abstract：`Didthemanrunaway,Dolt,whenwestoppedforthedrag?'`Monseigneur,heprecipitatedhimselfoverthehill-side,h

`Did the man run away, Dolt, when we stopped for the drag?'

`Monseigneur, he precipitated himself over the hill-side, head first, as a person plunges into the river.'

The half-dozen who were peering at the chain were still among the wheels, like sheep; the wheels turned so suddenly that they were lucky to save their skins and bones; they had very little else to save, or they might not have been so fortunate.

The burst with which the carriage started out of the village and up the rise beyond, was soon checked by the steepness of the hill. Gradually, it subsided to a foot pace, swinging and lumbering upward among the many sweet scents of a summer night. The postilions, with a thousand gossamer gnats circling about them in lieu of the Furies, quietly mended the points to the lashes of their whips; the valet walked by the horses; the courier was audible, trotting on ahead into the dim distance.

At the steepest point of the hill there was a little burial ground, with a Cross and a new large figure of Our Saviour on it; it was a poor figure in wood, done by some inexperienced rustic carver, but he had studied the figure from the life--is own life, maybe--or it was dreadfully spare and thin.

To this distressful emblem of a great distress that had long been growing worse, and was not at its worst, a woman was kneeling. She turned her head as the carriage came up to her, rose quickly, and presented herself at the carriage-door.

`It is you, Monseigneur! Monseigneur, a petition.'

With an exclamation of impatience, but with his Un+changeable face, Monseigneur looked out.