The old woman now partially opened the door, to see whether I slept; and I closed my eyes, for the purpose of hearing all that was to be heard without interruption.  The speaker, whom I alternately took for the gendarme of the district, and the executioner, gave went to his swelling soul in the national style.

“What! leave me! leave Jean Jacques Louis Gilet in charge of this wretched aristocrat, while I should be marching with my battalion, and at its head too, if merit meets its reward, to sweep the foes of the Republic from the face of the earth.  No; I shall not remain in this paltry place, solicitor of a village, when I ought to be on the highest seat of justice—­or playing the part of arresting aristocrats, when I might be commandant of a brigade, marching over the bodies of the crowned tyrants of the earth to glory!”

As his harangue glowed, his pace quickened, and his voice grew more vehement; at length, probably impatient of the time which lay between him and the first offices of the Republic, he overpowered the resistance of the nurse, and rushed into the chamber.  Throwng himself into a theatrical attitude before a mirror—­for what Frenchman ever passes one without a glance of happy recognition?—­“Rise, aristocrat!” he cried, in the tone of Talma calling up the shade of Caesar.  “Rise, and account to the world for your crimes against the liberty of man!”

I looked with such surprise on this champion of the sons of Adam—­a little meagre creature, who seemed to be shaped on the model of one of his own pens, stripped, withered, and ink-dried—­that I actually burst into laughter.  His indignation rose, and, pulling out a pistol with one hand, and a roll of paper from his bosom with the other, he presented them together.  I perceived, as I lay on my pillow, that the pistol was without a lock, and thus was comforted; but the paper was of a more formidable description.  It was the famous decree of “Fraternization,” by which France pronounced the fall of her own monarchy, declared “that she would grant succour to every people who wished to recover their liberty,” and commanded her generals “to aid all such, and to defend all citizens who might be troubled in the cause of freedom.”

This paper indeed startled me; it was the consummation which I had dreaded so long.  I saw at once that France, in those wild words, had declared war against every throne in Europe, and that we were now beginning the era of struggle and suffering which Mordecai’s strong sense had predicted, and of which no human sagacity could foresee the end.  My countenance probably showed the impression which this European anathema had made upon me; for Monsieur Gilet became more heroic than ever, tore his grizzled curls, throwing aside his pistol, which he had at length discovered to be hors de combat, and drawing the falchion which clattered at his heels, and was nearly as long as himself, flourished it in quick march backward and