w voice, these
words only, "Phoebus! Phoebus!" In proportion as the work of the
demolishers seemed to advance, the mother mechanically retreated, and
pressed the young girl closer and closer to the wall. All at once, the
recluse beheld the stone (for she was standing guard and never took
her eyes from it), move, and she heard Tristan's voice encouraging the
workers. Then she aroused from the depression into which she had fallen
during the last few moments, cried out, and as she spoke, her voice
now rent the ear like a saw, then stammered as though all kind of
maledictions were pressing to her lips to burst forth at once.

"Ho! ho! ho! Why this is terrible! You are ruffians! Are you really
going to take my daughter? Oh! the cowards! Oh! the hangman lackeys!
the wretched, blackguard assassins! Help! help! fire! Will they take my
child from me like this? Who is it then who is called the good God?"

Then, addressing Tristan, foaming at the mouth, with wild eyes, all
bristling and on all fours like a female panther,--

"Draw near and take my daughter! Do not you understand that this woman
tells you that she is my daughter? Do you know what it is to have a
child? Eh! lynx, have you never lain with your female? have you never
had a cub? and if you have little ones, when they howl have you nothing
in your vitals that moves?"

"Throw down the stone," said Tristan; "it no longer holds."

The crowbars raised the heavy course. It was, as we have said, the
mother's last bulwark.

She threw herself upon it, she tried to hold it back; she scratched the
stone with her nails, but the massive block, set in movement by six men,
escaped her and glided gently to the ground along the iron levers.

The mother, perceiving an entrance effected, fell down in front of the
opening, barricading the breach with her body, beating the pavement with
her head, and shrieking with a voice rendered so hoarse by fatigue that
it was hardly audible,--

"Help! fire! fire!"

"Now take the wench," said Tristan, still impassive.

The mother gazed at the soldiers in such formidable fashion that they
were more inclined to retreat than to advance.

"Come, now," repeated the provost. "Here you, Rennet Cousin!"

No one took a step.

The provost swore,--

"_Tete de Christ_! my men of war! afraid of a woman!"

"Monseigneur," said Rennet, "do you call that a woman?"

"She has the mane of a lion," said another.

"Come!" repeated the provost, "the gap