"'My child,' said he, 'I have come here not to bewail your sins but to partake of your affection.'
"But when the innkeeper left him alone with Mary he feigned no more, but raising his hat, he said weeping:
"'Mary, my child, do you not know me? Am I not that Abraham who has been a father to you?'
"He took her by the hand and all the night long he exhorted her to repentance and penance. Above all he was careful not to drive her to despair. He repeated incessantly 'My child, it is only God who is without sin.'
"Mary was naturally a sweet soul. She consented to go back to him. At daybreak they set out. She would have taken her robes and jewels. But the holy man made her understand that it would be more fitting to leave them. He mounted her on his horse and led her back to their cells, where they both took up their past life. Only this time the good man took care that Mary's room did not communicate with the outside world, and that there was no going out without passing through the room that he himself occupied. By which means and by the grace of God, he kept his ewe lamb. Such is the history of St. Abraham," said my good master, drinking his cup of wine.
"It is quite beautiful," said my father, "and the misfortunes of poor Mary have brought tears to my eyes."
III
MINISTERS OF STATE (concluded)
hat same day my good master and I were exceedingly surprised to meet at Monsieur Blaizot's at the sign of the Image de Sainte Catherine, a little thin, yellow man, who was no other than the celebrated pamphleteer, Jean Hibou.... We had every reason to believe that he was in the Bastille, where he usually was. And if we had no hesitation in recognising him it was because his face still showed traces of the darkness and mildew of the dungeon. He was turning over with a trembling hand, under the bookseller's anxious eye, some political writings newly come from Holland. Abbé Jérôme Coignard doffed his hat with a natural grace which would have been more effective if the hat had not been staved in the night before in a scuffle, that need not concern us, in the arbour at the Petit Bacchus.
Abbé Coignard having shown his pleasure at meeting so able a man again; Monsieur Jean Hibou replied, "It will not be for long. I am leaving this country where I am unable to live. I cannot breathe the corrupted air of this town any longer. In a month's time I shall be settled in Holland. It is cruel to have to put up with Fleury after Dubois, and I am too virtuous to be a Frenchman. We are governed on bad principles, by fools and rogues. I cannot endure it."