ermin, which (with
wasps) were the only things he feared in heaven or earth.

But the faint stirring ceasing, he grew interested in watching Father
Anselmo and the novice bearing simultaneously on the keys, which turned
together quite suddenly. Then the Confessor touched a spring concealed
behind some drapery and the door opened.

A former visitor, Marshal Souchy, had obtained the same privilege by
tying the late Abbot up by the thumbs till he gave the order for the
treasury to be opened. In the despatches which he forwarded to his
imperial master this fact appeared in the following form: "After half an
hour's persuasion the Abbot of Montblanch decided to give up his
treasures to your officers, and to celebrate a solemn service in
thanksgiving for the arrival in Aragon of the delivering armies of his
Majesty the Emperor."

The paucity of treasures of silver and gold in the treasury of
Montblanch was, however, more than made up for by the extraordinary
number of relics of saints which the monastery possessed. It was at this
point that the novice, who appeared to act as a kind of showman in
ordinary to the vaults, took up his tale.

"Brother Atanasio, do your duty!" the Confessor had said with a solemn
voice, precisely as if he had been ordering the first turn of the great
wheel of the garotte.

And in words that fairly tumbled over each other with haste the
custodian began his enumeration.

"Here we have a bud from the rod of Aaron--also the body of Aaron
himself; the clasp of the robe of Elijah, the prophet, which Elisha did
not observe when he picked up the mantle--also the aforesaid Elijah and
Elisha; the stone on which the angel sat in the holy sepulchre; the
stone on which holy St. Peter stumbled when he let John outrun him; the
words he said on that occasion, which are not included in Holy Writ, but
were embroidered on a handkerchief by his mother-in-law, probably out of
spite; the stone on which the Sainted Virgin was sitting when the angel
saluted her, the stone on which she sat down to watch the crucifixion;
the stone from Mount Sinai upon which St. Joseph prayed going down to
Egypt; a stone from the house of St. Nicholas, and another from his
sepulchre----"

Athanasius the rosy had only proceeded so far with his enumeration when
a groan came as it were from the ground, and the Scot leaped violently
aside.

"Good God!" he cried, "there is some one suffering down here--through
that door, I think! Open