ite air, as if beatified and convinced! But this was not
all. Along with chastisements there were rewards.

Observant people remarked that the favorites of the religious clan of
Madame de Saint-Dizier rose to high distinction with singular rapidity.
The virtuous young men, such as were religiously attentive to tiresome
sermons, were married to rich orphans of the Sacred Heart Convents, who
were held in reserve for the purpose; poor young girls, who, learning
too late what it is to have a pious husband selected and imposed upon
them by a set of devotees, often expiated by very bitter tears the
deceitful favor of thus being admitted into a world of hypocrisy and
falsehood, in which they found themselves strangers without support,
crushed by it if they dared to complain of the marriages to which they
had been condemned.

In the parlor of Madame de Saint-Dizier were appointed prefects,
colonels, treasurers, deputies, academicians, bishops and peers of
the realm, from whom nothing more was required in return for the
all-powerful support bestowed upon them, but to wear a pious gloss,
sometimes publicly take the communion, swear furious war against
everything impious or revolutionary,--and above all, correspond
confidentially upon "different subjects of his choosing" with the Abbe
d'Aigrigny,--an amusement, moreover, which was very agreeable; for the
abbe was the most amiable man in the world, the most witty, and above
all, the most obliging. The following is an historical fact, which
requires the bitter and vengeful irony of Moliere or Pascal to do it
justice.

During the last year of the Restoration, there was one of the mighty
dignitaries of the court a firm and independent man, who did not
make profession (as the holy fathers call it), that is, who did
not communicate at the altar. The splendor amid which he moved was
calculated to give the weight of a very injurious example to his
indifference. The Abbe-Marquis d'Aigrigny was therefore despatched to
him; and he knowing the honorable and elevated character of the non
communicant, thought that if he could only bring him to profess by
any means (whatever the means might be) the effect would be what was
desired. Like a man of intellect, the abbe prized the dogma but cheaply
himself. He only spoke of the suitableness of the step, and of the
highly salutary example which the resolution to adopt it would afford to
the public.

"M. Abbe," replied the person sought to be infl