hich compelled us
to do that. But to-day everything is changed. The man, to whom you
cannot deny genius, has seen his sycophants abandon and betray him; he
has seen that his strength lies in the people, and that those alliances
of which he had the weakness to be so proud, were the cause of his
ruin. He has come now to rid us of the others, and I am glad."

"Then you have no faith in yourself, eh? Have you any need of him?"
exclaimed Aunt Gredel. "If the processions annoyed you, and if you
were, as you say, 'the people,' why do you need him?"

Father Goulden smiled, and said, "If everybody had the courage to
follow his own conscience, and if so many persons who joined the
processions had not done so from vanity or to show their fine clothes,
and if others had not joined from interest, from the hope of getting a
good office, or to obtain permits, then Madame Gredel you would be
right, and we should not have needed Bonaparte to overturn all that,
and you would have seen that three-quarters of the people had
common-sense, and perhaps even the Comte d'Artois himself would have
cried, Hold! But as hypocrisy and interest hide and obscure everything
and make night out of the broad day, unhappily we must have
thunder-bolts to make us see clearly. It is you, and those who are
like you, who have caused those who have never changed their opinions,
to rejoice when fever takes the place of colic."

Father Goulden rose and walked up and down in great agitation, and as
Aunt Gredel was going on again, he took his cap and went out, saying:

"I have given you my opinions. Now talk to Joseph; he thinks you are
always right."

As soon as he had gone, Mother Gredel cried out:

"He is an old fool, and he has been, always! Now, as for you, if you
do not go to Switzerland, I warn you, you will be obliged to go, God
knows where. But we will talk about that another time, the principal
thing is to warn you. We will wait and see what happens; perhaps
Bonaparte will be arrested, but if he reaches Paris, we will go
somewhere else."

She embraced us and took her basket and went away. A few minutes
afterward, Father Goulden came in and we sat down to our work and said
no more about these things. We were very sober, and at night I was
more than ever surprised, when Catherine said:

"We will always listen to Mr. Goulden, he is right and will give us
good counsel."

On hearing that, I thought that she agreed with Father Goulden bec