on and
epithet of worship. Adrian met them half way; they halted: "What," he said,
"do you seek? Do you require any thing of us that we refuse to give, and
that you are forced to acquire by arms and warfare?"

His questions were answered by a general cry, in which the words election,
sin, and red right arm of God, could alone be heard.

Adrian looked expressly at their leader, saying, "Can you not silence your
followers? Mine, you perceive, obey me."

The fellow answered by a scowl; and then, perhaps fearful that his people
should become auditors of the debate he expected to ensue, he commanded
them to fall back, and advanced by himself. "What, I again ask," said
Adrian, "do you require of us?"

"Repentance," replied the man, whose sinister brow gathered clouds as he
spoke. "Obedience to the will of the Most High, made manifest to these his
Elected People. Do we not all die through your sins, O generation of
unbelief, and have we not a right to demand of you repentance and
obedience?"

"And if we refuse them, what then?" his opponent inquired mildly.

"Beware," cried the man, "God hears you, and will smite your stony heart in
his wrath; his poisoned arrows fly, his dogs of death are unleashed! We
will not perish unrevenged--and mighty will our avenger be, when he
descends in visible majesty, and scatters destruction among you."

"My good fellow," said Adrian, with quiet scorn, "I wish that you were
ignorant only, and I think it would be no difficult task to prove to you,
that you speak of what you do not understand. On the present occasion
however, it is enough for me to know that you seek nothing of us; and,
heaven is our witness, we seek nothing of you. I should be sorry to
embitter by strife the few days that we any of us may have here to live;
when there," he pointed downwards, "we shall not be able to contend, while
here we need not. Go home, or stay; pray to your God in your own mode; your
friends may do the like. My orisons consist in peace and good will, in
resignation and hope. Farewell!"

He bowed slightly to the angry disputant who was about to reply; and,
turning his horse down Rue Saint Honore, called on his friends to follow
him. He rode slowly, to give time to all to join him at the Barrier, and
then issued his orders that those who yielded obedience to him, should
rendezvous at Versailles. In the meantime he remained within the walls of
Paris, until he had secured the safe retreat of all. In abou