melody of
love by a yell, the thousand voices of hell joined in it. Earth blessed,
Heaven banned. The church was shaken to its ancient foundations.

_Te Deum laudamus_! cried the many voices.

"Go to the devil, brute beasts that you are! _Dios! Dios! Garajos
demonios!_ Idiots! What fools you are with your dotard God!" and a
torrent of imprecations poured forth like a stream of red-hot lava from
the mouth of Vesuvius.

"_Deus Sabaoth!... Sabaoth_!" cried the believers.

"You are insulting the majesty of Hell," shouted Don Juan, gnashing his
teeth. In another moment the living arm struggled out of the reliquary,
and was brandished over the assembly in mockery and despair.

"The saint is blessing us," cried the old women, children, lovers, and
the credulous among the crowd.

And note how often we are deceived in the homage we pay; the great man
scoffs at those who praise him, and pays compliments now and again to
those whom he laughs at in the depths of his heart.

Just as the Abbot, prostrate before the altar, was chanting "_Sancte
Johannes, ora pro noblis_!" he heard a voice exclaim sufficiently
distinctly: "_O coglione_!"

"What can be going on up there?" cried the Sub-prior, as he saw the
reliquary move.

"The saint is playing the devil," replied the Abbot.

Even as he spoke the living head tore itself away from the lifeless
body, and dropped upon the sallow cranium of the officiating priest.

"Remember Dona Elvira!" cried the thing, with its teeth set fast in the
Abbot's head.

The Abbot's horror-stricken shriek disturbed the ceremony; all the
ecclesiastics hurried up and crowded about their chief.

"Idiot, tell us now if there is a God!" the voice cried, as the Abbot,
bitten through the brain, drew his last breath.

PARIS, October 1830.

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