contrasts!  At the height of the stunning noise of these horrid deeds of tumult and devastation, a scene of imposing and mournful calm was taking place in the chamber of Marshal Simon’s father, the door of which was guarded by a few devoted men.  The old workman was stretched on his bed, with a bandage across his blood stained white hair.  His countenance was livid, his breathing oppressed, his look fixed and glazed.

Marshal Simon, standing at the head of the bed, bending over his father, watched in despairing anguish the least sign of consciousness on the part of the dying man, near whom was a physician, with his finger on the failing pulse.  Rose and Blanche, brought hither by Dagobert, were kneeling beside the bed, their hands clasped, and their eyes bathed in tears; a little further, half hidden in the shadows of the room, for the hours had passed quickly, and the night was at hand, stood Dagobert himself, with his arms crossed upon his breast, and his features painfully contracted.  A profound and solemn silence reigned in this chamber, only interrupted by the broken sobs of Rose and Blanche, or by Father Simon’s hard breathing.  The eyes of the marshal were dry, gloomy, and full of fire.  He only withdrew them from his father’s face, to interrogate the physician by a look.  There are strange coincidences in life.  That physician was Dr. Baleinier.  The asylum of the doctor being close to the barrier that was nearest to the factory, and his fame being widely spread in the neighborhood, they had run to fetch him on the first call for medical assistance.

Suddenly, Dr. Baleinier made a movement; the marshal, who had not taken his eyes off him, exclaimed:  “Is there any hope?”

“At least, my lord duke, the pulse revives a little.”

“He is saved!” said the marshal.

“Do not cherish false hopes, my lord duke,” answered the doctor, gravely:  “the pulse revives, owing to the powerful applications to the feet, but I know not what will be the issue of the crisis.”

“Father! father! do you hear me?” cried the marshal, seeing the old man slightly move his head, and feebly raise his eyelids.  He soon opened his eyes, and this time their intelligence had returned.

“Father! you live—­you know me!” cried the marshal, giddy with joy and hope.

“Pierre! are you there?” said the old man, in a weak voice.  “Your hand—­give—­it—­” and he made a feeble movement.

“Here, father!” cried the marshal, as he pressed the hands of the old man in his own.

Then, yielding to an impulse of delight, he bent over his father, covered his hands, face, and hair with kisses, and repeated:  “He lives! kind heaven, he lives! he is saved!”

At this instant, the noise of the struggle which had recommenced between the rabble, the Wolves, and the Devourers, reached the ears of the dying man.

“That noise! that noise!” said he:  “they are fighting.”