nce has
invaded the presbytery, and this silence is especially dreadful near
the paralyzed wife, who is dying without speaking. Even her eyes do
not betray a single thought. Gradually, a terrible desire to know
why his daughter committed suicide seizes him. At twilight, softly,
in his bare feet, he goes up to the room of his dead daughter and
speaks to her. He entreats her to tell him the truth, to confess to
him why she was always so sad, why she has killed herself. Only the
silence answers him. Then he rushes to the cemetery, where his
daughter's tomb irresistibly attracts him; again he implores, begs,
threatens. For a moment he thinks that a vague answer arises from
the earth; he places his ear on the rough turf.

"Vera, tell me!" he repeats in a loud and steady voice.

"And now Father Ignatius feels with terror that something
sepulchrally cold is penetrating his ear and congealing his brain;
it is Vera, who is continually answering him with the same prolonged
silence. This silence becomes more and more sinister and restless,
and when Father Ignatius arises with an effort, his face is as livid
as death."

Crushed by the same blind destiny which annihilated the powerful
personality of Father Ignatius, the piteous and tearful hero of "The
Marseillaise" moves us even more than does the old priest. The poor
fellow cannot grasp the reason for the ferocity of stupid fate,
which unrelentingly preys upon him. Arrested by mistake as a
revolutionist and condemned to deportation, he becomes an object of
derision to his comrades. However, gradually, he finds the strength
to share the severe privations of his companions who have sacrificed
themselves to their ideal of justice and liberty. And, on his
death-bed, he is elated by all that he has endured; he dreams of
liberty, which, up to this time, had been indifferent to him, and
asks them to sing the Marseillaise over his grave.

"He died, and we sang the Marseillaise. Our young and powerful
voices thundered forth this majestic song of liberty, accompanied by
the noise of the ocean which carried on the crests of its waves
towards 'dear France,' pale terror and blood-red hope.

"It became our standard forever, the picture of this nonentity with
the hare's body and the man's heart.

"On your knees to the hero, friends and comrades!

"We sang. The guns, with their creaking locks, were pointed
menacingly at us; the steel points of the bayonets were pointed at
our hearts. Th