“Here’s Pere Fario’s cart,” he answered.  “I nearly cracked my shins over it.  Let us get it up on the embankment of the tower in the first place, and we’ll make up our minds afterwards.”

When Richard Coeur-de-Lion built the tower of Issoudun he raised it, as we have said, on the ruins of the basilica, which itself stood above the Roman temple and the Celtic Dun.  These ruins, each of which represents a period of several centuries, form a mound big with the monuments of three distinct ages.  The tower is, therefore, the apex of a cone, from which the descent is equally steep on all sides, and which is only approached by a series of steps.  To give in a few words an idea of the height of this tower, we may compare it to the obelisk of Luxor on its pedestal.  The pedestal of the tower of Issoudun, which hid within its breast such archaeological treasures, was eighty feet high on the side towards the town.  In an hour the cart was taken off its wheels and hoisted, piece by piece, to the top of the embankment at the foot of the tower itself,—­a work that was somewhat like that of the soldiers who carried the artillery over the pass of the Grand Saint-Bernard.  The cart was then remounted on its wheels, and the Knights, by this time hungry and thirsty, returned to Mere Cognette’s, where they were soon seated round the table in the low room, laughing at the grimaces Fario would make when he came after his barrow in the morning.

The Knights, naturally, did not play such capers every night.  The genius of Sganarelle, Mascarille, and Scapin combined would not have sufficed to invent three hundred and sixty-five pieces of mischief a year.  In the first place, circumstances were not always propitious:  sometimes the moon shone clear, or the last prank had greatly irritated their betters; then one or another of their number refused to share in some proposed outrage because a relation was involved.  But if the scamps were not at Mere Cognette’s every night, they always met during the day, enjoying together the legitimate pleasures of hunting, or the autumn vintages and the winter skating.  Among this assemblage of twenty youths, all of them at war with the social somnolence of the place, there are some who were more closely allied than others to Max, and who made him their idol.  A character like his often fascinates other youths.  The two grandsons of Madame Hochon—­Francois Hochon and Baruch Borniche—­were his henchmen.  These young fellows, accepting the general opinion of the left-handed parentage of Lousteau, looked upon Max as their cousin.  Max, moreover, was liberal in lending them money for their pleasures, which their grandfather Hochon refused; he took them hunting, let them see life, and exercised a much greater influence over them than their own family.  They were both orphans, and were kept, although each had attained his majority, under the guardianship of Monsieur Hochon, for reasons which will be explained when Monsieur Hochon himself comes upon the scene.