ions, these tempests of the social atmosphere
which drench the earth with blood, and crush an entire generation of
men, than in those upheavals of nature which deluge a harvest, or flay
the vineyards with hail--that is to say, the fruits of a single harvest,
wreaking an injury, which can at the worst be repaired the ensuing year;
unless the Lord be in His days of wrath.

Thus, in other days, be it forgetfulness, heedlessness or ignorance
perhaps--(blessed he who is ignorant! a fool he who is wise!)--in other
days in relating the story which I am going to tell you to-day I would,
without pausing at the place where the first scene of this book occurs,
have accorded it but a superficial mention, and traversing the Midi like
any other province, have named Avignon like any other city.

But to-day it is no longer the same; I am no longer tossed by the
flurries of spring, but by the storms of summer, the tempests of
autumn. To-day when I name Avignon, I evoke a spectre; and, like Antony
displaying Caesar's toga, say:

"Look! in this place ran Cassius' dagger through;
See what a rent the envious Casca made;
Through this the well-beloved Brutus stabbed--"

So, seeing the bloody shroud of the papal city, I say: "Behold the blood
of the Albigenses, and here the blood of the Cevennais; behold the blood
of the Republicans, and here the blood of the Royalists; behold the
blood of Lescuyer; behold the blood of Marechal Brune."

And I feel myself seized with a profound sadness, and I begin to write,
but at the first lines I perceive that, without suspecting it, the
historian's chisel has superseded the novelist's pen in my hand.

Well, let us be both. Reader, grant me these ten, fifteen, twenty pages
to the historian; the novelist shall have the rest.

Let us say, therefore, a few words about Avignon, the place where the
first scene of the new book which we are offering to the public, opens.
Perhaps, before reading what we have to say, it would be well to cast a
glance at what its native historian, Francois Nouguier, says of it.

"Avignon," he writes, "a town noble for its antiquity, pleasing in
its site, superb for its walls, smiling for the fertility of its soil,
charming for the gentleness of its inhabitants, magnificent for its
palace, beautiful in its broad streets, marvellous in the construction
of its bridge, rich because of its commerce, and known to all the
world."

May the shade of Francois Nouguier pardon us