te him on his return amongst them. Agricola walked at
their head. Suddenly he saw a carriage with post-horses issuing from
the gateway of the house. The postilion whipped up the horses, and
they started at full gallop. Was it chance or instinct? The nearer the
carriage approached the group of which he formed a part, the more did
Agricola's heart sink within him.

The impression became so vivid that it was soon changed into a terrible
apprehension; and at the moment when the vehicle, which had its blinds
down, was about to pass close by him, the smith, in obedience to a
resistless impulse, exclaimed, as he rushed to the horses' heads: "Help,
friends! stop them!"

"Postilion! ten louis if you ride over him!" cried from the carriage the
military voice of Father d'Aigrigny.

The cholera was still raging. The postilion had heard of the murder of
the poisoners. Already frightened at the sudden attack of Agricola,
he struck him a heavy blow on the head with the butt of his whip which
stretched him senseless on the ground. Then, spurring with all his
might, he urged his three horses into a triple gallop, and the carriage
rapidly disappeared, whilst Agricola's companions, who had neither
understood his actions nor the sense of his words, crowded around the
smith, and did their best to revive him.

CHAPTER XLIV. REMEMBRANCES.

Other events took place a few days after the fatal evening in which M.
Hardy, fascinated and misled by the deplorable, mystic jargon of Rodin,
had implored Father d'Aigrigny on his knees to remove him far from
Paris, into some deep solitude where he might devote himself to a life
of prayer and ascetic austerities. Marshal Simon, since his arrival
in Paris, had occupied, with his two daughters, a house in the Rue des
Trois-Freres. Before introducing the reader into this modest dwelling,
we are obliged to recall to his memory some preceding facts. The day of
the burning of Hardy 's factory, Marshal Simon had come to consult with
his father on a question of the highest importance, and to communicate
to him his painful apprehensions on the subject of the growing sadness
of his twin daughters, which he was unable to explain.

Marshal Simon held in religious reverence the memory of the Great
Emperor. His gratitude to the hero was boundless, his devotion blind,
his enthusiasm founded upon reason, his affection warm as the most
sincere and passionate friendship. But this was not all.

One day the empe