Part 12 (1/2)
It was surprising to me how he carried on this game hour after hour, apparently without fatigue, and always to the delight of his audience, new-comers continually pressing around him, and old ones lingering in the distance with broad smiles on their faces. A little of it was well enough, but I thought that to be always at it must be harder work than the hardest handywork trade I knew. At last the day closed in, the people departed, we supplied ourselves with food, and departed like the rest.
”Now, then, have I not come off with flying colors?” said La Croissette, complacently.
”a.s.suredly you have: but you must be very tired.”
”Tired as can be--you know I had no sleep last night--we are coming to a little thicket where we will roost for the night.”
We had scarcely drawn up under the trees, which were thinning of leaves, when we heard a distant hollow sound gradually growing louder as it approached. ”The dragoons,” said La Croissette, in a low voice. ”I trust we shall escape their notice.”
They pa.s.sed by like a whirlwind, taking the direction we had just left, and we congratulated ourselves on having quitted their path.
”These wretches, look you,” said La Croissette, ”know neither mercy nor justice; they know they are let loose on the country to do all the mischief they can, and if they find a Paradise, they leave it a howling wilderness.”
Of this we had proof next day, when we came on their track, and found wretched women and children in tears and lamentations impossible for us to a.s.suage: men that had been cudgelled within an inch of their lives, or hung up by their wrists or their heels till they swooned, lying on the ground uncared for and dying. Ah, what wickedness! and all under pretence of doing G.o.d service! I cannot dwell on the terrible scenes we saw in crossing the country. Sometimes La Croissette did some trifling act of kindness, but the evils demanded more potent remedies.
”This unfits me for my calling,” said he, one day, as he scrambled into the cart and drove off. ”How can one play the merry-andrew under such circ.u.mstances? What will become of these poor creatures as winter comes on, even if they can last till then? It is impossible they should all escape from the country--they will have to conform after all, and had they not better do so now?”
I replied, ”It is written, 'Fear not, little flock; for it is the Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom.'”
”The kingdom of France?”
”No, the kingdom of heaven.”
”To whom were the words spoken?”
”To the early Christians, whose praise is in all the churches--whom the Catholics not only reverence but wors.h.i.+p.”
”Hum. Well, if they weathered such persecution as this, perhaps these may; but I could not stand it, I!--Do you know (with great awe) there are dungeons called Hippocrates' Sleeves, the walls of which slope like the inside of a funnel tapering to a point, so that those who are put inside them can neither lie, sit, nor stand? They are let down into them with cords, and drawn up every day to be whipped.”
”And have any come forth alive from such places?”
”I grant you; but sometimes without teeth or hair.”
”O, what glorious faith, to survive such a test!” exclaimed I.
”But some don't survive.”
”O, what hallelujahs their freed spirits must sing as they find themselves suddenly released and soaring upward with myriads of rejoicing angels, to receive their welcome at the throne of G.o.d!”
”Jean, I never knew anything like you!” said La Croissette. ”The worse the stories I tell you, the greater the triumph and exultation you cap them with.”
I answered, ”They overcame by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony; and they loved not their lives unto the death.” Rev.
xii. II.
”Do you think you could bear being put into a Hippocrates' Sleeve?”
”I am not called on to think what I could bear: only to bear what is put on me.”
”Your father, every word! As the old c.o.c.k crows, so does the young one.