All Chapters of Ninety-Three: Chapter 51 - Chapter 60

Just then René-Jean, satisfied with the result of his investigations of the woodlouse, raised his head and affirmed,—"It is a female."Georgette's laughter made René-Jean laugh, and Gros-Alain laughed because his brother did.Georgette having effected her object and joined her brothers, they sat round upon the floor as in a sort of diminutive chamber, but their friend the woodlouse had vanished.It had taken advantage of Georgette's laughter and hidden itself away in a crack.Other events followed the visit of the woodlouse.First some swallows flew by.Their nests were probably under the eaves. They flew quite close to the window, somewhat startled at the sight of the children, describing great circles in the air, and uttering their sweet spring note. This made the three children look up, and the woodlouse was forgotten.Georgette pointed her finger at the swallows, crying,—"Biddies!"René-Jean reprimanded her,—I "You mustn't say 'biddies,' missy; you must say 'birds.'"

Meanwhile René-Jean, jealous perhaps of the discoveries of his younger brother Gros-Alain, had conceived a grand project. For some time past, while he had been gathering the berries and pricking his fingers, his eyes had turned frequently towards the reading-desk, which, raised on a pivot, stood alone like a monument in the middle of the library. On this desk was displayed the famous volume of Saint Bartholomew.It was really a magnificent and remarkable quarto. It had been published at Cologne by Bloeuw, or Coesius, as he was called in Latin, the famous publisher of the Bible of 1682. It was printed, not on Dutch paper, but on that fine Arabian paper, so much admired by Édrisi, manufactured from silk and cotton, which always retains its whiteness; the binding was of gilded leather, and the clasps of silver; the fly-leaves were of that parchment which the Parisian parchment-sellers swore to buy at the hall Saint-Mathurin "and nowhere else." This volume was full of wood-cuts, engraving

Thus for the second time was Saint Bartholomew put to death,—he who had already suffered martyrdom in the year of our Lord 49.Meanwhile the evening was drawing on, and as the heat increased a certain drowsiness pervaded the atmosphere. Georgette's eyes were growing heavy; René-Jean went to his crib, pulled out the sack of straw that served him for a mattress, dragged it to the window, and stretching himself out upon it, said, "Let us go to bed."Gros-Alain leaned his head against René-Jean, Georgette laid hers on Gros-Alain, and thus the three culprits fell sound asleep.Warm breezes stole in at the open windows; the scent of wild-flowers borne upon the wind from the ravines and hills mingled with the breath of evening; Nature lay calm and sympathetic; radiance, peace, and love pervaded the world; the sunlight touched each object with a soft caress; and one felt in every pore of his being the harmony that springs from the profound tenderness of inanimate things. Infinity holds with

The mother had watched this dark object as it passed by, but she neither understood nor tried to understand it, absorbed as she was in the vision that pictured her children lost in the darkness.She too left the village soon after the procession which had just passed, and followed the same road at some distance behind the second squad of gendarmes. Suddenly the word "guillotine" came back to her, and she repeated it to herself; now, this untaught peasant woman, Michelle Fléchard, had no idea of its meaning, but her instinct warned her; she shuddered involuntarily, and it seemed dreadful to her to be walking behind it,—so she turned to the left, quitting the highway, and entered a wood, which was the Forest of Fougères.After roaming about for some time she spied a belfry and the roofs of houses,—evidently a village on the edge of the forest; and she went towards it, for she was hungry.It was one of those hamlets where the Republicans had established a military outpost.She went as

Meanwhile, on this very day, before dawn, amid the dim shadows of the forest, the following scene took place on the bit of road that leads from Javené to Lécousse.All the roads of the Bocage are shut in between high banks, and those enclosing the one that runs from Javené to Parigné by way of Lécousse are even higher than usual; indeed the road, winding as it does, might well be called a ravine. It leads from Vitré, and has had the honor of jolting Madame de Sévigné's carriage. Shut in as it is by hedges on the right and on the left, no better spot for an ambush could well be found.That morning, one hour before Michelle Fléchard, starting from a different part of the forest, had reached the first village, where she beheld the funereal apparition of the wagon escorted by the gendarmes, a crowd of unseen men, concealed by the branches, crouched in the thickets through which the road from Javené runs after it crosses the bridge over the Couesnon. They were, peasants dressed in coats o