of the neatherd increased Orberosia's apprehensions and added to her solicitude for the husband

The days passed by and no maiden arose in the island to combat the monster. And in the wooden monastery

old Mael, seated on a bench in the shade of an old figtree, accompanied by a pious monk called Regimental,

kept asking himself anxiously and sadly how it was that there was not in Alca a single virgin fit to overthrow

He sighed and brother Regimental sighed too. At that moment old Mael called young Samuel, who happened

"I have meditated anew, my son, on the means of destroying the dragon who devours the flower of our youth,

our flocks, and our harvests. In this respect the story of the dragons of St. Riok and of St. Pol de Leon seems

to me particularly instructive. The dragon of St. Riok was six fathoms long; his head was derived from the

cock and the basilisk, his body from the ox and the serpent; he ravaged the banks of the Elorn in the time of

King Bristocus. St. Riok, then aged two years, led him by a leash to the sea, in which the monster drowned

himself of his own accord. St. Pol's dragon was sixty feet long and not less terrible. The blessed apostle of

Leon bound him with his stole and allowed a young noble of great purity of life to lead him. These examples

prove that in the eyes of God a chaste young man is as agreeable as a chaste girl. Heaven makes no

distinction between them. For this reason, my son, if you believe what I say, we will both go to the Coast of

Shadows; when we reach the dragon's cavern we will call the monster in a loud voice, and when he comes

forth I will tie my stole round his neck and you will lead him to the sea, where he will not fail to drown

"There is at least cause for some hesitation," said he. "St. Riok was only two years old when he overcame the

dragon. Who says that nine or ten years later he could have done as much? Remember, father, that the dragon

who is devastating our island has devoured little Elo and four or five other young boys. Brother Samuel is not

go presumptuous as to believe that at nineteen years of age he is more innocent than they were at twelve and

"Alas!" added the monk, with a groan, "who can boast of being chaste in this world, where everything gives

the example and model of love, where all things in nature, animals, and plants, show us the caresses of love

and advise us to share them? Animals are eager to unite in their own fashion, but the various marriages of

quadrupeds, birds, fishes, and reptiles are far from equalling in lust the nuptials of the trees. The greatest

extremes of lewdness that the pagans have imagined in their fables are outstripped by the simple flowers of

the field, and, if you knew the irregularities of lilies and roses you would take those chalices of impurity,

"Do not speak in this way, Brother Regimental," answered old Mael. "Since they are subject to the law of

nature, animals and plants are always innocent. They have no souls to save, whilst man"

"You are right," replied Brother Regimental, "it is quite a different thing. But do not send young Samuel to

the dragonthe dragon might devour him. For the last five years Samuel is not in a state to show his

innocence to monsters. In the year of the comet, the Devil in order to seduce him, put in his path a milkmaid,

who was lifting up her petticoat to cross a ford. Samuel was tempted, but he overcame the temptation. The

Devil, who never tires, sent him the image of that young girl in a dream. The shade did what the reality was

unable to accomplish, and Samuel yielded. When he awoke be moistened his couch with his tears, but alas!

As he listened to this story Samuel asked himself how his secret could be known, for he was ignorant that the

Devil had borrowed the appearance of Brother Regimental, so as to trouble the hearts of the monks of Alca.

"Who will deliver us from the dragon's tooth? Who will preserve us from his breath? Who will save us from

However, the inhabitants of Alca began to take courage. The labourers of Dombes and the neatherds of

Belmont swore that they themselves would be of more avail than a girl against the ferocious beast, and they

exclaimed as they stroked the muscles on their arms, "Let the dragon come!" Many men and women had seen

him. They did not agree about his form and his figure, but all now united in saying that he was not as big as

they had thought, and that his height was not much greater than a man's. The defence was organised; towards

nightfall watches were stationed at the entrances of the villages ready to give the alarm; and during the night

companies armed with pitchforks and scythes protected the paddocks in which the animals were shut up.

Indeed, once in the village of Anis some plucky labourers surprised him as he was scaling Morio's wall, and,

as they had flails, scythes, and pitchforks, they fell upon him and pressed him hard. One of them, a very quick

and courageous man, thought to have run him through with his pitchfork; but he slipped in a pool and so let

him escape. The others would certainly have caught him had they not waited to pick up the rabbits and fowls

Those labourers declared to the Elders of the village that the monster's form and proportions appeased to

them human enough except for his head and his tail, which were, in truth, terrifying.

On that day Kraken came back to his cavern sooner than usual. He took from his head his sealskin helmet

with its two bull's horns and its visor trimmed with terrible hooks. He threw on the table his gloves that ended

in horrible clawsthey were the beaks of seabirds. He unhooked his belt from which hung a long green tail

twisted into many folds. Then he ordered his page, Elo, to help him off with his boots and, as the child did

not succeed in doing this very quickly, he gave him a kick that sent him to the other end of the grotto.

Without looking at the fair Orberosia, who was spinning, he seated himself in front of the fireplace, on which

"They fear me no longer," continued Kraken. "Formerly everyone fled at my approach. I carried away hens

and rabbits in my bag; I drove sheep and pigs, cows, and oxen before me. Today these clodhoppers keep a

good guard; they sit up at night. Just now I was pursued in the village of Anis by doughty labourers armed

with flails and scythes and pitchforks. I had to drop the hens and rabbits, put my tail under my arm, and run

as fast as I could. Now I ask you, is it seemly for a dragon of Cappadocia to run away like a robber with his

tail under his arm? Further, incommoded as I was by crests, horns, hooks, claws, and scales, I barely escaped

As he said this he carefully ran his hand over the insulted part, and, after giving himself up for a few

"What idiots those Penguins are! I am tired of blowing flames in the faces of such imbeciles. Orberosia, do

Having thus spoken the hero raised his terrible helmet in his hands and gazed at it for a long time in gloomy

"I have made this helmet with my own hands in the shape of a fish's head, covering it with the skin of a seal.

To make it more terrible I have put on it the horns of a bull and I have given it a boar's jaws; I have hung

from it a horse's tail dyed vermilion. When in the gloomy twilight I threw it over my shoulders no inhabitant

of this island had courage to withstand its sight. Women and children, young men and old men fled distracted

at its approach, and I carried terror among the whole race of Penguins. By what advice does that insolent

people lose its earlier fears and dare today to behold these horrible jaws and to attack this terrible crest?"

"Perish, deceitful helmet!" cried Kraken. "I swear by all the demons of Armor that I will never bear you upon

And having uttered this oath he stamped upon his helmet, his gloves, his boots, and upon his tail with its

"Kraken," said the fair Orberosia, "will you allow your servant to employ artifice to save your reputation and

your goods? Do not despise a woman's help. You need it, for all men are imbeciles."

And the fair Orberosia informed her husband that the monks were going through the villages teaching the

inhabitants the best way of combating the dragon; that, according to their instructions, the beast would be

overcome by a virgin, and that if a maid placed her girdle around the dragon's neck she could lead him as

"My friend," answered Orberosia, "do not interrupt a serious subject by frivolous questions. . . . 'If, then,'

added the monks, 'there be in Alca a pure virgin, let her arise!' Now, Kraken, I have determined to answer

their call. I will go and find the holy Mael and I will say to him: 'I am the virgin destined by Heaven to

At these words Kraken exclaimed: "How can you be that pure virgin? And why do you want to overthrow

me, Orberosia? Have you lost your reason? Be sure that I will not allow myself to be conquered by you!"

"Can you not try and understand me before you get angry?" sighed the fair Orberosia with deep though gentle

"Orberosia, your cunning, is deep," said he, "And if your plans are carried out according to your intentions I

shall derive great advantages from them. But how can you be the virgin destined by heaven?"

The next day in the greaseladen atmosphere of the cavern, Kraken plaited a deformed skeleton out of osier

rods and covered it with bristling, scaly, and filthy skins. To one extremity of the skeleton Orberosia sewed

the fierce crest and the hideous mask that Kraken used to wear in his plundering expeditions, and to the other

end she fastened the tail with twisted folds which the hero was wont to trail behind him. And when the work

was finished they showed little Elo and the other five children who waited on them how to get inside this

machine, how to make it walk, how to blow horns and burn tow in it so as to send forth smoke and flames

Orberosia, having clothed herself in a robe made of coarse stuff and girt herself with a thick cord, went to the

monastery and asked to speak to the blessed Mael. And because women were forbidden to enter the enclosure

of the monastery the old man advanced outside the gates, holding his pastoral cross in his right hand and

resting his left on the shoulder of Brother Samuel, the youngest of his disciples.

"Do you speak truth, woman? It is a certain fact that Orberosia was devoured by the dragon. And yet I see

Orberosia and hear her. Did you not, O my daughter, while within the dragon's bowels arm yourself with the

sign of the cross and come uninjured out of his throat? That is what seems to me the most credible

"You are not deceived, father," answered Orberosia. "That is precisely what happened to me. Immediately I

came out of the creature's bowels I took refuge in a hermitage on the Coast of Shadows. I lived there in

solitude, giving myself up to prayer and meditation, and performing unheard of austerities, until I learnt by a

revelation from heaven that a maid alone could overcome the dragon, and that I was that maid."

"I am not ignorant of the power of those who have placed a seal upon their flesh," replied the apostle of the

"That will," said he, "be the best proof. King Solomon has said: 'Three things are hard to understand and a

fourth is impossible: they are the way of a serpent on the earth, the way of a bird in the air, the way of a ship

in the sea, and the way of a man with a maid!' I regard such matrons as nothing less than presumptuous who

claim to compare themselves in these matters with the wisest of kings. Father, if you are led by me you will

not consult them in regard to the pious Orberosia. When they have given their opinion you will not be a bit

farther on than before. Virginity is not less difficult to prove than to keep. Pliny tells us in his history that its

signs are either imaginary or very uncertain.* One who bears upon her the fourteen signs of corruption may

yet be pure in the eyes of the angels, and, on the contrary, another who has been pronounced pure by the

matrons who inspected her may know that her good appearance is due to the artifices of a cunning perversity.

As for the purity of this holy girl here, I would put my hand in the fire in witness of it."

He spoke thus because he was the Devil. But old Mael did not know it. He asked the pious Orberosia:

"My daughter, how, would you proceed to conquer so fierce an animal as he who devoured you?"

"Tomorrow at sunrise, O Mael, you will summon the people together on the hill in front of the desolate

moor that extends to the Coast of Shadows, and you will take care that no man of the Penguins remains less

than five hundred paces from those rocks so that he may not be poisoned by the monster's breath. And the

dragon will come out of the rocks and I will put my girdle round his neck and lead him like an obedient dog."

"Ought you not to be accompanied by a courageous and pious man who will kill the dragon?" asked Mael.

"It will be as thou sayest, venerable father. I shall deliver the monster to Kraken, who will stay him with his

flashing sword. For I tell thee that the noble Kraken, who was believed to be dead, will return among the

Penguins and he shall slay the dragon. And from the creature's belly will come forth the little children whom

"What you declare to me, O virgin," cried the apostle, "seems wonderful and beyond human power."

"It is," answered the virgin Orberosia. "But learn, O Mael, that I have had a revelation that as a reward for

their deliverance, the Penguin people will pay to the knight Kraken an annual tribute of three hundred fowls,

twelve sheep, two oxen, three pigs, one thousand eight hundred bushels of corn, and vegetables according to

their season; and that, moreover, the children who will come out of the dragon's belly will be given and

committed to the said Kraken to serve him and obey him in all things. If the Penguin people fail to keep their

engagements a new dragon will come upon the island more terrible than the first. I have spoken."

The people of the Penguins were assembled by Mael and they spent the night on the Coast of Shadows within

the bounds which the holy man had prescribed in order that none among the Penguins should be poisoned by

The veil of night still covered the earth when, preceded by a hoarse bellowing, the dragon showed his

indistinct and monstrous form upon the rocky coast. He crawled like a serpent and his writhing body seemed

about fifteen feet long. At his appearance the crowd drew back in terror. But soon all eyes were turned

towards the Virgin Orberosia, who, in the first light of the dawn, clothed in white, advanced over the purple

heather. With an intrepid though modest gait she walked towards the beast, who, uttering awful bellowings,

opened his flaming throat. An immense cry of terror and pity arose from the midst of the Penguins. But the

virgin, unloosing her linen girdle, put it round the dragon's neck and led him on the leash like a faithful dog

She had walked over a long stretch of the heath when Kraken appeared armed with a flashing sword. The

people, who believed him dead, uttered cries of joy and surprise. The hero rushed towards the beast, turned

him over on his back, and with his sword cut open his belly, from whence came forth in their shirts, with

curling hair and folded hands, little Elo and the five other children whom the monster had devoured.

Immediately they threw themselves on their knees before the virgin Orberosia, who took them in her arms

"You will go through the villages saying: 'We are the poor little children who were devoured by the dragon,

and we came out of his belly in our shirts.' The inhabitants will give you abundance of all that you can desire.

Several Penguins, seeing the dragon disembowelled, rushed forward to cut him to pieces, some from a feeling

of rage and vengeance, others to get the magic stone called dragonite, that is engendered in his head. The

mothers of the children who had come back to life ran to embrace their little ones. But the holy Mael kept

them back, saying that none of them were holy enough to approach a dragon without dying.

And soon little Elo, and the five other children came towards the people and said:

"We are the poor little children who were devoured by the dragon and we came out of his belly in our shirts."

To commemorate this day on which Providence delivered the people from a cruel scourge, processions were

Kraken levied the tribute and became the richest and most powerful of the Penguins. As a sign of his victory

and so as to inspire a salutary terror, he wore a dragon's crest upon his head and he had a habit of saying to

For many years Orberosia bestowed her favours upon neatherds and shepherds, whom she thought equal to

the gods. But when she was no longer beautiful she consecrated herself to the Lord.

At her death she became the object of public veneration, and was admitted into the calendar of the saints and

Kraken left a son, who, like his father, wore a dragon's crest, and he was for this reason surnamed Draco. He

The kings of Alca were descended from Draco,the son of Kraken,and they wore on their heads a terrible

dragon's crest, as a sacred badge whose appearance alone inspired the people with veneration, terror, and

love. They were perpetually in conflict either with their own vassals and subjects or with the princes of the

The most ancient of these kings has left but a name. We do not even know how to pronounce or write it. The

first of the Draconides whose history is known was Brian the Good, renowned for his skill and courage in

He was a Christian and loved learning. He also favoured men who had vowed themselves to the monastic

life. In the hall of his palace where, under the sooty rafters, there hung the heads, pelts, and horns of wild

beasts, he held feasts to which all the harpers of Alca and of the neighbouring islands were invited, and he

himself used to join in singing the praises of the heroes. He was just and magnanimous, but inflamed by so

ardent a love of glory that he could not restrain himself from putting to death those who had sung better than

The monks of Yvern having been driven out by the pagans who ravaged Brittany, King Brian summoned

them into his kingdom and built a wooden monastery for them near his palace. Every day he went with

Queen Glamorgan, his wife, into the monastery chapel and was present at the religious ceremonies and joined

Now among these monks there was a brother called Oddoul, who, while still in the flower of his youth, had

adorned himself with knowledge and virtue. The devil entertained a great grudge against him, and attempted

several times to lead him into temptation. He took several shapes and appeared to him in turn as a warhorse,

a young maiden, and a cup of mead. Then he rattled two dice in a dicebox and said to him:

"Will you play with me for the kingdoms of, the world against one of the hairs of your head?"

But the man of the Lord, armed with the sign of the Cross, repulsed the enemy. Perceiving that he could not

seduce him, the devil thought of an artful plan to ruin him. One summer night he approached the queen, who

slept upon her couch, showed her an image of the young monk whom she saw every day in the wooden

monastery, and upon this image he placed a spell. Forthwith, like a subtle poison, love flowed into

Glamorgan's veins, and she burned with an ardent desire to do as she listed with Oddoul. She found

unceasing pretexts to have him near her. Several times she asked him to teach reading and singing to her

"I entrust them to you," said she to him. "And will follow the lessons you will give them so that I myself may

But the young monk kept making excuses. At times he would say that he was not a learned enough teacher,

and on other occasions that his state forbade him all intercourse with women. This refusal inflamed

Glamorgan's passion. One day as she lay pining upon her couch, her malady having become intolerable, she

summoned Oddoul to her chamber. He came in obedience to her orders, but remained with his eyes cast

down towards the threshold of the door. With impatience and grief she resented his not looking at her.

"See," said she to him, "I have no more strength, a shadow is on my eyes. My body is both burning and

And as he kept silence and made no movement, she called him in a voice of entreaty:

With outstretched arms to which passion gave more length, she endeavoured to seize him and draw him

Then, incensed with rage and fearing that Oddoul might divulge the shame into which she had fallen, she

In a voice of lamentation that resounded throughout all the palace she called for help, as if, in truth, she were

in some great danger. Her servants rushed up and saw the young monk fleeing and the queen pulling back the

sheets upon her couch. They all cried out together. And when King Brian, attracted by the noise, entered the

chamber, Glamorgan, showing him her dishevelled hair, her eyes flooded with tears, and her bosom that in

"My lord and husband, behold the traces of the insults I have undergone. Driven by an infamous desire

When he heard these complaints and saw the blood, the king, transported with fury, ordered his guards to

seize the young monk and burn him alive before the palace under the queen's eyes.

"King Brian, know by this example the difference between a Christian woman and a pagan. Roman Lucretia

was the most virtuous of idolatrous princesses, yet she had not the strength to defend herself against the

attacks of an effeminate youth, and, ashamed of her weakness, she gave way to despair, whilst Glamorgan

has successfully withstood the assaults of a criminal filled with rage, and possessed by the most terrible of

demons." Meanwhile Oddoul, in the prison of the palace, was waitin for the moment when he should be

burned alive. But God did not suffer an innocent to perish. He sent to him an angel, who, taking the form of

one of the queen's servants called Gudrune, took him out of his prison and led him into the very room where

And young Oddoul, believing that it was Gudrune herself, answered with downcast looks:

"It is by the grace of the Lord that I have resisted the violence of the queen and braved the anger of that

"No, I have not done it. The very thought of such an action fills me with horror."

* The Penguin chronicler who relates the fact employs the expression, Species inductilis. I have endeavoured

And she opened the door to facilitate the young man's escape. Oddoul felt himself pushed violently out.

Scarcely had he gone down into the street than a chamberpot was poured over his head; and he thought:

The direct posterity of Brian the Good was extinguished about the year 900 in the person of Collic of the

Short Nose. A cousin of that prince, Bosco the Magnanimous, succeeded him, and took care, in order to

assure himself of the throne, to put to death all his relations. There issued from him a long line of powerful

One of them, Draco the Great, attained great renown as a man of war. He was defeated more frequently than

the others. It is by this constancy in defeat that great captains are recognized. In twenty years he burned down

more than a hundred thousand hamlets, market towns, unwalled towns, villages, walled towns, cities, and

universities. He set fire impartially to his enemies' territory and to his own domains. And he used to explain

His justice was rigorous. When the peasants whom he made prisoners were unable to raise the money for

their ransoms he had them hanged from a tree, and if any unhappy woman came to plead for her destitute

husband he dragged her by the hair at his horse's tail. He lived like a soldier without effeminacy. It is

satisfactory to relate that his manner of life was pure. Not only did he not allow his kingdom to decline from

its hereditary glory, but, even in his reverses he valiantly supported the honour of the Penguin people.

The body of the blessed saint had been buried in a grotto on the Coast of Shadows at the end of a scented

heath. The first pilgrims who went to visit it were the boys and girls from the neighbouring villages. They

used to go there in the evening, by preference in couples, as if their pious desires naturally sought satisfaction

in darkness and solitude. They worshipped the saint with a fervent and discreet worship whose mystery they

seemed jealously to guard, for they did not like to publish too openly the experiences they felt. But they were

heard to murmur one to another words of love, delight, and rapture with which they mingled the name of

Orberosia. Some would sigh that there they forgot the world; others would say that they came out of the

grotto in peace and calm; the young girls among them used to recall to each other the joy with which they had

Such were the marvels that the virgin of Alca performed in the morning of her glorious eternity; they had the

sweetness and indefiniteness of the dawn. Soon the mystery of the grotto spread like a perfume throughout

the land; it was a ground of joy and edification for pious souls, and corrupt men endeavoured, though in vain,

by falsehood and calumny, to divert the faithful from the springs of grace that flowed from the saint's tomb.

The Church took measures so that these graces should not remain reserved for a few children, but should be

diffused throughout all Penguin Christianity. Monks took up their quarters in the grotto, they built a

monastery, a chapel, and a hostelry on the coast, and pilgrims began to flock thither.

As if strengthened by a longer sojourn in heaven, the blessed Orberosia now performed still greater miracles

for those who came to lay their offerings on her tomb. She gave hopes to women who had been hitherto

barren, she sent dreams to reassure jealous old men concerning the fidelity of the young wives whom they

had suspected without cause, and she protected the country from plagues, murrains, famines, tempests, and

But during the troubles that desolated the kingdom in the time of King Collic and his successors, the tomb of

St. Orberosia was plundered of its wealth, the monastery burned down, and the monks dispersed. The road

that had been so long trodden by devout pilgrims was overgrown with furze and heather, and the blue thistles

of the sands. For a hundred years the miraculous tomb had been visited by none save vipers, weasels, and

bats, when, one day the saint appeared to a peasant of the neighbourhood, Momordic by name.

"I am the virgin Orberosia," said she to him; "I have chosen thee to restore my sanctuary. Warn the

inhabitants of the country that if they allow my memory to be blotted out, and leave my tomb without honour

Learned churchmen held an inquiry concerning this apparition, and pronounced it genuine, and not diabolical

but truly heavenly, and in later years it was remarked that in France, in like circumstances, St. Foy and St.

The monastery was restored and pilgrims flocked to it anew. The virgin Orberosia worked greater and greater

miracles. She cured divers hurtful maladies, particularly clubfoot, dropsy, paralysis, and St. Guy's disease.

The monks who kept the tomb were enjoying an enviable opulence, when the saint, appearing to King Draco

the Great, ordered him to recognise her as the heavenly patron of the kingdom and to transfer her precious

In consequence, the odoriferous relics of that virgin were carried with great pomp to the metropolitan church

and placed in the middle of the choir in a shrine made of gold and enamel and ornamented with precious

Draco the Great, who had never ceased to defend and exalt the Christian faith, died fulfilled with the most

Terrible disorders followed the death of Draco the Great. That prince's successors have often been accused of

weakness, and it is true that none of them followed, even from afar, the example of their valiant ancestor.

His son, Chum, who was lame, failed to increase the territory of the Penguins. Bolo, the son of Chum, was

assassinated by the palace guards at the age of nine, just as he was ascending the throne. His brother Gun

succeeded him. He was only seven years old and allowed himself to be governed by his mother, Queen

Crucha was beautiful, learned, and intelligent; but she was unable to curb her own passions.

These are the terms in which the venerable Talpa expresses himself in his chronicle regarding that illustrious

"In beauty of face and symmetry of figure Queen Crucha yields neither to Semiramis of Babylon nor to

Penthesilea, queen of the Amazons; nor to Salome, the daughter of Herodias. But she offers in her person

certain singularities that will appear beautiful or uncomely according to the contradictory opinions of men

and the varying judgments of the world. She has on her forehead two small horns which she conceals in the

abundant folds of her golden hair; one of her eyes is blue and one is black; her neck is bent towards the left

side; and, like Alexander of Macedon, she has six fingers on her right hand, and a stain like a little monkey's

"Her gait is majestic and her manner affable. She is magnificent in her expenses, but she is not always able to

"One day, having noticed in the palace stables, a young groom of great beauty, she immediately fell violently

in love with him, and entrusted to him the command of her armies. What one must praise unreservedly in this

great queen is the abundance of gifts that she makes to the churches, monasteries, and chapels in her

kingdom, and especially to the holy house of Beargarden, where, by the grace of the Lord, I made my

profession in my fourteenth year. She has founded masses for the repose of her soul in such great numbers

that every priest in the Penguin Church is, so to speak, transformed into a taper lighted in the sight of heaven

From these lines and from some others with which have enriched my text the reader can judge of the

historical and literary value of the "Gesta Penguinorum." Unhappily, that chronicle suddenly comes suddenly

to an end at third year of Draco the Simple, the successor of Gun the Weak. Having reached that point of my

During the two centuries that followed, the Penguins remained plunged in bloodstained disorder. All the arts

perished. In the midst of the general ignorance, the monks in the shadow of their cloister devoted themselves

to study, and copied the Holy Scriptures with indefatigable zeal. As parchment was scarce,they scraped the

writing off old manuscripts in order to transcribe upon them the divine word. Thus throughout the breadth of

A monk of the order of St. Benedict, Ermold the Penguin, had himself alone defaced four thousand Greek and

Latin manuscripts so as to copy out the Gospel of St. John four thousand times. Thus the masterpieces of

ancient poetry and eloquence were destroyed in great numbers. Historians are unanimous in recognising that

Unending wars between the Penguins and the Porpoises filled the close of this period. It is extremely difficult

to know the truth concerning these wars, not because accounts are wanting, but because there are so many of

them. The Porpoise Chronicles contradict the Penguin Chronicles at every point. And, moreover, the

Penguins contradict each other as well as the Porpoises. I have discovered two chronicles that are in

agreement, but one has copied from the other. A single fact is certain, namely, that massacres, rapes,

Under the unhappy prince Bosco IX. the kingdom was at the verge of ruin. On the news that the Porpoise

fleet, composed of six hundred great ships, was in sight of Alca, the bishop ordered a solemn procession. The

cathedral chapter, the elected magistrates, the members of Parliament, and the clerics of the University

entered the Cathedral and, taking up St. Orberosia's shrine, led it in procession through the town, followed by

the entire people singing hymns. The holy patron of Penguinia was not invoked in vain. Nevertheless, the

Porpoises besieged the town both by land and sea, took it by assault, and for three days and three nights

killed, plundered, violated, and burned, with all the indifference that habit produces.

Our astonishment cannot be too great at the fact that, during those iron ages, the faith was preserved intact

among the Penguins. The splendour of the truth in those times illumined all souls that had not been corrupted

by sophisms. This is the explanation of the unity of belief. A constant practice of the Church doubtless

contributed also to maintain this happy communion of the faithfulevery Penguin who thought differently

During the minority of King Gun, Johannes Talpa, in the monastery of Beargarden, where at the age of

fourteen he had made his profession and from which he never departed for a single day throughout his life,

composed his celebrated Latin chronicle in twelve books called "De Gestis Penguinorum."

The monastery of Beargarden lifts its high walls on the summit of an inaccessible peak. One sees around it

When he began to write his "Gesta Penguinorum," Johannes Talpa was already old. The good monk has taken

care to tell us this in his book: "My head has long since lost," he says, "its adornment of fair hair, and my

scalp resembles those convex mirrors of metal which the Penguin ladies consult with so much care and zeal.

My stature, naturally small, has with years become diminished and bent. My white beard gives warmth to my

With a charming simplicity, Talpa informs us of certain circumstances in his life and some features in his

character. "Descended," he tells us, "from a noble family, and destined from childhood for the ecclesiastical

state, I was taught grammar and music. I learnt to read under the guidance of a master who was called

Amicus, and who would have been better named Inimicus. As I did not easily attain to a knowledge of my

letters, he beat me violently with rods so that I can say that he printed the alphabet in strokes upon my back."

In another passage Talpa confesses his natural inclination towards pleasure. These are his expressive words:

"In my youth the ardour of my senses was such that in the shadow of the woods I experienced a sensation of

boiling in a pot rather than of breathing the fresh air. I fled from women, but in vain, for every object recalled

While he was writing his chronicle, a terrible war, at once foreign and domestic, laid waste the Penguin land.

The soldiers of Crucha came to defend the monastery of Beargarden against the Penguin barbarians and

established themselves strongly within its walls. In order to render it impregnable they pierced loopholes

through the walls and they took the lead off the church roof to make balls for their slings. At night they

lighted huge fires in the courts and cloisters and on them they roasted whole oxen which they spitted upon the

ancient pinetrees of the mountain. Sitting around the flames, amid smoke filled with a mingled odour of

resin and fat, they broached huge casks of wine and beer. Their songs, their blasphemies, and the noise of

At last the Porpoises, having crossed the defiles, laid siege to the monastery. They were warriors from the

North, clad in copper armour. They fastened ladders a hundred and fifty fathoms long to the sides of the cliffs

and sometimes in the darkness and storm these broke beneath the weight of men and arms, and bunches of

the besiegers were hurled into the ravines and precipices. A prolonged wail would be heard going down into

the darkness, and the assault would begin again. The Penguins poured streams of burning wax upon their

assailants, which made them blaze like torches. Sixty times the enraged Porpoises attempted to scale the

For six months they had closely invested the monastery, when, on the day of the Epiphany, a shepherd of the

valley showed them a hidden path by which they climbed the mountain, penetrated into the vaults of the

abbey, ran through the cloisters, the kitchens, the church, the chapter halls, the library, the laundry, the cells,

the refectories, and the dormitories, and burned the buildings, killing and violating without distinction of age

or sex. The Penguins, awakened unexpectedly, ran to arms, but in the darkness and alarm they struck at one

another, whilst the Porpoises with blows of their axes disputed the sacred vessels, the censers, the

The air was filled with an acrid odour of burnt flesh. Groans and deathcries arose in the midst of the flames,

and on the edges of the crumbling roofs monks ran in thousands like ants, and fell into the valley. Yet

Johannes Talpa kept on writing his Chronicle. The soldiers of Crucha retreated speedily and filled up all the

issues from the monastery with pieces of rock so as to shut up the Porpoises in the burning buildings. And to

crush the enemy beneath the ruin they employed the trunks of old oaks as batteringrams. The burning

timbers fell in with a noise like thunder and the lofty arches of the naves crumbled beneath the shock of these

giant trees when moved by six hundred men together. Soon there was left nothing of the rich and extensive

abbey but the cell of Johannes Talpa, which, by a marvellous chance, hung from the ruin of a smoking gable.

This admirable intensity of thought may seem excessive in the case of an annalist who applies himself to

relate the events of his own time. However abstracted and detached we may be from surrounding things, we

nevertheless resent their influence. I have consulted the original manuscript of Johannes Talpa in the National

Library, where it is preserved (Monumenta Peng., K. L6., 12390 four). It is a parchment manuscript of 628

leaves. The writing is extremely confused, the letters instead of being in a straight line, stray in all directions

and are mingled together in great disorder, or, more correctly speaking, in absolute confusion. They are so

badly formed that for the most part it is impossible not merely to say what they are, but even to distinguish

them from the splashes of ink with which they are plentifully interspersed. Those inestimable pages bear

witness in this way to the troubles amid which they were written. To read them is difficult. On the other hand,

the monk of Beargarden's style shows no trace of emotion. The tone of the "Gesta Penguinorum" never

departs from simplicity. The narration is rapid and of a conciseness that sometimes approaches dryness. The

The Penguin critics vie with one another in affirming that Penguin art has from its origin been distinguished

by a powerful and pleasing originality, and that we may look elsewhere in vain for the qualities of grace and

reason that characterise its earliest works. But the Porpoises claim that their artists were undoubtedly the

instructors and masters of the Penguins. It is difficult to form an opinion on the matter, because the Penguins,

before they began to admire their primitive painters, destroyed all their works.

We cannot be too sorry for this loss. For my own part I feel it cruelly, for I venerate the Penguin antiquities

and I adore the primitives. They are delightful. I do not say the are all alike, for that would be untrue, but they

have common characters that are found in all schoolsI mean formulas from which they never departand

there is besides something finished in their work, for what they know they know well. Luckily we can form a

notion of the Penguin primitives from the Italian, Flemish, and Dutch primitives, and from the French

primitives, who are superior to all the rest; as M. Gruyer tells us they are more logical, logic being a

peculiarly French quality. Even if this is denied it must at least be admitted that to France belongs the credit

of having kept primitives when the other nations knew them no longer. The Exhibition of French Primitives

at the Pavilion Marsan in 1904 contained several little panels contemporary with the later Valois kings and

I have made many journeys to see the pictures of the brothers Van Eyck, of Memling, of Roger van der

Weyden, of the painter of the death of Mary, of Ambrogio Lorenzetti, and of the old Umbrian masters. It was,

however, neither Bruges, nor Cologne, nor Sienna, nor Perugia, that completed my initiation; it was in the

little town of Arezzo that I became a conscious adept in primitive painting. That was ten years ago or even

longer. At that period of indigence and simplicity, the municipal museums, though usually kept shut, were

always opened to foreigners. One evening an old woman with a candle showed me, for half a lira, the sordid

museum of Arezzo, and in it I discovered a painting by Margaritone, a "St. Francis," the pious sadness of

which moved me to tears. I was deeply touched, and Margaritone,of Arezzo became from that day my dearest

I picture to myself the Penguin primitives in conformity with the works of that master. It will not therefore be

thought superfluous if in this place I consider his works with some attention, if not in detail, at least under

We possess five or six pictures signed with his hand. His masterpiece, preserved in the National Gallery of

London, represents the Virgin seated on a throne and holding the infant Jesus in her arms. What strikes one

first when one looks at this figure is the proportion. The body from the neck to the feet is only twice as long

as the head, so that it appears extremely short and podgy. This work is not less remarkable for its painting

than for its drawing. The great Margaritone had but a limited number of colours in his possession, and he

used them in all their purity without ever modifying the tones. From this it follows that his colouring has

more vivacity than harmony. The cheeks of the Virgin and those of the Child are of a bright vermilion which

the old master, from a naive preference for clear definitions, has placed on each face in two circumferences as

A learned critic of the eighteenth century, the Abbe Lanzi, has treated Margaritone's works with profound

disdain. "They are," he says. "merely crude daubs. In those unfortunate times people could neither draw nor

paint." Such was the common opinion of the connoisseurs of the days of powdered wigs. But the great

Margaritone and his contemporaries were soon to be avenged for this cruel contempt. There was born in the

nineteenth century, in the biblical villages and reformed cottages of pious England, a multitude of little

Samuels and little St. Johns, with hair curling like lambs, who, about 1840, and 1850, became spectacled

That eminent theorist of PreRaphaelitism, Sir James Tuckett, does not shrink from placing the Madonna of

the National Gallery on a level with the masterpieces of Christian art. "By giving to the Virgin's head," says

Sir James Tuckett, "a third of the total height of the figure, the old master attracts the spectator's attention and

keeps it directed towards the more sublime parts of the human figure, and in particular the eyes, which we

ordinarily describe as the spiritual organs. In this picture, colouring and design conspire to produce an ideal

and mystical impression. The vermilion of the cheeks does not recall the natural appearance of the skin; it

rather seems as if the old master has applied the roses of Paradise to the faces of the Mother and the Child."

We see, in such a criticism as this, a shining reflection, so to speak, of the work which it exalts; yet MacSilly,

the seraphic aesthete of Edinburgh, has expressed in a still more moving and penetrating fashion the

impression produced upon his mind by the sight of this primitive painting. "The Madonna of Margaritone,"

says the revered MacSilly, "attains the transcendent end of art. It inspires its beholders with feelings of

innocence and purity; it makes them like little children. And so true is this, that at the age of sixtysix, after

having had the joy of contemplating it closely for three hours, I felt myself suddenly transformed into a little

child. While my cab was taking me through Trafalgar Square I kept laughing and prattling and shaking my

spectaclecase as if it were a rattle. And when the maid in my boardinghouse had served my meal I kept

"It is by such results," adds MacSilly, "that the excellence of a work of art is proved."

Margaritone, according to Vasari, died at the age of seventyseven, "regretting that he had lived to see a new

These lines, which I translate literally, have inspired Sir James Tuckett with what are perhaps the finest pages

in his work. They form part of his "Breviary for Aesthetes"; all the PreRaphaelites know them by heart. I

place them here as the most precious ornament of this book. You will agree that nothing more sublime has

Margaritone, full of years and labours, went one day to visit the studio of a young painter who had lately

settled in the town. He noticed in the studio a freshly painted Madonna, which, although severe and rigid,

nevertheless, by a certain exactness in the proportions and a devilish mingling of light and shade, assumed an

appearance of relief and life. At this sight the artless and sublime worker of Arezzo perceived with horror

what the future of painting would be. With his brow clasped in his hands he exclaimed:

"What things of shame does not this figure show forth! I discern in it the end of that Christian art which

paints the soul and inspires the beholder with an ardent desire for heaven. Future painters will not restrain

themselves as does this one to portraying on the side of a wall or on a wooden panel the cursed matter of

which our bodies are formed; they will celebrate and glorify it. They will clothe their figures with dangerous

appearances of flesh, and these figures will seem like real persons. Their bodies will be seen; their forms will

appear through their clothing. St. Magdalen will have a bosom. St. Martha a belly, St. Barbara hips, St. Agnes

buttocks; St. Sebastian will unveil his youthful beauty, and St. George will display beneath his armour the

muscular wealth of a robust virility; apostles, confessors, doctors, and God the Father himself will appear as

ordinary beings like you and me; the angels will affect an equivocal, ambiguous, mysterious beauty which

will trouble hearts. What desire for heaven will these representations impart? None; but from them you will

learn to take pleasure in the forms of terrestrial life. Where will painters stop in their indiscreet inquiries?

They will stop nowhere. They will go so far as to show men and women naked like the idols of the Romans.

There will be a sacred art and a profane art, and the sacred art will not be less profane than the other."

"Get ye behind me, demons," exclaimed the old master. For in prophetic vision he saw the righteous and the

saints assuming the appearance of melancholy athletes. He saw Apollos playing the lute on a flowery hill, in

the midst of the Muses wearing light tunics. He saw Venuses lying under shady myrtles and the Danae

exposing their charming sides to the golden rain. He saw pictures of Jesus under the pillar's of the temple

amidst patricians, fair ladies, musicians, pages, negroes, dogs, and parrots. He saw in an inextricable

confusion of human limbs, outspread wings, and flying draperies, crowds of tumultuous Nativities, opulent

Holy Families, emphatic Crucifixions. He saw St. Catherines, St. Barbaras, St. Agneses humiliating

patricians by the sumptuousness of their velvets, their brocades, and their pearls, and by the splendour of their

breasts. He saw Auroras scattering roses, and a multitude of naked Dianas and Nymphs surprised on the

banks of retired streams. And the great Margaritone died, strangled by so horrible a presentiment of the

We possess a precious monument of the Penguin literature of the fifteenth century. It is a narrative of a

journey to hell undertaken by the monk Marbodius, of the order of St. Benedict, who professed a fervent

admiration for the poet Virgil. This narrative, written in fairly good Latin, has been published by M. du Clos

des Limes. It is here translated for the first time. I believe that I am doing a service to my fellowcountrymen

in making them acquainted with these pages, though doubtless they are far from forming a unique example of

this class of mediaeval Latin literature. Among the fictions that may be compared with them we may mention

"The Voyage of St. Brendan," "The Vision of Albericus," and "St. Patrick's Purgatory," imaginary

descriptions, like Dante Alighieri's "Divine Comedy," of the supposed abode of the dead. The narrative of

Marbodius is one of the latest works dealing with this theme, but it is not the least singular.

In the fourteen hundred and fiftythird year of the incarnation of the Son of God, a few days before the

enemies of the Cross entered the city of Helena and the great Constantine, it was given to me, Brother

Marbodius, an unworthy monk, to see and to hear what none had hitherto seen or heard. I have composed a

faithful narrative of those things so that their memory may not perish with me, for man's time is short.

On the first day of May in the aforesaid year, at the hour of vespers, I was seated in the Abbey of Corrigan on

a stone in the cloisters and, as my custom was, I read the verses of the poet whom I love best of all, Virgil,

who has sung of the labours: of the field, of shepherds, and of heroes. Evening was hanging its purple folds

from the arches of the cloisters and in a voice of emotion I was murmuring the verses which describe how

Dido, the Phoenician queen, wanders with her everbleeding wound beneath the myrtles of hell. At that

moment Brother Hilary happened to pass by, followed by Brother Jacinth, the porter.

Brought up in the barbarous ages before the resurrection of the Muses, Brother Hilary has not been initiated

into the wisdom of the ancients; nevertheless, the poetry of the Mantuan has, like a subtle torch, shed some

"Brother Marbodius," he asked me, "do those verses that you utter with swelling breast and sparkling

eyesdo they belong to that great 'Aeneid' from which morning or evening your glances are never

I answered that I was reading in Virgil how the son of Anchises perceived Dido like a moon behind the

. . .qualem primo qui syrgere mense Aut videt aut vidisse putat per nubila lunam.

Brother Marbodius, by a strange misunderstanding, substitutes an entirely different image for the one created

"Brother Marbodius," he replied, "I am certain that on all occasions Virgil gives expression to wise maxims

and profound thoughts. But the songs that he modulates on his Syracusan flute hold such a lofty meaning and

"Take care, father," cried Brother Jacinth, in an agitated voice. "Virgil was a magician who wrought marvels

by the help of demons. It is thus he pierced through a mountain near Naples and fashioned a bronze horse that

had power to heal all the diseases of horses. He was a necromancer, and there is still shown, in a certain town

in Italy, the mirror in which he made the dead appear. And yet a woman deceived this great sorcerer. A

Neapolitan courtesan invited him to hoist himself up to her window in the basket that was used to bring the

"Virgil is a prophet," he replied, "and a prophet who leaves far behind him the sibyls with their sacred verses

as well as the daughter of King Priam, and that great diviner of future things, Plato of Athens. You will find

in the fourth of his Syracusan cantos the birth of our Lord foretold in a lancune that seems of heaven rather

than of earth.* In the time of my early studies, when I read for the first time JAM REDIT ET VIRGO, I felt

myself bathed in an infinite delight, but I immediately experienced intense grief at the thought that, for ever

deprived of the presence of God, the author of this prophetic verse, the noblest that has come from human

lips, was pining among the heathen in eternal darkness. This cruel thought did not leave me. It pursued me

even in my studies, my prayers, my meditations, and my ascetic labours. Thinkin that Virgil was deprived of

the sight of God and that possibly he might even be suffering the fate of the reprobate in hell, I could neither

enjoy peace nor rest, and I went so far as to exclaim several times a day with my arms outstretched to heaven:

" 'Reveal to me, O Lord, the lot thou hast assigned to him who sang on earth as the angels sing in heaven!'

*Three centuries before the epoch in which our Marbodius lived the words Maro, vates gentilium Da

"After some years my anguish ceased when I read in an old book that the great apostle St. Paul, who called

the Gentiles into the Church of Christ, went to Naples and sanctified with his tears the tomb of the prince of

poets.* This was some ground for believing that Virgil, like the Emperor Trajan, was admitted to Paradise

because even in error he had a presentiment of the truth. We are not compelled to believe it, but I can easily

*Ad maronis mausoleum Ductus, fudit super eum Piae rorem lacrymae. Quem te, intuit, reddidissem, Si te

Having thus spoken, old Hilary wished me the peace of a holy night and went away with Brother Jacinth.

I resumed the delightful study of my poet. Book in hand, I meditated upon the way in which those whom

Love destroys with its cruel malady wander through the secret paths in the depth of the myrtle forest, and, as

I meditated, the quivering reflections of the stars came and mingled with those of the leafless eglantines in the

waters of the cloister fountain. Suddenly the lights and the perfumes and the stillness of the sky were

overwhelmed, a fierce Northwind charged with storm and darkness burst roaring upon me. It lifted me up and

carried me like a wisp of straw over fields, cities, rivers, and mountains, and through the midst of

thunderclouds, during a long night composed of a whole series of nights and days. And when, after this

prolonged and cruel rage, the hurricane was at last stilled, I found myself far from my native land at the

bottom of a valley bordered by cypress trees. Then a woman of wild beauty, trailing long garments behind

her, approached me. She placed her left hand on my shoulder, and, pointing her right arm to an oak with thick

Immediately I recognised the Sibyl who guards the sacred wood of Avernus, and I discerned the fair

Proserpine's beautiful golden twig amongst the tufted boughs of the tree to which her finger pointed.

"O prophetic Virgin," I exclaimed, "thou hast comprehended my desire and thou hast satisfied it in this way.

Thou hast revealed to me the tree that bears the shining twig without which none can enter alive into the

dwellingplace of the dead. And in truth, eagerly did I long to converse with the shade of Virgil."

Having said this, I snatched the golden branch from its ancient trunk and I advanced without fear into the

smoking gulf that leads to the miry banks of the Styx, upon which the shades are tossed about like dead

leaves. At sight of the branch dedicated to Proserpine, Charon took me in his bark, which groaned beneath

my weight, and I alighted on the shores of the dead, and was greeted by the mute baying of the threefold

Cerberus. I pretended to throw the shade of a stone at him, and the vain monster fled into his cave. There,

amidst the rushes, wandered the souls of those children whose eyes had but opened and shut to the kindly

light of day, and there in a gloomy cavern Minos judges men. I penetrated into the myrtle wood in which the

victims of love wander languishing, Phaedra, Procris, the sad Eriphyle, Evadne, Pasiphae, Laodamia, and

Cenis, and the Phoenician Dido. Then I went through the dusty plains reserved for famous warriors. Beyond

them open two ways. That to the left leads to Tartarus, the abode of the wicked. I took that to the right, which

leads to Elysium and to the dwellings of Dis. Having hung the sacred branch at the goddess's door, I reached

pleasant fields flooded with purple light. The shades of philosophers and poets hold grave converse there.

The Graces and the Muses formed sprightly choirs upon the grass. Old Homer sang, accompanying himself

upon his rustic lyre. His eyes were closed, but divine images shone upon his lips. I saw Solon, Democritus,

and Pythagoras watching the games of the young men in the meadow, and, through the foliage of an ancient

laurel, I perceived also Hesiod, Orpheus, the melancholy Euripides, and the masculine Sappho. I passed and

recognised, as they sat on the bank of a fresh rivulet, the poet Horace, Varius, Gallus, and Lycoris. A little

apart, leaning against the trunk of a dark holmoak, Virgil was gazing pensively at the grove. Of lofty stature,

though spare, he still preserved that swarthy complexion, that rustic air, that negligent bearing, and

unpolished appearance which during his lifetime concealed his genius. I saluted him piously and remained for

"O thou, so dear to the Ausonian Muses, thou honour of the Latin name, Virgil," cried I, "it is through thee I

have known what beauty is, it is through thee I have known what the tables of the gods and the beds of the

"Arise, stranger," answered the divine poet. "I perceive that thou art a living being among the shades, and that

thy body treads down the grass in this eternal evening. Thou art not the first man who has descended before

his death into these dwellings, although all intercourse between us and the living is difficult. But cease from

praise; I do not like eulogies and the confused sounds of glory have always offended my ears. That is why I

fled from Rome, where I was known to the idle and curious, and laboured in the solitude of my beloved

Parthenope. And then I am not so convinced that the men of thy generation understand my verses that should

"I am called Marbodius of the Kingdom of Alca. I made my profession in the Abbey of Corrigan. I read thy

poems by day and I read them by night. It is thee whom I have come to see in Hell; I was impatient to know

what thy fate was. On earth the learned often dispute about it. Some hold it probable that, having lived under

the power of demons, thou art now burning in inextinguishable flames; others, more cautious, pronounce no

opinion, believing that all which is said concerning the dead is uncertain and full of lies; several, though not

in truth the ablest, maintain that, because thou didst elevate the tone of the Sicilian Muses and foretell that a

new progeny would descend from heaven, thou wert admitted, like the Emperor Trajan, to enjoy eternal

"I meet thee in truth, O Virgil, among the heroes and sages in those Elysian Fields which thou thyself hast

described. Thus, contrary to what several on earth believe, no one has come to seek thee on the part of Him

"I will conceal nought from thee. He sent for me; one of his messengers, a simple man, came to say that I was

expected, and that, although I had not been initiated into their mysteries, in consideration of my prophetic

verses, a place had been reserved for me among those of the new sect. But I refused to accept that invitation; I

had no desire to change my lace. I did so not because I share the admiration of the Greeks for the Elysian

fields, or because I taste here those joys which caused Proserpine to lose the remembrance of her mother. I

never believed much myself in what I say about these things in the 'Aeneid.' I was instructed by philosophers

and men of science and I had a correct foreboding of the truth. Life in hell is extremely attenuated; we feel

neither pleasure nor pain; we are as if we were not. The dead have no existence here except such as the living

"I gave excellent ones. I said to the messenger of the god that I did not deserve the honour he brought me, and

that a meaning had been given to my verses which they did not bear. In truth I have not in my fourth Eclogue

betrayed the faith of my ancestors. Some ignorant Jews alone have interpreted in favour of a barbarian god a

verse which celebrates the return of the golden age predicted by the Sibylline oracles. I excused myself then

on the ground that I could not occupy a place which was destined for me in error and to which I recognised

that I had no right. Then I alleged my disposition and my tastes, which do not accord with the customs of the

"'I am not unsociable,' said I to this man. 'I have shown in life a complaisant and easy disposition, although

the extreme simplicity of my habits caused me to be suspected of avarice. I kept nothing for myself alone. My

library was open to all and I have conformed my conduct to that fine saying of Euripides, "all ought to be

common among friends." Those praises that seemed obtrusive when I myself received them became

agreeable to me when addressed to Varius or to Macer. But at bottom I am rustic and uncultivated. I take

pleasure in the society of animals; I was so zealous in observing them and took so much care of them that I

was regarded, not altogether wrongly, as a good veterinary surgeon. I am told that the people of thy sect

claim an immortal soul for themselves, but refuse one to the animals. That is a piece of nonsense that makes

me doubt their judgment. Perhaps I love the flocks and the shepherds a little too much. That would not seem

right amongst you. There is a maxim to which I endeavour to conform my actions, "Nothing too much." More

even than my feeble health my philosophy teaches me to use things with measure. I am sober; a lettuce and

some olives with a drop of Falernian wine form all my meals. I have, indeed, to some extent gone with

strange women, but I have not delayed over long in taverns to watch the young Syrians dance to the sound of

the crotalum.* But if I have restrained my desires it was for my own satisfaction and for the sake of good

discipline. To fear pleasure and to fly from joy appears to me the worst insult that one can offer to nature. I

am assured that during their lives certain of the elect of thy god abstained from food and avoided women

through love of asceticism, and voluntarily exposed themselves to useless sufferings. I should be afraid of

meeting those, criminals whose frenzy horrifies me. A poet must not be asked to attach himself too strictly to

any scientific or moral doctrine. Moreover, I am a Roman, and the Romans, unlike the Greeks, are unable to

pursue profound speculations in a subtle manner. If they adopt a philosophy it is above all in order to derive

some practical advantages from it. Siro, who enjoyed great renown among us, taught me the system of

Epicurus and thus freed me from vain terrors and turned me aside from the cruelties to which religion

persuades ignorant men. I have embraced the views of Pythagoras concerning the souls of men and animals,

both of which are of divine essence; this invites us to look upon ourselves without pride and without shame. I

have learnt from the Alexandrines how the earth, at first soft and without form, hardened in proportion as

Nereus withdrew himself from it to dig his humid dwellings; I have learned how things were formed

insensibly; in what manner the rains, falling from the burdened clouds, nourished the silent forests, and by

what progress a few animals at last began to wander over the nameless mountains. I could not accustom

myself to your cosmogony either, for it seems to me fitter for a cameldriver on the Syrian sands than for a

disciple of Aristarchus of Samos. And what would become of me in the abode of your beatitude if I did not

find there my friends, my ancestors, my masters, and my gods, and if it is not given to me to see Rhea's noble

son, or Venus, mother of Aeneas, with her winning smile, or Pan, or the young Dryads, or the Sylvans, or old

Silenus, with his face stained by Aegle's purple mulberries.' These are the reasons which I begged that simple

* This phrase seems to indicate that, if one is to believe Macrobius, the "Copa" is by Virgil.

"To console themselves for thy absence, O Virgil, they have three poets, Commodianus, Prudentius, and

Fortunatus, who were all three born in those dark plays when neither prosody nor grammar were known. But

tell me, O Mantuan, hast thou never received other intelligence of the God whose company thou didst so

"Hast thou not told me that I am not the first who descended alive into these abodes and presented himself

"Thou dost remind me of it. A century and a half ago, or so it seems to me (it is difficult to reckon days and

years amid the shades), my profound peace was intruded upon by a strange visitor. As I was wandering

beneath the gloomy foliage that borders the Styx, I saw rising before me a human form more opaque and

darker than that of the inhabitants of these shores. I recognised a living person. He was of high stature, thin,

with an aquiline nose, sharp chin, and hollow cheeks. His dark eyes shot forth fire; a red hood girt with a

crown of laurels bound his lean brows. His bones pierced through the tight brown cloak that descended to his

heels. He saluted me with deference, tempered by a sort of fierce pride, and addressed me in a speech more

obscure and incorrect than that of those Gauls with whom the divine Julius filled both his legions and the

Curia. At last I understood that he had been born near Fiesole, in an ancient Etruscan colony that Sulla had

founded on the banks of the Arno, and which had prospered; that he had obtained municipal honours, but that

he had thrown himself vehemently into the sanguinary quarrels which arose between the senate, the knights,

and the people, that he had been defeated and banished, and now he wandered in exile throughout the world.

He described Italy to me as distracted by more wars and discords than in the time of my youth, and as sighing

anew for a second Augustus. I pitied his misfortune, remembering what I myself had formerly endured.

"An audacious spirit unceasingly disquieted him, and his mind harboured great thoughts, but alas! his

rudeness and ignorance displayed the triumph of barbarism. He knew neither poetry, nor science, nor even

the tongue of the Greeks, and he was ignorant, too, of the ancient traditions concerning the origin of the

world and the nature of the gods. He bravely repeated fables which in my time would have brought smiles to

the little children who were not yet old enough to pay for admission at the baths. The vulgar easily believe in

monsters. The Etruscans especially peopled hell with demons, hideous as a sick man's dreams. That they have

not abandoned their childish imaginings after so many centuries is explained by the continuation and progress

of ignorance and misery, but that one of their magistrates whose mind is raised above the common level

should share these popular illusions and should be frightened by the hideous demons that the inhabitants of

that country painted on the walls of their tombs in the time of Porsenathat is something which might

sadden even a sage. My Etruscan visitor repeated verses to me which he had composed in a new dialect,

called by him the vulgar tongue, the sense of which I could not understand. My ears were more surprised than

charmed as I heard him repeat the same sound three or four times at regular intervals in his efforts to mark the

rhythm. That artifice did not seem ingenious to me; but it is not for the dead to judge of novelties.

"But I do not reproach this colonist of Sulla, born in an unhappy time, for making inharmonious verses or for

being, if it be possible, as bad a poet as Bavius or Maevius. I have grievances against him which touch me

more closely. The thing is monstrous and scarcely credible, but when this man returned to earth he

disseminated the most odious lies about me. He affirmed in several passages of his barbarous poems that I

had served him as a guide in the modern Tartarus, a place I know nothing of. He insolently proclaimed that I

had spoken of the gods of Rome as false and lying gods, and that I held as the true God the present successor

of Jupiter. Friend, when thou art restored to the kindly light of day and beholdest again thy native land,

contradict those abominable falsehoods. Say to thy people that the singer of the pious Aeneas has never

worshipped the god of the Jews. I am assured that his power is declining and that his approaching fall is

manifested by undoubted indications. This news would give me some pleasure if one could rejoice in these

He spoke, and with a gesture of farewell he went away. I beheld his. shade gliding over the asphodels without

bending their stalks. I saw that it became fainter and vaguer as it receded farther from me, and it vanished

before it reached the wood of evergreen laurels. Then I understood the meaning of the words, "The dead have

no life, but that which the living lend them," and I walked slowly through the pale meadow to the gate of

* There is in Marbodius's narrative a passage very worthy of notice, viz., that in which the monk of Corrigan

describes Dante Alighieri such as we picture him to ourselves today. The miniatures in a very old

manuscript of the "Divine Comedy," the "Codex Venetianus," represent the poet as a little fat man clad in a

short tunic, the skirts of which fall above his knees. As for Virgil, he still wears the philosophical beard, in

One would not have thought either that Marbodius, or even Virgil, could have known the Etruscan tombs of

Chiusi and Corneto, where, in fact, there are horrible and burlesque devils closely resembling those of

Orcagna. Nevertheless, the authenticity of the "Descent of Marbodius into Hell" is indisputable. M. du Clos

des Lunes has firmly established it. To doubt it would be to doubt palaeography itself.

At that time, whilst Penguinia was still plunged in ignorance and barbarism, Giles Birdcatcher, a Franciscan

monk, known by his writings under the name Aegidius Aucupis, devoted himself with indefatigable zeal to

the study of letters and the sciences. He gave his nights to mathematics and music, which he called the two

adorable sisters, the harmonious daughters of Number and Imagination. He was versed in medicine and

astrology. He was suspected of practising magic, and it seemed true that he wrought metamorphoses and

The monks of his convent, finding in his cell Greek books which they could not read, imagined them to be

conjuringbooks, and denounced their too learned brother as a wizard. Aegidius Aucupis fled, and reached

the island of Ireland, where he lived for thirty studious years. He went from monastery to monastery,

searching for and copying the Greek and Latin manuscripts which they contained. He also studied physics

and alchemy. He acquired a universal knowledge and discovered notable secrets concerning animals, plants,

and stones. He was found one day in the company of a very beautiful woman who sang to her own

accompaniment on the lute, and who was afterwards discovered to be a machine which he had himself

He often crossed the Irish Sea to go into the land of Wales and to visit the libraries of the monasteries there.

During one of these crossings, as he remained during the night on the bridge of the ship, he saw beneath the

waters two sturgeons swimming side by side. He had very good hearing and he knew the language of fishes.

"The man in the moon, whom we have often seen carrying fagots on his shoulders, has fallen into the sea.

"And in the silver disc there will be seen the image of two lovers kissing each other on the mouth."

Some years later, having returned to his native country, Aegidius Aucupis found that ancient learning had

been restored. Manners had softened. Men no longer pursued the nymphs of the fountains, of the woods, and

of the mountains with their insults. They placed images of the Muses and of the modest Graces in their

gardens, and they rendered her former honours to the Goddess with ambrosial lips, the joy of men and gods.

They were becoming reconciled to nature. They trampled vain terrors beneath their feet and raised their eyes

to heaven without fearing, as they formerly did, to read signs of anger and threats of damnation in the skies.

At this spectacle Aegidius Aucupis remembered what the two sturgeons of the sea of Erin had foretold.

Aegidius Aucupis, the Erasmus of the Penguins, was not mistaken; his age was an age of free inquiry. But

that great man mistook the elegances of the humanists for softness of manners, and he did not foresee the

effects that the awaking of intelligence would have amongst the Penguins. It brought about the religious

Reformation; Catholics massacred Protestants and Protestants massacred Catholics. Such were the first

results of liberty of thought. The Catholics prevailed in Penguinia. But the spirit of inquiry had penetrated

among them without their knowing it. They joined reason to faith, and claimed that religion had been

divested of the superstitious practices that dishonoured it, just as in later days the booths that the cobblers,

hucksters, and dealers in old clothes had built against the walls of the cathedrals were cleared away. The

word, legend, which at first indicated what the faithful ought to read, soon suggested the idea of pious fables

The saints had to suffer from this state of mind. An obscure canon called Princeteau, a very austere and

crabbed man, designated so great a number of them as not worthy of having their days observed, that he was

surnamed the exposer of the saints. He did not think, for instance, that if St. Margaret's prayer were applied as

a poultice to a woman in travail that the pains of childbirth would be softened.

Even the venerable patron saint of Penguinia did not escape his rigid criticism. This is what he says of her in

"Nothing is more uncertain than the history, or even the existence, of St. Orberosia. An ancient anonymous

annalist, a monk of Dombes, relates that a woman called Orberosia was possessed by the devil in a cavern

where, even down to his own days, the little boys and girls of the village used to play at a sort of game

representing the devil and the fair Orberosia. He adds that this woman became the concubine of a horrible

dragon, who ravaged the country. Such a statement is hardly credible, but the history of Orberosia, as it has

since been related, seems hardly more worthy of belief. The life of that saint by the Abbot Simplicissimus is

three hundred years later than the pretended events which it relates and that author shows himself excessively

Suspicion attacked even the supernatural origin of the Penguins. The historian Ovidius Capito went so far as

to deny the miracle of their transformation. He thus begins his "Annals of Penguinia":

"A dense obscurity envelopes this history, and it would be no exaggeration to say that it is a tissue of puerile

fables and popular tales. The Penguins claim that they are descended from birds who were baptized by St.

Mael and whom God changed into men at the intercession of that glorious apostle. They hold that, situated at

first in the frozen ocean, their island, floating like Delos, was brought to anchor in these heavenfavoured

seas, of which it is today the queen. I conclude that this myth is a reminiscence of the ancient migrations of

In the following century, which was that of the philosophers, scepticism became still more acute. No further

evidence of it is needed than the following celebrated passage from the "Moral Essay":

"Arriving we know not from whence (for indeed their origins are not very clear), and successively invaded

and conquered by four or five peoples from the north, south, east, and west, miscegenated, interbred,

amalgamated, and commingled, the Penguins boast of the purity of their race, and with justice, for they have

become a pure race. This mixture of all mankind, red, black, yellow, and white, roundheaded and

longheaded, as formed in the course of ages a fairly homogeneous human family, and one which is

"This idea that they belong to the best race in the world, and that they are its finest family, inspires them with

"The life of a people is but a succession of miseries, crimes, and follies. This is true of the Penguin nation, as

of all other nations. Save for this exception its history is admirable from beginning to end."

The two classic ages of the Penguins are too wellknown for me to lay stress upon them. But what has not

been sufficiently noticed is the way in which the rationalist theologians such as Canon Princeteau called into

existence the unbelievers of the succeeding age. The former employed their reason to destroy what did not

seem to them, essential to their religion; they only left untouched the most rigid article of faith. Their

intellectual successors, being taught by them how to make use of science and reason, employed them against

whatever beliefs remained. Thus rational theology engendered natural philosophy.

That is why (if I may turn from the Penguins of former days to the Sovereign Pontiff, who, today governs

the universal Church) we cannot admire too greatly the wisdom of Pope Pius X. in condemning the study of

exegesis as contrary to revealed truth, fatal to sound theological doctrine, and deadly to the faith. Those

clerics who maintain the rights of science in opposition to him are pernicious doctors and pestilent teachers,

and the faithful who approve of them are lacking in either mental or moral ballast.

At the end of the age of philosophers, the ancient kingdom of Penguinia was utterly destroyed, the king put to

death, the privileges of the nobles abolished, and a Republic proclaimed in the midst of public misfortunes

and while a terrible war was raging. The assembly which then governed Penguinia ordered all the metal

articles contained in the churches to be melted down. The patriots even desecrated the tombs of the kings. It

is said that when the tomb of Draco the Great was opened, that king presented an appearance as black as

ebony and so majestic that those who profaned his corpse fled in terror. According to other accounts, these

churlish men insulted him by putting a pipe in his mouth and derisively offering him a glass of wine.

On the seventeenth day of the month of Mayflowers, the shrine of 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

townhall 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 rockcrystal, 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 townhall, 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

"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

"I tell you, Rouquin, that sooner or later they will regret what they are doing today. They illtreat 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

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

The sovereign Nation had taken possession of the lands of the nobility and clergy to sell them at a low price

to the middle classes and the peasants. The middle classes and the peasants thought that the revolution was a

The legislators of the Republic made terrible laws for the defence of property, and decreed death to anyone

who should propose a division of wealth. But that did not avail the Republic. The peasants who had become

proprietors bethought themselves that though it had made them rich, the Republic had nevertheless caused a

disturbance to wealth, and they desired a system more respectful of private property and more capable of

They had not long to wait. The Republic, like Agrippina, bore her destroyer in her bosom.

Having great wars to carry on, it created military forces, and these were destined both to save it and to

destroy it. Its legislators thought they could restrain their generals by the fear of punishment, but if they

sometimes cut off the heads of unlucky soldiers they could not do the same to the fortunate soldiers who

In the enthusiasm of victory the renovated Penguins delivered themselves up to a dragon, more terrible than

that of their fables, who, like a stork amongst frogs, devoured them for fourteen years with his insatiable

Half a century after the reign of the new dragon a young Maharajah of Malay, called Djambi, desirous, like

the Scythian Anacharsis, of instructing himself by travel, visited Penguinia and wrote an interesting account

After a voyage of ninety days I landed at the vast and deserted port of the Penguins and travelled over

untilled fields to their ruined capital. Surrounded by ramparts and full of barracks and arsenals it had a martial

though desolate appearance. Feeble and crippled men wandered proudly through the streets, wearing old

"What do you want?" I was rudely asked at the gate of the city by a soldier whose moustaches pointed to the

"No, sir, it is an insula. It was formerly called an island, but for a century it has been decreed that it shall bear

the name of insula. It is the only insula in the whole universe. Have you a passport?"

"The insula," said he, "has given birth, as you know, to Trinco, the greatest genius of the universe, whose

statue you see before you. That obelisk standing to your right commemorates Trinco's birth; the column that

rises to your left has Trinco crowned with a diadem upon its summit. You see here the triumphal arch

"That may be, but Trinco is the greatest warrior of all countries and all times. There never existed a greater

conqueror than he. As you anchored in our port you saw to the east a volcanic island called Ampelophoria,

shaped like a cone, and of small size, but renowned for its wines. And to the west a larger island which raises

to the sky a long range of sharp teeth; for this reason it is called the Dog's Jaws. It is rich in copper mines. We

possessed both before Trinco's reign and they were the boundaries of our empire. Trinco extended the

Penguin dominion over the Archipelago of the Turquoises and the Green Continent, subdued the gloomy

Porpoises, and planted his flag amid the icebergs of the Pole and on the burning sands of the African deserts.

He raised troops in all the countries he conquered, and when his armies marched past in the wake of our own

light infantry, our island grenadiers, our hussars, our dragoons, our artillery, and our engineers there were to

be seen yellow soldiers looking in their blue armour like crayfish standing on their tails; red men with parrots'

plumes, tattooed with solar and Phallic emblems, and with quivers of poisoned arrows resounding on their

backs; naked blacks armed only with their teeth and nails; pygmies riding on cranes; gorillas carrying trunks

of trees and led by an old ape who wore upon his hairy breast the cross of the Legion of Honour. And all

those troops, led to Trinco's banner by the most ardent patriotism, flew on from victory to victory, and in

"Trinco conquered it for us, and Trinco lost it to us. As great in his defeats as in his victories he surrendered

all that he had conquered. He even allowed those two islands we possessed before his time, Ampelophoria

and the Dog's Jaws, to be taken from us. He left Penguinia impoverished and depopulated. The flower of the

insula perished in his wars. At the time of his fall there were left in our country none but the hunchbacks and

After a succession of amazing vicissitudes, the memory of which is in great part lost by the wrongs of time

and the bad style of historians, the Penguins established the government of the Penguins by themselves. They

elected a diet or assembly, and invested it with the privilege of naming the Head of the State. The latter,

chosen from among the simple Penguins, wore no formidable monster's crest upon his head and exercised no

absolute authority over the people. He was himself subject to the laws of the nation. He was not given the

title of king, and no ordinal number followed his name. He bore such names as Paturle, Janvion, Traffaldin,

Coquenhot, and Bredouille. These magistrates did not make war. They were not suited for that.

The new state received the name of Public Thing or Republic. Its partisans were called republicanists or

republicans. They were also named Thingmongers and sometimes Scamps, but this latter name was taken in

The Penguin democracy did not itself govern. It obeyed a financial oligarchy which formed opinion by means

of the newspapers, and held in its hands the representatives, the ministers, and the president. It controlled the

finances of the republic, and directed the foreign affairs of the country as if it were possessed of sovereign

Empires and kingdoms in those days kept up enormous fleets. Penguinia, compelled to do as they did, sank

under the pressure of her armaments. Everybody deplored or pretended to deplore so grievous a necessity.

However, the rich, and those engaged in business or affairs, submitted to it with a good heart through a spirit

of patriotism, and because they counted on the soldiers and sailors to defend their goods at home and to

acquire markets and territories abroad. The great manufacturers encouraged the making of cannons and ships

through a zeal for the national defence and in order to obtain orders. Among the citizens of middle rank and

of the liberal professions some resigned themselves to this state of affairs without complaining, believing that

it would last for ever; others waited impatiently for its end and thought they might be able to lead the powers

"War," said he, "is a barbarity to which the progress of civilization will put an end. The great democracies are

Professor Obnubile, who had for sixty years led a solitary and retired life in his laboratory, whither external

noises did not penetrate, resolved to observe the spirit of the peoples for himself. He began his studies with

After a voyage of fifteen days his steamer entered, during the night, the harbour of Titanport, where

thousands of ships were anchored. An iron bridge thrown across the water and shining with lights, stretched

between two piers so far apart that Professor Obnubile imagined he was sailing on the seas of Saturn and that

he saw the marvellous ring which girds the planet of the Old Man. And this immense conduit bore upon it

more than a quarter of the wealth of the world. The learned Penguin, having disembarked, was waited on by

automatons in a hotel fortyeight stories high. Then he took the great railway that led to Gigantopolis, the

capital of New Atlantis. In the train there were restaurants, gamingrooms, athletic arenas, telegraphic,

commercial, and financial offices, a Protestant Church, and the printingoffice of a great newspaper, which

latter the doctor was unable to read, as he did not know the language of the New Atlantans. The train passed

along the banks of great rivers, through manufacturing cities which concealed the sky with the smoke from

their chimneys, towns black in the day, towns red at night, full of noise by day and full of noise also by night.

"Here," thought the doctor, "is a people far too much engaged in industry and trade to make war. I am already

certain that the New Atlantans pursue a policy of peace. For it is an axiom admitted by all economists that

peace without and peace within are necessary for the progress of commerce and industry."

As he surveyed Gigantopolis, he was confirmed in this opinion. People went through the streets so swiftly

propelled by hurry that they knocked down all who were in their way. Obnubile was thrown down several

times, but soon succeeded in learning how to demean himself better; after an hour's walking he himself

Having reached a great square he saw the portico of a palace in the Classic style, whose Corinthian columns

reared their capitals of arborescent acanthus seventy metres above the stylobate.

As he stood with his head thrown back admiring the building, a man of modest appearance approached him

"I see by your dress that you are from Penguinia. I know your language; I am a sworn interpreter. This is the

Parliament palace. At the present moment the representatives of the States are in deliberation. Would you like

The doctor was brought into the hall and cast his looks upon the crowd of legislators who were sitting on

The president arose and, in the midst of general inattention, muttered rather than spoke the following

"The war for the opening of the Mongol markets being ended to the satisfaction of the States, I propose that

"The war for the opening of the markets of ThirdZealand being ended to the satisfaction of the States, I

"Have I heard aright?" asked Professor Obnubile. "What? you an industrial people and engaged in all these

"Certainly," answered the interpreter, "these are industrial wars. Peoples who have neither commerce nor

industry are not obliged to make war, but a business people is forced to adopt a policy of conquest. The

number of wars necessarily increases with our productive activity. As soon as one of our industries fails to

find a market for its products a war is necessary to open new outlets. It is in this way we have had a coal war,

a copper war, and a cotton war. In ThirdZealand we have killed twothirds of the inhabitants in order to

At that moment a fat man who was sitting in the middle of the assembly ascended the tribune.

"I claim," said he, "a war against the Emerald Republic, which insolently contends with our pigs for the

"Is there any opposition?" said the President. "I put the proposition to the vote."

The war against the Emerald Republic was voted with uplifted hands by a very large majority.

"What?" said Obnubile to the interpreter; "you have voted a war with that rapidity and that indifference!"

"Since wealth and civilization admit of as many causes of wars as poverty and barbarism, since the folly and

wickedness of men are incurable, there remains but one good action to be done. The wise man will collect

enough dynamite to blow up this planet. When its fragments fly through space an imperceptible amelioration

will be accomplished in the universe and a satisfaction will be given to the universal conscience. Moreover,

Every system of government produces people who are dissatisfied. The Republic or Public Thing produced

them at first from among the nobles who had been despoiled of their ancient privileges. These looked with

regret and hope to Prince Crucho, the last of the Draconides, a prince adorned both with the grace of youth

and the melancholy of exile. It also produced them from among the smaller traders, who, owing to profound

economic causes, no longer gained a livelihood. They believed that this was the fault of the republic which

they had at first adored and from which each day they were now becoming more detached. The financiers,

both Christians and Jews, became by their insolence and their cupidity the scourge of the country, which they

plundered and degraded, as well as the scandal of a government which they never troubled either to destroy

or preserve, so confident were they that they could operate without hindrance under all governments.

Nevertheless, their sympathies inclined to absolute power as the best protection against the socialists, their

puny but ardent adversaries. And just as they imitated the habits of the aristocrats, so they imitated their

political and religious sentiments. Their women, in particular, loved the Prince and had dreams of appearing

However, the Republic retained some partisans and defenders. If it was not in a position to believe in the

fidelity of its own officials it could at least still count on the devotion of the manual labourers, although it had

never relieved their misery. These came forth in crowds from their quarries and their factories to defend it,

and marched in long processions, gloomy, emaciated, and sinister. They would have died for it because it had

Now, under the Presidency of Theodore Formose, there lived in a peaceable suburb of Alca a monk called

Agaric, who kept a school and assisted in arranging marriages. In his school he taught fencing and riding to

the sons of old families, illustrious by their birth, but now as destitute of wealth as of privilege. And as soon

as they were old enough he married them to the daughters of the opulent and despised caste of financiers.

Tall, thin, and dark, Agaric used to walk in deep thought, with his breviary in his hand and his brow loaded

with care, through the corridors of the school and the alleys of the garden. His care was not limited to

inculcating in his pupils abstruse doctrines and mechanical precepts and to endowing them afterwards with

legitimate and rich wives. He entertained political designs and pursued the realisation of a gigantic plan. His

thought of thoughts and labour of labours was to overthrow the Republic. He was not moved to this by any

personal interest. He believed that a democratic state was opposed to the holy society to which body and soul

he belonged. And all the other monks, his brethren, thought the same. The Republic was perpetually at strife

with the congregation of monks and the assembly of the faithful. True, to plot the death of the new

government was a difficult and perilous enterprise. Still, Agaric was in a position to carry on a formidable

conspiracy. At that epoch, when the clergy guided the superior classes of the Penguins, this monk exercised a

All the young men whom he had brought up waited only for a favourable moment to march against the

popular power. The sons of the ancient families did not practise the arts or engage in business. They were

almost all soldiers and served the Republic. They served it, but they did not love it; they regretted the

dragon's crest. And the fair Jewesses shared in these regrets in order that they might be taken for Christians.

One July as he was walking in a suburban street which ended in some dusty fields, Agaric heard groans

coming from a mossgrown well that had been abandoned by the gardeners. And almost immediately he was

told by a cobbler of the neighbourhood that a ragged man who had shouted out "Hurrah for the Republic!"

had been thrown into the well by some cavalry officers who were passing, and had sunk up to his ears in the

mud. Agaric was quite ready to see a general significance in this particular fact. He inferred a great

fermentation in the whole aristocratic and military caste, and concluded that it was the moment to act.

The next day he went to the end of the Wood of Conils to visit the good Father Cornemuse. He found the

monk in his laboratory pouring a goldencoloured liquor into a still. He was a short, fat, little man, with

vermiliontinted cheeks and an elaborately polished bald head. His eyes had rubycoloured pupils like a

guineapig's. He graciously saluted his visitor and offered him a glass of the St. Orberosian liqueur, which he

Agaric made a gesture of refusal. Then, standing on his long feet and pressing his melancholy hat against his

"I am very satisfied with them," answered the teacher. "It is everything to be nurtured in sound principles. It

is necessary to have sound views before having any views at all, for afterwards it is too late. . . . Yes, I have

"Yet, Cornemuse, the mind of the public is not so entirely corrupted as it seems."

"The people are tired of a government that ruins them and does nothing for them. Every day fresh scandals

"He is an amiable young man and, I dare say, a worthy scion of an august stock. I pity him for having to

endure the pains of exile at so early an age. Spring has no flowers for the exile, and autumn no fruits. Prince

Crucho has sound views; he respects the clergy; he practises our religion; besides, he consumes a good deal

"Cornemuse, in many homes, both rich and poor, his return is hoped for. Believe me, he will come back."

Seeing that he held these sentiments, Agaric depicted to him the state of people's minds such as he himself

imagined them. He showed him the nobles and the rich exasperated against the popular government; the army

refusing to endure fresh insults; the officials willing to betray their chiefs; the people discontented, riot ready

to burst forth, and the enemies of the monks, the agents of the constituted authority, thrown into the wells of

"We can," he cried, "save the Penguin people, we can deliver it from its tyrants, deliver it from itself, restore

the Dragon's crest, reestablish the ancient State, the good State, for the honour of the faith and the exaltation

of the Church. We can do this if we will. We possess great wealth and we exert secret influences; by our

evangelistic and outspoken journals we communicate with all the ecclesiastics in towns and county alike, and

we inspire them with our own eager enthusiasm and our own burning faith. They will kindle their penitents

and their congregations. I can dispose of the chiefs of the army; I have an understanding with the men of the

people. Unknown to them I sway the minds of umbrella sellers, publicans, shopmen, gutter merchants,

newspaper boys, women of the streets, and police agents. We have more people on our side than we need.

"Of forming a vast conspiracy and overthrowing the Republic, of reestablishing Crucho on the throne of the

Cornemuse moistened his lips with his tongue several times. Then he said with unction:

"Certainly the restoration of the Draconides is desirable; it is eminently desirable; and for my part, desire it

with all my heart. As for the Republic, you know what I think of it. . . . But would it not te better to abandon

it to its fate and let it die of the vices of its own constitution? Doubtless, Agaric, what you propose is noble

and generous. It would be a fine thing to save this great and unhappy country, to reestablish it in its ancient

splendour. But reflect on it, we are Christians before we are Penguins. And we must take heed not to

"Fear nothing. We shall hold all the threads of the plot, but we ourselves shall remain in the background. We

"Take care. Perhaps the Republic is stronger than it seems. Possibly, too, by dragging it out of the nerveless

inertia in which it now rests we may only consolidate its forces. Its malice is great; if we attack it, it will

defend itself. It makes bad laws which hardly affect us; if it is frightened it will make terrible ones against us.

Let us not lightly engage in an adventure in which we may get fleeced. You think the opportunity a good one.

I don't, and I am going to tell you why. The present government is not yet known by everybody, that is to say,

it is known by nobody. It proclaims that it is the Public Thing, the common thing. The populace believes it

and remains democratic and Republican. But patience! This same people will one day demand that the public

thing be the people's thing. I need not tell you how insolent, unregulated, and contrary to Scriptural polity

such claims seem to me. But the people will make them, and enforce them, and then there will be an end of

the present government. The moment cannot now be far distant; and it is then that we ought to act in the

interests of our august body. Let us wait. What hurries us? Our existence is not in peril. It has not been

rendered absolutely intolerable to us. The Republic fails in respect and submission to us; it does not give the

priests the honours it owes them. But it lets us live. And such is the excellence of our position that with us to

live is to prosper. The Republic is hostile to us, but women revere us. President Formose does not assist at the

celebration of our mysteries, but I have seen his wife and daughters at my feet. They buy my phials by the

gross. I have no better clients even among the aristocracy. Let us say what there is to be said for it. There is

no country in the world as good for priests and monks as Penguinia. In what other country would you find

our virgin wax, our virile incense, our rosaries, our scapulars, our holy water, and our St. Orberosian liqueur

sold in such great quantities? What other people would, like the Penguins, give a hundred golden crowns for

a wave of our hands, a sound from our mouths, a movement of our lips? For my part, I gain a thousand times

more, in this pleasant, faithful, and docile Penguinia, by extracting the essence from a bundle of thyme, than I

could make by tiring my lungs with preaching the remission of sins in the most populous states of Europe and

America. Honestly, would Penguinia be better off if a police officer came to take me away from here and put

Having thus spoken, the monk of Conils got up and led his guest into a huge shed where hundreds of orphans

clothed in blue were packing bottles, nailing up cases, and gumming tickets. The ear was deafened by the

noise of hammers mingled with the dull rumbling of bales being placed upon the rails.

"It is from here that consignments are forwarded," said Cornemuse. "I have obtained from the government a

railway through the Wood and a station at my door. Every three days I fill a truck with my own products.

Agaric made a last effort to engage the wise distiller in his enterprise. He pointed him to a prompt, certain,

"Don't you wish to share in it?" he added. "Don't you wish to bring back your king from exile?"

"Exile is pleasant to men of good will," answered the monk of Conils. "If you are guided by me, my dear

Brother Agaric, you will give up your project for the present. For my own part I have no illusions. Whether or

Father Agaric took leave of his friend and went back satisfied to his school. "Cornemuse," thought he, "not

being able to prevent the plot, would like to make it succeed and he will give money." Agaric was not

deceived. Such, indeed, was the solidarity among priests and monks that the acts of a single one bound them

Agaric resolved to proceed without delay to Prince Crucho, who honoured him with his familiarity. In the

dusk of the evening he went out of his school by the side door, disguised as a cattle merchant and took

The next day he landed in Porpoisea, for it was at Chitterlings Castle on this hospitable soil that Crucho ate

Agaric met the Prince on the road driving in a motorcar with two young ladies at the rate of a hundred miles

an hour. When the monk saw him he shook his red umbrella and the prince stopped his car.

"Is it you, Agaric? Get in! There are already three of us, but we can make room for you. You can take one of

"On my first signal," said he, "all your partisans will rise at once. With cross in hand and habits girded up,

your venerable clergy will lead the armed crowd into Formose's palace. We shall carry terror and death

among your enemies. For a reward of our efforts we only ask of you, Sire, that you will not render them

useless. We entreat you to come and seat yourself on the throne that we shall prepare."

Agaric declared that he accepted this manly response. Although, contrary to his custom, he had a lady on his

knee, he adjured the young prince, with a sublime loftiness of soul, to be faithful to his royal duties.

"Sire," he cried, with tears in his eyes, "you will live to remember the day on which you have been restored

from exile, given back to your people, reestablished on the throne of your ancestors by the hands of your

monks, and crowned by them with the august crest of the Dragon. King Crucho, may you equal the glory of

The young prince threw himself with emotion on his restorer and attempted to embrace him, but he was

prevented from reaching him by the girth of the two ladies, so tightly packed were they all in that historic

In the mean time the motorcar rushed like a tornado through hamlets and villages, crushing hens, geese,

turkeys, ducks, guineafowls, cats, dogs, pigs, children, labourers, and women beneath its insatiable tyres.

And the pious Agaric turned over his great designs in his mind. His voice, coming from behind one of the

The dinner was sumptuous. They toasted the Dragon's crest. Everybody knows that a closed goblet is a sign

of sovereignty; so Prince Crucho and Princess Gudrune, his wife, drank out of goblets that were

coveredover like ciboriums. The prince had his filled several times with the wines of Penguinia, both white

Crucho had received a truly princely education, and he excelled in motoring, but was not ignorant of history

either. He was said to be well versed in the antiquities and famous deeds of his family; and, indeed, he gave a

notable proof of his knowledge in this respect. As they were speaking of the various remarkable peculiarities

"It is perfectly true," said he, "that Queen Crucha, whose name I bear, had the mark of a little monkey's head

During the evening Agaric had a decisive interview with three of the prince's oldest councillors. It was

decided to ask for funds from Crucho's fatherinlaw, as he was anxious to have a king for soninlaw, from

several Jewish ladies, who were impatient to become ennobled, and, finally, from the Prince Regent of the

Porpoises, who had promised his aid to the Draconides, thinking that by Crucho's restoration he would

weaken the Penguins, the hereditary enemies of his people. The three old councillors divided among

themselves the three chief offices of the Court, those of Chamberlain, Seneschal, and High Steward, and

authorised the monk to distribute the other places to the prince's best advantage.

"It is but too true," replied one of them, the Marquis of Sevenwounds, who had experience of revolutions.

There was dancing, and after the ball Princess Gudrune tore up her green robe to make cockades. With her

own hands she sewed a piece of it on the monk's breast, upon which he shed tears of sensibility and gratitude.

M. de Plume, the prince's equerry, set out the same evening to look for a green horse.

After his return to the capital of Penguinia, the Reverend Father Agaric disclosed his projects to Prince

The prince belonged to the highest nobility. The Torticol des Boscenos went back to Brian the Good, and

under the Draconides had held the highest offices in the kingdom. In 1179, Philip Torticol, High Admiral of

Penguinia, a brave, faithful, and generous, but vindictive man, delivered over the port of La Crique and the

Penguin fleet to the enemies of the kingdom, because he suspected that Queen Crucha, whose lover he was,

had been unfaithful to him and loved a stableboy. It was that great queen who gave to the Boscenos the

silver warmingpan which they bear in their arms. As for their motto, it only goes back to the sixteenth

century. The story of its origin is as follows: One gala night, as he mingled with the crowd of courtiers who

were watching the fireworks in the king's garden, Duke John des Boscenos approached the Duchess of Skull

and put his hand under the petticoat of that lady, who made no complaint at the gesture. The king, happening

to pass, surprised them and contented himself with saying, "And thus I find you." These four words became

Prince Adelestan had not degenerated from his ancestors. He preserved an unalterable fidelity for the race of

the Draconides and desired nothing so much as the restoration of Prince Crucho, an event which was in his

eyes to be the forerunner of the restoration of his own fortune. He therefore readily entered into the

Reverend Father Agaric's plans. He joined himself at once to the monk's projects, and hastened to put him

into communication with the most loyal Royalists of his acquaintance, Count Clena, M. de La Trumelle,

Viscount Olive, and M. Bigourd. They met together one night in the Duke of Ampoule's country house, six

"We ought to keep within the law," said he in substance. "We are for order. It is by an untiring propaganda

that we shall best pursue the realisation of our hopes. We must change the feeling of the country. Our cause

The Prince des Boscenos expressed a contrary opinion. He thought that, in order to triumph, just causes need

"In the present situation," said he tranquilly, "three methods of action present themselves: to hire the butcher

"It would be a mistake to kidnap Formose," objected M. de La Trumelle. "The President is on our side."

The attitude and sentiments of the President of the Republic are explained by the fact that one Dracophil

proposed to seize Formose while another Dracophil regarded him as a friend. Formose showed himself

favourable to the Royalists, whose habits he admired and imitated. If he smiled at the mention of the Dragon's

crest it was at the thought of putting it on his own head. He was envious of sovereign power, not because he

felt himself capable of exercising it, but because he loved to appear so. According to the expression of a

Prince des Boscenos maintained his proposal to march against Formose's palace and the House of Parliament.

"Let us begin," said he, "by slaughtering, disembowelling, and braining the Republicans and all partisans of

M. de La Trumelle was a moderate, and moderates are always moderately opposed to violence. He

recognised that Count Clena's policy was inspired by a noble feeling and that it was highminded, but he

timidly objected that perhaps it was not conformable to principle, and that it presented certain dangers. At last

"I propose," added he, "to draw up an appeal to the people. Let us show who we are. For my own part I can

"Gentlemen, the Penguins are dissatisfied with the new order because it exists, and it is natural for men to

complain of their condition. But at the same time the Penguins are afraid to change their government because

new things alarm them. They have not known the Dragon's crest and, although they sometimes say that they

regret it, we must not believe them. It is easy to see that they speak in this way either without thought or

because they are in an illtemper. Let us not have any illusions about their feelings towards ourselves. They

do not like us. They hate the aristocracy both from a base envy and from a generous love of equality. And

these two united feelings are very strong in a people. Public opinion is not against us, because it knows

nothing about us. But when it knows what we want it will not follow us. If we let it be seen that we wish to

destroy democratic government and restore the Dragon's crest, who will be our partisans? Only the

butcherboys and the little shopkeepers of Alca. And could we even count on them to the end? They are

dissatisfied, but at the bottom of their hearts they are Republicans. They are more anxious to sell their cursed

"To make people sympathise with us and follow us we must make them believe that we want, not to

overthrow the Republic, but, on the contrary, to restore it, to cleanse, to purify, to embellish, to adorn, to

beautify, and to ornament it, to render it, in a word, glorious and attractive. Therefore, we ought not to act

openly ourselves. It is known that we are not favourable to the present order. We must have recourse to a

friend of the Republic, and, if we are to do what is best, to a defender of this government. We have plenty to

choose from. It would be well to prefer the most popular and, if I dare say so, the most republican of them.

We shall win him over to us by flattery, by presents, and above all by promises. Promises cost less than

presents, and are worth more. No one gives as much as he who gives hopes. It is not necessary for the man

we choose to be of brilliant intellect. I would even prefer him to be of no great ability. Stupid people show an

inimitable grace in roguery. Be guided by me, gentlemen, and overthrow the Republic by the agency of a

Republican. Let us be prudent. But prudence does not exclude energy. If you need me you will find me at

This speech made a great impression upon those who heard it. The mind of the pious Agaric was particularly

impressed. But each of them was anxious to appoint himself to a position of honour and profit. A secret

government was organised of which all those present were elected active members. The Duke of Ampoule,

who was the great financier of the party, was chosen treasurer and charged with organising funds for the

The meeting was on the point of coming to an end when a rough voice was heard singing an old air:

Boscenos est un gros cochon; On en va faire des andouilles Des saucisses et du jambon Pour le reveillon des

It had, for two hundred years, been a wellknown song in the slums of Alca. Prince Boscenos did not like to

hear it. He went down into the street, and, perceiving that the singer was a workman who was placing some

Prince Boscenos was as a rule goodtempered, but he was easily angered and a man of great strength.

As the workman, astride on his coping, showed no sign of budging, the prince climbed quickly up the

staircase of the tower and attacked the singer. He gave him a blow that broke his jawbone and sent him

rolling into a waterspout. At that moment seven or eight carpenters, who were working on the rafters, heard

their companion's cry and looked through the window. Seeing the prince on the coping they climbed along a

ladder that was leaning on the slates and reached him just as he was slipping into the tower. They sent him,

head foremost, down the one hundred and thirtyseven steps of the spiral staircase.

The Penguins had the finest army in the world. So had the Porpoises. And it was the same with the other

nations of Europe. The smallest amount of thought will prevent any surprise at this. For all armies are the

finest in the world. The second finest army, if one could exist, would be in a notoriously inferior position; it

would be certain to be beaten. It ought to be disbanded at once. Therefore, all armies are the finest in the

world. In France the illustrious Colonel Marchand understood this when, before the passage of the Yalou,

being questioned by some journalists about the RussoJapanese war, he did not hesitate to describe the

Russian army as the finest in the world, and also the Japanese. And it should be noticed that even after

suffering the most terrible reverses an army does not fall from its position of being the finest in the world. For

if nations ascribe their victories to the ability of their generals and the courage of their soldiers, they always

attribute their defeats to an inexplicable fatality. On the other hand, navies are classed according to the

number of their ships. There is a first, a second, a third, and so on. So that there exists no doubt as to the

The Penguins had the finest army and the second navy in the world. This navy was commanded by the

famous Chatillon, who bore the title of Emiralbahr, and by abbreviation Emiral. It is the same word which,

unfortunately in a corrupt form, is used today among several European nations to designate the highest

grade in the naval service. But as there was but one Emiral among the Penguins, a singular prestige, if I dare

The Emiral did not belong to the nobility. A child of the people, he was loved by the people. They were

flattered to see a man who sprang from their own ranks holding a position of honour. Chatillon was

goodlooking and fortune favoured him. He was not overaddicted to thought. No event ever disturbed his

The Reverend Father Agaric, surrendering to M. Bigourd's reasons and recognising that the existing

government could only be destroyed by one of its defenders, cast his eyes upon Emiral Chatillon. He asked a

large sum of money from his friend, the Reverend Father Cornemuse, which the latter handed him with a

sigh. And with this sum he hired six hundred butcher boys of Alca to run behind Chatillon's horse and shout,

"Hurrah for the Emiral!" Henceforth Chatillon could not take a single step without being cheered.

Viscountess Olive asked him for a private interview. He received her at the Admiralty* in a room decorated

She was discreetly dressed in greyish blue. A hat trimmed with roses covered her pretty, fair hair, Behind her

veil her eyes shone like sapphires. Although she came of Jewish origin there was no more fashionable woman

in the whole nobility. She was tall and well shaped; her form was that of the year, her figure that of the

"Emiral," said she, in a delightful voice, "I cannot conceal my emotion from you. . . . It is very natural . . .

"You are too kind. But tell me, Viscountess, what brings me the honour of your visit."

"For a long time I have been anxious to see you, to speak to you. . . . So I very willingly undertook to convey

"It is a great pity. He would be so delighted to see you! He esteems and appreciates you. He has your portrait

on his desk beside his mother's. What a pity it is he is not better known! He is a charming prince and so

grateful for what is done for him! He will be a great king. For he will be king without doubt. He will come

back and sooner than people think. . . . What I have to tell you, the message with which I am entrusted, refers

"Not a word more, dear lady. I have the esteem, the confidence of the Republic. I will not betray it. And why

"Allow me to tell you, my dear Emiral, that your honours and dignities are far from equalling what you

deserve. If your services were properly rewarded, you would be Emiralissimo and Generalissimo,

Commanderinchief of the troops both on land and sea. The Republic is very ungrateful to you."

"Yes, but the Republicans are jealous of you. That class of person is always afraid of his superiors. They

cannot endure the Services. Everything that has to do with the navy and the army is odious to them. They are

"They are wretches; they are ruining the country. Don't you wish to save Penguinia?

"It is what will certainly be done, if not by you, then by some one else. The Generalissimo, to mention him

alone, is ready to throw all the ministers, deputies, and senators into the sea, and to recall Prince Crucho."

"Do to him what he would do to you. The prince will know how to recognise your services, He will give you

the Constable's sword and a magnificent grant. I am commissioned, in the mean time, to hand you a pledge of

"So that they may be offered to the Generalissimo who will accept them! . . . No, Emiral, let me place them

Chatillon gently repelled the lady. But for some minutes he thought her extremely pretty, and he felt this

impression still more when two bare arms and the rosy palms of two delicate hands touched him lightly. He

yielded almost immediately. Olive was slow in fastening the ribbon. Then when it was done she made a low

"I have been ambitious like my comrades," answered the sailor, "I don't hide it, and perhaps I am so still; but

u on my word of honour, when I look at you, the only, desire I feel is for a cottage and a heart."

She turned upon him the charming sapphire glances that flashed from under her eyelids.

When she left the Admiralty, the Viscountess went immediately to the Reverend Father Agaric to give an

Morning and evening the newspapers that had been bought by the Dracophils proclaimed Chatillon's praises

and hurled shame and opprobrium upon the Ministers of the Republic. Chatillon's portrait was sold through

the streets of Alca. Those young descendants of Remus who carry plaster figures on their heads, offered busts

Every evening Chatillon rode upon his white horse round the Queen's Meadow, a place frequented by the

people of fashion. The Dracophils posted along the Emiral's route a crowd of needy Penguins who kept

shouting: "It is Chatillon we want." The middle classes of Alca conceived a profound admiration for the

Emiral. Shopwomen murmured: "He is goodlooking." Women of fashion slackened the speed of their

motorcars and kissed hands to him as they passed, amidst the hurrahs of an enthusiastic populace.

One day, as he went into a tobacco shop, two Penguins who were putting letters in the box recognized

Chatillon and cried at the top of their voices: "Hurrah for the Emiral! Down with the Republicans." All those

who were passing stopped in front of the shop. Chatillon lighted his cigar before the eyes of a dense crowd of

frenzied citizens who waved their hats and cheered. The crowd kept increasing, and the whole town, singing

The Emiral had an old comrade in arms, UnderEmiral Vulcanmould, who had served with great distinction,

a man as true as gold and as loyal as his sword. Vulcanmould plumed himself on his thoroughgoing

independence and he went among the partisans of Crucho and the Minister of the Republic telling both

parties what he thought of them. M. Bigourd maliciously declared that he told each party what the other party

thought of it. In truth he had on several occasions been guilty of regrettable indiscretions, which were

overlooked as being the freedoms of a soldier who knew nothing of intrigue. Every morning he went to see

"Well, old buffer, so you are popular," said he to him. "Your phiz is sold on the heads of pipes and on liqueur

bottles and every drunkard in Alca spits out your name as he rolls in the gutter. . . . Chatillon, the hero of the

Penguins! Chatillon, defender of the Penguin glory! . . . Who would have said it? Who would have thought

And he laughed with his harsh laugh. Then changing his tone: "But, joking aside, are you not a bit surprised

In the mean time Chatillon had taken a little flat at number 18 JohannesTalpa Street, so that he might

receive Viscountess Olive. They met there every day. He was desperately in love with her. During his martial

and neptunian life he had loved crowds of women, red, black, yellow, and white, and some of them had been

very beautiful. But before he met the Viscountess he did not know what a woman really was. When the

Viscountess Olive called him her darling, her dear darling, he felt in heaven and it seemed to him that the

She would come a little late, and, as she put her ba,q on the table, she would ask pensively:

And then she would talk of subjects suggested by the pious Agaric, interrupting the conversation with sighs

and kisses. She would ask him to dismiss such and such an officer, to give a command to another, to send the

And he did whatever she wished, for he was simple, he was anxious to wear the Constable's sword, and to

receive a large grant; he did not dislike playing a double part, he had a vague idea of saving Penguinia, and he

This delightful woman induced him to remove the troops that were at La Cirque, the port where Crucho was

to land. By this means it was made certain that there would be no obstacle to prevent the prince from entering

The pious Agaric organised public meetings so as to keep up the agitation. The Dracophils held one or two

every day in some of the thirtysix districts of Alca, and preferably in the poorer quarters. They desired to

win over the poor, for they are the most numerous. On the fourth of May a particularly fine meeting was held

in an old cattlemarket, situated in the centre of a populous suburb filled with housewives sitting on the

doorsteps and children playing in the gutters. There were present about two thousand people, in the opinion

of the Republicans, and six thousand according to the reckoning of the Dracophils. In the audience was to be

seen the flower of Penguin society, including Prince and Princess des Boscenos, Count Clena, M. de La

The committee had been carefully formed. A man of the people, a workman, but a man of sound principles,

M. Rauchin, the secretary of the yellow syndicate, was asked to preside, supported by Count Clena and M.

The government which Penguinia had freely given itself was called by such names as cesspool and drain in

several eloquent speeches. But President Formose was spared and no mention was made of Crucho or the

The meeting was not unanimous. A defender of the modern State and of the Republic, a manual labourer,

"Gentlemen," said M. Rauchin, the chairman, "we have told you that this meeting would not be unanimous.

We are not like our opponents, we are honest men. I allow our opponent to speak. Heaven knows what you

are going to hear. Gentlemen, I beg of you to restrain as long as you can the expression of your contempt,

Immediately he was knocked down, trampled beneath the feet of the indignant crowd, and his unrecognisable

The tumult was still resounding when Count Clena ascended the tribune. Cheers took the place of groans and

"Comrades, we are going to see whether you have blood in your veins. What we have got to do is to

This speech let loose such a thunder of applause that the old shed rocked with it, and a cloud of acrid and

thick dust fell from its filthy walls and wormeaten beams and enveloped the audience.

A resolution was carried vilifying the government and acclaiming Chatillon. And the audience departed

The only way out of the old market was through a muddy alley shut in by omnibus stables and coal sheds.

There was no moon and a cold drizzle was coming down. The police, who were assembled in great numbers,

blocked the alley and compelled the Dracophils to disperse in little groups. These were the instructions they

had received from their chief, who was anxious to check the enthusiasm of the excited crowd.

The Dracophils who were detained in the alley kept marking time and singing, "It is Chatillon we want."

Soon, becoming impatient of the delay, the cause of which they did not know, they began to push those in

front of them. This movement, propagated along the alley, threw those in front against the broad chests of the

police. The latter had no hatred for the Dracophils. In the bottom of their hearts they liked Chatillon. But it is

natural to resist aggression and strong men are inclined to make use of their strength. For these reasons the

police kicked the Dracophils with their hobnailed boots. As a result there were sudden rushes backwards

And in the gloomy alley the more prudent kept saying, "Don't push." Among these latter, in the darkness, his

lofty figure rising above the moving crowd, his broad shoulders and robust body noticeable among the

trampled limbs and crushed sides of the rest, stood the Prince des Boscenos, calm, immovable, and placid.

Serenely and indulgently he waited. In the mean time, as the exit was opened at regular intervals between the

ranks of the police, the pressure of elbows against the chests of those around the prince diminished and

"You see we shall soon be able to go out," said that kindly giant, with a pleasant smile. "Time and patience . .

He took a cigar from his case, raised it to his lips and struck a match. Suddenly, in the light of the match, he

saw Princess Anne, his wife, clasped in Count Clena's arms. At this sight he rushed towards them, striking

both them and those around with his cane. He was disarmed, though not without difficulty, but he could not

be separated from his opponent. And whilst the fainting princess was lifted from arm to arm to her carriage

over the excited and curious crowd, the two men still fought furiously. Prince des Boscenos lost his hat, his

eyeglass, his cigar, his necktie, and his portfolio full of private letters and political correspondence; he even

lost the miraculous medals that he had received from the good Father Cornemuse. But he gave his opponent

so terrible a kick in the stomach that the unfortunate Count was knocked through an iron grating and went,

Attracted by the struggle and the cries of those around, the police rushed towards the prince, who furiously

resisted them. He stretched three of them gasping at his feet and put seven others to flight, with, respectively,

a broken jaw, a split lip, a nose pouring blood, a fractured skull, a torn ear, a dislocated collarbone, and

broken ribs. He fell, however, and was dragged bleeding and disfigured, with his clothes in rags, to the

At daybreak groups of demonstrators went about the town singing, "It is Chatillon we want," and breaking

That night marked the culmination of the Dracophil movement. The Royalists had no longer any doubt of its

triumph. Their chiefs sent congratulations to Prince Crucho by wireless telegraphy. Their ladies embroidered

The pious Agaric shared the common hope. But he still worked to win partisans for the Pretender. They

In these times the artisans no longer lived, as in the days of the Draconides, under the government of

corporations. They were free, but they had no assured pay. After having remained isolated from each other

for a long time, without help and without support, they had formed themselves into unions. The coffers of the

unions were empty, as it was not the habit of the unionists to pay their subscriptions. There were unions

numbering thirty thousand members, others with a thousand, five hundred, two hundred, and so forth. Several

numbered two or three members only, or even a few less. But as the lists of adherents were not published, it

After some dark and indirect steps the pious Agaric was put into communication in a room in the Moulin de

la Galette, with comrades Dagobert, Tronc, and Balafille, the secretaries of three unions of which the first

numbered fourteen members, the second twentyfour, and the third only one. Agaric showed extreme

"Gentlemen," said he, "you and I have not, in most respects, the same political and social views, but there are

points in which we may come to an understanding. We have a common enemy. The government exploits you

and despises us. Help us to overthrow it; we will supply you with the means so far as we are able, and you

The Reverend Father placed on the table a bag which the distiller of Conils had given him with tears in his

As soon as the monk had departed, carrying with him the joy of having won over the masses to his cause,

Dagobert, Tronc, and Balafille whistled to their wives, Amelia, Queenie, and Matilda, who were waiting in

the street for the signal, and all six holding each other's hands, danced around the bag, singing:

In the evening all six went through the street from stall to stall singing their new song. The song became

popular, for the detectives reported that every day showed an increase of the number of workpeople who sang

The Dracophil agitation made no progress in the provinces. The pious Agaric sought to find the cause of this,

"I have proofs," sighed the monk of Conils, "that the Duke of Ampoule, the treasurer of the Dracophils, has

brought property in Porpoisia with the funds that he received for the propaganda."

The party wanted money. Prince des Boscenos had lost his portfolio in a brawl and he was reduced to painful

expedients which were repugnant to his impetuous character. The Viscountess Olive was expensive.

A schism divided the Dracophils. Misunderstandings reigned in their councils. Some wished that in

accordance with the policy of M. Bigourd and the pious Agaric, they should carry on the design of reforming

the Republic. Others, wearied by their long constraint, had resolved to proclaim the Dragon's crest and swore

The latter urged the advantage of a clear situation and the impossibility of making a pretence much longer,

and in truth, the public began to see whither the agitation was tending and that the Emiral's partisans wanted

A report was spread that the prince was to land at La Cirque and make his entry into Alca on a green horse.

These rumours excited the fanatical monks, delighted the poor nobles, satisfied the rich Jewish ladies, and put

hope in the hearts of the small traders. But very few of them were inclined to purchase these benefits at the

price of a social catastrophe and the overthrow of the public credit; and there were fewer still who would

have risked their money, their peace, their liberty, or a single hour from their pleasures in the business. On the

other hand, the workmen held themselves ready, as ever, to give a day's work to the Republic, and a strong

However, men, women, and children, when leaving their factories, used to shout with one voice:

As for the government, it showed the weakness, indecision, flabbiness, and heedlessness common to all

governments, and from which none has ever departed without falling into arbitrariness and violence. In three

words it knew nothing, wanted nothing, and would do nothing. Formose, shut in his presidential palace,

remained blind, dumb, deaf, huge, invisible, wrapped up in his pride as in an eiderdown.

Count Olive advised the Dracophils to make a last appeal for funds and to attempt a great stroke while Alca

An executive committee, which he himself had chosen, decided to kidnap the members of the Chamber of

The affair was fixed for the twentyeighth of July. On that day the sun rose radiantly over the city. In front of

the legislative palace women passed to market with their baskets; hawkers cried their peaches, pears, and

grapes; cab horses with their noses in their bags munched their hay. Nobody expected anything, not because

the secret had been kept but because it met with nothing but unbelievers. Nobody believed in a revolution,

and from this fact we may conclude that nobody desired one. About two o'clock the deputies began to pass,

few and unnoticed, through the sidedoor of the palace. At three o'clock a few groups of badly dressed men

had formed. At half past three black masses coming from the adjacent streets spread over Revolution Square.

This vast expanse was soon covered by an ocean of soft hats, and the crowd of demonstrators, continually

increased by sightseers, having crossed the bridge, struck its dark wave against the walls of the legislative

enclosure. Cries, murmurs, and songs went up to the impassive sky. "It is Chatillon we want!" "Down with

the Deputies!" "Down with the Republicans!" "Death to the Republicans!" The devoted band of Dracophils,

This silence and the absence of guards encouraged and at the same time frightened the crowd. Suddenly a

And Prince des Boscenos was seen raising his gigantic form to the top of the wall, which was covered with

barbs and iron spikes. Behind him rushed his companions, and the people followed. Some hammered against

the wall to make holes in it; others endeavoured to tear down the spikes and to pull out the barbs. These

defences had given way in places and some of the invaders had stripped the wall and were sitting astride on

the top. Prince des Boscenos was waving an immense green flag. Suddenly the crowd wavered and from it

came a long cry of terror. The police and the Republican carabineers issuing out of all the entrances of the

palace formed themselves into a column beneath the wall and in a moment it was cleared of its besiegers.

After a long moment of suspense the noise of arms was heard, and the police charged the crowd with fixed

bayonets. An instant afterwards and on the deserted square strewn with hats and walkingsticks there reigned

a sinister silence. Twice again the Dracophils attempted to form, twice they were repulsed. The rising was

conquered. But Prince des Boscenos, standing on the wall of the hostile palace, his flag in his hand, still

repelled the attack of a whole brigade. He knocked down all who approached him. At last he, too, was thrown

down, and fell on an iron spike, to which he remained hooked, still clasping the standard of the Draconides.

On the following day the Ministers of the Republic and the Members of Parliament determined to take

energetic measures. In vain, this time, did President Formose attempt to evade his responsibilities. The

government discussed the question of depriving Chatillon of his rank and dignities and of indicting him

before the High Court as a conspirator, an enemy of the public good, a traitor, etc.

At this news the Emiral's old companions in arms, who the very evening before had beset him with their

adulations, made no effort to conceal their joy. But Chatillon remained popular with the middle classes of

Alca and one still heard the hymn of the liberator sounding in the streets, "It is Chatillon we want."

The Ministers were embarrassed. They intended to indict Chatillon before the High Court. But they knew

nothing; they remained in that total ignorance reserved for those who govern men. They were incapable of

advancing any grave charges against Chatillon. They could supply the prosecution with nothing but the

ridiculous lies of their spies. Chatillon's share in the plot and his relations with Prince Crucho remained the

secret of the thirty thousand Dracophils. The Ministers and the Deputies had suspicions and even certainties,

but they had no proofs. The Public Prosecutor said to the Minister of justice: "Very little is needed for a

political prosecution! but I have nothing at all and that is not enough." The affair made no progress. The

On the eighteenth of September the news ran in Alca that Chatillon had taken flight. Everywhere there was

This is what had happened: One day as the brave UnderEmiral Vulcanmould happened, as if by chance, to

go into the office of M. Barbotan, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, he remarked with his usual frankness:

"M. Barbotan, your colleagues do not seem to me to be up to much; it is evident that they have never

commanded a ship. That fool Chatillon gives them a deuced bad fit of the shivers."

The Minister, in sign of denial, waved his paperknife in the air above his desk.

"Don't deny it," answered Vulcanmould. "You don't know how to get rid of Chatillon. You do not dare to

indict him before the High Court because you are not sure of being able to bring forward a strong enough

charge. Bigourd will defend him, and Bigourd is a clever advocate. . . . You are right, M. Barbotan, you are

"Ah! my friend," said the Minister, in a careless tone, "if you knew how satisfied we are. . . . I receive the

most reassuring news from my prefects. The good sense of the Penguins will do justice to the intrigues of this

mutinous soldier. Can you suppose for a moment that a great people, an intelligent, laborious people, devoted

"Ah! If I had time to do it I would relieve you of your difficulty. I would juggle away my Chatillon like a

"It would not take long," continued the sailor. "I would rid you in a trice of the creature. . . . But just now I

have other fish to fry. . . . I am in a bad hole. I must find a pretty big sum. But, deuce take it, honour before

The Minister and the UnderEmiral looked at each other for a moment in silence. Then Barbotan said with

"UnderEmiral Vulcanmould, get rid of this seditious soldier. You will render a great service to Penguinia,

The same evening Vulcanmould called on Chatillon and looked at him for some time with an expression of

"Old brother in arms, all is discovered. For the past halfhour the government knows everything."

"It would be mad," said Vulcanmould, handing him a passport and a pair of blue spectacles, and telling him

He embarked at night on an old cutter at La Cirque and set sail for Porpoisia. But eight miles from the coast

he was captured by a despatchboat which was sailing without lights and which was under, the flag of the

Queen of the Black Islands. That Queen had for a long time nourished a fatal passion for Chatillon.

Nunc est bibendum. Delivered from its fears and pleased at having escaped from so great a danger, the

government resolved to celebrate the anniversary of the Penguin regeneration and the establishment of the

President Formose, the Ministers, and the members of the Chamber and of the Senate were present at the

Preceded by the black flag of misery and the red flag of revolt, deputations of workmen walked in the

President, Ministers, Deputies, officials, heads of the magistracy and of the army, each, in their own names

and in the name of the sovereign people, renewed the ancient oath to live in freedom or to die. It was an

alternative upon which they were resolutely determined. But they preferred to live in freedom. There were

After the departure of the representatives of the State the crowd of citizens separated slowly and peaceably,

shouting out, "Hurrah for the Republic!" "Hurrah for liberty!" "Down with the shaven pates!"

The newspapers mentioned only one regrettable incident that happened on that wonderful day. Prince des

Boscenos was quietly smoking a cigar in the Queen's Meadow when the State procession passed by. The

prince approached the Minister's carriage and said in a loud voice: "Death to the Republicans!" He was

immediately apprehended by the police, to whom he offered a most desperate resistance. He knocked them

down in crowds, but he was conquered by numbers, and, bruised, scratched, swollen, and unrecognisable

even to the eyes of. his wife, he was dragged through the joyous streets into an obscure prison.

The magistrates carried on the case against Chatillon in a peculiar style. Letters were found at the Admiralty

which revealed the complicity of the Reverend Father Agaric in the plot. Immediately public opinion was

inflamed against the monks, and Parliament voted, one after the other, a dozen laws which restrained,

diminished, limited, prescribed, suppressed, determined, and curtailed, their rights, immunities, exemptions,

privileges, and benefits, and created many invalidating disqualifications against them.

The Reverend Father Agaric steadfastly endured the rigour of the laws which struck himself personally, as

well as the terrible fall of the Emiral of which he was the chief cause. Far from yielding to evil fortune, he

regarded it as but a bird of passage. He was planning new political designs more audacious than the first.

When his projects were sufficiently ripe he went one day to the Wood of Conils. A thrush sang in a tree and a

little hedgehog crossed the stony path in front of him with awkward steps. Agaric walked with great strides,

When he reached the door of the laboratory in which, for so many years, the pious manufacturer bad distilled

the golden liqueur of St. Orberosia, he found the place deserted and the door shut. Having walked around the

building he saw in the backyard the venerable Cornemuse, who, with his habit pinned up, was climbing a

"You can see for yourself," answered the monk of Conils in a feeble voice, turning a sorrowful look Upon

The red pupils of his eyes no longer imitated the triumph and brilliance of the ruby, they flashed mournful

and troubled glances. His countenance had lost its happy fulness. His shining head was no longer pleasant to

the sight; perspiration and inflamed blotches bad altered its inestimable perfection.

"It is easy enough to understand. You see the consequences of your plot. Although a multitude of laws are

directed against me I have managed to elude the greater number of them. Some, however, have struck me.

These vindictive men have closed my laboratories and my shops, and confiscated my bottles, my stills, and

my retorts. They have put seals on my doors and now I am compelled to go in through the window. I am

barely able to extract in secret and from time to time the juice of a few plants and that with an apparatus

"I told you so, Brother Agaric; I told you that your enterprise would turn against ourselves."

"Our defeat is only momentary," replied Agaric eagerly. "It is due to purely accidental causes; it results from

mere contingencies. Chatillon was a fool; he has drowned himself in his own ineptitude. Listen to me,

Brother Cornemuse. We have not a moment to lose. We must free the Penguin people, we must deliver them

from their tyrants, save them from themselves, restore the Dragon's crest, reestablish the ancient State, the

good State, for the honour of religion and the exaltation of the Catholic faith. Chatillon was a bad instrument;

he broke in our hands. Let us take a better instrument to replace him. I have the man who will destroy this

impious democracy. He is a civil official; his name is Gomoru. The Penguins worship him, He has already

At the beginning of this speech the monk of Conils had climbed into his window and pulled up the ladder.

"I foresee," answered he, with his nose through the sash, "that you will not stop until you have us all expelled

from this pleasant, agreeable, and sweet land of Penguinia. Good night; God keep you!"

Agaric, standing before the wall, entreated his dearest brother to listen to him for a moment:

"Understand your own interest better, Cornemuse! Penguinia is ours. What do we need to conquer it? just one

But without listening further, the monk of Conils drew in his head and closed his window.

O Father Zeus, only save thou the sons of the Acheans from the darkness, and make clear sky and vouchsafe

sight to our eyes, and then, so it be but light, slay us, since such is thy good pleasure. (Iliad, xvii. 645 et seq.)

A short time after the flight of the Emiral, a middleclass Jew called Pyrot, desirous of associating with the

aristocracy and wishing to serve his country, entered the Penguin army. The Minister of War, who at the time

was Greatauk, Duke of Skull, could not endure him. He blamed him for his zeal, his hooked nose, his vanity,

his fondness for study, his thick lips, and his exemplary conduct. Every time the author of any misdeed was

One morning General Panther, the Chief of the Staff, informed Greatauk of a serious matter. Eighty thousand

trusses of hay intended for the cavalry had disappeared and not a trace of them was to be found.

He remained in thought for some time and said: "The more I think of it the more I am convinced that Pyrot

has stolen those eighty thousand trusses of hay. And I know it by this: he stole them in order that he might

sell them to our bitter enemies the Porpoises. What an infamous piece of treachery!

The same day, as he passed by a cavalry barracks, Prince des Boscenos heard the troopers as they were

Boscenos est un gros cochon; On en va faire des andouilles, Des saucisses et du jambon Pour le riveillon des

It seemed to him contrary to all discipline that soldiers should sing this domestic and revolutionary refrain

which on days of riot had been uttered by the lips of jeering workmen. On this occasion he deplored the

moral degeneration of the army, and thought with a bitter smile that his old comrade Greatauk, the head of

this degenerate army, basely exposed him to the malice of an unpatriotic government. And he promised

"That scoundrel Greatauk," said he to himself, "will, not remain long a Minister."

Prince des Boscenos was the most irreconcilable of the opponents of modem democracy, free thought, and

the government which the Penguins had voluntarily given themselves. He had a vigorous and undisguised

hatred for the Jews, and he worked in public and in private, night and day, for the restoration of the line of the

Draconides. His ardent royalism was still further excited by the thought of his private affairs, which were in a

bad way and were hourly growing worse. He had no hope of seeing an end to his pecuniary embarrassments

When he returned to his house, the prince took out of his safe a bundle of old letters consisting of a private

correspondence of the most secret nature, which he had obtained from a treacherous secretary. They proved

that his old comrade Greatauk, the Duke of Skull, had been guilty of jobbery regarding the military stores and

had received a present of no great value from a manufacturer called Maloury. The very smallness of this

The prince reread the letters with a bitter satisfaction, put them carefully back into his safe, and dashed to

the Minister of War. He was a man of resolute character. On being told that the Minister could see no one he

knocked down the ushers, swept aside the orderlies, trampled under foot the civil and military clerks, burst

"I will not say much," said he to him, "but I will speak to the point. You are a confounded cad. I have asked

you to put a flea in the ear of General Mouchin, the tool of those Republicans, and you would not do it. I have

asked you to give a command to General des Clapiers, who works for the Dracophils, and who has obliged

me personally, and you would not do it. I have asked you to dismiss General Tandem, the commander of Port

Alca, who robbed me of fifty louis at cards, and who had me handcuffed when I was brought before the High

Court as Emiral Chatillon's accomplice. You would not do it. I asked you for the hay and bran stores. You

would not give them. I asked you to send me on a secret mission to Porpoisia. You refused. And not satisfied

with these repeated refusals you have designated me to your Government colleagues as a dangerous person,

who ought to be watched, and it is owing to you that I have been shadowed by the police. You old traitor! I

ask nothing more from you and I have but one word to say to you: Clear out; you have bothered us too long.

Besides, we will force the vile Republic to replace you by one of our own party. You know that I am a man of

my word. If in twentyfour hours you have not handed in your resignation I will publish the Maloury dossier

"Be quiet, you fool. I am just having a Jew transported. I am handing over Pyrot to justice as guilty of having

"My congratulations, Greatauk. But as one always needs to take precautions with you I shall immediately

publish the good news. People will read this evening about Pyrot's arrest in every newspaper in Alca . . . ."

"Sir," said he, "I have just examined the business of the eighty thousand trusses of hay. There is no evidence

"Let it be found," answered Greatauk. "Justice requires it. Have Pyrot arrested at once."

All Penguinia heard with horror of Pyrot's crime; at the same time there was a sort of satisfaction that this

embezzlement combined with treachery and even bordering on sacrilege, had been committed by a Jew. In

order to understand this feeling it is necessary to be acquainted with the state of public opinion regarding the

Jews both great and small. As we have had occasion to say in this history, the universally detested and all

powerful financial caste was composed of Christians and of Jews. The Jews who formed part of it and on

whom the people poured all their hatred were the upperclass Jews. They possessed immense riches and, it

was said, held more than a fifth part of the total property of Penguinia. Outside this formidable caste there

was a multitude of Jews of a mediocre condition, who were not more loved than the others and who were

feared much less. In every ordered State, wealth is a sacred thing: in democracies it is the only sacred thing.

Now the Penguin State was democratic. Three or four financial companies exercised a more extensive, and

above all, more effective and continuous power, than that of the Ministers of the Republic. The latter were

puppets whom the companies ruled in secret, whom they compelled by intimidation or corruption to favour

themselves at the expense of the State, and whom they ruined by calumnies in the press if they remained

honest. In spite of the secrecy of the Exchequer, enough appeared to make the country indignant, but the

middleclass Penguins had, from the greatest to the least of them, been brought up to hold money in great

reverence, and as they all had property, either much or little, they were strongly impressed with the solidarity

of capital and understood that a small fortune is not safe unless a big one is protected. For these reasons they

conceived a religious respect for the Jews' millions, and selfinterest being stronger with them than aversion,

they were as much afraid as they were of death to touch a single hair of one of the rich Jews whom they

detested. Towards the poorer Jews they felt less ceremonious and when they saw any of them down they

trampled on them. That is why the entire nation learnt with thorough satisfaction that the traitor was a Jew.

They could take vengeance on all Israel in his person without any fear of compromising the public credit.

That Pyrot had stolen the eighty thousand trusses of hay nobody hesitated for a moment to believe. No one

doubted because the general ignorance in which everybody was concerning the affair did not allow of doubt,

for doubt is a thing that demands motives. People do not doubt without reasons in the same way that people

believe without reasons. The thing was not doubted because it was repeated everywhere and, with the public,

to repeat is to prove. It was not doubted because people wished to believe Pyrot guilty and one believes what

one wishes to believe. Finally, it was not doubted because the faculty of doubt is rare amongst men; very few

minds carry in them its germs and these are not developed without cultivation. Doubt is singular, exquisite,

philosophic, immoral, transcendent, monstrous, full of malignity, injurious to persons and to property,

contrary to the good order of governments, and to the prosperity of empires, fatal to humanity, destructive of

the gods, held in horror by heaven and earth. The mass of the Penguins were ignorant of doubt: it believed in

Pyrot's guilt and this conviction immediately became one of its chief national beliefs and an essential truth in

"Proofs," muttered Greatauk, "Proofs, what do they prove? There is only one certain, irrefragable proofthe

"He will confess, he ought to. Panther, we must induce him; tell him it is to his interest. Promise him that, if

he confesses, he will obtain favours, a reduction of his sentence, full pardon; promise him that if he confesses

his innocence will be admitted, that he will be decorated. Appeal to his good feelings. Let him confess from

patriotism, for the flag, for the sake of order, from respect for the hierarchy, at the special command of the

Minister of War militarily. . . . But tell me, Panther, has he not confessed already? There are tacit confessions;

"But, General, he is not silent; he keeps on squealing like a pig that he is innocent."

"Panther, the confessions of a guilty man sometimes result from the vehemence of his denials. To deny

desperately is to confess. Pyrot has confessed; we must have witnesses of his confessions, justice requires

There was in Western Penguinia a seaport called La Cirque, formed of three small bays and formerly greatly

frequented by ships, but now solitary and deserted. Gloomy lagoons stretched along its low coasts exhaling a

pestilent odour, while fever hovered over its sleepy waters. Here, on the borders of the sea, there was built a

high square tower, like the old Campanile at Venice, from the side of which, close to the summit hung an

open cage which was fastened by a chain to a transverse beam. In the times of the Draconides the Inquisitors

of Alca used to put heretical clergy into this cage. It had been empty for three hundred years, but now Pirot

was imprisoned in it under the guard of sixty warders, who lived in the tower and did not lose sight of him

night or day, spying on him for confessions that they might afterwards report to the Minister of War. For

Greatauk, careful and prudent, desired confessions and still further confessions. Greatauk, who was looked

upon as a fool, was in reality a man of great ability and full of rare foresight.

In the mean time Pyrot, burnt by the sun, eaten by mosquitoes, soaked in the rain, hail and snow, frozen by

the cold, tossed about terribly by the wind, beset by the sinister croaking of the ravens that perched upon his

cage, kept writing down his innocence on pieces torn off his shirt with a toothpick dipped in blood. These

rags were lost in the sea or fell into the hands of the gaolers. But Pyrot's protests moved nobody because his

The morals of the Jews were not always pure; in most cases they were averse from none of the vices of

Christian civilization, but they retained from the Patriarchal age a recognition of family, ties and an

attachment to the interests of the tribe. Pyrot's brothers, halfbrothers, uncles, greatuncles, first, second, and

third cousins, nephews and greatnephews, relations by blood and relations by marriage, and all who were

related to him to the number of about seven hundred, were at first overwhelmed by the blow that had struck

their relative, and they shut themselves up in their houses, covering themselves with ashes and blessing the

hand that had chastised them. For forty days they kept a strict fast. Then they bathed themselves and resolved

to search, without rest, at the cost of any toil and at the risk of eve danger, for the demonstration of an

innocence which they did not doubt. And how could they have doubted? Pyrot's innocence had been revealed

to them in the same way that his guilt had been revealed to Christian Penguinia's; for these things, being

hidden, assume a mystic character and take on the authority of religious truths. The seven hundred Pyrotists

set to work with as much zeal as prudence, and made the most thorough inquiries in secret. They were

everywhere; they were seen nowhere. One would have said that, like the pilot of Ulysses, they wandered

freely over the earth. They penetrated into the War Office and approached, under different disguises, the

judges, the registrars, and the witnesses of the affair. Then Greatauk's cleverness was seen. The witnesses

knew nothing; the judges and registrars knew nothing. Emissaries reached even Pyrot and anxiously

questioned him in his cage amid the prolonged moanings of the sea and the hoarse croaks of the ravens. It

was in vain; the prisoner knew nothing. The seven hundred Pyrotists could not subvert the proofs of the

accusation because they could not know what they were, and they could not know what they were because

there were none. Pyrot's guilt was indefeasible through its very nullity. And it was with a legitimate pride that

Greatauk, expressing himself as a true artist, said one day to General Panther: "This case is a masterpiece: it

is made out of nothing." The seven hundred Pyrotists despaired of ever clearing up this dark business, when

suddenly they discovered, from a stolen letter, that the eighty thousand trusses of hay had never existed, that a

most distinguished nobleman, Count de Maubec, had sold them to the State, that he had received the price but

had never delivered them. Indeed seeing that he was descended from the richest landed proprietors of ancient

Penguinia, the heir of the Maubecs of Dentdulynx, once the possessors of four duchies, sixty counties, and six

hundred and twelve marquisates, baronies, and viscounties, he did not possess as much land as he could cover

with his hand, and would not have been able to cut a single day'S mowing of forage off his own domains. As

to his getting a single rush from a landowner or a merchant, that would have been quite impossible, for

everybody except the Ministers of State and the Government officials knew that it would be easier to get

The seven hundred Pyrotists made a minute inquiry concerning the Count Maubec de la Dentdulynx's

financial resources, and they proved that that nobleman was chiefly supported by a house in which some

generous ladies were ready to furnish all comers with the most lavish hospitality. They publicly proclaimed

that he was guilty of the theft of the eighty thousand trusses of straw for which an innocent man had been

Maubec belonged to an illustrious family which was allied to the Draconides. There is nothing that a

democracy esteems more highly than noble birth. Maubec had also served in the Penguin army, and since the

Penguins were all soldiers, they loved their army to idolatry. Maubec, on the field of battle, had received the

Cross, which is a sign of honour among the Penguins and which they valued even more highly than the

embraces of their wives. All Penguinia declared for Maubec, and the voice of the people which began to

assume a threatening tone, demanded severe punishments for the seven hundred calumniating Pyrotists.

Maubec was a nobleman; he challenged the seven hundred Pyrotists to combat with either sword, sabre,

"Vile dogs," he wrote to them in a famous letter, "you have crucified my God and you want my life too; I

warn you that I will not be such a duffer as He was and that I will cut off your fourteen hundred ears. Accept

The Chief of the Government at the time was a peasant called Robin Mielleux, a man pleasant to the rich and

powerful, but hard towards the poor, a man of small courage and ignorant of his own interests. In a public

declaration he guaranteed Maubec's innocence and honour, and presented the seven hundred Pyrotists: to the

criminal courts where they were condemned, as libellers, to imprisonment, to enormous fines, and to all the

It seemed as if Pyrot was destined to remain for ever shut in the cage on which the ravens perched. But all the

Penguins being anxious to know and prove that this Jew was guilty, all the proofs brought forward were

found not to be good, while some of them were also contradictory. The officers of the Staff showed zeal but

lacked prudence. Whilst Greatauk kept an admirable silence, General Panther made inexhaustible speeches

and every morning demonstrated in the newspapers that the condemned man was guilty. He would have done

better, perhaps, if he had said nothing. The guilt was evident and what is evident cannot be demonstrated. So

much reasoning disturbed people's minds; their faith, though still alive, became less serene. The more proofs

Nevertheless the danger of proving too much would not have been great if there had not been in Penguinia, as

there are, indeed, everywhere, minds framed for free inquiry, capable of studying a difficult question, and

inclined to philosophic doubt. They were few; they were not all inclined to speak, and the public was by no

means inclined to listen to them. Still, they did not always meet with deaf ears. The great Jews, all the

Israelite millionaires of Alca, when spoken to of Pyrot, said: "We do not know the man"; but they thought of

saving him. They preserved the prudence to which their wealth inclined them and wished that others would

Some weeks after the conviction of the seven hundred Pyrotists, a little, gruff, hairy, shortsighted man left

his house one morning with a pastepot, a ladder, and a bundle of posters and went about the streets pasting

placards to the walls on which might be read in large letters: Pyrot is innocent, Maubec is guilty. He was not

a billposter; his name was Colomban, and as the author of sixty volumes on Penguin sociology he was

numbered among the most laborious and respected writers in Alca. Having given sufficient thought to the

matter and no longer doubting Pyrot's innocence, he proclaimed it in the manner which he thought would be

most sensational. He met with no hindrance while posting his bills in the quiet streets, but when he came to

the populous quarters, every time he mounted his ladder, inquisitive people crowded round him and,

dumbfounded with surprise and indignation, threw at him threatening looks which he received with the calm

that comes from courage and shortsightedness. Whilst caretakers and tradespeople tore down the bills he

had posted, he kept on zealously placarding, carrying his tools and followed by little boys who, with their

baskets under their arms or their satchels on their backs, were in no hurry to reach school. To the mute

indignation against him, protests and murmurs were now added. But Colomban did not condescend to see or

hear anything. As, at the entrance to the Rue St. Orberosia, he was posting one of his squares of paper bearing

the words: Pyrot is innocent, Maubec is guilty, the riotous crowd showed signs of the most violent anger.

They called after him, "Traitor, thief, rascal, scoundrel." A woman opened a window and emptied a vase full

of filth over his head, a cabby sent his hat flying from one end of the street to the other by a blow of his whip

amid the cheers of the crowd who now felt themselves avenged. A butcher's boy knocked Colomban with his

pastepot, his brush, and his posters, from the top of his ladder into the gutter, and the proud Penguins then

felt the greatness of their country. Colomban stood up,, covered with filth, lame, and with his elbow injured,

Then he went down on allfours in the gutter to look for his glasses which he had lost in his fall. t was then

seen that his coat was split from the collar to the tails and that his trousers were in rags. The rancour of the

On the other side of the street stretched the big St. Orberosian Stores. The patriots seized whatever they could

lay their hands on from the shop front, and hurled at Colomban oranges, lemons, pots of jam, pieces of

chocolate, bottles of liqueurs, boxes of sardines, pots of foie gras, hams, fowls, flasks of oil, and bags of

haricots. Covered with the debris of the food, bruised, tattered, lame, and blind, he took to flight, followed by

the shopboys, bakers, loafers, citizens, and hooligans whose number increased each moment and who kept

shouting: "Duck him! Death to the traitor! Duck him!" This torrent of vulgar humanity swept along the streets

and rushed into the Rue St. Mael. The police did their duty. From all the adjacent streets constables

proceeded and, holding their scabbards with their left hands, they went at full speed in front of the pursuers.

They were on the point of grabbing Colomban in their huge hands when he suddenly escaped them by falling

He spent the night there in the darkness, sitting close by the dirty water amidst the fat and slimy rats. He

thought of his task, and his swelling heart filled with courage and pity. And when the dawn threw a pale ray

Forthwith he composed a memorandum in which he clearly showed that Pyrot could not have stolen from the

Ministry of War the eighty thousand trusses of hay which it had never received, for the reason that Maubec

had never delivered them, though he had received the money. Colomban caused this statement to be

distributed in the streets of Alca. The people refused to read it and tore it up in anger. The shopkeepers

shook their fists at the distributers, who made off, chased by angry women armed with brooms. Feelings grew

warm and the ferment lasted the whole day. In the evening bands of wild and ragged men went about the

streets yelling: "Death to Colomban!" The patriots snatched whole bundles of the memorandum from the

newsboys and burned them in the public squares, dancing wildly round these bonfires with girls whose

Some of the more enthusiastic among them went and broke the windows of the house in which Colomban

Parliament was roused and asked the Chief of the Government what measures he proposed to take in order to

repel the odious attacks made by Colomban upon the honour of the National Arm and the safety of Penguinia.

Robin Mielleux denounced Colomban's impious audacity and proclaimed amid the cheers of the legislators

that the man would be summoned before the Courts to answer for his infamous libel.

The Minister of War was called to the tribune and appeared in it transfigured. He had no longer the air, as in

former days, of one of the sacred geese of the Penguin citadels. Now, bristling, with outstretched neck and

hooked beak, he seemed the symbolical vulture fastened to the livers of his country's enemies.

This speech of Greatauk was reported all over Penguinia and satisfied the public conscience.

Colomban bore with meekness and surprise the weight of the general reprobation. He could not go out

without being stoned, so he did not go out. He remained in his study with a superb obstinacy, writing new

memoranda in favour of the encaged innocent. In the mean time among the few readers that he found, some,

about a dozen, were struck by his reasons and began to doubt Pyrot's guilt. They broached the subject to their

friends and endeavoured to spread the light that had arisen in their minds. One of them was a friend of Robin

Mielleux and confided to him his perplexities, with the result that he was no longer received by that Minister.

Another demanded explanations in an open letter to the Minister of War. A third published a terrible

pamphlet. The latter, whose name was Kerdanic, was a formidable controversialist. The public was unmoved.

It was said that these defenders of the traitor had been bribed by the rich Jews; they were stigmatized by the

name of Pyrotists and the patriots swore to exterminate them. There were only a thousand or twelve hundred

Pyrotists in the whole vast Republic, but it was believed that they were everywhere. People were afraid of

finding them in the promenades, at meetings, at receptions, in fashionable drawingrooms, at the

dinnertable, even in the conjugal couch. One half of the population was suspected by the other half. The

In the mean time Father Agaric, who managed his big school for young nobles, followed events with anxious

attention. The misfortunes of the Penguin Church had not disheartened him. He remained faithful to Prince

Crucho and preserved the hope of restoring the heir of the Draconides to the Penguin throne. It appeared to

him that the events that were happening or about to happen in the country, the state of mind of which they

were at once the effect and the cause, and the troubles that necessarily resulted from them mightif they

were directed, guided, and led by the profound wisdom of a monkoverthrow the Republic and incline the

Penguins to restore Prince Crucho, from whose piety the faithful hoped for so much solace. Wearing his huge

black hat, the brims of which looked like the wings of Night, he walked through the Wood of Conils towards

the factory where his venerable friend, Father Cornemuse, distilled the hygienic St. Orberosian liqueur, The

good monk's industry, so cruelly affected in the time of Emiral Chatillon, was being restored from its ruins.

One heard goods trains rumbling through the Wood and one saw in the sheds hundreds of orphans clothed in

Agaric found the venerable Cornemuse standing before his stoves and surrounded by his retorts. The shining

pupils of the old man's eyes had again become as rubies, his skull shone with its former elaborate and careful

Agaric first congratulated the pious distiller on the restored activity of his laboratories and workshops.

"Business is recovering. I thank God for it," answered the old man of Conils. "Alas! it had fallen into a bad

state, Brother Agaric. You raw the desolation of this establishment. I need say no more."

"The St. Orberosian liqueur," continued Cornemuse, "is making fresh conquests. But none the less my

industry remains uncertain and precarious. The laws of ruin and desolation that struck it have not been

"What a sight, Cornemuse, does unhappy Penguinia present to us! Everywhere disobedience, independence,

liberty! We seethe proud, the haughty, the men of revolt rising up. After having braved the Divine laws they

now rear themselves against human laws, so true is it that in order to be a good citizen a man must be a good

Christian. Colomban is trying to imitate Satan. Numerous criminals are following his fatal example. They

want, in their rage, to put aside all checks, to throw off all yokes, to free themselves from the most sacred

bonds, to escape from the most salutary restraints. They strike their country to make it obey them. But they

will be overcome by the weight of public animadversion, vituperation, indignation, fury, execration, and

abomination. That is the abyss to which they have been led by atheism, free thought, and the monstrous claim

"Doubtless, doubtless," replied Father Cornemuse, shaking his head, "but I confess that the care of distilling

these simples has prevented me from following public affairs. I only know that people are talking a great deal

about a man called Pyrot. Some maintain that he is guilty, others affirm that he is innocent, but I do not

clearly understand the motives that drive both parties to mix themselves up in a business that concerns neither

"I cannot doubt it, dear Agaric," answered the monk of Conils. "That would be contrary to the laws of my

country which we ought to respect as long as they are not opposed to the Divine laws. Pyrot is guilty, for he

has been convicted. As to saying more for or against his guilt, that would be to erect my own authority

against that of the judges, a thing which I will take good care not to do. Besides, it is useless, for Pyrot has

been convicted. If he has not been convicted because he is guilty, he is guilty because he has been convicted;

it comes to the same thing. I believe in his guilt as every good citizen ought to believe in it; and I will believe

in it as long as the established jurisdiction will order me to believe in it, for it is not for a private person but

for a judge to proclaim the innocence of a convicted person. Human justice is venerable even in the errors

inherent in its fallible and limited nature. These errors are never irreparable; if the judges do not repair them

on earth, God will repair them in Heaven. Besides I have great confidence in general Greatauk, who, though

he certainly does not look it, seems to me to be an abler man than all those who are attacking him."

"Dearest Cornemuse," cried the pious Agaric, "the Pyrot affair, if pushed to the point whither we can lead it

by the help of God and the necessary funds, will produce the greatest benefits. It will lay bare the vices of this

AntiChristian Republic and will incline the Penguins to restore the throne of the Draconides and the

prerogatives of the Church. But to do that it is necessary for the people to see the clergy in the front rank of

its defenders. Let us march against the enemies of the army, against those who insult our heroes, and

"Everybody will be too many," murmured the monk of Conils, shaking his head. "I see that the Penguins

want to quarrel. If we mix ourselves up in their quarrel they will become reconciled at our expense and we

shall have to pay the cost of the war. That is why, if you are guided by me, dear Agaric, you will not engage

"You know my energy; you know my prudence. I will compromise nothing. . . . Dear Cornemuse, I only want

For a long time Cornemuse refused to bear the expenses of what he thought was a fatal enterprise. Agaric was

in turn pathetic and terrible. At last, yielding to his prayers and threats, Cornemuse, with banging head and

swinging arms, went to the austere cell that concealed his evangelical poverty. In the whitewashed wall under

a branch of blessed box, there was fixed a safe. He opened it, and with a sigh took out a bundle of bills which,

"Do not doubt it, dear Cornemuse," said the latter, thrusting the papers into the pocket of his overcoat, "this

Pyrot affair has been sent us by God for the glory and exaltation of the Church of Penguinia."

And, left alone in his laboratory, he gazed, through his exquisite eyes, with an ineffable sadness at his stoves

The seven hundred Pyrotists inspired the public with an increasing aversion. Every day two or three of them

were beaten to death in the streets. One of them was publicly whipped, another thrown into the river, a third

tarred and feathered and led through a laughing crowd, a fourth had his nose cut off by a captain of dragoons.

They did not dare to show themselves at their clubs, at tennis, or at the races; they put on a disguise when

they went to the Stock Exchange. In these circumstances the Prince des Boscenos thought it urgent to curb

their audacity and repress their insolence. For this purpose he joined with Count Clena, M. de La Trumelle,

Viscount Olive, and M. Bigourd in founding a great antiPyrotist association to which citizens in hundreds of

thousands, soldiers in companies, regiments, brigades, divisions, and army corps, towns, districts, and

About this time the Minister of War happening to visit one day his Chief of Staff, saw with surprise that the

large room where General Panther worked, which was formerly quite bare, had now along each wall from

floor to ceiling in sets of deep pigeonholes, triple and quadruple rows of paper bundles of every as form and

colour. These sudden and monstrous records had in a few days reached the dimensions of a pile of archives

"Proofs against Pyrot," answered General Panther with patriotic satisfaction. "We had not got them when we

The door was open, and Greatauk saw coming up the staircase a long file of porters who were unloading

heavy bales of papers in the hall, and he saw the lift slowly rising heavily loaded with paper packets.

"They are fresh proofs against Pyrot that are now reaching us," said Panther. "I have asked for them in every

county of Penguinia, in every Staff Office and in every Court in Europe. I have ordered them in every town in

America and in Australia, and in every factory in Africa, and I am expecting bales of them from Bremen and

a shipload from Melbourne." And Panther turned towards the Minister of War the tranquil and radiant look

of a hero. However, Greatauk, his eyeglass in his eye, was looking at the formidable pile of papers with less

"Very good," said he, "very good! but I am afraid that this Pyrot business may lose its beautiful simplicity. It

was limpid; like a rockcrystal its value lay in its transparency. You could have searched it in vain with a

magnifyingglass for a straw, a bend, a blot, for the least fault. When it left my hands it was as pure as the

light. Indeed it was the light. I give you a pearl and you make a mountain out of it. To tell you the truth I am

afraid that by wishing to do too well you have done less well. Proofs! of course it is good to have proofs, but

perhaps it is better to have none at all. I have already told you, Panther, there is only one irrefutable proof, the

confession of the guilty person (or if the innocent what matter!). The Pyrot affair, as I arranged it, left no

room for criticism; there was no spot where it could be touched. It defied assault. t was invulnerable because

it was invisible. Now it gives an enormous handle for discussion. I advise you, Panther, to use your paper

packets with great reserve. I should be particularly grateful if you would be more sparing of your

communications to journalists. You speak well, but you say too much. Tell me, Panther, are there any forged

"That is what I meant. There are some adapted ones. So much the better. As proofs, forged documents, in

general, are better than genuine ones, first of all because they have been expressly made to suit the needs of

the case, to order and measure, and therefore they are fitting and exact. They are also preferable because they

carry the mind into an ideal world and turn it aside from the reality which, alas! in this world is never without

some alloy. . . . Nevertheless, I think I should have preferred, Panther, that we had no proofs at all."

The first act of the AntiPyrotist Association was to ask the Government immediately to summon the seven

hundred Pyrotists and their accomplices before the High Court of Justice as guilty of high treason. Prince des

Boscenos was charged to speak on behalf of the Association and presented himself before the Council which

had assembled to hear him. He expressed a hope that the vigilance and firmness of the Government would

rise to the height of the occasion. He shook hands with each of the ministers and as he passed General

Some days later by a unanimous vote of both Houses, on a motion proposed by the Government, the

AntiPyrotist Association was granted a charter recognising it as beneficial to the public interest.

The Association immediately sent a deputation to Chitterlings Castle in Porpoisia, where Crucho was eating

the bitter bread of exile, to assure the prince of the love and devotion of the AntiPyrotist members.

However, the Pyrotists grew in numbers, and now counted ten thousand. They had their regular cafes on the

boulevards. The patriots had theirs also, richer and bigger, and every evening glasses of beer, saucers,

matchstands, jugs, chairs, and tables were hurled from one to the other. Mirrors were smashed to bits, and

the police ended the struggles by impartially trampling the combatants of both parties under their hobnailed

On one of these glorious nights, as Prince des Boscenos was leaving a fashionable cafe in the company of

some patriots, M. de La Trumelle pointed out to him a little, bearded man with glasses, hatless, and having

only one sleeve to his coat, who was painfully dragging himself along the rubbishstrewn pavement.

The prince had gentleness as well as strength; he was exceedingly mild; but at the name of Colomban his

blood boiled. He rushed at the little spectacled man, and knocked him down with one blow of his fist on the

M. de La Trumelle then perceived that, misled by an undeserved resemblance, he had mistaken for

Colomban, M. Bazile, a retired lawyer, the secretary of the Antipyrotist Association, and an ardent and

generous patriot. Prince des Boscenos was one of those antique souls who never bend. However, he knew

"M. Bazile," said he, raising his hat, "if I have touched your face with my hand you will excuse me and you

will understand me, you will approve of me, nay, you will compliment me, you will congratulate me and

M. Bazile, wiping his bleeding nostrils with his handkerchief and displaying an elbow laid bare by the

"No, sir," answered he drily, "I shall not felicitate you, I shall not congratulate you, I shall not compliment

you, for your action was, at the very least, superfluous; it was, I will even say, supererogatory. Already this

evening I have been three times mistaken for Colomban and received a sufficient amount of the treatment he

deserves. The patriots have knocked in my ribs and broken my back, and, sir, I was of opinion that that was

Scarcely had he finished this speech than a band of Pyrotists appeared, and misled in their turn by that

insidious resemblance, they believed that the patriots were killing Colomban. They fell on Prince des

Boscenos and his companions with loaded canes and leather thongs, and left them for dead. Then seizing

Bazile they carried him in triumph, and in spite of his protests, along the boulevards, amid cries of: "Hurrah

for Colomban! Hurrah for Pyrot!" At last the police, who had been sent after them, attacked and defeated

them and dragged them ignominiously to the station, where Bazile, under the name of Colomban, was

Whilst the wind of anger and hatred blew in Alca, Eugine Bidault Coquille, poorest and happiest of

astronomers, installed in an old steamengine of the time of the Draconides, was observing the heavens

through a bad telescope, and photographing the paths of the meteors upon some damaged photographic

plates. His genius corrected the errors of his instruments and his love of science triumphed over the

worthlessness of his apparatus. With an inextinguishable ardour he observed aerolites, meteors, and

fireballs, and all the glowing ruins and blazing sparks which pass through the terrestrial atmosphere with

prodigious speed, and as a reward for is studious vigils he received the indifference of the public, the

ingratitude of the State and the blame of the learned societies. Engulfed in the celestial spaces he knew not

what occurred upon the surface of the earth. He never read the newspapers, and when he walked through the

town his mind was occupied with the November asteroids, and more than once he found himself at the

bottom of a pond in one of the public parks or beneath the wheels of a motor omnibus.

Elevated in stature as in thought he respected himself and others. This was shown by his cold politeness as

well as by a very thin black frock coat and a tall hat which gave to his person an appearance at once

emaciated and sublime. He took his meals in a little restaurant from which all customers less intellectual than

himself had fled, and thenceforth his napkin bound by its wooden ring rested alone in the abandoned rack.

In this cookshop his eyes fell one evening upon Colomban's memorandum in favour of Pyrot. He read it as

he was cracking some bad nuts and suddenly, exalted with astonishment, admiration, horror, and pity, he

forgot all about falling meteors and shooting stars and saw nothing but the innocent man hanging in his cage

That image did not leave him. For a week he had been obsessed by the innocent convict, when, as he was

leaving his cookshop, he saw a crowd of citizens entering a publichouse in which a public meeting was

going on. He went in. The meeting was disorderly; they were yelling, abusing one another and knocking one

another down in the smokeladen hall. The Pyrotists and the AntiPyrotists spoke in turn and were

alternately cheered and hissed at. An obscure and confused enthusiasm moved the audience. With the

audacity of a timid and retired man BidaultCoquille leaped upon the platform and spoke for threequarters

of an hour. He spoke very quickly, without order, but with vehemence, and with all the conviction of a

mathematical mystic. He was cheered. When he got down from the platform a big woman of uncertain age,

dressed in red, and wearing an immense hat trimmed with heroic feathers, throwing herself into his arms,

She declared to him that henceforth she would live but for Pyrot's defence and Colomban's glory. He thought

her sublime and beautiful. She was Maniflore, a poor old courtesan, now forgotten and discarded, who had

She never left him. They spent glorious hours together in dosshouses and in lodgings beautified by their

love, in newspaper offices, in meetinghalls and in lecturehalls. As he was an idealist, he persisted in

thinking her beautiful, although she gave him abundant opportunity of seeing that she had preserved no

charm of any kind. From her past beauty she only retained a confidence in her capacity for pleasing and a

lofty assurance in demanding homage. Still, it must be admitted that this Pyrot affair, so fruitful in prodigies,

invested Maniflore with a sort of civic majesty, and transformed her, at public meetings, into an august

BidaultCoquille and Maniflore did not kindle the least spark of irony or amusement in a single

AntiPyrotist, a single defender of Greatauk, or a single supporter of the army. The gods, in their anger, had

refused to those men the precious gift of humour. They gravely accused the courtesan and the astronomer of

being spies, of treachery, and of plotting against their country. BidaultCoquille and Maniflore grew visibly

For long months Penguinia had been divided into two camps and, though at first sight it may appear strange,

hitherto the socialists had taken no part in the contest. Their groups comprised almost all the manual workers

in the country, necessarily scattered, confused, broken up, and divided, but formidable. The Pyrot affair threw

the group leaders into a singular embarrassment. They did not wish to place themselves either on the side of

the financiers or on the side of the army. They regarded the Jews, both great and small, as their

uncompromising opponents. Their principles were not at stake, nor were their interests concerned in the

affair. Still the greater number felt how difficult it was growing for them to remain aloof from struggles in

Their leaders called a sitting of their federation at the Rue de la QueuedudiableSt. Mael, to take into

consideration the conduct they ought to adopt in the present circumstances and in future eventualities.

"A crime," said he, "the most odious and cowardly of crimes, a judicial crime, has been committed. Military

judges, coerced or misled by their superior officers, have condemned an innocent man to an infamous and

cruel punishment. Let us not say that the victim is not one of our own party, that he belongs to a caste which

was, and always will be, our enemy. Our party is the party of social justice; it can look upon no iniquity with

"It would be a shame for us if we left it to Kerdanic, a radical, to Colomban, a member of the middle classes,

and to a few moderate Republicans, alone to proceed against the crimes of the army. If the victim is not one

of us, his executioners are our brothers' executioners, and before Greatauk struck down this soldier he shot

"Comrades, by an intellectual, moral and material effort you must rescue Pyrot from his torment, and in

performing this generous act you are not turning aside from the liberating and revolutionary task you have

undertaken, for Pyrot his become the symbol of the oppressed and of all the social iniquities that now exist;

"You are advised to abandon your task in order to do something with which you have no concern. Why throw

yourselves into a conflict where, on whatever side you turn, you will find none but your natural,

uncompromising, even necessary opponents? Are the financiers to be less hated by us than the army? What

inept and criminal generosity is it that hurries you to save those seven hundred Pyrotists whom you will

"It is proposed that you act the part of the police for your enemies, and that you are to reestablish for them

the order which their own crimes have disturbed. Magnanimity pushed to this degree changes its name.

"Comrades, there is a point at which infamy becomes fatal to a society. Penguin society is being strangled by

its infamy, and you are requested to save it, to give it air that it can breathe. This is simply turning you into

"Leave is to smother itself and let us gaze at its last convulsions with joyful contempt, only regretting that it

has so entirely corrupted the soil on which it has been built that we shall find nothing but poisoned mud on

"Phoenix calls us to Pyrot's help for the reason that Pyrot is innocent. It seems to me that that is a very bad

reason. If Pyrot is innocent he has behaved like a good soldier and has always conscientiously worked at his

trade, which principally consists in shooting the people. That is not a motive to make the people brave all

dangers in his defence. When it is demonstrated to me that Pyrot is guilty and that he stole the army hay, I

"I am not of my friend, Phoenix's opinion but I am not with my friend Sapor either. I do not believe that the

party is bound to embrace a cause as soon as we are told that that cause is just. That, I am afraid, is a grievous

abuse of words and a dangerous equivocation. For social justice is not revolutionary justice. They are both in

perpetual antagonism: to serve the one is to oppose the other. As for me, my choice is made. I am for

revolutionary justice as against social justice. Still, in the present case I am against abstention. I say that when

a lucky chance brings us an affair like this we should be fools not to profit by it.

"How? We are given an opportunity of striking terrible, perhaps fatal, blows against militarism. And am I to

fold my arms? I tell you, comrades, I am not a fakir, I have never been a fakir, and if there are fakirs here let

them not count on me. To sit in meditation is a policy without results and one which I shall never adopt.

"A party like ours ought to be continually asserting itself. It ought to prove its existence by continual action.

We will intervene in the Pyrot affair but we will intervene in it in a revolutionary manner; we will adopt

violent action. . . . Perhaps you think that violence is oldfashioned and superannuated, to be scrapped along

with diligences, handpresses and aerial telegraphy. You are mistaken. Today as yesterday nothing is

obtained except by violence; it is the one efficient instrument. The only thing necessary is to know how to use

it. You ask what will our action be? I will tell you: it will be to stir up the governing classes against one

another, to put the army in conflict with the capitalists, the government with the magistracy, the nobility and

clergy with the Jews, and if possible to drive them all to destroy one another. To do this would be to carry on

an agitation which would weaken government in the same way that fever wears out the sick.

"The Pyrot affair, little as we know how to turn it to advantage, will put forward by ten years the growth of

the Social party and the emancipation of the proletariat, by disarmament, the general strike, and revolution."

The leaders of the party having each expressed a different opinion, the discussion was continued, not without

vivacity. The orators, as always happens in such a case, reproduced the arguments they had already brought

forward, though with less order and moderation than before. The dispute was prolonged and none changed

his opinion. These opinions, in the final analysis, were reduced to two: that of Sapor and Lapersonne who

advised abstention, and that of Phoenix and Larrivee, who wanted intervention. Even these two contrary

opinions were united in a common hatred of the heads of the army and of their justice, and in a common

belief in Pyrot's innocence. So that public opinion was hardly mistaken in regarding all the Socialist leaders

As for the vast masses in whose name they spoke and whom they represented as far as speech can express the

impossibleas for the proletarians whose thought is difficult to know and who do not know it themselves, it

seemed that the Pyrot affair did not interest them. It was too literary for them, it was in too classical a style,

and had an uppermiddleclass and highfinance tone about it that did not please them much.

When the Colomban trial began, the Pyrotists were not many more than thirty thousand, but they were every

where and might be found even among the priests and millionaires. What injured them most was the

sympathy of the rich Jews. On the other hand they derived valuable advantages from their feeble number. In

the first place there were among them fewer fools than among their opponents, who were overburdened

with them. Comprising but a feeble minority, they cooperated easily, acted with harmony, and had no

temptation to divide and thus counteract one another's efforts. Each of them felt the necessity of doing the

best possible and was the more careful of his conduct as he found himself more in the public eye. Finally,

they had every reason to hope that they would gain fresh adherents, while their opponents, having had

Summoned before the judges at a public sitting, Colomban immediately perceived that his judges were not

anxious to discover the truth. As soon as he opened his mouth the President ordered him to be silent in the

superior interests of the State. For the same reason, which is the supreme reason, the witnesses for the

defence were not heard. General Panther, the Chief of the Staff, appeared in the witnessbox, in full uniform

"The infamous Colomban states that we have no proofs against Pyrot. He lies; we have them. I have in my

archives seven hundred and thirtytwo square yards of them which at five hundred pounds each make three

That superior officer afterwards gave, with elegance and ease, a summary of those proofs.

"They are of all colours and all shades," said he in substance, "they are of every formpot, crown,

sovereign, grape, dovecot, grand eagle, etc. The smallest is less than the hundredth part of a square inch, the

Greatauk came to give evidence in his turn. Simpler, and perhaps greater, he wore a grey tunic and held his

"I leave," said he calmly and in a slightly raised voice, "I leave to M. Colomban the responsibility for an act

that has brought our country to the brink of ruin. The Pyrot affair is secret; it ought to remain secret. If it were

divulged the cruelest ills, wars, pillages, depredations, fires, massacres, and epidemics would immediately

burst upon Penguinia. I should consider myself guilty of high treason if I uttered another word."

Some persons known for their political experience, among others M. Bigourd, considered the evidence of the

"One evening at the Ministry of War," said that officer, "the attache of a neighbouring Power told me that

while visiting his sovereign's stables he had once admired some soft and fragrant hay, of a pretty green

colour, the finest hay he had ever seen! 'Where did it come from?' I asked him. He did not answer, but there

seemed to me no doubt about its origin. It was the hay Pyrot had stolen. Those qualities of verdure, softness,

and aroma, are those of our national hay. The forage of the neighbouring Power is grey and brittle; it sounds

LieutenantColonel Hastaing said in the witnessbox, amid hisses, that he did not believe Pyrot guilty. He

was immediately seized by the police and thrown into the bottom of a dungeon where, amid vipers, toads, and

There was deep silence, and a stately but illdressed nobleman, whose moustaches pointed to the skies and

whose dark eyes shot forth flashing glances, was seen advancing toward the witnessbox.

At these words the entire hall burst into enthusiastic applause and jumped up, moved by one of those

transports that stir men's hearts and rouse them to extraordinary actions. Without another word Count Maubec

All those present left the Court and formed a procession behind him. Prostrate at his feet, Princess des

Boscenos held his legs in a close embrace, but he went on, stern and impassive, beneath a shower of

handkerchiefs and flowers. Viscountess Olive, clinging to his neck, could not be removed, and the calm hero

When the court resumed its sitting, which it had been compelled to suspend, the President called the experts.

Vermillard, the famous expert in handwriting, gave the results of his researches.

"Having carefully studied," said he, "the papers found in Pyrot's house, in particular his account book and his

laundry books, I noticed that, though apparently not out of the common, they formed an impenetrable

cryptogram, the key to which, however, I discovered. The traitor's infamy is to be seen in every line. In this

system of writing the words 'Three glasses of beer and twenty francs for Adele' mean 'I have delivered thirty

thousand trusses of hay to a neighbouring Power! From these documents I have even been able to establish

the composition of the hay delivered by this officer. The words waistcoat, drawers, pocket handkerchief,

collars, drink, tobacco, cigars, mean clover, meadowgrass, lucern, burnet, oats, ryegrass, vernalgrass, and

common cat's tail grass. And these are precisely the constituents of the hay furnished by Count Maubec to the

Penguin cavalry. In this way Pyrot mentioned his crimes in a language that he believed would always remain

indecipherable. One is confounded by so much astuteness and so great a want of conscience."

Colomban, pronounced guilty without any extenuating circumstances, was condemned to the severest

penalty. The judges immediately signed a warrant consuming him to solitary confinement.

In the Place du Palais on the sides of a river whose banks had during the course of twelve centuries seen so

great a history, fifty thousand persons were tumultuously awaiting the result of the trial. Here were the heads

of the AntiPyrotist Association, among whom might be seen Prince des Boscenos, Count Clena, Viscount

Olive, and M. de La Trumelle; here crowded the Reverend Father Agaric and the teachers of St. Mael College

with their pupils; here the monk Douillard and General Caraguel, embracing each other, formed a sublime

group. The market women and laundry women with spits, shovels, tongs, beetles, and kettles full of water

might be seen running across the PontVieux. On the steps in front of the bronze gates were assembled all

the defenders of Pyrot in Alca, professors, publicists, workmen, some conservatives, others Radicals or

Revolutionaries, and by their negligent dress and fierce aspect could be recognised comrades Phoenix,

Larrivee, Lapersonne, Dagobert, and Varambille. Squeezed in his funereal frockcoat and wearing his hat of

ceremony, BidaultCoquille invoked the sentimental mathematics on behalf of Colomban and Colonel

Hastaing. Maniflore shone smiling and resplendent on the topmost step, anxious, like Leaena, to deserve a

The seven hundred Pyrotists disguised as lemonade sellers, uttermerchants, collectors of odds and ends, or

When Colomban appeared, so great an uproar burst forth that, struck by the commotion of air and water,

There were some cries of "Justice and truth!" and a voice was even heard shouting:

This was the signal for a terrible struggle. The combatants fell in thousands, and their bodies formed howling

and moving mounds on top of which fresh champions gripped each other by the throats. Women, eager, pale,

and dishevelled, with clenched teeth and frantic nails, rushed on the man, in transports that, in the brilliant

light of the public square, gave to their faces expressions unsurpassed even in the shade of curtains and in the

hollows of pillows. They were going to seize Colomban, to bite him, to strangle, dismember and rend him,

when Maniflore, tall and dignified in her red tunic, stood forth, serene and terrible, confronting these furies

who recoiled from before her in terror. Colomban seemed to be saved; his partisans succeeded in clearing a

passage for him through the Place du Palais and in putting him into a cab stationed at the comer of the

PontVieux. The horse was already in full trot when Prince des Boscenos, Count Clena, and M. de La

Trumelle knocked the driver off his seat. Then, making the animal back and pushing the spokes of the

wheels, they ran the vehicle on to the parapet of the bridge, whence they overturned it into the river amid the

cheers of the delirious crowd. With a resounding splash a jet of water rose upwards, and then nothing but a

Almost immediately comrades Dagobert and Varambille, with the help of the seven hundred disguised

Pyrotists, sent Prince des Boscenos head foremost into a riverlaundry in which he was lamentably

Serene night descended over the Place du Palais and shed silence and peace upon the frightful ruins with

which it was strewed. In the mean time, Colomban, three thousand yards down the stream, cowering beside a

lame old horse on a bridge, was meditating on the ignorance and injustice of crowds.

"The business," said he to himself, "is even more troublesome than I believed. I foresee fresh difficulties."

"What have you, poor friend, done to them?" said he. "It is on my account they have used you so cruelly."

He embraced the unfortunate beast and kissed the white star on his forehead. Then he took him by the bridle

and led him, both of them limping, trough the sleeping city to his house, where sleep soon allowed them to

In their infinite gentleness and at the suggestion of the common father of the faithful, the bishops, canons,

vicars, curates, abbots, and friars of Penguinia resolved to hold a solemn service in the cathedral of Alca, and

to pray that Divine mercy would deign to put an end to the troubles that distracted one of the noblest

countries in Christendom, and grant to repentant Penguinia pardon for its crimes against God and the

The ceremony took place on the fifteenth of June. General Caraguel, surrounded by his staff, occupied the

churchwarden's pew. The congregation was numerous and brilliant. According to M. Bigourd's expression it

was both crowded and select. In the front rank was to be seen M. de la Bertheoseille, Chamberlain to his

Highness Prince Crucho. Near the pulpit, which was to be ascended by the Reverend Father Douillard, of the

Order of St. Francis, were gathered, in an attitude of attention with their hands crossed upon their wands of

office, the great dignitaries of the AntiPyrotist association, Viscount Olive, M. de La Trumelle, Count

Clena, the Duke d'Ampoule, and Prince des Boscenos. Father Agaric was in the apse with the teachers and

pupils of St. Mael College. The righthand transept and aisle were reserved for officers and soldiers in

uniform, this side being thought the more honourable, since the Lord leaned his head to the right when he

died on the Cross. The ladies of the aristocracy, and among them Countess Clena, Viscountess Olive, and

Princess des Boscenos, occupied reserved seats. In the immense building and in the square outside were

gathered twenty thousand clergy of all sorts, as well as thirty thousand of the laity.

After the expiatory and propitiatory ceremony the Reverend Father Douillard ascended the pulpit. The

sermon had at first been entrusted to the Reverend Father Agaric, but, in spite of his merits, he was thought

unequal to the occasion in zeal and doctrine, and the eloquent Capuchin friar, who for six months had gone

through the barracks preaching against the enemies of God and authority, had been chosen in his place.

The Reverend Father Douillard, taking as his text, "He hath put down the mighty from their seat," established

that all temporal power has God as its principle and its end, and that it is ruined and destroyed when it turns

aside from the path that Providence has traced out for it and from the end to which He has directed it.

Applying these sacred rules to the government of Penguinia, he drew a terrible picture of the evils that the

"The first author of all these miseries and degradations, my brethren," said he, "is only too well known to

you. He is a monster whose destiny is providentially proclaimed by his name, for it is derived from the Greek

word, pyros, which means fire. Eternal wisdom warns us by this etymology that a Jew was to set ablaze the

He depicted the country, persecuted by the persecutors of the Church, and crying in its agony:

The powerful orator excited still greater indignation when he described the proud and crimestained

Colomban, plunged into the stream, all the waters of which could not cleanse him. He gathered up all the

humiliations and all the perils of the Penguins in order to reproach the President of the Republic and his

"That Minister," said he, "having been guilty of degrading cowardice in not exterminating the seven hundred

Pyrotists with their allies and defenders, as Saul exterminated the Philistines at Gibeah, has rendered himself

unworthy of exercising the power. that God delegated to him, and every good citizen ought henceforth to

insult his contemptible government. Heaven will look favourably on those who despise him. 'He hath put

down the mighty from their seat.' God will depose these pusillanimous chiefs and will put in their place

strong men who will call upon Him. I tell you, gentlemen, I tell you officers, noncommissioned officers, and

soldiers who listen to me, I tell you General of the Penguin armies, the hour has come! If you do not obey

God's orders, if in His name you do not depose those now in authority, if you do not establish a religious and

strong government in Penguinia, God will none the less destroy what He has condemned, He will none the

less save His people. He will save them, but, if you are wanting, He will do so by means of a humble artisan

Excited by this ardent exhortation, the sixty thousand people present rose up trembling and shouting: "To

arms! To arms! Death to the Pyrotists! Hurrah for Crucho!" and all of them, monks, women, soldiers,

noblemen, citizens, and loafers, who were gathered beneath the superhuman arm uplifted in the pulpit, struck

up the hymn, "Let us save Penguinia! They rushed impetuously from the basilica and marched along the

Left alone in the deserted nave, the wise Cornemuse, lifting his arms to heaven, murmured in broken accents:

"Agnosco fortunam ecclesiae penguicanae! I see but too well whither this will lead us."

The attack which the crowd made upon the legislative palace was repulsed. Vigorously charged by the police

and Alcan guards, the assailants were already fleeing in disorder, when the Socialists, running from the slums

and led by comrades Phoenix, Dagobert, Lapersonne, and Varambille, threw themselves upon them and

completed their discomfiture. MM. de La Trumelle and d'Ampoule were taken to the police station. Prince

des Boscenos, after a valiant struggle, fell upon the bloody pavement with a fractured skull.

In the enthusiasm of victory, the comrades, mingled with an innumerable crowd of papersellers and

guttermerchants, ran through the boulevards all night, carrying, Maniflore in triumph, and breaking the

mirrors of the cafes and the glasses of the street lamps amid cries of "Down with Crucho! Hurrah for the

Social Revolution!" The AntiPyrotists in their turn upset the newspaper kiosks and tore down the hoardings.

These were spectacles of which cool reason cannot approve and they were fit causes for grief to the

municipal authorities, who desired to preserve the good order of the roads and streets. But, what was sadder

for a man of heart was the sight or the canting humbugs, who, from fear of blows, kept at an equal distance

from the two camps, and who, although they allowed their selfishness and cowardice to be visible, claimed

admiration for the generosity of their sentiments and the nobility of their souls. They rubbed their eyes with

onions, gaped like whitings, blew violently into their handkerchiefs, and, bringing their voices out of the

depths of their stomachs, groaned forth: "O Penguins, cease these fratricidal struggles; cease to rend your

mother's bosom!" As if men could live in society without disputes and without quarrels, and as if civil

discords were not the necessary conditions of national life and progress. They showed themselves

hypocritical cowards by proposing a compromise between the just and the unjust, offending the just in his

rectitude and the unjust in his courage. One of these creatures, the rich and powerful Machimel, a champion

coward, rose upon the town like a colossus of grief; his tears formed poisonous lakes at his feet and his sighs

During these stormy nights BidaultCoquille at the top of his old steamengine, under the serene sky,

boasted in his heart, while the shooting stars registered themselves upon his photographic plates. He was

fighting for justice. He loved and was loved with a sublime passion. Insult and calumny raised him to the

clouds. A caricature of him in company with those of Colomban, Kerdanic, and Colonel Hastaing was to be

seen in the newspaper kiosks. The AntiPyrotists proclaimed that he had received fifty thousand francs from

the big Jewish financiers. The reporters of the militarist sheets held interviews regarding his scientific

knowledge with official scholars, who declared he had no knowledge of the stars, disputed his most solid

observations, denied his most certain discoveries, and condemned his most ingenious and most fruitful

He contemplated the black immensity pierced by a multitude of lights, without giving a thought to all the

heavy slumbers, cruel insomnias, vain dreams, spoilt pleasures, and infinitely diverse miseries that a great

"It is in this enormous city," said he to himself, "that the just and the unjust are joining battle."

And substituting a simple and magnificent poetry for the multiple and vulgar reality, he represented to

himself the Pyrot affair as a struggle between good and bad angels. He awaited the eternal triumph of the

Sons of Light and congratulated himself on being a Child of the Day confounding the Children of Night.

Hitherto blinded by fear, incautious and stupid before the bands of Friar Douillard and the partisans of Prince

Crucho, the Republicans at last opened their eyes and grasped the real meaning of the Pyrot affair. The

deputies who had for two years turned pale at the shouts of the patriotic crowds became, not indeed more

courageous, but altered their cowardice and blamed Robin Mielleux for disorders which their own

compliance had encouraged, and the instigators of which they had several times slavishly congratulated. They

reproached him for having imperilled the Republic by a weakness which was really theirs and a timidity

which they themselves had imposed upon him. Some of them began to doubt whether it was not to their

interest to believe in Pyrot's innocence rather than in his guilt, and thenceforward they felt a bitter anguish at

the thought that the unhappy man might have been wrongly convicted and that in his aerial cage he might be

expiating another man's crimes. "I cannot sleep on account of it!" was what several members of Minister

Guillaumette's majority used to say. But these were ambitious to replace their chief.

These generous legislators overthrew the cabinet, and the President of the Republic put in Robin Mielleux's

place, a patriarchal Republican with a flowing beard, La Trinite by name, who, like most of the Penguins,

understood nothing about the affair, but thought that too many monks were mixed up in it.

General Greatauk before leaving the Ministry of War, gave his final advice to Pariler, the Chief of the Staff.

"I go and you remain," said he, as he shook hands with him. "The Pyrot affair is my daughter; I confide her to

you, she is worthy of your love and your care; she is beautiful. Do not forget that her beauty loves the shade,

is leased with mystery, and likes to remain veiled. Great her modesty with gentleness. Too many indiscreet

looks have already profaned her charms. . . . Panther, you desired proofs and you obtained them. You have

many, perhaps too many, in your possession. I see that there will be many tiresome interventions and much

dangerous curiosity. If I were in your place I would tear up all those documents. Believe me, the best of

Alas! General Panther did not realise the wisdom of this advice. The future was only too thoroughly to justify

Greatauk's perspicacity. La Trinite demanded the documents belonging, to the Pyrot affair. Peniche, his

Minister of War, refused them in the superior interests of the national defence, telling him that the documents

under General Panther's care formed the hugest mass of archives in the world. La Trinite studied the case as

well as he could, and, without penetrating to the bottom of the matter, suspected it of irregularity.

Conformably to his rights and prerogatives he then ordered a fresh trial to be held. Immediately, Peniche, his

Minister of War, accused him of insulting the army and betraying the country and flung his portfolio at his

head. He was replaced by a second, who did the same. To him succeeded a third, who imitated these

examples, and those after him to the number of seventy acted like their predecessors, until the venerable La

Trinite groaned beneathe the weight of bellicose portfolios. The seventyfirst Minister of War, van Julep,

retained office. Not that he was in disagreement with so many and such noble colleagues, but he had been

commissioned by them generously to betray his Prime Minister, to cover him with shame and opprobrium,

and to convert the new trial to the glory of Greatauk, the satisfaction of the AntiPyrotists, the profit of the

General van Julep, though endowed with high military virtues, was not intelligent enough to employ the

subtle conduct and exquisite methods of Greatauk. He thought, like General Panther, that tangible proofs

against Pyrot were necessary, that they could never ave too many of them, that they could never have even

enough. He expressed these' sentiments to his Chief of Staff, who was only too inclined to agree with them.

"Panther," said he, "we are at the moment when we need abundant and superabundant proofs."

"You have said enough, General," answered Panther, "I will complete my piles of documents."

Six months later the proofs against Pyrot filled two storeys of the Ministry of War. The ceiling fell in beneath

the weight of the bundles, and the avalanche of falling documents crushed two head clerks, fourteen second

clerks, and sixty copying clerks, who were at work upon the ground floor arranging a change in the fashion of

the cavalry gaiters. The walls of the huge edifice had to be propped. Passersby saw with amazement

enormous beams and monstrous stanchions which reared themselves obliquely against the noble front of the

building, now tottering and disjointed, and blocked up the streets, stopped the carriages, and presented to the

motoromnibuses an obstacle against which they dashed with their loads of passengers.

The judges who had condemned Pyrot were not, properly speaking, judges but soldiers. The judges who had

condemned Colomban were real judges, but of inferior rank, wearing seedy black clothes like church vergers,

unlucky wretches of judges, miserable judgelings. Above them were the superior judges who wore ermine

robes over their black gowns. These, renowned for their knowledge and doctrine, formed a court whose

terrible name expressed power. It was called the Court of Appeal (Cassation) so as to make it clear that it was

One of these superior red Judges of the Supreme Court, called Chaussepied, led a modest and tranquil life in

a suburb of Alca. His soul was pure, his heart honest, his spirit just. When he had finished studying his

documents he used to play the violin and cultivate hyacinths. Every Sunday he dined with his neighbours the

Mesdemoiselles Helbivore. His old age was cheerful and robust and his friends often praised the amenity of

For some months, however, he had been irritable and touchy, and when he opened a newspaper his broad and

ruddy face would become covered with dolorous wrinkles and darkened with an angry purple. Pyrot was the

cause of it. Justice Chaussepied could not understand how an officer could have committed so black a crime

as to hand over eighty thousand trusses of military hay to a neighbouring and hostile Power. And he could

still less conceive how a scoundrel should have found official defenders in Penguinia. The thought that there

existed in his country a Pyrot, a Colonel Hastaing, a Colomban, a Kerdanic, a Phoenix, spoilt his

hyacinths,his violin, his heaven, and his earth, all nature, and even his dinner with the Mesdemoiselles

In the mean time the Pyrot case, having been presented to the Supreme Court by the Keeper of Seals, it fell to

Chaussepied to examine it and cover its defects, in case any existed. Although as upright and honest as a man

can be, and trained by long habit to exercise his magistracy without fear or favour, he expected to find in the

documents he submitted to him proofs of certain guilt and obvious criminality. After lengthened difficulties

and repeated refusals on the part of General Julep, Justice Chaussepied was allowed to examine the

documents. Numbered and initialed they ran to the number of fourteen millions six hundred and twentysix

thousand three hundred and twelve. As he studied them the judge was at first surprised, then astonished, then

stupefied, amazed, and, if I dare say so, flabbergasted. He found among the documents prospectuses of new

fancy shops, newspapers, fashionplates, paper bags, old business letters, exercise books, brown paper, green

paper for rubbing parquet floors, playing cards, diagrams, six thousand copies of the "Key to Dreams," but

The appeal was allowed, and Pyrot was brought down from his cage. But the AntiPyrotists did not regard

themselves as beaten. The military judges retried Pyrot. Greatauk, in this second affair, surpassed himself.

He obtained a second conviction; he obtained it by declaring that the proofs communicated to the Supreme

Court were worth nothing, and that great care had been taken to keep back the good ones, since they ought to

remain secret. In the opinion of connoisseurs he had never shown so much address. On leaving the court, as

he passed through the vestibule with a tranquil step, and his hands behind his back, amidst a crowd of

sightseers, a woman dressed in red and with her face covered by a black veil rushed at him, brandishing a

"Die, scoundrel!" she cried. It was Maniflore. Before those present could understand what was happening, the

general seized her by the wrist, and with apparent gentleness, squeezed it so forcibly that the knife fell from

He could not prevent the heroine from being taken to the policestation; but he had her immediately released

Justice Chaussepied, who had formerly liked soldiers so much, and esteemed their justice so highly,, being

now enraged with the military judges, quashed their judgments as a monkey cracks nuts. He rehabilitated

Pyrot a second time; he would, if necessary, have rehabilitated him five hundred times.

Furious at having been cowards and at having allowed themselves to be deceived and made game of, the

Republicans turned against the monks and clergy. The deputies passed laws of expulsion, separation, and

spoliation against them. What Father Cornemuse had foreseen took place. That good monk was driven from

the Wood of Conils. Treasury officers confiscated his retorts and his stills, and the liquidators divided

amongst them his bottles of St. Oberosian liqueur. The pious distiller lost the annual income of three million

five hundred thousand francs that his products procured for him. Father Agaric went into exile, abandoning

his school into the hands of laymen, who soon allowed it to fall into decay. Separated from its fostermother,

The victorious defenders of the innocent man now abused each other and overwhelmed each other

reciprocally with insults and calumnies. The vehement Kerdanic hurled himself upon Phoenix as if ready to

devour him. The wealthy Jews and the seven hundred Pyrotists turned away with disdain from the socialist

"We know you no longer," said they. "To the devil with you and your social justice. Social justice is the

Having been elected a Deputy and chosen to be the leader of the new majority, comrade Larrivee was

appointed by the Chamber and public opinion to the Premiership. He showed himself an energetic defender

of the military tribunals that had condemned Pyrot. When his former socialist comrades claimed a little more

justice and liberty for the employes of the State as well as for manual workers, he opposed their proposals in

"Liberty," said he, "is not licence. Between order and disorder my choice is made: revolution is impotence.

Progress has no more formidable enemy than violence. Gentlemen, those who, as I am, are anxious for

reform, ought to apply themselves before everything else to cure this agitation which enfeebles government

just as fever exhausts those who are ill. It is time to reassure honest people."

This speech was received with applause. The government of the Republic remained in subjection to the great

financial companies, the army was exclusively devoted to the defence of capital, while the fleet was designed

solely to procure fresh orders for the mineowners. Since the rich refused to pay their just share of the taxes,

In the mean time from the height of his old steamline, beneath the crowded stars of night, BidaultCoquille

gazed sadly at the sleeping city. Maniflore had left him. Consumed with a desire for fresh devotions and fresh

sacrifices, she had gone in company with a young Bulgarian to bear justice and vengeance to Sofia. He did

not regret her, having perceived after the Affair, that she was less beautiful in form and in thought than he

had at first imagined. His impressions had been modified in the same direction concerning many other forms

and many other thoughts. And what was cruelest of all to him, he regarded himself as not so great, not so

"You considered yourself sublime when you had but candour and goodwill. Of what were you proud,

BidaultCoquille? Of having been one of the first to know that Pyrot was innocent and Greatauk a scoundrel.

But threefourths of those who defended Greatauk against the attacks of the seven hundred Pyrotists knew

that better than you. Of what then did you show yourself so proud? Of having dared to say what you thought?

That is civic courage, and, like military courage, it is a mere result of imprudence. You have been imprudent.

So far so good, but that is no reason for praising yourself beyond measure. Your imprudence was trifling; it

exposed you to trifling perils; you did not risk your head by it. The Penguins have lost that cruel and

sanguinary pride which formerly gave a tragic grandeur to their revolutions; it is the fatal result of the

weakening of beliefs and character. Ought one to look upon oneself as a superior spirit for having shown a

little more clearsightedness than the vulgar? I am very much afraid, on the contrary, BidaultCoquille, that

you have given proof of a gross misunderstanding of the conditions of the moral and intellectual development

of a people. You imagined that social injustices were threaded together like pearls and that it would be

enough to pull off one in order to unfasten the whole necklace. That is a very ingenuous conception. You

flattered yourself that at one stroke you were establishing justice in your own country and in the universe.

You were a brave man, an honest idealist, though without much experimental philosophy. But go home to

your own heart and you will recognise that you had in you a spice of malice and that our ingenuousness was

not without cunning. You believed you were performing a fine moral action. You said to yourself: 'Here am I,

just and courageous once for all. I can henceforth repose in the public esteem and the praise of historians.'

And now that you have lost your illusions, now that you know how hard it is to redress wrongs, and that the

task must ever be begun afresh, you are going back to your asteroids. You are right; but go back to them with

Madame Clarence, the widow of an exalted functionary of the Republic, loved to entertain. Every Thursday

she collected together some friends of modest condition who took pleasure in conversation. The ladies who

went to see her, very different in age and rank, were all without money, and had all suffered much. There was

a duchess who looked like a fortuneteller and a fortuneteller who looked like a duchess. Madame Clarence

was pretty enough to maintain some old liaisons, but not to form new ones, and she generally inspired a quiet

esteem. She had a very pretty daughter, who, since she had no dower, caused some alarm among the male

guests; for the Penguins were as much afraid of portionless girls as they were of the devil himself. Eveline

Clarence, noticing their reserve and perceiving its cause, used to hand them their tea with an air of disdain.

Moreover, she seldom appeared at the parties and talked only to the ladies or the very young people. Her

discreet and retiring presence put no restraint upon the conversation, since those who took part in it thought

either that as she was a young girl she would not understand it, or that, being twentyfive years old, she

One Thursday therefore, in Madame Clarence's drawingroom, the conversation turned upon love. The ladies

spoke of it with pride, delicacy, and mystery, the men with discretion and fatuity; everyone took an interest in

the conversation, for each one was interested in what he or she said. A great deal of wit flowed; brilliant

apostrophes were launched forth and keen repartees were returned. But when Professor Haddi began to speak

"It is the same with our ideas on love as with our ideas on everything else," said he, "they rest upon anterior

habits whose very memory has been effaced. In morals, the limitations that have lost their grounds for

existing, the most useless obligations, the cruelest and most injurious restraints, are because of their profound

antiquity and the mystery of their origin, the least disputed and the least disputable as well as the most

respected, and they are those that cannot be violated without incurring the most severe blame. All morality

relative to the relations of the sexes is founded on this principle: that a woman once obtained belongs to the

man, that she is his property like his horse or his weapons. And this having ceased to be true, absurdities

result from it, such as the marriage or contract of sale of a woman to a man, with clauses restricting the right

of ownership introduced as a consequence of the gradual diminution of the claims of the possessor.

"The obligation imposed on a girl that she should bring her virginity to her husband comes from the times

when girls were married immediately they were of a marriageable age. It is ridiculous that a girl who marries

at twentyfive or thirty should be subject to that obligation. You will, perhaps, say that it is a present with

which her husband, if she gets one at last, will be gratified; but every moment we see men wooing married

women and showing themselves perfectly satisfied to take them as they find them.

"Still, even in our own day, the duty of girls is determined in religious morality by the old belief that God, the

most powerful of warriors, is polygamous, that he has reserved all maidens for himself, and that men can only

take those whom he has left. This belief, although traces of it exist in several metaphors of mysticism, is

abandoned today, by most civilised peoples. However, it still dominates the education of girls not only

among our believers, but even among our freethinkers, who, as a rule, think freely for the reason that they

"Discretion means ability to separate and discern. We say that a girl is discreet when she knows nothing at

all. We cultivate her ignorance. In spite of all our care the most discreet know something, for we cannot

conceal from them their own nature and their own sensations. But they know badly, they know in a wrong

"Sir," suddenly said Joseph Boutourle, the High Treasurer of Alca, "believe me, there are innocent girls,

perfectly innocent girls, and it is a great pity. I have known three. They married, and the result was tragical."

"I have noticed," Professor Haddock went on, "that Europeans in general and Penguins in particular occupy

themselves, after sport and motoring, with nothing so much as with love. It is giving a great deal of

"Then, Professor," exclaimed Madame Cremeur in a choking voice, "when a woman has completely

"No, Madame; it can have its importance," answered Professor Haddock, "but it is necessary to examine if

when she surrenders herself to us she offers us a delicious fruitgarden or a plot of thistles and dandelions.

And then, do we not misuse words? In love, a woman lends herself rather than gives herself. Look at the

"Sir, I have the greatest respect for her," replied Professor Haddock; "do not be afraid that I intend to say

anything in the least offensive about her. But allow me to tell you that, as a rule, the opinions of sons about

their mothers are not to be relied on. They do not bear enough in mind that a mother is a mother only because

she loved, and that she can still love. That, however, is the case, and it would be deplorable were it otherwise.

I have noticed, on the contrary, that daughters do not deceive themselves about their mothers' faculty for

loving or about the use they make of it; they are rivals; they have their eyes upon them."

The insupportable Professor spoke a great deal longer, adding indecorum to awkwardness, and impertinence

to incivility, accumulating incongruities, despising what is respectable, respecting what is despicable; but no

During this time in a room that was simple without grace, a room sad for the want of love, a room which, like

all young girls' rooms, had something of the cold atmosphere of a place of waiting about it, Eveline Clarence

turned over the pages of club annuals and prospectuses of charities in order to obtain from them some

acquaintance with society. Being convinced that her mother, shut up in her own intellectual but poor world,

could neither bring her out or push her into prominence, she decided that she herself would seek the best

means of winning a husband. At once calm and obstinate, without dreams or illusions, and regarding

marriage as but a ticket of admission or a passport, she kept before her mind a clear notion of the hazards,

difficulties, and chances of her enterprise. She had the art of pleasing and a coldness of temperament that

enabled her to turn it to its fullest advantage. Her weakness lay in the fact that she was dazzled by anything

Every Friday evening at nine o'clock the choicest of Alcan society assembled in the aristocratic church of St.

Mael for the Reverend Father Douillard's retreat. Prince and Princess des Boscenos, Viscount and

Viscountess Olive, M. and Madame Bigourd, Monsieur and Madame de La Trumelle were never absent. The

flower of the aristocracy might be seen there, and fair Jewish baronesses also adorned it by their presence, for

This retreat, like all religious retreats, had for its object to procure for those living in the world opportunities

for recollection so that they might think of their eternal salvation. It was also intended to draw down upon so

man noble and illustrious families the benediction of L. Orberosia, who loves the Penguins. The Reverend

Father Douillard strove for the completion of his task with a truly apostolical zeal. He hoped to restore the

prerogatives of St. Orberosia as the patron saint of Penguinia and to dedicate to her a monumental church on

one of the hills that dominate the city. His efforts had been crowned with great success, and for the

accomplishing of this national enterprise he had already united more than a hundred thousand adherents and

It was in the choir of St. Mael's that St. Orberosia's new shrine, shining with gold, sparkling with precious

The following account may be read in the "History of the Miracles of the Patron Saint of Alca" by the Abbe

"The ancient shrine had been melted down during the Terror and the precious relics of the saint thrown into a

fire that had been lit on the Place de Greve; but a poor woman of great piety, named Rouquin, went by night

at the peril of her life to gather up the calcined bones and the ashes of the blessed saint. She preserved them in

a jampot, and when religion was again restored, brought them to the venerable Cure of St. Maels. The

woman ended her days piously as a vendor of tapers and custodian of seats in the saint's chapel."

It is certain that in the time of Father Douillard, although faith was declining, the cult of St. Orberosia, which

for three hundred years had fallen under the criticism of Canon Princeteau and the silence of the Doctors of

the Church, recovered, and was surrounded with more pomp, more splendour, and more fervour than ever.

The theologians did not now subtract a single iota from the legend. They held as certainly established all the

facts related by Abbot Simplicissimus, and in particular declared, on the testimony of that monk, that the

devil, assuming a monk's form had carried off the saint to a cave and had there striven with her until she

overcame him. Neither places nor dates caused them any embarrassment. They paid no heed to exegesis and

took good care not to grant as much to science as Canon Princeteau had formerly conceded. They knew too

The church shone with lights and flowers. An operatic tenor sang the famous canticle of St. Orberosia:

Virgin of Paradise Come, come in the dusky night And on us shed Thy beams of light.

Mademoiselle Clarence sat beside her mother and in front of Viscount Clena. She remained kneeling during a

considerable time, for the attitude of prayer is natural to discreet virgins and it shows off their figures.

The Reverend Father Douillard ascended the pulpit. He was a powerful orator and could, at once melt,

surprise, and rouse his hearers. Women complained only that he fulminated against vice with excessive

harshness and in crude terms that made them blush. But they liked him none the less for it.

He treated in his sermon of the seventh trial of St. Orberosia, who was tempted by the dragon which she went

forth to combat. But she did not yield, and she disarmed the monster. The orator demonstrated without

difficulty that we, also, by the aid of St. Orberosia, and strong in the virtue which she inspires, can in our turn

overthrow the dragons that dart upon us and are waiting to devour us, the dragon of doubt, the dragon of

impiety, the dragon of forgetfulness of religious duties. He proved that the charity of St. Orberosia was a

work of social regeneration, and he concluded by an ardent appeal to the faithful "to become instruments of

the Divine mercy, eager upholders and supporters of the charity of St. Orberosia, and to furnish it with all the

After the ceremony, the Reverend Father Douillard remained in the sacristy at the disposal of those of the

faithful who desired information concerning the charity, or who wished to bring their contributions.

Mademoiselle Clarence wished to speak to Father Douillard, so did Viscount Clena. The crowd was large,

and a queue was formed. By chance Viscount Clena and Mademoiselle Clarence were side by side and

possibly they were squeezed a little closely to each other by the crowd. Eveline had noticed this fashionable

young man, who was almost as well known as his father in the world of sport. Clena had noticed her, and, as

he thought her pretty, he bowed to her, then apologised and pretended to believe that he had been introduced

He presented himself the following week at Madame Clarence's, thinking that her house was a bit fasta

thing not likely to displease himand when he saw Eveline again he felt he had not been mistaken and that

Viscount Clena had the finest motorcar in Europe. For three months he drove the Clarences every day over

hills and plains, through woods and valleys; they visited famous sites and went over celebrated castles. He

said to Eveline all that could be said and did all that could be done to overcome her resistance. She did not

conceal from him that she loved him, that she would always love him, and love no one but him. She remained

grave and trembling by his side. To his devouring passion she opposed the invincible defence of a virtue

conscious of its danger. At the end of three months, after having gone uphill and down hill, turned sharp

corners, and negotiated level crossings, and experienced innumerable breakdowns, he knew her as well as

he knew the flywheel of his car, but not much better. He employed surprises, adventures, sudden stoppages

in the depths of forests and before hotels, but he had advanced no farther. He said to himself that it was

absurd; then, taking her again in his car he set off at fifty miles an hour quite prepared to upset her in a ditch

One day, having come to take her on some excursion, he found her more charming than ever, and more

provoking. He darted upon her as a storm falls upon the reeds that border a lake. She bent with adorable

weakness beneath the breath of the storm, and twenty times was almost carried away by its strength, but

twenty times she arose, supple and, bowing to the wind. After all these shocks one would have said that a

light breeze had barely touched her charming stem; she smiled as if ready to be plucked by a bold hand. Then

her unhappy aggressor, desperate, enraged, and three parts mad, fled so as not to kill her, mistook the door,

went into the bedroom of Madame Clarence, whom he found putting on her hat in front of a wardrobe, seized

The same day Eveline, who had been making inquiries, learned that Viscount Clena had nothing but debts,

lived on money given him by an elderly lady, and promoted the sale of the latest models of a motorcar

manufacturer. They separated with common accord and Eveline began again disdainfully to serve tea to her

In Madame Clarence's drawingroom the conversation turned upon love, and many charming things were

"It seems to me," said he, "that the Penguin ladies have made a great fuss since, through St. Mael's agency,

they became viviparous. But there is nothing to be particularly proud of in that, for it is a state they share in

common with cows and pigs, and even with orange and lemon trees, for the seeds of these plants germinate in

"The selfimportance which the Penguin ladies give themselves does not go so far back as that," answered

M. Boutourle. "It dates from the day when the holy apostle gave them clothes. But this selfimportance was

long kept in restraint, and displayed itself fully only with increased luxury of dress and in a small section of

society. For go only two leagues from Alca into the country at harvest time, and you will see whether women

On that day M. Hippolyte Ceres paid his first call. He was a Deputy of Alca, and one of the youngest

members of the House. His father was said to have kept a dram shop, but he himself was a lawyer of robust

physique, a good though prolix speaker, with a selfimportant air and a reputation for ability.

"M. Ceres," said the mistress of the house, "your constituency is one of the finest in Alca."

"Unfortunately, it is impossible to take a stroll through it any longer," said M. Boutourle.

"Do not give them a bad name," answered the Deputy. "They are our great national industry."

"I know. The Penguins of today make me think of the ancient Egyptians. According to Clement of

Alexandria, Taine tells usthough he misquotes the textthe Egyptians worshipped the crocodiles that

devoured them. The Penguins today worship the motors that crush them. Without a doubt the future belongs

to the metal beast. We are no more likely to go back to cabs than we are to go back to the diligence. And the

long martyrdom of the horse will come to an end. The motor, which the frenzied cupidity of manufacturers

hurls like a juggernaut's car upon the bewildered people and of which the idle and fashionable make a foolish

though fatal elegance, will soon begin to perform its true function, and putting its strength at the service of

the entire people, will behave like a docile, toiling monster. But in order that the motor may cease to be

injurious and become beneficent we must build roads suited to its speed, roads which it cannot tear up with

its ferocious tyres, and from which it will send no clouds of poisonous dust into human lungs. We ought not

to allow slower vehicles or mere animals to go upon those roads, and we should establish garages upon them

and footbridges over them, and so create order and harmony among the means of communication of the

Madame Clarence led the conversation back to the improvements in M. Ceres' constituency. M. Ceres

showed his enthusiasm for demolitions, tunnelings, constructions, reconstructions, and all other fruitful

"We build today in an admirable style," said he; "everywhere majestic avenues are being reared. Was ever

"You are forgetting that big palace surmounted an immense melonshaped dome," grumbled by M. Daniset,

an old art amateur, in a voice of restrained rage. "I am amazed at the degree of ugliness which a modern city

can attain. Alca is becoming Americanised. Everywhere we are destroying all that is free, unexpected,

measured, restrained, human, or traditional among the things that are left us. Everywhere we are destroying

that charming object, a piece of an old wall that bears up the branches of a tree. Everywhere we are

suppressing some fragment of light and air, some fragment of nature, some fragment of the associations that

still remain with us, some fragment of our fathers, some fragment of ourselves. And we are putting up

frightful, enormous, infamous houses, surmounted in Viennese style by ridiculous domes, or fashioned after

the models of the 'new art' without mouldings, or having profiles with sinister corbels and burlesque

pinnacles, and such monsters as these shamelessly peer over the surrounding buildings. We see bulbous

protuberances stuck on the fronts of buildings and we are told they are 'new art' motives. I have seen the 'new

art' in other countries, but it is not so ugly as with us; it has fancy and it has simplicity. It is only in our own

country that by a sad privilege we may behold the newest and most diverse styles of architectural ugliness.

"Are you not afraid," asked M. Ceres severely, "are you not afraid that these bitter criticisms tend to keep out

of our capital the foreigners who flow into it from all arts of the world and who leave millions behind them?"

"You may set your mind at rest about that," answered M. Daniset. "Foreigners do not come to admire our

buildings; they come to see our courtesans, our dressmakers, and our dancing saloons."

Madame Clarence as an accomplished hostess thought it was time to return to the subject of love and asked

M. Jumel his opinion of M. Leon Blum's recent book in which the author complained. . . .

". . . That an irrational custom," went on Professor Haddock, "prevents respectable young ladies from making

love, a thing they would enjoy doing, whilst mercenary girls do it too much and without getting any

enjoyment out of it. It is indeed deplorable. But M. Leon Blum need not fret too much. If the evil exists, as he

says it does, in our middleclass society, I can assure him that everywhere else he would see a consoling

spectacle. Among the people, the mass of the people through town and country, girls do not deny themselves

And she praised the innocence of young girls in terms full of modesty and grace. It was charming to hear her.

Professor Haddock's views on the same subject were, on the contrary, painful to listen to.

"Respectable young girls," said he, "are guarded and watched over. Besides, men do not, as a rule, pursue

them much, either through probity, or from a fear of grave responsibilities, or because the seduction of a

young girl would not be to their credit. Even then we do not know what really takes place, for the reason that

what is hidden is not seen. This is a condition necessary to the existence of all society. The scruples of

respectable young girls could be more easily overcome than those of married women if the same pressure

were brought to bear on them, and for this there are two reasons: they have more illusions, and their curiosity

has not been satisfied. Women, for the most part, have been so disappointed by their husbands that they have

not courage enough to begin again with somebody else. I myself have been met by this obstacle several times

At the moment when Professor Haddock ended his unpleasant remarks, Mademoiselle Eveline Clarence

entered the drawingroom and listlessly handed about tea with that expression of boredom which gave an

"For my part," said Hippolyte Ceres, looking at her, "I declare myself the young ladies' champion."

Hippolyte Ceres, who had never set foot outside of his political world of electors and elected, thought

Madame Clarence's drawingroom most select, its mistress exquisite, and her daughter amazingly beautiful.

His visits became frequent and he paid court to both of them. Madame Clarence, who now liked attention,

thought him agreeable. Eveline showed no friendliness towards him, and treated him with a hauteur and

disdain that he took for aristocratic behaviour and fashionable manners, and he thought all the more of her on

that account. This busy man taxed his ingenuity to please them, and he sometimes succeeded. He got them

cards for fashionable functions and boxes at the Opera. He furnished Mademoiselle Clarence with several

opportunities of appearing to great advantage and in particular at a garden party which, although given by a

Minister, was regarded as really fashionable, and gained its first success in society circles for the Republic.

At that party Eveline had been much noticed and had attracted the special attention of a young diplomat

called Roger Lambilly who, imagining that she belonged to a rather fast set, invited her to his bachelor's flat.

She thought him handsome and believed him rich, and she accepted. A little moved, almost disquieted, she

very nearly became the victim of her daring, and only avoided defeat by an offensive measure audaciously

Being now on friendly terms with Ministers and with the President, Eveline continued to wear her aristocratic

and pious affectations, and these won for her the sympathy of the chief personages in the anticlerical and

democratic Republic. M. Hippolyte Ceres, seeing that she was succeeding and doing him credit, liked her still

Henceforth, in spite of everything, she began to observe him with interest, being curious to see if his passion

would increase. He appeared to her without elegance or grace, and not well bred, but active, clearsighted,

full of resource, and not too great a bore. She still made fun of him, but he had now won her interest.

One day she wished to test him. It was during the elections, when members of Parliament were, as the phrase

runs, requesting a renewal of their mandates. He had an opponent, who, though not dangerous at first and not

much of an orator, was rich and was reported to be gaining votes every day. Hippolyte Ceres, banishing both

dull security and foolish alarm from his mind, redoubled his care. His chief method of action was by public

meetings at which he spoke vehemently against the rival candidate. His committee held huge meetings on

Saturday evenings and at three o'clock on Sunday afternoons. One Sunday, as he called on the Clarences, he

found Eveline alone in the drawingroom. He had been chatting for about twenty or twentyfive minutes,

when, taking out his watch, he saw that it was a quarter to three. The young girl showed herself amiable,

engaging, attractive, and full of promises. Ceres was fascinated, but he stood up to go.

"Stay a little longer," said she in a pressing and agreeable voice which made him promptly sit down again.

She was full of interest, of abandon, curiosity, and weakness. He blushed, turned pale, and again got up.

Then, in order to keep him still longer, she looked at him out of two grey and melting eyes, and though her

bosom was heaving, she did not say another word. He fell at her feet in distraction,, but once more looking at

She was not quite in love with him, but she wished him to be in love with her. She was, moreover, very

reserved with him, and that not solely from any want of inclination to be otherwise, since in affairs of love

some things are due to indifference, to inattention, to woman's instinct, to traditional custom and feeling, to a

desire to try one's power, and to satisfaction at seeing its results. The reason of her prudence was that she

knew him to be very much infatuated and capable of taking advantage of any familiarities she allowed as well

As he was a professed anticlerical and freethinker, she thought it a good plan to affect an appearance of

piety in his presence and to be seen with prayerbooks bound in red morocco, such as Queen Marie

Leczinska's or the Dauphiness Marie Josephine's "The Last Two Weeks of Lent." She lost no opportunity,

either, of showing him the subscriptions that she collected for the endowment of the national cult of St.

Orberosia. Eveline did not act in this way because she wished to tease him. Nor did it spring from a young

girl's archness, or a spirit of constraint, or even from snobbishness, though there was more than a suspicion of

this latter in her behaviour. It was but her way of asserting herself, of stamping herself with a definite

character, of increasing her value. To rouse the Deputy's courage she wrapped herself up in religion, just as

Brunhild surrounded herself with flames so as to attract Sigurd. Her audacity was successful. He thought her

Ceres was reelected by an enormous majority and returned to a House which showed itself more inclined to

the Left, more advanced, and, as it seemed, more eager for reform than its predecessor. Perceiving at once

that so much zeal was but intended to hide a fear of change, and a sincere desire to do nothing, he determined

to adopt a policy that would satisfy these aspirations. At the beginning of the session he made a great speech,

cleverly thought out and well arranged, dealing with the idea that all reform ought to be put off for a long

time. He showed himself heated, even fervid; holding the principle that an orator should recommend

moderation with extreme vehemence. He was applauded by the entire assembly. The Clarences listened to

him from the President's box and Eveline trembled in spite of herself at the solemn sound of the applause. On

the same bench the fair Madame Pensee shivered at the intonations of his virile voice.

As soon as he descended from the tribune, Ceres, even while the audience were still clapping, went without a

moment's delay to salute the Clarences in their box. Eveline saw in him the beauty of success, and as he

leaned towards the ladies, wiping his neck with his handkerchief and receiving their congratulations with an

air of modesty though not without a tinge of selfconceit, the young girl glanced towards Madame Pensee

and saw her, palpitating and breathless, drinking in the hero's applause with her head thrown backwards. It

seemed as if she were on the point of fainting. Eveline immediately smiled tenderly on M. Ceres.

The Alcan deputy's speech had a great vogue. In political "spheres" it was regarded as extremely able. "We

have at last heard an honest pronouncement," said the chief Moderate journal. "It is a regular programme!"

Hippolyte Ceres had now established himself as leader of the radicals, socialists, and anticlericals, and they

appointed him President of their group, which was then the most considerable in the House. He thus found

After a long hesitation Eveline Clarence accepted the idea of marrying M. Hippolyte Ceres. The great man

was a little common for her taste. Nothing had yet proved that he would one day reach the point where

politics bring in large sums of money. But she was entering her twentyseventh year and knew enough of life

to see that she must not be too fastidious or show herself too difficult to please.

Hippolyte Ceres was celebrated; Hippolyte Ceres was happy. He was no longer recognisable; the elegance of

his clothes and deportment had increased tremendously. He wore an undue number of white gloves. Now that

he was too much of a society man, Eveline began to doubt if it was not worse than being too little of one.

Madame Clarence regarded the engagement with favour. She was reassured concerning her daughter's future

The celebration of the marriage raised some difficulties. Eveline was pious and wished to receive the

benediction of the Church. Hippolyte Ceres, tolerant but a freethinker, wanted only a civil marriage. There

were many discussions and even some violent scenes upon the subject. The last took place in the young girl's

room at the moment when the invitations were being written. Eveline declared that if she did not go to church

she would not believe herself married. She spoke of breaking off the engagement, and of going abroad with

her mother, or of retiring into a convent. Then she became tender, weak, suppliant. She sighed, and

everything in her virginal chamber sighed in chorus, the holywater font, the palmbranch above her white

bed, the books of devotion on their little shelves, and the blue and white statuette of St. Orberosia chaining

the dragon of Cappadocia, that stood upon the marble mantelpiece. Hippolyte Ceres was moved, softened,

Beautiful in her grief, her eyes shining with tears, her wrists girt by a rosary of lapis lazuli and, so to speak,

chained by her faith, she suddenly flung herself at Hippolyte's feet, and dishevelled, almost dying, she

"A religious marriage," he muttered, "a marriage in church, I could make my constituents stand that, but my

committee would not swallow the matter so easily. . . . Still I'll explain it to them . . . toleration, social

necessities . . . . They all send their daughters to Sunday school . . . . But as for office, my dear I am afraid we

At these words she stood up grave, generous, resigned, conquered also in her turn.

"Very well, but be guided by me. I am going to try and arrange everything both to your satisfaction and

She sought the Reverend Father Douillard and explained the situation. He showed himself even more

"Your husband is an intelligent man, a man of order and reason; he will come over to us. You will sanctify

him. It is not in vain that God has granted him the blessing of a Christian wife. The Church needs no pomp

and ceremonial display for her benedictions. Now that she is persecuted, the shadow of the crypts and the

recesses of the catacombs are in better accord with her festivals. Mademoiselle, when you have performed the

civil formalities come here to my private chapel in costume with M. Ceres. I will marry you, a observe the

most absolute discretion. I will obtain the necessary dispensations from the Archbishop as well as all

Hippolyte, although he thought the combination a little dangerous, agreed to it, a good deal flattered, at

He went in a frock coat with white gloves and varnished shoes, and he genuflected.

The Ceres household was established with modest decency in a pretty flat situated in a new building. Ceres

loved his wife in a calm and tranquil fashion. He was often kept late from home by the Commission on the

Budget and he worked more than three nights a week at a report on the postal finances of which he hoped to

make a masterpiece. Eveline thought she could twist him round her finger, and this did not displease him.

The bad side of their situation was that they had not much money; in truth they had very little. The servants

of the Republic do not grow rich in her service as easily as people think. Since the sovereign is no longer

there to distribute favours, each of them takes what he can, and his depredations, limited by the depredations

of all the others, are reduced to modest proportions. Hence that austerity of morals that is noticed in

democratic leaders. They can only grow rich during periods of great business activity and then they find

themselves exposed to the envy of their less favoured colleagues. Hippolyte Ceres had for a long time

foreseen such a period. He was one of those who had made preparations for its arrival. Whilst waiting for it

he endured his poverty with dignity, and Eveline shared that poverty without suffering as much as one might

have thought. She was in close intimacy with the Reverend Father Douillard and frequented the chapel of St.

Orberosia, where she met with serious society and people in a position to render her useful services. She

knew how to choose among them and gave her confidence to none but those who deserved it. She had gained

experience since her motor excursions with Viscount Clena, and above all she had now acquired the value of

The deputy was at first uneasy about these pious practices, which were ridiculed by the demagogic

newspapers, but he was soon reassured, for he saw all around him democratic leaders joyfully becoming

They found that they had reached one of those periods (which often recur) when advance had been carried a

little too far. Hippolyte Ceres gave a moderate support to this view. His policy was not a policy of

persecution but a policy of tolerance. He had laid its foundations in his splendid speech on the preparations

for reform. The Prime Minister was looked upon as too advanced. He proposed schemes which were admitted

to be dangerous to capital, and the great financial companies were opposed to him. Of course it followed that

the papers of all views supported the companies. Seeing the danger increasing, the Cabinet abandoned its

schemes, its programme, and its opinions, but it was too late. A new administration was already ready. An

insidious question by Paul Visire which was immediately made the subject of a resolution, and a fine speech

The President of the Republic entrusted the formation of a new Cabinet to this same Paul Visire, who, though

still very young, had been a Minister twice. He was a charming man, spending much of his time in the

greenrooms of theatres, very artistic, a great society man, of amazing ability and industry. Paul Visire

formed a temporary ministry intended to reassure public feeling which had taken alarm, and Hippolyte Ceres

The new ministry, belonging to all the groups in the majority, represented the most diverse and contrary

opinions, but they were all moderate and convinced conservatives.* The Minister of Foreign Affairs was

retained from the former cabinet. He was a little dark man called Crombile, who worked fourteen hours a day

with the conviction that he dealt with tremendous questions. He refused to see even his own diplomatic

agents, and was terribly uneasy, though he did not disturb anybody else, for the want of foresight of peoples

* As this ministry exercised considerable influence upon the destinies of the country and of the world, we

think it well to give its composition: Minister of the Interior and Prime Minister, Paul Visire; Minister of

Justice, Pierre Bouc; Foreign Affairs, Victor Crombile; Finance, Terrasson; Education, Labillette; Commerce,

Posts and Telegraphs, Hippolyte Ceres; Agriculture, Aulac; Public Works, Lapersonne; War, General

The office of Public Works was given to a Socialist, Fortune Lapersonne. It was then a political custom and

one of the most solemn, most severe, most rigorous, and if I may dare say so, the most terrible and cruel of all

political customs, to include a member of the Socialist party in each ministry intended to oppose Socialism,

so that the enemies of wealth and property should suffer the shame of being attacked by one of their own

party, and so that they could not unite against these forces without turning to some one who might possibly

attack themselves in the future. Nothing but a profound ignorance of the human heart would permit the belief

that it was difficult to find a Socialist to occupy these functions. Citizen Fortune Lapersonne entered the

Visire cabinet of his own free will and without any constraint; and he found those who approved of his action

even among his former friends, so great was the fascination that power exercised over the Penguins!

General Debonnaire went to the War Office. He was looked upon as one of the ablest generals in the army,

but he was ruled by a woman, the Baroness Bildermann, who, though she had reached the age of intrigue,

The new Minister of Marine, the worthy Admiral Vivier des Murenes, was generally regarded as an excellent

seaman. He displayed a piety that would have seemed excessive in an anticlerical minister, if the Republic

had not recognised that religion was of great maritime utility. Acting on the instruction of his spiritual

director, the Reverend Father Douillard, the worthy Admiral had dedicated his fleet to St. Orberosia and

directed canticles in honour of the Alcan Virgin to be composed by Christian bards. These replaced the

Prime Minister Visire declared himself to be distinctly anticlerical but ready to respect all creeds; he asserted

that he was a soberminded reformer. Paul Visire and his colleagues desired reforms, and it was in order not

to compromise reform that they proposed none; for they were true politicians and knew that reforms are

compromised the moment they are proposed. The government was well received, respectable people were

The administration announced that four new ironclads would be put into commission, that prosecutions

would be undertaken against the Socialists, and it formally declared its intention to have nothing to do with

any inquisitorial incometax. The choice of Terrasson as Minister of Finance was warmly approved by the

press. Terrasson, an old minister famous for his financial operations, gave warrant to all the hopes of the

financiers and shadowed forth a period of great business activity. Soon those three udders of modern nations,

monopolies, bill discounting, and fraudulent speculation, were swollen with the milk of wealth. Already

whispers were heard of distant enterprises, and of planting colonies, and the boldest put forward in the

Without having yet shown what he was capable of, Hippolyte Ceres was considered a man of weight.

Business people thought highly of him. He was congratulated on all sides for having broken with the extreme

sections, the dangerous men, and for having realised the responsibilities of government.

Madame Ceres shone alone amid the Ministers' wives. Crombile withered away in bachelordom. Paul Visire

had married money in the person of Mademoiselle Blampignon, an accomplished, estimable, and simple lady

who was always ill, and whose feeble health compelled her to stay with her mother in the depths of a remote

province. The other Ministers' wives were not born to charm the sight, and people smiled when they read that

Madame Labillette had appeared at the Presidency Ball wearing a headdress of birds of paradise. Madame

Vivier des Murenes, a woman of good family, was stout rather than tall, had a face like a beefsteak and the

voice of a newspaperseller. Madame Debonnaire, tall, dry, and florid, was devoted to young officers. She

ruined herself by her escapades and crimes and only regained consideration by dint of ugliness and insolence.

Madame Ceres was the charm of the Ministry and its tide to consideration. Young, beautiful, and

irreproachable, she charmed alike society and the masses by her combination of elegant costumes and

Her receptions were thronged by the great Jewish financiers. She gave the most fashionable garden parties in

the Republic. The newspapers described her dresses and the milliners did not ask her to pay for them. She

went to Mass; she protected the chapel of St. Orberosia from the illwill of the people; and she aroused in

With her golden hair, grey eyes, and supple and slight though rounded figure, she was indeed pretty. She

enjoyed an excellent reputation and she was so adroit, and calm, so much mistress of herself, that she would

have preserved it intact even if she had been discovered in the very act of ruining it.

The session ended with a victory for the cabinet which, amid the almost unanimous applause of the House,

defeated a proposal for an inquisitorial tax, and with a triumph for Madame Ceres who gave parties in honour

The Prime Minister invited Monsieur and Madame Ceres to spend a couple of weeks of the holidays in a little

villa that he had taken in the mountains, and in which he lived alone. The deplorable health of Madame Paul

Visire did not allow her to accompany her husband, and she remained with her relatives in one of the

The villa had belonged to the mistress of one of the last Kings of Alca: the drawingroom retained its old

furniture, and in it was still to be found the Sofa of the Favourite. The country was charming; a pretty blue

stream, the Aiselle, flowed at the foot of the hill that dominated the villa. Hippolyte Ceres loved fishing;

when engaged at this monotonous occupation he often formed his best Parliamentary combinations, and his

happiest oratorical inspirations. Trout swarmed in the Aiselle; he fished it from morning till evening in a boat

In the mean time, Eveline and Paul Visire sometimes took a turn together in the garden, or had a little chat in

the drawingroom. Eveline, although she recognised the attraction that Visire had for women, had hitherto

displayed towards him only an intermittent and superficial coquetry, without any deep intentions or settled

design. He was a connoisseur and saw that she was pretty. The House and the Opera had deprived him of all

leisure, but, in a little villa, the grey eyes and rounded figure of Eveline took on a value in his eyes. One day

as Hippolyte Ceres was fishing in the Aiselle, he made her sit beside him on the Sofa of the Favourite. Long

rays of gold struck Eveline like arrows from a hidden Cupid through the chinks of the curtains which

protected her from the heat and glare of a brilliant day. Beneath her white muslin dress her rounded yet

slender form was outlined in its grace and youth. Her skin was cool and fresh, and had the fragrance of

freshly mown hay. Paul Visire behaved as the occasion warranted, and for her part, she was opposed neither

to the games of chance or of society. She believed it would be nothing or a trifle; she was mistaken.

"There was," says the famous German ballad, "on the sunny side of the town square, beside a wall whereon

the creeper grew, a pretty little letterbox, as blue as the cornflowers, smiling and tranquil.

"All day long there came to it, in their heavy shoes, small shopkeepers, rich farmers, citizens, the

taxcollector and the policeman, and they put into it their business letters, their invoices, their summonses

their notices to pay taxes, the judges' returns, and orders for the recruits to assemble. It remained smiling and

"With joy, or in anxiety, there advanced towards it workmen and farm servants, maids and nursemaids,

accountants, clerks, and women carrying their little children in their arms; they put into it notifications of

births. marriages, and deaths, letters between engaged couples, between husbands and wives, from mothers to

"At twilight, young lads and young girls slipped furtively to it, and put in loveletters, some moistened with

tears that blotted the ink, others with a little circle to show the place to kiss, all of them very long. It remained

"Rich merchants came themselves through excess of carefulness at the hour of daybreak, and put into it

registered letters, and letters with five red seals, full of bank notes or cheques on the great financial

"But one day, Gaspar, whom it had never seen, and whom it did not know from Adam, came to put in a letter,

of which nothing is known but that it was folded like a little hat. Immediately the pretty letterbox fell into a

swoon. Henceforth it remains no longer in its place; it runs through streets, fields, and woods, girdled with

ivy, and crowned with roses. It keeps running up hill and down dale; the country policeman surprises it

Paul Visire had recovered all his customary nonchalance. Eveline remained stretched on the Divan of the

The Reverend Father Douillard, an excellent moral theologian, and a man who in the decadence of the

Church has preserved his principles, was very right to teach, in conformity with the doctrine of the Fathers,

that while a woman commits a great sin by giving herself for money, she commits a much greater one by

giving herself for nothing. For, in the first case she acts to support her life, and that is sometimes not merely

excusable but pardonable, and even worthy of the Divine Grace, for God forbids suicide, and is unwilling that

his creatures should destroy themselves. Besides, in giving herself in order to live, she remains humble, and

derives no pleasure from it a thing which diminishes the sin. But a woman who gives herself for nothing sins

with pleasure and exults in her fault. The pride and delight with which she burdens her crime increase its load

Madame Hippolyte Ceres' example shows the profundity of these moral truths. She perceived that she had

senses. A second was enough to bring about this discovery, to change her soul, to alter her whole life. To

have learned to know herself was at first a delight. The {greek here} of the ancient philosophy is not a

precept the moral fulfilment of which procures any pleasure, since one enjoys little satisfaction from knowing

one's soul. It is not the same with the flesh, for in it sources of pleasure may be revealed to us. Eveline

immediately felt an obligation to her revealer equal to the benefit she had received, and she imagined that he

who had discovered these heavenly depths was the sole possessor of the key to them. Was this an error, and

might she not be able to find others who also had the golden key? It is difficult to decide; and Professor

Haddock, when the facts were divulged (which happened without much delay as we shall see), treated the

matter from an experimental point of view, in a scientific review, and concluded that the chances Madame

C would have of finding the exact equivalent of M. V were in the proportion of 305 to 975008. This is

as much as to say that she would never find it. Doubtless her instinct told her the same, for she attached

I have related these facts with all the circumstances which seemed to me worthy of attracting the attention of

meditative and philosophic minds. The Sofa of the Favourite is worthy of the majesty of history; on it were

decided the destinies of a great people; nay, on it was accomplished an act whose renown was to extend over

the neighbouring nations both friendly and hostile, and even over all humanity. Too often events of this

nature escape the superficial minds and shallow spirits who inconsiderately assume the task of writing

history. Thus the secret springs of events remain hidden from us. The fall of Empires and the transmission of

dominions astonish us and remain incomprehensible to us, because we have not discovered the imperceptible

point, or touched the secret spring which when put in movement has destroyed and overthrown everything.

The author of this great history knows better than anyone else his faults and his weaknesses, but he can do

himself this justicethat he has always kept the moderation, the seriousness, the austerity, which an account

of affairs of State demands, and that he has never departed from the gravity which is suitable to a recital of

When Eveline confided to Paul Visire that she had never experienced anything similar, he did not believe her.

He had had a good deal to do with women and knew that they readily say these things to men in order to

make them more in love with them. Thus his experience, as sometimes happens, made him disregard the

truth. Incredulous, but gratified all the same, he soon felt love and something more for her. This state at first

seemed favourable to his intellectual faculties. Visire delivered in the chief town of his constituency a speech

The reopening of Parliament was serene. A few isolated jealousies, a few timid ambitions raised their heads

in the House, and that was all. A smile from the Prime Minister was enough to dissipate these shadows. She

and he saw each other twice a day, and wrote to each other in the interval. He was accustomed to intimate

relationships, was adroit, and knew how to dissimulate; but Eveline displayed a foolish imprudence: she

made herself conspicuous with him in drawingrooms, at the theatre, in the House, and at the Embassies; she

wore her love upon her face, upon her whole person, in her moist glances, in the languishing smile of her lips,

in the heaving of her breast, in all her heightened, agitated, and distracted beauty. Soon the entire country

knew of their intimacy. Foreign Courts were informed of it. The President of the Republic and Eveline's

husband alone remained in ignorance. The President became acquainted with it in the country, through a

misplaced police report which found its way, it is not known how, into his portmanteau.

Hippolyte Ceres, without being either very subtle, or very perspicacious, noticed that there was something

different in his home. Eveline, who quite lately had interested herself in his affairs, and shown, if not

tenderness, at least affection, towards him, displayed henceforth nothing but indifference and repulsion. She

had always had periods of absence, and made prolonged visits to the Charity of St. Orberosia; now, she went

out in the morning, remained out all day, and sat down to dinner at nine o'clock in the evening with the face

of a somnambulist. Her husband thought it absurd; however, he might perhaps have never known the reason

for this; a profound ignorance of women, a crass confidence in his own merit, and in his own fortune, might

perhaps have always hidden the truth from him, if the two lovers had not, so to speak, compelled him to

When Paul Visire went to Eveline's house and found her alone, they used to say, as they embraced each

other; "Not here! not here!" and immediately they affected an extreme reserve. That was their invariable rule.

Now, one day, Paul Visire went to the house of his colleague Ceres, with whom he had an engagement. It

was Eveline who received him, the Minister of Commerce being delayed by a commission.

They said it, mouth to mouth, embracing, and clasping each other. They were still saying it, when Hippolyte

Paul Visire did not lose his presence of mind. He declared to Madame Ceres that he would give up his

attempt to take the dust out of her eye. By this attitude he did not deceive the husband, but he was able to

Hippolyte Ceres was thunderstruck. Eveline's conduct appeared incomprehensible to him; he asked her what

She denied everything, not to convince him, for he had seen them, but from expediency and good taste, and to

avoid painful explanations. Hippolyte Ceres suffered all the tortures of jealousy. He admitted it to himself, he

kept saying inwardly, "I am a strong man; I am clad in armour; but the wound is underneath, it is in my

heart," and turning towards his wife, who looked beautiful in her guilt, he would say:

He suffered so much that he took up his revolver, exclaiming: "I will go and kill him!" But he remembered

that a Minister of Commerce cannot kill his own Prime Minister, and he put his revolver back into his

The weeks passed without calming his sufferings. Each morning he buckled his strong man's armour over his

wound and sought in work and fame the peace that fled from him. Every Sunday he inaugurated busts,

statues, fountains, artesian wells, hospitals, dispensaries, railways, canals, public markets, drainage systems,

triumphal arches, and slaughter houses, and delivered moving speeches on each of these occasions. His fervid

activity devoured whole piles of documents; he changed the colours of the postage stamps fourteen times in

one week. Nevertheless, he gave vent to outbursts of grief and rage that drove him insane; for whole days his

reason abandoned him. If he had been in the employment of a private administration this would have been

noticed immediately, but it is much more difficult to discover insanity or frenzy in the conduct of affairs of

State. At that moment the government employees were forming themselves into associations and federations

amid a ferment that was giving alarm both to the Parliament and to public feeling. The postmen were

Hippolyte Ceres informed them in a circular that their action was strictly legal. The following day he sent out

a second circular forbidding all associations of government employees as illegal. He dismissed one hundred

and eighty postmen, reinstated them, reprimanded themand awarded them gratuities. At Cabinet councils

he was always on the point of bursting forth. The presence of the Head of the State scarcely restrained him

within the limits of the decencies, and as he did not dare to attack his rival he consoled himself by heaping

invectives upon General Debonnaire, the respected Minister of War. The General did not hear them. for he

was deaf and occupied himself in composing verses for the Baroness Bildermann. Hippolyte Ceres offered an

indistinct opposition to everything the Prime Minister proposed. In a word, he was a madman. One faculty

alone escaped the ruin of his intellect: he retained his Parliamentary sense, his consciousness of the temper of

majorities, his thorough knowledge of groups, and his certainty of the direction in which affairs were moving.

The session ended calmly, and the Ministry saw no dangerous signs upon the benches where the majority sat.

It was visible, however, from certain articles in the Moderate journals, that the demands of the Jewish and

Christian financiers were increasing daily, that the patriotism of the banks required a civilizing expedition to

Nigritia, and that the steel trusts, eager in the defence of our coasts and colonies, were crying out for

armoured cruisers and still more armoured cruisers. Rumours of war began to be heard. Such rumours sprang

up every year as regularly as the trade winds; serious people paid no heed to them and the government

usually let them die away from their own weakness unless they grew stronger and spread. For in that case the

country would be alarmed. The financiers only wanted colonial wars and the people did not want any wars at

all. It loved to see its government proud and even insolent, but at the least suspicion that a European war was

brewing, its violent emotion would quickly have reached the House. Paul Visire was not uneasy. The

European situation was in his view completely reassuring. He was only irritated by the maniacal silence of

his Minister of Foreign Affairs. That gnome went to the Cabinet meetings with a portfolio bigger than

himself stuffed full of papers, said nothing, refused to answer all questions, even those asked him by the

respected President of the Republic, and, exhausted by his obstinate labours, took a few moments' sleep in his

armchair in which nothing but the top of his little black head was to be seen above the green tablecloth.

In the mean time Hippolyte Ceres became a strong man again. In company with his colleague Lapersonne he

formed numerous intimacies with ladies of the theatre. They were both to be seen at night entering

fashionable restaurants in the company of ladies whom they overtopped by their lofty stature and their new

hats, and they were soon reckoned amongst the most sympathetic frequenters of the boulevards. Fortune

Lapersonne had his own wound beneath his armour, His wife, a young milliner whom he carried off from a

marquis, had gone to live with a chauffeur. He loved her still, and could not console himself for her loss, so

that very often in the private room of a restaurant, in the midst of a group of girls who laughed and ate

crayfish, the two ministers exchanged a look full of their common sorrow and wiped away an unbidden tear.

Hippolyte Ceres, although wounded to the heart, did not allow himself to be beaten. He swore that he would

Madame Paul Visire, whose deplorable health forced her to live with her relatives in a distant province,

received an anonymous letter specifying that M. Paul Visire, who had not a halfpenny when he married her,

was spending her dowry on a married woman, E C, that he gave this woman thirtythousandfranc

motorcars, and pearl necklaces costing twentyfive thousand francs, and that he was going straight to

dishonour and ruin. Madame Paul Visire read the letter, fell into hysterics, and handed it to her father.

"I am going to box your husband's ears," said M. Blampignon; "he is a blackguard who will land you both in

the workhouse unless we look out. He may be Prime Minister, but he won't frighten me."

When he stepped off the train M. Blampignon presented himself at the Ministry of the Interior, and was

"You are welcome, my dear father. I was going to write to you. . . . Yes, to tell you of your nomination to the

M. Blampignon thanked his soninlaw warmly and threw the anonymous letter into the fire.

He returned to his provincial house and found his daughter fretting and agitated.

"Well! I saw your husband. He is a delightful fellow. But then, you don't understand how to deal with him."

About this time Hippolyte Ceres learned through a little scandalous newspaper (it is always through the

newspapers that ministers are informed of the affairs of State) that the Prime Minister dined every evening

with Mademoiselle Lysiane of the Folies Dramatiques, whose charm seemed to have made a great impression

on him. Thenceforth Ceres took a gloomy joy in watching his wife. She came in every evening to dine or

dress with an air of agreeable fatigue and the serenity that comes from enjoyment.

Thinking that she knew nothing, he sent her anonymous communications. She read them at the table before

He then persuaded himself that she gave no heed to these vague reports, and that in order to disturb her it

would be necessary to enable her to verify her lover's infidelity and treason for herself. There were at the

Ministry a number of trustworthy agents charged with secret inquiries regarding the national defence. They

were then employed in watching the spies of a neighbouring and hostile Power who had succeeded in

entering the Postal and Telegraphic service. M. Ceres ordered them to suspend their work for the present and

to inquire where, when, and how, the Minister of the Interior saw Mademoiselle Lysiane. The agents

performed their missions faithfully and told the minister that they had several times seen the Prime Minister

with a woman, but that she was not Mademoiselle Lysiane. Hippolyte Ceres asked them nothing further. He

was right; the loves of Paul Visire and Lysiane were but an alibi invented by Paul Visire himself, with

Eveline's approval, for his fame was rather inconvenient to her, and she sighed for secrecy and mystery.

They were not shadowed by the agents of the Ministry of Commerce alone. They were also followed by those

of the Prefect of Police, and even by those of the Minister of the Interior, who disputed with each other the

honour of protecting their chief. Then there were the emissaries of several royalist, imperialist, and clerical

organisations, those of eight or ten blackmailers, several amateur detectives, a multitude of reporters, and a

crowd of photographers, who all made their appearance wherever these two took refuge in their

perambulating love affairs, at big hotels, small hotels, town houses, country houses, private apartments,

villas, museums, palaces, hovels. They kept watch in the streets, from neighbouring houses, trees, walls,

staircases, landings, roofs, adjoining rooms, and even chimneys. The Minister and his friend saw with alarm

all round their bed room, gimlets boring through doors and shutters, and drills making holes in the walls. A

photograph of Madame Ceres in night attire buttoning her boots was the utmost that had been obtained.

Paul Visire grew impatient and irritable, and often lost his good humour and agreeableness. He came to the

cabinet meetings in a rage and he, too, poured invectives upon General Debonnairea brave man under fire

but a lax disciplinarianand launched his sarcasms at against the venerable admiral Vivier des Murenes

Fortune Lapersonne listened openeyed, and grumbled scoffingly between his teeth:

"He is not satisfied with robbing Hippolyte Ceres of his wife, but he must go and rob him of his catchwords

These storms were made known by the indiscretion of some ministers and by the complaints of the two old

warriors, who declared their intention of flinging their portfolios at the beggar's head, but who did nothing of

the sort. These outbursts, far from injuring the lucky Prime Minister, had an excellent effect on Parliament

and public opinion, who looked on them as signs of a keen solicitude for the welfare of the national army and

To the congratulations of the various groups and of notable personages, he replied with simple firmness:

The session ended, and Paul Visire, very exhausted, went to take the waters. Hippolyte Ceres refused to leave

his Ministry, where the trade union of telephone girls was in tumultuous agitation. He opposed it with an

unheard of violence, for he had now become a womanhater. On Sundays he went into the suburbs to fish

along with his colleague Lapersonne, wearing the tall hat that never left him since he had become a Minister.

And both of them, forgetting the fish,, complained of the inconstancy of women and mingled their griefs.

Hippolyte still loved Eveline and he still suffered. However, hope had slipped into his heart. She was now

separated from her ]over, and, thinking to win her back, he directed all his efforts to that end. He put forth all

his skill, showed himself sincere, adaptable, affectionate, devoted, even discreet; his heart taught him the

delicacies of feeling. He said charming and touching things to the faithless one, and, to soften her, he told her

He promised her everything he thought could gratify a woman, country parties, hats, jewels.

She no longer displayed an insolently happy countenance. Being separated from Paul, her sadness had an air

of gentleness. But the moment he made a gesture to recover her she turned away fiercely and gloomily, girt

Lapersonne excused himself, thinking that his intervention would be useless, but he gave some advice to his

"Make her think that you don't care about her, that you love another, and she will come back to you."

Hippolyte, adopting this method, inserted in the newspapers that he was always to be found in the company

of Mademoiselle Guinaud of the Opera. He came home late or did not come home at all, assumed in Eveline's

presence an appearance of inward joy impossible to restrain, took out of his pocket, at dinner, a letter on

scented paper which he pretended to read with delight, and his lips seemed as in a dream to kiss invisible lips.

Nothing happened. Eveline did not even notice the change. Insensible to all around her, she only came out of

her lethargy to ask for some louis from her husband, and if he did not give them she threw him a look of

contempt, ready to upbraid him with the shame which she poured upon him in the sight of the whole world.

Since she had loved she spent a great deal on dress. She needed money, and she had only her husband to

He lost patience, became furious, and threatened her with his revolver. He said one day before her to Madame

"I congratulate you, Madame; you have brought up your daughter to be a wanton hussy."

He loved her more ardently than ever. In his jealous rage, suspecting her, not without probability, of sending

and receiving letters, he swore that he would intercept them, reestablished a censorship over the post, threw

private correspondence into confusion, delayed stockexchange quotations, prevented assignations, brought

about bankruptcies, thwarted passions, and caused suicides. The independent press gave utterance to the

complaints of the public and indignantly supported them. To justify these arbitrary measures, the ministerial

journals spoke darkly of plots and public dangers, and promoted a belief in a monarchical conspiracy. The

less wellinformed sheets gave more precise information, told of the seizure of fifty thousand guns, and the

landing of Prince Crucho. Feeling grew throughout the country, and the republican organs called for the

immediate meeting of Parliament. Paul Visire returned to Paris, summoned his colleagues, held an important

Cabinet Council, and proclaimed through his agencies that a plot had been actually formed against the

national representation, but that the Prime Minister held the threads of it in his hand, and that a judicial

He immediately ordered the arrest of thirty Socialists, and whilst the entire country was acclaiming him as its

saviour, baffling the watchfulness of his six hundred detectives, he secretly took Eveline to a little house near

the Northern railway station, where they remained until night. After their departure, the maid of their hotel, as

she was putting their room in order, saw seven little crosses traced by a hairpin on the wall at the head of the

Jealousy is a virtue of democracies which preserves them from tyrants. Deputies began to envy the Prime

Minister his golden key. For a year his domination over the beauteous Madame Ceres had been known to the

whole universe. The provinces, whither news and fashions only arrive after a complete revolution of the earth

round the sun, were at last informed of the illegitimate loves of the Cabinet. The provinces preserve an

Various reasons have been alleged for this: Education, example, simplicity of life. Professor Haddock asserts

that this virtue of provincial ladies is solely due to the fact that the heels of their shoes are low. "A woman,"

said he, in a learned article in the "Anthropological Review", "a woman attracts a civilized man in proportion

as her feet make an angle with the ground. If this angle is as much as thirtyfive degrees, the attraction

becomes acute. For the position of the feet upon the ground determines the whole carriage of the body, and it

results that provincial women, since they wear low heels, are not very attractive, and preserve their virtue

with ease." These conclusions were not generally accepted. It was objected that under the influence of

English and American fashions, low heels had been introduced generally without producing the results

attributed to them by the learned Professor; moreover, it was said that the difference he pretended to establish

between the morals of the metropolis and those of the provinces is perhaps illusory, and that if it exists, it is

apparently due to the fact that great cities offer more advantages and facilities for love than small towns

provide. However that may be, the provinces began to murmur against the Prime Minister, and to raise a

scandal. This was not yet a danger, but there was a possibility that it might become one.

For the moment the peril was nowhere and yet everywhere. The majority remained solid; but the leaders

became stiff and exacting. Perhaps Hippolyte Ceres would never have intentionally sacrificed his interests to

his vengeance. But thinking that he could henceforth, without compromising his own fortune, secretly

damage that of Paul Visire, he devoted himself to the skilful and careful preparation of difficulties and perils

for the Head of the Government. Though far from equalling his rival in talent, knowledge, and authority, he

greatly surpassed him in his skill as a lobbyist. The most acute parliamentarians attributed the recent

misfortunes of the majority to his refusal to vote. At committees, by a calculated imprudence, he favoured

motions which he knew the Prime Minister could not accept. One day his intentional awkwardness provoked

a sudden and violent conflict between the Minister of the Interior, and his departmental Treasurer. Then

Ceres became frightened and went no further. It would have been dangerous for him to overthrow the

ministry too soon. His ingenious hatred found an issue by circuitous paths. Paul Visire had a poor cousin of

easy morals who bore his name. Ceres, remembering this lady, Celine Visire, brought her into prominence,

arranged that she should become intimate with several foreigners, and procured her engagements in the

musichalls. One summer night, on a stage in the Champs Elysees before a tumultuous crowd, she performed

risky dances to the sounds of wild music which was audible in the gardens where the President of the

Republic was entertaining Royalty. The name of Visire, associated with these scandals, covered the walls of

the town, filled the newspapers, was repeated in the cafes and at balls, and blazed forth in letters of fire upon

Nobody regarded the Prime Minister as responsible for the scandal of his relatives, but a bad idea of his

Almost immediately he was made to feel this in a pretty sharp fashion. One day in the House, on a simple

question, Labillette, the Minister of Religion and Public Worship, who was suffering from an attack of liver,

and beginning to be exasperated by the intentions and intrigues of the clergy, threatened to close the Chapel

of St. Orberosia, and spoke without respect of the National Virgin. The entire Right rose up in indignation;

the Left appeared to give but a halfhearted support to the rash Minister. The leaders of the majority did not

care to attack a popular cult which brought thirty millions a year into the country. The most moderate of the

supporters of the Right, M. Bigourd, made the question the subject of a resolution and endangered the

Cabinet. Luckily, Fortune Lapersonne, the Minister of Public Works, always conscious of the obligations of

power, was able in the Prime Minister's absence to repair the awkwardness and indecorum of his colleague,

the Minister of Public Worship. He ascended the tribune and bore witness to the respect in which the

Government held the heavenly Patron of the country, the consoler of so many ills which science admitted its

When Paul Visire, snatched at last from Eveline's arms, appeared in the House, the administration was saved;

but the Prime Minister saw himself compelled to grant important concessions to the upper classes. He

proposed in Parliament that six armoured cruisers should be laid down, and thus won the sympathies of the

Steel Trust; he gave new assurances that the income tax would not be imposed, and he had eighteen Socialists

He was soon to find himself opposed by more formidable obstacles. The Chancellor of the neighbouring

Empire in an ingenious and profound speech upon the foreign relations of his sovereign, made a sly allusion

to the intrigues that inspired the policy of a great country. This reference, which was receive with smiles by

the Imperial Parliament, was certain to irritate a punctilious republic. It aroused the national susceptibility,

which directed its wrath against its amorous Minister. The Deputies seized upon a frivolous pretext to show

their dissatisfaction. A ridiculous incident, the fact that the wife of a subprefect had danced at the Moulin

Rouge, forced the minister to face a vote of censure, and he was within a few votes of being defeated.

According to general opinion, Paul Visire had never been so weak, so vacillating, or so spiritless, as on that

He understood that he could only keep himself in office by a great political stroke, and he decided on the

expedition to Nigritia. This measure was demanded by the great financial and industrial corporations and was

one which would bring concessions of immense forests to the capitalists, a loan of eight millions to the

banking companies, as well as promotions and decorations to the naval and military officers. A pretext

presented itself; some insult needed to be avenged, or some debt to be collected. Six battleships, fourteen

cruisers, and eighteen transports sailed up the mouth of the river Hippopotamus. Six hundred canoes vainly

opposed the landing of the troops. Admiral Vivier des Murenes' cannons produced an appalling effect upon

the blacks, who replied to them with flights of arrows, but in spite of their fanatical courage they were

entirely defeated. Popular enthusiasm was kindled by the newspapers which the financiers subsidised, and

burst into a blaze. Some Socialists alone protested against this barbarous, doubtful, and dangerous enterprise.

At that moment when the Minister, supported by wealth, and now beloved by the poor, seemed

unconquerable, the light of hate showed Hippolyte Ceres alone the danger, and looking with a gloomy joy at

Whilst the country intoxicated itself with glory, the neighbouring Empire protested against the occupation of

Nigritia by a European power, and these protests following one another at shorter and shorter intervals

became more and more vehement. The newspapers of the interested Republic concealed all causes for

uneasiness; but Hippolyte Ceres heard the growing menace, and determined at last to risk everything, even

the fate of the ministry, in order to ruin his enemy. He got men whom he could trust to write and insert

articles in several of the official journals, which, seeming to express Paul Visire's precise views, attributed

These articles roused a terrible echo abroad, and they alarmed the public opinion of a nation which, while

fond of soldiers, was not fond of war. Questioned in the House on the foreign policy of his government, Paul

Visire made a reassuring statement, and promised to maintain a face compatible with the dignity of a great

nation. His Minister of Foreign Affairs, Crombile, read a declaration which was absolutely unintelligible, for

the reason that it was couched in diplomatic language. The Minister obtained a large majority.

But the rumours of war did not cease, and in order to avoid a new and dangerous motion, the Prime Minister

distributed eighty thousand acres of forests in Nigritia among the Deputies, and had fourteen Socialists

arrested. Hippolyte Ceres went gloomily about the lobbies, confiding to the Deputies of his group that he was

endeavouring to induce the Cabinet to adopt a pacific policy, and that he still hoped to succeed. Day by day

the sinister rumours grew in volume, and penetrating amongst the public, spread uneasiness and disquiet.

Paul Visire himself began to take alarm. What disturbed him most were the silence and absence of the

Minister of Foreign Affairs. Crombile no longer came to the meetings of the Cabinet. Rising at five o'clock in

the morning, he worked eighteen hours at his desk, and at last fell exhausted into his wastepaper basket,

from whence the registrars removed him, together with the papers which they were going to sell to the

General Debonnaire believed that a campaign was imminent, and prepared for it. Far from fearing war, he

prayed for it, and confided his generous hopes to Baroness Bildermann, who informed the neighbouring

The Minister of Finance unintentionally precipitated events. At the moment, he was speculating for a fall, and

in order to bring about a panic on the Stock Exchange, he spread the rumour that war was now inevitable.

The neighbouring Empire, deceived by this action, and expecting to see its territory invaded, mobilized its

troops in all haste. The terrified Chamber overthrew the Visire ministry by an enormous majority (814 votes

to 7, with 28 abstentions). It was too late. The very day of this fall the neighbouring and hostile nation

recalled its ambassador and flung eight millions of men into Madame Ceres' country. War became universal,

Half a century after the events we have just related, Madame Ceres died surrounded with respect and

veneration, in the eightyninth year of her age. She had long been the widow of a statesman whose name she

bore with dignity. Her modest and quiet funeral was followed by the orphans of the parish and the sisters of

"Alas!" sighed M. Monnoyer, a canon of St. Mael, as he received the pious legacy, "it was high time for a

generous benefactor to come to the relief of our necessities. Rich and poor, learned and ignorant are turning

away from us. And when we try to lead back these misguided souls, neither threats nor promises, neither

gentleness nor violence, nor anything else is now successful. The Penguin clergy pine in desolation; our

country priests, reduced to following the humblest of trades, are shoeless, and compelled to live upon such

scraps as they can pick up. In our ruined churches the rain of heaven falls upon the faithful, and during the

holy offices they can hear the noise of stones falling from the arches. The tower of the cathedral is tottering

and will soon fall. St. Orberosia is forgotten by the Penguins, her devotion abandoned, and her sanctuary

deserted. On her shrine, bereft of its gold and precious stones, the spider silently weaves her web."

Hearing these lamentations, Pierre Mille, who at the age of ninetyeight years had lost nothing of his

intellectual and moral power, asked, the canon if he did not think that St. Orberosia would one day rise out of

"It is a pity!" answered Pierre Mille. "Orberosia is a charming figure and her legend is a beautiful one. I

discovered the other day by the merest chance, one of her most delightful miracles, the miracle of Jean

"Cecile, the wife of Nicolas Gaubert, a jeweller on the PontauChange, after having led an honest and

chaste life for many years, and being now past her prime, became infatuated with Jean Violle, the Countess

de Maubec's page, who lived at the Hotel du Paon on the Place de Greve. He was not yet eighteen years old,

and his face and figure were attractive. Not being able to conquer her passion, Cecile resolved to satisfy it.

She attracted the page to her house, loaded him with caresses, supplied him with sweetmeats and finally did

"Now one day, as they were together in the jeweller's bed, Master Nicholas came home sooner than he was

expected. He found the bolt drawn, and heard his wife on the other side of the door exclaiming, 'My heart!

my angel! my love!' Then suspecting that she was shut up with a gallant, he struck great blows upon the door

and began to shout 'Slut! hussy! wanton! open so that I may cut off your nose and ears!' In this peril, the

jeweller's wife besought St. Orberosia, and vowed her a large candle if she helped her and the little page, who

"The saint heard the prayer. She immediately changed Jean Violle into a girl. Seeing this, Cecile was

completely reassured, and began to call out to her husband: 'Oh! you brutal villain, you jealous wretch! Speak

gently if you want the door to be opened.' And scolding in this way, she ran to the wardrobe and took out of it

an old hood, a pair of stays, and a long grey petticoat, in which she hastily wrapped the transformed page.

Then when this was done, 'Catherine, dear Catherine,' said she, loudly, 'open the door for your uncle; he is

more fool than knave, and won't do you any harm." The boy who had become a girl, obeyed. Master Nicholas

entered the room and found in it a young maid whom he did not know, and his wife in bed. 'Big booby,' said

the latter to him, 'don't stand gaping at what you see. just as I had come to bed because had a stomach ache, I

received a visit from Catherine, the daughter of my sister Jeanne de Palaiseau, with whom we quarrelled

fifteen years ago. Kiss your niece. She is well worth the trouble.' The jeweller gave Violle a hug, and from

that moment wanted nothing so much as to be alone with her a moment, so that he might embrace her as

much as he liked. For this reason he led her without any delay down to the kitchen, under the pretext of

giving her some walnuts and wine, and he was no sooner there with her than he began to caress her very

affectionately. He would not have stopped at that if St. Orberosia had not inspired his good wife with the idea

of seeing what he was about. She found him with the pretended niece sitting on his knee. She called him a

debauched creature, boxed his ears, and forced him to beg her pardon. The next day Violle resumed his

Having heard this story the venerable Canon Monnoyer thanked Pierre Mille for having told it, and, taking up

his pen, began to write out a list of horses that would win at the next race meeting. For he was a

In the mean time Penguinia gloried in its wealth. Those who produced the things necessary for life, wanted

them; those who did not produce them had more than enough. "But these," as a member of the Institute said,

"are necessary economic fatalities." The great Penguin people had no longer either traditions, intellectual

culture, or arts. The progress of civilisation manifested itself among them by murderous industry, infamous

speculation, and hideous luxury. Its capital assumed, as did all the great cities of the time, a cosmopolitan and

financial character. An immense and regular ugliness reigned within it. The country enjoyed perfect

And he overthrew those cities, and all the plain, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and that which grew upon

Poverty hast ever been familiar to Greece, but virtue has been acquired, having been accomplished by

dmbnfuspjtghjttdmjcfsufnbgsbodftftutpbnjtfbeftdpnqb hojtgjobo difsftr vjejtqpteoueftsjdifttftevqbzt

We are now beginning to study a chemistry which will deal with effects produced by bodies containing a

quantity of concentrated energy the like of which we have not yet had at our disposal.Sir William Ramsay.

The houses were never high enough to satisfy them; they kept on making them still higher and built them of

thirty or forty storeys: with offices, shops, banks, societies one above another; they dug cellars and tunnels

Fifteen millions of men laboured in a giant town by the light of beacons which shed forth their glare both day

and night. No light of heaven pierced through the smoke of the factories with which the town was girt, but

sometimes the red disk of a rayless sun might be seen riding in the black firmament through which iron

bridges ploughed their way, and from which there descended a continual shower of soot and cinders. It was

the most industrial of all the cities in the world and the richest. Its organisation seemed perfect. None of the

ancient aristocratic or democratic forms remained; everything was subordinated to the interests of the trusts.

This environment gave rise to what anthropologists called the multimillionaire type. The men of this type

were at once energetic and frail, capable of great activity in forming mental combinations and of prolonged

labour in offices, but men whose nervous irritability suffered from hereditary troubles which increased as

Like all true aristocrats, like the patricians of republican Rome or the squires of old England, these powerful

men affected a great severity in their habits and customs. They were the ascetics of wealth. At the meetings of

the trusts an observer would have noticed their smooth and puffy faces, their lantern cheeks, their sunken

eyes and wrinkled brows. With bodies more withered, complexions yellower, lips drier, and eyes filled with a

more burning fanaticism than those of the old Spanish monks, these multimillionaires gave themselves up

with inextinguishable ardour to the austerities of banking and industry. Several, denying themselves all

happiness, all pleasure, and all rest, spent their miserable lives in rooms without light or air, furnished only

with electrical apparatus, living on eggs and milk, and sleeping on camp beds. By doing nothing except

pressing nickel buttons with their fingers, these mystics heaped up riches of which they never even saw the

signs, and acquired the vain possibility of gratifying desires that they never experienced.

The worship of wealth had its martyrs. One of these multimillionaires, the famous Samuel Box, preferred to

die rather than surrender the smallest atom of his property. One of his workmen, the victim of an accident

while at work, being refused any indemnity by his employer, obtained a verdict in the courts, but repelled by

innumerable obstacles of procedure, he fell into the direst poverty. Being thus reduced to despair, he

succeeded by dint of cunning and audacity in confronting his employer with a loaded revolver in his hand,

and threatened to blow out his brains if he did not give him some assistance. Samuel Box gave nothing, and

Examples that come from high quarters are followed. Those who possessed some small capital (and they

were necessarily the greater number), affected the ideas and habits of the multimillionaires, in order that

they might be classed among them. All passions which injured the increase or the preservation of wealth,

were regarded as dishonourable; neither indolence, nor idleness, nor the taste for disinterested study, nor love

of the arts, nor, above all, extravagance, was ever forgiven; pity was condemned as a dangerous weakness.

Whilst every inclination to licentiousness excited public reprobation, the violent and brutal satisfaction of an

appetite was, on the contrary, excused; violence, in truth, was regarded as less injurious to morality, since it

manifested a form of social energy. The State was firmly based on two great public virtues: respect for the

rich and contempt for the poor. Feeble spirits who were still moved by human suffering had no other resource

than to take refuge in a hypocrisy which it was impossible to blame, since it contributed to the maintenance

Thus, among the rich, all were devoted to their social order, or seemed to be so; all gave good examples, if all

did not follow them. Some felt the gravity of their position cruelly; but they endured it either from pride or

from duty. Some attempted, in secret and by subterfuge, to escape from it for a moment. One of these,

Edward Martin, the President, of the Steel Trust, sometimes dressed himself as a poor man, went: forth to beg

his bread, and allowed himself to be jostled by the passersby. One day, as he asked alms on a bridge, he

engaged in a quarrel with a real beggar, and filled with a fury of envy, he strangled him.

As they devoted their whole intelligence to business, they sought no intellectual pleasures. The theatre, which

had formerly been very flourishing among them, was now reduced to pantomimes and comic dances. Even

the pieces in which women acted were given up; the taste for pretty forms and brilliant toilettes had been lost;

the somersaults of clowns and the music of negroes were preferred above them, and what roused enthusiasm

was the sight of women upon the stage whose necks were bedizened with diamonds, or processions carrying

golden bars in triumph. Ladies of wealth were as much compelled as the men to lead a respectable life.

According to a tendency common to all civilizations, public feeling set them up as symbols; they were, by

their austere magnificence, to represent both the splendour of wealth and its intangible . The old habits of

gallantry had been reformed, Tut fashionable lovers were now secretly replaced by muscular labourers or

stray grooms. Nevertheless, scandals were rare, a foreign journey concealed nearly all of them, and the

The rich formed only a small minority, but their collaborators, who composed the entire people, had been

completely won over or completely subjugated by them. They formed two classes, the agents of commerce or

banking, and workers in the factories. The former contributed an immense amount of work and received large

salaries. Some of them succeeded in founding establishments of their own; for in the constant increase of the

public wealth the more intelligent and audacious could hope for anything. Doubtless it would have been

possible to find a certain number of discontented and rebellious persons among the immense crowd of

engineers and accountants, but this powerful society had imprinted its firm discipline even on the minds of its

As for the workmen who toiled in the factories that surrounded the town, their decadence, both physical and

moral, was terrible; they were examples of the type of poverty as it is set forth by anthropology. Although the

development among them of certain muscles, due to the particular nature of their work, might give a false

idea of their strength, they presented sure signs of morbid debility. Of low stature, with small heads and

narrow chests, they were further distinguished from the comfortable classes by a multitude of physiological

anomalies, and, in particular, by a common want of symmetry between the head and the limbs. And they

were destined to a gradual and continuous degeneration, for the State made soldiers of the more robust among

them, and the health of these did not long withstand the brothels and the drinkshops that sprang up around

their barracks. The proletarians became more and more feeble in mind. The continued weakening of their

intellectual faculties was not entirely due to their manner of life; it resulted also from a methodical selection

carried out by the employers. The latter, fearing that workmen of too great ability might be inclined to put

forward legitimate demands, took care to eliminate them by every possible means, and preferred to engage

ignorant and stupid labourers, who were incapable of defending their rights, but were yet intelligent enough

to perform their toil, which highly perfected machines rendered extremely simple. Thus the proletarians were

unable to do anything to improve their lot. With difficulty did they succeed by means of strikes in

maintaining the rate of their wages. Even this means began to fail them. The alternations of production

inherent in the capitalist system caused such cessations of work that, in several branches of industry, as soon

as a strike was declared, the accumulation of products allowed the employers to dispense with the strikers. In

a word, these miserable employees were plunged in a gloomy apathy that nothing enlightened and nothing

exasperated. They were necessary instruments for the social order and well adapted to their purpose.

Upon the whole, this social order seemed the most firmly established that had yet been seen, at least amon

kind, for that of bees and ants is incomparably more stable. Nothing could foreshadow the ruin of a system

founded on what is strongest in human nature, pride and cupidity. However, keen observers discovered

several grounds for uneasiness. The most certain, although the least apparent, were of an economic order, and

consisted in the continually increasing amount of overproduction, which entailed long and cruel

interruptions of labour, though these were, it is true, utilized by the manufacturers as a means of breaking the

power of the workmen, by facing them with the prospect of a lockout. A more obvious peril resulted from

the physiological state of almost the entire population. "The health of the poor is what it must be," said the

experts in hygiene, "but that of the rich leaves much to be desired." It was not difficult to find the causes of

this. The supply of oxygen necessary for life was insufficient in the city, and men breathed in an artificial air.

The food trusts, by means of the most daring chemical syntheses, produced artificial wines, meat, milk, fruit,

and vegetables, and the diet thus imposed gave rise to stomach and brain troubles. The multimillionaires

were bald at the age of eighteen; some showed from time to time a dangerous weakness of mind.

Overstrung and enfeebled, they gave enormous sums to ignorant charlatans; and it was a common thing for

some bathattendant or other trumpery who turned healer or prophet, to make a rapid fortune by the practice

of medicine or theology. The number of lunatics increased continually; suicides multiplied in the world of

wealth, and many of them were accompanied by atrocious and extraordinary circumstances, which bore

Another fatal symptom created a strong impression upon average minds. Terrible accidents, henceforth

periodical and regular, entered into people's calculations, and kept mounting higher and higher in statistical

tables. Every day, machines burst into fragments, houses fell down, trains laden with merchandise fell on to

the streets, demolishing entire buildings and crushing hundreds of passersby. Through the ground,

honeycombed with tunnels, two or three storeys of workshops would often crash, engulfing all those who

In the southwestern district of the city, on an eminence which had preserved its ancient name of Fort

SaintMichel, there stretched a square where some old trees still spread their exhausted arms above the

greensward. Landscape gardeners had constructed a cascade, grottos, a torrent, a lake, and an island, on its

northern slope. From this side one could see the whole town with its streets, its boulevards, its squares, the

multitude of its roofs and domes, its airpassages, and its crowds of men, covered with a veil of silence, and

seemingly enchanted by the distance. This square was the healthiest place in the capital; here no smoke

obscured the sky, and children were brought here to play. In summer some employees from the neighbouring

offices and laboratories used to resort to it for a moment after their luncheons, but they did not disturb its

It was owing to this custom that, one day in June, about midday, a telegraph clerk, Caroline Meslier, came

and sat down on a bench at the end of a terrace. In order to refresh her eyes by the sight of a little green, she

turned her back to the town. Dark, with brown eyes, robust and placid, Caroline appeared to be from

twentyfive to twentyeight years of age. Almost immediately, a clerk in the Electricity Trust, George Clair,

took his place beside her. Fair, thin, and supple, he had features of a feminine delicacy; he was scarcely older

than she, and looked still younger. As they met almost every day in this place, a comradeship had sprung up

between them, and they enjoyed chatting together. But their conversation had never been tender, affectionate,

or even intimate. Caroline, although it had happened to her in the past to repent of her confidence, might

perhaps have been less reserved had not George Clair always shown himself extremely restrained in his

expressions and behaviour. He always gave a purely intellectual character to the conversation, keeping it

within the realm of general ideas, and, moreover, expressing himself on all subjects with the greatest

freedom. He spoke frequently of the organization of society, and the conditions of labour.

"Wealth," said he, "is one of the means of living happily; but people have made it the sole end of existence."

They returned continually to various scientific subjects with which they were both familiar.

"From the moment," said Clair, "that radium was seen to be transformed into helium, people ceased to affirm

the immutability of simple bodies; in this way all those old laws about simple relations and about the

"Now that we can procure radium in sufficient quantities, science possesses incomparable means of analysis;

even at present we get glimpses, within what are called simple bodies, of extremely diversified complex ones,

and we discover energies in matter which seem to increase even by reason of its tenuity."

As they talked, they threw bits of bread to the birds, and some children played around them.

"This hill, in the quaternary epoch," said Clair, "was inhabited by wild horses. Last year, as they were

tunnelling for the water mains, they found a layer of the bones of primeval horses."

He told her that man used to hunt the primeval horse long before he tried to domesticate him.

"Man," he added, "was at first a hunter, then he became a shepherd, a cultivator, a manufacturer . . . and these

diverse civilizations succeeded each other at intervals of time that the mind cannot conceive."

A little girl was making mud pies at the foot of their bench; a little boy of seven or eight years was playing in

front of them. Whilst his mother was sewing on an adjoining bench, he played all alone at being a runaway

horse, and with that power of illusion, of which children are capable, he imagined that he was at the same

time the horse, and those who ran after him, and those who fled in terror before him. He kept struggling with

himself and shouting: "Stop him, Hi! Hi! This is an awful horse, he has got the bit between his teeth."

"They suffered less when they were younger. They acted like that little boy: they played; they played at arts,

at virtues, at vices, at heroism, at beliefs, at pleasures; they had illusions which entertained them; they made a

The child, who was running, struck his foot against the little girl's pail, and fell his full length on the gravel.

He remained a moment stretched out motionless, then raised himself up on the palms of his hands. His

forehead puckered, his mouth opened, and he burst into tears. His mother ran up, but Caroline had lifted him

"A fisherman once threw his net into the sea and drew out a little, sealed, copper pot, which he opened with

his knife. Smoke came out of it, and as it mounted up to the clouds the smoke grew thicker and thicker and

became a giant who gave such a terrible yawn that the whole world was blown to dust.

Clair stopped himself, gave a dry laugh, and handed the child back to his mother. Then he took out his watch

again, and kneeling on the bench with his elbows resting on its back he gazed at the town. As far as the eye

"What splendid weather it is!" said she. "The sun's rays change the smoke on the horizon into gold. The worst

After some seconds of silence they saw about half a mile away, in the richer district on the other side of the

river, a sort of tragic fog rearing itself upwards. A moment afterwards an explosion was heard even where

they were sitting, and an immense tree of smoke mounted towards the pure sky. Little by little the air was

filled with an imperceptible murmur caused by the shouts of thousands of men. Cries burst forth quite close

The bewilderment was great, for although accidents were common, such a violent explosion as this one had

never been seen, and everybody perceived that something terribly strange had happened.

Attempts were made to locate the place of the accident; districts, streets, different buildings, clubs, theatres,

and shops were mentioned. Information gradually became more precise and at last the truth was known.

From that day onward, anarchist attempts followed one another every week without interruption. The victims

were numerous, and almost all of them belonged to the poorer classes. These crimes roused public

resentment. It was among domestic servants, hotelkeepers, and the employees of such small shops as the

Trusts still allowed to exist, that indignation burst forth most vehemently. In popular districts women might

be heard demanding unusual punishments for the dynamitards. (They were called by this old name, although

it was hardly appropriate to them, since, to these unknown chemists, dynamite was an innocent material only

fit to destroy anthills, and they considered it mere child's play to explode nitroglycerine with a cartridge

made of fulminate of mercury.) Business ceased suddenly, and those who were least rich were the first to feel

the effects. They spoke of doing justice themselves to the anarchists. In the mean time the factory workers

remained hostile or indifferent to violent action. They were threatened, as a result of the decline of business,

with a likelihood of losing their work, or even a lockout in all the factories. The Federation of Trade Unions

proposed a general strike as the most powerful means of influencing the employers, and the best aid that

could be given to the revolutionists, but all the trades with the exception of the gliders refused to cease work.

The police made numerous arrests. Troops summoned from all parts of the National Federation protected the

offices of the Trusts, the houses of the multimillionaires, the public halls, the banks, and the big shops. A

fortnight passed without a single explosion, and it was concluded that the dynamitards, in all probability but a

handful of persons, perhaps even Still fewer, had all been killed or captured, or that they were in hiding, or

had taken flight. Confidence returned; it returned at first among the poorer classes. Two or three hundred

thousand soldiers, who bad been lodged in the most closely populated districts, stimulated trade, and people

The rich, who had not been so quick to take alarm, were reassured more slowly. But at the Stock Exchange a

group of "bulls" spread optimistic rumours and by a powerful effort put a brake upon the fall in prices.

Business improved. Newspapers with big circulations supported the movement. With patriotic eloquence they

depicted capital as laughing in its impregnable position at the assaults of a few dastardly criminals, and public

wealth maintaining its serene ascendency in spite of the vain threats made against it. They were sincere in

their attitude, though at the same time they found it benefited them. Outrages were forgotten or their

occurrence denied. On Sundays, at the racemeetings, the stands were adorned by women covered with

pearls and diamonds. It was observed with joy that the capitalists had not suffered. Cheers were given for the

On the following day the Southern Railway Station, the Petroleum Trust, and the huge church built at the

expense of Thomas Morcellet were all blown up. Thirty houses were in flames, and the beginning of a fire

was discovered at the docks. The firemen showed amazing intrepidity and zeal. They managed their tall

fireescapes with automatic precision, and climbed as high as thirty storeys to rescue the luckless inhabitants

from the flames. The soldiers performed their duties with spirit, and were given a double ration of coffee. But

these fresh casualties started a panic. Millions of people, who wanted to take their money with them and

leave the town at once, crowded the great banking houses. These establishments, after paying out money for

three days, closed their doors amid mutterings of a riot. A crowd of fugitives, laden with their baggage,

besieged the railway stations and took the town by storm. Many who were anxious to lay in a stock of

provisions and take refuge in the cellars, attacked the grocery stores, although they were guarded by soldiers

with fixed bayonets. The public authorities displayed energy. Numerous arrests were made and thousands of

During the three weeks that followed no outrage was committed. There was a rumour that bombs had been

found in the Opera House, in the cellars of the Town Hall, and beside one of the Pillars of the Stock

Exchange. But it was soon known that these were boxes of sweets that had been put in those places by

practical jokers or lunatics. One of the accused, when questioned by a magistrate, declared that he was the

chief author of the explosions, and said that all his accomplices had lost their lives. These confessions were

published by the newspapers and helped to reassure public opinion. It was only towards the close of the

examination that the magistrates saw they had to deal with a pretender who was in no way connected with

The experts chosen by the courts discovered nothing that enabled them to determine the engine employed in

the work of destruction. According to their conjectures the new explosive emanated from a gas which radium

evolves, and it was supposed that electric waves, produced by a special type of oscillator, were propagated

through space and thus caused the explosion. But even the ablest chemist could say nothing precise or certain.

At last two policemen, who were passing in front of the Hotel Meyer, found on the pavement, close to a

ventilator, an egg made of white metal and provided with a capsule at each end. They picked it up carefully,

and, on the orders of their chief, carried it to the municipal laboratory. Scarcely had the experts assembled to

examine it, than the egg burst and blew up the amphitheatre and the dome. All the experts perished, and with

The capitalist society did not allow itself to be daunted by this fresh disaster. The great banks reopened their

doors, declaring that they would meet demands partly in bullion and partly in paper money guaranteed by the

State: The Stock Exchange and the Trade Exchange, in spite of the complete cessation of business, decided

In the mean time the magisterial investigation into the case of those who had been first accused had come to

an end. Perhaps the evidence brought against them might have appeared insufficient under other

circumstances, but the zeal both of the magistrates and the public made up for this insufficiency. On the eve

of the day fixed for the trial the Courts of justice were blown up and eight hundred people were killed, the

greater number of them being judges and lawyers. A furious crowd broke into the prison and lynched the

prisoners. The troops sent to restore order were received with showers of stones and revolver shots; several

soldiers being dragged from their horses and trampled underfoot. The soldiers fired on the mob and many

persons were killed. At last the public authorities succeeded in establishing tranquillity. Next day the Bank

From that time onwards unheardof things took place. The factory workers, who had refused to strike, rushed

in crowds into the town and set fire to the houses. Entire regiments, led by their officers, joined the workmen,

went with them through the town singing revolutionary hymns, and took barrels of petroleum from the docks

with which to feed the fires. Explosions were continual. One morning a monstrous tree of smoke, like the

ghost of a huge palm tree half a mile in height, rose above the giant Telegraph Hall which suddenly fell into a

Whilst half the town was in flames, the other half pursued its accustomed life. In the mornings, milk pails

could be heard jingling in the dairy carts. In a deserted avenue some old navvy might be seen seated against a

wall slowly eating hunks of bread with perhaps a little meat. Almost all the presidents of the trusts remained

at their posts. Some of them performed their duty with heroic simplicity. Raphael Box, the son of a martyred

multimillionaire, was blown up as he was presiding at the general meeting of the Sugar Trust. He was given

a magnificent funeral and the procession on its way to the cemetery had to climb six times over piles of ruins

The ordinary helpers of the rich, the clerks, employees, brokers, and agents, preserved an unshaken fidelity.

The surviving clerks of the Bank that had been blown up, made their way along the ruined streets through the

midst of smoking houses to hand in their bills of exchange, and several were swallowed up in the flames

Nevertheless, any illusion concerning the state of affairs was impossible. The enemy was master of the town.

Instead of silence the noise of explosions was now continuous and produced an insurmountable feeling of

horror. The lighting apparatus having been destroyed, the city was plunged in darkness all through the night,

and appalling crimes were committed. The populous districts alone, having suffered the least, still preserved

measures of protection. The were paraded by patrols of volunteers who shot the robbers, and at every street

corner one stumbled over a body lying in a pool of blood, the hands bound behind the back, a handkerchief

It became impossible to clear away the ruins or to bury the dead. Soon the stench from the corpses became

intolerable. Epidemics raged and caused innumerable deaths, while they also rendered the survivors feeble

and listless. Famine carried off almost all who were left. A hundred and one days after the first outrage,

whilst six army corps with field artillery and siege artillery were marching, at night, into the poorest quarter

of the city, Caroline and Clair, holding each other's hands, were watching from the roof a lofty house, the

only one still left standing, but now surrounded by smoke and flame. joyous songs ascended from the street,

The young woman, her hair loosened and her face shining with the reflection of the flames, gazed with a

And throwing herself into the destroyer's arms she pressed a passionate kiss upon his lips.

The other towns of the federation also suffered from disturbances and outbreaks, and then order was restored.

Reforms were introduced into institutions and great changes took place in habits and customs, but the country

never recovered the loss of its capital, and never regained its former prosperity. Commerce and industry

dwindled away, and civilization abandoned those countries which for so long it bad preferred to all others.

They became insalubrious and sterile; the territory that had supported so many millions of men became

nothing more than a desert. On the hill of Fort St. Michel wild horses cropped the coarse grass.

Days flowed by like water from the fountains, and the centuries passed like drops falling from the ends of

stalactites. Hunters came to chase the bears upon the hills that covered the forgotten city; shepherds led their

flocks upon them; labourers turned up the soil with their ploughs; gardeners cultivated their lettuces and

grafted their pear trees. They were not rich, and they had no arts. The walls of their cabins were covered with

old vines and roses, A goatskin clothed their tanned limbs, while their wives dressed themselves with the

wool that they themselves had spun. The goatherds moulded little figures of men and animals out of clay, or

sang songs about the young girl who follows her lover through woods or among the browsing goats while the

pine trees whisper together and the water utters its murmuring sound. The master of the house grew angry

with the beetles who devoured his figs; he planned snares to protect his fowls from the velvettailed fox, and

"Drink! The flies have not spoilt my vintage; the vines were dry before they came."

Then in the course of ages the wealth of the villages and the corn that filled the fields were pillaged by

barbarian invaders. The country changed its masters several times. The conquerors built castles upon the

hills; cultivation increased; mills, forges) tanneries, and looms were established; roads were opened through

the woods and over the marshes; the river was covered with boats. The hamlets became large villages and

joining together formed a town which protected itself by deep trenches and lofty walls. Later, becoming the

capital of a great State, it found itself straitened within its now useless ramparts and it converted them into

It grew very rich and large beyond measure. The houses were never high enough to satisfy the people; they

kept on making them still higher and built them of thirty or forty storeys, with offices, shops, banks, societies

one above another; they dug cellars and tunnels ever deeper downwards. Fifteen millions of men laboured in