mes mistaken for Colomban and
received a sufficient amount of the treatment he deserves. The patriots
have knocked in my ribs and broken my back, and, sir, I was of opinion
that that was enough."

Scarcely had he finished this speech than a band of Pyrotists appeared,
and misled in their turn by that insidious resemblance, they believed
that the patriots were killing Colomban. They fell on Prince des
Boscenos and his companions with loaded canes and leather thongs, and
left them for dead. Then seizing Bazile they carried him in triumph, and
in spite of his protests, along the boulevards, amid cries of: "Hurrah
for Colomban! Hurrah for Pyrot!" At last the police, who had been sent
after them, attacked and defeated them and dragged them ignominiously to
the station, where Bazile, under the name of Colomban, was trampled on
by an innumerable quantity of thick, hob-nailed shoes.

VII. BIDAULT-COQUILLE AND MANIFLORE, THE SOCIALISTS

Whilst the wind of anger and hatred blew in Alca, Eugine
Bidault-Coquille, poorest and happiest of astronomers, installed in
an old steam-engine of the time of the Draconides, was observing the
heavens through a bad telescope, and photographing the paths of the
meteors upon some damaged photographic plates. His genius corrected the
errors of his instruments and his love of science triumphed over the
worthlessness of his apparatus. With an inextinguishable ardour he
observed aerolites, meteors, and fire-balls, and all the glowing ruins
and blazing sparks which pass through the terrestrial atmosphere with
prodigious speed, and as a reward for is studious vigils he received the
indifference of the public, the ingratitude of the State and the blame
of the learned societies. Engulfed in the celestial spaces he knew
not what occurred upon the surface of the earth. He never read the
newspapers, and when he walked through the town his mind was occupied
with the November asteroids, and more than once he found himself at the
bottom of a pond in one of the public parks or beneath the wheels of a
motor omnibus.

Elevated in stature as in thought he respected himself and others. This
was shown by his cold politeness as well as by a very thin black frock
coat and a tall hat which gave to his person an appearance at once
emaciated and sublime. He took his meals in a little restaurant from
which all customers less intellectual than himself had fled, and
thenceforth his napkin bound by its wooden ring r