"It has to make a new skin."
"True—it is putting on its third. Do you bother your head with such things?"
"Oh! a little in my spare time. Our neighbors of the Jura have sent the Republic General Pichegru, just the same."
"Yes."
"They can't have liked that very well over yonder. But here I am chattering and wasting your time. After all, though, if you are going to Seillon, you need not hurry."
"Why not?"
"Why, because there is no one there."
"No one?"
"The deuce, not unless it be the ghosts of the old monks, and they don't appear until midnight, so you will have to wait."
"Are you sure, my friend," persisted the traveller, "that there is no one at the abbey of Seillon?" And he emphasized the words.