He went to the Governor.  That official scanned the odd figure with no slight interest.  Jean Poquelin was of short, broad frame, with a bronzed leonine face.  His brow was ample and deeply furrowed.  His eye, large and black, was bold and open like that of a war-horse, and his jaws shut together with the firmness of iron.  He was dressed in a suit of Attakapas cottonade, and his shirt unbuttoned and thrown back from the throat and bosom, sailor-wise, showed a herculean breast; hard and grizzled.  There was no fierceness or defiance in his look, no harsh ungentleness, no symptom of his unlawful life or violent temper; but rather a peaceful and peaceable fearlessness.  Across the whole face, not marked in one or another feature, but as it were laid softly upon the countenance like an almost imperceptible veil, was the imprint of some great grief.  A careless eye might easily overlook it, but, once seen, there it hung—­faint, but unmistakable.

The Governor bowed.

“Parlez-vous francais?” asked the figure.

“I would rather talk English, if you can do so,” said the Governor.

“My name, Jean Poquelin.”

“How can I serve you, Mr. Poquelin?”

“My ‘ouse is yond’; dans le marais la-bas.”

The Governor bowed.

“Dat marais billong to me.”

“Yes, sir.”

“To me; Jean Poquelin; I hown ’im meself.”

“Well, sir?”

“He don’t billong to you; I get him from me father.”

“That is perfectly true, Mr. Poquelin, as far as I am aware.”

“You want to make strit pass yond’?”

“I do not know, sir; it is quite probable; but the city will indemnify you for any loss you may suffer—­you will get paid, you understand.”

“Strit can’t pass dare.”

“You will have to see the municipal authorities about that, Mr. Poquelin.”

A bitter smile came upon the old man’s face: 

“Pardon, Monsieur, you is not le Gouverneur?”

“Yes.”

“Mais, yes.  You har le Gouverneur—­yes.  Veh-well.  I come to you.  I tell you, strit can’t pass at me ’ouse.”

“But you will have to see”—­

“I come to you.  You is le Gouverneur.  I know not the new laws.  I ham a Fr-r-rench-a-man!  Fr-rench-a-man have something aller au contraire—­he come at his Gouverneur.  I come at you.  If me not had been bought from me king like bossals in the hold time, ze king gof—­France would-a-show Monsieur le Gouverneur to take care his men to make strit in right places. Mais, I know; we billong to Monsieur le President.  I want you do somesin for me, eh?”

“What is it?” asked the patient Governor.

“I want you tell Monsieur le President,
strit—­can’t—­pass—­at—­me—­’ouse.”

“Have a chair, Mr. Poquelin;” but the old man did not stir.  The Governor took a quill and wrote a line to a city official, introducing Mr. Poquelin, and asking for him every possible courtesy.  He handed it to him, instructing him where to present it.