ials and
specimens. The persons present were, for the most part, fellow _savants_,
with a few young men, and even a lady or two, and, of course, an
occasional journalist. The whole made up a kind of family gathering, the
visitors chatting with the master in all freedom.

Directly Bertheroy perceived Pierre he came forward, pressed his hand and
seated him on a chair beside Guillaume's son Francois, who had been one
of the first arrivals. The young man was completing his third year at the
Ecole Normale, close by, so he only had a few steps to take to call upon
his master Bertheroy, whom he regarded as one of the firmest minds of the
age. Pierre was delighted to meet his nephew, for he had been greatly
impressed in his favour on the occasion of his visit to Montmartre.
Francois, on his side, greeted his uncle with all the cordial
expansiveness of youth. He was, moreover, well pleased to obtain some
news of his father.

However, Bertheroy began. He spoke in a familiar and sober fashion, but
frequently employed some very happy expressions. At first he gave an
account of his own extensive labours and investigations with regard to
explosive substances, and related with a laugh that he sometimes
manipulated powders which would have blown up the entire district. But,
said he, in order to reassure his listeners, he was always extremely
prudent. At last he turned to the subject of that explosion in the Rue
Godot-de-Mauroy, which, for some days, had filled Paris with dismay. The
remnants of the bomb had been carefully examined by experts, and one
fragment had been brought to him, in order that he might give his opinion
on it. The bomb appeared to have been prepared in a very rudimentary
fashion; it had been charged with small pieces of iron, and fired by
means of a match, such as a child might have devised. The extraordinary
part of the affair was the formidable power of the central cartridge,
which, although it must have been a small one, had wrought as much havoc
as any thunderbolt. And the question was this: What incalculable power of
destruction might one not arrive at if the charge were increased ten,
twenty or a hundredfold. Embarrassment began, and divergencies of opinion
clouded the issue directly one tried to specify what explosive had been
employed. Of the three experts who had been consulted, one pronounced
himself in favour of dynamite pure and simple; but the two others,
although they did not agree together, believed