fected her. Why, indeed, did not Eugene write to his
father? After keeping him so accurately informed of the progress of the
Bonapartist cause, he ought at least to have announced the triumph or
defeat of Prince Louis. Mere prudence would have counselled the
despatch of such information. If he remained silent, it must be that the
victorious Republic had sent him to join the pretender in the dungeons
of Vincennes. At this thought Felicite felt chilled to the marrow; her
son's silence destroyed her last hopes.

At that moment somebody brought up the "Gazette," which had only just
appeared.

"Ah!" said Pierre, with surprise. "Vuillet has issued his paper!"

Thereupon he tore off the wrapper, read the leading article, and
finished it looking as white as a sheet, and swaying on his chair.

"Here, read," he resumed, handing the paper to Felicite.

It was a magnificent article, attacking the insurgents with unheard of
violence. Never had so much stinging bitterness, so many falsehoods,
such bigoted abuse flowed from pen before. Vuillet commenced by
narrating the entry of the insurgents into Plassans. The description
was a perfect masterpiece. He spoke of "those bandits, those
villainous-looking countenances, that scum of the galleys," invading the
town, "intoxicated with brandy, lust, and pillage." Then he exhibited
them "parading their cynicism in the streets, terrifying the inhabitants
with their savage cries and seeking only violence and murder." Further
on, the scene at the town-hall and the arrest of the authorities became
a most horrible drama. "Then they seized the most respectable people by
the throat; and the mayor, the brave commander of the national
guard, the postmaster, that kindly functionary, were--even like the
Divinity--crowned with thorns by those wretches, who spat in their
faces." The passage devoted to Miette and her red pelisse was quite a
flight of imagination. Vuillet had seen ten, twenty girls steeped in
blood: "and who," he wrote, "did not behold among those monsters some
infamous creatures clothed in red, who must have bathed themselves in
the blood of the martyrs murdered by the brigands along the high roads?
They were brandishing banners, and openly receiving the vile caresses of
the entire horde." And Vuillet added, with Biblical magniloquence, "The
Republic ever marches on amidst debauchery and murder."

That, however, was only the first part of the article; the narrative
being ended, the e