1
XXIII. In Two Characters 318
XXIV. Armes! Armes! 335
XXV. Basterga at Argos 350
XXVI. The Dawn 365

CHAPTER I.

A STUDENT OF THEOLOGY.

They were about to shut the Porte St. Gervais, the north gate of Geneva.
The sergeant of the gate had given his men the word to close; but at the
last moment, shading his eyes from the low light of the sun, he happened
to look along the dusty road which led to the Pays de Gex, and he bade
the men wait. Afar off a traveller could be seen hurrying two donkeys
towards the gate, with now a blow on this side, and now on that, and now
a shrill cry. The sergeant knew him for Jehan Brosse, the bandy-legged
tailor of the passage off the Corraterie, a sound burgher and a good man
whom it were a shame to exclude. Jehan had gone out that morning to
fetch his grapes from Moeens; and the sergeant had pity on him.

He waited, therefore; and presently he was sorry that he had waited.
Behind Jehan, a long way behind him, appeared a second wayfarer; a young
man covered with dust who approached rapidly on long legs, a bundle
jumping and bumping at his shoulders as he ran. The favour of the gate
was not for such as he--a stranger; and the sergeant anxious to bar, yet
unwilling to shut out Jehan, watched his progress with disgust. As he
feared, too, it turned out. Young legs caught up old ones: the stranger
overtook Jehan, overtook the donkeys. A moment, and he passed under the
arch abreast of them, a broad smile of acknowledgment on his heated
face. He appeared to think that the gate had been kept open out of
kindness to him.

And to be grateful. The war with Savoy--Italian Savoy which, like an
octopus, wreathed clutching arms about the free city of Geneva--had come
to an end some months before. But a State so small that the frontier of
its inveterate enemy lies but two short leagues from its gates, has need
of watch and ward, and curfews and the like, so that he was fortunate
who found the gates of Geneva open after sunset in that year, 1602; and
the stranger seemed to know this.

As the great doors clanged together and two of the watch wound up the
creaking drawbridge, he turned to the sergeant, the smile still on his
face. "I feared that you would shut me out!" he panted, still holding
his sides. "I would not have given much for my chance of a bed a minute
ago."

The serge