fit rntjo takftt) tlie STO& stjall pnisj) ty ttje 
 
 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 AN UNPUBLISHED ORIGINAL SPANISH WORK. 
 
 BY 
 ADADUS CALPE. 
 
 TRANSLATED INTO THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE 
 
 PABT FIRST : 
 
 THE RUINS OF THE PARACLETE, 
 
 NEW-YORK : 
 
 STRINGER & TOWNSEND, PUBLISHERS, 
 
 222 BROADWAY. 
 
 1852.
 
 ENTERED, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1852, by 
 
 ANTONIO D. DE PASCUAL. 
 
 in the Clerk's Office of the District Court for the Southern District of 
 New- York.
 
 StacT; 
 Annex 
 
 5017824 
 
 TO 
 
 8. SUAREZ, Esq.: 
 
 MODEST AND ENLIGHTENED MIND 
 GENEROUS AND NOBLE HEART : 
 
 THIS HOMAGE OF FRIENDSHIP IS OFFERED YOU 
 38g 
 
 ADADUS OALPE. 
 
 BBOOKLYN, N. Y., 26th March, 1862.
 
 

 
 PREFACE TO THE ENGLISH TRANSLATION. 
 
 IT is the duty of an author, particularly when he publishes 
 his writings in a tongue which is not his own, to show to 
 the readers what he has proposed in the original ; and at 
 the same time to observe that certain accessories, beautiful 
 in one nation in consequence of climate, of education, of 
 the mode of government, of local beauties, have not the 
 same attraction for another people. My idea was to write 
 for the Spanish family of both hemispheres, not forgetting 
 that the scenes of this narration take place in France ; but 
 after some reflection I have determined to publish in 
 English : so that it will not be strange if some passages in 
 their literal translation do not produce exactly the in- 
 tended effect upon the Anglo-American population. But 
 the inhabitants of these happy States are of all nations, in 
 part by birth, in part by education ; they sympathize with 
 all that exhibits the Dignity of Man ; they feel the value 
 of education, for there is no people in the world among 
 whom it is so widely diffused ; they know the power of 
 religion, and the gulf opened at the feet of those who do 
 not possess it : so that all these eminent qualities, united to 
 their benevolent hospitality, have encouraged me to clothe 
 my modest offspring in a foreign dress ; and I cherish the 
 anticipation that they will receive it with that open free- 
 dom, and hospitable kindness which distinguish the first 
 amono; the free men of the universe.
 
 v i PREFACE. 
 
 Religion, Wisdom, Education, Work, and Constancy, 
 are the device of my writings. The scenes are all natural, 
 for it is unquestionable, that men have passions, which are 
 as the sails and the wind which swells them, to vessels, en- 
 abling them to navigate the ocean ; but it is my duty to 
 notify that, although strictly moral, there are points in 
 which, as happens in the history of the human race, I have 
 been obliged to describe man as he is ; for the contrary 
 would be to fail in truthfulness, and by an exaggerated 
 scrupulosity, my personages would be changed into gro- 
 tesque monastic phantasms. Truth and Virtue go arm in 
 arm, illumined in the midst of the obscurity of Vices, 
 hypocritical monsters which people the whole earth by 
 the splendid light of Wisdom. 
 
 In some passages I have used the language of mon- 
 archies, in others that of republics, guided in this by his- 
 tory, which teaches us to be moderate, ceremonious, timid 
 in the former, and frank, severe, free in the latter. Greece 
 and Rome bequeathed us both styles. 
 
 There are passions which either the influence of tempe- 
 rament, or vicious education, or preoccupations, or other 
 innumerable causes develope in the meridional nations, 
 to which more northern people are not so generally ac- 
 cessible. There are ideas, as there are beliefs, which pre- 
 vail in the north of Europe and America, as the Protes- 
 tant church ; others which reign in the south, as the Ca- 
 tholic church ; others in the east, as the Greek ; the 
 roots of which are so deep, that to attempt to generalize 
 them would be to reduce them to nothing, and in their 
 respective countries they have incontestable beauties; but 
 the truth is, that all these fractions unite in admiring a 
 general, beautiful, and sublime whole, although in their 
 details they do not agree. If this work had been written
 
 PREFACE. v ii 
 
 in English, I should not have introduced certain scenes 
 purely continental, but its being a translation, makes me 
 hope that they will not be displeasing to my readers. 
 
 In order to give a review of my plan I will repeat what 
 I said in the Prospectus ; that is, that my two Books are 
 Man and Nature; the tableaux of the latter, the linea- 
 ments of the former ; the truth of the one, and the falsity of 
 the other ; the sympathetic front of Virtue, and the repul- 
 sive visage of Vice; the grandeur of heroic actions, and 
 the vileness of sin ; the sublimity of the affections of man 
 in his normal state, and their baseness in moments of aber- 
 ration : what education is, and the horrors to which the 
 want of it conducts ; the worth of nobleness of soul, and 
 the contemptibility of that which, consists only in parch- 
 ments. I have wished to show that science alone, without 
 religion, involves itself in dense darkness : that education, 
 aided by faith in the One True God, can make heroes ; but 
 that without this faith, it is a vain pretence, which serves 
 only to raise an intoxicating vapor ; that the people are 
 victims to the bad organization of human affairs, to the 
 ambition of certain leaders, to ignorance in which, for 
 their own convenience, their rulers keep them being wor- 
 thy of better days ; that the sage this middle class which 
 forms the thinking element of the nations if not pro- 
 voked by the world, would invent wonders for the per- 
 fecting of his kind, objects to Avhich Nature, our mother, 
 constantly tends, and which now he seldom attempts, since 
 he fears the ingratitude of those around him which is 
 more bitter than death; or the interpretations of the 
 ignorant whose number is infinite ; or he is overwhelmed 
 by his sufferings which are generally intense; so that 
 what would be a wonderful antidote, is converted into a 
 powerful poison ; that however depraved the heart of man
 
 v iii PREFACE. 
 
 may be, it cannot resist the beauty of virtue, when present- 
 ed in all its simplicity ; that the greater part of the horrors 
 committed by the masses are the natural offspring of the 
 higher classes, whose repentance generally comes too 
 late : finally, that in this world man is mostly rewarded 
 according to his deeds, or what is the same thing, that he 
 who takes Vie sword perishes by the sword. 
 
 And now that I have succinctly stated my plan, I must 
 come to the new dress which I have given to my humble 
 foreign conception. Let us imagine it a Spanish or French 
 girl, poor, unhappy, but my daughter, and that I love her 
 with all her defects, uncomeliness, tawny complexion, black 
 eyes, slender frame, weakness, sickliness, timidity, and 
 that I wish to dress her in the style of the country which 
 I have adopted for her. As a stranger, I am not prac- 
 tised in the caprices of the fashion of the country, nor in 
 those finer strokes which constitute the speciality of the 
 new Fatherland ; and although I have watched piece by 
 piece, and word by word, every thing contained in my 
 work, I frankly confess that the accessories which may 
 make her more national often escape me, and therefore 
 I have associated with me a son of the country, or 
 what is the same thing, of the mother-country, who 
 takes upon himself to place properly those pins, those rib- 
 bons, those ornaments which my foreign taste, at present, 
 with all my efforts, knows not how to place ; and it will be 
 seen that I have done all that lies in my power to natural- 
 ize her. Lay aside allegories : the reader will judge whe- 
 ther the English style is pure, the expressions chaste, the 
 phraseology national. 
 
 It now only remains for me to cast myself upon the 
 indulgent kindness of the public.
 
 ttjat takttt) tjje sraort stjall pcristj litj ttjt smart. 
 
 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 FIRST PART. 
 
 lUins nf tjjt 
 
 CHAPTEK I. 
 
 IT was the month of June, 1836. M. Gueneau de Mussy, a 
 distinguished member of the Faculty in Paris, had just been 
 refuting, with equal power and elegance, in the Academy of 
 Medicine, the opinions of the Phrenologists, then in vogue. 
 Gall, Spurzheim and others, were authorities of great weight, 
 who could not but attract, in the course of five-and-twenty years, 
 many disciples, and make many proselytes all over the world, 
 particularly in France, the standard-bearer of modern civiliza- 
 tion. Nevertheless, this hypothesis, which will never reach 
 even the portico of Science, had, like all human things, enthu- 
 siastic panegyrists, and inveterate enemies. Which side is 
 right the reader of the following pages may judge ; and we 
 believe that while Phrenology may dazzle for awhile, it will 
 become dim in the rising light of truth. The cranium of 
 Fieschi had, according to some, certain protuberances situate 
 upon the side of the head, where has been placed the organ of 
 Murder or Destructiveness : according to others, these protu- 
 berances were not found in Fieschi, but were so in G eneral Foy,
 
 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 the type of urbanity and nobleness.* Contradictions so enor- 
 mous, and others which we do not cite, prove that man in the 
 midst of his progress often struggles in the darkness of ignor- 
 ance while he believes himself enthroned in the spheres of light. 
 To say that miserable mortals are victims of their organization 
 is a blasphemy a doctrine fatal to all liberty, to all morality, 
 to all hope ; a doctrine which arms the ignorant with terrible 
 weapons, worse than the inevitable doom of Mahomet, and pre- 
 sents to the mind of man Destiny with outspread wings swoop- 
 ing over the earth, spreading desolation, piling up putrescent 
 masses. We should have much to say upon this subject, but it 
 is not our intention to deliver an anti-phrenological course ; we 
 prefer commencing at once a history that will furnish our hum- 
 ble pen with matter for many pages. 
 
 In the northern part of the Department of Aube, some 
 twenty-six leagues from Paris, there is a small town, Nogent 
 de la Seine, watered by the river which lends it its name. Not 
 far off, a pile of ruins arrests the view of the traveller. Moul- 
 dering arches, broken columns, heaps of stone and brick, walls 
 carpeted with saxifrage, with tree and ground ivy, with parieta- 
 ria and its round red stems brittle as glass, and its rough, dark 
 green, sharp pointed leaves, and small apetalous flowers, and an 
 infinity of other climbing plants and shrubs, over which lightly 
 runs the lizard, lover of silence, with sparkling eye, rustling in 
 his nimble course the heaps of withered leaves, and interrupting 
 the tranquillity which reigns in these solitudes, over whose 
 crumbling masses has rolled the light of some eight centuries. 
 The founder of this monastery sought to immortalize the mem- 
 ory of the consolation he so much needed by calling it THE 
 PARACLETE. His history, though immoral, is well known, and 
 has furnished the materials for the Abelard and Heloisc ; but 
 such are human things, the Paraclete no longer exists save in 
 ruins, and many of the inhabitants of its own neighborhood, 
 
 * Journal des Debate, 27th June, 1836. 
 
 I
 
 THE RV1NS OF THE PARACLETE. 3 
 
 and nearly all the rest of the world, know not who founded it, 
 
 and do not approach it, because let us hear two 
 
 ignorant peasants who are passing by, eyeing the ruins askance, 
 and they will tell us why. 
 
 Not in the day time ; but in the night it is horrible ; you 
 could hear the groans from this place where we stand, and you 
 see it's a good way off. 
 
 And the man with the long beard lives there, eh ? 
 
 Parbleu ! don't name him, Julien, don't name him ; M. le 
 Cure told Dame Frayeur that the old founder of this monastery 
 was a scandalous man, who among other things taught a young 
 lady I don't know what magic tricks ; but one thing is certain, 
 that they both got a whipping at last, and a pretty smart one 
 too ! and it seems to me that the old fellow that lives now in 
 these ruins, but nobody has ever seen him, must be an enchan- 
 ter, a wizard, a goblin, a devil's whelp, for he goes about with a 
 bald-headed raven, the ugliest thing in the world, and the nasty 
 bird understands him when he speaks for all the world like a 
 Christian. 
 
 The clown hearing this, crossed himself, stared vacantly 
 with his mouth agape from ear to ear, his knees knocking 
 together, awkwardly shuffling his feet, and drawing a deep 
 breath, he said : 
 
 Why, how does he live 1 
 
 Why does he live, man ? Ah ! there's a question ! Why ? 
 because he is not dead. 
 
 And why is he not dead living there 1 
 
 I cannot tell ; but at night they say it is frightful to hear 
 the groanings and howlings that come from the cavern he lives 
 in. 
 
 And he does really live in there ? 
 
 To be sure, he lives in those vaults. 
 
 And, said the other, nudging his companion, he has 
 not got a young lady like the old founder to teach magics to ? 
 
 At this question they both stood still : the one puffed out
 
 4 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 his ruddy cheeks choking with laughter ; the other with his 
 hands resting on his knees, burst into a convulsive ha ! ha ! ha ! 
 Both, face to face, stood there laughing for some time, when 
 the raven of which they had just been speaking passed over 
 * their heads croaking. They remained fixed in the same posi- 
 tion, glancing from side to side with terror in their eyes and 
 wide-opened mouths, till it was out of sight ; then crossing 
 themselves, they went on their way to their cabins in an 
 unbroken silence, looking fitfully from time to time over their 
 shoulders. 
 
 Let us leave these countrymen, and follow two travellers 
 who are taking the narrow lane lined with green turf which 
 leads to the ruins. Both have reached a mature age, both be- 
 long to an elevated rank in society, and although arrived at a 
 period of reflection, both think as to certain matters like gay 
 young men of the world. They are on foot and alone, for 
 neither the peasants of the neighborhood nor the town's peo- 
 ple of Nogent dare approach the mysterious ruins ; so that they 
 have had to leave the carriage in which they came at the end of 
 the lane. 
 
 Strange country ! said the younger of the two. strange 
 country is this France ! Side by side with learning, around 
 the very focus of science, one finds the most frightful supersti- 
 tion, the densest ignorance. Did you hear, Count, the conversa- 
 tion of the hotel-keeper and his guests, when we said we wished 
 to visit the ruins of the Paraclete ? 
 
 Yes, Baron, but that proves only a bad social organization. 
 In France, it is as though the proprietor of a chateau, who was 
 eminently selfish, possessed a reservoir intended for purposes of 
 irrigation, which he would not suffer to be used for the neigh- 
 boring fields ; his own pastures, mellows, and gardens would 
 have all the luxuriance of tropical ve<_'etatinn. enriched by the 
 abundant watering of crystal streams, while the adjacent fields 
 would present but a desert to the view of his tenants. The 
 French, as leader of the nations, centralize in their cities learn-
 
 THE RUINS OF THE PARACLETE. 5 
 
 ing, education, great men ; they make an immense reservoir of 
 this Paris which lies beneath us ; but like egotists as they are, 
 they deny the crystal waters to the people, whether in the 
 country or in the towns, and thej T do right, and so ignorance 
 sterilizes this teeming soil, which, cultivated and watered, would 
 produce the richest fruits instead of the weeds and brambles 
 which we now see. 
 
 And who can this necromantic, savage, ferocious creature 
 be, that lives in the ruins and puts these people in such fear 1 
 
 We shall soon solve that question ; but I have little doubt 
 that the whole story is fabulous a tale of witchcraft. 
 
 As they said this they approached the Paraclete ; it was 
 eleven o'clock in the morning, and the sun was very powerful, 
 so they opened their umbrellas to screen their heads from his 
 scorching rays. 
 
 Surely this is the only way to the monastery. 
 
 It must be so. I have carefully examined the horizon ; 
 all the rest is a dense wood. What ideas rush into the mind 
 when treading a spot of which one has read in childhood, with 
 the soul suspended between pain and pleasure ! Do you know 
 that in view of the celebrity of the learned Abelard, whose 
 name was in the twelfth century the personification of know- 
 ledge, I cannot but wonder to see the errors to which man is 
 exposed ; when believing himself guided by reason, he is but 
 dragged along by his appetites. 
 
 The greatest men generally commit the greatest errors, 
 particularly when woman is concerned 
 
 The flight of a raven which slightly touched the umbrella of 
 the Count, interrupted this dialogue, and attracted the atten- 
 tion of the two travellers to the crumbling ogives of the peris- 
 tyle of the Paraclete. They went on in silence, searching for 
 some place where they might enter the ruins ; when presently 
 they heard the footsteps of a man at some distance in the inte- 
 rior of that abandoned monastery. They looked at each other : 
 but before they could speak, they perceived coming towards
 
 6 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 them a man truly mysterious. He was small of stature ; his 
 head hung upon his shoulders, his neck was twisted towards the 
 right, the cheek resting upon the collar-bone ; he was dressed 
 in a blouse ; he tottered as he went, and on his breast, he car- 
 ried a picture, the subject of which they could not see at that 
 distance. This mysterious man appeared through a ruined 
 window, leaned his body on one side so as to be able to see 
 them, and disappeared, not without striking terror into those 
 who had seen him. The travellers looked at each other, and 
 with a gesture of mutual understanding commenced the follow- 
 ing dialogue : 
 
 This must be the monastery, and the ruins on the other 
 side the church. 
 
 That which was the church has perished almost to its 
 foundations, while the monastery remains but half in ruins : 
 here Baron, you have a perfect picture of the actual clergy and 
 church ; the latter is almost demolished by the ministers who 
 exercise its divine authority so unworthily, and the former 
 meantime sustain themselves well enough, because they think 
 only of money-getting, and the pursuits of ambition, without 
 troubling themselves about the decadent church. Poor Abe- 
 lard ! Who would have ventured to tell him that the refuge he 
 sought against the barbarous envy of his enemies, and particu- 
 larly of the Canon, uncle of Heloise, would one day see the 
 lizard running, and wild plants growing over its ruins ? Who 
 would have believed that his numerous disciples, and the fame 
 he left behind him, would have been insufficient to eternize the 
 Paraclete, and that his very name would be buried in obli- 
 vion 
 
 From behind a massive wall clothed with parietaria, ap- 
 peared the head of another man. tall, thin, pale, with large blue 
 eyes, with red saffron-colored beard which covered his cheeks, 
 leaving only his eyes visible, dressed in a frock coat after the 
 fashion of the times, reaching down to his feet, and the cloth of 
 which shone with long wear upon the forearm and shoulder,
 
 THE RUINS OF THE PARACLETE. 7 
 
 who with his eyes riveted on the strangers, said to them with 
 honeyed voice and flashing eyes 
 
 Back, gentlemen, back ; here alone live I a poor bot- 
 anist. 
 
 And stretching out his arm, he pointed with his finger to 
 the path by which they were to retire. While he had been 
 speaking, Kant had stood contemplating him with much curi- 
 osity, and now giving way to his recollections he exclaimed : 
 
 Schmidt, Schmidt, don't you remember me ? don't you 
 remember Kant, the companion of your studies in London, the 
 playmate of your childhood in Wertemburg ? 
 
 The man to whom had thus been given the name of 
 Schmidt, passed his hands across his eyes, struck with his palm 
 his broad forehead, and with a gesture of delight clasped in his 
 arms the Count Kant, his fellow-student when a young man in 
 London, and, though Schmidt was the older of the two, the be- 
 loved friend of his childhood. 
 
 After the first transports of joy, which were natural upon 
 the reunion of those who had loved each other in the age of 
 truth, the tall man assumed the meditative air which was 
 habitual to him, and said : 
 
 Do you remember, Kant, the first time that the philoso- 
 pher of Wertemburg, the profound Grail, explained to us in 
 London, he and Spurzheim, before giving them to the light, 
 their investigations upon anatomy, and the physiology of the 
 nervous system ? 
 
 I remember it. 
 
 Do you remember my plans for the future ? 
 
 Yes, my friend, as if it were but yesterday. 
 
 I have followed them all, but not with the results I calcu- 
 lated upon at that epoch. 
 
 What have you accomplished ? 
 
 That is my secret. 
 
 Schmidt stopped short, looked at the Baron, stepped a 
 little aside, and whispered to his friend.
 
 8 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 Who ia this gentleman that comes with you ? 
 
 It is my friend, the Baron de Vieux. 
 
 The Baron de Vieux ! . . . . ah ! . . ah ! 
 
 The countenance of Schmidt assumed a peculiar expression, 
 as he repeated several times . . . de Vieux ! . . . . de Vieux ! 
 His friend Kant could distinguish none of the significance of 
 this expression, and answered him 
 
 Yes, my friend the Baron de Vieux. 
 
 Then I am sorry I cannot speak to you with freedom. 
 You nobles do not believe the science of the plebeians. 
 
 Schmidt, you do not know the Baron. I assure you, on 
 my word of honor, he is worthy of your highest esteem. 
 
 Very good, but it does not follow that I can confide to 
 him a secret. 
 
 As though he were a corpse, or the ruins on which we 
 tread. 
 
 Schmidt looked at Kant with one of those looks that go 
 right to the heart, and added : 
 
 Well, I will confess to you the half of it. 
 
 They then rejoined the Baron, who was examining the 
 monumental spot, and preceded by Schmidt, they directed their 
 steps to a corridor, which doubtless led to the vaults of the 
 Paraclete. Let us follow them, treading in their steps, and ob- 
 serving all that surrounded them, in the same silence that they 
 kept. 
 
 This corridor was a dark passage, whose arched ceiling 
 might defy yet another eight centuries, with its five layers 
 of bricks ; and it was so dark that it could not be entered with 
 confidence by any one who was not accustomed to pass through 
 it many times a day. After some three or four minutes they 
 began to descend, not a staircase, but a declivity worn smooth, 
 at the end of which light was perceivable. They raised their 
 heads, and saw the rays of the sun penetrating a dense mass of 
 foliage, which covered the topmost peaks of the ruined edifice. 
 A Picardy sheep-dog, with intelligence beaming in his counte-
 
 THE R UINS OF THE PARA CLETE. 9 
 
 nance, was lying at the door of a kind of apartment to the left, 
 and as soon as he observed the presence of strangers, he fixed 
 his eyes on Schmidt, as though asking him what he was to do. 
 His friend indicated by a signal that he was to remain quiet, which 
 seen by the intelligent animal, he returned to his first position, 
 resting his chin on his fore-paws. Schmidt opened the door, 
 and invited his guests to enter that strange inclosure. Before 
 a word is spoken, we will describe what they saw, and which 
 held them in breathless awe.
 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 ONE who has seen a South American market, where meat is ex- 
 posed for sale, upon filthy planks laid on the ground, swarming 
 with large blue flies, which make it teem with maggots, 
 may form an approximative idea of the place we are treading. 
 Pieces of flesh, violet, black, mulberry-red, mangled brains sepa- 
 rated into their several compartments, livid viscera, greenish 
 liver, whitened lungs with black spots, crania full of holes, 
 ^skulls sawn in pieces, heads of animals of different species 
 heaped in a corner, purulent marrow, a fetid smell half cam 
 phorate, mephitic miasms mixed with divers pharmaceutical 
 odors, were the first body of the horrid picture the Count and the 
 Baron were observing. Then in course of dissection were hearts 
 with the great arteries and veins that communicate with them ; 
 great aortas, lungs, tracheae, bronchi, venae cavae, right and left 
 ventricles of the heart, tricuspid valves, stomachs, pulmonary 
 arteries, viscera, thoraces, spleens, abdomens, oesophagi, bladders, 
 pancreata, mcsenteric veins and globules, arteries, absorbent ves- 
 sels, superior venae cavae, and an infinity of other integral parts 
 of the human body, some blackened, others greenish, these in 
 bottles, those half fresh, and some almost palpitating. This was 
 the second body of the fearful tableau. On one side, hanging on 
 a beam, were skeletons of men and of women, skinned and dis- 
 sected with all their members wonderful work of scientific pa- 
 tience. A little further, a complete chemical laboratory, but
 
 THE B UWS OF THE PARA CLETE. \ \ 
 
 equally horrible for filth, full of bones, blood, and pieces of 
 flesh ; the horrid nausea excited by which made the nerves re- 
 coil. The chamber was of great size, and it seemed as though 
 the inhabitant of this cavern must be the Secretary of Death, 
 or the universal executioner in his workshop, who, after the 
 Spanish fashion of forty years ago, was frying the members of 
 quartered criminals, or cutting them in pieces to expose them 
 in iron cages at the cross-roads, in order thus to announce to 
 the passers by the barbarism of human justice ! 
 
 Schmidt had fallen into a profound reverie, while Kant and 
 de Vieux felt their hairs standing on end at the contemplation 
 of so infernal a laboratory. Had either of them been asked 
 where they were, they would have fled at the sound of a human 
 voice. It has cost us some moments to describe all this, but 
 their vision embraced the whole in a very few seconds, at the 
 end of which was heard a cry as of a human being. Schmidt 
 made a satanic gesture and set off running to the bottom of the 
 cavern, which movement made the travellers start back twice 
 with fear ; their knees knocked together, their pallid counte- 
 nances expressing the terror which agitated their hearts. 
 
 Man is so much the child of his senses, that in certain cases 
 it is necessary to materialize the moral disorders in order that 
 they may produce on him a beneficial effect. The preceptor may 
 tire himself out in vain counselling youth to govern and not 
 succumb to their brutal appetites ; he may make a thousand re- 
 flections, and hold up before them a thousand examples ; he may 
 instil into them a thousand maxims, all will be useless ; but 
 let him take his pupils to one of those hospitals where are to be 
 seen the ravages effected by debauch ; where they may witness 
 the fatal consequences of vice, of intoxication, of gluttony ; let 
 him lift up the bloody and nauseous sheets ; let him expose to 
 view the apparatus that inflicts the surgical incision ; let him 
 cause the groans of the patient, perhaps in the flower of his age, 
 to fall upon their ears ; let him set before their fearful gaze the 
 monstrosities produced by vice, and the youths will be seen to
 
 12 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 return from the terrible couch with the muscles of the face 
 contracted, the hair all on end, the stomach nauseated, and, 
 what is of most consequence, with an extreme horror at the 
 possibility of falling into such a situation. This is not a sys- 
 tem of terror no, but of practical persuasion, one of sound rea- 
 son ; and it is not to be said that physicians are every day in 
 such scenes and are yet no more moral than the rest of man- 
 kind, because it may be replied that it is an injustice to the 
 faculty to suppose them immoral ; for though the generality of 
 them are, if you will, materialists, they show by their conduct 
 that the sight of such pictures, if it does not lead them reli- 
 giously to preserve themselves from debauch, at least creates 
 in their minds an inveterate antipathy to vice, which restrains 
 them from falling victims to it with so much frequency as the 
 rest of men who do not witness such "disenchantmcnts. 
 
 In the absence of Schmidt, Kant and de Vieux. petrified with 
 astonishment, stood motionless as statues, capable only for a long 
 time of regarding each other with bewildered eyes. It is not 
 to be wondered at that two men of the world, as those are gene- 
 rally called who have passed their youth in levities, remained 
 at such a moment awe-stricken in the midst of their no vulgar 
 attainments. There are certain scenes invented either by wick- 
 edness, or scientific fanaticism, or superstition, or the misled 
 judgment of men, which we in vain strive to imagine, and to 
 which we can much less make ourselves superior. Under this 
 influence, greater doubtless than the magnetic power of Joseph 
 Balsamo, they found themselves, when Schmidt returned rub- 
 bing his hands, in a meditative air. Kant could not help draw- 
 ing back, and saying : 
 
 Schmidt, what arc these horrors? what workshop of Satan 
 have you chosen for your operations? what cry was that? 
 
 Ka ! ha ' ha ! .... it is but the laboratory of a poor ph} r - 
 sician. 
 
 The three relapsed into silence. The strangers cast another 
 glance at these terrible remains of humanity, and the Franco-
 
 THE K UINS OF THE PARA CLETE. 1 3 
 
 German inclined his head. The frontal arteries throbbed con- 
 vulsively, the lower lip projected, and shrugging his shoulders 
 he directed himself to Kant : 
 
 Then you .... and this gentleman .... are astonished at 
 my house ? 
 
 But, my friend, who would not be horrified at such a sight 
 and such cries ? 
 
 I, you, and this gentleman, if I explained it to you. 
 
 Say, Schmidt, say for what end you have collected such 
 putrescent masses, and live in the midst of such sad cries ? 
 
 To give life to half a world. 
 
 To give life ! exclaimed de Vieux, a little recovered 
 from his amazement, to give life ! 
 
 Yes, M. de Vieux, to give life. 
 
 And how will you give life if these miasms take away 
 your own, Schmidt ? 
 
 Oh ! these miasms do not inflict death, those which kill 
 are those you respire in Paris and other cities, moral cesspools 
 whose vapors stifle. 
 
 The extraordinary man rose up, strode two steps, took a bugle, 
 drew from it two prolonged sounds, Ho-o-o-o, .... ho-o-o-o ! . . . . 
 turned and sat down, and placed the horn between his knees. 
 Inexplicable to the strangers was all that passed under their eyes, 
 and but for the ancient friendship of Kant and Schmidt, the 
 noble German, as well as the Frenchman, would have quitted the 
 vaults of the Paraclete, never again to set their feet within them. 
 The extraordinary physician had made signs to them with his 
 hand that he expected some one, and that they were to keep 
 silence, and while the person came whom he had thus called, he 
 struck the floor with the bloody bugle-horn as though beating 
 time to music. Footsteps were heard as of a person walking 
 slowly, the pallid features of the host of those ruins were dilated, 
 the os hyoidcs rose and fell quickly with the pleasure he was 
 experiencing, he could not swallow the saliva fast enough. The 
 door opened. The man who presented himself before them
 
 14 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 was the same wry-necked humpback whom they had seen before 
 the appearance of Schmidt. Our readers know him already, 
 but they do not know what he had hanging at his breast. On 
 seeing him Kant and de Vieux rose involuntarily from the 
 blocks of wood, for they could not be called benches, whereon 
 they were seated, and stepped back with demonstrations of hor- 
 ror. What was it they saw ! Let us with them fix our eyes upon 
 that painting. It is a picture a foot long, whereon is seen a 
 gallows, and a man struggling in the agonies of strangulation 
 between the knees of the hangman. It bore an inscription in 
 Spanish, saying, " Jose Feliu, wonderfully saved." Schmidt 
 smiled to see the two nobles so terrified, and after giving them 
 time to contemplate Jose Feliii. said to the condemned : 
 
 Jos, my son, go in and look to that and do not 
 
 let it move. 
 
 The wry-neck went out, dragging his disjointed legs, to the 
 bottom of the cave, whence had proceeded the terrible cry. 
 
 What is this, Schmidt, what is this ? 
 
 A poor worthy fellow, whom in the year '27 the Conde de 
 Espana. that tormentor of Catalonia, had hanged in Barcelona for 
 a liberal, as the monster said, whom I, being in the city, begged 
 after the execution, and whom I have been able to restore to life. 
 
 And how ? 
 
 You must have read it in the periodicals of the time. 
 Schmidt was one of those wonders of science, to whom 
 
 nothing attained appears worthy of admiration compared with 
 what they have yet to learn, and this ever recedes as they go 
 along towards the infinite horizon of science ; so he would 
 make no further answer. 
 
 This is truly horrible. 
 
 It is fearful, added de Vieux. 
 
 But what is there horrible and fearful, gentlemen ; the 
 sight of bones and dissected flesh, and of a man whom I have 
 saved, and who out of gratitude will not abandon the picture 
 which represents his sufferings and happy end? Bah! gentle-
 
 THE R UINS OF THE PAR A CLETE. \ 5 
 
 men, what you call horrible has nothing in it but the sublime 
 and holy ! It is plain .... the nobles .... 
 
 Come, Schmidt, pardon my first emotion ; since we are not 
 accustomed to see sages like you, nor cabinets so artistically 
 decorated, it has made an impression on us ; for you know 
 though I have studied somewhat, it has been only for pastime, 
 and the Baron knows only the anatomy of Love, and the remains 
 of hearts analyzed in cups of Louis d'Or. 
 
 Aye ! Aye ! 
 
 Let us leave this, now, and tell us how it is you are here. 
 I left you in London in the year the year '29, seven years 
 ago, more or less, is it not so ? 
 
 The man of science gave an affirmative sign. 
 
 Come, tell us what has happened to you that you should 
 have formed the determination to live amongst the dead. 
 Speak, the Baron de Vieux is but to me another self. 
 
 The mysterious man opened his large blue eyes and looked 
 at Kant, then at the Baron, and smiled. The glance which he 
 cast upon de Vieux made the hair of the latter stand on end, 
 though he knew not why ; the sea-blue eyes of Schmidt caused 
 an ocean of time to rush over his soul ; but this impression was 
 effaced, as the furrow traced by one wave is obliterated by the 
 larger succeeding one which rolls over it, as he gazed at the 
 smile of the extraordinary physician. 
 
 My history .... ah ! it is related in two words. 
 Schmidt twisted his fingers in his hand, beginning with the 
 
 smallest and finishing with the thumb. In his countenance 
 there was nothing that could be deciphered ; it was as a parch- 
 ment from which time had effaced all that in youth might have 
 been read there ; but one who had studied the rising and falling 
 of the os hyoides might have detected that something extraordi- 
 nary agitated his breast. 
 
 Come, tell us those two words ; I repeat that the Baron is 
 but an alter ego. 
 
 A flash darted out from the intelligent eyes of Schmidt. 
 The Baron added :
 
 16 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 If my presence .... 
 
 No, M. de Vieux, no, your presence cannot but be a 
 pleasure to me. I will relate in a few words my history from 
 that time. From London I passed to Paris, in search of 
 Science ; from Paris I went to Bremen, to Dresden, to Berlin 
 in search of Science ; thence I returned to France, and, being, 
 as Kant knows, poor, and the son of a husbandman, I sought to 
 make myself a name ; because the middle class, destitute of 
 parchments and coats of arms, seeks its trophies in science, in 
 intelligence, which is the greatest nobleness next to genuine vir- 
 tue, and perhaps the greatest of all, since without intelligence it is 
 impossible to be truly virtuous . . . begging your pardon, my Lords. 
 Not being able to live in Paris, for particular reasons, I sought 
 an asylum in these ruins, to dedicate myself entirely to inves- 
 tigations which might make me a name, and make me forget 
 .... my first disenchantments, my first attempts, and I have suc- 
 ceeded. Behold my history ! 
 
 But now before we go into details as to that which sur- 
 rounds us, if I mistake not, it seems to me that in the year 
 '20, in Werteinburg, you had a family, wife and daughter. 
 
 Schmidt bit his inferior lip, and added with a gesture of in- 
 difference : Yes, they died in '22. 
 
 And how have you been able to amass so many skeletons, 
 such heaps of flesh, so many corpses ? What discoveries have 
 you made ? Speak, my dear friend, speak. You have put me 
 into a burning impatience ; what does all this mean ? 
 
 Schmidt arose from his seat, went to the beam where the 
 skeletons were hanging, and taking one by the vertebral column, 
 said : 
 
 This is my wife. 
 
 The two aristocrats moved uneasily upon their chairs. Kant 
 said : Horrible ! 
 
 He who had just shown the remains of her who had made 
 him father, continued, without visible emotion : 
 
 This is my daughter, the only one I had.
 
 THE R UINS OF THE PARA CLETE. \ 7 
 
 Kant and de Vieux arose and drew back. 
 The Gallo-German, imperturbable, continued : 
 
 These are two celebrated murderers, who were guillo- 
 tined at Troyes ; this is the most lascivious man that ever en- 
 tered the Hospital Val de Grace at Paris ; this is the woman 
 most insatiable of pleasures that ever trode Marseilles, daughter 
 of the Terrace behind the Theatre ; this is a robber, essence of 
 Caco, or spirit of a usurer ; this is a soldier of the army of Al- 
 giers ; this is a cure, who passed for a saint, and was more 
 voluptuous than a monkey ; this belonged to a negro, who 
 would have become a prodigy of intelligence ; this is one of a 
 girl, type of sensuality ; why should I add more ? All are 
 celebrities, each in his own line. 
 
 The nobles were petrified with amazement at the sang-froid 
 of this Galen. 
 
 And how have you obtained a collection of notabilities so 
 numerous ? What have you gathered from your study ? With- 
 out doubt Gall and Spurzheim will fall into the background 
 when you give to light investigations so profound ? Speak, the 
 Baron and myself are enthusiasts of Phrenology. 
 
 Ha ! ha ! ha ! Phrenology is a hypothesis, and will never 
 attain a higher rank ; by it some phenomena can, in certain 
 cases, be explained ; but Science hides itself in the cerebral 
 sinuosities, and is confounded by the spirituality of the princi- 
 ple that animates those wonderful caverns. To attempt the 
 explanation of the mysteries of Nature by arguments so elastic, 
 so to speak, as those of Gall, Spurzheim, Salandier, Lavater, 
 Cabanis, &c., is to fight against truth, to debase the judgment. 
 
 And why are you so opposed to Phrenology ? How is it 
 that you have changed ? How can you deny what we have to- 
 gether seen in London ? 
 
 Sit down, and we will talk. 
 
 It is necessary to pause here and observe the sage, the ter- 
 rible man, who at 53 years seemed to be a septuagenarian, so 
 much had he studied ! . . or so much had he suffered ! ... or
 
 18 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 perhaps both these causes had combined so to wear him out ! 
 His kingdom was knowledge ; in reflecting upon the human body 
 his countenance became radiant, his features dilated, his eyes 
 sparkled, his hands spoke, torrents poured from his lips, his head 
 was elevated with a philosophic enthusiasm. Then Schmidt was 
 like a miser passing in review his bags of gold ; or an artist in 
 that blissful moment, when he has been permitted for the first 
 time to touch with transient kiss the lips of his beloved ; or a 
 conquering hero who, in the midst of the battle-field, plucks 
 the decorations from his own person to distribute to his brave 
 soldiers around him ; or a tragedian, who, in the height of his 
 triumph, sees his audience weep in the midst of their applause, 
 while they throw chaplets at his feet ; or the orator, who is ex- 
 citing by his sympathetic eloquence to heroic deeds ; or the 
 mother, who, from the wrecking ship, receives her only son in 
 her arms, snatched from the abyss which stood ready to ingulf 
 him before her eyes. All this and more was Schmidt. His 
 central point was that elementary being called by Leibnitz the 
 monad, his throne was the human body, his atmosphere the 
 soul, his court the secrets which environ those two substances. 
 Schmidt, before speaking, poured forth a deep breath as though 
 animating worlds of intelligence around him. Oh ! Schmidt 
 was terribly beautiful. The two nobles gazed with admiration 
 upon the metamorphosis undergone by the extraordinary being 
 before them ; they hoped to hear great things, to see wonders. 
 He, while they looked upon him, drew himself up, passed his 
 large fingers rapidly through his fast failing hair, opened wide 
 his eyes, as though seeking to penetrate the abyss thence to 
 draw out light, respired deeply, looked at his guests, searching 
 in their eyes to see if their souls were coming out at those win- 
 dows to hear what he was about to say : 
 
 Phrenology ! Poor alphabet of an imagined science ! The 
 soul and the body, the spiritual and the physical strength, 
 what relation have they ? How do they communicate with each 
 other? How do those two contraries unite ? It is a mystery.
 
 THE RUINS OF THE PARACLETE. 19 
 
 The configuration of the skull, the sinuosities, the protuber- 
 ances, the organs which are more than thirty-seven in number, 
 those conductors of external sensations, those cameras obscuroe 
 which represent that which is without, that which we feel, that 
 which we desire, that which we hate, that which we imagine, 
 that which we idealize ! . . . . the soul subject to the mechanism 
 of the body ! Error ! The same organ, the same protuberance, 
 which in man they call Destructiveness, is in the wolf an impe- 
 rious incitement to devour the lamb for his sustenance ; the 
 same organ, of assassination in man, makes the goat eat grass, 
 the bird feed on seeds, the insect live on air. To say that 
 all destroy is to give such elasticity to science, that it is re- 
 duced to a mere pretence. Intelligence based on configuration 
 or volume ! Nonsense ! A bird, a canary, a parrot, learn to do 
 marvellous things, are superior to other animals a hundred 
 times their size, from whose brains might be made a dozen 
 linnets, three or four parrots, or half a score of canaries. It is 
 not volume that we must consider, it is activity. The inclina- 
 tions of man. his moral part, boxed up in protuberances and 
 sinuosities ! Sheer madness ! A mass as of 20 with 3 degrees 
 of activity or velocity, is the same as a mass of 3 with 20 de- 
 grees of activity or velocity ; this is an incontestable principle 
 of mechanics. How do the phrenologists pretend to support 
 themselves upon it, or to evade its force ? The phrenologists 
 consider the brain only as a material organ ; this element alone 
 proves nothing ; it is necessary to consider whether we can 
 measure the activity which animates it. And who will measure 
 the soul of man? Who has entered this world full of dark- 
 ness ? Who has penetrated into this breath of God ? Oh ! the 
 soul of man has an activity like that which with a breath ani- 
 mated the statue of clay as it lay by the banks of the river of 
 Paradise ! Oh ! phrenology is a charlatanism ! I, with my 
 own hands, have lifted up. broken, severed in pieces, examined 
 even palpitating the frontal, parietal, occipital, sphenoid, tem- 
 poral and ethmoid bones; have fixed upon the quivering brains
 
 
 20 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 my greedy eyes ; have fatigued myself with comparing heads of 
 men and of animals ; have perforated heads of men and women, 
 of children and the aged ; have removed this coverlet of their 
 brains, and seen this mass of their thought trembling in the pal- 
 pitations of death ; have endeavored to seize the soul that \v;is 
 escaping me ; their heads have drooped, their brains have fallen 
 on the floor, the soul, the power of activity, has fled to Heaven ; 
 how I by what road ? where had it been * which was its seat : 
 Oh ! phrenology . . . . ! 
 
 Schmidt ! Schmidt ! are you a monster, a murderer, 
 a ? 
 
 Hear me, Kant, before you judge ; you say that I am a 
 murderer because I have killed some dozens of men and women 
 in order to save many, to aid the progress of science, to gain 
 knowledge, to hasten the reign of intelligence : hear my answer, 
 then I will go on with phrenology. You have called me an assas- 
 sin because I have searched for knowledge, not for myself, but 
 for the solace of human kind, for the amelioration of entire hu- 
 manity ; and what title will you give to the monarch who causes 
 thousands of men to die on the field of battle, for an imaginary 
 and dreamed-of right which he calls divine, that of subjugating 
 his fellows ? We need not go back to the wars of succession in 
 Spain, nor turn over the pages of history to cull odious names; 
 let us look at the fratricidal war which the Spaniards are waging 
 against each other for that poor mannikin of the Jesuits, Don 
 Carlos, on the one side, and on the other, Donna Isabella, that 
 little innocent, knowing as yet nothing but how to play with her 
 dolls ! If }'ou call me a murderer because I have, without one 
 selfish consideration, seen a few expire for the sake of the many, 
 what name will you give to Napoleon, and to all the sanguinary 
 cohort of ambitious conquerors whom men call heroes ? How 
 will you designate those worshippers of Mammon, who with ca- 
 pacious throat devour the goods of their fellows, causing them to 
 die of misery through their infamous usury, usurpation, and fraud ? 
 What appellation do those rulers deserve who suffer the people
 
 THE ItUINS OF THE PARACLETE. 21 
 
 to fight in the streets for a name call it king or liberty strew- 
 ing the ground with corpses ? What names will you invent for 
 the priests and monks, who in past centuries and they are 
 fully disposed to do the same now have lighted the fires of the 
 Inquisition, sacrificing not to God, who hates victims, but to 
 their own stupid superstition, hundreds of thousands, and per- 
 haps millions of men? For this the people rise against them, 
 and shoot them even in the churches, as you have seen now quite 
 recently in Madrid and Barcelona, paying them with brutal 
 fanaticism of liberty for their own religious fanaticism of op- 
 pression. " Pie that takes the sword shall perish by the sword." 
 What will you call those ignorant physicians who daily send 
 thousands to the tomb ? or those reckless merchants, who in 
 their unscrupulous thirst for gain, make the sea a sepulchre to 
 thousands of noble hearts ? And if from the material, of which 
 plenty more remains to be said, we turn to the moral, what 
 language can you invent justly to characterize those murderers, 
 the great and the rich, who abuse their position to defile the 
 bed of the unhappy son of the people, to sacrifice the virtue of 
 its daughters, to destroy the peace of proletarian families for 
 the accomplishment of their nefarious designs ? By what term 
 can you rightly name those deaths which are entailed by the 
 selfish upon the honest poor, by demagogues upon the incautious 
 people, by immoral and sophistical writers upon their un- 
 happy readers, by journalists upon the nations ? What can I 
 say to you, Kant, what can I say to you? You, yourself, this 
 
 gentleman yes, this gentleman and others that 
 
 occupy similar situations, answer : what names do those whom 
 I have described, and others whom to save myself hateful recol- 
 lections I will not mention, deserve, who, not for the good of 
 the community, but for their own ; not for the love of science, 
 but for their brutal appetites ; not from enthusiasm for knowledge, 
 but for the sake of the most petty worldly considerations, kill, 
 destroy, immolate ? No, my friend, no, do not call me an as- 
 sassin because I have killed a few for the good of all, and
 
 22 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 through whose deaths I have found a remedy for a thousand 
 ills. 
 
 The eccentric man inclined his head, and clasping his hands, 
 a tear ran down his saffron-colored beard and moustachio. 
 Kant and de Vieux could not take off their eyes from him. lost 
 as they were in the profound thought his extraordinary reason- 
 ing excited. On seeing him weep, his old class-mate was melt- 
 ed, and falling on his neck, said : 
 
 Pardon me, sage friend, pardon me, I have given you a 
 name you do not deserve ; Kant admires you ; Kant calls you 
 now in adult years more than in infancy, the friend of his heart. 
 Kant is a fool, who trembles at a few deaths, and does not con- 
 sider the thousands around him. 
 
 There was a prolonged silence, during which strange things 
 might have been remarked, if each had not been absorbed in 
 the thoughts which beclouded him ; the solemn stillness was at 
 length interrupted by Kant, who said, addressing himself to 
 Schmidt : 
 
 Well, my dear and wise friend, I concede that your end 
 justifies the means ; continue now your exposition of the prodi- 
 gious discoveries resulting from your studies. 
 
 The Gallo-Germau recovered himself in appearance from 
 the abstraction into which he had fallen, and replied in a casual 
 manner : 
 
 Think you not the obscure Schmidt wept when he heard 
 the cries of his victims ? Do you not judge that his heart- 
 strings broke when he caused the convulsions of death, when he 
 put his face into the reeking entrails of those whom he im- 
 molated? Has he not grown old with suffering? But Schmidt 
 had cruel pains to forget, Schmidt had to devour his most beau- 
 tiful sentiments ; and it was by force of suffering that Schmidt 
 cast himself into the unfathomable abyss of science, whose in- 
 finity threw him into ecstasies till he was even beside himself; 
 Sdunidt looked at humanity, and preferred repaying the evil he 
 had suffered with good, to taking vengeance on those who had 

 
 THE KUIA'S OF THE PARACLETE. 23 
 
 outraged him. Please God even the names of these men shall 
 be forgotten in order that all mankind may be loved 
 
 The man who an hour ago appeared a genius of the intellec- 
 tual heaven, sunk to the material earth to the abode of mor- 
 tality. 
 
 The Baron de Vieux ventured to address him : 
 
 Mons. Schmidt, will you have the kindness to lay aside 
 these recollections, and continue for the benefit of our intelli- 
 gence the exposition of your vast discoveries in relation to Cra- 
 niology ? You have so much interested me 
 
 Schmidt again surrounded himself with the luminous atmos- 
 phere in which he had but just now been swimming, and im- 
 pelled afresh by Kant, commenced thus : 
 
 God is not as men : with him there is no distinction of 
 persons ; justice is one of his highest attributes : the souls 
 of all men come from his hands equal ; he creates them with 
 equal wisdom ; he sends them with equal goodness to animate 
 the material part of man. All souls possess the same identical 
 gifts ; all enjoy equal activity ; all are endowed with the same 
 prodigious power. The physician more than all others is ready 
 to acknowlege the existence of God ; for he beholds wonders 
 which annihilate his arrogance and confound his comprehen- 
 sion. That the souls of all rational beings must be equal, is 
 manifest ; because a contrary doctrine robs God of his infinite 
 and wise justice, permitting us to lift up our necks against him, 
 and tell him that he has made a distinction of persons. The 
 body of man is equal in all the human race, as to its essential 
 and integral parts, if not in that which pertains to accidentals. 
 The same two hundred and fifty-two bones, the same viscera, 
 the same cartilages, the same tendons, the same arteries, the 
 same nerves, the same veins, the same vessels, the same fluids, 
 the same cuticle, the same epidermis, the same members. The 
 differences noted in the races are accidental ; for the most part, 
 they are the result of education, of climate, of food, and an in- 
 finity of other circumstances which barbarism, caprice, fashion,
 
 24 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 ignorance, have invented in their febrile disorder. The Carib- 
 bee has a flattened, the negro a melon-shaped cranium, the Chi- 
 nese woman feet exceedingly small, and other accidentals have 
 sprung from what I have just mentioned ; but in the essential. 
 in the integral, they are equal. From what happens it, then, 
 that morally they are so dissimilar ? Is it in the manner of 
 looking at things? Is it because the harmonies of all ineirs 
 bodies are not alike ? Is it because his corporeal and intellec- 
 tual activity are not in equilibrium ? It may be affected by 
 this, though it is not a sure rule in all cases. The activity of 
 the mind is the same in all cases of the body not so. because 
 anima omnis carnis in sanguine cjus cst. That is, the activity 
 of the corporeal substance is in the blood. That does not mean, 
 as a sect of philosophers two centuries ago interpreted it, that 
 the soul, or thinking principle, is in the blood ; no, the thinking 
 principle may be in the head or in the whole body, that is yet a 
 mystery, but for our purpose it is indifferent ; what is meant is, 
 that the strength of the physical principle is in the blood. On 
 the other hand, in the liquids there is life, in the solids death. 
 Moreover, the blood is like the sea in the earth, penetrating 
 its bowels, vivifying it, moistening it, giving it sap and 
 aliment, sending out its waters in all directions, and gathering 
 them together again in its capacious bosom. And will not 
 the purification, or empoisonmcnt of these waters, influence 
 very greatly the animal economy, which by a yet undisco- 
 vered mystery has its sympathies with the spiritual kingdom ? 
 Who can doubt it ? Look at the effects produced by wine, by 
 opium ; and look at the opposite effects of coffee. The former 
 are incitants to concupiscence, the latter is an antiphrodysiac. 
 This stimulates the senses, the others infuriate them ; this de- 
 lights, those sadden ; this gives energy to the body, which com- 
 municates it to the soul, and in that state of sur-excitation man 
 creates, originates, performs wonders ; the others enervate the 
 body, which drags down the soul to a participation in its in- 
 ertia and depression, till it finds itself enwrapped in stupidity.
 
 THE RUINS OF THE PARACLETE. 25 
 
 Sensual vice, in some cases reduces the blood as it were to 
 water, in others it envenoms it. In the first case it causes 
 idiocy or insanity ; in the second, generates monstrosities. 
 Yes, gentlemen, the velocity, the activity of the material part 
 of man is the blood ; it matters not that the brains have or 
 have not this or that configuration ; give one the necessary fluid 
 having qualities of the kind and activity of the power required by 
 the exigencies of the particular case in the given circumstances, 
 and you shall see prodigies of intelligence, of virtue, of wicked- 
 ness, of vehement passions. It is not to be believed that the 
 soul obeys the body ; no, she is the queen, she dominates ; she 
 but allows herself to be subjected in abnormal moments ; in re- 
 turning to the normal state she reveals her power. Gentlemen, 
 my secret is in 4he blood, my discovery I bequeath to the 
 world under the name of " The Nervo-Sanguinco-nulri-imbibi- 
 tive Art." Give me substances proportionate, analogous, assi- 
 milative to the conducting organs, the principles simple or com- 
 pound which touch those springs of sensibility that affect the 
 soul, which at times put it into an abnormal state, at times 
 equalize its forces, and behold a new world ; behold intelli- 
 gence ; behold prodigies of every kind. For what doubt can 
 there be but that the milk which the babe sucks influences 
 its future as well as its present development? What doubt 
 that the qualities existing in certain minerals, certain plants, 
 certain elements, is born of the liquid which nourishes them ? 
 What doubt that the aliments change the nature, the tenden- 
 cies, of the body, and influence in a surprising manner the rela- 
 tion which exists between it and the soul ? What doubt that 
 the animal education changes the ideas of men ? What doubt 
 that the moral part is affected by all the external ? Oh, my 
 friend ! my attempts will be perfected by others ; their results 
 consigned to posterity, and science will have gained thousands of 
 leagues in its spacious horizon. Transfusion, transfusion ! this 
 is the prodigious power, whether by the alimentary canal, by
 
 25 THE T\YO FATHERS. 
 
 the veins, or by the organs which directly act upon the intelli- 
 gence. 
 
 Here the admirable man arose, drew his guests nearer to 
 him to explain to them mysteries, marvels, wonders, whu-h lu- 
 had discovered in the analysis of the human structure. Here 
 there was an entrail, here a bone, here an artery, here a mem- 
 brane, here the cerebral cavity, here that of the thorax, here 
 the labyrinthine nervous system, here the blood of various be- 
 ings rational and irrational, here the caverns of the cerebellum, 
 here the globulous mass of the brains, here all these together, 
 here much that we cannot describe. The mysterious beginnings 
 of life enveloped in fluids, like the world in the hands of God, 
 their progression, their development, the ossification, life, the 
 tendencies of the being about to see the light, about to be 
 bathed in another atmosphere as fluid yet less liquid, the im- 
 mediate cause of its life, Schmidt treats of all with a freedom, 
 a facility, a disembarrassment conceivable only in one who had 
 been present with God in the fabrication of the world who 
 was with him in the composition of the beings that surround 
 us, who had served for hands to creative wisdom. This man of 
 the people was as superior to the two nobles as wisdom is to 
 ignorance, as strength is to impotence, as the people are to the 
 kings who govern them, in strength, in resources, in physical 
 and moral power. 
 
 The two guests were so ravished listening to the sage, that 
 four hours passed without their perceiving it ; when the body 
 of Schmidt admonished his soul to come down from the lofty 
 heights of science to the dark regions of the flesh which sought 
 food, and must be supplied at the risk of being separated from 
 its intelligent companion. During the repast, which was spar- 
 ing and frugal to excess, especially for the Baron, that volcano 
 of ideas grand and new, continued his explanations, his physi- 
 ognomy revealing nothing whatever of the inexplicable tor- 
 ments he was suffering. The Baron, in a moment when he 
 was left alone with Kant, said to him :
 
 THE RUINS OF THE PARACLETE. 37 
 
 This singular man is one of those visionaries, who be- 
 cause they conceive a thing believe it ; and while the strength 
 of their own conviction makes their hearers doubt whether it is 
 really truth or a paradox, their eloquence fascinates into con- 
 cession. 
 
 Do you think so ? 
 
 Such is my opinion. 
 
 I do not share it 
 
 The presence of the condemned and of Schmidt cut short 
 their discourse. They hoped for new wonders. They had de- 
 termined to leave the ruins, for it was now six o'clock in the 
 evening, and the carriage which conducted them to the end of 
 the terrible lane, which the country people would not tread for 
 their weight in gold, had perhaps gone, the driver believing 
 them victims to their temerity ; but Schmidt easily persuaded 
 them to pass the night with him, for he had yet to show them 
 wonderful things, which he exacted under oath that they should 
 bury in their breasts. They consented. 
 
 The sun with accelerated pace abandoned the horizon, so 
 that the darkness of night entering by the unsashed skylights 
 of the ruins, mingled with the gloom shed by the dense foliage 
 which served for curtains. The silence and the situation were 
 imposing, clothed in the mystery lent by night. They had gone 
 into another apartment, less lugubrious but not less majestic ; 
 it was the pantheon of the monks of Abelard, which retained 
 some few tombs almost in the state of their primitive exist- 
 ence.
 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 KANT and de Vieux remained alone in that mansion of dark- 
 ness, illumined only by the smoky light which emanated from a 
 sooty lamp of four wicks, placed upon a ruined tomb. It was 
 a symbol of the faith of men in our age, which sees every thing 
 through clouds of smoke. What were their feelings our read- 
 ers may imagine, who, if they have put themselves in their situ- 
 ation, cannot but confess freely that terror, mingled with 
 amazement, must have served as their atmosphere in those 
 caverns. 
 
 Schmidt had gone out with Jose Felii'i, the two strangers 
 not knowing whither nor for what purpose, but they hoped to 
 see extraordinary things. In the interim, they made a thousand 
 guesses as to what could have originated in that man a life so 
 strange ; pretensions so marvellous, customs so extravagant, 
 passions so inexplicable, actions so mysterious, reticences so in- 
 comprehensible. The voice of Schmidt was heard like the 
 sailor's horn on the wide expanse of ocean, when at a great dis- 
 tance from another ship he believes himself lost, the echo of 
 which transcended the imposing, and reached even the terrible. 
 
 What is that, Kant, what are these sounds so lugubrious, 
 that seem to be approaching us? 
 
 I don't understand it, do Vieux, I don't understand it ; 
 it may be, perhaps, the shepherds of the neighborhood tending 
 their flocks, whose shouts, since we are in these solitudes, seem 
 to us like the cries of those who, entering the vestibules of eter-
 
 THE R TJINS OF THE PAEA CLETE. 39 
 
 nity, and having lost their way, seek a conductor to the eternal 
 roads. 
 
 What think you, is it not fearful to live here ? Do you 
 know this man is capable of turning the brains of the wisest 
 man, with all his science ? It is not from fear, but from 
 I know not what repugnance that possesses me, but I am deter- 
 mined to leave this place. 
 
 And where would you go at this hour ? One can pass a 
 bad night any where. 
 
 The same tremendous voices drew nearer, proceeding appa- 
 rently from the bowels of the abyss. The frames of the two 
 aristocrats shuddered ; a strange trembling agitated their arms 
 from the elbows to the fingers. They looked at each other, and 
 their eyes fell upon the lamp, which emitted dense columns of 
 smoke from its four wicks, which began where the lurid flame 
 ended ; approximative image of the physical harmony of soul 
 and body. Their shadows, monstrously distorted by the arches 
 of the vaults, presented to their view formidable spectres ; the 
 slightest movement called up in their minds fearful images. 
 They stood like two statues. At the farther end of the apartment 
 there was an ogive which served as a door, leading from the place 
 where they were, abode of the dead, perhaps to the infernal re- 
 gions .... or to the fields. On that side they heard footsteps. 
 It was Schmidt, coming with a brand of burning pinewood in his 
 hand. Before they could distinguish, amid the shadows pro- 
 jected by the smoky torch, his saifron-colored beard, they 
 thought it must be Time encountering them, watching Death in 
 the darkness of night, to surprise in his arms the horrid myste- 
 ries of his inhuman loves. 
 
 Come, you must excuse my having left you alone a few 
 moments ; I went to prepare your beds ; they will not be wor- 
 thy of your aristocratic persons, but you will sleep tranquilly ; 
 that is all we need to insure to make sleep profitable. 
 
 These words brought back the souls of Kant and de Vieux 
 to their bodies.
 
 30 THE TWO FATHER*. 
 
 Do you know, Schmidt said the former, that your pa- 
 lace has a sinister aspect? 
 
 The aspect of things affects only the vulgar ; let us 
 study their qualities. Many times you may have seen a man 
 of fine countenance, elegant form, fascinating manners and melo- 
 dious voice, and his heart, his soul have horrified you when you 
 have known him profoundly ; on the contrary, you will not 
 fail to remember some whose aspect is forbidding, whose harsh 
 voice makes those who have delicate nerves tremble, but in 
 whom, upon intimate acquaintance, you have found souls of an- 
 gels in bodies of demons, hearts of wax incased within rusted 
 iron. We must not believe in appearances. 
 
 As he said this, he led them from the apartment, they not 
 knowing what they were doing ; for in certain circumstances of 
 life men prove that there are beings, like the loadstone, which 
 attract us independently of our wills, unconsciously to ourselves. 
 They arrived at the place where the Franco-German wished 
 them to remain : there was a door, which, after he had thrown the 
 torch upon the ground, with a stamp of his foot flew open, and 
 revealed what was within. De Vieux drew back and gave way 
 for Schmidt and Kant. 
 
 Here said the first, entering. you will see the truth 
 of the ncrvo-sangidnco-nutri-imbibiti'cc system. 
 
 The horror depicted by Michael Angelo in his Last Judgment, 
 is not equal to that which was represented by the countenances 
 of the two nobles. Let us see what caused them such surprise. 
 
 It was a vast vault, well lighted by half a dozen lamps of a 
 peculiar make ; on one side was a great plank with bottles and 
 glasses, and some blocks which Schmidt called benches or seats; 
 in the centre was erected a gallows whence ropes were hanging, 
 at the foot of which instrument were great stones enveloped in 
 a kind of net made of rough cords. Jose Feliii stood at the 
 left of the formidable machine, from the death inflicted by 
 which Schmidt had liberated him. 
 
 What does this mean, my friend exclaimed Kant, his 
 hair standing on end, what does this mean?
 
 THE RV1SS OF THE PAR AGLET E. 31 
 
 It is my workshop of wonders, my friend. 
 
 Workshop of wonders ! 
 
 As you hear. You will test it this night. 
 
 I! 
 
 Yes, and this gentleman too. 
 
 I ! exclaimed de Vieux. trembling. 
 
 Ha ! ha ! ha ! do you believe that I am a demon, or do 
 you but prove that what you call the great have degenerated, 
 and are sunk into the smallest atoms of men ? Why fear ? 
 Which of my antecedents can induce you to believe me an ex- 
 ecutioner, a murderer, a traitor ? I will make the first experi- 
 ment, and if you wish to taste for a while the preludes of para- 
 dise, you may try it. How misled are men ; this instrument 
 invented to torture thousands of innocents, instead of the ago- 
 nies of death, yields the pleasures of heaven ; in place of horri- 
 ble convulsions, causes quiverings of delight ; instead of making 
 the entrance into eternity frightful, renders it enchanting. Is 
 it not true, Jos j 1 is it not certain, my son ? 
 
 The condemned replied with broken voice : 
 
 The moments are few. but immense the delight. 
 
 Kant and de Vieux looked at each other, as though in 
 another world ; that which they have left above the vaults 
 seems to have receded several centuries. 
 
 I see that you are confounded at what I tell you, or that 
 you think me mad. Let us sit down. 
 
 The two nobles mechanically sat down. 
 Schmidt proceeded : 
 
 I am going to give you the key to this mystery, so inex- 
 plicable to you. 
 
 Before listening to Schmidt it is necessary to observe, that 
 this man was apparently exasperated against the nobles of the 
 earth ; nevertheless, such is the power of science, that it made 
 him forget even his anger as soon as he .entered the domain of 
 intelligence. Oh, that all men would amass wisdom, that they 
 might forget the passions which agitate them ! Let him go on : 
 
 You will remember, you particularly who were in Lon-
 
 32 TIM TW(J FATHERS. 
 
 don at that time, the arrival of our countryman, Faust- Wer- 
 ther, of Stuttgard, and the representations he gave in the me- 
 tropolis of Great Britain, on behalf of which Lord * * * be- 
 (.auii- so very enthusiastic, calling them his di-sscrt. with his 
 condemned criminal whom he had delivered, as I had done a 
 year before in Barcelona, with my poor son Jose, and Schmidt 
 turned his eyes full of tenderness to the spot where Feliii stood ; 
 also it will be present to your mind that the police prose- 
 cuted the German physician, and that Lord * * * went with 
 him and the condemned criminal from the Court of St. James, 
 and you will remember, too, the untimely end to which he 
 came 
 
 Yes, my friend, I remember ; you are right ; I was there. 
 
 Jose and I were there also, and we knew as much as they ; 
 but till then I never believed there could be any one who. for 
 the sake of money, would commit such a profanity. I grant 
 that enthusiasm may lead us to make experiments in the 
 secrecy of our laboratories for the good of mankind, and 
 even of poor animals ; this is well enough ; but to prostitute 
 Nature, making her loving mysteries serve to pander to the 
 vulgar ignorant, and give them an occasion for wickedness, is 
 not only unreasonable, but insane. From that moment I be- 
 gan to study this great discovery, due, like most prodigies, to a 
 mere chance, as you already know, through the Societc dcs 
 Pendus, which proves the little we study this great book that 
 we have before our eyes, Nature, whose pages embrace the uni- 
 verse. Jose told me what he had experienced ; I tested it. and 
 to perfect the discovery and bring my system into clearer light. 
 I added some potions, some of which taken half an hour, others 
 a quarter of an hour previously, combine with the strangulation 
 to agitate Nature and produce the desired sensations, caused 
 principally by the greater activity of the blood in these mo- 
 ments of nervous desperation. Why say any more? When 
 one who has profoundly studied nature can demonstrate truth 
 by experiment, theories are useless. I invite you to pass a few 
 moments of exquisite enjoyments in allowing yourselves to be
 
 THE R UINS OF TEE PARA CLETE. 3 3 
 
 hanged for some hundred seconds, and you will see if I have 
 not attained the object of my incalculable labors. 
 
 This is very dangerous, Schmidt ; I grant you all you 
 have said, but I had rather not trust my neck to such a funam- 
 bulous exercise. 
 
 M. le Baron will be more of our age ? 
 
 M. Schmidt, the question seems to me rather delicate ; 
 for in our age of positivism, I should not wish to risk myself on 
 a perhaps. 
 
 But I will be the first, Jose will follow me ; and after 
 you have seen the simplicity of the operation. I can assure you 
 you will desire to taste the pleasures it affords. Chloroform, 
 animal magnetism, and other modern inventions, are much 
 more hazardous, less delicious, and cause greater suffering. Oh ! 
 curiosity will incite you, and I shall obtain, if I die soon as I 
 believe I shall, the support of two personages like yourselves, 
 who with your own experience will be able to testify to the 
 theories of the obscure physician. Kant, friend of my child- 
 hood, will you deny me this service ? Do you know how much 
 you can make me lose or gain ? 
 
 He said this in a manner so peculiar, that Kant was moved 
 at the expression of the countenance of Schmidt, and replied : 
 
 Dear friend, the sublimity your features respire, united 
 to the certainty I feel of your great knowledge, makes me pro- 
 mise that after I have seen you, and if you give me your word 
 that you will watch the movements of the friend of your child- 
 hood. I will try it ! 
 
 It could not but be so exclaimed Schmidt, beside him- 
 self for joy, it could not but be so ; your eyes bespeak the 
 generosity of your soul ; in them I read frank friendship ; your 
 heart is great as your mind is not vulgar. Fear not and 
 stretching out his arm and displaying his hand, he continued : 
 from these fleshless fingers will escape not an atom of life that 
 passes through the air. When stretching out my arm I apply 
 a finger to the temples. I count the molecules of activity which 
 
 2*
 
 34 THE TWO FATllEHS. 
 
 rapidly circulate through the vital channels. You will see, you 
 will lose all fear, you will try, and afterwards after- 
 wards you will not suffer Schmidt to die in obscurity, whom 
 poverty and sufferings have buried alive in these ruins ; from 
 whom men fly as from a demon, while he sacrifices himself for 
 their good ; whose brains, while he to make them good and 
 happy opens his heart to mortal steel, they have crushed, rob- 
 bing him of the only thing he loved. Kant, Kant, Providence 
 drew you here 
 
 He was silent, and with the worn skirt of his surtout wiped 
 away a tear. To see a man so formidable in appearance weep ; 
 to hear one who was acquainted even with the causes of life sob, 
 must have interested not only those who heard him, but the 
 most ignorant, and confiding in his exquisite sensibilities, they 
 would have trusted themselves in his hands without reserve. 
 Thus it happened to Kant and de Vieux, particularly the latter, 
 who had in his youth drained the cup of pleasure, having tried 
 the sulphuric ether, the pastile of the harems, and every thing 
 that refined luxury has invented to imbrute man, and deprive 
 him of the gift of reason which assimilates him to God. After 
 a moment's reflection, during which all retained silence, he 
 ventured to put this question to the absorbed Schmidt, who, as 
 he stood like a monument in the silence of night after the in- 
 augural festival, was thinking something extraordinary : 
 
 M. Schmidt, have you found the means of exciting cer- 
 tain given sensations ; for example, those of love ? 
 
 A smile played lightly on the lips of Schmidt, which indi- 
 cated that which will be read in the following chapters, united 
 to the scorn which the epicure excited in him, and he re- 
 plied : 
 
 Have I found the means of exciting the pleasure of 
 which you speak ? And why not ? He made an effort as 
 though fighting with his own soul, and approaching the improvised 
 table, took up a bottle and said Read, " Heroic Aphrody- 
 siac." If you take a glass of this liquid, in a quarter of an
 
 THE RUIXS OF TUP: PARACLETE. 35 
 
 hour, my Lord Baroii, placed in the funi-phantasmagorica, 
 which is the name I have given to the experimental gallows, 
 you will far surpass the muleteer of Medina with his febrile 
 paradisiac dream. In a minute and a half you will be flying 
 through the air, your head reclining upon the bosom of a mag- 
 nificent woman, every convulsion will be a kiss, every move- 
 ment a flutter of love, every oscillation the supreme instant of a 
 passion suppressed for many years, and compensated by the 
 caresses of a delicious kouri. Oh ! M. de Vieux, this elixir, 
 
 and the gallows, will suit you that you may know 
 
 what it is to enjoy 
 
 He was going to continue, or to be silent, after these re- 
 ticenses, but Kant interrupted one or both these things, by 
 saying : 
 
 Schmidt, dear Schmidt, and is it in your power to call 
 up horrible images, infernal pictures ? 
 
 To awaken horrors in the imagination ? . . . . But what 
 scenes, friend, what scenes ? He took up a bottle and read the 
 label. " Phantasm agorico-Satanic." With this drink you see in 
 ninety seconds all that the mind of Lucifer can forge to ter- 
 rify men. It seems to you that you are dreaming ; that they 
 are inflicting on you the cruelties of Nero, Caligula, Attila, 
 Dioclcsian, those of the inquisition ; and you see here what a 
 leap, but the two epochs shake hands ; that you are suffering 
 the tortures of a night of agitating dreams, those that the In- 
 dians and the civilized have mutually inflicted upon each other ; 
 those that are suffered by the poor, freezing with cold and dy- 
 ing of hunger ; those experienced by the condemned criminal 
 as he ascends the steps of the guillotine ; those endured by the 
 husband whose wife and daughter have been stolen from him, 
 their honor stained, and their innocence blighted. Fired with 
 this potion, you see death and his satellites making fearful faces 
 at a moribund. Anger, envy, jealousy, rage, the tortures of 
 suspense, thirst for vengeance, lust for gold, the pains of num- 
 berless diseases all the emotions you may feel inclined to ex-
 
 36 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 
 
 perience, pleasing or painful, are inclosed in these bottles, with 
 the aid of the gallows which is before you. I want yet to see 
 horrors and suiting the action to the word, he emptied into a 
 cup a small draught of a red liquor, and drank it to the dregs, 
 with deadly anxiety ; then turning to his amazed guests he 
 said : 
 
 Choose, quickly, for it must be taken in the critical 
 moment. 
 
 He looked at them with sparkling eyes, and waited the an- 
 swer of Kant and de Vieux, who, notwithstanding their curi- 
 osity to make the experiment, touched their necks as though 
 they already felt them squeezed in the rough ropes that hung 
 from the gallows. 
 
 Well, what say you ? qtiick ! within ten minutes I put 
 on the cravate ; quick ! what will you try 1 
 
 My friend, if I determine after seeing the execution, I 
 desire to enjoy a state of beatitude of soul. 
 
 " Pacific spiritual enjoyments" this bottle, take, 
 
 drink. 
 
 Kant drained the glass. 
 
 You, M. de Vieux ? 
 
 Under the same conditions as my friend, I want to see 
 the Paradise of Mahomet. 
 
 Mahomet .... the first bottle, this, drink. 
 
 The Baron emptied it. The taste was agreeable, even dis- 
 gust was spared them. Schmidt did not wait for them to 
 speak : 
 
 This is agreed. 
 
 What ? 
 
 What? 
 
 That each one shall relate what he sees. 
 
 Agreed. 
 
 I consent. 
 
 It will be curious. 
 
 Worth hearing.
 
 THE RUINS OF THE PARACLETE. 37 
 
 The worker of wonders made them sit down near the appa- 
 ratus and began giving orders to Jose. There was heard from 
 this moment no sound, no sign of life, but the voice of Schmidt. 
 
 Jose, my son, bring the quilted cravate, that the ropes 
 may not graze the necks of these gentlemen, who are more deli- 
 cate than we ; get out the chronometer ; put the light beside it ; 
 see that the time is not exceeded by the smallest instant ; I 
 shall remain suspended a little less than 120 seconds. Quick! 
 Mind ! don't forget to untie the wheel and loosen the slip-knot 
 the moment I touch the ground. 
 
 I will attend to every thing. 
 
 Come, make haste, I feel the symptoms of the liquid. 
 
 In a bow-shot every thing was in order. The apparatus 
 was imposing. Schmidt looked at the chronometer, felt his 
 pulse, thought for an instant, directed his steps to the spot and - 
 put his neck into the halter, which was a rope with a little 
 quilted cushion of a material uniting flexibility with softness. 
 Jose went up the ladder, passed the rope through the pulley in 
 the centre, came down with it in his hand, and fixing it in the 
 notch of the wheel employed to suspend the patient in the air, 
 placed a block of wood some twelve inches high at the feet of 
 Schmidt, who stood upon it, had his hands tied tightly behind 
 him, and put his feet into fetters of a peculiar make. When all 
 these preparations were completed, Jose approached the wheel, 
 put his right hand on the handle ready to give it the turn which 
 would suspend the doctor two feet more in the air ; with the 
 left took a pike and stuck the point into the block to move it 
 from the place, so that the body on coming down would meet 
 no obstacle on the floor, and said : 
 
 All is ready, sir. 
 
 So am I ; quick ! 
 
 In the twinkling of an electric spark Schmidt was raised 
 three feet from the floor and the block removed to one side. 
 The eye's of Feliti, motionless, were riveted on the hands of the 
 chronometer. Kant and do Vieux gazed fearfully on the strug-
 
 38 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 gles of the Gallo-German's powerful frame; his eyes were 
 turned upwards, showing only the white balls ; his face was 
 livid, his tongue was hanging out, his veins and arteries were 
 inflated, his breast was agitated, and his legs from the knees to 
 the feet were seized with an extraordinary trembling. 
 
 One of the strangers clasped his head in his hands, struck 
 with horror ; the other put his finger on his mouth, gazing so 
 intently that little lights seemed to sparkle before his eyes. 
 
 Now, said Jose. 
 
 The wheel whirr-r-r-r-ed, Schmidt touched the ground ; the 
 slip-knot was loosened, a powerful aroma was applied to his 
 nostrils, the cords which bound his arms were untied, the irons 
 were taken from his feet, and in three minutes Schmidt smiled 
 looking at the nobles. A moment after he said to them : 
 
 Oh ! to see what I have seen at so little cost, it were 
 worth while to make a thousand such attempts ; and you see I 
 am already in my normal state. Come, who follows me ? the 
 time passes. 
 
 The Baron looked at Kant, he at Schmidt ; at last de Vieux 
 said : 
 
 M. le Docteur, I ; but my life 
 
 Say not a word ; if you suffer the least danger, here are 
 two pistols ; and he took them from his pocket Kant, in 
 whom I believe you have confidence, shall fire with the barrels 
 between my teeth. 
 
 I am ready. 
 
 But you will tell us what you see, as I will do. 
 
 Just as I see it : mind, now, don't go beyond the ninety 
 seconds. 
 
 Not an atom. 
 
 The French noble, in whose physiognomy there breathed a 
 thirst for pleasures and epicurean intoxication, took off his coat, 
 his vest, his cravat, suffered the pillowed halter to be placed 
 upon him. though at its contact he shuddered ; let his arms be 
 tied and his feet placed in the fetters. Schmidt told Jose to bring
 
 THE RUINS OF THE PARACLETE. 39 
 
 a ladder that he might, in those critical moments, place his fin- 
 gers upon the temples of the Baron and make sure of his exist- 
 ence, but to place it so that he need not approach nearer to his 
 bedy than about an arm's length. When de Vieux heard the 
 whirring of the wheel, he said : 
 
 M. Schmidt, it is a question of my life or my friend- 
 ship. 
 
 Don't concern yourself. 
 
 Before seeing the Baron suspended in the air, we must look 
 at the countenance of Schmidt. He was mounted on the ladder 
 in front of the Baron, so that he could, by reaching out his arm, 
 just touch the temporal arteries of the patient ; his counte- 
 nance wore a sinister expression, his features were contracted, 
 his lower lip clenched over the upper, his eyes were paralyzed ; 
 he shrugged his shoulders. Kant was observing him, and think- 
 ing he saw in him horrible ideas was about to cry out to him 
 to stop 
 
 Now, said Schmidt. 
 
 The wheel runs round ; the Baron is suspended, stretching 
 down his legs and the points of his toes, as though seeking to 
 glue himself to the earth ; the fingers of the Gallo-German are 
 fixed like pincers on the temples of the Baron, while the latter 
 makes fearful gestures, his eyes twinkle convulsively, he trem- 
 bles, he turns livid, Schmidt smiles ; already have elapsed sixty 
 seconds : the countenance of the physician contracts ; his eyes 
 are lost in the folds of their living curtains ; he bites his infe- 
 rior lip. draws a deep breath, returns to his normal state ; 
 cries : 
 
 The time, Jose. 
 
 The Baron is on the floor, freed from all the apparatus, safe ; 
 and throwing himself into the arms of Schmidt, exclaims : 
 
 Man of wonders, I have tasted what neither I nor the 
 genius of pleasure himself could conceive ! Try it, Kant, try it. 
 
 In such enthusiasm was de Vieux, and such security had 
 the extraordinary physician inspired in the noble German, that
 
 40 THE TWO FATHER*. 
 
 he consented to try those delights. The same was done to 
 him as we have seen done to the others : and within a quarter of 
 an hour from the commencement of these hangings, the three 
 hanged men found themselves alive and well in another cham- 
 ber, a kind of sitting-room, speaking of the wonderful character 
 of the discovery. The obscure sage cut short the river of their 
 praises, and with a sad countenance engaged them each to fulfil 
 the promise given to relate what he had seen. Kant wished to 
 be the first in relating what he had been the last to experience, 
 adding, which was true, that his vision had been the simplest. 
 
 I wish to tell you what I have seen. How original ! 
 how interesting ! how sublime ! 
 
 But tell it us. 
 
 You may imagine, and now that I have lost fear, and 
 am disposed to make a hundred trials, I can confess it with- 
 out accusing myself of cowardice, you may imagine that my 
 heart beat more quickly than it is wont, as I placed myself 
 upon the block ; a hundred lugubrious ideas were struggling in 
 my mind with fear, when I lost the earth, and began to hear a 
 rumbling in the ears, as if you were in a vault, while horses, cars, 
 and engines were running overhead ; afterwards came a sound as 
 of wind ; then I felt a delicious throbbing in the breast, that dif- 
 fused itself through all the body ; then it appeared as though 
 the heavens opened, and a bright light environed my exist- 
 ence ; then I saw Schmidt flying I touched the floor 
 
 and lost that delicious illusion, which I would fain have re- 
 tained for an hour. 
 
 The physician smiled, and his traits dilated. 
 
 Well, now Baron it is your turn. 
 
 De Vieux turned his eyes, flashing with the brilliancy of 
 sensual animalism, from one to the other of his interlocutors, 
 as though not daring to communicate what he had enjoyed, 
 jealous that others should share such delights ; but he decided 
 to do it, and said : 
 
 Gentlemen, to explain what I have seen and experienced,
 
 THE E UINS OF THE PARA QLETE. 4 1 
 
 it is necessary to relate an anecdote, because those moments 
 fly quickly, like pleasures ; but they present scenes and enjoy- 
 ments of many years. 
 
 "Well, say on, M. le Baron. 
 
 Certainly, speak out your mind, for Schmidt studies the 
 psychological part of his discovery, that is to say the effect 
 which it causes in the soul, and in these cases a sage like him 
 weighs even to the syllables whatever we utter. 
 
 Well, then, in vain I would try to deny to the sage 
 Schmidt, that my system is thirsty for pleasures, and insatiable 
 of that charming tendency. One of the incidents of my life 
 that has left the deepest trace on my mind and heart, bears date 
 a little over seventeen years ago. I knew by sight a German 
 lady, living at a country-house in the suburbs of Paris, a beau- 
 tiful, charming, luscious woman, widow or not widow of a phy- 
 sician .... the truth is, he was travelling I don't know where .... 
 and she missing him, I improved the occasion, blinding the ser- 
 vants with gold, and surprising her one night. Never, after- 
 wards, did I know her end, because she disappeared soon af- 
 ter. Schmidt had changed color several times. You cannot 
 imagine how delicious was that woman, nor the feelings that her 
 absence caused in me, for the cup of pleasure had but approached 
 my lips. With these antecedents I can relate what I have 
 seen. 
 
 The veins of the temples, and the os hyoidcs of Schmidt con- 
 tinued to be so agitated, that he was obliged to pass his hand 
 over his head and neck, as though to swallow something, or 
 alleviate some pain. This man of iron is softened only by fire ; 
 how intense must have been the fire lighted up by de Vieux, 
 when he put him into such a state ! 
 
 To recount what is seen in that inappreciable atom of 
 time is impossible, except diffusely. Jose well said, " the mo- 
 ments are few, but immense the delight ;" and to describe what 
 one enjoys, it is necessary to use many words. 
 
 But come, go on, you put me into desperation.
 
 42 T1IK T\YO FATHER*. 
 
 Schmidt continued swallowing, whether saliva or poison we 
 know not. 
 
 I pass over in silence that which we have all alike expe- 
 rienced. A few moments after my suspension, behold Wilhel- 
 mina presents herself to my eyes, with all the charms of that 
 half nudity of the Greek statues, which is a hundred times more 
 piquant than entire nudity, her mellow lips approaching mine 
 of fire, which advanced to burn her delicious coral, as burning 
 iron fine satin ; then I struggled in the agonies of inexplicable 
 
 love and returned to the monotonous life which we 
 
 men pass in this world. Oh ! del detto al fatto civa un gran 
 tratto. 
 
 While de Vieux had been speaking, the mysterious sage, 
 without being observed by the nobles, closed his eyes and 
 folded his hands upon his heart, which he detached as the 
 Baron finished, with the fingers and the nails bloody ; with 
 such violence had this man. in five minutes, battled with him- 
 self. 
 
 Now it is my turn, said Schmidt and then we will make 
 our comments. 
 
 Say, my friend, say what portentous visions you have had : 
 I am stunned with what I have felt and seen. And what have 
 not you experienced, de Vieux ? 
 
 I have seen night, illumined by a green-red pyre, and in 
 a deserted field a young woman battling with a tiger, who 
 was amusing himself, thrusting his claws into her skin, and 
 making her believe he was playing, when suddenly he tore open 
 her flesh from her head downwards, and I saw . . . Jose let me 
 down. 
 
 They were going to ask something ; but a cry which was 
 heard in the distance made the prodigious 111:111 begin to run, 
 leaving them in suspense. They had been talking a little upon 
 the strangeness of those cries, which could not but be of great 
 importance, seeing they so powerfully drew off the attention of 
 Schmidt, when he returned to their presence, rubbing his hands,
 
 THE BUMS OF THE PARACLETE. 43 
 
 a custom which in him denoted that his soul was in scientific 
 agitation. Kant was the first to break silence : 
 
 My friend, this is the second time during the few hours 
 we have been with you, that the same distressing cry has been 
 heard ; can you, by informing us of its cause, remove our curi- 
 osity ? It must be no other than one of those marvels which 
 your modest humility hides from the sight and knowledge of 
 those who cannot appreciate the intellectual power of semi-di- 
 vine beings, who, like you, have a body, but live only in the 
 mind. 
 
 The sage returned some disjointed words, which indicated 
 the high importance he set upon the cause of those lamentations, 
 and ended, saying : 
 
 I told you this morning, I would explain to you but the 
 half of these things ; the whole I cannot divulge. There are 
 mysteries in religion, which, revealed, would make men demons 
 of pride ; there are mysteries in nature, which, were the curtain 
 drawn, would make men audacious, and lead them, perhaps, to 
 aspire to equality with God ; there are mysteries in science, 
 which surprise the Divine Artist in his prodigious works, which, 
 if divulged, would do more harm than all the good which could be 
 derived from them, so that these ineffable pleasures must needs 
 be reserved to a privileged few. That which causes these 
 cries is not yet clear ; it is a new world : the Columbus of know- 
 ledge has begun his voyage, already he distinguishes land in 
 the horizon, he is about to satiate the ambition of those who 
 wished to accompany him so far as to plant his foot on a new 
 hemisphere ; but his vessel is not yet safe, although it has 
 already plqughed the uncertain sands of the abyss. That must 
 suffice. I can say no more. 
 
 Well, I do not wish to launch into an abyss whence per- 
 haps your knowledge could not raise me again, for I am not so 
 spiritual as to be able to sail between wind and water ; but you 
 will tell us at least what question you hope to solve by those 
 cries ?
 
 44 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 I seek to know whether man always sins when he per- 
 forms actions contrary to the law. It is a question I have 
 asked myself on seeing the unbridled course we run, dragged 
 on by our sensual and sordid appetites, till we seem to have 
 been born rather to fight against Providence, nature, and our 
 own happiness, than for any thing else. This universal, con- 
 stant, tenacious tendency of the inferior part of man, is diame- 
 trically opposed to the rectitude which characterizes the soul in 
 her intimate self-consciousness, or, which is the same thing, con- 
 science ; and I have drawn a consequence from the psychologi- 
 cal nature of the thinking principle, which has made me ask 
 myself the following question : Is it certain, as the philoso- 
 phers of times past have said, that the senses deceive and are 
 deceived? And I have come to the conclusion that the senses 
 never deceive, that what deceive the soul are the combinations, 
 the judgments she forms of the images which the conductors of 
 the exterior life transmit ; and these depend on her state, that 
 is to say, on the normal or abnormal state in which she finds 
 herself, subjected by a preternatural excitation which operates 
 on the conductors of tnovemcnt, and on those of sentiment. The 
 over-excitement of the mind produced by internal or external 
 causes, very often guarantees miserable man against the judg- 
 ment of God ; because, in truth, if all the wickedness which he 
 perpetrates were done by him in a normal state, he would de- 
 serve that the thunderbolts of Divine wrath should efface from 
 the earth the steps of the vile insects which, with heads lifted 
 up, insult Him at every step, at every breath, at every link of 
 the chain of time which passes unbroken over their existence. 
 Perhaps you will not understand the end I propose, to myself 
 in many of those things I have just told you ; but this is my 
 idea which I have in part stolen from the profound Dr. Ber- 
 trand, whose treatise on artificial somnambulism is a work wor- 
 thy of immortalizing its author.* This profound genius in his 
 
 * The whole scientific world is acquainted witli the learned Doctor 
 here mentioned, whose death, and the consequent loss of all his works, is
 
 RU1XS OF THE PARACLETE. 45 
 
 flight, rushes across the wide-spread hemisphere of philosophy, 
 of physiology, and of history. Finally, gentlemen, as to physio- 
 logical phenomena, I have made a great progress ; but psycho- 
 logy belittles me. It is certain that the soul enjoys an activity 
 that we will call ubiquity, if not instantaneous, at least succes- 
 sive and wonderfully rapid ; it has its agents or conductors of 
 sentiment, which, according to modern discoveries, are certain 
 nerves under its immediate control, and from these active, 
 swift, and rapid spontaneities are born an infinity of phenomena 
 which bewilder the imagination, disconcert the judgment, baffle 
 the reason, and confound all the faculties of one who seeks to 
 study them profoundly. Enthusiasm, moral fear, spiritual love, 
 ecstasies, the sur-excitation of the passions, are they not mar- 
 vels which the soul works upon the body, just as that which you 
 have experienced has operated upon it ; like those felt by drunk- 
 ards, the sensual, cowards, and those who allow themselves to 
 be dominated by their animal appetites? Gentlemen, man 
 knows nothing ; he must study himself yet many centuries to 
 be able to understand himself. What wonders does not the soul 
 exhibit in this state of intense, powerful, destructive, insur- 
 mountable irritation which controls her ! If . she is seized by 
 fear you see the members fail, the strength vanish, the body fall 
 into syncope : if in one of those supreme moments she touches, 
 without materializing herself in the least, the conductors of sen- 
 timent, those nerves that must be called the immediate agents 
 of the spiritual power, they excite enthusiasm ; if for a wo- 
 man, and without thinking of her body, man does wonders ; if 
 in an army, and each soldier is a hero, unsubdued by fatigue, 
 the third part of which would be sufficient in the absence of his 
 enthusiasm to kill him"; if in a person fanatical in religion, 
 or it may be truly pious, and he presents us with ecstasies, 
 elevations ; because, gentlemen, when the soul is in all her 
 
 deeply deplored by all who knew the transcendent sublimity which charac- 
 terized the unpublished, but powerful writings of this too-early-lost French 
 facultative.
 
 46 'f'JlK T\VO FATHERS. 
 
 activity, when passion for any object rules, subjects, dis- 
 quiets, torments, devours, destroys, kills us ; she forgets the 
 body, and the nerves of sentiment work wonders, produce con- 
 vulsions, contractions, leaps, elevations, gestures, things unseen, 
 unheard of. Oh ! if man could enter into this spiritual world ! 
 if he could succeed in penetrating the why of his phenomena, if 
 he could surprise nature in her most exquisite operations, he 
 would see that many of the bad actions he commits are not sin- 
 ful before God ; as those of the madman, those of a man intoxi- 
 cated, those of one who sleeps, those of the somnambulist. That 
 is my idea, Kant, to see if I could succeed in disonlpating the 
 human race before conscience, before God, before reason, from 
 all his errors when they are born of that sur-excitation of the 
 soul's activity in which the senses are left powerless. This is 
 my idea, awakened by seeing men so corrupt, so brutal. But 
 what ! I dream ! I imagine myself alone ; I believe no one 
 hears me ; it is already late, you doubtless wish to repose. 
 
 No, my friend, go on ; for my part, I confess I would 
 fain listen to you all night. 
 
 M. Schmidt, said the Baron your luminous conversa- 
 tion puts me into an ecstatic state like those of which you have 
 just spoken ; I enjoy hearing you as though I were present at 
 the plan of God in forming the world. 
 
 Thanks, gentlemen, thanks ; but the body demands that 
 the exercise of the conductors of movement^ or, as you call 
 them, the senses, be suspended for some hours. 
 
 Half an hour afterward nothing interrupted the august 
 silence of the ruins of the Paraclete. The two nobles, tired of 
 so many emotions, and in a state of marvellous psychological 
 and normal physiological tranquillity, were sleeping in a cham- 
 ber contiguous to that of Schmidt. But it will be well before 
 we speak of the admirable man, to describe his appearance as 
 we see him sitting at the foot of his poor bed, in his shirt 
 sleeves, with naked feet : and that we take note of the battle 

 
 THE R UINS OF THE PAR A CLETK 47 
 
 his soul sustains against himself. There are moments when he 
 inclines and shakes his head ; at other instants he stands up 
 and seems in imagination to be seeking something ; now he 
 takes a few paces on the damp earth ; now he has stretched his 
 arm with features of fearful expression : now he lets it fall and 
 sighs ; now he presses his hand upon his forehead, his counte- 
 nance is wrinkled ; now he smiles, he puts his forefinger to his 
 mouth ; now seizes his large beard, tearing its hairs with indig- 
 nation ; now he makes affirmative signs, now negative ; he takes 
 a few large strides, being near some planks whereon are placed 
 instruments of death in infinite variety, he recedes ; now, shrug- 
 ging his shoulders, he looks up to Heaven. He seems mad, or in 
 a state of sur-excitation, like that of which he has just spoken. 
 Schmidt, lighted by a little lamp whose pallid light in its last 
 agonies throws off sparks, half undressed, with his extreme thin- 
 ness of body and distorted visage, bears no resemblance to the 
 being who was discoursing half an hour ago. Schmidt, in speak- 
 ing, was like one of those birds who mount up as though they 
 would touch the sky, and in his strange bed-room resembles the 
 same bird which before had dazzled the sight, caught and im- 
 prisoned in an iron cage, where nothing can be seen but a miser- 
 able piece of corruptible flesh. While our readers have made 
 this reflection, the Grallo-German has taken a small vial, di- 
 rected himself to the door which communicates with the room 
 in which are his guests, his hand is placed upon it, now he is 
 going to open it, he has opened it, with one foot raised he is 
 looking at the Baron, who sleeps profoundly, the veins of the 
 neck are swelling, the os hyoidcs rises and falls, he compresses 
 his accelerated breath, now he has taken a step, the hand that 
 holds the bottle trembles, .... he bites his lip, returns into hi> 
 own apartment, places the bottle on the shelf, clasps his hands 
 looks up to Heaven, and weeps the lamp goes out.
 
 CHATTER IV. 
 
 TOWARDS the close of the evening preceding the night in which 
 we find ourselves, there were assembled at an inn in the out- 
 skirts of Nogent de la Seine, where the Baron de Vieux and 
 the Count Kant had been guests, many persons surrounding the 
 coachman, who had returned at about five o'clock, and asking 
 him over and over again what had become of the two rash no- 
 bles, who, despising advice, had ventured to penetrate the ruins 
 of the Paraclete, where the wizard lived. Among the company 
 were the two laborers whom we saw in the morning, and a man 
 who in the midst of that noise of voices, exclamations, gestures, 
 foolish words, listened without opening his lips. There is no- 
 thing in the world more slanderous, babbling, credulous, super- 
 stitious and ignorant, than the society of small country towns. 
 In them, every man's life is known to his neighbor, from the 
 least thing to the greatest ; and as there are no journals, news 
 augments in volume, according to the heads through which it 
 passes, and those of villagers are generally as dense and volu- 
 minous as their ignorance, so that when the news arrives, as 
 the Spaniards would say, at the last monkey of the village, it 
 has grown from a grain of mustard-seed into an enormous 
 pumpkin, whose magnitude exceeds that of the egg of Marras, 
 in the old story. Every one of those blockheads forged a tale 
 about the magician that lived in the Paraclete. Many had 
 seen him at night flying through the air, with horns and tail of 
 fire ; and our readers will see that he would go pretty hot in 
 such a guise ! Others, with a thousand precautions, and well-
 
 TEE RUINS OF THE PARACLETE. 49 
 
 provided with arms, had got a glimpse of him, and seen .... 
 such horrors ! They had seen him fight with a naked tall wo- 
 man, who must have been the witch wife of the great prince of the 
 Malandrines Follones, although these bumpkins knew nothing 
 of the story of the Hidalgo of La Mancha, and to that they 
 attributed the groanings and howlings that were often heard, 
 and which they said resembled the sound of a bugle-horn. At 
 this point the countrymen, whose laughter of the morning had 
 been cut short by the raven, looked at one another, and raised 
 their heads to see if the bird were passing ; but finding they 
 were under a roof, with a good bottle of beer before them, they 
 puffed out their cheeks, and in the midst of their ha ! ha ! ha ! 
 ha ! the most learned of the chub-faced said : 
 
 Morbleu ! Julien, you must be possessed with the devil, 
 not to have guessed that this wizard had a lassie to teach, like 
 the old founder. 
 
 And neighbor says he was fighting with a naked old 
 woman ha ! ha ! ha ! ha ! . . . . Voila line ecole ! 
 
 Bony and skinny! .... Ha! ha! ha! ha ! 
 
 They laughed so much and so loudly, that they attracted 
 the attention of their companions, who, though enraptured at 
 hearing of the levities of the wizard with the old woman, beg- 
 ged of Julien to explain the cause of their immoderate laughter. 
 He told them, and they began again Ha ! ha ! ha ! ha ! 
 
 As the end which every writer ought to propose to himself, 
 is to correct the vices of others, not omitting his own, because 
 thus he will get more profit from his writings, our readers will 
 excuse us if we make a little digression upon this laughter of 
 the husbandmen and villagers ; that is to say, that what people 
 take for wit is generally something improper ; and nothing will 
 make the vulgar, whether Spanish, French, Italian, or of any 
 other nation, laugh more heartily, and we venture to say more, 
 even the educated also, than the use of certain equivoques, cer- 
 tain unchaste phrases, certain indecorous reticences, and certain 
 gross gestures. This proves that society is wanting in that 
 3
 
 50 TllH T\VO /.17/7A7/.V 
 
 delicacy which true culture exacts. Well would it be if this 
 abuse in conversation were corrected ; because children hear, 
 if they do not understand, and they remember when they grow 
 older. National character is perpetuated by habit, and the 
 every-day scenes of life, to say nothing of climate and other 
 circumstances which education can neutralize. 
 
 Returning to those who were in the inn. we may say that 
 they passed a couple of hours slandering Schmidt ; for when 
 the sage falls into the hands of the ignorant, they put on him 
 the schoolmaster's frock ; relating stupidities of wizards and 
 witches, and stringing together horrors that had occurred, or 
 were to occur, in ruins and ancient castles. Nothing entertains 
 the ignorant better than tales of wonder, however improbable 
 they may be. Hence sprung the Novel. To pass the long 
 winter evenings it is customary, even now-a-days, among labor- 
 ers in the country, to relate tales of prodigies, of enchantments, 
 of chivalry, of dark heroes, of magic or fables, and these de- 
 grees exhibit the civilization of the times, as well as of the na- 
 tions. Before the middle ages it was enchantment ; in the 
 middle age, the knight-errant and heroes of fabulous cru- 
 elty ; then the marvellous-poetic ; and finally, we owe to 
 the English the Moral Tale. I am not ignorant that there 
 had been an ^Esop, a Homer, Greek and Roman Ages of 
 Gold, Oriental Tales, Arabic, Chinese and Egyptian, and of 
 other countries ; but we confine ourselves to modern society. 
 Bonald says that lilcnit HIT is the expression of 1hc <-iri/iz<itii>/t 
 of /In' mi/ ions ; and tlii.s luminous principle ought to make us weep 
 as we think of what the literature of our age has become in the 
 (lasses called illustrious, in the middle class, and among the 
 ignorant. France, where for our happiness we have lived the 
 greater part of our life, presents three classes more strongly 
 marked than any other nation could exhibit. The higher lias 
 its pens flowing with praises of the aristocracy and its fabulous 
 trreatness ; the middle class finds enlightened writers who trace 
 it the path of virtue, ard present to it vice in its tr
 
 THE R UlISS OF THE PARA CLETE. 5 \ 
 
 colors, though under a certain veil of delicacy ; and the people 
 can unfortunately count great geniuses who devote themselves 
 to teaching wickedness, corruption, and nauseating scenes, pros- 
 tituting their nobleness of soul. 
 
 The French country presents another picture different from 
 that of the people of the cities. The countryman of that na- 
 tion is stuperstitious ; believes in apparitions, in vampyres, in 
 spectres, in phantasms, in spirits from Purgatory, and in all 
 that fanaticism has invented. This is easily accounted for ; it 
 is the effect of religious education ; for although the French 
 were to be offended by it, which, however, we are sure cannot 
 happen, since we know the good sense and general enlighten- 
 ment of the middle class, yet we could not omit saying that its 
 agricultural people are, in our conception, the most backward 
 in Europe, notwithstanding they are the most hospitable, per- 
 haps, of all the continent ; but their virtues lose their merit in 
 the contemplation of their defects. Detraction and levity are 
 the two poles of this machine, whose zodiac is superstition. 
 For this reason our readers need not wonder if those who oc- 
 cupy the scene before us, believe Schmidt to be a he-goat, a 
 wizard, an enchanter, a diabolical kinsman of Satan. 
 
 It was about nine o'clock when they began to depart, and 
 the parlor of the public house, inn, or hotel, which was all three 
 in one, became more silent. In a corner were two men playing 
 at draughts ; in another sat the man who had been silent all 
 the evening ; he was an agent of police. Within the bar 
 or counter was a girl with an enormous cap, that would have 
 completely overtopped the shako of a royal Austrian grenadier, 
 stretched up to his full height. From time to time she cast her 
 eyes upon the silent man. and they smiled. The draught-play- 
 ers gave over, and went out disputing whether a certain piece 
 had not slipped a square ; whether another was duly crowned 
 or not ; whether one party had not neglected to take a certain 
 piece, or whether another was properly huffed, or taken unjustly 
 or in mistake. Then the agent of police approached the gill,.
 
 52 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 and after whispering to her some words which made her blush, 
 she asked him, to pass off her confusion, whether he had heard 
 the conversation about the phantasm of the Paraclete. The 
 man who was dumb with men, but a great talker with girls, 
 answered : 
 
 Tush ! what do they know ? But come, Stephanie, never 
 mind that ; answer me what I just now asked you. 
 
 The girl shuffled about on her seat, and almost set fire with 
 her hot blushes to her immense cap. The mistress of the house 
 came to her relief, wishing to close the bar-room which commu- 
 nicated with the hotel, since it was very possible that the sor- 
 cerer and the souls of the two nobles might come seeking to 
 sleep there, and her husband was not at home ; but the police- 
 man promised to watch all night, and assured her she might go 
 to sleep secured against any soul from the other world coming 
 into her house ; reserving to himself, no doubt, the right to re- 
 main there, because he was <tf this world, to which also the girl 
 belonged. 
 
 The golden cup of the sun bathes with light the summits of 
 the mountains and the ruined walls of the monastery of Abe- 
 lard; the lizards thrust their eyes, black, swollen, and with that 
 immobility which characterizes them through the crevices of their 
 nests ; some venture to run along the heaps of withered leaves ; 
 the raven of the ruins has gone out towards Nogent de la Seine ; 
 while Schmidt has already been walking for an hour within the 
 caverns. His two friends are sleeping placidly, not in aristo- 
 cratic beds, but upon some skins which appear to them softer 
 than their beds of down and damask. The mysterious man is 
 on the side of the ruins opposite to the apartment which they 
 occupy, at a distance great enough, as we may imagine if we 
 consider the extent which the ruins of a monastery like that 
 which is the scene of our narration would occupy. Here there 
 is respired another air, it is another zone, the aspect is more 
 smiling, the objects which meet 'the eye are more attractive.
 
 THE RUINS OF THE PARACLETE. 53 
 
 there is more trace of civilization, a certain coquetry is observa- 
 able in the furniture of the apartments, which although contigu- 
 ous, do not communicate with each other. The Franco-German 
 has just entered one on the left, where a young man of nineteen 
 years of age comes forward to greet him with manifestations of 
 great love. 
 
 Permit us to give a description of his person. He is of tall 
 stature, of more than five feet in height, of herculean form, ex- 
 panded chest, broad shoulders, powerful and nervous arms, of 
 sympathetic aspect, expressive countenance, large full blue eyes, 
 delicate lips, unburdened brow which manifests great imagina- 
 tion ; his features respire a profound ingenuousness, in them are 
 read exalted passions, and as it were, an expression of reserve 
 inherited from his conception ; his saffron-colored hair he wears 
 drawn back and divided into three compartments ; his head has 
 several scars on the pericranium, which are concealed by the 
 thickness of his ckevelure ; when he smiles the down of puberty, 
 which is a down almost white, makes graceful undulations, proof 
 of exquisite sensibility ; his dress is simple, a blouse girt in 
 with a glazed swojd-belt, and the shirt collar turned back reach- 
 ing to the shoulders, and exposing to view the naked throat and 
 neck, which have the marks of large sutures, signs of ancient 
 wounds. At the sight of Schmidt he approaches him smiling, 
 as though drawn by the loadstone of filial love. After their 
 mutual salutations, the sage, as though taking pleasure in the 
 work of his hands, passes them over the young man's head, and 
 caresses him as the Arab does his horse, the soldier his victo- 
 rious lance, the coquette the net of her dress that has taken 
 captive a hundred hearts in the mazes of a German waltz. 
 After the physician Jias with actions so fatherly manifested to 
 the young man his fond affection, he says : 
 
 My son, I have for some years told you that a day must 
 come when I should stand in need of you ; it has come. 
 
 I am ready for all that my kind father by adoption re- 
 quires of me.
 
 54 'Mil'-' T\\'U 
 
 The large blue eyes of the young man are fired with enthusi- 
 asm at the thought of being able to execute, as yet. he knows 
 not what ; those of Schmidt no smaller, and of the same color, 
 respire satisfaction. 
 
 Well, I will presently tell you what I wish you to do. 
 Have you seen your companion this morning ? 
 
 No, doctor, I have but just completed my ablutions. 
 
 Very well ; until a few minutes to seven you may study, 
 and analyze in the chemical laboratory what you began yester- 
 day. Salute her for me. Adieu ! 
 
 Schmidt turns away, putting his hand upon his head, and 
 goes out : the youth inclines himself as though to receive a 
 breath of intelligence from the brawny hand of him who was 
 doubtless his professor. 
 
 While this was happening, the Count and the Baron had 
 awoke ; a refulgent ray of the sun, which lighted up the cham- 
 ber, serving as their valet de chambre in announcing to them 
 the hour. Seldom in their lives had they experienced the satis- 
 faction imparted by the fresh breeze of mornkig, the aromas of 
 the fields and the glowing sun, with such ineffable pleasure as 
 on this day. Schmidt heard them talking, and entered to 
 salute them. The nobles immediately entered into an ani- 
 mated conversation upon the wonders they had experienced ; 
 but they found the sage meditative, downcast, and absorbed. 
 They were not surprised to see him thus, because nothing is 
 more natural in the brightest genius than these involuntary 
 transitions. Controlled by this paralyzation of the senses, he 
 mechanically invited them to leave the place, and was appa- 
 rently conducting them to the scene of the preceding evening's 
 transactions, when the same mental absorption gave rise to an 
 incident which deserves the attention of the reader, and which 
 extraordinarily astonished the two nobles, occasioning in the 
 sage one of those smiles that were in him preludes of grand re- 
 velations. As we were saying, he went along like an automa-
 
 THE RUISS OF THE PARACLETE. 55 
 
 ton, making the nobles tread again those dismal galleries, when 
 without thinking of what he was doing, he opened a door, and 
 heard Kant and de Vieux exclaim with surprise and fear : 
 - What is this, Schmidt ? 
 
 What horror is this, Doctor 1 
 
 That which occasioned these exclamations, was the sight of a 
 young woman of from twenty-three to twenty-five years of age, 
 who lay stretched on a kind of bed, enveloped in some dreadful 
 apparatus of a peculiar construction. Her bosom heaved with 
 agitation, and around her bed were seen patches of blood which 
 the tremendous knife of the terrible Doctor had some time be- 
 fore made run on the ground. At the exclamations of the 
 strangers the sage recollected himself, and a smile passing 
 over his face, which was very soon changed to a frown, he said 
 to them : 
 
 All cannot be told, and still less seen ; it has been an im- 
 prudence on my part, have the goodness to pass out again by 
 this door. 
 
 And without more ado he turned round to go out. His im- 
 perious voice cut short the nobles, who followed him like little 
 lambs. Over the countenance of Schmidt passed and repassed 
 a hundred passions, emotions, gestures. It was half past five in 
 the morning, the sky augured a hot day and a motionless at- 
 mosphere, the head of the sage was a volcano in movement ; on 
 reaching the door he turned back, looked sternly at the two 
 companions, and said to them : 
 
 Why mysteries where there ought to be none ? Let us 
 go to the bed-side of this poor creature, and before her I will 
 explain to you what causes you so much horror. 
 
 They approached. The patient raised her eyes full of grati- 
 tude at the sound of Schmidt's voice saying to her : 
 
 My daughter, have your pains been any less to-night ] 
 
 She was about to reply, when turning her eyes towards the 
 companions of her beneficent restorer to life and health, she 
 raised her hands, with the left she covered her eyes, and with
 
 56 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 the right she pointed to the Baron, who stood like a criminal 
 caught unawares, and with a desolating cry, she said: 
 
 That is the wretch, Doctor, that noble, that tiger 
 that is the Baron de Vieux 
 
 The patient fainted. Schmidt looked at the Baron with 
 eyes that flashed lightning. Kant drew back seized with amaze- 
 ment, and de Vieux recovering himself, burst into a laugh, 
 saying : 
 
 Gentlemen, this is the mad girl of my country-house on 
 the banks of the Seine, the daughter of one of my tenants, who, 
 through I know not what aberration of her disorder. h:is these 
 three years hated me with deadly hate. And how has she 
 passed into your hands, Doctor ? 
 
 While the audacious nobleman was speaking, Schmidt was 
 attending to his victim, restoring her to consciousness, which 
 done, he replied, choking with indignation : 
 
 M. de Vieux, this unfortunate girl is not mad, she is as 
 sane as you are libertine, she is one of your victims ; I have 
 taken her under my care to cure her of a disease she owed, as 
 I believe, to you : retire, for you are insulting one whom, to 
 satisfy your ferocious appetites, you have nearly murdered ; 
 whom you have poisoned, whose brains you have shattered. 
 
 Trembling with rage he seized the bugle, made the vaults 
 resound with its lugubrious notes, told the patient to apply to 
 her nostrils a smelling-bottle he took out of his pocket, and 
 seizing the Baron with his powerful hand, went out by the door 
 opposite to that by which he had entered, and which communi- 
 cated with the dissecting-room, adding : 
 
 Out here we will say adieu ! and I will give you one word 
 of advice. 
 
 The Baron smiled, freed himself from the iron hand that so 
 tightly held his arm. and assuming the imperious air which char- 
 acterizes the uneducated nobility, expressed in his countenance 
 the contempt which the obscure Galen inspired in him, and the 
 indignation which was boiling in his breast.
 
 THE R UINS OF THE PARA CL ETE. 5 7 
 
 De Vieux was one of those stains upon the French nobility 
 which are not wanting, either, in the elevated classes of other 
 nations, for whom their fantastic birth seems to possess a super- 
 human merit, to which all ought to humble themselves submis- 
 sive and subservient. The virtue of the daughters of the peo- 
 ple wa:.' for him a toy which the nobleman might play with, like 
 a flower which we pull to pieces in the fingers, or dandle at 
 our nostrils till it fades, and then throw away, as a useless 
 vestige of the momentary pleasure given us; the maidens, 
 the wives of the proletarian class had been born to obey the 
 nobleman, to become the prey of his unbridled lust, his omni- 
 potent immorality : God said to Samuel when he presented the 
 petition of the people of Israel, who would have a king : de- 
 spising not Samuel, but God : ' This will be the manner of the 
 king that shall reign over you : He will take your sons and 
 appoint them for himself, for his chariots, and his horsemen, 
 and to ear his ground, and to reap his harvest, and to make his 
 instruments of war. And he will take your daughters to be con- 
 fectionaries, and cooks, and bakers." And the Baron, like many 
 of his sort, assumed the right, which they call divine, as abso- 
 lute law, to tread under foot those beautiful flowers, the daugh- 
 ters of the people, which perfume the world with sweet-smelling 
 virtues. The Baron knew no other morality than his thirst for 
 pleasures, nor any other God, as St Paul says, than his belly. 
 
 While they were passing in silence through the subterranean 
 galleries, he said to himself: By what right has this scarecrow 
 plebeian insulted me, a noble, in the four quarters of my escutch- 
 eon ? Because I have amused myself with an ignorant coun- 
 try girl who believed me her slave, like the shepherd girls of 
 Florian the rustic swains ? Now I will just give a lesson to 
 this foolish man, who fancies himself superior to those whom 
 God has placed in the world to whip with iron rods the reptiles 
 that crawl over their cradle of mud. This middle class, which 
 in the revolutions of political affairs now usurps the name of 
 enlightened, wishes to seize from our doors tho arms of the 
 3*
 
 WT11E T\\'0 
 
 prowess of our ancestors. It is our own fault. Miserable 
 man ! skeleton inhabitant of tombs, who has inspired you to in- 
 sult the descendant of the valiant de Vieux ? 
 
 Thus discoursed the French nobleman. Kant, who knew 
 how far the cynical effrontery of his friend would go, and the 
 horror that Schmidt had for the nobility, prepared himself to 
 tranquillize this tempest with the breath of friendship. Schmidt 
 was livid with the rage that devoured him. They arrived at 
 the designated place, and the sage disappeared, giving them 
 time to make some reflections. 
 
 He did not keep them waiting long. At the moment when, 
 with hurried step he entered, the Baron was, as it were, pos- 
 sessed, vomiting abuse upon Schmidt. 
 
 Enough, M. de Vieux, enough. I knew you, some time 
 ago. said Schmidt, with convulsive laughter though I have 
 never had the misfortune to see you before ; but remember that 
 
 HE WHO TAKES THE SWORD SHALL PERISH BY THE SWORD ; and 
 
 the sons of the people will know how to take reprisals on the 
 daughters of the great in name. 
 
 The Baron, his tongue cleaving to the roof of his mouth 
 with rage, began to heap insults on the savant ; but the latter 
 looked at Kant and said : 
 
 My friend, take this miserable man away ; for the blood 
 of the people is red as fire which consumes, and theirs is blue, 
 like the flame which only singes. Quick ! cried he with voice 
 of thunder quick ! out from hence ! 
 
 His countenance was so terrible that Kant seized the arm 
 of de Vieux. and, half pushing him, took him towards the slo- 
 ping passage ; but de Vieux. before closing the door, cried to 
 Schmidt : 
 
 Miserable man ! I will make you die on the guillotine, 
 you shall not even enjoy the pleasure of the gallows. 
 
 The noblemen went out, and Schmidt ran to the western 
 part of the ruins, contiguous to the entrance of the caves, where 
 on the wall which fronted the lane to Nogent. straddling across
 
 THE RUINS OF THE PARACLETE. 59 
 
 the back of an ogive covered with shrub-ivy, was the youth of 
 nineteen, whom we saw the doctor visit half an hour before. 
 The latter ascended the pile of ruins, took the hand of the 
 youth, and placing his own upon his shoulder to enter the thick 
 foliage, pointed out to him the mouth of the cavern, and said : 
 
 Look well at the taller of the two who are about to come 
 out ; with that marvellous memory which you possess, imprint 
 his image deeply upon your mind, so that you may be able to 
 recognize him wherever he may be found : hereafter I will tell 
 you why. 
 
 In that moment Kant and de Vieux passed out in front, 
 talking very warmly. Schmidt pointed with his finger to the 
 Baron, his arm trembling ; the boy fixed upon him his greedy 
 eyes the raven croaking passed over the travellers' heads, and 
 came to place himself upon the shoulder of the sage ; the 
 ruined wall on which they were, began to fall with their weight, 
 and made them drop down ; the boy looked at Schmidt and said 
 to him : 
 
 Never, beloved Doctor, shall the countenance of this man 
 be effaced from my mind.
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE soul of man does assuredly enjoy the semi-divine faculty 
 of being present successively in all places. Ours is at this mo- 
 ment in the torrid zone, and sees one of those tropical rains 
 which sweep even to the foundations of the earth, and recall the 
 fearful cataclysm of Noah. Ash-colored clouds cross the sky, 
 seeming to speak to each other in their swift career, and with 
 the re-echoing thunder, utter the rage with which they are 
 bursting. The beautiful velvet sky is covered with vaporous 
 spectres, which, by an optical delusion assimilate themselves to 
 terrible monsters, which roar, and on opening their mouths 
 vomit flame. Every peal threatens to crack the world's axis : 
 the rain, or rather the impetuous immeasurable torrent which 
 is poured out, makes one believe no foundations will be left to 
 the abodes of men : the streets are rapid rivers, the roads 
 branches of the sea, the pastures portentous lakes ; the buds, 
 the branches of the trees, bend low, as though seeking pity. 
 The rattling of the rain upon the roofs makes us raise our 
 heads to see if its fury is throwing off the tiles and the roofs : 
 and it drowns the dweller in miserable huts. An hour after 
 the thunder has ceased, the water imitates drops of dew, weep- 
 ing for the outrages which, ceding to the violence of the clouds, 
 it has committed ; the sky spreads out its satin mantle ; the sun. 
 at the close of the evening, shines sadly at not being able to 
 wipe away the tears of its beloved earth ; the streets are clean.
 
 THE R UINS OF THE PARA CLETE. 6 1 
 
 as though there were a police in South America ; the features of 
 the inhabitants are smiling. Like this is the wrath of the sage 
 against men ; like this appears the spacious forehead and ma- 
 jestic countenance of Schmidt. There are yet passing the last 
 traces of the dark clouds of his indignation ; but they bear the 
 colors of the rainbow. 
 
 It is eleven o'clock in the morning ; the inhabitants of the 
 Paraclete have breakfasted, and the sage Schmidt is lying in the 
 shade of the contiguous grove, permitting the affectionate and 
 intelligent raven to clean his long beard. On a little mound 
 formed by the ruins of the edifice, and bristling with tangled 
 shrubs, are two young people, with one of whom we are already 
 acquainted ; the other is a girl of fifteen, with a fine noble 
 figure, German countenance, blond as the rays of the sun upon 
 the snow, with large, full, azure eyes, with a seductive look, 
 which tells what lies concealed within her alabaster virgin 
 breast. Her hands are playing with the saffron-colored head 
 of the youth ; and such is the whiteness of her skin, that each 
 finger resembles a piece of turned ivory, and the hands cot- 
 ton flocks. Her hands are not small like those of the aristo- 
 crats, they are of more than middle size, and with long fin- 
 gers ; but they have a certain I know not what, which, while it 
 sends the youth to sleep, would make the most pious Theatin 
 quiver with emotion. Many times the playful breeze makes 
 her tresses wave, and arouse him who is half asleep, stealthily 
 kissing them, and seizing them with his lips, as though they 
 were filaments of silk. What she is thinking while playing 
 with the thick strong hair of Hector, as her companion is called, 
 no one can penetrate ; for to do that we must noeds preserve 
 the innocence of fifteen years, which beyond that age is no more, 
 and before that age we do not reflect. 
 
 What he suffers stretched upon the grass, with his head 
 placed on her knees, may be imagined by one who, with a soul 
 of fire, has loved at nineteen years of age, knowing only one 
 woman, and that woman an extraordinary being educated in the
 
 62 TllK T\YO FATHERS. 
 
 school of Schmidt. Near him is a book, near her another ; 
 but both shut. He is lying on one side with one leg under the 
 other, with the right leg stretched out trembling, and the foot 
 resting on a stone ; suddenly he raises himself up, looks at the 
 girl with an expression of delight, and smiling, says to her : 
 
 My Rosamunda, now I am going to read you a chapter 
 on the history of the hearts of men : I will sit up as you are 
 doing, you lie down on my knees and listen, and afterwards tell 
 me what you think, and we can discuss it. 
 
 Rosamunda draws together the skirts of her morning gown, 
 stands up, clasps the dress between her knees, stoops to cover 
 herself well down to the ankle, rests one hand upon the ground, 
 stretches herself, and lays her ringlet-flowing head on the left 
 knee of Hector. Her countenance, raised towards him, has an 
 air so candidly passionate, that her eyes appear two fountains 
 of pleasure as they look intently upon the youth. He begins to 
 read, but at every fourth word looks aside, and four eyes meet 
 which rival, and not in color alone, the heavens above them. 
 Both smile. 
 
 Come, go on. 
 
 But don't look at me. 
 
 Now that is your fault ; you hold the book on one side, 
 and the words come flying from the corner of your eye. 
 
 It will be better not to read 
 
 And why not ? 
 
 I don't know what is the matter with my chest, I feel tired. 
 
 Are you not well ? 
 
 Yes ; but let me play with your curls, and tell me what 
 you were thinking when I began to read ? 
 
 I was looking at your mouth ; you have very thin lips, 
 and our doctor says it is the sign of 
 
 Of nothing ; because he also says that the machine of the 
 body has a motive power without forms, which knows how. 
 which can. which ought to impose them upon matter according 
 to its own nature.
 
 THE tiUIXS OF THE PARACLETE. 63 
 
 Very good. 
 
 What beautiful hair you have, sweet Rosamunda ! 
 
 The breeze freshens and blows open the morning gown, ex- 
 posing to view the white and chiselled leg of the beauteous girl 
 as far as the spot where her sex are accustomed to place the 
 garter. Thus far travel the eyes of Hector when they become 
 dim he turns pale, softly pushes his sweet companion from 
 him, starts to his feet, and says to her : 
 
 Now, my Rosamunda, I will return ; I have forgotten 
 something the doctor ordered me to do. 
 
 The sudden movement astonishes her. At the moment of 
 Hector's rising, a voice is heard at some distance from the spot 
 where they are, and the words 
 
 Well done ! bravo ! the intellectual man conquers ! 
 
 It is Schmidt, who glories to see Hector, in whose counte- 
 nance he has read the most ardent passion, fleeing from the 
 side of the sympathetic woman, because he fears to be domi- 
 nated by his body. At the sound of their adopted father's voice, 
 which repeats " well done ! bravo !" both of the young people, 
 who till that moment have been ignorant he is so near, run up 
 to him and place their heads upon his breast. The doctor ca- 
 resses them, and says : 
 
 You were thinking, no doubt, that the world had come to 
 an end, that the ruins of the Paraclete were its remains, and 
 that you were the only inhabitants of the universe. Love one 
 another, but look up at the heavens, there is an eye which covers 
 all their circumference, which searches with its lightning flashes 
 the folds of the heart, which has open before its sight the hearts 
 of mortals, the bowels of the earth, and the sandy bosom of the 
 sea. Now you were going to the gymnastic exercises, were 
 you not ? 
 
 No, Doctor ; Hector only was going to do something which 
 you bid him said she, candidly. 
 
 Then go, and perform some gymnastic exercises iii uiy 
 presence.
 
 64 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 All go out towards a bramble thicket, and as though by en- 
 chantment, they disappear from the surface. We must now 
 say who these young people are, so far as relates to their exist- 
 ence in the Paraclete, because the beginning of their lives is 
 unknown even to their adoptive father. 
 
 It is nine years that Hector has lived with Schmidt, and 
 eight, more or less, since Ilosamunda knew him as her benefac- 
 tor. Both passed through a rude school in the early part of 
 their residence with the sage ; but they have forgotten it by 
 force of kindness on his part. They travelled with him, passing 
 for his children, through part of Italy, Germany, Switzerland, 
 and France ; and now, for one year past, they have lived in the 
 Paraclete. Their bodies have undergone a regeneration, and 
 the intellectual part has been created by the Gallo-German in 
 his own fashion. All the passions have their seat in their souls 
 in an eminent degree of exaltation, playing in all their bodies 
 in a wonderful manner ; the blood of one circulates in the heart 
 of the other, and the life of him in her, they are two individual- 
 ities singularized ; they understand each other at a glance, they 
 tremble as they look at each other, they feel the same emotions, 
 almost think alike ; it might be said Schmidt had formed an 
 Eve from Hector, and an Adam from Rosamunda. For so ten- 
 der an age they are prodigies of intelligence : natural and ab- 
 stract sciences, arts, mysterious knowledge, every thing in the 
 intellectual sphere rolls in their heads with the same concert 
 and variety as the globes in space. They feel the pricks of the 
 flesh, which seem to them electric sparks that vanish and spiri- 
 tualize themselves on separating from the tube, or the chain, or 
 the rod which puts them into contact with the machine of the 
 body. Schmidt has succeeded in balancing two forces so con- 
 trary, has caused them to feel, but control, to enjoy, but com- 
 mand ; to see in the midst of darkness, but fly with the spirit 
 and not permit the body to be dragged along the heavy marly 
 earth. What it costs others ten years to learn, they know in 
 ten months ; because their organs have been polished, perfected,
 
 THE RUINS OF THE PARACLETE. 55 
 
 made capable of learning with a hundred times more facility 
 than those of the rest of mankind, who have to acquire know- 
 ledge by force of persevering exertion. What advantages has not 
 this marvellous man drawn from his attempts ? It is true he 
 has sacrificed many victims to science ; but how many millions 
 is he not about to save ? And, as he said to the noblemen, it 
 was not for himself, but for entire humanity. Two beings 
 like his pupils must promise much. But has he educated 
 them for good, or for evil? What end has he had in these 
 strange ideas? He has suffered much, as his exclamations and 
 eccentricities reveal. Will he keep all the life of these two 
 wonders to himself, burying his works without obtaining the 
 amelioration of the human race, or is he going to send them out 
 into the world to be a scourge to society, and revenge the out- 
 rages he has received from it ? We make these and a hundred 
 other such questions, and every body will do the same, but we 
 find at present no means of getting at any clue to the kind of 
 labyrinth in which Schmidt places us as to the future. 
 
 We take this opportunity of making one remark. If the 
 people do bastardize their noble sentiments, it is the nobles of 
 the earth who show them the way. But let us look at Hector 
 and Rosamunda, before they commence their exercises in the 
 acrobatic gymnasium. 
 
 To say that these two young people, educated with so much 
 liberty, with so much science, with such development, conserve 
 the innocence of children at an age so advanced, would be to 
 draw down ridicule upon them ; thence we must confess, that 
 Schmidt instead of educating has spoiled their natures. No ! 
 the sage has conciliated the body and the mind, and if in the 
 future they continue as they now are, the Franco-German will 
 sleep out the dream of eternity undisturbed by agonizing night- 
 mares ; and these will prove that while the bistoury in inexpe- 
 rienced hands gives death, in wise fingers it gives life ; that while 
 science in the ignorant kills, in the intelligent it is a fountain 
 of delights ; that while the good heart in the uncultivated is
 
 66 THE TWO FATHER*. 
 
 foolishness, in the truly enlightened it becomes exquisite sensi- 
 bility. 
 
 In the eastern part of the ruins is the site of the porch, the 
 cloisters, the large halls of the monastery, which still exist, 
 though a pile of ruins, all living, as Aristotle says, and all 
 dead. The cloistered court, which doubtless served for the con- 
 ferences of the founder with his numerous disciples, has still 
 many columns standing, and one who visited it at this moment, 
 would see that much work has been done in clearing the ground 
 of grass, covering it with sandy earth, and forming an amphi- 
 theatre of stones, bricks, rubbish, and the crumbling materials 
 of the edifice; the area of which" presents the appearance of a 
 gymnasium in miniature of the times of the Thebans. as though 
 indeed they had just abandoned it. Schmidt, Hector, Rosa- 
 munda, and Jose, have converted the spacious court into an 
 arena, which, while as rustic as simple nature, invites to the 
 wrestle, the race, acrobatic and gymnastic exercises ; and in 
 fact, there are estrapades, trapeziums, parallels, cords, poles, 
 ladders, bars of iron, weights enormous for a man of society, 
 and very heavy even for a laborer. On one side, under cover, 
 are hanging some pantaloons of Scotch plaid, a Greek cap, and 
 a corset with a broad belt. Between a ruined ogive enters 
 the sympathetic Rosamunda, takes down the dress, and retires, 
 but not so as to hinder our seeing her toilet. She gives us no 
 time to see how she puts on the broad pantaloon, we can only 
 observe that she girds her turned leg with tb6 strings that ad- 
 just it round the ankle ; that she passes her fingers rapidly over 
 the hem, and forms a hundred plaits; then with heavenly smile 
 although she is alone, she puts one arm through the shoulder- 
 strap of the corset, and before this can be adjusted, a movement 
 of her bosom is distinguishable through the fabric of her che- 
 mise, so agitated that if Hector were present, he would tremble 
 with emotion. Now the strings are passed round, the corset is 
 fairly on, she binds her delicious waist. The favorite odalisk 
 of AH Tebelen, did not present to the eyes of the cynical Mus-
 
 THE RUINS OF THE PARACLETE. 57 
 
 sulman forms more seductive than this beautiful girl displays as 
 she ties her rich blond chevelure with a ribbon, and crowns 
 herself with the Greek cap, which she fastens with two green 
 cords around her noble temples. One who was watching her 
 would say that Rosamuncla had just crowned herself as one of 
 the daughters of the Spartans in the Olympic G-ames, She sits 
 down upon a stone seat, takes off her shoes, to encase her feet 
 in boots of yellow buckskin, and before the strings of these are 
 fully laced, we can observe that if her foot is not small ; it has a 
 certain I know not what charm, which bedims the eyes. Now 
 she is entirely equipped : she gives some thumps on the ground 
 with her feet, which glide along with marvellous lightness ; 
 then she pushes down the pantaloon, that her waist might 
 be at perfect liberty, strikes out her arms as though to find 
 their flexibility, appears to defy Hector, and with forms of 
 Apollo, tacitly challenges a Hercules ; but she trusts in her 
 greater agility. She gives two claps of the hands, and fixes her 
 inebriated eyes of blue on the side opposite to that where she is 
 standing. During all this time there is one observing her ; it 
 is not Hector, it is Schmidt ; and at every action, at every 
 movement, at every bend which Rosamunda gives to her deli- 
 cious body, the soge smiles. It may seem strange that Schmidt, 
 seeing the trouble of Hector while they were playing on the 
 mound, should send them to the gymnasium ; but he has power- 
 ful reasons for conquering man by giving him more develop- 
 ment. - 
 
 He who wishes youth to reach manly age with a certain 
 degree of morality, physical, so to speak, must in certain mo- 
 ments tire, exercise, molest, agitate, govern the body, and this 
 is the only, or most efficacious means of avoiding effeminacy. 
 Schmidt know.s that the attention concentrates itself in the 
 execution of gymnastic movements ; Schmidt knows that the 
 body is then in another hemisphere ; that the animal life 
 changes the object of its forces, and he seeks to teach with 
 facts, without by-words further awakening the man, and to leave
 
 68 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 yet some time longer unroused in the woman the dream of her 
 maturer power. Although he has told them to exercise them- 
 selves in his presence, he does not wish to be seen, and will re- 
 main in his hiding-place till they have finished ; for afterward 
 he wishes to speak with Hector ; and from the arching of his 
 eyebrows, when he announced it to the young man, it may be 
 judged that what he is going to tell him is something terrible. 
 The graceful Rosamunda a second time claps her hands ; nor 
 does so in vain ; from the further end, as coming from a cavern, 
 Hector appears, with no further alteration in his dress than an 
 outer flannel shirt, adjusted to his athletic waist by a band of yel- 
 low leather. The exercises commence ; the flexibility of the wo- 
 man masters the man ; his colossal strength overcomes her ; the 
 lightness of the sylph charms, the limpidity of the youth 
 astonishes. Auriol would not find the diversion tedious ; but 
 we will content ourselves with saying, that every surpassing 
 thing presented by the Circus of Franconi in Paris, of Gucrra 
 in Vienna, of Paul in Madrid, all is executed with incomparable 
 perfection. The Gymnasium of Amoros, which although a 
 Spaniard he has established in Paris, has turned out brilliant 
 youths, athletic men, girls pre-eminent in strength and flexibi- 
 lity, has corrected a thousand corporeal, and perhaps spiritual 
 defects, has done great good to humanity : but Hector and 
 Rosamunda have nothing to envy the disciples of the Count of 
 Soteldo. 
 
 Sh/ is swinging with voluptuous negligence in the estrapade, 
 and her companion, stretched upon the ground, covered with 
 perspiration, is contemplating her sheepishly ; for she has a pecu 
 liar beauty, that without belonging either to the Greek, or Italian, 
 the ideal, or the Flemish school, or having any strongly marked 
 type, recalls all of them, while what assuredly makes the blood 
 of Hector boil, is the softness of her flesh ; it is a mass of 
 kneaded dough, with the apparent consistency of Carrara mar- 
 ble ; it is satin, with armor of steel ; it is . . . . Hector knows 
 not what it is ; but he knows its extraordinary power over him.
 
 THE K UJLNS OF THE PARA CLETE. 69 
 
 The countenance of Hector has an expression so melancholy, 
 that in one of the undulations made by Rosamunda, with that 
 freedom which would remind our readers of the graceful Ro- 
 man rope-dancer, Marietta, she says to him : 
 
 Hector, what is the matter ? Your countenance makes 
 me sad. What are you thinking about ? 
 
 He to whom the delicious girl has spoken, remains absorbed 
 in his ideas, and it is not till a few moments have passed, that, 
 as though waking up out of an inadvertent dream, he replies : 
 
 What were you saying, Rosamunda ? 
 
 What are you thinking about ? Why is your counte- 
 nance so sad? 
 
 Instead of replying, a tear comes into his eyes, which being 
 seen by her, she springs suddenly into the arena, leaving no trace 
 of her footstep, and sits down anxiously beside the youth, ask- 
 ing him a hundred questions at a time ; but that which predom- 
 inates in this whirlwind of passion, is : 
 
 What is the matter with you ? tell me : you know that 
 I never displease you, and that I obtain from the doctor every 
 thing that you want ? 
 
 Oh, my dearest, the doctor is in a fearful mood : the doc- 
 tor is suffering, the doctor wishes to speak to me alone. This 
 is the first time I have seen him thus. 
 
 And he takes the hand of Rosamunda as though to mitigate 
 with its suavity the asperity of his pain. 
 
 What ! can any ill happen to us ? Is he not our only 
 father ? Does he not love us as his children ? Who knows 
 what he wants to say to you ? 
 
 Yes it is true but he ha.s since when 
 
 he told us we should love each other and 
 
 And what ! Does he not wish we should love each other ? 
 What then saddens you? 
 
 It is true .... but .... 
 
 But what ? 
 
 But his transformed countenance, united to what he said
 
 70 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 to me this morning before six o'clock, makes me fear for him 
 and for myself not for myself but for you. 
 
 And what can you fear for him and for me ? 
 
 I do not know, llosamunda, I do not know ; but I feel a 
 cloud lowering over my heart. I love you so much ! Oh ! it 
 will be impossible for me to leave you 
 
 What ! leave us ! .... 
 
 It may be so ; but without him Hector cannot live, Hector 
 has a soul, he is its aliment, in him I find that with which to 
 fill the immense void of my ambition for knowledge ; he has 
 been to me a father, in his eyes I read the mysteries of the 
 universe ; I enter into his soul, rejoice in calling myself his 
 disciple, love him as I should love my father if I had one, 
 as I should my mother, which must needs "be a love very ten- 
 der, almost as much as I love you .... and you ; oh, my Kosa- 
 munda, I adore you and taking the head of the girl in his 
 powerful hands, continued if I have to separate myself from 
 you for him, I shall die, but thinking of you ! 
 
 He looks at her awhile with motionless and fiery eyes ; nei- 
 ther of them utters a syllable ; he is the electric fluid of first 
 love, she, the personified admiration of one who knows not 
 yet that terrible passion, unconsciously yielding to its pow- 
 erful influence, is now overcome. Something crosses Hector's 
 mind, for he disappears, the wall does not yet conceal hi.s 
 head, he turns to look at his companion who, with tears in her 
 eyes, is contemplating him without daring to call him back. 
 She remains alone, the left knee placed on the ground, the right 
 half inclined, the elbow of her right arm placed upon it, her 
 burning head in her hand, the left resting on her lip, her eyes 
 open and motionless, the oppression of her breast says : " the 
 love of her innocence has awakened, and exists in the world of 
 matter." 
 
 A slight tap on the left shoulder recalls her to the reality 
 of existence : it is Schmidt, who, with moved countenance, 
 says :
 
 THE RUINS OF THE PARACLETE. 7 1 
 
 Come to my arms, my daughter, come ! do not weep ! 
 your father, as you call me, would not have you weep ; you shall 
 see how much I love you. 
 
 - And Hector 1 
 
 The same as yourself; you are my. children of adoption. 
 Rosamunda feels that the blood has too much tinged her 
 
 countenance as she said " and Hector ?" and knows no other 
 means of cooling the ardor she feels in her head than falling 
 upon the hosoin of Schmidt. He looks up to Heaven, places 
 his hand upon her, and says : 
 
 Go, be calm ; we will presently see each other again. 
 
 It is five o'clock in the evening. Schmidt, who has, without 
 the young people being aware of it, witnessed the scene in the 
 gymnasium, has not seen them since, because there are revolv- 
 ing within him a world of combinations, of ideas, of opinions, of 
 consequences, to disentangle which, some hours are required 
 even by that omnipotent head. They assemble for dinner ; but 
 the appearance of a man who is known to the inhabitants of the 
 ruins and also to our readers, interrupts the meal at its com- 
 mencement. 
 
 The man who has just whistled is the agent of police, who 
 last night guarded the Tavern-Hotel, to prevent the entrance 
 of the sorcerer and the souls of the two nobles. This policeman 
 is, by exception to the rule, a good sort of a fellow, as we com- 
 monly say, and is in the confidence of the German sage, for he 
 conveys the corpses which his correspondents at Paris and other 
 points send to the physician, at night supplies whatever he wants, 
 and accompanies him in his excursions, for all which he is well 
 paid, without any responsibility, so that he has come at last 
 quite to like Schmidt. Notwithstanding all this confidence, Ii3 
 has penetrated only as far as to the laboratory of the sage, and 
 except Jose, has seen no one there. The German does not 
 wish that the agent of police should have much familiarity even 
 with him ; because this kind of gentry exercising so low and
 
 72 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 treacherous an office, are seldom loyal in their habits. Their 
 distinctive character is dissimulation, reserve, pretence, and that 
 cunning air which denotes one who has always an arricre pensee. 
 The host of the ruins, to whom the Prefet of Nogent has 
 granted this melancholy domain, goes out to hear what he has 
 no doubt must be something of importance, for the purveyor of 
 his dwelling presents himself at an unaccustomed hour. 
 
 What is the matter? says Schmidt, seeing he makes 
 mysterious gestures what is the matter ? 
 
 Here he relates what has passed in the village the preced- 
 ing day, and the surprise the two nobles have caused this morn- 
 ing on their return from the Paraclete, and sinking his voice, 
 adds: 
 
 I am assured that the Baron de Vieux has accused you 
 before the authorities, and notwithstanding M. le Prefet knows 
 your profession, it appears that the circumstances stated by the 
 nobleman make the case look rather serious, and perhaps they 
 will take judicial proceedings, and make a visit to the ruins. If 
 you have any thing to hide, you will have time. 
 
 - Thanks, I have nothing but bones and crania ; let them 
 come, and perhaps it will not be so well for the Baron de Vieux. 
 Thank you. 
 
 I have fulfilled my commission. 
 
 Many thanks .... 
 
 Before Schmidt can reply, the policeman has disappeared.
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 ALTHOUGH Schmidt told Hector that he wished to speak to him 
 to-night, he does not carry out his intention on account of the 
 information of the agent who left him with the words in his 
 mouth ; and from this moment there begins for the physician a 
 torment which he only is capable of resisting. 
 
 Certainly one who considers the condition of this world will 
 be irresistibly impelled to smile bitterly. To see a man like 
 Schmidt, whose immense knowledge, whose desire to serve the 
 world, are alike unbounded, weeping in an excess of desperation, 
 is a strange spectacle, but for the misfortune of society too often 
 repeated. There was a time when this man was happy ; he 
 loved a wife, he had a daughter, he aided the poor generously, 
 gave them the benefit of his knowledge without any other re- 
 turn than the tears of gratitude which he drew from all the suf- 
 fering classes of society. The love of science, the desire of 
 leaving to his children a celebrated name, this holy ambition of 
 an intelligent man, who desires that those who receive exist- 
 ence from him should not pass away like ephemeral plants, the 
 taste for penetrating into the mysteries of nature, caused him to 
 travel for the space of three years : when he returned full of 
 joy at meeting his wife and daughter, when he was going to 
 lay at their feet the inexhaustible treasures of science, when he 
 was going to interla.ce Science, Love, and Religion, he found that 
 a wretch, a traitor, a felon, a soul of Satan, had involved his 
 honor in ignominy, the virtue of his wife in shame, her soul in 
 4
 
 74 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 crime, his poor little daughter in degradation : for she when 
 she grew up would think of what she had seen in her mo- 
 ther, and either follow in her unclean steps, or suffer eternal 
 sorrow for having been born of such a mother. From that mo- 
 ment, as we shall presently see. Schmidt converted all his vir- 
 tues and talents into poisonous doctrines, and to distract him- 
 self from his pain, determined to know whether man sinned 
 from weakness or from wickedness, because his constitution im- 
 pelled him to it or because his soul was a daughter of cursing, 
 and thus to excuse in part the perfidy of his unfaithful wife 
 and that of all men. And who was the cause of the perdition 
 of Schmidt ? He who had been that of his wife. 
 
 It will appear strange to some that the sage has so great for- 
 bearance, which already seems degenerating into foolishness ; 
 we might indeed well say that if we knew all that had passed, 
 but this remains yet to be discovered to us. Oh ! woman in 
 general is incomprehensible, she is the most anomalous being 
 on earth, she is the daughter of her fancies and dies dragging 
 many into the tomb. Wilhelmina Schmidt died without her 
 husband having ever been able to gather even the first syllable 
 of the name of her infamous seducer. Nevertheless he has 
 heard her name repeated by the Baron de Vieux. has heard him 
 draw her portrait, has had him on the gallows in his hands .... 
 but might he not be mistaken ? 
 
 This single trait of rectitude will be sufficient to captivate 
 the sympathies of all who ever know Schmidt. This night, in 
 the darkness of the vaults, he is going to examine certain things 
 which will possibly throw much light on the question as to the 
 perpetrator of the adultery. 
 
 All arc sleeping but he, who is seated beside an iron box, 
 which served him as a medicine-chest, a safe, and a secret de- 
 pository. His countenance bears the impress of despair ; he is 
 pale. as. with a lamp in his hand, which, from the convulsive trem- 
 bling which agitates his arm, gives but a flickering light, he 
 touches a spring, making the lid which covers the secret de-
 
 THE R UIXS OF THE PA RA CLETE. 75 
 
 pository fly back. It is open. Schmidt puts the light on the 
 ground, opens his eyes wide, as though afraid, wipes away the 
 sweat that is bathing his forehead, and exclaims : 
 
 It is fifteen years that these papers have lain here ; I 
 had determined never to read them, that I might not see my 
 ignominy ; they are the papers I found in the dressing-case of 
 Wilhelmina when she died ; they must needs enlighten me in 
 the darkness in which I find myself, and woe to the seducer ! 
 I had forgotten it all, for my frenzy in that moment made me 
 mad ; but I loved my wife, as the moth loves the light, as steel 
 the loadstone, as weights the centre. Poor creature that I 
 am ! When I am going to put out my hand and take them, I 
 burn ; when I attempt to read, my eyes are bedimmed ; when 
 courage is demanded I weep. 
 
 The sage again wipes away two big tears that run down his 
 stiff, thick beard. He continues : 
 
 It is very hard to disturb the ashes of her I loved with 
 frenzy. I have not done it, out of respect to her memory ; but 
 has he not come with cynical effrontery to expose the shame of 
 the wife before the eyes of the outraged husband ? May it not 
 be said that this is a stroke of Providence ? And if she died 
 under my hands, why not he ? There is nothing hidden that 
 shall not be revealed. Now I shall bring to light that which 
 for so many years has been buried in my heart, in this box, and 
 in the tomb. 
 
 He takes a packet of papers, draws out a small bundle from 
 among others, sets the lamp on the corner of the box, opens a 
 paper which yet preserves the perfume he cannot distinguish 
 in this moment whether of his wife or of her vile corrupter 
 his hands trembling and his color changing at every word that 
 he reads, he at last discovers unquestionable signs of the male- 
 factor, though of his name the victim was ignorant, and as 
 though astounded, he exclaims : 
 
 It is he ! 
 
 He reads two or three pages, with his face puckered : at 

 
 76 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 the fourth he hurriedly flings the papers into the secret deposi- 
 tory, shuts the lid, locks the chest with double key, and begins 
 to pace like a lion from one side to the other, from the chemical 
 laboratory to the dissecting room. One who looked at him 
 through a crevice would say, that what he has just read must 
 have been the very instrument of the crime ; that it is the fire 
 of infidelity which consumes that man. He stamps upon the 
 floor, and mutters between his teeth : 
 
 Barbarian that I am ! the poor creature was the victim 
 of a malefactor, and afterwards spoke not, died without a word. 
 I was her murderer ; her sublimity irritated me ; her greatness 
 of soul made me kill her and my innocent daughter. Oh ! oh ! 
 oh ! and bursting into a flo.od of tears, he violently strikes his 
 
 broad forehead with his hand Oh ! oh ! Man knows 
 
 not how to appreciate an innocent woman. Poor little one ! 
 Poor Wilhelmina of my heart, kneeling before the skeleton of 
 his wife martyr of a malefactor, well you said to me as you 
 rolled down the precipice, that you were innocent. How did 
 your eyes affect me in the last looks of death which you fixed 
 
 upon me Oh ! I am a savage, he ... infamous ! He 
 
 surprised you, completed his crime without the intervention of 
 your will. You found yourself in treacherous hands ; you 
 feared lest you should lose the fruit of that crime, and chose 
 rather to die than that your offspring should perish. Oh ! Wil- 
 helmina, pardon Schmidt : pardon the assassin of your body ; 
 you shall be avenged ; you shall see from heaven. martyr to 
 maternal love. you shall see that the inhuman Schmidt is 
 atoning, and will atone for his crime even to .death. Oh ! great 
 of the earth, thus do you dishonor the daughters of the people ! 
 Thus do you slay them ! Thus do you make the poor un- 
 happy ! Wilhelmina, it is fifteen years ; it is fifteen hills of 
 pain since I lost you ; and now. now, love burns in my breast, 
 love which has never ceased to burn for you, even while I be- 
 lieved you unfaithful. Oh ! I imprint a hundred kisses upon 
 your skull, press to my heart the breast where beat yours. I
 
 THE R U1NS OF THE PARA CLETK 7 7 
 
 love you, I love you, more than on the night of our nuptials. 
 And my little daughter ! Oh ! the jealous man is a wild beast 
 pardons nothing. She was the daughter of my loins, and in 
 those terrible moments of agony, I even believed she was an- 
 other's. Ye great, ye rich, ye men of science, who abuse 
 your gifts, your gold, your ascendency ! the thunderbolts of 
 
 Heaven confound you 
 
 There is a pause ; it seems as though a sudden ray illu- 
 mines the mind of Schmidt ; he remembers something ; some- 
 thing comes to lay low the rage of that man. He draws back, 
 separating himself from the suspended skeleton, passes his 
 hand across his brow, opens his eyes as though in frenzy, the 
 muscles of his face all contract, giving him a diabolical ap- 
 pearance ; he gazes at the skeleton of Wilhelmina. which yet 
 oscillates, and in a sepulchral voice says : 
 
 I gather the fruit of that which I have sown. I was 
 first in sin, they have paid me in my own coin, just judgment of 
 Providence. I did not remember it till this moment. 
 
 What has this extraordinary man remembered? Let him 
 pass the rest of the night in the arms of his tormenting recol- 
 lections. 
 
 As the disk of the sun casts off his crystal mantle in the 
 east, the sage more yellow than the golden tints of the sky, di- 
 rects himself to the apartment of the youth. As soon as they 
 are together, he makes him sit down, and begins thus : 
 
 Son, this is a solemn day ; I am going to confess to you 
 what I know of you, and to show you who it is whom I told you 
 to observe so attentively. 
 
 The youth looks at him, and scrutinizes the countenance of 
 his putative father. Unwittingly he draws close to him, and 
 taking his hand 'hopes to learn who he is. The physician in- 
 clines his head to his breast, as though seeking to collect his 
 ideas and emotions, then looks at the young man, and con- 
 tinues :
 
 78 THE TWO FATHER*. 
 
 I have educated you with the independence of science. 
 You must not be surprised that I speak to you with the free- 
 dom of intelligence. Here, where you see me of forbidding 
 presence, with worn-out apparel, with a wild aspect, with a 
 countenance like that of a convict, I am not what I seem. I 
 expected to have been happy ; I expected to have embraced 
 my children ; I expected to have enjoyed the caresses of my 
 wife : but since the year '21, I have retired from the world, 
 and in order to forget myself, and to think no more of the wick- 
 edness of those who call themselves our fellow-creatures. I plunged 
 into those investigations of which you have been witness, and 
 for nine years you have been under my direction, and for eight 
 years, Rosamuuda also. During this time, have you had any 
 complaint to make against the poor, obscure Schmidt ? Declare 
 it, and I will make you reparation ; declare it, and I will ask 
 your pardon, son of misfortune, and the more unhappy that he 
 who has stood in the place of a father to you, is the being the 
 most ill-treated by society ! declare it, and you shall see me at 
 your feet, imploring mercy. 
 
 The face of the sage is so sad, that, together with his dis- 
 course, it deeply affects the young man who is beside him. and 
 who, falling on his shoulder, says to him through his tears : 
 
 What have I done, father, what have I done, that you 
 should make me weep, chiding me as though I had been un- 
 grateful ? 
 
 I do not chide you, son of my soul, I do not chide you, I 
 only wish to let you know how you came into my hands, that 
 you may see what this world is, and that you may conceive an 
 eternal hatred to sin. Sit down. 
 
 Here the youth draws closer to him, and taking the hands 
 of Schmidt into his own, gazes absorbed upon the face of his 
 father by adoption, hoping to learn that which could never come 
 into his own mind. 
 
 Let us return to the year '21. I had but just returned 
 from Germany, my native land, when I was obliged to go to the
 
 THE RULXS OF THE 1'AHACLETE. 79 
 
 mountains of Switzerland, which would to God I had never 
 visited ! Thence I returned to Paris, where my name was al- 
 most unknown. I made a thousand experiments in Phrenology, 
 Physiology, and other sciences, part of my works being crowned 
 with success. I travelled in Spain, in England, where I formed 
 an acquaintance with a great English physician. Sir W. Murray, 
 to whom I owe much of the knowledge I have acquired, and 
 returned with Jose to France ; and in order to have all kinds 
 of models, I gave up the lower animals, and began to traffic in 
 .human beings. 
 
 The young man looks at him. 
 
 Don't be astonished so soon. A negro had come with me 
 from Guadaloupe, a French possession in the lesser Antilles ; 
 this was my first subject : he died, he could not support the 
 rigorous treatment I had to use with him : then some girls, 
 whom I bought of certain women who follow this business : 
 they also died. Then, while the negro, a girl, and my old 
 Soujflcur were still living, I had the happiness to possess a Spa- 
 nish lad, who was about as old as you are now, but I lost him, 
 not because "he died, but for another cause. I was yet mourn- 
 ing for him, when passing one evening through the environs of 
 Paris, I saw you, Hector, my son. You looked a miserable ob- 
 ject at ten years old. Your fine Herculean form, your interest- 
 ing countenance, your head, showed that your parents were not la- 
 borers, but citizens, educated, intelligent. It was the month of 
 April, 1828, that I approached you, as you will remember, and 
 asked you who was your father, and where your mother was? 
 
 Hector, with a melancholy countenance, makes an affirma- 
 tive sign. 
 
 You told me you had none, and this was to me like the 
 finding of a lost treasure. I spoke to the woman with whom 
 you lived, and, forgive me, my son, for a thousand francs you 
 came into my power, under pretext that I would educate you. 
 You know what happened afterwards. But that you may see 
 the wickedness of this world, that miserable woman had been
 
 80 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 your nurse, and according to what she insinuated to me, your 
 parents were people of the city ; but after the first three years 
 of your nursing wore paid for, no one came to claim you. and 
 yott were an insupportable burden to her. Ah ! well ! up to 
 this point here is your history : from your entrance into my 
 house you will but too well remember your education ; and al- 
 though it was painful at first, I believe you will not now re- 
 gret having passed through that school. Don't interrupt me. 
 
 Notwithstanding this injunction, Hector embraces Schmidt, 
 and his face is moistened with the tears of them both. 
 
 Sit down, we are going to speak of my poor Rosamunda. 
 For about six months you were alone with me ; because Souf- 
 fleur died, as you will remember, from the consequences of a 
 fall, and applying to one of those women who steal poor little 
 girls, to transport them to France, to England, and other places, 
 where they serve, oh, horror ! as food to most loathsome 
 fires, I engaged her to procure me a girl, that from her appearance 
 and constitution would have some homogeneity with your pre- 
 sent companion ; and happily for this poor creature, then seven 
 years old, she told me she had got one of very tender years, but 
 whose aspect promised to become of my desired type. In 
 a miserable place she pointed out Rosamunda to me. and 
 seeing she was what I was seeking, it makes me shudder 
 to think of what that Satanic woman must have thought ! 
 she made me many praises of her innocence, begged me to observe 
 that she was much advanced for her age, of well-developed 
 forms, of compliant character, mild, timid to a certain degree, 
 but capable of learning whatever one might want to teach her. 
 She added, that I could not purchase her for less than two 
 thousand francs, because she loved her as her own child, and in 
 the future she would be of great advantage and comfort to her. 
 I saw what was the object of that monster in the shape of a 
 woman, whose hypocritical wickedness surpassed my previous 
 belief, and I gave her what she demanded. Rosamunda entered 
 my house crying, as without doubt you have not forgotten
 
 THE RUINS OF THE PARACLETE. 81 
 
 This is the history of the poor girl with whom you live. The 
 beginnings of both have very much resemblance. I have edu- 
 cated you both alike. You know what hitherto you have been 
 ignorant of. It is all with which it is in my power to make 
 you acquainted. Never tell her who she is .... Because, 
 from whence came you at first ? How came you into the power of 
 these women? Who were your parents ? These are questions never 
 put to this class of persons by those who apply to them, nor 
 would they, although they could do so, answer them, even to one 
 who by money obtains these unhappy creatures, who are, perhaps, 
 daughters of mystery, of debility, of corruption, of the unbridled 
 lust of the nobles, the rich, the libertine. Do not be amazed, my 
 son, at what I tell you ; listen, and you will see how much rea- 
 son I have to draw aside the veil, and exhibit to one that which 
 will perhaps make him detest the world, and even him who 
 brought him into it ; and how reasonable it is to hide from the 
 innocent sight of the other, that of which the representation 
 would put to flight the innocence of simplicity. If you had 
 been brought up in another manner, as is usual in the bosom of 
 families if you had not read in history, in contemporary news- 
 papers, greater horrors, I should, perhaps, have to repent of 
 having told you this ; but you know how much of what men 
 have done, and what you do not know I must needs teach you, 
 because in a short time hence we shall separate, perhaps for an 
 eternity. 
 
 Hector is going to say something to Schmidt, but the latter 
 makes a sign, which in him is imperative, and passing his lank 
 fingers through his thick beard continues : 
 
 I had wished not to have you separated from my side till 
 you were twenty-five years old, and so to have perfected my 
 work ; but circumstances, that word which serves as a puppet 
 to men and these times, compel me to cut the period short. 
 You are about to commence the battle of life. My son, this is 
 said in few words, but it involves a world of ideas. Do you 
 know to what you. having your companion to protect, are about 
 4*
 
 82 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 to be exposed in this whirlwind, which drags along hills much 
 larger and heavier than your head ? Men have two poles and 
 an axis interest and pleasures which revolve round selfishness. 
 In order to reach these two points, which are like those of the 
 earth unknown, they use every stratagem that can be invented 
 by the most creative, the most fervid, the most diabolical imag- 
 ination, and they succeed, or make victims in another way. 1 
 have told you how you came into my hands, and you have seen 
 the end I proposed by your acquisition ; any other than myself 
 would have proposed to himself double ends, double poles, until 
 the axis would have discovered itself. Rosamunda is not one 
 of those beauties that recall the Venus de Medicis, or the Eve of 
 Fufieli, or the Diana, or the Madonnas of Raphael, or the ladies 
 of the court of Louis XIV. or Henri IV.. or the Regency, or 
 the Court of the Medicis, or those of the Pontificates of Alex- 
 ander VI. and Leo X. ; but she unites traits of many of those 
 beauties ; she has much fire of soul, and a body which seems to 
 rob the Greek school of its forms, the ideal of its contour, the 
 Italian of its grace, the Spanish of its force of coloring, the 
 Flemish of its naturalness ; and this same heterogencousness 
 will set men on fire, will madden them, and make them lay for 
 her innocence countless snares. And whom has she to protect 
 her against that which will happen to her : because you have to 
 present yourself with her in public, turning to account the edu- 
 cation it has cost me so much to bestow upon you both, whom 
 has she to protect her? Only you, Hector, only you ; for what- 
 ever talent a woman has, if she is without a male protector, she 
 is like the ivy which trails along the ground, but never rises 
 victorious, unless united to the robust oak which defies the 
 hurricane. 
 
 Hector involuntarily presses the hand of Schmidt to his 
 breast ; Schmidt looks at him and inwardly rejoices. 
 
 You have seen in our travels to what those poor men and 
 women are exposed who have to make an exhibition of beauty, 
 talent, skill, and whatever else can flatter the caprices of those
 
 THE RUINS OF THE PARACLETE. 83 
 
 who have money. Think you not that dancers, singers, actors 
 and actresses, funambulists, professors, are exposed at every 
 step of their career ? My son, all those who serve the public in 
 these capacities, whatever reserve they may maintain, however 
 virtuous they may be, have to pass through combats so rude, 
 that singular is he who escapes unhurt. Think not it is for the 
 want of bravery, the greater this is the more violent are the 
 attacks of this foaming and turgid sea called the wealthy, the 
 nobility, men of fashion, and the worst of all are the titled and 
 aged rich. At this moment I could quote to you a catalogue 
 of victims ; but suffice it so say, that if you love her, as I disco- 
 ver in your features you do, you Hector must be a column that 
 lifts its head above the cities that you tread, and she Rosa- 
 munda the statue placed upon that pedestal so firmly based. 
 Do not trust to the testimony of your conscience, do not repose 
 too soundly under the shadow of your independence, do not 
 make a parade of your valor : I have seen a beautiful girl slain 
 at the door of the theatre for having the spirit to despise the 
 drivelling homages of a rich old noble ; I have seen intrigues 
 formed to blacken the fame of a celebrated actress, and succeed 
 in making her pass in the eyes of the world for what she was 
 not : I have seen a prodigy of declamation hissed through a con- 
 spiracy of nobles, who have found in her the defect of being too 
 virtuous, and they will drive her, in desperation, to seek some 
 one to protect her even at the cost of her virtue ; I have seen 
 one who merited a throne of ovations die of hunger to preserve 
 her dignity, and become the scofi" of the canaille of a hospital ; 
 I have seen .... but why multiply examples ? I will conclude 
 with one which is worth a hundred. Malibran Garcia, that in- 
 comparable Spaniard, for the Spaniards possess incomparable 
 things, that lyric tragedian, wonder of our days, has been stig- 
 matized as a drinker, for no other reason than her grand 
 enthusiasm, and the pride which chose not to stoop to the degra- 
 dation demanded by certain rich men. So do not blind your- 
 self, my son, with the dense cloud of flatteries which they will
 
 84 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 heap upon her in your presence ; woman is so frail, praise and 
 adulation pervert the most virtuous ; in the midst of the ova- 
 tions of a people remember that that adulation, if legitimate, 
 is smoke, which the slightest contrary wind will dissipate ; if, as 
 very often happens, it is bought by those who plot your per- 
 dition, spreading a bed of flowers in the mouth of a volcano, 
 the thorny branches of which may serve as fuel to burn you, it 
 is a flame that announces the devouring fire which is about to 
 be the end of the victim's career. If you wish to escape dangers 
 so great, never separate yourself from her even in thought : In 
 union is strength. Love each other with eternal love, never 
 abandon each other whatever may be your position, be one the 
 oak of the other, and she the vesture of luxuriant vegetation 
 around him ; remember your poor father of adoption, and fol- 
 low my counsels. A day will come, my son, in which you will 
 see that the obscure Schmidt did not deceive you, a day will 
 come, perhaps, in which you will know who it was that gave you 
 existence, and you will perhaps prefer giving to me the tender 
 name of father to naming your legitimate one. The same may 
 happen to her. Who knows whether those who gave you being 
 live in great palaces? Your persons bespeak a birth different 
 from that which the situation in which I found you would indi- 
 cate. Well ! the moment has not yet arrived for bidding 
 you adieu ; go therefore, Hector, go and enjoy the innocent 
 tranquillity of these ruins, since you will perhaps in a short 
 time find yourself tossed in the whirlwind of the cities. And 
 return at the close of the evening, for I have to talk to you of 
 other subjects. 
 
 Assuredly Schmidt must have been deeply affected, for in- 
 stead of the young man leaving him, it is he who hurriedly 
 leaves the place where they have been. Hector's moistened 
 eyes follow him till he is out of sight, and when the last sound 
 of his retreating footsteps has fallen on his ears. Hector goes 
 out in search of Rosamunda. After a few steps he finds her; 
 his countenance is changed, she asks him a hundred questions, 
 and he replies :
 
 THE K U1NS OF THE PARA CLETE. 5 
 
 Fear not, fear not, we shall never be separated. My fears 
 were unfounded. He has just told me that we are going to 
 leave the Paraclete together, and that I shall have to take care 
 of you to take care of you, Rosamunda. 
 
 Indeed ? And the doctor, where does he remain ? 
 
 I do not know : he says Jose will see us in Paris. 
 
 So we shall not be separated ? 
 
 No, sweet Rosamunda, no. 
 
 They clasp each other, as wishing to symbolize in acts the 
 ivy and the oak, as foreseeing the hurricane, as preparing for 
 the struggle to which the world challenges them. These two 
 young people have acquired, besides knowledge, the character 
 which the sage has wished by their education to give them, so 
 that in their great emotions, in their extreme agitations of spi- 
 rit, they are silent, as the heavens, when they veil themselves 
 ere rushing down upon the field, remain for some minutes in 
 atmospheric inaction. Locked in each other's arms they reflect 
 much in an instant, and then as if by consent burst forth : 
 
 Wilt thou ever love me ? 
 And reply : 
 
 Until death. 
 
 They look steadily upon each other, and with melancholy 
 smile give each other a kiss. Even if Hector desired to say 
 something to Rosamunda of that which he has just heard from 
 the lips of Schmidt, her having been put under his care is suf- 
 ficient to make him preserve the most profound silence. How 
 could he have the heart to sadden, with things so horrible, one 
 who is overflowing with innocent joys ? 
 
 At six o'clock in the evening, Hector is in the chamber of 
 the country girl, victim of the Baron de Vieux. Interesting 
 above all things must be the conversation by which a rustic 
 village girl can keep him hanging on her lips. Let us approach 
 and listen. The sick one, who finds herself, thanks to the 
 fathomless scientific profundity of the German, much relieved, 
 continues, and says to the young man:
 
 86 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 Three years of the same misery, my head sometimes set 
 me on fire, at others a kind of giddiness took away my reason ; 
 on some days I seemed to be an angel, I was so light-hearted, 
 joyful, disposed to enjoy every thing ; the fields appeared to me 
 a paradise, the people amiability itself, while on others I could 
 see no one ; I hated mankind, the sky appeared to me black, 
 the earth as sad as a grave-yard, I longed to die, but to die 
 tearing myself to pieces. At last, as I told you, they at home 
 took me to be possessed, my poor parents wept, all the neigh- 
 bors ran away from me, M. le Cure said prayers over me, I my- 
 self believed that the devil had got me into his power, and at 
 last I fled from home, and went wandering about the fields as 
 though mad till the doctor took me under his protection, and 
 four days ago when he came in with the doctor, I again be- 
 lieved that his presence was the cause of my torments, his me- 
 mory a hell to my soul, his eyes two fire-brands that scorched 
 my pupils. 
 
 But tell me, did this nobleman never magnetize you ? 
 
 What is it to magnetize ? 
 
 It is an operation performed by the look and with the 
 hands until it makes a person sleep. 
 
 No, sir ; but one time, as you say it is necessary I should 
 tell you all that passed, and being now almost well. I will re- 
 late to you what happened to me. Three years ago, or a little 
 less, the Baron de Vieux came to the country-seat he has on 
 the banks of the Seine, about twelve leagues from Paris, and 
 seven from this place, to pass the summer. My Lady, who is 
 very beautiful, did not stay more than a few days because soli- 
 tude annoyed her, and she returned to Paris or some other es- 
 tate, I don't know exactly which, and my Lord, who had seen 
 me many times, remained, alleging as he said to the family be- 
 fore my Lady, that he wished to push forward the repairs of 
 the house, because it had been the favorite seat of his deceased 
 aunt, Madame Donnedieu, who had left it to him on her death. 
 Oh ! from that moment dates my uuhappiuess. My father, who
 
 THE RUINS OF THE PARACLETE. 87 
 
 is an honest farmer, sent me to the castle at the request of 
 the Baron, who said he could not get on with the old ser- 
 vants ; and after some days, in which abusing the confidence of 
 a country girl, he had blinded my eyes, he told me he wanted 
 to speak to me, and in short he possessed himself of my heart, 
 and with jests and endearments made me in the silence of night 
 breathe a liquor from a bottle, which he said would produce 
 wonders in me, and he went through the operation himself first 
 to give me confidence ; I drew in a breath, and for a while lost 
 my senses, and afterwards remained in a state of delight so ex- 
 traordinary, that it occasioned my ruin. This was repeated a 
 great many times in the space of four months, during all of 
 which I continued in a nervous excitation which drove me to 
 desperation. At the end of this time he returned to Paris, as- 
 suring me that he would send for me to be ladies' maid to the 
 Baroness. I had not seen him again till now, although the 
 effect of those four months increased, and all took me for mad, 
 for I condemned myself to a silence, which is worse than death ; 
 for who would have believed that the poor daughter of my 
 Lord's tenant loved him, and was, as she pretended, loved by him 
 in return ? At best she would have passed for a vile creature, 
 and he never made me believe myself that. 
 
 Here the poor girl cannot help weeping. Hector passes his 
 hand over his forehead, foaming with the indignation excited in 
 him by the narration of the .nobleman's wickedness, then, as 
 though coming out of a distressing dream, he comforts the sor- 
 rowing girl, and says to her : 
 
 And you have told the doctor this incident in your 
 malady ? 
 
 No, sir. 
 
 Then it is necessary that you should tell him immedi- 
 ately, for this absorption must have been of sulphuric ether, and 
 perhaps with so much repetition it has injured your cerebral 
 system. Oh ! what monsters are these nobles ! I will go ai,d 
 tell him to come and speak with you.
 
 88 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 No, sir, no, it is better you should tell him. I could not 
 repeat what I have just related to you. 
 
 Then I will go and tell him myself, that he may employ 
 some remedy for the ravages of this wicked invention of an in- 
 famous age. And such are the nobles ! Well does the doctor 
 say they are monsters ! I will go now. 
 
 Hector goes in search of Schmidt. The latter meets him 
 and says : 
 
 My son, I was going to look for you, for it is necessary I 
 should speak with you ; but what is the matter ? 
 
 Hector relates to his adopted father what he has just heard, 
 to which the sage replies : 
 
 I knew it before she told you of it, I have succeeded in 
 lessening the ravages made by the sulphuric ether in her brains ; 
 but she cannot live many years, the principal vessels have been 
 injured. Here you see what the rich and the nobles are, they 
 know no other world than their appetites ; pleasure and interest 
 revolve on the axis of their selfishness. It is concerning this 
 monster that I am going to speak to you. Let us retire into 
 the most remote apartment, for, my son, what I have to reveal 
 to you this night four only know ; this wretch, his victim, my- 
 self, God ; this day you also will know it. 
 
 The place chosen for the secret conference is the cavern 
 where stands the gallows : they go thither with minds strangely 
 preoccupied. 
 
 Before they arrive let us look at another. Woman is more 
 perspicacious than man ; woman, by so much as her constitution 
 is more delicate than that of her companion, has more sensibility 
 than he ; the imagination of woman is more fervid than that of 
 man in proportion as reason in her works through noble, disin- 
 terested, grand instincts, the selfishness of interest entering into 
 none of her actions : her egotism is that of passion. Rosamunda 
 is not accustomed to secrecy, this is the first time that Schmidt 
 and Hector have used it towards her. Her origin is wrapped 
 in mystery, the preludes of her departure from the Paraclete
 
 THE RUINS OF THE PARACLETE. gg 
 
 also, Schmidt desires that her companion should know secrets 
 which doubtless touch her very nearly, her sole support is Hec- 
 tor ; he will not tell her more : this is a want of confidence which 
 deeply wounds her heart ; now he is going to know what never 
 will come to her ears. This cannot be. Alone in her apart- 
 ment she discourses in this or a similar manner, makes a thou- 
 sand guesses, then unmakes them, now it seems to her she has 
 hit upon it, now she is bewildered in conjectures, she discerns 
 a horizon, now it recedes, confounding itself in space as she runs 
 towards it. 
 
 Rosamunda has the body of a woman, and the soul of a 
 man. The one makes her astute, the other audacious. She 
 rises from the spot where she is seated and begins to walk in 
 the labyrinth of the vaults, whose obscurity bears a resemblance 
 to the chaos within her head. 
 
 At the same time Schmidt and Hector arrive at the scene 
 of the mysterious agonies. Solemn is the sight, imposing the ap- 
 paratus ; seriousness is impressed on the countenance of the 
 German, anxiety on that of the youth. They sit down on a 
 bench : artificial light is not needed, for from above, emitted by 
 the moon, come silver rays which illumine this roofless inclo- 
 sure with an opaque light, casting upon the ground fantastic 
 and strange appearances. The ropes swing to and fro in the 
 wind, their shadows representing sometimes serpents, and some- 
 times convulsive movements of 1 members of the human body. 
 The physician is thinking, his forehead resting on his hand and 
 his elbow on his knee ; the youth has never been afraid, but on 
 this occasion he feels a disagreeable sensation in his heart. 
 They hear a strange sound, both notice it, it must have been a 
 branch agitated by the breeze, or a ferret that has come to hunt 
 in the ruins, or the raven that was retiring ; whatever it was, all 
 now certainly remains in silence till this is broken by the aged 
 man, who. placing his hand on the shoulder of the youth, says : 
 
 Son, imagine that a youth of ardent passions, of vast 
 imagination, with heart of fire, has succeeded in uniting his ex-
 
 90 THE TWO FATllEKS. 
 
 istciice to a womau enchanting, virtuous, sweet as Rosamunda ; 
 think that they have a daughter, fruit of their loves, of that un- 
 whispered bond, of that deep mystery which wise nature be- 
 queathes to perfect and virtuous love ; take it that this young 
 man adores his wife, is enchanted with his little daughter ; sup- 
 pose that he has a journey to make, think of the sorrow he will 
 feel at leaving pledges so beloved ; conceive that he passes some 
 years away from home ; picture him to yourself as he returns 
 like a blindly enamored lover, like a tenderly fond father, 
 seeking to surprise his idolized wife, and smother with kisses the 
 angelic little face of his daughter sleeping at the bedside of her 
 mother, protected only by God. her guardian angel, and her to 
 whom she owes her being. This man longs to taste the plea- 
 sures of a surprise, wishes to gaze unseen upon the throbbing 
 bosom of his beloved, and in the midst of his delight will go on 
 tiptoe so as not to wake his little daughter, and thus stifling his 
 joy. will not let a breath escape but by fitful and delicious 
 gasps. This man enters his house late at night by a way known 
 to him because it is his house ; this man arrives at the bed- 
 chamber of his wife and daughter : this man hears the deep 
 breathing of their sleep ; this man fears to startle them by sud- 
 denly opening the door ; this man, by force of repressing the 
 pleasure in which his soul is rejoicing, feels his temples throb- 
 bing more quickly, his breast heaving, his ears filled with u 
 rumbling noise ; this man loves, he is blind with love ; this 
 man trembles at the thought of being able to impress a kiss 
 upon her innocent forehead ; this man can resist no longer the 
 emotion which agitates him ; this man hears the little cry of his 
 daughter who has turned in her cradle ; this man believe s lie 
 hears his wife calling him in her dreams ; this man opens the 
 door ; this man takes out a lantern ; this man draws his hand 
 over the conjugal bed, pronouncing with phrenetic love the name 
 which during the torments of absence, in the deliriums of his 
 heated imagination he has worshipped : this man fancies he re- 
 spires the soft breath of his wife ; this man looks, believing she
 
 THE JtWX OF THE PARACLETE. 91 
 
 is on the other side : this rnan had set the lantern on the floor 
 jealous that its rays should witness that embrace, that kiss ; this 
 
 man does not find his wife His temples are burning, his 
 
 heart is leaping from his breast, his ears tingle with a sound 
 like the ticking of a clock, his hands tremble, his sight is be- 
 dimmed, the bile tints his countenance with the hue of death. 
 Through his mind passes a river of fire which burns his brains. 
 He seeks the lantern, casts its light around the chamber, 
 sees his unhappy little daughter, looks at her with horror, fol- 
 lows a staircase, barefooted ascends its steps, goes along a corri- 
 dor, thence to a greenhouse ; so convulsive is the movement of 
 his nerves that the light flickers when he tries to fix it upon an 
 object he wishes to illuminate ; he perceives a white figure, it is 
 his wife, she is asleep. He puts this question to himself, Here ? 
 in the middle of the night, in this disorder, the window open, 
 her handkerchief yet wet with tears on the arm of the chair? 
 
 The fire of jealousy burns in his soul, the smoke of its 
 
 burning beclouds his reason, his outraged honor seeks vengeance, 
 he utters a cry of desperation, rushes towards her ; she awakes, 
 pushes aside her luxuriant ringlets, looks at him with horror, 
 and exclaims as though dreaming, " Pardon, pardon." This man 
 looks for weapons to make an end of her ; this man has none but 
 a heart full of fire ; this man puts his hands upon the throat of 
 that unhappy one to strangle her, to draw from her the secret, 
 to make her confess a hated imaginary name ; but not being 
 able to obtain full justice that way, speaks not, turns aside, 
 and hastens away. The following day he blinds the servants, 
 those venal beings, with gold, they reveal to him things true and 
 things false, relate to him mysterious tales, drive him mad. He 
 believes them in the fit of insanity which consumes him ; he reflects 
 not ; he asks his wife nothing. A day has passed, he takes a 
 carriage, it is the only means he has conceived of; he speaks 
 not, he leaves the country, ascends the Alps, goes alone with his 
 infamous wife and little daughter, arrives at the piled-up heights 
 of eternal snow ; the carriage is his, he is his own coachman,
 
 92 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 he is in a solitary spot : this is the place : there is a precipice 
 at his feet, there are crystal masses overhead, the sky is murky, 
 he turns to his wife, puts to her this question : " Who disho- 
 nored my name? answer, or die, precipitated into this abyss 
 which rolls down before your eyes, devoured by the bloodthirsty 
 wolf and the sinewy bear." The wife makes no answer. The 
 outraged man reiterates his question ; profound silence ; the 
 very silence infuriates him, the man forgets his daughter, the 
 man is phrenetic, the man drives the carriage to the brink of 
 the abyss, the man, become a demon of rage, cries : " Do you 
 tell his name?" The woman replies : " I do not know it." The 
 man cracks his whip, and sees horses, carriage, wife and daugh- 
 ter roll over those eternal rocks, while a scream from the little 
 daughter, and a cry " I am innocent" from the wife, ascends and 
 falls upon his ears. A noise is heard The man remains 
 absorbed like the image of despair on the borders of eternity. 
 .... I am he ! 
 
 Horrible ! Doctor, horrible ! 
 
 And who wrought these horrors ? I ? I ? . . . No. Hec- 
 tor, no ! The Baron de Vieux, who dishonored my wife, sur- 
 prising her asleep in the gallery of my house, during one of my 
 scientific journies. This day I have read the secret ; this pa- 
 per tells it ; this paper, which the unhappy one wrote the morn- 
 ing following my arrival, one week before she found herself 
 with her innocent little daughter, closely clasped in her bosom, 
 rolled down a precipice by my blind fury. Tell me, Hector, 
 tell me, if this woman had been Rosamunda, what would you 
 do ? What will you do now ? I never saw him till five days 
 ago ; even then I did not know him ; I did not know who he 
 was : his mouth, and some papers which I had always respected, 
 have made it manifest to me. Hector, Schmidt desires ven- 
 geance in the same kind upon that wretch. Schmidt cannot 
 Schmidt is old. Hector, his adopted son, ought to take up this 
 cause as his own. Will you know him wherever you may see 
 him?
 
 THE RUINS OF THE PARACLETE. 93 
 
 Yes, my beloved and unhappy friend. 
 
 An embrace of Schmidt closes that scene. 
 
 Along the crest of the ruined wall, is creeping a figure which 
 has heard the whole of this discourse, and which now disappears, 
 like the shadow killed by the light.
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 How few of those who are at the head of the nations have de- 
 served a grateful remembrance from the governed or their de- 
 scendants ! Consult history. Like Washington, perhaps not 
 a dozen can be found. How few mighty of the earth have left 
 their names consigned to posterity in grateful pages ! Examine 
 the world's annals. And yet why do the masses profess for 
 these beings called noble and powerful, a traditional respect 1 
 Why, in spite of all their unclean acts, are the ignorant, and 
 people who are not ignorant, dazzled ? Why ? Because they 
 have not permitted men of talent to write with freedom ; be- 
 cause they have hindered the free exercise of the soul of man ; 
 some with political tyrannies, others with religious despot- 
 ism ; the former buying talent to celebrate them, the latter perse- 
 cuting the few works which, proceeding perhaps from foreign 
 presses, seek to destroy the delusions of the deluded. But the 
 march of Mankind is like that of Time, which ever goes onward 
 augmentingly, and the days of oppression, of religious and poli- 
 tical fanaticism, and of blood, must give place to the morning 
 light of truth. The Reformation in Germany, the French Re- 
 volution of 1793, had of necessity to be, and they were, those 
 clouds which at early dawn are fearful phantasms, which to 
 shine with a safe light, have to pass through rivers of murky red, 
 which we will call of blood ; but in the end they opened gra- 
 dually, and the writings of the sons of both colossal clouds have 
 in part dissipated the darkness, have caused the light to shine, 
 have disinterred history, have accused the tyrants, have made 
 manifest what were the great, what were the priests, what
 
 THE RUINS OF THE PARA CLETE. 95 
 
 were the tribunals which they established, what objects 
 they had, what horrors they perpetrated in the obscurity 
 of dungeons, how many victims they immolated, not to re- 
 ligion, of whose holy name they made a handle, not to the dig- 
 nity with which they surrounded themselves, but to their appe- 
 tites, to their caprices, to their Satanic ambitions. It is useless 
 to kick against the pricks. You may blind yet for a short time', 
 but not very long will be the space conceded you by the Dig- 
 nity of Man, which is already tired of seeing itself so humili- 
 ated, by men who have no right to exalt themselves over it but 
 that of caprice, that of ignorance, that of baseness. The sole 
 prerogatives which are destined to remain upon the earth, are 
 those bequeathed to man by his only Legislator, in the Gospel, 
 virtue, honor, wisdom, and constancy in acting according to His 
 Divine word. But so much are the people irritated, that, partly 
 goaded by their wrongs, partly steeled by demagogues, partly 
 impelled by the ignorance in which they have been brought up, 
 partly maddened by the future which threatens them, they listen 
 not to those who counsel them patience, and rush with that fero- 
 cious impetus which characterizes demoralized masses, into 
 crime, robbery, assassination, profanation, horrors, as we are 
 shown at every step by cotemporaneous history ; and although 
 the governors think to stifle this hatred to the nobles by spill- 
 ing torrents of the people's blood, they succeed only in concen- 
 trating the fire, and making it more voracious for the day in 
 which an explosion shall take place. This is not the way to 
 draw men. Rigor makes hypocrites, traitors, and executioners. 
 Begin by chastising the infinite wickedness of the great at their 
 own and at others' firesides, destroying now the virtue, now the 
 honor, now the life, now the interests of others. This lesson, 
 given with thorough energy, will let the people see that justice 
 is fulfilling its mission, and they will bless the hand that ad- 
 ministers it ; they will find security at their hearths, rejoice in 
 individual liberty, and they will fear no longer lest the noble 
 should enter their workshops under pretence of some chattel,
 
 96 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 and rob them of wife or daughter, either corrupting her or mak- 
 ing her unhappy. All who know the kind of life generally led 
 by those who call themselves the high aristocracy, must needs 
 confess, that to their harems tribute is paid by the industrious 
 of every class, the gardener, the chambermaid, the shoemaker, 
 the dressmaker, the laundress, every unhappy being who has to 
 live by their luxury, by their money, must lay tears, shame, or 
 death, on the altars of their omnipotent impunity. It is not the 
 nobility alone, the immoral rich act as badly, or worse. It is 
 true that some of the wealthy do not belong to this degraded 
 and infamous race. We know men noble in soul, and rich in 
 heart, who, instead of calling down maledictions on their heads 
 as the others do from all who know them, crown their heads 
 with immortal laurels, not woven by adulation, but the silence 
 of the grateful, the love of those whom they have protected, the 
 cry of the children who implore Heaven to rain with bounteous 
 hands upon the souls of the noble in spirit and the rich in 
 heart, felicity, abundance, well-being, glory, holy joys. What 
 consolation must those few privileged beings obtain before the 
 tribunal of Divine Justice ! Hundreds and thousands of tongues 
 will proclaim upon the earth when as yet their souls have not 
 arrived at the footstool of God, " I was hungr}*, and ye gave 
 me to eat ; I was thirsty, and ye gave me to drink ; naked, and 
 ye clothed me." " That which ye have done to the least of 
 these my little ones, ye have done it unto me ;" and God, hear- 
 ing this chorus of grateful voices around his throne, will say to 
 the now arriving soul, ' ; Reign with me ; worthy art thou to 
 share my glory, since on earth thou didst imitate my Provi- 
 dence." How delightful would it be to be able to say of all 
 
 what we say of one ! But, unhappily, many are 
 
 rich, and few in heart; many are noble, and rare the noble in 
 soul. Why, Justice of the earth, dost thou not pass the level 
 over the heads of men ? Why dost thou not weigh with an 
 equal balance, since thou dost represent thyself with one in thy 
 hand ? Doth the poor man commit a fault ? thy inexorable
 
 THE RUINS OF THE PARACLETE. 97 
 
 sword falleth upon him ? Doth the great, the rich, the flatterer, 
 the taker of bribes sin ? then come in considerations of name, 
 of circumstances, of family, of generations passed, present, and 
 future, of influence, of ascendency. Wretches ! Imitate the 
 justice of God, which makes no distinction of persons. Make 
 your judgments, which ought to be a counterpart of his, conform 
 to the right, to the good, to the grand. Will you not do so ? 
 Then expect that the people, if they cannot rise en masse, be- 
 cause you compress them with your bayonets, will rise in detail, 
 and take vengeance in their own way. Do you not keep them 
 sunk in ignorance 1 Then expect the fruits of your school, 
 which are bitter and cruel. Do you not overwhelm the sage ? 
 Then know that he, exasperated, is rich in resources to satisfy 
 what is due to his rank as a Rational Being. 
 
 Schmidt has passed two days in revealing what his soul has 
 been suffering these fifteen years, through the baseness of the 
 nobles of the world ; and now to enroot in the hearts of his dis- 
 ciples an eternal hatred to the whole class, he induces Jose to 
 relate to them in his presence, the causes which led to his exe- 
 cution. It is night, the most appropriate time for producing 
 portentous results upon the imagination. The four are assem- 
 bled, together with the poor, dishonored country girl, in the 
 dissecting-saloon. Schmidt makes the saddened Hector and 
 Kosamunda sit down close beside him, the country girl lies on 
 one side, stretched upon some furs, and Jose Feliii takes his 
 place opposite the doctor. After they are thus arranged, the 
 German says to Felifi : 
 
 Jose, my son, I have many times desired to know the 
 cause of your sentence to death ; and if I have had the felicity 
 of being able to do you a benefit, I hope you will this night re- 
 count it to us ; for we have all, some more, some less, suffered 
 great wrongs on the part of society. 
 
 Doctor, I will do it with much pleasure ; but it seems to 
 me better to read that which I have by me in writing ; because 
 in such a web of misfortunes, some interesting incidents might,
 
 98 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 perhaps, in the heat of narration escape me. I will go and 
 fetch the book. 
 
 Yes, my son, so much the better. Does it not seem to 
 you that what he is going to read will be at once useful and 
 interesting 1 
 
 Assuredly, Doctor. 
 
 Yes, father. 
 
 Schmidt passes his hand over the head of Rosamunda, who 
 has just given him the glorious title of Father. 
 
 And you, how do you feel ? 
 
 Much better. Doctor, if it were not for the continual faint- 
 ings which trouble me, I should be entirely recovered. 
 
 There is no remedy for this nervous relaxation but time. 
 and a nutritious vegetable diet. 
 
 Here Jose interrupts them, carrying in one hand a thick 
 volume, and in the other a four-wicked lamp, and says : 
 
 I hope that if my narrative fatigues you, you will tell me, 
 and then I will read only the most important pages. 
 
 Do not imagine that, my son : the misfortunes of otliors 
 tire only the rich, who know not what it is to suffer ; we poor 
 plebeians take the deepest interest in the sufferings of our fel- 
 low-beings. Come, begin ; we are burning with desire to know 
 your misfortunes from their very origin. 
 
 Jose sets the lamp upon a block, places another block be- 
 side it, seats himself, raises his body as much as his deformity 
 permits, and with animation in his eyes, assumes a distinguished 
 air, which seems to be that of his youth, and begins : 
 
 STORY OF A CONDEMNED. 
 
 It was in 1826. The grand city of Hamilcar Barca, capital of the rich 
 principality, seat of the counts of its name, and of the raonarchs of Ar- 
 ragon, had lost its ancient splendor, and that colossus of prosperity, that 
 emporium of riches, that scene of pleasure?, that centre of festivities, that in- 
 dustrious metropolis, looked at Monjuic as n tyrant that lorded it over the
 
 THE RUINS OF THE PARACLETE. 99 
 
 sad Barcelona, on whose heights waved the noble banner of Castile, as though 
 in mockery. This insignia of heroes, of freemen, of profound, sages of gen- 
 erous souls, of captains of prowess, was clouded by the smoke of cannons, 
 which instead of saluting its magnificent colors, blackened them with the 
 blood of noble Castilians, of magnanimous Catalonians, of generous Spaniards. 
 Even the sky which covers countries governed by despots, loses its enchant- 
 ments. That of my country was sad, in the midst of its loveliness, like the 
 countenance of a bea\itiful woman dejected at the loss of her children. The 
 sea groaned as it dashed its swelling waves against the foot of Monjuic ; 
 the Llobregat, emptying itself into the sea close beside the impregnable 
 giant, tinted the waters of the Mediterranean with blood. The inhabitants 
 of the industrious and liberal manufacturing metropolis of the principality, 
 and even of all Spain, went sad and fearful along its narrow streets. The 
 father feared the son, the son the father ; the brother feared the brother, the 
 husband the wife ; the Catalonian feared the Castilian, the noble son of 
 Castile the industrious descendant of the Raymonds and Berengarias ; the 
 master feared the servant, the latter even the passer by in the street. Who 
 can have so fearfully transformed the Catalonians? Who can have put to 
 flight the confidence of Barcelona's inhabitants ? Who can have made them 
 look up, on rising from their beds, at the citadel, Atarazanas, Monjuic, to see 
 if from Spanish gallows Spaniards are hanging? Who can have made them 
 turn pale as they hear the rumbling echo of the cannon losing itself over the 
 expanse of the sea, as the announcement of the convolutions made by an 
 unhappy father, under the legs of the executioner ?* Who can have sealed 
 their mouths with terror, so that no chorus is heard in the workshops of these 
 inhabitants, such lovers of music ! Who can have converted this liberal 
 city into a monastery of Jesuits, in which they are all playing the spy with 
 the rosary in their hands? Can there be in the 19th century monsters like 
 those of the Rome of the Emperors, who spread terror among the citizens 
 for mere amusement? Who ruled the destinies of this people? CARLOS 
 ESPANA ! ! Fearful name, phantasm of despotism, a Nero become hangman, 
 Attila of Catalonia, a wretch who made more tears flow in our age, than 
 any other whomsoever, even in the ages called dark ; with the fires of the In- 
 quisition burning in the public squares favorite spectacle of Philip II. CAR- 
 LOS ESP ANA ! ! Reproach to humanity, Spanish and no Spaniard, tiger with 
 foreign countenance, hypocrite, venal. Why have they given this monster the 
 epithet otL'spatia, degrading in so atrocious a manner the name of the nation ? 
 
 * The Spanish mode of hanging is for the hangman to fix himself by his knees upon the 
 shoulders of the victim, and in this position to give a spring into the air, which causes all 
 his own weight, as well as that of the victim, to unite with the impetus thus given in the 
 strangulation of tlio latter.
 
 100 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 What can the enlightened of our own and foreign nations say, seeing nt the 
 head of the richest Spanish province, a superstition?, hypocritical miscreant, 
 who makes a holiday of shedding blood ; even using fraudulent pretences in 
 order to spill it? What say those who yet weep the loss of their moM bo- 
 loved objects caused by him? What will future generation! say, when 
 they read his atrocities ? What demon was gnawing at the heart of this 
 despot to awaken in him such rage and thirst for blood? Xow, in 18:'.r>, lie 
 is yet immolating Catalonians ; but I leave public opinion to condemn 
 him, and God to hurl him into the lake of his own blood, and p;i-< 
 to relate what happened to me this very month, in the year 1826. 
 
 Jose, permit me to interrupt you ; you must have re- 
 ceived a very good education ; your language bespeaks no vul- 
 gar mind. 
 
 That is not in my narrative, Doctor ; but I will only say 
 that I am the son of an honest carpenter, who sacrificed his life 
 to procure for me the career of an advocate, which I followed 
 for two years, till the fall of the Constitution, when I was pro- 
 hibited its pursuit ; then seeing myself, with my wife and two 
 children in poverty, I took a carpenter's shop, not despising the 
 business of my father. My wife was daughter of the brave 
 Captain Vidal, who was shot by one equal to, if not more atro- 
 cious than Carlos Espana, and who was called Elio ; and al- 
 though the poor little thing was not accustomed to so much 
 poverty, she helped me by her industry to sustain our obliga- 
 tions. I will go on then. 
 
 I lived in a miserable house near the end of the street del Conde del A xalto, 
 and worked as a carpenter to support my family. In the year '21 I had been 
 a national guard de la ley, that is to say, by forced service; but at the end 
 of the same year I read, I reflected, I turned over the pages of some books, 
 educated myself a little more, and finished by becoming a volunteer ami 
 most strenuous defender of my integrity and dignity as a man. This i -podi 
 terminated as prematurely as it did unfortunately, and I set myself, as I 
 have just said, in my workshop, and not being able in any other way to throw 
 off the chagrin with which I was overwhelmed by the new government 
 which had condemned me to die of hunger, I set to work day and night, M^- 
 sociating with no one but my two little ones and my beloved Luisa, who
 
 THE R UINS OF THE PARA CLETE. \ Q \ 
 
 was as beautiful in soul as she was fascinating in person. I believed no one 
 remembered me, for three years had transpired, and now I was only known 
 as Pepe the carpenter. Sometimes I went out very early in the morning to 
 buy wood, at others to seek work, which was scarce enough in those times 
 for us poor liberals who were favored with the nick-name of negros, and 
 indeed we were treated worse than those of Guinea in a slave-ship. One 
 night I was seated opposite my dear Luisa, with my daughter on my knees, 
 caressing her soft cheeks. I felt, I knew not why, pain, suspicion, doubt, 
 anxiety, and tenderness, us I looked upon my lovely wife." 
 
 Here he breaks off, and dropping the paper on his knees, 
 says : 
 
 You must know that I adored my wife. 
 
 He picks the paper up again, and with some emotion con- 
 tinues : 
 
 " Luisa's countenance was very sad, her lips moved as though she were 
 just bursting into tears, her eyes moistened, she kept up the click-click-click 
 of a multitude of box-wood bobbins which were moved by her delicate fin- 
 gers with incredible swiftness, weaving lace, an art in which the girls of Ca- 
 talonia excel. She was so absorbed in her thoughts she did not notice that 
 I was there. On the planing-bench my son lay sleeping, as we sleep at five 
 years old, when the mind knows no other agitations than those occasioned 
 by pleasure or pain, sole motive-powers of that age. The shavings on the 
 bench made him an easy bed, and a heap of them a soft pillow. For a 
 while neither of us spoke ; we heard only the sound of the bobbins, and I 
 watched the countenance of Luisa, the sadness of which. gave -me exceed- 
 ing pain. I thought to myself, can it be the misery in which we live that 
 is the cause of her sadness? for although 110 word ever came from her lips 
 that could mortify me, I saw nevertheless, that my poor little wife worked 
 too hard. Moved at seeing her so good, I ventured to address her. 
 
 Dear Luisa, what is the matter? Can you guess what I think it is? 
 She went on weaving and replied : 
 
 How do you suppose I can tell what you are thinking? 
 
 Look, my darling, why is your face tints puckered, why are you weep- 
 ing ? Is it a burden to you to have united your lot to that of a poor unfor- 
 tunate being? Can you not become accustomed to poverty? Forgive me, 
 my Luisa, forgive me, but I never dreamt that I should have to make you 
 work to maintain your children. 
 
 My wife threw down the lace-pillow, came to me, wound her arms round 
 my neck, and bursting into tears, said :
 
 1 02 THE T\VU 
 
 Son of my bosom, my Pepe, don't be unjust to your poor Luisa, the 
 misery of the father of my children is glory for me ; my mother also, after 
 my poor father was shot, mixed tears with the bread she kneaded. !No, 
 Pepe, no, do not be so cruel 
 
 Then what is the matter, daughter of my soul, what is the matter? 
 
 Oh ! Pepe, it is something terrible, dreadful ! 
 
 Speak, I am dying with anxiety. 
 
 She shook off her tears, took up my little daughter who was lying half 
 asleep on my knees, and said to me : 
 
 Let me put our children to bed, and I will tell you what is afflicting 
 me. 
 
 Ten minutes afterwards she was at my side. She sat down on my knees, 
 laid her heavenly face against mine, and pressing my cheek with her fore- 
 head, bathed it in teal's. I thought she was going to announce to me that 
 we had another child, that she was conscious of the life of a being that was 
 a part of our own life, and I began caressing her, heaping up kisses upon her 
 and uttering some few words which revealed my thought. 
 
 Xo, Pepe, it is not that, that would be a motive for joy; it is not that. 
 Listen. I believe my virtue is known to you; I believe your little wife 
 knows how to love you with all her poor soul, so that you cannot suspect I 
 have given any occasion for what you are about to hear. 
 
 My heart, which, with her first tears, and at the idea of having another 
 child, had dilated like a sponge filled with perfumed water, shrank as though 
 an iron hand had squeezed out of it the very last drop of gladness, and with 
 a suffocating dryness in the throat, I gazed upon her and would fain have 
 died, for one who loves as I did cannot live if he gets a glimpse of what I 
 began to perceive. 
 
 You must know, she continued that some weeks ago, I observed a 
 tall man, with French countenance, red moustache, with his hat pulled down 
 to his eyebrows, and with a shuffling gait, passing by here very early in the 
 morning nearly every day. You will say, that for a mutter which did not 
 concern me, I took too much notice ; but presently you will see how it was. 
 The day before yesterday I was sweeping in front of the door about five 
 o'clock in the morning, when you had gone out to buy this wood ; the little 
 ones were asleep, and he came up to me and wanted to stroke my cheek. 
 I lifted up my broom to give the impudent fellow a blow ; but he very 
 ealmlv and smiling said tome: "Poor Noya,* such a pretty little thing, 
 and sweeping?" That is nothing to you, I replied, so have the goodness to go 
 about your business and don't be ill-mannered. "This Carlos Espaiia," con- 
 tinued the man, "is a cruel fellow, ordering such charming little creatures 
 
 * Meaning in the Catalonian dialect girl.
 
 THE #AU OF THE PARACLETE. 1Q3 
 
 to sweep the streets twice a day." Go along with you and your CArlos Espana, 
 I replied, and turned to go into the house, when he added : " You must he a 
 liberal, that frown cannot be other than one of the year '20. Well, Cdrlos 
 Espana is a knave ; you are right, Noya, but hope to Heaven that the po- 
 lice have not heard us." And he went away. After him came two ill-look- 
 ing men. This is the cause of my sadness. Who can tell who that man 
 may be ? You know already what happened to poor Engracia, the turner's 
 daughter, for a less cause. 
 
 My wife buried her divine face' between my neck and whiskers as though 
 to hide her fear. Receiving the breath of Luisa in my bosom, and covering 
 her cherubic head with ardent kisses, I saw passing before my heated imag- 
 ination the tyrant of Catalonia ; the portrait was perfect ; jealousy depicted 
 before my eyes tilings which up to that time had no existence. I was 
 foaming with rage, my breathing was thickened ; if Luisa had let me go out 
 I should have committed some folly. That night I double locked the doors 
 and clasped my wife tightly in my arms, fearing lest they should steal her 
 from my side. My dreams were fearful. I saw my children crying for 
 their mother ; I saw Luisa transported to one of the villas of Engracia* in 
 the hands of that mussulman ; I saw myself in desperation, buried alive, 
 looking up at the moon as though I could see in that satellite what she with 
 moistened eyes imprinted on it. These dreams were the preludes of the 
 atrocious reality. 
 
 On the following day I said to Luisa : " Daughter of my heart, do not 
 sweep any more, from this day forward I will do it myself; it is nothing 
 more than gathering up the shavings, and thus we shall escape that man." 
 This was, in fact, done, and not a few were the times that I saw that Fan- 
 tasmon pass by. Oh ! if we two had been alone he should have died, and 
 who knows what would have happened to us ; but my children ? the poor 
 little innocent creatures? those fragments of our very hearts ? and the youth 
 of my charming wife ? and the consolations her divine lips afforded me ? and 
 the reflection that gold acquires no impurity even in a slough of mud ? and 
 the caresses of my little ones? The rage of jealousy when a wife is innocent, 
 when she is truly adored, when she has given no ground for the first dawn 
 of suspicion, is converted into froth incapable of wiping out stains. Oh! to 
 see the death of the sentiments caused by these wretches, to hear their fiend- 
 ish condemnations, to see a hell of sufferings inflicted solely for caprice, is, 
 we must confess, a veritable dying by inches. Time, oh! time is a great 
 teacher. 
 
 * A charming village near Barcelona, containing many splendid mansions of the Barce- 
 lona merchants.
 
 104 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 Two months had passed ; she no longer remembered the audacious man, 
 and I had almost forgotten him. It was night; it was valuing; my chil- 
 dren were asleep ; we were just going to bed, when several violent raps 
 were heard 011 the door. My Luisa began to tremble. I remained in sus- 
 pense ; the knocks were repeated, and a voice said : 
 
 Jose Feliu, open the door, I am LJoveras, Captain of the bomb-ketch. 
 
 This name was very dear to me, for Lloveras was a Liberal, and I had 
 not seen him for three years. I was indebted to him for many benefit?, and 
 what will not a grateful man do for a benefactor? Luisa and 1 believed IK- 
 was in danger, and at a bound I was at the door. Luisa followed me, and 
 also my little ones, who had woke up. I opened the wicket, and four armed 
 men entered my house, showed me an order of the General, which I read 
 by the light of their lantern, and having tied my arms, they proceeded 
 to do the same to Luisa If they had applied a burning brand '" my 
 pupils, I should not have made a more convulsive spring, and freeing 
 myself from the cords which bound me, and not being able to get at any 
 weapon with which to fell the csbirro to the ground, I f-ei/.ed his arm with 
 my teeth, nor did I leave my hold till a piece of his flesh was brought away 
 between them. My children screamed and clung to their mother's skirts. I 
 was raving, so thattwo men could not hold me. Mv wife tainted ; thev drag- 
 ged us away, put us into some coaehe- after the fashion of those of the liu[ui>i- 
 tion, and we were transported to the dungeons of the citadel, without know- 
 ing for what cause or for wliat end. I could not .-ay farewell to Luisa, nor 
 would they even suffer me to iihpress a kiss on the dear little heads of my 
 children. 
 
 Jose begins to weep, with the paper in his hand ; Schmidt 
 shakes his moustachios to roll off the tears which stand upon 
 them. Hector clings with an air of dread to Rosamunda, who 
 is weeping, the country girl sighs deeply, Jose half raises his 
 twisted neck, and exclaims : 
 
 And this was the beginning ! Oh ! night a thousand 
 times blacker than death ! 
 
 Jose, my son, can you go on 1 
 
 I am about to continue. Does my narrative fatigue 
 you? 
 
 No, Jose, no-, we weep with you they all exclaim we 
 weep with you. Poor little ones ! Unhappy Jose ! Unfortu- 
 nate Luisa !
 
 THE tiUlNS OF THE PARACLETE. 1Q5 
 
 I will go on. 
 
 Fifteen nights passed for in that dark dungeon no day dawns of my 
 sufferings during which I can give you no idea. I knew nothing of my 
 wife ; I heard not a word of my children , I got no hint of why I was there ; 
 for though I guessed it, I nevertheless tried hard to deceive myself. Death 
 is better than believing oneself robbed of honor. I had read much of what 
 occurred in the dungeons of the Inquisition, but vast as it was, it bore no 
 comparison with the moral martyrdom I was suffering. On repeated occa- 
 sions, the demon of suicide flattered my soul, presenting to me its very im- 
 mortal spirituality, as an inducement to the consummation of the crime. I 
 felt blown into my ears these, or similar words: "If that monster should use 
 tortures to secure a triumph over the virtue of your innocent wife, how 
 could you, imprisoned in the double dungeon of your body and thece rocks, 
 know any thing about it ? How could you hinder the triumph of vice over 
 virtue? Look! all may be happening in this moment: imagine that the 
 pain of the rack is about to be employed, and that the denuded body of your 
 Luisa is stretching little by little, the joints give way, the bones crack, 
 and he with fiendish voice, with inflamed eyes, with the convulsions of re- 
 fined vice, cries to her, ' Confess, confess what I have ordered you.' " Then 
 my brains trembled, and I was about to dash them upon the hard stone. This 
 odious image passed away, and I saw Luisa anew, with her beautiful black 
 hair tied to a rope, with no clothing but a sheet, suspended by her hair from 
 a pulley, compelled thus to try to rest the tips of her feet upon the ground, 
 which for pavement had blocks of wood full of sharp spikes, which tore her 
 delicate feet, making them drop blood, and tearing away pieces of flesh ; 
 struggling in the agonies of suffocation ; oscillating with the efforts she made 
 to touch the ground ; drawing up her feet from the points of the spikes, and 
 nearly choked, nearly naked, with her convulsive struggles seeking mercy, 
 the tyrant saying to her, "Say yes to what I told you." Then, again, I 
 longed to burst open my skull and leave this body, which hindered my soul 
 from seeing what was taking place, believing that my soul would confound 
 the monster with a breath, although it were from hell. These, and other 
 more horrible ideas wore me out, and left me powerless, till at last I sat 
 down upon the ground, and wept, in a state of frightful stupefaction. 
 
 One day, when I had suffered a thousand deaths at every breath, I heard 
 footsteps. It was not the hour for bringing me dinner, so that I took hope, 
 and thought at least to be brought before the tribunal, and see my precious 
 Luisa, even though afterwards they shot me. The heavy bolt creaked more 
 slowly than usual. I heard the padlock loosened from the door, which 
 grated on its hinges. I saw, as it were the twilight of a cloudy winter 
 5*
 
 106 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 moruiiig, through the iron cross-bare of the door, that I touched in that mo- 
 ment, the voice of a woman said to me : Prisoner, I have brought you the 
 ration of bread which was forgotten this morning. The steps of a sentinel 
 were heard whispering, she added, within there is a piece of paper from 
 Luisa, read it while I go up the stairs. Whether I blessed that woman, 
 that messenger of Heaven, it is unnecessary oven to consider. I opened the 
 loaf, nud by the scant}' light, which for me was the brightness of a May sun, 
 I read, written with charcoal in Luisa's hand, as follows: . . . "will come 
 .... at 11 .... poor L. . . . ." The first door creaked, and I uttered 
 n groan which moved my very soul. 
 
 There are some critical moments of life, in which the excitation of the 
 soul is so tremendous, that we even leave the earth on which we dwell, and 
 act from instinct, or by some power, I know not what, that governs us. I 
 know that I devoured the paper, masticated it, crushed it in pieces, ground 
 it, reduced it to saliva, swallowed it, not for fear they should seize it, but 
 because it had touched the hands of my wife, and perhaps she had hidden it 
 in her bosom, and perhaps had kissed it, and perhaps had moistened it with 
 her tears. 
 
 Poor Jose, exclaims Schmidt, poor Jose ! 
 
 There yet remained some remnants of the beloved paper between my 
 teeth, when the accursed Avords, with all their letters, assaulted my memory, 
 ". . . will come ... at 11 .... poor L . . . ." At 11, I exclaimed in 
 desperation, at 1 1 ! This must be by night . . . . Horror! And where can 
 you be, my poor Luisa ? Oh ! if but the kind woman had at least told me that ! 
 Oh! if she returns, if she returns, I w ill ask her; yes, she will tell me .... 
 Oh! if it were near me, I could at least hear if she cried out ; if thcv tor- 
 tured her, and I were not already sufferint: physically, I could sympathize 
 with her in soul ; I would cry out like a fiend, like Lucifer, as no words can 
 < \pn-s, to frighten the monster, if he have any fear of the things of the 
 other world, or by making Luisa hear my voice, give courage to her. Oh! 
 yes, she will know my voice as the female palm-tree feels th<' kis-cs of her 
 companion wafted to her from across the desert ; she will hear my voice, as 
 the dying father hears the groans of his children before sinking into 
 eternity. 
 
 When we are expecting some happiness, the moments pass like the wa- 
 ters of a deep and rapid river, without our taking notice of their silent flow : 
 they seem to us to be ever the same. When it is some impending calamity 
 that threatens us, every second is a year in an Inquisitorial dungeon. I 
 know not how to describe the passing of that time which had to elaj
 
 THE .RUINS OF THE PARACLETE. 107 
 
 it would be, according to my idea, eleven o'clock at night, lu those deep 
 glooms which the cruel genius of man has invented, to hide from his equals 
 the beautiful daylight ; flying in the face of what God said, that the sun 
 was created to give light to the evil and to the good ; although one is in 
 eternal night, the day is distinguishable through the eternal silence that 
 reigns in it. Placed in one of these pits, you seem to be buried, to be 
 travelling the road to eternity, to hear but the echo of the voice of men on 
 the earth, that confused murmur which is perceived at three or four leagues 
 distance from the great cities in the solitude of the fields ; and at night all 
 remains in immobility, so that the report of the footsteps of one walking over- 
 head, though the vault be of extreme thickness, makes apoom .... poom .... as 
 solemn as it is melancholy. My dungeon was, as I have said, separated from 
 the corridor by a flight of steps, which led down to my den, and two doors 
 with gratings, to the lower of which my desperation suggested that I should 
 apply my ear, gathering it up with both hands to unite closer attention and 
 greater body of sound, and I remained thus for two or three hours, loth 
 even to breathe. Man, when in the expectancy of desperation, does not so 
 much as think ; he is beside himself ; all his powers are concentrated in that 
 organ which is about to give life or death to his heart. I was exceedingly 
 weak ; for the miserable mess they called dinner, had not been brought me 
 that evening ; but on that very account, I believe, I had my senses, and par- 
 ticularly my hearing, more spiritualized. Something was approaching, for I 
 heard a sound like rain ; the image presented to my fancy by this sound 
 was so atrocious, that there began to ring in my ears, sounds of pum, pum, 
 putn, pum, BO agitated and violent, that I could hear nought else. How 
 miserable is man ! The bolts of the door creaked ; the light of a lantern fell 
 upon me ; I fancied I saw my adored Luisa, with my little ones clinging to 
 her hands ; I fancied I saw the kind-heai'ted woman of the beloved paper ; 
 I fancied I saw the jailer ; I fancied I saw the executioner, who was going 
 to prepare for 4 o'clock in the morning ; I fancied I saw the judges all 
 this in the twinkling of an eye, I fancied I saw scarcely a second could 
 have passed, for I heard a voice which said to me : 
 
 Criminal, here is the first magistrate. 
 
 All my senses had ceased to perform their office, and were united in that 
 of hearing. I answered nothing. He repeated again, putting the lantern 
 to the grating : 
 
 Criminal, here is the first magistrate. 
 
 Then I saw some saffron-colored whiskers, which converted me into 
 all eyes. It was CARLOS ESPAXA ! 
 
 Jose Feliii lets his arms fall, and as a prelude of some great
 
 1 08 'ME T I VO I'-* - 
 
 emotion, sighs deeply. Schmidt and the hearers respect his 
 sorrowing silence, and prepare to hear the sequel with, if it 
 were possible, still greater attention. Jose gives a very ex- 
 pressive movement of his shoulders, aud trimming the wicks of 
 the lamp continues : 
 
 On seeing him I was suddenly seized with a convulsive tremor of intense 
 rage ; but what I felt was so profound that its explosion, seeking to burst 
 forth at one stroke, found no vent, and my overwhelming emotion itself 
 sealed my lips. Then the proud despot raised his voice, and brandishing his 
 wand of office, said : 
 
 Villain ! dare you thus insult God's vicegerent xipon the earth ? one 
 who holds your life or death in his hands? Answer, respond to my au- 
 thority. 
 
 When I heard the holy name of God pronounced by this monster, [ 
 looked through the black walls of the dungeons up to Heaven, to see if a 
 thunderbolt of Divine indignation would not come and set us free, Luisa, 
 my little ones, and myself, from that beast of prey ; and in frenzy I re- 
 plied : 
 
 Thus, being unable to tear out their hearts, I answer the cowards who 
 insult the Dignity of Man. 
 
 And I spat in his face. 
 
 Here I will pass over three or four pages which are de- 
 void of interest, and will come to the matter in hand. 
 
 Why do you say they have no interest, Jose? Go on, 
 do not omit any thing. 
 
 I assure you, Doctor, they are entirely uninteresting. 
 And he turns over one or two leaves. 
 
 Listen. 
 
 I know not whether it was one o'clock or eleven o'clock at night ; it is 
 certain I must have passed a long space of time ere I recovered my reason, 
 for when I spat upon him I became mad with rage, and what I said to him, 
 the efforts that I made, the convulsion of my body, were more tlian suffi- 
 cient to kill a lion. 
 
 One time when my soul was master of my disconcerted srnsos I observe, 1 
 Hint tin- outer .lour wemed to be open, and I was confirmed in this idea by 
 b-aring -omul?. nn>re clearly, and feeling wind enter. Oh ! every mouthful
 
 THE R UINS OF THE PARA CLETK \ 09 
 
 of the Mediterranean breeze8 was a kiss sent me by Luisa ! Clinging with 
 l>oth hands to the iron grating, and my face placed close to it, riveted to the 
 cross, a column of fire proceeded from my mouth which, I believed, thus 
 judge those who love and are unhappy, would reach far enough to caress the 
 beautiful chevelure of my idolized wife and the curly little heads of my be- 
 loved children. A strange sound which now arose made me shudder, turn 
 my head aside to hear better, close my eyes tightly, press against the iron, 
 which grew hot within my hands, suspend my breath. The noise was as of 
 voices, it grew with every respiration, it seemed like a man and a woman ; 
 did I know those voices? For answer, I heard screams and feet running. 
 All was dark ; the person who was running came towards me screaming, 
 the sound stopped at the first door of my dungeon, I heard myself called by 
 name Pepe ! ! ! 
 
 It was Luisa. 
 
 Come, Luisa I exclaimed with enamored voice. 
 
 She who had just called me fell rolling down those stairs, and her body 
 struck against the door through which I was looking. The door separated 
 us. The door separated us ! .... I said to her : 
 
 I am here, 1 am here ! 
 
 She followed my voice in the darkness of that hell, I thrust out the tips 
 of my fingers, touched her cold hand, our lips united, I asked her for my 
 children, she answered me : 
 
 They are in the Casa de Misericordia . . . . and gave a heart-rend- 
 ing cry, the echo of which was quenched in the voice of the monster, who 
 appeared at that moment at the upper door with the lantern in his hand. 
 I made a last effort, tore my flesh in forcing rny hand through the grating 
 as far as the wrist, seized the arm of my wife ; by the light of the lantern 
 I saw that she was wrapped in a blanket, her breast all uncovered ; I shud- 
 dered, my heart quaked ; he sent down a bailiff to force Luisa away from 
 me, she began to cry out with frenzy, I held her by the arm as though wo 
 were one flesh ; he came down with the lantern. Coward ! even within a 
 dungeon he was afraid of me ! Luisa screamed : 
 
 I will not go ; let them kill me, Pepe, let them kill me, he wants 
 he wants he wants to mock at my nakedness. 
 
 The savage beast ! he put his hand on her mouth ; the bailiff struck me 
 violently with the heavy key across my knuckles which forced me, whether 
 I would or no, to leave my hold of Luisa, they lifted her up, dragging her 
 between them, naked, without the blanket ; I saw that man, no ! that fiend 1 
 rolling his lustful eyes over the treasure of my heart, and the remnant of 
 my strength fled. I remained hanging by one hand, which, as you may see 
 even now, is all mangled. Oh ! oh ! oh ! even yet, deprived of sense, I
 
 1 1 THE TWO FA TJ1ERS. 
 
 heard Luisa saying, " I will die first Adieu, Pepe, adieu," and she gave 
 herself a blow against the wall, from the results of which, as I learned the, 
 next day, she died. 
 
 I cannot .... go on, .... I cannot 
 
 Jose" goes out weeping to his own room, to pour forth sighs 
 and groans in the caverns of the Paraclete, and curse the great 
 till he could take vengeance on them for their iniquities. 
 
 The tableau presented by those who have thus far heard his 
 narration, would furnish a subject for the pencil of Verne t. imr 
 be among the worst that have sprung from his hand. Schmidt 
 remains dejected, his eyes fixed on the ground ; Rosamunda 
 weeps, clinging with the right hand to the doctor's knee, with 
 the left in the hands of Hector, whose countenance is filled with 
 indignation and dread ; the country girl. Martha, pulls out her 
 handkerchief and sighs ; the lamp flickers, and all are silent. 
 The doctor is the first to make an exclamation : 
 
 How unhappy is the people through the want of that equi- 
 librium in the rational faculties which creates social harmony. 
 
 Rosamunda says : 
 
 Poor Luisa ! Poor little children ! Unhappy Jose ! 
 Martha, the country girl, sighs : 
 
 Happy Luisa. that had the heart to dash out her brains ! 
 Hector looks at Schmidt and inquires with curiosity : 
 
 Doctor, and how were you able to obtain the body of the 
 poor Jose? 
 
 My children, I owe it to chance. Understand that when 
 I arrived at Barcelona, I heard some talk of a French captain of 
 grenadiers who. in 1823, in that same city, had lost his reason, 
 being in the garrison of the citadel, and persisting in it that he 
 was the chief of the place. As his insanity, while they left him 
 there, had no furious symptoms, and had many as soon as he 
 was taken away, the French Charge d' Affaires obtained permis- 
 sion from the Spanish authorities of the Court to keep the de- 
 monted man in the place under certain restrictions. As soon 
 as I set foot in the consulate, the representative of France
 
 THE R U1NS OF THE PARA CLETE. \ \ \ 
 
 told me that M. Constantin, captain of the 39th of the line, had 
 become lunatic ; his name recalled to me a person whom I 
 knew, and I sought permission to visit him ; he turned out in 
 fact to be the person I thought, and I obtained leave to attend 
 him in the double capacity of a physician and a friend, since this 
 relation also subsisted between us. At that time Jose was in 
 the dungeons, as was .also his wife ; and Carlos Espana, who, 
 from sympathy of blood, loved the French, if that wretch de- 
 serves to have the word love used in relation to him, intrust- 
 ed to me the care of Luisa, which I never told Jose ; she died, 
 for her wounds were mortal ; and afterwards I easily obtained 
 the grant of Jose's corpse, to be delivered to me some minutes 
 after the execution, for the purpose of study. How I restored 
 him to life you know, so that it only now remains for us to re- 
 member that we, all who are here, are victims of those who are 
 called the great of the earth. Heaven grant, my children, that 
 you should not some day have to relate, if they give you time 
 for it, how these blood-thirsty tigers have martyrized your 
 souls ! The night is advanced, and it is time we retired. Space 
 yet remains to us to make comments on the scenes Jose has 
 read to us, and draw from them a great instruction for the fu- 
 ture. Now, my children, go to bed ; cherish your honor and 
 dignity above all that is in the earth, and never permit the no- 
 bleman without education, or the stupid rich, or the heartless 
 mandarin, to tread your honor, your lineage as Rational Beings, 
 your nobility of soul, under his unclean feet. Men and women 
 ought to fly from dangers ; but if it is not given them, by their 
 position, to separate themselves from intercourse with these ne- 
 farious people, they ought to die, but never prostitute their 
 semi-divine dignity. Retire to rest.
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 IT is difficult in our day to fiud narratives in which heroes do 
 not appear as extraordinary as they are fantastic. It seems as 
 though the events of the day, with their prodigious magnitude, 
 their unexpected developments, their surprising scenes, and the 
 progress of the natural sciences with their semi-miracles, oper- 
 ated in a singular manner upon writers, who, lost in so much 
 wonder, and anxious not to display their own littleness, create 
 fantastic beings with astonishing colorings and superhuman pow- 
 ers. The object they propose to themselves is to disguise their 
 own smallness beside the colossal events presented by actual 
 society ; for who is not astounded at the transformations and 
 improvements the world has undergone these last fifty years ? 
 Who, in looking at the march of things, will venture to say 
 what will be its end? Look here at France in 1848. To read 
 what passed the 24th of February, when she went to bed mo- 
 narchical, and awoke republican, is enough to annihilate the 
 most profound politician ; and the same cause makes the heads 
 of the writers go astray, and from so much that is marvellous 
 in fact, they rush to enchantments, knight-errantries, literary, 
 political, and moral exaggerations, and go back to the barba- 
 rous style, which, during the 16th century, prevailed in Spain 
 and Italy. And if in literature they degenerate, the same hap- 
 pens in politics ; for exaggerations are always bad. We ought 
 to be well assured that every thing which steps beyond human 
 possibility can only dazzle for a moment, and that then reason 
 will say, with cold indifference, "idle tales, all idle tales r 
 and from such things man learns nothing. Why do the works
 
 THE R UINS OF THE PARA CLETE. \ \ 3 
 
 of the ancient Greeks and Romans, the productions of the 
 Golden Ages of Spain. England. France, Italy, and Germany, 
 never grow old ? Why are they read again and again, with 
 ever-growing pleasure, ever discovering beauties, instruction, 
 and wonders, which appear new? Why do those of our day 
 pique the curiosity at first, and yet never get taken up to be 
 read a second time ? Because the former copy nature, study 
 her secrets, sometimes surprising her, at others gaining glimpses 
 of what she jealously hides from them, and on all occasions 
 make manifest to us that her great book has inimitable pages, 
 which will cause men pleasure till the end of their existence. 
 And we moderns, thinking to surpass nature, go beyond her 
 sphere, and become visionaries. This is a defect which, as chil- 
 dren of our age, we may perchance contract ; but as our school 
 is antique, and our taste is for nature, we shall take all the 
 means in our power to correct it, whenever the imagination 
 wanders, and the hand runs without being borne along by the 
 understanding. We beg pardon for having to speak of our- 
 selves, poor beginners, who sufficiently know our own littleness 
 not to pretend to teach any one. But when we write we do 
 not believe no one will read us, and we say all that we feel, as 
 we are always accustomed to do, without fearing lest there may 
 be some who will laugh at our weaknesses ; and as one of these 
 was just now to place on the scene preternatural and magical 
 personages, so we wish our fault to be known, and, in the pre- 
 sence of others, hold it up before our face. We are now going 
 to amend, by continuing our story through the agency of men 
 of flesh and blood, acting in this world of clay, and not in imagi- 
 nary spheres. 
 
 While those of the Paraclete were spending the days as we 
 have seen, the Baron de Vieux was in Paris, and, for mere 
 amusement, went to visit the Chief Magistrate of the Police. 
 The influence of the de Vieux at the court of Louis Philippe 
 was not slight, in consideration of important services which 
 had been rendered in Argel. and even in Paris, by an uncle of 
 this nobleman, whom the king himself held in distinguished
 
 1 1 4 THE TWO FA 77/A7/.Y 
 
 esteem ; and de Vieux, who was the pet of his uncle, a General, 
 and his heir, was moreover a person of intimate relations with 
 the palace, through the family of the Baroness, his spouse, who 
 belonged to the first families of the Boulevard St. Germain. 
 The machinations of Fieschi and others', which had taken place 
 recently, had awakened greater mistrust in the Citizen King, 
 or rather in his ministers ; for Louis Philippe, no matter what 
 may be said by French republicans, or monarchists, not one of 
 whom is a good judge in this matter, until the passions have 
 ceased, and history, with mature reflection, passes sentence ; 
 for Louis Philippe feared not the attempts of the French people 
 against his life, so much as those who encircled him. The min- 
 isters of the king of the French were watching in their stir- 
 rups, and foresaw that the people would not much relish the 
 favoritism that hurled from the throne the best of monarchs ; 
 and consequently every sign of popular vengeance against the 
 great set them upon thorns. The perfumed de Vieux had been 
 attached to the embassy in London, secretary to that of Vienna, 
 which was no bad school of espionnage, and had filled other 
 diplomatic posts, which gave him a character of more than com- 
 mon importance, and which commanded respect. With these 
 antecedents he presented himself to the Grand Prefet. 
 
 What .novelty brings the noble Baron de Vieux to these 
 halls, honoring me with his esteemed presence ? 
 
 M. le Prefet, I have just come from my estates at Ser- 
 gines, which I inherited a short time since, on the decease of 
 my aunt, and the repairs of which I wished to urge forward, 
 for the good lady had abandoned them on account of her age, 
 and in an excursion to Nogent de la Seine, I perceived that 
 the police did not execute its commission as circumstances re- 
 quire, as the dangers around us demand, as the increase of ul- 
 tra-liberal ideas exacts ; and I take the liberty of manifesting 
 my fears to the first magistrate in these matters. I would 
 have seen his majesty in person, but I wished that the glory of 
 the discovery should fall on one of my best friends, the zealous 
 Prp.frt of Paris
 
 THE RUIXS OF THE PARACLETE. \ 15 
 
 Both made that favorite motion of courtiers, used by them 
 when they mutually flatter and deceive each other. 
 
 And what may be the matter in question, noble Baron 1 
 
 A machine a hundred times more infernal than that of 
 the regicide Fieschi. 
 
 How so ? 
 
 It is necessary I should explain to my noble friend, M. 
 le Pn'fet, what, by one of those chances we men call Provi- 
 dence, I have seen. Towards the southwest of Nogent are the 
 ruins of the Paraclete .... 
 
 Ah ! yes, if the noble Baron de Vieux will permit me to 
 interrupt him, I believe, and I do not deceive myself, that there 
 lives there an old original, a German, a physician, and a vision- 
 ary. 
 
 Precisely, a German, a physician, very learned, and . . . 
 revolutionary. 
 
 The information I have is not of that nature, M. le Baron, 
 and I am surprised .... 
 
 It is not strange, for his ability is diabolical. I will ex- 
 plain myself. M. le Prefet knows, without doubt, the illus- 
 trious Count de Kant, my friend. 
 
 The magistrate inclined his person ceremoniously. 
 
 He and I being at Nogent, they told us, that is, we heard 
 the people talk of the sorcerer of the ruins ; and the peculiarity 
 of living there, joined to the antiquarian interest of the memory 
 of Abelard, made us decide to pay a visit to the spot, to see if 
 the people with their stupidity were again giving importance to 
 a mere whimsicality. To be brief, we arrived, and after being 
 received by an assassin, who wore a picture representing the 
 Spanish gallows, from which he said the German had delivered 
 him, Schmidt, which is his name, came to meet us. At the 
 first glance Kant recognized in him a shoemaker, or some coach- 
 man or lackey of his ; and as our ascendency over the plebeians, 
 emanating from divinity, will never be unrecognized, the said 
 sorcerer acceded to all the demands of his former master.
 
 1 16 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 From what I beard from his own lips, from what I saw in those 
 caverns, this man is another philosopher of Geneva, another 
 lackey Rousseau, another Upsetter of the people. Accord- 
 ing to appearances, he holds nocturnal assemblies, and M. lo 
 Prefet will conceive the facility with which the malefactors can 
 assemble, travelling from Paris and more distant points by the 
 Seine. Here there are machines of unknown purpose and small 
 bulk. There are men working, to judge from the noise of the 
 subterranean workshops, besides women, prostitutes : and. in fine, 
 it is a cave of Montesinos, with the modern civili/ation and 
 wickedness. Passing by a vault, Kant saw and pointed out to 
 me a gallows, and the effigies of a king, a noble, and a priest. 
 M. le Prefet can see that this is no laboratory of a physician. 
 that what I have described indicates not the least connection 
 with such an occupation. I might have known more, but in- 
 dignation overcame me. and in one of those movements which 
 our souls experience, I used some harsh expressions towards 
 him, to which he replied in the following words : a He who 
 takes the sword shall perish by the sword, and the great 
 of the earth have done much to us to make the people retal- 
 iate upon them." These were his last words, and they admit of 
 no explanation. It is nothing strange, then, that to drive off 
 the rough country people, he presents himself to them as a 
 sorcerer, as a son of Satan, so as to keep the road clear for 
 his initiated. What I can insure is, that hence will spring a 
 revolution, and chiefs like Robespierre and Marat. 
 
 After this relation, of the truth of which our readers can 
 judge, they conferred together upon the subject, and the Prefet 
 congratulated himself on being the saviour of the French aristo- 
 cracy, thanks to the zeal of the noble de Vieux, which doubtless 
 he would have turned to account some other way, if the magis- 
 trate had hesitated about his part in the matter. They se- 
 parated, and the Prefet dared not neglect the institution of 
 inquiries, because the Baron was to be feared as a friend and 
 was terrible as an enemy.
 
 THE RUINS OF THE PARACLETE. \\f 
 
 On the night following the relation of Jose Feliu, the dwell- 
 ers in the vaults of the Paraclete were assembled, discussing the 
 artless but interesting narrative of the Catalonian's sorrows, and 
 begging him to continue the reading of it. It was ten o'clock 
 at night. The solitude of ruins, even though they may contain 
 some living inhabitants, has always that majestic void which 
 assimilates them to the other world. Just as Feliu was about 
 to accede to their reiterated request, a whistle was heard which 
 resounded through the vaults like a thing not unknown, but of 
 strange omen. Schmidt hastened towards the entrance of the 
 caverns followed by the faithful dog, by Jose, and by Hector. 
 It was the agent of police, purveyor to the German, and 
 the sous-prefet of Nogeut, who had been for some years the 
 friend of the sage. Schmidt suffered an inward struggle which 
 was hidden from observation by the darkness of the ravine 
 in which they were ; but he attended first to what was most 
 important. Under the excuse of fetching a light he caused 
 Hector to retire, and made the two women leave the place 
 where they were and betake themselves each to her own apart- 
 ment, while Jose returned with the lantern. The dog growled, 
 but at the voice of his master was heard to drop down on the 
 floor. Feliu speedily returned, and by the aid of the light the 
 guests in silence followed the doctor, the magistrate command- 
 ing the agent of police to remain and guard the entrance while 
 he conversed with Schmidt. M. de la Guise, as the magis- 
 trate was named, had never set his foot within the strange 
 house of his old friend, and on entering the dissecting saloon he 
 could not fail to be impressed by the sad and singular appara- 
 tus which was presented to his eyes. So soon as the one had 
 regained his tranquillity, and the other resumed his accustomed 
 air, the latter said : 
 
 M. dc la Guise, what accident occasions me the honor of 
 a visit from you ? For Schmidt to see a friend in his misfor- 
 tunes is prelude of felicity. 
 
 My dear M. Schmidt, this is in fact not a visit of friend-
 
 TV" /,177/AA'V. 
 
 ship, it is rather the performance of a duty, which, however, in- 
 volves nothing disagreeable, because I am firmly persuaded that 
 it is occasioned by some wickedness or ignorance ; but this even- 
 ing I have first to be a friend and then a magistrate. 
 
 M. de la Guise, I believe you will excuse me if I inter- 
 rupt you. I know who it is that must have originated this step, 
 which will cause you some annoyance ; but the person who has 
 deceived the authorities is sufficiently known to me for me to 
 expect this and much more from his villainy. M. le Baron de 
 Vieux has surprised and deceived you in the most iniquitous 
 manner. 
 
 M. Schmidt, my friend, I have not been surprised ; per- 
 haps the Grand Prefet of Paris may have been, by the person- 
 age you mention. 
 
 Then the order comes from Paris ? 
 
 From the Prefecture generale de Police. 
 
 My friend, for what concerns myself and what surrounds 
 me, I am tranquil ; but I cannot do less than deplore the want 
 there is in France and in the world of a veritable police. If 
 the object of police is to preserve good order, and make it 
 respected among the people according to the established laws, 
 without neglecting the public morals, then now I say that the 
 Grand Prefet ought to begin by correcting M. de Vieux and 
 an infinite number of his class. These, my friend, are they who 
 teach the people immorality, fraud, corruption, and then com- 
 plain of those they call plebeians. No revolution would have 
 to be feared, no political outbreak, if instead of being what they 
 arc, they were mirrors of virtue. What do they want ? That 
 the husband should see himself outraged, and keep silence be- 
 cause it was a noble who played with his honor? That the 
 father should see the beautiful white lily of his daughter's inno- 
 cence struck down, and because the hurricane which brought 
 low the tender shoot was an immoral great or wealthy man. put 
 a gag in his mouth 1 That the industrious artisan should see 
 his time and labor lost, because a great lord will not pay him,
 
 THE R UINS OF THE PAEA CLETE. \ \ 9 
 
 and bite his tongue? That men should see them, these stolid 
 lords, dividing among themselves the destinies, the wealth, the 
 money of the nation, placed in its coffers by the plebeians with 
 drops of sweat more numerous than the centimes those coffers 
 contain, and believe themselves born but to serve them whose sole 
 right is that derived from calling themselves great ? What do 
 these seigneurs want ? That the sage, the middle class who live 
 by their brains, should beg a smile from their stupid excellencies, 
 who cannot comprehend what the sage has thought and written, 
 and be silent, suffocating their highest prerogative, that of reason? 
 What would they 1 That the, world should remain stationary, 
 and believe that they came down from the Milky Way, and that 
 the plebeians sprung from the gutters ? M. de la Guise, France 
 has had, and now has, nobles who deserve that name ; many are 
 immortal, all the nations have had such ; but the generality are 
 hateful for their stupidity, for their pride, for their immorali- 
 ties. And let them not complain of revolutions, for their con- 
 duct foments them, their arrogance incites them, their ambition 
 makes them break forth. And if I speak thus of the rich and 
 nobles in general, it is because I know them. My friend, in 
 these ruins, which I owe to your friendship, I was quiet, and if 
 I plunged into the bowels of the earth, there would these mon- 
 sters come to torture me. Oh ! for sixteen years I had suf- 
 fered by their iniquities, and the sciences, study, death to the 
 world of men would have been a palliative, if my sufferings 
 could find any ; and even here in these caverns, buried alive, 
 has this monster come, this demon of destruction, who has killed 
 my illusions, who has lacerated my heart, who has overturned 
 my powers. . . . Oh ! if you knew what I suffer through him ! 
 Look at this skeleton, it is that of my poor wife ; he was 
 her assassin ; this other is that of my daughter, he was the 
 
 cause of this little angel's death Oh ! Schmidt clenched 
 
 his fist oh ! and even buried alive, turned to a wild beast, even 
 buried alive, you come to disturb my ashes? 
 
 The exaltation of the sage, his tears, and the skeletons of
 
 120 THE TWO FAT11EU*. 
 
 his wife and daughter, made a very deep impression on the en- 
 lightened sous-prefet, and after seeking to console him by a 
 few words of friendship, he asked him : 
 
 And who is the Count de Kant ? did you know him be- 
 fore? 
 
 Kant ? yes, Monsieur, he is the friend of my infancy and 
 childhood ; Kant is my college companion, Kant is a gentle- 
 man, Kant can tell what this wretch has seen here. M. de la 
 Guise, if being born with escutcheons on the door of one's house 
 is any thing in the eyes of the Justice of this earth, when I was 
 born I found those of honesty at the door of the house of the 
 husbandmen that were my parents, and afterwards, seeing the 
 people suffer so much, I gloried in my class, because the higher 
 is from its conduct so unworthy of my sympathies ; and I am a 
 plebeian, I am one of the people ; I love this poor class which 
 suffers, weeps, breaks its heart, and dies in the degradation to 
 which the ignorant great and rich, have condemned it. 
 
 Well. M. Schmidt, do not grow warm: I have always be- 
 lieved that the accusation deposited against you was the effect 
 of anger or ignorance. I have fulfilled my mission of friend- 
 ship, now I have to speak as a magistrate. In three days I 
 shall come to make a visitation to the vaults with the appara- 
 tus of justice ; if perchance you have any thing that 
 
 Thanks, my friend, thanks ; my machines are the bones 
 of men which I study, my instruments human vitals, that I en- 
 deavor to make myself acquainted with ; my secrets those of 
 science ; my mysteries those which God has consigned to men 
 to be the theme of their interminable disputes, incapable as 
 they are of penetrating such arcana. 
 
 Then, my friend, in three days your innocence will shine 
 forth like the rays of the sun at noonday, the hour at which I 
 shall come to make patent your heroism in having buried your- 
 self in these ruins. 
 
 The noble-hearted magistrate has no sooner gone than the 
 countenance of Schmidt changes, and instead of sleeping he re- 
 flects. Let us pass on at once to the following morning.
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 THERE are some mornings in the height of summer, when it 
 seems as though God were walking forth reviewing his creation, 
 and rejoicing a second time in beholding so marvellous a work. 
 The sun shines as if he were taking delight in showing that age 
 but adds to his splendor, and he repeatedly caresses each object 
 upon the face of the earth, kissing with lips of love that which 
 with his ardors he vivifies. The wind is fresh and mild, and 
 seems to be the same being which God formed, and set upon 
 the back of a cherubim to fly through space. The flowers will 
 not permit themselves to have been created for the pomp of 
 the fields and the embalming of the atmosphere in vain ; they 
 exhale their perfumes, so that the morning breeze, playing with 
 them, forms aromatic clouds around the globe, making it repeat 
 to the Maker that all which came from his hands is good. The 
 birds chirping, twittering, and making harmonious modulations, 
 sing hymns of praise to Him who ploughs through space upon 
 a cloud. The silence of nature in these hours is the homage of 
 admiration infused by the presence of Him who animated all 
 by an omnipotent breath. The streams murmur softly, the 
 cascades with leaps of joy, the rivers with placid flow, the seas 
 with dimpled and tranquil waves. The countless leaves of the 
 forest whisper their loves ; wild beasts retire, fearing the Good- 
 ness which looks at them with irate countenance : the birds 
 are frisking in the bowery trees ; the innocent beasts in the 
 fat meadows. Man, if in these hours he treads his earth, 
 feels his lungs expand, longs to respire with double throat, has 
 more life in his life, is filled 'with joy, and perchance blesses the
 
 122 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 infinite power of Him who made him lord of such marvels. It 
 is one of these mornings, and the ruins of the Paraclete, although 
 they are but fragments and vestiges of what they have been, are 
 resonant with life. The saxifrages, the ivies, the parietarias, 
 the twining and climbing plants of all kinds, as though ashamed 
 of being in ruins, stretch out their shoots crowned with dew, 
 spread open their leaves, and dispute among themselves for the 
 covering of these ruins with their luxurious clothing ; the spar- 
 rows, the swallows, the martens from the banks of the Seine, 
 frisk about those cages which nature has given them to free 
 them from the snares of men, and wagging their little tails, 
 now cocked up, now turned down, they express with their chir- 
 ruping the enjoyment they experience. Schmidt's dog stretches 
 out his fore-paws, inclines his body forward, pricks up his ears, 
 fixes his eyes, and pounces barking upon a lizard, which seeing 
 itself attacked, runs off, insinuates itself into its nest, and, in 
 token of its mockery of the hunter, thrusts out its eyes and lit- 
 tle snout through the hole, wagging its unquiet tongue. Every 
 thing respires joy, so that the raven of the Paraclete, not wish- 
 ing to disturb by its sinister presence this scene of pleasure, 
 condemns itself to run down into the lowest spots, making 
 plunges, as though in chase of unclean animals, which are un- 
 worthy of a place in the luxurious chain this morning dis- 
 plays. Where is Schmidt? What arc his beloved disciples 
 doing ? What are they, Jos, and Martha, thinking of the visit 
 of the preceding night ? Do they know what has occurred ? 
 Do they weep, or are they pouring out raging foam ? Let us 
 not respect its mysterious immobility ; the Paraclete is a heap 
 of ruins which has a thousand skylights ; let us imitate the 
 sun, who, wherever he can find a crevice, penetrates with his 
 light and illumines the darkness. We do well to imitate the 
 sun, who at this moment is gilding the entrance to the subter- 
 ranean places. We have found Schmidt, who has just spoken 
 with much mystery to the agent- of police. The latter has 
 gone again. The sage no longer moves with grave step ; his
 
 THE RUINS OF THE PARACLETE. 123 
 
 walk is accelerated ; he seems to be "a young man of thirty 
 years ; Jose and he meet, and the first says : 
 
 They are informed. 
 
 Have they already directed their steps to the spot? 
 -Yes, Doctor? 
 
 Then follow me, son Jos''. 
 
 Before they arrive, let us hear what Rosamunda says to 
 Hector : 
 
 What can it be? Can you imagine what was the sub- 
 ject of last night's interview? 
 
 No, my Rosamunda, no ; but as he has already called 
 us, we shall know soon. How beautiful you have arisen this 
 morning ! 
 
 The girl blushes and casts down her eyes. 
 
 Now you are more enchanting ; color gives your cheek a 
 celestial glow. 
 
 She turns a deeper color. 
 
 I never saw you so lovely ! 
 
 It is the morning that makes it seem so to you. 
 
 And Rosamunda, being no longer master of her actions, 
 throws herself into the arms of Hector, perhaps to make the 
 blushes of her love fly with the palpitations of his heart. 
 
 In fact, Rosamunda has this morning a certain I-know-not- 
 what, which we might translate, if she were not sixteen, and if 
 our readers had not already divined that she is in the morning 
 dawn of her age of beauty. Clasping each other's hands, they 
 are going to sit down, when they hear the steps of two persons. 
 It is Schmidt and Jose. Hector sighs, Rosamunda draws on 
 each side of her enchanting face a mass of blond ringlets. 
 
 The sage enters. His countenance bears the marks of sad- 
 ness and of desperation, mixed with hope and a future. With 
 tranquil voice he says to them : 
 
 Now, my children of adoption, the hour is come. Pre- 
 pare your baggage ; you will not be without the means of living 
 for some time. I am poor, but not so much so but that my
 
 124 TUX TWO FATHERS. 
 
 former savings have left me insured against want. Jose will 
 aid you. Now I am going out, and shall not return till the 
 close of the evening. Have every thing in readiness for your 
 journey. Before we separate I will give you the counsels that 
 your youth, your career, and your condition require. 
 
 Kosamunda falls a-weeping, Hector drops his head, and the 
 sage, that he may not exhibit proof that he is a man, retires 
 turning his face towards them, and letting fall a tear. 
 
 Near Sergines where de Vieux has part of his estates, there 
 is a laborer's cottage of miserable aspect. In the entrance, 
 under the shade of a luxurious vine, at mid-day, an old hus- 
 bandman is seated, smoking a clay pipe. His sad countenance, 
 the wandering of his eyes, the distraction which seems habitual 
 to him, make us stop to contemplate him for some moments. 
 Within the hut a girl of seventeen is singing, and doing the 
 work belonging to her sex and condition. Every strain of the 
 girL makes the old man pour forth a mouthful of smoke, and a 
 sigh. On one of the repetitions of the refrain of the ditty, the 
 wind brings to the ears of the ancient these words : 
 
 " Jure-le moi sur ta mere au tombeau " 
 
 and they have hardly expired in the air when he shakes his 
 head, puts his little finger into the expiring pipe, empties the 
 ashes, sucks once or twice, and says : 
 
 Mary, Mary ! 
 
 Father 
 
 Bring me the tobacco-pouch. 
 
 "Where is it, father ? 
 
 By the rack. 
 
 The girl disappears and returns instantly, with a small 
 leathern bag in her hand. 
 Here it is, father. 
 
 Give it me, Mary, give it me. This is one of those days 
 when your sister used to get up laughing, be all day singing 
 the same as you were singing just now. and go to bed laughing
 
 THE BUINS OF THE PARACLETE. 125 
 
 heartier than ever. Poor Martha ! she was the very picture of 
 your mother ! 
 
 Mary, whose appearance is ordinary, has an exquisite and 
 eminent sensibility, and has hardly heard the name of her sis- 
 ter, when she inclines her head, and drops a couple of tears. 
 The old man continues : 
 
 Where can the poor thing be ? Who would have thought 
 Martha would become possessed ? Do you remember how 
 glad she was to go and be the maid of my lady the Baroness ? 
 I had been reckoning up my hopes for my old age, thinking 
 she would keep this good place 
 
 But, father, why do you always say that Martha is pos- 
 sessed ? Does she not rather seem to be mad ? 
 
 No, my daughter, don't think it ; your sisterly love 
 blinds you, but my fatherly love sees things more clearly. In 
 the beginning of her sickness, that is to say. when M. le Baron 
 left her in the castle, because it was not possible to take her 
 to Paris in that state, she appeared so ; but afterwards, oh ! 
 afterwards, the Cure of Sergines undeceived me, showing me 
 how the exorcisms made her furious. Many times my lord, the 
 Baron, has told me of the rage Martha had against him, such 
 rage that one cannot believe it could come from any where 
 but the old enemy. 
 
 So good as my lord is ! Do you remember a fortnight 
 ago when he was here, he gave me while you were in the field 
 two louis-d'or ? 
 
 Yes, my daughter, he has always been generous to me 
 and my children. 
 
 I'll bet you don't know what he said to me. 
 
 What did he say to you ? 
 
 Why, he patted my chin, and said, ; ' Now don't go 
 
 and hate me, Mary, like Martha does." 
 
 That was as much as to say, that these are the sort of 
 injuries he does to his tenants, and particularly to Martha, 
 whom he loved as much as my lady his aunt.
 
 126 
 
 The countryman fills his pipe, and begins to puff. The 
 smoke which issues does not let him see the color that had come 
 into the cheek of his daughter Mary as she said, " Why, .... 
 he patted my chin . ..." 
 
 From the place where they are the river is visible, and di- 
 rectly after the steamboat has passed they see coming towards 
 them a tall man, with a great red beard, poorly dressed. Five 
 minutes after he comes up to the door and asks : 
 
 Are you M. Jules Bonhomme? 
 
 Your servant, what can I do for you ? 
 
 Have you not a daughter called Martha, who some time 
 ago in one of her fits of madness disappeared from home ? 
 
 The old man looks at his questioner, then at his daughter 
 Mary, and says : 
 
 For my misfortune, sir, I am the father of that poor girl, 
 whom I weep for every moment, and I had just now named her 
 to her sister, my daughter Mary, that you see beside me. 
 
 Well, M. Bonhomme, if you will permit me to speak a 
 few words with you. you will do me a great favor. 
 
 Say on. 
 
 I would be glad to be by ourselves. 
 
 Mary, daughter, go while I talk a bit with this gentle- 
 man, and pluck peas in the garden. 
 
 The girl goes, thinking who on earth so odd a man as this 
 can be. 
 
 Now we are alone. 
 
 Thank you, Monsieur Bonhomme ; you do not know me, 
 nor do I know you except by hearing : you arc poor. I also : 
 you are father, I also : you help the earth to yield her fruits. I 
 men that they should not die before their time ; so that be- 
 tween us two there is much resemblance, as far indeed as to be 
 alike unhappy. 
 
 You are very right. And what do you want of me ? 
 
 First sit down, then answer a few very simple questions 
 that I am going to ask, and in the end we will see if I can give 
 you any consolation in your sorrows.
 
 - 
 THE RUINS OF THE PARACLETE. \rtf 
 
 The countryman takes off his hat, the brim of which being 
 very broad, as is the fashion of the country people in some de- 
 partments of France, is bent into a variety of shapes, puts his 
 pipe into the pocket of his jacket, rests his elbows on his knees, 
 lifts up his head, and with open mouth and eyes sets himself 
 down to listen to the stranger. 
 
 Tell me, Monsieur Bonhomme, who loves his wife and 
 children most ; a duke, a prince, a king, or a laborer, a shoe- 
 maker, a hodman? Who loves them most, M. le Baron de 
 Vieux or you ? 
 
 Who loves his wife and children most? I dare say my 
 friend and master, the Baron de Vieux, loves his very much ; 
 
 but but I love mine more, for they have, cost me 
 
 many tears. 
 
 Well, we think alike : answer another question. If you 
 had a son and he were at the castle, and he deceived the daugh- 
 ter of M. le Baron, what would they do to him ? 
 
 They would put him in prison and then .... then 
 they would guillotine him. 
 
 They would do exactly that. And if a noble or a rich 
 man came and deceived Mary, that girl who just left us, and 
 you knew it. what would you do with the noble or the rich 
 man? 
 
 What would I do ? Parbleu ! . . . . what could I do ? I 
 
 should kill him no, no and the laborer reflects 
 
 I could do nothing, sir, because I am poor : I should content my- 
 self with weeping, for I am old. 
 
 Then that is precisely what has happened to Martha. 
 -Eh! what? 
 
 - Poor Martha, your daughter, who is more beloved by 
 you than is that of the Baron de Vieux by her father, the unhappy 
 Martha, through your being poor and old, has been a victim to 
 the wickedness of the Baron dc Vieux. 
 
 Don't speak so loud; don't speak so loud : how can this be? 
 
 You do not believe it?
 
 128 77/A' T\\'<> 
 
 Why .... perhaps .... but how can it be so 1 
 
 Listen, tell me what you would do if you were forty years 
 old, and rich, to one who should do to your daughter what I am 
 going to describe. Just suppose, then, that she is a poor inno- 
 cent, that she has been dazzled with promises, that she has been 
 deceived with gold, that she has been led to think it all in play, 
 that she has been taken for ladies' maid to the Baroness, that 
 she is made to drink a poison which bereaves her of reason and 
 enables them to do with her in that state whatever is suggested 
 to the vile seducer by brutal caprice ; that they get tired of her, 
 that her reason is overturned, that she sees herself abandoned, 
 that her father curses her, that her family flies from her, that 
 people point their fingers at her, that they believe her possessed 
 with a devil ; that they take her to church to exorcise her, that 
 from fear she holds her tongue, that she cannot kill her vile 
 
 " corruptor, but that she has the heart to hate him : would you 
 immolate this unhappy being, sacrificed to the bestiality of the 
 nobleman, and being her father thrust her from your house ; and 
 would you respect the nobleman and serve him. and bring up 
 the other daughter that he might without doubt do other things 
 as bad to her, with no other reason than that you are poor and 
 he noble and rich? This is just what happened to poor Mar- 
 tha. What say you ? 
 
 The countryman sobbing, exclaims : 
 
 And my poor Martha has suffered all this ? and my dear 
 daughter has been treated so ? and I am poor ? and I am old ? 
 and I can say nothing ? Where is my poor Martha ? Has she 
 killed herself? .... Sir ! . . . . Sir ! . . . . Bonhommc kneels 
 down, seizes the hands of Schmidt, and with broken accent con- 
 tinues Where is my poor daughter ? Oh ! if it was certain what 
 you say . . . . he rises up although I am old, I would plunge 
 a knife . . . . he looks round no, nowhere, because I am poor, 
 I am poor 
 
 Don't weep, my friend, Martha lives. Martha is quite 
 well, Martha will come to-morrow.
 
 THE R UINS OF THE PARA CLETE. \ 29 
 
 To-morrow ? . . . Give me your hands, sir .... or angel, 
 give me your hands, and where is she ? 
 
 In the house of a friend of yours, in my house. 
 
 Mary ! Mary ! Bonhomme seems mad with joy, and 
 continues Martha is alive, Martha is not possessed, Martha 
 will come to-morrow. 
 
 Hush ! keep silence ! All this has been done by a phy- 
 sician ; but revenge for the outrage is the work of a father. 
 The countryman inclines his head, reflects, and says : 
 
 It's of no use, I cannot avenge the outrages inflicted on 
 my daughters by the seigneurs and the rich ; I am poor, and if 
 he sends me away from this place, they and I will perish, beg- 
 ging from door to door, for I am old, and if they do not die 
 they will come to worse, driven to it by hunger. Sir, the poor 
 man always suffers even in having children, and the rich man 
 always enjoys. 
 
 Well ; Martha will come home to-morrow, you must do 
 what she tells you. and that you may not be dependent on this 
 savage, take two thousand francs in louis-d'or ; Martha will 
 tell you where you must go. 
 
 The chaf of the purse on the bench gives Bonhomme no 
 time either to throw himself at the feet of the stranger, or to 
 think of what has happened to him ; when he turns to look at 
 
 his benefactor and say to him, " Heaven bless " the sage 
 
 is not to be seen in the lane which fronts the cottage. 
 
 Those who live in cities, surrounded with pleasures, do not 
 know or think what the poor suffer, especially those of the 
 country, through the villany of those who own the lands culti- 
 vated by the unhappy husbandmen. Even the miserable po- 
 pulation of the cities is ignorant of what happens to the hus- 
 bandmen, for the corrupted population of the large and of the 
 middle-sized towns have an idea of what vice is, of what money 
 is worth, what it is to sell and buy honor and virtue ; perchance 
 they themselves are the abominable instruments of this fearful 
 6*
 
 130 THE T\VO I'ATIlKlls. 
 
 traffic, horror of the actual world, stain upon the rulers, re- 
 proach of all humanity ; but those of the country, oh ! these 
 innocents, who know only that they have to belabor the earth 
 to fill the purses of others, these innocents, who believe that a 
 Seigneur is a God, and when he arrives to take from them the 
 last sheaf of corn which they with their sweat have reaped, 
 make him a hundred bows, scrape their feet, put on their Sun- 
 day clothes, think it a holiday, these innocents, who have no 
 other letters than the clods they crumble with the plough, no 
 other leaves to enlighten them than those of the trees, no other 
 science than that of bearing the burden and heat of the day, no 
 other book than the sky, which they look at at the rising and 
 setting sun. to read whether its rays are about to ripen or burn 
 up the harvest, or whether the rain is about to bedew their 
 fruits with pearls, or they are to be parched up ; nor other reli- 
 gion than to ask God to suffer them to make their sheaves to 
 lay gold, sweat, fatigue, labor, at the feet of their lords, these 
 poor creatures are heroes. Oh ! what hapless beings are the 
 innocent husbandmen ! And can the rich and the noble have 
 the heart to enter your houses to rob you of honor, tranquillity, 
 peace, and innocence ? Yes, it is here that they lash them- 
 selves into the greatest fury ; here that they come to pluck 
 roses and lilies ; here that they come to carry away fruits and 
 leave thorns ; here that they come to lay waste the luxury of 
 the country that possesses more moral flowers than there are 
 colors in the meadows ! Oh ! what hapless beings are the in- 
 nocent husbandmen ! And do the rich and the great mock at 
 your unsophisticated simplicity ? Why do they not remember 
 iu treading your thresholds, that your sons defend with arms in 
 their hands their fantastic nobility and their treasures ? Why 
 do not they remember that your daughters and wives feed the 
 insects which enable those of the nobles to clothe themselves 
 with rich silks ? Why do they not consider that you purvey 
 for their markets, that you deck out their tables, that you per- 
 fume their saloons, that you make their cups reek with exqui-
 
 TEE B JJ2NS OF THJS PARA CLETE. \ 3 \ 
 
 site nectars, that you spin the thread converted also by the 
 people into fine clothing, that their skin may be delicately de- 
 fended ? Why do they not consider that you deprive your- 
 selves of the best of every thing to offer it to them ? that you 
 select your most exquisite productions wherewith to do them 
 homage ? Oh ! how unhappy are the poor husbandmen ! And 
 why do you, great and rich, mock at their innocence ? Why 
 do you trample on their innocent daughters ? Why do you 
 not respect the moral freshness of their wives ? Why ? Be- 
 cause you are accustomed to this for many centuries ? And 
 do you not know that he icho takes the sword shall perish by 
 tlie sword ? Do you believe that this dependence will last for 
 ever ? Do you imagine that the religion of Christ, of the car- 
 penter's son, will not illuminate them, and notwithstanding the 
 fascination your clergy exercises over them, that it will not 
 make them know that we are all brethren, and that their origin 
 is as noble as yours? Do you natter yourselves that these 
 arms which defend your riches and palaces can never be con- 
 verted into instruments of popular glory, of equality, of inde- 
 pendence ? Do you think that the sons of the husbandman 
 Noah will not very soon know that they are descendants of his 
 three sons, who were equal to their father, and that only vice 
 unlevels this equality? Why, will not your vices unlevel it, 
 and the saying of the Gospel be verified, that those who are last 
 shall be first, and that the first shall be last ? . Ye noble and 
 rich ! priests and savans ! think well on what you are doing, 
 afflict not with wickednesses those who maintain your luxury, 
 those who fill your coffers with gold. Behold ! the blind will 
 change his darkness into light the moment there is any one to 
 open his eyes. Oh ! how worthy of compassion are the poor 
 innocent husbandmen ! In the intense heats of August they 
 thresh out their corn all day long ; in the frosts of winter they 
 chop their wood ; in the rains of spring they prune the trees ; 
 in seed time they sow, in the winds of autumn they reap and 
 fill your stores with richest fruits ; and when they return to
 
 132 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 their houses dragging the rake, or with the spade on their 
 shoulders, drenched with rain or shivering with cold, the poor 
 enjoy no other felicity than looking on their wives, talking of 
 their work, caressing their offspring, on whom they calculate 
 for the future, admiring the ruddy cheeks of their daughters, 
 who have been working like themselves, and will work all their 
 lives, and after a frugal supper, in which perhaps they thank 
 and praise the landlord of their farms, who has condescended to 
 visit them to carry off all the sweat of the toiler, they go to 
 bed, they sleep, for they are flesh and blood, and are fatigued 
 with their labor ; and perhaps the visit of the lord has robbed 
 them of the peace of their bed, of the aroma of virtue which was 
 respired at their firesides, and of the hopes they had con- 
 ceived of their daughters. Oh ! ye noble and rich, be not 
 cruel. Why embitter these unhappy innocents ? Why glory in 
 desolating them, in humiliating them, in lacerating their gene- 
 rous hearts? Lo! with the money you pay you shall be paid ! 
 Look well to it ! The country of the 19th century is not that 
 of the middle ages ; know that the fires of domestic peace may 
 be converted into the flames of war ! Read, read, and you will 
 see that since 1793, the world has undergone a revolution, and 
 the aristocrats are crest-fallen; and in 1850, the rich already 
 begin to dread the socialist demagogues. Do not exacerbate 
 the poor ; respect them, love them, and you will see how little 
 these evil socialist seeds will germinate, for how will the people 
 rise against those who treat them as children ? How will they 
 injure those who heap them with benefits ? Of what can the 
 demagogues make a handle to sow enmity between the country 
 and the cities, between the workshops and the palaces or man- 
 sions of the powerful, if you are objects of gratitude ? Ye noble 
 and rich ! look to your own interests, and convert your haughty 
 manners, your vaporing pride, your thirst of gold and pleasures, 
 into benignity towards the poor and plebeian, into mansuetude, 
 into magnanimous disinterestedness, into just and pure enjoy- 
 ments. Consider that it is better to be humane towards the
 
 THE B UINS OF THE PARACLETE. 1 33 
 
 people, for they are more grateful than the opulent, and you 
 need not fear the apostles of robbery, who cover themselves 
 with the veil of compassion towards the masses, while their only 
 object is to take what belongs to you. Consider that the turn 
 of the people may come to act upon the lessons you have taught 
 them. He who takes the sword shall perish by the sword. 
 Look, ye great and rich ! the people in 1851 make a question 
 not only of eating and drinking, they wish to be enfranchised, 
 and afterwards to form themselves into an independent estate, 
 and then, alas for the rich ! it will be for them as it is now for 
 the titled. Behold ! the clergy no longer possess any thing ; 
 see ! titles, and first fruits, and seignoralties are all over ; see ! 
 individual property has made much increase with the revolu- 
 tions ; see ! there occur no more devises of land to the monas- 
 teries ; see ! every one of the sons of the people begins to say : 
 - This, which appertained to the count, the marquis, or the 
 clergy, is mine. Consider that property, however little, makes 
 men independent ; that ignorance is beginning to disappear, 
 that more than will serve your turn can be taught the people 
 in very few years. Be then charitable, kind, brothers to all 
 men, that, in the time of revolt, you may be reckoned as such. 
 
 In this manner, or some other very similar, Schmidt dis- 
 courses, reascending the Seine. 
 
 It is 6 o'clock in the evening, and the inhabitants of the 
 Paraclete are uneasy at not seeing their protector return, for 
 he had gone out before 5 o'clock in the morning. To form an 
 approximative idea of the state of mind in which the two young 
 people, Jose and Martha, find themselves, it will be sufiicient to 
 put ourselves in their places, in the midst of all the circum- 
 . stances which surround them. At this hour they have all as- 
 sembled in the eastern part of the ruins, their gaze fixed on the 
 path which leads from the river beyond Nogent to tRe Para- 
 clete. How different are their countenances ! The utterance of
 
 1 3 4 THE TWO FA TIIERS. 
 
 each one's soul is legible through the anxiety depicted on their 
 features. Jose is waiting, simply waiting ; Martha is anxious 
 to know something that touches her soul ; Hector fears lest he 
 may have lost his protector ; the interesting Rosamunda is 
 agitated with emotions as many as the waves formed by her 
 blond ringlets, agitated by the gentle evening zephyrs : and 
 after searching the horizon, she sets her celestial eyes on the hea- 
 vens, as though trusting only in them. All are wrapped in the 
 expectation of seeing the arrival of him who is, so to speak, the 
 life of tho'se anxious ones. Breaking the silence which they 
 have for some time preserved, Hector says : 
 
 Jose, do you not know where the doctor has gone ? 
 This question reminds the listeners where they are, and 
 
 three deep respirations are heard. Jose takes his eyes from 
 the path, and turning them towards the youth, replies : 
 
 Who can know that ? He is so pensive .... 
 
 One of the four knows more or less whither Schmidt has 
 gone, or imagines so, and on hearing Jose, Martha says : 
 
 Perhaps he will not be long. 
 
 Why do you say so, Martha ? 
 
 Because .... because the night is already coming on. 
 
 And if any misfortune should have happened to him, or 
 the melancholy which possesses him should have .... 
 
 Rosamunda till now has not opened her lips ; but the re- 
 ticence of Hector, united to the word misfortune, makes her 
 burst out into a 
 
 No, no ; nothing can happen to him, he is too good for 
 God to leave him unprotected. 
 
 The eyes of the sentimental French girl have fixed them- 
 selves on those of Hector, as though seeking to discover whe- 
 ther she has deceived herself. All sink again into silence. 
 The sun oscillates between the mountains of the west, and na- 
 ture clothes herself in that pensive raiment lent her by the ap- 
 proachof darkness, whose influence is shared by our heart 
 whenever upon rising ground we are surprised by night. This
 
 THE RUISS OF THE PARACLETE. 135 
 
 is the most august of the hours. Well says Ugo Foscolo, that 
 the close of evening, seen from flowery eminences, is a fruitful 
 subject for the artist's pencil, and it might be added, that it is 
 no less so for the pen of the moralist ; for the soul deprived of 
 the beauties of the exterior world, wraps herself in a melan- 
 choly nonchalance, which reveals the jealousy with which she is 
 inspired, at not being able to enjoy the mysteries of the globe 
 in those hours in which it is overspread by the breath of sleep. 
 Those of the Paraclete feel this melancholy pushed to its 
 highest degree, by the somewhat strange absence of their com- 
 mon father ; but all give a start of surprise, the features of all 
 become animated, a thousand emotions traverse their counte- 
 nances, when, blended with the last chirp of the birds, and the 
 sound of the bells on the cattle, they hear a whistle ; it is 
 Schmidt, who has just made use of it to announce to them his 
 presence in the entrance to the ruins. Some minutes after he 
 sees himself surrounded by them, and rejoices in the pleasure 
 which those only know, who, imitating Providence, receive the 
 homage of grateful affection from those who love them, and 
 look up to them as to a second God upon the earth. The coun- 
 tenance of Schmidt is at this moment like those hours of cer- 
 tain days in spring, in which the sun shines for a moment with 
 resplendent majesty, and is then obscured by the clouds which 
 cross the sky, and leave but pallid rays upon the earth. The 
 manifestations of his adopted children make his forehead di- 
 late, while their position causes his forehead to become arched. 
 He takes Martha aside, and says in her ear : 
 
 At 12 oclock at night, my daughter, you will go down to 
 seek your father and sister, and then I will tell you what line 
 of conduct you ought to follow. 
 
 Then he asks if all is ready. Upon their making an affirm- 
 ative sign, he intimates that it is the hour for dinner, and that 
 afterwards he has to speak with them of matters of deep inter- 
 est. Nothing which can reveal his emotion is discovered at the 
 table, it is only to be seen that the soul of the sage is in one of
 
 1 36 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 those solemn crises in which the intensity of its action engages 
 the highest powers, giving him a meditative air. The frugal 
 meal finished, they repair to the chemical laboratory, where the 
 four wait for Schmidt, who has disappeared for some minutes. 
 
 The souls of some privileged beings are altogether different- 
 ly constituted from those of the vulgar. The physician who 
 figures here had been educated in his youth by religious per- 
 sons ; his profession had further confirmed him in the faith of 
 an Omnipotent God. With the scalpel in his hands he had 
 witnessed the wondrous works of the incomprehensible Maker, 
 and bowed his head at the sight of his own littleness. To be 
 penetrated with the infinite wisdom of God, it will be sufficient 
 for man to look at the animal creation. Spinoza, Voltaire, and 
 Rousseau, were atheists from ostentatious pride, not from inti- 
 mate conviction. There are few men, who, with sincerity, dis- 
 avow the power of the Supreme Maker. Men in general see 
 themselves so little, that they must perforce render tribute to 
 an Extraordinary Being, unknown in Himself, but manifest in 
 his marvellous operations. If any one is more than others in 
 duty bound to worship God, the prerogative belongs to the 
 physician. The ignorant are atheists because ignorance is the 
 monster of monsters. Schmidt has all his life recognised the 
 hand of God in all that he has examined ; and whenever his 
 science has lost itself in that labyrinth of wonders, the body 
 and soul of man, he has uttered exclamations which were a 
 veritable hymn of praise to the Fabricator of Nature. The 
 goodness, the wisdom, the arrangement, the inexplicable har- 
 mony of the parts, the beauty of the whole, his own impotence 
 in penetrating so great mysteries, have been luminous pages, 
 reminding the sage that the wisdom of the world is foolishness 
 in the eyes of God ; and thence it has happened that Schmidt 
 sees always this world-watchfulness of the Supreme Being in 
 all created things. 
 
 After dinner he retires to reflect alone on what is taking 
 place, and he begins to discourse in this wise :
 
 THE R UINS OF THE PARA CLETE. \ 37 
 
 What prayer can I now utter more apt than " Our 
 Father?" To whom should I, a poor old man, have recourse in 
 the conflict in which I find myself? Hector and Rosamunda 
 are my children of adoption ; in them had I reckoned the glory 
 of my old age ; they were to have closed the eyes of my poor 
 body ; it was a consolation after the loss of the wife and daugh- 
 ter of my body, to be able to expect on my death-bed the ten- 
 derness of the children of my spirit ; but not even this plea- 
 sure, oh, God ! nor this hope ! " Thy will be done on earth 
 even as in heaven." I am but an atom of thy existence, why 
 should I wish to alienate myself from thy will ? " It is hard 
 to kick against the pricks." In heaven, on earth, in hell, in the 
 recesses of the human heart, there art Thou as prime mover, 
 and there is thy will done. To conform myself to it is but to 
 confess my dependence on Thee. Thou hast foreseen all my 
 steps, my sufferings, the atoms of my existence ; without Thee 
 nothing is done ; why should I wish to fly from that which 
 Thou hast marked out in the rotation of my days ? Oh ! to 
 love and to adore is to conform oneself to the will of the being 
 loved. Well, then, I love Thee, I adore Thee. ' : Thy will be 
 done on earth as it is done in heaven." They will go away this 
 night ; I shall not see them again, who knows for how long ? I 
 shall lose from my sight the eyes of Rosamunda, which are the 
 picture of those of Wilhelmina. I shall for ever lose the ex- 
 pressive face of Hector, that face which represents my youth ; 
 I shall lose it all. God of Mercy ! Might of Mights ! I am 
 weak ; but shine upon me, as the sun upon the plant laid low 
 by the hurricane, and I shall lift up my head full of strength 
 .... Oh ! Thou demandest of me one thing ..." Forgive 
 us our debts as we forgive our debtors." I forgive my debtors ; 
 I forgive them, Lord ! They are molecules of Thy exist- 
 ence, which have gone astray ; they are atoms like myself, 
 which have not chosen to follow the impulse of Thy will ; but 
 in the end they will flow back to Thee, Immeasurable Ocean ! 
 these little streams, turned out of their course on the steep de-
 
 138 THE TWO 
 
 clivity of the mountains and mingled in Thy waters, will swell 
 with me the sea of Thy greatness. And what would become of 
 me if I did not pardon them ? On falling into the great arch of 
 Eternity, I should go floating and insulated, without any one 
 with whom to unite myself in blessing Thy greatness ; and I 
 could enjoy nothing, because I should not form part of Thy 
 will, and consequently, the mere effort to be with Thee, and to 
 be accompanied by others, would be a hell of agonies. I for- 
 give them, and I will do thy will. 
 
 Before any other Idea can assault him he goes out in search 
 of his beloved disciples ; but how changed his countenance ! 
 Schmidt, in this act, is sublime as his ideas are grand. Schmidt 
 forms part of the will of God, and is resplendent with the good- 
 ness respired by the countenance of Divinity, compassionate to- 
 wards poor man. 
 
 As soon as he comes into their presence, the two young peo- 
 ple throw themselves on his neck with tears in their eyes. 
 Schmidt embraces them, and from the movement of their two 
 heads it may be seen that the breast of the sage heaves and falls 
 convulsively, his compressed sighs forming undulations. For a 
 time all remains in silence, at the end of which, sitting down, 
 he commences thus : 
 
 Children of m}- mind and heart, the hour is come ; you 
 have to set out within a few instants, and we shall not see each 
 other again, perhaps till eternity. 
 
 All weep. 
 
 I wished that when my soul had to leave the body my eyes 
 might feel the contact of your hands, and that my soul should 
 hear the flood of tears you poured out for him who was bidding 
 you adieu for so long a journey. This music which accompa- 
 nies the dying in the solitude of death, will be wanting to me. 
 I shall die alone alone, without any one to dry up the dying 
 tear ; the tears of all fall faster but. my children, there is a 
 "Will superior to all the desires of men, and to which we ought 
 to bend our reason.
 
 THK RUL\S Ob' THE PARACLETE. 139 
 
 Aud what is that, Doctor ? 
 - That of God, Hector. 
 
 The eyes of those who surround the sage fix themselves 
 upon his, which have a sublime expression of melancholy gran- 
 deur. 
 
 My children, we are all unhappy, but to all of us will 
 come the day of joy. Before bidding each other adieu, it is my 
 duty to give you one counsel in addition to the many I have 
 inculcated on you during these last days, and it is, that in the 
 course of life you should consider that you are on a journey, 
 and that before arriving at its end, you will meet many obsta- 
 cles. You will suffer the death of all your good tendencies in- 
 flicted on you by men and their crimes : you will pass under 
 their judgments which must needs be of the worst, when David, 
 on the prophet Gad proposing to him the three punishments, as 
 you may read in the 2d Book of Samuel, chapter xxiv., said: 
 Let us fall now into the hand of the Lord, and let me not fall 
 into the hand of man." You will suffer the hell of their 
 tongues, of their envy, of their appetites, who, in order to suc- 
 ceed in their designs, will not omit any moral or even physical 
 tortures upon which they can lay their hands, or which their 
 heads can devise ; but do not lose your vigor, take it for certain 
 that in the midst of these horrors you can make yourselves one 
 glory, that of conforming to the will of the Bounteous Maker, 
 and following His law. llcmember that neither those who per- 
 secute, nor those who are persecuted, will live to see a cen- 
 tury ; imagine them to be, as in fact they are, the molecules 
 which people the air, and are visible only because the sun 
 shines upon them, as men all exist only because God is diffused 
 through them ; respect in yourselves and in others this pre- 
 sence, eternal presence of the Divinity, and whatever injury 
 may be done to you, forget it, forgive it ; and love all your fel- 
 low-creatures as parts of a compound which benefit each other, 
 that harmony may reign over all. Observe, my children, that 
 man excited by the injustice of others may, in a moment of frenzy,
 
 140 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 hate them ; but if he reflects a moment, he will love them. 
 Who could he more irritated against men than God ? and yet 
 He came down from heaven, He became man, He felt what 
 men feel, and so loved them that He not only prayed for them, 
 exculpated them, forgave, loved them, but gave even His life 
 for beings so ungrateful. To forgive an enemy is grand, but 
 to love him is sublime ; this the God-Man alone could teach. 
 All the philosophers have spoken of generosity ; but of love for 
 those who have injured us, Christ alone, who is chief over all 
 the wise. Be just, fly from the paths of the wicked, do not ap- 
 proach them, but love them because they are parts of that 
 whole whose head is God. And have you ever seen the foot 
 hate the hand, or the hand the foot ? It will, no doubt, appear 
 strange to you all, for all of you are victims of the bad, that in 
 this solemn moment I should tell you to forgive and love your 
 enemies ; but listen. When one considers what passes in the 
 world he becomes enraged, he repents having had any thing to 
 do with men, as God for their iniquities repented having made 
 them : he finds himself weak in the presence of so many ene- 
 mies to battle with ; he sinks into despair on seeing the poor 
 despised, persecuted, abandoned ; he is filled with indignation 
 in thinking that the sweat of the people, their wives, their 
 daughters, their honor, their tranquillity, their dignity as ra- 
 tional beings, their liberty of thought, their affections, their 
 existence, their present, their past, their future, all is in the 
 hands of the noble and rich, who do at will what they please, 
 their crimes remaining unpunished because they are powerful, 
 rich, influential. The law is for them a puppet of India-rubber 
 which they put into what form they like, dress as they please, 
 color according to their fancy, and which as an ultimate conse- 
 quence, they stretch and stretch, its returning blows falling on 
 those who stand by looking at them. Oh ! the unhappy people 
 are exasperated at seeing their sons carried off from their anus 
 to serve not their country, but the ambitious aims of the man- 
 darins ; the unhappy people groan heavily, seeing they have not
 
 THE R UINS OF THE PA KA OLETE. \ 4 1 
 
 hands, hours, minutes, strength enough to meet the taxes heaped 
 upon them ; the unhappy people sink in despair, seeing that 
 even the peace of their hearths is disturbed, that the pretty 
 woman, that the graceful and virtuous girl, are the target of the 
 magnates, who either corrupt or kill them ; the unhappy people 
 are maddened seeing themselves so abject, so despised, so little 
 respected ; the unhappy people are in agony, seeing that even 
 the talents of their children are food for the wickedness of the 
 vicious, whether in the theatres, in public assemblies, in private 
 houses ; the poor man, if he have any education, weeps bitterly, 
 seeing infinite numbers of his companions imbruted for the 
 want of it, and without religion, without education, without no- 
 bleness of soul, committing atrocities ; and the masses in an ac- 
 cess of fury, blaspheme, rage, seek to put every thing to fire 
 and sword, and seeing their impotence, sit down in the chimney 
 corner to weep over their misfortunes. Unhappy people ! Why 
 is there no one to tell you that religion in those moments is 
 the best consolation, that it ennobles you, that your escutcheons 
 are the cross of Christ, emblem of equality ; that the will of 
 God is that all men should be equal before the law, and that 
 no one has any right to set himself up in things civil or politi- 
 cal, over others ; for equality in virtue, in talents, in riches, is 
 impossible. Why do not these demagogues give you the conso- 
 lation of true religion, not of that which men have invented to 
 frighten you, to obscure your minds and drive you to despair ? 
 Would you know in what consists all the religion of Jesus 
 Christ ? Then I will tell it you in two words : " Thy will be done 
 on earth, as it is done in heaven." He who in all the events of 
 his life repeats these words and conforms himself to their mean- 
 ing, is a veritable disciple of the Man-God. Why do they not 
 present to your mind ideas of your dignity, that you may seek 
 the rights that ought to be conceded you, not with tumults, 
 with blood, with arms, with fire, with disorder, with pillage, 
 with barbarism ; but with reason, with calmness, with conviction 
 of your own grandeur? Do you think the autocrat of the Rus-
 
 1 42 THE TWO FA THERS. 
 
 sias, and all the despots of the world, would not tremble at hear- 
 ing rise from the four corners of the earth a voice, issuing from 
 the mouth of six hundred millions of men. saying, " Respect in 
 us the brethren of God become man, and we will respect the 
 authority which in His name we have deposited in your hands 
 as His children and our brothers?" Oh, yes ! this cry would 
 sound in their ears like the peal of thunder at the beginning 
 of the storm ; and they would hasten to recognize that the 
 symptoms of the tempest were imminent, so that they would 
 hasten to send the rain of the holy liberty of the Gospel on the 
 earth. But, my children, I have wandered from my starting 
 point ; it matters not much, my one object is to counsel you to 
 treasure dearly your own dignity, to conform to the will of God, 
 obey the divine law, submit to human laws based upon it, and 
 liberty of thought, of religion, of men. Do not give way to the vile 
 and wicked in any situation of life ; if you are poor, ever look 
 to Christ who was always so ; if you suffer perscution for being 
 strictly good, look at Christ, who says to you : " If they have 
 persecuted me, they will also persecute you ; the disciple is not 
 greater than his Lord." If you live in penury, conform your- 
 selves to His will, and do not forget that in the prayer which 
 He taught us with His divine lips, He says : " Forgive us our 
 debts, as we forgive our debtors." Oh ! how great a consolation 
 do I enjoy as I pronounce these words ! Do you know that the 
 life of man is an agony of death unless he forgives his enemies ? 
 Oh ! my children, it is late, but with God that word exists not ; 
 I recognize that religion and conformity to His divine will, con- 
 stitute felicity to man. In the midst of all sufferings, when you 
 find consolation in nothing which surrounds you, remember what 
 I am saying to you, turn your eyes to God and say to Him : 
 " Thy will be done on earth, even as it is done in heaven ;" and 
 I can avouch you that your breasts will be filled with consolation. 
 I forgive all who have caused me sorrow ; I forgive him who de- 
 prives me of the consolation of dying in your arms ; I forgive 
 all that I may suffer in future, occasioned by men ; and you,
 
 THE RUINS Of THE PARACLETE. 143 
 
 do you forgive, Hector, forgive ; Jose, forgive ; Martha, forgive ; 
 Rosamunda, daughter of my soul, forgive ; and look with your 
 heavenly eyes on all who have done us ill, that God. seeing an 
 angel asking pardon for them, may forgive them as we forgive 
 
 our debtors 
 
 Whew! . ... Whew-w-w ! . . . Whew-w-w-w ! 
 
 Whew-w-w-w-w ! . . . Whew-w-w-w-w-w-w ! . . . 
 
 These prolonged whistles cut short the discourse of Schmidt ; 
 they are repeated, and he says : 
 
 - They have already come for you ; Jose, go and speak 
 with Henri, the agent of police. 
 
 He has hardly finished these words when they all burst into 
 a flood of tears, and the two young people fall upon the neck of 
 the aged sage, mingling their sobs and tears, and uttering 
 broken words, which add to their feelings, and heighten 
 the interest of this sublime picture. Martha can no longer 
 bear her emotion, and entwines her arms round the delicious 
 waist of Rosamunda, crying : 
 
 And we shall never see him again ! 
 
 There are certain occasions in which Nature, by a sympa- 
 thetic act, unrecognized by men, shows that she condoles with 
 their sorrows. This day had been warm and cloudy along the 
 horizon, although the sun had shone with majestic pomp ; but 
 from nine o'clock at night, when the inhabitants of the Paraclete 
 began to weep, the sky began also to bedew the earth with her 
 tears. Standing up, the doctor draws his arm round the necks 
 of the two young people, pressing them to his breast, bedewing 
 the beautiful head of Rosamunda with his tears. A flash of 
 lightning illumines them, so that they can see each other 
 in that august moment. At the rebound of the thunder, 
 Schmidt says : 
 
 - The very Heavens announce j r our departure, and weep 
 over our separation. 
 
 Half an hour after, the five inhabitants of the ruins of the 
 Paraclete sally forth from the mouth of the cavern, two only to
 
 144 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 enter again. Schmidt, Hector, and the agent of police put 
 three trunks on their shoulders ; Jose leads the way ; Rosa- 
 tnunda goes along clinging to the hand of the doctor, and Mar- 
 tha, tearful, closes the procession. A flash of lightning illu- 
 minates the path, which has been made slippery by the fine rain 
 that is falling ; the wind lashes all their faces, and resounds 
 with hollow moan in the vaults, whistling along the summits of 
 the surrounding mountains ; the tempest is yet far off, so that 
 the rebound of the thunder sounds like the echo of cannon over 
 the wide expanse of the sea. All is solemn. By the sudden 
 flashing of the sky might be seen the despondent countenance 
 of the old man, his large beard besprinkled with tears and rain ; 
 that of Hector which is troubled, that of Rosamunda breathing 
 sadness, that of Martha denoting mingled grief and hope, that 
 of Jose, frowning darkly, that of the police agent, in which 
 anxiety and cupidity sat side by side. They walk in silence, 
 mingling their chip chap with that of the rain, and Schmidt 
 presses in his hands of parchment those of Rosamunda, soft and 
 cold. Now they are near the town, and the dogs of the neigh- 
 boring farm-houses bark ; the rain increases, the storm ap- 
 proaches, they quicken their pace, guided now by Henri, the 
 agent of police. Now they hear the impetuous rushing of the 
 river, whose waters are swollen by those of the mountains ; 
 now they perceive a little light in the midst, now all is dark- 
 ness, now all glares like the mouth of a furnace. Schmidt 
 wishes to speak, as is denoted by the rigid and convulsive pres- 
 sure of Rosamunda's hand ; but silence is necessary for his 
 object, and on this occasion is at the same time a martyrdom. 
 They arrive on the bank of the river, and while Henri talks 
 aside with the boatman, the German sage, in the midst of their 
 stifling sobs, gives them all his last counsels, which he calls his 
 Will. The trunks are put into the boat, except that which 
 Schmidt carries, which is Rosamunda's. and which he will not 
 give up till they are embarked. When they are upon the ves- 
 sel, he says in the car of Rosamunda :
 
 THE XUIXS OF THE PARACLETE. 145 
 
 In this portmanteau there are two hundred and fifty 
 louis-d'or ; one hundred and fifty are the dowry given you by 
 your father Schmidt, one hundred belong to Hector. 
 
 M. le Docteur, the boat must put off says the agent of 
 police. 
 
 Here is the desolation ! The young people burst into tears, 
 and Rosamunda kisses the hands of their adoptive father. A 
 flash of lightning illuminates the scene, and exhibits the aged 
 man in a flood of tears, imploring the benediction of Heaven 
 upon his two children of mind and heart. 
 
 Come says the hoarse voice of the master boatman, 
 sha'n't we ever have done ? 
 
 Schmidt rushes into the river with Jose, and seeing the 
 barge set loose, exclaims : 
 
 Perhaps till eternity ! Perhaps till eternity ! . . . . 
 His sobs are mingled with the moanings of the wind.
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 SOLITUDE is eminently sad, say the generality of men. Yet all 
 that is solitary does not inspire this void in the heart. What 
 is there more agreeable to the soul than the solitude of woods, 
 of gardens, of fields ? With what enchantments are not those 
 surrounded, who live in glens, environed by smiling hills 1 
 How delicious is the silence of the Virgin forests of America ! 
 how grand the aspect of its mountains ! How full of majesty 
 do not the Alps, with their immobility, seem to us, the Py- 
 renees, with their secular bristling crests, trodden only by the 
 vulture, the eagle, and the gray bear ! Who will describe 
 the. infinity of ideas which assault man when, retired from the 
 world, he, in the desert, contemplates gay Nature ; who at one 
 time laughs, shaking with delight the leaves of the trees ; at 
 others weeps, the wind moaning through the tangled branches, 
 and the brooks, waterfalls, and torrents murmuring sighs ; at 
 others grows angry, the furious hurricane agitating her long 
 green hair ; at others roars, the thunder repeating from cavity 
 to cavity the echo of her voice ; at others sleeps, with marvel- 
 lous immobility ; at others plays, the zephyr making the heart 
 leap in the breast with bounds of delight ; at others, persists in 
 giving us inimitable concerts, whose singers, spreading their 
 wings, drive us to desperation, melodious songs now receding, 
 now approaching ; at others, seeking to awaken in us the emo- 
 tions of a gladiator in the arena of the amphitheatre, presents 
 to us a wild beast, at the sight of which the whole body trem- 
 bles ; at others, as though mocking at us, repeats sounds which 
 say nothing, but which make us fancy we know their meaning, 
 recalling the accent, even the tone of voice of the beloved indi-
 
 THE K UINS OF TEE PARA GLETE. \ 47 
 
 vidual who occupies our imagination at that moment ; at others, 
 fascinates us, making us believe ourselves on the margin of the 
 sea, hearing the rippling of the waves ; at others, seduces us 
 with the sound of an instrument, while it is but the canes which 
 shake, rocked by the wind ; at others, flatters the senses with 
 most delicious odors ; at others, so enchants us, that, forsaking 
 her, we rush with soul and eyes into the heavens, partly hidden 
 from us by the luxuriant, tangling branches, and we intone a 
 hymn which must surely rise up the softest of songs to the 
 ears of the Maker. Oh ! how sweet is solitude to one who 
 suffers ! Far from the tumult of the mansions of men, he ad- 
 judges them all to be good, forgets that they have made him 
 unhappy. Coming to commune with nature so beneficent, he 
 glorifies God with open mouth, and feels all the beauty which 
 surrounds him. And if he is accompanied, if he sees beside 
 him the heavenly face of a wife beloved ; if he contemplates 
 the little cheeks of dear children ; if loves and caresses, virtue 
 and religion, make his heart palpitate, how delicious is soli- 
 tude ! Oh, the mortal who finds himself thus, is not exaspe- 
 rated by the sight of triumphant vice and abashed virtue ; the 
 man who is thus happy does not sin, does^not envy, does not 
 lust for others' goods, is not ambitious for gold, knows not the 
 torments which other men would inflict oji him, if he lived 
 among them ; his glory is that of the fields, whose ornament is 
 the apparel given by God ; his music is to celebrate His won- 
 ders ; his emotion is that of content ; his life is a delicious 
 dream, which passes in the gardens of the Creator, whence he 
 will fly to the throne of the Deity, in company with the aromas 
 of the flowers of the desert. Oh ! solitude indescribably deli- 
 cious I The poor, he who suffers, he who desires to taste a 
 bliss, prelude to that of the future, ought to seek this enchant- 
 ing solitude. , 
 
 But is the desert 'always so delicious? Is not the tomb 
 also a solitude ? Are not Pompeii and Herculancum also soli- 
 tudes 1 Are not the ruins also a solitude ? Is not orphanage
 
 148 T1IE 
 
 also a solitude ? Is not the parting from our friends also 
 a solitude ? Oh ! pale, sad solitude, in whose confused 
 shadows the heart wanders enveloped in the night of all the 
 affections. What solitude can compare with that of the home 
 of the husband who has just seen the corpse of his wife pass 
 out, and finds a void in the bed, witness of the mysteries of his 
 heart; who finds a void in the chair where sat his beloved : who 
 finds a void in the walls which repeated the echo of her dear 
 voice ; who finds a void in his heart, which seeks love and finds 
 .it not ; who finds a void in his very existence whose half has 
 abandoned him ; who finds a void in the cry of his children, 
 who call for their mother and are not answered ; who finds a 
 void in his very ears, when he repeats the name of his com- 
 panion, and, believing she will answer, finds himself alone with 
 silence ? Oh ! this solitude is more desolating than that of 
 the tomb, two minutes after one has heard the first clod fall on 
 the coffin which entombs the lost loved one. And are there no 
 other similar solitudes? Oh, yes! the turmoil of the cities 
 envelopes many solitudes. That of -the unprotected, that of the 
 destitute, that of one whose loved ones are far away, and others, 
 which, if not so desolating as the loss of a wife, are, neverthe- 
 less, like the silence of the seas to the shipwrecked, who, al- 
 ready exhausted of his strength, fights against the furious element. 
 
 It is three o'clock in the morning, and in the vaults are 
 heard groans which rive the soul. The steps of him who weeps 
 resound in the solitude of the ruins, whose silence makes more 
 observable the profound lamentation which is as the ticking of 
 the clock of time. In the cavern devoted to the terribly-myste- 
 rious moments of the gallows, Schmidt is pacing, the tails of 
 his long coat flapping, his eyes swollen with weeping, his beard 
 moistened, his features wrinkled, his mouth slightly opened, his 
 hands folded on his breast, not a word escaping his lips ; at tin- 
 foot of the fearful apparatus is Jose, his head drooping on his 
 chest, where he stifles his sighs, seeing his liberator so afflicted.
 
 THE R UlNS OF THE PARA CLETE. \ 49 
 
 The latter halts, erases to groan, looks at the instrument of 
 death, his countenance shines with the refulgence of despera- 
 tion ; he casts down his eyes, sees Jose, and shaking his head 
 bursts into tears and says to him : 
 
 Jose, my son, would it not be better to die than to be 
 deprived of those we love like children ? 
 
 Feliti makes a sign which is neither affirmative nor negative, 
 and afterwards adds : 
 
 No, good Doctor, it is not better, because thus we should 
 give more freedom to those who delight in tormenting us ? 
 
 But Jose, does it not seem sad to you to be alone ? She 
 who with her eyes of celestial blue was my felicity, she who 
 knew how to mitigate the rage of my breast, she who passed her 
 hands down my beard and brought to my remembrance those of 
 Wilhelmina, those of my little daughter, she who with her in- 
 nocence filled us all with joy, now she is far away, Jose, now 
 she is far away ! And he ! oh ! he was my hope, my future, 
 the crowning of my work ; his head, his head ! .... oh ! he who 
 remains suffers a hundred times more from solitude than he who 
 journeys ! And through whom do I see myself deprived of the 
 children of my adoption ? Jose, in putting this question, I lose 
 conformity to the will of God ; but no matter, I have so to act 
 that he will not enjoy his triumph. Why should we suffer the 
 malefactor ever to mock at the righteous ? An idea, Jose, an 
 idea 
 
 Here the sage reflects for a while, and then adds : 
 
 They are going to Paris, I set out to-morrow night, 
 you must rejoin them ; but before that we have many things 
 to do. At present forty-eight hours remain to us according to 
 what the sous-Prefet said to me : forty-eight hours are so many 
 centuries ; let us set out hence, and not suffer the Baron de 
 Vieux to insult in our persons the Dignity of Humanity. 
 
 They go out, and we will leave them and go in search of 
 Hector, the gentle Rosamunda. and Martha.
 
 150 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 The bargeman had scarcely sheered off fnd the vessel begun 
 to be carried along by the stream, when Hector felt a sensation 
 of fear without knowing any cause for it, and, seated in a corner 
 with his knees set wide apart, he formed a reclining place for 
 the body of Rosamunda, whose head he clasped with both his 
 hands. They were but just two leagues distance from Nogent 
 when the police agent, Henri, leaped on shore and left them in 
 the hands of the bargeman and two companions of his. The 
 rain had ceased and the sky began to show its serene and beau- 
 tiful countenance, as a pretty child after crying while its mo- 
 ther is washing its little face, exhibits its beauty to the best 
 possible advantage. The calmness of the weather, the fresh- 
 ness of the hours of twilight, the silence of the vicinity they 
 were passing, the emotions experienced, her age and position, 
 made the enchanting girl say to the enamored youth : 
 
 Hector, I am sleepy. 
 
 Sleep, my Rosamunda, rest your head on my knee and 
 sleep ; I will wake you at the first approach of daylight. 
 
 And are not you sleepy ? 
 
 I am not sleepy, but my head is dizzy. 
 
 Then go . . to . sleep . . . also. 
 
 The head of Rosamunda drooped like the rose-sprout in the 
 scorching heat of a tropical noon, and fell on the left thigh of 
 her companion, who, without knowing what he said, added : 
 
 I . . will . wake . . you . . . don't . . don't . concern . 
 your . . . 
 
 And as he finished the " yourself," his head dropped, which 
 movement half brought him to himself, making him repeat : 
 
 Don't . . concern .... yourself. 
 
 Both are now sleeping, at three paces distance from the 
 helmsman and from Martha, and the two other men who have 
 till now been stretched on the deck, rise up and set themselves 
 beside the captain, and in an undertone and in slang or argot, 
 which is the favorite language of the mariners of the Seine,
 
 THE K UINS OF THE PA UA CLETK \ 5 1 
 
 sons of the suburbs of Paris, commence the following discourse, 
 more with dumb motions at first than with words. 
 
 Muchetampot, who is the captain, touches the shoulder of 
 Flamangel with his hand, and with his foot the leg of Fla- 
 neur, and then stretching out his forefinger points to the two 
 young people, screwing up his lips and licking them several 
 times. 
 
 Flaneur pulls out his clay pipe from his sheepskin jacket, 
 fills it with tobacco, goes towards the lantern to light it, and 
 with a gross gesture says : 
 
 Good tobacco ! 
 
 Flamangel rubs his hands, throws a kiss to Rosamunda, and 
 says softly : 
 
 Eh bien ! jc passer ais une nuit blanche .... 
 Muchetampot puts his finger to his mouth, and the three 
 
 bringing their faces close together, he says : 
 
 According to appearances they are running away, and 
 hence to Paris there are yet eight and twenty leagues good. 
 
 Oh ! they're running away ! 
 
 Him Flaneur makes signs as though he were throwing 
 
 something in the water and her then Louviers' Island 
 
 or .... 
 
 Hush ! there's time enough ; I will tell you presently 
 what I have thought, for now the day is coming and .... then 
 .... the night .... 
 
 But, the Policeman .... 
 
 Deuce take the policeman ! You know Henri belongs 
 to us. 
 
 Morbleu ! if I were Muchetampot I would not let this 
 blondine off to-night, nor the brunette either. 
 
 Mafoi ! que tu as un coup de gibelct pour .... and you 
 do not know whether the captain is .... 
 
 Stop ! in case we do perform something amusing, I pro- 
 pose and Flamangel takes out his poignard, sticking it in the 
 rudder I propose that it be by lot.
 
 152 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 Sacre bleu ! it shan't be by lot, Flantangel, it shan't be 
 by lot,7>ar la queue cht Diablc ! it shan't be by lot ! You know 
 that I and he puts his hand in his breast and takes out a dag- 
 ger of about a hand-breadth's length, which vibrates like the 
 tongue of a serpent you know that I don't stick my blade into 
 clumps of wood, but into hearts. 
 
 What then says Flaneur, showing a file with Damascene 
 point, and so fine as to cut through steel without producing any 
 sound what then, Muchetampot, you want every thing for your- 
 self? Heel of Mahomet ! that time is gone by, now the light- 
 est finger deals the cards : and the blondine shall be put up by 
 lot, or if not .... ma foi / .... if not .... it fhall be all up 
 with him ! 
 
 And we are two against one, eh ! Muchetampot, do you 
 understand ? 
 
 Well, come now ! just listen 
 
 Look, they're moving. 
 
 No matter, they don't understand argot. 
 
 Who knows that ? 
 
 They're all still. 
 
 No, it's better to hold our tongues. 
 
 Hector awakes at this moment, and asks the captain : 
 
 Sir. where are we \ 
 
 A good way from Nogent ; the current is pretty strong 
 then turning to his companions, he adds in a low voice when 
 we haul to for breakfast we can talk, and now let's pump them 
 a bit, for they don't seem brother and sister, as the gendarme 
 told me they were ; they sit too close together, and take too 
 much care of one another, eh ? .... 
 
 Do you want to sleep, Muchetampot? 
 
 I'm not sleepy, you go if you want. 
 
 Neither of them is willing to sleep, for each distrusts his 
 companion. This is the condition of the wicked : nevertheless 
 they retire to one side nearly opposite the group formed by 
 Hector. Rosamunda, and Martha, and tho captain intones one
 
 THE RUINS OF THE PARACLETE. 153 
 
 of those obscene songs which, from such constant use by the 
 canaille, seem to them sacred songs or hymns to the saints 
 
 The delicious girl sleeps on the lap of the youth. Her 
 countenance is so beautiful, her expression so gentle, that it 
 would have inspired devotion in any but such as the three boat- 
 men. Muchetarnpot finishes the refrain of his ditty with a peal 
 of laughter, and demands of Hector : 
 
 Young man, are you brother and sister ? 
 
 Yes, sir. 
 
 The helmsman winks at those who lie stretched on the right. 
 
 Well, that seems strange, because you are too fond of 
 one another to be the same blood. 
 
 Hector shrugs his shoulders in token of contempt for what 
 has just been said to him. 
 
 And where are you from 1 
 
 From Paris, whither we return. 
 
 This little girl looks like a German, don't she, Flaneur '? 
 
 A sprightly lass ! Young man, your sister is a pretty 
 little wench. 
 
 At this phrase, which so wounds Hector, that he cannot en- 
 tirely conceal his indignation, these vile beings exchange winks, 
 and Flaneur continues : 
 
 Come, boys, don't say any thing about the blondinc, for 
 her brother don't like jests. See what a face he makes ! 
 
 'Sblood and thunder ! if I was travelling with my sister, 
 and the folks called her a little duck and praised her up, I'd be 
 as proud as a puff; but of course if it was my sweetheart, it 
 would be another story. 
 
 Bah ! Flamangel, what do you put such notions into our 
 heads for? don't you see that .... 
 
 That what ? 
 
 That the young man 's getting angry 1 
 
 Pooh ! let him get angry. A pretty kettle of fish, if we 
 can't say what we think ! 
 
 Messieurs, till now I have not said a word to you, and I 
 
 7*
 
 154 
 
 beg you out of respect to my sister and this young lady, not 
 to continue your conversation, otherwise I shall land. 
 
 The boy is right says Muchetampot, with an air of 
 command, after exchanging a glance with his companions he 
 is right, leave them alone ; passengers must be respected, espe- 
 cially when there 's ladies in the case. 
 
 Come, let it be as the captain says. 
 
 Rosamunda awakes, and seizing both Hector's hands, with 
 her face turned towards him. says : 
 
 My Hector, what can our father be doing ? 
 
 Speak German, for these people are very vile, and I don't 
 wish that they should understand what we say. 
 
 I was afraid of them from the moment we came on board, 
 even before I had seen them. 
 
 They disgusted me also ; but from hence to Paris is not 
 very far. 
 
 We might land here when we breakfast and Martha 
 leaves the boat ; see with what looks they are regarding us. 
 
 Take no notice of them, they are miserable creatures. 
 
 Poor doctor ! oh ! Hector, how he wept. 
 
 But I do not lose all hope of seeing him again, Rosa- 
 munda ; he told me before leaving the Paraclete, that Jos5 
 would come within a short time to rejoin us, and would let us 
 know what the doctor thought of doing. 
 
 He told me also the same, and it is for that reason I do 
 not fret so much ; because being with you, and having the hope 
 of seeing him again, I have no need to be so afflicted as if it 
 were for ever. 
 
 Certainly not. 
 
 I warrant you do not know what he said to mo by the 
 bank of the river, amid his tears and embraces ; I warrant you, 
 my Hector, you do not know. He is so good, he is so kind, 
 that I love him as much as I could my father, if I had one. 
 
 What did he say to you ? 
 
 In this trunk that I am sitting on, there are two hundred
 
 
 THE RUINS OF THE PARACLETE. 155 
 
 and fifty louis-d'or here she drops her voice although speak- 
 ing German one hundred and fifty, according to him, are mine, 
 and one hundred yours ; but according to me, two hundred and 
 fifty are yours. 
 
 Excellent man ! as to that, he told me I should not have 
 to concern myself as to how I should pay my expenses for one 
 year in Paris ; and gave me two double louis for the journey. 
 
 Don't you think Martha will come too ? 
 
 To Paris 1 She has said nothing to me Martha cannot 
 understand what they say in German but I believe we shall 
 see her again. 
 
 So it seems to me. 
 
 And now we ought to consider that we shall be arriving 
 soon, and devise some means of becoming acquainted with those 
 persons who can give us information about those things the 
 doctor spoke to me of, because we cannot pass our lives in en- 
 joyments without knowing what we have to undertake. 
 
 Hector, these men frighten me ; the expression of their 
 eyes, as they look at me. makes me shudder. 
 
 Let us move over to the other side, for the sun is about 
 to rise. 
 
 They go towards the prow, sit down on the seats, put Rosa- 
 munda's portmanteau at their feet, and continue talking of the 
 doctor, of Feliii, of Martha's being about to leave them, of the 
 beauty of some spots along the river, of Rosamunda's being so 
 beautiful, of what they feel finding themselves free, masters of 
 their own actions, with money, talent, abilities, and at the gates 
 of Paris. Hector, in the midst of the pleasure which enthrals 
 his senses when he sits beside his enchanting Rosamunda, does 
 not fail to experience some sudden bursts of vengeance, and in 
 thought mingles the name of the Baron with those of his be- 
 loved and of Schmidt. 
 
 Thus they go on, ravished in each other's eyes, quite absent 
 from what is around them ; meanwhile the following conversa- 
 tion is carried on by the three bandits, who may well be most
 
 156 THE WO FATHERS. 
 
 fruitful in wickedness, seeing that they have studied in several 
 of those various classes which the government keeps open irnitis 
 for the rabble of thieves and murderers, who. in those establish- 
 ments of infernal instruction, complete their education. In the 
 vile trio they arrive at this point : Flamangel says : 
 
 No ; I arrange the thing better, so that Muchetampot 
 may have no responsibility, and we may all amuse ourselves. 
 You, Muchetampot, you pretend to be their friend all to-day, 
 and quarrel with me and Flaneur when we happen to say some 
 merry word, and we will have a fight which shall end by your 
 threatening to put us ashore : in four hours we shall arrive at 
 the place where we are to put the pale one ashore, afterwards 
 at night we will tie you up, but with a loose knot, so that you 
 can get away and come after us : him let us throw into the wa- 
 ter where there is a good strong current and the river makes a 
 sharp bend, we overpower her, bandage her eyes, and manage 
 her so as to hinder her making even a whisper ; we draw along- 
 side, jump ashore, do what we want, by lot, mind, and leave 
 her. We two go to Paris and see one another again in the 
 island ; you return to the craft and let the people see how 
 you've been served. 
 
 Good ! and where shall it be ? 
 
 Parbleu ! the river runs pretty fast, and this night about 
 twelve o'clock, we may be between Montereau and Melun, and 
 there are some lonely sort of places there where the current, 
 swollen as it is, will be just what will suit us. 
 
 Come, then, begin after breakfast. 
 
 We must not stop in any village. 
 
 Not to be thought of. 
 
 At the crib of mother Flaneuse 1 
 
 A good place. 
 
 Agreed. 
 
 In half an hour they descry the buildings of Bray de la 
 Seine where Hector wishes to laud ; but he is not permitted to 
 do this, the captain saying he is obliged to make his usual
 
 THE B UINS OF THE PARA CLETE. \ 57 
 
 halts, and that in Bray they would be exposed to having their 
 passports asked for by the gendarmes, and that according to 
 what the agent of police had told him, they have none. The 
 young man is convinced, and seeing the captain so pleasant, 
 lays aside part of the distrust he experienced at the outset. 
 And so at ten o'clock they arrive at a small house which, being 
 buried in a wood, could only be known to the old navigators of 
 the Seine, and there a decent breakfast is served up which Mu- 
 chetampot wishes to pay for, and in fact contends about it for 
 some time with Hector, who yields for this occasion, compro- 
 mising by taking upon himself the dinner. It seems that the 
 reprimand of the captain has quieted his disorderly comrades, 
 who, as Muchetampot says to Hector and Rosamunda, are men 
 unknown to him, and whom only the necessity of having some 
 one to help him, has made him take with him, and here he 
 adds with the coolness of the villain here on the rivers it is 
 necessary to know with whom one journeys, for many misfor- 
 tunes have happened : it is true, there is nothing to be afraid 
 of, because at every step one meets with the public force ; but 
 it is better to go provided. The vessel is not over good, but 
 you can have the cabin, and for one night one can manage any 
 where. 
 
 When shall we arrive in Paris? 
 
 To-morrow evening. Oh, if the river were to increase, 
 we should arrive before. 
 
 This halt has two objects ; to breakfast, and to land the 
 country girl, whose house is not far off. As the captain finishes 
 his discourse with Hector, Rosamunda and the afflicted Mar- 
 tha, the latter sets about her journey. She does not possess 
 any thing to demand a porter, or any care ; her own person, a 
 modest dress, and a little bundle, which from time to time she 
 presses to her breast, are all she has to take with her. 
 
 The leave-takings of the poor have not the ostentation and 
 noise of those of the rich ; but in them the heart operates with 
 all its grandeur. We would be very happy to make a de-
 
 158 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 scription of this interesting scene, but we will limit ourselves 
 to the relation of the last words exchanged by these generous 
 souls. 
 
 Rosamunda and Martha embrace, in tears ; Hector looks on 
 in sadness. Between her sighs, the country girl says : 
 
 Adieu, my friend, adieu ; our separation has not to be 
 for long ; we shall see each other in Paris soon ; don't cry. 
 don't cry ; M. le Docteur, and Jose, follow us 
 
 Yes, Martha, yes, we shall see each other in a short 
 time. 
 
 Come, don't weep ; our separation is only for a few 
 days. 
 
 Oh, Hector ! replies the village girl with melancholy 
 Oh, Hector ! they may be few ; but who knows what may hap- 
 pen to us, and whether we shall meet again ? 
 
 It is true, Martha, it is true ; Martha is right, Hector, 
 Martha is right. 
 
 The youth is moved, but commands himself for the mo- 
 ment, and replies : 
 
 Quit those bad auguries ; we shall see each other again 
 very soon ; we shall rejoin the Doctor in Paris, after a while, 
 and we shall be happy for ever. As to meeting one another, 
 what is there but to write to my name at the post-office, where 
 I shall go to get letters 1 Come, you need not distress your- 
 selves. 
 
 While the poor young people are discoursing thus, the 
 malefactors of the barge wink at them, make jests horribly sig- 
 nificant, and finally the two absent themselves, directing their 
 steps towards the river. The captain takes the tw.o young 
 people from Martha's arms, saying : 
 
 Come. Messieurs, come, we are losing the best of the 
 day : come aboard ! 
 
 It would not be so easy to separate the friends ; but the 
 cry, " Come aboard," makes them burst out into a copious flood 
 of tears, abandoning their determination to go by land, because, 
 without a passport, how can they reach Paris ?
 
 THE R UINS OF THE PARA CLETE. 1 59 
 
 What passes as the two go down to the bank of the river, 
 and the other towards the thick of the wood, can be imagined 
 by those who have loved with the affection of youth and of mis- 
 fortune, and part without the certainty of ever meeting again. 
 Hector and the maid of the ruins arrive at the barge melan- 
 choly, whither Flaneur and Flamangel have already preceded 
 them, and they let themselves glide on with the stream. 
 
 Youth, however much may have been theoretically taught, 
 are exposed at every breath to falling into the snares of the 
 wicked. Hector and Rosamunda, those two sensible souls, 
 those two noble hearts, believe the captain is their friend, with- 
 out any more proof than his having rebuked the insolent man- 
 ners of his two comrades. Oh ! how deserving of compassion 
 are the young, who imagine themselves capable, in the midst of 
 their inexperience, of encountering the dangers of travel ! 
 
 No matter, although we may be making a digression. Re- 
 flections which occur opportunely, are no insignificant ornaments 
 of a story, they are embellishments which gracefully clothe it, 
 and which the chronicler ought not to throw away when they 
 present themselves to him. We must confess that travelling 
 enlightens men ; but we cannot do less than observe that the 
 fathers, the husbands, the guardians who permit their children, 
 wives, and wards, to take journeys alone, commit an impru- 
 dence, the fatal results of which are generally irremediable. 
 The principal causes of the abuses committed by captains of 
 vessels, by conductors of diligences, and by travelling com- 
 panions, spring from the carelessness of society in not sur- 
 rounding the traveller with its assured protection. Of all na- 
 tions that we have visited, that which deserves the highest 
 praise for individual security on the public ways, is the United 
 States ; after which, to judge from the little we have seen of it, 
 comes England ; but France, Spain, Italy, some parts of Ger- 
 many, and all South America, are detestable for the father, 
 husband, brother, and gentleman who may have the care of la- 
 dies. What pictures are not presented in the obscurity of
 
 160 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 night in these diligences, upon those canals, upon those rivers, 
 upon these railways ! Pictures as to which the victims arc in 
 part silent, because it is impossible for them to explain them, 
 and which the shameless fellows and vile travellers reproduce, 
 with peals of laughter, at the end of the journey. The small 
 size of the vehicles, the frankness inspired by travel, the idle- 
 ness enjoyed, the close contact of the person, the rocking of 
 the carriage, the obscurity of the night, the liberties which 
 the situation involves, are more than sufficient to frighten 
 fathers of families, and particularly when having, as is gene- 
 rally the case, to travel with people unknown, and mostly rude. 
 If we turn from carriages by land to sailing vessels, we shall 
 have at each furrow they trace upon the sea, upon the waters of 
 rivers or canals, to weep over other as great, or greater abomi- 
 nations, committed through the gross brutality of captains and 
 passengers. The disorder of sea-sickness, the prostration of 
 the body, the relaxation of the mental powers, the necessity the 
 poor ladies are under of seeking assistance, gives to the ill-dis- 
 posed captains, who in some countries are fortunately few. all 
 imaginable advantages for failing in the highest quality of a 
 seaman nobleness of conduct. Few persons have ever trav- 
 elled without being able to relate anecdotes, some filthy, others 
 piquant, and not a few indecent. These men. as soon as they 
 see a young woman alone, without any one to protect her, or 
 any one able, when they shall arrive on shore, to knock out 
 their brains, permit themselves to take all manner of improper 
 liberties with their hands ; to employ every double-cntcndrc. 
 every disrespectful look, every vicious smile proper to rascals. 
 Poor Education ! into what vile hands art thou passing ? 
 The government ought by severe laws, to surround all travel- 
 lers, whether by sea or land, with an atmosphere of respect, 
 and require the captains, masters, and commanders of mercan- 
 tile vessels to acquire for themselves in the social world, a re- 
 putation for their good manners, and to repress the freedom of 
 men on board who are travelling as passengers. On a hundred
 
 THE R UISS OF THE PAS A CLETE. \ 6 1 
 
 occasions we have seen the modesty of a lady shocked where 
 she could not possibly cry out or make demonstrations of dis- 
 gust, for the very reason that she was a lady ; and from this 
 very virtue the vicious and discourteous are enabled to get the 
 best of it. Fortunately, the generality are not of this stamp ; 
 but, nevertheless, amid so many abuses, it is necessary for the 
 minority to be corrected, that they may not make proselytes. 
 And what might we not say about certain vessels of South 
 American rivers ? Oh, here we have not to do with particu- 
 lars ; all go the same road. We only warn fathers, that if they 
 had, in order to reach heaven, to pass by those rivers, they 
 would pray not to die till roads were made, or rather that they 
 might never go, for roads take many centuries to become de- 
 cent. How delightful it would be, at least for those who tra- 
 vel, if all knew how to respect the dignity inherent in them as 
 men, and to look upon woman with veneration ! Oh ! a day 
 must come, when civility will replace grossness, virtue receive its 
 adoration, and vice be ashamed to find itself beside it ; but 
 until this happy moment, it will be well for the governments 
 to begin taking more care of the decorum of those who travel 
 by road, or are obliged to cross the seas ! 
 
 The vessel to which Schmidt has confided his two children 
 of adoption, is one of those miserable barges which serve only 
 for wickedness, under pretext of carrying fruit and provisions. 
 The gendarme makes his harvest by smuggling, or otherwise, 
 out of the boatmen ; and Henri, on this occasion has wished to 
 do a good action, little guessing at the result. The children 
 have no passport, and it was therefore necessary to find a ves- 
 sel and crew accustomed to illicit traffic ; for the same reason 
 it is no wonder that these men indulge in such conversations 
 as we have heard, to the prejudice of their passengers. 
 
 The wickedness of the Isle described by the fluent pen of 
 Eugene Sue, furnishes a scene in which the author imitates na- 
 ture in colors so true, that we devoutly wish, for the true fame 
 of the celebrated writer, that he had employed just such in
 
 162 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 all liis works ; and as in this isle, so equally in other places, 
 there are to be found men who are rational beings only to the 
 extent necessary to enable them to devise and execute their 
 schemes of -wickedness. 
 
 It is four o'clock in the afternoon, and till now nothing lias 
 occurred that could awaken the least suspicion in the young 
 people, who. having gained confidence, have begun, still always 
 in German, to joke about their riches. For a while Flaneur is 
 observing them, in order to get hold of some gossamer-pretext 
 for beginning the conflict ; and as love, though it does not see. 
 yet makes itself seen, in looks, in gestures, in movements, in 
 broken words, there has not escaped so much as a turn of the 
 eyes from the glance of the sagacious malefactor ; and, excessively 
 annoyed at not understanding what they say. he catches at that 
 very thing, and in order to commence, calls Flamangel, who, for 
 his part, is busy, weaving his own plots. A manifestation of af- 
 fection, which a man of more experience would have called impru- 
 dent, and which Hector believes only fraternal, gives the heart- 
 less rascals an occasion for commencing hostilities ; it is thus. 
 
 Rosamunda is seated on the bench on the right side of the 
 prow, and at her left, the young man Hector : the wind agitates 
 her blond and curling chevelure, which caresses the lips of 
 the young man, making him remain silent : as though to free 
 himself from the emotions which it causes him, he takes a curl 
 between his fingers, and giving it a few turns, gazes at the work 
 of his hands, that is, the fine and silky ringlets, the contact of 
 which electrizes him and holds him speechless ; when suddenly 
 his ears are assailed by these words which proceed from the 
 mouth of Flamangel : 
 
 Look, Flaneur, look, this brother and sister love one 
 another like a newly married couple ! 
 
 That's just what I am thinking ; the young man's jea- 
 lousy is just like a sweetheart's, and his actions are something 
 more. 
 
 And she sleeps when he combs her.
 
 THE M UWS OF THE PARA CLETE. \ 63 
 
 And he gives her such looks, that 
 
 Well ! there's no harm in that ; all men are brothers, and 
 women sisters. 
 
 Ha ! ha ! ha ! Every one has his own way to kill fleas ! 
 these are as much brother and sister as my grandmother 
 
 Ha ! ha ! ha ! And look at the captain, how serious he is ! 
 
 Hope to be he won't hear us, for he .... by .... he is 
 
 very fond and tender with the fair little ones that are sisters, 
 and- his passengers, and .... 
 
 But he is right, boy, for this is whew-w ! 
 
 what a gal ! 
 
 The blood of Hector runs through his veins with such velo- 
 city, that he can neither hear nor see. Rosamunda, observing 
 that he trembles from head to foot, seizes his hand and presses 
 it between hers. The young man distinguishes some few words 
 more which fill his face with blazes, and throwing down the soft 
 hands of the girl, he jumps to his feet, approaches- the two men, 
 and says with a tone of anger : 
 
 I believe, sirs, that to insult people is contrary to all 
 laws, and ought to be chastised ; move away from hence and 
 shut your unclean mouths, for besides complaining of it to the 
 captain, I tell you I have nineteen years on my back and a 
 heart. 
 
 Ha ! ha ! ha ! See what news the boy is telling us ! He 
 has got a heart, and I'd like to see the man who has not ; and 
 nineteen years .... 
 
 And you take it so cool, Flaneur ? 
 
 Why, who"'d care about a driveller like that ? 
 
 From behind Hector, who is pale with rage, arises the soft 
 voice of Rosamunda, who says to him, seizing him by the arm : 
 
 Come, Hector, come. 
 
 Poor little blondine ! exclaims Flaneur how pale she 
 is lest something should happen to her .... brother. 
 
 Bon Dieu ! how young they are to be travelling by such 
 solitary places all alone !
 
 164 'niE TWO 
 
 Have done, sirs, have done, or I will let you see I have 
 got some strength in my arm. 
 
 Here is the very thing. The bandits venture to raise their 
 fists, and Hector freeing himself from the hands of Rosamuuda. 
 assails one of them, and gives good proof that it is not in vain 
 that he has taken lessons in the gymnasium of the Paraclete, 
 for he makes Flamangel measure his length on the deck, and is 
 preparing to give just such another lesson to Flaneur, when, at 
 the cries of all, and particularly at the demand of Rosamunda. 
 the captain interferes. 
 
 In a few minutes quiet is entirely restored, and the rascally 
 captain threatens his comrades to put them ashore unless they 
 conduct themselves according to his orders, and tells Hector he 
 has just served them right, and taken the very best means of teach- 
 ing the nasty fellows how to treat folks with respect ; and still 
 further to screen himself from all responsibility, he adds : 
 
 I told you once before this morning, that this is the first 
 time these men have been in my boat, and I am very sorry now 
 that I have taken them. 
 
 It is eleven o'clock at night ; the weather is calm, and in the 
 barge not a breath is to be heard. After the scene of the after- 
 noon, an absolute peace had reigned between the boatmen and 
 passengers, so that the young people, after enjoying the cool of 
 the evening, and the delicious spectacle presented by the twink- 
 ling canopy which covered their amorous sighs, determined to 
 go to bed. Rosamunda felt afraid, and would not suffer Hector 
 to separate himself from her side ; so she put the portmanteau 
 which inclosed her treasure underneath the blanket, which served 
 for a pillow, lay down under the caboose, and made the youth 
 stretch himself at her feet. The moon illuminates this interest- 
 ing picture without shining upon the beautiful group, except on 
 one side. Muchetampot is singing, and the other two malefac- 
 tors go and come, making believe to be arranging something 
 The two young people are not asleep, and they hoar Mucliotani-
 
 THE RU1XS OF THE PARACLETE. 165 
 
 pot put Flamangel at the rudder, and go to bed at a little dis- 
 tance from them. Now there is heard only the murmuring of 
 the waters of the river which pass by kissing the timbers. 
 
 The age at which our two young friends have arrived, is one 
 in which disagreeable sensations do not long retain their hold, 
 and in which anger is but momentary ; it is like the tropical 
 climate, which, in the midst of its luxury, becomes furious, 
 and in a few minutes again presents its smiling face to the earth 
 which it has agitated with its tempestuous rage. Rosamunda 
 sleeps, feeling the warmth of Hector's hand upon her feet. He, 
 at the delicious impression received from the smooth feet of 
 his enchanting little companion held fast in his hands, plunges 
 into dreamswhich make him, without knowing it, kiss the hem 
 of her dress, which magnetizes him by its delicious contact. 
 Oh, upon what a beautiful group is the midnight moon shed- 
 ding its rays ! Rosamunda is enveloped from her waist down- 
 wards in a colored blanket, her delicious head is raised by the 
 portmanteau, with her face upwards, her long natural ringlets 
 are scattered on this side and on that, adorning her beautiful 
 bosom as with an ample collar ; her right arm is raised over 
 her head, the left reposes on her breast, which rises and falls 
 with majestic tranquillity, Hector is beside her with both 
 hands clinging to her feet, and his countenance hidden among 
 the folds of the beauty's dress : they are a subject worthy of the 
 pencil of Velasquez, especially when the moon pours out her 
 silver light upon the group, and heightens its beauty by the fan- 
 tastic effects of her rays. 
 
 They are a little below Montereau, in an eminently danger- 
 ous whirlpool, formed, in a bend of the river, by the strong cur- 
 rent of the waters of the Seine. The solitude of the spot, the 
 profound sleep of the two young people, and the opportunity 
 furnished them by the whirlpool, determine the bandits to put 
 into execution their infernal idea. Flaneur and Flamangel, on 
 all fours, and without shoes, approach the place where they are 
 sleeping, which is close to the bulwarks of the prow, under the
 
 166 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 caboose. One sets himself at the head and the other at the 
 feet of Hector ; they regard him with attention, lean down, 
 stretch out their arms, take hold of him ; he struggles between 
 the two ; now cries are heard, now they are making an effort, as 
 though to throw him overboard ; they have him still struggling 
 on the very edge of the boat, which is wandering as it is impelled 
 by the current. Hector makes superhuman exertions ; Rosa- 
 munda screams ; Muchetampot calls for help ; the brigands con- 
 quer : Hector has gone head first into the water. They rush 
 upon Rosamunda, the barge approaches the bank, the two seize 
 her between them, they tear her dress, she is barefooted, they 
 seem trying to throw her overboard, she makes one effort, gives 
 a spring, and falls into the river, calling Hector with all her 
 might 
 
 At the same time that these things are passing on the 
 Seine, between Montereau and Melun, Schmidt has been for 
 four-and-twenty hours preparing to leave his ruins. At about 
 one o'clock in the morning, some of the inhabitants of the 
 neighborhood are looking towards the Paraclete. They see 
 flames and smoke ; it is so dense and red that the laborers 
 vow with oaths, that hell itself has been opened there, and that 
 the devils are broiling the wizard, the conjuror, the old man of 
 the ruins, upon a gridiron. They cross themselves so fast, that 
 any one seeing them from a distance would say they were driv- 
 ing away from their faces thousands of insects. They dare not 
 give information to the police of what they see, because, per- 
 chance the wizard being done too hot on Satan's gril, might let 
 fly through the air some drops of burning oil, and so reduce 
 ' their houses to lava, and their fields to ashes. What is in re- 
 ality passing is the following : 
 
 Schmidt, before his decampment, wishes to destroy every 
 thing that exists in the vaults of the Paraclete ; and having 
 sent Jose with some money safely to Paris, forms a great pyre 
 of the skeletons, craniums, gallows, seats, beds, instruments, and
 
 THE RUINS OF THE PARACLETE. 167 
 
 all that he possesses, and impregnating the whole with a power- 
 ful combustible liquid, now sees that burning to ashes which 
 he had made yield him so much knowledge, but which men 
 would judge proofs of guilt sufficient to condemn him, thus 
 compelling him to reveal to them that which he does not choose 
 them to know. Of all these objects he reserves only the skulls 
 of his wife and daughter, which, hidden amongst his modest 
 baggage, were to accompany him for the rest of his life.
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 UNHAPPY that I am, exclaimed Paul, who shall deliver me 
 from the body of this death ? And if the apostle thus com- 
 plained of his body of death, of his body of passions, of appe- 
 tites, of misery, the spirit wishing to do well, and the body not 
 permitting it ; of this law of the members warring against the 
 law of the soul, how much more reason have not men, who are 
 very far from being Pauls, to complain of their body of death ? 
 Oh ! if wishing to do well we see a law which fights against the 
 law of the mind, what must be the condition of the miserable 
 men who have never bowed before any law but that of their 
 appetites ? Oh ! world of mire ! Why do not men reflect, and 
 instead of amassing gold, which they shall soon leave for others 
 to count up, seek treasure for tKemselves and others in educa- 
 tion, which is the gold of fine chrysol, and which can purify us 
 from the dross of the flesh ? Oh ! how many will laugh at us. 
 poor beginners in the thorny career of the writer, because we 
 give utterance to ideas like these? No matter: our consola- 
 tion is, that they are the genuine offspring of the Gospel doc- 
 trine, and the gates of hell shall never prevail against the aegis 
 to which we cling. Laugh on ! you you who laugh at us will 
 be brought to confess that which thousands of thousands, in 
 spite of you, already confess, and will yet manifest ; and then 
 we, who believe in the Testament of Christ, will rejoice, not at 
 seeing you confounded, but at seeing you turned to him, and 
 confessing that education based on faith in the God-Man, does 
 set free from the unbridled lusts of the body of this death.
 
 THE R UINS OF THE PA RA CLETE. \ 59 
 
 We see among us occasionally, some of those elevated minds 
 who have not only to contend with the flesh, which gives them 
 trouble enough, but also with the world ; and while they, with 
 much difficulty, come off victorious over the former, the latter 
 submerges them in its quagmires of impurity. Their own 
 weakness, their miseries, their griefs, their sufferings, certainly 
 were not sufficient to overcome those men ; it was necessary in 
 order to make them die every moment, that they should have 
 others of their kind, who, from want of religion and education, 
 from parcity of wisdom, or rather let us say from stupidity, 
 exercise the odious office of executioners of humanity. Let us 
 see if it is not so. Observe the rich or the poor, the great or 
 the little, the wise or the ignorant, the soldier or the citizen, 
 the priest or the believer, the man of letters or the artist, the 
 artisan or the journalist, the citizen or the rustic, the wife or the 
 husband, the public man or the obscure, the young man or the 
 aged, fighting with outstretched arms against THE BODY OF THIS 
 DEATH : he is born weeping, whatever may be his cradle, whe- 
 ther of filagree or of osiers ; he weeps for seven years, because 
 he can neither understand, nor make himself understood ; 
 when a child he is in desperation, because all domineer over 
 him, while he feels an inner force, which, though he knows not 
 what it is, tells him that his soul is equal to those of others ; he 
 sees himself humiliated by hundreds of infirmities which afflict 
 him : what is pleasing to the palate injures him, cold makes 
 him sick, heat martyrizes him, the wind fills him with pain, 
 quietude of the body enervates him, excessive movement fa- 
 tigues him, little sleep weakens him, much sleep imbrutes him ; 
 when he sees that what the soul tells him the body fights 
 against, he is in despair, and that what the latter desires the 
 former reproves, he is exasperated : the age of mere impres- 
 sions passes, and these are followed by infinite torments : at- 
 tending school, the appetite for overcoming his equals in 
 trifles, the stings of concupiscence which wake him from the 
 sweet dream of innocence, and a thousand other things, which
 
 1 70 THE TWO FA THEKS. 
 
 the lad suffers before he is fifteen, and which all undergo, are 
 torments which his body inflicts upon him in all social condi- 
 tions. He has arrived at puberty. It is here that the flesh 
 and the world unite to levy homage to Mammon, Money, the 
 Devil ; and between the three they drive him mad. The poor 
 suffers, thinking how he will gain his miserable subsistence, and 
 for that he has to bow the neck to every body. The rich suf- 
 fers, because the conservation of riches costs many anxieties, 
 many toils, many pains. The public man has to fight with as 
 many Hercules as the individuals or passions which compose 
 the nation. The noble wishes to be more than the plebeian, 
 the plebeian to be equal with the noble. The sage is indignant 
 to see men so imbruted ; the ignorant laughs at the sage, suffer- 
 ing because he cannot be equal to him ; the rulers suffer, and 
 the ruled are in fury ; the grossness of the coarse irritates 
 those who are refined ; tyranny exasperates the mild ; selfish- 
 ness makes every one of us suffer when we see others better off 
 than ourselves. We covet the wife, the knowledge, the virtue, 
 the wealth, the prosperity, the health, the goods of others. 
 Carried away by this whirlwind of disorderly passions, we in- 
 troduce contentions at the fireside, into the cities, into king- 
 doms, into nations ; we light the brand of discord between 
 Spaniards and French, between the English and North Ameri- 
 cans, between citizen and citizen, between brother and brother, 
 between parents and children ; we awaken mistrust between 
 husband and wife ; we turn every thing to account for the gra- 
 tification of our appetites. Oh ! who will deliver us from the 
 body of this death. If a few retire from the world we go after 
 them, to hurl them back into the hurricane in which we are 
 whirling, to goad them into desperation ; and we employ at one 
 time religion, at another politics, now the rights of man, now 
 social inequality, the pride of the nobles, the abject condition 
 of the proletarian classes, the misery of the people, the want of 
 instruction, the mode of government, our own qualities, to rob 
 our fellow-creatures of their eouanimity. Here is a little child
 
 
 THE B UINS OF THE PAR A CLETE, \ 7 [ 
 
 who cried for a toy, playing by himself, glad, enjoying his ac- 
 quisition. Leave him alone. Look at his eyes, sparkling with 
 pleasure ; observe the agitation of his little breast, the restless- 
 ness of his whole frame ; he is full of joy : do not embitter this 
 waking dream in which he is revelling. Oh ! impiety of the 
 misery of this body of death, aggravated by the want of good 
 examples ! Another little one comes up, touches the toy, 
 takes it in his hands, breaks it, or calls it a thousand ugly 
 names, or wants it for himself, and the first little one suffers, 
 grows angry, cries, is in a passion, longs to make an end of him 
 who has woke him out of the calm of his little enjoyments and 
 filled him with rage. 
 
 The son of the artisan betakes himself to study, accom- 
 plishes feats of intelligence, sleeps with the book under his pil- 
 low, dreams about it, wakes up with it ; as he partakes of his 
 poor meal it is beside him ; he takes a mouthful and ponders 
 over what he is reading ; he goes his way content in the fulfil- 
 ment of his duty. Oh ! professors and classmates, leave him 
 alone in your midst ; do not discourage him. But oh ! cruelty ! 
 however well he may do, the professor hears him like the sound 
 of another's funeral bell, while he praises the stammering of the 
 son of the noble or the rich ; and the son of the son of the peo- 
 ple, seeing how he is treated beside other men, loses courage, 
 tears leap into his eyes, he is disheartened, and goes home ex- 
 claiming amid bitter sobs, " Because I am poor, therefore it is 
 they give me no prize ; I have studied with all my heart, I 
 know more than the son of Lord Mammon, but he is rich. 
 Father, it is of no use for me to study ; it seems to me that I 
 shall never gain any thing by it. I hate the rich. I hate the 
 rich ; I hate the professor ; they are all unjust." And that 
 young man is a viper, who waits but his turn to bite with con- 
 centrated rage and fermented poison. 
 
 Here is an artisan in his workshop, anxious to give a last 
 touch to the produce of his skill, anxious to have his task com- 
 pleted, that he may buy bread for his children ; he needs the
 
 172 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 night for rest. Leave him alone ! No. The ambitious dema- 
 gogue finds him out, touches him in the quick, represents to 
 him the insufficiency of his pay, the toilsomeness of his work, 
 the ease of the rich, the tyranny exercised over the poor, the 
 sorrow the latter devours in obscurity while the other enjoys 
 every thing and supplies his vices with whatever caprice may 
 dictate, and the artisan who was quiet, counting on the ca- 
 resses of his children, looks at them, considers that they will 
 one day suffer as he does, and he becomes indignant, kindles up, 
 makes gestures as though seizing arms to take vengeance for 
 the inequalities of human condition, born of an eternal law 
 which cannot cease to be, but of which the demagogue does not 
 speak he takes good care of that, because then adieu to his 
 ambitions and the workman is changed from a peaceful indus- 
 trious man to a rioter, a perturber of the public peace ; and 
 while the demagogue himself suffers the penalty of his own doc- 
 trines, the poor artisan falls a victim to his credulity. Oh ! 
 why did you not leave him alone in peace, or if you must needs 
 visit him, why did you not counsel him industry, constancy, 
 respective education, holy religion ? 
 
 Here are the tailor, the shoemaker, the carpenter, the ma- 
 son, the laborer, and all the operative, manufacturing, industrious 
 classes of society, devouring their misery, their wants, weeping 
 over their misfortunes. Then comes along a rich or an influential 
 man, pretending to hold out a hand to them to help them arise 
 from their debasement, and at the same time striking bitter woe 
 into the heart of the pretty wife, the charming daughter or the 
 beautiful relative. Leave them alone ! No, pompously re- 
 sponds the magnate, for these classes remain passive, and it is 
 their duty to fulfil their mission. 
 
 Here is the young writer, seated at his poor table, burning 
 his eyelids, straining every nerve to give bread to his children. 
 Leave him alone ! No ! the envy of some immures him, others 
 draw him out from obscurity to public light for their own ends, 
 and revolution overwhelms him ; or when they have launched
 
 THE R UINS OF THE PAR A CLETK 1 7 3 
 
 him into the arena, he finds no one come to his aid. Oh ! have 
 compassion ! Why do you not encourage him ? why not protect 
 him .... why not leave him alone ? 
 
 Here is a rich man with power and position, wishing perhaps 
 to act aright, and he falls in with a scoundrel who deceives him, 
 cheats him ; and the rich man who might have made hundreds 
 happy, is indignant at being thus practised upon, and fearing 
 all the needy, like the man who has cheated him, refuses any 
 longer to do good. Oh ! why did you not leave him alone, that 
 he might pour out part of his wealth upon the necessitous 1 
 Oh ! the theory of liousseau as to the natural state of man, 
 oftentimes appears really and certainly true, on account of the 
 inattention of men to religion, to education, to wisdom. And 
 what might not be said of the anxiety of the human heart for 
 money, for honors, for fame, for beauty ? 
 
 Ask woman, study her, consider her. and she will furnish 
 you with luminous examples of these truths. The married wo- 
 man, the maiden, the widow, the young, the old, if she is alone 
 is good ; she suffers, because such is the lot of the human race ; 
 but if she is surrounded by others she is lost. She sees friends 
 with elegant attire, which comes very often no one knows 
 whence or how ; loose conversation, visits of gentlemen, the 
 stories of her circle, the anecdote of a relative, the slander of 
 an acquaintance, are so many powerful enemies who drive her 
 into evil. Oh ! why do you not leave her alone ? Has she not 
 pains enough with her body of this death ? Of whatever states, 
 of whatever classes, of whatever conditions we discourse, we 
 shall see that the world is more fearful even than the flesh. 
 
 It seems as though the human race had forgotten the law of 
 God and turned idolater. Where is fraternity ? What has be- 
 come of the love of our neighbor? Whither has gone the pre- 
 cept, " that which you would not for yourselves, do not to others ?" 
 Whither has wandered the knowledge of religion? Its minis- 
 ters, who should be ministers of peace, make war upon the tran- 
 quillity of the conscience. Who will give us a voice of thunder
 
 174 'l' n % TWO FATHERS. 
 
 to stun the world crying Religion, Wisdom, Education ? Poor 
 head of ours ! whither hast thou gone ? We fancy we hear 
 many who, regarding us with contempt, and shrugging their 
 shoulders, say to us : " All you have said is old. we know it by 
 heart." What say you, old ? Then why do you not practise 
 it. and leave him in peace who has enough to do to struggle 
 with his body? What say you, ohll We reply only with the 
 mild, sensible, generous, and eternally-to-be-celebrated Lninar- 
 tine, that the ripe fruit is better than the young, since it has a 
 honey which in the other is but sour juice. The old is the 
 symbol of duration, of constancy, and the Gospel is not old. for 
 with its author time has no existence. Oh ! holy, true religion, 
 oh ! prudent wisdom, oh ! gentle education ! descend upon the 
 earth and embrace under your shadow the circumference of the 
 world, that all men may recognize you and follow in your track. 
 But what ! will men perchance listen to a poor mortal, when 
 they do not, unless it be a very few, listen to God ? It seems, 
 if we may be pardoned the comparison, that they would fain 
 imitate the dogs, who every where and always bark at each 
 other whenever they meet, and if one happens to be lying down 
 quietly, twenty rush at him to molest him, to pick a quarrel with 
 him, to bite him, to goad him into battle, that they may tear 
 each other to pieces. 
 
 If each one will lay his hand upon his heart, and turn his 
 eyes within, no one can possibly doubt that this is true ; viz. : 
 that if his kind-heartedness is converted into anger, he owes it 
 to intercourse with men ; that if his good faith degenerates into 
 mistrust, he owes it to intercourse with men ; that if his recti- 
 tude takes a tortuous road, he owes it to intercourse with men ; 
 that if his innocence changes into iniquity, he owes it to inter- 
 course with men ; that if he is tortured by envy, he owes it to 
 intercourse with men ; that if very often he looks upon religion 
 as a torment to his soul, it is men who have thus transformed 
 the mild, gentle, inestimable code of Jesus Christ, our boun- 
 teous Legislator, who himself experienced that the flesh is weak ;
 
 THE UL'ISX Ob' THE PARACLETE. [75 
 
 that if he becomes indignant against certain classes of society. 
 he owes it to intercourse with them, to false demagogic elo- 
 quence, or to the prejudices of men his companions ; and in fine, 
 from the companies we visit we derive the evil or the good our 
 souls desire. Proverbs are certain maxims passed through the 
 alembic of experience, which stripped of flowers, of leaves, of 
 the terrestrial parts, remain the spirit of the truth only, and if 
 we consult them, we shall see that " it is better to be alone than 
 ill-accompanied ;" that ' ; you may know a man by the company 
 he keeps ;" that "good fruit will be spoiled if you mix it with 
 the rotten ;" and there are innumerable others which corrobo- 
 rate the foregoing proposition ; that is, that the world does 
 more injury to man than his body of death. And what is the 
 reason of this ? We turn in the circle : the want of religion, 
 which commands us to love our neighbor as ourselves ; the want 
 of wisdom, which teaches the causes and effects of our actions, 
 and of all the phenomena produced by the senses, furnishing 
 remedies for what is evil and incitements to continuance in what 
 is good ; the want of respective education, which would make 
 men mild in society, and teach them to feel that all their inter- 
 course with their fellow-creatures ought to have for its sole ob- 
 ject, to add to their own and to other's enjoyment. Oh ! if 
 men were penetrated with these truths, how would it be possi- 
 ble that they should harass their brethren 1 
 
 Poor Schmidt, from the age of thirty-five years, had re- 
 nounced intimate intercourse with men, because he found 
 them always so prone to do ill to their fellows. He had re- 
 nounced honors, riches, worldly fame ; he had married, believ- 
 ing no one would perturb the harmony of the little world he 
 was going to form for himself; he had given himself up to sci- 
 ence, that he might in this manner do good to his kind, since 
 it was not within his power to do it in any other ; he had tra- 
 velled in order to gather up knowledge, which could not but in 
 some measure add to the happiness of men, and one of these 
 in his absence did not leave him alone, but sought by his ini-
 
 176 THJ-: TIVO FATIII:I;S. 
 
 quitous proceedings to convert the gentle Schmidt into a san- 
 guinary criminal. The sage has experienced the war of his 
 body of death ; he has succumbed many times in the conflict : he 
 has wept over his wanderings, he has almost purged out his 
 faults ; but at this hour, seated near the ashes which during 
 the night he has been making there, pass through his mind the 
 words : " He who takcth the sword shall perish by the sword," 
 and like a fiery serpent they burn his brains, rending from him 
 a cry of horror. We know Schmidt has been victim of the 
 world, of its bad organization, of the immorality of men. But 
 why has he just uttered a cry so sad, and repeated between his 
 teeth, " He who taketh the sword shall perish by the sword ?" 
 Let us listen to him ; his countenance is sad, his voice is weak, 
 his gesture mournful in the last degree, he looks up to heaven, 
 and a tear trickles from his eye : 
 
 You are right says he, as though talking with some 
 one you are right. In youth the flesh made me mad ; men 
 are right to conspire against me. Oh ! how miserable is the 
 son of Adam ! Even science becomes in his hands subservient 
 to evil ; even holy religion is converted into the instrument of 
 his ideas ; even education serves to ensnare him 
 
 Some whistles are heard ; the sage drops his head on one 
 side, closes his eyes, stands up and says : 
 
 Ah ! it is Henri ; this night I shall leave the Para- 
 clete. 
 
 At the entrance of the vaults he is met by the agent of po- 
 lice, who with changed countenance says to him : 
 
 Doctor, Doctor, they are lost ! 
 
 Who, Henri? 
 
 The two young people have been thrown into the river ; 
 the captain has been met bound by those who were coming up 
 early this morning by the steamboat, and the murderers were 
 the worthy boatman's two companions. 
 
 Henri ! Henri ! do you really know this that you are 
 saying ? Is it certain ? Is it positive ?
 
 THE R UINS OF THE PARA CLETE. \ 77 
 
 So positive that the barge has been towed up, and is 
 now at the pier of Nogent. The crime was committed at mid- 
 night, between Montereau and Melun. 
 
 Oh God ! oh God ! even to the loss of my children of 
 adoption ! Thy will be done on earth, even as it is done in 
 heaven ! 
 
 And more, Doctor, the fire in the night has given rise to 
 calumny, curiosity, and great suspicion against you, and I 
 doubt not that before noon, the authorities will present them- 
 selves at these ruins. 
 
 That is unimportant ; as far as concerns myself, I fear 
 nothing ; but my children, Henri, my children ! And their bo- 
 dies, and their bodies \ 
 
 Nothing is said to give any hope that they have been 
 found. 
 
 Oh God ! this only was wanting to the poor Schmidt ! 
 Henri, this night you will come here, and will find close to the 
 entrance of the monastery a box for you. 
 
 And where are you going, Doctor ? 
 
 I don't know whether I go or remain ; but in any case 
 you will find it. The bodies of my children ! . . . . The bo- 
 dies of my children !
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 WHO that knew him would have said that the sage Schmidt 
 would one day be wandering around the ruins where he had 
 thought to be at last happy, and that he would fall a victim 
 to moral death ? But such is the great drama of the world ; its 
 protagonist personages change, but the antagonist are always 
 the same : World, Devil and Flesh ; or, Irreligion, Ignorance, 
 Want of education, Idleness, and Inconstancy. This drama, 
 represented during these sixty centuries, proves that the modern 
 school which generally makes vice triumphant and virtue suffer, 
 has not done so ill, considering what happens in fact. Since 
 the tragedy of Abel, vice remains living and virtue dead ; and 
 if perchance men celebrate the latter, sing hymns to it, praise it, 
 it is after having said over it the prayers for the departed. At 
 the hour of death there will not be wanting to Schmidt some 
 panegyrist, as among the Egyptians in the time of their Pha- 
 raohs ; but while he lives they manage to do him all the evil 
 possible, perhaps with the intention of judging his ashes im- 
 partially, and celebrating his death as liberation from a mon- 
 ster, who could with a breath poison the earth. 
 
 It is night, and in a little boat there is a man crossing the 
 river, who, with two little linen bags at his feet, looks towards 
 the ruins of the Paraclete, and sighs. He sets foot on shore, 
 puts the bags on his shoulders, and having remunerated the boat- 
 man, begins to walk. Before him runs a dog, who stops from 
 time to time, as though he asked his master which path to take: 
 but the man is so absorbed that he pays no attention to the
 
 THE R JJINS OF THE PARA CLETK \ 79 
 
 mute prayers of the animal, nor knows whither his steps are lead- 
 ing him. In the midst of his dejection it might be inferred that 
 these ways were as familiar to him as his own house, supposing 
 him to have one. He neither speaks nor groans nor sighs ; he 
 walks and walks without even feeling the weight of his burdens, 
 or taking note of the distance between him and the ruined mo- 
 nastery. Sometimes, impelled by instinct, he puts the bags on 
 the ground, sits upon them, and passes his hand over his broad 
 forehead as though a violent heat afflicted him, or some despe- 
 rate thought tormented him. The road he takes leads in a di- 
 rection contrary to that of Paris ; it is day. and he still walks ; 
 there is reigning in his system that force which is lent by despe- 
 ration, a force which knows no limits but those imposed by the 
 enervation of the body, which often falls prostrate on the ground 
 exhausted of material strength, and which does not correspond to 
 the abnormal state of the spirit. In the places through which 
 he passes he is taken for a beggar : such is his aspect. 
 
 He has walked for two days and nights ; it is summer, and 
 he feels neither the heat of the sun nor the keen air of the 
 night. On the third morning, during the hours of scorching 
 heat, he falls into a ditch beside the high road : the faithful 
 sheep-dog puts his nose near the nostrils of the swooned man, 
 pricks up his ears, wags his tail, sits up on his hind legs look- 
 ing round on all sides, his countenance puts on a sorrowful ex- 
 pression ; again he sniffs around his master, sits up again and 
 begins to utter cries as sad as though he were a rational being 
 who had just lost a son. The hour is unseasonable for people 
 passing that way ; it is nearly noon and the month of August, 
 and the dog continues howling in a lugubrious manner, which 
 frightens the people round about, because they superstitiously 
 believe it is a sign of some sinister occurrence. The dog ap- 
 proaches anew, puts his nose to the mouth of the man, raises 
 his head as if seeking something, sets off running, finds a brook, 
 slakes his thirst, returns dripping wet, shakes his woolly ears 
 sprinkling the half-dead man. smells him anew, some drops of
 
 1 80 
 
 water fall upon his countenance from the lower jaw of the ani- 
 mal, who sits up again howling forth his despairing complaint. 
 Down the road are heard the bells of one of those immense 
 harvest wagons which are used by the French in general, and 
 particularly in Champagne and Tranche Comte ; the sheep-dog 
 turns one ear back, puts his head on one side and redoubles his 
 howls. Shortly after the wagon appears to the left full of corn- 
 sheaves ; the dog continues his ill-omened cries, and the wagoner 
 runs up, curious to see the cause of the poor animal's distress. 
 On arriving at the ditch he sees Schmidt, who has been suddenly 
 attacked by a fit of epilepsy arising from extreme wcakm ->s. 
 fatigue, and heat, these being united with a violent mental 
 suffering, and which have perhaps deprived him of existence. 
 The extraordinary noise which he makes, gnashing his teeth. 
 the convulsive movements and fearful contortions into which 
 he is thrown, the separation of the joints of the fingers, and 
 particularly of the thumb, which sticks fast to the palm ot the 
 hand, the froth which exudes from his mouth, the turn in his 
 eyes which are fixed on one side, certain fearful starts and the 
 incurvation of the extremities of his body, frighten the country- 
 man, who is, like all the ignorant, superstitious, and believes that 
 he has to do with a wizard, or an enchanter, or a man possess- 
 ed. The presence of the dog. which runs violently round the 
 wagoner and Schmidt, confirms the former in his idea, and now 
 he is filled with terror at seeing the distortions of Schmidt's 
 countenance and the fright of the horses who begin to run. But 
 what wonder that the rustic believes such follies, since the Gen- 
 tile nations believed this infirmity, from its symptoms, to be 
 the effect of the anger of the gods, and Christians, till within 
 a very few years, characterized it as the violence of evil spirits ? 
 Oh ignorance ! when wilt thou quit this world ? Sure enough 
 the villager attends to his horses rather than to his brother, and 
 making the sign of the cross, sets off running to catch the former. 
 and leaves Schmidt, like the poor man of the Gospel, whom the 
 Samaritan found in the middle of the road. Oh. what a religion
 
 777^ R UINS OF THE PA RA CLETE. \ 3 1 
 
 is that of the ignorant and superstitious ! Not in vain did 
 Christ set before us the example before mentioned, to show us 
 of what superstition is capable. Now, indeed, the dog begins 
 again to howl, seeing that his master is abandoned. Does not 
 the animal on this occasion better deserve the character of com- 
 passionate than the man ? 
 
 For some time Schmidt and his dog remain thus, till it 
 pleases Heaven to send this way a woman, young and lusty, who 
 is carrying on her arm a basket of mulberries. When she sees 
 what is passing she lays down the basket, fetches some water, 
 sprinkles the face of the epileptic, goes to get assistance, and 
 returns with two men just as the sick man is recovering the 
 use of his senses. 
 
 Woman is a hundred times more humane than man : travel, 
 suffer, be in pain, be unhappy, and you will find woman an an- 
 gel of consolation. Oh ! why do not men respect this which is. 
 even by instinct, the more virtuous half of the human race ? 
 
 Schmidt knows what is the matter with him from the effects 
 he experiences, and begs they will remove him to a place where 
 he can bleed himself. Another wagon which is coming along 
 the road, supplies them with the means of doing this. 
 
 Thirty-four leagues has the sage walked in two days and 
 some hours, and he is now near Ferte, a little village not far 
 from Chaumont, whose vicinity is solitary enough, in the midst 
 of the fertility of Champagne. In a poor house in the environs 
 of the village is his lodging. Two days afterwards he sets out 
 for Chaumont. 
 
 Schmidt enters this small but very beautiful city, and at 
 the expiration of some day or two receives, late in the evening, 
 the following note : 
 
 DOCTOR, 
 
 Notwithstanding the time that has transpired, it seems to me that you 
 must be the very individual who some years ago cured a relation of mine in 
 Paris ; and my eldest daughter having been given up by the physicians, I 
 have recourse to yon, whose science has done such wonders. If you will
 
 1 82 THE TWO FA THERS. 
 
 listen to the voice of a despairing father, have the goodness to come with 
 the bearer to this house, where you may wipe away the tears of a whole 
 family, 
 
 Your obed't servant, .Ii AN TARD. 
 
 The bearer of this note is a boy. The doctor asks him 
 some few questions, to which he replies by saying only : 
 
 I am a servant of the house. 
 
 And is the sick lady far from here ? 
 
 An hour's distance in the country. 
 
 Then it will be necessary to take a carriage. 
 
 I have come in one. 
 
 Then come, my son ; I am not following my profession 
 here, for I am only on a journey ; but it is my duty to do good 
 when the opportunity is offered me. 
 
 They descend the staircase of the poor inn where Schmidt 
 is lodged, and enter the carriage. It must be about ten o'clock 
 at night. To travel at that hour by the communal, or cross- 
 roads, in the province of Champagne, is not to be accomplished 
 without very considerable inconvenience, considering the neg- 
 lect in which these roads are left in all France, and particu- 
 larly in the district where that which we are narrating took 
 place. It is not unknown to us how much France has advanced 
 since the year '30. in means of communication. We know that 
 at that period, she numbered twenty-eight royal, and ninety- 
 seven or more departmental roads, of which number, particu- 
 larly in the west, there are many strategic roads of the first 
 class. We are not ignorant that she had ten railroads, though of 
 no great length ; but we also know that the French surface is wa- 
 tered by more than five thousand rivers, of which from one hun- 
 dred and ten to one hundred and twelve are navigable, many lakes, 
 although small, and seventy to eighty canals, of more than two 
 thousand miles in extent. It appears also that it was not with- 
 out reason that the Romans gave the province, which Schmidt 
 is at this moment traversing, the name of Campus* or Cham- 
 
 * Almost synonymous with the term prairie, as used in this country.
 
 THE R UINS OF THE PARA CLETE. \ gg 
 
 pagne, and its extensive plains, crossed and watered by the 
 Seine, the Marne, the Aube, the Aisne, and the Meuse, are at 
 some periods overflowed, and lakes, pools, and dangerous depo- 
 sits are thus formed. The irrigating canals, which are nume- 
 rous here, present another no less inconvenience for travelling 
 by night. This understood, we will return to the moment 
 when Schmidt entered the carriage. And yet once again we 
 allow ourselves to be carried away by the imagination, which 
 suggests to us how France, for the last two centuries, has been 
 the nation the most worthy of being studied. This France is 
 the centre of modern civilization, and the focus of barbarity. 
 Look at her last Revolution of 1793, and her establishments, 
 her academies, her assemblies of the learned, of politicians, of 
 artists, of litterateurs, of men profoundly versed in every branch 
 of science, in every art, of every imaginable attainment. This 
 France, in her tribunals, presents fearful causes and criminals ; 
 and among her victims, heroes and heroines. This France over- 
 flows with magnanimous sentiments, with sublime enthusiasm, 
 with veritable philanthropy, with longing for glory, with con- 
 sciousness of the Dignity of Man, with real religion, with thirst 
 for pleasures, with ambition for knowledge, with proverbial hos- 
 pitality, with exquisite delicacy, with refined manners, with un- 
 equalled taste, with a thousand virtues that cannot be appre- 
 ciated without living in its bosom ; but this same France wal- 
 lows in nauseating scenes, in miseries, in diabolic fury, in Ne- 
 ronic cruelties, in abjectness, in the lees of sensuality, in Sa- 
 tanic impiety, in inconceivable lubricity, in covetousncss. in 
 avarice, in gross ignorance, in a population of filthiest reptiles, 
 like that which is seen in the quarters of la cit6 in Paris, in 
 those of the Terrace behind the theatre at Marseilles, in those 
 of the River-banks at Bordeaux and other cities, enthusiasm, 
 inheritance of the French mind, becomes fury : and this san- 
 guinary people, which has seen more than sixteen hundred per- 
 sons decapitated in one day, which has watered its streets with 
 blood, which has hanged great men and heroes on the lamp 

 
 184 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 posts, which has given to the flames sumptuous edifices and en- 
 tire populations, which has cut the throats of thousands of Pro- 
 testants, which has set up a common prostitute in a temple to 
 be worshipped, which has decapitated the benevolent Louis 
 XVI., which has inflicted every kind of martyrdom on a Ma- 
 rie Antoinette a woman one of the most celebrated for her 
 gifts ever produced by Germany, which purged these faults by 
 the death of Robespierre, of Danton, and St. Just, which has 
 given life to a Marat, and conceded it also to a Charlotte Cor- 
 day ; this France, which rises in moments of rage and fury, 
 like a swollen ocean, to destroy the world, while in the very act 
 of submerging the plain under her tremendous wave, do but 
 call to her recollection her name, her exploits, her national 
 glory, her goodness, and the word of him who thus appeals to 
 her, has the magical effect of the Divine hand when it is 
 stretched over the raging element, and makes it in ripples of 
 
 crimpled lace, kiss the sandy beach Oh ! this 
 
 France is the very image of a man gifted with the most exqui- 
 site sensibility, with a most kind heart, with most susceptible 
 fibre, with most rare soul, with most gigantic imagination, with 
 most refined enthusiasm, and who is capable of all good and of 
 all evil. Oh ! this France is a Titanic plant, which in the 
 hours of intensest heat yields a grateful shade, and stupefies one 
 who ventures to enjoy the cool air of evening under its magni- 
 ficent branches. Oh ! this France is a delicious woman, that 
 intoxicates with love, and upsets the reason of the lover, mak- 
 ing him commit every kind of crime, to satisfy the caprices of 
 the beautiful coquette. Oh ! this France is a garden where are 
 to be seen twenty-four thousand plants, as in the tropical zone, 
 thousands of which are beneficent, and hundreds death-giving 
 to one who does not know how to use them at exactly the right 
 moment. Oh France ! incomparable from the remotest anti- 
 quity ? Not in vain dost thou take to thyself the name of free, 
 or franca, for in thy bosom grows the consecrated Tree of Li- 
 berty ; but before yielding richest fruits, it is bristling with 
 thorns, which draw much blood to water its wide-spreading feet
 
 THE RUINS OF THE PARACLETE. 185 
 
 and make its roots penetrate into the bowels of the earth, 
 whence will spring up all over the surface of the world, suckers 
 and mighty stems. Oh France ! country of heaven and of hell, 
 inconceivable mixture of good and of evil, paradise before the 
 fall of man, and land of malediction afterwards, why dost thou 
 not Cut down the Tree of Death, uproot it, cut it up, burn it, 
 and foster, cultivate, prune, and adorn the tree of life with reli- 
 gion, wisdom, education, industry, and constancy, that its fruits 
 may yield felicity to every French throat, and delight to the 
 stranger, like the fruit of a neighbor's garden ? If such atro- 
 cities are committed on thy delicious soil, it is because thou 
 dost not equally partition the waters of these five streams, and 
 dost permit them to water, even to overflowing, certain seeds, 
 certain vegetables, and leave others to remain sterile. Listen 
 not to mercenaries, listen to thy veritable sons, to the noble 
 republican Lamartine, who with his writings will assuredly 
 second thy noble instincts, and with the delectable flow of his 
 smooth and consolatory words, will make thy noble tenden- 
 cies fruitful. Read, all men, his " Tailleur de St. Point" and 
 you will feel your heart rise up with unequalled sensibility, 
 even to Divinity. Why, since thou art so lovely, commit such 
 horrors? Why does thy hatred invent such deeds of vengeance? 
 Why dost thou suffer thyself to be dragged along by unworthy 
 passions ? Will it be perchance because thou wouldst present 
 a picture in which lights and shadows meet to exhibit the bet- 
 ter the perfection of thy forms ? If it be so, remember, beau- 
 tiful land, that moral pictures admit light, but not shadows ; 
 soft pencillings, like those of Raphael, Murillo, Rivera, and the 
 ideal Italian school, but not dense masses of color, like the 
 Flemish school, or the pictures of Cano. 
 
 Art thou wandering again, imagination ? Wilt thou not 
 remain with Schmidt ? Oh ! now I remain beside him to see of 
 what the heart of man is capable when it has been exasperated. 
 
 The carriage has set out, it has been moving along for ten 
 minutes through the environs of Chaumont. Schmidt taking no
 
 186 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 notice of its progress, so absorbed is he in his thoughts, which 
 are wandering far away. The sage is thinking: 
 
 What chance is this? How can I have been recognized 
 after ten years? Who can be the person whom I aided in 
 Paris ? But how can I guess at any one among the thousands I 
 have known? Oh ! if I can console a father by my fallacious 
 science fallacious I call it. for what else is medicine ? but if 
 I can dry his tears. God will wipe away mine, which I also pour 
 out for children of my mind and heart. Hector is an ex- 
 cellent swimmer, she, my beloved Rosainunda, is not behind 
 him in any thing ; who will assure me that they have not saved 
 themselves ? The fact that no body has been found, proves it 
 to me ; but in these last few days my head has been so overturn- 
 ed, ... even now it is not serene. Will they not have been able 
 to escape the terrible death of suffocation in the water ? oh yes : 
 God will have protected them in that moment, and interlacing 
 their arms they will have been inspired by the bravery which 
 the desperation of that agony united to the first devouring im- 
 pulse would inevitably awaken. I imagine I see them falling 
 into the turbid current, the splash of the body of one is a sum- 
 mons to the other, drawn by the electric fluid of their love they 
 have met in the transparent obscurity of the water ; they have 
 embraced, they have stretched out their arms, like divers they 
 have walked along the bed of the river until they were beyond 
 the reach of their enemies. Yes, yes, they are saved. I feel it 
 here, here in the soul. I will read, as is my custom, all the 
 periodicals, and will find their names living as their memory 
 lives in my soul. 
 
 The carriage goes along without making any noise, which 
 silence recalls to consciousness him who is thus discoursing to 
 himself. He puts his head out of the window and sees that 
 the coach is going across the fields over a boggy ground. It is 
 a moonlight night, so that objects are represented to the sight 
 in a peculiar manner: it seems as though at each step they arc 
 going to bury themselves in a lake, or that they arc passing
 
 THE R U1SS OF THE PA RA GLETE. \ 87 
 
 along the bank of a river, which has been overflowed during the 
 day. and but recently confined again within its narrow bed, mak- 
 ing the wheels sink into the miry earth, which the river in re- 
 tiring has left behind in the adjacent fields. Every tree resem- 
 bles a misshapen man, every plant which waves in the breeze 
 seems like a woman fleeing through the forest from the compa- 
 nionship of men, every whisper is a moan, every murmur of 
 the waters an oh ! ... of pain. The noise of the town has given 
 place to the silence of the fields, interrupted only by the voices 
 of nature, which are instantly wrapped again in immobility 
 more monotonous. Schmidt moves to the other seat, puts his 
 head out of the little front window, and says to the boy who is 
 driving the carriage : 
 
 My good lad, we have been travelling an hour, when shall 
 we arrive at the house ? 
 
 In a few minutes, M. le Docteur. 
 
 And he cracks his whip and sets off at such a pace, that he 
 who is within replies : 
 
 Don't go so very fast, for the road does not seem good. 
 
 What ? 
 
 The road does not seem good. 
 
 I can't hear. Get on! . . . . get on ! . . . . 
 And he jerks the reins. 
 
 Take care, boy, take care ; don't you hear ? 
 
 The voice of Schmidt is carried away by the wind, and the 
 boy repeats : 
 
 I can't hear, sir. Get on ! Arr ! Chasseur ! arre ! 
 Tirailleur ! arrt, ! Hoo-o-o who-oy ! 
 
 The coachman makes the horses fly, and at last arrives at a 
 cross road which is steep. Now Schmidt raises his voice, see- 
 ing that he has checked his pace, and again repeats : 
 
 Boy, why do you drive so furiously ? 
 
 Beg your pardon, Doctor, for not answering you before ; 
 but I wanted to get home quickly, because I heard you ask me 
 how soon we should arrive.
 
 188 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 Certainly ; and when shall we do so ? 
 
 Do you see that light in front, to the left ? 
 
 Where ? 
 
 Here by the left window. 
 
 I see it 
 
 Then that's it ; we shall be there in five minutes. 
 
 The descent begins to be more gentle, and the coachman 
 hurries on again. If before he had run full gallop, now he flies ; 
 so that in a few instants they are on the very verge of a canal 
 of rapid current and great body of water, which is crossed by 
 a plank of some six or seven yards long The boy leaps to the 
 ground, opens the door, and says to the doctor : 
 
 Now, sir, you have to go along here, and the house in 
 front is the sick lady's. If you wish I'll lead the way. Can 
 you see pretty well 1 
 
 No, my good man, I do not see well enough to venture 
 to go across, for I am old and suffer from an infirmity which 
 might attack me in passing so dangerous a bridge. 
 
 Then you had better wait a bit, for they have heard us, I 
 dare say, and won't be long coming with a light. 
 
 In fact, he has no sooner spoken this than a man appears 
 carrying a lantern in his hand, who advances towards the bridge 
 to receive the doctor. 
 
 Do you see ? They are coming already. Now I will 
 stop here to arrange the harness of Chasseur, which is out of 
 order. 
 
 At this moment steps are heard besides those of the man 
 carrying the lantern, on this side of the canal, and a voice, 
 saying : 
 
 Good evening, gentlemen, are you waiting for Master 
 Peter ? 
 
 Good evening, Francois, you come just in time to help me 
 set to rights the horses' traces. The gentleman is the v doctor 
 who has come to ee the young lady. 
 
 The new-comer begins to make extravagant salutes after the 
 manner of the French peasants, and rejoins :
 
 THE R UINS OF THE PARA CLETE. 189 
 
 How is she to-night ? I heard the sound of the coach 
 while I was down home, and says to my wife, it must be the 
 doctor. 
 
 Master Peter and all the family, think she will die 
 
 At this moment the man with the lantern arrives at the 
 plank which serves for a bridge. 
 
 Julien, have you found the good doctor ? 
 
 Good evening, sir, I am here. 
 
 God will reward you. I trust your visit will take away 
 pains that I have for a long time suffered. Julien, pass on first 
 and give your hand to M. le Docteur. 
 
 Thanks, says the physician, seeing that the little cloud 
 of light emitted by the lantern is coming close up to him 
 thanks ; I see now sufficiently well to pass over alone. 
 
 And he begins to walk across the plank which, when he is 
 in the middle, bends a little, but it is broad and strong enough 
 not to inspire him with distrust. While he is crossing, Fran- 
 cois and Julien go over to the other sido of the road, doubtless 
 to arrange the harness, as the latter has said. Schmidt arrives 
 without obstacle to the otheT "side, though while in the centre 
 he felt a giddiness or fainting, which, in the infirmity from which 
 he has begun to suffer, might have been attended with fatal 
 results. 
 
 It will be well before they approach the house, which stands 
 at a little distance, to listen to the grandfather explaining the 
 sickness of his granddaughter and give some description of him, 
 although the light of the lantern is cast only on the ground, 
 and its broad round top hinders our seeing the countenance of 
 him who has it in his hand ; but from the little that can be 
 seen, any one would be well assured that his extraction had not 
 been that of a laborer, considering either his appearance, his 
 manners, or his language. He is old. as though of some sixty- 
 six years, clothed in the garb of the farmers of Champagne. 
 On joining Schmidt, and the latter directing to him the
 
 190 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 questions usual with physicians in dangerous cases before see- 
 ing the sufferer, he explains to him in polished and intelligent 
 language the infirmity which afflicts his granddaughter. They 
 arrive at the door of the farm-house, when Schmidt, after Inur- 
 ing the narration of the old man. stops on the threshold, inclines 
 his head, collects all his intellectual forces, and asks his intro- 
 ducer : 
 
 How old is the young wfiman ? 
 
 Twenty-three years and some months. 
 
 Do you know whether your granddaughter's affections are 
 fixed upon any one ? 
 
 I am sure not, for the poor little thing has suffered since 
 she was a year old, when through a wicked physician she lost 
 her mother. 
 
 And did she feel this so profoundly as to have retained 
 the impression so long a time ? It is uncommon. 
 
 I will tell you. Her mother did not die, she disappeared 
 from her husband's side to hide her shame : she was my daugh- 
 ter, but I cannot do less than speak thus. To crown the mis- 
 fortune, poor Regina, which is the name of my granddaughter, 
 discovered some three months since by chance, that her mother 
 is still living in the environs of Paris, in a deplorable state, and 
 as my son-in-law, who is an honest soldier, wishes not even to 
 hear the name of his wife, Regina, seeing herself separated from 
 her mother, has fallen into so profound a melancholy, that at 
 this critical period of life, it has overturned her constitution. 
 
 During this short explanation, the countenance of the sage, 
 which took an air of gloom mingled with dread, was made visi- 
 ble by the rays of light which were transiently cast upon it by 
 the lantern, which revolved in the hand of him who held it. 
 After a space of intense emotion, he pronounces the name of 
 Regina, and adds : 
 
 Will you have the goodness to tell me the name of her 
 mother and father, for I have, as it were, a recollection of some- 
 thing that is like this sad narration ?
 
 THE B TUNS OF THE PARA CLETE. \ 9 \ 
 
 The old man trembles, the lantern shows that, but nothing 
 more can be conjectured, and he replies : 
 
 My son-in-law is named Chicard. 
 
 The physician passes his hand down his stiff beard, and con- 
 tinues, as if he had been speaking : 
 
 Then have the goodness to introduce me to the apart- 
 ment of the sufferer. 
 
 Tard puts the lantern under a table, knocks at a door close 
 by, which is opened by a female advanced in years, who is 
 weeping, and they are both introduced to the bedside of Regina, 
 whose back is at this moment turned towards the new-comers. 
 The matron, with a profusion of compliments, explains many de- 
 tails to the physician, and her husband remains at the foot of 
 the bed. Till now Schmidt has observed only the sick woman, 
 whose breath is wheezing, without seeing her face ; but while 
 reflecting he gives a glance towards the panel of the opposite 
 wall, and sees the portrait in oil of a woman whom, at every 
 moment of his sufferings, as we have seen in the preceding 
 pages, he has remembered, though wrapped in a mystery which 
 till now we have not penetrated : but it is plain enough that 
 on seeing this portrait, he shudders, looks at the two weeping 
 parents, sees innocence and grief in their countenances, and a 
 tear escapes him, a cry of love issuing from his mouth, which 
 the bystanders interpret as we do, as love for humanity. 
 
 Will you have the goodness to turn Mademoiselle Regina 
 round this way ? 
 
 Regina, Regina, daughter of my heart says the discon- 
 solate, aged matron my daughter, turn round ; here is the 
 Doctor that your papa says, comes to cure you ; come, I will 
 help to turn you round this way. 
 
 What. Grandmamma, what? 
 
 Here is M. le Docteur, in whom your father places all his 
 hope of seeing you once more well. 
 
 And is her father here ? says Schmidt, with deep and 
 manifest emotion.
 
 1 92 THE TWO FA THERS. , 
 
 No, Sir, he lives in Chaumont. 
 
 The breast of the physician, without his perceiving it, di- 
 lates ; and at the same time, with the breath in his mouth, he 
 adds : 
 
 Well ! let us try and console this little angel ; fear no- 
 thing ; if science has any resources, we will give them all to 
 her, and after examining her, I believe I shall give you much 
 consolation. 
 
 In this interim the young woman has turned. She is the 
 portrait of the portrait which hangs upon the wall in front. 
 Schmidt gazes at her with devouring eyes. It seems as if he 
 were going to mesmerize her, or to give her his soul, with those 
 looks. He bends down, applies his ear to the chest of the 
 patient, touches her fleshless bosom, feels her pulse, weeps, and 
 
 Her paleness, her symptoms, all manifest that every 
 part of the animal economy has been affected by the burden 
 imposed upon it at the moment when nature was about to de- 
 velope itself. My daughter, do you not feel heat, weight, and 
 pain in the loins 1 
 
 Yes, Sir. 
 
 Do you not observe a dilatation and hardness in the 
 breast ? 
 
 Yes, Sir. 
 
 Do you not suffer sometimes much Cephalia, at others, 
 Cephalalgia, and often Hemicranea, or, as you say in common 
 parlance, head-ache \ 
 
 Yes, Sir. 
 
 Have you not lost your appetite for some months ? Have 
 you not felt extreme lassitude, and a light but slow fever? 
 
 Yes. Sir, replies the old lady, and adds She is lusty 
 by nature, and what most alarms us is. that she has in her 
 ankles ulcerous wounds, which nothing will close up. 
 
 That is well, that will save her; for the consumption is 
 only in its first stage. Come, my friends, you need not alllict
 
 THE RUINS OF THE PARACLETE. 193 
 
 yourselves ; I am going to prescribe the method you must fol- 
 low with Mll'e Regina ; and if she has change of air and scene, 
 I can assure you she will recover her health in a couple of 
 months. 
 
 They are going to fetch him writing materials ; but he ga- 
 zes at the girl, turns his eyes to the portrait, takes her hand, 
 presses it, and drops upon it a tear, no longer master of him- 
 self, and tells the aged man he wishes to go into another room 
 to write his prescription. After consoling and encouraging 
 Regina, he goes out with his eyes fixed on the portrait, his 
 right hand upon his breast. 
 
 When he is seated he begins to write ; he remains a quar- 
 ter of an hour studying the method he ought to use with the 
 patient ; he finishes, stands up, and delivers the paper to Tard, 
 saying : 
 
 If you follow the course which I have just prescribed, be 
 sure of the life of your grandchild ; and as I am on a journey, I 
 shall perhaps be unable to come here again, but follow the pre- 
 scription exactly, and you run no risk. I should be glad to 
 remain beside Regina till I saw her cheerful and vivacious, 
 but . . . but it cannot be. 
 
 Oh, M. le Docteur, God bless you ; if my son-in-law were 
 here, he would be happy indeed to hear you speak thus. 
 
 Then mind you follow the prescription to the letter. 
 
 What passes in the soul of Schmidt every time the inno- 
 cent old man mentions his son-in-law, or his unhappy daughter, 
 it is impossible for us to decipher, but we know he suffers cru- 
 elly ; it is therefore that he again repeats : 
 
 Follow the prescription to the letter, and do not fear 
 and goes out at the door. Jean Tard takes the lantern, and 
 they go out in the direction of the Canal, the same way as they 
 came. On arriving at the plank, the old mun gives a few 
 calls, and a voice at some distance answers him : 
 
 All right. 
 
 Good night, Sir, and follow the prescription. 
 
 9
 
 194 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 Wait, Doctor, wait till the boy comes. 
 
 He is with the carriage, thank you. I see well enough 
 to be able to cross. 
 
 Julien, M. le Docteur is going to cross. 
 
 All right. 
 
 Good night, then, follow the prescription. 
 
 Good night, Doctor, try and see her, if possible once 
 more. 
 
 I will do all in my power. 
 
 Schmidt begins to walk, and the old man to cry out : 
 
 Julien, come, quick, what are you about ? . . . 
 
 The plank cracks, Schmidt totters, the plank comes in two ; 
 Schmidt falls into the canal. The voice of the old man, with 
 accent of despair, is raised above the splash at the fall of 
 Schmidt. Some efforts of the victim are heard, and a running 
 in different directions. 

 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 IT was eight days after the unhappy Schmidt had left the Pa- 
 raclete, when this which we have just related happened ; and 
 in this interval, various things have taken place in those ruins. 
 On the day following the departure of the sage, when all the 
 laborers of the vicinity were yet in alarm at the flames and 
 dense smoke of the previous night, it was known as well in No- 
 gent, as all around, that the Justice of Men was going to sur- 
 prise the sorcerer of the vaults of the ruined monastery. What- 
 ever silence the police wished to keep in the business, it was 
 not possible that their visit to the dreaded place, and the for- 
 midable man, could escape the public curiosity. After the 
 Sous-prefet had penetrated with all the apparatus with which 
 men surround their contemptible Justice into the cavernous 
 vaults, and found them deserted and charred by fire, seeing 
 ashes scattered over what had been the chemico-anatomical 
 saloon, the warrant for apprehension, on suspicion and flight, 
 was made out against the physician, Pierre Schmidt. If in 
 that moment there had been desired a hundred or a thousand 
 witnesses of fabulous atrocities on the part of the Sorcerer, not 
 only would the ignorant country people have deposed to any 
 number of such deeds, but the disciples of Abelard would also 
 have taken anew their mortal remains, and testified to the 
 turns and revolutions made upon the gallows by his innumera- 
 ble victims. Nothing of the kind, however, was necessary, in 
 order that the name of the delinquent might be proclaimed, 
 and the police be at his heels. But ah ! Schmidt has disap-
 
 1 96 THE T\\'0 FA THERS. 
 
 peared iii the impetuous canal, in which an old enemy of his 
 has sought to bury him, at least so runs the common voice in 
 the neighborhood of Chaumont, no particular reason, however, 
 being assigned for his misfortune. 
 
 Justice has no sooner abandoned the Paraclete, about three 
 o'clock in the afternoon, than all the inhabitants of the neigh- 
 borhood direct their steps thither in procession ; and although 
 they have seen the before-mentioned explorers issue forth un- 
 hurt, the first platoon which venture to poke their noses into 
 the mouth of the cavern, are not without their terrors, and 
 there are runnings, and cries, and faintings, and falls, and 
 frights, and I don't know, how many other catastrophes, because 
 the raven with the pilled head, poor animal, lost as it is with- 
 out its master's companionship, flies round and round the ruins 
 croaking. Among the crowd of people who have come toge- 
 ther, are found the two laborers whom we saw at the begin- 
 ning, crossing themselves at the sight of the raven ; and the 
 more astute of them, on this occasion gathers round him a 
 crowd of curious folks, speaking in this fashion, in a loud tone, 
 as though to give himself importance. 
 
 Eh ! Julien, eh ! I told you a while ago ! see if I've been 
 mistaken the least bit in the world : the raven's the soul o' the 
 sorcerer, and so as they don't catch him they'll see many catty- 
 strofies. 
 
 Then come, let's kill him says a voice in the crowd. 
 
 Come on ! repeat a hundred. 
 
 No one came there to shoot, and yet by magic a gun finds 
 its way to their hands. The most dexterous applies the stock 
 to his shoulder, shuts his left eye and points to the raven. Poor 
 ingrate ! that didst not return to the ark of Noah, why now 
 dost thou give the lie to thy proverbial inconstancy and stn-U-li 
 out thy neck to see if thou canst meet th}- master ? Fly ! Fly ! 
 Let not thy wings hang down ! Disappear ! Hover over the 
 vaults !
 
 THE RUINS OF THE PARAVLKTK. 197 
 
 Paf! .... 
 
 taf ! .... repeats the echo ; but not till 
 after the miserable messenger of Schmidt has, with fluttering 
 wings, rolled down the mouldering walls. 
 
 A cry as of the roaring of the waves dashing themselves on 
 the rocks of the solitary Syrtes arises from the mouth of that 
 ignorant rabble, and some daring ones begin to run in the direc- 
 tion of the spot where the poor raven has fallen ; a hundred fol- 
 low these, and when they arrive at the spot it is yet struggling 
 in the last convulsions of death. With branches doubled to- 
 gether like tongs they take hold of him, and it causes them hor- 
 ror to observe the protuberances on the bare head of the raven, 
 who has never done any other mischief than out of gratitude 
 seek its master. Oh ! the ignorant populace is fearful when 
 blinded by superstition, whether in politics, in religion, or any 
 other human passion. The voice of a man, no matter whom, in 
 these popular gatherings, when the spirit is prepared, produces a 
 magical and always a diabolical effect. One voice arouses a 
 thousand cries, and the tumult goes on increasing like soap-lather 
 beaten by branches of thorny bramble. In all these popular re- 
 unions, which have caused some pages of History to be written 
 in blood, the beginning has been a voice uttered by nobody 
 knows whom ; but these voices a're like the thunderbolt which 
 destroys, kills, annihilates, overturns a city, no one being able to 
 tell whence it cometh. One of these cries has the power to 
 create a phalanx of brigands, one of* these cries awakens atro- 
 cious passions, and the earth itself sprouts up with arms to ena- 
 ble the people to imbrue their hands in innocent blood. Oh ! 
 as the raven dies so have died thousands of innocents, and like 
 it been dragged along the ground, quartered as they quarter it, 
 torn to atoms as it is. Men who command ! would you be able 
 to mollify the fury aroused by these mysterious voices in the 
 breast of the poor stupid people, and to control the commotion 
 nf their raging waves ? Then educate them, instruct them, make
 
 198 T1IE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 them know their Dignity, and then with a word you will control 
 them better than now by brutal force, you would run no risk, 
 you would no more exasperate them by attacking them with your 
 bayonets. The people in the popular street-fights are like the 
 sea, which they imitate in their fury, which is divided for a mo- 
 ment by the oars of the A'essel, to unite again, the vessel being 
 passed, with all the more impetus. To oppose material force 
 not by its like but by moral, ought to be the political maxim of 
 men in our age. The people have been provoked for many cen- 
 turies, they are accustomed to despotic treatment, they are very 
 ignorant, they have good impulses, they are not wanting in heart 
 nor in a certain criterium which makes them appreciate the just, 
 the good, the useful, the heroic, the grand ; they must be treated 
 with moderated mildness, with reserved frankness, with a self- 
 respectful kindness. To let yourself down like the demagogues, 
 even to ignominy, makes the masses proud, and they despise the 
 wretch as soon as they know him ; to be proud so far as to 
 claim to be superior to them irritates them. Oh if the people 
 were better educated and had a high idea of their Dignity as 
 rational beings, those insulated voices which are heard in the 
 popular reunions and cause such misfortunes, would be solitary 
 cries to which the air would echo back a universal shout of 
 " Human Dignity " 
 
 But come, whither does our pen carry us ? We are wander- 
 ing. No : for the excited country people, when they sec the 
 raven lifeless, suddenly enter the vaults, and by their cries, their 
 gestures, their menaces, show that if Schmidt were here he would 
 pay the tribute of his blood to this fanatic people. The sight 
 of the ashes yet hot, the carbonized bones, the half-consumed 
 skulls, ropes that they find, two stones enveloped in a net, some 
 blocks of wood which have plainly served to torture victims, 
 fearful anecdotes which run from mouth to mouth, atrocious con- 
 jectures which the ignorant form at pleasure with nauseating 
 colorings, all these united and much that escapes us in this tu- 
 mult, rouse them to anger, intoxicate them with fury, they long
 
 THE R UINS OF THE PARA OLETK \ 99 
 
 to find if it were only the skeleton of the wizard, to grind his 
 bones to powder. They search, they examine, they open sepul- 
 chres, they cry out, .... until another of those mysterious 
 voices says in a corner : 
 
 He escaped last night by the river. 
 
 A confused rumor is heard and presently they may be seen, 
 those besotted beings, defiling one by one, relating at pleasure 
 what they have seen, what they have heard, things that could 
 not even enter into the mind of an educated man. 
 
 Among the multitude who are retiring, for the night is fast 
 approaching, Henri, the agent of police, may be seen, and the 
 two countrymen of the first day of our History. 
 
 The chimneys of town and country are beginning to smoke, 
 the stars one by one are breaking out, now is heard the munch- 
 ing of the dilatory ox and now the little bells on the beasts of 
 labor, now go the fowls to roost upon their perches, from time 
 to time is heard the bark of the faithful dogs guardians of the 
 dwelling-places of men, when not only those who have been pro- 
 faning the abode of Schmidt, but those also who have remained 
 at home, are talking of the horrors of those vaults and of the 
 diabolical disposition of their master. This subject is about to 
 become the butt of universal curiosity, when the news arrives of 
 the misfortune of the two young people, and even then all the 
 weight of the crime falls upon the malefactor Schmidt. If we 
 wished to relate what was said by these clowns, and even by those 
 who were in their own estimation refined, we should never come 
 to an end : it is enough to say. that many of the laborers will not 
 sleep, believing, although they know nothing of the doctrine of 
 the metempsychosis, that the soul of the raven has passed into 
 the mosquitos, and that this night they will have the power to 
 inflict death or contaminate their beds with scandalous images. 
 
 The man who lives agitated by exterior things, now absorbed 
 in business, now wallowing in vice, now corroded by ambition, 
 in a word devoured by all those passions which are called into 
 play by intercourse with men, can care but little, according to
 
 200 THE TW O FATHERS. 
 
 our poor understanding, for that which is longed for by one who, 
 abstracting himself for the greater part of his life from exterior 
 things, soars with rapid flight into regions more spiritual. It is 
 true that the latter will often fall into the snares laid for him 
 by those who are more accustomed to the habits of the dwellers 
 in the heavy terrestrial atmosphere ; but what matter ? in com- 
 pensation he enjoys that which truly ennobles him, elevation of 
 soul. How many would be delighted with us to enjoy ubiquity ! 
 How beautiful must it not be to see men running about on their 
 ant-hill of a planet, and be able to dart our own glances into the 
 infinite orbs that roll over our heads, and to contemplate the 
 glorious multiform scene that from this height lies within the 
 vision ! Well ! God cannot do less than pity men as from his 
 throne he sees them in this world, and his infinite goodness 
 will pardon many things. We will have the hardihood to beg 
 of him that, if it be not contrary to his divine attributes, he- 
 would give us part of his prerogative : that of being in all 
 places, after we have passed into Eternity ; because the enjoy- 
 ment of this gift must, according to our limited understanding, 
 form part of the blessedness conceded to the soul of the mortal. 
 Oh ! if one could see the world at one glance, what varied ideas 
 one would form of it ! But since this is not possible, let us bow 
 our neck and see what is happening the night ushered in by the 
 afternoon of the poor Raven's death. 
 
 It is seven o'clock in the evening, between the lights, and a 
 woman, who does not seem a country girl nor yet absolutely a 
 city demoiselle, is ascending the river in the direction of Nogent. 
 She arrives at the town, and for three or four hours is wandering 
 round it apparently without any object ; and she must certainly 
 be tolerably familiar with the place, for she constantly comes 
 back to one particular spot on the southwest. 
 
 Through the thick material of her vail, strong emotion, de- 
 light, hope, and doubt, may be observed on her countenance. 
 She enters several shops, but does not buy any thing, and exec; t 
 what she cannot help saying on these occasions, she does not say
 
 THE K U1NS OF THE PARA CLETE. 20 1 
 
 any thing ; the mallet which has ten times repeated its blows on 
 the bronze of the Tower, which serves to indicate the march of 
 Time, is perhaps still hot, when, provided with a dark lantern, she 
 takes the road that leads to the ruins of the Paraclete. "Wrapped 
 in a large shawl, she hides at once her agitation and the scarce 
 light yielded, in spite of itself, by the lantern. What is she. a 
 weak woman, going to do in the terrible ruins ? Let us follow 
 her. Her respiration denotes that she is tired ; but she knows 
 so well the little paths which lead to the mouth of the cavern, 
 that we almost doubt whether it is fatigue, this thick breathing, 
 and the manifest undulation of her breast, which the shawl at 
 this moment does not conceal. Now she is in the entrance of 
 the ruined portico, she turns to the left, she loses herself among 
 the ruins, and now we do not see her ; but fortunately, the silvery 
 light of her little lantern has betrayed her, and between the ir- 
 regular shapeless walls we can discern her shadow, that some- 
 times expands, sometimes contracts, and breaks itself, so to 
 speak, in the ruins. Now she hides the light and we have lost 
 her. She whistles, whistles again, repeats several times a pro- 
 longed whistle ; she has taken out the little lantern, and we can 
 see her ; she glides down a sloping bank, formed by the crum- 
 bling masses, and is covered with ivy ; she plunges into the sub- 
 terranean caverns. Let us not leave her, for without light it 
 would be impossible to see what she is doing. What bravery ! 
 She fears nothing, she calls Schmidt, Jose. 
 
 Doctor, Doctor, here is Martha, come to bring you good 
 news, glorious and happy tidings. Doctor, Dr. Schmidt ! 
 
 She is answered by the echo of her own voice, and footsteps, 
 that repeat . . . . sat . . . . sat .... 
 Martha stops, reflects, exclaims : 
 
 Can he have died ? 
 
 This word in the mansions of the dead has a surprising effect 
 on the heart of Martha, daughter of the husbandman, dis- 
 honored by the noble, the grateful woman who comes with her
 
 202 THE TWO FATHERS. 
 
 heart in her mouth to give to her protector good news. The 
 young woman continues : 
 
 And Jose, also ? And the dog ? It cannot be. 
 Nevertheless, she trembles. But controlling her emotion, 
 
 she goes to the anatomical saloon. When near she perceives 
 the smell of smoke, discovers some signs of fire, leans down and 
 lights the ground. Close besides her she finds the wings of the 
 raven. 
 
 What do I see ? What do I see ? Has even the raven 
 fallen a victim to the fatal Destiny of the most generous and 
 compassionate man ever known ? 
 
 She continues her walk ; the door of the saloon is turned to 
 charcoal ; in this department nothing is to be seen but brands, 
 ashes, and heaps yet smoking ; some calcined bones make her 
 utter a cry of grief. Martha weeps, Martha reflects, Martha 
 thinks to have guessed what has happened, Martha believes 
 Schmidt has disappeared a victim to suicide, but sighing, she 
 continues her examination. She passes from one room to an- 
 other, finding only solitude, she calls and only silence answers, 
 she weeps, she is in despair, and returning to the entrance of 
 the caverns, picks up one of the raven's wings, kneels down, 
 prays to God for the soul of Schmidt, longs to have wings like 
 this which she has found, that she may fly to announce the 
 misfortune to others who will weep bitterly over it, and con- 
 cludes with this apostrophe : 
 
 Wise old man, restorer of my life, you have like myself 
 bowed down under misfortune, you have died through doing 
 good, and here is a feeble woman who pledges herself, for your 
 sake and her own, to avenge you on the wretch who makes so 
 many suffer. Oh ! Doctor ! if Martha, the poor Martha, had 
 been here you should not have died. Liberator of the poor, 
 my protector, my old father's generous benefactor, Martha loves 
 you, Martha would have rejoiced in consoling you with all the 
 sacrifices you could have wished from her, if you would but only
 
 THE RUISS OF THE PARACLETE. 203 
 
 have preserved your days for the good of many ! And what 
 shall we do now ? 
 
 The answer is a copious flood of tears, which she concludes, 
 "saying between her sobs : 
 
 But HE shall not be long happy ! 
 
 Martha abandons the sad spot. 
 
 THE E1O).
 
 BY THE SAME AUTHOR. 
 
 LAS CUATRO POSTRIMERf AS DEL HOMBRE, 
 
 JEtaerb, 3ttrria, Mmia, ij (gloria, 
 
 FOR 
 
 ADADUS CALPE. 
 
 ESPA^OL. 
 
 PROSPECTO. 
 
 CUAXDO el hombre llega al uso de la razon, lo priruero, qne le en- 
 tristece los sentidos y el alma, es su fin. Desde entcnces sabe lo que 
 es el horror de la muerte, espera con miedo el juicio, se estremece al 
 pensar en el infierno, y ansia dudoso llegar a la gloria. Ese mismo 
 horror, ese miedo, ese estreineciiniento, y esa duda ansiosa esperiincnta 
 en el azaroso curso de su tida ; pero, aunque lo sabe, no piensa qne, 
 si horrible es la muerte del cuerpo, tremenda es la de su honor, de su 
 conciencia, de su vida pilblica y donustica; si formidable es el juicio 
 de sus acciones, palabras y pensamientos mas alia de este valle de 
 amargura, mas temible es el de sus semejantes, porque carecen de la 
 sabiduria, de la bondad, y de la justicia de Dios : si borrendo es el 
 lugar del castigo, insoportable es tambien el infierno de la sociedad en 
 que vivimos: si deliciosa, si indescribible, si infinita es la gloria para 
 el que obru segun la ley, dnlce y deleitable es la pequeiia gloria, que 
 puede formarse en este mundo con la religion, la sabiduria, el trabajo, 
 la educacion, y la constancia. 
 
 El objeto de esta obra, que esta dividida en cuatro vohlmenes, es 
 demostrar la verdad de lo que se acaba de decir. 
 
 Notiwa of tf)t flnss. 
 
 Cuttrrier des Etats-Unis 22 Juilkt, \%5Q. New- York. 
 
 LAS CUATRO POSTRIMEI.IAS DEL HOMBRE. Tel est le litre d'une serie de romans phi- 
 losophiques ecrits en espagnol, dont la publication vient de commencer a New-York. 1,'au- 
 teur, Mr. ADADUS CALPE, se propose dcvelopper, ecus cette forme interessante, quelques 
 verites de 1'ordre le plus eleve. I.a premiere livraison. que nous avons sous les yeux. 
 semble r6veler chez lui des qualile* de style et une grande originalite ; il ne sera toutefois 
 possible de juger du morile de I'mivr.ii/c qne lorsqii'il sera plus avanc6.
 
 Xoticrs of tf)t $rtsjs 
 
 Kew- York Courier <( Inquirer, \Mh January, 1851. 
 
 LAS CUATRO POSTRIMERIAS DEL IIOMBRG : MuERTB, JulCIO, INPIERNO Y GLORIA, JS 
 
 a Spanish romance, written in this city by Mr. ADADUS CALPE, and in course of publication 
 by W. G. STEWART. Its title signifies "The Four Last States of Man ! Death, Judgment, 
 Hell and Heaven," and the book is designed to illustrate the evils of ignorance and supersti- 
 tion. The spirit is philosophical, and the story, so far as yet developed, is ingenious and 
 interesting. 
 
 Journal of Commerce, \\th January, 1851. New-York. 
 
 This work is designed to illustrate the evils of ignorance and superstition. The interest 
 of this story increases as it becomes developed, and the appearance of future numbers will 
 be gladly welcomed by those who are familiar with the beautiful language in which it is 
 written. 
 
 Xeic-Yoi"k Daily Tribune, January 12, 1851. 
 
 LAS CUATRO POSTRIMERIAS DKL HOMBRE, (the Four Final Conditions of Man). By 
 ADADUS CALPE. New-York : WM. G. STEWART. 
 
 We have received the first and second numbers of this work a novel in the Spanish 
 language, by SeiTor ADADUS CALPE, a resident of this city. It will be published in four 
 parts, the whole forming a work of about 2500 pages. The style is fresh and graphic, and the 
 story, so far as we have perused it, is animated and interesting. To the large and growing 
 Spanish population of this city and country, it will be an attractive work, while to those 
 studying the language it may be read with profit. 
 
 The Era, January 12, 1851. 
 
 LITERARY. A Spanish gentleman, Seiior ADADUS CALPE, who has travelled and 
 reflected greally, has commenced the 'publication of a series of metaphysical romances, 
 under the title of " LAS CUATRO POSTRIMEIUAS DEL HOMBRE " (the Four Ends of Man), in 
 the Spanish language. The first and second parts contain a part of "MCERTE " (Death), 
 and thus far evince a highly imaginative and philosophic vein of thought; the incidents are 
 wrought out with ingenuity, and the entire work will develop a new and elevated view of 
 moral thoughts and human actions. 
 
 Pennsylvania Inquirer, Avgmt 5, 1850. Philadelphia. 
 
 A ROMANCE IN SPANISH. We have been favored with the first number of a new work, 
 wh'.ch has just been commenced in New- York. It is written and printed in Spanish. The 
 title, translated, is "THE FOUR LAST STATES OF MAN." TJje author is ADADUS CALPE, a 
 highly-gifted Spaniard, who has taken up his residence in this country. The spirit is at 
 once philosophical and imaginative ; the incidents exhibit great ingenuity, and the interest 
 excited is thus far intense. 
 
 Tliis work may be obtained of the Publishers of The Two Fathers, 
 Messrs. STRINGER fe TOWNSEXD. The first volume has already appeared in 
 12 Nos., price 25 cents each, or complete, bound in cloth, f3 50. 
 
 The SECOND PART of THE TWO FATIIEES is now in press. It 
 will form a volume similar to "The Ruins of the Paraclete,'' but 
 containing some 40 or 50 more pages, entitled HECTOR ALONE. 
 
 The THIRD PART, SCIENCE AND LOVE, will follow immediately 
 after the publication of the Second.
 
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