ple
robe, the other in episcopalian violet, threw a little color over the
gloomy show.

But the large hall with painted statues amazed Amedee. They were all
there, statues of all the saints in little chapels placed promiscuously
upon the shelves in rows.

No more hierarchy. The Evangelist had, for a neighbor a little Jesuit
saint--an upstart of yesterday. The unfortunate Fourier had at his side
the Virgin Mary. The Saviour of men elbowed St. Labre. They were of
plaster run into moulds, or roughly carved in wood, and were colored
with paint as glaring as the red and blue of a barber's pole, and
covered with vulgar gildings. Chins in the air, ecstatic eyes shining
with varnish, horribly ugly and all new, they were drawn up in line like
recruits at the roll-call, the mitred bishop, the martyr carrying his
palm, St. Agnes embracing her lamb, St. Roch with his dog and shells,
St. John the Baptist in his sheepskin, and, most ridiculous of all,
poor Vincent de Paul carrying three naked children in his arms, like a
midwife's advertisement.

This frightful exhibition, which was of the nature of the Tussaud Museum
or a masquerade, positively frightened Amedee. He had recently been to
his first communion, and was still burning with the mystical fever, but
so much ugliness offended his already fastidious taste and threw him
into his first doubt.

One day, about five o'clock, M. Violette and his son arrived at the "Bon
Marche des Paroisses," and found Uncle Isidore in the room where the
painted statues were kept, superintending--the packing of a St. Michel.
The last customer of the day was just leaving, the Bishop 'in partibus'
of Trebizonde, blessing M. Gaufre. The little apoplectic man, the giver
of holy water, left alone with his clerks, felt under restraint no
longer.

"Pay attention, you confounded idiot!" he cried to the young man just
ready to lay the archangel in the shavings. "You almost broke the
dragon's tail."

Then, noticing Amedee and M. Violette who had just entered:

"Ah! It is you, Violate! Good-day! Good-day, Amedee! You come at an
unlucky time. It is shipping-day with us. I am in a great hurry--Eh!
Monsieur Combier, by your leave, Monsieur Combier! Do not forget the
three dozen of the Apparition de la Salette in stucco for Grenoble, with
twenty-five per cent. reduction upon the bill. Are you working hard,
Amedee? What do you say? He was first and assisted at the feast of
St. Charlemagne! So much the bett