st refuge. The two roots of his life have
been torn up and broken, with the same blow, the same day, almost at the
same moment. What then remains for thee, poor sensitive plant, as thy
tender mother used to call thee? What remains to console thee for the
loss of this last love--this last friendship, so infamously crushed? Oh!
there remains for thee that one corner of the earth, created after
the image of thy mind that little colony, so peaceful and flourishing,
where, thanks to thee, labor brings with it joy and recompense. These
worthy artisans, whom thou hast made happy, good, and grateful, will
not fail thee. That also is a great and holy affection; let it be thy
shelter in the midst of this frightful wreck of all thy most sacred
convictions! The calm of that cheerful and pleasant retreat, the sight
of the unequalled happiness of thy dependents, will soothe thy poor,
suffering soul, which now seems to live only for suffering. Come! you
will soon reach the top of the hill, from which you can see afar, in the
plain below, that paradise of workmen, of which you are the presiding
divinity.

M. Hardy had reached the summit of the hill. At that moment the
conflagration, repressed for a short time, burst forth with redoubled
fury from the Common Dwelling-house, which it had now reached. A bright
streak, at first white, then red, then copper-colored, illuminated
the distant horizon. M. Hardy looked at it with a sort of incredulous,
almost idiotic stupor. Suddenly, an immense column of flame shot up in
the thick of a cloud of smoke, accompanied by a shower of sparks, and
streamed towards the sky, casting a bright reflection over all the
country, even to M. Hardy's feet. The violence of the north wind,
driving the flames in waves before it, soon brought to the ears of M.
Hardy the hurried clanging of the alarm-bell of the burning factory.

(35) We wish it to be understood, that the necessities of our story
alone have made the Wolves the assailants. While endeavoring to paint
the evils arising the abuse of the spirit of association, we do not wish
to ascribe a character of savage hostility to one sect rather than to
the other to the Wolves more than to the Devourers. The Wolves, a club
of united stone-cutters, are generally industrious, intelligent workmen,
whose situation is the more worthy of interest, as not only their
labors, conducted with mathematical precision, are of the rudest and
most wearisome kind, but they are lik